THEODORE DWIGHT.

AFRICAN DISTRESS.

"HELP! oh, help! thou God of Christians! Save a mother from despair!

Cruel white men steal my children!

God of Christians, hear my prayer!

"From any arms by force they're rended,
Sailors drag them to the sea;
Yonder ship, at anchor riding,

Swift will carry them from me.

"There my son lies, stripp'd, and bleeding;
Fast, with thongs, his hands are bound.
See, the tyrants, how they scourge him!
See his sides a reeking wound.

* Ser his little sister by him;

Quaking, trembling, how she lies! Drugs of blood her face besprinkle; Tears of anguish fill her eyes.

Now they tear her brother from her; Down, below the deck, he's thrown ; Stiff with beating, through fear silent, Save a single, death-like, groan."

Hear the little creature begging —
"Take me, white men, for your own!
Spare, oh, spare my darling brother!
He's my mother's only son.

"See, upon the shore she's raving:
Down she falls upon the sands:
Now, she tears her flesh with madness;
Now, she prays with lifted hands.

"I am young, and strong, and hardy; He's a sick, and feeble boy;

Take me, whip me, chain me, starve me, All my life I'll toil with joy.

"Christians! who's the God you worship?

Is he cruel, fierce, or good?

Does he take delight in mercy?
Or in spilling human blood?

"Ah, my poor distracted mother! Hear her scream upon the shore."Down the savage captain struck her, Lifeless on the vessel's floor.

Up his sails he quickly hoisted,
To the ocean bent his way;
Headlong plunged the raving mother,
From a high rock, in the sea.

HANNAH F. GOULD.

THE SNOW FLAKE.

Now, if I fall, will it be my lot

To be cast in some low and lonely spot,
To melt, and to sink unseen or forgot?

And then will my course be ended ?" 'Twas thus a feathery Snow-flake said,

As down through the measureless space it strayed,
Or, as half by dalliance, half afraid,

66

It seemed in mid air suspended.

· O, no," said the Earth, "thou shalt not lie,
Neglected and lone, on my lap to die,
Thou pure and delicate child of the sky;

For thou wilt be safe in my keeping:
But, then, I must give thee a lovelier form;
Thou'lt not be a part of the wintry storm,

But revive when the sunbeams are yellow and warm,
And the flowers from my bosom are peeping.

“ And then thou shalt have thy choice to be
Restored in the lily that decks the lea,

In the jessamine bloom, the anemone,
Or aught of thy spotless whiteness;
To melt, and be cast in a glittering bead,

With the pearls that the night scatters over the mead,

In the cup where the bee and the fire-fly feed,
Regaining thy dazzling brightness;-

“To wake, and be raised from thy transient sleep, When Viola's mild blue eye shall weep,

In a tremulous tear, or a diamond leap

In a drop from the unlocked fountain;

Or, leaving the valley, the meadow and heath,
The streamlet, the flowers, and all beneath,
To go and be wove in the silvery wreath
Encircling the brow of the mountain.

"Or, wouldst thou return to a home in the skies,
To shine in the Iris I'll let thee arise,
And appear in the many and glorious dyes

A pencil of sunbeams is blending.
But true, fair thing, as my name is Earth,
I'll give thee a new and vernal birth,
When thou shalt recover thy primal worth,
And never regret descending !"

"Then I will drop," said the trusting flake; "But bear it in mind that the choice I make Is not in the flowers nor the dew to awake,

Nor the mist that shall pass with the morning: