THE VALLEY OF DRY BONES.

EZEKIEL XXXVII.

BY THE AUTHOR OF VISIONS OF SOLITUDE, ETC."

LONELY and drear that valley lay,

Where bones of dead men strewed the groundBleached like those rifted rocks of gray,

That reared their spectre forms around. No blade of grass-no wild-flower fair, No insect flitting through the air,

Amid that depth profound,

E'er met the eye-nor breeze's breath
Sighed o'er the deep repose of death.

Alone, one living form was seen,
Like last survivor of his race,
Beneath the pallid moonbeam's sheen,

Slowly to seek that silent place.
And there, with visage pale, he stood,
In musings of prophetic mood-

Upturned to heaven his face;

While thoughts, by language unexpressed,

Chilled the warm life-blood of his breast;

And to his inward soul there spake

A voice unheard by human earO, Son of Man, can these awake,

These bones, so scattered, old, and sere? But say the word, by His command Who made the ocean and the land; And they-e'en they, shall hear; And flesh and sinews shall o'erspread These mouldering relics of the dead.

Anon, the wondrous word he spoke,

That trembling seen, and heard with awe,

The fearful midnight silence woke,
As, subject to the law

Of their Creator-instant shook

Those withered bones before his look

Closer compelled to draw

Each to his fellow;-while the sound
Sent faint, mysterious echoes round.

And now more awful seems that glen,

With breathless corses scattered wide

The lifeless frames of stalwarth men,
Reposing in funereal pride.
Again the prophet lifts his voice,
And loud the echoes now rejoice,

As, marshalled side by side,
And, called to being, up they stand,
A living, moving, breathing band.

And shall not thus thy chosen race,

Though far dispersed, and dead in sin,
Feel the strong influence of thy grace,
O Lord! and thus, at length, begin
To wake to live-united by
A power descending from on high?

And feel their souls within

Thy Spirit's quick and potent fire
Each stony heart once more inspire?

And thus, yea thus, when time is past,
And when, resounding through the tomb,

Shall ring the mighty trumpet's blast,

Which calls the nations to their doom; The trembling graves-the floods profound, Obedient to that piercing sound,

Shall, from their depths of gloom, Give up the slumbering dead-to hear Th judgement-words of joy or fear.

Then shall the mighty of the earth,
The myriads by the mighty slain,

The babe that perished in its birth,

The sage-his wisdom now in vain

Alike surround the dazzling throne,

Where every secret thought is known,

To know their loss or gain;

The courts of heaven to tread, or swell
The legions of thy gulf, O hell!

ON THE MISSIONS OF THE UNITED BRETHREN.

COMPOSED ON THE ESTABLISHMENT OF A LOCAL ASSOCIATION IN AID OF THOSE ANCIENT AND EXCELLENT MISSIONS.

BY T GRINFIELD, M. A.

Nor long a century yet hath rolled,*
Since the first missionary band
Went forth, in Christian meekness bold,
To war with Satan in his land.

Of all the deeds that century knew,

What lovelier shines in memory's page?

What enterprise can time review,

Nobler, since apostolic age?

Till then, o'er many a pagan coast
No heavenly ray the darkness broke;

All Europe slept;-no sacred host
Yet, at the Spirit's call, awoke.

At last, Messiah's farewell charge,

Neglected, oh, too long! was heard

Dawn of millennial day—at large

O'er the dark earth to preach his word.

*The first Moravian Mission was undertaken among the negro slaves in the Danish West

India Islands, in 1732; the next, among the Greenlanders, in the following year.

Who were those first of men to claim
That first of human honors, who?
UNITED BRETHREN was the name

So dear to Christ,* to them so due.

Not injured Afric's utmost cape,

Nor stern ice-girded Labrador,

Their love's unwearied search escape:-
They brave the extremes of either shore.