THE FADED ONE.

WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK.

GONE to the slumber which may know no waking Till the loud requiem of the world shall swell; Gone! where no sound thy still repose is breaking, In a lone mansion through long years to dwell; Where the sweet gales that herald bud and blossom Pour not their music nor their fragrant breath: A seal is set upon thy budding bosom,

A bond of loneliness- a spell of death!

Yet 't was but yesterday that all before thee

Shone in the freshness of life's morning hours; Joy's radiant smile was playing briefly o'er thee, And thy light feet impressed but vernal flowers. The restless spirit charmed thy sweet existence, Making all beauteous in youth's pleasant maze, While gladsome hope illumed the onward distance,

And lit with sunbeams thy expectant days.

How have the garlands of thy childhood withered, And hope's false anthem died upon the air! Death's cloudy tempests o'er thy way have gathered,

And his stern bolts have burst in fury there.

On thy pale forehead sleeps the shade of even, Youth's braided wreath lies stained in sprinkled dust,

Yet looking upward in its grief to heaven,

Love should not mourn thee, save in hope and trust.

WORDS TO A MOURNING FATHER.

ROBERT HALL.

REMEMBER the many blessings with which a kind Providence still indulges you. Ought you not to rejoice, that your affectionate companion in life is spared; and that, though your child is snatched from your embraces, he has escaped from a world of sin and sorrow? The stamp of immortality is placed on his happiness, and he is encircled by the arms of a compassionate Redeemer. Had he been permitted to live, and you had witnessed the loss of his virtue, you might have been reserved to suffer still severer pangs.

WHO knoweth what is good for a man all the days of this his vain life, which he spends as a shadow?

ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG GIRL.

WILLIAM H. BURLEIGH.

SHE hath gone in the spring-time of life,

Ere her sky had been dimmed by a cloud, While her heart with the rapture of love was yet rife,

And the hopes of her youth were unbowedFrom the lovely, who loved her too well;

From the heart that had grown to her own;

From the sorrow which late o'er her young spirit

fell,

Like a dream of the night she hath flown;

And the earth hath received to its bosom its trustAshes to ashes, and dust unto dust.

The spring, in its loveliness dressed,

Will return with its music-winged hours, And, kissed by the breath of the sweet southwest, The buds shall burst out in flowers; And the flowers her grave-sod above,

Though the sleeper beneath recks it not, Shall thickly be strown by the hand of Love,

To cover with beauty the spot —

Meet emblems are they of the pure one and bright,
Who faded and fell with so early a blight.

Ay, the spring will return- but the blossom
That bloomed in our presence the sweetest,
By the spoiler is borne from the cherishing bosom,
The loveliest of all and the fleetest!

The music of stream and of bird

Shall come back when the winter is o'er;

But the voice that was dearest to us shall be heard In our desolate chambers no more!

The sunlight of May on the waters shall quiverThe light of her eye hath departed forever!

As the bird to its sheltering nest,

When the storm on the hills is abroad,

So her spirit hath flown from this world of unrest To repose on the bosom of GOD!

Where the sorrows of earth never more

May fling o'er its brightness a stain;

Where in rapture and love, it shall ever adore, With a gladness unmingled with pain;

And its thirst shall be slaked by the waters which spring,

Like a river of light, from the throne of the KING!

There is weeping on earth for the lost!

There is bowing in grief to the ground!

But rejoicing and praise mid the sanctified host,
For a spirit in paradise found?

Though brightness hath passed from the earth,
Yet a star is newborn in the sky,

And a soul hath gone home to the land of its birth,
Where are pleasures and fulness of joy!

And a new harp is strung, and a new song is given To the breezes that float o'er the gardens of heaven.

ON THE DEATH OF A SON.

FENELON.

THE great loss which you have sustained, escapes not my sight; but God has taken what belonged to him, and not to us. Who dare say to him, Why hast thou done thus ? This language is far from you. You know he is not accountable for what he doeth. His good pleasure is the supreme reason; besides, we may always see, in the most severe strokes of his fatherly hand, a secret design of mercy. He takes away in a happy hour certain weak men, whom, perhaps, the delusions of the world might have caused to err. He is hasted away to prevent a miserable fall. O what wonders shall we see in the next world, that escape us in this! then shall we sing the song of joy and everlasting thanks, for events that made us weep here. Alas! in the present darkness, we know not what is really good for us, or really evil. If God should do what pleases us, all would be lost. He saves us, by breaking our chains, and making us sorrowful. The same stroke that saves him we love, by taking him from