WE ARE SEVEN.

-A simple child,

That lightly draws its breath, And feels its life in every limb, What should it know of death?

I met a little cottage girl;

She was eight years old, she said; Her hair was thick with many a curl That clustered round her head.

She had a rustic, woodland air,
And she was wildly clad :
Her eyes were fair, and very fair-
Her beauty made me glad.

"Sisters and brothers, little maid, How many may you be?"

"How many? Seven in all," she said,

And wondering look'd at me.

And where are they? I pray you tell."

She answered: Seven are we ;

And two of us at Conway dwell,

And two are gone to sea.

"Two of us in the churchyard lie,

My sister and my brother;

And in the churchyard cottage I

Dwell near them with my mother."

(6 You say that two at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea,

Yet ye are seven! I pray you tell,
Sweet maid, how this may be?

Then did the little maid reply:
"Seven boys and girls are we ;
Two of us in the churchyard lie,
Beneath the churchyard tree."

"You run about, my little maid,
Your limbs they are alive;
If two are in the churchyard laid,
Then ye are only five."

"Their graves are green, they may be seen," The little maid replied,

Twelve steps or more from my mother's door, And they are side by side.

"My stockings there I often knit,

My kerchief there I hem;
And there upon the ground I sit-
I sit and sing to them.

"And often after sunset, sir,
When it is light and fair,
I take my little porringer,
And eat my supper there.

"The first that died was little Jane ;
In bed she moaning lay,

Till God released her of her pain;

And then she went away.

So in the churchyard she was laid; And when the grass was dry, Together round her grave we play'd, My brother John and I.

And when the ground was white with snow,
And I could run and slide,

My brother John was forced to go,

And he lies by her side."

How many are you, then? said I,

"If they two are in heaven?"

The little maiden did reply:

"Oh, master, we are seven !"

But they are dead-those two are dead,
Their spirits are in Heaven!"

"T was throwing words away, for still
The little maid would have her will,
And said: "Nay, we are seven !"

TO THE RIVER DUDDON.

I thought of thee, my partner and my guide,
As being passed away-vain sympathies !
For backward, Duddon ! as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide :

Still glides the stream, and shall not cease to glide ;

The form remains, the function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We men, who in our morn of youth defied
The elements, must vanish ;—be it so !
Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,

Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent dower,

We feel that we are greater than we know.

Sir Walter Scott.

1771-1832.

REBECCA'S HYMN.

When Israel, of the Lord beloved,
Out from the land of bondage came,
Her fathers' God before her moved,
An awful guide in smoke and flame.
By day, along the astonished lands,
The cloudy pillar glided slow;
By night, Arabia's crimsoned sands
Returned the fiery column's glow.

There rose the choral hymn of praise,
And trump and timbrel answered keen ;
And Zion's daughters poured their lays,

With priest's and warrior's voice between.

No portents now our foes amaze,

Forsaken Israel wanders lone;

Our fathers would not know Thy ways,
And Thou hast left them to their own.

But present still, though now unseen,
When brightly shines the prosperous day,
Be thoughts of Thee a cloudy screen,
To temper the deceitful ray,

And O, when stoops on Judah's path
In shade and storm the frequent night,
Be Thou, long-suffering, slow to wrath,
A burning and a shining light!

Our harps we left by Babel's streams,-
The tyrant's jest, the Gentile's scorn,
No censer round our altar beams,

And mute are timbrel, harp, and horn.
But Thou hast said, The blood of goats,
The flesh of rams, I will not prize,-
A contrite heart, a humble thought,
Are mine accepted sacrifice.

THE LADY OF THE LAKE.

From "Canto I."

And now, to issue from the glen,
No pathway meets the wanderer's ken,
Unless he climb, with footing nice,
A far-projecting precipice.