I would, in brave array, precede thee round, With pomp and pageantry and music sweet, And spread my shining mantle on the ground, For fear the dust should soil thy golden-sandaled feet! Away! away! the days are dim and cold, The withered flowers are crumbling in the mould, The Heaven is gray and blank, the Earth is drear, And fallen leaves are heaped on Summer’s bier! Sweet songs are out of place, however sweet, When all things else are wrapt in funeral gloom, True Poets never pipe to dancing feet, But only elegies around a tomb! Away with fancy now, the Year demands A sterner chaplet, and a deeper lay, A wreath of cypress woven with pious hands, A dirge for its decay! * * * * * LINES IN MEMORY OF MY LOST CHILD. BY GEORGE D. PRENTICE. My child! my dear, lost child! a father’s heart, Touched by the holy wand of memory, Would in this hour of loneliness and gloom, When not a sound is borne upon the air, And not a star is visible in heaven, Hold sweet communion with thy soul. My boy! Thou wast most beautiful. I never looked On thee but with a heart of pride. Thy curls Fell o’er a brow of angel-loveliness, And thy dark eyes, dark as the midnight cloud, And soft as twilight waters, flashed and glowed In strange, wild beauty, yet thy tears were far More frequent than thy smiles—thy wail of pain Came oftener on our hearts than thy dear cry Of infant joyousness. Thy few brief months Were months of suffering; ay, thy cup of life Was bitter, bitter, but thou wast not doomed To drain it, for a God of mercy soon Let it pass from thee. Oh! how well, my child, Do I remember that all mournful day, When thy young mother bore thy wasting form, With breaking heart and streaming eyes, afar, In the vain hope to save the dear young life To which the tendrils of her own were bound. With one wild pressure of thy little form To my sad bosom, with a frantic kiss Upon thy pallid lips, and a hot tear Wrung from a burning brain, I said farewell— Alas! my child, I never saw thee more. In a strange land, far from thy own dear home, But with the holy ministries of love Around thy couch, thy little being passed, Like the sweet perfume of a bright young rose, To mingle with the skies from whence it came. Oh! in that hour, my child, thy lost of earth, Did not a thought of thy poor father’s love