286 THE DREAMER. But where the incessant din Of iron hands and roar of brazen throats While the long Summer-day is pouring in, On wintry nights, just covered from the sky; And yet I dream Dream, were man more just, I might have been And yet I dream I, the despised of fortune, lift mine eye, And yet I dream— Dream of a sleep where dreams no more shall come, My last, my first, my only welcome home. Rest, unbeheld since life's beginning stage, THE MINSTREL BOY. THE FALLEN WIFE.-PHILLIPS. 287 ELL might she lament over her fallen fortunes! well might WELL she mourn over the memory of days when the sun of heaven seemed to rise but for her happiness! well might she recall the home she had endeared, the children she had nursed, the hapless husband, of whose life she was the pulse! But one short week before, this earth could not reveal a lovelier vision:--virtue blessed, affection followed, beauty beamed on her: the light of every eye, the charm of every heart, she moved along in cloudless chastity, cheered by the song of love, and circled by the splendors she created! Behold her now, the loathsome refuse of an adulterous bed; festering in the very infection of her crime; the scoff and scorn of their unmanly, merciless, inhuman author! But thus it ever is with the votaries of guilt; the birth of their crime is the death of their enjoyment; and the wretch who flings his offering on its altar falls an immediate victim to the flame of his devotion. I am glad it is so; it is a wise, retributive dispensation; it bears the stamp of a preventive Providence. I rejoice it is so, in the present instance, first, because this premature infliction must insure repentance in the wretched sufferer: and next, because, as this adulterous fiend has rather acted on the suggestions of his nature than his shape, by rebelling against the finest impulse of man, he has made himself an outlaw from the sympathies of humanity. Why should he expect that charity from you, which he would not spare even to the misfortunes he had inflicted? For the honor of the form in which he is disguised, I am willing to hope he was so blinded by his vice that he did not see the full extent of those misfortunes. If he had feelings capable of being touched, it is not to the faded victim of her own weakness and of his wickedness that I would direct them. There is something in her crime which affrights charity from its commiseration. THE MINSTREL BOY.-THOMAS MOORE. HE minstrel boy to the war is gone; THE In the ranks of Death you'll find him. His father's sword he has girded on, And his wild harp slung behind him. 288 ABOUT HUSBANDS. "Land of song," said the warrior-bard, The minstrel fell: but the foeman's chain Thy songs were made for the pure and the free; ABOUT HUSBANDS.-J. G. SAXE. OHNSON was right. I don't agree to all JOH The solemn dogmas of that rough old stager; Johnson was right. Although some men adore Of his own grub than of his spouse's grammar. I know it is the greatest shame in life; But who among us (save, perhaps ourself), What beef-not books-she has upon the shelf? Though Greek and Latin be the lady's boast, Or if, as fond ambition may command, Some home-made verse the happy matron show him, What mortal spouse but from her dainty hand Would sooner see a pudding than a poem ? THE "HOLLY AND IVY" GIRL. Young lady-deep in love with Tom or Harry- A very man, with something of a brute A very man, not one of nature's clods With human feeling, whether saint or sinner; 289 THE "HOLLY AND IVY" GIRL.-J. KEEGAN. COM YOME, buy my nice, fresh ivy, and my holly-sprigs so green; Come, buy from me, good Christians, and let me home, I pray, Year's Day.' 6 "Ah! won't you take my ivy ?-the loveliest ever seen! Ah! won't you have my holly-boughs?—all you who love the green! Do!-take a little bunch of each, and on my knees I'll pray Day. "This wind is black and bitter, and the hailstones do not spare My shivering form, my bleeding feet, and stiff, entangled hair; Then, when the skies are pitiless, be merciful, I say— So Heaven will light your Christmas and the coming New-Year's Day." 'Twas thus a dying maiden sung, whilst the cold hail rattled down, And fierce winds whistled mournfully o'er Dublin's dreary town ;- 290 THE LAKE of the dISMAL SWAMP. One stiff hand clutched her ivy-sprigs and holly-boughs so fair, So grim and statue-like she seemed, 'twas evident that Death 'Twas in that broad, bleak Thomas-street I heard the wanderer sing; I stood a moment in the mire, beyond the ragged ring;— The ghostlike singer still sung on, but no one came to buy; Day!' وو * * * * On New-Year's Day I said my prayers above a new-made grave, way, And now enjoys, with sister saints, an endless New-Year's Day. THE LAKE OF THE DISMAL SWAMP.-THOMAS Moore. "THEY made her a grave too cold and damp For a soul so warm and true; And she's gone to the Lake of the Dismal Swamp, She paddles her white canoe. |