“Beside me now no longer be,
Ye need not seek to die with me;
Go, friends”—­his manly bosom swell’d
With life the stiff’ning wounds withheld;
And struggling to his knees, he shook
The sword his hand had not forsook,
But to his arm it was denied
To slay the foe his heart defied. 
The faintly wielded steel was left
In the slight wound it barely cleft. 
Borne to the earth by the same thrust,
That smote his en’my to the dust,
His breast receiv’d their cowardly blows—­
The fluttering eye-lids slowly close,
Then parting, show the eye beneath
White with the searching touch of Death. 
The last thick drops congeal around
The jagged edge of many a wound;
See breaking through the marble skin
The clammy dews that lurk within,
The lip still quivers, but no breath
Seeks the unmoving heart beneath.

Thou gallant Clay—­thy name doth cast
A halo o’er the glorious past;
For in the brightness of such blaze
Even Alexander fame decays,
Yes—­yes, Columbia’s noble son
Died!  Monarchs could no more have done.

A VALENTINE.

Oh! for a brief poetic mood
  In which to write a merry line—­
A line, which might, could, would or should
  Do duty as a Valentine. 
Then to the woods the birds repair
  In pairs, prepared to woo
A mate whose breast shall fondly share
This world’s huge load of ceaseless care
  Which grows so light when borne by two. 
But ah! such language will not suit,
I’d better far have still been mute. 
My mate is dead or else she’s flown
And I am left to brood alone,
To think of joys of vanish’d years
And banish thus some present tears;
But then our life is but a dream
And things are not what they seem.

LINES

SUGGESTED ON VISITING THE GRAVE OF A DEAR FRIEND.

Like him who mourns a jewel lost
  In some unfathomable sea,
The precious gem he cherish’d most—­
  So, dearest, do I mourn for thee.

For oh! the future is as dark
  As is the ocean’s barren plain,
Whose restless waters wear no mark
  To guide his eyes, who seeks in vain.

True, reckless Fancy dares invade
  The realm of time’s uncounted hours,
As fondly gay, as if she stray’d
  In safety through a land of flowers.

And still doth hope shine bright and warm—­
  But oh! the light with which it cheers,
My darling one, but glows to form
  A rainbow o’er a vale of tears.

GEORGE WASHINGTON CRUIKSHANK.

George W. Cruikshank was born in Fredericktown, Cecil county, Md., May 11th, 1838.  He received his early education in the common school of Cecilton, and was afterwards sent to a military academy at Brandywine Springs, in New Castle county, Delaware, and graduated at Delaware College in 1858.