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he last half-sheet is read, loses her sight for ever--not in her eyes, nor in those of God who saw him, in the cold winter mornings, wearing John's clothes, to warm them for the dying man before he got up. His grief at his brother's death is inconsolable. He feels for the first time in his life, what a lot is his--for he feels for the first time that-- Parent and friend and brother gone, I stand upon the earth alone. Four years he lingers; friends begin to arise from one quarter and another, but he, not altogether wisely or well, refuses all pecuniary help. At last Mr. Hugh Miller recommends him to be editor of a projected "Non-Intrusion" paper in Dumfries, with a salary, to him boundless, of 100l. a-year. Too late! The iron has entered too deeply into his soul; in a few weeks more he is lying in his brother's grave--"Lovely and pleasant in their lives, and in their deaths not divided." "William Thom of Inverury" is a poet altogether of the same school. His "Rhymes and Recollections of a Handloom Weaver" are superior to those of either Nicoll or the Bethunes, the little love-songs in the volume reminding us of Burns's best manner, and the two languages in which he writes being better amalgamated, as it seems to us, than in any Scotch songwriter. Moreover, there is a terseness, strength, and grace about some of these little songs, which would put to shame many a volume of vague and windy verse, which the press sees yearly sent forth by men, who, instead of working at the loom, have been pampered from their childhood with all the means and appliances of good taste and classic cultivation. We have room only for one specimen of his verse, not the most highly finished, but of a beauty which can speak for itself. DREAMINGS OF THE BEREAVED. The morning breaks bonny o'er mountain and stream, An' troubles the hallowed breath of my dream. The gowd light of morning is sweet to the e'e, But ghost-gathering midnight, thou'rt dearer to me. The dull common world then sinks from my sight, And fairer creations arise to the night; When drowsy oppression has sleep-sealed my e'e, Then bright are the visions awakened to me! Oh, come, spirit-mother! discourse of the hours My young bosom beat all its beating to yours, When heart-woven wishes in soft counsel fell On ears--how unheedful, proved sorrow might tell! That deathless affection nae sorrow could break; When all else forsook me, ye would na forsake; The
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