changed. Yes, sit by our hearth-stones, and sing there, when we shall be gathered to the fathers. When by our children's children our memory is forgotten, thou shalt still be remembered; thou shalt list thy voice of melody to unborn ages, and tell them of the Better Land. Mrs. SIGOURNEY.

MRS. SIGOURNEY.

LESSON XX.
DEATH OF MRS. HEMANS.
Bring flowers to crown the cup and lute;

Bring flowers, the bride is near;
Bring flowers to soothe the captive's cell,

Bring flowers to strew the bier :
Bring flowers; thus said the lovely song ;

And shall they not be brought
To her who linked the offering

With feeling and with thought?
Bring flowers, the perfumed and the pure,

Those with the morning dew,
A sigh in every fragrant leaf,

A tear on every hue.
So pure, so sweet thy life has been,

So filling earth and air
With odors and with loveliness,

Till common scenes grew fair.
Thy song around our daily path

Flung beauty born of dreams,
That shadows on the actual world

The spirit's sunny gleams.
Mysterious influence, that on earth

Brings down the Heaven above,
And fills the universal heart

With universal love.
And thou from far and foreign lands

Didst bring back many a tone,
And giving such new music still,

A music of thine own.,
A lofty strain of generous thoughts,

And yet subdued and sweet,
An angel's song, who sings of earth,

Whose cares are at his feet.

And yet thy song is sorrowful,

Its beauty is not bloom ;
The hopes of which it breathes, are hopes

That look beyond the tomb;
Thy song is sorrowful as winds

That wander o'er the plain,
And ask for summer's banished flowers,

And ask for them in vain.

Ah! dearly purchased is the gift,

The gift of song like thine:
A fated doom is hers who stands,

The priestess of the shrine.
The crowd, they only see the crown,

They only hear the hymn;
They mark not that the cheek is pale,

And that the eye is dim.
Wound to a pitch too exquisite,

The soul's fine chords are wrung; With misery and melody

They are too highly strung.
The heart is made too sensitive

The daily pain to bear;
It beats in music, but it beats

Beneath a deep despair.
It never meets the love it paints,

The love for which it pines;
Too much of Heaven is in the faith

That such a heart enshrines,
The meteor wreath the poet wears,

Must make a lonely lot;
It dazzles, only to divied

From those who wear it not.
Let others thank thee; 'twas for them

Thy soft leaves thou didst wreathe;
The red rose wastes itself in sighs

Whose sweetness others breathe!
And they have thanked thee; many a lip

Has asked of thine for words,
When thoughts, life's finer thoughts, have touched

The spirit's inmost chords.

How many loved and honored thee

Who only knew thy name;

Which o'er the weary, working world

Like starry music came!
With what still hours of calm delight

Thy songs and image blend!
I cannot choose but think thou wert

An old familiar friend.
The charms that dwell in songs of thine

My inmost spirit moved ;
And yet I feel as thou hadst been

Not half enough beloved.
They say that thou wert faint and worn

With suffering and with care;
What music must have filled the soul

That had so much to spare! Miss L. E. Landon.

LESSON XXI.

THE TWO VOICES. · Two solemn voices, in a funeral strain, Met, as rich sunbeams and dark bursts of rain

Meet in the sky: “ Thou art gone hence !” one sang, " our light is flown, Our beautiful, that seemed too much our own

Ever to die!
“ Thou art gone hence ! our joyous hills among,
Never again to pour thy soul in song,

When spring-flowers rise ;
Never the friend's familiar step to meet,
With loving laughter, and the welcome sweet

Of thy glad eyes.” “ Thou art gone home, gone home !" then high and clear, Warbled that other voice; “ thou hast no tear

Again to shed ;
Never to fold the robe o'er secret pain,
Never, weighed down by Memory's clouds, again

To bow thy head.
“ Thou art gone home! oh! early crowned and blest!
Where could the love of that deep heart find rest

With aught below ?
Thou must have seen rich dream by dream decay,
All the bright rose-leaves drop from life away;

Thrice blessed to go !”

Yet sighed again that breeze-like voice of grief,
“ Thou art gone hence! alas ! that aught so brief,

So loved should be ;
Thou tak'st our summer hence; the flower, the tone,
The music of our being, all in one,

Depart with thee!
“ Fair form, young spirit, morning vision fled !
Canst thou be of the dead, the awful dead ?

The dark unknown?
Yes! to the dwelling where no footsteps fall,
Never again to light up hearth or hall,

Thy smile is gone!"
“ Home, home !" once niore the exulting voice arose;
• Thou art gone home! from that divine repose

Never to roam !
Never to say farewell, to weep in vain,
To read of change, in eyes beloved, again:

Thou art gone home!
6 By the bright waters now thy lot is cast;
Joy for thee, happy friend ! thy bark hath passed

The rough sea's foam !
Now the long yearnings of thy soul are stilled,
Home ! home! thy peace is won, thy heart is filled,

Thou art gone home!”

MRS. HEMANS.

LESSON XXII.

THE ANGEL'S GREETING.

Come to the land of peace ! Come where the tempest hath no longer sway, The shadow passes from the soul away,

The sounds of weeping cease.

Fear hath no dwelling there, .. Come to the mingling of repose and love, Breathed by the silent spirit of the dove

Through the celestial air'

Come to the bright, and blest,
And crowned forever! ’mid that shining band,
Gathered to Heaven's own wreath from every land,

Thy spirit shall find rest.

Thou hast been long alone ::
Come to thy mother! on the Sabbath shore,
The heart that rocked thy childhood, back once more

Shall take its wearied one.

In silence wert thou left ?
Come to thy sisters ! joyously again
All the home-voices, blent in one sweet strain,

Shall greet their long bereft.

Over thine orphan head
The storm has swept, as o'er a willow's bough:
Come to thy Father! it is finished now :

Thy tears have all been shed.

In thy divine abode,
Change finds no pathway, memory no dark trace,
And, oh! bright victory! death by love no place :
Come, spirit, to thy God !

MRS. HEMANS.

LESSON XXIII. EVENING PRAYER AT A GIRL'S SCHOOL. Hush! 'tis a holy hour; the quiet room

Seems like a temple, while yon soft lamp sheds A faint and starry radiance, through the gloom

And the sweet stillness, down on bright young heads, With all their clustering locks, untouched by care, And bowed, as flowers are bowed with night, in prayer.

Gaze on ! 'tis lovely! childhood's lip and cheek

Mantling beneath its earnest brow of thought; Gaze! yet what seest thou in those fair, and meek,

And fragile things, as but for sunshine wrought? Thou seest what grief must nurture for the sky, What death must fashion for eternity.

Oh! joyous creatures, that will sink to rest,

Lightly, when those pure orisons are done, As birds, with slumber's honey-dew oppressed,

'Mid the dim folded leaves, at set of sun; Lift up your hearts ! though yet no sorrow lies Dark in the summer-heaven of those clear eyes;

Though fresh within your breasts the untroubled springs

Of hope make melody where'er ye tread;