Excerpt from Poems Welcome to Childhood, tho' thy months must bring The April skies that shadow life's young spring With smiles and tears. Welcome to Age e'en though thy steps shall lead Them nearer to their Father's home of rest Thine autumn shall perchance give them the seed Of holy purposes, a long life blest; And when their son is set behind life's hill Its rays reflected shall be with us still To give us light! Welcome New Year! Tho' Freedom God's best gift. Unto three million souls has been denied It may be thine the darksome veil to lift! Through thee be heard who long in bonds have cried! The South confess at Slavery's funeral pyre The laborer is worthy of his hire Whate'er his skin. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.