THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS.

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Alas! they all are in their graves; the gentle race of flowers Are lying in their lowly beds, with the fair and good of ours. The rain is falling where they lie; but the cold November rain

Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again.

The wind-flower and the violet, they perished long ago,
And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the summer

glow;

But on the hill the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood, And the yellow sun-flower by the brook in autumn beauty stood,

Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as falls the plague on men,

And the brightness of their smile was gone, from upland, glade, and glen.

And now, when comes the calm mild day, as still such days will come,

To call the squirrel and the bee from out their winter home; When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, though all the trees are still,

And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of the rill, The south wind searches for the flowers whose fragrance late he bore,

And sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no

more.

And then I think of one who in her youthful beauty died, The fair meek blossom that grew up and faded by my side. In the cold moist earth we laid her, when the forests cast the

leaf,

And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief; Yet not unmeet it was that one like that young friend of ours, So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with the flowers.

WILLIAM C. BRYANT.

She Walks in Beauty.

S

HE walks in beauty like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meets in her aspect and her eyes;
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

One shade the more, one ray the less,

Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress,

Or softly lightens o'er her face;
Where thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.

And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But tell of days in goodness spent,

A mind at peace with all below,

A heart whose love is innocent.

LORD BYRON.

Hymn of the Hebrew Maid.

WHI

HEN Israel, of the Lord beloved,
Out from the land of bondage came,
Her fathers' God before her moved,

An awful guide in smoke and flame.
By day, along the astonished lands

The cloudy pillar glided slow;
By night, Arabia's crimsoned sands
Returned the fiery column's glow.

THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB.

Then rose the choral hymn of praise,

And trump and timbrel answered keen;
And Zion's daughters poured their lays,
With priests' and warriors' voice between.
No portents now our foes amaze,
Forsaken Israel wanders lone;

Our fathers would not know thy ways,
And thou hast left them to their own.

But present still, though now unseen,
When brightly shines the prosperous day,
Be thoughts of thee a cloudy screen,

To temper the deceitful ray.

And oh! when stoops on Judah's path,
In shade and storm, the frequent night,
Be thou, long-suffering, slow to wrath,
A burning and a shining light!

Our harps we left by Babel's streams—

The tyrant's jest, the Gentile's scorn ;
No censer round our altar beams,

And mute are timbrel, trump and horn.
But thou hast said, "The blood of goat,
The flesh of rams, I will not prize;
A contrite heart, an humble thought,
Are mine accepted sacrifice."

SIR WALTER SCOTT.

The Destruction of Sennacherib.

THE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold; And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea, When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

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Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green,
That host with their banners at sunset were seen;
Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath blown,
That host on the morrow lay withered and strewn.

For the Angel of death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And their hearts but once heaved-and forever grew still!

And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,
But through it there rolled not the breath of his pride;
And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,
And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.

And there lay the rider distorted and pale,
With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail;
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.

And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail,
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal;
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the sword,
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord!

LORD BYRON.

Song of the Captive Jews at Babylon.

Go

OD of the thunder! from whose cloudy seat
The fiery winds of desolation flow;
Father of vengeance! that with purple feet,

Like a full wine-press, tread'st the world below;
The embattled armies wait thy sign to slay,
Nor springs the beast of havoc on his prey,
Nor withering Famine walks his blasted way,

Till Thou the guilty land hast sealed for woe.

THE CAPTIVE JEWS AT BABYLON. 3:

God of the rainbow! at whose gracious sign

The billows of the proud their rage suppress; Father of mercies! at one word of thine

An Eden blooms in the waste wilderness;
And fountains sparkle in the arid sands,
And timbrels ring in maidens' glancing hands,
And marble cities crown the laughing lands,
And pillar'd temples rise thy name to bless.

O'er Judah's land thy thunders broke, O Lord;
The chariots rattled o'er her sunken gate;
Her sons were wasted by the Assyrian's sword;
E'en her foes wept to see her fallen state.
And heaps her ivory palaces became;
Her princes wore the captive's garb of shame;
Her temples sank amid the smouldering flame;

For thou didst ride the tempest-cloud of fate.

O'er Judah's land thy rainbow, Lord, shall gleam,
And the sad city lift her crownless head;

And songs shall wake and dancing footsteps gleam Where broods o'er fallen streets the silence of the dead.

The sun shall shine on Salem's gilded towers,
On Carmel's side our maidens gather flowers,
To strew at blushing eve their bridal bowers,

And angel feet the glittering Sion tread.

Thy vengeance gave us to the stranger's hand,

And Abraham's children were led forth for slaves;
With fettered step we left our pleasant land,

Envying our fathers in their peaceful graves.
The stranger's bread with bitter tears we steep,
And when our weary eyes should sink to sleep,
'Neath the mute midnight we steal forth to weep,

Where the pale willows shade Euphrates' waves.