Thy soul to heaven hath fled,
From earthly thraldom free;
Yet 't is not as the dead

That thou appear'st to me.
In slumber I behold

Thy form, as when on earth,
Thy locks of waving gold,
Thy sapphire eye of mirth.

I hear, in solitude,

The prattle, kind and free,
Thou uttered'st in joyful mood,
While seated on my knee.

So strong each vision seems,
My spirit that doth fill,

I think not they are dreams,

But that thou livest still.

From the Laurel.

THE SPIRIT OF AN INFANT TO HIS

MOTHER.

A VISION.

M. L. G.

MOTHER, I've lain upon thy lulling breast,
And felt thy gentle breathing on my brow;
My little frame is in the earth at rest,

But my young spirit hovers near thee now.
I cannot leave thee, though on ev'ry beam
A beck'ning angel hails me from above;
(Sleep, mother, sleep! I'm with thee in thy dream ;)
O e'en for them I cannot leave thy love,-
Thou who wouldst murmur to me till I crept
Into thy blameless bosom where I slept.

There is my little cot-no tenant now
Presses its pillow—all is still as death ;

The night-light gleams like moonbeams on her brow, Her lips apart are rosy with her breath;

Moveless is that white arm on which I've lain,
And veiled that bosom where I used to rest;
See, see a tear from the fair lid has strayed:
Mother! sweet mother! thy young boy is blest;
He lies no longer near thy beating heart,
But thou and he will ne'er be far apart.

Informed with new intelligence, I float

On the day's ether, and the night-star's beam; But O my childhood's memory ! I doat

With deathless fondness on that faded dream, And I would be again that thoughtless thing, Caressed and cared for with that lulling love, That made me nestle to thy succouring,

And coo-the language of the babe and dove, Both eloquent-both breathing of a heart That but in murmurs may its bliss impart.

O gentle mother! now that I can view
The realms of space with spiritual eye,
I see what, could it be beheld by you,
Would wake that bosom with too wild a sigh.
But let my murmurs melt into that ear

That lies amid thy silken tresses hid :
O mother! speak to mothers when you hear

Their trembling little ones by tyrants chid ;
Tell them they guess not how young spirits feel
The wanton wounds that petulance will deal.

O bid them leave us less to sordid care,

That heeds not what impression we may take; Bid them the threat, the promise to forbear,

That they will rashly breathe and basely break--Spoiling the fair, fresh fountain of our youth, With distrust dashing its reflecting stream, Loosing the pure integrity of truth

In its first basement, making it a theme For precept, not for practice, till we stray Further with falsehood every future day.

Tell them to give our very morning hours
All unto softest peace and sunny love;
Leave us all folded like the evening flowers,
Drinking the dew and sunshine from above.
But when our smiles with consciousness have shone,
Kindling to eyes with answering smiles imprest,
Then know that mind has quickened, that the throne
Of sympathy is seated in the breast;

Then from that moment is neglect a sin—
Then, education, must thy task begin.

But gradual, graceful, gracious, as the dawn
That comes with tender twilight scarce unfurled,
Sprinkling pale splendour over lake and lawn,
Nor rolls the sun till noonday on the world,
When the warm light the awakened eye can bear,
And all is bathed in the broad beam of day,

That paints not parts, nor pierceth here and there,

But kindles with a UNIVERSAL RAY.—

Thus, thus must mind be waked and warm'd and won, To the meridian of the mental sun.

But there are dews as well as beams, and they
Teach how to nurture our unfolding hearts;
The brain grows parched and arid, till the play
Of feelings' flow its gentle dews imparts;
That verdures all-that draws the hidden soul

Of fragrance from the leaf, the fruit, the flower;
That wakes, and warms, and bids the mind unroll
Its truest treasure, and its purest power,
Bathing the sources of all soul and sense
With holy love and bland benevolence.

Tell mothers, if their fondled first-born thus

Be moulded, nurtured, half their task is done; Example and communion are to us

More than to flowers are the dew and sun.— Here I have twined a wreath for thy dear brow, Each flower reflects its hue upon each other, The red rose kindles the pale lily now

Thus sister sister, and thus brother brother. Impress these precepts on each parent's brain, And thou'lt not dream, nor I have lived in vain.

Monthly Repository.