THE moon was high in the autumn sky,
The stars waned cold and dim,
Where hoarsely the mighty Oregon
Peals his eternal hymn;

And the prairie-grass bent its seedy heads
Far over the river's brim.

An impulse I might not defy,

Constrain'd my footsteps there,

When through the gloom a red eye burn'd
With fix'd and steady glare;
And a huge, misshapen form of mist
Loom'd in the midnight air.

Then out it spake: " My name is Death!"
Thick grew my blood, and chill-
A sense of fear weigh'd down my breath,
And held my pulses still;

And a voice from that unnatural shade
Compell'd me to its will.

"Dig me a grave! dig me a grave!"
The gloomy monster said,

"And make it deep, and long, and wide, And bury me my dead."

A corpse without sheet or shroud, at my feet, And rusted mattock laid.

With trembling hand the tool I spann'd, 'Twas wet with blood, and cold,

And from its slimy handle hung

The gray and ropy mould;

And I sought to detach my stiffen'd grasp,
But could not loose my hold.

"Now cautiously turn up the sod;
GOD's image once it bore,

And time shall be when each small blade

To life He will restore,
And the separate particles shall take
The shape which first they wore."
Deeply my spade the soft earth pierced,
It touch'd the festering dead;
Tier above tier the corpses lay,

As leaves in autumn shed;

The vulture circled, and flapp'd his wings, And scream'd, above my head.

O, then I sought to rest my brow,
The spade I held, its prop;

"Toil on! toil on!" scream'd the ugly fiend, My servants never stop!

Toil on! toil on! at the judgment-day
Ye'll have a glorious crop !"

Now, wheresoe'er I turn'd my eyes,
"T was horrible to see

How the grave made bare her secret work,
And disclosed her depths to me;

While the ground beneath me heaved and roll'd
Like the billows of the sea.

The spectre skinn'd his yellow teeth-
"Ye like not this, I trow:

Six thousand years your fellow-man
Has counted me his foe,

And ever when he cursed I laugh'd,
And drew my fatal bow.
"And generations all untold

In this dark spot I've laid-
The forest ruler and the young

And tender Indian maid;
And moulders with their carcasses
Behemoth of the glade.

"Yet here they may no more remain
I fain would have this room:
And they must seek another rest,

Of deeper, lonelier gloom;
Long ages since I mark'd this spot
To be the white man's tomb.

And where he builds his cities and towns, I ever must build mine."

Anon a pale and silvery mist

Was girdled round the moon:

Slowly the dead unclosed their eyes,
On midnight's solemn noon.
"Ha!" mutter'd the mocking sprite, "I fear
We've waken'd them too soon!

"Now marshal all the numerous host
In one concentred band,

276

And hurry them to the west," said he, "Where ocean meets the land: They shall regard thy bidding voice,

And move at thy command."

Then first I spake-the sullen corpse

Stood on the gloomy sod,

Like the dry bones the prophet raised,
When bidden by his Gon;
A might company, so vast,
Each on the other trod.

They stalk'd erect as if alive,

Yet not to life allied,

But like the pestilence that walks,
And wasteth at noontide,
Corruption animated, or

The grave personified.

The earth-worm drew his slimy trail
Across the bloodless cheek,

And the carrion bird in hot haste came
To gorge his thirsty beak;
But, scared by the living banquet, fled,
Another prey to seek.

While ever as on their way they moved,
No voice they gave, nor sound,

And before and behind, and about their sides,
Their wither'd arms they bound;

As the beggar clasps his skinny hands

His tatter'd garments round.

On, on we went through the livelong night,
Death and his troop, and I;

We turn'd not aside for forest or stream
Or mountain towering high,

But straight and swift as the hurricane sweeps
Athwart the stormy sky.

Once, once I stopp'd, where something gleam'd,
With a bright and star-like ray,
And I stoop'd to take the diamond up
From the grass in which it lay;
"T was an eye that from its socket fell,
As some wretch toil'd on his way.

At length our army reach'd the verge
Of the far-off western shore;
Death drove them into the sea, and said,
"Ye shall remove no more."
The ocean hymn'd their solemn dirge,
And his waters swept them o'er.

The stars went out, the morning smiled
With rosy tints of light,

The bird began his early hymn,
And plumed his wings for flight:

And the vision of death was broken with
The breaking up of night.

HE WEDDED AGAIN.

ERE death had quite stricken the bloom from her cheek,

Or worn off the smoothness and gloss of her brow, When our quivering lips her dear.name could not speak,

And our hearts vainly strove to God's judgment

to bow;

He estranged himself from us, and cheerfully then
Sought out a new object, and wedded again.
The dust had scarce settled itself on her lyre,

And its soft,melting tones still held captive the ear, While we look'd for her fingers to glide o'er the wire,

And waited in fancy her sweet voice to hear; He turn'd from her harp and its melody then, Sought out a new minstrel and wedded again. The turf had not yet by a stranger been trod,

Nor the pansy a single leaf shed on her grave, The cypress had not taken root in the sod, [gave; Nor the stone lost the freshness the sculptor first He turn'd from these mournful remembrances then, Wove a new bridal chaplet, and wedded again.

His dwelling to us, O, how lonely and sad!

When we thought of the light death had stolen

away,

Of the warm hearts which once in its keeping it had,
And that one was now widow'd and both in decay;
But its deep desolation had fled even then-
He sought a new idol, and wedded again.

But can she be quite blest who presides at his board?
Will no troublesome vision her happy home shade,
Of a future love luring and charming her lord,

When she with our lost one forgotten is laid? She must know he will worship some other star then, Seek out a new love, and be wedded again.

SONG.

SHOULD Sorrow o'er thy brow

Its darken'd shadows fling, And hopes that cheer thee now, Die in their early spring; Should pleasure at its birth

Fade like the hues of even, Turn thou away from earth,There's rest for thee in heaven!

If ever life shall seem

To thee a toilsome way,
And gladness cease to beam
Upon its clouded day;
If, like the wearied dove,

O'er shoreless ocean driven,
Raise thou thine eye above,-
There's rest for thee in heaven!
But, O! if always flowers
Throughout thy pathway bloom,
And gayly pass the hours,

Undimn'd by earthly gloom;
Still let not every thought
To this poor world be given,
Not always be forgot

Thy better rest in heaven!
When sickness pales thy cheek,
And dims thy lustrous eye,
And pulses low and weak

Tell of a time to die

Sweet hope shall whisper then,

"Though thou from earth be riven,

There's bliss beyond thy ken,—

There's rest for thee in heaven!"

MR. PRENTICE is a native of Preston, in Connecticut, and was educated at Brown University, in Providence, where he was graduated in 1823. He edited for several years, at Hartford, "The New England Weekly Review," in connection, I believe, with JOHN G. WHITTIER; and in 1831

he removed to Louisville, Kentucky, where he has since conducted the "Journal," of that city, one of the most popular gazettes ever published in this country. Nearly all his poems were written while he was in the university. They have never been published collectively.

THE CLOSING YEAR.

"TIs midnight's holy hour-and silence now Is brooding, like a gentle spirit, o'er The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds The bell's deep tones are swelling; 'tis the knell Of the departed year. No funeral train Is sweeping past; yet, on the stream and wood, With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest, Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirr'd, As by a mourner's sigh; and on yon cloud, That floats so still and placidly through heaven, The spirits of the seasons seem to stand, [form, Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn And Winter with his aged locks, and breathe In mournful cadences, that come abroad Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail, A melancholy dirge o'er the dead year, Gone from the earth forever. "Tis a time For memory and for tears. Within the deep, Still chambers of the heart, a spectre dim, Whose tones are like the wizard voice of Time, Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold And solemn finger to the beautiful And holy visions that have pass'd away, And left no shadow of their loveliness On the dead waste of life. That spectre lifts The coffin-lid of hope, and joy, and love, And, bending mournfully above the pale Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead flowers O'er what has pass'd to nothingness. The year Has gone, and, with it, many a glorious throng Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow, Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course, It waved its sceptre o'er the beautiful, And they are not. It laid its pallid hand Upon the strong man, and the haughty form Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim. It trod the hall of revelry, where throng'd The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song And reckless shout resounded. It pass'd o'er The battle-plain, where sword and spear and shield Flash'd in the light of midday-and the strength Of serried hosts is shiver'd, and the grass, Green from the soil of carnage, waves above The crush'd and mouldering skeleton. It came And faded like a wreath of mist at eve; Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air, It heralded its millions to their home

In the dim land of dreams. Remorseless Time-
Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe-what power
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt
His iron heart to pity? On, still on
He presses, and forever. The proud bird,
The condor of the Andes, that can soar
Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave
The fury of the northern hurricane,
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks down
To rest upon his mountain-crag,--but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,
And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind
His rushing pinion. Revolutions sweep
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
Of dreaming sorrow; cities rise and sink,
Like bubbles on the water; fiery isles
Spring, blazing, from the ocean, and go back
To their mysterious caverns; mountains rear
To heaven their bald and blacken'd cliffs, and bow
Their tall heads to the plain; new empires rise,
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations; and the very stars,
Yon bright and burning blazonry of GOD,
Glitter a while in their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away,
To darkle in the trackless void :-yet Time-
Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career,
Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not
Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path,
To sit and muse, like other conquerors,
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.

And oft, mid musings sad and lone,
At night's deep noon, that thrilling tone
Swells in the wind, low, wild, and clear,
Like music in the dreaming air.

When sleep's calm wing is on my brow,
And dreams of peace my spirit lull,
Before me, like a misty star,

That form floats dim and beautiful; And, when the gentle moonbeam smiles On the blue streams and dark-green isles, In every ray pour'd down the sky, That same light form seems stealing by.

It is a blessed picture, shrined

In memory's urn; the wing of years Can change it not, for there it glows, Undimm'd by "weaknesses and tears;" Deep-hidden in its still recess, It beams with love and holiness, O'er hours of being, dark and dull, Till life seems almost beautiful.

The vision cannot fade away;

"Tis in the stillness of my heart, And o'er its brightness I have mused In solitude; it is a part

Of my existence; a dear flower

Breathed on by Heaven: morn's earliest hour
That flower bedews, and its blue eye
At eve still rests upon the sky.

Lady, like thine, my visions cling

To the dear shrine of buried years;
The past, the past! it is too bright,
Too deeply beautiful for tears;

We have been bless'd; though life is made
A tear, a silence, and a shade,
And years have left the vacant breast
To loneliness-we have been bless'd!

Those still, those soft, those summer eyes,
When by our favourite stream we stood,
And watch'd our mingling shadows there,

Soft-pictured in the deep-blue flood,
Seem'd one enchantment. O! we felt,
As there, at love's pure shrine, we knelt,
That life was sweet, and all its hours
A glorious dream of love and flowers.

And still 't is sweet. Our hopes went by
Like sounds upon the unbroken sea;
Yet memory wings the spirit back
To deep, undying melody;
And still, around her early shrine,
Fresh flowers their dewy chaplets twine,
Young Love his brightest garland wreathes,
And Eden's richest incense breathes.

Our hopes are flown-yet parted hours Still in the depths of memory lie, Like night-gems in the silent blue

Of summer's deep and brilliant sky; And Love's bright flashes seem again To fall upon the glowing chain Of our existence. Can it be That all is but a mockery?

Lady, adieu! to other climes

I go, from joy, and hope, and thee;
A weed on Time's dark waters thrown,
A wreck on life's wild-heaving sea;
I go; but O, the past, the past!
Its spell is o'er my being cast,-
And still, to Love's remember'd eves,
With all but hope, my spirit cleaves.
Adieu! adieu! My farewell words

Are on my lyre, and their wild flow
Is faintly dying on the chords,

Broken and tuneless. Be it so! Thy name-O, may it never swell My strain again-yet long 't will dwell Shrined in my heart, unbreathed, unspokenA treasured word-a cherish'd token.

THE DEAD MARINER.

SLEEP on, sleep on! above thy corse
The winds their Sabbath keep;
The waves are round thee, and thy breast
Heaves with the heaving deep.
O'er thee mild eve her beauty flings,
And there the white gull lifts her wings,
And the blue halcyon loves to lave
Her plumage in the deep blue wave.

Sleep on; no willow o'er thee bends
With melancholy air,

No violet springs, nor dewy rose

Its soul of love lays bare;
But there the sea-flower, bright and young,
Is sweetly o'er thy slumbers flung,
And, like a weeping mourner fair,
The pale flag hangs its tresses there.

Sleep on, sleep on; the glittering depths
Of ocean's coral caves
Are thy bright urn-thy requiem

The music of its waves;
The purple gems forever burn
In fadeless beauty round thy urn,
And, pure and deep as infant love,
The blue sea rolls its waves above.

Sleep on, sleep on; the fearful wrath
Of mingling cloud and deep
May leave its wild and stormy track
Above thy place of sleep;

But, when the wave has sunk to rest,
As now, 't will murmur o'er thy breast,
And the bright victims of the sea
Perchance will make their home with thee.

Sleep on; thy corse is far away,

But love bewails thee yet;
For thee the heart-wrung sigh is breathed,
And lovely eyes are wet:

And she, thy young and beauteous bride,
Her thoughts are hovering by thy side,
As oft she turns to view, with tears,
The Eden of departed years.

SABBATH EVENING.

How calmly sinks the parting sun!
Yet twilight lingers still;

And beautiful as dream of Heaven

It slumbers on the hill;

Earth sleeps, with all her glorious things,
Beneath the Holy Spirit's wings,
And, rendering back the hues above,
Seems resting in a trance of love.

Round yonder rocks the forest-trees
In shadowy groups recline,

Like saints at evening bow'd in prayer
Around their holy shrine;

And through their leaves the night-winds blow
So calm and still, their music low
Seems the mysterious voice of prayer,
Soft echo'd on the evening air.

And yonder western throng of clouds,
Retiring from the sky,

So calmly move, so softly glow,

They seem to fancy's eye
Bright creatures of a better sphere,
Come down at noon to worship here,
And, from their sacrifice of love,
Returning to their home above.

The blue isles of the golden sea,
The night-arch floating by,

The flowers that gaze upon the heavens,
The bright streams leaping by,
Are living with religion-deep
On earth and sea its glories sleep,
And mingle with the starlight rays,
Like the soft light of parted days.
The spirit of the holy eve

Comes through the silent air

To feeling's hidden spring, and wakes
A gush of music there!

And the far depths of ether beam
So passing fair, we almost dream
That we can rise, and wander through
Their open paths of trackless blue.

Each soul is fill'd with glorious dreams,
Each pulse is beating wild;

And thought is soaring to the shrine
Of glory undefiled!

And holy aspirations start,

Like blessed angels, from the heart,

And bind-for earth's dark ties are rivenOur spirits to the gates of heaven.

TO A LADY.

I THINK of thee when morning springs
From sleep, with plumage bathed in dew,
And, like a young bird, lifts her wings
Of gladness on the welkin blue.
And when, at noon, the breath of love

O'er flower and stream is wandering free,
And sent in music from the grove,
I think of thee-I think of thee.

I think of thee, when, soft and wide,
The evening spreads her robes of light,
And, like a young and timid bride,

Sits blushing in the arms of night.
And when the moon's sweet crescent springs
In light o'er heaven's deep, waveless sea,
And stars are forth, like blessed things,
I think of thee-I think of thee.

I think of thee;-that eye of flame,

Those tresses, falling bright and free, That brow, where "Beauty writes her name," I think of thee-I think of thee.

WRITTEN AT MY MOTHER'S GRAVE.

THE trembling dew-drops fall Upon the shutting flowers; like souls at rest The stars shine gloriously: and all Save me, are blest.

Mother, I love thy grave!

The violet, with its blossoms blue and mild, Waves o'er thy head; when shall it wave Above thy child?

"T is a sweet flower, yet must

Its bright leaves to the coming tempest bow; Dear mother, 't is thine emblem; dust Is on thy brow.

And I could love to die:

To leave untasted life's dark, bitter streams-
By thee, as erst in childhood, lie,
And share thy dreams.

And I must linger here,

To stain the plumage of my sinless years, And mourn the hopes to childhood dear With bitter tears.

Ay, I must linger here,

A lonely branch upon a wither'd tree, Whose last frail leaf, untimely sere, Went down with thee!

Oft, from life's wither'd bower,

In still communion with the past, I turn,
And muse on thee, the only flower
In memory's urn.

And, when the evening pale

Bows, like a mourner, on the dim, blue wave, I stray to hear the night-winds wail Around thy grave.

Where is thy spirit flown?

I gaze above-thy look is imaged there;
I listen and thy gentle tone
Is on the air.

O, come, while here I press

My brow upon thy grave; and, in those mild And thrilling tones of tenderness,

Bless, bless thy child!

Yes, bless your weeping child;

And o'er thine urn-religion's holiest shrineO, give his spirit, undefiled,

To blend with thine.