Like a pale prophetess, whom he has wronged, Leans eager forward with most hungry eyes, Watching him bleed to death, and, as he faints, She brightens and dilates; revenge complete, She walks in lonely triumph through the night.

VIOLET.

Give not such hateful passion to the orb
That cools the heated lands; that ripes the fields
While sleep the husbandmen, then hastes away
Ere the first step of dawn, doing all good

In secret and the night.

A mighty purpose rises large and slow
From out the fluctuations of my soul,

As, ghost-like, from the dim and tumbling sea
Starts the completed moon.

I read and read

Until the sun lifted his cloudy lids

And shot wild light along the leaping deep, Then closed his eyes in death. I shed no tear, I laid it down in silence, and went forth Burdened with its sad thoughts: slowly I went; And, as I wandered through the deepening gloom, I saw the pale and penitential moon

Rise from dark waves that plucked at her, and go Sorrowful up the sky.

THE STARS.

So be it, large he sinks! Repentant day
Free's with his dying hand the pallid stars
He held imprisoned since his young hot dawn.
Now watch with what a silent step of fear
They steal out one by one, and overspread
The cool delicious meadows of the night.

See yon poor star

That shudders o'er the mournful hill of pines! "Twould almost make you weep, it seems so sad. 'Tis like an orphan trembling with the cold, Over his mother's grave amongst the pines.

As when, upon a racking night, the wind
Draws the pale curtains of the vapory clouds,
And shows those wonderful mysterious voids,
Throbbing with stars like pulses.

This wood I've entered oft when all is sheen The princely Morning walks o'er diamond dews, And still have lingered, till the vain young Night Trembles o'er her own beauty in the sea.

NURSERY RHYMES.

Ir may excite surprise in some minds that the following simple Nursery Rhymes should be inserted in a volume of this kind, but we think no one can read these beautiful little pieces without agreeing that Lord Jeffrey is right when, alluding to the volume from which these are selected ("Songs for the Nursery"), he says, "That there are more touches of genuine pathos, more felicities of idiomatic expression, more happy poetical images, and, above all, more sweet and engaging pictures of what is peculiar in the depth, softness, and thoughtfulness of our Scotch domestic affection, in this extraordinary little volume, than I have It with in anything like the same compass since the days of Burns."

THE WONDERFU' WEAV.

WILLIAM MILLER.

OUR wean's the most wonderfu' wean e'er I saw,
It would tak' me a long summer day to tell a'
His pranks, frae the morning till night shuts his ee,
When he sleeps like a peerie, 'tween father and me.
For in his quiet turns, siccan questions he'll speir :-
How the moon can stick up in the sky that's sae clear?
What gars the wind blaw? and whar frae comes the rain?
He's a perfect divert-he's a wonderfu' wean.

Or who was the first bodie's father? and wha
Made the very first snaw-shower that ever did fa'?
And who made the first bird that sang on a tree?
And the water that sooms a' the ships in the sea?—
But after I've told him as weel as I ken

Again he begins wi' his who? and his when?

And he looks aye so watchfu' the while I explain,—
He's as auld as the hills-he's an auld-farrant wean.

And folk who ha'e skill o' the lumps on the head,
Hint there's mae ways than toiling o' winning ane's bread;