THE SNOWDROP.

SUGGESTED BY THE DEATH OF AN INFANT,

FEBRUARY,

1843.

ON Flora's lap there now appears

A harbinger of Spring,

That never fails o'er darkened years

Its modest charms to fling.

In lightsome green it breaks the ground,

By fostering Nature led;

And having faintly glanced around,

Hangs down its beauteous head.

Exposed to storms by day and night,

This little graceful flower

Assumes a garb of spotless white,

And dares the boisterous hour.

Relentless ills descending fast,

Take vengeance on its birth;

And death ere long with final blast
Throws back its form to earth.

So, like the Snowdrop, does the face

Of infant beauty shine,

When on its placid brow we trace

No little darkling line.

But gathering tempests oft invade

The sweetest of such bloom,

Till all of loveliness is laid

To moulder in the tomb.

Yet He to whom the mourner flies,

This consolation gives:

The flower, when withered, truly dies

The soul for ever lives!

IN THE CHOICE OF A THEME.

IN the choice of a theme shall I fathom the deep,

Where the Shark on his merciless embassy roams? Shall I muse on the brink of a Lake in its sleep,

Or shuddering stand where the Cataract foams?

Shall I traverse some African waste to behold

The King of the forest repose in his lair ;

Or follow him into some sheltering fold,

And witness the death of his prey in despair?

Rather let me in solitude wander beneath

The bleak mountainous cliffs of our own British isle, Whence the Eagle is proudly accustomed to wreath

His ascent in the light of the Sun's passing smile.

THE EAGLE.

On the sky-hidden rock

Of the desolate wild,

Upon which the dread shock

Of the earthquake has piled

Dizzy crag upon crag,

The fierce Eagle alights,-

And from off his own heights,

With a vision unclouded as that of the star,

Which, at peace in its orbit, surveys from afar

The earth's busy expanse

He descries at a glance

The light breath of the Stag,

As it quivering plays

To the tremulous sigh,

Through its devious ways

To the ocean on high.

His imperial reign

Stretches over the heath

And the bountiful plain ;

And the subjects beneath

Him conduce to his spoil.

Like a mail-covered King,

On impervious wing,

He sweeps o'er his dominions in martial array,

And foreshadows the coming of sudden dismay.

Then collapsing, he drops

Like a plummet, nor stops

To evade the recoil;

But transfixing his prize

With a warrior's skill,

In a moment it lies

Irreversibly still!