THE MEMORY OF BURNS.

How sweetly come the holy psalms

From saints and martyrs down,

The waving of triumphal palms

Above the thorny crown

The choral praise, the chanted prayers

From harps by angels strung,

The hunted Cameron's mountain airs,

The hymns that Luther sung!

Yet, jarring not the heavenly notes,

The sounds of earth are heard,

As through the open minster floats

The song of breeze and bird

Not less the wonder of the sky

That daisies bloom below;

The brook sings on, though loud and high

The cloudy organs blow!

And, if the tender ear be jarred

That, haply, hears by turns

The saintly harp of Olney's bard,

The pastoral pipe of Burns,

No discord mars His perfect plan

Who gave them both a tongue;

For he who sings the love of man

The love of God hath sung!

To-day be every fault forgiven

Of him in whom we joy

We take, with thanks, the gold of Heaven

And leave the earth's alloy.

Be ours his music as of spring,

His sweetness as of flowers,

The songs the bard himself might sing

In holier ears than ours.

Sweet airs of love and home, the hum

Of household melodies,

Come singing, as the robins come

To sing in door-yard trees.

And, heart to heart, two nations lean,

No rival wreaths to twine,

But blending in eternal green

The holly and the pine!