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AN HOUR WITH GOD.

ONE hour with Thee, my God! when daylight breaks
Over a world thy guardian care has kept,
When the fresh soul from soothing slumber wakes,
To praise the love that watched me while I slept;
When with new strength my blood is bounding free,
The first, best, sweetest hour, I'll give to Thee.

One hour with Thee, when busy day begins

Her never-ceasing round of bustling care,
When I must meet with toil, and pain, and sins,
And through them all thy cross must bear ;
O, then to arm me for the strife, to be
Faithful to death, I'll kneel an hour to Thee.

One hour with Thee, when rides the glorious sun
High in mid-heaven, and panting nature feels
Lifeless and overpowered, and man has done
: For one short hour with urging life's swift wheels;
In that deep pause my soul from care shall flee,
To make that hour of rest one hour with Thee.

One hour with Thee, when saddened twilight flings
Her soothing charm o'er lawn, and vale, and grove,
When there breathes up from all created things

The sweet enthralling sense of thy deep love;
And when its softening power descends on me,
My swelling heart shall spend an hour with Thee.

One hour with Thee, my God! when softly night
Climbs the high heaven with solemn step and slow,
When thy sweet stars, unutterably bright,

Are telling forth thy praise to men below;
O, then, while far from earth my thoughts would
flee,

I'll spend in prayer one joyful hour with Thee!

From the Journal of Commerce.

THE following Ode breathes a spirit which must commend itself to every patriotic citizen. It was written by the Rev. Dr. Gilman, of Charleston, and was sung at the 4th of July celebration, in 1832, by the Union Party of that city. I had the satisfaction to be present, and to assist in the choir. The procession had moved to the Baptist church to listen to an oration by Col. Drayton, one of the influential men of the Unionists, while the Nullifiers were headed by the great Hayne, by Hamilton, and others. I recollect one sentence of Col. Drayton's speech, which it may not be amiss to mention. Endeavoring to demonstrate the impracticability of nullification, Col. Drayton said: "To be in the Union and out of it, simultaneously, is not in the power of Omnipotence itself."

Hail, our country's natal morn!
Hail, our spreading kindred born!
Hail, thou banner, not yet torn,
Waving o'er the free!
While this day, in festal throng,
Millions swell the patriot's song,
Shall not we the notes prolong?

Hallowed Jubilee !

Who would sever Freedom's shrine?
Who would draw the invidious line?
Though by birth one spot be mine,
Dear is all the rest-

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THERE'S LIGHT BEHIND THE CLOUD!

In the lone and weary nights, my child,

When all around is drear;
When the moon is hidden by the clouds,
And grief and pain are near-

O, never think, my gentle boy,

In that gloomy, trying hour,
That thou art not protected still
By a kind Almighty Power!

Soon will those dark clouds roll away,
And the glorious stars appear;
And the pensive moon, with her calm, pale light,
Will shine in beauty clear.

There is an Eye above, my child,

That slumbers not, nor sleeps:
There is a Friend in heaven, love
Who still His vigil keeps.

And though in trouble's darkest hour
His face He seems to shroud,
Believe-remember-O, my child,
There's light behind the cloud!

Chambers' Journal,

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Thy noble heart forever, ever more?

Cold in the earth-and fifteen wild Decembers,

Or art thou near allied

Yet moving voiceless through the heavens wide-
To the bright spark that gilds the thunder-cloud?-
Piercing night's sable shroud.

Vain is each prying thought,

To find the source and nature of thy ray,
For thou art ever with deep mystery fraught,
We cannot cast away.

Worketh unchanging through all space and time,
He, whose stupendous plan
For unknown ends, thy fitful flames doth fan,
And laws for thee assign.

And He thy home hath cast

From those brown hills, have melted into spring : 'Mid seas of ice, unchanged by Summer's ray-
Faithful, indeed, is the spirit that remembers
After such years of change and suffering!

Sweet Love of youth, forgive, if I forget thee,
While the world's tide is bearing me along;
Other desires and other hopes beset me,
Hopes which obscure, but cannot do thee wrong!
No later light has lightened up my heaven,

No second morn has ever shone for me;
All my life's bliss from thy dear life was given,
All my life's bliss is in the grave with thee.
But, when the days of golden dreams had perished,
And even Despair was powerless to destroy;
Then did I learn how existence could be cherished,
Strengthened, and fed without the aid of joy.

Then did I check the tears of useless passion-
Weaned my young soul from yearning after
thine;

Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten

Down to that tomb already more than mine.
And, even yet, I dare not let it languish,
Dare not indulge in memory's rapturous pain;
Once drinking deep of that divinest anguish,
How could I seek the empty world again?

Ellis Bell.

From the Journal of Commerce.

THE AURORA BOREALIS.
OFT in the solemn night,

When Earth is veiled in darkness to the eye,
There comes a sudden and mysterious light
Within the azure sky!

'Tis not the twilight beam,
Nor the pale radiance of the starry throng,
Nor Cynthia's pensive ray, nor meteor's gleam,
Shooting the heavens along :

But a strange, shifting glow,
Bright'ning and fading, like to flickering flame-
High o'er the North, white columns upwards go-
Then die-then soar again.

Light of the dreary North,

Fain would we know thy far and hidden springs,
And on what bidding thou dost issue forth
In ghostlike wanderings.

Art thou the icy smile

Of Arctic oceans, streaming in the sky?
Or light from some unknown, volcanic pile,
Uptow'ring, huge and high,

On a far northern shore,

With giant craters gaping to a sea,
Fiery and vast, that deep within Earth's core
Burneth unceasingly?

'Mid frigid deserts, stretching far and vast,
Where life can never stay.

Yet doth thy nightly glow
Glad the far dwellers of the dreary North:
The Greenlander, amid the drifted snow,
Doth hail thy coming forth.

Thou cheerest Siberia's gloom,
Sweden's cold clime, and Norway's ice-girt shore;
And northern men their hardy toils resume
When thou dost brightly soar.

EDWIN S. HIGBIE.

Exeter, N. Y., Feb. 9th, 1850.

From Chambers' Journal

MY EEN ARE DIM WI' TEARS.

My een are dim wi' tears, John

My heart is sair wi' wae,

I lie an' watch the stars, John,
A wearying for the day;
Yet it winna bring me rest, John,
An' it canna bring me peace,
Till the clay is on my breast, John,
An' thocht and feeling cease!

I hae looed ye weel and lang, John
An' shall while I hae life;
But ye've caused me mony a pang, John,
Wha should hae been your wife.
Though ye never said a word, John,
My trusting heart to win,
Ye hae leed before the Lord, John,
An' that is deeper sin!

Ye're hand leed seeking mine, John,
When naebody could see;
And ye kissed it mony a time, John,
An' wasna that a lee?

An' your een leed looking love, John,
Whene'er they turned on me ;

An' your gifts, what did they pruve, John,
But love-or treachery?

An' your step leed coming here, John,
Sae aft in cauld an' rain,

For mony a happy year, John,
Whase memory is pain!

For I thocht the time would come, John,
When we nae mair would part;
Yet ye gaed without ae word, John,
To ease my breaking heart!
Ye cam' o' your ain will, John,
Ye saw that I was poor;
Ye kenn'd I was nae light o' love,
Ye should hae passed our door.
But I loo ye after a', John,

An' pray to God in heaven,
That I may be ta'en hame, John,
An' your deceit forgiven!

From the National Era.

THE MEN OF OLD.

BY J. G. WHITTIER.

WELL Speed thy mission, bold Iconoclast!
Yet all unworthy of its trust thou art,
If with dry eye, and cold, unloving heart,
Thou tread'st the solemn phantom of the past,
By the great Future's dazzling hope made blind
To all the beauty, power, and truth, behind.
Not without reverent awe should'st thou put by
The cypress branches and the amaranth blooms,
Where, with clasped hands of prayer, upon their
tombs

The effigies of old confessors lie,

God's witnesses; the voices of his will

Heard in the distant march of centuries still!
Such were the men at whose rebuking frown,
Dark with God's wrath, the tyrant's knee went
down;

Such from the terrors of the guilty drew
The vassal's freedom and the poor man's due.
St. Anselm (may he rest forevermore

In heaven's sweet peace!) forbid, of old, the sale
Of men as slaves, and from the church's pale
Hurled the Northumbrian buyers of the poor.
To ransom souls from bonds and evil fate,
St. Ambrose melted down the sacred plate-
Image of saint, the chalice and the pix,
Crosses of gold, and silver candlesticks;
"MAN 19 WORTH MORE THAN TEMPLES!" he replied
To such as came his holy work to chide.
And brave Cesarius, stripping altars bare,

And coining from the abbey's golden hoard The captive's freedom, answered to the prayer Or threat of those whose fierce zeal for the Lord Stifled their love of man; " An earthen dish

The last sad supper of the Master bore: Most miserable sinners, do ye wish

More than your Lord, and grudge his dying poor What your own pride and not his need require? Souls, than these shining gauds, he values more; Mercy, not sacrifice, his heart desires."

O, faithful worthies! resting far behind
In your Dark Ages; since ye fell asleep
Much labor has been done for human kind-
Shadows are scattered, wherein you groped blind;
Man claims his birthright, freer pulses leap
Through peoples driven in your day like sheep;
Yet, like your own, our age's sphere of light
Though widening still is walled around by night;
With slow, reluctant eye, the church has read,
Sceptic at heart, the lessons of its head;
Counting, too oft, its living members less
Than its walls' garnish and the pulpit's dress;
World-moving zeal with power to bless and feed
Life's fainting pilgrims to their utter need,
Instead of bread, holds out the stone of creed;
Sect builds and worships, where its Wealth and

Pride

And Vanity stand shrined and deified,
Careless that in the shadow of its walls
God's living temple into ruin falls.

We need, methinks, the prophet-hero still,
Saints true of life, and martyrs strong of will,
To tread the land, even now, as Xavier trod
The streets of Goa, barefoot, with his bell,
Proclaiming freedom in the name of God,

And startling tyrants with the fear of hell!
Soft words, smooth prophecies, are doubtless well,
But to rebuke the age's popular crime,

We need the souls of fire, the hearts of that old. time.

"I AM SO HAPPY!"

I SEE the faded writing, dated oh! so long ago; The clear round text is fairly traced by childish fingers slow;

'Tis but a simple record of inconstant hopes and fears,

But one short sentence written there I blot with falling tears.

It is this "I am so happy." But twenty years have flown

Since those pleasant words were writ to a loving playmate gone;

This is the hand that traced them, they were innocent and true,

This is the heart so buoyant then, as rosy moments flew.

I gaze upon the characters, I ponder o'er them yet; The many intervening years I struggle to forget; O, but to realize them now for one short fleeting hour,

The dark, dark shadows of this life ceasing awhile to lour !

"I am so happy"-well-a-day! those strange and thrilling words

Sound soft and sweetly as the song of wild and woodland birds,

In twilight glades at evening fall, when, 'mid the shiv'ring leaves,

A whispering of import sad our busy fancy weaves. May I not be a child once more? My second birth must be

No day-dream of a sickly mind, but blest reality; Then, then again those glorious words with truth I may indite

"I am so happy"-traced within in characters of light.

LAST WISHES OF A CHILD.

THE following beautiful little poem was written by James T. Fields for the Boston Book for 1850. "All the hedges are in bloom,

And the warm west wind is blowing-
Let me leave this stifled room,

Let me go where flowers are growing!
"Look! my cheek is thin and pale,
And my pulse is very low,
Ere my sight begins to fail,
Take my hand and let us go.
"Was not that the robin's song

Piping through the casement wide?
I shall not be listening long,
Take me to the meadow-side-

"Bear me to the willow-brook

Let me hear the merry mill-
On the orchard I must look,

Ere my beating heart is still.

"Faint and fainter grows my breath-
Bear me quickly down the lane ;
Mother dear, this chill is death-
I shall never speak again!"

Still the hedges are in bloom,

And the warm west wind is blowing;

Still we sit in silem gloom

O'er her grave the grass is growing.

From the Journal of Commerce.

A CEMETERY WITHOUT A MONUMENT.

MANY a tear has been dropped in memory of Capt. Ira Bursley, who, with his noble crew, after sending all the passengers ashore from the ill-fated Hottinguer, went down with her to the "6 cemetery without a monument."

Like the lamented Dustan, on board the Atlantic, he staid by his vessel until the last efforts were put forth to save the lives of others. One is reminded of Cooper's description of long Tom Coffin, which, though fiction, has proved the mournful truth concerning many a brave sailor. In looking over a volume of poems by Brainard, I copied his

LAMENT FOR LONG TOM.

Let us think of them that sleep
Full many a fathom deep,

By thy wild and stormy steep,
Elsinore !

Thy cruise is over now,

Thou art anchored by the shore,

And never more shalt thou

Hear the storm around thee roar;

Death has shaken out the sands of thy glass.
Now around thee sports the whale,
And the porpoise snuffs the gale,
And the night winds wake their wail,
As they pass.

The sea-grass round thy bier

Shall bend beneath the tide,
Nor tell the breakers near,

Where thy manly limbs abide;

But the granite rock thy tombstone shall be.
Though the edges of thy grave
Are the combings of the wave,
Yet unheeded they shall rave
Over thee.

At the piping of all hands,

When the Judgment signal's spread; When the islands and the lands

And the seas give up their dead,

And the North and the South shall come :
When the sinner is betrayed,
And the just man is afraid,
Then Heaven be thy aid,
Poor Tom.

From the Ohio State Journal.
THE CONVICT TO HIS MOTHER. *

I'VE wandered far from thee, mother,
Far from my happy home;

I've left the land that gave me birth,
In other climes to roam;

And time since then has rolled its years,

And marked them on my brow,
Yet I have often thought of thee-
I'm thinking of thee now.

I'm thinking on the day, mother,
When at thy tender side

You watched the dawning of my youth,
And kissed me in your pride;

Then brightly was my heart lit up
With hopes of future joy,

While your bright fancy honors wove

To deck thy darling boy.

These lines were written by a convict in the Ohio

Penitentiary, and inscribed, "To my mother."

I'm thinking of the day, mother,
When with such anxious care,
You lifted up your heart to Heaven-
Your hope, your trust was there.
Fond memory brings thy parting words,
While tears stole down your cheek;
Thy long, last, loving look told more
Than ever words could speak.

I'm far away from thee, mother;
No friend is near me now,
To soothe me with a tender word,
Or cool my burning brow;
The dearest ties affection wove

Are all now torn from me;
They left me when the trouble came-
They did not love like thee.

I'm lonely and forsaken now,
Unpitied and unblest ;

Yet still I would not have thee know
How sorely I'm distressed;

I know you would not chide, mother,
You would not give me blame,
But soothe me with your tender word,
And bid me hope again.

I would not have thee know, mother,
How brightest hopes decay-
The tempter with his baneful cup
Has dashed them all away;
And shame has left its venom sting
To rack with anguish wild-
Yet still I would not have thee know
The sorrows of thy child.

O, I have wandered far, mother,
Since I deserted thee,
And left thy trusting heart to break,
Beyond the deep blue sea!
O, mother! still I love thee well,
And long to hear thee speak,
And feel again thy balmy breath
Upon my care-worn cheek.

But, ah! there is a thought, mother,
Pervades my beating breast,
That thy freed spirit may have flown
To its eternal rest;

And while I wipe the tear away,
There whispers in my ear

A voice that speaks of heaven and thee,
And bids me seek thee there.

Ohio Penitentiary, Jan. 17, 1850.

ALPHA.

From the Missionary.

MALLEUS DOMINI.

Is not my word, saith the Lord, like a hammer, that breaketh the rock in pieces?-Jeremiah xxiii. 29.

SLEDGE of the Lord, beneath whose stroke
The rocks are rent, the heart is broke,

I hear thy pond'rous echoes ring,

And fall, a crushed and crumbled thing.

Meekly, these mercies I implore,

Through Him, whose cross our sorrows bore : On earth, thy new-creating grace;

In heaven, the very lowest place.

O, might I be a living stone,
Set in the pavement of thy throne!
For sinner saved, what place so meet,
As at the Saviour's bleeding feet?

G. W. D.

From the Daily News.
And in vain I ask my spirit

THE MUSIC GRINDERS.

You 're sitting on your window-seat, Beneath a cloudless moon;

You hear a sound, that seems to wear
The semblance of a tune-
As if a broken fife should strive
To drown a cracked bassoon.

And nearer, nearer still, the tide

Of music seems to come,

There's something like a human voice,

And something like a drum ;

You sit in speechless agony,

Until your ear is numb.

Poor "home, sweet home," should seem to be A very dismal place;

Your "auld acquaintance," all at once,

Is altered in the face;

Their discords sting through Burns and Moore
Like hedgehogs dressed in lace.

You think they are crusaders sent
From some infernal clime,
To pluck the eyes of Sentiment,
And dock the tail of Rhyme,
To crack the voice of Melody,

And break the legs of Time.
But, hark! the air again is still,

The music all is ground,

And silence, like a poultice, comes
To heal the blows of sound;

It cannot be it is—it is!

A hat is going round.

No! pay the dentist when he leaves
A fracture in your jaw,
And pay the owner of the bear

That stunned you with his paw,
And buy the lobster that has had
Your knuckles in his claw.

But, if you are a portly man,
Put on your fiercest frown,
And talk about a constable

To turn them out of town;
Then close your sentence with an oath,
And shut the window down.

And if you are a slender man,
Not big enough for that,

Or, if you cannot make a speech,
Because you are a flat,

Go very quietly in and drop
A button in the hat!

BOOK OF LIGHT.*

GENTLEST Sister, I am weary-
Bring, O, bring the Book of Light!
There are shadows, dark and dreary,
Settling o'er my heart to-night.
That alone can soothe my sadness,
That alone can dry my tears,
When I see no spot of gladness
Down the dusky vale of years.
Well I know that I inherit

All that sometimes makes me blest

*Poems of Alice and Phoebe Carey.

Why this feeling of unrest.

But all day have been around me
Voices that would not be still,
And the twilight shades have found me
Shrinking from a nameless ill.

Seeing not despair's swift lightning-
Hearing not the thunders roll,
Hands invisible are tightening
Bands of sorrow on my soul.

Out beneath the jewelled arches
Let us bivouac to-night,

And to soothe day's dusty marches,
Bring, O, bring the Book of Light!

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