"I stand, while all around me lie

Composed in slumber long and deep:

Where darkness sits on every eye,

'Tis mine alone to wake and weep!
Amid the hearts that once would leap
In welcome of my coming feet,
I feel my lonely life-stream creep;
For not another breast will beat.

"The arms that spread so quick to twine Around me, now no more I fill:

The hand, once fondly locked in mine,
Is here beside me, cold and still.

I sigh, I feel, I think alone;

For not a dream is passing here. 'Tis all oblivion! and my groan

Unheeded falls on every ear.

"And have the ties affection wove So close, so tender, ended thus? Does nature form our souls for love

To sport with, and to torture us?

I long this weary load of life

To lay aside, and be at rest,

To end at once the pain and strife That slowly now consume my breast.

"But earth! earth! earth! it is not so That I may yet thy part dismiss ; And forth to other scenes I go,

With all my soul confined to this!
For, when the busy world shall claim
That I amid its throngs appear,

I shall be there in form and name,
While all beside will linger here.

"I now must join the noisy crowd,
To hold their pleasures light as air;
Yet, not like one whom grief has bowed,
Or sorrow marked, will I be there.

The world's rude hand I would not trust
Too near my bosom's bleeding strings;
For these, beloved and hallowed dust!

'Twixt God and us are sacred things.

"Its careless eye shall never see

The wounds it has no balm to heal :

Its look of pity, turned on me,

I would not, could not bear to feel.

Before it I will wear a smile,

To veil the void it can not fill;

Though deep within my breast the while

I feel the arrow rankling still.

"The light of mirth may then be found Upon my lip, but there alone :

My voice may even mock its sound,

To drown my weeping spirit's moan.. But what's the heartless world to me, Since ye, my loved ones, slumber here?

I stand on earth, a blighted tree,

With winter round me all the year!"

"Thou barren tree!" a voice then said,

And to his soul: "with leaves and flowers

I've clothed thee well; and o'er thee shed

The richest gifts of sun and showers!

And now, if I should cut thee down,

For giving back no fruit to me, To lie beneath my withering frown, It were not rest and peace for thee!

"An earthly, dark, and sterile heart Yields not the fruits of faith and love, That should, for thine immortal part,

Be ripened here, and stored above. Frail man thy Maker's hand is kind. In each severe and chastening blow: The gold that is for Heaven refined, It tries and polishes below!"

H. F. GOULD.

VESPER HOUR.

WHEN vesper hour, with stilly spell,
Shall lead thee to her hermit cell,

Chasing from round, thy path away

The varied visions of the day;

When no vain dreams thy thoughts may share,

No lonely hope, no earth-born care;

What time thou bend'st the suppliant knee,

And pour'st thy fervent soul in prayer,

Blend not my memory with its ray,

The tissue of its hopes and fears,

Its promises of other years,

But when the chastened hour is come,

That bids my fancy cease to roam;