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THE LOST LITTLE ONE.

Of that bright and happy land:
I was going, when you called me,
When you came and kissed my hand.

“And at first I felt so sorry

You had called me: I would go
O, to sleep, and never suffer!
Mother, don't be crying so!
Hug me closer, closer, mother;
Put your arms around me tight;
O, how much I love you, mother!
But I feel so strange to-night!"

And the mother pressed her closer
To her overburdened breast;
On the heart so near to breaking
Lay the heart so near at rest!
In the solemn hour of midnight,
In the darkness calm and deep,
Lying on her mother's bosom,
Little Bessie fell asleep!

MELODIES FOR CHILDHOOD.

THE LOST LITTLE ONE.

THE fairy form our home that blest
With sport and prattle gay,
The little one we loved the best

From earth has passed away.

THE LOST LITTLE ONE.

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We miss her footfall on the floor,
Amidst the nursery din,
Her tip-tap at our bedroom door,
Her bright face peeping in.

And when to Heaven's high courts above
Ascends our social prayer,

Though there are voices that we love,
One sweet voice is not there.

And dreary seem the hours, and lone,
That drag themselves along,
Now from our board her smile is gone,
And from our hearth her song.

We miss that farewell laugh of hers,
With its light, joyous sound,
And the kiss between the balusters,
When good-night time comes round.

And empty is her little bed,

And on her pillow there

Must never rest that cherub head
With its soft silken hair.

But often, as we wake and weep,
Our midnight thoughts will roam,
To visit her cold, dreamless sleep,
In her last narrow home.

Then, then it is Faith's tear-dimmed eyes
See through ethereal space,
Amidst the angel-crowded skies,
That dear, that well-known face.

With beckoning hand she seems to say,
"Though, all her sufferings o'er,
Your little one is borne away
To this celestial shore,

"Doubt not she longs to welcome you
To her glad, bright abode,

There, happy, endless ages through,

To live with her and God."

REV. W. CALVERT.

RESIGNATION.

THERE is no flock, however watched and tended,

But one dead lamb is there!

There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended,
But has one vacant chair!

The air is full of farewells to the dying,
And mournings for the dead;

The heart of Rachel for her children crying
Will not be comforted!

RESIGNATION.

Let us be patient! these severe afflictions

Not from the ground arise,

But oftentimes celestial benedictions

Assume this dark disguise.

We see but dimly through the mists and vapors ;
Amid these earthly damps

What seem to us but dim, funereal tapers

May be Heaven's distant lamps.

There is no Death! what seems so is transition;

This life of mortal breath

Is but a suburb of the life elysian,
Whose portal we call Death.

But gone unto that school,

Where she no longer needs our poor protection,
And Christ himself doth rule.

In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion,
By guardian angels led,

Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution,
She lives whom we call dead.

Day after day we think what she is doing
In those bright realms of air;

Year after year her tender steps pursuing,
Behold her grown more fair.

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RESIGNATION.

Thus do we walk with her, and keep unbroken
The bond which nature gives,

Thinking that our remembrance, though unspoken,
May reach her where she lives.

Not as a child shall we again behold her;
For when with raptures wild

In our embraces we again enfold her,
She will not be a child;

But a fair maiden, in her Father's mansion,
Clothed with celestial grace;

And beautiful with all the soul's expansion
Shall we behold her face.

And though at times, impetuous with emotion
And anguish long suppressed,

The swelling heart heaves moaning like the ocean
That cannot be at rest;

We will be patient! and assuage the feeling

We cannot wholly stay;

By silence sanctifying, not concealing,

The grief that must have way.

LONGFELLOW.