He looks,—­the shepherd of Chaldea’s hills
  Tending his flocks,—­
  And wonders the rich beacon does not blaze,
  Gladdening his gaze;—­
  And from his dreary watch along the rocks,
  Guiding him safely home through perilous ways! 
  Still wondering as the drowsy silence fills
  The sorrowful scene, and every hour distils
  Its leaden dews.—­How chafes he at the night,
  Still slow to bring the expected and sweet light,
  So natural to his sight!

  And lone,
  Where its first splendors shone,
  Shall be that pleasant company of stars: 
  How should they know that death
  Such perfect beauty mars? 
  And like the earth, its crimson bloom and breath;
  Fallen from on high,
  Their lights grow blasted by its touch, and die!—­
  All their concerted springs of harmony
  Snapped rudely, and the generous music gone.

  A strain—­a mellow strain—­
  A wailing sweetness filled the sky;
  The stars, lamenting in unborrowed pain,
  That one of their selectest ones must die! 
  Must vanish, when most lovely, from the rest! 
  Alas! ’tis evermore our destiny,
  The hope, heart-cherished, is the soonest lost;
  The flower first budden, soonest feels the frost: 
  Are not the shortest-lived still loveliest? 
  And, like the pale star shooting down the sky,
  Look they not ever brightest when they fly
  The desolate home they blessed?

WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS.

* * * * *

PASSING AWAY.

  Was it the chime of a tiny bell
    That came so sweet to my dreaming ear,
  Like the silvery tones of a fairy’s shell
    That he winds, on the beach, so mellow and clear,
  When the winds and the waves lie together asleep,
  And the Moon and the Fairy are watching the deep,
  She dispensing her silvery light. 
  And he his notes as silvery quite. 
  While the boatman listens and ships his oar,
  To catch the music that comes from the shore? 
  Hark! the notes on my ear that play
  Are set to words; as they float, they say,
      “Passing away! passing away!”

  But no; it was not a fairy’s shell. 
    Blown on the beach, so mellow and clear;
  Nor was it the tongue of a silver bell,
    Striking the hour, that filled my ear,
  As I lay in my dream; yet was it a chime
  That told of the flow of the stream of time. 
  For a beautiful clock from the ceiling hung,
  And a plump little girl, for a pendulum, swung
  (As you’ve sometimes seen, in a little ring
  That hangs in his cage, a canary-bird swing);
  And she held to her bosom a budding bouquet,
  And, as she enjoyed it, she seemed to say,
      “Passing away! passing away!”