The winter's harbinger had still'd

That soul of song which cheer'd the scene.

With visage pale, and tottering gait,
As one who hears his parting knell,
I saw a youth disconsolate ;—

He came to breathe his last farewell.

"Thou grove!-how dark thy gloom to me!
Thy glories riven by autumn's breath!
In every falling leaf I see

A threatening messenger of death.

"O Esculapius!* in my ear

Thy melancholy warnings chime :-
'Fond youth! bethink thee, thou art here
A wanderer for the last, last time.

"Thy spring will winter's gloom o'ershade,
Ere yet the fields are white with snow;

Ere yet the latest flowerets fade,

Thou, in thy grave, wilt sleep below.'

"I hear the hollow murmuring—

The cold wind rolling o'er the plain-
Alas! the brightest days of spring

How swift! how sorrowful! how vain!

"O wave, ye dancing boughs, O wave!
Perchance to-morrow's dawn may see
My mother weeping on my grave:

Then consecrate my memory.

*In the Greek mythology, the cock was one of the animals consecrated to Esculapius, the god of medicine.

"I see, with loose, dishevelled hair, Covering her snowy bosom, come The angel of my childhood there,

And dew, with tears, my early tomb.

"Then in the autumn's silent eve,
With fluttering wing and gentlest tread,
My spirit its calm bed shall leave,
And hover o'er the mourner's head."

Then he was silent;-faint and slow
His steps retraced. He came no more:
The last leaf trembled on the bough,
And his last pang of life was o'er.

Beneath the aged oaks he sleeps:-
The angel of his childhood there
No watch around his tombstone keeps;
But, when the evening stars appear,

The woodman, to his cottage bound,
Close to that grave is wont to tread:
But his rude footsteps, echoed round,
Break not the silence of the dead.

RELIGION.

THROUGH shades and solitudes profound The fainting traveller wends his way; Bewildering meteors glare around,

And tempt his wandering feet astray.

Welcome, thrice welcome to his eye
The sudden moon's inspiring light,
When forth she sallies through the sky,
The guardian angel of the night.

Thus mortals blind and weak below
Pursue the phantom bliss in vain ;
The world's a wilderness of wo,
And life's a pilgrimage of pain!

Till mild Religion from above

Descends, a sweet engaging form,
The messenger of heavenly love,
The bow of promise 'mid the storm.

Ambition, pride, revenge, depart,
And folly flies her chastening rod;
She makes the humble, contrite heart
A temple of the living God.

Beyond the narrow vale of time,
Where bright celestial ages roll,

To scenes eternal, scenes sublime,
She points the way, and leads the soul.

At her approach, the grave appears
The gate of paradise restored;

Her voice the watching cherub hears,
And drops his double flaming sword.

Baptized with her renewing fire,

May we the crown of glory gain; Rise when the hosts of heaven expire, And reign with God, forever reign.

"HE SHALL FLY AWAY AS A DREAM."

I DREAMED :—I saw a rosy child,

With flaxen ringlets, in a garden playing;

Now stooping here, and then afar off straying,
As flower or butterfly his feet beguiled.

'T was changed: one summer's day I stepped aside,
To let him pass; his face had manhood's seeming,
And that full eye of blue was fondly beaming
On a fair maiden, whom he call'd his bride.

Once more: 't was evening, and the cheerful fire
I saw a group of youthful forms surrounding,
The room with harmless pleasantry resounding;
And, in the midst, I mark'd the smiling sire.

The heavens were clouded-and I heard the tone
Of a slow-moving bell: the white-hair'd man had
gone.

THE HARP OF JUDAH.

SWEET harp of Judah! shall thy sound
No more be heard on earthly ground,
Nor mortal raise the lay again,

That rung through Judah's sainted reign?

No-for to higher worlds belong

The wonders of thy sacred song;

Thy prophet-bards might sweep thy chords,
Thy glorious burden was the Lord's.

Thy lay, descending from above,

Full fraught with justice, truth, and love;
His Spirit breathed and mingled there
As much of heaven as earth could bear.

Kind was its tone-its warning plain ;
But rebel Israel scorn'd the strain;
Proud, careless, unabash'd, they trod,
Nor own'd the voice of Zion's God.

Then fell at length his vengeful stroke;
The necks that scorn'd to bend he broke ;
The shrine his hand had guarded well,
Himself destroy'd-and Zion fell.

Final and unretrieved her fall:

The heathen ploughshare razed her wall,
And o'er the race of Judah's kings

Rome's slaughtering eagle clapp'd her wings.

Yet, harp of Judah! rung thy strain,
And woke thy glories not in vain;

Yet, though in dust thy frame be hurl'd,
Thy spirit rules a wider world.

Though faintly swell thy notes sublime,
Far distant-down the stream of time;
Yet to our ears the sounds are given,
And even thy echo tells of heaven.

Through worlds remote-the old—the new; Through realms nor Rome nor Israel knew; The Christian hears-and by thy tone, Sweet harp of Judah! tunes his own.