Awake, awake! and gird up thy strength Whom the powers of Nature, unceasingly praise, Maria Brooks. TO THE RIVER ST. LAWRENCE. HE first time I beheld thee, beauteous stream, THE How pure, how smooth, how broad thy bosom heaved! What feelings rushed upon my heart!—a gleam As of another life my kindling soul received. Fair was the day, and o'er the crowded deck Cast, as they moved, faint shadows on the blue- Soft, deep, and distant-of the mountain-chain, Time, scene, has changed: 'twill never be effaced. Now o'er thy tranq il breast the moonbeams quiver: How calm the air, how still the hour-how bright! Would thou wert doomed to be my grave, sweet river! How blends my soul with thy pure breath to-night! The dearest hours that soul has ever known - Have been upon thy brink: would it could wait, And, parted, watch thee still!-to stay and moan With thee, were better than my promised fate. Ladaüanna! monarch of the North! Father of streams unsung, be sung by me! Receive a lay that flows resistless forth! Oh, quench the fervour that consumes, in thee I've seen more beauty on thy banks, more bliss, Dew falls not on a happier land than this; Fruits spring from desert wilds, and Love sits throned ɔn snow; Snows that drive warmth to shelter in the heart; Snows that conceal, beneath their moonlit heaps, How many grades of life thou view'st! thy wave A hardy race, sprung from the Gaul, and gay, Where yet no mass-bell tinkles from the shore. The pensive nun throws back the veil that hides And trims her lamp, and hangs it in her tower; Who had been lost, what heart from breaking saved, The plaided soldier, in his mountain pride Views his white limbs reflected in thy tide, While wave the sable plumes that shade his manly face. The song of Ossian mingles with thy gale, The harp of Carolan's remembered here; The bright-haired son of Erin tells his tale, Dreams of his misty isle, and drops for her a tear. Thou'st seen the trophies of that deathless day, Youthful Columbia, ply thy useful arts; Rear the strong nursling that thy mother bore, Or leave them to that few, who, blind to gold, Nature's best loved, thine own, thy virtuous WEST, Bade Death recede, who the fallen victor pressed, SULLY, of tender tints transparent, fain I would thy skill a while; for Memory's showing, Or he who sketched the Cretan: gone her Greek, Could he paint beauty, warmth, light, happiness, Or soul concentrate in one form-his power I'd ask. But Nature, Nature, when thou wilt, Guard well the wondrous model thou hast built, Which these, thy nectared waves, reflect and love to bear. Nature, all-powerful Nature, thine are ties That seldom break: though the heart beat so cold, That Love and Fancy's fairest garland dies— Though false, though light as air-thy bonds may hold. * In allusion to West's celebrated picture, "The Death of Wolfe." Vanderlyn-see his picture of "Ariadne." The mother loves her child: the brother yet Her who hath blest him once, though seas may roll between. But can a friendship, pure and rapture-wrought, O stream, O country of my heart, farewell! Else, how endure my weary lot-the strife To gain content when far-the burning sighs— The asking wish-the aching void? O life! Thou art, and hast been, one long sacrifice! THE John Neal. MUSIC OF THE NIGHT. HERE are harps that complain to the presence of To the presence of Night alone— In a near and unchangeable tone— Like winds, full of sound, that go whispering by, |