publishes rarely now. Her poems have never been collected. We trust she will collect them, and, before another year has elapsed, gratify her friends with a volume.
Mrs. Bolton was well described in an article written for the New York Home Journal, in 1850, by Robert Dale Owen:
With a finely formed head, and ample intellectual forehead, her countenance, without boasting regularity of feature, is of highly pleasing expression, especially when lighted up, as in conversation it usually is, by the bright and cheerful spirit within. Her manners are frank, lively and winning, with little of conventional form and much of genuine propriety about them.
The freedom from conventional form thus ascribed to Mrs. Bolton's manners, is a characteristic arising from the independence and force of character displayed when she abandoned poetic pleasures for domestic duties, and the spirit which then animated her, a spirit worthy of her patriotic ancestors, breathes nobly m many of her poems.
The time to labor will not always last,
And no regret, repentance or repining
Can bring to us again the buried past.
The silent sands of life are falling fast;
Time tells our busy pulses, one by one,
And shall our work, so needful and so vast,
Be all completed, or but just begun
When twilight shadows vail life's dim, departing sun?
What useful lessons have we learned and taught?
What warmth, what radiance have our hearts reflected;
What rich and rare materials have we brought
For deep investigation, earnest thought;
Concealed within the soul's unfathomed mine,
How many a sparkling gem remains un-wrought,
That industry might place on learning's shrine,
Or lavish on the world, to further God's design.
With that prevailing power, undying song.
For human good let every pen be lifted,
For human good let every heart be strong.
Is there no crying sin, no grievous wrong
That ye may help to weaken or repress.
In wayside hut and hovel, midst the throng,
Downtrodden by privation and distress,
Is there no stricken heart that ye can cheer and bless?
Sing idle lays to idle harps no longer,
Go!peal an anthem at the gate of Heaven;
Exertion makes the fainting spirit stronger.
Sing, till the bonds of ignorance are riven,
Till dark oppression from the earth is driven.
