And lo! from the assembled crowd With all her youth and all her charms." How beautiful she is! how fair Through wind and wave, right onward steer! Are not the signs of doubt or fear. Sail forth into the sea of life, Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State ! In what a forge and what a heat Fear not each sudden sound and shock; Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee : Are all with thee, are all with thee. LVIII. OVER THE RIVER. MISS PRIEST. NANCY A. W. PRIEST, author of the following beautiful and touching poem, was born in Hinsdale, New Hampshire, in 1847; and died September 21, 1870. She received no other education than that of a common country district school, and was for several years an operative in a factory in Winchendon, Massachusetts. It was during the hour's interval from the toil of the mill that she composed this now famous poem, which was written on a piece of brown paper as she sat at a window overlooking the river. It was laid aside and forgotten; but a year later it was accidentally found, and published in the "Springfield Republican," in August, 1867, when the author was only twenty years of age. It appeared over the nom de plume of "Lizzie Lincoln." Miss Priest afterwards became Mrs. A. C. Wakefield. Ο VER the river they beckon to me, Loved ones who 've crossed to the farther side; But their voices are drowned in the rushing tide. And eyes the reflection of heaven's own blue; And the pale mist hid him from mortal view. We saw not the angels who met him there; My brother stands waiting to welcome me! Over the river the boatman pale Carried another, the household pet ; And all our sunshine grew strangely dark. My childhood's idol is waiting for me. For none return from those quiet shores, We hear the dip of the golden oars, And catch a gleam of the snowy sail, And lo! they have passed from our yearning heart; They cross the stream, and are gone for aye; We e may not sunder the veil apart That hides from our vision the gates of day; We only know that their bark no more And I sit and think, when the sunset's gold I shall one day stand by the water cold, And list for the sound of the boatman's oar I shall watch for a gleam of the flapping sail; I shall know the loved who have gone before, LIX.- HYMN IN THE VALLEY OF CHAMOUNI. H COLERIDGE. AST thou a charm to stay the morning-star In his steep course? So long he seems to pause On thy bald, awful head, O sovereign Blanc ! O dread and silent Mount! I gazed upon thee Didst vanish from my thought: entranced in prayer Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody, So sweet we know not we are listening to it, Thou, the mean while, wast blending with my thought, Yea, with my life, and life's own secret joy; As in her natural form, swelled vast to heaven. Awake, my soul! not only passive praise Thou first and chief, sole sovereign of the vale ! Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink, Thyself earth's rosy star, and of the dawn Co-herald, wake, O wake, and utter praise! And you, ye five wild torrents fiercely glad! Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy, And who commanded, and the silence came, "Here let the billows stiffen and have rest?" Ye ice-falls! ye that from the mountain's brow |