CARLOS WILCOX, 1794-1827.

CARLOS WILCOx was born at Newport, N. H., October 22, 1794. He graduated at Middlebury College, in 1813, and then entered the theological school at Andover, Mass. After preaching in various places (during which time he published several of his poetical effusions), he was settled at Hartford, in December, 1824. In consequence of ill health, he was dismissed, in May, 1826; and he retired to Danbury, where he died, May 29, 1827.

The above is all we can find of his life. Of him as a poet, his writings, though few, enable us to speak in terms of decided praise. It has been truly said that he resembles Cowper in many respects-in the gentleness and tenderness of his sensibilities-in the modest and retiring disposition of his mind-in its fine culture, and its original and poetical cast-and not a little in the character of his poetry.' The following pieces present good specimens of his style :

SUNSET IN SEPTEMBER.

The sun now rests upon the mountain tops-
Begins to sink behind-is half concealed-

And now is gone: the last faint twinkling beam
Is cut in twain by the sharp rising ridge.
Sweet to the pensive is departing day,

When only one small cloud (so still and thin,
So thoroughly imbued with amber light,
And so transparent, that it seems a spot
Of brighter sky beyond the farthest mount)
Hangs o'er the hidden orb; or when a few
Long, narrow stripes of denser, darker grain,
At each end sharpened to a needle's point,
With golden borders, sometimes straight and smooth,
And sometimes crinkling like the lightning stream,
A half hour's space above the mountain lie:

Or when the whole consolidated mass,
That only threatened rain, is broken up
Into a thousand parts, and yet is one,
One as the ocean broken into waves;
And all its spongy parts, imbibing deep
The moist effulgence, seem like fleeces dyed
Deep scarlet, saffron light, or crimson dark,

As they are thick or thin, or near or more remote,

'Rev. George B. Cheever.

All fading soon as lower sinks the sun,
Till twilight end. But now another scene,
To me most beautiful of all, appears :
The sky, without the shadow of a cloud,
Throughout the west, is kindled to a glow
So bright and broad, it glares upon the eye,
Not dazzling, but dilating with calm force
Its power of vision to admit the whole.
Below, 'tis all of richest orange dye,
Midway the blushing of the mellow peach
Paints not, but tinges the ethereal deep;
And here, in this most lovely region, shines,
With added loveliness, the evening-star.
Above, the fainter purple slowly fades,
Till changed into the azure of mid-heaven.

FREEDOM.

All are born free, and all with equal rights.
So speaks the charter of a nation proud
Of her unequalled liberties and laws,
While, in that nation-shameful to relate-
One man in five is born and dies a slave.
Is this my country? this that happy land,
The wonder and the envy of the world?
O for a mantle to conceal her shame!
But why, when Patriotism cannot hide
The ruin which her guilt will surely bring

If unrepented? and unless the God

Who poured his plagues on Egypt till she let
The oppressed go free, and often pours his wrath
In earthquakes and tornadoes, on the isles
Of western India, laying waste their fields,
Dashing their mercenary ships ashore,

Tossing the isles themselves like floating wrecks,
And burying towns alive in one wide grave,
No sooner ope'd but closed, let judgment pass
For once untasted till the general doom,
Can it go well with us while we retain
This cursed thing? Will not untimely frosts,
Devouring insects, drought, and wind and hail,
Destroy the fruits of ground long tilled in chains?
Will not some daring spirit, born to thoughts
Above his beast-like state, find out the truth,
That Africans are men; and, catching fire
From Freedom's altar raised before his eyes
With incense fuming sweet, in others light
A kindred flame in secret, till a train,
Kindled at once, deal death on every side?
Cease then, Columbia, for thy safety cease,

And for thine honor, to proclaim the praise

Of thy fair shores of liberty and joy,

While thrice five hundred thousand wretched slaves,'
In thine own bosom, start at every word

As meant to mock their woes, and shake their chains,
Thinking defiance which they dare not speak.

DOING GOOD, TRUE HAPPINESS.

Wouldst thou from sorrow find a sweet relief?
Or is thy heart oppressed with woes untold?
Balm wouldst thou gather for corroding grief?
Pour blessings round thee like a shower of gold.
"Tis when the rose is wrapped in many a fold
Close to its heart, the worm is wasting there

Its life and beauty; not when, all unrolled,
Leaf after leaf, its bosom, rich and fair,

Breathes freely its perfumes throughout the ambient air.

Wake, thou that sleepest in enchanted bowers,
Lest these lost years should haunt thee on the night
When death is waiting for thy numbered hours
To take their swift and everlasting flight;

Wake, ere the earth-born charm unnerve thee quite,
And be thy thoughts to work divine addressed;

Do something-do it soon-with all thy might;
An angel's wing would droop if long at rest,
And God himself, inactive, were no longer blest.

Some high or humble enterprise of good
Contemplate, till it shall possess thy mind,
Become thy study, pastime, rest, and food,
And kindle in thy heart a flame refined.

Pray Heaven for firmness thy whole soul to bind
To this thy purpose-to begin, pursue,

With thoughts all fixed, and feelings purely kind;
Strength to complete, and with delight review,
And grace to give the praise where all is ever due.

No good of worth sublime will Heaven permit
To light on man as from the passing air;

The lamp of genius, though by nature lit,
If not protected, pruned, and fed with care,
Soon dies, or runs to waste with fitful glare;
And learning is a plant that spreads and towers
Slow as Columbia's aloe, proudly rare,

That, 'mid gay thousands, with the suns and showers

Of half a century, grows alone before it flowers.

According to the census of 1850, there are in the land 3,204,347 slaves, about one to every six freemen.

Has immortality of name been given

To them that idly worship hills and groves,
And burn sweet incense to the queen of heaven?
Did Newton learn from fancy, as it roves,

To measure worlds, and follow where each moves?
Did Howard gain renown that shall not cease,

By wanderings wild that nature's pilgrim loves?
Or did Paul gain heaven's glory and its peace,
By musing o'er the bright and tranquil isles of Greece?

Beware lest thou, from sloth, that would appear
But lowliness of mind, with joy proclaim

Thy want of worth; a charge thou couldst not hear
From other lips, without a blush of shame,
Or pride indignant; then be thine the blame,
And make thyself of worth; and thus enlist

The smiles of all the good, the dear to fame;
'Tis infamy to die and not be missed,
Or let all soon forget that thou didst e'er exist.

Rouse to some work of high and holy love,

And thou an angel's happiness shalt know;
Shalt bless the earth while in the world above:
The good begun by thee shall onward flow
In many a branching stream, and wider grow;
The seed that, in these few and fleeting hours,
Thy hands, unsparing and unwearied, sow,
Shall deck thy grave with amaranthine flowers,
And yield thee fruits divine in heaven's immortal bowers.

JOHN G. C. BRAINARD, 1797-1828.

JOHN G. C. BRAINARD was born in New London, Conn., in 1797, and graduated at Yale College in 1815. He studied law, and commenced the practice, at Middleton; but not pleased with the profession, he abandoned it, and in 1822 undertook the editorial charge of the "Connecticut Mirror," at Hartford, which for five years he enriched with his beautiful poetical productions, and chaste and elevated prose compositions. "His pieces were extensively copied, and not unfrequently with high encomium. But Brainard was one of those who bear their faculties meekly.' Although publishing, week after week, poems which would have done honor to the genius of Burns or Wordsworth, he never publicly betrayed any symptoms of vanity. He held on the quiet and even tenor of his way, apparently regardless of that prodigality of intellectual beauty which blossomed around him."

As an editor of a literary, political, and news journal, he was a model, and the influence that his paper exerted on all within whose sphere it came could not but be most happy and elevating; but consumption had marked him for her own, and in less than five years he returned to his father's house, where he died September 26th, 1828.

That Brainard had the true spirit of a poet, there can be no doubt; but he wrote in great haste, and published as fast as he wrote. Hence there is great inequality in his compositions, some showing high poetical beauty and strength, both in thought and language; and some, the want of good taste, and great negligence. The following are, we think, among the best of his pieces :—

FALLS OF NIAGARA.

The thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain,
While I look upward to thee! It would seem
As if God poured thee from his "hollow hand,"
And hung his bow upon thine awful front;

And spoke in that loud voice, which seemed to him
Who dwelt in Patmos for his Saviour's sake,
"The sound of many waters;" and had bade
Thy flood to chronicle the ages back,

And notch His cent'ries in the eternal rocks.

Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we,
That hear the question of that voice sublime?
O, what are all the notes that ever rung

From war's vain trumpet, by thy thundering side!
Yea, what is all the riot man can make,

In his short life, to thy unceasing roar!

And yet, bold babbler, what art thou to Him

Who drowned a world, and heaped the waters far
Above its loftiest mountains?-a light wave,

That breaks, and whispers of its Maker's might.

THE DEEP.

There's beauty in the deep:-
The wave is bluer than the sky;

And, though the light shine bright on high,
More softly do the sea-gems glow

That sparkle in the depths below;

The rainbow's tints are only made

When on the waters they are laid,
And sun and moon most sweetly shine
Upon the ocean's level brine.

There's beauty in the deep.