Labor is life!-'Tis the still water faileth; Play the sweet keys, wouldst thou keep them in tune! Labor is rest from the sorrows that greet us, Labor is health!-Lo! the husbandman reaping, Droop not, though shame, sin, and anguish are round thee; Bravely fling off the cold chain that hath bound thee! Look to yon pure heaven smiling beyond thee: Rest not content in thy darkness—a clod! Work for some good, be it ever so slowly; Cherish some flower, be it ever so lowly : Labor -all labor is noble and holy ; Let thy great deeds be thy prayer to thy God. FRANCES Sargent OSGOOD. THE FACTORY GIRL'S LAST DAY. Robert Dale Owen, in one of the chapters of his autobiography, reproduces the following poem, written many years ago to illustrate an incident of English factory life. NA 'WAS on a winter morning, The weather wet and wild, Two hours before the dawning The father roused his child; Her daily morsel bringing, The darksome room he paced, And cried, “The bell is ringing; My hapless darling, haste!" Dear father, I'm so sorry! I scarce can reach the door; The overlooker met her She thought how her dead mother Worked down, like her, to death; Then told a tiny neighbor A half-penny she'd pay The sun had long descended As cruel tyrants chose. At night, with tortured feeling, Her last perceptions tried ; Up from her straw-bed springing, "It's time!" she shrieked, and died. That night a chariot passed her, An evening visit pay. As negro's wrongs were told THE CORAL-INSECT. 'OIL on! toil on! ye ephemeral train, Who build in the tossing and treacherous main ; Toil on-for the wisdom of man ye mock, With your sand-based structures and domes of rock: A fabric so vast, in a realm so drear. Ye bind the deep with your secret zone, The turf looks green where the breakers rolled; But why do ye plant 'neath the billows dark Ye build-ye build—but ye enter not in, Like the tribes whom the desert devoured in their sin; Ye slumber unmarked 'mid the desolate main, R RING OUT, WILD BELLS! ING out, wild bells, to the wild sky, Ring out the old, ring in the new Ring, happy bells, across the snow; Ring out the grief that saps the mind, For those that here we see no more; Ring out the feud of rich and poor, Ring in redress to all mankind. Ring out a slowly dying cause, And ancient forms of paltry strife; Ring in the nobler modes of life, With sweeter manners, purer laws. Ring out the want, the care, the sin, The faithless coldness of the times; But ring the fuller minstrel in. Ring out false pride in place and blood, Ring in the love of truth and right, The larger heart, the kindlier hand; ALFRED TENNYSON. THE GOOD TIME COMING. HERE'S a good time coming, boys, But thought's a weapon stronger; Wait a little longer. There's a good time coming, boys, A good time coming: The pen shall supersede the sword; There's a good time coming, boys, A good time coming : War in all men's eyes shall be A monster of iniquity In the good time coming. To prove which is the stronger; There's a good time coming, boys, A good time coming : And flourish all the stronger; There's a good time coming, boys, A good time coming : In the good time coming. Anon it faints and falls in deadly strife, Every child shall be a help To make his right arm stronger; The happier he the more he has ;— Wait a little longer. There's a good time coming, boys, A good time coming: In the good time coming; Till limbs and mind grow stronger; And every one shall read and write;→ Wait a little longer. There's a good time coming, boys, Wait a little longer. There's a good time coming, boys, A good time coming: Let us aid it all we can, Every woman, every man, The good time coming. Smallest helps, if rightly given, Make the impulse stronger; 'Twill be strong enough one day ;Wait a little longer. CHARLES MACKAY. · ENDURANCE. "OW much the heart may bear, and yet not break! How much the flesh may suffer, and not die! I question much if any pain or ache Of soul or body brings our end more nigh. We shrink and shudder at the surgeon's knife ; We see a sorrow rising in our way, And try to flee from the approaching ill; We seek some small escape- we weep and prayBut when the blow falls, then our hearts are still, Not that the pain is of its sharpness shorn, But that it can be borne. We wind our life about another life We hold it closer, dearer than our own— Leaving us stunned, and stricken, and alone; But ah! we do not die with those we mourn— This, also, can be borne. Behold, we live through all things-famine, thirst, All woe and sorrow; life inflicts its worst ELIZABETH Akers Allen. LEARN TO SWEEP. NCE, in a city's crowded street, Anon some passing idlers sought RHYMES FOR HARD TIMES. OURAGE, brother! do not stumble, Though thy path be dark as night, There's a star to guide the humble; "Trust in God, and do the right." Though the road be long and dreary, Perish policy and cunning; Perish all that fears the light, Whether losing, whether winning, "Trust in God, and do the right." Shun all forms of guilty passion, Fiends can look like angels bright. Heed no custom, school or fashion, "Trust in God, and do the right." NORMAN M'LEOD. THE MINER. 'HE eastern sky is blushing red, The distant hill-top glowing; The brook is murmuring in its bed, 'Tis time the pickaxe and the spade, And iron "tom" were ringing, And with ourselves, the mountain stream, A song of labor singing. The mountain air is cool and fresh, Nor wizard-rod divining, The pickaxe, spade and brawny hand When labor closes with the day, To simple fare returning, We gather in a merry group Around the camp-fires burning; The mouutain sod our couch at night, JOHN SWIFT. A LANCASHIRE DOXOLOGY. Some cotton had lately been imported into Farringdon, where the mills had been closed for a considerable time. The people, who were previously in the deepest distress, went out to meet the cotton: the women wept over the bales and kissed them, and finally sang the Doxology over them. "P RAISE God from whom all blessings flow," He opens and he shuts his hand, We fathom not the mighty plan, We women, when afflictions come, And when, the tempest passing by, He gleams out, sunlike, through our sky, Ours is no wisdom of the wise, DINAH MARIA MULOCK CRAIK. THE DRUNKARD'S DAUGHTER. O, feel what I have felt, Go, bear what I have borne; 'Go, weep as I have wept, O'er a loved father's fall, See every cherished promise sweptYouth's sweetness turned to gall; Hope's faded flowers strewed all the way That led me up to woman's day. Go, kneel as I have knelt; Implore, beseech, and pray, Strive the besotted heart to melt, The downward course to stay; Be cast with bitter curse asideThy prayers burlesqued, thy tears defied. Go, stand where I have stood, And see the strong man bow; With gnashing teeth, lips bathed in blood, And cold and livid brow; Go, catch his wandering glance, and see Go, hear what I have heard-- As memory's feeling fount hath stirred, Have told him what he might have been, Go to my mother's side, And her crushed spirit cheer; Thine own deep anguish hide, Wipe from her cheek the tear. Mark her dimmed eye, her furrowed brow, F Go, hear, and see, and feel, and know, If all proclaimed, “'Tis drink and die !” Tell me I hate the bowl' Hate is a feeble word: I loathe, abhor-my very soul THE SONG OF STEAM. ARNESS me down with your iron bands, Be sure of your curb and rein, For I scorn the strength of your puny hands How I laughed as I lay concealed from sight When I saw an army upon the land, Or waiting the wayward breeze; When I measured the panting courser's speed, As they bore the law a king decreed, Or the lines of impatient love, I could but think how the world would feel, When I should be bound to the rushing keel, Ha! ha ha! they found me at last, They invited me forth at length, And I rushed to my throne with a thunder blast, O, then ye saw a wondrous change Hurrah! hurrah! the waters o'er, The mountain's steep decline; The ocean pales wherever I sweep I carry the wealth of the lord of earth, In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine Where the rocks never saw the sun's decline, Or the dawn of the glorious day; I bring earth's glittering jewels up From the hidden caves below. And I make the fountain's granite cup I blow the bellows, I forge the steel, I hammer the ore and turn the wheel And all my doings I put into print On every Saturday eve. I've no muscles to weary, no brains to decay, And soon I intend you may go and play, For I scorn the strength of your puny hands DUTY. GEORGE W. CUTTER SLEPT and dreamed that life was beauty: I woke and found that life was duty: And thou shalt find thy dream to be WEET is the pleasure One with true toil? Thou that wouldst taste it, Still do thy best; Use it, not waste it- Wouldst behold beauty Only hath duty Such a sight found. |