ILLINOIS, 1858.

A hundred times the bells of Brown

Have rung to sleep the idle summers,

And still to-day clangs clamouring down

A greeting to the welcome comers.

And far, like waves of morning, pours

Her call, in airy ripples breaking,

And wanders to the farthest shores,

Her children's drowsy hearts awaking.

The wild vibration floats along,

O'er heart-strings tense its magic plying,

And wakes in every breast its song

Of love and gratitude undying.

My heart to meet the summons leaps

At limit of its straining tether,

Where the fresh western sunlight steeps

In golden flame the prairie heather.

And others, happier, rise and fare

To pass within the hallowed portal,

And see the glory shining there

Shrined in her steadfast eyes immortal.

What though their eyes be dim and dull,

Their heads be white in reverend blossom;

Our mothers smile is beautiful

As when she bore them on her bosom!

Her heavenly forehead bears no line

Of Time's iconolastic fingers,

But o'er her form the grace divine

Of deathless youth and wisdom lingers.

We fade and pass, grow faint and old,

Till youth and joy and hope are banished,

And still her beauty seems to fold

The sum of all the glory vanished.

As while Tithonus faltered on

The threshold of the Olympian dawnings,

Aurora's front eternal shone

With lustre of the myriad mornings.

So joys that slip like dead leaves down,

And hopes burnt out that die in ashes,

Rise restless from their graves to crown

Our mother's brow with fadeless flashes.

And lives wrapped in traditions mist

These honoured halls to-day are haunting,

And lips by lips long withered kissed

The sagas of the past are chanting.

Scornful of absence’ envious bar

BROWN smiles upon the mystic meeting

Of those her sons, who, sundered far,

In brotherhood of heart are greeting;

Her wayward children wandering on

Where setting stars are lowly burning,

But still in worship toward the dawn

That gilds their souls’ dear Mecca turning;

Or those who, armed for God's own fight,

Stand by His Word through fire and slaughter,

Or bear our banner's starry light

Far-flashing through the Gulf's blue water.

For where one strikes for light and truth,

The right to aid, the wrong redressing,

The mother of his spirit's youth

Sheds o'er his soul her silent blessing.

She gained her crown a gem of flame

When KNEASS fell dead in victory gory;

New splendour blazed upon her name

When IVES’ young life went out in glory!

Thus bright for ever may she keep

Her fires of tolerant Freedom burning,

Till War's red eyes are charmed to sleep

And bells ring home the boys returning.

And may she shed her radiant truth

In largess on ingenuous comers,

And hold the bloom of gracious youth

Through many a hundred tranquil summers!