Wisconsin Herald

For the Herald.

To "Ada."

Oh! touch again thy gentle harp,
Oft let its notes be heard;
They fall as sweetly on the heart,
As songs of summer bird.

And like the songs of summer birds,
When wintery storms are past,
Thy gentle lays like zephyrs come,
To chase away the blast.

I oft have sat at even tide,
Beside some murmuring stream,
And listened to its waters glide,
Like music in a dream.

And often too beneath the shade
Of waving linden trees,
And heard from out the sighing glade,
The music of the breeze.

And oft amid those fairy sounds,
Such lays as thine would come,
Like music borne on memory's wing,
From childhood's far off home.

Oh! there are strains we sometimes hear,
That never should depart:
They fall upon the aching breast,
Like manna on the heart.

They come like shadows of the past,
As fleeting and as brief-
They fall as soft as evening dew,
Upon the trembling leaf.

Then Ada, let thy trembling harp be heard;
Be never mute its strings,
For there are hearts will hail thy lays,
As when an angel sings.

The wintry blasts have fled away,
With all their gloomy hours,
And gentle spring hath come again,
To gem the earth with flowers.

And ye can sing thy gentle lays,
To blooming valleys fair:
The prairie birds will catch thy strains,
And sing them through the air.

And as we wander o'er the lawn,
Where sparkling waters glide,
From out the brake, the speckled fawn,
Will nestle at thy side.

For it will ken that by thy side,
Is safer than its lair,
No hunter's toils will snare its feet,
Or harm the trembler there.

"Tis said the flowers of Paradise
That grow its streams beside:
An angel springs from every one,
Crushed by the silvery tide;

And on the green and flowing banks,
Till evening shades draw nigh,
These tiny angels sweetly sing,
Then fold their wings and die.

Unlike the spirits of those flowers,
Ada-shall be thy song:
Long after thy allotted hours,
Time will thy lays prolong. B