The Voice of Spring.

COME, I come!-ye have called me long

I come o'er the mountains with light and song!

Ye may trace my steps o'er the wakening earth,

By the winds which tell of the violet's birth,

By the primrose-stars in the shadowy grass,

By the green leaves opening as I pass.

I have breathed on the South, and the chestnut-flowers,

By thousands, have burst from the forest-bowers,
And the ancient graves, and the fallen fanes,
Are veiled with wreaths on Italian plains.

But it is not for me, in my hour of bloom, To speak of the ruin or the tomb!

I have passed o'er the hills of the stormy North,
And the larch has hung all his tassels forth,
The fisher is out on the sunny sea,

And the reindeer bounds through the pasture free,
And the pine has a fringe of softer green,
And the moss looks bright where my step has been.

I have sent through the wood-paths a gentle sigh,
And called out each voice of the deep blue sky,

THE VOICE OF SPRING.

From the night-bird's lay through the starry time,
In the groves of the soft Hesperian clime,
To the swan's wild note by the Iceland lakes,
When the dark fir-bough into verdure breaks.

From the streams and founts I have loosed the chain;
They are sweeping on to the silvery main,
They are flashing down from the mountain-brows,
They are flinging spray on the forest boughs,
They are bursting fresh from their sparry caves,
And the earth resounds with the joy of waves.

Come forth, O ye children of gladness, come!
Where the violets lie may be now your home.
Ye of the rose-cheek and dew-bright eye,
And the bounding foosteps, to meet me fly,
With the lyre, and the wreath, and the joyous lay:
Come forth to the sunshine; I may not stay!

Away from the dwellings of care-worn men,
The waters are sparkling in wood and glen;
Away from the chamber and dusky hearth,
The young leaves are dancing in breezy mirth;
Their light stems thrill to the wild-wood strains,
And youth is abroad in my green domains.

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91

The Burial of Sir John Moore.

OT a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the ramparts we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning;
By the struggling moonbeams' misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin inclosed his breast,

Not in sheet nor in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,
With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,

And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

[Seldom indeed can it be said of a young aspirant for poetic fame, that eight short verses have been sufficient to preserve from oblivion the name alike of the writer and of the hero in whose honour they were penned; and yet this has been the case with the Rev. CHARLES WOLFE and his ode "On the Death of Sir John Moore." Never has hero been embalmed in more noble and touching strains than those that sing the fall of the warrior of Corunna ; never was the cause of valour in misfortune more successfully pleaded than in the noble appeal for the brave leader, who "lay like a warrior taking his rest" in his grave in the citadel of the hostile town. Byron pronounced "The Burial" to be the most perfect ode in the English language. It certainly entitled the author to a high place among the poets. The lines to "Sweet Mary," in another part of this volume, though they have not the martial ring of the famous ode, are exquisite in their mournful tenderness. The Rev. Charles Wolfe was a curate in Ireland. He died of consumption, at the early age of thirty-two years.]

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.

93

We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed,

And smoothed down his lonely pillow,

That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,
And we far away on the billow.

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him;

But nothing he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done

When the clock toll'd the hour for retiring; And we heard the distant and random gun, That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down,

From the field of his fame fresh and gory; We carved not a line, we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory!

OW the bright morning star, day's harbinger, Comes dancing from the east, and leads with

her

The flowery May, who from her green lap throws

The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.