TO MISS

Come wed with me and we will write,
My Blue of Blues, from morn till night,
Chased from our classic souls shall be
All thoughts of vulgar progeny;
And thou shalt walk through smiling rows
Of chubby duodecimos,
While I, to match thy products nearly,
Shall lie-in of a quarto yearly.
'T is true, even books entail some trouble;
But live productions give one double.

Correcting children is such bother, —
While printers devils correct the other.
Just think, my own Malthusian dear,

Sweet Jesus, sweet Jesus,
He's the Lily of the Valley,
He's the Bright and Morning Star
Sweet Jesus, sweet Jesus,
He's the Fairest of ten thousand to my soul.

How I love Him, how I love Him...

I'll serve Him, I'll serve Him...

He's worthy, He's worthy,
He's the Lily of the Valley,
He's the Bright and Morning Star.
He's worthy, He's worthy,
He's the governor of the nations, bless His name.

AFTER THE TAKING OF CADIZ

Will you hear a Spanish lady,
How she wooed an Englishman?
Garments gay and rich as may be
Decked with jewels she had on.
Of a comely countenance and grace was she,
And by birth and parentage of high degree.

As his prisoner there he kept her,
In his hands her life did lie;
Cupid's bands did tie them faster
By the liking of an eye.
In his courteous company was all her joy,

The fight just done, I snatched my notes,
While Jack, my gelding, ate his oats,
And ran my chance without a guard,
And for Pamunkey I rode hard;
What made me want to leave the camps,
And beat the mail with what I penned?
It was not glory and not " stamps "
It was my girl at the other end.

I wound the oaks and pines among
And felt so buoyant and so young,
You would not think I had a list
Of dead and wounded in my fist;
What said those sweet birds in the brush?
Why made that squirrel seem my friend?

Oh ! could I fly from every Eye,
Where I could vent my Grief;
I think unto my troubled Soul
It would be some Relief.

Nothing but a Redeemer's Love
Have I to comfort me;
My God, he can do nothing wrong,
And I resign'd should be.

Enough I love you, after years and years,
To write Love in your grave-dust with my tears.
And after you whom shall I love? At most
Only, ah me, a dead man—or a ghost!

A BALLAD .

Come , play me that simple air again,
I used so to love, in life's young day,
And bring, if thou canst, the dreams that then
Were wakened by that sweet lay,
The tender gloom its strain
Shed o'er the heart and brow,
Grief's shadow without its pain —

At night, when all is still around,
How sweet to hear the distant sound
Of footstep, coming soft and light!
What pleasure in the anxious beat,
With which the bosom flies to meet
That foot that comes so soft at night!

And then, at night, how sweet to say
" 'T is late, my love! " and chide delay,
Tho' still the western clouds are bright;
Oh! happy, too, the silent press,
The eloquence of mute caress,
With those we love exchanged at night!

Pure as the mantle, which, o'er him who stood
By Jordan's stream, descended from the sky,
Is that remembrance which the wise and good
Leave in the hearts that love them, when they die.

So pure, so precious shall the memory be,
Bequeathed, in dying, to our souls by thee —
So shall the love we bore thee, cherisht warm
Within our souls thro' grief and pain and strife,
Be, like Elisha's cruse, a holy charm,
Wherewith to " heal the waters " of this life!

Love had a fever — ne'er could close
His little eyes till day was breaking;
And wild and strange enough, Heaven knows,
The things he raved about while waking.

To let him pine so were a sin; —
One to whom all the world's a debtor —
So Doctor Hymen was called in,
And Love that night slept rather better.

Next day the case gave further hope yet,
Tho' still some ugly fever latent; —
" Dose, as before " — a gentle opiate,
For which old Hymen has a patent.

After a month of daily call,