THE LITTLE HAND.

THOU wak'st, my baby boy, from sleep,

And through its silken fringe

Thine eye, like violet, pure and deep,
Gleams forth with azure tinge.

With what a smile of gladness, meek,
Thy radiant brow is drest,

While fondly to a mother's cheek

Thy lip and hand are prest.

That little hand! what prescient wit
Its history may discern,
When time its tiny bones hath knit
With manhood's sinews stern?

The artist's pencil shall it guide?
Or spread the adventurous sail?

Or guide the plough with rustic pride,
And ply the sounding flail ?

Through music's labyrinthine maze,
With dexterous ardor rove,

And weave those tender, tuneful lays
That beauty wins from love?

Old Coke's or Blackstone's mighty tome,
With patient toil turn o'er?

Or trim the lamp in classic dome,
Till midnight's watch be o'er?

Well skilled, the pulse of sickness press? Or such high honor gain

As, o'er the pulpit, raised, to bless

A pious listening train?

Say, shall it find the cherished grasp

Of friendship's fervor cold?

Or, shuddering, feel the envenomed clasp. Of treachery's serpent-fold?

Yet, oh! may that Almighty Friend,
From whom existence came,

That dear and powerless hand defend
From deeds of guilt and shame.

Grant it to dry the tear of woe,
Bold folly's course restrain,

The alms of sympathy bestow,
The righteous cause maintain-

Write wisdom on the wing of time, Even 'mid the morn of youth, And with benevolence sublime, Dispense the light of truth

Discharge a just, an useful part Through life's uncertain maze, Till coupled with an angel's heart, It strike the lyre of praise.

BABE BURIED AT SEA.

THE deep sea took the dead. It was a babe
Like sculptur'd marble, pure and beautiful
That lonely to its yawning gulfs went down.
-Poor cradled nursling-no fond arm was there
To wrap thee in its folds; no lullaby

Came from the green sea-monster, as he laid
His shapeless head, thy polished brow beside,
One moment wondering at the beauteous spoil
On which he fed. Old Ocean heeded not
This added unit to his myriad dead;
But in the bosom of the tossing ship

Rose up a burst of anguish, wild and loud,

From the vex'd fountain of a mother's love,
-The lost! The lost! Oft shall her startled dream,

Catch the drear echo of the sullen plunge

That whelm'd the uncoffin'd body-oft her eye

Strain wide through midnight's long unslumbering watch Remembering how his soft sweet breathing seem'd

Like measur'd music in a lily's cup,

And how his tiny shout of rapture swelled,

When closer to her bosom's core, she drew

His eager lip.

Who thus, with folded arms, And head declin'd, doth seem to count the waves, And yet to heed them not? The sorrowing sire, Doth mark the last, faint ripple, where his child Sank down into the waters. Busy thought Turns to his far home, and those little ones, Whom sporting 'mid their favorite lawn he left, And troubled fancy shows the weeping there, When he shall seat them once more on his knee, And tell them how the baby that they lov'd, Hid its pale cheek within its mother's breast, And pin'd away and died—yet found no grave Beneath the church-yard turf, where they might plant The lowly mound with flowers.

But tell them too,

Oh father! as a balsam for their grief,

That He who guards the water-lily's germ,
Through the long winter, and remembereth well
To bring its lip of snow and broad green leaf
Up from the darkness of its slimy cell
To meet the summer sun-will not forget
Their little brother, in his ocean bed,

But raise him from the deep, and call him forth
With brighter beauty, and a glorious form,
Never to fade, nor die.—