Do you remember all the sunny places, [gether? Where in bright days, long past, we play'd toDo you remember all the old home faces
That gather'd round the hearth in wintry weather? Do you remember all the happy meetings,
In Summer evenings round the open doorKind looks, kind hearts, kind words and tender greetings,
And clasping hands whose pulses beat no more?
Do you remember them?
Do you remember all the merry laughter;
The voices round the swing in our old garden:
The dog that, when we ran, still follow'd after;
The teazing frolic sure of speedy pardon:
We were but children then, young happy creatures,
And hardly knew how much we had to lose-
But now the dreamlike memory of those features
Comes back, and bids my darken'd spirit muse.
Do you remember them?
Do you remember when we first departed
From all the old companions who were round us,
How very soon again we grew light-hearted,
And talk'd with smiles of all the links which bound us?
And after, when our footsteps were returning,
With unfelt weariness, o'er hill and plain;
How our young hearts kept boiling up, and burning,
To think how soon we'd be at home again,
Do you remember this?
Do you remember how the dreams of glory
Kept fading from us like a fairy treasure;
How we thought less of being famed in story,
And more of those to whom our fame gave plea-
Do you remember in far countries, weeping, When a light breeze, a flower, hath brought to mind Old happy thoughts, which till that hour were sleeping.
And made us yearn for those we left behind?
Do you remember this?
Do you remember when no sound woke gladly. But desolate echoes through our home were ringing,
How for a while we talk'd-then paused full sadly, Because our voices bitter thoughts were bringing! Ah me! those days-those days! my friend, my brother,
Sit down, and let us talk of all our wo, For we have nothing left but one another;Yet where they went, old play mate, we shall go—
BE frank with me, and I accept my lot;
But deal not with me as a grieving child,
Who for the loss of that which he hath not
Is by a show of kindness thus beguiled.
Raise not for me, from its enshrouded tomb,
The ghostly likeness of a hope deceased;
Nor think to cheat the darkness of my doom
By wavering doubts how far thou art released :
This dressing pity in the garb of love,-
This effort of the heart to seem the same,-
These sighs and lingerings, (which nothing prove
But that thou leavest me with a kind of shame,)—
Remind me more, by their most vain deceit,
Of the dear loss of all which thou dost counterfeit.
We stand among the fallen leaves,
Young children at our play,
And laugh to see the yellow things
Go rustling on their way:
Right merrily we hunt them down,
The autumn winds and we,
Nor pause to gaze where snow-drifts lie,
Or sunbeams gild the tree :
With dancing feet we leap along
Where wither'd boughs are strown;
Nor past nor future checks our song-
The present is our own.
We stand among the fallen leaves
In youth's enchanted spring-
When hope (who wearies at the last)
First spreads her eagle wing.
We tread with steps of conscious strength
Beneath the leafless trees,
And the colour kindles in our cheek
As blows the winter breeze;
While, gazing towards the cold gray sky,
Clouded with snow and rain,
We wish the old year all past by,
And the young spring come again.
We stand among the fallen leaves
In manhood's haughty prime-
When first our pausing hearts begin
To love the olden time;"
And, as we gaze, we sigh to think
How many a year hath pass'd
Since neath those cold and faded trees
Our footsteps wander'd last;
And old companions-now perchance
Estranged, forgot, or dead-
Come round us, as those autumn leaves
Are crush'd beneath our tread.
We stand among the fallen leaves
In our own autumn day--
And, tottering on with feeble steps,
Pursue our cheerless way.
We look not back-too long ago
Hath all we loved been lost;
Nor forward-for we may not live
To see our new hope cross'd:
But on we go-the sun's faint beam
A feeble warmth imparts-
Childhood without its joy returns-
The present fills our hearts!
A WORD is ringing through my brain:
It was not meant to give me pain;
It had no tone to bid it stay,
When other things had pass'd away;
It had no meaning more than all
Which in an idle hour fall:
It was when first the sound I heard
A lightly-utter'd, careless word.
That word-oh! it doth haunt me now,
In scenes of joy, in scenes of wo;
By night, by day, in sun or shade,
With the half smile that gently play'
Reproachfully, and gave the sound
Eternal power through life to wound.
There is no voice I ever heard
So deeply fix'd as that one word.
When in the laughing crowd some tone,
Like those whose joyous sound is gone,
Strikes on my ear, I shrink-for then
The careless word comes back again.
When all alone I sit and gaze
Upon the cheerful home-fire blaze,
Lo! freshly as when first 't was heard,
Returns that lightly-utter'd word.
When dreams bring back the days of old,
With all that wishes could not hold;
And from my feverish couch I start
To press a shadow to my heart-
Amid its beating echoes, clear
That little word I seem to hear:
In vain I say, while it is heard,
Why weep?'t was but a foolish word.
It comes-and with it come the tears,
The hopes, the joys of former years;
Forgotten smiles, forgotten looks,
Thick as dead leaves on autumn brooks,
And all as joyless, though they were
The brightest things life's spring could share.
Oh! would to God I ne'er had heard
That lightly-utter'd, careless word!
It was the first, the only one
Of these which lips forever gone
Breathed in their love-which had for me
Rebuke of harshness at my glee:
And if those lips were heard to say,
"Beloved, let it pass away,"
Ah! then, perchance-but I have heard
The last dear tone-the careless word!
Oh! ye who, meeting, sigh to part,
Whose words are treasures to some heart,
Deal gently, ere the dark days come,
When earth hath but for one a home;
Lest, musing o'er the past, like me,
They feel their hearts wrung bitterly,
And, heeding not what else they heard,
Dwell weeping on a careless word.
Low she lies, who blest our eyes
Through many a sunny day;
She may not smile, she will not rise-
The life hath past away!
Yet there is a world of light beyond,
Where we neither die nor sleep-
She is there, of whom our souls were fond-
Then wherefore do we weep?
The heart is cold, whose thoughts were told
In each glance of her glad bright eye;
And she lies pale, who was so bright,
She scarce seem'd made to die.
Yet we know that her soul is happy now,
Where the saints their calm watch keep;
That angels are crowning that fair young brow-
Then wherefore do we weep?
Her laughing voice made all rejoice,
Who caught the happy sound;
There was gladness in her very step,
As it lightly touch'd the ground.
The echoes of voice and step are gone;
There is silence still and deep:
Yet we know she sings by God's bright throne-
Then wherefore do we weep?
The cheek's pale tinge, the lid's dark fringe,
That lies like a shadow there,
Were beautiful in the eyes of all—
And her glossy golden hair!
But though that lid may never wake
From its dark and dreamless sleep,
She is gone were young hearts do not break-
Then wherefore do we weep?
That world of light with joy is bright,
This is a world of wo:
Shall we grieve that her soul hath taken flight,
Because we dwell below?
We will bury her under the mossy sod,
And one long bright tress we'll keep; We have only given her back to GodAh! wherefore do we weep?
LIKE an enfranchised bird, who wildly springs,
With a keen sparkle in his glancing eye
And a strong effort in his quivering wings,
Up to the blue vault of the happy sky,-
So my enamour'd heart, so long thine own,
At length from love's imprisonment set free,
Goes forth into the open world alone,
Glad and exulting in its liberty:
But like that helpless bird, (confined so long,
His weary wings have lost all power to soar,
Who soon forgets to trill his joyous song,
And, feebly fluttering, sinks to earth once more.) So, from its former bonds released in vain, [chain. My heart still feels the weight of that remember'd
DURING the last five or six years the readers of Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine have been from time to time delighted by the appearance in that popular miscellany of various papers under the signature of ARCHEUS. Among them has been a series in prose, entitled "Legendary Lore," from which "The Onyx Ring," a story of thrilling interest, and several other essays and tales, have been reprinted in this country. But superior to the prose articles-beautiful and highly wrought as these are-are the author's poetical writings, distinguished alike for purity of thought, delicacy of fancy, and depth and tenderness of feeling. "They have the pleasing tone of
WORDSWORTH, without the mannerism of phrase and imagery by which the imitators of that poet are distinguished."
A collection of these poems, with one much longer than any that had appeared in Blackwood's Magazine, entitled "The Sexton's Daughter," was published in London, in 1839, and it was then discovered that they were written by JOHN STERLING, in early life a clergyman, and latterly a student in philosophy and man of letters. He subsequently wrote "Hymns of a Hermit" and "Strafford, a Tragedy." Since the first edition of this work was published we have heard of his death, which occurred in September, 1844.
DEAR child! whom sleep can hardly tame,
As live and beautiful as flame,
Thou glancest round my graver hours
As if thy crown of wild-wood flowers
Were not by mortal forehead worn,
But on the summer breeze were borne,
Or on a mountain streamlet's waves,
Came glistening down from dreamy caves.
With bright round cheek, amid whose glow
Delight and wonder come and go,
And eyes whose inward meanings play,
Congenial with the light of day,
And brow so calm, a home for thought,
Before he knows his dwelling wrought;
Though wise indeed thou seemest not,
Thou brightenest well the wise man's lot.
That shout proclaims the undoubting mind,
That laughter leaves no ache behind;
And in thy look and dance of glee,
Unforced, unthought of, simply free,
How weak the schoolman's formal art
Thy soul and body's bliss to part!
I hail the childhood's very lord,
gaze and glance, in voice and word.
In spite of all foreboding fear,
A thing thou art of present cheer;
And thus to be beloved and known
As is a rushy fountain's tone,
As is the forest's leafy shade,
Or blackbird's hidden serenade:
Thou art a flash that lights the whole;
A gush from nature's vernal soul.
And yet, dear child! within thee lives
A power that deeper feeling gives,
That makes thee more than light or air,
Than all things sweet and all things fair;
And sweet and fair as aught may be,
Diviner life belongs to thee,
For mid thine aimless joys began
The perfect heart and will of man.
Thus what thou art foreshows to me
How greater far thou soon shalt be;
And while amid thy garlands blow
The winds that warbling come and go,
Ever within not loud but clear
Prophetic murmur fills the ear,
And says that every human birth
Anew discloses God to earth.
I LOOK D upon a plain of green,
That some one call'd the land of prose,
Where many living things were seen,
In movement or repose.
I look'd upon a stately hill
That well was named the mount of song, Where golden shadows dwelt at will The woods and streams among.
But most this fact my wonder bred, Though known by all the nobly wise,
It was the mountain streams that fed
The fair green plain's amenities.
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