His heart was open as the day,
His feelings all were true;
His hair was some inclined to gray,
He wore it in a queue.
Whene'er he heard the voice of pain,
His breast with pity burned;
The large, round head upon his cane
From ivory was turned.
Kind words he ever had for all,
He knew no base design;
His eyes were dark and rather small,
His nose was aquiline.
He lived at peace with all mankind,
In friendship he was true;
His coat had pocket-holes behind,
His pantaloons were blue.
Unharmed, the sin which earth pollutes
He passed securely o'er,
And never wore a pair of boots
For thirty years or more.
But good old Grimes is now at rest,
Nor fears misfortune's frown;
He wore a double-breasted vest-
The stripes ran up and down.
He modest merit sought to find,
And pay it its desert;
He had no malice in his mind,
No ruffles on his shirt.
His neighbors he did not abuse,
Was sociable and gay;
He wore large buckles on his shoes,
And changed them every day.
His knowledge, hid from public gaze,
He did not bring to view,
Nor make a noise town-meeting days,
As many people do.
His worldly goods he never threw
In trust to fortune's chances,
But lived (as all his brothers do)
In easy circumstances.
Thus undisturbed by anxious cares
His peaceful moments ran;
And everybody said he was
A fine old gentleman.
The Closing Year.
"T IS midnight's holy hour,-and silence now
Is brooding like a gentle spirit o'er
The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds
The bell's deep tones are swelling,-'t is the knell
Of the departed year. No funeral train
Is sweeping past; yet, on the stream and wood,
With melancholy light, the moon-beams rest
Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred
As by a mourner's sigh; and on yon cloud
That floats so still and placidly through heaven,
The spirits of the seasons seem to stand,——
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form,
And Winter with its aged locks,-and breathe,
In mournful cadences that come abroad
Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail,
A melancholy dirge o'er the dead year,
Gone from the Earth forever.
For memory and for tears. Within the deep,
Still chambers of the heart, a spectre dim,
Whose tones are like the wizard voice of Time
Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold
And solemn finger to the beautiful
And holy visions that have passed away,
And left no shadow of their loveliness
On the dead waste of life. That spectre lifts
The coffin-lid of Hope, and Joy, and Love,
And, bending mournfully above the pale,
Sweet forms, that slumber there, scatters dead flowers O'er what has passed to nothingness.
Has gone, and, with it, many a glorious throng
Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,
Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course,
It waved its sceptre o'er the beautiful,-
And they are not. It laid its pallid hand
Upon the strong man,--and the haughty form
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged
The bright and joyous,-and the tearful wail
Of stricken ones is heard where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded.
The battle-plain, where sword, and spear, and shield,
Flashed in the light of midday,-and the strength
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass,
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came,
And faded like a wreath of mist at eve;
Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,
It heralded its millions to their home
In the dim land of dreams.
Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe!--what power
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt
His iron heart to pity? On, still on,
He presses, and forever. The proud bird,
The condor of the Andes, that can soar
Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave
The fury of the northern hurricane,
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks down
To rest upon his mountain crag,-but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,
And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind
His rushing pinions.
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
Of dreaming sorrow,-cities rise and sink
Like bubbles on the water,-fiery isles
Spring blazing from the ocean, and go back
To their mysterious caverns,-mountains rear
To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow
Their tall heads to the plain,-new empires rise,
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations, and the very stars,
Yon bright and burning blazonry of God,
Glitter a while in their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away
To darkle in the trackless void. Yet, Time,
Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career,
Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not
Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path,
To sit and muse, like other conquerors,
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.
I FILL this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon;
To whom the better elements
And kindly stars have given
A form so fair, that, like the air,
'T is less of earth than heaven.
Her every tone is music's own,
Like those of morning birds,
And something more than melody
Dwells ever in her words;
The coinage of her heart are they,
And from her lips each flows
As one may see the burdened bee
Forth issue from the rose.
Affections are as thoughts to her,
The measures of her hours;
Her feelings have the fragrancy,
The freshness of young flowers;
And lovely passions, changing oft,
So fill her, she appears
The image of themselves by turns,
The idol of past years!
Of her bright face one glance will trace
A picture on the brain,
And of her voice in echoing hearts
A sound must long remain; But memory, such as mine of her, So very much endears,
When death is nigh my latest sigh
Will not be life's, but hers.
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