And God who made shall gather them :
I go from you to Him!"

The morning dawn'd full darkly,
The rain came flashing down,
And the jagged streak of the levin-bolt
Lit up the gloomy town:

The thunder crash'd across the heaven,
The fatal hour was come;

Yet aye broke in with muffled beat
The 'larum of the drum.

There was madness on the earth below
And anger in the sky,

And young and old, and rich and poor, Came forth to see him die.

Ah, God! that ghastly gibbet!
How dismal 't is to see

The great tall spectral skeleton,
The ladder and the tree!

Hark! hark! it is the clash of arms -
The bells begin to toll-
"He is coming! he is coming!
God's mercy on his soul!"
One last long peal of thunder:

The clouds are clear'd away,

And the glorious sun once more looks down

Amidst the dazzling day.

"He is coming! he is coming!" Like a bridegroom from his room, Came the hero from his prison

To the scaffold and the doom. There was glory on his forehead, There was lustre in his eye, And he never walk'd to battle More proudly than to die : There was color in his visage, Though the cheeks of all were wan, And they marvell'd as they saw him pass, That great and goodly man!

He mounted up the scaffold,

And he turn'd him to the crowd;
But they dar'd not trust the people,
So he might not speak aloud.
But he look'd upon the heavens,
And they were clear and blue,
And in the liquid ether

The eye of God shone through;
Yet a black and murky battlement
Lay resting on the hill,

As though the thunder slept within-
All else was calm and still.

As we drove our prize at leisure,
The king march'd forth to catch us :
His rage surpass'd all measure,
But his people could not match us.
He fled to his hall-pillars;
And, ere our force we led off,
Some sack'd his house and cellars,
While others cut his head off.

We there, in strife bewildering,
Spilt blood enough to swim in:
We orphan'd many children
And widow'd many women.
The eagles and the ravens
We glutted with our foemen :
The heroes and the cravens,
The spearmen and the bowmen.

We brought away from battle,
And much their land bemoan'd them,
Two thousand head of cattle

And the head of him who own'd them:
Ednyfed, King of Dyfed,

His head was borne before us;

His wine and beasts supplied our feasts, And his overthrow, our chorus.

MARGARET LOVE PEACOCK

THREE YEARS OLD

LONG night succeeds thy little day:
O, blighted blossom! can it be
That this gray stone and grassy clay
Have clos'd our anxious care of thee?

The half-form'd speech of artless thought, That spoke a mind beyond thy years, The song, the dance by Nature taught, The sunny smiles, the transient tears,

The symmetry of face and form,

The eye with light and life replete, The little heart so fondly warm,

The voice so musically sweet,

These, lost to hope, in memory yet

Around the hearts that lov'd thee cling, Shadowing with long and vain regret The too fair promise of thy Spring.

THE VICAR

SOME years ago, ere time and taste Had turn'd our parish topsy-turvy, When Darnel Park was Darnel Waste, And roads as little known as scurvy, The man who lost his way between

St. Mary's Hill and Sandy Thicket Was always shown across the green, And guided to the parson's wicket.

Back flew the bolt of lissom lath;

Fair Margaret, in her tidy kirtle, Led the lorn traveller up the path Through clean-clipp'd rows of box and myrtle;

And Don and Sancho, Tramp and Tray, Upon the parlor steps collected, Wagg'd all their tails, and seem'd to say, "Our master knows you; you're expected."

Up rose the reverend Doctor Brown,

Up rose the doctor's "winsome marrow;" The lady laid her knitting down,

Her husband clasp'd his ponderous Bar

row.

Whate'er the stranger's caste or creed,
Pundit or papist, saint or sinner,
He found a stable for his steed,

And welcome for himself, and dinner.

If, when he reach'd his journey's end, And warm'd himself in court or college, He had not gain'd an honest friend,

And twenty curious scraps of knowledge; If he departed as he came,

With no new light on love or liquor,— Good sooth, the traveller was to blame,

And not the vicarage, nor the vicar.

His talk was like a stream which runs With rapid change from rocks to roses; It slipp'd from politics to puns;

It pass'd from Mahomet to Moses; Beginning with the laws which keep The planets in their radiant courses, And ending with some precept deep For dressing eels or shoeing horses. He was a shrewd and sound divine,

Of loud dissent the mortal terror;

And when, by dint of page and line,

He 'stablish'd truth or startled error, The Baptist found him far too deep,

The Deist sigh'd with saving sorrow, And the lean Levite went to sleep

And dream'd of tasting pork to-morrow.

His sermon never said or show'd
That earth is foul, that heaven is gracious,
Without refreshment on the road

From Jerome, or from Athanasius ;
And sure a righteous zeal inspir'd

The hand and head that penn'd and plann'd them,

For all who understood admir'd,

And some who did not understand them.

He wrote too, in a quiet way,

Small treatises, and smaller verses, And sage remarks on chalk and clay, And hints to noble lords and nurses; True histories of last year's ghost;

Lines to a ringlet or a turban ; And trifles to the Morning Post,

And nothings for Sylvanus Urban.

He did not think all mischief fair,

Although he had a knack of joking; He did not make himself a bear,

Although he had a taste for smoking; And when religious sects ran mad,

He held, in spite of all his learning, That if a man's belief is bad,

It will not be improv'd by burning.

And he was kind, and lov'd to sit

In the low hut or garnish'd cottage, And praise the farmer's homely wit,

And share the widow's homelier pottage. At his approach complaint grew mild, And when his hand unbarr'd the shutter The clammy lips of fever smil'd

The welcome which they could not utter.

He always had a tale for me

Of Julius Cæsar or of Venus ; From him I learn'd the rule of three, Cat's-cradle, leap-frog, and Quæ genus. I used to singe his powder'd wig,

To steal the staff he put such trust in, And make the puppy dance a jig When he began to quote Augustine.