Hope they had none, and death was very near;
Each heart was full of its own bitterness;
And yet in none appeared a craven fear—
They hushed the smothered groan, repressed the rising tear.
What were their thoughts in that terrific hour?
Surely to calm the heart, to cheer the mind,
The sense of duty done had mighty power:
They must have had that joy, for heaven is kind.
They thought, alas! of dear ones left behind :—
One of his wife, and of his little son;
One of his mother, paralysed and blind,
Whose sole support he was; and, dying, one
Thought of the grief of her, whose love in vain he won.
Through some minds rushed the memory of the past,
And all its deeds; but most, with upraised eyes,
And throbbing hearts, and words confused and fast,
Mercy implored, and pardon from the skies.
But higher, higher still the waters rise,
And higher, higher, higher yet, until,
Just as the boom of their last signal dies,
Down, down they go,-their ranks unbroken still, And, gurgling o'er their heads, the waves close dark and chill.
IN every land where burns the sun,
The fires of man's affliction glow;
every clime where rivers run,
The tears of sorrowing bosoms flow.
Where'er Night spreads her sable shade
Are hopes eclipsed, affections fade.
The sun shall leave no wrack behind,
Rivers run dry, night cease, ere sorrow leave mankind.
Nor any can elude its grasp,
Nor fail its awful face to see;
None can unloose its fatal clasp,
Or from its tyrant presence flee :
Love fails to assuage it, wine to drown,
Nor hot ambition casts it down
From the mind-throne.
It rules, while round, the wrecks of former realms are
God's messenger is woe full oft,
Leave it to tell its own command ;
Then will its voice be sweet and soft,
And thou shalt own a Father's hand.
Rebel not thou, nor seek to fly,
Or heavier will affliction lie,
And seem to give its message wrong;
Then useless is thy pain, and thy repentance long.
Give woe its will; aye, let it lash
Thy being, as waves lash the sand ;
Let all its force upon thee dash,
As tempests break upon the land;
And as when all the storm is o'er
The air is clearer than before,
And earth more fair, in fresher green,
So shall thy nature grow more strong and more
Oft fabled Nilus leaves his strand,
And far surrounding fields he laves ;
For miles along the level land
Extends the empire of the waves.
But short his reign; the weeks roll on,
And his appointed time is gone ;
Back to his olden bed goes he,
But leaves the land enriched with new fertility.
ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT BROTHER. 19
And so when sorrow floods the mind,
As if to drown the hopes and loves;
The doom which seems to us unkind,
A discipline and blessing proves.
It crushes out our former shames;
It gives a life to nobler aims;
True souls are holiest when sad :
Then mourn not woe's approach, be thankful, and be glad.
In Scotland, as subsides the storm,
Forth from his cot the peasant strides,
Hoping to find the bright cairngorm
Gleaming upon the mountain sides:
The rains but wash the earth away,
And thus reveal the starry ray;
And so the mind, by sorrow's tear,
Is purged from all its dross, and all its gems appear.
And every soul must be baptized
By washing of repentant tears;
Nor any are emparadised
In happiness of endless years,
Who have not felt the chastening rod,
Which comes in mercy from our God.
To reach the heavenly Canaan, we
Must pass through Jordan's stream of woe and misery.
ON THE DEATH OF AN INFANT BROTHER.
HEAVEN opened for a little while,
We saw supernal glories smile;
It closed full soon.
A star electric lit the sky,
Then sank beneath a cloud to die,
At night's cold noon.
'Twas so our angel left the skies,
Bright with the shine of paradise;
A short-lived stay
Made he, up-pointing with his hand,
And teaching of that sunny land,-
Then sped away.
As the rich rainbow's glimmer tells
How briefly on the cloud it dwells;
Or as the smile
Upon the mourner's dewy face
Finds an unwilling resting-place
A little while ;-
His eyes looked strangely on the earth,
Nor could men understand the birth
Of glory there;
But those who loved him wept to trace
The death-hues gathering on that face,
So young, so fair!
Death's cloud passed o'er, and darkly passed,
And left our weeping souls down cast!-
He sped afar :
With Him who loved such babes, with Christ,
He rests above, emparadised,
I SAW an angel, with fair golden tresses,
Entering a room where a maiden lay dying ;
Folding the maid in the fondest caresses,
Then far away flying.
I saw a cherub, with sunniest smiling,
Approaching a child on its mother's lap dying,
Calming the child with the softest beguiling,
Then far away flying.
I saw a spirit, with countenance doomful,
Touching a man in the prime of life dying;
Beckoning with air that was solemn and gloomful,
Then far away flying.
I saw a fiend, on the fierce storm-wind riding, Approaching a sinner with loud curses dying; Striking him roughly with fearful deriding, Then far away flying.
But whether lovely, mournful, or grimly,
Appeared these strange visitants unto the dying,
Each with the same form was seen above dimly,
When far away flying.
SOFT as stirred memories,
Or a mother's lullabys,
Or the Psalm's melodious tide,
Heard among the graves outside,
Falls the snow.
Soft as distant hum of streams,
Or the voices of our dreams,
Falls the snow.
Soft as music of the spheres,
Audible to purest ears,
Or the beatings of the heart
As we from earth's scenes depart,
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