Kiss him once for somebody's sake,
Murmur a prayer soft and low;

One bright curl from its fair mates take-
They were somebody's pride, you know.
Somebody's hand hath rested here-

Was it a mother's, soft and white?
Or have the lips of a sister fair

Been baptized in their waves of light?

God knows best. He has somebody's love,
Somebody's heart enshrined him there,
Somebody wafts his name above,

Night and morn, on the wings of prayer.
Somebody wept when he marched away,
Looking so handsome, brave, and grand;
Somebody's kiss on his forehead lay,
Somebody clung to his parting hand.

Somebody's watching and waiting for him,
Yearning to hold him again to her heart;
And there he lies with his blue eyes dim,
And the smiling, childlike lips apart.
Tenderly bury the fair young dead-

Pausing to drop on his grave a tear.
Carve on the wooden slab o'er his head :
"Somebody's darling slumbers here."

[Southern.]

LEFT ON THE BATTLE-FIELD.

BY SARAH T. BOLTON.

HAT, was it a dream? am I all alone

WHAT,

In the dreary night and the drizzling rain?

Hist!-ah, it was only the river's moan;

They have left me behind with the mangled slain.

Yes, now I remember it all too well!

We met, from the battling ranks apart; Together our weapons flashed and fell,

And mine was sheathed in his quivering heart.

In the cypress gloom, where the deed was done,
It was all too dark to see his face;
But I heard his death groans, one by one,
And he holds me still in a cold embrace.

He spoke but once, and I could not hear
The words he said, for the cannon's roar;
But my heart grew cold with a deadly fear,-
O God! I had heard that voice before!

Had heard it before at our mother's knee,

When we lisped the words of our evening prayer!
My brother! would I had died for thee,—
This burden is more than my soul can bear!

I pressed my lips to his death-cold cheek,
And begged him to show me by word or sign,
That he knew and forgave me; he could not speak,
But he nestled his poor cold face to mine.

The blood flowed fast from my wounded side,
And then for a while I forgot my pain,
And over the lakelet we seemed to glide
In our little boat, two boys again.

And then, in my dream, we stood alone

On a forest path where the shadows fell; And I heard again the tremulous tone

And the tender words of his last farewell.

But that parting was years, long years ago,
He wandered away to a foreign land;
And our dear old mother will never know
That he died to-night by his brother's hand.

The soldiers who buried the dead away

Disturbed not the clasp of that last embrace, But laid them to sleep till the judgment day,

Heart folded to heart, and face to face.

*

UT of the clover and blue-eyed grass,

OUT

He turned them into the river-lane; One after another he let them pass, Then fastened the meadow bars again.

Under the willows, and over the hill,
He patiently followed their sober pace;
The merry whistle for once was still,
And something shadowed the sunny face.

Only a boy! and his father had said
He never could let his youngest go;
Two already were lying dead

Under the feet of the trampling foe.

But after the evening work was done,

And the frogs were loud in the meadow swamp, Over his shoulder he slung his gun,

And stealthily followed the foot-path damp.

Across the clover and through the wheat,
With resolute heart and purpose grim,

Though cold was the dew on his hurrying feet,
And the blind bat's flitting startled him.

Thrice since then had the lanes been white,

And the orchards sweet with apple-bloom; And now when the cows came back at night, The feeble father drove them home.

For news had come to the lonely farm
That three were lying where two had lain ;
And the old man's tremulous, palsied arm
Could never lean on a son's again.

The summer day grew cold and late,

He went for the cows when the work was done; But down the lane, as he opened the gate,

He saw them coming, one by one,—