My little sister she is pale;

She is too tender and too young
To bear the autumn's sullen gale,
And all day long the child has sung.
She was our mother's favourite child,
Who loved her for her eyes of blue;
And she is delicate and mild-

She cannot do what I can do.
She never met her father's eyes,
Although they were so like her own;
In some far distant sea he lies,

A father to his child unknown.

The first time that she lisp'd his name,
A little playful thing was she;

How proud we were, yet that night came
The tale how he had sunk at sea.
My mother never raised her head-

How strange, how white, how cold she grew! It was a broken heart, they saidI wish our hearts were broken too.

We have no home-we have no friends;
They said our home no more was ours-
Our cottage where the ash-tree bends,

The garden we had fill'd with flowers;
The sounding shells our father brought,
That we might hear the sea at home;
Our bees, that in the summer wrought
The winter's golden honeycomb.

We wander'd forth 'mid wind and rain,
No shelter from the open sky;

I only wish to see again

My mother's grave, and rest, and die. Alas, it is a weary thing

To sing our ballads o'er and o'erThe songs we used at home to singAlas, we have a home no more!

MISS LANDON.

TO A DESERTED COUNTRY-SEAT.

Hail to thy silent woods,

Thy solemn climate, and thy deep repose,
Where the west wind as he goes
Moans to the falling floods,

That through the forest glide,

And journey with a melancholy tide!

Hail to thy happy ground,

Where all is steep'd in stillest solitude;
And no unhallow'd sound

Wakes nature from her holy mood;
Here let me waste away

The little leisure of life's busy day!

Thy lone and ancient towers

Shall be my only haunt from youth to age;
The wild grown garden bowers

Shall shelter me in life's long pilgrimage;
And I will think me blest,

For ever in thy peaceful bounds to rest.

On thee the sunbeam falls

In silence all the solitary year;

And mouldering are thy walls,

That echoed once with hospitable cheer;

And all is past away

That stood around thee in thy prosperous day.

But I may seek thy shades,

And wander in thy long forgotten bowers,

And haunt thy sunny glades,

Where the mild summer leads the rosy hours,

And mingled flowers perfume

The noontide air,-a wilderness of bloom.

For nature here again

With silent steps repairs her woodland throne, Usurps the fair domain,

And claims the lovely desert for her own,

And o'er yon threshold throws

With lavish hand the woodbine and the rose.

Deep silence reigns around,

Save when the blackbird strains his tuneful throat, Then the old woods resound,

And the sweet thrush begins his merry note;

And from some scathed bough

The murmuring ring-dove pours her plaintive vow.

Here at the break of morn,

No hunter wakes the halloo of the chase,

Nor hounds and echoing horn

Fright from their quiet haunts the sylvan race.
Rest, happy foresters, for ye shall be

In these green walks for ever safe and free!

Wave, laurel, wave thy boughs,

And soothe with friendly shade my wearied head;

Come, sleep, and o'er my brows

With gentle hand thy dewy poppies shed.

Here shall be well forgot

The many sorrows of this earthly lot.

Haunts of my early years,

Amid your sighing woods O give me rest;

Unnoticed be the tears,

Unknown the grief that fills this aching breast,

While, shelter'd in your bowers,

With patient heart I wait the suffering hours.

How soon the morn of life,

The beam, the beauty of our days, is o'er,

Amid a world of strife

The heart's young joys, shall bud, shall bloom no more!

Yet tranquil be the day

That lights the wanderer on his homeward way.

Lo! where the lord of light

In setting splendour pours his crimson beams,
And at the approach of night

Bathes his bright orbs amid the ocean streams,
And sinks into the west,-

So still, so peaceful be my hour of rest.

W. S. ROSCOE.

STANZAS FOR MUSIC.

WE parted in silence, we parted by night,
On the banks of that lonely river,
Where the fragrant limes their boughs unite,-
We met, and we parted for ever.
The night-bird sang, and the stars above
Told many a touching story,

Of friends long past to the kingdom of love,
Where the soul wears its mantle of glory.

We parted in silence, our cheeks were wet
With the tears that were past controlling ;
We vow'd we would never--no never forget,
And those vows at the time were consoling:
But the lips that echoed the vow of mine,
Are cold as that lonely river;

And that eye, the beautiful spirit's shrine,
Has shrouded its fires for ever.

And now on the midnight sky I look,
And my heart grows full to weeping;

Each star is to me as a sealed book,
Some tale of that loved one keeping.
We parted in silence, we parted in tears,
On the banks of that lonely river;

But the odour and bloom of those bygone years
Shall hang round its water for ever.

ANON.

THE VILLAGE BELLS.

"TWAS evening when I left the vale,
That nursed my boyish years-
My father's manly cheek was pale,
My mother's wet with tears;
Then borne upon the breeze of night,
I heard the distant bells

Come o'er those waters, coldly bright,
With all their breathing spells;-
Sweet village bells! sweet village bells!
With all their breathing spells.

The stars are in the blue sky set,
And light is on the sea,

And some that parted-now are met

But who shall welcome me?

They light not home's unwreathed bowers,

Of whom my spirit tells,

Nor come, as when in happier hours

I heard those village bells;

Sweet village bells! sweet village bells!

With all their breathing spells.

ANON.

BEFORE THE DRAWING-ROOM.

I MUST be presented to-day, Lady Susan,
I must be presented to-day,

I must be presented, or what will my cousin
The bride, Lady Mackintosh, say!

She married a man who was knighted last season

For carrying up an address;

If she's a great lady, you'll own there's no reason,

My lady, why I should be less!

I must be presented to-day, Lady Susan,

I must be presented to-day.