The world, when round my bed
Wife, children, weeping friends, are gathered,
And the calm voice of prayer

And holy hymning shall my soul prepare,
To go and be at rest

With kindred spirits,-spirits who have blessed
The human brotherhood

By labors, cares, and counsels for their good.

In my dying hour,

When riches, fame, and honor, have no power
To bear the spirit up,

Or from my lips to turn aside the cup
That all must drink at last,

O, let me draw refreshment from ◆he past!
Then let my soul run back,

With peace and joy, along my earthly track,
And see that all the seeds

That I have scattered there, in virtuous deeds,
Have sprung up, and have given,
Already, fruits of which to taste in heaven.
And though no grassy mound

Or granite pile says 'tis heroic ground
Where my remains repose,

Still will I hope,-vain hope, perhaps,-that those
Whom I have striven to bless,-

The wanderer reclaimed, the fatherless,

May stand around my grave,

With the poor prisoner and the lowest slave,
And breath an humble prayer,

That they may die like him whose bones are moulder

ing there.

John Pierpont.

ON BEING FOUND GUILTY OF TREASON.

A jury of my countrymen have found me guilty of the crime for which I stood indicted. For this I entertain not the slightest feeling of resentment towards them. Influenced, as they must have been, by the charge of the lord chief justice, they could have found no other verdict. What of that charge? Any strong observations on it I feel sincerely would ill befit the solemnity of this scene;

but I would earnestly beseech of you, my Lord,-you who preside on that bench,-when the passions and prejudices of this hour have passed away, to appeal to your own conscience, and to ask of it, was your charge as it ought to have been, impartial and indifferent between the subject and the crown?

My Lords, you may deem this language unbecoming in me, and perhaps it will seal my fate. But I am here to speak the truth, whatever it may cost; I am here to regret nothing I have ever done,-to retract nothing I have ever said. I am here to crave, with no lying lip, the life I consecrate to the liberty of my country. Far from it, even here-here, where the thief, the libertine, the murderer, have left their footprints in the dust; here on this spot, where the shadows of death surround me, and from which I see my early grave in an unanointed soil opened to receive me,-even here, encircled by these terrors, the hope which has beckoned me to the perilous sea upon which I have been wrecked, still consoles, animates, enraptures me.

No; I do not despair of my poor old country,-her peace, her liberty, her glory. For that country, I can do no more than bid her hope. To lift this island up; to make her a benefactor to humanity, instead of being the meanest beggar in the world; to restore her to her native powers and her ancient constitution,-this has been my ambition, and this ambition has been my crime. Judged by the law of England, I know this crime entails the penalty of death; but the history of Ireland explains this crime, and justifies it. Judged by that history, I am no criminal, I deserve no punishment. Judged by that history, the treason of which I stand convicted loses all its guilt, is sanctioned as a duty, will be ennobled as a sacrifice. With these sentiments, my Lord, I await the sentence of the court.

Having done what I felt to be my duty, having spoken what I felt to be the truth,-as I have done on every other occasion of my short career,-I now bid farewell-to the country of my birth, my passion, and my death; the country whose misfortunes have invoked my sympathies; whose factions I have sought to still; whose intellect I have prompted to a lofty aim; whose freedom has been

my fatal dream. I offer to that country, as a proof of the love I bear her, and the sincerity with which I thought and spoke and struggled for her freedom, the life of a young heart, and with that life all the hopes, the honors, the endearments, of a happy and an honored nome. Pronounce, then, my Lords, the sentence which the laws direct, and I will be prepared to hear it. I trust I shall be prepared to meet its execution. I hope to be able, with a pure heart and perfect composure, to appear before a higher tribunal, a tribunal where a judge of infinite goodness as well as of justice will preside, and where, my Lords, many, many of the judgments of this world will T. F. Meagher.

be reversed.

JACK HORNER.

"Little Jack IIorner sat in a corner,

Eating a Christmas pie,

He put in his thumb and pulled out a plumi,
And said, What a great boy an IÎÌ?”

Ah the world has many a Horner,
Who, seated in his corner,

Finds a Christmas pie provided for his thumb;
And cries out with exultation,

When successful exploration

Doth discover the predestinated plum.

Little Jack outgrows his sire,

And becometh John, Esquire,

And he finds a monstrous pastry ready-made,
Stuffed with notes, and bonds, and bales,
With invoices and sales,

And all the mixed ingredients of trade.

And again it is his luck,

To be just in time to pluck,

By a "clever operation," from the pie
An unexpected plum;

So he glorifies his thumb,

And says, proudly,

66

What a mighty man am I!"

Or, perchance, to science turning,
And, with weary labor, learning

All the formulas and phrases that oppiess her,

For the fruit of others baking,

So a fresh diploma taking,

Comes he forth a full accredited professor.

Or, he's not too nice to mix
In the dish of politics;

And the dignity of office he puts on;

And feels as big again

As a dozen nobier men,

While he writes himself the "Honorable John."

Not to hint at female Horners,
Who, in their exclusive corners,

Think the world is only made of upper crust,
And in the funny pie

That we call society,

Their dainty fingers delicately thrust.

Till it sometimes comes to pass,
In the spiced and sugared mass,

One may compass (don't they call it so?) a catch;
And the gratulation given,

Seems as if the very heaven

Had outdone itself in making such a match.

O, the world keeps Christmas day

In a queer perpetual way;

Shouting always, "What a great big boy am I !"
Yet how many of the crowd,

Thus vociferating loud,

And all its accidental honors lifting high,

Have really, more than Jack,

With all their lucky knack,

Had a finger in the making of the pie.

Mother Goose for Grown People.

THE FATE OF VIRGINIA.

In order to render the commencement less abrupt, six lines of introduc tion have been added to this extract from the fine ballad by Macaulay.

"Why is the Forum crowded?

Rome?"

What means this stir in

"Claimed as a slave, a free-born maid is dragged here from

her home.

On fair Virginia, Claudius has cast his eye of blight;
The tyrant's creature, Marcus, asserts an owner's right,
O, shame on Roman manhood! Was ever plot more clear?
But look! the maiden's father comes! Behold Virginius here!"

Straightway Virginius led the maid a little space aside, To where the reeking shambles stood, piled up with horn and hide.

Hard by, a butcher on a block had laid his whittle down,Virginius caught the whittle up, and hid it in his gown.

And then his eyes grew very dim, and his throat began to swell,

And in a hoarse, changed voice he spake, "Farewell, sweet child, farewell!

The house that was the happiest within the Roman walls,The house that envied not the wealth of Capua's marble halls, Now, for the brightness of thy smile, must have eternal gloom, And for the music of thy voice, the silence of the tomb.

"The time is come. The tyrant points his eager hand this way; See how his eyes gloat on thy grief, like a kite's upon the prey; With all his wit he little deems that, spurned, betrayed, bereft, Thy father hath, in his despair, one fearful refuge left; He little deems that, in this hand, I clutch what still can save Thy gentle youth from taunts and blows, the portion of the slave;

Yea, and from nameless evil, that passeth taunt and blow,Foul outrage, which thou knowest not,-which thou shalt never know.

Then clasp me round the neck once more, and give me one more kiss;

And now, mine own dear little girl, there is no way but this " With that, he lifted high the steel, and smote her in the side, And in her blood she sank to earth, and with one sob she died.

Then, for a little moment, all people held their breath;
And through the crowded Forum was stillness as of death;
And in another moment brake forth from one and all

A cry as if the Volscians were coming o'er the wall;

Till, with white lips and bloodshot eyes, Virginius tottered nigh,

And stood before the judgment seat, and held the knife on high:

"O, dwellers in the nether gloom, avengers of the slain,
By this dear blood I cry to you, do right between us twain;
And e'en as Appius Claudius hath dealt by me and mine,
Deal you by Appius Claudius and all the Claudian line!"
So spake the slayer of his child; then, where the body lay,
Pausing, he cast one haggard glance, and turned and went his

way.