The convolutions of a smooth-lipped shell;
To which, in silence hushed, his very soul
Listened intensely; and his countenance soon
Brightened with joy; for from within were heard
Murmurings, whereby the monitor expressed
Mysterious union with its native sea.
Even such a shell the universe itself
Is to the ear of Faith; and there are times,
I doubt not, when to you it doth impart
Authentic tidings of invisible things;
Of ebb and flow, and ever-during power;
And central peace, subsisting at the heart
Of endless agitation.
E sought not praise, and praise did overlook His unobtrusive merit; but his life, Sweet to himself, was exercised in good, That shall survive his name and memory.
Acknowledgments of gratitude sincere Accompanied these musings; fervent thanks For my own peaceful lot and happy choice; A choice that from the passions of the world Withdrew, and fixed me in a still retreat; Sheltered, but not to social duties lost, Secluded, but not buried; and with song Cheering my days, and with industrious thought; With the ever-welcome company of books; With virtuous friendship's soul-sustaining aid, And with the blessings of domestic love.
Is no mechanic structure, built by rule;
And which, once built, retains a steadfast shape
And undisturbed proportions; but a thing
Subject, you deem, to vital accidents;
And, like the water-lily, lives and thrives,
Whose root is fixed in stable earth, whose head
Floats on the tossing waves.
COTTAR'S DWELLING AMONG THE
High on the breast of yon dark mountain, dark
With stony barrenness, a shining speck,
Bright as a sunbeam sleeping till a shower
Brush it away, or cloud pass over it;
And such it might be deemed-a sleeping sunbeam ;
But 'tis a plot of cultivated ground,
Cut off, an island in the dusky waste;
And that attractive brightness is its own.
The lofty site, by nature framed to tempt
Amid a wilderness of rocks and stones
The tiller's hand, a hermit might have chosen,
For opportunity presented thence
Far forth to send his wandering eye o'er land
And ocean, and look down upon the works,
The habitations, and the ways of men,
Himself unseen! But no tradition tells
That ever hermit dipped his maple dish
In the sweet spring that lurks 'mid yon green fields; And no such visionary views belong
To those who occupy and till the ground,
High on that mountain where they long have dwelt A wedded pair in childless solitude.
A house of stones collected on the spot,
By rude hands built, with rocky knolls in front,
Backed also by a ledge of rock, whose crest
Of birch trees waves over the chimney-top;
A rough abode-in colour, shape, and size,
Such as in unsafe times of border-war
Might have been wished for and contrived, to elude
The eye of roving plunderer-for their need
Suffices; and unshaken bears the assault
Of their most dreaded foe, the strong South-west,
In anger blowing from the distant sea.
-Alone within her solitary hut;
There, or within the compass of her fields,
At any moment may the Dame be found,
True as the stock-dove to her shallow nest
And to the grove that holds it. She beguiles
By intermingled work of house and field
The summer's day, and winter's; with success
Not equal, but sufficient to maintain,
Even at the worst, a smooth stream of content,
Until the expected hour at which her Mate
From the far-distant quarry's vault returns;
And by his converse crowns a silent day
With evening cheerfulness. In powers of mind,
In scale of culture, few among my flock
Hold lower rank than this sequestered pair:
But true humility descends from heaven;
And that best gift of heaven hath fallen on them;
Abundant recompense for every want.
-Stoop from your height, ye proud, and copy these!
Who, in their noiseless dwelling-place, can hear The voice of wisdom whispering scripture texts For the mind's government, or temper's peace; And recommending for their mutual need, Forgiveness, patience, hope, and charity!
LIFE UNDER THE BRITISH CONSTITUTION.
HUS are they born, thus fostered, thus main-
tained;
And by the care prospective of our wise
Forefathers, who, to guard against the shocks
The fluctuation and decay of things,
Embodied and established these high truths
In solemn institutions-men convinced
That life is love and immortality,
The being one, and one the element.
There lies the channel, and original bed,
From the beginning, hollowed out and scooped
For Man's affections-else betrayed and lost,
And swallowed up 'mid deserts infinite!
This is the genuine course, the aim, and end
Of prescient reason; all conclusions else
Are abject, vain, presumptuous, and perverse.
The faith partaking of those holy times.
Life, I repeat, is energy of love
Divine or human; exercised in pain,
In strife, and tribulation; and ordained,
If so approved and sanctified, to pass
Through shades and silent rest, to endless joy.
LOYALTY TO STATE AND CHURCH.
HALL to the crown by Freedom shaped—to
An English Sovereign's brow! and to the throne
Whereon he sits! Whose deep foundations lie
In veneration and the people's love;
Whose steps are equity, whose seat is law.
-Hail to the State of England! And conjoin
With this a salutation as devout,
Made to the spiritual fabric of her Church;
Founded in truth; by blood of Martyrdom
Cemented; by the hands of Wisdom reared
In beauty of holiness, with ordered pomp,
Decent and unreproved. The voice, that grects
The majesty of both, shall pray for both;
That, mutually protected and sustained,
They may endure long as the sea surrounds
This favoured Land, or sunshine warms her soil.
HAPPY COTTAGE HOME.
ROUGHT from the woods, the honeysuckle twines
Around the porch, and seems, in that trim place,
A plant no longer wild; the cultured rose
There blossoms, strong in health, and will be soon
Roof-high; the wild pink crowns the garden-wall,
And with the flowers are intermingled stones
Sparry and bright, rough scatterings of the hills.
These ornaments, that fade not with the year,
A hardy Girl continues to provide ;
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