How his mother, bent low at the foot of the cross,

Brings down for him safety and blessing:

Yielding him tearfully,

Watching so fearfully,

Trusting yet cheerfully,

God keep her boy!

5. How I laugh when the oak to his rugged old breast
Takes me home with a sigh and a quiver;
Or, splashing, I sink in the welcoming wave
Closing over me, for aye and forever.
Nay-better than this when I've written
On the walls of the fortress all over,
I'll rest me at last, when around me shall grow
Green grass, starry daisies, and clover;-
Sweet in the summer air,

Waving their blossoms fair,
Cover the minstrel there,

Silent forever!

my name

LESSON XIII

THE CHILDREN OF THE BATTLE-FIELD.

JAMES G. CLARK.

The following touching stanzas received the prize offered by the Philadelphia Christian Commission for a poem on the death of Sergeant Humiston, of Portville, N. Y., who was found dead at Gettysburg several days after the battle, with his eyes fixed upon the ambrotype of his three children.

1.

ON the field of Gettysburg

UPON

The summer sun was high,

When Freedom met her haughty foe,
Beneath a Northern sky;

Among the heroes of the North,

Who swelled her grand array,

And rushed, like mountain eagles forth,
From happy homes away,

There stood a man of humble name,

A sire of children three,

And gazed within a little frame,

Their pictured forms to see;
And blame him not, if in the strife
He breathed a soldier's prayer
"Oh, Father! guard the soldier's wife,
And for his children care!"

2. Upon the field of Gettysburg
When morning shone again,

The crimson cloud of battle burst
In streams of fiery rain;
Our legions quelled the awful flood
Of shot, and steel, and shell,

While banners, marked with ball and blood,
Around them rose and fell;

And none more nobly won the name

Of Champion for the Free

Than he who pressed the little frame
That held his children three;

And none were braver in the strife
Than he who breathed the prayer:
"Oh, Father! guard the soldier's wife,
And for his children care!”

3. Upon the field of Gettysburg

The full moon slowly rose;

She looked and saw ten thousand brows

All pale in death's repose;

And, down beside a silver stream,
From other forms away,

Calm as a warrior in a dream
Our fallen comrade lay;

() His limbs were cold, his sightless eyes
Were fixed upon the three;

Sweet stars that rose in memory's skies
To light him o'er death's sea.

Then honored be the soldier's life,

THE

With a smile that well her grief dissembles,
The while beneath her drooping lash

One starry tear-drop hangs and trembles,
Though Heaven alone record the tear,
And Fame shall never know her story,
Her heart doth shed a drop as dear
As ever dewed the field of glory.

2. The Wife who girds her husband's sword,
'Mid little ones who weep and wonder,

And bravely speaks the cheering word,
What though her heart be rent asunder,-

* Pronounced wôr yur.

“I

LESSON XV.

THE SOLDIER'S REPRIEVE.

N. Y. OBSERVER.

THOUGHT, Mr. Allan, when I gave my Bennie to

his country, that not a father in all this broad land made so precious a gift,-no, not one. The dear boy only slept a minute, just one little minute, at his post: I know that was all, for Bennie never dozed over a duty. How prompt and reliable he was! I know he only fell asleep one little second; -- he was so young, and not strong, that boy of mine! Why, he was as tall as I, and only eighteen! and now they shoot him because he was found asleep when doing sentinel duty! Twenty-four hours, the telegram said, only twenty-four hours. Where is Bennie now?"

2. "We will hope with his heavenly Father," said Mr. Allan, soothingly.

And, down bope: God is very merciful!
From oshamed, father!' Bennie said, 'when I
Calm think I never used this great right arm,'

held it out so proudly before me, for my when it needed it! Palsy it rather than keep at the plow!'

"Go, then go, my boy,' I said, ' and God keep you!' God has kept him, I think, Mr. Allan!" and the farmer repeated these last words slowly, as if, in spite of his reason, his heart doubted them.

"Like the apple of his eye, Mr. Owen, doubt it not!" 3. Blossom had sat near them listening, with blanched cheek. She had not shed a tear. Her anxiety had been so concealed that no one had noticed it. She had occupied herself mechanically in the household cares. Now she answered a gentle tap at the kitchen door, opening it to receive from a neighbor's hand a letter. "It is from him," was all she said.

It was like a message from the dead! Mr. Owen took the letter, but could not break the envelope, on account of his trembling fingers, and held it toward Mr. Allan, with the helplessness of a child.

4. The minister opened it, and read as follows:

"Dear Father: When this reaches you, I shall be in eternity. At first, it seemed awful to me; but I have thought about it so much now, that it has no terror. They say they will not bind me, nor blind me; but that I may meet my death like a man. I thought, father, it might have been on the battle-field, for my country, and that, when I fell, it would be fighting gloriously; but to be shot down like a dog for nearly betraying it, to die for neglect of duty! O, father, I wonder the very thought does not kill me! But I shall not disgrace you I am going to