She prays that a father's love may shrine
His opening youth with a trust divine;
That the world in its varied forms of ill
May never his guileless bosom fill,
But all unsullied, the heavenly flame
May return to Him from whom it came.

O! more and earnest that mother's prayer
As her sighs are breathed on the midnight air :
Her own sad fate she has all forgot,-

The unkindness that wounds her daily lot;
The neglect that leaves her to

weep unknown ;Her heart is full of her child alone.

And the prayer is heard-it is traced above,
In the glowing light of a mother's love;
A few short days-she must fade and die,
And the baby will heed not her farewell sigh;
But when she is laid in her youthful grave,
That prayer shall have power to shield and save.

O human love! what a load it would be,
Fearful and sad, to cherish thee,

In a world where all things lovely fly

The delighted gaze of the dreamer's eye,
But for the hope that cannot fade,

For the clear bright faith that knows no shade!

For there is a land where the smile is true,
Where the cheek has ever a healthy hue,-
Where the heart for unkindness weeps no more,
And the thousand fears of earth are o'er;
And in that land, oh! is it not sweet

To think that the mother and child will meet?

ON A CHILD SLEEPING IN A THUNDER

STORM.

THE REV. J. JOHNS.

BEAUTIFUL innocence, that thus can sleep,
While the sky flushes pale, like hate in ire;
And near and nearer, deeper and more deep,

The thunder's roar fills up the chasms of fire!
Thou art a type of that we should desire,
Were our desires and wisdom's one-of peace,
Centred within, that no commotion dire
Can from without unsettle-that at ease
(Like the Christ sleeping on the battling seas,
Or thou beneath the thunder, gentle child,)
Into its own calm depths can turn, and please
Itself with its own heavenly dreams, though wild
The lightnings quiver and the thunders roll:-
Yes, the true fearless is the guiltless soul.

THE POET'S BIRTH-NIGHT.

THERE's joy in yonder Cottage-home, half hid By the tall iinden o'er the roof which towers; There's light in every window-pane, amid

Its veil of rose and honeysuckle flowers; There's joy for perils past, for bliss possessed. Three laid them down at evening there to rest,— Four shall awaken to the sun at morn,

For lo!-to hope and fear, an infant one is born!

An infant one!--could such a stranger bless
The dreary silence of the Baron's hall,
Lighting with cherub smile the loneliness

Of gloomy court and turret grey and tall;
How would glad trumpets spread abroad the tale,
And blazing bonfires light the narrow vale;
And costly jewels pile the chapel shrine,
To hail the new-born heir of that old waning line!

A deeper, purer gratitude is here,

Though not by beacon-blaze or trumpet told, For love-the love which never learned to fearDoth that small band in golden circlet hold;

And he, that welcome Babe, though not with

down

Of the white Arctic birds his couch be strewn,

A lip so rose-like and a brow so fair,

A queen might well be proud upon her breast to

bear!

Upon that night, so beautiful and mild,

When heaven was all one cloud of stars and dew, The night that did awake the peasant child

To earth, a fairy region bright and new, A lonely wanderer came to muse and dream Beside the mirror of the wide clear stream, And by the witchery of that hour unsealed, To his enchanted eye a vision was revealed.

The blue heavens parted-like the crystal arch
Cleft by the prophet's rod who smote the sea,
And from their burning depths in stately march
Came slowly forth a solemn company,
Each with his lyre of gold, his robe of snow,
A wreath of laurel circled every brow,

And swelled the increasing strain of many lyres,
As on their way they past our mighty Poet slow.

And first among the great and gifted came

The seers of olden time, to whom 't was given To see the Highest in his car of flame

And hear his voice in the still groves at even,

Who spoke his messages to despot kings,

And bade destroying angels wave their wings,— And when to heaven their hands in prayer were spread,

Huge crime-stained cities fell, and haughty hosts lay dead

And followed close behind the prophet throng,
The old blind Bard who sang the tale of Troy,
The mighty monarch of the lyric song;

And she who died enamoured of a boy,

The Lesbian swan-and many a Grecian bard Whose song and name have passed from the regard Of vain capricious Fame, with those whose lays With Rome's proud triumphs swept along her marble ways.

And there were more than these ;-there came the shade

Of him, whose Hippogryff uncurbed by rein, As some wild child, amid a garden played, Through the gay fields of fancy's rich domain, Who sung of mad Orlando's feats; and he The Holy city's bard, elate and free; And he, the lofty one whom Beatrice led Through the dark spirit-land to commune with the

dead.

T