THE WIFE'S SONG. That scene of love! - where hath it gone? Where have their light and splendour fled? And I am left on earth to mourn: And I am left to drop my tears O'er memory's lone and icy urn! Yet why pour forth the voice of wail My hopes are crush'd, my heart is riven; And I shall soon bid life adieu, To seek enduring joys in heaven! THE WIFE'S SONG. BY WILLIAM LEGGETT. As the tears of the even, By the sweet light of heaven, So gladness to-morrow Shall shine on thy brow, The more bright for the sorrow That darkens it now. 135 Yet if fortune, believe me, Though each other deceive thee, I'll love thee the more. As ivy leaves cluster More greenly and fair, Round trees that are bare. LAMENT. BY WILLIS G. CLARK. THERE is a voice, I shall hear no more— There were eyes that late were lit up for me, They revealed the thoughts of a trusting heart, Whose affections were fresh as a stream of spring When birds in the vernal branches sing; They were filled with love, that hath passed with them, And my lyre is breathing their requiem. LAMENT. I remember a brow, whose serene repose Alas! for the clod that is resting now On those slumbering eyes-on that faded brow; Yet the joy of grief it is mine to bear; Oh! once the summer with thee was bright; A Sabbath of blessings was in my breast; 137 Now, thou art gone to that voiceless hall LINES [Written on a pane of glass in the house of a friend.] BY WILLIAM LEGGETT. As playful boys by ocean's side Upon its margin trace, Some frail memorial which the tide Returning must efface; Thus I upon this brittle glass These tuneless verses scrawl, The waves that beat upon the strand As soon some rude or careless hand But though what I have written here I trust my name will still be dear, THE SEPULCHRE OF DAVID. BY WILLIAM L. STONE. “As for Herod, he had spent vast sums about the cities, both without and within his own kingdom: and as he had before heard that Hyrcanus, who had been king before him, had opened David's sepulchre, and taken out of it three thousand talents of silver, and that there was a greater number left behind, and indeed enough to suffice all his wants, he had a great while an intention to make the attempt; and at this time he opened that sepulchre by night and went into it, and endeavoured that it should not be at all known in the city, but he took only his most faithful friends with him. As for any money, he found none, as Hyrcanus had done, but that furniture of gold, and those precious goods that were laid up there, all which he took away. However, he had a great desire to make diligent search, and to go farther in, even as far as the very bodies of David and Solomon; where two of his guards were slain by a flame that burst out upon those that went in, as the report was. So he was severely affrighted, and went out and built a propitiatory monument of that fright he had been in, and this of white stone, at the mouth of the sepulchre, and that at a great expense also."-Josephus. HIGH on his throne of state, With purest gold inwrought, A crystal mirror bright, The monarch's panoply ! |