The Northern Star And Freemen's Advocate

The following pathetic and affecting stanzas will be read with great pleasure by all who have felt the vicissitudes they describe. To the fond wife, the faithful husband, the doting father, or the loving maid who longs to love, they will impart a pensive pleasure: and to parents who have lost the favorite blossom of their domestic garden-the plant they most watched, most loved, and most cherished-it will afford a temporary balm, a soothing luxury of sorrow to their wounded spirits. It is not original. We know not whence it comes; but it is heartily welcome to our columns. Petersburg Statesman.

Ten years ago, ten years ago,
Life was to us a fairy scene ;
And the keen blasts of worldly woe
Had seared not then its pathway green.

Youth and its thousand dreams were ours,
Feelings we ne'er can know again ;
Unwithered hopes, unwasted powers,
And frames unworn by mortal pain

Such was the bright and genial flow
Of life with us ten years ago !

Time has not blanched a single hair
That clusters round thy forehead now ;
Nor hath the cankering touch of care
Left even one furrow on thy brow

Thine eyes are blue as when we met,
In love's deep truth, in earlier years ;
Thy cheek of rose is blooming yet,
Though sometimes stained with secret tears:

But where-oh, where's the spirit's glow,
That shone through all-ten years ago?

I, too, am changed -I scarce know why
Can feel each flagging pulse decay ;
And youth, and health, and visions high,
Melt like a wreath, of snow away ;

Time cannot sure have wrought the ill;
Tho' worn in this world's sickening strife,
In soul and form, I linger still
In the first Summer month of life ;

Yet journey on my path below,
Oh ! how unlike ten years ago!

But look not thus-I would not give
The wreck of hopes that thou must share,
To bid those jocund hours revive
And still will keep, 'mid storm and gloom;
Endeared by ties we could not know
When life was young--ten years ago!

Has Fortune frowned ? Her frowns were vain,
For hearts like ours she could not chill ;
Have friends proved false ? Their love might
wane,
But ours grow fonder, firmer still.

Twin barks on this world's changing wave,
Steadfast in calms. in tempests tried,
In concert still our fate we'll brave,
Together cleave life's fitful tide,

Nor mourn, whatever winds may blow,
Youth's first wild dream-ten years ago.

Have we not knelt beside his bed,
And watched our first-born blossom die ?
Hoped, till the shades of hope had fled,
Then wept till feeling's fount was dry ?

Was it not sweet in that dark hour,
To think, mid mutual tears and sighs,
Our bud had left its earthly bower,
And burst to bloom in Paradise ;

What to the thoughts that soothed that woe,
Were heartless joys ten years ago!

Yes, it is sweet, when Heaven is bright,
To share its sunny beams with thee ;
But sweeter far, 'mid clouds and blight,
To have thee near to weep with me.

Then dry those tears--tho something changed
From what we were in early youth,
Time that has hopes and friends estranged,
Hath left us love in all its truth:

Sweet feelings we would not forego
For life's best joy--ten years ago.