Peace! Peace! Orestes-like I breathe this prayer! Descend with broad-wing'd flight,

The welcome, the thrice-pray'd for, the most fair, The best-beloved, Night!

-American.

H. W. LONGFELLOW, 1807

BLESSED BE GOD FOR FLOWERS.

BLESS'D be God for flowers!

For the bright, gentle, holy thoughts that breathe
From out their odorous beauty, like a wreath
Of sunshine on life's hours!

Lightly upon thine eye

Hath fallen the noontide sleep, my joyous bird!
And through thy parted lips the breath, scarce heard,
Comes, likes a summer's sigh.

One rosy hand is thrown

Beneath thy rosier cheek, the other holds

A group of sweet field-flowers, whose bloom unfolds

A freshness like thine own.

Around the fragrant prize

With eager grasp, thy little fingers close;

What are the dreams that haunt thy sweet repose,

What radiance greets thine eyes?

For thou art smiling still;

Art thou yet wandering in the quiet woods,
Plucking th' expanded cups and bursting buds,
At thine unfetter'd will?

Or does some prophet voice,

Murmuring amidst thy dreams, instinctive say— "Prize well these flowers, for thou, beyond to-day, Shalt in their spells rejoice!"

Yes! thou wilt learn their power,

When, cherish'd not as now, thou stand'st alone, Compass'd by sweetly-saddening memories, thrown Round thee by leaf or flower!

"Twill come! as seasons come,

The empire of the flowers, when these shall raise Round thee once more the forms of other days, Warm with the light of home!

Shapes thou no more mayst see;

The household hearth, the heart-enlisted prayer; All thou hast loved, and lost, and treasured there, Where thy best thoughts must be!

Ay, prize them well, my child;

The bright, young, blooming things that never die;
Pointing our hope to happier worlds, that lie
Far o'er this earthly wild!

Prize them, that, when forgot

By all, their old familiar tints shall bring

Sweet thoughts of her whose dirge the deep winds sing, And whose love earth holds not!

Prize them, that through all hours

Thou hold'st sweet commune with their beauty there; And, rich in this, through many a future year,

Bless thou our God for flowers!

MRS C. TINSLEY, 1848

THE TIME FOR PRAYER.

WHEN is the time for prayer?

With the first beams that light the morning sky,
Ere for the toils of day thou dost prepare,

Lift up thy thoughts on high:

Commend thy loved ones to His watchful care :—
Morn is the time for prayer!

And in the noontide hour,

If worn by toil or by sad cares opprest,
Then unto God thy spirit's sorrow pour,

And He will give thee rest :—

Thy voice shall reach Him through the fields of air :-

Noon is the time for prayer!

When the bright sun hath set,—

Whilst yet eve's glowing colours deck the skies ;-
When with the loved, at home, again thou'st met,
Then let thy praise arise

:

For those who in thy joys and sorrows share :-
Eve is the time for prayer!

And when the stars come forth,—

When to the trusting heart sweet hopes are given,
And the deep stillness of the hour gives birth
To pure bright dreams of heaven,-

Kneel to thy God-ask strength, life's ills to bear :Night is the time for prayer!

When is the time for prayer?

In every hour, while life is spared to thee-
In crowds or solitude-in joy or care-

Thy thoughts should heavenward flee.

At home-at morn and eve—with loved ones there, Bend thou the knee in prayer!

ANONYMOUS.

A HYMN OF THE SEA.

THE sea is mighty, but a mightier sways

His restless billows. Thou whose hands have scoop'd His boundless gulfs and built his shore, Thy breath, That moved in the beginning o'er his face,

Moves o'er it evermore. The obedient waves
To its strong motion roll and rise and fall.
Still from that realm of rain thy cloud goes up,
As at the first, to water the great earth
And keep her valleys green. A hundred realms
Watch its broad shadow warping on the wind,
And in the drooping shower with gladness hear
Thy promise of the harvest. I look forth
Over the boundless blue, where, joyously,
The bright crest of innumerable waves
Glance to the sun at once, as when the hands
Of a great multitude are upward flung
In acclamation. I behold the ships

Gliding from cape to cape, from isle to isle,
Ör stemming toward far lands, or hastening home
From the old world. It is thy friendly breeze
That bears them with the riches of the land
And treasures of dear lives, till, in the port,
The shouting seaman climbs and furls the sail.

But who shall bide Thy tempest? Who shall face The blast that wakes the fury of the sea?

O God! Thy justice makes the world turn pale,
When on the armèd fleet that royally
Bears down the surges, carrying war to smite
Some city, or invade some thoughtless realm,
Descends the fierce tornado. The vast hulks
Are whirl'd like chaff upon the waves; the sails
Fly, rent like waves of gossamer; the masts
Are snapp'd asunder; downward from the decks,
Downward are slung into the fathomless gulf
Their cruel engines; and their hosts, array'd