O, should my gentle child be spared to man- | But I know (for God hath told me this) that he earthly love; An Inverary 'correspondent writes: "Thom gave me the for. And if, beside his grave, the tears our aching lowing narrative as to the origin of The Mitherless Bairn': I eyes must dim, quote his own words. When I was livin' in Aberdeen, I was limping roun' the house to my garret, when I heard the greetin' o' God comfort us for all the love which we shall a wean. A lassie was thumpin' a bairn, when out cam a big dame, bellowin', "Ye hussie, will ye lick a mitherless bairn!" I hobled lose in him. up the stair and wrote the sang afore sleepin'. " I have a son, a third sweet son; his age I cannot WHEN a' ither bairnies are hushed to their hame tell, By aunty, or cousin, or frecky grand-dame, For they reckon not by years and months where Wha stands last and lanely, an' naebody carin'? he has gone to dwell. 'Tis the puir doited loonie, - the mitherless bairn ! To us, for fourteen anxious months, his infant smiles were given; And then he bade farewell to earth, and went to The mitherless bairn gangs to his lane bed; live in heaven. I cannot tell what form is his, what looks he weareth now, Nane covers his cauld back, or haps his bare head; His wee hackit heelies are hard as the airn, Nor guess how bright a glory crowns his shining An' litheless the lair o' the mitherless bairn. seraph brow. The thoughts that fill his sinless soul, the bliss Aneath his cauld brow siccan dreams hover there, which he doth feel, O' hands that wont kindly to kame his dark hair; Are numbered with the secret things which God But mornin' brings clutches, a' reckless an' stern, will not reveal. That lo'e nae the locks o' the mitherless bairn! Yon sister that sang o'er his saftly rocked bed The father toils sair their wee bannock to earn, Her spirit, that passed in yon hour o' his birth, May I but meet thee on that peaceful shore, O, speak him na harshly, he trembles the But, though I less deplored thee, ne'er forgot. while, He bends to your bidding, and blesses your smile; In their dark hour o' anguish the heartless shall learn Where once we dwelt our name is heard no more; Children not thine have trod my nursery floor; That God deals the blow, for the mitherless bairn! Drew me to school along the public way, WILLIAM THOM. MY MOTHER'S PICTURE. The meek intelligence of those dear eyes O welcome guest, though unexpected here! -- Delighted with my bawble coach, and wrapped glowed, All this, and, more endearing still than all, Not scorned in heaven, though little noticed here. My mother! when I learned that thou wast When, playing with thy vesture's tissued flow dead, Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed? ers, The violet, the pink, the jessamine, I pricked them into paper with a pin, smile,) Could those few pleasant days again appear, here? I would not trust my heart, the dear delight That I should ill requite thee to constrain Thy unbound spirit into bonds again. Thou - as a gallant bark, from Albion's coast, "Where tempests never beat nor billows roar," And day by day some current's thwarting force And, while the wings of fancy still are free, WILLIAM COWPER. I REMEMBER, I REMEMBER. I REMEMBER, I remember The house where I was born, The little window where the sun Came peeping in at morn. He never came a wink too soon, Nor brought too long a day; But now I often wish the night Had borne my breath away! I remember, I remember The roses, red and white, The violets, and the lily-cups, Those flowers made of light! The lilacs where the robin built, And where my brother set With pure heart newly stamped from nature's "O Lord! O dear, my heart will break, I shall Toss the light ball, bestride the stick, – (I knew so many cakes would make him sick !) With fancies buoyant as the thistle-down, Prompting the face grotesque, and antic brisk, With many a lamb-like frisk! (He's got the scissors, snipping at your gown!) Thou pretty opening rose! (Go to your mother, child, and wipe your nose !) Balmy and breathing music like the south, (He really brings my heart into my mouth!) Bold as the hawk, yet gentle as the dove; (I'll tell you what, my love, I cannot write unless he's sent above.) The last time as ever I see him, poor thing, was with my own blessed Motherly eyes, Sitting as good as gold in the gutter, a playing at making little dirt-pies. I wonder he left the court, where he was better off than all the other young boys, With two bricks, an old shoe, nine oyster-shells, and a dead kitten by way of toys. When his father comes home, and he always comes home as sure as ever the clock strikes one, He'll be rampant, he will, at his child being lost; and the beef and the inguns not done! La bless you, good folks, mind your own concerns, and don't be making a mob in the street; O Sergeant M'Farlane! you have not come across my poor little boy, have you, in your beat? Do, good people, move on! don't stand staring at me like a parcel of stupid stuck pigs; Saints forbid but he's p'r'aps been inviggled away up a court for the sake of his clothes by the priggs; He'd a very good jacket, for certain, for I bought it myself for a shilling one day in Rag Fair; And his trousers considering not very much patched, and red plush, they was once his Father's best pair. His shirt, it's very lucky I'd got washing in the tub, or that might have gone with the rest; But he'd got on a very good pinafore with only two slits and a burn on the breast. He'd a goodish sort of hat, if the crown was sewed in, and not quite so much jagged at the brim. With one shoe on, and the other shoe is a boot, and not a fit, and you'll know by that if it's him. Except being so well dressed, my mind would misgive, some old beggar woman, in want of an orphan, Had borrowed the child to go a-begging with, | And his nose is still a good un, though the but I'd rather see him laid out in his bridge is broke, by his falling on a pewter coffin ! pint pot; Do, good people, move on, such a rabble of boys! I'll break every bone of 'em I come near, you 're spilling the porter - go home - Tommy Jones, go along home with your beer. Go home This day is the sorrowfullest day of my life, ever since my name was Betty Morgan, Them vile Savoyards! they lost him once before O dear! to think of losing him just after nussall along of following a monkey and an ing him back from death's door! organ: Only the very last month when the windfalls, hang 'em, was at twenty a penny! O my Billy - my head will turn right round if he's got kiddynapped with them Ital- And the threepence he'd got by grottoing was ians, They'll make him a plaster parish image boy, they will, the outlandish tatterdemalions. And Billy — where are you, Billy?—I'm as hoarse as a crow, with screaming for ye, you young sorrow! And sha'n't have half a voice, no more I sha'n't, for crying fresh herrings to-morrow. O Billy, you're bursting my heart in two, and my life won't be of no more vally, spent in plums, and sixty for a child is too many. the Cholera man came and whitewashed us all, and, drat him! made a seize of our hog. It's no use to send the Crier to cry him about, he's such a blunderin' drunken old dog; The last time he was fetched to find a lost child he was guzzling with his bell at the Crown, If I'm to see other folks' darlin's, and none And went and cried a boy instead of a girl, for a distracted Mother and Father about Town. of mine, playing like angels in our And what shall I do but cry out my eyes, when I would run all the wide world over to find him, Little Murphy, now I remember, was once lost for a month through stealing a penny bun, -- The Lord forbid of any child of mine! I think it would kill me raily, Billy-where are you, Billy, I say? come, Billy, Or maybe he's stole by some chimbly-sweeping And be poked up behind with a picked pointed pole, when the soot has ketched, and the chimbly's red hot. To find my Bill holdin' up his little innocent O, I'd give the whole wide world, if the world was mine, to clap my two longin' eyes on his face. hand at the Old Bailey. For though I say it as ought n't, yet I will say, I'll owe 'em five pounds, and a blessing besides, For he 's my darlin' of darlin's, and if he don't soon come back, you'll see me drop stone dead on the place. I only wish I'd got him safe in these two Motherly arms, and would n't I hug him and kiss him! Lawk! I never knew what a precious he wasbut a child don't not feel like a child till you miss him. Why, there he is! Punch and Judy hunting, the young wretch, it 's that Billy as sartin as sin! as will only bring him safe and sound But let me get him home, with a good grip of home. He's blue eyes, and not to be called a squint, his hair, and I'm blest if he shall have a whole bone in his skin! though a little cast he 's certainly got; THOMAS hood |