ANNA CORA MOWATT. ANNA CORA OGDEN, a daughter of Mr. Samuel Gouverneur Ogden, now of the city of New York, was born in Bordeaux during a temporary residence of her parents in France. Her father's family has long been distinguished in the social and commercial history of New York, and her mother was descended from Francis Lewis, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. Mr. Ogden had lost the principal portion of a large fortune in Miranda's celebrated expedition into South America, and his residence at Bordeaux was occasioned by mercantile affairs which in a few years secured for him a second time rank among the great merchants and capitalists of his native city. A melancholy interest was thrown around Mr. Ogden's return, by the loss of two sons, who were swept overboard in a storm during the voyage; but the surviving members of the family settled in his old home, and for several years the education of the daughters occupied and rewarded his best attention. In the château in which they had lived near Bordeaux, they had passed the holy days and domestic anniversaries in masques and private theatricals, and there Anna Cora Ogden gave, in the abandon with which she enacted childish characters, the first indications of that histrionic genius for which she is now distinguished. At thirteen she read with delight the plays of Voltaire, and the next year she personated the heroine of Alzire on her mother's birthday. She had previously become acquainted with Mr. Mowatt, a young lawyer of good family and flattering prospects, who then became a suitor for her hand, and as her parents, to whom the marriage was not objectionable, demanded its postponement until she should be seventeen years of age, they eloped and were privately married by one of the French clergymen of the city. Mr. and Mrs. Mowatt resided several years near the city of New York, and in this period she wrote Pelayo, or the Cavern of Covadonga, a poetical romance, in six cantos, which was published anonymously by the Harpers in 1836. Mr. Mowatt's health having declined, they seized the occasion of the marriage of a younger daughter of Mr. Ogden to visit Europe. They resided in Germany and France a year and a half, and in Paris Mrs. Mowatt wrote Gulzare, the Persian Slave, a five act play, which was printed in New York soon after their return, in 1841. The interruption of his business caused by this visit to Europe, and the infirm condition of his health, induced Mr. Mowatt to abandon the profession of the law and to embark in trade, and in the period of commercial disasters which followed, he lost nearly all his property. Mr. Ogden had also suffered new misfortunes, and these reverses led Mrs. Mowatt to the first public display of her abil ities. The dramatic readings of Mr. Vandenhoff had been eminently successful in the chief cities of the Union, and, confident of her powers, she determined to follow his example. She had already acquired some reputation in literature, which secured for her a favorable reception on her first appearance, of which the results more than justified her sanguine anticipations. Her readings from the poets were repeated to large and applauding audiences in Boston, Providence, and New York. Mr. Mowatt having become a partner in a publishing house, she turned her attention again to literary composition, and produced in quick succession several volumes, among which were Sketches of Celebrated Persons, and the Fortune Hunter, a Novel. In 1844 she wrote Evelyn, or the Heart Unmasked, a Tale of Fashionable Life, which is the last and in some respects the best of her works of this description. It is spirited and witty, but unequal, and was written too hastily and carelessly to be justly regarded as the measure of her talents. Her next work was Fashion, a Comedy, which was successfully acted in the theatres of New York and Philadelphia in the spring of 1845; and in the following autumn she made her brilliant first appearance as an actress, at the Park Theatre. She afterward made two theatrical tours of the principal cities of the United States, and in the spring | of 1847 she brought out in New York her third five act play, Armand, or the Child of the People. In November of the same year she sailed with her husband for England, and she has since played in Manchester and London a wide range of characters, in many of which she has won high praises from the most judicious critics. and her dramatic pieces, are brief and fugitive, and generally wanting in that artistic finish of which she has frequently shown herself to be capable. All who know her personally, and those who are familiar with her history, will join in the exclamation of Mary Howitt, in a recent notice of her, "How excellent in character, how energetic, unselfish, devoted, is The poems of Mrs. Mowatt, except Pelayo this interesting woman!" THE RAISING OF JAIRUS' DAUGHTER. WITHIN the darkened chamber sat The grief-wrung tears were warm; Where lay a withering flower that wooed Within the mourner's grasp; Then low the mother bent her knee, My loved, my last, mine only one Tear her not yet away; Leave this crushed heart its best, sole joy: A radiance lit the maiden's face, As though she joyed her sinless soul And touched the dewy hair. "No warmth-no life-my child, my child! "She is not dead-she could not die- All else I can endure. Take hope, take peace, this blighted head Give back my child, O God!" The suppliant ceased; her tears were stayed; A hallowed peace crept o'er her soul; Of soft, celestial lustre fell- And slowly then her awe-struck face Her heart leaped high: those clouded orbs For oh! they rested on a shape Majestic yet so mild, Imperial dignity seemed blent With sweetness of a child. It spake not, but that saintlike smile Have breathed without a word- He turns, and on that beauteous clay His potent fingers pressed: Beneath that quickening hand; The pale lips, softly panting, move; She breathes at his command! The spirit in its kindred realm Has heard its Master's call; Resumes its earthly thrall. MY LIFE. My life is a fairy's gay dream, And thou art the genii, whose wand Tints all things around with the beam, The bloom of Titania's bright land. A wish to my lips never sprung, A hope in mine eyes never shone, But, ere it was breathed by my tongue, To grant it thy footsteps have flown. Thy joys, they have ever been mine, Thy sorrows, too often thine own; The sun that on me still would shine, O'er thee threw its shadows alone. Life's garland then let us divide, Its roses I'd fain see thee wear, For one-but I know thou wilt chideAh! leave me its thorns, love, to bear! LOVE. THOU Conqueror's conqueror, mighty Love! to thee A nation's worshipped idol owns thee lord; Can know the raptures of thy magic sway, TIME. NAY, rail not at Time, though a tyrant he be, The cold breath of Time soon to ashes will turn. THY WILL BE DONE. Tax will be done! O heavenly King, Its upward flight, great God, to thee! Though I must still on earth abide, To toil, and groan, and suffer here, To seek for peace on sorrow's tide, And meet the world's unfeeling jeer. When heaven seemed dawning on my view, And I rejoiced my race was run, Thy righteous hand the bliss withdrew; And still I say, "Thy will be done!" And though the world can never more A world of sunshine be to me, Though all my fairy dreams are o'er, And Care pursues where'er I flee; Though friends I loved-the dearest-best, Were scattered by the storm away, And scarce a hand I warmly pressed As fondly presses mine to-day: Yet must I live--must live for those Who mourn the shadow on my brow, The noble mission scarce begun, All Wise! All Just! "Thy will be done!" ON A LOCK OF MY MOTHER'S HAIR. Tress of mingled brown and gold! Round what brow, say, didst thou twine? Angel-mother, it was thine! Cold the brow that wore this braid, Pale the cheek this bright lock pressed, Dim the eyes it loved to shade, Still the ever-gentle breastAll that bosom's struggles past, When it held this ringlet last. In that happy home above, Where all perfect joy hath birth, Mother, as thou didst on earth. Still thy spirit can infuse Good in mine, unknown before. Still the voice, from childhood dear, Steals upon my raptured earChiding every wayward deed, Fondly praising every just, Whispering soft, when strength I need, "Loved one! place in God thy trust!" Oh, 'tis more than joy to feel Thou art watching o'er my weal! MARY NOEL MEIGS. THE father of Miss BLEECKER (now Mrs. MEIGS) was of the Bleecker family so long distinguished in the annals of New York, and among her paternal connexions were Mrs. Anne Eliza Bleecker and Mrs. Faugeres, whose poems have been commented upon in an earlier part of this volume. Her maternal grandfather was the late Major William Popham, the last survivor of the staff Rosy June; And I love the flashing ray Of the rivulets at play, As they sparkle into day, Most lovely do I call thee, For thy skies are bright and blue, And the heats of summer noon, Which the scythe must sweep so soon: With thy softest gales of balm, Till the pulse so low and weak Beateth stronger and more calm... Kind physician, thou dost lend To the suffering and the weary every blessing thou canst bring; of Washington. In 1834 Miss Bleecker was married to Mr. Pierre E. F. McDonald, who died at the end of ten years. In 1845 she published an octavo volume entitled Poems by M. N. M., and she has since written many poems and prose essays for the magazines, besides several volumes of stories for children, &c. In the autumn of 1848 she was married to Mr. Henry Meigs, of New York. And a thousand summer fancies with the melody have come; And he turneth from the page Of the prophet or the sage, And forgetteth all the wisdom of his books; And chimeth with the music of the brooks, In the flashing light of noon, One chord of thy sweet lyre, laughing June! And I sometimes long to fly To a world of love and light, Nor the day gives place to night; And we fondly clasp again All the loved ones gone before: Where, at dawning or at noon, Or the breeze with mournful tune Rosy June! But when thou art o'er the earth, With thy blue and tranquil skies, And thy many tones of mirth- And thy garlands wreathe the bough, From the darkness of the tomb, Brighter, fairer than thine own, lovely June! No night obscures the day, A glimpse thou art of heaven, Type of a purer clime Where the amaranth flowers are rife In immortal fragrance blowing. A transient gleam of regions that are all divinely fair; A foretaste of the bliss In a holier world than this, And a place beside the loved ones who are safely gathered there. THE SPELLS OF MEMORY. IT was but the note of a summer bird, And saw bright shapes in the floating clouds, Alas! I have waked from that early dream: And the woodland flowers, they are far away; And the fount of thought hath been deeply stirred By the passing note of a summer bird. It was but the rush of the autumn wind, As we caught the prize which a kindly breeze For the shaded dell, and the leafy halls To waken no more from that tranquil sleep. Then we laid the flower her hand had pressed To wither and die on her gentle breast; LOVE'S ASPIRATION. WHAT shall I ask for thee, Beloved, when at the silent eve or golden morn Of earth's poor votaries? pleasures that must fade I ask not this for thee...... For thee, fair child, for thee, In thy fresh, budding girlhood, shall my prayer Thy heart from purer things; but God's own hand Ever shall Love for thee Implore Heaven's best and holiest benison, Its perfect peace-that peace which can not be The gift of Earth; for this when upward borne My soul grows earnest, angel-lips of flame May echo thy sweet name. Ay, in their world of light Immortal voices catch a mother's prayer, And while I kneel, some waiting seraph bright, Swift on expanded wing, the boon may bear, And, soft as falling dewdrops, kindly shed Heaven's peace o'er thy young head. |