THE DYING BOY.1 I KNEW a boy, whose infant feet had trod And when the eighth came round, and called him out And sought his chamber, to lie down and die! 'Twas night-he summoned his accustomed friends, "Mother! I'm dying now There is deep suffocation in my breast, "I feel the cold sweat stand; My lips grow dry and tremulous, and my breath "Here—lay it on my wrist, And place the other thus, beneath my head, "Never beside your knee Shall I kneel down again at night to pray, You taught to me! (1) The deep pathos of these lines cannot but recommend them to every heart capable of feeling. "Oh, at the time of prayer, When you look round and see a vacant seat, "Father! I'm going home! To the good home you speak of, that blest land I must be happy then, From pain and death you say I shall be free- "Brother!-the little spot I used to call my garden, where long hours "Plant there some box or pineSomething that lives in winter, and will be A verdant offering to my memory, And call it mine!" Sister! my young rose-tree That all the spring has been my pleasant care, Just putting forth its, leaves so green and fair, give to thee. "And when its roses bloom, I shall be gone away-my short life done! You "Now, mother! sing the tune sang last night-I'm weary and must sleep! Who was it called my name ?-Nay, do not weep, You'll all come soon!" Morning spread over earth her rosy wings- Anonymous. THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM. Can fix the sinner's wandering eye: Once on the raging seas I rode; The storm was loud, the night was dark; The wind that tossed my foundering bark; Death-struck, I ceased the tide to stem; It was the star of Bethlehem! It was my guide, my light, my all, For ever and for evermore The star-the star of Bethlehem! METRICAL FEET. TROCHEE trips from lōng to shōrt; From long to long, in solemn sort, Slow Spōndee stalks; strong foot! yet ill able Evěr to come up with Dactyl trĭsyllǎblě. Iambics march from shōrt to lōng; Kirke White. With ǎ leap and ǎ bound the swift Anăpæsts thrōng; Amphibrǎchy's hastes with a stately stride; First and last being lõng, middle shōrt, Amphĭmacer Strikes his thundering hoofs like ǎ proud high-bred racer. N Coleridge. THE HOMERIC HEXAMETER DESCRIBED AND FROM THE GERMAN OF SCHILLER. STRONGLY it bears us along in swelling and limitless billows, Nothing before and nothing behind but the sky and the ocean Coleridge. THE OVIDIAN ELEGIAC METRE DESCRIBED AND EXEMPLIFIED.2 FROM THE GERMAN OF SCHILLER. In the Hexameter rises the fountain's silvery column; ON A CATARACT.3 FROM THE GERMAN OF STOLBERG. UNPERISHING Youth!4 Thou leapest from forth The cell of thy hidden nativity; Never mortal saw The cradle of the strong one; Coleridge. (1) Though brief, these specimens of versification are of rare beauty, and finely exemplify the flexibility of our native tongue. The scheme is: ཆ | The original German is subjoined: "Schwindelnd trägt er dich fort auf rastlos strömenden Wogen; "Im Hexameter steigt des Springquells flüssige Säule ; Im Pentameter drauf fällt sie melodisch herab." (3) These lines-a transfusion rather than a translation of Stolberg's conceptions as a specimen of pure rhymth without rhyme, are perhaps unparalleled in the English language. They are musical, vigorous, and in every sense adapted to the subject; even, perhaps, in their occasional obscurity. (4) Unperishing youth-i. e. the torrent is boldly personified as a sort of infant Hercules. Never mortal heard The gathering of his voices; The deep murmured' charm of the son of the rock, It embosoms the roses of dawn, It entangles the shafts of the noon, And into the bed of its stillness The moonshine sinks down as in slumber, That the son of the rock, that the nursling of heaven, Coleridge. AGAINST CRUELTY TO ANIMALS. THE heart is hard in nature, and unfit Nor feels their happiness augment his own. Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm. (1) Deep murmured, &c.—the gurgling of the water on issuing from the spring. (2) Embosoms, &c.-i. e. the veil of mist catches the rosy tints of the morning, as well as the more direct beams of noon. (3) "Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy." Matt. v. 7. |