Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1848-05-25
Gootrs department,
(Fsom Godey's Lady's Book
A SPRING FLOWER FADED.
BY GRACE GREENWOOD

A spring flower, indeed, was our little G.
dewy, and glowing with innocence and beauty
a sweet bud, plucked, ere it opened to the day
leaving to us but her gentle memory, floating il
upon our souls like pie ,sant fragrance.
The death of little child-with what com
pete and weary desolation it fills home How
all seems dark without the CLEAN of one bright
face-how all seems silent without the sound Of
one glad voice-how all seems cold without the
glow of one lost love
But the mother, poor, stricken heart, who shall
count her tears, who shall sound the depths OF
her afiliction? How must she miss that face,
that voice, that buried love-the fond twining OF
little arms about her neck, and the pressure OF
soft, warm lips against her own! And how oft
en- will she listen unconsciously tor the light
footsteps which shall come no more-and how
at the mention of one name, will her heart bleed
within her, will she grow faint through all her
soul How often, in the deep night, will she
wake to miss one dear head from her bosom,
and stretch forth her hands and call upon her
dead in the agony Of vain yearning-"Gone gone
torever-best treasure of my heart-young life
of my life-my child, my precious babel Why
hast thou left me desolate, oh, my God !"
This is the language Of mothers intense
sorrow in the despairing blindness of first ter
rible bereavement But with the Christian moth
er, there succeeds to this storm of the soul, a
sweet and holy calm, when balmy breathngs
from the celestial shore steal over the troubled
waters, and the voice of divine love says, "Peace
be still" the thick clouds part above her, grow
sivery with brightness and reveal a Heaven
starry with the glorious Of God.
Oh, how near to the bereaved mother is the
divine Master, the meek Redcemer-tor was he
not "a man of sorrows, land acquainted with grief"
In the hour of her utter desoaton, when the
crushing weight of her anguish hath borne her
to the earth He offers not to her faint lip, with
terrible mockery, ga goblet of gall and vine
gar," but cup filled with hottest consolations-
a draught of joy eternal, which is the hope of
immortality.
She knows-that mother-that the child lost
to her, has been found and cared for by the an
gels; and its spirit hath but passed, like bird
OF passage, from the storms and chill airs of a
wlntry land, to cline of unending summer,
whose sunshine is the smile of love, whose at
mosphere is the breath Of peace, She knows
that the fragile mother which faded on her bosom,
hath sprung into lovelier life and sweeter bloom,
in 'the garden of the Lord"
There is one incident in history which strik-
ingy shows the believing mothers Indebtedness
to the Gospel of Christ, "and reveals how great
ly she is blessed above her heather sister, 1t is
this :-Cleomenes, King Of Sparta, was impris-
oned by one of the Ptoemies. lie escaped by
bold stratagem, but falling to raise rebellion,
fell upon his own sword and died. Ptolemy,
greatly exasperated, ordered that the Spartan's
family should be put to death. Cratesclea, one
the most heroic of Sparta's heroic women, en-
treated to die before the children; but this was
not permitted her-she behed them perish, and
as the dagger pierced her own bosom, she cried
ooh, my children, whittier are ye gone?'
Can words convey to the mind more of the
agony of the soul than thesel Amid the sharp
anguish, sent forth that cry-"Oh, my children
whithcr are ye gone pa question Of fearful
import, which there was none to answer. The
life of earth was fast fading behind, and before
her lay a realm, shadowy and strange and dim
ga voceless shore" She hung with unspeakable
fear over dark and unfathomable abyss into
which she had seen hurled the children of hel
love, and strove to discern them ere she plunged
herself into that vast gulf, which sent up no muir
muir from its black and awful depths. In vain
in vain, that last, wild, downward gael Ii
vain that listening pause She beheld not even
the CLEAN of floating robe on that mdnigh
deep she heard not the faintest cry of loved
voice saying-"Here are we, come thou to usp
and in blindness and despalrng frenzy, de
scended her spirit to the dread abyss of DEATH
For then, the faith in Him "who tasted death 70
our sake" had not come, like sustaining angel
to receive the falling SOUL and bear it upward
the "Star of Bethlehem had not risen on tn
night Of the grave. Then oh, well might tn
mother mourn and 'reluse to be comiorted,' 70
Jesus had not said, "Suffer little childrea t
come unto me, and forbid them not, for of sue
is the kingdom of heaven"
Oh, young mother, if when from your arm
you lay your dead babe, yet warm with your las
embrace, upon the cold bosom of the earth, you
heart is buried with it, and you pine and pra
for the grave-rest beside your darling, think no,
far more terrible the anguish born of the COL
victon that the gentle and loving spirit ha
passed into nothingness, as those fair limbs an
that sweet face, those shining curls, those so
lips and those dear eyes, fall into dust, shapeles
- cooress and feless.
= The child departed has been spoken of as
ie faded flower, This it is not; but flower tran
: planted, in the morn of its beautiful existenc
'e Had it fingered here the dust of low desires an
IN the soil of sin might have weighed il to the cart