Forth from the noisy guests around the board, Creeps by her softly; at her footstool kneels ; And, when she pauses, murmurs tender things Into her fond ear-while the Blackbird sings.

The smoke-wreaths from the chimneys curl up higher,
And dizzy things of eve begin to float
Upon the light; the breeze begins to tire.

Half-way to sunset, with a drowsy note,
The ancient clock from out the valley swings;
The graudam nods-and still the Blackbird sings.

Far shouts and laughter from the farm-stead peal,
Where the great stack is piling in the sun;
Through narrow gates o'erladen wagons reel,
And barking curs into the tumult run;
While the inconstant wind bears off, and brings
The merry tempest-and the Blackbird sings.

On the high wold the last look of the sun
Burns, like a beacon, over dale and stream;
The shouts have ceased, the laughter and the fun;
The grandam sleeps, and peaceful be her dreams!
Only a hammer on an anvil rings;
The day is dying-still the Blackbird sings.

Now the good vicar passes from his gate,

Serene, with long white hair; and in his eye Burns the clear spirit that has conquered Fate, And felt the wings of immortality; His heart is thronged with great imaginings, And tender mercies-while the Blackbird sings.

Down by the brook he bends his steps, and through
A lowly wicket; and at last he stands
Awful beside the bed of one who grew

From boyhood with him,-who, with lifted hands
And eyes, seems listening to far welcomings
And sweeter music-than the Blackbird sings.

Two golden stars, like tokens from the blessed,
Strike on his dim orbs from the setting sun;
His sinking hands seem pointing to the West;
He smiles as though he said, "Thy will be done!"
His eyes, they see not those illuminings;
His ears, they hear not-what the Blackbird sings.

SONNET.

"Tis not for golden eloquence I pray,

A godlike tongue to move a stony heart:Methinks it were full well to be apart

In solitary uplands far away,
Between the blossoms of a rosy spray,
Dreaming upon the wonderful sweet face
Of Nature in a wild and pathless place.
And if it chanced that I did once array,
In words of magic woven curiously,
All the deep gladness of a summer's morn,
Or rays of evening that light up the lea
On dewy days of spring, or shadows borne
Across the forehead of an autumn noon,-
Then would I die and ask no better boon.

Charles Fenno Hoffman.

AMERICAN.

Hoffman was born in the city of New York in 1806. While yet a boy, as he was sitting carelessly at the end of a pier on the Hudson, a steamboat drew up and crushed one of his legs, so that he had to have it amputated. Thenceforward he had to go with a wooden leg. This did not prevent his making an adventurous journey on horseback through the North-western States to the Mississippi in 1833. He published, on his return, a graphic account of his adventures in a volume, entitled " A Winter in the West." Educated at Columbia College, Hoffman tried the law, but drifted into literature, and edited the Knickerbocker Magazine for a year or two. Bryant has truly said of him: "His kindly and generous temper and genial manners won the attachment of all who knew him. His poems bear the impress of his noble character." Hoffman became insane, and passed the last quarter of his life in an asylum.

MONTEREY.

"Pends toi, brave Crillon! Nous avons combattu, et tu n'y etois pas."-Lettre de Henri IV. à Crillon.

We were not many, we who stood
Before the iron steel that day-
Yet many a gallant spirit would
Give half his years if he then could
Have been with us at Monterey.

Now here, now there, the shot, it hailed
In deadly drifts of fiery spray,

Yet not a single soldier quailed
When wounded comrades round them wailed
Their dying shout at Monterey.

And on-still on our column kept

Through walls of flame its withering way; Where fell the dead, the living stepped, Still charging on the guns that swept

The slippery streets of Monterey.

William Gilmore Simms.

AMERICAN.

Simms (1806-1870) was a native of Charleston, S. C., and resided there most of his life, with the exception of occasional visits to New York, where he was well known in literary circles. He wrote numerous novels, the most successful of which was "The Yemassee." His principal poems are "Atlantis," "Lays of the Palmetto," and "Songs and Ballads of the South." Simms was a prolific writer, and as he wrote for an immediate support, he had little time to blot. A list of some sixty volumes from his pen may be found in Appleton's "Cyclopædia." As a man he was thoroughly estimable. His collected poems, in two volumes, were published by Redfield, New York, 1853. In 1829 he had purchased an interest in a newspaper; but this proved a losing venture, as the doctrine of nullification was then in the ascendant, and he was a strenuous advocate for the maintenance of the Union. His education was limited.

FREEDOM OF THE SABBATH.

Let us escape! This is our holiday-
God's day, devote to rest; and, through the wood
We'll wander, and, perchance, find heavenly food:
So, profitless, it shall not pass away.
'Tis life, but with sweet difference, methinks,
Here in the forest;-from the crowd set free,
Fresh sense of music from its liberty.
The spirit, like escaping song-bird, drinks
Thoughts crowd about us with the trees: the shade
Holds teachers that await us: in our ear,
Unwonted but sweet voices do we hear,
That with rare excellence of tongue persuade :
They do not chide our idlesse,—were content

If all our walks were half so innocent.

THE FIRST DAY OF SPRING.

O! thou bright and beautiful day,
First bright day of the virgin spring,
Bringing the slumbering life into play,
Giving the leaping bird his wing!

Thou art round me now in all thy hues,
Thy robe of green, and thy scented sweets,
In thy bursting buds, in thy blessing dews,
In every form that my footstep meets.

I hear thy voice in the lark's clear note,
In the cricket's chirp at the evening hour,

SOLACE OF THE WOODS.

Woods, waters, have a charm to soothe the ear,
When common sounds have vexed it: when the day
Grows sultry, and the crowd is in thy way,
And working in thy soul much coil and care,
Betake thee to the forest: in the shade
Of pines, and by the side of purling streams
That prattle all their secrets in their dreams,
Unconscious of a listener-unafraid-
Thy soul shall feel their freshening, and the truth
Of nature then, reviving in thy heart,
Shall bring thee the best feelings of thy youth,
When in all natural joys thy joy had part,
Ere lucre and the narrowing toils of trade
Had turned thee to the thing thou wast not made.

Elizabeth Oakes Smith.

AMERICAN.

Mrs. Smith was born in 1806 at Cumberland, about twelve miles from Portland, Me. Her maiden name was Elizabeth Oakes Prince. She married, in 1823, Seba Smith, author of the "Jack Downing Letters," and several poems. The family removed to New York in 1839, and after Mr. Smith's death in 1868, she resided for several years in North Carolina. She published "The Sinless Child, and other Poems," wrote tragedies, stories, and hymns, besides contributing largely to magazines and newspapers. Latterly she resided at Patchogue, Suffolk County, N. Y.

SONNET: THE UNATTAINED.

And is this life? and are we born for this?-
To follow phantoms that elude the grasp,
Or whatsoe'er secured, within our clasp,
To withering lie, as if each earthly kiss

Were doomed death's shuddering touch alone to meet.

O Life! hast thou reserved no cup of bliss?
Must still THE UNATTAINED beguile our feet?
THE UNATTAINED with yearnings fill the breast,
That rob for aye the Spirit of its rest?
Yes, this is Life; and everywhere we meet,
Not vietor crowns, but wailings of defeat;
Yet faint thou not: thou dost apply a test,
That shall incite thee onward, upward still:
The present cannot sate, nor e'er thy spirit fill.

SONNET: POESY.

With no fond, sickly thirst for fame I kneel,
O goddess of the high-born art, to thee;
Not unto thee with semblance of a zeal
I come, O pure and heaven-eyed Poesy!
Thon art to me a spirit and a love,

Felt ever from the time when first the earth
In its green beauty, and the sky above,
Informed my soul with joy too deep for mirth.
I was a child of thine before my tongue
uld lisp its infant utterance unto thee;
now, albeit from my heart are flung
'ant numbers, and the song may be
ch I would not, yet I know that thou
wilt not spurn, while thus to thee I bow.

ONNET: FAITH.

-faith is the subtle chain he Infinite: the voice

Of a deep life within, that will remain Until we crowd it thence. We may rejoice With an exceeding joy, and make our life, Ay, this external life, become a part

Of that which is within, o'erwrought and rife
With faith, that childlike blessedness of heart;-
The order and the harmony inborn
With a perpetual hymning crown our way,
Till callousness and selfishness and scorn
Shall pass as clouds where scathless light
play!

Cling to thy faith: 'tis higher than the thou
That questions of thy faith, the cold external d.∙ it.

John Sterling.

Sterling (1806-1844) was born at Kaimes Castle of Bute. His father, Captain Sterling, became editor the Times newspaper, and John, having been educat Trinity College, Cambridge, was early introduced the best literary society of London. This included ridge and Carlyle; and with the latter, who wrote a Lice moir of him, he became very intimate. He took hol ders in the Church, and preached for eight months: failing health and doubts as to the creed he was t ing induced him to resign his charge. Thencefort!. devoted himself to literature, writing for Blackwood's azine and the Westminster Review. In the former of his poems first appeared. He published a volume them, 1839; "The Election," a poem, 1841; and “stai ford," a tragedy, 1843. His prose works, edited by i deacon Hare, appeared in 1848. Sterling was remark... for his genial, amiable traits, and his conversational p ers. He was the charm of every society into which h entered. His poems lack the popular element, but a.. rich in profound, earnest thought.

TO A CHILD.

Dear child! whom sleep can hardly tame
As live and beautiful as flame,

Thou glancest round my graver hours
As if thy crown of wild-wood flowers
Were not by mortal forehead worn,
But on the summer breeze were borne,
Or on a mountain streamlet's waves,
Came glistening down from dreamy caves.

With bright round cheek, amid whose glow
Delight and wonder come and go,
And eyes whose inward meanings play,
Congenial with the light of day,
And brow so calm, a home for thought,
Before he knows his dwelling wrought;

Lunt was born in Newburyport, Mass., in 1807. He was graduated at Harvard College in 1824, studied and practised law. In 1848 he removed to Boston, and was appointed United States District Attorney. He edited the Boston Courier for several years with marked ability, published volumes of poems in 1839, 1843, 1854, and 1855, also in the last-named year, "Eastford, a Novel." He is also the author of several valuable historical works. 'is residence since 1877 was in Scituate, Mass. mong the lyrics that "almost sing themselves" from 'n of Lunt is his "Pilgrim Song," which runs to sure of T. H. Bayly's once popular ballad, ayly the troubadour touched his guitar." anzas from Lunt's poem is as follows: ath sunny dales, dearly they bloom; heather-hills, sweet their perfume: he wilderness cheerful we stray, ive land, home far away! wanderers, hither we come ;

lare to be,-this is our home.""

THE HAYMAKERS.

Down on the Merrimac River,
While the autumn grass is green,
Oh, there the jolly hay-men

In their gundalows are seen; Floating down, as ebbs the current, And the dawn leads on the day, With their scythes and rakes all ready To gather in the hay.

The good wife, up the river,
Has made the oven hot,
And with plenty of pandowdy
Has filled her earthen pot.

Their long oars sweep them onward,

As the ripples round them play, And the jolly hay-men drift along To make the meadow hay.

At the bank-side then they moor her,
Where the sluggish waters run,
By the shallow creek's low edges,
Beneath the fervid sun-

And all day long the toilers

Mow their swaths, and, day by day, You can see their scythe-blades flashing At the cutting of the hay.

When the meadow-birds are flying,

Then down go scythe and rake,

And right and left their scattering shots
The sleeping echoes wake-

For silent spreads the broad expanse,

To the sand-hills far away,

And thus they change their work for sport, At making of the hay.

When the gundalows are loaded—

Gunwales to the water's brimWith their little square-sails set atop, Up the river how they swim! At home, beside the fire, by night,

While the children round them play, What tales the jolly hay-men tell Of getting in the bay!

THE COMET.

Yon car of fire, though veiled by day,-
Along that field of gleaming blue,
When twilight folded earth in gray,
A world-wide wonder flew.