90

96

TO THE CRICKET.

For a summer month or two
She can sing and sip the dew;
But at Christmas, as in May,
Thou art ever brisk and gay,
Thy continued song we hear,
Trilling, thrilling, all the year.

Every day and every night
Bring to thee the same delight;
Winter, summer, cold or hot,
Late or early, matters not;
Mirth and music still declare
Thou art ever void of care:
Whilst with sorrows and with fears,
We destroy our days and years;
Thou, with constant joy and song,
Ev'ry minute dost prolong,
Making thus thy little span,
Longer than the age of Man.

SONG.

BY MISS LANDON.

ARE other eyes beguiling, Love?
Are other rose-lips smiling, Love?
Ah, heed them not; you will not find
Lips more true, or eyes more kind,
Than mine, Love.

Are other white arms wreathing, Love? Are other fond sighs breathing, Love? Ah, heed them not; but call to mind The arms, the sighs, you leave behindAll thine, Love.

Then gaze not on other eyes, Love;
Breathe not other sighs, Love;
You may find many a brighter one

Than your own rose, but there are none
So true to thee, Love.

All thine own, 'mid gladness, Love;
Fonder still, 'mid sadness, Love;
Though changed from all that now thou art,
In shame, in sorrow, still thy heart
Would be the world to me, Love.

RECOLLECTIONS.

I'VE pleasant thoughts, that memory brings, in moments free from care,

Of a fairy-like and laughing girl, with roses in her

hair;

Her smile was like the starlight of summer's softest skies,

And worlds of joyousness there shone from out her witching eyes.

Her looks were looks of melody, her voice was like the swell

Of sudden music, gentle notes, that of deep gladness

tell;

She came like spring, with pleasant sounds of sweetness and of mirth,

And her thoughts were those wild, flowery thoughts, that linger not on earth.

LYRE.

K

98

RECOLLECTIONS.

A quiet goodness beamed amid the beauty of her face, And all she said and did was with its own instinctive

grace;

She seemed as if she thought the world a good and pleasant one,

And her light spirit saw no ill in aught beneath the

sun.

I've dreamed of just such creatures, but they never met my view,

'Mid the sober, dull reality, in their earthly form and hue.

And her smile came gently over me, like springs first scented airs,

And made me think life was not all a wilderness of

cares.

I know not of her destiny, or where her smile now strays,

But the thought of her comes o'er me, with my own lost sunny days,

With moonlight hours, and far-off friends, and many pleasant things

That have gone the way of all the earth, on Time's resistless wings.

THE UNKNOWN GRAVE.

BY D. M. MOIR.

Man comes into the world like morning mushrooms, soon thrusting up their heads into the air, and conversing with their kindred of the same production, and as soon they turn into dust and forgetfulness.-JEREMY TAYLOR.

WHO sleeps below?-who sleeps below?—
It is a question idle all !

Ask of the breezes as they blow,

Say, do they heed, or hear thy call?
They murmur in the trees around,
And mock thy voice, an empty sound!

A hundred summer suns have showered
Their fostering warmth, and radiance bright;
A hundred winter storms have loured

With piercing floods, and hues of night,
Since first this remnant of his race

Did tenant his lone dwelling-place.

Was he of high or low degree?

Did grandeur smile upon his lot?
Or, born to dark obscurity,

Dwelt he within some lonely cot,
And, from his youth to labour wed,
From toil-strung limbs wrung daily bread?

Say, died he ripe, and full of years,
Bowed down and bent by hoary eld,
When sound was silence to his ears,
And the dim eyeball sight withheld;

100

THE UNKNOWN GRAVE.

Like a ripe apple falling down,
Unshaken 'mid the orchard brown;

When all the friends that blessed his prime,
Were vanished like a morning dream;
Plucked one by one by spareless Time,
And scattered in oblivion's stream;
Passing away all silently,

Like snow-flakes melting in the sea:

Or, 'mid the summer of his years,

When round him thronged his children young, When bright eyes gushed with burning tears, And anguish dwelt on every tongue,

Was he cut off, and left behind
A widowed wife, scarce half resigned?

Or 'mid the sunshine of his spring,
Came the swift bolt that dashed him down ;
When she, his chosen, blossoming

In beauty, deemed him all her own,
And forward looked to happier years,
Than ever blessed their vale of tears?

Question no more, alas !-'tis vain—

The summer flowers in beauty blow,
And sighs the wind, and floods the rain,
O'er the poor bones that rot below;
No mouldering record can we trace,
Of fame or fortune, rank or race!

Then, what is life, when thus we see
No trace remain of life's career?-
Mortal! whoe'er thou art, for thee

A moral lesson liveth here;
Place not on aught of earth thy trust;

'Tis doomed that dust shall mix with dust.