THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS. 27 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, 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. HE walks in beauty like the night SH Of cloudless climes and starry skies; One shade the more, one ray the less, And on that cheek, and o'er that brow, The smiles that win, the tints that glow, A mind at peace with all below, A heart whose love is innocent. LORD BYRON. Hymn of the Hebrew Maid. HEN Israel, of the Lord beloved, WH Out from the land of bondage came, Her fathers' God before her moved, THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB. Then rose the choral hymn of praise, And trump and timbrel answered keen ; Forsaken Israel wanders lone; Our fathers would not know thy ways, But present still, though now unseen, And oh! when stoops on Judah's path, Our harps we left by Babel's streams-- And mute are timbrel, trump and horn. SIR WALTER SCOTT. 29 The Destruction of Sennacherib. HE Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold, THE 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. Like the leaves of the forest when summer is green, For the Angel of death spread his wings on the blast, And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide, And there lay the rider distorted and pale, With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his mail; And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail, LORD BYRON. Song of the Captive Jews at Babylon. G OD of the thunder! from whose cloudy seat Father of vengeance! that with purple feet, Like a full wine-press, tread'st the world below; Till Thou the guilty land hast sealed for woe. THE CAPTIVE JEWS AT BABYLON. 31 God of the rainbow! at whose gracious sign An Eden blooms in the waste wilderness; O'er Judah's land thy thunders broke, O Lord; O'er Judah's land thy rainbow, Lord, shall gleam, 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, Thy vengeance gave us to the stranger's hand, Envying our fathers in their peaceful graves. |