THE LITTLE AUK. (Mergulus Melano Leukos.)
The Little Auk, or Sea Dove, is an example of the genus Mergulus. It braves the inclemency of very high latitudes, and is found in immense flocks on the inhospitable coasts of Greenland, Spitsbergen, and Melville Island. Here they watch the motion of the ice, and when it is broken up by storms, “they come down in legions, crowding into every fissure, to banquet on the crustaceous and other marine animals which lie there at their mercy.
“The Little Auk is between nine and ten inches in length; the bill is black and the legs inclining to brown; the plumage is black and white; and in winter the front of the neck, which is black in summer, becomes whitish. It lays but one egg, of a pale, bluish green, on the most inaccessible ledges of the precipices which overhang the ocean.” Such are the accounts of the naturalists and voyagers who have visited the arctic regions. With its name of Sea Dove, its apparently delicate structure, and its daring and heroic habits of life, it affords a most inviting theme to the poet.
PLEASANT WORDS.
———
BY CAROLINE MAY.
———
Pleasant words are as an honey-comb, sweet to the soul, and health to the bones. Prov. xvi. 24.
Many truths the Wise man gives
To his sons and daughters,
As pure and useful, strong and bright,
As streams of living waters;
But one I choose from all the rest,
And call it now the very best.
Pleasant words, he says, are like
A comb of fragrant honey;
The savings-bank of thriving bees,
Whose cells contain their money,
Where they, in little space, lay up
The gains of many a flowery cup.
“Sweet to the soul,” they gently soothe
In days of bitter anguish;
“Health to the bones,” they cheer the sick
And lift the heads that languish;
And with their care-dispelling chime,
They touch the heart at any time.
O! let us then ask God to plant
In us His flowers of beauty,
And teach us to watch over them
With humble, patient duty;
Sweet flowers that grace both age and youth,
Love, meekness, gentleness and truth.
For, as honey is not found
Where no flowers are blowing,
So, unless within our hearts
Love and truth are growing,
No one upon our lips will find
“Pleasant words,” sincere and kind.
But, unlike the fragile flowers,
Who die—as soon as ever
They have given their honey up—
The more that we endeavor
To lavish kindness everywhere,
The more we still shall have to spare.
“Pleasant words!” O let us strive
To use them very often;
Other hearts they will delight,
And our own they’ll soften;
While God himself will hear above,
“Pleasant words” of truth and love.
“Pleasant words!” The river’s wave
That ripples every minute
On the shore we love so well,
Hath not such music in it;
Nor are the songs of breeze or birds,
Half so sweet as “pleasant words!”
DIRGE.
ON THE DEATH OF A YOUNG LADY.
———
BY RICHARD PENN SMITH.
———
Mournfully toll the bell:
Gently bear earth to earth;
Solemnly chant the knell;
Death claims a mortal birth.
Virgins, strew early flowers,
Plucked from the snow in spring;
Emblems of her sad hours—
Smiling while withering.
She was a gentle one:
Pure as a seraph’s tear;
Too soon her task was done;
Born but to disappear!
Low chant her requiem;
Close o’er her breast the sod;
Angels, teach her your hymn,
While winging her way to God.
PASSING AWAY.
———
BY ANNIE GREY.
———
’Tis written on the early flower,
By a single faded leaf;
’Tis written with terrific power
Upon the burning cheek.
’Tis written with an iron pen
Upon that old man’s brow;
And mark its tyrant impress when
It touched thy darling now.
’Tis written on the fleeting smile
And on the falling tear;
’Tis seen upon that old quaint dial,
And in the grave-yard near.
’Tis written in thy mother’s touch,
And in thy father’s care;
These may not—though they love thee much—
They may not linger here.
Here, too, we see on friendship’s bond
Its shadowy impress laid;
The love we deemed so true, so fond,
Its own dark grave hath made.
Yet surely there is one thing here
Which may not pass away—
’Tis early love, so fond, so dear,
It cannot yield its sway?
Oh! mark the eye averted now,
And list to that scornful word,
And see the cherished broken vow—
E’en this hath the mandate heard.
’Tis written, then, on all things here,
On smiles, on tears, on joy, on wo,
On that we prize, on that we fear,—
All teach alike that we must go.
THE UNDIVIDED HEART.
AFTER THE MANNER OF AN EARLY ENGLISH POET.
———
BY MYRRHA.
———
When the rich merchant sendeth out his store,
To multiply in foreign lands and seas,
He scattereth it to every friendly shore,
And spreads his sails to every favoring breeze.
Then, if one bark, more luckless than the rest,
Should chance make shipwreck on some fatal coast,
Seeing he is of many more possest,
He comforts him, although that one be lost.
But one rich argosy holds all my store—
If harm befall that one, what comes of me?
Must I in beggary wander evermore,
Subsistence craving of cold charity?
How should I bear to think upon the day
When Fortune’s gifts were showered upon my head
Would not my misery more heavy weigh.
In view of happiness remembered?
Then let me rather trust my life also,
In that one ship where all my riches be,
That wheresoe’er she goeth I may go,
And toss with her upon the faithless sea.
Then, if the tempest bow the sturdy mast,
And horrid billows sweep the shuddering deck,
When every help and every hope is past,
Calmly I’ll perish with my treasure’s wreck.