"No _parting_?" I asked, with a burst of joy; And the lovely illusion broke! My rapture had banished my beauteous boy-- To a shadowy void I spoke. But, O! that STAR of the morn still beams With light to direct my feet Where, when I have done with my earthly dreams, The mother and child may meet. THE WAR-SPIRIT ON BUNKER'S HEIGHT. The sun walked the skies in the splendor of June, O'er earth full of promise, and air full of tune; The broad azure streams calmly rolled to the deep, Whose waves on its breast stirred like babes in their sleep. The turf heaved its green to the white vestured flock, That fed, or reposed in the shade of the rock; The birds sang their songs by their nests in the bowers; And the bee hummed with sweets from the fresh opened flowers. The humming-bird glittered, and whirred o'er the cell, Where her nectar was stored, from the hill to the dell; 'Mid the bloom and the perfume, that passed on the breeze, From the rose, and the vine, and the fruit-bearing trees. It seemed like a gala, when Nature, arrayed In festival robes, with her treasures displayed, Reflected the smile of her Maker above, And offered up hymns of her thanksgiving love. And yet, in the bosom of man there were fires Fierce, quenchless and fearful--consuming desires For right unpossessed, and for lawless domain, That burned to the soul, and that flamed to the brain. In the streets there was clanging and gleaming of arms; In the dwellings, resolve, preparation, alarms; In the eye of the wife, mother, sister, a tear; In the face of their soldier, no semblance of fear. The patriot chieftain had marked out his ground, To hold, or to fall, if his foe passed the bound: And now was the hero to close in the strife, For death as a bondman, or freedom with life. The war-spirit hovered, and frowned on the height, His eye flashing lightning--his wings shedding night! From his wide fiery nostrils rolled volumes of smoke, And the rocks roared afar, as in thunder he spoke. At his dread shock of nature, the lamb from its play, The bee and the bird, in affright fled away; The branch, flower, and grass, felt the crush and the scath, And the winds passing by, snuffed the heat of his wrath. With blood, that, in torrents, he poured down like rain, He drenched the green turf, that he strewed with the slain, Till the eminence groaned with the carnage it bore, And its heart heaved and shuddered at drinking the gore. While the breath of the war-spirit scented the air, The rivers looked wild in reflecting his glare; And ocean's cold bosom was torn, as he gave The flap of his pinion to trouble its wave.