The Snow Flake. HANNAH F. GOULD.

Now, if I fall, will it be my lot

'To be cast in some low and lonely spot, To melt, and to sink unseen or forgot

And then will my course be ended?" 'Twas thus a feathery Snow-Flake said, As down through the measureless space it strayed, Or, as half by dalliance, half afraid,

It seemed in mid air suspended.

"O, no," said the Earth," thou shalt not lie,
Neglected and lone, on my lap to die,
Thou pure and delicate child of the sky;
For thou wilt be safe in my keeping;

But, then, I must give thee a lovelier form;
Thou❜lt not be a part of the wintry storm,

But revive when the sunbeams are yellow and warm,
And the flowers from my bosom are peeping.

"And then thou shalt have thy choice to be
Restored in the lily that decks the lea,
In the jessamine bloom, the anemone,
Or aught of thy spotless whiteness;

To melt, and be cast in a glittering bead,

With the pearls that the night scatters over the mead In the cup where the bee and the fire-fly feed, Regaining thy dazzling brightness ;

"To wake, and be raised from thy transient sleep, When Viola's mild blue eye shall weep,

In a tremulous tear, or a diamond leap

In a drop from the unlocked fountain;

Or, leaving the valley, the meadow and heath,
The streamlet, the flowers, and all beneath,
and be wove in the silvery wreath
Encircling the brow of the mountain.

To go

..

Or, wouldst thou return to a home in the skies,
To shine in the Iris I'll let thee arise,

And appear in the many and glorious dyes
A pencil of sunbeams is blending.
But true, fair thing, as my name is Earth,
I'll give thee a new and vernal birth,

When thou shalt recover thy primal worth,
And never regret descending!"

"Then I will drop," said the trusting flake;
"But bear it in mind that the choice I make
Is not in the flowers nor the dew to awake,

Nor the mist that shall pass with the morning: For, things of thyself, they expire with thee; But those that are lent from on high, like me, They rise, and will live, from thy dust set free, To the regions above returning.

"And if true to thy word, and just thou art,
Like the spirit that dwells in the holiest heart,
Unsullied by thee, thou wilt let me depart,
And return to my native heaven;

For I would be placed in the beautiful bow,
From time to time, in thy sight to glow,
So thou may'st remember the Flake of Snow
By the promise that God hath given."

"I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life."— ANONYMOUS.

THOU art the Way-and he who sighs,
Amid this starless waste of wo,

To find a pathway to the skies,

A light from heaven's eternal glow,

By thee must come, thou gate of love,

Through which the saints undoubting trod;

Till faith discovers, like the dove,

An ark, a resting place in God.

Thou art the Truth-whose steady day

Shines on through earthly blight and bloom,

The pure, the everlasting ray,

The lamp that shines e'en in the tomb;
The light, that out of darkness springs,
And guideth those that blindly go;

The word, whose precious radiance flings
Its lustre upon all below.

Thou art the Life-the blessed well,
With living waters gushing o'er,

Which those who drink shall ever dwell Where sin and thirst are known no more; Thou art the mystic pillar given,

Our lamp by night, our light by day; Thou art the sacred bread from heaven;Thou art the Life-the Truth-the Way.

The Iceberg.-J. O. ROCKWELL.

'Twas night-our anchored vessel slept
Out on the glassy sea;

And still as heaven the waters kept,
And golden bright—as he,

The setting sun, went sinking slow
Beneath the eternal wave;

And the ocean seemed a pall to throw
Over the monarch's grave.

There was no motion of the air
To raise the sleeper's tress,

And no wave-building winds were there,
On ocean's loveliness;

But ocean mingled with the sky

With such an equal hue,

That vainly strove the 'wildered eye

To part their gold and blue.

And ne'er a ripple of the sea

Came on our steady gaze,

Save when some timorous fish stole out
To bathe in the woven blaze,-

When, flouting in the light that played

All over the resting main,

He would sink beneath the wave, and dart To his deep, blue home again.

Yet, while we gazed, that sunny eve,
Across the twinkling deep,

A form came ploughing the golden wave,
And rending its holy sleep;

It blushed bright red, while growing on
Our fixed, half-fearful gaze;

But it wandered down, with its glow of light,
And its robe of sunny rays.

It seemed like molten silver, thrown
Together in floating flame;

And as we looked, we named it, then,

The fount whence all colors came:

There were rainbows furled with a careless grace,
And the brightest red that glows;
The purple amethyst there had place,
And the hues of a full-blown rose.

And the vivid green, as the sun-lit grass
Where the pleasant rain hath been;
And the ideal hues, that, thought-like, pass
Through the minds of fanciful men;

They beamed full clear-and that form moved on,
Like one from a burning grave;

And we dared not think it a real thing,

But for the rustling wave.

The sun just lingered in our view,
From the burning edge of ocean,
When by our bark that bright one passed
With a deep, disturbing motion:
The far down waters shrank away,
With a gurgling rush upheaving,
And the lifted waves grew pale and sad,
Their mother's bosom leaving.

Yet, as it passed our bending stern,
In its throne-like glory going,

It crushed on a hidden rock, and turned
Like an empire's overthrowing.

The uptorn waves rolled hoar,-and, huge,
The far-thrown undulations

Swelled out in the sun's last, lingering smile,
And fell like battling nations.

Hymn.-J. PIERPONT.

BORNE by the tempest, on we sail

O'er ocean's billowy way;

One glorious orb by day we hail,

By night one faithful ray.

Thus God his undivided light

Pours on life's troubled wave;

Thus hope, meek star, through death's still night,
Looks on the Christian's grave.

Monarch of heaven, Eternal One,
On thee our spirit calls;

To thee, as followers of thy Son,
We consecrate these walls.

These arches, springing to the sky,
This lightly swelling dome,
That lifts to heaven its starry eye,-
Be these, O God, thy home.

And wilt thou, Omnipresent, deign
Within these walls to dwell?-
Then shalt thou hear our holiest strain,
Our organ's proudest swell.

Devotion's eye shall drink the light
That richly gushes through
Our simple dome of spotless white,
From thine, of cloudless blue.

And Faith, and Penitence, and Love,
And Gratitude, shall bend

To thee:-O hear them from above,
Our Father and our Friend.

The Bride.-ANONYMOUS.

Ir hath passed, my daughter; fare thee well!
Pledged is the faith, inscribed the vow;
Yet let these gushing tear-drops speak,
Of all thy mother's anguish now;
And when, on distant, stranger-shores,

Love beams from brighter eyes than mine,
When other hands thy tresses weave,
And other lips are pressed to thine,-