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THE LEGEND OF THE CROSSBILL.

Bore he swallows and their fledglings,
Flowers and weeds of every kind.

And so stands he calm and childlike,
High in wind and tempest wild;
O, were I like him exalted,

I would be like him, a child!

And my songs,-green leaves and blossoms,-
To the doors of heaven would bear,
Calling, even in storm and tempest,
Round me still these birds of air.

THE LEGEND OF THE CROSSBILL.

FROM THE GERMAN OF JULIUS MOSEN.

ON the cross the dying Saviour
Heavenward lifts his eyelids calm,
Feels, but scarcely feels, a trembling
In his pierced and bleeding palm.

And by all the world forsaken,

Sees he how with zealous care

At the ruthless nail of iron

A little bird is striving there.

Stained with blood and never tiring,
With its beak it doth not cease,
From the cross 'twould free the Saviour,
Its Creator's Son release.

And the Saviour speaks in mildness:
"Blest be thou of all the good!

Bear, as token of this moment,

Marks of blood and holy rood!”

And that bird is called the crossbill;
Covered all with blood so clear,

In the groves of pine it singeth

Songs, like legends, strange to hear.

THE sea hath its pearls,

The heaven hath its stars;

But my heart, my heart,

My heart hath its love.

Great are the sea and the heaven;
Yet greater is my heart,
And fairer than pearls and stars
Flashes and beams my love.

Thou little, youthful maiden,

Come unto my great heart;

My heart, and the sea, and the heaven, Are melting away with love!

POETIC APHORISMS.

FROM THE SINNGEDICHTE OF FRIEDRICH VON LOGAU.-SEVENTEENTH CENTURY,

MONEY.

WHEREUNTO is money good?

Who has it not wants hardihood,

Who has it has much trouble and care,

Who once has had it has despair.

THE BEST MEDICINES.

Joy and Temperance and Repose
Slam the door on the doctor's nose.

SIN.

Man-like is it to fall into sin,
Fiend-like is it to dwell therein,

Christ-like is it for sin to grieve,
God-like is it all sin to leave.

POVERTY AND BLINDNESS.

A blind man is a poor man, and blind a poor man is ;
For the former seeth no man, and the latter no man sees.

LAW OF LIFE.

Live I, so live I,

To my Lord heartily,
To my Prince faithfully,
To my Neighbour honestly,

Die I, so die I.

CREEDS.

Lutheran, Popish, Calvinistic, all these creeds and doctrines three
Extant are; but still the doubt is, where Christianity may be.

THE RESTLESS HEART.

A millstone and the human heart are driven ever round;

If they have nothing else to grind, they must themselves be ground.

CHRISTIAN LOVE.

Whilom Love was like a fire, and warmth and comfort it bespoke ;
But, alas! it now is quenched, and only bites us, like the smoke.

ART AND TACT.

Intelligence and courtesy not always are combined;
Often in a wooden house a golden room we find.

RETRIBUTION.

Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small; Though with patience he stands waiting, with exactness grinds he all.

TRUTH.

When by night the frogs are croaking, kindle but a torch's fire,
Ha! how soon they all are silent! Thus Truth silences the liar.

RHYMES.

If perhaps these rhymes of mine should sound not well in strangers' ears,
They have only to bethink them that it happens so with theirs;

For so long as words, like mortals, call a fatherland their own,
They will be most highly valued where they are best and longest known.

AT the foot of the mountain height
Where is perched Castèl-Cuillè,

When the apple, the plum, and the almond tree

In the plain below were growing white,
This is the song one might perceive

On a Wednesday morn of Saint Joseph's Eve: