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And must be bought, though penury Of the mountains of sin hanging o'er

betide.

The plum all azure, and the nut all

brown,

And here each season do those cakes abide,

them,

Of the tempest of Fate blowing wild;

Oh, there's nothing on earth half so holy As the innocent heart of a child!

Whose honor'd names th' inventive city They are idols of hearts and of households;

own,

Rend'ring through Britain's isle Salopia's

praises known.

Admired Salopia! that with venial pride Eyes her bright form in Severn's ambient wave,

Famed for her loyal cares in perils tried, Her daughters lovely and her striplings brave:

They are angels of God in disguise; His sunlight still sleeps in their tresses, His glory still gleams in their eyes. Those truants from home and from heaven,

They have made me more manly and mild,

And I know now how Jesus could liken
The kingdom of God to a child.

Ah! midst the rest, may flowers adorn I ask not a life for the dear ones,
All radiant, as others have done,

his grave,

Whose art did first these dulcet cates dis- But that life may have just enough shadow
play!
To temper the glare of the sun :
A motive fair to learning's imps he I would pray God to guard them from evil,
But my prayer would bound back to

gave,

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WHEN the lessons and tasks are all ended, And the school for the day is dismiss'd, The little ones gather around me,

To bid me good-night and be kiss'd: Oh, the little white arms that encircle My neck in their tender embrace! Oh the smiles that are halos of heaven, Shedding sunshine of love on my face! And when they are gone I sit dreaming Of my childhood, too lovely to last : Of joy that my heart will remember While it wakes to the pulse of the past, Ere the world and its wickedness made me A partner of sorrow and sin; When the glory of God was about me, And the glory of gladness within.

All my heart grows as weak as a woman's,

And the fountains of feeling will flow, When I think of the paths steep and stony,

Where the feet of the dear ones must go;

myself;

Ah! a seraph may pray for a sinner, But a sinner must pray for himself.

The twig is so easily bended,

I have banish'd the rule and the rod; I have taught them the goodness of knowledge,

They have taught me the goodness of God;

My heart is the dungeon of darkness, Where I shut them for breaking a

rule;

My frown is sufficient correction; My love is the law of the school.

I shall leave the old house in the autumn,
To traverse its threshold no more;
Ah! how I shall sigh for the dear ones
That meet me each morn at the door!
I shall miss the " good-nights" and the
kisses,

And the gush of their innocent glee, The group on the green, and the flowers

That are brought every morning for me.

I shall miss them at morn and at even, Their song in the school and the street; I shall miss the low hum of their voices, And the tread of their delicate feet.

When the lessons of life are all ended,

And Death says, "The school is dis-
miss'd !"

May the little ones gather around me,
To bid me good-night, and be kiss'd!

CHARLES M. DICKINSON.

THE CRY OF THE CHILDREN.

Do ye hear the children weeping, O my brothers,

Ere the sorrow comes with years? They are leaning their young heads against their mothers,

And that cannot stop their tears. The young lambs are bleating in the meadows,

The young birds are chirping in the nest,

The young fawns are playing with the shadows,

"Your old earth," they say, "is very dreary,

Our young feet," they say, "are very
weak;

Few paces have we taken, yet are weary-
Our grave-rest is very far to seek :

Ask the aged why they weep, and not the
children,

For the outside earth is cold, And we young ones stand without, in our bewildering,

And the graves are for the old.

"True," say the children, "it may happen That we die before our time:

Little Alice died last year, her grave is shapen

Like a snowball, in the rime.

We looked into the pit prepared to take her: Was no room for any work in the close clay!

The young flowers are blowing toward From the sleep wherein she lieth none will

the west

But the young, young children, O my brothers,

They are weeping bitterly!

They are weeping in the playtime of the others,

In the country of the free.

Do you question the young children in
their sorrow

Why their tears are falling so?
The old man may weep for his to-morrow
Which is lost in Long Ago;

The old tree is leafless in the forest,

The old year is ending in the frost, The old wound, if stricken, is the sorest,

The old hope is hardest to be lost:

wake her,

Crying, 'Get up little Alice! it is day.' If you listen by that grave, in sun and shower,

With your ear down, little Alice never cries;

Could we see her face, be sure we should not know her,

For the smile has time for growing in

her eyes:

And merry go her moments, lull'd and still'd in

The shroud by the kirk-chime. It is good when it happens," say the children,

"That we die before our time."

But the young, young children, O my Alas, alas, the children! they are seeking

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But they answer, "Are your cowslips of the meadows

Like our weeds a-near the mine? Leave us quiet in the dark of the coalshadows,

From your pleasures fair and fine!

"For oh," say the children, "we are weary, And we cannot run or leap;

If we cared for any meadows, it were merely

To drop down in them and sleep. Our knees tremble sorely in the stooping, We fall upon our faces, trying to go; And, underneath our heavy eyelids drooping,

The reddest flower would look as pale as

snow.

For all day we drag our burden tiring

Through the coal-dark, underground; Or all day we drive the wheels of iron

In the factories, round and round.

"For all day the wheels are droning, turning;

Their wind comes in our faces,

Till our hearts turn, our heads with pulses burning,

And the walls turn in their places: Turns the sky in the high window blank and reeling,

Turns the long light that drops adown

the wall,

Let them prove their living souls against the notion

That they live in you, or under you, O

wheels!

Still, all day, the iron wheels go onward, Grinding life down from its mark; And the children's souls, which God is calling sunward,

Spin on blindly in the dark.

Now tell the poor young children, O my brothers,

To look up to Him and pray; So the blessed One who blesseth all the others,

Will bless them another day. They answer, "Who is God, that He should hear us,

While the rushing of the iron wheels is

stirr'd?

When we sob aloud, the human creatures

near us

Pass by, hearing not, or answer not a word.

And we hear not (for the wheels in their resounding)

Strangers speaking at the door :

Is it likely God, with angels singing round Him,

Hears our weeping any more?

Turn the black flies that crawl along the "Two words, indeed, of praying we re

ceiling,

All are turning, all the day, and we with all.

And all day the iron wheels are droning,

And sometimes we could pray,

member,

And at midnight's hour of harm,

Our Father,' looking upward in the cham

ber,

We say softly for a charm.

'O ye wheels' (breaking out in a mad We know no other words except 'Our

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And we think that, in some pause of angels' song,

Ay, be silent! Let them hear each other God may pluck them with the silence

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"But no!" say the children, weeping faster,

"He is speechless as a stone: And they tell us of His image is the master, Who commands us to work on. Go to!" say the children,-" up in heaven, Dark, wheel-like, turning clouds are all we find.

Do not mock us; grief has made us unbelieving :

We look up for God, but tears have made us blind."

Do you hear the children weeping and disproving,

O my brothers, what ye preach? For God's possible is taught by His world's loving,

And the children doubt of each.

Our blood splashes upward, O goldheaper,

And your purple shows your path! But the child's sob in the silence curses deeper

Than the strong man in his wrath."

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.

TO A HIGHLAND GIRL.

(AT INVERSNEYDE, UPON LOCH LOMOND.)
SWEET Highland Girl, a very shower
Of beauty is thy earthly dower!
Twice seven consenting years have shed
Their utmost bounty on thy head:
And, these gray Rocks; this household
Lawn;

These Trees, a veil just half withdrawn ;

And well may the children weep before you! This fall of water, that doth make

They are weary ere they run;

A murmur near the silent Lake;

They have never seen the sunshine, nor the This little Bay, a quiet Road

glory

Which is brighter than the sun.

That holds in shelter thy Abode;
In truth, together do ye seem

They know the grief of man, without its Like something fashion'd in a dream; Such Forms as from their covert peep

wisdom; They sink in man's despair, without its When earthly cares are laid asleep!

calm;

Yet, dream and vision as thou art,

Are slaves, without the liberty in Christ- I bless thee with a human heart:

dom,

God shield thee to thy latest years!

Are martyrs, by the pang without the I neither know thee nor thy peers;

palm :

Are worn as if with age, yet unretrievingly

The harvest of its memories cannot reap,

And yet my eyes are fill'd with tears.

With earnest feeling I shall pray
For thee when I am far away:

Are orphans of the earthly love and heav- For never saw I mien or face,

enly.

Let them weep! let them weep!

They look up with their pale and sunken faces,

And their look is dread to see,

In which more plainly I could trace
Benignity and home-bred sense
Ripening in perfect innocence.
Here scatter'd like a random seed,
Remote from men, thou dost not need
The embarrass'd look of shy distress,

For they 'mind you of their angels in high And maidenly shamefacedness:

places,

With eyes turned on Deity.

Thou wear'st upon thy forehead clear
The freedom of a Mountaineer:

How long," they say, "how long, O cruel A face with gladness overspread !

nation,

Will you stand, to move the world, on a

child's heart,—

tion,

Soft smiles by human kindness bred!
And seemliness complete, that sways
Thy courtesies, about thee plays:

Stifle down with a mailed heel its palpita- With no restraint, but such as springs
From quick and eager visitings
And tread onward to your throne amid Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach
the mart?
Of thy few words of English speech:

A bondage sweetly brook'd, a strife.
That gives thy gestures grace and life!
So have I, not unmoved in mind,
Seen birds of tempest-loving kind,
Thus beating up against the wind.

What hand but would a garland cull
For thee who art so beautiful?
Oh happy pleasure! here to dwell
Beside thee in some heathy dell;
Adopt your homely ways, and dress,
A Shepherd, thou a Shepherdess!
But I could frame a wish for thee
More like a grave reality:
Thou art to me but as a wave

Of the wild sea: and I would have
Some claim upon thee, if I could,
Though but of common neighborhood.
What joy to hear thee, and to see!
Thy elder Brother I would be,
Thy Father, anything to thee!

Now thanks to Heaven! that of its grace
Hath led me to this lonely place.
Joy have I had; and going hence
I bear away my recompense.
In spots like these it is we prize
Our Memory, feel that she hath eyes:
Then, why should I be loth to stir?
I feel this place was made for her;
To give new pleasure like the past,
Continued long as life shall last.
Nor am I loth, though pleased at heart,
Sweet Highland Girl! from thee to part;
For I, methinks, till I grow old,
As fair before me shall behold,

As I do now, the Cabin small,
The Lake, the Bay, the Waterfall;
And thee, the Spirit of them all!

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

MAIDENHOOD.

MAIDEN! with the meek, brown eyes,
In whose orbs a shadow lies
Like the dusk in evening skies!
Thou whose locks outshine the sun,
Golden tresses, wreath'd in one,
As the braided streamlets run!

Standing, with reluctant feet,
Where the brook and river meet,
Womanhood and childhood fleet!

Gazing, with a timid glance,

On the brooklet's swift advance, On the river's broad expanse!

Deep and still, that gliding stream
Beautiful to thee must seem,
As the river of a dream.

Then why pause with indecision, When bright angels in thy vision Beckon thee to fields Elysian?

Seest thou shadows sailing by, As the dove, with startled eye, Sees the falcon's shadow fly?

Hearest thou voices on the shore, That our ears perceive no more, Deafen'd by the cataract's roar?

O thou child of many prayers!
Life hath quicksands,-life hath snares!
Care and age come unawares.

Like the swell of some sweet tune,
Morning rises into noon,
May glides onward into June.

Childhood is the bough, where slumber'd Birds and blossoms many-number'd :— Age, that bough with snows encumber'd.

Gather, then, each flower that grows,
When the young heart overflows,
To embalm that tent of snows.

Bear a lily in thy hand;
Gates of brass cannot withstand
One touch of that magic wand.

Bear through sorrow, wrong, and ruth,
In thy heart the dew of youth,
On thy lips the smile of truth.

Oh, that dew, like balm, shall steal
Into wounds that cannot heal,
Even as sleep our eyes doth seal;

And that smile, like sunshine, dart
Into many a sunless heart,
For a smile of God thou art.

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.

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