Flooding the skies, bathing the earth, All was sweet to the ear: But there's beauty more fair to me That beauty was not here. I sat in my room alone. Its soothing strains were such And the faith that conquers time Then the purposes of life In the sternest hour of trial In a meek obedience The wants of every human heart, That bath felt the better world's control. Here is beauty such as ne'er MY THOUGHTS. MANY are the thoughts that come to me In my lonely musing; And they drift so strange and swift, There's no time for choosing Which to follow, for to leave Any, seems a losing. When they come, they come in flocks, As, on glancing feather, Startled birds rise one by one, In autumnal weather, Waking one another up From the sheltering heather. Some so merry that I laugh, Some are grave and serious, There are thoughts that o'er me steal, And an inward morning. Some have dark and drooping wings, Some are as gay, as if to-day Could see no cloudy morrow, And yet like light and shade they each Must from the other borrow. One by one they come to me On their destined mission; One by one I see them fade With no hopeless vision; For they 've led me on a step To their home Elysian. THE HOURS. THE hours are viewless angels, TO HIM who sits on high; Like summer-bees, that hover The heart's deep flower cups yield,” And some flit by on pinions Of joyous gold and blue, And some flag on with drooping wings And as we spend each minute That GOD to us bath given, The deeds are known before His throne, The tale is told in heaven. These bee-like hours we see not, Nor hear their noiseless wings; We only feel, too oft, when flown, That they have left their stings. So, teach me, Heavenly Father, So, when death brings its shadows, THOUGHT is deeper than all speech; We are spirits clad in veils : Man by man was never seen: To remove the shadowy screen. Of a temple once complete. All is thus but starlight here. But a babbling summer stream? But the glancing of a dream? Only when the sun of love Melts the scatter'd stars of thought, Only when we live above What the dim-eyed world hath taught, Only when our souls are fed By the fount which gave them birth, Which they never drew from earth; MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI. OH, still sweet summer days! Oh, moonlight nights, And how,oh Night,bring'st thou the sphere of sleep. To soar for truth, to labour for mankind? Oh, many a heart was stricken dumb with grief, Of proud St. Peter's dome-the Sistine walls— HENRY THEODORE TUCKERMAN. [Born, 1813.] THE TUCKERMAN family is of German origin, and the name is still common in the states of Germany, where, however, it is spelled with a double n. In a history of the country of Braunselweig and Luneberg, by WILLIAM HANEMANN, published in Luneberg in 1827, allusion is made to one of the kindred of the TUCKERMANS in America, PETER TUCKERMAN, who is mentioned as the last abbot of the monastery of Riddagshausen. He was chosen by the chapter in 1621, and at the same time held the appointment of superintendent or court preacher at Wolfenbuttill. By the mother's side, Mr. TUCKERMAN is of Irish descent. The name of his mother's family is KEATING. In MACAULAY's recent history he thus speaks of one of her ancestors, as opposing a military deputy of JAMES II., in his persecution of the Protestant English in Ireland, in 1686: "On all questions which arose in the privy council, TYRCONNEL showed similar violence and partiality. JOHN KEATING, chief-justice of the common pleas, a man distinguished for ability, integrity, and loyalty, represented with great mildness that perfect equality was all that the general could reasonably ask for his own church." Mr. TUCKERMAN is a nephew of the late Rev. Dr. JOSEPH TUCKERMAN, a memoir of whom has recently appeared in England, and who is generally known and honoured as the originator of the "Ministry at Large," an institution of Christian benevolence and eminent utility. His mother was also related to and partly educated with another distinguished Unitarian clergyman, JOSEPH STEVENS BUCKMINSTER, whose memory is yet cherished in Boston by all lovers of genius and character. Mr. TUCKERMAN was born in Boston, on the twentieth of April, 1813. After preparing for college, the state of his health rendered it necessary for him to relinquish his studies and seek a milder climate. In September, 1833, he sailed from New York for Havre, and after a brief sojourn in Paris, proceeded to Italy, where he remained until the ensuing summer. In the spring after his return he gave the results of his observation to the public, in a volume entitled "The Italian SketchBook," of which a third and considerably augmented edition appeared in New York in 1849. Mr. TUCKERMAN resumed and for a time prosecuted his academical studies, but again experiencing the injurious effects of a sedentary life and continued mental application, he embarked in October, 1837, for the Mediterranean; visited Gibraltar and Malta, uade the tour of Sicily, and after a winter's residence in Palermo, crossed over to the continent. The winter of 1838 he passed chiefly in Florence and returned to the United States in the course of the ensuing summer. In 1839 he published "Isabel, or Sicily, a Pilgrimage," in which, under the guise of a romance, he gives many interesting descriptions and reflections incident to a tour in Sicily. This work was reprinted in London, in 1846. In 1845 he finished his "Thoughts on the Poets," in which he has discussed the characteristics of the chief masters of modern song. This work has passed through several editions. In 1848 he gave to the press his "Artist Life, or Sketches of eminent American Pain'ers;" in 1849, « Characteristics of Literature, illustrated by the Genius of Distinguished Men;" in 1850, "The Optimist,” and a "Life of Commodore TALBOT;" in 1851, a second series of "Characteristics of Literature;" in 1853 The Diary of a Dreamer," "A Memorial of GREENOUGH," and "Mental Portraits;" and in 1854, "A Month in England." A collection of his "Poems" appeared in 1851, but it embraces only a small proportion of those he had published in the magazines and newspapers. Mr. TUCKERMAN's poems are in a great variety of measures; they are, for the most part, expressions of graceful and romantic sentiment, but are often fruits of his reflection and illustrations of his taste. The little piece called "Mary" is a delightful echo of emotions as common as culture of mind and refinement of feeling; and among his sonnets are some very pleasing examples of this kind of writing. In these works he has occasionally done injustice to his own fine powers by the carelessness with which he has adopted familiar ideas, images, and forms of expression, from other writers. Considering the nature of the poetic principle, the author of an Essay on American Poetry which appeared in 1841, observes: "He who looks on Lake George, or sees the sun rise on Mackinaw, or listens to the grand music of a storm. is divested, for a time, of a portion of the alloy of his nature." The alteration Mr. TUCKERMAN makes in the paraphrase of this in his highly-finished produc tion, The Spirit of Poetry," published three years afterwards, is unquestionably an improvement: "Who that has rocked upon Lake George's tide, When its clear ripples in the moonlight glide... And who Niagara's loveliness has known, The rainbow diadem, the emerald zone, Nor felt thy spell each baser thought control," Hypercritical readers may fancy that the grammatical relations of the last word of the second line here copied demand that it should be written glided, but it will not be denied that the substitution of "Niagara" for "a storm" renders the pas HENRY T. TUCKERMAN. WHAT shade has fallen this loved threshold o'er 66 64 Strove with dim eyes thy lineaments to trace. And more than these-the loved-ones round the Two whoso gray hair with daily joy he crowned, JOHN W. FRANCIS, jr., eldest son of the eminent and venerable JOHN W. FRANCIS, M.D., LL. D. of New York, died on the twentieth of January, 1855, of typhus fever, brought on by extreme devotion to medical studies and attendance upon the poor. He was a youth of rare promise and great accomplishments; and perhaps there was never another occasion when one so young received the tribute of funeral honours from so large and distinguished a assemblage as that which accompanied his remains to St. Tarmas's Church, where appropriate services were conducted in a very impressive manner by Dr. HAWK8, an old persul friend of the family. from the more immediate vocabulary of common Of Mr. TUCKERMAN'S character as an essayist, some more particular observations may be found in my "Prose Writers of America." He has resided for several years in the city of New York. When up the aisle familiar to thy tread, For wisdom's banquet thou so well relied, The blest assurance of a short farewell, The New York Hospital. THE HOLY LAND. THROUGH the warm noontide, I have roam'd Where CESAR's palace-ruins lie, And in the Forum's lonely waste Oft listen'd to the night-wind's sigh. I've traced the moss-lines on the walls That Venice conjured from the sea, And seen the Colosseum's dust Before the breeze of autumn flee. Along Pompeii's lava-street, With curious eye, I've wander'd lone, And mark'd Segesta's temple-floor With the rank weeds of ages grown. I've clamber'd Etna's hoary brow, And sought the wild Campagna's gloom; I've hail'd Geneva's azure tide, And snatch'd a weed from VIRGIL'S tomb. Why all unsated yearns my heart To seek once more a pilgrim shrine? Oh, for a glance at those wild hills Upon the Jordan's moonlit strand! Upon each thorn is gleaming now, And rest beside Samaria's well? Who would not stand beneath the spot And kiss the ground where JESUS wept? Gethsemane who would not seek, And pluck a lily by the way? Through Bethany devoutly walk, And on the mount of Olives pray ? On Calvary's celestial height! TO AN ELM. BRAVELY thy old arms fling Their countless pennons to the fields of air, Their panoply of green still proudly wear. As some rude tower of old, Thy massive trunk still rears its rugged form, To battle sternly with the winter storm. In Nature's mighty fane, Thou art the noblest arch beneath the sky; Lone patriarch of the wood! Like a true spirit thou dost freely rise, The locust knows thee well, And when the summer-days his notes prolong, Hid in some leafy cell, Pours from thy world of green his drowsy song. Oft, on a morn in spring, The yellow-bird will seek thy waving spray, To whet his beak, and pour his blithesome lay. How bursts thy monarch wail, When sleeps the pulse of Nature's buoyant life, And, bared to meet the gale, Wave thy old branches, eager for the strife! The sunset often weaves Upon thy crest a wreath of splendour rare, Fill with cool sound the evening's sultry air. Sacred thy roof of green To rustic dance, and childhood's gambols free: Gay youth and age serene Turn with familiar gladness unto thee. O, hither should we roam, To hear Truth's herald in the lofty shade; Might Freedom's champion fitly draw his blade. With blessings at thy feet, Falls the worn peasant to his noontide rest; Inspires the sad and soothes the troubled breast. When, at the twilight hour, Plays through thy tressil crown the sun's last gleam The schoolboy comes to sport, the bard to dream As o'er the sward the flitting shadows pass Then lovers haste to thee, With hearts that tremble like that shifting light |