THE LITTLE FLOCK.

"WE were not many" -we who stood
In childhood round our mother's knee-
A laughing, wild, and wayward brood
Of many a changeful mind and mood,

And hearts as light as hearts could be. "We were not many"-we who played,

When breathless came the scorching noon,
Out in the leafy, grassy shade,
The old and fragrant orchard made,

As lengthened shadows fell in June.
How sweetly smelled the upturned mould
Beneath the green and bending bough,
For there, when days were moist and cold,
The grass was sown ere spring was old-
I'd give the world to see it now!
"We were not many"-we who drew

At evening round the blazing hearth,
To read, how from the harebells blue
The tiny elves would drink the dew,

Ere fairy forms forsook the earth. "We were not many"-w -we who heard,

From lips we loved at eve and morn, The teachings of the holy word, When youthful hearts to prayer were stirred, And love of meek-eyed Faith was born. "We were not many"—death has spared A larger flock to mother's tears, And when his icy arm was bared, We scarcely thought that he had dared To touch the one so young in years. "We were not many"- -we who wept To see his star in swift decline: Five golden autumns he has sleptFive budding springs the moss has crept Around his couch beneath the pine. "We are not many"—when we stand

Where now he sleeps, at fall of dew; When loving May, with breezes bland, Has smoothed the turf with angel hand, And decked it round with violets blue. "We are not many"-we who press

With trembling lips Life's brimming cup: One craving draughts of happinessAnother, it may be, would bless

The wave that dashed death's waters up. "We are not many"-doubts and fears,

And faded hopes of earth's renown, And broken faith, and toil and tears, Have, in the winepress of our years, Been heaped, and crushed, and trodden down! "We were not many"-we who stood

In childhood round our mother's knee :
But one from out the laughing brood
Has borne unto his solitude

The dreams he dreampt in infancy.

MUSINGS.

How like a conqueror the king of day
Folds back the curtains of his orient couch,
Bestrides the fleecy clouds, and speeds his way
Through skies made brighter by his burning
touch;

For as a warrior from the tented field,

Victorious hastes his wearied limbs to rest,
So doth the sun his brazen sceptre yield,
And sink, fair night, upon thy gentle breast.

All hail, sad Vesper! on thy girdled throne
Thou sitst a queen. Oh, twilight watcher-star,
With gliding step thou comest forth alone,
Pale, dreamy dweller of the realms afar;
And when at eve's most holy, chastened hour,
I watch each lesser star within its shrine,
How do I miss the strange, mysterious power
That chains my spirit to thine orb divine.

Fair Vesper! when thy golden tresses gleam
Amid the banners of the sunset sky,
Thy spirit floats on every radiant beam

That gilds with beauty thy sweet home on high:
Then hath my soul its hour of deepest bliss,
And gentle thoughts like angels round me
throng,

Breathing of worlds (oh, how unlike to this!)
Where dwells eternal melody and song.

Star of the twilight! thou wert loved by one
Whose spirit late hath passed away from earth,
Who parted from us when the wailing tone
Of some lone winds hushed gentle summer's
mirth :

Yet, though we missed her at the eventide,
And eyes gazed sadly on the vacant chair,
Though from the hearth her music-tones have
died,

And gone glad laughter that resounded there

Still from her high and holy place above
None would recall her to this earthly sphere,
Or seek to win her from that home of love
To tread the paths of sin and sorrow here:
But clouds are gathering round fair Cynthia's
home,

And dark and heavy grows the sultry air,
While, one by one, the lights in yon vast dome
Fade and go out as Death were busy there.

And she, pale spirit of the midnight skies,

Whose tears of light were streaming o'er the

heath,

Now seems, unto my wakeful, watching eyes,

Like some lone weeper in the house of death! The storm hath burst-the lightning's angry eye Glanceth around me, and the hoarse winds tell The raging tempest's might and majesty. Bright thoughts have vanished-gentle star, farewell!

MRS. JULIA HOWE is a daughter of the late eminent banker Samuel Ward, and a sister of Samuel Ward, junior, one of our most accomplished scholars. In the spring of 1843 she was married to Dr. S. G. Howe, of Boston, so well known to his countrymen, and indeed to mankind, as one of the most active and wise of living philanthropists. Mrs. Howe was educated by the best masters, and her native intelligence rewarded a careful culture with fruits of grace and beauty which detain the admiration of society. One of her teachers was the much-lamented Schlesinger, of whom an elegant memoir was published by Mr. Ward, at the close of which he observes: "Returning to New York from a visit to Boston, on the morning of the twelfth of June, the writer of this memoir was overpowered by the sad intelligence of the demise of Mr. Schlesinger-whom he loved as a brother, and of whose danger he

had no suspicion. He gradually gathered from a pupil of the deceased, that he had died in the night of the eighth, and been buried, the Sunday after, in the Marble Cemetery, whither his mortal remains were followed by his friends and his Brothers of the 'Concordia,' who sang a requiem over his grave. When he asked her for further details, turning away to hide her tears, she handed him these lines." The pupil here referred to is Mrs. Howe, and the lines are the poem entitled The Burial of Schlesinger, which may be ranked among the finest productions of feminine genius.

Mrs. Julia Ward, the mother of Mrs. Howe, was a woman of taste and various acquirements, and her literary abilities are illustrated in many brilliant occasional poems, in English and French, of which some specimens are furnished in an earlier part of the present volume.

THE BURIAL OF SCHLESINGER.

SAD music breathes upon the air,

And steps come mournfully and slow; Heavy is the load we bear, Fellow-men our burthen share,

Death has laid our brother low.
Ye have heard our joyous strain,
Listen to our notes of wo!

Do ye not remember him
Whose finger, from the thrilling wire,

Now drew forth tears, now tones of fire?

Ah! that hand is cold for ever:

Gone is now life's fitful fever

We sing his requiem.

We are singing him to rest

He will rise a spirit blest.

Sing it softly, sing it slowly

Let each note our sorrow tell,

For it is our last farewell,

And his grave is lone and lowly.

We sorrow for thee, brother!

We grieve that thou must lie

Far from the spot where thy fathers sleep;

Thou camest o'er the briny deep

In a stranger land to die.

We bear thee gently, brother,
To thy last resting-place;

Soon shall the earth above thee close,
And the dark veil of night repose

For ever on thy face.

We placed the last flowers, brother,
Upon thy senseless brow;

We kissed that brow before 't was hid,
We wept upon thy coffin-lid,

But all unmoved wert thou.

We've smoothed the green turf, brother,

Above thy lowly head;

Earth in her breast receive thee:

Oh, it is sad to leave thee,

Alone in thy narrow bed!
Thou art not with us, brother---
Yet, in yon blissful land,
Perhaps, thou still canst hear us-
Perhaps thou hoverest near us

And smilest as the choral band,

Which once obeyed thy master hand,

Now linger with their tears to leave

The sod that seals thy grave.
The sun is sinking, brother,

And with it our melody.
The dying cadence of our rite
Is mingled with the dying light.
Oh, brother! by that fading ray,
And by this mournful parting lay,
We will remember thee.

The sculptor, in his chiselled stone,
The painter, in his colors blent,
The bard, in numbers all his own,

Raises himself his monument:
But he, whose every touch could wake
A passion, and a thought control,
He who, to bless the ear, did make
Music of his very soul;

Who bound for us, in golden chains,

The golden links of harmonyNaught is left us of his strains,

Naught but their fleeting memory: Then, while a trace of him remains, Shall we not cherish it tenderly?

WORDSWORTH.

BARK of the unseen haven,
Mind of unearthly mood,
Like to the prophet's raven,

Thou bringest me heavenly food; Or like some mild dove winging

Its way from cloudless skies,
Celestial odors bringing,
And in its glad soul singing
The songs of paradise.

Surely thou hast been nearer

The bounds of day and night-
Thy vision has been clearer,
And loftier thy flight,
And thou to God art dearer

Than many men of might.
Speak! for to thee we listen
As never to bard before,
And faded eyes shall glisten

That thought to be bright no more. Oh, tell us of yonder heaven,

And the world that lies within; Tell us of the happy spirits

To whom we are near of kin; Tell of the songs of rapture,

Of the stars that never set;
Do the angels call us brothers—
Does our Father love us yet?
Speak, for our souls are thirsting

For the light of righteousness;
Speak, for our bosoms are bursting
With a desolate loneliness;
Our hearts are worn and weary,
Our robes are travel-soiled-
For through a desert dreary

Our wandering feet have toiled.
Those to whom life looks brighter
May ask an earthlier strain:
A gayer spell and a lighter

Shall hold them in its chain;

But to those who have drunk deepest
Of the cup of joy and grief,
The tuneful tears thou weepest
Do minister relief.

Speak, for the earth is throbbing
With a wild sense of pain;
The wintry winds are sobbing

The requiem of the slain;
Dimly our lamps are burning,

And gladly we list to thee,
With a strange and mystic yearning

Toward the home where we would be: Turn from the rhyme of weary Time, And sing of Eternity!

Tell of the sacred mountains

Where prophets in prayer have kneeled; Tell of the glorious fountains

That soon shall be unsealed; Tell of the quiet regions

Where those we love are fled;
Tell of the angel legions

That guard the blessed dead!
Tell us of the sea of glass,
And of the icy river;

To those who its waves must pass
Thy message of love deliver.
Strike, strike thy harp of many lays,
And we will join the song of praise
To Him that sitteth upon the throne
Of life and love for ever!

WOMAN.

A VESTAL priestess, proudly pure,
But of a meek and quiet spirit;
With soul all dauntless to endure,

And mood so calm that naught can stir it,
Save when a thought most deeply thrilling
Her eyes with gentlest tears is filling,
Which seem with her true words to start
From the deep fountain at her heart.
A mien that neither seeks nor shuns

The homage scattered in her way;
A love that hath few favored ones,

And yet for all can work and pray;
A smile wherein each mortal reads
The very sympathy he needs;
An eye like to a mystic book

Of lays that bard or prophet sings,
Which keepeth for the holiest look

Of holiest love its deepest things.
A form to which a king had bent,
The fireside's dearest ornament-
Known in the dwellings of the poor
Better than at the rich man's door;
A life that ever onward goes,
Yet in itself has deep repose.
A vestal priestess, maid, or wife-
Vestal, and vowed to offer up
The innocence of a holy life

To Him who gives the mingled cup;
With man its bitter sweets to share,
To live and love, to do and dare;
His prayer to breathe, his tears to shed,
Breaking to him the heavenly bread
Of hopes which, all too high for earth,
Have yet in her a mortal birth.
This is the woman I have dreamed,
And to my childish thought she seemed
The woman I myself should be:
Alas! I would that I were she.

TO A BEAUTIFUL STATUE.

I WOULD there were a blush upon thy cheek,
That I might deem thee human, not divine!
I would those sweet yet silent lips might speak,
Even to say, "I never can be thine!"

I would thine eye might shun my ardent gaze,
Then timidly return it; 'neath the fold

Of the white vest thy heart beat to the praise Responsive that thou heedest not. I hold Thy slender hand in mine: oh, why is it so cold? Statue! I call on thee! I bid thee wake

To life and love. The world is bright and fair; The flowers of spring blush in each verdant brake; The birds' sweet song makes glad the perfumed air, And thou alone feel'st not its balmy breath. Oh! by what spell, once dear, still unforgot, Shall I release thee from this seeming death? [spot? What prayer shall charm thee from yon haunted Awake! I summon thee! In vain: she hears me not. What power hath bound thee thus? Devoid of

sense,

Buried in thine own beauty, speechless, pale— What strange, stern destiny, what dire offence, Hath drawn around thy living charms this veil? Didst thou, like Niobe, behold the death Of all thy loved ones? Did so sad a sight Urge from thy bosom forth the panting breath, Steal from thy tearful eye its liquid light, And wrap thy fainting spirit in eternal night? Or wert thou false, and merciless as fairAnd is it thus thy perfidy is wroken? Didst thou with smiles the trusting soul ensnare, And smile again to see it crushed and broken? Oh, no! Heaven wished to rescue from the tomb A form so faultless; and its mandate high Arrested thee in youth's transcendent bloom, Congealed in marble thy last parting sigh, Soothed thee to wakeless sleep, nor suffered thee to For sure thou wert not always thus! The rush Of life's warm stream hath lit thy vacant glance, Tinting thy pallid cheek with maiden blush; Those fairy limbs have sported in the dance, Before they settled thus in quiet rest; Thine ear the lyre's numbers hath received, And told their import to the throbbing breast; Thy heart hath hoped and feared, hath joyed and grieved,

[die.

Hath loved and trusted, and hath been deceived.
Sleep on! The memory of thy grief or wrongs
With the forgotten past have long since fled;
And pitying Fate thy slumber still prolongs,
Lest thou shouldst wake, to sorrow for the dead.
Oh, should thine eyes unclose again on earth,
To find thyself uncared for, and alone—
The mates of thy young days of laughing mirth,
And he, more dear than all, for ever gone-
With bitter tears thou 'dst ask again a heart of stone.
Sleep on in peace! thou shalt not sleep for ever:
Soon on thine echoing ear the voice shall thrill,
Whose well-known tone alone thy bonds may
And bid thy spirit burst its cerements chill: [sever,
Thy frozen heart its pulses shall resume,

Thine eye with glistening tears of rapture swell, Thou shalt arise in never-fading bloom! The voice of deathless Love must break the spell : Until that time shall come, sweet dreamer, fare thee well!

WANING.

THE Moon looks dimly from the skies,
Of half her queenlike beauty shorn;
A sad and shrouded thing, she lies
Where she, scarce three weeks since, was born.
As from the darkness forth she sprang,
And it to her a cradle gave,
So on its bosom she must hang

Trembling, till it become her grave.
But while she sees the stars so bright,

The Moon can not her death deplore, For all the heavens are sown with light,

Though from herself it come no more.
Pale Moon! and I like thee am sinking
Into my natural nothingness;

I who, like thee, from heaven was drinking
The godlike power to love and bless.
This shroud of night is dark and chill,

And yet I can not think to mourn;
The skies I filled are radiant still,
And will be bright when I am gone!

LEES FROM THE CUP OF LIFE.

ONCE I was sad, and well could weep,
Now I am wild, and I will laugh;
Pour out for me libations deep!

The blood of trampled grapes I'll quaff, And mock at all who idly mourn,

And smite the beggar with his staff. Oh! let us hold carousal dread

Over our early pleasures gone, Youth is departed, love is dead;

Oh wo is me that I was born! Yet fill the cup, pass round the jestMethinks I could laugh grief to scorn. "Tis well to be a thing alone,

For whom no creature cares or grieves, To build on desert sands a throne,

And spread a couch on wintry leaves, Ruthless and hopeless, worn and wiseThe fool, the imbecile, believes! Make me a song whose sturdy rhyme

Shall bid defiance bold to Wo.
Though caitiff wretch, come down to me;
See, at thy gate my trump I blow,
And, armed with rude indifference,
To thee thy scornful glove I throw!
Ah me! unequal, bootless fight!

Ah, cuiras, that betrays my trust!
Sorrow's stern angel bears a dart
Fatal to all of mortal dust;
He is a spirit, I of clay :
He can not die-alas, I must!

SPEAK, FOR THY SERVANT HEARETH.

SPEAK, for thy servant heareth;

Alone, in my lowly bed, Before I laid me down to rest,

My nightly prayer was said; And naught my spirit feareth, In darkness or by day: Speak, for thy servant heareth, And heareth to obey.

I've stood before thine altar,

A child before thy might;

No breath within thy temple stirred
The dim and cloudy light;

And still I knew that thou wert there,
Teaching my heart to say-
"Speak, for thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey."

O God, my flesh may tremble

When thou speakest to my soul;

But it can not shun thy presence blest, Or shrink from thy control.

A joy my spirit cheereth

That can not pass away:

Speak, for thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey.

Thou biddest me to utter

Words that I scarce may speak, And mighty things are laid on me, A helpless one and weak;

Darkly thy truth declareth

Its purpose and its way:
Speak, for thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey.

And shouldst thou be a stranger
To that which thou hast made?
Oh! ever be about my path,

And hover near my bed.
Lead me in every step I take,
Teach me each word I say:
Speak, for thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey.

How hath thy glory lighted

My lonely place of rest;
How sacred now shall be to me

The spot which thou hast blest!
If aught of evil should draw nigh

To bring me shame and fear,
My steadfast soul shall make reply,
"Depart, for God is near!"

I bless thee that thou speakest
Thus to an humble child;
The God of Jacob calls to me
In gentle tones and mild;

Thine enemies before thy face

Are scattered in dismay:

Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey.

I've stood before thee all my days-
Have ministered to thee;

But in the hour of darkness first
Thou speakest unto me.
And now, the night appeareth
More beautiful than day:
Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey.

A MOTHER'S FEARS.

I AM one who holds a treasure,
A gem of wondrous cost;
But I mar my heart's deep pleasure
With the fear it may be lost.

God gives not many mothers
So fair a child as thou,
And those he gives to others
In death are oft laid low.
I, too, might know that sorrow,
To stand by thy dying bed,
And wish each weary morrow
Only that I were dead.

Oh! would that I could bear thee,

As I bore thee 'neath my heart,
And every sorrow spare thee,
And bid each pain depart!
Tell me some act of merit
By which I may deserve
To hold the angel spirit,

And its sweet life preserve.
When I watch the little creature,
If tears of rapture flow-
If I worship each fair feature-
All mothers would do so.
And if I fain would shield her
From suffering, on my breast,
Strive every joy to yield her,

"Tis thus that I am blest.

Oh! for some heavenly token,
By which I may be sure
The vase shall not be broken-
Dispersed the essence pure!

Then spake the Angel of Mothers
To me, in gentle tone:
"Be kind to the children of others,
And thus deserve thine own."