'Tis death's red banner streams on high.Fly to the rocks for shelter !-Fly! Lo! darkening o'er the fiery skies The pillars of the desert rise! On, in terrific grandeur wheeling, A giant host, the heavens concealing, They move like mighty genii-forms, Towering immense midst clouds and storms! Who shall escape! With awful force The whirlwind bears them on their course. They join-they rush resistless onThe landmarks of the plain are gone! The steps, the forms, from earth effaced Of those who trod the boundless waste! All whelmed !-All hushed!-None left to bear Sad record how they perished there! No stone their tale of death shall tell,The desert guards its mysteries well! And o'er the unfathomed sandy deep Where now their nameless relics sleep, Oft shall the future Pilgrim tread, Nor know his steps are on the dead! Constable's Edinburgh Magazine. FROM PLATO. BY THOMAS MOORE, ESQ. WHY dost thou gaze upon the sky? And every star should be an eye To wonder on thy beauties here! In life thou wert my morning star, But now that death hath stolen thy light, Alas! thou shinest dim and far, Like the pale beam that weeps at night. THE BROKEN HEART. And what's her history? A blank, my Lord. TWELFTH NIGHT. YES! I remember well how beautiful Half veiled with drooping wreaths-how like an angel And yet, at times, what heavy sighs she breathed Pure gales, and smiling scenes, their influence shed,— 'Past hope-past cure.' They said her heart was broken ;—but a child, Was weaned from this world, and it looked on high Music alone still held it's witching o'er her; But ceaseless, life-consuming sorrow, slept. In sighs of fragrance, and across the wave Some Spirit of Heaven his midnight hymn breathed there, I do remember it well-though long, long past; Or the enchantment of the scene and time,- She died and died unknown to all around, Literary Gazette. ISABEL. TO A DYING INFANT. SLEEP, little baby! Sleep! But with the quiet dead. Yes-with the quiet dead, Would fain lie down with thee. Flee little tender nursling! Flee to thy grassy nest; There the first flowers shall blow, The first pure flake of snow Shall fall upon thy breast. Peace! Peace! The little bosom Labours with shortening breath :— Peace! Peace! That tremulous sigh Speaks his departure nigh ! Those are the damps of death. I've seen thee in thy beauty, Baby, thou seem'st to me! Thine up-turned eyes glazed over, By the convulsed lid, Their pupils darkly blue. Thy little mouth half-open- Mount up, immortal essence! Young spirit, haste, depart!— And is this death!-Dread Thing?— If such thy visiting, How beautiful thou art! Oh! I could gaze for ever An Angel's dwelling place. Thou weepest, childless Mother! Aye, weep 'twill ease thine heart ; He was thy first-born-Son, Thy first, thine only one, "Tis hard from him to part! "Tis hard to lay thy darling Deep in the damp cold earth,— His empty crib to see, . His silent nursery, Once gladsome with his mirth. To meet again, in slumber, Then, wakened with a start To feel (half conscious why,) T |