Lines on the Death of a Child

The Mission House is dark and drear, For, lo! the death-shade resteth there: And oh! the Mother's wail we hear. Give grace, O God!

Thy Heavenly Father death has sent To take back what he kindly lent: Oh! wait not till thy grief is spent, But trust Him now.

Can living faith now find no room Within thy heart all filled with gloom? Let light from Heav'n shine on the tomb, Where Willie sleeps.

Hope, Mother, breathes a rich perfume Through every sleeping Christian's tomb, And Angels whisper, through the gloom, Soft words of love.

Would'st thou the heavenly music hear From Cherub songster's hov'ring near? Let faith attune thine inner ear, And hearken now.

The welcome song to Heav'n ascends, See, Willie, smiling, forward bends. His well-known voice now sweetly blends With choral strains!

Behold, upon thy Willie's brow, A crown of gold is glittering now! O, weeping Mother, murmur'st thou That he has gone?

Mother, would'st thou relight life's fire— Bid yon cherubic host retire— And give back Willie's crown and lyre? Mother, would'st thou?

O, Mother, now a living tie Unites thee to the world on high. Dry up that tear and check that sigh, And live for heaven.

We publish the above sadly suggestive lines, along with the following letter from the Rev. John W. Kelly:

"The venerable William Bird, whose recent death you announced last week, was to us 'Uncle Bird' from January, 1846, when I went to St. James, on the Neck, and at the close of which year I married his niece. I always found him as true as the needle to the pole, in all the walks of life. Such old men deserved all the reverence they received, and were entitled to deference and love from pastor and people to the last. Let us love, honor and comfort the aged disciples, whose feet have been in the ways of righteousness so long, and smooth their weary way to the grave with tender and assiduous courtesies and benefits.

"My friend, Rev. U. S. Bird, is a true poet. I thank him for those lines written during his father's last illness. It was a happy coincidence to meet them in the same paper containing the notice of the honored father's death. Brother Sinclair wrote in sweet poetic numbers twenty-six years ago.

When our first-born son died, in California, in 1852, he sent the enclosed verses to the bereaved mother, which were highly appreciated, and are yet valued as a precious memento of the love and friendship which trouble puts so fully to the test, and which recalls the consolations that we received, in a far distant and difficult field, from the fruit of our kinsman's poetic genius."