DEATH OF THE FIRST-BORN.

WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK.

YOUNG mother, he is gone!

His dimpled cheek no more will touch thy breast; No more the music-tone

Float from his lips, to thine all fondly pressed; His smiles and happy laugh are lost to thee; Earth must his mother and his pillow be.

His was the morning hour,

And he hath passed in beauty from the day,
A bud, not yet a flower,

Torn, in its sweetness, from the parent's spray;
The death-wind swept him to his soft repose,
As frost, in spring-time, blights the early rose.

Never on earth again

Will his rich accents charm thy listening ear,
Like some Eolian strain,

Breathing at eventide serene and clear;

His voice is choked in dust, and on his eyes
The unbroken seal of peace and silence lies.

And from thy yearning heart,

Whose inmost core was warm with love for him,
A gladness must depart,

And those kind eyes with many tears be dim;
While lonely memories, an unceasing train,
Will turn the raptures of the past to pain.

Yet, mourner, while the day

Rolls like the darkness of a funeral by,

And hope forbids one ray

To stream athwart the grief-discolored sky; There breaks upon thy sorrow's evening gloom A trembling lustre from beyond the tomb.

'Tis from the better land!

There, bathed in radiance that around them springs,

Thy loved one's wings expand;

As with the choiring cherubim he sings,
And all the glory of that GoD can see,
Who said, on earth, to children,' Come to me.'

Mother, thy child is blessed:

And though his presence may be lost to thee,
And vacant leave thy breast,

And missed, a sweet load from thy parent knee;
Though tones familiar from thine ear have passed,
Thou 'lt meet thy first-born with his Lord at last.

SORROW is better than laughter: for by the sadness of the countenance the heart is made better. ECCLESIASTES.

GOD WILL AFFORD SUPPORT.

DRELINCOURT.

THE only source of all our consolation, is God's gracious promise to help us in time of need. Engrave in the bottom of your hearts these divine sayings: When he that hath set his love upon me, shall call upon me, I will answer him: I will be with him in trouble, I will deliver him, and honor him. The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations. He is rich unto all that call upon him. He is nigh unto all them that call upon him, to all that call upon him in truth. He fulfils the desires of the humble, he hears their cry. Many are the afflictions of the righteous but the Lord delivereth him out of them all. Call upon me, saith he, in the day of trouble, I will deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify me. The tenderness of God's love accompanies the glory of his majesty. He is the father of mercies, and the God of all comfort, who comforteth us in all our tribulation. He is that bosom friend, who loveth at all times, as it were, a brother who is born for adversity. He is at

once the King of kings, and our most cordial friend. He enters into the house of mourning, and is nigh unto every broken heart and contrite spirit. The lower our estate is, the more he remembereth us. Shall thy God, who loves thee more cordially, and with a more unalterable love than the best of fathers, or the most tender-hearted mother, forsake thee in the day of affliction? This merciful and compassionate Father, who took thee into his protection when thou camest into the world, and hath administered to all thy necessities, shall he refuse thee his gracious succor in this thy utmost extremity? He, who hath crowned thy youthful days with his divine blessings, will not cast thee off when thy strength faileth.

THEN shall ye call upon me, and ye shall go and pray unto me, and I will hearken un to you. And ye shall seek me, and find me, when ye shall search for me with all your heart.

JEREMIAH.

SHALL we receive good at the hand of God, and shall we not receive evil?

THE EARLY DEAD.

WILLIS GAYLORD CLARK.

If it be sad to mark the bowed with age
Sink in the halls of the remorseless tomb,
Closing the changes of life's pilgrimage

In the still darkness of its mouldering gloom:
O! what a shadow o'er the heart is flung,
When peals the requiem of the loved and young!

They to whose bosoms, like the dawn of spring
To the unfolding bud and scented rose,
Comes the pure freshness age can never bring,
And fills the spirit with a rich repose,
How shall we lay them in their final rest,
How pile the clods upon their wasting breast?

Life openeth brightly to their ardent gaze;

A glorious pomp sits on the gorgeous sky; O'er the broad world Hope's smile incessant plays,

And scenes of beauty win the enchanted eye: How sad to break the vision, and to fold. Each lifeless form in earth's embracing mould!

Yet this is life! To mark from day to day,
Youth, in the freshness of its morning prime,
Pass like the anthem of a breeze away,

Sinking in waves of death ere chilled by time!