APRIL.

"A violet by a mossy stone, Half-hidden from the eye, Fair as a star, when only one Is shining in the sky."

WORDSWORTH.

I HAVE found violets. April hath come on,
And the cool winds feel softer, and the rain
Falls in the beaded drops of summer-time.
You may hear birds at morning, and at eve
The tame dove lingers till the twilight falls,
Cooing upon the eaves, and drawing in
His beautiful, bright neck; and, from the hills,
A murmur like the hoarseness of the sea,
Tells the release of waters, and the earth
Sends up a pleasant smell, and the dry leaves
Are lifted by the grass; and so I know
That Nature, with her delicate ear, hath heard
The dropping of the velvet foot of Spring.
Take of my violets! I found them where
The liquid south stole o'er them, on a bank
That lean'd to running water. There's to me
A daintiness about these early flowers,
That touches me like poetry. They blow
With such a simple loveliness among
The common herbs of pasture, and breathe out
Their lives so unobtrusively, like hearts
Whose beatings are too gentle for the world.
I love to go in the capricious days
Of April and hunt violets, when the rain
Is in the blue cups trembling, and they nod
So gracefully to the kisses of the wind.
It may be deem'd too idle, but the young
Read nature like the manuscript of Heaven,
And call the flowers its poetry. Go out!
Ye spirits of habitual unrest,

And read it, when the "fever of the world"
Hath made your hearts impatient, and, if life
Hath yet one spring unpoison'd, it will be
Like a beguiling music to its flow,
And you will no more wonder that I love
To hunt for violets in the April-time.

THE ANNOYER.

LOVE knoweth every form of air,
And every shape of earth,
And comes, unbidden, everywhere,
Like thought's mysterious birth.
The moonlit sea and the sunset sky
Are written with Love's words,
And you hear his voice unceasingly,
Like song, in the time of birds.

He peeps into the warrior's heart

From the tip of a stooping plume,

And the serried spears, and the many men, May not deny him room.

He'll come to his tent in the weary night,

And be busy in his dream,

And he'll float to his eye in morning light, Like a fay on a silver beam.

He hears the sound of the hunter's gun,

And rides on the echo back,

And sighs in his ear like a stirring leaf,

And flits in his woodland track.

The shade of the wood, and the sheen of the river, The cloud, and the open sky,

He will haunt them all with his subtle quiver,
Like the light of your very eye.

The fisher hangs over the leaning boat,
And ponders the silver sea,

For Love is under the surface hid,

And a spell of thought has he;
He heaves the wave like a bosom sweet,
And speaks in the ripple low,
Till the bait is gone from the crafty line,
And the hook hangs bare below.

He blurs the print of the scholar's book,
And intrudes in the maiden's prayer,
And profanes the cell of the holy man
In the shape of a lady fair.

In the darkest night, and the bright daylight,
In earth, and sea, and sky,

In every home of human thought
Will Love be lurking nigh.

As ever made a lip of heaven

Falter amid its music-prayer!

The first-lit star of summer even

Springs not so softly on the eye,

Nor grows, with watching, half so bright, Nor, mid its sisters of the sky,

So seems of heaven the dearest light; Men murmur where that face is seen

My youth's angelic dream was of that look and mien.

Yet, though we deem the stars are blest,
And envy, in our grief, the flower
That bears but sweetness in its breast,

And fear'd the enchanter for his power,
And love the minstrel for his spell
He winds out of his lyre so well;
The stars are almoners of light,
The lyrist of melodious air,
The fountain of its waters bright,

And every thing most sweet and fair
Of that by which it charms the ear,
The eye of him that passes near;
A lamp is lit in woman's eye

That souls, else lost on earth, remember angels by.

EDWARD SANFORD, a son of the late Chancellor SANFORD, is a native of the city of New York. He was graduated at the Union College in 1824, and in the following year became a law student in the office of BENJAMIN F. BUTLER, afterward Attorney-General of the United States. He subsequently practised several years in the courts of

New York, but finally abandoned his profession to conduct the "Standard," an able democratic journal, with which he was connected during the political contest which resulted in the election of Mr. VAN BUREN to the Presidency, after which he was for a time one of the editors of "The Globe," at Washington. He now resides in New York.

ADDRESS TO BLACK HAWK. THERE's beauty on thy brow, old chief! the high And manly beauty of the Roman mould, And the keen flashing of thy full, dark eye

Speaks of a heart that years have not made cold; Of passions scathed not by the blight of time; Ambition, that survives the battle-rout. The man within thee scorns to play the mime To gaping crowds, that compass thee about. Thou walkest, with thy warriors by thy side, Wrapp'd in fierce hate, and high, unconquer'd pride. Chief of a hundred warriors! dost thou yet— Vanquish'd and captive-dost thou deem that here The glowing day-star of thy glory set

Dull night has closed upon thy bright career? Old forest-lion, caught and caged at last, Dost pant to roam again thy native wild? To gloat upon the lifeblood flowing fast

Of thy crush'd victims; and to slay the child, To dabble in the gore of wives and mothers, [thers? And kill, old Turk! thy harmless, pale-faced broFor it was cruel, BLACK HAWK, thus to flutter The dove-cotes of the peaceful pioneers, To let thy tribe commit such fierce and utter Slaughter among the folks of the frontiers. Though thine be old, hereditary hate,

Begot in wrongs, and nursed in blood, until It had become a madness, 'tis too late

[will

To crush the hordes who have the power and To rob thee of thy hunting-grounds and fountains, And drive thee backward to the Rocky Mountains. Spite of thy looks of cold indifference, [wonder; There's much thou'st seen that must excite thy Wakes not upon thy quick and startled sense

The cannon's harsh and pealing voice of thunder? Our big canoes, with white and widespread wings, That sweep the waters as birds sweep the sky; Our steamboats, with their iron lungs, like things

Of breathing life, that dash and hurry by? Or, if thou scorn'st the wonders of the ocean, What think'st thou of our railroad locomotion? Thou'st seen our museums, beheld the dummies That grin in darkness in their coffin cases; What think'st thou of the art of making mummies, So that the worms shrink from their dry embraces?

Thou'st seen the mimic tyrants of the stage

Strutting, in paint and feathers, for an hour; Thou'st heard the bellowing of their tragic rage,

Seen their eyes glisten,and their dark brows lower. Anon, thou'st seen them, when their wrath cool'd down,

Pass in a moment from a king-to clown.

Thou seest these things unmoved! sayst so, old fellow?

Then tell us, have the white man's glowing

daughters

Set thy cold blood in motion? Has't been mellow
By a sly cup or so of our fire-waters?
They are thy people's deadliest poison. They

First make them cowards, and then white men's

slaves;

And sloth, and penury, and passion's prey,

And lives of misery, and early graves. For, by their power, believe me, not a day goes But kills some Foxes, Sacs, and Winnebagoes.

Say, does thy wandering heart stray far away,

To the deep bosom of thy forest-home? The hill-side, where thy young pappooses play, And ask, amid their sports, when thou wilt come? Come not the wailings of thy gentle squaws

For their lost warrior loud upon thine ear, Piercing athwart the thunder of huzzas,

That, yell'd at every corner, meet thee here? The wife who made that shell-deck'd wampum belt, Thy rugged heart must think of her-and melt.

Chafes not thy heart, as chafes the panting breast
Of the caged bird against his prison-bars,
That thou, the crowned warrior of the West,
The victor of a hundred forest-wars,
Shouldst in thy age become a raree-show,

Led, like a walking bear, about the town,
A new-caught monster, who is all the go,

And stared at, gratis, by the gaping clown? Boils not thy blood, while thus thou'rt led about, The sport and mockery of the rabble rout?

Whence came thy cold philosophy? whence came,

Thou tearless, stern, and uncomplaining one, The power that taught thee thus to veil the flame Of thy fierce passions? Thou despisest fun,

And thy proud spirit scorns the white men's glee, Save thy fierce sport, when at the funeral-pile Of a bound warrior in his agony,

Who meets thy horrid laugh with dying smile. Thy face, in length, reminds one of a Quaker's; Thy dances, too, are solemn as a Shaker's.

Proud scion of a noble stem! thy tree

Is blanch'd, and bare, and sear'd, and leafless I'll not insult its fallen majesty, [now. Nor drive,with careless hand, the ruthless plough Over its roots. Torn from its parent mould,

Rich, warm, and deep, its fresh, free, balmy air, No second verdure quickens in our cold,

New, barren earth; no life sustains it there, But, even though prostrate, 't is a noble thing, Though crownless, powerless, "every inch a king."

Give us thy hand, old nobleman of nature,
Proud ruler of the forest aristocracy;
The best of blood glows in thy every feature,

Thou little siren, when the nymphs of yore

Charm'd with their songs till men forgot to dine, And starved, though music-fed, upon their shore, Their voices breathed no softer lays than thine. They sang but to entice, and thou dost sing As if to lull our senses to repose, That thou mayst use, unharm'd, thy little sting, The very moment we begin to doze; Thou worse than siren, thirsty, fierce blood-sipper, Thou living vampire, and thou gallinipper!

Nature is full of music, sweetly sings

The bard, (and thou dost sing most sweetly too,) Through the wide circuit of created things, Thou art the living proof the bard sings true. Nature is full of thee; on every shore,

'Neath the hot sky of Congo's dusky child, From warm Peru to icy Labrador,

The world's free citizen, thou roamest wild. Wherever "mountains rise or oceans roll,"

Thou wear'st thy titles on that godlike brow;

Let him who doubts them meet thine eagle-eye, He'll quail beneath its glance, and disavow All question of thy noble family;

For thou mayst here become, with strict propriety, A leader in our city good society.

TO A MUSQUITO.

His voice was ever soft, gentle, and low.-King Lear.

THOU Sweet musician, that around my bed

Dost nightly come and wind thy little horn, By what unseen and secret influence led,

Feed'st thou my ear with music till 'tis morn? The wind-harp's tones are not more soft than thine, The hum of falling waters not more sweet: I own, indeed, I own thy song divine, [meet, And when next year's warm summer nights we (Till then, farewell!) I promise thee to be À patient listener to thy minstrelsy. Thou tiny minstrel, who bid thee discourse Such eloquent music? was 't thy tuneful sire? Some old musician? or didst take a course

Of lessons from some master of the lyre? Who bid thee twang so sweetly thy small trump? Did NORTON form thy notes so clear and full ? Art a phrenologist, and is the bump

Of song developed in thy little skull?

At NIBLO's hast thou been when crowds stood mute,
Drinking the birdlike tones of CUDDY's flute?

Tell me the burden of thy ceaseless song.
Is it thy evening hymn of grateful prayer,
Or lay of love, thou pipest through the long,
Still night? With song dost drive away dull care?
Art thou a vieux garçon, a gay deceiver,

A wandering blade, roaming in search of sweets, Pledging thy faith to every fond believer,

Who thy advance with halfway shyness meets? Or art o' the softer sex, and sing'st in glee, "In maiden meditation, fancy free?"

The incarnation of Queen MAB art thou,

"The fairies' midwife;"-thou dost nightly sip, With amorous proboscis bending low,

The honey-dew from many a lady's lip(Though that they "straight on kisses dream,” I doubt-)

On smiling faces, and on eyes that weep, Thou lightest, and oft with "sympathetic snout" "Ticklest men's noses as they lie asleep; And sometimes dwellest, if I rightly scan, "On the forefinger of an alderman."

Yet thou canst glory in a noble birth.

As rose the sea-born VENUS from the wave,
So didst thou rise to life; the teeming earth,
The living water and the fresh air gave
A portion of their elements to create

Thy little form, though beauty dwells not there. So lean and gaunt, that economic fate

Meant thee to feed on music or on air.
Our vein's pure juices were not made for thee,
Thou living, singing, stinging atomy.

The hues of dying sunset are most fair,

And twilight's tints just fading into night, Most dusky soft, and so thy soft notes are

By far the sweetest when thou takest thy flight. The swan's last note is sweetest, so is thine; Sweet are the wind-harp's tones at distance heard; 'Tis sweet at distance, at the day's decline,

To hear the opening song of evening's bird.
But notes of harp or bird at distance float
Less sweetly on the ear than thy last note.

The autumn-winds are wailing: 'tis thy dirge;
Its leaves are sear, prophetic of thy doom.
Soon the cold rain will whelm thee, as the surge
Whelms the toss'd mariner in its watery tomb:
Then soar, and sing thy little life away!

Albeit thy voice is somewhat husky now. "Tis well to end in music life's last day,

Of one so gleeful and so blithe as thou: For thou wilt soon live through its joyous hours, And pass away with autumn's dying flowers.

JAMES OTIS ROCKWELL was born in Lebanon, an agricultural town in Connecticut, in 1807. At an early age he was apprenticed to a printer, in Utica, and in his sixteenth year he began to write verses for the newspapers. Two years afterward he went to New York, and subsequently to Boston, in each of which cities he laboured as a journeyman compositor. He had now acquired considerable reputation by his poetical writings, and was engaged as associate editor of the "Statesman," an old and influential journal published in Boston, with which, I believe, he continued until 1829, when he became the conductor of the Providence "Patriot."

Doubtless ROCKWELL was a man of genius. He was poor, and in his youth he had been left nearly to his own direction. He chose to learn the business of printing, because he thought it would afford him opportunities to improve his mind; and his education was acquired by diligent study during the leisure hours of his apprenticeship. When he removed to Providence, it became necessary for him to take an active part in the discussion of political questions. He felt but little interest in public affairs, and shrank instinctively from the strife of partisanship; but it seemed the only avenue to competence and reputation, and he embarked in it with apparent ardour. Journalism, in the hands of able and honourable men, is the noblest of callings; in the hands of the ignorant and mercenary, it is among the meanest. There are at all times connected with the press, persons of the baser sort, who derive their support and chief enjoyment from ministering to the worst passions; and by some of this class ROCKWELL'S private character was assailed, and he was taunted with his obscure parentage, defective education, and former vocation, as if to have elevated his position in society, by perseverance and the force of mind, were a ground of accusation. He had too little energy in his nature to regard such assaults with the indifference they merited; and complained in some of his letters that they "robbed him of rest, and of all pleasure." With constantly increasing reputation, however, he continued his editorial labours until the summer of 1831, when, at the early age of twenty-four years, he was suddenly "called to the better land." He felt unwell, one morning, and, in a brief paragraph, apologized for the apparent neglect of his gazette. The next number of it wore the signs of mourning for his death. A friend of ROCKWELL'S, in a notice of him published in the "Southern Literary Messenger," mentions as the immediate cause of his death, that

he "was troubled at the thought of some obliga

*Reverend CHARLES W. EVEREST, of Meriden, Connecticut.

37

tion which, from not receiving money then due to him, he was unable to meet, and shrank from the prospect of a debtor's prison." That it was in some way a result of his extreme sensitiveness, was generally believed among his friends at the time. WHITTIER, who was then editor of the "New England Weekly Review," soon after wrote the following lines to his memory:

"The turf is smooth above him! and this rain
Will moisten the rent roots, and summon back
The perishing life of its green-bladed grass,
And the crush'd flower will lift its head again
Smilingly unto heaven, as if it kept

No vigil with the dead. Well-it is meet
That the green grass should tremble, and the flowers
Blow wild about his resting-place. His mind
Was in itself a flower but half-disclosed--
A bud of blessed promise which the storm
Visited rudely, and the passer by
Smote down in wantonness. But we may trust
That it hath found a dwelling, where the sun
Of a more holy clime will visit it,

And the pure dews of mercy will descend,
Through Heaven's own atmosphere, upon its head.
"His form is now before me, with no trace
Of death in its fine lineaments, and there
Is a faint crimson on his youthful cheek,
And his free lip is softening with the smile
Which in his eye is kindling. I can feel
The parting pressure of his hand, and hear
His last 'God bless you!' Strange-that he is there
Distinct before me like a breathing thing,
Even when I know that he is with the dead,
And that the damp earth hides him. I would not
Think of him otherwise-his image lives
Within my memory as he seem'd before
The curse of blighted feeling, and the toil
And fever of an uncongenial strife, had left
Their traces on his aspect. Peace to him!
He wrestled nobly with the weariness
And trials of our being-smiling on,
While poison mingled with his springs of life,
And wearing a calm brow, while on his heart
Anguish was resting like a hand of fire-
Until at last the agony of thought
Grew insupportable, and madness came
Darkly upon him,-and the sufferer died!

"Nor died he unlamented! To his grave
The beautiful and gifted shall go up,
And muse upon the sleeper. And young lips
Shall murmur in the broken tones of grief-
His own sweet melodies-and if the ear
Of the freed spirit heedeth aught beneath
The brightness of its new inheritance,
It may be joyful to the parted one
To feel that earth remembers him in love!"

The specimens of ROCKWELL's poetry which have fallen under my notice show him to have possessed a strong imagination and deep feeling. His imagery is not always well chosen, and his versification is sometimes defective; but his thoughts pieces is striking. His later poems are his best, are often original, and the general effect of his and probably he would have produced works of much merit had he lived to a mature age.

THE SUM OF LIFE.

SEARCHER of gold, whose days and nights
All waste away in anxious care,
Estranged from all of life's delights,
Unlearn'd in all that is most fair-
Who sailest not with easy glide,
But delvest in the depths of tide,

And strugglest in the foam;

O! come and view this land of graves,
Death's northern sea of frozen waves,

And mark thee out thy home.

Lover of woman, whose sad heart

Wastes like a fountain in the sun,
Clings most, where most its pain does start,
Dies by the light it lives upon;
Come to the land of graves; for here
Are beauty's smile, and beauty's tear,
Gather'd in holy trust;

Here slumber forms as fair as those
Whose cheeks, now living, shame the rose,
Their glory turn'd to dust.

Lover of fame, whose foolish thought

Steals onward o'er the wave of time,
Tell me, what goodness hath it brought,
Atoning for that restless crime?

The spirit-mansion desolate,
And open to the storms of fate,

The absent soul in fear;

Bring home thy thoughts and come with me,
And see where all thy pride must be:
Searcher of fame, look here!

And, warrior, thou with snowy plume,
That goest to the bugle's call,
Come and look down; this lonely tomb

Shall hold thee and thy glories all:
The haughty brow, the manly frame,
The daring deeds, the sounding fame,
Are trophies but for death!
And millions who have toil'd like thee,
Are stay'd, and here they sleep; and see,
Does glory lend them breath?

I could blame thee for awaking

Thoughts the world will but deride; Calling out, and then forsaking

Flowers the winter wind will chide; Guiling to the midway ocean Barks that tremble by the shore; But I hush the sad emotion, And will punish thee no more.

THE LOST AT SEA.

WIFE, who in thy deep devotion
Puttest up a prayer for one
Sailing on the stormy ocean,

Hope no more-his course is done.
Dream not, when upon thy pillow,

That he slumbers by thy side; For his corse beneath the billow Heaveth with the restless tide.

Children, who, as sweet flowers growing, Laugh amid the sorrowing rains, Know ye many clouds are throwing

Shadows on your sire's remains? Where the hoarse, gray surge is rolling With a mountain's motion on, Dream ye that its voice is tolling

For your father lost and gone?

When the sun look'd on the water,
As a hero on his grave,
Tinging with the hue of slaughter
Every blue and leaping wave,
Under the majestic occan,

Where the giant current roll'd,
Slept thy sire, without emotion,
Sweetly by a beam of gold;

And the silent sunbeams slanted,

Wavering through the crystal deep, Till their wonted splendours haunted Those shut eyelids in their sleep. Sands, like crumbled silver gleaming, Sparkled through his raven hair; But the sleep that knows no dreaming Bound him in its silence there.

So we left him; and to tell thee
Of our sorrow and thine own,
Of the wo that then befell thee,
Come we weary and alone.
That thine eye is quickly shaded,

That thy heart-blood wildly flows, That thy cheek's clear hue is faded, Are the fruits of these new woes.

Children, whose meek eyes, inquiring,
Linger on your mother's face-
Know
ye that she is expiring,
That ye are an orphan race?
God be with you on the morrow,
Father, mother, both no more;
One within a grave of sorrow,
One upon the ocean's floor!