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Beneath the chancel's hallow'd stone,
Exposed to every rustic tread,
To few, save rustic mourners, known,
My brother, is thy lowly bed.
Few words, upon the rough stone graven,
Thy name--thy birth--thy youth declare--
Thy innocence--thy hopes of Heaven--
In simplest phrase recorded there.
No 'scutcheons shine, no banners wave,
In mockery, o'er my brother's grave.
The place is silent--rarely sound
Is heard those ancient walls around;
Nor mirthful voice of friends that meet
Discoursing in the public street,
Nor hum of business dull and loud,
Nor murmur of the passing crowd,
Nor soldier's drum, nor trumpet's swell
From neighbouring fort or citadel,--
No sound of human toil or strife
To death's lone dwelling speaks of life;
Nor breaks the silence, still and deep,
Where thou, beneath thy burial stone,
Art laid "in that unstartled sleep
The living eye hath never known."
The lonely sexton's footstep falls
In dismal echoes on the walls,
As, slowly pacing through the aisle,
He sweeps the unholy dust away,
And cobwebs, which must not defile
Those windows on the Sabbath day;
And, passing through the central nave,
Treads lightly on my brother's grave.
But when the sweet-toned Sabbath chime,
Pouring its music on the breeze,
Proclaims the well-known holy time
Of prayer, and thanks, and bended knees;
When rustic crowds devoutly meet,
And lips and hearts to God are given,
And souls enjoy oblivion sweet
Of earthly ills, in thoughts of Heaven;
What voice of calm and solemn tone
Is heard above thy burial stone?
What form, in priestly meek array,
Beside the altar kneels to pray?
What holy hands are lifted up
To bless the sacramental cup?
Full well I know that reverend form,
And if a voice could reach the dead,
Those tones would reach thee, though the worm,
My brother, makes thy heart his bed;
That Sire, who thy existence gave,
Now stands beside thy lowly grave.
It is not long since thou wert wont
Within these sacred walls to kneel;
This altar, that baptismal font,
These stones which now thy dust conceal,
The sweet tones of the Sabbath bell,
Were holiest objects to thy soul;
On these thy spirit loved to dwell,
Untainted by the world's control.
My brother, those were happy days,
When thou and I were children yet;
How fondly memory still surveys
Those scenes the heart can ne'er forget!
My soul was then, as thine is now,
Unstain'd by sin, unstung by pain;
Peace smiled on each unclouded brow--
Mine ne'er will be so calm again.
How blithely then we hail'd the ray
Which usher'd in the Sabbath day!
How lightly then our footsteps trod
Yon pathway to the house of God!
For souls, in which no dark offence
Hath sullied childhood's innocence,
Best meet the pure and hallow'd shrine,
Which guiltier bosoms own divine.
I feel not now as then I felt,
The sunshine of my heart is o'er;
The spirit now is changed which dwelt
Within me, in the days before.
But thou wert snatch'd, my brother, hence,
In all thy guileless innocence;
One Sabbath saw thee bend the knee
In reverential piety--
For childish faults forgiveness crave--
The next beam'd brightly on thy grave.
The crowd, of which thou late wert one,
Now throng'd across thy burial stone;
Rude footsteps trampled on the spot
Where thou lay'st mould'ring and forgot;
And some few gentler bosoms wept
In silence, where my brother slept.
I stood not by thy fev'rish bed,
I look'd not on thy glazing eye,
Nor gently lull'd thy aching head,
Nor view'd thy dying agony:
I felt not what my parents felt,
The doubt--the terror--the distress--
Nor vainly for my brother knelt--
My soul was spared that wretchedness,
One sentence told me, in a breath,
My brother's illness--and his death!
And days of mourning glided by,
And brought me back my gaiety;
For soon in childhood's wayward heart
Doth crush'd affection cease to smart.
Again I join'd the sportive crowd
Of boyish playmates, wild and loud;
I learnt to view with careless eye
My sable garb of misery;
No more I wept my brother's lot,
His image was almost forgot;
And ev'ry deeper shade of pain
Had vanish'd from my soul again.
The well-known morn I used to greet
With boyhood's joy at length was beaming,
And thoughts of home and raptures sweet,
In every eye but mine, were gleaming;
But I, amidst that youthful band
Of beating hearts and beaming eyes,
Nor smiled nor spoke at joy's command,
Nor felt those wonted ecstasies:
I loved my home, but trembled now
To view my father's alter'd brow;
I fear'd to meet my mother's eye,
And hear her voice of agony;
I fear'd to view my native spot,
Where he who loved it--now was not.
The pleasures of my home were fled--
My brother slumber'd with the dead.
I drew near to my father's gate--
No smiling faces met me now--
I enter'd--all was desolate--
Grief sat upon my mother's brow:
I heard her as she kiss'd me, sigh,
A tear stood in my father's eye;
My little brothers round me press'd,
In gay unthinking childhood bless'd.
Long, long that hour has pass'd, but when
Shall I forget its mournful Scene?
The Sabbath came--with mournful pace
I sought my brother's burial place--
That shrine, which when I last had view'd,
In vigour by my side he stood.
I gazed around with fearful eye--
All things reposed in sanctity.
I reach'd the chancel--nought was changed--
The altar decently arranged--
The pure white cloth above the shrine--
The consecrated bread and wine--
All was the same--I found no trace
Of sorrow in that holy place.
One hurried glance I downward gave--
My foot was on my brother's grave!
And years have pass'd and thou art now
Forgotten in thy silent tomb;
And cheerful is my mother's brow,
My father's eye has lost its gloom;
And years have pass'd, and death has laid
Another victim by thy side;
With thee he roams, an infant shade,
But not more pure than thou he died.
Blest are ye both! your ashes rest
Beside the spot ye loved the best;
And that dear home, which saw your birth,
O'erlooks you in your bed of earth.
But who can tell what blissful shore
Your angel spirits wander O'er?
And who can tell what raptures high
Now bless your immortality?
My boyish days are nearly gone,
My breast is not unsullied now;
And worldly cares and woes will soon
Cut their deep furrows on my brow--
And life will take a darker hue
From ills my brother never knew.
And I have made me bosom friends,
And loved and link'd my heart with others;
But who with mine his spirit blends,
As mine was blended with my brother's?
When years of rapture glided by,
The spring of life's unclouded weather,
Our souls were knit, and thou and I,
My brother, grew in love together.
The chain is broke which bound us then--
When shall I find its like again?
1816
I have a son, a little son, a boy just five years old,
With eyes of thoughtful earnestness, and mind of gentle
mould.
They tell me that unusual grace in all his ways appears,
That my child is grave and wise of heart beyond his childish
years.
I cannot say how this may be, I know his face is fair,
And yet his chiefest comeliness is his sweet and serious
air:
I know his heart is kind and fond, I know he loveth me,
But loveth yet his mother more with grateful fervency:
But that which others most admire, is the thought which fills his
mind,
The food for grave enquiring speech he every where doth
find.
Strange questions doth he ask of me, when we together walk;
He scarcely thinks as children think, or talks as children
talk.
Nor cares he much for childish sports, dotes not on bat or
ball,
But looks on manhood's ways and works, and aptly mimicks
all.
His little heart is busy still, and oftentimes perplext
With thoughts about this world of ours, and thoughts about the
next,
He kneels at his dear mother's knee, she teacheth him to
pray,
And strange, and sweet, and solemn then are the words which he
will say.
Oh, should my gentle child be spared to manhood's years like
me,
A holier and a wiser man I trust that he will be:
And when I look into his eyes, and stroke his thoughtful
brow,
I dare not think what I should feel were I to lose him now.
I have a son, a second son, a simple child of three;
I'll not declare how bright and fair his little features
be,
How silver sweet those tones of his when he prattles on my
knee:
I do not think his light blue eye is, like his brother's,
keen,
Nor his brow so full of childish thought as his hath ever
been;
But his little heart's a fountain pure of kind and tender
feeling,
And his every look's a gleam of light, rich depths of love
revealing.
When he walks with me, the country folk, who pass us in the
street,
Will shout for joy, and bless my boy, he looks so mild and
sweet.
A playfellow is he to all, and yet, with cheerful tone,
Will sing his little song of love, when left to sport
alone.
His presence is like sunshine sent to gladden home and
hearth,
To comfort us in all our griefs, and sweeten all our mirth.
Should he grow up to riper years, God grant his heart may
prove
As sweet a home for heavenly grace as now for earthly love:
And if, beside his grave, the tears our aching eyes must
dim,
God comfort us for all the love which we shall lose in him.
I have a son, a third sweet son; his age I cannot tell,
For they reckon not by years and months where he is gone to
dwell.
To us, for fourteen anxious months, his infant smiles were
given,
And then he bade farewell to Earth, and went to live in
Heaven.
I cannot tell what form is his, what looks he weareth now,
Nor guess how bright a glory crowns his shining seraph
brow.
The thoughts that fill his sinless soul, the bliss which he doth
feel,
Are number'd with the secret things which God will not
reveal.
But I know (for God hath told me this) that he is now at
rest,
Where other blessed infants be, on their Saviour's loving
breast.
I know his spirit feels no more this weary load of flesh,
But his sleep is bless'd with endless dreams of joy for ever
fresh.
I know the angels fold him close beneath their glittering
wings,
And soothe him with a song that breathes of Heaven's divinest
things.
I know that we shall meet our babe, (his mother dear and
I,)
Where God for aye shall wipe away all tears from every eye.
Whate'er befalls his brethren twain, his bliss can never
cease;
Their lot may here be grief and fear, but his is certain
peace.
It may be that the tempter's wiles their souls from bliss may
sever,
But, if our own poor faith fail not, he must be ours for
ever.
When we think of what our darling is, and what we still must
be,--
When we muse on that world's perfect bliss, and
this world's misery,--
When we groan beneath this load of sin, and feel this grief and
pain,--
Oh! we'd rather lose our other two, than have him here again.
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