s a voice whose tone still brings
Joy mid the world's dark strife:
We launch youth's bark and trim the sail,
Life's ocean o'er to roam,
But that same voice, throughout the gale,
Is whispering still of home.

Ask him, with sickness sore oppressed,
Who cheered his hope when dim,
He'll tell you _she_, in whose loved breast
Glowed sympathy for him:
The soothing voice, the gentle tread,
And ever silent prayer,
The pillow smoothed to ease the head--
All tell a mother's care.

Ask him who, on the ocean dark,
In unknown seas did roam,
When first he spied the nearing bark,
If he thought not of home?
He'll tell of thoughts that thrilled his heart
While bounding o'er the wave;
The joys that none but home impart
Lent courage to the brave.

He thought of her, his early choice,
The parting hour, the sigh,
The hand that pressed, the trembling voice,
Sad face, and tearful eye;
And while he walks the deck at night,
He ever sees that star
Whose beam reflects where joys more bright
Still win him from afar.

[Illustration]

COUNTRY CHARACTERS.

THE LAST OF THE TIE-WIGS.

BY JARED AUSTIN.

ONE of my earliest village reminiscences is a vision of old Captain
Garrow, in his old-fashioned, square-skirted coat, plush shorts, silk
stockings, shoe buckles, and, to crown the whole, his venerable tie-wig.
He was a character, the captain. He was a relic of a past age, an
antique in perfect preservation, a study for a novelist or historian.
Born in Massachusetts before the rebel times, he had taken an active
part in the Revolution; served as commissary, for which his education as
a trader had qualified him; and the rank of captain which was attached
to the office had given him the title he bore in his old age. When the
war was over, his savings (very moderate, indeed, they were, for the
captain was as honest as daylight) were invested in a stock of what used
to be called English goods, but what are now, through the increase of
manufactures in our own country, denominated dry goods; I think it
rather fortunate for our village that the worthy captain pitched upon it
for his residence, and for the sale of hi