How happy must thy parents be
Who daily live in sight of thee!
Whose hearts no greater pleasure seek
Than see thee smile, and hear thee speak,
And feel all natural griefs beguiled
By thee, their fond, their duteous child.
What joy must in their souls have stirr'd
When thy first spoken words were heard,
Words, that, inspired by Heaven, express'd
The transports dancing in thy breast!
And for thy smile!-thy lip, cheek, brow,
Even while I gaze, are kindling now.

I call'd thee duteous; am I wrong?
No! truth, I feel, is in my song:
Duteous thy heart's still beatings move
To God, to Nature, and to Love!
To God!-for thou a harmless child
Hast kept his temple undefiled:
To Nature!--for thy tears and sighs
Obey alone her mysteries:

To Love!-for fiends of hate might see
Thou dwell'st in love, and love in thee!
What wonder then, though in thy dreams
Thy face with mystic meaning beams!

Oh! that my spirit's eye could see
Whence burst those gleams of ecstasy!
That light of dreaming soul appears
To play from thoughts above thy years.
Thou smilest as if thy soul were soaring
To Heaven, and Heaven's God adoring!
And who can tell what visions high
May bless an infant's sleeping eye?
What brighter throne can brightness find
To reign on than an infant's mind,
Ere sin destroy, or error dim,
The glory of the Seraphim?

PROFESSOR WILSON.

NIGHT.

NIGHT is the time for rest;

How sweet, when labours close, To gather round an aching breast The curtain of repose;

Stretch the tired limbs, and lay the head
Upon our own delightful bed!

Night is the time for dreams,
The gay romance of life;

When truth that is and truth that seems
Blend in fantastic strife;
Ah! visions less beguiling far
Than waking dreams by daylight are!

Night is the time for toil;

To plough the classic field,
Intent to find the buried spoil
Its wealthy furrows yield;
Till all is ours that sages taught,
That poets sang, or heroes wrought.

Night is the time to weep;

To wet with unseen tears
Those graves of memory where sleep
The joys of other years;

Hopes that were angels in their birth
But perish'd young, like things of earth!

Night is the time to watch;

Ön ocean's dark expanse, To hail the Pleiades, or catch

The full moon's earliest glance,
That brings unto the home-sick mind
All we have loved and left behind.

Night is the time for care;
Brooding on hours mispent,
To see the spectre of despair
Come to our lonely tent;

Like Brutus 'midst his slumbering host
Startled by Cæsar's stalwart ghost.

Night is the time to muse;

Then from the eye the soul

Takes flight, and with expanding views
Beyond the starry pole;

Descries athwart the abyss of night
The dawn of uncreated light.

Night is our time to pray;

Our Saviour oft withdrew
To desert mountains far away,
So will his followers do;

Steal from the throng to haunts untrod,
And hold communion there with God.

- Night is the time for death;

When all around is peace, Calmly to yield the weary breath From sin and suffering cease;

Think of Heaven's bliss, and give the sign,

To parting friends :-such death be mine!

MONTGOMERY.

THE FROSTED TREES.

WHAT strange enchantment meets my view, So wondrous bright and fair?

Has heaven pour'd out its silver dew

On the rejoicing air?

Or am I borne to regions new

To see the glories there?

Last eve when sunset fill'd the sky
With wreaths of golden light,
The trees sent up their arms on high,
All leafless to the sight,

And sleepy mists came down to lie
On the dark breast of night.

But now the scene is changed, and all
Is fancifully new;

The trees, last eve so straight and tall,
Are bending on the view,

And streams of living daylight fall
The silvery arches through.

The boughs are strung with glittering pearls,
As dewdrops bright and bland,
And there they gleam in silvery curls,
Like gems of Samarcand,

Seeming in wild fantastic whirls

The work of fairy land.

Each branch stoops meekly with the weight,
And in the light breeze swerves,

As if some viewless angel sate

Upon its graceful curves,

And made the fibres spring elate,
Thrilling the secret nerves.

Oh! I could dream the robe of heaven,
Pure as the dazzling snow,

Beaming as when to spirits given,

Had come in its stealthy flow,

From the sky at silent even,

For the morning's glorious show.

ANON.

FIELD FLOWERS.

YE field flowers! the gardens eclipse you, 'tis true, Yet, wildings of nature, I dote upon you,

For ye waft me to summers of old,

When the earth teem'd around me with fairy delight, And when daisies and buttercups gladden'd my sight, Like treasures of silver and gold.

I love you for lulling me back into dreams

Of the blue Highland mountains and echoing streams,

And of broken blades breathing their balm; While the deer was seen glancing in sunshine remote, And the deep mellow crush of the wood-pigeon's note Made music that sweeten'd the calm."

Not a pastoral song has a pleasanter tune

Than ye speak to my heart, little wildings of June;
Of old ruinous castles ye tell:

I thought it delightful your beauties to find
When the magic of nature first breathed on my mind,
And your blossoms were part of her spell.

Even now what affections the violet awakes;
What loved little islands, twice seen in the lakes
Can the wild water-lily restore!

What landscapes I read in the primrose's looks;
What pictures of pebbles and minnowy brooks,
In the vetches that tangle the shore!

Earth's cultureless buds! to my heart ye were dear,
Ere the fever of passion, or ague of fear,

Had scathed my existence's bloom;

Once I welcome you more, in life's passionless stage,
With the visions of youth to revisit my age,
And I wish you to grow on my tomb.

CAMPBELL.

A SKETCH FROM REAL LIFE.

I SAW her in the morn of hope, in life's delicious

spring,

A radiant creature of the earth, just bursting on the

wing;

Elate and joyous as the lark when first it soars on high, Without a shadow in its path,-a cloud upon its sky.

I see her yet-so fancy deems-her soft, unbraided hair,

Gleaming, like sunlight upon snow, above her forehead fair;