Think not that my heart shall quail, Spirit droop, or courage fail. Where the boldest deed is done, Where the laurel-wreath is won, Where the standard eagles fly, There thy son shall proudly die; Though, perhaps, no voice may tell How the nameless conscript fell! Thy blessing, father.
Farewell, mother;
It is hard to part from thee, And my tears are flowing free. While around thee gloom and night Quench'd religion's blessed light, Still thou bad'st my lisping voice In the evening hymn rejoice; And my childhood's prayer was said, Ere thou bless'd my pillow'd head. Oh, before I leave thee now, Place thy hand upon my brow, And with every treasured word, That my infant ears have heard, Bless me, mother.
Farewell, brother ;- Many an hour of boyish glee, I have pass'd in joy with thee; If with careless act or tongue I have ever done thee wrong, Think upon thy brother's lot, And be all his faults forgot; Thou may'st dry our mother's tears, Soothe our sisters' anxious fears, Be their shield, their guide, their stay Throughout many a coming day; Freely with thy father share All his secret weight of care; Be what it were mine to be, Had I still remain'd with thee,
And love me, brother.
Farewell, sisters ;
Yonder is our favourite vine, You must now its tendrils twine, And when 'neath its leafy bower, You are met at evening hour, Think how oft in by-past days, There we waked the song of praise, Till your beaming eyes are wet With the tears of fond regret ; Then together fondly bend, And your gentle voices blend. Pray for me, sisters.
THE WOODS WANDERER.
DAY after day, I wander'd on alone— The stricken heart is fearless; and the woods, Amidst whose far-stretch'd depths a solemn moan Of winds was ever sounding, and whose floods, Pour'd 'midst unbroken solitudes, had ceased To waken mine to terror. I had learn'd,
E'en when no moon-beam the pale night clouds fleeced, To thread their trackless mazes, while I turn'd For guidance to the stars that high above me burn'd.
They who have never seen the broad blue sky, Save through the smoke-dimm'd air of crowded streets, Can never know how truly gloriously
It bendeth o'er the wilderness, and meets The tall brows of the mountains. It must be The veriest clod that wears a human form, Who round him those majestic forms could see, And o'er his head the eagle and the storm, Nor feel a nobler pulse within his bosom warm.
I had laid down to slumber-but there came A sound that night upon the fitful wind, That kept me waking. No electric flame
Flash'd o'er the heavens-yet my thoughts could find No sound more like to it, than the low growl
Of worn-out thunder; wrapt in thought I lay, With nature's glory telling to my soul
Of God's own presence, till the coming day O'er the fair orient stole, to light me on my way.
I stood, at sunrise, where Lake Erie's wave Caught on its foamy crest the rosy light; All round was solitude and silence, save The voice of nature's joy. Against the bright And pearly sky, a thin blue smoke-curl rose From the far shore, and floated on the air, And the slant sunbeam might to view disclose One distant piroque that its waters bare; All else was lone and wild, as it was lovely, there.
Still sent that deep sound forth its solemn tone, Louder and louder, as I onward fared, Northward where Niagara led me on,
O'er tangled brake, and green, and flower-strewn sward. At length I reached the spot-and such a sight!
Even now the wild blood rushes through my brain, And my heart reels with faintness, as the light Of memory restores that scene again, And paints it to my view as I beheld it then.
Broad, dark, and deep, the river hurried on, Pouring the volume of its mighty flood
Right to the yawning steep!—no pause-down-down The gather'd sea was hurl'd! half stunn'd I stood Upon the shaken earth, and almost wept With awe and fear and admiration, wild
And passionate;-like clouds on high were swept spray the shatter'd waves; while bending mild, Over the turbulent gulf, a gorgeous rainbow smiled.
The sun went down on that vast solitude,— And underneath the solemn stars, alone With God, and his stupendous works, I stood; Where, since their first creation, haply none Save the rude Indian, e'er had trod or gazed
On that magnificence! to earth I bent My humbled brow, yet with a soul upraised, And conscious of a nobler being, bent By the felt presence of the great Omnipotent.
in the old wilderness-The vine Is linked with thoughts of sunny Italy,
Or the fair hills of France, or the sweet vales Where flows the Guadalquivir. But this grew Where, as the sunlight look'd through lacing boughs, The shadows of the stern, tall, primal wood Fell round us, and across the silent flood,
That wash'd the deep ravine. The pauseless lapse Of ages had beheld no change in all
The aspect of that scene; or but such change, As Time himself had made; the slow decay Of the old patriarch oaks, and as they fell And moulder'd on the earth, the silent growth Of the young sturdy stem, that rear'd itself To stretch its branches in their former place. The wild flower stretch'd its tender petals out, Lending strange brightness to the forest gloom; The fleet deer toss'd his antlers to the breeze, Graceful and shy; and when the sun went down, The tangled thicket rustled to the tread
Of the gaunt wolf-just as in former years. But the red hunter was no longer there;
And the bright flowers were no more twined to deck The brow of Indian maid.
We stood beside A fallen oak; its aged limbs were spread Prone to the earth, uptorn by the rude wind, And perishing on the soil that once had fed Their giant strength: clinging around its roots And its decaying trunk, a grape-vine wreathed Its fresh green foliage, draping the still grave With its luxuriance--meet garniture
For such a sepulchre! a sepulchre most meet To wrap the bones of the old forest race! For we had checked our idle wanderings To gaze upon the relics of the dead— The dead of other ages! they who trod When that fallen tree was fresh in its green prime, The earth that it now cumber'd; they who once In savage freedom bounded through the wild, And quaff'd the limpid spring, or shot along The swift canoe upon yon rushing wave, Or yell'd the fierce and horrid war whoop round, Or gather'd to the council fire, or sprang With proud firm step to mingle in the dance, And vaunt of their own triumphs ;-there they lie, Brittle and time-blanch'd fragments! bones-dry bones! Prison'd for lingering years beneath the sod, And now that the strong wind hath torn away The bars of their dark cell, restored again To the clear sunshine. It seems strange to think That those wan relics once were clothed with life- Breathing and living flesh-and sprang away O'er the green hills at morning, and at eve, Return'd again to the low cabin home, And found its shadows happiness.
Gather some to thee-the keen eye can mark No difference from that spread widely round- The common earth we tread upon; yet this Once help'd to form the garment of a mind Once wrapp'd a human heart, and thrill'd with all The emotions of man's nature; love and hate, Sweet hope and stern revenge-ay, even faith In an undying world.
That faith, erring and dark as it might be, Was yet not wholly vain. We may not know Of what the dark grave hideth; but the soul, Immortal as eternity itself,
Is in the hands of One most merciful.
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