Now thy young heart, like a bird,
Singeth in its summer nest,

No evil thought, no unkind word,
No bitter, angry voice hath stirred
The beauty of its rest;

But winter cometh, and decay

Wasteth thy verdant home away;

Then pray, child, pray.

Thy spirit is a house of glee,

And gladness harpeth at the door,
While ever with a merry shout,
Hope, the May Queen, danceth out,

Her lips with music running o'er;

But Time those strings of joy will sever,

And Hope will not dance on forever;

Then pray, child, pray.

Now thy mother's hymn abideth,
Round thy pillow in the night,
And gentle feet creep to thy bed,
And o'er thy quiet face is shed
The taper's darkened light.

But that sweet hymn shall pass away,
By thee no more those feet shall stay;

Then pray, child, pray.

BUT a child! that bids the world good night
In downright earnest, and cuts it quite, -
Is a cherub no art can copy;

All calm, and balm, and quiet, and rest.
"T is a perfect picture to see him lie,
As if he had supped on dormouse pie,
(An ancient classical dish, by the by,)
With a sauce of the syrup of poppy.

ON MY FIRST SON.

FAREWELL, thou child of my right hand, and joy; My sin was too much hope of thee, loved boy: Seven years thou wert lent to me, and I thee pay Exacted by thy fate on the just day.

O, could I lose all father now! for why

Will man lament the state he should envy?

To have so soon 'scaped world's and flesh's rage,
And if no other misery, yet age?

Rest in soft peace, and asked, say here doth lie
Ben Jonson, his best piece of poetry!

CURIOSITY.

(EXTRACT.)

In the pleased infant see its power expand,
When first the coral fills his little hand;
Throned in his mother's lap, it dries each tear,
As her sweet legend falls upon his ear;
Next it assails him in his top's strange hum
Breathes in his whistle, echoes in his drum ;
Each gilded toy that doting love bestows,
He longs to break, and every spring expose.
Placed by your hearth, with what delight he pores

O'er the bright pages of his pictured stores!
How oft he steals upon your graver task,
Of this to tell you, and of that to ask!
And, when the waning hour to bedward bids,
Though gentle sleep sit waiting on his lids,
How winningly he pleads to gain you o'er,
That he may read one little story more!

Nor yet alone to toys or tales confined,
It sits, dark-brooding, o'er his embryo mind.
Take him between your knees, peruse his face,

While all you know, or think you know, you trace;

Tell him who spoke creation into birth,

Arched the broad heavens, and spread the rolling

earth;

Who formed a pathway for the obedient sun,

And bade the seasons in their circles run;
Who filled the air, the forest, and the flood,
And gave man all, for comfort or for food;
Tell him they sprang at God's creating nod,-
He stops you short with, "Father, who made God?"

THE tear down childhood's cheek that flows,

Is like the dew-drop on the rose;

When next the summer breeze comes by,

The bush is waved, the flower is dry.

WALTER SCOTT.

THE MORNING-GLORY.

WE wreathed about our darling's head the morning

glory bright;

Her little face looked out beneath, so full of life and

light,