In the rich rose, whose bloom I loved so well,
In the dim-brooding violet of the dell,
Set deep that thought!

And let the sunset's melancholy glow,

And let the spring's first whisper, faint and low,
With me be fraught!

And Memory answered me, "Wild wish and vain!
I have no hues the loveliest to detain

In the heart's core.

The place they held in bosoms all their own,

Soon with new shadows filled, new flowers o'ergrown, Is theirs no more."

Hast thou such power, O Love? –
And Love replied,
"It is not mine! Pour out thy soul's full tide
Of hope and trust,

Prayer, tear, devotedness, that boon to gain-
'Tis but to write, with the heart's fiery rain,
Wild words on dust!"

Song, is the gift with thee?—I ask a lay,
Soft, fervent, deep, that will not pass away
From the still breast;

Filled with a tone O not for deathless fame,
But a sweet haunting murmur of my name,
Where it would rest.

And Song made answer,

"It is not in me,

Though called immortal; though my gifts may be

All but divine.

A place of lonely brightness I can give:

A changeless one, where thou with Love wouldst live,— This is not mine! "

Death, Death! wilt thou the restless wish fulfil ?

And Death, the Strong One, spoke: "I can but still

Each vain regret.

What if forgotten?

All thy soul would crave,

Thou too, within the mantle of the grave,
Wilt soon forget."

Then did my heart in lone, faint sadness die,
As from all nature's voices one reply —
But one was given :

"Earth has no heart, fond dreamer! with a tone
To send thee back the spirit of thine own -
Seek it in heaven."

LESSON CIX.

To my Mother. ELIZA COOK.

I MISS thee, my Mother! Thy image is still
The deepest impressed on my heart;

And the tablet so faithful in death must be chill
Ere a line of that image depart.

Thou wert torn from my side when I treasured thee most;
When my reason could measure thy worth;
When I knew but too well that the idol I'd lost
Could be never replaced upon earth.

I miss thee, my Mother, in circles of joy,

Where I've mingled with rapturous zest;

For how slight is the touch that will serve to destroy
All the fairy web spun in my breast!

Some melody sweet may be floating around 'Tis a ballad I learned at thy knee;

Some strain may be played, and I shrink from the sound, For my fingers oft woke it for thee.

I miss thee, my Mother; when young
And I sink in the languor of pain,

health has fled,

Where, where is the arm that once pillowed my head,
And the ear that once heard me complain?
Other hands may support, gentle accents may fall;
For the fond and the true are yet mine :
I've a blessing for each; I am grateful to all;
But whose care can be soothing as thine?

I miss thee, my Mother, in summer's fair day,
When I rest in the ivy-wreathed bower,

When I hang thy pet linnet's cage high on the spray,
Or gaze on thy favorite flower.

There's the bright gravel-path, where I played by thy side
When time had scarce wrinkled thy brow;

Where I carefully led thee, with worshipping pride,
When thy scanty locks gathered the snow.

I miss thee, my Mother, in winter's long night:
I remember the tales thou wouldst tell

The romance of wild fancy, the legend of fright
O, who could e'er tell them so well?

Thy corner is vacant; thy chair is removed :
It was kind to take that from my eye:

Yet relics are round me - the sacred and loved-
To call up the pure sorrow-fed sigh.

I miss thee, my Mother! O, when do I not?
Though I know 'twas the wisdom of Heaven

That the deepest shade fell on my sunniest spot,
And such tie of devotion was riven;

For when thou wert with me, my soul was below;

I was chained to the world I then trod ;

My affections, my thoughts, were all earth-bound; but now They have followed thy spirit to God!

LESSON CX.

Fireside Education.

CHAMBERS'S MISCELLANY.

FIRESIDE education is a wide and comprehensive thing: its enlightened object is to transform a weak, uninstructed child into a healthy and accomplished man or woman. What a variety of considerations are necessarily engaged in this onerous duty! The child is to be cared for physically; that is, as regards food, warmth, clothing, exercise, and, it may be, medical attendance. He is to be cared for morally; in which are involved the suppression of evil passions, the cultivation of the affections, kindness to animals, love of honesty and truth, and worship of the Divine Being. He is to be cared for intellectually; that is, he is to be instructed in all useful knowledge, in order that he may with advantage perform his part in society.

Any routine of education which does not embrace all these particulars is, of course, imperfect. Education, as respects mere physical training, may produce a man healthful in constitution, and handsome in appearance, accomplished, possibly, in walking, riding, or in the performance of manual operations; but he who possesses no more education than this is, at best, only an elegant savage.

Lamentable is the fate of that child for whom no domestic hearth offers its cheering influence. The fireside may be

homely, or it may be dignified; but whether it belong to poor or rich, it may be equally a shrine of the affections, a scene | of happiness, a school of the heart.

A school of the heart! In these words we arrive at the true operation of moral principle. The heart must be touched, the feelings affected, the baser propensities subdued, the higher emotions quickened, and all made love and joy within. And how can this be done? Only by moral and religious principle being confirmed by training and exercise, in reference to companions, parents, brothers, sisters, and other relations, as well as the general circumstances by which we are surrounded. The very act of loving and of consulting the feelings of those with whom we are domesticated, strengthens the tendency to well-doing. Nor are the incidents which occur in a family without their value. Births, deaths, meetings of relations, misfortunes, things joyful and things sorrowful, are all means of moral culture. So likewise, within the domestic circle, are acquired habits of order and perseverance, ideas of personal intercourse and courtesy, along with much familiar but useful knowledge. Recollections of a youthful and well-regulated home form also a source of refined gratification in after life. How frequently has it been confessed that the remembrance of a father's solicitude and affection has acted like a perpetual beacon in warning from vice!

Old remembrances, however, centre chiefly round the mother. She is the divinity of the child, and was all in all to him before he knew of any other object of veneration. What hosts of remembrances of this dear departed friend! Her early attention to all his little wants; her anxiety about his personal appearance and behavior, as she used to send him forth every morning to school; her attempts to shelter him from rebuke and punishment; perhaps her privations, her sufferings, in widowhood; her heroic struggles to maintain appearances, and get her boy forward in the world; her delight, finally, in living to see him in that position of respectability which for