THOMAS HOOD, humorist and poet, was born at London, in 1798. The best incident of his early boyhood was his instruction by a schoolmaster who appreciated his talents, and was so interested in teaching as to render it impossible not to interest his pupil. At this period he earned his first fee-a few guineasby revising for the press a new edition of "Paul and Virginia." In his fifteenth year, after receiving a miscellaneous education, he was placed in the counting. house of a Russian merchant; but, soon after learned the art of engraving. In 1821, having already written fugitive papers for periodicals, he became subeditor of the "London Magazine," a position which at once introduced him to the best literary society of the time. Odes and Addresses" soon after appeared. "Whims and Oddities," "National Tales," "Tylney Hall," a novel, and "The Plea of the Midsummer Fairies," followed. In these, the humorous fac

1 Cŏn' tu mē lý, rudeness or reproach compounded of haughtiness and contempt; despiteful treatment.

ulty not only predominated, but expressed itself with a freshness, originality, and power, which the poetical element could not claim. There was, however, much true poetry in the verse, and much sound sense and keen observation in the prose of these works. After publishing several annuals, he started a magazine in his own name. Though aided by men of reputation and authority, this work, which he conducted with surprising energy, was mainly sustained by his own intellectual activity. At this time, confined to a sick-bed, from which he never rose, in his anxiety to provide for his wife and children, he composed those poems, too few in number, but immortal in the English language, such as the "Song of the Shirt," the "Song of the Laborer,” and the “Bridge of Sighs.” His death occurred on the 3d of May, 1845.

L

I. SUCCESSION OF HUMAN BEINGS.

IKE leaves on trees the life of man is found,

Now green in youth, now withering on the ground;

Another race the following spring supplies,

They fall successive, and successive rise:

So generations in their course decay;

So flourish these, when those have passed away.

II. DEATH OF THE YOUNG AND FAIR.

She died in beauty, like a rose blown from its parent stem;
She died in beauty, like a pearl dropped from some diadem;
She died in beauty, like a lay along a moonlit lake ;
She died in beauty, like the song of birds amid the brake;
She died in beauty; like the snow on flowers dissolved away;
She died in beauty, like a star lost on the brow of day ;-
She lives in glōry, like Night's gems set round the silver moon;
She lives in glory, like the sun amid the blue of June.

III. A LADY DROWNED.-PROCTER.

Why so shall I be,

Is she dead?... -ere these autumn blasts

Have blown on the beard of Winter.

Is she dead?

Ay, she is dead,-quite dead! The wild Sea kissed her
With its cold white lips, and then-put her to sleep:
She has a sand pillow, and a water sheet,

And never turns her head or knows 'tis morning!

IV. LIFE OF MAN.-BEAUMONT.
Like to the falling of a star,

Or as the flights of eagles are,

Or like the fresh spring's gaudy hue,
Or silver drops of morning dew,
Or like a wind that chafes the flood,
Or bubbles which on water stood:
E'en such is man, whose borrowed light
Is straight called in and paid to-night :
The wind blows out, the bubble dies;
The spring entombed in autumn lies;
The dew's dried up, the star is shot,
The flight is past, and man forgot.

V. CORONACH.1-SCOTT.

He is gone on the mountain, he is lost to the forest,
Like a summer-dried fountain, when our need was the sōrest;
The fount, reappearing, from the rain-drops shall borrow,
But to us comes no cheering, to Duncan no morrow!
The hand of the reaper takes the ears that are hōary,
But the voice of the weeper wails manhood in glōry ;
The autumn winds rushing waft the leaves that are serest,
But our flower was in flushing when blighting was nearest.-
Fleet foot on the correi,' sage counsel in cumber,'
Red hand in the foray,' how sound is thy slumber!

Like the dew on the mountain, like the foam on the river,
Like the bubble on the fountain, thou art gone, and forever!

VI. IMMORTALITY.-R. H. DANA.

"Man, thou shalt never die!" Celestial voices
Hymn it unto our souls: according harps,
By angel fingers touched, when the mild stars
Of morning sang together, sound förth still
The song of our great immortality!

Thick-clustering orbs on this our fair domain,
The tall, dark mountains, and the deep-toned seas,
Join in this solemn, universal song.

O listen, ye our spirits! drink it in

From all the air! "Tis in the gentle moonlight;
'Tis floating mid day's setting glōries; night,
Wrapped in her sable' robe, with silent step,

1 Coronach, (kor' o nak), a song of lamentation; a lament.

9 Correi, (kör rå), the side of a kill where game usually lies.

3 Cum' ber, perplexity: distress. 'Fō'ray, a sudden pillaging incursion in peace or war.

'Sa' ble, dark; black.

TH

Comes to our bed, and breathes it in our ears.
Night and the dawn, bright day and thoughtful eve,
All time, all bounds, the limitlèss expanse,

As one vast mystic' instrument, are touched
By an unseen, living hand, and conscious chords
Quiver with joy in this great jubilee :'

The dying hear it; and, as sounds of earth
Grow dull and distant, wake their passing souls
To mingle in this heavenly harmony.

VIII.

27. SELECTED EXTRACTS.

HE man who carries a lantern in a dark night, can have friends all around him, walking safely by the help of its rays, and he be not defrauded. So he who has the God-given light of hope in his breast, can help on many others in this world's darkness, not to his own loss, but to his precious gain.

2. As a rose after a shower, bent down by tear-drops, waits for a passing breeze or a kindly hand to shake its branches, that, lightened, it may stand once more upon its stem,-so one who is bowed down with affliction longs for a friend to lift him out of his sorrow, and bid him once more rejoice. Happy is the man who has that in his soul which acts upon the dejected like April airs upon viölet roots.

3. Have you ever seen a cactus growing? What a dry, ugly, spiny thing it is! But suppose your gardener takes it when just sprouting forth with buds, and lets it stand a week or two, and then brings it to you, and lo! it is a blaze of light, glorious above all flowers. So the poor and lowly, when God's time comes, and they begin to stand up and blossom, how beautiful they will be!

4. The sun does not shine for a few trees and flowers, but for the wide world's joy. The lonely pine upon the mountain-top waves its somber boughs, and cries," Thou art my sun." And the little meadow violet lifts its cup of blue, and whispers with its perfumed breath, "Thou art my sun." And the grain in a thousand fields rustles in the wind, and makes answer, "Thou

1

Mystic, obscure; involving some secret meaning.

"Jū' bi lee, among the Jews every

fiftieth year, when the bondsmen were all set free and lands restored to their former owners.

art my sun." And so God sits effulgent in heaven, not for a favored few, but for the universe of life; and there is no creature so poor or so low that he may not look up with child-like confidence and say, "My Father! Thou art mine."

5. I think the human heart is like an artist's studio. You can tell what the artist is doing, not so much by his completed pictures, for they are mostly scattered at once, but by the halffinished sketches and designs which are hanging on his wall. And so you can tell the course of a man's life, not so much by his well-defined purposes, as by the half-formed plans-the faint day-dreams, which are hung in all the chambers of his heart.

6. Men are like birds that build their nests in trees that hang over rivers. And the birds sing in the tree-top, and the river sings underneath, undermining and undermining, and in the moment when the bird thinks not, it comes crashing down, and the nest is scattered, and all goes floating down the flood. If we build to ambition, we are like men who build before the track of a volcano's eruption, sure to be overtaken and burnt up by its hot lava. If we build to wealth, we are as those who build upon the ice. The spring will melt our foundations from under us.

7. Shall we build to earthly affections? If we can not transfigure' those whom we love-if we can not behold the eternal world shining through the faces of father and mother, of husband and wife-if we can not behold them all irradiated with the glory of the supernal' sphere, it were not best to build for love. Death erects his batteries right over against our homes, and in the hour when we think not, the missile flies and explodes, carrying destruction all around.

8. I think it is a sad sight to look at one of the receiving hulks at the Navy Yard. To think that that was the ship which once went so fearlessly across the ocean! It has come back to be anchored in the quiet bay, and to roll this way and that with the tide. Yet that is what many men set before them as the end of life-that they may come to that pass where they may be able to cast out an anchor this way and an anchor that way, and never move again, but rock lazily with the tide—without a sail-without a voyage-waiting simply for decay to take their

1 Trans figure, change the outward form or appearance of.

'Su per' nal, being in a higher region or place; heavenly.