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SONG OF THE DECANTER.

"There's another, not a sister; in the happy days gone by,

You'd have known her by the merriment that sparkled in her eye;

Too innocent for coquetry,-too fond for idle scorning,

Oh! friend, I fear the lightest heart makes sometimes heaviest mourning!

Tell her the last night of my life (for ere the moon be risen,

My body will be out of pain-my soul be out of prison,)

I dreamed I stood with her, and saw the yellow sunlight shine

On the vine-clad hills of Bingen-fair Bingen on the Rhine!

"I saw the blue Rhine sweep along—I heard, or seemed to hear,

The German songs we used to sing, in chorus sweet and clear;

And down the pleasant river, and up the

slanting hill,

The echoing chorus sounded, through the

evening calm and still;

And her glad blue eyes were on me, as we passed, with friendly talk,

Down many a path beloved of yore, and well remembered walk,

And her little hand lay lightly, confidingly

in mine:

But we'll meet no more at Bingen-loved Bingen on the Rhine!"

His voice grew faint and hoarse- his grasp was childish weak,

His eyes put on a dying look,—he sighed and ceased to speak:

His comrade bent to lift him, but the spark of life had fled!

The soldier of the Legion, in a foreign land—

was dead!

And the soft moon rose up slowly, and calmly she looked down

On the red sand of the battle-field with

bloody corses strown;

Yes, calmly on that dreadful scene her pale light seemed to shine,

As it shone on distant Bingen-fair Bingen on the Rhine!

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SONG OF THE DECANTER.

There was an old decanter, and its mouth was gaping wide; the rosy wine had ebbed away

to me.

and left

its crystal side; and the wind

went humming, humming;

up and down the sides it flew, and through the reed-like, hollow neck

the wildest notes it blew. I placed it in the window, where the blast was blowing free, and fancied that its pale mouth sang the queerest strains "They tell me puny conquerors-the Plague has slain his ten, and War his hundred thousands of the very best of men; but I"-'twas thus the bottle spoke-"but I have conquered more than all your famous conquerors, so feared and famed of yore. Then come, ye youths and maidens, come drink from out my cup, the beverage that dulls the brain and burns the spirit up; that puts to shame the conquerors that slay their scores below; for this has deluged millions with the lava tide of woe. Though, in the path of battle, darkest waves of blood may roll; yet while I killed the body, I have damned the very soul. The cholera, the sword, such ruin never wrought, as I, in mirth or malice, on the innocent have brought. And still I breathe upon them, and they shrink before my breath; and year by year my thousands tread

THE FEARFUL ROAD ΤΟ DEATH.

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SORROW FOR THE DEAD.

WASHINGTON IRVING.

HE sorrow for the dead is the only sorrow from which we refuse to be divorced. Every other wound we seek to heal, every other affliction to forget; but this wound we consider it a duty to keep open; this affliction we cherish and brood over in solitude. Where is the mother who would willingly forget the infant that perished like a blossom from her arms, though every recollection is a pang? Where is the child that would willingly forget the most tender of parents, though to remember be but to lament? Who, even in the hour of agony, would

SORROW FOR THE DEAD.

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forget the friend over whom he mourns? Who, even when the tomb is closing upon the remains of her he most loved-when he feels his heart, as it were, crushed in the closing of its portals-would accept of consolation that must be bought by forgetfulness?

No, the love which survives the tomb is one of the noblest attributes of the soul. If it has its woes, it has its delights; and when the overwhelming burst of grief is calmed into the gentle tear of recollection, when the sudden anguish and the convulsive agony over the present ruins of all that we most loved is softened away into pensive meditation on all that it was in the days of its loveliness, who would root out such a sorrow from the heart? Though it may sometimes throw a passing cloud over the bright hour of gayety, or spread a deeper sadness over the hour of gloom, yet who would exchange it even for the song of pleasure, or the burst of revelry?

No, there is a voice from the tomb sweeter than song. There is a remembrance of the dead to which we turn, even from the charms of the living. Oh, the grave! the grave! It buries every error, covers every defect, extinguishes every resentment! From its peaceful bosom spring none but fond regrets and tender recollections. Who can look down, even upon the grave of an enemy, and not feel a compunctious throb that he should ever have warred with the poor handful of earth that lies moldering before him?

But the grave of those we loved, what a place for meditation! There it is that we call up in long review the whole history of virtue and gentleness, and the thousand endearments lavished upon us, almost unheeded in the daily intercourse of intimacy; there it is that we dwell upon the tenderness, the solemn, awful tenderness of the parting scene; the bed of death, with all its stifled griefs, its noiseless attendance, its mute, watchful assiduities. The last testimonies of expiring love! the feeble, fluttering, thrilling,-oh, how thrilling !--pressure of the hand! The faint, faltering accents, struggling in death to give one more assurance of affection! The last fond look of the glazing eye, turned upon us even from the threshold of existence! Ay, go to the grave of buried love and meditate. There settle the account with thy conscience for every past benefit unrequited, every past endearment unregarded, of that departed being who can never, never, never return to be soothed by thy contrition.

If thou art a child, and hast ever added a sorrow to the soul, or a furrow to the silvered brow of an affectionate parent; if thou art a husband, and hast ever caused the fond bosom that ventured its whole happiness in thy arms to doubt one moment of thy kindness or thy truth; if

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EMBARKATION OF THE EXILES.

thou art a friend, and hast ever wronged, in thought, or word, or deed, the spirit that generously confided in thee; if thou art a lover, and hast ever given one unmerited pang to that true heart that now lies cold and still beneath thy feet; then be sure that every unkind look, every ungracious word, every ungentle action will come thronging back upon thy memory, and knock dolefully at thy soul; then be sure that thou wilt lie down sorrowing and repentant in the grave and utter the unheard groan, and pour the unavailing tear, more deep, more bitter, because unheard and unavailing.

Then weave thy chaplet of flowers, and strew the beauties of nature about the grave; console thy broken spirit, if thou canst, with these tender, yet futile tributes of regret; but take warning by the bitterness of this thy contrite affliction over the dead, and henceforth be more faithful and affectionate in the discharge of thy duties to the living.

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THE GENEROUS SOLDIER SAVED.

THOUGHT, Mr. Allan, when I gave my Bennie to his country, that not a father in all this broad land made so precious a gift,— no, not one. The dear boy only slept a minute, just one little minute, at his post; I know that was all, for Bennie never dozed over a duty. How prompt and reliable he was! I know he only fell asleep one little second; he was so young, and not strong, that boy of mine! Why, he was as tall as I, and only eighteen! and now they shoot him because he was found asleep when doing sentinel duty. Twentyfour hours the telegram said,—only twenty-four hours. Where is Bennie now ?"

"We will hope, with his heavenly Father," said Mr. Allan, soothingly.

"Yes, yes; let us hope; God is very merciful!"

"I should be ashamed, father,' Bennie said, 'when I am a man, to think I never used this great right arm'-and he held it out so proudly before me for my country, when it needed it. Palsy it rather than keep it at the plow.'

"Go, then, my boy,' I said, 'and God keep you!' God has kept him, I think, Mr. Allan !" and the farmer repeated these words slowly, as if, in spite of his reason, his heart doubted them.

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