PoETIcAL Fou Mt. .

g Here Natures minstrels quaf inspiring draughts.


THE RETAILER AND HIS VICTIM.


BY CHARLES W. DENIsON. 5
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The hand Of death was on him. There he lay
In utter agony, upon his bed


OF straw; his sunken eye upturn d, and fxd
On vacancy; his mouth was open VIDE,
And oft he grasp'd for breath, like shot bird
Beneath noon-day sun ; his face how wan!
And DER it often pass'd, like black cloud
Over sterile waste, the awful frown m
OF hopeless deep despair. Around him stood ~
His wreched offspring, noisy in their wo; +
And their cries burst from their aching hearts,
They seem'd to shake their totterng hut; but they,
Forsaken ones! had no kind mother there,
TO still their bitter groans. The dying man
Had bid them all adieu: had cast them forth
Upon the bleak, wide world neglected heirs
TO poor beggars villa drunkard's name ~
There enter'd one, with reckless step, and look,
That boldly mock'd this touching scene of wo
He gazed with fearless eye, and blanchless cheek,
Upon the wreck which he himself hath made;
Then sezing on his dying victims hand
Which seem'd instinctively to dread his touch
With sanity voice, but quaking heart, he ask'd:
"My neghbor, know st thou ME?' Deep groas replied
In tones Of thrilling sound, the sufferer turnd,
And fixing on his visiter an eye
That told unutterabe things, he said
"Know you alas alas too well do N
You! who have s'rpt me of my earthly ALL
Have beggard me and mine ; have made my life
A hell on earth and now for me have burst
The burning portals of hell to come
Look at this frame SO weak and haggard now;
Look at this hovel-squallid misry's den
AT those dear innocents, and hear their sobs--
Then hence-and to the spot you call your home;-
Bet as you 60, tread lightly DER the grave
Ofmy lost murder'd wife :-when there, reflect,
Z Tint, but for knou1ng you. now might have n
frame as healthy and as firm as yours;
That the same hand you now have dared to touch
Might still have labor'd on. TO gather up
The treasures of the soil, and joyous, cast
Them in my partners lap, future store
For those sad, helpless orphans: that this hut
Which charity to me has deign'd to loan
That might here be shelter'd from the storm,
And close my wretched days beneath roof
BY you has been exchanged for that which once
Was mine--mine, by the purchase of my daily toll.
And now begone! my spirit loaths thy sight;
But stop-relnember must meet again! 4
Meet at the bar of him whose searching eye
Has mark'd your every slep; till then FAREWELL
He ceased His face was finsh'd and in his eye
There shone brightness not of earth, which seem'd
To pass, Ike fiery arrows through the soul
Of him who trembling listen'd. He had pourd
The scorchIng torrent of his curses out,
Till II had dried the very fount of life,
And thus, while burning in its fires, he died!