THE WRECK OF THE "HESPERUS."

IT was the schooner Hesperus,

That sailed the wintry sea;

And the skipper had taken his little daughter,

To bear him company.

Blue were her eyes as the fairy flax,

Her cheeks like the dawn of day,

And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds
That ope in the month of May.

The skipper he stood beside the helm,
With his pipe in his mouth,

And watched how the veering flaw did blow
The smoke now west, now south.

Then up and spake an old sailor, Had sailed the Spanish Main, pray thee put into yonder port,

"I

For I fear a hurricane.

"Last night the moon had a golden ring,
And to-night no moon we see !"

The skipper he blew a whiff from his pipe,
And a scornful laugh laughed he.

Colder and louder blew the wind

A gale from the north-east;
The snow fell hissing in the brine,

And the billows frothed like yeast.

Down came the storm, and smote amain
The vessel in its strength;

She shuddered and paused like a frighted steed,
Then leaped her cable's length.

"Come hither, come hither, my little daughter, And do not tremble so,

For I can weather the roughest gale

That ever wind did blow."

He wrapped her warm in his seaman's coat,
Against the stinging blast;

He cut a rope from a broken spar,

And bound her to the mast.

"O father! I hear the church-bells ring, Oh, say, what may it be?”

""Tis a fog-bell on a rock-bound coast!" And he steered for the open sea.

"O father! I hear the sound of guns, Oh, say, what may it be?"

"Some ship in distress, that cannot live In such an angry sea!"

66

O father! I see a gleaming light,
Oh, say, what may it be?”

But the father answered never a word,

A frozen corpse was he.

Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark,

With his face to the skies,

The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow On his fixed and glassy eyes.

Then the maiden clasped her hands, and prayed That saved she might be;

And she thought of Christ, who stilled the waves On the lake of Galilee.

And fast through the midnight dark and drear,
Through the whistling sleet and snow,
Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept
Towards the reef of Norman's woe.

And ever the fitful gusts between,
A sound came from the land;
It was the sound of the trampling surf
On the rocks and hard sea-sand.

The breakers were right beneath her bows,
She drifted a dreary wreck,

And a whooping billow swept her crew
Like icicles from her deck.

She struck where the white and fleecy waves
Looked soft as carded wool;

But the cruel rocks, they gored her sides
Like the horns of an angry bull.

Her rattling-shrouds, all sheathed in ice,
With the mast, went by the board;
Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank,
Ho! ho! the breakers roared!

At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach,
A fisherman stood aghast,

To see the form of a maiden fair

Lashed close to a drifting mast.

The salt sea was frozen on her breast,

The salt tears in her eyes;

And he saw her hair like the brown sea-weed,
On the billows fall and rise.

Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,

In the midnight and the snow;

Christ save us all from a death like this,
On the reef of Norman's woe!

Longfellow.

THE BABES IN THE WOOD.

SUPPOSED DATE, A.D. 1602.

A GENTLEMAN of good account

In Norfolk dwelt of late,

Who did in honour far surmount
Most men of his estate.

Sore sick he was, and like to die,
No help his life could save;
His wife by him as sick did lie,
And both possessed one grave.
No love between these two was lost,
Each was to other kind;

In love they lived, in love they died,
And left two babes behind.

The one a fine and pretty boy,
Not passing three years old;
The other a girl more young than he,
And framed in beauty's mould.

The father left his little son,
As plainly doth appear,

When he to perfect age should come,
Three hundred pounds a year.

And to his little daughter Jane
Five hundred pounds in gold,
To be paid down on marriage day,
Which might not be controll'd.
But if the children chance to die,
Ere they to age should come,
Their uncle should possess their wealth,
For so the will did run.

"Now brother," said the dying man,
"Look to my children dear;
Be good unto my boy and girl,
No friends else have they here.
"To God and you I recommend
My children dear this day,
But little while be sure we have
Within this world to stay.
"You must be father, mother-both,
And uncle all in one;

God knows what will become of them,
When I am dead and gone."

With that bespake their mother dear:
"O brother kind," quoth she,

"You are the man must bring our babes To wealth or misery.

"And if you keep them carefully,

Then God will you

reward;

But if you otherwise should deal,
God will your deeds regard."

With lips as cold as any stone

They kiss'd their children small: "God bless you both, my children dear;" With that the tears did fall.

These speeches then their brother spake,
To this sick couple there:
"The keeping of your children small,
Sweet sister, do not fear.
"God never prosper me nor mine,
Nor aught else that I have,
If I do wrong your children dear,
When you are laid in grave.”
Their parents being dead and gone,
The children home he takes,
And brings them both into his house,
And much of them he makes.