The

Soldier's Gravę.

L. E. L.

THERE's a white stone placed upon yonder tomb,

Beneath is a Soldier lying:

The death-wound came amid sword and plume
When banner and ball were flying.

Yet now he sleeps, the turf on his breast,
By wet wild flowers surrounded;

The church-shadow falls o'er his place of rest,
Where the steps of his childhood bounded .

There were tears that fell from manly eyes,
There was woman's gentler weeping,
And the wailing of age and infant-cries,
O'er the grave where he lies sleeping.

He had left his home in his spirits' pride,
With his father's sword and blessing;
He stood with the valiant side by side,
His country's wrongs redressing.

He came again in the light of his fame,
When the red campaign was over:
One heart that in secret had kept his name,
Was claim'd by the Soldier lover.

But the cloud of strife came over the sky,—
He left his sweet home for battle;

And his young child's lisp for the loud roar-cry,
And the cannon's long death-rattle.

He came again,-but an altered man :
The path of the grave was before him;
And the smile that he wore was cold and wan,
For the shadow of death hung o'er him.

He spoke of victory,-spoke of cheer: —
These are words that are vainly spoken
To the childless mother or orphan's ear,
Or the widow whose heart is broken.

A helmet and sword are engraved on the stone,
Half-hidden by yonder willow;

There he sleeps whose death in battle was won,
But who died on his own home pillow!

Verses by J. Montgomery.

Composed for the Anniversary of Robert Burn's Birthday, celebrated at Sheffield, 1820.

WHAT bird in beauty, flight, or song,

Can with the Bard compare,

Who sang as sweet, and soar'd as strong,

As ever child of air.

His plume, his note, his form, could Burns

For whim or pleasure change;

He was not one, but all by turns,

With transmigration strange.

The Blackbird, oracle of spring,

When flow'd his moral lay;

The Swallow, wheeling on the wing,
Capriciously at play :

The Humming-bird from bloom to bloom,

Inhaling heavenly balm;

The Raven in the tempest gloom;
The Halcyon in the calm :

In "Auld Kirk Allaway" the Owl
At 'witching time of night;
By "Bonnie Doon" the earliest fowl
That caroll'd to the light:

It was the Wren amidst the gloom,
When in his homely vein;
At "Bannockburn " the bird of Jove,

With thunder in his train.

The Burial of Sir John Moore.

Nor a drum was heard, nor a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot,
O'er the grave where our hero was buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning;
By the struggling moon-beam's misty light;
And the lantern dimly burning.

Wolf.

E

No useless coffin enclosed his breast,

Nor in sheets nor in shroud we bound 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 of the dead,
And bitterly thought on the morrow.

We thought as we hollow'd his narrow bed,
And smooth'd 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 our heavy task was done,

When the clock told the hour for retiring; But we heard, by the distant and random gun, That the foe was suddenly 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 in his glory.

The Becond.

L. E. L.

HE sleeps, his head upon his sword,

His soldier's cloak a shroud;

His church-yard is the

field open

Three times it has been plough'd;

The first time that the wheat sprung up
"T was black as if with blood,

The meanest beggar turn'd away
From the unholy food.

Third year, and the grain grew fair,

As it was wont to wave;

None would have thought that golden corn

Was growing on the grave.

His lot was but a peasant's lot,

His name a peasant's name;

Not his the place of death that twines
Into a place of fame.

He fell as other thousands do,

Down trampled where they fall,
While on a single man is heap'd
The glory gain'd by all.

Yet even he whose common grave
Lies in the open fields:

Died not without a thought of all

The joy that glory yields.