THE ADOPTED CHILD.

"WHY wouldst thou leave me, oh! gentle child?
Thy home on the mountain is bleak and wild,
A straw-roof'd cabin with lowly wall—
Mine is a fair and a pillar'd hall,

Where many an image of marble gleams,
And the sunshine of picture for ever streams."

"Oh! green is the turf where my brothers play, Through the long bright hours of the summer-day, They find the red cup-moss where they climb, And they chase the bee o'er the scented thyme; And the rocks where the heath-flower blooms they know

Lady, kind lady! oh! let me go."

"Content thee, boy! in my bower to dwell,

Here are sweet sounds which thou lovest well;

Flutes on the air in the stilly noon,

Harps which the wandering breezes tune;
And the silvery wood-note of many a bird,

Whose voice was ne'er in thy mountains heard."

"My mother sings, at the twilight's fall,
A song of the hills far more sweet than all;
She sings it under our own green tree,

To the babe half slumbering on her knee;
I dreamt last night of that music low-
Lady, kind lady! oh! let me go."

"Thy mother is gone from her cares to rest,
She hath taken the babe on her quiet breast;
Thou wouldst meet her footstep, my boy, no more,
Nor hear her song at the cabin door.

-Come thou with me to the vineyards nigh,
And we'll pluck the grapes of the richest dye."

"Is my mother gone from her home away? -But I know that my brothers are there at play. I know they are gathering the fox-glove's bell, Or the long fern-leaves by the sparkling well, Or they launch their boats where the bright streams flow

Lady, kind lady! oh! let me go."

"Fair child! thy brothers are wanderers now,
They sport no more on the mountain's brow,
They have left the fern by the spring's green side,
And the streams where the fairy barks were tried.
-Be thou at peace in thy brighter lot,

For thy cabin-home is a lonely spot."

"Are they gone, all gone from the sunny hill? -But the bird and the blue-fly rove o'er it still, And the red-deer bound in their gladness free, And the turf is bent by the singing bee,

And the waters leap, and the fresh winds blowLady, kind lady! oh! let me go."

THE DEPARTED.

"Thou shalt lie down

With patriarchs of the infant world-with kings,
The powerful of the earth-the wise, the good,

Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,

All in one mighty sepulchre."

Bryant.

AND shrink ye from the way

To the spirit's distant shore? Earth's mightiest men, in arm'd array, Are thither gone before.

The warrior kings, whose banner

Flew far as eagles fly,

They are gone where swords avail them not,

From the feast of victory.

And the seers, who sat of yore

By orient palm or wave,

They have pass'd with all their starry loreCan ye still fear the grave?

-We fear, we fear!-the sunshine
Is joyous to behold,

And we reck not of the buried kings,
Or the awful seers of old.

Ye shrink!-the bards whose lays

Have made your deep hearts burn, They have left the sun, and the voice of praise, For the land whence none return:

And the lovely, whose memorial

Is the verse that cannot die,

They too are gone with their glorious bloom, From the gaze of human eye.

Would ye not join that throng
Of the earth's departed flowers,

And the masters of the mighty song
In their far and fadeless bowers?

Those songs are high and holy,

But they vanquish not our fear;
Not from our path those flowers are gone-
We fain would linger here!

Linger then yet awhile,

As the last leaves on the bough!
-Ye have loved the gleam of many a smile
That is taken from you now.