Let their silver voices fall
On thy heart with happy call:
"Praise the Lord, who loveth all,
Night and day."
OLD WINTER'S ARRIVAL.
OLD Winter came forth in his robe of white,
He sent the sweet flowers far out of sight,
He robbed the trees of their green leaves quite,
And froze the pond and the river;
He spoiled the butterfly's gauzy vest,
He ordered the birds not to build their nest,
He banished the frog to his four months' rest,
And he made all the children shiver.
Yet he did some good with his icy tread,
For he kept the corn-seeds warm in their bed;
He dried up the damp which the rain had spread,
And rendered the air more healthy;
He taught the boys to slide, and he flung
Rich Christmas gifts o'er the old and the young,
And when cries for food from the poor were wrung,
He opened the purse of the wealthy.
We like the Spring, with its fine, fresh air;
We like the Summer with flowers so fair;
We like the fruits we in Autumn share;
And we like, too, old Winter's greeting:
His touch is cold but his heart is warm;
So, though he may bring to us wind and storm,
We look with a smile on his well known form,
And ours is a gladsome meeting.
SLEIGHING SONG.
AWAY! away! the track is white,
The stars are shining clear to-night,
The winter winds are sleeping;
The moon above the steeple tall,
A silver crescent over all
Her silent watch is keeping.
Then jingle, jingle, jingle, jingle,
Bells and hoofs are gay;
Clack! clack! clack! clack!
Clatter, clatter, clatter, clatter,
Jingle, jingle, jingle, jingle,
What a merry lay;
Clack clack! clatter,
As we dash away.
Away! away! our hearts are gay,
And need not breathe by night or day
A sigh for summer pleasure;
The merry bells ring gaily out,
Our lips keep time with song and shout,
And laugh in happy measure.
Away! away! across the plain,
We sweep as sea birds skim the main,
Our pulses gaily leaping ;
The stars are bright, the track is white,
There's joy in every heart to-night,
While winter winds are sleeping.
Then jingle, &c.
LUCY GREY; OR, SOLITUDE.
FT I had heard of Lucy Grey;
And, when I crossed the wild,
I chanced to see, at break of day,
The solitary child.
No mate, no comrade Lucy knew;
She dwelt on a wide moor-
The sweetest thing that ever grew
Beside a human door!
You yet may spy the fawn' at play,
The hare upon the green;
But the sweet face of Lucy Grey
Will never more be seen.
"To-night will be a stormy night;
You to the town must go,
And take a lantern, child, to light
Your mother through the show."
"That, father, will I gladly do;
"Tis scarcely afternoon;
The minster-clock has just struck two,
And yonder is the moon."
At this the father raised his hook,
And snapped a faggot-band;
Ile plied his work ;-and Lucy took
The lantern in her hand.
Not blither is the mountain roe:2
With many a wanton stroke
Her feet disperse the powdery snow
That rises up like smoke.
The storm came on before its time;
She wandered up and down;
And many a hill did Lucy climb,
But never reached the town.
The wretched parents all that night
Went shouting far and wide,
But there was neither sound nor sight
To serve them for a guide.
At daybreak on a hill they stood,
That overlooked the moor,
And thence they saw the bridge of wood,
A furlong from their door.
They wept—and, turning homeward, cried,
"In heaven we all shall meet;"
-When in the snow the mother spied
The print of Lucy's feet.
Then downwards from the steep hill's edge
They tracked the footmarks small,
And through the broken hawthorn hedge,
And by the long stone wall;
And then an open field they crossed—
The marks were still the same;
They tracked them on, nor ever lost,
And to the bridge they came.
2 A deer, the female of the roebuck.
They followed from the snowy bank
Those footmarks, one by one,
Into the middle of the plank;
And further there were none !
-Yet some maintain that to this day
She is a living child-
That you may see sweet Lucy Grey
Upon the lonesome wild.
O'er rough and smooth she trips along,
And never looks behind;
And sings a solitary song
That whistles in the wind.
THE STORMY PETREL.1
THOUSAND miles from land are we
Tossing about on the roaring sea;
From billow to bounding billow cast,
Like fleecy snow on the stormy blast:
The sails are scattered abroad like weeds,
The strong masts shake like quivering
reeds,
The mighty cables, and iron chains,
The hull, which all earthly strength disdains-
They strain and they crack, and hearts like stone
Their natural hard proud strength disown.
1 The Stormy Petrel is a small sea bird-barely six inches in length-black, tipped with white on the edges of the wings.
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