Had charactered her countenance, still gleamed
On her wan features-when such playful words,
As once could scatter gladness on all hearts,
Still trembled from the lip, and o'er the souls
Of those who listened shed a deeper gloom.-
In hours of such most mournful gaiety,
Oh! was there not even then a lingering hope,
That flitted fearfully, like parent birds

Fast fluttering o'er their desolate nest?
Mourn not for her who died!-She lived, as saints
Might pray to live-she died as Christians die ;-
There was no earthward struggle of the heart,
No shuddering terror- no reluctant sigh.—
They who beheld her dying, fear not Death!
Silently silently the Spoiler came,

As sleep steals o'er the senses, unperceived,

And the last thoughts that soothed the waking soul Mingle with our sweet dreams.-Mourn not for her! Blackwood's Magazine.

THE MICHAELMAS DAISY.

LAST Smile of the departing year,

Thy sister sweets are flown;

Thy pensive wreath is far more dear,

For blooming thus alone.

Thy tender blush, thy simple frame,
Unnoticed might have passed;

But now thou com'st with softer claim,
The loveliest and the last!

Sweet are the charms in thee we find,
Emblem of hope's gay wing;

"T is thine to call past bloom to mind,
To promise future spring.

That the voice was hers whose early death I mourned,
That she it was who breathed those solemn notes
Which like a spell possessed the soul.—

I lay

Wakeful, the prey of many feverish feelings,

My thoughts were of the dead !—At length I slept,
If it indeed were sleep.-She stood before me
In beauty-the wan smile had passed away—
The eye was bright—I could not bear its brightness.
Till now I knew not death was terrible,

For seldom did I dwell upon the thought;
And if, in some wild moment, Fancy shaped
A world of the departed, 't was a scene
Most calm and cloudless, or if clouds at times
Stained the blue quiet of the still soft sky,
They did not dim its charms, but suited well
The stillness of the scene, like thoughts that move
Silently o'er the soul or linger there,

Shedding a tender twilight pensiveness!
This is an idle song!-I cannot tell

What charms were hers who died.-I cannot tell
What grief is theirs, whose spirits weep for her!
Oh! many were the agonies of prayer,
And many were the mockeries of hope;
And many a heart, that loved the weak delusion,
Looked forward for the rosy smiles of Health,
And many a rosy smile passed o'er that cheek
Which will not smile again;—and the soft tinge
That often flushed across that fading face,

And made the stranger smile with friends, would wake
A momentary hope ;-
-even the calm tone

With which she spoke of Death, gave birth to thoughts,

Weak, trembling thoughts, that the lip uttered not!

And when she spoke with those, whom most she mourned
To leave, and when through clear calm tears the eye
Shone with unwonted light, oh! was there not

In its rich sparkle something that forbade

The fear of Death ?— And when in life's last days

The same gay spirit, that in happier hours

Had charactered her countenance, still gleamed
On her wan features-when such playful words,
As once could scatter gladness on all hearts,
Still trembled from the lip, and o'er the souls
Of those who listened shed a deeper gloom.-
In hours of such most mournful gaiety,
Oh! was there not even then a lingering hope,
That flitted fearfully, like parent birds

Fast fluttering o'er their desolate nest?

Mourn not for her who died!-She lived, as saints
Might pray to live-she died as Christians die ;-
There was no earthward struggle of the heart,
No shuddering terror— no reluctant sigh.—
They who beheld her dying, fear not Death!
Silently—silently the Spoiler came,

As sleep steals o'er the senses, unperceived,

And the last thoughts that soothed the waking soul Mingle with our sweet dreams.-Mourn not for her! Blackwood's Magazine.

THE MICHAELMAS DAISY.

LAST Smile of the departing year,

Thy sister sweets are flown;

Thy pensive wreath is far more dear,

For blooming thus alone.

Thy tender blush, thy simple frame,
Unnoticed might have passed;

But now thou com'st with softer claim,
The loveliest and the last!

Sweet are the charms in thee we find,
Emblem of hope's gay wing;

"T is thine to call past bloom to mind,
To promise future spring.

BY ARTHUR BROOKE, ESQ.

He sleeps in peace at last,
The storm of being o'er;
Life's hateful struggle past,

He rests to rise no more;
And could the ceaseless round of Fate,
Reviving things inanimate,

The breath he scorned, restore,

He'd curse the wayward fate that hurled Him back upon this worthless world!

Affliction's early chill

His best emotions froze,
She in the grave was still,

Who lightened half his woes;

In friends, to whom his heart was bared, And every inmost feeling shared,

He met his deadliest foes.

What though he joined the ways of men— Those wounds could never close again!

With fevered hand he caught
At Joy's bewildering bowl,
As if the demon Thought

That preyed upon his soul,
Steeped in the rich Lethean draught,
Through midnight hours of riot quaffed,
Its scorpions would controul;

Still, still the fruitless cup was drained-
While life was there that pang remained.

The brightest shapes of love
Reclined upon his breast;

To banish one he strove,

In dalliance with the rest;

But 't was in vain with heart unmoved, Through all the paths of bliss he roved... A melancholy jest!!

There Pleasure smiled, and Beauty shone,
A ghastly, gazing man of stone.

His spirit darker grew ;

He loathed the light of heaven ;
The impious blade he drew—

That stroke-his heart is riven!
In sooth, it was a deed of fear,
Yet think on what he suffered here;
And hope his faults forgiven;
Though o'er his cold and lonely bed
No sigh was breathed, no tear was shed.

STANZAS.

BY W. S. WALKER, ESQ.

THOU hast left us, dearest Spirit! and left us all alone,

But thou thyself to glory and liberty art flown;

And the song that tells thy virtues, and mourns thy early doom, Should be gentle as thy happy death, and peaceful as thy tomb.

Thy place no longer knows thee beside the household hearth,
We miss thee in our hour of woe, we miss thee in our mirth;
But the thought that thou wert one of us- that thou hast borne

our name,

Is more than we would part with, for fortune or for fame.

Thy dying gift of love-'t was a light and slender token,

And thy parting words of comfort, were few and faintly spoken; But memory must forsake us, and life itself decay,

Ere those gifts shall lie forgotten, or those accents pass away.

Farewell, our best and fairest! a long, a proud farewell!

May those who love thee follow, to the place where thou dost dwell

Like the lovely star that led from far the wanderers to their God, May'st thou guide us in the pathway which thy feet in beauty

trod.

The Etonian.