The woods shrink away, and wide spreads the

morass,

With junipers cluster'd, and matted with grass; Trees, standing like ghosts, their arms jagged and bare,

And hung with gray lichens, like age-whiten'd hair.
The tamarack here and there rising between,
Its boughs clothed with rich, star-like fringes of
green,

And clumps of dense laurels, and brown-headed flags,

And thick, slimy basins, black dotted with snags :
Tread softly now, Carlo! the woodcock is here,
He rises his long bill thrust out like a spear;
The gun ranges on him-his journey is sped;
Quick scamper, my spaniel! and bring in the dead!
We plunge in the swamp-the tough laurels are
round;

No matter; our shy prey not lightly is found;
Another up-darts, but unharm'd is his flight;
Confound it! the sunshine then dazzled my sight;
But the other my shot overtakes as he flies:
Come, Carlo! come, Carlo! I wait for my prize;
One more still another-till, proofs of my sway,
From my pouch dangle heads, in a ghastly array.
From this scene of exploits, now made birdless, I
pass;

Pleasant Pond gleams before me, a mirror of glass: The boat's by the marge, with green branches supplied,

From the keen-sighted duck my approaches to hide;

A flock spots the lake; now crouch, Carlo, below!
And I move with light paddle, on softly and slow,
By that wide lily-island, its meshes that weaves
Of rich yellow globules, and green oval leaves.
I watch them; how bright and superb is the sheen
Of their plumage, gold blended with purple and

The smoke-curls melt off, as the echoes rebound, Hurrah! five dead victims are floating around!

But "cloud-land" is tinged now with sunset, and bright

On the water's smooth polish stretch long lines of light;

A FOREST WALK.

A LOVELY Sky, a cloudless sun,

A wind that breathes of leaves and flowers,
O'er hill, through dale, my steps have won,
To the cool forest's shadowy bowers;
One of the paths all round that wind,

Traced by the browsing herds, I choose,
And sights and sounds of human kind
In nature's lone recesses lose;
The beech displays its marbled bark,

The spruce its green tent stretches wide,
While scowls the hemlock, grim and dark,
The maple's scallop'd dome beside :
All weave on high a verdant roof,
That keeps the very sun aloof,
Making a twilight soft and green,
Within the column'd, vaulted scene.
Sweet forest-odours have their birth
From the clothed boughs and teeming earth;
Where pine-cones dropp'd, leaves piled and dead,
Long tufts of grass, and stars of fern,
With many a wild flower's fairy urn,

A thick, elastic carpet spread;
Here, with its mossy pall, the trunk,
Resolving into soil, is sunk;
There, wrench'd but lately from its throne,

By some fierce whirlwind circling past,
Its huge roots mass'd with earth and stone,
One of the woodland kings is cast.
Above, the forest-tops are bright
With the broad blaze of sunny light:
But now a fitful air-gust parts

The screening branches, and a glow
Of dazzling, startling radiance darts

Down the dark stems, and breaks below;
The mingled shadows off are roll'd,
The sylvan floor is bathed in gold:
Low sprouts and herbs, before unseen,
Display their shades of brown and green:
Tints brighten o'er the velvet moss,
Gleams twinkle on the laurel's gloss;
The robin, brooding in her nest,

Chirps as the quick ray strikes her breast;
And, as my shadow prints the ground,

I see the rabbit upward bound,

With pointed ears an instant look,
Then scamper to the darkest nook,

Where, with crouch'd limb, and staring eye,
He watches while I saunter by.

A narrow vista, carpeted

With rich green grass, invites my tread;
Here showers the light in golden dots,
There sleeps the shade in ebon spots,
So blended, that the very air
Seems network as I enter there.
The partridge, whose deep-rolling drum
Afar has sounded on my ear,
Ceasing his beatings as I come,
Whirrs to the sheltering branches near;
The little milk-snake glides away,

lain,

And I pull with my spoil to the margin again.

And now, between the boughs, a space Of the blue, laughing sky I trace:

He mark'd the fire-storm's blazing flood
Roaring and crackling on its path,
And scorching earth, and melting wood,
Beneath its greedy wrath;

He mark'd the rapid whirlwind shoot,
Trampling the pine tree with its foot,
And darkening thick the day
With streaming bough and sever'd root,
Hurl'd whizzing on its way.

His gaunt hound yell'd, his rifle flash'd,
The grim bear hush'd his savage growl;
In blood and foam the panther gnash'd
His fangs, with dying howl;
The fleet deer ceased its flying bound,
Its snarling wolf-foe bit the ground,
And, with its moaning cry,

The beaver sank beneath the wound

Its pond-built Venice by. Humble the lot, yet his the race,

When Liberty sent forth her cry,
Who throng'd in conflict's deadliest place,
To fight-to bleed-to die!

Who cumber'd Bunker's height of red,
By hope through weary years were led,
And witness'd York Town's sun
Blaze on a nation's banner spread,
A nation's freedom won.

AN AMERICAN FOREST IN SPRING.
Now fluttering breeze, now stormy blast,
Mild rain, then blustering snow:
Winter's stern, fettering cold is past,

But, sweet Spring! where art thou?
The white cloud floats mid smiling blue,
The broad, bright sunshine's golden hue
Bathes the still frozen earth:
"Tis changed! above, black vapours roll:
We turn from our expected stroll,

And seek the blazing hearth.
Hark! that sweet carol! with delight

We leave the stifling room!
The little blue-bird greets our sight,
Spring, glorious Spring, has come!
The south wind's balm is in the air,
The melting snow-wreaths everywhere
Are leaping off in showers;

And Nature, in her brightening looks,
Tells that her flowers, and leaves, and brooks,
And birds, will soon be ours.

A few soft, sunny days have shone,
The air has lost its chill,

A bright-green tinge succeeds the brown,
Upon the southern hill.

Off to the woods! a pleasant scene!
Here sprouts the fresh young wintergreen,
There swells a mossy mound;
Though in the hollows drifts are piled,
The wandering wind is sweet and mild,
And buds are bursting round.
Where its long rings uncurls the fern,
The violet, nestling low,
Casts back the white lid of its urn,
Its purple streaks to show:

Beautiful blossom! first to rise

And smile beneath Spring's wakening skies;
The courier of the band

Of coming flowers, what feelings sweet
Gush, as the silvery gem we meet
Upon its slender wand.

A sudden roar-a shade is cast-
We look up with a start,

And, sounding like a transient blast,
O'erhead the pigeons dart;

Scarce their blue glancing shapes the eye
Can trace, ere dotted on the sky,

They wheel in distant flight.

A chirp! and swift the squirrel scours
Along the prostrate trunk, and cowers
Within its clefts from sight.

Amid the creeping pine, which spreads
Its thick and verdant wreath,
The scaurberry's downy spangle sheds
Its rich, delicious breath.
The bee-swarm murmurs by, and now
It clusters black on yonder bough:

The robin's mottled breast
Glances that sunny spot across,
As round it seeks the twig and moss
To frame its summer nest.
Warmer is each successive sky,
More soft the breezes pass,
The maple's gems of crimson lie
Upon the thick, green grass.
The dogwood sheds its clusters white,
The birch has dropp'd its tassels slight,
Cowslips are by the rill;

The thresher whistles in the glen,
Flutters around the warbling wren,
And swamps have voices shrill.
A simultaneous burst of leaves

Has clothed the forest now,
A single day's bright sunshine weaves
This vivid, gorgeous show.
Masses of shade are cast beneath,
The flowers are spread in varied wreath,

Night brings her soft, sweet moon;
Morn wakes in mist, and twilight gray
Weeps its bright dew, and smiling May
Melts blooming into June!

THE LOST HUNTER.
NUMB'D by the piercing, freezing air,
And burden'd by his game,
The hunter, struggling with despair,
Dragg'd on his shivering frame;
The rifle he had shoulder'd late
Was trail'd along, a weary weight;

His pouch was void of food;
The hours were speeding in their flight,
And soon the long, keen, winter night
Would wrap the solitude.

Oft did he stoop a listening ear,
Sweep round an anxious eye,-
No bark or axe-blow could he hear,
No human trace descry.

His sinuous path, by blazes, wound
Among trunks group'd in myriads round;
Through naked boughs, between
Whose tangled architecture, fraught
With many a shape grotesquely wrought,
The hemlock's spire was seen.

An antler'd dweller of the wild

Had met his eager gaze,

And far his wandering steps beguiled

Within an unknown maze;

Stream, rock, and run-way he had cross'd,
Unheeding, till the marks were lost

By which he used to roam;

And now, deep swamp and wild ravine
And rugged mountain were between
The hunter and his home.

A dusky haze, which slow had crept
On high, now darken'd there,
And a few snow-flakes fluttering swept
Athwart the thick, gray air,
Faster and faster, till between

The trunks and boughs, a mottled screen
Of glimmering motes was spread,
That tick'd against each object round
With gentle and continuous sound,
Like brook o'er pebbled bed.

The laurel tufts, that drooping hung
Close roll'd around their stems,

And the sear beech-leaves still that clung,
Were white with powdering gems.
But, hark! afar a sullen moan
Swell'd out to louder, deeper tone,

As surging near it pass'd,

And, bursting with a roar, and shock
That made the groaning forest rock,
On rush'd the winter blast.

As o'er it whistled, shriek'd, and hiss'd,

Caught by its swooping wings,
The snow was whirl'd to eddying mist,
Barb'd, as it seem'd, with stings;
And now 'twas swept with lightning flight
Above the loftiest hemlock's height,

Like drifting smoke, and now
It hid the air with shooting clouds,
And robed the trees with circling shrouds,
Then dash'd in heaps below.
Here, plunging in a billowy wreath,
There, clinging to a limb,
The suffering hunter gasp'd for breath,
Brain reel'd, and eye grew dim;
As though to whelm him in despair,
Rapidly changed the blackening air
To murkiest gloom of night,
Till naught was seen around, below,
But falling flakes and mantled snow,
That gleam'd in ghastly white.
At every blast an icy dart

Seem'd through his nerves to fly,
The blood was freezing to his heart-

Thought whisper'd he must die.
The thundering tempest echo'd death,
He felt it in his tighten'd breath;
Spoil, rifle dropp'd, and slow

As the dread torpor crawling came
Along his staggering, stiffening frame,
He sunk upon the snow.

Reason forsook her shatter'd throne,-
He deem'd that summer-hours
Again around him brightly shone

In sunshine, leaves, and flowers;
Again the fresh, green, forest-sod,
Rifle in hand, he lightly trod,-

He heard the deer's low bleat;

Or, couch'd within the shadowy nook,
He drank the crystal of the brook
That murmur'd at his feet.

It changed;-his cabin roof o'erspread,
Rafter, and wall, and chair,
Gleam'd in the crackling fire, that shed

Its warmth, and he was there;
His wife had clasp'd his hand, and now
Her gentle kiss was on his brow,

His child was prattling by,

The hound crouch'd, dozing, near the blaze,
And through the pane's frost-pictured haze
He saw the white drifts fly.

That pass'd;-before his swimming sight
Does not a figure bound,

And a soft voice, with wild delight,
Proclaim the lost is found?

No, hunter, no! 'tis but the streak

Of whirling snow-the tempest's shriek-
No human aid is near!

Never again that form will meet

Thy clasp'd embrace-those accents sweet
Speak music to thine ear.

Morn broke;-away the clouds were chased,
The sky was pure and bright,
And on its blue the branches traced

Their webs of glittering white.
Its ivory roof the hemlock stoop'd,
The pine its silvery tassel droop'd,

Down bent the burden'd wood,
And, scatter'd round, low points of green,
Peering above the snowy scene,

Told where the thickets stood.
In a deep hollow, drifted high,
A wave-like heap was thrown,
Dazzlingly in the sunny sky

A diamond blaze it shone;
The little snow-bird, chirping sweet,
Dotted it o'er with tripping feet;

Unsullied, smooth, and fair,

It seem'd, like other mounds, where trunk
And rock amid the wreaths were sunk,
But, O! the dead was there.

Spring came with wakening breezes bland,
Soft suns and melting rains,

And, touch'd by her Ithuriel wand,

Earth bursts its winter-chains.
In a deep nook, where moss and grass
And fern-leaves wove a verdant mass,
Some scatter'd bones beside,
A mother, kneeling with her child,
Told by her tears and wailings wild
That there the lost had died.

2L2

WILLIAM H. BURLEIGH was born in the town of Woodstock, in Connecticut, on the second day of February, 1812. His paternal ancestors came to this country from Wales; and on both sides he is descended from the stern old Puritan stock, being on the mother's a lineal descendant of Governor BRADFORD, whose name appears conspicuously and honourably in the early annals of Massachusetts. An intermediate descendant, the grandfather of Mr. BURLEIGH, served with credit under WASHINGTON, in the war of the Revolution. Such ancestral recollections are treasured, with just pride, in many an humble but happy home in New England.

In his infancy, Mr. BURLEIGH's parents removed to Plainfield, in his native state, where his father was for many years the principal of a popular academy, until the loss of sight induced him to abandon his charge, before his son had attained an age to derive much benefit from his instructions. He retired to a farm, and the boy's time was mainly devoted to its culture, varied by the customary attendance in a district-school through the wintermonths, until he was sixteen, when he proposed to become an apprentice to a neighbouring clothier, but abandoned the idea after two weeks' trial, from an inveterate loathing of the coarseness and brutality of those among whom he was set to labour. Here, however, while engaged in the repulsive cares of his employment, he composed his first sonnet, which was published in a gazette printed in the vicinity. Returning to his father's house, he in the following summer became an apprentice to a

village printer, whom he left after eight months' tedious endurance, leaving in his "stick” a farewell couplet to his master, which is probably remembered unforgivingly to this day. He did not, however, desert the business, of which he had thus obtained some slight knowledge, but continued to labour as half-apprentice, journeyman, sub-editor, etc., through the next seven years, during which he assisted in the conduct of perhaps as many periodicals, deriving thereby little fame and less profit. In December, 1834, while editor of "The Literary Journal," in the city of Schenectady, he married an estimable woman, who has since "divided his sorrows and doubled his joys." In July, 1836, abandoning the printing business for a season, he commenced a new career as a public lecturer, under the auspices of a philanthropic society, and in his new employment he continued for two years. At the close of that period he assumed the editorship of "The Christian Witness," at Pittsburg, Pennsylvania, which he held two years and a half, when he resigned it, to take charge of "The Washington Banner," a gazette published at Allegheny, on the opposite side of the Ohio. Between this duty, and the study of the law, his time is now divided.

His contributions to the periodical literature of the country commenced at an early age, and have been continued at intervals to the present day. "The New Yorker" was for years his favourite medium of communication with the public. A collection of his poems appeared in Philadelphia, early in 1840.

ELEGIAC STANZAS.

SHE hath gone in the spring-time of life,

Ere her sky had been dimm'd by a cloud, While her heart with the rapture of love was yet rife, And the hopes of her youth were unbow'd— From 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 dress'd,

Will return with its music-wing'd hours, And, kiss'd by the breath of the sweet south-west,

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 bloom'd 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 quiver-
The 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!