160

DEATH AND LIFE.

But thou, O Life! O Life! the searching test
Of the weak heart! to thee, to thee I bow:
And if the fire upon the altar shrine

Descend, and scathe each glowing hope of mine,
Still may my heart as now

Turn not from that dread test.

But let me pay my vows to thee, O Life!
And let me hope that from that glowing fire
There yet may be redeem'd a gold more pure
And bright, and eagle thoughts to mount and soar
Their flight the higher,

Released from earthly hope, or earthly fear.

This, this, O Life! be mine.

Let others strive thy glowing wreaths to bindLet others seek thy false and dazzling gleams, For me their light went out on early streams,

And faded were thy roses in my grasp,

No more, no more to bloom.

Yet as the stars, the holy stars of night,
Shine out when all is dark,

So would I, cheer'd by hopes more purely bright,
Tread still the thorny path whose close is light,

If, but at last, the toss'd and weary bark

Gains the sure haven of her final rest,

TO A WATERFOWL.

BY WILLIAM C. BRYANT.

WHITHER, 'midst falling dew,

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way!

Vainly the fowler's eye

Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along,

Seek'st thou the plashy brink

Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean side?

There is a power whose care

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,-
The desert and illimitable air,

Lone wandering, but not lost,

All day thy wings have fann'd,

At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere,
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome 'land,
Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end;

Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,

And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend,

Soon, o'er thy shelter'd nest.

(161)

162

THE BROTHERS.

Thou'rt gone, the abyss of heaven

Hath swallow'd up thy form; yet on my heart
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,
And shall not soon depart.

He who, from zone to zone,

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone,
Will lead my steps aright.

THE BROTHERS.

BY C. SPRAGUE.

WE ARE BUT Two-the others sleep
Through death's untroubled night;
We are but two-O, let us keep
The link that binds us bright.

Heart leaps to heart-the sacred flood
That warms us is the same;
That good old man-his honest blood
Alike we fondly claim.

We in one mother's arms were lock'd

Long be her love repaid;

In the same cradle we were rock'd,

Round the same hearth we play'd.

Our boyish sports were all the same,

Each little joy and woe;

Let manhood keep alive the flame,
Lit up so long ago.

WE ARE BUT TWO-be that the band

To hold us till we die

;

Shoulder to shoulder let us stand,

Till side by side we lie.

As die the embers on the hearth,

And o'er the floor the shadows fall, And creeps the chirping cricket forth,

And ticks the death-watch in the wall

I see a form in yonder chair,

That grows beneath the waning light—
There are the wan, sad features-there,
The pallid brow, and locks of white!

MY FATHER! when they laid thee down,
And heap'd the clay upon thy breast,
And left thee sleeping all alone

Upon thy narrow couch of rest-
I know not why, I could not weep—
The soothing drops refused to roll,
And oh! that grief is wild and deep,
Which settles tearless on the soul!

But when I saw thy vacant chair—
Thine idle hat upon the wall-
Thy book-the pencil'd passage where
Thine eye had rested last of all;
The tree, beneath whose friendly shade,
Thy trembling feet had wander'd forth-
The very prints those feet had made
When last they feebly trod the earth;

And thought, while countless ages fled,
Thy vacant seat would vacant stand-
Unworn thy hat, thy book unread,
Effaced thy footsteps from the sand-

And widow'd in this cheerless world,

The heart that gave its love to thee-
Torn, like a vine whose tendrils curl'd
More closely round the falling tree! —

Oh! Father, then, for her and thee,

Gush'd madly forth the scorching tears,
And oft, and long, and bitterly,

Those tears have gush'd in later years;
For as the world grows cold around,
And things take on their real hue,
"Tis sad to learn that love is found
Alone above the stars with you!

"ARE WE NOT EXILES HERE?"

BY HENRY T. TUCKERMAN.

ARE we not exiles here?

Come there not o'er us memories of a clime

More genial and more dear

Than this of time?

When deep vague wishes press

Upon the soul and prompt it to aspire,

A mystic loneliness,

And wild desire;

When our long-baffled zeal

Turns back in mockery on the weary heart,

Till, at the sad appeal,

Dismay'd we start;