ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY. 301

ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY.

S. G. BULFINCH.

ALAS, Sweet maid! hast thou so soon departed? Thou of the bright smile and the speaking eye, The good, the cheerful, and the gentle-hearted,Who could have thought that thou so soon shouldst die?

To die so young, when all was bright before thee, When fond affection strewed thy path with flowers!

Who could have thought so dark a doom was o'er thee,

Fair being, formed for life's most radiant hours?

How shall we miss thee where thy voice was heard!

How, where thy smile hath shed its light

around!

And where we listened to the holy word,

Dear friend, with thee, on yonder hallowed ground!

Yes; in the hour of happiness, a sigh,

Sweet girl! shall witness that thou still art

near;

And many a season, as it hastens by,
Shall bid the past in vivid light appear.

But there are those who mourn thee with a deep,
A heavier sorrow than 't is ours to know,
They who in childhood watched thy tranquil sleep,
And smoothed the pillow for thy brow of snow.

Friends of the orphan! He who gave your treasure Has taken to himself the boon he gave;

The pure, the gentle one, it was his pleasure

From earth's dark sufferings early thus to save.

Lament her not! There, where her lovely spirit. Abides, she glows with other thoughts than ours. Not all that earth's most favored ones inherit Could win her now to leave those heavenly bowers.

There may we join her, Father! when the day
Of duty and of trial here is done;
When earthly hope and fear have passed away,
And the bright morn of endless life begun.

THE DYING HEBREW'S PRAYER.

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THE DYING HEBREW'S PRAYER.

ANONYMOUS.

A HEBREW knelt in the dying light:
His eye was dim and cold,

The hairs on his brow were silver white,
And his blood was thin and old!
He lifted his looks to his latest sun,
For he knew that his pilgrimage was done;
And as he saw God's shadow there,
His spirit poured itself in prayer.

“I come unto death's second birth,
Beneath a stranger air,

A pilgrim on a dull, cold earth,
As all my fathers were!

And men have stamped me with a curse,

I feel it is not Thine;

Thy mercy, like yon sun, was made

And therefore dare I lift mine eye,
Through that, to Thee, before I die.

"In this great temple, built by Thee,
Whose altars are divine,

Beneath yon lamp that ceaselessly
Lights up thine own true shrine,

O take my latest sacrifice!

Look down, and make this sod Holy as that where, long ago,

The Hebrew met his God!

"I have not caused the widow's tears,
Nor dimmed the orphan's eye,
I have not stained the virgin's years,
Nor mocked the mourner's cry:
The songs of Zion in mine ear
Have ever been most sweet,
And always, when I felt Thee near,
My 'shoes' were 'off my feet'!

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"I have known Thee in the whirlwind, I have known Thee on the hill,

I have loved Thee in the voice of birds,
Or the music of the rill!

I dreamt Thee in the shadow,
I saw Thee in the light,
I heard Thee in the thunder-peal,
And worshipped in the night!
All beauty, while it spoke of Thee,
Still made my soul rejoice,

And my spirit bowed within itself,

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To hear thy still, small voice'!
I have not felt myself a thing
Far from thy presence driven,
By flaming sword or waving wing

Shut out from Thee and heaven!

THE DYING HEBREW'S PRAYER.

"Must I the whirlwind reap, because
My father sowed the storm?
Or shrink because another sinned
Beneath Thy red right arm?
O, much of this we daily scan,
And much is all unknown;

But I will not take my curse from man,

I turn to Thee alone!

O, bid my fainting spirit live,

And what is dark reveal, And what is evil, O forgive!

And what is broken, heal;

And cleanse my nature, from above,
In the deep Jordan of thy love.

"I know not if the Christian's heaven

Shall be the same as mine;

I only ask to be forgiven,

And taken home to thine!
I wander on a far, dim strand,
Whose mansions are as tombs,
And long to find the fatherland,
Where there are many homes!-
O, grant, of all yon starry thrones,
Some dim and distant star,

Where Judah's lost and scattered sons

May love Thee from afar!

Where all earth's myriad harps shall meet
In choral praise and prayer,

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