GRACE DARLING.

[GRACE DARLING was the only child of the lighthouse keeper on Longstone, the largest of the Farne Islands, a group of bare and desolate rocks off the coast of Northumberland. On a dark and stormy night in September 1838, the steamer Forfarshire was wrecked between these islands and the coast; and the fore part, to which some dozen poor wretches clung, was impaled upon a rock. At dawn the next morning, Grace Darling, then a slight maid of twenty-two, descried the fragment of the wreck, and prevailed upon her father to go out with her in the open boat to rescue the survivors. Nine persons were got safely into the boat and landed on the island. Grace at once became one of the most famous of women. She died of consumption in 1841.]

A MAIDEN gentle, yet, at duty's call,
Firm and unflinching as the Lighthouse reared
On the Island-rock,1 her lonely dwelling-place;
Or like the invincible Rock2 itself that braves,
Age after
the hostile elements,

age,

As when it guarded holy Cuthbert's cell.

All night the stormi had raged, nor ceased, nor paused,
When, as day broke, the Maid, through misty air,
Espies far off a Wreck, amid the surf,

Beating on one of those disastrous isles ;—
Half of a Vessel,3 half-no more; the rest

Had vanished, swallowed up with all that there
Had for the common safety striven in vain,

Or thither thronged for refuge. With quick glance
Daughter and Sire through optic-glass discern,
Clinging about the remnant of this Ship,
Creatures-how precious in the Maiden's sight !
For whom, belike, the old Man grieves still more
Than for their fellow-sufferers engulfed

Where every parting agony is hushed,

And hope and fear mix not in further strife,
But courage,
Father! let us out to sea-
A few may yet be saved." The Daughter's words,
Her earnest tone, and look beaming with faith,
Dispel the Father's doubts: nor do they lack
The noble-minded Mother's helping hand

To launch the boat; and with her blessing cheered,
And inwardly sustained by silent prayer,
Together they put forth, Father and Child!

Each grasps an oar, and struggling on they go—
Rivals in effort; and, alike intent

Here to elude and there surmount, they watch
The billows lengthening, mutually crossed
And shattered, and re-gathering their might;
As if the tumult, by the Almighty's will,
Were, in the conscious sea, roused and prolonged,
That woman's fortitude1-so tried, so proved—
May brighten more and more!

True to the mark,

They stem the current of that perilous gorge,

Their arms still strengthening with the strengthening heart,
Though danger, as the Wreck is neared, becomes
More imminent. Not unseen do they approach;
And rapture, with varieties of fear

Incessantly conflicting, thrills the frames
Of those who, in that dauntless energy,
Foretaste deliverance. But the least perturbed
Can scarcely trust his eyes, when he perceives
That of the pair-tossed on the waves to bring
Hope to the hopeless, to the dying, life—
One is a Woman, a poor earthly sister;
Or, be the Visitant other than she seems,
A guardian Spirit sent from pitying Heaven,
In woman's shape. But why prolong the tale,
"Casting weak words amid a host of thoughts
Armed to repel them? Every hazard faced
And difficulty mastered, with resolve
That no one breathing should be left to perish,
This last remainder of the crew are all
Placed in the little boat, then o'er the deep
Are safely borne, landed upon the beach,
And, in fulfilment of God's mercy, lodged
Within the sheltering Lighthouse.

Shout, ye Waves!

Send forth a song of triumph. Waves and Winds,

Exult in this deliverance wrought through faith
In Him whose providence your rage hath served!
Ye screaming Sea-mews, in the concert join!
And would that some immortal Voice-a Voice
Fitly attuned to all that gratitude

Breathes out from floor or couch, through pallid lips
Of the survivors to the clouds might bear—
Blended with praise of that parental love
Beneath whose watchful eye the Maiden grew
Pious and pure, modest and yet so brave,
Though young so wise, though meek so resolute
Might carry to the clouds and to the stars,
Yea, to celestial Choirs, GRACE DARLING's name

1Island-rock-Longstone, of w ich her father and mother and herself vere the only inhabitants.

2 The invincible Rock-Lindisfarne, or "Saint Cuthbert's Holy Isle," as Scott calls it, about three miles from the coast of Northumberland, and the site of an ancient monastery in which St. Cuthbert, Bishop of Durham, was buried in 687. (See The Scott Reader, Nelson's Royal School Series, p. 94.)

"Half of a vessel.-The Forfarshire had broken off sharp amidships: the stern was swallowed up, and the fore part alone stuck upon the rock.

That woman's fortitude.--That here means "in order that."

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH."

Be the Visitant other. If the visitant be other than she seem; that is, if she is not a woman, she must be an angel,

6 William Wordsworth. Poet; born at Cockermouth, Cumberland, in 1770; Poet Laureate from 1843 till 1850; lived near the Lakes of Cumberland (chiefly at Rydal Mount), where Coleridge and Southey also resided,—hence the three were called "Lake Poets." Chief works: The Excursion, The White Doe of Rylstone, The Prelude; wrote also many lyrical ballads, sonnets, and short poems. The above poem was written in 1842. Wordsworth died 1850.

CHOICE QUOTATIONS.

(To be written from memory.)

DOING GOOD.

HE that does good to another man, does also good to himself; not only in the consequence, but in the very act of doing it for the consciousness of well-doing is an ample reward.--SENECA.

HOPE.

WHITE as a white sail on a dusky sea,

When half the horizon's clouded and half free,
Fluttering between the dun wave and the sky,
Is hope's last gleam in man's extremity.-BYRON.

THE FRIGATE-BIRD.

WHAT bird is this? It is the little ocean-eagle, first and chief of the winged race, the daring navigator who never furls his sails, the lord of the tempest, the scorner of all peril-the man-of-war or frigatebird.1

Here we have a bird which is virtually nothing more than wings: scarcely any body-barely as large as that of the domestic cock-while his prodigious pinions are fifteen feet in span! The great problem of flight is solved and overpassed, for the power of flight seems useless. Such a bird, naturally sustained by such supports, needs but allow himself to be borne along. The storm bursts; he mounts to lofty heights, where he finds tranquillity. The poetic metaphor, untrue when applied to any other bird, is no exaggeration when applied to him: literally, he sleeps upon the storm.

When he chooses to oar his way seriously, all distance vanishes: he breakfasts at the Senegal;2 he dines in America.

Or, if he thinks fit to take more time, and amuse himself en route, he can do so. He may continue his progress through the night uninterruptedly, certain of reposing himself. Upon what? On his huge motionless pinion, which takes upon itself all the weariness of the voyage; or on the wind, his slave, which eagerly hastens to cradle him.

4

Amid the glowing azure of the tropics, at incredible altitudes, almost imperceptible in the dim remoteness, we see him triumphantly sweeping past