And the hands, as they swept o'er the dial of gold,

Seemed to point to the girl below. And lo! she had changed: in a few short hours, Her bouquet had become a garland of flowers, That she held in her outstretched hands, and flung This way and that, as she, dancing, swung In the fulness of grace and womanly pride, That told me she soon was to be a bride; Yet then, when expecting her happiest day, In the same sweet voice I heard her say,

“ Passing away! passing away!”

While I gazed at that fair one's cheek, a shade

Of thought, or care, stole softly over,
Like that by a cloud in a summer's day made,

Looking down on a field of blossoming clover.
The rose yet lay on her cheek, but its flush
Had something lost of its brilliant blush;
And the light in her eye, and the light on the wheels,

That marched so calmly round above her, Was a little dimmed, as when evening steals

Upon noon's hot face; — yet one couldn't but love her, For she looked like a mother, whose first babe lay Rocked on her breast, as she swung all day; And she seemed, in the same silver tone to say,

“Passing away! passing away!”

While yet I looked, what a change there came!

Her eye was quenched, and her cheek was wan; Stooping and staffed was her withered frame;

Yet just as busily swung she on.
The garland beneath her had fallen to dust;
The wheels above her were eaten with rust;
The hands that over the dial swept
Grew crooked and tarnished, but on they kept,

And still there came that silver tone
From the shrivelled lips of the toothless crone,
(Let me never forget till my dying day
The tone or the burden of her lay,)

“Passing away! passing away!"

LESSON CXLIV.

That Silent Moon.

GEORGE W. DOANE.

Tuat silent moon, that silent moon,

Careering now through cloudless sky,
O, who shall tell what varied scenes

Have passed beneath her placid eye,
Since first, to light this wayward earth,
She walked in tranquil beauty forth !

How oft has Guilt's unhallowed hand,

And Superstition's senseless rite,
And loud, licentious Revelry,

Profaned her pure and holy light !
Small sympathy is hers, I ween,
With sights like these - that virgin queen!

But dear to her, in summer eve,

By rippling wave, or tufted grove,
When hand in hand is purely clasped,

And heart meets heart in holy love,
To smile in quiet loneliness,
And hear each whispered vow, and bless.

Dispersed along the world's wide way,

When friends are far, and fond ones rove, low powerful she to wake the thought,

And start the tear for those we love, Who watch with us at night's pale noon, And gaze upon that silent moon!

How powerful, too, to hearts that mourn,

The magic of that moonlight sky, To bring again the vanished scenes

The happy eves — of days gone by ; Again to bring, 'mid bursting tears, T'he loved and lost of other years !

And oft she looks, that silent moon,

On lonely eyes that wake to weep In dungeon dark, or sacred cell,

On couch, whence pain has banished sleep : 0, softly beams her gentle eye On those who mourn, and those who die.

But beam on whomsoe'er she will,

And fall where'er her splendors may, There's pureness in her chastened light,

There's comfort in her tranquil ray: What power is hers to soothe the heart What power, the trembling tear to start!

The dewy morn let others love,

Or bask them in the noontide ray;
There's not an hour but has its charm,

From dawning light to dying day:
But O, be mine a fairer boon
That silent moon, that silent moon!

LESSON CXLV.

The Midnight Mail.

HANNAH F. GOULD,

'Tis midnight - all is peace profound ! But lo! upon the murmuring ground, The lonely, swelling, hurrying sound

Of distant wheels is heard ! They come — they pause a moment — when, Their charge resigned, they start, and then Are gone, and all is hushed again,

As not a leaf had stirred.

Hast thou a parent far away?
A beauteous child, to be thy stay
In life's decline? or sisters, they

Who shared thine infant glee?
A brother on a foreign shore ?
Is he whose breast thy token bore,
Or are thy treasures, wandering o'er

A wide, tumultuous sea ?

If aught like these, then thou must feel
The rattling of that reckless wheel,
That brings the bright, or boding seal,

On every trembling thread
That strings thy heart, till morn appears,
To crown thy hopes, or end thy fears,
To light thy smile, or draw thy tears,

As line on line is read.

Perhaps thy treasure 's in the deep,
Thy lover in a dreamless sleep,
Thy brother where thou canst not weep

Upon his distant grave !

Thy parent's hoary head no more
May shed a silver lustre o'er
His children grouped, nor death restore

Thy son from out the wave!

Thy prattler's tongue perhaps is stilled;
Thy sister's lip is pale and chilled;
Thị blooming bride, perchance, has filled

Her corner of the tomb:
May be, the_home where all thy sweet
And tender recollections meet,
Has shown its flaming winding-sheet

In midnight's awful gloom !

And while, alternate o'er my soul
Those cold or burning wheels will roll
Their chill or heat, beyond control,

Till morn shall bring relief,
Father in heaven, whate'er may be
The cup which thou hast sent for me,
I know 'tis good, prepared by thee,

Though filled with joy or grief!

LESSON CXLVI.

The Progress of Knowledge. S. G. GOODRICH.

CONTEMPLATE for a moment the progress of science with. in the last forty years. Geology has almost entirely grown up within the present century. All former ages had dozed in ignorance and indifference over its mighty revelations. The bones of the mastodon and the ichthyosaurus had been occasionally discovered, and some dreaming philosophers