A DIRGE.

By Walter Richard Cassels

Winds are sighing round the drooping eaves;

Sadly float the midnight hours away;

Dun and grey athwart the ivy-leaves,

Fall the first pale chilly tints of day,

Ah me! the weary, weary tints of day.

Soon the darkness will be past and gone;

Soon the silence spread its noiseless wing;

Sleep will strike its tent and hurry on;

Life commence its weary wandering,

Ah me! its weary, weary wandering.

Not the sighing of my lonely heart,

Not the heavy grief-clouds hanging o'er,

Not its silence can with night depart:

Gloom hangs o'er it ever, evermore,

Ah me! darkness ever, evermore.