THE HIGHLANDER.

Many years ago, a poor Highland Soldier, on his return to his native hills, fatigued, as it was supposed, by the length of the march and the heat of the weather, sat down under the shade of a birch tree on the solitary road of Lowran, that winds along the margin of Lochken in Galloway. Here he was found dead, and this incident forms the subject of the following verses.

weary,

From the climes of the sun, all war-worn and
The Highlander sped to his youthful abode ;
Fair visions of home cheered the desert so dreary,
Though fierce was the noon-beam, and steep was the
road.

Till, spent with the march that still lengthened before him,
He stopped by the way in a sylvan retreat ;
The light shady boughs of the birch-tree waved o'er him,
And the stream of the mountain fell soft at his feet.

He sunk to repose where the red heaths are blended,
One dream of his childhood his fancy passed o'er;
But his battles are fought, and his march now is ended,
The sound of the bagpipe shall wake him no more.

They have made her a grave too cold and damp, For a soul so warm and true,

And she's gone to the lake of the Dismal Swamp,
Where all night long, by a fire-fly lamp,
She paddles her white canoe.

And her fire-fly lamp I soon shall see,
And her paddle I soon shall hear;
Long and loving our life shall be,
And I'll hide the maid in a cypress tree,
When the footsteps of death are near.'

Away to the Dismal Swamp he speeds,
His path was rugged and sore,
Through tangled juniper, beds of reeds,
Through many a fen where the
serpent feeds,
And man ne'er trode before.

And when on earth he sunk to sleep,
(If slumbers his eyelids knew,)
He lay where the deadly vines do weep
Their venomous tears, and nightly steep
The flesh with blistering dew!

And near him the she-wolf stirred the brake,
And the rattlesnake breathed in his ear,
Till he starting cried, from his dream awake,
• Oh! when shall I see the dusky lake,
And the white canoe of my dear!'

He saw the lake-and the meteor bright
Quick o'er its surface played.

6

Welcome,' he said, my dear one's light!' And the dim shore echoed for many a night The name of the death-cold maid !

Till he formed a boat of the birchen bark,
Which carried him off from the shore;

Far he followed the meteor spark;

The winds were high, and the clouds were dark,
And the boat returned no more!

But oft from the Indian hunter's camp,

This lover and maid so true,

Are seen, at the hour of midnight damp,
To cross the lake by the fire-fly lamp,
And paddle their white canoe!

Moore.

STANZAS.

I never cast a flower away,

The gift of one who cared for me,
A little flower,-a faded flower,—
But it was done reluctantly.

I never looked a last adieu

To things familiar, but my heart
Shrank with a feeling almost pain,
Even from their lifelessness to part.

I never spoke the word farewell!

But with an utterance faint and broken;
A heart-sick yearning for the time
When it should never more be spoken.

Anon.

DEATH AND BURIAL OF A CHILD AT SEA.

My boy refused his food, forgot to play,
And sickened on the waters, day by day;