The chain was firm in every link, But not to bear a stranger's touch; THE MAID OF BALDOCK. E. E. C. This celebrated beauty, on whom the following song, once so popular in England, was made, was named Mary Cornwall, and was married about nine or ten years to Henry Leonard, a carpenter. She has been dead between forty and fifty years, and lies buried in Baldock church-yard. She was of the middle size, and a fair, good-looking woman. She had one daughter, married to a cooper, of Harlow Bush, in Essex. She died of a quinsy, from her inability to swallow. The song was popular in her own days, and she frequently avoided all market places and fairs, where it was constantly sung by ballad-singers. She used to work at sewing, and lived by her industry. Her father gave her £100. or £150. when she married, so that she was indebted to her merit for her celebrity. The following is the song : Who has e'er been at Baldock must needs know the mill, The man at the mill has a daughter so fair, But looking again, I perceived my mistake, Prometheus stole fire, as the poets do say, Since first I beheld this dear lass of the mill, THE BURIAL OF THE WIDOW'S DAUGHTER. "Tears have wept the virtuous dead.” I could not laugh—too much solemnity pervaded the scene : it told the little history of the short time a child spent her days in the world. London, or rather the outskirts, presented a funeral. The Sunday noon-tide sun shone with unusual beauty on the earth, and pleasure-taking people crowded the streets and roadways. Did these people, by their laughing becks, imagine themselves not mortal? or supposed they, by their indecorous remarks, the parade was a vain show? alas! alas! I, for one, could not esteem it such. The tear involuntarily leapt to my eyelid, for I had lost a daughter, and my strongest appeals could not recall her from the grave. A funeral is no strange appearance in, or out of, the metropolis: the mourners go about the streets, and the hearse, with the plumaged horses, is heard rattling home from the burial-place. This was not so it was a walking funeral:-first, six children dressed in white, with their faces half hid in their handkerchiefs, quietly and silently trod the roadside in advance; and four maidens, attired in the same emblems of chastity and love, walked, two on each side of the coffin, which they bore, with tearful and swollen eyelids: the undertaker, in the authority of his office, attended, with his white hatband floating behind him in the air, and the widowed mother and childless widow walked with hurried steps close to the coffin, that showed its wooden form from beneath the pall, as the wind glanced over its black centre and white silk edges. The widow, who was hooded in black, and shedding her feelings in her handker THE BURIAL OF THE WIDOW'S DAUGHTER 203 chief profusely, was succeeded by her female relatives and friends in sable. I sometimes loitered, side by side of them, and sometimes preceded, or walked behind my heart was on my lips, but I could not break its weight. I heard many a gazer, as the procession advanced near and nearer the church, say,-"Ah! poor woman! she followed her husband to the grave but last Sunday; now, her only treasure, her daughter, is brought to the same narrow house to moulder with him: she herself seems scarcely able to deposit the seal of her wedded affections in the impressions of the dust." The small bell tolled within the steeple of the church-the sexton waited in the porch with his spade in his hand-the clerk advanced and met the funeral-the pastor, in white, opened his book, and advancing towards the opened grave, to which children and grown persons hastened, commenced the beautiful service, than which, nothing for composition can surpass. By the quick manner in which it was performed I might have gathered other reflections than those of sympathetic solemnity; but my thoughts were too intimate with the experience of the poor widow. She heard the clay dropped on the coffin with a sudden impulse; she took a parting glance at the remains of her child and her husband, as she stepped tremblingly forward on the upturned mould, with bones sticking out of it, and she sighed most heavily as her arm was led from the spot to form the chief mourner, in her return to her solitary and humble dwelling. I little thought previously, even a moment ere I witnessed this scene, that my heart would be drawn into it so unexpectedly, and that, by a corresponding exercise, I should feel the fibres of my affection called into action. The sweet offices of peace, and the dear duties of bereavement, are never so well and righteously done, as when the heart is engaged in them. It may appear to some a trifling incident in the many opportunities of life to behold the relative affections of others truly employed; but to me they are a part of those finer sensibilities by which we are instructed, and for our good they are exampled. We learn a part of that duty we ourselves might be called upon to perform; and, it is a duty we should wish others to perform for us. The hopes that affectionate wives and mothers will see us covered peaceably are in the secret chambers of our best ideas, and we are the more resigned to our change, when it shall come,' the 204 THE BURIAL OF THE WIDOW'S DAUGHTER. stronger our assurances of faith operate. This widow, who had but scant means for the exercise of the most amiable of human duties, had evidently made sacrifices to perform the principles which her love inspired; and though many a struggle would be made, and many months pass, yet, the selfapproving smile of having executed her errands of dissolution to her best ability, would give her warfare impetus, and, if she should not escape the mercenary grasp of worldlings, she would overcome her trials by a persevering consciousness.— Peace! thou lovely associate of a woman's conscience in the beauty of her affectionate regards, be thou her companion when she is out of society! stay with her-support her in her tears-be the monitor to her future rewards-guard her musings out of the reach of despondency-comfort her with the prospects which will await her in her resignation, and persuade her, that however flattering the blandishments of worldly pleasures might seem, it is better to go to the house of mourning than to the house of feasting.' Islington, Nov. 1829. THE MAIDEN'S SIGH. J. R. PRIOR. IN ANSWER TO THE SOLDIER'S TEAR." THE CELEBRATED BALLAD SUNG BY MR. WOOD. The soldier left the cot Of her he lov'd so well, She watch'd his fast receding steps Across the silent dell; No tear was in her eye, But the maiden's gentle heart was sad, She saw him gain the bridge, And, as she pray'd for him she lov'd, At length the wars were o'er, The wreath of honor deck'd his brow, Affection's gentle tear Now trickled from her eye, And as he clasp'd her to his breast, Her heart forgot to sigh. WILLIAM L***. THE ORIGIN OF THE RED ROSE. WRITTEN ON SEEING A YOUNG LADY PREFER ONE TO SEVERAL RARE PLANTS. BY JAMES KNOX. The rose of Cyprus once was white, But when the envious flowers beheld Full pleas'd was Beauty at the change, IMPROMPTU ON WOMAN. Say, what is woman?—a ray of light, To guide our lone course, through life's dark night, |