HOWDEN CHURCH.

HIS holy ground my earliest steps have trod, When childish musings turn'd my soul to GodThat God who looks o'er all-alas vain man! Fondly conceiving that thy narrow span

Of life and intellect, may all things know-
Look down and dwell on what thou seest below.-
There childhood rests, and many an aged head,
At last finds quiet with the silent dead :

Here lies the mother-there the daughter's urn-
All wept, all lov'd, when first they sought that bourne,
Whence to return, to mortal ne'er was given,
Earth's ills exchang'd for all the bliss of Heaven.

That broken stone-sad, sad the sculptur'd tale, Nor love, nor youth, nor beauty could avail To save the withering flower which lies beneath, the prize, of indiscriminate death.

The prey,

She lov'd and was belov'd-her guileless heart
Beat but for one-and from that one to part
And still live on-nature the strength denied,
She lov'd-she mourn'd-she sicken'd-and she died.
A parent's pride dealt the untimely blow-
Death gave her bliss-to him gave endless woe.

Where now the pride of Prelate and of Priest ! All gone and only equal with the least Of those they spurn'd in wantonness of power, Who weary laden, labour'd through the hour Of life's short span-then willing sunk to rest, Borne on the wings of Hope to regions of the blest.

A child, I wander'd mid thy ruin'd walls, And sad the memories hastening time recalls, Of all my fleeting visions, hopes, and fears, When short-liv'd smiles gave place to short-liv'd tears, As little skill'd to know why sad my soul, As powerless now that sadness to control: When tower and turret stood before my view, The ruin'd choir, the ivy, and the yew, The crumbling Palace, with its gloomy Hall, The sculptur'd Gateway tottering to its fall,— Heraldic scutcheonry, pride's last retreatIn fragments mouldering at my boyish feet.

The grave, the legend, which with fear I read,
Telling me wonders of the silent dead

Who slept in quiet 'neath the grassy sod,

To wake, to rise, to meet a judging God.

Such thoughts were mine-ere love or passion's

sway,

Clouded the brightness of my opening day,
Ere hope had wither'd to my aching sight,
Ere morn was clouded by the approach of night,
Ere my soul's freshness shrunk from human pain,
Ere friends prov'd false-or beauty sooth'd in vain—
Ere every joy the dearest to my heart,

Lagging came last, the earliest to depart-
Ere love withdrew his sweetly proffer'd bliss,
When all my world was center'd in a kiss,

And the pale cheek was glistening with a tear
Warm from the heart-and still to memory dear-

Ere on the River's brink, when side by side,
Gladly I'd plung'd beneath its sullen tide

A moment rippled by yon Vesper bell,

My wish'd for requiem, and my last farewell-
Ere sad experience taught me with a sigh,
Man and his works are only born to die.

ANONYMOUS.