THE LIGHT OF HOME.

My boy, thou wilt dream the world is fair,
And thy spirit will sigh to roam;

And thou must go; but never, when there,
Forget the light of home.

Though pleasure may smile with a ray more bright
It dazzles to lead astray:

Like the meteor's flash, 'twill deepen the night
When thou treadest the lonely way.

But the hearth of home has a constant flame,
And pure as vestal fire:

"Twill burn, 'twill burn, for ever the same,
For nature feeds the pyre.

The sea of ambition is tempest-tost,

And thy hopes may vanish like foam;
But when sails are shiver'd, and rudder lost,
Then look to the light of home ;

And then, like a star through the midnight cloud,
Thou shalt see the beacon bright!

For never, till shining on thy shroud,
Can be quench'd its holy light.

The sun of fame, 'twill gild the name;
But the heart ne'er felt its ray;

And fashion's smiles, that rich ones claim,
Are but beams of a wint'ry day.

And how cold and dim those beams must be,
Should life's wretched wanderer come!
But, my boy, when the world is dark to thee,
Then turn to the light of home.

MRS. HALE.

THE AFRICAN CHIEF.'

CHAIN'D in the market-place he stood
A man of giant frame,
Amid the gath'ring multitude

That shrunk to hear his name-
All stern of look and strong of limb,

:

His dark eye on the ground :
And silently they gaz'd on him,
As on a lion bound.

Vainly, but well, that chief had fought,
He was a captive now,

Yet pride, that fortune humbles not,
Was written on his brow.

The scars his dark broad bosom wore,
Show'd warrior true and brave;
A prince among his tribe before,
He could not be a slave.

Then to his conqueror he spake

66

My brother is a king ;

Undo this necklace from my neck,

And take this bracelet ring,

The story of the African Chief, related in this ballad, may be found in the African Repository for April, 1825. The subject of it was a warrior, the brother of Yarradee, king of the Solima nation, a people who inhabit a country adjoining those rivers of Western Africa which enter the sea at or to the north of Sierra Leone. He had been taken in battle, and was brought in chains for sale to the Rio Pongas, where he was exhibited in the market-place, his ankles still adorned with the massy rings of gold which he wore when captured. The refusal of his captor to listen to his offers of ransom drove him mad, and he died a maniac.

And send me where my brother reigns, And I will fill thy hands

With store of ivory from the plains,

And gold-dust from the sands."

"Not for thy ivory nor thy gold
Will I unbind thy chain;
That bloody hand shall never hold
The battle-spear again.

A price thy nation never gave,
Shall yet be paid for thee;

For thou shalt be the Christian's slave,
In lands beyond the sea."

Then wept the warrior chief, and bade
To shred his locks away;

And, one by one, each heavy braid
Before the victor lay.

Thick were the plaited locks, and long,
And deftly hidden there

Shone many a wedge of gold among

The dark and crisped hair.

"Look, feast thy greedy eye with gold Long kept for sorest need;

Take it thou askest sums untold,

And

say that I am freed.

Take it my wife the long, long day
Weeps by the cocoa-tree,

And my young children leave their play
And ask in vain for me."

"I take thy gold — but I have made Thy fetters fast and strong,

And ween that by the cocoa-shade

Thy wife will wait thee long."

Strong was the agony that shook
The captive's frame to hear,
And the proud meaning of his look
Was chang'd to mortal fear.

His heart was broken. craz'd his brain:

At once his eye grew wild;

He struggled fiercely with his chain,
Whisper'd, and wept, and smil'd;
Yet wore not long those fatal bands,
And once, at shut of day,

They drew him forth upon the sands,
The foul hyena's prey.

BRYANT.

TIME.

"WHY sitt'st thou by that ruin'd hall, Thou aged carle so stern and grey? Dost thou its former pride recal,

Or ponder how it pass'd away?"

"Know'st thou not me ?" the deep voice cried, "So long enjoy'd, so oft misus'd:

Alternate, in thy fickle pride,

Desir'd, neglected, and accus'd?

"Before my breath, like blazing flax,
Man and his marvels pass away;
And changing empires wane and wax,
Are founded, flourish, and decay.

"Redeem mine hours

the space is brief – While in my glass the sand-grains shiver;

And measureless thy joy or grief

When Time and thou shall part for ever!"

SCOTT.

THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS IN NEW ENGLAND.'

THE breaking waves dash'd high
On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods, against a stormy sky,
Their giant branches toss'd;

And the heavy night hung dark

The hills and waters o'er,

When a band of exiles moor'd their bark
On the wild New England shore.

Not as the conqueror comes,
They, the true-hearted came;

Not with the roll of the stirring drums,
And the trumpet that sings of fame :

Not as the flying come,

In silence and in fear.

They shook the depths of the desert's gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.

Amidst the storm they sang,

And the stars heard, and the sea,

And the surrounding aisles of the dim wood rang To the anthem of the free.

The ocean-eagle soar'd

From his nest by the white waves' foam, And the rocking pines of the forest roar'd This was their welcome home!

1 New England was colonised by a body of Puritans, who left England, 1620, that they might enjoy the full exercise of their religion.