The Democratic press. (Eaton, Preble County, Ohio) 1860-1865, 1862-02-20
4. SslttteS 4oetrg.
LOST SOMEBODY'S CHILD.
by THOMAS MACKELBAR.

Laying blessing on every head
After their evening prayers were said
God keep the slumbering band
Yet somebody's child is lost, / say,
This night so bitterly cold,
Some innocent lamb has gone astray
Unwittingly from its fold
""Belman ho, bellman, whose child is lost2
And grasp my staff and cloak
But the ringer over the void had crossd
Before tardily spoke.
The neighbors soon gather, and far and near
We pry into ditch and fen,
TIL, bark an answering shout | hear.
The rover is found again.
All mother, fond mother, your heart is light
With Joe to your bosom bound
But many child is lost tonight
Who'll never, no. never be found
'Ay somebody's child is lost tonight,
While the wind is high and hoarse,
And the scudding ship, like a bird alright
Flies shivering on its course
She suddenly drops in the yawning deep
As never to return;
She leaps atop the watery steep,
A creaking from stem to stern.
Hold well, good bark for a score of lives
Comprise thy costliest freight;
Else loving mothers, and maids, and wives
Will ever be desolate.
And we'll she holds, with a single sail
0utspread to guide her way,
While all the furies of the gale
4 Around her bulwarks play.
The sailor-boy, with fearful heart,
Signs for his distant home,
And the hasty tears from his eyeliis start,
And drop in the briny foam.
In the months agone father sighed,
And a mother trembled with fears:
Bat the fathers law had he defed,
And he scorn'd that mothers tears.
The pitiIcss blast now mocks his grief,
And huge and hungry wave,
Bears him away beyond relief,
To the depths of an ocean grave
The brand is blazing upon the hearth,
The work of the day is done,
And the fathers heart runs over the earth
In search of the wandering sou.
"0h where is our poor boy tonight
This night so bleak and wild2''
The mother shuts her eyes to the light,
And inly prays for her child.
The busy needles all cease their fight,
While their hearts say, "Where is he7
. They dream not he has sunken from sight,
Down, down, down in the sea.
Tn, mother may pray, and she may weep
Till she weep her life away,
But never more will she find the sheep
That willfully went astray. "
Somebody's child is lost tonight
Oh sorrow is on the day
VIII n virgins fame is marr'd with blight
That cannot be cleansed away.
An humbled family sit in the gloom,
Bemoaning their hopeless shame u
Would that she were safe in the tomb
With honor upon her name
While deck'd in garments of satin and sin,
The fallen daughter, ween,
Is scorch'd d with fever Of heart within,
Though reigning as wanton-queen.
o merciful father is this the child
Thy hand created so fair, ..
With eyes where simple innocence smiled,
And coy and maidenly air2
Is this the promising morning-aower, &,
The brightest its rivals among2
Is this the bird that sang in the bower
With sweetest and merriest tongue
All me this child is more than lost
For her low-fallen form,
On sins voluptuous sugges tost,
VIII perish in passions storm.
And the mother may sigh, and she may wee
Till she weep her life away,
But never more will she find the sheep
1 That wickedly went astray.
Somebody's child is lost to night
A widows only son,
With brow as light and eye as brirht,
AS you ever looked upon.
And he will be my staff and stay
Her words were inly spoken
"Whon am old and my hair is gray,
And my natural strength is broken"
Her motherly soul with pride o'erran
AS the lad grew up to the estate of man,
And she said in her Joy,
That nobody's boy
Could match her paragon by span.
Time stole along and her locks we're gray,
But her heart had lost its pride;
For the man had wander so far astray,
'Twere better the boy had died.
A loathsome, vile, and gibbering thing,
Stung by the fatal stll.worm's sting,
Despised of man, contemning God,
And gnashing at the avenging rod
Where Sitn.n.e +, sSiOns scourged him sore