When youth is wedded to age or sacrificed to decrepitude to promote some State policy, though the victims are not clothed in the garb of the Egyptian slave, but arrayed in the pomp of regal vestments, yet the diamond often rests upon an aching brow, and the pearls press a saddened bosom; and when the holiest of earthly institutions is thus violated, each relation of life is profaned; and polluted streams descend from the highest sources and diffuse their poison through all the ranks of life--through all the gradations of society. There will still be Hagars--women who marry for a home, or a support; and especially while woman is educated to be helpless--unable to provide for her own wants; or while that prejudice is cherished which leads her to deem useful employment a degradation. * * * * * HAGAR'S EXILE. She fled, with one reproachful look On him who bade her go, And scarcely could the patriarch brook That glance of voiceless wo: In vain her quivering lips essay'd His mercy to implore; Silent the mandate she obey'd, And then was seen no more. The burning waste and lonely wild Received her as she went; Hopeless, she clasp'd her fainting child, With thirst and sorrow spent. And in the wilderness so drear, She raised her voice on high, And sent forth that heart-stricken prayer "Let me not see him die!" Her beautiful, her only boy, Her all of hope below; So long his father's pride and joy, And yet--from _him_ the blow! Alone she must his head sustain, And watch his sinking breath, And on his bright brow mark the stain Of the destroyer, Death. "Let me not see him die," and lo! The messenger of peace! Once more her tears forget to flow, Once more her sorrows cease. Life, strength, and freedom now are given With mighty power to one Who from his father's roof was driven, And he--the outcast's son. How often we, like Hagar, mourn, When some unlook'd for blight Drives us away, no more to turn To joys we fancied bright! Forced from our idols to retreat, And seek the Almighty's care, Perchance we are sent forth to meet A desert-angel there. [Illustration] THE PARTIAL AND INTRIGUING MOTHER--REBEKAH. [Illustration] After the departure of Hagar and her son from the tents of Abraham, peace seems to have returned, and it became the abode of filial and parental as well as of conjugal affection. Sarah's days were still prolonged, that she might exercise the duties and enjoy the pleasures of a mother.