FELICIA HEMANS.

BY LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY.

NATURE doth mourn for thee.

There is no need

For man to strike his plaintive lyre and fail,
As fail he must, if he attempt thy praise.
The little plant that never sang before,

Save one sad requiem, when its blossoms fell,
Sighs deeply through its drooping leaves for thee,
As for a florist fallen. The ivy, wreathed

FELICIA HEMANS.

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Round the gray turrets of a buried race,

And the tall palm that like a prince doth rear
Its diadem 'neath Asia's burning sky,

With their dim legends blend thy hallowed name.
Thy music, like baptismal dew, did make
Whate'er it touched most holy. The pure shell,
Laying its pearly lip on Ocean's floor,

The cloistered chambers, where the sea-gods sleep,
And the unfathomed melancholy main,

Lament for thee, through all the sounding deeps.
Hark! from the snow-breasted Himmaleh to where
Snowdon doth weave his coronet of cloud,

From the scathed pine tree, near the red man's hut,
To where the everlasting banian builds

Its vast columnac temple, comes a moan

For thee, whose ritual made each rocky height

An altar, and each cottage-home, the haunt

Of Poesy.

Yea, thou didst find the link

That joins mute nature to ethereal mind,
And make that link a melody.

The couch

Of thy last sleep, was in the native clime
Of song and eloquence and ardent soul,
Spot fitly chosen for thee. Perchance, that isle
So loved of favouring skies, yet banned by fate,
Might shadow forth thine own unspoken lot.

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That angels poising on some silver cloud
Might linger mid the errands of the skies,
And listen, all unblamed.

How tenderly

Doth Nature draw her curtain round thy res And like a nurse, with finger on her lip, Watch, lest some step disturb thee, striving s From other touch, thy sacred harp to guard. Waits she thy waking, as the mother waits For some pale babe, whose spirit sleep hath s And laid it dreaming on the lap of Heaven? We say not thou art dead. We dare not. I For every mountain stream and shadowy dell Where thy rich harpings linger, would hurl b The falsehood on our souls. Thou spak'st ali The simple language of the freckled flower, And of the glorious stars. God taught it thee And from thy living intercourse with man Thou shalt not pass away, until this earth Drops her last gem into the doom's-day flame. Thou hast but taken thy seat with that blest c Whose hymns thy tuneful spirit learned so we From this sublunar terrace, and so long

Interpreted.

mix thee with its household charities, age shall greet thee with his benison, Woman shrine thee as a vestal flame the temples of her sanctity,

he young child shall take thee by the hand ravel with a surer step to Heaven.

AN INVITATION.

RY WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK.

"They that seek me early shall find me."

COME, while the blossoms of thy years are brig Thou youthful wanderer in a flowery maze, Come, while the restless heart is bounding ligh And joy's pure sunbeams tremble in thy ways Come, while sweet thoughts, like summer-buds Waken rich feelings in the careless breast, While yet thy hand the ephemeral wreath is h Come, and secure interminable rest!

Soon will the freshness of thy days be over, And thy free buoyancy of soul be flown; Pleasure will fold her wing, and friend and love Will to the embraces of the worm have gone; Those who now love thee, will have passed for Their looks of kindness will be lost to thee; Thou wilt need balm to heal thy spirit's fever, As thy sick heart broods over years to be!