The dancing waters flash’d and gleam’d
    Beneath her silver ray;
  And gently fell her placid beam,
    On tower and turret gray.

  And softly came the silent dew,
    And fell with gentle pow’r,
  Sparkling like gems, or diamonds fair,
    On trembling leaf and flow’r.

  Fair night hung out her golden lamps,
    In her blue chambers high;
  And earth, all gemmed, in their pure light,
    Lay lovely to the eye.

  But look within those costly halls,
    Where waxen tapers gleam,
  And crimson curtains’ silken folds
    Exclude the moon’s bright beams.

  A queenly matron mournful sits,
    In all her jewelled pride;
  The costly diamond on her breast,
    Its anguish cannot hide.

  The angel of the raven wing
    His sable plume waves there,
  And writhing on his silken couch,
    Lies stretch’d the only heir.

  She feels how vain a thing is wealth,
    To ease that lab’ring breath,—­
  Or bribe, in his resistless course,
    The tyrant monster, death.

  The hours of night passed slow away,
    When brightly rose the sun;
  The boy in quiet beauty lay—­
    The fearful work was done.

  The angel had performed his part,
    And back to heav’n had flown;
  The mother with a bursting heart,
    Sat weeping now, alone.

  She rising, smoothed his golden hair,
    One ringlet gently shred;
  And then, within a costly shroud,
    She wrapped her silent dead.

  And folded light the snowy screen,
    That hid from every eye
  Those features, beautiful in death,
    And marble forehead high.

  But hark! she hears a prancing hoof,
    And sees a horseman come;
  Soon the proud charger reached her side,
    Cover’d with dust and foam.

  Her husband from the saddle springs,
    And clasps her to his breast;
  And on her icy lip and brow
    The kiss of love was pressed.

  “How is our son?” the father cried;
    In his, her hand she placed,
  And through their gorgeous, darkened halls,
    Their silent way they traced.

  Nor stopped, until they reached his side,
    Who yesterday, in health,—­
  The mother’s joy, the father’s pride,—­
    Was heir to all their wealth.

  The mother folded back the screen,
    And said, “There lays our child;”
  Then overcome with bursting grief,
    They wept in accents wild.

  They laid him in a marble tomb,
    With all that wealth could show;
  But deeply in their castled home
    Dark rolled the tide of woe.

Picture No.  II.

  The midnight moon, with pallid beams,
    From eastern sky again
  Look’d forth, and shed her fitful gleams
    On mountain, hill and plain.

  And far upon the moaning sea,
    She threw her mellow light;
  And tossing waves, and heaving spray,
    Were gemm’d with diamonds bright.