A STORY FROM A GERMAN BALLAD.

BY ELMA SOUTH.

'TWAS night, the star-gemmed and glittering, when a bereaved mother lay tossing on her bed in all the feverish restlessness of unsanctified sorrow. Sleep had fled far from her weary eye-lids; and her grief-burdened heart refused to send up from its troubled fountains the refreshing stream of prayer.

The deep stillness that rested on the hushed earth was broken by those saddest of all sounds, the bitter wailings of a mother weeping for her children, and "refusing to be comforted because they are not."

"Oh, woe, woe is me!" was the piteous cry of that breaking heart, and the piercing sound went up to the still heavens; but they looked calmly down in their starry beauty and seemed to hear it not.

And thus slowly passed the long, weary hours of the night, and naught was heard save the solemn chiming of the clock, telling, with iron tongue, that man was drawing hourly nearer to the quiet grave.

And as the mourner lay listening to Time's slow, measured strokes, Memory was busy with the images of the loved and lost. Again they were before her in all their youthful beauty; she heard their gleeful voices and felt their fond caresses. The night wind swept coolingly into the casement, and, as it touched her throbbing brow, it seemed like the soft kisses of her loving children.

Poor mourner! Could earth furnish no magic mirror in which thou couldst always thus see the dead living? Oh, no! for as melts the fleecy cloud in to the blue depths of heaven, so passed away the blessed vision; and seeing but the coffin and the shroud, again arose on the silent air those tones of despairing anguish: "Woe is me! my sons are dead!"

Then softly and sweetly sounded forth the matin chimes, blending their holy music with the anguished cries of the bereaved mother. In the midst of her sorrow, she heard the bells' sweet harmony, and, leaving her sleepless couch, walked forth into the refreshing air. Morning was breaking cold and gray over the earth, and the stars were growing pale at the approaching step of the monarch of the day.

Slowly walks the mourner through the yet sleeping woods, whose flowers are folded in silence, and whose birds give forth no carols. She reaches the antique church and enters the sacred doors. A mysterious light—light that is almost shade—is brooding over the holy aisles, clothing in shadowy garments the pale images of departed saints; wrapping in mantle of dimness the carved sepulchres; throwing strange gleams over the tall white columns; and embracing, with pale arms, cross and picture, and antique shrine. In the midst of this mysterious light kneel a silent company; each head is bowed on the clasped hands, and no sound is heard save a deep, far distant murmuring, like the voice of the mighty wind when it passes through the leaves of the dark, old pines, dwelling in some dim, solemn woods.

Suddenly every head is lifted, and the mourner sees in that vast company friends who had been sleeping long ages in the silent tomb. All were there again; the friend of her cloudless childhood, who went down to death's cold chambers in all her stainless beauty, sinking into the grave as pure as the snow-flake that falls to the earth. And there was the sister of her home and heart, the tried friend of sorrow's shaded hours, who, in dying, left a mighty void that time could never fill. And there were the "mighty dead," they whose footsteps, when living, tracked the world with light—light that now shed a halo over their graves. And there were the meek, patient ones of earth, pale martyrs to sorrow, who struggled hopefully through the dim vapors that surround the world, and met as a reward the ineffable brightness of heaven. They were all here, all who had passed from earth amidst a fond tribute of tears and regrets.

All were here save two, those two the most dearly loved among the precious company of the dead; and wildly scanning the pale group, the mother called aloud as she missed her children: "Oh, my sons! my sons! would that I could see them but once again!"

Then arose a loud voice, and it said: "Look to the east;" and the weeping mother looked.

Oh! dreadful sight! there, by the sacred altar, rested a block and a fearful wheel. Stretched on these dreadful instruments of doom, in the coarse garb of the prison, wrestling fiercely with death in its most awful form, were two poor youths; and in their wan countenances, where crime and grief had traced their fearful march, the mother recognized her lost sons.

Dismayed, heart-sick, despairing, she motionless stands; and the deep silence is again broken by a voice speaking these words:—

"Mourner, whose every tone is a murmur at Heaven's will, whose every expression is a doubt of God's love, let this teach thee a mighty truth. See the dark path of crime they might have trod; see the agony, the shame, the maternal anguish that might have swept like a desolating tempest over thy heart; then thank thy God, in a burst of fervent praise, that he took them in unsullied youth from a world of sin to a place of safe refuge."

The voice ceased, and darkness fell like a pall on the marble floor; but through the arched windows came streaming the pale moonlight, and beneath its holy rays, the mother knelt and prayed.

There fell on her heart a blessed calm, as a voice whispered to the troubled waves of sorrow, "peace, be still."

And the angel of death stole softly in, and sealed her pale lips forever, whilst repentance and resignation were breathing from them in the music of prayer.

Oh, weeping mother! who art hanging garlands of sorrow ever fresh over thy children's tombs, take to thy bereaved heart, and ponder well, this "Mother's Lesson!"