When starting through my timid heart, the thought that thou couldst die, Shot, even amidst a mother's bliss, a pang of agony. My boy! my boy! Oh cling not thus around me in thy grief, Thy mother's arm, thy mother's love, can yield thee no relief; The tiger's bloody jaw hath not a gripe more fierce and fell Than that which tears thee from my arms-thou who wert loved so well! How may I live bereft of thee? Thy smile was all that flung A ray of gladness 'midst the gloom, forever round me hung: How may a mother's heart endure to think upon thy fate, Thou doom'd to misery and chains!-so young and desolate! Farewell! farewell!-They tear thee hence!—and yet my heart beats on; How can it bear the weight of life, when thou art from me gone ? Mine own! mine own! Yet cruel hands have barter'd thee for gold, And torn thee, with a ruthless grasp, forever from my hold! REPENTANCE. OUR Father, God! behold us raise Our hopes, our thoughts, our hearts, to thee; But humbly bow the suppliant knee. For we have sinn'd before thy face, We knew that on his limbs were bound We knew-but in our selfish hearts, We weep the oppress'd one's galling chain. We weep, repenting of the pride That chill'd our narrow souls so long; Oh, Father! may that suppliant tide Efface our deep and cruel wrong. CHRISTMAS. MOTHER, when christmas comes once more, The taste of cakes and sugar-plums But I have learn'd, dear mother, That the poor and wretched slave And when he faints with weariness But when the holy angels' hymn, Peal'd sweetly on the shepherds' ear, They sung of glory to our God,- And is it for His glory, men Are made to toil, With weary limbs and breaking hearts, That they are taught not of his law, And that He hates the deed of sin, And is it peace and love to men, And sell them like the beasts that feed To tear their flesh with scourgings rude, The ties to which it fondliest clings, And 'tis because of all this sin, my mother, That I shun To taste the tempting sweets for which If men to men will be unjust, if slavery must be, Mother, the chain must not be worn; the scourge be plied for me. MY COTTAGE HOME. My cottage home! my cottage home! Amid its quiet loveliness, Beneath our bright blue skies. To me it is a lovely spot, For those I love are there. In summer there are wild flowers round, With its green and pleasant leaves; The shadowing of an oak's green boughs Is flung the low roof o'er; And clambering vines their blossoms hang And round the harvest's ripening wealth And the feathery tassels of the maize But were it thousand times more fair- Were better for my home, So never on its arid breeze The voice of wrong might come. But round my home, my cottage home, And o'er the field's luxuriant wealth In other scenes to know Of deeds of cruelty and wrong, And of the oppress'd ones' woe- I might, perchance, almost forget But woe for man's dark cruelty! For him the earth is drench'd with tears, THE CONSCRIPT'S FAREWELL. FAREWELL, father ; I had hoped that I should be But when years have mark'd thy brow, In the closing hours of life, |