Susanna Moodie

Offspring of heaven, fair Freedom! impart The light of thy spirit to quicken each heart. Though the chains of oppression our free limbs ne'er bound,

Autumn, thy rushing blast Sweeps in wild eddies by, Whirling the sear leaves past,

Born with the sun, the fair daughters of time, We silently lead to a lovelier clime, Where the day is undimmed by the shadows of night,

Oh for the spirit which inspired of old The seer's prophetic song--the voice that spake Through Israel's warrior king. The strains that burst

Sinking now in floods of light, The sun resigns the world to night; When a lingering glance he turns,

Oh ye! who all life's energies combine The fadeless laurel round your brows to twine, Pause but one moment in your brief career,

Poet— Enchanting spirit!—at thy votive shrine

My eyes have seen another spring In floral beauty rise, And happy birds on gladsome wing

Like a dew-drop from heaven in the ocean of life, From the morn's rosy diadem falling, A stranger as yet to the storms and the strife,

"What hast thou seen in the olden time, Dark ruin, lone and gray?" "Full many a race from thy native clime,

Oh nature! though the blast is yelling, Loud roaring through the bending tree, There's sorrow in man's darksome dwelling,

Oh Love! how fondly, tenderly enshrined In human hearts, how with our being twined! Immortal principle, in mercy given,

"He will come to night," young Mary said, And checked the rising sigh; And gazed on the stars that o'er her head

O'er Time's mighty billows borne, Angels lead the purple morn; Chasing far the shades of night

I have dreamed sweet dreams of a summer night, When the moon was walking in cloudless light, And my soul to the regions of Fancy sprung,

I come, like Oblivion, to sweep away The scattered beams from the car of day: The gems which the evening has lavishly strown

O come to the meadows! I'll show you where Primrose and violet blow, And the hawthorn spreads its blossoms fair,

Rejoice O my people! Jehovah hath spoken! The dark chain of sin and oppression is broken; Thy warfare is over, thy bondage is past,

O mighty God! our fathers told The wondrous works thou didst of yore; Thy glories in the days of old,

THE TWILIGHT HOUR. Slowly I dawn on the sleepless eye, Like a dreaming thought of eternity;

There were two sons of Ashur at work in the field, And one to the other his passion revealed-- As the white barley bowed to the stroke of his scythe,

Sorrow has touched thee, my beautiful boy! And dimmed the bright eyes that were dancing with joy; Thy ruby lips tremble, thy soft cheek is wet,

THE FOLLOWING LITTLE POEM WAS SUGGESTED BY A PASSAGE IN THE MEMOIRS OF THE LATE MRS. SUSAN HUNTINGTON OF BOSTON, NEW ENGLAND. Ah! cold at my feet thou art sleeping, my boy, And I press on thy pale lips, in vain, the fond kiss;

Visions of the years gone by Flash upon my mental eye; Ages time no longer numbers,

An awful vision floats before my sight, Black as the storm and fearful as the night: Thy fall, oh Babylon!--the awful doom

Methought last night I saw thee lowly laid, Thy pallid cheek yet paler, on the bier; And scattered round thee many a lovely braid

There was no sound in earth or air, And soft the moonbeams smiled On stately tower and temple fair,

Like the herald hope of a fairer clime, The brightest link in the chain of time, The youngest and loveliest child of day,

Young Naiad of the sparry grot, Whose azure eyes before me burn, In what sequestered lonely spot

"When will the grave fling her cold arms around me, And earth on her dark bosom pillow my head? Sorrow and trouble and anguish, have found me,

THIS REMARKABLE PHENOMENON WAS WITNESSED BY THE AUTHOR ON THE NIGHT OF THE 29th OF SEPTEMBER, 1829. Vision of beauty! there floats not a cloud O'er the blue vault of heaven thy glory to shroud;

Like a maid on her bridal morn I rise, With the smile on her lip and the tear in her eyes; Whilst the breeze my crimson banner unfurls,

WRITTEN IN COVE CHURCH-YARD; AND OCCASIONED BY OBSERVING MY OWN SHADOW THROWN ACROSS A GRAVE. "Tell me, thou grassy mound, What dost thou cover?

I come like an Eastern monarch dight In my crown of beams, in my robe of light; And nature droops at my ardent gaze,

Thou beautiful Ash! thou art lowly laid, And my eyes shall hail no more From afar thy cool and refreshing shade,

JUDGES VIII. Who are ye, who through the night Onward urge your desperate flight?

There is a pause in nature, ere the storm Rushes resistless in its awful might; There is a softening twilight, ere the morn

The harvest is nodding on valley and plain, To the scythe and the sickle its treasures must yield; Through sunshine and shower we have tended the grain;

I know a cliff, whose steep and craggy brow O'erlooks the troubled ocean, and spurns back The advancing billow from its rugged base;

Spirit of eternal motion! Ruler of the stormy ocean, Lifter of the restless waves,

The spirit of the shower, Of the sunshine and the breeze, Of the dewy twilight hour,

Thou splendid child of southern skies! Thy brilliant plumes and graceful form Are not so precious in mine eyes

Slowly I dawn on the sleepless eye, Like a dreaming thought of eternity; But darkness hangs on my misty vest,

EZEKIEL XXXVII. The Spirit of God with resistless control, Like a sunbeam, illumined the depths of my soul,

When the eye whose kind beam was the beacon of gladness From the glance of a lover turns coldly away, O'er the bright sun of hope float the dark clouds of sadness,

There's joy when the rosy morning floods The purple east with light, When the zephyr sweeps from a thousand buds

When these eyes, long dimmed with weeping, In the silent dust are sleeping; When above my narrow bed

Written After Perusing The Interesting Memoir Composed By Her Husband, The Rev. Greville Ewing. Daughter of Scotland! may a stranger twine One cypress wreath around thy honoured urn?--

LATE OF IPSWICH, AND ONE OF THE SOCIETY OF FRIENDS. From thy sad sire and weeping kindred torn, Thine is the crown of everlasting life;

Beautiful flowers! with your petals bright, Ye float on the waves like spirits of light, Wooing the zephyr that ruffles your leaves

Oh dread uncertainty! Life-wasting agony! How dost thou pain the heart,

Dark spirit! who through every age Hast cast a baleful gloom; Stern lord of strife and civil rage,

Majestic King of storms! around Thy wan and hoary brow A spotless diadem is bound

WINTER. Awake--arise! all my stormy powers, The earth, the fair earth, again is ours!

YOUTH. Pilgrim of life! thy hoary head Is bent with age, thine eye