Poor bird! in vain is all thy care!
Thy cherish'd ones must perish there :
Their doom is seal'd, they can but die;
But thou may'st spread thy wings and fly.
Thy children soon must breathe their last,
Their death-pang will be quickly past.
All that maternal love can do

Has proved thee faithful, fond, and true;
Oh! linger not a moment more,
Thy chance of life will soon be o'er.
Think ye maternal love will cease,
When danger and distress increase ?
Believe it not-stronger than death
It braves the fierce volcano's breath;
Undaunted faces every ill,

And bids the tempest work its will;
Lifts to the last its guardian shield,
And cannot fly, and will not yield.
That faithful bird heeds not your cry,
She will not spread her wings and fly;
Think not maternal love can tire;
That nest will be her funeral pyre.

More closely still she spreads her wings
Above those feeble, trembling things.

66

Fly, faithful bird, there still is space, Nor perish with thy helpless race!"

She heeds us not-the flames ascend,
And all in one wide ruin blend;

And since their lives she cannot save,
She shares with them one common grave.
Firm courage, that will never quail,
Still strongest in the stormiest gale,
Undaunted zeal, wouldst thou behold?
Oh! go not to the stern and cold;
But where the warm affections dwell,
There look thou for its mightiest spell;
For love, e'en in its lowest form,
Hath power the coward heart to warm,
And in its highest, calleth down

The strength that wins the martyr's crown.*

"The affection which the Stork manifests for her young has been proverbial from antiquity. She feeds them for a long period, nor quits them till they can defend and provide for themselves. She bears them on her wings, and protects them from danger, and has been known to perish rather than abandon them, an instance of which was exhibited in the town of Delft, in 1636, when a fire broke out in a building that had a Stork's nest on it, containing young unable to fly. The old Stork made several attempts to save them, but, finding all in vain, she at last spread her wings over them, and in that endearing attitude expired with them in the flames."-Brit. Cyclop.

THE GOLDFINCH'S NEST.

Graham.

SOMETIMES, suspended at the limber end

Of plane-tree spray, among the broad-leaved

shoots,

The tiny hammock swings to every gale;

Sometimes in closest thickets 'tis conceal'd; Sometimes in hedge luxuriant, where the brier, The bramble, and the crooked plum-tree branch, Warp through the thorn, surmounted by the flowers

Of climbing vetch, and honeysuckle wild,

All undefaced by Art's deforming hand.
But mark the pretty bird himself! how light
And quick his every motion, every note!

How beautiful his plumes! his red-tinged head;
His breast of brown: and see him stretch his

wing;

A fairy fan of golden spokes it seems.

Он, herald of the Spring! while yet
No harebell scents the woodland lane,
Nor starwort fair, nor violet,

Braves the bleak gust, and driving rain, "Tis thine, as through the copses rude

Some pensive wanderer sighs along, To tell of hope and fortitude,

And soothe him with thy lonely song.

For thee, then, may the hawthorn bush, The elder, and the spindle tree,

With all their various berries, blush,

And the blue sloe abound for thee! For thee the coral holly glow

Its armed and glossy leaves among ; And the pellucid mistletoe

O'er many a branched oak be hung!

Still may thy nest, with soft moss lined,
Be hidden from the invading jay;
Nor truant boy its covert find,

To bear thy callow young away.
So thou, precursor still of good,
Shalt to the pensive wanderer sing
Thy song of hope and fortitude,

Oh! herald of approaching spring.