Nor cares he much for childish sports, dotes not on bat and ball,

But looks on manhood's ways and works, and aptly mimics all.

His little heart is busy still, and oftentimes per

plext

With thoughts about this world of ours, and thoughts about the next.

He kneels at his dear mother's knee-she teaches

him to pray

And strange and sweet and solemn then, the words that he will

say.

Oh, should my gentle child be spared to manhood's years, like me,

A holier, and a wiser man, I trust that he will be; And when I look into his eyes, and stroke his thoughtful brow.

I dare not think what I should feel were I to lose

him now.

I have a son, a second son, a simple child of three, I'll not declare, how bright and fair his little features

be,

And silver sweet those tones of his, while prattling on my knee;

I do not think his light blue eye is like his brother's,

keen,

Nor is his brow so full of childish thought, as his has often been;

THE THREE SONS.

107

And his little heart's a fountain pure of kind and tender feeling,

And every look a gleam of light with depths of love revealing.

When he walks with me, the country folks, who pass us in the street,

Will shout for joy, and bless my boy, he looks so mild and sweet.

A playfellow he is to all, and yet with cheerful

tone

Will sing his little song of love when he is left alone.

His presence is like sunshine, sent down to gladden earth,

To comfort us in all our griefs, and sweeten all our mirth:

Should he grow up to riper years, God grant his heart may prove

As sweet a home for heavenly grace, as now for earthly love;

And if beside his grave, the tears our aching eyes must dim,

God comfort us, for all the love that we may lose in him.

I have a son, a third sweet son, his age I cannot

tell,

For they reckon not by years and months where he has gone to dwell.

To us for fourteen anxious months his infant smiles

were given,

And then he bade farewell to earth, and went to live in heaven.

I cannot tell what form is his, what look he weareth

now,

Nor guess how bright a glory crowns his shining seraph brow.

The thoughts that fill his sinless soul, the bliss that he doth feel

Are numbered with the secret things which God doth not reveal.

But I know-for God hath told me this—that now he is at rest,

Where other blessed infants are, on their loving Saviour's breast.

Whate'er befals his brethren twain, his bliss can

never cease

Their lot may here be grief and pain, but his is perfect peace;

It may be that the tempter's wiles their souls from bliss can sever,

But if our own poor faith fail not, he must be ours for ever.

When we think of what our darling is, and what he still must be

When we think on that world's perfect bliss, and this world's misery

THE DEATH-BED.

109

When we groan beneath this load of sin, and feel

this grief and pain

Oh, we'd rather lose our other two, than have him

here again!

MOULTRIE.

THE DEATH-BED.

WE watched her breathing through the night,

Her breathing soft and low,

As in her heart the wave of life
Kept heaving to and fro.

So silently we seemed to speak,
So slowly moved about,

As we had lent her half our powers

To eke her being out.

Our very hopes belied our fears,
Our fears our hopes belied;

We thought her dying when she slept,
And sleeping when she died.

For when the morn came, dim and sad
And chill with early showers,
Her quiet eyelids closed-she had
Another morn than ours.

THE INFANT'S GRAVE.

"For we sorrow not as those who are without hope."

I MARKED where the lonely mourner strayed
By the shade of the waving willow,

Where the blighted hope of her heart was laid,
With the verdant sod for its pillow.

I marked when the cypress bough she wreathed
To hang o'er its lowly dwelling,

That her quivering lip in silence breathed
The sigh that her bosom was swelling.

But I heard not the bitter wail of grief,
As when sorrow the heart is rending;
For she knew where the wretched find relief,
And in prayer she was meekly bending.

I heard her in murmured accents breathe
Her hope of a blissful meeting,

When the just shall from kindred saints receive
In heaven a joyful greeting.

I knew by the beam of her tearful eye,
As its fervor was slowly kindled,

That the light of faith in her soul was high,
And its joy with her grief was mingled.