The Norfolk post. [volume] (Norfolk, Va.) 1865-1866, 1865-06-22
TWO PICTURES.


that land happy homestead. Peace
with its sunlit smile blessed it by day,
and by night, embodied it in guardian
shadow of security. But the tempest
fraught cloud of civil strife gathers and
bursts over that once happy land, and
as the months and years go by, one by
one, the lights of that homestead are
dimmed. All, at length, is shrouded in
thickest gloom; want, restitution, sepa-
ration by imprisonment, follow in sor-
rowful succession, and yet the mothers
heart bears bravely on. Her stay in life
is taken away but she can still fold her
children to her bosom and rejoice that
they, at least are safe. A little while,
and the tramp of the victor is heard,
the experiment explodes, the rebellion is
at an end, and that family, like thou
sands of others, sees before it nothing
but ruin and desolation. Even the last
sad solace of sufferings shared N COM
mon must be resigned; they must sepa-
rate ill better days are at hand. The
youngest, a lovely babe of ten months, is
entrusted to a stranger guidance, in the
fond hope of sparing it hardships fore
seen, inevitable. 1t is carried to neigh
boring State, and brought here to the
city of Norfolk. But in crossing the
boundary line Of Carolina, it does not
leave sorrows behind it. Three weeks
of neglect, of hard usage, of starvation,
almost, and it falls dangerously ill. Its
humble guardian, a colored female, sees it
dropping, and, at last, in desperation,
she carries it abroad seeking pity, trust
ing to find humanity amongst the more
| favored of fortune. But pity is rare
guest in the breast of the powerful and
prosperous, and so the helpless little
stranger would have died unrelieved in
| her arms in the street, had not a benign
Providence been watching over it. That
| Providence directs il TO an abode OF
charity. III is received into st. Mary's
Asylum, and no effort is spared to revive
the crushed blossom. Neglect has OBJ
scured, but it could not destroy the
charms of that infantile countenance;
it is lovely in its wreUchedness, in its
rags, in its unwonted surroundings.
The other Picture: A light sheds soft
| radiance over an apartment whose APP
preparation is betokened by various OBJ
jects of devotion. 1t is a chapel, and be-
fore the altar lies the form of a sleeping
| Chernh. A coronal of pure white flow
ers enwreathes its lily-baby-brows; while
the tiny fingers are clasped over buds
and blossoms, emblematic of sweet in
nocence. Yes, the child-angel has been
claimed by Death. But the ruthless De-
stroyer is less cruel than life has been,
since it snatches its tender prey from
suffering, lays it amid flowers, to sleep
the sleep of peace, and gives it bright
sister spirits to sing its lullaby. How
is the lovely little one transformed as
| it lies there, clothed in robes of spot
less white, with the smile of the bea-
titled lowering over it's almost speak
! ing features! But, oh! how more lovely,
far, isit in its little soul, for the christian
rite has santified it to God, sealed it as
His child! 1t entered that house of
Mercy stray waif, an infant of exile
and sorrow; a few brief hours, and it
wings thence its fight, an angel, to yon
pure upper sphere.
Butthese two picturesque they not
suggestive of reflections salutary, pract-
cal and most fitting to be remembered in
times such as ours? Under the image of
the hapless infant, friendless, cast upon
theworld's cold charity, rejected and for
lorn, may wenot behold the type ofmany
abrother reduced topenury, helpless, af-
fiicted? True, they have erred. They
have wandered from the homestead Of
their fathers. But now that the nation
al tumult is stilled, now that the great
family of our beloved country is gather
ed once mofe to it's ancient halls, the
abode OF union and peace and sweet secu-
rity, shall we moi. stretch forth a friendly
helping hand to each returned wanderer?
Shall We not complete the similitude of
the child-angel? shall we not repeat
merciful deeds that ravishing results
NAV likewise 1e repeated?
Tlis London Post of the 9th ultimo.