Flag of the brave! thy folds shall fly, The sign of hope and triumph high, When speaks the signal trumpet tone, And the long line comes gleaming on. Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet, Has dimm'd the glistening bayonet, Each soldier eye shall brightly turn To where thy sky-born glories burn; And as his springing steps advance, Catch war and vengeance from the glance. And when the cannon-mouthings loud Heave in wild wreaths the battle shroud, And gory sabres rise and fall Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall; Then shall thy meteor glances glow, And cowering foes shall shrink beneath Each gallant arm that strikes below That lovely messenger of death. Flag of the seas! on ocean wave Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave; When death, careering on the gale, Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail, And frighted waves rush wildly back Before the broadside's reeling rack, Each dying wanderer of the sea Shall look at once to heaven and thee, And smile to see thy splendours fly In triumph o'er his closing eye. Flag of the free heart's hope and home! By angel hands to valour given; Thy stars have lit the welkin dome, And all thy hues were born in heaven. For ever float that standard sheet! Where breathes the foe but falls before us, With Freedom's soil beneath our feet, And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us? MORNING HYMN. _Genesis_ i. 3. BY C. F. HOFFMAN. "Let there be light!" The Eternal spoke, And from the abyss where darkness rode The earliest dawn of nature broke, And light around creation flow'd. The glad earth smiled to see the day, The first-born day came blushing in; The young day smiled to shed its ray Upon a world untouched by sin. "Let there be light!" O'er heaven and earth, The God who first the day-beam pour'd, Whispered again his fiat forth, And shed the Gospel's light abroad. And, like the dawn, its cheering rays On rich and poor were meant to fall, Inspiring their Redeemer's praise In lonely cot and lordly hall. Then come, when in the Orient first Flushes the signal light for prayer; Come with the earliest beams that burst From God's bright throne of glory there. Come kneel to Him who through the night Hath watched above thy sleeping soul, To Him whose mercies, like his light, Are shed abroad from pole to pole. BRONX. BY J. R. DRAKE. I sat me down upon a green bank-side, Skirting the smooth edge of a gentle river, Whose waters seemed unwillingly to glide, Like parting friends who linger while they sever; Enforced to go, yet seeming still unready, Backward they wind their way in many a wistful eddy.