To-night yon frigate scarce shall keep
Her broad breast to the gale;

And many a foresail, scooped and strained,
Shall break from yard and stay,

Before this smoky wreath has stained

The rising mist of day.

Hark! hark! I hear yon whistling shroud,
I see yon quivering mast;

The black throat of the hunted cloud
Is panting forth the blast!

An hour, and whirled like winnowing chaff,
The giant surge shall fling

His tresses o'er yon pennon staff,
White as the sea-bird's wing!

Yet rest, ye wanderers of the deep;
Nor wind nor wave shall tire

Those fleshless arms, whose pulses leap

With floods of living fire;

Sleep on-and when the morning light
Streams o'er the shining bay,

O think of those for whom the night
Shall never wake in day!

"TIS midnight's holy hour-and silence no

Is brooding like a gentle Spirit o'er
The still and pulseless world.

Hark! on the

The bell's deep tones are swelling-'tis the k
Of the departed year. No funeral train
Is sweeping past-yet, on the stream and wo
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest
Like a pale, spotless shroud-the air is stirred

› Spirits of the Seasons seem to stand,

ing Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form, | Winter with his aged locks, and breathe, nournful cadences that come abroad

the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail, elancholy dirge o'er the dead year

e from the Earth for ever.

'Tis a time

memory and for tears. Within the deep chambers of the heart, a spectre dim,

ose tones are like the wizard voice of Time rd from the tomb of Ages, points its cold solemn finger to the beautiful

holy visions, that have passed away left no shadow of their loveliness

the dead waste of life. That spectre lifts coffin-lid of Hope, and Joy, and Love,

, bending mournfully above the pale

et forms that slumber there, scatters dead flowers what has passed to nothingness. The year gone, and, with it, many a glorious throng happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow, hadow in each heart. In its swift course, aved its sceptre o'er the beautiful—

286

THE CLOSING YEAR.

And they are not. It laid its pallid hand
Upon the strong man-and the haughty form
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged
The bright and joyous-and the tearful wail
Of stricken ones is heard where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er
The battle-plain, where sword and spear and shield
Flashed in the light of mid-day-and the strength
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass,
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came
And faded like a wreath of mist at eve;
Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,

It heralded its millions to their home

In the dim land of dreams.

Remorseless Time

Fierce Spirit of the Glass and Scythe-what power

Can stay him in his silent course, or melt

His iron heart to pity! On, still on,

He presses, and for ever. The proud bird,

The condor of the Andes, that can soar

Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave The fury of the northern hurricane,

And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,

Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks down

Night's deep darkness has no chain to bind ushing pinion. Revolutions sweep

Earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast reaming sorrow-Cities rise and sink bubbles on the water-Fiery isles

ng blazing from the Ocean, and go back heir mysterious caverns-Mountains rear eaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow r tall heads to the plain-New Empires rise, ering the strength of hoary centuries, rush down like the Alpine avalanche,

ling the nations-And the very stars, bright and burning blazonry of God, er a while in their eternal depths,

like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,

t from their glorious spheres and pass away arkle in the trackless void-Yet Time,

the Tomb-builder, holds his fierce career, , stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not

I the mighty wrecks that strew his path,
it and muse, like other conquerors,
the fearful ruin he has wrought.