There, in thy lonely state, thou livest on
Through days, and years, and ages,—still the same Unshaken, undecaying :-not alone
A thing material haply, for within
Thy heart a secret spirit may now abide ;
The same that fills thy veins in spring with green, And hangs around thee long the summer thyme; And when the winds of Autumn moan away Solemn and sad, from thy supremest brow Poureth the white stream bright and beautiful.
The winds! are they thy music? (who shall say
Thou hearest not!)-Thy echoes, which restore
The rolling thunder fainting fast away,
From death to a second life seem now, methinks,
Not mere percussions of the common air,
But imitations high of mightier sense-
Of some communicable soul that speaks
From the most inward earth, abroad to men
And mountains, bird and beast, and air and Heaven.
London Magazine.
CALM is the tenor of my way,
Not hurried on with furious haste,
Nor raised aloft in proud display :
Pure too the tribute of my urn,
With constant flow, not idle waste,
Offering to him who sends the rain,
By serving man, the best return.
A course like mine thy trials o'er
Those living waters will attain,
Which he who drinks shall thirst no more.
BENEATH the chancel's hallowed stone,
Exposed to every rustic tread,
To few, save rustic mourners, known,
My brother, is thy lowly bed.
Few words, upon thy rough stone graven,
Thy name-thy birth-thy youth declare
Thy innocence-thy hopes of heaven,
In simplest phrase recorded there.
No 'scutcheons shine, no banners wave,
In mockery o'er my brother's grave!
The place is silent. Rarely sound
Is heard those ancient walls around,
Nor mirthful voice of friends that meet
Discoursing in the public street;
Nor hum of business dull and loud,
Nor murmur of the passing crowd,
Nor soldier's drum, nor trumpet's swell,
From neigbouring fort or citadel ;
No sound of human toil or strife
In death's lone dwelling speaks of life,
Or breaks the silence still and deep
Where thou, beneath thy burial stone,
Art laid in that unstartled sleep
The living eye hath never known.
The lonely sexton's footstep falls
In dismal echoes on the walls,
As, slowly pacing through the aisle,
He sweeps the unholy dust away,
And cobwebs, which must not defile
Those windows on the sabbath-day;
And, passing through the central nave,
Treads lightly on my brother's grave.
But when the sweet-toned sabbath-chime,
Pouring its music on the breeze,
Proclaims the well known holy time
Of prayer, and thanks, and bended knees;
When rustic crouds devoutly meet,
And lips and hearts to God are given,
And souls enjoy oblivion sweet
Of earthly ills, in thoughts of heaven;
What voice of calm and solemn tone
Is heard above thy burial stone?
What form in priestly meek array
Beside the altar kneels to pray?
What holy hands are lifted up
To bless the sacramental cup?
Full well I know that reverend form,
And if a voice could reach the dead,
Those tones would reach thee, though the worm,
My brother, makes thy heart his bed.
That sire, who thy existence gave,
Now stands beside thy lowly grave.
It is not long since thou wert wont
Within these sacred walls to kneel;
This altar, that baptismal font,
These stones which now thy dust conceal,
The sweet tones of the sabbath bell,
Were holiest objects to thy soul;
On these thy spirit loved to dwell,
Untainted by the world's controul.
My brother, those were happy days,
When thou and I were children yet!
How fondly memory still surveys
Those scenes, the heart can ne'er forget!
My soul was then, as thine is now,
Unstained by sin, unstung by pain;
Peace smiled on each unclouded brow-
Mine ne'er will be so calm again.
How blithely then we hailed the ray
Which ushered in the sabbath day!
How lightly then our footsteps trod
Yon pathway to the house of God!
For souls, in which no dark offence
Hath sullied childhood's innocence,
Best meet the pure and hallowed shrine
Which guiltier bosoms own divine.
I feel not now, as then I felt ;-
The sunshine of my heart is o'er;
The spirit now is changed which dwelt
Within me, in the days of yore.
But thou wert snatched, my brother, hence
In all thy guileless innocence;
One sabbath saw thee bend the knee,
In reverential piety,—
(For childish faults forgiveness crave)—
The next beamed brightly on thy grave.
The crowd, of which thou late wert one,
Now throng across thy burial stone;
Rude footsteps trample on the spot,
Where thou liest mouldering-not forgot;
And some few gentler bosoms weep,
In silence, o'er thy last long sleep.
I stood not by thy feverish bed,
I looked not on thy glazing eye,
Nor gently lulled thy aching head,
Nor viewed thy dying agony;
I felt not what my parents felt,—
The doubt the terror-the distress ;-
Nor vainly for my
brother knelt ;-
My soul was spared that wretchedness: One sentence told me, in a breath, My brother's illness and his death!
And days of mourning glided by,
And brought me back my gaiety;
For soon in childhood's wayward heart
Doth crushed affection cease to smart.
Again I joined the sportive crowd
Of boyish playmates, wild and loud;
I learnt to view with careless eye
My sable garb of misery;
No more I wept my brother's lot,
His image was almost forgot;
And every deeper shade of pain
Had vanished from my soul again.
The well known morn, I used to greet
With boyhood's joy, at length was beaming,
And thoughts of home and raptures sweet
In every eye but mine were gleaming;
But I, amidst that youthful band
Of bounding hearts and beaming eyes,
Nor smiled nor spoke at joy's command,
Nor felt those wonted extasies!
I loved my home, but trembled now
To view my father's altered brow;
I feared to meet my mother's eye,
And hear her voice of agony;
I feared to view my native spot,
Where he who loved it-now was not.
The pleasures of my home were fled ;-
My brother slumbered with the dead.
I drew near to my father's gate ;-
No smiling faces met me now.
I entered, all was desolate.
Grief sat upon my mother's brow ;-
I heard her, as she kissed me, sigh;
A tear stood in my father's eye;
My little brothers round me pressed,
In gay unthinking childhood blest.
Long, long, that hour has passed, but when Shall I forget its gloomy scene!
I sought my brother's burial place
That shrine, which when I last had viewed
In vigour by my side he stood.
I gazed around with fearful eye :—
All things reposed in sanctity.
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