Fear ye foes who kill for hire?
Will ye to your homes retire?
Look behind you,-they're afire!
And, before you, see

Who have done it! From the vale
On they come!-and will ye quail?
Leaden rain and iron hail

Let their welcome be!

In the God of battles trust!
Die we may, and die we must:
But oh, where can dust to dust

Be consigned so well,

As where heaven its dews shall shed
On the martyred patriots bed,

And the rocks shall raise their head,
Of his deeds to tell?

THRILLING SKETCH.-SALATHIEL.

A portal of the arena opened, and the combatant, with a mantle thrown over his face and figure, was led into the surroundery. The lion roared and ramped against the bars of his den at the sight. The guard put a sword and buckler

He

He

into the hands of the Christian, and he was left alone. drew the mantle from his face, and bent a slow and firm look around the amphitheatre. His fine countenance and lofty bearing raised a universal shout of admiration. might have stood for an Apollo encountering the Python. His eye at last turned on mine. Could I believe my senses? Constantius was before me.

All my rancor vanished. An hour past, I could have struck the betrayer to the heart,-I could have called on the severest vengeance of man and heaven to smite the destroyer of my child. But to see him hopelessly doomed, the man whom I had honored for his noble qualities, whom I had even loved, whose crime was, at the worst, but the crime of giving way to the strongest temptation that can bewilder the heart of man; to see the noble creature flung to the savage beast, dying in tortures, torn piecemeal before my eyes, and

his misery wrought by me, I would have obtested earth and heaven to save him. But my tongue cleaved to the roof of my mouth. My limbs refused to stir. I would have thrown myself at the feet of Nero; but I sat like a man of stonepale-paralyzed-the beating of my pulse stopped-my eyes alone alive.

The gate of the den was thrown back, and the lion rushed in with a roar and a bound that bore him half across the arena. I saw the sword glitter in the air: when it waved again, it was covered with blood. A howl told that the blow had been driven home. The lion, one of the largest from Numidia, and made furious by thirst and hunger, an animal of prodigious power, crouched for an instant, as if to make sure of his prey, crept a few paces onward, and sprang at the victim's throat. He was met by a second wound, but his impulse was irresistible. A cry of natural horror rang round the amphitheatre. The struggle was now for an instant, life or death. They rolled over each other; the lion, reared upon his hind feet, with gnashing teeth and distended talons, plunged on the man; again they rose together. Anxiety was now at its wildest height. The sword now swung round the champion's head in bloody circles. They fell again, covered with blood and dust. The hand of Constantius had grasped the lion's mane, and the furious bounds of the monster could not loose his hold; but his strength was evidently giving way,-he still struck his terrible blows, but each was weaker than the one before; till, collecting his whole force for a last effort, he darted one mighty blow into the lion's throat, and sank. The savage beast yelled, and, spouting out blood, fled howling around the arena. But the hand still grasped the mane, and the conqueror was dragged whirling through the dust at his heels. A universal outcry now arose to save him, if he were not already dead. But the lion, though bleeding from every vein, was still too terrible, and all shrank from the hazard. At last the grasp gave way, and the body lay motionless on the ground.

What happened for some moments after, I know not. There was a struggle at the portal; a female forced her way through the guards, rushed in alone, and flung herself upon the victim. The sight of a new prey roused the lion; he

tore the ground with his talons; he lashed his streaming sides with his tail; he lifted up his mane and bared his fangs; But his approaching was no longer with a bound; he dreaded the sword, and came snuffing the blood on the sand, and stealing round the body in circuits still diminishing.

The confusion in the vast assemblage was now extreme. Voices innumerable called for aid. Women screamed and fainted, men burst into indignant clamors at this prolonged cruelty. Even the hard hearts of the populace, accustomed as they were to the sacrifice of life, were roused to honest curses. The guards grasped their arms, and waited but for a sign from the emperor. But Nero gave no sign.

I looked upon the woman's face; it was Salome! I sprang upon my feet. I called on her name,-called on her, by every feeling of nature, to fly from that place of death, to come to my arms, to think of the agonies of all that loved her.

She had raised the head of Constantius on her knee, and was wiping the pale visage with her hair. At the sound of my voice, she looked up, and, calmly casting back the locks from her forehead, fixed her eyes upon me. She still knelt; one hand supported the head,-with the other she pointed to it as her only answer. I again adjured her. There was the silence of death among the thousands around me. A fire dashed into her eye,-her cheek burned,—she waved her hand with an air of superb sorrow.

"This The

"I am come to die," she uttered, in a lofty tone. bleeding body was my husband,-I have no father. world contains to me, but this clay in my arms. Yet," and she kissed the ashy lips before her, "yet, my Constantius, it was to save that father that your generous heart defied the peril of this hour. It was to redeem him from the hand of evil that you abandoned your quiet home!—Yes, cruel fath er, here lies the noble being that threw open your dungeon, that led you safe through the conflagration, that, to the last moment of his liberty, only sought how he might preserve and protect you." Tears at length fell in floods from her eyes. "But," said she, in a tone of wild power, "he was betrayed, and may the Power whose thunders avenge the cause of his people, pour down just retribution upon the head that dared"

I heard my own condemnation about to be pronounced by the lips of my own child. Wound up to the last degree of suffering, I tore my hair, leaped upon the bars before me, and plunged into the arena by her side. The height stunned me; I tottered a few paces and fell. The lion gave a roar and sprang upon me. I lay helpless under him, I heard the gnashing of his white fangs above me.

An exulting shout arose. I saw him reel as if struck,gore filled his jaws. Another mighty blow was driven to his heart. He sprang high in the air with a howl. He dropped; he was dead. The amphitheatre thundered with acclama

tions.

With Salome clinging to my bosom, Constantius raised me from the ground. The roar of the lion had roused him from his swoon, and two blows saved me. The falchion had broken in the heart of the monster. The whole multitude

stood up, supplicating for our lives in the name of filial piety and heroism. Nero, devil as he was, dared not resist the strength of popular feeling. He waved a signal to the guards; the portal was opened, and my children, sustaining my feeble steps, showered with garlands and ornaments from innumerable hands, slowly led me from the arena.

I'll trust ye no more;

But with giant hand I'll pluck

From Norway's frozen shore

Her tallest pine, and dip its top

Into the crater of Vesuvius,

And upon the high and burnished heavens

I'll write

Agnes, I love thee!"—

And I would like to see any

Dog-goned wave wash that out.

OUT IN THE SOBBING RAIN-DORA SHAW.

I loved him long, and I loved him well,
Now with hate I burn like a fiend of hell,
And curse the day in his arms I fell,

Not dreaming then of pain;—

Not dreaming then what the year would bring,
For my soul was white as an angel's wing;
Now here I am wandering, a lone, lost thing,
Out in the sobbing rain!

I was no city maid, with eyes

Burned black with passion, looking lies;
No, mine were blue as the bluest skies,
And told, ah! wondrous plain,

The innocent thoughts I would gathering hold
Like spotless lambs to my bosom-fold,

But the shepherd slept, and the thief grew bold,—
Aye, sob, thou sobbing rain!

Aye, the thief grew bold: now my peace is gone!
Like a God-cursed thing, I keep wandering on,
Nor heed the bleak storm, as it breaks upon
My weary, weary brain,-

I but clasp my hands o'er an aching breast,
And shriek out a prayer for the grave and rest,
But the winds laugh aloud down the darkening west
At the sobs of the sobbing rain.

Oh, alas for my home on the distant moor!
Alas! the dear eyes that watch by the door,
Watch for a pale form they will never see more,—
Heart, cease, oh, cease thy pain!

Alas for the flowers that bloom on the heath,
Which the frost, like a lover, kisses to death!
Would I were a flower, to fall 'neath his breath,
In the sobs of the sobbing rain!

To-night I passed by his castle old,-
The one he bought when his heart he sold;
In his arms his young bride I saw him fold,
Near by the window-pane;

Her pale face drooped 'neath his glowing eye,
Like a northern flower 'neath a tropic sky,-
A withering bud, 'neath his blasting sigh,—
Aye, sob, thou sobbing rain!