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And he thinks of the two in the low trundle bed
Far away in the cot on the mountain.

His musket falls slack-his face dark and grim,
Grows gentle with memories tender,

As he mutters a prayer for the children asleep,
For their mother-may Heaven defend her!

The moon seems to shine just as brightly as then
That night, when the love yet unspoken
Leaped up to his lips-when low murmured vows
Were pledged to be ever unbroken.

Then drawing his sleeves roughly over his eyes
He dashes off tears that are welling,
And gathers his gun closer up to its place,
As if to keep down the heart-swelling.

He passes the fountain, the blasted pine-tree,
The footstep is lagging and weary;

Yet onward he goes through the broad belt of light
Towards the shades of the forest so dreary.
Hark! was it the night wind that rustled the leaves,
Was it moonlight so wondrously flashing?

It looked like a rifle "Ha! Mary, good-bye!"

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And the life-blood is ebbing and plashing.

All quiet along the Potomac to-night,

No sound save the rush of the river;

While soft falls the dew on the face of the dead.

The Picket's off duty forever!

LX.

A PASTORAL.

BY A. J. MUNBY.

I sat with Doris, the Shepherd maiden;

Her crook was laden with wreathed flowers,
I sat and wooed her, through sunlight wheeling,
And shadows wheeling for hours and hours.

✔ Tremor, with feeling.

And she, my Doris, whose lap incloses

Wild summer roses of faint perfume,

That while I sued her, kept hushed and harkened,
Till shades had darkened from gloss to gloom.

She touched my shoulder with fearful finger;
She said, "We linger, we must not stay;
My flock's in danger, my sheep will wander;
Behold them yonder, how far they stray."

I answered bolder, "Nay, let me hear you,
And still be near you, and still adore!
Nor wolf, nor stranger will touch one yearling-
Ah! stay, my darling, a moment more!"

She whispered, sighing, "There will be sorrow
Beyond to-morrow, if I lose to-day;

My fold unguarded, my flock unfolded.
I shall be scolded and sent away!"

Said I, replying, "If they do miss you,

They ought to kiss you when you get home; And well rewarded by friend and neighbor Should be the labor from which you come."

"They might remember," she answered meekly, "That lambs are weakly and sheep are wild; But if they love me, it's none so ferventI am a servant, and not a child."

Then each hot ember glowed quick within me,
And love did win me to swift reply;

“Ah! do but prove me, and none shall bind you, Nor fray nor find you, until I die."

She blushed and started, and stood awaiting,

As if debating in dreams divine:

But I did brave them-I told her plainly
She doated vainly, she must be mine.

So we, twin-hearted, from all the valley
Did rouse and rally her nibbling ewes;
And homeward drove them, we two together,
Through blooming heather and healing dews.

That simple duty from grace did lend her,
My Doris tender, my Doris true;

That I, her warder, did always bless her,
And often press her to take her due.

And now in beauty she fills my dwelling
With the love excelling, and undefiled;
And love doth guard her, both fast and fervent,
No more a servant, nor yet a child.

LXI.

PRESIDENT LINCOLN.

GEORGE BANCROFT-APRIL 27TH.

How shall the nation most completely show its sorrow at Mr. Lincoln's death? How shall it best honor his memory? There can be but one answer. He was struck down when he was highest in its service, and, in strict conformity with duty, was engaged in carrying out principles affecting its life, its good name and its relations to the cause of freedom and the progress of mankind. Grief must take the character of action, and breathe itself forth in the assertion of the policy to which he fell a sacrifice. The standard which he held in his hand must be uplifted again, higher and more firmly than before, and must be carried on to triumph. Above everything else, his Proclamation of the first day of January, 1863, declaring throughout the parts of the country in rebellion the freedom of all persons who had been held as slaves, must be affirmed and maintained

Events, as they rolled onward, have removed every doubt of the legality and binding force of that Proclamation. The country and the Rebel Government have each laid claim to the public service of the slave, and yet but one of the two can have a rightful claim to such service. That rightful claim belongs to the United States, because every one so born on their soil, with the few exceptions of the children of travelers and transient residents, owes them a primary allegiance. Every one so born has been counted among those represented in Congress-imperfectly and wrongly it may be-but still it has

been counted and represented. The slave born on our soil always owed allegiance to the General Government. It may in time past have been a qualified allegiance, manifested through his master, as the allegiance of a ward through its guardian, or of an infant through its parent. But when the master became false to his allegiance, the slave stood face to face with his country, and his allegiance, which may before have been a qualified one, became direct and immediate. His chains fell off, and he stood in the presence of the nation, bound, like the rest of us, to its public defense. Mr. Lincoln's proclamation did but take notice of the already existing right of the bondman to freedom. The treason of the master made it a

public crime for the slave to continue his obedience; the treason of a State set free the collective bondmen of the State. * * * *

We owe it to the memory of the dead, we owe it to the cause of popular liberty throughout the world, that the sudden crime which has taken the life of the President of the United States shall not produce the least impediment in the smooth course of public affairs. This great city, in the midst of unexampled emblems of deeply-seated grief, has sustained itself with composure and magnanimity. It has nobly done its part in guarding against the derangement of business or the slightest shock to public credit. The enemies of the Republic put it to the severest trial, but the voice of faction has not been heard-doubt and despondency have been unknown. In serene majesty the country rises in the beauty and strength and hope of youth, and proves to the world the quiet energy and the durability of institutions growing out of the reason and affection of the people.

Heaven has willed it that the United States shall live. The nations of the earth cannot spare them. All the worn-out aristocracies of Europe saw in the spurious feudalism of slaveholding their strongest outpost, and banded themselves together with the deadly enemies of our national life. If the Old World will discuss the respective advantages of oligarchy or equality; cf the union of Church and State, or the rightful freedom of religion; of land accessible to the many or of land monopolized by an ever-decreasing number of

the few, the United States must live to control the decision by their quiet and unobtrusive example. It has often and truly been observed that the trust and affection of the masses gather naturally round an individual; if the inquiry is made whether the man so trusted and beloved shall elicit from the reason of the people enduring institutions of their own, or shall sequester political power for a superintending dynasty, the United States must live to solve the problem. If a question is raised on the respective merits of Timoleon or Julius Cæsar, of Washington or Napoleon, the United States must be there to call to mind that there were twelve Cæsars, most of them the opprobrium of the human race, and to contrast with them the line of American Presidents.

The duty of the hour is incomplete, our mourning is insincere if, while we express unwavering trust in the great principles that underlie our Government, we do not also give our support to the man to whom the people have intrusted its administration.

LXII.

THE FUGITIVE SLAVE.

CHARLES SUMNER -1852.

Every escape from slavery necessarily and instinctively awakens the regard of all who love freedom. The endeavor, though unsuccessful, reveals courage, manhood, character. No story is read with more interest than that of our own Lafayette, when, aided by a gallant South Carolinian, in defiance of the despotic ordinance of Austria, kindred to our Slave Act, he strove to escape from the bondage of Olmutz. Literature pauses with exultation over the struggles of Cervantes, the great Spaniard, while a slave in Algiers, to regain the liberty for which he says, in his immortal work, "we ought to risk life itself, slavery being the greatest evil that can fall to the lot of man." Science in all her manifold triumphs, throbs with pride and delight that Arago, the astronomer and philosopher

devoted republican also was redeemed from barbarous slavery to

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