I've seen him when the morning sun
Burned like a bale-fire on the height;
I've seen him when the day was done,
Bathed in the evening's crimson light.
I've seen him at the midnight hour,
When all the world were calmly sleeping,
Like some stern sentry in his tower,
His weary watch in silence keeping.
And there for ever firm and clear,
His lofty turret upward springs;
He owns no rival summit near,
No sovereign but the King of kings.
Thousands of nations have passed by,
Thousands of years unknown to story,
And still his aged walls on high
He rears, in melancholy glory.
The proudest works of human hands
Live but an age, before they fall;
While that severe and hoary tower
Outlasts the mightiest of them all.
And man himself, more frail by far,
Than even the works his hand is raising,
Sinks downwards like the falling star,-
That flashes, and expires in blazing.
And all the treasures of the heart,
Its loves and sorrows, joys and fears,
Its hopes and memories must depart
To sleep with unremembered years.
But still that ancient rampart stands
Unchanged, though years are passing o'er him;
And time withdraws his powerless hands,
While ages melt away before him.
So should it be-for no heart beats
Within his cold and silent breast;
To him no gentle voice repeats
The soothing words that make us blest.
And more than this-his deep repose
Is troubled by no thoughts of sorrow,
He hath no weary eyes to close,
No cause to hope or fear to-morrow.
Farewell! I go my distant way;
Perchance in some succeeding years,
The eyes that know no cloud to-day,
May gaze upon thee dim with tears.
Then may thy calm, unaltering form,
Inspire in me the firm endeavour-
Like thee to meet each lowering storm,
Till life and sorrow end for ever.
HER suff'ring ended with the day,
Yet lived she at its close,
And breathed the long, long night away,
In statue-like repose.
But when the sun, in all his state,
Illum'd the eastern skies,
She passed through Glory's Morning-gate, And walked in Paradise!
ADIEU, the city's ceaseless hum,
The haunts of sensual life, adieu!
Green fields, and silent glens! we come,
To spend this bright spring-day with you.
Whether the hills and vales shall gleam
With beauty, is for us to choose;
For leaf and blossom, rock and stream,
Are coloured with the spirit's hues.
Here, to the seeking soul, is brought
A nobler view of human fate,
And higher feeling, higher thought,
And glimpses of a higher state.
Through change of time, on sea and shore,
Serenely nature smiles away;
Yon infinite blue sky bends o'er
Our world, as at the primal day.
The self-renewing earth is moved
With youthful life each circling year;
And flowers that Ceres' daughter loved
At Enna, now are blooming here.
Glad nature will this truth reveal,
That God is ours and we are His;
O friends, my friends! what joy to feel
That He our loving father is!
BY CHARLES FENNO HOFFMAN.
SHE loves-but 'tis not me she loves:-
Not me on whom she ponders,
When in some dream of tenderness
Her truant fancy wanders.
The forms that flit her visions through,
Are like the shapes of old,
Where tales of Prince and Paladin
On tapestry are told.
Man may not hope her heart to win,
Be his of common mould!
But I-though spurs are won no more
Where herald's trump is pealing,
Nor thrones carved out for lady fair
Where steel-clad ranks are wheeling―
I loose the falcon of my hopes
Upon as proud a flight
As those who hawked at high renown,
In song-ennobled fight.
If daring then true love may crown,
My love she must requite!
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