A YEAR'S SPINNING.

He listened at the porch that day

To hear the wheel go on, and on, And then it stopped-ran back awayWhile through the door he brought the sun: But now my spinning is all done.

He sat beside me, with an oath
That love ne'er ended once begun;
I smiled-believing for us both,
What was the truth for only one.
And now my spinning is all done.

My mother cursed me that I heard

A young man's wooing as I spun. Thanks, cruel mother, for that word, For I have since a harder known! And now my spinning is all done.

I thought-O God!-my first-born's cry
Both voices to my ear would drown.
I listened in mine agony-

It was the silence made me groan!
And now my spinning is all done.

Bury me 'twixt my mother's grave,
Who cursed me on her death-bed lone,
And my dead baby's-(God it save!)
Who not to bless me would not moan.
And now my spinning is all done.

A stone upon my heart and head,
But no name written on the stone!
Sweet neighbours! whisper low instead,
"This sinner was a loving one—
And now her spinning is all done."

And let the door ajar remain,

In case he should pass by anon;
And leave the wheel out very plain,
That HE, when passing in the sun,
May see the spinning is all done.

THE MUSIC OF HEAVEN.

"The imaginative Irish of the lower orders believe and assert that music from Heaven is often heard by a peculiarly virtuous person when expiring."

The Death Flag.-By MISS CRUMP.

THE days of his life are well nigh spent.

He lieth in patient meekness;

And God hath his holy angels sent

To comfort him in his weakness:

He doth not the mournful wailings hear
Of the weeping friends who love him,
He listeth with glad and earnest ear

To the music of Heaven above him!

Voices, sweet voices, in choral lay,

Are of loved and lost ones telling,

Who passed from a world of care away
To live in a brighter dwelling;

He knows that they wait his entrance there,
They are eager to greet and love him,
And the pangs of death he well may bear
With the music of Heaven above him!

Oh! if we hope in the hour of death
For the angels' kind assistance,
Let us serve the Lord in humble faith,
Through the term of our brief existence;
Leaving a precious and dear bequest

To the weeping friends who love us,
In the thought that we went to our final rest
With the music of Heaven above us!

4*

i

WATCH.

WATCH!-watch where daylight's glow expires,
Beneath the royal City's spires,

Lest lawless hands should compass wrong,
And crush the weak beneath the strong.
Cheered by the silvery-glistening star,
Watch, where the Desert spreads afar.
At sea-where sweep man's floating towers-
Watch through the midnight's purple hours.
Watch ye beside the Conqueror's tent,

When the red battle-bow's unbent.

Watch!

But oh! watch most the heart within;
From that keep danger, strife, and sin;
Its portals guard from reckless Pride,
From red Ambition's thundering stride,
From venomed Wrath and Falsehood vile,
And all the hideous train of Guile.
Watch!-drive Presumption from its gate;
Envy, with stealthy tread, and Hate;
And oh dread Love's winged step-that oft
Brings storm and Death-though light and soft
Watch!

JOANNA BAILLIE

WHEN We think of the women, who-not possessing a tithe of Joanna Baillie's creative fancy, nor a hundredth part of her power over the passions,-have appealed to their imaginations and to their sensibilities, in excuse for the flagrant and frantic errors in which they have rioted, we turn to the simple and pure life of the Scottish poetess, adorned by the practice of every duty, without the slightest accompaniment of self-assertion-as to a noble and holy vindication of Genius: an answer to those pretenders, who, possessing few of the gifts, claim, nevertheless, all the license. The word "womanly," is repulsive if it be cited as a plea for inconsistency, as an excuse for frivolity, as a make-shift to gloss over disproportions, as a door to admit weaknesses. But the word has a speciality and a significance, if it be used to characterize something more gracious, and less gross, than is often possible to man-of necessity worn coarse in his intercourse with life, or his experience of trial. If we point to Joanna Baillie as a type of womanly genius, it neither means that she was weak nor imitative; but gentle, firm, and pure. As such, her name should be eminently dear to all women. That it has been cordially honoured by men, we had only the other day a new proof in the following sonnet, published among