The Anderson intelligencer. [volume] (Anderson Court House, S.C.) 1860-1914, 1877-12-27
THE CLOSING YEAR.
GEORGE D. pRHyTrcE.

GEORGE D. PRENTICE.
IT'S midnight's holy hour-and silence now
Is brooding, like q gentle spirit, Ger
The still and pulselesa world. Hark OF
the winds
The BELLS deepest tones are swelling. Til
the knell
OF the departed year.
No funeral train
Is sweeping past; yet on the stream and
With melancholy light, the moonbeams
Like pale spotlsss shroud; the sir il
AS by mourner's sigh; and on yon cloud
That floats 80 still and placidly through
heaven, ~.
The spirits Of the seasons seem to stand
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn't
solemn form,
And Winter with his aged locks-and
breathe
In mo1rnful cadenccs, that come abroad
Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching
2,1 wall, s.sl+ $50 5-s
A melancholy dirge Ter the dead Year,
Gone from the earth forever.
lis time
For memory and for tears. Within the
Still chambers Of the heart spectre dim,
Whose tones are like tho wizard voice ol
Time
Heard from .thetomb of ages, points its cold
And solemn finger to the beautiful
And holy visions that have passed away,
And left no shadow of their loveliness
~ NJ fte
The coffin-lid ofhope and JOY and love.
And, bending mournfully above the pale,
Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters
Ger whathas passed to ,nothingiiess.
$3.50. The Year ~
Has gone, and, with it, many glorious
throng ..
OF happy dreams. Its mark is on each
Its shadow IN each heart. In its swift
course
It waved its sceptre DER the beautiful,
And they are not. It laid its pailid hand
Upon the strong man, and the naughty
). form
Is fallen and the flashing eye is dim.
| 1t trod the hall of reyelry, where thronged
The bright and joyous, and the fearful wall
OF stricken ones is heard where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded. 1t passed
The battle-plain, where sword and spear and
Flashed in in the light Of mid-day-and the
strength
Ofserried hosts Is shivered, and the grass,
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. il
came
And faded Ike wreath Of mist at eve;
Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air, =
It heralded its millions to their home = s
In the dim land of dreams.
Remorseless Timel
Fierce spirit Of the glass and scythe! what
- power
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt
His iron heart to pity? On, still on
He presses, and forever The proud bird,
The, condor of the Andes, that can soar
Through heavens unfathomable depths, OF
brave
The fury of the northern hurricane, !.
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's
home, -,
Furls his broad wings atnightfall and sinks
down
To rest upon his mountaineering. But Time
Knows not the weight Of sleep or weari-
- ness,
And nights deep darkness has no chain, to
bind -
His rushing pinion. Revolutions sweep
Der earth, like troubled visions DER the
breast = 49,
OF dreaming sorrow; cities rise and sink
Like bubbles on the water; fiery isles
Spring blazing from the ocean, and go back
To their mysterious carerns; mountains
rear
To heaven, their bald and blnckened cliffs,
and bow
Their tall heads to the plain; new empires
rise,
Gathering the strength Of hoary centuries,
And rush; down like che Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations; and the very stars.
sYon bright. and burning blazonry Of God,
Glitter awhile in. their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,
Shoot from their glorious spheres and pass
away,e
To darkle in the trackless-void: yet Time,
Time, the tomb-builder, holds mis- fierce
career,
Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not
Amid the mighty wrecks thatstrew his path,
To sit and muse, like other conquerors,
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.