The master of the village school, sleek of hair and smooth of tongue, To the quaint tune of some old psalm a husking-ballad sung: Heap high the farmer's wintry hoard! Heap high the golden corn! Let other lands, exulting, glean We better love the hardy gift To cheer us when the storm shall drift When spring-time came with flower and bud, And merry bob'links, in the wood, Like mad musicians sung: We dropped the seed o'er hill and plain, And frightened from our sprouting grain All through the long, bright days of June And now, with Autumn's moonlit eves, Its harvest-time has come, We pluck away the frosted leaves, And bear the treasure home. There, richer than the fabled gift Fair hands the broken grain shall sift, Let vapid idlers loll in silk Around their costly board, Where'er the wide old kitchen hearth Then shame on all the proud and vain, Let earth withhold her goodly root, But, let the good old crop adorn Still let us for His golden corn SHRINK not, O Human Spirit, The Everlasting arm is strong to save! And overcame the grave! Life's work is almost done; Fruitless endeavor, hope deferred, and strife! One pang, and then is o'er All the long, mournful weariness of life. Come now and look your last! And his last blessing hear, See how he loved you who departeth now! Whose breast he leaned upon, Come, faithful unto death, Receive his parting breath, The fluttering spirit panteth to be free, - The bonds are riven, the struggling soul is free. Hail, hail, enfranchised spirit! Thou that the wine-press of the field hast trod! Life's weary work is o'er, Thou art of earth no more: No more art trammelled by the oppressive clay, The high acclivities Of truth sublime, up Heaven's crystalline way. Here is no bootless guest; The city's name is Rest; Here shalt thou win thy ardent soul's desire; Here clothe thee in thy beautiful attire. And this fair, shining band Are spirits of thy land! And these that throng to meet thee are thy kin, The city's gates unfold-enter, O! enter in! LESSON CXXXIV. The Voice of the Pestilence.*- ANONYMOUS. [This splendid poem was written in 1831, on the approach of the cholera from the East toward the western parts of Europe, and is appropriate to its renewed apparition and westward progress, as mentioned in recent journals.] BREATHLESS the course of the pale white horse, Bearing the ghastly form Rapid and dark the spectre bark, When it sweeps before the storm! Balefully bright through the torrid night Ensanguined meteors glare Fiercely the spires of volcanic fires Stream on the sulphurous air! Shades of the slain through the murderer's brain Shadowy and swift the black storm-drift Doth trample the atmosphere! But swifter than all, with a darker pall I have arisen from my lampless prison — *The Asiatic cholera. And it said, "Go forth from the south to the north Over yon wandering ball Sin is the king of that doomed thing, Forth from the gate of the Uncreate, From the portals of the Abyss From the caverns dim where vague forms swim, From Hades' womb-from the joyless tomb Of Erebus and old night — From the unseen deep, where Death and Sleep I come I come - before me are dumb The nations, aghast for dread Lo! I have past, as the desert blast And the millions of Earth lie dead! A voice of fear from the hemisphere Earth weeping aloud for her widowhood— Thrones and dominions beneath my pinions Cower like the meanest things Melt from my presence the pride and the pleasance Of pallor-stricken kings! Sorrow and mourning supremely scorning, My throne is the boundless air My chosen shroud is the dark-plumed cloud |