Over his eyes in soft eclipse,
Over his brow and over his lips,
Out to his little finger-tips!
Softly sinking, down he goes!
Down he goes! down he goes!
See! he's hushed in sweet repose.

JOSIAH GILBERT HOLLAND.

CHOOSING A NAME.

I HAVE got a new-born sister;
I was nigh the first that kissed her.
When the nursing-woman brought her
To papa, his infant daughter,
How papa's dear eyes did glisten!
She will shortly be to christen;
And papa has made the offer,
I shall have the naming of her.

Now I wonder what would please her, -
Charlotte, Julia, or Louisa?
Ann and Mary, they 're too common;
Joan's too formal for a woman;
Jane's a prettier name beside;
But we had a Jane that died.
They would say, if 't was Rebecca,
That she was a little Quaker.
Edith's pretty, but that looks
Better in old English books;
Ellen's left off long ago;
Blanche is out of fashion now.
None that I have named as yet
Are so good as Margaret.
Emily is neat and fine;
What do you think of Caroline?
How I'm puzzled and perplexed
What to choose or think of next!
I am in a little fever

Lest the name that I should give her
Should disgrace her or defame her;
I will leave papa to name her.

BABY MAY.

MARY LAMB.

CHEEKS as soft as July peaches;
Lips whose dewy scarlet teaches
Poppies paleness; round large eyes
Ever great with new surprise;

Minutes filled with shadeless gladness;
Minutes just as brimmed with sadness;
Happy smiles and wailing cries;
Crows, and laughs, and tearful eyes;
Lights and shadows, swifter born
Than on wind-swept autumn corn;
Ever some new tiny notion,

Making every limb all motion;
Catchings up of legs and arms;
Throwings back and small alarms;
Clutching fingers; straightening jerks;
Twining feet whose each toe works ;
Kickings up and straining risings;
Mother's ever new surprisings;

Hands all wants and looks all wonder
At all things the heavens under;
Tiny scorns of smiled reprovings
That have more of love than lovings;
Mischiefs done with such a winning
Archness that we prize such sinning;
Breakings dire of plates and glasses ;
Graspings small at all that passes;
Pullings off of all that's able
To be caught from tray or table;
Silences, - small meditations
Deep as thoughts of cares for nations;
Breaking into wisest speeches
In a tongue that nothing teaches ;
All the thoughts of whose possessing
Must be wooed to light by guessing;
Slumbers, — such sweet angel-seemings
That we'd ever have such dreamings;
Till from sleep we see thee breaking,
And we'd always have thee waking;
Wealth for which we know no measure;
Pleasure high above all pleasure ;
Gladness brimming over gladness;
Joy in care; delight in sadness;
Loveliness beyond completeness;
Sweetness distancing all sweetness ;
Beauty all that beauty may be ;
That's May Bennett; that 's my baby.

O, pray to them softly, my baby, with me!
And say thou wouldst rather
They'd watch o'er thy father!

"I love you," Baby Louise.

Do you hear me, Baby Louise?

I have sung your praises for nearly an hour,

thee."

The dawn of the morning Saw Dermot returning,

And closely caressing

Her child with a blessing,

Said, "I knew that the angels were whispering with thee."

SAMUEL LOVER.

LULLABY.

TO CHARLOTTE PULTENEY.

TIMELY blossom, Infant fair,

Fondling of a happy pair,
Every morn and every night
Their solicitous delight,

Sleeping, waking, still at ease,
Pleasing, without skill to please;
Little gossip, blithe and hale,
Tattling many a broken tale,
Singing many a tuneless song,
Lavish of a heedless tongue;
Simple maiden, void of art,
Babbling out the very heart,
Yet abandoned to thy will,
Yet imagining no ill,

Yet too innocent to blush;
Like the linnet in the bush
To the mother-linnet's note
Moduling her slender throat;
Chirping forth thy petty joys,
Wanton in the change of toys,
Like the linnet green, in May
Flitting to each bloomy spray;
Wearied then and glad of rest,
Like the linnet in the nest :-
This thy present happy lot,
This in time will be forgot:
Other pleasures, other cares,
Ever busy Time prepares;
And thou shalt in thy daughter see,
This picture, once, resembled thee.

AMBROSE PHILIPS.

TO MY INFANT SON.

THOU happy, happy elf!

(But stop, first let me kiss away that tear,) Thou tiny image of myself!

(My love, he's poking peas into his ear,) Thou merry, laughing sprite,

With spirits, feather light,

(He's got a knife!)

Thou enviable being!

THE LOST HEIR.

"O where, and O where

Is my bonnie laddie gone?"-OLD SONG.

ONE day, as I was going by

That part of Holborn christened High,
I heard a loud and sudden cry
That chilled my very blood;
And lo! from out a dirty alley,
Where pigs and Irish wont to rally,

I saw a crazy woman sally,

Bedaubed with grease and mud.

She turned her East, she turned her West,
Staring like Pythoness possest,

With streaming hair and heaving breast,

As one stark mad with grief.

"O Lord! O dear, my heart will break, I shall go stick stark staring wild!

Has ever a one seen anything about the streets like a crying lost-looking child?

Lawk help me, I don't know where to look, or to run, if I only knew which way

A Child as is lost about London streets, and especially Seven Dials, is a needle in a bottle of hay.

I am all in a quiver-get out of my sight, do, you wretch, you little Kitty M'Nab! You promised to have half an eye to him, you know you did, you dirty deceitful young drab.

The last time as ever I see him, poor thing, was with my own blessed Motherly eyes, Sitting as good as gold in the gutter, a playing at making little dirt-pies.

I wonder he left the court, where he was better off than all the other young boys, With two bricks, an old shoe, nine oyster-shells, and a dead kitten by way of toys. When his Father comes home, and he always comes home as sure as ever the clock strikes one,

Play on, play on,

My elfin John!

lost; and the beef and the inguns not done!

La bless you, good folks, mind your own concarns, and don't be making a mob in the street;

O Sergeant M'Farlane! you have not come across my poor little boy, have you, in your beat?

Do, good people, move on! don't stand staring

at me like a parcel of stupid stuck pigs; Saints forbid but he's p'r'aps been inviggled away up a court for the sake of his clothes by the priggs;

He'd a very good jacket, for certain, for I bought it myself for a shilling one day in Rag Fair;