The silent workings of thy heart Do almost seem to have a part With our humanity!

THE WHITE HARE.

Ir was the sabbath eve-we went,
My Geraldine and I, intent

The twilight hour to pass,

Where we might hear the water flow,
And scent the freighted winds that blow
Athwart the vernal grass.

In darker grandeur-as the day
Stole scarce perceptibly away-

The purple mountain stood, Wearing the young moon as a crest: The sun, half sunk in the far west, Seemed mingling with the flood. The cooling dews their balm distilled; A holy joy our bosoms thrilled;

Our thoughts were free as air; And, by one impulse moved, did we Together pour instinctively

Our songs of gladness there.

The green wood waved its shade hard by, While thus we wove our harmony:

Lured by the mystic strain,

A snow-white hare, that long had been
Peering from forth her covert green,
Came bounding o'er the plain.
Her beauty, 'twas a joy to note-
The pureness of her downy coat,
Her wild yet gentle eye-
The pleasure that, despite her fear,
Had led the timid thing so near
To list our minstrelsy.

All motionless, with head inclined,
She stood, as if her heart divined
The impulses of ours-

Till the last note had died—and then
Turned half reluctantly again,

Back to her greenwood bowers.

Once more the magic sounds we triedAgain the hare was seen to glide

From out her sylvan shade; Again, as joy had given her wings, Fleet as a bird she forward springs

Along the dewy glade.

Go, happy thing! disport at will—
Take thy delight o'er vale and hill,

Or rest in leafy bower:
The harrier may beset thy way,
The cruel snare thy feet betray-
Enjoy thy little hour!

We know not, and we ne'er may know,
The hidden springs of joy and wo,
That deep within do lie:

THE SEA-BIRD.
SEA-BIRD! haunter of the wave,
Delighting o'er its crest to hover;
Half engulfed where yawns the cave
The billow forms in rolling over;
Sea-bird! seeker of the storm!

In its shriek thou dost rejoice;
Sending from thy bosom warm

Answer shriller than its voice.
Bird, of nervous winged flight,
Flashing silvery to the sun,
Sporting with the sea-foam white-
When will thy wild course be done?
Whither tends it? Has the shore

No alluring haunt for thee?
Nook, with tangled vines grown o'er,
Scented shrub, or leafy tree?

Is the purple seaweed rarer

Than the violet of the spring? Is the snowy foam-wreath fairer Than the apple's blossoming? Shady grove and sunny slope

Seek but these, and thou shalt meet Birds not born with storm to cope,

Hermits of retirement sweet

Where no winds too rudely swell,
But in whispers, as they pass,
Of the fragrant flow'ret tell,
Hidden in the tender grass.
There the mockbird sings of love;
There the robin builds his nest;
There the gentle-hearted dove,
Brooding, takes her blissful rest.
Sea-bird, stay thy rapid flight:

Gone! where dark waves foam and dash, Like a lone star on the night

Far I see his white wing flash.
He obeyeth God's behest,
All their destiny fulfil:
Tempests some are born to breast-
Some to worship and be still.

If to struggle with the storm

On life's ever-changing sea,
Where cold mists enwrap the form,
My harsh destiny must be
Sea-bird! thus may I abide

Cheerful the allotment given,
And, rising o'er the ruffled tide,

Escape at last, like thee, to heaven!

IN 1833, Bishop Potter, then one of the professors in Union College, was shown by his wife, who had just returned from a visit to Rhinebeck on the Hudson, the Ode for the Fourth of July which is quoted on the next page, and informed that it was the production of a young woman at service in the family of a friend there, whom he had often noticed on account of her retiring and modest manners, and who had been in that capacity more than twenty years. When further advised

that these lines had been thrown off with great rapidity and apparent ease, and that the writer had been accustomed almost from childhood to find pleasure in similar efforts, the information awakened a lively interest, and led him to examine other pieces from the same hand, and finally to introduce them to the public notice, in a preface over his signature to the volume entitled Wales and other Poems, by MARIA JAMES, published in

1839.

MARIA JAMES is the daughter of poor but pious parents who emigrated to this country from Wales, near the beginning of the present century, and settled near the slate quarries in the northern part of New York. Her remaining history is told in an interesting manner in the following extracts from a letter which she addressed to Mrs. Potter:

"Toward the completion of my seventh year, I found myself on ship-board, surrounded by men, women, and children, whose faces were unknown to me. It was here, perhaps, that I first began to learn in a particular manner from observation-soon discovering that those children who were handsome or smartly dressed received much more attention than myself, who had neither of these recommendations: however, instead of giving way to feelings of envy and jealousy, my imagination was revelling among the fruits and flowers which I expected to find in the land to which we were bound. I also had an opportunity to learn a little English during the voyage, as 'Take care, and Get out of the way,' seemed reiterated from land's end to land's end.

"After our family were settled in some measure, I was sent to school, my father having commenced teaching me at home some time previous. I think there was no particular aptness to learn about me. After I could read, I took much delight in John Rogers's last advice to his children, with all the excellent et cæteras to be found in the old English Primer. I was also fond of reading the common hymubook. The New Testament was my only school-book. Thus accomplished, I happened one

day to hear a young woman read Addison's inimitable paraphrases of the twenty-third psalm: I listened as to the voice of an angel. Those who know the power of good reading or good speaking, need not be told that, where there is an ear for sound, the manner in which either is done will make every possible difference. This, probably, was the first time that I ever heard a good reader.

"My parents again removing, I found myself in a school where the elder children used the American Preceptor. I listened in transport as they read Dwight's Columbia, which must have been merely from the smoothness of its sound, as I could have had but very little knowledge of its meaning. I was now ten years of age, and as an opportunity offered which my parents saw fit to embrace, I entered the family in which I now reside, where, besides learning many useful household occupations, that care and attention was paid to my words and actions as is seldom to be met with in such situations. I had before me some of the best models for good reading and good speaking; and any child, with a natural ear for the beautiful in language, will notice these things, and though their conversation may not differ materially from that of others in their line of life, they will almost invariably think in the style of their admiration.

"The Bible here, as in my father's house, was the book of books, the heads of the family constantly impressing on all, that the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom,' and that to 'depart from iniquity is understanding.' There is scarcely anything that can affect the mind of young persons like those lessons of wisdom which fall from lips they love and respect.

"Besides frequent opportunities of hearing instructive books read, my leisure hours were often devoted to one or the other of these works: first, the Female Mentor, comprising within itself a little epitome of elegant literature; two odd volumes of the Adventurer; Miss Hannah More's Cheap Repository; and Pilgrim's Progress. During a period of nearly seven years which I spent in this family, the newspapers were more or less filled with the wars and fightings of our European neighbors. My imagination took fire, and I lent an ear to the whispers of the muse. "T was then that first she pruned the wing; 'Twas then she first essayed to sing.'

But the wing was powerless, and the song without melody. As I advanced toward womanhood, I shrunk from the nickname of poet, which had been awarded me: the very idea seemed the height of presumption. In my seventeenth year I left this situation to learn dressmaking. I sewed neatly, but too slow to insure success. My failure in this was always a subject of regret. After this, I lived some time in different situations, my employment being principally in the nursery. In each of these different families I had access to those who spoke the purest English, also frequent opportunities of hearing correct and elegant readers-at least I believed them such by the effect produced on my feelings; and although nineteen years have nearly passed away since my return to the home of my early life, I have not ceased to remember with gratitude the kind treatment received from different persons at this period, while my attachment to their children has not been obliterated by time nor by absence, and is likely to continue till death......

"With respect to the few poems which you have

been so kind as to overlook, I can hardly say myself how they came to be written. I recollect, many years ago, of trying something in this way for the amusement of a little boy who was very dear to me; except this, with a very few other pieces, long for gotten, no attempt of the kind was made until The Mother's Lament, and Elijah, with a number of epitaphs, which were written previous to those which have been produced within the last six years. The subject of the Hummingbird, (the oldest of these,) was taken captive by my own hand. The Adventure is described just as it happened. Wales is a kind of retrospect of the days of childhood.......Of Ambition, permit me, dear madam, to call your attention to the summer of 1832, when yourself, with the other ladies of this family, were reading Bourrienne's Life of Napoleon Bonaparte: I had opportu nities of hearing a little sometimes, which brought forcibly to my mind certain conversations which I heard in the early part of my life respecting this wonderful man. The poem was produced the following summer. In the year 1819, The American Flag appeared in the New York American, signed 'Croaker & Co.': this kindled up the poetic fires in my breast, which, however, did not find utterance until fourteen years afterward, in the Ode on the Fourth of July, 1833. This appearing in print, some

who did not know me very well inquired of others, 'Do you suppose she ever wrote it?' Being answered in the affirmative, it was imagined 'she must have had help.' These remarks gave rise to the question, What is poetry? The Album was begun and carried through without previous arrangement or design, laid aside when the mind was weary, and taken up again just as the subject happened to present itself. Friendship was produced in the same way. Many of the pieces are written from impressions received in youth, particularly the Whip-poorwill, the Meadow Lark, the Firefly, &c."

In the Introduction to her poems Bishop Potter vindicates in an admirable manner, against the sneers of Johnson, the propriety of recognising the abilities of the humblest classes. It will be seen that the poems of Maria James will bear a very favorable comparison with the compositions of any of the "uneducated poets" whose names are celebrated in Mr. Southey's fine essay upon this subject.

ODE,

WRITTEN FOR THE FOURTH OF JULY, 1833.

I SEE that banner proudly wave-
Yes, proudly waving yet;

Not a stripe is torn from the broad array,
Not a single star is set;
And the eagle, with unruffled plume,
Is soaring aloft in the welkin dome.

Not a leaf is plucked from the branch he bears;
From his grasp not an arrow has flown;
The mist that obstructed his vision is past,
And the murmur of discord is gone:

For he sees, with a glance over mountain and plain,
The Union unbroken, from Georgia to Maine.
Far southward, in that sunny clime,
Where bright magnolias bloom,

And the orange with the lime tree vies

In shedding rich perfume,

A sound was heard like the ocean's roar,
As its surges break on the rocky shore.

Was it the voice of the tempest loud,
As it felled some lofty tree,

Or a sudden flash from a passing storm
Of heaven's artillery?

But it died away, and the sound of doves
Is heard again in the scented groves.

The links are all united still

That form the golden chain,
And peace and plenty smile around,
Throughout the wide domain :

How feeble is language, how cold is the lay,
Compared with the joy of this festival day—
To see that banner waving yet-

Ay, waving proud and high-
No rent in all its ample folds,
No stain of crimson dye :

And the eagle spreads his pinions fair,
And mounts aloft in the fields of air.

THE PILGRIMS.

TO A LADY.

WE met as pilgrims meet,

Who are bound to a distant shrine,
Who spend the hours in converse sweet

From noon to the day's decline

Soul mingling with soul, as they tell of their fears And their hopes, as they pass thro' the valley of tears. And still they commune with delight,

Of pleasures or toils by the way,
The winds of the desert that chill them by night,
Or heat that oppresses by day:

For one to the faithful is ever at hand,
As the shade of a rock in a weary land.

We met as soldiers meet,

Ere yet the fight is won-
Ere joyful at their captain's feet

Is laid their armor down:

Each strengthens his fellow to do and to bear,
In hope of the crown which the victors wear.
Though daily the strife they renew,

And their foe his thousands o'ercome,
Yet the promise unfailing is ever in view

Of safety, protection, and home: [conferred, Where they knew that their sovereign such favor "As eye hath not seen, as the ear hath not heard."

We met as seamen meet,

On ocean's watery plain,

Where billows rise and tempests beat,

Ere the destined port they gain:

But tempests they baffle, and billows they brave,
Assured that their pilot is mighty to save.

They dwell on the scenes which have past,
Of perils they still may endure-
The haven of rest, where they anchor at last,
Where bliss is complete and secure-
Till its towers and spires arise from afar,
(To the eye of faith,) as some radiant star.

We met as brethren meet,

Who are cast on a foreign strand,

Whose hearts are cheered as they hasten to greet
And commune of their native land-
Of their Father's house in that world above,
Of his tender care and his boundless love.

The city so fair to behold,

The redeemed in their vestments of whiteIn those mansions of rest, where, mid pleasures unThey finally hope to unite :

[told, Where ceaseless ascriptions of praise shall ascend To God and the Lamb in a world without end.

How many a gallant ship

Since then has crossed the sea, Deep freighted from the western worldBut where is he?

Oh, ne'er beside that hearth

The unbroken ring shall meet, To tell th' adventurous tale, or join In converse sweet!

For in that stranger-land

His lonely grave is seen,

Where northern mountains lift their heads In fadeless green.

THE SOLDIER'S GRAVE.*

IN Gallia's sunny fields,

Where blooms the eglantine, And where luxuriant clusters bend The fruitful vine

The youth to manhood rose,

('Tis fancy tells the tale :)

His step was swift as mountain deer
That skims the vale.

And his cagle glance,

Which told perception keen, "Of will to do and soul to dare," Deep fixed within.

Perchance a mother's love,

A father's tender care,

With every kindly household bond,
Were his to share.

Perchance the darling one,

The best beloved was he,

Of all that gathered round the hearth From infancy.

How fair life's morn to him!

The world was blithe and gay

Hope, beckoning with an angel's smile, Led on the way.

He left his native plain,

He bade his home farewellAnd she, the idol of his heart,

The fair Adele.

Though sad the parting hour,

What ardor fixed his breast,

To view the streams, to tread the soil, Far in the West!

From where the Huron's wave

First greets the ruddy light,

To where Superior, in its glow,
Lies calm and bright-

Where rose the forest deep,

Where stretched the giant shore, From Del Fuego's utmost bound

To Labrador.

*The grave here spoken of was pointed out to the writer as the final resting place of a French officer-a single mound, without a stone to mark the spot, in Rutland county, Vermont.

TO A SINGING BIRD.

HUSH, hush that lay of gladness,
It fills my heart with pain,
But touch some note of sadness,
Some melancholy strain,
That tells of days departed,

Of hopes for ever flown-
Some golden dream of other years,
To riper age unknown.

The captive, bowed in sadness,
Impatient to be free,
Might call that lay of gladness
The voice of liberty:
Again the joyous carol,

Warm gushing, peals along,
As if thy very latest breath

Would spend itself in song.

Oft as I hear those tones of thine

Will thoughts like these intrude"If once compared, thy lot with mine, How cold my gratitude;

Though gloom or sunshine mark the hours,

Thy bosom, ne'ertheless,

Will pour, as from its inmost fount,
The tide of thankfulness."

GOOD FRIDAY.

THE scene is fresh before us,
When Jesus drained the cup,
As new the day comes o'er us
When he was offered up-

The veil in sunder rending,

The types and shadows flee, While heaven and earth are bending Their gaze on Calvary.

Should mortal dare in numbers,

Where angels, trembling, standOr wake the harp that slumbers

In flaming seraph's hand? Then tell the wondrous story

Where rolls Salvation's wave, And give Him all the glory,

Who came the lost to save.

Ir may be doubted whether, in the long catalogue of those whose works illustrate and vindicate the intellectual character and position of woman, there are many names that will shine with a clearer, steadier, and more enduring lustre, than that of MARIA DEL OCCIDENTE.

MARIA GOWEN, afterward Mrs. BROOKS, upon whom this title was conferred originally, I believe, by the poet Southey, was descended from a Welsh family that settled in Charlestown, near Boston, sometime before the Revolution. A considerable portion of the liberal fortune of her grandfather was lost by the burning of that city in 1775, and he soon afterward removed to Medford, across the Mystic river, where Maria Gowen was born about the year 1795. Her father was a man of education, and among his intimate friends were several of the professors of Harvard college, whose occasional visits varied the pleasures of a rural life. From this society she derived, at an early period, a taste for letters and learning. Before the completion of her ninth year, she had committed to memory many passages from the best poets; and her conversation excited special wonder by its elegance, variety, and wisdom. She grew in beauty, too, as she grew in years, and when her father died, a bankrupt, before she had attained the age of fourteen, she was betrothed to a merchant of Boston, who undertook the completion of her education, and as soon as she quitted the school was married to her. Her early womanhood was passed in commercial affluence; but the loss of several vessels at sea in which her husband was interested was followed by other losses on land, and years were spent in comparative indigence. In that remarkable book, Idomen, or The Vale of Yumuri, she says, referring to this period: "Our table had been hospitable, our doors open to many; but to part with our wellgarnished dwelling had now become inevitable. We retired, with one servant, to a remote house of meaner dimensions, and were

sought no longer by those who had come in our wealth. I looked earnestly around me; the present was cheerless, the future dark and fearful. My parents were dead, my few relatives in distant countries, where they thought perhaps but little of my happiness. Burleigh I had never loved other than as a father and protector; but he had been the benefactor to my fallen family, and to him I owed comfort, education, and every ray of pleasure that had glanced before me in this world. But the sun of his energies was setting, and the faults which had balanced his virtues increased as his fortune declined. He might live through many years of misery, and to be devoted to him was my duty while a spark of his life remained. I strove to nerve my heart for the worst. Still there were moments when fortitude became faint with endurance, and visions of happiness that might have been mine came smiling to my imagination. I wept and prayed in agony.”

In this period, poetry was resorted to for amusement and consolation. At nineteen she wrote a metrical romance, in seven cantos, but it was never published. It was followed by many shorter lyrical pieces, which were printed anonymously; and in 1820, after favorable judgments of it had been expressed by some literary friends,* she gave to the public a small volume entitled Judith, Esther, and other Poems, by a Lover of the Fine Arts. It contained many fine passages, and gave promise of the powers of which

* One of the friends here alluded to was the late Dr. Kirkland, president of Harvard college. On a blank leaf of the first copy of the volume that she received, she wrote the following lines, which have not before been printed: Should e'er my half-fledged muse attain the height She trembling longs, yet fears to tempt no more, Still will she bless, though wounded in her flight, The generous hand that gave her strength to soar. But should resistless tempests fiercely meet, And cast her, struggling, to the whelming wave, Even then, one tender, grateful pulse shall beat In her torn heart, for him who strove to save. Writing to me in 1842, Mrs. Brooks enclosed these verses, and observed: "I recall them after an interval of twenty years. They have meaning and sincerity in them; but having during that time extended my acquaintance with muses and angels, I can not now bear to see either of them represented with plumage on their wings. Some of the most celebrated painters have, however, set the example."