NORTHWESTERN
UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY
EVANSTON
ILLINOIS
"A ir'j,uyg'inH-f aiiWAOH'sciioj
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Qolibas tibi .on. ,
/
THE FAMILY LIBRARY
OF
Poetry and Song.
BEING
C^0ue SjeUitmns from tl^r §jesi Hoíís,
ENGLISH, SCOTTISH, IRISH, AND AMERICAN ;
INCLUDING TRANSLATIONS FROM ANCIENT AND MODERN LANGUAGES.
i
EDITED BY
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
OTítí) ait JEntrotiuctora Creatúse ftg EOitor
ON THE
" POETS AND POETRY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE." .
OeoiBcb, anb ®nlargci>
BY THE ADDITION OF POEMS AND CLASSIFIED POETICAL QUOTATIONS.
ALSO, CONTAINING
The Biographical Memoir of Bryant,
BY JAMES GRANT WILSON.
lOitI) InîrcïcB, JUustrationa, auïr Tutogropl)ic Tac-similcs.
NEW YORK:
FORDS, HOWARD, AND HULBERT.
. "V H ' ^
.-ff
Copyright,
By J. B. Ford and Company, in 1870.
By Fords, Howard, and Hulbert, in 1878 and i88c
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PREFACE.
4
The flattering reception accorded to Mr. Br5'ant's Library of Poetry and Song
is best shown in the fact that upwards of one hundred thousand copies have
been sold since its publication in 1870, while its popularity seems in no way
diminished.
In 1876 the Publishers thought it worthy of a thorough revision, enlargement,
and improvement. Accordingly, with Mr. Bryant's active co-operation, the work
underwent an entire reconstruction : selected parts of thv^ early volume were
eliminated, and a large amount of new matter added. This entailed upon Mr.
Brj'ant much labor in revision of all the material, — cancelling, inserting, sug¬
gesting, even copying out with his own hand many poems not readily attainable
except from his private library ; in short, giving the work the genuine influence
of his fine poetic sense, his unquestioned taste, and his broad and scholarly
acquaintance with literature.
The work thus reconstructed riras f)ublished in Numbers, printed on large
paper, and with some eighty full-page illustrations, — steel portraits, wood en¬
gravings, etc., — having been completed just before Mr. Brjrant's death in 1878.
This forms a handsome work in two quarto volumes.
The demand for the original, one-volume octavo form, however, has still con¬
tinued ; and now, in order to have it as complete as possible,, it has been revised
in the light of Mr. Bryant's later labor on the quarto edition. The making of
entirely new electrotj'pe plates has given opportunit}^ to observe the suggestions
of the critics, to correct errors (especially' in the indexes, which have been brought
down to the present year in the matter of the deaths of authors), to complete
many poems of which only portions had been given, and as far as practicable to
transfer to this volume many of the improvements of the larger work.*
The design of the book cannot be better set forth than in the words of its early
Preface : —
" It has been intended in this work to gather the largest practicable compilation of the
best poems in our language, making it as nearly as possible the choicest and most complete
general collection of poetry yet published.
" The name ' Library ' which is given it indicates the principle upon which the book has '
been made, namely, that it might serve as a book of reference ; as a comprehensive exhibit
♦ In view of this fact, it has been thought appropriate to introduce the extract from Mr. Bry¬
ant's Preface to the quarto edition, which follows.
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PREFACE.
a
of the history, growth, and condition of poetical literature ; and, more especially, aa a com¬
panion, at the will of its possessor, for the varying moods of the mind.
" Necessarily limited in extent, it yet contains one fifth more matter than any similar
publication, presenting over fifteen hundred selections, from more than five hundred authors,*
and it may be claimed that of the poetical ivriters whose works have caused their names to
be'held in general esteem or affection, none are unrepresented ; while scores of the produc¬
tions of unknown authors, verses of merit though not of fame, found in old books or caught
out of the passing current of literature, have been here collated with those more notable.
And the chief object of the collection — to present an array of good poetry so widely repre¬
sentative and so varied in its tone as to offer an answering chord to every mood and phase
of human feeling — has been carefully kept in view, both in the selection and the arrange¬
ment of its contents. So that, in all senses, the realization of the significant title, ' Library,'
has been an objective point.
" In pursuance of this plan, the highest standard of literary criticism has not been made
the^only test of worth for selection, since many poems have been included which, though
less perfect than others in form, have, by some power of touching the heart, gained and
maintained a sure place in the popular esteem."
The present edition embraces a new feature, namely, the addition to each of
the departments into which the poems are divided (as "Childhood and Youth,"
" Love," " Nature," " Peace and War," etc.) of a number of briefer poetical quo¬
tations under the general head of " Fragments." These are in harmony with the
character of the respective divisions, and are also grouped under more specific
subject-titles. In the compilation of them there has been not only much careful
searching in original poetical works, but also, for hints of what are commonly-
accepted as famous or apt quotations, a consultation of various collections of such
brief passages, — those of Addington, Mrs. Hale, AVatson, Allibone, Bartlett,
and others. By far the most helpful of these has been Mr. John Bartlett's
Familiar Quotations: being an Attempt to trace to their Sources Passages and Phrases
in Common Use, published by Messrs. Little, Brown, & Co., of Boston. This
work covers not only^ the poetical but also the prose literature of the English lan¬
guage, besides the Bible, the Book of Common Prayer, and a mass of Proverbial
Expressions of miscellaneous and curious origins. It is a work of such broad
scope and rare ac curacy of detail, and it has been so fruitful of suggestion and
helpful in settling troublesome questions (for, as an authority, it holds probably
the first place), that an acknowledgment of the debt which this book owes to it is
gladly offered.
The Publishers desire to return their cordial thanks for the courtesy freely
extended to them, by which many copyrighted American poems have been allowed
to appear in this collection. In regard to a large number of them, permission
has been accorded by the authors themselves ; other poems, having been gathered
as waifs and strays, have been necessarily used without especial authority ; and,
where due credit is not given, or where the authorship may have been erroneously-
ascribed, future editions will afford opportunity for correction, which wiU be
gladly made. Particular acknowledgments are offered to Messrs. D. Appleton
* Now more than two thousand selections, representing more than six hundred authors.
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PREFACE.
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& Co. for extracts from the works of Fitz-Greene Halleck, and from the poems
of William Gullen Bryant ; to Messrs. Harper and Brothers for poems of Charles
G. Halpine and Will Carleton ; to Messrs. J. B. Lippincott & Co. for quotations
from the writings of T. Buchanan Read ; to Messrs. Charles ScribneFs Sons for
extracts from Dr. J. G. Holland's poems ; and more especially to the house of
Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin, & Co. — formerly Messrs. Fields, Osgood, & Co. —
for their courtesy in the liberal extracts granted from the writings of Aldrich,
Emerson, Holmes, Longfellow, Lowell, Florence Percy, Saxe, Mrs. Stowe, Sted-
man, Bayard Taylor, Bret Harte, Trowbridge, Mrs. Thaxter, Whittier, and
others of their unequalled list of poetical writers.
In addition to the above acknowledgments, readers will see in the "Index of
Authors " references enabling them to find the pubUshers of the works of Ameri¬
can writers to whom their attention has been called by any fragment or poem
printed in this volume. This "Library" contains specimens of many styles,
and it is believed that, so far from preventing the purchase of special authors, it
serves to draw attention to their merits ; and the courtesy of their publishers in
granting the use of some of their poems here will find a practical recognition.
The death of Mr. Bryant made it seem especially appropriate that some recog¬
nition of his life and literary career should be embodied in this conti-ibution of his
to die literature of the household, — this "Family Librar}^" as he was wont to
call it. A Memoir of him was therefore prepared bj' one who knew him long and
well,—Gen. James Grant Wilson, of New York, — and is included in this
volume, which will hereafter be known as the "Memorial Edition."
With these explanations and acknowledgments, Bryant's Family Library of
Poetry and Song is placed anew before the public.
New York, November, 1880.
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CONTENTS.
Page
Index of Authors and Titles op the Poems 8
Mr. Bryant's Introduction: Poets and Poetry or the English Language 31
Memoir of Bryant 41
Poems of Childhood and Youth 73
Poems op the Affections.
Eriendship 109
Compliment and Admiration 122
Love 135
Marriage 208
Home 216
Parting 233
Absence 241
Disappointment and Estrangement 249
Bereavement and Death 272
Poems of Sorrow and Adversity 313
Poems of Religion 349
- Poems op Nature • 401
Poems of Peace and War 497
Poems of Temperance and Labor 543
Poems of Patriotism and Freedom 561
Poems of the Sea 605
Poems of Adventure and Rural Sports 633
Descriptive Poems 673
- Poems op Sentiment and Reflection 727
Poems of Fancy 817
Poems of Tragedy 871
Personal Poems 901
Humorous Poems 941
Index op First Lines 1017
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LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
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STEEL ENGRAVING.
Portrait or William Gullen Bryant Frontispiece.
FAC-SIMILES OF AUTOGRAPH MANUSCRIPTS.
William Wordsworth To front page 42
William Gullen Bryant (three-page MS. "The Poet") 70
Edmund Clarence Stedman 74
John Keats 74
Edgar Allan Poe 74
John Howard Payne IIO
" I. — Helen Hunt Jackson 110
Thomas Hood 314
William Gilmore Simms 314
Leigh Hunt 350
JosiAH Gilbert Holland 350
Alfred Tennyson 350
Julia Ward Howe 400
Walt Whitman 402
George H. Boker 498
T. Buchanan Read 542
Nathaniel Parker Willis 544
John Greenle.af Whittier 544
Francis Scott Key 560
Oliver Wendell Holmes 562
Fitz-Greene Halleck 562
Bayard Taylor 606
George Perkins Morris 606
Elizabeth Barrett Browning 634
John Quincy Adams 634
Jean Ingelow 674
it ^ -Ö'
í£r
6 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS.
George Gordon Noel, Lord Byron 728
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow 818
Ricuajrd Henry Dana 870
Ralph Waldo Emerson 872
Thomas Gray 902
Harriet Beecher Stowe 902
Lydia Huntley Sigourney 902
John G. Saxe 942
Richard Henry Stoddard 942
James Russell Lowell 942
WOOD ENGRAVINGS.
Mr. Bryant in his Library at Cedarmere 41
Mr. Longfellow's Home, in Cambridge 79
The Old Oaken Bucket 100
Mr. Emerson's Home, in Concord 112
Mr. Lowell's Home, in Cambridge 170
Love-Letters in Elowers ■ 195
Mr. Whittier's Home, in Amesbury 275
Mr. Emerson's Study 406
The Storm 430
The Orient 451
The Treasures of the Deep 620
The Convent 676
Fisher's Rock 691
The Blind Milton and his Daughters 735
Mr. Longfellow in his Library 777
Cedarmere; Mr, Bryant's Country Home at Roslyn 788
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MR. BRYANT'S LIBRARY AT CEDARMERE.
ó-^0-^¿h^ÚrA>r¿j'
MEMOIR OF
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
By James Grant Wilson.
" Blessings be with them, and eternal praise,
Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares, —
The Poets ! who on earth have made us heirs
Of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays ! "
Personal Talk. ^
a
MEMOIR
OF
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT
BY JAMES GRANT WILSON.
CHAPÏEE I.
"The gravity and stillness of your youth
The world hath noted, and your name is great
In mouths of wisest censure."
Shakespeare.
" He had the wisdom of.age in his youth, and the fire of youth in his age."
Makk Hopkins.
Ancestors — Birth — Childhood — School and College Days — Legal Studies —■
Marriage — Publication op Poems.
Sir Walter Scott relates that, when some one was mentioned as a " fine old man " to
Dean Swift, he exclaimed with violence that there was no such thing. " If the man you
speak of had either a mind or a body worth a farthing, they would have worn him out long
ago." Béranger and Brougham, Goethe and Guizot, Humboldt and Sir Henry Holland,
Lyndhurst and Palmerston, Earl Russell and Field-Marshal Moltke, and among Americans,
J. Q. Adams and Taney, Professors Henry and Hodge, Horace Binney and Richard Henry
Dana, who died shortly after reaching the age of ninety-one — the age at which Titian said
that genius never grows old — may be cited among the men of the nineteenth century in
refutation of this theory, which it may be presumed has nothing to do with thews or stature.
But if we wanted a bright and shining example of faculties, and faculties of a high order,
remaining unimpaired in mind and body till long past the grand climacteric, we might
name William Gullen Bryant, the beloved patriarch of American poetry, and " the most ac¬
complished, the most distinguished, and the most universally honored citizen of the United
States," who, having lived under every President of our country, completed his fourscore
years and three, cheerful and full of conversation, and continued until the last week of
May, 1878, to heartily enjoy what Dr. Johnson happily calls "the sunshine of life."
No name in our contemporaneous literature, either in England or America, is crowned
with more successful honors than that of William Gullen Bryant. Bom among the granite
' hills of Massachusetts, at a period when our colonial literature, like our people, was but
recently under the dominion of Great Britain, he lived to see that literature expand from
its infancy and take a proud place in the republic of letters, and he sui-vived to see the
Republic itself, starting from its revolutionary birth, spring up to a giant power, after pass¬
ing most trinmphantly through a giant rebeUion. Surrounded by such historic and heroic
associations, men like Bryant, who survive, embody in their lives the annals of a people,
and represent in their individuality the history of a natiom
Pursuing beyond the age of fourscore an energetic literary career, the poet was also an
7
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
a
active co-laborer in all worthy movements to promote the advancement of the arts and liter¬
ature. A liberal patron of art himself, he was always the judicious and eloquent advocate
of the claims of artists. On the completion of the beautiful Venetian temple to art erected
by the New York Academy of Design, Mr. Bryant delivered the address inaugurating the
building and consecrating it to its uses. Foremost in the literary circles of his' adopted city,
he was for many years the president of that time-honored institution of New York, the
Century Club, which has always embraced among its members men of letters, prominent
artists, and leading gentlemen of the liberal professions. The poet's predecessors in that
office were Gulian C. Verplanck and George Bancroft. Philanthropic in his nature, Bryant
was ever the consistent promoter of all subjects having for their tendency the elevation of
the race and the furtherance of the interests of humanity. Connected with the leading
evening metropolitan journal, and one of the oldest in the United States, he was enabled to
bring the powerful influence of the press to bear with his own great literary renown and
personal weight upon whatever measure he supported in the cause of philanthropy, letters,
and the promotion of art.
William Cullen Bryant was bom in a log-house at Cummington, Hampshire County,
Massachusetts, November 3,1794.* He was a descendant of the English and Scotch fami¬
lies of Alden, Ames, Harris, Hayward, Howard, Keith, Mitchell, Packard, Snell, and
Washburn, and through them from several of the Pilgrims who landed from the Mayflower
at Plymouth, on the 22d of December, 1620, — not a bad genealogy for an American citizen,
nor unlike that of his brother-poet Halleck, who was descended from the Pilgrim Fathers,
including John EHot, the apostle to the Indians. Bryant also had a worthy clerical ances¬
tor in the person of James Keith, the first minister of Bridgewater, Massachusetts, who,
after having preached from the same pulpit fifty-six years, died in that town in I7I9.
Stephen Bryant, the first of the poet's American ancestors of his own name, who is
known to have been at Plymouth, Massachusetts, as early as 1632, and who some time before
1650 married Abigail Sbaw, had several children, one of whom was also named Stephen.
He was the father of Ichabod Bryant, who moved from Eaynham to West Bridgewater in
1745, bringing with him a certificate of dismission from the church at Eaynham, and a
recommendation to that of his new place of residence. Philip, the eldest of his five sons,
studied medicine, and settled in North Bridgewater, now Brockton, where his house is still
standing. Dr. Philip Bryant married Silence Howard, daughter of Dr. Abiel Howard, with
whom he studied medicine. One of their nine children, a son called Peter, bom in the year
1767, studied his father's profession, and succeeded to his practice. At that time there lived
in the same town a revolutionary veteran, " stern and severe," named Ebenezer Snell, of
whom a small boy of the period, still living, informs the writer that " all the boys of
Bridgewater were dreadfully afraid," so austere and authoritative were his manners. The
old soldier had a pretty daughter, who won the susceptible young doctor's affections, so that
when Squire Snell removed with his family to Cummington, and built what is now known
as the " Bryant Homestead," Peter Bryant followed, establishing himself there as a physician
and surgeon, and in 1792 was married to "sweet Sarah Snell," as she is called in one of the
* A general misapprehension exists as to îlr. Bryant's birthplace. He was bom, as he told the
writer, not in what is now known as the " Biyant Homestead," but in a small house constracted of
square logs, and long since removed. This fact is further confirmed by the following note from
the poet to a friend, dated December 5, 1876; "Your uncle Eliphalet Packard was quite right in
designating my birthplace. As the tradition of my family goes, I was born in a house which then
stood at the northwest comer of a road leading north of the burying-ground on the hill, and
directly opposite to the burying-ground. The house was afterwards removed and placed near that
occupied then by Daniel Dawes. I suppose there is nothing left of it now.''
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
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youthful doctor's poetic effusions. Five sons and two daughters were the fruit of this happy
marriage, their second son being the subject of this sketch. Of these seven children but
two sons survive, Arthur and John Howard Bryant of Illinois, who were present at the
poet's funeral.
Dr. Peter Bryant's bearing, I am told by an aged man who remembers him, was the very
reverse of that of his gruff father-in-law. Although reserved, he was gentle in manner,
with a low, soft voice, and always attired with scrupulous neatness. While not above the
height of his gifted son, he was broad-shouldered, and would sometimes exhibit his great
strength by lifting a barrel of cider from the ground over the wheel into a wagon. Accord¬
ing to the account of another who knew him, he was " possessed of extensive literary and
scientific acquirements, an unusually vigorous and well-disciplined mind, and an elegant and
refined taste." He was for his son William an able and skilful instructor, who chastened,
improved, and encouraged the first rude efforts of his boyish genius. A personal friend of
the poet wrote of him in 1840 : " His father, his guide in the first attempts at versification,
taught him the value of correctness and compression, and enabled him to distinguish
between true poetic enthusiasm and fustian."
The son in after-life commemorated the teachings and trainings of the father in a poem
entitled Hyrnm to Death, published in 1825, which has often been quoted for its beauty
and pathos: —
The poet's great-grandfather. Dr. Abiel Howard, a graduate of Harvard College of the
class of 1729, had an extensive library for those times, and in his youth wrote verses.
Some of these were in Mr. Bryant's possession, and, to quote his own words, " show no
small power of poetic expression." The inclination to express themselves in poetic form
reappeared in Dr. Howard's grandchildren. Dr. Bryant wrote many songs and love stanzas
in his'younger days, and some satirical political poems in middle age. His sister Ruth Bry¬
ant, who died young, left behind several meritorious poems which her nephew had read in
manuscript. When Mr. Bryant was studying law, the late Judge Daniel Howard asked him
from whom he inherited his poetic gift ; he promptly replied, from his great-grandfather.
Dr. Howard. One of the poet's surviving brothers recently said to the writer, "We were
aU addicted, more or less, to the unprofitable business of rhyming."
It was the dream of Dr. Bryant's life to educate a child for his own and his father's loved
profession, and so it came to pass that his second son was named after one of the great Scot¬
tish medical lights of that era, William Gullen, an eminent Edinburgh physician. The
child was frail, and his head was deemed too large for his body, which fact so disturbed the
worthy doctor that, unable to find in the books any remedy for excessive cerebral develop¬
ment, he decided upon a remedy of his own, and directed that the child should be daily
ducked in an adjoining spring of clear cold water. Two of Dr. Bryant's students were
deputed to carry the child from his bed each morning and to immerse him and his immense
head. The tradition is that the embryo-poet fought stoutly against this singular proceed¬
ing, of which the young mother did not approve, but which, notwitLstanding, was continued
" For he ^s in \tis grav\who taught^y youth
The art of verse, and in the end of life
Offered me the Muses. O, cut off
Untimely ! when the reason in its strength,
Ripened hy years of toil and studious search.
And watch of nature's silent lessons, taught
Thy hand to practise best the lenient art
To which thou gavest thy laborious days
And lost thy life."
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
till the discrepancy of proportion between the head and the body disappeared, and the father
no longer deemed its continuance necessary.
As a child, Bryant exhibited extraordinary precocity. He received instruction at home
from his mother, whose school education, like that of most American women of her day,
was limited to the ordinary English branches. He also was instructed by his father and an
uncle, who taught him
Bryant has happily told the story of his boyhood * in better and more entertaining style
than it can by any possibility be narrated by another. It forms a charming chapter in an
autobiography to which the venerable poet devoted an occasional hour during the closing
years of his long career. Says Mr. Bryant: —
"The boys of the generation to which I belonged—that is to say, who were born in the last
years of the last century or the earliest of this — were brought up under a system of discipline
which put a far greater distance between parents and their children than now exists. The parents
seemed to think this necessary in order to secure obedience. They were believers in the old maxim
that familiarity breeds contempt. My own parents lived in the house with my grandfather and
grandmother on the mother's side. My grandfather was a disciplinarian of the stricter sort, and I can
hardly find words to express the awe in which I stood of him—an awe so great as almost to pre¬
vent anything like affection on my part, although he was in the main kind, and certainly never
thought of being severe beyond what was necessary to maintain a proper degree of order in the
family.
" The other boys in that part of the country, my schoolmates and playfellows, were educated
on the same system. Yet there were at that time some indications that this very severe disci¬
pline was beginning to relax. "With my father and mother I was on much easier terms than
with my grandfather. If a favor was to be asked of my grandfather, it was asked with fear and
trembling; the request was postponed to the last moment, and then made with hesitation and
blushes and a confused utterance.
"One of the means of keeping the boys of that generation in order was a little bundle of
birchen rods, bound together by a small cord, and generally suspended on a nail against the wall
in the kitchen. This was esteemed as much a part of the necessary furniture as the crane that
hung in the kitchen fireplace, or the shovel and tongs. It sometimes happened that the boy
suffez-ed a fate similar to that of the eagle in the fable, wounded by an arrow fledged with a
feather from his own wing ; in other words, the boy was made to gather the twigs intended for
his own castigation.
"The awe in which the boys of that time held their parents extended to all elderly per¬
sons, toward whom our behavior was more than merely respectful, for we all observed a hushed
and subdued demeanor in their presence. Towai'd the ministers of the Gospel this behavior was
particularly marked. At that time every township in Massachusetts, the State in which I lived,
had its minister, who was settled there for life, and when he once came among his people was
undei-stood to have entered into a connection with them scai'cely less lasting than the marriage-tie.
The community in which he lived regai'ded him with great veneration, and the visits which from
time to time he made to the distiict schools seemed to the boys important occasions, for which
special preparation was made. When he came to visit the school which I attended, we all had
on ozir Sunday clothes, and wei-e ready for him with a few answers to the questions in the
Westminster Catechism. He heard us recite our lessons, examined us in the catechism, and
then began a little addi'ess, wbich I remember was the same on every occasion. He told us how
much greater weie the advantages of education which we enjoyed than those which had fallen to
the lot of our parents, and exhoi'ted us to make the best possible use of them, both for our own
"A little Latine and less Greeke."
* "The Boys of my Boyhood," St. Nicholas Magazine, December, 1876.
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
11
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sakes and that of our parents, who were ready to make any sacrifice for us, even so far as to take
the bread out of their own mouths to give us. I remember being disgusted with this illustration
of parental kindness, which I was obliged to listen to twice at least in every year.
" The good man had, perhaps, less reason than he supposed to magnify the advantages of
education enjoyed in the common schools at that time. Reading, spelling, writing, and arith¬
metic, with a little grammar and a little geography, were all that was taught, and these by persons
much less qualified, for the most part, than those who now give instruction. Those, however,
who wished to proceed further took lessons from graduates of the colleges, who were then much
more numerous in proportion to the population than they now are.
"One of the entertainments of the boys of my time was what were called the 'raisings,'
meaning the erection of the timber-frames of houses or barns, to which the boards were to be
afterward nailed. Here the minister made a point of being present, and hither the able-bodied
men of the neighborhood, the young men especially, were summoned, and took part in the work
with great alacrity. It was a spectacle for us next to that of a performer on the tight-rope to see
the young men walk steadily on the narrow footing of the beams at a great height from the
ground, or as they stood to catch in their hands the wooden pins and the braces flung to them from
below. They vied with each other in the dexterity and daring with which they went through
with the work, and when the skeleton of the building was put together, some one among them
generally capped the climax of fearless activity by standing on the ridge-pole with his head down¬
ward and his heels in the air. At that time even the presence of the minister was no restraint
upon the flow of milk-punch and grog, which, in some cases, was taken to excess. The practice
of calling the neighbors to these ' raisings ' is now discontinued in the rural neighborhoods ; the
carpenters provide their own workmen for the business of adjusting the timbers of the new
building to each other, and there is no consumption of grog.
"Another of the entertainments of rustic life in the region of which I am speaking was the
making of maple sugar. This was a favorite frolic of the boys.
"In autumn, the task of stripping the husks from the ears of Indian com was made the occa¬
sion of social meetings, in which the boys took a special part. A farmer would appoint what was
called ' a husking,' to which he invited his neighbors. The ears of maize in the husk, sometimes
along with part of the stalk, were heaped on the barn floor. In the evening lanterns were brought,
and, seated on piles of dry husks, the men and boys stripped the ears of their covering, and,
breaking them from the stem with a sudden jerk, threw them into baskets placed for the purpose.
It was often a merry time : the gossip of the neighborhood was talked over, stories were told,
jests went round, and at the proper hour the assembly adjourned to the dwelling-house, and were
treated to pumpkin-pie and cider, which in that season had not been so long from the press as to
have parted with its sweetness.
"Quite as cheerful were the 'apple-parings,' which on autumn evenings brought together
the young people of both sexes in little circles. The fruit of the orchards was pared and quar¬
tered and the core extracted, and a supply of apples in this state provided for making what
was called 'apple-sauce,' a kind of preserve of which every family laid in a large quantity
every year.
" The cider-making season in autumn was, at the time of which I am speaking, somewhat cor¬
respondent to the vintage in the wine countries of Europe. Large tracts of land in New England
were overshadowed by rows of apple-trees, and in the month of May a journey through that region
was a journey through a wilderness of bloom. In the month of October the whole population
was busy gathering apples under the trees, from which they fell in heavy showers as the branches
were shaken by the strong arms of the farmers. The creak of the cider-mill, turned by a horse
moving in a circle, was heard in every neighborhood as one of the most common of rural sounds.
The freshly pressed juice of the apples was most agreeable to boyish tastes, and the whole process
of gathering the fruit and making the cider came in among the more laborious rural occupations
in a way which diversified them pleasantly, and which made it seem a pastime. The time that was
a
12
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
given to making cider, and the number of barrels made and stored in the cellars of the farm-houses,
would now seem incredible. A hundred barrels to a single farm was no uncommon proportion,
and the quantity swallowed by the men of that day led to the habits of intemperance which at
length alarmed the more thoughtful part of the community, and gave occasion to the formation
of temperance societies and the introduction of better habits.
"The streams which bickered through the narrow glens of the region in which 1 lived were
much better stocked with trout in those days than now, for the country had been newly opened
to settlement. The boys all were anglers. 1 confess to having felt a strong interest in that 'sport,'
as I no longer call it. I have long since been weaned from the propensity of which 1 speak ; but
1 have no doubt that the instinct which inclines so many to it, and some of them our grave
divines, is a remnant of the original wild nature of man.
" 1 have not mentioned other sports and games of the boys of that day ; that is to say, of
seventy or eighty years since — such as wrestling, running, leaping, base-ball, and the like, for
in these there was nothing to distinguish them from the same pastimes at the present day. There
were no public lectures at that time on subjects of general interest ; the profession of public
lecturer was then unknown, and eminent men were not solicited, as they now are, to appear before
audiences in distant parts of the country, and gratify the curiosity of strangers by letting them
hear the sound of their voices. But the men of those days were far more given to attendance
on public worship than those who now occupy their place, and of course they took their boys
with them.
" Every parish had its tithing-men, two in number generally, whose business it was to maintain
order in the chmch during divine service, and who sat with a stem countenance through the ser¬
mon, keeping a vigilant eye on the boys in the distant pews and in the galleries. Sometimes,
when he detected two of them communicating with each other, he went to one of them, took him
by the button, and, leading him away, seated him beside himself. His power extended to other
delinquencies. He was directed by law to see that the Sabbath was not profaned by people wan¬
dering in the fields and angling in the brooks. At that time a law, no longer in force, directed
that any person who absented himself unnecessarily from public worship for a certain length of
time should pay a fine into the treasury of the county. 1 remember several persons of whom it
was said that they had been compelled to pay this fine, but 1 do not remember any of them who
went to church afterward."
Bryant's education was continued under his uncle the Eev. Thomas Snell,* of Brookfteld,
in whose family he lived and studied for one year; and by the Rev. Moses Hallock, of
Plainfield, he was prepared for college. One of his surviving brothers remembers that when
the young poet came home on visits from his uncle Snell's or " Parson Hallock's," he was
in the habit of playing at games with them, and of amusing them in various ways; that he
excelled as a runner and had many successful running contests with his college classmates;
also that he was accustomed on his home visits to declaim, for the entertamment of the
family circle, some of his own compositions, both in prose and verse. He was, when study¬
ing with the pastor, a small, delicate, and handsome youth, very shy and reserved, and a
great reader, devouring every volume that he could meet with, and resembling the hero of
Waverley in " driving through a sea of books like a vessel without pilot or rudder." He
was, I am also told by one who studied with him at that time, — now nearly seventy years
ago, — a natural scholar like his father, and although but fifteen, he had already accumulated
a vast stock of information. In a letter to the Rev. H. Seymour, of Northampton, Massa¬
chusetts, published since Mr. Bryant's death, he speaks as follows of his early studies of
• Dr. Snell was pastor of the North Parish of Brookfield for sixty-four years.
P
ö
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
13
Greek. " I began with the Greek alphabet, passed to the declensions and conjugations,
which I committed to memory, and was put into the Gospel of St. John. In two calendar
months from the time of beginning with the powers of the Greek alphabet I had read
every book in the New Testament. I supposed, at the time, that I had made pretty good
progress, but do not even now know whether that was very extraordinary." He found more
pleasure in books, and in silent rambles among the hills and valleys, than in the usual
sports and pastimes of youth of that age.
In October, 1810, when in his sixteenth year, he entered the Sophomore Class of Wil¬
liams College. He continued his studies there during one winter with the same ardor as
before, but not with the same enthusiasm or pleasure. He did not like his college life,
some features of which were distasteful to his shy and sensitive nature, and so with his
father's permission he obtained an honorable dismissal in May, 1811, and in due time he
received the degree as a member of the class of 1813, of which there are now [July, 1878]
but two survivors, the Rev. Elisha D. Barrett, of Missouri, and the Hon. Charles F. Sedg¬
wick, of Connecticut. Dr. Calvin Durfee, the historian of Williams College, writes to me
that Mr. Bryant " did not graduate in a regular course with his class; still, years ago, by vote
of the trustees of the college, he was restored to his place in the class, and has been enrolled
among the alumni."
Judge Sedgwick, imder date Sharon, July 3, 1878, writes: —
"I have your favor asking me to give you some of my recollections of the college life of my
classmate W. C. Bryant. It gives me great pleasure to comply with your request, so far as I am
able; but the short time during which he remained a member of the college could not be produc¬
tive of many events of very great interest. Since his decease, many incorrect statements in rela¬
tion to this portion of his history have gone forth, most of them intimating that he was a member
of the college for two years. The truth is that, having entered the Sophomore Class in October,
1810, and then having continued his membership for two terms, he took a dismission in May, 1811,
intending to complete his collegiate education at Yale College. As stated above, he entered our
class at the commencement of the Sophomore year. His room-mate was John Avery, of Conway,
Massachusetts, who was some eight years his senior in age. Bryant had not then attained to the
physical dimensions which he afterwards reached, but his bodily structure was remarkably regular
and systematic. He had a prolific growth of dark brown hair, and I do not remember ever to have
known a person in whom the progress of years made so great a difference in personal appearance as
it did in the case of Mr. Bryant. I met him twice near the close of his life at Williams College
Commencements, and if I had not seen pictures of him as he appeared in old age, I would hardly
have been persuaded of his identity with the Bryant 1 knew in early life.
" When he entered college, it was known that he was the reputed author of two or three short
poems which had recently been published, and which indicated decidedly promising talent on the
part of their author. When spoken to in relation to these poetical effusions, he was reticent and
modest, and in fact his modesty in everything was a peculiar trait of his character. It was very
diflBcult to obtain from him any specimens of his talent as a poet. One exercise demanded of the
students was the occasional writing of a composition, to be read to the tutor in presence of the class,
and once Bryant, in fulfilling this requirement, read a .short poem which received the decided approval
of the tutor, and once he translated one of the Odes of Horace which he showed to a few personal
friends. Those were the only examples of his poetry that 1 now remember of his furnishing during
his college Ufe. It may be stated here that the tutor who instructed Mr. Bryant in college was
the Rev. Orange Lyman, who was afterwards the Presbyterian clergyman at Vernon, Oneida
County, New York.
" Bryant, during all his college experience, was remarkably quiet, pleasant, and unobtrusive in
his manners, and studious in the literary course. His lessons were all well mastered, and not a
single event occurred during his residence which received the least disapproval of the faculty.
4
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14 WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
"Your letter reminds me of the fact that there are hut very few persons left who knew
Mr. Bryant in college. ' The Flood of Years ' has swept them all away except the Rev. Herman
Halsey, of the class of 1811, who yet survives in W^estem New York, and my classmate the Rev.
E. D. Barrett, of Missouri, and myself. If I live to see the first day of September, I shall have
completed eighty-three years of life."
The Rev. E. D. Barrett, under date Sedalia, Missouri, July 9, 1878, writes: —
"I well remember Bryant's first appearance at college in my Sophomore year. Many of the
class were assembled in one of our rooms when he presented himself. A friendly greeting passed
round the circle, and all seemed to enjoy the arrival of the young stranger and poet. News of Mr.
Bryant's precocious intellect, his poetical genius, and his literary taste had preceded his arrival.
He was looked up to with great respect, and regarded as an honor to the class of which he had
become a member, and to the college which had now received him as his alma mater. I was the
poet's senior by more than four years, having been born in January, 1790, and am, with the single
exception of Charles F. Sedgwick, the sole survivor of the Williams College class of 1813."
No American poet has equalled Bryant in early poetic development. In that particular
he surpassed Pope and Cowley and Byron. At the age of nine we find him composing
tolerably clever verses, and four years later writing The Embargo, a political as well as a
poetical satire upon the Jeffersonian party of that day. The poem is also remarkable as
having manifested at that early age a political order of mind which continued to develop in an
equal ratio with his poetical nature through life. That mind, indeed, taking higher range,
was not active in the turmoils and schemes of politicians; but it investigated the great ques¬
tions of political economy, and grappled with principles of the gravest moment to society
and humanity.
The Embargo; or, Sketch of the Times, a Satire, we could easily imagine had been
written in 1878, instead of seventy-one years ago, when, our fathers tell us, demagogism was
unknown.
" E'en while I sing, see Faction urge her claim.
Mislead with falsehood, and with zeal inflame;
Lift her black banner, spread her empire wide,
And stalk triumphant with a Fury's stride!
She blows her brazen trump, and at the sound
A motley throng obedient flock around:
A mist of changing hue around she flings.
And darkness perches on her dragon wings."
This poem, printed in Boston, attracted the public attention, and the edition was soon
sold. To the second edition, containing The Spanish Revolution and several other juve¬
nile pieces, was prefixed this curious advertisement, dated February, 1809: —
" A doubt having been intimated in the Monthly Anthology of June last, whether a youth of
thirteen years could have been the author of this poem, in justice to his merits, the friends of the
writer feel obliged to certify the fact from their personal knowledge of himself and his family, as
well as his literary improvement and extraordinary talents. They would premise that they do not
come uncalled before the public to bear this testimony: they would prefer that he should be judged
by his works without favor or affection. As the doubt has been suggested, they deem it merely an
act of justice to remove it ; after which they leave him a candidate for favor in common with other
literary adventurers. They therefore assure the public that Mr. Bryant, the author, is a native of
Cummington, in the county of Hampshire, and in the month of November last arrived at the age
of fourteen years. The facts can be authenticated by many of the inhabitants of that place, as
well as by several of his friends who give this notice. And if it be deemed worthy of further
inquiry, the printer is enabled to disclose their names and places of residence."
CÖ 3
r
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
15
a
In September, 1817, appeared in the North American Review the poem entitled Thana-
topsis, which Professor Wilson said " was alone sufficient to establish the author's claims to
the honors of genius." It was written in a few weeks, in his eighteenth year, and but
slightly retouched during the time that elapsed between its composition and its first appear¬
ance in print. The poem created a marked sensation at the time of its appearance, not
unlike that caused by the publication of Halleck's Marco Bozzaris, a few years later.
Richard H. Dana was then a member of the committee which conducted the Review, and
received the manuscript poems Thanatopsis and the Inscription for the Entrance to a
Wood. The former was understood to have been written by Dr. Bryant, and the latter by
his son. When Dana learned the name, and heard that the author of Thanatopsis was a
member of the State legislature, he proceeded to the Senate-chamber to observe the new
poet. He saw there a man of dark complexion, with iron-gray hair, thick eyebrows, well-
developed forehead, with an intellectual expression, in which, however, he failed to find
He went away puzzled and mortified at his lack of discernment. When Bryant in 1821
delivered at Harvard University his didactic poem entitled The Ages, — a comprehensive
poetical essay reviewing the world's progress in a panoramic view of the ages, and glowing
with a prophetic vision of the future of America, — Dana alluded in complimentary terms
to Dr. Bryant's Thanatopsis, and then learned for the first time that the son was the
author of both poems.
It is related that when the father showed a copy of Thanatopsis in manuscript, before
its publication, to a lady well qualified to judge of its merits, simply saying, " Here are
some lines that our AVillie has been writing," she read the poem, raised her eyes to the
father's face, and burst into tears, in which Dr. Bryant, a somewhat reserved and silent
man, was not ashamed to join. "And no wonder," continues the writer ; "it must have
seemed a mystery that in the bosom of eighteen had grown up thoughts that even in boy¬
hood shaped themselves into solemn harmonies, majestic as the diapason of ocean, fit for a
temple-service beneath the vault of heaven."
Mr. Bryant continued his classical and mathematical studies at home with a view to
entering Yale College ; but, abandoning this purpose, he became a law student in the office
of Judge Howe, of Worthington, afterwards completing his course of legal study with
William Baylies, of West Bridgewater. He was admitted to the bar at Plymouth in 1815,
and began practice at Plainfield, where he remained one year, and then removed to Great
Barrington (all these towns being in the State of Massachusetts). At Great Barringtoñ
he made the acquaintance of the author Catherine M. Sedgwick, who afterwards dedicated
to him her novel. Redwood, and of Miss Frances Fairchild. The lovely qualities of this
latter lady the young lawyer celebrated in verses which, for simple purity and delicate
imagery, are most characteristic of our poet's genius. They are elsewhere given in the
Library (on page 130), and it will be of interest to read them in connection with the
incidents of their origin. They are entitled 0 Fairest of the Rural Maids.
Miss Fairchild became Mr. Bryant's wife in 1821, and for more than twoscore years was
the "good angel of his life." She is mentioned in many of the poet's stanzas. The
Future Life (see page 275) is addressed to her. " It was written," says Mr. Bryant in a
note to me, " during the lifetime of my wife, and some twenty years after our marriage, —
that is to say, about 1840, or possibly two or three years after."
A few months after the young poet's marriage a small volume of forty-four dingy pages
was published by Hilliard & Metcalf, of Cambridge, Massachusetts, entitled Poems by
William Gullen Bryant. A copy is now lying before me. It contains The Ages, To a
Waterfowl, Translation of a Fragment of Simonides, Inscription for the Entrance to a Wood,
" The vision and the faculty divine."
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16
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
The Yellow Violet, Song, Green River, and Thanatopsis. In this rare little volume the first
and last paragraphs of the latter poem appear as they now stand, the version originally
published in the North American Review having commenced with the lines,
Last winter 1 met Mr. Bryant in a Broadway bookstore, and showed him a copy of this
early edition of his poetical writings, which the dealer in literary wares had just sold
for ten dollars. He laughingly remarked, "Well, that's more than 1 received for its
contents."
" This little life^boat of an earth, with its noisy crew of a mankind, and their troubled history, will one
day have vanished ; faded like a cloud-speck from the azure of the all! What, then, is man? He endures but
for an hour, and is crushed before the moth. Yet, in the being and in the working of a faithful man is there
already (as all faith, from the beginning, gives assurance) a something that pertains not to this wild death-element
of time ; that triumphs over time, and is, will be, when time shall be no more." — Thou as Cablyle.
Literary Career — Author, Editor, and Poet — Foreign Travels — Seventieth
Birthday Festival — Country Houses — Eightieth Birthday — Poetical and
Prose Writings—Public Addresses.
In the year 1824 Mr. Bryant's picturesque poem, A Forest Hymn, The Old Man's
Funeral, The Murdered Traveller, and other poetical compositions appeared in the United
States Literary Gazette, a weekly journal issued in Boston. The same year, at the sug¬
gestion of the Sedgwick family, he made his first visit to New York City, where, through
their influence, he was introduced to many of the leading literaiy men of the metropolis.
From the first, Bryant was averse to the dull and distasteful routine of his profession, —
He could not like it, and his aversion for it daily increased. With Slender he could say,
"If there be no great love in the beginning, yet heaven may decrease it upon better
acquaintance." His visit to New York decided his destiny. Abandoning the law, in
which he had met with a fair measure of success, having enjoyed for nine years a reasonable
share of the local practice of Great Barrington, he determined upon pursuing the career of a
man of letters, so well described by Carlyle, the " Censor of the Age," as " an anarchic,
nomadic, and entirely aerial and ill-conditioned profession," and he accordingly, in 1825,
removed to New York, which continued to be his place of residence for more than half a
century. Here he lived from earnest youth to venerable age — from thirty-one to eighty-
four — in one unbroken path of honor and success.
" Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course
and ended with the words.
"And make their bed with thee.
CHAPTEE II.
" Forced to drudge for the dregs of men
And scrawl strange words with a barbarous pen."
g
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT. 17
■a
Establishing "himself as a literary man in New York, the poet entered upon the editor¬
ship of a monthly magazine, to which he contributed The Death of the Flowers and
many other popular poems, as well as numerous articles on art and kindred subjects. This
position soon introduced Bryant into a very charming circle, composed of Chancellor Kent ;
Cooper, just achieving popularity by his American novels; the young poets Halleck, Hill-
house, and Percival; the painters Dunlap, Durand, Inman, and Morse ; the scholars Charles
King and Verplanck ; and many other choice spirits, all long since passed away.
A few days after the poet's arrival in New York he met Cooper, to whom he had been
previously introduced, who said : —
" Come and dine with me to-morrow ; I live at No. 345 Greenwich Street."
"Please put that down for me," said Bryant, "or I shall forget the place."
" Can't you remember three-four-five 1" replied Cooper, bluntly.
Bryant did " remember three-four-five " not only for the day, but ever afterward. He
dined "with the novelist according to appointment, the additional guest, besides Cooper's
immediate family, being Fitz-Greene Halleck. The warm friendship of these three gifted
men was severed only by death.
It was chiefiy through the influence of the brothers Eobert and Henry D. Sedgwick that
Mr. Bryant was induced to abandon the uncongenial pursuit of the law ; and it was through
the influence of the same gentlemen that, during the year 1826, he became connected with
the Evening Post. Mr. H. D. Sedgwick, who was among the first to appreciate the genius
of young Bryant, was a brother of Miss Sedgwick, the author, and at the time of his death,
in 1831, he was among the most prominent lawyers and political writers of that day. To
the Evening Post Mr. Bryant brought a varied experience of literary taste and learning, and
even at that time a literary reputation. Halleck at that period rendered in the Recorder a
richly deserved compliment to his brother bard, when he wrote : —
" Bryant, whose songs are thoughts that bless
The heart — its teachers and its joy —
As mothers blend with their caress
Lessons of truth and gentleness
And virtue for the listening boy.
Spring's lovelier flowers for many a day
Have blossomed on his wandering way ;
Beings of beauty and decay.
They slumber in their autumn tomb ;
But those that graced his own Green River
And wreathed the lattice of his home.
Charmed by his song from mortal doom.
Bloom on, and will bloom on forever."
The Evening Post was founded by William Coleman, a lawyer of Massachusetts, its first
number being issued on the 16th of November, 1801. Mr. Coleman dying in 1826, the
well-remembered William Leggett became its assistant editor, in which capacity he con¬
tinued for ten years. Mr. Bryant soon after his return from Europe in 1836, upon the
retirement of Mr. Leggett, assumed the sole editorial charge of the paper, performing those
duties, -with intervals of absence, till the 29th day of May, 1878, when he sat at his desk for
the last time. To the Post, originally a Federal journal, Mr. Bryant early gave a strongly
Democratic tone, taking decided ground against aU class legislation, and strongly advo¬
cating freedom of trade ; when his party at a later day passed under the yoke of slavery,
the poet followed his principles out of the party, becoming before the war a strong Eepub-
lican. In its management he was for a long time assisted by his son-in-law, Parke God-win,
gi
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18
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
and John Bigelow, late United States minister to France. Besides these able coadjutors,
the Post has had the benefit of many eminent writers of prose and verse. To its column«
Drake and Halleck contributed those sprightly and sparkling jmx d'esprit, The Croakers,
which, after nearly sixty years, are still read with pleasure. At the expiration of the Post's
first half-century, Mr. Bryant prepared a history of the veteran journal, in which his ver¬
satile pen and well-stored mind had ample range and material, in men and incidents, to do
justice to the very interesting and eventful period through which the paper had passed.
The following terse and just characterization of Mr. Bryant as a political journalist, taken
from an article which appeared in the editorial column of the Post since his death, gives an
admirable summary of the man's life and work : —
"Mr. Bryant's political life was so closely associated with his journalistic life that they must
necessarily be considered together. He never sought public office ; he repeatedly refused to hold
it. He made no effort either to secure or to use influence in politics except through his newspaper
and by his silent, individual vote at the polls. The same methods marked his political and his
journalistic life. He could be a stout party man upon occasion, but only when the party promoted
what he believed to be right principles, When the party with which he was accustomed to act did
what according to his judgment was wrong, he would denounce and oppose it as readily and as
heartily as he would the other party
"He used the newspaper conscientiously to advocate views of political and social subjects which
he believed to be correct. He set before himself principles whose prevalence he regarded as beneficial
to the country or to the world, and his constant purpose was to promote their prevalence. He
looked upon the journal which he conducted as a conscientious statesman looks upon the official
trust which has been committed to him, or the work which he has undertaken — not with a view
to do what is to be done to-day in the easiest or most brilliant way, but so to do it that it may
tell upon what is to be done to-morrow, and all other days, until the worthiest object of ambition
is achieved. This is the most useful journalism ; and, first and last, it is the most effective and
influential."
The lines with which Dr. Johnson concluded a memoir of James Thomson may with
equal truth be applied to the writings of William Gullen Bryant : " The highest praise
which he has received ought not to be suppressed : it is said by Lord Lyttleton, in the Pro¬
logue to his posthumous play, that his works contained
Though actively and constantly connected with a daily paper, the poet found ample time
to devote to verse and other literary pursuits.
In 1827 and the two following years Mr. Bryant was associated with Verplanck and
Robert C. Sands in an annual publication called The Talisman, consisting of miscellanies
in prose and verse written almost exclusively by the trio of literary partners, in Sands's
library at Hoboken. Verplanck had a curious habit of balancing himself on the back legs
of a chair with his feet placed on two others, and occupying this novel position he dictated
his portion of the three volumes to Bryant and Sands, who alternately acted as his amanu¬
ensis. In 1832 Bryant was again associated with Sands in a brace of volumes entitled
Tales of the Glauber Spa, to which Paulding, Leggett, and Miss Sedgwick were also con¬
tributors. In 1839 Mr. Bryant made a most admirable selection from the American poets,
which Vas published by the Harpers in two volumes during the following year. At the same
time they brought out a similar collection from the British poets, edited by Halleck.
So far back as 1827, Washington Irving writes from Spain to his friend Henry Brevoort
of the growing faine of Bryant and Halleck. He says : " I have been charmed with what
I have seen of the writings of Bryant and Halleck. Are you acquainted with them '( I
should like to know something of them personally. Their vein of thinking is quite above
'No line which, dying, he could wish to blot.' "
B-
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
19
that of ordinary men and ordinary poets, and they are masters of the magic of poetical lan¬
guage." Four years later, Mr. Bryant, in a letter to Irving, informs him of the publication,
in New York, of a volume comprising all his poems which he thought worth printing, and
expresses a desire for their republication by a respectable English house. In order to antici¬
pate their reproduction by any other, he requested Mr. Irving's kind aid in securing their
publication. They appeared, with an introauction by Irving, in London in 1832. Professor
Wilson said, in a periodical distinguished rbr its contempt of mediocrity: "Bryant's poetry
overflows with natural religion — with what Wordsworth calls 'the religion of the gods.'
The reverential awe of the irresistible pervades the verses entitled Thanatopsis and Forest
Hymn, imparting to them a sweet solemnity, which must affect all thinking hearts."
Another British periodical, very chary of its praise of anything American, remarked :
" The verses of Mr. Bryant come as assuredly from the ' well of English undeflled ' as the
finer compositions of Wordsworth ; indeed, the resemblance between the two living authors
might justify a much more invidious comparison."
Irving left behind him the following picture of the poetry of this distinguished American
whom his own country delighted to honor ; " Bryant's writings transport us into the depths
of the solemn primeval forest, to the shore of the lovely lake, the banks of the wild nameless
stream, or the brow of the rocky upland, rising like a promontory from amidst a wide ocean
of foliage, while they shed around us the glories of a climate fierce in its extremes but splendid
in all its vicissitudes." Dana has expressed his opinion of Bryant's poetry in equally ad¬
miring terms, and Halleck said to the writer, after repeating the whole of one of Bryant's
later poems, TTie Planting ' of the Apple-Tree* " His genius is almost the only instance
of a high order of thought becoming popular ; not that the people do not prize literary
worth, but because they are unable to comprehend obscure poetry. Bryant's pieces seem to
be fragments of one and the same poem, and require only a common plot to constitute a
unique epic." (For the poem see p. 457.)
Since the appearance of the first English edition of Bryant's poems, many others, mostly
unauthorized, have been published in Great Britain, with but slight, if any, pecuniary
advantage to their author. With one of these, which I bought at an English railway-stand
for a shilling of their currency, and brought back with me to present to the poet in October,
1855, he appeared much amused, as it contained a villanous portrait of himself, which looked,
he said, b more like Jack Ketch than a respectable poet." Many American editions of his
poetical writings have appeared, from which Mr. Bryant derived a considerable amount of
copyright, notwithstanding the remark he once made to the writer : " I should have starved
if I had been obliged to depend upon my poetry for a living." Of one of these editions, known
as the Red-line, there were five thousand copies sold in 1870, the year in which it appeared;
and of another beautiful illustrated edition issued in 1877, the entire edition was exhausted
in the course of a few months.
Intensely American in his feelings, the love of home and of his native land being among
his most cherished sentiments, Mr. Bryant, like all truly cultivated and liberal minds, pos¬
sessed an enlarged appreciation of the poetical associations of other lands. The inspirations
of the East, the glowing imagery and romantic history of Spain, the balmy breezes and sun¬
shine of the island of Cuba, — all had an enchantment and charm for his most appreciative
genius. The range of his poetic gift embraced with comprehensive sympathy the progress
* "I was most agreeably surprised, as well as flattered, the other day to receive from General
Wilson, who has collected the poetical wi'itings of Halleck, and is engaged in preparing his Life
and Letters for the press, a copy in the poet's handwriting of some verses of mine entitled The
Planting of the Apple-Tree, which he had taken the pains to transcribe, and which General Wilson
had heard him repeat from memory in his own fine manner." — Bryants Address on Halleck, 1869.
[S -a
20 WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
and struggles of humanity, seeking its vindication in a universal and enlightened liberty, in the
beauties and harmonies of nature in her many forms, and the inspirations of art in its truth¬
fulness to nature ; and all these find their legitimate expression in productions of his muse.
Between the years 1834 and 1867, inclusive, Mr. Bryant made six visits to the Old
World. In 1872 still another long journey was undertaken by him, — a second voyage to
Cuba, his tour being extended to the city of Mexico. Bryant was fond of travel, and seemed
as unwilling as that ancient worthy, Ulysses, whose wanderings he not long ago put in such
pleasing English verse, to let his faculties rest in idleness. His letters to the Evening Post,
embracing his observations and opinions of Cuba and the Old World, were collected and
published after his third visit to Europe in 1849, and were entitled The Letters of a Trav¬
eller. A few years later, after recrossing the Atlantic for the fifth time, he put forth in
book form his letters from Spain and the East. These charming volumes, " born from his
travelling thigh," as Ben Jonson quaintly expressed it, are written in a style of English prose
distinguished for its purity and directness. The genial love of nature and the lurking ten¬
dency to humor which they everywhere betray prevent their severe simplicity from running
into hardness, and give them a freshness and occasional glow in spite of their prevailing pro¬
priety and reserve. The reception which Mr. Bryant always met among literary men of
distinction, especially in Great Britain, was a direct testimony to his own fine qualities. The
poets Wordsworth and Kogers particularly extended to him most cordial and intimately
friendly attention.
Bryant's sympathy for the kindred arts was reciprocated by its votaries — though happily
not in a posthumous form — in a novel and most beautiful manner, by a tribute paid to the
poet on the anniversary of his seventieth birthday. I allude to the oflFering of paintings and
poems made to Mr. Bryant on the evening of November 5, 1864 — which was selected for
the festival — by the painters and poets of America, who cherished a love and veneration
for one standing as a high-priest at the altar of nature, singing its praises in most harmonious
numbers, and encouraging art in all its glowing beauties. An appropriate place for the
offering was the Century Club of New York, of which but five of the one hundred founders
are now living. On the occasion of the festival — a memorable one not only in the annals
of the society itself, but in the history of American art and letters — Bancroft delivered the
congratulatory address in most touching and eloquent words, and was followed by Ralph
Waldo Emerson, Richard H. Dana, Jr., and William M. Evarts, in equally felicitous addresses.
Miss Sedgwick, Mrs. Sherwood, the elder Dana, Edward Everett, Halleck, Longfellow, LoweU,
Whittier, Willis, and others who were unable to be present, sent poems and epistles of affection¬
ate greeting. Mr. Everett wrote : " 1 congratulate the Century Club on the opportunity of
paying this richly earned tribute of respect and admiration to their veteran, and him on the
weU-deserved honor. Happy the community that has the discernment to appreciate its gifted
sons ; happy the poet, the artist, the scholar, who is permitted to enjoy, in this way, a foretaste
of posthumous commemoration and fame ! " Halleck, from a sick-chamber, sent these
words : " Though far off in body, 1 shall be near him in spirit, repeating the homage which
with heart, voice, and pen 1 have, during more than forty years of his threescore and ten,
delighted to pay him." Longfellow in his letter said : " 1 assure you, nothing would give
me greater pleasure than to do honor to Bryant at all times and in all ways, both as a poet
and a man. He has written noble verse and led a noble life, and we are all proud of him."
Whittier, in felicitous stanzas, written, be it remembered, in the third year of the war,
exclaims: —
" 1 praise not here the poet's ait,
The rounded fitness of his song :
Who weighs him from his life apart
Must do his nobler nature wrong.
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5
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
" When Freedom hath her own again,
Let happy lips his songs rehearse ;
His life is now his noblest strain,
His manhood better than his verse.
" Thank God ! his hand on nature's keys
Its cunning keeps at life's full span ;
But dimmed and dwarfed, in times like the.se.
The poet seems beside the Man."
Other poetical tributes were addressed to Mr. Bryant by Boker, Buchanan Read, Mrs.
Howe, Mrs. Sigourney, Holmes, Street, Tuckerman, and Bayard Taylor ; but the feature of
the festival was the presentation to the venerable poet, in an eloquent address by the Presi¬
dent of the National Academy, of upward of twoscore oil-paintings, — gifts of the artist-
members of the Century Club, including Church, Darley, Durand, Gififord, Huntington,
Eastman Johnson, and othei-s.
Shelley, in his Defence of Poetry, asserts that " no living poet ever arrived at the
fulness of his fame : the jury which sits in judgment upon a poet, belonging, as he does, to
all time, must be composed of his peers, — it must be impanelled by Time from the select-
est of the wise of many generations." Does not the continual sale of the beloved Bryant's
poems, on which criticism and panegyric are alike unneeded, and on which the American
world has pronounced a judgment of unanimous admiration, prove him to be an exception
to the rule laid down by the dictum of the gifted Shelley Î
As promised in his Inscription for the Entrance to a Wood, to him who .should enter
and " view the haunts of Nature," " the calm shade shall bring a kindred calm," so did he
truly seem to have received a quietude of spirit, a purity and elevation of thought, a " vari¬
ous language" of expression, which held him at once in subtle sympathy with nature and
in ready communion with the minds of men. George William Curtis writes in his editorial
Easy Chair of Harper's Mayazine concerning Bryant : " What Nature said to him was plainly
spoken and clearly heard and perfectly repeated. His art was exquisite. It was absolutely
uususpected ; but it served its truest purpose, for it removed every obstruction to full and
complete delivery of his message."
In December, 1867, Mr. Bryant responded in a beautifirl letter to an invitation of the
alumni of Williams College to read a poem at their next meeting. The brief letter of decli¬
nation is poetical in its sympathy, and expresses, with pathos, not the decline of the powers
of a mind yet vigorous, but a conscientious distrust of reaching that degree of excellence
f which his admirers might expect from his previous poems : —
^ " You ask me for a few lines of verse to be read at your annual fe.stival of the alumni of Wil-
> liams College. I am ever ill at occasional verses. Such as it is, my vein is not of that sort. I
i, find it difficult to satisfy myself. Besides, it is the December of life with me ; I try to keep a few
flowers in pots, — mere remembrances of a more genial season which is now with the things of the
Ç past. If I have a carnation or two for Christmas, I think myself fortunate. You write as if I had
p nothing to do, in fulfilling your reciuest, but to go out and gather under the hedges and by the
brooks a bouquet of flowers that spring spontaneously, and throw upon your table. If I am to
^ try, what would you say if it proved to be only a little bundle of devil-stalks and withered leaves,
which my dim sight had mistaken for fresh, green sprays and blossoms ? So I must excuse myself
as well as I can, and content myself with wishing a very pleasant evening to the foster-children ot
old 'Williams' who meet on New Year's Day, and all manner of prosperity and honor to the
excellçnt in.stitution of learning in which they were nurtured."
3
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
On the evening of the I7th of May, 1870, Mr. Bryant delivered an address before the
New York Historical Society, his subject being the "Life and Writings of Gulian C. Ver-
planck." The venerable poet spoke of his friend, as in previous years he had spoken of
their contemporaries, Thomas Cole, the painter, and the authors Fenimore Cooper, Wash¬
ington Irving, and Fitz-Greene Halleck. These charming orations, together with various
addresses, including those made at the unveiling of the Shakespeare, Scott, and Morse
statues in the Central Park, were published in 1872 in a volume worthy of being possessed
by all Bryant's admirers.
The literary life which began more than sixty years ago was crowned by his translations
of Homer. He was more than threescore and ten when he set himself to the formidable
task of adding another to the many translations of the Ilia and Odyssey. The
former occupied most of his leisure hours for three years, and the latter about two ;
being completed when Mr. Bryant was well advanced in his seventy-seventh year. The
opinion has been pronounced by competent critics that these wiU hold their own with
the translations of Pope, Chapman, Newman, or the late Earl Derby, of which latter
Halleck said to the writer that " it was an admirable translation of the Iliad with the
poetry omitted ! " •
To the breakfast-table at Eoslyn I remember that Mr. Bryant one day brought some
pages in manuscript, being his morning's work on Homer ; for, like Scott, he was always an
early riser, and by that excellent habit he gained some hours each day. That Bryant, Bayard
Taylor, and Longfellow should have, during the past decade, simultaneously appeared as
translators of Homer, Goethe, and Dante, and that their work should compare favorably
with any previous renderings into English of Faust, the Divina Commedia, and of the
Iliad and Odyssey, is certainly a striking illustration of advancing literary culture in the
New World.
In 1873 Mr. Bryant's name appeared as the editor of Picturesque Americcu, a hand¬
some illustrated quarto published by the Appletons ; and the latest prose work with which
he was associated is a History of the United States, now in course of publication by
the Scribners, the second volume having been completed shortly before Mr. Bryant's
death, the residue of the work remaining in the hands of its associate author, Sidney
Howard Gay.
To the readers of this memoir a topic of especial interest will be Mr. Bryant's connection
with the volume which encloses it, — A Library of Poetry and Song. This began in 1870,
with the origination of the book in its octavo form, and continued with constant interest,
through the reconstruction and enlargement of the work in its more elaborate quarto form, until
its completion in 1878. His own words best show how it happened that Mr. Bryant became
the sponsor of this book, which, in its various editions, has already taken his name into
nearly a hundred thousand American homes. " At the request of the publishers," he says,
" I undertook to write an Introduction to the present work, and, in pursuance of this design,
I find that I have come into a somewhat closer personal relation with the book. In its prog¬
ress it has passed entirely under niy revision I have, as requested, exercised a free
hand both in excluding and in adding matter according to my judgment of what was best
* Of Mr. Bryant's translations of the Tliad and the Odyssey, the Alhaueum remarks : " These
translations are with Mr. Bryant, as with Lord Derby, the work of the ripened scholarship and
honorable leisure of age, and the impulse is natural to compare the products of the two minds.
Mr. Bryant's translations seem less laboriously rounded and ornate, but perhaps even more forceful
and vigorous, than Lord Derby's ; " while the London Times expresses the judgment that " his
performance fell flat on the ears of an educated audience, after the efforts of Loi-d Derby and others
in the same direction."
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23
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
adapted to the purposes of the enterprise." Every poem took its place after passing under
his clear eye. Many were dropped out hy him ; more were suggested, found, often copied
out by him for addition. In the little notes accompanying his frequent forwarding of mat¬
ter to the publishers, he casually included many interesting points and hints of criticism or
opinion : " I send also some extracts from an American poet who is one of our best, —
Richard H. Dana." " I would request that more of the poems of Jones Very be inserted.
I think them quite remarkable." " Do not, I pray you, forget Thomson's Castle of Indo¬
lence, the first canto of which is one of the most magnificent things in the language, and
altogether free from the faults of style which deform his blank verse." " The lines are
pretty enough, though there is a bad rhyme — toes and clothes ; but I have seen a similar
one in Dryden — clothes pronounced as cloes — and I think I have seen the same thing in
He was not a man given to humorous turns, yet he was not deficient in the sense of the
comical. In forwarding some correction for an indexed name, he writes : " It is difficult
always to get the names of authors right. Please read the enclosed, and see that Mrs.
be not put into a pair of breeches."
In specifying some additional 'poems of Stedman's for insertion, he says : " I think
Alectryon a very beautiful poem. It is rather long The Old Admiral should go
in, — under the head of ' Patriotism,' I think ; or, better, under that of ' Personal.' The
Door-Step is a poem of ' Love ' ; but it is pretty enough for anywhere," etc. " I do not
exactly like the poem To a Girl in her Thirteenth Year, on account of the bad rhymes ;
nor am I quite pleased with Praed's I remember, I remember, printed just after Hood's,—
it seems to me a little flippant, which is Praed's fault." The scrupulous care which Mr.
Bryant exercised in keeping the compilation clean and pure was exemplified in his habitual
name for it in correspondence and conversation, — " The Family Book," " The Family
Library." He writes : " I have made more suggestions for the omission of poems in the
humorous department than in any other ; several of them being deficient in the requisite
literary merit. As to the convivial poems, the more I think of it the more I am inclined
to advise their total omission."
When the book appeared in 1870, it met with an instant and remarkable popular wel¬
come, selling more than twenty thousand copies during the first six months, which, for a
bo'ok costing five dollars in its least expensive style, was certainly unusual. In 1876 it was
determined to give the work a thorough revision, although it had been from time to time
benefiting by the amendments sent by Mr. Bryant or suggested by use. Mr. Bryant took a
keen interest in this enlargement and reconstruction, and, as stated in the Publisher's Pref¬
ace to the quarto edition, it "entailed upon him much labor, in conscientious and thorough
revision of all the material, — cancelling, inserting, suggesting, even copying out with his
own hand many poems not attainable save from his private library ; in short, giving the
work not only the sanction of his widely honored name, but also the genuine influence of
his fine poetic sense, his unquestioned taste, his broad and scholarly acquaintance with liter¬
ature." Both the octavo and the quarto editions now contain his much-admired Introduc¬
tion, in the form of an essay on " The Poets and Poetry of the English Language." Of this,
Edmund Clarence Stedman, in an admirable paper on Bryant as " The Man of Letters,"
contributed to the Evening Post since the poet's death, says : " This is a model of expres¬
sive English prose, as simple as that of the Spectator essayists and far more to the purpose.
Like all his productions, it ends when the writer's proper work is done. The essay, it may
be added, contains, in succinct language, the poet's own views of the scope and method of
song, a reflection of the instinct governing his entire poetical career."
Bryant's prose has always received high commendation. A little collection of extracts
from his writings has been compiled for use in schools, as a model of style. The secret of
Whittier."
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
it, so far as genius can communicate its secrets, may Le found in a letter addressed by Mr.
Bryant to one of the editors of the Christian Intelligencer, in reply to some questions, and I
published in the issue of that journal, July 11, 1878 : —
"It seems to me that in style we ought first, and above all things, to aim at clearness of ex¬
pression. An obscure style is, of course, a bad style. In writing we should always consider not
only whether we have expressed the thought in a manner which meets our own comprehension, but
whether it will be understood by readers in generaL
" The quality of style next in importance is attractiveness. It should invite and agreeably
detain the reader. To acquire such a style, 1 know of no other way than to contemplate good mod¬
els and consider the observations of able critics. The Latin and Greek classics of which you speak
are certainly impoitant helps in forming a taste in respect to style, but to attain a good English
style something more is necessary, — the diligent study of good English authors. 1 would recur
for this purpose to the elder worthies of our literature — to such writers as Jeremy Taylor and Bar¬
row and Thomas Fuller— whose works are perfect treasures of the riches of our language. Many
modern writers have great excellences of style, but few are without some deficiency
" 1 have but one more counsel to give in regard to the formation of a style in composition, and
that is to read the poets, — the nobler and gi'auder ones of our language. In this way wannth and
energy is communicated to the diction and a musical fiow to the sentences.
" 1 have here treated the subject very briefly and meagrely, but 1 have given you my own
method and the rules by which 1 have been guided through many years mostly passed in literary
labors and studies."
On Mr. Bryant's eightieth birthday he received a congratulatory letter with its thousands
of signatures, sent from every State and Territory of his native land, followed soon after by
the presentation, in Chickering Hall, New York, in the presence of a large and appreciative
audience, of a superb silver vase, the gift of many hundred admirers in various portions of
the country. This exquisite and valuable specimen of American silver work is now in the
possession of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Standing before it, the spectator may fitly
recall those noble lines of Keats upon a Grecian urn : —
A few months later, the venerable poet presented to the citizens of Koslyn a new hall
and public reading-room, having previously given one to his native town. It was the wish
of his fellow-citizens that the handsome hall should be named in honor of Mr. Bryant ; but
as he proposed that it should be known simply as " The Hall," that title was bestowed upon
it by popular acclamation.
The Centennial Ode, written by Bryant for the opening of the International Exposition
at Philadelphia, is worthy of the great fame of its author. Another of his recent compo¬
sitions, and one of his noblest, elicited from a prominent foreign journal the following
mention: "The venerable American poet, who was bom before Keats, and who has seen so
many tides of influence sweep over the literature of his own country and of England, pre¬
sents us here with a short but very noble and characteristic poem, which carries a singular
weight with it as embodying the reflection of a very old man of genius on the mutability
of all things, and the hurrying tide of years that cover the past as with a flood of waters.
In a vein that reminds us of Thanatopsü, the grand S3anphonic blank verse of which was
" Roslvn, Loxo Island, July 6, 1863.
" When old age shall this generation waste
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to men : to whom thou sayest,
' Beauty is truth, truth beauty; that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.'"
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT. 25
published no less than sixty-one years ago, Mr. Bryant reviews the mortal life of man as
the ridge of a wave ever hurrying to oblivion the forms that appear on its surface for a
moment." In this worthy companion to Thanatopsis, written in his eighty-second year,
the poet strikes the old familiar key-note that he took so successfully in his greatest poem
in 1812, in The Ages in 1821, and again in Among the Trees in 1874. It is called The Flood
of Years. A gentleman recently bereaved was so struck by the unquestioning faith in
immortality expressed in the concluding lines of this poem that he wrote to the poet,
asking if they represented his own belief. Mr. Bryant answered him in the following note,
dated Cummington, August 10,1876: " Certainly I believe all that is said in the lines you
have quoted. If I had not, I could not have written them. I believe in the everlasting
life of the soul; and it seems to me that immortality would be but an imperfect gift without
the recognition in the life to come of those who are dear to us here."
If the harmony of the poet's career was sustained in his writings and his love of art,' it
was further manifested in the taste and affection which governed him in the selection of his
homes. Like the historian Prescott, Bryant had three residences, — a town-house and two
country homes. One of these is near the picturesque village of Eoslyn, Long Island, and
commands a view which in its varied aspect takes in a mingled scene of outspreading land
and water. The mansion, embosomed in trees and vines, an ample dwelling-place situated
at the top of the hills, was built by Richard Kirk in 1781. Mr. Bryant, who was ever
mindful of the injunction given by the dying Scotch laird to his son, " Be aye sticking in
a tree, Jock : it will be growing while ye are sleeping," alternated recreations of tree plant¬
ing and pruning and other rural occupations with his literary labor.
This country-seat at Eoslyn, called " Cedarmere," has been the resort of many distin¬
guished men of art and literature, of travellers and statesmen, gone thither to pay their re¬
spects to the sage, philosopher, and author. They were always welcomed, and enjoyed the
purity of taste and simplicity of manner which presided over the mansion. Here the ven¬
erable host continued to the last to enjoy the society of his friends; and here much of his
best literary work had been done since his purchase of the place in 1845. He was accus¬
tomed to spend most of the time there from May to the end of November of each year,
excepting the months of August and September, which were given to the old Homestead
at Cummington. Not extensive, but excellent in wide and judicious selections, was his
Cedarmere library of several thousand volumes. The poet's knowledge of ancient and
living languages enabled him to add with advantage to his collection of books the works
of the best French, German, Italian, and Spanish authors. Among his poems may be
found admirable translations from these various languages as well as from the Greek and
Latin.
Cedarmere is an extensive estate, and rich in a great variety of trees. As I was walking
on a sunny October afternoon with the poet through his loved domain, he pointed out a
Spanish chestnut-tree laden with fruit, and, springing lithely on a fence, despite his seventy-
six summers, caught an open burr hanging from one of the lower branches, opened it, and,
jumping down with the agility of a youth, handed to his city guest the contents, consisting
of two as large chestnuts as I ever saw in Spain. The Madeira and Pecan nuts were also
successfully cultivated by him at Cedannere. During another walk, Mr. Bryant gave a
jump and caught the branch of a tree with his hands, and, after swinging backward
and forward several times with his feet raised, he swung himself over a fence without
touching it.
About a quarter of a mile from the mansion, he pointed out a black-walnut tree, which
was planted by Adam Smith, and first made its appearance above ground in 1713. It had
attained a girth of twenty-five feet and an immense breadth of branches. It was the com-
10 EJ
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26 WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
fortable home of a small army of squirrels, and every year strewed the ground around its
gigantic stem with an abundance of " heavy fruit." The tree is alluded to in one of Mr.
Bryant's poems : —r
" On my cornice linger the ripe black grapes ungathered ;
Children fill the groves with the echoes of their glee,
Gathering tawny chestnuts, and shouting when beside them
Drops the heavy fruit of the tall black-walnut tree."
The taste displayed by the poet in the selection and adornment of his residence at Rosl3m
was more than equalled by the affection and veneration which fourteen years ago prompted
him to purchase the old Bryant Homestead and estate at Cummington, which had some
thirty years previous passed out of the family into other hands. The mansion is situated
among the Hampshire hills, and is a spot that nature has surrounded with scenes calculated
to awaken the early dreams of the poet, and to fill his soul with purest inspiration. In the
midst of such scenes the young singer received his earliest impressions, and descriptive of
them he has embodied some of his mo.st cherished and home-endearing poetry. To a friend
who requested information about the home of his boyhood, Mr. Bryant in 1872 wrote as
follows: —
"I am afraid that I cannot say much that will interest you or anybody else. A hundred
years since this broad highland region lying between the Housatonic and the Connecticut was prin¬
cipally forest, and bore the name of Pontoosuc. In a few places settlers had cleared away wood¬
lands and cultivated the cleared spots. Bears, catamounts, and deer were not uncommon here.
Wolves were sometimes seen, and the woods were dense and dark, without any natural openings or
meadows. My grandfather on the mother's side came up from Plymouth County, in Massachu¬
setts, when a young man, in the year 1773, and chose a farm on a commanding site overlooking an
extensive prospect, cut down the trees on a part of it, and built a house of square logs with a
chimney as large as some kitchens, within which I remember to have sat on a bench in my child¬
hood. About ten years afterward he purchased, of an original settler, the contiguous farm, now
called the Bryant Homestead, and having built beside a little brook, not very far from a spring
from which water was to be drawn in pipes, the house which is now mine, he removed to it with
his family. The soil of this region was then exceedingly fertile, all the settlers prospered, and my
grandfather among the rest. My father, a physician and sui-geon, married his daughter, and after
a while came to live with him on the homestead. He made some enlargements of the house, in
one part of which he had his office, and in this, during my boyhood, were generally two or three
students of medicine, who sometimes accompanied my ficther in his visits to his patients, always
on horseback, which was the mode of travelling at that time. To this place my father brought me
in my early childhood, and 1 have scarce an early recollection which does not relate to it.
" On the farm beside the little brook, and at a short distance from the house, stood the district
school-house, of which nothing now remains but a little hollow where was once a cellar. Here I
received my earliest lessons in learning, except such as were given me by my mother, and here,
when ten years old, I declaimed a copy of verses composed by me as a description of a district
school. The little brook which runs by the house, on the site of the old district school-house, was
in after years made the subject of a little poem entitled 77t« Rivulet. To the south of the house
is a wood of tall trees clothing a declivity, and touching with its outermost boughs the grass of a
moist meadow at the foot of the hill, which suggested the poem entitled An Inscription for (he
Entrance to a Wood.
"In the year 1835 the place passed out of the family; and at the end of thirty years I repur¬
chased it, and made various repairs of the house and additions to its size. A part of the building
which my father had added, and which contained his office, had, in the mean time, been detached
from it, and moved off down a steep hill to the side of the Westfield River. I supplied its place
J by a new wing with the same external form, though of less size, in which is now my library.
[0— —ö
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27
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WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
" The site of the house is uncommonly beautiful. Before it, to the east, the ground descends,
first gradually, and then rapidly, to the Westfield River, flowing in a deep and narrow valley, from
which is heard, after a copious rain, the roar of its swollen cunent, itself unseen. In the spring¬
time, when the frost-bound waters are loosened by a warm rain, the roar and crash are remarkably
loud as the icy crust of the stream is broken, and the masses of ice are swept along by the flood
over the stones with which the bed of the river is paved. Beyond the narrow valley of the West-
field the surface of the country rises again gradually, carrying the eye over a region of vast extent,
interspersed with farm-houses, pasture-grounds, and wooded heights, where on a showery day you
sometimes see two or three different showers, each watering its own separate district; and in winter¬
time two or three different snow-storms dimly moving from place to place.
" The soil of the whole of this highland region is disintegrated mica slate, for the most part.
It has its peculiar growth of trees, shrubs, and wild-flowers, differing considerably from those of
the eastern part of the State. In autumn the woods are peculiarly beautiful with their brightness
and variety of hues. The higher farms of this region lie nearly two thousand feet above tide-water.
The air is pure and healthful; the summer temperature is most agreeable, but the spring is coy in
her approaches, and winter often comes before he is bidden. No venomous reptile inhabits any
part of this region, as I think there is no tradition of a rattlesnake or copperhead having been
seen here."
The serenity and dignity so manifest in Bryant's writings were notable also in his person.
The poet was often depicted with pencil and pen. The phrenologists exhausted their skill
upon his noble head, and the painters and engravers their art upon his face. The former
believed him to approach the ideal of Spurzheim in his phrenological developments, and
the latter deemed him to' possess the fine artistic features of Titian and the Greek poet whom
he translated. It is a consolation to age, when protected by a wise and orderly regulated
Ufe, that its inherent dignity supplies the want, if not the place, of youth, and that the
veneration and serenity which surround it more than compensate for the passions which
turbulence renders dangerous. To such an honored age as this Bryant attained; calm, cir¬
cumspect, and sedate, he passed the perilous portals of Parnassus with his crown of laurel
untarnished and un withered by the baser breath that sometimes lurks Uke a poison within
its leaves. To my conception, he more resembled Dante in the calm dignity of his nature,
though happily not in the violent and oppressive affliction of his life, than any other poet in
history.
Having passed, by more than three winters, what the Psalmist calls " the days of our
years," and escaped the " labor and sorrow " that are foreboded to the strength that attains
fourscore, Bryant continued to perform his daily editorial duties, to pursue his studies, and
to give the world his much prized utterances, without exhibiting any evidences of physical
or mental decay, although for a good part of half a century he was under whip and spur,
with the daily press forever, as Scott expressed it, " clattering and thundering at his heels."
On the evening of January 31, 1878, he walked out on the wildest night of the winter,
when a blinding snow-storm kept many younger men at home, to address a meeting of the
American Geographical Society, and to take part in the cordial welcome extended to the
Earl of Dufferin, the accomplished Governor-General of Canada. When the president of
the society sent for a carriage and urged the aged poet, at the close of the meeting, to make
use of it, he sturdily refused, saying that he preferred to walk home.
Among Mr. Bryant's latest utterances was the following noble ode, written for Washing¬
ton's last birthday, February 22, 1878, for the Sunday School Times : —
" Pale is the February sky.
And brief the mid-day's sunny hours;
The wind-swept forest seems to sigh
For the sweet time of leaves and flowers.
'S-
^ ^ HL
\ 28 WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT. l-P
"Yet even when the summer broods
O'er meadows in their fresh array,
Or autumn tints her glowing woods,
No month can boast a prouder day.
" For this chill season now again
Brings, in its annual round, the mom
When, greatest of the sons of men.
Our glorious Washington was bom.
" Lo, where, beneath an icy shield.
Calmly the mighty Hudson flows.
By snow-clad fell and frozen fleld
Broadening the lordly river goes.
"'The wildest storm that sweeps through space.
And rends the oak with sudden force.
Can raise no ripple on his face
Or slacken his majestic course.
' Thus, mid the wreck of thrones, shall live
Unmarred, undimmed, our hero's fame.
And years succeeding years shall give
Increase of honors to his name."
Still later (May 15, 1878) Mr. Bryant wrote at Roslyn the following characteristic senti¬
ment contributed to a Decoration Day number of the Recorder : —
"In expressing my regard for the memory of those who fell in the late civil war, I cannot
omit to say that, for one result of what they did and endured — namely, the extinction of slavery
in this great republic — they deserve the imperishable gratitude of mankind. Their memory will
survive many thousands of the generations of spring flowers which men will gather to-day on their
graves. Nay, they will not be forgotten while the world has a written history."
S
à
¡p-, ^ ^
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT. 29
CHAPTEE III.
" Of no distemper, of no blast he died,
But fell like autumn fruit that mellowed long :
Even wondered at because he dropt no sooner.
Fate seemed to wind him up for fourscore years ;
Yet freshly ran he on three winters more ,
Till, like a clock worn out with eating time,
The wheels of weary life at last stood still."
John Dryden.
Mazzini Address — Last Words — Accident — Sickness — Death — Burial at
Roslyn — Tributes to his Memory.
In accordance with the expressed wishes of many personal friends of the patriarch of
American poetry, who was so recently laid in his grave with many tears, and also remem¬
bering that posterity likes details in regard to the latest actions and utterances of eminent
men, I have recorded, to the best of my recollection, some particulars of his conversation
during the afternoon of Wednesday, May 29th, his last hours of consciousness. He was
appointed to deliver an oration on the occasion of unveiling a bronze bust of Mazzini, the
Italian revolutionist and statesman, in the Central Park. I met Mr. Bryant in the Park
about half an hour before the commencement of the ceremonies, conversing with him during
that time, and again for a similar period after those ceremonials were concluded. While I
was walking with Mr. Bryant for the last time, he quoted an aphorism from his friend
Sainte-Beuve, that " To know another man well, especially if he be a noted and illustrious
character, is a great thing not to be despised." It was my good fortune to have enjoyed for
nearly or quite a quarter of a century the privilege and pleasure of Mr. Bryant's acquaint¬
ance, and in all that time I never met him in a more cheerful and conversational mood than
on the above-mentioned afternoon, and never saw him exhibit an equal depth and tender¬
ness of feeling, either in his public utterances or in his private talk.
At the proper time Mr. Bryant took his seat on the platform — for he had been standing
or seated under the welcome shade of adjoining elms — and presently he proceeded with
the delivery of the last of a long series of scholarly addresses delivered in New York during
the last thirty )'^ears. As I gazed on the majestic man, with his snow-white hair and
flowing beard, his small, keen but gentle blue eye, his light but firm lithe figure, standing
so erect and apparently with undiminished vigor, enunciating with such distinctness, I
thought of what Napoleon said of another great singer who, like our American poet, reached
an advanced age to which but few attain, and which was equally true of Bryant: " Behold
a man 1 "
The delivery of the oration, which affords most interesting evidence of the enthusiasm
and mental energy of its aged author, it is to be feared drew too heavily on the poet's failing
powers. It was uttered with an unusual depth of feeling, and for the first time in his pub¬
lic addresses, so far as I am aware, he hesitated and showed some difficulty in finding his
place in the printed slip which was spread before him, and in proceeding with his remarks.
During the delivery of his speech he was but slightly exposed to the hot sun, an umbrella
being held over his
" Good gray head, which all men knew,"
till he reached his peroration, when he stepped from under its shelter, and, looking up at the
bust, delivered with power and great emphasis, while exposed to the sun, the concluding
paragraph of his address : —
e
30
"WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
" Image of the illustrious champion of civU and religious liberty, cast in enduring bronze to
typify the imperishable renown of thy original ! Remain for ages yet to come where we place thee,
in this resort of millions ; remain till the day shall dawn — far distant though it may he — when
the rights and duties of human brotherhood shall be acknowledged by all the races of mankind ! "
At the conclusion Mr. Bryant was loudly applauded, and, resuming his seat again on the
platform, he remained an interested listener to the address in Italian which followed his.
At the close of the ceremonies, and when the poet was left almost alone on the platform, he
took my offered arm to accompany me to my home, saying that he was perfectly able to
walk there, or indeed to his own house in Sixteenth Street. Before proceeding, I again
proposed that we should take a carriage, when the poet said, in a determined manner, " I am
not tired, and prefer to walk." As we set oflF, I raised my umbrella to protect him from the
sun, when he said, in a most decided tone, " Don't hold that umbrella up on my account ;
I like the warmth of the sunshine." He was much interested in the fine flock of sheep,
together with the shepherd and his intelligent Scotch coUie, that he observed as we passed
across the green.
Mr. Bryant alluded to the death of Lord John Russell the day before, and asked if I had
ever met him or heard him speak in public, adding : "For a statesman, he devoted a good
deal of time to literature, and he appears to have been a man of respectable talents. How
old was he ? " " Eighty-six." " Why, he was older than I am ; but I expect to beat that
and to live as long as my friend Dana, who is ninety-one." " Have you any theory as to
the cause of your good health ? " " 0, yes," he answered ; " it is all summed up in one
word, — moderation. As you know, I am a moderate eater and drinker, moderate in my
work, as well as in my pleasures, and I believe the best way to preserve the mental and
physical faculties is to keep them employed. Don't allow them to rust." " But surely,"
I added, " there is no moderation in a man of eighty-three, after walking more than two
miles, mounting eight or nine pairs of stairs to his office." " 0," he merrily replied, " I
confess to the two or three miles down-town, but I do not often mount the stairs ; and if
I do sometimes, when the elevator is not there, I do not see that it does me any harm. I can
walk and work as well as ever, and have been at the office to-day, as usual."
Some mention having been made of Lord Houghton's and Tapper's recent travels in this
country, the poet asked ; " Did I ever tell you of Lord Houghton's visit to Roslyn a few
years ago 1 He was accompanied by his valet, who announced in my kitchen that his
' master was the greatest poet in England,' when one of my servants, not to be outdone,
thereupon said, ' Our man is the greatest poet in America.' " The use of the words
" master " and " man," I may remark, is worthy of notice, and appeared to amuse the
poet when relating the incident.
Passing the Halleck statue, Mr. Bryant paused to speak of it, of other statues in similar
sitting posture, and of Halleck himself and his genius, for several minutes.
Still continuing to lean on my ann, he asked my little daughter, whose hand he had held
and continued to hold during our walk, if she knew the names of the robins and sparrows
that attracted his attention, and also the names of some flowering shrubs that we passed.
Her correct answers pleased him, and he then inquired if she had ever heard some little
verses about the bobolink. She answered yes, and that she also knew the poet who wrote
them. This caused him much amusement, and he said, " I think I shall have to write
them out for you. Mary, do you know the name of that tree with the pretty blue flowers ? "
he asked, and as she did not know, he told her that it was " called the Paulovmia imperialis,
— a hard name for a little girl to remember ; it was named in honor of a princess, and was
brought from Japan."
Arriving at the Morse statue at the Seventy-second Street gate, we stopped, and he said :
3
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
31
a
" This recalls to my mind a curious circumstance. You remember Launt Thompson's bust
which the Commissioners refused to admit in the Park, on the ground that I was living 1
Well, soon after, this statue of Morse was placed here, although he was alive, and [laugh¬
ingly] I was asked to deliver the address on the occasion of its unveiling, which I did."
" Do you like your bust ? " " Yes, I think it is a good work of art, and the likeness is
pleasing and satisfactory, I believe, to my friends." " Which do you think your best por¬
trait?" "Unlike Irving, I prefer the portraits made of me in old age. Of the earlier
pictures, I presume the best are Inman's and my friend Durand's,* which you perhaps
remember hangs in the parlor at Roslyn."
As we approached my house, about four o'clock, Mr. Bryant was recalling the scenes of
the previous year on the occasion of President Hayes's first visit to New York, and he was
still, I think, cheerfully conversing on that subject as we walked up arm in arm, and all
entered the vestibule. Disengaging my arm, I took a step in advance to open the inner
door, and during those few seconds, without the slightest warning of any kind, the venerable
poet, while my back was turned, dropped my daughter's hand and fell suddenly backward
through the open outer door, striking his head on the steps. I turned just in time to see
the silvered head striking the stone, and, springing to his side, hastily raised him up. He
was unconscious, and I supposed that he was dead. Ice-water was immediately applied to
his head, and, with the assistance of a neighbor's son and the servants, he was carried into
the parlor and laid unconscious at full length on the sofa. He soon moved, became restless,
and in á few minutes sat up and drank the contents of a goblet filled with iced sherry, which
partially restored him, and he asked, with a bewildered look, " Where am I ? I do not feel
at all well. 0, my head ! my poor head ! " accompanying the words by raising his right
hand to his forehead. After a little, at his earnest request, I accompanied him to his own
house, and, leaving him in charge of his niece, went for his family physician. Dr. John F. Gray.
The following is a portion of the statement made by Dr. Gray after the poet's death : —
"I sent for Dr. Camochan, the surgeon. He could find no injury to the skull, and therefore
thought there was a chance of recovery. Mr. Bryant, during the first few day.s, would get up and
walk about the library or sit in his favorite chair. He would occasionally say something about
diet and air. When his daughter arrived from Atlantic City, where she had been for her health,
she thought her father recognized her. It is uncertain how far he recognized her or any of his
friends. The family were hopeful and made the most out of every sign of consciousness or recog¬
nition.
" On the eighth day after the fall, hemorrhage took place in the brain, resulting in paralysis,
technically called hemiplegia, and extending down the right side of the body. After this he was
most of the time comatose. He ceased to recognize his friends in any way, and lay much of the
time asleep. He was unable to speak, and when he attempted to swallow his food lodged in his
larynx and choked him. He was greatly troubled with phlegm, and could not clear his throat.
There was only that one attack of hemorrhage of the brain, and that was due to what is called trau¬
matic inflammation. After the fourteenth day he died.
"He was a man who made little demonstration of affection or emotion, but he had a pro¬
foundly sympathetic feeling for the life and mission of Mazzini, and on the day when he delivered
* The most important portraits of the poet, mentioned as nearly as possible in the order in
which they were painted, are by Henry Inman (1835) ; Prof. S. F. B. Morse (1836); Henry Peters,
Gray, S. W. Cheney, Charles Martin (1851) ; Charles L. Elliott, A. B. Durand (1854); Samuel
Lawrence (1856) ; Paul Duggan, C. G. Thompson, A. H. Wenzler (1861) ; Thomas Hicks (1863) ;
and Charles Fisher (1875). Of these I have engravings on steel now before me from Inman's,
Martin's, Elliott's, Durand's, and Lawrence's portraits, as well as several taken from recent
photographs. The portrait of Mr. Bryant which appears in this work is engraved from an admi¬
rable photograph taken by Sarony.
, 32
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
the address he exhibited considerable emotion. That and the walk afterwards certainly exhausted
him, and led to the swoon. He overtaxed his strength during the winter, in attending evening
entertainments and in public speaking. He had few intimate acquaintances, and was so extremely
modest in expressing approbation or liking that one could scarcely tell the extent of his friendly
feeling. Though 1 had attended him for many yeai-s, and often visited him at Roslyn, and also at
his old homestead in Massachusetts, I never noticed an expression of more than ordinary friendship
till 1 was prostrated by sickness. He made an impression ordinarily of coldness, but his poems
show that he had plenty of feeling, and great sympathy for mankind.
" Once when at Roslyn we visited the grave of his wife in the village cemetery, and we saw the
place by her side resei-ved for him. He frequently requested that his funeral should be simple and
without ostentation. He has had fulfilled his wish to die in June.
" Mr. Bryant owed his long life to an exceedingly tenacious and tough constitution and very pru¬
dent living. I always found him an early riser. Although he was slight of body and limb, he
seemed to me unconscious of fatigue, and he would walk many a stronger man off his legs. He
did not walk rapidly, but seemed as wiry as an Indian."
In April, 1867, Mr. Bryant expressed to the writer a wish that he might not survive the
loss of his mental faculties, like Southey, Scott, Wilson, Lockhart, and the Ettrick Shep¬
herd, who all suffered from softening of the brain, and mentioned his hope that he should
be permitted to complete his translation of Homer before death or mental imbecility, with a
failure of physical strength, should overtake him. On another occasion he said, " If I am
worth}'', I would wish for sudden death, with no interregnum between I cease to exercise rea¬
son and I cease to exist." In these wishes he was happily gratified, as well as in the time of
his being laid away to his final rest, as expressed in his beautiful and characteristic lines to
June : —
" 1 gazed upon the glorious sky.
And the green mountains round.
And thought that when I came to lie
At rest within the ground,
'T were pleasant that in flowery June,
When brooks send up a cheerful tune.
And groves a cheerful sound.
The sexton's hand, my grave to make.
The rich, green mountain turf should break." *
It was indeed a glorious day, and the daisies were dancing and glimmering over the
fields as the poet's family, a few old friends, and the villagers saw him laid in his last resting-
place at Roslyn, after a few words fitly spoken by his pastor, and beheld his coffin covered
with roses and other summer flowers by a little band of country children, who gently dropped
them as they circled round the poet's grave. This act completed, we left the aged min¬
strel amid the melody dearest of all to him in life, — the music of the gentle June breezes
murmuring through the tree-tops, from whence also came the songs of summer birds.
The following, from the pen of Paul H. Hayne, of South Carolina, is one of the many
tributes to Mr. Bryant's character and genius, that have appeared since the poet's death, from
the pens of Curtis, Holland, Osgood, Powers, Stedman, Stoddard, Street, Symington (a
Scottish singer), and many others : —
" Lo ! there he lies, our Patriarch Poet, dead !
The solemn angel of eternal peace
Has waveii a wand of my^teiy o'erjhis head,
Touched his ^rong heart, imd bade his puUes cease.
* The entire poem may be found on page 425.
P
©
a
WILLIAM GÜLLEN BRYANT.
33
" Behold, in marble quietude he lies !
Pallid and cold, divorced from earthly breath.
With tranquil brow, lax hands, and dreamless eyes ; —
Yet the closed lips would seem to smile at death.
" Well may they smile ; for death, to such as he.
Brings purer freedom, loftier thought and aim ;
And, in grand truce with immortality.
Lifts to song's fadeless heaven his star-like fame ! "
I cannot forbear adding to this expression of appreciative affection a few words from the
funeral address uttered by his pastor, the Rev. Dr. Bellows, at the commemorative ceremony
held in New York, on the 14th of June, at All Souls' Church, of which Mr. Bryant was
for the last fifteen years of his life an active and honored member. Dr. Bellows said : —
" Never, perhaps, was there an instance of such precocity in point of wisdom and maturity as
that which marked Thanatopsis, written at eighteen, or of such persistency in judgment, force,
and melody as that exhibited in his last public ode, written at eighty-three, on occasion of Wash¬
ington's last birthday. Between these two bounds lies one even path, high, finished, faultless, in
which comes a succession of poems, always meditative, always steeped in the love and knowledge
of nature, always pure and melodious, always stamped with his sign manual of faultless taste and
gcm-like purity
" A devoted lover of religious liberty, he was an equal lover of religion itself — not in any pre¬
cise dogmatic form, but in its righteousness, reverence, and charity
"It is the glory of this man, that his character outshone even his great talent and his large
fame. Distinguished equally for his native gifts and his consummate culture, his poetic inspira¬
tion and his exquisite art, he is honored and loved to-day even more for his stainless purity of life,
his unswerving rectitude of will, his devotion to the higher interests of his race, his unfeigned
patriotism, and his broad humanity
" The increasing sweetness and beneficence of his character, meanwhile, must have struck his
familiar friends. His last years were his devoutest and most humane years. He became benefi¬
cent as he grew able to be so, and his hand was open to all just needs and to many unreasonable
claimants."
No more appropriate concluding paragraph can be added to this memorial paper, which
I could wish worthier of the good and gifted Bryant — Integer vitce scelerisque purus — than
his own beautiful words, applied to his contemporary, Washington Irving. " If it were
becoming," said the poet, " to address our departed friend as if in his immediate presence,
I would say, ' Farewell, thou who hast entered into the rest prepared from the foundation
of the world for serene and gentle spirits like thine. Farewell, happy in thy life, happy
in thy death, happier in the reward to which that death is the assured passage ; fortunate
in attracting the admiration of the world to thy beautiful writings ; still more fortunate in
having written nothing which did not tend to promote the reign of magnanimous forbear¬
ance and generous sympathies among thy fellow-men. The brightness of that enduring fame
which thou hast won on earth is but a shadowy symbol of the glory to which thou art ad¬
mitted in the world beyond the grave. Thy errand on earth was an errand of peace and
good-will to men, and thou art now in a region where hatred and strife never enter, and
where the harmonious activity of those who inhabit it acknowledges no impulse less noble
or less pure than love."
JAMES GRANT WILSON.
New York, July, 1878.
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a
THE EDITOE TO THE HEADER.
[Mb. Bryant's Preface to the Revision of 1876-8.]
HE present enlarged edition of the "Library of Poetry and Song"'
has been projected with a view of making the collection more perfect,
both in the choice of poems and the variety of sources from which they
are derived. Within a very few years past several names of eminence have
been added to the list of poets in our language, and every reader would
expect to find samples of their verse in an anthology like this, to say nothing
of the air of freshness which these would give.
That the demand for compilations of this character is genuine and very
general is sufficiently demonstrated by the appearance, since the first edition
of this was published, of Emerson's " Parnassus" and Whittier's "Songs of
Three Centuries." These, however, do not seem to have supplanted Dana's
" Household Book of Poetry," which still retains its popularity. It often
happens that the same household contains several of these publications. The
present volume, moreover, in addition to the fullness of its material, has been
got up with much expense in the way of engraved illustrations, so that it will
occupy a place by itself. Regarded from a literary point of view, it owes
much to the expert hands of Mr. Knight and Mr. Raymond,* who have
assisted in its compilation and the perfecting of its details. The first edition
has proved, commercially speaking, one of the most successful publications of
♦Edward H. Knight, LL.D., since deceased, who did much work on the first edition
also, and Prof. Robert R. Raymond, Principal of the Boston School of Oratory.
84
e
TUE EDITOR TO THE READER.
the day; and if the compilation in its present shape should meet with the
same favor, the Publishers, it seems to me, can ask no more.
When I saw that Mr. Emerson had omitted to include any of his own poems
in the collection entitled " Parnassus," I doubted, for a while, whether I
ought not to have practiced the same reserve. Yet when I considered that
the omission on his part was so far a defect, and that there is not a reader of
his volume who would not have been better pleased to possess several of his
poems along with the others, I became better satisfied with what I had done,
and allowed such of my poems as I had included to remain. In one respect,
at least, the present compilation will have the advantage over Mr. Emerson's,
namely, that it contains several of the poems with which he has enriclied our
literature.
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
SI
■B
ö
EDITOR'S INTRODUCTION.
So large a collection of poems as this demands of its compiler an extensive
familiarity with the poetic literature of our language, both of the early and
the later time, and withal so liberal a taste as not to exclude any variety of
poetic merit. At the request of the Publishers I undertook to write an Intro¬
duction to the present work, and in pursuance of this design I find that I
have come into a somewhat closer personal relation with the book. In its
progress it has passed entirely under my revision, and, although not absolutely
responsible for the compilation or its arrangement, I have, as requested, exer¬
cised a free hand both in excluding and in adding matter according to my
judgment of what was best adapted to the purposes of the enterprise. Such,
however, is the wide range of English verse, and such the abundance of the
materials, that a compilation of this kind must be like a bouquet gathered
from the fields in June, when hundreds of flowers will be left in unvisited
spots as beautiful as those which have been taken. It may happen, there¬
fore, that many who have learned to delight in some particular poem will
turn these pages, as they might those of other collections, without finding their
favorite. JSTor should it be matter of surprise, considering the multitude of
authors from whom thé compilation is made, if it be found that some are
overlooked, especially the more recent, of equal merit with many whose poems
appear in these pages. It may happen, also, that the compiler, in consequence
of some particular association, has been sensible of a beauty and a power of
awakening emotions and recalling images in certain poems which other readers
will fail to perceive. It should be considered, moreover, that in poetry, as in
painting, different artists have different modes of presenting their conceptions,
each of which may possess its peculiar merit, yet those whose taste is formed
by contemplating the productions of one class take little pleasure in any other.
Crabb Eobinson relates that Wordsworth once admitted to him that he did not
much admire contemporary poetry, not because of its want of poetic merit,
but because he had been accustomed to poetry of a different sort, and added
that but for this he might have read it with pleasure. I quote from memory.
15
86
37
a
INTRODUCTION.
It is to be hoped that every reader of this collection, however he may have
been trained, will find in the great variety of its contents something conform¬
able to his taste.
I suppose it is not necessary to give a reason for adding another to the
collections of this nature, already in print. .They abound in every language,
for the simple reason that there is a demand for them. German literature,
prolific as it is in verse, has many of them, and some of them compiled by
distinguished authors. The parlor table and the winter fireside require a book
which, when one is in the humor for reading poetry, and knows not what
author to take up, will supply exactly what he wantsi
I have known persons who frankly said that they took no pleasure in read¬
ing poetry, and perhaps the number of those who make this admission would
be greater were it not for the fear of appearing singular. But to the great
mass of mankind poetry is really a delight and a refreshment. To many,
perhaps to most, it is not requisite that it should be of the highest degree
of merit. Nor, although it be true that the poems which are most famous and
most highly prized are works of considerable length, can it be said that the
pleasure they give is in any degree proportionate to the extent of their plan.
It seems to me that it is only poems of a moderate length, or else portions of
the greater works to which I refer, that produce the effect upon the mind and
heart which make the charm of this kind of writing. The proper office of
poetry, in filling the mind with delightful images and awakening the gentler
emotions, is not accomplished on a first and rapid perusal, but requires that
the words should be dwelt upon until they become in a certain sense our own,
and are adopted as the utterance of our own minds. A collection such as
this is intended to be furnishes for this purpose portions of the best English
verse suited to any of the varying moods of its readers.
Such a work also, if sufficiently extensive, gives the reader an opportunity
of comparing the poetic literature of one period with that of another; of
noting the fluctuations of taste, and how the poetic forms which are in fashion
during one age are laid aside in the next ; of observing the changes which
take place in our language, and the sentiments which at different periods
challenge the public approbation. Specimens of the poetry of different cen¬
turies, presented in this way, show how the great stream of human thought in
its poetic form eddies now to the right and now to the left, wearing away its
banks fimt on one side and then on the other. Some author of more than
common faculties and more tlian common boldness catches the public atten¬
tion, and immediately he has a crowd of followers who form their taste on his
and seek to divide with him the praise. Thus Cowley, with his undeniable
genius, was the head of a numerous class who made poetry consist in far¬
fetched conceits, ideas oddly brought together, and quaint turns of thought.
Pope, following close upon Dryden, and learning much from him, was the <
-•-ff
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INTRODUCTION.
founder of a school of longer duration, which found its models in Boileau and
other poets of the reign of Louis XIV., — a school in which the wit predomi¬
nated over the poetry, — a school marked by striking oppositions of thought,
frequent happinesses of expression, and a carefully balanced modulation, —
numbers pleasing at first, but in the end fatiguing. As this school degener¬
ated, the wit almost disappeared ; but there was no new infusion of poetry in
its place. When Scott gave the public the Lay of tlie Last Minstrel, and
other poems, which certainly, considered as mere narratives, are the best we
have, carrying the reader forward without weariness and with an interest
which the author never allows to subside, a crowd of imitators pressed after
him, the greater part of whom are no longer read. Wordsworth had, and still
has, his school ; the stamp of his example is visible on the writings of all the
poets of the present day. Even Byron showed himself, in the third canto of
Cliilcle Harold, to be one of his disciples, though he fiercely resented being
called so. The same poet did not disdain to learn of Scott in composing his
narrative poems, such as the Bride of Ahydos and the Giaour, though he could
never tell a story in verse without occasional tediousness. In our day the
style of writing adopted by eminent living poets is often seen reflected in the
verses of their younger contemporaries, — sometimes with an effect like that
of a face beheld in a tarnished mirror. Thus it is that poets are formed by
their influence on one another ; the greatest of them are more or less indebted
for what they are to their predecessors and their contemporaries.
While speaking of these changes in the pubhc taste, I am tempted to cau¬
tion the reader against the mistake often made of estimating the merit of one
poet by the too easy process of comparing him with another. The varieties of
poetic excellence are as great as the varieties of beauty in flowers or in the
female face. There is no poet, indeed no author in any department of litera¬
ture, who can be taken as a standard in judging of others ; the true standard
is an ideal one, and even this is not the same in all men's minds. One
delights in grace, another in strength ; one in a fiery vehemence and enthusi¬
asm on the surface, another in majestic repose and the expression of feeling
too deep to be noisy ; one loves simple and obvious images strikingly em¬
ployed, or familiar thoughts placed in a new light ; another is satisfied only
with novelties of thought and expression, with uncommon illustrations and
images far sought. It is certain that each of these modes of treating a subject
may have its peculiar merit, and that it is absurd to require of those whose
genius inclines them to one that they should adopt its opposite, or to set one
down as inferior to another because he is not of the same class. As well, in
looking through an astronomer's telescope at that beautiful phenomenon, a
double star, in which the twin flames are one of a roseate and the other of a
golden tint, might we quarrel with either of them because it is not colored like
its feUow. Some of the comparisons made by critics between one poet and
3
e
a
INTRODUCTION.
another are scarcely less preposterous than would be a comparison between a
river and a mountain.
The compiler of this collection has gone as far back as to the author who
may properly be called the father of English poetry, and who wrote while our
language was like the lion in Milton's account of the creation, when rising
from the earth at the Divine command and
for it was still clogged by the unassimilated portions of the French tongue, to
which in part it owed its origin. These were to be thrown aside in after years.
The versification had also one characteristic of French verse, which was soon
after Chaucer's time laid aside, — the mute or final e had in his lines the value
of a syllable by itself, especially when the next word began with a consonant.
But though these peculiarities somewhat embarrass the reader, he stiU finds in
the writings of the old poet a fund of the good old English of the Saxon fire¬
side, which makes them worthy to be studied, were it only to strengthen our
hold on our language. He delighted in describing natural objects which still
retained their Saxon names, and this he did with great beauty and sweetness.
In the sentiments also the critics ascribe to him a degree of delicacy which
one could scarcely have looked for in the age in which he wrote, though at
other times he avails himself of the license then allowed. There is no majesty,
no stately march of numbers, in his poetry, still less is there of fire, rapidity,
or conciseness ; the French and Italian nairative poets from whom he learned
his art wrote as if the people of their time had nothing to do but to attend to
long stories ; and Chaucer, who translated from the French the Itomaunt of the
Base, though a greater poet than any of those whom he took for his models,
made small improvement upon them in this respect. His Troylus and Cry-
seyde, with but little action and incident, is as long as either of the epics of
Homer. The Canterbury Tales, Chaucer's best things, have less of this defect ;
but even there the narrative is over-minute, and the personages, as Taine, the
French critic, remarks, although they talk well, talk too much. The taste for
this prolixity in narratives and conversations had a long duration in English
poetry, since we find the same tediousness, to call it by its true name, in
Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis and his Lucrece, written more than two hun¬
dred years later. Yet in the mean time the old popular ballads of England
and Scotland had been composed, in which the incidents follow each other in
quick succession, and the briefest possible speeches are uttered by the person-,
ages. The scholars and court poets doubtless disdained to learn anything of
these poets of the people ; and the Davideis of Cowley, who lived three hun¬
dred years after Chaucer, is as remarkable for the sluggish progress of the
story and the tediousness of the harangues as for any other characteristics.
. . pawing to get free
His hinder parts.
10-^.
gi
a
40 INTRODUCTION.
Between the time of Chaucer and that of Sidney and Spenser we find little
in the poetic literature of our language to detain our attention. That age
produced many obscure versifiers, and metrical romances continued to be
written after the fashion of the French and Italian poets, whom Chaucer
acknowledged as his masters. During this period appeared Skelton, the poet
and jester, whose special talent was facility in rhyming, who rhymed as if he
could not help it, — as if he liad only to put pen to paper, and the words
leaped of their own accord into regular measure with an inevitable jingle at
the endings. Meantime our language was undergoing a process which gradu¬
ally separated the nobler parts from the dross, rejecting the French additions
for which there was no occasion, or which could not easily be made to take
upon themselves the familiar forms of our tongue. The prosody of English
became also fixed in that period ; the final e, which so perplexes the modem
reader in Chaucer's verse, was no longer permitted to figure as a distinct syl¬
lable. The poets, however, still allowed themselves the liberty of sometimes
making, after the French manner, two syllables of the terminations tion and
ion, so that nation became a word of three syllables and opinion a word of
four. The Sonnets of Sidney, written on the Italian model, have all the grace
and ingenuity of those of Petrarch. In the Faerie Queene of Spenser it seems
to me that we find the English language, so far as the purposes of poetry
require, in a degree of perfection beyond which it has not been since carried,
and I suppose never wUl be. A vast assemblage of poetic endowments con¬
tributed to the composition of the poem, yet I think it would not be easy to
name one of the same length, and the work of a genius equally great, in any
language, which more fatigues the reader in a steady perusal from beginning
to end. In it we have an invention ever awake, active, and apparently inex¬
haustible ; an affluence of imagery grand, beautiful, or magnificent, as the
subject may require ; wise observations on human life steeped in a poetic color¬
ing, and not without touches of pathos ; a wonderful mastery of versification,
and the aptest forms of expression. We read at first with admiration, yet to
this erelong succeeds a sense of satiety, and we lay down the book, not unwill¬
ing, however, after an interval, to take it up with renewed admiration. I once
heard an eminent poet say that he thought the second part of the Faerie Queene
inferior to the first ; yet I am inclined to ascribe the remark rather to a falling
off in the attention of the reader than in the merit of the work. A poet, how¬
ever, would be more likely to persevere to the end than any other reader, since
in every stanza he would meet with some lesson in his art.
In that fortunate age of English literature arose a greater than Spenser.
Let me only say of Shakespeare, that in his dramas, amid certain faults im¬
putable to the taste of the English public, there is to be found every conceivable
kind of poetic excellence. At the same time and immediately after him
flourished a group of dramatic poets who drew their inspiration from nature
t0
e
INTRODUCTION.
and wrote with manly vigor. One would naturally suppose that their example,
along with the more illustrious ones of Spenser and Shakespeare, would influ¬
ence and form the taste of the succeeding age ; but almost before they had
ceased to claim the attention of the public, and while the eminent divines,
Barrow, Jeremy Taylor, and others, wrote nobly in prose with a genuine
eloquence and a fervor scarcely less than poetic, appeared the school of writers
inverse whom Johnson, by a phrase the propriety of which has been disputed»
calls the metaphysical poets, — a class of wits whose whole aim was to extort
admiration by ingenious conceits, thoughts of such unexpectedness and singu¬
larity that one wondered how they could ever come into the mind of the author.
For what they regarded as poetic effect they depended, not upon the sense of
beauty or grandeur, not upon depth or earnestness of feeling, but simply upon
surprise at quaint and strange resemblances, contrasts, and combinations of
ideas. These were delivered for the most part in rugged diction, and in num¬
bers so harsh as to be almost unmanageable by the reader. Cowley, a man of
real genius, and of a more musical versification than his fellows, was the most
distinguished example of this school. Milton, born a little before Cowley, and
like him an eminent poet in his teens, is almost the only instance of escape
from the infection of this vicious style ; his genius was of too robust a mould
for such petty employments, and he would have made, if he had condescended
to them, as ill a figure as his own Samson on the stage of a mountebank.
Dryden himself, in some of his earlier poems, appears as a pupil of this school ;
but he soon outgrew — in great part, at least — the false taste of the time, and
set an example of a nobler treatment of poetic subjects.
Yet though the genius of Dryden reacted against this perversion of the art
of verse, it had not the power to raise the poetry of our language to the height
which it occupied in the Elizabethan age. Within a limited range he was a
true poet; his imagination was far from fertile, nor had he much skiU in
awakening emotion, but he could treat certain subjects magnificently in verse,
and often where his imagination fails him he is sustained by the vigor of his
understanding and the largeness of his knowledge. He gave an example of
versification in the heroic couplet, which has commanded the admiration of
succeeding poets down to our time, — a versification manly, majestic, and
of varied modulation, of which Pope took only a certain part as the model of
his own, and, contracting its range and reducing it to more regular pauses,
made it at first appear more musical to the reader, but in the end fatigued him
by its monotony. Dryden drew scarcely a single image from his own obser¬
vation of external nature, and Pope, though less insensible than he to natural
beauty, was still merely the poet of the drawing-room. Yet he is the author
of more happy lines, which have passed into the common speech and are
quoted as proverbial sayings, than any author we have save Shakespeare ;
and, whatever may be said in his dispraise, he is likely to be quoted as long
e
a
42
INTRODUCTION.
as the English is a living language. The footprints of Pope are not those of
a giant, but he has left them scattered aU over the field of our literature,
although the fashion of writing like him has wholly passed away.
Certain faculties of the poetic mind seem to have slumbered from the time
of Milton to that of Thomson, who showed the literary world of Great Britain,
to its astonishment, what a profusion of materials for poetry Nature offers
to him who directly consults her instead of taking his images at second-hand.
Thomson's blank verse, however, is often swoUen and bladdery to a painful
degree. He seems to have imagined, like many other writers of his time, that
blank verse could not support itself without the aid of a stilted phraseology ;
for that fine poem of his, in the Spenserian stanza, the Castle of Indolence,
shows that when he wrote in rhyme he did not think it necessary to depart
from a natural style.
Wordsworth is generally spoken of as one who gave to our literature that
impulse which brought the poets back from the capricious forms of expression
in vogue before his time to a certain fearless simplicity; for it must be
acknowledged that until he arose there was scarce any English poet who did
not seem in some degree to labor under the apprehension of becoming too
simple and natural, — to imagine that a certain pomp of words is necessary
to elevate the style and make that grand and noble which in its direct ex¬
pression would be homely and trivial. Yet the poetry of Wordsworth was
but the consummation of a tendency already existing and active. Cowper
had already felt it in writing his Tosh, and in his longer rhymed poems had
not only attempted a freer versification than that of Pope, but had clothed
his thoughts in the manly English of the better age of our poetry. Percy's
Reliques had accustomed English readers to perceive the extreme beauty of
the old ballads in their absolute simplicity, and shown how much superior
these were to such productions as Percy's own Hermit of Warhworth and
Goldsmith's Edwin and Angelina, in their feeble elegance. Burns's inimitable
Scottish poems — his English verses are tumid and wordy — had taugiit the
same lesson. We may infer that the genius of Wordsworth was in a great
degree influenced by these, just as he in his turn contributed to form the taste
of those who wrote after him. It was long, however, before he reached the
eminence which he now holds in the estimation of the literary world. His
Lyrical Ballads, published about the close of the last century, were at first
little read, and of those who liked them there were few who were not afraid
to express their admiration. Yet his fame has slowly climbed from stage to
stage until now his influence is perceived in all the English poetry of the day.
If this were the place to criticise his poetry, I should say, of his more stately
poems in blank verse, that they often lack compression, — that the thought
suffers by too great expansion. Wordsworth was unnecessarily afraid of being
epigrammatic. He abhorred what is called a point as much as Dennis is said
a
INTRODUCTION.
a
to have abhorred a pun. Yet I must own that even his most diffuse amplifi¬
cations have in them a certain grandeur that fills the mind.
At a somewhat later period arose the poet Keats, who wrote in a manner
which carried the reader back to the time when those charming passages of
lyrical enthusiasm were produced which we occasionally find in the plays
of Shakespeare, in those of Beaumont and Fletcher, and in Milton's Comus.
The verses of Keats are occasionally disfigured, especially in his Endymion,
a flatness almost childish, but in the finer passages they clothe the thought
in the richest imagery and in words each of which is a poem. Lowell has
justly called Keats " over-languaged," but there is scarce a word that we should
be willing to part with in his Ode to the Nightingale, and that on a Grecian
Urn, and the same thing may be said of the greater part of his Hyperion.
His poems were ridiculed in the Edinburgh Eeview, but they survived the
ridicule, and now, fifty years after their first publication, the poetry of the
present day, by certain resemblances of manner, testifies to the admiration
with which he is still read.
The genius of Byron was of a more vigorous mould than that of Keats ;
but notwithstanding his great popularity and the number of his imitators at
one time, he made a less permanent impression on the character of English
poetry. His misanthropy and gloom, his scoffing vein, and the fierceness of
his animosities, after the first glow of admiration was over, had a repellent
effect upon readers, and made them turn to more cheerful strains. Moore had
in his time many imitators, but all his gayety, his brilliant fancy, his somewhat
feminine graces, and the elaborate music of his numbers, have not saved him
from the fate of being imitated no more. Coleridge and Southey were of the
same school with Wordsworth, and only added to the effect of his example
upon our literature. Coleridge is the author of the two most perfect poetical
translations which our language in his day could boast, those of Schiller's
Piccolomini and Death of Wallenstein, in which the English verse falls in no
respect short of the original German. Southey divides with Scott the honor
mf writing the first long narrative poems in our language which can be read
without occasional weariness.
Of the later poets, educated in part by the generation of authors which
produced Wordsworth and Byron and in part by each other, yet possessing
their individual peculiarities, I should perhaps speak with more reserve. The
number of those who are attempting to win a name in this walk of literature
is great, and several of them have already gained, and through many years
held, the public favor. To some of them will be assigned an enduring station
among the eminent of their class.
There are two tendeneies by which the seekers after poetic fame in our day
are apt to be misled, through both the example of others and the applause of
critics. One of these is the desire to extort admiration by striking novelties
I?
e
INTRODUCTION.
44
of expression ; and the other, the ambition to distinguish themselves by
subtleties of thought, remote from the common apprehension.
With regard to the first of these I have only to say what has been often
said before, that, however favorable may be the idea which this luxuriance of
poetic imagery and of epithet at first gives us of the author's talent, our
admiration soon exhausts itself. We feel that the thouglit moves heavily
under its load of garments, some of which perhaps strike us as tawdry and
others as ill-fitting, and we lay down the book to take it up no more.
The other mistake, if I may so call it, deserves more attention, since we
find able critics speaking with high praise of passages in the poetry of the
day to which the general reader is puzzled to attach a meaning. This is often
the case when the words themselves seem simple enough, and keep within the
range of the Saxon or household element of our language. The obscurity
lies sometimes in the phrase itself, and sometimes in the recondite or remote
allusion. I will not say that certain minds are not affected by this, as others
are by verses in plainer English. To the few it may be genuine poetry, althougli
it may be a riddle to the mass of readers. I remember reading somewhere of
a mathematician who was affected with a sense of sublimity by the happy
solution of an algebraical or geometrical problem, and I have been assured by
one who devoted himself to the science of mathematics that the phenomenon
is no uncommon one. Let us beware, therefore, of assigning too narrow limits
to the causes which produce the poetic exaltation of mind. The genius of
those who write in this manner may be freely acknowledged, but they do not
write for mankind at large.
To me it seems that one of the most important requisites for a great poet
is a luminous style. The elements of poetry lie in natural objects, in the
vicissitudes of human life, in the emotions of the human heart, and the rela¬
tions of man to man. He who can present them in combinations and lights
which at once affect the mind with a deep sense of their truth and beauty is
the poet for his own age and the ages that succeed it. It is no disparagement
either to his skill or his power that he finds them near at hand ; the nearer
they lie to the common track of the human intelligence, the more certain is
he of the sympathy of his own generation, and of those which shall come after
him. The metaphysician, the subtile thinker, the dealer in abstruse specula¬
tions, whatever his skill in versification, misapplies it when he abandons the
more convenient form of prose and perplexes himself with the attempt to
express his ideas in poetic numbers.
Let me say for the poets of the present day that in one important respect
they have profited by the example of their immediate predecessors ; they have
learned to go directly to nature for their imagery, instead of taking it from
what had once been regarded as the common stock of the guild of poets. I
have often had occasion to verify this remark with no less delight than surprise
Ö
e
a
INTRODUCTION.
45
on meeting in recent verse new images in their untarnished lustre, like coins
fresh from the mint, unworn and unsoiled by passing from pocket to pocket. It
is curious, also, to observe how a certain set of hackneyed phrases, which Leigh
Hunt, I believe, was the first to ridicule, and which were once used for the con¬
venience of rounding out a line or supplying a rhyme, have disappeared from
our poetry, and how our blank verse in the hands of the most popular writers
has dropped its stiff Latinisms and all the awkward distortions resorted to by
those who thought that by putting a sentence out of its proper shape they
were writing like Milton.
I have now brought this brief survey of the progress of our poetry down
to the present time, and refer the reader, for samples of it in the different stages
of its existence, to those which are set before him in this volume.
WILLIAM GULLEN BRYANT.
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a
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
ADAMS, JOHN QUINCY.
Quincy, Mass., 1767 -1848.
The Wants of Man .
ADAMS, SARAH FLOWER.
England, i8osHt848-
" Nearer, my God, to thee'
Page
732
373
ADDISON, JOSEPH.
England, 1672-1719.
Sempronius's Speech for War [Caic) . . 570
Soliloquy: On Immortality(Câ/îi) . . 759
"The spacious firmament on high " {Spectator) 376
From: — Campaign, The, 539; Cato, 310, 6oi,
631, 796, 799, 800, 802 ; Letter from Italy, 807 ;
Spectator, The, 724.
AKENSIDE, MARK.
England, 1721-1770.
Delights of Fancy {Pleasures of Imagituttion) 819
" The shape alone let others prize " . . 129
Virtuoso, The 946
From: — Pleasures of the Imagination 814
AKERMAN. LUCY EVELINA.
America.
" Nothing but leaves " 370
ALDRICH, THOMAS BAILEY.
Portsmouth, N. H.. b. 1836.
After the Rain 430
Baby Bell 79
Before the Rain ...... 427
Intaglio Head of Minerva, On an . . 749
Publishers : Houghton, Milflin, & Co., Boston.
ALEXANDER, CECIL FRANCES.
England.
Burial of Moses ....
383
ALFORD, HÈNRY.
England, b. 1810.
" Rise, said the Master, come unto the feast ". 301
ALGER, WILLIAM ROUNSEVILLE.
P'reetown, Mass., b. 1823.
Parting Lovers, The {Front the Chinese) . 236
"To Heaven approached a Sufi SA\nt {From
the Persian 0/ Dschellaleddin Rumi) . 365
Publishers ; Roberts Brothers, Boston.
ALISON, RICHARD.
England, b. I6th century.
* There is a garden in her face " {A n Moure's
Recreation in Musickey 1606) . 123
ALLEN, ELIZABETH AKERS {Florence Percy).
Strong, Me., b. 1832.
Left Behind 250
My Ship 318
Rock me to Sleep 222
Publishers: Houghton, Mifflin, &* Co., Boston.
ALLINGHAM, WILLIAM,
Ballyshannon, Ireland, b. 1828. I.ives in London, Eng.
Dirty Old Man, The 253
Faines, The 836
Lovely Mary Donnelly 198
Touchstone, The 735
ALLSTON, WASHINGTON.
Georgetown, S. C., 1779-1843.
America to Great Britain 58S
Boyhood 87
Rosalie 317
ALTENBURG, MICHAEL.
Germany, 1583-1640.
The Battle-Song of Gustavus Adolphus {Trans¬
lation) ....... 519
ANACREON.
Greece, d. 476 B. C.
Grasshopper, The {Cowley's Translation) 4S4
%'^ún%{Moore's Translation) , . 422
ANDERSEN, HANS CHRISTIAN.
Denmark. 1805-1875.
The Little Match-Girl {From the Danish) . 336
ANDROS, R. S. S.
Berkeley, Mass., d. 1859.
Perseverance 477
ANGELO, MICHAEL.
See Buonarotti, Michael Angelo.
ANSTER, JOHN.
Ireland, b. about 1798; d. 1867.
The Fairy Child 840
ARMSTRONG, JOHN.
Scotland, 1709-1779.
Building a Home {Art 0/ Preserving Health) 445
From'. — The Art of Preserving Health, 558, 809.
ARNOLD, EDWIN.
England, b. 1831.
Almond Blossom , . ' . > 457
Secret of Deaih, The ... 298
From : — Woman's Voice 795
ARNOLD, GEORGE.
New York, 1834-18^.
Golden Fish, The .... . 185
Jolly Old Pedagogue 708
September 433
Publishers: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
ARNOLD, MATTHEW.
En^nd, b. 1822.
Desire 359
Dover Beach .... 611
Forsaken Merman, The .... 826
Heine's Grave 923
Philomela 479
ASKEWE, ANNE.
England, 1529-1546.
The Fight of Faith ... . . 366
AUSTEN, SARAH.
England, b. 1803.
The Passage (From the German of Uhland) 291
AVERILL, ANNA BOYNTON.
The Birch Stream .... 692
AYTON, SIR ROBERT.
Scotland, 1570-1638.
On Love ... 140
Woman's Inconstancy ..... 267
AYTOUN, WILLIAM EDMONSTOUNE.
Scotland, 1813-1865.
Execution of Montrose, The . 877
Heart of the Bruce, The 504
BACON, FRANCIS, BARON VERULAM.
England, 1561-1626.
From : — Life . . . . 320, 792
BAILEY, PHILIP JAMES.
England, b. 1816.
Aim of Life, The {Festus) .... 742
Poet of Nature, The {Festus) . 766
From:—Festus .... 204,232
4fl
}
fi-
50
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
-a
BAILLIE, JOANNA.
Scotland, 1762-1851.
Heath-Cock, The . . • . . . 477
*'Up! Quit thy bower " 408
310
Tyler's Rebellion 559
From : — Rayner
BALL, JOHN.
England, executed at Coven^. 1381.
From : — Lines used in Wat
BARBAULD, ANNA LETITIA.
England, 1743-1825.
•' Life ! I know not what thou art " • • 303
Sabbath of the Soul) The .... 389
Summer Evening's Meditation, A , . 430
To a Ladv with some Painted Flowers . 128
From : — ** Come here, fond Youth " . . • 800
BARHAM, RICHARD HARRIS {Thomas In-
goldsbyy Esq).
England, 1788-1845.
City Bells 716
Jackdaw of Rheims, The 965
Misadventures at Margate . • 966
BARNARD, LADY ANNE.
Scotland. 1750-1825.
Auld Robin Gray 249
BARNFIELD, RICHARD.
England, 1574-1606.
Address to the Nightingale .... 480
BARON, ROBERT.
England, b. about 1630.
From : — Mirza 312
602
939
395
BARRETT, EATON STANNARD.
Eng^land, 1785-1820.
From : — Woman : Her Character and Influence 795
BARRY, MICHAEL JULAND.
From : — " The Dublin Nation," Sept. 28, 1844.
BARTON, BERNARD.
England, 1784-1849.
Bruce and the Spider
Caractacus
Not ours the vows "
Sea, The
BASSE, WILLIAM.
England, 1613-1648. '
From : — On Shakespeare ....
BAXTER, RICHARD.
England, 1615-1691.
From : — Love breathing Thanks and Praise .
BAYLY, THOMAS HAYNES.
England, 1797-1839.
The Mistletoe Bough . . . . . 891
From : — Isle of Beauty, 248 ; The Pilot, 632 ;
The Rose that all are praising, 205 ; Why
don't the men propose ? 214.
BEATTIE, JAMES.
Scotland. 1735-1803.
Hermit, The 737
Moming {TheMznsirei) .... 409
From: — The Minstrel, 493» 559» 812.
BEAUMONT, FRANCIS.
England, 1586-1616.
From: — Humorous Lieutenant, 310; Letter
to Ben Jonson, 939.
BEAUMONT, FRANCIS, and FLETCHER, JOHN.
England, 1586-1616. and 1576-1625.
Folding the Flocks 469
Hence, all ye vain delights " {Nice Valour) 315
From: — A King and no King, 395 ; Chaucer,
899; Faithful Shepherdess, 134; Four Plays
m One : The Triumph of Honor, 348 ; Knight
of Malta, 204; Love's Cure, 107, 815; Wit
without Money, io8.
BEDDOES, THOMAS LOVELL.
England, 1809-1849.
*• If thou wilt ease thine heart" . . 303
"To Sea !" 630
BEERS, MRS. ETHELIN YAAOT {EthelLynn\
Goshen, N. Y., b. 1825. Died in Orange, N. J., 1879.
The Picket-Guard . ...
Publishers : Porter & Coates, Philadelphia.
BENNETT, HENRY.
England, b. about 1785.
St. Patrick was a gentleman .... 1004
524
BENNETT, WILLIAM COX.
Greenwich, Eng., b. idaa Lives in London.
Baby May 76
Baby's Shoes 82
Invocation to Rain in Summer . , . 428
Worn Wedding-Ring, The .... 221
BENTON, MYRON B.
Amenia, N. Y., b. 1824.
The Mowers 552
BERKELEY, GEORGE.
England, 1684-1753. Bishop of Cloyne, Ireland.
On the Prospect of planting Arts and Learning
in America 587
BETHUNE, GEORGE WASHINGTON.
New York, 1805-1862.
Hymn to Night 763
BICKERSTAFF, ISAAC.
England, about 1735-1787.
From : — Love in a Village, 559, 800, 816.
BLACKER, COLONEL.
Ireland.
From I — Oliver's Advice .... 602
BLAIR, ROBERT.
England, 1699-1747.
From : — 1 he Grave, 107, 120, 30S, 310, 346, 396.
BLAKE, WILLIAM.
England, 1757-1827.
Piper, The 85
Tiger, The 468
BLAMIRE, SUSANNA.
England, 1747-1794.
The Siller Croun . . • . . 155
" What ails this heart o' mine ?" . . 245
BLANCHARD, LAMAN.
England, 1803- 1845.
The Mother's Hope 84
BLAND, ROBERT» REV.
England. 1779-1825.
Home {From the Greek) .... 225
BLOOMFIELD, ROBERT.
England, 1766 -1823.
Farmer's Boy, The 553
Lambs at Play 469
Moonlight in Summer 432
Soldier's Return, The ..... 530
BOKER, GEORGE HENRY.
Philadelphia. Pa., b. 1824.
Black Regiment, The 595
Countess Laura 886
Dirge for a Soldier 531
Prince Adeb 652
Publishers: J. B. Lippmcottdc Co., Philadelphia.
BOLTON, SARAH T.
Newp>ort, Ky.. b. 1820.
Left on the Battle-Field ..... 527
BONAR, HORATIUS.
Scotland, b. i8<d8.
* ' Beyond the smiling and the weeping " 296
Master's Touch, The ..... 388
BOOTH, BARTON.
England, 1681 -1733.
From : — Song 796
BOTTA, ANNE CHARLOTTE LYNCH.
Bennington, Vt., b. about 1820. Lives in New York.
On a Picture 247
BOURDILLON, FRANCIS W.
England, now living.
Light 13s
BOWLES, CAROLINE ANNE.
SceSOUTHEY, MRS. Caroline Bowles
BOWLES, WILLIAM LISLE.
England, 1762-1850.
" Come to these scenes of peace " . 403
Greenwood, The 454
Rhine, On the . . ... 447
BOWRING, SIR JOHN.
England, 1792-1872.
" From the recesses of a lowly spirit " . . 375
Nightingale, The {From the Portuguese) . 479
Nightingale, The {From the Duich) . . 479
B-
-Ö
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
51
BRADSTREET, ANNE.
Englai.d, b. 1612. d. America, 1672.
From: — Contemplations (Pub. in 2d ed. of
The Tenth Musty lately sprung up in A mer'
tea. Boston : 167S) 493
BRAINARD, JOHN GARDINER CALKINS.
New London. Conn., 1796- 1828.
" I saw two clouds at rooming " 137
Niagara, The Fall of . . . 449
BRANCH, MARY L. BOLLES.
Brooklyn. N. Y., b. New London. Conn., 1840.
The Petrified Fern 863
BRENAN, JOSEPH.
Ireland, b. 1829 ; d. in New Orleans, 1857.
Come to me, dearest " • . . . 247
BRETON, NICHOLAS.
England, X5S5-1624.
** 1 would I were an excellent divine " 362
Phillida and Corydon . . . • . 136
Phillis the Fair ... 124
BRISTOL, LORD
See DIGBY, JOHN, EARL OF BRISTOL.
BROOKS, CHARLES TIMOTHY.
Salem. Mass., b. 1813. Lives in Newport, R. I.
Alpine Heights {From the German 0/ Krum-
macher) 445
Fisher, The {From the German of Goethe) . 825
Good Night {From the German of /Córner) . 558
Men and Boys {From the German of K'ómer) 583
Nobleman and the Pensioner, The {From the
German of Pfeffel) ...... 520
Sword Song, The {From the German of
/Córner) giç
Winter Song {From the German of Ludwiz
HoUy) 434
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
BROOKS, MARIA {Maria del Occidente),
Medford, Mass., 179^-1845.
" Day, in melting purple dying " . , 245
Disappointment {Zophiel^ or the Bride of
Seven) 26]
Publishers : Lee & Shepard, Boston.
BROWN, FRANCES.
Ireland, 1818-1864.
Losses 333
" O the pleasant days of old !" . . 699
BROWNE, SIR THOMAS.
England, 1605-1682.
From : — Religio Medió .... 310
BROWNE, WILLIAM.
England, 1590-1645.
My Choice 140
Siren*s Song, The {inner Temple Masqne). 825
** Welcome, welcome, do I sing" . . . 126
From : — Britannia's Pastorals . , 938
BROWNELL, HENRY HOWARD.
Providence. R. I., 1824-1872.
Lawyer's Invocation to Spring, The . . 99a
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
BROWNING, ELIZABETH BARRETT.
England, 1B09-1861.
Court Lady, A 585
George Sand, Sonnets To ... . 923
Lady's Yes, The ...... 144
Lord Walter's Wife 217
Mother and Poet . . . 283
Musical Instrument, A 865
Parting Lovers {Sienna) 236
Pet Name, The 89
Portrait, A 97
Romance of the Swan's Nest, The . . 102
Sleep 762
Sonnets from the Portuguese • . . 189
View across the Roman Campagna, A . . 683
Wordsworth, On a Portrait of . . . 914 !
BROWNING, ROBERT.
En^and, b. 1812.
Evelyn Hope 284
Flower's Name, The 147
Hervé Riel 617
How they brought the Good News from Ghent
to Aix 513
In a Year 260
Incident of the French Camp 513
Meeting . . 170
Pied Piper of Hamelin, The 849
The King is cold 884
"The Moth's kiss, first ! " {In a Gondola) . 188
From:—One Word more, 399; Paracelsus, 801,
808.
BRYANT, JOHN HOWARD.
Cummin^on, Mass.. b. 1807.
Little CioucL The .. 0 . 593
Valley Brook, The 447
Winter 438
BRYANT, WILLIAM CULLEN.
Cummin^on, Mass., 1794-1878.
America 587
Battle-Field, The 534
Blessed are they that mourn " . . 743
Death of the Flowers, The .... 466
Evening Wind, The . . 411
Fatima and Raduan {From the Spanish) 166
Flood of Years, The ..... 750
Forest P^mn, A 452
Fringed Gentian, To the . 463
Future Life, The 275
Hurricane, The 686
¿une 425
ove of God, The {From the Provençal) 388
Mosquito, To a ^7
My Autumn Walk . . . . 535
" O, fairest of the rural maids " . . 130
Planting of the Apple^Tree, The . -w 457
{Manuscript facsimile) ... 78
Robert of Lincoln — 476
Snow-Shower, The 440
Song of Marion's Men. ... 589
Thanatopsis 307
To a Waterfowl ...... 481 •<-
Washington's Birthday, Ode for . . . 62
From: — Autumn Woods, 494; March, 492;
Scene on the Banks of the Hudson, 309.
Publishers x D. Appleton & Co., New York.
BRYDGES, SIR SAMUEL EGERTON.
England, 1762 -1837.
Echo and Silence 865
BUCHANAN, ROBERT.
Scotland, b. 1841.
Fra Giacomo 885
Little Milliner, The 181
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE, JOHN SHEFFIELD,
DUKE OF.
England, 1649-1720.
From : — Essay on Poetry .... 806
BUNYAN, JOHN.
England, 1628-1688.
From : — Pilgrim's Progress . 347, 805
BUONAROTTI, MICHAEL ANGELO.
Italy. 1474-1563-
" If it be true that any beauteous thing" {f. E.
TayloPs Translation) 135
" The might of one fair face " ( Taylor*s Transi) 135
From : — Sonnet {Mrs. Henry Roscoe*s 7rans.) 809
BURLEIGH, GEORGE S.
America.
A Prayer for Life 380
BURLEIGH, WILLIAM H.
Woodstock, Conn., b. 1812.
Deborah Lee 1005
BURNS, ROBERT.
Scotland, 1759-1796.
Ae fond kiss before we part . • > . 233
Afton Water 447
Auld Lang Syne 118
Banks o' Doon, The 249
Bannockbum 573.
Bard's Epitaph, A 917
*' Ca' the yowes to the knowes " . , . 153
Comin' through the Rye ..... 187
Cotter's Saturday Night, The . . . 385
" Duncan Gray cam'here to woo " , . 196
Elegy on Captain Henderson . , . 917
" For a' that and a* that " . . . . 34*
" Green grow the rashes, O ! " . ï9'
I love my Jean 242
"John Anderson,, my Jo " 222
Ô2
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
John Barleycorn ....
Let not woman e*er complain "
Louse, To a
Man was made to mourn
Mary in Heaven, To . . .
Mary Morison .....
Mountain Daisy, To a . . .
Mouse, To a
My Heart's in the Highlands.
*^My wife's a winsome wee thing "
O my luve like a red, red rose
" O, saw ye bonuie Lesley ?"
Tarn O'Shanter ....
The day returns, my bosom bums " .
Toothache, Address to the
To the Unco Guid ....
" Whistle and 1 Ml come to you, my lad "
From : — Despondency, 345 ; Epistle from Eso-
pus to Maria, 346 ; Epistle to Davie, 348 ;
Epistle to a Young Friend, 395, 396, 796;
Epistle to James Smith, 108; Jessy, 134:
On Captain Grose's Peregrinations through
Scotland, 805; Sensibility, 204; Vision,
The, 309.
BUTLER. SAMUEL.
England, 1600-1680.
Hudibras' Sword and Dagger ....
Hudibras, The Logic of ... .
Hudibras, The Religion of ... .
From: — Hudibras, 108, 205, 215, 309, 347, 395»
396, 490, 540, 632, 671, 803, 804, 807, 808, 809.
BUTLER, WILLIAM ALLEN.
Albany, N. Y., d. 1825.
" Nothing to wear " ....
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
BYRON, JOHN.
England, 1691 -1763.
A Pastoral
BYRON, GEORGE GORDON NOEL, LORD
England, 1788- 1824.
" Adieu, adieu ! my native shore " .
Augusta, To . >
Coliseum by Moonlight {Man/red)
Co\\%t\xm^Th^{Chüdé Harold) .
Daniel Boone {Don yuan ) . . .
Destruction of Sennacherib, The {Hebrew
Melodies)
Dream, The
Evening {Don yuan)
" Farewell, if ever fondest prayer"
Farewell to his Wife
Filial Love {Childe Harold)
First Love {Don yuan) .
Greece (The Giaour) .
Greece {Ckilde Harold) .
Greek Poet Song of the {Don Juan) .
Lake Leman, Calm and Storm on {Childe
Harold )
Latest Verses
" Maid of Athens, ere we part "
yiyirzi {Odeyrom the French)
Napoleon {Childe Harold)....
Night .......
Ox\evXyT\\e {Bride 0/Ahydos.)
** O, snatched away in beauty's bloom "
'P^TiiheoTi {Childe Harold) ....
Picture of Death, A ( The Giaour) .
Poet's Impulse {Childe Harold) .
Prisoner of Chillón, The ....
Rhine, The (CÄi/Ä
Rover, Song of the ( The Corsair) .
Sea, The {Childe Harold) ....
She walks in beauty " {Hebrew Melodies)
Swimming ( Two Foscari) ....
"The kiss, dear maid " ....
Thomas Moore, To
Transient Beauty {Tho Giaour)
Waterloo (Childe Harold) ....
From: — Beppo, 721, 795, 801, 814; Bride of
Abydos, 134, 206, 231, 309, 541,720; Childe
Harold, 133,134,206,341,271,396.397» 49®» 493»
541, 720, 725. 726, 792, 796, 800,. 8i2, 813, 867,
869,938 ; Corsair, 348,812 ; Death of Sheridan,
940; Doge of Venice, 491 ; Don Juan, 107,
944
194
486
332
288
149
462
468
659
216
234
242
847
2i8
952
784
156
506
945
387
981
245
238
223
680
681
926
501
764
413
238
238
222
166
581
581
580
685
250
234
913
911
4*5
45*
288
682
303
767
70.3
446
626
607
130
669
234
920
267
5"
203, 204, 205, 215, 30g, 310, 396, 490, 631, 632,
671, 794, 796, 80^, 808,809, 8zi ; English Bards
and Scotch Reviewers, 215, 397» 800, 804, 805,
806,940 ; Giaour, The, 205, 307, 271, 312, 816 ;
Island, The, 814 ; Lara, 346, 49© ; Letter, 793 ;
Manfred, 107, 108, 493; Mazeppa, 899; Par¬
isina, 491, 899: Sardanapalus, 241, 794 ; Waltz,
The, 814 ; " When we two parted," 241.
CALDWELL, WILLIAM W.
Newburyport, Mass., b. 1823.
Rose-Bush, The {From thé Germad)
CALIDASA.
India, ist Century B. C.
Baby, The {Sir JVtlliam yones*s Trans.)
omzxi {Horace H. IVilsotCs Trans.)
CALLANAN. JEREMIAH JOSEPH.
Ireland, 1795-1829.
Gougaune Barra
CALVERLEY, CHARLES S.
England, b. 1831.
Arab, The
Cock and the Bull, The ....
Disaster
Lovers and a Reflection
741
78
776
577
lOIO
1008
99*
1010
Motherhood 991
To Tobacco
990
412
578
788
5*3
743
185
573
338
*44
616
583
74*
529
629
CAMOENS, LUIS DE.
Portuiral. 1524- 1579.
Blighted 'L.ove{LordStrang/ord*s Trans.)
CAMPBELL, THOMAS.
Scotland, 1777-1844.
Evening Star, The
Exile of Erin ....
Hallowed Ground .
Hohenlinden ....
Hope {Pleasures 0/Hope)
Kiss, The First ....
Lochiel's Warning ...
Lord Ullin's Daughter . ,
Maid's Remonstrance, The
Napoleon and the British Sailor .
Poland
River of Life, The
Soldier's Dream, The .
** Ye mariners of England "
From : — Drink ye to her, 205 ; Gertrude, 494
Pleasures of Hope, 204, 248, 310, 347, 395» 397»
795, 800, 802, 810 ; To the Rainbow, 494.
CANNING, GEORGE.
England, 1770-1827,
Epitaph on the Marquis of Anglesea's Leg . 953
Friend of Humanity and the Knife-Grin der 952
From : — New Morality, 121, 806 ; The Pilot that
weathered tlie Storm, 632.
CAREW, LADY ELIZABETH.
England, pub. 1613.
Revenge of Injuries {Mariant) . . . 789
CAREW, THOMAS.
England, is¡89-i639.
Compliment, The ..... 126
" Give me more love or more disdain " 144
" He that loves a rosy cheek'' . *4*
** Sweetly breathing, vernal air " . . 422
From : — Conquest by Flight, 205 : On the Duke
of Buckingham, 309 ; "Think not 'cause men
flattering say," 203.
CAREY, HENRY.
England, 1663-1743.
Maiden's Ideal of a Husband {Contrivances) 142
Saliy in our Alley ....
From : — Choonon, 808 ; God save the King, 603.
CARLETON, WILL M.
Ohio, b. 1839.
New Church Organ, The . . . 995
Over the Hill to the Poor-House • 34a
Publishers: Harper Bros,, New York.
GARY, ALICE.
Near Cincinnati. 0.. 1820-1871.
IWing Hymn, A 391
Make Believe ...... 188
Pictures of Memory ..... 89
Spinster's Stint, A 17t
Publishers, Houghton, Mifflin, &Co., Boston.
INDEX OF AUTHOKS AND TITLES.
53
CARY, HENRY FRANCIS.
England, 1773 • 1844-
** The fairest thing in mortal eyes " {From the
French of Charles^ Duke of Orleans) . 300
CARY, LUCIUS (Lord Falkland).
England, 1610-1643.
Ben Jonson's Commonplace Book . . 907
CARY, PHŒBE.
Near Cincinnati, O., 1824-1871.
Dreams and Realities 113
Lovers, The toes
Nearer Home 375
Peace 533
Publishers: Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., New York.
CASIMIR THE GREAT, KING OF POLAND.
Poland, 1309-1370.
** It lundles all my soul " {From the Polish) 372
CASWALL, EDWARD.
England, b. 1814.
** My God, I love thee {From the Latin of
St. Francis Xavier) 360
CELANO, THOMAS A.
Italy, about 1250.
Dies Irae {John A. Dix^s Translation). 353
CHADWICK, JOHN WHITE.
Marblehead, Mass., b. 1840.
The Two Waitings ...... 277
CHALKHILL, JOHN (Probably Izaak Walton).
The Angler 668
CHAMBERLAYNE, WILLIAM.
England, 1619-1689.
From'.—Chastity 796
CHANNING, WILLIAM ELLERY.
Boston, Mass., b. 1818.
Our Boat to the Waves 630
Publishers : American Unitarian Association,Boston.
CHAPMAN, GEORGE.
England, 1557*^634.
Camp at Night, The {Iliad) . . . . 414
*' Muses th^t sing Love's sensual empiric " 135
From : — Blind Beggar of Alexandria, 203 ; Re¬
venge, 120; Widows* Tears, 900.
CHARLES, DUKE OF ORLEANS.
France, 1391-1465.
"The fairest thing in mortal eyes*' (Henry F.
Carfs Translation 300
Spnng 421
CHATTERTON, THOMAS.
England, 1752 1770.
Minstrel's Song 289
CHAUCER, GEOFFREY.
England, 1328-1400.
Canterbury Pilgrims, The {Canterbury Tales) 695
Compieynte of Chaucer to his Purse . . 904
'D2Í\%yi'T\\^{Legend of Good IVomen) . . 462
Morning in May {Knightes Tale) . 418
From: — Assembly of Foules, 489; Canterbury
Tales: Prologue, 809; Clerkes Tale, 231;
Frankleines Tale, 398 ; Knightes Tale, 490,
492, 802; Manciples Tale, 398; Nonnes
Preestes Tale, 900; Troilus and Creseide, 108.
CHERRY, ANDREW.
England, 1762-1812. *
The Bay of Biscay .... 628
CHESTERFIELD, EARL OF.
England, 1694-1773.
From: — Advice to a Lady in Autumn . . 491
CHORLEY, HENRY FOTHERGILL.
England, 1808-1^2.
'ITie Brave Old Oak 454
CHURCHILL, CHARLES.
England, 1731-1764.
From : — Prophecy of Famine, 807 ; Rosciad 804
CIBBER, COLLEY,
Engird, 1671-1757.
The Blind Boy 343
From: — Richard III., Altered 204, 492, 539, 541, 899
CLARE, JOHN.
England, 1793-1864,
Laborer, The 557
Summer Moods 427
CLARKE, JAMES FREEMAN.
Hanover, N. H., b. 1810.
Cana 388
The Caliph and Satan {Persian of Tholuck) 866
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
CLAUDIUS, MATTHIAS.
Germany, 1743-1815.
The iitn{ Translation) 991
CLELAND, WILLIAM
England, about 1661-1Ó89.
Hallo, my Fancy 820
CLEMMER, MARY.
By the Sea . 743
CLEVELAND, JOHN.
England, 161 1659.
To the Memory of Ben Jonson . 906
CLOUGH, ARTHUR HUGH.
England, 1819-1861.
Quâ Cursum Ventus 233
COFFIN, ROBERT BARRY {Barry Gray).
Ships at Sea 261
COLERIDGE, HARTLEY.
England, 1796-1849.
Shakespeare 906
" She is not fair to outward view " . . 129
COLERIDGE, SAMUEL TAYLOR.
England, 1772 -1834.
Answer to a Child's Question .... 474
Epigrams . 954
Exchange, The 192
Fancy in Nubibus 822
Good Great Man, The 739
Hymn before Sunrise in the Vale of Chamouni 376
Knight's Tomb, The 538
Kubla Khan. . . ' . 834
Love. . , 162
Metrical Feet 1015
Quarrel of Friends, The . ii6
Rime of the Ancient Mariner .... 854
From: — Christabel, 308, 721, 726; Christmas
Carol, 492 ; Day Dream, 807 ; Death of Wallen¬
stein, 490, 800 ; Devil's Thoiights, 396 ; Epi¬
taph on an Infant, 107 : Fears in Solitude, 395 ;
Homeric Hexameter Gei'man of Senil-
ler \ 63: : Wallenstein, 307 ; Youth and Age,
120.
COLES, ABRAHAM.
Newark, N. J.
SiibdXÍA7t.\etT>o\oro$A{Fromthe Latin). • 355
COLLINS, ANNE.
England, about 1627.
" The winter being over " .... 420
COLLINS, MORTIMER.
England, 1827-1878.
Comfort 974
Darwin... .... 991
COLLINS, WILLIAM.
England, 1720-1756.
" How sleep the brave " 563
Passions, The 773
From: — Ode on the Death of Thomson . 94'
COLMAN, GEORGE (The Younger).
England, 1762-1836.
{The Myrtle a7idthe Vine) . 946
Sir Marmaduke 958
Toby Tosspot . 958
Front : — Lodgings for Single Gentlemen . 809
CONGREVE, WILLIAM.
England, 1670-1729.
Silly Fair 713
From : —Letter to Cobham, 793 ; Mourning
Bride, 207, 398, 809 ; Old Bachelor, 214.
COOK, ELIZA.
England, b. 1817.
Old Arm-Chair, The ..... 101
COOKE, PHILIP PENDLETON.
Martinsburgh, Va., 1816-1850.
Life in the Autumn Woods . . . 663
COOKE, ROSE TERRY.
Hartford. Conn.
Rêve du Midi 41c
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
COOLIDGE, SUSAN. See Woolsev, Sarah C.
[fi-
64
INDEX OP AUTHORS AND TITLES.
a
COOPER, JAMES FENIMORE.
Burlington, N. J., 1789-1851.
My Brigantine ( The IVater iVitch)
CORBET. RICHARD.
EngUna, 1582-1635.
Farewell to the Fairies .
CORNWALL, BARRY.
See Procter, B. W.
CORNWELL, HENRY SYLVESTER.
The Sunset City
COTTON, CHARLES.
England, 1630 -1687.
Contentation
Retirement, The ... • •
COTTON. NATHANIEL.
England, 1721-1788.
The Fireside
COWLEY, ABRAHAM.
England, 1618-1667.
Chronicle, The
Grasshopper, Th e f Greek 0/ A nacreon)
Hymn to Light, From the ....
Invocation Q)avideis)
Of Myself .......
—Anacreontiques, 494; Davideis, 793;
For Hope, 800 ; Gold, 204 ; Motto, The, 811 ;
On the Death of Crashaw, 398 ; Prophet, The,
804; Waiting Maid, The, 795.
COWPER, WILLIAM.
England, 1731-1800.
Boadicea
Contradiction {Conversaiion)
Cricket, The ...
Diverting History of John Gilpin
Duelling {Conversation) .
England Task: Book If,) .
Freeman, The {The Task: Book V.)
Happy Man, The {The Task: Book Vi:,
Humanity {The Task: Book VI.) .
My Mothers Picture .
Nightingale and Glow-Worm, The .
Nose and the Eyes, The
Rose, The
Royal George, On the Loss of the
Slavery Task: Book II.)
Sum of Life, The {The Task: Book VI.\
Sweet stream, that winds '* .
Verses supposed to be written by Alexander
Selkirk
Winter Morning (T'A^ Task: Book V.)
Winter Noon {The Task: Book VI.)
From: — Conversation, 558, 724, Exhortation to
Prayer, 398; Fable, A, 394; Li^ht shining
out of Darkness, 632 : Motto of Connoisseur
No. III., 107; Mutual Forbearance, 215;
Needless Alarm, 671, 793 ; On Friendship,
121; Pairing-Time Anticipated, 215, 495;
Progress of Error, 793 ; Retired Cat, 802 ;
Retirement, 120^ $g6, 724, 815; Stanzas
subjoined to a Bill of Mortality, 308; Table
Talk, ^i, 602; Task, The: Sofa, 493, 672;
Timepiece, 232, 806, 809, 814. 815; Winter
Evening, 492, 495, 810; Winter Morning
Walk, 394, 493, 539, 541 ; Tirocinium, 398 ; To
an Afflicted Protestant Lady, 348; Transla¬
tion from the Greek, 271 ; Translation of
Horace, 815 ; Truth, 397, 493.
COZZENS, FREDERICK SWARTWOUT.
New York, 1818-1869.
An Experience and a Moral ....
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, Sc Co., Boston.
CRABBE. GEORGE.
England. 1754-1832.
Approach of Age, The ( Tales 0/ the Hall) .
Quack Medicines ( The Borough)
From : Birth of Flattery, 798 ; Parish Register,
805.
CRAIK, DINAH MARIA MULOCIC
England, b. 1826.
Alma River, By the
*'Suried to-day'*
Dead Czar Nicliolas, The ....
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true
626
847
. 823
734
737
226
191
484
407
772
730
572
780
485
959
780
575
600
735
782
92
863
95*
464
612
593
790
z06
738
435
437
253
323
783
5*6
272
929
289
%
Fletcher Harper, To the Memory oí . 935
Her Likeness 130 ]
Lancashire Doxology, A 556 '
Now and Afterwards . . 295
Only a Woman 258
Philip, my King 75
CRANCH, CHRISTOPHER PEARSE.
Alexandria. D. C.. b. 1813.
Thought ........ 73t
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, Sc Co., and Roberts Bros.,
Bo.ston.
CRASHAW, RICHARD.
England, 1600 -1650.
Nightingale's Song {Music's Duel) . . 774
Supposed Mistress, Wishes to his . . 192
The Cheap Physician {In Praise 0/Lessius's
Rule of Health) 546
"Two men went up to the Temple to pray." 362
Water turned into Wine 362
Widow's Mites, The 362
CRAWFORD, MRS. JULIA.
Ireland.
" We parted in silence " ...» 240
CROLY,REV. GEORGE, LL.D.
Ireland, 1780 -1860.
Catiline to the Roman Army . .501
Genius of Death, The 744
Leonidas, The Death of . . . .. 564
CROSS, MARIA EVANS LEWES {George Eliot).
England, b. 1820.
" Day is Dying" {The Spanish Gipsy) . . 411
" O, may I join the choir invisible " . . 760
CROWQUILL, ALFRED.
See Forrester, Alfred A.
CUNNINGHAM, ALLAN,
Scotland, 1784-1842.
"Thou h^t sworn by thy God, my Jeanie" . 208
Poet's Bridal-Day Song, The , . . 219
Wet Sheet and a Flowing Sea. A . . . 626
CUNNINGHAM, JOHN.
Ireland, 1729- 1773.
Morning 408
CUTTER, GEORGE W.
Massachusetts, b. z8oi.
Song of the Lightning ..... s64
Song of Steam 555
DANA, RICHARD HENRY.
Cambridge. Mass., 1787-1879.
Bea<^ Bird, The Little 482
Husband and Wife's Grave, The . • 304
Islznà, The {The Buccaneer) . . . . 691
Pleasure-Boat, The 666
Soul, The 368
Publishers ; Charles Scribner's Sons, New York.
DANIEL, SAMUEL.
England, 1562 -1619.
To Delia 414
Love is a Sickness 130
From : — On the Earl of Southampton, 348 ; Son¬
net, 204 ; To the Countess of Cumberland, 808.
DANTE.
Italy, 1265-1321.
From : — Inferno 346, 396.
DARLEY, GEORGE,
Ireland, 1785-1846.
Gambols of Children, The .... 85
Song of the Summer Winds . • . 425
DARWIN, ERASMUS.
England, 1731-1802,
From : — Botanic Garden .... 802
DAVIES, SIR JOHN.
England, 1570-1626.
The Dancing of the Air 451
From : — Contendon betwixt a Wife, &c. . .23»
DAVIS, THOMAS*.
Ireland, 1814-1845.
Sack of Baltimore, The 880
Welcome, The 152
DEKKER, THOMAS.
EngUnd, about 1574-about 1641.
The Happy Heart {Patient Grissell) . 550
From : — Honest Whore, The, 723 ; Old Fortuna-
tus, 308.
-ff
»
ja
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
55
a
DE LISLE, ROUGET.
France. The Song written at Strasburg, in 1792.
The Marseilles Hymn Translation) 584
DENHAM, SIR JOHN.
England, 1615-1668.
From: — Cooper's Hill, 720, 723; Elegy on
Cowley, 939.
DE VERE, AUBREY.
Ireland, b. 1814.
Early Friendship 111
Sad is our youth, for it is ever going" . 316
DIBDIN. CHARLES,
England, 1745-1B14.
Heaving of the Lead, The .... 627
Poor Jack 615
Tom Bowling 629
DIBDIN, THOMAS.
England. 1771- 1841.
A\\*%^^W.(,The British Fleet) . • . 627
From : — The Tight Little Island . . . 6oa
DICKENS, CHARLES.
England, 1812 -1870.
ivy Green, The 465
DICKINSON. CHARLES M.
Lowville, N. Y., b. 1842.
The Children . 330
DICKSON, DAVID.
England, 1583-1662.
The New Jerusalem 358
DIMOND, WILLIAM.
England, 1800-1837.
The Mariner's Dream 6x4
DIX, JOHN ADAMS.
Boscawen. N. H., 1798-1879.
lr3i (Latin 0/Thomas à Celano) . . 353
DOBELL, SYDNEY.
England, 1824-1875.
Home» Wounded 325
How's my Boy ? 616
Milkmaid s Song, The 168
DOBSON, AUSTIN.
En^and, b. about 1840.
before Sedan 529
For a Copy of Theocritus {Essays in old
French Forms 0/ Verse) .... 405
Browing Gray 755
o a Fan. * 749
Romaunt of the Rose ( Vignettes in Rhyme) . 266
Sun Dial, The 184
DODDRIDGE, PHILIP.
England, 1702- 1751.
''Amazing, beauteous change !" . . . 377
From : — Epigram on his Family Arms . . 794
DODGE, MARY MAPES.
New York City.
The Two Mysteries 297
DOLLIVER, CLARA G.
America.
No Baby in the House . ... 80
DONNE, DR. JOHN.
England, 1573-1631.
The Will 791
From : — Comparison, The, 795 ; Divine Poems :
On the Sacrament, 598 ; Triple Fool, The, 798 ;
Valediction forbidding Mourning, 248.
DORR, JULIA C. R.
Charleston, S. C., b. 1825.
Outgrown
Publishers : J. B. Eippincott & Co.. Philadelphia.
263
DORSET. CHARLES SACKVILLE, EARL OF.
England, 1637-1709.
The Fire of Love (Examen Miscellaneum) . 202
DOUGLAS, MARIAN.
See Green, Annie D.
DOUGLASS .
Scotland-
Annie Laurie . 155
DOWLAND, JOHN.
England, 1562-x6x^
Sleep . 762
DOYLE, SIR FRANCIS HASTINGS.
England, b. 1810.
The Private of the Buffs . -514
■ r»
DRAKE, JOSEPH RODMAN.
New York City, 1795-1820.
American Flag, The •
Culprit Fay, 'i'he ....
DRAYTON, MICHAEL.
England, 1563-1631.
Ballad of Agincourt, The 502
" Come, let us kisse and parte " • . . 239
From: — To Henry Reynolds .... 938
DRUMMOND, WILLIAM.
Scotland. 1585-1640.
Nightingale, To a 479
DRYDEN, JOHN.
England, 1631-1700.
Ah, how sweet Í ( Tyrannic Love) . . . 145
Alexander's Feast ; or, tire Power of Music. 771
Character of the Earl of Shaftesbury (Absalom
and A chitophel) 908
Portrait of John Milton, Lines written under 907
Song for St. Cecilia's Day, A, 1687. . . 775
Veni Creator Spiritus (From the Latin). . 357
Zimri (A bsalom and A chitophel) . . 909
From : — Absalom and Achilophel, 490,601, 798 ;
All for Love, 207 ; Amphictrion, 248 ; Aurung-
Zebe, 793 ; Cock and the Fox, 489; Conquest
of Grenada, 345, 798; Cymon and Iphigenia,
204, 206, 671, 721 ; Don Sebastian, 813 ; Elegy
on Mrs. Killigrew, 311 ; Epistle to Congreve,-
120; Hind and Panther, 39S; Imitation of
Horace, 792, 793, 806 ; Marriage à la Mode»
203 ; CEdipus, 309; Oliver Cromwell, 939 ; On
tlie Death of a very young Gentleman, 309:
Palamon and Arcite, 207; Tempest, 725;
Threnodia Augustalis, 725 ; Trans. Ovid's
Metamorphoses, 493 ; Tyrannic Love, 539.
DSCHELLALEDDIN RUMI.
Persia.
" To heaven approached a Sufi saint " ( R.
Alger's Translation) 365
DUFFERIN, LADY {Helen Selina Sheridan).
Ireland, 1807-1867.
Lament of the Irish Emigrant.... 292
DUNLOP, JOHN.
Scotland, 1755 -1820.
"Dinnaaskme" 161
DWIGHT, JOHN SULLIVAN.
Boston, Mass., b- 1813-
Landlady's Daughter, The {From the German
o/Uhland)
True Rest 557
DWIGHT, TIMOTHY.
Northampton, Mass., 1752-1817.
Columbia 5S8
DYER, JOHN,
Wales, 1700-1758.
Grongar Hill 443
From : — Ruins of Rome 725
DYER, SIR EDWARD.
England, about 1540-1607.
" My minde to me a kingdom is " . • 729
EASTMAN, CHARLES GAMAGE.
Burlington. Vt., 1816-iS6i.
A Picture . 229
A Snow-Storm 440
EDWARDS, AMELIA BLANDFORD.
England, b. 1831.
" Give me three grains of com, mother" . 338
ELIOT, GEORGE.
See Cross, Maria Evans Lewes.
ELLIOT, EBENEZER {The Corn-Law Rhymer).
England, 1781-1849.
Bums 914
Corn-Law Hymn, The 557
Spring 421
EMERSON, RALPH WALDO.
Boston. Mass., 1803 -1882.
Boston Hymn 597
Brahma 746
Concord Monument Hymn . . . . , 589
Each and All . . . • . 405
Friendship na
Good By 744
Humble-Bee, To the 484
Letters 746
M
-gi
e-
56
INDEX OE AUTHORS AND TITLES-^
O ^
Problem, The . » . . • *735
Rhodora, The .... . 461
Sea, The .... ... 610
Snow-Storm, The 439
From : — Good By 397
Publishers, Houghton, Milflin, & Co., Boston.
ERASMUS.
Rotterdam, 1467-1536.
From: — Apothegms 540
EVERETT, DAVID.
I'rinceton, Mass., 1769-1813.
From : — Lines written for a School Declamation 107
EVERETT, EDWARD.
Dorchester, Mass.. 1794 - í865.
Dirge of Alario the Visigoth .... 903
EYTINGE, MARGARET.
America.
Baby Louise 78
FABER, FREDERICK WILLIAM.
England, b. 1814-1864.
O, how the thought of God attracts " . . 374
The Right must Win 390
FALCONER, WILLIAM.
Scotland, 1730-1769.
The Shipwreck 612
FANSHAWE, CATHERINE.
England. 1-atter part of i8th centurj'.
A Riddle. (The Letter H.) .... 778
FENNER, CORNELIUS GEORGE.
Providence. R. 1., 1822-1847.
Gulf-Weed 622
FERGUSON, SIR SAMUEL.
Ireland, 1803.
Forging of the Anchor, The .... 554
Pretty Girl of Loch Dan, The . . . 105
FIELDING, HENRY.
England, 1707-1754.
A hunting we will go" .... 662
Roast Beef of Old England, The . . 575
From: — Covent Garden Tragedy, 803; Tom
Thumb the Great, 797.
FIELDS, JAMES THOMAS.
Portsmouth. N. H., b. 1820.
Nantucket Skipper, The 988
Tempest, The 627
Publishers ; Houghton, Miftlin, & Co., Boston. 1
FINCH, FRANCIS MILES.
Ithaca, N. V., b. 1827.
The Blue and the Gray . . . . 533
FINLEY, JOHN.
Cincinnati, O.
• Bachelor's Hall 1003
FLAGG, WILSON.
Beverly, Mass.. b. 1805.
The O'Lincoln Family ... . 475
Publishers, Houghton, Mifflin. &Co., Bostoji.
FLETCHER, GILES.
England, 15^-1623.
Drop, drop, slow tears " . , . . 300
FLETCHER, JOHN.
England, 1576-1625.
Invocation to Sleep ( . . . 761
" Take, O, take those lips away " . ^ . 263
From: — Nice Valour, 206; Queen of Corinth,
346; Upon an Honest Man's Fortune, 793, 797.
FORD, JOHN.
England, 1586-about 1639.
The Musical Duel XThe Loveras Melancholy) 694
FORRESTER, ALFRED H. {Alfred CrowquiU).
England, b. 1806.
To my Nose ...... 1015
FOSDICK, WILLIAM WHITEMAN.
Cincinnati, 0-, 1825-1862.
The Maize
434
593
309, 801
712
79»
FREILIGRATH, FERDINAND.
Germany, b. 1810. ""
Lion's Ride, The {From the German)
GALLAGHER, WILLIAM D.
Philadelphia, Pa., b. 1808.
Autumn, The
GARRICK, DAVID.
England, 1716-1779.
From: — Hearts of Oak, 631; Prologue on
quitting the Stage in 1776, 804.
GARRISON, WILLIAM LLOYD.
Ncwburyport, Mass., 1804-1879.
Sonnet written in Prison ►
GARTH, SIR SAMUEL.
England, 1670-1719.
From : — The Dispensary
GASCOIGNE, GEORGE.
England, 1537-1577.
The Vanity of the Beautiful
From : — The Swiftness of Time
GAY, JOHN.
England, 1688-1732.
Black-eyed Susan 235
From : — Beggar's Opera, 12t, 134, 205, 493, 722,
795 ; Dione,207 ; Hare and Many Friends, 121,
133 ; Mother, Nurse, and Fairy, 232 ; My own
' Epitaph, 792 ; Painter who pleased Nobody
and Everybody, 805, 810; Rural Sports, 671 ;
Shepherd and Philosopher, 804 ; Sick Man and
the Angel, 794; Squire and his Cur, 121.
GAYLORD, WILLIS.
Lines written in an Album .... 1015
, GERHARDT, PAUL.
Germany, 1607-1676.
The Dying Saviour .... . 373
GIBBONS, THOMAS.
England, 1720-1785.
From: — When Jesus dwelt .... 797
GIFFORD, RICHARD.
England, 1725-1807.
From : — Contemplation .... 559
GILBERT, WILLIAM SCHWENCK.
England, b. 1836.
Captain Reece 970
I To the Terrestrial Globe .... 1012
Yam of the " Nancy Bell," The {Bab Ballads) 968
1 GILDER, RICHARD WATSON-
Bordentown, N. J., b. 1844.
Dawn ........ 409
Publishers : Charles Scribner's Sons, New York.
GILMORE, JAMES R. {EdmundKirke).
Boston, Mass., b. 1823.
Three Days 751
GLAZIER, WILLIAM BELCHER.
Hallowcll, Me., b. 1827.
1 Cape-Cottage at Sunset 412
, GLUCK,
FOSTER, STEPHEN COLLINS.
Pittsburg, Pa.. 1826-1864.
My Old Kentucky Home
FOX, WILLIAM JOHNSON.
England, 1786-1864.
The Martyr's Hymn {German of Luther)
FRANKLIN, BENJAMIN.
Boston, Mass., 1706-1790.
Paper ....
458
238
365
975
Germany.
To Death {Translation)
GOETHE, JOHANN WOLFGANG VON.
Germany 1749-1833.
Brothers, The ( Translation) ....
Fisher, The(C. T. Brooks's Translation) .
King of Thüle, The {Bayard Taylor's Trans.)
GOLDSMITH, OLIVER.
Ireland, 1725-1774.
Deserted village, The
Hermit, The ( The Vicar of Wakeßeld)
Home {The Traveller) .....
Madame Blaize, Elegy on ... .
Mad Dog, Elegy on the Death of a
I {Vicar of Wakeßeld)
From: — Art of Poetry on a New Plan, 540 : Cap-
j tivity. The, 347, 348, 800 ; Good-natured Man,
I 813 ; Retaliation, 724 ; Traveller, 232, 248,306,
398, 603, 632, 809, 812 ; Vicar of Wakefiefcl :
On Woman, 271. it
GOULD, HANNAH FRANCES.
I-ancaster, Vt., 1789-1865.
I The Frost
GRAHAM, JAMES, MARQUESS OF MON-
1 TROSE.
Scotland, 1612-1650.
' " My dear and only love"
295
761
825
862
686
138
229
949
94»
33^
96
150
B-
lOP AUTHORS AND TITLES.
GRAHAM OF GARTMORE.
Scotland.
" I£ doughty deeds my lady please "
GRAHAME, JAMES.
Scotland; 1785-1838.
The Sabbath
GRANT, SIR ROBERT.
Scotland, 1785-1838.
Litany
GRAY. DAVID.
Scotland, 1838-1861.
** Die down, O dismal day"
Homesick ......
O winter, wilt thou never go ? "
GRAY, THOMAS.
En^nd, 1716-1771.
Eleçy written in a Country Churchyard
Spring
Front : — Bard, The, 108, 206, 868 ; Distant
Prospecto! Eton College, 108, 793, 899; Edu¬
cation and Government, 232, 397; Fatal Sis¬
ters, 540; Hymn to Adversity, 345; Ode on
the Pleasure arising from Vicissitude, 232, 346,
A^9y 559 Î Progress of Poesy, 205, 867, 939.
GREEN, ANNIE D. {Marian Douglas).
Bristol, N. H.
Two Pictures
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
GREEN, MATTHEW.
England, 1696-1737.
Voyage of Life, The ( Tht Spleen) .
GREENE, ALBERT GORTON.
Providence, R. I., 1802-1868.
Baron's Last Banquet, The . . . .
" Old Grimes is dead " ....
Publisher ; S. S. Rider, Providence, R. I.
GREENE, ROBERT.
England, 1560-1592.
Coxiitnt {Farewell to Follie) . . . .
Shepherd and the King, The
GREENWOOD, GRACE.
See LIPPINCOTT, SARA J.
GREGORY THE GREAT, ST.
Italy, 540-604,
Darkness is thinning (y. M. NeaWs Trans).
Veni Creator Spiritus {Dryden^s Trans)
HABINGTON, WILLIAM.
England, 1605- 1645.
From : — Castara
146
378
358
4>9
223
441
305
421
HALLECK, FITZ-GREENE.
Guilford, Conn., 1790-1867.
Alnwick Castle
Bums
Fortune {Fanny) ......
Joseph Rodman Drake ....
Marco Bozzaris ......
Weehawken and the New York Bay {Fanny)
From : — Connecticut
Publishers j D. Appleton & Co., New York.
HALPINE, CHARLES G. {Miles O'Reilly).
Ireland, 1829-1868.
Quakerdom — The Formal Call
Publishers : Harper & Brothers, New York.
HAMILTON, ELIZABETH.
Scotland, 1758-1816.
My ain Fireside
229
293
976
73 t
136
360
357
311
677
9»5
777
937
582
685
603
159
HARRINGTON, SIR JOHN.
England, 1561-1612.
Lines on Isabella Markhani ....
Of a Certaine Man
Warres in Ireland, Of the {Epigrams) .
From: — Epigrams .... 801,805,
HARTE, FRANCIS BRET.
Albany,/^. Y.. b. 1839.
Dickens in Camp ....
Dow's Flat
Her Letter
Bm ........
Plain Language from Truthful James (Heathen
Chinee)
Pliocene Skull, To the ....
Ramon ......
926
996
m
997
Society upon the Stanislaus, The .
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, 8c Co., Boston.
HARTE, WALTER.
Wales, 1700-1774.,
A Soliloquy
57
98S
484
a
998
999
270
136
760
HARVEY, STEPHEN.
England.
From: — Translation of Juvenal's Satire IX.
HAY, JOHN.
Salem, Ind., b. 1839.
Banty Tim . -
Little Breeches
Woman's Love
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
HAYNE, PAUL HAMILTON.
Charleston, S. C., b, 1832.
Love scorns Degrees ( Mountain of the
Lovers)
Pre-existence
Publishers : E. J. Hale 6e Son, New York.
HEBER, REGINALD.
England, 1783-1826.
Jf thou wert by my side, my love " . ^ . 219
From : — Epiphany, 397 ; Gulistan, 724 ; Lines
written to a March, 491 ; Missionary Hymn, 395.
HEDGE, FREDERIC HENRY.
Cambridge, Mnss., b. 1805.
"A mighty fortress is our God" {From the
German of Martin Luther) -37*
HEGGE, ROBERT.
England, 1599- 1629.
From : — On Love . .... 204
HEINE, HEINRICH.
Germany, 1797-1847.
Fisher's Cottage, The (C. G. Leland's Trans) 691
Lore-lei, The {Translation) . . . .825
HEMANS, FELICIA DOROTHEA.
England, 1794-1835.
Casablanca 6x4
Homes of England, The .... 229
Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers, The 587
Meeting of the Ships, The . • • 115
Mignon's Song {German of Goethe) . . 789
Treasures of the Deep, The .... 619
From: — Graves of a Household, 31t; Hour of
Death, The, 308 ; Wordsworth, 940.
HERBERT, GEORGE.
Wales, 1593-1632.
Church Porch, The 364
Flower, The 768
Gifts of God, The 778
Life 741
Praise 363
Said I not so?" 366
Virtue Immortal ..... • 30*
From: — Answer, The, 121; Church Militant,
395 ; Country Parson, 398 ; Devil's Progress,
271 ; Man, 792 ; Pulley, The, 395.
HERRICK, ROBERT.
England, 1591-1674.
Ben Jonson, Ode to 907
Blossoms, To ...... 456
Daffodils 464
Delight in Disorder .... 713
Holy Spirit, The 359
Kiss, The 186
Lent, A True 361
" Sweet, be not proud " i33
Violets 461
yirgins, To the 754
" When as in silks my Julia goes" . . . 126
From: — Cherry Ripe, 134; "Love me little,
love me long," 207 ; Night Piece to Julia, 134 ;
Rock of Rubies and Quarrie of Pearls, 134;
Seek and find, 800; Upon her Feet, 721.
HERVEY, THOMAS KIBBLE.
England, 1804-1859.
Love 208
The Devil at Home {The Devil's Progress) 951
From:—The Devil's Progress . 271
98*1] HEYWOOD, JOHN.
99z England, d. 1565.
897 From: " Be merry, friends" • 347
trr
58
INDEX OF AÜTHOKS
HEYWOOD, THOMAS.
England, d. 1649.
Pack clouds away "
Portrait, The
From :—Apology for Actors
HIGGINS, JOHN.
En^and. Time of Queen Elizabeth.
Books ....
409
127
792
768
HILL, AARON.
England, 1685-1750.
From : — Epilogue to Zara, 795 ; Verses writ¬
ten on a Window in Scotland, 800.
HILL, THOMAS.
New Brunswick, N. J., b. 1818.
The Bobolink 475
HINDS, SAMUEL (Bishop of Norwich).
En^nd, 1793-1872.
Baby Sleeps
. 282
HOBART, MRS. CHARLES.
England.
The Changed Cross.
HOFFMAN, CHARLES FENNO.
New York City, b. 1806.
Monterey
Publishers : Porter & Coates, Philadelphia.
HOGG, JAMES.
Scotland, ^72-1835.
Jock Johnstone, the Tinkler .
Kilmeny {Quoon*s IVako) .
Skylark. The ....
When the Kye comes Hame
Women Fo'k, The .
374
523
. 639
837
. 473
163
. 974
75
.HOLLAND, JOSIAH GILBERT.
Belchertown, Mass., b. 1819.
Cradle Song ( Bitter-Sweet)
Publishers : Chas. Scribner's Sons, New York.
HOLMES, OLIVER WENDELL.
Cambridge, Mass., b. 1809.
Bill and Joe 112
Boys, The
Chambered Nautilus, The
Contentment
Daniel Webster
The
1015
620
979
977
55*
978
347» 803
Height of the Ridiculous,
Katydid .
Last Leaf, The
Ode for a Social Meeting
Old Ironsides
Old Man Dreams, The
One-Hoss Shay, The .
Ploughman, The
Rudolph the Headsman
From : — Urania
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
HÔLTY, LUDWIG, HEINRICH CHRISTOPH.
Germany, 1748-1776.
Winter Song {Charles T. Brooks's Trans.) . 434
HOME, JOHN,
Scotland, 1724-1808.
Norvai {Douglas) 650
HOMER.
Greece. IX. Centu^, B. C.
The Camp at Night ChapmafCs Trans^ 414
From : — Iliad {Pope's Trans.\ 120, 792, 794, 797 ;
Odyssey {Pope's Trans.)t 121, 489.
HOOD, THOMAS.
England, 1798-1845.
Art of Bookkeeping
Autumn
Bridge of Sighs, The .
Dream of Eugene Aram, The .
Faithless Nelly Gray .
Faithless Sally Brown
" Farewell, life !"
Flowers .....
Heir, The Lost .
Infant Son, To my .
" I remember, I remember "
Morning Meditations
No
Nocturnal Sketch
Ruth
989
433
335
895
964
953
327
460
94
93
93
963
435
1014
106
r
# Song ^ the Shirt, The . 337
** 'SV^at can an old man do but die **
322
From : — Miss Kilmansegg, 724, 802 : LadyU
Dream, 798.
HOOPER, LUCY.
Newburyport. Mass., 1816-1841.
Three Loves
Publishers : J. B. Lippincott & Co.. Philadelphia.
HOPKINSON, JOSEPH.
Philadelphia, Fa., 1770-1842.
From : — Hail Columbia
HOPPIN, WILLIAM J.
Charlie Macbree
HORACE [QUINTUS HORATIUS FLACCUS].
Italy, 65-8 B.C.
From : — Book i.. Ode 5 (Afiliónos Trans.) . 632
HOUGHTON, LORD (Richard Monckton
milnes).
EnjH^d, b. 1809.
Brookside, The
Good Nient and Good Morning .
London Churches
Men of Old
From : — Tragedy of the Lac de Gaube
142
fo3
253
*49
103
334
740
489
HOVEL, EDWARD.
See Lord Thür low.
HOWARD, HENRY.
See surrey, Earl of.
HOWARD, SIR ROBERT.
England, 162(^1698.
From : — The Blind Lady
HOWE, JULIA WARD.
New York City, b. 1819.
Battle Hymn of the Republic
Royal Guest, The .
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co.,
HOWITT, MARY.
England, b. about 1800 or 1804.
Use of Flowers, The .
HOWITT, WILLIAM.
England, 1795-1879.
Departure of the Swallow, The
Summer Noon, A
ROWLAND, MARY WOOLSEY.
England, b. 1832 ; d. New York, 1864.
First Spring Flowers
Rest
Publishers : E. P. Dutton & Co., New York.
HOYT, RALPH.
New York, 1808-1878.
Old
Snow.—A Winter Sketch ....
HUGO, VICTOR.
France, b. 1802.
From : — The Djinns {CSuüivan^s Trans.).
HUME, ALEXANDER.
Scotland, 17x1-1776.
The Story of a Summer Day ....
HUNT, SIR A.
England.
From :
HUNT, LEIGH.
England, 1784-1850.
Abou Ben Adhem ......
Child during Sickness, To a . . .
Cupid Swallowed
Fairies* Song {Latin of Thomas Randolph)
Glove and the Lions, The ....
Grasshopper and Cricket, To the .
Jaffar
Jenny kissed me**
Love-Letters made in Flowers
Mahmoud
Sneezing
Trumpets of Doolkamein, The
From : —Politics and Poetics, 489 ; The Story of
Rimini, 493.
HURDIS, JAMES.
England, 1763-1801.
From : — The Village Curate ...
594
116
466
478
410
289
295
3^3
44o
868
426
631
768
88
*95
835
652
48s
**5
98
*95
700
1015
699
495
AUTHORS AND TITLES.
59
INGELOW, JEAN.
England, b. 1830.
High-Tide on the Coast of Lincolnshire
Like a Laverock in the Lift
Maiden with a Milking-Pail» A
Seven Times One
386
213
167
87
Seven Times Two 101
172
86
213
Seven Times Three
Seven Times Four .
Seven Times Six
INGOLDSBY, THOMAS.
See Harham, R. H.
JACKSON, HELEN HUNT.
America, now living«
My Legacy 770
Publishers: Roberts Bros., Boston.
JACKSON, HENRY R.
Savannah. Ga., b. 1810.
My Wife and Child
JACOPONE, ERA.
Italy, d. 1306.
Stabat Mater Dolorosa Translation)
JENKS, EDWARD A.
Newport, N. H., b. 1835.
Going and Coming
JENNER, DR. EDWARD-
England, 1749-1823.
Signs of Rain
JOHNSON, C.
England.
From: — Wife's Reick
JOHNSON, EDWARD, M.D.
England. Pub. 1837.
The Water-Drinker .
522
355
754
558
545
JOHNSON, SAMUEL.
England, 1709-178^
C\\zv\t%'^\l\yaHÍty 0/Human, JVsAm) ■ 909
Shakespeare 905
To-morrow ^ 754
From: — Epitaph, 940 ; Epitaph on C. Philips,
802 ; Lines added to Goldsmith'? "Traveller,'
807; London, 345, 806; Rambler, The, 394;
Vanity of Human Wishes, 794, 804 ; Verses
on Robert Levet, 395.
JONES, SIR WILLIAM.
England, 1746- 1794.
Baby, The (From the Sanskrit of CédidáseC) . 78
" What constitutes a State? " . . . 599
From: — A Persian Song of Hañz . 807
JONSON. BEN.
England, 1574-1637.
"Drink to me only with thine (From
the Greek of Philostratus) 125
Epitaph on Elizabeth L. H. . 907
Epitaph on the Countess of Pembroke . 907
Fame 781
{Vision of Delight) .... 819
Freedom in Dress (E^icœne) . • 713
" How near to good IS what fair " . \ 711
Good Life, Long Life 729
" O, do not wanton with those eyes" . 184
On the Portrait of Shakespeare . 905
To the Memory of Shakespeare . . 905
Vision of Beauty, A 123
From : — Cynthia's Revels, 120 ; Masques, 671 ;
Underwood, i2r; Valpone, 809.
JUDSON, EMILY CHUBBUCK.
Eaton, Ñ. Y., 1817 -1854.
Watching 763
JUVENAL, DECIMUS JULIUS.
Italy, b. ist Cent., d. 2d Cent.. A. D.
From : — Satire IX. (.y. Harvefs Trans. ) .8x1
KEATS, JOHN.
England, 1796-1821.
Eve of St. Agnes, The 176
Fairy Song 846
Fancy 819
Grasshopper and Cricket, The . 485
Ode on a Grecian Urn ... 718
Ode to a Nightingale 316
Thing of Beauty js a Joy îox^v^x(Endymion\ 675
From:—Yiyptxioni 494; Lamia, 205,808; On
hrst looking into Chapman's Homer, 805,
KEBLE, JOHN.
England, 1700-1866.
Example 739
From : — Burial of the Dead, 120; The Christian
Year, 309.
KEMBLE-BUTLER. FRANCES ANNE.
England, b. i8ix.
Absence 244
Faith ........ 790
KENNEDY, CRAMMOND.
Scotland, b. 1841.
Greenwood Cemetery 305
KEPPEL, LADY CAROLINE.
Scotland.
Robin Adair 154
KEY, FRANCIS SCOTT.
Frederick Co., Md-, 1779-1843.
The Star-spangled Banner . . 59a
KING, HENRY.
England, 1591-1669.
Sic Vita 301
KING. WILLIAM.
England, x663'i7i2.
—Upon a Giant's Angling . . 672
KINGSLEY, CHARLES.
England, 1819-1875.
^olcino to Margaret 214
Farewell, A 97
Merry Lark, The 280
Rough Rhyme on a Rough Matter, A 331
Sands o' Dee 621
Song of the River 448
Three Fishers, The 621
KINNEY. COATES.
Pen Van, N. V.. b, 1826.
Rain on the Roof 97
KNOWLES, JAMES SHERIDAN.
Ireland,. 1784-1862.
Switzerland TV//) . . • , 585
KNOX, WILLIAM.
Scotland, 1789-1825.
" O, why should the spirit of mortal be proud ? " ya
KÖRNER, CHARLES THEODORE.
Germany, 1791-1813.
Good Night (C. T. Brfunks^s Translatiofi) . 558
Men and Boys " ^ " 583
Sword Song, The " " sir
KRUMMACHER, FRIEDERICH WILHELM.
Germany, 1774-1868.
Alpine Heights (C. T. Brooks's Translation) 445
Moss Rose, The (T'ra/wÄz/«»») . . 464
LAMB, CHARLES.
England, 1773- 1834.
Childhood . 86
Farewell to Tobacco, A • . • . 548
Hester . 285
Housekeeper, The 487
Old Familiar Faces, The 274
LAMB, MARY.
England, 1765-1847.
Choosing a Name - 7b
LANDON, LETITIA ELIZABETH.
England, 1802-1838.
Death and the Youth 270
Female Convict, The 330
LANDOR, WALTER SAVAGE.
England. 1775-1864.
Iphigenia and Agamemnon .... 873
Macaulay, To 923
Maid's Lament, The ..... 260
One Gray Hair, The 755
LANIER, SIDNEY.
Charleston, S. C., 1842-1881.
From : — Centennial Meditation of Columbia 604
Publishers : J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia.
LARCOM, LUCY.
Lowell, Mass., b. 1826.
By the Fireside 227
Publishers: Boughton, Mifflin, St Co., Boston.
LEE, NATHANIEL.
England, 1655-1692.
From ; — Alexander the Great . . 204, 541
fl¬
eo
index of authors a:
'les.
LEIGH, HENRY S.
England.
Only Seven • 1006
LELAND, CHARLES G.
Philadelphia, Pa., b. 1824.
Fisher's Cottage, The {From German of
Heinrich Heine) 691
Hans Breitmann's Party ...» 999
Ritter Hugo xooo
Publishers ; T.B. Peterson &Bros., Philadelphia.
LEONIDAS.
Alexandria, 59-129.
HomtiRohert Biand's Translation) . 225
On the Picture of an InfantRogers*s Trans.) 81
L'ESTRANGE, ROGER.
England, 1616-1704.
In Prison 731
From : — The Boys and the Frogs . • 108
LEVER, CHARLES JAMES.
Ireland, 1806-1872.
Widow Malone 1003
LEWIS, MATTHEW GREGORY.
England, 1775-1818.
Alonzo the Brave and the Fair Imogine . . 861
The Maniac 339 |
LEYDEN, JOHN. I
Scotland, 1775-1811. 1
Daisy, The « . 463 '
Noontide 410 1
Sabbath Morning, The . 410
LILLY, JOHN.
England, 1553-1600.
From : — Endymion . . . . 120
LIPPINCOTT, SARA JANE {Grace Greenwood).
Pompey, N. Y.. b. 1823. j
Horseback Ride, The 665
Poet of To-day, The .... 767'
Publishers : Jas. R. Osgood & Co., Boston. j
LOCKER, FREDERICK. I
England, b. 1824.
On an Old Muff 972
Widow's Mite, The 282
LOCKHART. JOHN GIBSON.
Scotland, 1^2-1854
Lord of^Butrago, The {From the Spanish) . 507
Zara's Ear-Rings {From the Spanish). . 171
LODGE, THOMAS.
En^and, 1556-1625. -
Rosalind's Complaint 194
Rosaline • 127
LOGAN, JOHN.
Scotland, 1748-1788.
Cuckoo, To the . . ...
" Thy braes were bonny " .
LOGAU, FRIEDERICH VON.
Germany.
"Retribution {Longfellow*s Translation).
LONGFELLOW, HENRY WADSWORTH.
Portland, Maine. 1807-1882.
Agassiz, Fiftieth Birthday of .
Carillon
Children's Hour, The
Daybreak • _
Divina Commedia ......
Excelsior . .
Footsteps of Ai)gels... . .
God's Acre
Household Sovereign, ITie {Hanging 0/ the
Crane) ........
Hymn to the Night
Maidenhood
Moonlight on the Prairie {Evangeline)
Nuremberg . . . . . . ■ , -
Paul Revere's Ride 5^
Primeval Forest . . . 453
Psalm of Life, A 769
Rain in Summer 428
Rainy Day, The 344
Reaper and the Flowers, The . . . 276
Résiliation 272
Retribution {German 0/F. von Logau). 747
Sea-Weed . . .... 622
Snow-Flakes 440
Village Blacksmith, The . 550
From MSSilding of the Ship, 631 : Endymion,
345, So® i Evangeline, 492 ; Fire of Drift-wood,
801 ; Flowers, 494 ; Goblet of Life, 345 ; Gold¬
en Legend, 794 ; Hawthorne, 940 ; Hyperion,
348; Ladder of St. Augustine, 3991 Light of
Stars, 348, 802 ; Midniglit Mass, 494 i Sunrise
on the Hills, 490 : Day is done, 490, 813, 816.
Publishers, Houghton, Milflin, & Co., Boston.
LOVELACE, RICHARD.
England, 1618-1658.
Althea from Prison, To 146
Lucasta, To 242
Lucasta, on Going to the Wars, To . 235
LOVELL, MARIA.
;—Ingomar the Barbarian . - . .205
LOVER, SAMUEL.
Ireland, 1797-1866.
Angel's Whisper, The 81
Birth of St. Patrick, The .... 1004
Father Land and Mother Tongue . • • 778
Low-backed Car, The ..... 197
RoryO'More 196
Widow Machree ...... 200
471
2S8
747
935
716
98
408
707
777
273
305
79
416
104
432
678
LOVERIDGE, RICHARD.
England, Eighteenth Century.
Stanzas added to *'The Roast Beef of Old
England " . 575
LOWELL, JAMES RUSSELL.
Cambridge, Mass., b- 1819.
Abraham Lincoln 930
Auf Wiedersehen ! {From Summer) . , 170
Courtin', The 993
First Snow-Fall, The 275
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, To 937
June {The Vision of Sir Launfat). . . 424
Sonnets 216
Summer Storm 429
Washington 927
What Mr. Robinson thinks {Biglow Papers). 994
William Lloyd Garrison .... 932
Winter Pictures {The Vision of Sir Launfal) 438
Winter Evening Hymn to my Fire . . 228
Vussouf 768
Fromt — R^x^o^ Papers, 493» 539» 54*1 558;
Irenè, 723 ; Love, 215 ; Ode to Freedom, 604 ;
Rhœcus, 869 ; Sirens, The, 631 ; Sonnet, 796,
807 ; To the Dandelion, 495.
Publisners : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
LOWELL, MARIA WHITE.
Watertown, Mass., 1821- 1853.
The Morning Glory 280
Publishers ; Hougliton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
LOWELL, ROBERT T. S.
Cambridge, Mass., b. i8t6.
The Relief of Lucknow . . . »5*5
Publishers ; E. P. Dutton & Co., New York.
LUDLOW, FITZ HUGH.
Poughkeepsie, N. Y., 1837-1875.
Too Late 755
LUTHER, MARTIN.
Germany, 1483-1546.
"A mighty fortress is our God" {F. H.
Hedge's Translation) ..... 371
Martyrs' Hymn, The {IV. f. Fox's Trans.) 365
LYLY, JOHN.
England. 1554-1600.
Cupid and Campaspe 186
Front I — Alexander and Campaspe . . 495
LYTLE, WILLIAM HAINES.
Cincinnati, O., 1826-1863.
Antony and Cleopatra ..... 296
LYTTLETON, GEORGE, LORD.
England, 1708-1773.
"Tell me, my heart, if this be love" . 137
From: — Advice to a Lady, 214, 795; Epigram,
204; Irregular Ode, 215; Prologue to Thom¬
son's "Coriolanus," 806; Soliloquy on a
Beauty in the Country, 133 ; Stanza for
Thomson's "Castle of indolence," 940.
LYTTON, EDWARD BULWER, LORD.
England, 1805-1873.
From: — Lady of Lyons, 203 ; New Timon,
723, 813; Richelieu, 541, S02, 805.
fl-
INDEX
AUTHORS AND TITLES.
61
-a
LYTTON, ROBERT BULWER, LORD
Meredith),
England, b. 1831.
Aux Italiens
Chess-Board, The
Portrait, The ...
Possession ......
From : — Lucile
MACAULAY, THOMAS BABINGTON, LORD
England, 1800-1859.
Horatius at the Bridge ....
Naseby ... ...
Roman Father's Sacrifice, The {Virginia)
MAC-CARTHY, DENIS FLORENCE.
Ireland, b. 1817.
Ireland
Labor Song {Bell-founder) .
Love and Time .....
Summer Longings ....
MACDONALD, GEORGE.
England, b. 1824.
Baby, The ....
Earl O'Quarterdeck
MACE, FRANCIS LAUGHTON.
America.
" Only waiting "...
MACKAY, CHARLES.
Scotland, b. 1814.
Cleon and I . . .
Small Beginnings .
Tell me, ye winged winds '
Tubal Cain . . . .
264
160
265
202
S14
565
576
873
579
556
150
419
78
646
368
732
779
369
537
MAGINN, WILLIAM.
Ireland, 1793-1842.
Waiting for the Grapes
MAHONY, FRANCIS {Father Prout).
Ireland, 1805-1866.
Bells of Shandon, The
Bonaparte, Popular Recollections of {From
Béranger) .......
Flight into Egypt, The
MALLET, DAVID. .
Scotland, 1700-1765.
From : — Mustapha
MANGAN, JAMES CLARENCE.
Ireland, 1803 -1849.
The Sunken City {German of Mueller) .
MANNERS, JOHN. LORD.
England, Pub. 1841.
From: — England's Trust, and Other Poems .
MARLOWE, CHRISTOPHER.
En^nd, 1564- 1593.
The Passionate Shepherd to his Love .
From: — Edward II., 899; Faustus, 134, 396;
Hero and Leander, 203 ; Jew of Malta, 726.
MARSDEN, WILLIAM.
England. 1754-1836.
What is Time? ....
MARSTON, JOHN.
England. Time of Queen Elizabeth and James I.
From : — A Scholar and his Dog .
MARVELL, ANDREW.
Engend, 1620-1678.
Death of the White Fawn ....
Drop of Dew, A
Song of the Emigrants in Bermuda
From'.—An Horatian Ode: Upon Cromwell's
Return from Ireland, 539; The Garden, 719,
813 ; The Loyal Scot, 7^.
MARY.
Queen of Hungary, d. 1558.
Prayer
539
82s
812
*57
748
808
MASSEY. GERALD.
England, b. 1828.
** O, \3.y thy hand in mine, dear''
Our Wee White Rose
MASSINGER, PHILIP.
England, 1584-1640.
From: — The Maid of Honor, 120, 900;
New Way to pay Old Debts
365
221
83
54*
MAY, THOMAS.
England, about i5j4-1650.
From:^Htnry IL, 248; Continuation of
Lucan, 311.
McMASTER, GUV HUMPHREY.
Clyde, N, Y.. b. «-9-
Carmen Belhcosum .... S9^
MATURIN, CHARLES ROBERT.
England, 1782-1824.
From : — Bertram, '>32, 800.
MEEK, ALEXANDER BEAUFORT.
Columbia, S. C., 1814-»■{05.
Balaklava
MEREDITH, OWEN.
See Lytton, Robert Bulwer.
MERIVALE, JOHN HERMAN.
England, 1779- 1844.
The V oyt {From ike Greek) .
MESSENGER, ROBERT rilNCHLEY.
Boston, MssSm b. 1807.
Give me the Old ....
METASTASIO. PIERRE A. D. B.
Italy. 1698-1782.
without and Within
MICKLE. WILLIAM JULIUS.
Scotland, 1734-1788.
The Sailor's Wife
From: — Cumnor Hall ...
MILLER, CINCINNATUS HEINE
Indiana, b. 184t.
. People's Song of Peace, The ....
MILLER, WILLIAM.
Scotland.
Willie Winkie
5*6
268
118
757
246
49*
598
83
MILMAN. HENRY HART.
England. 1791-1869.
Hebrew Wedding ( Fall 0/ Jerusalem ) .
Jewish Hymn in Babylon
MILNES, RICHARD MONCKTON.
See Houghton, Lord.
MILTON, JOHN.
England, 1608- 1674.
Adam and Eve {Paradise Lost)
Adam describing Eve {Paradise Lost)
Adam's Morning Hymn in Paradise
Adam to Eve .....
Battle of the Angels {Paradise Lost)
Blindness, On his
Blindness, On his own {To Cyriack Skinner]
Cromwell, To the Lord-General
Epitaph on Shakespeare
Evening in Paradise {Paradise Lost) —,
Faithful Angel, The {Paradise Lost) .
Haunt of the Sorcerer {Comus)
II Penseroso
Invocation to Light {Paradise Lost)
L'Allegro
Lady lost in the Wood {Comus)
May Morning
Nymph of the Severn {Comus)
Samson on his Blindness {Samson Agonistes)
Selections from " Paradise Lost "
From: — Comus, 491, 558, 726, 796, 869; Ly-
cidas, 203, 490, 494, 495, 812; On his Being
Arrived to the Age of Twenty-three, 395; On
the Detraction which Followed my Writing
Certain Treatises, II., 6or ; Paradise Lost,
121, 203, 204, 205, 206, 207, 215, 232, 310, 346,
348, 3948 395. 396, 398, 399» 490» 49*» 492» 494,
496» 539» 54O) 558» 601, 719. 722, 724» 725» 794»
798, 799, 801, 803, 807, 808, 812, 814, 815, 816,
868, 899; Paradise Regained, 107, 490, 720,
800, 804, 811; Samson Agonistes, 631, 794;
To the Lady Margaret Ley, 939; To the
Nightingale, 496; Translation of^Horace, 632.
MITCHELL, WALTER F.
New Bedford. Mass.
Tacking Ship off Shore ..... 619
372
711
209
363
216
500
366
735
909
906
4*3
387
830
786
407
785
829
422
830
32*
321
62
INDEX OF AUTHOES AND TITLES.
MITFORD, MARY RUSSELL.
En^and, 1786-1855.
^enzi to the Romans {Rienzt)
MOIR. DAVID MACBETH.
Scotland, 1798 -1851.
Casa Wappy
Rustic Lad's Lament in 'he Town, The
MONTAGU, LADY MAÍ WORTLEV.
England, 16^-1762.
From : — Answer, The, -5 ; To the Imitator of
the First Satire of \orace, 806.
MONTGOMERY, JAMA'S.
Scotland, 1771 -18^
0 . .
can Island)
•d
erty !
Birds (Pe/iVa« Is
Common Lot, T'
Coral Reef, The
Daisy, The .
Forever with the
Make way for '
My Country
Night
Ocean, The
Parted Frieno ...
Pelican (i dican Island) .
Sea Life ( ^ican Island) ....
From: — Lart t^uil of God's Goodnes^ 399 :
Grave The h \ Issues of Life and Death,
311, 39) ; Ln Cloud, 801; Mother's Love,
232; What is-'^t'rayer? 398.
MONTREUIL, MATHIEU DE.
France, 1611 - 1691.
To Madame de Sevig^é
MOORE, CLEMENT CLARKE.
New York City, 1779-18^.
St. Nicholas, A Visit from ....
MOORE, EDWARD.
England, 1712-1757.
From : — Fables : Happy Marriage, The, 215 ;
Spider and the Bee, Ihe, 134, 795.
MOORE, THOMAS. ^
Ireland, 1779-1852.
" AJas ! how light a cause may move"
As by the shore, at break of day "
As slow our ship "
Believe me, if all those endearing young
charms"
Black and Blue Eyes
Campbell, To
Canadian Boat-Song, A .
Come, rest in this bosom "...
Farewell, but whenever " . . . .
" Farewell to thee, Araby's daughter " (Fire-
Worshippers)
Fly to the desert, fly with me " (From L ight
of the Harem)
Go where Glory waits thee ....
** I knew by the smoke that so gracefully
curled "
lÀi^àAXoYi^itàKFire-Worshippers) ,
Love's Young Dream
"Oft, in the stilly night" ....
" O, breathe not his name " . . . .
Orator Puff .......
Origin of the Harp. The
S^x\x\% (From ihe Greek of Anacreofi)
Syria ( Paradise and the Peri)
Temple to Friendship, A . . . .
" The harp that once through Tara's halls " .
"Those evening bells" ....
" 'T is the last rose of summer "...
Vale of Avoca, The
Vah of Cashmere, The (Light of the Harem)
Verses written in an Album ....
From : All that's bright must fade, 793 ; Blue
Stocking, 816; "How shall I woo? "121; 111
Omens, 205; " I saw thy form," 248; Lalla
Rookh : Fire-Worshippers, 348, — Light of the
Harem, 203,— Paradise and the Peri, 396,—
Veiled Prophet of Khorassan, 120, 397, 793 ;
Lines on the Death of Sheridan, 940 ; My Heart
and Lute, 795 ; " O, the sight entrancing," 539,
602; *'Rich and Rare," 721; Sacred Songs,
348» 399 ; The Time I've lost, 203, 204 ; To
——204; "While gazing on the Moon's
Light," 491 ; Young May Moon, 205.
725
279
243
470
308
624
463
3^9
584
563
416
608
114
480
623
914
96
264
577
237
>74
131
920
665
185
240
294
151
237
228
25>
262
318
92 Ï
962
865
422
45 >
120
577
716
465
116
452
133
MORE, HANNAH.
England, 1744-»833.
From: — Florio .... 812
MORLAIX, BERNARD DE.
France, 12th Century, Benedictine Monk..
The Celestial Country (John Mason Nealit
Translation) 351
MORRIS, CHARLES.
England, 1739-1832.
From : — Town and Country. . • . 814
MORRIS, GEORGE PERKINS.
Philadelphia, Pa., 2802-1864.
My Mother's Bible 100
The Retort 996
" Woodman, spare that tree " . . . 101
MORRIS, J. W.
America.
Collusion between a Alegaiter and a Water-
Snaik looo
MORRIS, WILLIAM.
England, b. i8u.
Atalanta Conquered ( The Eartkly Paradise) 165
Atalanta Victorious " . " " 164
March 418
Riding Together. 883
MOSS, THOMAS.
England, about 1740-1808.
The Beggar 340
MOTHERWELL, WILLIAM.
Scotland, 1797 -1835.
Jeanie Morrison 242
** My held is like to rend, Willie " . . 269
"They come ! the merry summer months" . 423
MOULTON, ELLEN LOUISE CHANDLER.
Pomfret, Conn., b. 1835.
Late Spring, The 32a
MOULTRIE, JOHN.
England. Pub. 18^.
Forget thee .... . . 161
The Three Sons 9°
MUELLER, WILLIAM.
Germany, 1794-18^.
The Sunken (Z\X.y (James Clarence MangatPs
Translation)' ...... 82s
MULOCK, DINAH MARIA.
See Craik^ Dinah Mulock.
MUNBY, ARTHUR J.
England.
Après 776
NABB.
From: — Microcosmos ..... 348
NAIRNE, CAROLINA. BARONESS.
Scotland, 1776-1845.
Laird o' Cockpen, The 200
Land o* the Leal, The 296
NASH, THOMAS
England, 1558-1600.
" Spring, the sweet Spring " .... 422
NEALE, JOHN MASON.
England, 1818-1866.
Art thou Weary? (From the Latin of Si.
Stephen the Sabcite) 364
Celestial Country, The (From ihe Latin of
Bernard de Morlaix) . . 351
Darkness is thinning" (From the Latin of
St. Gregory the Great) . . . 360
NEELE, HENRY.
England, 1798-1828.
" Moan, moan, ye dying gales " . . . 315
NEWELL, ROBERT HENRY (Orpheus C. Kerr).
New York City, b- 1836.
Poems received in Response to an Advertised
Call for a National Anthem .... 1007
Publishers : Lee & Shep>ard, Boston.
NEW ENGLAND PRIMER.
Quotations 107, 308, 397
NEWMAN, JOHN HENRY.
England, b. 1801.
Flowers without Fruit 789
The Pillar of the Cloud 364
NICHOLS, MRS. REBECCA S.
Greenwich. N. J. Pub. 1844,
The Philosopher Toad ..... ^
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TljTLES.
63
lí
131
347
NICOLL, ROBERT.
Scotland, 1814-1837.
We are Brethren a' 117
NOEL, THOMAS.
Enj^land. Pub. 1841.
The Pauperis Drive ..•••. 341
NORRIS, JOHN.
England. 1657-Z711.
My Little Saint
From : — The Parting . . , .
NORTH, CHRISTOPHER.
See WH.son, John.
NORTON, CAROLINE ELIZABETH S., HON.
England. zdo8-1876.
Arab to his Favorite Steed, The 664
Bingen on the Rhine 521
King of Denmark's Ride, The . 293
Love Not 320
Mother's Heart, The 83
** We have been friends together " 116
From : — The Dream 232
O'BRIEN, FITZJAMES.
Ireland. D. 1829-; d. wounded, in Virginia, 1862.
Kane
933
O'KEEFE, JOHN.
Ireland, 1747 -1833.
" 1 am a friar of orders gray " {^Robin Hood) . 964
OLDMIXON, JOHN.
England. 1673-1742.
From: — Governor of Cyprus . . . - 271
OLIPHANT, THOMAS.
England.
" Where are the men?" (From tho Welsh of
Talhaiarn) 530
O'REILLY, JOHN BOYLE.
Ireland, b. 1844.
My Native Land .... 579
Publishers : Roberts Brothers. Boston.
O'REILLY, MILES.
See Halpine, Charles G.
ORRERY, CHARLES BOYLE, EARL OF.
England, 1676-1731.
From: — Henry V. 120
OSGOOD, FRANCES SARGENT.
Boston. Mass., 1812-1850.
To Labor is to Pray . ► . .
556
OSGOOD, KATE PUTNAM.
Fryeburg, Me., b. 1843.
Driving Home the Cows 531
Publishers : Houghton, Mihiin, & Co., Boston.
O'SULLIVAN, JOHN L.
America.
From : — The Djinns {From the French of
Victor Hugo ...... 868
OTWAY, THOMAS.
England. 1651-1685.
Jaffier parting with Belvidera (Venice Pre¬
served . 239
From: — Caius Marius, 725 : Don Carlos, 108;
Orphan, The, 232, 795; Venice Preserved,
133. 206.
OVERBURY, SIR THOMAS.
England, 1581-1613.
From : — A Wife, 232,796.
OVID. [PoBLius OviDius Naso.]
Italy, 43 B. c.-18 a. d.
From: — Metamorphoses (DrydetCs Transla-
iion)y 493; Metamorphoses (Tate and Stone-
street^ s Translation^ 395.
PAINE, THOMAS.
England, 1736-1^.
The Castle in the Air 823
PALMER, JOHN WILLIAMSON.
Baltimore, Md., b. 1825.
For Charlie's sake" 277
Thread and Song 104
Publishers : Charles Scribner's Sons, New York.
PALMER, RAY.
Rhode Island, b. 1808.
** I saw thee" 393
The Soul's Cry 394
Publisher : A. D. F. Randolph, New York.
PALMER, WILLIAM PITT.
Stockbridge. Mciss.. b. 1805.
The Smack in School 99
PARKER, MA^JYN.
England. XVII. Century.
From: — Y^ Gentlemen of England . , 632
»ARKER, THEODORE* '
Lexington, Mass.. iöio-i8t Í J:
'• The Way, the Truth ,nd the Life" . . 389
Publishers : D. Appl<?ton & One. New York.
PARNELL, THOMAS. ^ ,
England, 1679-1717. Jli
" When your beauty
From : — An Elegy to an 01
<eauty, 134; Her-
veneris.
18s
;
reneris, 207.
mit, The, 399, 490 ; Pervi
PARSONS, THOMAS Will ' M.
Boston, Mass., b. 1819.
On a Bust of Dante . • i'> . 908
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin & t Bostom
PATMORE, COVENTRY.
England, b. 1823.
Rose of the World, The 128
Sly Thoughts . . . • • , . 186
Sweet Meeting of Desires . . 170
Tribute, The . . ' f • 12b
PAYNE, JOHN HOWARD. . ,
New York City, 1792-1852. y
Home, Sv/ettHomt (Ciarif the laidHMilan) 225
Brutus's Oration over the Body of Lucretia
(Brutus) 875
Publisher ; S. r rench & Son. New Yora-
PEALE, REMBRANDT.
Near Philadelphia. Pa., 1778-i86a
Faith and Hope 231
PEELE, GEORGE.
England, 1552-15^.
From : — The Arraignment of Paris ; Cupid's
Curse
PERCIVAL, JAMES GATES.
Berlin, Conn., 1795-1856,
May
Coral Grove. The ....
Seneca Lake
From : — The Graves of the Patriots
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
PERCY, FLORENCE.
See Allen, Elizabeth Akers.
PERCY, THOMAS BISHOP.
England, 1728- 1811.
Friar of Orders Gray, The
" O Nanny, wilt thou gang wi' me ? " .
From : — Winifreda
PERRY, NORA.
America.
Love-Knot, The ......
PETTEE, G. W.
Canada.
Sleigh Song
PFEFFEL.
Germany, 1736-1809.
The Nobleman and the Pensioner (Charles T.
Brooks's Translatio7i) .....
' PHILIPS, JOHN.
England, 1676-1708.
The Splendid Shilling
PHILLIPS, AMBROSE.
I England, 1675-174^.
¡ Blest as the immortal gods " (From the Greek)
207
423
624
449
601
»37
»56
21$
190
670
520
947
184
PHILOSTRATUS.
Greece.
" Drink to me only with thine eyes " ( Trans¬
lation of Ben yonson) . . . .125
PIERPONT, JOHN.
Litchfield, Conn., 1785-1866.
My Child 278
Not on the Battle-Field .... 534
Warren's Address .... . 500
Whittling . 979
From : — A Word from a Petitioner . 604
PINKNEY, EDWARD COATE.
Annapolis, Md., 1802- 1828.
A Health 129
3-^-
64
INDE)^ OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
PITT, WILLIAM.
Ën^nd, d. 1840.
The Sailor's Consolation .... 630
POE, EDGAR ALLAN.
Baltimore. Md., 1811-1849.
Annabel Lee . 285
Annie, For . • / • • • 299
Bells, The . . . ^ . 714
Raven, The 852
From : — To F. S. 0 796
Publisher : W. J. Widdleton. York,
POLLOK, ROBERT.
Scotland, 1799-1827.
Byron {Course Time) ^ . 918
Ocean " " .... 610
:-I-Course of Time . . . 346,797
POMFRET, JOHN.
England, 1667-1703.
From: — Verses to his Friend under Afflic¬
tion, 312, 347.
POPE, ALEXANDER.
England, 1688-1744'
Aà^\son {Prologue to The Satires) . . . 910
Belinda ( The Rape of the Lock) . . . 128
Dying Christian to his Soul, The . 365
Fame {Essay m Man) 780
Greatness " " 781
Happiness " " .... 736
Nature's Chain {Essay on Man) 405
Ode to Solitude 225
"Poti^^YritnàyTht {Essay on Man) • 9"
Reason and Instinct " . 781
Ruling Passion, The {Moral Essays) . 779
Scandal {Prologue to the Satires) . 781
Sporus, — Lord Hervey " . . 909
Toilet, The {Rape 0/ the Lock) . 713
Universal Prayer, The . . . . . 370
From : — Dunciad, The, 396, 724, 803, 807 ; Eloísa
to Abelard, 215,248 ; Epigram from Boileau,
810; Epilogue to Satires, 797 ; Epistle IL, 107 ;
Epistle to Mr. Addison, 120; Epistle to Dr.
Arbuthnot, 107, 805, 815 ; Epistle to Robert,
Earl of Oxford, 801 ; Epitaph on Gay, 724 ;
Epitaph on Hon. S. Harcourt, 120; Essay on
Criticism, 798, 799, 803, 805, 806, 807, 812;
Essay on Man, 107, 394, 395» 397» 398,399» 489,
496, 792, 793, 796, 799, 800, 801, 803, 807, 808,
812, 815, 938, 939; Imitations of Horace, 793,
796, 803, 804, 806, 807, 811, 814; Martinus
ScribUrus on the Art of Sinking in Poetry,
205 ; Moral Essays, 2x5, 231, 232, 396, 723, 795,
797» 798» 799» 803, 804, 805, 808,812, 814 ; Pro¬
logue to Addison's Cato, 602 -, Rape of the Lock,
203, 799, 8xo, 811, 814, 815 ; Temple of Fame,
8x1 ; To the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady,
31J, 3x2; Translation of Homer's Iliad, x2o,
792, 797 ; Translation of Homer's Odyssey, 121,
207,489 ; Wife of Bath : Prologue, 805 ; Wind¬
sor Forest, 671, 672, 815.
PORTEUS, BEILBY.
England, 1731 -1808.
From : — Death, 311, 539, 341, 559, 794.
PRAED, WINTHROP MACKWORTH.
England, 1802-1839.
Belle of the Ball, The 97X
Camp-bell 920
From: — "I remember, I remember," 108;
School and Schooiiellows, 309.
PRENTICE, GEORGE DENISON.
Preston, Conn., 1802- 1870.
The Closing Year 752
PRIEST, NANCY AMELIA WOODBURY.
America, 1837 -1870.
Heaven 368
Over the River 276
PRINGLE, THOMAS.
Scotland, 1789-1834.
" Afar in the desert " 319
PRIOR, MATTHEW.
Engird, 1664-1721.
To the Honorable Charles Montague . . 730
From: — Henry and Emma, 721 ; Upon a Pas¬
sage in the Scaligerana, 803.
PROCTER, ADELAIDE ANNE.
England, 1826-1864.
Doubting Heart, A .
Judge Not ....
Lost Chord, A .
Woman's Answer, A
Woman's Question, A
From : — Hearts
PROCTER, BRYAN W. {Barry Cornwall^
England, 1787-1874.
Address to the Ocean
Blood Horse, The
Golden Girl, A .
History of a Life ....
Owl, The . ...
Poet's Song to his Wife, The
Sea, The
Sit down, sad soul" .
" Softly woo away her breath "
Song of Wood Nymphs
Stormy Petrel, The .
White Squadl, The
PROUT, FATHER, See Mahony, Francis.
PULTENEY, WILLIAM, EARL OF BATH.
England, 1682- 1764.
From : — The Honest Jury .
PUNCH.
Published in London.
Bomba, King of Naples, Death-Bed of .
Collegian to his Bride, The ....
Jones at the Barber's Shop
Roasted Sucking Pig
318
784
760
*43
*43
27X
611
467
132
74*
483
219
625
369
296
83s
483
629
810
922
992
lOlX
1013
QUARLES, FRANCIS.
En^nd. 1592-1644.
Delight in God 360
Vanity of the World, The . . . . 743
From:—Emblems, 214, 309, 489, 798; Divine
Poems, 309.
RALEIGH, SIR WALTER.
England, 1552-1618.
Lines found in his Bible 745
Nymph's Reply, The 158
Pilgrimage, The 361
Soul's Errand^ The 745
From : — The Silent Lover 204
RAMSAY, ALLAN.
Scotland, 1685-1758.
" At setting day and rising morn " . , . x6x
Lochaber no more 237
RANDOLPH, ANSON D. F.
Woodbridge, N. J., b. 1820.
Hopefully Waiting 391
RANDOLPH, THOMAS.
En^mi, 1605-1634.
Fairies' %on% {Leigh HunPs Translation) .
To a Lady adminng herself in a Looking-
83s
125
RASCAS, BERNARD.
Provence, France.
The Love of God ( W. €■ BryanPs Trans.)
RAY, WILLIAM.
England, pub. 1752.
From : — History of the Rebellion .
388
540
5*8
RAYMOND, ROSSITER W.
Cincinnati, O., b. 1840.
Trooper's Deatk, The {Frotn the German)
READ, THOMAS BUCHANAN.
Chester, Fa., 1822-1872.
Angler, The 669
Brave at Home, The 563
Closing Scene, The 710
Drifting 684
Sheridan's Ride 594
Publishers : J. B. Lippincott & Co., Philadelphia«
REQUIER, AUGUSTUS JULIAN.
Charleston. S. C., b. t825_.
Baby Zulma's Christmas Carol ... 81
RITTER, MARY LOUISE.
Perished 3"
Why? '*8
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
65
ROBERT II. {Son «j/'Hugh Capet).
France. ^96-1031.
Veni Sánete Spiritus (C. IVínkworíh's Trans.) 356
ROBERTS, SARAH.
Portsmouth, N, H.
The Voice of the Grass 465
ROCHESTER, JOHN WILMOT, EARL OF.
England, 1648-1680.
Too late, alas, 1 must confess " . . 160
Prom : — Song, 134 ; Written on the Bedchamber
Door of Charles II 940
RODGER, ALEXANDER.
Scotland. 1784-1846.
" Behave yoursel'before folk " . 157
ROGERS, SAMUEL.
En^nd, 1763-1855.
Descent, The 446
Ginevra 890
Italy ......... 679
Jorasse (//a^) 651
Marriage 212
Naples {Italy) 683
On the Picture of an Infant {Greek 0/ León¬
idas) 81
Rome {Italy) 680
Sleeping Beauty, A 130
Tear, A • 789
Venice {Italy) 679
Wish, A 225
From : — Italy, 248, 493 ; Human Life, 311, 809 ;
Jacqueline, 348.
RONSARD, PIERRE.
France. 1542-1585.
Ketwm of Sprmg {Translation) . .421
ROSCOE, MRS. HENRY.
England, Pub. 1868.
From : — Sonnet {Italian of Michel A ngelo) . 809
ROSCOMMON, WENTWORTH DILLON, EARL.
Ireland, about 1633- 1684.
From: — Essay on Translated Verse, 805;
Translation of Dies 1rs, 394.
ROSSETTI, CHRISTINA GEORGINA.
England, b. 1830.
Milking-Maid, The X32
Up-Hill 363
ROSSETTI, DANTE GABRIEL.
England, b. 1828.
Blessed Damozel, The 824
Nevermore, The 744
ROWE, NICHOLAS.
England, 1673-1718.
From: — The Fair Penitent . . . i34j 347
ROVDEN, MATHEW.
England, about 1586.
Sir Philip Sidney . ... 904
From : — An Elegie on a Friend's Passion for his
Astrophill 133
RYAN, ABRAM J.
Ireland. Lives in Mobile, Ala.
Rosary of my Tears 742
Sentinel Songs 532
The Cause of the South .... 596
RYAN, RICHARD.
England, 170- 1849.
"Oh, saw ye the lass" .... 149
SANGSTER, CHARLES.
Kingston, Canada, b. 1822.
The Comet 863
The Snows ....... 666
Publisher : John Lovell, Montreal, Canada.
SANGSTER, MRS. MARGARET E. M.
New Rochelle, N. Y., b. 1838.
"Are the children at home " .... 281
SAPPHO.
Island of Lesbos, 600 B. C.
"Blest as the Immortal Gods" {Ambrose
Phillips's Translation) .... 184
SARGENT, EPES.
Gloucester, Mass., b. 1814.
A Life on the Ocean Wave .... 630
SAVAGE, RICHARD.
Engltnd, 1696-1743.
Prom:—The Bastard . . • . . 812
SAXE, JOHN GODFREY.
Highgate, Vt., b. 1816.
Echo 1014
" My eyes ! how I love you " , . . . 195
Proud Miss McBride, The .... 985
Railroad Rhyme 980
Woman's Will . . ... 981
Publishers : Houghton. Mifñin, ¿1: Co., Boston.
SCHILLER, FRIEDRICH.
Würtemberg, 1759-1805.
From: — Homeric Hexameter {Coleridge's
Translation) 631
SCOTT, SIR WALTER.
Scotland. 1771-1832.
"And said 1 that my limbs were old" {Lay
of the Last Minstreb) . ^ . . . 202
Beal* an Dhifine {Lady of the Lake\ . . 510
" Breathes there the man " {Last Minstrel) . 563
Christmas in Olden Time {Mar^nion) . . 698
Clan-Alpine, Song of {Lady of the Lake) . 519
Coxoi\2S^ {Lady of the Lake) 283
County Guy {Qtientin Durward) . . 194
Fitzjamesand Roderick Dhu {Lady of Lake) 655
Flodden Field {Marmion) .... 507
Helvellyn 654
James Fitzjames and Ellen {Lady of Lake) . 648
hoch'invdir (Marmion) 175
Marmion and Douglas . . 648
Melrose Abbey {Lay of the Last Miftstrel) 675
Norham Castle {Marmion) .... 676
Pibroch of Donuil Dhu {Lady of the Lake). 518
Rebecca's Hymn {Ivauhoe) .... 372
Scotland {Lay of the Last Minstrel) . 575
"Soldier, rest I thy warfare o'er" {Lady of
the Lake) 53°
Stag Hunt, The {Lady of the Lake) . . 658
" The heath this night " {Lady of the Lake) . 234
" Waken, lords and ladies gay " . . 658
From : — Bridal of Triermain, 395 ; Lady of the
Lake, 204, 308, 670, 671, 719, 721, 791, 813;
Lay of the Last Minstrel, 491, 494,
811, 814; Lord of the Isles, 348, 539, 893;
Marmion, 108, 248, 816, 899; Monastery,
397
SCUDDER, ELIZA.
The Love of God 392
SEARING, LAURA C. REDDEN {Howard
Glyndon).
SomerbCt Co., Md., b. about 1840.
Mazzini 934
SEDLEY, SIR CHARLES.
England, 1631-1701.
To a Very Young Lady 147
"Phillis IS my only joy " .... 124
SEWALL, HARRIET WINSLOW.
America, d. 1833.
Why thus Longing? 392
SHAKESPEARE, WILLIAM.
England, 1564-1616.
Airy Nothings .... 867
Approach of Age {Sonnet XII.) . . . 753
Antony's Oration over the Body of Caesar
{yiilius Ccesar) . . . . • 875
"Blow, blow, thou winter wind" {As You
Like It) . 316
Cleopatra {A ntony and Cleopatra) . -712
Compliment to Queen Elizabeth {Midsummer
Night's Dreani) 835
Course of True Love, The {Midsummer
Night's Dream) ...... 250
Dagger of the Mind, A {Macbeth) . . 882
Dover Cliff {Kittg Lear) 445
Fairies' Lullaby {Midsummer Night's Dream) 835
" Farewell ! thou art too dear " . . 239
" Fear no more the heat " ' • 3o*
Friendship m
Qx\^\.{Hamlet). ... . • 294
** Hark, hark ! the lark " {Cymbeline) . 474
Hotspur's Description of a Fop {Henry IF) 506
King to his Soldiers before Harfleur, The
{Henry V.) S03
INDEX OP AUTHORS AND TITLES.
** Let me not to the marriage of true minds " . 208
Lo\t {Merchant ûf yenice) . . . 125
Love Dissembled {As Yon Like If) . 144
Love's Memory {Airs iVell that Ends IVeW) 242
Martial Friendship . . . 114
Murder, The {Macbeth) .... 882
Music {Merchant of Venice") .... 775
Old Age of Temperance {As Vov Likt It. ). 546
Olivia ( Twelfth Night)
O mistress mine ! " {Twelfth Night) . 122
Othello's Defence {Othello) .... 145
Othello's Remorse {Othello) .... 877
Portia's Picture {Merchant of Venice) • . 122
Queen Mab {Romeo and Juliet) . . . 836
Seven A%es ot M^niAs Vors Like It) . . 711
Shepherd's Life, A {Henry VI, Part III.) 225
S\eep{Henry IV. Part ÍI.) .... 762
Soliloquy on Death {Hamlet) . . 297
" Take, O, take those lips away **{Measure for
Measure) . 263
*'The forward violet" 123
Unrequited Love . . .251
*'When icicles hang by the wall" {Lovers
Labor Lost) 439
" When in the chronicle" ' . . . 122
" When to the sessions of sweet silent thought "115
Wolsey's Fall VIII ) . . 321
Wolsey's Advice to Cromwell {Henry VIII.) 321
Prom:—All's Well that Ends Well, 312, 791,
793» 796» 801, 813-
Antony and Cleopatra» 206, 490, 722.
As You Like It, 133» >34» 204, 214» 347» 348,
394,489, 496, 602, 722, 791, 795, 803, 8io, 813.
Comedy of Errors, 345, 722, 799, 868.
Coriolanus, 493, 813.
Cymbeline, 241, 798, 811, 816.
Hamlet, 121, 133, 203, 205, 206, 207, 241» 248,
271» 309» 310» 31Ï» 345» 346» 347» 395»
396, 397, 399» 489, 490» 491» 495, 540» 559»
671, 721, 722, 723» 724, 725» 793» 797» 79S,
8or, 803, 804, 80$, 809, 811, 813, 814, 815,
867, 868, 900.
Julius Caesar, 120, 121, 206, 310, 492, 539, 670,
671, 722, 793» 797» 799» 802, 810, 8^, 900,
938.
King Henry IV. Ft. I, 108, 312, 397, 398, 670,
671, 722, 793» 798, 807, 812, 815, 816.
King Henry IV. Pt. II., 346, 395, 540, 724, 800.
King Henry V., 395, 540, 559, 631, 632, 723,
802, 811, 867.
King Henry VI., Pt. I., 310, 795, 810.
King Henry VI., Pt. II., 495, 724, 796, 799.
King Henry VI., Pt. III., 541, 798, 802, 815,
938.
King Henry VIII., 3"» 3»2, 345, 346, 347,
601, 723, 811.
King John, 107, 232, 309, 345, 346, 34S, 541,
603, 722, 726, 798, 799, 801, 812, 815, 899.
King Lear, 346, 347» 348, 494, 721, 723, 802.
King Richard II., 308, 309, 310, 346, 541, 603,
719, 722, 725, 792-
King Richard III., 107,232, 310, 396, 540, 541,
721, 722, 796, Soo, 802, 803, 804, 868, 899, 938.
Love's Labor Lost, 133, 203, 723, 724, 795,
804, 810.
Lover's Complaint, 204.
Macbeth, 232, 309, 3"r3ï2. 345» 346, 347» 396,
491, 540, 54J» 559» 720, 724, 725» 79»,
792» 793» 794» 797» 798, 800, 802, 810, 816,
868, 900.
Measure for Measure, 205, 232, 310, 347» 797»
800, 8rj, 813.
Merchant of Venice, 133, 203, 248, 312, 346,
347» 348, 496» 632, 722, 723, 724, 797» 798,
802, 803, 804, 899.
Merry Wives of Windsor, 868, 869.
Midsummer Night's Dream, 203, 495,722,
806, 867, 869.
Much Ado About Nothing, 121, 203, 204, 271,
312, 345» 723» 724, 799» 80X.
Othello, 207, 248, 347» 539» 721» 722, 723» 724»
72Ç, 81X, 9c^.
Passionate Pilgrim, 492.
Romeo and Juliet, 134, 207, 241» 345» 346» 490»
492, 721, 723, 724, 809, 815, 899.
Sonnet XVIII., 134.
Sonnet X XV., 540,
Sonnet LXVI., 398.
Sonnet LXX., 722.
Sonnet XC., 271.
Sonnet XCVIII., 492.
Sonnet CXI., 722.
Sonnet CXXXII..49I-
Taming of the Shrew, 121, 215, 725, 804.
Tempest. 133, 205, 492, 672, 721, 797, 805, 869.
Tiinon of Athens, 347. 489.
Titus Andronicus, 311, 798.
Troilusand Cressida, 121, 792, 811.
Twelfth Night, 205, 215, 494» 798» 808.
Two Gentlemen of Verona, 133, 134» 203, 215,
27Í» 345» 493» 723» 795-
Venus and Adonis, 205, 803.
Winter's Tale, 107, 134» 495» 63*» 724» 802.
SHANLY, CHARLES DAWSON.
America, l^ib. 1866.
Brierwood Pipe 525
Civil War 525
SHARPE, R. S.
England, 17^9-183^
The Miuute-Guo . . . . « . . 627
SHEALE, RICHARD.
England.
Chevy-Chase 635
SHELLEY. PERCY BYSSHE.
England, 1792-1822.
Cloud, The 822
lanthe, Sleeping {Queen Mob) . . • 714
'M arise from dreams of thee" . • 188
" I fear thy kisses, gentle maiden " . . 131
Lament, A 322
Love's Philosophy 188
** Music, when soft voices die "... 776
Night {Queen Mab) 415
Night, To - . 4*4
Ozymandias of Egypt 7»7
Skylark, To the 473
Sunset {Queen Mob) 412
" The sun is warm, the sky is clear " • 317
View from the Euganean Hills ... 441
War 499
" When the lamp is shattered " . . . 262
From : — Cenci, The, 720 ; Julian and Maddalo»
806 ; Prometheus Unbound, 206.
SHENSTONE, WILLIAM.
England, 17x4-1763.
Village Schoolmistress, The ( Schoolmistress) 707
Prom: — Pastoral, A, 241 ; Schoolmistress, The,
107 ; Written on the Window of an Inn, X2i.
SHEPHERD. N. G.
America.
" Only the clothes she wore " . . • . 299 •
SHERIDAN, RICHARD BRINSLEV.
Ireland, 1751 -1816.
het the Tozst pass {Schoolfor S candad) • 13t
SHIRLEY, JAMES.
England, 1594-1666.
Death, the Leveller 301
From : — Cupid and Death .... 308
SIBLEY, CHARLES.
Scotland.
The Plaidie tS;
SIDNEY, SIR PHILIP.
England, 1554-1586.
Love's Silence >44
" My true-love hath my heart" ... >37
S\eep {Astropheland Stella) .... 762
"With how sad steps, O Moon " . . . 249
SIGOURNEY, LYDIA HUNTLEY.
Norwich, Conn., 1791-1865.
Coral Insect, The 623
** Go to thy rest, feir child " . . . • 282
Man —* Woman 776
Publishers : Hamersley 8c Co., Hartford, Coon.
SIMMONS, BARTHOLOMEW.
Ireland, pub. 1843: d. 1850.
To the Memory of Thomas Hood . . .922
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
67
SIMMS, WILLIAM GILMORE.
Charleston, S. C.. 1806-1870.
Grape-Vine Swing, The 456
Mother and Child 81
Shaded Water 448
Publishers : W. J. Widdleton & Co., New York.
SKELTON, JOHN.
England, about 1460- isaç«
To Mistress Margaret Hussey . . 122
SMITH, ALEXANDER.
Scotland, 1830-1867.
Lady Barbara . . . . 163
The Night before the Wedding '. . 210
From : — A Life Drama .... 493, 807
SMITH, CHARLOTTE.
England, 1749-1306.
The Swallow ... . 478
SMITH. F. BÜRGE.
America.
Little Goldenhair 85
SMITH, HORACE.
England, 1779-1849.
Address to the Mummy at Belzoni*s Exhibition 717
Flowers, Hymn to the 459
Moral Cosmetics 545
Tale of Drury Lane, A {Rejected Addresses) ioo6
The Gouty Merchant and the Stranger . . 962
From : — Rejected Addresses .... 808
SMITH, JAMES.
England, 1775-18^.
From : — Rejected Addresses
SMITH, SEBA.
Turner. Me., 1792-1868.
The Mother's Sacrifice
SMITH, SYDNEY.
England, 1771-1845.
A Recipe for Salad .
SMOLLETT, TOBIAS GEORGE.
Scotland. 1721-1771.
From : — Roderick Random
SOMERVILLE, WILLIAM.
England, 1677-1742.
From : — The Chase
SOUTHEY, MRS. CAROLINE BOWLES.
England, 1787 -1854.
Cuckoo Clock, The (The Birthday)
Greenwood Shrift, The.
Pauper's Death-Bed, The
Young Gray Head, The
SOUTHEY, ROBERT.
England. 1774-1843.
Blenheim, The Battle of .
Cataract of Lodore, The
Devil's Walk, The
Emmett's Epitaph
God's Judgment on a Wicked Bishop
Greenwood Shrift, The
Holly-Tree, The .....
Inchcape Rock, Tlie ....
Old Man's Comforts, The
Well of St. Keyne, The ....
From : — Curse of Kehama, 206, 309, 816 ; Ma
doc, 271 ; Joan of Arc, 311 ; Thalaba the De
stroyer, 491 ; Occasional Pieces, XVIIL,-8o6
SPENCER, CAROLINE S.
Catskill, N. v., 1850.
Living Waters
SPENCER, WILLIAM ROBERT.
England. 1770- 1834.
Beth Gêlert
"Toolate [ stayed" ,
Wife, Children, and Friends .
SPENSER, EDMUND.
England, I553- »599-
Beauty {Hymn in Honor 0/ Beauty)
Bower of Bliss, The {Faerie Queene)
'Bnát^ThtiEpithalamion)
Cave of Sleep, The {Faerie Queene)
Ministry of Angels " *'
Una and the Lion " "
Una and the Red Crosse Knight {Faerie
Queene)
Prom: — Faerie Queene, 311, 395, 398, 492, 494,
540, 670, 671 ; Fate of the Butterfly, 489 \
808
86
X013
203
671
717
3B3
341
891
538
449
949
921
879
383
455
620
545
955
739
662
Ï17
220
730
829
212
828
373
828
827
Hymn in Honor of Beauty, 206 ; Lines on his
Promised Pension, 938 ; Mother Hubberd's
Tale, 204.
SPOFFORD, HARRIET PRESCOTT.
Calais, Me., b. 183$.
Vanity 769
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston,
SPRAGUE, CHARLES.
Boston, Mass.. 1791-1875.
Winged Worshippers, The .... 478
From : — Curiosity, 804 ; To my Cigar . 814
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
STA NI FORD.
Boston, Mass., Pub. 1803^
From : — Art of Reading .... 398
STEDMAN, EDMUND CLARENCE.
Hartford, Conn., b. 1833.
Betrothed Anew 460
Caw&hy Sovg{ A/ice ^Monmouth) . 518
Old Admiral, The 932
What the Winds bring 451
Publishers : Hougliton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
STEPHEN THE SABAITE, ST.
Art thou weary ? ( yohn Mason Nealds Trans. ) 364
STERLING, JOHN.
Scotland, 1^-1844.
Alfred the^Harper 645
.... 406
. 456
Beautiful D^, On a
Spice-Tree, The
STEVENS, GEORGE ALEXANDER.
England, 1720-1784.
The Storm
STILL, JOHN.
England, 1543-1607.
Good Ale
628
946
STODDARD, RICHARD HENRY.
Hinghain, Mass., b. 1825.
Brahma's Answer 746
" It never comes again " ...
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
STODDART, THOMAS TOD.
ScotKind, b. 1810.
The Anglers* Trysting-Tree .
STORY, ROBERT.
Scotland, 1790-1859.
The Whistle
STORY, WILLIAM WETMORE.
Salem, Mass., b. 18x9.
Pan in Love
Perseverance {From the Italian 0/ Leonardo
da Vinci)
Violet, The
Publishers : Little. Brown, & Co., Boston.
STOWE, HARRIET BEECHER.
Lítchñeid, Conn., b- 1812.
A Day in the Pamñli Doria
Lines to the Memory of Annie
" Only a year " .... *
Other World. The ....
Publishers : Houghton. Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
STRANGFORD, LORD.
England. 1789-1855.
Blighted Love {From the Portugueoe) .
STREET, ALFRED B.
Poughkcepsic, N. Y., b. i8ii.
Nightfall
Settler, The
STRODE, WILLIAM.
England, 1600-1644.
Kisses
106
667
156
488
781
461
682
273
278
387
2ÓI
4f2
709
186
SUCKLING, SIR JOHN.
England, 1609-1641.
Bride, The {A Ballad upon a IVedding)
Constancy
I prythee send me back my heart "
why so pale and wan ? "
From: — Brennoralt, 134; Against Fruition
SURREY, HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF.
England, 1516-1547.
** Give place, ye lovers" 123
Means to attain Happy Life, The .
211
124
146
263
801
226
68
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
126
156
796
993
6ri
188
148
419
770
794
SWAIN, CHARLES.
England, 1803- 1874.
A Violet in her Hair .....
" Smile and never heed me "
From: — The Mother's Hand ....
SWIFT, JONATHAN.
Ireland. 1^-1745.
Tonis ad resto mare "
From : — Cadenus and Vanessa, 810 ; Imitation
of Horace, 121; Poetry; a Rhapsody, 496.
SWINBURNE. ALGERNON CHARLES.
En^nd, b. 1837.
Disappointed Lover, The ( Triumph of Time)
Kissing her Hair
Match, A . . . .
** When the hounds of spring'* .
SYLVESTER, JOSHUA.
England, 1563-1618.
Contentment
Were I as base as is the lowly plain "
TALFOURD, SIR THOMAS NOON.
England, 1795-1854.
Sympathy {Ion)
From : — I on
TALHAIARN OF WALES.
Where are the men ? " {Olipkanfs Trans.) 530
TANNAHILL, ROBERT.
Scotland, 1774-1810.
Flower o' Dumblane, The .... 148
" The midges dance aboon the bum ". . 411
TAYLOR, BAYARD.
Kennett Square, Pa., 1825-1878.
Arab to the Palm, The 454
Bedouin Love-Song 186
King of Thüle {From the German 0/ Goethe) 862
Possession 218
Rose, The {Hassan Ben Khaled) . 464
Song of the Camp 155
From : — National Ode 604
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin. & Co., Boston.
TAYLOR, BENJAMIN FRANKLIN.
Lowville. N. Y., b. 1822.
Northern Lights, The 409
TAYLOR, SIR HENRY.
England, b. about 1800.
Athulf and Ethilda 172
{Philip van Artevelde) . . 229
Scholar, The {Edwin the Fair) . . 766
K {Philip van Artevelde) . . 213
From: — Philip van Artevelde . . 348,812,867
TAYLOR. JANE.
Encana, 1783-1824.
Philosopher's Scales, The .... 862
Toad's Journal, The 851
TAYLOR, JOHN EDWARD.
England, Pub. ¡852.
** If it be true that any beauteous thing " {From
the Italian of Michael A ngelo Buonarotti) 135
" The might of one fair face " {From the
Italian of Michael Angelo Buonarotti) . 135
TAYLOR, JEFFERYS.
England, 1703-i8>3.
The Milkmaid .....
TAYLOR, JEREMY.
England, 1613-1667.
Heaven .....
TAYLOR, TOM.
England, 1817-11580.
Abraham Lincoln {London Punch)
TENNANT, WILLIAM.
Scotland, 1784- 1848.
Ode to Peace
TENNYSON, ALFRED.
England, b. 1810.
Break, break, break " .
Bugle, The (Princess) ....
Charge of the Light Brigade .
Come into the garden, Maud " .
Dead Friend, The {In Memoriam)
Death of the Old Year, The
Eaçle, The
Enid's Song {Idyls of tht King) .
Foolish Virgins, The {Idyls of the King)
957
367
931
534
315
449
5*7
'52
113
753
483
777
754
Godiva . . 702
Hero to Leander . . . 235
"Home they brought her warrior dead"
{Princess) 292
In Memoriam, Selections from . 290
Lady Clara Vere de Vere . .267
Locicsley Hall 254
Lullaby {Princess) 81
May Queen, The 327
Miner's Daughter, The {MillePs Daughter) 183
Mort d'Arthur ..... 642
New Year's Eve (/« . . 752
" ü swallow, swallow, flying south " {Princess) 171
"O, yet we trust that somehow good" {In
Memoriam) 392
Retrospection {Princess) .... 315
Sleeping Beauty, The ( Drfrtw) . 174
Song of the Brook ( The Brook : an Idyl) . 446
Song of the Milkmaid {Queen Mary) . . 168
Spring {In Memoriam) .... 418
"Strong Son of God, immortal Love" {In
Memoriam) ....... 393
Victor Hugo, To 926
" What does little birdie say?" {Sea Dreams)' 80
From: — Aylmer's Field, 810; Fatima, 205; In
Memoriam. 309, 311, 345, 394, 397, 399i 797»
803, 807 ; International Exhibition Ode, 541 ;
Land of Lands, The, 603 : Miller's Daughter,
814; "Of old sat Freedom on the heights,"
602 ; On the Death of the Duke of Welling¬
ton, 940; Princess, The, 493, 721, 807; Sir
Launcelot and Queen Guinevere, 721 ; To the
Queen, 632.
TENNYSON, FREDERICK.
England. (Brotlicrof the preceding.)
Blackbird, The
TERRETT, WILLIAM B.
Platonic .
693
119
THACKERAY, WILLIAM MAKEPEACE.
England, 1811-1863,
Age of Wisdom, The 202
Church Gate, At the 132
End of the Play, The 344
Little Billee 971
Mahogany Tree, The 117
Mr. Molony's Account of the Ball . . 1002
Sorrows of Werther 972
THAXTER, MRS. CELIA.
Isles of Shoals.
The Sandpiper. . . . . . , 482
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
THEOBALD, LEWIS.
England, 1691-1744-
From: — The Double Falsehood . .812
THOM, WILLIAM.
Scotland. 1799-1850.
The Milherless Baira 91
THOMSON, JAMES.
Scotland. 1700- 1748.
hT\^\Ti%{Tne Seasons: Spring) . . . 669
Bathing ( The Seasons : Summer) . . 669
Castle of Indolence, The {From Canto I.) . 831
Connubial {The Seasons: Spring) . 214
Domestic Birds ( 6'ííwívíí: Spring). . 470
Hymn on the Seasons 417
Plea for the Animals {The Seasons: Spring) 783
Rule Britannia 576
Songsters, The {7he Seasons: Spring) . 469
Stag Hunt, The {The Seasons: Autumn) 659
War for the Sake of Peace {Britannia) . 499
Winter Scenes (; ¡Vinter) . . 439
From: — Britannia, 541; Castle of Indolence,
489» 539, 814, 816 ; Coriolanus, 812 ; Seasons,
The : Spring, 107, 489, 492, 672, 799, — Sum¬
mer, 204, 490, 631, 719, — Autumn, 492, 795,—
Winter, 310, 672, 806; Song, 205.
THOREAU, HENRY DAVID.
Concord, Mass., 1817-1862.
Mist
Smoke
Publishers t Houghton, Mifflin & Co.. Boston
THORNBURY, GEORGE WALTER.
England, 1828-1877.
The Jester's Sermon
69t
691
748
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
69
2og
910
532
422 I
392
558
388
769
THORPE, ROSE HARTWICK.
Litchñeld, Mich., b. 1840.
Curfew must not ring to-night.... 180
THRALE, HESTER LYNCH Piozzi).
Wales, 1740-1821.
The Three Warnings 756
THURLOW9 EDWARD HOVEL, LORD.
En^and, 1781-1829.
Beauty 730
Bird, To a 482
TICKELL, THOMAS.
Enjriand, 1686-1740.
To a Lady before Marriage ....
To Earl of Warwick on the Death of Addison
From : ~ To a Lady, with a Present of Flowers,
134: Colin and Lucy, 311.
TIMROD, HENRY.
Charleston, S. C., 1829-1867.
" Sleep sweetly in your humble graves "
Spring in Carolina
Publishers ; E. J. Hale & Son, New York.
TOPLADY, AUGUSTUS.
England, 1740-1778.
" Love divine, all love excelling " .
TOURNEUR, CYRIL.
England, Time of James I.
From : — The Revenger* s Tragedy
TRENCH, RICHARD CHENEVIX.
Ireland, b. 1807.
Different Minds ......
Harniosan .......
TROWBRIDGE, JOHN TOWNSEND.
Ogden, N. Y., b. 1827.
Dorothy in the Garret 251
Vagabonds, The 547
Publishers ; Harper iS: Brothers, New York.
TRUMBULL, J.
Woodbury, Conn., 1750-1831,
From: — McFingal, 671, 793.
TUCKERMAN, HENRY THEODORE.
Boston, Mass., 1813-1871.
Newport Beach 692
Publi.shers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
TUPPER, MARTIN FARQUHAR.
England, b. i8io.
Cruelty to Animals, Of {Prov. Philosophy) •. 782
From:—Of Education, 107; Of Immortality 394
TURNER, CHARLES TENNYSON.
England, 1808-1879. Brother of Alfred Tennyson.
The Ocean
TUSSER. THOMAS.
England, 1523-1380.
From: — Farmer's Daily Diet, 232; Good
Husbandry Lessons, 347, 394, 672, 802 ;
Winds, The, 802 ; Wiving and Thriving, 214.
TVCHBORN, CHIDIOCK.
England.
Lines written by One in the Tower
UDALL, NICHOLAS.
England, 1506-1364.
From: — Translations from Erasmus, 540
UHLAND, LUDWIG.
Germany, i787-'i8.>2.
Landlady's Daughter, The {DwighPs Trans.) 142
Passage, The {Sarah Ansíenos Translation) • 291
UPTON, JAMES.
England, 1670-1749.
The Lass of Richmond Hill
VAUGHAN, HENRY.
England, 1621-1695.
They are all gone
VENABLE, W. H.
America.
Welcome to ** Boz," A
VERY, JONES.
Salem, Mass., b. 1813.
Latter Rain, The
Nature
631
745
149
274
925
433
403
Spirit Land, The 3^8
VICENTE, GIL.
Portugal, 1482-1537. , ^ .
The Nightingale {Sir John Bowrin^s Trans. ) 479
VINCI, LEONARDO DA.
Italy, 1452- 1519.
Perseverance IV. Story''s Translation) . 781
VISSCHER, MARIA TESSELSCHADE.
Holland, 1594-1649.
The Nightingale {Sir John Bowring s Trans.) 479
WALLER, EDMUND.
England, 1605-1687.
Girdle, On a 125
Go, Lovely Rose ! 125
Old Age and Death ( Upon his Divine Poesy) 755
From ; — Divine Love, 399 ; On the King's Re¬
turn, 798 ; To a Lady singing a Song of his
Composing, 134; Upon Roscommon's Trans¬
lation of Horace's De Arte Poética, 806; Verses
upon his Divine Poesy, 794; " While I listen
to thy voice," 399.
WALLER. JOHN FRANCIS.
Ireland, D. i8io.
" Dance light " 174
The Spinning-Wheel Song .... 173
WALSH, WILLIAM.
En^and, 1663-1707.
Rivalry in Love 147
WALTON, IZAAK. (See also John Chalkhill.)
England, 1593-1683.
The Angler's Wish . . ... 668
WARTON, THOMAS.
England, 1728-1790.
Retirement 406
WASSON, DAVID A.
Love against Love ..... 790
WASTELL, SIMON.
England, d. 1623.
Man's Mortality 302
WATSON, JAMES W.
America.
Beautiful Snow 334
Wounded to Death. .... 526
WATTS, ISAAC.
England, 1674-1749.
Cradle Hymn, A 76
Insignificant Existence 751
Summer Evening, A 431
From: — Divine Songs, 395, 398; Funeral
Thought, 308, 310; Glory to the Father and
Son, 394 ; Horae Lyric®, 807 ; Hymns and
Spiritual Songs, 794, 799 ; Sluggard, The,
815; Song XVI., 108; Song XX., io8-
WAUGH, EDWIN.
England, 1817. (Called *' The Lancashire Poet.")
The dule's i'this bonnet o'mine " . • 196
WEBSTER, DANIEL.
Salisbury, N. H., 1782-1852.
The Memory of the Heart .... 112
From : — Address before the Sons of New
Hampshire 939
WEBSTER. JOHN
England, about xóoo.
From: — Duchess of Malfy, 121, 232; The
White Devil, 495
WEIR, HARRISON.
England. Pub. 1S65.
The English Robin 475
WELBY, AMELIA B COPPUCK.
St. Michaels, Md.. 1821-1852.
Old Maid, The 790
Twilight at Sea ...... 610
WESLEY, CHARLES.
England, 1708-^88.
Wrestling Jacob 37*
WESLEY, JOHN.
England, 1703-1791.
The Love of God Supreme . . . • 39®
WESTWOOD, THOMAS.
England, b. 1814.
Little Bell 88
" Under my window " 8S
WHEWELL, WILLIAM,
England, 1795-1866.
Physics 99«
[fi-
70
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
-a
WHITCHER, FRANCES MIRIAM.
Whitesboro", N. Y., 1812-1852.
Widow Bedott to Elder Sniffles . , . 995
WHITE, JOSEPH BLANCO.
Spain, b. 1775, d. England. 1841
Night 415
WHITE, HENRY KIRKE.
England, 1785- 1806.
Early Primrose, To the 461
Harvest Moon, To the .... 550
WHITMAN, SARAH HELEN.
Providence. R. I., b. 1803.
A Still Day in Autumn ... 692
WHITMAN, WALT.
West Hills. N. v.. b. 1819.
The Mocking-Bird (" O«/ of thé cradle^^) . 470
WHITNEY. ADELINE D. TRAIN.
Boston, b. 1824.
Jack Horner (^MotJur Goose for Grown Folks) 973
Publishers : Roberts Bros.
WHITTIER, JOHN GREENLEAF.
Haverhill. Mass., b. 1807.
Absent Sailor, To her Tent on the Beack) 241
Agassiz, Prayer of 936
Angel of Patience, The . 275
. Barbara Frietchie 596
Barclay of Ury 536
Barefoot Boy, The 99
Benedicite zii
Brown of Ossawatomie 599
Bums 914
Fremont, John C 935
Halleck, Fitz-Greene ... 937
Hampton Beach 609
Ichabod 929
Laus Deo! . .... 597
Maud Muller. 158
Meeting, The 378
New England in Winter {Snow-Bound) . 436
Palm-Tree, The 455
Pumpkin, The 459
Reformer, The 600
Thy Will be Done 375
From: — Centennial Hymn, 604; Democracy, 813 ;
Eve of Election, 603, 719 ; Snow-Boundi, 807.
Publishers : Houghton, Mifflin, & Co., Boston.
WILCOX, CARLOS.
Newport, N. H., 1794- 1827.
God everywhere in Nature .... 488
WILDE, RICHARD HENRY.
Ireland, b. 1789 ; d. New Orleans, La.. 1847.
Life . . . • 743
WILLIS, NATHANIEL PARKER.
Portland, Me., 1807-1867.
Belfry Pigeon, The 47^
Leper, The 70*
Parrhasius ... ... 881
Women, Two 333
Publishers : Clark & Maynard, New York.
WILLSON, ARABELLA M.
Canandaigua. N. Y.
To the " Sextant " 1001
WILLSON, BYRON FORCEYTHE. '
America, 1837-1867.
In State . . 523
WILMOT, JOHN. See Rochester, Earl of,
WILSON, HORACE HAYMAN.
England, 1786-1860. j
Woman {From Sanskrit of Càîidàsa) . 776
WILSON. JOHN {Kit ox Christopher North).
Scotlana, 1785-1854.
Evening Cloud, The ..... 692
Rose and the Gauntlet, The 884
WINKWORTH. CATHARINE.
Scotland, b. 1829.
Veni Sánete Spiritus {From the Latin) - • 356
WINTER, WILLIAM.
Beauty . - 769
WITHER, GEORGE.
England, 1588-1667.
" Lord ! when those glorious lights I see** . 376
Shepherd*s Resolution, The . . . 193
Upon a Stolen Kiss 186
From: — Christmas, 816 ; The Shepherd's Hunt¬
ing, 803.
WOLCOTT, or WOLCOT, JOHN {PeUr Pindar).
England, 1738-1819.
Chloe, To 192
Pilgrims and the Peas, The .... 953
Razor-Seller, The 954
Sleep 761
WOLFE, CHARLES.
Ireland, 1791-1823.
Burial of Sir John Moore. . . , 920
WOODWORTH, SAMUEL.
Scituate, Mass., 1785-1842.
The Old Oaken Bucket 100
WOOLSEY, SARAH CHAVHiCEY {Susan Coolid^e).
New Haven, Conn. Now living.
In the Mist . 823
When? 381
Publishers : Roberts Brothers, Boston.
WORDSWORTH, WILLIAM.
England, 1770-1850.
Cuckoo, To the . 472 '
DafTodils 464 -
Hart-leap Well 660
Highland Girl at Inversneyde, To a . . 105-'
Inner Vision, The 767
Lucy Z04 -
Milton, To ....... 907
Rainbow, The . 432-
She was a phantom of delight " 128-
Skylark, To the ...... 474-.
Sleeplessness . . ... ^3-
Sonnet composed upon Westminster Bridge 678
Sonnet, The 907
" There was a time " 757...
^ The world is too much with us " - 403 ■.
Three years she grew ". . ' . . 103 -
Tintem Abbey 403 ^
To a Child .89
Toussaint l'Ouverture, To . . 921
Vrikxíown Poets {Excursion) .... 766 -s
Walton's Book of Lives {Eccles. Sonnets) . 908
We are Seven 87
From: — Character of the Happy Warrior, 540;
Dion, 868 ; Early Spring, 492, 495 ; Ecclesias¬
tical Sonnets, 809, 939; Ellen Irwin, 311 ; Ex¬
cursion, The, 309» 396, 397» 398, 399, 494, 631,
^3, 798, 801, 806, 808, 867 ; Expostulation and
Reply, 397 ; Extempore Effusion on the Death
of James Hogg, 309 ; Influence of Natural Ob¬
jects, 672 ; Lao-
damia, 203, 206, 399 ; Lines added to ** The
Ancient Mariner/' 108 ; Lines written in Ear¬
ly Spring, 492, 495 ; Miscellaneous Sonnets,
489; " My heart leaps up," 107: Nutting, 490;
Ode to Duty, 797 ; Old Cumberland Beggar,
489; On the Subjugation of Switzerland, 4931
Personal Talk, 805 ; Peter Bell, 490, 495 »
Poems dedicated to National Independence,
602 : Poems in Summer of 1833, 495 ; Poet's
Epitaph, 205 ; Prelude, The, 4to ; Resolution
and Independence, 807 ; Sky Prospect, 491 ;
Sonnet composed at —— Castle, 494 • Sonnet
XXXV., 398; Sparrow's Nest, The, 231;
Tables turned, The, 494 ; Thoughts suggested
on the Banks of Nith, 398 ; To , 206 ; To
a Butterfly, 108 ; To the Daisy, 495 '> To Sir
G. H. B., 348 ; To a Young Lady, 311, 723 ;
Triad, The, 721 ; Written in London, Septem¬
ber, x8o2, 814; Yarrow Unvisited, 493«
WOTTON. SIR HENRY.
England, 1568-T639. ^
Character of a Happy Life, The • 73"
In Praise of Angling . . . • 667
To his Mistress 124
From : — The Death of Sir Albert Morton's Wife 312
WROTHER, MISS.
From: — The Universal Songster • • 271
WYATT, SIR THOMAS.
England. 1503-1542.
Earnest Suit, An • - . . • ^4P
XAVIER, ST. FRANCIS.
France. 1506-1552.
" My God, I love thee " [CaswaU*s Trans.) . 360
B-
■4
INDEX OF AUTHORS AND TITLES.
-a
71 ,
YALDEN, or VOULDING, THOMAS.
England, i669»7o-1736.
From : — Against Enjoyment 801
YOUNG, DR. EDWARD.
England, 1684-1765.
Man {Night Thoughts) 776
Narcissa 106
Procrastination {Night Thoughts) . . 748
Time {Night Thoughts) .... 747
From: — Epistle to Mr. Pope, 347, 798; Last
Day, The, 398 ; Love of Fame, 215, 347, 541,
793, 804, 810, 815; Night Thoughts, 120, 232,
308, 309, 310, 312, 345» 348, 395» 398» 399» 489»
491, 492, 792, 794, 798, 799, 801, 816.
YOUNG, SIR J.
Epitaoh on Ben Jonson 939
ANONYMOUS.
Anne Hathaway 904
A Voice and Nothing Else .... 923
Bellagcholly Days 1016
Books {KaUder 0/Sheperdes) . . 767
Constancy . 713
Cooking and Courting .... 301
Cosmic Egg, The 991
Cradle Song 77
Dreamer, The {Poems by a Seamstress) . 330
Drummer-Boy's Burial, The .... 528
Duty . 557
Echo and the Lover. X014
Edwin and Paulinus {Conversion of North-
umbria) ...... 389
Eggs and the Horses, The . . . 955
Faithful Lovers, The aoi
Fetching Water from the Well . . 169
Fine Old English Gentleman . 959
Flotsam and jetsam .... 621
George Washington ..... 928
Girlhood 711
•* Go, feel what I have felt " ... 546
Good By 233
Grief for the Dead 272
Indian Summer 434
Inscription on Melrose Abbey . . . 307
King John and the Abbot of Canterbury . 943
Kissing's no Sin 187
** Rock of Ages," p. 367, in a previous edition in«
Springfield, Mass. "The Babie," on p. 79, in former
Washington, D. C., b. New Hampshire, 1828.
Kitty of Coleraine 187
Lady Ann Bothwell's Lament . . 269
Lament of the Border Widow . . - . 638
Life's Love, A ..... • 972
Little Feet 77
Love lightens Labor 220
Loveliness of Love, The 14z
" Love me little, love me long " ... 141
" Love not me for comely grace " . . . 141
Modern House that Jack built, The . . loii
My Love . . . . • . 1012
My sweet Sweeting (temp. Henry VÍ//,) . 123
Not one to spare ..... 230
Nursery Rhymes ...... 993
Old-School Punishment . ... 99
Origin of the Opal 865
Parting Lovers, The {IV. R. Alger's Trans.) 236
Passage in the Life of St. Augustine . . 362
Praxiteles {From the Greek) .... 903
Remonstrance with the Snails . . 486
Revelry of the Dying 898
Robin Hood and Allan-a-Dale . . . 638
Sea Fight, The . . . ' . . . 612
Seaside Well, The ... . 739
Siege of Belgrade 1013
Silent Baby ....... 78
Skater Belle, Our . ..... 670
Skeleton, To a 761
Somebody ....... 170
Somebody's Darling . . 531
Stormy Petrel, Lines to the .... 483
Summer Days ..... 160
Swell's Soliloquy 1001
Tell-tale, The 476
" They are dear fish to me " .... 282
Unsatisfactory 194
Useful Plough, The 551
Vicar of Bray, The . . . . 945
"Waly, waly, but love be bonny" . . . 268
" When I think on the happy days " , , 247
" When shall we all meet again ? " . . . 322
" Where are you going, iny pretty maid?" . 958
White Rose, The . . . . . 123
"Why, lovely charmer" . . 146
Wife to her Husband, The .... 244
Woman 975
From : — Battle of the Boyne, The, 602 ; Epigram
on Matrimony, 232 ; On Tobacco, 814.
as Anonymous, was written by Prof. Edward H. Rice,
ns ascribed to Hugh Miller- w by Rev. J. £. Rankim,
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
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POEMS OP CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
PHILIP, MY KING.
•* Who bears upon his baby brow the round
And top of sovereignty. '
Look at me with thy large brown eyes,
Philip, my king !
Round whom the enshadowing purple lies
Of babyhood's royal dignities.
Lay on my neck thy tiny hand
With Love's invisible sceptre laden ;
I am thine Esther, to command
Till thou shalt find a queen-handmaiden,
Philip, my king !
0, the day when thou goest a-wooing,
Philip, my king !
When those beautiful lips 'gin suing,
And, some gentle heart's bars undoing.
Thou dost enter, love-crowned, and there
Sittest love-glorified ! — Rule kindly,
Tenderly over thy kingdom fair ;
For we that love, ah ! we love so blindly,
Philip, my king !
Up from thy sweet mouth up to thy brow,
Philip, my king !
The spirit that there lies sleeping now
May rise like a giant, and make men bow
As to one Heaven-chosen among his peers.
My Saul, than thy brethren taller and fairer.
Let me behold thee in'future years !
Yet thy head needeth a circlet rarer,
Philip, my king ; —
A wreath, not of gold, but palm. One day,
Philip, my king !
Thou too must tread, as we trod, a way
Thorny, and cniel, and cold, and gray;
Rebels within thee and foes without
Will snatch at thy crown. But march on,
gloriovts,
Martyr, yet monarch ! tUl angels shout.
As thou sitt'st at the feet of God victorious,
" Philip, the king ! "
dinah Maria Mulock craik.
CRADLE SONG.
prom " bitter-sweet."
What is the little one thinking about ?
Very wonderful things, no doubt ;
Unwritten history!
Unfathomed mystery I
Yet he chuckles, and crows, and nods, and winks,
As if his head were as full of kinks
And curious riddles as any sphinx !
Warped by colic, and wet by teais.
Punctured by pins, and tortured by fears.
Our little nephew will lose two years ;
And he '11 never know
"Where the summers go ;
He need not laugh, for he '11 find it so.
Who can tell what a baby thinks ?
Who can follow the gossamer links
By which the manikin feels his way
Out from the shore of the great unknown.
Blind, and wailing, and alone.
Into the light of day ?
Out from the shore of the unknown sea.
Tossing in pitiful agony ;
Of the unknown sea that reels and rolls.
Specked with the barks of little souls, —
Barks that were launched on the other side.
And slipped from heaven on an ebbing tide !
What does he think of his mother's eyes ?
What does he think of his mother's hair ?
What of the cradle-roof, that flies
Forward and backward through the air ?
What does he think of his mother's breast.
Bare and beautiful, smooth and white,
Seeking it ever with fresh delight.
Cup of his life, and couch of his rest ?
What does he think when her quick embrace
Presses his hand and buries his face
Deep where the heart-throbs sink and swell.
With a tenderness she can never tell,
Though she murmur the words
Of all the birds, —
Words she has learned to murmur well !
Now he thinks he'll go to sleep I
1 can see the shadow creep
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUtH.
Over his eyes in soft eclipse,
Over his brow and over his lips,
Out to his little finger-tips !
Softly sinking, down he goes !
Down he goes ! down he goes !
See ! he's hushed in sweet repose.
josiAH Gilbert Holland.
CHOOSING A NAME.
I HAVE got a new-bom sister ;
I was nigh the first that kissed her.
"When the nursing-woman brought her
To papa, his infant daughter.
How papa's dear eyes did glisten ! —
She will shortly be to christen ;
And papa has made the offer,
1 shall have the naming of her.
Now 1 wonder what would please her, —
Charlotte, Juha, or Louisa ?
Ann and Mary, they 're too common ;
Joan's too formal for a woman ;
Jane's a prettier name beside ;
But we had a Jane that died.
They would say, if't was Rebecca,
That she was a little Quaker.
Edith's pretty, but that looks
Better in old English books ¡
Ellen's left off long ago ;
Blanche is out of fashion now.
None that 1 have named as yet
Are so good as Margaret.
Emily is neat and fine ;
What do you think of Caroline Í
How 1 'm puzzled and perplexed
What to choose or think of next !
I am in a little fever
Lest the name that 1 should give her
Should disgrace her or defame her ; —
I wül leave papa to name her.
Mary lamb.
—♦—
BABY MAY.
Cheeks^ soft as frulylpeaohes ;
Lips whos^ dewy /fecarlet fceaches
Poppies paleness ; round large eyes
Ever great with new surprise ;
Minutes filled with shadelcss gladness ;
Minutes just as brimmed with sadness ;
Happy smiles and wailing cries ;
Crows, and laughs, and tearful eyes ;
Lights and shadows, swifter bom
Than on wind-swept autumn com ;
Ever some new tiny notion.
Making every limb all motion ;
Catchings up of legs and arms ;
Throwiugs back and small alarms ;
Clutching fingers ; straightening jerks ;
Twining feet wl^e each toe works ;
Kickings up am^raiuing risings ;
Mother's ever new surprisings ;
Hands all wants and looks all wonder
At all things the heavens under ;
Tiny scoms of smiled reprovings
That have more of love than lovings ;
Mischiefs done with such a winning
Archness that we prize such sinning ;
Breakings dire of plates and glasses ;
Graspings small at all that passes ;
Pullings off of all that's able
To be caught from tray or table ;
Silences, — small meditations
Deep as thoughts of cares for nations ;
Breaking into wisest speeches
In a tongue that nothing teaches ;
All the thoughts of whose possessing
Must be wooed to light by guessing ;
Slumbers, — such sweet angel-seenrings
That we'd ever have such dr-eamings ;
Till from sleep we see thee breakirrg.
And we'd always have thee waking ;
Wealth for which we know no measure
Pleasure high above all pleasure ;
Gladness brimming over gladness ;
Joy in care ; delight in sadness ;
Loveliness beyond completeness ;
Sweetness distancing all sweetness ¡
Beauty all that beauty may be ; —
That's May Bennett ; that's my baby.
William Cox Bennett.
A CRADLE HYMN.
abbreviated from the original.
Hush ! my dpir, lie^tjll, and slumber ^
Holylangefls guard tlrjnbed !
Heavenly bles^ngs Without number
Gently falling on thy head.
Sleep, my babe ; thy food and raiment,
House and home, thy friends provide ;
All without thy care or payment.
All thy wants are well supplied.
How much better thou 'rt attended
Than the Son of God could be.
When from heaverr he descended,
And became a child like thee.
Soft and easy is thy cradle :
Coarse and hard thy Saviour lay :
When his birthplace was a stable.
And his softest bed was hay.
0
l;
INFANCY.
77
-a
See the kinder shepherds round him,
Telling wonders from the sky !
There they sought him, there they found him,
With his virgin motjjer by.
O-
See tlie lovely Babe a-dressing ;
Lovely Infant, how he smiled !
When he wept, the mother's blessing
Soothed and hushed the holy Child.
Lo, he slumbers in his manger.
Where the horned oxen feed ;
Peace, my darling, here's no danger.
Here's no ox anear thy bed.
Mayst thou live to know and fear him,
Trust and love him all thy days ;
Then go dwell forever near him.
See his face and sing his praise!
I could give thee thousand kisses.
Hoping what I most desire ;
Not a mother's fondest wishes
Can to greater joys aspire.
Isaac Watts.
LITTLE FEET.
It' I
Two little feet, so small that .botija may nestle
^ In one caressingdiand, — '
Two tender feet upon the untried border
Of lifers mysterious land.
Dimpled, ^amf soft, l^nd pink Vs peach-Wee. blo^
soms, ' ^
In April's frigi-ant days.
How can they walk among the briery tangles,
Edging the world's rough ways !
These rose-white feet, along the doubtful future.
Must bear a mother's load ;
Alas ! since Woman has the heaviest burden.
And walks the harder road.
Love, for a while, will make the path before them
All dainty, smooth, and fair, —
Will cull away the brambles, letting only
The roses blossom there.
But when the mother's watchful eyes are shrouded
Away from sight of men.
And these dear feet are left without her guiding.
Who shall direct them then Í
How will they be allured, betrayed, deluded.
Poor little untaught feet !
Into what dreary mazes will they wander.
What dangers will they meet ?
Will they go stumbling blindly in the darkness
Of Sorrow's tearful shades ?
Or find the upland slopes of Peace and Beauty,
Whose sunlight never fades ?
Will they go toiling up Ambition's summit.
The common world above ?
Or in some nameless vale, securely sheltered.
Walk side by side with Love ?
Some feet there be which walk Life's track un-
wounded.
Which find but pleasant ways :
Some hearts there be to which this life is only
A round of happy days.
But these are few. Far more there are who
wander
Without a hope or friend, —
Who find their journey full of pains and losses.
And long to reach the end.
How shall it be with her, the tender stranger.
Fair-faced and gentle-eyed.
Before whose unstained feet the world's rude
highway
Stretches .so fair and wide ?
Ah ! who may read the future ? For our darling
We crave all blessings sweet.
And pray that He who feeds the crying ravens
Will guide the baby's feet.
ANONYMOUS.
CRADLE SONG.
Sleep, little baby of mine.
Night and the darkness are near.
But Jesus looks down
Through the shadows that fiown.
And baby has nothing to fear.
Shut, little sleepy blue eyes ;
Dear little head, be at rest ;
Jesus, like you.
Was a baby once, too.
And slept on his own mother's breast.
Sleep, little baby of mine.
Soft on your pillow so white ;
Jesus is here
To watch over you, dear.
And nothing can harm you to-night.
O, little darling of mine.
What can you know of the bliss.
The comfort I keep.
Awake and asleep.
Because I am certain of this ?
ANONYMOUS.
I&
78
POEMS OP CHIIDHOOD AND YOUTH.
■a
THE BABY.
/ / /
Where did ^ou come from, baby dear ?
Out of fm everywhere into the here.
Where did you get your eyes so blue Î
Out of the sky as I came through.
What makes the light in them sparkle and spin ?
Some of the starry spikes left in.
Where did you get that little tear ?
I found it waiting when I got here.
What makes your forehead so smooth and high ?
A soft hand stroked it as I went by.
What makes your cheek like a warm white rose ?
Something better than any one knows.
Whence that three-cornered smile of bliss !
Three angels gave me at once a kiss.
Where did yon get that pearly ear ?
Ood spoke, a-nd it came out to hear.
Where did you get those arms and hands ?
Love made itself into hooks and bands.
Feet, whAc^lid you come, yod darlingVhings ?
From the ^me byX ^ the \herubs\wings. ^
How did\he^ all just comV to be you ?
Ood thought me, and^o I grew.
But how^did you come td us, youydear ?
Ood thought of you, and so I am hkre.
george macdonald.
THE BABY.
ON.paijents' knees,la naked, newlborn child.
Weeping thou sat'sWhen all arovynd thee smiled:
So live, that, sinking in thy last long sleep.
Thou then mayst smile while all around thee
weep.
From the Sanscrit of CALIUASA, by
sir William Jones.
■6-
SILENT BABY.
The baby sits in her cradle.
Watching the world go round,
Enwrapt in a mystical silence.
Amid all the tumult of sound.
She must be akin to the flowers.
For no one has heard
A whispered word
From this silent baby of ours.
Wondering, she looks at the childj-en.
As they merrily laughing pass.
And smiles o'er her face go rippling.
Like sunshine over the grass
And into the heart of the flowers ;
But never a word
Has yet been heard
From this silent darling of ours.
Has she a wonderful wisdom,
Of unspoken knowledge a store.
Hid away from all curious eyes.
Like the mysterious lore
Of the bees and the birds and the flowers ?
Is this why no word
Has ever been heard
From this silent baby of ours ?
Ah, baby, from out your blue eyes
The angel of silence is smiling, —
Though silvern hereafter your speech.
Your silence is golden, — beguiling
All hearts to this darling of ours,
Who speaks not a word
Of all she has heard.
Like the birds, the bees, and the flowers.
anonymooa
, BABY LOUISE.
I'm in lo^ with you. Baby Louise !
With your silken hair, and your soft blue eyes.
And the dreamy wisdom that in them liés.
And the fmnt, sweet smile you brodght from the
skies, — .•
God's sunshine. Baby Louise.
When you fold your hands. Baby Louise,
Your hands, like a fairy's, so tiny and fair,
With a pretty, innocent, saint-like air,
Are you trying to think of some angel-taught
prayer
You learned above. Baby Louise ?
I'm in love with you, Baby Louise !
Why ! you never raise your beautiful head !
Some day, little one, your cheek wiU grow red
With a flush of delight, to hear the word said,
" I love you," Baby Louise.
Do you hear me. Baby Louise ?
I have sung your praises for nearly an hour,
And your lashes keep drooping lower and lower.
And — you 've gone to sleep, like a weary flower.
Ungrateful Baby Louise !
makgaret Evtinge.
LONGFELLOW'S HOME AT QAMBKXUGE.
Somewhat back from ilte village street
Stands the old-fashioned country scat.*'
Once—ah! once—within these halls
One whom memory oft recalls^
The Father of his Country^ diveiif
,r
~l ' • n
i
1
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INFANCY. 79
THE BABIE. if i'® could but would not speak.
And now, 0 monarch absolute,
Nae shoon to hide her tiny taes. Thy power is put to proof ; for lo !
Nae stockin' on her feet ; Resistless, fathomless, and slow.
Her supple ankles white as snaw. The nurse comes rustling like the sea.
Or early blossoms sweet And pushes back thy chair and thee.
And so good night to King Canute.
Her simple dress o' sprinkled pink, henry .wadsworth Longfellow.
Her double, dimplit chin.
Her puckered lips an' baumy mou'.
With na ane tooth within. BABY BELL
Her een sae like her mither's een. Have you not heard the poets tell
Twa gentle, liquid things ; How came the dainty Baby Bell
Her face is like an angel's face. Into this world of ours ?
We're glad she has nae wings. The gates of heaven were left ajar ;
With folded hands and dreamy eyes.
She is the buddin' o' our luve. Wandering out of Paradise,
A giftie God gied us : She saw this planet, like a star.
We maun na luve the gift owre weel. Hung in the glistening depths of even, —
'T wad be nae blessing thus. Its bridges, running to and fro.
O'er which the white-winged angels go.
We still maun lo'e the Giver mair. Bearing the holy dead to heaven.
An' see Him in the given ; She touched a bridge of flowers, — those feet.
An' sae she '11 lead us up to Him, So light they did not bend the bells
Our babie straight frae Heaven. Of the celestial asphodels,
j. E. Rankin. They fell like dew upon the flowers :
Then all the air grew strangely sweet !
, And thus came daintv Babv Bell
Into this world of ours.
"THF HnTT<îFHnTr> «nVFPFTPH" She came, and brought delicious May.
THE HOUSEHOLD SOVEREIGN. swallows built beneath the eaves ;
from "the hanging op the crane." Like sunlight. In and out the leaves
The robins went the livelong day ;
Seated I see the two again. The lily swung its noiseiess bell;
But not alone ; they entertain And o'er the porch the trembling vine
A little angel unaware. Seemed burstmg with its veins of wine.
With face as round as is the moon ; How sweetly, softly, twilight fell !
A royal guest with flaxen hair, earth was fuli of singing-birds
Who, throned upon his lofty chair. And opening spring-tide flowers.
Drums on the table with his spoon. When the dainty Baby Beil
Then drops It careless on the floor. Came to this world of ours 1
To grasp at things unseen before.
Are these celestial manners Î these 0, Baby, dainty Baby Bell,
The ways that win, the arts that please ? How fair she grew from day to day I
Ah. yes ; consider weU the guest. What woman-nature fiUed her eyes.
And whatsoe'er he does seems best ; What poetry within them iay I
He mleth by the right divine Those deep and tender twiiight eyes.
Of helplessness, so lately born So full of meaning, pure and bright
In purple chambers of the mom. As if she yet stood in the iight
As sovereign over thee and thine. Of those oped gates of Paradise.
He speaketh not, and yet there lies And so we loved her more and more :
A conversation in his eyes ; Ah, never in our hearts before
The golden silence of the Greek, Was love so lovely bom ;
The gravest wisdom of the wise. We felt we had a link between
Not spoken in language, but in looks This real world and that unseen—
More legible than printed books. The land beyond the mom ;
J
1
80
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
And for the love of those dear eyes,
For love of her whom God led forth
(The mother's being ceased on earth
When Baby came from Paradise), —
For love of Him who smote our lives,
And woke the choi'ds of joy and pain.
We said. Dear Christ ! — oui- hearts bent down
Like violets after rain.
And now the orchards, wliich were white
And red with blossoms when she came.
Were rich in autumn's mellow prime ;
The clustered apples burnt like flame.
The soft-cheeked peaches blushed and fell,
The ivory chestnut burst its shell.
The grapes hung purpling in the gi'ange ;
And time wrought just as rich a change
In little Baby Bell.
Her lissome fomr more perfect grew.
And in her features we could trace.
In softened curves, her mother's face.
Her angel-nature ripened too ;
We thought her lovely when she came,
But she was holy, saintly now : —
Around her pale angelic brow
We saw a slender ring of flame !
God's hand had taken away the seal
That held the portals of her speech ;
And oft she said a few strange words
Whose meaning lay beyond our reach.
She never was a child to us.
We never held her being's key ;
IVe could not teach her holy things ;
She was Christ's self in purity.
It came irpon us by degrees,
We saw its shadow ere it fell, —
The knowledge that our God had Sent
His messenger for Baby Bell.
We shuddered with unlanguaged pain.
And all our hopes were changed to fears.
And all our thoughts ran into tears
Like sunshine into rain.
We cried aloud in our belief,
" 0, smite us gently, geutly, God !
Teach us to bend and kiss the rod.
And perfect grow through grief."
Ah, how we loved her, God can tell ;
Her heart was folded deep in ours.
Our hearts are broken. Baby Bell !
At last he came, the messenger.
The messenger from unseen lands :
And what did dainty Baby Bell ?
She only crossed her little hands.
She only looked more meek and fair !
We parted back her silken hair.
We wove the roses round her brow, —
White buds, the summer's drifted snow, —
Wrapt her from head to foot in flowers !
And thus went dainty Baby Bell
Out of this world of ours !
Thomas Bailey Aldrich.
NO BABY IN THE HOUSE.
No baby in the house, 1 know,
'T is far too nice and clean.
No toys, by careless fingera strewn.
Upon the floors are seen.
No finger-marks are on the panes.
No scratches on the chairs ;
No wooden men set up in rows.
Or marshalled off in pairs ;
No little stockings to be darned.
All ragged at the toes ;
No pile of mending to be done.
Made up of baby-clothes ;
No little troubles to be soothed ;
No little hands to fold ;
No grimy fingers to be washed ;
No stories to be told ;
No tender kisses to be given ;
No nicknames, " Dove " and " Mouse ;
No merry frolics after tea, —
No baby in the house !
Clara G. Dolliver
WHAT DOES LITTLE BIRDIE SAY?
from " sea dreams. '
What does little birdie say
In her nest at peep of day ?
Let me fly, says little birdie.
Mother, let me fly away.
Birdie, rest a little longer,
Till the little wings are stronger.
So she rests a little longer,
Then she flies away.
What docs little baby say.
In her bed at peep of day ?
Baby says, like little birdie.
Let me rise and fly away.
Baby sleep, a little longer.
Till the little limbs are stronger,
If she sleeps a little longer.
Baby too shall fly away.
ALFRED TENNYSON.
INFANCY.
81
ON THE PICTURE OF AN INFANT
playing near a precipice.
While on the cliff with calm delight she kneels,
And the blue vales a thousand joys recall,
See, to the last, last verge her infant steals !
O, fly — yet stir not, speak not, lest it fall. —
Far better taught, she lays her bosom bare,
And the fond boy springs back to nestle there.
LEONIDAS of Alexandria (Creek). Translation
of SAMUEL Rogers.
LULLABY.
from " the princess."
Sweet and low, sweet and low,
Wind of the western sea.
Low, low, breathe and blow.
Wind of the western sea !
Over the rolling waters go.
Come from the dying moon, and blow.
Blow him again to me ;
While my little one, while my pretty one, sleeps.
Sleep and rest, sleep and rest.
Father will come to thee soon ;
Rest, rest, on mother's breast.
Father will come to thee soon ;
Father will come to his babe in the nest.
Silver sails all out of the west
Under the silver moon :
Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty one, sleep.
Alfred Tennyson.
THE ANGEL'S WHISPER.
In Ireland they have a pretty fancy, that, when a child smiles in
its sleep, it is " talking with angels."
A baby'was sleeping J
Its mother was weeping ;
For her husband was far on the wild raging sea ;
And the tempest was swelling
Round the flsherman's dwelling ;
And she cried, " Dcrmot, darling ! 0 come back
to me ! "
Her beads while she numbered
The baby stül slumbered.
And smiled in her face as she bended her knee :
" 0, blessed be that warning.
My child, thy sleep adorning, —
For 1 know that the angels arc whispering with
thee.
" And while they Me keeping
Blight watch o'er thy sleeping.
0, pray to them softly, my baby, with me, —
And say thou wouldst rather
They'd watch o'er thy father !
For I know that the angels are whispering to
thee."
The dawn of the morning
Saw Dermot returning.
And the wife wept with joy her babe's father to
see ;
And closely caressing
Her child with a blessing.
Said, " 1 knew that the angels were whispering
with thee."
samuel i.over.
MOTHER AND CHILD.
, ' < < *
The wind blew wide the casement, and within —
It was the loveliest picture ! — a sweet child
Lay in its mother's arms, and drew its life.
In pauses, from the fountain, — the white round
Part shaded by loose tresses, soft and dark.
Concealing, but still showing, the fair realm
Of so much rapture, as green shadowing trees
With beauty shroud the brooklet. The red lips
Were parted, and the cheek upon the breast
Lay close, and, like the young leaf of the flower.
Wore the same color, rich and warm and fresh : —
And such alone are beautiful. Its eye,
A full blue gem, most exquisitely set.
Looked archly on its world, — the little imp.
As if it knew even then that such a wreath
W ere not for all ; and with its playful hands
It drew aside the robe that hid its realm.
And peeped and laughed aloud, and so it laid
Its head upon the shrine of such pure joys.
And, laughing, slept. And while it slept, the tears
Of the sweet mother fell upon its cheek, —
Tears such as fall from April skies, and bring
The sunlight after. They were tears of joy ;
And the true heart of that young mother then
Grew lighter, and she sang unconsciously
The silliest ballad-song that ever yet
Subdued the nursery's voices, and brought sleep
To fold her sabbath wings above its couch.
William Gilmore Simsis.
BABY ZULMA'S CHRISTMAS CAROL.
A lighter scarf of richer fold
The morning flushed upon our sight.
And Evening trimmed her lamps of gold
From deeper springs of purer light ;
And softer drips bedewed the lea.
And whiter blossoms veiled the tree.
[&
82
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
■a
And bluer waves danced on the sea
When baby Zulma came to be !
The day before, a bird had sung
Strange gi-eetings on the roof and flown ;
And Night's immaculate priestess flung
A diamond from her parted zone
Upon the crib beside the bed,
Whereunto, as the doctor said,
A king or queen would soon be led
By some sweet Ariel overhead.
Ere yet the sun had crossed the line
When we, at Aries' double bai-s,
Behold him, tempest-beaten, shine
In stormy Libra's triple stara :
What time the hillsides shake with corn
And boughs of fruitage laugh unshorn
And cheery echoes wake the morn
To gales of fragrance harvest-bom.
In storied spots of vernal flame
And breezy realms of tossing shade.
The tripping elves tumultuous came
To join the fairy cavalcade :
From blushing chambers of the rose,
And bowers the lily's buds enclose.
And nooks and dells of deep repose.
Where human sandal never goes.
The rabble poured its motley tide :
Some upon airy chariots rode.
By cupids showered from side to side.
And some the dragon-fly bestrode ;
While troops of virgins, left and right.
Like microscopic trails of light.
The sweeping pageant made as bright
As beams a rainbow in its flight !
It passed : the bloom of purple plums
Was rippled by trumpets rallying long
O'er beds of pinks ; and dwarfish dnims
Struck all the insect world to song :
The milkmaid caught the low refrain.
The ploughman answered to her strain.
And every warbler of the plain
The ringing chorus chirped again !
Beneath the sunset's faded arch.
It fomed and filed within our- porch.
With not a ray to guide its march
Except the twilight's silver torch :
And thus she came from clouds above,
With spirits of the glen and grove,
A flower of grace, a cooing dove,
A shrine of prayer and star of love !
A queen of hearts ! — her mighty chains
Are beads of coral round her strung.
And, ribbon-diademed, she reigns,
Commanding in an imknown tongue :
The kitten spies her cunning ways.
The patient cur romps in her plays.
And glimpses of her earlier days
Are seen in picture-books of fays.
To fondle all things doth she choose.
And when she gets, what some one sends,
A trifling gift of tiny shoes.
She kisses both as loving friends ;
For in her eyes this orb of care.
Whose hopes are heaps of frosted hair.
Is but a garland, trim and fair.
Of cherubs twining in the air.
0, from a soul suffused with tears
Of trust thou mayst be spared the thorn
Which it has felt in other years, —
Across the mom our Lord was bora,
I waft thee blessings ! At thy side
May his invisible seraphs glide ;
And teU thee still, whate'er betide.
For thee, for thine, for all. He died !
Augustus Julian Requibk.
BABY'S SHOES.
0, THOSE little, those little blue shoes !
Those shoes that no little feet use.
0 the price were high
That those shoes would buy,
Those little blue unused shoes !
For they hold the small shape of feet
That no more their mother's eyes meet.
That, by God's good will,
Yeai-s since, grew stUl,
And ceased from their totter so sweet.
And O, since that baby slept.
So hushed, how the mother has kept.
With a tearfid pleasure.
That little dear treasure.
And o'er them thought and wept !
For they mind her forevermore
Of a patter along the floor ;
And blue eyes she sees "
Look up from her knees
With the look that in life they wore.
As they lie before her there.
There babbles from chair to chair
A little sweet face
That's a gleam in the place.
With its little gold curls of hair.
-S
INFANCÏ.
83
Then O wonder not that her heart
From all else would rather part
Than those tiny blue shoes
That no little feet use,
And whose sight makes such fond tears start !
William Cox Bennett.
OUR WEE WHITE ROSE.
All in our marriage garden
Grew, smiling up to God,
A bonnier flower than ever
Suekt the green warmth of the sod ;
0, beautiful unfathomably
Its little life unfurled ;
And crown of all things was our wee
White Rose of all the world.
From out a balmy bosom
Our bud of beauty gi'ew ;
It fed on smiles for sunshine.
On tears for daintier dew :
Aye nestling warm and tenderly.
Our leaves of love were curled
So close and close about our wee
White Rose of all the world.
With mystical faint fragrance
Our house of life she filled ;
Revealed each hour some fairy tower
Where winged hopes might build !
We saw — though none like us might see —
Such precious promise pearled
Upon the petals of our wee
White Rose of all the world.
But evermore the halo
Of angel-light increased.
Like the mystery of moonlight
That folds some fairy feast.
Snow-white, snow-soft, snow-silently
Our darling bud upcurled.
And dropt i' the grave — God's lap — our wee
White Rose of all the world.
Our Rose was but in blossom.
Our life was but in spring.
When down the solemn midnight
We heard the spirits sing,
" Another bud of infancy
With holy dews impearled ! "
And in their hands they bore our wee
White Rose of all the world.
You scarce could think so small a thing
Could leave a loss so large ;
Her little light such shadow fling
From dawn to sunset's marge.
In other springs our life may be
In bannered bloom unfurled.
But never, never match our wee
White Rose of aU the world.
Gerald Massey.
WILLIE WINKIE.
Wee Willie Winkie rins through the town.
Up stairs and doon stairs, in his nicht-gown,
Tirlin' at the window, cryin' at the lock,
" Are the weans in their bed ?—for it's now ten
o'clock."
Hey, Willie Winkie ! are ye comin' ben ?
The cat's singin' gay thrums to the sleepin' hen.
The doug's speldered on the floor, and disna gie
a cheep ; '
But here's a waukrife laddie, that winna fa'
asleep.
Ony thing but sleep, ye rogue; — glow'rin' like
the moon,
Rattlin' in an aim jug wi' an aim spoon,
Rumblin', tnmblin' roun' about, crawin' like a
cock,
Skirlin' like a kenna-what — wauknin' sleepin'
folk!
Hey, Willie Winkie ! the wean's in a creel !
Waumblin' aff a bodie's knee like a vera eel,
Ruggin' at the cat's lug, and ravellin' a' her
thrums ;
Hey, Willie Winkie ! — See, there he comes !
Wearie is the mither that has a storie wean,
A wee stumpie stoussie, that canna rin his lane.
That has a battle aye wi' sleep, before he '11 close
an ee ;
But a kiss frae aff his rosy lips gies strength
anew to me.
WILLIAM Miller.
THE MOTHER'S HEART.
When first thou earnest, gentle, shy, and fond.
My eldest born, first hope, and dearest treasure,
My heart received thee with a joy beyond
All that it yet had felt of earthly pleasure ;
Nor thought that any love again might be
So deep and strong as that I felt for thee.
Faithful and trae, with sense beyond thy years.
And natural piety that leaned to heaven ;
Wrung by a harsh word suddenly to tears.
Yet patient to rebuke when justly given;
Obedient, easy to be reconciled,
And meekly cheerful ; such wert thou, my
child !
POEMS OF. CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH,
Not willing to be left — still by my side,
Haunting my walks, while summer-day was
dying ;
Nor leaving in thy turn, but pleased to glide
Through the dark room where I was sadly
lying;
Or by the couch of pain, a sitter meek.
Watch the dim eye, and kiss the fevered cheek.
0 boy ! of such as thou are oftenest made
Earth's fragile idols ; like a tender flower.
No strength in all thy freshness, prone to fade.
And bending weakly to the thunder-shower ;
Still, round the loved, thy heart found force to
bind.
And clung, like woodbine shaken in the wind !
Then thou, my merry love, — bold in thy glee.
Under the bough, or by the ñrelight dancing.
With thy sweet temper, and thy spirit free, —
Didst come, as restless as a bird's wing glan¬
cing.
Full of a wild and frrepressible mirth.
Like a young sunbeam to the gladdened earth !
Thine was the shout, the song, the burst of joy.
Which sweet from childhood's rosy lip re-
soundeth ;
Thine was the eager spirit naught could cloy.
And the glad heart from which all grief re-
boundeth ;
And many a mirthful jest and mock reply
Lurked in the laughter of thy dark-blue eye.
And thine was many an art to win and bless.
The cold and stern to joy and fondness warm¬
ing ;
The coaxing smile, the frequent soft caress,
The earnest, teaiiul prayer all wrath disarm¬
ing !
Again my heart a new affection found.
But thought that love with thee had reached its
bound.
At length thou earnest, — thou, the last and
least.
Nicknamed " the Emperor " by thy laughing
brothers.
Because a haughty spirit swelled thy breast,
And thou didst seek to rule and sway the
others.
Mingling with every playful infant wile
A mimic majesty that made us smile.
And O, most like a regal child wert thou !
An eye of resolute and successful scheming !
Fair shoulders, curling lips, and dauntless brow.
Fit for the world's strife, not for poet's dream¬
ing;
And proud the lifting of thy stately head.
And the firm bearing of thy eonscious tread.
Different from both ! yet each succeeding elaim
I, that all other love had been forswearing.
Forthwith admitted, equal and the same ;
Nor injured either by this love's comparing.
Nor stole a fraction for the newer call, —
But in the mother's heart found room for all !
Caroline E. Norton.
THE MOTHER'S HOPE.
Is there, when the winds are singing
In the happy summer time, —
When the raptured air is ringing
With Earth's music heavenward springing,
Forest chirp, and village chime, —
Is there, of the sounds that float
Unsighingly, a single note
Half so sweet and clear and wild
As the laughter of a child ?
Listen ! and be now delighted :
Morn hath touched her golden strings ;
Earth and Sky their vows have plighted ;
Life and Light are reunited
Amid countless carollings ;
Yet, delicious as they are.
There's a sound that's sweeter far, —
One that makes the heart rejoice
More than all, — the human voice !
Organ finer, deeper, clearer.
Though it be a stranger's tone, —
Than the winds or waters dearer.
More enchanting to the hearer.
For it answereth to his own.
But, of all its witching words.
Sweeter than the song of birds.
Those are sweetest, bubbling wild
Tlu-ough the laughter of a chUd.
Haimonies from time-touched towem.
Haunted strains from livulets.
Hum of bees among the flowers.
Rustling leaves, and silver showers, —
These, erelong, the ear forgets ;
But in mine there is a sound
Ringing on the whole year round, —
Heart-deep laughter that I heard
Ere my child could speak a word.
Ah ! *t was heard by ear far purer,
Fondlier formed to catch the strain, —
Ear of one whose love is surer, —
Hers, the mother, the endurer
Of the deepest share of pain ;
^
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CHILDHOOD. 85
Hers the deepest bliss to treasure " Pitty much," answered the sweet little one ;
Memories of that cry of pleasure " 1 cannot tell so much things 1 have done, —
Hers to hoard, a lifetime after. Played with my dolly and feeded my Bun.
Echoes of that infant laughter.
" And 1 have jumped with my little jump-rope,
'T is a mother's large affection And 1 made out of some water and soap
Hears with a mysterious sense, — Bufitle worlds ! mamma's castles of Hope.
Breathings that evade detection.
Whisper faint, and fine inflection, " And I have readed in my picture-hook.
Thrill in her with power intense. And little Bella and 1 went to look
Childhood's honeyed words untaught For some smooth stones by the side of the brook.
Hiveth she in loving thought, —
Tones that never thence depart ; " Then 1 comed home and I eated my tea,
For she listens — with her heart. 1 climbed up to my grandpapa's knee.
iJiMAN BLANCHARD. 1 jcs as tired as tired can be."
—♦— Lower and lower the little head pressed.
Until it drooped upon grandpapa's breast ;
THE PIPER. Dear little Goldenhair ! sweet be thy rest !
Piping down the vaUeys wild, theVthings thaiwe do
Pipmg songs of pleasant glee, J
On a cloud I saw a child, That sees all our weakness, and pities it too.
And he laughing said to me : —
+ 1 V »» grant that when night overshadows our way,
x^ipe a son^ aooux a xamo. . v i sv ^ n v . > ^
o T • J •., , And we shall be called to account for our day,
» °p-,, He shall find us as guileless as Goldenhair's play !
" Piper, pipe that song again ; ° ^
So I piped : he wept to hear.
And 0, when aweary, may we be so blest
" Drop thy pipe, thy happy pipe, As to sink like the innocent child to our rest.
Sing thy son^s of happy cheer : " And feel ourselves clasped to the Infinite breast !
So 1 sung the same again, smith.
While he wept with joy to hear. —.—
" Piper, sit thee down and write tjje GAMBOLS OF CHILDREN.
In a book that all may read — "
So he vanished from my sight ; Down the dimpled greensward dancing,'
And 1 plucked a hollow reed. Bursts a flaxen-headed bevy^ —
Bud-lipt'boys ami girls advancing.
And I made a rural pen. Love's irregular little levy. ,
And I stnined the water clear.
And 1 wrote my happy songs Rows of liquid eyes in laughter.
Every child may joy to hear. How they glimmer, how they quiver
william blake. Sparkling one another after,
J Take blight ripples on a river.
LITTLE GOLDENHAIR. Tipsy band of mbious faces.
Flushed with Joy s ethereal spmt.
Goldenea,ir climbed up on grandpapa's knee ; Make your mocks and sly grimaces
Dear little Goldenhair ! tired was she. At Love's self, and do not fear it.
AU the day busy as busy could be. george darlev.
—«—
Up in the morning as soon as 'twas light.
Out with the birds and butterflies bright, UNDER MY WINDOW
Skipping about tiU the coming of night.
Under my window, under my window.
Grandpapa toyed with the curls on her head. AU in the Midsummer weather,
" What has my baby been doing," he said. Three little girls with fluttering curls
" Since she arose, with the sun, from her bed ? " FUt to and fro together : — '
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86 POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
There's Bell with her bonnet of satin sheen, " 0 God !" she cried in accents wild,
And Maud with her mantle of silver-green, "If I must perish, save my child 1 "
And Kate with her searlet feather.
She stripped her mantle from her breast.
Under my window, under my window, And bared her bosom to the storm.
Leaning stealthily over. And round the child she wrapped the vest.
Merry and clear, the voice I hear. And smiled to think her babe was warm.
Of each glad-hearted rover. With one cold kiss, one tear she shed.
Ah I sly little Kate, she steals my roses ; And sunk upon her snowy bed.
And Maud and Bell twine wreaths and posies,
As merry as bees in clover. At dawn a traveller passed by.
And saw her 'neath a snowy veil ;
Under my window, under my window. The frost of death was in her eye.
In the blue Midsummer weather, Her cheek was cold and hard and pale.
Stealing slow, on a hushed tiptoe. He moved the robe from off the child, —
I catch them all together : The babe looked up and sweetly smiled !
Bell with her bonnet of satin sheen, seba smith.
And Maud with her mantle of silver-green,
And Kate with the scarlet feather.
„ , . , , . ^ SEVEN TIMES FOUR.
Under my window, under my window.
And off through the orchard closes; maternity.
While Maud she flouts, and Bell she pouts. Heigh-ho I daisies and buttercups.
They scamper and drop their posies ; pair yellow daffodils, stately and taU !
But dear little Kate takes naught amiss. When the wind wakes, how they rock in the
And leaps in my arms with a loving kiss, grasses
And 1 give her all my roses. dance with the cuckoo-buds slender and
Thomas Westwood. ,, .
small I
♦ Here's two bonny boys, and here's mothers
ptttt "nirnntl own lasses,
CHILDHOOD.
In my poor mind it is most sweet to muse
Upon the days gone by ; to act in thought Heigli-ho I daisies and buttercups !
Past seasons o'er, and be again a child ; Mother shall thread them a daisy chain ;
To sit in fancy on the turf-clad slope. Sing them a song of the pretty hedge-sparrow,
Down which the child would roll ; to pluck gay That loved her brown little ones, loved them
flowers, >
Make posies in the sun, which the child's hand Sing, " Heart, thou art wide, though the house
(Childhood offended soon, soon reconciled), narrow," —
Would throw away, and straight take up again. Sing once, and sing it again.
Then fling them to the winds, and o'er the lawn . , , , . .
Bound with so playful and so light a foot, Heigh-ho ! daisies and buttercups,
That the pressed daisy scarce declined her head. ^aggmg cowslips, they bend and they
Charles Lamb. >
1 A ship sails afar over warm ocean waters.
And haply one musing doth stand at her prow.
THE MOTHER'S SACRIFICE. 0 bonny brown sons, and 0 sweet little daugh-
ters.
The cold winds swept the mountain s height. Maybe he thinks on you now !
And pathless was the dreary wild.
And mid the cheerless hours of night Heigh-ho ! daisies and buttercups,
A mother wandered with her child ; Fair yellow daffodils, stately and tall —
As through the drifting snow she pressed, A sunshiny world full of laughter and leisure.
The babe was sleeping on her breast. And fresh hearts unconscious of sorrow and
thiull I
And colder still the winds did blow. Send down on their pleasure smiles passing its
And darker hours of night came on, measure
And deeper grew the drifting snow : Goj that 4 over us all 1
Her limbs were chilled, her sti'ength was gone. jean ingelow.
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INFANCY.
87
BOYHOOD.
Ah, then how sweetly closed those crowded days !
The minutes parting one by one, like rays
That fade upon a summer's eve.
But O, what charm or magic numbers
Can give me back the gentle slumbers
Those weary, happy days did leave ?
When by my bed I saw my mother kneel.
And with her blessing took her nightly kiss ;
Whatever time destroys, he cannot this ; —
E'en now that nameless kiss I feel.
Washington Allston.
—4
SEVEN TIMES ONE.
There's no dew left on the daisies and clover.
There's no rain left in heaven.
I 've said my " seven times " over and over, —
Seven times one are seven.
I am old, — so old I can write a letter ;
My birthday lessons are done.
The lambs play always, — they know no better ;
They are only one times one.
0 Moon ! in the night I have seen you sailing
And shining so round and low.
You were bright — ah, bright — but your light
is failing ;
You are nothing now but a bow.
You Moon ! have you done something wrong in
heaven.
That God has hidden your face ?
1 hope, if you have, you will soon be forgiven.
And shine again in your place.
0 velvet Bee ! you 're a dusty fellow, —
You've powdered your legs with gold.
0 brave marsh Mary-buds, rich and yellow.
Give me your money to hold !
0 Columbine ! open your folded wrapper.
Where two twin turtle-doves dwell !
0 Cuckoo-pint ! toll me the purple clapper
That hangs in your clear green bell !
And show me your nest, with the young ones in
it,—
I will not steal them away ;
1 am old ! you may trust me, linnet, linnet !
I am seven times one to-day.
Jean Ingelow.
WE ARE SEVEN.
A SIMPLE child.
That lightly draws its breath.
And feels its life in every limb.
What should it know of death ?
I met a little cottage girl :
She was eight years old, she said ;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head.
She had a rustic, woodland air.
And she was wildly clad ;
Her eyes were fair, and very fair ; —
Her beauty made me glad.
" Sisters and brothers, little maid.
How many may you be ? "
" How many ? Seven in all," she said,
And wondering looked at me.
And where are they ? 1 pray you telL"
She answered, " Seven are we ;
And two of us at Conway dwell.
And two are gone to sea ;
" Two of us in the churchyard He,
My sister and my brother ;
And, in the churchyard cottage, I
Dwell near them with my mother."
" You say that two at Conway dwell,
And two are gone to sea.
Yet ye are seven ! I pray you tell.
Sweet maid, how this may be."
Then did the little maid reply,
"Seven boys and girls are we ;
Two of us in the churchyard lie
Beneath the churchyard tree."
"You run about, my little maid ;
Your Umbs they are alive ;
If two are in the churchyard laid.
Then ye are only five."
"Their graves are green, they may he seen,"
The little maid replied :
" Twelve steps or more from my mother's door.
And they are side by side.
" My stockings there I often knit.
My kerchief there I hem ;
And there upon the ground I sit.
And sing a song to them.
" And often after sunset, sir.
When it is light and fair,
I take my Httle porringer.
And eat my supper there.
" The first that died was Sister Jane ;
In bed she moaning lay,
Till God released her of her pain ;
And then she went away.
a-
d8
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
-a
"Soin the churchyard she was laid ;
And, when the grass was dry,
Together round her grave we played,
My brother John and I.
" And when the ground was white with snow.
And I could run and slide,
My brother John was forced to go,
And he lies by her side."
" How many are you, then," said I,
" If they two are in heaven ? "
Quick was the little maid's reply !
"0 Master ! we are seven."
" But they are dead ; those two are dead !
Their spirits are in heaven ! "
'T was throwing words away ; for stiU
The little maid would have her will.
And said, "Nay, we are seven."
William Wordsworth.
TO A CHILD DURING SICKNESS.
Sleep breathes at last from out thee.
My little patient boy ;
And balmy rest about thee
Smooths off the day's annoy.
I sit me down, and think
Of all thy winning ways ;
Yet almost wish, with sudden shrink.
That I had less to praise.
Thy sidelong pillowed meekness ;
Thy thanks to all that aid ;
Thy heart, in pain and weakness.
Of fancied faults afraid ;
The little trembling hand
That wipes thy quiet tears, —
These, these are things that may demand
Dread memories for years.
Sorrows I've had, severe ones,
I will not think of now ;
And calmly, midst my dear ones.
Have wasted with dry brow ;
But when thy fingers press
And pat my stooping head,
I cannot bear the gentleness, —
The tears are in their bed.
Ah, first-bom of thy mother,
"When life and hope were new ;
Kind playmate of thy brother.
Thy sister, father too ;
My light, where'er I go ;
My bird, when prison-bound ;
My hand-in-hand companion — No,
My prayers shall hold thee round.
To say, " He has departed " —
" His voice " — " his face " — is gone.
To feel impatient-hearted.
Yet feel we must bear on, —
Ah, I could not endure
To whisper of such woe.
Unless I felt this sleep insure
That it will not be so.
Yes, stül he's fixed, and sleeping !
This silence too the while, —
Its very hush and creeping
Seem whispering us a smile %.
Something divine and dim
Seems going by one's ear.
Like parting wings of cherabim,
"*^0 say, "We've finished here."
Leigh hunt.
LITTLE BELL.
Piped the Blackbird, on the beechwood spray,
" Pretty maid, slow wandering this way.
What's your name ? " quoth he, —
" "What's your name ? O, stop and straight un¬
fold.
Pretty maid with showery curls of gold." —
" Little Bell," said she.
Little Bell sat down beneath the rocks.
Tossed aside her gleaming golden locks, —
" Bonny bird," quoth she,
" Sing me your best song before I go."
" Here's the very finest song I know.
Little Bell," said he.
And the Blackbird piped ; you nevft heard
Half so gay a song from any bird, —
Full of quips and wiles.
Now so round and rich, now soft and slow,
All for love of that sweet face below.
Dimpled o'er with smiles.
And the while that bonny bird did pour
His full heart out, freely o'er and o'er
'Neath the morning skies.
In the little childish heart below
All the sweetness seemed to grow and grow.
And shine forth in happy overflow
From the brown, bright eyes.
Down the dell she tripped, and through the glade ;
Peeped the squirrel from the hazel shade.
And from out the tree
Swung and leaped and frolicked, void of fear ;
While bold Blackbird piped, that all might
hear, —
" Little BeU ! " piped he.
f
INFANCY.
89
■a
Little Bell sat down amid the fern :
•' Squirrel, Squirrel, to your task return ;
Bring me nuts," quoth she.
Up, away ! the frisky Squirrel hies, —
Golden wood-lights glancing in his eyes, —
And adown the tree
Great ripe nuts, kissed brown by July sun.
In the little lap drop one by one.
Hark, how Blackbird pipes to see the fun !
" Happy Bell ! " pipes he.
Little Bell looked up and down the glade:
" Squirrel, Squirrel, from the nut-tree shade.
Bonny Blackbird, if you 're not afraid,
Come and share with me ! "
Down came Squirrel, eager for his fare,
Down came bonny Blackbird, I declare ;
Little Bell gave each his honest share, —
Ah 1 the merry three !
And the while those frolic playmates twain
Piped and frisked from bough to bough again,
'Neath the morning skies.
In the little childish heart below
All the sweetness seemed to grow and grow.
And shine out in happy overflow
From her brown, bright eyes.
By her snow-white cot, at close of day.
Knelt sweet Bell, with folded palms, to pray ;
Very calm and clear
Kose the praying voice to where, unseen.
In blue heaven, an angel-shape serene
Paused awhile to hear.
" What good child is this," the angel said,
" That with happy heart beside her bed
Prays so lovingly ? "
Low and soft, 0, very low and soft.
Crooned the Blackbird in the orchard croft,
" Bell, dear BeU ! " crooned he.
"Whom God's creatures love," the angel fair
Murmured, " God doth bless with angels' care ;
Child, thy bed shall be
Folded safe from harm. Love, deep and kind,
ShaK watch around and leave good gifts behind.
Little Bell, for thee ! "
thomas westwood.
TO A CHILD.
written in her album.
Small service is [true sej-vice whik it lastä :
Of humblest friends, bnght creature ! scorn not
one :
The daisy, by the shadow that it casts.
Protects the lingering dewdrop from the sun.
William Wordsworth.
PICTURES OF MEMORY.
Among the beautiful pictures
That hang on Memory's wall
Is one j)f a dim old forest.
That seemeth best of all ;
Not for its gnarled oaks olden.
Dark with the mistletoe ;
Not for the violets golden
That sprinkle the vale below ;
Not for the milk-white lilies
That lean from the fragrant ledge.
Coquetting all day with the sunbeams.
And stealing their golden edge ;
Not for the vines on the upland.
Where the bright red berries rest.
Nor the pinks, nor the pale sweet cowslip.
It seemeth to me the best.
I once had a little brother.
With eyes that were dark and deep ;
In the lap of that old dim forest
He lieth in peace asleep :
Light as the down of the thistle.
Free as the winds that blow.
We roved there the beautiful summers.
The summers of long ago_x^
But his feet on the hills grew weary.
And, one of the autumn eves,
I made for my little brother
A bed of the yellow leaves.
Sweetly his pale arms foldeí
My neck in a meek embrace.
As the light of immortal beauty
Silently covered his face ;,
And when the arrows of sunset
Lodged in the tree-tops bright.
He fell, in his saint-like beauty.
Asleep by the gates of light.
Therefore, of all the pictures
That hang on Memory's wall.
The one of the dim old forest
Seemeth tire best of all.
Alice Carv.
THE PET NAME.
*' The name
Which from THEIR lips seemed a caress."
Miss Mitford's Dramatic Scenes
I have a name, a little name,
Uncadenced for the ear,
Unhonored by ancestral claim,
Unsanctified by prayer and psalm
The solemn font anear.
&
S"
90
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
fe¬
lt never did, to pages wove
For gay romance, belong.
It never dedicate did move
As " Saebarissa," unto love, —
" Orinda," unto song.
Though I write books, it will be read
Upon the leaves of none.
And afterward, when I am dead.
Will ne'er be graved for sight or tread.
Across my funeral-stone.
This name, whoever chance to call
Perhaps your smile may win.
Nay, do not smile ! mine eyelids fall
Over mine eyes, and feel withal
The sudden tears within.
Is there a leaf that greenly grows
Where summer meadows bloom.
But gathereth the winter snows.
And changeth to the hue of those.
If lasting till they come ?
Is there a word, or jest, or game.
But time encrusteth round
With sad associate thoughts the same ?
And so to me my very name
Assumes a mournful sound.
My brother gave that name to me
When we were children twain, —
When names acquired baptismally
Were hard to utter, as to see
That life had any pain.
No shade was on us then, save one
Of chestnuts from the hill, —
And through the word our laugh did run
As part thereof. The mirth being done.
He calls me by it still.
Nay, do not smile ! 1 hear in it
What none of you can hear, —
The talk upon the willow seat.
The bird and wind that did repeat
Around, our human cheer.
1 hear the birthday's noisy bliss.
My sisters' woodland glee, —
My father's praise I did not miss.
When, stooping down, he cared to kiss
The poet at his knee, —
And voices which, to name me, aye
Their tenderest tones were keeping, —
To some 1 nevermore can say
An answer, till God wipes away
In heaven these drops of weeping.
My name to me a sadness wears ;
No murmurs cross my mind.
Now God be thanked for these thick tears,
Which show, of those departed years.
Sweet memories left behind.
Now God be thanked for years en wrought
With love which softens yet.
Now God be thanked for every thought
Which is so tender it has caught
Earth's guerdon of regret.
Earth saddens, never shall remove.
Affections purely given ;
And e'en that mortal grief shall prove
The immortality of love.
And heighten it with Heaven.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
THE THREE SONä
1 HAVE ^ son,/a little sonj, a boy^ust fivefyears
old.
With eyes of thoughtful earnestness, and mind
of gentle mould.
They tell me that unusual grace in all his ways
appears.
That my child is grave and wise of heart beyond
his childish years.
1 cannot say how this may be ; 1 know his face
is fair, —
And yet his chiefest comeliness is his sweet and
serious air ;
1 know his heart is kind and fond ; 1 know he
loveth me ;
But loveth yet his mother more with grateful
fervency.
But that which others most admire, is the thought
which fills his mind.
The food for grave inquiring speech he every¬
where doth find.
Strange questions doth he ask of me, when we
together walk ;
He scarcely thinks as children think, or talks as
children talk.
Nor cares he much for childish sports, dotes not
on bat or ball.
But looks on manhood's ways and works, and
aptly mimics all.
His little heart is busy still, and oftentimes per-
plext
With thoughts about this world of ours, and
thoughts about the next.
He kneels at his dear mother's knee ; she teacheth
him to pray ;
And strange and sweet and solemn then are the
words which he wül say.
-3
CHILDHOOD.
O, should my gentle child be spared to man¬
hood's years like me,
A holier and a wiser man I trust that he will be ;
And when I look into his eyes, and stroke his
thoughtful brow,
I dare not think what I should feel, were I to
lose him now.
Í have a son, a second son, a simple chUd of
three ;
I '11 not declare how bright and fair his little
features be.
How silver sweet those tones of his when he
prattles on my knee ;
I do not think his light-blue eye is, like his
brother's, keen.
Nor his brow so full of childish thought as his
hath ever been ;
But his little heart's a fountain pure of kind and
tender feeling ;
And his every look's a gleam of light, rich
depths of love revealing.
When he walks with me, the country folk, who
pass us in the street,
Will shout for joy, and bless my boy, he looks
so mild and sweet.
A playfellow is he to all ; and yet, with cheerful
tone.
Win sing his little song of love, when left to
sport alone.
His presence is like sunshine sent to gladden
home and hearth,
To comfort us in all our griefs, and sweeten all
our mirth.
Should he grow up to riper years, God grant his
heart may prove
As sweet a home for heavenly grace as now for
earthly love ;
And if, beside his grave, the tears our aching
eyes must dim,
God comfort us for all the love which we shall
lose in him.
I have a son, a third sweet son ; his age I cannot
tell,
For they reckon not by years and months where
he has gone to dwell.
To us, for fourteen anxious months, his infant
smiles were given ;
And then he bade farewell to earth, and went to
live in heaven.
I cannot tell what form is his, what looks he
weareth now.
Nor guess how bright a glory crowns his shining
seraph brow.
The thoughts that fill his sinless soul, the bliss
which he doth feel.
Are numbered with the secret things which God
will not reveal.
But I know (for God hath told me this) that he
is now at rest.
Where other blessed infants be, on their Saviour's
loving breast.
I know his spirit feels no more this weary load
of flesh.
But his sleep is blessed with endless dreams of
joy forever fresh.
I know the angels fold him close beneath their
guttering wings.
And soothe him with a song that breathes of
Heaven's divinest things.
I know that we shall meet our babe (his mother
dear and I)
Where God for aye shall wipe away all tears from
every eye.
Whate'er befalls his brethren twain, his bliss can
never cease ;
Their lot may here be grief and fear, but his is
certain peace.
It may be that the tempter's wiles their souls
from bliss may sever ;
But, if our own poor faith fail not, he must be
ours forever.
When we think of what our darling is, and what
we still must be, —
When we muse on that world's perfect bliss, and
this world's misery, —
When we groan beneath this load of sin, and feel
this grief and pain, —
Oh ! we'd rather lose qur other two, than have
him hero again.
JOHN MODI-TRIE.
«
THE MITHERLESS BAIRN.
An Inverary correspondent writes : "Thom gave me the fol¬
lowing narrative as to the origin of * The Mitherless Bairn ' ; I
quote his own words. ' When I wîis livin* in Aberdeen, I was
limping roun' the house to my garret, when I heard the greetin' o'
a wean. A lassie was thumpin' a bairn, when out cam a big dame,
bellowin', " Ye hussie, will ye lick a mitherless bairn I " I hobled
up the stair and wrote the sang afore sleepin'.' "
When a' ither bairnies are bushed to their hame
By aunty, or cousin, or frecky grand-dame)
Wha stands laslNand lanely, an' naebody carin' ?
'T is the puir* doited loonie, —the mitherless
bairn !
The mitherless baim gangs to his lane bed ;
Nane covers his cauld back, or haps his bare
head;
His wee hackit heelies are hard as the aim.
An' Utheless the lair o' the mitherless bairn.
Aneath his cauld brow siecan dreams hover there,
0' hands that wont kindly to käme his dark hair ;
But momin' brings clutches, a' reckless an' stem,
That lo'e nae the locks o' the mitherless bairn !
[&
92
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
Yon sister that sang o'er his safjtly rocked bed
Now rests in* the mools where her mammie-is
laid ;
The father toils sair their wee bannock to earn,
An' kens na the wrangs o' his mitherless haim.
Her spirit, that passed in yon hour o' his birth,
Stül watches his wearisome wanderings on earth ;
Recording in heaven the blessings they earn
Wha couthüie deal wi' the mitherless baim !
0, speak him na harshly, —he trembles the
while.
He bends to your bidding, and blesses your smile;
In their dark hour o' anguish the heartless shall
learn
That God deals the blow, for the mitherless baim !
William Thom.
MY MOTHER'S PICTURE.
out op norfolk, the gift of my cousin, ann bodham.
1&
0 THAT those lips had language ! Life^has passed
With me but roughly since I heard thee last.
Those lips are thine,—thy own sweet smile I see.
The same that oft in childhood solaced me ;
Yoice only fails, else how distinct they say,
" Grieve not, my child ; chase all thy fears
away ! "
The meek intelligence of those dear eyes
(Blest be the art that can immortalize, —
The art that baffles time's tyrannic claim
To quench it !) here shines on me still the same.
Faithful remembrancer of one so dear !
0 welcome guest, though unexpected here !
Wlio bid'st me honor with an artless song.
Affectionate, a mother lost so long.
1 wiU obey, —not willingly alone.
But gladly, as the precept were her own ;
And, while that face renews my filial grief.
Fancy shall weave a charm for my relief, —
Shall steep me in Elysian revery,
A momentary dream that thou art she.
My mother! when I learned that thou wa.st
dead.
Say, wast thou conscious of the tears I shed ?
Hovered thy spirit o'er thy sorrowing son, —
Wretch even then, life's journey just begun ?
Perhaps thou gavest me, though unfelt, a kiss ;
Perhaps a tear, if souls can weep in bliss —
Ah, that maternal smile ! it answers — Yes.
I heard the bell tolled on thy burial day ;
I saw the hearse that bore thee slow away;
And, turning from my nursery window, drew
A long, long sigh, and wept a last adieu I
But was it such ?—It was. —Where thou art gone
Alliens and farewells are a sound unknown ;
May I but meet thee on that peaceful shore.
The parting word shall pass my lips no more.
Thy maidens, grieved themselves at my concern.
Oft gave me promise of thy quick return ;
What ardently I wished I long believed.
And, disappointed still, was stiU deceived, —
By expectation every day beguiled.
Dupe of to-morrow even from a child.
Thus many a sad to-morrow came and went.
Till, aU my stock of infant sorrows spent,
I learned at last submission to my lot ;
But, though I less deplored thee, ne'er forgot.
Where once we dwelt our name is heard no
more ;
Children not thine have trod my nursery fioor ;
And where the gardener Robin, day by day.
Drew me to school along the public way, —
Delighted with my bawble coach, and wrapped
In scarlet mantle warm and velvet cap, —
'T is now become a hi-story little known
That once we called the pastoral house our own.
Short-lived possession ! but the record fair.
That memory keeps of all thy kindness there.
Still outlives many a storm that has effaced
A thousand other themes, less deeply traced:
Thy nightly visits to my chamber made.
That thou mightst know me safe and warmly laid;
Thy morning bounties ere I left my home, —
The biscuit, or confectionery plum ;
The fragrant waters on my cheeks bestowed
By thy own hand, till fresh they shone and
glowed, —
AU this, and, more endearing still than all.
Thy constant Row of love, that knew no fall, —
Ne'er roughened by those cataracts and breaks
That humor interposed too often makes ;
All this, still legible in memory's page.
And still to be so to my latest age.
Adds joy to duty, makes me glad to pay
Such honors to thee as my numbers may, —
Perhaps a frail memorial, but sincere, —
Not scorned in heaven, though little noticed here.
Could time, his Right reversed, restore the
hours
"Wlien, playing with thy vesture's tissued flow¬
ers, —
The violet, the pink, the jessamine, —
I pricked them into paper with a pin,
(And thou wast happier than myself the while —
Wouldst softly speak, and stroke my head and
smile, ) —
Could those few pleasant days again appear.
Might one wish bring them, would I wish them
here ?
I would not trust my heart, — the dear delight
Seems so to be desired, perhaps I might.
But no, — what here we caU our life is such.
So little to be loved, and thou so much.
CHILDHOOD.
93
That I should ill requite thee to constrain
Thy unbound spirit into bonds again.
Thou —as a gallant bark, from Albion's coast,
(The storms all weathered and the ocean crossed, )
Shoots into port at some well-havened isle.
Where spices breathe and brighter seasons smile ;
There sits quiescent on the floods, that show
Her beauteous form reflected clear below.
While ah's impregnated with incense play
Around her, fanning light her streamers gay, —
So thou, with sails how swift ! hast reached the
shore
"Where tempests never beat nor billows roar,"
And thy loved consort on the dangerous tide
Of life long since has anchored by thy side.
But me, scarce hoping to attain that rest.
Always from port withheld, always distressed, —
Me howling blasts drive devious, tempest-tossed.
Sails ripped, seams opening wide, and compass
lost ;
And day by day some current's thwarting force
Sets me more distant from a prosperous course.
Yet 0, the thought that thou art safe, and he! —
That thought is joy, arrive what may to me.
My boast is not that I deduce my birth
From loins enthroned, and rulers of the earth ;
But higher far my proud pretensions rise,—
The son of parents passed into the skies.
And now, farewell !—Time, unrevoked, has run
His wonted course ; yet what I wished is done.
By contemplation's help, not sought in vain,
I seem to have lived my childhood o'er again, —
To have renewed the joys that once were mine.
Without the sin of violating thine ;
And, while the wings of fancy still are free,
And I can view this mimic show of thee.
Time has but half succeeded in his theft, —
Thyself removed, thy power to soothe me left.
William Cowper.
I REMEMBER, I REMEMBER.
I REMEMBER, I remember
The house where I was bom.
The little window where the sun
Came peeping in at mom.
He never came a wink too soon.
Nor brought too long a day ;
But now I often wish the night
Had borne my breath away !
I remember, I remember
The roses, red and white.
The violets, and the lily-cups, —
Those flowers made of light !
The lilacs where the robin built,
Aud where my brother set
The laburnum on his birthday, —
The tree is living yet I
I remember, I remember
Where I was used to swing,
And thought the air must rash as fresh
To swallows on the wing ;
My spirit flew in feathers then.
That is so heavy now.
And summer pools could hardly cool .
The fever on my brow !
I remember, I remember
The fir-trees dark and high ;
I used to think their slender tops
Were close against the sky.
It was a childish ignorance.
But now 't is little joy
To know I'm farther off from heaven
Than when I was a boy.
Thomas Hood.
«
TO MY INFANT SON.
Thou happy, happy elf I
(But stop, first let me kiss away that tear,)
Thou tiny image of myself !
(My love, he's poking peas into his ear,)
Thou merry, laughing sprite.
With spirits, feather light.
Untouched by sorrow, and unsoiled by sin ;
(My dear, the child is swallowing a pin !)
Thou little tricksy Puck I
With antic toys so funnily bestück.
Light as the singing bird that rings the air, —
(The door ! the door ! he '11 tumble down the
stair !)
Thou darling of thy sire !
(Why, Jane, he '11 set his pinafore afire !)
Thou imp of mirth and joy I
In love's dear chain so bright a link.
Thou idol of thy parents ; — (Drat the boy !
There goes my ink.)
Thou cherub, but of earth ;
Fit playfellow for fairies, by moonlight pale,
In harmless sport and mirth,
(That dog will bite him, if he pulls his tail !)
Thou human humming-bee, extracting honey
From every blossom in the world that blows.
Singing in youth's Elysium ever sunny, —
(Another tumble I That's his precious nose !)
Thy father's pride and hope !
(He'U break that mirror with that skipping-
rope !)
94
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
With pure heart newly stamped from nature's
mint,
(Where did he learn that squint ?)
Thou young domestic dove !
(He '11 have that ring off with another shove,)
Dear nursling of the hymeneal nest !
(Are these torn clothes his best ?)
Little epitome of man !
(He '11 climb upon the table, that's his plan,)
Touched with the beauteous tints of dawning life,
(He's got a knife !)
Thou enviable being !
No storms, no clouds, in thy blue sky foreseeing.
Play on, play on.
My elfln John !
Toss the light ball, bestride the stick, —
(I knew so many cakes would make him sick !)
With fancies buoyant as the thistle-down.
Prompting the face grotesque, and antic brisk.
With many a lamb-like frisk !
(He's got the scissors, snipping at your gown !)
Thou pretty opening rose !
(Go to your mother, child, and wipe your nose !)
Balmy and breathing music like the south,
(He really brings my heart into my mouth !)
Bold as the hawk, yet gentle as the dove ;
(1 'U tell you what, my love,
1 cannot write unless he's sent above. )
Thomas Hood.
THE LOST HEIR.
" O where, and O where
Is my bonnie laddie ffonet "—OLD SONG.
One day, as 1 was going by
That part of Holborn christened High,
I heard a loud and sudden cry
That chilled my very blood ;
And lo ! from out a dirty alley.
Where pigs and Irish wont to rally,
I saw a crazy woman sally.
Bedaubed with grease and mud.
She turned her East, she turned her West,
Staring like Pythoness possest.
With streaming hair and heaving breast.
As one stark mad with grief.
This way and that she wildly ran.
Jostling with woman and with man, —
Her right hand held a frying-pan.
The left a lump of beef.
At last her frenzy seemed to reach
A point just capable of speech.
And with a tone almost a screech.
As wUd as ocean birds.
Or female ranter moved to preach.
She gave her " sorrow words."
" 0 Lord ! O dear, my heart will break, 1 shall
go stick stark staring wild !
Has ever a one seen anything about the streets
like a crying lost-looking child ?
Lawk help me, 1 don't know where to look, or
to run, if 1 only knew which way —
A Child as is lost about London streets, and es¬
pecially Seven Dials, is a needle in a bottle
of hay.
1 am all in a quiver — get out of my sight, do,
you wretch, you little Kitty M'Nab !
You promised to have half an eye to him, you
know you did, you dirty deceitful young
drab.
The last time as ever 1 see him, poor thing, was
with my own blessed Motherly eyes.
Sitting as good as gold in the gutter, a playing
at making little dirt-pies.
1 wonder he left the court, where he was better
off than all the other young boys.
With two bricks, an old shoe, nine oyster-shells,
and a dead kitten by way of toys.
When his father comes home, and he always
comes home as sure as ever the clock
strikes one.
He'll be rampant, he will, at his child being
lost ; and the beef and the inguns not
done !
La bless you, good folks, mind your own con¬
cerns, and don't be making a mob in the
street ;
0 Sergeant M'Farlane ! you have not come across
my poor little boy, have you, in your beat ?
Do, good people, move on ! don't stand staring
at me like a parcel of stupid stuck pigs ;
Saints forbid ! but he's p'r'aps been inviggled
away up a court for the sake of his clothes
by the priggs ;
He'd a very good jacket, for certain, for I bought
it myself for a shilling one day in Rag
Fair ;
And his trousers considering not very much
patched, and red plush, they was once his
Father's best pair.
His shirt, it's very lucky I'd got washing in
the tub, or that might have gone with the
rest ;
But he'd got on a very good pinafore with only
two slits and a burn on the breast.
He'd a goodish sort of hat, if the crown was
sewed in, and not quite so much jagged
at the brim.
With one shoe on, and the other shoe is a boot,
and not a fit, and you '11 know by that if
it's him.
Except being so well dressed, my mind would
misgive, some old beggar woman, in want
of an orphan,
á
rft
CHILDHOOD.
95
rö
Had borrowed the child to go a-begging with,
but I'd rather see him laid out in his
coffin !
Do, good people, move on, such a rabble of boys !
I '11 break every bone of 'em I come near.
Go home — you 're spilling the porter — go home
— Tommy Jones, go along home with
your beer.
This day is the sorrowfuUest day of my life, ever
since my name was Betty Morgan,
Them vile Savoyards ! they lost him once before
all along of following a monkey and an
organ :
0 my Billy — my head will turn right round —
if he's got kiddynapped with them /tal-
ians.
They '11 make him a plaster parish image boy,
they will, the outlandish tatterdemalions.
Billy — where are you, Billy ? — 1 'm as hoarse
as a crow, with screaming for ye, you
young sorrow !
And sha'n't have half a voice, no more I sha'n't,
for crying fresh herrings to-morrow.
0 Billy, you 're bursting my heart in two, and
my life won't be of no more vally.
If I'm to see other folks' darlin's, and none
of mine, playing like angels in our
alley.
And what shall I do but cry out my eyes, when
I looks at the old three-legged chair
As Billy used to make coach and horses of, and
there a'n't no Billy there !
1 would run all the wide world over to find htm,
if I only knowed where to run.
Little Murphy, now I remember, was once lost
for a month through stealing a penny
bun, —
The Lord forbid of any child of mine ! I think
it would kill me rally.
To find my Bill holdin' up his little innocent
hand at the Old Bailey.
For though I say it as ought n't, yet I will say,
you may search for miles and mileses
And not find one better brought up, and more
pretty behaved, from one end to t' other
of St. Giles's.
And if I called him a beauty, it's no lie, but
only as a mother ought to speak ;
You never set eyes on a more handsomer face,
only it has n't been washed for a week ;
As for hair, though it's red, it's the most nicest
hair when I 've time to just show it the
comb ;
I 'U owe 'em five pounds, and a blessing besides,
as will only bring him safe and sound
home.
He's blue eyes, and not to be called a squint,
though a little cast he's certainly got ;
And his nose is still a good un, though the
bridge is broke, by his falling on a pewter
pint pot ;
He's got the most elegant wide mouth in the
world, and very large teeth for his age ;
And quite as fit as Mrs. Murdockson's child to
play Cupid on the Drury Lane stage.
And then he has got such dear winning ways —
but 0, I never, never shall see him no
more !
0 dear ! to think of losing him just after nuss-
ing him back from death's door !
Only the very last month when the windfalls,
hang 'em, was at twenty a peimy !
And the threepence he'd got by grottoing was
spent in plums, and sixty for a child is
too many.
And the Cholera man came and whitewashed us
all, and, drat him ! made a seize of our
hog. —
It's no use to send the Crier to cry him about,
he's such a blunderin' drunken old dog ;
The last time he was fetched to find a lost child
he was guzzling with his bell at tha
Crown,
And went and cried a boy instead of a girl, for
a distracted Mother and Father about
Town.
BiUy — where are you, Billy, I say ? come, Billy,
come home, to your best of Mothers !
I'm scared when I think of them Cabroleys,
they drive so, they'd run over their own
Sisters and Brothers.
Or maybe he's stole by some chimbly-sweeping
wretch, to stick fast in narrow flues and
what not.
And be poked up behind with a picked pointed
pole, when the soot has ketched, and the
chimbly's red hot.
0, I'd give the whole wide world, if the world
was mine, to clap my two longin' eyes on
his face.
For he's my darlin' of darlin's, and if he don't
soon come back, you '11 see me drop stone
dead on the place.
1 only wish I'd got him safe in these two Moth¬
erly arms, and would n't I hug him and
kiss him !
Lawk ! I never knew what a precious he was —
but a child don't not feel like a chüd till
you miss him.
Why, there he is ! Punch and Judy hunting, the
young wretch, it's that Billy as sartin as
sin !
But let me get him home, with a good grip of
his hair, and I'm blest if he shall have a
whole bone in his skin !
Thomas Hood.
— ,
n
L
J
96 POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath.
He had a broad face and a little round belly
That shook, when he laughed, like a bowl full of
jelly-
He was chubby and plump, — a right jolly old
elf;
And I laughed, when I saw him, in spite of my¬
self.
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread.
He spoke not a word, but went straight to his
work,
And filled all the stockings ; then turned with a
jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose.
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose.
He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a
whistle.
And away they all flew like the down of a this¬
tle ;
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of
sight,
" Happy Christinas to all, and to all a good¬
night ! "
Clement C. Moore.
»
THE FROST.
The Frost looked forth, one still, clear night.
And he said, "Now I shall be out of sight ;
So through the valley and over the height
In silence 1 '11 take my way.
I will not go like that blustering train,
The wind and the snow, the hail and the rain.
Who make so much bustle and noise in vain.
But 1 'U be as busy as they ! "
Then he went to the mountain, and powdered its
crest,
He climbed up the trees, and their boughs he
dressed
With diamonds and pearls, and over the breast
Of the quivering lake he spread
A coat of mail, that it need not fear
The downward point of many a spear
That he hung on its margin, far and near.
Where a rock could rear its head.
A VISIT FROM ST. NICHOLAS.
'T WAS the night before Christmas, when all
through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse ;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with
care.
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;
The children were nestled all snug in their beds.
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their
heads ;
And mamma in her kerchief, and 1 in my cap.
Had just settled our brains for a long winter's
nap, —
When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
1 sprang from my bed to see what was the mat¬
ter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash.
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.
The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave a lustre of midday to objects below ;
When what to my wondering eyes should ap¬
pear.
But a miniature sleigh and eight tiny reindeer.
With a little old driver, so lively and quick
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came.
And he whistled and shouted, and called them
by name :
" Now, Dasher ! now. Dancer ! now, Prancer and
Vixen !
On, Comet ! on, Cupid ! on, Donder and Blitzen !
To the top of the porch, to the top of the wall !
Now dash a^way, dash ¿way, dash awayaj] ! "
As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly.
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the
sky.
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew.
With the sleigh full of toys, — and St. Nicholas
too.
And then in a twinkling I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As I drew in my head, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a
bound.
He was dressed all in fur from his head to his
foot.
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes
and soot ;
A bundle of toys he had flung on his back.
And he looked like a pedler just opening his
pack.
His eyes how they twinkled ! his dimples how
merry !
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry ;
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow.
And the beard on his chin was as white as the
snow.
He went to the windows of those who slept.
And over each pane like a fairy crept :
Wherever he breathed, wherever he stepped.
By the light of the moon were seen
Most beautiful things. There were flowers and
trees.
There were bevies of birds and swarms of bees.
CHILDHOOD.
97
There were cities, thrones, temples, and towers,
and these
All pictured in silver sheen !
But he did one thing that was hardly fair, —
He peeped in the cupboard, and, finding there
That all had forgotten far him to prepare, —
" Now, just to set them a thinking,
I '11 bite this basket of fruit," said he ;
" This costly pitcher I '11 burst in three.
And the glass of water they've left for me
Shall ' tchick ! ' to tell them I'm drinking."
hannah frances gould.
RAIN ON THE ROOF.
When the humid shadows hover
Over all the starry spheres.
And the melancholy darkness
Gently weeps in rainy tears.
What a bliss to press the pillow
Of a cottage-chamber bed.
And to listen to the patter
Of the soft rain overhead !
Every tinkle on the shingles
Has an echo in the heart ;
And a thousand dreamy fancies
Into busy being start.
And a thousand recollections
Weave their air-threads into woof.
As I listen to the patter
Of the rain upon the roof.
Now in memory comes my mother.
As she used, in years agone.
To regard the darling dreamers
Ere she left them till the dawn:
So I see her leaning o'er me.
As I list to this refrain
Which is played upon the shingles
By the patter of the rain.
Then my little seraph sister.
With the wings and waving hair.
And her star-eyed cherub brother —
A serene angelic pair —
Glide around my wakeful pillow.
With their praise or mild reproof.
As I listen to the murmur
Of the soft rain on the roof.
And another comes, to thrill me
With her eyes' delicious blue ;
And I mind not, musing on her.
That her heart was all untrue ;
I remember but to love her.
With a passion kin to pain.
And my heart's quick pulses vibrate
To the patter of the rain.
Art hath [naught ofj^tone orjcadence
That can ^ork withl such a( spell
In theVsoul's mysterious Ifountains,
Whence the^tears of \rapture\well.
As thaf^melody ofinature.
That subdued, subduing strain
Which is played upon the shingles
By the patter of the rain.
Coates Kinney.
A FAREWELL.
My fairest child, I have no song to give you ;
No lark could pipe to skies so dull and gray ;
Yet, ere we part, one lesson I can leave you
For every day.
Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever;
Do noble things, not dream them, all day long :
And so make life, death, and that vast forever
One grand, sweet song.
Charles Kingsley.
A EÛRTRAIT.
"One name is Elizabeth,"—Ben JonSON.
I WILL paint her as I see her.
Ten timeà Jie^ve thejlilies blown
Since she looked upon the sun.
And her face is lily-clear,
Lily-shaped, and dropped in duty
To the law of its own beauty.
Oval cheeks encolored faintly.
Which a trail of golden hair
Keeps from fading off to air ;
And a forehead fair and saintly.
Which two blue eyes undershine.
Like meek prayers before a shrine.
Face and figure of a child, —
Though too calm, you think, and tender.
For the childhood you would lend her.
Yet child-simple, undefiled,
Frank, obedient, — waiting still
On the turnings of your will.
Moving light, as all your things.
As young birds, or early wheat.
When the wind blows over it.
98
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
Only, free from flutterings
Of loud mirth that scometh measure, —
Taking love for her chief pleasure.
Choosing pleasures, for the rest,
Which come softly, —just as she.
When she nestles at your knee
Quiet talk she liketh best.
In a bower of gentle looks, —
Watering flowers, or reading hooks.
And her voice, it murmurs lowly.
As a silver stream may run.
Which yet feels, you feel, the sun.
And her smile, it seems half holy.
As if drawn from thoughts more far
Than our common jestings are.
And if any poet knew her.
He would sing of her with falls
Used in lovely madrigals.
And if any painter drew her.
He would paint her unaware
With a halo round the hair.
And if reader read the poem.
He would whisper, "You have done a
Consecrated little Una."
And a dreamer (did you show him
That same picture) would exclaim,
" 'T is my angel, with a name ! "
And a stranger, when he sees her
In the street even, smileth stilly.
Just as you would at a lily.
And all voices that address her
Soften, sleeken every word.
As if speaking to a bird.
And all fancies yearn to cover
The hard earth whereon she passes,
With the thymy-scented grasses.
And all hearts do pray, "God love ter ! " —
Ay, and always, in good sooth.
We may all be sure He doth.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
«
THE CHILDREN'S HOUR.
Between the dark and the daylight.
When night is beginning to lower.
Comes a pause in the day's occupations,
That is known as the children's hour.
I hear in the chamber above me
The patter of little feet.
The sound of a door that is opened,
And voices soft and sweet.
From my study I see in the lamplight,
Descending the iroad hall stair.
Grave Alice and laughing Allegra,
And Edith with golden hair.
A whisper and then a silence,
Yet I know by their merry eyes
They are plotting and planning together
To take me by surprise.
A sudden rush from the stairway,
A sudden raid from the haU,
By three doors left unguarded.
They enter my castle walL
They climb up into my turret.
O'er the arms and back of my chair ;
If I try to escape, they surround me :
They seem to be ever3rwhere.
They almost devour me with kisses.
Their arms about me intwine.
Till I think of the Bishop of Bingen
In his Mouse-Tower on the Rhine.
Do you think, 0 blue-eyed banditti.
Because you have scaled the wall.
Such an old mustache as I am
Is not a match for you all ?
\
I have you fast in my fortress.
And will not let you depart.
But put you into the dungeon
In the round-tower of my heart.
And there will 1 keep you forever.
Yes, forever and a day.
Till the walls shall crumble to ruin.
And moulder in dust away.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
JENNY KISSED ME.
Jenny kissed me when we met.
Jumping from the chair she sat in.
Time, you thief ! who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in.
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad ;
Say that health and wealth have missed me ;
Say I'm growing old, but add —
Jenny kissed me !
LEIGH Hunt.
a-
CHILDHOOD.
1- ' jj 1 /
' Q|
99
THE SMACK IN SCHOOL.
A district school, not far away,
Mid Berkshire hills, one winter's day.
Was humming with its wonted noise
Of threescore mingled girls and boys ;
Some few upon their tasks intent.
But more on furtive mischief bent.
The while the master's downward look
Was fastened on a copy-book ;
When suddenly, behind his back.
Hose sharp and clear a rousing smack !
As't were a battery of bliss
Let off in one tremendous kiss !
" What's that 1 " the startled master cries ;
" That, thir," a little imp replies,
" Wath William Willith, if you pleathe, —
I thaw him kith Thuthanna Peathe ! "
With frown to make a statue thrill.
The master thundered, " Hither, Will ! "
Like wretch o'ertaken in his track.
With stolen chattels on his back.
Will hung his head in fear and shame.
And to the awful presence came, —
A great, green, bashful simpleton.
The butt of all good-natured fun.
With smile suppressed, and birch upraised.
The threatener faltered, — " I'm amazed
That you, my biggest pupil, should
Be guilty of an act so rude !
Before the whole set school to boot -
What evil genius put you to't ? "
" ' T was she herself, sir," sobbed the lad,
" I did not mean to be so bad ;
But when Susannah shook her curls.
And whispered, I was 'fraid of girls
And dursn't kiss a baby's doll,
I could n't stand it, sir, at all.
But up and kissed her on the spot !
I know — boo-hoo — I ought to not.
But, somehow, from her looks—boo-hoo —
I thought she kind o' wished me to ! "
William Pitt Palmer.
OLD-SCHOOL PUNISHMENT.
Old Master Brown brought his ferule down.
And his face looked angry and red.
" Go, seat you there, now, Anthony Blair,
Along with the girls," he said.
Then Anthony Blair, with a mortified air.
With his head down on his breast,
Took his penitent seat by the maiden sweet
That he loved, of all, the best.
And Anthony Blair seemed whimpering there,
But the rogue only made believe ;
For he peeped at the girls with the beautiful curls.
And ogled them over his sleeve.
Anonymous.
THE BAEEFOOT BOY.
Blessings on thee, little man.
Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan !
With thy tumed-up pantaloons,
And thy merry whistled tunes ;
With thy red lip, redder still
Kissed by strawberries on the hill ;
With the sunshine on thy face.
Through thy torn brim's jaunty grace ;
From my heart I give thee joy, —
1 was once a barefoot boy !
Prince thou art, —■ the grown-up man
Only is republican.
Let the million-dollared ride !
Barefoot, trudging at his side.
Thou hast more than he can buy
In the reach of ear and eye, —
Outward sunshine, inward joy :
Blessings on thee, barefoot boy !
0 for boyhood's painless play.
Sleep that wakes in laughing day.
Health that mocks the doctor's rules.
Knowledge never learned of schools.
Of the wild bee's morning chase.
Of the wild-flower's time and place.
Flight of fowl and habitude
Of the tenants of the wood ;
How the tortoise bears his shell.
How the woodchuck digs his cell.
And the ground-mole sinks his well ;
How the robin feeds her young.
How the oriole's nest is hung ;
Where the whitest lilies blow.
Where the freshest berries grow,
■Where the ground-nut trails its vine.
Where the wood-grape's clusters shine ;
Of the black wasp's cunning way.
Mason of his walls of clay.
And the architectural plans
Of gray hornet artisans ! —
For, eschewing books and tasks.
Nature answers all he asks ;
Hand in hand with her he walks.
Face to face with her he talks.
Part and parcel of her joy, —
Blessings on the barefoot boy !
O for boyhood's time of June,
Crowding years in one brief moon.
When all things I heard or saw.
Me, their master, waited for.
I was rich in flowers and trees,
Humming-birds and honey-bees ;
For my sport the squirrel played.
Plied the snouted mole his spade ;
For my taste the blackberry cone
Purpled over hedge and stone ;
w
POEMS OP CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
Laughed the hrook for my delight
Through the day and through the night,
Whispering at the garden wall,
Talked with me from fall to fall ;
Mine the sand-rimmed pickerel pond,
Mine the walnut slopes beyond,
Mine, on bending orchard trees.
Apples of Hesperides !
Still as my horizon grew.
Larger grew my riches too ;
All the world I saw or knew
Seemed a complex Chinese toy,
Pashioned for a barefoot hoy !
0 for festal dainties spread.
Like my bowl of milk and bread, —
Pewter spoon and howl of wood.
On the door-stone, gray and rude !
O'er me, like a regal tent,
Cloudy-rihhed, the sunset bent.
Purple-curtained, fringed with gold.
Looped in many a wind-swung fold ;
While for music came the play
Of the pied frogs' orchestra ;
And, to light the noisy choir.
Lit the fly his lamp of fire.
I was monarch : pomp and joy
Waited on the barefoot hoy !
Cheerly, then, my little man.
Live and laugh, as boyhood can !
Though the flinty slopes he hard,
Stuhhle-speared the new-mown sward.
Every mom shall lead thee through
Presh baptisms of the dew ;
Every evening from thy feet
Shall the cool wind kiss the heat
All too soon these feet must hide
In the prison cells of pride.
Lose the freedom of the sod.
Like a colt's for work he shod.
Made to tread the mills of toil.
Up and down in ceaseless moil :
Happy if their track he found
Never on forbidden ground ;
Happy if they sink not in
Quick and treacherous sands of sin.
Ah ! that thou couldst know thy joy.
Ere it passes, barefoot hoy !
John Greenleap Whittier.
MY MOTHER'S BIBLE.
This hook^is all that's left me now, —
Tears will unhidden start, —
With faltering lip and throbbing brow
I press it to my heart.
Por many generations past
Here is our family tree ;
My mother's hands this Bible clasped.
She, djdng, gave it me.
Ah ! well do I remember those
Whose names these records bear ;
Who round the hearthstone used to closer
After the evening prayer.
And speak of what these pages said
In tones my heart would thrill !
Though they are with the silent dead.
Here are they living still !
My father read this holy hook
To brothers, sisters, dear ;
How calm was my poor mother's look.
Who loved God's word to hear !
Her angel face, — I see it yet !
What thronging memories come !
Again that little group is met
Within the halls of home !
Thou truest friend man ever knew.
Thy constancy I've tried ;
When all were false, I found thee tme.
My counsellor and guide.
The mines of earth no treasures give
That could this volume buy ;
In teaching me the way to live,
It taught me how to die !
george perkins morris
THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET.
How dead toj^ this heart hrelthe scenes jofí my
chil^hoodl . " ' M
When fond re!plle€t|on[ piesentsltheni to view !
The orcliard, the meadiw^ the deep-tangled wild-
■VTOOd,
And every loved spot which my infancy knew ;
The wide-spreading pond, and the mill which
stood by it.
The bridge, and the rock where the cataract
feU;
The cot of my father, the dairy-house nigh it,
And e'en the rude bucket which hung in the
well, —
The old oaken bucket, the iron-hound hucket,
The moss-covered bucket which hung in the well.
That moss-covered vessel I hail as a treasure ;
For often, at noon, when retm-ned from the field,
I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure.
The purest and sweetest that nature can yield.
How ardent I seized it, with hands that were
glowing !
And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it
fell;
THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET.
fancy reverti to vty fat her''s plantation
And sighs for the bucket which hangs in the well*'
YOUTH.
101
■a
Then soon, with the emblem of truth overflow¬
ing,
And dripping with coolness, it rose from the
/ ' well ; —
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket, arose from the well.
How sweet from the green mossy brim to receive
it.
As, poised on the curb, it inclined to my lips !
Not a full blushing goblet could tempt me to
leave it.
Though flUed with the nectar that Jupiter sips.
And now, far removed from the loved situation.
The tear of regret will intrusively swell.
As fancy reverts to my father's plantation.
And sighs for the bucket which hangs in the
well ; —
The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,
The moss-covered bucket which hangs in the well.
Samuel woodworth.
THE OLD ARM-CHAIR.
I LOVE it, I love it ! and who shall dare
To chide me for loving that old arm-chair ?
I've treasured it long as a sainted prize,
I've bedewed) it with tears! I ' ve embalmed in with
sighsî'" 'I ' >
'T is bound by a thousand bands to my heart ;
Not a tie break, not a link will start ;
Would you know the'spell ? —; a mother sat there !
And a sacred thing is that old arm-chair.
In chüdjiood's houf 1 lingered near'
The hallowed seat with'listening ear ;
And gentle words that mother would give
To fit melto diej and tea,ch md to live.
She told in^ that shame would never betide
With Truth fot my creed, and God foi my guide ;
She taught me/ to lisp my earliest prayer.
As 1 knelt 'beside that old arm-chair.
1
I sat, and watched her many a day.
When her eye grew dim, and her locks were
gray;
And 1 almost worshipped her when she smiled.
And turned from her Bible to bless her child.
Years rolled on, but the last one sped, —
My idol was shattered, my earth-star fled !
1 leamt how much the heart can bear.
When 1 saw her die in her old arm-chair.
'T is past, 't is past ! but 1 gaze on it now.
With quivering breath a^d throbl^ing brow :
'T was there she nursed me, 't wasthere she died.
And memory flows with lava tide.
Say it is folly, and deem me weak,
Whilst scalding drops start down my cheek ;
Bu1| 1 love it, 1 love it, and cannot tear
My soul^from a mother's old! arm-chair.
ELIZA Cook.
WOODMAN, SPARE THAT TREE.
Woodman, spare that tree ! i
Touch not a single\boug^ !
In youth "1(1; shelter^ me.
And 1 '11 protect it now.
'T was my forefather's hand
That placed it near his cot ;
There, woodman, let it stand.
Thy axe shall harm it not 1
That old familiar tree.
Whose glory and renown
Are spread o'er land and sea.
And wouldst thou hew it down Í
Woodman, fojbear thy stroke !
Cut not its earth-bound ties ;
0, spare that aged oak.
Now towering to the skies.!
When but an idle boy
1 sought its grateful shade ;
In all their gushing joy
Here too my sisters played.
My mother kissed me here ;
My father pressed my hand —
Forgive this foolish tear.
But let that old oak stand !
My heart-strings round thee cling.
Close as thy bark, old friend !
' Here shall the wild-bird sing.
And still thy branches bend.
Old tree I the storm still brave !
And, woodman, leave the spot ;
While I've a hand to save.
Thy axe shall hurt it not.
george Perkins morris.
SEVEN TIMES TWO.
romance.
i
You bells in the steeple, ring, ring out your
changes, ^ .
How many soever they be, ,
And let the 'brown meadow-lark's note as he
ranges'
Come over, come over to me.
Yet birds' clearest carol by fall or by swelling
No magical sense conveys.
And bells have foigotten their old art of telling
The fortune of future days.
102
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
' ' Tum again, turn again, "once they rang cheerily
While a boy listened alone :
Made his heart yearn again, musing so wearily
All by himself on a stone.
Poor beUs ! 1 forgive you ; your good days are
over,
And mine, they are yet to he ;
No hsteaing, no longing, shall aught, aught
discover :
You leave the story to me.
The foxglove shoots out of the green matted
heather.
Preparing her hoods of snow ;
She was idle, and slept tül the sunshiny weather :
0, children take long to grow.
1 wish, and 1 wish that the spring would go
faster.
Nor long summer hide so late ;
And 1 could grow on like the foxglove and aster.
For some things are ill to wait.
1 wait for the day when dear hearts shall discover.
While dear hands are laid on my head ;
" The child is a woman, the book may close over,
For aU the lessons are said."
1 wait for my story — the birds cannot sing it.
Not one, as he sits on the tree ;
The heUs cannot ring it, but long years, 0, bring
it!
Such as I wish it to he.
JEAN INGELOW.
THÉ EOMANCE OF THE SWAN'S NEST.
Little Ellie sits alone
Mid the beeches of a meadow.
By a stream-side on the grass.
And the trees are showering down
Doubles of their leaves in shadow.
On her shining hair and face.
She has thrown her bonnet by.
And her feet she has been dipping
In the shallow water's flow.
Now she holds them nakedly
In her hands all sleek and dripping.
While she rocketh to and fro.
Little EUie sits alone.
And the smile she softly uses
Fills the silence like a speech.
While she thinks what shall he done, —
And the sweetest pleasure chooses
For her future within reach.
Little Ellie in her smile
Chooses ..." 1 wiU have a lover.
Biding on a steed of steeds I
He shall love me without guüe.
And to him 1 will discover
The swan's nest among the reeds.
"And the steed shall he red-roan.
And the lover shall be noble.
With an eye that takes the breath.
And the lute he plays upon
Shall strike ladies into trouble.
As his sword strikes men to death.
"And the steed it shall be shod
All in silver, housed in azure.
And the mane shall swim the wind ;
And the hoofs along the sod
Shall flash onward and keep measure.
Till the shepherds look behind.
" But my lover will not prize
All the glory that he rides in.
When he gazes in my face.
He will say, ' O Love, thine eyes
Build the shrine my soul abides in.
And 1 kneel here for thy grace.'
"Then, ay then — he shall kneel low.
With the red-roan steed anear him.
Which shall seem to understand —
Till 1 answer, ' Bise and go I
For the world must love and fear him
Whom 1 gift with heart and hand.'
" Then he will arise so pale,
1 shall feel my own lips tremble
With a yes 1 must not say ;
Nathless maiden-brave, ' Farewell '
1 will utter, and dissemble ; —
' Light to-morrow with to-day.'
" Then he '11 ride among the hills
To the wide world past the river.
There to put away all wrong ;
To make straight distorted wUls,
And to empty the broad quiver
Which the wicked bear along.
"Three times shall a young foot-page
Swim the stream and climb the mountain
And kneel down beside my feet ; —
• Lo, my master sends this gage.
Lady, for thy pity's counting !
What wilt thou exchange for it ? '
" And the first time, 1 will send
A white rosebud for a guerdon, —
And the second time, a glove ;
YOUTH.
103
But the third time, I may bend
From my pride, and answer, ' Pardon,
If he comes to take my love.'
" Then the young foot-page will run, —
Then my lover will ride faster.
Till he kneeleth at my knee :
' I am a duke's eldest son !
Thousand serfs do call me master, —
But, 0 Love, I love but thee ! '
" He will kiss me on the mouth
Then, and lead me as a lover
Through the crowds that praise his deeds ;
And, when soul-tied by one troth.
Unto him I will discover
That swan's nest among the reeds."
Little Ellie, with her smile.
Not yet ended, rose up gayly.
Tied the bonnet, donned the shoe.
And went homeward, round a mile.
Just to see, as she did daily.
What more eggs were with the two.
Pushing through the elm-tree copse.
Winding up the stream, light-hearted.
Where the osier pathway leads, —
Past the boughs she stoops — and stops.
Lo, the wild swan had deserted.
And a rat had gnawed the reeds.
EUie went home sad and slow.
If she found the lover ever.
With his red-roan steed of steeds,
Sooth I know not ! but I know
She could never show him — never.
That swan's nest among the reeds !
Elizabeth Barrett browning.
—«
GOOD NIGHT AND GOOD MORNING.
A FAIR little girl sat imder a tree
Sewing as long as her eyes could see ;
Then smoothed her work and folded it right,
.'ind said, " Dear work, good night, good night ! "
Such a number of rooks came over her head,
Crying " Caw, caw ! " on their way to bed.
She said, as she watched their curious flight,
" Little black things, good night, good night ! "
The horses neighed, and the oxen lowed.
The sheep's "Bleat! bleat!" came over the
road ;
All seeming to say, with a quiet delight,
" Good little girl, good night, good night ! "
She did not say to the sun, " Good night ! "
Though she saw him there like a ball of light ;
For she knew he had God's time to keep
AU over the world and never could sleep.
The tall pink foxglove bowed his head ;
The violets courtesied, and went to bed ;
And good Uttle Lucy tied up her hair.
And said, on her knees, her favorite prayer.
And, whUe on her pillow she softly lay.
She knew nothing more till again it was day ;
And aU things said to the beautiful sun,
" Good morning, good morning ! our work is
begun."
Richard Monckton Milnes.
(lord Houghton.)
THREE YEARS SHE GREW.
Three years she grew in sun and shower ;
Then Nature said, " A lovelier flower
On earth was never sown :
This child I to myself wiU take ;
She shall be mine, and I wiU make
A lady of my own.
" Myself will to my darling be
Both law and impulse ; and with me
The girl, in rock and plain.
In earth and heaven, in glade and bower.
Shall feel an overseeing power
To kindle or restrain.
" She shaU be sportive as the fawn
That wild with glee across the lawn
Or up the mountain springs ;
And hers shall be the breathing balm,
And hers the silence and the calm.
Of mute insensate things.
" The floating clouds their state shall lend
To her ; for her the willow bend ;
Nor shall she fail to see
E'en in the motions of the storm
Grace that shall mould the maiden's form
By silent sympathy.
" The stars of midnight shall be dear
To her ; and she shall lean her ear
In many a secret place
Where rivulets dance their wayward round.
And beauty born of murmuring sound
Shall pass into her face.
" And vital feelings of delight
ShaU rear her form to stately height.
Her virgin bosom swell ;
Such thoughts'to Lucy I will give
WhUe she and I together live
Here in this happy dell."
*104
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
a
Thus Nature spake. The work was done, —
How soon my Lucy's race was run !
She died, and left to me
This heath, this calm and quiet scene ;
The memory of what has been.
And nevermore wül be.
William Wordsworth.
THREAD AND SONG.
Sweeter and sweeter.
Soft and low.
Neat little nymph.
Thy numbers flow.
Urging thy thimble.
Thrift's tidy symbol.
Busy and nimble.
To and fro ;
Prettily plying
Thread and song,
Keeping them flying
Late and long,
Through the stitch linger.
Kissing thy finger,
Quick, — as it skips along.
Many an echo.
Soft and low.
Follows thy flying
Fancy so, —
Melodies thrilling.
Tenderly fllling
Thee with their trilling,
Come and go ;
Memory's flnger.
Quick as thine.
Loving to linger
On the line,
"Writes of another,
Dearer than brother ;
Would that the name were mine !
John Williamson palmer.
h
MAIDENHOOD.
Maiden ! with the meek brown eyes.
In whose orbs a shadow lies
Like the dusk in evening skies !
Thou whose locks outshine the sun, —
Golden tresses wreathed in one.
As the braided streamlets run !
Standing, with reluctant feet.
Where the brook and river meet.
Womanhood and childhood fleet !
Gazing, with a timid glance,
On the brooklet's swift advance.
On the river's broad expanse !
Deep and still, that gliding stream
Beautiful to thee must seem
As the river of a dream.
Then why pause with indecision.
When bright angels in thy vision
Beckon thee to fields Elysian ?
Seest thou shadows sailing by.
As the dove, with startled eye.
Sees the falcon's shadow fly ?
Hearest thou voices on the shore.
That our ears perceive no more.
Deafened by the cataract's roar ?
O thou child of many prayers !
Life hath qiucksands, Life hath snares !
Care and age come unawares !
Like the swell of some sweet tune.
Morning rises into noon.
May glides onward into June.
Childhood is the bough where slumbered
Birds and blossoms many-numbered ; —
Age, that bough with snows encumbered.
Gather, then, each flower that grows.
When the young heart overflows.
To embalm that tent of snows.
Bear a lily in thy hand ;
Gates of brass cannot withstand
One touch of that magic wand.
Bear through sorrow, wrong, and ruth.
In thy heart the dew of youth.
On thy lips the smile of truth.
O, that dew, like balm, shall steal
Into wounds that cannot heal.
Even as sleep our eyes doth seal ;
And that smile, like sunshine, dart
Into many a sunless heart.
For a smile of God thou art.
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
LUCY.
She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove ;
A maid whom there were none to praise.
And very few to love.
i
YOUTH.
105
A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye !
Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.
She lived unknown, and few could know
"When Lucy ceased to be ;
But she is in her grave, and O,
The difference to me !
William Wordsworth.
THE PRETTY GIRL OF LOCH DAN.
The shades of eve had crossed the glen
That frowns o'er infant Avonmore,
When, nigh Loch Dan, two weary men.
We stopped before a cottage door.
"God save all here," my comrade cries.
And rattles on the raised latch-pin;
" God save you kindly," quick replies
A clear sweet voice, and asks us in.
We enter ; from the wheel she starts,
A rosy girl with soft black eyes ;
Her fluttering courtesy takes our hearts.
Her blushing grace and pleased surprise.
Poor Mary, she was quite alone,
For, all the way to Glenmalure,
Her mother had that morning gone.
And left the house in charge with her.
But neither household cares, nor yet
The shame that startled virgins feel.
Could make the generous girl forget
Her wonted hospitable seal.
She brought us in a beechen bowl
Sweet milk that smacked of mountain thyme.
Oat cake, and such a yellow roll
Of butter, — it gilds all my rhyme !
And, while we ate the grateful food
(With weary limbs on bench reclined).
Considerate and discreet, she stood
Apart, and listened to the wind.
Kind wishes both our souls engaged.
From breast to breast spontaneous ran
The mutual thought, — we stood and pledged
The modest hose above Loch Dan.
" The milk we drink is not more pure.
Sweet Mary, — bless those budding charms ! —
Than your own generous heart, I'm sure.
Nor whiter than the breast it warms ! "
She turned and gazed, unused to hear
Such language in that homely glen ;
But, Mary, you have naught to fear.
Though smiled on by two stranger-men.
Not for a crown would I alarm
Your virgin pride by word or sign.
Nor need a painful blush disarm
My friend of thoughts as pure as mine.
Her simple heart could not but feel
The words we spoke were free from guile ;
She stooped, she blushed, she fixed her wheel, —
'T is all in vain, — she can't but smile !
Just like sweet April's dawn appears
Her modest face, — I see it yet, —
And though I lived a hundred years
Methinks I never could forget
The pleasure that, despite her heart.
Fills all her downcast eyes with light ;
The lips reluctantly apart.
The white teeth struggling into sight.
The dimples eddying o'er her cheek.
The rosy cheek that won't be still : —
0, who could blame what flatterers speak.
Did smiles like this reward their skill ?
For such another smile, I vow.
Though loudly beats the midnight rain,
I'd take the mountain-side e'en now.
And walk to Luggelaw again !
samuel ferguson.
TO A HIGHLAND GIRL.
at inversneyde, upon loch lomond.
Sweet Highland Girl, a very shower
Of beauty is thy earthly dower !
Twice seven consenting years have shed
Their utmost bounty on thy head ;
And these gray rocks, this household lawn.
These trees, — a veil just half withdrawn, —
This fall of water that doth make
A murmur near the silent lake.
This little bay, a quiet road
That holds in shelter thy abode ;
In truth together ye do seem
Like something fashioned in a dream.
Such forms as from their covert peep
When earthly cares are laid asleep !
But 0 fair Creature ! in the light
Of common day so heavenly bright,
I bless thee. Vision as thou art,
I bless thee with a human heart r
God shield thee to thy latest years !
I neither know thee nor thy peers ;
And yet my eyes are filled with tears.
With earnest feeling I shall pray
For thee when I am far away ;
106 POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
For never saw I mien or face
In which more plainly I could trace
Benignity and home-bred sense
Ripening in perfect innocence.
Here scattered like a random seed,
Remote from men, thou dost not need
The embarrassed look of shy distress.
And maidenly shamefacedness :
Thou weai'st upon thy forehead clear
The freedom of a mountaineer ;
A face with gladness overspread,
Soft smiles, by human kindness bred ;
And seemliness complete, that sways
Thy courtesies, about thee plays ;
With no restraint, hut such as springs
From quick and eager visitings
Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach
Of thy few words of English speech, —
A bondage sweetly brooked, a strife
That gives thy gestures grace and life !
So have I, not unmoved in mind.
Seen birds of tempest-loving kind,
Thus beating up against the wind.
What hand hut would a garland cull
For thee^ho art so beautiful ?
0 happy pleasure ! here to dwell
Beside thee in some heathy dell ;
Adopt your homely ways and dress,
A shepherd, thou a shepherdess !
But I could frame a wish for thee
More like a grave reality :
Thou art to me hut as a wave
Of the wild sea ; and I would have
Some claim upon thee, if I could.
Though hut of common neighborhood.
What joy to hear thee, and to see !
Thy elder brother I would be.
Thy father, — anything to thee.
Now thanks to Heaven ! that of its grace
Hath led me to this lonely place ;
Joy have 1 had ; and going hence
1 bear away my recompense.
In spots like these it is we prize
Our Memory, feel that she hath eyes :
Then why should I be loath to stir ?
1 feel this place was made for her ;
To give new pleasure like the past.
Continued long as life shall last.
Nor am I loath, though pleased at heart.
Sweet Highland Girl ! from thee to part ;
For I, methinks, till I grow old
As fair before me shall behold
As I do now, the cabin small.
The lake, the hay, the waterfall ;
And thee, the spirit of them aU !
William Wordsworth.
SWEET STREAM, THAT WINDS.
Sweet stream, that winds through yonder glade.
Apt emblem of a virtuous maid, —
Silent and chaste she steals along.
Far from the world's gay, busy throng ;
With gentle yet prevailing force,
Intent upon her destined course ;
Graceful and useful all she does.
Blessing and blest where'er she goes ;
Pure-hosomed as that watery glass.
And Heaven reflected in her face.
william cowpeh.
RUTH.
She stood breast high amid the com.
Clasped by the golden light of mom.
Like the sweetheart of the sun.
Who many a glowing kiss had won.
On her cheek an autumn flush
Deeply ripened ; — such a blush
In the midst of brown was born.
Like red poppies grown with com.
Round her eyes her tresses fell, —
Which were blackest none could tell ;
But long lashes veiled a light
That had else been all too bright.
And her hat, with shady brim.
Made her tressy forehead dim ; —
Thus she stood amid the stooks.
Praising God with sweetest looks.
Sure, I said. Heaven did not mean
Where I reap thou shouldst but glean ;
Lay thy sheaf adown and come.
Share my harvest and my home.
Thomas Hood.
NARCISSA.
from " night thoughts," night v.
" Yottno, gay, and fortunate !" Each yields a
theme.
And, first, thy youth ; what says it to gray hairs ?
Narcissa, I'm become thy pupil now ; —
Early, bright, transient, chaste as morning dew.
She sparkled, was exhaled, and went to heaven.
dr. Edward young.
IT NEVER COMES AGAIN.
There are gains for aR our losses.
There are balms for all our pain.
But when youth, the dream, departs.
It takes something from our hearts.
And it never comes again.
4
FRAGMENTS.
107
We are stronger, and are better,
Under manhood's sterner reign ;
Still we feel that something sweet
Followed youth, with flying feet,
And will never come again.
Something beautiful is vanished.
And we sigh for it in vain ;
We behold it everywhere.
On the earth, and in the air.
But it never comes again.
RICHARD HENRY STODDARD.
EEAGMENTS.
The Baby.
A babe in a house is a well-spring of pleasure.
0/Educatim. m. F. Tupper.
Behold the chUd, by Nature's kindly law.
Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw.
Efisile II, Pope.
Behold, my lords.
Although the print be little, the whole matter
And copy of the father : eye, nose, lip.
The trick of his frown, his forehead ; nay, the
valley.
The pretty dimples of his chin, and cheek ; his
smiles ;
The very mould and frame of hand, nail, flnger.
tyittitr's Tail, Act ii. Sc. 3. Shakespeare.
0, 't is a parlous boy ;
Bold, quick, ingenious, forward, capable ;
He is all the mother's from the top to toe.
Richard III., Act. iü. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Eably Death.
" Whom the gods love die young," was said of
yore.
Do7i yuan. Cant, ivt Stan, z2. BYRON.
Ere sin could blight or sorrow fade.
Death came with friendly care ;
The opening bud to Heaven conveyed.
And bade it blossom there.
Epitafh on an Infant. S. T. COLERIDGE.
Grief fills the room up of my absent child.
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me ;
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words.
Remembers me of all his gracious parts.
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form.
King yohn, Act \\\. Sc. 4. shakespeare.
Child's Pratee.
Now I lay me down to take my sleep,
I pray the Lord my soul to keep :
If 1 should die before I wake,
I pray the Lord my soul to take.
New England Primer.
Prophecies.
Men are but children of a larger growth.
Alt/or Lome, Act iv. Sc, i. DrvDEN.
The childhood shows the man
As morning shows the day.
Paradise Regained, Book iv. MiLTON.
A little bench of heedless bishops here.
And there a chancellor in embryo.
The Schoolmistress, SHBNSTONB*
Look here upon thy brother Geffrey's face ;
These eyes, these brows, were moulded out of his :
This little abstract doth contain that large
Which died in Geffrey : and the hand of time
Shall draw this brief unto as large a volume.
King John, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
As yet a chUd, nor yet a fool to fame,
1 lisped in numbers, for the numbers came.
Epistle to Dr, Arbuthnot. pope,
Boyish Ambition.
But strive still to be a man before your mother.
Motto of No, III. Connoisseur, COWPER.
Thou wilt scarce be a man before thy mother.
Love's Cure, Act ii. Sc. 2. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER.
School-Days.
The school-boy, with his satchel in his hand.
Whistling aloud to bear his courage up.
The Grave, R. Blair.
Besides, they always smell of bread and butter.
Manfred', BYRON.
You'd scarce expect one of my age
To speak in pubhc on the stage ;
And if 1 chance to fall below
Demosthenes or Cicero,
Don't view me with a critic's eye,
But pass my imperfections by.
Large streams from little fountains flow,
Tall oaks from little acoms grow.
Lines written for a School Declamation. D. EVERETT.
1 pray ye, flog them upon all occasions.
It mends their morals, never mind the pain.
Don yuan. Cant. ii. BYRON.
fi-
108
POEMS OF CHILDHOOD AND YOUTH.
■a
Love is a boy by poets styled ;
Then spare the rod and spoil the child.
Hudtbras, Part II. Cant. i. BUTLER.
Whipping, that's virtue's governess,
Tutoress of arts and sciences ;
That mends the gi-oss mistakes of nature,
And puts new life into dull matter ;
That lays foundation for renown.
And aU the honors of the gown.
Hudibras, Part II. Cant. i.
Butler.
Work and Plat.
If all the year were playing holidays,
To sport would be as tedious as to work.
K. Henry, Part I. Act i. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
How doth the little busy bee
Improve each shining hour.
And gather honey all the day.
From every opening flower 1
For Satan finds some mischief still
For idle hands to do.
Seng XX.
Though this may be play to you,
'T is death to us.
Fables : The Boys and the Frogs.
Watts
L'Estrange.
Qdaeeelling.
Let dogs delight to bark and bite.
For God hath made them so ;
Let bears and lions growl and fight.
For 'tis their nature too.
But, children, you should never let
Y our angry passions rise ;
Your little hands were never made
To tear each other's eyes.
Song XVI.
watts.
Careless Childhood.
As children gath'ring pebbles on the shore.
Paradise Regained, Book iv, MILTON,
One eare it heard, at the other out it went.
Trailles and Creseide, Book iv. CHAUCER.
Children blessings seem, but torments are ;
When young, our folly, and when old, our fear.
Don Carlos. OTWAY.
I remember, I remember
How my childhood fleeted by, —
The mirth of its December,
And the warmth of its July.
I Remember, I Remember. PRABD.
When they are young, they
Are like bells rung backwards, nothing but noise
And giddiness.
Wit tvithout Money. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER.
Ah, happy hiUs ! ah, pleasing shade !
Ah, fields beloved in vain !
Where once my careless childhood strayed,
A stranger yet to pain !
I feel the gales that from ye blow
A momentary bliss bestow.
On a Distant Prospect Eton College» GRAY.
Childish Days.
Sweet childish days, that were as long
As twenty days are now.
To a Butterfly.
WORDSWORTH.
Merry Youth.
O Life ! how pleasant in thy morning.
Young Fancy's rays the hills adorning !
Cold-pausing Caution's lesson scorning.
We frisk away.
Like school-boys at th' expected warning.
To joy and play.
Epistle to yames Smith. BURNS.
Life went a Ma3dng
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy,
When I was young !
Youth and Age. s. t. coleridge.
Just at the age 'twixt boy and youth.
When thought is speech, and speech is truth.
Marmion, Introduc. to Cant. ii. SCOTT.
Naught cared this body for wind or weather
When youth and I lived in't together.
Youth and Age, S. T. COLERIDGE.
Oh, Mirth and Innocence ! Oh, Milk and Water !
Ye happy mixtures of more happy days !
Manfred. BYRON.
Fair laughs the mom, and soft the zephyr blows.
While proudly riding o'er the azure realm
In gallant trim the gilded vessel goes ;
Youth on the prow, and Pleasure at the helm ;
Regardless of the sweeping whirlwind's sway.
That, hushed in grim repose, expects his evening
prey.
The Bard, II. 2. GRAY.
Yet, ah ! why should they know their fate.
Since sorrow never comes too late.
And happiness too swiftly flies ?
Thought would destroy their paradise.
No more ; — where ignorance is bliss,
'T is foUy to be wise.
On a Distant Prospect of Eton College. GRAY.
à
a
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
B--
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
FRIENDSHIP.
B-
BENEDICITE.
God's love and peace be with thee, where
Soe'er this soft autumnal air
Lifts the dark tresses of thy hair !
Whether through city casements comes
Its kiss to thee, in crowded rooms.
Or, out among the woodland blooms.
It freshens o'er thy thoughtful face.
Imparting, in its glad embrace.
Beauty to beauty, grace to grace !
Fair Nature's book together read.
The old wood-paths that knew our tread.
The maple shadows overhead, —
The hills we climbed, the river seen
By gleams along its deep ravine, —
All keep thy memory fresh and green.
Where'er I look, where'er I stray.
Thy thought goes with me on my way.
And hence the prayer I breathe to-day :
O'er lapse of time and change of scene.
The weary waste which lies between
Thyself and me, my heart I lean.
Thou lack'st not Friendship's spellword, nor
The half-unconscious power to draw
All hearts to thine by Love's sweet law.
With these good gifts of God is cast
Thy lot, and many a charm thou hast
To hold the blessed angels fast.
If, then, a fervent wish for thee
The gracious heavens will heed from me.
What should, dear heart, its burden be ?
The sighing of a shaken reed, —
What can I more than meekly plead
The greatness of our common need ?
God's love, — unchanging, pure, and true, —
The Paraclete white-shining through
His peace, — the fall of Hermon's dew !
With such a prayer, on this sweet day,
As thou mayst hear and I may say,
I greet thee, dearest, far away !
John greenleaf whittier.
EAKLY FRIENDSHIP.
The half-seen memories of childish days,
When pains and pleasures lightly came and went ;
The sympathies of boyhood rashly spent
In fearful wanderings through forbidden ways ;
The vague, but manly wish to tread the maze
Of life to noble ends, — whereon intent.
Asking to know for what man here is sent,
The bravest heart must often pause, and gaze;
The firm resolve to seek the chosen end
Of manhood's judgment, cautious and mature, —
Each of these viewless bonds binds friend to friend
With strength no selfish purpose can secure :
My happy lot is this, that all attend
That friendship which first came, and which shall
last endure.
Aubrey De Vere.
FRIENDSHIP.
from " hamlet," act hi. sc. 2.
Ham. Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man
Ai e'er my conversation coped withaL
Hor. O my dear lord —
Ham. Nay, do not think I flatter :
For what advancement may I hope from thee
That no revènue hast but thy good spirits.
To feed and clothe thee ? Why should the poor
be flattered ?
No, let the candied tongue lick absurd pomp.
And crook the pregnant hinges of the knee.
Where thrift may follow fawning. Dost thou
hear?
112
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Since my dear soul was mistress of her choice,
And could of men distinguish, her election
Hath sealed thee for herself ; for thou hast been
As one, in suffering all, that suffers nothing, —
A man that Fortune's buffets and rewards
Hast ta'en with equal thanks ; and blessed are
those
Whose blood and judgment are so well co-mingled.
That they are not a pipe for Fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please : Give me that
man
That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him
In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart.
As I do thee.
SHAKESPEARE.
FRIENDSHIP.
A RUDDY drop of manly blood
The surging sea outweighs ;
The world uncertain comes and goes.
The lover rooted stays.
I fancied he was fied, —
And, after many a year.
Glowed unexhausted kindliness.
Like daily sunrise there.
My careful heart was free again ;
0 friend, my bosom said.
Through thee alone the sky is arched.
Through thee the rose is red ;
All things through thee take nobler form.
And look beyond the earth ;
The mill-round of our fate appears
A sun-path in thy worth.
Me too thy nobleness has taught
To master my despair ;
The fountains of my hidden life
Are through thy friendship fair.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
THE MEMORY OF THE HEART.
If stores of dry and learned lore we gain.
We keep them in the memory of the brain ;
Names, things, and facts, — whate'er we knowl¬
edge call, —
There is the common ledger for them all;
And images on this cold surface traced
Make slight impression, and are soon effaced.
But we've a page, more glowing and more bright.
On which our friendship and our love to write ;
That these may never from the soul depart.
We trust them to the memory of the heart.
There is no dimming, no effacement there ;
Each new pulsation keeps the record clear ;
Warm, golden letters all the tablet fill.
Nor lose their lustre tiU the heart stands still.
' ' daniel Webster.
B
BILL AND JOK
Come, dear old comrade, you and I
Will steal an hour from days gone by, —
The shining days when life was new.
And all was bright as morning dew.
The lusty days of long ago.
When you were BUI and I was Joe.
Your name may flaunt a titled trail.
Proud as a cockerel's rainbow tail ;
And mine as brief appendix wear
As Tam O'Shanter's luckless mare ;
To-day, old friend, remember stiU
That I am Joe and you are BiU.
You've won the great world's envied prize.
And grand you look in people's eyes.
With HON. and L L. D.
In big brave letters, fair to see, —
Your fist, old fellow ! off they go !
How are you. Bill ? How are you, Joe ?
You've worn the judge's ermined robe ;
You've taught your name to half the globe;
You've sung mankind a deathless strain ;
You've made the dead past live again :
The world may call you what it wiU,
But you and I are Joe and BilL
The chaffing young folks stare and say,
" See those old buffers, bent and gray ;
They talk like fellows in their teens!
Mad, poor old boys I That's what it means," -
And shake their heads ; they little know
The throbbing hearts of Bill and Joe !
How BUI forgets his hour of pride.
While Joe sits smiling at his side ;
How Joe, in spite of time's disguise.
Finds the old schoolmate in his eyes, —
Those calm, stern eyes that melt and fill
As Joe looks fondly up at BUI.
Ah, pensive scholar, what is fame ?
A fitful tongue of leaping flame ;
A giddy whirlwind's fickle gust.
That lifts a pinch of mortal dust :
A few swift years, and who can show
Which dust was BUI, and which was Joe ?
The weary idol takes his stand.
Holds out his bruised and aching hand.
While gaping thousands come and go, —
How vain it seems, this empty show-!
Till all at once his pulses thrill,
'T is poor old Joe's " God bless you. Bill ! "
EMERSON'S HOME AT CONCORD.
" dell attd cragy
Hollow ond like, hillside aud plnc-arcad\
Are tmtch'd with genius."
FRIENDSHIP.
And shall we breathe in happier spheres
The names that pleased our mortal ears, —
In some sweet lull of harp and song,
For earth-bom spirits none too long, —
Just whispering of the world below,
"Where this was Bill, and that was Joe ?
No matter ; while our home is here
No sounding name is half so dear;
"When fades at length our lingering day,
"Who cares what pompous tombstones say ?
Read on the hearts that love us still,
Hicjacet Joe. Eicjacet BiU.
Oliver Wendell holmes.
DREAMS AND REALITIES.
0 Rosamond, thou fair and good
And perfect flower of womanhood !
Thou royal rose of June !
"Why didst thou droop before thy time ?
"Why wither in the first sweet prime ?
"Why didst thou die so soon ?
For, looking backward through my tears
On thee, and on my wasted years,
1 cannot choose but say.
If thou hadst lived to be my guide.
Or thou hadst lived and 1 had died,
'T were better far to-day.
O child of light, 0 golden head ! —
Bright sunbeam for one moment shed
Upon life's lonely way, —
"Why didst thou vanish from our sight ?
Could they not spare my little light
From heaven's unclouded day ?
0 friend so true, O friend so good ! —
Thou one dream of my maidenhood.
That gave youth all its charms, —
"What had 1 done, or what hadst thou,
That, through this lonesome world till now.
We walk with empty arms ?
And yet had this poor soul been fed
With all it loved and coveted ;
Had life been always fair.
Would these dear dreams that ne'er depart.
That thriU with bliss my inmost heart.
Forever tremble there ?
If still they kept their earthly place.
The friends 1 held in my embrace.
And gave to death, alas !
Could 1 have learned that clear, cabn faith
That looks beyond the bonds of death,
And almost longs to pass ?
Sometimes, 1 think, the things we see
Are shadows of the things to be ;
That what we plan we build ;
That every hope that hath been crossed.
And every dream we thought was lost.
In heaven shall be fulfilled ;
That even the children of the brain
Have not been born and died in vain,
Though here unclothed and dumb ;
But on some brighter, better shore
They live, embodied evermore,
And wait for us to come.
And when on that last day we rise,
Caught up between the earth and skies.
Then shall we hear our Lord
Say, Thou hast done with doubt and death.
Henceforth, according to thy faith.
Shall be thy faith's reward.
phcebe carv.
THE DEAD FRIEND.
from "in memoriam."
The path by which we twain did go,
which led by tracts that pleased us well.
Through four sweet years arose and fell.
From flower to flower, from snow to snow.
But where the path we walked began
To slant the fifth autumnal slope.
As we descended, following Hope,
There sat the Shadow feared of man ;
"Who broke our fair companionship.
And spread his mantle dark and cold.
And wrapped thee formless in the fold.
And dulled the murmur on thy lip.
When each by turns was guide to each.
And Fancy light from Fancy caught.
And Thought leapt out to wed with Thought
Ere Thought could wed itself with Speech ;
And all we met was fair and good.
And all was good that Time could bring.
And all the secret of the Spring
Moved in the chambers of the blood ;
1 know that this was Life, — the track
"Whereon with equal feet we fared ;
And then, as now, the day prepared
The daUy burden for the back.
But this it was that made me move
As light as carrier-birds in air ;
1 loved the weight 1 had to bear
Because it needed help of Love :
e
114
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
a
Nor could I weary, heart or limb,
When mighty Love would cleave in twain -
The lading of a single pain.
And part it, giving half to him.
But 1 remained, whose hopes were dim,
Whose life, whose thoughts were little worth.
To wander on a darkened earth.
Where all things round me breathed of him.
O friendship, equal-poised control,
0 heart, with kindliest motion warm,
0 sacred essence, other form,
0 solemn ghost, O crownèd soul !
Yet none could better know than I,
How much of act at human hands
The sense of human will demands,
By which we dare to live or die.
Whatever way my days decline,
1 felt and feel, though left alone.
His being working in mine own.
The footsteps of his life in mine.
My pulses therefore beat again
For other friends that once 1 met ;
Nor can it suit me to forget
The mighty hopes that make us men.
1 woo your love : 1 count it crime
To mourn for any overmuch ;
1, the divided half of sueh
A friendship as had mastered Time ;
Which masters Time, indeed, and is
Eternal, separate from fears :
The all-assuming mouths and years
Can take no part away from this.
0 days and hours, your work is this.
To hold me from my proper place,
A little while from his embrace.
For fuller gain of after bliss :
That out of distance might ensue
Desire of nearness doubly sweet ;
And unto meeting when we meet.
Delight a hundred-fold accrue.
The hills are shadows, and they flow
From form to form, and nothing stands ;
They melt like mist, the solid lands.
Like clouds thsy shape themselves and go.
But in my spirit will I dwell.
And dream my dream, and hold it trae ;
For tho' my lips may breathe adieu,
1 cannot think the thing farewell.
Alfred Tehwïsok.
PARTED FRIENDS.
Friend after friend departs :
Who hath not lost a friend ?
There is no union here of hearts
That finds not here an end ;
Were this frail world our only rest,
Living or dying, none were blest.
Beyond the flight of time.
Beyond this vale of death.
There surely is some blessed clime
Where life is not a breath,
Nor life's affections transient fire.
Whose sparks fly upward to expire.
There is a world above.
Where parting is unknown ;
A whole eternity of love.
Formed for the good alone ;
And faith beholds the dying here
Translated to that happier sphere.
Thus star by star declines.
Till all are passed away.
As morning high and higher shines.
To pure and perfect day ;
Nor sink those stars in empty night ;
They hide themselves in heaven's own light.
James Montgomery.
MARTIAL FRIENDSHIP.
from "coriolanus," act iv. sc. s-
(Aufidius the Volscian to Catus Marcius Coriolanus.]
Auf. 0 Marcius, Marcius !
Each word thou hast spoke hath weeded from
my heart
A root of ancient envy. If Jupiter
Should from yond' cloud speak divine things,
and say,
"'Tis true," 1 'd not believe them more than thee.
All-noble Mareius. — Let me twine
Mine arms about that body, where-against
My grained ash an hundred times hath broke.
And scared the moon with splinters ! Here 1 clip
The anvil of my sword ; and do contest
As hotly and as nobly with thy love.
As ever in ambitious strength 1 did
Contend against thy valor. Know thou first,
1 loved the maid 1 married ; never man
Sighed truer breath ; but that I see thee here.
Thou noble thing ! more dances my rapt heart
Than when I first my wedded mistress saw
Bestride my thi-eshold. Why, thou Mars ! I tell
thee.
We have a power on foot ; and I had purpose
Once more to hew thy target from thy brawn.
FRIENDSHIP.
115
Or lose mine arm for't. Thou hast beat me out
Twelve several times, and I have nightly since
Dreamt of encounters 'twixt thyself and me,
We have been down together in my sleep.
Unbuckling helms, fisting each other's throat.
And waked half dead with nothing. Worthy
Marcius,
Had we no other quarrel else to Rome, but that
Thou art thence banished, we would muster all
From twelve to seventy ; and, pouring war
Into the bowels of ungrateful Rome,
Like a bold flood o'erbear. 0, come ! go in.
And take our friendly senators by the hands ;
Who now are here, taking their leaves of me.
Who am prepared against your territories.
Though not for Rome itself.
A thousand welcomes !
And more a friend than e'er an enemy ;
Yet, Marcius, that was much.
shakespeare.
WHEN TO THE SESSIONS OF SWEET
SILENT THOUGHT.
sonnet .xxx.
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought
I summon up remembrance of things past,
I sigh the lack of many a thing I sought.
And with old woes new wail my dear time's waste :
Then can I drown an eye, unused to flow.
For precious friends hid in death's dateless night,
And weep afresh love's long-since-cancelled woe.
And moan the expense of many a vanished sight.
Then can I grieve at grievances foregone.
And heavily from woe to woe tell o'er
The sad account of fore-bemoanèd moan.
Which I new pay, as if not paid before ;
But if the while I think on thee, dear friend.
All losses are restored, and sorrows end.
Shakespeare.
JAFFAE.
Jaffae, the Barmecide, the good vizier.
The poor man's hope, the friend without a peer,
Jaflar was dead, slain by a doom unjust ;
And guilty Haroun, sullen with mistrust
Of what the good, and e'en the bad, might say.
Ordained that no man living from that day
Should dare to speak his name on pain of death.
All Araby and Persia held their breath ;
All but the brave Mondeer : he, proud to show
How far for love a grateful soul could go.
And facing death for very scorn and grief
IFor his great heart wanted a great relief).
Stood forth in Bagdad daily, in the square
Where once had stood a happy house, and there
Harangued the tremblers at the scymitar
On all they owed to the divine Jaifar.
"Bring me this man," the caliph cried ; the man
Was brought, was gazed upon. The mutes began
To bind his arms. "Welcome, brave cords,"
cried he ;
" From bonds far worse Jaffar delivered me ;
From wants, from shames, from loveless house¬
hold fears ;
Made a man's eyes friends with delicious tears ;
Restored me, loved me, put me on a par
With his great self. How can I pay Jaifar ? "
Haroun, who felt that on a soul like this
The mightiest vengeance could but fall amiss,
Now deigned to smile, as one great lord of fate
Might smile upon another half as great.
He said, " Let worth grow frenzied if it will ;
The caliph's judgment shall be master still.
Go, and since gifts so move thee, take this gem,
The richest in the Tartar's diadem.
And hold the giver as thou deemest flt ! "
"Gifts!" cried the friend; he took, and hold¬
ing it
High toward the heavens, as though to meet his
star.
Exclaimed, " This, too, I owe to thee, Jaffar ! "
Leigh Hunt.
THE MEETING OF THE SHIPS.
** We take each other by the hand, and we exchai^e a few words
and looks of kindness, and we rejoice together for a few short mo¬
ments ; and then days, months, years intervene, and we see and
know nothing of each other." — WASHINGTON IRVING.
Two barks met on the deep mid-sea.
When calms had stilled the tide ;
A few bright days of summer glee
There found them side by side.
And voices of the fair and brave
Rose mingling thence in mirth ;
And sweetly floated o'er the wave
The melodies of earth.
Moonlight on that lone Indian main
Cloudless and lovely slept ;
While dancing step and festive strain
Each deck in triumph swept.
And hands were linked, and answering eyes
With kindly meaning shone ;
0, brief and passing sympathies,
Like leaves together blown !
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
A little while suçh joy was cast
Over the deep's repose,
Till the loud singing winds at last
Like trumpet music rose.
And proudly, freely on their way
The parting vessels bore ;
In calm or storm, by rock or bay,
To meet — 0, nevermore !
Never to blend in victory's cheer,
To aid in hours of woe ;
And thus bright spirits mingle here.
Such ties are formed below.
Felicia Hemans.
THE VALE OF AVOCA.
There is not in this wide world a valley so sweet
As that vale in whose bosom the bright waters
meet ;
0, the last ray of feeling and life must depart
Ere the bloom of that valley shall fade from my
heart !
Y et it was not that N ature had shed o'er the scene
Her purest of crystal and brightest of green ;
'T was not the soft magic of streamlet or hill, —
0, no ! it was something more exquisite still.
'T was that friends, the beloved of my bosom,
were near.
Who made every dear scene of enchantment
more dear.
And who felt how the best charms of nature im¬
prove.
When we see them reflected from looks that we
love.
Sweet Vale of Avoca ! how calm could I rest
In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love
best;
Where the storms that we feel in this cold world
should cease,
And our hearts, like thy waters, be mingled in
peace.
Thomas Moore.
WE HAVE BEEN FRIENDS TOGETHER.
We have been friends together
In sunshine and in shade.
Since first beneath the chestnut-tree
In infancy we played.
But coldness dwells within thy heart,
A cloud is on thy brow ;
We have been friends together.
Shall a light word part us now ?
^ 22:
We have been gay together ;
We have laughed at little jests ;
For the fount of hope was gushing
Warm and joyous in our breasts.
But laughter now hath fled thy Up,
And sullen glooms thy brow ;
We have been gay together.
Shall a light word part us now ?
We have been sad together ;
We have wept with bitter tears
O'er the grass-grown graves where slumbered
The hopes of early years.
The voices which were silent then
Would bid thee clear thy brow ;
We have been sad together.
Shall a Ught word part us now ?
caroline elizabeth SARAH NORTON.
THE QUARREL OF FRIENDS.
from "christabel."
Alas ! they had been friends in youth ;
But whispering tongues can poison truth ;
And constancy lives in realms above ;
And Ufe is thorny ; and youth is vain ;
And to be wroth with one we love
Doth work like madness in the brain.
And thus it chanced, as I divine.
With Roland and Sir Leoline !
Each spoke words of high disdain
And insult to his heart's best brother ;
They parted, — ne'er to meet again !
But never either found another
To free the hollow heart from paining.
They stood aloof, the scars remaining.
Like cUffs which had been rent asunder ;
A dreary sea now flows between.
But neither heat, nor frost, nor thunder
Shall wholly do away, 1 ween.
The marks of that which once hath been.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
——♦
THE ROYAL GUEST.
They tell me I am shrewd with other men ;
With thee I'm slow, and difficult of speech.
With others I may guide the car of talk ;
Thou wing'st it oft to realms beyond my reach.
If other guests should come, I'd deck my hair.
And choose my newest garment from the shelf ;
When thou art bidden, I would clothe my heart
With holiest purpose, as for God himself.
irr
FRIENDSHIP.
117
a
For them I while the hours with tale or song,
Or web of fancy, fringed with careless rhyme ;
But how to find a fitting lay for thee,
Who hast the harmonies of every time ?
O friend beloved ! I sit apart and dumb, —
Sometimes in sorrow, oft in joy divine ;
My lip will falter, but my prisoned heart
Springs forth to measure its faint pulse with
thine.
Thou art to me most like a royal guest.
Whose travels bring him to some lowly roof.
Where simple rustics spread their festal fare
And, blushing, own it is not good enough.
Bethink thee, then, whene'er thou com'st to me.
From high emprise and noble toil to rest.
My thoughts are weak and trivial, matched with
thine ;
But the poor mansion offers thee its best.
julia Ward Howe,
TOO LATE I STAYED.
Too late I stayed, —forgive the crime !
Unheeded flew the hours :
How noiseless falls the foot of Time
That only treads on flowers !
And who, with clear account, remarks
The ebbings of his glass.
When all its sands are diamond sparks.
That dazzle as they pass ?
O, who to sober measurement
Time's happy swiftness brings,
When birds of paradise have lent
Their plumage to his wings ?
William Robert Spencer.
WE ARE BRETHREN A'.
A happy bit hame this auld world would be
If men, when they 're here, could make shift to
agree.
An' ilk said to his neighbor, in cottage an' ha',
" Come, gi'e me your hand, —we are brethren a'."
I ken na why ane wi' anither should fight,
When to 'gree would make ae body cosie an' right.
When man meets wi' man, 't is the best way ava.
To say, "Gi'e me your hand,—we are breth¬
ren a'."
My coat is a coarse ane, an' yours may be fine.
And I maun drink water, while you may drink
wine ;
But we baith ha'e a leal heart, unspotted to
shaw :
Sae gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'.
The knave ye would scorn, the unfaithfu' deride ,
Ye would stand like a rock, wi' the truth on
your side ;
Sae would I, an' naught else would I value a
straw :
Then gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'.
Ye would scorn to do fausely by woman or man ;
I baud by the right aye, as weel as I can ;
We are ane in our joys, our affections, an' a' :
Come, gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'.
Your mother has lo'ed you as mithers can lo'e ;
An' mine has done for me what mithers can do ;
We are ane high an' laigh, an' we shouldna be
twa :
Sae gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'.
We love the same sunmer day, sunny and fair ;
Hame ! oh, how we love it, an' a' that are there !
Frae the pure air of heaven the same life we
draw :
Come, gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'.
Frail shakin' auld age will soon come o'er us
baith.
An' creeping alang at his back will be death ;.
Syne into the same mither-yird we will fa' ;
Come, gi'e me your hand, — we are brethren a'.
robert nicolu
THE MAHOGANY-TREE.
Christmas is here ;
Winds whistle shrill.
Icy and chill, ,
Little care we ;
^ Little we fear
Weather without.
Sheltered about
The mahogany-tree.
Once on the boughs
Birds of rare plume
Sang, in its bloom ;
Night-birds are we ;
Here we carouse.
Singing, like them.
Perched round the stem
Of the jolly old tree.
Here let us sport.
Boys, as we sit, —
Laughter and wit
Flashing so free.
iP
fl¬
us
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Life is but short, —
When we are gone.
Let them sing on,
Kound the old tree.
Evenings we knew,
Happy as this ;
Faces we miss.
Pleasant to see.
Kind hearts and true.
Gentle and just.
Peace to your dust !
We sing round the tree.
Care, like a dun.
Lurks at the gate :
Let the dog wait ;
Happy we '11 he !
Drink, every one ;
Pile up the coals ;
Fill the red howls,
Kound the old tree !
Drain we the cup. —
Friend, art afraid ?
Spirits are laid
In the Ked Sea.
Mantle it up ;
Empty it yet ;
Let us forget.
Round the old tree !
Sorrows, begone !
Life and its ills.
Duns and their hills.
Bid we to flee.
Come with the dawn.
Blue-devil sprite ;
Leave us to-night,
Kound the old tree !
William makepeace Thackeray.
GIVE ME THE OLD.
old wine to drink, old wood to burn, old books
to read, and old friends to converse with.
Old wine to drink ! —
Ay, give the slippery juice
That drippeth from the grape thrown loose
Within the tun ;
Plucked from beneath the cliff
Of sunny-sided Teneriffe,
And ripened 'neath the blink
Of India's sun !
Peat whiskey hot.
Tempered with well-boiled water !
These make the long night shorter, —
Forgetting not
Good stout old English porter.
Old wood to bum ! —
Ay, bring the hillside beech
From where the owlets meet and screech.
And ravens croak ;
The crackling pine, and cedar sweet ;
Bring too a clump of fragrant peat.
Dug 'neath the fern ;
The knotted oak,
A fagot too, perhap.
Whose bright flame, dancing, winking.
Shall light us at our drinking ;
While the oozing sap
Shall make sweet music to our thinking.
Old books to read ! —
Ay, bring those nodes of wit.
The brazen-clasped, the vellum writ.
Time-honored tomes !
The same my sire scanned before.
The same my grandsire thumbed o'er.
The same his sire from college bore.
The well-earned meed
Of Oxford's domes ;
Old Homer blind.
Old Horace, rake Anacreon, by
Old Tully, Plautus, Terence lie ;
Mort Arthur's olden minstrelsie.
Quaint Burton, quainter Spenser, ay !
And Gervase Markham's venerie, —
Nor leave behind
The Holye Book by which we live and die.
Old friends to talk ! —■
Ay, bring those chosen few.
The wise, the courtly, and the true.
So rarely found ;
Him for my wine, him for my stud.
Him for my easel, distich, bud
In mountain walk !
Bring Walter good :
With soulful Fred ; and learned Will,
And thee, my alter ego (dearer still
For every mood).
Robert Hinckley Messenger.
AULD LANG SYNE.
Should auld acquaintance be forgot.
And never brought to min' ?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot.
And days o' lang syne ?
chorus.
For auld lang syne, ray dear.
For auld lang syne.
We '11 tak a cup o' kindness yet.
For auld lang syne.
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FRIENDSHIP.
119
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We twa hae run about the braes,
And pu'd the gowans fine ;
But we've wandered mony a weary foot
Sin' auld lang syne.
For auld, etc.
We twa hae paidl't i' the burn,
Frae momin' sun till dine ;
But seas between us braid hae roared
Sin' auld lang syne.
For auld, etc.
And here's a hand, my trusty fiere.
And gie's a hand o' thine ;
And we '11 tak a right guid-willie waught
For auld lang syne.
For auld, etc.
And surely ye '11 be your pint-stowp.
And surely I '11 be mine ;
And we '11 tak a cup o' kindness yet
For auld lang syne.
For auld, etc.
robert Burns.
PLATONIC.
I HAoVswom tolbe a\bachelo]V she ^ad^swoni to^
be-annaid.
For we quite agreed in doubting whether matri¬
mony paid ;
Besides, we had our higher loves, — fair science
ruled my heart.
And she said her young affections were all wound
up in art.
So we laughed at those wise men who say that
friendship cannot live
'Twixt man and woman, unless each has some¬
thing more to give ;
We would be friends, and friends as true as e'er
were man and man ;
I'd be a second David, and she Miss Jonathan. •
We scorned all sentimental trash, — vows, kisses,
tears, and sighs ;
High friendship, such as ours, might well such
childish arts despise ;
We liked each other, that was all, quite all there
was to say.
So we just shook hands upon it, in a business
sort of way.
We shared our secrets and our joys, together
hoped and feared.
With common pm-pose sought the goal that
young Ambition reared ;
We dreamed together of the days, the dream-
bright days to come.
We were strictly confidential, and we called
each other " chum."
And many a day we wandered together o'er the
hills,
I seeking bugs and butterflies, and she, the
ruined mills
And rustic bridges, and the like, that picture-
makers prize
To run in with their waterfalls, and groves, and
summer skies.
And many a quiet evening, in hours of silent
ease.
We floated down the river, or strolled beneath
the trees.
And talked, in long gradation from the poets to
the weather.
While the western skies and my cigar burned
slowly out together.
Yet through it all no whispered word, no tell¬
tale glance or sigh.
Told aught of warmer sentiment than friendly
sympathy.
We talked of love as coolly as we talked of
nebulse,
And thought no more of being o'm than we did
of being three.
"Well, good by, chum !" I took her hand, for
the time had come to go.
My going meant our parting, when to meet, we
did not know.
I had lingered long, and said farewell with a
very heavy heart ;
For although we were but friends, 'tis hard for
honest friends to part.
" Good-by, old fellow ! don't forget your friends
beyond the sea.
And some day, when you've lots of time, drop a
line or two to me."
The words came lightly, gayly, but a great sob,
just behind.
Welled upward with a story of quite a different
kind.
And then she raised her eyes to mine, — great
liquid eyes of blue.
Filled to the brim, and running o'er, like violet
cups of dew ;
One long, long glance, and then I did, what Í
never did before —
Perhaps the tears meant friendship, but I'm
sure the kiss meant more.
WILLIAM B. TERRETT.
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120
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
A TEMPLE TO FRIENDSHIP.
"A TEMPLE to Friendship," cried Laura, en¬
chanted,
"I'll build in this garden; the thought is di¬
vine."
So the temple was built, and she now only
wanted
An image of Friendship, to place on the shrine.
So she flew to the sculptor, who sat down before
her
An image, the fairest his art could invent ;
But so cold, and so dull, that the youthful
adorer
Saw plainly this was not the Friendship she
meant.
"O, never," said she, "could I think of en¬
shrining
An image whose looks are so joyless and dim ;
But yon little god upon roses reclining,
We'U make, if you please, sir, a Friendship of
him."
So the bargain was struck ; with the little god
laden.
She joyfully flew to her home in the grove.
"Farewell," said the sculptor, "you 're not the
first maiden
Who came but for Friendship, and took away
Love ! "
Thomas Moore.
à
FEAGMENTS.
Friendship.
Friendship ! mysterious cement of the soul !
Sweet'ner of life ! and solder of society !
The Grave. R. BLAIR.
Friendship is the cement of two minds.
As of one man the soul and body is ;
Of which one cannot sever but the other
Suffers a needful separation.
Rnmge. Geo. CHAPMAN.
Friendship's the image of
Eternity, in which there's nothing
Movable, nothing mischievous.
Endymion. LILLY.
Flowers are lovely ; Love is flower-like ;
Friendship is a sheltering tree ;
0 the Joys, that came down shower-like.
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty,
Ere 1 was old !
nmt-igr s.t.coleridge.
Heaven gives us friends to bless the present
scene ;
Resumes them, to prepare us for the next.
Thoughts. YOUNG.
'T is sweet, as year by year we lose
Friends out of sight, in faith to muse
How grows in Paradise our store.
Burial of the Dead. KEBLE.
1 praise the Frenchman,* his remark was shrewd,
How sweet, how passing sweet is solitude !
But grant me still a friend in my retreat.
Whom 1 may whisper. Solitude is sweet.
Retirement. COWPER.
Choice Friends.
True happiness
Consists not in the multitude of friends,
But in the worth and choice.
Cynthia's Revels. Ben JONSON.
A generous friendship no cold medium knows.
Burns with one love, with one resentment glows.
Iliad, Book ix. Homer, Poise's Trans.
Statesman, yet friend to truth ! of soul sincere.
In action faithful, and in honor clear ;
Who broke no promise, served no private end.
Who gained no title, and who lost no friend.
Epistle tc Mr, Addison, POPE.
Like the stained web that whitens in the sun.
Grow pure by being purely shone upon.
LallaRoobh: The Veiled Pn^hetqf Khorassan. T.MOORB»
Who ne'er knew joy but friendship might divide.
Or gave his father grief but when he died.
Epitaph on the Hon, S. Harcourt. pope.
Though last, not least, in love !
yulius Casar, Act iii. Sc. x. SHAKESPEARE.
Faithful Friends.
Friendship above all ties does bind the heart ;
And faith in friendship is the noblest part.
Henry V. earl of orrery.
Be kind to my remains ; and 0, defend,
Against your judgment, your departed friend !
Epistle to Congreve. DrvdEN.
Summer Friends.
O summer friendship.
Whose flatteiing leaves, that shadowed us in
Our prosperity, with the least gust drop off
In the autumn of adversity.
The Maid of Honor. m asszngb&
• La Bruyère. sa3rs Bartlett.
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FRIENDSHIP.
121
Like summer friends,
Flies of estate and sunneshine.
The AnsTver. CBOaCB HERBERT.
What the declinèd is
He shall as soon read in the eyes of others
As feel in his own fall ; for men, like butterflies.
Show not their mealy wings but to the summer.
Troilus and Cressida, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE*
Friends to be Shunned.
The man that hails you Tom or Jack,
And proves, by thumping on your back.
His sense of your great merit.
Is such a friend, that one had need
Be very much his friend indeed
To pardon, or to bear it.
On FrUndshif. COWPER.
Give me the avowed, the erect, ftie manly foe.
Bold I can meet, — perhaps may turn his blow ;
But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can
send,
Save, save, oh ! save me from the Candid Friend!
New Morality. GEORGE CANNING.
Friendship and Love.
Friendship is constant in all other things.
Save in the office and' affairs of love.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act ii. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
If I speak to thee in Friendship's name.
Thou think'st I speak too coldly ;
If I mention Love's devoted flame.
Thou say'st I speak too boldly.
H(rw Shall I IVeo}
T. MOORE.
Friendship, like love, is but a name.
Unless to one you stint the flame.
'T is thus in friendship ; who depend
On many rarely flnd a friend.
The Hare and Many Friends,
Quarrels of Friends.
I have shot mine arrow o'er the house.
And hurt my brother.
Hamlet, Act v. Sc. 2.
SHAKESPEARE.
Brother, brother, we are both in the wrong.
The Beggar's Ojera, Act U. Sc, 9. GAY.
A friend should bear his friend's infirmities.
But Brutus makes mine greater than they are.
yuliu* Casar, Act iy. Sc, 2, Shakespeare.
Hospitality.
I've often wished that I had clear.
For life, six hundred pounds a year,
A handsome house to lodge a friend,
A river at my garden's end.
Imitation 0/Horace, Book iL Sat. 6. SWIFT.
True friendship's laws are by this rule exprest.
Welcome the coming, speed the parting guest.
Odyssey, Book xv. Translation 0/ POPE. HOMER.
Whoe'er has travelled life's dull round.
Where'er his stages may have been.
May sigh to think he still has found
The warmest welcome at an inn.
Written on a Window of an Inn, SHENSTONE.
And do as adversaries do in law.
Strive mightily, but eat and drink as friends.
Taming of the Shrew, Act i. Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Sir, you are very welcome to our house :
It must appear in other ways than words.
Therefore I scant this breathing courtesy.
The Merchant of Venice, Act v. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
Good Counsel.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be.
For loan oft loses both itself and friend.
Hamlet, Acti. Sc. 3.
shakespeare.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar :
The friends thou hast, and their adoption tried.
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel.
Hhmlet, Act l Sc. 3. shakespeare.
Turn him, and see his thrtads : look if he be
Friend to himself, that would be friend to thee :
For that is first required, a man be his own ;
But he that's too much that is friend to none.
Underwood. BEN JONSON.
Lay this into your breast :
Old friends, like old swords, still are trusted best.
Duchas i/Mal/j!. John Webster.
:.i}-
SI
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122
POEMS GE THE AFPECTIONS.
COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.
WHEN IN THE CHRONICLE OF WASTED
TIME.
sonnet cvi.
When in the chronicle of wasted time
I see descriptions of the fairest wights.
And beauty making beautiful old rhyme,
In praise of ladies dead, and lovely knights ;
Then, in the blazon of sweet beauty's best
Of hand, of foot, of lip, of eye, of brow,
I see their antique pen would have expressed
Even such a beauty as you master now.
So all their praises are but prophecies
Of this our time, all you prefiguring ;
And, for they looked but with divining eyes.
They had not skill enough your worth to sing ;
For we, which now behold these present days,
Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to
praise.
shakespeare.
How could he see to do them ? having made one,
Methinks it should have power to steal both his.
And leave itself unfurnished.
shakespeare.
OLIVIA.
prom "twelfth night," act i. sc. 5.
Viola. 'T is beauty truly blent, whose red
and white
Nature's own sweet and cunning hand laid on :
Lady, you are the cruel'st she alive.
If you will lead these graces to the grave.
And leave the world no copy.
shakespeare.
0 MISTRESS MINE.
from "twelfth night." act ii. sc. 3.
0 mistkess mine, where are you roaming ?
O, stay and hear ! your true-love's coming
That can sing both high and low ;
Trip no further, pretty sweeting.
Journeys end in lovers' meeting, —
Every wise man's son doth know.
What is love ? 't is not hereafter ;
Present mirth hath present laughter ;
What's to come is still unsui'e :
In delay there lies no plenty, —
Then come kiss me; Sweet-and-twenty,
Youth's a stuff will not endure.
shakespeare.
è
PORTIA'S PICTURE.
from "the merchant of venice," act iii. sc. 2.
Fair Portia's counterfeit ? What demi-god
Hath come so near creation ? Move these eyes ?
Or whether, riding on the balls of mine.
Seem they in motion ? Here are severed lips.
Parted with sugar breath ; so sweet a bar
Should sunder such sweet friends : Here in her
hairs
The painter plays the spider ;, and hath woven
A golden mesh to entrap the hearts of men.
Faster than gnats in cobwebs : But her eyes, —
TO MISTRESS MARGARET HUSSEY.
Merry Margaret,
As midsummer flower.
Gentle as falcon.
Or hawk of the tower ;
With solace and gladness.
Much mirth and no madness.
All good and no badness ;
So joyously.
So maidenly.
So womanly
Her demeaning.
In everything
Far, far passing
That I can indite.
Or suffice to write.
Of merry Margaret,
As midsummer flower.
Gentle as falcon
Or hawk of the tower ;
As patient and as still.
And as fuU of good-will.
As fair IsiphU,
Coliander,
Sweet Pomander,
Good Cassander ;
Stedfast of thought,
Well made, well wrought ;
Far may be sought
Ere you can find
So courteous, so kind.
As merry Margaret,
This midsummer flower,
Gentle as falcon.
Or hawk of the tower.
john skelton.
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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.
123
THE FORWARD VIOLET THUS DID
I CHIDE.
sonnet xcix.
The forward violet thus did I chide : —
Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet
that smells,
If not from my love's breath ? the purple pride
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dweUs,
In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed.
The lily I condemned for thy hand,
And buds of maijoram had stolen thy hair :
The roses fearfully on thorns did stand.
One blushing shame, another white despair ;
A third, nor red nor white, had stolen of both,
And to this robbery had annexed thy breath ;
But, for his theft, in pride of all his growth
A vengeful canker eat him up to death.
More flowem I noted, yet I none could see
But sweet or color it had stolen from thee.
shakespeare.
THERE IS A GARDEN IN HER FACE.
from "an houre's recreation in mosicke," l6os.
There is a garden in her face.
Where roses and white lilies blow ;
A heavenly paradise is that place.
Wherein all pleasant fruits do grow ;
There cherries grow that none may buy,
Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry.
Those cherries fairly do enclose
Of orient pearl a double row.
Which when her lovely laughter shows.
They look like rosebuds filled with snow ;
Yet them no peer nor prince may buy.
Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry.
Her eyes like angels watch them still.
Her brows like bended bows do stand.
Threatening with piercing frowns to kill
All that approach with eye or hand
These sacred cherries to come nigh.
Till cherry-ripe themselves do cry.
Richard Allison.
MY SWEET SWEETING.
from a ms. temp. henrv viii.
Ah, my sweet sweeting ;
My little pretty sweeting.
My sweeting will I love wherever I go ;
She is so proper and pure.
Full, steadfast, stable, and demure.
There is none such, you may be sure.
As my sweet sweeting.
In all this world, as thinketh me.
Is none so pleasant to my e'e.
That I am glad so oft to see,
As my sweet sweeting.
When I behold my sweeting sweet.
Her face, her hands, her minion feet.
They seem to me there is none so mete,
As my sweet sweeting.
Above all other praise must I,
And love my pretty pygsnye.
For none 1 find so womanly
As my sweet sweeting.
Anonymous.
—«—
THE WHITE ROSE.
sent by a yorkish lover to his lancastrian /
mistress.
If this fair rose offend thy sight.
Placed in thy bosom bare,
'Twill blush to find itself less white.
And turn Lancastrian there.
■ But if thy ruby lip it spy.
As kiss it thou mayest deign.
With envy pale't will lose its dye.
And Yorkish turn again.
Anonymous.
A VISION OF BEAUTY.
It was a beauty that I saw, —
So pure, so perfect, as the frame
Of all the universe were lame
To that one figure, could I draw.
Or give least line of it a law :
A skein of silk without a knot !
A fair march made without a halt !
A curious form without a fault !
A printed book without a blot !
All beauty ! — and without a spot.
ben jonson.
GIVE PLACE, YE LOVERS.
Give place, ye lovers, here before
That spent your boa.sts and brags in vain ;
My lady's beauty passeth more
The best of yours, I dare well sayen.
Than doth the sun the candle-light.
Or brightest day the darkest night.
And thereto hath a troth as just
As had Penelope the fair ;
For what she saith, ye may it trust.
As it by writing sealed were :
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124
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
And virtues hath she many mo'
Than I with pen have skill to show.
I could rehearse, if that I would,
The whole effect of Nature's plaint.
When she had lost the perfect mould.
The like to whom she could not paint :
With wringing hands, how she did cry.
And what she said, 1 know it aye.
I know she swore with raging mind.
Her kingdom only set apart.
There was no loss by law of kind
That could have gone so near her heart ;
And this was chiefly all her pain ;
" She could not make the like again."
Sith Nature thus gave her the praise.
To be the chiefest work she wrought.
In faith, methink, some better ways
On your behalf might well be sought.
Than to compare, as ye have done,
To match the candle with the sun.
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey.
TO HIS MISTRESS,
elizabeth, queen of bohemia.
Yott meaner beauties of the night.
That poorly satisfy our eyes
More by your number than your light, —
You common people of the skies.
What are you when the moon shall rise ?
You curious chanters of the wood.
That warble forth Dame Nature's lays.
Thinking your passions understood
By your weak accents, — what's your praise
When Philomel her voice shall raise ?
You violets that flrst appear.
By your pure purple mantles known.
Like the proud virgins of the year.
As if the spring were all your own, —
What are you when the rose is blown ?
So when my mistress shall be seen
In form and beauty of her mind :
By virtue first, then choice, a queen, —
Tell me, if she were not designed
The eclipse and glory of her kind?
Sir henry Wotton
'S
CONSTANCY.
Out upon it. I have loved
Three whole days together ;
And am like to love three more,"
If it prove fair weather.
Time shall moult away his wings,
Ere he shall discover
In the whole wide world again
Such a constant lover.
But the spite on't is, no praise
Is due at all to me ;
Love with me had made no stays.
Had it any been but she.
Had it any been but she,
And that very face.
There had been at least ere this
A dozen in her place.
sir john suckling.
PHILLIS THE FAIR.
On a hill there grows a flower.
Fair befall the dainty sweet !
By that flower there is a bower
Wliere the heavenly muses meet.
In that bower there is a chair,
Fringèd all about with gold.
Where doth sit the fairest fail-
That ever eye did yet behold.
It is Phillis, fair and bright.
She that is the shepherd's joy.
She that Venus did despite.
And did blind her little boy.
"Who would not that face admire ?
Who would not this saint adore ?
Who would not this sight desire ?
Though he thought to see no more.
Thou that art the shepherd's queen.
Look upon thy love-sick swain ;
By thy comfort have been seen
Dead men brought to life again.
NICHOLAS Breton
PHILLIS IS MY ONLY JOY.
Phillis is my only joy
Faithless as the wind or seas ;
Sometimes coming, sometimes coy.
Yet she never fails to please.
If with a frown
I am cast down,
Phillis, smiling
And beguiling.
Makes me happier than before.
Though, alas ! too late I find
Nothing can her fancy fix ;
Yet the moment she is kind
I forgive her all her tricks ;
á
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COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.
125
-a
WhicR tho>^h I see,
I can't get free ;
She deceiving,
I believing.
What need lovera wish for more ?
Sir Charles Sedley.
GO, LOVELY ROSE.
Go, lovely rose !
Tell her that wastes her time and me.
That now she knows,
When 1 resemble her to thee,
How sweet and fair she seems to be.
Tell her that's young.
And shuns to have her graces spied.
That hadst thou sprung
In deserts, where no men abide,
Thou must have uncommended died.
Small is the worth
Of beauty from the light retired ;
Bid her come forth.
Suffer herself to be desired,
And not blush so to be admired.
Then die, that she
The common fate of all things rare
May read in thee ;
How small a part of time they share.
That are so wondrous sweet and fair.
Edmund waller.
stanza added by henry kirke white.
Yet, though thou fade.
From thy dead leaves let fragrance rise ;
And teach the maid.
That goodness Time's rude hand defies.
That virtue lives when beauty dies.
ON A GIRDLE.
That which her slender waist confined
Shall now my joyful temples bind ;
No monarch but would give his crown.
His arms might do what this hath done.
It was my heaven's extremest sphere.
The pale which held that lovely deer :
My joy, my grief, my hope, my love.
Did all within this circle move.
A narrow compass ! and yet there
Dwelt all that's good, and all that's fair.
Give me but what this ribbon bound.
Take all the rest the sun goes round !
Edmund Waller.
DRINK TO ME ONLY WITH THINE
EYES.
from "the forest."
Drink to me only with thine eyes.
And 1 will pledge with mine ;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup.
And 1 '11 not look for wine.
The thirst that from the soul doth rise
Doth ask a drink divine ;
But might 1 of Jove's nectar sup,
1 would not change for thine.
I sent thee late a rosy wreath.
Not so much honoring thee
As giving it a hope that there
It could not withered be ;
But thou thereon didst only breathe
And sent'st it back to me ;
Since when it grows, and smells, 1 swear.
Not of itself but thee !
philostratus (Greek). Trans¬
lation of Ben Jonson.
LOVE.
from "the merchant of venice," act iii. sc. o.
Tell me where is fancy bred.
Or in the heart, or in the head 1
How begot, how nourished 2
Reply, reply.
It is engendered in the eyes.
With gazing fed ; and fancy dies
In the cradle where it lies.
Let us all ring fancy's knell ;
I '11 begin it, — ding, dong, bell.
Ding, dong, beU.
Shakespeare.
TO A LADY ADMIRING HERSELF IN A
LOOKING-GLASS.
Fair lady, when you see the grace
Of beauty in your looking-glass ;
A stately forehead, smooth and high.
And full of princely majesty ;
A sparkling eye no gem so fair.
Whose lustre dims the Cyprian star ;
A glorious cheek, divinely sweet.
Wherein both roses kindly meet ;
A cherry lip that would entice
Even gods to kiss at any price ;
You think no beauty is so rare
That with your shadow might compare ;
That your reflection is alone
The thing that men most dote upon.
JB--
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126
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
Madam, alas ! your glass doth lie,
And you are much deceived ; for I
A beauty know of richer grace
(Sweet, be not angry), 'tis your face.
Hence, then, 0, learn more mild to be,
And leave to lay your blame on me :
If me your real substance move.
When you so much your shadow love.
Wise nature would not let your eye
Look on her own bright majesty ;
Which, had you once but gazed upon.
You could, except yourself, love none ;
What then you cannot love, let me,
That face I can, you cannot see.
Now you have what to love, you '11 say,
What then is left for me, I pray ?
My face, sweet heart, if it please thee ;
That which you can, I cannot see :
So cither love shall gain his due,
Yours, sweet, in me, and mine in you.
Thomas Randolph.
WELCOME, WELCOME, DO I SING.
Welcome, welcome, do I sing.
Far more welcome than the spring ;
He that parteth from you never
Shall enjoy a spring forever.
Love, that to the voice is near,
Breaking from your ivory pale.
Need not walk abroad to hear
The delightful nightingale.
Welcome, welcome, then I sing, etc.
Love, that still looks on your eyes.
Though the winter have begim
To benumb our arteries.
Shall not want the summer's sun.
Welcome, welcome, then I sing, etc.
Love, that still may see your cheeks.
Where all rareness still reposes.
Is a fool if e'er he seeks
Other lilies, other roses.
Welcome, welcome, then I sing, etc.
Love, to whom your soft lip yields.
And perceives your breath in kissing.
All the odors of the fields
Never, never shall be missing.
William Browne.
h
WHENAS IN SILKS MY JULIA GOES.
When as in silks my Julia goes.
Then, then, me thinks, how sweetly flowes
That liquefaction of her clothes.
Next, when 1 cast mine eyes and see
That brave vibration each way freej
O how that glittering taketh me !
r. kerrick.
A VIOLET IN HER HAIR.
A VIOLET in her lovely hair,
A rose upon her bosom fair !
But 0, her eyes
A lovelier violet disclose.
And her ripe lips the sweetest rose
That's 'neath the skies.
A lute beneath her graceful hand
Breathes music forth at her command ;
But still her tongue
Far richer music calls to birth
Than all the minstrel power on earth
Can give to song.
And thus she moves in tender light.
The purest ray, where all is bright.
Serene, and sweet ;
And sheds a graceful infiuence round.
That hallows e'en the very ground
Beneath her feet '
charles swain.
THE TRIBUTE.
No splendor 'neath the sky's proud dome
But serves her for familiar wear ;
The far-fetched diamond finds its home
Flashing and smouldering in her hair ;
For her the seas their pearls reveal ;
Art and strange lands her pomp supply
With purple, chrome, and cochineal.
Ochre, and lapis lazuli ;
The worm its golden woof presents ;
Whatever runs, flies, dives, or delves,
All doff for her their ornaments.
Which suit her better than themselves ;
And all, by this their power to give
Proving her right to take, proclaim
Her beauty's clear prerogative
To profit so by Eden's blame.
Coventry patmore.
THE COMPLIMENT.
I do not love thee for that fair
Rich fan of thy most curious hair ;
Though the wires thereof be diuwii
Finer than the threads of lawn.
And are softer than the leaves
On which the subtle spider weaves.
-gi
COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.
127
I do not love thee for those flowers
Growing on thy cheeks, — love's bowers ;
Though such cunning them hath spread,
None can paint them white and red :
Love's golden arrows thence are shot.
Yet for them I love thee not.
I do not love thee for those soft
Red coral lips I've kissed so oft ;
Nor teeth of pearl, the double guard
To speech whence music still is heard.
Though from those lips a kiss being taken
Might tyrants melt, and death awaken.
I do^ot love[thee, 0 [my, fallest.
For that richest, for that rarest
Silver pillar, which stands under
Thy sound head, that globe of wonder ;
Though that neck be whiter far
Than towers of polished ivory are.
Thomas Carew.
THE EORTRATT.
Give place, ye ladies, and begone.
Boast not yourselves at all ;
For here at hand approacheth one
"Whose face will stain you all.
The virtue of her lively looks
Excels the precious stone :
I wish to have none other books
To read or look upon.
In each of her two crystal eyes
Smileth a naked boy :
It would you all in heart suffice
To see that lamp of joy.
I think Nature hath lost the mould
"Where she her shape did take ;
Or else I doubt if Nature could
So fair a creature make.
In life she is Diana chaste.
In truth Penelope ;
In word and eke in deed steadfast ;
"What will you more we say ?
If all the world were sought so far.
Who could find such a wight ?
Her beauty twinkleth like a star
Within the frosty night.
Her rosial color comes and goes
With such a comely grace.
More ruddier too than in the rose.
Within her lovely face.
At Bacchus' feast none shall her meet.
Nor at no wanton play
Nor gazing in an open street.
Nor gadding as astray.
The modest mirth that she doth use
Is mixt with shamefastness ;
All vice she doth wholly refuse.
And hateth idleness.
0 Lord ! it is a world to see
How virtue can repair
And deck in her such honesty,
Whom Nature made so fair !
How might I do to get a graffe
Of this unspotted tree-?
For all the rest are plain but chaff,
"Which seem good cgm to be.
Thomas Hevwood.
«
ROSALINE.
Like to the clear in highest sphere
"Where all imperial glory shines :
Of selfsame color iâ her hair,
"Whether unfolded, or in twines :
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline !
Her eyes are sapphires set in snow.
Resembling heaven by every wink ;
The gods do fear whenas they glow.
And I do tremble when I think
Heigh-ho, would she were mine !
Her cheeks are like the blushing cloud
That beautifies Aurora's face.
Or like the silver crimson shroud
That Phœbus' smiling looks doth grace :
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline !
Her lips are like two budded roses
"Whom ranks of lilies neighbor nigh.
Within which bounds she balm encloses
Apt to entice a deity :
Heigh-ho, would she were mine !
Her neck is like a stately tower
Where Love himself imprisoned lies
To watch for glances every hour
From her divine and sacred eyes ;
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline !
Her paps are centres of delight.
Her breasts are orbs of heavenly frame,
Where Nature moulds the dew of light
To feed perfection with the same :
Heigh-ho, would she were mine !
128
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
With orient pearl, with ruby red.
With marble white, with sapphire blue.
Her body every way is fed,
Yet soft in touch and sweet in view :
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline !
Nature herself her shape admires ;
The gods are wounded in her sight ;
And Love forsakes his heavenly fires
And at her eyes his brand doth light :
Heigh-ho, would she were mine !
Then muse not. Nymphs, though I bemoan
The absence of fair Rosaline,
SincQ for a fair there's fairer none.
Nor for her virtues so divine :
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline !
Heigh-ho, my heart ! would God that she were
mine !
Thomas lodge.
BELINDA.
FROM THE " RAPE OF THE tOCK."
On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore.
Which Jews might kiss, and Infidels adore.
Her lively looks a sprightly mind disclose.
Quick as her eyes, and as unfixed as those :
Favors to none, to all she smiles extends :
Oft she rejects, but never, once offends.
Bright as the sun, her eyes the gazers strike.
And, like the sun, they shine on all alike.
Yet, graceful ease, and sweetness void of pride.
Might hide her faults, if belles had faults to hide ;
If to her share some female errors fall.
Look on her face, and you 'U forget them all.
Alexander Pope.
TO A LADY, WITH SOME PAINTED
FLOWERS.
Flowers to the fair : to you these flowers I bring.
And strive to greet you with an earlier spring.
Flowers sweet, and gay, and delicate like you ;
Emblems of innocence, and beauty too.
With flowers the Graces bind their yellow hair.
And flowery wreaths consenting lovers wear.
Flowers, the sole luxury which nature knew.
In Eden's pure and guiltless garden grew.
To loftier forms are rougher tasks assigned ;
The sheltering oak resists the stormy wind.
The tougher yew repels invading foes.
And the tall pine for future navies grows :
But this soft family to cares unknown.
Were bom for pleasure and delight alone.
Gay without toil, and lovely without art.
They spring to cheer the sense and glad the heàit.
Nor blush, my fair, to own you copy these ;
Your best, your sweetest empire is — to please.
ANXA L/CTITtA BARBAULD.
SHE WAS A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT.
She was a phantom of delight
When first she gleamed upon my sight ;
A lovely apparition, sent
To be a moment's ornament ;
Her eyes as stars of twilight fair ;
Like Twilight's, too, her dusky hair ;
But aU things else about her drawn
From May-time and the cheerful dawn j
A dancing shape, an image gay.
To haunt, to startle, and waylay.
I saw her upon nearer view,
A spirit, yet a woman too !
Her household motions light and free,
And steps of virgin-liberty ;
A countenance in which did meet
Sweet records, promises as sweet ;
A creature not too bright or good
For human nature's daily food.
For transient sorrows, simple wiles.
Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears, and smiles.
And now I see with eye serene
The very pulse of the machine ;
A being breathing thoughtful breath,
A traveller between life and death :
The reason firm, the temperate will.
Endurance, foresight, strength, and skill ;
A perfect woman, nobly planned
To warn, to comfort, and command ;
And yet a spirit still, and bright
With something of an angel-light.
William Wordsworth.
THE ROSE OF THE WORLD.
Lo, when the Lord made north and south.
And sun and moon ordained, he.
Forth bringing each by word of mouth
In order of its dignity.
Did man from the crude clay express
By sequence, and, all else decreed.
He formed the woman ; nor might less
Than Sabbath such a work succeed.
And still with favor singled out.
Marred less than man by mortal fall.
Her disposition is devout.
Her countenance angelical.
No faithless thought her instinct shrouds.
But fancy checkers settled sense.
Like alteration of the clouds
On noonday's azure permanence.
COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.
129
Pure courtesy, composure, ease,
Declare affections nobly fixed.
And impulse sprung from due degrees
Of sense and spirit sweetly mixed.
Her modesty, her chiefest grace.
The cestus clasping Venus' side,
Is potent to deject the face
Of him who would affront its pride.
Wrong dares not in her presence speak.
Nor spotted thought its taint disclose
Under the protest of a cheek
Outbragging Nature's boast, the rose.
In mind and manners how discreet !
How artless in her very art !
How candid in discourse ! how sweet
The concord of her lips and heart !
How (not to call true instinct's bent
And woman's very nature harm).
How amiable and innocent
Her pleasure in her power to charm !
How humbly careful to attract,
Though crowned with all the soul desires.
Connubial aptitude exact.
Diversity that never tires !
coventry patmore.
SONG.
The shape alone let others prize.
The features of the fair :
I look for spirit in her eyes.
And meaning in her air.
A damask cheek, an ivory arm.
Shall ne'er my wishes win :
Give me an animated foim.
That speaks a mind within.
A face where awful honor shines.
Where sense and sweetness move.
And angel innocence refines
The tenderness of love.
These are the soul of beauty's frame ;
Without whose vital aid
Unfinished all her features seem.
And all her roses dead.
But ah ! where both their charms unite.
How perfect is the view.
With every image of delight.
With graces ever new ;
Of power to charm the gteatest woe,
The wildest rage control.
Diffusing mildness o'er the brow.
And rapture through the soul.
Their power but faintly to express
All language must despair ;
But go, behold Arpasia's face.
And read it perfect there.
Marx Akenside.
—«—
SHE IS NOT FAIR TO OUTWARD VIEW
She is not fair to outward view.
As many maidens be ;
Her loveliness 1 never knew
Until she smiled on me ;
0, then I saw her eye was bright, —
A well of love, a spring of light.
But now her looks are coy and cold ;
To mine they ne'er reply ;
And yet I cease not to behold
The love-light in her eye :
Her very frowns are fairer far
Than smiles of other piaidens are !
hartley Coleridge
A HEALTH.
I FILL this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon ;
To whom the better elements
And kindly stars have given
A form so fair, that, like the air,
'T is less of earth than heaven.
Her every tone is music's own,
, Like those of morning birds.
And something more than melody
Dwells ever in her words ;
The coinage of her heart are they.
And from her lips each fiows.
As one may see the burdened bee
Forth issue from the rose.
Affections are as thoughts to her.
The measures of her hours ;
Her feelings have the fragrancy,
The freshness of young flowers ;
And lovely passions, changing oft.
So fill her, she appears
The image of themselves by turns, —
The idol of past years !
Of her bright face one glance will trace
A picture on the brain.
And of her voice in echoing hearts
A sound must long remain ;
130
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
But memory, such as mine of her,
So very much endears.
When death is nigh my latest sigh
Will not be life's, but hers.
I fill this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,
A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon.
Her health ! and would on earth there stood
Some more of such a frame.
That life might be all poetry.
And weariness a name.
Edward Coate Pinknev.
SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY.
"hebrew melodies.'
She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies.
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes.
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.
One shade the more, one ray the less.
Had half impaired the nameless grace
Which waves in every raven tress
Or softly lightens o'er her face,
Wliere thoughts serenely sweet express
How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek and o'er that brow
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent.
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,
But teU of days in goodness spent, —
A mind at peace with aU below,
A heart whose love is innocent.
Byron.
A SLEEPING BEAUTY.
Sleep on ! and dream of Heaven awhile !
Though shut so close thy laughing eyes.
Thy rosy lips still wear a smile.
And move, and breathe delicious sighs.
Ah ! now soft blushes tinge her cheeks
And mantle o'er her neck of snow ;
Ah ! now she murmurs, now she speaks.
What most I wish, and fear, to know.
She starts, she trembles, and she weeps !
Her fair hands folded on her breast ;
— And now, how like a saint she sleeps !
A seraph in the realms of rest !
Sleep on secure ! Above control,
Thy thoughts belong to Heaven and thee ;
And may the secret of thy soul
Remain within its sanctuary !
samuel ROGERS.
0, FAIREST OF THE RURAL MAIDS!
O, fairest of the rural maids !
Thy birth was in the forest shades ;
Green boughs, and glimpses of the sky.
Were all that met thine infant eye.
Thy sports, thy wanderings, when a child.
Were ever in the sylvan wild.
And all the beauty of the place
Is in thy heart and on thy face.
The twilight of the trees and rocks
Is in the light shade of thy locks ;
Thy step is as the wind, that weaves
Its playful way among the leaves.
Thine eyes are springs, in whose serene
And silent waters heaven is seen ;
Their lashes are the herbs that look
On their young figures in the brook.
The forest depths, by foot unpressed.
Are not more sinless than thy breast ;
The holy peace, that fills the air
Of those cahn solitudes, is there.
william cullen bryant.
HER LIKENESS.
A GIRL, who has so many wilful ways
She would have caused Job's patience to for
sake him ;
Yet is so rich in all that's girlhood's praise.
Did Job himself upon her goodness gaze,
A little better she would surely make him.
Yet is this girl I sing in naught uncommon.
And very far from angel yet, I trow.
Her faults, her sweetnesses, are purely human ;
Yet she's more lovable as simple woman
Than any one diviner that I know.
Therefore I wish that she may safely keep
This womanhede, and change not, only grow ;
From maid to matron, youth to age, may creep,
And in perennial blessedness, still reap
On every hand of that which she doth sow.
dinah Maria Mulock Craik.
iS-
COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.
131
a
I FEAR THY KISSES, GENTLE MAIDEN.
I fear thy kisses, gentle maiden ;
Thou needest not fear mine ;
My spirit is too deeply laden
Ever to burden thine.
I fear thy mien, thy tones, thy motion ;
Thou needest not fear mine ;
Innocent is the heart's devotion
With which I worship thine.
percy bvsshe shelley,
.e-
BLACK AND BLUE EYES.
The brilliant black eye
May in triumph let fly
All its darts without caring who feels 'em ;
But the soft eye of blue,
Though it scatter wounds too.
Is much better pleased when it heals 'em !
Dear Fanny !
The black eye may say,
" Come and worship my ray ;
By adoring, perhaps you may move me ! "
But the blue eye, half hid,
Says, from under its lid,
" I love, and am yours, if you love me ! "
Dear Fanny !
Then tell me, 0 why.
In that lovely blue eye.
Not a charm of its tint I discover ;
Or why should you wear
The only blue pair
That ever said " No " to a lover ?
Dear Fanny !
Thomas moorb.
LET THE TOAST PASS.
prom " the school for scandal."
Here's to the maiden of bashful fifteen ;
Here's to the widow of fifty ;
Here's to the flaunting extravagant quean.
And here's to the housewife that's thrifty.
Let the toast pass.
Drink to the lass,
I 'II warrant she '11 prove an excuse for the glass.
Here's to the charmer whose dimples we prize,
Now to the maid who has none, sir ;
Here's to the girl with a pair of blue eyes.
And here's to the nymph with but one, sir.
Let the toast pass, etc.
Here's to the maid with a bosom of snow ;
Now to her that's as brown as a berry ;
Here's to the wife with a face full of woe.
And now to the damsel that's merry.
Let the toast pass, etc.
For let 'em be clumsy, or let 'em be slim.
Young or ancient, I care not a feather ;
So fill a pint bumper quite up to the brim.
So fill up your glasses, nay, fill to the brim.
And let us e'en toast them together.
Let the toast pass, etc.
Richard Brinsley Sheridan.
MY LITTLE SAINT.
1 care not, though it be
By the préciser sort thought popery ;
We poets can a license show
For everything we do.
Hear, then, my little saint ! 1 '11 pray to thee.
If now thy happy mind.
Amidst its various joys, can leisure find
To attend to anything so low
As what 1 say or do.
Regard, and be what thou wast ever, —kind.
Let not the blest above
Engross thee quite, but sometimes hither rove :
Fain would I thy sweet image see.
And sit and talk with thee ;
Nor is it curiosity, but love.
Ah ! what delight't would be,
Wouldst thou sometimes by stealth converse with
me !
How should 1 thy sweet commune prize.
And other joys despise !
Come, then ! 1 ne'er was yet denied by thee.
I would not long detain
Thy soul from bliss, nor keep thee here in pain ;
Nor should thy fellow-saints e'er know
Of thy escape below :
Before thou'rt missed, thou shouldst return again.,
Sure, heaven must needs thy love.
As well as other qualities, improve :
Come, then ! and recreate my sight
With rays of thy pure light ;
'T wiU cheer my eyes more than the lamps above.
But if Fate's so severe
As to confine thee to thy blissful sphere,
(And by thy absence 1 shall know
Whether thy state be so,)
Live happy, and be mindful of me there.
John norris
132
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIOA'S.
A GOLDEN GIRL.
Ltrcr is a golden girl ;
But a man, a man, should woo her ■
They who seek her shrink aback,
When they should, like storms, pursue her.
All her smiles are hid in light ;
All her hair is lost in splendor ;
But she hath the eyes of Night
And a heart that's over-tender.
Yet the foolish suitors fly
(Is't excess of dread or duty ?)
From the starlight of her eye.
Leaving to neglect her beauty 1
Men by fifty seasons taught
Leave her to a young beginner.
Who, without a second thought.
Whispers, wooes, and straight must win her.
Lucy is a golden girl !
Toast her in a goblet brimming !
May the man that wins her wear
On his heart the Rose of Women !
Bryan waller Procter {Barry CormiaU).
*—
THE MILKING-MAID.
The year stood at its equinox.
And bluff the North was blowing,
A bleat of lambs came from the flocks,
Green hardy things were growing ;
I met a maid with shining locks
Where milky kine were lowing.
She wore a kerchief on her neck.
Her bare arm showed its dimple.
Her apron spread without a speck.
Her air was frank and simple.
She milked into a wooden pail,
And sang a country ditty, —
An innocent fond lovers' tale,
That was not wise nor witty.
Pathetically rustical.
Too pointless for the city.
She kept in time without a beat.
As true as church-bell ringers.
Unless she tapped time with her feet.
Or squeezed it with her fingers ;
Her clear, unstudied notes were sweet
As many a practised singer's.
1 stood a minute out of sight.
Stood silent for a minute.
To eye the pail, and creamy white
The frothing milk within it, —
To eye the comely milking-maid.
Herself so fresh and creamy.
"Good day to you ! " at last I said ;
She turned her head to see me.
" Good day ! " she said, with lifted head ;
Her eyes looked soft and dreamy.
And all the while she milked and milked
The grave cow heavy-laden :
I've seen grand ladies, plumed and silked.
But not a sweeter maiden ;
But not a sweeter, fresher maid
Than this in homely cotton.
Whose pleasant face and silky braid
I have not yet forgotten.
Seven springs have passed since then, as I
Count with a sober sorrow ;
Seven springs have come and passed me by.
And spring sets in to-morrow.
I've half a mind to shake myself
Free, just for once, from London,
To set my work upon the shelf.
And leave it done or undone ;
To run down by the early train.
Whirl down with shriek and whistle.
And feel the hluflf north blow again.
And mark the sprouting thistle
Set up on waste patch of the lane
Its green and tender bristle ;
And spy the scarce-blown violet banks.
Crisp primrose-leaves and others.
And watch the lambs leap at their pranks.
And butt their patient mothers.
Alas ! one point in all my plan
My serious thoughts demur to ;
Seven years have passed for maid and man,
Seven years have passed for her too.
Perhaps my rose is over-blown.
Not rosy, or too rosy;
Perhaps in farm-house of her own
Some husband keeps her cosy.
Where I should show a face unknown, —
Good-by, my wayside posy !
Christina Georgina Rossetti.
«
AT THE CHURCH GATE.
Although I enter not.
Yet round about the spot
Ofttimes I hover ;
And near the sacred gate.
With longing eyes I wait.
Expectant of her.
COMPLIMENT AND ADMIRATION.
133
a
P-
The minster bell tolls out
Above the city's rout,
And noise and humming ;
They 've hushed the minster bell ;
The organ 'gins to swell ;
She's eoioing, coming !
My lady comes at last,
Timid and stepping fast.
And hastening hither,
With modest eyes downcast ;
She comes, — she's here, she's past !
May Heaven go with her !
Kneel undisturbed, fair saint !
Pour out your praise or plaint
Meekly and duly ;
I will not enter there.
To sully your pure prayer
With thoughts unruly.
But suffer me to pace
Round the forbidden place,
Lingering a minute.
Like outcast spirits, who wait.
And see, through heaven's gate.
Angels within it.
William Makepeace Thackeray.
SWEET, BE NOT PROUD.
Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes.
Which starlike sparkle in their skies ;
Nor be you proud that you can see
All hearts your captives, yours yet free.
Be you not proud of that rich hair.
Which wantons with the lovesick air ;
Whenas that ruby which you wear.
Sunk from the tip of your soft ear.
Will last to be a precious stone
When all your world of beauty's gone.
Robert Herrick.
VERSES WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM.
Here is one leaf reserved for me.
Prom all thy sweet memorials free ;
And here my simple song might tell
The feelings thou must guess so well.
But could I thus, within thy mind.
One little vacant comer find.
Where no impression yet is seen.
Where no memorial yet has been,
O, it should be my sweetest care
To write my name forever there !
T. Moore.
FKAGMENTS.
Compliments.
Where none admire, 't is useless to excel ;
Where none are beaux, 't is vain to be a belle.
SoHíoqvy on a Beauty in the Country. LORD LYTTLETON.
That man that hath a tongue, I say, is no man.
If with his tongue he cannot win a woman.
Two Gentlemen Verona, Act iii. Sc. x. SHAKESPEARE.
Woman.
And when a lady's in the case.
You know all other things give place.
The Hare and Many Friends. j. Gay.
o woman ! lovely woman ! nature made thee
To temper man ; we had been bmtes without you.
Angels are painted fair, to look like you :
There's in you all that we believe of heaven ;
Amazing brightness, purity, and truth.
Eternal joy, and everlasting love.
Venice Preserved, Act i. Sc. i. T. OTWAY.
Prom women's eyes this doctrine I derive :
They sparkle still the right Promethean fire ;
They are the books, the arts, the Academes,
That show, contain, and nourish all the world.
Lovds Labor Lost, Act iv. Sc. 3. Shakespeare.
Personal Charms.
Such was Zuleika ! such around her shone
The nameless charms unmarked by her alone ;
The light of love, the purity of grace.
The mind, the music breathing from her face.
The heart whose softness harmonized the whole.
And oh ! that eye was in itself a Soul.
Bride 0/ Abydos, Cant. i. BVRON.
Is she not passing fair ?
Two Gentlemen 0/ Verona, Act iv. Sc. 4«
Shakespeare.
And she is fair, and fairer than that word.
Merchant 0/ Venice, Act 1. Sc. i. shakespeare.
There's nothing ill can dwell in such a temple :
If the ill spirit have so fair a house.
Good things will strive to dwell with't.
The Tempest, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Beauty provoketh thieves sooner than gold.
As Ycu Like It, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE
Here's metal more attractive.
Hantlet. Act iii. Sc. 2.
shakespeare.
-EP
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134
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
She is pretty to walk with.
And witty to talk with,
And pleasant, too, to think on.
Brennoralt, Aciii.
SIR J". Suckling.
But from the hoop's bewitching round.
Her very shoe has power to wound.
Fables: The Slider and the Bee. E. MOORE.
We call it only pretty Fanny's way.
An EU¿y to an Old Beauty. T. PaRNELL.
The fair, the chaste, and unexpressive she.
As Ycu Like It, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Angels listen when she speaks :
She's my delight, all mankind's wonder ;
But my jealous heart would break.
Should we live one day asunder.
Scttg. Earl of Rochester.
Impartial Affection.
How happy could 1 be with either,
Were t'other dear charmer away.
Beggai^s Opera, Act ii. Sc. 2.
J. CAY.
Had sighed to many, though he loved but one.
Childe Harold's Pilgrimage, Cant. L BYRON.
Compliments from Nature.
O, thou art fairer than the evening air.
Clad in the beauty of a thousand stars.
When he shall die.
Take him and cut him out in little stars,
And he will make the face of heaven so fine.
That all the world will be in love with night.
And pay no worship to the garish sun.
Rcmeo and yuliet. Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Her eyes the glow-worm lend thee.
The shooting-stars attend thee ;
And the elves also,
Whose little eyes glow
Like the sparks of fire, befriend thee.
The Night Piece to yulia.
R. Herrick.
The sweetest garland to the sweetest maid.
To a Lady ; vith a Present of Flov/ers% T. TlCKELL.
When you do dance, I wish you
A wave o' th' sea, that you might ever do
Nothing but that.
IViniePs Tale, Act iv. Sc. 4.
Shakespeare.
Some asked me where the Rubies grew.
And nothing I did say.
But with my finger pointed to
The lips of Julia.
The Rock 0/Rubies, and the Quarrte 0/ Pearls. R. HERRICK
Cherry ripe, ripe, ripe, I cry.
Full and fair ones, — Come and buy ;
If so be you ask me where
They do grow, I answer, there.
Where my Julia's lips do smile.
There's the land, or cherry-isle.
Cherry Ripe. R. HERRICK.
Except I be by Sylvia in the night.
There is no music in the nightingale.
Ttuo Gentlemen 0/ Verona, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Sonnet XVIH. SHAKESPEARE.
Be thou the rainbow to the storms of life !
The evening beam that smiles the clouds away.
And tints to-morrow with prophetic ray !
The Bride 0/ Abydos, Cant. ii. BYRON,
The Poet's Admiration.
That eagle's fate and mine are one.
Which, on the shaft that made him die.
Espied a feather of his own.
Wherewith he wont to soar so high.
To a Lady singing a Song oy his Composing. E. WALLER.
Is she not more than painting can express,
Or youthful poets fancy when they love ?
The Fair Penitent, Act iii. Sc. 1. N. rowe.
'T is sweeter for thee despairing.
Than aught in the world beside, — Jessy !
yessy. BURNS.
Flattery.
Banish all compliments but single truth.
Faithful Shepherdess. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER.
a-
LOVE.
135
a
LOVE.
IF IT BE TRUE THAT ANY BEAUTEOUS
THING.
If it be true that any beauteous thing
Raises the pure and just desire of man
From earth to God, the eternal fount of aU,
Such I believe my love ; for as in her
So fair, in whom I all besides forget,
1 view the gentle work of her Creator,
I have no care for any other thing.
Whilst thus I love. Nor is it marvellous.
Since the effect is not of my own power.
If the soul doth, by nature tempted forth.
Enamored through the eyes.
Repose upon the eyes which it resembleth.
And through them riseth to the Primal Love,
As to its end, and honors in admiring ;
For who adores the Maker needs must love his
work.
Michael Angelo (Italian). Translation
of j. e. Taylor,
SONNET.
Muses, that sing Love's sensual empirie.
And lovers kindling your enraged fires
At Cupid's bonfires burning in the eye.
Blown with the empty breath of vain desires ;
You, that prefer the painted cabinet
Before the wealthy jewels it doth store ye.
That aU your j oye in dying figures set.
And stain the living substance of your glory ;
Abjure those joys, abhor their memory ;
And let my love the honored subject be
Of love and honor's complete history !
Your eyes were never yet let in to see
The majesty and riches of the mind.
That dwell in darkness ; for your god is blind.
george chapman.
THE MIGHT OF ONE FAIR FACE.
The might of one fair face sublimes my love.
For it hath weaned my heart from low desires ;
Nor death I heed, nor purgatorial fires.
Thy beauty, antepast of joys above.
Instructs me in the bliss that saints approve ;
For 0, how good, how beautiful, must be
The God that made so good a thing as thee.
So fair an image of the heavenly Dove !
Forgive me If I cannot tum away
From those sweet eyes that are my earthly
heaven.
For they are guiding stars, benignly given
To tempt my footsteps to the upward way ;
And if I dwell too fondly in thy sight,
I live and love in God's peculiar light.
michael Angelo (Italian). Translation
of j. e. Taylor.
WERE I AS BASE AS IS THE LOWLY
PLAIN.
Were I as base as is the lowly plain.
And you, my Love, as high as heaven above.
Yet should the thoughts of me your humble
swain
Ascend to heaven, in honor of my Love.
Were I as high as heaven above the plain.
And you, my Love, as humble and as low
As are the deepest bottoms of the main,
Wheresoe'er you were, with you my Love should
go-
Were you the earth, dear Love, and I the skies.
My love should shine on you like to the sun.
And look upon you with ten thousand eyes
TiU heaven waxed blind, and till the world were
done.
Wheresoe'er I am, below, or else above you,
Wheresoe'er you are, my heart shall truly love
you.
Joshua Sylvester.
LIGHT.
The night has a thousand eyes,
. The day but one ;
Yet the light of the bright world dies
With the dying sun.
The mind has a thousand eyes.
And the heart but one ;
Yet tbe light of a whole life dies
When its love is done.
francis w. bourdillon.
f
136
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
n
LOVE IS A SICKNESS.
Love is a sickness full of woes,
All remedies refusing ;
A plant that most with cutting grows,
Most harren with best using.
Why so ?
More we enjoy it, more it dies ;
If not enjoyed, it sighing cries
Heigh-ho !
Love is a torment of the mind,
A tempest everlasting ;
And Jove hath made it of a kind.
Not weU, nor full, nor fasting.
Why so ?
More we enjoy it, more it dies ;
If not enjoyed, it sighing cries
Heigh-ho !
Samuel Daniel.
PHILLIDA AND CORYDON.
In the merry month of May,
In a morn by break of day.
With a troop of damsels playing
Forth I rode, forsooth, a-maying.
When anon by a woodside.
Where as May was in his pride,
I espied, all alone,
PhiUida and Corydon.
Much ado there was, God wot !
He would love and she would not :
She said, " Never man was true
He says, " None was false to you."
He said he had loved her long :
She says, "Love should have no wrong."
Corydon he would kiss her then.
She says, " Maids must kiss no men
Till they do for good and all."
Then she made the shepherd call
All the heavens to witness, truth
Never loved a truer youth.
Thus, with many a pretty oath.
Yea and nay, and faith and troth, —
Such as silly shepherds use
When they will not love abuse, —
Love, which had been long deluded.
Was with kisses sweet concluded ;
And PhiUida, with garlands gay.
Was made the lady of the May.
Nicholas Breton.
LOVE SCORNS DEGREES.
from "the mountain of the lovers."
Love scorns degrees ; the low he lifteth high.
The high he draweth down to that fair plain
Whereon, in his divine equality.
Two loving hearts may meet, nor meet in vain ;
'Gainst such sweet levelling Custom cries amain.
But o'er its harshest utterance one bland sigh.
Breathed passion-wise, doth mount victorious
stiU,
For Love, earth's lord, must have his lordly wilL
PAUL H. HAYNE.
THE SHEPHERD AND THE KING.
Ah ! what is love ? It is a pretty thing.
As sweet unto a shepherd as a king,
And sweeter too ;
For kings have cares that wait upon a^rown.
And cares can make the sweetest face to frown :
Ah then, ah then.
If country loves such sweet desires gain.
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ?
His flocks are folded ; he comes home at night
As merry as a king in his delight.
And merrier too ;
For kings bethink them what the state require.
Where shepherds, careless, carol by the fire :
Ah then, ah then.
If country loves such sweet desires gain.
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ?
He kisseth first, then sits as blithe to eat
His cream and curd as doth the king his meat.
And blither too ;
For kings have often fears when they sup.
Where shepherds dread no poison in their cup :
Ah then, ah then.
If country loves such sweet desires gain.
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ?
Upon his couch of straw he sleeps as sound
As doth the king upon his beds of down.
More sounder too ;
For cares cause kings full oft their sleep to spill,
Where weary shepherds lie and snort their fill :
Ah then, ah then.
If country loves such sweet desires gain.
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ?
Thus with his wife he spends the year as blithe
As doth the king at every tide or syth.
And blither too ;
-d'
LOVE.
137
For kings have wars and broils to take in hand,
When shepherds laugh, and love upon the land ;
Ah then, ah then.
If country loves such sweet desires gain.
What lady would not love a shepherd swain ?
Robert Greene.
TELL ME, MY HEART, IF THIS BE
LOVE.
When Delia on the plain appears.
Awed by a thousand tender fears,
I would approach, hut dare not move • —
TeU me, my heart, if this be love.
Whene'er she speaks, my ravished ear
No other voice than hers can hear ;
No other wit but hers approve ; —
TeU me, my heart, if this be love.
If she some other swain commend.
Though I was once his fondest friend,
His instant enemy I prove ; —
Tell me, my heart, if this be love.
When she is absent, I no more
Delight in all that pleased before,
The clearest spring, the shadiest grove ; —
Tell me, my heart, if this he love.
When fond of power, of beauty vain,
Her nets she spread for every swain,
I strove to hate, but vainly strove ; —
TeU me, my heart, if this be love.
George, Lord Lyttilton.
MY TRUE-LOVE HATH MY HEART.
My true-love hath my heart, and I have his.
By just exchange one to the other given :
I hold his dear, and mine he cannot miss.
There never was a better bargain driven :
My true-love hath my heart, and I have his.
His heart in me keeps him and me in one ;
My heart in him his thoughts and senses guides :
He loves my heart, for once it was his own ;
1 cherish his because in me it bides :
My ti'ue-love hath my heart, and I have his.
SIR Philip Sidney.
I SAW TWO CLOUDS AT MORNING.
I SAW two clouds at morning.
Tinged by the rising sun,
wAnd in the dawn they floated on.
And mingled into one ;
I thought that morning cloud was blest.
It moved so sweetly to the west.
I saw two summer currents
Flow smoothly to theii- meeting.
And join their course, with silent force.
In peace each other greeting ;
Calm was their course through hanks of green,
WhUe dimpling eddies played between.
Such be your gentle motion,
TiU life's last pulse shaU beat ;
Like summer's beam, and summer's stream,
Float on, in joy, to meet
A calmer sea, where storms shaU cease,
A purer sky, where all is peace.
John Gardiner Calkins Brainard.
—«
THE FRIAR OF ORDERS GRAY.
It was a friar of orders gi'ay
Walked forth to tell his beads ;
And he met with a lady fan-
Clad in a pilgrim's weeds.
" Now Christ thee save, thou reverend friar :
I pray thee teU to me.
If ever at yon holy shrine
My true-love thou didst see."
"And how should 1 know your true-love
From many another one ? "
" O, by his cockle hat, and stafl^
And by his sandal shoon.
" But chiefly by his face and mien.
That were so fair to view ;
His flaxen locks that sweetly curled.
And eyes of lovely blue."
" 0 lady, he is dead and gone 1
Lady, he's dead and gone !
And at his head a green grass turf,
And at his heels a stone.
" Within these holy cloisters long
He languished, and he died.
Lamenting of a lady's love.
And 'plaining of her pride.
" Here bore him barefaced on his bier
Six proper youths and tall.
And many a tear bedewed his grave
Within yon kirkyard wall."
" And art thou dead, thou gentle youth ?
And art thou dead and gone ?
And didst thou die for love of me ?
Break, cruel heart of stone ! "
138
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
" 0, weep not, lady, weep not so ;
Some ghostly comfort seek ;
Let not vain sorrow rive thy heart.
Nor tears bedew thy cheek."
"0, do not, do not, holy friar.
My sorrow now reprove ;
For I have lost the sweetest youth
That e'er won lady's love.
" And now, alas ! for thy sad loss
I '11 evermore weep and sigh ;
For thee I only wished to live.
For thee I wish to die."
" Weep no more, lady, weep no more.
Thy sorrow is in vain ;
For violets plucked, the sweetest showers
Wül ne'er make grow again.
" Our joys as wingèd dreams do fly ;
Why then should sorrow last ?
Since grief but aggravates thy loss.
Grieve not for what is past."
" 0, say not so, thou holy friar ;
I pray thee, say not so ;
For since my true-love died for me,
'T is meet my tears should flow.
" And will he never come again ?
Will he ne'er come again ?
Ah, no ! he is dead, and laid in his grave,
Forever to remain.
" His cheek was redder than the rose ;
The comeliest youth was he !
But he is dead and laid in his grave :
Alas, and woe is me ! "
" Sigh no more, lady, sigh no more.
Men were deceivers ever :
One foot on sea and one on land.
To one thing constant never.
" Hadst thou been fond, he had been false.
And left thee sad and heavy ;
For young men ever were fickle found.
Since summer trees were leafy."
"Now say not so, thou holy friar,
I pray thee say not so ;
My love he had the truest heart,
O, he was ever true !
*' And art thou dead, thou much-loved youth,
And didst thou die for me ?
Then farewell home ; for evermore
A pilgrim I will be.
" But first upon my true-love's grave
My weary limbs I 'U lay.
And thi ice I '11 kiss the green-grass turf
That wraps his breathless clay."
" Yet stay, fair lady ; rest awhile
Beneath this cloister wall ;
The cold wind through the hawthorn blows,
And drizzly rain doth fall."
" O, stay me not, thou holy friar,
0, stay me not, I pray ;
No drizzly rain that falls on me
Can wash my fault away."
"Yet stay, fair lady, turn again.
And dry those pearly tears ;
For see, beneath this gown of gray
Thy own true-love appears.
" Here forced by grief and hopeless love.
These holy weeds I sought ;
And here, amid these lonely walls,
To end my days I thought.
" But haply, for my year of grace
Is not yet passed away.
Might I still hope to win thy love.
No longer would I stay."
" Now farewell grief, and welcome joy
Once more unto my heart ;
For since I have found thee, lovely youth.
We nevermore will part."
Adapted from old ballads by THOMAS PERCY-
THE HERMIT.
FROM "THE VICAR OF WAKEFIELD."
" Tuen, gentle Hermit of the dale.
And guide my lonely way
To where yon taper cheers the vale
With hospitable ray.
"For here forlorn and lost I tread.
With fainting steps and slow ;
Where wilds, immeasurably spread.
Seem lengthening as I go."
"Forbear, my son," the Hermit cries,
"To tempt the dangerous gloom ;
For yonder faithless phantom flies
To lure thee to thy doom.
" Here to the houseless child of want
My door is open still ;
And though my portion is but scant,
I give it with good will.
LOVE.
139
"Then turn to-night, and freely share
W hate'er my cell bestows ;
My rushy couch and frugal fare,
My blessing and repose.
"No flocks that range the valley free
To slaughter I condemn ;
Taught by that Power that pities me,
I learn to pity them ;
" But from the mountain's grassy side
A guiltless feast I bring ;
A scrip with herbs and fruits supplied.
And water from the spring.
" Then, pilgrim, turn, thy cares forego ;
All earth-born cares are wrong :
Man wants but little here below.
Nor wants that little long."
Soft as the dew from heaven descends.
His gentle accents fell :
Thé modest stranger lowly bends,
And follows to the cell.
Far in a wilderness obscure
The lonely mansion lay ;
A refuge to the neighboring poor.
And strangers led astray.
No stores beneath its humble thatch
Required a master's care :
The wicket, opening with a latch.
Received the harmless pair.
And now, when busy crowds retire
To take their evening rest.
The Hermit trimmed his little fire.
And cheered his pensive guest ;
And spread his vegetable store.
And gayly pressed and smiled ;
And, skilled in legendary lore.
The lingering hours beguiled.
Around, in sympathetic mirth.
Its tricks the kitten tries ;
The cricket chirrups on the hearth ;
The crackling fagot flies.
But nothing could a charm impart
To soothe the stranger's woe ;
For grief was heavy at his heart.
And tears began to flow.
His rising cares the Hermit spied,
With answering care opprest :
" And whence, unhappy youth," he cried,
" The sorrows of thy breast ?
" From better habitations spumed.
Reluctant dost thou rove ?
Or grieve for friendship imretumed.
Or unregarded love ?
" Alas ! the joys that fortune brings
Are trifling, and decay ;
And those who prize the paltry things
More trifling still than they.
"And what is friendship but a name,
A charm that lulls to sleep ;
A shade that follows wealth or fame.
And leaves the wretch to weep ?
" And love is still an emptier sound.
The modern fair one's jest ;
On earth unseen, or only found
To warm the turtle's nest.
"For shame, fond youth ! thy sorrows hush.
And spum the sex," he said ;
But while he spoke, a rising blush
His lovelorn guest betrayed.
Surprised, he sees new beauties rise.
Swift mantling to the view ;
Like colors o'er the morning skies.
As bright, as transient too.
The bashful look, the rising breast.
Alternate spread alarms :
The lovely stranger stands contest
A maid in all her charms.
" And, ah ! forgive a stranger rude,
A wretch forlorn," she cried;
" Whose feet unhallowed thus intrude
Where heaven and you reside.
" But let a maid thy pity share.
Whom love has taught to stray ;
Who seeks for rest, but finds despair
Companion of her way.
"My father lived beside the Tyne,
A wealthy lord was he ;
And all his wealth was marked as mine, —
He had but only me.
" To win me from his tender arms.
Unnumbered suitors came ;
Who praised me for imputed charms.
And felt, or feigned, a flame.
" Each hour a mercenary crowd
With richest proffers strove :
Among the rest young Edwin bowed,
But never talked of love.
"In humble, simplest habit clad.
No wealth or power had he ;
Wisdom and worth were all he had.
But these were aU to me.
" And when beside me in the dale
He carolled lays of love.
His breath lent fragrance to the gale
And music to the grove.
" The blossom opening to the day.
The dews of heaven refined.
Could naught of purity display
To emulate his mind.
" The dew, the blossoms of the tree.
With charms inconstant shine ;
Their charms were his, but, woe to me !
Their constancy was mine.
"For still I tried each fickle art.
Importunate and vain ;
And while his passion touched my heart,
I triumphed in his pain ■
" Till, quite dejected with my scorn.
He left me to my pride ;
And sought a solitude forlorn.
In secret, where he died.
" But mine the sorrow, mine the fault.
And well my life shall pay ;
I '11 seek the solitude he sought.
And stretch me where he laj'.
"And there forlorn, despairing, hid,
I 'U lay me down and die ;
'T was so for me that Edwin did.
And so for him wiU I."
"Forbid it. Heaven !" the Hermit cried.
And clasped her to his breast :
The wondering fair one turned to chide, —
'T was Edwin's self that pressed.
" Turn, Angelina, ever dear.
My charmer, turn to see
Thy own, thy long-lost Edwin here.
Restored to love and thee.
" Thus let me hold thee to my heart.
And every care resign :
And shall we never, never part.
My life, — my all that's mine ?
" No, never from this hour to part.
We '11 live and love so true :
The sigh that rends thy constant heart
Shall break thy Edwin's too."
olivek goldsmith.
ON LOVE.
There is no worldly pleasure here below.
Which by experience doth not folly prove :
But among all the follies that I know.
The sweetest folly in the world is love :
But not that passion which, with fools' consent.
Above the reason bears imperious sway.
Making their lifetime a perpetual Lent,
As if a man were born to fast and pray.
No, that is not the humor I approve.
As either yielding pleasure or promotion ;
I like a mild and lukewarm zeal in love.
Although I do not like it in devotion ;
For it has no coherence with my creed.
To think that lovers die as they pretend ;
If all that say they dy had dy'd indeed.
Sure, long ere now the world had had an eml.
Besides, we need not love but if we please.
No destiny can force men's disposition ;
And how can any die of that disease
Whereof himself may be his own physician ?
But some seem so distracted of their wits.
That I would think it but a venial sin
To take some of those innocents that sits
In Bedlam out, and put some lovers in.
Yet some men, rather than incur the slander
Of true apostates, wül false martyrs prove.
But I am neither Iphis nor Leander,
I '11 neither drown nor hang myself for love.
Methinks a wise man's actions should be such
As always yield to reason's best advice ;
Now, for to love too little or too much
Are both extreams, and all extreams are vice.
Yet have I been a lover by report.
Yea I have dy'd for love, as others do ;
But, praised be God, it was in such a sort.
That I revived within an hour or two.
Thus have I lived, thus have I loved till now.
And find no reason to repent me yet ;
And whosoever otherways will do.
His courage is as little as his wit.
Sir Robert Ayton.
MY CHOICE.
Shall I tell you whom I love ?
Hearken then awhile to me ;
And if such a woman move
As I now shall versify.
Be assured't is she or none.
That I love, and love alone.
Nature did her so much right
As she scorns the help of art
In as many virtues dight
As e'er yet embraced a heart
LOVE.
141
fi]
So much good so truly tried,
Some for less were deified.
Wit she hath, without desire
To make known how much she hath ;
And her anger flames no higher
Than may fitly sweeten wrath.
Tull of pity as may be.
Though perhaps not so to me.
Keason masters every sense.
And her virtues grace her birth ;
Lovely as all excellence.
Modest in her most of mirth.
Likelihood enough to prove
Only worth could kindle love.
Such she is ; and if you know
Such a one as I have sung ;
Be she brown, or fair, or so
That she be but somewhat young ;
Be assured't is she, or none.
That I love, and love alone.
William Browne.
LOVE NOT ME FOR COMELY GRACE.
Love not me for comely grace.
For my pleasing eye or face,
Nor for any outward part,
No, nor for my constant heart ;
For those may fail or turn to ill.
So thou and I shall sever ;
Keep therefore a true woman's eye.
And love me stUl, but know not why.
So hast thou the same reason still
To dote upon me ever.
Anonymous.
DISDAIN RETURNED.
He that loves a rosy cheek.
Or a coral lip admires.
Or from starlike eyes doth seek
Fuel to maintain his fires ;
As old Time makes these decay.
So his flames must waste away.
But a smooth and steadfast mind.
Gentle thoughts, and calm desires.
Hearts with equal love combined.
Kindle never-dying fires : —
Where these are not, I despise
Lovely cheeks or lips or eyes.
Thomas Carew.
LOVE ME LITTLE, LOVE ME LONG.
originally printed in 1569.
Love me little, love me long !
Is the burden of my song :
Love that is too hot and strong
Burneth soon to waste.
Still I would not have thee cold, —
Not too backward, nor too bold ;
Love that lasteth till't is old
Fadeth not in haste
Love me little, love me long !
Is the burden of my song.
If thou lovest me too much,
'T will not prove as true a touch ;
Love me little more than such, —
For I fear the end.
I'm with little well content.
And a little from thee sent
Is enough, with true intent
To be steadfast, friend.
Say thou lovest me, while thou live
I to thee my love will give.
Never dreaming to deceive
While that life endures ;
Nay, and after death, in sooth,
I to thee will keep my truth,
As now when in ray May of youth :
This my love assures.
Constant love is moderate ever.
And it will through life persever ;
Give me that with true endeavor, —
I will it restore.
A suit of durance let it be.
For all weathers, —that for me,—
For the land or for the sea :
Lasting evermore.
Winter's cold or summer's heat.
Autumn's tempests on it beat ;
It can never know defeat.
Never can rebel
Such the love that I would gain.
Such the love, I tell thee plain.
Thou must give, or woo in vain ;
So to thee — farewell !
anonymous.
THE LOVELINESS OF LOVE.
It is not Beauty I demand,
A crystal brow, the moon's despair.
Nor the snow's daughter, a white hand.
Nor mermaid's yellow pride of hair :
-51
142
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
TeU me not of yom- starry eyes,
Your lips that seem on roses fed.
Your breasts, where Cupid tumbling lies
Nor sleeps for kissing of his bed, —
A bloomy pair of vermeil cheeks
Like Hebe's in her ruddiest hours,
A breath that softer music speaks
Than summer winds a-wooing flowers ; —
These are but gauds : nay, what are lips ?
Coral beneath the ocean-stream,
Who^e brink when your adventurer slips
Full oft he peiisheth on them.
And what are cheeks, but ensigns oft
That wave hot youth to fields of blood ?
Did Helen's breast, though ne'er so soft,
Do Greece or Ilium any good ?
Eyes can with baleful ardor bum ;
Poison can breath, that erst perfumed ;
There's many a white hand liolds an urn
With lovers' hearts 'to dust consumed.
For crystal brows there's naught within ;
They are but empty cells for pride ;
He who the Siren's hair would win
Is mostly strangled in the tide.
Give me, instead of Beauty's bust,
A tender heart, a loyal mind.
Which with temptation I would trust.
Yet never linked with error find, —
One in whose gentíe bosom I
Could pour my secret heart of woes.
Like the care-burdened honey-fly
That hides his murmurs in the rose, —
My earthly Comforter ! whose love
So indefeasible might be
That, when my spirit wonned above.
Hers could not stay, for sympathy.
anonvmous.
A MAIDEN'S IDEAL OF A HUSBAND.
from "the contrivances."
Genteel in personage.
Conduct, and equipage.
Noble by heritage.
Generous and free :
Brave, not romantic ;
Learned, not pedantic ;
Frolic, not frantic ;
This must he be.
Houor maintaining,
Meanness disdaining.
Still entertaining.
Engaging and new.
Neat, but not finical ; ,
Sage, but not cynical ;
Never tyrannical.
But ever true.
Henry Carey.
THE LANDLADY'S DAUGHTER.
Three students were travelling over the Rhine ;
They stopped when they came to the landlady's
sign ;
" Good landlady, have you good beer and wine ?
And where is that dear little daughter of thine ? "
" My beer and wine are fresh and clear ;
My daughter she lies on the cold death-bier ! "
And when to the chamber they made their way.
There, dead, in a coal-black slirine, she lay.
The first he drew near, and the veil gently raised.
And on her pale face he mournfully gazed :
" Ah ! wert thou but living yet," he said,
" I'd love thee from this time forth, fair maid ! "
The second he slowly put back the shroud.
And turned him away and wept aloud :
"Ah ! that thou liest in the cold death-bier !
Alas ! 1 have loved thee for many a year ! "
The third he once more uplifted the veil.
And kissed her upon her mouth so pale :
" Thee loved 1 always ; 1 love still but thee ;
And thee will 1 love through eternity ! "
From the German of Uhland. Translation
of J. S, DWIGHT.
THREE LOVES.
There were three maidens who loved a king ;
They sat together beside the sea ;
One cried, " 1 love him, and 1 would die
If but for one day he might love me ! "
The second whispered, " And 1 would die
To gladden his life, or make him great."
The third one spoke not, but gazed afar
With dreamy eyes that were sad as Fate.
The king he loved the first for a day.
The second his life with fond love blest ;
And yet the woman who never spoke
Was the one of the three who loved him best.
lucy H. Hoofer.
e-
LOVE.
143
■a
A WOMAN'S QUESTION.
Before I trust my fate to thee.
Or place my hand in thine,
Before I let thy future give
Color and form to mine.
Before I peril all for thee,
Question thy soul to-night for me.
I break all slighter bonds, nor feel
A shadow of regret ;
Is there one link within the past
That holds thy spirit yet ?
Or is thy faith as clear and free
As that which I can pledge to thee ?
Does there within thy dimmest dreams
A possible future shine.
Wherein thy life could henceforth breathe,
Untouched, unshared by mine ?
If so, at any pain or cost,
0, tell me before all is lost !
Look deeper still ; if thou canst feel,
Within thy inmost soul.
That thou hast kept a portion hack,
While I have staked the whole,
Let no false pity spare the blow.
But in true mercy tell me so.
Is there within thy heart a need
That mine cannot fulfil ?
One chord that any other hand
Could better wake or still?
Speak now, lest at some future day
My whole life wither and decay.
Lives there within thy nature hid
The demon-spirit, change,
Shedding a passing glory still
On all things new and strange ?
It may not he thy fault alone, —
But shield my heart against thine own.
Couldst thou withdraw thy haná one day
And answer to my claim.
That fate, and that to-day's mistake, —
Not thou, — had been to blame,?
• Some soothe their conscience thus ; but thou
Wilt surely warn and save me now.
Nay, answer riot, — I dare not hear ;
The words would come too late ;
Yet I would spare thee all remorse.
So comfort thee, my fate:
Whatever on my heart may fall,
Eemember, I would risk it all !
Adelaide Anne Feoctee.
A WOMAN'S ANSWER.
I WILL not let you say a woman's part
Must be to give exclusive love alone ;
Dearest, although I love you so, my heart
Answers a thousand claims besides your own.
I love, — what do I not love ? Earth and air
Find space within my heart, and myriad things
You would not deign to heed are cherished there.
And vibrate on its very inmost strings.
I love the summer, with her ebb and flow
Of light and warmth and music, that have
nursed
Her tender buds to blossoms . . . and you know
It was in summer that I saw you first.
I love the winter dearly too, . . . but then
I owe it so much ; on a winter's day.
Bleak, cold, and stormy, you returned again.
When you had been those weary months away.
I love the stars like friends ; so many nights
I gazed at them, when you were far from me.
Till I grew blind with tears . . . those far-off lights
Could watch you, whom I longed in vain to see.
I love the flowers ; happy hours lie
Shut up within their petals close and fast :
You have forgotten, dear ; but they and I
Keep every fragment of the golden Past.
I love, too, to be loved ; all loving praise
Seems like a crown upon my life, — to make
It better worth the giving, and to raise
Still nearer to your own the heart you take.
I love all good and noble souls ; — 1 heard
One speak of you but lately, and for days.
Only to think of it, my soul was stirred
In tender memory of such generous praise.
I love all those who love you, all who owe
Comfort to you ; and I can find regret
Even for those poorer hearts who once could know.
And once could love you, and can now forget.
Well, is my heart so narrow, —I, who spare
Love for all these ? Do I not even hold
My favorite books in special tender care.
And prize them as a miser does his gold ?
The poets that you used to read to me
While summer twilights faded in the sky ;
But most of all I think Aurora Leigh,
Beeause — because — do you remember why ? t
e
144
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Will you be jealous ? Did you guess before
I loved so many things ?—Still you the best : —
Dearest, remember that I love you more,
0, more a thousand times, than all the rest !
Adelaide Anne Procter.
THE LADY'S "YES."
"Yes," I answered you last night;
"No," this morning, sir, I say.
Colors seen by candle-light
Will not look the same by day.
When the viols played their best,
Lamps above, and laughs below.
Love me sounded like a jest.
Fit for yes or fit for no.
CaU me false or call me free.
Vow, whatever light may shine, .
No man on your face shall see
Any grief for change on mine.
Yet the sin is on us both ;
Time to dance is not to woo ;
vVooing light makes fickle troth.
Scorn of me recoils on you.
Learn to win a lady's faith
Nobly, as the thing is high.
Bravely, as for life and death.
With a loyal gravity.
Lead her from the festive boards.
Point her to the starry skies.
Guard her, by your truthful words.
Pure from courtship's flatteries.
By your truth she shall be true,
Ever true, as wives of yore ;
And her yes, once said to you.
Shall be Yes forevermore.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
THE MAID'S REMONSTRANCE.
Never wedding, ever wooing.
Still a lovelorn heart pursuing.
Read you not the wrong you 're doing
In my cheek's pale hue ?
AU my life with sorrow strewing.
Wed, or cease to woo.
Rivals banished, bosoms plighted,
StUl our days are disunited ;
Now the lamp of hope is lighted.
Now half quenched appears.
Damped and wavering and benighted
Midst my sighs and tears.
Charms you call your dearest blessing.
Lips that thrUl at your caressing.
Eyes a mutual soul confessing.
Soon you '11 make them grow
Dim, and worthless your possessing.
Not with age, but woe !
Thouas Caupbbll.
LOVE'S SILENCE.
BECATrsE\l breathe(not love ^o eve^ie one,
Nor do toot use ^t colprs for (to weare.
Nor nourish special locks of vowèd haire.
Nor give each speech a full point of a groane, —
The courtlie nymphs, acquainted with the moane
Of them who on their lips Love's standard beare,
"What! he?" say they of me. "Now I
dare sweare
He cannot love : No, no I let him alone."
And think so stiU, — if SteUa know my minde.
Profess, indeed, I do not Cupid's art ;
But you, faire maids, at length this true shall
finde, —
That his right badge is but worne in the hearte.
Dumb swans, not chattering pies, do lovers
prove :
They love indeed who quake to say they love.
Sir PHILIP Sidney.
GIVE ME MORE LOVE OR MORE
DISDAIN.
Give me more love or more disdain j
The tomd or the frozen zone
Brings equal ease "unto my pain ;
The temperate affords me none;
Either extreme, of love or hate.
Is sweeter than a calm estate.
Give me a storm ; If it be love.
Like Danaë in a golden shower,
I swim in pleasure ; if it prove
Disdain, that torrent wül devour
My vulture hopes ; and he's possessed.
Of heaven that's but from hell released;
Then crown my joys, or cure my pain ;
Give me more love or more disdain.
Thomas Carew.
LOVE DISSEMBLED.
from " as you like it," act iii. sc. 5.
Think not I love him, though I ask for him ;
'T is but a peevish boy :—yet he talks weU ; —
But what care I for words ?—yet words do well.
When he that speaks them pleases those that hear.
-0
• LOVE,
145
a
But, sure, he's proud ; and yet his pride hecomes
him :
He '11 make a proper man ; The best thing in him
Is his complexiqj^ ; and^faster than his tongue
Did make oH'ence, his eye did heal it up.
He is not very tall ; yet for his years he's tall ;
His leg is but so so ; and yet't is well :
There was a pretty redness in his lip,
A little riper and more lusty red .
Than -that \nixed ir^his cheel^; 't was justi the
difllprence^. ,
Bet^Yixt the constant reoL and minmed damnsk.
There be some women, Sflvius, had they marked
him
In parcels, as I did, would have gone near
To fall in love with him : but, for my part,
I love him not, nor hate him not ; and yet
I have more cause to hate him than to love hint :
For what had he to do to chide at me ?
He said mine eyes were black, and my hair black ;
And, now I am remembered, scorned at me :
I marvel, why I answered not again :
But that's all one ; omittance is no quittance.
shakespeare.
OTHELLO'S DEFENCE.
from " othello," act i. sc. 3.
Othello. Most potent, grave, and reverend
signiors.
My veiy noble and approved good master.?, —
That I have ta'en away this old man's daughter.
It is most tme ; true, I have married her ;
The veiy heaa and front of my offending
Hakh this extent, no more. Bude am I in my
speech.
And little blessed with the soft phrase of peace ;
For since these arms of mine had seven yeais' pith.
Till now some nine moons wasted, they have used
Their dearest action in the tented field ;
And little of this great world can I speak.
More than pertains to feats of broil and battle ;
And therefore little shall I grace my cause
In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious
patience,
1 will a round unvarnished tale deliver ^
Of my whole course of love ; what drugs, what
charms.
What conjuration, and what mighty magic, —
For such proceeding I am charged withal, —
I won his daughter.
I '11 present
How 1 did thrive in this fair lady's love,
And she in mine.
Her father loved me ; oft invited mc
Still questioned me the story of my life,
F'rom year to year ; — the battles, sieges, fortunes.
That 1 have passed.
1 ran it through, even from my boyish days.
To the very moment that he bade me tell it :
Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances.
Of moving accidents by flood and field ;
Of hair-breadth 'scapes i' the imminent deadly
breach ;
Of being taken by the insolent foe.
And sold to slavery ; of my redemption thence.
And portance in my travel's history :
Wherein of antres vast, and deserts idle.
Bough quarries, rocks, and hills whose head ;
touch heaven.
It was my hint to speak, — such was the process ;
And of the Cannibals that each other eat.
The Anthropophagi, and men whose heads
Do grow beneath their shoulders. This to heai'.
Would Desdemona seriously incline :
But still the house affairs would draw hep thence ;
Which ever as she could with haste despatch.
She'd come again, and with a greedy ear
Devour up my discourse. Which I observing,
Took once a pliant hour ; and found good means
To draw from her a prayer of earnest heart.
That 1 would all my pilgrimage dilate.
Whereof by parcels she had something heard.
But not intentively : I did consent ;
And often did beguile her of her tears.
When 1 did speak of some distressful stroke.
That my youth suffered. My .story being done.
She gave me for my pains a world of sighs ;
She swore,—in faith 'twas strange, 'twas pass¬
ing strange ;
'T was pitiful, 't was wondrous pitiful :
She wished she had not heard it ; yet she wished
That Heaven had made her such a man : she
thanked me ;
And b.ade me, if 1 had a friend that loved her,
1 should teach him how to tell my story.
And that would woo her. Upon this hint, I
spake ;
She loved me for the dangers I had passed.
And I loved her that she did pity them.
This only is the witchcraft 1 have used :
Here comes the lady, let her witness it.
shakespeaku.
10
AH, HOW SWEET.
from " tyrannic love." act iv. sc. i-
AH,ihow sweet it is to love !
Ah, how gay is young desire !
And what pleasing pains we prove
When we first approach love's fire !
Pains ofjlove be|sweetei|far
Than all othciypleasuresjare.
•fï
146
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
1
Sighs which are from lovers blown
Do but gently heave the heart ;
E'en the tears they shed alone
Cure, like trickling balm, their smart.
Lovers, when they lose their breath.
Bleed away in easy death.
Love and Time with reverence use.
Treat them like a parting friend ;
Nor the golden gifts refuse
Which in youth sincere they send :
For each year their price is more.
And they less simple than before.
Love, like spring-tides full and high.
Swells in every youthful vein ;
But each tide does less supply,
Till they quite shrink in again.
If a flow in age appear,
'T is but rain, and runs not clear.
john drvden.
WHY, LOVELY CHARMER?
from " the hive."
Why, lovely charmer, tell me why,
So very kind, and yet so shy ?
Why does that cold, forbidding air
Give damps of sorrow and despair ?
Or why that smile my soul subdue.
And kindle up my flames anew ?
In vain you strive with all your art.
By turns to fire and freeze my heart ;
When 1 behold a face so fair.
So sweet a look, so soft an air.
My ravished soul is charmed all o'er,
I cannot love thee less or more.
Anonymous.
But love is such a mystery,
I cannot find it out ;
For when I think I'm best resolved
I then am most in doubt.
Then farewell care, and farewell woe ;
I will no longer pine ;
For I '11 believe I have her heart
As much as she has mine.
Sir Joh.n Suckling.
1 PRITHEE SEND ME BACK MY HE.A.RÏ.
I prithee send me back my heart.
Since I cannot have thine ;
For if from youre you will not part,
Why then shouldst thou have mine ?
Yet, now I think on't, let it lie ;
To find it were in vain ;
For thou 'st a thief in either eye
Would steal it back again.
Why should two hearts in one breast lie.
And yet not lodge together ?
G Love ! wLere is thy sympathy
If thus our breasts thou sever ?
IF DOUGHTY DEEDS MY LADY PLEASE.
If doughty deeds my ladj' please,
Right soon I '11 mount my steed.
And strong his arm and fast his seat
That bears frae me the meed.
I '11 wear thy colors in my cap.
Thy picture at my heart.
And he that bends not to thine eye
Shall rue it to his smart !
Then tell me how to woo thee. Love ;
0, tell me how to woo thee !
For thy dear sake nae care I '11 take.
Though ne'er another trow me.
If gay attire delight thine eye
I '11 dight me in array ;
I '11 tend thy chamber door all night.
And squire thee aU the day.
If sweetest sounds can win thine ear.
These sounds I '11 strive to catch ;
Thy voice I '11 steal to woo thysell.
That voice that nane can match.
But if fond love thy heart can gain,
I never broke a vow ;
Nae maiden lays her skaith to me ;
I never loved but you.
For you alone I ride the ring,
For you I wear the blue ;
For you alone I strive to sing,
O, tell me how to woo !
Then tell me how to woo thee. Love ;
0, tell me how to woo thee !
For thy dear sake nae care I 'U take.
Though ne'er another trow me.
Graham of Garthore.
TO ALTHEA FROM PRISON.
Whem Love with uuconfinëd wings
Hovers within my gates,
■ And my divine Althea brings
To whi.sper at my grates ;
When I lie tangled in her hair
And fettered with her eye.
The birds that wanton in the air
Know no such liberty.
4
LOVE.
147
■a
When flowing cups pass swiftly round
With no allaying Thames,
Our careless heads with roses crowned,
Our hearts with loyal flames ;
When thirsty grief in wine We steep,
When healths and draughts go free.
Fishes that tipple in the deep
Know no such liberty.
When, linnet-like confinèd,
With shriller throat shall sing
The mercy, sweetness, majesty
And glories of my King ;
When I shall voice aloud how good
He is, how great should be.
The enlarged winds, that curl the flood.
Know no such liberty.
Stone walls do not a prison make.
Nor iron bars a cage ;
Minds innocent and quiet take
That for an hermitage :
If 1 have freedom in my love,
And in my soul am free.
Angels alone, that soar above.
Enjoy such liberty.
colonel Richard Lovelace.
RIVALRY IN LOVE.
Of all the torments, all the cares.
With which our lives are curst ;
Of all the plagues a lover bears,
Sure rivals are the worst !
By partners in each other kind.
Afflictions easier grow ;
In love alone we hate to find
Companions of our woe.
Sylvia, for aU the pangs you see
Are laboring in my breast,
I beg not you would favor me ; —
Would you but slight the rest !
How great soe'er your rigors are,
With them alone I '11 cope ;
I can endure my own despair.
But not another's hope.
William Walsh.
TO A VERY YOUNG LADY.
Ah, Chloris ! that I now could sit
As unconcerned as when
Your infant beauty could beget
No pleasure, nor no pain.
When I the dawn used to admire.
And praised the coming day,
I little thought the growing fire
Must take my rest away.
Your charms in harmless childhood lay.
Like metals in the mine ;
Age from no face took more away.
Than youth concealed in thine.
But as your charms insensibly
To their perfection prest.
Fond Love as unperceived did fly.
And in my bosom rest.
My passion with your beauty grew.
And Cupid at my heart.
Still as his mother favored you.
Threw a new flaming dart.
Each gloried in their wanton part :
To make a lover, he
Employed the utmost of his art ;
To make a Beauty, she.
Though now I slowly bend to love
Uncertain of my fqte.
If your fair self my chains approve,
I shall my freedom hate.
Lovers, like dying men, may well
At first disordered be.
Since none alive can truly tell
What fortune they must see.
sir charles sedlev.
THE FLOWER'S NAME.
Herf, 's the garden she walked acros.s.
Arm in my arm, such a short while since :
Hark ! now I push its wicket, the moss
Hinders the hinges, and makes them wince.
She must have reached this shrub ere she turned,
As back with that murmur the wicket swung ;
For shelaid the poor snail my chance foot spurned,
To feed and forget it the leaves among.
Down this side of the gravel-walk
She went while her robè's edge brushed the bo.v ;
And here she paused in her gracious talk
To point me a moth on the milk-white phlox.
Roses, ranged in valiant row,
I will never think that she passed you by !
She loves yon, noble roses, I know ;
But yonder see where the rock-plants lie !
This flower she stopped at, finger on lip, —
Stooped over, in doubt, as settling its claim ;
Till she gave me, with pride to make no slip.
Its soft meandering Spanish name.
148
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
ñ
"What a name ! was it love or praise ?
Speech half asleep, or song half awake ?
I must learii Spanisli one of these days,
Only for that slow sweet name's sake.
Eose.s, if 1 live and do well,
I may bring her one of these days,
To li.x you last with as fine a sjiell, —
Fit you each with his Spanish phrase.
But do not detain me now, for she lingers
There, like sunshine over the ground ;
And ever I see her soft white fingers
Searching after the bud she found.
Flower, you Spaniard ! look that you grow not, —
Stay as you are, and be loved forever !
Bud, if I ki.ss you, 't is that you blow not, —
Mind ! the shu.t pink mouth opens never !
For while thus it pouts, her fingers wrestle.
Twinkling the audacious leaves between.
Till round they turn, and down they nestle :
Is not the dear mark still to be seen ?
Where I find her not, beauties v.anish ;
Whither I follow her, beauties flee.
Is there no method to tell her in Spanish
June's twice June since she breathed it with me?
Come, bud ! show me the least of her traces ;
Treasure my lady's lightest footfall :
Ah ! you may flout and turn up your faces,
PlOscs, you are not so fair after all !
Robert Browning.
WHY ?
Wiiy came the rose ? Because the sun, in shining.
Found in the mould some atoms rare and fine ;
.Vnd, stooping, drew and wanned them into grow-
iug.—
Dust, with the spirit's mystic countersign.
What made the perfume ? All his wondrous kisses
Fell on the sweet red mouth, till, lost to sight.
The love became too exquisite, and vanished
Into a viewless rapture of the night.
Why did the rose die ? Ah, why ask the question ?
There is a time to love, a time to give ;
She perished gladly, folding close the secret
Wherein is garnered what it is to live.
Mary Louise Ritter.
A MATCH.
If love were what the rose is.
And I were like the leaf.
Our lives would grow together
In sad or singing weather.
Blown fields or flowerfiil closes,
Green pleasure or gray grief ;
If love were what the rose is.
And 1 were like the leaf.
If I were what the words are.
And love were like the tune.
With double sound and single
Delight our lips would mingle.
With kisses glad as birds are
That get sweet rain at noon ;
If I were what the words are.
And love were like the tune.
If you were life, my darling.
And 1, your love, were death,
We'd shine and snow together
Ere March made sweet the weather
With daffodil and starling
And hours of fruitful breath ;
If you were life, my darling.
And I, your love, were death.
If you were thrall to sorrow.
And I were page to joy.
We'd play for lives and seasons,
W^ith loving looks and treasons.
And tears of night and morrow,
And laughs of maid and boy ;
If you were thrall to sorrow.
And I were page to joy.
If you were April's lady.
And I were lord in May,
We'd throw with leaves for hours.
And draw for days with flowers,
Till day like night were shady.
And night were bright like day ;
If you were April's lady.
And I were lord in May.
If you were queen of pleasure.
And I were king of pain.
We'd hunt down love together.
Pluck out his flying-feather.
And teach his feet a measure.
And find his mouth a rein ;
If you were queen of plea.sure.
And I were king of pain.
Algernon Charles Swinburne.
THE FLOWER 0' DUMBLANE.
The sun has ganedown o'erthe lofty Ben Lomond,
And left the red clouds to preside o'er the scene,
While lanely 1 stray in the calm summer gloamin',
To muse on sweet Jessie, the Flower o' Dum- ,
blane.
a-
LOVE.
149
How sweet is the brier, wi' its saft fauldin' blos¬
som,
And sweet is the birk, wi' its mantle o' green ;
Yet sweeter and fairer, and dear to this bosom.
Is lovely young Jessie, the Flower o' Dumblane.
She's modest as ony, and blithe as she's bonnie, —
For guileless simplicity marks her its ain ;
And far be the villain, divested of feeling,
Wha'd blight in its bloom-the sweet F'lower o'
Dumblane.
Sing on, thou sweet mavis, thy hymn to the
e'ening ! —
Thou 'rt dear to the echoes of Calderwood glen ;
Sae dear to this bosom, sae artless and winning.
Is charming young Jessie, the Flower o' Dum¬
blane.
How lost were my days till I met wi' my Jessie !
The sports o' the city seemed foolish and vain ;
1 ne'er s.aw a nymph I would ca' my dear lassie
Till charmed wi' sweet Jessie, the Flower o'
Dumblane.
Though mine were the station o' loftiest grandeur.
Amidst its profusion I'd languish in pain.
And reckon as naething the height o' its splendor.
If wanting sweet Jessie, the Flower o' Dum¬
blane.
Robert Taxnahill.
■e-
MARY MORI SON.
0 Mart, at thy window be !
It is the wished, the trysted hour !
Those smiles and glances let me see
That make the miser's treasure poor :
How blithely wad I bide the stoure,
A weary slave frae sun to sun.
Could I the rich reward secure.
The lovely Mary Morison.
Yestreen when to the trembling string
The dance gaed through the lighted ha'.
To thee my fancy took its wing, —
I sat, but neither heard nor saw :
Though this was fair, and that was braw.
And yon the toast of a' the town,
1 sighed, and said amang them a',
" Ye are na Mary Morison."
0 Maiy, canst thou wreck his peace
Wha for thy sake wad gladly dee ?
Or canst thou break that heart of his.
Whose only faut is loving, thee ?
If love for love thou wilt na gie.
At least be pity to me shown ;
A thought ungentle canna be
The thought o' Mary Morison.
robert burn's.
0, SAW YE THE LASS?
0, saw ye the lass wi' the bonny blue een ?
Her smile is the sweetest that ever was seen ;
Her cheek like the rose is, but fresher, I ween ;
She's the loveliest lassie that trips on the green.
The home of my love is below in the valley.
Where wild-flowers welcome the wandering bee ;
But the sweetest of flowers in that spot that is
seen
Is the maid that I love wi' the bonny blue eeii.
When night overshadows her cot in the glen.
She '11 steal out to meet her loved Donald again ;
And when the moon shines on the valley so green,
I '11 welcome the lass wi' the bonny blue een.
As the dove that has wandered away from his
nest
Returns to the mate his fond heart loves the best,
I '11 fly from the world's false and vanishing scene.
To my dear one, the lass wi' the bonny blue een.
richard rva.n.
THE LASS OF RICHMOND HILL.
On Richmond Hill there lives a laas
More bright than May-day morn.
Whose charms all other maids surpass, —
A rose without a thoni.
This lass so neat, with smiles so sweet.
Has won my right good-will ;
I'd crowns resign to call her mine.
Sweet lass of Riehmond HilL
Ye zephyrs gay, that fan the air.
And wanton through the grove,
O, whisper to my charming fair,
I die for her I love.
How happy will the shepherd be
Who calls this nymph his' own I
O, may her choice be fixed on me 1
Mine's fixed on her alone.
TAMES Upton.
THE BROOKSIDE.
1 wandered by the brookside,
1 wandered by the mill ;
I could not hear the brook flow, —
The noisy wheel was still ;
There was no burr of grasshopper.
No chirp of any bird.
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound 1 heard.
ifl-
150
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
I sat beneath the elm-tree ;
I watched the long, long shade,
And, as it grew still longer,
I did not feel afraid ;
For 1 listened for a footfall,
1 listened for a word, —
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.
He came not, — no, he came not, —
The night came on alone, —
The little stars sat, one by one.
Each on his golden throne ;
The evening wind passed by my cheek.
The leaves above were stirred, —
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.
Fast silent tears were flowing,
Wlien something stood behind ;
A hand was on my shoulder, —
I knew its touch was kind :
It drew me nearer, — nearer, —
We did not speak one word.
For the beating of our own hearts
Was all the sound we heard.
Richard Monckton Milnes,
lord houghton.
MY DEAR AND ONLY LOVE, 1 PRAY,
My dear and only love, 1 pray
That little world, of thee.
Be governed by no otljer sway
Than purest monarchie.
For if confusion have a part,
• Which vii-tuous souls abhöre.
And hold a synod in thine heart,
1 '11 never love thee more.
As Alexander 1 will reign.
And 1 will reign alone ;
My thoughts did evermore disdain
A rival on my throne ;
He either fears his fate too much.
Or his deserts are small.
That dares not put it to the touch.
To gain or lose it all.
But 1 will reign, and govern still.
And always give the law.
And have each subject at my wiU,
And all to stand in awe ;
But 'gainst my batteries if 1 find
Thou kick, or vex me sore.
As that thou set me up a blind,
1 '11 never love thee more.
And in the empire of thine heart.
Where 1 should solely be.
If others do pretend a part.
Or dare to vie with me.
Or if committees thou erect.
And go on such a score,
1 '11 laugh and sing at thy neglect.
And never love thee more.
But if thou wilt prove faithful then.
And constant of thy word,
1 '11 make thee glorious by my pen.
And famous by my sword ;
I '11 serve thee in such noble ways
Was never heard before,
I '11 crown and deck thee all with bays.
And love thee more and more.
James Graham. Marquxss
of montrose.
LOVE AND TIME.
Two pilgrims from the distant plain
Come quickly o'er the mossy ground.
One is a boy, with locks of gold
Thick curling round his face so fair ;
The other pilgiim, stern and old.
Has snowy beard and silver hair.
The youth with many a merry trick
Goes singing on his careless way ;
His old companion walks as quick.
But speaks no word by night or day.
Where'er the old man treads, the grass .
Fast fadeth with a certain doom ;
But where the beauteous boy doth pass
Unnumbered flowers are seen to bloom.
And thus before the sage, the boy
Trips lightly o'er the blooming lands,
And proudly bears a pretty toy, —
A crystal glass with diamond sands.
A smile o'er any brow would pass
To see him frolic in the sun, —
To see him shake the crystal glass.
And make the sands more quickly run.
And now they leap the streamlet o'er,
A silver thread so white and thin.
And now they reach the open door.
And now they lightly enter in :
" God save all here," — that kind wish fliet
Still sweeter from his lips so sweet ;
"God save you kindly," Noi-ah cries,
"Sit down, my child, and rest and eat."
" Thanks, gentle Norah, fair and good.
We '11 rest awhile our weary feet ;
LOVE.
151
But though this old mau needeth food,
There's nothing here that he can eat.
His taste is strange, he eats alone.
Beneath some ruined cloister's cope,
Or on some tottering turret's stone.
While I can only live on — Hope !
" A week ago, ere you were wed, —
It was the very night before, —
Upon so many sweets I fed
While passing by your mother's door, —
It was that dear, delicious hour
When Owen here the nosegay brought.
And found you in the woodbine bower, —
Since then, indeed, I've needed naught."
A blush steals over Norah's face,
A smile comes over Owen's brow,
A ti-amiuil joy illumes the place.
As if the moon were shining now ;
The boy beholds the pleasing pain.
The sweet confusion he has done.
And shakes the crystal glass again.
And makes the sands moi'e quickly run.
" Dear Norah, we are pilgrims, bound
Upon an endless path sublime ;
We pace the green earth round and round,
And mortals call us Love and Time ;
He seeks the many, I the few ;
I dwell with peasants, he with kings.
We seldom meet ; but when we do,
I take his glass, and he my wings.
" And thus together on we go,
Where'er I chance or wish to lead ;
And Time, whose lonely steps are slow.
Now sweeps along with lightning speed.
Now on our bright predestined way
We must to other regions pass ;
But take this gift, and night and day
Look well upon its truthful glass.
" How quick or slow the bright sands fall
Is hid from lovers' eyes alone.
If you can see tliem move at all.
Be sure your heart has colder grown.
'T is coldness makes the glass grow dry.
The icy hand, the freezing brow ;
But warm the heart and breathe the sigh.
And then they '11 pass you know not how."
She took the glass where Love's warm hands
A bright impeiwious vapor cast.
She looks, but cannot see the sands.
Although she feels they 're falling fast.
But cold hours came, and then, alas !
She saw them falling frozen through,
Till Love's warm light suffused the glass.
And hid the loosening sands from view !
Demis Florence MacCarthv.
FLY TO THE DESERT, FLY WITH ME.
song of nourmahal in "the light of the harem."
" Fly to the desert, fly with me.
Our Arab tents are rude for thee ;
But oh ! the choice what heart can doubt
Of tents with love or thrones without ?
" Our rocks are rough, but smiling there
The acacia waves her yellow hair.
Lonely and sweet, nor loved the less
For flowering in a wilderness.
"Our sands are bare, but down their slope
The silvery-footed antelope
As gracefully and gayly springs
As o'er the marble courts of kings.
" Then come, — thy Arab maid will be
The loved and lone acacia-tree.
The antelope, whose feet shall bless
With their light sound thy loneliness.
" Oh ! there are looks and tones that dart
An instant sunshine through the heart.
As if the soul that minute caught
Some treasure it through life had sought ;
" As if the very lips and eyes
Predestined to have all our siglis.
And never be forgot again.
Sparkled and spoke before as then !
" So came thy every glance and tone,
When first on me they breathed and shone ;
New, as if brought from other spheres.
Yet welcome as if loved for years !
"Then fly with me, if thou hast known
No other flame, nor falsely thrown
A gem aw.ay, that thou hadst sworn
Should ever in thy heart be worn.
" Come, if the love thou hast for me
Is pure and fresh as mine for thee, —
Fresh as the fountain undei'ground.
When first't is by the lapwing found.
" But if for me thou dost forsake
Some other maid, and rudely break
Her worshipped image from its base.
To give to me the ruined place ;
' ' Then, fare thee well ! — I'd rather make
My bower upon some icy lake
When thawing suns begin to shine.
Than trust to love so false as thine ! "
There was a pathos in this lay,
Tiiat even without enchantment's art
Would instantly h.ave found its way
Deep into Selim's burning heart ;
e-
152
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Hut breathing, as it did, a tone
To earthly lutes and lips unknown ;
AVith every chord fresh from the touch
Of music's spirit, 't was too much !
Starting, he dashed away the cup, —
Which, all the time of this sweet ah-.
His hand had held, untasted, up.
As if't were fixed by magic there.
And naming her, so long unnamed.
So long unseen, wildly*exclaimed,
" 0 Nounnahal ! 0 Nourmahal !
Hadst thou but sung this witching strain,
1 could forget — foi'give thee all.
And never leave those eyes again."
The mask is off, — the charm is wrought, —
And Selini to his heart has caught,
1 n blushes, more than ever bright.
His Nourmahal, his Harem's Light !
And well do vanished frowns enhance
The chaim of eveiy brightened glance ;
And dearer seems each dawning smile
For having lost its light awhile ;
And, happier now for all her sighs.
As on his arm her head reposes,
She whispers him, with laughing eyes,
" Eemeinber, love, the Feast of Roses ! "
Thouas Moore.
THE WELCOME.
Come in the evening, or come in the morning ;
Come when you 're looked for, or come without
warning ;
Kisses and welcome you '11 find here before you.
And the oftener you come here the more I '11
adore you !
Jnght is my heart since the day we were
plighted ;
Red is myj cheek that they told me was
blighted ;
The green of the trees looks far greener than
ever,
1 the
don't sever ! '
And the linnets are singing, "True lovere
I&
I '11 pull you sweet flowers, to wear if you choose
them !
Or, after you 've kissed them, "they '11 lie ,on my
bosom ;
I '11 fetch from the mountain its breeze to inspire
you : I
1 '11 fetch from my fancy a tale that won't tire
you.
0, your step's like the rain to the summer-
vexed farmer.
Or sabre and shield to a knight without anuor ;
I'll sing you sweet songs till the stare rise
above me.
Then, wandering, I '11 wish you in silence to
love me.
We '11 look through the trees at the cliff and the
eyrie ;
We '11 tread round the rath on the track of the
fairy ;
We '11 look on the stars, and we '11 list to tlie
river.
Till you ask of your darling what gift you can
give her.
O, she'll whisper you, "Love, as unchange¬
ably beaming.
And tmst, when in secret, most tunefully
streaming ;
TUl the starlight of heaven above us shall
quiver.
As our souls flow in one down eternity's river."
So come in the evening, or come in the morning ;
Come when you 're looked for, or come without
warning ;
Kisses and welcome you '11 find here before you.
And the oftener you come here the more I '11
adore you !
Light is my heart since the day we were
plighted ;
Red is my cheek that they told me was
blighted ;
The green of the trees looks far greener than
ever.
And the-linnets are singing, "Tnie lovers
don't sever ! '
thomas Davis.
COME INTO THE GARDEN, MAUD.
Come into the garden, Maud,
For the black bat, night, has flown !
Come into the gai Jen, JIaud,
I am here at the gate alone ;
And the woodbine spices are wafted abroad.
And the musk of tlie roses blown.
For a breeze of morning moves.
And the planet of Love is on high.
Beginning to faint in tlie light that she loves.
On a bed of dafl'odil sky, —
To faint in the light of the sun that she loves.
To faint in its light, and to die.
All night liave the roses heard
The flute, violin, bassoon ;
All night has the casement jessamine stirred
To the dancers dancing in tune, —
Till a silence fell with the waking bird.
And a hush with tire setting moon.
■ff
!&
LOVE.
133
■a
<0-
I .said to the lily, " There is but one
With whom she has heart to be gay.
When, will the dancers leave her alone ?
She is weary of dance and play."
Kow half to the setting moon are gone.
And half to the rising day ;
Low on the sand and loud on the stone
The last wheel echoes away.
I said to the rose, "The brief night goes
In babble and revel and wine.
O young lord-lover, what sighs are those
For one that will never be thine ?
But mine, but mine,".so I sware to the rose,
" For ever and ever mine ! "
And the soul of the rose went into my blood,
As the music clashed in the hall ;
And long by the garden lahe 1 stood.
For I heard your rivulet fall
From the lake to the meadow and on to the
wood.
Our wood, that is dearer than all ;
From the meadow your walks have left so .sweet
That whenever a March-wind sighs.
He sets the jewel-print of your feet
In violets blue as your eyes.
To the woody hollows in which we meet.
And the valleys of Paradise.
The slender acacia would not shake
One long milk-bloom on the tree ;
The white lake-blossom fell into the lake.
As the pimpernel dozed on the lea ;
But the rose was awake all night for your sake.
Knowing your promise to me ;
The lilies and roses were all awake.
They sighed for the dawn and thee.
Queen rose of the rosebud garden of girls.
Come hither ! the dances are done ;
In gloss of satin and glimmer of pearls.
Queen lily and rose in one ;
Shine out, little head, sunning over with curls.
To the flowers, and be their sun.
There has fallen a splendid tear
From the passion-flower at the gate.
She is coming, my dove, my dear ;
She is coming, my life, my fate !
The red rose cries, " She is near, she is near ; "
And the white rose weeps, "She is late ; "
The larkspur listens, " 1 hear, I hear ; "
And the lily whispers, " I wait."
She is coming, my own, my sweet !
Were it ever so airy a tread,
My heart would hear her and beat.
Were it earth in an earthly bed ;
My dust would hear her and beat.
Had I lain for a century dead ;
Would start and tremble under her feet.
And blossom in purple and red.
ALFRED TENNYSON.
CA' THE YOWES TO THE KNOWES.
Ca' the yermes to the knoaoes,
Ca' them where the Iwaihcr grows,
Ca' them where the humie rowcs.
My bannie dearie.
Hark the mavis' evening sang
Sounding Clouden's woods amang ;
Then a-faulding let us gang, .
My bonnie dearie.
We '11 gae down by Clouden side.
Thro' the hazels spreading wide.
O'er the waves that sweetly glide
To the moon sae clearly.
Yonder Clouden's silent towers.
Where at moonshine midnight hours.
O'er the dewy bending flowers.
Fairies dance sae cheerie.
Ghaist nor bogle shalt thou fear :
Thou 'rt to Love and Heaven sae dear,
Nocht of ill may come thee near.
My bonnie dearie.
Fair and lovely as thou art.
Thou hast stown my very heart ;
I can die — but canna part.
My bonnie dearie.
While waters wimple to the sea ;
While day blinks in the lift sae hie ;
Till clay-cauld death shall blin' my e'e.
Ye shall be my dearie.
robert Burns.
CHARLIE MACHREE.
Come over, come over
The river to me.
If ye are my laddie.
Bold Charlie machree.
Here's Mary McPhereon
And Susy O'Linn,
Who say ye 're faint-hearted.
And darena plunge in.
But the dark rolling water.
Though deep as the sea,
I know willna scare j'e,
Nor keep ye frae me ;
154
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
For stout is yer back,
And strong is yer arm,
And the heart in yer bosom
Is faithful and warm.
Come over, come over
The river to me.
If yc are my laddie.
Bold Charlie machree !
I see him, I see him !
He's plunged in the tide.
His strong arms are dashing
The big waves aside.
O, the dark rolling water
Shoots swift as the sea.
But blithe is the glance
Of his bonny blue e'e.
And his cheeks are like roses,
Twa buds on a bough ;
Wlio says ye 're faint-hearted.
My brave Charlie, now ?
Ho, ho, foaming river.
Ye may roar as ye go.
But ye canna bear Charlie
To the dark loch below !
Come over, come over
The river to me,
My true-hearted laddie.
My Charlie machree !
He's sinking, he's sinkings
O, what shall I do !
Strike out, Charlie, boldly.
Ten strokes and ye 're thro' !
He's sinking, O Heaven !
Ne'er fear, man, ne'er fear ;
I've a kiss for ye, Charlie,
As soon as ye 're here !
He rises, I see him, —
Five strokes, Charlie, mair, —
He's shaking the wet
From his bonny brown hair ;
He conquers the current.
He gains on the sea, —
Ho, where is the swimmer
Like Charlie machree ?
Come over the river.
But once come to me.
And I '11 love ye forever.
Dear Charlie machree !
He's sinking, he's gone, —
0 God ! it is I,
It is I, who have killed him —
Help, help ! — he must die !
Help, help ! — ah, he rises, —
Strike out and ye 're free !
Ho, bravely done, Charlie,
Once more now, for me !
Now cling to the rock.
Now gie us yer hand, —
Ye 're safe, dearest Charlie,
Ye 're safe on the land !
Come rest in my bosom.
If there ye can sleep ;
1 canna speak to ye,
I only can weep.
Ye've crossed the wild river.
Ye've risked all for me.
And I '11 part frae ye never.
Dear Charlie machree !
William J. Hoppin.
KOBIN ADAIR.
What's this dull town to me ?
Robin's not near, —
He whom I wished to see.
Wished for to hear ;
Where's all the joy and mirtfi
Made life a heaven on earth,^''
O, they 're all fled with thee,
Robin Adair !
What made the assembly shine ?
Robin Adair :
What made the ball so fine ?
Robin was there ;
What, when the play was o'er.
What made my heart so sore ?
O, it was parting with
Robin Adair !
But now thou art far from me,
Robin Adair ;
But now I never see
Robin Adair ;
Yet him I loved so well
Still in my heart shall dwell ;
O, I can ne'er forget
Robin Adair !
Welcome on shore again,
Robin Adair !
AVelcome once more again,
Robin Adair !
a-
LOVE.
155
■a
I feel thy trembling hand ;
Tears in thy eyelids stand,
To greet thy native land,
Eobin Adair.
Long I ne'er saw thee, love,
Robin Adair ;
Still I prayed for thee, love,
Robin Adair ;
When thou wert far at sea.
Many made love to me.
But still 1 thought on thee,
Robin Adair.
Come to my heart again,
Robin Adair ;
Never to part again,
Robin Adair ;
And if thou still art true,
I will be constant too.
And will wed none but you,
Robin Adair !
Lady Caroline Keppel.
THE SILLER CROUN.
" And ye sail walk in silk attire.
And siller hae to spare.
Gin ye '11 consent to be his bride.
Nor think o' Donald mair."
O, wha wad buy a silken goun
Wi' a puir broken heart ?
Or what's to me a siller croun
Gin frae my love I part ? ■
The mind whose meanest wish is pure
Far dearest is to me.
And ere I'm forced to break my faith,
I '11 lay me doun an' dee.
For I hae vowed a virgin's vow
My lover's fate to share.
An' he has gi'en to me his heart.
And what can man do mair ?
His mind and manners won my heart ;
He gratefu' took the gift ;
And did I wish to seek it back,
It wad be waur than theft.
The langest life can ne'er repay
The love he bears to me.
And ere I'm forced to break my faith,
I '11 lay me doun an' dee.
Susanna Blamire.
ANNIE LAURIE.*
Maxwelton banks are bonnie.
Where early fa's the dew ;
Where me and Annie Laurie
Made up the promise true ;
Made up the promise true.
And never forget will I ;
And for bonnie Annie Laurie
I '11 lay me down and die.
She's backit like the peacock.
She's breistit like the swan.
She's jimp about the middle.
Her waist ye weel micht span ;
Her waist ye weel micht span.
And she has a rolling eye ;
And for bonnie Annie Laurie
I '11 lay me down and die.
Douglass
THE SONG OF THE CAMP.
" Give us a song ! " the soldiers cried.
The outer trenches guarding,
When the heated guns of the camps aUied
Grew weary of bombarding.
The dark Redan, in silent scoff.
Lay grim and threatening under ;
And the tawny mound of the Malakofif
No longer belched its thunder.
There was a pause. A guardsman said :
" We storm the forts to-morrow ;
Sing while we may, another day
Will bring enough of sorrow."
They lay along the battery's side.
Below the smoking cannon :
Brave hearts from Severn and from Clyde,
And from the banks of Shannon.
They sang of love, and not of fame ;
Forgot was Britain's glory :
Each heart recalled a different name.
But all sang " Annie Laurie."
Voice after voice caught up the song.
Until its tender passion
Rose like an anthem, rieh and strong, —
Their battle-eve confession.
Dear girl, her name he dared not speak.
But as the song grew louder.
Something upon the soldier's cheek
Washed off the stains of powder.
• A daughter of Sir Robert Laurie, whom a Mr. Douglasfi
courted in vain, but whose name he immortalized, says Chamàertm
ff
fi-
156
POEMS OP THE APTWnONS.
Beyond the darkening ocean burned
The bloody sunset's embers.
While the Crimean valleys learned
How English love remembers.
And once again a fire of hell
Eained on the Russian quarters.
With scream of shot, and burst of shell.
And bellowing of the mortars !
And Irish Nora's eyes are dim
For a singer dumb and gory ;
And English Mary mourns for him
Who sang of "Annie Laurie."
Sleep, soldiers ! still in honored rest
Your truth and valor wearing :
The bravest are the tenderest, —
The loving are the daring.
Bayard Taylor.
I&
0 NANNY, WILT THOU GANG WP ME?
O Nanny, wilt thou gang wi' me.
Nor sigh to leave the flaunting town ?
Can silent glens have charms for thee,
The lowly cot and russet gown ?
Nae langer drest in silken sheen,
Nae langer decked wi' jewels rare.
Say, canst thou quit each courtly scene.
Where thou wert fairest of the fair ?
O Nanny, when thou'rt far awa.
Wilt thou not cast a look behind ?
Say, canst thou face the flaky snaw.
Nor shrink before the winter wind ?
O, can that soft and gentle mien
Severest hardships leam to bear.
Nor, sad, regret each courtly scene.
Where thou wert fairest of the fair ?
0 Nanny, canst thou love so true,.
Through perils keen wi' me to gae ?
Or, when thy swain mishap shall rue.
To share with him the pang of wae I
Say, should dise.ase or pain befall.
Wilt thou assume the nurse's care.
Nor, wishful, those gay scenes recall
Where thou wert fairest of the fair ?
And when at last thy love shall die.
Wilt thou receive his parting bi-eath ?
Wilt thou repress each struggling sigh.
And cheer with smiles the bed of death?
And wilt thou o'er his much-loved clay
Strew flowers, and drop the tender tear ?
Nor then regret those scenes so gay.
Where thou wert fairest of the fair ?
Bishop Thomas Percy.
SMILE AND NEVER HEED ME.
Though, when other maids stand by,
I may deign thee no reply.
Turn not then away, and sigh, —
Smile, and never heed me !
If our love, indeed, be such
As must thrill at every touch.
Why should others learn as much ? —
Smile, and never heed me !
Even if, with maiden pride,
I should bid thee quit my side.
Take this lesson for thy guide, —
Smile, and never heed me !
But when stars and twilight meet.
And the dew is falling sweet.
And thou hear'st my coming feet, —
Then—thou then — mayst heed mo!
Charles Swain.
WHISTLE, AND I'LL COME TO YOU,
MY LAD.
0 whistle, ind I '11 come to you, my lad,
O whistle, and 1 '11 come to you, ray lail,
Tho' father .ind mither and a' should gae mad,
O whistle, and I '11 come to you, my lad.
But warily tent, when ye come to court me.
And come na unless the baek-yett be a-jee:
Syne up the back stile, and let naebody see.
And come as ye were na comin' to me.
And come, etc.
0 whistle, etc.
At kirk, or at market, whene'er ye meet me.
Gang by me as tho' that ye cared nae a flie ;
But steal me a blink o' your bonnie black e'e.
Yet look as ye were na lookin' at me.
Yet look, etc.
0 whistle, etc.
Aye vow and protest that ye-care na for me,
And wh'iles ye may lightly my behuty a wee ;
But court nae anither, tho' jokin' ye be.
For fear that she wile your fancy frae me.
For fear, etc.
O whistle, etc.
Robert burns.
THE WHISTLE.
"You have heard," said a youth to his sweet¬
heart, who stood.
While he sat on a corn-sheaf, at daylight's
decline, —
LOVE.
157
"You have heard of the Danish boy's whistle of
wood ?
I wish that that Danish boy's whistle were
mine."
"And what would you do with it? —tell me,"
she said,
M'hile an arch smile played over her beautiful
face.
" I would blow it," he answered ; " and then my
fair maid
Would fly to my side, and would here take her
place."
"Isthat all you wish it for? That may be yours
Without any magic," the fair maiden cried :
"A favor so slight one's good nature secure.s;"
And she playfully seated herself by his side.
" I would blow it again," said the youth, " and
the charm
Would work so, that not even Modesty's check
AVould be able to keep from my neck your fine
aim : "
She smiled, —and she laid her fine arm round
his neck.
"Vet once move would I blow, and the music
divine
Would bring me the third time an exquisite
bliss:
You would lay your fair cheek to this brown one
of mine,
And your lips, stealing past it, would give me
a kiss."
The maiden laughed out in her innocent glee, —
"What a fool of yourself with your whistle
you'd make !
1 )!• only consider, how silly't would be
To sit there and whistle for — what you might
take ! "
Robert Story.
—0—
BEHAVE YOURSEL' BEFORE FOLK.
Behave yoursel' before folk,
Behave yoursel' before folk.
And dinna be sae rude to me.
As kiss me sae before folk.
It wouldna give me meikle jmin,
Gin we were seen and heard by naile,
To tak' a kiss, or grant you ane ;
But giidesake ! no before folk.
Behave youisel' before folk.
Behave yoursel' before folk, —
Whate'er you do when out o' view,
Be cautious aye before folk !
Consider, lad, how folks will crack.
And what a great afiliir they '11 mak'
0' naething but a simple smack.
That's gi'cn or ta'en before folk.
Behave your-scl' before folk,
Behave yoursel' before folk, —
Nor gi'e the tongue o' old and young •
Occasion to come o'er folk.
I'm sure wi' you I've been as free
As ony modest lass should be ;
But yet it doesna do to see
Sic freedom used before folk.
Behave yoursel' before folk.
Behave yoursel' before folk, —
I '11 ne'er submit again to it ;
So mind you that — before folk !
Ye tell me that my face is fair :
It may be sae — 1 dinna care —
But ne'er again gar't blush so sair
As ye hae done before folk.
Behave yoursel' before folk.
Behave yoursel' before folk, —
Nor heat my cheeks wi' your mad freaks.
But aye be douce before folk !
Ye tell me that my lips are sweet ;
Sic tales, 1 doubt, are a' deceit ; —
At ony rate, it's hardly meet
To prie their sweets before folk.
Behave yoursel' before folk.
Behave yoursel' before folk, —
Gin that's tjie case, there's time and place.
But surely no before folk !.,
But gin ye re.ally do insist
Tliat I should suffer to be kissed,
Gae get a license frae the priest,
And mak' me youis before folk !
Behave yoursel' before folk,
Behave yoursel' before folk, —
And when we 're ane, baith flesh and bane.
Ye may tak' ten — before folk !
Alexander Rodcfk.
THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS
LOVE.
Come live with me and be my love.
And we will all the pleasures prove.
That hills and valleys, dales and fields.
And all the craggy mouutains yield.
There will we sit upon the rocks.
And see the shepherds feed their flocks
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.
And will I make thee beds of roses.
With a thousand fragrant posies ;
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POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
A cap of flowers and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle ;
A gown made of the flnest wool
Which from our pretty lambs we pull ;
Slippers lined choicely for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold ;
A belt of straw, and ivy buds,
With coral clasps and amber studs.
The shepherd swains shall dance and sing
For thy delight each May morning ;
And if these pleasures may thee move.
Then live with me and be my love.
christopher marlowe.
THE NYMPH'S REPLY.
If all the world and love were young,
And tnith in every shepherd's tongue,
These pretty pleasures might me move
To live with thee, and be thy love.
Time drives the flocks from field to fold.
When rivers rage and rocks grow cold ;
And Philomel becometh dumb.
The rest complain of cares to come.
The flowers do fade, and wanton fields
To wayward winter reckoning yields ;
A honey tongue, a heart of gall.
Is fancy's spring, but sorrow's fall.
Thy gowns, thy shoes, thy beds of roses.
Thy cap, thy kirtle, and thy posies.
Soon break, soon wither, soou forgotten,
In folly ripe, in reason rotten.
Thy belt of straw and ivy buds.
Thy coral clasps and amber studs ;
All these in me no means can move
To come to thee and be thy love.
But could youth last, and love still breed.
Had joys no date, nor age no need.
Then these delights my mind might move
To live with thee and be thy love.
Sir Walter Raleigh.
■&
MAUD MULLER.
Maud Mulleii, on a summer's day,
Raked the meàJow sweet with hay.
Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth
Of simple beauty and rustic health.
Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee
The mock-bird echoed from his tim
But, when she glanced to the far-off town.
White from its hill-slope looking down.
The sweet song died, and a vague unrest
And a nameless longing filled her breast, —
A wish, that she hardly dared to own.
For something better than she had known.
The Judge rode slowly down the lane.
Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane.
He drew his bridle in the shade
Of the apple-trees, to greet the maid,
And ask a draught from the spring that flowed
Through the meadow, across the road.
She stooped where the cool spring bubbled up.
And filled for Mm her small tin cup.
And blushed as she gave it, looking down
On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown.
" Thanks ! " said the Judge, " a sweeter draught
From a fairer hand was never quaffed."
He spoke of the grass and flowers and trees.
Of the singing birds and the humming bees ;
Then talked of the haying, and wondered wnetner
The cloud in the west would bring foul weather.
And Maud forgot her brier-tom gown.
And her graceful ankles, bare and brown.
And listened, while a pleased surprise
Looked from her long-laslied hazel eyes.
At last, like one who for delay
Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away.
Maud Millier looked and sighed : " Ah me !
That I tlie Judge's bride might be !
" He would dress me up m silks so fine.
And praise and toast me at his wine.
" My father should wear a broadcloth coat.
My brother should sail a painted boat.
" I'd dress my mother so grand and gay.
And the baby should have a new toy each day.
"And I'd feed the hungr)' and clothe the poor.
And all should bless me who left our door."
The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill.
And saw Maud Midler standing still :
" A form more fair, a face more sweet.
Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet.
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LOVE. 159 •-
" And her modest answer and graceful air Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls
Show her wise and good as she is fair. Stretched away into stately halls ;
" Would she were mine, and I to-day, The weary wheel to a spinnet tui-ned,
Like her, a harvester of hay. The tallow candle an astral burned ;
" No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs. And for him who sat by the chimney lug.
Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues. Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug,
" But low of cattle, and song of birds, A manly form at her side she saw.
And health, and quiet, and loving words." And joy was duty and love was law.
But he thought of his sister, proud and cold, Then she took up her burden of life again.
And his mother, vain of her rank and gold. Saying only, "It might have been."
So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on, Alas for maiden, alas for judge.
And Maud was left in the field alone. For rich repiner and household drudge !
But the lawyers smiled that afternoon, God pity them both ! and pity us all,
When he hummed in court an old love tune ; Who vainly the dreams of youth recall ;
And the young girl mused beside the well, For of all sad words of tongue or pen,
Till the rain on the unraked clover fell. The saddest are these ; "It might have been ! "
He wedded a wife of richest dower. Ah, well ! for us all some sweet hope lies
Who lived for fashion, as he for powqf. Deeply buried from human eyes ;
Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow. And, in the hereafter, angels may
He watched a picture come and go ; Roll the stone from its grave away !
John Creenleaf Whittier.
And sweet Maud Muller's hazel eyes
Looked out in their innocent surprise. —
Oft, when the wine in his glass was red, QUAKERDOM.
He longed for the wayside well instead, formal call.
THROtJGH her forced, abnormal quiet
And closed his eyes on his garnished rooms. Flashed the soul of frolic riot.
To dream of meadows and clover blooms ; ^ malicious laughter lighted up her
And the proud man sighed with a secret pain, donnent e^s , .
<< Ai. il i. T c • 1 All m vain I tried each topic,
" Ah, that I were free again ! _ ia it : 1 •
Ranged from polar climes to tropic, —
" Free as when I rode that day commonplace I started met with yes-or-no
Where the barefoot maiden raked the hay." replies.
... , , , For her mother — stiff and stately.
She wedded a man unlearned and Tioor, «-ííei j- iiai
, , , , , , , Í J As if starched and ironed lately —
And many children played round her door. „ . ...... n l u j .a
•' Sat erect, with ngid elbows bedded thus in curv-
But care and sorrow, and child-birth pain, palms ;
Left theii' traces on heart and brain. There she sat on guard before us.
And in words precise, decorous.
And oft, when the summer sun shone hot And most calm, reviewed the weather, and recited
On the new-mown hay in the meadow lot, several psalms.
And she heard the little spring brook fall '¿bmpÛy ending
Over the roadside, through the wall, This my visit, and offending
Wealthy neighbors, vas the problem which, em-
In the shade of the apple-tree again ployed my mental care ;
She saw a rider draw his rein, When the butler, bowing lowly.
Uttered clearly, stiflly, slowly,
And, gazing down with a timid grace, "Madam, please, the gaidener wants you," —
She felt his pleased eyes read her face. Heaven, I thought, has heard my prayer. j
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PüE.MS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
" Pardon me ! " she grandly uttered ;
Bowing low, I gladly muttered,
"Surely, madam!" and, relieved, I turned to
scan the daughter's face : ,
Ha I what pent-up mirth outflashes
From beneath those pencilled lashes !
How the drill of Quaker custom yields to Na¬
ture's brilliant grace.
Brightly springs the prisoned fountain
Ficni the side of Delphi's mountain
When the stone that weighed upon its buoyant
life is thrust aside ;
So the long-enforced stagnation
Of the maiden's conversation
Now imparted five-fold brilliance to its ever-
varying tide.
Widely ranging, quickly changing.
Witty, winning, from beginning
Unto end I listened, merely flinging in a casual
word ;
Eloquent, and yet how simple !
Hand and eye, and eddying dimple,
Tongire and lip together made a music seen as
well as heard.
When the noonday woods are ringing,
All the birds of summer singing,
.•Suddenly there falls a silence, and we know a
serpent nigh :
So upon the door a rattle
Stopped our animated tattle.
And the stately mother found us prim enough to
suit her eye.
Charles C. halpinf..
THE CHESS-BOARD.
My little love, do you remember.
Ere we were grown so sadly wise.
Those cvening.s in the bleak December,
Curtained warm from the snowy weather.
When you and I pl.ayed chess together.
Checkmated by each other's eyes ?
Ah ! still I see your soft white hand
Hovering warm o'er Queen and Knight ;
Brave Pawns in valiant battle stand ;
The double Castles guard the wings ;
The Bishop, bent on distant things.
Moves, sidling, through the fight.
Our fingers touch ; our glances meet.
And falter ; falls your golden hair
Against my cheek ; your bosom sweet
Is heaving. Down the field, your Queen
Hides slow, her soldiery all between,
And checks me unaware.
Ah me ! the little battle '.s done :
Disjrerst is all its chivalry-
Full many a move since then have we
Mid life's perjdexing checkers made.
And many a game with fortune played ;
What is it we have won ?
This, this at least, — if this alone :
That never, never, nevermore.
As in those old still nights of yore,
(Ere we were grown so sadly wise,)
Can you and 1 shut out the skies.
Shut out the world and wintry weather.
And, eyes exchanging warmth with eyes,
Play chess, as then we played together.
Robert Bulwer. i.ord Lytto.v.
(Oti/eft Mer,'dith.)
SONG.
Too late, alas I I must confess.
You need not arts to move me ;
Such charms by nature you possess,
"T were madness not to love ye.
Then spare a heart you may surprise.
And give my tongue the glory-
To boast, though my unfaithful eyes
Betray a tender story.
John Wilmot, Earl of Rochesthr.
SUMMER DAYS.
Ix summer, when the days were long.
We walked together in the wood :
Our heart was light, our step was strong ;
weet ñutterings were there in our blood.
In summer, when the days were long.
We strayed from morn till evening came ;
We gathered flowers, and wove us crowns ;
We walked mid jroppies red as flame.
Or sat upon the yellow downs ;
And always wished our life the same.
In summer, when the days were long,
Wc leaped the hedge-row, cr ossed the brook ;
And still her voice flowed forth in song.
Or else she read some graceful book.
In summer, when the days were long.
And then we sat beneath the trees.
With shadows lessening in the noon ;
And in the sunlight and the breexe.
We feasted, many a gorgeous June,
While larks were singing o'er the leas.
LOVE.
161
In summer, when the days were long,
On dainty chicken, snow-white bread.
We feasted, with no grace but song ;
We plucked wild strawberries, ripe and red.
In summer, when the days were long.
We loved, and yet we knew it not, —
For loving seemed like breathing then ;
We found a heaven in eveiy spot ;
Saw angels, too, in all good men ;
And dreamed of God in giove and grot.
In summer, when the days are long.
Alone I wander, muse alone.
I see her not ; but that old song
Under the fragrant wind is blown.
In summer, when the days are long.
Alone I wander in the wood :
But one fair spirit hears my sighs ;
And half I see, so glad and good.
The honest daylight of her eyes.
That charmed me under earlier skies.
In summer, when the days are long,
I love her as we loved of old.
My heart is light, my step is strong ;
For love brings back those hours of gold.
In summer, when the days are long.
anonymous.
FORGET THEE?
"Forget thee ?" — If to .dream by night, and
muse on thee by day.
If all the worship, deep and wüd, a poet's heart
can pay.
If prayers in absence breathed for thee to Heav¬
en's protecting power.
If winged thoughts that flit to thee — a thousand
in an hour.
If busy Fancy blending thee with all my future
lot, —•
If this thou call'st "forgetting," thou indeed
shalt be forgot !
" Forget thee ? " — Bid the forest-birds forget
their sweetest tune ;
"Forget thee ?" — Bid the sea forget to swell
beneath the moon ;
Bid the thirsty flowers forget to drink the eve's
refreshing dew ;
Thyself forget thine "own dear land," and its
"mountains wüd and blue;"
Forget each old familiar face, each long-remem¬
bered spot ; —
When these things are forgot by thee, then thou
shalt be forgot !
Keep, if thou wilt, thy maiden peace, still calm
and fancy-free.
For God forbid thy gladsome heart should grow
less glad for me ;
Yet, while that heart is still unwon, 0, bid not
mine to rove.
But let it nurse its humble faith and uncomplain¬
ing love ;
If these, preserved for patient years, at last avail
me not,
Forget me then ; — but ne'er believe that thou
canst be forgot !
John Moultrie.
DINNA ASK ME.
0, ninna ask me gin I lo'e ye :
Troth, I dauma tell !
Dinna ask me gin I lo'e ye, —
A.sk it o' yoursel'.
O, dinna look sae sair at me.
For weel ye ken me true ;
0, gin ye look sae sair at me,
I dauma look at you.
When ye gang to yon braw braw town,
And bonnier lassies see,
O, dinna, Jamie, look at them.
Lest ye should mind na me.
For I could never bide the lass
That ye'd lo'e mair than me ;
And 0, I'm sure my heart wad brak.
Gin ye'd prove fause to me !
John dunlop.
SONG.
At setting day and rising mom.
With soul that still shall love thee,
I '11 ask of Heaven thy safe return.
With all that can improve thee.
I '11 visit aft the birken bush.
Where first thou kindly told me
Sweet tales of love, and hid thy blush,
Whüst round thou didst infold me.
To all our haunts I will repair.
By greenwood shaw or fountain ;
Or where the summer day I'd share
With thee upon yon mountain ;
There will I tell the trees and flowers.
From thoughts unfeigned and tender.
By vows you 're mine, by love is yours
A heart which cannot wander.
Allan Ramsay.
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162
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
LOVE.
All thoughts, all passions, all delights.
Whatever stirs this mortal frame.
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.
Oft in my waking dreams do 1
Live o'er again that happy hour,
When midway on the mount I lay
Beside the ruined tower.
The moonshine stealing o'er the scene
Had blended with the lights of eve ;
And she was there, my hope, my joy.
My own dear Genevieve !
She leaned against the armed man,
The statue of the armèd knight ;
She stood and listened to my lay,
Amid the lingering hght.
Few sorrows hath she of her own.
My hope ! my joy ! my Genevieve !
She loves me best whene'er I sing
The songs that make her grieve.
I played a soft and doleful air,
I sang an old and moving story, —
An old rude song, that suited well
That ruin wild and hoary.
She listened with a flitting blush.
With downcast eyes and modest grace ;
For well she knew, I could not choose
But gaze upon her face.
I told her of the Knight that wore
Upon his shield a burning brand ;
And that for ten long years he wooed
The Lady of the Land.
I told her how he pined ; and ah !
The deep, the low, the pleading tone
With which I sang another's love
Interpreted my own.
She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes and modest grace ;
And she forgave me that I gazed
Too fondly on her face.
But when I told the cruel scorn
That crazed that bold and lovely Knight,
And that he crossed the mountain-woods.
Nor rested day nor night ;
That sometimes from the savage den.
And sometimes from the darksome shade.
And sometimes starting up at once
In green and sunny glade.
There came and looked him in the face
An angel beautiful and bright ;
And that he knew it was a Fiend,
This miserable Knight !
And that unknowing what he did.
He leaped amid a murderous band.
And saved from outrage worse than death
The Lady of the Land ;
And how she wept, and clasped his knees ;
And how .she tended him in vain ;
And ever strove to expiate
The scorn that crazed his brain ;
And that she nursed him in a cave.
And how his madness went away.
When on the yellow forest-leaves
A dying man he lay ;
— His dying words—but when I reached
That tenderest strain of all the ditty,
My faltering voice and pausing harp
Disturbed her soul with pity !
All impulses of soul and sense
Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve ;
The music and the doleful tale.
The rich and balmy eve ;
And hopes, and fears that kindle hope.
An imdistinguishable throng.
And gentle wishes long subdued.
Subdued and cherished long.
She wept with pity and delight.
She blushed with love, and virgin shame ;
And like the murmur of a dream,
I heard her breathe my name.
Her bosom heaved, — she stepped aside.
As conscious of my look she stept, —
Then suddenly, with timorous eye
She fled to me and wept.
She half enclosed me with her arms.
She pressed me with a meek embrace ;
And bending back her head, looked up.
And gazed upon my face.
'T was partly love, and partly fear.
And partly't was a bashful art
That I might rather feel than see
The swelling of her heart.
I calmed her fears, and she was calm.
And told her love with virgin pride ;
And so I won my Genevieve,
My bright and beauteous Bride.
samuel Taylor Coleridge
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LOVE 163
J
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WHEN THE KYE COMES HAME.
Come, all ye jolly shepherds
That whistle through the glen,
I '11 tell ye of a secret
That courtiers dinna ken :
What is the greatest bliss
That the tongue o' man can name ?
'T is to woo a bonny lassie
When the kye comes hame !
When the kye comes hame.
When the kye comes hame,
'Tween the gloaming and the mirk,
When the kye comes hame !
'T is not beneath the coronet.
Nor canopy of state,
'T is not on couch of velvet.
Nor arbor of the great, —
'T is beneath the spreading birk.
In the glen without the name,
Wi' a bonny, bonny lassie.
When the kye comes hame !
When the kye comes hame, etc.
There the blackbird bigs his nest
For the mate he loes to see.
And on the topmost bough,
0, a happy bird is he ;
Where he pours his melting ditty.
And love is a' the theme.
And he '11 woo his bonny lassie
When the kye comes hame !
When the kye comes hame, etc.
When the blewart bears a pearl.
And the daisy turns a pea.
And the bonny lucken gowan
Has fauldit up her ee.
Then the laverock frae the blue lift
Doops down, an' thinks nae shame
To woo his bonny lassie
When the kye comes hame !
When the kye comes hame, etc.
See yonder pawkie shepherd.
That lingers on the hill.
His ewes are in the fauld.
An' his lambs are lying still ;
Yet he downa gang to bed.
For his heart is in a flame.
To meet his bonny lassie
When the kye comes hame !
When the kye comes hame, etc.
■When the little wee bit heart
Rises high in the breast.
An' the little wee bit stam
Rises red in the east.
0 there's a joy sae dear.
That the heart can hardly frame,
Wi' a honny, bonny lassie.
When the kye comes hame !
When the kye comes hame, etc.
Then since all nature joins
In this love without alloy,
0, wha wad prove a traitor
To Nature's dearest joy ?
0, wha wad choose a crown,
Wi' its perils and its fame.
And miss his bonny lassie
When the kye comes hame ?
When the kye comes hame.
When the kye comes hame,
'Tween the gloaming and the mirk.
When the kye comes hame !
James hocc.
LADY BARBARA.
Eael Gawain wooed the Lady Barbara,
High-thoughted Barbara, so white and cold !
'Mong broad-branched beeches in the summer
shaw.
In soft green light his passion he has told.
When rain-beat winds did shriek across the wold.
The Earl to take her fair reluctant ear
Framed passion-trembled ditties manifold ;
Silent' she sat his amorous breath to hear.
With calm and steady eyes ; her heart was other¬
where.
He sighed for herj through all the summer weeks ;
Sitting beneath a tree whose fruitful boughs
Bore glorious apples with smooth, shining cheeks.
Earl Gawain came and whispered, " Lady, rouse !
Thou art no vestal held in holy vows ;
Out with our falcons to the pleasant heath."
Her father's blood leapt up into her brows, —
He who, exulting on the trumpet's breath.
Came charging like a star across the lists of
death.
Trembled, and passed before her high rebuke :
And then she sat, her hands clasped round her
knee ;
Like one far-thoughted was the lady's look.
For in a morning cold as misery
She saw a lone ship sailing on the sea ;
Before the north't was driven like a cloud.
High on the poop a man sat mournfully :
The wind was whistling through mast and
shroud,
And to the whistling wind thus did he s''ng
aloud ; —
1
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POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
■a
" Didst look last night upon my native vales,
Thou Sun ! that from the drenching sea hast
clomb ?
Ye demon winds ! that glut my gaping sails,
Upon the salt sea must 1 ever roam.
Wander forever on the barren foam ?
0, happy are ye, resting mariners !
0 Death, that thou wouldst come and take me
home !
A hand unseen this vessel onward steers,
And onward I must float through slow, moon-
measured years.
"Ye winds ! when like a curse ye drove us on.
Frothing the waters, and along our way.
Nor cape nor headland through red mornings
shone.
One wept aloud, one shuddered down to pray,
One howled, ' Upon the deep we are astray.'
On our wild hearts his words fell like a Might
In one short hour my hair was stricken gray.
For all the crew sank ghastly in my sight
As we went driving on through the cold starry
night.
" Madness fell on me in my loneliness.
The sea foamed curses, and the reeling sky
Became a dreadful face which did oppress
Me with the weight of its unwinking eye.
It fled, when I hurst forth into a cry, —
A shoal of fiends came on me from the deep ;
1 hid, hut in all comers they did pry.
And dragged me forth, and round did dance and
leap;
They mouthed on me in dream, and tore me
from sweet sleep.
"Strange constellations humed above my head.
Strange birds around the vessel shrieked and flew.
Strange shapes, like shadows, through the clear
sea fled.
As our lone ship, wide-winged, came nppling
through.
Angering to foam the smooth and sleeping blue. "
The lady sighed, "Far, far upon the sea.
My own Sir Arthur, could I die with you !
The wind blows shrill between my love and me."
Fond heart ! the space between was but the apple-
tree. •
There was a cry of joy ; with seeking hands
She fled to him, like worn bird to her nest ;
Like washing water on the figured sands.
His being came and went in sweet unrest.
As from the mighty shelter of his breast
The Lady Barbara her head uprears
With a wan smile, ' ' Methinks I'm but half blest :
Now when I 've found thee, after weary years,
I cannot see thee, love ! so blind I am with tears. "
Alexander Smith.
ATALANTA'S RACE.
from "the earthly paradise"
atalanta victorious.
And there two runners did the sign abide
Foot set to foot, — a young man slim and fair.
Crisp-haired, well knit, with firm limbs often tried
In places where no man his strength may spare ;
Dainty his thin coat was, and on his hair
A golden circlet of renown he wore.
And in his hand an olive garland bore.
But on this day with whom shall he contend ?
A maid stood by him like Diana clad
When in the woods she lists her bow to bend.
Too fair for one to look on and be glad.
Who scarcely yet has thirty summers had.
If he must still behold her from afar ;
Too fair to let the world live free from war.
She seemed all earthly matters to forget ;
Of all tormenting lines her face was clear.
Her wide gray eyes upon the goal were set
Calm and unmoved as though no soul were near :
But her foe trembled as a man in fear.
Nor from her loveliness one moment turned
His anxious face with fierce desire that burned.
Now through the hush there broke the trum¬
pet's clang
Just as the setting sun made eventide.
Then from light feet a spurt of dust there sprang
And swiftly were they running side by side ;
But silent did the thronging folk abide
Until the turning-post was reached at last.
And round about it still abreast they passed.
But when the people saw how close they ran.
When half-way to the starting-point they were,
A cry of joy broke forth, whereat the man
Headed the white-foot runner, and drew near
Unto the very end of aU his fear;
And scarce his straining feet the ground could feel.
And bliss unhoped for o'er his heart 'gan steal.
But midst the loud victorious shouts he heard
Her footsteps drawing nearer, and the sound
Of fluttering raiment, and thereat afeard
His flushed and eager face he turned around.
And even then he felt her past him bound
Fleet as the wind, but scarcely saw her Hiere
Till on the goal she laid her fingers fair.
There stood she breathing like a little child
Amid some warlike clamor laid asleep.
For no victorious joy her red lips smiled.
Her cheek its wonted freshness did but keep ;
No glance lit up her clear gray eyes and deep.
Though some divine thought softened all her face
As once more rang the trumpet through the place.
-ff
LOVE.
165
But her late foe stopped short amidst his course.
One moment gazed upon her piteously,
Then with a groan his lingering feet did force
To leave the spot whence he her eyes could see ;
And, changed like one who knows his time must be
But short and bitter, without any word
He knelt before the hearer of the sword ;
Then high rose up the gleaming deadly blade.
Bared of its flowers, and through the crowded place
Was silence now, and midst of it the maid
Went by the poor wretch at a gentle pace.
And he to hers upturned his sad white face ;
Nor did his eyes behold another sight
Ere on his soul there fell eternal night.
ATALANTA CONQUERED.
Now has the lingering month at last gone by.
Again are all folk round fhe running place.
Nor other seems the dismal pageantry
Than heretofore, hut that another face
Looks o'er the smooth course ready for the race ;
For now, beheld of all, MUanion
Stands on the spot he twice has looked upon.
But yet — what change is this that holds the
maid?
Does she indeed see in his glittering eye
More than disdain of the sharp shearing blade.
Some happy hope of help and victory?
The others seemed to say, "We come to die.
Look down upon us for a little while.
That dead, we may bethink us of thy smile."
But he — what look of mastery was this
He cast on her ? why were his lips so red ?
Why was his face so flushed with happiness ?
So looks not one who deems himself but dead.
E'en if to death he bows a willing head ;
So rather looks a god well pleased to find
Some earthly damsel fashioned to his mind.
Why must she drop her lids before his gaze.
And even as she casts adown her eyes
Redden to note his eager glance of praise.
And wish that she were clad in other guise ?
Why must the memory to her heart arise
Of things unnoticed when they first were heard.
Some lover's song, some answeringmaiden's word ?
What makes these longings, vague, without a
name.
And this vain pity never felt before.
This sudden languor, this contempt of fame.
This tender sorrow for the time past o'er.
These doubts that grow each minute more and
more ?
Why does she tremble as the time grows near.
And weak defeat and woful victory fear ?
But while she seemed to hear her heating heart,
Above their heads the trumpet blast rang out.
And forth they sprang ; and she must play her
part ;
Then flew her white feet, knowing not a doubt.
Though slackening once, she turned her head
about.
But then she cried aloud and faster fled
Than e'er before, and all men deemed him dead.
But with no sound he raised aloft his hand.
And thence what seemed a ray of light there flew
And past the maid rolled on along the sand ;
Then trembling she her feet together drew.
And in her heart a strong desire there grew
To have the toy ; some god she thought had
given
That gift to her, to make of earth a heaven.
Then from the course with eager steps she ran.
And in her odorous bosom laid the gold.
But when she turned again, the great-limbed
man
Now well ahead she failed not to behold.
And mindful of her glory waxing cold.
Sprang up and followed him in hot pursuit.
Though with one hand she touched the golden
fruit.
Note, too, the bow that she was wont to bear
She laid aside to grasp the glittering prize.
And o'er her shoulder from the quiver fair
Three arrows fell and lay before her eyes
Unnoticed, as amidst the people's cries
She sprang to head the strong Milanion,
Who now the turning-post had wellnigh won.
as he set his mighty hand on it,
Wliite fingers underneath his own were laid.
And white limbs from Ms dazzled eyes did flit.
Then he the second fruit cast by the maid ;
But she ran on awllile, then as afraid
Wavered and stopped, and turned and made no
stay
Until the globe with its bright fellow lay.
Then, as a troubled glance she cast around.
Now far ahead the Argive could she see.
And in her garment's hem one hand she wound
To keep the double prize, and strenu'ously
Sped o'er the course, and little doubt had she
To wjn the day, though now but scanty space
Was left betwixt him and the winning place.
Short was the way unto such winged feet.
Quickly she gained upon him till at last
He turned about her eager eyes to meet.
And from his hand the third fair apple cast.
She wavered not, but turned and ran so fast
[S-
,, 166 POEMS OP
After the prize that should her bliss fulfil,
That in her hand it lay ere it was stiU.
if or did she rest, but turned about to win
Once more, an unblest, woful victory—
And yet —and yet—why does her breath begin
To fail her, and her feet drag heavily ?
Why fails she now to see if far or nigh
The goal is ? Why do her gray eyes grow dim ?
Why do these tremors run through every limb ?
She spreads her arms abroad some stay to find
Else must she fall, indeed, and findeth this,
A strong man's arms about her body twined.
Nor may she shudder now to feel his kiss,
So wrapped she is in new, unbroken bliss :
Made happy that the foe the prize hath won.
She weeps glad tears for all her glory done.
William Morkis.
FATIMA AND EADUAN.
from the spanish.
** Diamante falso y ñngido,
Ez^astado en pedernal," etc.
" False diamond set in flint ! hard heart in
haughty breast !
By a softer, warmer bosom the tiger's couch is
prest.
Thou art fickle as the sea, thou art wandering
as the wind.
And the restless ever-mounting flame is not
more hard to bind.
If the tears I shed were tongues, yet aU too few
would be
To tell of all the treachery that thou hast shown
to me.
Oh! I could chide thee sharply, — but every
maiden knows
That she who chides her lover forgives him ere
he goes.
" Thou hast called me oft the flower of all Gre¬
nada's maids,
Thou hast said that by the side of me the first
and fairest fades ;
And they thought thy heart was mine, and it
seemed to every one
That what thou didst to win my love, for love of
me was done.
Alas ! if they but knew thee, a-s mine it is to
know.
They well might see another mark to which
thine arrows go ;
But thou giv'st little heed, — for 1 speak to one
who knows
That she who chides her lover forgives him ere
à he goes.
AFFECTIONS.
" It wearies me, mine enemy, that 1 must weep
and bear
What fills thy heart with triumph, and fills my
own with care.
Thou art leagued with those that hate me, and
ah ! thou know'st I feel
That cruel words as surely kill as shai'pest blades
of steel.
'T was the doubt that thou wert false that wrung
my heart with pain ;
But, now 1 know thy perfidy, 1 shall be well
again.
1 would proclaim thee as thou art, — but every
maiden knows
That she who chides her lover forgives him ere
he goes."
Thus Fatima complained to the valiant Raduan,
Where underneath the myrtles Alhambra's foun¬
tains ran :
The Moor was inly moved, and, blameless as he
was.
He took her white hand in his own, and pleaded
thus his cause ;
"0 lady, dry those star-like eyes, —their dim¬
ness does me wrong ;
If my heart be made of flint, at least 'twill keep
thy image long ;
Thou hast uttered cniel words, — but 1 grieve
the less for those.
Since she who chides her lover forgives him ere
he goes."
William Collen Bryant.
FIRST LOVK
from " don juan," canto i.
'T IS sweet to hear.
At midnight on the blue and moonlit deep.
The song and oar of Adria's gondolier,
By distance mellowed, o'er the waters sweep ;
'T is sweet to see the evening star appear ;
'T is sweet to listen as the night-winds creep
From leaf to leaf ; 't is sweet to view on high
The rainbow, based on ocean, span the sky.
'T is sweet to hear the watch-dog's honest bark
Bay deep-mouthed welcome as we draw near
home ;
'T is sweet to know there is an eye wül mark
Our coming, and look brighter when we come ;
'T is sweet to be awakened by the lark,
Or lulled by falling waters ; sweet the hum
Of bees, the voice of girls, the song of birds,
The lisp of children, and their earliest words.
1
r
^ LOVE. 167 ^
1
Sweet is the vintage, when the showering grapes She, rosy in the morning light.
In Bacchanal profusion reel to earth. Among the water-daisies white.
Purple and gushing : sweet are our escapes Like some fair sloop appeared to sail.
From civic revelry to rural mirth ;
Sweet to the miser are his glittering heaps ; Against her ankles as she trod
Sweet to the father is his first-born's birth ; Tli® lucky buttercups did nod :
Sweet is revenge, — especially to women, I leaned upon the gate to see.
Pillage to soldiers, prize-money to seamen. The sweet thing looked, but did not speak ;
A dimple came in either cheek,
'T is sweet to win, no matter how, one's laurels, -^d all my heart was gone from me.
By blood or ink ; 't is sweet to put an end
To strife; 'tis sometimes sweet to have our Then, as I lingered on the gate,
quarrels came up like coming fate.
Particularly with a tiresome friend ; ^ ^ picture in her eyes, -
Sweet is old wine in bottles, ale in barrels ; Clear dancirg eyes, more black than sloes !
Dear is the helpless creature we defend Cheeks like the mountain pink, that grows
Against the world ; and dear the school-boy spot Among white-headed majesties !
We ne'er forget, though there we are forgot. j ^
„ „ That I would fain to thee unfold.
But sweeter stül than this, than these, than all, ¡
Is first and passionate love, - it stands alone, ^ .
Like Adam's recollection of his fall; " I cannot heed it now," she said,
an's known""^ ^ ~ milking-paU."
And life yields nothing further to recall She laughed. What good to make ado ?
Worthy of this ambrosial sin, so shown, I held the gate, and she came through.
No doubt in fable, as the unforgiven And took her homeward path anon.
Fire which Prometheus filched for us from From the clear pool her face had fied ;
heaven. It rested on my heart instead.
Reflected when the maid was gone.
With happy youth, and work content,
A MAIDEN WITH A MILKIN6-PAIL. So sweet and stately, on she went,
J Right careless of the imtold tale.
Each step she took 1 loved her more.
What change has made the pastures sweet, followed to her dairy door
And reached the daisies at my feet, maiden with the milking-pail.
And cloud that wears a golden hem ?
This lovely world, the hills, the sward, — n.
They aU look fresh, as if our Lord hearts where wakened love doth lurk.
But yesterday had finished them. How fine, how blest a thing is work !
. For work does good when reasons faü, —
And here s the field with light aglow :
How fresh its boundary lime-trees show ! ^he echo of a name awoke, -
And how its wet leaves trembling shine ! Martindale.
Between their trunks come through to me
The morning sparkles of the sea, I'm glad that echo was not heard
Below the level browsing line. Aright by other men. A bird
Knows doubtless what his own notes tell ;
I see the pool, more clear by half And 1 know not, — but I can say
Than pools where other waters laugh I felt as shamefaced all that day
Up at the breasts of coot and rail. As if folks heard her name right well.
There, as she passed it on her way,
I saw reflected yesterday And when the west began to glow
A maiden with a milking-pail, I went — I could not choose but go —
To that same dairy on the hill ;
There, neither slowly nor in haste, • And while sweet Mary moved about
One hand upon her slender waist. Within, I came to her without.
The other lifted to her pail, — And leaned upon the window-sill.
"1 - ■ -P
LI * Lj
168
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
The garden border where I stood
Was sweet with pinks and southernwood.
I spoke, — her answer seemed to fail.
I smelt the pinks, — I could not see.
The dusk came down and sheltered me.
And in the dusk she heard my tale.
And what is left that 1 should tell ?
1 begged a kiss, — 1 pleaded well :
The rosebud lips did long decline ;
But yet, 1 think — 1 think't is true —
That, leaned at last into the dew.
One little instant they were mine !
0 life ! how dear thou hast become !
She laughed at dawn, and 1 was dumb !,
But evening counsels best prevail.
Fair shine the blue that o'er her spreads,
Green be the pastures where she treads.
The maiden with the milking-pail !
Jean Ingelow.
SONG OF THE MILKMAID.
from " queen mary.",
Shame upon you, Robin,
Shame upon you now !
Kiss me would you ? with my hands
Milking the cow ?
Daisies grow again.
Kingcups blow again.
And you came and kissed me milking the cow.
Robin came behind me.
Kissed me well 1 vow ;
Cuff him could 1 ? with my hands
Milking the cow ?
Swallows fly again.
Cuckoos cry again,
And you came and kissed me milking the cow.
Come, Robin, Robin,
Come and kiss me now ;
Help it can 1 ? with my hands
Milking the cow ?
Ringdoves coo again.
All things woo again.
Come behind and kiss me milking the cow !
Alfred Tennyson.
THE MILKMAID'S SONG.
Turn, turn, for my cheeks they bum.
Turn by the dale, my Harry !
Fill paU, flU pail.
He has turned by the dale.
And there by the stile waits Harry.
FUI, ñll,
FUI, pail, fill.
For there by the stUe waits Harry !
The world may go round, the world may stand
still.
But I can milk and marry.
Fill pail,
1 can milk and marry.
Wheugh, wheugh !
0, if we two
Stood down there now by the water,
1 know who'd carry me over the ford
As brave as a soldier, as proud as a lord.
Though 1 don't live over the water.
Wheugh, wheugh ! he's whistling through.
He's whistling " The Farmer's Daughter."
Give down, give down.
My crumpled brown !
He shall not take the road to the town.
For 1 '11 meet him beyond the water.
Give down, give down.
My crumpled brown !
And send me to my Harry.
The folk o' towns
May have silken gowns.
But 1 can milk and marry.
Fill pail,
1 can milk and marry.
Wheugh, wheugh ! he has whistled through
He has whistled through the water.
FiU, fill, with a will, a will.
For he's whistled through the water.
And he's whistling down
The way to the town.
And it's not " The Farmer's Daughter ! "
Churr, churr ! goes the cockchafer.
The sun sets over the water,
Churr, chuir ! goes the cockchafer,
1 'm too late for my Harry !
And, 0, if he goes a-soldiering.
The cows they may low, the bells they may ring.
But 1 '11 neither milk nor marry,
FiU pail,
Neither milk nor marry.
My brow beats on thy flank, FiU pail.
Give down, good wench, give down !
1 know the primrose bank, FiU paU,
Between him and the town.
Give down, good wench, give down, FiU paU,
And he shall not reach the town !
Strain, strain ! he's whistling again.
He's nearer by half a mile.
More, more ! 0, never before
Were you such a weary while !
Fill, fill ! he's crossed the hill.
LOVE.
169
a
I can see him down by the stile,
He's passed the hay, he's coming this way,
He's coming to me, my Harry !
Give silken gowns to the folk o' towns.
He's coming to me, my Harry !
There's not -so grand a dame in the land.
That she walks to-night with Harry !
Come late, come soon, come sun, come moon,
0, 1 can milk and marry.
Fill pail,
I can milk and marry.
Wheugh, wheugh ! he has whistled through.
My Harry ! my lad ! my lover !
Set the sun and fall the dew.
Heigh-ho, merry world, what's to do
That you 're smiling over and over ?
Up on the hill and down in the dale.
And along the tree-tops over the vale
Shining over and over.
Low in the grass and high on the bough.
Shining over and over,
0 -world, have you ever a lover ?
You were so dull and cold just now,
0 world, have you ever a lover ?
1 could not see a leaf on the tree.
And now I could count them, one, two, three.
Count them over and over.
Leaf from leaf like lips apart.
Like lips apart for a lover.
And the hillside beats with my beating heart,
And the apple-tree blushes all over.
And the May bough touched me and made me
start.
And the wind breathes warm like a lover.
Pull, pull ! and the pail is full.
And milking's done and over.
Who would not sit here under the tree ?
What a fair fair thing's a green field to see !
Brim, brim, to the rim, ah me !
I have set my pail on the daisies !
It seems so light, — can the sun be set ?
The dews must be heavy, my cheeks are wet,
1 could cry to have hurt the daisies !
Harry is near, Harry is near.
My heart's as sick as if he were here.
My lips are burning, my cheeks are wet.
He has n't uttered a word as yet.
But the air's astir with his praises.
My Harry !
The air's astir with your praises.
He has scaled the rock by the pixy's stone.
He's among the kingcups, — he picks me one,
I love the grass that I tread upon
When I go to iny Harry !
He has jumped the brook, he has climbed the
knowe.
There's never a faster foot I know,
But still he seems to tai-ry.
0 Harry ! 0 Harry ! my love, my pride.
My heart is leaping, my arms are wide !
Roll up, roll up, you dull hillside.
Roll up, and bring my Harry !
They may talk of glory over the sea.
But Harry's alive, and Harry's for me.
My love, my lad, my Harry !
Come spring, come winter, come sun, come snow.
What cares DoUy, whether or no.
While I can milk and marry ?
Right or wrong, and wrong or right.
Quarrel who quarrel, and fight who fight.
But I '11 bring my pail home every night
To love, and home, and Harry '
We'll drink our can, we '11 eat our cake.
There's beer in the barrel, there's bread in the
bake.
The world may sleep, the world may wake.
But I shall milk and marry.
And marry,
1 shall milk and marry.
Sydney Dobell.
FETCHING WATER FROM THE WET.T.
Early on a sunny morning, while the lark was
singing sweet.
Came, beyond the ancient farm-house, sounds of
lightly tripping feet.
'T was a lowly cottage maiden going, — why, let
young hearts teU, —
With her homely pitcher laden, fetching water
from the well.
Shadows lay athwart the pathway, all along the
quiet lane.
And the breezes of the morning moved them to
and fro again.
O'er the sunshine, o'er the shadow, passed the
maiden of the famr,
With a charmed heart within her, thinking of
no ill nor harm.
Pleasant, surely, were her musings, for the nod¬
ding leaves in vain
Sought to press their brightening image on her
ever-busy brain.
Leaves and joyous birds went by her, like a dim,
half-waking dream ;
And her soul was only conscious of life's gladdest
summer gleam.
At the old lane's shady turning lay a weU of
water bright.
Singing, soft, its hallelujah to the gi-acious morn¬
ing light.
fl-
170
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Fern-leaves, broad and green, bent o'er it where
its silvery droplets fell.
And the fairies dwelt beside it, in the spotted
foxglove bell.
Back she bent the shading fem-leaves, dipt the
pitcher in the tide, —
Drew it, with the dripping waters flowing o'er
its glazed side.
But before her arm could place it on her shiny,
wavy hair.
By her side a youth was standing ! — Love re¬
joiced to see the pair !
Tones of tremulous emotion trailed upon the
morning breeze.
Gentle words of heart-devotion whispered 'neath
the ancient trees.
But the holy, blessed secrets it becomes me not
to tell :
Life had met another meaning, fetching water
from the well !
Down the rural lane they sauntered. He the
burden-pitcher bore ;
She, with dewy eyes down looking, grew more
beauteous than before !
When they neared the silent homestead, up he
raised the pitcher light ;
Like, a fitting crown he placed it on her hair of
wavelets bright :
Emblems of the coming burdens that for love of
him she'd bear.
Calling every burden blessed, if his love but
lighted there.
Then, still waving benedictions, further, further
oflf he drew.
While his shadow seemed a glory that across the
pathway grew.
Now about her household duties sUently the
maiden went.
And an ever-radiant halo o'er her daily life was
blent.
Little knew the aged matron as her feet like
music fell.
What abundant treasure found she fetching water
from the well !
ANONYMOUS.
AUF WIEDERSEHEN!*
The little gate was reached at last.
Half hid in lilacs down the lane ;
She pushed it wide, and, as she past,
A wistful look she backward cast.
And said, " Auf wiedersehen !"
* Till we meet again I
With hand on latch, a vision white
Lingered reluctant, and again
Half doubting if she did aright.
Soft as the dews that fell that night.
She said, "Auf wiedersehen ! ' '
The lamp's clear gleam flits up the stair ;
1 linger in delicious pain ;
Ah, in that chamber, whose rich air
To breathe in thought 1 scarcely dare.
Thinks she, " Auf wiedersehen ! "
'T is thirteen years : once more I press
The turf that silences the lane ;
I hear the rustle of her dress,
I smell the lilacs, and — ah yes,
I hear, " Auf wiedersehen. ! "
Sweet piece of bashful maiden art !
The English words had seemed too fain.
But these — they drew us heart to heart.
Yet held us tenderly apart ;
She said, "Auf wiedersehen ! "
James Russell Lowell
MEETING.
The gray sea, and the long black land ;
And the yellow half-moon large and low ;
And the startled little waves, that leap
In fiery ringlets from their sleep.
As I gain the cove with pushing prow.
And quench its speed in the slushy sand.
Then a mile of warm, sea-scented beach ;
Three fields to cross, till a farm appears :
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch
And blue spqrt of a lighted match.
And a voice less loud, through its joys and fears.
Than the two hearts, beating each to each.
Robert Browning.
SWEET MEETING OF DESIRES.
I grew assured, before I asked.
That she'd be mine without reserve.
And in her unclaimed graces basked
At leisure, tiU the time should serve, —
With just enough of dread to thrill
The hope, and make it trebly dear :
Thus loath to speak the word, to kill
Either the hope or happy fear.
Till once, through lanes retuming late.
Her laughing sisters lagged behind ;
And ere we reached her father's gate.
We paused with one preseutient mind ;
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LOVE.
171
ra
And, in the dim and perfumed mist
Their coming stayed, who, blithe and free,
And very women, loved to assist
A lover's opportunity.
Twice rose, twice died, my trembling word ;
To faint and frail cathedral chimes
Spake time in music, and we heard
The chafers rustling in the limes.
Her dress, that touched me where I stood ;
The warmth of her confided arm ;
Her bosom's gentle neighborhood ;
Her pleasure in her power to charm ;
Her look, her love, her form, her touch !
The least seemed most by blissful turn, —
Blissful but that it pleased too much,
And taught the wayward soul to yearn.
It was as if a harp with wires
Was traversed by the breath I drew ;
And O, sweet meeting of desires !
She, answering, owned that she loved too.
COVENTRY PATMORE.
B-
ZARA'S EAR-RINGS.
FROM THE SPANISH.
" Mt ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! they 've dropt
into the well,
And what to say to Muça, I cannot, cannot tell."
'T was thus, Granada's fountain by, spoke Albu-
harez' daughter, —
" The well is deep, far down they lie, beneath
the cold blue water.
To me did Muça give them, when he spake his
sad farewell.
And what to say when he comes back, alas ! I
cannot tell.
" My ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! they were pearls
in silver set,
That when my Moor was far away, I ne'er should
him forget.
That I ne'er to other tongue should list, nor
smile on other's tale,
But remember he my lips had kissed, pure as
those ear-rings pale.
When he comes back, and hears that I have
dropped them in the well,
O, what will Muça think of me, I cannot, can¬
not tell.
" My ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! he '11 say they
should have been.
Not of pearl and of silver, but of gold and glit¬
tering sheen,
Of jasper and of onyx, and of diamond shining
clear.
Changing to the changing light, with radiance
insincere ;
That changeful mind unchanging gems are not
befitting well, —
Thus will he think, — and what to say, alas ! I
cannot tell.
" He '11 think when I to market went I loitered
by the way ;
He '11 think a willing ear I lent to all the lads
might say ;
He'll think some other lover's hand among my
tresses noosed,
From the ears where he had placed them my
rings of pearl unloosed ;
He '11 think when I was sporting so beside this
marble well.
My pearls fell in, — and what to say, alas ! I
cannot tell.
" He '11 say I am a woman, and we are all the
same ;
He '11 say I loved when he was here to whisper
of his ñame —
But when he went to Tunis my virgin troth had
broken.
And thought no more of Muça, and cared not
for his token.
My ear-rings ! my ear-rings ! O, luckless, luck¬
less well !
For what to say to Muça, alas ! I cannot tell.
" I '11 tell the truth to Muça, and I hope he will
believe.
That I have thought of him at mom, and thought
of him at eve ;
That musing on my lover, when down the sun
was gone.
His ear-rings in my hand I held, by the fountain
all alone ;
And that my mind was o'er the sea, when from
my hand they fell,
And that deep his love lies in my heart, as they
lie in the well."
John Gibson Lockhart.
0 SWALLOW, SWALLOW, FLYING
SOUTH.
FROM "THE PRINCESS."
0 Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying South,
Fly to her, and fall upon her gilded eaves.
And tell her, tell her what I tell to thee.
0 tell her. Swallow, thou that knowest each.
That bright and fierce and fickle is the South,
And dark and true and tender is the North.
9
172 POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
0 Swallow, Swallow, if I could follow, and
light
Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill.
And cheep and twitter twenty million loves.
O were I thou that she might take me in.
And lay me on her bosom, and her heart
Would rock the snowy cradle till I died !
Why lingereth she to clothe her heart with
love.
Delaying as the tender ash delays
To clothe herself, when all the woods are green ?
0 tell her. Swallow, that thy brood is flown ;
Say to her, I do but wanton in the South,
But in the North long since my nest is made.
0 tell her, brief is life, but love is long,
And brief the sun of summer in the North,
And brief the moon of beauty in the South.
0 Swallow, flying from the golden woods.
Fly to her, and pipe and woo her, and make her
mine.
And tell her, tell her, that I follow thee.
alfred Tennyson.
•
ATHULF AND ETHILDA.
Athulf. Appeared
The princess with that merry child Prince Guy :
He loves me well, and made her stop and sit.
And sat upon her knee, and it so chanced
That in his various chatter he denied
That I could hold his hand within my own
So closely as to hide it : this being tried
Was proved against him ; he insisted then
I could not by his royal sister's hand
Do likewise. Starting at the random word.
And dumb with trepidation, there I stood
Some seconds as bewitched ; then I looked up.
And in her face beheld an orient flush
Of half-bewildered pleasure : from which trance
She with an instant ease resumed herself.
And frankly, with a pleasant laugh, held out
Her arrowy hand.
I thought it trembled as it lay in mine,
But yet her looks were clear, direct, and free.
And said that she felt nothing.
sideoc. And what felt'st thou ?
Athülf. a sort of swarming, curling, tremu¬
lous tumbling.
As though there were an ant-hill in my bosom.
I said I was ashamed. — Sidroc, you smile ;
If at my folly, well ! But if you smile.
Suspicious of a taint upon my heart.
Wide is your error, and you never loved.
HENRY TAYLOR.
SEVEN TIMES THREE.
love.
I leaned out of window, I smelt the white clover,
Dark,~dark was the garden, I saw not the gate ;
"Now, if there be footsteps, he comes, my one
lover —
Hush, nightingale, hush ! O sweet nightin¬
gale, wait
Till I listen and hear
If a step draweth near.
For my love he is late !
"The skies in the darkness stoop nearer and
nearer,
A cluster of stars hangs like fruit in the tree.
The fall of the water comes sweeter, comes clearer¡:
To what art thou listening, and what dost thou
see ?
Let the star-clusters glow.
Let the sweet waters flow.
And cross quickly to me.
"You night-moths that hover where honey brims
over
From sycamore blossoms, or settle or sleep ;
You glow-worms, shine out, and the pathway
discover
To him that comes darkling along the rough
steep.
Ah, my sailor, make haste.
For the time runs to waste.
And my love lieth deep, —
" Too deep for swift telling ; and yet, my one
lover,
I've conned thee an answer, it waits thee to¬
night."
By the sycamore passed he, and through the
white clover ;
Then all the sweet speech I had fashioned
took flight ;
But I '11 love him more, more
Than e'er wife loved before.
Be the days dark or bright.
jean ingelow.
A SPINSTER'S STINT.
Six skeins and three, six skeins and three !
Good mother, so you stinted me.
And here they be, — ay, six and three !
Stop, busy wheel ! stop, noisy wheel !
Long shadows down my chamber steal.
And warn me to make haste and reek
LOVE.
•
173
'T is done, — the spinning work complete,
0 heart of mine, what makes you beat
So fast and sweet, so fast and sweet ?
1 must have wheat and pinks, to stick
My hat from hrim to ribbon, thick, —
Slow hands of mine, he quick, be quick !
One, two, three stars along the skies
Begin to wink their golden eyes, —
I '11 leave my thread all knots and ties.
O moon, so red ! 0 moon, so red !
Sweetheart of night, go straight to bed ;
Love's light will answer in your stead.
A-tiptoe, beckoning me, he stands, —
Stop trembling, little foolish hands.
And stop the bands, and stop the bands !
alice carv.
—*—
THE SPINNING-WHEEL SONG.
Mellow the moonlight to shine is beginning ;
Close by the window young Eileen is spinning ;
Bent o'er the fire, her blind grandmother, sitting.
Is Groaning, and moaning, and drowsily knit¬
ting,—
"Eileen, achora, I hear some one tapping."
" 'T is the ivy, dear mother, against the glass
flapping."
" Eileen, I surely hear somebody sighing."
" 'T is the sound, mother dear, of the summer
wind dying."
Merrily, cheerily, noisily whirring.
Swings the wheel, spins the reel, while the foot's
stirring ;
Sprightly, and lightly, and airily ringing,
Thrills the sweet voice of the young maiden
singing.
" What's that noise that I hear at the window,
I wonder ? "
" 'T is the little birds chirping the holly-bush
under."
" What makes you be shoving and moving your
stool on.
And singing aU wrong that old song of ' The
Coolun'?"
There's a form at the casement, — the form of
her true-love, —
And he whispers, with face bent, " I'm waiting
for you, love ;
Get up on the stool, through the lattice step
lightly.
We 'U rove in the grove while the moon's shin¬
ing brightly."
Merrily, cheerily, noisily whirring.
Swings the wheel, spins the reel, while the foot's
stirring ;
Sprightly, and lightly, and airily ringing,
ThrUls the sweet voice of the young maiden
singing.
The maid shakes her head, on her lip lays her
fingers.
Steals up from her seat, — longs to go, and yet
lingers ;
A frightened glance turns to her drowsy grand¬
mother,
Puts one foot on the stool, spins the wheel with
the other.
Lazily, easily, swings now the wheel round ;
Slowly and lowly is heard now the reel's sound ;
Noiseless and light to the lattice above her
The maid steps, — then leaps to the arms of her
lover.
Slower — and slower—and slower the wheel
swings ;
Lower — and lower — and lower the reel rings ;
Ere the reel and the wheel stop their ringing and
moving.
Through the grove the young lovers by moon¬
light are roving.
John Francis waller.
»—
SOMEBODY.
\
Somebody's courting somebody.
Somewhere or other to-night ;
Somebody's whispering to somebody.
Somebody's listening to somebody.
Under this clear moonlight.
Near the bright river's flow.
Running so still and slow.
Talking so soft and low.
She sits with Somebody.
Pacing the ocean's shore.
Edged by the foaming roar.
Words never used before
Sound sweet to Somebody.
Under the maple-tree
Deep though the shadow be.
Plain enough they can see.
Bright eyes has Somebody.
No one sits up to wait.
Though she is out so late.
All know she's at the gate.
Talking with Somebody.
174
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Tiptoe to parlor door ;
Two shadows on the floor !
Moonlight, reveal no more, —
Susy and Somebody.
Two, sitting side by side
Float with the ebbing tide,
" Thus, dearest, may we glide
Through life," says Somebody.
Somewhere, Somebody
Makes love to Somebody,
To-night.
Anonymous.
♦
DANCE LIGHT.
"Ah! sweet Kitty Neil, rise up from that
wheel, —
Your neat little foot will be weary with spin¬
ning !
Come trip down with me to the sycamore-tree :
Half the parish is there, and the dance is be¬
ginning.
The sun is gone down, but the full harvest moon
Shines sweetly and cool on the dew-whitened
valley ;
While all the air rings with the soft, loving
things
Each little bird sings in the green shaded alley."
With a blush and a smile Kitty rose up the while,
Her eye in the glass, as she bound her hair,
glancing ;
'T is hard to refuse when a young lover sues.
So she could n't but choose to go off to the
dancing.
And now on the green the glad groups are seen, —
Each gay-hearted lad with the lass of his
choosing ;
And Pat, without fail, leads out sweet Kitty
Neil, —
Somehow, when he asked, she ne'er thought
of refusing.
Now Felix Magee put his pipes to his knee.
And with flourish so free sets each couple in
motion :
With a cheer and a bound the lads patter the
ground ;
The maids move around just like swans on the
ocean.
Cheeks bright as the rose, feet light as the doe's.
Now coyly retiring, now boldly advancing :
Search the world all around, from the sky to the
ground.
No such sight can be found as an Irish lass
dancing I
Sweet Kate ! who could view your bright eyes
of deep blue.
Beaming hiunidly through their dark lashes so
mildly.
Your fair-turnèd arm, heaving breast, rounded
form.
Nor feel his heart warm, and his pulses throb
wildly ?
Young Pat feels his heart, as he gazes, depart.
Subdued by the smart of such painful yet
sweet love ;
The sight leaves his eye as he cries with a sigh.
Dance light, for my heart ü lies under your
feet, lam !
John Francis waller.
BELIEYE ME, IF ALL THOSE ENDEAR¬
ING YOUNG CHARMS.
Believe me, if all those endearing young
charms.
Which I g^e on so fondly to-day.
Were to change by to-morrow, and fleet in my
arms.
Like fairy-gifts fading away.
Thou wouldst still be adored, as this moment
thou art.
Let thy loveliness fade as it will.
And around the dear ruin each wish of my heart
Would entwine itself verdantly still.
It is not while beauty and youth are thine own.
And thy cheeks unprofaned by a tear,
That the fervor and faith of a soul may be known.
To which time will but make thee more dear !
No, the heart that has truly loved never forgets.
But as truly loves on to the close.
As the sunflower turns to her god when he sets
The same look which she turned when he rose !
Thomas moore.
THE SLEEPING BEAUTY.
from "the day dream."
Year after year unto her feet,
She lying on her couch alone.
Across the purple coverlet.
The maiden's jet-black hair has grown ;
On either side her tranced form
Forth streaming from a braid of pearl ;
The slumberous light is rich and warm.
And moves not on the rounded curL
The silk star-broidered coverlid
Unto her limbs itself doth mould.
Languidly ever ; and amid
Her full black ringlets, downward rolled.
(&
LOVE.
175
ra
Glows forth each softly shadowed arm,
With bracelets of the diamond bright.
Her constant beauty doth inform
Stillness with love, and day with light.
She sleeps : her breathings are not heard
In palace chambers far apart.
The fragrant tresses are not stirred
That lie upon her chaimèd heart.
She sleeps ; on either hand upswells
The gold-fringed pillow lightly prest :
She sleeps, nor dreams, but ever dwells
A perfect form in perfect rest.
THE REVIVAL.
A touch, a kiss ! the charm was snapt.
There rose a noise of striking clocks.
And feet that ran, and doors that clapt.
And barking dogs, and crowing cocks ;
A fuller light illumined all,
A breeze through all the garden swept,
A sudden hubbub shook the hall.
And sixty feet the fountain leapt.
The hedge broke in, the banner blew,
The butler drank, the steward scrawled.
The fire shot up, the martin flew.
The parrot screamed, the peacock squalled.
The maid and page renewed their strife.
The palace banged, and buzzed and clackt.
And all the long-pent stream of life
Dashed downward in a cataract.
At last with these the king awoke,
And in his chair himself upreared.
And yawned, and rubbed his face, and spoke,
" By holy rood, a royal beard !
How say you ? we have slept, my lords.
My beard has grown into my lap."
The barons swore, with many words,
'T was but an after-dinner's nap.
" Pardy," returned the king, " but stiU
My joints are something stiff or so.
My lord, and shall we pass the bill
I mentioned half an hour ago ? "
The chancellor, sedate and vain.
In courteous words returned reply :
But dallied with his golden chain.
And, smiling, put the question by.
THE DEPARTTTRE.
And on her lover's arm she leant.
And round her waist she felt it fold ;
And far across the hills they went
In that new world which is the old.
Across the hills, and far away
Beyond their utmost purple rim,
And deep into the dying day.
The happy princess followed him.
" I'd sleep another hundred years,
0 love, for such another kiss ; '
"0 wake forever, love," she hears,
" 0 love, 't was such as this and this."
And o'er them many a sliding star.
And many a merry wind was borne,
And, streamed through many a golden bar.
The twilight melted into morn.
" 0 eyes long laid in happy sleep ! "
" O happy sleep, that lightly fled ! "
" 0 happy kiss, that woke thy sleep ! "
' ' 0 love, thy kiss would wake the dead ! "
And o'er them many a flowing range
Of vapor buoyed the crescent bark ;
And, rapt thro' many a rosy change.
The twilight died into the dark.
" A hundred summers ! can it be ?
And whither goest thou, tell me where ? "
"0, seek my father's court with me.
For there are gi-eater wonders there."
And o'er the hills, and far away
Beyond their utmost purple rim.
Beyond the night, across the day.
Thro' all the world she followed him.
Alfred Tennvsow.
LOCHINVAR.
from "marmion,-* canto v.
O, YOTTNG Lochinvar is come out of the west.
Through all the wide Border his steed was the
best ;
And, save his good broadsword, he weapon had
none.
He rode all unarmed, and he rode all alone.
So faithful in love, and so dauntless in war.
There never was knight like the young Lochinvar.
He stayed not for brake, and he stopped not for
stone.
He swam the Eske River where ford there was
none ;
But, ere he alighted at Netherby gate.
The bride had consented, the gallant came late ;
For a laggard in love, and a dastard in war.
Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Lochinvar.
So boldly he entered the Netherby HaU,
Among bridesmen, and kinsmen, and brothers,
and all.
th
176
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
Then spoke the bride's father, his hand on his
sword
(For the poor craven bridegroom said never a
word),
" 0, come ye in peace here, or come ye in war.
Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord Lochin-
var ? "
" I long wooed your daughter, my suit you de¬
nied ; —
Love swells like the Solway, but ebbs like its
tide, —
And now I am come, with this lost love of mine.
To lead but one measure, drink one cup of wine.
There are maidens in Scotland more lovely by far.
That would gladly be bride to the young Loch-
invar."
The bride kissed the goblet ; the knight took it
up.
He quaffed off the wine, and threw down the cup.
She looked down to blush, and she looked up to
sigh,
With a smUe on her lips, and a tear in her eye.
He took her soft hand, ere her mother could
bar, —
"Now tread we a measure," said young Loch-
invar.
So stately his form, and so lovely her face.
That never a hall such a gaillard did grace ;
While her mother did fret, and her father did
fume.
And the bridegroom stood dangling his bonnet
and plume ;
And the bridemaidens whispered, ' 'T were bet¬
ter by far
To have matched our fair cousin with young
Lochinvar."
One touch to her hand, and one word in her ear.
When they reached the hall-door, and the charger
stood near ;
So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung.
So light to the saddle before her he sprung ;
" She is won ! we are gone I over bank, bush,
and scaur ;
They '11 have fleet steeds that follow," quoth
young Lochinvar.
There was mounting 'mong Graemes of the Neth-
erby clan ;
Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode
and they ran ;
There was racing and chasing on Cannobie Lee,
But the lost bride of Netherby ne'er did they see.
So daring in love, and so dauntless in war.
Have ye e'er heard of gallant like young Loch¬
invar ?
Sir Walter Scott.
THE EVE OF ST. AGNES.
St. Agnes' Eve, — ah, bitter chill it was !
The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ;
The hare limped trembling through the frozen
grass.
And silent was the flock in woolly fold :
Numb were the beadsman's flngers while he told
His rosary, and while his frosted breath.
Like pious incense from a censer old.
Seemed taking flight for heaven without a death.
Fast the sweet virgin's picture, while his prayer
he saith.
His prayer he saith, this patient, holy man ;
Then takes his lamp, and riseth from his knees.
And back returneth, meagre, barefoot, wan.
Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees ;
The sculptured dead on each side seem to freeze,
Emprisoned in black, purgatorial rails ;
Knights, ladies, praying in dumb orat'ries^
He passeth by ; and his weak spirit fails
To think how they may ache in icy hoods and
mails.
Northward he tumeth through a little door.
And scarce three steps, ere music's golden tongue
Flattered to tears this aged man and poor ;
But no, — already had his death-bell rung ;
The joys of all his life were said and sung :
His was harsh penance on St. Agnes' Eve :
Another way he went, and soon among
Rough ashes sat he for his soul's reprieve.
And all night kept awake, for sinners' sake to
grieve.
That ancient beadsman heard the prelude soft ;
And so it chanced, for many a door was wide.
From hurry to and fro. Soon, up aloft.
The silver, snarling trumpets 'gan to chide ;
The level chambers, ready with their pride.
Were, glowing to receive a thousand guests :
The carvèd angels, ever eager-eyed.
Stared, where upon their heads the cornice rests.
With hair blown back, and wings put crosswise
on their breasts.
At length burst in the argent revelry.
With plume, tiara, and all rich array.
Numerous as shadows haunting fairily
The brain, new-stufifed, in youth, with triumphs
m
Of old romance. These let us wish away ;
And turn, sole-thoughted, to one lady there.
Whose heart had brooded, all that wintry day.
On love, and winged St. Agnes' saintly care.
As she had heard old dames fuU many times
declare.
e-
LOVE.
177
!&-
They told her how, upon St. Agnes' Eve,
Young virgins might have visions of delight.
And soft adorings from their loves receive
Upon the honeyed middle of the night.
If ceremonies due they did aright ;
As, supperless to bed they must retire.
And couch supine their beauties, lily white ;
Nor look behind, nor sideways, but require
Of heaven with upward eyes for all that they
desire.
FuU of this whim was thoughtful Madeline ;
The music, yearning like a god in pain.
She scarcely heard ; her maiden eyes divine.
Fixed on the floor, saw many a sweeping train
Pass by, — she heeded not at all ; in vain
Came many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier.
And back retired, not cooled by high disdain.
But she saw not ; her heart was otherwhere ;
She sighed for Agnes' dreams, the sweetest of the
year.
She danced along with vague, regardless eyes,
Anxious her lips, her breathing quick and short ;
The hallowed hour was near at hand ; she sighs
Amid the timbrels, and the thronged resort
Of whisperers in anger, or in sport ;
Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and scorn.
Hoodwinked with fairy fancy ; all amort
Save to St. Agnes and her lambs unshorn.
And all the bliss to be before to-morrow morn.
So, purposing each moment to retire.
She lingered still. Meantime, across the moors,
Had come young Porphyro, with heart on fire
For Madeline. Beside the portal dooi's.
Buttressed from moonlight, stands he, and im¬
plores
All saints to give him sight of Madeline ;
But for one moment in the tedious hours.
That he might gaze and worship all unseen ;
Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss, — in sooth
snch things have been.
He ventures in : let no buzzed whisper tell :
All eyes be muffled, or a hundred swords
Will storm his heart, love's feverous citadel ;
For him, those chambers held barbarian hordes.
Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords.
Whose veiy dogs would execrations howl
Against his lineage ; not one breast affords
Him any mercy, in that mansion foul.
Save one old beldame, weak in body and in soul.
Ah, happy chance ! the aged creature came.
Shuffling along with ivory-headed wand.
To where he stood, hid from the torch's flame,
Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond
The sound of merriment and chorus bland.
He startled her ; but soon she knew his face.
And grasped his fingers in her palsied hand.
Saying, "Mercy, Porphyro! hie thee from this
place ;
They are all here to-night, the whole blood¬
thirsty race !
" Get hence I get hence ! there's dwarfish Hüde-
brand ;
He had a fever late, and in the fit
He cursed thee and thine, both house and land ;
Then there's that old Lord Maurice, not a whit
More tame for his gray hairs — Alas me I flit !
Flit like a ghost away ! " " Ah, gossip dear.
We're safe enough ; here in this arm-chair sit.
And tell me how — " " Good saints I not here,
not here ;
Follow me, child, or else these stones will be thy
bier."
He followed through a lowly arched way.
Brushing the cobwebs with his lofty plume ;
And as she muttered, " Well-a — well-a-day ! "
He found him in a little moonlight room.
Pale, latticed, chill, and silent as a tomb.
"Now tell me where is Madeline," said he,
" O, tell me, Angela, by the holy loom
Which none but secret sisterhood may see.
When they St. Agnes' wool are weaving piously."
" St Agnes ! Ah ! it is St. Agnes' Eve, —
Yet men will murder upon holy days ;
Thou must hold water in a witch's sieve.
And be liege-lord of all the elves and fays.
To venture so. It fills me with amaze
To see thee, Porphyro ! —St. Agnes' Eve !
God's help I my lady fair the conjurer plays
This very night ; good angels her deceive !
But let me laugh awhile, I've mickle time to
grieve."
Feebly she laugheth in the languid moon.
While Porphyro npon her face doth look.
Like puzzled urchin on an aged crone
Who keepeth closed a wondrous riddle-book.
As spectacled she sits in chimney nook.
But soon his eyes grew brilliant, when she told
His lady's purpose ; and he scarce could brook
Tears, at the thought of those enchantments cold.
And Madeline asleep in lap of legends old.
Sudden a thonght came like a full-blown rose.
Flushing his brow, and in his painèd heart
Made purple riot ; then doth he propose
A stratagem, that makes the beldame start :
" A cruel man and impious thou art I
Sweet lady, let her pray, and sleep and dream
Alone with her good angels, far apart
-SI
17S
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
--E
à
From wicked men like thee. Go, go ! I deem
Thou canst not surely be the same that thou
didst seem."
" I will not harm her, by all saints I swear ! "
Quoth Porphyro ; "0, may I ne'er find grace
When my weak voice shall whisper its last
prayer.
If one of her soft ringlets I displace.
Or look with ruffian passion in her face :
Good Angela, believe me by these tears ;
Or I will, even in a moment's space.
Awake, with horrid shout, my foemen's ears.
And beard them, though they be more fanged
than wolves and bears."
" Ah ! why wilt thou affright a feeble soul ?
A poor, weak, palsy-stricken, churchyard thing.
Whose passing-bell may ere the midnight toll ;
Whose prayers for thee, each morn and evening,
Were never missed." Thus plaining, doth she
bring
A gentler speech from burning Porphyro ;
So woful, and of such deep sorrowing.
That Angela gives promise she will do
Whatever he shall wish, betide her weal or woe.
Which was, to lead him, in close secrecy.
Even to Madeline's chamber, and there hide
Him in a closet, of such privacy
That he might see her beauty unespied.
And win perhaps that night a peerless bride.
While legioned fairies paced the coverlet.
And pale enchantment held her sleepy-eyed.
Never on such a night have lovers met.
Since Merlin paid his demon all the monstrous
debt.
" It shall be as thou wishest," said the dame ;
" All cates and dainties shall be stored there
Quickly on this feast-night ; by the tambour
frame
Her own lute thou wilt see ; no time to spare,
For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare
On such a catering trust my dizzy head.
Wait here, my child, with patience kneel in
prayer
The while. Ah ! thou must needs the lady wed.
Or may I never leave my grave among the dead."
So saying, she hobbled off with busy fear.
The lover's endless minutes slowly passed :
The dame returned, and whispered in his ear
To follow her ; with aged eyes aghast
From fright of dim espial. Safe at last,
Through many a dusky gallery, they gain
The maiden's chamber, silken, hushed and
chaste ;
Where Porphyro took covert, pleased amain.
His poor guide hurried back with agues in her
brain.
Her faltering hand upon the balustrade.
Old Angela was feeling for the stair.
When Madeline, St. Agnes' charmed maid.
Rose, like a missioned spirit, unaware ;
With silver taper's light, and pious care.
She turned, and down the aged gossip led
To a safe level matting. Now prepare.
Young Porphyro, for gazing on that bed I
She comes, she comes again, like ring-dove
frayed and fled.
Out went the taper as she hurried in ;
Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, died ;
She closed the door, she panted, all akin
To spirits of the air, and visions wide ;
No uttered syllable, or, woe betide !
But to her heart, her heart was voluble.
Paining with eloquence her balmy side ;
As though a tongueless nightingale should swell
Her throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled in her
dell.
A casement high and triple-arched there was.
All garlanded with carven imageries
Of fruits, and flowers, and bimches of knot-grass.
And diamonded with panes of quaint device.
Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes.
As are the tiger-moth's deep-damasked wings ;
And in the midst, 'mong thousand heraldries.
And twilight saints, and dim emblazonings,
A shielded scutcheon blushed with blood of
queens and kings.
Full on this casement shone the wintry moon.
And threw warm gules on Madeline's fair breast,
As down she knelt for heaven's grace and boon ;
Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together prest.
And on her silver cross soft amethyst.
And on her hair a glory, like a saint ;
She seemed a splendid angel, newly drest.
Save wings, for heaven. Porphyro grew faint :
She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from mortal
taint.
Anon his heart revives ; her vespers done.
Of all its wreathèd pearls her hair she frees ;
Unclasps her warmèd jewels one by one ;
Loosens her fragrant bodice ; by degrees
Her rich attire creeps rustling to her knees ;
Half hidden, like a mermaid in sea-weed.
Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and sees,
In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed.
But dares not look behind, or all the charm Ú >
fled. f
&
LOVE.
179
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Soon, trembling in her soft and chilly nest.
In sort of wakeful swoon, perplexed she lay.
Until the poppied wannth of sleep oppressed
Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued away ;
Flown like a thought, until the morrow-day ;
Blissfully havened both from joy and pain ;
Clasped like a missal where swart Paynims pray ;
Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain.
As though a rose should shut, and be a bud
again.
Stolen to this paradise, and so entranced.
Porphyre gazed upon her empty dress.
And listened to her breathing, if it chanced
To wake into a slumberous tenderness ;
Which when he heard, that minute did he bless.
And breathed himself ; then from the closet
crept.
Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness.
And over the hushed carpet, silent, stept.
And 'tween the curtains peeped, where, lo ! —
how fast she slept.
Then by the bedside, where the faded moon
Made a dim, silver twilight soft he set
A table, and, half anguished, threw thereon
A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and jet : —
0 for some drowsy Morphean amulet !
The boisterous, midnight, festive clarion.
The kettle-drum, and far-heard clarionet.
Affray his ears, though but in dying tone ; —
The hall-door shuts again, and all the noise is
gone.
And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep.
In blanehèd linen, smooth, and lavendered ;
While he from forth the closet brought a heap
Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and gourd ;
With jellies soother than the creamy curd,
And lucent syrops, tinct with cinnamon ;
Manna and dates, in argosy transferred
From Fez ; and spiced dainties, every one.
From silken Samarcand to cedared Lebanon.
These delicates he heaped with glowing hand
On golden dishes and in baskets bright
Of wreathèd silver. Sumptuous they stand
In the retired quiet of the night.
Filling the chilly room with perfume light. —
" And now, my love, my seraph fair, awake !
Thou art my heaven, and 1 thine eremite ;
Open thine eyes, for meek St. Agnes' sake,
Or 1 shall drowse beside thee, so my soul doth
ache."
Thus whispering, his warm, unnerved arm
Sank in her jrillow. Shaded was her dream
By the dusk curtains ; — 't was a midnight charml
Impossible to melt as icèd stream : )
The lustrous salvers in the moonlight gleam ;
Broad golden fringe upon the carpet lies ;
It seemed he never, never could redeem
From such a steadfast spell his lady's eyes ;
So mused awhile, entoiled in woofèd phantasies.
Awakening up, he took her hollow lute, —
Tumultuous, — and, in chords that tenderest be.
He played an ancient ditty, long since mute.
In Provence called " La belle dame sans merci ; "
Close to her ear touching the melody ; —
Wherewith disturbed, she uttered a soft moan :
He ceased ; she panted quick, — and suddenly
Her blue affrayèd eyes wide open shone ;
Upon his knees he sank, pale as smooth-sculptured
stone.
Her eyes were open, but she still beheld.
Now wide awake, the vision of her sleep.
There was a painful change, that nigh expelled
The blisses of her dream so pure and deep ;
At which fair Madeline began to weep.
And moan forth witless words with many a sigh ;
While still her gaze on Porphyre would keep ;
Who knelt, with joined hands and piteous eye.
Fearing to move or speak, she looked so dream-
ingly.
" Ah, Porphyre ! " said she, " but even now
Thy voice was at sweet tremble in mine ear.
Made tunable with every sweetest vow ;
And those sad eyes were spiritual and clear ;
How changed thou art ! how pallid, chill, and
drear !
Give me that voice again, my Porphyro,
Those looks immortal, those complainings dear !
O, leave me not in this eternal woe.
For if thou diest,mylove, 1 know not where to go."
Beyond a mortal man impassioned far
At these voluptuous accents, he arose.
Ethereal, flushed, and like a throbbing star
Seen mid the sapphire heaven's deep repose ;
Into her dream he melted, as the rose
Blendetli its odor with the violet, —
Solution sweet ; meantime the frost-wind blows
Like love's alarum pattering the sharp sleet
Against the window-panes ; St. Agnes' moon
hath set.
'T is dark ; quick pattereth the flaw-blown sleet ;
" This is no dream, nry bride, my Madeline ! "
'T is dark ; the icèd gusts still rave and beat :
" No dream 1 alas ! alas ! aitd woe is mirre !
Porphyro will leave trre here to fade atrd pine.
Cruel ! what traitor could thee hither bring ?
1 curse not, for nry heart is lost irr thirre,
TJrorrgh tlrorr forsakest a deceived thing ; —
Adove forlorn andlost, with sick, unprunèd wing."
-51,
[f]~*—
180
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
a
" My Madeline ! sweet dreamer ! lovely bride !
Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest ?
Thy beauty's shield, heart-shaped and vermeil
dyed ?
Ah, silver shrine, here will 1 take my rest
After so many hours of toil and quest,
A famished pilgrim, — saved by miracle.
Though 1 have found, 1 will not rob thy nest.
Saving of thy sweet self ; if thou think'st well
To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude infidel.
" Hark ! 't is an elfin storm from faery land,
Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed :
Arise, arise ! the morning is at hand ; —
The bloated wassailers will never heed :
Let us away, my love, with happy speed ;
There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see, —
Drowned all in Rhenish and the sleepy mead :
Awake, arise, my love, and fearless be.
For o'er the southern moors 1 have a home for
thee."
She hurried at his words, beset with fears.
For there were sleeping dragons all around.
At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready spears ;
Down the wide stairs a darkling way they found.
In all the house was heard no human sound.
A chain-droopedlamp was flickering by each door ;
The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, and hound.
Fluttered in the besieging wind's uproar ;
And the long carpets rose along the gusty floor.
They glide, like phantoms, into the wide hall !
Like phantoms to the iron porch they glide.
Where lay the porter, in uneasy sprawl.
With a huge empty flagon by his side :
The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook his hide,
But his sagacious eye an inmate owns ;
By one, and one, the bolts full easy slide ;
The chains lie silent on the footworn stones ;
The key turns, and the door upon its hinges groans.
And they are gone ! ay, ages long ago
Tliese lovei-s fled away into the storm.
That night the baron dreamt of many a woe,
..Vnd all his warrior-guests, with shade and form
Of witch, and demon, and large coffin-worm,
Were long be-nightmared. Angela the old
Died palsy-twitched, with meagre face deform ;
The beadsman, after thousand aves told.
For aye unsought-for slept among his ashes cold.
john Keats.
CURFEW MUST NOT RING TO-NIGHT.
Slowly England's sun was setting o'er the hill¬
tops far away,—
Filling all the land with beauty at the close of
And the last rays kissed the forehead of a man
and maiden fair, —
He with footsteps slow and weary, she with
sunny floating hair ;
He with bowed head, sad and thoughtful, she
with lips all cold and white,
Struggling to keep back the murmur, —
" Curfew must not ring to-night."
" Sexton," Bessie's white lips faltered, pointing
to the prison old.
With its turrets tall and gloomy, with its walls
dark, damp, and cold,
" I've a lover in that prison, doomed this very
night to die.
At the ringing of the Curfew, and no earthly
help is nigh ;
Cromwell will not come till sunset," and her
lips grew strangely white
As she breathed the husky whisper : —
" Curfew must not ring to-night."
" Bessie," calmly spoke the sexton, — every word
pierced her young heart
Like the piercing of an arrow, like a deadly
poisoned dart, —
" Long, longyears I've rung the Curfew from that
gloomy, shadowed tower ;
Every evening, just at sunset, it has told the
twilight hour ;
1 have done my duty ever, tried to do it just
and right.
Now 1 'm old 1 will not falter, —
Curfew, it must ring to-night."
Wild her eyes and pale her features, stem and
white her thoughtful brow.
As witliin her secret bosom Bessie made a solemn
vow.
She had listened while the judges read without
a tear or sigh :
" At the ringing of the Curfew, Basil Underwood
must die."
And her breath came fast and faster, and her
• eyes grew large and bright ;
In an undertone she murmured : —
" Curfew must not ring to-night."
With quick I step she bounded forward, sprung
within the old church door.
Left the old man threading slowly paths so oft
he'd trod before ;
Not one moment paused the maiden, but with
eye and cheek aglow
Mounted up the gloomy tower, where the bell
swung to and fro
As she climbed the dusty ladder on which fell no
ray of light.
Up and up, — her white lips saying : —
" Curfew must not ring to-night."
E'
LOVE.
181
■a
She has reached the topmost ladder ; o'er her
hangs the great, dark bell ;
Awful is the gloom beneath her, like the path¬
way down to hell.
Lo, the ponderous tongue is swinging, — 't is the
hour of Curfew now.
And the sight has chilled her bosom, stopped
her breath, and paled her brow.
Shall she let it ring ? No, never ! flash her eyes
with sudden light.
As she springs, and grasps it flrmly, —
" Curfew shall not ring to-night ! "
Out she swung — far out ; the city seemed a
speck of light below.
There 'twixt heaven and earth suspended as the
bell swung to and fro.
And the sexton at the bell-rope, old and deaf,
heard not the bell.
Sadly thought, "That twilight Curfew rang
young Basil's funeral knell."
Still the maiden clung more firmly, and with
trembling lips so white.
Said to hush her heart's wild throbbing ; —
" Curfew shall not ring to-night ! "
It was o'er, the bell ceased swaying, and the
maiden stepped once more
Firmly on the dark old ladder where for hun¬
dred years before
Human foot had not been planted. The brave
deed that she had done
Should be told long ages after, as the rays of
setting sun
Crimson all the sky with beauty ; aged sires,
with heads of white.
Tell the eager, listening children,
" Curfew did not ring that night."
O'er the distant hills came Cromwell; Bessie
sees him, and her brow.
Lately white with fear and anguish, has no
anxious traces now.
At his feet she tells her story, shows her hands
all bruised and torn ;
And her face so sweet and pleading, yet with
sorrow pale and worn.
Touched his heart with sudden pity, lit his eyes
with misty light :
"Go ! your lover lives," said Cromwell,
" Cmfew shall not ring to-night."
Wide they flung the massive portal ; led the
prisoner forth to die, —
All his bright young life before him. 'Neath the
darkening English sky
Bessie comes with flying footsteps, eyes aglow
with love-light sweet ;
Kneeling on the turf beside him, lays his pardon
at his feet.
In his brave, strong arms he clasped her, kissed
the face upturned and white.
Whispered, " Darling, you have saved me, —
Curfew will not ring to-night ! "
ROSE HARTWICK THORPE.
THE LITTLE MILLINER.
My girl hath violet eyes and yellow hair,
A soft hand, like a lady's, small and fair,
A sweet face pouting in a white straw bonnet,
A tiny foot, and little boot upon it ;
And all her finery to charm beholder*
I s the gray shawl drawn tight around her shoulders.
The plain stuff-gown and collar white as snow.
And sweet red petticoat that peeps below.
But gladly in the busy town goes she.
Summer and winter, fearing nobodie ;
She pats the pavement with her fairy feet.
With fearless eyes she charms the crowded street ;
And in her pocket lie, in lieu of gold,
A lucky sixpence and a thimble old.
We lodged in the same house a year ago :
She on the topmost floor, I just below, —
She, a poor milliner, content and wise,
1, a poor city clerk, with hopes to rise ;
And, long ere we were friends, I learnt to love
The little angel on the floor above.
For, every morn, ere from my bed I stirred.
Her chamber door would open, and I heard, —
And listened, blushing, to her coming down.
And palpitated with her rustling gown.
And tingled while her foot went downward slow.
Creaked like a cricket, passed, and died below ;
Then peeping from the window, pleased and sly,
I saw the pretty shining face go by.
Healthy and rosy, fresh from slumber sweet, —
A sunbeam in the quiet morning street.
And every night, when in from work she tript.
Red to the ears I from my chamber slipt.
That I might hear upon the narrow stair
Her low " Good evening," as she passed me there.
And when her door was closed, below sat 1,
And hearkened stüiy as she stirred on high, —
Watched the red firelight shadows m the room.
Fashioned her face before me in the gloom.
And heard her close the window, lock the door.
Moving about more lightly than before.
And thought, "She is undressing now ! " and, oh !
My cheeks were hot, my heart was in a glow !
And 1 made pictures of her, — standing bright
Before the looking-glass in bed-gown white.
9
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182
POEMS OP THE APPECTIONS.
1
B-
Unbinding in a knot her yellow hair.
Then kneeling timidly to say a prayer ;
TUl, last, the floor creaked softly overhead,
'Neath bare feet tripping to the little bed, —
And all was hushed. Yet still I hearkened on.
Till the faint sounds about the streets were gone ;
And saw her slumbering with lips apart,
One little hand upon her little heart.
The other pillowing a face that smiled
In slumber like the slumber of a child.
The bright hair shining round the small white ear.
The soft breath stealing visible and clear,
And mixing with the moon's, whose frosty gleam
Made round her rest a vaporous light of dream.
How free she wandered in the wicked place.
Protected only by her gentle face !
She saw bad things — how could she choose but
see ? —
She heard of wantonness and misery ;
The city closed around her night and day.
But lightly, happily, she went her way.
Nothing of evil that she saw or heard
Could touch a heart so innocently stirred, —
By simple hopes that cheered it through the storm.
And httle flutterings that kept it warm.
No power had she to reason out her needs.
To give the whence and wherefore of her deeds ;
But she was good and pure amid the strife
By virtue of the joy that was her life.
Here, where a thousand spirits daily fall.
Where heart and soul and senses turn to gall.
She floated, pure as innocent could be.
Like a small sea-bird on a stormy sea,
Which breasts the billows, wafted to and fro,
Fearless, uninjured, while the strong winds blow,
While the clouds gather, and the waters roar.
And mighty ships are broken on the shore.
All winter long, witless who peeped the while.
She sweetened the chill mornings with her smile ;
When the soft snow was falling dimly white.
Shining among it with a child's delight.
Bright as a rose, though nipping winds might
blow.
And leaving fairy footprints in the snow !
'T was when the spring was coming, when the
snow
Had melted, and fresh winds began to blow.
And girls were selling violets in the town.
That suddenly a fever struck me down.
The world was changed, the sense of life was
pained.
And nothing but a shadow-land remained ;
Death came in a dark mist and looked at me,
1 felt his breathing, though I could not see.
But heavily 1 lay and did not stir.
And had strange images and dreams of her.
Then came a vacancy: with feeble breath,
1 shivered under the cold touch of Death,
And swooned among strange visions of the dead,
When a voice called from heaven, and he fled ;
And suddenly I wakened, as it seemed.
From a deep sleep wherein I had not dreamed.
And it was night, and I could see and hear.
And I was in the room I held so dear.
And unaware, stretched out upon my bed,
I hearkened for a footstep overhead.
But all was hushed. I looked around the
room.
And slowly made out shapes amid the gloom.
The wall was reddened by a rosy light,
A faint fire flickered, and I knew't was night.
Because below there was a sound of feet
Dying away along the quiet street, —
When, turning my pale face and sighing low,
I saw a vision in the quiet glow :
A little figure, in a cotton gown.
Looking upon the fire and stooping down.
Her side to me, her face illumed, she eyed
Two chestnuts burning slowly, side by side, —
Her lips apart, her clear eyes strained to see.
Her little hands clasped tight around her knee.
The firelight gleaming on her golden head.
And tinting her white neck to rosy red.
Her features bright, and beautiful, and pure,
With childish fear and yearning half demure.
0 sweet, sweet dream ! I thought, and strained
mine eyes.
Fearing to break the spell with words and sighs.
Softly she stooped, her dear face sweetly fair.
And sweeter since a light like love was there.
Brightening, watching, more and more elate.
As the nuts glowed together in the grate.
Crackling with little jets of fiery light.
Till side by side they turned to ashes white, —
Then up she leapt, her face cast off its fear
For rapture that itself was radiance clear.
And would have clapped her little hands in
glee.
But, pausing, bit her lips and peeped at me.
And met the face that yearned on her so whitely.
And gave a cry and trembled, blushing brightly.
While, raised on elbow, as she turned to flee,
"Polly ! " I cried, —and grew as red as she !
It was no dream ! for soon my thoughts were
clear.
And she could tell me all, and I could hear :
How in my sickness friendless I had lain.
How the hard people pitied not my pain ;
How, in despite of what bad people said.
She left her labors, stopped beside my bed,
LOVE.
183
And nursed me, thinking sadly I would die ;
How, in the end, the danger passed me by ;
How she had sought to steal away before
The sickness passed, and I was strong once
more.
By fits she told the story in mine ear,
And troubled all the telling with a fear
Lest by my cold man's heart she should be chid.
Lest 1 should think her bold in what she did ;
But, lying on my bed, I dared to say,
How I had watched and loved her many a day.
How dear she was to me, and dearer stUl
For that strange kindness done while I was ill.
And how I could but think that Heaven above
Had done it all to bind our lives in love.
And Polly cried, turning her face away.
And seemed afraid, and answered "yea" nor
"nay
Then stealing close, with little pants and sighs.
Looked on my pale thin face and earnest eyes.
And seemed in act to fling her arms about
My neck; then, blushing, paused, in fluttering
doubt ;
Last, sprang upon my heart, sighing and sob¬
bing, —
That I might feel how gladly hers was thrcbbing !
Ah ! ne'er shall I forget until I die.
How happily the dreamy days went by.
While 1 grew well, and lay with soft heart-beats,
Hearkening the pleasant murmur from the
streets.
And Polly by me like a sunny beam.
And life all changed, and love a drowsy dream !
'T was happiness enough to lie and see
The little golden head bent droopingly
Over its sewing, while the stUl time flew.
And my fond eyes were dim with happy dew !
And then, when I was nearly well and strong,
And she went back to labor all day long.
How sweet to lie alone with half-shut eyes.
And hear the distant murmurs and the cries.
And think how pure she was from pain and
sin, —
And how the summer days were coming in !
Then, as the sunset faded from the room.
To listen for her footstep in the gloom.
To pant as it came stealing up the stair.
To feel my whole life brighten unaware
When the soft tap came to the door, and when
The door was opened for her smile again !
Best, the long evenings ! — when, till late at
night.
She sat beside me in the quiet light.
And happy things were said and kisses won.
And serious gladness found its vent in fun.
Sometimes I would draw close her shining head.
And pour her bright hair out upon the bed.
And she would laugh, and blush, and try to
scold,
While "Here," I cried, "I count my wealth in
gold ! "
Once, like a little sinner for transgression,
She blushed upon my breast, and made con¬
fession :
How, when that night I woke and looked around,
I found her busy with a charm profound, —
One chestnut was herself, my girl confessed,
The other was the person she loved best.
And if they burned together side by side.
He loved her, and she would become his bride ;
And burn indeed they did, to her delight, —
And had the pretty charm not proven right ?
Thus much, and more, with timorous joy, she
said.
While her confessor, too, grew rosy red, —
And close together pressed two blissful faces.
As I absolved the sinner, with embraces.
And here is winter come again, winds blow.
The houses and the streets are white with snow ;
And in the long and pleasant eventide.
Why, what is Polly making at my side ?
Wliat but a silk gown, beautiful and grand.
We bought together lately in the Strand !
What but a dress to go to church in soon.
And wear right queenly 'neath a honeymoon !
And who shall match her with her new straw
bonnet.
Her tiny foot and little boot upon it ;
Embroidered petticoat and silk gown new.
And shawl she wears as few fine ladies do ?
And she will keep, to charm away all ill.
The lucky sixpence in her pocket still ;
And we will turn, come fair or cloudy weather.
To ashes, like the chestnuts, close together !
Robert Buchanan.
SONG.
from "the miller's daughter."
It is the miller's daughter.
And she is grown so dear, so dear.
That I would be the jewel
That trembles at her ear :
For, hid in ringlets day and night,
I'd touch her neck so warm and white.
And I would be the girdle
About her dainty, dainty waist.
And her heart would beat against me
In sorrow and in rest :
And I should know if it beat right,
I'd clasp it round so close and tight.
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
And I would be the necklace,
And all day long to fall and rise
Upon her balmy bosom,
With her laughter or her sighs :
And I would lie so light, so light,
I scarce should be unclasped at night.
alfred Tennyson.
BLEST AS THE IMMORTAL GODS.
Blest as the immortal gods is he.
The youth who fondly sits by thee.
And hears and sees thee all the while
Softly speak, and sweetly smüe.
'T was this deprived my soul of rest.
And raised such tumults in my breast :
For while I gazed, in transport tost.
My breath was gone, my voice was lost.
My bosom glowed ; the subtle flame
Ran quick through all my vital frame ;
O'er my dim eyes a darkness hung ;
My ears with hollow murmurs rung ;
In dewy damps my limbs were chilled ;
My blood with gentle horrors thrilled :
My feeble pulse forgot to play —
I fainted, sunk, and died away.
From the Greek of SAPPHO,
by AMBROSE PHILLIPS.
0, DO NOT WANTON WITH THOSE
EYES.
0, DO not wanton with those eyes.
Lest I be sick with seeing ;
Nor cast them down, but let them rise.
Lest shame destroy their being.
0, be not angry with those fires.
For then their threats will kill me ;
Nor look too kind on my desires.
For then my hopes will spill me.
O, do not steep them in thy tears.
For so will sorrow slay me ;
Nor spread them as distract with fears ;
Mine own enough betray me.
Ben Jonson.
THE SUN-DIAL.
'T IS an old dial, dark with many a stain ;
In summer crowned with drifting orchard
bloom.
Tricked in the autumn with the yellow rain.
And white in winter like a marble tomb.
And round about its gray, time-eaten brow
Lean letters speak, — a worn and shattered
row :
E am a iSfjaUe : a Äfjaöotor too art tl)ou ;
E markt tijr ®imr: sage, ffiossip, Uost tijou sot?
Here would the ring-doves linger, head to head ;
And here the snail a silver course would run,
Beating old Time ; and here the peacock spread
His gold-green glory, shutting out the sun.
The tardy shade moved forward to the noon ;
Betwixt the paths a dainty Beauty stept.
That swung a flower, and, smiling, hummed a
tune, —
Before whose feet a barking spaniel leapt.
O'er her blue dress an endless blossom strayed ;
About her tendril-curls the sunlight shone ;
And round her train the tiger-lilies swayed.
Like courtiers bowing till the queen be gone.
She leaned upon the slab a little while.
Then drew a jewelled pencil from her zone.
Scribbled a something with a frolic smile.
Folded, inscribed, and niched it in the stone.
The shade slipped on, no swifter than the snail ;
There came a -second lady to the place.
Dove-eyed, dove-robed, and something wan and
pale, —
An inner beauty shining from her face.
She, as if listless with a lonely love.
Straying among the alleys with a book, —
Herrick or Herbert, — watched the circling dove.
And spied the tiny letter in the nook.
Then, like to one who confirmation found
Of some dread secret half-accounted true, —
Who knew what hearts and hands the letter
bound.
And argued loving commerce 'twixt the two, —
She bent her fair young forehead on the stone ;
The dark shade gloomed an instant on her
head ;
And 'twixt her taper fingers pearled and shone
The single tear that tear-worn eyes will shed.
The shade slipped onward to the falling gloom ;
Then came a soldier gallant in her stead.
Swinging a beaver with a swaling plume,
A ribboned love-lock rippling from his head.
Blue-eyed, frank-faced, with clear and open brow,
Scar-seamed a little, as the women love ;
So kindly fronted that you marvelled how
The frequent sword-hilt had so frayed his
glove ;
LOVE.
185
ü¡
Who switched at Psyche plunging in the sun ;
Uncrowned three lilies with a backward swinge;
And standing somewhat widely, like to one
More used to "Boot and Saddle" than to
cringe
As courtiers do, but gentleman withal.
Took out the note ; — held it as one who feared
The fragile thing he held would slip and fall ;
Eead and re-read, pulling his tawny beard ;
Kissed it, I think, and hid it in his breast ;
Laughed softly in a flattered, happy way.
Arranged the broidered baldrick on his crest,
And sauntered past, singing a roundelay.
The shade crept forward through the dying glow ;
There came no more nor dame nor cavalier ;
But for a little time the brass will show
A small gray spot, — the record of a tear.
austin dobson.
■. THE GOLDEN FISH.
Love is a little golden flsh.
Wondrous shy . . . ah, wondrous shy.. .
You may catch him if you wish ;
He might make a dainty dish. . .
But 1. . .
Ah, I've other fish to fry !
For when I try to snare this prize.
Earnestly and patiently.
All my skill the rogue defies.
Lurking safe in Aimée's eyes. . .
So, you see,
I am caught and Love goes free !
George Arnold.
COME, REST IN THIS BOSOM.
prom " irish melodies."
Comb, rest in this bosom, my own stricken deer,
Though the herd have fled from thee, thy home
is still here ;
Here still is the smile, that no cloud can o'ereast.
And a heart and a hand all thy own to the last.
Oh ! what was love made for, if't is not the same
Through joy and through torment, through glory
and shame ?
I know not, I ask not, if guilt's in that heart,
I but know that I love thee, whatever thou art.
Thou hast called me thy Angel in moments of
bliss.
And thy Angel I '11 be, mid the horrors of this.
Through the furnace, unshrinking, thy steps to
pursue.
And shield thee, and save thee, —or perish there
too !
Thomas Moore.
♦
WHEN YOUR BEAUTY APPEARS.
"When your beauty appears,
In its graces and airs,
AU bright as an angel new dropt from the skies.
At distance I gaze, and am awed by my
fears.
So strangely you dazzle my eyes !
" But when without art
Your kind thoughts you impart.
When your love runs in blushes through every
vein.
When it darts from your eyes, when it pants
at your heart.
Then 1 know that you 're woman again."
" There's a passion and pride
In our sex," she replied ;
" And thus (might I gratify both) I would do, —
Still an angel appear to each lover beside.
But stiU be a woman to you."
Thomas parnell.
THE FIRST KISS.
I
How delicious is the winning
Of a kiss at love's beginning.
When two mutual hearts are sighing
For the knot there's no untying.
Yet remember, midst your wooing.
Love has bliss, but love has ruing ;
Other smiles may make you fickle.
Tears for other charms may trickle.
Love he comes, and Love he tarries.
Just as fate or fancy carries, —
Longest stays when sorest chidden.
Laughs and flies when pressed and bidden.
Bind the sea to slumber stilly.
Bind its odor to the lily.
Bind the aspen ne'er to quiver, —
Then bind Love to last forever !
Love's a fire that needs renewal
Of fresh beauty for its fuel ;
Love's wing moults when caged and captured, -
Only free he soars enraptured.
-gi
e-
186
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Can you keep the bee from ranging,
Or the ring-dove's neck from changing ?
No ! nor fettered Love from dying
In the knot there's no untying.
thomas Campbell.
BEDOUIN LOVE-SONG.
From the Desert I come to the^
On a staUion shod with fire;
And the winds are left behind
In the speed of my desire.
Under thy window I stand,
And the midnight heai-s my cry ;
i love thee, I love but thee ! .
With a love that shall not die
Till the mn grows cold,
And the stars are old.
And the leaves of the Judgment
Boole unfolds !
Look from thy window, and see
My passion and my pain !
I lie on the sands below.
And I faint in thy disdain.
Let the night-winds touch thy brow
With the heat of my burning sigh,
And melt thee to hear the vow
Of a love that shall not die
Till the sun grows cold.
And the stars are old.
And the leaves of the Judgment
Book unfold !
My steps are nightly driven.
By the fever in my breast.
To hear from thy lattice breathed
The word that shall give me rest.
Open the door of thy heart,
And open thy chamber door.
And my kisses shall teach thy lips
The love that shall fade no more
Till the sun grows cold.
And the stars are old.
And the leaves of the Judgmenvt
Book unfold !
Bayard Taylor.
SONNET UPON A STOLEN KISS.
Now gentle sleep hath closèd up those eyes
Which, waking, kept my boldest thoughts in awe ;
And free access unto that sweet lip lies.
From whence I long the rosy breath to draw.
Methinks no wrong it were, if I should steal
From those two melting rubies one poor kiss ;
None sees the theft that would the theft reveal.
Nor roh I her of aught what she can miss ;
Nay, should I twenty kisses take away.
There would be little sign I would do so ;
Why then should 1 this robbery delay?
0, she may wake, and therewith angry grow !
Well, if she do, I '11 back restore that one.
And twenty hundred thousand more for loan.
grorce Wither.
SLY THOUGHTS.
"I SAW him kiss your cheek !" — "'T is true."
" 0 Modesty ! "— " 'T was strictly kept :
He thought me asleep ; at least, I knew
He thought I thought he thought I slept."
coventry patmore.
KISSES.
My love and I for kisses played :
She would keep stakes — I was content ;
But when I won, she would be paid ;
This made me ask her what she meant.
" Pray, since I see," quoth she, " your wrangling
vein.
Take your own kisses ; give me mine again,"
William Strope«
CUPID AND CAMPASPE.
Cupid and my Campaspe played
At cards for kisses, — Cupid paid ;
He stakes his quiver, how and arrows.
His mother's doves, and team of sparrows, —
Loses them too ; then down he throws
The coral of his lip, the rose
Growing on's cheek (but none knows how) ;
With these the crystal of his brow.
And then the dimple of his chin, —
All these did my Campaspe win.
At last he set her both his eyes ;
She won, and Cupid blind did rise.
O Love I has she done this to thee ?
What shall, alas I become of me ?
John Lylv.
THE KISS.
1. Among thy fancies tell me this :
What is the thing we call a kiss ?
2. I shall resolve ye what it is :
It is a creature horn and bred
Between the lips all cherry red.
By love and warm desires fed ;
Chor. And makes more soft the bridal bed.
a-
LOVE.
187
Ü1
It is an active flame, that flies
First to the babies of the eyes,
And charms them there with lullabies ;
Chor. And stills the bride too when she cries.
Tlien to the chin, the cheek, the ear,
, It frisks and flies, — now here, now there ;
'T is now far off, and then't is near ;
Char. And here, and there, and everywhere.
1. Hai it a speaking virtue ? — 2. Yes.
1. How speaks it, say ? — 2. Do you but
/ this :
Part your joined lips, — then speaks your
kiss ;
Chor. And this love's sweetest language is. _
1. Has it a body ? — 2. Ay, and wings,
With thousand rare encolorings ;
And as it flies it gently sings ;
Chor. Love honey yields, but never stings.
Robert Herrick.
THE PLAIDIE.
Upon ane stormy Sunday,
Coming adoon the lane.
Were a score of bonnie lassies —
And the sweetest I maintain
Was Caddie,
That I took unneath my plaidie.
To shield her from the rain.
She said that the daisies blushed
For the kiss that I had ta'en ;
I wadna hae thought the lassie
Wad sae of a kiss complain :
" How, laddie !
1 winna stay under your plaidie.
If I gang hame in the rain ! "
But, on an after Sunday,
When cloud there was not ane.
This selfsame winsome lassie
(We chanced to meet in the lane)
Said, "Laddie,
Why dinna ye wear your plaidie ?
Wha kens but it may rain ? "
CHARLES SIBLEV.
KITTY OF COLERAINE.
As beautiful Kitty one morning was tripping
With a pitcher of milk, from the fair of Cole-
raine.
When she saw me she stumbled, the pitcher it
tumbled.
And all the sweet buttermilk watered the plain.
" 0, what shall I do now — 't was looking at you
now !
Sure, sure, such a pitcher I '11 ne'er meet again !
'T was the pride of my dairy : O Barney M'Cleary !
You're sent as a plague to the girls of Cole-
raine."
I sat down beside her, ind gently did chide her.
That such a misfortune should give her such
pain.
A kiss then I gave her ; and ere I did leave her.
She vowed for such pleasure she'd break it
again.
'T was hay-making season — I can't tell the rea¬
son —
Misfortunes will never come single, 't is plain ;
For very soon after poor Kitty's disaster
The devil a pitcher was whole in Coleraine.
Anonymous.
KISSING'S NO SIN.
Some say that kissing's a sin ;
But I think it's nane ava.
For kissing has wonn'd in this warld
Since ever that there was twa.
0, if it wasna lawfu'
Lawyers wadna allow it ;
If it wasna holy.
Ministers wadna do it.
If it wasna modest.
Maidens wadna tak' it ;
If it wasna plenty,
Puir folk wadna get it.
anonymous,
COMIN' THROUGH THE RYE.
Gin a body meet a body
Comin' through the rye.
Gin a body kiss a body.
Need a body cry?
Every lassie has her laddie, —
Ne'er a ane hae I ;
Yet a' the lads they smile at me
When comin' through the rye.
Amang the train there is a swain
I dearly lo'e myseV ;
But whaur his hame, or what his name,
I dinna care to tell.
Gin a body meet a body
Comin' frae the town.
Gin a body greet a body.
Need a body frown ?
-g
188
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Every lassie has her laddie, —
Ne'er a ane hae I ;
Yet a' the lads they smile at me
When comin' through the rye.
Amang the train there is a swain
I ókarly lo'e myseV;
But whaur his harm, or what his name,
I dinna care to tell.
Adapted from BURNS.
KISSING HER HAIR.
Kissing her hair, I sat against her feet :
Wove and unwove it, — wound, and found it
sweet ;
Made fast therewith her hands, drew down her
eyes.
Deep as deep flowers, and dreamy like dim skies ;
With her own tresses bound, and found her
fair, —
Kissing her hair.
Sleep were no sweeter than her face to me, —
Sleep of cold sea-bloom under the cold sea :
What pain could get between my face and hers ?
What new sweet thing would Love not relish
worse ?
Unless, perhaps, white Death had kissed me
there, —
Kissing her hair.
Algernon Charles Swinburne.
—♦
MAKE BELIEVE.
Kiss me, though you make believe ;
Kiss me, though I almost know
You are kissing to deceive :
Let the tide one moment flow
Backward ere it rise and break,
for noor nitv's sake !
LOVE'S PHILOSOPHY.
The fountains mingle with the river.
And the rivers with the ocean ;
The winds of heaven mix forever.
With a sweet emotion ;
Nothing in the world is single ;
All things by a law divine
In one another's being mingle : —
Why not I with thine ?
See ! the mountains kiss high heaven,
And the waves clasp one another ;
No sister flower would be forgiven
If it disdained its brother ;
And the sunlight clasps the earth.
And the moonbeams kiss the sea : —
What are aU these kissings worth.
If thou kiss not me ?
PERCY BvssHE Shelley.
—*—
THE MOTH'S KISS, FIRST!
frou " in a gondola."
The Moth's kiss, first !
Kiss me as if you made believe
You were not sure, this eve.
How my face, your flower, had pursed
Its petals up ; so, here and there
You brush it, till I gi-ow aware
Who wants me, and wide open burst.
The Bee's kiss, now !
Kiss me as if you entered gay
My heart at some noonday,
A bud that dared not disallow
The claim, so all is rendered up.
And passively its shattered cup
Over your head to sleep I bow.
Robert Browning.
Give me of your flowers one leaf.
Give me of your smiles one smile,
Backward roU this tide of grief
Just a moment, though, the while,
I should feel and almost know
You are trifling with my woe.
Whisper to me sweet and low ;
Tell me how you sit and weave
Dreams about me, though I know
It is only make believe !
Just a moment, though't is plain
You are jesting with my pain.
Alice Gary.
LINES TO AN INDIAN AIR.
serenade.
I arise from dreams of thee
In the first sweet sleep of night,
When the winds are breathing low.
And the stars are shining bright.
I arise from dreams of thee.
And a spirit in my feet
Has led me — who knows how ? —
To thy chamber-window, sweet 1
The wandering airs they faint
On the dark, the silent stream, —
The champak odors fail
Like sweet thoughts in a dream ;
LOVE.
189
The nightingale's complaint,
It dies upon her heart,
As I must die on thine,
O, belovèd as thou art 1
0, lift me from the grass !
I die, I faint, I fail !
Let thy love in kisses rain
On my lips and eyelids pale.
My cheek is cold and white, alas !
My heart heats loud and fast :
0, press it close to thine again.
Where it will break at last !
PERCY BVSSHE SHELLEY.
SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE.
Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand
Henceforward in thy shadow. Nevermore
Alone upon the threshold of my door
Of individual life, 1 shall command
The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand
Serenely in the sunshine as before.
Without the sense of that which I forbore,.. .
Thy touch upon the palm. The widest land
Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart in mine
With pulses that beat double. What I do
And what I dream include thee, as the wine
Must taste of its own grapes. And when I sue
God for myself, he hears that name of thine.
And sees within my eyes the tears of two.
Indeed this very love which is my boast,
And which, when rising up from breast to brow.
Doth crown me with a ruby large enow
To draw men's eyes and prove the inner cost, .
This love even, all my worth, to the uttermost,
I should not love withal, unless that thou
Hadst set me an example, shown me how,
AVhen first thine earnest eyes with mine were
crossed,
And love called love. And thus, I cannot speak
Of love even, as a good thing of my own.
Thy soul hath snatched up mine all faint and
weak.
And placed it by thee on a golden throne, —
And that I love (0 soul, we must be meek !)
Is by thee only, whom I love alone.
If thou must love me, let it be for naught
Except for love's sake only. Do not say
"I love her for her smile.. . her look. . . her way
Of speaking gently, — for a trick of thought
That falls in well with mine, and certes brought
A sense of pleasant ease on such a day."
È
For these things in themselves, belovfed, may
Be changed, or change for thee, — and love so
wrought,
May be un wrought so. Neither love me for
Thine own dear pity's wiping my cheeks dry, —
A creature might forget to weep, who bore
Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby.
But love me for love's sake, that evermore
Thou mayst love on, through love's eternity.
I never gave a lock of hair away
To a man. Dearest, except this to thee,
Which now upon my fingers thoughtfully
1 ring out to the full brown length and say
" Take it." My day of youth went yesterday ;
My hair no longer bounds to my foot's glee.
Nor plant I it from rose or myrtle tree.
As girls do, any more. It only may
Now shade On two pale cheeks, the mark of tears.
Taught drooping from the head that hangs aside
Through sorrow's trick. I thought the funeral-
shears
Would take this first, but Love is justified, —
Take it thou, . .. finding pure, from all those
years.
The kiss my mother left here when she died.
Sat over again, and yet once over again.
That thou dost love me. Though the word re¬
peated
Should seem " a cuckoo-song," as thou dost treat
it.
Remember, never to the hill or plain.
Valley and wood, without her cuckoo-strain.
Comes the fresh spring in all her green completed.
Beloved, I, amid the darkness greeted
By a doubtful spirit-voice, in that doubt's pain
Cry : " Speak once more — thou lovest ! " Who
can fear
Too many stars, though each in heaven shall
roll, —
Too many flowers, though each shall crown the
year ?
Say thou dost love me, love me, love me, — toll
The silver iterance ! — only minding, dear.
To love me also in silence, with thy soul.
My letters ! all dead paper,.. . mute and white ! —
And yet they seem alive and quivering
Against my tremulous hands which loose the
string
And let them drop down on my knee to-night.
This said,... he wished to have me in his sight
Once, as a friend : this fixed a day in spring
To come and touch my hand ... a simple thing.
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
Yet I wept for it ! this,... the paper's light.. .
Said, Dear, I love thee ; and I sank and quailed
As if God's future thundered on my past.
This said, I am thim, — and so its ink has paled
With lying at my heart that beat too fast.
And this ... 0 Love, thy words have ill availed.
If what this said, I dared repeat at last !
The first time that the sun rose on thine oath
To love me, I looked forward to the moon
To slacken all those bonds which seemed too soon
And quickly tied to make a lasting troth.
Quick-loving hearts, I thought, may quickly
loathe ;
And, looking on myself, I seemed not one
For such man's love ! — more like an out of tune
Worn viol, a good singer would be wroth
To spoil his song with, and which, snatched in
haste.
Is laid down at the first ill-sounding note.
I did not wrong myself so, but I placed
A wrong on thee. For perfect strains may float
'Neathmaster-hands, from instruments defaced,—
And great souls, at one stroke, may do and doat.
First time he kissed me, he but only kissed
The fingers of this hand wherewith I write ;
And, ever since, it grew more clean and white.
Slow to world-greetings, quick with its " 0 list ! "
When the angels speak. A ring of amethyst
I could not wear here, plainer to my sight
Than that first kiss. The second passed in height
The first, and sought the forehead, and half missed.
Half falling on the hair. 0, beyond meed !
That was the chrism of love, which love's own
crown.
With sanctifying sweetness, did precede.
The third upon my lips was folded down
In perfect, purple state ; since when, indeed,
I have been proud, and said, "My love, my own ! "
How do I love thee ? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
j\Iy soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of Being and ideal Grace.
I love thee to the level of every day's
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for Eight ;
I love thee purely, as they turn from Praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints,—I love thee with the breath.
Smiles, tears, of all my life ! — and, if God choose,
1 shall but love thee better after death.
elizabeth Barrett Browning.
WAITING FOR THE GRAPES.
That I love thee, charming maid, I a thousand
times have said.
And a thousand times more I have sworn it.
But't is easy to be seen in the coldness of your
mien
That you doubt my afifection — or scorn it.
Ah me!
Not a single grain of sense is in the whole of
these pretences
For rejecting your lover's petitions ;
Had I windows in my bosom, 0, how gladly I'd
expose 'em.
To undo your fantastic suspicions !
Ah me !
You repeat I 've known you long, and you hint
I do you wrong.
In beginning so late to pursue ye ;
But 't is folly to look glum because people did
not come
Up the stairs of your nursery to woo ye.
Ah me I
In a grapery one walks without looking at the
stalks.
While the bunches are green that they 're bear¬
ing:
AH the pretty little leaves that are dangling at
the eaves
Scarce attract e'en a moment of staring.
Ah me !
But when time has sweUed the grapes to a richer
style of shapes.
And the sun has lent warmth to their blushes.
Then to cheer us and to gladden, to enchant us
and to madden.
Is the ripe ruddy glory that rushes.
Ah me !
0, 't is then that mortals pant while they gaze
on Bacchus' plant, —
0, 't is then, — will my simile serve ye ?
Should a damsel fair repine, though neglected
like a vine ?
Both erelong shaU turn heads topsy-turvy.
Ah me !
William macinn.
THE LOVE-KNOT.
Tying her bonnet under her chin.
She tied her raven ringlets in.
But not alone in the silken snare
Did she catch her lovely floating hair.
For, tying her bonnet under her chin.
She tied a young man's heart within.
[S-
They were strolling together up the hill,
Where the wind came blowing merry and chill ;
And it blew the curls a frolicsome race,
All over the happy peach-colored face.
Till scolding and laughing, she tied them in.
Under her beautiful, dimpled chin.
And it blew a color, bright as the bloom
Of the pinkest fuchsia's tossing plume.
All over the cheeks of the prettiest girl
That ever imprisoned a romping curl.
Or, in tying her bonnet under her chin,
Tied a young man's heart within.
Steeper and steeper grew the hill.
Madder, merrier, chiller still,
The western wind blew down, and played
The wildest tricks with the little maid.
As, tying her bonnet under her chin.
She tied a young man's heart within.
0 western wind, do you think it was fair
To play such tricks with her floating hair ?
To gladly, gleefully, do your best
To blow her against the young man's breast.
Where he has gladly folded her in.
And kissed her mouth and dimpled chin ?
0 Ellery Vane, you little thought.
An hour ago, when you besought
This country lass to walk with you.
After the sun had dried the dew.
What terrible danger you'd be'in.
As she tied her bonnet under her cliin.
Nora perry.
GREEN GROW THE RASHES O!
Green grow the rashes O,
Green grow the rashes 0 ;
The sweetest hours that e'er I spend
Are spent amang the lasses O !
There's naught but care on ev'ry han'.
In every hour that passes O ;
What signifies the life o' man.
An't were na for the lasses 0 ?
The warly race may riches chase.
An' riches still may fly them 0 ;
An' though at last they catch them fast.
Their hearts can ne'er enjoy them O !
Gie me a canny hour at e'en.
My arms about my dearie 0,
An' warly cares an' warly men
May all gae tapsalteerie O !
«
For you sae douce, ye sneer at this.
Ye 're naught but senseless asses 0 ;
The wisest man the warl' e'er saw
He dearly lo'ed the lasses 0 !
Auld Nature swears the lovely dears
Her noblest work she classes O :
Her 'prentice han' she tried on man.
An' then she made the lasses O !
robert Burns.
THE CHRONICLE.
MaÍigabita first possessed.
If I remember well, my breast,
Margarita first of all ;
But when awhile the wanton maid
/ i < '
With my restless heart had^ played,
Martha took the flying ball.
Martha soon did it resign
To the beauteous Catharine.
Beauteous Catharine gave place
(Though loath and angry she to part
With the possession of my heart)
To Eliza's conquering face.
Eliza till this hour might reign.
Had she not evil counsels ta'en ;
Fundamental laws she broke.
And still new favorites she chose.
Till up in arms my passions rose.
And cast away her yoke.
Mary then, and gentle Anne,
Both to reign at once began ;
Alternately they swayed ;
And sometimes Mary was the fair.
And sometimes Anne the crown did wear.
And sometimes both I obeyed.
Another Mary then arose.
And did rigorous laws impose ;
A mighty tyrant she !
Long, alas ! should I have been
Under that iron-sceptred queen.
Had not Rebecca set me free.
When fair Rebecca set me free,
'T was then a golden time with me :
But soon those pleasures fled ;
For the gracious princess died
In her youth and beauty's pride.
And Judith reignèd in her stead.
One month, three days, and half an honr
Judith held the sovereign power ;
Wondrous beautiful her face !
192
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
But so weak and small her wit,
That she to govern was unfit.
And so Susanna took her place.
But when Isabella came,
Armed with a resistless ñame.
And the artillery of her eye ;
Whilst she proudly marched about.
Greater conquests to find out,
She beat out Susan, by the by.
But in her place I then obeyed
Black-eyed Bess, her viceroy-maid,
To whom ensued a vacancy :
Thousand worse passions then possessed
The interregnum of my breast ;
Bless me from such an anarchy !
Gentle Henrietta then.
And a third Mary, next began ;
Then Joan, and Jane, and Audria ;
And then a pretty Thomasine,
And then another Catharine,
And then a long et caetera.
But I wiU briefer with them be.
Since few of them were long with me.
An higher and a nobler strain
My present emperess does claim,
Heleonora, first o' th' name.
Whom God grant long to reign !
Abraham Cowley.
Grown calmer, wiser, how the fault they curse.
And, limping, look with such a sneaking
grace !
Job's war-horse fierce, his neck with thunder
hung.
Sunk to an humble hack that carries dung.
Smell to the queen of flowers, the fragrant rose —
Smell twenty times—and then, my dear, thy
nose
Will tell thee (not so much for scent athirst)
The twentieth drank less flavor than the first.
Love, doubtless, is the sweetest of all fellows ;
Yet often should the little god retire.
Absence, dear Chloe, is a pair of bellows.
That keeps alive the sacred fire.
Dr. Wolcott {Peter Pindar).
e-
TO CHLOE.
an apology for going into the country.
Chloe, we must not always be in heaven.
Forever tojiing, ogling, kissing, billing ;
The joys for which 1 thousands would have given, '
Will presently be scarcely worth a shilling.
Thy neck is fairer than the Alpine snows.
And, sweetly swelling, beats the down of
doves ;
Thy cheek of health, a rival to the rose ;
Thy pouting lips, the throne of all the loves ;
Yet, though thus beautiful beyond expression.
That beauty fadeth by too much possession.
Economy in love is peace to nature.
Much like economy in worldly matter ;
We should be prudent, never live too fast ;
Profusion wiU not, cannot always last.
Lovers are really spendthrifts, — 't is a shame, —
Nothing their thoughtless, wild career can tame.
Till penury stares them in the face ;
knà. when they find an empty purse,
THE EXCHANGE.
We pledged our hearts, my love and 1, —
1 in my arms the maiden clasping ;
1 could not tell the reason why.
But, O, 1 trembled like an aspen !
Her father's love she bade me gain ;
I went, and shook like any reed !
I strove to act the man, —in vain !
We had exchanged our hearts indeed.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
WISHES TO HIS SUPPOSED MISTRESS.
Whoe'er she be.
That not impossible she.
That shall command my heart and me ;
Where'er she lie.
Locked up from mortal eye.
In shady leaves of destiny.
Till that ripe birth
Of studied fate stand forth.
And teach her fair steps to our earth ;
Till that divine
Idea take a shrine
Of crystal flesh, through which to shine :
Meet you her, my Wishes,
Bespeak her to my blisses.
And be ye called my absent kisses.
I wish her beauty,
That owes not all its duty
To gaudy tire, or glistering shoe-tie,
-0
LOVE.
193
Something more than
Taffata or tissue can.
Or rampant feather, or rich fan ;
More than the spoil
Of shop, or silkworm's toil.
Or a bought blush, or a set smile.
A face, that's best
By its own beauty dressed.
And can alone command the rest.
A face, made up
Out of no other shop,
Thau what Nature's white hand sets ope.
Days, that need borrow
No part of their good morrow.
From a fore-spent night of sorrow.
Days, that in spite
Of darkness, by the light
Of a clear mind, are day all night.
Nights, sweet as they
Made short by lovers' play.
Yet long by the absence of the day.
Life that dares send
A challenge to his end.
And when it comes, say. Welcome, friend !
Sydneian showers
Of sweet discourse, whose powers
Can crown old Winter's head with flowers.
Soft silken hours.
Open suns, shady bowers ;
'Bove all — nothing within that lowers.
Whate'er delight
Can make day's forehead bright.
Or give down to the wings of night.
In her whole frame.
Have Nature all the name.
Art and ornament the shame.
Her flattery.
Picture and poesy.
Her counsel her own virtue be.
I wish her store
Of worth may leave her poor
Of wishes ; and 1 wish — no more.
Now, if Time knows
That her, whose radiant brows
Weave them a garland of my vows ;
1
Her, whose just hays
My future hopes can raise,
A trophy to her present praise ;
Her, that dares he
What these lines wish to see :
I seek no further, it is She.
'T is She, and here,
Lo, 1 unclothe and clear
My Wish's cloudy character f
May she enjoy it.
Whose merit dare apply it.
But modesty dares still deny it !
Such worth as this is
Shall fix my flying wishes.
And determine them to kisses.
Let her full glory.
My fancies, fly before ye.
Be ye my fictions, but — her story.
Richard Crashaw.
THE SHEPHERD'S RESOLUTION
Shall I, wasting in despair.
Die because a woman's fair ?
Or make pale my cheeks with care
'Cause another's rosy are ?
Be she fairer than the day.
Or the flowery meads in May, —
If she be not so to me.
What care I how fair she be ?
Shall my foolish heart be pined
'Cause 1 see a woman kind ?
Or a well-disposèd nature
Joined with a lovely feature ?
Be she meeker, kinder than
The turtle-dove or pelican, —
If she be not so to me.
What care I how kind she be ?
Shall a woman's virtues move
Me to perish for her love ?
Or, her well deservings known.
Make me quite forget mine own ?
Be she with that goodness blest
Which may merit name of best, -
If she be not such to me.
What care I how good she be ?
'Cause her fortune seems too high,
Shall I play the fool and die ?
Those that bear a noble mind
Where they want of riches find.
194
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Think what with them they would do
That without them dare to woo ;
And unless that mind I see,
What care I how great she be ?
Great, or good, or kind, or fair,
I will ne'er the more despair :
If she love me, this believe, —
I will die ere she shall grieve.
If she slight me when I woo,
I can scorn and let her go ; —
For if she be not for me,
What care I for whom she be ?
gborgf. wither.
BOSALIND'S COMPLAINT.
Love in my bosom, like a bee.
Doth suck his sweet ;
Now with his wings he plays with me.
Now with his feet ;
Within mine eyes he makes his nest.
His bed amidst my tender breast,
My kisses are his daily feast,
And yet he robs me of my rest :
Ah ! wanton, will ye ?
And if I sleep, then percheth he
With pretty flight.
And makes his pillow of my knee.
The livelong night.
Strike I the lute, he tunes the string ;
He music plays, if so I sing ;
He lends me every lovely thing.
Yet, cruel, he my heart doth sting ;
Whist ! wanton, still ye !
Else I with roses every day
Will whip you hence.
And bind you when you long to play.
For your offence ;
I 'II shut my eyes to keep you in,
I '11 make you fast it for your sin,
I 'II count your power not worth a pin :
Alas ! what hereby shall I win
If he gainsay me !
What if I beat the wanton boy
With many a rod ?
He will repay me with annoy,
Because a god ;
Then sit thou safely on my knee,
And let thy bower my bosom be ;
Lurk in my eyes, I like of thee,
0 Cupid ! so thou pity me ;
Spare not, but play thee !
Thomas Lodge.
COUNTY GUY.
from " quentin durward."
Ah ! County Guy, the hour is nigh,
The sun has left the lea,
The orange-flower perfumes the bower.
The breeze is on the sea.
The lark, his lay who trilled all day.
Sits hushed his partner nigh ;
Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour.
But where is County Guy ?
The village maid steals through the shade.
Her shepherd's suit, to hear ;
To beauty shy, by lattice high,
Sings high-bom cavalier.
The star of Love, all stars above.
Now reigns o'er earth and sky.
And high and low the influence know.
But where is County Guy ?
Sir walter Scott.
LET NOT WOMAN E'ER COMPLAIN.
Let not woman e'er complain
Of inconstancy in love ;
Let not woman e'er complain
Fickle man is apt to rove ;
Look abroad through Nature's range,
Nature's mighty law is change ;
Ladies, would it not be strange
Man should then a monster prove ?
Mark the winds, and mark the skies ;
Ocean's ebb and ocean's flow ;
Sun and moon but set to rise.
Round and round the seasons go.
Why then ask of silly man.
To oppose great Nature's plan ?
We '11 be constant while we can, —
You can be no more, you know.
Robert Burns.
UNSATISFACTORY.
" Have other lovers — say, my love —
Loved thus before to-day ? "
" They may have, yes, they may, my love ;
Not long ago they may."
" But, though they worshipped thee, my love.
Thy maiden heart was free ? "
" Don't ask too much of me, my love ;
Don't ask too much of me."
" Yet, now't is you and I, my love.
Love's wings no more wUI fly ? "
" If love could never die, my love.
Our love should never die."
LOVE-LETTERS IN FLOWERS
exquisite invention this^
H 'orthy of Lovers most honeyed kiss^ -
This art of writiuf^ bilUt'doux
In buds, and odors, and hris:ht hues I
LOVE.
195
" For shame ! and is this so, my love,
And Love and I must go ? "
" Indeed, I do not know, my love,
My life, I do not know."
" You wiU, you must be true, my love, —
Not look and love anew ! "
" I '11 see what I can do, my love,
I '11 see what I can do."
Anonymous.
LOVE-LETTERS , MADE IN FLOWERS.
on a print of one op them in a book.
An exquisite invention this.
Worthy of Love's most honeyed kiss, —
This art of writing billet-doux
In buds, and odors, and bright hues !
In saying all one feels and thinks
In clever daffodils and pinks ;
In puns of tulips ; and in phrases.
Charming for their truth, of daisies ;
Uttering, as well as silence may.
The sweetest words the sweetest way.
How fit too for the lady's bosom !
The place where billet-doux repose 'em.
What delight in some sweet spot
Combining love with garden plot.
At once to cultivate one's fiowers
And one's epistolary powers !
Growing one's own choice words and fancies
In orange tubs, and beds of pansies ;
One's sighs, and passionate declarations.
In odorous rhetoric of carnations ;
Seeing how far one's stocks will reach ;
Taking due care one's flowers of speech
To guard from blight as well as bathos.
And watering every day one's pathos !
a letter comes, just gathered. We
Dote on its tender brilliancy.
Inhale its delicate expressions
Of balm and pea, and its confessions
Made with as sweet a Maiden's Blush
As ever morn bedewed on bush :
{'T is in reply to one of ours.
Made of the most convincing flowers.)
Then, after we have kissed its wit
And heart, in water putting it
(To keep its remarks fresh), go round
Our little eloquent plot of ground.
And with enchanted hands compose
Our answer, — aU of lily and rose,
Of tuberose and of violet.
And Little Darling (mignonette);
Of Look-at-me and Call-me-to-you
(Words that, while they greet, go through you) ;
Of Thoughts, of Flames, Forget-me-not,
Bridewort, — in short, the whole blest lot
Of vouchers for a hfelong kiss, —
And literally, breathing bliss !
Leigh Hunt.
MY EYES! HOW I LOVE YOU.
My eyes ! how I love you.
You sweet little dove you I
There's no one above you.
Most beautiful Kitty.
So glossy your hair is.
Like a sylph's or a fairy's ;
And your neck, I declare, is
Exquisitely pretty
Quite Grecian your nose is.
And your cheeks are like roses.
So delicious — O Moses !
Surpassingly sweet !
Not the beauty of tulips.
Nor the taste of mint-juleps.
Can compare with your two lips.
Most beautiful Kate !
Not the black eyes of Juno,
Nor Minerva's of blue, no.
Nor Venus's, you know.
Can equal your own !
0, how my heart prances.
And frolics and dances.
When its radiant glances
Upon me are thrown !
And now, dearest Kitty,
It's not very pretty.
Indeed it's a pity.
To keep me in sorrow !
So, if you 'II but chime in.
We 'U have done with our rhymin'.
Swap Cupid for Hymen,
And be married to-morrow.
john Godfrey Saxe.
•
CUPID SWALLOWED.
T' other day, as I was twining
Roses for a crown to dine in.
What, of all things, midst the heap.
Should I light on, fast asleep.
e-
196
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
But the little desperate elf,
The tiny traitor, — Love himself !
By the wings 1 pinched him up
Like a bee, and in a cup
Of my wine I plunged and sank him ;
And what d' ye think I did ? — I drank him !
Faith, I thought him dead. Not he !
There he lives with tenfold glee ;
And now this moment, with his wings
I feel him tickling my heart-strings.
Leigh Hunt.
DUNCAN GRAY CAM' HERE TO "WOO.
Duncan Gray cam' here to woo —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
On blythe Yule night when we were fou —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Maggie coost her head fu' high.
Looked asklent and unco skeigh.
Gart poor Duncan stand aheigh —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Duncan fleeched and Duncan prayed —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Meg was deaf as Ailsa craig —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't I
Duncan sighed haith out and in,
Grat his een haith bleer't and blin*,
Spak o' lowpin o'er a linn —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't I
Time and chance are but a tide —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Slighted love is sair to bide —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Shall I, like a fool, quoth he.
For a haughty hizzie dee ?
She may gae to — France, for me !
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
How it comes let doctors tell —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Meg grew sick as he grew heal —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Something in her bosom wrings, —
Foi reRef a sigh she brings ;
And O, her een they speak sic things !
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Duncan was a lad o' grace —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Maggie's was a piteous case —
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
Duncan could na be her death :
Swelling pity smoored his wrath.
Now they're crouse and canty haith.
Ha, ha ! the wooing o't !
robert Burns
THE DULE 'S I' THIS BONNET 0' MINE.
lancashire dialect.
The dule's i' this bonnet o' mine ;
My ribbins 'U never be reet ;
Here, Mally, aw'm like to be fine,
For Jamie '11 be comin' to-neet ;
He met me i' th' lone t' other day
(Aw wur gooin' for wayter to th* well).
An' he begged that aw'd wed him i' May,
Bi th' mass, if he 'U let me,'aw wül !
"When he took my two hoods into his.
Good Lord, heaw they trembled between !
An' aw durst n't look up in his face,
Becose on him seein' my e'en.
My cheek went as red as a rose ;
There's never a mortal con tell
Heaw happy aw felt, — for, thae knows.
One could n't ha' axed hhn theirsel'.
But th' tale wur at th' end o' my tung :
To let it eawt would n't he reet,
For aw thought to seem forrud wur wrung ;
So aw towd him aw'd teU him to-neet.
But, Mally, thae knows very weel.
Though it is n't a thing one should own,
Iv aw'd th' pikein' o' th' world to mysel'.
Aw'd oather ha Jamie or noan.
Neaw, Mally, aw've towd thae my mind ;
What would to do iv it wur thee ?
" Aw'd tak him just while he 'se inclined,
An' a farrantly bargain he '11 be ;
For Jamie's as greadly a lad
As ever stept eawt into th' sun.
Go, jump at thy chance, an' get wed ;
An' mak th' best o' th' job when it's done ! "
Eh, dear ! but it's time to be gwon :
Aw should n't like Jamie to wait ;
Aw connut for shame be too soon.
An' aw would n't for th' wuld be too late.
Aw'm o' ov a tremble to th' heel :
Dost think 'at my bonnet 'U do ?
" Be off, lass, — thae looks very weel ;
He wants noan o' th' bonnet, thae foo ! "
edwin waugh.
RORY O'MORE;
or, all for good luck.
Young Rory O'More courted Kathleen bawn, —
He was bold as a hawk, she as soft as the dawn j
He wished in his heart pretty Kathleen to please.
And he thought the best way to do that was to
tease.
á
F
LOVE.
197
'S-
"Now, Rory, be aisy ! " sweet Kathleen would
cry,
Reproof on her lip, but a smile in her eye, —
" With your tricks, I don't know, in troth, what
I'm about ;
Faith ! you've tazed tiU I've put on my cloak
inside out."
" Geh ! jewel," says Rory, " that same is the way
Ye've thrated my heart for this many a day ;
And 't is plazed that I am, and why not, to be
sure ?
For 'tis all for good luck," says bold Rory
O'More.
"Indeed, then," says Kathleen, "don't think of
the like.
For I half gave a promise to soothering Mike :
The ground that I walk on he loves, I 'U be
bound — "
"Faith! " says Roiy, " I'd rather love you than
the ground."
"Now, Rory, I '11 cry if you don't let me go ;
Sure I dream every night that I'm hating you
so!"
"Geh ! " says Rory, "that same I'm delighted
to hear.
For dhrames always go by conthraries, my dear.
So, jewel, kape dhraming that same till ye die.
And bright morning will give dirty night the
black lie !
And 't is plazed that I am, and why not, to be
sure ?
Since 'tis all for good luck," says bold Rory
G'More.
" Arrah, Kathleen, my darlint, you've tazed me
enough ;
Sure I've thrashed, for your sake, Dinny Grimes
and Jim Duff ;
And I've made myself, drinking your health,
quite a baste, —
So I think, after that, I may talk to the praste."
Then Rory, the rogue, stole his arm round her
neck.
So soft and so white, without freckle or speck ;
And he looked in her eyes, that were beaming
with light.
And he kissed her sweet lips, — don't you think
he was right ?
" Now, Rory, leave off, sir, — you '11 hug me no
more, —
That's eight times to-day that you've kissed me
before."
"Then here goes another," says he, "to make
sure !
For there's luck in odd numbers," says Rory
O'More.
Samuel Lover.
THE LGW-BACKED CAE.
When first I saw sweet Peggy,
'T was on a market day :
A low-backed car she drove, and sat
Upon a truss of hay ;
But when that hay was blooming grass.
And decked with fiowers of spring.
No ño wer was there that could compare
With the blooming girl I sing.
As she sat in the low-backed car.
The man at the turnpike bar
Never asked for the toU,
But just rubbed his owld poll.
And looked after the low-backed car.
In battle's wild commotion,
The proud and mighty Mars
With hostile scythes demands his tithes
Gf death in warlike cars ;
While Peggy, peaceful goddess.
Has darts in her bright eye.
That knock men down in the market town,
As right and left they fly ;
While she sits in her low-backed car.
Than battle more dangerous far, —
For the doctor's art
Cannot cure the heart
That is hit from that low-backed car
Sweet Peggy round her car, sir.
Has strings of ducks and geese.
But the scores of hearts she slaughters
By far outnumber these ;
While she among her poultry sits.
Just like a turtle-dove.
Well worth the cage, I do engage,
Gf the blooming god of Love !
While she sits in her low-backed car.
The lovers come near and far.
And envy the chicken
That Peggy is pickin'.
As she sits in her low-backed car.
O, I'd rather own that car, sir.
With Peggy by my side.
Than a coach and four, and gold galore.
And a lady for my bride ;
For the lady would sit forninst me.
On a cushion made with taste, —
While Peggy would sit beside me.
With my arm around her waist.
While we drove in the low-backed car.
To be married by Father Mahar ;
G, my heart would beat high
At her glance and her sigh, —
Though it beat in a low-backed car !
Samuel Lover.
-51
198
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
SALLY IN OUR ALLEY.
Of all the girls that are so smart
There's none like pretty Sally ;
She is the darling of my heart.
And she lives in our alley.
There is no lady in the land
Is half so sweet as Sally ;
She is the darling of my heart,
And she lives in our alley.
Her father he makes cabbage-nets,
And through the streets does cry 'em ;
Her mother she sells laces long
To such as please to buy 'em ;
But sure such folks could ne'er beget
So sweet a girl as Sally !
She is the darling of my heart,
And she lives in our alley.
When she is by I leave my work,
I love her so sincerely ;
My master comes like any Turk,
And bangs me most severely.
But let him bang his bellyful,
I '11 bear it all for Sally ;
For she's the darling of my heart.
And she lives in our alley.
Of all the days that's in the week
I dearly love but one day,
And that's the day that comes betwixt
The Saturday and Monday ;
For then I'm drest all in my best
To walk abroad with Sally ;
She is the darling of my heart.
And she lives in our alley.
My master carries me to church.
And often am I blamed
Because I leave him in the lurch
As soon as text is named :
I leave the church in sermon-time.
And slink away to Sally ;
She is the darling of my heart.
And she lives in our alley.
When Christmas comes about again,
0, then I shall have money !
I '11 hoard it up, and box it all.
And give it to my honey ;
I would it were ten thousand pound!
I'd give it all to Sally ;
She is the darling of my heait.
And she lives in our alley.
My master and the neighbors all
Make game of me and Sally,
And, but for her, I'd better be
A slave, and inw a galley ;
But when my seven long years are out,
0, then I '11 marry Sally !
O, then we '11 wed, and then we '11 bed, —
But not in our alley !
henry Carey.
LOVELY MARY DONNELLY.
0 LOVELY Mary Donnelly, it's you I love the
best !
If fifty girls were round you, I'd hardly see the
rest.
Be what it may the time of day, the place be
where it will.
Sweet looks of Mary Donnelly, they bloom be¬
fore me still.
Her eyes like mountain water that's fiowing on
a rock.
How clear they are I how dark they are ! and
they give me many a shock.
Red rowans warm in sunshine, and wetted with
a shower.
Could ne'er express the charming lip that has
me in its power.
Her nose is straight and handsome, her eyebrows
lifted up.
Her chin is very neat and pert, and smooth like
a china cup.
Her hair's the brag of Ireland, so weighty and
so fine, —
It's rolling down upon her neck, and gathered
in a twine.
The dance o' last Whit-Monday night exceeded
all before ;
No pretty girl for miles about was missing from
the floor ;
But Mary kept the belt of love, and 0, but she
was gay !
She danced a jig, she sung a song, that took my
heart away.
When she stood up for dancing, her steps were
so complete
The music nearly killed itself to listen to her
feet ;
The fiddler moaned his blindness, he heard her
so much praised,
But blessed himself he was n't deaf when once
her voice she raised.
And evermore I'm whistling or lilting what you
sung,
Your smüe is always in my heart, your name
beside my tongue ;
LOVE.
199
But you've as many sweethearts as you'd count
on both your hands,
And for myself there's not a thumb or little
finger stands.
0, you're the flower o' womankind in country
or in town ;
The higher I exalt you, the lower I'm cast
down.
If some great lord should come this way, and see
your beauty bright.
And you to be his lady, I'd own it was but
right.
O, might we live together in a lofty palace hall.
Where joyful music rises, and where scarlet cur¬
tains faU !
0, might we live together in a cottage mean and
small ;
With sods of grass the only roof, and mud the
only wall !
0 lovely Mary Donnelly, your beauty's my dis¬
tress ;
It's far too beauteous to be mine, but I '11 never
wish it less.
The proudest place would fit your face, and I
am poor and low ;
But blessings be about you, dear, wherever you
may go !
WILLIAM ALLINGHAM.
HER LETTER.
I'm sitting alone by the fire.
Dressed just as I came from the dance.
In a robe even you would admire, —
It cost a cool thousand in France ;
I'm bediamonded out of all reason.
My hair is done up in a cue :
In short, sir, " the belle of the season "
Is wasting an hour on you.
A dozen engagements I've broken ;
I left in the midst of a set ;
Likewise a proposal, half spoken.
That waits — on the stairs — for me yet.
They say he 'U be rich, — when he grows up, —
And then he adores me indeed.
And you, sir, are turning your nose up.
Three thousand miles off, as you read.
" And how do I like my position ? "
" And what do 1 think of New York ? "
"And now, in my higher ambition.
With whom do I waltz, flirt, or talk ? "
" And is n't it nice to have riches
And diamonds and silks and aU that ? "
" And are n't it a change to the ditches
And tunnels of Poverty Flat ? "
Well, yes, — if you saw us out driving
Each day in the park, four-in-hand ;
If you saw poor dear mamma contriving
To look supematurally grand, —
If you saw papa's picture, as taken
By Brady, and tinted at that.
You'd never suspect he sold bacon
And flour at Poverty Flat.
And yet, just this moment, when sitting
In the glare of the grand chandelier.
In the bustle and glitter befitting
The " finest soiree of the year,"
In the mists of a gaze de chainbéry
And the hum of the smallest of talk, —
Somehow, Joe, I thought of " The Ferry,"
And the dance that we had on " The Fork ; "
Of Harrison's bam, with its muster
Of flags festooned over the wall ;
Of the candles that shed their soft lustre
And tallow on head-dress and shawl ;
Of the steps that we took to one fiddle ;
Of the dress of my queer vis-à-vis ;
And how I once went down the middle
With the man that shot Sandy McGee ;
Of the moon that was quietly sleeping
On the hill, when the time came to go ;
Of the few baby peaks that were peeping
From under their bedclothes of snow ;
Of that ride, — that to me was the rarest ;
Of — the something you said at the gate :
Ah, Joe, then I was n't an heiress
To "the best-paying lead in the State."
Well, well, it's all past ; yet it's funny
To think, as I stood in the glare
Of fashion and beauty and money.
That I should he thinking, right there.
Of some one who breasted high water.
And swam the North Fork, and all that.
Just to dmce with old Folinsbee's daughter.
The Lily of Poverty Flat.
But goodness ! what nonsense I'm writing !
(Mamma says my taste still is low,)
Instead of my triumphs reciting,
I'm spooning on Joseph, — heigh-ho !
And I'm to be " finished" by travel.
Whatever's the meaning of that, —
0, why did papa strike pay gravel
In drifting on Poverty Flat ?
Good night, — here's the end of my paper ;
Good night, — if the longitude please, —
For maybe, while wasting my taper.
Your sun's climbing over the trees.
200
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
But know, if you have n't got riches,
And are poor, dearest Joe, and all that.
That my heart's somewhere there in the ditches,
And you've struck it, — on Poverty Flat.
Bret Harte.
WIDOW MAOHREE.
Widow machree, it's no wonder you frown, —
Och hone ! widow machree ;
Faith, it ruins your looks, that same dirty black
gown, —
Och hone ! widow machree.
How altered your air.
With that close cap you wear, —
'T is destroying your hair.
Which should be flowing free :
Be no longer a churl
Of its black silken curl, —
Och hone ! widow machree.
Widow machree, now the summer is come, —
Och hone ! widow machree ;
When everything smiles, should a beauty look
glum ?
Och hone ! widow machree !
See the birds go in pairs.
And the rabbits and hares ;
Why, even the bears
Now in couples agi'ee ;
And the mute little fish.
Though they can't spake, they wish, —
hone ! widow machree !
Widow machree, and when winter comes in, —
Och hone ! widow machree, —
To be poking the fire all alone is a sin,
Och hone ! widow machree !
Sure the shovel and tongs
To each other belongs,
And the kettle sings songs
Full of family glee ;
While alone with your cup
Like a hermit you sup,
Och hone ! widow machree !
And how do you know, with the comforts I've
towld, —
Och hone ! widow machree, —
But you 're keeping some poor fellow out in the
cowld ?
Och hone ! widow machree !
With such sins on your head.
Sure your peace would be fled ;
Could you sleep in your bed
Without thinking to see
Some ghost or some sprite.
That would wake you each night.
Crying " Och hone ! widow machree ! "
Then take my advice, darling widow machree, —
Och hone 1 widow machree ! —
And with my advice, faith, I wish you'd take
me,
Och hone ! widow machree !
You'd have me to desire
Then to stir up the fire ;
And sure hope is no liar
In whispering to me
That the ghosts would depart
When you'd me near your heart, —
Och hone ! widow machree !
Samuel Lover.
«
THE LAIRD O' COCKPEN.
The laird o' Cockpen he's proud and he's great.
His mind is ta'en up with the things o' the state ;
He wanted a wife his braw house to keep.
But favor wi' wooin' was fashious to seek.
Doun by the dyke-side a lady did dwell.
At his table-head he thought she'd look well ;
M'Clish's ae daughter o' Claverse-ha' Lee,
A penniless lass wi' a lang pedigree.
His wig was weel pouthered, and guid as when
new ;
His waistcoat was white, his coat it was blue ;
He put on a ring, a sword, and cocked hat, —
And wha could refuse the Laird wi' a' that ?
He took the gray mare, and rade cannilie, —
And rapped at the yett o' Claverse-ha' Lee ;
" Gae tell Mistress Jean to come speedily ben ;
She's wanted to speak wi' the Laird o' Cockpen."
Mistress Jean she was makin' the elder-flower
wine ;
" And what brings the Laird at sic a like time ? "
She put aff her apron, and on her silk gown,
Her mutch wi' red ribbons, and gaed awa' down.
And when she cam' ben, he boued fu' low.
And what was his enund he soon let her know.
Amazed was the Laird when the lady said, Na,
And wi' a laigh curtsie she turnèd awa'.
Dumfoundered he was, but nae sigh did he gi'e ;
He mounted his mare, and rade cannilie.
And aften he thought, as he gaed through the glen,
" She's daft to refuse the Laird o' Cockpen."
And now that the Laird his exit had made.
Mistress Jean she reflected on what she had said ;
" 0, for ane I '11 get better, it's waur I '11 get ten ;
I was daft to refuse the Laird o' Cockpen."
LOVE.
201
Neist time that the Laird and the lady were seen,
They were gaun arm and arm to the kirk on the
green ;
Now she sits in the ha' like a weel-tappit hen,
But as yet there's nae chickens appeared at
Cockpen.
Carolina Oliphant, Baroness NaIrne.
♦
THE FAITHFUL LOVERS.
1 'd been away from her three years, — q,hout
that.
And I returned to find my Mary true ;
And though I'd question her, I did not doubt
that
It was unnecessary so to do.
'T was by the chimney-comer we were sitting :
*' Mary," said I, " have you been always tme ?"
"Frankly," says she, just pausing in her knit¬
ting,
" I don't think I've unfaithful been to you ;
But for the three years past I '11 tell you what
I've done ; then say if I've been true or not.
" When first you left my grief was uncontrollable;
Alone I mourned my miserable lot ;
And all who saw me thought me inconsolable.
Till Captain Clifford came from Aldershott.
To flirt with him amused me while't was new :
I don't count that unfaithfulness — do you ?
"The next — oh! let me see — was Frankie
Phipps ;
I met him at my uncle's, Christmas-tide,
And 'neath the mistletoe, where lips meet lips.
He gave me his first kiss — " And here she
sighed.
"We stayed six weeks at uncle's — how time
flew !
I don't count that unfaithfidness — do you ?
"Lord Cecil Fossmore — only twenty-one —
Lent me his horse. 0, how we rode and raced I
We scoured the downs — we rode to hounds —
such fun !
And often was his arm about my waist, —
That was to lift me up and down. But who
Would call just that unfaithfulness ? Would
you?
" Do you know Reggy Vere ? Ah, how he sings I
We met, — 't was at a picnic. O, such weather !
He gave me, look, the first of these two rings
When we were lost in Cliefden woods together.
Ah, what a happy time we spent, — we two I
I don't count that unfaithfulness to you.
" I've yet another ring from him ; d' ye see
The plain gold circlet that is shining here ? "
I took her hand : "0 Mary I can it be
That y ou—" Quoth she, ' ' that I am Mrs. Vere.
I don't call that unfaithfulness — do you ? "
" No," I replied, " for I am married too."
Anonymous.
COOKING AND COURTING.
from tom to ned.
Dear Ned, no doubt you '11 be surprised
When you receive and read this letter.
I've railed against the marriage state ;
But then, you see, I knew no better.
I've met a lovely girl out here ;
Her manner is — well — very winning ;
We 're soon to be — well, Ned, my dear,
I '11 tell you all, from the beginning.
I went to ask her out to ride
Last Wednesday — it was perfect weather.
She said she could n't possibly :
The servants had gone ofl" together
(Hibernians always rush away.
At cousins' funerals to be looking) ;
Pies must be made, and she must stay.
She said, to do that branch of cooking.
" O, let me help you," then I cried :
" I '11 be a cooker too — how jolly I "
She laughed, and answered, with a smile,
" All right I but you '11 repent your folly ;
For I shall be a tyrant, sir.
And good hard work you '11 have to grapple ;
So sit down there, and don't you stir.
But take this knife, and pare that apple."
She rolled her sleeve above her arm, —
That lovely arm, so plump and rounded ;
Outside, the morning sun shone bright ;
Inside, the dough she deftly pounded.
Her little fingere sprinkled flour.
And rolled the pie-crust up in masses :
I passed the most delightful hour
Mid butter, sugar, and molasses.
With deep reflection her sweet eyes
Gazed on each pot and pan and kettle :
She sliced the apples, filled her pies.
And then the upper crust did settle.
Her rippling waves of golden hair
In one great coil were tightly twisted ;
But locks would break it, here and there.
And curl about where'er they listed.
And then her sleeve came down, and I
Fastened it up — her hands were doughy ;
O, it did take the longest time I —
Her arm, Ned, was so round and snowy.
202
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
She blushed, and trembled, and looked shy ;
Somehow that made me all the holder ;
Her arch lips looked so red that I —
Well — found her head upon my shoulder.
We 're to be married, Ned, next month;
Come and attend the wedding revels.
I really think that bachelors
Are the most miserable devils !
You'd better go for some girl's hand ;
And if you are uncertain whether
You dare to make a due demand.
Why, just try cooking pies together.
Anonymous.
POSSESSION.
A Poet loved a Star,
And to it whispered nightly,
" Being so fair, why art thou, love, so far ?
Or why so coldly shine, who shin'st so brightly ?
0 Beauty wooed and uupossest !
0, might I to this beating breast
But clasp thee once, and then die blest ! "
That Star her Poet's love.
So wildly warm, made human ;
And leaving, for his sake, her heaven above.
His Star stooped earthward, and became a
Woman.
" Thou who hast wooed and hast possest.
My lover, answer : Which was best,
The Star's beam or the Woman's breast ?"
"I miss from heaven," the man replied,
" A light that drew my spirit to it."
And to the man the woman sighed,
" I miss from earth a poet."
Robert Bulwer, lord Lvtton.
(Orveu Aferedith.)
THE AGE OF WISDOM.
Ho ! pretty page, with the dimpled chin.
That never has known the barber's shear,
All your wish is woman to win ;
This is the way that boys begin, —
Wait till you come to forty year.
Curly gold locks cover foolish brains ;
Billing and cooing is all your cheer, —
Sighing, and singing of midnight strains.
Under Bonny bell's window-panes, —
Wait till you come to forty year.
Forty times over let Michaelmas pass ;
Grizzling hair the brain doth clear ;
Then you know a boy is an ass.
Then you know the worth of a lass, —
Once you have come to forty year.
Pledge me round ; I bid ye declare.
All good fellows whose beards are gray, —
Did not the fairest of the fair
Common grow and wearisome ere
Ever a month was past away ?
The reddest lips that ever have kissed,
The brightest eyes that ever have shone.
May pray and whisper and we not list.
Or look away and never be missed, —
Ere yet ever a month is gone.
Gillian's dead ! God rest her bier, —
How I loved her twenty years syne !
Marian's married ; but I sit here.
Alone and merry at forty year.
Dipping my nose in the Gascon wine.
William Makepeace Thackeray.
THE FIRE OF LOVE.
from the " examen miscellaneum." j708.
«
The fire of love in youthful blood.
Like what is kindled in brushwood.
But for a moment bui-ns ;
Yet in that moment makes a mighty noise ;
It crackles, and to vapor turns.
And soon itself destroys.
But when crept into aged veins
It slowly burns, and then long remains.
And with a silent heat.
Like fire in logs, it glows and warms 'em long ;
And though the flame be not so great.
Yet is the heat as strong.
Charles Sackville, Earl of Dorset.
»
LOVE.
from the "lay of the last minstrel, ' canto iil
And said I that my limbs were old.
And said I that my blood was cold.
And that my kindly fire was fled.
And my poor withered heart was dead,
"And that I might not sing of love ? —
How could I, to the dearest theme
That ever warmed a minstrel's dream.
So foul, so false a recreant prove !
How could I name love's very name.
Nor wake my heart to notes of flame !
In peace, Love tunes the shepherd's reed ;
In war, he mounts the warrior's steed ;
In halls, in gay attire is seen ;
In hamlets, dances on the gi'een.
f
FRAGMENTS. 20^"^ ^
Love rules the court, the camp, the grove,
And men below, and saints above ;
For love is heaven, and heaven is love.
True love's the gift which God has given
To man alone beneath the heaven ;
It is not fantasy's hot fire.
Whose wishes, soon as granted, fly ;
It liveth not in fierce desire.
With dead desire it doth not die ;
It is the secret sympathy.
The silver link, the silken tie.
Which heart to heart, and mind to mind.
In body and in soul can bind.
sir Walter Scott.
4
FEAGMENTS.
Power of Love and Beattty.
Love, like death.
Levels all ranks, and lays the shepherd's crook
Beside the sceptre.
Lady of Lyons. e. bulwer-lytton.
Didst thou hut know the inly touch of love.
Thou wouldst as soon go kindle fire with snow.
As seek to quench the fire of love with words.
Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act ii. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE#
Thy fatal shafts unerring move,
1 bow before thine altar. Love !
Roderick Random, Ch. xL T. SMOLLETT.
Alas ! the love of women ! it is known
To be a lovely and a fearful thing.
Don yuan. Cant. u. byron.
Mightier far
Than strength of nerve or sinew, or the sway
Of magic potent over sun and star.
Is love, though oft to agony distrest.
And though his favorite seat be feeble woman's
breast.
Laodamia. wordsworth.
There's a bUss beyond all that the minstrel has
told.
When two, that are linked in one heavenly tie.
With heart never changing, and brow never cold.
Love on through all ills, and love on till they
die !
One hour of a passion so sacred is worth
Whole ages of heartless and wandering bliss ;
And 0, if there be an Elysium on earth.
It is this, it is this.
Lalla Rookh : Light of the Harem. MOORE.
Those curious locks so aptly twined
Whose every hair a soul doth bind.
Think not 'cause men flattering say. T. CAREW.
To sport with Amaryllis in the shade,
Or with the tangles of Nesera's hair.
Lycidccs. MiLTON.
And beauty draws us with a single hair.
Rape of the Lock, Cant. ii. POPE.
Lie ten nights awake, carving the fashion of a
new doublet.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act ii. Sc. 3« SHAKESPEARE.
still harping on my daughter.
Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. s.
Shakespeare.
This is the very ecstasy of love.
Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
The light that lies
In woman's eyes.
The time I've tact. MOORE.
It adds a precious seeing to the eye.
Love's Labor Lost, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
I With a smile that glowed
' Celestial rosy red, love's proper hue.
Paradise Lost, Book viii. MiLTON.
Hung over her enamored, and beheld
Beauty, which, whether waking or asleep.
Shot forth peculiar graces.
Paradise Lost, Book v. Milton.
Love's Blindness.
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind.
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
Midsummer Night's Dream, Acti. Sc. x. SHAKESPEARE.
None ever loved but at first sight they loved.
BliTtd Beggar of Alexandria, GEO. CHAPMAN.
Wlro ever loved that loved not at first sight ?
Hero and Leander. c. MarlOwe.
But love is blind, and lovers cannot see
The pretty follies that themselves commit.
Merchant of Venice, Act ii. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE.
Charms strike the sight, but merit wins the soul.
Rafe of the Lock, Cant. v. POPE.
Our souls sit close and silently within.
And their own web from their own entrails spin ;
And when eyes meet far off, our sense is such,
That, spider-Uke, we feel the tenderest touch.
Mariage à la Mode, Act W. Sc. X. DRYDEN.
á
204 POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Love's Pains.
A mighty pain to love it is.
And't is a pain that pain to miss ;
But of aU pains, the greatest pain
It is to love, but love in vain.
Cold.
A. COWLEV.
The sweetest joy, the wildest woe is love ;
The taint of earth, the odor of the skies
Is in it
Festus. p. J. BAILEY.
Chords that vibrate sweetest pleasure
TliriU the deepest notes of woe.
On Sensibility*
BURNS.
Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act i. Sc* i.
SHAKESPEARE.
Love is like a landscape which doth stand
Smooth at a distance, rough at hand.
On Love. R. HEGGH
Vows with so much passion, swears with so much
grace,
That't is a kind of heaven to be deluded by him.
Alexander the Great, Act i. Sc. 3. N. LEE.
To love you was pleasant enough,
And O, 't is delicious to hate you !
To — MOORE
Sighs, Tears, and Smiles.
To love,
It is to be all made of sighs and tears.
As You Like It, Act v. Sc* a. SHAKESPEARE.
The world was sad, — the garden was a wild ;
And Man, the hermit, sighed — tiU Woman
smiled.
Pleasures of Hope, Part L T. CAMPBELL.
o father, what a hell of witchcraft lies
In the small orb of one particular tear !
A Lover's Complaint, St. xUi. SHAKESPEARE.
Sighed and looked unutterable things.
The Seasons : Summer. THOMSON.
U
Sunshine and rain at once.
JCin£' Lear, Act iv. Sc. 3.
SHAKESPEARE.
Smiles from reason flow.
To brute denied, and are of love the food.
Paradise Lost, Book ix. MiLTON.
The rose is fairest when 'tis budding new.
And hope is brightest when it dawns from fears.
The rose is sweetest washed with morning dew.
And love is loveliest when embalmed in tears.
Lady of the Lake, Cant. iv. SCOTT.
Fantastic t3rTant of the amorous heart.
How hard thy yoke ! how cruel is thy dart !
Those 'scape thy anger who refuse thy sway.
And those are punished most who most obey.
Solomon, M. PRIOR.
To be in love where scorn is bought with groans ;
Coy looks, with heart-sore sighs; one fading
moment's mirth.
With twenty watchful, weary, tedious nights :
If haply won, perhaps a hapless gain ;
If lost, why then a grievous labor won.
Shyness of Love.
Silence in love bewrays more woe
Than words, though ne'er so witty ;
A beggar that is dumb, you know.
May challenge double pity.
The Silent Lover.
Sir w. Raleigh.
Read it, sweet maid, though it be done but slightly :
Who can show all his love doth love but lightly.
Sonnet. S. DANIEL.
I never tempted her with word too large ;
But, as a brother to his sister, showed
Bashful sincerity, and comely love.
Muck Ado about Jiothing-, Act iv. Sc* x. SHAKESPEARE.
Arts of Love.
Of all the paths lead to a woman's love
Pity's the straightest.
Knight 0/Malta, Act i. Sc. i. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER.
So mourned the dame of Ephesns her love ;
And thus the soldier, armed with resolution.
Told his soft tale, and was a thriving wooer.
Richard III. {Altered), Act ii. Sc. i. COLLEY ClBBER.
The Devil hath not, in all his quiver's choice.
An arrow for the heart like a sweet voice.
Don Juan, Cant. xv. BYRON.
Love first invented verse, and formed the rhyme.
The motion measured, harmonized the chime.
Cymon and Iphigenia* Drvden.
Pleased me, long choosing and beginning late.
Paradise Lost, Book ix. MILTON.
None without hope e'er loved the brightest fair.
But love can hope where reason would despair.
Epigram. GEORGE, LORD LYTTELTON.
Idle Love.
My only books
Were woman's looks.
And folly's all they've taught me.
The time I've lost
íí-
FRAGMENTS.
205
-Qi
Love in your hearts as idly bums
As fire in antique Roman urns.
ffudibraSt Part n. Cani. t. BUTLER.
Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.
Twelfth Night, Act ii. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Discriminating Love.
The rose that all are praising
Is not the rose for me ;
Too many eyes are gazing
Upon the costly tree ;
But there's a rose in yonder glen
That shuns the gaze of other men.
For me its blossom raising, —
O, that's the rose for me.
The rose that all are praising. T. H. BAYLY.
But the fruit that can fall without shaking.
Indeed is too mellow for me.
The Answer. LAOV MAKV W. Mo.NTAGU.
Love in a hut, with water and a crust.
Is — Lord forgive us ! — cinders, ashes, dust.
Lamia, KEATS.
The cold in clime are cold in blood.
Their love can scarce deserve the name.
The Giaour, BYRON.
Love's Dangers.
And when once the young heart of a maiden is
stolen.
The maiden herself will steal after it soon.
/// Omens, MoORE.
And whispering, " I will ne'er consent," — con¬
sented.
Don Juan, Cant. i. BYRON.
The fly that sips treacle is lost in the sweets.
Beggar's Opera, Act ii. Sc. 2, J, GAY.
Then fly betimes, for only they
Conquer Love, that run away.
Conquest by Flight, T. Carew.
The Sweets of Love.
Then awake ! — the heavens look bright, my
dear !
'T is never too late for delight, my dear !
And the best of all ways
To lengthen our days,
Is to steal a few hours from the night, my dear !
Young May Moon, MOORE.
Lovers' hours are long, though seeming short.
Venus and Adonis,
Shakespeare
0 Love ! 0 fire ! once he drew
With one long kiss my whole soul through
My lips, as sunlight drinketh dew.
Fatima. TENNYSON.
A long, long kiss, a kiss of youth and love.
Don yuan. Cant. ii. BYRON.
O'er her warm cheek, and rising bosom, move
The bloom of young Desire and purple light of
Love.
Progress of Poesy, T.GRAY.
Still amorous, and fond, and billing,
Like Philip and Mary on a shilling.
Hudibras, Part. iu. Cant.i, BUTLER.
And dallies with the innocence of love.
Twelfth Night, Act iL Sc. A SHAKESPEARE.
And, touched by her fair tendance, gladlier grew.
Paradise Lost, Book viii. MILTON.
Why, she would hang on him.
As if increase of appetite had grown
By what it fed on.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE.
Imparadised in one another's arms.
Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON.
Mutual Love.
Two souls with but a single thought.
Two hearts that beat as one.
Ingomar the Barbarian, Act \\, MARIA LOVELL.
Ferd. Here's my hand.
Miran. And mine, with my heart in't.
Temfest, Act Hi. Sc. i. Shakespeare.
What's mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.
Measure for Measure, Acty.Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
Drink ye to her that each loves best.
And if you nurse a flame
That's told but to her mutual breast.
We will not ask her name.
Dri7tk ye to her.
Campbell.
Forever, Fortune, wilt thou prove
An unrelenting foe to love ;
And, when we meet a mutual heart.
Come in between and bid us part ?
Song.
And you must love him, ere to you
He will seem worthy of your love.
A Poet's Epitaph,
WORDSWORTH
Ye gods ! annihilate but space and time,
And make two lovers happy.
Martinus Scriblerus on the Art of Sinking in Poetry, Ch. xi.
pope.
!&-
á
3-,
206
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
-a
Sweet to entrance
The raptured soul by intermingling glance.
PsyclK.
Mrs. Tighe.
True beauty dwells in deep retreats,
Whose veil is unremoved
Till heart with heart in concord beats,
And the lover is beloved.
To » wordsworth.
0 that the desert were my dwelling-place.
With one fair Spirit for my minister.
That 1 might all forget the human race.
And, hating no one, love but only her !
Ckilde Harold, Cant, iv. Byron.
With thee, all toils are sweet ; each clime hath
charms ;
Earth — sea alike—our world within our arms.
The Bride of Abydot. bvron.
True Love.
Love is a celestial harmony
Of likely hearts.
Hymn in Honor o/ Beauty. SPENSER.
The Gods approve
The depth, and not the tumult, of the soul ;
A fervent, not ungovernable, love.
Thy transports moderate.
Laodamia. wordsworth.
In his deportment, shape, and mien appeared
Elysian beauty, melancholy grace,
Brought from a pensive, though a happy place.
He spake of love, such love as Spirits feel
In worlds whose course is equable and pure ;
No fears to beat away, — no strife to heal, —
The past unsighed for, and the future sure.
Laodamia. wordsworth.
There's beggary in the love that can be reckoned.
Antony and Cleopatra, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Forty thousand brothers
Could not, with all their quantity of love,
Make up my sum.
HamUt,Acty.Sc.\. SHAKESPEARE.
Tender Affection.
So loving to my mother.
That he might not beteem the winds of heaven
Visit her face too roughly.
Hatnlet, Act i. Sc. 2.
Shakespeare.
Dear as the vital warmth that feeds my life ;
Dear as these eyes, that weep in fondness o'er
thee.
Venice Preserved, Act v. Sc. i. T. Otway.
Dear as the light that visits these sad eyes ;
Dear as the ruddy drops that warm my heart.
The Bard, i. 3. T. GRAY.
As dear to me as are the ruddy drops
That visit my sad heart.
Julius Casar, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
With thee conversing 1 forget all time ;
All seasons and their change, all please alike.
But neither breath of mom when she ascends
With charm of earliest birds, nor rising sun
On this delightful land, nor herb, fruit, flower.
Glistering with dew, nor fragrance after showers.
Nor grateful evening mild, nor silent night
With this her solemn bird, nor walk by moon,
Or glittering starlight, without thee is sweet.
Paradise Lost, Book iy. MILTON.
Constancy.
All love is sweet.
Given or returned. Common as light is love.
And its familiar voice wearies not ever.
Prometheus Unbound, Act ii. Sc. 5. SHELLEY,
Love is indestructible :
Its holy flame forever burneth ;
From Heaven it came, to Heaven retumeth ;
It soweth here with toil and care.
But the harvest-time of Love is there.
Curse 0/ Kehanxa, Cant.x, R, SOUTHSY*
They sin who tell us Love can die :
With Life all other passions fly.
All others are but vanity.
Curse of Kehama, Cant. x. R. SOUTHEY.
Doubt thou the stare are fire.
Doubt that the sun doth move ;
Doubt truth to be a liar.
But never doubt I love.
Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. a. shakespeare.
When love begins to sicken and decay.
It useth an enforcèd ceremony.
There are no tricks in plain and simple faith.
Julius Casar, Act iv. Sc. 2.
shakespeare.
She hugged the offender, and forgave the offenca
Sex to the last.
Cymon and iphigenia. DRYOENe
FRAGMENTS.
207
Lightly thou say'st that woman's love is false,
The thought is falser far.
Bertram. R. MATURIN.
You say to me-wards your affection's strong ;
Pray love me little, so you love me long.
Love me little, love me long. R. HERRICK.
Let those love now who never loved before.
Let those who always loved now love the more.'
Pervigilium Veneris. T. ParNELL.
Inconstancy and Jealottst.
All love may be expelled by other love
As poisons are by poisons.
AU/or Lave. DRVDEN.
Frailty, thy name is woman !
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Ham. Is this a prologue, or the posy of a ring ?
Oph. 'T is brief, my lord.
Ham. As woman's love.
Hamlet, Act iiL Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
A little month.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2.
shakespeare.
Framed to make women false.
OthcUa, Act i. Sc. 3. Shakespeare.
To beguile many, and be beguiled by one.
Othetta, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
The lady doth protest too much, niethinks.
Hamlet, Act Hi. Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE.
O, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon.
That monthly changes in her circled orb.
Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.
Ramea and fulicl. Act u. Sc, 2. shakespeare.
O, beware, my lord, of jealousy ;
It is the green-eyed monster which doth mock
The meat it feeds on.
Otheila, Actm. Sc. 3. Shakespeare.
To be once in doubt.
Is once to be resolved.
Oltietla, Actm. Sc. 3. shakespeare.
That we can call these delicate creatures ours.
And not their appetites !
otheila. Act iU. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
But, O, what damnèd minutes tells he o'er.
Who dotes, yet doubts ; suspects, yet strongly
loves !
otheila. Act ill. Xi. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Trifles, light as air.
Are to the jealous confirmations strong
As proofs of holy writ.
otheila. Act Hi. Sc, 3. SHAKESPEARE.
With groundless fear he thus his soul deceives :
What phrenzy dictates, jealousy believes.
Dione. J. Gay.
At lovers' perjuries.
They say, Jove laughs.
Romeo and Juliet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Fool, not to know that love endures no tie.
And Jove but laughs at lovers' perjury.
Palamon and Arcite, Book'Ú, DRVDEN.
Nor jealousy
Was vmderstood, the mjured lover's hell.
Paradise Lost, Book y. MILTON.
Good heaven, the souls of all my tribe defend
From jealousy !
Othello, Act iii. Sc. %.
Shakespeare.
Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned.
Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.
The Mourning Bride, Act iii. Sc. 8. W, CONGREVE.
t
Who love too much hate in the like extreme.
Homer's Odyssey. POPE.
They that do change old love for new.
Pray gods, they change for worse !
The Arraignment of Paris : Cupids Curse. G. PEELE.
POSSESSrON.
I die — but first I have possessed.
And come what may, 1 Jiavt heen blest.
TheCtaaur. BYRON.
1 've lived and loved.
IVaUensiein, Part 1. Actü. Sc. 6.
S. T. coleridge.
208
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
a
MAREIAQE.
SONNET.
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments : love is not love,
Which alters when it alteration finds.
Or bends with the remover to remove ;
O, no ! it is an ever-fixed mark.
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken ;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be
taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and
cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come ;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks.
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error, and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
shakespeare.
LOVE.
There are who say the lover's heart
Is in the loved one's merged ;
0, never by love's own warm art
^o cold a plea was urged !
No ! — hearts that love hath crowned or crossed
Love fondly knits together ;
But not a thought or hue is lost
That made a part of either.
It is an ill-told tale that tells
Of "hearts by love made one ; "'
He grows who near another's dwells
More conscious of his own ;
In each spring up new thoughts and powers
That, mid love's warm, clear weather.
Together tend like climbing flowers,
And, turning, grow together.
Such fictions blink love's better part.
Yield up its half of bliss ;
The wells are in the neighbor heart
When there is thirst in this ;
There findeth love the passion-flowers
On which it learns to thrive.
Makes honey in another's bowei's.
But brings it home to hive.
Love's life is in its own replies, —
To each low beat it beats,
Smiles back the smiles, sighs back the sighs.
And every throb repeats.
Then, since one loving heart still throws
Two shadows in love's sun.
How should two loving hearts compose
And mingle into one ?
THOMAS Kibble hervev.
THOU HAST SWORN BY THY GOD, MY
JEANIE.
Thou hast sworn by thy God, my Jeanie,
By that pretty white hand o' thine.
And by a' the lowing stars in heaven.
That thou wad aye be mine !
And 1 hae sworn by my God, my Jeanie,
And by that kind heart o' thine.
By a' the stars sown thick owre heaven,
That thou shalt aye be mine !
Then foul fa' the hands that wad loose sic bands.
And the heart that wad part sic luve !
But there's nae hand can loose the band.
But the finger o' God abuve.
Though the wee, wee cot maun be my bield.
An' my claithing ne'er sae mean,
1 wad lap me up rich i' the faulds o' luve, —
Heaven's armfu' o' my Jean !
Her white ann wad be a pillow to me,
Fu' safter than the down ;
An' Luve wad winnow owre us his kind, kind
wings.
An' sweetly 1 'd sleep, an' soun'.
Come here to me, thou lass o' my luve !
Come here and kneel wi' me !
The mom is fu' o' the presence o' God,
An' 1 canna pray without thee.
The morn-wiud is sweet 'mang the beds o' new
flowers.
The wee bii'ds sing kindlie an' hie ;
Our gudeman leans owre his kail-yard dike.
And a blythe auld bodie is he.
The Book maun be ta'en whan the carle comes
hame,
Wi' the holie psalmodie ;
And thou maun speak o' me to thy God,
And 1 WÜ1 speak o' thee.
Allan Cunningham
9
f
MAIIUIAGE.
209
•a
ADAM DESCTJBING EVE.
FROM "PARADISE LOST," DOOK VIII.
Mixe eyes he closed, but open left the cell
OffaiTcy, my" internal sight," by whicli
Abstract, as in a trance, methought I saw.
Though sleeping, where 1 lay, and saw the shape
Still glorious before whom awake I stood ;
AVho, stooping, opened my left side, and took
From thence a rib, with cordial spirits warm,
x\nd life-blood streaming fresh ; wide was the
wound.
But suddenly with flesh filled up and healed ;
The rib ho formed and fashioned with his hands ;
Under his forming hands a creature grew.
Manlike, but different sex, so lovely fair.
That what seemed fair in all the world seemed
now
Mean, or in her summed up, in her contained
Ami in her looks, which from that time infuse 1
Mveetness into my heart, unfelt before,
\ ml into all things from her air inspired
1 lie spirit of love and amorous klelightj
Mie disappeared, and left me dark ; I waked
'i'u find her, or forever to deplore
Her loss, and other pleasures all abjure :
When out of hope, behold her, not far off.
Such as I saw her in my dream, adorned
With what all earth or Heaven could bestow
To make her amiable. On she eame,
Led by her heavenly Maker, though unseen.
And guided by his voice, nor uninformed
Of nuptial sanctity and marriage rites :
Grace was in all her stops, Heaven in her eye.
In every gesture dignity and love.
I, overjoyed, could not forbear aloud :
" This turn hath made amends ; thou hast
fulfilled
Thy words, Creator^bounteous and benign.
Giver of all things fair, but fairest this
Of all thy gifts, nor enviest. I now see
Bone of my bone, (lesh of my flesh, myself
Before me; Woman is her name, of man
Extracted : for this cause ho shall forego
Father and mother, and to his wife adhere ;
And they shall be one flesh, one heart, one soul. "
She heard me thus, and though diviuely
brought,
A"et innocence and virgin modesty.
Her virtue and the conscience of her worth.
That would be wooed, and not unsought be won,
Not obvious, not obtrusive, but retired.
The more desirable ; or, to say all.
Nature herself, though pure of sinful thought.
Wrought in her so, that, seeing me, she turned ;
I followed her ; she what was honor knew.
And with obsequious majesty approved
My pleaded reason. To the nuptial bower
I led her blushing like the morn : all Heaven,
And happy constellations on that hour
Shed their selectest influence ; the eai tli
Gave sign of gratulation, and each hill ;
Joyous the bii-ds ; fiesh gales and gentle airs
Whi.spercd it to the woods, and from their wings
Flung rose, flung odors from the spicy shrub.
Disporting, till the amorous bird of night
Sung spousal, and bid haste the evening star
On his hill-top, to light the bridal lamp.
When I approach
Her loveliness, so absolute she .seems.
And in herself complete, so well to know
Her own, that what she wills to do or say
Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best ;
All higher knowledge in her presence falls
Degraded, wisdom in discourse with her
Loses discountenanced, and like folly shows ;
Authority and reason on her wait.
As one intended first, not after made
Occasionally ; and, to consummate all,
( ireatness of mind and nobleness their seat
Build in her loveliest, and create an awe
-Vbout her, as a guard angelic placed.
Neither her outside formed so fair, nor aught
So much delights me, as those graceful acts.
Those thousand decencies that daily flow
From all her words and actions, mixed with love
And sweet compli.ance, which declare unfeigned
Union of mind, or in us both one soul ;
Harmony to behold in wedded pair
More grateful than harmonious sound to the ear.
TO A LADY BEFORE MARRIAGE
0, formed by Nature, and refined by Art,
With charms to win, and sense to fix the heart !
By thousands sought, Clotilda, canst thon free
Thy crowd of captives and descend to me ?
Content in shades obscure to waste thy life,
A hidden beauty and a country wife ?
0, listen while thy summers are my theme !
Ah ! soothe thy partner in his waking dream !
In some small hamlet on the lonely idain.
Where Thames through meadows rolls his mazy
train.
Or where high Windsor, thick with greens ar¬
rayed,
Waves his old oaks, and spreads his ample shade.
Fancy has figured out our calm retreat ;
Already round the visionary seat
Our limes begin to shoot, onr flowers to spring.
The brooks to murmur, and the birds to sing.
-EP
210 POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Where dost thou lie, thou thinly peopled green,
Thou nameless lawn, and village yet unseen.
Where sons, contented with their native ground.
Ne'er travelled further than ten furlongs r ound.
And the tanned peasant and his ruddy bride
Were born together, and togetlier dieil.
Wher e early larks best tell the mornirrg light.
And only Philomel disturbs the rright ?
Midst gardetrs here my humble pile shall rise.
With sweets surrounded of ten thousand dyes ;
All savage where the embroidered gardens end.
The haunt of echoes, shall rny woods ascend ;
Arrd oh ! if Heaven the ambitious thought ap¬
prove,
A rill shall warble 'cross the gloomy grove, —
A little rill, o'er pebbly bods conveyed.
Gush down the steep, and glitter through the
glade.
What cheering scents these bordering banks ex¬
hale !
How loud that heifer lows from yonder vale !
That thrush how shrill ! his note so clear, so
high,
He drowtrs each feathered minstrel of the sky.
Here let nre trace beneath the purpled nior-n
The deep-mouthed beagle arrd the sprightly horn.
Or lure the trout with well-dissembled flies.
Or fetch the flutterirrg partridge from the skies.
Nor shall thy hand disdain to cr op the vine.
The dowrry peach, or flavored nectarine ;
Or rob the beehive of its golden hoard.
And bear the unbought luxuriaueo to thy board.
Sometimes rny books by day shall kill the hours.
While from thy tteedlc rise the silkcir Hewers,
And thou, by turns, to ease nry feeble sight.
Resume the volume, and deceive the night.
O, when 1 mark thy twinklirrg eyes opprest,
Soft whispering, let rrte warn nry love to rest ;
Then watch thee, charmed, while sleep locks
every sense.
And to sweet Heaven commend thy innocence.
Thus reigned our fathers o'er the rural fold.
Wise, hale, arrd honest, in the days of old ;
Till courts arose, where substance pays for show.
And specious joys are boirght with real woe.
Thomas Tickell.
THE NIGHT BEFORE THE WEDDING;
OR, TEN YEARS AFTER.
The country ways are full of mire.
The boughs toss in the fading light.
The winds blow out the sunset's fire,
And snddetr dr oppeth down the night.
I sit in this fanriliar room.
Where rnud-splashed hunting squires resort ;
My sole conrpartion in the gloom
This slofl'ly dying piut of port.
'Mong all the joys my soul hath known,
'Mong errors over which it grieves,
I sit at this dark hour alone.
Like Autumn mid his withered leaves.
This is a night of wild farewells
To all the past, the good, the fair ;
To-morrow, and my wedding bells
Will make a music in the air.
Like a wet fisher tempest-tost.
Who sees throughout the weltering night
Afar on some low-lying coast
The streaming of a rainy light,
I saw this hour, — and now't is come ;
The rooms are lit, the feast is set ;
Within the twilight 1 am dumb.
My heart filled with a vague regret.
I cannot say, in Eastern style.
Where'er she treads the pansy blows ;
Nor call her eyes twin stars, her smile
A sunbeam, and her mouth a rose.
Nor can I, as your bridegrooms do.
Talk of my raptiu-es. O, how sore
The fond romance of twenty-two
Is parodied ere thirty-four !
To-night I shake hands with the past, —
Familiar j'ears, adieu, adieu !
An unknown door is open cast.
An empty future wide and new
Stands waiting. O ye naked rooms.
Void, desolate, without a charm!
Will Love's smile chase your lonely glooms.
And drape your walls, and make them warm ?
The man who knew, while he was young.
Some soft and soul-subduing air.
Melts when again he hears it .sung.
Although't is only half so fair.
So I love thee, and love is sweet
(My Florence, 't is the cruel truth)
Because it can to age repeat
That long-lost passion of my youth.
0, often did my spirit melt.
Blurred lettere, o'er your artless rhymes !
Fair tress, in which the sunshine dwelt,
I've kissed thee many a million times !
And now't is done. — My passionate tears.
Mad pleadings with an iron fate.
And all the sweetness of my years.
Are blackened ashes in the grate.
Then ring in the wind, my wedding chimes ;
Smile, villagers, at every door ;
Old churchyard, stuffed with buried crimes.
Be clad in sunshine o'er and o'er ;
-0
MARRIAGE.
211
And youthful maidens, white and sweet,
Scatter your blossoms far and wide ;
And with a bridal chorus greet
This happy bridegroom and his bride.
" This happy bridegroom !" there is sin
At bottom of my thankless mood :
What if desert alone could win
For me life's chiefest grace and good?
Love gives itself ; and if not given.
No genius, beauty, state or wit.
No gold of earth, no gem of heaven.
Is rich enough to purchase it.
It may be, Florence, loving thee.
My heart will its old memories keep;
Like some worn sea-shell from the sea.
Filled with the music of the deep.
And you may watch, on nights of rain,
A shadow on my brow encroach ;
Be startled by my sudden pain.
And tenderness of self-reproach.
It may be that your loving wiles
Will call a sigh from far-off years ;
It may be that your happiest smiles
Will brim my eyes with hopeless tears ;
It may be that my sleeping breath
Will shake, with painful visions wrung ;
And, in the awful trance of death,
A stranger's name be on my tongue.
Ye phantoms, bom of bitter blood.
Ye ghosts of passion, lean and worn.
Ye teiTors of a lonely mood.
What do ye here on a wedding-mom ?
For, as the dawning sweet and fast
Through all the heaven spreads and flows.
Within life's discord, rade and vast.
Love's subtle music grows and grows.
And lightened is the heavy cm'se.
And clearer is the weary road ;
The very worm the sea-weeds nurse
Is cared for by the Eternal God.
My love, pale blossom of the snow.
Has pierced earth wet with wintry showers, —
0 may it drink the sun, and blow.
And be followed by all the year of flowers !
Black Bayard from the stable bring ;
The rain is o'er, the wind is down.
Round stirring farms the birds will sing.
The dawn stand in the sleeping town.
Within an hour. This is her gate.
Her sodden roses droop in night.
And — emblem of my happy fate —
In one dear window there is light.
The dawn is oozing pale and cold
Through the damp east for many a mile ;
When half my tale of life is told.
Grim-featured Time begins to smile.
Last star of night that lingerest yet
In that long rift of rainy gray.
Gather thy wasted splendors, set,
And die into my wedding day.
Alexander Smith.
—•
THE BRIDE.
from "a ballad upon a wedding."
» • • • •
The maid, and thereby hangs a tale.
For such a maid no Whitsun-ale
Could ever yet proiluce :
No grape that's kindly ripe could be
So round, so plump, so soft as she.
Nor half so full of juice.
Her finger was .so small, the ring
Would not stay on which they did bring, —
It was too wide a peck ;
And, to say truth, — for out it must, —
It looked like the great collar—just —
About our young colt's neck.
Her feet beneath her petticoat.
Like little mice, stole in and out.
As if they feared the light ;
But O, she dances such a way !
No sun upon an Easter-day
Is half so fine a sight.
Her cheeks so rare a white was on.
No daisy makes comparison ;
Who sees them is undone ;
For streaks of red were mingled there.
Such as are on a Katherine pear.
The side that's next the sun.
Her lips were red ; and one was thin.
Compared to that was next her chin.
Some bee had stung it newly ;
But, Dick, her eyes so guard her face,
I durst no more upon them gaze.
Than on the sun in July.
Her mouth so small, when she does speak.
Thou 'dst swear her teeth her words did break.
That they might passage get ;
But she so handled still the matter.
They came as good as ours, or better.
And are not spent a whit.
• , • . .
SIR John succling.
212
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
THE BRIDE.
from " the epithalamion."
Loe ! where she conies along with portly pace,
Lylce Phœbe, from her chamber of tlie East,
Arysing forth to run her mighty race.
Clad all in white, that seems a virgin best.
So well it her beseems, that ye would weene
Some angelí she had beene.
Her long loose yellow locks lyke golden wyre,
Sprinekled with perle, and pei ling Howresatwcene,
Doe lyke a golden mantle her attyre,
And, being crowned with a girland greene.
Seem lyke some niäyden queene.
Her modest eyes, aliashed to behold
So many gazers as on her do stare.
Upon the lowly ground affixed are.
Ne dare lift up her countenance too bold.
But blush to heare her prayses sung so loud, —
So faire from being proud.
Nathlesse doe ye still loud her prayses sing.
That all the woods may answer, and your eccho
ring.
Tell me, ye merchants daughters, did ye see
So fayre a creature in your towne before ;
So sweet, so lovely, and so mild as she,
Adomd with bcautyes grace and vertues store ?
Her goodly eyes lyke saphyres shining bright.
Her forehead yvoiy white.
Her clieekes lyke apples which the sun hath
nidded.
Her lips lyke cherries, charming men to byte.
Her brest lyke to a bowl of creame uncrudded.
Her paps lyke lyllies budded.
Her snowie necke lyke to a marble towre.
And all her body like a pallace fayre.
Ascending up, with many-a stately stay re.
To honors seat and chastities sweet bowre.
Why stand ye still, ye virgins, in amaze,
ITpon her so to gaze,
AVhiles ye forget your former lay to sing.
To which'the woodS|did aqiswer, anc^' your eccho
ring?
Edmund Spenser.
HEBREW WEDDING.
from "the fall of jerusalem."
To the sound of timbrels sweet
Moving slow our solemn feet,
We have home thee on the road
To the virgin's blest abode ;
With thy yellow torches gleaming,
And thy scarlet mantle streaming.
And the canopy above
Swaying as we slowly move.
Thou hast left the joyous feast.
And the mirth and wine have ceased ;
And now we set thee down before
The jealously unclosing door.
That the favored youth admits
Where the vcilèd virgin sits
In the bliss of maiden fear.
Waiting our soft tread to hear.
And the" music's brisker din
At the bridegroom's entering in.
Entering in, a welcome guest.
To the chamber of his rest.
CHOEtJS of MAIDENS.
Now the jocund song is thine.
Bride of David's kingly line ;
How thy dove-like bosom trembleth,
And thy shrouded eye resembleth
Violets, when the dews of eve
A moist and tremulous glitter leave
On the bashful sealed lid !
Close within the bride-veil hid.
Motionless thou sitt'st and mute ;
Save that at the soft salute
Of each entering maiden friend.
Thou dost rise and softly bend.
Hark ! a brisker, merrier glee !
The door unfolds, — 't is he ! 't is he !
Thu.s we lift our lamps to meet him.
Thus we touch our lutes to greet him.
Thou shalt give a fonder meeting,
Then shalt give a tenderer greeting.
henry hart MlLUAM.
MARRIAGE.
from human life."
Then before All they stand, —the holy vow
And ring of gold, no fond illusions now,
Bind her as his. Across the threshold led.
And every tear kissed off as soon as shed.
His house she entere, —there to be a light.
Shining within, when all without is night ;
A guardian angel o'er his life presiding.
Doubling his pleasures and his cares dividing.
Winning him back when mingling in the throng.
Back from a world we love, alas ! too long,
To fireside happiness, to hours of ease,
Blest with that charm, the certainty to please,
How oft her eyes read his ; her gentle mind
To all his wishes, all his thoughts inclined ;
Still subject, — ever on the watch to borrow
Mirth of his mirth and sorrow of his sorrow !
MARRIAGE.
The soul of music slumbers in the shell,
ÏU1 waked and kindled by the master's spell,
And feeling hearts — touch them but rightly —
pour
A thousand melodies unheard before !
Samuel Rogers.
SEVEN TIMES SIX.
giving in marriage.
To bear, to nurse, to rear.
To watch, and then to lose :
To see my bright ones disappear.
Drawn up like morning dews ; —
To bear, to nurse, to rear.
To watch, aud then to lose :
This have 1 done when God drew near
Among his own to choose.
To hear, to heed, to wed,
And with thy lord depart
In tears that he, as soon as shed,
Will let no longer smart. —
To hear, to heed, to \ved.
This while thou didst 1 smiled.
For now it was not God who said,
" Mother, give me thy child."
0 fond, 0 fool, and blind.
To God 1 gave with teai-s ;
But, when a man like grace would find.
My soul put by her fears.
O fond, O fool, and blind,
God guards in happier spheres ;
Tliat man will guard where he did bind
Is hope for unknown years.
To hear, to heed, to wed.
Fair lot that maidens choose.
Thy mother's tenderest words are said.
Thy face no more she views ;
Thy mother's lot, my dear.
She doth in naught accuse ;
Her lot to bear, to nurse, to rear.
To love—and then to lose.
Jean Ingelow.
LIKE A LAVEROCK IN THE LIFT.
It's we two, it's we two for aye.
All the world, and we two, and Heaven be our
stay !
Like a laverock* in the lift,t sing, O bonny
bride !
All the world was Adam once, with Eve by his
side.
* Lark. f Cloud.
What's the world, my lass, my love! — what can
it do ?
1 am thine, and thou art mine ; life is sweet and
new.
If the world have missed the mark, let it stand
by;
For we two have gotten leave, and once more
will try.
Like a laverock in the lift, sing, O bonny bride I
It's we two, it's we two, happy side by side.
Take a kiss from me, thy man ; now the song
begins :
"All is made afresh for us, and the brave heart
wins."
When the darker days come, and nO sun will
shine.
Thou shalt dry my tears, lass, and I '11 dry thinç.
It's we two, it's we two, while the world's
away.
Sitting by tjie golden sheaves on our wedtling
day.
Jean Ingelow.
NOT OURS THE VOWS.
Not ours the vows of such as plight
Their troth in sunny weather.
While leaves are green, aud skies are bright.
To walk on fiowers together.
But we have loved as those who tread
The thorny path of son'ow.
With clouds above, and cause to dread
Yet deeper gloom to-morrow.
That thorny path, those stormy skies.
Have drawn our spirits nearer ;
And rendered us, by sorrow's ties.
Each to the other dearer.
Love, born in hom-s of joy and mirth.
With mirth and joy may perish ;
That to which darker hours gave birth
Still more and more wo cherish.
It looks beyond the clouds of time.
And through death's shadowy portal ;
Made by advereity sublime,
By faith aud hope immortal.
Bernard Barton.
A WIFE.
from " philip van artevelde."
She was a creature framed by love divine
For mortal love to muse a life away
In pondering her perfections ; so unmoved
Amidst the world's contentions, if they touched
214
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
No vital chovd nor troubled what she loved,
Philosophy might look her in the face,
And, like a hermit stooping to the well
That yields him sweet refreshment, might therein
See but his own serenity reflected
With a more heavenly tenderness of hue !
Yet whilst the world's ambitious empty cares,
Its small disi]^uietudes and insect stings.
Disturbed her never, she was oue made up
Of feminine aflbctions, and her life
Was oue full stream of love from fount to sea.
Hemrv Taylor.
DOLCINO TO MARGARET.
The world goes up and the world goes down.
And the sunshine follows the rain ;
And yesterday's sneer, and yesterday's frown.
Can never come over again,
Sweet wife.
No, never come over again.
For woman is warmj though man be cold.
And the night will liallow the dajT;
Till the heart which at even Was weary and old
Can rise in the morning gay.
Sweet wife.
To its work in the morning gay.
Charles Kingsley.
CONNUBIAL LIFE.
FROU "THE SEASONS: SPRING.'
But happy they ! the happiest of their kind !
Whom gentler stars unite, and in one fate
Their hearts, their fortunes, and their beings
blend.
'T is not the coarser tie of human laws.
Unnatural oft, and foreign to the mind.
That binds their peace, but hannony itself.
Attuning all their passions into love ;
Where friendship full-exei-ts her softest power.
Perfect esteem enlivened by desire
Ineffable, and sympathy of soul ;
Thought meeting tliought, and will preventing
will.
With boundless confidence : for naught but love
Can answer love, and render bliss secure.
Meantime a smiling olTspiing rises round.
And mingles both their graces. By degrees.
The human blossom blows ; and every day.
Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm.
The father's lustre and the mother's bloom.
Then infant reason gi-ows apace, and calls
For the kind hand of an assiduous care.
Delightful task ! to rear the tender thought.
To teach the young idea how to shoot.
To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind.
To breathe the enlivening spirit, and to fix
The generous purpose in the glowing bi-east.
0, speak the joy ! ye whom the sudden tear
Surprises often, while you look around.
And nothing strikes your eye but sights of bliss.
All various natui-e pressing on the heart ;
An elegant sufficiency, content.
Retirement, rural quiet, friendship, books.
Ease and alternate labor, useful life,
Progi-essive virtue, and approving Heaven.
These are the matchless joys of vii-tuous love ;
And thus their moments fly. The Seasons thus.
As ceaseless round a janing world they roll.
Still find them happy ; and consenting Spring
Sheds her own rosy garland on their heads :
Till evening comes at last, serene and mild ;
When after the long vernal day of life.
Enamored more, as more remembrance swells
With many a proof of recollected love.
Together down they sink in social sleep ;
Together freed, their gentle spii'its fly
To scenes where love and bliss immortal reign.
James Thomson.
FRAGMENTS.
Forelookings.
Why don't the men propose, mamma.
Why don't the men propose ?
IVhydonUthemeHfropostf T. H. BATLY«
Warnings.
This house is to be let for life or years ;
Her rent is sorrow, and her income tears ;
Cupid, 't has long stood void ; her bills make
known.
She must be dearly let, or let alone.
EmbUtns, Book ii. xo. F« QUARLES.
Look ere thou leap, see ere thou go.
0/ IViXfing attd Thriving. T. TUSSER.
Thus grief still treads upon the heels of pleasure ;
Married in haste, we may repent at leisure
Tht Old Bax:helor. Act v. Sc. i. W. CONGREVE.
Men are April when they woo, December when
they wed.
As Vcu Lite It. Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
And oft the careless find it to their cost,
The lover in the husband may be lost.
Advice to a Lady, LORD LYTTELTON.
MAKKIAGE.
215
Mehcenary Matches.
Maidens like moths are ever canght by glai-e,
And Mammon wins his way where seraphs might
despair.
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, BYRON.
Possibilities.
Find all his having and his holding
lîeduced to eternal noise and scolding, —
The conjugal petard that tears
Down all portcullises of ears.
Uudibras, butler.
Abroad too kind, at home't is steadfast hate,
And one eternal tempest of debate.
Love of Fame. E. YOUNG.
Curse on all laws but those which love has made.
Love, free as air, at sight of human ties.
Spreads his light wings, and in a moment flies.
Eloisa to Abclard. POPE.
Certainties.
The kindest and the happiest pair
Will flnd occasion to forbear ;
And something every day they live
To pity and perhaps forgive.
Mutual Forbearance,
cowper«
Advice.
Misses ! the tale that I relate
This lesson seems to carry, —
Choose not alone a proper mate,
But proper time to marry.
Pairing Time Anticipated,
cowper.
Let still the woman take
An elder than herself ; so wears she to him.
So sways she level in her husband's heart.
For, boy, however we do praise ourselves.
Our fancies are more giddy and unfirm,
More longing, wavering, sooner lost and won.
Than women's are.
Then let thy love be younger than thyself.
Or thy affection cannot hold the bent.
Iviel/ih Night, Aet ii, Sc. 4. shakespeare.
Such duty as the subject owes the prince,
Even such a woman oweth to her husband.
Taming of the Shrew, Act v. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
She who ne'er answers till a husband cools.
Or, if she rules him, never shows she rules.
Moral Essays; Epistle il, POPE;
And truant husband should return, and saj',
" My dear, I was the first who came away."
Don yuan. Cant, i. BVRON.
The Happy Lot.
My latest found.
Heaven's last best gift, my ever new delight.
Paradise Lost, Book v. MiLTON.
She is mine own !
And I as rich in having such a jewel
As twenty seas, if all their sand were pearl.
The water nectar, and the rocks pure gold.
Two Gent, of Verona, Act ii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
How much the wife is dearer than the bride.
An Irregular Ode, lord LytteltoN.
Time still, as he flies, brings increase to her truth.
And gives to her mind what he steals from her
youth.
The Happy Marriage. e. moore,
And when with envy Time, tran.sported.
Shall think to rob us of our joys.
You'll in your girls again be courted.
And 1 '11 go wooing in my boys.
li'im/rtda. t. PERCY.
True Love is but a humble, low-bom thing.
And hath its food served up in eartlien ware ;
It is a thing to walk with, hand in hand.
Through the every-dayness of this work-day
world,
A simple, fireside thing, whose quiet smile
Can warm earth's poorest hovel to a home.
Lme. J, R. LOWELL.
f
21Ü
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
■a
HOME.
MY mFE 'S A WINSOME WEE THING.
She is a winsome wee thing,
She is a handsome wee thing.
She is a bonnie wee thing,
This sweet wee wife o' mine.
1 never saw a fairer,
I never lo'ed a dearer,
And neist my heart I '11 wear her.
For fear my jewel tine.
She is a winsome wee thing.
She is a handsome wee thing.
She is a bonnie wee thing,
Tliis sweet wee wife o' mine.
The warld's wrack we share o't.
The warstle and the care o't ;
Wi' her I '11 blythely bear it,
And think my lot divine.
Robert Burns.
SONNETS.
My Love, I have no fear that thon shouldst die ;
Albeit I ask no fairer life than this,
Whose numbering-clock is still thy gentle kiss,
AVhile Time and Peace with hands unlocked fl}', —
Y et care I not where in Eternity
We live and love, well knowing that there is
No backward step for those who feel the bliss
Of Faith as their-most lofty yearnings high ;
Love hath so purified my being's core,
üleseems I scarcely should be startled, even,
To find, some morn, that thou had.st gone before ;
Since, with thy love, this knowledge too was
given.
Which each calm day doth strengthen more and
more,
That they who love are but one step fwm Heaven.
I CANNOT think that thou shouldst pass away,
Wliose life to mine is an eteimal law,
A piece of nature that can have no flaw,
A new and certain sunrise every day ;
Hut, if thou art to be another ray
About the Sun of Life, and art to live
Free from all of thee that was fugitive.
The debt of Love I will more fully pay.
Not downcast with the thought of thee so high.
But rather raised to be a nobler man,
And more divine in my humanity.
As knowing that the waiting eyes which scan
Mj' life are lighted by a purer being.
And ask meek, calm-browed deeds, with it agree¬
ing.
Our love is not a fading, earthly flower :
Its winged seed dropped down from Paradise,
And, nursed by day and night, by sun and
shower.
Doth momently to fresher beauty rise :
To us the leafless autumn is not bare.
Nor winter's rattling boughs lack lusty green.
Our .summer hearts make summer's fulness, where
No leaf, or bud, or blossom may be seen :
For nature's life in love's deep life doth lie.
Love, — whose forgetfulness is beauty's death.
Whose mystic key these cells of Thou and I
Into the infinite freedom openèth.
And makes the body's dark and narrow grate
The wind-flung leaves of Heaven's palace-gate.
I THOUGHT our love at full, but I did err ;
Joy's wreath drooped o'er mine eyes ; I could not "
see
That sorrow in our hajipy world must be
Love's deepest spokesman and interpreter.
But, as a mother feels her child fii-st stir
Under her heart, so felt I instantly
Deep in my soul another bond to thee
Thrill with that life we saw depart from her ;
O mother of our angel child ! twice dear!
Death knits as well as parts, and still, I wis,
Her tender radiance shall infold us here.
Even as the light, borne up by inward bliss.
Threads the void glooms of space without a fear.
To print on farthest stars her pitying kiss.
Jaubs Russell Lowell.
ADAM TO EVE.
from " paradise lost." book ix.
0 F.AIREST of creation, last and best
Of all God's works, creature in whom excelled
Whatever can to sight or thought be formed.
Holy, divine, good, amiable, or sweet !
How art thou lost, how on a sudden lost.
Defaced, deflowered, and now to death devote !
Rather, how hast tliou yielded to transgress
■ßl
HOME.
217
The strict forbiddance, how to violate
The sacred fruit forbidden ! Some cureed fraud
Of enemy hath beguiled thee, yet unknown,
And me with thee hath ruined, for with thee
Certain my resolution is to die.
How can I live without thee, how forego
Thy sweet converse, and love so dearly joined,
To live again in these wild woods forlorn ?
Should God create another Eve, aud I
Another rib aflbrd, yet loss of thee
Would never from my heart ; no, no, I feel
The link of nature draw me : Hesh of flesh.
Bone of my bone thou art, and from thy state
Mine never shall be parted, bliss or woe.
However, I with thee have fixed my lot,
Certain to undergo like doom ; if death
Consort with thee, death is to me as life ;
So forcible within my heart I feel
The bond of nature draw me to my own.
My own in thee, for what thou art is mine ;
Our state cannot be severed, we are .one.
One flesh ; to lose thee were to lose myself.
MILTON.
LORD WALTER'S WIFE.
" But why do you go ? " said the lady, while
both sate under the yew.
And her eyes were alive in their depth, as the
kraken beneath the sea-blue.
" Because I fear you," he answered ; — " because
you are far too fair.
And able to strangle my soul in a mesh of your
gold-colored hair."
" 0, that," she said, " is no reason ! Such knots
are quickly undone.
And too much beauty, I reckon, is nothing but
too much sun."
"Yet farewell so," ho answered;—"the sun¬
stroke's fatal at times.
I value your husband. Lord Walter, whose gallop
rings still from the limes."
"0, that," she said, " is no reason. You smell
a rose through a fence :
If two should smell it, what matter ? who grum¬
bles, and where's the pretence ? "
"But I," he replied, "have promised another,
when love was free.
To love her alone, alone, who alone aud afar loves
me."
"Why, that," she said, "is no reason. Love's
always free, 1 am told.
Will you vow to be -safe from the headache on
Tuesday, and think it will hold ? "
" But you," he replied, *' have a daughter, a
young little child, who was laid
In your lap to be pure ; so I leave you ; the
angels would make me afraid."
"0, that," she said, "is no reason. The angels
keep out of the way ;
And Dora, the child, observes nothing, although
you should please me and stay."
At which he rose up in his anger, — " Why,
now, you no longer are fair !
Why, now, you no longer are fatal, but ugly and
hateful, I swear."
At which she laughed out in her scorn,— " These
men ! 0, these men overnice.
Who are shocked if a color not virtuous is
frankly put on by a vice."
Her eyes blazed upon him — " And you ! You
bring us your vices so near
That we smell them ! you think in our presence
a thought't would defame us to hear !
"What reason had you, and what right, —I
appeal to your soul from my life, —
To find me too fair as a woman ? Why, .sir, I
am pure, and a wife.
" Is the day-star too fair up above you ? It
burns you not. Dare you imply
I brushed you more close than the star does,
when Walter had set mo as high ?
" If a man finds a woman too fair, he means
simply adapted too much
To uses unlawful and fatal. The praise ! — shall
I thank you for such ?
"Too fair? — not unless you misuse us! and
surely if, once in a while,
Y'ou attain to it, straightway you call us no
longer too fair, but too vile.
" A moment, — I pray your attention ! — I have
a poor word in my head
1 must utter, though womanly custom would set
it down better unsaid.
" Y'^ou grew, sir, i)ale to impertinence, once when
I showed you a ring.
You kissed my fan when I dropped it- No mat¬
ter ! 1 've broken the thing.
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
"You did me tlic honor, perhaps, to be moved
at my side now and then
In the sense.s, — a vice, I have heard, which is
common to beasts and some men.
" Love's a virtue for heroes ! — as white as the
snow on liigh hills,
And immortal as eveiy great soul is that strug¬
gles, endures, and fulfils.
" I love my Walter profoundly, — yon, Maude,
though you faltered a week.
For the sake of . . . what was it ? an eyebrow ?
or, less still, a mole on a cheek ?
"And since, when all's said, you're too noble to
stoop to the frivolous cant
About crimes irresistible, virtues that swindle,
betray, and supplant,
"I determined to prove to yourself that, what-
e'er you might dream or avow
By illusion, you wanted precisely no more of me
than you have now.
" There ! Look me full in the face ! — in the
face. Understand, if you can.
That the eyes of such women as I am are clean
as the palm of a man.
"Drop his hand, you insult him. Avoid us for
fear we should cost you a scar, —
You take us for harlots, I tell you, and not for
the women we are.
"You wronged me : but then I considered . . .
there's Walter ! And so at the end,
I vowed that he should not be mulcted, by me,
in the hand of a friend.
" Have I hurt you indeed ? We are quits tlien.
Nay, friend of my Walter, bo mine !
Come, Dora, my darling, my angel, and help me
to ask him to dine."
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
u
POSSESSION.
"It was our wedding-day
A month ago," dear heart, 1 hear you say.
If months, or yeais, or ages since have passed,
I know not : I have ceased to question Time.
I only know that once there pealed a chime
Of joyous bells, and then 1 held you fast.
And all stood back, and none my right denied.
And forth we walked ; the world was free and wide
Before us. Since that day
1 count my life : the Past is washed away.
It was no dream, that vow :
It was the voice that woke me from a dream, —
A happy dream, I think ; but I am waking now.
And drink the splendor of a sun supreme
That turns the mist of former tears to gold.
Within these arms 1 hold
The fleeting promise, chased so long in vain :
Ah, weary bird ! thou wilt not fly again :
Thy wings are clipped, thou canst no more de¬
part, —
Thy nest is builded in my heart !
I was the crescent ; thou
The silver phantom of the perfect sphere,
Held in its bosom : in one glory now
Our lives united shine, and many a 3'ear —
Not the sweet moon of bridal only — we
One lustre, ever at the full, shall be :
One pure and rounded light, one planet whole,
One life developed, one completed soul !
For I in thee, and thou in me.
Unite our cloven halves of destiny.
God knew his chosen time.
He bade me slowly ripen to my prime.
And from my boughs withheld the promised fruit.
Till storm and sun gave vigor to the root.
Secure, O Love ! secure
Thy blessing is : 1 have thee day and night :
Thou art become my blood, my life, my light :
God's mercy thou, and therefore shalt endure.
Bayard Taylor.
THE DAY RETURNS, MY BOSOM BURNS.
The day returns, my bosom burns.
The blissful day we twa did meet ;
Though winter wild in tempest toiled.
Ne'er summer sun was half sae sweet.
Than a' the pride that loads the tide.
And crosses o'er the sultry line, —
Than kingly robes, and croums and globes,
Heaven gave me more ; it made thee mine.
While day and night can bring delight.
Or nature aught of pleasure give, —
While joj's above my mind can move,
For thee and thee alone 1 live ;
When that grim foe of life below
Comes in between to make us part,
The iron hand that breaks our band.
It breaks my bliss, — it breaks my heart.
Rosert Burns.
í&
HOME.
219
■a
fe
THE POETS BRIDAL-DAY SOÍÍG.
0, MY love's like the steadfast sun,
Or streams that dee¡)en as they run ;
Nor hoary hairs, nor forty years.
Nor moments between sighs and tears.
Nor nights of thought, nor days of pain,
Nor dreams of glory dreamed in vain.
Nor mirth, nor sweetest song that flows
To sober joys and soften woes,
Can make my heart or fancy flee.
One moment, my sweet wife, from thee.
Even while I muse, I see thee sit
In maiden bloom and matron wit ;
Pair, gentle as when first 1 sued.
Ye seem, but of sedater mood;
Yet my heart leaps as fond for thee
As when, beneath Arbigland tree.
We stayed and wooed, and thought the moon
Set on the sea an hour too soon ;
Or lingered mid the falling dew.
When looks were fond and words were few.
Though I see smiling at thy feet
Five sons and ae fair daughter sweet.
And time, and care, and birthtime woes
Have dimmed thine eye and touched thy rose.
To thee, and thoughts of thee, belong
Whate'er charms me in tale or song.
When words descend like dews, unsought.
With gleams of deep, enthusiast thought.
And Fancy in her heaven flies free.
They come, my love, they come from thee.
0, when more thought we gave, of old,
To silver than some give to gold,
'T was sweet to sit and ponder o'er
How we should deck our humble bower ;
'T was sweet to pull, in hope, with thee.
The golden fruit of fortune's tree ;
And sweeter still to choose and twine
A garland for that brow of thine, —
A song-wreath which may grace my Jean,
While rivers flow, and woods grow green.
At times there come, as come there ought.
Grave moments of sedater thought.
When Fortune frowns, nor lends our night
One gleam of her inconstant light ;
And Hope, that decks the peasant's bower.
Shines like a rainbow through the shower ;
0, then I see, while seated nigh,
A mother's heart shine in thine eye.
And proud resolve and purpose meek.
Speak of thee more than words can speak.
I think this wedded wife of mine
The best of all that's not divine.
Allan Cunningha.m.
THE POET'S SONG TO HIS WIFE.
How many summers, love.
Have I been thine?
How many days, thou dove,
Hast thou been mine ?
Time, like the wingèd wind
When 't bends the flowers.
Hath left no mark behind.
To count the hours !
Some weight of thought, though loath,^
On thee he leaves ;
Some lines of care round both.
Perhaps he weaves ;
Some fears, — a soft regret
For joys scarce known ;
Sweet looks we half forget
All else is flown !
Ah ! —With what thankless heart
I mourn and sing !
Look, where our children start.
Like sudden spring !
With tongues all sweet and low
Like a pleasant rhyme.
They tell how much I owe
To thee and time !
B. W. Procter (Barty CormaaU).
IF THOU WERT BY MY SIDE, MY LOVE.
lines written to his wife, while on a visit to
upper india.
If thou wert by my side, my love !
How fast would evening fail
In green Bengala's palmy grove.
Listening the nightingale !
If thou, my love, wert by my side.
My babies at my knee.
How gayly would our pinnace glide
O'er Gunga's mimic sea ! •
I miss thee at the dawning gray.
When, on our deck reclined.
In careless ease my limbs I lay
. And woo the cooler wind.
I miss thee when by Gunga's stream
My twilight steps I guide.
But most beneath the lamp's pale beam
I miss thee from my side.
I spread my books, my pencil try.
The lingering noon to cheer.
But miss thy kind, approving eye.
Thy meek, attentive ear.
-gi
220
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
But when at morn and eve the star
Beholds me on my knee,
I feel, though thou art distant far.
Thy prayers ascend for me.
Then on ! then on ! where duty leads,
My course be onward still.
O'er broad Hindostan's sultry meads.
O'er bleak Almorah's hill.
That course nor Delhi's kingly gates.
Nor mild Malwah detain ;
For sweet the bliss us both awaits
By yonder western main.
Thy towers, Bombay, gleam bright, they say.
Across the dark blue sea ;
But never were hearts so light and gay
As then shall meet in thee !
Reginald Heber.
AVIFE, CHILDREN, AND FRIENDS.
When the black-lettered list to the göds was
pi'esented
(The list of what Fate for each mortal intends).
At tlie long string of ills a kind goddess relented,
And slipped in three blessings,—wife, chil¬
dren, and friends.
In vain sulrly Plutol maintained he'was cheated.
For justice divine could not compass its ends ;
The scheme of man's penance he swore was de¬
feated.
For earth becomes heaven with — wife, chil¬
dren, and friends.
If the stock of our bliss is in stranger hands
vested.
The fund, ill secured, oft in bankruptcy ends ;
But the heart issues bills which are never pro-
, tested.
When drawn on the firm of — wife, children,
and friends.
Though valor still glows in his Ufe's dying em¬
bers.
The death-wounded tar, who his colors defends.
Drops a tear of regret as he dying remembers
How blessed was his home with — wife, chil¬
dren, and friends.
The soldier, whose deeds live immortal in story.
Whom duty to far distant latitudes sends.
With transport would barter whole ages of glory
For one happy day with—wife, children, and
friends.
Though spice-breathing gales on his caravan
hover.
Though for him all Arabia's fragrance ascends.
The merchant still thinks of the woodbines that
cover
The bower where he sat with—wife, children,
and friends.
The dayspring of youth, still imclouded by sor¬
row,
Alone on itself for enjoyment depends ;
But drear is the twilight of age, if it borrow
No warmth from the smile of—wife, children,
and friends.
Let the breath of renown ever freshen and
nourish
The laurel which o'er the dead favorite bends ;
O'er me wave the wiUow, and long may it
flourish.
Bedewed with the tears of—wife, children,
and friends.
Let us drink, for my song, growing gi'aver and I
giaver.
To subjects too solemn insensibly tends ;
Let us drink, pledge me high, love and virtue
shall flavor
The glass which I fill to — wife, children, and
friends.
William Robert Spencer.
LOVE LIGHTENS LABOR.
A GOOn wife rose from her bed one mom.
And thought, with a nervous dread.
Of the piles of clothes to be washed, and more
Than a dozen mouths to be fed.
" There's the meals to get for the men in the
field,
And the children to fix away
To school, and the milk to be skimmed and
churned ;
And all to be done this day."
It had rained in the night, and all the wood
Was wet as it could be ;
There were puddings and pies to bake, besides
A loaf of cake for tea.
And the day was hot, and her aching head
Throbbed wearily as she said,
" If maidens but knew what good vnves know.
They would not be in haste to wed ! "
" Jennie, what do you think I told Ben Brown ? "
Called the famier from the well ;
And a flush crept up to his bronzed brow,
'And his eyes half-bashfully fell.
HOME.
" It was this," he said, and coming near
He smiled, and stooping down.
Kissed her cheek, — "'t was this, that you were
the best
And the dearest wife in town ! "
The farmer went back to the field, and the wife.
In a smiling, absent way.
Sang snatehes of tender little songs
She'd not sung for many a day.
And the pain in her head was gone, and the
clothes
Were white as the foam of the sea ;
Her bread was light, and her butter was sweet.
And as golden as it could be.
"Just think," the children all called in a breath,
"Tom Wood has run olf to sea !
He would n't, I know, if he'd only had
As happy a home as we."
The night came down, and the good wife smiled
To herself, as she softly said ;
" 'T is so sweet to labor for those we love, —
It's not strange that maids will wed ! "
a.VO.NVMOUS.
0, LAY THY HAND IN MINE, DEAR !
0, lay thy hand in mine, dear !
We 're growing old ;
But Time hath brought no sign, dear.
That hearts grow cold.
'T is long, long since our new love
Made life divine ; |
But age enricheth true love,
Like noble wine.
■ And lay, thy cheek to mine, dear.
And take thy rest ;
Mine arms around thee twine, dear.
And make thy nest. (,
A many cares are pressing
On this dear head ;
But Sorrow's hands in blessing
Are surely laid.
0, lean thy life on mine, dear !
'T will shelter.thee.
Thou wert a winsome vine, dear.
On my young tree :
And so, till boughs are leafless.
And songbirds flown.
Wo '11 twine, then lay us, grieficss.
Together down.
Cr.RALD MAssr.v.
THE WORN WEDDING-RING.
Your wedding-rîng wears thin, dear wife ; ah,
summers not a few.
Since I put it on your finger first, have passed
o'er me and you ;
And, love, what changes we have seen, — what
cares and pleasures, too, —
Since you became my own dear wife, when this
old ring was new !
0, blessings on that happy day, the happiest of
my life.
When, thanks to God, your low, sweet "Yes"
made you my loving wife !
Your heart will say the same, I know ; that
day's as dear to you, —
That day that made me yours, dear wife-, when
this old ring was new.
How well do I remember now your young sweet
face that day !
How fair Vi»» were, how dear you were, my
fonijvt^uld hardly say ;
Nor how t liaated on you ; 0, how proud I was
of you !
But did I love you more than now, when this
old ring was new ?
No—no ! no fairer were you then than at this
hour to me ;
And, dear as life to me this day, how could you
dearer be ?
As sweet your face might be that day as now it
is, 't is true ;
But did I know your heart as well when this old
ring was new ?
0 partner of my gladneSs, wife, what care, what
grief is there
For me you would not bravely face, with me you
would not share ?
0, what a weary want had every day, if wanting
you.
Wanting the love that God made mine when
this old ring was new !
Years bring fresh links to bind us, wife, —young
voices that are here ;
Young faces round our fire that make their
mother's yet more dear ;
Young loving hearts your care each day makes
yet more like to you.
More like the loving heart made mine when this
I old ring was new.
s-
222
POEMS OP THE APFECTIONS.
And blessed be God ! all he has given are with
lis yet ; around
Our table every precious life lent to us still is
found.
Though cares we 've known, with hopeful hearts
the worst we've struggled through ;
Blessed be his name for all his love since this
old ring was new !
The past is dear, its sweetness still our memo¬
ries treasure yet ;
The griefs we've borue, together home, we would
not now forget.
Whatever, wife, the future brings, heart unto
heart still trae.
We'll share as wo have shared all else since this
old ring was new.
And if God spare us 'mengst our sons and daugh¬
ters to grow old.
We know his goodness will not let your heart
or mine grow cold.
Your aged eyes will see in mine all they've still
shown to you.
And mine in yours all they have seen since this
old ring was new.
And 0, when death shall come at last to bid me
to my rest.
May I die looking in those eyes, and resting on
that breast ;
O, may my parting gaze be blessed with the dear
sight of you.
Of those fond eyes, — fond as they were when
this old ring was new !
William Cox Ben.nett.
JOHN ANDERSON, MY JO.
John Anderson, my jo, John,
When we were first aequent.
Your locks were like the raven.
Your bonnie brow was brent ;
But now your brow is beld, John,
Your locks are like the snaw ;
But blessings on your frosty pow,
John Anderson, my jo.
John Anderson, my jo, John,
We clamb the hill thegither ;
And monie a canty day, John,
We've had wi' ane anither.
Now we maun totter down, John,
But hand in hand we '11 go ;
And sleep thegither at the foot,
John Anderson, my jo.
Robert Burns.
FILIAL LOVE.
from "childe harold."
There is a dungeon in whose dim drear light
What do I gaze on ? Nothing : look again !
Two forms are slowly shadowed on my sight, —
Two insulated phantoms of the brain :
It is not so ; I see them full and plain, — -
An old man and a female young and fair.
Fresh as a nui-sing mother, in whose vein
The blood is nectar : but what doth she there.
With her unmantled neck, and bosom white and
bare ?
Full swells the deep pure fountain of young life.
Where on the heart and from the heart we took
Our first and sweetest nurture, when the wife,
Blest into mother, in the innocent look.
Or even the piping cry of lips that brook
No pain and small suspense, a joy perceives
Man knows not, when from out its cradled nook
She sees her little bud put forth its leaves —
What may the fruit be yet ? I know not — Cain
was Eve's.
But here 5'-outh offers to old age the food,
The milk of his own gift : it is her sire
To whom she rendei-s back the debt of blood
Bom with her birth. No ! he shall not e.xpire
While in those warm and lovely veins the lire
Of health and holy feeling can provide
Great Nature's Nile, whose deep stream rises
higher
Than Egypt's river ; — from that gentle side
Drink, drink and live, old man ! Heaven's realm
holds no such tide.
The starry fable of the milky-way
Has not thy story's puiity ; it is
A constellation of a sweeter ray.
And sacred Nature triumphs more in this
Reverse of her decree, than in the abyss
Where sparkle distant worlds ; — 0, holiest
nurse !
No drop of that clear stream its way shall miss
To thy sire's heart, replenishing its source
With life, as our freed souls rejoin the univeise.
Byron.
ROCK ME TO SLEEP.
Backward, turn backward, O Time, in your
flight.
Make m4 a chUd again just for to-night !
Mother, comeyback from the|echolesSy^hore,
Take me again to your heart as of yore ;
Kiss from my forehead the fuiTows of care.
Smooth the few silver threads out of my hair ¡
Over my slumbers your loving watch keep ; —
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep !
HOME.
223
Backward, flow backward, 0 tide of the years !
I am so weary of toil and of tears, —
Toil without recompense, tears all in vain, —
Take them, and give me my childhood again !
I have gi'own weary of dust and decay, —
Weary of flinging my soul-wealth away ;
Weary of sowing for others to reap ; —
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock mo to sleep !
Tired of the hollow, the base, the untrué.
Mother, O mother, my heart calls for you.l
Many a summer the grass has grown green.
Blossomed, and faded our faces between.
Yet with sti'ong yearning and passionate pain
Long I to-night for your presence again.
Come from the silence so long and so deep ; —
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep !
Over my heart, in the days that are flown, '
No love Rke mother-love ever has shone ;
No other worship abides and endures, — i
Faithful, unselfish, and patient, like yours s |
None like a mother can charm away pain
From the sick soul and the world-weary brain.
Slumber's soft calms o'er my heavy lids creep ; —
Rock mo to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep !
Come, let your brown hair, just lighted with gold.
Fall on your shoulders again as of old ;
Let it drop over my forehead to-night.
Shading my faint eyes away from the light ;
For with its sunny-edged shadows once more
Haply will throng the sweet visions of yore ;
Lovingly, softly, its bright billows sweep ; —
Rock me to sleep, mother, — rock mo to sleep I
Mother, dear mother, the years have been long
Since I last listened your lullaby song :
Sing, then, and unto my soul it shall seem
Womanhood's years have been only a dream.
Clasped to your heart in a loving embrace.
With your light lashes just sweeping your face.
Never hereafter to wake or to weep ; —
Rock mo to sleep, mother, — rock me to sleep I
Elizabeth Akers Allen (Florence Percy).
)
HOMESICK.
Come to me, 0 my Mother ! come to me.
Thine own son slowly dying far away !
Through the moist ways of the wide ocean, blown
By great invisible winds, come stately ships
To this calm bay for quiet anchorage ;
They come, they rest awhile, they go away,
But, O my Mother, never comest thou !
The snow is round thy dwelling, the white snow,
That cold soft revelation pure as light.
And the pine-spire is mystically fringed.
Laced with incrusted silver. Here —ah me ! —
The winter is decrepit, under-born,
A leper with no power but his disease.
Why am I from thee. Mother, far from thee ?
Far from the frost enchantment, and the woods
Jewelled from bough to bough? 0 home, my
home !
0 river in the valley of my homo.
With mazy-winding motion intricate.
Twisting thy deathless music underneath
The polished ice-work, — must I nevermore
Behold thee with familiar eyes, and watch
Thy beauty changing with the changeful day.
Thy beauty constant to the constant change ?
David gray.
TO AUGUSTA.
his sister, augusta leigh.
Mt sister ! my sweet sister ! if a name
Dearer and purer were, it should be thine.
Mountains and seas divide us, but I claim
No tears, but tenderness to answer mine :
Go where I will, to me thou art the same, —
A loved regret which I would not resign.
There yet are two things in my destiny, —
A world to roam through, and a home with thee.
The first were nothing, — had I still the last,
It were the haven of my happiness ;
But other claims and other ties thou hast.
And mine is not the wish to make them less.
A strange doom is thy father's son's, and past
Recalling, as it lies beyond reilrcss ;
Reversed for him our grandsire's fate of yore, —
He had no rest at sea, nor I on shore.
If my inheritance of storms hath been
In other elements, and on the rocks
Of perils, overlooked or unforeseen,
I have sustained my share of worldly shocks.
The fault was mine ; nor do I seek to screen
My errors with defensive paradox ;
I have been cunning in mine overthrow.
The careful pilot of my proper woe.
Mine were my faults, and mine be their reward.
My whole life was a contest, since the day
That gave me being gave me that which marred.
The gift, —a fate, or will, that walked astray ;
And I at times have found the struggle hard.
And thought of shaking otf my bonds of clay :
But now I fain would for a time survive.
If but to see what next can well arrive.
c&
224
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
©■
Kingdoms and empires in my little day
1 have outlived, and yet I am not old ;
And when I look on this, the petty spray
Of my own years of trouble, which have rolled
Like a wild bay of breakers, melts away :
Something—I know not what — does still
uphold
A spirit of slight patience ; — not in vain.
Even for its own sake, do we purchase pain.
Perhaps the workings of defiance stir
Within me, — or jierhaps of cold despair.
Brought on when ills habitually recur, —
Perhaps a kinder clime, or purer air,
(For even to this may change of soul refer.
And with light armor we may learn to bear,)
Have taught me a strange quiet, which was not
The chief companion of a calmer lot.
I feel almost at times as I have felt
In happy childhood ; trees, and flowers, and
brooks.
Which do remember me of where I dwelt
Ere my young mind was sacrificed to books.
Come as of yore upon me, and can melt
My heart with recognition of their looks ;
And even at moments I could think I see
Some living thing to love, — but none like thee.
Here are the Alpine landscapes which create
A fund for contemplation ; — to admire
Is a brief feeling of a trivial date ;
But something worthier do such scenes inspire.
Here to be lonely is not desolate.
For much I view which I could most desire,
And, above all, a lake I can behold
Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old.
0 that thou wert but with roe ! — but I grow
✓ O
The fool of my own wishes, and forget
The solitude which 1 have vaunted so
Has lost its praise in this but one regret ;
There may be others which I less may show ;
I am not of the plaintive mood, and yet
1 feel an ebb in my philosophy.
And the tide rising in my altered eye.
I did remind thee of our own dear Lake,
By the old Hull which may be mine no mere.
Leman's is fair ? but think not I forsake
The sweet remembrance of a dearer shore ;
Sad havoo Time must with my memory make,
Ere that or thou can fade these eyes before ;
Though, like all things which I have loved, they
are
Resigned forever, or divided far. I
The world is all before me ; I but ask
Of Nature that with which she will comply, —
It is but in her summer's sun to bask.
To mingle with the quiet of her sky.
To see her gentle face without a mask.
And never gaze on it with apathy.
She was my early friend, and now shall be
My sister, — till I look again on thee.
I can reduce all feelings but this one ;
And that I would not ; for at length I see
Such scenes as tho.se wherein my lile begun.
The earliest, — even the oidy paths for me, —
Had 1 but sooner learnt the crowd to shun,
I had been better than I now can be ;
The passions which have torn me would have
slept :
I had not suffered, and thou hadst not wept.
With false Ambition what had I to d& ?
Little with Love, and least of all with Fame !
And yet they came unsought, and with me grew.
And made me all which they can make, — a
name.
Yet this was not the end I did pursue ;
Surely I once beheld a nobler aim.
But all is over ; I am one the more
To baffled millions which have gone before.
And for the future, this world's future may
From me demand but little of my care ;
I have outlived myself by many a day
Having survived so many things that were ;
My yeam have been no slumber, but the prey
Of ceaseless vigils ; for I had the share
Of life which might have filled a century.
Before its fourth in time had passed me by.
And for the remnant which may be to come,
I am content ; and for the past I feel
Not thankless, — for within the crowded sum
Of struggles, happiness at times would steal.
And for the present, I would not benumb
My feelings farther. — Nor shall I conceal
That with all this I still can look aroiuid.
And worship Nature with a thought inofouud.
For thee, my own sweet sister, in thy heart
I know myself secure, as thou in mine :
We were and are — I am, even as thou art —
Beings who ne'er each other can resign ;
It is the same, together or apart.
From life's commencement to its slow decline
AFe are intwined, — let death come slow or first.
The tie which bound the first endures the last !
DVRON.
HOME.
&
HOME.
Oi.iNO to thy home ! if there the meanest shed
Yield thee a hearth and shelter for thy head,
And some poor plot, irith vegetables stored,
lie all that Heaven allots thee for thy board,.—
Unsavory bread, and herbs that scattered grow-
Wild on the river brink or mountain brow.
Yet e'en this cheerless mansion shall provide
Moi-e heart's repose than all the world be.side.
From the Greek of I-EoxiDAS,
by Robert Bland,
HOME, SWEET HOME.
fro! the opera of "clari, the maid of milax."
Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam.
Be it ever so humble there's no place like home I
A charm fiom the sky seems to hallow us there.
Which, seek through the world, is ne'er met with
elsewhere. .
Home ! home ! sweet, sweet home !
There's no place like home !
An exile from home, splendor dazzles in vain :
0, give me my lowly thatched cottage again !
The birds singing gayly that came at my call ; —
(;ive me them, — and the peace of mind dearer
than all !
Home ! home ! sweet, sweet home !
There's no place like home !
john Howard Payne.
A WISH.
Mine be a cot beside the hill ;
A beehive's hum shall soothe my ear ;
A willowy brook that turas a mill.
With many a fall shall linger near.
The swallow, oft, beneath my thatch
Shall twitter from her clay-built nest ;
Oft shall the pilgrim lift the latch.
And share my meal, a welcome guest.
Around my ivied porch shall spring
Each fragrant flower that drinks the dew,
And Lucy, at her wheel, shall sing
In russet gown and apron blue.
The village-church among the trees,
Where first our marriage-vows were given.
With merry peals shall swell the breeze
And point with taper spire to heaven.
Samuel rooees.
ODE TO SOLITUDE.
H.yppY the man, whose wish and care
A few paternal acres bound.
Content to breathe his native air
In his own ground.
Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread,
Whose flocks supply him with attire ;
Wliose trees in summer yield him shade.
In winter, fire.
Blest, who can unconcem'dly find
Honrs, days, and yeare slide soft away
In health «f body, peace of mind.
Quiet by day,
Sound sleep by night ; study and ease
Together mi.ved ; sweet recreation.
And innocence, which most does please
With meditation.
Thus let me live, unseen, unknown ;
Tims unlamented let me die ;
Steal from the world, and not a stone
Tell where 1 lie.
Alexander Pope.
A SHEPHERD'S LIFE.
from "third part of henry vi.," act ii. sc. 5.
Kixo Henp.y. o God ! methinks, it wore a
happy life.
To be no bettei than a homely swain ;
To sit upon a hill, as I do now.
To carve out dials quaintly, point by point,
Thereby to see the minutes how they run ;
How many make the hour full complete.
How many hours bring about the day.
How many days will finish up the year.
How many years a mortal man may live.
When this is known, then to divide the times : —
So many hours must I tend my flock ;
So many hours must 1 take my rest ;
So many hours must 1 contemplate ;
So many hours must 1 sport myself ;
So many days my ewes have been with young ;
So many weeks ere the poor fools will yean ;
So many years ere 1 shall shear the fleece ;
So minutes, hours, days, weeks, months, and
yeai-s.
Passed over to the end they were created.
Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave.
Ah, what a life were this ! how sweet ! how-
lovely !
Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade
To shepherds, looking on their silly sheep,
Than doth a rich embroidered canopy
1 To kings that fear their subjects' treachery ?
I shakespeare.
a-
226
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
THE MEANS TO ATTAIN HAPPY LIFE.
Maktial, the things that do attain
The happy life be these, I find, —
The riches left, not got with pain ;
The fruitful ground, the quiet mind,
The equal friend ; no grudge, no strife ;
No' charge of rule, nor governance ;
Without disease, the healthful life ;
The household of continuance ;
The mean diet, no delicate fare ;
True wisdom joined with simpleness ;
The night discharged of all care, *
Where wine the wit may not oppress ;
The faithful wife, without debate ;
Such sleeps as may beguile the night ;
Contented with thine own estate.
Ne wish for death, ne fear his might.
Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey.
THE FIRESIDE.
Dear Chloe, while the busy crowd.
The vain, the wealthy, and the proud.
In folly's maze advance ;
Though singularity and pride
Be called our choice, we '11 step a.side.
Nor join the giddy dance.
From the gay world we '11 oft retire
To our own family and fire.
Where love our hours employs ;
No noisy neighbor enters here.
No intenneddling stranger near.
To spoil our heartfelt joys.
If solid happiness we prize.
Within our breast this jewel lies.
And they are fools who roam ;
The world hath nothing to bestow, —
From our own selves our bliss must flow.
And that dear hut, our home.
Of rest was Noah's dove bereft,
When with impatient wing she left
That safe retreat, the ark ;
Oiving her vain e.xcursion o'er.
The disappointed bird once more
Explored the sacred bark.
Though fools spurn Hymen's gentle powers.
Wo, who improve his golden hours.
By sweet experience know
That marriage, rightly understood.
Gives to the tender and the good
A paradise below.
Our babes shall richest comforts bring ;
If tutored right, they '11 prove a spring
Whence pleasures ever rise :
We '11 form their minds, with studious care.
To all that's manly, good, and fair.
And train them for the skies.
While they our wisest hours engage.
They '11 joy our youth, support our .age.
And crown our hoary hairs :
They '11 grow in virtue every day.
And thus our fondest loves repay,
And recompenso our cares.
No borrowed joys, they 're all our own¿
While to the world we live unknown,
Or by the world forgot :
Monarchs ! we envy not your state ;
We look with pity on the great.
And bless our humbler lot.
Our portion is not large, indeed ;
But then how little do we need,
For nature's calls are few ;
In this the art of living lies.
To want no more than may suffice.
And make that little do.
We '11 therefore relish with content
Whate'er kind Providence has sent.
Nor aim beyond our power ;
For, if our stock be very small,
'T is prudence to enjoy it all.
Nor lose the present hour-.
To be resigned when ills betide.
Patient when favors are denied.
And pleased with favors given, —
Dear Chloe, this is wisdom's part.
This is that incense of the heart.
Whose fragrance smells to heaven.
Wc '11 ask no long-protracted treat.
Since winter-life is seldom sweet ;
But when our feast is o'er.
Grateful from table we '11 arise.
Nor grudge our sons with envious eyes
The relics of our store.
Thus, hand in hand, through life we '11 go ;
Its checkered paths of joy and woe
With cautious steps we'll tread ;
Quit its vain scenes without a tear.
Without a trouble or a fear.
And mingle with the dead :
While Conscience, like a faithful friend.
Shall through the gloomy vale attend.
J
fi-
HOME.
227
And cheer our dying bi-cath ;
Shall, when all other comforts cease,
Like a kind angel whi.sper peace,
" And smooth the bed of death.
Nathaniel cotton.
MY AIN FIRESIDE.
I HAE seen great anes and sat in great ha'.s,
'Maiig lords and fine ladies a' covered wi' braws,
At feasts made for princes wi' princes I've been,
When the grand shine o' splendor has dazzled
my een ;
But a sight sae delightfu' I trow I ne'er spied
As the bonny blithe blink o' my ain fireside.
My ain fireside, my ain fireside,
O, cheeiy's the blink o' my ain fireside ;
My ain fireside, my ain fireside,
O, there's naught to compare wi' ane's ain
fireside.
Ance mair, Gude be thankit, round my ain heart-
some ingle,
Wi' the friends o' my youth I cordially mingle ;
Nae forms to compel me to seem wae or glad,
I may laugh when I'm merry, and sigh when
I'm sad.
Nae falsehood to dread, and nae malice to fear,
But truth to delight me, and friendship to cheer ;
Of a' roads to happiness ever were tried.
There's nane half so sure as ane's ain fireside.
My ain fireside, my ain fireside,
O, there's naught to compare wi' ane's ain
fireside.
When I draw in my stool on my cozy hearth-
stane.
My heart loups sae light I scarce ken't for my
ain ;
Care's down on the wind, it is clean out o'
sight.
Past troubles they seem but as dreams o' the
night.
I hear but kend voices, kend faces I see.
And mark saft affection glent fond frae ilk ee ;
Nae fleechings o' flattery, nae boastings o' pride,
'T is heart speaks to heart at ane's ain fireside.
My ain fireside, my ain fireside,
O, there's naught to compare wi' ane's ain
fireside.
Elizabeth Hamilto.v.
m
BY THE FIRESIDE
What is it fades and flickers in the fire.
Mutters and sighs, and yields reluctant breath.
As if in the red embers some desire.
Some word prophetic burned, defying death ?
Loi-ds of the forest, stalwart oak and pine.
Lie down for us in flames of martyrdom :
A human, household wai-mth, their death-fires
shine ;
Yet fragi'ant with high memories they come.
Bringing the mountain-winds that in their boughs
Sang of the torrent, and the plashy edge
Of storm-swept lakes ; and echoes that arouse
The eagles from a splintered eyiie ledge ;
And breath of violets sweet about their roots ;
And earthy odors of the moss and fern ;
And hum of rivulets ; smell of ripening fruits ;
And green leaves that to gold and crimson turn.
What clear Septembers fade out in a spark !
What rare Octobei-s drop with every coal !
Within these costly ashes, dumb and dark.
Are hid spring's budding hope, and summer's
soul.
Pictures far lovelier smoulder in the firs.
Visions of friends who walk ed ahiong these trees,
Whose presence, like the free air, could inspire
A wingèd life and boundless sympathies.
Eyes with a glow like that in the brown beech.
When sunset through itsautumn beauty shines ;
Or the blue gentian's look of silent speech.
To heaven appealing as earth's light declines ;
Voices and steps forever fled away
From the familiar glens, the haunted hills, —
Most pitiful and strange it is to stay
Without you in a world your lost love fiUs.
Do you forget us, — under Eden trees.
Or in full sunshine on the hills of God, —;
Who miss you from the shadow and the breeze.
And tints and perfumes of the woodland sod ?.
Dear for your sake the fireside-where we sit
Watching these sad, bright pictures come and
go ;
That waning years are with your memory lit
Is the one lonely comfort that we know.
Is it all memory ? Lo, these forest-boughs
Burst on the hearth into fi-esh leaf and bloom ;
Waft a vague, far-off sweetness through the houso^
And give close walls the hillside's breathing-
A second life, more spiritual than thé first.
They find, — a life won only out of dèatb.
O sainted souls, within you still is nursed
For us a flame not fed by mottal breath I
228
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
-a
Unseen, ye bting to us, who love and vrnt.
Wafts from the heavenl}' hills, immortal air ;
No flood can quench your hearts' wamith, or
abate ;
Ye are our gladness, here and everywhere.
lucy Larcom.
cq-
A WINTER-EVENING HYMN TO MY
FIRE.
0 Tiiou of home the guardian Lar,
And, when our earth hath wandered far
Into the cold, and deep snow covei-s
The walks of our New England lovers.
Their sweet secluded evening-star !
'T was with thy rays the English Muse
Ripened her mild domestic hues ;
'T was by thy flicker that she conned
The fireside wisdom that enrings
With light from heaven familiar things ;
By thee she found the homely faith
In whose mild eyes thy comfort stay'th.
When Death, extinguishing his torch.
Gropes for the latch-string in the porch ;
The love that wandeis not beyond
His earliest nest, but sits and sings
While children smooth his patient wings :
Therefore with thee 1 love to read
Our brave old poets : at thy touch how stirs
Life in the withered words ! how swift recede
Time's shadows ! and how glows again
Through its dead mass the incandescent verse,
As when upon the anvils of the brain
It glittering lay, cyclopically wrought
By the fast-throbbing hammers of the poet's
thought !
Thou murmurest, too, divinely stirred,
The aspirations unattained,
The rhythms so rathe and delicate.
They bent and strained
And broke, beneath the sombre weight
Of any airiest mortal word.
What warm protection dost thou bend
Round curtained talk of friend with friend.
While the gray snow-storm, held aloof,
To softest outline rounds the roof.
Or the rude North with baffled strain
Shoulder's the frost-starred window-pane !
Now the kind nymph to Bacchus borne
By Morpheus' daughter, she that seems
Gifted upon her natal morn
By him with fire, by her with dreams,
Nicotia, dearer to the Muse
Than all the grapes' bewildering juice.
We worship, unforbid of thee ;
And, as her incense floats and curls
In airy spires and wayward whirls.
Or poises on its ti'emulous stalk
A flower of frailest revery.
So winds and loiters, idly fi-ee.
The current of unguided talk.
Now laughter-rippled, and now caught
In smooth dark pools of deeper thouglit.
Meanwhile thou mellowest every wm-d,
A sweetly unobtrusive third ;
For thou hast magic beyond wine.
To unlock natures each to each ;
The unspoken thought thou canst divine ;
Thou fill'st the pauses of the speech
With whispers that to dream-land reach.
And frozen fancy-springs unchain
In Arctic outskirts of the brain ;
Sun of all inmost confidences.
To thy rays doth the heart unclose
Its formal calyx of pretences,
That close against rude day's offences.
And open its shy midnight rose !
wj james russell lowell
I KNEAV BY THE SMOKE THAT SO
GRACEFULLY CURLED.
I K.NFVk liy the smoke that so gracefully curled .
Above the green elms, that a cottage was near.
And I .said, " If there's peace to be ibimd in the
world,
A heart that is humble might hope for it here ! "
It was noon, and on flowers that languished
around
In silence reposed the voluptuous bee ;
Every leaf was at rest, and I he.urd not a sound
But the woodpecker tapping the hollow beech-
tree.
And " Here in this lone little wood," I ex¬
claimed,
"AVith a maid who was lovely to soul and to
eye,
Who would blush when I praised her, and weep
if 1 blamed.
How blest could I live, and how calm could 1
die !
" By the shade of yon sumach, whose red berry
dips
In the gush of the fomrtain, how sweet to re¬
cline.
And to know that I sighed upon innocent lips, •
Which had never been sighed on by any but
mine ! "
Thomas Moore.
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229
HEART-REST.
from " philip van artf.velde."
The heart of man, walk it which way it will,
Seque-stered or frequented, smooth or rough,
Down the deep valley among.st tinkling flocks.
Or mid the clang of trumpets and the march
Of clattering ordnance, still must have its halt.
Its hour of truce, its instant of repose.
Its inn of rest ; and craving still must seek
The food of its affections, — still must slake
Its con.stant thirst of what is fresh and pure.
And pleasant to behold.
Henry Taylor.
TWO PICTURES.
An old farm-house with meadows wide.
And sweet with clover on each side ;
A bright-eyed boy, who looks from out
The door with woodbine wreathed about,
And wishes his one thought all day :
" O, if I could but fly away
From this dull spot, the world to see.
How happy, happy, happy.
How happy I should be ! "
Amid the city's constant din,
man who round the world has been.
Who, mid the tumult and the throng,
Is thinking, thinking all day long :
" 0, could I only tread once more
The field-path to the farm-house door.
The old, gieen meadow could I see.
How happy, happy, happy.
How happy 1 should be ! "
Annie D. green (Marian Dottslas).
u
HOME.
prom "the traveller."
But where to find that happiest spot below.
Who can direct, when all pretend to know '/
The shuddering tenant of the frigid zone
Boldly proclaims that happiest spot his own ;
Extols the treasures of his stormy seas.
And his long nights of revelry and ease :
The naked negro, panting at the line.
Boasts of his golden sands and palmy wine.
Basks in the glare, or stcnis the tepid wave,
And thanks his gods for all the good they gave.
Such is the imtriot's boast, where'er we roam,
His first, best eountry, ever is at home.
And yet, perhaps, if countiies we compare.
And estimate the blessings which they share.
Though patriots flatter, still shall wisdom find
An equal portion dealt to all mankind ;
As different good, by art or nature given.
To different nations makes their blessing even.
oliver Goldsmith.
THE HOMES OF ENGLAND.
The stately Homes of England,
How beautiful they stand !
Amidst their tall ance.stral trees.
O'er all the pleasant land ;
The deer across their gi'eensward bound
Through shade and sunny gleam.
And the swan glides past them with the sound
Of some rejoicing stream.
The merry Homes of England !
Around their hearths by night.
What gladsome looks of household love
Meet in the ruddy light.
There woman's voice flows forth in song.
Or childish tale is told ;
Or lips move tunefully along
Some glorious page of old.
The blcssèd Homes of England !
How softly on their bowers
Is laid the holy quietne.ss
That breathes from Sabbath hours !
Solemn, yet sweet, the church-bell's chime
Floats through their woods at mom ;
All other sounds, in that still time.
Of breeze and leaf are bom.
The cottage Homes of England !
By thousands on her plains.
They are smiling o'er the silvery brooks.
And round the hamlct-fanes.
Through glorving orchards forth they peep,
Each from its nook of leaves ;
And fearless there the lowly sleep.
As the bird beneath their eaves.
The free, fair Homes of England !
Long, long in hut and h.all.
May hearts of native proof be reared
To guard each hallowed wall !
And green forever be the groves.
And bright the flowery sod,
AVhere first the child's glad spirit loves
Its country and its God.
Felicia Hemans
A PICTURE.
THEjiarmer sat in his easy-chair.
Smoking his pipe of clay.
While his hale old wife, with busy care,
Was clearing the dinner away ;
A sweet little girl, witli fine blue eyes.
On her gi'andfather's knee was catching flics.
S
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'230
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
ft
The old man laid his hand on her head,
With a tear on his wrinkled face ;
He thought how often her mother, dead.
Had sat in the self-same place.
As the tear stole down from his half-shut eye,
" Don't smoke ! " said the child ; " how it makes
you cry ! "
The house-dog lay stretched out on the floor.
Where the shade after noon used to steal ;
The busy old wife, by the open door.
Was turning the spinning-wheel ;
And the old brass clock on the mantel-tree
Had plodded along to almost three.
Still the farmer sat in his easy-chair.
While close to his heaving breast
The moistened brow and the cheek so fair
Of his sweet grandchild were pressed ;
His head, bent down, on her soft hair lay :
Fast asleep were they both, that summer day !
charles gamace east.max,
e-
NOT ONE TO SPARE.
" Which shall it be ? Which shall it Ire ? "
I looked at John —John looked at me
(Dear, |raticnt John, who loves me yet
As well as though my locks were jet) ;
And when 1 found that I must speak.
My voice seemed strangely low and weak ;
•' Tell me again what Robert said."
And then 1, listening, bent my head.
" This is his letter : ' 1 will give
A house and land while you shall live.
If, in return, from out your seven.
One child to me for aye is given.' "
1 looked at John's old gannents worn,
I tliought of all that John had home
Of poverty and work and care.
Which 1, though, willing, could not share ;
1 thought of seven mouths to feed.
Of seven little children's need.
And then of this. " Come, John," said 1,
"We '11 choose among them as they lie
■ Asleep ; " so, walking hand in hand.
Dear John and 1 surveyed our baud.
First to the ci-adle lightly stepped.
Where Lilian, the baby, slept,
A glory 'gainst the pillow white.
Softly the father stooped to lay
His rough hand down in a gentle waj',
AVhen dream or whisper made her stir.
And huskily he said, " Not her, not her ! "
We stopped beside the trundle-bed,
. And one long ray of lamplight shed
Athwart the boyish faces there,
In sleep so pitiful and fair ;
I saw on Jamie's rough, red cheek
A tear undried. Ere John could speak,
" He's but a baby, too," said 1,
And kissed him as we hurried by.
Pale, patient Robbie's angel face
Still in his sleep bore suffering's trace.
" No, for a thousand crowns, not him ! "
He whispered, while our eyes were dim.
Poor Dick ! bad Dick ! our wayward son,
Turbulent, reckless, idle one —
Could he be spared ? Nay ; Ho who gave.
Bid us befriend him to his grave ;
Only a mother's heart can be
Patient enough for such as he ;
" And so," said John, " 1 would not dare
To send him from our bedside prayer."
Then stole we softly up above
And knelt by Mary, child of love.
" Perhaps for her't would better be,"
1 said to John. Quite silently
He lifted up a curl that lay
Across her check in wilful way.
And shook his head : " Nay, love ; not thee,"
The while my heart beat audibly.
Only one more, our eldest lad,
Trusty and truthful, good and glad —
So like his father. " No, John, no -
I cannot, will not, let him go."
And so we wrote, in courteous way,
We could not drive one chUd away ;
And afterward toil lighter seemed.
Thinking of that of which we dreamed,
Happy in trath that not one face
Was missed from its accustomed place ;
Thankful to work for all the seven,
Tru-stiug the rest to One in heaven.
Anonymous.
THE CHILDREN.
When the lessons and tasks are all ended.
And the school for the day is disniissetl.
And the little ones gather around mc.
To bid mc good night and be kissed ¡
0 the little white arms tliat encircle
My neck in their tender embrace !
O the smiles that are halos of heaven.
Shedding sunshine of love on my face I
And when they are gone, 1 sit dreaming
Of my childhood, too lovelj' to last ;
Of love that my heart will remember
AVheu it wakes to the pulse of thé past.
4
HOME.
231
fe
Ere the world and its wickedness made tne
A partner of sorrow and sin, —
When the glory of God was about me.
And the glory of gladness within.
All my heart grows weak as a woman's.
And the fountains of feeling will How,
When I think of the paths steep and stony,
Where the feet of the dear ones must go ;
Of the mountains of sin hanging o'er them,
Of the tempest of Fate blowing wild ;
0, there's nothing on earth half so holy
As the innocent heai't of a child !
They are idols of hearts and of households ;
They arc angels of God in disguise ;
His sunlight still sleeps in their tresses.
His glory still gleams in their eyes ;
O, these truants from home and from heaven, —
They have made me more manly and mild ;
And I know no^^ how Jesus could liken
The kingdom of God to a child !
I ask not a life for the dear ones.
All radiant, as others have done.
But that life may have just enough shadow
To temper the glare of the sun ;
I would pray God to guard them from evil,
But my prayer would bound back to myself ;
Ah ! a seraph may pray for a sinner.
But a sinner must pray for himself.
The twig is so easily bended,
I have banished the rule and the rod ;
I have taught them the goodness of knowledge.
They have taught me the goodness of God.
My heart is the dungeon of darkness.
Where I shut them for breaking a rule ;
My frown is sufficient con'ection ;
My love is the law of the school.
I shall leave the old house in the autumn.
To traverse its threshcdd no more ;
Ah ! how shall I sigh for the dear ones
That meet me each morn at the door !
I shall miss the "good nights" and the kisses.
And the gush of their innocent glee,
' The group on its green, and the flowei-s
That are brought every morning to me.
I shall miss them at mom and at even,
Tlieir song in the school and the street ;
I shall miss the low hum of their voices.
And the tread of their delicate feet.
When the lessons of life are all ended.
And death says, " The school is dismissed ! "
May the little ones gather around me.
To bid me good night and be kissed !
Charles M. Dickiksoh.
FAITH AND HOPE.
O, don't be sorrowful, darling 1
Now, don't be sorrowful, pray ;
For, taking the year together, my dear.
There is n't more night than day.
It's rainy weather, my loved one ;
Time's wheels they heavily run ;
But taking the year together, my dear.
There is n't more cloud than sun.
We 're old folks now, companion, —
Our heads they are growing gray ;
But taking the year all round, my dear.
You always will find the May.
We've had our May, my darling,
And our roses, long ago ;
And the time of the year is come, my dear.
For the long dark nights, and the snow.
But God is God, my faithful.
Of night as well as of day ;
And we feel and know that we can go
Wherever he leads the way.
Ay, God of night, my darling !
Of the night of death so grim ;
And the gate that from life leads out, good wife,
Is the gate tliat leads to Him.
Rembrandt itale.
FEAGMENTS.
The Wife.
To cheer thy sickness, watch thy health.
Partake, but never waste thy wealth.
Or stand with smile unmuiuiuring by.
And lighten half thy poverty.
Bride o/Abydos, CanUx, Byro.N.
She gave me eyes, she gave me ears ;
And humble cares, and delicate fears,
A heart, the fountain of sweet teai'S ;
And love, and thought, and joy.
The Sparrow's Nest. "wordsworth.
This flour of wifly patience.
The Clerkes Tale, Pars v. ChauCek.
And mistress of herself, though china fall.
Moral Essays : Epistle II.
pope.
The Mauried State.
Wedlock, indeed, hath oft compared been
To public feasts, where meet a public rout,
Where they that are without would fain go in.
And they that are within would fain go out.
Contenfiott betwixt a IVife, etc» SIR J. DAVIi'.á.
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232
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
O fie lipon this single life ! forego it.
Ducluss 0/Mal/y. J.WEBSTER.
1. That man must lead a happy life'
2. Who is directed by a wife ;
3. Who's free from matrimonial chains
4. Is sure to suffer for his pains.
5. Adam could find no solid peace
6. Till he beheld a woman's face ;
7. When Eve was given for a mate,
8. Adam was in a happy state.
Bpigram on Mairitnony : Read altérnate lines, — x, 3, a, 4;
5. 7. 6, 8,
Incoxst.ixcy.
Trust not a man : we are by nature false,
Dissembling, subtle, cruel and inconstant;
Wlien a man talks of love, with caution hear
him ;
But if he swears, he '11 ceitainly deceive thee.
The Orfhan. t. otwav.
Nay, women are frail too ;
Ay, as the glasses where tiiey view themselves ;
Which arc as easy broke as they make forms.
Mc^tsnrj/orMeasure, ^ct\\.Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
In part to blame is she,
Which hath without consent bin only tride :
He comes to neere that comes to be denide.
./ ITi/e. Sir t. overdurv.
Virtue she finds too painful an endeavor.
Content to dwell in decencies forever.
Moral Essays : UpistU II. POPE.
Completion.
JIan is but half without woman ; and
As do idolatera their heavenly gods,
AVe deify the things that wo adore.
FestHS. P. J. BAILEV.
Ho is the half part of a blessed man,
Left to be finished by such as she ;
And she a fair divided excellence.
Whose fulness of perfection lies in him.
King yohn. Act il. Sc» 2, SHAKESPEARE.
Home Life.
Domestic happiness, thou only bliss
Of paradise that has suiwived the fall !
The Task. COWPBR.
The first sure symptom of a mind in health
Ts i-est of heart, and pleasure felt at home.
Night Thoughts, ' li. VoUNC.
And hie him Home, at evening's close.
To sweet repast and calm repose.
Ode OH the Pleasure arising from Vicissitude, T. GR AV.
The social smile, the sympathetie tear.
Education and Government, T. ClCAY.
Oh ! blessed with temper, whose unclouded ray
Cau make to-morrow cheerful as to-day.
Moral Essays : Epistle II, POPE.
Why left you wife and children, —
Those precious motives, those strong knots of love ?
Macbeth, Acl 're.Sc. SHAKESPÉARE.
Motheh-Love.
The only love which, on this teeming earth,
Asks no return for passion's wayward birth.
The Dream. HON. MRS. NORTON.
A mother's love, — how sweet the name !
What is a mother's love ? —
A noble, pure, and tender flame.
Enkindled from above.
To bless a heart of earthly mould ;
The warmest love that can grow cold ; —
This is a mother's love.
A Mother's Love. J. MONTGOMERY.
Hath he set bounds between their love and me ?
I am their mother ; who shall bar me from them
Richard III,, ActVi,Sc, x. SHAKESPEARE.
Tlie poor wren,
The most diminutive of birds, will fight.
The young ones in her nest against the owl.
Macbeth, Act i». Sc. ». SHAKESPEARE.
Where yet was ever found a mother
Who'd give her booby for another ?
Eaàles : The Mother, the Nurse, and the fairy.
J. gav.
Home Pleasures.
At Christmas play, and make good cheer.
For Christmas comes but once a year.
T/ie Farmers Daily Diet. ï. tusser;
So saying, with despatchful looks in haste
She turns, on hospitable thoughts intent.
Paradise Lost, Book v* MlLTON.
Alike all ages : dames of ancient days
Have led their "children through the miithful
maze ;
And the gay grandsire, skilled in gestic lore.
Has fiisked beneath the burden of threescort.
The Traveller, COEbsulTH.
rh
(&■
PARTING.
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233
PARTING.
GOOD BY.
" Fap.ewell ! farewell ! " is often heard
From the lips of those who part :
'T is a whispered tone, — 't is a gentle word,
But it springs not from the heart.
It may serve for the lover's closing lay.
To be sung 'neath a summer sky ;
But give to me the lips that say
The honest words, " Good by ! "
"Adieu ! adieu ! " may greet the ear,
In the guise of courtly speech ;
But when we leave the kind and dear,
'T is not what the soul would teach.
Whene'er we grasp the hands of those
We would have forever nigh,
The flame of Friendship bursts and glows
In the warm, frank words, " Good by."
The mother, sending forth her child
To meet with cares and strife.
Breathes through her tears her doubts and fears
For the loved one's future life.
No cold "adieu," no "farewell," lives
Within her choking sigh.
But the deepest sob of anguish gives,
"God bless thee, boy ! Good by !"
Go, watch the pale and dying one.
When the glance has lost its beam ;
When the brow Ls cold as the marble .stone.
And the world a passing dream ;
And the latest pressure of the hand.
The look of the closing eye.
Yield what the heart must understand,
A long, a last Good-by.
anonvmol's.
QUA CURSUM VENTUS,
As ships, becalmed át eve, fhat lay
With canvas drooping, side by side.
Two towers of sail at dawn of day
Ai •e scarce long leagues apart descried.
When fell the night, up sprang the breeze.
And all the darkling hours they plied.
Nor dreamt but each the selfsame seas
By each was cleaving, side by side :
E'en so, — but why the tale reveal
Of those whom, year by year unchanged.
Brief absence joined anew to feel,
Astounded, soul from soul estranged ?
At dead of night their sails were fllled.
And onward each rejoicing steered ; —
Ah ! neither blame, for neither willed
Or wist what flrst with dawn appeared.
To veer, how vain Î On, onward strain.
Brave barks! In light, in darkness too,
Through winds and tides one compass guides :
To that and your own selves be tfne.
But O blithe breeze ! and 0 great seas I
Though ne'er, that earliest parting past.
On your wide plain they join again, —
Together lead them home at last.
One port, methought, alike they sought,—
One purpose hold where'er they fare ;
0 bounding breeze, O rushing seas.
At last, at last, unite them there !
Arthur Hugh Clough.
AE FOND KISS BEFORE WE PART.
Ae fond kiss, and then we sever ;
Ae fareweel, alas, forever !
Deep in heart-wrung tears I '11 pledge thee ;
Warring sighs and groans I'll wage thee.
Who shall say that fortune grieves him,
While the star of hope she leaves him f
Me, nae cheerfu' twinkle lights me ;
Dark despair around benights me.
I '11 ne'er blame my partial fancy—
Naething could resist my Nancy ;
But to see her was to love her.
Love but her, and love forever.
Had we never loved sae kindly.
Had we never loved sae blindly.
Never met — or never parted.
We had ne'er been broken-hearted.
Fare thee weel, thou flrst and fairest !
Fare thee weel, thou best and dearest f
Thine be ilka joy and treasure.
Peace, enjoyment, love, a.nd pleasure 1
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234
rOEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
■a
Ae fond kiss, and then we sever ;
Ae fareweel, alas, foi'ever !
Deep in heart-wrung tears I '11 pledge thee,
Waning sighs and groans 1 '11 wage thee !
Robert Burns.
O, MY LUVE'S LIKE A RED, RED ROSE.
O, MY Luve 's like a red, red rose
That's newly sprung in June :
O, jny Luve 's like the melodie
That's sweetly played in tune.
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass.
So deep in luve am I :
And I will luve thee still, my dear.
Till a' the seas gang dry : ;
Till a'the seas gang dry, my dear.
And the rocks melt wi' the sun :
And 1 will luve thee still, my dear,
WhUc the sands o' life shall run.
And fare thee weel, my only Luve !
And fare thee weel awhile !
And 1 will come again, my Luve,
'Xho' it were ten thousand mile.
Robert Burns.
THE KISS, DEAR MAID.
The kiss, dear maid ! thy lip has left
Shall never part from mine.
Till happier hours restore the gift
Untainted back to thine.
Tliy parting glance, which fondly beams.
An equal love may see :
The tear that from thine eyelid streams
Can weep no ehange in me.
I ask no idedge to make me blest
In gazing when alone ;
Nor one memorial for a breast
Wliose thoughts are all thine own.
Nor need I write — to tell the talo
My pen were doubly weak :
O, what can idle words avail,
Unless the heart could speak ?
By day or night, in weal or woe.
That heart, no longer free.
Must bear the love it cannot show,
And silent, ache for thee.
c:Î-
MAID OF ATHENS, ERE WE PART.
Z<¿7) /iov aás àyairû.*
Maid of Athens, ere we part.
Give, O, give me back my heart !
Or, since that has left my breast.
Keep it now, and take the rest !
Hear my vow before 1 go,
Z¿r) fiov <rás kyaitû.
By those tresses unconfined.
Wooed by each Aîgean wind ;
By those lids whose jetty fringe
Kiss thy soft cheeks' blooming tinge ;
By those wild eyes like the roe,
Ziii] fiov <rás àyairû.
By that lip 1 long to taste ;
By that zone-encircled waist ;
By all the token-flowers that tell
What words can never speak so well ;
By love's alternate joy and woe,
Zûri /íov aás àyairû.
Maid of Athens ! I am gone.
Think of me,.sweet ! when alono.
Though I fly to Istambol,
Athens holds my heart and soul ;
Can 1 cease to love thee ? No !
Ztai) fiov aás àyairû,
Byron.
SONG
of the young highlander summoned. from the side
of his bride by the "fiery cross ' of roderick dhu.
from "the lady of the lake."
The heath this night must be my bed.
The bracken curtain for my heail,
My lullaby the warder's tread.
Far, far from love and thee, Mary;
To-morrow eve, more stilly laid
My couch may be my bloody plaid,
My vesper song, thy wail, sweet maid !
. It will not waken me, Mary !
I may not, dare not, fancy now
The grief that clouds thy lovely brow,
I dare not think upon thy vow.
And all it promised me, Mary.
No fond regret must Norman know ;
When bursts Clan-Alpine on the foe.
His heart must be like bended bow.
His foot like arrow free, Mary.
• My life, I love tlice*
¿
&
PARTING.
235
-a
A time will come with feeling fraught !
For, if I fall in battle fought,
Thy hapless lover's dying thought
Shall be a thought on thee, Mary.
And if returned from conijuered foes.
How blithely will the evening close.
How sweet the linnet sing repose.
To my young bride and me, Mary !
sir Walter Scott.
TO LUCASTA,
o.n going to the wars.
Tell me not, sweet, I am unkindo.
That from the nunnerie
Of thy chaste breast and quiet minde,
To wane and arines I flee.
True, a new mistresse now I chase, —
The first foe in the field ;
And with a stronger faith imbrace
A sword, a horae, a shield.
Yet this inconstancy is such
As you, too, shall adore ;
I could not love thee, deare, so much.
Loved I not honor more.
Richard Lovelace.
BLACK-EYED SUSAN.
All in the Downs the fleet was moored.
The streamera waving in the wind.
When black-eyed Susan came aboard ;
" O, where shall I my true-love find?
Tell me, ye jovial sailora, tell me true
If my sweet William sails among the crew."
William, who high upon the yard
Rocked with the billow to and fro.
Soon as her well-known voice he heard
Ho sighed, and cast his eyes below :
The cord slides swiftly through his glowing
hands.
And quick as lightning on the deck he stands.
So the sweet lark, high poised in air.
Shuts close his pinions to his breast
If chance his mate's shrill call he hear.
And drops at once into her nest : —
The noble.st captain in the British fleet
Might envy William's lip those kisses sweet.
" 0 Susan, Susan, lovely dear.
My vows shall ever true remain ;
Let me kiss off that falling tear ;
We only part to meet again.
Change as ye list, ye winds ; my heart .shall be
The faithful compass that still points to thee.
" Believe not what the landmen say
Who tempt with doubts thy constant mind :
They T1 tell thee, sailors, when away.
In every port a mistress find :
Yes, yes, believe them when they tell thee so.
For Thou art present wheresoe'er 1 go.
" If to fair India's coast we sail.
Thy eyes are seen in diamonds bright.
Thy breath is Afric's spicy gale.
Thy skin is ivory so white.
Thus every beauteous object that 1 view
Wakes in my soul some charm of lovely Sue.
" Though battle call me from thy arms.
Let not my pretty Susan mourn ;
Though cannons roar, yet safe from harms
William shall to his dear return.
Love turns aside the balls that round me fly.
Lest precious tears should drop from Susan's eye."
The boatswain gave the dreadful word.
The sails their swelling bosom spread ;
No longer must she stay aboard :
They kissed, she sighed, he hung his head.
Her lessening boat unwilling rows to land ;
"Adieu !" she cried ; and waved her lily hand.
John Gay.
My
HERO TO LEANDER.
O, go not yet, my love.
The night is dark and vast ;
The white moon is hid in her heaven above.
And the waves climb high and fast
O, kiss me, kiss me, once again.
Lest thy kiss should be the last.
0, kiss me ere we part ;
Grow closer to my heart,
heart is wanner surely than the bosom of
the main.
O joy ! 0 bliss of blisses !
My heart of hearts art thou.
Come, bathe me with thy kisses.
My eyelids and my brow.
Hark how the wild rain hisses.
And the loud sea roars below.
Thy heart beats through thy rosy limbs.
So gladly doth it stir ;
Thine eye in drops of gladness swims.
1 have bathed thee with the pleasant
myrrh ;
Thy locks are dripping balm ;
Thou shalt not wander hence to-night,
1 '11 stay thee with my kisses.
To-night the roaring brine
Will rend thy golden tresses ;
f
236
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
The ocean with the monow light
Will be both blue and calm ;
And the billow will embrace thee with a kiss as
soft as mine.
No Western odors wander
On the black and moaning sea,
And when thou art dead, Leauder,
My soul must follow thee !
O, go not yet, iny love.
Thy voice is sweet and low ;
The deep salt wave breaks in above
Those marble steps below.
The turret-staiis are wet
That lead into the sea.
Leander ! go not yet.
The pleasant stars have set :
O, go not, go not yet.
Or I will follow thee.
Alfred Tennyson.
THE PARTING LOVERS.
She says, "The cock crows, — hark !"
He says, "No ! still't is dark."
She says, " The dawn grows bright,"
He says, "O no, my Light."
She says, " Stand up and say,
Gets not the heaven gi'ay ? "
He says, " The morning star
Climbs the horizon's bar."
She says, " Then quick depart :
Alas ! you now must start ;
But give the cock a blow
Who did begin our woe ! "
ANONV.mous (Chinese). Translation
of William R. Alger.
L
PARTING LOVERS.
I love thee, love thee, Giulio !
Some call me cold, and some demure,
And if thou hast ever guessed that so
I love thee .. . well ; — the proof was poor,
And no one eould be sure.
Before thy song (with shifted rhymes
To suit my name) did I undo
The Persian ? If it moved sometimes.
Thou hast not seen a hand push through
A flower or two.
My mother listening to my sleep
Heard nothing but a sigh at night, —
The short sigh rippling on the deep, —
When hearts run out of breath and sight
Of men, to God's clear light.
When others named thee,. .. thought thy brows
Were straight, thy smile was tender,. . . "Here
He comes between the vineyard-rows ! " —
I said not " Ay," — nor waited. Dear,
To feel thee step too near.
I left such things to bolder girls,
Olivia or Clotilda. Nay,
When that Clotilda through her curls
Held both thine eyes iu hera one day,
I marvelled, let me say.
I could not try the woman's trick :
Between us straightway fell the blush
Which kept me separate, blind, and sick..
A wind came with thee in a flush.
As blown through Horeb's bush.
But now that Italy invokes
Her young men to go forth and chase
The foe or perish, — nothing chokes
My voice, or drives me from the place :
I look thee in the face.
I love thee ! it is understood,
Confest : I do not shrink or start ;
No blushes : all my body's blood
Has gone to greaten this poor heart.
That, loving, we may part.
Our Italy invokes the youth
To die if need be. Still there's room.
Though earth is strained with dead, in trutL
Since twice the lilies were in bloom
They had not gmdged a tomb.
And many a plighted maid and wife
And mother, who can say since then
"My country," cannot say through life
"Myson," "my spouse,''"" my flower of men,""
And not weep dumb again.
Heroic males the country bears.
But daughters give up more than sons.
Flags wave, drums beat, and unawares
You flash your souls out with the guns.
And take your heaven at once !
But yfe, — wo empty heart and home
Of life's life, love ! we bear to think
You 're gone,... to feel you may not come,...
To hear the door-latch stir and clink
Yet no more you,... nor sink.
±r
PARTING.
237
Dear God ! when Italy is one
And perfected from hound to bound,.. .
Suppose (for my share) earth's undone
By one grave in't ! as one small wound
May kill a man, 't is found ¡
What then ? If love's delight must end.
At least we '11 clear its truth from flaws.
I love thee, love thee, sweetest friend !
Now take my sweetest without pause.
To help the nation's cause.
And thus of noble Italy
We '11 both be worthy. Let her show
The future how we made her free.
Not sparing life, nor Giulio,
Nor this,, , this heart-break. Go !
Elizabeth Barrett browning.
»
GO WHERE GLORY WAITS TIIEE.
i om " irish mel loies,"
Go r Ir re glory waits thee,
But, while fame elates llieo,
O, .still remember me !
Wlien the jiraise thou moetest
To thine ear is sweetest,
O, then remember me !
Other arms may press thee.
Dearer friends caress thee.
All the joys that bless thee.
Sweeter far may be ;
But when friends are nearest.
And when joys are dearest,
0, then remember me I
When at, eve thou rovest
By the star thou lovest,
0, then remember me !
Think, when home returning.
Bright we 've seen it burning,
O, thus remember me !
Oft as summer closes,
On its lingering roses,
Once so loved by thee.
Think of her who wove them.
Her who made thee love them,
0, then remember me !
Wben, around thee dying.
Autumn leaves are lying,
O, then remember me !
And, at night, when gazing
On the gay hearth blazing,
O, still remember me !
Then should music, stealing
All the soul of feeling,
To thy heart appealing,
Draw one tear from thee ;
Then let memory bring thee
Strains I used to sing thee, —
O, then remember me !
tho.vias moore.
LOCHABER NO MORE.
Farewell to Lochaber ! and farewell, my Jean,
Where heartsome with thee 1 hae mony day been ;
For Lochaber no more, Lochaber no more.
We '11 maybe return to Lochaber no more!
These tears that I shed they are a' for my dear.
And no for the dangers attending on wear,
Though borne on rough seas to a far bloody shore.
Maybe to return to Lochaber no more.
Though hurricanes rise, and rise every wind,
They '11 ne'er make a tempest like that in my
mind ;
Though loudest of thunder on louder waves roar.
That's naething like leaving my love on the shore;
To leave thee behind me my heart is sair pained ;
By ease that's inglorious no fame can be gained ;
And beauty and love's the reward of the brave.
And I must deserve it before 1 can crave.
Then glor3', my Jeany, maun plead my excuse ;
Since honor commands me, how can I refuse ?
Without it 1 ne'er can have merit for thee.
And without thy favor I'd better not he.
1 gae then, my lass, to win honor and fame.
And if 1 should luck to come gloriously hame,
1 '11 bring a heart to thee with love running o'er.
And then I '11 leave thee and Lochaber no more.
allan Ramsay.
AS SLOW OUR SHIP.
As slow our ship her foamy ti-ack
Against the wind was cleaving,
Her trembling pennant still looked back
To that dear isle't was leaving.
So loath we part from all we love.
From all the links that bind us ;
So turn our hearts, as on we rove.
To those we've left behind us I
When, round the bowl, of vanished years
We talk with joyous seeming, —
With smiles that might as well be tears,
So faint, so sad their beaming ;
While memory brings us back again
Each early tie that twined us,
O, sweet's the cu]) that circles then
To those we've left behind us 1
e-
238
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
And when, in other climes, we meet
Some isle or vale enchanting,
"Where all looks flowery, wild, and sweet,
And naught but love is wanting ;
"We think how great had been our bliss
If Heaven had but assigned us
To live and die in scenes like this,
With some we 've left behind us !
As travellers oft look back at eve
When eastwai-d darkly going,
To gase upon that light they leave
Still faint behind them glowing, —
So, when the close of pleasure's day
To gloom hath near consigned us.
We turn to catch one fading ray
Of joy that's left behind us.
Thomas Moore.
ADIEU, ADIEU! MY NATIVE SHORE.
Adieu, adieu ! my native shore
Fades o'er the watem blue ;
The night-winds sigh, the breakers roar.
And shrieks the wild sea-mew.
Yon sun that sets upon the sea
We follow in his flight ;
Farewell awhile to him and thee.
My native Land— Good Night !
A few short hours, and he will rise
To give the morrow birth ;
And I shall hail the main and skies.
But not my mother earth.
Deserted is my own good hall.
Its hearth is desolate ;
Wild weeds are gathering on the wall ;
My dog howls at the gate.
MY OLD KENTUCKY HOME.
negro song.
The sun shines bright in our old Kentucky home ;
'Tis summer, the darkeys are ga; ;
The com top's ripe and the meadow's in the
bloom.
While the birds make music all the day ;
The young folks roll on the little cabin floor.
All merry, all happy, all bright ;
By'm by hard times comesaknockin'atthedoor,—
Then, my old Kentucky home, good night !
CHORUS.
Weep no more, my lady ; 0, weep no more to¬
day !
We '11 sing one song for the old Kentucky home.
For our old Kentucky home far away.
They hunt no more for the possum and the coon.
On the meadow, the hill, and the shore ;
They sing no more by the glimmer of the moon.
On the bench by the old cabin door ;
The day goes by, like a shadow o'er the heart.
With sorrow where all was delight ;
The time has come, when the darkeys have to
part.
Then, my old Kentucky home, good night !
Weep no more, my lady, etc.
The head must bow, and the back will have to
bend.
Wherever the darkey may go ;
A few more days, and the troubles all will end.
In the field where the sugar-cane grow ;
A few more days to tote the weary load.
No matter, it will never be light ;
A few more days till we totter on the road.
Then, my old Kentucky home, good night !
Weep no more, my lady, etc.
Stephen Collins Uoster.
FAREWELL! IF EVER FONDEST
PRAYER.
Farewelt, ! if ever fondest prayer
For • 'hcr's weal availed on high.
Mine will not all 1 e lust in air.
But waft thy name beyond the sky.
'T were vain to speak, to weep, to .sigh :
Oh ! more than tears of blood can tell.
When wrung from guilt's expiring eye.
Are in that word — Farewell ! — Farewell !
Thejse lips are mute, these eyes are dry :
But in my breast and in my brain
Awake the pangs that pass not by.
The thought that ne'er .shall sleep again.
My soul nor deigns nor dares complain.
Though grief and passion there rebel :
I only know we loved in vain —
I only feel — Farewell ! — Farewell !
bvron.
FAREWELL TO HIS WIFE.
Fare thee well ! and if forever.
Still forever, fare thee well ;
Even though unforgiving, never
'Gainst thee shall my heart rebeL
Would that breast were bared before theo
Where thy head so oft hath lain.
While that placid sleep came o'er thee
Which thou ne'er canst know again :
PARTING.
WoxilA that breast, by thee glanced over,
Kvery inmost thought could show !
Then thou wouldst at last discover
'T was not well to spurn it so.
Though the world for this commend thee, —
Though it smile upon the blow.
Even its praises must offend thee.
Founded on another's woe :
Though my many faults defaced me.
Could no other arm be found
Thau tlie one which once embraced me.
To inflict a cureless wound ?
Yet, 0, yet thyself deceive not :
Love may sink by slow decay ;
But by sudden wrench, believe not
Hearts can thus be torn awiiy :
Still thine own its life retaineth, —
Still must mine, though bleeding, beat ;
And the undying thought which paineth
Is — that we no more may meet.
These are words of deeper son-ow
Than the wail above the dead ;
Both shall live, but every morrow
Wake us from a widowed bed.
And when thou wouldst solace gather.
When our child's flrst accents flow.
Wilt thou teach her to say " Father ! "
Though his care she must forego ?
AVhen her little hands shall press thee.
When her lip to thine is pressed.
Think of him whose prayer shall bless thee.
Think of him thy love had blessed !
Should her lineaments resemble
Those thou nevermore mayst see.
Then thy heart will softly tremble
With a pulse yet true to me.
All my faults perchance thou knowest.
All my madness none can know ;
All my hopes, where'er thou goest,
AVither, yet with thee they go.
Every feeling hath been shaken ;
Pride, which not a world could bow.
Bows to thee, — by thee forsaken.
Even my soul forsakes me now ;
But't is done ; all words are idle, —
AVords from me are vainer still ;
But the thoughts we cannot bridle
Force their way without the will.
Fare thee well ! — thus disunited.
Torn from every nearer tie.
Seared in heart, and lone, and blighted.
More than this I scarce can die.
bvro.v.
JAFFIER PARTING AAHTH BELATDERA.
from "venice preserved.-
Then hear me, bounteous Heaven,
Pour down your blessings on this beauteous head.
Where everlasting sweets are always springing,
AA^ith a continual giving hand : let peace,
Honor, and safety always hover round her :
Feed her with plenty ; let her eyes ne'er see
A sight of sorrow, nor her heart know mom-ning;
Crown all her days with joy, her nights with rest.
Harmless as her own thoughts ; and prop lier
virtue.
To bear the loss of one that too much loved ;
And comfort her with patience in our parting.
Thouas Otway.
COME, LET US KISSE AND PARTE.
Since there's no helpe, — come, let us kisse and
parte.
Nay, 1 have done, — you get no more of me ;
And I am glad, — yea, glad with all my hearto.
That thus so cleanly I myselfe can free.
Shake hands forever ! — cancel all our vows ;
And when we meet at any time againe.
Be it not scene in either of our brows.
That we one jot of former love retaine.
Now — at the last gaspe of Love's latest breath —
When, his pube failing, Pa.ssion speechless lies ;
When Faith b kneeling by his bed of death.
And Innocence b closing up his eyes.
Now! if thou wouldst — when all have given
him over —
From death to life thou mighbt him yet re¬
cover.
Michael Drayton.
»
FAREWELL! THOU ART TOO DEAR.
• ' I II'
Fakewell ! thou art too dear for my pos-sessing,
And like enough thou know'st thy estimate :
The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing ;
My bonds in thee are all detemiinate.
For how do 1 hold thee but by thy granting f
And for that riches where b my de.serving ?
The cause of this fair gift in me is wanting,
And so my jiatent back again b swerving.
240
POEMS OP THE APPECTIOXS.
Tliyself thou gav'st, thy own worth tlien not
knowing,
Or me, to whom thou gav'st it, else mistaking ;
So thy gi-eatgii't, upon misprision growing.
Comes liome again, on better judgment making.
Thus have I had thee, as a dream doth flatter;
In .sleep a king, but, waking, no such matter.
Shakespeare.
AN EAPvNEST SUIT,
to his unkind mistress not to forsake him.
And wilt thou leave me thus ?
Say nay ! say nay ! for shame !
To save thee from the blame
Of all my gi-ief and grame.
And wilt thou leave me thus ?
Say nay ! say nay !
And wilt thou leave me thus.
That hath loved thee so long.
In wealth and woe among ?
And is thy heart 50 strong
As for to leave me thus ?
Say nay ! say nay !
And wilt thou leave me thus.
That hath given thee my heart.
Never for to depart,
Neither for pain nor smart ?
And wilt thou leave me thus ?
Say nay ! say nay !
And wilt thou leave me thus,
And llave no more pity
Of him that loveth thee ?
Alas ! thy cruelty !
And wilt thou leave me thus ?
Say nay ! say nay !
Sir Tho.m.as Wvatt.
AVE PARTED IN SILENCE.
AVp. pai* 1 in ■ ilence, we pii'li d In nigli
On till Ikinh of that loin v rivoi ;
AVhere the fragriuit limes tln ir boug ik nit",
AVe met — and we parted forever !
The night-bird sung, and the stars abovi
Told many a touching story.
Of friends long passed to the kingdom of love,
AVhere the soul weai-s its mantle of glory.
AVe parted in silence, —our cheeks were wet
With the tears that were past controlling ;
AA'e vowetl we would never, no, never forget.
And those vows at the time were consoling ;
But those lips that echoed the sounds of mine
Are as cold as that lonely river ;
And that eye, that beautiful spirit's .shrine.
Has shrouded its tires forever.
And now on the midnight sky I look.
And my heart grows full of weeping ;
Each star is to me a sealed book.
Some tale of that loved one keeping.
AA'^e parted in silence, — we parted in tears.
On the banks of that lonely river :
But the odor and bloom of those bygone ycam
Shall hang o'er its waters forever.
Julia Crawforu.
FAREAVELL! BUT AVHENEVER.
Fakewell ! — but whenever you welcome the
hour
That awakens the night-song of mirth in your
bower.
Then think of the friend who once welcomed it
too.
And forgot his own griefs, to be happy with ybu.
His griefs may return — not a hope may remain
Of the few that have brightened his pathway of
pain —
But he ne'er can forget the short vision that
threw
Its enchantment around him while lingering
with you !
And still on that evening when Pleasure iills up
To the highest top sparkle each heart and each
cup,
AA'here'er my path lies, be it gloomy or bright.
My soul, happy friends ! will be with you that
night ;
Shall join in your revels, your sports, and your
wiles.
And return to me, beaming all o'er with your
smiles —
Too blest if it tell me that, mid the gay cheer.
Some kind voice has niunnured, " 1 wish he
were here ! "
Let Fate do her worst, there are relics of joy,-
Bright dreams of the pa.st, which she cannot
destroy ;
AA''hich come, in the night-time of sonow and care.
And bring back the features which joy used to
wear.
Long, long be my heart with such memories filled !
Like the vase in which roses have once been
distilled —
You may break, yon may shatter the vase, if you
will.
But the scent of the roses will hang lound it .still.
TiioMAb MOORE.
ABSENCE.
241
FEAGMENTS.
Farewells.
Farewell ! a word that must be, and hath been —
A sound which makes us linger ; — yet — tare-
well.
Childe Harold Cant. ¡y. BYRON.
Good night, good night : parting is such sweet
sorrow.
That I shall say good night till it be morrow.
Romeo and yultet, Act ii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Juliet. 0, think'st thou we shall ever meet
again ?
Eomeo. I doubt it not ; and all these woes
shall serve
For sweet discourses in our time to come.
Romeo and ynliet. Act Hi. Sc. $• SHAKESPEARE.
So sweetly she bade me "Adieu,"
1 thought that she bade me return.
A Pastoral, SHENSTONE.
He did keep
The deck, with glove, or hat, or handkerchief.
Still waving as the fits and stirs of his mind
Could best e.xpress how slow his soul sailed on, —
How swift his ship.
Cymbelinc, Ad i. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
All farewells should be sudden, when forever.
Else they make an eternity of moments.
And clog the last sad sands of life with tears.
Sardanafalus, Bykon.
When we two parted
In silence and tears.
Half broken-hearted,
To sever for years.
Pale grew thy cheek and cold.
Colder thy kiss :
Truly that hour foretold
Sorrow to this !
When loe tioo parted, BYRON^
And so, without more circumstance at all,
I hold it fit that we shake hands and part.
Hamlet, Ad i. Sc. 5, SHAKESPEARE.
-O
ABS
TO HER ABSENT SAILOR.
FROM "THE TENT ON THE BEACH."
Her window opens to the bay.
On glistening liglit or misty gray.
And there at dawn and set of day
In prayer she kneels :
"Dear Lord ! " she saith, "to many a home
From wind and wave the wanderers come ;
I only see the tossing foam
Of stranger keels.
" Blown out and in by summer gales.
The stately ships, with crowded sails.
And sailors leaning o'er their rails.
Before me glide ;
They come, they go, but nevermore,
Spice-ladeii from the Indian shore,
1 see his swift-winged Isidore
The waves divide.
" 0 Thou ! with whom the night is day
And one the near and far away,
Look out on yon gray waste, and say
Where lingers he.
NCE.
Alive, perchance, on some lone beach
Or thirsty isle beyond the reach
Of man, he hears the mocking speech
Of wind and sea.
" 0 dread and cruel deep, reveal
The secret which thy waves conceal,
And, ye wild sea-birds, hither wheel
And tell your tale.
Let winds that tossed his raven hair
A message from my lost one bear, —
Some thought of me, a last fond prayer
Or dying wail !
" Come, with your dreariest tnith shut out
The fears that haunt me round about ;
0 God ! I cannot bear this doubt
That stifles breath.
The worst is better than the di ead ;
Give me but leave to mourn my dead
Asleep in tmst and hope, instead
Of life in death ! "
It might have been the evening breeze
That whispered in the garden trees.
It might have been the sound of seas
That rose and fell ;
•&
242
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
But, Tritli her heart, if not her ear.
The old loved voice she seemed to hear :
" 1 wait to meet thee : be of cheer,
For all is well ! "
John Greenleaf whittier.
TO LTJCASTA.
If to be absent were to be
Away from thee ;
Or that, when I am gone,
You or I were alone ;
Then, my Lucasta, might I ci-ave
Pity from blustering wind or swallowing wave.
But I '11 not sigh one blast or gale
To swell my sail.
Or pay a tear to 'suage
The foaming blue-god's rage ;
For, whether he will let me pass
Or no, I'm still as happy as I was.
Though seas and lands be 'twixt us both.
Our faith and troth.
Like separated souls.
All time and space controls :
Above the highest sphere we meet.
Unseen, unknown ; and greet as angels greet.
So, then, we do anticipate
Our after-fate.
And are alive i' th* skies.
If thus our lips and eyes
Can speak like spirits unconfined
In heaven, — their earthly bodies left behind.
colonel Richard Lovelace.
I LOVE MY JEAN.
Of a' the airts * the wind can blaw,
I dearly like the west ;
For there the bonnie lassie lives.
The lassie I lo'e best.
There wild woods grow, and rivers row.
And monie a hill's between ;
But day and night my fancy's flight
Is ever wi' my Jean.
I see her in the dewy flowers,
I see her sweet and fair ;
I hear her in the tunefu' bii-ds,
I hear her charm the air ;
There's not a bonnie flower that springs
By fountain, shaw, or green ;
There's not a bonnie bird that sings.
But minds me of my Jean.
Robert Burns.
Í1-
* The points of tlie compass.
LOVE'S MEMORY.
FROM " ALL 'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL," ACT i. SC. t.
I AM undone : there is no living, none.
If Bertram be away. It were all one.
That I should love a bright particular star.
And think to wed it, he is so above me :
In his bright radiance and collatei-al light
Must 1 be comforted, not in his sphere.
The ambition in my love thus plagues itself :
The hind that would be mated by the lion
Must die for love. 'T was pretty, though a plague.
To see him eveiy hour ; to sit and draw
His archèd brows, his hawking eye, his curls.
In our heart's table, — heart too capable
Of every line and trick of his sweet favor :
But now he's gone, and my idolatrous fancy
Must sanctify his relics.
SHAKESPEARE.
O, SAW YE BONNIE LESLEY?
O, SAW ye bonnie Lesley
As she gaed o'er the border ?
She's gane, like Alexander,
To spread her conquests farther.
To see her is to love her,
And love but her forever ;
For nature made her what she is,
And ne'er made sic anither !
Thou art a queen, fair Leslej",
Thy subjects we, before thee ;
Thou art divine, fair Lesley,
The hearts o' men adore thee.
The deil he could na scaith thee.
Or aught that wad belang thee ;
He'd look into thy bonnie face.
And say, " I canna wrang thee ! "
The Powers aboon will tent thee ;
Misfortune sha' na .steer * thee ;
Thou 'rt like themselves sae lovely
That ill they '11 ne'er let near thee.
Return again, fair Lesley,
Return to Caledonie !
That we may brag we hae a lass
There's nane again sae bonnie.
robert burns.
JEANIE MORRISON.
I 've wandered east, I've wandered west.
Through mony a weary way ;
But never, never can forget
The luve o' life's young daj' !
ABSENCE.
243
The fire that's blawn on Beltane e'en
May weel be black gin Yule ;
But blacker fa' awaits the heart
Where first fond luve grows cule.
0 dear, dear Jeanie Morrison,
The thochts o' bygane years
Still fling their shadows ower my path.
And blind my een wi' tears :
They blind my een wi' saut, saut tears.
And sair and sick I pine.
As memory idly summons up
The blithe blinks o' langsyne.
'T was then we luvit ilk ither weel,
'T was then we twa did part ;
Sweet time — sad time Î twa baims at seule,
Twa baims, and but ae heart !
'T was then we sat on ae laigh bink,
To leir ilk ither lear ;
And tones and looks and smiles were shed.
Remembered everraair.
1 wonder, Jeanie, aften yet.
When sitting on that bink.
Cheek touchin' cheek, loof locked in loof.
What our wee heads could think.
When baith bent doun ower ae braid page,
Wi' ae buik on our knee.
Thy lips were on thy lesson, but
My lesson was in thee.
O, mind ye how we hung our heads.
How cheeks brent red wi' shame,
Whene'er the scule-weans, langhin', said
We decked thegither hame ?
And mind ye o' the Saturdays,
(The seule then skail't at noon,)
Wlien we ran off to speel the braes, —
The broomy braes o' June ?
My head rins round and round about, —
My heart flows like a sea.
As ane by ane the thochts rush back
0' scule-time, and o' thee.
0 mornin' life ! O mornin' luve !
0 lichtsome days and lang,
When hinnied hopes around our hearts
Like simmer blossoms sprang !
0, mind ye, luve, how aft we left
The deavin', dinsome toun.
To wander by the green bumside.
And hear its waters croon ?
The simmer leaves hung ower our heads.
The flowers burst round our feet,
Aud in the gloamin' o' the wood
The throssil whusslit sweet ;
l&-
The throssil whusslit in the wood.
The bum sang to the trees, —
And we, with nature's heart in tune.
Concerted harmonies ;
And on the knowe abune the burn.
For hours thegither sat
In the silentness o' joy, till baith
Wi' very gladness grat.
Ay, ay, dear Jeanie Morrison,
Tears trickled doun your cheek
Like dew-beads on a rose, yet naue
Had ony power to speak !
That was a time, a blessed time.
When hearts were fresh and young.
When freely gushed all feelings forth,
Unsyllabled — unsung !
I marvel, Jeanie Morrison,
Gin I hae been to thee
As closely twined wi' earliest thochts
As ye hae been to me ?
0, tell me gin their music fills
Thine ear as it does mine !
O, say gin e'er your heart grows grit
Wi' dreamings o' langsyne ?
I've wandered east, I've wandered west,
I've borne a weary lot ;
But in my wanderings, far or near.
Ye never were forgot.
The fount that first burst frae this heart
Still travels on its way ;
And channels deeper, as it rins.
The luve o' life's young day.
0 dear, dear Jeanie Morrison,
Since we were sindered young
I've never seen your face nor heard
The music o' your tongue;
But I could hug all wretchedness.
And happy could I dee.
Did I but ken your heart .still dreamed
0' bygane days and me !
William Motherwell.
THE RUSTIC LAD'S LAMENT IN THE
TOWN.
0, WAD that my time were owre but,
Wi' this wintry sleet and snaw.
That I might see our house again,
I' the bonnie birken shaw !
For this is no my ain life.
And I peak and pine away
Wi' the thochts o' hame and the young flowers.
In the glad green month of May.
Cj
244
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
-•Ü
I used to wauk in the morning
Wi' tlie loud sang o' the lark,
And the whistling o' the ploughman lads,
As they gaod to their wark ;
I used to wear the hit young lamhs
Frae the tod and the roaring stream ;
But the warld is changed, and a' thing now
To me seems like a dream.
There are busy crowds around me,
On ilka lang dull street ;
Yet, though sae mony surround me,
I ken na ane I meet :
And I think o' kind kent faees.
And o' blithe an' cheery days.
When I wandered out wr' our ain folk.
Out owre the simmer braes.
Waes me, for my heart is breaking !
I think o' my brither sma'.
And on my sister greeting.
When I cam frae hame awa.
And O, how my mither sobbit.
As she shook me by the hand.
When I left the door o' our auld house.
To come to this stranger land.
There's nae hamo like our ain hame —
0, I wush that I were there !
Tliere's nae hame like our ain hame
To be met wi' onywhere ;
And 0 that I were back again.
To our farm and fields sae green ;
And heard the tongues o' my ain folk.
And were what 1 hae been !
David Macbeth Moir.
U-
THE WIFE TO HER HUSBAND. ,
Linger not long. Home is not home without
thee :
Its dearest tokens do but make me mourn.
O, let its memoiy, like a chain about thee.
Gently compel and hasten thy return !
Lingernot long. Though crowds should woo thy
staying.
Bethink thee, can the mirth of thy friends,
though dear.
Compensate for the grief thy long delaying
Costs the fond heart that sighs to have thee
here ?
Linger not long. How shall I watch thy coming.
As evening shadows stretch o'er moor and dell ;
When the wild bee hath ceased her busy humming.
And silence hangs on all things like a spell !
How shall I watch for thee, when fears grow
stronger.
As night grows dark and darker on the hill !
How shall 1 weep, when I can watch no longer !
Ah ! art thou absent, art thou absent still ?
Yet I shall giieve not, though the eye that seeth
ma
Gazeth through tears that make its splendor
dull ;
For oh ! I sometimes fear when thou art with me.
My cup of happiness is all too fulL
Haste, haste thee home unto thy mountain dwell¬
ing,
Haste, as a bird unto its peaceful nest !
Haste, as a skifiF, through tempests wide and"
swelling.
Flies to its haven of securest rest !
anonymous.
ABSENCE.
What shall I do with all the da3rs and hours
That must be counted ere I see thy face ?
How shall I charm the interval that lowers
Between this time and that sweet time of grace ?
Shall I in slumber steep each weary sense.
Weary with longing ? — shall 1 flee away
Into past days, and with some fond pretence
Cheat myself to forget the present day ?
Shall love for thee lay on my soul the sin
Of casting from me God's great gift of time ?
Shall I, these mists of memory locked within.
Leave and forget life's purposes sublime ?
0, how or by what means may I contiive
To bring the hoiu- that brings thee back more
near ?
How may I teach my drooping hope to live
Until that blessèd time, and thou art here ?
I '11 tell thee ; for thy sake I will lay hold
Of all good aims, and consecrate to thee.
In worthy deeds, each moment that is told
Whüe thou, beloved one ! art far from me.
For thee I will arouse my thoughts to try
All heavenward flights, all high an d holy strains ;
For thy dear sake I will walk patiently
Through these long hours, nor call their min¬
utes pains.
I will this dreary blank of absence make
A noble task-time ; and will therein strive
To follow excellence, and to o'ertake
More good than I have won since yet I live.
ABSENCE.
245
::3
So may tliis doomed time build up in me
A thousand graces, which shall thus be thine ;
So may my love and longing hallowed be,
And thy dear thought an influence divine.
Frances Anne Kemble.
DAY, IN MELTING PUEPLE DYING.
. Day, in melting purple dying ;
Blossoms, all around me sighing ;
Fragrance, from the lilies straying ;
Zephyr, with my ringlets playing ;
Ye but waken my distress ;
I am sick of loneliness !
Thou, to whom I love to hearken.
Come, ere night around me darken ;
Though thy softness but deceive me.
Say thou 'rt true, and I '11 believe thee ;
Veil, if ill, thy soul's intent.
Let me think it innocent !
Save thy toiling, spare, thy treasure ;
All I ask is friendship's pleasure ;
Let the shining ore lie darkling, —
Bring no gem in lustre sparkling ;
Gifts and gold are naught to me,
I would only look on thee !
Tell to thee the high-wrought feeling.
Ecstasy but in revealing ;
Paint to thee the deep sensation,
Eapture in participation ;
Yet but torture, if comprest
In a lone, unfriended breast.
Absent still ! Ah ! come and bless me !
Let these eyes again caress thee.
Once in caution, I could fly thee ;
Now, I nothing could deny thee.
In a look if death there be.
Come, and I will gaze on thee !
maria Gowen Brooks {Marta del Occidente).
WHAT AILS THIS HEART 0' MINE?
AVhat ails this heart o' mine ?
What ails this watery e'e ?
What gars me a' turn pale as death
When I take leave o' thee ?
When thou art far awa'.
Thou 'It dearer grow to me ;
But change o' place and change o' folk
May gar thy fancy jee.
When I gae out at e'en.
Or walk at morning air.
Ilk rustling bush will seem to say
I used to meet thee there :
Then I '11 sit down and cry.
And live aneath the tree.
And when a leaf fa's i' my lap,
I '11 ca't a word frae thee.
I '11 hie me to the bower
That thou wi' roses tied.
And where wi' mony a blushing bud
I strove myself to hide.
I '11 doat on ilka spot
Where I ha'e been wi' thee ;
And ca' to mind some kindly woi-d
By ilka burn and tree.
Susanna Blamire.
A PASTORAL.
My time, Ojyp was iiappily spi-nt,
When I'liceho nent with mc wherever I ■ ■ t ;
Ten thousand sweet pleasures I felt in my
breast :
Sure never fond shepherd like Colin was blest !
But now she is gone, ami has left me behind.
What a marvellous change on a sudden I find !
When things were as fine as could possibly be,
I thought't was the Spring ; but alas ! it was
she.
With such a companion to tend a few sheep.
To rise up and play, or to lie down and sleep ;
1 was so good-humored, so cheerful and gay.
My heart was as light as a feather all day ;
But now I so cross and so peevish am grown.
So strangely uneasy, as never was known.
My fair one is gone, and my joys are all drowned.
And my heart — I am sui'e it weighs more than
a pound.
9
The fountain that wont to run sweetly along.
And dance to soft murmurs the pebbles among ;
Thou know'st, little Cupid, if Phœbe was tliei o,
'T was pleasure to look at, 't was music to hear ;
But now she is absent, I walk by its side.
Ami still, as it murmurs, do nothing but chide ;
Must you be so cheerful, while I go in pain ?
Peace there with your bubbling, and hear me
complain.
My lambkins around me would oftentimes
play,
And Phœbe and I were as joyful as they ;
How pleasant their sporting, how happy their
time.
When Spring, Love, and Beauty were all in
their prinre ;
But now, in their frolics when by me they pass,
I fling at their fleeces a handful of grass ;
Be still, therr, I cry, for it makes me quite mad.
To see you so merry while I arn so sad.
á
24G
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
My (log I was ever well pleased to see
Come wagging his tail to my fair one and mo ;
And Pliœbe was pleased too, and to my dog said,
" Come hither, poor fellow ; " and patted his
head.
But now, when he's fawning, I with a sour look
Cry "Sirrah!" and give him a blow with my
crook :
And I '11 give him another ; for why should not
Tray
Be as dull as his master, when Phcebe's away ?
"When walking with Phoebe, what sights have
I seen.
How fair was the flower, how fresh was the
green !
"What a lovely appeaiunce the trees and the
shade.
The cornñelds and hedges and everything made !
But now she has left me, though all are still
there.
They none of them now so delightful appear :
'T was naught but the magic, 1 find, of her eyes.
Made so many beautiful prospects arise.
Sweet music went with us both all the wood
through.
The lark, linnet, throstle, and nightingale too ;
"Winds over us whispered, flocks by us did bleat.
And chirp ! went the grasshopper under our
feet.
But now she is absent, though still they sing on.
The woods are but lonely, the melody's gone :
Her voice in the concert, as now I have found,
Gave everything else its agreeable sound.
Eose, what is become of thy delicate hue ?
And where is the violet's beautiful blue ?
Does aught of its sweetness the blossom beguile ?
That meadow, those daisies, why do they not
smile ?
Ah I rivals, I see what it was that you drest.
And made yourselves fine for — a place in her
breast ?
You put on your colors to pleasure her eye.
To be plucked by her hand, on her bosom to die.
How slowly Time creeps till my Phoebe re¬
turn,
"While amidst the soft zephyr's cool breezes I
bum !
Methinks, if I knew whereabouts ho would tread,
I could breathe on his wings, and't would melt
down the lead.
Fly swifter, ye minutes, bring hither my dear.
And rest so much longer for't when she is here.
Ah, Colin ! old Time is full of delay.
Nor will budge one foot faster for all thou canst
Will no pitying power, tlrat hears me com¬
plain.
Or cure my disquiet or soften my pain ?
To be cured, thou must, Colin, thy passion re¬
move ;
But what swain is so silly to live without love !
No, deity, bid the dear nymph to return.
For ne'er was poor shepherd so sadly forlorn.
Ah ! what shall 1 do ? 1 shall die with despair ;
Take heed, all ye swains, how ye part with your
fair.
JOH.V BVROM,
THE SAILOR'S WIFE.*
And are ye sure the news is true ?
And are ye sure he's wcel ?
Is this a time to think o' wark ?
Ye jades, lay by your wheel ;
Is this the time to spin a thread.
When Colin's at the door ?
Reach down my cloak, I '11 to the quay.
And see him come ashore.
For there's nae luck about the house>
There's nae luck at a' ;
There's little pleasm-e in the house
When our gudeman's awa'.
i
And gie to me my bigonet, '
My bishop's-satin gown ;
For 1 maun tell the baillie's wife
That Colin's in the town.
My Turkey slippere maun gae on.
My stockin's pearly blue ;
It's a' to pleasure our gudeman.
For he's baith leal and tme.
Rise, lass, and mak a clean fireside.
Put on the muckle pot ;
Gie little Kate her button gown.
And Jock his Sunday coat ;
And mak their shoon as black as slaes.
Their hose as white as snaw ;
It's a' to please my ain girdeman.
For he's been long awa'.
There's twa fat hens upo' the coop
Been fed this month and inair ;
Mak haste and thraw their necks about.
That Colin weel may fare ;
And spread the table neat and clean.
Gar ilka thing look braw.
For wha can tell how Colin fared
When he was far awa' ?
• Bartlett. in his Familiar Quotations, has the followin(t î " The
Mariner's Wife is now ^ven. 'by couuuoa cousciit/ says Sarah
Tytler, to Jean Adam, 17IO»j76s."
ABSENCE.
247
Sae true his heart, sae smooth his speech,
His breath like caller air ;
His very foot has music in't
As he comes up the stair, —
And will I see his face again ?
And will I hear him speak ?
1 'm downright dizzy wi' the thought,
In troth 1 'm like to greet !
If Colin's weel, and weel content,
I hae nae mair to crave :
And gin I live to keep him sae
• I'm blest aboon the lave :
And will I see his face again ?
And will I hear him speak ?
I'm downright dizzy wi' the thought.
In troth I'm like to greet.
For there's nae luck about the house,
There's nae luck at a' ;
There's little pleasure in the house
^ When our gudeman's awa'.
William James Mickle.
ABSENCE.
When I think on the happy days
I spent wi' you, my dearie ;
And now what lands between us lie, '
How can I bo but eerie !
How slow ye move, ye heavy hours.
As ye were wae and weary !
It was na sae ye glinted by
When I was wi' my dearie.
Anonymous.
h
ON A PICTURE.
When summer o'er her native hills
A veil of beauty spread.
She sat and watched her gentle flocks
And twined her flaxen thread.
The mountain daisies kissed her feet ;
The moss sprung greenest there ;
The breath of summer fanned her cheek
And tossed her wavy hair.
The heather and the yellow gorse
Bloomed over hill and wold.
And clothed them in a royal lobe
Of pui-ple and of gold.
There rose the skylark's gushing song.
There hummed the laboring bee ;
And merrily the mountain stream
Ran singing to the sea.
But while she missed from those sweet sounds
The voice she sighed to hear.
The song of hee and bird and stream
Was discord to her ear.
Nor could the bright green world around
A joy to her impart.
For still she missed the eyes that made
The summer of her heart.
a.nne c. Lynch (Mrs. botta).
COME TO ME, DEAREST.
Come to me, dearest, I'm lonely without thee.
Daytime and night-timej I'm thinking about
thee ;
Night-time and daytime, in dreams I behold
thee ; ,
Unwelcome the waking which ceases to fold thee.
Come to me, darling, my sorrows to lighten.
Come in thy beauty to bless and to brighten ;
Come in thy womanhood, meekly and lowly.
Come in thy lovingness, queenly and holy.
Swallows will flit round the desolate ruin.
Telling of spring and its joyous renewing ;
And thoughts of thy love, and its manifold treas¬
ure.
Are circling my heart with a promise of pleasure.
0 Spring of my spirit, 0 May of my bosom.
Shine out on my soul, till it bourgeon and blos¬
som ;
The waste of my life has a rose-root within it.
And thy fondness alone to the sunshine can
win it.
Figure that moves like a song through the even ;
Features lit up by a reflex of heaven ;
Eyes like the skies of poor Erin, our mother.
Where shadow and simshine are chasing each
other ;
Smiles coming seldom, but childlike and simple.
Planting in each rosy cheek a sweet dimple ; —
0, thanks to the Saviour, that even thy seeming
Is left to the exile to brighten his dreaming.
You have been glad when you knew I was glad¬
dened ;
Dear, are you sad now to hear I am saddened ?
Our heaits ever answer in tune and in time,
love.
As octave to octave, and rhyme unto rhyme,
love :
1 cannot weej) but your tears will be flowing.
You cannot smile but my cheek will be glowing ;
I would not die without you at my side, love.
You will not linger when I shall have died, love.
■S
• -a
248 POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Come to me, dear, ere I die of my sorrow,
Eise on my gloom like the sun of to-morrow ;
Strong, swift, and fond as the words which I
speak, love.
With a song on your lip and a smile on your
cheek, love.
Come, for my heart in your absence is weary, —
Haste, for my spirit is sickened and dreary, —
Come to the arms which alone should caress thee.
Come to the heart that is throbbing to press thee !
JOSEPH BRENNAK.
FEAGMENTS.
Memokt in Absence.
And memory, like a drop that night and day
Falls cold and ceaseless, wore my heart away !
Lalla Rookk, MOORE.
Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see.
My heart untravelled fondly turns to thee ;
Still to my brother turns, with ceaseless pain.
And drags at each remove a lengthening chain.
Tht TravcUcr. GOLDSUITH.
Of all affliction taught the lover yet,
"r is sure the hardest science to forget.
Sioisa to Abelard. POPEi
Ere such a soul regains its peaceful state.
How often must it love/how often hate.
How often hope, despair, resent, regret.
Conceal, disdain, — do all things but forget.
Eloísa to Abelard, POPE.
Though absent, present in desires they be ;
Our souls much further than our eyes can see.
M. dravton.
When, musing on companions gone.
We doubly feel ourselves alone.
Marmion, Cant. ii. Introd. SCOTT.
To live with them is far less sweet
Than to remember thee !
I saw thy form, MOORE.
Hope Defep.red.
Long did his wife.
Suckling her babe, her only one, look out
The way he went at parting, — but he came not !
Ua(y, KOCBRS.
Absence strengthens Lovf
There's not a wind but whispers of thy name.
Mirándola. B. W. PROCTER.
Short absence hurt him more.
And made his wound far greater than before ;
Absence not long enough to root out quite
All love, increases love at second sight.
Henry II, T. MAY.
'T is distance lends enchantment to the view.
And robes the mountain in its azure hue.
Pleasures o/Hope, Part i. T. CAMPBELL.
Absence makes the heart grow fonder ;
Isle of Beauty, fare thee well !
Isle of Beauty. t. h. bayly.
Time in Absence.
Love reckons hours for months, and days for
years ;
And every little absence is an age.
Amphictrion. DRYDEN.
What ! keep a week away ? Seven days and
nights ?
Eightscore eight hours ? And lovers' absent
hours
More tedious than the dial eightscore times
0, weary reckoning !
Olhello, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
The Unwelcome Lover.
I dote on his very absence.
Merchant of Venice, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE*
Presence in Absence.
Our two souls, therefore, which are one,
Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion.
Like gold to airy thinness beat.
If they be two, they are two so
As stiff twin compasses are two ;
Thy soul, the fixt foot, makes no show
To move, but doth if the other do.
And though it in the centre sit.
Yet when the other far doth roam.
It leans and hearkens after it.
And grows erect, as that comes home.
Such wilt thou be to me, who must.
Like the other foot, obliquely run.
Thy firmness makes my circle just.
And makes me end where I begun.
A Valediction Jorbidding Mourning, DR. J. DONNE.
■Ö
a-
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
249
■a
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
SONNET.
"With how sad steps, 0 Moon ! thou climb'st the
skies,
How silently, and with how wan a face !
What may it be, that even in heavenly place
That busy Archer his shai'p arrows tries ?
Sure, if that long with love acquainted eyes
C.an judge of love, thoir feel'st a lover's case ;
I read it in thy looks, thy languished grace
To me that feel the like thy state descries.
Then, even of fellowship, 0 Moon, tell me.
Is constant love deemed there but want of wit ?
Are beauties there as proud as here they be ?
Do they above love to be loved, and yet
Those lovers scorn whom that love doth possess ?
Do they call virtue there ungratefulness ?
Sir Philip Sidney.
¡ THE BANKS 0' DOON.
Ye banks and braes o' bonnie Doon,
How can ye bloom sae fresh and <air ?
Howj can ye chant, ye little birds.
And I sae weary, fu' o' care ?
Thou 'It break my heart, thoir warbling bird.
That wantons through the flowering thorn ;
Thou minds mé o' departed joys,
Departed — never to return.
Thou'It break my heart, thou bonnie bird.
That sings beside thy mate ;
For sae 1 sat, and sae I sang.
And wistna o' my fate.
Aft hae I roved by bonnie Doon,
To see the rose and woodbine twine ;
And ilka bird sang o' its luve,
And, fondlj', sae did I o' mine.
Wi' lightsome heart I pou'd a rose,
Fu' sweet upon it.s thorny tree ;
And my fause luvev stole my rose.
But ah ! he left the thorn wi' me.
robert Burns.
AULD ROBIN GRAY.
When the sheep are in the fauld, and the kye a'
at hame.
When a' the weary world to sleep are gane,
The waes o' my heart fa' in showers frae my c'e.
While my gudcman lies sound by me.
Young Jamie lo'ed mo weel, and sought me for
his bride ;
But saving a crown, he had naething else beside.
To make the crown a pound, my Jamie gaed to
sea ;
And the crown and the pound, they wore baith
for me !
He h.adna been awa' a week but only twa.
When my mither she fell sick, and the cow was
stown awa ;
My father brak his arm — my Jamie at the sea —
And Auld Robin Gray came a-courting me.
My father couldna work, — my mither couldna
spin ;
I toiled day and night, but their bread I couldna
win ;
Auld Rob maintained them baith, and, wi' tears
in his e'e.
Said, "Jennie, for their sakes, will you marry
me ? "
I
My heart it said na, and 1 looked for Jamie back ;
But hard blew the winds, and his ship was a wrack ;
His ship it was a wrack ! Why didiia Jennie dee ?
And wherefore was I spared to cry, Wae is me !
My father argued sair — my mithw didna speak.
But she looked in my face till my heart was like
to brea.k ;
They gied him my hand, but my heart was in the
sea ;
And so Auld Robin Gray, he was gudeman to me.
1 hadna been his wife, a week but only four.
When, mournfu' as 1 sat on the staue at the door,
I saw my Jamie's ghaist — I couldna think it he.
Till he said, " I'm come hame, my love, to marry
thee ! "
0 sair, sair did we greet, and mickle did we say :
Ae kiss we took — nae mair — I bad him gang
away.
1 wish that I were dead, but I'm no like to dee,
And why do 1 live to say, Wae is me !
I gang like a ghaist, and I carena to spin ;
I darena think o' Jamie, for that wad be a sin.
But I will do my best a gude wife aye to be.
For Auld Robin Gray, he is kind to me.
LADY ANNE Barnard.
fl-
250
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
THE COURSE OF TRUE LOVE.
FROM "MIDSUMMER NIGHT'S DREAM," ACT I. SC. I.
For aught that ever I could read,
Could ever hear by tale or history,
The course of true love never did run smooth :
But, either it was different in blood.
Or else misgraffèd in respect of years ;
Or else it stood upon the choice of friends ;
Or, if there were a sympathy in choice.
War, death, or sickness did lay siege to it.
Making it momentary as a sound,
Swift as a shadow, short as any dream ;
Brief as the lightning in the collied night.
That, in a spleen, unfolds both heaven and earth.
And ere a man hath power to say, — Behold !
The jaws of darkness do devour it up :
So quick bright things come to confusion.
SHAKESPEARE.
BYRON'S LATEST VERSES.
[Missolonghi, January 23,1824. On this day 1 completed my
thirty-sixth yearj
'T IS time this heart should be unmoved.
Since others it has ceased to move :
Yet, though I cannot be beloved.
Still let me love !
My days are in the yellow leaf.
The flowers and fruits of love are gone :
The worm, the canker, and the grief.
Are mine alone.
The fire that in my bosom preys
Is like to some volcanic isle ;
No torch is kindled at its blaze, —
A funeral pile.
The hope, the fear, the jealous care.
The exalted portion of the pain
And power of love, I cannot share.
But wear the chain.
But't is not thus, — and't is not here,
Such thoughts should .shake my soul, nor now,
Where glory decks the hero's bier.
Or binds his brow.
The sword, the banner, and the field.
Glory and Greece about us see ;
The Spartan borne upon his shield
Was not more free.
Awake ! — not Greece, — she is awake !
Awake my spirit ! think through whom
Thy life-blood tastes its parent lake.
And then strike home !
Tread those reviving passions down.
Unworthy manhood ! unto thee
Indifferent should the smile or frown
Of beauty be.
If thou regrett'st thy youth, — why live ?
The land of honorable death
Is hero : — up to the field, and give
Away thy breath !
Seek out — less often sought than found —
A soldier's gmve, for thee the best ;
Then look ai'ound, and choose thy ground.
And take thy rest !
LEFT BEHIND.
It was the autumn of the year ;
The strawberry-leaves were red and sear ;
October's airs were fresh and chill,
AVhen, pausing on the windy hill.
The hill that overlooks the sea,
Vou talked confidingly to me, —
Me whom your keen, artistic sight
Has not yet learned to read aright.
Since I have veiled my heart from you.
And loved you better than you knew.
You told me of your toilsome past ;
The tardy honors won at last.
The trials borne, the conquests gained,^
The longed-for boon of Fame attained ;
I knew that every victory
But lifted you away from me,
That every step of high emprise
But left me lowlier in your eyes ;
I watched the distance as it grew.
And loved you better than you knew.
You did not see the bitter trace
Of anguish sweep across my face ;
You did not hear my proud heart beat,
Heavy and slow, beneath your feet ;
You thought of triumphs still unwon.
Of glorious deeds as yet undone ;
And I, the while you talked to me,
I watched the gulls float lonesomely.
Till lost amid the hungry blue.
And loved you better than you knew.
You walk the sunny side of fate ;
The wise world smiles, and calls you great ;
The golden fmitage of success
Drop.s at your feet in plenteousness ;
And you have blessings manifold : —
Renown and power and friends and gold, —
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT
251
They build a wall between us twain,
Wbieb may not be thrown down again,
Alas ! for 1, the long years through,
Have loved you better than you knew.
Your life's proud aim, your art's high truth.
Have kept the promise of your youth ;
And while you won the crown, which now
Breaks into bloom upon your brow,
My soul cried strongly out to you
Across the ocean's yearning blue,
"While, unreraembered and afar,
I watched you, as I watch a star
Through darkness struggling into view.
And loved you better than you knew.
1 used to dream in all these years
Of patient faith and silent tears.
That Love's strong hand would put aside
The barriers of place and pride,
"Would reach the pathless darkness through.
And draw me softly up to you ;
But that is past. If you should stray
Beside my grave, some future day.
Perchance the violets o'er my dust
"Will half betray their buried trust.
And say, their blue eyes full of dew,
"She loved you better than you knew."
euzabeth akers aleen (ivi)«««
LINDA TO HAFED.
from "the fire-worshippers."
" How sweetly," said the trembling maid.
Of her own gentle voice afraid,
So long had they in silence stood.
Looking upon that moonlight flood, —
" How sweetly does the moonbeam smile
To-night upon yon leafy isle !
Oft ill my fancy's wanderings,
I 've wished that little isle had wings.
And we, within its fairy bowers.
Were wafted off to seas unknown.
Where not a pulse should beat but em's.
And we might live, love, die alone !
Far from the cruel and the cold, —
Where the bright eyes of angels only
Should come around us, to behold
A paradise so pure and lonely !
Would this be world enough for thee ? " —
Playful she turned, that he might see
The pa.ssing smile her cheek put on ;
But when she marked how mournfully
His eyes met hers, that smile was gone ;
And, bursting into heartfelt tears,
"Yes, yes," she cried, "my hourly fears,
My dreams, have boded all too right, —
We part — forever ]mrt — to-night !
I knew, 1 knew it cotdd not last, —
'T was bright, 't was heavenly, but't is past !
O, ever thus, from childhood's hour,
I've seen my fondest hopes decay ;
1 never loved a tree or flower
But't was the first to fade away.
I never nursed a dear gazelle.
To glad me with its soft black eye.
But when it came to know me well.
And love me, it was sure to die !
Now, too, the joy most like divine
Of all 1 ever dreamt or knew.
To see thee, hear thee, call thee mine, —
0 misery ! must 1 lose that too ? "
Thomas Moore.
UNREQUITED LOVE.
from " twelfth night," act I. sc. 4.
Viola. Ay, but 1 know, —
Duke. What dost thou know ?
Viola. Too well what love women to men
may owe :
In faith, they are as true of heart as we.
My father had a daughter loved a man.
As it might be, perhaps, were 1 a woman,
1 should your lordship.
Duke. And what's her history ?
Viola. A blank, my lord. She never told
her love.
But let concealment, like a worm i' the bud.
Feed on her damask cheek ; she pined in thought ;
And, with a green and yellow melancholy.
She sat like Patience on a monument.
Smiling at grief. Was not this love, indeed ?
We men may say more, swear more : but, indeed.
Our shows are more than will ; for still we prove
Much in our vows, but little in our love.
shakespeare.
DOROTHY IN THE GARRET.
Ix the low-raftered garret, stooping
Carefully over the creaking boards.
Old Maid Dorothy goes a-groping
Among its dusty and cobWebbed hoards ;
Seeking some bundle of patches, hid
Far under the eaves, or bunch of sage.
Or satchel hung on its nail, amid
The heirlooms of a bygone age.
There is the ancient family chest.
There the ancestral cards and hatchel ;
Dorothy, sighing, sinks down to rest.
Forgetful of patches, sage, and satcheL
Ghosts of faces peer from the gloom
Of the chimney, where, with swifts and reel.
And the long-disused, dismantled loom.
Stands the old-fashioned spinning-wheel.
252
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS
She sees it back in the clean-swept kitchen,
A part of her girlhood's little world ;
Her mother is there by the window, stitching ;
Spindle buzzes, and reel is whirled
With many a click : on her little stool
She sits, a child, by the open door.
Watching, and dabbling her feet in the pool
Of sunshine spilled on the gilded floor.
Her sisters are spinning all day long ;
Tb her wakening sense the flrst sweet warning
Of daylight come is the cheerful song
To the hum of the wheel in the early morning.
Benjie, the gentle, red-cheeked boy.
On his way to school, peeps in at the gate ;
In neat white pinafore, pleased and coy.
She reaches a hand to her bashful mate ;
And under the elms, a prattling pair.
Together they go, tluough glimmer and
gloom : —
It all comes back to her, dreaming there
In the low-raftered gaiTet-room ;
The hum of the wheel, and the summer weather.
The heart's flrst trouble, and loye's beginning.
Are all in her memory linked together ;
And now it is she herself that is spinning.
With the bloom of youth on cheek and lip.
Turning the spokes with the flashing pin.
Twisting the thread from the spindle-tip.
Stretching it out and winding it in.
To and fro, with a blithesome tread.
Singing she goes, and her heart is full.
And many a long-drawn golden thread
Of fancy is spun with the shining wool.
Her father sits in his favorite place.
Puffing his pipe by the chimney-side ;
Through curling clouds his kindly face
Glows upon her with love and pride.
Lulled by the wheel, in the old arm-chair
Her mother is musing, cat in lap,
With beautiful drooping head, and hair
Whitening under her snow-white cap.
One bj'one, to the grave, to the bridal.
They have followed her sisters from the door ;
Now they are old, and she is their idol : —
It all comes back on her heart once more.
In the autumn dusk the hearth gleams brightly.
The wheel is set by the shadowy wall, —
A hand at the latch, — 't is lifted lightly.
And in walks Benjie, manly and tall.
His chair is placed ; the old man tips
The pitcher, and brings his choicest fruit ;
Benjie basks in the blaze, and sips.
And tells his story, and joints his flute :
0, sweet the tunes, the talk, the laughter !
They fill the hour with a glowing tide ;
But sweeter the still, deep moments after.
When she is alone by Benjie's side.
But once with angry words they part :
0, then the weary, weai-y days !
Ever with restless, wretched heart.
Plying her task, she turns to gaze
Far up the road ; and early and late
She harks for a footstep at the door.
And starts at the gust that swings the gate,
And prays for Benjie, who comes no more.
Her fault ? 0 Benjie, and could you steel
Your thoughts toward one who loved you so ? —
Solace she seeks in the whirling wheel.
In duty and love that lighten woe ;
Striving with labor, not in vain.
To drive away the dull day's dreariness, —
Blessing the toil that blunts the pain
Of a deeper grief in the body's weariness.
Proud and petted and spoiled was she i
A word, and all her life is changed !
His wavering love too easily
In the great, gay city grows estranged :
One year : she sits in the old church pew ;
A rustle, a murmur, — 0 Dorothy ! hide
Your face and shut from your soul the view
'T is Benjie leading a white-veiled bride !
Now father and mother have long been dead.
And the bride sleeps under a churchyard stone,
And a bent old man with grizzled head
Walks up the long dim aisle alone.
Years blur to a mist ; and Dorothy
Sits doubting betwLxt the ghost she seem.
And the phantom of youth, more real than she.
That meets her there in that hamit of dreams.
Bright young Dorothy, idolized daughter,
Sought by many a youthful adorer.
Life, like a new-risen dawn on the water.
Shining an endless vista before her !
Old Maid Dorothy, wrinkled and gray.
Groping under the farm-house eaves, —
And life was a brief November day
That sets on a world of withered leaves !
Yet faithfulness in the humblest part
Is better at last than proud success.
And patience and love in a chastened hcai-t
Are pearls more precious than happiness ;
And in that morning when she shall wake
To the spring-time freshness of youth again.
All trouble will seem but a flying flake.
And lifelong sorrow a breath on the pane. ,
John Townsend Trowbridge.
^
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
253 i
THE DIRTY OLD MA]S\
a lay of leadenhall.
[A singular man, named Nathaniel Bentley, for many years kept
a lar^e liardware-shop in Leadcnhall Street, Uondon. He was
best kncwn as Dirty Dick (Dick, for alliteration's sake, probably),
and his place of business as the Dirty Warehouse, He died about
the year ih-hj. Tliesc verses accord with the accounts respcctiiij;
himself and ins house.J
Ix a dirty old house lived a Dirty Old Man (
Soap, toweds, or brushes were not in his plan.
For forty huig years, as the neighbors declared,
His house never one,, had been cleaned or re¬
paired.
'T was a scandal and shame to the business-like
street,
One terrible blot in a ledger so neat ;
The shop full of hardware, but black as a hearse.
And the rest of the mansion a thousand times
Outside, the old plaster, all spatter and stain,
booked spotty in sunshine and streaky in rain ;
The window-sills sprouted with mildewy grass.
And the panes from being broken were known to
be glass.
On the rickety sign-board no learning could spell
The merchant who sold, or the goods he'd to
sell ;
But for house and for man a new title took
gi-owth.
Like a fungus, —the Dirt gave its name to them
both.
Within, there were carpets and cushions of dust.
The wood was half rot, and the metal half rust.
Old curtains, half cobwebs, hung grimly aloof ;
'T was a Spiders' Elysium from cellar to roof.
There, king of the spiders, the Dirty Old Man
Lives busy and dirty as ever he can ;
With dirt on his fingers and dirt on his face.
For the Dirty Old Alan thinks the dirt no dis¬
grace.
From his wig to his shoes, from his coat to his
shirt,
Iiis clothes are a proverb, a marvel of dirt ;
The dirt is pervading, unfading, exceeding, —
Yet the Dirty Old Alan has both learning and
breeding.
Fine dames from their carriages, noble and fair.
Have entered his shop, less to buy than to stare ;
And have afterwards said, though the dirt was
so frightful.
The Dirty Alan's manners were truly delightful.
Upstairs might they venture, in dirt and in
gloom,
To peep at the door of the wonderful room
Such stories are told about, none of them true ! —
The keyhole itself has no mortal seen through.
That room, — forty years since, folk settled and
decked it.
The luncheon's prepared, and the guests are
expected.
The handsome young host he is gallant and gay.
For his love and her friends will be with him
to-day.
With solid and dainty the,table is drest.
The wine beams its brightest, the flowers bloom
their best ;
A'et the host need not smile, and no guests will
appear.
For his sweetheart is dead, as he shortly shall
hear.
Full forty years since turned the key in that
door.
'T is a room deaf and dumb mid the city's uproar.
The guests, for whose joyance that table was
spread.
May now enter as ghosts, for they 're every one
dead.
Through a chink in the shutter dim lights come
and go ;
The seats are in order, the dishes a-row ;
But the luncheon was wealth to the rat and the
mouse
Whose descendants have loug left the Dirty Old
House.
I
Cup and plat(er are masked in thick layers of
dust ;
The flowers fallen to powder, the wine swathed
in crust ;
A nosegay was laid before one special chair.
And the faded blue ribbon that bound it lies
there.
The old man has played out his part in the scene.
Wherever ho now is, 1 hope he's more clean.
Y'et give we a thought free of scoffing or ban
To that Dirty Old House and that Dirty Old
Man.
William At.lincham.
AN EXPERIENCE AND A AIORAL.
I LENT my love a book one day ;
She brought it back ; 1 laid it by :
'T was little either had to say, —
She was so strange, and I so shy.
-3
254
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
But yet we loved indifferent things, —
The sprouting buds, the birds in tune, —
And Time stood still and wreathed Iiis wings
AVith rosy links from June to June.
For her, what task to dare or do ?
What peril tempt ? what hardship bear ?
But with her — ah ! she never knew
My heart, and what was hidden there I
And she, with me, so cold and coy.
Seemed a little maid bereft of sense ;
But in the crowd, all life and joy.
And full of blushful impudence.
She married,—well, —a woman needs
A mate, her life and love to share, —
And little cares sprang up like weeds
And played around her elbow-chair.
And years rolled by, —hut I, content.
Trimmed my oivn lamp, and kept it bright,
Till age's touch my hair besprent
With rays and gleams of silver light.
And then it chanced I took the hook
Which she perused in days gone by ;
And as I read, such passion shook
My soul, — I needs must curse or cry.
For, here and there, her love was writ.
In old, half-faded pencil-signs.
As if she yielded — hit by bit —
Her heart in dots and underlines.
Ah, silvered fool, too late you look t
I know it ; let me here record
This maxim : Lend no girl a hook
Unless 1J0ÍI read it afterward !
Frederick Swartwout Cozzens.
LOCKSLEY HALL.
CoMEADE.s, leave mi here a little, while as yet
't is early morn, —
Leave me here, and when you want me, sound
upon the bugle horn.
*T is the place, and all around it, as of old, the
curlews call.
Dreary gleams about the moorland, flying over
Locksley Hall :
Locksley Hall, that in the distance overlooks the
sandy tracts.
And the hollow ocean-ridges roaring into cata¬
racts.
Many a night from yonder ivied casement, ere 1
went to rest.
Did I look on great Orion sloping slowly to the
west.
Many a night 1 saw the Pleiads, rising through
the mellow shade.
Glitter like a swarm of ñre-flies tangled in a silver
braid.
Here about the beach 1 wandered, nourishing a
youth sublime
With the fairy tales of science, and the long
result of time ;
When the centuries behind me like a fruitful
land reposed ;
When 1 clung to all the present for the promise
that it closed ;
When I dipt into the future far as human eye
could see, —
Saw the vision of the world, and all the woffder
that would be.
In the spring a fuller crimson comes upon the
robin's breast ;
In the spring the wanton lapwing gets himself
another crest ;
In the spring a livelier iris changes on the
bui-nished dove ;
In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns
to thoughts of love.
Then her cheek was pale and thinner than should
be for one so .young.
And her eyes on all my motions with a mute
observance hung.
And 1 said, " My cousin Amy, speak, and speak
the truth to me ;
Trust me, cousin, all the current of my being
sets to thee."
On her pallid cheek and forehead came a color
and a light.
As I have seen the rosy red flushing in the
northern night.
And she turned,—her bosom shaken with a
sudden storm of sighs ;
All the spirit deeply dawning in the dark of
hazel eyes, —
Saying, "I have hid my feelings, fearing they
should do me wrong ; "
Sa3dng, " Dost thou love me, cousin ? " weeping,
" 1 have loved thee long."
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
255
Love took np the glass of time, and turned it in
his glowing hands ;
Every moment, lightly shaken, ran itself in
golden sands.
Love took np the harp of life, and smote on all
the chords with might ;
Smote the chord of self, that, trembling, passed
in music out of sight.
Many a morning on the moorland did we hear the
copses ring.
And her whisper thronged my pulses with the
fulness of the spring.
Many an evening by the waters did we watch the
stately ships.
And our spirits rushed together at the touching
of the lips.
0. my cousin, shallow-hearted ! 0 my Amy,
mine no more !
0 the dreary, dreary moorland O the barren,
barren shore !
Falser than all fancy fathoms, falser than all songs
have sung, —
Puppet to a father's threat, and servile to a
shrewish tongue !
Is it well to wish thee happy 1 — having known
me ; to decline
On a range of lower feelings and a narrower heart
than mine !
Yet it shall be : thou shalt lower to his level day
by day.
What is fine within thee growing coarse to sym¬
pathize with clay.
As the husband is, the wife is ; thou art mated
with a clown.
And the gi-ossness of his nature will have weight
to drag thee down.
He will hold thee, when his passion shall have
spent its novel force.
Something better than his dog, a little dearer
than his horse.
What is this? his eyes are heavy,—think not
they are glazed with wine.
Go to him ; it is thy duty, —kiss him ; take his
hand in thine.
It may be my lord is weary, that his brain is
overwrought, —
Soothe him with thy finer fancies, touch him
with thy lighter thought.
He will answer to the purpose, easy things to
understand, —
Better thou wert dead before me, though I slew
thee with my hand.
Better thou and I were lying, hidden from the
heart's disgrace.
Rolled in one another's arms, and silent in a last
embrace.
Cursed be the social wants that sin against the
strength of youth !
Cursed be the social lies that warp us from the
living truth !
Cursed be the sickly forms that err from honest
nature's rule !
Cursed be the gold that gilds the straitened fore¬
head of the fool !
Well — 't is well that I should bluster ! — Hadst
thou less unworthy proved,
Would to God — for I had loved thee more than
ever wife was loved.
Am I mad, that I .should cherish that which
bears but bitter fruit ?
I will pluck it from my bosom, though my heart
be at the root.
Never ! though my mortal summers to such length
of years should come
As the many-wintered crow that leads the clang¬
ing rookery home.
Where is comfort ? in division of the records of
the mind ?
Can I part her from herself, and love her, as I
knew her, kind ?
I remember one that perished ; sweetly did she
speak and move ;
Such a one do I remember, whom to look at was
to love.
Can I think of her as dead, and love her for the
love she bore ?
No, — she never loved me truly ; love is love
forevermore.
Comfort? comfort scorned of devils ! this is truth
the poet sings.
That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering
happier things.
Dnig thy memories, lest thou learn it, lest thy
heart be put to proof.
In the dead, unhappy night, and when the rain
is on the roof.
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
1&
Like a dog, ho hunts in dreams ; and thou art
staring at the wall,
"Where the dying night-lamp flickers, and the
shadows rise and fall.
Then a hand shall pass before thee, pointing to
his drunken sleep.
To thy widowed marriage-pillows, to the tears
that thou wilt weep.
Thou shalt hear the "Never, never," whispered
by the phantom years.
And a song from out the distance in the ringing
of thine ears ;
And an eye .shall vex thee, looking ancient kind¬
ness on thy pain.
Turn thee, turn thee on thy pillow ; get thee to
thy rest again.
Nay, but nature brings thee solace ; for a tender
voice will cry ;
'T is a purer life than thine, a lip to drain thy
trouble dry.
Baby lips will laugh me down ; my latest rival
brings thee rest, —
Baby fingers, waxen touches, press me from the
mother's breast.
0, the child too clothes the father with a dear-
ness not his due.
Half is thine and half is his : it will be worthy
of the two.
0, I see thee old and formal, fitted to thy petty
jiart,
With a little hoard of maxims preaching down a
daughter's heart.
" They were dangerous guides, the feelings — she
herself was not exempt —
Truly, she herself had .suffered " — Perish in thy
self-contempt !
Overlive it—lower yet — be happy ! wherefore
should I care ?
I myself must mix with action, lest I wither by
despair.
What is that which I should tnni to, lighting
upon days like these ?
Every door is barred with gold, and opens but to
golden keys.
Every gate is thronged with suitors, all the
markets overflow.
I have but an angry fancy ; what is tlnat which
1 should do ?
I had been content to perish, falling on the foe-
man's ground.
When the ranks are rolled in vapor, and the
winds are laid with sound.
But the jingling of the guinea helps the hurt
that honor feels.
And the nations do but murmur, snarling at each
other's heels.
Can I but relive in sadness ? I will turn that
earlier page.
Hide me from my deep emotion, O thou won¬
drous mother-age !
Make me feel the wild pulsation that I felt be¬
fore the strife.
When I heard my days before me, and the tu¬
mult of my life ;
Yearning for the large excitement that the com¬
ing years would yield.
Eager-hearted as a boy when first he leaves his
father's field.
And at night along the dusky highway near and
nearer drawn.
Sees in heaven the light of London flaring like
a dreary dawn ;
And his spirit leaps within him to be gone be¬
fore him then.
Underneath the light he looks at, in among the
throngs of men ;
Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reap¬
ing something new :
That which they have done but earnest of the
things that they shall do :
For I dipt into the future, far as human eye
could see.
Saw the vision of the world, and all the wonder
that would be ;
Saw the heavens fill with commerce, argosies of
magic sails.
Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with
costly bales ;
Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and there
rained a ghastly dew
From the nations' airy navies grapipling in the
central blue ;
Far along the world-wide whisper of the south-
,wind rushing warm.
With the standards of the peoples plunging
through the thunder-stonu ;
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
257
n
Till the war-drum throbbed no longer, and the
battle-flags were furled
In the parliament of man, the federation of the
world.
There the common sense of most shall hold a
fretful realm in awe,
And the kindly earth shall slumber, lapt in uni¬
versal law.
So 1 triumphed ere my passion sweeping through.
me left me dry,
Left me with a palsied heart, and left me with
the jaundiced eye j
Eye, to which all order festers, all things here
are out of joint.
Science moves, but slowly, slowly, creeping on
from point to point ;
Slowly comes a hungry people, as a lion, creep¬
ing nigher.
Glares at one that nods and winks behind a
slowly dying fire.
Yet I doubt not through the ages one increasing
purpose runs.
And the thoughts of men are widened with the
process of the suns.
What is that to him that reaps not harvest of
his youthful joys.
Though the deep heart of existence beat forever
like a boy's ?
Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers ; and 1
linger on the shore.
And the individual withers, and the world is
more and more.
Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, and he
bears a laden breast,
Full of sad experience moving toward the still¬
ness of his rest.
Hark ! my meny comrades call me, sounding on
the bugle horn, —
They to whom my foolish passion were a target
for their scorn ;
Shall it not bo scom to me to harp on such a
mouldered string ?
1 am shamed through all my nature to have loved
so slight a thing.
Weakness to bo wroth with weakness ! woman's
pleasure, woman's iwiii —
Nature made them blinder motions bounded in
a shallower brain ;
Woman is the lesser man, and all thy passions,
matched with mine.
Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as water
unto wine —
Here at least, where nature sickens, nothing.
Ah for some retreat
Deep in yonder shining Orient, where my life
began to beat !
Where in wild Mahratta-battle fell my father,
evil-starred ;
1 was left a trampled orphan, and a selfish
uncle's ward.
Or to burst all links of habit, — there to wander
far away.
On from island unto island at the gateways of
the day, —
Larger constellations burning, mellow moons and
happy skies,
Breadths of tropic shade and palms in cluster,
knots of Paradise.
Never comes the trader, never floats an European
flag, —
Slides the bird o'er lustrous woodland, swings
the trailer from the crag, —
Droops the heavy-blossomed bower, hangs the
heavy-fruited tree, —
Summer isles of Eden lying in dark-purple
spheres of sea.
There, methinks, would be enjoyment more than
in this march of mind —
In the steamship, in the railway, in the thoughts
that shake mankiu
» \ V \
There the passions, cramped no longer, shall
havd scope and breathing-space ;
I will- take somessavage^woman,« she shall rear
my.dusky. race.
Iron-jointed, supple-sinewed, they shall dive,
and they sh.all run.
Catch the wild goat by the hair, and hurl their
lances in the sun.
Whistle back the paiTot's call, and leap the
rainbows of the brooks.
Not with blinded eyesight poring over miserable
books —
Fool, again the dream, the fancy ! but 1 know
my words are wild, | i
But 1 count ,the gray.jbarba^iau lower thai the
17
Christ ian child. I
rrt—
258
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
a
I, to herd with narrow foreheads, vacant of our
glorious gains,
Like a beast with lower pleasures, like a beast
with lower pains !
Mated with a squalid savage, — what to me were
sun or clime ?
I, the heir of all the ages, in the foremost files
of time, —
I, that rather held it better men should perish
one by one.
Than that earth shoidd stand at gaze like Joshua's
moon in Ajalon !
Not in vain the distance beacons. Forward,
forward let us range ;
Let the great world spin forever down the ring¬
ing grooves of change.
Through the shadow of the globe we sweep into
the younger day :
Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of
Cathay.
Mother-age, (for mine 1 knew not,) help me as
when life begun, —
Kift the hills, and roll the waters, flash the
lightnings, weigh the sun, —
O, 1 see the crescent promise of my spirit hath
not set ;
Ancient founts of inspiration well through all my
fancy yet.
Howsoever these things be, a long farewell to
Locksley Hall !
Now for me the woods may wither, now for me
the roof-tree fall.
Comes a vapor from the margin, blackening over
heath and holt.
Cramming all the blast before it, in its breast a
thunderbolt.
Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or hail, or
fire or snow ;
For the mighty wind ai-ises, roaring seaward, and
1 go.
Alfred Tennyson,
ONLY A WOMAN.
"She loves with love that cannot tire :
And if, all, woe ! she loves alone.
Through passionate duty love flames higher,
As grass grows taller round a stone."
coventry patmore,
So, the truth's out. 1 '11 grasp it like a snake, —
It will not slay me. My heart shall not break
Awhile, if only for the children's sake.
For his, too, somewhat. Let him stand unblamed ;
None say, he gave me less than honor claimed.
Except —one trifle scarcely worth being named —
The heart. That's gone. The corrupt dead might
be
As easily raised up, breathing, — fair to see.
As he could bring his whole heart back to me.
1 never sought him in coquettish sport.
Or courted him as silly maidens court.
And wonder when the longed-for prize falls short.
I only loved him, — any woman would :
But shut my love up till he came and sued.
Then poured it o'er his dry life like a flood.
1 was so happy 1 could make him blest ! —
So happy that I was his first and best.
As he mine, — when he took me to his breast.
Ah me ! if only then he had been true !
If for one little year, a month or two.
He had given, me love for love, as was my due !
Or had he told me, ere the deed was done.
He only raised me to his heart's dear throne —
Poor substitute — because the queen was gone !
0, had he whispered, when his sweetest kiss
Was warm upon my mouth in fancied bliss.
He had kissed another woman even as this, —
It were less bitter ! Sometimes 1 could weep
To be thus cheated, like a child asleep ; —
Were not my anguish far too dry and deep.
So 1 built my house upon another's ground ;
Mocked with a heart just caught at the rebound, —
A cankered thing that looked so firm and sound.
And when that heart grew colder, — colder still,
1, ignorant, tried all duties to fulfil,
Blaming my foolish pain, exacting will.
All, — anything but him. It was to be
The full draught other's drink up carelessly
Was made this bitter Tantalus-cup for me.
1 say again, — he gives me all 1 claimed,
1 and my children never shall be shamed :
He is a just man, — he will live unblamed.
Only — 0 God, 0 God, to cry for bread.
And get a stone ! Daily to lay my head
UjKm a bosom where the old love's dead !
Dead ? — Fool ! It never lived. It only stirred
Galvanic, like an hour-cold corpse. None heard :
So let me bury it without a word.
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
259
He '11 keep that other woman from my sight.
I know not if her face be foul or bright ;
I only know that it was his delight —
As his was mine ; I only know he stands
Pale, at the touch of their long-severed hands,
Then to a flickering smile his lips commands.
Lest I should grieve, or jealous anger show.
He need not. When the ship's gone down, I trow.
We little reck whatever wind may blow.
And so my silent moan begins and ends.
No world's laugh or world's taunt, no pity of
friends
Or sneer of foes, with this my torment blends.
None knows, —none heeds. I have a little pride ;
Enough to stand up, wifelike, by his side.
With the same smile as when I was his bride.
And I shall take his children to my arms ;
They will not miss these fading, worthless charms ;
Their kiss — ah ! unlike his.— all pain disarms.
And haply as the solemn years go by.
He will think sometimes, with regretful sigh.
The other woman was less true than I.
DINAH Maria mulock Craik.
DEATH OF THE WHITE FAWN.
The wanton troopers, riding by.
Have shot my fawn, and it will die.
Ungentle men ! they cannot thrive
Who killed thee. Thou ne'er didst, alive.
Them any harm ; alas ! nor could
Thy death yet do them any good.
I'm sure I never wished them ill, —
Nor do 1 for all this, nor will ;
But if my simple prayers may yet
Prevail with Heaven to forget
Thy murder, I will join my tears.
Rather than fail. But, O my fears !
It cannot die so. Heaven's king
Keeps register of everything ;
And nothing may we use in vain ;
Even beasts must be with justice slain, —
Else men are made their deodands.
Though they should wash their guilty hands
In this warm life-blood, which doth part
From thine and wound me to the heart.
Yet could they not be clean, — their stain
Is dyed in such a purple grain ;
There is not such another in
The world to offer for their sin.
Inconstant Sylvio, when yet
I had not found him counterfeit.
One morning (1 remember well)
Tied in this silver chain and bell.
Gave it to me ; nay, and 1 know
What he said then, — I'm sure I do :
Said he, " Look how your huntsman here
Hath taught a fawn to hunt his dear ! "
But Sylvio soon had me beguiled :
This waxed tame, while he grew wild ;
And, quite regardless of my smart.
Left me his fawn, but took his heart.
Thenceforth I set myself to play
My solitary time away
With this ; and, very well content.
Could so mine idle life have spent.
For it was full of sport, and light
Of foot and heart, and did invite
Me to its game. It seemed to bless
Itself in me ; how could I less
Than love it ? 0, I cannot be
Unkind to a beast that loveth me !
Had it lived long, I do not Icnow
Whether it, too, might have done so
As Sylvio did, — his gifts might bo
Perhaps as false, or more, than he.
For I am sure, for aught that I
Could in so short a time espy.
Thy love was far more better than
The love of false and cruel man.
With sweetest milk and sugar, first
I it at mine own fingers nursed ;
And as it grew, so every day
It waxed more white and sweet than they.
It had so sweet a breath ! and oft
I blushed to see its foot more soft
And white — shall I say than my hand ?
Nay, any lady's of the land.
It is a wondrous thing how fleet
'T was on those little silver feet.
With what a pretty, skipping grace
It oft would challenge me the race ;
And when't had left me far away,
'T would stay, and run again, and stay ;
For it was nimbler much than hinds,
And trod as if on the four winds.
I have a garden of my own, —
But so with roses overgrown.
And lilies, that you would it guess
To be a little wilderness ;
And all the springtime of the year
It only loved to be there.
Among the beds of lilies I
Have sought it oft, where it should lie ;
Yet could not, till itself would rise,
Find it, although before mine eyes ;
For in the flaxen lilies' shade
It like a bank of lilies laid.
Upon the roses it would feed.
Until its lips even seemed to bleed ;
260
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
a
£3-
And then to me't would boldly trip,
And print those roses on my lip.
But all its chief delight was still
On roses thus itself to fill ;
And its pure virgin limbs to fold
In whitest sheets of lilies cold.
Had it lived long, it would have been
Lilies without, roses within.
0, help ! 0, help ! I see it faint.
And die as calmly as a saint !
See how it weeps ! the tears do come.
Sad, slowly, dropping like a gum.
So weeps the wounded balsam ; so
The holy frankincense doth flow ;
The brotherless Heliades
Melt in such amber tears as these,
I in a golden phial will
Keep these two ciystal tears, and fill
It, till it do o'erflow, with mine ;
Then place it in Diana's shrine.
Now my sweet fawn is vanished to
Whither the swans and turtles go,
9 fair Elysium to endure,
ivhfh milk-white lambs, and ermines pure.
Ö do not run too fast ! for I
Will but bespeak thy grave — and die.
First, my unhappy statue shall
Be cut in marble ; and withal.
Let it be weeping too. But there
The engraver sure his art may spare ;
For I so truly thee bemoan
That I shall weep, though I be stone.
Until my teal's, still dropping, wear
My breast, themselves engi'aving there.
There at my feet shalt thou be laid.
Of purest alabaster made ;
For I would have thine image be
White as I can, though not as thee.
Andrew Marvell.
1
THE MAID'S LAMENT.
I LOVED him not ; and yet, now he is gone,
I feel I am alone.
I checked him while he spoke ; yet could he speak,
Alas ! I would not check.
For reasons not to love him once I sought.
And wearied all my thought
To vex myself and him : I now would give
My love, could he but live
Who lately lived for me, and when he found
'T was vain, in holy ground
He hid his face amid the shades of death !
I waste for him my breath
Who wasted his for me ; but mine returns.
And this lone bosom burns
With stifling heat, heaving it up in sleep.
And waking me to weep
Tears that had melted his soft heart : for years
Wept he as bitter tears !
" Merciful God ! " such was his latest prayer,
" These may she never share ! "
Quieter is his breath, his breast more cold
Than daisies in the mould.
Where children spell athwart the churchyard gate
His name and life's brief date.
Pray for him, gentle souls, whoe'er ye be.
And 0, pray, too, for me !
Walter Savage Landor.
IN A YEAR.
Never any more
While I live,
Need I hope to see his face
As before.
Once his love grown chill.
Mine may strive, —
Bitterly we re-embrace.
Single still.
Was it something said.
Something done.
Vexed him ? was it touch of hand.
Turn of head ?
Strange ! that very way
Love begun.
I as little understand
Love's decay.
When I sewed or drew,
I recall
How he looked as if I sang
— Sweetly too.
If I spoke a word.
First of all
Up his cheek the color sprang.
Then he heard.
Sitting by my side.
At my feet.
So he breathed the air I breathed,
Satisfied !
I, too, at love's brim
Touched the sweet :
1 would die if death bequeathed
Sweet to him.
" Speak, — I love thee best !■"
He exclaimed.
•' Let thy love my own foretell," —
I confessed :
" Clasp my heart on thine
Now unblamed.
Since upon thy soul as well
Hangeth mine ! "
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
261
Was it wrong to own,
Being truth ?
Why should all the giving prove
His alone ?
I had wealth and ease,
Beauty, youth,—
Since my lover gave me love,
1 gave these.
That was all I meant,
— To be just,
And the passion I had raised
To content.
Since he chose to change
Gold for dust.
If I gave him what he praised.
Was it strange ?
Would he loved me yet,
On and on,
While I found some way undreamed,
— Paid my debt !
Gave more life and more.
Till, all gone.
He should smile, " She never seemed
Mine before.
What — she felt the while.
Must I think ?
Love's so different with us men,"
He should smile.
"Dying for my sake —
White and pink !
Can't we touch these bubbles then
But they break ? "
Dear, the pang is brief.
Do thy part.
Have thy pleasure. How perplext
Grows belief !
Well, this cold clay clod
Was man's heart.
Cmmble it, — and what comes next ?
Is it God ?
ROBERT BROWNING.
&
BLIGHTED LOVE.
Flowers arc fresh, and bushes green.
Cheerily the linnets sing ;
Winds are soft, and skies serene ;
Time, however, soon shall throw
Winter's snow
O'er the buxom breast of Spring !
Hope, that buds in lover's heart.
Lives not through the scorn of years ;
Time makes love itself depart ;
Time and scorn congeal the mind, —
Looks unkind
Freeze alfectioii's warmest tears.
Time shall make the bushes green ;
Time dissolve the winter snow ;
Winds be soft, and skies serene ;
Linnets sing their wonted strain;
But again
Blighted love shall never blow !
From the Portugese of LUIS DE CAMOENS.
Translation of LORD STRANCFORD.
DISAPPOINTMENT.
from "zophiel, or the bride of seven."
The bard has sung, God never formed a soul
Without its own peculiar mate, to meet
Its wandering half, when ripe to crown the whole
Bright plan of bliss most heavenly, most com¬
plete.
But thousand evil things there are that hate
To look on happiness : these hurt, impede,
And leagued with time, space, circumstance, and
fate.
Keep kindred heart from heart, to pine, and
pant, and bleed.
Í
And as the dove to far Palmyra flying ,
From where her native founts of Antioch l' ..ra.
Weary, exhausted, longing, panting, sighing.
Lights sadly at the desert's bitter stream ;
So many a soul, o'er life's drear desert faring.
Love's pure congenial spring unfound, un-
quaffed.
Suffers — recoils — then thirsty and despairing
Of what it would, descends and sips the near¬
est draught !
Maria Gowen Brooks (Maria del Occidente).
SHIPS AT SEA.
I HAVE ships that went to sea
More than fifty years ago ;
None have yet come home to me.
But are sailing to and fro.
I have seen them in my sleep.
Plunging through the shoreless deep.
With tattered sails and battered hulls.
While around them screamed the gulls.
Flying low, flying low.
I have wondered whj' they strayed
From me, sailing round the world ;
And I've said, " I'm half afraid
That their sails will ne'er be furled."
Great the treasures that they hold.
Silks, and plumes, and bars of gold ;
While the spices that they bear
Fill with fragrance all the air.
As they sail, as they sail.
262
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Ah ! each sailor in the port
Knows that I have ships at sea.
Of the waves and winds the sport,
And the sailors pity ine.
Oft they come and with me walk.
Cheering me with hopeful talk.
Till I put my fears aside,
And, contented, watch the tide
Eise and fall, rise and falL
I have waited on the piers.
Gazing for them down the bay,
Days and nights for many years.
Till I turned heart-sick away.
But the pilots, when they land.
Stop and take me by the hand.
Saying, "You will live to see
Your proud vessels come from sea.
One and all, one and all."
So I never quite despair.
Nor let hope or courage fail ;
And some day, when skies are fair.
Up the bay my ships will sail.
I shall buy then all I need, —
Prints to look at, books to read.
Horses, wines, and works of art.
Everything — except a heart
That is lost, that is lost.
Once, when I was pure and young,
Eicher, too, than 1 am now.
Ere a cloud was o'er me flung.
Or a wrinkle creased my brow.
There was one whose heart was mine ;
But she's something now divine.
And though come my ships from sea.
They can bring no heart to me
Eveimore, evermore.
Robert Steveksos Coffin.
LOVE'S YOUNG DEE AM.
from " irish melodies. "
0 THE days ar^ gone when beauty bright
My heart's chain wove !
When my dream of life, from morn till night.
Was love, still love !
New hope may bloom.
And days may come.
Of milder, calmer beam.
But there's nothing half so sweet in life
As love's young dream !
O, there's nothing half so sweet in life
As love's young dream !
Though the bard to purer fame may soar.
When wild youth's past ;
Though he win the wise, who frowned before.
To smile at last ;
He '11 never meet
A joy so sweet
In all his noon of fame
As when ñrst he sung to woman's ear
His soul-felt flame,
■ And at every close she blushed to hear
The one loved name !
0, that hallowed form is ne'er forgot.
Which first love traced ;
Still it lingering haunts the greenest spot
On memory's waste !
'T was odor fled
As soon as shed ;
'T was morning's winged dream ;
'T was a light that ne'er can shine again
On life's dull stream !
O, 't was a light that ne'er can shine again
On life's dull stream !
thomas Moore.
WHEN THE LAMP IS SHATTEEED.
When the lamp is shattered
The light in the dust lies dead ;
When the cloud is scattered.
The rainbow's glory is shed.
When the lute is broken.
Sweet tones are remembered not ;
When the lips have spoken.
Loved accents are soon forgot.
As music and splendor
Survive not the lamp and the Int«^
The heart's echoes render
No song when the spirit is mute, —
No song but sad dirges.
Like the wind through a ruined cell.
Or the mournful surges
That ring the dead seaman's knelL
When heai-ts have once imngled.
Love fimt leaves the well-built nest ;
The weak one is singled
To endure what it once possessed.
O Love i who bewailest
The frailty of all things here.
Why choose you the frailest
For your cradle, y oui" home, and your bier ?
Its passions will rock thee
As the storms rock the ravens on higji ;
Bright reason will mock thee
Like the sun from a wintry sky.
From thy nest every rafter
Will rot, and thine eagle homo
Leave thee naked to laughter.
When leaves fall and cold winds come.
percv dysshe shellev.
fi-
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
263
TAKE, O, TAKE THOSE LIPS AWAY.*
Take, O, take those lips away.
That so sweetly were forsworn ;
And those eyes, like break of day.
Lights that do mislead the morn ;
But my kisses bring again,
Seals of love, but sealed in vain.
Hide, 0, hide those hills of snow
Which thy frozen bosom bears.
On whose tops the pinks that grow
Are yet of those that April wears !
But hist set my poor heart free,
Bound in tho.^e icj clieiiu by tliee.
SHAKESPEARE and JOHN FLETCHER.
WHY SO PALE AND WAN?
Why so pale and wan, fond lover ?
Pr'y thee, why so pale ?
Will, when looking well can't move her,
Looking ill prevail ?
Pr'y thee, why so pale ?
Why so dull and mute, young sinner ?
Pr'y thee, why so mute ?
Will, when speaking well can't win her,
Saying nothing do't ?
Pr'y thee, why so mute ?
Quit, quit, for shame ! this will not move.
This cannot take her :
If of herself she will not love.
Nothing can make her :
The devil take her ! (
sir John Suckling.
OUTGROWN.
Nay, you wrong her, my friend,,she's not fickle ;
her love -.he has simply outgrown :
One can read the whole matter, translating her
heart by the light ot one's own..
Can you bear me to talk with you frankly 1 There
is much that my heart would say ;
And you know we were children together, have
quaiTelled and "made up " in play.
And so, for the sake of old friendship, I venture
to tell you the truth, —
As plainly, perhaps, and as bluntly, as I might
in our earlier youth.
* The first stanza of this song appears in Shakespeare's
Measure for Measure, Act iv. Sc. i.; the same, with the second
Stanza added, is found in beaumont and Fletcher's Bloody
Brother, Act v. Sc. a.
Five summers ago, when you wooed her, you
stood on the self-same plane.
Face to face, heart to heart, never dreaming your
souls could be parted again.
She loved you at that time entirely, in the bloom
of her life's early May ;
And it is not her fault, I repeat it, that she does
not love you to-day.
Nature never stands still, nor souls either; tney
ever go up or go down ;
And hers has been steadily soaring, — but how
has it been with your own ?
She has struggled and yearned and aspired, —
grown purer and wiser each year :
The stars are not farther above you in yon lumi¬
nous atmosphere !
For she whom you crowned with fresh roses,
down yonder, five summers ago.
Has learned that the first of our duties to God
and ourselves is to grow.
Her eyes they are sweeter and calmer ; but their
vision is clearer as well :
Her voice has a tenderer cadence, but is pure as
a silver belL
Her face has the look worn by those who with
God and his angels have talked :
The white robes she wears are,less white than,
the spirits with whom .she has walked.
And you ? H ave you aimed at the highest ? Have
you, too, aspired and prayed ?
Have you looked upon evil unsullied ? Have you
conquered it undismayed ?
Have yon, too, grown purer and wiser, as the
months and the years have rolled on ?
Did you meet her this morning rejoicing in the
triumph of victory won ?
Nay, hear me ! The tmth cannot harm you.
When to-day in her presence you stood.
Was the hand that you gave her as white and
clean as that of her womanhood ?
Go measure yourself by her standard. Look
back on the years that have fled ;
Then ask, if you need, why she teUs you that
the love of her girlhood is dead !
She cannot look down to her lover : her love,
like her soul, aspires ;
He must stand by her side, or above her, who
would kindle its holy fires.
264
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
•Now farewell ! For the sake of old friendship
I have ventured to tell you the ti'uth.
As plainly, perhaps, and as bluntly, as I might
in our earlier youth.
Julia c. r. Dorr.
ALAS! HOW LIGHT A CAUSE MAY
MOVE.
from "the light of the harem."
Alas ! how light a cause may move
Dissension between hearts that love, !
Hearts that the world in vain has tried,
And sorrow but more closely tied ;
That stood the storm when waves were rough,
Yet in a sunny hour fall off.
Like ships that have gone down at sea.
When heaven was all tranquillity !
A something light as air, — a look,
A word unkind or wrongly taken, —
0, love that tempests never shook,
A breath, a touch like this has shaken I
And ruder words will soon rush in
To spread the breach that words begin ;
And eyes forget the gentle ray
They wore in courtship's smiling day ;
And voices lose the tone that shed
A tenderness round all they said ;
Till fast declining, one by one.
The sweetnesses of love are gone,
And hearts, so lately mingled, seem
Like broken clouds, — or like the stream.
That smiling left the mountain's brow.
As though its waters ne'er could sever.
Yet, ere it reach the plain below.
Breaks into floods that part forever.
O you, that have the charge of Love,
Keep him in rosy bondage bound.
As in the Fields of Bliss above
He sits, with flowerets fettered round ; —
Loose uot a tie that round him clings.
Nor ever let him use his wings ;
For even an hour, a minute's flight
Will rob the plumes of half their light.
Like that celestial bird, — whose nest
Is found beneath far Eastera skies, —
Whose wings, though radiant when at rest.
Lose all their glory when he flies !
Thomas Moore.
■a
AUX ITALIENS.
At Paris it was, at the opera there ;
And she looked like a queen in a book that
night.
With the wi-eatli of pearl in her raven hair.
And the brooch on her breast so bright.
Of all the operas that Verdi wrote.
The best, to my taste, is the Trovatore ;
And Mario can soothe, with a tenor note.
The souls in purgatory.
The moon on the tower slept soft as snow ;
And who was not thrilled in the strangest way,
As we heard him sing, while the gas burned low,
" Non ti scordar dime" t
The emperor there, in his box of state.
Looked grave, as if he had just then seen
The red flag wave from the city gate.
Where his eagles in bronze had been.
The empress, too, had a tear in her eye :
You'd have said that her fancy had gone back
again.
For one moment, under the old blue sky.
To the old glad life in Spain.
Well ! there in our front-row box we sat
Together, my bride beti'othed and I ;
My gaze was fixed on my opera hat.
And hers on the stage hard by.
And both were silent, and both were sad ; —
Like a queen she leaned on her full white arm.
With that regal, indolent air she had ;
So confident of her charm !
I have not a doubt she was thinking then
Of her former lord, good soul that he was.
Who died the richest and roundest of men.
The Marquis of Carabas.
I hope that, to get to the kingdom of heaven.
Through a needle's eye.he had not to pass ;
I wish him well for the jointure given
To my lady of Carabas.
Meanwhile, I was thinking of my first love
As I had not been thinking of aught for years ;
Till over my eyes there began to move
Something that felt like tears.
I thought of the dress that she wore last time.
When we stood 'neath the cypress-trees together.
In that lost laud, in that soft clime.
In the crimson evening weather ;
Of that muslin dress (for the eve was hot) ;
And her wann white neck in its golden chain ;
And her full soft hair, just tied in a knot.
And falling loose again ;
And the jasmine flower in her fair young breast ;
(0 the faint, sweet smell of that jasmine flower !)
And the one bird singing alone to his nest ;
And the one star over the tower.
tr
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
'S-
I thought of our little quarrels and strife,
And the letter that brought me back my ring ;
And it all seemed then, in the waste of life.
Such a very little thing !
For I thought of her grave below the hill.
Which the sentinel cypress-tree .stands over ;
And I thought, " Were she only living still.
How I could forgive her and love her ! "
And I swear, as I thought of her thus, in that hour,
And of how, after all, old things are best.
That I smelt the smell of that jasmine flower
Which she used to wear in her breast.
It smelt so faint, and it smelt so sweet.
It made me creep, and it made me cold !
Like the scent that steals from the cnimbling sheet
Where a mummy is half unrolled.
And I turned and looked : she was sitting there,
In a dim box over the stage ; and drest
In that muslin dress, with that full soft hair.
And that jasmine in her breast !
I was hei'e, and she was there ;
And the glitteriiighorseshoecurvedbetween ! —
From my bride betrothed, with her raven hair
And her sumptuous scornful mien.
To mj' early love with her eyes downcast.
And over her primrose face the shade,
(In short, from the future back to the past,)
There was but a step to be made.
To my early love from my future bride
One moment I looked. Then I stole to the door,
I traversed the passage ; and down at her side
1 was sitting, a moment more.
My thinking of her, or the music's strain.
Or something which never will be exprest.
Had brought her back from the gravevagain.
With the jasmine in her breast.
She is not dead, and she is not wed !
But she loves me now, and she loved me then !
And the very first word that her sweet lips .said.
My heart grew youthful again.
The marchioness there, of Carabas,
She is wealth}', and young, and handsome still ;
And but for her — well, we '11 let that pass ;
She may marry whomever she will.
But I will many my own first love,
With her primrose face, for old things aro best ;
And the flower in her bosom, I prize it above
The brooch in my lady's breast.
The world is filled with folly and sin.
And love must cling where it can, I say ;
For beauty is easy enough to win ;
But one is n't loved every day.
And I think, in the lives of most women and men.
There's a moment when all would go smooth
and even.
If only the dead could find out when
To come back and be forgiven.
But 0, the smell of that jasmine flower !
And O, that music ! and O, the way
That voice rang out from the donjon tower.
Non ti scordar di me.
Non ti scordar di me !
Robert BULWER-LYTTON {Owtn MercdUh).
THE PORTRAIT.
Midnight past ! Not a sound of aught
Through the silent house, but the wind at his
prayers.
I sat by the dying fire, and thought
Of the dear dead woman up stairs.
A night of tears ! for the gusty rain
Had ceased, but the eaves were dripping yet ;
And the moon looked forth, as though in pain.
With her face all white and wet :
Nobody with me, my watch to keep.
But the friend of my bosom, the man I love :
And grief had sent him fast to .sleep
In the chamber up above.
Nobody else, in the country place
All round, that knew of my loss beside.
But the good young Priest with the Raphael-face,
Who confessed her when she died.
That good young Priest is of gentle nerve.
And my grief had moved him beyond control ;
For his lip grew white, as I could observe.
When he speeded her parting souj.
I sat by the dreary hearth alone :
I thought of the pleiisant days of yore :
I said, " The start' of my life is gone :
The woman I loved is no more.
"On her cold dead bosom my portrait lies.
Which next to her heart she used to wear —
Haunting it o'er with her tender eyes
When my own face was not there.
" It is set all round with rubies rod.
And pearls which a Peri might have kept.
For each ruby there my heart hath bled :
For each pearl my eyes have wept."
e-
2G6
TOEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
■a
And I said — " The thing is precious to me :
They will bury her soon in the churchyard
clay ;
It lies on her heart, and lost, must be
If I do not take it away."
I lighted my lamp at the dying flame,
And crept up the stairs that creaked for fright.
Till into the chamber of death I came.
Where she lay all in white.
The moon shone over her winding-sheet.
There stark she lay on her carven bed :
Seven burning tapers about her feet,
And seven about her head.
As I stretched my hand, I held my breath ;
I turned as I drew the curtains apart :
I dared not look on the face of death :
I knew where to find her heart.
I thought at first, as my touch fell there.
It had warmed that heart to life, with love ;
For the thing 1 touched was warm, I swear.
And I could feel it move.
'Twas the hand of a man, that was moving
slow
O'er the heart of the dead, — from the other
side :
And at once the sweat broke over my brow :
" Who is robbing the corpse ?" I cried.
Opposite me by the tapers' light.
The friend of my bosom, the man I loved.
Stood over the corpse, and all as white.
And neither of us moved.
"What do you here, my friend ?"... The man
Looked first at me, and then at the dead.
"There is a portrait here," he began ;
"There is. It is mine," I said.
*
Said the friend of my bosom, "Yours, no doubt.
The portrait was, till a month ago.
When this suffering angel took that out.
And placed mine there, I know."
" This woman, she loved me well," said I.
" A month ago," said my friend to me :
" And in your tliroat," 1 groaned, " you lie I "
He answered,..." Let us see."
" Enough I " I returned, " let the dead decide :
And whosesoever the portrait prove.
His shall it bo, when the cause is tried.
Where Death is arraigned by Love."
We found the portrait there, in its place :
We opened it by the tai)ers' shine :
The gems were all unchanged : the face
Was — neither his nor mine.
" One nail drives out another, at least !
The face of the portrait there," I cried,
" Is our friend's, the Eaphael-faced young Priest,
Who confessed her when she died."
The setting is all of rubies red.
And pearls which a Peri might have kept.
For each i-uby there my heart hath bled ;
For each pearl my eyes have wept.
Robert Bulwer-Lvtton (Owct Mtrediih).
THE EOMAUNT OF THE ROSE.
from "vignettes in rhyme."
Poor Rose ! I lift you from the street —
Far, better I should own you
Than you should lie for random feet
Where careless hands have thrown you.
Poor pinky petals, crushed and torn Í
Did heartless Mayfair use you.
Then cast you forth to lie forlorn.
For chariot-wheels to bruise you ?
I saw you last in Edith's hair.
Rose, you would scarce discover
That I she passed upon the stair
Was Edith's favored lover,
A month — "a little month" — ago —
0 theme for moral writer I —
'Twixt you and me, my Rose, you know.
She might have been politer ;
But let that pass. She gave you then —
Behind the oleander—
To one, perhaps, of all the men.
Who best could understand her.
Cyril, that, duly flattered, took.
As only Cyril's able.
With just the same Arcadian look
He used, last night, for Mabel ;
Then, having waltzed till every star
Had paled away in morning.
Lit up his cynical cigar.
And tossed you downward, scorning.
Kismet, my Rose ! Revenge is sweet, —
She made my heart-strings quiver ;
And yet — you sha'n't lie in the street,
1 'U drop you in the River.
austin dobson.
iS-
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
267
n
TRANSIENT BEAUTY.
from " the giaour."
As, rising on its purple wing,
The insect-queen of Eastern spring.
O'er emerald meadows of Kaslimeer,
Invites the young pursuer near,
And leads him on from flower to flower,
A weary chase and wasted hour.
Then leaves him, as it soars on high,
With panting heart and tearful eye ;
So Beauty lures the full-grown child.
With hue as bright, and wind a's wild ;
A chase of idle hopes and fears.
Begun in folly, closed in tears.
If won, to equal ills betrayed.
Woe waits the insect and the maid :
A life of pain, the loss of peace.
From infant's pl.ay and man's caprice ;
The lovely toy, so fiercely sought.
Hath lost its charm by being caught ;
For every touch that wooed its stay
Hath brushed its brightest hues away.
Till, charm and hue and beauty gone,
"T is left to fly or fall alone.
With wounded wing or bleeding breast.
Ah ! where shall either victim rest 2
Can this with faded pinion soar
From rose to tnlip as before ?
Or Beauty, blighted in an hour.
Find joy within her broken bower ?
No ; gayer insects fluttering by
Ne'er droop the wing o'er those that die.
And lovelier things have mercy shown
To every failing but their own.
And every woe a tear can claim.
Except an erring sister's shame.
EVRON.
t
WOMAN'S INCONSTANCY.
I loved thee once, I '11 love no more.
Thine be the grief as is the blame ;
Thou art not what thou wast before.
What reason I should be the same ?
He that can love unloved again.
Hath better store of love than brain :
God sends me love my debts to pay.
While unthrifts fool their love away.
Nothing could have my love o'er-thrown.
If thou hadst still continued mine ;
Yea, if thou hadst remained thy own,
I might perchance have yet been thine.
But thou thy freedom didst recall.
That if thou might elsewhere inthrall ;
And then how could I but disdain
A captive's captive to remain ?
When new desires had conquered thee,
And changed the object of thy will.
It had been lethargy in me.
Not constancy, to love thee still.
Yea, it had been a sin to go
And prostitute affection so.
Since we are taught no prayers to say
To such as must to others pray.
Yet do thou glory in thy choice.
Thy choice of his good fortune boast ;
I '11 neither grieve nor yet rejoice.
To see him gain what I have lost ;
The height of my disdain shall be.
To laugh at him, to blush for thee }
To love thee still, but go no more
A begging to a beggar's door.
Sir Robert Ayton.
LADY CLARA VERE DE VERE.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
Of me you shall not win renown ;
You thought to break a country heart
For pastime, ere you went to town.
At me yov smiled, but unbeguiled
I saw the snare, and I retired :
The daughter of a hundred Earls,
You are not one to be desired.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
I know you proud to bear your name ;
Your pride is yet no mate for mine.
Too proud to care from whence I came.
Nor would I break for your sweet sake
A heart that dotes on truer clxarms.
A simple maiden in her flower
Is worth a hundred coats-of-arms.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
Some meeker pupil you must find.
For were you ijueen of all that is,
I could not stoop to such a mind.
You sought to prove how I could love.
And my disdain is my reply.
The lion on your old .stone gates
Is not more cold to you than I.
Lady Clai-a Vere de Vere,
You put strange memories in my head.
Not thrice your branching limes have blown
Since I beheld young Laurence dead.
0 your sweet eyes, your low replies ;
A great enchanri-ess you may be ;
But thei-e was that aci-oss his throat
Which you had hardly cared to see.
a-
268
--a
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
When thus he met his mother's view,
She had the passions of her kind,
She spake some certain truths of you.
Indeed I heard one bitter word
That scarce is fit for you to hear ;
Her manners had not that repose
Which stamps the caste of Vere de Vere.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
There stands a spectre in your hall :
The guilt of blood is at your door :
You changed a wholesome heart to gall.
You held your course without remorse.
To make him trust his modest worth.
And, last, you fixed a vacant stare.
And slew him with your noble birth.
Trust me, Clara Vere de Vere,
From yon blue heavens above us bent
The grand old gardener and his wife
Smile at the claims of long descent.
Howe'er it be, it seems to me,
'T is only noble to be good.
Kind hearts are more than coronets.
And simple faith than Norman blood.
I know you, Clara Vere de Vere *
You pine among your halls and towers :
The languid light of your proud eyes
Is wearied of the rolling hours.
In glowing health, with boundless wealth.
But sickening of a vague disease.
You know so ill to deal with time.
You needs must play such pranks as these.
Clara, Clara Vere de Vere,
If Time be heavy on your hands.
Are there no beggars at your gate.
Nor any poor about your lands ? ,
Oh ! teach the orphan-boy to read,
Or teach the orphan-girl to sew.
Pray Heaven for a human heart.
And let the foolish yeoman go.
Alfred Tennyson.
43-
LINES ON ISABELLA MARKHAM.
Whence comes my love ? 0 heart, disclose ;
It was fi'om cheeks that shamed the rose.
From lips that spoil the ruby's pi-aise.
From eyes that mock the diamond's blaze :
Whence comes my woe ? as freely own ;
Ah me ! 'twas from a heart like stone.
The blushing cheek speaks modest mind.
The lips befitting words most kind,
The eye does tempt to love's desire.
And seems to say 'tis Cupid's fire ;
Yet all so fair but speak my moan,
Sith nought doth say the heart of stone.
Why thus, my love, so kind bespeak
Sweet eye, sweet lip, sweet blushing cheek —
Yet not a heart to save my pain ;
0 Venus, take thy gifts again !
Make not so fair to cauáe our moan.
Or make a heart that's like our own.
john Harrington.
THE VOW.
In holy night we made the vow ;
And the same lamp which long before
Had seen our early passion grow
Was witness to the faith we swore.
Did I not swear to love her ever ;
And have 1 ever dared to rove ?
Did she not own a rival never
Should shake her faith, or steal her love t
Yet now she says those words were air.
Those vows were written all in water.
And by the lamp that saw her swear
Has yielded to the first that sought her-
From the Greek of Melhager.
Translation of JOHN Herman Merivale,
WALY, WALY, BÜT LOVE BE BONNY.
O, WALT, waly up the bank,
And waly, waly down the brae.
And waly, waly yon bum side.
Where I and my love wont to gae.
I leaned my back unto an aik,
I thought it was a trusty tree ;
But first it bowed, and syne it brak —
Sae my true love did lightly me !
O, waly, waly, but love be bonny,
A little time while it is new ;
But when't is auld it waxeth cauld.
And fades away like the morning dew.
0, wherefore should I busk niy head ?
Or wherefore should 1 käme my hair ?
For my true love has me forsook.
And says he '11 never love nie inair.
Now Arthur-Seat shall be my bed ;
The sheets shall ne'er be fyled by me ;
Saint Anton's well shall be my drink.
Since my true love has forsaken me.
DISAPPOINTMENT AND ESTRANGEMENT.
Martinmas wind, when wilt thou blaw,
And shake the green leaves otf the tree ?
0 gentle death, when wilt thou come ?
For of my life I'm weary.
'T is not the frost that freezes fell.
Nor blowing snaw's inclemency ;
'T is not sic cauld that makes me cry.
But my love's heart grown cauld to me.
When we came in by Glasgow town.
We were a comely sight to .see ;
My love was clad in the black velvet.
And I mysell in cramasie.
But had I wist, before I kissed.
That love had been sae ill to win,
I'd locked my heart in a case of gold.
And pinned it with a silver pin.
Oh, oh, if my young babe were bom.
And set upon the nurse's knee.
And I mysell were dead and gane.
And the green grass gi-owin' over me !
ANONY.mous.
LADY ANN BOTHWÉLL'S LAMENT.
a scottish song.
Balow, my babe, ly stil and sleipe !
It grieves me sair to see thee weipe ;
If thoust be silent, Ise be glad.
Thy maining maks my heart ful sad.
Balow, my boy, thy mither's joy ! ^
Thy father breides me great annoy.
Balow, my habe, ly stil and sleipe !
II grieves me sair to see thee weipe.
When he began to court my hive.
And with his .sugred words to m uve.
His faynings fais and flattering cheire
To me th.at time did not appeire :
But now 1 see, most cruell hce.
Cares neither for my babe nor mee.
Balow, etc.
Ly stil, my darlinge, sleipe awhile.
And when thou wakest sweitly smile :
But smile not, as thy hither did,
To cozen maids ; nay, God forbid !
But yette 1 feire, thou wilt gae neire.
Thy fatheris hart and face to beire.
Balow, etc.
I cannae chuse, but ever will
Be hiving to thy father stil :
AVhaircir lie gae, whaireir he ryde.
My luve with him maun stil abyde ;
IÖ
In weil or wae, whaireir he gae.
Mine hart can neir depart him frae.
Balow, etc.
But doe not, doe not, prettie mine,
To faynings fais thine hart incline ;
Be loyal to thy hiver trew.
And nevir change hir for a new ;
If glide or faire, of hir have care.
For womens banning's wonderous sair.
Balow, etc.
Baifne, sin thy cruel father is gane.
Thy winsome smiles maun eise my paine ;
My babe and I '11 together live.
He '11 comfort me when cares doe grieve ;
My babe and I right saft will Ij',
And q^uite forgeit man's cnielty.
Balow, etc.
Farewell, farewell, thou falsest youth
That ever kist a woman's mouth !
I wish all maids be warned by mee,
Nevir to trust man's curtesy ;
For if we doe but chance to bow,
.They'll use us then they care not how.
Balow, my babe, ly stil and sleipe !
It grieves me sair to see thee weipe.
Anonymous.
MY HEID IS LIKE TO REND, WILLIE,
My held is like to rend, Willie,
My heart is like to break ;
I'm wearin' aff my feet, Willie,
I'm dyin' for your sake !
O, lay your cheek to mine, Willie,
Your hand on my bricst-bane, —
0, say ye 'II think on me, Willie,
When I am deid and gane !
It's vain to comfort me, Willie,
Sair grief maun ha'e its will ;
But let me rest upon your briest
To sab and greet my fill.
Let me sit on your knee, Willie,
Let me shed by your hair.
And look into the face, "Willie, '
1 never sail see mair !
I'm sittin' on your knee, Willie,
For the last time in my life, —
A puir heart-broken thing, Willie,
A niither, yet nae wife.
Ay, jn-ess your hand upon my heart.
Ami press it mair and mair.
Or it will burst the silken twine,
Sae Strang is its despair.
e-
270
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
O, wae's mo for the hour, Willie,
When we thegither met, —
0, wae's me for the time, Willie,
That our fivt tryst was set !
O, wae's me for the loanin' green
Where we were wont to gae, —
And wae's me for the destinie
That gart me luve thee sae !
0, dinna mind my words, Willie,
I downa seek to blame ;
But 0, it's hard to live, Willie,
And dree a warld's shame !
Het tears are hailin' ower your cheek.
And hailin' ower your chin :
AVhy weep ye sae for worthlessness.
For sorrow, and for sin ?
I'm weary o' this warld, Willie,
And sick wi' a' I see,
I canna live as 1 ha'e lived.
Or be as I should he.
But fauld unto your heart, Willie,
The heart that still is thine.
And kiss ance mair the white, white cheek
Ye said was red langsyne.
A stoun' gaes through my heid, Willie,
A sair stoun' through my heart ;
0, hand me up and let me kiss
Thy brow ere we twa pairt.
Anither, and anither yet ! —
How fast my life-strings break ! —
Fareweel ' fareweel ! through yon kirk-yard
Step lichtly for my sake !
The lav'rock in the lift, Willie,
That lilts far ower our heid.
Will sing the mom as merrilie
Abune the clay-cauld deid ;
And this green turf we 're sittin' on,
Wi' dew-draps shimmerin' sheen.
Will hap the heart that luvit thee
As warld has seldom seen.
But 0, remember me, Willie,
On land where'er ye he ;
And O, think on the leal, leal heart.
That ne'er luvit ane hut thee !
And 0, think on the cauld, cauld mools
That file my yellow hair.
That kiss the cheek, and kiss the chin
Ye never sail kiss mair !
wu.liam Motherwell.
A WOMAN'S LOVE.
A SENTINEL angel, sitting high in glory.
Heard this shrill wail ring out from Purgatory ;
" Have mercy, mighty angel, hear my stoiy !
"1 loved, — and, blind with passionate love, I
fell.
Love brought me down to death, and death to
Hell;
For God is just, and death for sin is welL
" 1 do not rage against his high decree.
Nor for myself do ask that grace shall be ;
But for my love on earth who mourns for me.
" Great Spirit ! Let me see my love .again
And comfort him one hour, and 1 were fain
To pay a thousand years of fire and pain."
Tlien said the pitying angel, "Nay, repent
That wild vow ! Look, the dial-finger's bent
Down to the last hour of thy punishment ! '
But still she wailed, " I pray thee, let me go !
1 cannot rise to peace and leave him so.
O, let me soothe him in his bitter woe ! "
The brazen gates ground sullenly ajar.
And upward, joyous, like a rising star.
She rose and vanished in the ether far.
But soon adown the dying sunset sailing.
And like a wounded bird her pinions trailing.
She fluttered back, with broken-hearted wailing.
She sobbed, " I found him by the summer sea
Reclined, his head upon a maiden's knee, —
She curled his hair and kissed him. Woe is me ! "
She wept, " Now let my punishment begin !
1 havç been fond and foolish. Let me in
To expiate my sorrow and my sin."
The angel answered, " Nay, sad soul, go higher I
To be deceived in your true heart's desire
Was bitterer than a thousand years of fire ! "
John Hay.
DEATH AND THE YOUTH.
" Not yet, the flowers are in my path.
Tire sun is in the sky ;
Not yet, my heart is full of hope,
I cannot bear to die.
"Not yet, I never knew till now
How precious life could be ;
My heart is full of love, 0 Death !
1 cannot come with thee ! "
But Love and Hope, enchanted twain.
Passed in their falsehood by ;
Death came again, and then he said,
" 1 'm ready now to die ! "
letitia Elizabeth I.andox.
a-
FRAGMENTS.
271
a
FEAGMENTS.
Fragility of Love.
There lives -within the very flame of love
A kind of wick or snuff that will abate it.
Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
The heart ! — Yes, I -wore it
As sign and as token
Of a love that once gave it,
A vow that was spoken ;
But a love, and a vow, and a heart.
Can he broken.
Hearts. A. A. PROCTER.
A love that took an early root.
And had an early doom.
Tfu Devil's Progress,
T. K. HERVEY.
False Hope.
Hope tells a flattering tale.
Delusive, vain, and hollow.
Ah, let not Hope prevail.
Lest disappointment follow.
The Universal Songster,
Miss Wrother.
Inconstancy of Man.
Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more.
Men were deceivers ever ;
One foot in sea and one on shore ;
To one thing constant never.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act iU Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE*
There is no music in a voice
That is hut one, and still the same ;
Inconstancy is hut a name
To fright poor lovers from a better choice.
Shepherds Holiday. J, RUTTER.
The fraud of men was ever so
Since summer first was leafy.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act à. Sc 3. SHAKESPEARE.
0 heaven ! were man
But constant, he were perfect : that one eiTor
Fills him with faults.
7'viq (ieniUiuen o/ t^erofta, Act v* Sc, 4* SHAKESPEARE.
Inconstancy of Woman.
There are three things a wise man will not trust ;
The wind, the sunshine of an Apiil day.
And woman's plighted faith.
Madoc, SOUTHEV.
Who trusts himself to woman or to waves
Should never hazard what he fears to lose.
Governor qf Cyprus, Oldmixon.
Away, away—you 're all the same,
A fluttering, smiling, jilting throng !
0, by my soul, I hum -with shame.
To think I've been your slave so long !
T. MOORE.
The Disappointed Heart.
The cold—the changed—perchance the dead
— anew.
The mourned, the loved, the lost — too many ! —
yet how few !
Childe Harold, Caui. ir. ' BYRON-
Do not drop in for an after-loss.
Ah, do not, when my heiirt hath scaped this sonw.
Come in the rearward of a conquered woe ;
Give not a windy night a rainy morrow,
To linger out a purposed overthrow.
Sonnet XC. shakespeare.
I have not loved the world, nor the world me.
Childe Harold, Cant, iii. BYRON.
At threescore winters' end I died,
A cheerless being, sole and sad ;
The nuptial knot 1 never tied,
And wish "my father never had.
Front the Greek. COWPER'S Trans.
Alas 1 the breast that inly bleeds
Hath naught to dread from outward blow :
Who falls from all he knows of bliss
Cares little into what abyss.
The titaour, bvron.
t 4
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
RESIGNATION.
TiiF.nK is jjo flock, ftiqwev|er watchid akà tended,
But onej dead] lambí is there !
There is no fireside, nortsoe'cr defended.
But Ufks cue Vacant chair 1 '
The air is full of farewells to the d3dng,
And mournings for the dead ;
The heart of Rachel, for her children crying,
Will not be comforted !
Let us be patient ! These severe afflictions
Not from the ground arise,
But oftentimes celestial benedictions
Assume this dark disguise.
We sec but dimly through the mists and vapors ;
Amid these earthly damps
What seem to us but sad, |'unereal tapera
May be heaven's distan' ■ lamps.
There is no Death ! What seems so is transition :
This life of mortal breath
Is but a suburb of the life elysian.
Whose portal we call Death.
She is not dead, —the child of our affection, —
But gone unto that school
Where she no longer needs our poor protection.
And Christ himself doth rule.
In that gi'cat cloister's stillness and seclusion.
By guardian angels led.
Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution.
She lives whom we call dead.
Day after day we think what she is doing
In those bright realms of air ;
Ycar'after year, her tender steps puraniug,
Behold lier grown more fair.
Thus do we walk with her, and keep unbroken
The bond which nature gives.
Thinking that our remembrance, though un¬
spoken,
May reach her where she lives.
Not as a child shall wc again behold her ;
For when with rai)tures wild
In our embraces we again enfold her.
She will not be a child :
But a fair maiden, in her Father's mansion.
Clothed with celestial grace ;
And beautiful with all the soul's expansion
Shall wc behold her face.
And though, at times, impetuous with emotion
And anguish long suppressed.
The swelling heart heaves moaning like the ocean.
That cannot be at rest, —
We will be patient, and assuage the feeling
We may not wholly stay ;
By silence sanctifying, not concealing.
The grief that must have way.
Henry Wadswokth Lo.ncfellow.
BURIED TO-DAY.
BuRiF.n to-day.
When the soft green buds are bursting out,
And up on the south-wind comes a shout
Of village boys and girls at play
In the mild spring evening gray.
Taken away.
Sturdy of heart and stout of limb.
From eyes that drew half their light from
him.
And put low, low underneath the clay.
In his spring, — on this spring day.
Passes away,
All the pride of boy-life begun.
All the hope of life yet to run ;
Who dares to (jucstion when One saith " Nay."
Murmur not, — only iiray.
Entera to-day
Another body in churchyaitl sod.
Another soul on the life in God.
His Christ was buried — and lives alway :
Trust Him, and go your way.
Dinah Maria Mulock CRAIi-
GRIEF FOR THE DEAD.
O nEAUTs that never cease to yeani !
0 brimming tcara that ne'er are dried !
The dead, though they depart, i-eturn
As though thev had not died !
Ö-
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
273
The living are the only dead ;
The dead live, — nevermore to die ;
And often, when wo mourn them fled.
They never were so nigh !
And though they lie beneath the waves.
Or sleep within the churchyard dim,
(Ah ! through how many different graves
God's children go to him !) —
Yet every grave gives up its dead
Ere it is overgrown with grass ;
Then why should hopeless tears be shed,
Or need we cry, " Alas " ?
Or why should Memory, veiled with gloom,
And like a sorrowing mourner craped.
Sit weeping o'er an empty tomb.
Whose captives have escaped ?
'T is but a mound, —and will be mossed
Whene'er the summer grass appears ;
The loved, though wept, are never lost ;
We only lose — our tears !
Nay, Hope may whisper with the dead
By bending forward where they are ;
But Memory, with a backward tread.
Communes with them afar.
The joys we lose are but forecast.
And we shall find them all once more ;
AVe look behind us for the Past,
But lo ! 't is all before !
Anonymous.
LINES
to the memory of " annie," who died at milan.
JUNE 6, lS6o.
•'Jesus saith unto her, Woman, why weepest thou? whom seek-
est thou? She. supposing' him to be the gardener, saith unto him.
Sir, if thou liave borne htm hence, tell me where thou ha&t laid
him."—John xx. 15.
In the fair gardens of cele.stial peace
Walketh a gardener in meekness chad ;
Fair are the Howers that wTeatbc bis detvy locks,
And bis mysterious eyes are sweet and sad.
Fair are the silent foldings of bis robes,
Falling with saintly calmness to his feet ;
And wlien he walks, each floweret to bis will
With living pnlse of sweet accord doth beat.
Every green leaf thrills to its tender heart.
In the mild summer radiance of bis eye ;
No fear of storm, or cold, or bitter fro.st.
Shadows the flowerets when their sun is nigh.
And all our pleasant haunts of earthly love
Are nurseries to those gardens of the air ;
And his far-darting eye, with starry beam.
Watching the gi'owing of his treasures there.
We call them ours, o'erwept with selfish tears,
O'erwatched with restless longings night and
day ;
Forgetful of the high, mysterious right
He holds to bear our cherished plants awa}-.
Bnt when some sunny spot in those.hright fields
Needs the fair presence of an added fiowcr,
Down sweeps a starry angel in the night :
At morn the rose has vanished from our bower.
Where stood our tree, our flower, there is a grave !
Blank, silent, vacant ; hut in worlds above,
Like a new star ontblossomed in the skies.
The angels hail an added flower of love.
Dear friend, no more upon that lonely mound.
Strewed with the red and yellow autumn Iciif,
Drop thou the tear, hut raise the fainting eye
Beyond the autumn mists of earthly givof.
Thy garden ro.sehnd bore within its breast
Those mysteries of color, warm and bright.
That the bleak climate of this lower sphere
Could never waken into fonn and light.
Yes, the sweet Gardener hath home her henee.
Nor must thou ask to take her thence away ;
Thou slialt behold her, in some coming hour.
Full blossomed in his fields of cloudless day.
HARRIET BEECHER STOWE.
&
FOOTSTEPS OF ANGELS.
When the hours of da}' are numbered.
And the voices of the night
Wake the better soul that slumbered
To a holy, calm delight, —
Ere the evening lamps are lighted.
And, like phantoms grim and tall,
Shadows from the fitful firelight
Dance upon the parlor wall ;
Then the forms of the departed
Enier at the 'open door, —
The beloved ones, the true-hefirted.
Come to visit me once more ;
He, the young and strong, who cherished
Noble longings for the strife.
By the roadside fell and perished.
Weary with the march of life !
IS
274
-t— —
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
They, the holy ones and weakly,
Who the cross of suffering bore.
Folded their pale hands so meekly.
Spake with us on earth no more !
And with them the being beauteous
Who unto my youth was given.
More than all things else to love me,
And is now a saint in heaven.
With a alow and noiseless footstep.
Comes tliat messenger divine.
Takes the vacant chair beside me.
Lays her gentle hand in mine ;
And she sits and gazes at me
With those deep and tender eyes.
Like the stai-s, so still and saint-like,
Looking downward from the skies.
Uttered not, yet comprehended.
Is the spirit's voiceless prayer.
Soft rebukes, in blessings ended.
Breathing from her lips of air.
O, though oft depressed and lonely.
All my fears are laid aside
If I but remember only
Such as these have lived and died !
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
»—
THE OLD FAMILIAR FACES.
I HAVh had playmates, I have had companions.
In my days of childhood, in my joyful school¬
days ; ' ■ V
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.
I have been laughing, I have been carousing.
Drinking late, sitting late, with my bosom cro¬
nies ;
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.
I loved a Love once, fairest among women :
Clased are her doom on me, I must not see her, —
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.
I have a friend, a kinder friend has no man .
Like an ingrate, I left my friend abruptly ;
Left him, to muse on the old familiar faces.
Ghost-like T paced round the haunts of my child¬
hood.
Earth seemed a desert I was bound to traverse.
Seeking to find the old familiar- faces.
Friend of my bosom, thou more than a brother.
Why wert not thou bom in my father's dwelling ?
So might we talk of the old familiar faces.
How some they have died, and some they have
left me,
And some are taken from me ; all are departed ;
All, all are gone, the old familiar faces.
Charles lamb.
THEY ARE ALL GONE.
Thet are all gone into the world of light.
And I alone sit lingering here !
Their very memory is fair and bright.
And my sad thoughts doth clear ;
It glows and glitters in my cloudy breast.
Like stars upon some gloomy grove, —
Or those faint beams in which this hill is drest
After the sun's remove.
I see them walking in an air of glory.
Whose light doth trample on my days, —
My days which are at best but dull aud hoary,
Mere glimmering and decays.
0 holy hope ! and high humility, —
High as the heavens above ! ^
These are your walks, and you have showed them
me
To kindle my cold love.
Dear, beauteous death, — the jewel of the just, —
Shining nowhere but in the dark !
What mysteries do lie beyond thy dust.
Could man outlook that mark !
He that hath found some fledged bird's nest may
know,
At first sight, if the bird be flown ;
But what fair dell or grove he sings in now.
That is to him unknown.
And yet, as angels in some brighter dreams
Call to the soul when man doth sleep.
So some strange thoughts transcend our wonted
themes.
And into glory peep.
If a star were confined into a tomb.
Her captive flames must needs bum there.
But when the hand that locked her up gives room.
She '11 shine through all the sphere.
0 Father of eternal life, and all ,
Created glories under thee !
Resume thy spirit from this world of thrall
Into true liberty.
WHITTJKirs HOME AT AMESEURY.
{BirthJ>lace at //az'er/n'//.)
And sweet homes nestle in these dales,
And perch along these wooded swells.
And, hlest beyond Arcadian vales,
They hear the sound of Sabbath belU."
fl-
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
275
Either disperse these mists, which blot and fill
My perspective still as they pass ;
Or else remove me hence unto that hill
Where I shall need no glass.
Henry Vaughan.
e-
THE FUTURE LIFE.
sphero'which keepji
the dead,
could wither sleeps
ihg the dust we tread ?
For I mtra^Üte jÜBg of ceaseless pain
If tliere 1'meet thy gMitle presence not ;
Nor bear tlm v.nica I Inv^, nor r^ad again
In thy serenest eyes the tender thought.
Will not thy own meek heart demand me there ?
That heart whose fondest throbs to me were
given ;
My name on earth was ever in thy prayer.
And wilt thou never utter it in heaven ?
In meadows fanned hy heaven's life-breathing
wind.
In the resplendence of that glorious sphere,
And larger movements of the unfettered mind.
Wilt thou forget the love that joined us here ?
The love that lived through all the stormy past,
And meekly with my harsher nature bore.
And deeper grew, and tenderer to the last.
Shall it expire with life, and be no more ?
A happier lot than mine, and larger light.
Await thee there ; for thou hast bowed thy will
In cheerful homage to the rule of right.
And lovest all, and renderest good for ill
For me, the .sordid cares in which I dwell.
Shrink and consume my heart, as heat the
scroll ;
Aiid wi-ath has left its scar—that fire of hell
Has left its frightful scar upon my soul.
Yet though thou wear'st the glory of the sky.
Wilt thou not keep the same beloved name.
The sanie fair thoughtful brow, and gentle eye.
Lovelier iu heaven's sweet climate, yet the
same ?
Shalt thou not teach me, in that calmer home.
The wisdom that I learned so ill in this —
The wisdom which is love — till I become
Thy fit companion in that land of bliss ?
William Collen Bryant.
THE ANGEL OF PATIENCE.
a free paraphrase of the german.
To weary hearts, to mourning homes,
God's meekest Angel gently comes ;
No power has he to banish pain.
Or give us hack our lost again ;
And yet in tenderest love our dear
And heavenly Father sends him here.
There's quiet in that Angel's glance,
There's rest in his still countenance !
He mocks no grief with idle cheer.
Nor wounds with words the mourner's ear ;
But ills and woes he may not cure
He kindly trains us to endure.
Angel of Patience ! sent to calm
Our feverish hrows with cooling palm ;
To lay the storms of hope and fear.
And reconcile life's smile and tear ;
The throbs of wounded pride to-still,
And make our own our Father's will !
0 thou who moumest on thy way.
With longings for the close of day ;
He walks with thee, that-Angel kind,
And gently whispers, " Be resigned :
Bear up, bear on, the end shall tell
The dear Lord ordereth all things well ! "
John Greenleaf Whittier.
THE FIRST SNOW-FALL.
The snow had begun in the gloaming.
And busily all the night
Had been heaping field and highway
With a silence deep and white.
Every pine and fir and hemlock
Wore ermine too dear for an earl.
And the poorest twig on the clm-ti-ee
Was ridged inch deep with pearl.
From sheds new-roofed with Canura
Came Chanticleer's muffled crow,
Tlie stiff rails were softened to swan's-down.
And still fiuttered down the snow.
I stood and watched by the window
The noiseless work of the sk)%
And the sudden flurries of snow-birds.
Like brown leaves whirling bj'.
I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn,
Where a little headstone stood ;
How the flakes were folding it gently.
As did robins the babes in the wood.
Ci
276
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
-a
Up spoke our own little Mabel,
Saying, " Father, who makes it snow ? "
And I told of the good All-father
Who cares for us here below.
Again I looked at the snow-fall.
And thought of the leaden sky
That arched o'er our first great sorrow.
When tliat mound was heaped so high.
I remembered the gradual patience
That fell from that cloud like snow.
Flake by flake, healing and hiding
The scar of our deep-plunged woe.
And again to the child I whispered,
"The snow that huslieth all,
Darling, the merciful Father
Alone can make it fall ! "
Then, with eyes that saw not, I kissed her ;
And she, kissing back, could not know
That my kiss was given to her sister.
Folded close under deepening snow.
ja.mes Russell Lowell.
Ci
THE REAPER AND THE FLOWERS.
Thtre is a Reaper whose name is Death,
And, with his sickle keen,
He reaps the bearded grain at a breath.
And the flowers that grow between.
"Shall 1 have naught that is fair?" saith he ;
" Have naught but the bearded grain ?
Though tlie breath of these flowers is sweet to me,
I will give them all back again."
He gazed at the flowers with tearful eyes.
He kissed their drooping leaves ;
It was for the Loi-d of Paradise
He bound them in his sheaves.
" My Lord has need of these flowerets gay,*'
The Reaper said, and smiled ;
"Deartokens of the earth are the}';
Where he was once a child.
"The)' shall all bloom in fields of light,
Tmnsplanted by my care.
And saints, upon their garments white.
These sacred blossoms wear."
And the mother gave, in tears and pain.
The flowers she most did love ;
She knew she should find them all again
In the fields of light above.
0, not in cruelty, not in wrath.
The Reaper came that d.ay ;
T was an angel visited the green earth,
And took the flowers away.
Henry Wadsworth Lo.ncfellow.
OVER THE
OvEr the riviT they '
Lu I I'd ones who 'ye erosi
The gleam of their snowy i
But their voices are lost I
■ u. t
There's one with ringlets of suni^
And eyes the reflection of heavcnA^^n blue ;
He crossed in the t-wilight gray andcold,.
And the pale mist hid him from mortal view.
We saw not the angels who met liim there.
The gates of the city ■we could not see :
Over the river, over the river.
My brother stands waiting to welcome me.
Over the river the boatman pale
Carried another, the household pet ;
Her brown curls waved in the gentle gale.
Darling Minnie ! 1 see her yet.
She crossed on her bosom her dimpled hands.
And fearlessly entered the phantom bark ;
We felt it glide from the silver sands.
And all our sunshine grew strangely dark ;
We know she is safe on the farther side.
Where all the ransomed and angels be :
Over the river, the mystic river.
My childhood's idol is waiting for me.
For none return from those quiet .shores.
Who cross with the boatman cold and pale ;
We hear the dip of tire golden oars.
And catch a gleam of the snowy sail ;
And lo ! they have passed from our yearning
hearts,
They cross the stream and are gone for aye.
We may not sunder the veil apart
That hides from our vision the gates of day ;
AVe only know that their Rnks no more
May sail with us o'er life's stomiy sea ;
Yet somewhere, I know, on the unseen shore.
They watch, and beckon, aud wait for me.
And I sit and think, when the sunset's gold
Is flushing river and hill and shore,
I shall one day stand by the water cojd.
And list for the sound of the boatman's oar ;
I shall watch for a gleam of the flapping sail,
I shall hear the boat as it gains the strand,
I shall luiss from sight with tlie boatman pale.
To the better shore of the spirit land.
fl-
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
217
::3
I shall know the loved who have gone before,
And joyfully sweet will the meeting be,
"When over the river, the peaceful river.
The angel of death shall carry me.
Nancy Woodbury priest.
THE TWO WAITINGS.
Dear hearts, you ^ere waiting a year ago
For the glory to be revealed ;
Yon were wondering deeply, with bated breath.
What treasure the days concealed.
O, would it be this, or would it be that ?
Would it be girl or boy ?
Would it look like father or mother most ?
And what should you do for joy ?
And then, one day, when the time was full.
And the spring was coming fast.
The trembling veil of the body was rent.
And you saw your baby at last.
Was it or not what you had dreamed ?
It was, and yet it was not ;
But O, it was better a thousand times
Than ever you wished or thought.
II.
And now, dear hearts, you are waiting again.
While the spring is coming fast ;
For the baby that was a future dream
Is now a dream of the past :
A dream of sunshine, and all that's sweet ;
Of all that is pure and bright ;
Of eyes that were blue as the sky by day.
And as soft as the stars by night.
You are waiting again for the fulness of time.
And the gloi-y to be revealed ;
You are wondering deeply with aching hearts
What treasure is now concealed.
0, will she be' this, or will she be that ?
And what will there be in her face
That will tell you sure that she is your own,
When you meet in the heavenly place ?
As it was before, it will be again.
Fashion your dream as you will ;
When the veil is rent, and the glory is seen.
It will more than your hope fulßl.
John White Chadwick.
FOR CHARLIE'S SAKE.
The night is late, the house is still ;
The angels of the hour fulñl
Their tender ministries, and move
From couch to couch in cares of love.
They drop into thy dreams, sweet wife.
The happiest smile of Charlie's life.
And lay on baby's lips a kiss.
Fresh from his angel-broliher's bliss ;
And, as they pass, they seem to make
A strange, dim hymn, " For Charlie's sake." ,
My listening heart takes up the strain.
And gives it to the night again.
Fitted with words of lowly praise.
And patience learned of mournful days.
And memories of the dead child's ways.
His will be done. His will be done !
Who gave and took away my son.
In " the far land " to shine and sing
Before the Beautiful, the King,
Who every day doth Christmas make.
All starred and belled for Charlie's sake.
For Charlie's sake I will arise ;
I will anoint me where he lies.
And change my raiment, and go in
To the Lord's house, and leave my sin
Without, and seat me at his board.
Eat, and be glad, and praise the Lord.
For wherefore should I fast and weep.
And sullen moods of mourning keep '!
I cannot bring him back, nor he.
For any calling, come to me.
The bond the angel Death did sign,
God sealed — for Charlie's sake, and mine.
I'm very poor — this slender stone
Marks all the narrow field I own ;
Yet, patient husbandman, I till
With faith and prayere, that precious hill.
Sow it with penitential pains.
And, hopeful, wait the latter rains ;
Content if, after all, the spot
Yield barely one forget-me-not —
Whether or figs or thistles make
My crop, content for Charlie's sake.
I have no houses, builded well —
Only that little lonesome cell.
Where never romping playmates come.
Nor bashful sweethearts, cunning-dumb—
An April buret of girls and boys.
Their lainljowed cloud of glooms and joys
Born with their songs, gone with their toys ;
Nor ever is its stillness .stirred
By purr of cat, or chirp of bird,
!&
278
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Or mother's twilight legend, told
Of Homer's pie, or Tiddler's gold.
Or fairy hobbling to the door,
Red-cloaked and weird, banned and poor.
To bless the good child's gracious eyes.
The good child's wistful charities.
And crippled changeling's hunch to make
Dance on his ci'utch, for good child's sake.
How is it with the child ? 'T is well ;
Nor would I any miracle
Might stir my sleeper's tranquil trance.
Or plague his painless countenance :
I would not any seer might place
His staff on my immortal's face.
Or lip to lijr, and eye to eye.
Charm back his pale mortality.
No, Shunamite ! I would not break
God's stillness. Let them weep who wake.
For Charlie's sake my lot is blest :
No comfort like his mother's breast.
No praise like here ; no charm expressed
In fairest forms hath half her zest.
For Charlie's sake this bird's caressed
That death left lonely in the nest ;
For Charlie's sake my heart is dressed.
As for its birthday, in its best ;
For Charlie's sake we leave the rest
To Him who gave, and who did take.
And saved us twice, for Charlie's sake.
John wicuamson Palmer.
"ONLY A YEAR."
One year ago, — a ringing voice,
A clear blue eye.
And clustering curls of sunny hair.
Too fair to die.
Only a year, — no voice, no smile.
No glance of eye.
No clustering curls of golden hair.
Fair but to die !
One year ago, — what loves, what schemes
Far into life !
"What joyous hopes, what high resolves.
What generous strife !
The silent picture on the wall,
The burial-stone
Of all that beauty, life, and joy.
Remain alone !
One year, — one year, — cue little year.
And so much gone !
And yet the even flow of life
Moves calmly on.
The grave grows green, the flowers bloom fair,
Above that head ;
No sorrowing tint of leaf or spray
Says he is dead.
No pause or hush of merry birds
That sing above
Tells us how coldly sleeps below
The form we love.
Where hast thou been tliis year, beloved ?
What hast thou seen, —
What visions fair, what glorious life,
V/here thou hast been ?
The veil ! the veil ! so thin, so strong !
'Twixt us and thee ;
The mystic veil ! when shaR it fall.
That we may see ?
Not dead, not sleeping, not even gone,
But present still.
And waiting for the coming hour
Of God's sweet wilL
Lord of the living and the dead.
Our Saviour dear !
We lay in silence at thy feet
This sad, sad year.
Harriet Beecher STOwa.
MY CHILD.
I cannot make him dead !
His fair sunshiny head
Is ever bounding round my study chair ;
Yet when my eyes, now dim
With tears, 1 turn to him.
The vision vanishes, — he is not there !
1 walk my parlor floor.
And, through the open door,
1 hear a footfall on the chamber stair ;
I'm stejiping toward the hall
To give the boy a call ;
And then bethink me that—he is not there !
1 thread the crowded street ;
A satchelled lad 1 meet.
With the same beaming eyes and colored hair ;
And, as he's running by,
F'ollow him with my eye.
Scarcely believing that — he is not there !
I know his face is hid
Under the coffin lid ;
Closed are his eyes ; cold is his forehead fair ;
fi-
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
279
f
My hand that marble felt 5
O'er it in prayer I knelt ;
Yet my heart whispers that — he is not there !
I cannot make him dead i
"When passing by the bed,
So long watched over with parental care,
My spirit and my eye
Seek him inquiringly.
Before the thought comes, that—he is not there !
When, at the cool gray break
Of day, from sleep I wake,
AVith my first breathing of the morning air
My soul goes up, with joy.
To Him who gave my boy ;
Then comes the sad thought that — he is not
there !
When at the day's calm close.
Before we seek repose,
I'm with his mother, offering up our prayer ;
Whate'er I may be saying,
I am in spirit praying
For our boy's spirit, though — he is not there !
Not there ! — Where, then, is he ?
The form I used to see
Was but the raiment that he used to wear.
The grave, that now doth press
Upon that cast-off' dress.
Is but his wardrobe locked ; —^ he is not there !
He lives ! — In all the past
He lives ; nor, to the last.
Of seeing him again will I despair ;
In dreams I see him now ;
And, on his angel brow,
I see it written, " Thou shalt see me tíiere ! "
Yes, we all live to God !
Father, thy chastening rod
So help us, thine afflicted ones, to bear,
Tliat, in the spirit land,
Meeting at thy right hand,
'T will be our heaven to find that — he is there !
John Piekpont.
h
CASA WAPPY.
the child's pet name, chosen by himself.
And hast thou sought thy heavenly home,
Our fond, dear boy, —
The realms where sorrow dare not come.
Where life is joy ?
Pure at tliy death as at thy birth.
Thy spirit caught no taint from earth ;
Even by its bliss we mete our dearth.
Casa Wappy !
Despair was in our last farewell.
As closed thine eye ;
Tears of our anguish may not tell
AVhen thou didst die ;
Words may not paint our grief for thee ;
Sighs are but bubbles on the sea
Of our unfathomed agony ;
Casa Wappy !
Thou wert a vision of delight.
To bless us given ;
Beauty embodied to our sight,
A type of heaven I
So dear to us thou wert, thou art
Even less thine own self, than a part
Of mine, and of thy mother's heart.
Casa Wappy !
Thy bright, brief day knew no decline,
'T was cloudless joy ;
Sunrise and night alone were thine,
Belovèd boy I
This moon beheld thee blithe and gay ;
That found thee prostrate in decay ;
And ere a third shone, clay was clay.
Casa Wappy !
Gem of our hearth, our household pride.
Earth's undefiled,
Could love have saved, thou hadst not died.
Our dear, sweet child !
Humbly we bow to Fate's decree ;
Yet had we hoped that Time should see
Thee moura for us, not us for thee.
Casa Wappy !
Do what I may, go where I will.
Thou meet'st my sight ;
There dost thou glide before me still, —
A form of light !
I feel thy breath upon my cheek —
I see thee smile, I hear thee speak —
Till O, my heart is like to break,
Casa Wappy !
Methinks thou smil'st before me now.
With glance of stealth ;
The hair thrown back from thy full brow
In buoyant health :
I see thine eyes' deep violet light,
Thy dimpled cheek carnationed bright,
Thy clasping anns so roUnd and white.
Casa Wappy !
The nursery shows thy pictured wall.
Thy bat, thy bow.
Thy cloak and bonnet, club and ball ;
But where art thou '?
■&
230
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
A corner holds thine empty chair,
Thy playthings idly scattered there.
But speak to us of our despair,
Casa M'appy !
Even to the last thy every word —
To glad, to grieve —
Was sweet as sweetest song of bird
On summer's eve ;
In outward beauty undecayed,
Death o'er thy spirit cast no shade.
And like the rainbow thou didst fade.
Casa Wappy !
We mourn for thee when blind, blank night
The chamber fills ;
AVe pine for thee when morn's first light
Keddens the hills :
The sun, the moon, the stars, the sea,
All — to the wallflower and wild pea —
Are changed ; we saw the world through thee.
Casa Wappy !
And though, perchance, a smile may gleam
Of casual mirth,
It doth not own, whate'er may seem.
An inward birth ;
We miss thy small step on the stair ;
We miss thee at thine evening prayer ;
All day we miss thee, — everywhere,.—
Casa Wappy !
Snows muffled earth when thou didst go.
In life's spring-bloom,
Down to the appointed house below, —
The silent tomb.
But now the gieen leaves of the tree.
The cuckoo, and "the busy bee,"
Eetuni, — but with them bring not thee,
Casa Wappy !
'T is so ; but can it be — while flowers
Revive again —
Man's doom, in death that we and ours
For aye remain ?
O, can it be, that o'er the grave
The gi-ass renewed should yearly wave.
Yet God forget our child to save ? —
Casa Wappy !
It cannot be ; for were it so
Thus man could die.
Life were a mockery, thought were woe,
And truth a lie ;
Heaven were a coinage of the brain ;
Religion frenzy, virtue vain.
And all our hopes to meet again.
Casa Wappy !
Then be to us, 0 dear, lost child !
"With beam of love,
A star, death's uncongenial wild
Smiling above !
Soon, soon thy little feet have trod
The skyward path, the. seraph's road.
That led thee back from man to God,
Casa Wappy !
Yet't is sweet balm to our despair.
Fond, fairest boy.
That heaven is God's, and thou art there.
With him in joy ;
There past are death and all its woes ;
There beauty's stream forever flows ;
And pleasure's day no sunset knows.
Casa Wappy !
Farewell, then — for a while, farewell, —
Pride of my heart !
It cannot be that long we dwell.
Thus torn apart.
Time's shadows like the shuttle flee ,
And dark howe'er life's night may be.
Beyond the grave I '11 meet with thee.
Casa Wappy !
David Macbeth Moir.
THE MERRY LARK.
The merry, merry lark was up and singing,
And the hare was out and feeding on the lea.
And the merry, meny bells below were ringing.
When my child's laugh rang through me.
Now the hare is snared and dead beside the
snowyard.
And the lark beside the dreary winter sea.
And my baby in his cradle in the churchyard
Waiteth there until the bells bring me.
Charles Kingslev.
THE MORNING-GLORY.
We wreathed about our darling's head
The morning-glory bright ;
Her little face looked out beneath
So full of life and light.
So lit as with a sunrise.
That we could only say,
" She is the morning-glory true,
And her poor types are they."
So always from that happy time
We called her by their name.
And very fitting did it seem, -
For sme as morning came.
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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
281
Behind her cradle bars she smiled
To catch the first faint ra)',
As from the trellis smiles the fiower
And opens to the day.
But not so beautiful they rear
Their airy cups of blue,
As turned her sweet eyes to the light,
Brimmed with sleep's tender dew ;
Ami not so close their tendrils fine
Round their supports are thrown.
As those dear arms whose outstretched plea
Clasped all hearts to her own.
We used to think how she had come.
Even as comes the flower.
The last and perfect added gift
To crown Love's morning hour ;
And how in her was imaged forth
The love we could not say.
As on the little dewdrops round
Shines back the heart of day.
We never could have thought, 0 God,
That she must wither up.
Almost before a day was flown.
Like the morning-glory's cup ;
We never thought to see her droop
Her fair and noble head.
Till she lay stretched before our eyes.
Wilted, and cold, and dead !
The morning-glory's blossoming
Will soon be coming round, —
We see their rows of heart-shaped leaves
Upspriuging from the ground ;
The tender things the winter killed
Renew again their birth.
But the glory of our morning
Has passed away from earth.
Earth ! in vain our aching eyes
Stretch over thy green plain !
Too harsh thy dews, too gross thine air.
Her spirit to sustain ;
But up in groves of Paradise
Full surely we shall see
Our morning-glory beautiful
Twine round our dear Lord's knee.
Maria White Lowell.
ARE THE CHILDREN AT HOME?
Each day, when the glow of sunset
Fades in the western sky,
And the wee one.s, tired of playing.
Go tripping lightly by.
I steal away from my husband.
Asleep in his easy-chair.
And watch from the open doorway
Their faces fresh and fair.
Alone in the dear old homestead
That once was full of life.
Ringing with girlish laughter.
Echoing boyish strife.
We two are waiting together ;
And oft, as the shadows come.
With tremulous voice he calls me,
" It is night ! are the children home ?'
" Yes, love ! " I answer him gently,
" They 're all home long ago ; " —
And I sing, in my quivering treble,
A song so soft and low.
Till the old man drops to slumber,
With his head upon his hand.
And I tell to myself the number
At home in the better land.
At home, where never a sorrow
Shall dim their eyes with tears !
Where the smile of God is on them
Through all the summer years !
I know, — yet my arms are empty,
That fondly folded seven.
And the mother heart within me
Is almost starved for heaven.
Sometimes, in the dusk of evening,
I only shut my eyes.
And the children are all about me,
A vision from the skies :
The babes whose dimpled fingers
Lost the way to my breast.
And the beautiful ones, tlie angels.
Passed to the world of the blest.
With never a cloud upon them,
I see their radiant brows ;
My boys that I gave to freedom, —
The red sword sealed their vows !
In a tangled Southern forest.
Twin brothers bold and brave.
They fell ; aud the flag they died for.
Thank God ! floats over their grave.
A breath, an# the vision is lifted
Away on wings of light.
And again we two are together.
All alone in the night.
They tell me his mind is failing.
But I smile at idle feai-s ;
He is only baek with the children.
In the dear and peaceful years.
[&
282
a
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
And still, as the summer sunset
Fades away in the west,
And the wee ones, tired of playing.
Go trooping home to rest,
My husband calls from his corner,
" Say, love, have the children come ? "
And I answer, with eyes uplifted,
" Yes, dear ! they are all at home."
Margaret E. M. Sangster.
BABY SLEEPS.
1 *'Sbe U not dead, but sleepeth." — LUKE viü.52.
The baby wept ;
The mother took it from the nurse's arms.
And hushed its fears, and soothed its vain alarms.
And baby slept.
Again it weeps.
And God doth take it from the mother's arms.
From present griefs, and future unknown harms.
And baby sleeps.
Samuel hinds.
GO TO THY BEST.
Go to thy rest, fair child !
Go to thy dreamless bed,
"While yet so gentle, undefiled.
With blessings on thy head.
Fresh roses in thy hand.
Buds on thy pillow laid.
Haste from this dark and fearful land.
Where flowers so quickly fade.
Ere sin has seared the breast.
Or soiTow waked the tear.
Rise to thy throne of changeless rest.
In yon celestial .sphere !
Because thy smile was fair,
Thy lip and eye so bright.
Because thy loving cradle-care
Was such a dear delight.
Shall love, with weak embrace.
Thy upward wing detain ?
Ho ! gentle angel, seek thy place
Amid the cherub train.
Lydia hu.ntley Sicoueney.
THE WIDOW'S MITE.
A ■WIDOW—slie had only one !
A puny and decrepit son ;
But, day and night.
Though fretful oft, and weak and small,
A loving child, he was her all —
The Widow's Mite.
The Widow's Mite — ay, so sustained.
She battled onward, nor complained.
Though friends were fewer :
And while she toUed for daUy fare,
A little cmtch upon the stair
Was music to her.
I saw her then, — and now I see
That, though resigned and cheerful, she
Has sorrowed much :
She has. He gave it tenderly.
Much faith ; and carefully laid by.
The little crutch.
frederick Locker.
"THEY ARE DEAR FISH TO ME."
The farmer's wife sat at the door,
A pleasant sight to see ;
And blithesome were the wee, wee bairns
That played around her knee.
When, bending 'neath her heavy creel,
A poor flsh-wife came by,
And, turning from the toilsome road.
Unto the door drew nigh.
She laid her burden on the green.
And spread its scaly store ;
With trembling hands and pleading words
She told them o'er and o'er.
But lightly laughed the young guidwife,
" We 're no sae scarce o' cheer ;
Tak' up your creel, and gang your ways, —
I '11 buy nae fish sae dear."
Bending beneath her load again,
A weary sight to see ;
Right sorely sighed the poor fish-wife, ;
" They are dear fish to me !
" Our boat was oot ae fearfii night.
And when the storm blew o'er.
My husband, and my three brave son%
Lay corpses on the shore.
" I've been a wife for thirty yearn,
A childless widow three ;
I maun buy them now to sell again, —
They are dear fish to mo ! "
The fanner's wife turned to the door, —
What was't upon her cheek ?
What was there rising in her breast.
That then .she scarce could .speak ?
■J
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
283
a
She thought upon her ain guidman,
Her lightsome laddies three ;
The woman's words had pierced her heart, —
"They are dear fish to me !"
" Come back," she cried, with quivering voice,
And pity's gathering tear ;
" Come in, come in, my poor woman.
Ye 're kindly welcome here.
" I kentna o' your aching heart.
Your weaiy lot to dree ;
"I '11 ne'er forget your sad, sad words :
' They are dear fish to me ! ' "
Ay, let the happy-hearted leam
To pause ere they deny
The meed of honest toil, and think
How much their gold may buy, —
How much of manhood's wasted strength.
What woman's misery, —
What breaking hearts might swell the cry :
" They are dear fish to me ! "
Anonymous.
■&
CORONACH.
from " the lady of the lake," canto iii.
He is gone on the mountain.
He is lost to the forest.
Like a summer-dried fountain
When our need was the sorest.
Tlie font, reappearing.
From the rain-drops shall borrow.
But to us comes no cheering.
To Duncan no monxiw :
The hand of the reaper
Takes the eara that are hoary ;
But the voice of the weeper
M^ails manhood in glory.
The autumn winds rushing
Waft the leaves that are searest.
But our flower was in flushing
When blighting was nearest.
Fleet foot on the correi.
Sage counsel in cumber.
Red hand in the foray.
How sound is thy slumber •
Like the dew on the mountain.
Like the foam on the river.
Like the bubble on the fountain.
Thou art gone, and forever !
Sir Walter Scott.
.MOTHER AND POET.
turin.—after news from gaeta. 1861.
This was Laura Savto of Turin, a poetess aad patriot, whose
sons were killed at Ancooa and Gaëto«
Dead ! one of them shot by the sea in the east.
And one of them shot in the west by the sea.
Dead ! both my boys ! When you sit at the
feast.
And are wanting a great song for Italy free.
Let none look at me !
Yet I was a poetess only last year,
And good at my art, for a woman, men said.
But this woman, this, who is agonized here.
The east sea and west sea rhyme on in her head
Forever instead.
What art can a woman be good at? 0, vain !
What art is she good at, but hurting her breast
With the milk teeth of babes, and a smile at the
pain ?
Ah, boys, how you hurt ! you were strong as
you pressed.
And I proud by that test.
What art's for a woman ! To hold on her knees
Both darlings ! to feel all their arms round her
throat
Cling, struggle a little ! to sew by degrees
And 'broider the long-clothes and neat little
coat !
To dream and to dote.
To teach them ... It stings there. I made them
indeed
Speak plain the word "country," I taught
them, no doubt.
That a country's a thing men .should die for at
need.
I prated of liberty, rights, and about
The tyrant turned out.
And when their eyes flashed ... O my beautiful
eyes !...
I exulted I nay, let them go forth at the wheels
Of the guns, and denied not. — But then tho
surprise.
When one sits quite alone I — Then one weeps,
then one kneels !
—-God ! how the house feels !
At first happy news came, in gay letters moiled
With my kisses, of camp-life, and glory, and
how
They both loved me, and soon, coming home to
be spoiled,
In raturn would fan off every fly from my brow
With their green laurel-bough.
fi-
284
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
-a
Then was triumph at Turin. " Ancona was free ! "
And some one came out of the cheers in the
street
With a face pale as stone, to say something to me.
—My Guido was dead ! — I fell down at his feet,
While they cheered in the street.
I bore it ; — friends soothed me : my gi-ief looked
sublime
As the ransom of Italy. One boy remained
To be leant on and walked with, recalling the
time
When the first grew immortal, while both of
us strained
To the height he liad gained.
And letters still came, — shorter, sadder, more
strong,
Writ now but in one hand. " I was not to
faint.
One loved me for two . . . would be with me ere¬
long :
And ' Viva Italia ' he died for, our saint.
Who forbids our complaint."
My Nanni would add "he was safe, and aware
Of a presence that turned off the balls. .. was
imprest
It was Guido himself, who knew what I could
bear.
And how't was impossible, quite dispossessed,
To live on for the rest."
On which without pause up the telegraph line
Swept smoothly the next news from Gaëta :—
"Shot.
Tell his mother." Ah, ah, " his," " their" moth¬
er; not "mine."
No voice says "my mother" again to me.
What !
You think Guido forgot ?
Are souls straight so happy that, dizzy with
heaven.
They drop earth's affections, conceive not of
woe ?
I thiuk not. Themselves were too lately for¬
given
Through that love .and sorrow which reconciled
so
The above and below.
0 Christ of the seven wounds, who look'dst
through the dark
To the face of thy mother ! consider, I pray.
How we common mothers stand desolate, mark.
Whose sons, not being Christs, die with eyes
turned away,
And no last word to say !
Both boys dead ! but that's out of nature. Wo all
Have been patriots, yet each house must always
keep one.
T were imbecile hewing out roads to a wall.
And when Italy's made, for what end is it
done
If we have not a son ?
Ah, ah, ah ! when Gaëta 's taken, what then ?
When the fair wicked queen sits no more at
her sport
Of the fire-balls of death crashing souls out or
men ?
When your guns at Cavalli with final retort
Have cut the game short, —
When Venice and Rome keep their new jubilee.
When your flag takes all heaven for its white,
green, and red.
When you have your countiy from mountidn to
sea.
When King Victor has Italy's crown on his
head,
(And I have my dead,)
What tlien ? Do not mock me. Ah, ring your
bells low.
And burn your lights faintly ! — My coimtiy
is there.
Above the star pricked by the last peak of snow,
My Italy's there, — with my brave civic pair.
To disfranchise despair.
Forgive me. Some women bear children in
strength,
And bite back the cry of their pain in self-
scorn.
But the birth-pangs of nations will wring us at
length
Into such wail as this ! — and we sit on forlorn
When the man-child is born.
Dead ! one of them shot by the sea in the west,
And one of them shot in the east by the sea !
Both ! both my boys ! — If in keeping the feast
You want a great song for your Italy free.
Let none look at me !
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
EVELYN HOPE.
Beautifiti, Evelyn Hope is dead !
Sit and watch by her side an hour.
That is her'book-shelf, this her bed ;
She plucked thatj' piece of geianium-flower.
Beginning to die too, in the glass.
Little has yet been changed, I think ;
The shutters are shut, — no light may pass
Save two long i-ays through the hinge's chink.
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
285
Ü1
Sixteen yeara old when she died !
Perhaps she had scarcely heard my name, —
It was not her time to love ; beside,
Her life had many a hope and aim.
Duties enough and little cares ;
And now wa^ quiet, now astir, —
Till God's hand beckoned unawares.
And the sweet white brow is all of her.
Is it too late, then, Evel}^ Hope ?
What ! your soul was pure and true ;
The good stars met in your horoscope.
Made you of spirit, fire, and dew ;
And just because I was thrice as old.
And our paths in the world diverged so wide.
Each was naught to each, must I be told ?
We were fellow-mortals, —naught beside "
No, indeed ! for God above
Is gieat to grant as mighty to make.
And creates the love to reward the love ;
I claim you still, for my own love's sake !
Delayed, it may be, for more lives yet,
Through worlds 1 shall traverse, not a few ;
Much is to leam and much to forget
Ere the time be come for taking you.
But the time will come — at last it will —
When, Evelyn Hope, what meant, I shall say.
In the lower earth, — in the years long still, —
That body and soul so pure and gay ?
Why your hair was amber I shall divine.
And your mouth of your own geranium's
red, —
And what you would do with me, in fine.
In the new life come in the old one's stead.
I have lived, I shall say, so much since then.
Given up myself so many times.
Gained me the gains of various men,
Ransacked the ages, spoiled the climes
Yet one thing — one — in my soul's full scope.
Either I missed or itself missed me, —
And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope !
What is the issue ? let us see !
I loved you, Evelyn, all the while ;
My heart seemed full as it could hold, —
There was place and to spare for the frank young
smile.
And the red young mouth, and the hair's
young gold.
So, hush ! I will give you this leaf to keep ;
See, I shut it inside the sweet, cold hand.
There, that is our secret ! go to sleep ;
You will wake, and remember, and understand.
robf.rt brow.mng.
HESTER.
When maidens such as Hester die.
Their place ye may not well supply.
Though ye among a thousand try.
With vain endeavor.
A month or more hath she been dead.
Yet cannot I by force be led
To think upon the wormy bed
And her together.
A springy motion in her gait,
A rising step, did indicate
Of pride and joy no common i-ate.
That flushed her spirit ;
I know not by what name beside
I shall it call ; — if't was not pride.
It was a joy to that allied.
She did inherit.
Her parents held the Quaker rule,
Which doth the human feeling cool ;
But she was trained in nature's school.
Nature had blessed her.
A waking eye, a prying mind,
A heart that stirs, is hard to bind ;
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blind, —
Ye could not Hester.
/,
My sprightly neighbor, gone before
To that unknown and silent shore !
Shall we not meet as heretofore
Some summer morning.
When from thy cheerful eyes a ray
Hath struck a bliss upon the day, —
A bliss that would not go away, —
A sweet forewarning
Charlbs Laub.
ANNABEL LEE.
It was many and many a year .igo.
In a kingdom by the sea.
That a maiden lived, whom you may know
By the nam^of Annabel Lee ; >
And this maidbn she lived with no other thought
Than to love," and be loved by me. •
I was a child and she was a child.
In this kingdom by the sea ;
But we loved with a love that was more than
love,
I and my Annabel Lee, —
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.
J-
r
^ -4=^
286 POEMS OP THE AFFECTIOXS. ^
And this was the reason that long ago, And dark against day's golden death
In this kingdom by the sea, She moved where Lindls wandereth, —
So that her high-born kinsmen came. My Sonne's faire wife, Elizabeth.
And bore her away from me.
To shut her up in a sepulchre, " Cnsha ! Cusha ! Cusha ! " calling.
In this kingdom by the sea. Ere the early dews were falling,,
Farre away I heard her song.
The angels, not so happy in heaven, " Cusha ! Cusha 1 " all along í
Went envying her and me. Where the reedy Lindls floweth.
Yes ! that was the reason (as all men know) Floweth, floweth.
In this kingdom by the sea. From the meads where melick groweth.
That the wind came out of the cloud by night, Faintly came her milking-song.
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
" Cusha ! Cusha ! Cusha ! " calling.
But our love it was stronger by far than the lo^ • "For the dews will soone be falling ; ,
Of those who were older than we. Leave your meadow grasses mellow.
Of many far wiser than we ; Mellow, mellow !
And neither the angels in heaven above, Quit your cowslips, co-slips yellow !
Nor the demons down under the sea. Come uppe, Whitefoot ! come uppe, Lightfoot I
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul Quit the stalks of parsley hollow.
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee. Hollow, hollow !
_ , .... Come iippe. Jetty ! rise and follow ;
For the moon never beams without bringing me ,
dreams Come uppe, Whitefoot ! come uppe, Lightfoot 1
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee, jgtty j ñse and foUow,
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes niilking-shed."
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.
And so, all the night-tide I lie down by the side jj. jp ^ ay, lon<T a^o —
Of my darling, my darling, my life, and my ^j^g^ j ^gi„„g j,g^g
Againe I hear the Lindis flow.
In her sepulchre there by the sea. Swift as an arrowc, sharpe and strong ;
In her tomb by the sounding sea. ^pg ^gg^g^p ^gg^
Esoib ¿TI..1J poB. ]t,g]]g (sayth shee),
—'— That ring the tune of Eiidcrby.
HIGH-TIDE ON THE COAST OF LIN- ^pg frggji the level pasture lay,
COLNSHIRE. jjgj. siia(jowe mote be seene,
[TIME, 1571.J Save where, full fyve good miles away,
,, T 1, 1 il V ir X ' The steeple towered from out the ereene
The old mayor climbed the belfry tower, . j , . i, 1 ■?
u i v ,ii- And lo ! the great bell farre and wide
The ringers rang by two, by three : nr 1, 1 • n ii i • j
„ T, , 11 1 1. r Was heard 111 all the country side
"Pull! it ye never pulled before ; mi_ i 0 ^ 1 i .-i
„ 1 . ,f V i » i.1 1. That Saturday at eventide.
Good ringers, pull your best, quoth he. •'
" Play uppe, play uppe, 0 Boston bells !
T» 11 V i 11 11 1 The swannerds, where their sedges are.
Ply all your changes, all your swells ! tt 1 • i. ,, ,ü
T>i m? T> • J .f TT J 1 . » Moved on in sunset s golden breath :
Play uppe The Brides of Enderoy ! , , . , , r 1 1 t
The shepherde lads I heard afarrc.
Men say it was a " stolen tyde," — And my sonne s wife, Elizabeth ;
The Lord that sent it, he knows all. Till, floating o'er the grassy sea,
But in niyne ears doth still abide ^'ame downe that kyndly message free.
The message that the bells let fall ; Brides of Mavis Enderby.
And there was naught of strange, beside
The flights of mews and peewits pied. Then some looked uppe into the sky.
By millions crouched on the old sea-wall. along where Lindis flows
To where the goodly vessels lie,
I sat and spun within the doore ; ' And where the lordly steeple shows.
My thread brake off, I raised myne eyes : They sayde, " And why should this thing be.
The level sun, like ruddy ore. What danger lowers by land or sea ?
Lay sinking in the barren skies ; They ring the tune of ATuácrtí/.
1. ■ r"!
j_ . , , .... . i_j
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BEREAVEMENT ANB DEATH.
287
■n
&
" For evil news from Mablethorpe,
Of pyrate galleys, warping down, —
For shippes ashore beyond the scorpe,
They have not spared to wake the towne ;
But while the west bin red to see,
And storms be none, and pyrates flee,
"Why ring The Brides of Enderby ?
I looked without, and lo ! my sonne
Came riding downe with might and main ;
He raised a shout as ho drew on.
Till all the welkin rang again :
" Elizabeth ! Elizabeth ! "
(A sweeter woman ne'er drew breath
Than my Sonne's wife, Elizabeth.)
" The olde sea-wall (he eryed) is downe !
The rising tide comes on apace ;
And boats adrift in yonder towne
Go sailing uppe the market-place ! "
He shook as one that looks on death ;
"God save you, mother ! " straight he sayth ;
" Where is my wife, Elizabeth ? "
"Good sonne, where Hindis winds away
With her two bairns I marked her long ;
And ere yon bells begänne to play.
Afar I heard her milking-song."
He looked across the grassy sea.
To right, to left, IIo, Enderby !
They rang The Brides of Enderby.
With that he cried and beat his breast ;
For lo ! along the river's bed
A mighty cygre reared his crest.
And uppe the Hindis raging sped.
It swept with thunderous noises loud, —
Shaped like a curling snow-white cloud.
Or like a demon in a shroud.
And rearing Hindis, backrVard pressed.
Shook all her trembling bankes amaine ;
Then madly at the eygie's breast
Flung uppe her weltering walls again.
Then bankes came downe with ruin and rout, -
Then beaten foam flew round about, —
Then all the mighty floods were out.
So faire, so fast, the eygre drave.
The heart had hardly time to beat
Before a shallow seething wave
Sobbed in the gi'asses at oure feet ;
The feet had hardly time to flee
Before it brake against the knee, —
And all the world was in the sea.
Upon the roofe we sate that night ;
The noise of bells went sweeping by ;
I marked the lofty beacon light
Stream from the church-tower, red and high, -
A lurid mark, and dread to see ;
And awsome bells they were to mee.
That in the dark rang Enderby.
They rang the sailor lads to guide.
From roofe to roofe who fearless rowed ;
And I, — my sonne was at my side.
And yet the ruddy beacon glowed ;
And yet he moaned beneath his breath,
"0, come in life, or come in death !
0 lost ! my love, Elizabeth ! "
And didst thou visit him no more '
Thou didst, thou didst, my daughter dearc !
The waters laid thee at his doore
Ere yet the early dawn was clear :
Thy pretty bairns in fast embrace.
The lifted sun shone on thy face,
Downe drifted to thy dwelling-place.
That flow strewed wrecks about the grass.
That ebbe swept out the flocks to sea, —
A fatal ebbe and flow, alas !
To manye more than myne and mee ;
But each will nioume his own (she sayth)
And sweeter woman ne'er drew breath
Than my Sonne's wife, Elizabeth.
1 shall never hear her more
By the reedy Hindis shore,
" Cusha ! Cusha ! Cusha ! " calling.
Ere the early dews be falling ;
I shall never hear her song,
" Cusha ! Cusha ! " all along.
Where the sunny Hindis floweth,
Goeth, floweth.
From the meads where melick groweth.
Where the water, winding down.
Onward floweth to the town.
I shall never see her more.
Where the reeds and rushes quiver.
Shiver, quiver.
Stand beside the sobbing river, —
Sobbing, throbbing, in its falling.
To the sandy, lonesome shore ;
I shall never hear her calling,
" Heave your meadow grasses mellow.
Mellow, mellow !
Quit your cowslips, cowslips yellow !'
Come uppe, Whitefoot ! come uppe, Higlitfoot !
Quit your pipes of parsley hollow.
Hollow, hollow !
Come upjie, Higlitfoot ! rise and follow ;
Hightfoot ! Whitefoot !
From your clovers lift the head ;
Come uppe. Jetty ! follow, follow,
Jetty, to the milking-shed ! "
Jean Incelow..'
288 POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
TO MARY IN HEAVEN.
[Composed by Bums, in September, 1789. on the anniversary of
tlie day on which he heard of the death of his early love, Marj'
Campbell.)
Thou lingering ¡star, with lessening ray,
Th.at lov'st to greet the early morn.
Again thon usher'st in the day
My Mary from my soul was torn.
0 Mary ! dear departed shade !
Where is thy place of blissful rest ?
See'st thou thy lover lowly laid ?
Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast ?
That sacred hour can I forget, —
Can I forget the hallowed grove.
Where by the winding Ayr we met
To live one day of parting love ?
Etei-nity will not efface
Those records dear of transports past ;
Thy image at our last embrace ;
Ah ! little thought we't was our last !
Ayr, gurgling, kissed his pebbled shore,
O'erhung with wild woods, thickening green ;
The fragrant birch, and hawthorn hoar.
Twined amorous round the raptured scene ;
The flowers sprang wan j i to be prest,
The birds sang love nu . cry spray,—
Till soon, too soon, u iving west
Proclaimed the - d el wingèd day.
Still o'er thr^f .■ 1 Jriy memory wakes,
And feiidl' Ihm ,. • ith miser care !
Time but tlii im| i' ■ ion stronger makes.
As sin uns tin ir channels deeper vveai".
My M u y I deal departed shade !
Where is thy place of blissful rest ?
See'.st thou thy lover lowly laid ?
Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast ?
Robert burns.
O, SNATCHED AWAY IN BEAUTY'S
BLOOM !
O, .SNATCHED away in beauty's bloom.
On thee shall press no ponderous tomb ;
Rut on thy turf shall roses rear
Their leaves, the earliest of the year.
And the wild cypress wave in tender gloom ;
And oft by yon blue gushing stream
Shall Sorrow lean her drooping head.
And feed deep thought with many a dream.
And lingering pause and lightly tread ;
Fond wretch ! as if her step disturbed the dead
Away ! we know that tears are vain,
Tliat death nor heeds nor hears distress ;
Will this unteach us to complain ?
Or make one mourner weep the less ?
And thou, who tell'st me to forget.
Thy looks are wan, thine eyes are wet.
Lord Bvro.v.
THY BRAES WERE BONNY.
Tht braes were bonny. Yarrow stream !
When first on them I met my lover ;
Thy braes how dreary, Yanow stream 1
When now thy waves his body cover.
Forever now, 0 Yarrow Stream !
Thou art to me a stream of sorrow ;
For never on thy banks shall I
Behold my love, the flower of Yarrow.
He promised me a milk-white steed.
To bear me to his father's bowers ;
He promised me a little page.
To 'squire me to his father's towers ;
He promised me a wedding-ring, —
The wedding-day was fixed to-morrow ;
Now lie is wedded to his grave,
Alas, his wateiy grave, in Yarrow !
Sweet were his words when last we met ;
My passion 1 as freely told him !
Clasped in his arms, I little thought
That I should neveimorc behold him !
Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost ;
It vanished with a shriek of sorrow ;
Thrice did the water-wraith ascend.
And gave a doleffll groan through Yarrow.
His mother from the window looked
With all the longing of a mother ;
His little sister weeping walked
The greenwood path to meet her brother.
They sought him east, they sought him west,
They sought him all the forest thorough ;
They only saw the cloud of night.
They 011I3' heiird the roar of Yarrow !
No longer from thy window look.
Thou hast no son, thou tender mother !
No longer walk, thou lovely maid ;
Alas, thou hast no more a brother !
No longer .seek him east or west.
And scai'ch no more the forest thorough ;
For, wandering in tlie night so dark.
He fell a lifeless corse in Yarrow.
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
—a
289
The tear .shall never leave my cheek,
No other youth shall be my marrow ;
1 '11 seek thy body in the stream,
And then with thee I '11 sleep in VaiTow.
john Logan.
■—♦—
DOUGLAS, DOUGLAS, TENDER AND
TRUE.
CoVLi) ye come back to me, Douglas, Douglas,
In the old likeness that 1 knew,
I would be so faithful, so loving, Douglas,
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true.
Never a scornful word should grieve ye,
I'd smile on ye sweet as the angels do ; —
Sweet as your smile on me shone ever,
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true.
O, to call back the days that are not !
My eyes were blinded, your words were few ;
Do you know the truth now up in heaven,
Douglas, Douglas, tender and true ?
I never was worthy of you, Douglas
Not half worthy the like of you :
Now all men beside seem to me like shadows —
I love you, Douglas, tender and true.
Stretch out you^ hand to me, Douglas, Douglas,
^ Drop for^ivejless froirj^h&aven like dew\;
As I lay n/y liêârfbn your jlead jpeart, Douglas,
Douglks, Douglas)ytender and^true.
i dinah maria'jaulock craik.
FIRST SPRING FLOWERS.
I •■IM watching for the early buds to wake
Under the snow :
From little beds the soft white covering take.
And, nestling, lo !
They lie, with pink lips parted, all aglow !
0 darlings ! open wide your tender eyes ;
See ! I am here —
Have been here, waiting under winter skies
Till you appear —
You, just come up from where he lies so near.
Tell me, dear flowers, is he gently laid,
Wrapped round from cold ;
lias spring about him fair green garments made.
Fold over fold ;
Arc sweet things growing with him in the
mould ?
10-
Has he found quiet resting-place at la.st.
After the fight ?
Wliat message did he send me, as you passed
Him in the night, •
Eagerly pushing upward toward the light ?
I will not pluck you, lest his hand should be
Close clasping you :
These slender fibres which so cling to me
Do grasp him too —
What gave these delicate veins their blood-
red hue ?
One kiss I press, dear little bud, half shut.
On your sweet eyes ;
For when the April rain falls at your foot.
And April sun yearns downward to your root
From soft spring skies.
It, too, may reach him, where he sleeping 1 ie.s.
Marv woolsev Howla.nu.
MINSTREL'S SONG.
O, SING unto my roundelay !
0, drop the briny tear with me !
Dance no more at holiday ;
Like a running river be.
My love is dead.
Gome to his death-bed.
All under the wiUoio-trce.
Black his hair as the winter night.
White his neck as the summer snow.
Ruddy his face as the morning light ;
Cold he lies in the grave below.
My love is dead, etc.
Sweet his tongue as the throstle's note ;
Quick in dance as thought can be ;
Deft his tabor, cudgel stout ;
, 0, he lies by the willow-tiee !
My love is dead, etc.
Hark ! the raven flaps his wing
In the briered dell below ;
Hark ! the death-owl loud doth sing
To the nightmares as they go.
My love is dead, etc.
See ! the white moon shines on high ;
Whiter is my true-love's shroud.
Whiter than the morning sky.
Whiter than the evening cloud.
My love is dead, etc.
Here, upon my true-love's grave
Shall the banen flowers be laid,
Nor one holy saint to save
All the coldness of a maid.
My love is dead, etc.
290
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
With my hands I '11 bind the briers
Kound his holy coise to gre ;
Onphant fairy, light your fires ;
Here my body still shall be.
My love is dead, etc.
Come, with acom-cnp and thorn.
Drain my heart's blood away ;
Life and all its good 1 scorn.
Dance by night, or feast by day.
My love is dead, etc.
Water-witches, crowned with rey tes.
Bear me to your lethal tide.
I die ! 1 come ! my true-love waits.
Thus the damsel spake, and died.
thomas Chatterton.
SELECTIONS FROM "IN MEMORIAM."
(arthur henry hallam. ob. 1833]
grief unspeakable.
I sometimes hold it half a sin
To put in words the grief I feel :
For words, like Nature, half reveal
And half conceal the Soul within.
But, for the unquiet heart and brain,
A use in measured language lies ;
The sad mechanic exercise,
Like dull narcotics, numbing pain.
In words, like weeds, I '11 wrap me o'er.
Like coarsest clothes against the cold ;
But that large grief which these enfold
Is given in outline and no more.
dead, in a foreign land.
Fair ship, that from the Italian shore
Sailest the placid ocean-plains
With my lost Arthur's loved remains,
.Spread thy full wings, and waft him o'er.
So draw him home to those that mourn
In vain ; a favorable speed
Ruffle thy mirrored mast, and lead
Through prosperous floods his holy urn.
All night no nider air perplex
Thy sliding keel, till Phosphor, bright
As our pure love, thiough early light
Sh;dl glimmer on the dewy decks.
Sjihere all your lights around, above ;
Sleep, gentle heavens, before the prow ;
Sleep, gentle winds, as he sleeps now.
My friend, the brother of my love ;
My Arthur, whom I shall not see
Till all my widowed race be run ;
Dear as the mother to the son.
More than my brothers are to me.
the peace of .sorrow.
Calm is the mom without a sound,
Calm as to suit a calmer grief.
And only through the faded leaf
The chestnut pattering to the ground :
Calm and deep peace on this high wold
And on these dews that drench the furze.
And all the silvery gossamers
That twinkle into green and gold :
Calm and still light on yon gi-eat plain
That sweeps with all its autumn bowers.
And crowded farms and lessening towers,'
To mingle with the bounding main :
Calm and deep peace in this wide air.
These leaves that redden to the fall ;
And in my heart, if calm at all.
If any calm, a calm despair :
Calm on the seas, and silver sleep.
And waves that sway themselves in rest.
And dead calm in that noble breast
Which heaves but with the heaving deep.
time and etep.nitt.
If Sleep and Death be truly one.
And every spirit's folded bloom
Through all its intervital gloom
In some long trance should slumber on ;
Unconscious of the sliding hour.
Bare of the body, might it last.
And silent traces of the past
Be all the color of the flower :
So then were nothing lost to man ;
So that still garden of the souls
In many a figured leaf enrolls
Tlie total world since life began ;
And love will la.st as pure and whole
As when he loved me here in Time,
And at the spiritual jirime
Rewaken with the dawning soul.
pep.sonal resurrection.
That each, who seems a separate whole.
Should move his rounds, and fusing all
The skirts of self again, should full
Remerging in the genei-al Soul,
^
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
291
Is faith as vague as all uiisweet :
Eternal form shall still divide
The eternal soul from all beside ;
And I shall know him when we meet :
And we shall sit at endless feast.
Enjoying each the other's good :
What vaster dream can hit the mood
Of Love on earth 7 He seeks at least
Upon the last and sharpest height.
Before the spirits fade away,
Some landing-place to clasp and say,
" Farewell ! "We lose ourselves in light."
spiritual companionship.
How pure at heart and sound in head.
With what divine affections bold,
Should be the man whose thought would hold
An hour's communion with the dead.
In vain shalt thou, or any, call
The spirits from their golden day.
Except, like them, thou too canst say,
My spirit is at peace with all.
They haunt the silence of the breast.
Imaginations calm and fair.
The memory like a cloudless air.
The conscience as a sea at rest ;
But when the heart is full of din,
And doubt beside the portal waits.
They can but listen at the gates.
And hear the household jar within.
Do we indeed desire the dead
Should still be near us at our side ?
Is there no baseness we would hide ?
No inner vileness that we dread ?
Shall he for whose applause I strove,
I had sueh reverence for his blame.
See with clear eye some hidden shame.
And I be lessened in his love Î
«
I wrong the grave with fears untrue :
Shall love be blamed for want of faith ?
There must be wisdom with great Death :
The dead sliall look me through and through.
Be near us when we climb or fall :
Ye watch, like God, the rolling hours
With larger other eyes than ours.
To make allowance for us all.
death in life's prime.
So many worlds, so much to do.
So little done, such things to be.
How know I what had need of thee ?
For thou wert strong as thou wert true.
The fame is quenched that I foresaw.
The head hath missed an earthly wreath :
I curse not nature, no, nor death ;
For nothing is that errs from law.
We pass ; the path that each man trod
Is dim, or will be dim, with weeds :
What fame is left for human deeds
In endless age ? It rests with God-
0 hollow wraith of dying fame,
Fade wholly, while the soul exults.
And self-enfolds the large results
Of force that would have forged a name.
the poet's tribute.
What hope is here for modern rhyme
To him who turns a musing eye
On songs, and deeds, and lives, that lie
Foreshortened in the tract of time ?
These mortal lullabies of pain
May bind a book, may line a box.
May serve to curl a maiden's locks :
Or when a thousand moons shall wane
A man upon a stall may find.
And, passing, turn the page that tells
A grief, then changed to something else.
Sung by a long-forgotten mind.
But what of that ? My darkened ways
Shall ring with music all the same ;
To breathe my loss is more than fame.
To utter love more sweet than praise.
alfred Tennyson.
« ■
THE PASSAGE.
Many a year is in its grave
Since I crossed this restless wave ;
And the evening, fair as ever.
Shines on i-uin, rock, and river.
Then in this same boat beside.
Sat two commdes old and tried, —
One with all a father's tmth.
One with all the fire of youth.
POEMS OP THE APPECTIONS.
One on earth in silence wrought,
And his grave in silence sought ; j
But the younger, brighter form
Passed in battle and in storm.
So, whene'er I turn mine eye
Back upon the days gone by.
Saddening thoughts of friends come o'er me,
Friends that closed their course before me.
But what binds us, friend to friend.
But that soul with soul can blend ?
Soul-like were those hours of yore ;
Let us walk in soul onco more.
Take, 0 boatman, thrice thy fee.
Take, I give it willingly ;
For, invisible to thee.
Spirits twain have ci-ossed with me.
prom the German of LUDWIG UHLAND.
Translation of SARAH AUSTEN*
HOME THEY BROUGHT HER WARRIOR
DEAD.
FROM "THE PRINCESS."
Home they brought her warrior dead :
She nor swooned, nor uttered cry ;
All her maidens, watching, said,
"She must weep or she will die."
Then they praised him, soft and low
Called him worthy to be loved.
Truest friend and noblest foe ;
Yet she neither spoke nor moved
Stole a maiden from her place.
Lightly to the warrior stept.
Took the face-cloth from the face ;
Yet she neither moved nor wept.
Rose a nurse of ninety years.
Set his child upon her knee, —
Like summer tempest came her tears,
"Sweet my child, 1 live for thee."
Alfred Tennyson.
LAMENT OF THE IRISH EMIGRANT.
I '.M sittin' on the stile, Maiy,
AVhere we sat side by side
On a bright May moruin' long ago.
When first you were my bride ;
The corn was springin' fresh and green.
And the lark Sang loud and high ;
And the red was on your lip, Mary,
And the lovc-liglit in your eye.
The place is little changed, Maiy ;
The day is bright as then ;
The lark's loud song is in my ear.
And the corn is green again ;
But 1 miss the soft cla.si) of your hand.
And your breath, warm on my check ;
And 1 still keep list'nin' for the words
You nevermore wiU speak.
'T is but a step down yonder lane.
And the little church stands near, —
The church where we were wed, Mary ;
1 see the spire from here.
But the graveyard lies between, Mary,
And my step might break your rest, —
For 1 've laid you, darling, down to sleeps
With your baby on your breast.
I'm very lonely now, Mary,
For the poor make no new friends ;
But, O, they love the better still
The few our Father sends !
And you were all I had, Mary, —
My blessin' and my pride ;
There's nothing left to care for now.
Since my poor Mary died.
Yours was the good, brave heart, Mary,
That still kept hoping on.
When the trust in God had left my soul.
And my arm's young strength was gone ;
There was comfort ever on your lip,
And the kind look on your brow, —
I bless you, Mary, for that same.
Though you cannot hear me now.
I thank you for the patient smile
When your heart was fit to break, —
MTien the hunger-pain was gnawin' there.
And you hid it for my sake ;
I bless you for the pleasant word.
When your heart was sad and sore, —
0, I'm thankful you are gone, Mary,
Where grief can't reach you more !
I'm bid din' you a long farewell.
My Mary — kind and true !
But I '11 not forget you, darling,.
In the land I'm goin' to ; '
They say there's bread and work for all.
And the sun shines always thei-e, —
But I '11 not forget old Ireland,
Were it fifty times as fair !
And often in those grand old woods
I '11 sit, and shut my eyes.
And my heart will travel back again
To the place where Maiy lies ;
Ö-
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
293
t:3
'S-
And I '11 think I see the little stile
Where we sat side by side,
And the springin'corn, and the bright May mom,
When first you were my bride.
Helen Selina sherida.v, Lady duffeein.
THE KING OF DENMARK'S RIDE.
Word was brought to the Danish king
(Hurry !)
That the love of his heart lay suffering.
And pined for the comfort his voice would bring;
(O, ride as though you were flying !)
Better he loves each golden eurl
On the brow of that Scandinavian girl
Than his rich crown jewels of ruby and pearl :
And his rose of the isles is dying !
Thirty nobles saddled with speed ;
(Hurry !)
Each one mounting a gallant steed
Wliich he kept for battle and days of need ;
(0, ride as though you were flying !)
Spurs were struck in the foaming flank ;
AVorn-out chargers staggered and sank ;
Bridles were slackened, and girths were burst ;
But ride as they would, the king rode first.
For Ids rose of the isles lay dying !
His nobles are beaten, one by one ;
(Hurry!)
They have fainted, and faltered, and homeward
gone ;
His little fair page now follows alone.
For strength and for courage trying !
The king looked back at that faithful child ;
Wan was the face that answering smiled ;
They passed the drawbridge with clattering din.
Then he dropped ; and only the king rode in
AVhere his rose of the isles lay dying !
The king blew a blast on his bugle hom ;
(Silence I)
No answer came ; but faint and forlorn
An echo returned on the cold gray morn.
Like the breath of a spirit sighing.
The castle portal stood grimly wide ;
None welcomed the king from that weaiy ride ;
For dead, in the light of the dawning day,
Tlie pale sweet form of the weleomer lay,
Who had yearned for his voice while dying !
The panting steed, with a drooping crest.
Stood weary.
The king returned from her chamber of rest.
The thick sobs choking in his breast ;
And, that dumb companion eying,
The tears gushed forth which he strove to check ;
He bowed his head on his charger's neck :
" O steed, that every nerve didst strain.
Dear steed, our ride hath been in vain
To the halls where my love lay dying ! "
Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton.
THE BARON'S LAST BANQUET.
O'er a low conch the setting sua
Had thrown its latest ray.
Where in his last strong agony
A dying warrior lay, —
The stem old Baron Rüdiger,
Whose frame had ne'er been bent
By wasting pain, till time and toil
Its iron strength had spent.
" They come around me here, and say
My days of life are o'er.
That I shall mount my noble steed
And lead my band no more ;
They come, and to my beard they dare
To tell me now, that I,
Their own liege lord and master born, —
That I — ha I ha I — must die".
" And what is Death ? I 've dared him oft
Before the Paynim spear, —
Think ye he's entered at my gate.
Has come to seek me here ?
I've met him, faced him, scorned him,
AVhen the fight was raging hot, —
I '11 try his might — I '11 brave his power ;
Defy, and fear him not.
" Ho ! sound the tocsin from my tower, —
And fire the culvcrin, —
Bid each retainer arm with speed, —
Call every vassal in ;
Up with my banner on the wall, —
The banquet-board prepare, —
Throw wide the portal of my hall.
And bring my armor there I "
A hundred hands were busy then, —
The banquet forth was spread, —
And rung the heavy oaken floor
AVith many a martial tread.
While from the rich, dark tracery
Along the vaulted wall.
Lights gleamed on harness, plume, and siiear.
O'er the proud old Gothic hall.
Fast hurrying through the outer gate.
The mailed retainei-s poured,
On through the portal's frowning arch,
And thronged around the board.
if]-
294
POEMS OP THE AFFECTIONS.
While at its head, within his dark.
Carved oaken chair of state,
Armed cap-a-pie, stern Rüdiger,
With girded falchion, sate.
" Fill every beaker np, my men.
Pour forth the cheering wine ;
There's life and strength in every drop, —
Thanksgiving to the vine !
Are ye all there, my vassals true ? —
Mine eyes are waxing dim ; —
Fill round, my tried and fearless ones.
Each goblet to the brim. '
" Ye 're there, but yet I see ye not.
Drp,w forth each trusty sword,
And let me hear your faithful steel
Clash once around my board :
I hear it faintly : — Louder yet ! —
What clogs my heavy breath ?
Up, all, —and shout for Rüdiger,
' Defiance unto Death ! ' "
Bowl rang to bowl, — steel clanged to steel.
And rose a deafening cry
That made the torches flare around.
And shook the flags on high ; —
" Ho ! cravens, do ye fear him ? —
Slaves, traitors ! have ye flown ?
Ho ! cowards, have ye left me
To meet him here alone ?
"But I defy him : — let him come ! "
Down rang the massy cup.
While from its sheath the ready blado
Came flashing half-way up ;
And, with the black and heavy plumes
Scarce trembling on his head.
There, in his dark, carved, oaken chair.
Old Rüdiger sat, dead.
Albert C. Cree,\e.
FAREWELL TO THEE, ARABYS
DAUGHTER.
from "the fire-worshippers."
Farf.well, — farewell to thee, Araby's daughter !
(Thus warbled a Peri beneath the dark sea ;)
No |iearl ever lay under Oman's green water
More pure in its shell than thy spirit in thee.
O, fair as the sea-flower close to thee growing.
How light was thy heart till love's witchery
came.
Like the wind of the south o'er a summer lute
blowing.
And hushed all its music and withered its frame !
But long, upon Araby's green sunny highlands,
Sliall maids and their lovers remember the
doom
Of her who lies sleeping among the Pearl Islands,
With naught but the sea-star to light up her
tomb.
And still, when the merry date-season is burning.
And calls to the palm-groves the young and
the old.
The happiest there, from their pastime returning
At sunset, will weep when thy story is told.
The young village maid, when with flowers she
dresses
Her dark-flowing hair for some festival day.
Will think of thy fate till, neglecting her tresses.
She mournfully turns from the miiTor away.
Nor shall Iran, beloved of her hero, forget thee, —
Though tyrants watch over her tears as they
start.
Close, close by the side of that hero she '11 set thee.
Embalmed in the innermost shrme of her
heart.
Farewell ! — be it ours to embellish thy pillow
With everything beauteous that grows in the
deep ;
Each flower of the rock and each gem of the billow
Shall sweeten thy bed and illumine thy sleep.
Around thee shall glisten the loveliest amber
That ever the sorrowing sea-bird has wept ;
With many a shell, in whose hollow-wreathed
chamber.
We, Peris of ocean, by moonlight have slept.
We '11 dive where the gardens of coral lie dark¬
ling.
And plant all the rosiest stems at thy head ;
We '11 seek where the sands of the Caspian are
sparkling.
And gather their gold to strew over thy bed.
Farewell ! — farewell ! — until pity's sweet foun¬
tain
Is lost in the hearts of the fair and the brave.
They '11 weep for the Chieftain who died on that
mountain.
They '11 weep for the Maiden who sleeps in the
wave.
Thomas Moore.
GRIEF.
from " hamlet. prince of denmark," act i. sc. 2.
Queen. Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color
off.
And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.
Do not, forever, with thy veiled lids
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
295
Seek for thy noble father in the dust ;
Thou know'st't is common, — all that live must
die.
Passing through nature to eternity.
Hamlet. Ay, madam, it is common.
Queen. If it be,
"Why seems it so particular with thee ?
Ham. Seems, madam ! nay, it is ; I know not
seems.
'T is not alone my inky cloak, good mother.
Nor customary suits of solemn black.
Nor windy suspiration of forced breath.
No, nor the fruitful river in the eye.
Nor the dejected havior of the visage.
Together with all forms, modes, shows of grief.
That can denote me truly ; these, indeed, seem.
For they are actions that a man might play :
But I have that within, which passeth show ;
These, but the trappings and the suits of woe.
Shakespears.
TO DEATH.
Methinks it were no pain to die
On such an eve, when such a sky
O'er-canopies the west ;
To gaze my fill on yon calm deep.
And, like an infant, fall asleep
On Earth, my mother's breast.
There's peace and welcome in yon sea
Of endless blue tranquillity :
These clouds are living things :
1 trace their veins of liquid gold,
I see them solemnly unfold
Their soft and fieecy wings.
These be the angels that convey
Us weary children of a day —
Life's tedious nothing o'er—
Where neither passions come, nor woes.
To vex the genius of repose
On Death's majestic shore.
No darkness there divides the sway
With startling dawn and dazzling day ;
But gloriously serene
Are the interminable plains :
One fixed, eternal sunset reigns
O'er the wide silent scene.
I cannot doff all human fear ;
I know thy greeting is severe
To this poor shell of clay :
Yet come, 0 Death ! thy freezing kiss
Emancipates ! thy rest is bliss !
1 would I were away !
From the German of CLUCK.
NOW AND AFTERWARDS.
*' Two hands upon the breast, and tabor is past."
RUSSIAN FROVERH.
" Two hands upon the breast.
And labor's done ;
Two pale feet crossed in rest, —
The race is won ;
Two eyes with coin-weights shut.
And all tears cease ;
Two lips where grief is mute.
Anger at peace ; "
So pray we oftentimes, mourning our lot ;
God in his kindpess answereth not.
" Two hands to work addrest
Aye for his praise ;
Two feet that never rest
Walking his ways ;
Two eyes that look above
Through all their tears ;
Two lips still breathing love.
Not wrath, nor fears : "
So pray we afterwards, low on our knees ;
Pardon those erring prayers ! Father, hear these !
Dinah Maria MULock Craiic
REST.
I LAY me down to sleep.
With little care
Whether my waking find
Me here, or there.
A bowing, burdened head
That only asks to rest.
Unquestioning, upon
A loving breast.
My good right-hand forgets
Its cunning now ;
To march the weary march
I know not how.
I am not eager, bold.
Nor strong, — all that is irast ;
I am ready not to do.
At last, at last.
My half-day's work is done.
And this is all my part, —
I give a patient God
My patient heart ;
And grasp his banner still,
Though all the blue be dim ;
These stripes as well as stare
Lead after him.
Mary Woolsey IIowland.
■S
296
POEMS OF THE, AFFECTIONS.
fil
EEYOND THE SMILING AND THE
WEEPING.
IIeyond the smiling and the weeping
I shall be soon ;
Beyond the waking and the sleeping,
Beyond the sowing and the reaping,
I shall be soon.
Love, rest, and home !
Sweet hope !
Lord, tarry not, hut come.
Beyond the blooming and the fading
I shall be soon ;
Beyond the shining and th'e shading.
Beyond the hoping and the dreading,
I shall be soon.
Love, rest, and home ! etc.
Beyond the rising and the setting
I shall be soon ;
Beyond the calming and the fretting.
Beyond reniemljering and forgetting,
I shall be soon.
Love, rest, and home ! etc.
Beyond the gathering and the strewing
I shall be soon ;
Beyond the ebbing and the flowing.
Beyond the coming and the going,
I shall be soon.
Love, rest, and home ! etc.
Beyond the parting and the meeting
1 shall be soon ;
Beyond the farewell and the greeting.
Beyond this pulse's fever beating,
I shall be soon.
Love, rest, and home ! etc.
Beyond the frost chain and the fever
I shall be soon ;
Beyond the rock waste and the river.
Beyond the ever and the never,
I shall be -twA
Xovc, rest, and haJSkc !
Sweet hope '
tovi f« nil net, but come.
' ' ' ■ HORATIUS EONAR.
Ye were aye leal and true, Jean. ;
Your ta.sk's emled noo, Jean, ^
And I '11 welcon»e you
To the land a ft he leal. ,
Our bionnie baiin's there, Jean,
She was baith guid and fair, Jean ;
0, we grudged her right Sair
To the laud o' the leal !
Then dry that tearfu' e'e, Jean,
My soul längs to be free, Jean,
And angels wait on me
To the land o' the leal !
Now fare ye weel, my ain Jean,
This warld's care is vain, Jean ;
We '11 meet and aye be fain
in the land o' the leal.
Carolina, Baroness Nairne.
u
THE LAND 0* THE LEAL.
i'm wearing awaj, Jean,
Like snaw when it's thaw, Jean ;
I'm wearing awa'
To the land o' the leal.
Thei''s nae soitow there, Jean,
Tbeii' ' neither eauld nor care, Jean,
The day is aye fair
In the land o' the leal.
SOFTLY WOO AWAY HER BREATH.
So F ri,Y woo away her- breath.
Gentle Aeath !
Let her leave thee with no strife,
Tcuiler, mournful, murmuring life !
She li.ith seen hei hajipy day, —
She hath had her bud ani^ blossom ;
Now she pales and shrinks away,
Earth, into thy gentle bosom !
She hath done her bidding here.
Angels dear !
Bear her perfect soul above.
Seraph of the skies, — sweet love !
Good she was, and fair in youth ;
And her mind was seen to soar.
And her heart was wed to truth :
Take her, then, foreverinore, —
Forever — evermore, —
I bryan Waller Procter (Barry Carania/l).
ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.
' lam dying, EgjT>t. dying." —SHAKESPEARE'S Antony and
Cleopatra, Act iv. Sc. 13,
I AM dying, Egypt, dying.
Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast.
And the dark Plutonian shadows
Gather on the evening blast ;
Let thine arms, 0 Queen, enfold me,
•Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear ;
Listen to the great heart-secrets.
Thou, and thou alone, must hear.
■3
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
297
Though my scarred and veteran legions
Bear their eagles high no more,
And my wrecked and scattered galleys
Strew dark Actium's fatal shore,
Though no glittering guards surround me.
Prompt to do their master's will,
I must perish like a Roman,
Die the great Triumvir still.
Let not Cœsar's servile minions
Mock the lion thus laid low ;
"T was no foeman's arm that felled him,
'T was his own that struck the blow :
His who, pillowed on thy bosom.
Turned aside from glory's ray.
His who, drunk with thy caresses,
Madly threw a world away.
Should the base plebeian rabble
Dare assail my name at Rome,
Where my noble spouse. Octavia,
Weeps within her widowed home.
Seek her ; say the gods bear witness —
Altars, augurs, circling wings —
That her blood, with mine commingled.
Yet shall mount the throne of kings.
As for thee, star-eyed Egyptian !
Glorious sorceress of the Nile !
Light the path to Stygian horrors
With the splendors of thy smile.
Give the Cpesar crowns and arches.
Let his brow the laurel twine ;
I can scorn the Senate's triumphs.
Triumphing in love like thine.
I am dying, Egypt, dying ;
Hark ! the insulting foeman's cry.
They are coming — quick, my falchion !
Let me front them ere I die.
Ah ! no more amid the battle
Shall my heart exulting swell ;
Isis and Osiris guard thee !
Cleopatra — Rome — farewell !
William Haines Lvtle.
SOLILOQUY ON DEATH.
from ' hamlet, prince of denmark," act iii. sc. i.
Hamlet. To be,(or notito be,\—that is »the
question
Whether('tis nollcr in/the mind|to suffer
The slinggfand aij-ows of^utra^ous foij^une.
Or to take arms against a sea olTtroubles,
And, by opposing, end them ? — To die, to
sleep ; —
No more ; and, by a sleep, to say we end
The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, — 't is a consummation
Devoutly to be wished. To die, — to sleep ; —
To sleep ! perchance to dream : — a}', there's the
rub ;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come.
When we have shuffled, off this mortal coil.
Must give us pause : there's the respect
That makes calamity of so long life ;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time.
The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's con¬
tumely.
The pains of despised love, the law's delay.
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes.
When he himself might his quietus make .
With a bare bodkin ? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life.
But that the dread of something after death, —
The undiscovered country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns, — puzzles the will.
And makes us rather bear those ills we have,
Than fly to others that we know not of ?
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all ;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought ;
And enterprises of great pith and moment.
With this regard, their currents turn awiy.
And lose the name of action.
shakespeare.
—•—
THE TWO MYSTERIES.
f" Tn the middle oS the room, in its white coffin, lay the dead
child, the nephew of the poet. Near it, in a ereat chair, sat Walt
Whitman, surrounded by little ones, and holding a beautiful little
girl on his lap. She looked wonderingly at the spectacle of death,
and then inquiring^ly into the old man's face. ' You don't know
what it is, do you, my dear!' said he, and added, 'We don't,
either.' 'J
We know not what it is, dear, this sleep so deep
and still ;
The folded hands, the awful calm, the cheek so
pale and chill ;
The lids that will not lift again, though we may
call and call ;
The strange white solitude of peace that settles
over all.
We know not what it means, dear, this desolate
heart-pain ; .
This dread to take our daily way, and walk in
it again ;
We know not to what other sphere the loved
who leave us go.
Nor why we 're left to wonder still, nor why we
do not know.
a-
298
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
■a
But this we know : Our loved and dead, if they
should come this day —
Should come and ask us, " What is life ? " not
one of us could say.
Life is a mystery, as deep as ever death can be ;
Yet, 0, how dear it is to us, this life we live
and see !
Then might they say — these vanished ones —
and blessed is the thought,
" So death is sweet to us, beloved ! though we
may show you naught ;
We may not to the quick reveal the mystery of
death —
Ye cannot tell us, if ye would, the mystery of
breath."
The child who enters life comes not with knowl¬
edge or intent.
So those who enter death must go as little chil¬
dren sent.
Nothing is known. But I believe that God is
overhead ;
And as life is to the living, so death is to the
dead.
Mary Mapes Dodge.
&■
THE SECRET OF DEATH.
" She is dead ! " they said to him ; " come away ;
Kiss her and leave her, — thy love is clay ! "
They smoothed her tresses of dark brown hair ;
On her forehead of stone they laid it fair ;
Over her eyes that gazed too much
They drew the lids with a gentle touch ;
With a tender touch they closed up well
The sweet thin lips that had secrets to tell ;
About her brows and beautiful face
They tied her veil and her marriage-lace.
And drew on her white feet her white silk shoes—
Which were the whitest no eye could choose !
And over her bosom they crossed her hands.
" Come away ! " they said ; " God miderstands ! "
And there was silence, and nothing there
But silence, and scents of eglantere.
And jasmine, and roses, and rosemary ;
And they said, " As a lady should lie, lies she."
And they held their breath till they left the room.
With a shudder, to glance at its stillness and
gloom.
But he who loved her too well to dread
The sweet, the stately, the beautiful dead,
Ne lit his lamp and took the key
And turned it. Alone again — he and she !
He and she ; but she would not speak,
Though he kissed, in the old place, the quiet
cheek.
He and she ; yet she would not smile.
Though he called her the name she loved ere-
while.
He and she ; still she did not move
To any one passionate whisper of love.
Then he said : " Cold lips, and breasts without
breath,'
Is there no voice, no language of death,
" Dumb to the ear and still to the sense.
But to heart and to soul distinct, intense ?
" See now ; I will listen with soul, not ear ;
What was the secret of dying, dear ?
" Was it the infinite wonder of all
That you ever could let life's flower fall ?
" Or was it a greater marvel to feel
The perfect calm o'er the agony steal ?
" Was the miracle greater to find how deep
Beyond all dreams sank downward that sleep ?
" Did life roll back its records, dear.
And show, as they say it does, past things clear t
And was it the innermost heart of the bliss
To find out so, what a wisdom love is ?
" 0 perfect dead ! 0 dead most dear,
I hold the breath of my soul to hear !
" I listen as deep as to horrible hell.
As high as to heaven, and j'ou do not tell.
" There must be pleasure in dying, sweet.
To make you so i)lacid from head to feet !
" I would tell you, dai-ling, if I were dead.
And't were your hot teai-s upon my brow shed, —
"I would say, though the angel of death had laid
His sword on my lips to keep it unsaid.
You should not ask vainly, with streaming eyes.
Which of all death's was the chiefest surprise,
" The very strangest and suddenest thing
Of all the snrprises that dying must bring."
é
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
299
All, foolish world ! 0, most kind dead !
Though he told me, who will believe it was said !
Who will believe that he heard her say.
With a sweet, soft voice, in the dear old way ;
" The utmost wonder is this, — I hear,
And see you, and love you, and kiss you, dear ;
" And am your angel, who was your bride.
And know that, though dead, I have never died."
Edwin Arnold.
ONLY THE CLOTHES SHE WORE.
There is the hat
With the blue veil thrown 'round it, just as they
found it.
Spotted and soiled, stained and all spoiled —
Do you recognize that ?
The gloves, too, lie there.
And in them still lingers the shape of her fingers.
That some one has pressed, perhaps, and caressed.
So slender and fah'.
There arc the shoes.
With their long silken laces, still bearing traces,
To the toe's dainty tip, of the mud of the slip.
The slime and the ooze.
There is the dress,
Like the blue veil, all dabbled, discolored, and
drabbled —
This you should know without doubt, and, if so.
All else you may guess.
There is the shawl.
With the striped border, hung next in order.
Soiled hardly less than the white muslin dress.
And — that is all.
Ah, here is a ring
We were forgetting, with a pearl setting ;
There was only this one — name or date ? — none ?
A frail, pretty thing ;
A keepsake, maybe.
The gift of another, perhaps a brother.
Or lover, who knows ? him her heart chose.
Or was she heart-free ?
Does the hat there.
With the blue veil around it, the same as they
found it.
Summon up a fair face with just a trace
Of gold in the hair ?
Or does the shawl.
Mutely appealing to some hidden feeling,
A fom, young and slight, to your mind's sight
Clearly recall ?
A month now has passed,
And her sad history remains yet a mystery,
But these we keep still, and shall keep them until
Hopre dies at last.
Was she a prey
Of some deep sorrow clouding the morrow,
Hiding from view the sky's happy blue ?
Or was there foul play ?
Alas ! who may tell ?
Some one or other, perhajis a fond mother.
May recognize these when her child's clothes she
sees ;
hen — will it be well ?
N. C. SHEPHERD.
—«—
FOR ANNIE.
Thank Fleavrn ! the crisis.
Tin d nigi r is jiast,
And the lingering illnoas
J 3 over at last, —
Ancf the feyer called " I.iving"
Is conquered at last.
Sadly, I know,
I am shorn of my strength.
And no muscle I movo
As I lie at full length, —
But no matter ! — I feel
I am better at length.
And I rest so composedly
Now, in my bed.
That any beholder
Might fancy me dead, —
Might start at beholding me.
Thinking me dead.
Th ■ iiiuaning and groaning.
The sigliing and sobbing.
Are ipuetcil now,
Wif^i that hoiriblr throbbing
At he.irt, —all, that hoiiihle.
Horrible thrubbing !
The sickness, the nausea.
The pitiless pain.
Have ceased, with the fever
That maddened my brain, —
With the fever called " Living "
That burned in my brain.
■Ö
I&
300
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
And 0, of all tortures
That torture the worst
Has abated, — the terrible
Torture of thirst
For the naphthaline river
Of Passion accurst !
I have drunk of a water
That quenches all thirst,
Of a water that flows,
With a lullaby sound.
From a spring but a very few
Feet under ground, —
From a cavern not very far
Down under ground.
And ah ! let it never
Be foolishly said
That my room it is gloomy
And narrow my bed ;
For man never slept
In a different bed, —
And, to sleep, you must slumber
In just such a bed.
My tantalized spirit
Here blandly reposes.
Forgetting, or never
Kcgretting, its roses, —
Its old agitations
Of myrtles and roses :
For now, while so quietly
Lying, it fancies
A holier odor
About it, of pansies, —
A rosemary odor.
Commingled with pansies.
With rue and the beautiful
Puritan pansies.
And so it lies happily.
Bathing in many
A dream of the truth
And the beauty of Annie, —
Drowned in a bath
Of the tresses of Annie.
She tenderly kissed me.
She fondly caressed.
And then 1 fell gently
To sleep on her breast, —
Deeply to sleep
From the heaven of her breast.
When the light was extinguished.
She covered me warm.
And she prayed to the angels
To keep me from harm, —
To the queen of the angels
To shield me from harm.
And I lie so con)posedly
Now in my bed,
(Knowing her love,)
That you fancy me dead ; —
And I rest so contentedly
Now in my bed,
(With her love at my breast,)
That you fancy me dead, —
That you shudder to look at me,
Thinking me dead :
But my heart it is brighter
Than all of the many
Stars in tlie sky ;
For it .sparkles with Annie, —
It glows with the light
Of the love of iny Annie,
With the thought of the light
Of the eyes of my Annie.
Edcar Allan Fob.
THE FAIREST THING IN MORTAL
EYES.
Addressed to Iiis deceased wife, who died in childbed at the age
of tweoiy-tivOs
To make my lady's obsequies
My love a minster wrought.
And, in the chantry, seivice there
Was sung by doleful thought ;
The tapers were of burning sighs.
That light and odor gave :
And soiTows, painted o'er with tears,
Enluminèd her grave ;
And round about, in quaintest guise,
Was carved : " Within this tomb there lies
The fairest thing in mortal eyes."
Above her lieth spread a tomb
Of gold and sapphires blue :
The gold doth show her blessedness.
The sapphires mark her true ;
For blessedness and truth in her
Were livelily portiayed.
When gracious God with both his hands
Her goodly substance made.
He framed her in such wondrous wise.
She was, to speak without disguise,
The fairest thing in mortal eyes.
No more, no more ! my heart doth faint
When I the life recall
Of her who lived so free from taint.
So virtuous deemed by all, —
That in herself was so complete
I think that she was ta'en
By God to deck his paradise.
And with his saints to reign »
&
tSr
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
301
Ü1
Whom while ou earth each one did prize
The fairest thing in mortal eyes.
But naught our tears avail, or cries ;
All soon or late in death shall sleep ;
Nor living wight long time may keep
The fairest thing in mortal eyes.
From the French of Charles Duke of Orleans.
Translation oí Henry Francis Cary.
SONNET.
The funeral sermon was on the text, " The Master is come, and
callcth for thee" (John xi. 2^).
Rise, said the Master, come unto the feast ; —
She heard the call, and rose with willing feet ;
But thinking it not otherwise than meet
For such a bidding to put on her best.
She is gone from us for a few short hours
Into her bridal closet, there to wait
I'or the unfolding of the palace-gate.
That gives her entrance to the blissful bowers.
AV'e have not seen her yet, though we have been
Full often to her chamber-door, and oft
Have listened underneath the po.stern green.
And laid fresh flowers, and whisi>erod short and
soft ;
But she hath made no answer, and the day
From the clear west is fading fast away.
Henrv alford.
FEAR NO MORE THE HEAT 0' THE
SUN.
vrom "cvmbeline," act IV. sc. 2.
Fear no more the heat o' the sun.
Nor the furious winter's rages ;
Thou thy worldly task hast done.
Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages ;
Golden lads and girls all must.
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.
Fear no more the frown o' the gi'eat.
Thou art jiast the tyrant's stroke ;
Care no more to clothe, and eat ;
To thee the reed is as the oak :
The sceptre, learning, physic, must
All follow this and come to dust.
Fear no more the lightning flash
Nor the all-dreaded thunder-stone ;
Fear not slander, censure rash ;
Thou hast finished joy and moan ;
All lovers young, all lovers must
Consign to thee, aud come to dust.
shakespeare.
• DEATH THE LEVELLER.
These verses are said to have "chilled the heart" of Oliver
Ciomwell.
The glories of our blood and state
Are .shadow.s, not substantial things ;
Thei'e is no armor against fate ;
Death lays his icy hand on kings :
Sceptre and crown
Must tumble down.
And in the dust bo equal made
With the poor crooked scythe and spade.
Some men with swords may reap the field.
And plant fresh laurels where they kill ;
But their strong nerves at last must yield ;
They tamo but one another still :
Early or late.
They stoop to fate.
And must give up their murmuring breath.
When they, pale captives, creep to death.
The garlands wither on your brow.
Then boast no more your mighty deeds ;
Upon death's purple altar now
See where the victor-victim bleeds :
Yonr heads must come
To the cold tomb ;
Only the actions of the just
Smell sweet, and blossom in their dust.
James Shirley.
SIC VITA.*
Like to the falling of a star.
Or as the flights of eagles are.
Or like the fresh spring's gaudy hue.
Or silver drops of morning dew.
Or like a wind that chafes the flood.
Or bubbles which on water stood, —
E'en such is man, whose borrowed light
Is straight called in, and paid to-night.
The wind blows out, the bubble dies,
The spring entombed in autumn lies,
The dew dries up, the star is shot,
The flight is past, — and man forgot !
Henry King.
VIRTUE IMMORTAL.
Sweet Day, so cool, so calm, so briglit.
The bridall of the earth and skic ;
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night ;
For thou must die.
• Fields and Whipple. In their admirable Fatntly Library oj
liritish Pœfs.zâià the followiii}* note: "This poem, of wíii.lí
there are nine iiuitations, is claimed for l-rancU Bcauntont by boiae
authorities."
x;3
!&
302
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Sweet Rose, whose hue angrie and brave
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye,
Thy root is ever in its grave,
And thou must die.
Sweet Spring, full of sweet dayes and roses,
A box where sweets compacted lie.
Thy musick shows ye have your closes.
And all must die.
Onely a sweet and vertuous soul.
Like seasoned timber, never gives ;
But, though the whole world turn to coal,
Tlien chiefly lives.
George Herbert.
0, "WHY SHOULD THE SPIRIT OF
MORTAL BE PROUD?
The following poem wns a particular favorite with Abraham
Lincoln. It was first shown to him when a young man by a friend,
and afiertvards he cut it from a newspaper and learned it by heart.
He said to a friend. " 1 would give a groat deal to know who wrote
it. but have never been able to ascertain." He did afterwards
learn the name of the author.
0, WHY should the spirit of mortal be proud ?
Like a swift-fleeting meteor, a fast-flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave.
He passeth from Ufe to his rest in the grave.
The leaves of the oak and the willow shall fade.
Be scattered around, and together be laid ;
As the young and the old, the low and the high.
Shall crumble to dust and together shall lie.
The infant a mother attended and loved.
The mother that infant's affection who proved,
The father that mother and infant who blest, —
Each, all, are away to that dwelling of rest.
The maid on whose brow, on whose check, in
whose eye,
Shone beautyancl pleasure,—hertriumphsarcby ;
And alike from the minds of the living erased
Are the memories of mortals who loved her
and praised.
The head of the king, that the sceptre hath
home ;
The brow of the prie.st, that the mitre hath
worn ;
The eye of the sage, and the heart of the brave, —
Arc hidden and lost in the depths of the grave.
The peasant, whose lot was to sow and to reap ;
The herdsman, who climbed with his goats up
the steep ;
The beggar, who wandered in search of his
bread, —
Have faded away like the grass that we tread.
So the multitude goes, like the flower or weed.
That withers away to let others succeed ;
So the multitude comes, even those we behold.
To repeat every talc that has often been told.
For we are the same our fatliers have been ;
We see the same sights our fathei-s have seen ;
We drink the same stream, we see the same sun.
And mn the same course our fathers have run.
The thoughts we are thinking our fathers did
think ;
From the death we are shrinking our fathers did
shrink ;
To the life we are clinging our fathers did cling.
But it speeds from us all Uke tlie biixi on tlic wing.
They loved, —but the story we cannot unfold ;
They scorned, — but the heart of the haughty is
cold ;
They grieved, — but no wall from their slumbers
will come ;
They jo3'ed, — but the tongue of their gladness
is dumb.
They died, — ah ! they died ; — we, things that
are now.
That walk on the turf that lies over their brow.
And make in their dwelling a transient abode.
Meet the things that they met on their pilgrim¬
age road.
Yea, hope and despondency, pleasure and pain.
Are mingled together in sunshine and rain :
And the smile and the tear, and the soiig and
the dirge.
Still follow each other like surge upon surge.
'T is the wink of an eye ; 't is the draught of a
breath
From the blossom of health to the paleness of
death.
From the gilded saloon to the bier and the shroud ;
0, why should the spirit of mortal be proud ?
William Knox.
MAN'S MORTALITY.
Like as the damask rose you see.
Or like the blossom on the tree.
Or like the dainty flower in May,
Or like the morning of the day.
Or like the sun, or like the shade.
Or like the gourd which Jonas had, —
E'en such is man ; whoso thread is spun.
Drawn out, and cut, and so is done. —
•Qi
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BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
303
o-fi]
The rose withers, the blossom blasteth.
The flower fades, the morning hasteth.
The sun sets, the shadow flies.
The goui'd consumes, — and man he dies I
Like to the grass that's newly sprung.
Or like a tale that's new begun.
Or like the bird that's heie to-day.
Or like the pearlèd dew of May,
Or like an hour, or like a span,
Or like the singing of a swan, —
E'en such is man ; who lives by breath,
Is here, now there, in life and death. —
The grass withers, the tale is ended.
The bird is flown, the dew's ascended.
The hour is short, the span is long.
The swan's near death, —man's life is done !
Simon wastell.
IF THOU WILT EASE THINE HEART.
If thou wilt ease thine heart
Of love, and all its smart, —
Then sleep, dear, sleep !
And not a sorrow
Hang any tear on your eyelashes ;
Lie still and deep.
Sad soul, until the sea-wave washes
The rim o' the sun to-morrow.
In eastern sky.
But wilt thou cure thine heart
Of love, and all its smart, —
Then die, dear, die !
'T is deeper, sweeter.
Than on a rose bank to lie dreaming
With folded eye ;
And then alone, amid the beaming
Of love's stai-s, thou 'It meet her
In eastern sky.
Thomas Lovell Beddoes.
A PICTURE OF DEATH
from " the giaour."
He who hath bent him o'er the dead
Ere the first day of death is fled.
The first dark day of nothingness.
The last of danger and distress,
(Before Decay's effacing fingers
Have swept the lines where beauty lingers, )
And marked the mild angelic air.
The rapture of repose, that's there.
The fixed yet tender traits that streak
The languor of the placid cheek.
And — but for that sad shrouded eye,
That fires not, wins not, weeps not now.
And but for that chill, changeless brow.
Where cold Obstruction's apathy
Appalls the gazing mourner's heart.
As if to him it could impart
The doom he dreads, yet dwells upon ;
Yes, but for these and these alone.
Some moments, ay, one treacherous hour,
He still might doubt the tyrant's power ;
So fair, so calm, so softly sealed.
The fii-st, last look by death revealed !
Such is the aspect of this shore ;
'T is Greece, but living Greece no more !
So coldly sweet, so deadly fair.
We start, for soul is wanting there.
Hers is the loveliness in death.
That parts not quite with parting breath ;
But beauty with that fearful bloom.
That hue which haunts it to the tomb.
Expression's last receding ray,
A gilded halo hovering round decay.
The farewell beam of Feeling past away ;
Spark of that flame, perchance of heavenly birth.
Which gleams, but warms no more its cherished
earth !
byron.
LIFE.
** Animula. vapula, bUndula."
Life ! I know not what thou art.
But know that thou and I must part ;
And when, or how, or where we met
I own to me's a secret yet.
But this I know, when thou art fled.
Where'er they lay these limbs, this head.
No clod so valueless shall be.
As all that then remains of me.
0, whither, whither dost thou fly.
Where bend unseen thy trackless course.
And in this strange divorce.
Ah, tell where I must seek this compound I ?
To the vast ocean of empyreal flame,
From whence thy essence came.
Dost thou thy flight pursue, when freed
From matter's base encumbering weed ?
Or dost thou, hid from sight.
Wait, like some spell-bound knight.
Through blank, oblivious years the appointed
hour
To break thy trance and reassume thy power ?
Yet canst thou, without thought or feeling be ?
0, say what art thou, when no more thou 'rt thee ?
304
POEMS OF TÍIE AFFECTIONS.
Life ! we've Leen long together
Through pleasant and through cloudy weather ;
'T is hard to part when friends are dear, —
Perhaps't will cost a sigh, a tear :
Then steal away, give little warning.
Choose thine own time ;
Say not Good Night, — but in .some brighter
clime
Bid me Good Morning.
j{n.\a Letitia Dakbauld.
THE HUSBAND AND WIFE'S GRAVE.
lIusiB.AND and wife ! no converse now ye hold.
As once ye did in your young days of love.
On its alarms, its anxious hours, delays.
Its silent meditations and glad hopes,
Its fears, impatience, (piiet .sympathies ;
Nor do ye speak of joy assured, and bliss
Full, certain, and possessed. Domestic cares
Call you not now together. Earnest talk
On what your children may be moves you not.
Ve lie in silence, and an awful silence ;
Not like to that in which ye rested oirce
iMost happy, — silence eloquent, when heart
With heart held speech, and your rnysteriorrs
frames,
llarmoniou.s, serrsitivc, at every beat
Touched the soft rrotes of love.
A stillness deep,
Irr.sensible, unheeding, folds yon round,
Aitd darkness, as a storre, has sealed yolt in ;
Away fronr all the living, here ye rest,
lir all the near ness of the ttarrow tomb.
Vet feel ye not each other's presence now ; —
Dread fellowship ! — together, yet alotre.
Is this thy prison-house, thy grave, then. Love?
And doth death cancel the great bond that holds
Cornmiitgling spirits Í Are thoughts that ktrow
rto bounds.
But, self-inspired, rise upward, searching orrt
The Eter'n.'il jMitrd, the Father of all tjiorrght, —
Ar-o they become nrere tenants of a tomb ? —
Dwellers in darkness, who the illuminate r-ealms
Of uncre.ated light have visited, and lived ? —
Lived in the dicadful splendor of that throne
Which Orte, with gentle hand the veil of flesh
Lifting that hung 'twi.xt mart and it, revealed
lir glory ? — throne before which even now
Our souls, moved by prophetic power, bow down
Rejoicitrg, j'et at their own natures awed ? —
Souls that thee know by a mysterious sense.
Thou awful, unseen Presence, — are they
quetrched ?
Or bum they on, hid from our mortal eyes
By that bright day which ends not ; as the sun
His robe of light flings round the glittering stars?
And do our loves ail perish with our fi-arrres ?
Do those that took their root and put forth buds.
And then soft leaves unfolded in the warmth
Of mutual hearts, grow up and live in beauty.
Then fade and fall, like fair, unconscious floweis ?
Arc thoughts and passions that to the tongue
"give speech,
And make it send forth winning harmonie.s,
That to the cheek do give its living glow.
And vision in the eye the soul intense
With that for which there is no utterance, —
Are those the body's accidents, no more ?
To live in it, ami when that dies go out
Like the burnt taper's flame ?
0 listen, man !
A voice within us speaks the startling word,
" Man, then shalt never die ! " Celestial voices
Hymn it around our souls ; according harps.
By angel flngers touched when the mild stars
Of morning sang together, sound forth still
The song of our great immortality ;
Thick-clustering orbs, and this o\ir fair domain.
The tall, dark mountains and the deep-toned seas,
Join in this solemn, universal song.
0 listen, ye, our spirits ! drink it in
From all the air ! 'T is in the gentle moonlight ;
Is floating in day's setting glories ; Night,
Wrapped in her sable robe, with silent step
Comes to our bed and breathes it in our ears ; —
Night and the dawn, bright day and thoughtful
eve.
All time, all bounds, the limitless expanse.
As one vast mystic instrument, are touched
By an unseen, living Hand, and conscious chords
Quiver with joy in this gre.at jubilee.
The dying hear it ; and, as sounds of earth
Grow dull and distant, wake their ])as.sing souls
To mingle in this heavenly harmony.
Why is it that 1 linger round this tomb ?
What holds it ? Dust that cumbered those I
mourn.
They shook it off, and laid aside earth's robes.
And put on those of light. They 're gone to dwell
In love,—their God's and angels' ! Mutual love.
That bound them here, no longer needs a .speech
For full communion ; nor sensations strong,
Within the breast, their prison, strive in vain
To be set free, and meet their kind in joy.
Changed to celestials, thoughts that rise in each
By natures new impart themselves, though silent.
Each quickening sense, each throb of holy love.
Affections sanctified, and the full glow
Of being, which expand and gladden one.
By union .all mysterious, thrill and live
In both immortal frames ; — sensation all,
f
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
305
ÜI
And thought, pervading, mingling sense and
thought !
Ye paired, yet one ! wrapt in a consciousness
Twofold, yet single, — this is love, this life !
Why call we, then, the square-built monument.
The upright column, and the low-laid slab
Tokens of death, memorials of decay ?
Stand in this solemn, still assembly, man.
And learn thy proper nature ; for thou seest
In these shaped stones and lettered tables figures
Of Ufe. Then be they to thy soul as those
Which he who talked on Sinai's mount with God
Brought to the old Judeans, — types are these
Of thine eternity.
I thank thee. Father,
That at this simple grave on which the dawn
Is breaking, emblem of that day whieh hath
No close, thou kindly unto my dark mind
Hast sent a sacred Ught, and that away
From this green hUlock, whither I had come
In sorrow, thou art leading me in joy.
Richard Henry Dana.
GREENWOOD CEMETERY.
How calm they sleep beneath the shade
Who once were weary of the strife.
And bent, like us, beneath the load
Of human life !
The willow hangs with sheltering grace
And benediction o'er their sod.
And Nature, hushed, assures the soul
They rest in God.
O weary hearts, what rest is here.
From all that curses yonder town !
So deep the peace, I almost long
To lay me down.
For, oh, it will be blest to sleep.
Nor dream, nor move, that silent night.
Till wakened in immortal strength
And heavenly light !
crammond kennedy.
GOD'S-ACRE.
I LIKE that ancient Saxon phrase which calls
The burial-ground God's-Acre ! It is just ;
It consecrates each grave within its walls.
And breathes a benison o'er the sleeping dust.
God's-Acre ! Yes, that blessed name imparts
Comfort to those who in the grave have sown
The seed that they had garnered in their hearts,
Their bread of Ufe, alas I no more their own.
Into its furrows shall we all be cast.
In the sure faith that we shall rise again
At the great harvest, when the archangel's blast
ShaU winnow, like a fan, the chaflf and grain.
Then shall the good stand in immortal bloom.
In the fair gardens of that second birth ;
And each bright blossom mingle its perfume
With that of fiowers which never bloomed on
earth. ,
With thy rude ploughshare. Death, turn up the
sod,
And spread the fuirow for the seed we sow ;
This is the field and Acre of our God,
This is the place where human harvests grow !
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
ELEGY WRITTEN IN A COUNTRY
CHURCHYARD.
The curfew tolls the knell of parting day ;
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea ;
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way.
And leaves the world to dai-kness and to me.
Now fades the glimmering landscape on the
sight.
And all the air a solemn stillness holds.
Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight.
And drowsy tinkUngs lull the distant folds ;
Save that, from yonder ivy-mantled tower.
The moping owl does to the moon complain
Of such as, wandering near her secret bower.
Molest her ancient, solitary reign.
[Hark ! how the holy calm that breathes around
Bids every fierce tumultuous passion cea.se ;
In still small accents whispering from the ground
The grateful earnest of eternal peace.]*
Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,
Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering
heap.
Each in his narrow cell forever laid.
The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.
The breezy call of incense-breathing mom.
The swallow twittering from the straw-built
shed.
The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn.
No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.
For them no more the glazing hearth shalljmrn.
Or busy housewife ply her evening care
No children ran to lisp their sire's return.
Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.
* Removed by the author from the original poem.
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306
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
10-
Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,
Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke ;
How jocund did they drive their team afield !
How bowed the woods beneath their sturdy
stroke !
Let not ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys, and destiny obscure ;
Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.
The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power.
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await alike the inevitable hour ;
The paths of glory lead but to the grave.
Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault.
If memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise,
"Where, through the long-drawn aisle and fretted
vault.
The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.
Can storied urn, or animated bust.
Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath ?
Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust.
Or flattery soothe the dull, cold ear of death ?
Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid
Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire ;
Hands that the rod of empire might have swayed.
Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre ;
Biit knowledge to their eyes her ample page.
Eich with the spoils of time, did ne'er unroll ;
Chill penury repressed their noble rage.
And froze the genial current of the soul.
Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark, unfathomed caves of ocean bear ;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen.
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.
Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless
breast.
The little tyrant of his fields withstood ;
Some mute, inglorious Milton here may rest ;
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood.
The applause of listening senates to command.
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,
To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land.
And read their history in a nation's eyes.
Their lot forbade : nor circumscribed alone
Their growing virtues, but their crimes con¬
fined ;
Forbade to wade through slaughter to a throne.
And shut the gates of mercy on mankind ;
The struggling pangs of conscious truth to hide,
To quench the blushes of ingenuous ¿hame,
Or heap the shrine of luxury and pride
With incense kindled at the muse's flame.
Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learned to stray ;
Along the cool, sequestered vale of life
I They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.
Yet even these bones from insult to protect.
Some frail memorial still erected nigh.
With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture
decked.
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.
Their name, their years, spelt by the unlettered
muse.
The place of fame and elegy supply ;
And many a holy text around she strews.
That teach the rustic moralist to die.
For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey.
This pleasing, anxious being e'er resigned.
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing, lingering look behind?
On some fond breast the parting soul relies.
Some pious drops the closing eye requires ;
E'en from the tomb the voice of Nature cries.
E'en in our ashes Uve their wonted fires.
For thee, who, mindful of the unhonored dead.
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate ;
If chance, by lonely contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate.
Haply some hoai-y-headed swain may say ; —
" Oft have we seen him, at the peep of dawn.
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away.
To meet the sun upon the upland lawn.
" There at the foot of yonder nodding beech.
That wreathes its old, .fantastic roots so high.
His listless length at noontide would he stretch.
And pore upon the brook that babbles by.
" Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn.
Muttering his wayward fancies, he would rove ;
Now drooping, woful-wan, like one forlorn.
Or crazed with care, or crossed in hopeless
love.
" One mom I missed him on the customed hill.
Along the heath, and near his favorite tree ;
Another came, — nor j*et beside the rUl,
Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he ;
-91
BEREAVEMENT AND DEATH.
30*7
" The next, with dirges due, in sad array,
Slow through the church-way path we saw him
borne ; —
Approach and read (for thou canst read) the lay
Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."
THE EPITAPH.
Here rests his head upon the lap of earth,
A youth to fortune and to fame unknown ;
Fair science frowned not on his humble birth.
And melancholy marked him for her own.
Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere ;
Heaven did a recompense as largely send ;
He gave to misery (all he had) a tear.
He gained from heaven ('t was all he wished)
a friend.
No further seek his merits to disclose.
Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, —
(There they alike in trembling hope repose,)
The bosom of his Father and his God.
Thomas Gray.
INSCRIPTION ON MELROSE ABBEY.
The earth goes on the earth glittering in gold.
The earth goes to the earth sooner than it wold ;
The earth builds on the earth castles and towers.
The éarth says to the earth — All this is ours.
THANATOPSIS.
To him who, in the love of Nature, holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language ; for his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty ; and she glides
Into his darker musings with a mild
And healing sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts
Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images
Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall.
And breathless darkness, and the naiTow house.
Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart.
Go forth under the open sky, and list
To Nature's teachings, while from all around—
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air —
Comes a still voice ; — Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course ; nor yet in the cold ground.
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears.
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall
claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again ;
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up^
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix forever with the elements ;
To be a brother to the insensible rock.
And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thine eternal resting-place
Shalt thou retire alone, — nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world, — with
kings.
The powerful of the earth, — the wise, the good.
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past.
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills,
Rock-ribbed, and ancient as the sun ; the vales -
Stretching in pensive quietness between ;
The venerable woods ; rivers that move
In majesty, and the complaining brooks,
That make the meadows green ; and, poured
round all.
Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste, —
Are but the solemn decorations all
Of the great tomb of man ! The golden sun.
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven.
Are shining on the sad abodes of death.
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread.
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness.
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound
Save his own dashings, —yet the dead are there !
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep,—the dead reign there alone !
So shalt thou rest ; and what if thou withdraw
In silence from the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure ? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase
His favorite phantom ; yet all these shall leave
Hieir mirth and their employments, and shall
come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men —
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron and maid.
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man —
Shall, one by one, be gathered to thy side
By those who in their turn shall follow them.
So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves
To the pale realms of shade, where each shall take
His chamber in the sUent halls of death.
308
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and
soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.
William Collen Bryant.
THE COMMON LOT.
Once, in the flight of ages past.
There lived a Man ; — and who was he ?
— Mortal ! howe'er thy lot be cast.
That Man resembled thee.
Unknown the region of his birth.
The land in which he died unknown :
His name has perished from the earth.
This truth survives alone : —
That joy and grief, and hope and fear.
Alternate triumphed in his breast :
His bliss and woe — a smile, a tear !
— Oblivion hides the rest.
The bounding pulse, the languid limb.
The changing spirit's rise and fall, —•
We know that these were felt by him.
For these are felt by all.
He suffered, — but his pangs are o'er ;
Enjoyed, — but his delights are fled ;
Had friends, — his friends are now no more ;
And foes, — his foes are dead.
He loved, but whom he loved, the grave
Hath lost in its unconscious womb :
0, she was fair, — but naught could save
Her beauty from the tomb.
He saw whatever thou hast seen ;
Encountered all that troubles thee ;
He was — whatever thou hast been ;
He is — what thou shalt be.
The rolling seasons, day and night, *
Sun, moon, and stars, the earth and main,
Erewhile his portion, life and light.
To him exist in vain.
The clouds and sunbeams, o'er his eye
That once their shades and glory threw.
Have left in yonder silent .sky
No vestige where they flew.
The annals of the human race.
Their ruins, since the world began.
Of him afford no other trace
Than this, — There lived a man.
James Montco.verv.
FEAGMENTS.
The Lot of Man.
Death calls ye to the crowd of common men.
Cupid and Death. T. SHIRLEY.
A worm is in the bud of youth.
And at the root of age.
Stanzas subjoined to a Bill of Afortality, CO WPER.
The tall, the wise, the reverend head
Must lie as low as ours.
A Funeral Thougktt Book iL Hymn 63. WaTTS.
Comes at the last, and with a little pin
Bores through his castle wall, and — farewell
king !
Richard lt.. Act iil Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
And though mine arm should conquer twenty
worlds.
There's a lean fellow beats all conquerors.
Old Fortunattis.
T. DEKKER.
Each matin bell, the Baron saith.
Knells us back to a world of death.
Christabel, Part it. S. T. COLERIDGE*
Sure, 't is a serious thing to die 1. . .
Nature runs back and shudders at the sight.
And every life-string bleeds at thought of parting ;
For part they must : body and soul must part ;
Fond couple! linked more close than wedded pair.
The Creme. R. BLAIR.
WhUe man is growing, life is in decrease ;
And cradles rock us nearer to the tomb.
Our birth is nothing but our death begun.
Night Thoughts, Night v. DR. E. YOUNG.
Our days begin with trouble here.
Our life is but a span.
And cruel death is always near.
So frail a thing is man.
Nevo England Primer.
Leaves have their time to fall.
And flowers to wither at the North-wind's breath.
And stars to set ; — bnt all.
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, 0 Death I
The Hour 0/Death. MRS. HEMANS.
The race of yore
Who danced our infancy upon their knee.
And told our marvelling boyhood legends store.
Of strange adventures happed by land or sea.
How are they blotted from the things that be !
Lady o/the Lake. scott.
FRAGMENTS.
309
n
Some lie beneath the churchyard stone,
And some before the speaker.
Scho0l and Schoolfellows. W. M. PRAED.
One, that was a woman, sir ; but, rest her soul,
she's dead.
Hamlet, Acte. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
How fast has brother followed brother.
From sunshine to the sunless land !
Extempore Effusion upon the Death of fames Hogg,
WORDSWO
The slender debt to nature's quickly paid.
Discharged, perchance, with greater ease than
made.
Emblems, Book ii. 13. F. QUARLES.
With mortal crisis doth portend
My days to appropinque an end.
Hudibras, Part i. Cant. iii. BUTLER.
This fell sergeant, death.
Is strict in his arrest.
Hamlet. Act v. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
We cannot hold mortality's strong hand.
King John, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Early Death.
Happy they !
Thrice fortunate ! who of that fragile mould.
The precious porcelain of human clay.
Break with the first fall.
Don yuan. Cant, iv. BYRON.
Hark ! to the hurried question of despair :
"Where is my child?" an echo answers,—
" Where ? "
Bride of Abydos, Cant. ii. BYRON.
Oh ! when a Mother meets on high
The Babe she lost in infancy.
Hath she not then, for pains and fears.
The day of woe, the watchful night.
For all her sorrow, all her tears.
An over-payment of delight ?
Curse of Kekama, Cant, x. R, SOUTHEY.
What, all my pretty chickens, and their dam,
At one fell swoop ?
Macbeth, Activ.Se,^, SHAKESPEARE.
Ijoveliest of lovely things are they.
On earth that .soonest pass away.
The rose that lives its little hour
Is prized beyond the sculptured flower.
A Seene on the Banks of the Hudson, W. C. BRYANT.
Thy leaf has perished in the green.
In Memoriam, Ixxiv. TbNNVSON.
An untimely grave.
On the Duke of Buckingham, T. Carew.
Death's Choice.
Death loves a shining mark, a signal blow.
Night Thoughts, Night v. DR» E. YOUNG.
Death aims with fouler spite
At fairer marks.
Divine Poems,
F. Quarles.
The good die first.
And they whose hearts are dry as summer dust
Burn to the socket.
TJte Excursion. Boot L WORDSWORTH.
The ripest fruit first fall i
Richard //., Act ii. 5*^. 1.
SHAKESPEARE.
Death-Beds.
The chamber where the good man meets his fate
Is privileged beyond the common walk
Of virtuous life, quite in the verge of heaven.
Night Thoughts, Night Vi. DR. E. YOUNGi
Of no distemper, of no blast he died.
But fell like autumn fruit that mellowed long ;
Even wondered at, because he dropt no sooner.
Fate seemed to wind him up for foui-score years ;
Yet freshly ran he on ten winters more :
Till, like a clock worn out with eating time.
The wheels of weary life at last stood still.
Œdipus, Act iv. Sc. z. DRYDEN.
Nothing in his life
Became him like the leaving it ; he died.
As one that had been studied in his death.
To throw away the dearest thing he owed.
As't were a careless trifle.
Macbeth. Act i. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
To die is landing on some silent shore.
Where billows never break, nor tempests roar ;
Ere well we feel the friendly stroke, 't is o'er.
The Dispensary, Cant Ui. S. Garth.
And, like a passing thought, .she fled
In light away.
The Vision. burns
He was exhaled ; his great Creator drew
His .spirit, as the sun the morning dew.
On the Death of a very Young Gentleman. DRYDEN.
Why should we faint and fear to live alone.
Since all alone, so Heaven has willed, we die.
Nor even the tenderest heart, and next our own.
Knows half the reasons why we smile and sigh.
The Christian Year: XXIV. Sunday after Trinity, KebLB.
iP
fl-
310
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
Cut off even in the blossoms of my sin,
Unhouseled, disappointed, unaneled ;
No reckoning made, but sent to my account
With all my imperfections on my bead.
Hamltt, Act\. Sc. z, SHAKESPEARB.
A deatb-bed's a detector of the heart :
Here tired dissimulation drops her mask.
Through life's grimace that mistress of the scene ;
Here real and apparent are the same.
Night Thoughts, Night'ú, DR. E. YOUNG.
The tongues of d3Úng men
Enforce attention, like deep harmony :
When words ara scarce, they 're seldom spent in
vain ;
For they breathe truth that breathe their words
in pain.
Richard II., Act U. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
Death and Sleep.
' • • i '
Death, so called, is a thing that makes men weep,
And yet a third of life is passed in sleep.
Don yuan^ Canto xiv. BYRON.
Let no man fear to die ; we love to sleep all.
And death is hut the sounder sleep.
Humorous Lieutenant, F. BEAUMONT.
Sleep is a death ; 0 make me try
By sleeping what it is to die.
And as gently lay my head
On my grave as now my bed.
Religio Medici, Part ii. Sec, 12.
Sir T. Browne.
Let guilt, or fear.
Disturb man's rest. Cato knows neither of them ;
Indifferent in his choice, to sleep or die.
Cato. ADDISON.
ö-
Fear of Death.
I fear to die . . .
For oh ! it goes against the mind of man
To he turned out from its warm wonted home.
Ere yet one rent admits the winter's chill.
Rayner. JOANNA BAILLIE.
The sense of death is most in apprehension ;
And the poor beetle, that we tread upon,
lu corporal sufferance finds a pang as great
As when a giant dies.
Measure for Measure, Act \ú. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Cowards die many times before their deaths ;
The valiant never taste of death but once.
yutius Casar, Actil Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,
It seems to me most strange that men should
fear ;
Seeing that death, a necessary end.
Will come when it will come.
yulius Cacar, Act ii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Death — Conventional and Natural.
Hark ! from the tombs a doleful sound.
A Funeral Thought, Book u« Hymn 63. Watts.
Whatever crazy sorrow saith.
No life that breathes with human breath
Has ever truly longed for death.
Two Voices, Tennyson.
I fied, and cried out Death !
Hell trembled at the hideous name, and sighed
From all her caves, and back resounded Death.
Paradise Lost, Book iL MiLTON,
Before mine eyes in opposition sits
Grim Death, my son and foe.
Paradise Lost, Book \\. MILTON.
Imagination's fool, and error's wretch,
Man makes a death which nature never made ;
Then on the point of his own fancy falls ;
And feels a thousand deaths, in fearing one.
Night Thoughts. DR. E. YOUNG.
So mayst thou live, till like ripe fruit thou drop
Into thy mother's lap.
Paradise Lost, Book xL MiLTON.
The Grave.
Let's talk of graves, of worms, and epitaphs.
. . . nothing can we call our own but death.
And that small model of the barren earth
Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.
For heaven's sake, let us sit upon the ground.
And tell sad stories of the death of kings.
Richard II., Act ii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
The Grave, dread thing !
Men shiver when thou'rt named ; Nature, ap¬
palled.
Shakes oflf her wonted firmness.
Cruel as death, and hungry as the grave.
The Seasons: ¡Vinter. THOMSON.
Brave Percy, fare thee well !
Ill-weaned ambition, how much art thou shrunk :
When that this body did contain a spirit,
A kingdom for it was too small a bound ;
But now, two paces of the vilest earth
Is room enough.
Henry y/.. Part I. Act a. Sc. SHAKESPEARE.
FRAGMENTS.
311
-a
How loved, how honored once, avails thee not,
To whom related, or by whom begot ;
A heap of dust alone remains of thee ;
"T is all thou art, and all the proud shall be !
To the Memory o/an Un/ortunate Lady» POPE.
The had man's death is horror ; hut the just
Keeps something of his glory in the dust.
Castara. w. habincton.
And from his ashes may he made
The violet of his native land.
In Memoriam, xviiL . TENNYSON.
Lay her i' the earth ;
And from her fair and unpolluted flesh
May violets spiing !
Hamlet, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Sweets to the sweet : farewell.
I hoped thou shouldst have been my Hamlet's
wife :
I thought thy hride-hed to have decked, sweet
maid,
And not t' have strewed thy grave.
HamUt, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
May no rude hand deface it.
And its forlorn hie jouxt !
Ellen Irwin, wordsworth.
Longing for Death.
Friend to the wretch whom every friend forsakes,
I woo thee. Death !
Death. b. porteus.
Death ! to the happy thou art terrible.
But how the wretched love to think of thee,
O thou true comforter, the friend of all
Who have no friend beside.
yuan cf Arc. r. southev.
0, that this too, too solid flesh would melt.
Thaw, and resolve itself into a dew ;
I Or that the Everlasting had not fixed
I His canon 'gainst self-slaughter.
The Peace of Death.
Rest, rest, perturbed spirit !
Hamlet, Aeti. Sc, 5.
shakespeare;
Here lurks no treason, here no envy swells.
Here grow no damned grudges ; here are no
storms.
No noise, but silence and eternal sleep.
Titus Andronicus, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
He gave his honors to the world again.
His blessèd part to heaven, and slept in peace.
Henry yill.. Act. iv. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Better be with the dead.
Whom we to gain our peace have sent to peace,
Than on the torture of the mind to lie
In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave ;
After life's fitful fever, he sleeps well ;
Treason has done his worst : nor steel, nor poison,
Maliee domestic, foreign levy, nothing.
Can touch him further !
Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Here may the storme-bett vessell safely ryde ;
This is the port of rest from troublous toyle.
The worlde's sweet inn from paine and wearisome
turmoyle.
faery Queene. SPENSER.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2.
shakespeare.
I hear a voice you cannot hear.
Which says I must not stay,
I see a hand you cannot see.
Which beckons me away.
Colin and Luey. T. TICKELL.
Thank God for Death ! bright thing with dreary
name.
Benedicam Domino, susan coolidge.
But an old age serene and bright.
And lovely as a Lapland night.
Shall lead thee to thy grave.
Toa Young Lady,
Wordsworth.
After Death.
The wisest men are glad to die ; no fear
Of death can touch a true philosopher.
Death sets the soul at liberty to fly.
Continuation o/Lucan, T. MAY.
Alas ! for love, if thou art all.
And naught beyond, 0 Earth !
The Graves of a Household,
'T is not the whole of life to live :
Nor all of death to die.
Mrs. Hemans.
The Issues of Life and Death,
J. MONTGOMERY.
Since heaven's eternal year is thine.
Elegy on Mrs. Killegrew,
Mourning.
'T is better to have loved and lost.
Than never to have loved at all.
In Memoriam, xxvii.
Tennyson.
Those that he loved so long and sees no more.
Loved and still loves, — not dead, but gone be¬
fore, —
He gathers round him.
Human Life. rogers.
[&
312
POEMS OF THE AFFECTIONS.
I cannot but remember such things were,
That were most precious to me.
Matbeth, Act a. Sc. 3. shakespeare.
Give sorrow words ; the grief that does not speak
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart, and bids it break.
Macbtth, Act iv. Sc» 3*
shakespeare.
Praising what is lost
Makes the remembrance dear.
AU V WeU thai Ends WcU, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
We bear it calmly, though a ponderous woe.
And still adore the hand that gives the blow.
Verses to his Friend under AjfflicHon. j. pomfret.
He first deceased ; she for a little tried
To live without him, liked it not, and died.
Upon the Death of Sir Albert Morton's IVi/e.
Sir H. Wotton.
Speak me fair in death.
Merchant of Venice, Actxy. Sc» i.
Patch grief with proverbs.
Much Ado About Nothing, Act v. Sc. k
shakespeare.
Shakespeare.
Poor Jack, farewell !
I could have better spared a better man.
Henry ¡V., Part I. Acte. Sc. 4. shakespeare.
So may he rest ; his faults lie gently on him !
Henry VIII., ActivaSc,2. Shakespeare.
The veiy cypress droops to death —
Dark tree, still sad when others' grief is fled.
The only constant mourner o'er the dead.
The Giaour. byron.
They truly mourn, that mourn without a wit-
What though no friends in sable weeds appear.
Grieve for an hour, perhaps, then mourn a year.
And bear about the mockery of woe
To midnight dances and the public show !
To the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady. POPE
He mourns the dead who lives as they desire.
Night Thoughts, Nights DR. E. YOUNQ.
&
■0'
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
fi-
f.
. { n M ^
5 ^ ^ r\
V^'n
^ ^ i 4
u
4
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
RETROSPECTION.
from "the princess."
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean.
Tears from the depth of some divine despair
Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes.
In looking on the happy autumn fields.
And thinking of the days that are no more.
Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail.
That brings our friends up from the under world ;
Sad as the last which reddens over one
That sinks with all we love below the verge, —
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.
Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns
The eai'liest pipe of half-awakened birds
To dying ears, when unto dying eyes
The casement slowly grows a glimmering square ;
So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.
Dear as remembered kisses after death.
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feigned
On lips that are for others ; deep as love,
Deep as first love, and wild with all regi'et, —
O Death in Life, the days that are no more.
Alfred Tennvson.
BREAK, BREAK, BREAK.
Break, break, break.
On thy cold^gray stones, 0 sea !
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me.
f ^ \
O well for the fisherman's boy
That he shoutsVith his sister at play I
0 well for thetsailor lad '
That he sings in his boat on the bay !
And the stately ships go on.
To the haven under the hill ;
But 0 for the touch of a vanished hand.
And the sound of a voice that is stUl !
Break, break, break.
At the foot of thy crags, 0 sea !
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
WÜ1 never come back to me.
alfred Tennyson.
<
MOAN, MOAN, YE DYING GALES.
Moan, moan, ye dying gales !
The saddest of your tales
Is not so sad as life ;
Nor have you e'er began
A theme so wild as man.
Or with such sorrow rife.
Fall, fall, thou withered leaf !
Autumn sears not like grief.
Nor kills such lovely fiowers ;
More terrible the storm.
More mournful the deform.
When dark misfortune lowers.
Hush ! hush ! thou trembling lyre.
Silence, ye vocal choir.
And thou, mellifluous lute.
For man soon breathes his last.
And all his hope is past.
And all his music mute.
Then, when the gale is sighing.
And when the leaves are dying.
And when the song is o'er,
O, let us think of those
Whose lives are lost in woes.
Whose cup of grief runs o'er.
Henrv Neble.
HENCE, ALL YE VAIN DELIGHTS.
from "the nice valowr," act iii. sc. 3.
Hence, all ye vain delights.
As short as are the nights
Wherein you spend your foUy !
There's naught in this life sweet.
If man were wise to see't
But only melancholy,
O, sweetest melancholy !
fl-
316
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
a
Welcome, folded arms, and fixèd eyes,
A sigh that piercing mortifies,
A look that's fastened to the ground,
A tongue chained up without a sound 1
Fountain-heads and pathless groves.
Places which pale passion loves !
Moonlight walks, when all the fowls
Are warmly housed save bats and owls !
A midnight bell, a parting groan !
These are the sounds we feed upon ;
Then stretch our bones in a still gloomy valley :
Nothing's so dainty sweet as lovely melancholy.
John Fletcher.
BLOW, BLOW, THOU WINTER WIND.
prom "as you like it," act ii. sc
Blow, blow, thou winter wind.
Thou art not so unkind
As man's ingratitude ;
Thy tooth is not so keen.
Because thou art not seen.
Although thy breath be rude.
Heigh-ho ! sing heigh-ho ! unto the green holly ;
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere
folly ;
Then, heigh-ho, the holly !
This life is most jolly !
Freeze, freeze, thou bitter sky.
Thou dost not bite so nigh
As benefits forgot :
Though thou the waters warp.
Thy sting is not so sharp
As friend remembered not.
Heigh-ho ! sing heigh-ho ! unto the green hoUy :
Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere
folly :
Then, heigh-ho, the holly !
This life is most jolly !
shakespeare.
U
SAD IS OUR YOUTH, FOR IT IS EVER
GOING.
Sa.d is our youth, for it is ever going.
Crumbling away beneath our very feet ;
Sad is our life, for onward it is fiowing
In current unperceived, because so fleet}
Sad are our hopes, for they were sweet in sow¬
ing,—
But tares, self-sown, have overtopped the wheat ;
Sad are our joys, for they were sweet in blow¬
ing,—
And still, 0, stUI their dying breath is sweet ;
And sweet is youth, although it hath bereft us
Of that which made our childhood sweeter still ;
And sweet is middle life, for it hath left us
A nearer good to cure an older Ü1 ;
And sweet are all things, when we learn to prize
them.
Not for their sake, but His who grants them or
denies them !
Aubrey De verb.
ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE.
Written in the spring of 1819, when suffering from physical de*
pression, the precursor of his death, which happened soon after.
My heart ^hes, and^ drowiy numbness pains
My sense, as though of hemlock I had diimk.
Or emptied some dull opiate to the dmins
One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk :
'T is not through envy of thy happy lot.
But being too happy in thy happiness, —
That thou, light-winged Dryad of the trees.
In some melodious plot
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless.
Singest of Summer in full-throated ease.
0 for a draught of vintage, that hath been
Cooled a long age in the deep delved earth.
Tasting of Flora and the country-green.
Dance, and Provençal song, and sunburnt
mirth !
O for a beaker full of the warm South,
Full of the true, the blushful Hippocrene,
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim.
And purple-stainèd mouth, —
That I might drink, and leave the world un¬
seen.
And with thee fade away into the forest dim :
Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget
What thou among the leaves hast never known.
The weariness, the fever, and the fret
Here, where men sit and hear each other gi'oan ;
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gi-ay hairs.
Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and
dies ;
Where but to think is to be full of sorrow
And leaden-eyed despairs.
Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes.
Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow.
Away ! away ! for I will fly to thee.
Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards.
But on the viewless wings of Poesy,
Though the duU brain perplexes and retards :
-S
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
317
3-
Already with thee ! tender is the night,
And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne.
Clustered around by all her starry Fays ;
But here there is no light.
Save what from heaven is with the breezes
blown
Through verdurous glooms and winding
mossy ways.
I cannot see what flowers are at my feet.
Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs,
But in embalmèd darkness, guess each sweet
Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild ;
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine ;
Fast-fading violets covered up in leaves ;
And mid-May's eldest child.
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine.
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer
eves.
Darkling I listen ; and for many a time
I have been half in love with easeful Death.
Called him soft names in many a mused rhyme.
To take into the air my quiet breath ;
Now, more than ever, seems it rich to die.
To cease upon the midnight, with no pain.
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad.
In such an ecstasy ! —
Still wouldst thou sing, ' and I have ears in
vain —
To thy high requiem become a sod.
Thou wast not bom for death, immortal Bird !
No hungry generations tread thee down ;
The voice I hear this passing night was heard
In ancient days by emperor and clown :
Perhaps the self-same song that found a path
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for
home.
She stood in tears amid the alien com ;
The same that oft-times hath
Charmed magic casements opening on the foam
Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.
Forlom ! the very word is like a bell.
To toll me back from thee to my sole self !
Adieu ! the Fancy cannot cheat so well
As she is famed to do, deceiving elf.
Adieu ! adieu ! thy plaintive anthem fades
Past the near meadows, over the still stream.
Up the hillside ; and now 't is buried deep
In the next valley-glades :
Was it a vision or a waking dream ?
Fled is that music : — do I wake or sleep ?
John Keats.
THE SUN IS WARM, THE SKY IS CLEAR.
, STANZAS WRITTEN IN DEJECTION NEAR NAPLES.
The sun is warm, the sky is clear.
The waves are dancing fast and bright.
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear
The purple noon's transparent light :
The breath of the moist air is light
Around its nnexpanded buds ;
Like many a voice of one delight, —
The winds', the birds', the ocean-floods', —
The City's voice itself is soft like Solitude's.
I see the Deep's untrampled floor
With green and purple sea-weeds strown ;
I see the waves upon the shore
Like light dissolved in star-showers thrown :
I sit upon the sands alone ;
The lightning of the noontide ocean
Is flashing round me, and a tone
Arises from its measured motion, —
How sweet, did any heart now share in my
emotion !
Alas ! I have nor hope nor health.
Nor peace within nor calm around.
Nor that Content surpassing wealth
The sage in meditation found.
And walked with inward glory croivned, —
Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure.
Others I see whom these surround ;
Smiling they live, and call life pleasure ;
To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.
Yet now despair itself is mild
Even as the winds and waters are ;
I could lie down like a tired child.
And weep away the life of care
Which I have borne, and yet must bear.
Till death like sleep might steal on me.
And I might feel in the wami air
My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.
ROSALIE.
0, pour upon my .soul again
That sad, unearthly strain
That seems from other worlds to 'plain !
Thus falling, falling from afar.
As if some melancholy star
Had mingled with her light her sighs.
And dropped them from the skies.
318 POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
No, never came from aught below
This melody of woe,
That makes my heart to overflow.
As from a thousand gushing springs
Unknown before ; that with it brings
This nameless light — if light it be —
That veils the world I see.
For all I see around me wears
The hue of other spheres ;
And something blent of smiles and tears
Comes from the very air I breathe.
O, nothing, sure, the stars beneath.
Can mould a sadness like to this, —
So like angelic bliss !
So, at that dreamy hour of day.
When the last lingering ray
Stops on the highest cloud to play, —
So thought the gentle Rosalie
As on her maiden revery
First fell the strain of him who stole
In music to her soul.
Washington Allston.
A DOUBTING HEART.
Where are the swallows fled ?
Frozen and dead
Perchance upon some bleak and stormy shore.
0 doubting heart !
Far over purple seas
They wait, in sunny ease.
The balmy southern breeze
Tobring them to their northern homes once more.
Why must the flowers die ?
Prisoned they lie
In the cold tomb, heedless of tears or rain.
0 doubting heart !
They only sleep below
The soft white ermine snow
While winter winds shall blow.
To breathe and smile upon you soon again.
The sun has hid its rays
These many days ;
Will dreary hours never leave the earth ?
O doubting heart !
The stormy clouds on high
Veil the same sunny sky
That soon, for spring is nigh.
Shall wake the summer into golden mirth.
Fair hope is dead, and light
Is quenched in night ;
What sound can break the silence of despair ?
0 doubting heart !
The sky is overcast.
Yet stars shall rise at last,
Brighter for darkness past.
And angels' silver voices stir the air.
ADELAIDE Anne Procter.
OFT IN THE STILLY NIGHT.
Oft in the stilly night.
Ere slumber's chain has bound me.
Fond Memory brings the light
Of other days around me :
The smiles, the tears.
Of boyhood's years.
The words of love then spoken ;
The eyes that shone.
Now dimmed and gone.
The cheerful hearts now broken.
Thus in the stilly night.
Ere slumber's chain has bound me.
Sad Memory brings the light
Of other days around me.
When 1 remember all
The friends so linked together
I've seen around me fall.
Like leaves in wintry weather,
I feel like one
Who treads alone
Some banquet-haU deserted.
Whose lights are fled.
Whose garlands dead.
And all but he departed.
Thus in the stilly night.
Ere slumbei''s chain has bound me.
Sad Memory brings the light
Of other days around me.
Thomas Moore.
MY SHIP.
Down to the wharves, as the sun goes down.
And the daylight's tumult and dust and din
Are dying away in the busy town,
I go to see if my ship comes in.
1 gaze far over the quiet sea.
Rosy with sunset, like mellow wine.
Where ships, like lilies, lie ti'auquilly.
Many and fair, — but 1 see not mine.
I question the sailors every night
Who over the bulwarks idly lean.
Noting the sails as they come in sight, —
" Have you .seen my beautiful ship come in ?'
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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
319
" Whence does she come ? " they ask of me ;
"Who is her master, and what her name ? "
And they smile upon me pityingly
When my answer is ever and ever the same.
0, mine was a vessel of strength and truth,
Her sails were white as a young lamb's fleece,
She sailed long since from the port of Youth, —
Her master was Love, and her name was Peace.
And like all beloved and beauteous things.
She faded in distance and doubt away, —
With only a tremble of snowy wings
She floated, swan-like, adown the bay.
Carrying with her a precious freight, —
All I had gathered by years of pain ;
A tempting prize to the pirate, Fate, —
And still I watch for her back again ; —
Watch from the earliest morning light
Till the pale stars grieve o'er the d3dng day,
To catch the gleam of her canvas white
Among the islands which gem the bay.
But she comes not yet, — she will never come
To gladden my eyes and my spirit more ;
And my heart grows hopeless and faint and dumb.
As I wait and wait on the lonesome shore.
Knowing that tempest and time and storm
Have wrecked and shattered my beauteous bark ;
Rank sea-weeds cover her wasting form.
And her sails are tattered and stained and dark.
But the tide comes up, and the tide goes down.
And the daylight follows the night's eclipse, —
And still with the sailors, tanned and brown,
1 wait on the wharves and watch the ships.
And still with a patience that is not hope.
For vain and empty it long hath been,
1 sit on the rough shore's rocky slope.
And watch to see if my ship comes in.
Elizabeth akers Allen (Fiormx Percy).
w
AFAR IN THE DESERT.
Afar in the desert 1 love to ride.
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side :
When the sorrows of life the soul o'ercast.
And, sick of the present, 1 cling to the past ;
When the eye is suffused with regretful tears.
From the fond recollections of former years ;
And shadows of things that have long since fled
Flit over the brain, like the ghosts of the dead, —
Bright visions of glory that vanished too soon ,
Day-dreams, that departed ere manhood's noon ;
Attachments by fate or falsehood reft ;
Companions of early days lost or left ;
And my native land, whose magical name
Thrills to the heart like electric flame ;
The home of my childhood ; the haunts of my
prime;
All the passions and scenes of that rapturous
time
When the feelings were young, and the world
was new.
Like the fresh bowers of Eden unfolding to view ;
All, all now forsaken, forgotten, foregone !
And 1, a lone exile remembered of none.
My high aims abandoned, my good acts undone.
Aweary of all that is under the sun, —
With that sadness of heart which no stranger
may scan,
1 fly to the desert afar from man.
Afar in the desert 1 love to ride.
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side !
When the wild turmoil of this wearisome life.
With its scenes of oppression, corruption, and
strife.
The proud man's frown, and the base man's fear.
The scorner's laugh, and the sufferer's tear.
And malice, and meanness, and falsehood, and
folly,
Dispose me to musing and dark melancholy ;
When my bosom is full, and my thoughts are
high.
And my soul is sick with the bondman's sigh, —
O, then there is freedom, and joy, and pride.
Afar in the desert alone to ride !
There is rapture to vault on the champing steed.
And to hound away with the eagle's speed,
With the death-fraught firelock in my hand, —
The only law of the Desert Land !
Afar in the desert 1 love to ride.
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side.
Away, away from the dwellings of men.
By the wild deer's haunt, by the buffalo's glen ;
By valleys, remote where the oribi plays.
Where the gnu, the gazelle, and the hartèheest
graze.
And the kudu and eland unhunted recline
By the skirts of gray forest o'erhung with wild
vine ;
Where the elephant browses at peace in his wood.
And the river-horse gambols unscared in the
flood.
And the mighty rhinoceros wallows at will
In the fen where the wild ass is drinking his filL
Afar in the desert 1 love to ride.
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side^
á
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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
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O'er the brown karroo, where the bleating cry
Of the springbok's fawn sounds plaintively ;
And the timorous quagga's shrill whistling neigh
Is heard by the fountain at twilight gray ;
Where the zebra wantonly tosses his mane,
"With wild hoof scouring the desolate plain ;
And the fleet-footed ostrich over the waste
Speeds like a horseman who travels in haste.
Hieing away to the home of her rest.
Where she and her mate have scooped their
nest,
Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's view
In the pathless depths of the parched karroo.
Afar in the desert I love to ride.
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side.
Away, away, in the wilderness vast
Where the white man's foot hath never passed.
And the quivered Coranna or Bechuan
Hath rarely crossed with his roving clan, —
A region of emptiness, howling and drear.
Which man hath abandoned from famine and
fear ;
Which the snake and the lizard inhabit alone.
With the twilight bat from the yawning stone ;
Where grass, nor herb, nor shrub takes root.
Save poisonous thorns that pierce the foot ;
And the bitter-melon, for food and drink.
Is the pUgrim's fare by the salt lake's brink ;
A region of drought, where no river glides.
Nor rippling brook with osiered sides ;
Where sedgy pool, nor bubbling fount,
Nor tree, nor cloud, nor misty mount.
Appears, to refresh the aching eye ;
But the barren earth and the burning sky,
And the blank horizon, roimd and round.
Spread, —void of living sight or sound.
And here, while the night-winds round me sigh.
And the stars bum bright in the midnight sky.
As I sit apart by the desert stone.
Like Elijah at Horeb's cave, alone,
" A still small voice " comes through the wild
(Like a father consoling his fretful child).
Which banishes bitterness, wrath, and fear.
Saying, — Man is distant, but God is near !
thomas pringle.
6-
THE WORLD.
The World's a bubble, and the Life of Man
Less than a span ;
In his conception wretched, from the womb.
So to the tomb ;
Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years
With cares and fears.
Who then to frail mortality shall trust.
But limns on water, or but writes in dust.
Yet whilst with sorrow here we live opprest,
What life is best ?
Courts are but only superficial schools
To dandle fools :
The rural parts are turned into a den
Of savage men :
And where's a city from foul vice so free.
But may be term'd the worst of all the three ?
Domestic cares afflict the husband's bed.
Or pains his head :
Those that live single, take it for a curse.
Or do things worse :
Some would have children : those that have
them, moan
Or wish them gone :
What is it, then, to have or have no wife,
But single thraldom, or a double strife ?
Our own affection still at home to" please
Is a disease :
To cross the seas to any foreign soil.
Peril and toil :
Wars with their noise affnght us ; when they
cease.
We are worse in peace ; —
"What then remains, but that we still should cry
For being bom, or, being bom, to die ?
Francis, Lord Bacon.
LOVE NOT.
Love not, love not, ye hapless sons of clay !
Hope's gayest wreaths are made of earthly flow¬
ers, —
Things that are made to fade and fall away
Ere they have blossomed for a few short hours.
Love not !
Love not ! the thing ye love may change ;
The rosy lip may cease to smile on you.
The kindly-beaming eye grow cold and strange,
The heart still warmly beat, yet not be trae.
Love not !
Love not ! the thing you love may die, —
May perish from the gay and gladsome earth ;
The silent stars, the blue and smiling sky.
Beam o'er its grave, as once upon its birth.
Love not !
Love not ! 0 waming vainly said
In present hours as in years gone by !
Love flings a halo round the dear ones' head.
Faultless, immortal, till they change or die.
Love not !
caroline Elizabeth Sheridan.
(Hon. Mrs. Norton.)
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POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
321
SAMSON ON HIS BLINDNESS.
FROM •• SAMSON AGONISTES."
0 LOSS of sight, of thee I most complain !
Blind among enemies, 0, worse than chains,
Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age !
Light, the prime work of God, to me is extinct.
And all her various objects of delight
Annulled, which might in part my grief have
eased.
Inferior to the vilest now become
Of man or worm ; the vilest here excel me :
They creep, yet see ; I, dark in light, exposed
To daily fraud, contempt, abuse, and wrong.
Within doors or without, still as g, fool.
In power of othei-s, never in my own ;
Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half.
0 dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon.
Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse.
Without all hope of day 1
FROM "PARADISE LOST."
eve's lament.
BOOK XI.
o unexpected stroke, worse than of death !
Must I thus leave thee. Paradise ? thus leave
Thee, native soil ! these happy walks and shades.
Fit haunt of gods ; where I had hope to spend.
Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day
That must he mortal to us both ? O flowers.
That never will in other climate grow.
My early visitation, and my last
At even, which I bred up with tender hand
Prom the first opening bud, and gave ye names !
Who now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank
Your tribes, and water from the ambrosial fount ?
Thee, lastly, nuptial bower ! by me adorned
With what to sight or smeU was sweet, from thêe
How shall I part, and whither wander down
Into a lower world, to this obscure
And wild ? how shall we breathe in other air
Less pure, accustomed to immortal fruits ?
eve to adam.
BOOK XI.
With sorrow and heart's distress
Wearied, I fell asleep. But now lead on ;
In me is no delay ; with thee to go.
Is to stay here ; without thee here to stay.
Is to go hence unwilling ; thou to me
Art all things under heaven, all places thou.
Who for my wilful crime art banished hence.
This further consolation, yet secure,
I carry hence ; though all by me is lost.
Such favor I imworthy am vouchsafed.
By me the promised Seed shall all restore.
THE DEPAKTUKE FEOM PARADISE.
BOOK XII.
In either hand the hastening angel caught
Our lingering parents, and to the eastern gate
Led them direct, and down the cliff as fast
To the subjected plain ; then disappeared.
They, looking back, all the eastern side beheld
Of Paradise, so late their happy seat.
Waved over by that flaming brand ; the gate
With dreadful faces thronged and fleiy arms.
Some natural tears they dropt, but wiped them
soon ;
The world was all before them, where to choose
Their place of rest, and Providence their guide.
They, hand in hand, with wandering steps and
slow.
Through Eden took their solitary way.
Milton.
WOLSEY'S FALL,
FROM "HENRY VIII.," ACT III. SC. 2.
parewell,|a lon¿ farçwell,^to all^my greatness !
This is|^the statè, of man ; to-day he puts^forth
The tender leaves,of hope ¡^to-mp^row blqssoms.
And bears his blushing honors thick upon him ;
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost ;
And—when he thinks, good easy man, full surely
His greatness is a ripening — nips his root.
And then he falls, as I do. I have ventured.
Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders.
This many summers in a sea of glory ;
But far beyond my depth : my high-blown pride
At length broke under me ; and now has left me.
Weary and old with service, to the mercy
Of a rude stream, that must forever hide me.
Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye :
I feel my heart new opened. 0, how wretched
Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favors !
There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to.
That sweet aspect of princes, and their ruin.
More pangs and fears than wars or women have ;
And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer,
Never to hope again.
shakespeare.
WOLSEY'S ADVICE TO CROMWELL,
FROM " HENRY VIII.," ACT HI. SC. 2.
Cromwell, I did not think to shed a tear
In all my miseries ; but thou hast forced me.
Out of thy honest truth, to play the woman.
Let's dry our eyes : and thus far hear me, Crom¬
well ;
And — when I am forgotten, as I shall he.
And sleep in didl, cold marble, where no mention
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322
POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
Of me more must be heard of — say, I taught thee,
Say, Wolsey — that once trod the ways of glory.
And sounded all the depths and shoals of honor—
Found thee a way, out of his wreck, to rise in ;
A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it.
Mark but my fall, and that that ruined me.
Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition :
By that sin fell the angels ; how can man, then.
The image of his Maker, hope to win by't ?
Love thyself last ; cherish those hearts that hate
thee :
Corruption wins not more than honesty.
Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace,
To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not :
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's.
Thy God's, and truth's ; then if thou faU'.st, 0
Cromwell !
Thou falTst a blessed mariyr.
Serve the king ; and — pr'ythee, lead me in :
There take an inventory of all I have.
To the last penny ; 't is the king's : my robe.
And my integrity to heaven, is all
I dare now call mine own. 0 Cromwell, Crom¬
well !
Had I but served my God with half the zeal
I served my king, he would not in mine age
Have left me naked to mine enemies !
Shakespeare.
THE LATE SPRING.
She stood alone amidst the April fields, —
Brown, sodden fields, all desolate and bare.
"The spring is late," she said, "the faithless
spring.
That should have come to make the meadows
fair.
"Their sweet South left too soon, among the
trees
The birds, bewildered, flutter to and fro ;
For them no green boughs wait,—their memories
Of last year's April had deceived them so."
She watched the homeless birds, the slow, sad
spring.
The barren fields, and shivering, naked trees.
"Thus God has dealt with me, his child," she
said ;
" 1 wait my spring-time, and am cold like
these.
" To them will come the fulness of their time ;
Their spring, though late, wül make the mead¬
ows fair ;
Shall 1, who wait like them, like them be blessed ?
I am his own, — doth not my Father care ? "
louise Chandler moulton.
A LAMENT.
0 world ! O Life ! 0 Time !
On whose last steps 1 climb.
Trembling at that where 1 had stood before ;
When will return the glory of your prime ?
No more, — 0 nevermore !
Out of the day and night
A joy has taken flight :
Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar
Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight
No more, — 0 nevermore !
percy Byssbe Shelley.
"WHAT CAN AN OLD MAN DO BUT
DIE ?"
Spring it is cheery.
Winter is dreary.
Green leaves hang, but the brown must fly ;
When he's forsaken.
Withered and shaken.
What can an old man do but die ?
Love will not clip him.
Maids will not lip him,
Maud and Marian pass him by;
Youth it is sunny.
Age has no honey, —
What can an old man do but die ?
June it was jolly,
O for its folly !
À dancing leg and a laughing eye !
Youth may be silly.
Wisdom is chilly, —
What can an old man do but die ?
Friends they are scanty.
Beggars are plenty.
If he has followers, 1 know why ;
Gold's in his clutches
(Buying him crutches !) —
What can an old man do but die ?
Thomas Hoon
PERISHED.
catskill mountain house.
Wave after wave of greenness rolling down
From mountain top to base, a whispering sea
Of affluent leaves through which the viewless-
breeze
Murmurs mysteriously.
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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITE.
323
fil
And towering up amid the lesser throng,
A giant oak, so desolately grand.
Stretches its gray imploring arms to heaven
In agonized demand.
Smitten hy lightning from a summer sky,
Or bearing in its heart a slow decay.
What matter, since inexorable fate
Is pitiless to slay.
Ah, wayward soul, hedged in and clothed about,
Doth not thy life's lost hope lift up its head.
And, dwarfing present joys, proclaim aloud, —
" Look on me, I am dead! "
Marv Louise Ritter.
B-
THE LAST LEAF.
I SAW him once before.
As he passed hy the door ;
And again
The pavement-stones resound
As he totters o'er the ground
With his cane.
They say that in his prime.
Ere the pruning-knife of time
Cut him down.
Not a better man was found
By the crier on his round
Through the town.
But now he walks the streets.
And he looks at all he meets
So forlorn ;
And he shakes his feeble head.
That it seems as if he said,
"They are gone."
The mossy marbles rest
On the lips that he has pressed
In their bloom ;
And the names he loved to hear
Have been caived for many a year
On the tomb.
My grandmamma has said —
Poor old lady I she is dead
Long ago —
That he had a Roman nose.
And his cheek was like a rose
In the snow.
But now his nose is thin.
And it rests upon his chin
Like a staff ;
And a crook is in his back.
And a melancholy crack
In his laugh.
I know it is a sin
For me to sit and grin
At him here,
But the old three-cornered hat.
And the breeches, — and all that.
Are so queer !
And if I should live to be
The last leaf upon the tree
In the spring.
Let them smile, as I do now.
At the old forsaken bough
Where I cling.
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
THE APPROACH OF AGE.
from " tales of the hall."
Six years had passed, and forty ere the six.
When Time began to play his usual tricks :
The locks once comely in a virgin's sight.
Locks of pure brown, displayed the encroaching
white ;
The blood, once fervid, now to cool began.
And Time's strong pressure to subdue the man.
I rode or walked as I was wont before,
But now the bounding spirit was no more ;
A moderate pace would now my body heat,
A walk of moderate length distress my feet. •
I showed my stranger guest those hills sublime.
But said, "The view is poor, we need not climb."
At a friend's mansion I began to dread
The cold neat parlor and the gay glazed bed ;
At home I felt a more decided taste.
And must have all things in my order placed.
I ceased to hunt ; my horses pleased me less, —
My dinner more ; I learned to play at chess.
1 took my dog and gun, but saw the brute
Was disappointed that I did not shoot.
My morning walks I now could bear to lose.
And blessed the shower that gave me not to
choose.
In fact, I felt a languor stealing on ;
The active arm, the agile hand, were gone ;
Small daily actions into habits grew.
And new dislike to forms and fashions new.
I loved my trees in order to dispose ;
1 numbered peaches, looked how stocks arose ;
Told the same story oft,—in short, began to prose.
george cxabbe.
•
OLD,
Bt the wayside, on a mossy stone,
Sat a hoary pilgrim, sadly musing ;
Oft I marked him sitting there alone.
All the landscape, like a page, perusing ;
Poor, unknown,
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
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324
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
n
[&
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-brimmed bat ;
Coat as ancient as the form't was folding ;
Silver buttons, queue, and crimped cravat ;
Oaken staff bis feeble band upholding ;
There be sat !
Buckled knee and shoe, and broad-brimmed bat.
Seemed it pitiful be should sit there.
No one sympathizing, no one heeding.
None to love him for bis thin gray hair,
, And the furrows all so mutely pleading
Age and care ;
Seemed it pitiful be should sit there.
It was summer, and we went to school.
Dapper country lads and little maidens ;
Taught the motto of the " Dunce's Stool," —
Its grave import still my fancy ladens, —
" Here's a fool ! "
It was summer, and we went to school.
When the stranger seemed to mark our play.
Some of us were joyous, some sad-hearted,
I remember well, too well, that day !
Oftentimes the tears unbidden started.
Would not stay
When the stranger seemed to mark our play.
Onw sweet spirit broke the silent spell,
O, to me her name was always Heaven !
She besought him all his grief to tell,
(I was then thirteen, and she eleven,)
Isabel !
One sweet spirit broke the silent spelL
"Angel," said he sadly, "I am old ;
Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow ;
Yet, why I sit here thou shalt be told."
Then his eye betrayed a pearl of sorrow,
Down it rolled !
"Angel," said he sadly, " I am old.
" I have tottered here to look once more
On the pleasant scene where I delighted
In the careless, happy days of yore,
Ere the garden of my heart was blighted
To the core :
I have tottered here to look once more.
" All the picture now to me how dear f
E'en this gray old rock where I am seated.
Is a jewel worth my journey here ;
Ah that such a scene must be completed
With a tear !
All the picture now to me how dear !
" Old stone school-house ! it is still the same ;
There's the very step I so oft mounted ;
There's the window creaking in its frame.
And the notches that I cut and counted
For the game.
Old stone school-house, it is still the same.
" In the cottage yonder I was bom ;
Long my happy home, that humble dwelling ;
There the fields of clover, wheat, and com ;
There the spring with limpid nectar swelling ;
Ah, forlorn !
In the cottage yonder I was bom.
" Those "two gateway sycamores you see
Then were planted just so far asunder
That long well-pole from the path to free.
And the wagon to pass safely under ;
Ninety-three !
Those two gateway sycamores you see.
" There's the orchard where we used to climb
When my mates and I were boys together.
Thinking nothing of the flight of time.
Fearing naught but work and rainy weather ;
Past its prime !
There's the orchard where we used to climb.
" There the mde, three-cornered chestnut-rails.
Round the pasture where the flocks were graz¬
ing.
Where, so sly, I used to watch for quails
In the crops of buckwheat we were raising ;
Traps and trails !
There the rade, three-comered chestnut-rails.
" There's the mill that ground our yellow grain ;
Pond and river still serenely flowing ;
Cot there nestling in the shaded lane.
Where the lily of my heart was blowing, —
Mary Jane !
There's the mill that ground our yellow grain.
" There's the gate on which I used to swing,
Brook, and bridge, and bam, and old red
stable ;
But alas ! no more the mom shall bring
That dear group around my father's table j
Taken wing !
There's the gate on which I used to swing.
I am fleeing, — all I loved have fled.
Yon green meadow was our place for playing ;
That old tree can tell of sweet things said
When around it Jane and I were straying ;
She is dead !
I am fleeing, — all I loved have fled.
"Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky.
Tracing silently life's changeful story.
So familiar to my dim old eye.
Points me to seven that are now in glory
There on high !
Yon white spire, a pencil on the sky.
a
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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
325
" Oft the aisle of that old church we trod,
Guided thither by an angel mother ;
Now she sleeps beneath its sacred sod ;
Sire and sisters, and my little brother.
Gone to God !
Oft the aisle of that old church we trod.
'* There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways ;
Bless the holy lesson ! — hut, ah, never
Shall I hear again those songs of praise.
Those sweet voices silent now forever !
Peaceful days !
There I heard of Wisdom's pleasant ways.
" There my Mary blest me with her hand
When our souls drank in the nuptial blessing,
Ere she hastened to the spirit-land.
Yonder turf her gentle bosom pressing ;
Broken band !
There my Mary blest me with her hand.
" I have come to see that grave once more.
And the sacred place where we delighted.
Where we worshipped, in the days of yore.
Ere the garden of my heart was blighted
To the core !
I have come to see that grave once more.
"Angel," said he sadly, "I am old ;
Earthly hope no longer hath a morrow.
Now, why 1 sit here thou hast been told."
In his eye another pearl of sorrow,
Down it rolled !
"Angel," said he sadly, "I am old."
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Sat the hoary pilgi-im, sadly musing ;
Still I marked him sitting there alone.
All the landscape, like a page, perusing ;
Poor, unknown !
By the wayside, on a mossy stone.
Ralph Hovt.
HOME, WOUNDED.
Wheel me into the sunshine.
Wheel me into the shadow.
There must be leaves on the woodbine.
Is the king-cup crowned in the meadow ?
Wheel me down to the meadow,
Down to the little river.
In sun or in shadow
I shall not dazzle or shiver,
I shall be happy anywhere,
Every breath of the morning air
Makes me throb and quiver.
Stay wherever you will,
By the mount or under the hill.
Or down by the little river :
Stay as long as you please.
Give me only a bud from the trees.
Or a blade of grass in morning dew,
Or a cloudy violet clearing to blue,
I could look on it forever.
Wheel, wheel through the sunshine,
Wheel, wheel through the shadow ;
There must be odors round the pine,
There must be balm of breathing kine^
Somewhere down in the meadow.
Must I choose ? Then anchor me there
Beyond the beckoning poplars, where
The larch is snooding her flowery hair
With wreaths of morning shadow.
Among the thickest hazels of the brake
Perchance some nightingale doth shake
His feathers, and the air is full of song ;
In those old days when I was young and strong,
He used to sing on yonder garden tree.
Beside the nursery.
Ah, I remember how I loved to wake.
And find him singing on the self-same bough
(I know it even now)
Where, since the flit of bat.
In ceaseless voice he sat.
Trying the spring night over, like a tune.
Beneath the vernal moon ;
And while I listed long.
Day rose, and still he sang.
And all his stanchless song.
As something falling unaware.
Fell out of the tall trees he sang among.
Fell ringing down the ringing morn, and rang, —
Rang like a golden jewel down a golden stair.
My soul lies out like a basking hound, —
A hound that dreams and dozes ;
Along my life my length I lay,
I flu to-morrow and yesterday,
I am warm with the suns that have long since
set,
I am warm with the summers that are not yet.
And like one who dreams and dozes
Softly afloat on a sunny sea.
Two worlds are whispering over me.
And there blows a wind of roses
From the backward shore to the shore before,
From the shore before to the backward shore.
And like two clouds that meet and pour
Each through each, till core in core
A single self reposes.
The nevermore with the evermore
Above me mingles and closes ;
■SI
Ö-
326
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
Ö-
As my soul lies out like the basking hound,
And wherever it lies seems happy ground,
And when, awakened by some sweet sound,
A dreamy eye uncloses,
I see a blooming world around,
And I lie amid primroses, —
Years of sweet primroses.
Springs of fresh primroses.
Springs to be, and springs for me
Of distant dim primroses.
0, to lie a-dream, a-dream,
To feel I may dream and to know you deem
My work is done forever.
And the palpitating fever.
That gains and loses, loses and gains.
And beats the hurrying blood on the brunt of a
thousand pains.
Cooled at once by that blood-kt
Upon the parapet ;
And all the tedious taskèd toU. of the difficult
long endeavor
Solved and quit by no more fine
Than these limbs of mine.
Spanned and measured once for all
By that right-hand I lost.
Bought up at so light a cost
As one bloody fall
On the soldier's bed.
And three days on the ruined wall
Among the thirstless dead.
0, to think my name is crost
From duty's muster-roll ;
That I may slumber though the clarion call.
And live the joy of an embodied soul
Free as a liberated ghost.
O, to feel a life of deed
Was emptied out to feed
That fire of pain that burned so brief awhile, —
That fire from which I come, as the dead come
Forth from the irreparable tomb.
Or as a martyr on his funeral pile
Heaps up the burdens other men do bear
Through years of segi-egated care,
And takes the total load
Upon his shoulders broad.
And steps from earth to God.
O, to think, through good or ill.
Whatever I am you '11 love me still ;
O, to think, though dull I be.
You that are so grand and free.
You that are so bright and gay,
WiU pause to hear me when I will.
As though my head were gay ;
A single self reposes.
The neveraiore with the evermore
Above me mingles and closes ;
As my soul lies out like the basking hound.
And wherever it lies seems happy ground.
And when, awakened by some sweet sound,
A dreamy eye uncloses,
I see a blooming world around.
And I lie amid primroses, —
Years of sweet primroses.
Springs of fresh primroses,
Springs to be, and springs for me
Of distant dim primroses.
O, to lie a-dream, a-dream,
To feel I may dream and to know you deem
My work is done forever.
And the palpitating fever.
That gains and loses, loses and gains.
And she.
Perhaps, O even she
May look as she looked when I knew her
In those old days of childish sooth.
Ere my boyhood dared to woo her.
I will not seek nor sue her.
For I'm neither fonder nor truer
Than when she slighted my lovelorn youth,
My giftless, graceless, guinealess truth.
And I only lived to rue her.
But I '11 never love another.
And, in spite of her lovers and lands.
She shall love me yet, my brother !
/ ^
As a child that holds by his mother.
While his mother speaks his praises.
Holds with eager hands.
And ruddy and silent stands
In the ruddy and silent daisies.
And hears her bless her boy.
And lifts a wondering joy.
So I 'U not seek nor sue her.
But I '11 leave my glory to woo her.
And I '11 stand like a child beside.
And from behind the purple pride
I '11 lift my eyes unto her.
And I shall not be denied.
And you will love her, brother dear,
And perhaps next year you '11 bring me here
All through the balmy April tide.
And she will trip like spring by my side.
And be all the birds to my ear.
And here all three we '11 sit in the sun.
And see the Aprils one by one,
Primrosed Aprils on and on.
Till the floating prospect closes
In golden glimm era that rise and rise.
And perhaps are gleams of Paradise,
And perhaps too far for mortal eyes.
p
POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
327
■a
New springs of fresh primroses,
Springs of earth's primroses,
Springs to be, and springs for me
Of distant dim primroses.
Sidney dobell.
I&
FAREWELL, LIFE.
written during sickness. april, 184s.
Farewell, life ! my senses swim,
And the world is growing dim ;
Thronging shadows cloud the light.
Like the advent of the night, —
Colder, colder, colder still.
Upward steals a vapor chill ;
Strong the earthy odor grows, —
I smell the mould above the rose !
Welcome, life ! the spirit strives !
Strength returns and hope revives ;
Cloudy fears and shapes forlorn
Fly like shadows at the morn, —
O'er the earth there comes a bloom ;
Sunny light for sullen gloom,
Warm perfume for vapor cold, —
1 smell the rose above the mould !
Thomas Hood.
THE MAY QUEEN.
Yotr must'wake and call me early, call me early,
mother dear ;
To-mon-ow '11 be the happiest time of all the glad
new-year, —
Of all the glad new-year, mother, the maddest,
merriest day ;
For I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
There's many a black, black eye, they say, but
none so bright as mine ;
There's Margaret and Mary, there's Kate and
Caroline ;
But none so fair as little Alice in all the land,
they say ;
So I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
I sleep so sound all night, mother, that I shall
never wake.
If you do not call me loud when the day begins
to break ;
But I must gather knots of flowers and buds,
and garlands gay ;
For I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
As I came up the valley, whom think ye should
I see
But Robin leaning on the bridge beneath the
hazel-tree '(
He thought of that sharp look, mother, I gave
him yesterday, —
But I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
He thought I was a ghost, mother, for I was all
in white ;
And I ran by him without speaking, like a flash
of light.
They call me cruel-hearted, but I care not what
they say.
For I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May. $
They say he's dying all for love, — but that can
never be ;
They say his heart is breaking, mother, — what
is that to me ?
There's many a bolder lad '11 woo me any sum¬
mer day ;
And I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
Little Effie shall go with me to-morrow to the
green,
And you '11 be there, too, mother, to see me made
the Queen ;
For the shepherd lads on every side 'U come from
far away ;
And I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, 1 'm to
be Queen o' the May.
The honeysuckle round the porch has woven its
wavy bowers,
And by the meadow-trenches blow the faint sweet
cuckoo-flowers ;
And the wild marsh-marigold shines like fire in
swamps and hollows gi-ay ;
And I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
The night-winds come and go, mother, upon the
meadow-grass.
And the happy stars above them seem to brightem
as they pass ;
There will not be a drop of rain the whole of the
livelong day ;
And I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
All the valley, mother, '11 be fresh and green and
still.
And the cowslip and the crowfoot are over all the
hill.
W
328
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
And the rivulet in the flowery dale '11 merrily
glance and play.
For I'm to he Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
So you must wake and call me early, call me
early, mother dear ;
To-morrow '11 be the happiest time of all the glad
new-year ;
To-morrow '11 be of all the year the maddest,
merriest day.
For I'm to be Queen o' the May, mother, I'm to
be Queen o' the May.
new-tear's eve.
If you 're waking, call me early, call me early,
mother dear.
For I would see the sun rise upon the glad new-
year.
It is the last new-year that I shall ever see, —
Then you may lay me low i' the mould, and think
no more of me.
To-night I saw the sun set, —he set and left
behind
The good old year, the dear old time, and all my
peace of mind ;
And the new-year's coming up, mother ; but I
shall never see
The blossom on the blackthorn, the leaf upon
the tree.
Last May we made a crown of flowers ; we had
a merry day, —
Beneath the hawthorn on the green they made
me Queen of May ;
And we danced about the May-pole and in the
hazel copse.
Till Charles's Wain came out above the tall white
chimney-tops.
There's not a flower on all the hills, — the frost
is on the pane ;
I only wish to live tUl the snowdrops come
again.
I wish the snow would melt and the sun come
out on high, —
I long to see a flower so before the day I die.
The building rook '11 caw from the windy tall
elm-tree.
And the tufted plover pipe along the fallow
lea.
And the swallow '11 come back again with sum¬
mer o'er the wave.
But I shall lie alone, mother, within the mould¬
ering grave.
Upon the chancel-casement, and upon that grave
of mine.
In the early, early morning the summer sun '11
shine.
Before the red cock crows from the farm upon
the hill, —
When you are warm-asleep, mother, and aU the
world is still.
When the flowers come again, mother, beneath
the waning light
You '11 never see me more in the long gray fields
at night ;
When from the dry dark wold the summer airs
blow cool
On the oat-grass and the sword-grass, and the
bulrush in the pool.
You '11 bury me, my mother, just beneath the
hawthorn shade.
And you '11 come sometimes and see me where I
am lowly laid.
I shall not forget you, mother ; I shall hear you
when you pass,
AVith your feet above my head in the long and
pleasant grass.
I have been wild and wayward, but you '11 for¬
give me now ;
You '11 kiss me, my own mother, upon my cheek
and brow ;
Nay, nay, you must not weep, nor let your grief
be mid ;
You should not fret for me, mother — you have
another child.
If I can, I '11 come again, mother, from out my
resting-place ;
Though you '11 not see me, mother, I shall look
upon your face ;
ThoughT cannot speak a word, I shall heai'ken
what you say.
And be often, often with you when you think
I'm far away.
Good night ! good night ! when I have said good
night forevermore.
And you see me carried out from the threshold
of the door,
Don't let Effie come to see me till my grave be
growing gieen, —
She 'U be a better child to you than ever I have
been.
She 'U find my garden tools upon the granary
floor.
Let her take 'em —they are hers ; I shall never
garden more.
fl-
POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
329
ra
But tell her, when I'm gone, to train the rose¬
bush that I set
About the parlor window and the box of migno¬
nette.
Good night, sweet mother ! Call me before the
day is bom.
All night I lie awake, but I fall asleep at morn ;
But I would see the sun rise upon the glad new-
year,—
So, if you 're waking, call me, call me early,
mother dear.
CONCLUSION.
I THOUGHT to pass away before, and yet alive I
am ;
And in the fields all round 1 hear the bleating of
the lamb.
How sadly, I remember, rose the morning of the
year !
To die before the snowdrop came, and now the
violet's here.
0, sweet is the new violet, that comes beneath
the skies ;
And sweeter is the young lamb's voice to me that
cannot rise ;
And sweet is all the land about, and all the
fiowers that blow ;
And sweeter far is death than life, to me that
long to go.
It seemed so hard at first, mother, to leave the
blessed sun.
And now it seems as hard to stay ; and yet. His
will be done !
But stiU 1 think it can't be long before I find
release ;
And that good man, the clergyman, has told me
words of peace.
0, blessings on his kindly voice, and on his
silver hair !
And blessings on his whole life long, nntü he
meet me there !
0, blessings on his kindly heart and on his silver
head !
A thousand times I blest him, as he knelt beside
my bed.
He taught me all the mercy, for he showed me
all the sin ;
Now, though my lamp was lighted late, there's
One will let me in.
Nor would I now be well, mother, again, if that
could be ;
For my desire is but to pass to Him that died
for me.
1 did not hear the dog howl, mother, or the
death-watch beat, —
There came a sweeter token when the night and
morning meet ;
But sit beside my bed, mother, and put your
hand in mine,
And Effie on the other side, and I wiU tell the
sign.
All in the wild March-morning I heard the
angels call, —
It was when the moon was setting, and the dark
was over all ;
The trees began to whisper, and the wind began
to roll.
And in the wild March-morning I heard them
call my soul.
For, lying broad awake, I thought of you and
Effle dear ;
I saw you sitting in the house, and I no longer
here ;
■With all my strength I prayed for both, — and
so I felt resigned.
And up the vaUey came a swell of music on the
wind.
I thought that it was fancy, and I listened in my
bed ;
And then did something speak to me, — I know
not what was said ;
For gi'eat delight and shuddering took hold of all
my mind.
And up the valley came again the music on the
wind.
But you were sleeping ; and I said, " It's not
for them, — it's mine ; "
And if it comes three times, I thought, I take it
for a sign.
And once again it came, and close beside the
window-bars ;
Then seemed to go right up to heaven and die
among the stars.
So now I think my time is near ; I trust it is.
I know
The blessed music went that way my soul will
have to go.
And for myself, indeed, I care not if I go to¬
day ;
But EflSe, you must comfort her when I am past
away.
And say to Robin a kind word, and tell him not
to fret ;
There's many a worthier than I, would make
him happy yet.
e
330
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
If I had lived — I cannot tell — I might have
been his wife ;
But all these things have ceased to be, with my
desire of life.
0, look ! the sun begins to rise ! the heavens are
in a glow ;
He shines upon a hundred fields, and all of them
1 know.
And there 1 move no longer now, and there his
light may shine, —
Wild flowers in the valley for other hands than
mine.
O, sweet and strange it seems to me, that ere
this day is done
The voice that now is speaking may be beyond
the sun, —
Forever and forever with those just souls and
true, .—
And what is life, that we should moan ? why
make we such ado ?
Forever and forever, all in a blessed home.
And there to wait a little while till you and Effie
come, —
To lie within the light of God, as 1 lie upon your
breast, —
And the wicked cease from troubling, and the
weary are at rest.
alfred Tennyson.
Ö-
THE FEMALE CONVICT.
She shrank from all, and her silent mood
Made her wish only for solitude :
Her eye sought the ground, as it could not brook.
For innermost shame, on another's to look ;
And the cheérings of comfort fell on her ear
Like deadliest words, that were curses to hear ! —
She still was young, and she had been fair ;
But weather-stains, hunger, toil, and care.
That frost and fever that wear the heart.
Had made the colors of youth depart
From the sallow cheek, save over it came
The burning flush of the spirit's shame.
They were sailing over the salt sea-foam.
Far from her country, far from her home ;
And all she had left for her friends to keep
Was a name to hide and a memory to weep !
And her future held forth but the felon's lot, —
To live forsaken, to die forgot !
She could not weep, and she could not pray,
But she wasted and withered from day to day,
Till you might have counted each sunken vein.
When her wrist was prest by the iron chain ;
And sometimes 1 thought her large dark eye
Had the glisten of red insanity.
She called me once to her sleeping-place,
A strange, wild look was upon her face.
Her eye flashed over her cheek so white.
Like a gravestone seen in the pale moonlight,
And she spoke in a low, unearthly tone, —
The sound from mine ear hath never gone ! —
" 1 had last night the loveliest dream :
My own land shone in the summer beam,
1 saw the fields of the golden grain,
1 heard the reaper's harvest strain ;
There stood on the hills the green pine-tree.
And the thrush and the lark sang merrily.
A long and a weary way 1 had come ;
But 1 stopped, methought, by mine own sweet
home.
1 stood by the hearth, and my father sat there.
With pale, thin face, and snow-white hair !
The Bible lay open upon his knee.
But he closed the book to welcome me.
He led me next where my mother lay.
And together we knelt by her grave to pray.
And heard a hymn it was heaven to hear.
For it echoed one to my young days dear.
This dream has waked feelings long, long since
fled.
And hopes which 1 deemed in my heart were
dead !
— We have not spoken, but still 1 have hung
On the Northern accents that dwell on thy
tongue.
To me they are music, to me they recall
The things long hidden by Memory's pall !
Take this long curl of yellow hair.
And give it my father, and teU him my prayer.
My dying prayer, was for him." ....
Next day
Upon the deck a coffin lay ;
They raised it up, and like a dirge
The heavy gale swept over the surge ;
The corpse was cast to the wind and wave, —
The convict has found in the green sea a grave.
Letitia Elizabeth Landon.
THE DREAMER.
from " poems by a seamstress.
Not in the laughing bowers.
Where by green swinging elms a pleasant shade
At summer's noon is made.
And where swift-footed hours
Steal the rich breath of enamored flowers.
Dream 1. Nor where the golden glories be.
At sunset, laving o'er the flowing sea ;
And to pure eyes the faculty is given
To trace a smooth ascent from Earth to Heaven I
■Ö
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITÍ.
331
Not on a couch of ease,
With all the appliances of joy at hand, —
Soft light, sweet fragrance, beauty at command ;
Viands that might a godlike palate please.
And music's soul-creative ecstasies.
Dream I. Nor gloating o'er a wide estate.
Till the full, self-complacent heart elate.
Well satisfied with bliss of mortal birth.
Sighs for an immortality on Earth !
But where the incessant din
Of iron hands, and roar of brazen throats.
Join their unmingled notes.
While the long summer day is pouring in.
Till day is gone, and darkness doth begin.
Dream I, — as in the corner where I lie.
On wintry nights, just covered from the sky ! —
Such is my fate, — and, barren though it seem.
Yet, thou blind, soulless scorner, yet I dream !
And yet I dream, —
Dream what, were men more just, I might have
been ;
How strong, how fair, how kindly and serene.
Glowing of heart, and glorious of mien ;
The conscious crown to Nature's blissful scene.
In just and equal brotherhood to glean.
With all mankind, exhaustless pleasure keen, —■
Such is my dream !
And yet I dream, —
I, the despised of fortune, lift mine eyes,
Bright with the lustre of integrity.
In unappealing wretchedness, on high.
And the last rage of Destiny defy ;
Resolved alone to live, — alone to die.
Nor swell the tide of human misery !
And yet I dream, —
Dream of a sleep where dreams no more shall
come.
My last, my first, my only welcome home !
Rest, unbeheld since Life's beginning stage,
Sole remnant of my glorious heritage.
Unalienable, I shall find thee yet.
And in thy soft embrace the past forget !
Thus do I dream !
ANONYMOUS.
A ROUGH RHYME ON A ROUGH
MATTER.
THE ENGLISH GAME LAWS.
The merry *brown hares came leaping
Over the crest of the hill.
Where the clover and corn lay sleeping.
Under the moonlight still.
Leaping late and early,
Till under their bite and their tread.
The swedes, and the wheat, and the harley
Lay cankered, and trampled, and dead.
A poacher's widow sat sighing
On the side of the white chalk bank.
Where, under the gloomy fir-woods.
One spot in the lea throve rank.
She watched a long tuft of clover.
Where rabbit or hare never ran,
For its black sour haulm covered over
The blood of a murdered man.
She thought of the dark plantation.
And the hares, and her husband's blood.
And the voice of her indignation
Rose up to the throne of God :
" I am long past wailing and whining,
I have wept too much in my life :
I've had twenty years of pining
As an English laborer's wife.
" A laborer in Christian England,
Where they cant of a Saviour's name.
And yet waste men's lives like the vermin's.
For a few more brace of game.
"There's bloodj on your new foreign shnibs,
squire.
There's blood on your pointer's feet ;
There's blood on the game you sell, squire,
And there's blood on the game you eat.
"You have sold the laboring man, squire.
Both body and soul to shame.
To pay for your seat in the House, squire.
And to pay for the feed of your game.
"You made him a poacher yourself, squire.
When you'd give neither work nor meat.
And your barley-fed hares robbed the garden
At our starving children's feet ;
" When, packed in one reeking chamber,
Man, maid, mother, and little ones lay ;
While the rain pattered in on tlie rotten bride-bed.
And the walls let in the day ;
" When we lay in the burning fever.
On the mud of the cold clay floor.
Till you parted us all for thrqe months, squii'e.
At the cursèd workhouse door.
"We quarrelled like brutes, and who wonders ?
What self-respect could we keep.
Worse housed than your hacks and your pointem.
Worse fed than your hogs and your sheep ?
332
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
" Our daughters, with base-born babies,
Have wandered away in their shame ;
If your misses had slept, squire, where they did,
Your misses might do the same.
" Can your lady patch hearts that are breaking.
With handfuls of coals and rice.
Or by dealing out flannel and sheeting
A little below cost price ?
" You may tire 'of the jail and the workhouse,
And take to allotments and schools.
But you've run up a debt that will never
Be repaid us by penny-club rules.
" In the season of shame and sadness.
In the dark and dreary day.
When scrofula, gout, and madness
Are eating your race away ;
" When to kennels and liveried varlets
You have cast your daughters' bread.
And, worn out with liquor and harlots.
Your heir at your feet lies dead ;
"When your youngest, the mealy-mouthed
rector.
Lets your soul rot asleep to the grave.
You wiU find in your God the protector
Of the freeman you fancied your slave."
She looked at the tuft of clover.
And wept till her heart grew light ;
And at last, when her passion was over.
Went wandering into the night.
But the merry brown hares came leaping
Over the uplands still.
Where the clover and corn lay sleeping
On the side of the white chalk hiU.
Charles Kingsley.
■a-
MAN WAS MADE TO MOURN.*
When chill November's surly blast
Made fields and forests bare.
One evening, as I wandered forth
Along the banks of Ayr,
I spied a man whose aged step
Seemed weary, wem with care ;
His face was furrowed o'er with years,
And hoary was his hair.
* Gilbert Bums, the brother of the poet, says : " He (Bums) used
to remark to me that he could not well conceive a more mortifying
picture of human life than a man seeking work. In casting about
in his mind how this sentiment might be brought forward, the elegy,
Man Tvas made to mourn, was composed."
" Young stranger, whither wanderest thou ?"
Began the reverend sage ;
" Does thirst of wealth thy step constrain.
Or youthful pleasures rage ?
Or haply, prest with cares and woes.
Too soon thou hast began
To wander forth, with me, to mourn
The miseries of man 1
" The sun that overhangs yon moors.
Outspreading far and wide.
Where hundreds labor to support
A haughty lordling's pride, —
I've seen yon weary winter sun
Twice forty times return ;
And every time has added proofs
That man was made to mourn.
" O man, while in thy early years,
How prodigal of time !
Misspending all thy precious hours,
Thy glorious youthful prime !
Alternate follies take the sway :
Licentious passions burn ;
Which tenfold force gives Nature's law.
That man was made to mourn.
" Look not alone on youthful prime.
Or manhood's active might ;
Man then is useful to his kind.
Supported in his right ;
But see him on the edge of life.
With cares and sorrows worn.
Then age and want, O Ul-matehed pair !
Show man was made to mourn.
" A few seem favorites of fate.
In pleasure's lap carest ;
Yet think not all the rich and great
Are likewise truly blest.
But, 0, what crowds in every land
Are wretched and forlorn !
Through weary life this lesson leam, —
That man was made to mourn.
" Many and sharp the numerous ills.
Inwoven with our frame !
More pointed stiU we make ourselves.
Regret, remorse, and shame !
And man, whose heaven-erected face
The smiles of love adorn,
Man's inhumanity to man
Makes countless thousands mourn !
" See yonder poor, o'erlabored wight.
So abject, mean, and vile.
Who begs a brother of the earth
To give him leave to toil ;
S
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
333
And see his lordly fellow-wonn
The poor petition spurn,
Unmindful, 'though a weeping wife
And helpless offspring mourn.
" If I'm designed yon lordling's slave.
By Nature's law designed, —
Why was an independent wish
E'er planted in my mind ?
If not, why am I subject to
His cruelty or scorn ?
Or why has man the will and power
To make his feDow mourn ?
*' Yet let not this too much, my son,
Disturb thy youthful breast :
This partial view of humankind
Is sui'ely not the last ! >
The poor, oppressed, honest man
Had never, sure, been bom.
Had there not been some recompense
To comfort those that mourn !
" 0 Death ! the poor man's dearest friend.
The kindest and the best !
Welcome the hour my aged limbs
Are laid with thee at rest !
The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow.
From pomp and pleasure torn ;
But 0, a blest relief to those
That weary-laden mourn ! "
Robert Burns.
LOSSES.
Upon the white sea-sand
There sat a pilgrim band.
Telling the losses that their lives had known ;
While evening waned away
From breezy cliff and bay.
And the strong tides went out with weary moan.
One spake, with quivering lip.
Of a fair freighted ship.
With all his household to the deep gone down ;
But one had wilder woe —
For a fair face, long ago
Lost in the darker depths of a great town.
There were who mourned their youth
With a most loving ruth.
For its brave hopes and memories ever green ;
And one upon the west
Turned an eye that would not rest.
For far-off hüls whereon its joy had been.
Some talked of vanished gold.
Some of proud honors told.
Some spake of friends that were their trust no
more ;
h-
And one of a green gi-ave
Beside a foreign wave.
That made him sit so lonely on the shore.
But when their tales were done.
There spake among them one,
A stranger, seeming from all sorrow free :
"Sad losses have ye met.
But mine is heavier yet ;
For a believing heart hath gone from me."
" Alas ! " these pilgrims said,
" For the living and the dead —
For fortune's cruelty, for love's sure cross.
For the wrecks of land and sea !
But, however it came to thee.
Thine, stranger, is life's last and heaviest loss."
frances Brown.
TWO WOMEN.
The shadows lay along Broadway,
'T was near the twilight-tide.
And slowly there a lady fair
Was walking in her pride.
Alone walked she ; but, viewlessly.
Walked spirits at her side.
Peace charmed the street beneath her feet.
And Honor charmed the air ;
And all astir looked kind on her.
And called her good as fair, —
For all God ever gave to her
She kept with chary care.
She kept with care her beauties rare
From lovers warm and true.
For her heart was cold to aU but gold.
And the rich came not to woo, —
But honored weU are charms to sell
If priests the selling do.
Now walking there was one more fair,—
A slight girl, lily-pale ;
And she had unseen company
To make the spirit quail, —
'Twixt Want and Scorn she walked forlorn.
And nothing could avail.
No mercy now can clear her brow
For this world's peace to pray ;
For, as love's wild prayer dissolved in air,
Her woman's heart gave way ! —
But the sin forgiven by Christ in heaven
By man is cursed alway !
nathaniel parker willis
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POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
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LONDON CHURCHES.
I STOOD, one Sunday morning,
Before a large church door.
The congregation gathered.
And carriages a score, —
From one out stepped a lady
I oft had seen before.
Her hand was on a prayer-book.
And held a vinaigrette ;
The sign of man's redemption
Clear on the hook was set, —
But above the Cross there glistened
A golden Coronet.
For her the obsequious beadle
The inner door flung wide ;
Lightly, as up a haU-room,
Her footsteps seemed to glide, —
There might he good thoughts in her.
For all her evil pride.
But after her a woman
Peeped wistfully within.
On whose wan face was graven
Life's hardest discipline, —
The trace of the sad trinity
Of weakness, pain, and sin.
The few free-seats were crowded
Where she could rest and pray ;
With her worn garb contrasted
Each side in fair array, —
"God's house holds no poor sinnere,"
She sighed, and crept away.
Richard Monckton Milnbs,
(lord Houghton.)
BEAUTIFUL SNOW.
0 THE snow, the beautiful snow,
Filling the sky and the earth below !
Over the house-tops, over the street.
Over the heads of the people you meet.
Dancing,
Flirting,
Skimming along.
Beautiful snow ! it can do nothing wrong.
Flying to kiss a fair lady's cheek ;
Clinging to lips in a frolicsome freak ;
Beautiful snow, from the heavens above,
Pure as an angel and flckle as love 1
0 the snow, the beautiful snow !
How the flakes gather and laugh as they go !
Whirling about in its maddening fun.
It plays in its glee with every one.
Chasing,
Laughing,
Hurrying by.
It lights up the face and it sparkles the eye ;
And even the dogs, with a hark and a bound,
Snap at the crystals that eddy around.
The town is alive, and its heart in a glow.
To welcome the coming of beautiful snow.
How the wüd crowd go swaying along,
Hailing each other with humor and song !
How the gay sledges like meteors flash by, —
Bright for a moment, then lost to the eye !
Ringing,
Swinging,
Dashing they go
Over the crest of the beautiful snow :
Snow so pure when it falls from the sky.
To be trampled in mud by the crowd rushing by ;
To he trampled and tracked by the thousands of
feet
Till it blends with the horrible filth in the street.
Once I was pure as the snow, — hut I fell :
Fell, like the snow-flakes, from heaven — to hell :
Fell, to he tramped as the filth of the street :
Fell, to be scoffed, to he spit on, and beat.
Pleading,
Cursing,
Dreading to die.
Selling my soul to whoever would buy.
Dealing in shame for a morsel of bread.
Hating the living and fearing the dead.
Merciful God ! have 1 fallen so low ?
And yet I was once like this beautiful snow !
Once I was fair as the beautiful snow.
With an eye like its crystals, a heart like its
glow ;
Once 1 was loved for my innocent grace, —
Flattered and sought for the charm of my face.
Father,
Mother,
Sisters all,
God, and myself, 1 have lost by my fall.
The veriest wretch that goes shivering by
Will take a wide sweep, lest 1 wander too nigh ;
For of aU that is on or about me, 1 know
There is nothing that's pure hut the beautiful
snow.
How strange it should be that this beautiful
snow
Should fall on a sinner with nowhere to go 1
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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
335
■a
How strange it would be, when the night comes
again.
If the snow and the ice struck my desperate brain !
Fainting,
Freezing,
Dying alone.
Too wicked for prayer, too weak for my moan
To be heard in the crash of the crazy town.
Gone mad in its joy at the snow's coming down ;
To lie and to die in my terrible woe.
With a bed and a shroud of the beautiful snow !
Jambs w. Watson.
THE BRIDGE OF SIGHS.
" Drowned 1 drowned 1 " — HAMLET.
One more unfortunate.
Weary of breath.
Rashly importunate.
Gone to her death !
Take her up tenderly.
Lift her with care !
Fashioned so slenderly.
Young, and so fair ! ,
Look at her garments
Clinging like eerements.
Whilst the wave constantly
Drips from her clothing ;
Take her up instantly.
Loving, not loathing !
Touch her not scornfully !
Think of her mournfully.
Gently and humanly, —
Not of the stains of her ;
All that remains of her
Now is pure womanly.
Make no deep scrutiny
Into her mutiny.
Rash and undutiful ;
Past all dishonor,
Death has left on her
Only the beautiful.
Still, for all slips of hers, —
One of Eve's family, —
Wipe those poor lips of hers.
Oozing so clammily.
Loop up her tresses
Escaped from the comb, —
Her fair auburn tresses, —
Whilst wonderment guesses
Where was her home ?
Who was her father ?
Who was her mother ?
Had she a sister ?
Had she a brother ?
Or was there a dearer one
StUl, and a nearer one
Yet, than aU otheY ?
Alas ! for the rarity
Of Christian charity
Under the sun !
O, it was pitiful !
Near a whole city full.
Home she had none.
Sisterly, brotherly.
Fatherly, motherly
Feelings had changed, —
Love, by harsh evidence.
Thrown from its eminence ;
Even God's providence
Seeming estranged.
Where the lamps quiver
So far in the river.
With many a light
From window and casement
From garret to basement.
She stood, with amazement.
Houseless by night.
The bleak wind of March
Made her tremble and shiver ;
But not the dark arch.
Or the black flowing river ;
Mad from life's history.
Glad to death's mystery,
Swift to be hurled —
Anywhere, anywhere
Out of the world !
In she plunged boldly, —
No matter how coldly
The rough river ran —
Over the brink of it !
Picture it — think of it,
Dissolute man !
Lave in it, drink of it.
Then, if you can !
Take her up tenderly,
Lift her with care !
Fashioned so slenderly.
Young, and so fair !
Ere her limbs, frigidly,
Stifi'en too rigidly.
Decently, kindly.
e
336
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
Smooth and compose them ;
And her eyes, close them.
Staring so blindly !
Dreadfully staring
Through muddy impurity.
As when with the daring
Last look of despairing
Fixed on futurity.
Perishing gloomily.
Spurred by contumely.
Cold inhumanity.
Burning insanity.
Into her rest !
Cross her hands humhly.
As if praying dumbly,
Over her breast !
Owning her weakness.
Her evil behavior,
And leaving, with meekness.
Her sins to her Saviour !
Thomas Hood.
ON WOMAN.
from "the vicar of wakefield."
When lovely woman stoops to folly.
And finds too late that men betray.
What charm can soothe her melancholy ?
What art can wash her guilt away ?
The only art her guilt to cover.
To hide her shame from every eye.
To give repentance to her lover.
And wring his hosom, is —to die.
Oliver Goldsmith.
THE LITTLE MATCH-GIRL.
Little Gretchen, little Gretchen wanders up and
down the street ;
The snow is on her yeUow hair, the frost is on
her feet.
The rows of long, dark houses without look cold
and damp.
By the struggling of the moonbeam, by the
dicker of the lamp.
The clouds ride fast as horses, the wind is from
the north.
But no one cares for Gretchen, and no one look-
eth forth.
Within those dark, damp houses are merry faces
bright.
And happy hearts are watching out the old year's
latest night.
With the little box of matches she could not sell
all day.
And the thin, tattered mantle the wind blows
every way.
She clingeth to the railing, she shivers in the
gloom, —
There are parents sitting snugly by the firelight
in the room ;
And children with grave faces are whispering one
another
Of presents for the New Year, for father or for
mother.
But no one talks to Gretchen, and no one hears
her speak ;
No breath of little whisperers comes warmly to
her cheek.
Her home is cold and desolate ; no smile, no food,
no fire.
But children clamorous for bread, and an im¬
patient sire.
So she sits down in an angle where two great
houses meet.
And she curleth up beneath her for warmth her
little feet ;
And she looketh on the cold wall, and on the
colder sky.
And wonders if the little stars are bright fires
up on high.
She hears the clock strike slowly, up high in a
church-tower.
With such a sad and solemn tone, teUing the
midnight hour.
She remembered her of stories her mother used
to tell.
And of the cradle-songs she sang, when summer's
twilight fell.
Of good men and of angels, and of the Holy
Child,
Who was cradled in a manger when winter was
most wild ;
Who was poor, and cold, and hungry, and deso¬
late and lone ;
And she thought the song had told her he was
ever with his own.
And all the poor and hungry and forsaken ones
were his, —
" How good of him to look on me in such a place
as this ! "
Colder it grows and colder, but she does not feel
it now.
For the pressure on her bosom, and the weight
upon her brow ;
But she struck one little match on the wall so
cold and bare,
-51
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POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
337
a
That she might look around her, and see if he
was there.
The single match was kindled ; and, by the light
it threw.
It seemed to little Maggie that the wall was rent
in two.
And she could see the room within, the room all
warm and light,
With the fire-glow red and blazing, and the ta¬
pers burning bright.
And kindred there were gathered round the table
richly spread,
With heaps of goodly viands, red wine, and pleas¬
ant bread.
She could smell the fragrant odor ; she could
hear them talk and play ;
Then all was darkness once again — the match
had birrned away.
She struck another hastily, and now she seemed
to see,
Within the same warm chamber a glorious Christ¬
mas-tree.
The branches all were laden down with things
that children prize ;
Bright gifts for boy and maiden they showed be¬
fore her eyes.
And she almost seemed to touch them, and to
join the welcome shout ;
Then darkness fell around her, for the little
match was out.
Another, yet another, she has tried, — they will
not light ;
Then aU her little store she took, and struck
with all her might.
And the whole place around her was lighted
with the glare :
And lo ! there hung a little Child before her in
the air !
There were blood-drops on his forehead, a spear-
wound in his side.
And cruel naü-prints in his feet, and in his hands
spread wide.
And he looked upon her gently, and she felt that
he had known
Pain, hunger, cold, and soitow, — ay, equal to
her own.
And he pointed to the laden board and to the
Christmas-tree,
Then up to the cold sky, and. said, "WUl
Gretchen come with me ? "
The poor child felt her pulses fail, she felt her
eyeballs swim.
And a ringing sound was in her ears, like her
dead mother's hymn :
And she folded both her thin white hands and
turned from that bright board.
And from the golden gifts, and said, "With thee,
with thee, 0 Lord ! "
The chilly winter morning breaks up in the dull
skies
On the city wrapt in vapor, on the spot where
Gretchen lies.
In her scant and tattered garments, with her
back against the wall.
She sitteth cold and rigid, she answers to no
call.
They lifted her up fearfully, and shuddered as
they said,
" It was a bitter, bitter night ! the child is frozen
dead."
The angels sang their greeting for one more re¬
deemed from sin ;
Men said, " It was a bitter night ; would no one
let her in ? "
And they shivered as they speke of her, and
sighed : they could not see
How much of happiness thpre was after that
misery.
From the Danish of hans Christian Andersen.
THE SONG OF THE SHIRT.
With fingers weary and worn.
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags.
Plying her needle and thread, —
Stitch ! stitch ! stitch !
In poverty, hunger, and dirt ;
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch
She sang the " Song of the Shirt ! "
"Work ! work ! work
While the cock is crowing aloof !
And work — work — work
TiU the stars shine through the roof
It's, 0, to be a slave
Along with the barbarous Turk,
Where woman has never a sovd to save^
If this is Christian work !
" Work — work — work
Till the brain begins to swim !
Work — work — work
Till the eyes are heavy and dim !
Seam, and gusset, and band.
Band, and gusset, and seam, —
TUl over the buttons 1 fall asleep.
And sew them on in a dream !
338
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
a
" 0 men with sisters dear !
0 men with mothers and wives !
It is not linen you 're wearing out,
But human creatures' lives !
Stitch — stitch — stitch,
In poverty, hunger, and dirt, —
Sewing at once, with a double thread,
A shroud as well as a shirt !
" But why do I talk of death, —
That phantom of grisly bone ?
I hardly fear his terrible shape.
It seems so like my own, —
It seems so like my own
Because of the fasts I keep ;
0 God ! that bread should be so dear.
And flesh and blood so cheap !
" Work — work — work !
My labor never flags ;
And what are its wages ? A bed of straw,
A crust of bread — and rags.
That shattered roof — and this naked floor —
A table — a broken chair —
And a wall so blank my shadow I thank
For sometimes falling there !
" Work — work — work
From weaiy chime to chime !
Work — work — work
As prisoners work for crime !
Band, and gusset, and seam.
Seam, and gusset, and band, —
Till the heart is sick and the brain benumbed.
As well as the weary hand.
" Work — work — work
In the dull December light !
And work — work — work
When the weather is warm and bright !
While underneath the eaves
The brooding swallows cling.
As if to show me their sunny backs.
And twit me with the Spring.
A little weeping would ease my heart ;
But in their briny bed
My tears must stop, for every drop
Hinders needle and thread ! "
With ñngers weary and worn.
With eyelids heavy and red,
A woman sat, in unwomanly rags.
Plying her needle and thread, —
Stitch ! stitch ! stitch !
In poverty, hunger, and dirt ;
And still with a voice of dolorous pitch —
Would that its tone could reach the rich ! —
She sang this " Song of the Shirt ! "
Thomas Hood.
GIVE ME THREE GRAINS OF CORN,
MOTHER.
the irish famine.
Give me three grains of com, mother, —
Only three grains of com ;
It will keep the little life I have
Till the coming of the mom.
I am dying of hunger and cold, mother, —
Dying of hunger and cold ;
And half the agony of such a death
My lips have never told.
It has gnawed like a wolf, at my heart, mother,—
A wolf that is flerce for blood ;
All the livelong day, and the night beside.
Gnawing for lack of food.
I dreamed of bread in my sleep, mother.
And the sight was heaven to see ;
I awoke with an eager, famishing lip.
But you had no bread for me.
How could I look to you, mother, —
How could I look to you
For bread to give to your starving boy.
When you were starving too ?
For I read the famine in your cheek.
And in your eyes so wild.
And I felt it in your bony hand,
As you laid it on your child.
The Queen has lands and gold,^mother, —
The Queen has lands and gold.
While you are forced to your empty breast
A skeleton babe to hold, —
A babe that is dying of want, mother.
As I %m dying now.
With a ghastly look in its sunken eye,
And famine upon its brow.
" 0, but to breathe the breath
Of the cowslip and primrose sweet.
With the sky above my head.
And the grass beneath my feet !
For only one short hour
To feel as I used to feel.
Before I knew the woes of want
And the walk that costs a meal !
" 0, but for one short hour, —
A respite, however brief !
No blessèd leisure for love or hop^
But only time for grief !
POEMS OF SORROW ANU ADVERSITY.
339
What has poor Ireland done, mother, —
What has poor Ireland done.
That the world looks on, and sees us starve.
Perishing one by one ?
Do the men of England care not, mother, —
The great men and the high, —
For the suffering sons of Erin's isle,
Whether they live or die ?
There is many a brave heart here, mother.
Dying of want and cold.
While only across the Channel, mother.
Are many that roll in gold ;
There are rich and proud men there, mother.
With wondrous wealth to view.
And the bread they ffing to their dogs to-night
Would give life to me and you.
Come nearer to my side, mother.
Come nearer to my side.
And hold me fondly, as you held
My father when he died ;
Quick, for I cannot see you, mother.
My breath is almost gone ;
Mother ! dear mother ! ere I die.
Give me three grains of corn.
Amelia Blandforo Edwards.
LORD ULLIN'S DAUGHTER.
A chieftain, to the Highlands bound.
Cries, " Boatman, do not tarry !
And I '11 give thee a silver pound.
To row us o'er the ferry."
"Now who be ye, would cross Lochgyle,
This dark and stormy water ? "
" 0,1'm the chief of Ulva's isle.
And this Lord Ullin's daughter.
" And fast before her father's men
Three days we 've fled together.
For should he ñnd us in the glen.
My blood would stain the heather.
" His horsemen hard behina us ride ;
Should they our steps discover.
Then who will cheer my bonny bride
When they have slain her lover ? "
Out spoke the hardy Highland wight,
" I '11 go, my chief, — I'm ready : —
It is not for your silver bright ;
But for your winsome lady :
" And by my word ! the bonny bird
In danger shall not tarry :
So, though the waves are raging white^
I '11 row you o'er the ferry."
By this the stoim grew loud apace.
The water-wraith was shrieking ;
And in the scowl of heaven each face
Grew dark as they were speaking.
But still as wilder blew the wind.
And as the night grew drearer,
Adown the glen rode armèd men.
Their trampling sounded nearer.
" 0, haste thee, haste ! " the lady cries,
" Though tempests round us gather ;
I '11 meet the raging of the skies.
But not an angry father."
The boat has left a stormy land,
A stormy sea before her, —
When, 0, too strong for human hand,
The tempest gathered o'er her.
And still they rowed amidst the roar
Of waters fast prevailing :
Lord Ullin reached that fatal shore.
His wrath was changed to wailing.
For sore dismayed, through storm and shade.
His child he did discover :
One lovely hand she stretched for aid.
And one was round her lover.
" Come back ! come back ! " he cried in grief,
" Across this stormy water :
And I '11 forgive your Highland chief.
My daughter ! — 0 my daughter ! "
'T was vain ; — the loud waves lashed the shore.
Return or aid preventing ;
The waters wild went o'er his child.
And he was left lamenting.
Thomas Campbell.
THE MANIAC.
Stay, jailer, stay, and hear my woe !
She is not mad who kneels to thee ;
For what I'm now too well I know.
And what I was, and what should be.
I '11 rave no more in proud despair ;
My language shall be mild, though sad ;
But yet I firmly, truly swear,
I am not mad, I cm, not mad !
My tyrant husband forged the tale
Which chains me in this dismal cell ;
My fate unknown my friends bewail, —
0 jailer, haste that fate to tell !
0, haste my father's heart to cheer !
His heart at once't will grieve and glad
To know, though kept a captive here,
1 am not mad, I am not mad !
[&
340
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
n
He smiles in scom, and turns the key ;
He quits the grate ; I knelt in vain ;
His glimmering lamp still, still I see, —
'T is gone ! and all is gloom again.
Cold, bitter cold ! — No warmth ! no light !
Life, all thy comforts once I had ;
Yet here I'm chained, this freezing night.
Although not Triad; no, no, —not mad!
'T is sure some dream, some vision vain ;
What ! I, the child of rank and wealth, —
Am I the wretch who clanks this chain.
Bereft of freedom, friends, and health ?
Ah ! while I dwell on blessings fled.
Which nevermore my heart must glad.
How aches my heart, how bums my head ;
But't is not mad ; no, 't is not mad I
Hast thou, my child, forgot, ere this,
A mother's face, a mother's tongue ?
She '11 ne'er forget your parting kiss.
Nor round her neck how fast you clung ;
Nor how with her you sued to stay ;
Nor how that suit your sire forbade ;
Nor how — 1 '11 drive such thoughts away !
They '11 make me mad, they '11 make me mad !
His rosy lips, how sweet they smiled !
His mild blue eyes, how bright they shone !
None ever bore a lovelier chUd,
And art thou now forever gone ?
And must I never see thee more.
My pretty, pretty, pretty lad 1
I will be free ! unbar the door !
I am not mad ; I am Twt mad !
0, hark ! what mean those yells and cries ?
His chain some furious madman breaks ;
He comes, — I see his glaring eyes ;
Now, now, my dungeon-grate he shakes.
Help ! Help I — He's gone ! — 0, fearful woe.
Such screams to hear, such sights to see !
My brain, my brain, — I know, I know
I am Twt mad, but soon shall be.
Yes, soon ; — for, lo you ! while I speak, —
Mark how yon demon's eyeballs glare !
He sees me ; now, with dreadful shriek.
He whirls a serpent high in air.
Horror !—the reptile strikes his tooth
Deep in my heart, so crashed and sad ;
Ay, larigh, ye fiends ; — I feel the truth ;
Your task is done, — I'm mad ! I'm mad !
matthew Gregory Lewis.
THE BEGGAR.
Pitt the sorrows of a poor old man !
Whose trembling limbs have borne him to
your door.
Whose days are dwindled to the shortest span,
0, give relief, and Heaven will bless your store.
These tattered clothes my poverty bespeak.
These hoary locks proclaim my lengthened
years ;
And many a furrow in my grief-wom cheek
Has been the channel to a stream of tears.
Yon honse, erected on the rising ground.
With tempting aspect drew me from my road.
For plenty there a residence has found.
And grandeur a magnificent abode.
(Hard is the fate of the infirm and poor !)
Here craving for a morsel of their bread,
A pampered menial drove me from the door.
To seek a shelter in a humbler shed.
0, take me to your hospitable dome.
Keen blows the wind, and piercing is the cold !
Short is my passage to the friendly tomb.
For I am poor and miserably old.
Should 1 reveal the source of every grief.
If soft humanity e'er touched your breast.
Your hands would not withhold the kind relief.
And tears of pity could not be repressed.
Heaven sends misfortunes, — why should we
repine ?
'T is Heaven has brought me to the state you
see :
And your condition may be soon like mine.
The child of sorrow and of misery.
A little farm was my paternal lot.
Then, like the lark, 1 sprightly hailed the
morn ;
But ah ! oppression forced me from my cot ;
My cattle died, and blighted was my corn.
My daughter, — once the comfort of my age !
Lured by a villain from her native home.
Is cast, abandoned, on the world's wild stage,
And doomed in scanty poverty to roam.
My tender wife, — sweet soother of my care ! —
Strack with sad anguish at the stern decree,
Fell, — lingering fell, a victim to despair.
And left the world to wretchedness and me.
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
341
Pity the sorrows of a poor old man !
Whose trembling limbs have home him to
your door,
Whose days are dwindled to the shortest span,
0, give relief, and Heaven will bless your store.
Thomas Moss.
FOR A' THAT AND A' THAT.
Is there for honest poverty
Wha hangs his head, and a' that ?
The coward slave, we pass him by ;
We dare be poor for a' that.
For a' that, and a' that,
Our toil's obscure, and a' that ;
The rank is but the guinea's stamp, —
The man's the gowd for a' that.
What though on hamely fare we dine,
Wear hoddin gray, and a' that ?
Gie fools their silks, and knaves their wine, —
A man's a man for a'-that.
For a' that, and a' that.
Their tinsel show, and a' that ;
The honest man, though e'er sae poor.
Is king o' men for a' that.
Ye see yon birkie ca'd a lord,
Wha struts, and stares, and a' that, —
Though hundreds worship at his word.
He's but a coof for a' that ;
For a' that, and a' that.
His riband, star, and a' that ;
The man of independent mind.
He looks and laughs at a' that.
A prince can mak a belted knight,
A marquis, duke, and a' that ;
But an honest man's aboon his might, —
Guid faith, he maunna fa' that !
For a' that, and a' that ;
Their dignities, and a' that,
The pith o' sense, and pride o' worth,
Are higher ranks than a' that.
Then let us pray that come it may, —
As come it wUl for a' that, —
That sense and worth, o'er a' the earth,
May bear the gree, and a' that.
For a' that, and a' that.
It's coming yet, for a' that, —
When man to man, the warld o'er.
Shall brothers be for a' that !
Robert Burns.
THE PAUPER'S DEATH-BED.
Tread softly, — bow the head, —
In reverent silence bow, —
No passing-bell doth toll.
Yet an immortal soul
Is passing now.
Stranger ! however great.
With lowly reverence bow ;
There's one in that poor shed —
One by that paltry bed —
Greater than thou.
Beneath that beggar's roof,
Lo ! Death doth keep his state.
Enter, no crowds attend ;
Enter, no guards defend
This palace gate.
That pavement, damp and cold.
No smiling courtiers tread ;
One silent woman stands.
Lifting with meagi-e hands
A dying head.
No mingling voices sound, —
An infant wail alone ;
A sob suppressed, — again
That short deep gasp, and then —
The parting groan.
0 change ! 0 wondrous change !
Burst are the prison bars, —
This moment, there, so low.
So agonized, and now, —
Beyond the stars.
0 change ! stupendous change !
There lies the soulless clod ;
The sun eternal breaks.
The new immortal wakes, —
Wakes with his God !
Caroline Anne Bowles southev.
THE PAUPER'S DRIVE.
There's a grim one-horse hearse in a joUy round
trot, —
To the churchyard a pauper is going, I wot ;
The road it is rough, and the hearse has no
springs ;
And hark to the dirge which the mad driver sings ;
Rattle his bones over the stones!
He's only a pauper whomi nobody ovxns !
0, where are the mourners ? Alas ! there are none ;
He has left not a gap in the world, now he's
gone, —
e-
342
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
Not a tear in the eye of child, woman, or man ;
To the grave with his carcass as fast as you can :
Rattle his hones over the stones!
He's only a pauper whom nobody owns !
What a jolting and creaking and splashing and
din !
The whip, how it cracks ! and the wheels, how
they spin !
How the dirt, right and left, o'er the hedges is
hurled !
The pauper at length makes a noise in the world !
Rattle his hones over the stones!
He's only a pauper whom nobody owns!
Poor pauper defunct ! he has made some approach
To gentility, now that he's stretched in a coach !
He's taking a drive in his carriage at last ;
But it wiU not be long, if he goes on so fast:
Rattle his hones over the stones /
He's only a pauper whom nobody owns !
You bumpkins ! who stare at your brother con¬
veyed.
Behold what respect to a cloddy is paid !
And be joyful to think, when by death you 're
laid low.
You 've a chance to the grave like a gemman to
go !
Rattle his hones over the stones I
He's only a pauper whom nobody owns I
But a truce to this strain ; for my soul it is sad.
To think that a heart in humanity clad
Should make, like the brute, such a desolate end.
And depart from the light without leaving a
friend !
Bear soft his bones over the stones !
Though a pauper, he's one whom his Maker
yet owns !
thomas Noel.
OVER THE HILL TO THE POOR-HOUSE.
Over the hill to the poor-house I'm trudgin' my
weary way —
I, a woman of seventy, and only a trifle gray —
I, who am smaii an' chipper, for all the years
I've told.
As many another woman that's only half as old.
Over the hill to the poor-house — I can't quite
make it clear !
Over the hill to the poor-house — it seems so
horrid queer !
Many a step 1 've taken a-toilin' to and fro.
But this is a sort of journey 1 never thought
to go.
6-
What is the use of heapin' on me a pauper's
shame ?
Am 1 lazy or crazy ? am 1 blind or lame ?
True, 1 am not so supple, nor yet so awful stout ;
But charity ain't no favor, if one can live without.
1 am wUlin' and anxious an' ready any day
To work for a decent livin', an' pay my honest
way;
For 1 can earn my victuals, an' more too, 1 '11 be
bound.
If anybody only is willin' to have me round.
Once 1 was young an' han'some — 1 was, upon
my soul —
Once my cheeks was roses, my eyes as black as
coal ;
And 1 can't remember, in them days, of hearin'
people say.
For any kind of a reason, that I was in their way.
'T ain't no use of boastin', or talkin' over free.
But many a horrse an' home was open then to
me ;
Many a han'some oifer-1 had from likely men.
And nobody ever hinted that 1 was a burden
then.
And when to John 1 was married, sure he was
good and smart.
But he and all the neighbors would owrr 1 done
my part ;
For life was aU before me, an' 1 was young an'
strong.
And 1 worked the best that 1 could in tryin' to
get along.
And so we worked together : and life was hard,
but gay.
With now and then a baby for to cheer us on our
way ;
Till we had half a dozen, an' all growed clean
an' neat.
An' went to school like others, an' had enough
to eat.
So we worked for the chüd'm, and raised 'em
every one ;
Worked for 'em summer and whiter, just as we
ought to've done ;
Only perhaps we humored 'em, which some good
folks condemn.
But every couple's child'rn's a heap the best to
them.
Strange how much we think of our blessed little
ones ! —
1 'd have died for my daughters, 1 'd have died
for my sons ;
-9
f
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
343
And God he made that rule of love ; hut when
we 're old and gray,
I've noticed it sometimes somehow fails to work
the other way.
Strange, another thing : when our boys an' girls
was grown.
And when, exceptin' Charley, they'd left us
there alone ;
When John he nearer an' nearer come, an' dearer
seemed to he.
The Lord of Hosts he come one day an' took him
away from me.
StUl I was bound to struggle, an' never to cringe
or fall —
StiU I worked for Charley, for Charley was now
myall;
And Charley was pretty good to me, with scarce
a word or frown,
Tül at last he went a-courtin', and brought a wife
from town.
She was somewhat dressy, an' had n't a pleasant
smile —
She was quite conceity, and carried a heap o'
style ;
But if ever I tried to be friends, I did with her,
I know ;
But she was hard and proud, an' I could n't make
it go.
She had an edication, an' that was good for
her ;
But when she twitted me on mine, 't was carryin'
things too fur ;
An' I told her once, 'fore company (an' it almost
made her sick).
That I never swallowed a grammar, or 'et a 'rith-
metic.
So't was only a few days before the thing was
done —
They was a family of themselves, and I another
one ;
And a very little cottage one family will do.
But I never have seen a house that was big
enough for two.
An' I never could speak to suit her, never could
please her eye.
An' it made me independent, an' then I did n't
try;
But I was terribly staggered, an' felt it like a
blow,
When Charley turned ag'in me, an' told me I
I could go.
1 went to live with Susan, but Susan's house was
small.
And she was always a-hintin' how snug it was
for us all ;
And what with her husband's sisters, and what
with child'rn three,
'T was easy to discover that there was n't room
for me.
An' then I went to Thomas, the oldest son I've
got,
For Thomas's buûdings'd cover the half of an
acre lot ;
But all the child'm was on me — I could n't
stand their sauce —
And Thomas said 1 need n't think I was comin'
there to boss.
An' then I wrote to Rebecca, my girl who lives
out West,
And to Isaac, not far from her — some twenty
miles at best ;
And one of 'em said't was too warm there for
any one so old.
And t' other had an opinion the climate was fbo
cold.
So they have shirked and slighted me, an' shifted
me about —
So they have well-nigh soured me, an' wore my
old heart out ;
But still I've borne up pretty well, an' was n't
much put down.
Till Charley went to the poor-master, an' put me
on the town.
Over the hill to the poor-house — my child'm
dear, good by !
Many a night 1 've watched you when only God
was nigh ;
And God '11 judge between us ; but 1 will al'ays
pray
That you shall never suffer the half I do to-day.
Will m. Carleton.
THE BLIND BOY.
O, say, what is that thing called Light,
Which I must ne'er enjoy ?
What are the blessings of the sight,
O, tell your poor blind boy !
You talk of wondrous things you see.
You say the sun shines bright ;
I feel him warm, but how can he
Or make it day or night Í
344
POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
My day or night myself I make
Whene'er I sleep or play ;
And could 1 ever keep awake
With me 't were always day.
With heavy sighs I often hear
You mourn my hapless woe ;
But sure with patience I can bear
A loss I ne'er can know.
Then let not what I cannot have
My cheer of mind destroy :
"Whilst thus I.sing, 1 am a king,
Although a poor blind boy.
colley cibber.
THE RAINY DAY.
The day is cold, and dark, and dreary ;
It rains, and the wind is never weary ;
The vine still clings to the mouldering waU,
But at every gust the dead leaves fall.
And the day is dark and dreary.
•
My life is cold, and dark, and dreary ;
It I'ains, and the wind is never weary ;
My thoughts stUl cling to the mouldering Past,
But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast,
Ajid the days are dark and dreary.
Be still, sad heart ! and cease repining ;
Behind the clouds is the sun still shining ;
Thy fate is the common fate of all.
Into each life some rain must fall.
Some days must be dark and dreary.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
THE END OF THE PLAY.
The play is done, — the curtain drops.
Slow falling to the prompter's bell ;
A moment yet the actor stops.
And looks around, to say farewell.
It is an irksome word and task ;
And, when he's laughed and said his say.
He shows, as he removes the mask,
A face that's anything but gay.
One word, ere yet the evening ends, —
Let's close it with a parting rhyme ;
And pledge a hand to all young friends.
As flits the merry Christmas time ;
On life's wide scene you, too, have parts
That fate erelong shall bid you play ;
Good night ! — with honest, gentle hearts
A kindly greeting go alway !
Good night ! — I'd say the griefs, the joys.
Just hinted in this mimic page.
The triumphs and defeats of boys.
Are but repeated in our age ;
I'd say your woes were not less keen.
Your hopes more vain, than those of men, —
Your pangs or pleasures of fifteen
At forty-five played o'er again.
I'd say we suffer and we strive
Not less nor more as men than boys, —
With grizzled beards at forty-five.
As erst at twelve in corduroys ;
And if, in time of sacred youth.
We learned at home to love and pray.
Pray Heaven that early love and truth
May never wholly pass away.
And in the world, as in the school,
I'd say how fate may change and shift, —
The prize be sometimes with the fool.
The race not always to the swift :
The strong may yield, the good may fall.
The gi'eat man be a vulgar clown.
The knave be lifted over all.
The kind cast pitilessly down.
Who knows the inscrutable design ?
Blessèd be He who took and gave !
Why should your mother, Charles, not mine.
Be weeping at her darling's grave ?
We bow to Heaven that willed it so.
That darkly rules the fate of all.
That sends the respite or the blow.
That's free to give or to recall.
This crowns his feast with wine and wit, —
Who brought him to that mirth and state ?
His betters, see, below him sit.
Or hunger hopeless at the gate.
"Who bade the mud from Dives' wheel
To spurn the rags of Lazarus ?
Come, brother, in that dust we '11 kneel.
Confessing Heaven that ruled it thus.
So each shall mourn, in life's advance.
Dear hopes, dear friends, untimely killed ;
Shall grieve for many a forfeit chance
And longing passion unfulfilled.
Amen ! — whatever fate be sent.
Pray God the heart may kindly glow.
Although the head with cares be bent.
And whitened with the winter snow.
Come wealth or want, come good or ill,
Let young and old accept their part,
And bow before the awful will.
And bear it with an honest heart.
r
r
FRAGMENTS. 345 ^
J
1
Who misses, or who wins the prize, — 0 life ! thou art a galling load.
Go, lose or conquer as you can ; Along a rough, a weary road,
But if you fail, or if you rise. To wretches such as I !
Be each, pray God, a gentleman. Dapondtncy. burns.
A gentleman, or old or young ! A man I am, crossed with adversity.
( Bear kindly with my humble lays ;) ««^kespeare.
The sacred chorus first was sung ^ wretched soul, bruised with adversity.
Upon the first of Christmas days ; comedy 9/Errors, Acta, Sc. i. Shakespeare.
The shepherds heard it overhead, —
The joyful angels raised it then : „ ~
„ ° T. -j Sympathy and Scorn.
Glory to Heaven on high, it said.
And peace on earth to gentle men I He jests at scars, that never felt a wound.
Romeo and Juliet, ActW. Sc. i. shakespeare.
My song, save this, is little worth : • j i. ^ a.
t 1 Tr .j « No one is so accursed by late,
I lay the weary pen aside, t,, aa 1 j i a
v lav j 1 j • u.r. No one so utterly desolate.
And wish you health and love and mirth, ^ v a ai. 1. 1
A £a Ai. 1 • A a«j But some heart, though unknown.
As fits the solemn Christmas-tide. j a 1 •
A üA AT- 1- 1 /-.I- • A -L- Ai- Responds unto his own.
As fits the holy Christmas birth, .. . t
_ 1 , ..,1 Endymioni longfellow.
Be this, good friends, our carol still, —
Be peace on earth, be peace on earth. What precious drops are those,
To men of gentle will. Which silently each other's track pursue,
william Makepeace Thackeray. Bright as young diamonds in their infant dew ?
Conçuest of Granada, Part II. Act iii. Sc. i. dryden.
* T is all men's office to speak patience
To those that wring under the load of sorrow.
But no man's virtue, nor sufficiency,
FRAGMENTS. To be so moral when he shall endure
The like himself.
The Lot of Mankind. much Ado about Nothing, Acty.sc.i. shakespearb.
Never morning wore Every one can master ;■ grief, but he that has it.
To evening, but some heart did break. Much Ado about Nothing, Act m-sc... Shakespeare.
In Memoriam, si. tennyson.
One writ with me in sour misfortune's book !
Daughter of Jove, relentless power, s- Shakespeare.
pou tamer of the human breast, ^ falling man too far.
■Whose iron scourge and torturing hour jcingHenry viii.. Act a.. Sc. a. shakespeara
The bad affright, afdict the best !
Hymn to Adversity. T. GRAY. Of all the griefs that harass the distrest.
Sure the most bitter is a scornful jest.
0 suffering, sad humanity ! Ltmdm. dr. s. Johnson.
0 ye afflicted ones, who lie
Steeped to the lips in misery, Disappointed Ambition.
Longing, and yet afraid to die, Here I and sorrows sit ;
Patient, though sorely tried ! Here is my throne ; bid kings come bow to it.
The GobUt of Life. LONGFELLOW. fohn. Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
■When sorrows come, they come not single spies. Upon my head they placed a fruitless crown.
But in battalions. And put a barren sceptre in my gripe,
Hamlet, ActW. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE. Thence to be wrenched with an unlineal hand.
No son of mine succeeding.
One woe doth tread upon another's heel Macbeth, Act iu. sc. i. Shakespeare.
So fast they follow.
Hamlet, ActW. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE. And be these juggling fiends no more believed.
That palter with us in a double sense ;
Woes cluster ; rare are solitary woes ; That keep the word of promise to our ear.
They love a train, they tread each other's heel. And breai it to our hope.
Night Thoughtt, Night m. DR. E. YOUNG. Macbeth, Act v. Sc.j. SHAKESPEARB.
:i. . r
ß-
346
POEMS OP SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
And my large kingdom for a little grave,
A little little grave, an obscure grave.
King Richard II., Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Thrice he assayed, and thrice in spite of scorn
Tears, such as angels weep, burst forth.
Paradise Lost, Book \. MiLTON.
WoLSBY. I have touched the highest point of
all my greatness.
And from that full meridian of my glory,
I haste now to my setting : I shall fall
Like a bright exhalation in the evening.
And no man see me more.
King Henry VIII,, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
An old man, broken with the storms of state.
Is come to lay his weary bones among ye ;
Give him a little earth for charity !
King Henry VIII., Act iv. Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE.
The wine of life is drawn, and the mere lees
Is left this vault to brag of.
Machcth, Aa ii. Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
World-Weariness.
I 'gin to be a-weary of the sun.
Macbeth, Act v. Sc, 5.
Shakespeare.
0 God ! 0 God !
How weary, stale, flat, and unprofltable
Seem to me aU the uses of this world !
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Man delights not me ; no, nor woman neither.
Hamlet, Act U. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
The Memory of Sorrows.
Sorrows remembered sweeten present joy.
The Course of Time, Book i. FOLLOK.
The hues of bliss more brightly glow.
Chastised by sabler tints of woe.
Ode on the Pleasure arisingfrom Vicissitude. T. GRAV.
Weep no more, nor sigh, nor groan.
Sorrow calls no time that's gone :
Violets plucked, the sweetest rain
Makes not fresh nor grow again.
The Queen of Corinth, Act iii. Sc. 2. J, FLETCHER.
The Memory of Joys.
No greater grief than to remember days
Of joy when misery is at hand.
Inferno, Cant. v. Dante.
U
Of joys departed.
Not to return, how painful the remembrance !
The Grave. R« BLAIR.
He that is stricken blind cannot forget
The precious treasure of his eyesight lost.
Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. i, SHAKESPEARE.
0, who can hold a fire in his hand
By thinking on the frosty Caucasus ?
Or cloy the hungry edge of appetite
By bare imagination of a feast Í
Or wallow naked in December snow.
By thinking on fantastic Summer's heat ?
O, no ! the apprehension of the good
Gives but the greater feeling to the worse.
King Richard II., Act i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Bad News.
Yet the first bringer of unwelcome news
Hath but a losing oflSce ; and his tongue
Sounds ever after as a sullen bell.
Remembered knoUing a departed friend.
King Henry IV., Part II. Act i. Sc. i. Shakespeare.
Varied Misery.
A poor, infirm, weak, and despised old man.
King Lear, Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Eating the bitter bread of banishment.
King Richard II., Act íü. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
For sufferance is the badge of all our tribe.
Merchant of Venice, Act t Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Lord of himself, — that heritage of woe !
Lara, Cant. L Byron.
Lord of thy presence, and no land beside.
King John, Acti. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
0, 1 could play the woman with mine eyes.
And braggart with my tongue !
Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Moping melancholy.
And moonstruck madness.
Paradise Lost, Book xi. MILTON.
0, let not women's weapons, water-drops.
Stain my man's cheeks.
King Lear, Act ii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
The little dogs and all.
Tray, Blanch, and Sweet-heart, see, they bark
at me.
King Lear, Act iii. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE.
Vex not his ghost : 0, let him pass : he hates
him.
That would upon the rack of this tough world
Stretch him out longer.
King Lear, Act v. Sc. iii. SHAKESPEARE.
In durance vile here must I wake and weep.
And all my frowzy couch in sorrow steep.
Epistle from Esofus to Maria, BURNS
(&
FRAGMENTS.
347
a
Consolation in Adversity.
Cheered up himself with ends of verse,
And sayings of philosophers.
HuäüraSt Part 1. Cant. Hi. BUTLER.
On Fortune's cap we are not the very button.
HamUt, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE,
I am not merry ; but I do beguile
The thing I am, by seeming otherwise.
Othello, Act U. Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
Heaven is not always angry when he strikes.
But most chastises those whom most he likes.
Vtrses to his Friend under A^lietion. J. POMFRET.
The weariest and most loathèd worldly life.
That age, ache, penury, and imprisonment
Can lay on nature, is a paradise
To what we fear of death.
Measurt/or Measure^ Act Ui. Sc. x. SHAKESPEARE.
Hope, the balm and life-blood of the souL
Art of Preserving Health, Book iv. J. ARMSTRONG.
Loss of Property.
.Who goeth a borrowing
Goeth a sorrowing.
Five Hundred Points of Good Husbandry ; funds Abstract.
T. Tusser.
You take my house when you do take the prop
That doth sustain my house ; you take my life
When you do take the means whereby I live.
Merchant of Venice, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE,
The loss of wealth is loss of dirt.
As sages in all times assert ;
The happy man's without a shirt.
Be Merry, Friends.
J. HEYWOOU.
If ever you have looked on better days ;
If ever been where bells have knoUed to church.
As you Like It, Act a. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
We have seen better days.
Timon of Athens, Act iv. Sc. 2.
My pride fell with my fortunes.
As You Like It, Act i. Sc. 2.
shakespeare.
Shakespeare.
>s
The High and the Low.
He that is down needs fear no fall.
Pilgrim's Progress, Part H. BUNYAN.
I am not now in fortune's power ;
He that is down can fall no lower.
Hudibras, Part I, Cant. Ul. BUTLER.
Their feet through faithless leather met the dirt.
And oftener changed their principles than shirt.
Etistu to Mr. Pofe. E. YOUNG.
'T is better to be lowly bom.
And range with humble livers in content,
Than to be perked up in a glistering grief.
And wear a golden sorrow.
King Henry VIII., Act il Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Yes, child of suffering, thou may'st well be sure.
He who ordained the Sabbath loves the poor !
Urania. 0. W. HOLMES.
As if Misfortune made the throne her seat.
And none could be unhappy but the great.
The Fair Penitent : Prologue. N. ROWE.
None think the great unhappy, but the great.
Love of Fame, Satire Í, dr. e. young*
Hope in Misery.
The wretch condemned with life to part.
Still, still on hope relies ;
And every pang that rends the heart
Bids expectation rise.
The CapHvity, Act ii. GOLDSMITH.
The worst is not
So long as we can say. This is the worst.
King Lear, Act vt. Sc.z. shakespeare.
The miserable have no other medicine.
But only hope.
Measure for Measure, Aet'úx. Sc. t. shakespeare.
Macb. Canst thou not minister to a mind
diseased.
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow.
Raze out the written troubles of the brain.
And with some sweet oblivious antidote
Cleanse the stuffed bosom of that perilous stuff.
Which weighs upon the heart ?
Doct. Therein the patient
Must minister to himself.
Macbeth, Acto. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Briefness of Joys.
What though my winged hours of bliss have been.
Like angel-visits, few and far between.
Pleasures of Hope, Part II.
T. Campbell.
How fading are the joys we dote upon !
Like apparitions seen and gone ;
But those which soonest take their flight
Are the most exquisite and strong ;
Like angels' visits, short and bright.
Mortality's too weak to bear them long.
The Parting. J. NORRIS.
Despair.
I am one, my liege.
Whom the vile blows and buffets of the world
Have so incensed, that I am reckless what
I do to spite the world.
Macbeth, Act m. Sc. a. shakespeare,
[5-
348
POEMS OF SORROW AND ADVERSITY.
-a
How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is
To hare a thankless child I
King Lear, Act\. Sc. ^ SHAKESPEARE.
O, that way madness lies ; let me shun that ;
No more of that.
King Lear, Act Iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
I would that I were low laid in my grave ;
I am not worth this coil that's made for me.
King Johrif Act ii. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE*
I am a tainted wether of the flock.
Merchant 0/ Venice, ActXe. Sc, z.
Shakespeare.
No words suffice the secret soul to show,
For truth denies aU eloquence to woe.
The Corsair, Cant, iiL BYRON.
Where peace
And rest can never dwell, hope never comes.
That comes to all.
Paradise Lost, Book L MILTON.
The strongest and the fiercest spirit
That fought in heaven, now fiercer by despair.
Paradise Lost, Book'Ú, MlLTON.
Resignation.
But hushed be every thought that springs
From out the bitterness of things.
Addressed to Sir G, H. B.
wordsworth.
'T is impious in a good man to be sad.
Night Thotsghts, Night ir. DR. E. YOUNG.
Heaven a Refüge foe the Weetched.
Who ne'er his bread in sorrow ate.
Who ne'er the mournful midnight hours
Weeping upon his bed has sate.
He knows you not, ye Heavenly Powers.
Hyperion, Book i. ; Motto : from Goethe's fViihelm Meister,
LONGFELLOW.
In man's most dark extremity
Oft succor dawns from Heaven.
The Lord of the IsUs, Cant, L SCOTT.
The path of sorrow, and that path alone.
Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown.
To an Afflicted Protestant Lady, CowpER.
Here bring your wounded hearts, here tell your
anguish —
Earth has no sorrow that Heaven cannot heal.
Saored Songs : Corne, ye Disconsolate, MOORE.
The Uses of Adveesity.
Sweet are the uses of adversity.
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous.
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.
As Ycu Like It, Act l Sc. 3. shakespeare.
He that lacks time to mourn, lacks time to mend.
Eternity mourns that. 'T is an ill cure
For life's worst ills, to have no time to feel them.
Where sorrow's held intrusive and turned out.
There wisdom will not enter, nor true power.
Nor aught that dignifies humanity.
Philip Van Arievelde, Part /. Act\. Sc. 5. h. taylor.
The good are better made by ill.
As odors crushed are sweeter stUl.
Jacqueline.
S. ROGERS.
As aromatic plants bestow
No spicy fragrance while they grow ;
But, crushed or trodden to the ground,
Difliise their balmy sweets around.
The CafHtrily, Acti. GOLDSMITH.
As sunshine, broken in the rill.
Though turned astray, is sunshine stUL
Pire IVorshippers, MOORB.
Tho' losses and crosses
Be lessons right severe.
There's wit there, ye '11 get there.
Ye '11 find nae otherwhere.
Epistle to Davie. BURNS.
By adversity are wrought
The greatest works of admiration.
And all the fair examples of renown
Out of distress and misery are grown.
On the Earl of Southampton. S. DANIEL.
More safe I sing with mortal voice, unchanged
To hoarse or mute, though fallen on evil days.
On evil days though fallen, and evil tongues.
Parculise Lost, Book vii. MiLTON.
Calamity is man's true touchstone.
Four Plays in One: The Triumph of Honor, Sc. i.
Beauuont and Fletcher.
Like a ball that bounds
According to the force with which't was thrown.
So in affliction's violence, he that's wise
The more he's cast down will the higher rise.
Microcosmos, nabb.
0, fear not in a world like this.
And thou shalt know erelong, —
Know how sublime a thing it is
To suflfer and be strong.
The Light 0/Stars. LONGFELLOW.
B-
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POEMS OF RELIGION.
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POEMS OF KELIGION,
THE CELESTIAL COUNTRY.
The poem De Contemptu Mündt was written in dactylic hexam*
eter Latin verse by Bernard de Morlaix, Monk of Cluni, who lived
in the earlier half of the twelfth century. It contained three thou*
sand lines divided into three books. The poem commences : ~
Hora novissima. témpora pessima
Sunt, vigilemus.
Ecce minaciter imminet arbiter
Ille supremas.
Imminet, imminet et mala terminet,
iEqua coronet.
Recta remuneret. anxia liberet,
iEthera donet,
Auferat aspera duraque pondera
Mentes onustx
Sobria muniat, improba puniat,
Utraquejuste.
WUch have been rendered : —
Hours of the latest 1 times of the basest !
Our vigil before us !
Judgment eternal of Being supernal ;
Now hanging o'er us 1
Evil to terminate, equity vindicate,
Cometh the Kingly ;
Righteousness seeing, anxious hearts freeing.
Crowning each singly.
Bearing life's weariness, tasting life's bitterness,
Life as it must be,
Th' righteous retaining, siimers arraigning,
Judging all justly.
The translation following is of a portion of the poem distin*
gokhed by the $ub*title " Laus Patri.£ Cœlestis."
The world is very evil,
The times are waxing late ;
Be sober and keep vigil,
The Judge is at the gate, —
The Judge that comes in mercy.
The Judge that comes with might.
To terminate the evil.
To diadem the right.
When the just and gentle Monarch
Shall summon from the tomb,
Let man, the guilty, tremble.
For Man, the God, shall doom !
Arise, arise, good Christian,
Let right to wrong succeed ;
Let penitential sorrow
To heavenly gladness lead, —
To the light that hath no evening,
That knows nor moon nor sun,
The light so new and golden,
The light that is but one.
And when the Sole-Begotten
Shall render up once more
The kingdom to thq Father,
Whose own it was before,
Then glory yet unheard of
Shall shed abroad its ray.
Resolving all enigmas.
An endless Sabbath-day.
For thee, 0 dear, dear Coimtry !
Mine eyes their vigils keep ;
For very love, beholding
Thy happy name, they weep.
The mention of thy glory
Is unction to the breast.
And medicine in sickness.
And love, and life, and rest.
0 one, 0 only Mansion !
0 Paradise of Joy,
Where tears are ever banished.
And smiles have no alloy ¡
Beside thy living waters
All plants are, great and small,
The cedar of the forest.
The hyssop of the wall ;
With jaspers glow thy bulwarks.
Thy streets with emeralds blaze.
The sardius and the topaz
Unite in thee their rays ;
Thine ageless walls are bonded
With amethyst unpriced ;
Thy Saints build up its fabric.
And the comer-stone is Christ,
The Cross is all thy splendor.
The Crucified thy praise ;
His laud and benediction
Thy ransomed people raise :
"Jesus, the Gem of Beauty,
True God and Man," they sing,
" The never-fading Garden,
The ever-golden Ring ;
The Door, the Pledge, the Husband,
The Guardian of his Court ;
The Day-star of Salvation,
The Porter and the Port ! "
352
POEMS OF RELIGION.
u
Thou hast no shore, fair ocean !
Thou hast no time, bright day !
Dear fountain of refreshment
To pilgrims far away !
Upon the Rock of Ages
They raise thy holy tower ;
Thine is the victor's laurel.
And thine the golden dower !
Thou feel'st in mystic rapture,
0 Bride that know'st no guile.
The Prince's sweetest kisses.
The Prince's loveliest smile ;
Unfading liliej, bracelets
Of living pearl thine own ;
The Lamb is ever near thee.
The Bridegroom thine alone.
The Crown is he to guerdon.
The Buckler to protect.
And he himself the Mansion,
And he the Architect.
The only art thou needest —
Thanksgiving for thy lot ;
The only joy thou seekest —
The Life where Death is not.
And all thine endless leisure.
In sweetest accents, sings
The ill that was thy merit.
The wealth that is thy King's I
Jerusalem the golden.
With milk and honey blest,
Beneath thy contemplation
Sink heart and voice oppressed.
I know not, 0 1 know not.
What social joys are there !
What radiancy of glory,
What light beyond compare !
And when 1 fain would sing them.
My spirit fails and faints ;
And vainly would it image
The assembly of the Saints.
They stand, those halls of Zion,
Conjubilaut with song.
And bright with many an angel.
And all the martyr throng ;
The Prince is ever in them.
The daylight is serene ;
The pastures of the Blessëd
Are decked in glorious sheen.
There is the Throne of David,
And there, from care released.
The song of them that triumph.
The shout of them that feast ;
And they who, with their Leader,
Have conquered in the fight,
Forever and forever
Are clad in robes of white !
0 holy, placid harp-notes
Of that eternal hymn !
0 sacred, sweet reflection.
And peace of Seraphim !
O thirst, forever ardent.
Yet evermore content !
0 true peculiar vision
Of God cunctipotent !
Ye know the many mansions
For many a glorious name.
And divers retributions
That divers merits claim ;
For midst the constellations
That deck our earthly sky.
This star than that is brighter —
And so it is on high.
Jerusalem the glorious !
The glory of the Elect !
0 dear and future vision
That eager hearts expect !
Even now by faith 1 see thee.
Even here thy walls discern ;
To thee my thoughts are kindled,
And strive, and pant, and yearn»
Jerusalem the only.
That look'st from heaven below.
In thee is all my glory.
In me is all my woe ;
And though my body may not.
My spirit seeks thee fain.
Till flesh and earth return me
To earth and flesh again.
O none can tell thy bulwarks.
How gloriously they rise !
0 none can tell thy capitals
Of beautiful device !
Thy loveliness oppresses
All human thought and heart,
And none, O peace, 0 Zion,
Can sing thee as thou art !
New mansion of new people.
Whom God's own love and light
Promote, increase, make holy.
Identify, unite !
Thou City of the Angels !
Thcj^ City of the Lord !
Whose everlasting music
Is the glorious decachord !
l'
3 ' * G
POEMS OF RELIGION. 353
And there the band of Prophets Bore with me in defilement,
United praise ascribes, And from defilement laved.
And there the twelvefold chorus When in his strength I struggle,
Of Israel's ransomed tribes. For very joy I leap.
The lily-beds of virgins. When in my sin I totter,
The roses' martyr-glow, I weep, or tiy to weep :
The cohort of the Fathers Then grace, sweet grace celestial.
Who kept the faith below. Shall all its love display.
And David's Royal Fountain
And there the Sole-Begotten Purge every sin away.
Is Lord in regal state, —
He, Judah's mystic Lion, 0 mine, my golden Zion !
He, Lamb Immaculate. 0 lovelier far than gold,
0 fields that know no sorrow ! With laurel-girt battalions,
0 state that fears no strife ! And safe victorious fold !
0 princely bowers ! 0 land of flowers ! ^ sweet and blessed Country,
0 realm and home of Life ! Shall I ever see thy face ?
0 sweet and blessëd Country,
Jerusalem, exulting , ^ '
On that securest shore, ^ "î
1 hope thee, wish thee, sing thee, ^ Jo comfort and to bless !
And love thee evermore ! \win the pnze itself Î
T 1 J. r 'x O tell me, tell me. Yes !
I ask not for my ment, ' '
1 seek not to deny
My merit is destruction, P^ult ! 0 dust and ashes !
A child of wrath am I ; The Lord shall be thy part ;
But yet with faith I venture ^is only, his forever.
And hope upon my way ; Thou shalt be, and thou art !
For those perennial guerdons Exult, 0 dust and ashes !
I labor night and day. The Lord shall be thy part ;
His only, his forever.
The best and dearest Father, Thou shalt be, and thou art !
1 J V J From the Latin of Bernard DE Morlaix.
Wno macLo m6 and wno savod, j Translation of John mason neale.
DIES IRj;.
fA Latin poem by Thomas of Celano (a Neapolitan village), about a. d. 1250. Perhaps no poem has been more frequently
translated. a German collector published eighty-seven versions in German. Dr. Coles, of Newark, N. J., has made thirteen. Seven
are given In the " Seven Gieat Hymns of the Mediaeval Church," Randolph Se Co., N. Y. The version here given preserves the
measure of the original.)
Dies lr>e, dies illa, dûs tribuUUionis et angustia, dies ca- that day, a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a
lamtiatU et miseria, dies tenebrarum et caliginis, dies nebula et '^y "f desolation, a day of darkness and gloomi-
turbinis, dies tuba et clangc-ris super civitatis munitas, et super darkness, a day of the trumpet
ángulos excelsos I 15, 16. alarm against the fenced cities, and against the high totU'
erv / — Zephaniah i. 15, lO.
Dies irae, dies ilia ! Day of vengeance, without morrow !
Solvet sseclum in favillâ. Earth shall end in flame and sorrow,
Teste David cum Sybillâ. As from Saint and Seer we borrow.
Quantus tremor est futurus. Ah ! what terror is impending,
Quando Judex est venturos. When the Judge is seen descending,
Cuneta stricte discussurns ! And each secret veil is rending !
Tuba mirum spargens sonum To the throne, the trumpet sounding,
Per sepiliera regionum, Through the sepulchres resounding,
Coget omnes ante thronum. Summons all, with voice astounding.
1 , . 1
J
■
1
ÎJ -t •- L.
354
POEMS OF RELIGION.
t]
Mors stupebit, et natura,
Quum resurget creatura,
Judicantl responsura.
Liber scriptus proferetur,
In quo totum continetur,
Unde mundus judicetur.
Judex ergo cum sedebit,
Quidquid latet, apparebit :
Nil inultum remanebit.
Quid sum, miser ! tunc dicturus.
Quem patronum rogaturus,
Quum vix Justus sit securus ?
Rex tremendse majestatis.
Qui salvandos salvas gratis.
Salva me, fons pietatis !
Recordare, Jesu pie.
Quod sum causa tuae viae ;
Ne me perdas ilia die !
Quaerens me, sedisti lassus,
Redemisti, crucem passus :
Tantus labor non sit cassus !
Juste Judex ultionis,
Donum fac remissionis
Ante diem rationis !
Ingemisco tanquam reus.
Culpa rubet vultus meus ;
Supplicanti parce, Deus !
Qui Mariam absolvisti.
Et latronem exaudisti.
Mihi queque spem dedisti.
Preces meae non sunt dignae.
Sed tu bonus fac benigne
Ne perenni cremer igne !
Inter oves locum praesta.
Et ab haedis me sequestra.
Statuons in parte dextrâ.
Confutatis maledictis,
riammis acribus addictis,
^oca. me cum benedictis !
Ore supplex et acclinis.
Cor contritum quaisi ciuis,
Gere curam mei finis !
Lacrymosa dies ilia,
Qua resurget ex favillà
Judicandus homo reus ;
Huic ergo parce, Deus !
Thomas a Celauo.
Death and Nature, mazed, are quaking,
When, the grave's long slumber breaking,
Man to judgment is awaking.
On the written Volume's pages.
Life is shown in all its stages —
Judgment-record of past ages.
Sits the Judge, the raised arraigning.
Darkest mysteries explaining.
Nothing unavenged remaining.
What shall I then say, unfriended.
By no advocate attended.
When the just are scarce defended ?
King of majesty tremendous,
By thy saving grace defend us.
Fount of pity, safety send us !
Holy Jestjs, meek, forbearing.
For my sins the death-crown wearing.
Save me, in that day, despairing !
Worn and weary, thou hast sought me ;
By thy cross and passion bought me —
Spare the hope thy labors brought me !
Righteous Judge of retribution.
Give, O give me absolution
•Ere the day of dissolution !
As a guilty culprit groaning.
Flushed my face, my errors owning,
Hear, 0 God, my spirit's moaning !
Thou to Mary gav'st remission,
Heard'st the dying thief s petition,
Bad'st me hope in my contrition.
/ In my prayers no grace discerning.
Yet on me thy favor turning.
Save my soul from endless burning !
Give me, when thy sheep confiding
Thou art from the goats dividing.
On thy right a place abiding !
When the wicked are confounded,
And by bitter flames surrounded.
Be my joyful pardon sounded !
Prostrate, all my guilt discerning,
>^eart as though to ashes turning ;
Save, 0 save me from the burning !
^Day of weeping, when from ashes
Man shall rise mid lightning flashes,—
Guilty, trembling with contrition.
Save him. Father, from perdition !
John a. dix.
POEMS OF RELIGION.
STABAT MATER DOLOROSA.
f A Latin poem, written in the thirteenth century by JACOPONB, a Franciscan friar, of Umbria. Of this and the two preceding^ poems
Dr. Neale says : " The De Contemftu is the most lovely, the Dies Ira the most sublime, and the Stabat MaUr the most pathetic, of
medûeval poems."J
Stabat Mater dolorosa
Juxta crucem lacrymosa.
Dum pendebat filius ;
Cujus animam gementem,
Contristatam et dolentem,
Pertransivit gladius.
0 quam tristis et aflicta,
Fuit illa benedicta
Mater unigeniti,
Qu» mœrebat et doiebat,
Pia mater, dum videbat
Nati poenas inciyti !
Quis est homo qui non fleret,
Christi matrem si videret
In tanto supplicio ?
Quis non posset contristaii
Piam matrem contemplari
Dolentem cum filio !
Pro peccatis suae gentis,
Vidit Jesum in tormentis.
Et flagellis subditum.
Vidit suum dulcem natum,
Morientem, desolatum,
Dum emisit spiritum.
Eia mater, fons amoris.
Me sentira vim doloris
Fac, ut tecum lugeam.
Fac ut ardeat cor meum
In amando Christum Daum,
Ut illi complaceam.
Sancta Mater, istud agas,
Cmcifixi fige plagas
Cordi meo valide.
Tui nati vulnerati,
Tarn dignati pro me pati,
Pœnas meeum divide.
Fac me vera tecum flare,
Crucifixo condolei-e.
Donee ego vixero ;
Juxta crucem tecum stare.
Et tibi me sociare
In planctu desidero.
Virgo virginum prseclara.
Mihi jam non sis amara ;
Fac me tecum plangere ;
Fac ut portera Christi mortem,
Passionis fac consortem.
Et plagas recolare.
Stood the afflicted mother weeping.
Near the cross her station keeping
Whereon hung her Son and Lord ;
Through whose spirit sympathizing,
Sorrowing and agonizing.
Also passed the cruel sword.
Oh ! how mournful and distressed
Was that favored and most blessèd
Mother of the only Son,
Trembling, grieving, bosom heaving.
While perceiving, scarce believing.
Fains of that Illustrious One !
Who the man, who, called a brother.
Would not weep, saw he Christ's mother
In such deep distress and wild ?
Who could not sad tribute render
Witnessing that mother tender
Agonizing with her child ?
Tor his people's sins atoning.
Him she saw in torments groaning,
Given to the scourger's rod ;
Saw her darling offspring dying.
Desolate, forsaken, crying.
Yield his spirit up to God.
Make me feel thy sorrow's power.
That with thee I tears may shower.
Tender mother, fount of love !
Make my heart with love unceasing
Burn toward Christ the Lord, that pleasing
I may be to him above.
Holy mother, this be granted.
That the slain one's wounds be planted
Firmly in my heart to bide.
Of him wounded, all astounded —
Depths unbounded for me sounded —
All the pangs with me divide.
Make me weep with thee in union ;
With the Crucified, communion
In his grief and suffering give ;
Near the cross, with tears unfailing,
I would join thee in thy wailing
Here as long as I shall live.
Maid of maidens, all excelling !
Be not bitter, me repelling ;
Make thou me a mourner too ;
Make me bear about Christ's dying.
Share his passion, shame defying ;
All his wounds in mo renew.
■51
¡a
356
POEMS OF RELIGION.
n
Fao me plagis vulneran,
Cruce hac inebrian,
Et cruore filii ;
Inflammatus et accensus,
Per te, Virgo, sim defensus
In die judicii.
Fac me cruce custodiri,
Morte Christi praemuniri,
Confoveri gratia.
Quando corpus morietur,
Fac ut animse donetur
Faradisi gloria.
fra jacopone.
Wound for wound be there created ;
With the cross intoxicated
For thy Son's dear sake, I pray —
May I, fired with pure affection.
Virgin, have through thee protection
In the solemn Judgment Day.
Let me by the cross be warded.
By the death of Christ be guarded.
Nourished by divine supplies.
When the body death hath riven.
Grant that to the soul be given
Glories bright of Paradise.
Abraham Colss.
VENI SANCTE SPIRITUS.
[Thb hTnm was written in the tenth century by ROBERT II., the gentle son of hugh CAPET,
rank to riie Dûs /ra.]
It is often mentioned as second In
e-
Veni, Sánete Spiritus,
Et emitte coelitus
Lucís tuse radium.
Veni, pater pauperum,
Veni, dator munerum,
Veni, lumen cordium.
Consolator optime,
Dulcis hospes animse,
Dulce refrigerinm.
In labore requies.
In sestu temperies.
In fletu solatium.
O lux beatissima !
Reple cordis intima,
Tuorum fideUum.
Sine tuo numine.
Nihil est in homine.
Nihil est innoxium.
Lava quod est sordidum,
Riga quod est aridum,
Sana quod est saucium.
Fleete quod est rigidum,
Fove quod est frigidum.
Rege quod est devium.
Da tuis fidelibus.
In te confidentibus.
Sacrum septenarium ;
Da virtutis meritnm.
Da salutis exitum.
Da perenne gaudium !
robert il op France.
Come, Holy Ghost ! thou fire divine !
From highest heaven on us down shine !
Comforter, be thy comfort mine !
Come, Father of the poor, to earth ;
Come, with thy gifts of precious worth ;
Come, Light of all of mortal birth !
Thou rich in comfort ! Ever blest
The heart where thou art constant guest.
Who giv'st the heavy-laden rest.
Come, thou in whom our toil is sweety
Our shadow in the noonday heat.
Before whom mourning fiieth fleet.
Bright Sun of Grace ! thy sunshine dart
On aU who cry to thee apart.
And fill with gladness every heart.
Whate'er without thy aid is wrought.
Or skilful deed, or vrisest thought,
God counts it vain and merely naught.
O cleanse us that we sin no more.
O'er parchèd souls thy waters pour ;
Heal the sad heart that acheth sore.
Thy will be ours in all our ways ;
O melt the frozen with thy rays ;
Call home the lost in error's maze.
And grant us, Lord, who cry to thee,
And hold the Faith in unity.
Thy precious gifts of charity ;
That we may live in holiness.
And find in death our happiness.
And dwell with thee in lasting bliss !
Catharine winkwort*.
■Ö
POEMS OF RELIGION.
357
VENI CREATOR SPIRITUS.
[This hymn, one of the most important in the service of the Latin Church, has been sometimes attributed to the eupbror
Charlemagne. The better opinion, however, inclines to popa gregory 1., called the Great, as the author, and fixes its origin
somewhere in the âxth century .J
Veni, Creator Spiritus,
Mentes tuorum visita,
Imple superna gratia,
Qu» tu creasti pectora.
Creator Spirit, by whose aid
The world's foundations first were laid.
Come visit every pious mind,
Come pour thy joys on human kind ;
From sin and sorrow set us free.
And make thy temples worthy thee.
Qui diceris Paraclitus,
Altissimi donum Dei,
Fons vi vus, ignis, caritas,
Et spiritaUs unctio.
O source of uncreated light.
The Father's promised Paraclete !
Thrice holy fount, thrice holy fire.
Our hearts with heavenly love inspire ;
Come, and thy sacred unction bring.
To sanctify us whUe we sing.
Tu septiformis muñere,
Dextr» Dei tu digitus
Tu rite promissum Patria,
Sermone ditans guttura.
Plenteous of grace, descend from high.
Rich in thy seven-fold energy !
Thou strength of his almighty hand.
Whose power does heaven and earth command !
Proceeding Spirit, our defence.
Who dost the gifts of tongues dispense.
And crown'st thy gift with eloquence I
Accende lumen sensibus,
Infunde amorem cordibus,
Infirma nostri corporis
Virtute firmans perpeti.
Refine and purge our earthly parts ;
But, O, inflame and fire our hearts !
Our frailties help, our vice control.
Submit tbe senses to the soul ;
And when rebellious they are grown.
Then lay thy hand and hold 'em down.
Hostem repellas longius,
Pacemque dones protinus ;
Ductore sic te praevio
Vitemus omne noxium.
Chase from our minds the infernal foe.
And peace, the fruit of love, bestow ;
And, lest our feet should step astray.
Protect and guide us on the way.
Per te sciamus da Patrem,
Noscamus atque Filium ;
Te utriusque Spiritum
Credamus omni tempore.
Make us eternal truths receive.
And practise all that we believe ;
Give us thyself, that we may see
The Father and the Son by thee.
Deo Patri sit gloria
Et Filio qui a mortuis
Surrexit, ac Paráclito,
In saeculorum saecula.
st. gregory the GREAT.
Immortal honor, endless fame.
Attend the Almighty Father's name ;
The Saviour Son he glorified,
Who for lost man's redemption died ;
And equal adoration he,
Eternal Paraclete, to thee.
John Orvden.
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POEMS OP RELIGION.
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THE NEW JERUSALEM.
0 MOTHER dear, Jerusalem,
When shall I come to thee ?
When shall my sorrows have an end, —
Thy joys when shall I see ?
0 happy harbor of God's saints !
0 sweet and pleasant soil !
In thee no sorrow can he found.
Nor grief, nor care, nor toil.
No dimly cloud o'ershadows thee.
Nor gloom, nor darksome night ;
But every soul shines as the sun,
For God himself gives light.
Thy walls are made of precious stone,
Thy bulwarks diamond-square,
Thy gates are all of orient pearl, —
0 God ! if I were there !
0 my sweet home, Jerusalem !
Thy joys when shall I see ? —
The King sitting upon thy throne.
And thy felicity ?
Thy gardens and thy goodly walks
Continually are green,
AVhere grow such sweet and pleasant flowers
As nowhere else are seen.
Quite through the streets with pleasing sound
The flood of life doth flow ;
And on the banks, on every side.
The trees of life do grow.
These trees each month yield ripened fruit ;
Forevermore they spring.
And all the nations of the earth
To thee their honors bring.
Jerusalem, God's dwelling-place
Full sore I long to see ;
0 that my sorrows had an end.
That I might dwell in thee !
1 long to see Jerusalem,
The comfort of us all ;
For thou art fair and beautiful, —
None ill can thee befall.
No candle needs, no moon to shine.
No glittering star to light ;
For Christ the King of Righteousness
Forever shineth bright.
O, passing happy were my state.
Might I be worthy found
To wait upon my God and King,
His praises there to sound !
Jerusalem! Jerusalem!
Thy joys fain would I see ;
Come quickly. Lord, and end my grie^
And take me home to thee !
David Dicksok.
LITANY.
Saviottb, when in dust to thee
Low we bend the adoring knee ;
When, i-epentant, to the skies
Scarce we lift our weeping eyes, —
0, by all thy pains and woe
Suffered once for man below.
Bending from thy throne on high.
Hear our solemn litany !
By thy helpless infant years ;
By thy life of want and tears ;
By thy days of sore distress
In the savage wilderness ;
By the dread mysterious hour
Of the insulting tempter's power, —
Tum, 0, turn a favoring eye.
Hear our solemn litany !
By the sacred griefs that wept
O'er the grave where Lazarus slept ;
By the boding tears that flowed
Over Salem's loved abode ;
By the anguished sigh that told
Treachery lurked within thy fold, —
From thy seat above the sky
Hear our solemn litany !
By thine hour of dire despair ;
By thine agony of prayer ;
By the cross, the nail, the thom.
Piercing spear, and torturing scom ;
By the gloom that veiled the skies
O'er the dreadful sacrifice, —
Listen to our humble cry.
Hear our solemn litany !
By thy deep expiring groan ;
By the sad sepulchral stone ;
By the vault whose dark abode
Held in vain the rising God ;
O, from earth to heaven restored.
Mighty, reascended Lord, —
Listen, listen to the cry
Of our solemn litany !
Sir robert Grant.
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THE HOLY SPIRIT.
In the hour of my distress,
When temptations me oppress.
And when I my sins confess,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When I lie within my bed.
Sick at heart, and sick in head.
And with doubts discomforted,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the house doth sigh and weep.
And the world is drowned in sleep.
Yet mine eyes the watch do keep,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the artless doctor sees
No one hope but of his fees,
And his skill runs on the lees,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When his potion and his pill
Has or none or little skill.
Meet for nothing but to kiU, —
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the passing-bell doth toll.
And the Furies, in a shoal.
Come to fright a parting soul.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the tapers now burn blue.
And the comforters are few,
And that number more than true.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the priest his last hath prayed,
And I nod to what is said
Because my speech is now decayed.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When, God knows, I'm tost about
Either with despair or doubt.
Yet before the glass be out,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the tempter me pursu'th
With the sins of all my youth,
And half damns me with untruth,
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the flames and hellish cries
Fright mine ears, and fright mine eyes.
And all terrors me surprise.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
When the judgment is revealed.
And that opened which was sealed, —
When to thee I have appealed.
Sweet Spirit, comfort me !
ROBERT HERRICK.
DESIRE.
Thoü, who dost dwell alone ;
Thou, who dost know thine own ;
Thou, to whom all are known.
From the cradle to the grave, —
Save, 0, save !
From the world's temptations ;
From tribulations ;
From that fierce anguish
Wherein we languish ;
From that torpor deep
Wherein we lie asleep,
Heavy as death, cold as the grave, —
Save, O, save !
When the soul, growing clearer.
Sees God no nearer ;
When the soul, mounting higher,
To God comes no nigher ;
But the arch-fiend Pride
Mounts at her side,
Foiling her high emprize.
Sealing her eagle eyes.
And, when she fain would soar.
Makes idols to adore ;
Changing the pure emotion
Of her high devotion.
To a skin-deep sense
Of her own eloquence ;
Strong to deceive, strong to enslave, —
Save, O, save !
From the ingrained fashion
Of this earthly nature
That mars thy creature ;
From grief, that is but passion ;
From mirth, that is but feigning ;
From tears, that bring no healing ;
From wild and weak complaining ; —
Thine old strength revealing.
Save, O, save !
From doubt, where all is double,
Where wise men are not strong ;
Where comfort turns to trouble ;
Where just men sufier wrong ;
Where sorrow treads on joy ;
Where sweet things soonest cloy ;
Where faiths are built on dust ;
Where love is half mistrust.
Hungry, and barren, and sharp as the sea ;
O, set us free !
0, let the false dream fly
Where our sick souls do lie.
Tossing continually.
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POEMS OF
RELIGION.
O, where thy voice doth come,
Let all doubts be dumb ;
Let all words be mild ;
All strife be reconciled ;
All pains beguiled.
Light bring no blindness ;
Love no unkindness ;
Knowledge no ruin ;
Fear no imdoing,
From the cradle to the grave, —
Save, 0, save !
Matthew Arnold.
MY GOD, I LOVE THEE.
My God, I love thee ! not because
I hope for heaven thereby ;
Nor because those who love thee not
Must burn eternally.
Thou, O my Jesus, thou didst me
Upon the cross embrace !
For me didst bear the nails and spear.
And manifold disgrace.
And griefs and torments numberless.
And sweat of agony.
Yea, death itself, —and all for one
That was thine enemy.
Then why, 0 blessed Jesus Christ,
Should 1 not love thee well ?
Not for the hope of winning heaven.
Nor of escaping hell ;
Not with the hope of gaming aught.
Not seeking a reward ;
But as thyself hast lovèd me,
0 everlasting Lord !
E'en so I love thee, and will love.
And in thy praise will sing, —
Solely because thou art my God,
And my eternal King.
From the Latin of ST FRANCIS XAVIER.
Translation of EDWARD CASWALL.
DROP, DROP, SLOW TEARS.
Deop, drop, slow tears.
And bathe those beauteous feet
Which brought from heaven
The news and Prince of peace !
Cease not, wet eyes.
His mercies to entreat ;
To cry for vengeance
Sin doth never cease ;
In your deep floods
Drown all my faults and fears ;
Nor let his eye
See sin but through my tears.
phineas Fletcher.
»
DARKNESS IS THINNING.
Darkness is thinning ; shadows are retreating ;
Morning and light are coming in their beauty ;
Suppliant seek we, with an earnest outcry,
God the Almighty !
So that our Master, having mercy on us.
May repel languor, may bestow salvation.
Granting us. Father, of thy loving-kindness
Glory hereafter !
This, of his mercy, «ver blessed Godhead,
Father, and Son, and Holy Spirit, give us, —
Whom through the wide world celebrate forever
Blessing and glory !
From the Latin of st. gregory the great.
Translation of john mason neale.
DELIGHT IN GOD.
I LOVE, and have some cause to love, the earth, —
She is my Maker's creature, therefore good ;
She is my mother, for she gave me birth ;
She is my tender nurse, she gives me food :
But what's a creature. Lord, compared with
thee I
Or what's my mother or my nurse to me ?
I love the air, — her dainty sweets refresh
My drooping soul, and to new sweets invite
me ;
Her shrill-mouthed choir sustain me with their
flesh.
And with their pol3iphonian notes delight me ;
But what's the air, or all the sweets that she
Can bless my soul withal, compared to thee ?
I love the sea, — she is my fellow-creature.
My careful puiveyor ; she provides me store ;
She walls me round ; she makes my diet greater ;
She wafts my treasure from a foreign shore :
But, Lord of oceans, when compared with thee.
What is the ocean or her wealth to me ?
To heaven's high city I direct my journey.
Whose spangled suburbs entertain mine eye ;
Mine eye, by contemplation's great attorney.
Transcends the crystal pavement of the sky ;
But what is heaven, great God, compared to
thee ?
Without thy presence, heaven's no heaven to
me.
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POEMS OF RELIGION.
361
Without thy presence, earth gives no refection ;
Without thy presence, sea affords no treasure ;
Without thy presence, air's a rank infection ;
Without thy presence, heaven's itself no
pleasure :
If not possessed, if not enjoyed in thee.
What's earth, or sea, or air, or heaven to me ?
The highest honors that the world can boast
Are subjects far too low for my desire ;
The brightest beams of glory are, at most.
But dying sparkles of thy living fire ;
The loudest ñames that earth can kindle be
But nightly glow-worms, if compared to thee.
Without thy presence, wealth is bags of cares ;
Wisdom but folly ; joy, disquiet— sadness ;
Friendship is treason, and delights are snares ;
Pleasures but pain, and,mirth but pleasing
madness ;
Without thee. Lord, things be not what they be.
Nor have their being, when compared with
thee.
In having all things, and not thee, what have I ?
Not having thee, what have my labors got ?
Let me enjoy but thee, what further crave I ?
And having thee alone, what have I not ?
I wish nor sea nor land ; nor would I be
Possessed of heaven, heaven unpossessed of
thee !
Francis Quarles.
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THE PILGRIMAGE.
Give me my scallop-shell of quiet.
My staff of faith to walk upon.
My scrip of joy, immortal diet.
My bottle of salvation.
My gown of glory, hope's true gauge ;
And thus I '11 take my pilgrimage !
Blood must be my body's bahner, '
No other balm will there be given ;
Whilst my soul, like^quiet palmer,
Travelleth towards the land of Heaven,
Over the silver mountains
Where spring the nectar foimtains •
There will I kiss
The bowl of bliss.
And drink mine everlasting fill
Upon every milken hill.
My soul will be a-dry before.
But after, it will thirst no more.
Then by that happy, blissful day.
More peaceful pilgrims I shall see.
That have cast off their rags of clay.
And walk apparelled fresh like me.
I 'U take them first
To quench their thirst.
And taste of nectar's suckets
At those clear weUs
Where sweetness dwells
Drawn up by saints in crystal buckets.
Aud when our bottles and all we
Are filled with immortality.
Then the blest paths we '11 travel.
Strewed with rubies thick as gravel, —
Ceilings of diamonds, sapphire^floors.
High walls of coral, and pearly bowers.
From thence to Heaven's bribeless hall.
Where no corrupted voices brawl ;
No conscience molten into gold.
No forged accuser, bought or sold.
No cause deferred, no vain-spent journey,
For there Christ is the King's Attorney j
Who pleads for all without degrees.
And he hath angels, but no fees ;
And when the grand twelve-million jury
Of our sins, with direful fury,
'Gainst our souls black verdicts give,
Christ pleads his death, and then we live.
Be thou my speaker, taintless pleader,
Unblotted lawyer, true proceeder !
Thou giv'st salvation even for alms, —
Not with a bribed lawyer's palms.
And this is mine eternal plea
To Him that made heaven, earth, and sea,
That, since my flesh must die so soon.
And want a head to dine next noon.
Just at the stroke when my veins start and spread.
Set on my soul an everlasting head :
Then am I, like a palmer, fit
To tread those blest paths which before I writ.
Of death and judgment, heaven and hell.
Who oft doth think, must needs die welL
sir Walter Raleigh.
A TRUE LENT.
Is this a fast, — to keep
The larder lean.
And clean
From fat of veals and sheep ?
Is it to quit the dish
Of flesh, yet stiU
To fill ^
The platter high with fish?
Is it to fast an hour.
Or ragg'd to go,
Or show
A downcast look, and sour ?
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362 POEMS OF RELIGION.
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No ! 't is a fast to dole And as Augustine o'er its margent wide
Thy sheaf of wheat, Strayed, deeply pondering the puzzling theme.
And meat, A little child before him he espied :
Unto the hungry soul. In earnest labor did the urchin seem.
Working with heart intent close by the sounding
It is to fast from strife, stream.
From old debate
And hate, — He looked, and saw the child a hole had scooped.
To circumcise thy life. Shallow and narrow in the shining sand.
O'er which at work the laboring infant stooped.
To show a heart grief-rent ; still pouring water in with busy hand.
To starve thy sin. The saint addressed the child in accents bland :
Not bin, — "Fair boy," quoth he, "I pray what toil is thine ?
And that's to keep thy Lent. Let me its end and purpose understand. "
robert herrick. The boy replied i " An easy task is mine,
* To sweep into this hole all the wide ocean's brine."
BRIEFS " ® foolish boy ! " the saint exclaimed, " to hope
That the broad ocean in that hole should lie ! "
water tttrned into wine. "Q foolish saint!" exclaimed the boy; "thy
The conscious water saw its God and blushed. scope
Is still more hopeless than the toil I ply,
the widow's mites. Who think'st to Comprehend God's nature high
_ .. .. J . ,1, , ,, , In the small compass of thine human wit !
Two mites, ^o drops, yet all her house and land, Augustine, sooner far, shall I
Fall from a steady heart, though tremblinff hand : c A • x- -x
Confine the ocean in this tiny pit,
The others wanton wealth foams high, and brave : mv ^ • j • ri j»
^ 1 Than finite minds conceive Gods nature in-
The other cast away, she only gave. finite * "
Anonymous.
"TWO WENT TP TO THE TEMPLE TO PRAY." •
Two went to pray ? 0, rather say, I WOULD I WERE AN EXCELLENT
One went to brag, the other to pray ; DIVINE.
One stands up close and treads on high, I would I were an excellent divine
Where the other dares not lend his eye ; That had the Bible at my fingers' ends ;
That men might hear out of this mouth of mine
One nearer to God's altar trod. How God doth make his enemies his friends ;
The other to the altar's God. Rather than with a thundering and long prayer
Richard crashaw. j Be led into presumption, or despair.
This would I be, and would none other be.
But a religious servant of my God ;
A PASSAGE IN THE LIFE OF ST. And know there is none other God but he,
AUGUSTINE. And willingly to suffer mercy's rod, —
~ , , Joy in his grace, and live but in his love,
Lond pored St. Austin o er the sacred page,
And doubt and darkness overspread his mind ;
On God's mysterious being thought the Sage, And I would frame a kind of faitliful prayer.
The Triple Person in one Godhead joined. Por all estates within the state of grace,
The more he thought, the harder did he find That careful love might never know despair.
To solve the various doubts which fast arose ; if or servile fear might faithful love deface ;
And as a ship, caught by imperious wind. And this would I both day and night devise
Tosses where chance its shattered body throws. To make my humble spirit's exercise.
So tossed his troubled soul, and nowhere found
repose. -^ud I would read the rules of sacred life ;
Persuade the troubled soul to patience ;
Heated and feverish, then he closed his tome. The husband care, and comfort to the wife.
And went to wander by the ocean-side, To child and servant due obedience ;
Where the cool breeze at evening loved to come, Faith to the friend, and to the neighbor peace,
M urmuring responsive to the murmuring tide ; That love might live, and quarrels all might cease.
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n
Prayer for the health of all that are diseased,
Confession unto all that are convicted,
And patience unto all that are displeased.
And comfort unto all that are afflicted,
And mercy unto all that have offended.
And grace to all, that all may he amended.
Nicholas Breton.
ADAM'S MORNING HYMN IN PARADISE.
from " paradise lost," book v.
These are thy glorious works, Parent of good,
Almighty, thine this universal frame,
Tims wondrous fair ; thyself how wondrous then !
Unspeakable, who sitt'st above these heavens
To us invisible, or dimly seen
In these thy lowest works ; yet these declare
Thy goodness beyond thought, and power divine.
Speak, ye who best can tell, ye sons of light.
Angels ; for ye behold him, and with songs
And choral symphonies, day without night.
Circle his throne rejoicing ; ye in Heaven,
On earth join, all ye creatures, to extol
Him first, him last, him midst, and without end.
Fairest of stars, last in the train of night.
If better thou belong not to the dawn.
Sure pledge of day, that crown'st the smiling morn
With thy bright circlet, praise him in thy sphere.
While day arises, that sweet hour of prime.
Thou sun, of this great world both eye and soul,
Acknowledge him thy greater ; sound his praise
In thy eternal course, both when thou elimb'st.
And when high noon hast gained, and when thou
fall'st.
Moon, that now meets the orient sun, now ffiest.
With the fixed stars, fixed in their orb that flies,
And ye five other wandering fires that move
In mystic dance not without song, resound
His praise, who out of darkness called up light.
Air, and ye elements, the eldest birth
Of Nature's womb, that in quaternion run
Perpetual circle, multiform, and mix
And nourish all things, let your ceaseless change
Vary to our great Maker still new praise.
Ye mists and exhalations, that now rise
From hill or steaming lake, dusky or gray.
Till the sun paint yonr fleecy skirts with gold.
In honor to the world's great Author rise.
Whether to deck with clouds the uncolored sky.
Or wet the thirety earth with falling showers,-
Rising or falling, still advance his praise.
His praise, ye winds, that from four quarters blow.
Breathe soft orloud ; and wave your tops, ye pines.
With every plant, in sign of worship wave.
Fountains, and ye that warble, as ye flow.
Melodious murmurs, warbling tune his praise.
Join voices, all ye living souls ; ye birds.
That singing up to Heaven-gate ascend.
Bear on your wings and in your notes his praise.
Ye that in waters glide, and ye that walk
The earth, and stately tread, or lowly creep.
Witness if I be silent, morn or even.
To hill or valley, fountain or fresh shade.
Made vocal by my song, and taught his praise.
HaU, universal Lord ! be bounteous still
To give us only good ; and if the night
Have gathered aught of evil, or concealed.
Disperse it, as now light dispels the dark.
Milton.
PRAISE.
To write a verse or two is all the praise
That I can raise ;
Mend my estate in any wayes.
Thou shalt have more.
I go to church ; help me to wings, and I
Will thither flie ;
Or, if I mount unto the skie,
I will do more.
Man is all weaknesse : there is no such thing
As Prince or King :
His arm is short ; yet with a sling
He may do more.
A herb destilled, and drunk, may dwell next doore.
On the same floore.
To a brave soul ; Exalt the poore.
They can do more.
0, raise me then ! poore bees, that work all day.
Sting my delay.
Who have a work, as well as they.
And much, much more.
george Herbert«
UP HILL.
Does the road wind up hill all the way ?
Yes, to the very end.
Will the day's journey take the whole long day ?
From mom to night, my friend.
But is there for the night a resting-place ?
A roof for when the slow dark hours begin.
May not the darkness hide it from my face ?
You cannot miss that inn.
Shall I meet other wayfarers at night ?
Those who have gone before.
Then must I knock, or call when just in sight ?
They will not keep you standing at that door.
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POEMS OF RELIGION.
Shall I find comfort, travel-sore and weak ?
Of labor you shall find the sum.
Will there be beds for me and aU who seek ?
Yea, beds for all who come.
christina c. rossetti,
THE PILLAR OF THE CLOUD.
Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom.
Lead thou me on !
The night is dark, and I am far from home, —
Lead thou me on !
Keep thou my feet ; I do not ask to see
The distant scene, — one step enough for me.
I was not ever thus, nor prayed that thou
Shouldst lead me on ;
I loved to choose and see my path, but now
Lead thou me on !
I loved the garish day, and, spite of fears,
Pride ruled my will : remember not past years.
So long thy power hath blessed me, sure it still
Will lead me on ;
O'er moor and fen, o'er crag and torrent, till
The night is gone ;
And with the morn those angel faces smile
Which I have loved long since, and lost awhile.
John Henry Newman.
FROM "THE CHURCH PORCH."
Thou whose sweet youth and early hopes enhance
Thy rate and price, and mark thee for a treasure.
Hearken unto a Verser, who may chance
Rhyme thee to good, and make a bait of pleasure :
A verse may find him who a sermon files
And turn delight into a sacrifice.
When thou dost purpose aught (within thy
power).
Be sure to doe it, though it be but small ;
Constancie knits the bones, and make us stowre.
When wanton pleasures beckon us to thrall.
Who breaks his own bond, forfeiteth himself ;
What nature made a ship, he makes a shelf.
By all means use sometimes to be alone.
Salute thyself : see what thy soul doth wear.
Dare to look in thy chest ; for't is thine own ;
And tumble up and down what thou find'st there.
Who cannot rest till he good fellows finde,
He breaks up house, turns out of doores his
minde.
In clothes, cheap handsomenesse doth bear the
bell.
Wisdome's a trimmer thing than shop e'er gave.
Say not then. This with that lace will do well ;
But, This with my discretion will be brave.
Much curiousnesse is a perpetual wooing ;
Nothing, with labor ; folly, long a doing.
When once thy foot enters the church, be bare.
God is more there than thou ; for thou art there
Only by his permission. Then beware.
And make thyself all reverence and fear.
Kneeling ne'er spoiled silk stockings ; quit
thy state ;
All equal are within the church's gate.
Resort to sermons, but to prayers most :
Praying's the end of preaching. 0, be drest !
Stay not for th' other pin : why thou hast lost
A joy for it worth worlds. Thus hell doth jest
Away thy blessings, and extremely fiout thee.
Thy clothes being fast, but thy soul loose
about thee.
Judge not the preacher ; for he is thy judge :
If thou mislike him, thou conceiVst him not.
God calleth preaching folly. Do not grudge
To pick out treasures from an earthen pot.
The worst speak something good : if all
want sense,
God takes a text, and preacheth Pa-ti-ence.
george herbert.
ART THOU WEARY?
Art thou weary, art thou languid.
Art thou sore distressed ?
"Come to me," saith One, "and coming,
Be at rest."
Hath he marks to lead me to him,
If he be my Guide ?
" In his feet and hands are wound-prints,
And his side."
Is there diadem, as monarch,
That his brow adorns Î
"Yea, a crown, in veiy surety,
But of thorns."
If I find him, if I follow.
What his guerdon here ?
" Many a sorrow, many a labor,
Many a tear."
If I stUl hold closely to him.
What hath he at last ?
"Sorrow vanquished, labor ended,
Jordan passed."
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POEMS OP RELIGION.
If I ask him to receive me,
Will he say me nay ?
"Not till earth, and not till heaven
Pass away."
Finding, following, keeping, struggling.
Is he sure to bless ?
" Saints, apostles, prophets, martyrs.
Answer, Yes."
From the Latin of st. stephen the sabaite.
Translation of John Mason Neale.
TO HEAVEN APPROACHED A SUFI
SAINT.
To heaven approached a Sufi Saint,
From groping in the darkness late.
And, tapping timidly and faint.
Besought admission at God's gate.
Said God, *' Who seeks to enter here ? "
"'Tis I, dear Friend," the Saint replied.
And trembling much with hope and fear.
" If it be thou, without abide."
Sadly to earth the poor Saint turned.
To bear the scourging of life's rods ;
But aye his heart within him yearned
To mix and lose its love in God's.
He roamed alone through weary years.
By cruel men still scorned and mocked.
Until from faith's pure fires and tears
Again he rose, and modest knocked.
Asked God, " Who now is at the door ? "
" It is thyself, beloved Lord,"
Answered the Saint, in doubt no more.
But clasped and rapt in his reward.
From the Persian of dschellaleddin rumi.
Translation of william R. AlGER..
THE DYING CHRISTIAN TO HIS SOUL.
Vital spark of heavenly flame !
Quit, 0 quit this mortal frame !
Trembling, hoping, lingering, flying,
0, the pain, the bliss of dying !
Cease, fond nature, cease thy strife,
And let me languish into life !
Hark ! they whisper ; angels say.
Sister spirit, come away !
What is this absorbs me quite ?
Steals my senses, shuts my sight.
Drowns my spirits, draws my breath ?
Tell me, my soul, can this be death ?
The world recedes ; it disappears !
Heaven opens on my eyes ! my ears
With sounds seraphic ring ;
Lend, lend your wings ! I mount ! I fly !
0 Grave ! where is thy victory Î
0 Death ! where is.thy sting ?
ALEXANDER POPB.
PRAYER.
o God ! though sorrow be my fate.
And the world's hate
For my heart's faith pursue me,
My peace they cannot take away ;
From day to day
Thou dost anew imbue me ;
Thou art not far ; a little while
Thou hid'st thy face, with brighter smile
Thy father-love to show me.
Lord, not my will, but thine, be done ;
If I sink down
When men to terrors leave me.
Thy father-love still warms my breast ;
All's for the best ;
Shall man have power to grieve me.
When bliss eternal is my goal.
And thou the keeper of my soul.
Who never will deceive me ?
Thou art my shield, as saith the Word.
Christ Jesus, Lord,
Thou standest pitying by me.
And lookest on each grief of mine
And if't were thine :
What, then, though foes may try me.
Though thorns be in my path concealed ?
World, do thy worst ! God is my shield !
And will be ever nigh me.
Translated from MARY, QUEEN OF HUNGARY.
THE MARTYRS' HYMN.
Flung to the heedless winds.
Or on the waters cast.
The martyrs' ashes, watched.
Shall gathered be at last ;
And from that scattered dust.
Around us and abroad.
Shall spring a plenteous seed
Of witnesses for God.
The Father hath received
Their latest living breath ;
And vain is Satan's boast
Of victory in their death ;
Still, still, though dead, they speak,
And, trumpet-tongued, proclaim
To many a wakening land
The one availing name.
From the German of MARTIN LUTHER.
Translation of W. J. FOX.
^66
POEMS OP
RELIGION.
THE FIGHT OF FAITH.
fThe author of this poem, one of the victims of the persecuting^
Henry vlll., was burnt to death at Smithfield in 1546. It was made
and sung by her while a prisoner in Newgate.)
Like as the armèd Knighte,
Appointed to the fielde.
With this world wil I fight,
And faith shal be my shilde.
Faith is that weapon stronge,
Which wil not falle at nede ;
My foes therefore amonge.
Therewith wil I procede.
As it is had in strengthe,
And forces of Christes waye,
It wil prevails at lengths,
Though aU the devils says naye.
Faiths of the fathers olde
Obtainèd right witness.
Which makes me verye holds
To fear no worldes distress.
I now rejoice in harte.
And hope bides me do so ;
For Christ wil take my part.
And ease me of my wo.
Thou sayst, Lord, whoso knocke,
To them wilt thou attende ;
Undo, therefore, the locks,
And thy stronge power sends.
More enemies now I have
Than heeres upon my head ;
Let them not me deprave.
But fight thou in my steads.
On thee my care I cast.
For all their cruell spight ;
I set not by their hast.
For thou art my delight.
I am not she that list
My anker to let fall
For every drisUnge mist ;
My shippe's substancial.
Not oft I use to Wright
In prose, nor yet m lynie ;
Yet wil I shewe one sight,
That I saws in my time :
I saws a royall throne.
Where Justice shulde have aitte ;
But in her steade was One
Of moody cruell witte.
Absorpt was rightwisness.
As by the raginge floude ;
Sathan, in his excess,
Sucte up the guiltlesse bloude.
Then thought I, — Jesus, Lords,
When thou shalt judge us all,
H arde is it to records
On these men what will falL
Yet, Lords, I thee desire.
For that they doe to me.
Let them not taste the hire
Of their iniquitie.
Anne Askewe.
ON HIS BLINDNESS.
When I consider how my light is spent
Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide.
And that one talent, which is death to hide.
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more
bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest he returning chide ;
"Doth God exact day-labor, light denied ?"
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, " God doth not need
Either man's work or his own gifts ; who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best : his
state
Is kingly ; thousands at his bidding speed,.
And post o'er land and ocean without rest ;
They also serve who only stand and wait."
MU.TON.
SAID I NOT SO?
Said I not so, — that I would sin no more ?
Witness, my God, I did ;
Yet I am run again upon the score ;
My faults cannot be hid.
What shall I do ? — make vows and break them
still ?
'T will be but labor lost ;
My good cannot prevail against mine ill :
The business will be crost.
0, say not so ; thou canst not tell what strength
Thy God may give thee at the length.
Renew thy vows, and if thou keep the last.
Thy God will pardon all that's past.
Vow while thou canst ; while thou canst vow,
thou mayst
Perhaps perform it when thou thinkest least.
f
POEMS OF RELIGION.
367
a
Thy God hath not denied thee all,
Whilst he permits thee but to call.
Call to thy God for grace to keep
Thy vows ; and if thou break them, weep.
Weep for thy broken vows, and vow again :
Vows made with tears cannot be still in vain.
Then once again
I vow to mend my ways ;
Lord, say Amen,
And thine be all the praise.
george Herbert.
10-
HEAVEN.
0 beauteous God ! uncircumscribèd treasure
Of an eternal pleasure !
Thy throne is seated far
Above the highest star,
Where thou preparest a glorious place,
Within the brightness of thy face.
For every spirit
To inherit
That builds his hopes upon thy merit.
And loves thee with a holy charity.
What ravished heart, seraphic tongue, or eyes
Clear as the morning rise.
Can speak, or think, or see
That bright eternity.
Where the great King's transparent throne
Is of an entire jasper stone 2
There the eye
0' the chrysolite.
And a sky
Of diamonds, rubies, Chrysoprase, —
And above all thy holy face, —
Makes an eternal charity.
AVhen thou thy jewels up dost bind, that day
Remember us, we pray, —
That where the beryl lies.
And the crystal 'bove the skies.
There thou mayest appoint us place
Within the brightness of thy face, —
And our soul
In the scroll
Of life and blissfulness enroll.
That we may praise thee to eternity. Allelujah !
jeremy taylor.
4
"ROCK OF AGES."
" Such hymns are never forgrotten. They cling to us through cur
whole life. We cany them with us upon our journey. We sing
them in the forest The workman follows the plough with sacred
songs. Children catch them, and singii^f only for the joy it gives
them now. are yet laying up for ail their life food of the sweetest
Joy.' — Henry Ward beecher.
" Roce of ages, cleft for me,"
Thoughtlessly the maiden sung.
Fell the words unconsciously
From her girlish, gleeful tongue ;
Sang as little children sing ;
Sang as sing the birds in June ;
Fell the words like light leaves down
On the current of the tune, —
" Rock of ages, cleft for me.
Let me hide myself in thee."
" Let me hide myself in thee : "
Felt her soul no need to hide, —
Sweet the song as song could be.
And she had no thought beside ;
All the words unheedingly
Fell from lips untouched by care.
Dreaming not that they might be
On some other lips a prayer, —
" Rock of ages, cleft for me.
Let me hide myself in thee."
" Rock of ages, cleft for me,"
'T was a woman sung them now.
Pleadingly and prayerfully ;
Every word her heart did know.
Rose the song as storm-tossed bird
Beats with weary wing the air.
Every note with sorrow stirred.
Every syllable a prayer, —
" Rock of ages, cleft for me.
Let me hide myself in thee."
" Rock of ages, cleft for me," —
Lips grown agèd sung the hymn
Trustingly and tenderly.
Voice grown weak and eyes grown dim, —
" Let me hide myself in Thee."
Trembling though the voice and low,
Rose the sweet strain peacefully
Like a river in its flow ;
Sung as only they can sing
Who life's thorny path have passed ;
Sung as only they can sing
Who behold the promised rest, —
"Rock of ages, cleft for me.
Let me hide myself in thee."
"Rock of ages, cleft for me,"
Sung above a coffin lid ;
Underneath, all restfully.
All life's joys and sorrows hid.
Nevermore, O storm-tossed soul !
Nevermore from wind or tide.
Nevermore from billow's roll.
Wilt thou need thyself to hide.
Could the sightless, sunken eyes.
Closed beneath the soft gray hair.
Could the mute and stiffened lips
Move again in pleading prayer,
StiU, aye still, the words would be, —
" Let me hide myself in Thee."
prof. edward H. rice.
e-
368
POEMS OP RELIGION.
•a
THE SPIRIT-LAND.
Father ! thy wonders do not singly stand.
Nor far removed where feet have seldom strayed ;
Around us ever lies the enchanted land,
In marvels rich to thine own sons displayed.
In finding thee are all things round us found ;
In losing thee are all things lost beside ;
Ears have we, but in vain strange voices sound ;
And to our eyes the vision is denied.
We wander in the country far remote,
Mid tombs and ruined piles in death to dwell ;
Or on the records of past greatness dote,
And for a buried soul the living sell ;
While on our path bewildered falls the night
That ne'er returns us to the fields of light.
Jones very.
HEAVEN.
Beyond these chilling winds and gloomy skies.
Beyond death's cloudy portal.
There is a land where beauty never dies,
IVhere love becomes immortal ;
A land whose life is never dimmed by shade.
Whose fields are ever vernal ;
Where nothing beautiful can ever fade.
But blooms for aye eternal.
We may not know how sweet its balmy air.
How bright and fair its flowers ;
We may not hear the songs that echo there.
Through those enchanted bowers.
The city's shining towers we may not see
With our dim earthly vision.
For Death, the silent warder, keeps the key
That opes the gates elysian.
But sometimes, when adown the western sky
A fiery sunset lingers.
Its golden gates swing inward noiselessly.
Unlocked by unseen fingers.
And while they stana a moment half ajar,
Gleams from the inner glory
Stream brightly through the azure vault afar.
And half reveal the story.
0 land unknown ! 0 land of love divine !
Father, all-wise, eternal !
O, guide these wandering, wayworn feet of mine
Into those pastures vernal !
Nancy Amelia Woodbury Priest.
"ONLY WAITING."
[A very aged man in an almshouse was asked what he was
now. He replied, " Only waiüog."]
I I
Only waiting till the shadows
Are a little longer grown.
Only waiting till the glimmer
Of the day's last beam is flown ;
Till the night of earth is faded
From the heart, once full of day ;
Till the stars of heaven are breaking
Through the twilight soft and gray.
Only waiting till the reapers
Have the last sheaf gathered home,
For the summer time is faded.
And the autumn winds have come.
Quickly, reapers ! gather quickly
The last ripe hours of my heart.
For the bloom of life is withered.
And I hasten to depart.
Only waiting till the angek
Open wide the mystic gate.
At whose feet I long have lingered.
Weary, poor, and desolate.
Even now I hear the footsteps,
And their voices far away ;
If they call me, I am waiting.
Only waiting to obey.
Only waiting tiU. the shadows
Are a little longer grown.
Only waiting till the glimmer
Of the day's last beam is flown.
Then from out the gathered darkness.
Holy, deathless stars shall rise.
By whose light my soul shall gladly
Tread its pathway to the skies.
Francis Lauchton Mace.
THE SOUL.
Come, Brother, turn with me from pining
thought
And all the inward ills that sin has wrought ;
Come, send abroad a love for all who live.
And feel the deep content in turn they give.
Kind wishes and good deeds, — they make not
poor ;
They '11 home again, full laden, to thy door ;
The streams of love flow back where they begin.
For springs of outward joys lie deep within.
Even let them flow, and make the places glad
Where dwell thy fellow-men. Shouldst thou be
&
POEMS OP RELIGION.
369
And earth seem bare, and hours, once happy,
press
Upon thy thoughts, and make thy loneliness
More lonely for the past, thou then shalt hear
The music of those waters running near ;
And thy faint spirit drink the cooling stream.
And thine eye gladden with the playing beam
That now upon the water dances, now
Leaps up and dances in the hanging hough.
Is it not lovely ? Tell me, where doth dwell
The power that wrought so beautiful a spell ?
In thine own bosom. Brother ? Then as thine
Guard with a reverent fear this power divine.
And if, indeed, 't is not the outward state.
But temper of the soul by which we rate
Sadness or joy, even let thy bosom move
With noble thoughts and wake thee into love ;
And let each feeling in thy breast be given
An honest aim, which, sanctified by Heaven,
And springing into act, new life imparts.
Till beats thy frame as with a thousand hearts.
Sin clouds the mind's clear vision ;
Around the self-starved soul has spread a dearth.
The earth is full of life ; the living Hand
Touched it with life ; and all its forms expand
With principles of being made to suit
Man's varied powers and raise him from the
brute.
And shall the earth of higher ends be full, —
Earth which thou tread'st, — and thy poor mind
be dull ?
Thou talk of life, with half thy soul asleep ?
Thou " living dead man," let thy spirit leap
Forth to the day, and let the fresh air blow
Through thy soul's shut-up mansion. Wouldst
thou know
Something of what is life, shake off this death ;
Have thy soul feel the universal breath
With which all nature's quick, and learn to be
Sharer in all that thou dost touch or see ;
Break from thy body's grasp, thy spirit's trance ;
Give thy soul air, thy faculties expanse ;
Love, joy, even sorrow, — yield thyself to all !
They make thy freedom, gr oveller, not thy thrall.
Knock off the shackles which thy spirit bind
To dust and sense, and set at large the mind I
Then move in sympathy with God's great whole,
And be like man at first, a liviTig soul.
Richard Henry Dana.
B-
SIT DOWN, SAD SOUL.
Sit down, sad soul, and count
The moments flying ;
Come, tell the sweet amount
That's lost by sighing !
How many smiles ? — a score ?
Then laugh, and coimt no more ;
For day is dying !,
Lie down, sad soul, and sleep.
And no more measure
The flight of time, nor weep
The loss of leisure ;
But here, by this lone stream.
Lie down with us, and dream
Of starry treasure !
We dream : do thou the same ;
We love, — forever ;
We laugh, yet few we shame, —
The gentle never.
Stay, then, till sorrow dies ;
Then — hope and happy skies
Are thine forever !
BRYAN Waller Procter.
{Barry Cornwall.)
TELL ME, YE WINGÈD WINDS.
Tell me, ye winged winds,
That round my pathway roar.
Do ye not know some spot
Where mortals weep no more ?
Some lone and pleasant dell.
Some valley in the west.
Where, free from toil and pain.
The weary soul may rest ?
The loud wind dwindled to a whisper low.
And sighed for pity as it answered, — " No."
Tell me, thou mighty deep.
Whose billows round me play,
Know'st thou some favored spot.
Some island far away.
Where weary man may find
The bliss for which he sighs, —
Where sorrow never lives.
And friendship never dies ?
The loud waves, rolling in perpetual flow,
Stopped for a while, and sighed to answer, —
"No."
And thou, serenest moon.
That, with such lovely face.
Dost look upon the earth.
Asleep in night's embrace ;
Tell me, in all thy round
Hast thou not seen some spot
Where miserable man
May find a happier lot ?
Behind a cloud the moon withdrew in woe,
And a voice, sweet but sad, responded, — " No.'
■ff
370
POEMS OF
RELIGION.
Tell me, my secret soul,
0, tell me, Hope and Faith,
Is there no resting-place
From sonw, sin, and death ?
Is there no happy spot
Where mortals may be blest,
Where grief may find a balm.
And weariness a rest ?
Faith, Hope, and Love, best boons to mortals
given.
Waved their bright wings, and whispered, —
"Yes, in heaven ! "
Charles Mackay,
NOTHING BUT LEAVES.
Nothing but leaves ; the spirit grieves
Over a wasted life ;
Sin committed while conscience slept.
Promises made, but never kept.
Hatred, battle, and strife ;
Nothing hut leaves t
Nothing but leaves ; no garnered sheaves
Of life's fair, ripened grain ;
Words, idle words, for earnest deeds ;
We sow our seeds, —lo ! tares and weeds ;
We reap, with toil and pain.
Nothing hut leaves !
Nothing but leaves ; memory weaves
No veil to screen the past :
As we retrace our weary way.
Counting each lost and misspent day.
We find, sadly, at last.
Nothing hut leaves !
And shall we meet the Master so.
Bearing our withered leaves ?
The Saviour looks for perfect fruit.
We stand before him, humbled, mute ;
Waiting the words he breathes, —
" Nothing hut leaves ? "
LUCY E. AKERMAN.
THE UNIVERSAL PRAYER.
Father of all ! in every age.
In every clime adored.
By saint, by savage, and by sage,
Jehovah, Jove, or Lord !
Thou great First Cause, least understood.
Who all my sense confined
To know but this, that thou art good.
And that myself am blind ;
Yet gave me, in this dark estate.
To see the good from ill ;
And, binding nature fast in fate.
Left free the human wiU ;
What conscience dictates to be done,
Or warns me not to do.
This, teach me more than hell to shun.
That, more than heaven pursue.
What blessings thy free bounty gives
Let me not cast away ;
For God is paid when man receives.
To enjoy is to obey.
Yet not to earth's contracted span
Thy goodness let me bound.
Or think thee Lord alone of man,
When thousand worlds are round :
Let not this weak, unknowing hand
Presume thy bolts to throw.
And deal damnation round the land
On each I judge thy foe.
If I am right, thy grace impart
Still in the right to stay ;
If I am wrong, O, teach my heart
To find that better way !
Save me alike from foolish pride
And impious discontent
At aught thy wisdom has denied.
Or aught thy goodness lent.
Teach me to feel another's woe,
To hide the fault I see ;
That mercy I to others show,
That mercy show to me.
Mean though I am, not wholly so.
Since quickened by thy breath ;
O, lead me wheresoe'er I go.
Through this day's life or death !
This day be bread and peace my lot ;
All else beneath the sun.
Thou know'st if best bestowed or not.
And let thy will be done.
To thee, whose temple is all space.
Whose altar, earth, sea, skies.
One chorus let all Being raise.
All Nature's incense rise !
Alexander Pope.
POEMS OP
RELIGION.
37i
WRESTLING JACOB.
first part.
Come, 0 thou Traveller unknown,
Whom still I hold, but cannot see ;
My company before is gone, .
And I am left alone with thee ;
With thee all night I mean to stay.
And wrestle till the break of day.
I need not tell thee who I am ;
My sin and misery declare ;
Thyself hast called me by my name ;
Look on thy hands, and read it there ;
But who, I ask thee, who art thou ?
TeU me thy name, and tell me now.
In vain thou strugglest to get free ;
I never will unloose my hold :
Art thou the Man that died for me ?
The secret of thy love unfold ;
Wrestling, I will not let thee go
Till 1 thy name, thy nature know.
Wilt thou not yet to me reveal
Thy new, unutterable name ?
Tell me, I stiU beseech thee, tell ;
To know it now resolved I am ;
Wrestling, I wiU not let thee go
Till I thy name, thy nature know.
What though my shrinking flesh complain
And murmur to contend so long ?
I rise superior to my pain ;
When I am weak, then am I strong !
And when my all of strength shall fail,
I shall with the God-man prevail.
second part.
Yield to me now, for I am weak,
But confident in self-despair ;
Speak to my heart, in blessings speak ;
Be conquered by my instant prayer ;
Speak, or thou never hence shalt move.
And tell me if thy name be Love.
f{,£ r
'T is Love ! 't is Love ! Thou diedst for me ;
I hear thy whisper in my heart ;
The moia¿Bg breaks, the shadows flee ;
Pure, Love thou art ;
move ;
Thy natuyKliB^^ name is Love.
My praye) m^^ner with God ; the grace
Unspeakabiyia« receive ;
Through faith \ see vee face to face ;
I see thee];facmto fiv and live !
In vain I have not wept and strove ;
Thy nature and thy name is Love.
I know thee. Saviour, who thou art,
Jesus, the feeble sinner's friend ;
Nor wUt thou with the night depart.
But stay and love me to the end ;
Thy mercies never shall remove ;
Thy nature and thy name is Love.
The Sun of Righteousness on me
Hath risen, with healing in his wings ;
Withered my nature's strength ; from thee
My soul its life and succor brings ;
My help is all laid up above ;
Thy nature and thy name is Love.
Contented now upon my thigh
I halt till life's short journey end ;
All helplessness, all weakness, I
On thee alone for strength depend ;
Not have I power from thee to move ;
Thylnature and thy name is Love.
Lame as I am, I take the prey ;
Hell, earth, and sin with ease o'ercome ;
I leap for joy, pursue my way.
And, as a bounding hart, fly home ;
Through all eternity to prove
Thy nature and thy name is Love.
Charles Wesley.
A MIGHTY FORTRESS IS OUR GOD.
*• Ein' feste Burg ist unser Gott."
A mighty fortress is our God,
A bulwark never failing ;
Our helper he amid thè flood
Of mortal ills prevailing.
For still our ancient foe
Doth seek to work us woe ;
His craft and power are great,
And, armed with equal hate.
On earth is not his equal.
Did we in our own strength confide.
Our striving would be losing ;
Were not the right man on our sidt.
The man of God's own choosing.
Dost ask who that may be ?
Christ Jesus, it is he.
Lord Sabaoth his name.
From age to age the same.
And he must win the battle.
From the German of Martin Luther. Translation
of Frederic Henry Hedge.
a-
372
POEMS OP RELIGION.
■a
IT KINDLES ALL MY SOUL.
"Urit me Patriae decor."
It kindles all my soul,
My country's loveliness ! Those starry choirs
That watch around the pole,
And the moon's tender light, and heavenly fires
Through golden halls that roll.
O chorus of the night ! O planets, sworn
The music of the spheres
To follow ! Lovely watchers, that think scorn
To rest till day appears !
Me, for celestial homes of glory bom,
Why here, 0, why so long.
Do ye behold an exile from on high ?
Here, 0 ye shining throng,
With lilies spread the mound where I shall lie :
Here let me drop my chain.
And dust to dust returning, cast away
The trammels that remain ;
The rest of me shall spring to endless day !
From the Latin of CASIMIR OF POLAND,
JÉWISH HYMN IN BABYLON.
God of the thunder ! from whose cloudy seat
The fiery winds of «Desolation flow ;
Father of vengeance, that with purple feet
Like a full wine-press tread'st the world below ;
The embattled armies wait thy sign to sla}'.
Nor springs the beast of havoc on his prey.
Nor withering Famine walks his blasted way.
Till thou hast marked the guilty land for woe.
God of the rainbow ! at whose gracious sign
The billows of the proud their rage suppress •
Father of mercies ! at one word of thine
An Eden blooms in the waste wilderness.
And fountains sparkle in the arid sands.
And timbrels ring in maidens' glancing hands,
And marble cities crown the laughing lands.
And pillared temples rise thy name to bless.
O'er Judah's land thy thunders broke, 0 Lord !
The chariots rattled o'er her sunken gate.
Her sons were wasted by the Assyrian's sword.
Even her foes wept to see her fallen state ;
And heaps her ivory palaces became.
Her princes wore the captive's garb of shame.
Her temples sank amid the smouldering flame.
For thou didst ride the tempest cloud of fate.
O'er Judah's land thy rainbow, Lord, shall beam.
And the sad City lift her crownless head,
And songs shall wake and dancing footsteps
gleam
In streets where broods the silence of the dead.
The sun shall shine on Salem's gilded towers.
On Carmel's side our maidens cull the flowers
To deck at blushing eve their bridal bowers.
And angel feet the glittering Sion tread.
Thy vengeance gave us to the stranger's hand,
And Abraham's children were led forth for
slaves.
With fettered steps we left our pleasant land.
Envying our fathers in their peaceful graves.
The strangers' bread with bitter tears we steep.
And when our weary eyes should sink to sleep,
In the mute midnight we steal forth to weep.
Where the pale willows shade Euphrates'
The bom in sorrow shall bring forth in joy ;
Thy mercy. Lord, shall lead thy children home ;
He that went forth a tender prattling boy
Yet, ere he die, to Salem's sti-eets shall come ;
And Canaan's vines for us their fruit shall bear,
And Hermon's bees their honeyed stores prepare.
And we shall kneel again in thankful prayer.
Where o'er the cherub-seated God full blazed
the inudiate dome.
Henry hart Milman.
REBECCA'S HYMN.
from "ivanhoe."
When Israel, of the Lord beloved.
Out from the land of bondage came
Her fathers' God before her moved.
An awful guide in smoke and flame.
By day, along the astonished lands.
The cloudy pillar glided slow :
By night, Arabia's crimsoned sands
Returned the fiery column's glow.
There rose the choral hymn of praise.
And tmmp and timbrel answered keen.
And Zion's daughters poured their lays.
With priest's and warrior's voice between.
No portents now our foes amaze.
Forsaken Israel wanders lone :
Our fathers would not know thy ways.
And thou hast left them to their own.
But present still, though n(<W3JiSeen !
When brightly shines the prosperous day.
Be thoughts of thee a cloudy screen
To temper the deceitful ray.
And 0, when stoops on Judah's path
In shade and storm the frequent night.
Be thou, long-suffering, slow to wrath,
A burning and a shining light !
POEMS OF RELIGION.
Our harps we left by Babel's streams,
The tyrant's jest, the Gentile's scorn ;
No censer round our altar beams.
And mute are timbrel, harp, and horn.
But thou hast said, "The blood of goat.
The flesh of rams, I will not prize ;
A contrite heart, a humble thought.
Are mine accepted sacriflce."
sir Walter Scott.
THE DYING SAVIOUR.
0 sacred Head, now wounded,
"With grief and shame weighed down ;
Now scornfully surrounded
With thorns, thy only crown ;
0 sacred Head, what glory.
What bliss, till now was thine !
Yet, though despised and gory,
I joy to call thee mine.
0 noblest brow and dearest.
In other days the world
All feared when thou appearedst j
What shame on thee is hurled !
How art thou pale with anguish.
With sore abuse and scorn !
How does that visage languish
Which once was bright as mom !
What language shall I borrow.
To thank thee, dearest Friend,
For this thy dying sorrow.
Thy pity without end !
0, make me thine forever.
And should I fainting be.
Lord, let me never, never.
Outlive my love to thee.
If 1, a wretch, should leave thee,
O Jesus, leave not me !
In faith may I receive thee.
When death shall set me free.
When strength and comfort languish.
And I must hence depart.
Release me then from anguish.
By thine own wounded heart.
Be near when I am dying,
0, show thy cross to me !
And for my succor flying.
Come, Lord, to set me free.
These eyes new faith receiving.
From Jesus shall not move ;
For he who dies believing
Dies safely — through thy love.
THE MINISTRY OF ANGELS.
from "the faerie queene," book ii. canto 8.
And is there carmin heaVen ? And is Ifhere love
In heavenly spijrits to |hese creatures base.
That may compassion of their evils move ?
There is : — else much more wretched were the
case
Of men than beasts : but 0 the exceeding grace
Of Highest God ! that loves his creatures so,
And all his workes with mercy doth embrace.
That blessèd angels he sends to and fro.
To serve to wicked man, to serve his wicked foe !
How oft do they their silver bowers leave.
To come to succour us that succour want !
How oft do they with golden pinions cleave
The flitting skyes, like flying pursuivant.
Against fowle feendes to ayd us militant !
They for us fight, they watch, and dewly ward.
And their bright squadrons round about us
plant ;
And all for love, and nothing for reward ;
0, whjj should heaienly Godlto men|have such
regard ! I Edmund Spenser.
NEARER, MY GOD, TO THEE.
Nearer, my God, to thee.
Nearer to thee !
E'en though it be a cross
That raiseth me ;
Still all my song shall be, —
Nearer, my God, to thee.
Nearer to thee !
Though, like the wanderer.
The sun gone down.
Darkness be over me.
My rest a stone ;
Yet in my dreams I'd be
Nearer, my God, to thee.
Nearer to thee !
There let the way appear
Steps unto heaven ;
All that thou sendest me
In mercy given ;
Angels to beckon me
Nearer, my God, to thee.
Nearer to thee !
Then with my waking thoughts.
Bright with thy praise.
Out of my stony griefs
Bethel I '11 raise ;
So by my woes to be
Nearer, my God, to thee.
Nearer to thee !
e
374
POEMS OF RELIGION.
Or if on joyful wing
Cleaving the sky,
Sun, moon, an(J. stars forgot,
Upward I fly ;
Still all my song shall be, —
Nearer, my God, to thee.
Nearer to thee.
Sarah Flower Adams.
0, HOW
THE THOUGHT
ATTRACTS !
C
OP GOD
0, how the thought of God attracts
And draws the heart from earth.
And sickens it of passing shows
And dissipating mirth !
God only is the creature's home ;
Though long and rough the road.
Yet nothing less can satisfy
The love that longs for God.
O, utter hut the name of God
Down in your heart of hearts.
And see how from the world at once
All tempting light departs.
A trusting heart, a yearning eye,
Can win their way above ;
If mountains can be moved by faith,
Is there less power in love ?
How little of that road, my soul.
How little hast thou gone !
Take heart, and let the thought of God
Allure thee farther on.
Dole not thy duties out to God,
But let thy hand be free ;
Look long at Jesus ; his sweet blood.
How was it dealt to thee ?
The perfect way is hard to flesh ;
It is not hard to love ;
If thou wert sick for want of God,
How swiftly wouldst thou move !
Frederick William faber.
THE CHANGED CROSS.
It was a time of sadness, and my heart.
Although it knew and loved the better part.
Felt wearied with the conflict and the strife.
And aU the needful discipline of life.
And while I thought on these, as given to me.
My trial-tests of faith and love to be.
It seemed as if I never could he sure
That faithful to the end I should endure.
And thus, no longer trusting to his might
Who says, "We walk by faith and not by sight,"
Doubting, and almost yielding to despair.
The thought arose, "My cross I cannot bear.
"Far heavier its weight must surely be
Than those of others which I daily see ;
Oh ! if I might another burden choose,
Methinks I should not fear my crown to lose."
A solemn silence reigned on all around,
E'en Nature's voices uttered not a sound ;
The evening shadows seemed of peace to tell.
And sleep upon my weary spirit fell.
A moment's pause, —and then a heavenly light
Beamed fuU upon my wondering, raptured sight ;
Angels on silvery wings seemed everywhere.
And angels' músic thrüled the balmy air.
Then One, more fair than all the rest to see.
One to whom all the others bowed the knee.
Came gently to me, as I trembling lay.
And, " Follow me," he said ; " I am the Way."
Then, speaking thus, he led me far above.
And there, beneath a canopy of love.
Crosses of divers shape and size were seen.
Larger and smaller than my own had been.
And one there was, most beauteous to behold,—
A little one, with jewels set in gold.
"Ah! this," methought, "I can with comfort
wear.
For it wül be an easy one to bear."
And so the little cross I quickly took.
But all at once my frame beneath it shook ;
The sparkling jewels, fair were they to see,
But far too heavy was their weight for me.
"This may not he," I cried, and looked again.
To see if there was any here could ease my pain ;
But, one by one, I passed them slowly by,
TUl on a lovely one I cast my eye.
Fair flowers around its sculptured form entwined.
And grace and beauty seemed in it combined.
Wondering, I gazed, — and still I wondered more.
To think so many should have passed it o'er.
But oh ! that form so beautiful to see
Soon made its hidden son'ows known to me ;
Thorns lay beneath those flowers and colors fair ;
Sorrowing, I said, "This cross I may not bear."
And so it was with each and all around, —
Not one to suit my need could there be found ;
Weeping, I laid each heavy burden down.
As my Guide gently said, "No cross,—no crown."
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At length to him I raised my saddened heart ;
He knew its sorrows, bade its doubts depart ;
" Be not afraid," he said, " but trust in me ;
My perfect love shall now be shown to thee."
And then, with lightened eyes and willing feet.
Again I turned, my earthly cross to meet ;
With forward footsteps, turning not aside.
For fear some hidden evil might betide ;
And there — in the prepared, appointed way.
Listening to hear, and ready to obey —
A cross I quickly found of plainest form.
With only words of love inscribed thereon.
With thankfulness I raised it from the rest,
And joyfully acknowledged it the best, —
The only one, of all the many there.
That I could feel was good for me to bear.
And, whUe I thus my chosen one confessed,
I saw a heavenly brightness on it rest ;
And as I bent, my burden to sustain,
I recognized my own old cross again.
But oh ! how different did it seem to be.
Now I had learned its preeiousness to see !
No longer could I unbelieving say,
" Perhaps another is a better way."
Ah, no ! henceforth my one desire shall be.
That he who knows me best should choose for
me ;
And so, whate'er his love sees good to send,
I '11 trust it's best, — because he knows the end.
Hon. Mrs. Charles hobart.
fe-
FROM THE RECESSES OF A LOWLY
SPIRIT.
From the recesses of a lowly spirit.
Our humble prayer ascends ; 0 Father ! hear it.
Ilpsoaring on the wings of awe and meekness.
Forgive its weakness !
We see thy hand, — it leads us, it supports us ;
We hear thy voice, — it counsels and it courts us ;
And then we turn away ; and still thy kindness
Forgives our blindness.
0, how long-suffering. Lord ! but thou delightest
To win with love the wandering : thou invitest.
By smiles of mercy, not by frowns or terrors,
Man from his errors.
Father and Saviour ! plant within each bosom
The seeds of holiness, and bid them blossom
In fragrance and in beauty bright and vernal.
And spring eternal.
joh.n bowring.
THY WILL BE DONE.
We see not, know not ; all our way
Is night — with Thee alone is day :
From out the torrent's troubled drift.
Above the storm our prayers we lift,
Thy will be done !
The flesh may fail, the heart may faint.
But who are we to make complaint.
Or dare to plead, in times like these.
The weakness of our love of ease ?
Thy wUl be done !
We take with solemn thankfulness
Our burden up, nor ask it less.
And count it joy that even we
May suffer, serve, or wait for Thee,
Whose will be done !
Though dim as yet in tint and line.
We trace Thy picture's wise design.
And thank Thee that our age supplies
Its dark relief of sacriñee.
Thy wUl be done !
And if, in our unworthiness.
Thy saeriflcial wine we press ;
If from Thy ordeal's heated bars
Our feet are seamed with crimson scars.
Thy will be done !
If, for the age to come, this hour
Of trial hath vicarious power.
And, blest by Thee, our present pain
Be Liberty's eternal gain.
Thy will be done !
Strike, Thou the Master, we Thy keys.
The anthem of the destinies !
The minor of Thy loftier strain.
Our hearts shall breathe the old refrain.
Thy wül be done !
John Greenleap whittier.
NEARER HOME.
One sweetly solemn thought
Comes to me o'er and o'er ;
I'm nearer my home to-day
Than I ever have been before ;
Nearer my Father's house.
Where the many mansions be ;
Nearer the great white throne.
Nearer the crystal sea ;
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POEMS OF
RELIGION.
a
Nearer the bound of life,
"Where we lay our burdens down ;
Nearer leaving the cross.
Nearer gaining the crown !
But the waves of that silent sea
Roll dark before my sight
That brightly the other side
Break on a shore of light.
0, if my mortal feet
Have almost gained the brink ;
If it be I am nearer home
Even to-day than I think, —
Father, perfect my trust !
Let my spirit feel, in death.
That her feet are firmly set
On the Rock of a living faith !
PHOBBE Gary.
ODE.
from "the spectator."
The spacious firmament on high,
With all the blue ethereal sky.
And spangled heavens, a shining frame.
Their great Original proclaim ;
The unwearied sun, from day to day.
Does his Creator's power display.
And publishes to every land
The work of an Almighty hand.
Soon as the evening shades prevail.
The moon takes up the wondrous tale.
And nightly to the listening earth
Repeats the story of her birth ;
While all the stars that round her bum.
And all the planets in their turn,
Confirm the tidings as they roll.
And spread the truth from pole to pole.
What though, in solemn silence, all
Move round the dark terrestrial ball ?
What though no real voice or sound
Amid their radiant orbs be found ?
In Reason's ear they all rejoice.
And utter forth a glorious voice.
Forever singing, as they shine,
" The hand that made us is divine ! "
joseph Addison.
LORD
WHEN THOSE GLORIOUS LIGHTS
I SEE.
hymn and prayer for the use of believers.
Lord ! when these glorious lights I see
With which thou hast adorned the skies.
Observing how they moved be.
And how their splendor fiUs mine eyes.
Methinks it is too large a grace.
But that thy love ordained it so, —
That creatures in so high a place
Should servants be to man below.
The meanest lamp now shining there
In size and lustre doth exceed
The noblest of thy creatures here.
And of our friendship hath no need.
Yet these upon mankind attend
For secret aid or public light ;
And from the world's extremest end
Repair unto us every night.
O, had that stamp been undefaced
Which first on us thy hand had set.
How highly should we have been graced.
Since we are so much honored yet !
Good God, for what but for the sake
Of thy beloved and only Son,
Who did on him our nature take.
Were these exceeding favors done ?
As we by him have honored been.
Let us to him due honors give ;
Let his uprightness hide our sin.
And let us worth from him receive.
Yea, so let us by giace improve
What thou by nature doth bestow.
That to thy dwelling-place above
We may be raised from below.
george Wither.
HYMN
before sunrise, in the vale of chamouni.
Hast thou a charm to stay the morning star
In his steep course ? So long he seems to pause
On thy bald, awful head, 0 sovran Blanc !
The Arve and Arveiron at thy base
Rave ceaselessly ; but thou, most awful Form,
Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines
How silently ! Around thee and above.
Deep is the air and dark, substantial, black, —
An ebon mass. Methinks thou piercest it.
As with a wedge ! But when I look again.
It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine.
Thy habitation from eternity !
0 dread and silent Mount ! I gazed upon thee,
Till thou, still present to the bodily sense.
Didst vanish from my thought. Entranced in
prayer
1 worshipped the Invisible alone.
Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody.
So sweet we know not we are listening to it.
Thou, the mean while, "wast blending with my
thought, —
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POEMS OF RELIGION.
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4
Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy, —
Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused.
Into the mighty vision passing, there.
As in her natural form, swelled vast to Heaven !
Awake, my soul ! not only passive praise
Thou owest ! not alone these swelling tears.
Mute thanks, and secret ecstasy ! Awake,
Voice of sweet song ! Awake, my heart, awake !
Green vales and icy cliffs, all join my hymn.
Thou first and chief, sole sovereign of the vale I
0, struggling with the darkness all the night.
And visited all night by troops of stars.
Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink.
Companion of the morning-star at dawn.
Thyself Earth's rosy star, and of the dawn
Co-herald, —• wake, 0, wake, and utter praise !
Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in earth ?
Who filled thy countenance with rosy light ?
Who made thee parent of perpetual streams ?
And you, ye five wild torrents fiercely glad !
Who called you forth from night and utter death.
From dark and icy caverns called you forth,
Down those precipitous, black, jaggèd rocks.
Forever shattered and the same forever ?
Who gave you your invulnerable life.
Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your
joy.
Unocasing thunder and eternal foam ?
And who commanded (and the silence came).
Here let the billows stiffen, and have rest ?
Ye ice-falls ! ye that from the mountain's brow
Adown enormous ravines slope amain, —
Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice.
And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge !
Motionless torrents ! silent cataracts !
Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven
Beneath the keen full moon ? Who hade the sun
Clothe you with rainbows ? Who, with living
flowers
Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet ?
God ! — let the torrents, like a shout of nations.
Answer ! and let the ice-plains echo, God !
God ! sing, ye meadow-streams, with gladsome
voice !
Ye pine-groves, with your soft and soul-like
sounds !
And they too have a voice, yon piles of snow.
And in their perilous fall shall thunder, God !
Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost !
Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle's nest !
Ye eagles, playmates of the mountain-storm !
Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds !
Ye signs and wonders of the elements !
Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise !
Thou, too, hoar Mount ! with thy sky-pointing
peaks.
Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard.
Shoots downward, glittering through the pure
serene.
Into the depth of clouds that veil thy breast, —
Thou too again, stupendous Mountain ! thou
That, as I raise my head, awhile bowed low
In adoration, upward from thy base
Slow travelling with dim eyes suffused with tears,
Solemnly seemest, like a vapory cloud.
To rise before me, — Rise, 0, ever rise !
Rise, like a cloud of incense, from the Earth !
Thou kingly Spirit throned among the hUls,
Thou dread ambassador from Earth to Heaven,
Great Hierarch ! tell thou the silent sky.
And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun.
Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
AMAZING, BEAUTEOUS CHANGE!
Amazing, beauteous change I
A world created new I
My thoughts with transport range.
The lovely scene to view ;
In all 1 trace.
Saviour divine.
The work is thine, —
Be thine the praise !
See crystal fountains play
Amidst the burning sands ;
The river's winding way
Shines through the thirsty lands ;
New grass is seen.
And o'er the meads
Its carpet spreads
Where pointed brambles grew,
Intwined with horrid thorn.
Gay flowers, forever new.
The painted fields adorn, —
The blushing rose
And lily there.
In union fair.
Their sweets disclose.
"Where the bleak mountain stood
All bare and disarrayed.
See the wide-branching wood
Difi'use its grateful shade ;
Tall cedars nod.
And oaks and pines.
And elms and vines
Confess thee God.
&
[&
378
POEMS OP RELIGION.
The tyrants of the plain
Their savage chase give o'er, —
No more they rend the slain,
And thirst for blood no more ;
But infant hands
Fierce tigers stroke.
And lions yoke
In flowery bands.
O, when. Almighty Lord !
Shall these glad scenes arise.
To verify thy word.
And bless our wandering eyes ?
That earth may raise.
With all its tongues.
United songs
Of ardent praise.
philip doddridge.
THE SABBATH.
How still the morning of the hallowed day !
Mute is the voice of rural labor, hushed
The ploughboy's whistle and the milkmaid's
song.
The scythe lies glittering in the dewy wreath
Of tedded grass, mingled with fading flowers.
That yestermorn bloomed waving in the breeze ;
Sounds the most faint attract the ear, — the
hum
Of early bee, the trickling of the dew,
The distant bleating, midway up the hill.
Calmness sits throned on yon unmoving cloud.
To him who wanders o'er the upland leas
The blackbird's note comes mellower from the
dale ;
And sweeter from the sky the gladsome lark
Warbles his heaven-tuned song ; the lulling
brook
Murmurs more gently down the deep-wom glen ;
While from yon lowly roof, whose circling smoke
O'ermounts the mist, is heard at intervals
The voice of psalms, the simple song of praise.
With dovelike wings Peace o'er yon village
broods ;
The dizzying mill-wheel rests ; the anvil's din
Hath ceased ; all, all around is quietness.
Less fearful on this day, the limping hare
Stops, and looks back, and stops, and looks on
man.
Her deadliest foe. The toil-worn horse, set free,
Unheedful of the pasture, roams at large ;
And as his stiff, unwieldy bulk he rolls,
His iron-armed hoofs gleam in the morning ray.
James Gkahame.
THE MEETING.
The elder folk shook hands at last,
Down seat by seat the signal passed.
To simple ways like ours unused.
Half solemnized and half amused.
With long-di-awn breath and shrug, my guest
His sense of glad relief expressed.
Outside, the hills lay warm in sun ;
The cattle in the meadow-run
Stood half-leg deep ; a single bird
The gieen repose above us stirred.
" What part or lot have you," he said,
" In these dull rites of drowsy-head ?
Is silence worship ? Seek it where
It soothes with dreams the summer air ;
Not in this close and rude-benched hall.
But where soft lights and shadows fall.
And all the slow, sleep-walking hours
Glide soundless over grass and flowers !
From time and place and form apart.
Its holy ground the human heart.
Nor ritual-bound nor templeward
Walks the free spirit of the Lord !
Our common Master did not pen
His followers up from other men ;
His service liberty indeed.
He built no church, he framed no creed ;
But while the saintly Pharisee
Made broader his phylactery,
As from the synagogue was seen
The dusty-sandaled Nazarene
Through ripening cornfields lead the way
Upon the awful Sabbath day.
His sermons were the healthful talk
That shorter made the mountain-walk.
His wayside texts were flowers and birds.
Where mingled with his gracious words
The rustle of the tamarisk-tree
And ripple-wash of Galilee."
"Thy words are well, 0 friend," 1 said ;
" Unmeasured and unlimited.
With noiseless slide of stone to stone.
The mystic Church of God has grown.
Invisible and silent stands
The temple never made with hands.
Unheard the voices still and small
Of its unseen confessional.
He needs no special place of prayer
Whose hearing ear is everywhere ;
He brings not back the childish days
That ringed the earth with stones of praise.
Roofed Karnak's hall of gods, and laid
The plinths of Philae's colonnade.
Still less he owns the selfish good
And sickly growth of solitude, —
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POEMS OF RELIGION.
379
&
The worthless grace that, out of sight,
Flowers in the desert anchorite ;
Dissevered from the suffering whole,
Love hath no power to save a soul.
Not out of Self, the origin
And native air and soil of sin.
The living waters spring and flow.
The trees with leaves of healing grow.
" Dream not, 0 friend, because I seek
This quiet shelter twice a week,
I better deem its pine-laid floor
Than breezy hill or sea-sung shore ;
But nature is not solitude ;
She crowds us with her thronging wood ;
Her many hands reach out to us.
Her many tongues are garrulous ;
Perpetual riddles of surprise
She offers to our ears and eyes ;
She will not leave our senses still.
But drags them captive at her will ;
And, making earth too great for heaven.
She hides the Giver in the given.
" And so I find it well to come
For deeper rest to this still room.
For here the habit of the soul
Feels less the outer world's control ;
The strength of mutual purpose pleads
More earnestly our common needs ;
And from the silence multiplied
By these still forms on either side.
The world that time and sense have known
Falls off and leaves us God alone.
"Yet rarely through the channed repose
Unmixed the stream of motive flows,
A flavor of its many springs.
The tints of earth and sky it brings ;
In the still waters needs must be
Some shade of human sympathy ;
And here, in its accustomed place,
I look on memory's dearest face ;
The blind by-sitter guesseth not
What shadow haunts that vacant spot ;
No eyes save mine alone can see
The love wherewith it welcomes me !
And still, with those alone my kin.
In doubt and weakness, want and sin,
I bow my head, my heart I bare
As when that face was living there.
And strive (too oft, alas ! in vain)
The peace of simple trust to gain.
Fold fancy's restless wings, and lay
The idols of my heart away.
" Welcome the silence all unbroken.
Nor less the words of fitness spoken, —
Such golden words as hers for whom
Our autumn flowers have just made room ;
Whose hopeful utterance through and through
The freshness of the morning blew ;
Who loved not less the earth that light
Fell on it from the heavens in sight,
But saw in all fair forms more fair
The Eternal beauty mirrored there.
Whose eighty years but added grace
And saintlier meaning to her face, —
The look of one who bore away
Glad tidings from the hills of day.
While all our hearts went forth to meet
The coming of her beautiful feet !
Or haply hers whose pilgrim tread
Is in the paths where Jesus led ;
Who dreams her childhood's sabbath dreara
By Jordan's willow-shaded stream.
And, of the hymns of hope and faith.
Sung by the monks of Nazareth,
Hears pious echoes, in the call
To prayer, from Moslem minarets fall.
Repeating where His works were wrought
The lesson that her Master taught.
Of whom an elder Sibyl gave.
The prophesies of Cumae's cave !
" I ask no organ's soulless breath
To drone the themes of life and death.
No altar candle-lit by day.
No ornate wordsman's rhetoric-play.
No cool philosophy to teach
Its bland audacities of speech
To double-tasked idolaters.
Themselves their gods and worshippers.
No pulpit hammered by the fist
Of loud-asserting dogmatist.
Who borrows for the hand of love
The smoking thunderbolts of Jove.
I know how well the fathers taught.
What work the later schoolmen wrought ;
I reverence old-time faith and men.
But God is near us now as then ;
His force of love is still unspent.
His hate of sin as imminent ;
And still the measure of our needs
Outgrows the cramping bounds of creeds ;
The manna gathered yesterday
Already savors of decay ;
Doubts to the world's child-heart unknown
Question us now from star and stone ;
Too little or too much we know.
And sight is swift and faith is slow ;
The power is lost to self-deceive
With shallow forms of make-believe.
We walk at high noon, and the bells
Call to a thousand oracles.
POEMS OF
RELIGION.
But the sound deafens, and the light
Is stronger than our dazzled sight ;
The letters of the sacred Book
Glimmer and swim beneath our look ;
Still struggles in the Age's breast
With deepening agony of quest
The old entreaty : ' Art thou He,
Or look we for the Christ to be ? '
" God should he most where man is least ;
So, where is neither church nor priest,
And never rag of form or creed
To clothe the nakedness of need, —
Where farmer-folk in silence meet, —
I turn my beU-unsummoned feet ;
I lay the critic's glass aside,
I tread upon my lettered pride.
And, lowest-seated, testify
To the oneness of humanity ;
Confess the universal want.
And share whatever Heaven may grant.
He findeth not who seeks his own.
The soul is lost that's saved alone.
Not on one favored forehead fell
Of old the fire-tongued miracle.
But flamed o'er all the thronging host
The baptism of the Holy Ghost ;
Heart answers heart : in one desire
The blending lines of prayer aspire ;
' Where, in my name, meet two or three,'
Our Lord hath said, ' 1 there will be ! '
" So sometimes comes to soul and sense
The feeling which is evidence
That very near about us lies
The realm of spiritual mysteries.
The sphere of the supernal powers
Impinges on this world of ours.
The low and dark horizon lifts.
To light the scenic terror shifts ;
The breath of a diviner air
Blows down the answer of a prayer : —
That all our sorrow, pain, and doubt
A great compassion clasps about.
And law and goodness, love and force.
Are wedded fast beyond divorce.
Then duty leaves to love its task.
The beggar Self forgets to ask ;
With smile of trust and folded hands.
The passive soul in waiting stands
To feel, as flowers the sun and dew.
The One true Life its own renew.
" So, to the calmly gathered thought
The innermost of truth is taught.
The mystery dimly understood.
That love of God is love of good.
And, chiefly, its divinest trace
In Him of Nazareth's holy face ;
That to be saved is only this, —
Salvation from our selfishness.
From more than elemental fire.
The soul's unsanctified desire, .
From sin itself, and not the
That warns us of its chafing
That worship's deeper meaning lies
In mercy, and not sacrifice.
Not proud humilities of sense
And posturing of penitence.
But love's unforced obedience ;
That Book and Church and Day are given
For man, not God, — for earth, not heaven, —
The blessed means to holiest ends.
Not masters, but benignant friends ;
That the dear Christ dwells not afar.
The king of some remoter star.
But flamed o'er all the thronging host
The baptism of the Holy Ghost ;
Heaid answers heart : in one desire
The blending lines of prayer aspire ;
' Where, in my name, meet two or three,'
Our Lord hath said, ' 1 there will be ! ' "
JOHN CREENLEAP WHnTIER.
A PRAYER FOR LIFE.
O Father, let me not die young !
Earth's beauty asks a heart and tongue
To give true love and praises to her worth ;
Her sins and judgment-sufferings call
For fearless martyrs to redeem thy Earth
From her disastrous fall.
For though her summer hills and vales might
seem
The fair creation of a poet's dream, —
Ay, of the Highest Poet,
Whose wordless rhythms are chanted by the
gyres
Of constellate star-choirs.
That with deep melody flow and overflow it, —
The sweet Earth, — very sweet, despite
The rank grave-smell forever drifting in
Among the odors from her censers white
Of wave-swung lilies and of wind-swung
roses, —
The Earth sad-sweet is deeply attaint with
sin !
The pure air, which encloses
Her and her starry kin.
Still shudders with the unspent palpitating
Of a great Curse, that to its utmost shore
Thrills with a deadly shiver
Which has not ceased to quiver
Down all the ages, nathless the strong beating
Of Angel-wings, and the defiant roar
Of Earth's Titanic thunders.
f
POEMS OF EELIGION. 381
Fair and sad,
HI sin and beauty, our belovèd Earth
Has need of aU her sons to make her glad ;
Has to reflre the hearth
her — of heroic men
With lBPl|^^paMi,or Troth's supernal pen.
To shape the wmMmH mould of nobleness again.
And she has need of Poets who can string
Their harps with steel to catch the light¬
ning's fire.
And pour her thunders from the clanging
wire.
To cheer the hero, mingling with his cheer.
Arouse the laggard in the battle's rear.
Daunt the stern wicked, and from discord wring
Prevailing harmony, while the humblest soul
Who keeps the tune the warder angels sing
In golden choirs above.
And only wears, for crown and aureole.
The glow-worm light of lowliest human love,
Shall fill with low, sweet undertones the
chasms
Of silence, 'twixt the booming thunder-spasms.
And Earth has need of Prophets fiery-lipped
And deep-souled, to announce the glorious
dooms
Writ on the silent heavens in starry script.
And flashing fitfully from her shuddering
tombs, —
Commissioned Angels of the new-born Faith,
To teach the immortality of Good,
The soul's God-likeness, Sin's coeval death.
And man's indissoluble Brotherhood.
Yet never an age, when God has need of him.
Shall want its Man, predestined by that need,
To pour his life in fiery word or deed, —
The strong Archangel of the Elohim !
Earth's hollow want is prophet of his coming:
In the low murmur of her famished cry.
And heavy sobs breathed up despairingly.
Ye hear the near invisible humming
Of his wide wings that fan the lurid sky
Into cool ripples of new life and hope.
While far in its dissolving ether ope
Deeps beyond deeps, of sapphire calm, to cheer
With Sabbath gleams the troubled Now and Here.
Father ! thy will be done !
Holy and righteous One !
Though the reluctant years
May never crown my throbbing brows with
white.
Nor round my shoulders turn the golden light
Of my thick locks to wisdom's royal ermine :
Yet by the solitary tears.
Deeper than joy or sorrow, —by the thrill.
Higher than hope or terror, whose ^uick genuin,
In those hot tears to sudden vigor sprung,
Sheds, even now, the fruits of graver age, —
By the long wrestle in which inward ill
Fell like a trampled viper to the gr ound, —
By all that lifts me o'er my outward peers
To that supernal stage
Where soul dissolves the bonds by Nature
bound, —
Fall when I may, by pale disease unstrung.
Or by the hand of fratricidal "rage,
I cannot now die young !
George s. Burleigh.
•—
WHEN.
If I were told that I must die to-morrow.
That the next sun
Which sinks should bear me past all fear and
sorrow
For any one.
All the fight fought, all the short journey
through.
What should I do ?
I do not think that I should shrink or falter.
But just go on.
Doing my work, nor change nor seek to alter
Aught that is gone ;
But rise and move and love and smile and pray
For one more day.
And, lying down at night for a last sleeping.
Say in that ear
Which hearkens ever : " Lord, within thy keeping
How should I fear ?
And when to-morrow brings thee nearer still.
Do thou thy will."
I might not sleep for awe ; but peaceful, tender.
My soul would lie
All the night long ; and when the morning
splendor
Flushed o'er the sky,
I think that I could smile — could calmly say,
"It is his day."
But if a wondrous hand from the blue yonuer
Held out a scroll.
On which my life was writ, and I with wonder
Beheld unroll
To a long century's end its mystic clue.
What should I do ?
What could I do, 0 blessed Guide and Master,
Other than this ;
Still to go on as now, not slower, faster.
Nor fear to miss
The road, although so very long it be.
While led by thee ?
L
r
H * ' C
382 POEMS OF RELIGION.
J
1
Step after step, feeling tliee close beside me, From a tyrant's pursuit, from an enemy's wrath.
Although unseen. Spent with toil and o'ercome with fatigue.
Throngh thorns, through flowers, whether the
tempest hide thee, And the gypsy came forth |plre\pjfaj[)^elling, and
Or heavens serene, prayed ^
Assured thy faithfulness cannot betray. That the pilgrims woul(lpg^i|fcÉ#%while ;
Thy love decay. And she offered her couch ÍÍSjil^delicate maid.
Who had come many, many a mile.
I may not know ; my God, no hand revealeth And she fondled the babe with affection's caress.
Thy counsels wise , begged the old man would repose ;
Along the path a deepening shadow stealeth, « ^he stranger," she said, " ever finds free
No voice replies
To all my questioning thought, the time to tell ; wanderer balm for his woes."
And it is well.
Let me keep on, abiding and nnfearing Then her guests from the glare of the noonday
Thy will always,
Throngh a long centuiy's ripening fruition To a seat in her grotto so cool ;
Or a short day's ; Where she spread them a banquet of fruits, and
Thou canst not come too soon ; and I can wait ®'
If thou come late. "^ith a manger, was found for the mule ;
SARAH WOOLSEY (Susan Cooiidgs). With the wine of the palm-tree, with dates newly
culled,
♦- All the toil of the day she beguiled ;
And with song in a language mysterious she lulled
THE FLIGHT INTO EGYPT, On her bosom the wayfaring child.
a BALLAD.
> 1 J iL 4. ' i 1A Í L When the gypsy anon in her Ethiop hand
There s a legend that s told of a gypsy who
dwelt Took the infant s dimmutive palm.
In the Zands where the pyramids be ; 0,Wfearfnl to see how the features she scanned
And her robe was embroidered with stars, and , 3'' slumbers so calm !
lisr »Veil sn6 notôo. 6äcii niärK änd. 63-cli lurrow
With devices right wondrous to see ; crossed ....
And she lived in the days when our Lord was a ® ^ ^ ® tracmgs of destiny s line :
"Whence came te? she cned, in astonish-
On his mother's immaculate breast ; „ ment lost.
When he fled from his foes, - when to Egypt Child is of lineage Divine !
exiled.
He went down with St. Joseph the blest. " the village of Nazareth," Joseph repUed,
" Where we dwelt in the land of the Jew,
ThisEg3rptianheldconversewithmagic,methinks, We have fled from a tyrant whose garment is
And the future was given to her gaze ; dyed
For an obelisk marked her abode, and a sphinx the gore of the children he slew :
On her threshold kept vigil always. We were told to remain till an angel s command
She was pensive and ever alone, nor was seen Should appoint us the hour to return ;
In the haunts of the dissolute crowd ; B^^t till then we inhabit the foreigners land.
But communed with the ghosts of the Pharaohs, Eg3rpt we make our sojourn."
I ween.
Or with visitors wrapped in a shroud. " Then ye tarry with me," cried the gypsy in joy,
" And ye make of my dwelling your home ;
And there came an old man from the desert one Many years have I prayed that the Israelite boy
day, (Blessèd hope of the Gentiles !) would come."
With a maid on a mule by that road ; and she kissed both the feet of the infant and
And a child on her bosom reclined, and the way knelt.
Led them straight to the gypsy's abode ; And adored him at once ; then a smile
And they seemed to have travelled a wearisome Lit the face of his mother, who cheerfully dwelt
path. With her host on the banks of the Nile.
From thence many, many a league,— Francis mahony (aaia<r/y«»/). '
3^ ^
POEMS OF RELIGION.
383
BURIAL OF MOSES.
" And he buried htm in a valley in the land of Moab, over against
Beth*peor ; but no fBa&Jgnoweth of his sepulchre unto this day." —
deut.
By hear, wi^KPUMBifc
On this wavej
In a vale in tlRnand, of Moab,
There lies a lonely grave ;
But no man built that sepulchre,
And no man saw it e'er ;
For the angels of God upturned the sod,
And laid the dead man there.
That was the grandest funeral
That ever passed on earth ;
Yet no man heard the trampling.
Or saw the train go forth :
Noiselessly as the daylight
Comes when the night is done.
And the crimson streak on ocean's cheek
Grows into the great sun ;
Noiselessly as the spring-time
Her crown of verdure weaves,
And all the trees on all the hüls
Unfold their thousand leaves :
So without sound of music
Or voice of them that wept.
Silently down from the mountain's crown
The great procession swept.
Perchance the bald old eagle
On gray Beth-peor's height
Out of his rocky eyry
Looked on the wondrous sight ;
Perchance the lion stalking
Still shuns that hallowed spot ;
For beast and bird have seen and heard
That which man knoweth not.
But, when the warrior dieth.
His comrades of the war.
With arms reversed and muflSed drums,
Follow the funeral car :
They show the banners taken ;
They tell his battles won ;
And after him lead his masterless steed.
While peals the minute-gun.
Amid the noblest of the land
Men lay the sage to rest.
And give the bard an honored place.
With costly marbles drest.
In the great minster transept
Where lights like glories fall.
And the sweet choir sings, and the organ rings
Along the emblazoned hall.
This was the bravest warrior
That ever buckled sword ;
This the most gifted poet
That ever breathed a word ;
And never earth's philosopher
Traced with his golden pen
On the deathless page truths half so sage
As he wrote down for men.
And had he not high honor ? —
The hillside for a pall !
To lie in state while angels wait.
With stars for tapers tall !
And the dark rock-pines, like tossing plumes.
Over his bier to wave.
And God's own hand, in that lonely land.
To lay him in his grave ! —
In that strange grave without a name.
Whence his imcoliined clay
Shall break again— 0 wondrous thought ! —
Before the judgment-day.
And stand, with glory wrapped around.
On the hills he never trod.
And speak of the strife that won our life
With the incarnate Son of God.
O lonely tomb in Moab's land !
0 dark Beth-peor's hill !
Speak to these curious hearts of ours.
And teach them to be still :
God hath his mysteries of grace.
Ways that we cannot tell.
He hides them deep, like the secret sleep
Of him he loved so well.
cecil Frances Alexander.
THE GREENWOOD SHRIFT.
george iii. and a dying woman in windsor forest.
Outstretched beneath the leafy shade
Of Windsor forest's deepest glade,
A dying woman lay ;
Three little children round her stood.
And there went up from the greenwood
A woful wail that day.
" 0 mother ! " was the mingled cry,
" 0 mother, mother ! do not die.
And leave us all alone."
" My blessed babes ! " she tried to say.
But the faint accents died away
In a low sobbing moan.
And then, life struggled hard with death,
And fast and strong she drew her breath,
And up she raised her head ;
384
POEMS OF RELIGION.
a
And, peering through the deep wood maze
With a long, sharp, imearthly gaze,
" WiU she not come ? " she said.
Just then, the parting boughs between,
A little maid's light form was seen.
All breathless with her speed ;
And, following close, a man came on
(A portly man to look upon).
Who led a panting steed.
" Mother ! " the little maiden cried.
Or e'er she reached the woman's side.
And kissed her clay-cold cheek, —
" I have not idled in the town.
But long went wandering up and down.
The minister to seek.
" They told me here, they told me there, —
I think they mocked me everywhere ;
And when I found his home.
And begged him on my bended knee
To bring his book and come with me.
Mother ! he would not come.
" I told him how you dying lay.
And could not go in peace away
Without the minister ;
I begged him, for dear Christ his sake.
But 0, my heart was fit to break, —
Mother ! he would not stir.
"So, though my tears were blinding me,
I ran back, fast as fast could be.
To come again to you ;
And here — close by — this squire I met.
Who asked (so mild) what made me fret ;
And when I told him true, —
" 'I will go with you, child,' he said,
' God sends me to this dying bed,' —
Mother, he's here, hard by."
While thus the little maiden spoke.
The man, his back against an oak.
Looked on with glistening eye.
The bridle on his neck hung free.
With quivering fiank and trembling knee.
Pressed close his bonny bay ;
A statelier man, a statelier steed.
Never on greensward paced, 1 rede.
Than those stood there that day.
So, while the little maiden spoke,
The man, his back against an oak.
Looked on with glistening eye
And folded arms, and in his look
Something that, like a sermon-book.
Preached, — " All is vanity."
But when the dying woman's face
Turned toward him with a wishful gaze.
He stepped to where she lay ;
And, kneeling dovni.
Saying, "I am a raini^
My sister ! let us i
fkKY.
And well, withouten book or stole,
(God's words were printed on his soul !)
Into the dying ear
He breathed, as't were an angel's strain,
The things that unto life pertain.
And death's dark shadows clear.
He spoke of sinners' lost estate.
In Christ renewed, regenerate, —
Of God's most blest decree.
That not a single soul should die
Who turns repentant, with the ciy
" Be merciful to me."
He spoke of trouble, pain, and toil.
Endured but for a little while
In patience, faith, and love, —
Sure, in God's own good time, to be
Exchanged for an eternity
Of happiness above.
Then, as the spirit ebbed away.
He raised his hands and eyes to pray
That peaceful it might pass ;
And then"— the orphans' sobs alone
Were heard, and they knelt, every ob£.
Close round on the green grass.
Such was the sight their wandering eyes
Beheld, in heart-struck, mute surprise.
Who reined their coursers back.
Just as they found the long astray.
Who, in the heat of chase that day,
Had wandered from their track.
But each man reined his pawing steed.
And lighted down, as if agreed.
In silence at his side ;
And there, uncovered all, they stood, —
It was a wholesome sight and good
That day for mortal pride.
For of the noblest of the land
Was that deep-hushed, bareheaded band ;
And, central in the ring.
By that dead pauper on the ground.
Her ragged orphans clinging round.
Knelt their anointed king.
Robert and Caroline Southey
-51
fl-
POEMS GE RELIGION.
385
THE COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT.
INSCRIBED TO R. AIKEN, ESQ.
" Let not ambition mock their useful toil,
Their homely joys and destiny obscure ;
Nor grandrijr hear, with a disdainful smile,
The short but simple annals of the poor." — GRAY.
Mt loved, my honored, much-respected friend.
No mercenary bard his homage pays :
With honest pride I scorn each selfish end ;
My dearest meed, a friend's esteem and
praise.
To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays.
The lowly train in life's sequestered scene ;
The native feelings strong, the guileless ways ;
What Aiken in a cottage would have been ;
Ah ! though his worth unknown, far happier
there, I ween.
November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh ;
The shortening winter-day is near a close ;
The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh.
The blackening trains o' craws to their
repose ;
The toilwom cotter frae his labor goes, —
This night his weekly moil is at an end, —
Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his hoes.
Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend.
And weary, o'er the moor, his course does hame-
ward bend.
At length his lonely cot appears in view.
Beneath the shelter of an aged tree ;
Th' expectant wee things, toddlin', staeher
through
To meet their dad, wi' flichterin' noise an' gle e.
His wee bit ingle, blinking bonnily.
His clean hearthstane, his thriftie wifie's
smile.
The lisping infant prattling on his knee.
Does a' his weary carking cares beguile.
And makes him quite forget his labor and his toil.
Belyve* the elder bairns come drapping in.
At service out amang the farmers roun ;
Some ca' the pleugh, some herd, some tentie +
rin
A cannie errand to a neibor town ;
Their eldest hope, their Jenny, woman grown.
In youthfu' bloom, love sparkling in her e'e.
Comes hame, perhaps, to shew a bra' new gown.
Or deposit her sair-won penny-fee.
To help her parents dear, if they in hardship be.
Wi' joy unfeigned brothers and sisters meet.
An' each for other's weelfare kindly spiers :
The social hours, swift-winged, unnoticed fleet ;
Each teUs the uncos that he sees or hears ;
* By aod by.
f Cautious.
The parents, partial, eye their hopeful years ;
Anticipation forward points the view :
The mother, wi' her needle an' her shears.
Gars auld claes look amaist as weel's the new ;
The father mixes a' wi' admonition due.
Their master's an' their mistress's command,
The younkers a' are warned to obey ;
And mind their labora wi' an eydent * hand.
And ne'er, though out o' sight, to jauk or
play;
"An' 0, be sure to fear the Lord alway !
An' mind your duty, duly, morn an' night !
Lest in temptation's path ye gang astray.
Implore his counsel and assisting might ;
They never sought in vain that sought the Lord
aright ! "
But, hark ! a rap comes gently to the door.
Jenny, wha kens the meaning o' the same.
Tells how a neibor lad cam o'er the moor.
To do some errands and convoy her hame.
The wily mother sees the conscious flame
Sparkle in Jenny's e'e, and flush her cheek ;
Wi' heart-struck anxious care inquires his
name.
While Jenny hafflinst is afraid to speak ;
Weel pleased the mother hears it's nae yrild,
worthless rake.
Wi' kindly welcome, Jenny brings him ben ;
A strappin' youth ; he taks the mother's e'e ;
Blithe Jenny sees the visit's no ill ta'en ;
The father cracks of horses, ploughs, and kye.
The youngster's artless heart o'erflows wi' joy.
But blate and lathefu', scarce can weel be¬
have ;
The mother, wi' a woman's wiles, can spy
What makes the youth sae bashfu' an' sae
grave ;
Weel pleased to think her bairn's respected like
the lave.
0 happy love ! where love like this is found !
O heartfelt raptures ! bliss beyond compare !
I've pacëd much this weary mortal round.
And sage experience bids me this declare : —
If Heaven a draught of heavenly pleasure spare.
One cordial in this melancholy vale,
'T is when a youthful, loving, modest pair
In other's arms breathe out the tender tale.
Beneath the milk-white thorn that scents the
evening gale.
Is there, in human form, that bears a heart,
A wretch, a villain, lost to love and truth.
That can, with studied, sly, ensnaring art,
Betray sweet Jenny's unsuspecting youth ?
• Diligent. # Half.
Ú
fi¬
sse
POEMS OF RELIGION.
■a
Curse on his perj ured arts ! dissembling smooth !
Are honor, virtue, conscience, all exiled ?
Is there no pity, no relenting ruth.
Points to the parents fondling o'er their
child.
Then paints the ruined maid, and their distrac¬
tion wild ?
But now the supper crowns their simple board.
The halesome parritch, chief o' Scotia's food ;
The soupe their only hawkie * does afford,
That'yontthehallantsnugly chows hercood ;
The dame brings forth, in complimentai mood.
To grace the lad, her weel-hained kebbuck Î
fell.
An' aft he's prest, an' aft he ca's it guid ;
The frugal wifie, garrulous, will tell.
How't was a towmond § auld, sin' lint was i' the
bell.
The cheerfu' supper done, wi* serious face.
They, round the ingle, form a circle wide ;
The sire turns o'er, wi' patriarchal grace.
The big ha'-Bible, ance his father's pride ;
His bonnet reverently is laid aside.
His lyart haffets || wealing thin an' bare :
Those strains that once did sweet in Zion glide.
He wales a portion with judicious care ;
And " Let us worship God ! " he says with sol¬
emn air.
They chant their artless notes in simple guise ;
They tune their hearts, by far the noble.st
aim :
Perhaps " Dundee's " wild-warbling measures
rise.
Or plaintive "Martyrs," worthy of the name;
Or noble " Elgin " beets the heavenward flame.
The sweetest far of Scotia's holy lays ;
Compared with these, Italian trills are tame ;
The tickled ears no heartfelt raptures raise ;
Nae unison hae they with our Creator's praise.
The priest-like father reads the sacred page, —
How Abram was the friend of God on high ;
Or Moses bade eternal warfare wage
With Amalek's ungracious progeny ;
Or how the royal bard did groaning lie
Beneath the stroke of Heaven's avenging ire ;
Or Job's pathetic plaint, and wailing cry ;
Or rapt Isaiah's wild, seraphic fire ;
Or other holy seers that tune the sacred lyre.
Perhaps the Christian volume is the theme, —
How guiltless blood for guilty man was shed ;
How He, who bore in heaven the second name.
Had not on earth whereon to lay his head :
• Cow.
§ Twelvemonth.
t Partition.
I Gray locks.
t Cheese.
How his first followers and servants sped ;
The precepts sage they wrote to many a land ;
How he, who lone in Patmos banishèd.
Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand.
And heard great Bab'lon's doom pronounced by
Heaven's command.
Then, kneeling down, to heaven's eternal King,
The saint, the father, and the husband prays :
Hope " springs exulting on triumphant wing,"
That thus they all shall meet in future days ;
There ever bask in uncreated rays.
No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear.
Together hymning their Creator's praise.
In such society, yet still more dear ;
While circling Time moves round in an eternal
sphere.
Compared with this, how poor Religion's pride,
In all the pomp of method and of art,
When men display to congregations wide.
Devotion's every grace, except the heart !
The Power, incensed, the pageant wiU desert.
The pompous strain, the sacerdotal stole ;
But, haply, in some cottage far apart.
May hear, well pleased, the language of the
soul ;
And in his Book of Life the inmates poor enroll.
Then homeward all take off their several way ;
The youngling cottagers retire to rest :
The parent-pair their secret homage pay.
And proffer up to Heaven the warm request.
That He who stills the raven's clamorous nest.
And decks the lily fair in flowery pride.
Would, in the way his wisdom sees the best.
For them and for their little ones provide ;
But, chiefly, in their hearts with grace divine
preside.
From scenes like these old Scotia's grandeur
springs.
That makes her loved at home, revered
abroad ;
Princes and lords are but the breath of kings,
" An honest man's the noblest work of
God!"
And certes, in fair Virtue's heavenly road.
The cottage leaves the palace far behind :
What is a lordling's pomp ?— a cumbrous load,
Disguising oft the wretch of humankind.
Studied in arts of hell, in wickedness refined !
O Scotia ! my dear, my native soil !
For whom my warmest wish to Heaven is
sent,
Long may thy hardy sons of rustic toü
Be blest with health, and peace, and sweet
content I
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POEMS OF RELIGION.
387
a
And, O, may Heaven their simple lives prevent
From luxury's contagion, weak and vile !
Then, howe'er crowns and coronets he rent,
A virtuous populace may rise the whUe,
And stand a wall of fire around their much-loved
isle.
0 Thou ! who poured the patriotic tide.
That streamed through Wallace's undaunted
heart ;
Who dared to nobly stem tyrannic pride.
Or nobly die, the second glorious part,
(The patriot's God peculiarly thou art.
His friend, inspirer, guardian, and reward !)
0, never, never Scotia's realm desert ;
But still the patriot and the patriot bard
In bright succession raise, her ornament and guard !
robert Burns.
THE RELIGION OF HUDIBRAS.
prom " hudibras," part i.
He was of that stubborn crew
Of en-ant saints, whom alljnen grant
To be the true church militant ;
Such as build their faith upra
The holy text of pike and gun ;
Decide all controversies by
Infallible artillery,
And prove their doctrine orthodox
6y apostolic blows and knocks ;
Call fire, and sword, and desolation
A godly, thorough Reformation,
Which always must be carried on
And still be doing, never done ;
As if religion were intended
For notfiing elselbut to be mended.
A seet whose chief devotion lies
In odd perverse antipathies ;
In falling out with that or this,
And finding somewhat still amiss ;
More peevish, cross, and splenetic.
Than dog distract, or monkey sick ;
That with more care keep holiday
The wrong than others the right way ;
Compound for sins they are inclined to.
By damning those they have no mind to ;
Still so perverse and opposite.
As if they worshipped God for spite ;
The self-same thing they will abhor
One way, and long another for.
Samuel Butler.
it
THE FAITHFUL ANGEL.
prom " paradise lost." book v.
The seraph Abdiel, faithful found
Among the faithless, faithful only he ;
Among innumerable false, unmoved.
Unshaken, unseduced, unterrified.
His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal ;
Nor number, nor example with him wrought
To swerve from truth, or change his constant
mind.
Though single. From amidst them forth he
passed.
Long way through hostile scorn, which he sus¬
tained
Superior, nor of violence feared aught ;
And with retorted scorn his back he turned
On those proud towers to swift destruction
doomed.
THE OTHER WORLD.
It lies around us like a cloud, —
A world we do not see ;
Yet the sweet closing of an eye
May bring us there to be.
Its gentle breezes fan our cheek ;
Amid our worldly cares
Its gentle voices whisper love.
And mingle with our prayers.
Sweet hearts around us throb and beat.
Sweet helping hands are stirred.
And palpitates the veil between
With breathings almost heard.
The silence — awful, sweet, and calm —
They have no power to break ;
For mortal words are not for them
To utter or partake.
So thin, so soft, so sweet they glide,
So near to press they seem, —
They seem to lull us to our rest.
And melt into our dream.
And in the hush of rest they bring
'T is easy now to see
How lovely and how sweet a pass
The hour of death may be.
To close the eye, and close the ear.
Rapt in a trance of bliss.
And gently dream in loving arms
To swoon to that — from this.
Scarce knowing if we wake or sleep.
Scarce asking where we are.
To feel all evil sink away.
All sorrow and all care.
Sweet souls around us ! watch us still,
Press nearer to our side.
Into our thoughts, into our prayers,
With gentle helpings glide.
t&
388
POEMS OF RELIGION.
■a
Let death between us be as naught,
A dried and vanished stream ;
Your joy be the reality,
Our suffering life the dream.
Harriet Beecher Stowe.
THE LOVE OF GOD.
All things that are on earth shall whoUy pass
away.
Except the love of God, which shall live and last
for aye.
The forms of men shall be as they had never been ;
The blasted groves shall lose their fresh and ten¬
der green ;
The birds of the thicket shall end their pleasant
song,
And the nightingale shall cease to chant the even¬
ing long.
The kine of the pasture shall feel the dart that
kiUs,
And all the fair white flocks shall perish from
the hills.
The goat and antlered stag, the wolf and the fox.
The wüd boar of the wood, and the chamois of
the rocks.
And the strong and fearless bear, in the trodden
dust shall lie ;
And the dolphin of the sea, and the mighty
whale, shall die.
And realms shall be dissolved, and empires be
no more.
And they shall bow to death, who ruled from
shore to shore ;
And the great globe itself, so the holy writings
tell.
With the rolling firmament, where the starry
armies dwell.
Shall melt with fervent heat, — they shall all
pass away.
Except the love of God, which shall live and last
for aye.
From the Provençal of bernard rascas. Trans¬
lation of William Gullen Bryant.
THE MASTER'S TOUCH.
In the stUI air the music lies unheard ;
In the rough marble beauty hides unseen :
To make the music and the Wuty, needs
The master's touch, the sculptor's chisel keen.
Great Master, touch us with thy skilful hand ;
Let not the music that is in us die !
Great Sculptor, hew and polish us ; nor let,
Hidden and lost, thy form within us lie !
Spare not the stroke ! do with us as thou wilt !
Let there be naught unfinished, broken, marred ;
Complete thy purpose, that we may become
Thy perfect image, thou our God and Lord !
HORATIUS BONAR.
DIFFERENT MINDS.
Some murmur when their sky is clear
And wholly bright to view.
If one small speck of dark appear
In their great heaven of blue ;
And some with thankful love are fiUed
If but one streak of light.
One ray of God's good mercy, gUd
The darkness of their night.
In palaces are hearts that ask.
In discontent and pride.
Why life is such a dreary task.
And aU good things denied ;
And hearts in poorest huts admire
How Love has in their aid
(Love that not ever seems to tire)
Such rich provision made.
RICHARD CHENEVIX TRENCH.
CANA.
Dear Friend ! whose presence in the house,
Whose gracious word benign,
Could once, at Cana's wedding feast.
Change water into wine ;
Come, visit us ! and when dull work
Grows weary, line on line.
Revive our souls, and let us see
Life's water turned to wine.
Gay mirth shall deepen into joy.
Earth's hopes grow half divine.
When Jesus visits us, to make
Life's water glow as wine.
The social talk, the evening fu-e.
The homely household shrine.
Grow bright with angel visits, when
The Lord pours out,the wine. •
For when self-seeking tiums to love,
Not knowing mine nor thine.
The miracle again is wrought.
And water turned to wine.
JAUES FREEUAN CLARKE,
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POEMS OP
RELIGION.
389
THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE
LIFE.
0 thou great Friend to all the sons of men,
Who once appeared in humblest guise below.
Sin to rebuke, to break the captive's chain,
And call thy brethren forth from want and
woe, —
We look to thee ! thy truth is still the Light
Which guides the nations, groping on their
way, ,
Stumbling and falling in disastrous night.
Yet hoping ever for the perfect day.
Yes ; thou art still the Life, thou art the Way
The holiest know ; Light, Life, the Way of
heaven !
And they who dearest hope and deepest pray.
Toil by the Light, Life, Way, which thou hast
given.
theodore Parker.
FOREVER WITH THE LORD.
Forever with the Lord !
Amen ! so let it be !
Life from the dead is in that word.
And immortality.
Here in the body pent.
Absent from him I roam.
Yet nightly pitch my moving tent
A day's march nearer home.
My Father's house on high.
Home of my soul ! how near.
At times, to faith's foreseeing eye
Thy golden gates appear ¡
Ah ! then my spirit faints
To reach the land I love.
The bright inheritance of saints,
Jerusalem above !
Yet clouds will intervene.
And all my prospect flies ;
Like Noah's dove, I flit between
Rough seas and stormy skies.
Anon the clouds depart.
The winds and waters cease ;
While sweetly o'er my gladdened heart
Expands the bow of peace !
Beneath its glowing arch.
Along the hallowed ground,
I see cherubic armies march,
A camp of flre around.
I hear at morn and even.
At noon and midnight hour,.
The choral harmonies of heaven.
Earth's Babel tongues o'erpower»
Then, then I feel that he.
Remembered or forgot.
The Lord, is never far from me.
Though I perceive him not.
In darkness as in light.
Hidden alike from view,
I sleep, I wake, as in his sight
Who looks aU nature through.
All that I am, have been.
All that I yet may be.
He sees at once, as he hath seen.
And shall forever see.
" Forever with the Lord : "
Father, if't is thy wiU,
The promise of that faithful word
Unto thy child fulfil !
So, when my latest breath
Shall rend the veil in twain,
By death I shall escape from death.
And life eternal gain.
James Montgomery.
THE SABBATH OF THE SOUL.
Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting cares.
Of earth and folly born ;
Ye shall not dim the light that streams
From this celestial morn.
To-morrow will be time enough
To feel your harsh control ;
Ye shall not violate, this day.
The Sabbath of my soul.
Sleep, sleep forever, guilty thoughts ;
Let fires of vengeance die ;
And, purged from sin, may I behold
A God of purity !
Anna Letitia Barbauld.
EDWIN AND PAULINUS:
the conversion of northumbria
The black-haired gaunt Paulinus
By ruddy Edwin stood ; —
" Bow down, O king of Deiia,
Before the blessed Rood !
Cast out thy heathen idols.
And worship Christ our Lord."
— But Edwin looked and pondered.
And answered not a word.
c&
390
POEMS OF RELIGION.
0
Again the gaunt Paulinus
To ruddy Edwin spake :
" God offers life immortal
For his dear Son's own sake !
Wüt thou not hear his message,
Who bears the keys and sword ? "
— But Edwin looked and pondered,
And answered not a word.
Rose then a sage old warrior
Was fivescore winters old ;
Whose beard from chin to girdle
Like one long snow-wreath rolled ;
" At Yule-time in our chamber
We sit in warmth and light.
While cold and howling round us
Lies the black land of Night.
" Athwart the room a sparrow
Darts from the open door :
Within the happy hearth-light
One red flash, — and no more !
We see it come from darkness.
And into darkness go : —
So is our life. Bang Edwin !
Alas, that it is so !
" But if this pale Paulinus
Have somewhat more to tell ;
Some news of Whence and Whither,
And where the soul will dwell ; —
If on that outer darkness
The sun of hope may shine ; —
He makes life worth the living !
I take his God for mine ! "
So spake the wise old warrior ;
And all about him cried,
" Paulinus' God hath conquered !
And he shall be our guide : —
For he makes life worth living
Who brings this message plain.
When our brief days are over.
That we shall live again."
anonymous.
[0-
THE LOVE OF GOD SUPREME.
Thotj hidden love of God, whose height.
Whose depth unfathomed no man knows,
I see from far thy beauteous light.
Inly I sigh for thy repose.
My heart is pained, nor can it be
At rest till it finds rest in thee.
Thy secret voice invites me still
The sweetness of thy yoke to prove.
And fain I would ; but though my will
Be fixed, yet wide my passions rove.
Yet hindrances strew all the way ;
I aim at thee, yet from thee stray.
'T is mercy all that thou hast brought
My mind to seek her peace in thee.
Yet while I seek but find thee not
No peace my wand'ring soul shall see.
Oh ! when shall all my wand'rings end.
And aU my steps to-thee-ward tend ?
Is there a thing beneath the sun
That strives with thee my heart to share ?
Ah ! tear it thence and reign alone.
The Lord of every motion there.
Then shall my heart from earth be free.
When it has found repose in thee.
Oh ! hide this self from me, that I
No more, but Christ in me, may live.
My vile affections crucify.
Nor let one darling lust survive.
In aU things nothing may I see.
Nothing desire or seek but thee.
O Love, thy sovereign aid impart.
To save me from low-thoughted care ;
Chase this self-will through all my heart.
Through all its latent mazes there.
Make me thy duteous child, that I
Ceaseless may Abba, Father, cry.
Ah ! no ; ne'er wül I backward tum :
Thine wholly, thine alone 1 am.
Thrice happy he who views with scom
Earth's toys, for thee his constant flame.
Oh ! help, that I may never move
From the blest footsteps of thy love.
Each moment draw from earth away
My heart, that lowly waits thy call.
Speak to my inmost soul, and say,
"I am thy Love, thy God, thy All."
To feel thy power, to hear thy voice.
To taste thy love is all my choice.
john Wesley.
THE RIGHT MUST WIN.
O, IT is hard to work for God,
To rise and take his part
Upon this battle-field of eai'th.
And not sometimes lose heart !
He hides himself so wondrously.
As though there were no God ;
He is least seen when all the powers
Of ill are most abroad.
-Ö
f
POEMS OF RELIGION.
391
n
Or he deserts us at the hour
The fight is all but lost ;
And seems to leave us to ourselves
Just when we need him most.
Ill masters good, good seems to change
To ill with greatest ease ;
And, worst of all, the good with good
Is at cross-purposes.
Ah ! God is other than we think ;
His ways are far above.
Far beyond reason's height, and reached
Only by childlike love.
Workman of God ! 0, lose not heart.
But learn what God is like ;
And in the darkest battle-field
Thou shalt know where to strike.
Thrice blest is he to whom is given
The instinct that can tell
That God is on the field when he
Is most invisible.
Blest, too, is he who can divine
Where real right doth lie.
And dares to take the side that seems
Wrong to man's blindfold eye.
For right is right, since God is God ;
And right the day must win ;
To doubt would be disloyalty.
To falter would be sin !
Frederick William Faber,
A DYING HYMN.
Earth, with its dark and dreadful ills.
Recedes and fades away ;
Lift up your heads, ye heavenly hills ;
Ye gates of death, give way !
My soul is full of whispered song, —
My blindness is my sight ;
The shadows that I feared so long
Are full of life and light.
The while my pulses fainter beat.
My faith doth so abound ;
I feel gi'ow firm beneath my feet
The green, immortal ground.
That faith to me a courage gives
Low as the grave to go ;
I know that my Redeemer lives, —
That I shall live I know.
The palace walls I almost see
Where dwells my Lord and King !
0 grave, where is thy victory ?
O death, where is thy sting ?
Alice Gary.
HOPEFULLY WAITING.
" Blessed are they who are homesick, for they shall come at last to
their Father's house." — Heinrich Stilling.
Not as you meant, 0 learnèd man, and good !
Do I accept thy words of truth and rest ;
God, knowing all, knows what for me is best.
And gives me what I need, not what he could.
Nor always as I would !
I shall go to the Father's house, and see
Him and the Elder Brother face to face, —
What day or hour I know not. Let me be
Steadfast in work, and earnest in the race.
Not as a homesick child who all day long
Whines at its play, and seldom speaks in song.
If for a time some loved one goes away.
And leaves us our appointed work to do.
Can we to him or to ourselves be true
In mourning his departure day by day.
And so our work delay ?
Nay, if we love and honor, we shall make
The absence brief by doing well our task, —
Not for ourselves, but for the dear One's sake.
And at his coming only of him ask
Approval of the work, which most was done.
Not for ourselves, but our Beloved One.
Our Father's house, I know, is broad and grand ;
In it how many, many mansions are !
And, far beyond the light of sun or star.
Four little ones of mine through that fair land
Are walking hand in hand !
Think you I love not, or that I forget
These of my loins ? Still this world is fair.
And I am singing while my eyes are wet
With weeping in this balmy summer air ;
Yet I'm not homesick, and the children here
Have need of me, and so my way is clear.
I would be joyful as my days go by.
Counting God's mercies to me. He who bore
Life's heaviest cross is mine forevermore.
And I who wait his coming, shall not I
On his sure word rely ?
And if sometimes the way be rough and steep.
Be heavy for the grief he sends to me.
Or at my waking I would only weep.
Let me remember these are things to be.
To work his blessed will until he come
To take my hand, and lead me safely home.
Anson d. F. Randolph.
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fi-
392
POEMS OF RELIGION.
WHY THUS LONGING?
Why thus longing, thus forever sighing
For the far off, unattained, and dim,
While the beautiful, all round thee lying.
Offers up its low perpetual hymn ?
Wouldst thou listen to its gentle teaching.
All thy restless yearnings it would still ;
Leaf and flower and laden bee are preaching
Thine own sphere, though humble, first to fill.
Poor indeed thou must be, if around thee
Thou no ray of light and joy canst throw, —
If no silken cord of love hath bound thee
To some little world through weal and woe ;
If no dear eyes thy fond love can brighten, —
No fond voices answer to thine own ;
If no brother's sorrow thou canst lighten
By daily syunpathy and gentle tone.
Not by deeds that win the crowd's applauses.
Not by works that gain thee world-renown.
Not by martyrdom or vaunted crosses,
Canst thou win and wear the immortal crown.
Daily struggling, though unloved and lonely.
Every day a rich reward will give ;
Thou wilt find, by hearty striving only.
And tiTily loving, thou canst tnily live.
Dost thou revel in the rosy morning.
When all nature hails the Lord of light,
And his smile, the mountain-tops adorning.
Robes yon fragrant fields in radiance bright ?
Other hands may grasp the field and forest.
Proud proprietors in pomp may shine ;
But with fervent love if thou adorest.
Thou art wealthier, — all the world is thine.
Yet if through earth's wide domains thou rovest.
Sighing that they are not thine alone.
Not those fair fields, but thyself thou lovest.
And their beauty and thy wealth are gone.
Nature wears the color 01 the spirit ;
Sweetly to her worshipper she sings ;
All the glow, the grace she doth inherit.
Round her trusting child she fondly flings.
harriet winslow sewall.
0 YET WE TRUST- THAT SOMEHOW
GOOD.
from "in memoriam."
h
0 yet we trust that somehow good
AVill be the final goal of ill.
To pangs of nature, sius of will.
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood ;
That nothing walks with aimless feet ;
That not one life shall be destroyed.
Or cast as rubbish to the void.
When God hath made the pile complete ;
That not a worm is cloven in vain ;
That not a moth with vain desire
Is shrivelled in a fruitless fire.
Or but subserves another's gain.
Behold, we know not anything ;
I can but trust that good shall fall
At last — far off—at last, to all,
And every winter change to spring.
So runs my dream : but what am I ?
An infant crying in the night :
An infant crying for the light :
And with no language but a cry.
Alfred Tennyson.
THE LOVE OF GOD.
Thott Grace Divine, encircling all,
A soundlesa, shoreless sea !
Wherein at last our souls must fall,
0 Love of God most free !
When over dizzy heights we go.
One soft hand blinds our eyes.
The other leads us, safe and slow,
O Love of God most wise !
And though we turn us from thy face
And wander wide and long.
Thou hold'iît us still in thine embrace,
0 Love of God most strong !
The saddened heart, the restless soul.
The toil-worn frame and mind.
Alike confess thy .sweet control,
O Love of God most kind !
But not alone thy care we claim.
Our wayward steps to win ;
We know thee by a dearer name,
0 Love of God within !
And, filled and quickened by thy breath.
Our souls are strong and free
To rise o'er sin and fear and death,
0 Love cf God, to thee !
Eliza scudder.
LOVE DIVINE, ALL LOVE EXCELLING.
Love djvme, ali Iqve expelling,
Joy ollheavea'toyarth corné down.
Fix in us thy humble dwelling.
All thy faithful mercies crown ;
-0'
Jesus, thou art all compassion !
Pure, unbounded love thou art ;
Visit us with thy salvation.
Enter every trembling heart.
Breathe, O, breathe thy loving spirit
Into every troubled Weast ;
Let us all in thee inherit.
Let us find the promised rest ;
Take away the love of sinning.
Alpha and Omega be ;
End of faith, as its beginning.
Set our hearts at liberty.
Come, almighty to deliver.
Let us all thy life receive ;
Suddenly return, and never.
Never more thy temples leave :
Thee we would be always blessing.
Serve thee as thy hosts above ;
Pray and praise thee without ceasing.
Glory in thy precious love.
Finish then thy new creation ;
Pure, imspotted may we be ;
Let us see thy great salvation
Perfectly restored by thee :
Changed from glory into glory.
Till in heaven we take our place !
Till we cast our crowns before thee.
Lost in wonder, love, and praise.
AUGUSTUS TOPLADV.
I SAW THEE.
*'When thou wast under the fig-tree, I saw theCi"
I saw thee when, as'twilight fell,
And evening lit her fairest star.
Thy footsteps sought yon quiet dell,
The world's confusion left afar.
I saw thee when thou stood'st alone.
Where drooping branches thick o'erhung.
Thy still retreat to all unknown,
Hid in deep shadows darkly flung.
I saw thee when, as died each sound
Of bleating flock or woodland bird,
Kneeling, as if on holy ground.
Thy voice the listening silence heard.
I saw thy calm, uplifted eyes.
And marked the heaving of thy breast,
When rose to heaven thy heartfelt sigh«
For purer life, for perfect rest.
I saw the light that o'er thy face
Stole with a soft, suffusing glow,
As if, within, celestial grace
Breathed the same bliss that angels know.
I saw — what thou didst not— above
Thy lowly head an open heaven ;
And tokens of thy Father's love
With smiles to thy rapt spirit given.
I saw thee fix>m that sacred spot
With firm and peaceful soul depart ;
I, Jesus, saw thee, — doubt it not, —
And read the secrets of thy heart !
rav falmbr.
—«—
STRONG SON OF GOD, IMMORTAL LOVK
FROM " IN MEMORIAM."
Strong Son of God, immortal Love,
Whom we, that have not seen thy face,
By faith, and faith alone, embrace.
Believing where we cannot prove ;
Thine are these orbs of light and shade ;
Thou madest Life in man and brute ;
Thou madest Death ; and lo, thy foot
Is on the skull which thou hast made.
Thou wilt not leave us in the dust :
Thou madest man, he knows not why ;
He thinks he was not made to die ;
And thou hast made him : thou art just.
Thou seemest human and divine.
The highest, holiest manhood, thou :
Our wills are ours, we know not how ;
Our wiUs are ours, to make them thine.
Our little systems have their day ;
They have their day and cease to be :
They are but broken lights of thee.
And thou, O Lord, art more than they.
We have but faith : we cannot know ;
For knowledge is of things we see ;
And yet we trust it comes from thee,
A beam in darkness : let it grow.
Let knowledge grow from more to more,
But more of reverence in us dwell ;
That mind and soul, according well.
May make one music as before.
But vaster. We are fools and slight ;
We mock thee when we do not fear :
But help thy foolish ones to bear ;
Help thy vain worlds to bear thy light. ' '
E]
394
POEMS OF
RELIGION.
a
Forgive what seemed my sin in me ;
What seemed my worth since I began ;
For merit lives from man to man,
And not from man, O Lord, to thee.
Forgive my grief for one removed.
Thy creature, whom I found so fair.
I trust he lives in thee, and there
I find him worthier to be loved.
Forgive these wild and wandering cries.
Confusions of a wasted youth ;
Forgive them where they fail in truth.
And in thy wisdom make me wise.
Alfred Tennyson.
THE SOUL'S CRY.
" I cry unto thee daily." — PS. Ixxxvi. 3.
0, EVEK from the deeps
Within my soul, oft as I muse alone.
Comes forth a voice that pleads in tender tone ;
As when one long unblest
Sighs ever after rest ;
Or as the wind perpetual murmuring keeps.
I hear it when the day
Fades o'er the hiUs, or 'cross the shimmering sea ;
In the soft twilight, as is wont to be.
Without my wish or will.
While all is hushed and still.
Like a sad, plaintive cry heard far away.
Not even the noisy crowd.
That like some mighty torrent rushing down
Sweeps clamoring on, this cry of want can drown ;
But ever in my heart
Afresh the echoes start ;
I hear them still amidst the tumult loud.
Each waking mom anew
The sense of many a need returns again ;
I feel myself a child, helpless as when
I watched my mother's eye.
As the slow hours went by.
And from her glance my being took its hue.
I cannot shape my way
Where nameless perils ever may betide,
O'er slippery steeps whereon my feet may slide ;
Some mighty hand I crave.
To hold and help and save.
And guide me ever when my steps would stray.
There is but One, I know.
That all my hourly, endless wants can meet ;
Can shield from haim, recall my wandering feet ;
My God, thy hand can feed
And day by day can lead
Where the sweet streams of peace and safety fiow,
Ray Palmer.
FEAGMENTS.
Deitt.
From thee, great God, we spring, to thee we tend,
Path, motive, guide, original, and end.
The Rambler, No- 7. Dr, S. JOHNSON.
God sendeth and giveth, both mouth and the meat.
Good Husbandry Lessons, T. TUSSER.
'T is Providence alone secures
In every change both mine and yours.
A Failc. COWPER.
One God, one law, one element,
And one far-off divine event.
To which the whole creation moves.
In Memoriam, Conclusion. TBNNYSON.
Give what thou canst, without thee we are poor,
And with thee rich, take what thou wilt away.
Tht Task : Winter Momine Walt, COWPER.
God, from a beautiful necessity, is Love.
0/Immortality
M. F. TUPPER.
Yet I shall temper so
Justice with mercy, as may illustrate most
Them fully satisfied, and thee appease.
Paradise Lost, Book x. MiLTON.
Who sees with equal eye, as God of all,
A hero perish, or a sparrow fall.
Atoms or systems into ruin hurled.
And now a bubble burst, and now a world.
Essay on Man, Epistle /. POPE.
•
And He that doth the ravens feed.
Yea, providently caters for the sparrow.
Be comfort to my age !
As You Like It, Act iL Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE;
My God, my Father, and my Friend,
Do not forsake me at my end.
♦ Translation of Dies Iree, Earl OF ROSCOMMON.
As full, as perfect, in vile man that mourns.
As the rapt seraph that adores and bums :
To Him no high, no low, no great, no small ;
He fills. He bounds, connects, and equals all !
Essay on Man, Epistle Í. PoPE.
To God the Father, God the Son,
And God the Spirit, three in one ;
Be honor, praise, and glory given.
By all on earth, and all in heaven.
Glory to the Father and the Son, dr. i. watts.
■0
FRAGMENTS.
395
Atheism.
Forth from his dark and lonely hiding-place,
(Portentous sight !) the owlet Atheism,
Sailing on obscene wings athwart the noon.
Drops his blue-fringed lids, and holds them close.
And, hooting at the glorious Sun in Heaven,
Cries out, " Where is it ? "
Fears in Selitude. COLERIDGE.
An atheist's laugh's a poor exchange
For Deity offended !
EpistUtoa Young Friend. BURNS.
Pkeaohing and Missions.
I preached as never sure to preach again.
And as a dying man to dying men.
Love breathing Thanks and Praise. R. Baxter.
What in me is dark
Illumine, what is low raise and support ;
That to the height of this great argument
I may assert eternal Providence,
And justify the ways of God to men.
Paradise Lost, Book i. Milton.
Time flies, death urges, knells call, heaven in¬
vites.
Hell threatens.
Night Thoughts, Night ii. DR. E. YOUNG.
If goodness lead him not, yet weariness
May toss him to my breast.
The Pulley. GEORGE HERBERT.
Religion stands on tiptoe in our land,
Ready to pass to the Ameriean strand.
The Church Militant. GEORGE HERBERT.
From Greenland's icy mountains.
From India's coral strand.
Where Afric's sunny fountains
Roll down their golden sand.
Missionary Hymn.
Bishop heber.
Sin.
4
I see the right, and I approve it too.
Condemn the wrong, and yet the wrong pursue.
Metamorphoses, vii. 20. Tr. of Tate Gr Stonestreet. OviD.
Where is the man who has not tried
How mirth can into folly glide.
And folly into sin !
The Bridal 0/ Triermain, Cant. i. ScOTT.
There is a method in man's wickedness.
It grows up by degrees.
A King and no King, Act v. Sc
beaumont and Fletcher.
Ay me, how many perils doe enfold
The righteous man, to make him daily fall.
Faerie Queene, Book i. Spenser.
Of man's first disobedience and the fruit
Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste
Brought death into the world and all our woe.
Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON.
Though every prospect pleases.
And only man is vüe.
Missionary Hymn. BISHOP HEBER.
And he that does one fault at first.
And lies to hide it, makes it two.
Divine Songs,
dr. i. Watts.
But, sad as angels for the good man's sin.
Weep to record, and blush to give it in.
Pleasures of Hofe, T. CAMPBELL.
About some act.
That has no relish of salvation in't.
Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 2.
shakespeare.
Long is the way
And hard, that out of hell leads up to light.
Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTON.
Commit
The oldest sins the newest kind of ways.
Henry IV., Part II. Act iï. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
So farewell hope, and with hope farewell fear.
Farewell remorse : all good to me is lost.
Evil, be thou my good.
Paradise Lost, Book iv. MiLTON.
Vice is a monster of so frightful mien
As to be hated, needs but to be seen.
Essay on Man, Epistle II. pope.
0 shame, where is thy blush?
Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 4.
shakespeare.
Conscience.
Servant of God, well done.
Paradise Lost, Book vi. milton.
As ever in my great taskmaster's eye.
On his being arrived to the Age 0/ Tmenty-three, milton.
And sure the eternal Master found
His single talent well employed.
Verses on Robert Level. dr. s. johnson,
Consideration, like an angel, came
And whipped the offending Adam out of him.
Henry V., Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Leave her to Heaven,
And to those thorns that in her bosom lodge.
To prick and sting her.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5.
shakespeare.
Why should not conscience have vacation.
As well as other courts o' th' nation ?
HuetOras, Part 11. Cant. iL DR. S. BUTLER.
396
POEMS OF
RELIGION.
Remorse.
Now conscience wakes despair
That slumbered, wakes the bitter memory
Of what he was, what is, and what must be.
Paradise Lost, Book iv. MILTON.
What exile from himself can flee ?
To zones though more and more remote
Still, still pursues, where'er I be.
The blight of life — the demon Thought.
Childs Harold, Cant. L
Se quoque fugit
Odes. Book ii. Ode xvii.
BVRON.
Patriae quis exsul
HORACE.
Fleeting Good.
Some fleeting good, that mocks me with the view.
Goldsmith.
The Traveller.
The good he scorned
Stalked off reluctant, like an ill-used ghost.
Not to return ; or, if it did, in visits
Like those of angels, short and far between.
The Grave, Part 11, R. Blair.
Hell.
All hope abandon, ye who enter here.
In/erno Cant. iii. DANTE.
Which way shall 1 fly
Infinite wrath, and infinite despair ?
Which way 1 fly is hell ; myself am hell ;
And, in the lowest deep, a lower deep.
Still threatening to devour me, opens wide.
To which the hell 1 suffer seems a heaven.
Paradise Lost, Book iv. MlLTON.
When all the world dissolves.
And every creature shall be purified.
All places shall be hell that are not heaven.
Faustus. C. Marlowe.
The Devil.
The devil hath power
To assume a pleasing shape.
Hamlet, Act iL Sc. 2.
SHAKESPEARE.
And oftentimes, to win us to our harm.
The instruments of darkness tell us truths ;
Win us with honest trifles, to betray us
In deepest consequence.
Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 3. shakespeare.
But the trail of the serpent is over them all.
Paradise and the Peri. MOORE.
Respectability.
Assume a virtue, if you have it not.
Hamlet, ActiU. Sc. 4. shakespeare.
Hypocrisy.
That practised falsehood under saintly shew,
Deep malice to conceal, couched with revenge.
Paradise Lost, Book iv.
Milton.
With devotion's visage.
And pious action, we do sugar o'er
The devil himself.
Hamlet, Act liL Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
1 waive the quantum o' the sin,
The hazard of concealing ;
But, och ! it hardens a' within.
And petrifies the feeling.
Epistle to a Young Friend. BURNS.
Built God a church, and laughed his word to
scorn.
Retirement. cowper.
But then I sigh, and with a piece of scripture
TeU them that God bids us do good for evil :
And thus 1 clothe my naked villany
With odd old ends stol'n forth of holy writ.
And seem a saint when most 1 play the devil.
King Richard III., Act L Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
And the devil did grin, for his darling sin
Is pride that apes humility.
The DeviVs Thoughts. coleridge.
Ecclesiasticism.
Christians have burnt each other, quite per¬
suaded
That all the Apostles would have done as they
did.
Don yuan. Cant. L B'vron.
Till Peter's keys some christened Jove adorn.
And Pan to Moses lends his pagan horn.
The Dunciad, Book iiL POPE
With crosses, relics, crucifixes.
Beads, pictures, rosaries, and pixes ;
The tools of working out salvation
By mere mechanic operation.
Hudibras, Part III. Cant. i. DR. S. BUTLER.
When pious frauds and holy shifts
Are dispensations and gifts.
Hudibras, Part I. Cant. 3.
R. S. BUTLER.
In hope to merit heaven by making earth a heU.
Childe Harold, Cant. i. BVRON.
Spires whose "silent fingers point to heaven."
The Excursion, Book \i. WORDSWORTH.
To rest, the cushion and soft dean invite.
Who never mentions hell to ears polite.
Moral Essays, Epistle IV. POPE.
4-'
&
FRAGMENTS.
397
a
Perverts the Prophets and purloins the Psalms.
En^iish Bards and Scotch Reviewers. byron.
The enormous faith of many made for one.
Essay on Man, Epistle III» Pope.
Embryos and idiots, eremites and friars,
"White, black, and gray, with all their trumpery
Paradise Lost, Book m. MILTON*
Theologt.
In Adam's fall
"We sinned all.
My Book and Heart
Must never part.
Young Obadias,
David, Josias,—
All were pious.
Peter denyed
His Lord, and cryed.
Young Timothy
Learnt sin to fly.
Xerxes did die,
And so must I.
Zaccheus he
Did climb the tree
Our Lord to see.
New England Primer.
Hold thou the good : define it well ;
For fear divine Philosophy
Should push beyond her mark, and be
Procuress to the Lords of Hell.
In Mtmmriam. Tennyso.n.
0 Star-eyed Science ! hast thou wandered there.
To waft us home the message of despair ?
PUasuresc/Hope. T. CAMPBELL.
The Bible.
"When love could teach a monarch to be wise.
And Gospel-light first dawned from Bullen's eyes.
Education and Qovermnettí,
T. GRAY.
Just kuows, and knows no more, her Bible true.
Truth. COWPBR.
Within that awful volume lies
The mystery of mysteries !
And better had they ne'er been horn,
"llTio read to doubt, or read to scorn.
The Monastery. SCOTT.
Belief and Doubt.
One in whom persuasion and belief
Had ripened into faith, and faith become
A passionate intuition.
The Excursion, BookWORDSWORTH.
Nor less 1 deem that there are Powers
Which of themselves our minds impress ;
That we can feed this mind of ours
In a wise passiveness.
Expostulation and Reply. WORDSWORTU.
But there are wanderers o'er Eternity
Whose bark drives on and on, and anchored
ne'er shall be.
Childe Harold, Cant. iiL BYRON.
Whose faith has centre everywhere.
Nor cares to fix itself to form.
In Memoriam. tennyson.
But Faith, fanatic Faith, once wedded fast
To some dear falsehood, hugs it to the last.
LallaRookh: Veiled Prophet of Khorassan. MOORB.
For forms of government let fools contest;
Whate'er is best administered is best :
For modes of faith let gi'aceless zealots fight ;
His can't be wrong whose life is in the right.
Essay an Man, Epistle III. POPE.
Perplexed in faith, but pure in deeds.
At last he beat his music out.
There lives more faith in honest doubt.
Believe me, than in half the creeds.
In Memoriam. tennyson.
Jesus Christ.
Brightest and best of the sons of the morning !
Dawn on our darkness, and lend us thine aid.
Epiphany. BISHOP HEBER.
Some say, that ever 'gainst that season comes
"Wherein our Saviour's birth is celebrated.
The bird of dawning singeth all night long ;
And then, they say, no spirit dare stir abroad ;
The nights are wholesome ; then no planets
strike.
No fairy takes, nor witch hath power to charm.
So hallowed and so gracious is the time.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. X, SHAKESPEARE.
In those holy fields.
Over whose acres walked those blessed feet
Which fourteen hundred years ago were nailed.
For our advantage, on the bitter cross.
Henry IK. Pari I. Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
398
POEMS OF RELIGION.
a
He was the Word, that spake it ;
He took the bread and brake it ;
And what that Word did make it,
I do believe and take it.
Divitu Points : On tJu Sacramtnt.
Dr. j. Donne.
Virtue.
Do well and right, and let the world sink.
Country Parson. george herbert*
For blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds.
And though a late, a sure reward succeeds.
The Mourning Bride, Acty, Sc. 12. "w. congreve.
That virtue only makes our bliss below.
And all our knowledge is, ourselves to know.
Essay on Man, Epistle IV. pope.
Pygmies are pygmies still, though perched on
Alps ;
And pyramids are pyramids in vales.
Each man makes his own stature, builds himself :
Virtue alone outbuilds the Pyramids ;
Her monuments shall last when Egypt's fall.
Night Thoughts, NightDR. E. YOUNG.
Abashed the devil stood.
And felt how awful goodness is, and saw
Virtue in her shape how lovely.
Paradise Lost, Book iv. MILTON.
Count that day lost whose low descending sun
Views from thy hand no worthy action done.
Art 0/Reading, [Bartlett, p. 606.] Staniford.
Shine by the side of every path we tread
With such a lustre, he that runs may read.
Tirocinium. cowper.
Good, the more
Communicated, more abundant grows.
Paradise Lost, Book v. MiLTON.
His/œiiÂ, perhaps, in some nice tenets might
Be wrong ; his life, I' m sure, was in the right.
On the Death 0/Crashatu. A. COWLEY.
Know then this truth (enough for man to know),
" Virtue alone is happiness below."
Essay on Man, Epistle ly. pope.
There buds the promise of celestial worth.
The Last Day, Book và. Dr. E. Young.
TI10 best of what we do and are.
Just God, forgive.
Thoughts Suggested on the Banks o/Nith. WORDSWORTH.
Truth.
The firste vertue, sene, if thou wilt lere.
Is to restreine, and kepen wel thy tonge.
T)u MancifUs Tale. CHAUCER.
0, while you Uve, teU truth, and shame the devil
Henry IV., Part I, Act iiî. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
And simple truth miscalled simplicity,
And captive good attending captain ül.
Sonna LXVt. SHAKBSPBARB.
Truth is the highest thing that man may keep.
The Frankeleines Tate. CHAUCER.
For truth has such a face and such a mien.
As to be loved needs only to be seen.
The Hind and Panthtr. dryden.
Charity.
In Faith and Hope the world will
But aU mankind's concern is charity.
Essay on Man, Epistle III.
Whene'er I take my walks abroad.
How many poor I see !
What shall I render to my God
For all his gifts to me ?
Divine Songs.
DR. I. WATTS.
Who wUl not mercie unto others show.
How can he mercy ever hope to have ?
Faerie Queene, Book vL SPENSER.
'T is hers to pluck the amaranthine flower
Of Faith, and round the sufferer's temples bind
Wreaths that endure affliction's heaviest shower.
And do not shrink from sorrow's keenest wind.
Sonna XXXy. WORDSWORTH.
The primal duties shine aloft, like stars ;
The charities that soothe, and heal, and bless.
Are scattered at the feet of man, like flowers.
The Excursion, Book ix. WORDSWORTH.
And leam the luxury of doing good.
The Traveller.
GOLDSUITH.
Prayer.
Pi-ayer is the soul's sincere desire.
Uttered or unexpressed.
The motion of a hidden ñre
That trembles in the breast.
IVhat is Prayer t J. MONTGOMERY.
And Satan trembles when he sees
The weakest saint upon his knees.
Exhortation to Prayer. cowper.
FRAGMENTS.
The imperfect offices of prayer and praise.
The Excursim, Bmh l wordsworth.
Her eyes are homes of silent prayer.
In Mentfiriatn, tbnnyson*
0 limed soul ! that, struggling to be free.
Art more engaged ! Help, angels ! make assay :
Bow, stubborn knees ; and, heart, with strings
of steel,
Be soft as sinews of the new-born babe.
HamUt, Act ül 5^. x shakespeare.
Religious Meditation.
Remote from man, with God he passed the days.
Prayer all his business, all his pleasure praise.
The Hermit. t. parnell.
Or if Sion hill
Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook, that flowed
Fast by the oracle of God.
Paradis« Lost, Book 1. milton.
The Christian Life.
I held it tnith, with him who sings
To one clear harp in divers tones.
That men may rise on stepping-stones
Of their dead selves to higher things.
In Uemoriam. tennyson.
Saint Augustine I well hast thou said.
That of our vices we can frame
A ladder, if we will but tread
Beneath our feet each deed of shame !
The Ladder of St. Augustine. longfellow.
Could we forbear dispute, and practise love,
We should agree as angels do above.
Divine Love, Cant. ul. e. waller*
A Christian is the highest style of man.
Night Thoughts, Night ir. dr. e. young.
Heaven.
If God hath made this world so fair.
Where sin and death abound.
How beautiful, beyond compare.
Will paradise be found !
The Earth full 0/God S Goodness. j, montgomery.
We know what we are, but know not what we
may be.
Hamlet. Act t. Sc. $. shakespeare.
Lo, the poor Indian ! whose untutored mind
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind ;
His soul, proud Science never taught to stray
Far as the solar walk or milky way.
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky,
His faithful dog shall bear him company.
Essay on Man, Epistle I. POP&
This world is all a fleeting show,
For man's illusion given ;
The smiles of joy, the tears of woe.
Deceitful shine, deceitful flow, —
There's nothing true but Heaven !
Sacred Songs: The world it allaßeetingshow» moorb*
Beyond this vale of tears
There is a life above.
Unmeasured by the flight of years ;
And all that life is love.
The Issues o/Life and Death, j. montgomery.
For all we know
Of what the blessed do above
Is, that they sing and that they love.
While I listen to thy voice. e. waller.
Of all that is most beauteous imaged there
In happier beauty ; more pellucid streams.
An ampler ether, a diviner air.
And fields invested with purpureal gleams.
Laodamia. wordsworth.
Other heights in other lives., God willing.
One Word More, r. browning.
POEMS OF NATURE.
a
POEMS OF NATURE.
SONNET.
The World is too much with us ; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers ;
Little we see in nature that is ours ;
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon !
This sea that bares her bosom to the moon ;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers ;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune ;
It moves us not. — Great God ! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn,
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn ;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea,
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.
William Wordsworth,
NATURE.
The bubbling brook doth leap when I come by.
Because my feet find measure with its call ;
The birds know when the friend they love is nigh.
For 1 am known to them, both great and small.
The flower that on the lonely hillside grows
Expects me there when spring its bloom has given ;
And many a tree and bush my wanderings knows.
And e'en the clouds and silent stars of heaven ;
For he who with his Maker walks aright.
Shall be their lord as Adam was before ;
His ear shall catch each sound with new delight.
Each object wear the dress that then it wore ;
And he, as when erect in soul he stood.
Hear from his Father's lips that all is good.
Jones Very.
COME TO THESE SCENES OF PEACE.
Come to these scenes of peace,
Where, to rivers murmuring,
The sweet birds all the summer sing.
Where cares and toil and sadness cease 1
Stranger, does thy heart deplore
Friends whom thou wilt see no more ?
Does thy wounded spirit prove
Pangs of hopeless, severed love ?
Thee the stream that gushes clear,
Thee the birds that carol near
Shall soothe, as silent thou dost lie
And dream of their wild lullaby ;
Come to bless these scenes of peace.
Where cares and toU and sadness cease.
William lisle Bowles.
TINTERN ABBEY.
Five years have past ; five summers, with the
length
Of five long winters ! and again I hear
These waters,*rollingfrom their mountain-springs
With a soft inland murmur. — Once again
Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs.
That on a wild, secluded scene impress
Thoughts of more deep seclusion, and connect
The landscape with the quiet of the sky.
The day is come when I again repose
Here, under this dark sycamore, and view
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts,
Which at this season, with their unripe fruits.
Are clad in one green hue, and lose themselves
Mid groves and copses. Once again I see
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines
Of sportive wood run wild : these pastoral farms.
Green to the very door ; and wreaths of smoke
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees !
With some uncertain notice, as might seem
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods.
Or of some hennit's cave, where by his fire
The hermit sits alone.
These beauteous forms.
Through a long absence, have not been to me
As is a landscape to a blind man's eye ;
But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them.
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet.
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart ;
And passing even into my purer mind,
• The River Wye.
fl-
404
POEMS OF NATURE.
■a
With tranquil restoration : — feelings too
Of unremembered pleasure : such, perhaps,
As liave no slight or trivial influence
On that best portion of a good man's life.
His little, nameless, unremembered acts
Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust.
To them I may have owed another gift,
Of aspect more sublime ; that blessed mood.
In which the burden of the mystery.
In which the heavy and the weary weight
Of all this unintelligible world.
Is lightened, — that serene and blessëd mood.
In which the aflections gently lead us on.
Until, the breath of this coi-poreal frame
And even the motion of our human blood
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep
In body, and become a living soul :
While with an eye made quiet by the power
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy.
We see into the life of things.
If this
Be but a vain belief, yet, 0, how oft —
In darkness and amid the many shapes
Of joyless daylight ; when the fretful stir
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world,
Have hung upon the beatings of my heart —
How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee,
0 sylvan Wye ! thouwanderer through the woods.
How often has my spirit turned to thee !
And now, with gleams of half-extinguished
thought.
With many recognitions dim and faint.
And somewhat of a sad perplexity,
The picture of the mind revives again :
While here I stand, not only with the sense
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts
That in this moment there is life and food
For future years. And so I dare to hope.
Though changed, no doubt, from what I was when
fii-st
1 came among these hills ; when like a roe
I bounded o'er the mountain.s, by the sides
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams.
Wherever nature led : more like a man
Flying from something that he dreads, than one
Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then
(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days
And their glad animal movements all gone by)
To me was all in all. — I cannot paint
What then I was. The sounding cataract
Haunted me like a passion : the tall rook.
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood.
Their colors and their forms, were then to me
An appetite ; a feeling and a love.
That had no need of a remoter charm
By thoughts supplied, nor any interest
Unborrowed from the eye. —That time is past,
And all its aching joys are now no more.
And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this
Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur ; other gifts
Have followed ; for such loss, I would believe.
Abundant recompense. For I have learned
To look on nature, not as in the hour
Of thoughtless youth ; but hearing oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity.
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that distmbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts ; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused.
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns.
And the round ocean, and the living air.
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man :
A motion and a spirit, that impels
All thinking things, all objects of all thought.
And rolls through all things. Therefore am 1
still
A lover of the meadows and the woods,
And mountains ; and of all that we behold
From this green earth ; of all the mighty world
Of eye, and ear, — both what they half create,*
And what perceive ; well pleased to recognize
In nature and the language of the sense.
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse.
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul
Of all my moral being.
Nor perchance,
If I were not thus taught, should I the more
Suffer my genial spirits to decay :
For thou art with me here upon the banks
Of this fair river ; thou my dearest friend.
My dear, dear friend ; and in thy voice I catch
The language of my former heart, and read
My fonner pleasures in the shooting lights
Of thy wild eyes. O, yet a little while
May I behold in thee what I was once.
My dear, dear sister ! and this prayer I make.
Knowing that Nature never did betray
The heart that loved her ; 't is her privilege,
Through all the years of this our life, to lead
From joy to joy : for she can so inform
The mind that is within us, so impress
With quietness and beauty, and so feed
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues.
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men.
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all
The dreary intercourse of daily life.
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb
Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold
Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon
Shine on thee in thy solitary walk ;
And let the misty mountain-winds be free
* " This line has a close resemblance to an admirable line of
Younj^'s, the exact expression of which I do not recollect." ^ THE
AUTHOR.
•3
(S-
POEMS OF NATURE.
405
a
To blow against thee ; and, in after years,
When these wild ecstasies shall be matured
Into a sober pleasure ; when thy mind
Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms.
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place
For all sweet sounds and harmonies ; 0, then,
If solitude or fear or pain or grief
Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts
Of tender joy wilt thou remember me.
And these my exhortations ! Nor, perchance, —
If I should be where I no more can hear
Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these
gleams
Of past existence, — wilt thou then forget
That on the banks of this delightful stream
We stood together ; and that I, so long
A worshipper of Nature, hither came
Unwearied in that service : rather say
With warmer love, — 0, with far deeper zeal
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget
That after many wanderings, many years
Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs.
And this green pastoral landscape, were to me
More dear, both for themselves and for thy sake !
william wordsworth.
FOR A COPY OF THEOCRITUS.
villanellb.
from "essays in old french forms of verse."
O Singer of the field and fold,
Theocritus ! Pan's pipe was thine, —
Thine was the happier Age of Gold.
For thee the scent of new-turned mould.
The beehives and the murmuring pine,
O Singer of the field and fold !
Thou sang'st the simple feasts of old, —
The beechen bowl made glad with wine ;
Thine was the happier Age of Gold.
Thou bad'st the rustic loves be told.
Thou bad'st the tuneful reeds combine,
0 Singer of the field and fold !
And round thee, ever laughing, rolled
The blithe and blue Sicilian brine ;
Thine was the happier Age of Gold.
Alas for us ! Our songs are cold ;
Our Northern suns too sadly .shine : —
O Singer of the field and fold.
Thine was the happie/Age of Gold !
Austin dobson.
NATURE'S CHAIN.
from "the essay on man."
Look round our world ; behold the chain of love
Combining all below and all above.
See plastic nature working to this end.
The single atoms each to other tend.
Attract, attracted to, the next in place.
Formed and impelled its neighbor to embrace.
See matter next, with various life endued,
Press to one centre still, the general good.
See dying vegetables life sustain.
See life dissolving vegetate again :
All forms that perish other forms supply
(By turns we catch the vital breath, and die) ;
Like bubbles on the sea of matter borne.
They rise, they break, and to that sea return.
Nothing is foreign ; parts relate to whole ;
One all-extending, all-preserving Soul
Connects each being, greatest with the least ;
Made beast in aid of man, and man of beast ;
All served, all serving ; nothing stands alone ;
The chain holds on, and where it ends, unknown.
Has God, thou fool ! worked solely for thy good.
Thy joy, thy pastime, thy attire, thy food ?
Who for thy table feeds the wanton fawn.
For him as kindly spreads the flowery lawn.
Is it for thee the lark ascends and sings ?
Joy tunes his voice, joy elevates his wings.
Is it for thee the linnet pours his throat ?
Loves of his own and raptures swell the note.
The bounding steed you pompously bestride
Shares with his lord the pleasure and the pride.
Is thine alone the seed that strews the plain ?
The birds of heaven shall vindicate their grain.
Thine the full harvest of the golden year ?
Part pays, and justly, the deserving steer :
The hog that ploughs not, nor obeys thy call.
Lives on the labors of this lord of all.
Know, Nature's children all divide her care ;
The fur that warms a monarch warmed a bear.
While man exclaims, "See all things for my use ! "
" See man for mine ! " replies a pampered goose :
And just as short of reason he must fall
Who thinks all made for one, not one for all.
alexander pope.
EACH AND ALL.
Little thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked
clown.
Of thee from the hill-top looking down ;
The heifer that lows in the upland farm.
Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm ;
The sexton, tolling his bell at noon.
Deems not that gi-eat Napoleon
Stops his horse, and lists witlij delight.
Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height
3
406
POEMS OF NATURE.
Nor knowest thou what argument
Thy life to thy neighbor's creed has lent.
All are needed by each one ;
Nothing is fair or good alone.
I thought the sparrow's note from heaven,
Singing at dawn on the alder bough ;
I brought him home, in his nest, at even ;
He sings the song, but it pleases not now.
For I did not bring home the river and sky ; —
He sang to my ear, — they sang to my eye.
The delicate shells lay on the shore ;
The bubbles of the latest wave
Fresh pearls to their enamel gave ;
And the bellowing of the savage sea
Greeted their safe escape to me.
1 wiped away the weeds and foam,
1 fetched my sea-bom treasures home ;
But the poor, unsightly, noisome things
Had left their beauty on the shore.
With the sun and the sand and the wild uproar.
The lover watched his graceful maid.
As mid the virgin train she strayed,
Nor knew her beauty's best attire
Was woven still by the snow-white choir.
At last she came to his hermitage.
Like the bird from the woodlands to the cage ; —
The gay enchantment was undone,
A gentle wife, but fairy none.
Then I said, "I covet truth ;
Beauty is unripe childhood's cheat ;
I leave it behind with the games of youth." —
As I spoke, beneath my feet
The ground-pine curled its pretty wreath.
Running over the club-moss burrs ;
I inhaled the violet's breath ;
Around me stood the oaks and firs ;
Pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground ;
Over me soared the eternal sky.
Full of light and of deity ;
Again I saw, again I heard,
The rolling river, the morning bird ; —
Beauty through my senses stole ;
1 yielded myself to the perfect whole.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
!&■
RETIREMENT.
inscription in a hermitage.
Beneath this stony roof reclined,
] soothe to peace my pensive mind ;
And while, to shade my lowly cave.
Embowering elms their umbrage wave.
And while the maple dish is mine, —
The beechen cup, unstained with wine, -
I scorn the gay licentious crowd.
Nor heed the toys that deck the proud.
Within my limits, lone and still.
The blackbird pipes in artless trill ;
Fast by my couch, congenial guest.
The wren has wove her mossy nest :
From busy scenes and brighter skies.
To lurk with innocence, she flies.
Here hopes in safe repose to dwell.
Nor aught suspects the sylvan celL
At mom I take my customed round.
To mark how buds yon shrabby mound.
And every opening primrose count.
That trimly paints my blooming mount ;
Or o'er the sculptures, quaint and rude.
That grace my gloomy solitude,
I teach in winding wreaths to stray
Fantastic ivy's gadding spray.
At eve, within yon studious nook,
I ope my brass-embossèd book.
Portrayed with many a holy deed
Of martyrs, crowned with heavenly meed ;
Then, as my taper waxes dim.
Chant, ere I sleep, my measured hymn.
And, at the close, the gleams behold
Of parting wings, bedropt with gold.
While such pure joys my bliss create.
Who but would smile at guilty state ?
Who but would wish his holy lot
In calm oblivion's humble grot ?
Who but would cast his pomp away.
To take my staff, and amice gray ;
And to the world's tumultuous stage
Prefer the blameless hermitage ?
thomas warton.
ON A BEAUTIFUL DAY.
0 unseen Spirit ! now a calm divine
Comes forth from thee, rejoicing earth and air !
Trees, hills, and houses, all distinctly shine.
And thy great ocean slumbers everywhere.
The mountain ridge against the purple sky
Stands clear and strong, with darkened rocks
and dells.
And cloudless brightness opens wide and high
A home aerial, where thy presence dwells.
The chime of bells remote, the murmuring sea.
The song of biiTis in whispering copse and wood.
The distant voice ofVhildren's thoughtless glee.
And maiden's song, are all one voice of good.
-Ö
RALPH WALDO EMERSON'S STUDY.
" The passive master lent his hand
To the vast Soul that o^er him planned^"'
f
POEMS OF NATURE.
407
a
Amid the leaves' green mass a sunny play
Of flash and shadow stirs like inward life :
The ship's white sail glides onward far away,
Unhaunted by a dream of storm or strife.
John Sterling.
i
INVOCATION TO LIGHT.
from "paradise lost." book iii.
Hail, holy Light, offspring of Heaven first-bom !
Or of the Eternal coeternal beam
May I express thee unblamed ? since God is light.
And never but in unapproachèd light
Dwelt from eternity, dwelt then in thee, .»
Bright effluence of bright essence increate !
Or hear'st thou rather pure ethereal stream.
Whose fountain who shall tell ? Before the sun.
Before the heavens, thou wert, and at the voice
Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest'
The rising world of "-aters dark and deep.
Won from the void and formless infinite.
Thee I revisit now with bolder wing.
Escaped the Stygian pool, though long detained
In that obscure sojourn, while in my flight
Through utter and through middle darkness
home.
With other notes than to the Orphean lyre,
I sung of Chaos and etemal Night,
Taught by the heavenly Muse to venture dowm
The dark descent, and up to re-ascend.
Though hard and rare : thee I revisit safe,
And feel thy sovereign vital lamp ; but thoij
Revisitest not these eyes, that roll in vain
To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn ;
So thick a drop serene hath quenched their orbs.
Or dim suffusion veiled. Yet not the more
Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt
Clear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill,
Smit with the love of sacred song ; hut chief
Thee, Sion, and the flowery hrooks beneath,
That wash thy hallowed feet, and warbling flow.
Nightly I visit : nor sometimes forget
Those other two equalled with me in fate.
So were I equalled with them in renown.
Blind Thamyiis and blind Mseonides,
And Tiresias and Phineus, prophets old :
Then feed on thoughts that voluntary move
Harmonious numbers ; as the wakeful bird
Sings darkling, and in shadiest covert hid
Tunes her noctumal note. Thus with the year
Seasons return, but not to me returns
Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn.
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose.
Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine ;
But cloud, instead, and ever-during dark.
Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men
Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair
Presented with a universal blank
Of nature's works, to me expunged and rased.
And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out.
So much the rather thou, celestial Light,
Shine inward, and the mind through all her
powers
Irradiate ; there plant eyes, all mist from thence
Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell
Of things invisible to mortal sight.
FROM THE "HYMN TO LIGHT."
Say, from what golden quivers of the sky
Do all thy wingèd arrows fly ?
Swiftness and Power by birth are thine
From thy great sire they came, thy sire, the
Word Divine.
Thou in the Moon's bright chariot, proud and
gay,
Dost thy bright wood of stars survey
And all the year dost with thee bring
Of thousand flowery lights thine own nocturiBl
spring.
Thou, Scythian-like, dost round thy lands
above
The Sun's gilt tent forever move.
And still, as thou in pomp dost go.
The shining pageants of the world attend thy
show-
Nor amidst all these triumphs dost thou scorn
The humble glow-worms to adorn,
And with those living spangles gild
(O greatness without pride !) the bushes of the
field.
Night and her ugly subjects thou dost fright.
And Sleep, the lazy owl of night ;
Ashamed, and fearful to appear.
They screen their horrid shapes with the black
hemisphere.
At thy appearance. Grief itself is said
To shake his wings, and rouse his head :
And cloudy Care has often took
A gentle beamy smile, reflected from thy look.
At thy appearance, fear itself grows bold ;
Thy sunshine melts away his cold.
Encouraged at the sight of thee
To the cheek color comes, and firmness to the
knee.
■51
e
408
POEMS OF NATURE
When, goddess, thou lift'st up thy wakened
head
Out of the morning's purple bed.
Thy quire of birds about thee play,
And all the joyful world salutes the rising day.
All the world's bravery, that delights oui' eyes.
Is but thy several liveries ;
Thou the rich dye on them bestow'st.
Thy nimble pencil paints this landscape as thou
go'st.
A crimson garment in the rose thou wear'st ;
A crown of studded gold thou bear'st ;
The virgin-lilies, in their white.
Are clad but with the lawn of almost naked light.
The violet, Spring's little infant, stands
Girt in thy purple swaddling-bands ;
On the fair tulip thou dost dote ;
Thou cloth'st it in a gay and party-colored coat.
Through the soft ways of heaven, and air, and
sea.
Which open all their pores to thee.
Like a clear river thou dost glide,
And with thy living stream through the close
channels slide.
But the vast ocean of unbounded day.
In the empyrean heaven does stay.
Thy rivers, lakes, and springs, below.
From thence took first their rise, thither at last
must flow.
abraham cowley.
DAYBREAK.
A wind came up out of the sea.
And said, " O mists, make room for me ! "
It hailed the ships, and cried, " Sail on,
Y. mariners, the night is gone ! "
And hurried landward far away.
Crying, " Awake ! it is the day ! "
It said unto the forest, "Shout !
Hang all your leafy banners out ! "
It touched the wood-bird's folded wing.
And said, " 0 bird, awake and sing ! "
And o'er the fai-ms, " O chanticleer,
Your clarion blow ; the day is near ! "
It whispered to the fields of com,
" Bow down, and.hail the coming mom ! "
It shouted through the belfry-tower,
" Awake, 0 beU ! proclaim the hour."
It crossed the churchyard with a sigh.
And said, " Not yet ! in quiet lie."
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
MORNING SONG.
Up ! quit thy bower ! late wears the hour.
Long have the rooks cawed round the tower ;
O'er flower and tree loud hums the bee.
And the wild kid sports merrily.
The sun is bright, the sky is clear ;
Wake, lady, wake ! and hasten here.
Up, maiden fair ! and bind thy hair.
And rouse thee in the breezy air !
The lulling stream that soothed thy dream
Is dancing in the sunny beam.
Wasteinot these hours, so fresh, so gay :
Leave thy soft couch and haste away !
Up ! Time will tell the morning bell
Its service-sound has chimed well ;
The aged crone keeps house alone.
The reapers to the fields are gone.
Lose not these hours, so cool, so gay :
Lo ! while thou sleep'st they haste away !
Joanna baillis.
MORNING.
In the bam the tenant cock,
Close to partlet perched on high.
Briskly crows (the shepherd's clock !)
Jocund that the morning's nigh.
Swiftly from the mountain's brow,
Shadows, nursed by night, retire ;
And the peeping sunbeam now.
Paints with gold the village spire.
Philomel forsakes the thorn.
Plaintive where she prates at night ;
And the lark, to meet the mom,
Soars beyond the shepherd's sight.
From the low-roofed cottage ridge.
See the chattering swallow spring ;
Darting through the one-arched bridge.
Quick she dips her dappled wing.
Now the pine-tree's waving top
Gently greets the moming gale :
Kidlings now begin to crop
Daisies, on the dewy dale.
fl-
POEMS OP NATURE.
409
a
From the balmy sweets, uncloyed
(Restless till her task be done),
Now the busy bee's employed
Sipping dew before the sun.
Trickling through the creviced rock.
Where the limpid stream distils.
Sweet refreshment waits the flock
When't is sun-drove from the hills.
Colin's for the promised corn
(Ere the harvest hopes are ripe)
Anxious ; — whilst the huntsman's horn,
Boldly sounding, di-owns his pipe.
Sweet, 0 sweet, the warbling throng,
On the white emblossomed spray !
Nature's universal song
Echoes to the rising day.
john Cunningham.
THE NORTHERN LIGHTS.
To claim the Arctic came the sun
With banners of the burning zone.
UnroUed upon their airy spars.
They froze beneath the light of stars ;
And there they float, those streamers old,
Those Northern Lights, forever cold !
Benjamin Franklin Taylor.
DAWN.
The night was dark, though sometimes a faint
star
A little while a little space made bright.
The night was long and like an iron bar
Lay heavy on the land : till o'er the sea
Slowly, within the East, there grew a light
Which half was starlight, and half seemed to be
The herald of a greater. The pale white
Turned slowly to pale rose, and up the height
Of heaven slowly climbed. The gray sea grew
Rose-colored like the sky. A white gull flew
Straight toward the utmost boundary of the East,
Where slowly the rose gathered and increased.
It was as on the opening of a door
By one that in his hand a lamp doth hold.
Whose flame is hidden by the garment's fold, —
The still air moves, the wide room is less dim.
More bright the East became, the ocean turned
Dark and more dark against the brightening
sky,—
Sharper against the sky the long sea line.
The hollows of the breakers on the shore
Were green like leaves whereon no sun doth shine,
Though white the outer branches of the tree.
From rose to red the level heaven burned ;
Then sudden, as if a sword fell from on high,
A blade of gold flashed on the horizon's rim.
Richard Watson Gilder.
PACK CLOUDS AWAY.
Pack clouds away, and welcome day.
With night we banish sorrow ;
Sweet air, blow soft ; mount, lark, aloft.
To give my love good morrow.
Wings from the wind to please her mind.
Notes from the lark 1 '11 borrow :
Bird, prune thy wing ; nightingale, sing.
To give my love good morrow.
To give my love good morrow.
Notes from them all 1 '11 borrow.
Wake from thy nest, robin redbreast,
Sing, birds, in every furrow ;
And from each hill let music shrill
Give my fair love good morrow.
Blackbird and thrush in eveiy bush,
Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow.
You petty elves, amongst yourselves.
Sing my fair love good morrow.
To give my love good morrow.
Sing, birds, in every furrow.
thomas heywood.
MORNING.
from "the minstrel."
But who the melodies of mom can tell ?
The wild brook babbling down the mountain¬
side ;
The lowing herd ; the sheepfold's simple bell ;
The pipe of early shepherd dim descried
In the lone valley ; echoing far and wide
The clamorous horn along the cliffs above ;
The hollow murmur of the ocean-tide ;
The hum of bees, the linnet's lay of love.
And the full choir that wakes the universal grove.
The cottage curs at early pilgrim bark ;
Crowned with her pail the tripping milkmaid
sings ;
The whistling ploughman stalks afield ; and,
hark!
Down the rough slope the ponderous wagon
rings ;
Through rustling com the hare astonished
springs ;
Slow tolls the village-clock the drowsy hour ;
The partridge bursts away on whirring wings ;
Deep mourns the turtle in sequestered bower.
And shrUl lark carols clear from her aerial tower.
James Beattie.'
[&
410
POEMS OF NATURE.
THE SABBATH MORNING.
With silent awe I hail the sacred mom,-
That slowly wakes while all the fields are still !
A soothing calm on every breeze is borne ;
A graver murmur gurgles from the rill ;
And echo answers softer from the hill ;
And sweeter sings the linnet from the thorn :
The skylark warbles in a tone less shrill.
Hail, light serene ! hail, sacred Sabbath mom !
The rooks float silent by in airy drove ;
The sun a placid yeUow lustre throws ;
The gales that lately sighed along the grove
Have hushed their downy wings in dead repose ;
The hovering rack of clouds forgets to move, —
So smiled the day when the first morn arose !
john levden.
6
RÈVE DU MIDI.
When o'er the mountain steeps
The hazy noontide creeps.
And the shrill cricket sleeps
Under the grass ;
When soft the shadows lie.
And clouds sail o'er the sky.
And the idle winds go by.
With the heavy scent of blossoms as they pass,—
Then, when the silent stream
Lapses as in a dream.
And the water-lilies gleam
Up to the sun ;
When the hot and burdened day
Rests on its downward way.
When the moth forgets to play.
And the plodding ant may dream her work is
done, —
Then, from the noise of war
And the din of earth afar.
Like some forgotten star
Dropt from the sky, —
Tlie sounds of love and fear.
All voices sad and clear.
Banished to silence drear, —
The willing thrall of trances sweet 1 lie.
Some melancholy gale
Breathes its mysterious tale.
Till the rose's lips grow pale
With her sighs ;
And o'er my thoughts are cast
Tints of the vanished past.
Glories that faded fast.
Renewed to splendor in my dreaming eyes.
As poised on vibrant wings.
Where its sweet treasure swings.
The honey-lover clings
To the red flowers, —
So, lost in vivid light.
So, rapt from day and night,
I linger in delight.
Enraptured o'er the vision-freighted hours.
rose Terry cookb.
A SUMMER NOON.
Who has not dreamed a world of bliss
On a bright sunny noon like this.
Couched by his native brook's green maze,
With comrade of his boyish days.
While all around them seemed to be
Just as in joyous infancy ?
Who has not loved, at such an hour.
Upon that heath, in birchen bower.
Lulled in the poet's dreamy mood.
Its wild and sunny solitude ?
While o'er the waste of purple ling
You mark a sultry glimmering ;
Silence herself there seems to sleep.
Wrapped in a slumber long and deep.
Where slowly stray those lonely sheep
Through the tall foxglove's crimson bloom.
And gleaming of the scattered broom.
Love you not, then, to list and hear
The crackling of the gorse-flowers near.
Pouring an orange-scented tide
Of fragrance o'er the desert wide ?
To hear the buzzard's whimpering shrill.
Hovering above you high and still ?
The twittering of the bird that dwells
Among the heath's delicious bells ?
While round your bed, o'er fern and blade.
Insects in green and gold arrayed.
The sun's gay tribes have lightly strayed ;
And sweeter sound their humming wings
Than the proud minstrel's echoing strings.
William howitt.
NOONTIDE.
Beneath a shivering canopy reclined.
Of aspen-leaves that wave without a wind,
I love to lie, when lulling breezes stir
The spiry cones that tremble on the fir ;
Or wander mid the dark-green fields of broom.
When peers in scattered tufts the yellow bloom ;
Or trace the path with tangling furze o'errun.
When bursting seed-bells crackle in the sun.
And pittering grasshoppers, confus'dly shrill,
Pipe giddily along the glowing hiU :
POEMS OP NATURE.
411
Sweet grasshopper, who lov'st at noon to lie
Serenely in the green-ribbed clover's eye,
To sun thy filmy wings and emerald vest.
Unseen thy form, and undisturbed thy rest.
Oft have I listening mused the sultry day.
And wondered what thy chirping song might say,
When naught was heard along the blossomed lea.
To join thy music, save the listless bee.
JOHN LEVDEN.
THE MIDGES DANCE ABOON THE BURN.
The midges dance aboon the burn ;
The dews begin to fa' ;
The pairtricks down the rushy holm
Set up their e ening ca'.
Now loud and clear the blackbird's sang
Rings through the briery shaw.
While, fiitting gay, the swallows play
Around the castle wa'.
Beneath the golden gloamin' sky
The mavis mends her lay ;
The redbreast pours his sweetest strains
To charm the lingering day ;
While weary yeldrins seem to wail
Their little nestlings torn.
The merry wren, frae den to den,
Gaes jinking through the thorn.
The roses fauld their silken leaves.
The foxglove shuts its bell ;
The honeysuckle and the birk
Spread fragrance through the dell.
Let others crowd the giddy court
Of mirth and revelry.
The simple joys that nature yields
Are dearer far to me.
ROBERT Tannahill.
DAY IS DYING.
FROM "THE SPANISH GYPSV."
Day is dying ! Float, O song,
Down the westward river.
Requiem chanting to the Day, —
Day, the mighty Giver.
Pierced by shafts of Time he bleeds.
Melted rubies sending
Through the river and the sky.
Earth and heaven blending ;
All the long-drawn earthy banks
Up to cloud-land lifting :
Slow between them drifts the swan,
'Twixt two heavens drifting.
Wings half open, like a flower
Inly deeper flushing.
Neck and breast as virgin's pure, —
Virgin proudly blushing.
Day is dying ! Float, 0 swan,
Down the ruby river ;
Follow, song, in requiem
To the mighty Giver.
Marian Evans Lewes Cross (George Eliot).
THE EVENING WIND.
Spirit that breathest through my lattice : thou
That cooTst the twilight of the sultry day !
Gratefully flows thy freshness round my brow ;
Thou hast been out upon the deep at play.
Riding all day the wild blue waves till now.
Roughening their crests, and scattering high
their spray.
And swelling the white sail. I welcome thee
To the scorched land, thou wanderer of the sea !
Nor I alone, — a thousand bosoms round
Inhale thee in the fulness of delight ;
And languid forms rise up, and pulses bound
Livelier, at coming of the wind of night ;
And languishing to hear thy welcome sound.
Lies the vast inland, stretched beyond the sight.
Go forth into the gathering shade ; go forth, —
God's blessing breathed upon the fainting earth !
Go, rock the little wood-bird in his nest ;
Curl the stUl waters, bright with stars ; and
rouse
The wide old wood from his majestic rest.
Summoning, from the innumerable boughs.
The strange deep harmonies that haunt his breast.
Pleasant shall be thy way where meekly bows
The shutting flower, and darkling waters pass.
And where the o'ershadowing branches sweep
the grass.
Stoop o'er the place of graves, and softly sway
The sighing herbage by the gleaming stone.
That they who near the churchyard willows stray.
And listen in the deepening gloom, alone.
May think of gentle souls that passed away.
Like thy pure breath, into the vast unknown.
Sent forth from heaven among the sons of men,
And gone into the boundless heaven again.
The faint old man shall lean his silver head
To feel thee ; thou shalt kiss the child asleep.
And dry the moistened curls that overspread
His temples, while his breathing grows more
deep ;
L
r
ZI ' * IZ
412 POEMS OF NATURE.
And they who stand about the sick man's bed 0 sunset sky ! 0 purple tide !
Shall joy to listen to thy distant sweep, 0 friends to friends that closer pressed !
And softly part his curtains to allow Those glories have in darkness died.
Thy visit, grateful to his burning brow. And ye have left my longing breast.
I could not keep you by my side.
Go, — but the circle of eternal change. Nor fix that radiance in the west.
Which is the life of nature, shall restore, William belcher glazier.
With sounds and scents from aU thy mighty —•—
range,
Thee to thy birthplace of the deep once more. 0 u in öe. l .
Sweet odors in the sea air, sweet and strange, from -queen mab."
Shall tell the homesick mariner of the shore ; If solitude hath ever led thy steps
And, listening to thy munnur, he shall deem To the wild ocean's echoing shore.
He hears the rustling leaf and running stream. And thou hast lingered there
William Gullen Bryant. Until the SUn's broad orb
Seemed resting on the burnished wave,
—♦— Thou must have marked the lines
Of purple gold that motionless
THE EVENING STAR. Hung o'er the sinking sphere :
Thou must have marked the billowy clouds.
Star that bringest home the bee. Edged with intolerable radiancy.
And sett'st the weary laborer free ! Towering like rocks of jet
If any star shed peace, 't is thou. Crowned with a diamond wreath.
That send'st it from above. And yet there is a moment.
Appearing when heaven's breath and brow When the sun's highest point
Are sweet as hers we love. Peeps like a star o'er ocean's western edge.
When those far clouds of feathery gold.
Come to the luxuriant skies. Shaded with deepest purple, gleam
Whilst the landscape's odors rise. Like islands on a dark-blue sea ;
Whilst far-off lowing herds are heard. Then has thy fancy soared above the earth.
And songs when toil is done. And furled its wearied wing
From cottages whose smoke unstirred Within the Fairy's fane.
Curls yellow in the sun. Yet not the golden islands
Gleaming in yon ñood of light.
Star of love's soft interviews. Nor the feathery curtains
Parted lovers on thee muse ; Stretching o'er the sun's bright couch.
Their remembrancer in heaven Nor the burnished ocean s waves
Of thrilling vows thou art. Paving that gorgeous dome.
Too delicious to be riven So fair, so wonderful a sight
By absence from the heart. As Mab's ethereal palace could afford.
Thomas Campbell. Yet likest evening's vault, that fairy Hall !
Heaven, low resting on the wave, it spread
* Its fioors of flashing light.
Its vast and azure dome,
CAPE-COTTAGE AT SUNSET.
We stood upon the ragged rocks. Floating on a silver sea ;
When the long day was nearly done ; Whilst suns their mingling beamings darted
The waves had ceased their sullen shocks. Through clouds of circumambient darkness.
And lapped our feet with murmuring tone. And pearly battlements around
And o'er the bay in streaming locks Looked 0 er the immense of heaven.
Blew the red tresses of the sun. ,percv bysshe Shelley.
NIGHTFALL; A PICTURE.
Still to a deeper glory grew ;
Above our heads the faint, few stars Low burns the summer afternoon ;
Looked out from the unfathomed blue ; A mellow lustre lights the scene ;
And the fair city's clamorous jars And from its smiling beauty soon
Seemed melted in that evening hue. The purpling shade will chase the sheen.
3 -t
J
f
POEMS OP NATURE.
413
a
The old, quaint homestead's windows blaze ;
The cedars long, black pictures show ;
And broadly slopes one path of rays
Within the barn, and makes it glow.
The loft stares out — the cat intent.
Like carving, on some gnawing rat —
With sun-bathed hay and rafters bent,
Nooked, cobwebbed homes of wasp and bat.
The harness, bridle, saddle, dart
Gleams from the lower, rough expanse ;
At either side the stooping cart.
Pitchfork and plough cast looks askance.
White Dobbin through the stable-doors
Shows his round shape ; faint color coats
The manger, where the farmer pours.
With rustling rush, the glancing oats.
A sun-haze streaks the dusky shed ;
Makes spears of seams and gems of chinks :
In mottled gloss the straw is spread ;
And the gray grindstone dully blinks.
The sun salutes the lowest west
With gorgeous tints around it drawn ;
A beacon on the mountain's breast,
A crescent, shred, a star — and gone.
The landscape now prepares for night :
A gauzy mist slow settles round ;
Eve shows her hues in every sight.
And blends her voice with every sound.
The sheep stream rippling down the dell.
Their smooth, sharp faces pointed straight ;
The pacing kine, with tinkling bell.
Come grazing through the pasture-gate.
The ducks are grouped, and talk in fits :
One yawns with stretch of leg and wing ;
One rears and fans, then, settling, sits ;
One at a moth makes awkward spring.
The geese march grave in Indian file.
The ragged patriarch at the head ;
Then, screaming, flutter off awhile.
Fold up, and once more stately tread.
Brave chanticleer shows haughtiest air ;
Hurls his shrill vaimt with lofty bend ;
Lifts foot, glares round, then follows where
His scratching, picking partlets wend.
Btaid Towser scents the glittering ground ;
Then, yawning, draws a crescent deep.
Wheels his head-drooping frame around
And sinks with fore-paws stretched for sleep.
The oxen, loosened from the plough.
Rest by the pear-tree's crooked trunk ;
Tim, standing with yoke-burdened brow.
Trim, in a moimd beside him sunk.
One of the kine upon the bank
Heaves her face-lifting, wheezy roar ;
One smooths, with lapping tongue, her flank ;
With ponderous droop one finds the floor.
Freed Dobbin thi-ough the soft, clear dark
Glimmers across the pillared scene,
With the grouped geese, — a pallid mark, —
And scattered bushes black between.
The fire-flies freckle every spot
With fickle light that gleams and dies ;
The bat, a wavering, soundless blot.
The cat, a pair of prowling eyes.
Still the sweet, fragrant dark o'erflows
The deepening air and darkening ground ;
By its rich scent I trace the rose.
The viewless beetle by its sound.
The cricket scrapes its rib-like bars ;
The tree-toad purrs in whirring tone ;
And now the heavens are set with stars.
And night and quiet reign alone.
Alfred b. Street.
EVENING IN PARADISE.
from " paradise lost," book iv.
Now came still evening on, and twilight gray
Had in.her sober liyery all things clad ;
Silence accompanied ; for beast and bird.
They to their grassy couch, these to their nests.
Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale ;
She all night long her amorous descant sung.
Süence was pleased ; now glowed the firmament
With living sapphires ; Hesperus, that led
The starry host, rode brightest, till the moon.
Rising in clouded majesty, at length
Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light.
And o'er the dark her silver mantle threw.
EVENING.
from " don juan."
Ave Maria ! o'er the earth and sea,
That heavenliest hour of heaven is worthiest thee !
Ave Maria ! blessid be the hour.
The time, the clime, the spot, where I so oft
Have felt that moment in its fullest power
Sink o'er the earth so beautiful and soft,
y--
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414
POEMS OF NATURE.
a
While swung the deep bell in the distant tower
Or the faint dying day-hymn stole aloft,
And not a breath crept through the rosy air,
And yet the forest leaves seemed stirred with
prayer.
Ave Maria ! 't is the hour of prayer !
Ave Maria ! 't is the hour of love !
Ave Maria ! may our spirits dare
Look up to thine and to thy Son's above !
Ave Maria ! 0 that face so fair !
Those downcast eyes beneath the Almighty
dove, —
What though 't is but a pictured image ? —
strike, —
That painting is no idol, — 't is too like.
Sweet hour of twilight ! in the solitude
Of the pine forest, and the silent shore
Which bounds Ravenna's immemorial wood,
Rooted where once the Adrian wave flowed o'er
To where the last Cajsarean fortress stood.
Evergreen forest ; which Boccaccio's lore
And Dryden's lay made haunted ground to me.
How have I loved the twilight hour and thee !
The shrill cicalas, people of the pine.
Making their summer lives one ceaseless song.
Were the sole echoes, save my steed's and
mine.
And vesper bells that rose the boughs along ;
The spectre huntsman of Onesti's line.
His hell-dogs, and their chase, and the fair
throng
M'hich learned from this example not to fly
From a true lover, — shadowed my mind's eye.
0 Hesperus ! thou bringest all good things, —
Home to the weary, to the hungry cheer.
To the young bird the parent's brooding wings.
The welcome stall to the o'erlabored steer ;
"Whate'er of peace about our hearthstone clings,
Whate'er our household gods protect of dear.
Are gathered round us by thy look of rest ;
Thou bring'st the child, too, to the mother's
breast.
Soft hour ! which wakes the wish and melts the
heart
Of those who sail the seas, on the first day
When they from their sweet friends are torn
apart ;
Or fills with love the pilgrim on his way.
As the far bell of vesper makes him start.
Seeming to weep the dying day's decay :
Is this a fancy which our reason scorns ?
Ah ! surely nothing dies but something mourns.
Lord Byron.
TO DELIA.
Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable Night,
Brother to Death, in silent darkness bom :
Relieve my languish and restore the light ;
With dark forgetting of my care, return.
And let the day be time enough to moum
The shipwreck of my Ul-adventured youth :
Let waking eyes suffice to waü their scom
Without the torment of the night's untrath.
Cease dreams, the images of day desires.
To model forth the i)assions of the moiTow ;
Never let rising sun approve you liars.
To add more grief to aggravate my sorrow.
StiU let me sleep, embracing clouds in vain.
And never wake to feel the day's disdain.
Samuel Daniel.
THE CAMP AT NIGHT.
from "the iliad," book viii.
The winds transferred into the friendly sky
Their supper's savor ; to the which they sat de¬
lightfully.
And spent all night in open field ; fires round
about them shined.
As when about the silver moon, when air is free
from wind.
And stars shine clear, to whose sweet beams,
high prospects, and the brows
Of all steep hiUs and pinnacles, thrust up them¬
selves for shows.
And even the lowly valleys joy to glitter in their
sight.
When the unmeasured firmament bursts to dis¬
close her light.
And all the signs in heaven are seen, that glad
the shepherd's heart ;
So many fires disclosed their beams, made by the
Trojan part.
Before the face of IRon, and her bright turrets
showed.
A thousand courts of guard kept fires, and every
guard allowed
Fifty stout men, by whom their horse eat oats
and hard white corn.
And all did wishfully expect the silver-thronèd
mom.
From the Greek of HOMER. Translation
of GEORGE CHAPMAN.
TO NIGHT.
Swiftly walk over the western wave.
Spirit of Night !
Out of the misty eastem cave.
Where, all the long and lone daylight.
Thou wovest dreams of joy and fear
Which make thee terrible and dear, —
Swift be thy flight !
POEMS OF NATURE.
Wrap thy form in a mantle gray,
Star-inwrought ;
Blind with thine hair the eyes of Day,
Kiss her until she be wearied out ;
Then wander o'er city and sea and land,
Touching all with thine opiate wand, —
Come, long-sought !
When I arose and saw the dawn,
I sighed for thee ;
When light rode high, and the dew was gone,
And noon lay heavy on flower and tree.
And the weary Day turned to her rest.
Lingering like an unloved guest,
I sighed for thee !
Thy brother Death came, and cried,
" Wouldst thou me ? "
Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed.
Murmured like a noontide bee,
" Shall I nestle near thy side ?
Wouldst thou me ? " — And I replied,
'No, not thee !"
Death will come when thou art dead.
Soon, too soon, —
Sleep will come when thou art fled ;
Of neither would I ask the boon
1 ask of thee, beloved Night, —
Swift be thine approaching flight.
Come soon, soon !
PERcv BvssHE Shelley.
♦
NIGHT.
PROM "CHILDE HAROLD." CANTO II.
'T IS night, when Meditation bids us feel
We once have loved, though love is at an end ;
The heart, lone mourner of its baffled zeal,
Though friendless now, will dream it had a
friend.
Who with the weight of years would wish to
bend.
When Youth itself survives young Love and
joy?
Alas I when mingling souls forget to blend.
Death hath but little left him to destroy !
Ah I happy years I once more who would not be
a boy?
Thus bending o'er the vessel's laving side.
To gaze on Dian's wave-reflected sphere.
The soul forgets her schemes of Hope and Pride,
And flies unconscious o'er each backward year.
None are so desolate but something dear.
Dearer than self, possesses or possessed
A thought, and claims the homage of a tear ;
A flashing pang ! of which the weary brea.st
Would still, albeit in vain, the heavy heart divest.
To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell.
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene
Where things that own not man's dominion
dwell.
And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been ;
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen.
With the wild flock that never needs a fold ;
Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean, —
This is not solitude ; 't is but to hold
Converse with Nature's charms, and view her
stores unrolled.
But midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of
men
To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess.
And roam along, the world's tired denizen.
With none who bless us, none whom we can
bless ;
Minions of splendor shrinking from distress I
None that, with kindred consciousness endued.
If we were not, would seem to smile the less
Of all that flattered, followed, sought, and sued ;
This is to be alone ; this, this is solitude !
Lord Byron.
NIGHT.
Mysterious Night ! when our first parent knew
Thee, from report divine, and heard thy name.
Did he not tremble for this lovely frame, —
This glorious canopy of light and blue ?
Yet 'neath a curtain of translucent dew.
Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame,
Hesperus, with the host of heaven, came.
And lo ! creation widened in man's view.
Who could have thought such darkness lay con¬
cealed
Within thy beams, 0 Sun ! or who could find.
Whilst fly and leaf and insect stood revealed.
That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind !
Why do we then shun death with anxious strife !
If light can thus deceive, wherefore not life ?
joseph Blanco white.
NIGHT.
PROM "queen MAB."
How beautiful this night ! the balmiest sigh
Which vernal zephyrs breathe in evening's ear
Were discord to the speaking quietude
That wraps this moveless scene. Heaven's ebon
vault.
Studded with stars unutterably bright.
Through which the moon's unclouded grandeur
rolls.
Seems like a canopy which love has spread
To curtain her sleeping world. Yon gentle hills,
, Robed in a garment of untrodden snow ;
gi
e-
416
POEMS OF NATURE.
Bl
Yon darksome rocks, whence icicles depend,
So stainless that their white and glittering spires
Tinge not the moon's pure beam ; yon castle steep,
Whose banner hangeth o'er the time-worn tower
So idly that rapt fancy deemeth it
A metaphor of peace — all form a scene
Where musing solitude might love to lift
Her soul above this sphere of earthliness ;
Where silence undisturbed might watch alone,
So cold, so bright, so stUl.
The orb of day
In southern climes o'er ocean's waveless field
Sinks sweetly smiling : not the faintest breath
Steals o'er the unruffled deep ; the clouds of eve
. Refiect unmoved the lingering beam of day ;
And vesper's image on the western main
Is beautifully still. To-morrow comes :
Cloud upon cloud, in dark and deepening mass.
Rolls o'er the blackened waters ; the deep roar
Of distant thunder mutters awfully ;
Tempest unfolds its pinion o'er the gloom
That shrouds the boiling surge ; the pitiless fiend,
With all his winds and lightnings, tracks hisprey ;
The torn deep yawns, — the vessel finds a grave
Beneath its jaggèd gulf.
Percy Bvsshe Shelley.
NIGHT.
h
Night is the time for rest :
How sweet, when labors close.
To gather round an aching breast
The curtain of repose.
Stretch the tired limbs, and lay the head
Upon our own delightful bed !
Night is the time for dreams :
The gay romance of life.
When truth that is, and tnith that seems.
Blend in fantastic strife ;
Ah ! visions, less beguiling far
Than waking dreams by daylight are !
Night is the time for toil :
To plough the classic field.
Intent to find the buried spoil
Its wealthy furrows yield ;
Till all is ours that sages taught.
That poets sang or heroes wrought.
Night is the time to weep :
To wet with unseen tears
Those graves of Memory, where sleej
The joys of other yeai-s ;
Hopes, that were Angels at their birth.
But perished young, like things of earth.
Night is the time to watch :
O'er ocean's dark expanse.
To hail the Pleiades, or catch
The full moon's earliest glance.
That brings into the homesick mind
All we have loved and left behind.
Night is the time for care :
Brooding on hours misspent.
To see the spectre of Despair
Come to our lonely tent ;
Like Brutus, midst his slumbering host.
Startled by Csesar's stalwart ghost.
Night is the time to muse :
When, from the eye, the soul
Takes flight ; and, with expanding views.
Beyond the starry pole
Descries athwart the abyss of night
The dawn of uncreated light.
Night is the time to pray :
Our Saviour oft withdrew
To desert mountains far away ;
So will his followers do, —
Steal from the throng to haunts untiod.
And hold communion there with God.
Night is the time for Death :
When all around is peace.
Calmly to yield the weary breath.
From sin and suffering cease.
Think of heaven's bliss, and give the sign
To parting friends ; — such death be mine !
James Montgomery.
HYMN TO THE NIGHT.
*AaTraa¿T)t TpiAÀt<rroç.
I HEARD the trailing garments of the Night
Sweep through her marble halls !
I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light
From the celestial walls !
I felt her presence, by its spell of might,
Stoop o'er me from above ;
The calm, majestic presence of the Night,
As of the one I love.
I heard the sounds of sorrow and delight.
The manifold, soft chimes.
That fill the haunted chambers of the Night,
Like some old poet's rhymes.
From the cool cisterns of the midnight air
My spirit drank repose ;
The fountain of perpetual peace flows there, —
From those deep cisterns flows.
-51
POEMS OF NATURE.
417
■a-
0 holy Night ! from thee I learn to bear
What man has home before !
Thou layeat thy finger on the lips of Care,
And they complain no more.
Peace ! Peace ! Orestes-like I breathe this prayer !
Descend with broad-winged flight,
The welcome, the thrice-prayed for, the most fair.
The best-belovèd Night !
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.
HYMN.
FROM "THE SEASONS."
¡0-.-
These, as they change. Almighty Father, these
Are but the varied God. The rolling year
Is full of thee. Forth in the pleasing spring
Thy beauty walks, thy tenderness and love.
Wide flush the fields ; the softening air is balm ;
Echo the mountains round ; the forest smiles ;
And every sense and every heart is joy.
Then comes thy glory in the summer months.
With light and heat refulgent. Then thy sun
Shoots full perfection through the swelling year ;
And oft thy voice in dreadful thunder speaks.
And oft at dawn, deep noon, or falling eve.
By brooks and groves in hollow-whispering gales.
Thy bounty shines in autumn unconfined.
And spreads a common feast for all that lives.
In winter awful thou ! with clouds and storms
Around thee thrown, tempest o'er tempest rolled.
Majestic darkness ! on the whirlwind's wing
Riding sublime, thou bidd'st the world adore.
And humblest nature with thy northern blast.
Mysterious round ! whatskill, what force divine.
Deep felt, in these appear ! a simple train.
Yet so delightful mixed, with such kind art.
Such beauty and beneficence combined ;
Shade, unperceived, so softening into shade ;
And all so forming an harmonious whole.
That, as they still succeed, they ravish still.
But wandering oft, with brute unconscious gaze,
Man marks not thee, marks not the mighty hand.
That, ever busy, wheels the silent spheres ;
Works in the secret deep ; shoots, steaming,
thence
The fair profusion that o'erspreads the spring ;
Flings from the sun direct the flaming day ;
Feeds every creature ; hurls the tempest forth ;
And, as on earth this grateful change revolves.
With transport touches all the sirrings of life.
Nature, attend ! join every living soul.
Beneath the spacious temple of the sky.
In adoration join ; and, ardent, raise
One general song ! To Him, ye vocal gales.
Breathe soft, whose spirit in your freshness
breathes :
0, talk of him in solitary glooms ;
Where, o'er the rock, the scarcely waving pine
Fills the brown shade with a religious awe.
And ye whose bolder note is heard afar.
Who shake the astonished world, lift high to
Heaven
The impetuous song, and say from whom you
rage.
His praise, ye brooks, attune, ye trembling rills ;
And let me catch it as 1 muse along.
Ye headlong torrents, rapid, and profound ;
Ye softer floods, that lead the humid maze
Along the vale ; and thou, majestic main,
A secret world of wonders in thyself,
Sound his stupendous praise, — whose greater
voice
Or bids you roar, or bids your roarings fall.
Soft roll your incense, herbs, and fruits, and
flowers.
In mingled clouds to him, — whose sun exalts.
Whose breath perfumes you, and whose pencil
paints.
Ye forests bend, ye harvests wave, to him ;
Breathe your still song into the reaper's heart.
As home he goes beneath the joyous moon.
Ye that keep watch in heaven, as earth asleep
Unconscious lies, effuse your mildest beams.
Ye constellations, while your angels strike.
Amid the spangled sky, the silver lyre
Great source of day ! best image here below
Of thy Creator, ever pouring wide.
From world to world, the vital ocean round.
On Nature write with every beam his praise.
The thunder rolls ; be hushed the prostrate
world ;
While cloud to cloud returns the solemn hymn.
Bleat out afresh, ye hills ; ye mossy rocks.
Retain the sound ; the broad responsive low.
Ye valleys, raise ; for the great Shepherd reigns.
And his unsuffering kingdom yet will come.
Ye woodlands all, awake : a boundless song
Burst from the groves; and when the restless
day.
Expiring, lays the warbling world asleep.
Sweetest of birds ! sweet Philomela, charm
The listening shades, and teach the night his
praise.
Ye chief, for whom the whole creation smiles.
At once the head, the heart, and tongue of all.
Crown the great hymn ! in swarming cities vast.
Assembled men to the deep organ join
The long-resounding voice, oft breaking clear.
At solemn pauses, through the swelling bass ;
And, as each mingling flame increases each.
In one united ardor rise to heaven.
Or if you rather choose the rural shade.
And find a fane in every sacred grove.
There let the .shepherd's flute, the virgin's
-t-
s lay, t
G
418
POEMS OF NATURE.
The prompting seraph, and the poet's lyi'e,
Still sing the God of seasons as they roll.
For me, when I forget the darling theme.
Whether the blossom blows, the summer i-ay
Russets the plain, inspiring autumn gleams.
Or winter rises in the blackening east, —
Be my tongue mute, my fancy paint no more.
And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat !
Should fate command me to the farthest verge
Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes.
Rivers unknown to song, — where first the sun
Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam
Flames on the Atlantic isles, — 't is naught to
me :
Since God is ever present, ever felt.
In the void waste as in the city full ;
And where he vital breathes there must be joy.
When even at last the solemn hour shall come,
And wing my mystic ñight to future worlds,
1 cheerful will obey ; there, with new powers.
Will rising wonders sing ; I cannot go
Where Universal Love not smiles around,
Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their suns ;
From seeming evü still educing good.
And better thence again, and better still.
In infinite progression. But I lose
Myself in him, in light ineffable !
Come, then, expressive Silence, muse his praise.
James Thomson.
MARCH.
Slater of winter, art thou here again ?
0 welcome, thou that bring'st the summer nigh !
The bitter wind makes not thy victory vain.
Nor will we mock thee for thy faint blue sky.
Welcome, O March ! whose kindly days and dry
îlake April ready for the throstle's song.
Thou first redresser of the winter's wrong !
Yea, welcome, March ! and though 1 die ere June,
Yet for the hope of life 1 give thee praise.
Striving to sweU the burden of the tune
That even now I hear thy brown birds raise,
Unmindful of the past or coming days ;
Who sing, " 0 joy ! a new year is begun !
What happiness to look upon the sun ! "
0, what begetteth all this storm of bliss.
But Death himself, who, crying solemnly.
Even from the heart of sweet Forgetfulness,
Bids us, " Rejoice ! lest pleasureless ye die.
Within a little time must ye go by.
Stretch forth your open hands, and, while ye live,
Take all the gifts that Death and Life may give."
william morris.
MORNING IN MAY.*
from "the canterbury pilgrims : the knightes tale."
The busy larke, messager of daye,
Salueth in hire song the morwe graye ;
And fyry Phebus ryseth up so brighte.
That al the orient laugheth of the lighte.
And with his stremes dryeth in the greves +
The silver di'opes, hongyng on the leeves.
And Areite, that is in the court ryal
With Theseus, his squyer principal.
Is risen, and loketh on the merye day.
And for to doon his observaunce to May,
Remembryng on the poynt of his desir.
He on his courser, stertyng as the fir, Î
Is riden, into the feeldes him to pleye, §
Out of the court, were it a myle or tweye.
And to the grove, of which that 1 yow tolde.
By aventure his wey he gan to holde.
To maken him a garland of the greves.
Were it of woodebynde or hawethorn leves.
And lowde he song ayens the sonne scheene ;
" May, with aUe thy fioures and thy greene.
Welcome be thou, wel faire fressche May,
I hope that I som grene gete may."
chaucer.
SPRING.
from "in memoriam."
Dip down upon the northern shore,
0 sweet new-year, delaying long ;
Thou doest expectant Nature wrong ;
Delaying long, delay no more.
What stays thee from the clouded noons.
Thy sweetness from its proper place ?
Can trouble live with April days.
Or sadness in the summer moons ?
Bring orchis, bring the foxglove spire.
The little speedwell's darling blue.
Deep tulips dashed with fiery dew.
Laburnums, dropping-wells of fire.
0 thou, new-year, delaying long,
Delayest the sorrow in my blood.
That longs to burst a frozen bud.
And flood a fresher throat with song.
Now fades the last long streak of snow ;
Now bourgeons every maze of quick
About the flowering squares, and thick
By ashen roots the violets blow.
• Text of the Ciarendan Series.
t Groves. J Fire. § Play.
POEMS OF NATURE
419
Now rings the woodland loud and long,
The distance takes a lovelier hue,
And drowned in yonder living blue
The lark becomes a sightless song.
Now dance the lights on lawn and lea.
The flocks are whiter down the vale.
And milkier every milky sail
On winding stream or distant sea ;
Where now the sea-mew pipes, or dives
In yonder greening gleam, and fly
The happy birds, that change their sky
To build and brood, that live their lives
From land to land ; and in my breast
Spring wakens too ; and my regret
Becomes an April violet.
And buds and blossoms like the rest.
Alfred Tennyson.
DIE DOWN, 0 DISMAL DAY.
Die down, 0 dismal day, and let me live ;
And come, blue deeps, magnificently strewn
With colored clouds, — large, light, and fugi¬
tive, —
By upper winds through pompous motions blown.
Now it is death in life, — a vapor dense
Creeps round my window, till I cannot see
The far snow-shining mountains, and the glens
Shagging the mountain-tops. 0 God ! make free
This barren shackled earth, so deadly cold, —
Breathe gently forth thy spring, till winter flies
In rude amazement, fearful and yet bold.
While she performs her customed charities ,'
I weigh the loaded hours till life is bare, —
0 God, for one clear day, a snowdrop, and sweet
air !
david gray.
t.-
SUMMER LONGINGS.
An ! my heart is weaiy waiting.
Waiting for the May, —
Waiting for the pleasant rambles
Where the fragrant hawthorn-brambles.
With the woodbine alternating.
Scent the dewy way.
Ah ! my heart is weary waiting.
Waiting for the May.
Ah ! my heart is sick with longing,
Longing for the May, —
Longing to escape from study
To the young face fair and ruddy,
And the thousand charms belonging
To the summer's day.
Ah ! my heart is sick with longing.
Longing for the May.
Ah ! my heart is sore with sighing.
Sighing for the May, —
Sighing for their sure returning.
When the summer beams are burning,
Hopes and flowers that, dead or dying.
All the winter lay.
Ah ! my heart is sore with sighing,
Sighing for the May.
Ah ! my heart is pained with throbbing.
Throbbing for the May, —
Throbbing for the seaside billows.
Or the water-wooing willows ;
Where, in laughing and in sobbing,
Glideithe streams away.
Ah ! my heart, my heart is throbbing.
Throbbing for the May.
Waiting sad, dejected, weary.
Waiting for the May :
Spring goes by with wasted warnings, —
Moonlit evenings, sunbright mornings, —
Summer comes, yet dark and dreary
Life still ebbs away ;
Man is ever weary, weary.
Waiting for the May !
Denis Florence MacCarthy.
WHEN THE HOUNDS OF SPRING.
When the hounds of spring are on winter's
traces.
The mother of months in meadow or plain
Fills the shadows and windy places
With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain ;
And the brown bright nightingale amorous
Is half assuaged for Itylus,
For the Thracian ships and the foreign faces ;
The toiigueless vigil, and all the pain.
Come with bows bent and with emptying of
quivers.
Maiden most perfect, lady of light,
With a noise of winds and many rivers.
With a clamor of waters, and with might ;
Bind on thy sandals, 0 thou most fleet,
Over the splendor and speed of thy feet !
For the faint east quickens, the wan west shivers,
Round the feet of the day and the feet of the
night.
£]-
420
POEMS OP NATURE.
n
Where shall we find her, how shall we sing to her,
Fold our hands round her knees and cling ?
0 that man's heart were as fire and could spring
to her.
Fire, or the strength of the streams that spring !
For the stars and the winds are unto her
As raiment, as songs of the harp-player ;
For the risen stars and the fallen cling to her,
And the southwest-wind and the west-wind
sing.
For winter's rains and ruins are over.
And all the season of snows and sins !
The days dividing lover and lover.
The light that loses, the night that wins ;
And time remembered its grief forgotten.
And frosts are slain and flowers begotten.
And in green underwood and cover
Blossom by blossom the spring begins.
The full streams feed on flower of rushes.
Ripe grasses trammel a travelling foot, .
The faint fresh flame of the young year flushes
From leaf to flower and flower to fruit ;
And fruit and leaf are as gold and fire.
And the oat is heard above the lyre.
And the hoofed heel of a satyr crushes
The chestnut-husk at the chestnut-root.
And Pan by noon and Bacchus by night.
Fleeter of foot than the fleet-foot kid,
Follows with dancing and fills with delight
The Maenad and the Bassarid ;
And soft as lips that laugh and hide.
The laughing leaves of the trees divide.
And screen from seeing and leave in sight
The god pursuing, the maiden hid.
The ivy falls with the Baechanal's hair
Over her eyebrows shading her eyes ;
The wild vine slipping down leaves bare
Her bright breast shortening into sighs ;
The wild vine slips with the weight of its leaves.
But the berried ivy catches and cleaves
To the limbs that glitter, the feet that seare
The wolf that follows, the fawn that flies.
Algernon Charles Swinburne.
I&
THE WINTER BEING OVER.
The winter being over.
In order comes the spring.
Which doth green herbs discover,
And cause the birds to sing.
The night also expired.
Then comes the morning bright.
Which is so much desired
By all that love the light.
This may learn
Them that mourn
To put their grief to flight :
The spring succeedeth winter.
And day must follow night.
He therefore that sustaineth
Affliction or distress
Which every member paineth.
And findeth no release, —
Let such therefore despair not.
But on firm hope depend.
Whose griefs immortal are not,
And therefore must have end.
They that faint
With complaint
Therefore are to blame ;
They add to their afflictions.
And amplify the same.
For if they could with patience
Awhile possess the mind.
By inward consolations
They might refreshing find.
To sweeten all their crosses.
That little time they 'dure ;
So might they gain by losses.
And sharp would sweet procure.
But if the mind
Be inclined
To unquietness.
That only may be called
The worst of all distress.
He that is melancholy.
Detesting all delight.
His wits by sottish folly
Are ruinated quite.
Sad discontent and mumiurs
To him are incident ;
Were he possessed of honors.
He could not be content.
Sparks of joy
Fly away ;
Floods of care arise ;
And all delightful motion-
In the conception dies.
But those that are contented
However things do fall.
Much anguish is prevented.
And they soon freed from all.
They finish all their labors
With much felicity ;
Their joy in trouble savors
Of perfect piety.
POEMS OF NATURE.
421
Cheerfulness
Doth express
A settled pious mind,
Which is not prone to grudging,
From murmming refined.
Anne Coluns.
SPRING.
written while a prisoner in england.
The Time hath laid his mantle by
Of wind and rain and icy chill.
And dons a rich embroidery
Of sunlight poured on lake and hill.
No beast or bird in earth or sky,
Whose voice doth not with gladness thrill,
For Time hath laid his mantle by
Of wind and rain and icy chill.
River and fountain, brook and riU,
Bespangled o'er with livery gay
Of silver droplets, wind their way.
All in their new apparel vie.
For Time hath laid his mantle by.
Charles of Orleans.
RETURN OF SPRING.
God shield ye, heralds of the spring !
Ye faithful swallows, fleet of wing,
Houps, cuckoos, nightingales.
Turtles, and every wilder bird.
That make your hundred chirpings heard
Through the green woods and dales.
God shield ye, Easter daisies all.
Fair roses, buds, and blossoms small.
And he whom erst the gore
Of Ajax and Narciss did print.
Ye wUd thyme, anise, balm, and mint,
1 welcome ye once more !
God shield ye, bright embroidered train
Of butterflies, that on the plain
Of each sweet herblet sip ;
And ye, new swarms of bees, that go
Where the pink flowers and yellow grow
To kiss them with your lip !
A hundred thousand times I call
A hearty welcome on ye all !
This season how 1 love —
This merry din on every shore —
For winds and storms, whose suUen roar
Forbade my steps to rove.
From the French of PlERRB RONSARD.
SPRING.
Again the violet of our early days
Drinks beauteous azure from the golden sun.
And kindles into fragrance at his blaze ;
The streams, rejoiced that winter's work is done.
Talk of to-morrow's cowslips, as they run.
Wild apple, thou art blushing into bloom !
Thy leaves are coming, snowy-blossomed thorn !
Wake, buried lily ! spirit, quit thy tomb !
And thou shade-loving hyacinth, be bom !
Then, haste, sweet rose ! sweet woodbine, hymn
the morn.
Whose dewdrops shall illume with pearly light
Each grassy blade that thick embattled stands
From sea to sea, while daisies infinite
Uplift in praise their little glowing hands.
O'er every hill that under heaven expands.
EBENEZER Elliott.
SPRING.
Lo ! where the rosy-bosomed Hours,
Fair Venus' train, appear,
Disclose the long-expecting flowers
And wake the purple year !
The Attic warbler pours her throat
Responsive to the cuckoo's note.
The untaught harmony of spring :
While, whispering pleasure as they fly.
Cool zephyrs through the clear blue sky
Their gathered fragrance fling.
Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch
A broader, browner shade.
Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech
O'ercanopies the glade.
Beside some water's mshy brink
With me the Muse shall sit, and think
(At ease reclined in rustic state)
How vain the ardor of the crowd.
How low, how little are the proud.
How indigent the great !
Still is the toiling hand of care ;
The panting herds repose ;
Yet hark, how through the peopled air
The busy murmur glows !
The insect youth are on the wing.
Eager to taste the honeyed spring
And float amid the liquid noon :
Some lightly o'er the current skim.
Some show their gayly gilded trim
Quick-glancing to the sun.
To Contemplation's sober eye
Such is the race of man ;
And they that creep, and they that fly.
Shall end where they began.
422
POEMS OF NATURE.
Alike the busy and the gay
But flutter through life's little day,
In Fortune's varying eolors drest :
Brushed by the hand of rough mischance
Or chiUed by age, their airy dance
They leave, in dust to rest.
Methinks I hear in accents low
The sportive kind reply ;
Poor moralist ! and what art thou ?
A solitary fly !
Thy joys no glittering female meets.
No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets.
No painted plumage to display ;
On hasty wings thy youth is flown ;
Thy sun is set, thy spring is gone, —
We frolic while't is May.
Thomas Gray.
SWEETLY BREATHING, VERNAL AIR.
Sweetly breathing, vernal air.
That with, kind warmth doth repair
Winter's ruins ; from whose breast
All the gums and spice of the Ea.st
Borrow thçir perfumes^; whose,eye
Grids the mom, and clears the sky •
Whose dishevelled tresses shed
Pearls upon the violet bed ;
On whose brow, with calm smiles drèst
The halcyon sits and builds her nest ;
Beauty, youth, and endless spring
Dwell upon thy rosy wing !
Thou, if stormy Boreas throws
Down whole forests when he blows.
With a pregnant, flowery birth.
Canst refresh the teeming earth.
If he nip the early bud.
If Jie blast what's .fair or good.
If he scatter our choice flowers.
If he shake our halls or bowers.
If his rude breath threaten us.
Thou canst stroke great jEoIus,
And from him the grace obtain.
To bind him in an iron chain.
thomas carew.
SPRING, THE SWEET SPRING.
Spring, the sweet spring, is the year's pleasant
king ;
Then blooms each thing, then maids danee in a
ring,
Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing.
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo !
C3-
The palm and may make country-houses gay.
Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day.
And we hear aye birds tune this merry lay.
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo !
The flelds breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet,
Young lovers meet, old wives a sunning sit.
In every street these tunes our ears do greet.
Cuckoo, jug-jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo !
Spring ! the sweet spring !
Thomas Nash.
SPRING.
Behold the young, the rosy spring
Gives to the breeze her scented wing.
While virgin graces, warm with May,
Fling roses o'er her dewy way.
The murmuring billows of the deep
Have languished into silent sleep ;
And mark ! the flitting sea-birds lave
Their plumes in the reflecting wave ;
While cranes from hoary winter fly
To flutter in a kinder sky.
Now the genial star of day
Dissolves the murky clouds away,
And cultured field and winding stream
Are freshly glittering in his beam.
Now the earth prohfie swells
With leafy buds and flowery bells ;
Gemming shoots the olive twine' ;
Clusters bright festoon the vine ;
All along the branches creeping.
Through the velvet foliage peeping,
Little infant fruits we see
Nursing into luxury.
From the Greek of Anacreon. Transía»
tion of thomas moorb.
MAY MORNING.
Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger.
Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her
The flowery May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.
Hail, bounteous May ! that doth inspire
Mirth and youth and warm desire ;
Woods and groves are of thy dressing,
HiU and dale doth boast thy blessing.
Thus we salute thee with om' eatly song.
And welcome thee, and wish thee long.
Milton.
•—
SPRING IN CAROLINA. -
Spring, with that nameless pathos in the air
Which dwells with all things fair.
Spring, with her golden suns and silver rain.
Is with us once again.
: gj
POEMS OP NATURE. 423
Out in the lonely woods the jasmine burns
Its fragrant lamps, and turns
Into a royal court with green festoons
The hanks of dark lagoons.
In the deep heart of every forest tree
The blood is all aglee,
And there's a look about the leafless bowers
As if they di'eamed of flowers.
Yet stiU on every side we trace the hand
Of Winter in the land.
Save where the maple reddens on the lawn.
Flushed by the season's dawn ;
Or where, like those strange semblances we find
That age to childhood bind,
The elm puts on, as if in Nature's scorn.
The brown of autumn com.
As yet the turf is dark, although you know
That, not a span below,
A thousand germs are groping through the gloom.
And soon will bm-st their tomb.
In gardens you may note amid the dearth.
The crocus breaking earth ;
And near the snowdrop's tender white and green.
The violet in its screen.
But many gleams and shadows need must pass
Along the budding grass.
And weeks go by, before the enamored South
Shall kiss the rose's mouth.
Still there's a sense of blossoms yet unborn
In the sweet airs of morn ;
One almost looks to see the very street
Grow purple at his feet.
At times a fragrant breeze comes floating by.
And brings, you know not why,
A feeling as when eager crowds await
Before a palace gate
Some wondrous pageant ; and you scarce would
start.
If from a beech's heart,
A blue-eyed Dryad, stepping forth, should say,
" Behold me ! I am May ! "
Henry Timrod.
MAY.
I FKEL a newer life in every gale ;
The winds that fan the flowere.
And with their welcome breathings fill the sail.
Tell of serener hours, —
Of hours that glide unfelt away
Beneath the sky of May.
I
The spirit of the gentle south-wind calls
From his blue throne of air.
And where his whispering voice iij music falls.
Beauty is budding there ;
The bright ones of the valley break
Their slumbers, and awake.
The waving verdure rolls along the plain.
And the wide forest weaves.
To welcome back its playful mates again,
A canopy of leaves ;
And from its darkening shadow floats
A gush of trembling notes.
Fairer and brighter spreads the reign of May ;
The tresses of the woods
With the light dallying of the west-wind play ;
And the full-brimming floods.
As gladly to their goal they run,
Haü the returning sun.
James Gates percival.
THEY COME! THE MERRY SUMMER
MONTHS.
Thet come I the merry summer months of
beauty, song, and flowers ;
They come! the gladsome months that bring
thick leafiness to bowers.
Up, up, my heart ! and walk abroad ; fling cark
and care aside ;
Seek silent hills, or rest thyself where peaceful
waters glide ;
Or, underneath the shadow vast of patriarchal
tree.
Scan through its leaves the cloudless sky in rapt
tranquillity.
The grass is soft, its velvet touch is grateful to
the hand ;
And, like the kiss of maiden love, the breeze is
sweet and bland ;
The daisy and the buttercup are nodding cour¬
teously ;
It stirs their blood with kindest love, to bless
and welcome thee ;
And mark how with thine own thin locks —
they now are silvery gray —
That blissful breeze is wantoning, and whisper¬
ing, " Be gay ! "
There is no cloud that sails along the ocean of
yon sky
Bnt hath its own winged mariners to give it
melody ;
EP
f
424
POEMS OP NATURE.
Thou seest their glittering fans outspread, all
gleaming like red gold ;
And hark ! with shriU pipe musical, their merry
course they hold.
God bless them all, those little ones, who, far
above this earth.
Can make a scofif of its mean joys, and vent a
nobler mirth.
But soft ! mine ear upcaught a sound, — from
yonder wood it came !
The spirit of the dim green glade did breathe his
own glad name ; —
Yes, it is he ! the hennit bird, that, apart from
all his kind.
Slow spells his beads monotonous to the soft
western wind ;
Cuckoo ! Cuckoo ! he sings again, — his notes
are void of art ;
But simplest strains do soonest sound the deep
founts of the heart.
Good Lord ! it is a gracious boon for thought-
crazed wight like me.
To smell again these summer flowers beneath
this summer tree !
To suck once more in every breath their little
souls away,
And feed my fancy with fond dreams of youth's
bright summer day.
When, rushing forth like untamed colt, the
reckless, truant boy
Wandered through greenwoods all day long, a
mighty heart of joy !
I'm sadder now, — I have had cause ; but 0,
I'm proud to think
That each pure joy-fount, loved of yore, I yet
delight to drink ; —
Leaf, blossom, blade, hill, valley, stream, the
calm, unclouded sky.
Still mingle music with my dreams, as in the
days gone by.
When summer's loveliness and light fall round
me dark and cold,
I '11 bear indeed life's heaviest curse, — a heart
that hath waxed old !
William Motherwell.
JUNE.
from "the vision of sir launfal."
Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us ;
The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in.
The priest hath his fee who comes and shrives us.
We Bargain for the graves we lie in ;
At the Devil's booth are all things sold.
Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold ;
For a cap and bells our lives we pay.
Bubbles we earn with a whole soul's tasking ;
'T is heaven alone that is given away,
'T is only God may be had for the asking ;
There is no price set on the lavish summer.
And June may be had by the poorest comer.
And what is so rare as a day in June ?
Then, if ever, come perfect days ;
Then Heaven tries the earth if it be in tune,
And over it softly her warm ear lays :
Whether we look, or whether we listen.
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten ;
Every clod feels a stir of might.
An instinct within it that reaches and towers
And, groping blindly above it for light.
Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers ;
The flush of life may well be seen
Thrilling back over hills and valleys ;
The cowslip startles in meadows green.
The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice.
And there's never a leaf or a blade too mean
To be some happy creature's palace ;
The little bird sits at his door in the sun,
Atilt like a blossom among the leaves.
And lets his illumined being o'errun
With the deluge of summer it receives ;
His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings,
And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and
sings ;
He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest, —
In the nice ear of Nature, which song is the best ?
Now is the high-tide of the year.
And whatever of life hath ebbed away
Comes flooding back, with a ripply cheer.
Into every bare inlet and creek and bay ;
Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it.
We are happy now because God wUls it ;
No matter how barren the past may have been,
'T is enough for us now that the leaves are green ;
We sit in the warm shade and feel right well
llow the sap creeps up and the blossoms swell ;
We may shut our eyes, but we cannot help know¬
ing
That skies are clear and grass is growing ;
The breeze comes whispering in our ear,
That dandelions are blossoming near.
That maize has sprouted, that streams are
flowing,
Tliat the river is bluer than the sky.
That the robin is plastering his house hard by ;
And if the breeze kept the good news back.
For other couriers we should not lack ;
We could guess it all by yon heifer's lowing, —
And hark ! how clear bold chanticleer.
Warmed with the new wine of the 'year.
Tells all in his lusty crowing !
-ßi
f
POEMS OF NATURE.
425
Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how ;
Everything is happy now.
Everything is upward striving ;
'T is as easy now for the heart to be true
As for grass to be green or skies to be blue, —
'T is the natural way of living :
Who knows whither the clouds have fled ?
In the unscarred heaven they leave no wake.
And the eyes forget the tears they have shed.
The heart forgets its sorrow and ache ;
The soul partakes the season's youth.
And the sulphurous rifts of passion and woe
lie deep 'neath a silence pure and smooth.
Like bumt-out craters healed with snow.
James Russell Lowell.
JUNE.
i
I GAZED upon the glorious sky.
And the green mountains round.
And thought that when I came to lie
At rest within the ground,
'T were pleasant that in flowery June,
When brooks send up a cheerful tune.
And groves a cheerful sound,
The sexton's hand, my grave to make.
The rich, green mountain turf should break.
A cell within the frozen mould,
A cofSn home through sleet.
And icy clods above it rolled,
While fierce the tempests beat —
Away ! I will not think of these —
Blue be the sky and soft the breeze.
Earth green beneath the feet,
And be the damp mould gently pressed
Into my narrow place of rest.
There, through the long, long, summer hours
The golden light should lie.
And thick young herbs and groups of flowers
Stand in their beauty by.
The oriole should build and tell
His love-tale close beside my cell ;
The idle butterfly
Should rest him there, and there be heard
The housewife bee and humming-bird.
And what if cheerful shouts at noon
Come, from the village sent.
Or song of maids beneath the moon
With fairy laughter blent ?
And what if, in the evening light.
Betrothed lovers walk in sight
Of my low monument ?
I would the lovely scene around
Might know no sadder sight nor sound.
I know that I no more should see
The season's glorious show.
Nor would its brightness shine for me.
Nor its wild music flow ;
But if, around my place of sleep.
The friends I love should come to weep.
They might not haste to go.
Soft airs, and song, and light and bloom
Should keep them lingering by my tomb.
These to their softened hearts should bear
The thought of what has been,
And speak of one who cannot share
The gladness of the scene ;
Whose part, in all the pomp that fills
The circuit of the summer hills,
Is that his grave is green ;
And deeply would their hearts rejoice
To hear again his living voice.
William Cullen Bryant.
U-
SONG OF THE SUMMER WINDS.
Up the dale and down the bourne.
O'er the meadow swift we fly ;
Now we .sing, and. now wejnoum.
Now we whistle,, now we gigh.
By the grassy-fringed river.
Through the murmuring reeds we sweep ;
Mid the lily-leaves we quiver.
To their very hearts we creep.
Now the maiden rose is blushing
At the frolic things we say.
While ^ide her cheek we 're rushing.
Like some truant bees at play.
Through the blooming graves we rustle,
Kissing every bud we pass, —
As we did it in the bustle,
Scarcely knowing how it was.
Down the glen, across the mountain,
O'er the yellow heath we roam.
Whirling round about the fountain.
Till its little breakers foam.
Bending down the weeping willows.
While our vesper hymn we sigh ;
Then unto our rosy pillows
On our weary wings we hie.
There of idlenesses dreaming.
Scarce from waking we refrain.
Moments long as ages deeming
TiU we 're at our play again.
george daeley.
426
POEMS OP NATURE.
THE STORY OF A SUMMER DAY.
O PERFECT Light, which shaid away
The darkness from the light,
And set a ruler o'er the day.
Another o'er the night ;
Thy glory, when the day forth flies.
More vively does appear.
Than at midday unto our eyes
The shining sun is clear.
The shadow of the earth anon
Removes and drawls by.
While in the east, when it is gone.
Appears a clearer sky.
Which soon perceive the little larks.
The lapwing and the snipe.
And time their songs, like Nature's clerks,
O'er meadow, muir, and stripe.
Our hemisphere is polished clean.
And lightened more and more ;
While everything is clearly seen.
Which seemèd dim before ;
Except the glistering astres bright,
Which all the night were clear,
Offuskèd with a greater light
No longer do appear.
The golden globe incontinent
Sets up his shining head.
And o'er the earth and firmament
Displays his beams abread.
For joy the birds with boulden throats
Against his visage sheen
Take up their kindly music notes
In woods and gardens gi-een.
The dew upon the tender crops.
Like pearles white and round.
Or like to melted silver drops.
Refreshes all the ground.
The misty reek, the clouds of rain
From tops of mountains skails.
Clear are the highest hills and plain.
The vapors take the vales;
The ample heaven, of fabric sure.
In cleanness does surpass
The crystal and the silver pure.
Or clearest polished glass.
The time so tranquil is and still.
That nowhere shall ye find.
Save on a high and barren hill.
The air of peeping wind.
All trees and simples, great and small.
That balmy leaf do bear.
Than they were painted on a wall.
No more they move or steir.
Calm is the deep and purple sea.
Yea, smoother than the sand ;
The waves, that weltering wont to be.
Are stable like the land.
So silent is the cessile air.
That every cry and call.
The hills and dales and forest fair
Again repeats them all.
The flourishes and fragrant flowers.
Through Phoebus' fostering heat.
Refreshed with dew and silver showery
Cast up an odor sweet.
The clogged, busy humming-bees.
That never think to drone.
On flowers and flourishes of trees.
Collect their liquor brown.
The sun, most like a speedy post.
With ardent course ascends ;
The beauty of the heavenly host
Up to our zenith tends.
Not guided by a Phaethon,
Not trainèd in a chair.
But by the high and holy One,
Who does allwhere empire.
The burning beams down from his face
So fervently can beat.
That man and beast now seek a place
To save them from the heat.
The herds beneath some leafy tree.
Amidst the flowers they lie ;
The stable ships upon the sea
Tend up their sails to dry.
With gilded eyes and open wings.
The cock his courage shows ;
With claps of joy his breast he dings.
And twenty times he crows.
The dove with whistling wings so blue.
The winds can fast coUect,
Her purple pens turn many a hue
Against the sun direct.
Now noon is went ; gone is midday.
The heat does slake at last.
The sun descends down west away.
For three o'clock is past.
POEMS OF NATURE.
427
The rayons of the sun we see
Diminish in their strength,
The shade of every tower and tree
Extended is in length.
Great is the calm, for everywhere
The wind is settling down.
The reek throws right up in the air
From every tower and town.
The gloaming comes, the day is spent.
The sun goes out of sight.
And painted is the occident
With purple sanguine bright.
The scarlet nor the golden thread,
Who would their beauty try,
Are nothing like the color red
And beauty of the sky.
Our west horizon circular.
From time the sun be set.
Is all with rubies, as it were.
Or roses red o'erfret.
What pleasure were to walk and see.
Endlong a river clear.
The perfect form of every tree
Within the deep appear.
0, then it were a seemly thing.
While all is still and calm.
The praise of God to play and sing
With cornet and with shalm !
All laborers draw home at even.
And can to other say.
Thanks to the gracious God of heaven.
Which sent this summer day !
Alexander Hume.
BEFORE THE RAIN.
We knew it would rain, for all the mom,
A spirit on slender ropes of mist
Was lowering its golden buckets down
Into the vapory amethyst
Of marshes and swamps and dismal fens, —
Scooping the dew that lay in the flowers.
Dipping the jewels out of the sea.
To sprinkle them over the land in showers.
We knew it would rain, for the poplars showed
The white of their leaves, the amber grain
Shrunk in the wind, — and the lightning now
Is tangled in tremulous skeins of rain.
Thomas Bailev Aldrich.
SIGNS OF RAIN.*
fortv reasons for not accepting an invitation of
A friend to hake an excursion with him.
1 The hollow winds begin to blow ;
2 The clouds look black, the glass is low,
3 The soot falls down, the spaniels sleep,
4 And spiders from their cobwebs peep.
6 Last night the sun went pale to bed,
6 The moon in halos hid her head ;
7 The boding shepherd heaves a sigh,
8 For see, a rainbow spans the sky !
9 The walls are damp, the ditches smell,
10 Closed is the pink-eyed pimpernel.
11 Hark how the chairs and tables crack !
12 Old Betty's nerves are on the rack ;
13 Loud quacks the duck, the peacocks cry,
14 The distant hills are seeming nigh.
15 How restless are the snorting swine !
16 The busy flies disturb the kine,
17 Low o'er the grass the swallow wings,
18 The cricket, too, how sharp he sings !
19 Puss on the hearth, with velvet paws,
20 Sits wiping o'er her whiskered jaws ;
21 Through the clear streams the fishes rise,
22 And nimbly catch the incautious flies.
23 The glow-worms, numerous and light,
24 Illumed the dewy dell last night ;
25 At dusk the squalid toad was seen,
26 Hopping and crawling o'er the green ;
27 The whirling dust the wind obeys,
28 And in the rapid eddy plays ;
29 The frog has changed his yellow vest,
30 And in a russet coat is dressed.
81 Though June, the air is cold and still,
32 The mellow blackbird's voice is shrill ;
33 My dog, so altered in his taste,
34 Quits mutton-bones on grass to feast ;
35 And see yon rooks, how odd their flight !
36 They imitate the gliding kite,
37 And seem precipitate to fall,
38 As if they felt the piercing ball.
39 'T wUl surely rain ; I see with sorrow,
40 Our jaunt must be put off to-moiTow.
dr. edward jenner.
*
SUMMER MOODS.
I love at eventide to walk alone,
Down narrow glens, o'erhung with dewy thom.
Where from the long grass underneath, the snail.
Jet black, creeps out, and sprouts his timid
horn.
I love to muse o'er meadows newly mown,
• "Verified by Darwin," says C. C. Bombau^h in his " Glean¬
ings from the Harvest Fields of Literature," though his version of
the lines varies somewhat from this.
POEMS OF NATURE.
"Where withering grass perfumes the sultry air ;
"Where bees search round, with sad and weary
drone,
In vain, for flowers that bloomed but newly
there ;
"While in the juicy corn the hidden quail
Cries, "Wet my foot;" and, hid as thoughts
unborn.
The fairy-like and seldom-seen land-rail
Utters "Craik, craik," like voices underground,
Eight glad to meet the evening's dewy veU,
And see the light fade into gloom around.
john Clare.
—»
INVOCATION TO RAIN IN SUMMER.
O GENTLE, gentle summer rain.
Let not the silver lily pine.
The drooping lily pine in vain
To feel that dewy touch of thine, —
To drink thy freshness once again,
0 gentle, gentle summer rain !
In heat the landscape quivering lies ;
The cattle pant beneath the tree ;
Through parching air and purple skies
The earth looks up, in vain, for thee ;
For thee — for thee, it looks in vain,
0 gentle, gentle summer rain.
Come thou, and brim the meadow streams.
And soften all the hills with mist,
O falling dew ! from burning dreams
By thee shall herb and flower be kissed.
And Earth shall bless thee yet again,
0 gentle, gentle summer rain.
William Cox Bennett.
RAIN IN SUMMER.
How beautiful is the rain !
After the dust and heat.
In the broad and flery street.
In the narrow lane,
How beautiful is the rain !
How it clatters along the roofs.
Like the tramp of hoofs !
How it gushes and struggles out
Prom the throat of the overflowing spout !
Across the window-pane
It pours and pours ;
And swift and wide.
With a muddy tide.
Like a river down the gutter roars
The rain, the welcome rain !
The sick man from his chamber looks
At the twisted brooks ;
He can feel the cool
Breath of each little pool ;
His fevered brain
Grows calm again.
And he breathes a blessing on the rain.
From the neighboring school
Come the boys.
With more than their wonted noise
And commotion ;
And down the wet streets
Sail their mimic fleets.
Till the treacherous pool
Ingulfs them in its whirling
And turbulent ocean.
In the country, on every side.
Where far and wide.
Like a leopard's tawny and spotted hide.
Stretches the plain.
To the dry grass and the drier grain
How welcome is the rain !
In the furrowed land
The toilsome and patient oxen stand ;
Lifting the yoke-encumbered head.
With their dilated nostrils spread.
They silently inhale
The clover-scented gale.
And the vapors that arise
From the well-watered and smoking soU.
For this rest in the furrow after toil
Their large and lustrous eyes
Seem to thank the Lord,
More than man's spoken word.
Near at hand.
From under the sheltering trees.
The farmer sees
His pastures, and his fields of grain.
As they bend their tops
To the numberless beating drops
Of the incessant rain.
He counts it as no sin
That he sees therein
Only his own thrift and gain.
These, and far more than these.
The Poet sees !
He can behold
Aquarius old
Walking the fenceless fields of air ;
And from each ample fold
Of the clouds about him roUed
Scattering everywhere
The showery rain.
As the farmer scatters his grain.
POEMS OF NATURE.
429
He can behold
Things manifold
That have not yet been wholly told, —
Have not been wholly sung nor said.
For his thought, that never stops,
Follows the water-drops
Down to the graves of the dead, .
Down through chasms and gulfs profound,
To the dreary fountain-head
Of lakes and rivers underground ;
And sees them, when the rain is done.
On the bridge of colors seven
Climbing up once more to heaven.
Opposite the setting sun.
Thus the Seer,
With vision clear.
Sees forms appear and disappear.
In the perpetual round of strange.
Mysterious change
From birth to death, from death to birth.
From earth to heaven, from heaven to earth ;
Till glimpses more sublime
Of things, unseen before.
Unto his wondering eyes reveal
The Universe, as an immeasurable wheel
Turning forevemiore
In the rapid and rushing river of Time.
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
SUMMER STORM.
Untremulous in the river clear,
Toward the sky's image, hangs the imaged bridge ;
So still the air that I can hear
The slender clarion of the unseen midge ;
Out of the stillness, with a gathering creep.
Like rising wind in leaves, which now decreases.
Now lulls, now swells, and all the while increases.
The huddling trample of a drove of sheep
Tilts the loose planks, and then as gradually ceases
In dust on the other side ; life's emblem deep,
A confused noise between two silences.
Finding at last in dust precarious peace.
On the wide marsh the purple-blossomed grasses
Soak up the sunshine ; sleeps the brimming tide.
Save when the wedge-shaped wake in silence
passes
Of some slow water-rat, whose sinuous glide
Wavers the long green sedge's shade from side
to side ;
But up the west, like a rock-shivered surge.
Climbs a great cloud edged with sun-whitened
spray ;
Huge whirls of foam boil toppling o'er its verge.
And falling still it seems, and yet it climbs
' alway.
ti
Suddenly all the sky is hid
As with the shutting of a lid.
One by one great drops are falling
Doubtful and slow ;
Down the pane they are crookedly crawling.
And the wind breathes low ;
Slowly the circles widen on the river.
Widen and mingle, one and all ;
Here and there the slenderer flowers shiver.
Struck by an icy rain-drop's fall.
Now on the hills I hear the thunder mutter.
The wind is gathering in the west ;
The upturned leaves first whiten and flutter.
Then droop to a fitful rest ;
Up from the stream with sluggish flap
Struggles the gull and floats away ;
Nearer and nearer rolls the thunder-clap, —
We shall not see the sun go down to-day :
Now leaps the wind on the sleepy marsh.
And tramples the grass with terrified feet.
The startled river turns leaden and harsh.
You can hear the quick heart of the tempest
beat.
Look ! look ! that livid flash !
And instantly follows the rattling thunder.
As if some cloud-crag, split asunder,
Fell, splintering with a ruinous crash.
On the Earth, which crouches in silence under ;
And now a solid gray wall of rain
Shuts off the landscape, mile by mile ;
For a breath's space I see the blue wood again.
And, ere the next heart-beat, the wind-hurled pile.
That seemed but now a league aloof.
Bursts crackling o'er the sun-parched roof ;
Against the windows the storm comes dashing.
Through tattered foliage the hail tears crashing.
The blue lightning flashes.
The rapid hail clashes,
The white waves are tumbling.
And, in one baffled roar.
Like the toothless sea mumbling
A rock-bristled shore.
The thunder is rumbling
And crashing and crumbling, —
Will silence return nevermore ?
Hush ! Still as death.
The tempest holds his breath
As from a sudden will ;
The rain stops short, but from the eaves
You see it drop, and hear it from the leaves,
All is so bodingly still ;
Again, now, now, again
Plashes the rain in heavy gouts.
The crinkled lightning
Seems ever brightening.
e
430
POEMS OF NATURE.
And loud and long
Again the thunder shouts
His battle-song, —
One quivering flash.
One wildering crash.
Followed by silence dead and dull,
As if the cloud, let go.
Leapt bodily below
To whelm the earth in one mad overthrow.
And then a total lull.
Gone, gone, so soon !
No more my half-crazed fancy there
Can shape a giant in the air.
No more I see his streaming hair,
The writhing portent of his form ; —
The pale and quiet moon
Makes her calm forehead bare.
And the last fragments of the storm.
Like shattered rigging from a fight at sea.
Silent and few, are drifting over me.
James Russell lowelu
AFTER THE RAIN.
The rain has ceased, and in my room
The sunshine pours an airy flood ;
And on the church's dizzy vane
The ancient Cross is bathed in blood.
From out the dripping ivy-leaves.
Antiquely carven, gray and high,
A dormer, facing westward, looks
Upon the village like an eye :
And now it glimmers in the sun,
A square of gold, a disk, a speck ;
And in the belfry sits a Dove
With purple ripples on her neck.
Thomas Bailey Aldrich.
A DROP OF DEW.
See how the orient dew.
Shed from the bosom of the mom
Into the blowing roses,
(Yet careless of its mansion new
For the clear region where 't was bom)
Round in itself encloses.
And in its little globe's extent
Frames, as it can, its native element.
How it the purple flower does slight.
Scarce touching where it lies ;
But gazing back upon the skies.
Shines with a mournful light,
Like its own tear.
Because so long divided from the sphere ;
Restless it rolls, and unsecure.
Trembling, lest it grow impure,
TiU the warm sun pities its pain.
And to the skies exhales it back again.
So the soul, that drop, that ray
Of the clear fountain of etemal day.
Could it within the human flower be seen.
Remembering still its former height.
Shuns the sweet leaves and blossoms green,
And, recollecting its own light.
Does, in its pure and circling thoughts, express
The greater heaven in a heaven less.
In how coy a figure wound.
Every way it turns away ;
So the world excluding round.
Yet receiving in the day.
Dark beneath, but bright above ;
Here disdaining, there in love.
How loose and easy hence to go !
How girt and ready to ascend !
Moving but on a point below.
It aU about does upwards bend.
Such did the manna's sacred dew distil,
White and entire, although congealed andchiU,—
Congealed on earth, but does, dissolving, run
Into the glories of the Almighty sun.
Andrew Marvell.
A SUMMER EVENING'S MEDITATION.
*' One sun by day, by night ten thousand shine." — YOUNC.
'T IS past, — the sultry tyrant of the South
Has spent his short-lived rage ; more grateful
hours
Move silent on ; the skies no more repel
The dazzled sight, but, with mild maiden beams
Of tempered lustre, court the cherished eye
To wander o'er their sphere ; where, hung aloft,
Dian's bright crescent, like a silver bow,
New strung in heaven, lifts its beamy horns
Impatient for the night, and seems to push
Her brother down the sky. Fail- Venus shines
Even in the eye of day ; with sweetest beam
Propitious shines, and shakes a trembling flood
Of softened radiance with her dewy locks.
The shadows spread apace ; while meekened Eve,
Her cheek yet warm with blushes, slow retires
Through the Hesperian gardens of the West,
And shuts the gates of Day. 'T is now the hour
When Contemplation, from her sunless haunts.
The cool damp grotto, or the lonely depth
Of unpierced woods, where rapt in solid shade
She mused away the gaudy hours of noon.
And fed on thoughts unripened by the sun.
Moves forward and with radiant finger points
THE STORM.
^^Now leaps the wind on the sierpy inarsht
And tramples the grass with terrified fieet,
The startled river turns leaden and harsh.
Vou can hear the quick heart ofi the tempest beat**
POEMS OF NATURE.
431
To yon blue concave swelled by breath divine,
Where, one by one, the living eyes of heaven
Awake, quick kindling o'er the face of ether
One boundless blaze ; ten thousand trembling
fires.
And dancing lustres, where the unsteady eye,
Restless and dazzled, wanders unconfined
O'er all this field of glories ; spacious field.
And worthy of the Master, — He whose hand
With hieroglyphics elder than the Nile
Inscribed the mystic tablet, hung on high
To public gaze, and said. Adore, O man !
The finger of thy God. From what pure wells
Of milky light, what soft o'erflowing urn,
Are all these lamps so filled ? — these friendly
lamps,
Forever streaming o'er the azure deep
To point our path, and light us to our home.
How soft they slide along their lucid spheres.
And, silent as the foot of Time, fulfil
Their destined courses ! Nature's self is hushed,
And but a scattered leaf, which rustles through
The thick-wove foliage, not a sound is heard
To break the midnight air ; though the raised
ear.
Intently listening, drinks in every breath.
How deep the silence, yet how loud the praise !
But are they silent all ? or is there not
A tongue in every star that talks with man,
And wooes him to be wise ? nor wooes in vain :
This dead of midnight is the noon of thought,
And Wisdom mounts her zenith with the stars.
At this still hour the self-collected soul
Turns inward, and beholds a stranger there
Of high descent, and more than mortal rank ;
An embryo God ; a spark of fire divine.
Which must bum on for ages, when the sun
(Fair transitory creature of a day !)
Has closed his golden eye, and, wrapt in shades.
Forgets his wonted joumey through the East.
Ye citadels of light, and seats of gods !
Perhaps my future home, from whence the soul.
Revolving periods past, may oft look back.
With recollected tenderness, on all
The various busy scenes she left below,
•Its deep-laid projects and its strange events.
As on some fond and doting tale that soothed
Her infant hours, — 0, be it lawful now
To tread the hallowed circle of your courts.
And with mute wonder and delighted awe
Approach your burning confines ! Seized in
thought.
On Fancy's wild and roving wing I saü.
From the green borders of the peopled eai-th,
And the pale moon, her duteous, fair attendant ;
From solitary Mars ; from the vast orb
Of Jupiter, whose huge gigantic bulk
Dances in ether like the lightest leaf,
To the dim verge, the suburbs of the system.
Where cheerless Saturn midst his watery moons
Girt with a lucid zone, in gloomy pomp.
Sits like an exiled monarch : fearless thence
I launch into the trackless deeps of space.
Where, burning round, ten thousand suns appear,
Of elder beam, which ask no leave to shine
Of our terrestrial star, nor borrow light
From the proud regent of our scanty day ;
Sons of the morning, first-bom of creation.
And only less than Him who marks their track
And guides their fiery wheels. Here must I stop.
Or is there aught beyond ? What hand unseen
Impels me onward through the glowing orbs
Of habitable nature, far remote.
To the dread confines of etemal night.
To solitudes of waste unpeopled space.
The deserts of creation, wide and wild ;
Where embryo systems and unkindled suns
Sleep in the womb of chaos ? Fancy droops.
And Thought, astonished, stops her bold career.
But, O thou mighty Mind ! whose powerful word
Said, "Thus let all things be," and thus they
were.
Where shall I seek thy presence ? how unblamed
Invoke thy dread perfection ?
Have the broad eyelids of the mom beheld thee !
Or does the beamy shoulder of Orion
Support thy throne ? 0, look with pity down
On erring, guilty man ; not in thy names
Of terror clad ; not with those thunders armed
That conscious Sinai felt, when fear appalled
The scattered tribes ; thou hast a gentler voice.
That whispers comfort to the swelling heart.
Abashed, yet longing to behold her Maker !
But now my soul, unused to stretch her powers
In flight so daring, drops her weary wing.
And seeks again the known accustomed spot,
Drest up with sun and shade and lawns and
streams,
A mansion fair and spacious for its guests.
And all replete with wonders. Let me here.
Content and grateful, wait the appointed time.
And ripen for the skies : the hour will come
When all these splendors bursting on my sight
Shall stand unveiled, and to my ravished sense
Unlock the glories of the world unknown.
Anna Letitia Barsauld.
A SUMMER EVENING.
How fine has the day been ! how bright was the
sun !
How lovely and joyful the course that he run.
Though he rose in a mist when his race he begun.
And there followed some droppings of rain !
432
POEMS OF NATURE.
a
But now the fair traveller's come to the west,
His rays are all gold, and his beauties are best :
He paints the sky gay as he sinks to his rest,
And foretells a bright rising again.
Just such is the Christian : his course he begins.
Like the sun in a mist, when he mourns for his
sins.
And melts into tears ; then he breaks out and
shines.
And travels his heavenly way :
But when he comes nearer to finish his race,
Like a fine setting sun, he looks richer in grace,
And gives a sure hope, at the end of his days,
Of rising in brighter array.
Isaac Watts.
MY HEART LEAPS UP,
My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky ;
So was it when my life began,
So is it now I am a man.
So be it when I shall grow old.
Or let me die !
The Child is father of the Man ;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.
William Wordsworth.
4
MOONLIGHT IN SUMMER.
Low on the ,utmost boundary of the sight.
The rising vapors catch the silver light ;
Thence fancy measures, as they parting fly.
Which first wül throw its shadow on the eye.
Passing the source of light ; and thence away.
Succeeded quick by brighter still than they.
For yet above these wafted clouds are seen
(In a remoter sky stül more serene)
Others, detached in ranges through the air.
Spotless as snow, and countless as they 're
fair ;
Scattered immensely wide from east to west.
The beauteous semblance of a flock at rest.
These, to the raptured mind, aloud proclaim
Their mighty Shepherd's everlasting name ;
And thus the loiterer's utmost stretch of soul
Climbs the still clouds, or passes those that
roll,
And loosed imagination soaring goes
High o'er his home and all his little woes.
Robert Bloomfisld.
MOONLIGHT ON THE PRAIRIE.
from "evangeline."
J ,
Beatjtiful was the night. Behind the black
wall of the forest.
Tipping its summit with silver, arose the moon.
On the river
Fell here and there through the branches a tremu¬
lous gleam of the moonlight.
Like the sweet thoughts of love on a darkened
and devious spirit.
Nearer and round about her, the manifold flowers
of the garden
Poured out their souls in odors, that were their
prayers and confessions
Unto the .night, as it went its way,^ like a silent,
^ Carthusian.
Fuller of fragrance than they, and as heavy with
, shadows and night-dews, ,
Hung the heart of the nfáiden. The calm and
the m'agical moonlight
Seemed to inundate her soul with indefinable
longings, ^ ,
As, through the ^ardenïgate, and bejieatl^the'-
tshadej'of thejoak-trees/
Passed she along the path to the edge of the
measureless prairie.
Silent it lay, with a silvery haze upon it, and
fire-flies
Gleaming and floating ^^way in mingled and in¬
finite numbers.
Over her head the stars, the thoughts of God in
the heavens.
Shone on the eyes of man, who had ceased to
marvel and worship.
Save when a blazing comet was seen on the walls
of that temple.
As if a hand had appeared and written upon
them, " Upharsin."
And the soul of the maiden, between the stars
and fhe fire-flies.
Wandered alone, and she cried, "0 Gabriel !
0 my beloved !
Art thou so near unto me, and yet I cannot
behold thee ?
Art thou so ,near unto, me, and yet thy voice
does not reach me ?
Ah ! how often thy feet have trod this path to
the prairie !
Ah ! how often thine eyes have looked on the
woodlands around me !
Ah ! how often beneath this oak, returning from
labor.
Thou hast lain down to rest, and to dream of
me in thy slumbers.
When shall these eyes behold, these arms be
folded about thee ?"
Loud and sudden and near the note of a whip-
poorwill sounded
Like a flute in the woods ; and anon, through
the neighboring thickets,
Farther and farther away it floated and dropped
into silence.
" Patience ! " whispered the oaks from oracular
caverns of darkness ;
And, from,the,^loonlit meadow, a sigh responded,
*' To-morrow ! "
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
SEPTEMBER.
Sweet is the voice that calls
From babbling waterfalls
In meadows where the downy seeds are fl3dng ;
And soft the breezes blow.
And eddying come and go
In faded gardens where the rose is dying.
Among the stubbled corn
The blithe quail pipes at mom.
The merry partridge drums in hidden places.
And glittering insects gleam
Abové the reedy stream,
Where busy spiders spin their fllmy laces.
At eve, cool shadows fall
Across the garden wall,
And on the clustered grapes to purple turning ;
And pearly vapors lie
Along the eastern sky.
Where the broad harvest-moon is redly burning.
Ah, soon on field and hill
The wind shall whistle chill.
And patriarch swallows call their flocks together,
To fly from frost and snow,
And seek for lands where blow
The fairer blossoms of a balmier weather.
The cricket chirps all day,
" 0 fairest summer, stay ! "
The squirrel eyes askance the chestnuts browning ;
The wild fowl fly afar
Above the foamy bar.
And hasten southward ere the skies are frowning.
Now comes a fragrant breeze
Through the dark cedar-trees.
And round about my temples fondly lingers.
In gentle playfulness.
Like to the soft caress
Bestowed in happier days by loving fingers.
Yet, though a sense of grief
Comes with the falling leaf.
And memory makes the summer doubly pleasant.
In all my autumn dreams
A future summer gleams.
Passing the fairest glories of the present !
George Arnold.
♦—
AUTUMN.
A dirge.
The autumn is old ;
The sear leaves are flpng ;
He hath gathered up gold.
And now he is dying :
Old age, begin sighing !
The vintage is ripe ;
The harvest is heaping ;
But some that have sowed
Have no riches for reaping ; —
Poor wretch, fall a-weeping !
The year's in the wane ;
There is nothing adorning ;
The night has ilo eve.
And the day has no morning ;
Cold winter gives warning.
The rivers run chill ;
The red sun is sinking ;
And I am grown old.
And life is fast shrinking ;
Here's enow for sad thinking !
Thomas Hood.
THE LATTER RAIN.
The latter rain, — it falls in anxious haste
Upon the sun-dried fields and branches bare.
Loosening with searching drops the rigid waste
As if it would each root's lost strength repair ;
But not a blade grows green as in the spring ;
No swelling twig puts forth its thickening
leaves ;
The robins only mid the harvests sing.
Pecking the grain that scatters from the sheaves ;
The rain falls still, — the fruit all ripened
drops.
It pierces chestnut-burr and walnut-shell ;
The furrowed fields disclose the yellow crops ;
Each bursting pod of talents used can tell ;
And all that once received the early rain
Declare to man it was not sent in vain.
Jones Very
434
POEMS OP NATURE.
THE AUTUMN.
The autumn time is with us ! Its approach
Was heralded, not many days ago,
By hazy skies that veiled the brazen sun.
And sea-like munnurs from the rustling corn.
And low-voiced brooks that wandered drowsily
By purpling clusters of the juicy grape.
Swinging upon the vine. And now, 't is here.
And what a change hath passed upon the face
Of Nature, where thy waving forests spread.
Then robed in deepest green ! All thi'ough the
night
The subtle frost hath plied its mystic art.
And in the day the golden sun hath wrought
True wonders ; and the wings of mom and even
Have touched with magic breath the changing
leaves.
And now, as wanders the dilating eye
Athwart the varied landscape circling far.
What gorgeousness, what blazonry, what pomp
Of colors, bursts upon the ravished sight !
Here, where the maple rears its yellow crest,
A golden glory ; yonder, where the oak
Stands monarch of the forest, and the ash
Is girt with flame-like parasite, and broad
The dog-wood spreads beneath a rolling field
Of deepest crimson ; and afar, where looms
The guailèd gum, a cloud of bloodiest red !
William D. Gallagher.
INDIAN SUMMER.
When leaves grow sear all things take sombre hue ;
The wild winds waltz no more the woodside
through.
And all the faded grass is wet with dew.
A gauzy nebula films the pensive sky.
The golden bee supinely buzzes by.
In süent flocks the bluebirds southward fly.
The forest's cheeks are crimsoned o'er with shame.
The cynic frost enlaces every lane.
The ground with scarlet blushes is aflame !
The one we love grows lustrous-eyed and sad,
With sympathy too thoughtful to be glad.
While all the colors roxmd are running mad.
The sunbeams kiss askant the sombre hill.
The naked woodbine climbs the window-sill.
The breaths that noon exhales are faint and chill.
The ripened nuts drop downward day by day,
Sounding the hoUow tocsin of decay.
And bandit squirrels smuggle them away.
Vague sighs and scents pervade the atmosphere.
Sounds of invisible stirrings hum the ear.
The morning's lash reveals a frozen tear.
The hermit mountains gird themselves with mail,
Mocking the threshers with an echo flail.
The while the afternoons grow crisp and pale.
Inconstant Summer to the tropics flees.
And, as her rose-sails catch the amorous breeze,
Lo ! bare, brown Autumn trembles to her knees
The stealthy nights encroach upon the days.
The earth with sudden whiteness is ablaze.
And all her paths are lost in crystal maze !
Tread lightly where the dainty violets blew.
Where the spring winds their soft eyes open flew;
Safely they sleep the churlish winter through.
Though all life's portals are indiced with woe.
And frozen pearls are all the world can show.
Feel ! Nature's breath is warm beneath the snow.
Look up, dear mourners ! Still the blue expanse.
Serenely tender, bends to catch thy glance ;
Within thy tears sibyllic sunbeams dance !
With blooms full-sapped again will smile the
land :
The faU is but the folding of His hand.
Anon with fuller glories to expand.
The dumb heart hid beneath the pulseless tree
Will throb again ; and then the torpid bee
Upon the ear will drone his drowsy glee.
So shall the truant bluebirds backward fly.
And all loved things that vanish or that die
Return to us in some sweet By-and-By.
Anonymous.
WINTER SONG.
Summer joys are o'er ;
Flowerets'bloom no more.
Wintry winds are sweeping";
Through the snow-drifts peeping, .■
Cheerful evergreen
Rarely now is seen.
Now no plumèd throng
Charms the wood with song ;
Ice-bound trees are glittering ;
Merry snow-birds, twittering.
Fondly strive to cheer
Scenes so cold and drear.
POEMS OP NATURE.
435
Winter, still I see
Many charms in thee, —
Love thy chilly greeting,
Snow-storms fiercely beating.
And the dear delights
Of the long, long nights.
From the German of LUDWIG HOLTY. Trans
latioa of Charles T. Brooks.
NO !
No sun — no moon !
No mom — no noon —
No dawn — no dust — no proper time of day —
No sky — no earthly view —
No distance looking blue —
No road — no street — no "f other side the
way " —
No end to any Row —
N 0 indications where the Crescents go—
No top to any steeple —
No recognitions of familiar people —
No courtesies for showing 'em —
No knowing 'em !
No travelling at all — no locomotion, j
No inkling of the way — no notion —
" No go " —by land or ocean —
No mail — no post —
No news from any foreign coast —
No park — no ring — no afternoon gentility —
No company — no nobility —
No warmth, no cheerfulness, no healthful ease.
No comfortable feel in any member —
No shade, no shine, no butterfiies, no bees.
No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds,
November !
WINTER MORNING.
from "the winter morning walk ; "
"the task," book v.
'T IS morning ; and the sun, with ruddy orb
Ascending, fires the horizon ; while the clouds.
That crowd away before the driving wind.
More ardent as the disk emerges more.
Resemble most some city in a blaze.
Seen through the leafless wood. His slanting ray
Slides ineffectual down the snowy vale.
And, tingeing all with his own rosy hue.
From every herb and every spiry blade
Stretches a length of shadow o'er the field.
Mine, spindling into longitude immense.
In spite of gravity, and sage remark
That I myself am but a fleeting shade,
' ' Provokes me to a smile. With eye askance
■a
I view the muscular proportioned limb
Transformed to a lean shank. The shapeless pair.
As they designed to mock me, at my side
Take step for step ; and, as I near approach
The cottage, walk along the plastered wall.
Preposterous sight ! the legs without the man.
The verdure of the plain lies buried deep
Beneath the dazzling deluge ; and the bents.
And coarser grass, upspearing o'er the rest.
Of late unsightly and unseen, now shine
Conspicuous, and in bright apparel clad.
And, fledged with icy feathers, nod superb.
The cattle mourn in corners, where the fence
Screens them, and seem half petrified to sleep
In unreoumbent sadness. There they wait
Their wonted fodder ; not, like hungering man.
Fretful if unsupplied ; but silent, meek.
And patient of the slow-paced swain's delay.
He from the stack carves out the accustomed load.
Deep plunging, and again deep plunging oft.
His broad keen knife into the solid mass ;
Smooth as a wall the upright remnant stands.
With such undeviating and even force
He severs it away : no needless care
Lest storms should overset the leaning pile
Deciduous, or its own unbalanced weight.
Forth goes the woodman, leaving unconcerned
The cheerful haunts of men, — to wield the axe
And drive the wedge in yonder forest drear.
From mom to eve his solitary task.
Shaggy and lean and shrewd with pointed ears,
And tail cropped short, half lurcher and half cur.
His dog attends him. Close behind his heel
Now creeps he slow ; and now, with many a frisk
Wide-scampering, snatches up the drifted snow
With ivory teeth, or ploughs it with his snout ;
Then shakes his powdered coat, and barks for joy.
Now from the roost, or from the neighboring pale.
Where, diligent to catch the first faint gleam
Of smiling day, they gossiped side by side.
Come trooping at the housewife's well-known call
The feathered tribes domestic. Half on wing.
And half on foot, they brush the fleecy flood.
Conscious and fearful of too deep a plunge.
The sparrows peep, and quit the sheltering eaves
To seize the fair occasion. Well they eye
The scattered grain, and, thievishly resolved
To escape the impending famine, often scared
As oft retnrn, a pert voracious kind.
Clean riddance quickly made, one only care
Remains to each, the search of sunny nook.
Or shed impervious to the blast. Resigned
To sad necessity, the cock foregoes
His wonted strut, and, wading at their head
With well-considered steps, seems to resent
His altered gait and stateliness retrenched.
How find the myriads, that in summer cheer
436
POEMS OF NATURE.
The hills and valleys with their ceaseless songs,
Due sustenance, or where subsist they now ?
Earth yields them naught ; the imprisoned worm
is safe
Beneath the frozen clod ; all seeds of herbs
Lie covered close ; and berry-bearing thorns.
That feed the thrush (whatever some suppose),
Afford the smaller minstrels no supply.
The long protracted rigor of the year
Thins aU their numerous flocks. In chinks and
holes
Ten thousand seek an unmolested end,
As instinct prompts ; self-buried ere they die.
WILLIAM COWPER.
—•—
NEW ENGLAND IN WINTER.
FROM "SNOW-BOUND."
The sun that brief December day
Rose cheerless over hills of gray.
And, darkly circled, gave at noon
A sadder light than waning moon.
Slow tracing down the thickening sky
Its mute and ominous prophecy,
A portent seeming less than threat.
It sank from sight before it set.
A chill no coat, however stout,
Of homespun stuff could quite shut out,
A hard, dull bitterness of cold.
That checked, mid-vein, the circling race
Of life-blood in the sharpened face.
The coming of the snow-storm told.
The wind blew east : we heard the roar
Of Ocean on his wintry shqre.
And felt the strong pulse fírrobbin¿ there
Beat with low rhythm our inland air.
Meanwhile we did our nightly chores, —
Brought in the wood from out of doors,
Littered the stalls, and from the mows
Raked down tlie herd's-grass for the cows ;
Heard the horse whinnying for his corn ;
And, sharply clashing horn on horn.
Impatient down the stanchion rows
The cattle shake their walnut bows ;
While, peering from his early perch
Upon the scaffold's pole of birch.
The cock his crested helmet bent
And down his querulous challenge sent.
Unwarmed by any sunset light
The gray day darkened into night,
A night made hoary with the swarm
And whirl-dance of the blinding storm.
As zigzag wavering to and fro
Crossed and recrossed the wingèd snow :
And ere the early bedtime came
The white drift piled the window-frame.
And through the glass the clothes-line posts
Looked in like tall and sheeted ghosts.
So all night long the storm roared on :
The morning broke without a sun ;
In tiny spherule traced with lines
Of Nature's geometric signs,
In starry flake, and pellicle.
All day the hoary meteor fell ;
And, when the second morning shone,
We looked upon a world unknown,
On nothing we could call our own.
Around the glistening wonder bent
The blue walls of the firmament.
No cloud above, no earth below, —
A universe of sky and snow !
The old familiar sights of ours
Took marvellous shapes; strangedomesandtowers
Rose up where sty or com-crib stood,
Or garden wall, or belt of wood ;
A smooth white mound the brush-pile showed,
A fenceless drift what once was road ;
The bridle-post an old man sat
With loose-flung coat and high cocked hat ;
The well-curb had a Chinese roof ;
And even the long sweep, high aloof,
In its slant splendor, seemed to tell
Of Pisa's leaning miracle.
A prompt, decisive man, no breath
Our father wasted : "Boys, a path ! "
Well pleased, (for when did farmer boy
Count such a summons less than joy ?)
Our buskins on our feet we drew ;
With mittened hands, and caps drawn low.
To guard our necks and ears from snow,
We cut the solid whiteness through.
And, where the drift was deepest, made
A tunnel walled and overlaid
With dazzling crystal : we had read
Of rare Aladdin's wondrous cave.
And to our own his name we gave.
With many a wish the luck were oura
To test his lamp's supernal powers.
We reached the barn with meiTy din.
And roused the prisoned brutes within.
The old horee thrust his long head out,
And grave with wonder gazed about ;
The cock his lust}' gi'eeting said.
And forth his speckled harem led ;
The oxen lashed their tails, and hooked.
And mild reproach of hunger looked ; '
The horned patriarch of the sheep.
Like Egypt's Amun roused from sleep.
Shook his sage head with gesture mute.
And emphasized with stamp of foot.
f
POEMS OF NATURE.
437
n
All day the gusty north-wind bore
The loosening drift its breath before ;
Low eircling round its southern zone,
The sun through dazzling snow-mist shone.
No church-bell lent its Christian tone
To the savage air, no social smoke
Curled over woods of snow-hung oak.
A solitude made more intense
By dreary-voicèd elements.
The shrieking of the mindless wind.
The moaning tree-boughs swaying blind,
And on the glass the unmeaning beat
Of ghostly finger-tips of sleet.
Beyond the circle of our hearth
No weleome sound of toil or mirth
Unbound the spell, and testified
Of human life and thought outside.
We minded that the sharpest ear
The buried brooklet could not hear.
The music of whose liquid lip
Had been to us companionship,
And, in our lonely life, had grown
To have an almost human tone.
As night drew on, and, from the crest
Of wooded knolls that ridged the west.
The sun, a snow-blown traveller, sank
From sight beneath the smothering bank.
We piled, with care, our nightly staek
Of wood against the chimney-back, —
The oaken log, green, huge, and thick.
And on its top the stout back-stick j
The knotty forestick laid apart.
And filled between with curious art
The ragged brush ; then, hovering near.
We watched the first red blaze appear,
Heard the sharp crackle, caught the gleam
On whitewashed wall and sagging beam.
Until the old, rude-furnished room
Burst, flower-like, into rosy bloom ;
While radiant with a mimic flame
Outside the sparkling drift became.
And through the bare-boughed lilac-tree
Our own warm hearth seemed blazing free
The crane and pendent trammels showed ;
The Turks' heads on the andirons glowed ;
While ehildish fancy, prompt to tell
The meaning of the miracle.
Whispered the old rhyme : " Under the tree.
When fire outdoors hums merrily,
There the vritches are making tea. "
The moon aoove the eastern wood
Shone at its full ; the hill-range stood
Transfigured in the silver flood.
Its blown snows flashing cold and keen.
Dead white, save where some sharp ravine
Took shadow, or the sombre green
Of hemlocks turned to pitchy black
Against the whiteness at their baek.
For such a woi'ld and such a night
Most fitting that unwarming light.
Which only seemed where'er it feD
To make the coldness visible.
Shut in from all the world without.
We sat the clean-winged hearth about.
Content to let the north-wind roar
In baffled rage at pane and door.
While the red logs before us beat
The frost-line back with tropic heat ;
And ever, when a louder blast
Shook beam and rafter as it passed.
The merrier up its roaring draught
The great throat of the chimney laughed ;
The house-dog on his paws outspread
Laid to the fire his drowsy head.
The cat's dark silhouette on the wall
A couchant tiger's seemed to fall ;
And, for the winter fireside meet.
Between the andirons' straddling feet.
The mug of cider simmered slow.
The apples sputtered in a row.
And, close at hand, the basket stood
With nuts from brown Oetober's wood.
JOHN GREENLEAP WHITTIER.
"WINTER NOON.
FROM "THE WINTER WALK AT NOON !"
"THE TASK," BOOK VI.
The nighll^was wiAter in^his rougfest mood.
The moniing sharp and clear. But now at noon
Upon the southern side of the slant hills.
And where the woods fence olf the northern
blast.
The season smiles, resigning all its rage.
And has the warmth of May. The vault is blue
Without a cloud, and white without a speck
The dazzling splendor of the scene below.
Again the harmony comes o'er the vale ;
And through the trees 1 view the embattled tower.
Whence all the music. 1 again perceive
The soothing influence of the wafted strains.
And settle in soft musings as I tread
The walk, still verdant, under oaks and elms.
Whose outspread branches overarch the glade.
No noise is here, or none that hinders thought.
The redbreast warbles still, but is content
With slender notes, and more than half sup¬
pressed :
Pleased with his solitude, and flitting light
From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes
à
POEMS OF NATURE.
From many a twig the pendent drops of ice,
That tinkle in the withered leaves below.
Stülness, accompanied with sounds so soft,
Charms more than silence. Meditation here
May think down hours to moments. Here the
heart
May give a useful lesson to the head.
And Learning wiser grow without his books.
William cowfek.
WINTER.
The day had been a calm and sunny day.
And tinged with amher was the sky at even ;
The fleecy clouds at length had rolled away.
And lay in furrows on the eastern heaven ; —
The moon arose and shed a glimmering ray.
And round her orb a misty circle lay.
The hoar-frost glittered on the naked heath.
The roar of distant winds was loud and deep.
The dry leaves rustled in each passing breath.
And the gay world was lost in quiet sleep.
Such was the time when, on the landscape brown,
Thi'ough a December air the snow came down.
The morning came, the dreary morn, at last.
And showed the whitened waste. The shiv¬
ering herd
Lowed on the hoary meadow-ground, and fast
Fell the light flakes upon the earth unstirred ;
The forest firs with glittering snows o'erlaid
Stood like hoar priests in robes of white arrayed.
John Howard Bryant.
«
WINTER PICTURES.
ífrom "the vision of sir launfal."
Down swept the chill wind from the mountain
peak.
From the snow five thousand summers old ;
On open wold and hill-top bleak
It had gathered all the cold.
And whirled it like sleet on the wanderer's cheek ;
It earned a shiver everywhere
From the unleafed boughs and pastures bare ;
The little brook heard it and built a roof
'Neath which he could house him, winter-proof ;
All night by the white stars' frosty gleams
He groined his arches and matched his beams ;
Slender and clear were his crystal spam
As the lashes of light that trim the stara :
He sculptured every summer delight
In his halls and chambers out of sight ;
Sometimes his tinkling waters slipt
Down through a frost-leaved forest-crypt.
I Long, sparkling aisles of steel-stemmed trees
' Rending to counterfeit a breeze ;
Sometimes the roof no fretwork knew
But silvery mosses that downward grew ;
Sometimes it was carved in sharp relief
With quaint arabesques of ice-fern leaf ;
Sometimes it was simply smooth and clear
For the gladness of heaven to shine through, and
here
He had caught the nodding bulrush-tops
And hung them thickly with diamond drops.
Which crystalled the beams of moon and sun,
And made a star of every one :
No mortal builder's most rare device
Could match this winter-palace of ice ;
'T was as if every image that mirrored lay
In his depths serene through the summer day.
Each flitting shadow of earth and sky.
Lest the happy model should be lost.
Had been mimicked in fairy masonry
By the elfin builders of the frost. .
Within the hall are song and laughter.
The cheeks of Christmas grow red and joUy,
And sprouting is every corbel and rafter
With the lightsome green of ivy and holly ;
Through the deep gulf of the chimney wide
Wallows the Yule-log's roaring tide ;
The broad flame-pennons droop and flap
And belly and tug as a flag in the wind ;
Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap.
Hunted to death in its galleries blind ;
And swift little troops of silent sparks.
Now pausing, now scattering away as in fear.
Go threading the soot-forest's tangled darks
Like herds of startled deer.
But the wind without was eager and sharp.
Of Sir LaunfaTs gray hair it makes a harp.
And rattles and rings
The icy strings.
Singing, in dreary monotone,
A Christmas carol of its own.
Whose burden still, as he might guess, '
Was—"Shelterless, shelterless, shelterless!"
The voice of the seneschal flared like a torch
As he shouted the wanderer away from the porch.
And he sat in the gateway and saw all night
The great hall-fire, so cheery and bold.
Through the window-slits of the castle old,
Build out its piers of ruddy light
Against the drift of the cold.
There was never a leaf on bush or tree.
The bare boughs rattled shudderingly ;
The river was dumb and could not speak.
For the weaver Winter its shroud had spun ;
[ö-
POEMS 0
A single crow on the tree-top bleak
From his shining feathers shed off the cold sun ;
Again it was morning, but shrunk and cold,
As if her veins were sapless and old.
And she rose up decrepitly
For a last dim look at earth and sea.
James Russell Lowell.
WINTER SCENES.
prom "the seasons : winter."
The keener tempests rise ; and fuming dun
From all the livid east, or piercing north.
Thick clouds ascend ; in whose capacious womb
A vapory deluge lies, to snow congealed.
Heavy they roll their fleecy wprld along ;
And the sky saddens with the gathered storm.
Through the hushed air the whitening shower
descends
At first thin wavering ; till at last the flakes
Fall broad and wide and fast, dimming the day
With a continual flow. The cherished fields
Put on their winter robe of purest white.
'T is brightness all ; save where the new snow
melts
.Along the mazy current. Low the woods
Bow their hoar head ; and, ere the languid sun
Faint from the west emits his evening ray.
Earth's universal face, deep hid and chill.
Is one wide dazzling waste, that buries wide
The works of man. Drooping, the laborer-ox
Stands covei'ed o'er with snow, and then demands
The frait of all his toil. The fowls of heaven.
Tamed by the cruel season, crowd around
The winnowing store, and claim the little boon
Which Providence assigns them. One alone,
The redbreast, sacred to the household gods,
Wisely regardful of the embroiling sky.
In joyless fields and thorny thickets leaves
His shivering mates, and pays to tinsted man
His annual visit. Half afraid, he first
Against the window beats ; then, brisk, alights
On the warm hearth ; then, hopping o'er the floor.
Eyes all the smiling family askance.
And pecks, and starts, and wonders where he is :
TUl, more familiar grown, the table-crumbs
Attract his slender feet. The foodless wilds
Pour forth their brown inhabitants. The hare.
Though timorous of heart, and hard beset
By death in various forms, dark snares, and dogs,
And more unpitying man, the garden seeks.
Urged on by fearless want The bleating kind
Eye the bleak heaven, and next the glistening
earth,
With looks of dumb despair; then, sad dispersed.
Dig for the withered herb through heaps of snow.
James Thomson.
ta
NATURE. 439
WHEN ICICLES HANG BY THE WALL.
from "love's labor's lost," act v. sc. 2.
When icicles hang by the wall.
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail.
And Tom bears logs into the hall.
And milk comes frozen home in pail.
When blood is nipped, and ways be foul.
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-who ;
To-whit, to-who, a merry note.
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.
When all aloud the wind doth blow.
And coughing drowns the parson's saw.
And birds sit brooding in the snow.
And Marian's nose looks red and raw.
When roasted crabs hiss in the bowl.
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-who ;
To-whit, to-who, a merry note.
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.
Shakespeare,
THE SNOW-STORM.
Annottnced by all the trumpets of the sky,
Anives the snow ; and, driving o'er the fields.
Seems nowhere to alight ; the whited air
Hides hills and woods, the river, and the heaven.
And veils the farm-house at the garden's end.
The sled and traveller stopped, the courier's feet
Delayed, all friends shut out, the housemates
sit
Around the radiant fireplace, enclosed
In a tumultuous privacy of storm.
Come see the north-wind's masonry !
Out of an unseen quarry, evermore
Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer
Curves his white bastions with projected roof
Round every windward stake or tree or door ;
Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work
So fanciful, so savage ; naught cares he
For number or proportion. Mockingly,
On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths ;
A swan-like form invests the hidden thorn ;
Fills up the farmer's lane from wall to wall,
Maugre the farmer's sighs ; and at the gate
A tapering turret overtops the work.
And when his hours are numbered, and the world
Is all his own, retiring as he were not.
Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art
To mimic m slow structures, stone by stone.
Built in an age, the mad wind's night-work.
The frolic architecture of the snow.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
Bi
fl-
440
POEMS OP NATURE.
THE SNOW-SHOWER.
Stand here by my side and turn, I pray,
On the lake below thy gentle eyes ;
The clouds hang over it, heavy and gray,
And dark and silent the water lies ;
And out of that frozen mist the snow
In wavering flakes begins to flow ;
Flake after flake
They sink in the dark and silent lake.
See how in a living swarm they come
From the chambers beyond that misty veil ;
Some hover awhile in air, and some
Rush prone from the sky like summer hail.
All, dropping swiftly or settling slow.
Meet, and are still in the depths below ;
Flake after flake
Dissolved in the dark and silent lake.
Here delicate snow-stars, out of the cloud, '
Come floating downward in airy play.
Like spangles dropped from the glistening crowd
That whiten by night the Milky Way ;
There broader and burlier masses fall ;
The sullen water buries them all, —
Flake after flake, —
All drowned in the dark and silent lake.
And some, as on tender wings they glide
From their chilly birth-cloud, dim and gray.
Are joined in their fall, and, side by side.
Come clinging along their unsteady way ;
As friend with friend, or husband with wife.
Makes hand in hand the passage of life ;
Each mated flake
Soon sinks in the dark and silent lake.
Lo ! while we are gazing, in swifter haste
Stream down the snows, till the air is white.
As, myriads by mj'riads madly chased.
They fling themselves from their shadowy
height.
The fair, frail creatures of middle sky.
What speed they make, with their grave so nigh ;
Flake after flake
To lie in the dark and silent lake !
I see in thy gentle eyes a tear ;
They tum to me in sorrowful thought ;
Thou thinkest of friends, the good and dear.
Who were for a time, and now are not ;
Like these fair children of cloud and frost.
That glisten a moment and then are lost, —
Flake after flake, —
All lost in the dark and silent lake.
Yet look again, for the clouds divide ;
A gleam of blue on the water lies ;
And far away, on the mountain-side,
A sunbeam falls from the opening skies.
But the hurrying host that flew between
The cloud and the water no more is seen ;
Flake after flake
At rest in the dark and silent lake.
William Gullen Bryant.
SNOW.—A WINTER SKETCH.
The blessed morn has come again ;
The early gray
Taps at the slumberer's window-pane.
And seems to say.
Break, break from the enchanter's chain
Away, away !
'T is winter, yet there is no sound
Along the air
Of winds along their battle-ground ;
But gently there
The snow is falling, — all around
How fair, how fair !
ralph hovt.
SNOW-FLAKES.
Out of the bosom of the Air,
Out of the cloud-folds of her garments shaken.
Over the woodlands brown and bare.
Over the harvest-fields forsaken.
Silent and soft and slow
Descends the snow.
Even as our cloudy fancies take
Suddenly shape in some divine expression,
Even as the troubled heart doth make
In the white countenance confession.
The troubled sky reveals
The grief it feels.
This is the poem of the air.
Slowly in silent syllables recorded ;
This is the secret of despair.
Long in its cloudy bosom hoarded.
Now whispered and revealed
To wood and field.
henry wadsworth longfellow.
A SNOW-STORM.
scene in a vermont winter.
'T IS a fearful night in the winter time.
As cold as it ever can be ;
The roar of the blast is heard like the chime
Of the waves on an angry sea.
POEMS GE NATURE.
441
The moon is full ; but her silver light
The storm dashes out with its wings to-night ;
And over the sky from south to north
Not a star is seen, as the wind comes forth
In the strength of a mighty glee.
All day hadlthe snow com J down, — all day
As it never came down before ;
And over the hUls, at sunset, lay
Some two or three feet, or more ;
The fence was lost, and the wall of stone ;
The windows bloeked and the well-curbs gone ;
The haystack had grown to a mountain lift.
And the wood-pile looked like a monster drift.
As it lay by the farmer's door.
The night setsj in on a world of snow.
While the air grows sharp and chill.
And the warning roar of a fearful blow
Is heard on the distant hill ;
And the norther, see ! on the mountain peak
In his breath how the old trees writhe and shriek!
He shouts on the plain, ho-ho ! ho-ho I
He drives from his nostrils the blinding snow.
And growls with a savage wiU.
Such a night as this to be found abroad.
In the drifts and the freezing air.
Sits a shivering dog, in the field, by the road.
With the snow in his shaggy hair.
He shuts his eyes to the wind and growls ;
He lifts his head, and moans and howls ;
Then crouching low, from the cutting sleet.
His nose is pressed on his quivering feet, —
Pray, what does the dog do there ?
A farmer came from the village plain, —
But he lost the travelled way ;
And for hours he trod with might and main
A path for his horse and sleigh ;
But colder still the cold winds blew.
And deeper still the deep drifts grew.
And his mare, a beautiful Morgan brown.
At last in her struggles floundered down.
Where a log in a hollow lay.
In vain, with a neigh and a frenzied snort.
She plunged in the drifting snow.
While her master urged, till his breath gi-ew short,
With a word and a gentle blow ;
But the snow was deep, and the tugs were tight ;
His hands were numb and had lost their might ;
So he wallowed back to his half-filled sleigh.
And strove to shelter himself till day.
With his coat and the buffalo.
He has given the last faint jerk of the rein.
To rouse up his dying steed ;
And the poor dog howls to the blast in vain.
For help in his master's need.
L J
For a while he strives with a wistful cry
To catch a glance from his drowsy eye.
And wags his tail if the rude winds flap
The skirt of the buffalo over his lap.
And whines when he takes no heed.
The wind goes down and the storm is o'er, —
'T is the hour of midnight, past ;
The old trees writhe and bend no more
In the whirl of the rushing blast.
The silent moon with her peaceful light
Looks down on the hills with snow all white.
And the giant shadow of Camel's Hump,
The blasted pine and the ghostly stump.
Afar on the plain are cast.
But cold and dead by the hidden log
Are they who came from the town, —
The man in his sleigh, and his faithful dog.
And his beautiful Morgan brown, —
In the wide snow-desert, far and grand.
With his cap on his head and the reins in his
hand, —
The dog with his nose on his master's feet.
And the mare half seen through the crusted sleet.
Where she lay when she floundered down.
Charles Gam.age Eastman.
0 WINTER! WILT THOU NEVER GO?
0 winter ! wilt thou never, never go ?
0 summer ! but I weary for thy coming.
Longing once more to hear the Luggie flow.
And frugal bees, laboriously humming.
Now the east-wind diseases the infirm.
And must crouch in corners from rough weather ;
Sometimes a winter sunset is a charm, —
When the fired clouds, compacted, blaze together.
And the large sun dips red behind the hills.
I, from my window, can behold this pleasure ;
And the eternal moon, what time she fills
Her orb with argent, treading a soft measure.
With queenly motions of a bridal mood.
Through the white spaces of infinitude.
DAVID Gray.
♦—
VIEW FROM THE EUGANEAN HILLS,*
NORTH ITALY.
Many a green isle needs must be
In the deep wide sea of misery.
Or the mariner, worn and wan.
Never thus could voyage on
Day and night, and night and day.
Drifting on his dreary way,
* The lonely mountains which surround what was once the re*
treat, and is now the sepulchre, of Petrarch.
442
POEMS OF NATURE.
With the solid darkness black
Closing round his vessel's track ;
Whüst above, the sunless sky,
Big with clouds, hangs heavily.
And behind, the tempest fleet
Hurries on with lightning feet.
Riving sail and cord and plank
Till the ship has almost drank
Death from the o'erbrimming deep ;
And sinks down, down, like that sleep
When the dreamer seems to be
Weltering through eternity ;
And the dim low line before
Of a dark and distant shore
Still recedes, as, ever still
Longing with divided will.
But no power to seek or shun,
He is ever drifted on
O'er the unreposing wave
To the haven of the grave.
Ay, many flowering islands lie
In the waters of wide agony :
To such a one this morn was led
My bark, by soft winds piloted.
— Mid the mountains Euganean
I stood listening to the paean
With which the legioned rooks did hail
The sun's uprise majestical :
Gathering round with wings all hoar.
Through the dewy mist they soar
Like gray shades, till the eastern heaven
Bursts, and then, as clouds of even.
Flecked with fire and azure, lie
In the unfathomable sky.
So their plumes of purple grain.
Starred with drops of golden rain,
Gleam above the sunlight woods.
As in silent multitudes
On the morning's fitful gale,
Through the broken mist they sail ;
And the vapors cloven and gleaming
Follow, down the dark steep streaming.
Till all is bright and clear and still
Round the solitary hill.
Beneath is spread like a green sea
The waveless plain of Lombardy,
Bounded by the vaporous air,
Islanded by cities fair ;
Underneath day's azure eyes.
Ocean's nursling, Venice, lies, —
A peopled labyrinth of walls,
Amphitrite's destined halls.
Which her hoary sire now paves
With his blue and beaming waves.
Lo I the sun upsprings behind,
Broad, red, radiant, half reclined
On the level quivering line
Of the waters crystalline ;
And before that chasm of light.
As within a furnace bright.
Column, tower, and dome, and spire
Shine like obelisks of fire.
Pointing with inconstant motion
From the altar of dark ocean
To the sapphire-tinted skies ;
As the flames of sacrifice
From the marble shrines did rise.
As to pierce the dome of gold
Where Apollo spoke of old.
Sun-girt city ! thou hast been
Ocean's child, and then his queen ;
Now is come a darker day.
And thou soon must be his prey.
If the power that raised thee here
Hallow so thy watery bier.
A less drear ruin then than now.
With thy conquest-branded brow
Stooping to the slave of slaves
From thy throne among the waves.
Wilt thou be when the sea-mew
Flies, as once before it flew.
O'er thine isles depopulate.
And all is in its ancient state.
Save where many a palace-gate
With green sea-flowers overgrown
Like a rock of ocean's own.
Topples o'er the abandoned sea
As the tides change sullenly.
The fisher on his watery way
Wandering at the close of day
Will spread his sail and seize his oar
Till he pass the gloomy shore.
Lest thy dead should, from theh- sleep
Bursting o'er the starlight deep.
Lead a rapid mask of death
O'er the waters of his path.
Noon descends around me now :
'T is the noon of autumn's glow.
When a soft and purple mist.
Like a vaporous amethyst.
Or an air-dissolved star.
Mingling light and fragrance, far
From the curved horizon's bound
To the point of heaven's profound.
Fills the overflowing sky ;
And the plains that silent lie
Underneath ; the leaves unsodden
Where the infant frost has trodden
With his moming-wingèd feet.
Whose bright print is gleaming yet ;
And the red and golden vines.
Piercing with their trellised lines
POEMS OF NATURE.
443
The rough, dark-skirted wilderness ;
The dun and bladed grass no less,
Pointing from this hoary tower
In the windless air ; the flower
Glimmering at my feet ; the line
Of the olive-sandalled Apennine
In the south dimly islanded ;
And the Alps, whose snows are spread
High between the clouds and sun ;
And of living things each one ;
And my spirit, which so long
Darkened this swift stream of song, —
Interpenetrated lie
By the glory of the sky ;
Be it love, light, harmony.
Odor, or the soul of all
Which from heaven like dew doth fall.
Or the mind which feeds this verse
Peopling the lone universe.
Noon descends, and after noon
Autumn's evening meets me soon.
Leading the infantine moon
And that one star, which to her
Almost seems to minister
Half the crimson light she brings
From the sunset's radiant springs :
And the soft dreams of the morn
(Which like wingèd winds had home
To that silent isle, which lies
Mid remembered agonies.
The frail bark of this lone being)
Pass, to other sufferers fleeing.
And its ancient pilot. Pain,
Sits beside the helm again.
Other flowering isles must be
In the sea of life and agony ;
Other spirits float and flee
O'er that gulf ; even now, perhaps.
On some rock the wild wave wraps.
With folding winds they waiting sit
For my bark, to pilot it
To some calm and blooming cove, j
Where for me, and those I love.
May a windless bower be built.
Far from passion, pain, and guilt.
In a dell mid lawny hills.
Which the wild sea-murmur fills.
And soft sunshine, and the sound
Of old forests echoing round.
And the light and smell divine
Of all flowers that breathe and shine.
— We may live so happy there.
That the spirits of the air.
Envying us, may even entice
To our healing paradise
The polluting multitude ;
But their rage would be subdued
By that clime divine and calm.
And the winds whose wings rain balm
On the uplifted soul, and leaves
Under which the bright sea heaves ;
While each breathless interval
In their whisperings musical
The inspired soul supplies
With its own deep melodies ;
And the love which heals all strife,
Circling, like the breath of life.
All things in that sweet abode
With its own mild brotherhood.
They, not it, would change ; and soon
Every sprite beneath the moon
Would repent its envy vain,
And the earth grow young again !
percy Bysshb Shelley.
GRONGAR HILL.
[The Vale of the Towy embraces, in its winding* course of fifteen
miles, some of the loveliest scenery of South Wales. If it be less
cultivated than the Vale of Usk, its woodland views are more ro>
roantic and frequent. The neighborhood is historic and poetic
ground. From Grongar Hill the eye discovers traces of a Roman
camp 5 Golden Grove, the home of Jeremy Taylor, is on the oppo¬
site side of the river ; Merlin's chair recalls Spenser ; and a farm¬
house near the foot of Llangumnor Hill brings back the memory
of its once genial occupant, Richard Steele. Spenser places the
cave of Merlin among the dark woods of Dinevawr.J
Silent nymph, with curious eye.
Who, the purple even, dost lie
On the mountain's lonely van.
Beyond the noise of busy man.
Painting fair the form of things.
While the yellow linnet sings.
Or the tuneful nightingale
Charms the forest with her tale, —
Come, with all thy various hues.
Come, and aid thy sister Muse.
Now, while Phœbus, riding high.
Gives lustre to the land and sky,
Grongar Hill invites my song, —
Draw the landscape bright and strong ;
Grongar, in whose mossy cells
Sweetly musing Quiet dwells ;
Grongar, in whose sUent shade.
For the modest Muses made.
So oft I have, the evening stUl,
At the fountain of a rill.
Sat upon a flowery bed.
With my hand beneath my head.
While strayed my eyes o'er Towys flood.
Over mead and over wood.
From house to house, from hiU to hill.
Till Contemplation had her fill.
About his checkered sides I wind.
And leave his brooks and meads behind.
POEMS OF NATURE.
And groves and grottoes where I lay,
And vistas shooting beams of day.
Wide and wider spreads the vale,
As circles on a smooth canal.
The mountains round, unhappy fate !
Sooner or later, of all height.
Withdraw their summits from the skies.
And lessen as the others rise.
Still the prospect wider spreads.
Adds a thousand woods and meads ;
Still it widens, widens still.
And sinks the newly risen hill.
Now I gain the mountain's brow ;
What a landscape lies below !
No clouds, no vapors intervene ;
But the gay, the open scene
Does the face of Nature show
In all the hues of heaven's bow !
And, swelling to embrace the light,
Spreads around beneath the sight.
Old castles on the cliffs arise,
Proudly towering in the skies ;
Rushing from the woods, the spires
Seem from hence ascending fires ;
Half his beams Apollo sheds
On the yellow mountain-heads,
Gilds the fleeces of the flocks.
And glitters on the broken rocks.
Below me trees unnumbered rise.
Beautiful in various dyes :
The gloomy pine, the poplar blue.
The yellow beech, the sable yew.
The slender fir that taper grows.
The sturdy oak with broad-spread boughs ;
And beyond, the purple grove.
Haunt of Phyllis, queen of love !
Gaudy as the opening dawn.
Lies a long and level lawn.
On which a dark hill, steep and high.
Holds and charms the wandering eye ;
Deep are his feet in Towy's flood ;
His sides are clothed with waving wood ;
And ancient towers crown his brow,
That cast an awful look below ;
Whose ragged walls the ivy creeps.
And with her arms from falling keeps ;
So both a safety from the wind
In mutual dependence find.
'T is now the raven's bleak abode ;
'T is now the apartment of the toad ;
And there the fox securely feeds ;
And there the poisonous adder breeds.
Concealed in ruins, moss, and weeds ;
While, ever and anon, there fall
Huge heaps of hoary, mouldered wall.
Yet Time has seen, —that lifts the low
And level lays the lofty brow, —
Has seen this broken pile complete.
Big with the vanity of state.
But transient is the smile of Fate !
A little rule, a little sway,
A sunbeam in a winter's day.
Is all the proud and mighty have
Between the cradle and the grave.
And see the rivers, how they run
Through woods and meads, in shade and sun.
Sometimes swift, sometimes slow, —
Wave succeeding wave, they go
A various journey to the deep.
Like human life to endless sleep !
Thus is Nature's vesture wrought
To instruct our wandering thought ;
Thus she dresses green and gay
To disperse our cares away.
Ever charming, ever new.
When will the landscape tire the view !
The fountain's fall, the river's flow ;
The woody valleys, warm and low ;
The windy summit, wild and high.
Roughly rushing on the sky ;
The pleasant seat, the ruined tower.
The naked rock, the shady bower ;
The town and village, dome and farm, —
Each gives each a double charm.
As pearls upon an Ethiop's arm.
See on the mountain's southern side.
Where the prospect opens wide.
Where the evening gilds the tide.
How close and small the hedges lie !
What streaks of meadow cross the eye !
A step, methinks, may pass the stream.
So little distant dangers seem ;
So we mistake the Future's face.
Eyed through Hope's deluding glass ;
As yon summits, soft and fair.
Clad in colors of the air.
Which, to those who journey near.
Barren, brown, and rough appear ;
StiU we tread the same coarse way, —
The present's still a cloudy day.
0, may I with myself agree.
And never covet what I see ;
Content me with a humble shade.
My passions tamed, my wishes laid ;
For while our wishes wildly roll.
We banish quiet from the soul.
'T is thus the busy beat the air,
And misers gather wealth and care.
Now, even now, my joys run high.
As on the mountain-turf I lie ;
While the wanton Zephyr sings.
And in the vale perfumes his wings ;
While the waters murmur deep ;
While the shepherd charms his sheep ;
While the birds unbounded fly.
And with music fill the sky, —
f
POEMS OF NATURE. 445
Now, even now, my joys nin high.
Be full, ye courts ; be great who will ;
Search for Peace with all your skill ;
Open wide the lofty door.
Seek her on the marble floor :
In vain you search ; she is not there !
In vain you search the domes of Care !
Grass and flowers Quiet treads.
On the meads and mountain-heads.
Along with Pleasure, — close allied.
Ever by each other's side, —
And often, by the murmuring rill.
Hears the thrush, while all is still
Within the groves of Grongar Hill.
John Dyer.
BUILDING A HOME.
from "the art of preserving health."
Meantime, the moist malignity to shun
Of burdened skies, mark where the dry cham¬
paign
Swells into cheerful hills : where marjoram
And thyme, the love of bees, perfume the air ;
And where the cynorrhodon with the rose
For fragrance vies ; for in the thirsty soil
Most fragrant breathe the aromatic tribes.
There bid thy roofs high on the basking steep
Ascend, there light thy hospitable fires.
And let them see the winter morn arise.
The summer evening blushing in the west :
While with umbrageous oaks the ridge behind
O'erhung, defends you from the blustering North,
And bleak affliction of the peevish East.
0, when the growling winds contend, and all
The sounding forest fluctuates in the storm.
To sink in warm repose, and hear the din
Howl o'er the steady battlements, delights
Above the luxury of vulgar sleep.
The murmuring rivulet, and the hoarser strain
Of waters rushing o'er the slippery rocks.
Will nightly lull you to ambrosial rest.
To please the fancy is no trifling good.
Where health is studied ; for whatever moves
The nrind with calm delight promotes the just
And natural movements of the harmorrious frame.
Besides, the sportive brook forever shakes
The tremblirrg air, that floats from hill to hill.
From vale to mountain, with incessant change
Of purest element, refreshing still
Your airy seat, and uninfected gods.
Chrefly for this I praise the man who builds
High on the breezy ridge, whose lofty sides
The ethereal deep with endless billows chafes.
His purer mansion nor contagious years
Shall reach, nor deadly putrid airs annoy.
John Armstrong.
^
DOVER CLIFF.
from "king lear." act iv. sc. 6.
Come on, sir ; here's the place : stand still !
How fearful
And dizzy't is, to cast one's eyes so low !
The crows and choughs that wing the midway air
Show scarce so gross as beetles : half-way down
Hangs one that gathers samphire, — dreadful
trade !
Methinks he seems no bigger than his head :
The fishermen, that walk upon the beach.
Appear like mice ; and yon tall anchoring bark.
Diminished to her cock ; her cock, a buoy
Almost too small for sight : the murmuring surge.
That on the unnumbered idle pebbles chafes.
Cannot be heard so high. — I '11 look no more ;
Lest my brain turn, and the deficient sight
Topple down headlong.
shakespeare.
ALPINE HEIGHTS.
On Alpine heights the love of God is shed ;
He paints the morning red.
The flowerets white and blue,
And feeds them with his dew.
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells.
On Alpine heights, o'er many a fragrant heath.
The loveliest breezes breathe ;
So free and pure the air.
Sis breath seems floating the^p.
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells.
On Alpine heights, beneath his mild blue eye.
Still vales and meadows lie ;
The soaring glacier's ice
Gleams like a paradise.
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells.
Down Alpine heights the silvery streamlets flow 1
There the bold chamois go ;
On giddy crags they stand.
And drink from his own hand.
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells.
On Alpine heights, in troops all white as snow.
The sheep and wild goats go ;
here, in the solitude.
He fills their hearts with food.
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells.
On Alpine heights the herdsman tends his herd ;
His Shepherd is the Lord ;
For he who feeds the sheep
Will sure his offspring keep.
On Alpine heights a loving Father dwells.
From the German of Krummacher. Transía
tion of Charles T. brooks.
fi-
446
POEMS OF NATURE.
n
THE DESCENT.
My mule refreshed, his bells
Jingled once more, the signal to depart,
And we set out in the gray light of dawn,
Descending rapidly, — by waterfalls
Fast frozen, and among huge blocks of ice
That in their long career had stopt midway ;
At length, unchecked, unbidden, he stood still.
And all his bells were mufiled. Then my
guide.
Lowering his voice, addressed me : — " Through
this chasm
On, and say nothing, — for a word, a breath.
Stirring the air, may loosen and bring down
A winter's snow, — enough to overwhelm
The horse and foot that, night and day, defiled
Along this path to conquer at Marengo."
Samuel Rogers.
SONG OF THE BROOK.
FROM "THE BROOK: AN IDYL."
I COME from haunts of coot and hem ;
I make a sudden sally
And sparkle out among the fern.
To bicker down a valley.
By thirty hills I hurry down.
Or slip between the ridges.
By twgnty thorps, a little town.
And half a hundred bridges.
Till last by Philip's farm I flow
To join the brimming river.
For men may come and men may go.
But I go on forever.
I chatter over stony ways.
In little sharps and trebles,
I bubble into eddying bays,
I babble on the pebbles.
With many a curve my banks I fret
By many a field and fallow.
And many a fairy foreland set
With willow-weed and mallow.
I chatter, chatter, as I flow
To join the brimming river ;
For men may come and men may go.
But I go on forever.
I wind about, and in and out,
With here a blossom sailing.
And here and there a lusty trout.
And here and there a grayling.
And here and there a foamy flake
Upon me, as I travel
With many a silvery waterbreak
Above the golden gravel.
And draw them aU along, and flow
To join the brimming river ;
For men may come and men may go.
But I go on forever.
I steal by lawns and grassy plots :
I slide by hazel covers ;
I move the sweet forget-me-nots
That grow for happy lovers.
I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance.
Among my skimming swallows ;
I make the netted sunbeam dance
Against my sandy shallows ;
I murmur finder moon and stars
In brambly wildernesses ;
I linger by 'my shingly bars ;
I loiter round my cresses ;
And out again I curve and flow
To join the brimming river ;
For men may come and men may go.
But I go on forever.
Alfred Tennyson.
THE RHINE.
from "CHILDE HAROLD." CANTO Itl.
The castled crag of Drachenfels
Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine,
Whose breast of waters broadly swells
Between the banks which bear the vine.
And hills all rich with blossomed trees.
And fields which promise corn and wine.
And scattered cities crowning these,
Whose far white walls along them shine.
Have strewed a scene, which I should see
With double joy, wert thou with me.
And peasant-girls, with deep-blue eyes.
And hands which offer early flowers.
Walk smiling o'er this paradise ;
Above, the frequent feudal towers
Through green leaves lift their walls of gray.
And many a rock which steeply lowers.
And noble arch in proud decay.
Look o'er this vale of vintage-bowers ;
But one thing want these banks of Rhine, —
Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine !
f
POEMS OF NATURE.
417
■a
I send the lilies given to me,
Though long before thy hand they touch
I know that they must withered be, —
But yet reject them not as such ;
For I have cherished them as dear.
Because they yet may meet thine eye.
And guide thy soul to mine even here.
When thou behold'st them drooping nigh.
And know'st them gathered by the Rhine,
And offered from my heart to thine ¡
The river nobly foams and flows.
The charm of this enchanted ground.
And aU its thousand turns disclose
Some fresher beauty varying round ;
The haughtiest breast its wish might bound
Through life to dwell delighted here ;
Nor could on earth a spot be found
To nature and to me so dear.
Could thy dear eyes in following mine
Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine !
Byron.
ON THE RHINE.
'T WAS morn, and beautiful the mountain's
brow —
Hung with the clusters of the bending vine —
Shone in the early light, when on the Rhine
We sailed and heard the waters round the prow
In murmurs parting ; varying as we go.
Rocks after rocks come forward and retire.
As some gray convent wall or sunlit spire
Starts up along the banks, unfolding slow.
Here castles, like the prisons of despair,
Frown as we pass ; — there, on the vineyard's
side.
The bursting sunshine pours its streaming tide ;
While Grief, forgetful amid scenes so fair.
Counts not the hours of a long summer's day.
Nor heeds bow fast the prospect winds away.
William Lisle Bowles.
THE VALLEY BROOK.
Fresh from the fountains of the wood
A rivulet of the valley came.
And glided on for many a rood.
Flushed with the morning's ruddy flame.
The air was fresh and soft and sweet ;
The slopes in spring's new verdure lay,
And wet with dew-drops at my feet
Bloomed the young violets of May.
No sound of busy life was heard
Amid those pastures lone and still.
Save the faint chirp of early bird.
Or bleat of flocks along the hill.
I traced that rivulet's winding way ;
New scenes of beauty opened round.
Where meads of brighter verdure lay.
And lovelier blossoms tinged the ground.
"Ah, happy valley stream !" I said,
" Calm glides thy wave amid the flowers,
Whose fragrance round thy path is shed
Through all the joyous summer hours.
" 0, could my years, like thine, be passed
In some remote and silent glen,
Where I could dwell and sleep at last.
Far from the bustling haunts of men I
But what new echoes greet my ear ?
The village school-boy's merry call ;
And mid the village hum I hear
The murmur of the waterfall.
I looked ; the widening veil betrayed
A pool that shone like burnished steel.
Where that bright valley stream was stayed
To turn the mUler's ponderous wheel.
Ah ! why should I, I thought with shame.
Sigh for a life of solitude,
When even this stream without a name
Is laboring for the common good.
No longer let me shun my part
Amid the busy scenes of life.
But with a warm and generous heart
Press onward in the glorious strife.
john Howard Bryant.
AFTON WATER.
Flow gently,lsweet AftonI among thy|green braes ;
Flow gently, 1 '11 sing thee a song in thy praise ;
My Mary's asleep by thy murmuring stream.
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
Thou stock-dove whose echo resounds through
the glen.
Ye wüd whistling blackbirds in yon thorny den.
Thou green-crested lapwing, thy screaming for¬
bear ;
I charge you disturb not my slumbering fair.
How lofty, sweet Afton, thy neighboring hills,
Far marked with the coursesof clear-winding rills!
There daily I wander as noon rises high,
My flocks and my Mary's sweet cot in my eye.
&
[&
448
POEMS OP NATURE.
How pleasant thy banks and green valleys below,
Where wild in the woodlands the primroses blow !
There oft as mild evening weeps over the lea,
The sweet-scented birk shades my Mary and me.
Thy crystal stream, Afton, bow lovely it glides.
And winds by the cot where my Mary resides ; '
How wanton thy waters her snowy feet lave,
As, gathering sweet flowerets, she stems thy clear
Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes ;
Flow gently, sweet river, the theme of my lays ;
My Mary's asleep by thy murmuring stream.
Flow gently, sweet Afton, disturb not her dream.
koBERT BURNS.
THE SHADED WATER.
When that my mood is sad, and in the noise
And bustle of the crowd I feel rebuke,
I turn my footsteps from its hollow joys
And sit me down beside this little brook ;
The waters have a music to mine ear
It glads me much to hear.
It is a quiet glen, as you may see.
Shut in from all intrusion by the trees.
That spread their giant branches, broad and free.
The silent growth of many centuries ;
And make a hallowed time for hapless moods,
A sabbath of the woods.
Few know its quiet shelter, — none, like me.
Do seek it out with such a fond desire.
Poring in idlesse mood on flower and tree.
And listening as the voiceless leaves respire, —
When the far-travelling breeze, done wandering.
Rests here his weary wing.
And all the day, with fancies ever new.
And sweet companions from their boundless
store.
Of merry elves bespangled all with dew,
Fautastic creatures of the old-time lore.
Watching their wild but unobtrusive play,
I fling the hours away.
A gracious couch — the root of an old oak
Whose branches yield it moss and canopy —
Is mine, and, so it be from woodman's stroke
Secure, shall never be resigned by me ;
It hangs above the stream that idly flies.
Heedless of any eyes.
There, with eye sometimes shut, but upward bent.
Sweetly I muse through many a quiet hour.
While every sense on earnest mission sent.
Returns, thought-laden, hack with bloom and
flower ;
Pursuing, though rebuked by those who moU,
A proñtable toil.
And still the waters, trickling at my feet.
Wind on their way with gentlest melody,.
Yielding sweet music, which the leaves repeat.
Above them, to the gay breeze gliding by, —
Yet not so rudely as to send one sound
Through the thick copse around.
Sometimes a brighter cloud than all the rest
Hangs o'er the archway opening through the
trees.
Breaking the spell that, like a slumber, pressed
On my worn spirit its sweet luxuries, ^
And with awakened vision upward bent,
I watch the firmament.
How like its sure and undisturbed retreat —
Life's sanctuary at last, secure from storm —
To the pure waters trickling at my feet
The bending trees that overshade my form !
So far as sweetest things of earth may seem
Like those of which we dream.
Such, to my mind, is the philosophy
The young bird teaches, who, with sudden flight.
Sails far into the blue that spreads on high.
Until I lose him from my straining sight, —
With a most lofty discontent to fly
Upward, from earth to sky.
William Gilmore Simms.
SONG OF THE RIVER.
Clear and cool, clear and cool.
By laughing shallow and dreaming pool ;
Cool and clear, cool and clear.
By shining shingle and foaming weir ;
Under the crag where the ouzel sings.
And the ivied wall where the church-bell rings,
Undefiled for the undefiled ;
Play by me, bathe in me, mother and child !
Dank and foul, dank and foul.
By the smoky town in its murky cowl ;
Foul and dank, foul and dank.
By wharf, and sewer, and slimy bank ;
Darker and darker the further I go.
Baser and baser the richer I grow ;
Who dare sport with the sin-defiled ?
Shrink from me, turn from me, mother and child !
Strong and free, strong and free.
The flood-gates are open, away to the sea :
Free and strong, free and strong.
Cleansing my streams as 1 hurry along
POEMS OF NATURE.
To the golden sands and the leaping bar,
And the taintless tide that awaits me afar,
As I lose myself in the infinite main,
Like a soul that has sinned and is pardoned again,
Undefiled for the undefiled ;
Play by me, bathe in me, mother and child !
Charles Kingsley.
TO SENECA LAKE.
On thy fair bosom, silver lake.
The wild swan sprfeads his snowy sail,
And round his breast the ripples break,
As down he bears before the gale.
On thy fair bosom, waveless stream.
The dipping paddle echoes far.
And flashes in the moonlight gleam.
And bright refleets the polar star.
The waves along thy pebbly shore.
As blows the north-wind, heave their foam.
And curl around the dashing oar.
As late the boatman hies him home.
How sweet, at set of sun, to view
Thy golden mirror spreading wide.
And see the mist of mantling blue
Float round the distant mountain's side.
At midnight hour, as shines the moon,
A sheet of silver spreads below.
And swift she cuts, at highest noon.
Light clouds, like wreaths of purest snow.
On thy fair bosom, silver lake,
0, I could ever sweep the oar.
When early birds at morning wake.
And evening tells us toil is o'er !
james Gates Percival.
THE BUGLE.
from "the princess."
The splendor falls on castle walls
And snowy summits old in story :
The long light shakes across the lakes.
And the wild cataract leaps in glory.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying.
Blow, bugle ; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.
0 hark ! 0 hear ! how thin and clear.
And thinner, clearer, farther going !
0 sweet and far, from cliff and scar.
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing t
Blow, let us hear the purple glens replying :
Blow, bugle ; answer, echoes, dying, dying, dying.
0 love, they die in yon rich sky.
They faint on hUl or field or river ;
Our echoes roll from soul to soul.
And grow forever and forever.
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes flying.
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dying, dying.
alfred Tennyson.
THE FALL OF NIAGARA.
The thoughts are strange that crowd into my
brain.
While I look upward to thee. It would seem
As if God poured thee from his hollow hand.
And hung his bow upon thine awful front,
And spoke in that loud voice which seemed to him
Who dwelt in Patmos for his Saviour's sake
The sound of many waters ; and had bade
Thy flood to chronicle the ages back.
And notch his centuries in the eternal rocks.
Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we.
That hear the question of that voice sublime ?
0, what are all the notes that ever rung
From war's vain trumpet, by thy thundering
side ?
Yea, what is all the riot man can make
In his short life, to thy unceasing roar ?
And yet, bold babbler, what art thou to Him
Who drowned a world, and heaped the waters far
Above its loftiest nqountains ? — a light wave.
That breaks, and whispers of its Maker's migh|:
John Gardiner Calkins Brainard.
THE CATARACT OF LODORE.
described in rhymes for the nursery.
" How does the water
Come down at Lodore ! "
My little boy asked me
Thus, once on a time ;
And moreover he tasked me
To tell him in rhyme.
Anon at the word.
There first came one daughter.
And then came another.
To second and third
The requit of their brother.
And to hear how the water
Comes down_at Lodore,
With its rush and its roar.
As many a time
They had seen it before.
So I told them in rhyme,
For of rhymes I had store.;
■0
iS-
450
POEMS OF NATURE.
And't was in my vocation
For their recreation
That so I should sing ;
Because I was Laureate
To them and the King.
From its sources which well
In the tarn on the fell ;
From its fountains
In the mountains,
Its rills and its gills ;
Through moss and through brake,
It runs and it creeps
For a while, till it sleeps
In its own little lake.
And thence at departing,
Awakening and starting.
It runs through the reeds.
And away it proceeds.
Through meadow and glade.
In sun and in shade.
And through the wood-shelter.
Among crags in its flurry.
Helter-skelter,
Hurry-skurry.
Here it comes sparkling,
And there it lies darkling ;
Now smoking and frothing
Its tumult and wrath in.
Till, in this rapid race
On which it is bent.
It reaches the place
Of its steep descent.
The cataract strong
Then plunges along.
Striking and raging
As if a war waging
Its caverns and rocks among ;
Rising and leaping.
Sinking and creeping.
Swelling and sweeping.
Showering and springing.
Flying and flinging,
"Writhing and ringing.
Eddying and whisking,
Spouting and frisking.
Turning and twisting.
Around and around
With endless rebound :
Smiting and fighting,
A sight to delight in ;
Confounding, astounding.
Dizzying and deafening the ear with its sound.
Collecting, projecting.
Receding and speeding.
And shocking and rocking.
And darting and parting.
I J I J
And threading and spreading,
ñd whizzing and hissing,
And dripping and skipping.
And hitting and splitting.
And shftiing and twining, -
And rattling and battling.
And shaking and quaking.
And pouring and roaring.
And waving and raving.
And tossing and crossing.
And flowing and going.
And running and stunning,
And foaming and roaming.
And dinning and spinning.
And dropping and hopping.
And working and jerking.
And guggling and struggling.
And heaving and cleaving,
"Aîid moaning and groaning ;
And glittering and frittering.
And gathering and feathering.
And whitening and brightening.
And quivering and shivering.
And huiTying and skurrying.
And thundering and floundering ;
Dividing and gliding and sliding, ""
And falling and brawling and sprawling,"^
And driving and riving and striving, -,
And sprinkling and twinkling and wrinkling,
"ïnd sounding and bounding and rounding.
And bubbling and troubling and doubling.
And grumbling and rumbling and tumbling.
And clattering and battering and shattering
Retreating and beating and meeting and sheeting.
Delaying and straying and playing and spraying.
Advancing and prancing and glancing and dan¬
cing.
Recoiling, turmoiling and toiling and boiling.
And gleaming and streaming and steaming and
beaming.
And rushing and flushing and brushing and
gushing,
•And flapping and rapping and clapping and
slapping.
And curling and whirling and purling and twirl¬
ing,
And thumping and plumping and bumping and
jumping.
And dashing and flashing and splashing and
clashing ;
And so never ending,'^but always descending.
Sounds and motions for ever and ever are blend-
y ing"
All at once and all o'er, with a mighty uproar, —
And this way the water comes down at Lodore.
Robert southev.
9
THE ORIENT.
^^Know ye the land of the cedar and vine^
Where the fioivers e^fer blossom, the beams ever shine
f
POEMS OF NATURE.
451
WHAT THE WINDS BRING.
Which is the wind that brings the cold ?
The north-wind, Freddy, and all the snow ;
And the sheep wiU scamper into the fold
When the north begins to blow.
Which is the wind that brings the heat ?
The south-wind, Katy ; and corn will grow,
And peaches redden for you to eat.
When the south begins to blow.
Which is the wind that brings the rain 1
The east-wind, Arty ; and farmers know
That cows come shivering up the lane
When the east begins to blow.
Which is the wind that brings the flowers ?
The west-wind, Bessy ; and soft and low
The birdies sing in the summer hours
When the west begins to blow.
Edmund Clarencp Stedman.
THE DANCING OF THE AIR.
And now behold your tender nurse, the.air,
And common neighbor that aye runs around,
How many pictures and impressions fair
Within her empty regions are there found.
Which to your senses dancing do propound !
For what are breath, speech, echoes, music, winds,
But dancings of the air in sundry kinds ?
For when you breathe, the air in order moves.
Now in, now out, in time'and measure true ;
And when you speak, so well she dancing loves.
That doubling oft, and oft redoubling new.
With thousand forms she doth herself endue :
For all the words that from your lips repair,
Are naught but tricks and turnings of the air.
Hence is her prattling daughter. Echo, bom.
That dances to all voices she can hear :
There is no sound so harsh that she doth scorn.
Nor any time wherein she will forbear
The airy pavement with her feet to wear :
And yet her hearing sense is nothing quick,
For after time she endeth every trick.
And thou, sweet Music, dancing's only life.
The ear's sole happiness, the air's best speech.
Loadstone of fellowship, charming-rod of strife.
The soft mind's paradise, the sick mind's leech.
With thine own tongue thou trees and stones
canst teach.
That, when the air doth dance her finest measure,
Then art thou bom, the gods' and men's sweet
pleasure.
Lastly, where keep the winds their revelry.
Their violent turnings, and wild whirling hays.
But in the air's translucent gallery.
Where she herself is turned a hundred ways.
While with these maskers wantonly she plays ?
Yet in this misrule, they such rule embrace.
As two at once encumber not the place.
Sir John Davies.
THE ORIENT.
from "the bride of abydos."
Know ye the land where the cypress and myrtle
Are emblems of deeds that ai-e done in their
clime ;
Where the rage of the vulture, the love of the
turtle,
NOw melt into sorrow, now madden', to crime ?'
Know ye the land of the cedar and vine.
Where the flowers ever blossom, the beams ever
shine' ;
Where the light wing^df Zephyr, oppressed with
perfume.
Wax faint o'er the gardens of Giil in her bloom ?
Where the citron and olive are fairest of fruit.
And the voice of the nightingale never is mute ;
Where the tints of the earth, and the hues of
the sky.
In color though varied, in beauty may vie.
And the purple of ocean is deepest in dye ;
Where the virgins are soft as the roses they twine.
And all, save the spirit of man, is divine ?
'T is the clime of the East ; 't is the land of the
Sun, —
Can he smile on such deeds as his children have
done ?
0, wild as the accents of lover's farewell
Are the hearts which they bear and the tales
which they tell !
Lord Byron.
SYRIA.
from " paradise and the peri.
Now, upon Sjnia's land of roses
Softly the light of eve reposes.
And, like a glory, the broad sun
Hangs over sainted Lebanon,
"Whose head in wintry grandeur towers.
And whitens with eternal sleet.
While summer, in a vale of flowers.
Is sleeping rosy at his feet.
To one who looked from upper air
O'er all the enchanted regions there.
How beauteous must have been the glow.
The life, how sparkling from below !
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452
POEMS OF NATURE.
-a
Fair gardens, shining streams, with ranks
Of golden melons on their banks.
More golden where the sunlight falls ;
Gay lizards, glittering on the walls
Of ruined shrines, busy and bright
As they were all alive with light ;
And, yet more splendid, numerous flocks
Of pigeons, settling on the rocks.
With their rich restless wings, that gleam
Variously in the crimson beam
Of the warm west, — as if inlaid
With brilliants from the mine, or made
Of tearless rainbows, such as span
The unclouded skies of Peristan !
And then, the mingling sounds that come.
Of shepherd's ancient reed, with hum
Of the wild bees of Palestine,
Banqueting through the flowery vales ; —
And, Jordan, those sweet banks of thine.
And woods, so full of nightingales !
THOMAS MOORE.
THE VALE OF CASHMERE.
FROM "THE LIGHT OF THE HAREM."
Who has not heard of the Vale of Cashmere,
With its roses the brightest that earth ever
gave.
Its xemples, and grottoes, and fountains as clear
As the love-lighted eyes that hang over their
wave ?
0, to see it at sunset, — when warsa-o'er the lake
Its spl^dor at parting a sàmmer eve thrbws.
Like a bride, full of blibhes, when lihgering to
take
A last loôîc of her mirror at àight ere she
goes ! —
When the shrines through the foliage are gleam¬
ing half shown.
And each hallows the hour by some rites of its
own.
Here the music of prayer from a minaret swells.
Here the Magian his urn full of perfume is
swinging.
And here, at the altar, a zone of sweet bells
Round the waist of some fair Indian dancer is
ringing.
Or to see it by moonlight, — when mellowly
shines
The light o'er its palaces, gardens, and shrines ;
When the waterfalls gleam like a quick fall of
stars.
And the nightingale's hjunn from the Isle of
Chenars
Is broken by laughs and light echoes of feet
From the cool .shining walks where the young
people meet.
Or at mom, when the magic of daylight awakes
A new wonder each minute as slowly it breaks.
Hills, cupolas, fountains, called forth every one
Out of darkness, as they were just bom of the
sun ;
When the spirit of fragrance is up with the day.
From his harem of night-flowers stealing away ;
And the wind, full of wantonness, wooes like a
lover
The young aspen-trees till they tremble aU over ;
When the east is as warm as the light of first
hopes.
And day, with its banner of radiance unfurled.
Shines in through the mountainous portal that
opes.
Sublime, from that valley of bliss to the world !
Thomas mqore.
A FOREST HYMN.
The groves were God's first temples. Ere
man learned
To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave.
And spread the roof above them, — ere he framed
The lofty vaulty to gather and! roll back!
The souhd of anthems , in the darkling wood.
Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down.
And oflered to the Mightiest solemn thanks
And supplication. For his simple heart
Might not resist the sacred influences
Which, from the stilly twilight of the place.
And from the gray old tmnks that high in heaven
Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound
Of the invisible breath that swayed at once
All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed
His spirit with the thought of boundless power
And inaccessible majesty. Ah, why
Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect
God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore
Only among the crowd, and under roofs
That our frail hands have raised ? Let me, at
least.
Here, in the shadow of this aged wood.
Offer one hymn, ■— thrice happy if it find
Acceptance in his ear.
Father, thy hand
Hath reared these venerable columns, thou
Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look
down
Upon the naked earth, and forthwith rose
All these fair ranks of trees. They in thy sun
Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy
breeze.
And shot towards heaven. The century-living
crow.
Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died
&
POEMS OP NATURE.
453
-a
IQ-
Among their branches, till at last they stood,
As now they stand, massy and tall and dark.
Fit shrine for humble worshipper to hold
Communion with his Maker. These dim vaults.
These winding aisles, of human pomp or pride
Report not. No fantastic carvings show
The boast of our vain race to change the form
Of thy fair works. But thou art here, — thou
fill'st
The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds
That run along the summit of these trees
In music ; thou art in the cooler breath
That from the inmost darkness of the place
Comes, scarcely felt ; the barky trunks, the
ground.
The fresh moist gi-ound, are all instinct with thee.
Here is continual worship ; — nature, here.
In the tranquillity that thou dost love.
Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly around.
From perch to perch, the solitary bird
Passes ; and yon clear spring, that, midst its
herbs.
Wells softly forth and wandering steeps the roots
Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale
Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left
Thyself without a witness, in these shades,
Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace
Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak, —
By whose immovable stem I stand and seem
Almost annihilated, — not a prince.
In all that proud old world beyond the deep.
E'er wore his crown as loftily as he
Wears the green coronal of leaves with which
Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root
Is beauty, such as blooms not in the glare
Of the broad sun. That delicate forest flower
With scented breath, and look so like a smile.
Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mould.
An emanation of the indwelling Life,
A visible token of the upholding Love,
That are the soul of this wide universe.
My heart is awed within me when I think
Of the great miracle that still goes on.
In silence, round me, — the perpetual work
Of thy creation, finished, yet renewed
Forever. Written on thy works I read
The lesson of thy own eternity.
Lo ! aU grow old and die ; but see again.
How on the faltering footsteps of decay
Ycuth presses, — ever gay and beautiful youth
In all its beautiful forms. These lofty trees
Wave not less proudly that their ancestors
Moulder beneath them. O, there is not lost
One of Earth's charms ! upon her bosom yet.
After the flight of untold centuries.
The freshness of her far beginning lies.
And yet shall lie. Life mocks the idle hate
Of his arch-enemy Death, — yea, seats himself
Upon the tyrant's throne, the sepulchre.
And of the triumphs of his ghastly foe
Makes his own nourishment. For he came forth
From thine own bosom, and shall have no end.
There have been holy men who hid themselves
Deep in the woody wilderness, and gave
Their lives to thought and prayer, till they out¬
lived
The generation born with them, nor seemed
Less aged than the hoary trees and rocks
Around them ; — and there have'been holy men
Who deemed it were not well to pass life thus.
But let me often to these solitudes
Retire, and in thy presence reassure
My feeble virtue. Here its enemies.
The passions, at thy plainer footsteps shrink
And tremble, and are still. 0 God ! when thou
Dost scare the world with tempests, set on fire
The heavens with falling thunderbolts, or fill.
With all the waters of the firmament.
The swift dark whirlwind that uprootsthe woods
And drowns the villages ; when, at thy call,
Uprises the great deep, and throws himself
Upon the continent, and overwhelms
Its cities, — who forgets not, at the sight
Of these tremendous tokens of thy power.
His pride, and lays his .strifes and follies by ?
0, from these sterner aspects of thy face
Spare me and mine, nor let us need the wrath
Of the mad unchained elements to teach
Who rules them. Be it ours to meditate.
In these calm shades, thy milder majesty.
And to the beautiful order of thy works
Leam to conform the order of our lives.
William Collen Bryant.
THE PRIMEVAL FOREST.
from the introduction to "evangeline."
This is thejfforest. pr|meval. .The [murmuring
Ipines'and the jhemlo.cks.
Bearded with ^ moss, and inj garments greer^ in-
distinctvn the ijwib^ht.
Stand like iDimds of jcld;, with voices sad and
prophatifc.
Stand like harpers hoar, with beards that rest
on their bosoms.
Loud from its« rocky caverns, the deep-voiced
neighbofing ocean
Speaks, and in accents disconsolate answers the _
wail of the forest.
This is the forest primeval ; but where are the
hearts that beneath it
Leaped like the! roe, when he hears in the wood¬
land the [voice of the huntsman ?
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
e-
454
POEMS OF NATURE.
THE GREENWOOD.
0, when't is summer weather,
And the yellow hee, with fairy sound.
The waters clear is humming round.
And the cuckoo sings unseen.
And the leaves are waving green, —
0, then 'tis sweet.
In some retreat.
To hear the murmuring dove.
With those whom on earth alone we love.
And to wind through the greenwood together.
But when't is winter weather.
And crosses grieve.
And friends deceive,
And rain and sleet
The lattice beat, —
O, then't is sweet
To sit and sing
Of the friends with whom, in the days of spring.
We roamed through the greenwood together.
William Lisle BOWLES.
THE BRAVE OLD OAK,
A song to the oak, the brave old oak.
Who hath ruled in the greenwood long ;
Here's health and renown to his broad green crown.
And his fifty arms so strong.
There's fear in his frown when the sun goes down.
And the fire in the west fades out ;
And he showeth his might on a wild midnight.
When the storms through his branches shout.
Then here's to the oak, the brave old oak.
Who stands in his pride alone ;
And still fiourish he, a hale green tree.
When a hundred years are gone !
In the days «f old, when the spring with cold
Had brightened his branches gray,
Through the grass at his feet crept maidens sweet.
To gather the dew of May.
And on that day to the rebeck gay
They frolicked with lovesome swains ;
They are gone, they are dead, in the churchyard
laid.
But the tree it still remains.
Then here's, etc.
He saw the rare times when the Christmas chimes
Were a merry sound to hear.
When the squire's wide hall and the cottage small
Were filled with good English cheer.
Now gold hath the sway we all obey.
And a ruthless king is he ;
But he never .shall send our ancient friend
To be tossed on the stormy sea.
Then here's, etc.
Henry fothergill Chorlev,
THE ARAB TO THE PALM.
Next to thee, 0 fair gazelle,
0 Beddowee girl, beloved so well ;
Next to the fearless Nedjidee,
Whose fleetness shall bear me again to thee ;
Next to ye both, I love'the palm.
With his leaves of beauty, his fruit of balm ;
Next to ye both, I love the tree
Whose fiuttering shadow wraps us three
With love and silence and mystery !
Our tribe is many, our poets vie
With any under the Arab sky ;
Yet none can sing of the palm but I.
The marble minarets that begem
Cairo's citadel-diadem
Are not so light as his slender stem.
He lifts his leaves in the sunbeam's glance.
As the Almehs lift their arms in dance, —
A slumberous motion, a passionate sign.
That works in the cells of the blood like wine.
Full of passion and sorrow is he.
Dreaming where the beloved may be ;
And when the warm south-winds arise.
He breathes his longing in fervid sighs.
Quickening odors, kisses of balm.
That drop in the lap of his chosen palm.
The sun may flame, and the sands may stir.
But the breath of his passion reaches her.
0 tree of love, by that love of thine.
Teach me how I shall soften mine !
Give me the secret of the sun.
Whereby the wooed is ever won !
UI were a king, 0 stately tree,
A likeness, glorious as might be.
In the court of my palace I'd build for thee ;
With a shaft of silver, burnished bright.
And leaves of beryl and malachite ;
POEMS OF NATURE.
455
With spikes of golden bloom ablaze,
And fruits of topaz and Chrysoprase ;
And there the poets, in thy praise,
Should night and morning frame new lays, —
New measures, simg to tunes divine ;
But none, 0 palm, should equal mine !
bayard Taylor.
THE PALM-TREE.
Is it the palm, the cocoa-palm.
On the Indian Sea, by the isles of balm ?
Or is it a ship in the breezeless calm ?
A ship whose keel is of palm beneath.
Whose ribs of palm have a palm-bark sheath.
And a rudder of palm it steereth with.
Branches of palm are its spars and rails.
Fibres of palm are its woven sails.
And the rope is of palm that idly trails !
What does the good ship bear so well ?
The cocoa-nut with its stony shell.
And the milky sap of its inner cell.
What are its jars, so smooth and fine.
But hollowed nuts, filled with oil and wine.
And the cabbage that ripens under the Line ?
In the cabin he sits on a palm-mat soft.
From a beaker of palm his drink is quaffed.
And a palm thatch shields from the sun aloft !
His dress is woven of palmy strands.
And he holds a palm-leaf scroll in his hands.
Traced with the Prophet's wise commands !
The turban folded about his head .
Was daintily wrought of the palm-leaf braid.
And the fan that cools him of palm was made.
Of threads of palm was the carpet spun
Whereon he kneels when the day is done.
And the foreheads of Islam are bowed as one !
To him the palm is a gift divine.
Wherein all uses of man combine, —
House and raiment and food and wine !
And, in the hour of his great release.
His need of the palm shall only cease
With the shroud wherein he lieth in peace.
" Allah il Allah ! " he sings his psahn
On the Indian Sea, by the isles of balm ;
" Thanks to Allah, who gives the palm ! "
John Greenleaf whittier.
♦
THE HOLLY-TREE.
0 EEABER ! hast thou ever stood to see
The holly-tree ;
The eye that contemplates it well perceives
Its glossy leaves
Ordered by an intelligence so wise
As might confound the atheist's sophistries.
Below, a- circling fence, its leaves are seen
Wrinkled and keen ;
No grazing cattle, through their prickly round,
Can reach to wound ;
But as they grow where nothing is to fear.
Smooth and unarmed the pointless leaves appear.
1 love to view these things with curious eyes.
And moralize ;
And in this wisdom of the holly-tree
Can emblems see
Wherewith, perchance, to make a pleasant rhyme,
One which may profit in the after-time.
Thus, fjiough abroad, perchance, I might appear
Harsh and austere ;
To those who on my leisure would intrude.
Reserved and rude ;
Gentle at home amid my friends I'd be.
Like the high leaves upon the holly-tree.
And should my youth — as youth is apt, I know —
Some harshness show,
AU vain asperities I, day by day.
Would wear away,
TiU the smooth temper of my age should be
Like the high leaves upon the holly-tree.
And as, when all the summer trees are seen
So bright and green.
The hoUy-leaves their fadeless hues display
Less bright than they ;
But when the bare and wintry woods we see.
What then so cheerful as the holly-tree ?
So, serious should my youth appear among
The thoughtless throng ;
So would I seem, amid the young and gay.
More grave than they ;
That in my age as cheerful I might be
As the green winter of the hoUy-tree.
robert southey.
Who smokes his nargileh, cool and calm 1
The master, whose cunning and skiU could charm
Cargo and ship from the bounteous palm.
POEMS OF NATURE.
THE SPICE-TREE.
The spice-tree lives in the garden green ;
Beside it the fountain flows ;
And a fair bird sits the boughs between,
And sings his melodious woes.
No greener garden e'er was known
Within the bounds of an earthly king ;
No lovelier skies have ever shone
Than those that illumine its constant spring.
That coU-hound stem has branches three ;
On each a thousand blossoms grow ;
And, old as aught of time can be.
The root stands fast in the rocks below.
In the spicy shade ne'er seems to tire
The fount that builds a silvery dome ;
And flakes of purple and ruby fire
Gush out, and sparkle amid the foam.
The fair white bird of flaming crest.
And azure wings bedropt with gold.
Ne'er has he known a pause of rest.
But sings the lament that he framed of old :
" 0 princess bright ! how long the night
Since thou art sunk in the waters clear !
How sadly they flow from the depth below, —
How long must 1 sing and thou wilt n8t hear ?
" The waters play, and the flowers are gay.
And the skies are sunny above ;
I would that all could fade and fall.
And 1, too, cease to mourn my love.
" 0, many a year, so wakeful and drear,
I have sorrowed and watched, beloved, for thee !
But there comes no breath from the chambers of
death.
While the lifeless fount gushes under the tree."
The skies grow dark, and they glare with red ;
The tree shakes off its spicy bloom ;
The waves of the fount in a black pool spread ;
And in thunder sounds the garden's doom.
Down springs the bird with a long shrill cry,
Into the sable and angry flood ;
And the face of the pool, as he falls from high.
Curdles in circling stains of blood.
But sudden again upswells the fount ;
Higher and higher the waters flow, —
In a guttering diamond arch they mount.
And round it the colors of morning glow.
Finer and finer the watery mound
Softens and melts to a thin-spun veil.
And tones of music circle arotmd.
And bear to the stars the fountain's tale.
And swift the eddying rainbow screen
FaUs in dew on the grassy floor ;
Under the spice-tree the garden's queen
Sits by her lover, who wails no more.
John sterling.
THE GRAPE-VINE SWING.
Lithe and long as the serpent train,
Springing and clinging from tree to tree.
Now darting upward, now down again.
With a twist and a twirl that are strange to see ;
Never took serpent a deadlier hold.
Never the cougar a wilder spring,
Strangling the oak with the boa's fold.
Spanning the beach with the condor's wing.
Yet no foe that we fear to seek, —
The boy leaps wild to thy rude embrace ;
Thy bulging arms bear as soft a cheek
As ever on lover's breast found place ;
On thy waving train is a playful hold
Thou shalt never to lighter grasp persuade ;
While a maiden sits in thy drooping fold.
And swings and sings in the noonday shade !
0 giant strange of our Southern woods !
1 dream of thee still in the well-known spot.
Though our vessel strains o'er the ocean floods.
And the northern forest beholds thee not ;
1 think of thee still with a sweet regret.
As the cordage yields to my playful grasp, —
Dost thou spring and cling in our woodlands yet ?
Does the maiden still .swing in thy giant clasp ?
William Gilhore simms.
TO BLOSSOMS.
Fair pledges of a fruitful tree.
Why do ye fall so fast ?
Your date is not so past
But you may stay yet here awhile
To blush and gently smile.
And go at last
What ! were ye bom to be
An hour or half s delight,
And so to bid good-night ?
'T is pity Nature brought ye forth.
Merely to show your worth.
And lose you quite. '
POEMS OP NATURE.
457
Ü1
But you are lovely leaves, where we
May read how soon things have
Their end, though ne'er so brave ;
And after they have shown their pride
Like you awhile, they glide
Into the grave.
Robert Herrick.
ALMOND BLOSSOM.
Blossom of the almond-trees,
April's gift to April's bees.
Birthday ornament of spring,
Flora's fairest daughterling ; —
Coming when no flowerets dare
Trust the cruel outer air.
When the royal king-cup bold
Dares not don his coat of gold.
And the sturdy blackthorn spray
Keeps his silver for the May ; —
Coming when no flowerets would.
Save thy lowly sisterhood,
Early violets, blue and white.
Dying for their love of light.
Almond blossom, sent to teach us
That the spring days soon will reach us.
Lest, with longing over-tried.
We die as the violets died, —
Blossom, clouding all the tree
With thy crimson broidery.
Long before a leaf of green
On the bravest bough is seen, —
Ah ! when winter winds are swinging
All thy red bells into ringing,
With a bee in every beH,
Almond bloom, we greet thee well !
edwin Arnold.
THE PLANTING OF THE APPLE-TEEE.
Come, let us plant the apple-tree.
Cleave the tough greensward with the spade ;
Wide let its hollow bed be made ;
There gently lay the roots, and there
Sift the dark mould with kindly care.
And press it o'er them tenderly.
As round the sleeping infant's feet
We softly fold the cradle-sheet ;
So plant we the apple-tree.
What plant we in this apple-tree ?
Buds, which the breath of summer days
Shall lengthen into leafy sprays ;
Boughs where the thrush with crimson breast
Shall haunt, and sing, and hide her nest ;
We plant, upon the sunny lea,
A shadow for the noontide hour,
A shelter from the summer shower.
When we plant the apple-tree.
What plant we in this apple-tree ?
Sweets for a hundred flowery springs
To load the May-wind's restless wings,
When, from the orchard row, he pours
Its fragrance through our open doors ;
A world of blossoms for the bee.
Flowers for the sick|girTs silent room.
For the glad infant sprigs of bloom.
We plant with the apple-tree.
What plant we in this apple-tree !
Fruits that shall swell in sunny June,
And redden in the August noon.
And drop, when gentle airs come by.
That fan the blue September sky.
While children come, with cries of glee.
And seek them where the fragrant grass
Betrays their bed to those who pass.
At the foot of the apple-tree.
And when, above this apple-tree.
The winter stars are quivering bright.
And winds go howling through the night.
Girls, whose young eyes o'erflow with mirth.
Shall peel its fruit by cottage hearth,
And guests in prouder homes shall see.
Heaped with the grape of Cintra's vine
And golden orange of the Line,
The fruit of the apple-tree.
The fruitage of this apple-tree
Winds and our flag of stripe and star
Shall bear to coasts that lie afar.
Where men shall wonder at the view,
And ask in what fair groves they grew ;
And sojourners beyond the sea
Shall think of childhood's careless day
And long, long hours of summer play.
In the shade of the apple-tree.
Each year shall give this apple-tree
A broader flush of roseate bloom,
A deeper maze of verdurous gloom.
And loosen, when the frost-clouds lower.
The crisp brown leaves in thicker shower.
The years shall come and pass, but we
Shall hear no longer, where we lie.
The summer's songs, the autumn's sigh.
In the boughs of the apple-tree.
And time shall waste this apple-tree.
0, when its aged branches throw
Thin shadows on the ground below.
Shall fraud and force and iron will
Oppress the weak and helpless still ?
458
POEMS OF NATÜRE.
What shall the tasks of mercy be,
Amid the toils, the strifes, the teai-s
Of those who live when length of years
Is wasting this apple-tree ?
"Who planted this old apple-tree ?"
The children of that distant day
Thus to some aged man shall say ;
And, gazing on its mossy stem.
The gray-haired man shall answer them :
" A poet of the land was he.
Bom in the mde but good old times ;
'T is said he made some quaint old rhymes
On planting the apple-tree."
William Gullen Bryant.
THE MAIZE.
precious seed into the furrow cast
Earliest in spring-time crowns the harvest last."
^ Phcebe Cary.
/
A SONG for the plapt of my own native West,
Where nature and freedom reside.
By plenty still crowned, and by peace ever blest.
To the com,! the green corn of her pride !
In climes of the East has the olive been sung.
And the grape been the theme of their lays ;
But for thee shall a harp of the backwoods be
Strang,
Thou bright, ever beautiful maize !
Afar in the forest the rude cabins rise.
And send up their pillars of smoke.
And the tops of their cohimns are lost in the
skies,
O'er the heads of the cloud-kissing oak ;
Near the skirt of the grove, where the sturdy
arm swings
The axe till the old giant sways.
And echo repeats every blow as it rings.
Shoots the green and the glorious maize !
There buds of the buckeye in spring are the first.
And the willow's gold hair then appears.
And snowy the cups of the dogwood that burst
By the red bud, with pink-tinted tears.
And stripèd the bolls which the poppy holds up
For the dew, and the sun's yellow rays.
And brown is the pawpaw's shade-blossoming
cup.
In the wood, near the sim-loving maize !
When through the dark soil the bright steel of
the plough
Tums the mould from its unbroken bed
The ploughman is cheered by the finch on the
bough.
And the blackbird doth foUow his tread.
And idle, afar on the landscape descried.
The deep-lowing kine slowly graze.
And nibbling the grass on the sunny hillside
Are the sheep, hedged away from the maize.
With spring-time and culture, in martial array
It waves its green broadswords on high.
And fights with the gale, in a fluttering fray.
And the sunbeams, which fall from the sky ;
It strikes its green blades at the zephyrs at
noon.
And at night at the swift-flying fays.
Who ride through the darkness the beams of the
moon.
Through the spears and the flags of the maize I
When the summer is fierce still its banners are
green.
Each warrior's long beard groweth red.
His emerald-bright sword is sharp-pointed and
keen.
And golden his tassel-plumed head.
As a host of armed knights set a monarch at
naught.
That defy the day-god to his gaze.
And, revived every mom from the battle that's
fought.
Fresh stand the green ranks of the maize I
But brown comes the autumn, and sear grows
the com.
And the woods like a lainbow are dressed.
And but for the cock and the noontide horn
Old Time would be tempted to rest.
The humming bee fans off a shower of gold
From the mullein's long rod as it sways.
And dry grow the leaves which protecting infold
The ears of the well-ripened maize !
At length Indian Summer, the lovely, doth come.
With its blue frosty nights, and days still.
When distantly clear sounds the waterfall's hum.
And the sun smokes ablaze on the hill I
A dim veil hangs over the landscape and flood.
And the hills are all mellowed in haze.
While Fall, creeping on like a monk 'neath his
hood.
Plucks the thick-rustling wealth of the maize.
And the heavy wains creak to the barns large
and gray.
Where the treasure securely we hold.
Housed safe from the tempest, dry-sheltered away,
Our blessing more precious than gold !
And long for this manna that springs from the sod
Shall we gratefully give him the praise,
The source of all bounty, our Father and God,
Who sent us from heaven the maize I
William w. Fosdick.
POEMS OF NATURE.
459
•a
THE PUMPKIN.
0, greenly and fair in the lands of the sun.
The vines of the gourd and the rich melon run,
. And the rock and the tree and the cottage en¬
fold.
With broad leaves all greenness and blossoms
all gold.
Like that which o'er Nineveh's prophet once
grew,
While he waited to know that his warning was
true.
And longed for the storm-cloud, and listened in
vain
For the rush of the whirlwind and red fire-rain.
On the banks of the Xenil, the dark Spanish
maiden
Comes up with the fruit of the tangled vine
laden ;
And the Creole of Cuba laughs out to behold
Through orange-leaves shining the broad spheres
of gold ;
Yet with dearer delight from his home in the
North,
On the fields of his harvest the Yankee looks forth.
Where crook-necks are coiling and yellow fruit
shines.
And the sun of September melts down on his vines.
Ah ! on Thanksgiving Day, when from East and
from West,
From North and from South come the pilgrim
and guest.
When the gray-haired New-Englander sees round
his board
The old broken links of affection restored.
When the care-wearied man seeks his mother
once more,
And the worn matron smiles where the girl smiled
before,
What moistens the lip and what brightens the
eye?
What calls back the past, like the rich pumpkin-
pie ?
0, fruit loved of boyhood ! the old days recalling ;
When wood-gi'apes were purpling and brown nuts
were falling !
When wild, ugly faces we carved in its skin.
Glaring out through the dark with a candle
within !
When we laughed round the corn-heap, with
heaits all in tune.
Our chair a broad pumpkin, our lantern the moon.
Telling tales of the fairy who travelled like steam
In a pumpkin-shell coach, with two rats for her
team!
Then thanks for thy present ! — none sweeter or
better
E'er smoked from an oven or circled a platter 1
Fairer hands never wrought at a pastry more fine.
Brighter eyes never watched o'er its baking, than
thine !
And the prayer, which my mouth is too full to
express.
Swells my heart that thy shadow may never be
less.
That the days of thy lot may be lengthened below.
And the fame of thy worth like a pumpkin-vine
grow.
And thy life be as sweet, and its last sunset sky
Golden-tinted and fair as thy own pumpkin-pie !
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.
HYMN TO THE FLOWERS.
Day-stars I that ope your frownless eyes to
twinkle
From rainbow galaxies of earth's creation,
And dew-drops on her lonely altars sprinkle
As a libation.
Ye matin worshippers ! who bending lowly
Before the uprisen sun, God's lidless eye.
Throw from your chalices a sweet and holy
Incense on high.
Ye bright mosaics ! that with storied beauty
The floor of Nature's temple tessellate.
What numerous emblems of instructive duty
Your forms create I
'Neath cloistered boughs, each floral bell that
swingeth
And tolls its perfume on the passing air.
Makes Sabbath in the fields, and ever ringeth
A call to prayer.
Not to the domes where crumbling arch and col¬
umn
Attest the feebleness of mortal hand.
But to that fane, most catholic and solemn.
Which God hath planned ;
To that cathedral, boundless as our wonder.
Whose quenchless lamps the sun and moon
supply ;
Its choir the winds and waves, its organ thunder,
Its dome the sky.
There, as in solitude and shade 1 wander
Through the green aisles, or stretched upon
the sod,
Awed by the silence, reverently ponder
The ways of God,
-g
iS-
460
POEMS OP NATURE.
■a
Your voiceless lips, O flowera ! are living preach¬
ers,
Each cup a pulpit, every leaf a book.
Supplying to my fancy numerous teachers
From loneliest nook.
Floral apostles ! that in dewy splendor
"Weep without woe, and blush without a
crime,"
O, may I deeply learn, and ne'er surrender
Your lore sublime !
" Thou wert not, Solomon, in all thy glory.
Arrayed," the lilies cry, " in robes like ours !
How vain your grandeur ! ah, how transitory
Are human flowers !"
In the sweet-scented pictures, heavenly artist.
With which thou paintest Nature's wide-spread
hall.
What a delightful lesson thou impartest
Of love to all !
Not useless are ye, flowers ! though made for
pleasure ;
Blooming o'er field and wave, by day and
night.
From every source your sanction bids me treasure
Harmless delight.
Ephemeral sages I what instructors hoary
For such a world of thought could furnish
scope ?
Each fading calyx a memento mori.
Yet fount of hope.
Posthumous glories ! angel-like collection I
Upraised from seed or bulb interred in earth.
Ye are to me a type of resmrection
And second birth.
Were I in churchless solitudes remaining.
Far from all voice of teachers and divines.
My soul would find, in flowers of God's ordaining.
Priests, sermons, shrines I
Horace Smith.
■e-
FLOWERS.
I WILL not have the mad Clytie,
Whose head is turned by the sun ;
The tulip is a courtly quean.
Whom, therefore, I will shun :
The cowslip is a country wench.
The violet is a nun ; —
But I will woo the dainty rose,
The queen of every one.
The pea is but a wanton witch.
In too much haste to wed.
And clasps her rings on every hand ;
The wolfsbane I should dread ;
Nor will I dreary rosemarye.
That always mourns the dead ;
But I will woo the dainty rose.
With her cheeks of tender red.
The lily is all in white, like a saint.
And so is no mate for me ;
And the daisy's cheek is tipped with a blush.
She is of such low degree ;
Jasmine is sweet, and has many loves.
And the broom's betrothed to the bee ; —
But I will plight with the dainty rose.
For fairest of all is she.
Thomas Hood.
BETROTHED ANEW.
The sunlight fills the trembling air.
And balmy days their guerdons bring ;
The Earth again is young and fair.
And amorous with musky Spring.
The golden nurslings of the May
In splendor strew the spangled green.
And hues of tender beauty play.
Entangled where the wUlows lean.
Mark how the rippled currents flow ;
What lustres on the meadows lie !
And hark I the songsters come and go.
And trill between the earth and sky.
Who told us that the years had fled.
Or home afar om* blissful youth ?
Such joys are all about us spread ;
We know the whisper was not truth.
The birds that break from grass and grove
Sing every carol that they sung
When first our veins were rich with love.
And May her mantle round us flung.
0 fresh-lit dawn I immortal life !
0 Earth's betrothal, sweet and true.
With whose delights our souls are rife.
And aye their vernal vows renew I
Then, darling, walk with me this mora ;
Let your brown tresses drink its sheen ••
These violets, within them worn.
Of floral fays shall make you queen.
What though there comes a time of pain
When autumn winds forebode decay !
The days of love are bom again ;
That fabled time is far away !
-ÍÍ
f
POEMS OF NATURE. 461
And never seemed the land so fair
As now, nor birds such notes to sing,
Since first within your shining hah-
1 wove the blossoms of the spring.
Edmund Clarence stedman.
»—
THE EARLY PRIMROSE.
Mild offspring of a dark and sullen sire ?
Whose modest form, so delicately fine.
Was nursed in whirling storms
And cradled in the winds.
Thee, when young Spring first questioned Win¬
ter's sway.
And dared the sturdy blusterer to the fight.
Thee on this bank he threw
To mark his victory.
In this low vale the promise of the year.
Serene, thou openest to the nipping gale.
Unnoticed and alone.
Thy tender elegance.
While every bleaching breeze that on her blows
Chastens her spotless purity of breast.
And hardens her to bear
Serene the üls of life.
Henry Kirke white
THE RHODORA.
LINES ON BEING ASKED, WHENCE IS THE FLOWER i
In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes,
I found the fresh rhodora in the woods.
Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook,
To please the desert and the sluggish brook ;
The purple petals fallen in the pool
Made the black waters with their beauty gay, —
Here might the red-bird come his plumes to cool.
And court the flower that cheapens his array.
Rhodora ! if the sages ask thee why
This charm is wasted on the marsh and sky.
Dear, teU them, that if eyes were made for seeing.
Then beauty is its own excuse for being.
Why thou wert there, 0 rival of the rose !
I never thought to ask ; I never knew.
But in my simple ignorance suppose
The self-same Power that brought me there brought
you.
raliii Waldo emerson.
VIOLETS.
Welcome, maids of honor !
You doe bring
In the Spring,
And wait upon her.
She has virgins many.
Fresh and faire ;
Yet you are
More sweet than any.
Y' are the maiden Posies,
And, so grac't.
To be plac't
'Fore damask roses.
Yet though thus respected.
By and by
Ye doe lie,
Poore girles ! neglected.
robert Herrick.
THE VIOLET,
O FAINT, delicious, spring-time violet !
Thine odor, like a key.
Turns noiselessly in memory's wards to let
A thought of sorrow free.
The breath of distant fields upon my brow
Blows through that open door
The sound of wind-borne bells, more sweet andlow.
And sadder than of yore.
It comes afar, from that belovèd place.
And that beloved hour.
When life hung ripening in love's golden grace.
Like grapes above a bower.
A spring goes singing through its reedy grass ;
The lark sings o'er my head.
Drowned in the sky — 0, pass, ye visions, pass !
I would that I were dead ! —
Why hast thou opened that forbidden door.
From which I ever flee ?
0 vanished joy ! O love, that art no more.
Let my vexed spirit be !
0 violet ! thy odor through my brain
Hath searched, and stung to grief
This sunny day, as if a curse did stain
Thy velvet leaf.
William Wetmore story.
So Virtue blooms, brought forth amid the storms
Of chill adversity ; in some lone walk
Of life she rears her head.
Obscure and unobserved ;
Ö"
462
POEMS OP NATURE.
n
THE DAISY.
from the " legend of good women."
Of all the fleures in the mede,
Than love I most these floures white and rede,
Soch that men caUen daisies in our towji;
To hem I have so great affection,
As I said erst, whan comen is' the May,
That in my hedde there daweth me no day
That I nam * up and walking in the mede,
JÍO seene this flour ayenst the Sunne sprede.
Whan it up riseth early by the morrow.
That blissful sight softeneth all my sorrow.
So glad am I, whan that I have the presence
Of it, to done it all reverence.
And ever I love it, and ever ylike newe.
And ever shall, till that mine herte die
All swere I not, of this I wiU not lie.
My busie gost, that thursteth alway newe.
To seen this flour so yong, so fresh of hew.
Constrained me, with so greedy desire.
That in my herte I fele yet the fire.
That made me rise ere it were day.
And this was now the first morow of May,
With dreadful + herte, and glad devotion
For to been at the resurrection
Of this floure, whan that it should unclose
Againe the Sunne, that rose as redde as rose.
And doune on knees anon right I me sette.
And as I could, this fresh floure I grette.
Kneeling alway, till it unclosed was.
Upon the small, soft, swete gras.
That was with floures swete embrouded all.
Of such swetenesse, and such odour overall
That for to speke of gomme, herbe, or tree.
Comparison may not ymaked be,
For it surmounteth plainly all odoures.
And of rich beaute of floures.
And Zephirus, and Flora gentelly,
Yave to these floures soft and tenderly,
Hir swotej breth, and made hem for to sprede.
As god and goddesse of the fleurie mede.
In which me thoughte I might day by day,
Dwellen alway, the joly month of May,
Withouten slepe, withouten meat or drinke :
Adoune fuU softly I gan to sinke.
And leaning on my elbow and my side.
The long day I shope me for to abide.
For nothing els, and I shall nat lie.
But for to looke upon the daisie.
That well by reason men it call may
The daisie, or els the eye of the day.
The empress and floure of floures all,
I pray to God that faire mote she fall.
And all that loven floures for her sake.
chaocsr.
U
* I am not
t FeariuL
J Sweet
TO A MOUNTAIN DAISY,
on turning one down with the plough, in april.
Web, modest, crimson-tipped flower.
Thou's met me in an evil hour.
For I maun crush amang the stoure
Thy slender stem ;
To spare thee now is past my power.
Thou bonny gem.
Alas ! it's no thy neebor sweet.
The bonnie lark, companion meet.
Bending thee 'mang the dewy weet,
Wi' spreckled breast.
When upward springing, blithe to greet
The purpling east.
Cauld blew the bitter-biting north
Upon thy early, humble birth ;
Yet cheerfully thou glinted forth
Amid the storm.
Scarce reared above the parent earth
Thy tender form.
The flaunting flowers our gardens yield
High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield :
But thou beneath the random bield
0' clod or stane.
Adorns the histie stibble-field.
Unseen, alane.
There, in thy scanty mantle clad.
Thy snawie bosom sunward spread.
Thou lifts thy unassuming head
In humble guise ;
But now the share uptears thy bed.
And low thou lies !
Such is the fate of artless maid.
Sweet floweret of the rural shade I
By love's simplicity betrayed.
And guileless trust,
Till she, like thee, all soiled, is laid
Low i' the dust.
Such is the fate of simple bard.
On life's rough ocean luckless starred !
Unskilful he to note the card
Of prudent lore.
Till billows rage, and gales blow hard.
And whelm him o'er !
Such fate to suffering worth is given,
Who long with wants and woes has striven,
By human pride or cunning driven
To misery's brink.
Till, wrenched of every stay but Heaven,
He, ruined, sink !
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POEMS OF NATURE.
463
Even thou who mourn'st the daisy's fate,
That fate is thine, — no distant date :
Stem Ruin's ploughshare drives, elate,
Full on thy bloom.
Till crushed beneath the furrow's weight
Shall be thy doom !
Robert Burns.
THE DAISY.
Star of the mead ! sweet daughter of the day.
Whose opening flower invites the morning ray.
From the moist cheek and bosom's chilly fold
To kiss the tears of eve, the dew-drops cold !
Sweet daisy, flower of love ! when birds are
paired,
'T is sweet to see thee, with thy bosom bared.
Smiling in virgin innocence serene.
Thy pearly crown above thy vest of green. ■>
The lark with sparkling eye and rustling wing
Rejoins his widowed mate in early spring.
And, as he prunes his plumes of russet hue.
Swears on thy maiden blossom to be true.
Oft have I watched thy closing buds at eve.
Which for the parting sunbeams seemed to
grieve ;
And when gay morning güt the dew-bright
plain.
Seen them unclasp their folded leaves again ;
Nor he who sung "The daisy is so sweet ! "
More dearly loved thy pearly form to greet.
When on his scarf the knight the daisy bound.
And dames to tourneys shone with daisies
crowned.
And fays forsook the purer fields above.
To hail the daisy, flower of faithful love.
John levden.
THE DAISY.
There is a flower, a little flower
With silver crest and golden eye.
That welcomes every changing hour.
And weathers every sky.
The prouder beauties of the field
In gay but quick succession shine ;
Race after race their honors yield.
They flourish and decline.
But this small flower, to Nature dear.
While moons and stai-s their courses run,
Inwreathes the circle of the year.
Companion of the sun.
It smiles upon the lap of May,
To sultry August spreads its charm,
Lights pale October on his way.
And twines December's arm.
The purple heath and golden broom
On moory mountains catch the gale ;
O'er lawns the lily sheds perfume.
The violet in the vale.
But this bold floweret climbs the hill.
Hides in the forest, haunts the glen.
Plays on the margin of the rill.
Peeps round the fox's den.
Within the garden's cultured round
It shares the sweet carnation's bed ;
And blooms on consecrated ground
In honor of the dead.
The lambkin crops its crimson gem ;
The wild bee murmurs on its breast ;
The blue-fly bends its pensile stem
Light o'er the skylark's nest.
'T is Flora's page, — in every place.
In every season, fresh and fair ;
It opens with perennial grace.
And blossoms everywhere.
On waste and woodland, rock and plain.
Its humble buds unheeded rise ;
The rose has but a summer reign ;
The daisy never dies!
jahes Montgomery.
DAFFODILS.
I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o'er vales and hills.
When all at once I saw a crowd, —
A host of golden daffodils
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.
Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the Milky Way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay ;
Ten thousand saw I, at a glance.
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.
The waves beside them danced, but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee ;
A poet could not but be gay
In such a jocund company ;
I gazed — and gazed — but little thought
WRat wealth the show to me had brought.
464
POEMS OP NATURE.
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For oft, when on my couch I lie,
In vacant or in pensive mood.
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude ;
And then my heart with pleasure fills.
And dances with the daflbdils.
William Wordsworth.
DAFFODILS.
Faire dafiadills, we weep to see
You haste away so soone ;
As yet the early-rising sun
Has not attained his noone.
Stay, stay.
Until the hastening day
Has run
But to the even-song ;
And, having prayed together, we
WiU goe with you along.
We have short time to stay as you.
We have as short a spring ;
As quick a growth, to meet decay, ^
As you or anything.
We die.
As your hours doe, and drie
Away,
Like to the summer's raine.
Or as the pearles of morning's dew.
Ne'er to be found againe.
Robert Herrick.
THE ROSE.
prom hassan ben khaled."
Then took the generous host
A basket filled with roses. Every guest
Cried, " Give me roses ! " and he thus addressed
His words to all ; " He who exalts them most
In song, he only shall the roses wear."
Then sang a guest: " The rose's cheeks are fair;
It crowns the purple bowl, and no one knows
If the rose colors it, or it the rose."
And sang another : " Crimson is its hue.
And on its breast the morning's crystal dew
Is changed to rubies." Then a thiid replied :
" It blushes in the sun's enamored sight.
As a yoimg virgin on her wedding night.
When from her face the bridegroom lifts the veil. "
When all had sung their songs, I, Hassan, tried.
" The rose," I sang, " is either red or pale.
Like maidens whom the flame of passion bums,
And love or jealousy controls, by turns.
Its buds are lips prejiaring for a kiss ;
Its open floweis are like the blush of bliss
On lovers' cheeks ; the thoms its armor are.
And in its centre shines a golden star.
As on a favorite's cheek a sequin glows ; —
And thus the garden's favorite is the rose."
The master from his open basket shook
The roses on my head.
bayaw Taylor.
THE ROSE.
The rose had been washed, just washed in a
shower.
Which Mary to Anna conveyed.
The plentiful moisture encumbered the flower.
And weighed down its beautiful head.
The cup was all filled, and the leaves were all wel^
And it seemed, to a fanciful view.
To weep for the buds it had left with regret, ^
On the flourishing bush ^here it grew.
I hastily seized it, unfit as it was
For a nosegay, so dripping and drowned.
And swinging it rudely, too rudely, alas !
I snapped it, it fell to the ground.
And such, I exclaimed, is the pitiless part
Some act by the delicate mind.
Regardless of wringing and breaking a heart
Already to sorrow resigned.
This elegant rose, had I shaken it less.
Might have bloomed with its owner awhile ;
And the tear that is wiped with a little address.
May be followed perhaps by a smile.
WILLIAM COWPER.
THE MOSS ROSE.
The angel of the flowers, one day.
Beneath a rose-tree sleeping lay, —
That spirit to whose charge't is given
To bathe young buds in dews of heaven.
Awaking from his light repose.
The angel whispered to the rose :
" 0 fondest object of my care.
Still fairest found, where all are fair ;
For the sweet shade thou giv'st to me
Ask what thou wilt, 't is granted thee."
" Then," said the rose, with deepened glow,
"On me another grace bestow."
The spirit paused, in silent thought.
What grace was there that flower had not ?
'T was but a moment, — o'er the rose
A veil of moss the angel throws.
And, robed in nature's simplest weed.
Could there a flower that rose exceed ?
From the German of KrummaCMER.
•SI
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POEMS 05 NATURE.
465
■a
'TIS THE LAST ROSE OF SUMMER.
from "irish melodies."
'T is the last rose of summer,
Left blooming alone ;
All her lovely companions
Are faded and gone ;
No flower of her kindred,
No rosebud, is nigh
To reflect back her blushes.
Or give sigh for sigh !
I '11 not leave thee, thou lone one !
To pine on the stem ;
Since the lovely are sleeping,
Go, sleep thou with them ;
Thus kindly I seatter
Thy leaves o'er the bed
Where thy mates of the garden
Lie scentless and dead.
So soon may I follow.
When friendships deeay.
And from love's shining circle
The gems drop away !
When true hearts lie withered.
And fond ones are flown,
0, who would inhabit
This bleak world alone ?
Thomas Moore.
TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN.
Thou blossom, bright with autumn dew.
And colored with the heaven's own blue.
That openest when the quiet light
Succeeds the keen and frosty night ;
Thou comest not when violets lean
O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen.
Or columbines, in purjile dressed.
Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden nest.
Thou waitest late, and eom'st alone.
When woods are bare and birds are flown.
And frosts and shortening days portend
The aged Year is near his end.
Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye
Look through its fringes to the sky.
Blue — blue—as if that sky let fall
A flower from its cerulean wall.
I would that thus, when I shall see
The hour of death draw near to me,
Hope, blossoming within my heart.
May look to heaven as I depart.
William Gullen Bryant.
THE VOICE OF THE GRASS.
/
Heke I come creeping, creeping everywhere ;
By the dú.sty roadside.
On the sunny hillside.
Close by the noisy brook.
In every shady nook,
I come creeping, creeping everywhere.
Here I come creeping, smiling everywhere ;
All round the open door.
Where sit the aged poor ;
Here where the children play.
In the bright and merry May,
I eome creeping, creeping everywhere.
Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ;
In the noisy city street
My pleasant face you '11 meet.
Cheering the sick at heart
Toiling his busy part, —
Silently creeping, creeping everywhere.
Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ;
You cannot see me coming.
Nor hear my low sweet humming ;
For in the starry night.
And the glad morning light,
I come quietly creeping everywhere.
Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ;
More welcome than the flowers
In summer's pleasant hours ;
The gentle cow is glad.
And the merry bird not sad,
To see me creeping, creeping everywhere.
Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ;
When you 're numbered with the dead
In your still and narrow bed.
In the happy spring I '11 come
And deck your silent home, —
Creeping, silently creeping everywhere.
Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere ;
My humble song of praise
Most joyfully 1 raise
To Him at whose command
I beautify the land.
Creeping, silently creeping everywhere.
Sarah Roberts.
THE IVY GREEN.
0, a dainty plant is the ivy green.
That crcepeth o'er ruins old !
Of right choice food are his meals, I ween,
In his cell so lone and cold.
a-
466
POEMS OP NATURE.
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The walls must be crumbled, the stones decayed,
To pleasure Jiis dainty whim ;
And the mouldering dust that years |iave made.
Is a merry meal for Jiiin. I
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Fast he stealeth on, though he wears no wings.
And a staunch old heart has he !
How closely he twineth, how tight he clings
To his friend, the huge oak-tree !
And slyly he traileth along the ground.
And his leaves he gently waves,
And he joyously twines and hugs around
The rich mould of dead men's graves.
Creeping where grim death has been,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Whole ages have fled, apd their works decayed.
And nations! scattered been ; '
But the stout ¿Id ivy shall never fade
From its halei and hefirty gi'een.
The brave old planti in its londy days
Shall fatten upon) the past ; ^
For the stateliest building man can raise
Is the iVy'à food at last.
Creeping on where Time has been,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Charles Dickens.
THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS.
The melancholy days are come, the saddest of
the year.
Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows
brown and sear.
Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn
leaves lie dead ;
They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rab¬
bit's tread.
The robin and the wren are flown, and from the
shrubs the jay.
And from the wood-top calls the crow through
all the gloomy day.
Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers,
that lately sprang and stood
In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous
sisterhood ?
Alas ! they all are in their graves ; the gentle
race of flowera
Are lying in their lowly beds with the fair and
good of ours.
The rain is falling where they lie ; but the cold
November rain
Calls not from out the gloomy eaith the lovely
ones again.
The wind-flower and the violet, they perished
long ago.
And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the
summer glow ;
But on the hill the golden-rod, and the aster in
the wood.
And the, yellow sunflower by the brook in au¬
tumn beauty stood, '
Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as
falls the plague on men.
And the brightness of their smile was gone from
upland, glade, and glen.
And now, when comes the calm mild day, as
still such days will come,
To call the squiirel and the bee from out their
winter home ;
When the sound of dropping nuts is heard,
though all the trees are still,
And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of
the rill ;
The south-wind searches for the flowers whose
fragrance late he bore.
And sighs to find them in the wood and by the
stream no more.
And then I think of one who in her youthful
beauty died,
The fair meek blossom that grew up and faded
b3' my side.
In the cold moist earth we laid her, when the
forests cast the leaf.
And we wept that one so lovely should have a
life so brief ;
Yet not unmeet it was that one, like that young
friend of ours.
So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with
the flowers.
William Gullen Bryant.
THE USE OF FLOWERS.
God might have bade the earth bring forth
Enough for great and small.
The oak-tree and the cedai'-tree,
Without a flower at all.
We might have had enough, enough
For every want of ours.
For luxury, medicine, and toil.
And yet have had no flowers.
Then wherefore, wherefore were they made.
All dyed with rainbow light,
All fashioned with supremest grace,
Up.springing day and night : —
Springing in valleys green and low.
And on the mountains high.
And in the silent wilderness
Where no man passes by ?
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POEMS OF NATURE.
467
ff)
Our outward life requires them not, —
Then wherefore had they birth ? —
To minister delight to man,
To beautify the earth ;
To comfort man, — to whisper hope.
Whene'er his faith is dim.
For who so careth for the flowers
Will care much more for him !
marv howitt.
THE LION'S RIDE.
The lion is the desert's king ; through his do¬
main so wide
Right swiftly and right royally this night he
means to ride.
By the sedgy brink, where the wild herds drink,
close couches the grim chief ;
The trembling sycamore above whispers with
every leaf.
At evening, on the Table Mount, when ye can
see no more
The changeful play of signals gay ; when the
gloom is speckled o'er
With kraal fires ; when the Caff.e wends home
through the lone karroo ;
When the boshbok in the thicket sleeps, and by
the stream the gnu ;
Then bend your gaze across the waste, — what
see ye Î The giraffe.
Majestic, stalks towards the lagoon, the turbid
lymph to quaff ;
With outstretched neck and tongue, adust, he
kneels him down to cool
His hot thirst with a welcome draught from the
foul and brackish pool.
A rustling sound, a roar, a bound, —the lion sits
astride
Upon his giant courser's back. Did ever king so
ride ?
Had ever king a steed so rare, caparisons of state
To match the dappled skin whereon that ridei^
sits elate ?
In the muscles of the neck his teeth are plunged
with ravenous greed ;
His tawny mane is tossing round the withers of
the steed.
Up leaping with a hollow yell of anguish and
surprise.
Away, away, in wild dismay, the cameleopard
flies.
His feet have wings ; see how he springs across
the moonlit plain !
As from their sockets they would burst, his
gl.aring eyeballs strain ;
In thick black streams of purling blood, full fast
his life is fleeting ;
The stillness of the desert hears his heart's tu¬
multuous beating.
Like the cloud that, through the wilderness, the
path of Israel traced, —
Like an airy phantom, dull and wan, a spirit of
the waste, —
From the sandy sea uprising, as the water-spout
from ocean,
A whirling cloud of dust keeps pace with the
courser's fiery motion.
Croaking companion of their flight, the vulture
whirs on high ;
Below, the teiror of the fold, the panther fierce
and sly.
And hyenas foul, round graves that prowl, join
in the horrid race ;
By the footprints wet with gore and sweat, their
monarch's course they trace.
They see him on his living throne, and quake
with fear, the while
"With claws of steel he tears piecemeal his cushion's
painted pile.
On ! on ! no pause, no rest, giraffe, while life and
strength remain !
The steed by snch a rider backed may madly
plunge in vain.
Reeling npon the desert's verge, he falls, and
breathes his last ;
The courser, stained with dust and foam, is the
rider's fell repast.
O'er Madagascar, eastward far, a faint flush, is
descried ; —
Thus nightly, o'er his broad domain, the king of
beasts doth ride.
From the German of FERDINAND FREILICRATH.
THE BLOOD HORSE.
Gamap.ra is a dainty steed.
Strong, black, and of a noble breed.
Full of fire, and full of bone.
With all his line of fathers known ;
Fine his nose, his nostrils thin.
But blown abroad by the pride within !
1&
468
POEMS OF NATURE.
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His mane is like a river flowing.
And his eyes like embers glowing
In the darkness of the night,
And his pace as swift as light.
Look, —how round his straining throat
Grace and shifting beauty float ;
Sinewy strength is in his reins.
And the red blood gallops through his veins :
Richer, redder, never ran
Through the boasting heart of man.
He can trace his lineage higher
Than the Bourbon dare aspire, —
Douglas, Guzman, or the Guelph,
Or O'Brien's blood itself !
He, who hath no peer, was bom
Here, upon a red March morn.
But his famous fathers dead
Were Arabs all, and Arab-bred,
And the last of that great line
Trod like one of a race divine !
And yet, — he was but friend to one
Who fed him at the set of sun
By some lone fountain fringed with green ;
With him, a roving Bedouin,
He lived (none else would he obey
Through all the hot Arabian day).
And died untamed upon the sands
Where Balkh amidst the desert stands.
Bryan W. Procter (Barry Carnwail).
I&
THE TIGER.
Tiger ! Tiger ! burning bright.
In the forests of the night ;
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful s3'mmetry ?
In what distant deeps or skies
Burned the fire of thine eyes ?
On what wings dare he aspire ?
What the hand dare seize the fire ?
And what shoulder, and what art.
Could twist the sinews of thine heart ?
And when thy heart began to beat,
What dread hand ? and what dread feet ?
What the hammer, what the chain ?
In what furnace was thy brain ?
What the anvil ? what dread grasp
Dare its deadly terrors clasp ?
When the stars threw down their speare,
And watered, heaven with their tears.
Did he smile his work to s(^ ?
Did He, who made the Lamb, make thee !
Tiger ! Tiger ! burning bright.
In the forests of the night.
What immortal hand or eye
Dare frame thy^fearful symmetry ?
William Blare.
TO A MOUSE;
on turning her up in her nest with the plough,
november. j785.
Wee, sleekit, cowerin', timorous beastie,
0, what a panic's in thy breastie !
Thou needna start awa sae hasty,
Wi' bickering brattle !
I wad be laith to rin an' chase thee,
Wi' murdering pattle !
I'm truly sorry man's dominion
Has broken nature's social union.
An' justifies that ill opinion
Which makes thee startle
At me, thy poor earth-born companion.
An' fellow-mortal !
I doubtna, whyles, but thou may thieve ;
What then? poor beastie, thou maun live !
A daimen-icker* in a thrave +
'S a sma' request ;
I '11 get a blessin' wi' the lave.
And never miss't !
Thy wee bit housie, too, in nrin !
Its silly wa's the win's are strewin' !
An' naething now to big a new ane
O' foggage green !
A.n' bleak December's winds ensuin',
Baith snell and keen !
Thou saw the fields laid bare an' waste.
An' weary winter comin' fast.
An' cozie here, beneath the blast.
Thou thought to dwell.
Till, crash! the cruel coulter past
Out through thy cell.
That wee bit heap o' leaves an' stibble
Has cost thee mony a weary nibble !
Now thou's turned out, for a' thy trouble.
But house or hald.
To thole the winter's sleety dribble.
An' cranreuch î cauld !
But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane.
In proving foresight may be vain :
The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men
Gang aft a-gley.
An' lea'e us naught but grief and pain,
For pi'omised joy.
* An ear of coro.
♦ Hoar-ftost.
t Twenty-four sheaves.
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POEMS OF NATURE.
469
Still thou art blest, compared wi' me !
The present only toucheth thee :
But, och! I backward cast my e'e
On prospects drear ;
An' forward, though I canna see,
1 guess an' fear.
Robert Burns.
LAMBS AT PLAY.
Say, ye that know, j-e who have felt and seen
Spring's morning smiles, and soul-enlivening
green,—
Say, did you give the thrilling transport way.
Did your eye brighten, when young lambs at play
Leaped o'er your path with animated pride,
Or gazed in merry clusters by your side ?
Ye who can smile— to wisdom no disgrace —
At the arch meaning of a kitten's face ;
If spotless innocence and infant mirth
Excites to praise, or gives reflection birth ;
In shades like these pursue your favorite joy.
Midst nature's revels, sports that never cloy.
A few begin a short but vigorous race.
And indolence, abashed, soon flies the place :
Thus challenged forth, see thither, one by one.
From every side assembling playmates run ;
A thousand wily antics mark their stay,
A starting crowd, impatient of delay ;
Like the fond dove from fearful prison freed.
Each seems to say, " Come, let us try our speed
Away they scour, impetuous, ardent, strong.
The green turf trembling as they bonnd along
Adown the slope, then up the hillock climb.
Where every mole-hill is a bed of thyme.
Then, panting, stop ; yet scarcely can refrain, —
A bird, a leaf, will set them off again :
Or, if a gale with strength unusual blow.
Scattering the wild-brier roses into snow.
Their little limbs increasing efforts tiy ;
Like the torn flower, the fair assemblage fly.
Ah, fallen rose ! sad emblem of their doom ;
Frail as thy.self, they perish while they bloom !
Robert bloomfield.
FOLDING THE FLOCKS.
Shepherds all, and maidens fair.
Fold your flocks up ; for the air
'Gins to thicken, and the sun
Already his gieat course hath run.
See the dew-drops, how they kiss
Every little flower that is ;
Hanging on their velvet heads.
Like a string of crystal beads.
See the heavy clouds low falling
And bright Hesperus down calling
The dead night from underground ;
At whose rising, mists unsound.
Damps and vapors, fly apace.
And hover o'er the smiling face
Of these pastures ; where they come.
Striking dead both bud and bloom.
Therefore from such danger lock
Every one his loved flock ;
And let your dogs lie loose without,
Lest the wolf come as a scout
F rom the mountain, and ere day.
Bear a lamb or kid away ;
Or the crafty, thievish fox.
Break upon your simple flocks.
To secure yourself from these.
Be not too secure in ease ;
So shall you good shepherds prove.
And deserve your master's love.
Now, good night ! may sweetest slumbers
And soft silence fall in numbers
On your eyelids. So farewell :
Thus I end my evening knell.
Beaumont and Fletcher.
THE SONGSTERS.
from " the seasons : spring."
Up springs the lark.
Shrill-voiced and loud, the messenger of morn.
Ere yet the shadows fly, he mounted sings
Amid the dawning clouds, and from their haunts
Calls up the tuneful nations. Every copse
Deep-tangled, tree irregular, and bush
Bending with dewy moisture, o'er the heads
Of the coy quiristers that lodge within.
Are prodigal of harmony. The thrush
And woodlark, o'er the kind-contending throng
Superior heard, run through the sweetest length
Of notes ; when listening Philomela deigns
To let them joy, and purposes, in thought
Elate, to make her night excel their day.
The blackbird whistles from the thorny brake ;
The mellow bullflneh answera from the grove.;
Nor are the linnets, o'er the flowering furze
Poured out profusely, silent ; joined to these,
Innumerous songsters, in the freshening shade
Of new-sprung leaves, their modulations mix
Mellifluous. The jay, the rook, the daw.
And each harsh pipe, discordant heard alone.
Aid the full concert ; while the stockdove breathes
A melancholy murmur through the whole.
'T is love creates their melody, and all
This waste of music is the voice of love ;
That even to bii-ds and beasts the tender arts
Of pleasing teaches.
James Thomson.
470
POEMS OF NATURE.
• DOMESTIC BIRDS.
from "the seasons: spring."
The careful hen
Calls all her chirping family around.
Fed and defended by the fearless cock,
Whose breast with ardor flame.s, as on he walks.
Graceful, and crows defiance. In the pond
The finely checkered duck before her train
Rows garrulous. The stately-sailing swan
Gives out her snowy plumage to the gale ;
And, arching proud his neck, with oaiy feet
Bears forward fierce, and guards his osier-isle.
Protective of his young. The turkey nigh.
Loud-threatening, reddens ; while the peacock
spreads
His every-colored glory to the sun.
And swims in radiant majesty along.
O'er the whole homely scene, the cooing dove
Flies thick in amorous chase, and wanton rolls
The glancing eye, and turns the changeful neck.
James Thomson.
Ö-
BIRDS.
from "the pelican island."
— Birds, the free tenants of land, air, and ocean,
Their forms all symmetry, their motions grace ;
In plumage, delicate and beautiful.
Thick without buixien, close as fishes' scales.
Or loose as full-blown poppies to the breeze ;
With wings that might have had a soul within
them,
They bore their owners by such sweet enchant¬
ment,
— Birds, small and great, of endless shapes and
colors.
Here flew and perched, there swam and dived at
pleasure ;
Watchful and agile, uttering voices wild
And harsh, yet in accordance with the waves
Upon the beach, the winds in caverns moaning.
Or winds and waves abroad npon the water.
Some sought their food among the finny shoals.
Swift darting from the clouds, emerging soon
With slender captives glittering in their beaks ;
These in recesses of steep crags constnicted
Their eyries inaccessible, and trained
Their hardy broods to forage in all weathers :
Others, more gorgeously apparelled, dwelt
Among the woods, on nature's dainties feeding.
Herbs, seeds, and roots ; or, ever on the wing.
Pursuing insects through the boundless air :
In hollow trees or thickets these concealed
Their exquisitely woven nests ; whe.re lay
Their callow offspring, quiet as the down
On their own breasts, till from her search the
dam
With laden bill returned, and sliared the meal
Among her clamorous suppliants, all agape ;
Then, cowering o'er them with expanded wings.
She felt how sweet it is to be a mother.
Of these, a few, with melody untaught.
Turned all the air to musie within hearing.
Themselves unseen ; while bolder quiristers
On loftiest branches strained their clarion-pipes.
And made the forest echo to their screams
Discordant, — yet there was no discord there.
But tempered harmony ; all tones combining.
In the rich confluence of ten thousand tongues.
To tell of joy and to inspire it. Who
Could hear such concert, and not join in choiais ?
James Montgomery.
THE MOCKING-BIRD.
from " out of the cradle endlessly rocking."
Once, Paumanok,
When the| snows had melted, and the Fifth-
month grass was growing.
Up this sea-shore, in some briers.
Two guests from Alabama, — two together-.
And their nest, and four light-green eggs, spotted
with brown.
And every day the he-bird, to and fro, near at
hand.
And every day the she-bird, crouched on her
nest, silent, with bright eyes.
And every day I, a curious boy, never too close,
never disturbing them.
Cautiously peering, absorbing, translating.
" Shine ! shine ! shine !
Pour down your wai-mth, great Sun !
While we bask — we two together.
" Two together !
Winds blow south, or winds blow north.
Day come white, or night come black.
Home, or rivers and mountains from home.
Singing all time, minding no time.
If we two but keep together."
Till, of a .sudden.
Maybe killed, unknown to her mate.
One forenoon the she-bird crouched not on the
nest.
Nor returned that afternoon, nor the next.
Nor ever appeared again.
And thenceforward, all summer, in the sound
of the sea.
And at night, under the full of the moon, in
calmer weather.
g
r-
POEMS OP NATURE.
471
■a
Over tlie hoarse surging of the sea.
Or flitting from brier to brier by day,
I saw, I heard- at intervals, the remaining one,
the he-bird.
The solitary guest from Alabama.
" Blow ! blow ! blow !
Blow up, sea-winds, along Paumanok's shore !
1 wait and I wait, till you blow my mate to me."
Yes, when the stars glistened.
All night long, on the prong of a moss-scalloped
stake,
Down, almost amid the slapping waves.
Sat the lone singer, wonderful, causing tears.
He called ou his mate ;
He pouied forth the meanings which I, of all
men, know.
" Soothe ! soothe ! soothe !
Close on its wave soothes the Wave behind,
And again another behind, embracing and lap¬
ping, every one close.
But my love soothes not me, not me.
" Low hangs the moon — it rose late.
0, it is lagging — 0, I think it is heavy with
love, with love.
" 0, madly the sea pushes, pushes upon the
land.
With love — with love.
" 0 night ! do I not see my love fluttering out
there among the breakers ?
What is that little black thing I see there in the
white ?
" Loud ! loud ! loud !
Loud I call to you, my love !
High and clear I shoot my voice over the waves ;
Surely you must know who is here, is here •
You must know who I am, my love !
" Low-hanging moon !
What is that dusky spot in your brown yellow ?
0, it is the shape, the shape of my mate !
O moon, do not keep her from me any longer.
" Land ! land ! O land !
Whichever way I turn, 0,1 think you could give
me my mate back again, if you only would;
For I am almost sure I see her dimly whichever
way I look.
"0 rising stars !
Perhaps the one I want so much will rise, will
rise with some of you.
" 0 throat ! 0 trembling throat !
Sound clearer through the atmosphere !
Pierce the woods, the earth ;
Somewhere listening to catch you, must be the
one I want.
" Shake out, carols !
Solitary here —' the night's carols !
Carols of lonesome love ! Death's carols !
Cax'ols under that lagging, yellow, waning moon !
O, under that moon, where she droops almost
down into the sea !
0 reckless, despairing carols !
" But soft ! sink low ;
Soft ! let me just murmur ;
And do you wait a moment, you husky-noised
sea ;
For somewhere I believe I heard my mate re¬
sponding to me.
So faint — I must be still, be still to listen ;
But not altogether still, for then she might not
come immediately to me.
" Hither, my love !
Here I am ! Here !
With this just-sustained note I announce myself
to you ;
This gentle call is for you, my love, for you.
" Do not be decoyed elsewhere !
That is the whistle of the wind — it is not my
voice ;
That is the fluttering, the fluttering of the spray ;
Those are the shadows of leaves.
" 0 darkness ! 0 in vain !
O, I am very sick and sorrowful."
Wact Whitman.
TO THE CUCKOO.
Haii., beauteous stranger of the grove 1
Thou messenger of spring !
Now Heaven repairs thy rural seat.
And woods thy welcome sing.
What time the daisy decks the green.
Thy certain voice we hear.
Hast thou a star to guide thy path.
Or mark the rolling year ?
Delightful visitant ! with thee
I hail the time of flowei-s.
And hear the sound of music sweet
From birds among the bowers.
ß-
472
POEMS OF NATURE.
Tlio school-boy, wandering through the wood
To pull the primrose gay,
Starts, the new voice of Spring to hear,
And imitates thy lay.
What time the pea puts on the bloom,
Thou fliest thy vocal vale.
An annual guest in other lands.
Another spring t6 hail.
Sweet bird ! thy bower is ever green.
Thy sky is ever clear ;
Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,
No winter in thy year !
0, could I fly, I'd fly with thee !
We'd make, with joyful wing.
Our annual visit o'er the globe,
Companions of the Spring.
joh.\ loca.m.
TO THE CUCKOO.
0 blithe new-comer ! I have heard,
I hear thee and rejoice.
0 cuckoo ! shall I call thee bird.
Or but a wandering voice ?
While I am lying on the grass
Thy twofold shout I hear ;
From hill to hill it seems to pass.
At once far off and near.
Though babbling only to the vale
Of sunshine and of flowers,
Thou bringest unto me a tale
Of visionary hours.
Thrice welcome, darling of the spring !
Even yet thou art to me
No bird, but an invisible thing,
A voice, a mystery ;
The same whom in my school-boy days
I listened to ; that cry
Which made me look a thousand ways.
In bush and tree and sky.
To seek thee did I often rove
Through woods and on the green ;
And thou wert still a hope, a love ;
Still longed for, never seen.
And I can listen to thee yet ;
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again.
0 blessed bird ! the earth we pace
Again appears to be
An unsubstantial, fairy place ;
That is fit home for thee !
William Wordsworth.
THE BELFRY PIGEON.
On the cross-beam under the Old South bell
The nest of a pigeon is builded well.
In summer and winter that bird is there,
Out and in with the morning air ;
I love to see him track the street.
With his wary eye and active feet ;
And I often watch him as he springs.
Circling the steeple with easy wings.
Till across the dial his shade has passed.
And the belfry edge is gained at last ;
'T is a bird I love, with its brooding note.
And the trembling throb in its mottled throat ;
There's a human look in its swelling breast.
And the gentle curve of its lowly crest ;
And I often stop with the fear I feel, —
He runs so close to the rapid wheel.
Whatever is rung on that noisy bell, —
Cliime of the hour, or funeral knell, —
The dove in the belfry must hear it well.
When the tongue swings out to the midnight
moon.
When the sexton cheerly rings for noon.
When the clock strikes clear at morning light.
When the child is waked with "nine at night,"
When the chimes play soft in the Sabbath air.
Filling the spirit with tones of prayer, —
Whatever tale in the bell is heard,
He broods on his folded feet unstirred.
Or, rising half in his rounded nest.
He takes the time to smooth his breast.
Then drops again, with filmed eyes,
And sleeps as the last vibration dies.
Sweet bird ! I would that I could be
A hennit in the crowd like thee !
With wings to fly to wood and glen.
Thy lot, like mine, is cast with men ;
And daily, with unwilling feet,
I tread, like thee, the crowded street.
But, unlike me, when day is o'er.
Thou canst dismiss the world, and soar ;
Or, at a half-felt wish for rest.
Canst smooth the feathers on thy breast.
And drop, forgetful, to thy nest.
I would that in such wings of gold
I could my weary heart upfold ;
I would I could look down unmoved
(Unloving as I am unloved),
And while the world throngs on beneath,
Smooth down my cares and calmly breathe ;
f
POEMS OF NATURE.
473
-a
And never sad with others' sadness,
And never glad with others' gladness,
Listen, unstirred, to knell or chime,
And, lapped in quiet, hide my time.
Kai'haniel Parker Willis.
THE SKYLARK.
Bird of the wilderness, i
Blithesdine and cumberless, ^
Sweet be thy Vnatin o'ei moorland and lea !
Emblem of happiness.
Blest is thy dwelling-place, —
0, to abide in the desert with thee !
Wild is thy lay and loud^
Ear in the dowmy cloud.
Love gives it energy, love gave it birth.
Wliere, on thy dewy wing.
Where art thou journeying ?
Thy lay is in heaven, thy love is on earth.
O'er fell and fountain sheen.
O'er moor and mountain green.
O'er the red streamer that heralds the day.
Over the cloudlet dim.
Over the rainbow's rim.
Musical eherub, soar, singing, away !
Then, when the gloaming comes,
Low in the heather blooms
Sweet will thy welcome and bed of love be !
Emblem of happiness.
Blest is thy dwelling-place, —
0, to abide in the desert with thee !
James Hogg.
TO THE SKYLARK.
Hail to thee, blithe spirit !
Bird thou never wert.
That from heaven, or near it,
Pourest thy full heart
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.
Higher still and higher
From the earth thou springest.
Like a cloud of fire ;
The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever
singest.
In the golden lightning
Of the setting sun.
O'er which clouds are brightening.
Thou dost float and run ;
Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.
The pale purple even
Melts around thy flight ;
Like a star of heaven.
In the broad daylight
Thou art unseen, but yet 1 hear thy shrill delight.
Keen as are the arrows
Of that silver sphere.
Whose intense lamp narrows
In the white dawn clear.
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there.
All the earth and air
With thy voice is loud.
As, when night is bare.
From one lonely cloud
The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is
overflowed.
What thou art we know not ;
Wliat is most like thee ?
From rainbow clouds there flow not
Drops so bright to see.
As from thy presence showers a rain of melody.
Like a poet hidden
In the light of thought.
Singing liymns unbidden.
Till the world is wrought
To sympathy with hopes and fcais it heeded not ;
Like a high-born maiden
In a palace tower.
Soothing her love-laden
Soul in secret hour
With music sweet as love, which overflows her
bower ;
liike a glow-worm golden
In a dell of dew.
Scattering unbeholden
Its aerial hue
Among the flowers and grass which sci-een it
from the view ;
Like a rose embowered
In its own green leaves.
By warm winds deflowered.
Till the scent it gives
Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-
wingèd thieves.
Sound of vernal showers
On the twinkling grass.
Rain-awakened flowers.
All that ever was
Joyous and fresh and clear thy music doth sur¬
pass.
474
POEMS OP NATURE.
a
Teach us, sprite or bird,
What sweet thoughts are thine ;
I have never heard
Praise of love or wine
That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.
Chorus hymeneal.
Or triumphant chant.
Matched with thine, would be all
But an empty vaunt, —
A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden
want.
What objects are the fountains
Of thy happy strain ?
What fields, or waves, or mountains ?
What shapes of sky or plain ?
What love of thine own kind ? What ignorance
of pain ?
With thy clear, keen joyance
Languor cannot he :
Shadow of annoyance
Never come near thee ;
Thou lovest ; hut ne'er knew love's sad satiety.
Waking or asleep.
Thou of death must deem
Things more true and deep
Than we mortals dream.
Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal
stream ?
We look before and after.
And pine for what is not ;
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught ;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest
thought.
Yet if we could scorn
Hate and pride and fear.
If we were things born
Not to shed a tear,
I know not how thy joy wo ever should come near.
Better than all measures
Of delightful sound.
Better than all treasures
That in books ai'e found.
Thy skill to poet were, thou scomer of the
gi-ound !
Teach me half the gladness
That thy bi'ain must know.
Such harmonious madness
From my lips would flow.
The world should listen then, as I am listening
now.
Percy Bvsshe Shelley.
HARK, HARK! THE LARK.
from " cymbeline." act ii. sc. 3,
Habk, hark I the lark at heaven's gate sings,
And Phoebus 'gins arise.
His steeds to water at those springs
On chaliced flowere that lies ;
And winking Mary-buds begin
To ope their golden eyes ;
With everything that pretty bin.
My lady sweet, arise ;
Arise, arise !
shakespeare.
TO THE SKYLARK.
Ethep.eal minstrel ! pilgrim of the sky !
Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound ?
Or, while the wings aspire, are heart and eye
Both with thy nest upon the dewy ground ?
Thy nest, which thou canst drop into at will.
Those quivering wings composed, that music still I
To the last point of vision, and beyond.
Mount, daring wai-bler ! — that love-prompted
strain,
'Twixt thee and thine a never-failing bond.
Thrills not the less the bosom of the plain ;
Yet mightst thou seem, proud privilege I to sing
All independent of the leafy spring.
Leave to the nightingale her shady wood ;
A privacy of glorious light is thine.
Whence thou dost pour upon the world a flood
Of harmony, with instinct more divine ;
Type of the wise, who soar, but never roam, —
True to the kindred points of Heaven and Home I
William Wordsworth.
ANSWER TO A CHILD'S QUESTION.
Do you ask what the birds say ? The sparrow,
the dove.
The linnet, and thrush say "I love, and I
love !"
In the winter they 'i-e silent, the wind is so
strong ;
What it says I don't know, but it sings a loud
song.
But green leaves, and blossoms, and sunny
warm weather.
And singing and loving — all come back to¬
gether.
But the lark is so brimful of gladness and love.
The green fields below him, the blue sky above,
That he sings, and he sings, and forever sings he,
" I love my Love, and my Love loves me."
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
■0
^
POEMS OP NATURE. 475
THE ENGLISH ROBIN.
See yon robin on the spray ;
Look ye how his tiny fomi
Swells, as when his merry lay
Gushes forth amid the storm.
Though the snow is falling fast,
Specking o'er his coat with white, —
Though loud roars the chilly blast,
And the evening's lost in night, —
Yet from out the darkness dreary
Cometh still that cheerful note ;
Praiscful aye, and never weary.
Is that little warbling throat.
Thank him for his lesson's sake.
Thank God's gentle minstrel there.
Who, when storms make others quake.
Sings of days that brighter were.
Harrison Warn.
THE BOBOLINK.
Bobolink ! that in the meadow.
Or beneath the orchard's shadow,
Keepest up a constant rattle
Joyous as my children's prattle.
Welcome to the north again !
Welcome to mine ear thy strain.
Welcome to mine eye the sight
Of thy buff, thy black and white !
Brighter plumes may greet the sun
By the banks of Amazon ;
Sweeter tones may weave the spell
Of enchanting Philomel ;
But the tropic bird would fail.
And the English nightingale.
If we should compare their worth
With thine endless, gushing mirth.
When the ides of May are past,
June and summer nearing fast.
While from depths of blue above
Comes the mighty breath of love.
Calling out each bud and flower
With resistless, secret power, —
Waking hope and fond desire.
Kindling the erotic flre, —
Filling youths' and maidens' dreams
With mysterious, pleasing themes ;
Then, amid the sunlight clear.
Floating in the fragrant air.
Thou dost fill each heart with pleasure
By thy glad ecstatic measure.
A single note, so sweet and low.
Like a full heart's overflow.
Forms the prelude ; but the strain
Gives us no such tone again ;
For the wild and saucy song
Leaps and skips the notes among.
With such quick and sportive play.
Ne'er was madder, merrier lay.
Gayest songster of the spring !
Thy melodies before me bring
Visions of some dream-built land.
Where, by constant zephyrs fanned,
I might walk the livelong day.
Embosomed in perpetual May.
Nor care nor fear thy bosom knows ,
For thee a tempest never blows ;
But when our northern summer's o'er.
By Delaware's or Schuylkill's shore
The wild rice lifts its airy head.
And royal feasts for thee are spread.
And when the winter threatens there.
Thy tireless wings yet own no fear.
But bear thee to more southern coasts.
Far beyond the reach of frosts.
Bobolink ! still may thy gladness
Take from me all taints of sadness ;
Fill my soul with trust unshaken
In that Being who has taken
Care for every living thing,
summer, winter, fall, and spring.
Thomas Hill.
THE O'LINCOLN FAMILY.
A flock of merry singing-birds were sporting in
the grove :
Some were warbling cheerily, and some were
making love :
There were Bobolincon, Wadolincon, Winter-
seeble, Conquedle, —
A livelier set was never led by tabor, pipe, or
fiddle,—
Crying, "Phew, shew, Wadolincon, see, see,
Bobolincon,
Down among the tiekletops, hiding in the but¬
tercups !
I know the saucy chap, I see his shining cap
Bobbing in the clover there, — see, see, see ! "
Up flies Bobolincon, perching on an apple-tree.
Startled by his rival's song, quickened by his
raillery ;
Soon he spies the rogue afloat, curvetting in the
air.
And merrily he turns about, and warns him to
beware !
—gi
ß-
476
POEMS OF NATURE.
" 'T is you tliat would a-wooing go, down an)oug
the rushes 0 !
But wait a week, till flowers are cheery, — wait
a week, and, ere you marry.
Be sure of a house wherein to tarry !
Wadolink, Whiskodink, Tom Denny, wait, wait,
wait ! "
Every one's a funny fellow ; every one's a little
mellow ;
Follow, follow, follow, follow, o'er the hill and
in the hollow !
Merrily, merrily, there they hie ; now thej' rise
and now they fly ;
They cross and turn, and in and out, and down
in the middle, and wheel about, —
"With a "Phew, shew, Wadolincon ! listen to
me, Bobolincon ! —
Happy's the wooing that's speedily doing, that's
speedily doing.
That's merry and over with the bloom of the
clover !
Bobolincon, "Wadolinco ""Vinterseeble, follow,
follow me !
Wilson Flagc.
THE TELLTALE.
Once, on a golden afternoon,
"With radiant faces and hearts in tune.
Two fond lovers in dreaming mood
Threaded a rural solitude.
"Wholly happy, they only knew
That the earth was bright and the sky was blue.
That light and beauty and joy and song
Charmed the way, as they passed along :
The air was fragrant with woodland scents ;
The squirrel frisked on the roadside fence ;
And hovering near them, "Ghee, chee,
chink?"
Queried the curious bobolink.
Pausing and peering with sidelong head.
As saucily questioning all they said ;
While the ox-eye danced on its slender
stem.
And all glad nature rejoiced with them.
Over the odorous flelds were strown
Wilting windrows of grass new-mown.
And rosy billows of clover bloom
Surged in the sunshine and breathed per¬
fume.
Swinging low on a slender limb.
The sparrow warbled his wedding hymn.
And, balancing on a blackberry-brier.
The bobolink sung with his heart on flre, —
" Chink ? If you wish to kiss her, do I
Do it, do it ! You coward, you !
Hiss her ! Kiss, kiss her ! "Who will see ?
Only we three ! we three I we three ! "
Under garlands of drooping vines,
Through dim vistas of sweet-breathed pines,
Past wide meadow-flelds, lately mowed.
Wandered the indolent countiy road.
The lovers followed it, listening still.
And, loitering slowly, as lovers will.
Entered a low-roofed bridge that lay,
Dusky and cool, in their pleasant way.
Under its arch a smooth, brown stream
Silently glided, with glint and gleam.
Shaded by graceful elms that spread
Their verdurous canopy overhead, —
The stream so narrow, the boughs so wide.
They met and mingled across the tide.
Alders loved it, and seemed to keep
Patient watch as it lay asleep.
Mirroring clearly the trees and sky
And the flitting form of the dragon-fly.
Save where the swift-winged swallow played
In and out in the sun and shade.
And darting and circling in merry chase.
Dipped, and dimpled its clear dark face.
Fluttering lightly from brink to brink
Followed the garrulous bobolink,
Rallj'ing loudly, with mirthful din.
The pair who lingered unseen within.
And when from the friendly bridge at last
Into the road beyond they passed.
Again beside them the tempter went,
Keeping the thread of his argument ; —
" Kiss her 1 kiss her ! chink-a-chee-chee !
I '11 not mention it ! Don't mind me !
I '11 be sentinel— I can see
All aivund from this tall birch-tree ! "
But ah ! they noted — nor deemed it strange —
In his rollicking chorus a trifling change :
" Do it ! do it ! " with might and main
Warbled the telltale — " Do it again ¡ "
Ano.nvmous.
ROBERT OF LINCOLN.
Meiirily swinging on brier and weed,
Near to the nest of his little dame.
Over the mountain-side or mead,
Robert of Lincoln is telling his name ;
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spiuk ;
Snug and safe is that nest of ours.
Hidden among the summer flowers.
Chee, chee, chee.
Robert of Lincoln is gayly dressed.
Wearing a bright black wedding coat ;
White are his shoulders and white his crest,
Hear him call in his merry note :
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink ;
-51
POEMS OF
NATURE.
477
Look, what a nice new coat is mine,
Sure there was never a bird so fine.
Chee, chee, chee.
Robert of Lincoln's Quaker wife.
Pretty and quiet, with plain brown wings.
Passing at home a patient life.
Broods in the grass while her husband sings;
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink ;
Brood, kind creature ; you need not fear
Thieves and robbers while I am here.
Chee, chee, chee.
Modest and shy as a nun is she,
One weak chirp is her only note.
Braggart and prince of braggarts is he.
Pouring boasts from his little throat :
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink ;
Never was I afraid of man ;
Catch me, cowardly knaves, if you can.
Chee, chee, chee.
Six white eggs on a bed of hay,
Flecked with purple, a pretty sight !
There as the mother sits all day,
Robert is singing with all his might :
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink ;
Nice good wife, that never goes out.
Keeping house while 1 frolic about.
Chee, chee, chee.
Soon as the little ones chip the shell
Six wide mouths are open for food ;
Robert of Lincoln bestirs him well.
Gathering seed for the hungry biwd.
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink ;
This new life is likely to be
Hard for a gay young fellow like me.
Chee, chee, chee.
Robert of Lincoln at length is made
Sober with work, and silent with care ;
OIT is his holiday garment laid.
Half fofgotten that merry air,
Bob-o'-link, bob-V-link,
Spink, spank, spink ;
Nobody knows but my mate and I
Where our nest and our nestlings lie.
Chee, chee, chee.
Summer wanes ; the children are grown ;
Fun and frolic no more he knows ;
Robert of Lincoln's a humdrum crone ;
Off he flies, and we sing as he goes :
Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,
Spink, spank, spink ;
When you can pipe that merry old strain,
Robert of Lincoln, come back again.
Chee, chee, chee.
william Gullen Bryant.
THE HEATH-COCK.
Good morrow to thy sable beak'
And glossy plumage dark and sleelc.
Thy crimson moon and azure eye.
Cock of the heath, so wildly shy :
I see thee slyly cowering through
That wiry web of silvery dew.
That twinkles'in the morning air.
Like casements of my lady fair.
A maid there is in yonder tower.
Who, peeping from her early bower.
Half shows, like thee, her simple wile.
Her braided hair and morning smile.
The rarest things, with wayward will.
Beneath the covert hide them still ;
The rarest things to break of day
Look shortly forth, and shrink away.
A fleeting moment of delight
I sunned mo in her cheering sight ;
As short, I ween, the time will be
That I shall parley hold with thee.
Through Snowdon's mist red beams the day,
The climbing herd-boy chants his lay,
The gnat-flies dance their sunny ring, —
Thou art already on the wing.
Joanna bailliu.
♦—
PERSEVERANCE.
A swallow in the spring
Came to our granary, and 'neath the eaves
Essayed to make a nest, and there did bring
Wet earth and straw and leaves.
Day after day she toiled
With patient art, but ere herwork was crowned,
Some sad mishap the tiny fabric spoiled.
And dashed it to the ground.
She found the ruin wrought.
But, not cast down, forth from the place she flow.
And with her mate fresh earth and grasses brought
And built her nest anew.
But scarcely had she placed
The last soft feather on its ample floor.
When wicked hand, or chance, again laid waste
And wrought the ruin o'er.
478
POEMS OF NATURE.
But still her heart she kept,
And toiled again, — and last night, hearing calls,
I looked, —and lo ! three little swallows slept
Within the earth-made walls.
What truth is here, 0 man !
Hath hope been smitten in its early dawn I
Have clouds q'ercast thy puqiose, trust, or plan ?
Have faith, and struggle on !
R. s. s. ANDROS.
—•—
THE WIITGED WORSHIPPERS.
[Addressed to two swallows that flew into the Chauncy Place
Church during divine service.] '
Gay, guiltless pair.
What seek ye from the fields of heaven ?
Ye have no need of prayer ;
Ye have no sins to be forgiven.
Why perch ye here.
Where mortals to their Maker bend ?
Can your pure spirits fear
The God ye never could offend ?
Ye never knew
The crimes for which we come to weep.
Penance is not for you.
Blessed wanderers of the upper deep.
To jmu't is given
To wake sweet Nature's untaught lays ;
Beneath the arch of heaven
To chii'p away a life of praise.
Then spread each wing
Far, far above, o'er lakes and lands.
And join the choirs that sing
In yon blue dome not reared with hands.
Or, if ye stay,
To note the consecrated hour.
Teach me the aiiy way.
And let me try your envied power.
Above the crowd
On upward wings could I but fly,
I'd bathe in yon bright cloud.
And seek the stai-s that gem the sky.
'T were heaven indeed
Through fields of trackless light to soar,
On Nature's charms to feed,
, And Nature's own great God adore.
charles sprague.
il^
THE SWALLOW.
The gorse is yellow on the heath.
The banks with speedwell flowers are gay,
The oaks are budding ; and beneath.
The hawthorn soon will bear the wreath.
The silver wreath of May.
The welcome guest of settled spring.
The swallow too is come at last ;
Just at sunset, when thrushes sing,
I saw her dash with rapid wing.
And hailed her as she passed.
Come, summer visitant, attach
To my reed-roof thy nest of clay.
And,let my ear thy music catch.
Low twittering underneath the thatch.
At the gray dawn of day.
As fables tell, an Indian sage.
The Hindustani woods among.
Could in his desert hermitage.
As if 'twere marked in Written page.
Translate the wild bird's song.
I wish I did his power possess.
That I might leain, fleet bird, from thee,
What our vain systems only guess,
And know from what wild wilderness
Thou earnest o'er the sea.
CHARLoriE Smith.
THE DEPARTURE OF THE SWALLOW,.
Axd is the swallow gone ?
Who beheld it ?
W.hich way sailed it t
Farewell bade it none ?
No moi-tal saw it go ; —
But who doth hear
Its summer cheer
As it fli'tteth to and fro ?
So the freed spirit flies !
From its surrounding clay
It steals away
Like the swallow from the skies.
Whither ? wherefore doth it go ?
'T is all unknown ;
We feel alone
That a void is left below.
William Howitt-
POEMS OF NATURE.
479
TO A NIGHTINGALE.
Sweet bird ! that sing'st away the early hours
Of winters past or coming, void of care ;
Well pleased with delights which present are,
Fair seasons, budding sprays, sweet-smelling
flowers :
To rocks, to springs, to rills, from leafy bowers
Thou thy Creator's goodness dost declare.
And what dear gifts on thee he did not spare,
A stain to human sense in sin that lowers.
What soul can be so sick which by thy songs
(Attired in sweetness) sweetly is not driven
Quite to forget earth's turmoils, spites, and wrongs.
And lift a reverent eye and thought to heaven ?
Sweet, artless songster ! thou my mind dost raise
To airs of spheres, — yes, and to angels' lays.
William druhmono.
THE NIGHTINGALE.
The rose looks out in the valley,
And thither will I go !
To the rosy vale, where the nightingale
Sings his song of woe.
The virgin is on the river-side.
Culling the lemons pale :
Thither, —yes ! thither will I go.
To the rosy vale, where the nightingale
Sings his song of woe.
The fairest fruit her hand hath culled,
'T is for her lover all ;
Thither, — yes ! thither will I go.
To the rosy vale, where the nightingale
Sings his song of woe.
In her hat of straw, for her gentle swain.
She has placed the lemons pale :
Thither, — yes '. thither will I go.
To the rosy vale, where the nightingale
Sings his song of woe.
From the Portuguese of GlL ViCENTE,
Translation of John Bqwring.
THE NIGHTINGALE.
Prize thou the nightingale.
Who soothes thee with his tale.
And wakes the woods around ;
A singing feather he, — a winged and wandering
sound ;
Whose tender carolling
Sets all ears listening
Unto that living lyre.
Whence flow the airy notes his ecstasies inspire :
Whose shrill, capricious song
Breathes like a flute along.
With many a careless tone, —
Music of thousand tongues, formed by one tongue
alone.
0 charming creature rare !
Can aught with thee compare ?
Thou ait all song, — thy breast
Thrills for one month o' the year, — is tranquil
all the rest.
Tliee wondrous we may call, —
Most wondrous this of all.
That such a tiny throat
Should wake so loud a sound, and pour so loud
a note.
' From the Dutch of Maria Tesselschade Visscher.
Translation of john bowring.
PHILOMELA.
Hark ! ah, the nightingale !
The tawny-throated !
Hark ! from that moonlit cedar what a burst !
What triumph ! hark, — what pain !
O wanderer from a Grecian shore.
Still, — after many years, in distant lands, —
Still nourishing in thy bewildered brain
That wild, unquenched, deep-sunken, Old-World
pain, —
Say, will it never heal ?
And can this fragrant lawn.
With its cool trees, and night.
And the sweet, tranquil Thames,
And moonshine, and the dew.
To thy racked heart and brain
Aflbrd no balm ?
Dost thou to-night behold.
Here, through the moonlight on this English
grass.
The unfriendly palace in the Thracian wild ?
Dost thou again peruse,
With hot cheeks and seared eyes.
The too clear web, and thy dumb sister's .shame ?
Dost thou once more essay
Thy flight ; and feel come over thee.
Poor fugitive ! the feathery change
Once more ; and once more make resound.
With love and hate, triumph and agony.
Lone Daulis, and the high Cephisian vale ?
Listen, Eugenia, —
How thick the bursts come crowding through
the leaves !
Again — thou hcarest 1
Eternal passion !
Eternal pain !
Matthew Arnold.
EP
480
POEMS OF NATURE.
a
TO THE NIGHTINGALE.
As it fell upon a day,
In the merry month of May,
Sitting in a pleasant shade
Which a grove of myrtles made.
Beasts did leap, and birds did sing,
Trees did grow, and plants did spring
Everything did banish moan.
Save the nightingale alone.
She, poor bird, as all forlorn.
Leaned her breast up-till a thorn ;
And there sung the dolefuTst ditty
That to hear it was great pity.
Fie, fie, fie ! now would she cry ;
Teru, teru, by and by ;
That, to hear her so complain,
Scarce I could from tears refrain ;
For her griefs, so lively shown.
Made me think upon mine own.
Ah ! (thought I) thou moum'st in vain ;
None takes pity on thy pain ;
Senseless trees, they cannot hear thee ;
Ruthless bears, they will not cheer thee ;
King Pandion, he is dead ;
All thy friends are lapped in lead :
All thy fellow-birds do sing.
Careless of thy sorrowing !
Whilst as fickle Fortune smiled,
Thou and I were both beguiled.
Every one that flatters thee
Is no friend in miseiy.
Words are easy, like the wind ;
Faithful friends are hard to find.
Every man will be thy friend
Whilst thou hast wherewith to spend ;
But, if stores of crowns be scant,
No man will supply thy want.
If that one be prodigal.
Bountiful they will him call ;
And, with such-like flattering,
" Pity but he were a king."
If he be addict to vice.
Quickly him they will entice ;
But if Fortune once do frown.
Then farewell his great renown ;
They that fawned on him before,
Use his company no more.
He that is thy friend indeed,
He will help thee in thy need ;
If thou sorrow, he will weep,
If thou wake, he cannot sleep.
Thus, of every giief in heart.
He with thee doth bear a part.
These are certain signs to know
Faithful friend from flattering foe.
Richard Barnfield.
114
THE PELICAN.
from "the pelican island."
At early dawn I marked them in the sky,
Catching the morning colors on their plumes ; —
Not in voluptuous pastime revelling there,
Among the rosy clouds, while orient heaven
Flamed like the opening gates of Paradise,
Whence issued forth the angel of the sun.
And gladdened nature with returning day :
— Eager for food, their searching eyes they fixed
On ocean's unrolled volume, from a height
That brought immensity within their .scope ;
Yet with such power of vision looked they down.
As though they watched the shell-fish slowly
gliding
O'er sunken rocks, or climbing trees of coral.
On indefatigable wing upheld.
Breath, pulse, existence, seemed suspended in
them :
They were as pictures painted on the sky ;
Till suddenly, aslant, away they shot.
Like meteors changed from stars to gleams of
lightning.
And struck upon the deep, where, in wild play.
Their quarry floundered, unsuspecting harm ;
With terrible voracity, they plunged
Their heads among the affrighted shoals, and beat
A tempest on the surges with their wings.
Till flashing clouds of foam and spray concealed
them.
Nimbly they seixed and secreted their prey.
Alive and wriggling in the elastic net.
Which Nature hung beneath their grasping beaks.
Till, swollen with captures, the unwieldy burden
Clogged their .slow flight, as heavily to land
These mighty hunters of the deep returned.
There on the craggèd cliffs they perched at case.
Gorging their hapless victims one by one ;
Then, full and weary, side by side they slept.
Till evening roused them to the chase again.
Love found that lonely couple on their isle,
And soon surrounded them with blithe compan¬
ions.
The noble birds, with skill spontaneous, framed
A nest of reeds among the giant-grass.
That waved in lights and shadows o'er the soil.
There, in sweet thraldom, yet unweening wh)'.
The patient dam, who ne'er till now had known
Parental instinct, brooded o'er her eggs.
Long ere she found the curious secret out.
That life was hatching in their brittle shells.
Tlien, from a wild rapacious bird of prey.
Tamed by the kindly process, she became
That gentlest of all living things, — a mother ;
Gentlest while j-earniug o'er her naked 3'oung,
Fiercest when stirred by anger to defend them.
POEMS OF NATURE.
481
Her mate himself the softening power confessed,
Forgot his sloth, restrained his appetite.
And ranged the sky and fished the stream for her.
Or, when o'erwearied Nature forced her off
To shake her torpid feathers in the breeze.
And bathe her bosom in the cooling flood.
He took her place, and felt through every nerve.
While the plump nestlings throbbed against his
heart.
The tenderness that makes the vulture mild ;
Yea, half unwillingly his post resigned.
When, homesick with the absence of an hour.
She hurried back, and drove him from her seat
With peeking bill and cry of fond distress.
Answered by him with murmurs of delight.
Whose gutturals harsh to her were love's own
music.
Then, settling down, like foam upon the wave.
White, flickering, effervescent, soon subsiding.
Her ruffled pinions smoothly she composed ;
And, while beneath the comfort of her wings.
Her crowded progeny quite filled the nest.
The halcyon sleeps not sounder, when the wind
Is breathless, and the sea without a curl,
—Nor dreams the halcyon of .serener days,
Or nights more beautiful with silent stars.
Than in that hour, the mother pelican.
When the warm tumults of affection sunk
Into calm sleep, and dreams of what they were, —
Dreams more delicious than reality.
He sentinel beside her stood, and watched
With jealous eye the raven in the clouds.
And the rank sea-mews wheeling round the cliffs.
Woe to the reptile then that ventured nigh !
The snap of his tremendous bill was like
Death's scythe, down-cutting everything it
struck.
The heedless lizard, in his gambols, peeped
Upon the guarded nest, from out the flowers.
But paid the instant forfeit of his life ;
Nor could the serpent's subtlety elude
Capture, when gliding by, nor in defence
Might his malignant fangs and venom save him.
Erelong the thriving brood outgrew their
cradle.
Ran through the grass, and dabbled in the pools ;
No sooner denizens of earth than made
Free both of air and water ; day by day.
New lessons, exercises, and amusements
Employed the old to teach, the young to leain.
Now floating on the blue lagoon behold them ;
The sire and dam in swan-like beauty steering,
Their cygnets following through the foamy wake,
Picking the leaves of plants, pursuing insects.
Or catching at the bubbles as they broke ;
Till on some minor fry, in reedy shallows.
With flapping pinions and unsparing beaks.
The well-taught scholars plied their double art.
To fish in troubled waters, and secure
The petty captives in their maiden pouches ;
Then hurried with their banquet to the shore.
With feet, wings, breast, half swimming and
half flying.
But when their pens grew strong to fight the
storm.
And buffet with the breakers on the reef.
The parents put them to severer proof :
On beetling rocks the little ones were marshalled;
There, by endearments, stripes, example, urged
To try the void convexity of heaven.
And plough the ocean's horizontal field.
Timorous at first they fluttered round the verge.
Balanced and furled their hesitating wings.
Then put them forth again with steadier aim ;
Now, gaining courage as they felt the wind
Dilate their feathers, fill their airy frames
With buoyancy that bore them from their feet,
1?hey yielded all their burden to the breeze.
And sailed and soared where'er their guardiansled;
Ascending, hovering, wheeling, or alighting,
They searched the deep in quest of nobler game
Than yet their inexperience had encountered ;
With these they battled in that element.
Where wings or fins were equally at home.
Till, conquerors in many a desperate strife.
They dragged their spoils to land, and gorged at
leisure,
James Montcomerv.
TO A WATERFOWL.
Whither, midst falling dew.
While glow the heavens with the last steps of
day.
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way ?
Vainly the fowler's eye
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong.
As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.
Seek'st thou the plashy brink
Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide.
Or where the rocking biUows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean-side ?
There is a Power whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast, —
The desert and illimitable air, —
Lone wandering, but not lost.
All day thy wings have fanned.
At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere.
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.
[&
482
POEMS OP NATURE.
n
And soon that toil shall end ;
Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,
And scream among thy fellows ; reeds shall bend.
Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest.
Thou 'rt gone, the abyss of heaven
Hath swallowed up thy form ; yet, on my heart
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given.
And shall not soon depart ;
He who, from zone to zone.
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain
flight.
In the long way that I must tread alone.
Will lead my steps aright.
william Collen Bryant.
TO A BIRD
That haunted the waters of laaken in the winter
0 melancholy bird, a winter's day
Thou standest by the margin of the pool.
And, taught by God, dost thy whole being
school
To patience, which all evil can allay.
God has appointed thee the fish thy prey.
And given thyself a lesson to the fool
Unthrifty, to submit to moral rule.
And his unthinking course by thee to weigh.
There need not schools nor the professor's chair.
Though these be good, true wisdom to impart :
He who has not enough for these to spare.
Of time or gold, may yet amend his heart.
And teach his soul by brooks and rivers fair, —
Nature is always wis in every part.
edward hovel, lord thurlow.
THE SANDPIPER.
Across the nan-ow beach we flit.
One little sandpiper and I ;
And fast I gather, bit by bit.
The scattered driftwood bleached and dry.
The wild waves reach their hands for it.
The wild wind raves, the tide runs high.
As up and down the beach we flit, —
One little sandpiper and I.
Above our heads the sullen clouds
Scud black and swift across the sky :
Like silent ghosts in misty shrouds
Stand out the white light-houses high.
Almost as far as eye can i-each
I see the close-reefed vessels fly.
As fast we flit along the beach, —
One little sandpiper and I.
I watch him as he skims along.
Uttering his sweet and mournful cry ;
He starts not at my fitful song.
Or flash of fluttering drapery ;
He has no thought of any wrong,
He scans me with a fearless eye.
Stanch friends are we, well tried and strong.
The little sandpiper and I.
Comrade, where wüt thou be to-night
When the loosed storm breaks furiously ?
My driftwood-fire wiU bum so bright !
To what warm shelter canst thou fly ?
I do not fear for thee, though wroth
The tempest rushes through the sky :
For are we not God's children both.
Thou, little sandpiper, and I ?
Celia Thaxter
THE LITTLE BEACH BIRD.
Thott little bird, thou dweUer by the sea.
Why takest thou its melancholy voice Î
Why with that boding cry
O'er the waves dost thou fly ?
0, rather, bird, with me
Through the fair land rejoice !
Thy flitting form comes ghostly dim and pale.
As driven by a beating storm at sea ;
Thy cry is weak and scared.
As if thy mates had shared
The doom of us. Thy wail—
What does it bring to me ?
Thou call'st along the sand, andhaunt'stthe surge.
Restless and sad ; as if, in strange accord
With motion and with roar
Of waves that drive to shore.
One spirit did ye urge —
The Mystery— the Word.
Of thousands thou both sepulchre and pall.
Old ocean, art ! A requiem o'er the dead,
From out thy gloomy cells,
A tale of mourning tells, —
Tells of man's woe and fall.
His sinless glory fled.
Then tum thee, little bird, and take thy flight
Where the complaining sea shall sadness bring
Thy spirit neveimore.
Come, quit with me the shore.
For gladness and the light,
Where birds of summer sing.
Richard Henrv Dana.
&
POEMS OF NATURE.
483
THE STORMY PETREL.
A THOUSAND miles from land are we.
Tossing about on the stormy sea, —
From billow to bounding billow cast.
Like fleecy snow on the stormy blast.
The sails are scattered abroad like weeds ;
The strong masts shake like quivering reeds ;
The mighty cables and iron chains.
The hull, which all earthly strength disdains, —
They strain and they crack ; and hearts like stone
Their natural, hard, proud strength disown.
Up and down ! — up and down !
From the base of the wave to the billow's crown.
And amidst the flashing and feathery foam
The stormy petrel finds a home, —
A home, if such a place may be
For her who lives on the wide, wide sea.
On the craggy ice, in the frozen air.
And only seeketh her rocky lair
To warm her young, and to teach them to spring
At once o'er the waves on their stormy wing !
O'er the deep ! — o'er the deep !
■Where the whale and the shark and the sword-
fish sleep, —
Outflying the blast and the driving rain.
The petrel telleth her tale — in vain ;
For the mariner curseth the warning bird
Which bringeth him news of the storm unheard !
Ah ! thus does the prophet of good or ill
Meet hate from the creatures he serveth still ;
Yet he ne'er falters, — so, petrel, spring
Once more o'er the waves on thy stormy wing !
Bryan w. Procter (Barry Comviatl).
LINES TO THE STORMY PETREL.
The lark sings for joy in her own loved land.
In the furrowed field, by the breezes fanned ;
And so revel we
in the fuiTowed sea.
As joyous and glad as the lark'can be.
On the placid breast of the inland lake
The wild duck delights her pastime to take ;
But the petrel braves
The wild ocean waves,
His wing in the foaming billow he laves.
The halcyon loves in the noontide beam
To follow his sport on the tranquil stream :
He fishes at ease
In the summer breeze.
But we go angling in stormiest seas.
No song-note have we but a piping cry.
That blends with the storm when thewind is high.
■When the land-birds wail
"We sport in the gale.
And merrily over the ocean we sail.
A.yonymous.
—•—
THE EAGLE.
a fragment.
He clasps the crag with hooked hands ;
Close to the sun in lonely lands.
Ringed with the azure world, he stands.
The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls ;
He watches from his mountain walls.
And like a thunderbolt he falls.
alfred Tennyson.
THE OWL.
In the hollow tree, in the old gray tower.
The spectral owl doth dwell ;
Dull, hated, despised, in the sunshine hour.
But at dusk he's abroad and well !
Not a bird of the forest e'er mates with him ;
All mock him outright by day ;
But at night, when the woods grow still and dim.
The boldest will shrink away !
0, when the night falls, and roosts the fowl.
Then, then, is the reign of the homèd owl /
And the owl hath a bride, who is fond and bold.
And loveth the wood's deep gloom ;
And, with eyes like the shine of the moonstone
cold.
She awaiteth her ghastly groom ;
Not a feather she moves, not a carol she sings,
As she waits in her tree so still ;
But when her heart heareth his flapping wings.
She hoots out her welcome shrill !
0, when the moon shines, and dogs do howl.
Then, then, is the joy of the hornkd owl !
Mourn not for the owl, nor his gloomy plight !
The owl hath his share of good ;
If a prisoner he be in the broad daylight,
He is lord in the dark greenwood !
Nor lonely the bird, nor his ghastly mate.
They are each unto each a pride ;
Thrice fonder, perhaps, since a strange, dark fate
Hath rent them from all beside !
So, when the night falls, and dogs do howl.
Sing, ho ! for the reign of the hornèd owl /
We know not alway
Who are kings by day.
But the king of the night isthe bold brown, owl!
Bryan w. Procter (Barry oarn-wall).
484
POEMS OF NATURE.
TO THE HUMBLEBEE.
Burly, dozing humblebee !
Where thou art is clime for me ;
Let them sail for Porto Rique,
Far-off heats through seas to seek,
I will follow thee alone.
Thou animated torrid zone !
Zigzag steerer, desert cheerer.
Let me chase thy waving lines ;
Keep me nearer, me thy hearer.
Singing over shrubs and vines.
Insect lover of the sun,
Joy of thy dominion !
Sailor of the atmosphere ;
Swimmer through the waves of air.
Voyager of light and noon.
Epicurean of June !
Wait, I prithee, till I come
Within earshot of thy hum, —
All without is martyrdom.
When the south-wind, in May days.
With a net of shining haze
Silvers the horizon wall ;
And, with softness touching all,
Tints the human countenance
With the color of romance ;
And infusing subtle heats
Turns the sod to violets, —
Thou in sunny solitudes.
Rover of the underwoods.
The green silence dost displace
With thy mellow breezy bass.
Hot midsummer's petted crone.
Sweet to me thy drowsy tone
Tells of countless sunny hours.
Long days, and solid banks of flowers ;
Of gulfs of sweetness without bound.
In Indian wildernesses found ;
Of Syrian peaee, immortal leisure.
Firmest cheer, and birdlike pleasure.
Aught unsavory or unclean
Hath my insect never seen ;
But violets, and bilberry bells.
Maple sap, and daffodels.
Grass with gi'een flag half-mast high.
Succory to match the sky.
Columbine with horn of honey.
Scented fern, and agrimony.
Clover, catchfly, adder's-tongue.
And brier-roses, dwelt among :
All beside was unknown waste.
All was picture as he passed.
Wiser far than human seer.
Yellow-breeched philosopher.
Seeing only what is fair.
Sipping only what is sweet.
Thou dost mock at fate and care.
Leave the chaflf and take the wheat.
When the fierce northwestern blast
Cools sea and land so far and fast, —
Thou already slumberest deep ;
Woe and want thou canst outsleep ;
Want and woe, which torture us.
Thy sleep makes ridiculous.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
A SOLILOQUY:
occasioned by the chirping of a grasshopper.
Happy insect ! ever blest
With a more than mortal rest.
Rosy dews the leaves among.
Humble joys, and gentle song !
Wretched poet ! ever curst
With a life of lives the worst.
Sad despondence, restless fears.
Endless jealousies and tears.
In the burning summer thou
Warblest on the verdant bough.
Meditating cheerful play.
Mindless of the piercing ray ;
Scorched in Cupid's fervors, I
Ever weep and ever die.
Proud to gratify thy will.
Ready Nature waits thee still ;
Balmy wines to thee she pours.
Weeping through the dewy flowers.
Rich as those by Hebe given
To the thirsty sons of heaven.
Yet, alas, we both agree.
Miserable thou like me !
Each, alike, in youth rehearses
Gentle strains and tender verses ;
Ever wandering far from home.
Mindless of the days to come
(Such as aged Winter brings
Trembling on his icy wings).
Both alike at last we die ;
Thou art staiwed, and so am I.
WALTER BARTE.
♦—
THE GRASSHOPPER.
Happy insect ! what can be
iii happiness compared to thee ?
Fed with nourishment divine.
The dewy morning's gentle wine f
Nature waits upon thee still.
And thy verdant cup does fill ;
'T is filled wherever thou dost tread.
Nature's self's thy Ganymede.
POEMS OF NATURE,
485
Thou dost drink and dance and sing,
Happier than the happiest king !
All the fields which thou dost see,
All the plants belong to thee ;
All the summer hours produce.
Fertile made with early juice.
Man for thee does sow and plough.
Farmer he, and landlord thou !
Thou dost innocently joy,
Nor does thy luxury destroy.
The shepherd gladly heareth thee.
More harmonious than he. •
Thee country hinds with gladness hear.
Prophet of the ripened year !
Thee Phœbns loves, and does inspire ;
Phoebus is himself thy sire.
To thee, of all things upon earth,
Life is no longer than thy mirth.
Happy insect ! happy thou
Dost neither age nor winter know ;
But when thou 'st drunk and danced and sung
Thy fill, the flowery leaves among,
(Voluptuous and wise withal.
Epicurean animal !)
Sated with thy summer feast.
Thou retir'st to endless rest.
From the Greek of AnaCREON, Trans¬
lation of Abraham Cowley.
THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET.
The poetry of earth is never dead
When all the birds are faint with the hot sun
And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run
From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead.
That is the grasshopper's, — he takes the lead
In summer luxury, —he has never done
With his delights ; for, when tired out with fun.
He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed.
The poetry of earth is ceasing never.
On a lone winter evening, when the frost
Has ivrought a silence, from the stove there
shrills
The cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever.
And seems, to one in drowsiness half lost,
The grasshopper's among some grassy hills.
john Keats.
TO THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET.
Green little vaulter in the sunny grass,
Catching your heart up at the feel of June, —
Sole voice that's heard amidst the lazy noon.
When even the bees lag at the summoning brass ;
And you, warm little housekeeper, who class
With those who think the candles come too soon.
Loving the fire, and with your tricksome tune
Nick the glad silent moments as they pass 1
0 sweet and tiny cousins, that belong.
One to the fields, the other to the hearth.
Both have your sunshine ; both, though small,
are strong
At your clear hearts ; and both seem given to
earth
To sing in thoughtful ears this natural song, —
In doors and out, summer and winter, mirth.
Leigh hunt.
THE CRICKET.
Little inmate, full of mirth.
Chirping on my kitchen health,
Wheresoe'er be thine abode
Always harbinger of good.
Pay me for thy warm retreat
With a song more soft and sweet ;
In return thou shalt receive
Such a strain as I can give.
Thus thy praise shall be expressed.
Inoffensive, welcome guest !
While the rat is on the scout.
And the mouse with curious snout.
With what vermin else infest
Every dish, and spoil the best ;
Frisking thus before the fire.
Thou hast all thy heart's desire.
Though in voice and shape they be
Formed as if akin to thee.
Thou surpassest, happier far.
Happiest grasshoppers that are ;
Theirs is but a summer's song, —
Thine endures the winter long.
Unimpaired and shrill and clear.
Melody throughout the year.
Neither night nor dawn of day
Puts a period to thy play ;
Sing then — and extend thy span
Far beyond the date of man.
Wretched man, whose years are spent
In repining discontent.
Lives not, aged though he be.
Half a span, compared with thee.
William Cowper.
TO AN INSECT.
I LOVE to hear thine earnest voice.
Wherever thou art hid.
Thou testy little dogmatist.
Thou pretty Katydid !
Thou mindest me of gentlefolks, —
Old gentlefolks are they, —
Thou say'st an undisputed thing
In such a solemn way.
486
POEMS OP NATURE.
Thou art a female, Katydid !
I know it by the trül
That quivers through thy piercing notes,
So petulant and shrill.
I think there is a knot of you
Beneath the hollow tree, —
A knot of spinster Katydids, —
Do Katydids drink tea ?
0, tell me where did Katy live,
And what did Katy do ?
And was she very fair and young,
And yet so wicked too ?
Did'Katy love a naughty man.
Or kiss more cheeks than one ?
I warrant Katy did no more
Than many a Kate has done.
Oliver Wendell HOLHES.
TO A LOUSE,
on seeing one on a lady's bonnet at church.
Ha ! whare ye gaun, ye crawlin' ferlie ?
Your impudence protects you sairly :
I canna say but ye strunt rarely
Owre gauze an' lace ;
Though, faith ! I fear ye dine but sparely
On sic a place.
Ye ugly, creepin', blastit wonner.
Detested, shunned by saunt an' sinner.
How dare you set your fit upon her,
Sae fine a lady ?
Gae somewhere else, and seek your dinner
On some poor body.
Swith, in some beggar's haffet squattle ;
There ye may creep and sprawl and sprattle
Wi' ither kindred, jumping cattle.
In shoals and nations :
Whare horn nor bane ne'er daur unsettle
Your thick plantations.
Now hand you there, ye 're out o' sight.
Below the fatt'rels, snug an' tight ;
Na, faith ye yet ! ye '11 no be right
Till ye've got on it.
The very tapmost tow'ring height
O' Miss's bonnet.
My sooth ; right bauld ye set your nose out.
As plump and gray as ony grozet ;
O for some rank, mercurial rozet.
Or fell, red smeddum !
I'd gie you sic a hearty dose o't.
Wad dress your droddum !
I wad na been surprised to spy
You on an auld wife's fiannen toy ;
Or aiblins some bit duddie boy.
On's -wyliecoat ;
But Miss's fine Lunardi, fie !
How daur ye do't ?
0 Jenny, dinna toss your head.
An' set your beauties a' abread !
Ye little ken what cursed speed
The blastie's makin' !
Thae winks and finger-ends, I dread.
Are notice takin' !
0 wad some power the giftie gie us
To see oursel's as ithers see us !
It wad frae monie a blunder free us.
And foolish notion :
What airs in dress an' gait wad lea'e us.
And ev'n devotion !
Robert Burns.
REMONSTRANCE WITH THE SNAILS.
Ye little snails.
With slippery tails.
Who noiselessly travel
Along this gravel.
By a silvery path of slime unsightly,
I leam that you visit my pea-rows nightly.
Felonious your visit, I guess !
And I give you this warning.
That, every morning,
I '11 strictly examine the pods ;
And if one I hit on.
With slaver or spit on.
Your next meal wiU be with the gods.
I own you 're a very ancient race.
And Greece and Babylon were amid ;
You have tenanted many a royal dome.
And dwelt in the oldest pyramid ;
The source of the Nüe ! — O, you have been there !
In the ark was your floodless bed ;
On the moonless night of Marathon
You crawled o'er the mighty dead ;
But stm, though I reverence your ancestries,'
I don't see why you should nibble my peas.
The meadows are yours, — the hedgerow and
brook.
You may bathe in their dews at mom ;
By the aged sea you may sound your shells,
On the mountains erect your hom ;
The fruits and the flowers are your rightful dowers.
Then why — in the name of wonder —
Should my six pea-rows be the only cause
To excite your midnight plunder ?
POEMS OF NATURE.
487
I have never disturbed your slender shells ;
You have hung round my aged walk ;
And each might have sat, tiU he died in his fat,
Beneath his own eabhage-stalk :
But now you must fly from the soil of your sires ;
Then put on your liveliest crawl.
And think of your poor little snails at home.
Now orphans or emigrants all.
Utensils domestic and civil and social
I give you an evening to pack up ;
But if the moon of this night does not rise on
your flight,
To-morrow I T1 hang each man Jack up.
You '11 think of my peas and your thievish
tricks.
With tears of slime, when crossing the Styx.
Anonymous.
—*
THE HOUSEKEEPER.
The frugal snail, with forecast of repose.
Carries his house with him where'er he goes ;
Peeps out, — and if there comes a shower of
rain.
Retreats to his small domicile again.
Touch but a tip of him, a horn, — 't is well, —
He curls up in his sanctuary shell.
He's his own landlord, his own tenant ; stay
Long as he will, he dreads no Quarter Day.
Himself he boards and lodges ; both invites
And feasts himself ; sleeps with himself o' nights.
He spares the upholsterer trouble to procure
Chattels ; himself is his own furniture.
And his sole riches. Wheresoe'er he roam, —
Knock when you will, — he's sure to be at
home.
charles lamb.
»—
TO A MOSQUITO.
Fair insect, that, with thread-like legs spread
out,
And blood-extracting bill, and filmy wing.
Dost murmur, as thou slowly sail'st ahout.
In pitiless ears, full many a plaintive thing.
And telTst how little our large veins should
bleed.
Would we but yield them freely in thy need ;
I call thee stranger, for the town, I ween.
Has not the honor of so proud a birth ;
Thou com'st from Jersey meadows, broad and
green.
The oflTspring of the gods, though born on earth.
At length thy pinions fluttered in Broadway, —
Ah, there were fairy steps, and white necks
kissed
By wanton airs, and eyes whose killing ray
Shone through the snowy veils like stars
through mist !
And, fresh as morn, on many a cheek and chin.
Bloomed the bright blood through the transpar¬
ent skin.
0, these were sights to touch an anchorite ! —
What, do I hear thy slender voice complain ?
Thou wailest, when I talk of beauty's light.
As if it brought the memory of pain :
Thou art a wayward being, — well, come near.
And pour thy tale of sorrow in my ear.
What say'st thou, slanderer? "Rouge makes
thee sick.
And China bloom at best is sorry food ;
And Rowland's Kalydor, if laid on thick.
Poisons the thirsty vrretch that bores for
blood " ?
Go, 'twas a just reward that met thy crime, —
But shun the sacrilege another time.
That bloom was made to look at, not to touch.
To worship, not approach, that radiant white ;
And well might sudden vengeance light on such
As dared, like thee, most impiously to bite.
Thou shouldst have gazed at distance, and ad¬
mired.
Murmured thy adoration, and retired.
Thou 'rt welcome to the town ; but why come here
To bleed a brother poet, gaunt like thee ?
Alas ! the little blood I have is dear.
And thin will be the banquet drawn from me.
Look round, — the pale-eyed sisters, in my cell.
Thy old acquaintance. Song and Famine, dwell.
Try some plump alderman : and suck the blood
Enriched with generous wine and costly meat ;
In well-filled skins, soft as thy native mud.
Fix thy light pump, and raise thy freckled feet.
Go to the men for whom, in ocean's halls,
The oyster breeds, and the green turtle sprawls.
There corks are drawn, and the red vintage flows, ■
To fill the swelling veins for thee ; and now
The ruddy cheek, and now the ruddier nose.
Shall tempt thee as thou flittest round the
brow ;
And when the hour of sleep its quiet brings.
No angry hand shall rise to brush thy wings.
William Gullen Bryant.
POEMS OF NATURE.
PAN IN LOVE.
Nay ! ifjyoa.will|n£)t sit upon/my knee.
Lie on that bank, and listen while I play
A sylvan song upon these reedy pipes.
In the full moonrise as 1 lay last night
Under the alders on Peneus' banks.
Dabbling my hoofs in the cool stream that welled
Wine-dark with gleamy ripples round their roots,
1 made the song the while 1 shaped the pipes.
'T is all of you and love, as you shall hear.
The drooping lilies, as 1 sang it, heaved
Upon their broad green leaves, and underneath.
Swift sUvery fishes, poised on quivering fins.
Hung motionless to listen ; in the grass
The crickets ceased to shrill their tiny beUs ;
And even the nightingale, that aU the eve.
Hid in the grove's deep green, had throbbed and
thrilled.
Paused in his strain of love to list to mine.
Bacchus is handsome, but such songs as this
He cannot shape, and better loves the clash
Of brazen cymbals than my reedy pipes.
Fair as he is without, he's coarse within, —
Gross in his nature, loving noise and wine.
And, tipsy, half the time goes reeling round
Leaning on old Silenus' shoulders fat.
But 1 have scores of songs that no one knows.
Not even Apollo, no, nor Mercury, —
Their strings can never sing like my sweet
pipes, —
Some, that wUl make fierce tigers rub their fur
Against the oak-trunks for delight, or stretch
Their plump sides for my pillow on the sward.
Some, that will make the satyrs' clattering hoofs
Leap when they hear, and from their noonday
dreams
Start up to stamp a wild and frolic dance
In the green shadows. Ay ! and better songs.
Made for the delicate nice ears of nymphs.
Which while 1 sing my pipes shall imitate
The droning bass of honey-seeking bees.
The tinkling tenor of clear pebbly streams.
The breezy alto of the alder's sighs.
And all the airy sounds that lull the grove
When noon falls fast asleep among the hiUs.
Nor only these, —for 1 can pipe to you
Songs that will make the slippery vipers pause.
And stay the stags to gaze with their great eyes ;
Such songs — and you shall hear them if you
will —
That Bacchus' self would give his hide to hear.
If you '11 but love me every day, 1 '11 bring
The coyest flowers, such as you never saw.
To deck you with. 1 know their secret nooks, —
They cannot hide themselves away from Pan.
And you shall have rare garlands ; and your bed
Of fragrant mosses shall be sprinkled o'er
With violets like your eyes, —just for a kiss.
Love me, and you shall do whate'er you like.
And shall be tended wheresoe'er you go.
And not a beast shaU hurt you, — not a toad
But at your bidding give his jewel up.
The speckled shining snakes shall never sting.
But twist like bracelets round your rosy arms.
And keep your bosom cool in the hot noon.
You shall have berries ripe of every kind.
And luscious peaches, and wild nectarines.
And sun-flecked apricots, and honeyed dates.
And wine from bee-stung grapes, drunk with the
sun
(Such wine as Bacchus never tasted yet).
And not a poisonous plant shall have the power
To tetter your white flesh, if you '11 love Pan.
And theu 1 '11 tell you tales that no one knows ;
Of what the pines talk in the summer nights.
When far above you hear them murmuring.
As they sway whispering to the lifting breeze ;
And what the storm shrieks to the struggling
oaks
As it flies through them hurrying to the sea
From mountain crags and cliS's. Or, when you 're
sad,
1 '11 tell you tales that solemn cypresses
Have whispered to me. There's not anything
Hid in the woods and dales and dark ravines.
Shadowed in dripping caves, or by the shore.
Slipping from sight, but 1 can tell to you.
Plump, dull-eared Bacchus, thinking of himself.
Never can catch a syllable of this ;
But with my shaggy ear against the grass
1 hear the secrets hidden underground.
And know how in the inner forge of Earth,
The pulse-like hammers of creation beat.
Old Pan is ugly, rough, and rude to see.
But no one knows such secrets as old Pan.
William wetmore Story.
GOD EVERYWHERE IN NATURE.
How desolate were nature, and how void
Of every charm, how like a naked waste
Of Africa, were not a present God
Beheld employing, in its various scenes.
His active might to animate and adorn !
What life and beauty, when, in all that breathes,
Or moves, or grows, his hand is viewed at work,'
When it is viewed unfolding every bud.
Each blossom tingeing, shaping every leaf.
Wafting each cloud that passes o'er the sky.
Rolling each billow, moving every wing
That fans the air, and every warbling throat
Heard in the tuneful woodlands ! In the least
As well as in the greatest of his works
a--
FRAGMENTS.
489
a
Is ever manifest his presence kind ;
As well in swarms of glittering insects, seen
Quick to and fro within a foot of air,
Dancing a merry hour, then seen no more.
As in the systems of resplendent worlds.
Through time revolving in unbounded space.
His eye, while comprehending in one view
The whole creation, fixes full on me ;
As on me shines the sun with his full blaze.
While o'er the hemisphere he spreads the same.
His hand, while holding oceans in its palm.
And compassing the skies, surrounds my life.
Guards the poor rushlight from the blast of death.
Carlos Wilcox.
FRAGMENTS.
God and Natitke.
Nature,! tfie yicaFe^f the'ahnightie Lord.
ilssembiy ofFntUs, Chaucer.
'T is el¿er Serihture, writ hi^ God'^ own hand :
Scripti^e authWic ! uncorrupt by man.
Night Thoughts, Night ix* DR. E. YOUNG.
To the solid ground
Of nature trusts the Mind that builds for aye.
Miscellaneous Sonnets, WORDSWQrth.
The course of nature is the art of God.
NiehtTkouzMs, Night \x. Dr. E. YOUNG.
For Art may err, but Nature cannot miss.
Thi Cock and Fox. dryden.
Who can paint
Like Nature ? Can imagination boast.
Amid its gay creation, hues like hers ?
TheSectsons: Spring, THOMSON.
All nature is but art, unknown to thee ;
All chance, direction, which thou canst not see ;
All discord, harmony not understood ;
All partial evil, universal good ;
And spite of pride, in erring reason's spite,
One truth is clear. Whatever is, is right.
Essay on Man, Epistle I. POPB.
What more felicitie can fall to creature
Than to enjoy delight with libertie.
And to be lord of all the workes of Nature,
To raine in th* aire from earth to highest skie.
To feed on fidwres ^d weeds bf glorious feature.
The Pate of the Butterfly. spenser. >
Warms in the sun, refreshes in the breeze.
Glows in the stars, and blossoms in the trees.
Essay on Man, Epistle /. POPE.
The meanest fioweret of the vale.
The simplest note that swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies.
To him are opening paradise.
Ode: On the Pleasure arising from Vicissitude, T. GRAY.
All are but parts of one stupendous whole.
Whose body Nature is, and God the soul.
Essay on Man, Epistle I, POPB.
CouNTKT Life.
But on and up, where Nature's heart
Beats strong amid the hills.
Tragedy of the Lac de Gaube, LORD HOUGHTON*
Far from gay cities and the ways of men.
Odyssey, Book Translation of POVB., HOMER*
I care not. Fortune, what you me deny :
You cannot rob me of free Nature's grace.
The Castle of Indolence, Cant, ii. THOMSON*
0 for a seat in some poetic nook.
Just hid with trees and sparkling with a brook.
Politics and Poetics. leigh hunt.
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running
brooks.
Sermons in stones, and good in everything.
As You Like It, Act u. Sc. i. shakespeare.
As in the eye of Nature he has lived.
So in the eye of Nature let him die !
The Old Cumberland Beggar, WORDSWORTH*
Faik Exchange no Robbery.
I 'U example you with thievery :
The sun's a thief, and with his great attraction
Robs the vast sea : the moon's an arrant thief,
And her pale fire she snatches from the sun :
The sea's a thief, whose liquid j|B||k resolves
The moon into salt tears : the eartlr s a thief.
That feeds and breeds by a composture stolen
From general excrement : each thing's a thief.
Timon 0/Athens, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Light and the Sky.
Sweet Phosphor, bring the day ;
Light will repay
The wrongs of night ;
Sweet Phosphor, bring the day !
Emblems, Book L F. QUARLBS*
But soft ! methinks I scent the morning air.
Hamlet, Act\. Sc, s. SHAKESPEARE.
POEMS OF NATURE.
Night wanes, — the vapors round the mountains
curled
Melt into mom, and light awakes the world.
Lara. Byron.
So sinks the day-star in the ocean-bed.
And yet anon repairs his drooping head,
And tricks his beams, and with new-spangled ore
Flames in the forehead of the morning sky.
Lycidas. milton.
But yonder comes the powerful King of Day
Rejoicing in the east.
The Seasons : Summer» THOMSON.
Night's candles are burnt out, and jocund day
Stands tiptoe on the misty mountain-tops.
Romeo and yuliet. Act iii. Sc» 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Clothing the palpable and familiar
With golden exhalations of the dawn.
TheDeatke/tVaUatstein, AduSc.l. s. t. coleridge.
Oh ! "darkly, deeply, beautifully blue,"
As some one somewhere sings about the sky.
Don yuan. Cant. tv. BYRON.
The soft blue sky did never melt
Into his heart ; he never felt
The witchery of the soft blue sky !
PettrBM.
Wordsworth.
One of those heavenly days that cannot die.
Nutting, WORDSWORTH.
By day or star light thus from my first dawn
Of childhood didst thou intertwine for me
The passions that build up our human soul.
The Excursion : The Prelude.
Wordsworth.
Morning.
The glow-worm shows the matin to be near.
And 'gins to pale his uneffectual fire.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc, 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Fled
Murmuring, and with him fled the shades of night.
Paradise Lost, Book VV» MlLTON.
Till morning fair
Came forth with pilgrim steps in amice gray.
Paradise Regained, Book iv. MlLTON.
Morn,
Waked by the circling hours, with rosy hand
Unbarred the gates of light.
Paradise Lost, Book vi. MlLTON.
Under the opening eyelids of the mom.
Lymäai, milton.
The sun had long since in the lap
Of Thetis taken out his nap.
And, like a lobster boiled, the mom
From black to red began to tum.
Hudibras, Part il» Cant. ii.
Dr. S. Butler.
Now mom, her rosy steps in the eastern clime
Advancing, sowed the earth with orient pearl.
When Adam waked, so customed, for his sleep
Was aery-light, from pure digestion bred.
Paradise Lost, Book v. MlLTON.
Up rose the sonne, and up rose Emelie.
Canterbury Tales : The Knightes Tale» CHAUCER.
The meek-eyed Morn appears, mother of dews.
The Seasons: Summer. THOMSON.
Sweet is the breath of mom, her rising sweet
With charm of earliest birds ; pleasant the sun,
When first on this delightful land he spreads
His orient beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flower.
Glistering with dew.
Paradise Lost, Book Í7.
Milton.
No tears
Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.
Sunrise on the Hills. LONGFELLOW.
This morning, like the spirit of a youth
That means to be of note, begins betimes.
Antony and Cleopatra, Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive.
But to be young was very Heaven !
The Prelude, Book xL WORDSWORTH.
Evening.
Behold him setting in his western skies,
The shadows lengthening as the vapors rise.
Absalom and Achitophel, Part I, DRYDEN.
Now sunk the sun ; the closing hour of day
Came onward, mantled o'er with sober gray ;
Nature in silence bid the world repose.
The Hermit, T. PARNELL.
Parting day
Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues
With a new color as it gasps away.
The last still loveliest, till — 't is gone — and all
is gray.
Childe Harold. Cant, iv, BVRON.
The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.
The Day is Done.
Longpelia>w.
-g
f
FRAGMENTS.
491
Meek Nature's evening comment on the shows
That for oblivion take their daily birth
From all the fuming vanities of earth.
Sky'Prosftctfrom the Plain 0/France. WORDSWORTH.
Sweet the coming on
Of grateful evening mild ; then silent night
With this her solemn bird and this fair moon,
And these the gems of heaven, her starry train.
Paradise Lost, Book tv. MILTON.
The star that bids the shepherd fold.
Comus. Milton.
The dews of the evening most carefully shun, —
Those tears of the sky for the loss of the sun.
Advice to a Lady in Autumn. CHESTERFIELD.
It is the hour when from the boughs
The nightingale's high note is heard ;
It is the hour when lovers' vows
Seem sweet in every whispered word.
Now spurs the lated traveller apace.
To gain the timely inn.
tiacbeth, Act iii. Sc. 3.
Shakespeare
Night.
How beautiful is night !
A dewy freshness fills the silent air ;
No mist obscures, nor cloud, nor speck, nor
stain.
Breaks the serene of heaven :
In full-orbed glory, yonder moon divine
Rolls through the dark-blue depths.
Beneath her steady ray
The desert-circle spreads.
Like the round ocean, girdled with the sky.
How beautiful is night !
Thataba. SOUTHEY.
This sacred shade and solitude, what is it ?
'T is the felt presence of the Deity.
By night an atheist half believes a God.
Fight Thoughts, Night v. DR> E. YOUNG.
Night, sable goddess ! from her ebon throne,
In rayless majesty, now stretches forth
Her leaden sceptre o'er a slumbering world.
Kgkt Thmghts, Night i. Dr. E. YOUNG.
All is gentle ; naught
Stirs rudely ; but, congenial with the night.
Whatever walks is gl'ding like a spirit.
Oogc 0/ yenice. « Byron.
In the dead vast and middle of the night.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
'T is now the very witching time of night.
When churchyards yawn, and Hell itself
breathes out
Contagion to this world.
Hamlet, Act Ul. Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Ham. The air bites shrewdly ; it is very cold.
Hoe. It is a nipping and an eager air.
HamUt, Actx, Sc. h. SHAKESPEARE.
The Moon.
There does a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night.
And cast a gleam over this tufted grove.
Comus* MlLTONe
The dews of summer nights did fall.
The moon, sweet regent of the sky.
Silvered the walls of Cumnor Hall
And many an oak that grew thereby.
CHtnnorHaU. W. J. MlCKLE.
Faëry elves.
Whose midnight revels, by a forest-side.
Or fountain, some belated peasant sees.
Or dreams he sees, while overhead the moon
Sits arbitress, and nearer to the earth
Wheels her pale course.
Paradue Lost, Book i. MlLTON*
1 see them on their winding way.
Above their ranks the moonbeams play.
And waving arms and banners bright
Are glancing in the mellow light.
Lines written to a March. BISHOP HEBEIU
The moon looks
On many brooks,
" The brook can see no moon but this."
While gazing on the moon's light. MOORB.
Insatiate archer ! could not one suffice ?
Thy shaft fiew thrice : and thrice my peace was
slain ;
And thrice, ere thrice yon moon had filled her
hom.
Night Thoughts, Night DR. E. YOUNG.
The Stabs.
That fuU star that ushers in the even.
Smnet CXXXH. SHAKESPEARE.
Her blue eyes sought the west afar.
For lovers love the western star.
Ldy o/the Last Minstrel, Cant. Ui. SCOTT.
e
492
POEMS OF NATURE.
■Q
And fast by, hanging in a golden chain
This pendent world, in bigness as a star
Of smallest magnitude close by the moon.
Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON.
An host
Innumerable as the stars of night.
Or stars of morning, dew-drops, which the sun
Impearls on every leaf and every flower.
Paradise Lost, Book v» . MILTON.
Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of
the angels.
Evangeline, Part L LONGPfiLLOW»
But I am constant as the northern star.
Of whose true-fixed and resting quality
There is no fellow in the firmament.
yulius Casar, Act Hi. Sc% i. SHAKESPEARE.
Devotion ! daughter of astronomy !
An undevout astronomer is mad.
Night Thoughts, Night be.
Dr. E. young.
The Seasons.
So issued forth the seasons of the year ;
First lusty Spring, all dight in leaves of flowers
That freshly budded, and new blossoms did bear.
In which a thousand birds had built their bowers.
That sweetly sung to call forth paramours ;
And in his hand a javelin he did bear.
And on his head^(as fit for warlike stores)
A gilt engraven morion he did wear.
That, as some did him love, so others did him
fear.
Faerie Queens, Book vli. SPENSER.
The stormy March has come at last.
With winds and clouds and changing skies ;
1 hear the rushing of the blast
That through the snowy valley flies.
March. W. C. BRYANT.
When proud-pied April, dressed in all his trim,
Hath put a spirit of youth in everything.
Sonnet xcyill. shakespeare.
O, how this spring of love resemhleth
The uncertain glory of an April day !
The Tempest, Act,. Sc. 3. shakespeare.
As it fell upon a day
In the merry month of May.
The Passionate Pilgrim. SHAKESPEARE.
For May wol have no slogardie a-night.
The seson priketh every gentil herte,
And maketh him out of his slepe to sterte.
Canterbury Tales : The KnighXes Tale. CHAUCER.
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.
Lines written in Early Spring.
WOROSWORTH.
Come, gentle Spring ! ethereal Mildness ! come.
The Seasons : Spring, thomson.
Then came the jolly Summer, being dight
In a thin silken cassock colored green.
That was unlinèd, all to be more light.
And on his head a garland well beseene.
Faerie Queene, Book vii. SPENSER.
Joy rises in me, like a summer's mom.
A Christmas Carol. S. t. coleridge.
Or summer's noontide air.
Paradise Lost, Book iL
Still as night
This bud of lovely Summer's ripening breath,
May prove a beauteous flower when next we meet.
Romeo and yuliet. Act iL Sc. s.
Shakespeare.
Then came the Autumne, all in yellow clad, '
As though he joyed in his plenteous store, '
Laden with fruits that made him laugh, full glad'^
That he had banished hunger, which to-fore
Had by the beUy oft him pinched sore ;
Upon his head a wreath, that \fras enrold
With ears of corne of every sort, he hore.
And in his hand a sickle he did holde.
To reape the ripened frait the which the earth
had yold.
Faerü Queene, Book viL SPENSER.
Autumn nodding o'er the yellow plain.
The Seasons : Autumn.
thomson.
And the ripe harvest of the new-mown hay
Gives it a sweet and wholesome odor.
Richard in. (Altered), Act v. Sc. 3. COLLEY CiBBER.
Lastly came Winter, cloathèd all in frize.
Chattering his teeth for cold that did him chill ;
Whilst on his hoary beard his breath did freeze.
And the dull drops that from his purple bill
As from a limbeck did adown distill ;
In his right hand a tipped staff he held
With which his feeble steps he stayèd still,
For he was faint with cold and weak with eld.
That scarce his loosfed limbs he able was to weld.
Faerie Queene, Book vU. SPENSER.
0 Winter, ruler of the inverted year.
1 love thee, all imlovely as thou seem'st.
And dreaded as thou art !
The Task : WistUr Euening. COWPER.
FRAGMENTS.
Chaste as the icicle,
That's curded by the frost from purest snow.
And hangs on Dian's temple : dear Valeria !
Comlanus, Act y. Sc. 3. shakespeare.
Silently as a dream the fabric rose.
No sound of hammer or of saw was there.
Ice upon ice, the well-adjusted parts
Were soon conjoined.
TJu Tasi : ffiMcr Morning Walt. cowper.
Sounds of Nature.
Nor rural sights alone, but rural sounds.
Exhilarate the spirit, and restore
The tone of languid nature.
The Task : Tht So/a. cowper.
See where it smokes along the sounding plain.
Blown all aslant, a driving, dashing rain ;
Peal upon peal, redoubling all around,
' Shakes it again and faster to the ground.
Truth. / cowper.
In winter when the dismal rain
Came down in slanting lines.
And Wind, that grand old harper, smote
His thunder-harp of pines.
A Life Drama. A. SMITH.
Under the yaller-pines I house,
When sunshine makes 'em all sweet-scented.
An' hear among their furry boughs
The baskin' west-wind purr contented.
Biglffw Papers, Seeond Series, No. x. J, R. LOWELL.
The current, that with gentle murmur glides,
Thou know'st, being stopped, impatiently doth
rage ;
But, when his fair course is not hindernd.
He makes sweet music with the enamelled stones.
Giving a gentle kiss to every sedge
He overtaketh in his pilgrimage.
Tm Gentlemen 0/ Verona, Act ii. Sc. 7. Shakespeare.
Every sound is sweet ;
Myriads of rivulets hurrying through the lawn.
The moan of doves in immemorial elms.
And murmuring of innumerable bees.
The Princess, Cant. vii. Tennyson.
The Mountains.
/
Over the hills and far away.
The Beggar's Ofiera, Act i. Sc, i.
J. GAY,
Two voices are there ; one is of the sea.
One of the mountains ; each a mighty Voice.
Thought 0/ a Briton on the Subjugation o/ Ssoitaertand,
Wordsworth.
Who first beholds those everlasting clouds.
Seedtime and harvest, morning, noon, and night.
Still where they were, steadfast, immovable ;
Who first beholds the Alps — that mighty chain
Of mountains, stretching on from east to west.
So massive, yet so shadowy, so ethereal.
As to belong rather to heaven than earth —
But instantly receives into his soul
A sense, a feeling that he loses not,
A something that informs him't is a moment
Whence he may date henceforward and forever !
ItcUy. Rogers.
Mont Blanc is the monarch of mountains ;
They crowned him long ago
On a throne of rocks, in a robe of clouds.
With a diadem of snow.
Manfred, Act L Sc, i. BYRON.
I live not in myself, but I become
Portion of that around me ; and to me
High mountains are a feeling, but the hum
Of human cities torture.
Childe Harold, Cant. iiL BYRON,
Water.
Mine be the breezy hUl that skirts the down ;
Where a green grassy turf is all I crave.
With here and there a violet bestrewn,
Fast by a brook or fountain's murmuring wave ;
And many an evening sun shine sweetly on my
grave.
The Minstrel, Book U. J. BEATTIE.
With spots of sunny openings, and with nooks
To lie and read in, sloping into brooks.
The Story of Rimini. L. HUNT.
Under the cooling shadow of a stately elm.
Close sat I by a goodly river's side.
Where gliding streams the rocks did overwhelm ;
A lonely place, with pleasures dignified.
1, that once loved the shady woods so well.
Now thought the rivers did the trees excel,
And if the sun would ever shine, there would I
dwell.
Contemplations, anne bradstreet,
Let beeves and home-bred kine partake
The sweets of Bum-mill meadow ;
The swan on still St. Mary's Lake
Float double, swan and shadow !
Yarrow Unvisited, wordsworth,
111 habits gather by unseen degrees.
As brooks make rivers, rivers run to seas.
Metamorphoses, Book x.y. Translation of OVXD.
&
494
POEMS OP NATURE.
By happy chaace we saw
A twofold image ; on a grassy bank
A snow-white ram, and in the crystal flood
Another and the same !
The Excursion, Book ix. WORDSWORTH-
Along thy wild and willowed shore ;
Where'er thou wind'st, by dale or hill,
AU, all is peaceful, all is stilL
Lay of the Last Minstrel, Cant, iv.
Scott.
The torrent's smoothness, ere it dash below !
Gertrude, Part ¡11. t. campbell.
Rain and Stoem.
The lowering element
Scowls o'er the darkened landscape.
Paradise Lost, Book ii. MlLTON.
The hooded clouds, like friars.
Tell their beads in drops of rain.
Midnight Mass. LONGPELLCW
The thirsty earth soaks up the rain.
And drinks and gapes for drink again ;
The plants suck in the earth, and are
With constant drinking fresh and fair.
Anacreoniiques, A. COWLEY.
When that I was and a little tiny boy.
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,
A foolish thing was but a toy.
For the rain it raineth every day.
Twelfth Night, Actv. Sc. i. shakespeare.
Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks ! rage !
blow !
JCing Lear, Act ¡íi. Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE.
Poor natjed wretfhes, wher^pe'er^ou are.
That bide the peSting of thii pitUess storm.
How shall |your houseless ieads smd united sides, ^
Your looped and windowed raggedness, defend
you
Prom seasons such as these ?
¡¡Ting Lear, Actm.Sc.4. shakespeare.
From cloud to cloud the rending lightnings rage,
TiU, in the furious elemental war
Dissolved, the whole precipitated mass
Unbroken floods and solid torrents pour.
The Seasons : Summer. thomson.
Triumphal arch, that fiU'st the sky,
When storms prepare to part ;
I ask not proud Philosophy
To teach me what thou art.
To the Rainbow. X» CAMPBELL.
Trees.
One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man.
Of moral evil and of good.
Than all the sages can.
The Tables Turned,
WORDSWORTH.
Those green-robed senators of mighty woods,
Tall oaks, branch-cbarmèd by the earnest stars.
Dream, and so dream all night without a stir.
Hyperion, Book i. Keats.
A brotherhood of venerable Trees.
Sonnet composed at Castle. WORDSWORTH.
Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks
In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades
High overarched imbower.
Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON.
But 'neath yon crimson tree,
Lover to listening maid might breathe his flame.
Nor mark, within its roseate canopy.
Her blush of maiden shame.
Autumn Woods, W. C. BRYANT.
Flowers.
No daint^e flowip^or herbejhat growes on grownd.
No arborett with painted blossoms drest
And smeUing sweete, but there it might be fownd
To bud out faire, and throwe her sweete smels
al arownd.
Faerü Queene, Book ii. Cant, vi.
Spenser.
,e\
Ye vidl^s lojj, inhere the Wild whis|pers use'
Of shades, and wanton winds, and gushing brooks
On whose fresh lap the swart-star sparely looks ;
Throw hither all your quaint enamelled eyes,
That on the green turf suck the honied showers.
And purple all the ground with vernal flowers.
Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies.
The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine.
The white pink, and the pansy freaked with jet.
The glowing violet.
The musk-rose, and the well-attired woodbine,
With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head.
And every flower that sad embroidery wears.
Lycidas. milton.
Spake full well, in language quaint and olden.
One whqjdwelleth 'by the pastled 'Rhine,
When he called the flowers, so blue and golden.
Stars, that in earth's firmament do shine.
FUrVXrs. longfellow.
With coronet of fre.sh and fragrant flowers ;
The same dew, which sometimes on the buds
Was wont to swell, like round and orient pearls,
Stood now within the pretty flow'rets' eyes,
Like tears that did their own disgrace bewail.
Midsummer Nighfs Dream, Act iv. Sc, i. SHAKESPEARE.
FRAGMENTS.
495
With little here to do or see
Of things that in the great world be.
Sweet dais^ ! oft I talk to thee.
For thou art worthy,
Thou unassuming commonplace
Of nature, with that homely face.
And yet with something of a grace
Which love makes for thee !
To the Daisy,
WORDSWORTH,
Myriads of daisies have shone forth in flower
Near the lark's nest, and in their natural hour
Have passed away ; less happy than the one
That, by the unwilling ploughshare, died to
prove
The tender charm of poetry and love.
Poems composed in the Summer of 1833. WORDSWORTH.
We meet thee, like a pleasant thought.
When such are wanted.
To Ou Daisy. WORDSWORTH.
Dear common flower, that grow'st beside the
way.
Fl inging the dusty road with harmless gold.
First pledge of blithesome May,
Which children pluck, and, full of pride, uphold.
High-hearted buccaneers, o'erjoyed that they
An El Dorado in the grass have found.
Which not the rich earth's ample round
May match in wealth — thou art more dear to me
Than all the prouder summer-blooms may be.
To Ou DanätHon. J. R. Lowell .
' 0 Proserpina !
For the flowers now, that, frighted, thou let'st fall
From Dis's wagon ! daffodils.
That come before the swallow dares, and take
The winds of March with beauty ; violets, dim.
But sweeter than the lids of Juno's eyes.
Or Cytherea's breath ; pale primroses.
That die unmarried ere they can behold
Bright Phoebus in his strength — .
bold oxlips, and
The crown imperial ; lilies of all kinds.
Tht Winter's TaU, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
A primrose by a river's brim
A yellow primrose was to him.
And it was nothing more.
Peter BelU WORJ#WORTH.
I know a hank where the wild thyme blows.
Where ox-lips and the nodding violet grows ;
Quite over-canopied with luscious woodbine.
With sweet musk-roses, and with eglantine.
Midsummer Nighfs Dream, Act ii. Se» i. SHAKESPEARE.
Desert caves.
With wild thyme and the gadding vine o'ergi-own.
lycidas. MILTON.
There's rosemary, that's for remembrance ;
pray you, love, remember :— and there is pansies,
that's for thoughts.
Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 5.
SHAKESPEARE.
Gentle
As zephyrs, blowing below the violet,
Not wagging his sweet head.
Cymbeline, Act iv. Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE*
But earthlier happy is the rose distilled.
Than that which, withering on the virgin thorn.
Grows, lives, and dies, in single blessedness.
Midsummer Nighfs Dream, Act i. Sc. i, SHAKESPEARE.
Then wull I raise aloft the milk-white rose.
With whose sweet smell the air shall be per¬
fumed.
King Henry VI., Partit. Act i, Xi.i. SHAKESPEARE.
The Frenchman's darling.*
The Task : JVinter Evening,
COWPER*
And't is my faith that every flower
Enjoys the air it breathes.
Lines written in Early Spring. WORDSWORTH.
Animate Nattre.
I shall not ask Jean Jaques Rousseau
If birds confabulate or no.
'T is clear that they were always able
To hold discourse — at least in fable.
Pairing Time Anticipated. COWPER.
\
Rise with the lark, and with the lark to bed.
The Village Curate, J. HURDIS.
Call for the robin-redbreast and the wren.
Since o'er shady groves they hover.
And with leaves and flowers do cover
The friendless bodies of unburied men.
The White Devil. Act v. Se. a. J. WEBSTER.
What bird so sings, yet so does wail ?
0, 't is the ravished nightingale —
J"g. jiig. jug. jug—tereu —she cries.
And still her woes at midnight rise.
Brave prick-song ! who is't now we hear ?
None but the lark so shrill and clear,
Now at heaven's gate she claps her wings.
The mom not waking tiU she sings.
Hark, hark ! but what a pretty note.
Poor Robin-redbreast tunes his throat ;
Hark, how the jolly cuckoos sing
" Cuckoo ! " to welcome in the spring.
Alexander and Campaspe, Act v. Sc. 1. JOHN LYLY.
* Bartlettsays, " It was Cowper who gave this now common name
to the Mignonette."
496
POEMS OP NATURE.
0 nightingale, that on yon bloomy spray
Warblest at eve, when all the woods are still ;
Thou with fresh hope the lover's heart dost fill
While the jolly Hours lead on propitious May.
Thy liquid notes, that close the eye of day.
Portend success in love.
To the Nightingale, MiLTON.
The crow doth sing as sweetly as the lark
When neither is attended ; and I think
The nightingale, if she should sing by day.
When every goose is cackling, would be thought
No better a musician than the wren.
How many things by season seasoned are
To their right praise and true perfection.
Merchant 0/ Venice, Act v. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE*
So, naturalists observe, a flea
Has smaller fleas that on him prey ;
And these have smaller still to bite 'em ;
And so proceed ad infinitum,
Pottry, a Rhapsody. SWIFT.
A harmless necessaiy cat.
Merchant ((f Venéu, Act iv. Sc, 1. ' SHAKESPEARE,
The spider's touch, how exquisitely fine !
Feels at each thread, and lives along the line.
Essay on Man, Epistle /. POPE,
A poor sequestered stag.
That from the hunter's aim had ta'en a hurt.
Did come to languish ; . . .
and the big round tears
Coursed one another down his innocent nose
In piteous chase.
As You Like It, Act U. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
The lamb thy riot dooms to bleed to-day.
Had he thy reason, would he skip and play ?
Pleased to the last, he crops the flowery food.
And licks the hand just raised to shed his blood.
Essay on Man, Epistle 1* POPH*
Now half appeared
The tawny lion,* pawing to get free
His hinder parts, then springs as broke from
bonds.
And rampant shakes his brinded mane.
Paradise Lost, Book vii* MiLTON.
* See Mr* Bryant's Introduction, p^e 32.
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
POEMS
OF PEACE AND
WAR.
WAR.
WAR FOR THE SAKE OF PEACE.
froh "britannia."
0 first of human blessings, and supreme !
Fair Peace ! how lovely, how delightful thou !
By whose wide tie the kindred sons of men
Like brothers live, in amity combined
And unsuspicious faith ; while honest toil
Gives every joy, and to those joys a right
Which idle, barbarous rapine but usurps.
Pure is thy reign.
What would not. Peace ! the patriot hear for
thee?
What painful patience ? What incessant care ?
What mixed anxiety ? What sleepless toil ?
E'en from the rash protected, what reproach ?
For he thy value knows ; thy friendship he
To human nature : but the better thou.
The licher of delight, sometimes the more
Inevitable war, —when ruffian force
Awakes the fury of an injured state.
E'en the good patient man whom reason rules.
Roused by bold insult and injurious rage.
With sharp and sudden check the astonished sons
Of violence confounds ; firm as his cause
His bolder heart ; in awful justice clad ;
His eyes effulging a peculiar fire :
And, as he charges through the prostrate war.
His keen arm teaches faithless men no more
To daro the sacred vengeance of the just.
Then ardent rise ! 0, great in vengeance rise !
O'ertum the proud, teach rapine to restore ;
And, as you ride sublimely round the world,
Make every vessel stoop, make every state
At once their welfare and their duty know.
James Thomson.
WAR.
Ah ! whence yon glare.
That fires the arch of heaven ? — that dark-red
smoke
Blotting the silver moon ? The stars are quenched
In darkness, and pure and spangling snow
Gleams faintly through the gloom that gathers
round !
Hark to that roar, whose swift and deafening
peals
In countless echoes through the mountains ring.
Startling pale midnight on her starry throne !
Now swells the intermingling din ; the jar
Frequent and frightful of the bursting bomb ;
The falling beam, the shriek, the groan, the
shout.
The ceaseless clangor, and the rush of men
Inebriate with rage ; — loud, and more loud
The discord grows; till pale death shuts the
scene.
And o'er the conqueror and the conquered draws
His cold and bloody shroud. — Of all the men
Whom day's departing beam saw blooming there.
In proud and vigorous health ; of all the hearts
That beat with anxious life at sunset there.
How few survive, how few are beating now !
All is deep silence, like the fearful calm
That slumbers in the storm's portentous pause ;
Save when the frantic wail of widowed love
Comes shuddering on the blast, or the faint moan
With which some soul bursts from the frame of
clay
Wrapt round its struggling powers.
The gray mom
Dawns on the mournful scene ; the sulphurous
smoke
Before the icy wind slow rolls away.
And the bright beams of frosty morning dance
Along the spangling snow. There tracks of blood
Even to the forest's depth, and scattered arms.
And lifeless warriors, whose hard lineaments
Dejith's self could change not, mark the dreadful
path
Of the outsallying victors ; far behind.
Black ashes note where their proud city stood.
Within yon forest is a gloomy glen, —
Each tree which guards its darkness from the
day
Waves o'er a warrior's tomb.
500
POEMS OF PEACE AND "WAR.
"War is the statesman's game, the priest's delight,
The lawyer's jest, the hired assassin's trade.
And to those royal murderers whose mean thrones
Are bought by crimes of treachery and gore,
The bread they eat, the staff on which they lean.
Guards, garbed in blood-red livery, surround
Their palaces, participate the crimes
That force defends, and from a nation's rage
Secure the crown, which all the curses reach
That famine, frenzy, woe, and penury breathe.
These are the hired bravos who defend
The tyrant's throne.
Percy Bvsshe Shelley.
BATTLE OF THE ANGELS.
from " paradise lost." book vi.
THE ARRAY.
Now went forth the mom.
Such as in highest heaven, arrayed in gold
Emp5Teal ; from before her vanished night.
Shot through with orient beams ; when all the
plain
Covered with thick embattled squadrons bright.
Chariots, and ffaming arms, and fiery steeds,
Eeflecting blaze on blaze, first met his view.
The apostate in his sun-bright chariot sat.
Idol of majesty divine, enclosed
"With flaming chembim, and golden shields ;
Then lighted from his gorgeous throne, for now
'Twixt host and host but narrow space was left,
A dreadful interval, and front to front
Presented stood in terrible array
Of hideous length ; before the cloudy van.
On the rough edge of battle ere it joined,
Satan, with vast aad haughty strides advanced.
Came towering, armed in adamant and gold.
THE CONFLICT.
Michael bid sound
The archangel trumpet ; through the vast of
heaven
It sounded, and the faithful armies rung
Hosanna to the Highest : nor stood at gaze
The adverse legions, nor less hideous joined
The horrid shock. Now storming fury rose.
And clamor, such as heard in heaven till now
Was never ; arms on armor clashing brayed
Horrible discord, and the madding wheels
Of brazen chariots raged ; dire was the noise
Of conflict ; overhead the dismal hiss
Of fiery darts in flaming volleys flew.
And flying vaulted either host with fire.
So under fiery cope together rushed
Both battles main, with ruinous assault
And inextinguishable rage. All heaven
Resounded ; and had earth been then, all earth
Had to her centre shook.
Deeds of eternal fame
Were done, but infinite : for wide was spread
That war,land various: sometimes on firm ground
A standing fight, then, soaring on main wing.
Tormented all the air ; all air seemed then
Conflicting fire.
Forthwith (behold the excellence, the power
Which God'hath in his mighty angels placed !)
Their arms away they threw, and to the hiUs
(For earth hath this variety from heaven.
Of pleasure situate in hill and dale),
Light as the lightning glimpse they ran, they
flew, J ^ ^
From their foundations loosening to and fro.
They plucked the seated hills, with aU their load.
Rocks, waters, woods, and by the shaggy tops
Uplifting bore them in their hands : amaze.
Be sure, and terror, seized the rebel host.
When coming towards them so dread they saw
The bottom of the mountains upward turned,
and on their heads
Main promontories flung, which in the air
Came shadowing, and oppressed whole legions
aimed ;
Their armor helped their harm, crushed in and
bruised
Into their substance pent, which wrought them
pain
Implacable, and many a dolorous groan ;
Long struggling underneath, ere they could wind
Out of such prison, though spirits of purest light.
Purest at first, now gross by sinning grown.
The rest, in imitation, to like arms
Betook them, and the neighboring hüls uptore :
So hills amid the air encountered hüls.
Hurled to and fro with jaculation dire.
That underground they fought in dismal shade ;
Infernal noise ! war seemed a civU game
To this uproar ; horrid confusion heaped
Upon confusion rose.
THE VICTOR.
So spake the Son, and into terror changed
His countenance too severe to be beheld.
And full of wrath bent on his enemies.
At once the four spread out their starry wings
With dreadful shade contiguous, and the orbs
Of his fierce chariot rolled, as with the sound
Of torrent floods, or of a numerous host.
He on his impious foes right onward drove.
Gloomy as night : under his burning wheels
The steadfast empyrean shook thi-oughout.
"WAR.
501
AU but the throne itself of God. Full soon
Among them he arrived ; in his right hand
Grasping ten thousand thunders, which he sent
Before him, such as in their souls infixëd
Plagues ; they, astonished, all resistance lost.
All courage ; down their idle weapons dropt ;
O'er shields, and helms, and helmed heads he
rode
Of thrones and mighty seraphim prostrate.
That wished the mountains now might be again
Thrown on them, as a shelter from his ire.
Nor less on either side tempestuous fell
His arrows, from the fourfold-visaged Four
Distinct with eyes, and from the living wheels
Distinct alike with multitude of eyes ;
One spirit in them ruled ; and every eye
Glared lightning, and shot forth pernicious fire
Among the accursed, that withered all their
strength, ; ^ ^ _ j
And of ^thmr wo"hl)eä vigor left ^hjm drainedj
Exhausted, spiijillessl afillcjted, fallen.
Yet half his strength he put not forth, but
checked
His thunder in mid volley ; for he meant
Not to destroy, but root them out of heaven :
Tlie overthrown he raised, and as a herd
Of goats or timorous flock together thronged.
Drove them before him thunderstruck, pursued
With terrors and with furies, to the bounds
And crystal wall of heaven ; which, opening wide.
Rolled inward, and a spacious gap disclosed
Into the wasteful deep : the monstrous sight
Struck them with horror backward, but far worse
Urged them behind : headlong themselves they
threw
Down from the verge of heaven ; eternal wrath
Burnt after them to the bottomless pit.
milton.
THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB.
from "hebrew melodies.'"
The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the
fold.
And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and
gold;
And the sheen of their spears was like stai-s on
the sea,
"When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep
Galilee.
Like the leaves of the forest when summer is
green.
That host with their banners at sunset were seen:
Like the leaves of the forest when autumn hath
blown.
That host on the morrow lay withered and
strown.
For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the
blast.
And breathed in the face of the foe as he passed;
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and
chill.
And their hearts but once heaved, and forever
grew still !
And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide.
But through it there rolled not the breath of his
pride ;
And the foam of his gasping lay white on the
turf.
And cold as the spray of the rock-beating surf.
And there lay the rider distorted and pale.
With the dew on his brow, and the rust on his
mail ;
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone.
The lances unlifted, the trumpet unblown.
And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail.
And the idols are broke in the temple of Baal ;
And the might of the Gentile, unsmote by the
sword.
Hath melted like snow in the glance of the Lord !
Lord Byron.
CATILINE TO THE ROMAN ARMY.
from "catiline," act v. sc. 2.
Sound all to arms ! (A flourish of trumpets.)
Call in the captains, — {To an officer.)
I would speak with them !
(The oflicer goes.)
Now, Hope ! away, — and welcome gallant
Death !
Welcome the clanging shield, the trumpet's
yell, —
Welcome the fever of the mounting blood.
That makes wounds light, and battle's crimson
toil
Seem but a sport, — and welcome the cold bed.
Where soldiers with their upturned faces lie, —
And welcome wolf's and vulture's hungry throats.
That make their sepulchres ! We fight to-night.
(The soldiery enter.)
Centurions ! all is ruined ! I disdain
To hide the trath from you. The die is thrown !
And now, let each that wishes for long life
Put up his sword, and kneel for peace to Rome.
Ye all are free to go. What ! no man stirs !
Not one ! a soldier's spirit in you all ?
Give me your hands ! (This moisture in my eyes
Is womanish, — 't will pass. ) My noble heai-ts !
Well have you chosen to die ! For, in my mind.
The gi-ave is better than o'erburdened life ;
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
Better the quick release of glorious wounds,
Than the eternal taunts of galling tongues ;
Better the spear-head quivering in the heart.
Than daily struggle against fortune's curse ;
Better, in manhood's muscle and high blood.
To leap the gulf, than totter to its edge
In poverty, dull pain, and base decay.
Once more, I say, — are ye received ?
{The soldiers shout, "All! All!")
Then, each man to his tent, and take the arms
That he would love to die in, — for, this hour.
We storm the Consul's camp. A last farewell !
(He takes their hands.)
When next we meet, — we '11 have no time to look,
How parting clouds a soldier's countenance.
Few as we are, we '11 rouse them with a peal
That shall shake Rome !
Now to your cohorts' heads; — the word's —
Revenge !
George Croly.
THE BALLAD OF AGINCOURT.
Fair stood the wind for France,
When we our sails advance.
Nor now to prove our chance
Longer will tarry ;
But putting to the main.
At Kause, the mouth of Seine,
With all his martial train.
Landed King Harry,
And taking many a fort.
Furnished in warlike sort.
Marched towards Agincourt
In happy hour, —
Skirmishing day by day
With those that stopped his way,
Where the French general lay
With all his J)ower,
Which in his height of pride.
King Henry to deride.
His ransom to provide
To the king sending ;
Wliich he neglects the while.
As from a nation vile.
Yet, with an angry smile.
Their fall portending.
And turning to his men.
Quoth our brave Henry then ;
Though they to one be ten.
Be not amazed ;
Yet have we well begun.
Battles so bravely won
Have ever to the sun
By fame been raisèd.
And for myself, quoth he.
This my full rest shall be ;
England ne'er mourn for me,
Nor more esteem me,
Victor I will remain.
Or on this earth lie slain ;
Never shall she sustain
Loss to redeem me.
Poitiers and Cressy tell.
When most their pride did swell.
Under our swords they fell;
No less our skill is
Than when our grandsire great.
Claiming the regal seat.
By many a warlike feat
Lopped the French lilies.
The Duke of York so dread
The eager vaward led ;
With the main Henry sped.
Amongst his henchmen,
Excester had the rear, —
A braver man not there :
0 Lord ! how hot they were
On the false Frenchmen !
They now to fight are gone ;
Armor on armor shone ;
Drum now to drum did groan, —
To hear was wonder ;
That with the cries they make
The very earth did shake ;
Trumpet to trumpet spake.
Thunder to thunder.
Well it thine age became,
O noble Erpingham !
Which did the signal aim
To our hid forces ;
When, from a meadow by.
Like a stomi, suddenlj'.
The English archery
Struck the French horses
With Spanish yew so strong.
Arrows a cloth-yard long.
That like to serpents stung.
Piercing the weather ;
None from his fellow starts.
But playing manly parts.
And, like true English hearts.
Stuck close together.
VTxen down their bows they threw.
And forth their bilboes drew,
And on the French they flew.
Not one was tardy ;
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WAR. 503 *-
Arms were from shoulders sent ; Like the brass cannon ; let the brow o'erwhelm it.
Scalps to the teeth were rent ; As fearfully as doth a gallèd rock
Down the French peasants went ; O'erhaiig and jutty his confounded base,
Our men were hardy. Swilled with the wild and wasteful ocean.
Now set the teeth, and stretch the nostril wide ;
1 This whUe our noble king, Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit
His broadsword brandishing. To his full height ! — On, on, you noblest
Down the French host did ding, English,
As to o'erwhelm it ; Whose blood is fet from fathers of war-proof !
And many a deep wound lent. Fathers, that, like so many Alexanders,
His arms with blood besprent, • Have, in these parts, from morn till even fought.
And many a cruel dent And sheathed their swords for lack of argument.
Bruised his helmet. Dishonor not your mothers ; now attest.
That those whom you called fathers, did beget
Glo'ster, that duke so good, you !
Next of the royal blood. Be copy now to men of grosser blood.
For famous England stood And teach \them how^o war I-l-And you, good
With his brave brother, yeomen,
Clarence, in steel so bright. Whose limbs were made in England, show us
Though but a maiden knight, Jiere
Yet in that furious fight The mettle of j'our pasture ; let us swear
Scarce such another. That you are worth your breeding ; which I
doubt'not ;
Warwick in blood did wade ; por there is none of you so mean and base,
Oxford the foe invade. That hath not noble lustre in your eyes.
And cruel slaughter made, I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips.
Still as they ran up. Straining upon the start. The game's afoot ;
Suffolk his axe did ply ; Follow your spirit : and, upon this charge,
Beaumont and Willoughby Cry — God for Harry! England! and Saint
Bare them right doughtily, George !
Ferrers and Fanhope. Shakespeare.
Upon St. Crispin's day
Fought was this noble fray.
Which fame did not delay OF THE WARRES IN IRELAND.
To England to carry ;
0, when shall Englishmen "epigrams," book iv. ep. s.
With such acts fill a pen, j praised the speech, but cannot now abide it.
Or England breed again That warre is sweet to those that have not try'd it;
Such a King Harry ? p^j. j proved it now and plainly see't,
michael Drayton, sweet, it maketh all things sweet.
♦ Athome Canaricwines and Greek grow lothsome;
Here milk is nectar, water tasteth toothsome.
THE KING TO HIS SOLDIERS BEFORE There without baked, rost, boyl'd, it is no cheere ;
HARFLEUR. Bisket we like, and Bonny Clabo here.
There we complaine of one wan rested chick ;
prom "king henry v.," act iii. sc. i. yforsc cookt nc'rc makes us sick.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends. At home in silken sparrers, beds of Down,
once more ; We scant can rest, but still tosse up and down ;
Or close the wall up with our English dead ! Here we can sleep, a saddle to our pillow.
In peace, there's nothing so becomes a man, A hedge the Curtaine, Canopy a Willow.
As modest stillness, and humility : There if a child but cry, 0 what a spite !
But when the blast of war blows in our ears, Here we can brook three lanims in one night.
Then imitate the action of the tiger ; There homely rooms must be perfumed with
Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, Roses ;
Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage : Here match and powder ne're offend our noses.
Then lend the eye a terrible aspèct ; There from a storm of rain we run like Pullets ;
Let it pry through the portage of the head. Here we stand fast against a showre of bullets.
r
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POEMS OP PEACE AND WAR.
t
Lo, then how greatly their opinions erre,
That think there is no great delight in warre ;
But yet for this, sweet warre, lie be thy debtor,
I shaU forever love my home the better.
Sir John Harrington.
THE HEART OF THE BRUCE.
It was upon an April mom.
While yet the frost lay hoar,
We heard Lord James's hugle-hom
Sound by the rocky shore.
Then down we went, a hundred knights,
All in our dark array.
And flung our armor in the ships
That rode within the bay.
We spoke not as the shore grew less.
But gazed in silence back.
Where the long billows swept away
The foam behind our track.
And aye the purple hues decayed
Upon the fading hill.
And but one heart in all that ship
Was tranquil, cold, and still.
The good Lord Douglas paced the deck.
And 0, his face was wan !
Unlike the flush it used to wear
When in the battle-van. —
" Come hither, come hither, my trusty knight.
Sir Simon of the Lee ;
There is a freit lies near my soul
1 fain would tell to thee.
" Thou know'st the words King Robert spoke
Upon his dying day :
How he bade take his noble heart
And carry it far away ;
" And lay it in the holy soil
Where once the Saviour trod.
Since he might not bear the blessèd Cross,
Nor strike one blow for God.
" Last night as in my bed 1 lay,
1 dreamed a dreary dream : —
Methought 1 saw a Pilgrim stand
In the moonlight's quivering beam.
" His robe was of the azure dye.
Snow-white his scattered hairs.
And even such a cross he bore
As good St. Andrew bears.
" ' Why go ye forth. Lord James,' he said,
' With spear and belted brand ?
Why do you take its dearest pledge
From this our Scottish land ?
" ' The sultry breeze of Galilee
Creeps through its groves of palm.
The olives on the Holy Mount
Stand glittering in the calm.
' But 'tis not there that Scotland's heart
Shall rest, by God's decree.
Till the great angel calls the dead
To rise from earth and sea !
" • Lord James of Douglas, mark my rede !
That heart shall pass once more
In fiery fight against the foe.
As it was wont of yore.
" ' And it shall pass beneath the Cross,
And save King Robert's vow ;
But other hands shall bear it back.
Not, James of Douglas, thou ! '
" Now, by thy knightly faith, 1 pray,
Sir Simon of the Lee, —
For truer friend had never man
Than thou hast been to me, —
" If ne'er upon the Holy Land
'T is mine in life to tread.
Bear thou to Scotland's kindly earth
The relics of her dead."
The tear was in Sir Simon's eye
As he wrung the warrior's hand, -
" Betide me weal, betide me woe,
1 '11 hold by thy command.
" But if in battle-front. Lord James,
'T is ours once more to ride.
Nor force of man, nor craft of fiend.
Shall cleave me from thy side ! "
And aye we sailed and aye we sailed
Across the weary sea.
Until one mom the coast of Spain
Rose grimly on our lee.
And as we rounded to the port.
Beneath the watch-tower's wall.
We heard the clash of the atabais.
And the trumpet's wavering call.
"Why sounds yon Eastern music here
So wantonly and long.
And whose the crowd of armèd men
That round yon standard throng ? "
tí'
f
"WAR.
505
-a
tli.
" The Moors have come from Africa
To spoil and waste and slay,
And King Alonzo of Castile
Must fight with them to-day."
" Now shame it were," cried good Lord James,
" Shall never be said of me
That 1 and mine have turned aside
From the Cross in jeopardie !
"Have down, have down, my merrv men all,—
Have down unto the plain ;
We T1 let the Scottish lion loose
Within the fields of Spain ! "
"Now welcome to me, noble lord.
Thou and thy stalwart power ;
Dear is the sight of a Christian knight,
Who comes in such an hour !
" Is it for bond or faith you come.
Or yet for golden fee ?
Or bring ye France's lilies here.
Or the flower of Burgundie ? "
" God greet thee well, thou valiant king.
Thee and thy belted peers, —
Sir James of Douglas am I called.
And these are Scottish spears.
"We do not fight for bond or plight.
Nor yet for golden fee ;
But for the sake of our blessèd Lord,
"Who died upon the tree.
"Wo bring our great King Robert's heart
Across the weltering wave.
To lay it in the holy soil
Hard by the Saviour's grave.
" True pilgrims we, by land or sea.
Where danger bars the way ;
And therefore are we here. Lord King,
To ride with thee this day ! "
The King has bent his stately head.
And the tears were in his eyne, —
" God's blessing on thee, noble knight.
For this brave thought of thine !
" 1 know thy name full well. Lord James ;
And honored may I be.
That those who fought beside the Bruce
Should fight this day for me !
"Take thou the leading of the van, '
And charge the Moors amain ;
There is not such a lance as thine
In all the host of Spain ! "
The Douglas turned towards us then,
O, but his glance was high I —
" There is not one of all my men
But is as bold as I.
" There is not one of all my knights
But bears as true a spear, —
Then onward, Scottish gentlemen.
And think King Robert's here ! "
The trumpets blew, the cross-bolts flew.
The arrows flashed like flame.
As spur in side, and spear in rest.
Against the foe we came.
And many a bearded Saracen
Went down, both horse and man ;
For through their ranks we rode like com.
So furiously we ran !
But in behind our path they closed.
Though fain to let us through.
For they were forty thousand men.
And we were wondrous few.
We might not see a lance's length.
So dense was their array.
But the long fell sweep of the Scottish blade
Still held them hard at bay.
"Make in ! make in ! " Lord Douglas cried —
" Make in, my brethren dear !
Sir William of St. Clair is down ;
We may not leave him here ! "
But thicker, thicker grew the swarm,
And sharper shot the rain.
And the horses reared amid the press.
But they would not charge again.
" Now Jesu help thee," said Lord James,
" Thou kind and true St. Clair !
An' if I may not bring thee off,
I 'U die beside thee there ! "
Then in his stirmps up he stood.
So lion-like and bold.
And held the precious heart aloft.
All in its ease of gold.
He flung it fi-om him, far ahead.
And never spake he more.
But—"Pass thou first, thou dauntless heart,
As thou wert wont of yore ! "
The roar of fight rose fiercer yet.
And heavier still the stour,
Till the spears of Spain came shivering in.
And swept away the Moor.
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606
POEIMS OP PEACE AND WAR.
"Now praised be God, the day is won !
They fly, o'er flood and fell, —
Why dost thou draw the rein so hard.
Good knight, that fought so well ? "
" O, ride ye on. Lord King ! " he said,
"And leave the dead to me.
For I must keep the dreariest watch
That ever I shall dree !
" There lies, above his master's heart.
The Douglas, stark and grim ;
And woe is me I should be here,
Not side by side with him !
" The world grows cold, my arm is old.
And thin my lyart hair.
And all that I loved best on earth
Is stretched before me there.
" 0 Bothwell banks, that bloom so bright
Beneath the sun of May !
The heaviest cloud that ever blew
Is bound for you this day.
" And Scotland ! thou mayst veil thy head
In sorrow and in pain
The sorest stroke upon thy brow
Hath fallen this day in Spain !
"We '11 bear them back unto our ship,
We 'll bear them o'er the sea.
And lay them in the hallowed earth
Within our own countrie.
" And be thou strong of heart. Lord King,
For this I tell thee sure.
The sod that drank the Douglas' blood
Shall never bear the Moor ! "
The King he lighted from his horse.
He flung his brand away.
And took the Douglas by the hand.
So stately as he lay.
" God give thee rest, thou valiant soul !
That fought so well for Spam ;
I'd rather half my land were gone.
So thou wert here again ! "
We bore the good Lord James away,
And the priceless heart we bore.
And heavily we steered our ship
Towards the Scottish shore.
No welcome gi'eeted our return,
Nor clang of martial tread.
But all were dumb and hushed as death
Before the mighty dead.
We laid our chief in Douglas Kirk,
The heart in fair Melrose ;
And woful men were we that day, —
God grant their souls repose !
"William Edmundstone Aytoun.
HOTSPUR'S DESCRIPTION OF A FOP.
FROM ".KING HENRY IV.," PART I. ACT I. SC. 3.
But I remember, when the fight was done.
When I was dry with rage and extreme toil,
Breathless and faint, leaning npon my sword,
Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly dressed.
Fresh as a bridegroom ; and his chin, new reaped.
Showed like a stubble-land at harvest-home ;
He was perfumèd like a milliner ;
And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held
A pouncet-box which ever and anon
He gave his nose, and took't away again ; —
Who, therewith angry, when it next came there,
Took it in snuff ; —and still he smiled and talked ;
And, as the soldiers bore dead bodies by.
He called them untaught knaves, unmannerly,
To bring a slovenly unhandsome corse
Betwixt the wind and his nobility.
With many holiday and lady terms
He (Questioned me ; among the rest, demanded
My prisoners in your majesty's behalf.
I then, all smarting, with my wounds being cold,
To be so pestered with a popinjay.
Out of my grief and my impatience.
Answered neglectingly, I know not what, —
He should, or he should not ; for he made me mad
To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet.
And talk so like a waiting gentlewoman,
Of guns, and drums, and wounds, — God save
the mark ! —
And telling me, the sovereign'st thing on earth
Was parmaceti for an inward bruise ;
And that it was great pity, so it was.
That villanous saltpetre should be digged *
Out of the bowels of the harmless earth.
Which many a good tall fellow had destroyed
So cowardly, and, but for these vile guns.
He would himself have been a soldier.
Shakespeare.
HUDIBRAS' SWORD AND DAGGER.
FROM " HUDIBRAS," PART I.
His puissant s^vord unto his side
Near his undaunted heari was tied.
With basket hilt that wouM hold broth,
And serve for fight^and dinner both.
In it he melted lead for bullets
To shoot al foes, and sometimes pullets.
To whom he hore so fell a grutch
He ne'er gave quarter to any such.
The trenchant blade, Toledo trusty,
Por want of fighting was grown rusty.
And ate into itself, for lack
Of somebody to hew and hack.
The peaceful scabbard,, where it dwelt.
The rancor of its edge had felt ;
Por of the lower end two handful
It had devoured, it was so manful ;
And so much scorned to lurk in case,
As if it dtirst not show its face.
This sword a dagger had, his page,
That wasjjut little for his age, .
And therefore waited on him so
As dwarfs unto knight-errants do.
It was a serviceable dudgeon.
Either for fighting or for drudging.
When it had stabbed or broke a head.
It would scrape trenchers or chip bread,
Toast cheese or bacon, though it were
To bait a mouse-trap't would not care ;
'T would make clean shoes, and in the earth
Set leeks' and onions, and so forth :
It had been 'prentice to a brewer.
Where this and more it did endure ;
But left the trade, as many more
Have lately done on the same score.
Dr. Samuel butler.
THE LORD OF BUTRAGO.
from the spanish.
" Your horse is faint, my King, my Lord ! your
gallant horse is sick, —
His limbs are torn, his breast is gored, on his
eye the film is thick ;
Mount, mount on mine, 0, mount apace, I pray
thee, mount and fly !
Or in my arms I '11 lift your Grace, — their
trampling hoofs are nigh !
" My King, my King ! you 're wounded sore, —
the blood runs from your feet ;
But only lay a hand before, and I '11 lift you to
your seat ;
Mount, Juan, for they gather fast ! — I héar
their coming cry, —
Mount, mount, and ride for jeopardy, — I 'U save
you though I die !
"Stand, noble steed ! this hour of need, —be
gentle as a lamb ;
I 'U kiss the foam from off thy mouth, — thy
master dear I am, —
Mount, Juan, mount; whate'er betide, away the
bridle fling.
And plunge the rowels in his side. — My horse
shall save my King !
"Nay, never speak; my sires. Lord King, re¬
ceived their land from yours.
And joyfully their blood shall spring, so be it
thine secures ;
If I should fly, and thou, my King, be found
among the dead.
How could I stand 'mong gentlemen, such scorn
on my gray head ?
"Castile's proud dames shall never point the
finger of disdain.
And say there's one that ran away when our
good lords were slain !
I leave Diego in your care, — you '11 fill his
father's place ;
Strike, strike the spur, and never spare, — God's
blessing on your Grace ! "
So spake the brave Montañés, Butrago's lord was
he ;
And turned him to the coming host in steadfast¬
ness and glee ;
He flung himself among them, as they came down
the hUl; —
He died, God wot ! but not before his sword had
drunk its fiU.
Translation of JOHN GIBSON LOCKHAKT.
FLODDEN FIELD.
FROM " MARMION," CANTO VI.
[The battle was fought in September, 1513, between the forces of
England and Scotland. The latter were worsted, and King James
slain with eight thousand of his men. Lord Surrey commanded the
English troops.]
A MOMENT then Lord Marmion stayed.
And breathed his steed, his men arrayed.
Then forward moved his band.
Until, Lord Surrey's rear-guard won.
He halted by a cross of stone.
That, on a hillock standihg lone.
Did all the field command.
Hence might they see the full array
Of either host for deadly fray ;
Their marshalled lines stretched east and west,
And fronted north and south.
And distant salutation past
From the loud cannon-mouth ;
Not in the close successive rattle
That breathes the voice of modem battle,
But slow and far between. —
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508
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
■a
a
The hillock gained, Lord Mannion stayed ;
" Here, by this cross," he gently said,
"You well may view the scene ;
Here shalt thou tarry, lovely Clare :
0, think of Mannion in thy prayer ! —
Thou wilt not ? — well, — no less my care
Shall, watchful, for thy weal prepare. —
You, Blount and Eustace, are her guard.
With ten picked archers of my train ;
With England if the day go hard.
To Berwick speed amain, —
But, if we conquer, cruel maid.
My spoils shall at your feet be laid.
When here we meet again."
He waited not for answer there.
And would not mark the maid's despair.
Nor heed the discontented look
From either squire : but spurred amain.
And, dashing through the battle-plain.
His way to Surrey took.
Blount and Fitz-Eustace rested stiU
With Lady Clare upon the hill ;
On which (for far the day was spent)
The western sunbeams now were bent.
The cry they heard, its meaning knew.
Could plain their distant comrades view ;
Sadly to Blount did Eustace say,
" Unworthy office here to stay !
No hope of gilded spurs to-day. —
But, see ! look up, — on Flodden bent
The Scottish foe has fired his tent." —
And sudden, as he spoke.
From the sharp ridges of the hill.
All downward to the banks of Till
Was wreathed in sable smoke.
Volumed and vast, and rolling far.
The cloud enveloped Scotland's war.
As down the hill they broke ;
Nor martial shout, nor minstrel tone,
Announced their march ; their tread alone.
At times their warning trampet blown.
At times a stifled hum.
Told England, from his mountain-throne
King James did rushing come. —
Scarce could they hear or see their foes.
Until at weapon-point they close. —
They close in clouds of smoke and dust.
With sword-sway and with lance's thrust ;
And such a yell was there.
Of sudden and portentous birth.
As if men fought upon the earth
And fiends in upper air :
0, life and death were in the shout.
Recoil and rally, charge and rout.
And triumph and despair.
Long looked the anxious squires ; their eye
Could in the darkness naught descry.
At length the freshening western blast
Aside the shroud of battle cast ;
And, first, the ridge of mingled spears
Above the brightening cloud appears ;
And in the smoke the pennons fle'jr.
As in the storm the white sea-mew.
Then marked they, dashing broad and far.
The broken billows of the war.
And plumèd crests of chieftains brave
Floating like foam upon the wave ;
But naught distinct they see :
Wide raged the battle on the plain ;
Spears shook, and falchions flashed amain ;
Fell England's arrow-flight like rain ;
Crests rose, and stooped, and rose again.
Wild and disorderly.
Amid the scene of tumult, high
They saw Lord Marmion's falcon fly :
And stainless Tunstall's banner white.
And Edmund Howard's lion bright.
Still bear them bravely in the fight ;
Although against them come
Of gallant Gordons many a one.
And many a stubborn Highlandman,
And many a ragged Border clan.
With Huntley and with Home.
Far on the left, unseen the while,
Stanley broke Lennox and Argyle ;
Though there the western mountaineer
Rushed with bare bosom on the spear.
And flung the feeble targe aside.
And with both hands the broadsword plied,
'T was vain : — But Fortune, on the right.
With fickle smUe, cheered Scotland's fight.
Then fell that spotless banner white.
The Howard's lion fell ;
Yet still Lord Marmion's falcon flew
With wavering flight, while fiercer grew
Around the battle-yell.
The Border slogan rent the sky !
A Home ! a Gordon ! was the cry :
Loud were the clanging blows ;
Advanced, — forced back, — now low, now high.
The pennon sunk and rose ;
As bends the bark's mast in the gale.
When rent are rigging, shrouds, and sail.
It wavered mid the foes.
No longer Blount the view could bear : —
" By heaven and all its saints, I swear,
I will not see it lost !
Fitz-Eustace, you with Lady Clare
May bid your beads, and patter prayer, —
I gallop to the host."
And to the fray he rode amain.
Followed by all the archer train.
The fiery youth, with desperate charge.
Made, for a space, an opening large, —
-B
The rescued banner rose,
But darkly closed the war around,
Like pine-tree, rooted from the ground.
It sunk among the foes.
Then Eustace mounted too ; — yet stayed,
As loath to leave the helpless maid.
When, fast as shaft can fly.
Bloodshot his eyes, his nostrils spread.
The loose rein dangling from his head,
Housing and saddle bloody red.
Lord Marmion's steed rushed by ;
And Eustace, maddening at the sight,
A look and sign to Clara cast.
To mark he would return in haste,
Then plunged into the flght.
Ask me not what the maiden feels.
Left in that dreadful hour alone :
Perchance her reason stoops or reels ;
Perchance a courage, not her own,
Braces her mind to desperate tone. —
The scattered van of England wheels ; —
She only said, as loud in air
The tumult roared, "Is Wilton there ?" —
They fly, or, maddened by despair.
Fight but to die, — "Is Wilton there ?"
With that, straight up the hill there rode
Two horsemen drenched with gore,
And in their arms, a helpless load,
A wounded knight they bore.
His hand still strained the broken brand ;
His arms were smeared with blood and sand.
Dragged from among the horses' feet.
With dinted shield, and helmet beat.
The falcon-crest and plumage gone.
Can that be haughty Marmion ! . . . .
Young Blount his armor did unlace.
And, gazing on his ghastly face.
Said, — " By St. George, he's gone !
That spear-wound has our master sped, —
And see the deep cut on his head !
Good night to Marmion." —
" Unnurtured Blount ! thy brawling cease :
He opes his eyes," said Eustace ; " peace ! "
When, doffed his casque, he felt free air.
Around 'gan Marmion wildly stare : —
" Where's Harry Blount ? Fitz-Eustace where ?
Linger ye here, ye hearts of hare !
Redeem my pennon, — charge again !
Cry — ' Marmion to the rescue ! ' — vain !
Last of my race, on battle-plain
That shout shall ne'er be heard again ! —
Yet my last thought is England's : — fly.
To Dacre bear my signet-ring ;
Tell him his squadrons up to bring : —
Fitz-Eustace, to Lord Surrey hie ;
Tunstall lies dead upon the field.
His life-blood stains the spotless shield :
Edmund is down ; — my life is reft ; —
The Admiral alone is left.
Let Stanley charge with spur of fire, —
With Chester charge, and Lancashire,
Full upon Scotland's central host.
Or victory and England's lost. —
Must I bid twice ? — hence, varlets I fly 1
Leave Marmion here alone — to die."
They parted, and alone he lay :
Clare drew her from the sight away.
Till pain wrung forth a lowly moan.
And half he murmured, — "Is there none.
Of all my halls have nurst.
Page, squire, or groom, one cup to bring,
Of blessed water from the spring.
To slake my dying thirst ? "
O woman ! in our hours of ease.
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please,
And variable as the shade
By the light quivering aspen made ;
When pain and anguish wring the hrow,
A ministering angel thou ! —
Scarce were the piteous accents said.
When, with the Baron's casque, the maid
To the nigh streamlet ran ;
Forgot were hatred, wrongs, and fears ;
The plaintive voice alone she hears.
Sees but the dying man.
She stooped her by the runnel's side.
But in abhorrence backward drew ;
For, oozing from the mountain's side.
Where raged the war, a dark-red tide
Was curdling in the streamlet blue.
Where shall she turn ! — behold her mark
A little fountain cell.
Where water, clear as diamond-spark.
In a stone basin fell.
Above, some half-worn letters say,
íBrínít« faearj- gtlgrtm- Srink- ans- präg»
JFor- tlje* kinB- soul- of- Ägbil- ffireg-
0511)0• built* tl)is* cross* anb* tocll*
She filled the helm, and back she hied.
And with surprise and joy espied
A monk supporting Marmion's head ;
A pious man whom duty brought
To dubious verge of battle fought.
To shrive the dying, bless the dead.
Deep drank Lord Marmion of the wave.
And, as she stooped his brow to lave, —
" Is it the hand of Clare," he said,
" Or injured Constance, bathes my head Î *"
Then, as remembrance rose, —
" Speak not to me of shrift or prayer I
I must redress her woes.
510
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
a
Short space, few words, are mine to spare ;
Forgive and listen, gentle Clare ! " —
"Alas ! " she said, "the while, —
0, think of your immortal weal !
In vain for Constance is your zeal ;
She — died at Holy Isle."—
Lord Marmion started from the ground.
As light as if he felt no wound ;
Though in the action burst-the tide
In torrents from his wounded side.
" Then it was truth ! " he said, — "I knew
That the dark presage must be true. —
I would the Fiend, to whom belongs
The vengeance due to all her wrongs,
Would spare me but a day !
For wasting fire, and dying groan.
And priests slain on the altar stone.
Might bribe him for delay.
It may not be ! — this dizzy trance, —
Curse on yon base mara\ider's lance.
And doubly cursed my failing brand !
A sinful heart makes feeble hand."
Then, fainting, down on earth he sunk,
Supported by the trembling monk.
With fruitless labor, Clara bound.
And strove to stanch the gushing wound :
The monk, with unavailing cares.
Exhausted all the Church's prayers.
Ever, he said, that, close and near,
A lady's voice was in his ear.
And that the priest he could not hear,
For that she ever sung,
"Tn the lost haitle, borne dovm, by the flying.
Where mingles war's rattle with groans of the
dying ! "
So the notes rung : —
" Avoid thee. Fiend ! — with cruel hand.
Shake not the dying sinner's sand ! —
O, look, my son, upon yon sign
Of the Redeemer's grace divine :
0, think on faith and bliss i —
By many a death-bed I have been.
And many a sinner's parting seen.
But never aught like this."
The war, that for a space did fail,
Now trebly thundering swelled the gale.
And—Stanley ! was the cry ; —
A light on Marmion's visage spread.
And fired his glazing eye :
With dying hand above his head
He shook the fragment of his blade.
And shouted " Victory !
Charge, Chester, charge ! On, Stanley, on I "
Were the last words of Marmion.
Sir Walter Scott*
BEAL' AN DHUINE.
from "the lady of the lake." canto VU
There is no breeze upon the fern.
No ripple on the lake,"
Upon her eyrie nods the erne.
The deer has sought the brake ; ,
The small birds will not sing aloud.
The springing trout lies still.
So darkly glooms yon thunder-cloud.
That swathes, as with a purple shroud,
Benledi's distant hill.
Is it the thunder's soleçin sound
That mutters deep and dread.
Or echoes from the^groaning ground
The wäfrior's measured tread ?
Is it the lightning's quivering glance
That on the thicket streams.
Or do they flash on spear and lance
The sun's retiring beams ?
I see the dagger crest of Mar,
I see the Moray's silver star
Wave o'er the cloud of Saxon war.
That up the lake comes winding far I
To hero bound for battle strife.
Or bard of martial lay,
'T were worth ten years of peaceful life.
One glance at their array !
Their light-armed archers far and near
Surveyed the tangled ground.
Their centre ranks, with pike and spear,
A twilight forest frowned.
Their barbed horsemen. In the rear.
The stern battalia crowned.
N o cymbal clashed, no clarion rang.
Still were the pipe and drum ;
Save heavy tread, and armor's clang.
The sullen march was dumb.
There breathed no wind theh crests to shake^
Or wave their flags abroad ;
Scarce the frail aspen seemed to quake.
That shadowed o'er their road.
Their vaward scouts no tidings bring.
Can rouse no lurking foe.
Nor spy a trace of living thing.
Save when_they stirred the roe ;
The host moves like a deep sea wave.
Where rise no rocks its pride to brave.
High swelling, dark, and slow.
The lake is passed, and now they gain
A narrow and a broken plain.
Before the Trosach's rugged jaws ;
And here the horse and spearmen pause,
While, to explore the dangerous glen.
Dive through the pass the archer men.
-Ö
f
WAR.
511
■a
At once there rose so wild a yell
Within that dark and iiaiTow dell,
As all the fiends, from heaven that fell,
Had pealed the banner cry of hell !
Forth from the pass in tumult driven.
Like chaff before the wind of heaven.
The archery appear :
For life ! for life ! their flight they ply —
And shriek, and shout, and battle-cry.
And plaids and bonnets waving high,
And broadswords flashing to the sky.
Are maddening in the rear.
Onward they drive, in dreadful race.
Pursuers and pursued ;
Before that tide of flight and chase.
How shall it keep its rooted place.
The spearmen's twilight wood ?
— "Down, down," cried Mar, "your lances down !
Bear back both friend and foe ! "
Like reeds before the tempest's frown.
That serried grove of lances brown
At once lay levelled low ;
And closely shouldering side to side.
The bristling ranks the onset bide. —
—"We'll quell the savage mountaineer.
As their Tinchel * cows the game ;
They come as fleet as forest deer.
We'll drive them back as tame."
Bearing before them, in their course.
The relics of the archer force.
Like wave with crest of sparkling foam.
Right onward did Clan-Alpine come.
Above the tide, each broadsword bright
Was brandishing like beam of light.
Each targe was dark below ;
And with the ocean's mighty swing.
When heaving to the tempest's wing.
They hurled them on the foe.
I heard the lance's shivering crash.
As when the whirlwind rends the ash ;
I heard the broadsword's deadly clang.
As if a hundred anvils rang !
But Moray wheeled his rearward rank
Of horsemen on Clan-Alpine's flank —
" My bannerman, advance !
I see," he cried, " their columns shake.
Now, gallants ! for your ladies' sake.
Upon them with the lance ! "
The horsemen dashed among the rout.
As deer break through the broom ;
Their steeds are stout, their swords are out.
They soon make lightsome room.
Clan-Alpine's best are backward borne —
Where, where was Roderick then ?
One blast upon his bugle-bom
Were worth a thousand men !
* A circle of sportsmen, surrounding^ the deer
And refluent through the pass of fear
The battle's tide was poured ;
Vanished the Saxon's struggling spear.
Vanished the mountain sword.
As Bracklinn's chasm, so black and sxeep,
Receives her roaring linn.
As the dark caverns of the^deep
Suck the wild whirlpool in.
So did the deep and darksome pass
Devour the battle's mingled mass ;
None linger now upon the plain.
Save those who ne'er shall fight again.
Sir Walter Scott.
"WATERLOO.
from "childe harold," canto iii.
There was a sound of revelry by night.
And Belgium's capital had gathered then
Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright
The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave
men ;
A thousand hearts beat happily ; and when
Music arose with its voluptuous swell.
Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again.
And all went merry as a marriage-bell ;
But hush ! hark ! a deep sound strikes like a
rising knell !
Did ye not hear it?—No; 'twas but the
wind.
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street ;
On with the dance ! let joy be unconfined I
No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure
meet
To chase the glowing Hours with flying feet, —
But, hark ! — that heavy sound breaks in once
more.
As if the clouds its echo would repeat ;
And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before !
Arm ! arm ! it is— it is — the cannon's opening
roar !
Within a windowed niche of that high hall
Sate Brunswick's fated chieftain ; he did hear
That sound the first amidst the festival.
And caught its tone with Death's prophetic
ear ;
And when they smiled because he deemed it
near.
His heart more tinly knew that peal too well
Wliich stretched his father on a bloody bier.
And roused the vengeance blood alone could
quell :
He rushed into the field, and, foremost fighting,
feU.
-S
512 POEMS OP PEACE AND WAR.
Ah ! then and there was hurrying to and fro,
And gathering tears, and tremblings of dis¬
tress,
And cheeks all pale which but an hour ago
Blushed at the praise of their own loveliness ;
And there were sudden partings, such as press
The life from out young hearts, and choking
sighs
Which ne'er might be repeated : who would
guess
If evermore should meet those mutual eyes
Since upon night so sweet such awful morn could
rise !
And there was mounting in hot haste : the
steed.
The mustering squadron, and the clattering car.
Went pouring forward with impetuous speed.
And swiftly forming in the ranks of war ;
And the deep thunder peal on peal afar ;
And near, the beat of the alarming drum
Roused up the soldier ere the morning star ;
While thronged the citizens with terror dumb.
Or whispering with white lips, — " The foe ! they
come ! they come ! "
And wild and high the " Cameron's gathering "
rose.
The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn's hills
Have heard, — and heard, too, have her Saxon
foes :
How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills
Savage and shrill ! But with the breath which
fills
Their mountain pipe, so fill the mountaineers
With the fierce native daring which instills
The stirring memory of a thousand years.
And Evan's, Donald's fame, rings in each clans¬
man's ears !
And Ardennes waves above them her green
leaves.
Dewy with nature's tear-drops, as they pass.
Grieving, if aught inanimate e'er grieves.
Over the unreturning brave, — alas !
Ere evening to be trodden like the grass
Which now beneath them, but above shall grow
In its next verdure, when this fiery mass
Of living valor, rolling on the foe.
And burning with high hope, shall moulder cold
and low.
Last noon beheld them full of lusty life, '
Last eve in Beauty's circle proudly gay,
The midnight brought the signal sound of
strife,
The mom the marshalling in amis, — the day
Battle's magnificently stem array I
The thunder-clouds close o'er it, which when
rent
The earth is covered thick with other clay.
Which her own clay shall cover, heaped and
pent.
Rider and horse, — friend, foe, — in one red
burial blent !
Their praise is hymned by loftier harps than
mine ;
Yet one I would select from that proud throng.
Partly because they blend me with his line.
And partly that I did his sire some wrong.
And partly that bright names will hallow song !
And his was of the bravest, and when showered
The death-bolts deadliest the thinned files
along.
Even where the thickest of war's tempest
lowered.
They reached no nobler breast than thine, young,
gallant Howard !
There have been tears and breaking hearts for
thee.
And mine were nothing, had I such to give ;
But when I stood beneath the fresh green tree.
Which living waves where thou didst cease to
live.
And saw around me the wide field revive
With fraits and fertile promise, and the Spring
Come forth her work of gladness to contrive.
With all her reckless birds upon the wing,
I turned from all she brought to those she could
not bring.
I turned to thee, to thousands, of whom each
And one as all a ghastly gap did make
In his own kind and kindred, whom to teach
Forgetfulness were mercy for their sake ;
The Archangel's trump, not glory's, must
awake
Those whom they thirst for ; though the sound
of Fame
May for a moment soothe, it cannot slake
The fever of vain longing, and the name
So honored but assumes a stronger, bitterer claim.
They mourn, but smile at length ; and, smil¬
ing, mourn ;
The tree will wither long before it fall ;
The hull drives on, though mast and sail be torn ;
The roof-tree sinks, but moulders on the hall
In massy hoarines#'; the ruined wall
Stands when its wind-worn battlements are
gone;
The bars survive the captive they enthrall ;
The day drags through though storms keep out
the .sxm ;
And thus the heart will break, yet brokenly live on ;
i
f
WAR.
513
Even as a broken mirror, which the glass
In every fragment multiplies, and makes
A thousand images of one that was
The same, and stUl the more, the more it
breaks ;
And thus the heart will do which not for¬
sakes,
Living in shattered guise, and still, and cold.
And bloodless, with its sleepless sorrow aches,
Yet withers on till all without is old.
Showing no visible sign, for such things are
untold.
Lord bvron.
HOHENLINDEN.
On Linden, when the sun was low.
All bloodless lay the untrodden snow.
And dark as winter was the flow
Of Iser, rolling rapidly.
But Linden saw another sight
When the drum beat, at dead of night.
Commanding fires of death to light
The darkness of her scenery.
By torch and trumpet fast arrayed,
Each horseman drew his battle-blade.
And furious every charger neighed.
To join the dreadful revelry.
Then shook the hills with thunder riven.
Then rushed the steed to battle driven.
And louder than the bolts of heaven
Far flashed the red artillery.
But redder yet that light shall glow
On Linden's hills of stained snow,
And bloodier yet the torrent flow
Of Iser, rolling rapidly.
'T is mom, but scarce yon level sun
Can pierce the war-clouds, rolling dun,
Where furious Frank and fiery Hun
Shout in their sulphurous canopy.
The combat deepens. Oh, ye brave.
Who rush to glory, or the grave !
Wave, Munich ! all ffcy banners wave.
And charge with all thy chivalry !
Few, few shall part where many ineet !
The snow shall be their winding-sheet.
And every turf beneath their feet
Shall be a soldier's sepulchre.
thouas Campbell.
INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP.
You know we French stormed Ratisbon :
A mile or so away.
On a little mound. Napoleon
Stood on our stonning-day ;
With neck out-thrust, .you fancy how.
Legs wide, arms locked behind.
As if to balance the prone brow.
Oppressive with its mind.
Just as perhaps he mused, " My plans
That soar, to earth may fall.
Let once my army-leader Lannes
Waver at yonder wall," —
Out 'twixt the battery-smokes there flew
A rider, bound on bound
Full-galloping ; nor bridle drew
Until he reached the mound.
Then off there flung in smiling joy.
And held himself erect
By just his horse's mane, a boy :
You hardly could suspect
(So tight he kept his lips compressed,
Scarce any blood came through).
You looked twice ere you saw his breast
Was all but shot in two.
"Well," cried he, "Emperor, by God's grace
We 've got you Ratisbon !
The marshal's in the market-place.
And you '11 be there anon
To see your flag-bird flap his vans
Where I, to heart's desire,
Perched him !" The chief's eye flashed ; his plans
Soared up again like fire.
The chief's eye flashed ; but presently
Softened itself, as sheathes
A film the mother-eagle's eye
When her braised eaglet breathes :
"You 're wounded I " " Nay," his soldier's pride
Touched to the quick, he said :
" I'm killed, sire ! " And, his chief beside.
Smiling, the boy fell dead.
Robert browning.
HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS
FROM GHENT TO AIX.
» ' » * * \
I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris and he ;
I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped all three ;
" Good speed I " cried the watch as the gate-
bolts undrew,
" Speed ! " echoed the waU to us galloping
through.
Behind shut the postem, the lights sank to rest.
And into the midnight we galloped abreast.
Not a word to each other ; we kept the great
pace, —
Neck by neck, stride by stride, never changing
our place ;
I turned in my saddle and made its girths tight,
Then shortened each stirrup and set the pique
right,
Rebuckled the check-strap, chained slacker the
hit.
Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit.
T was a moonset at starting ; but while we drew
near
Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight dawned
clear ;
At Boom a great yellow star came out to see ;
At Diifleld't was morning as plain as could be ;
And fropi Mecheln church-steeple we heard the
half-chime, —
So Joris broke silence with " Yet there is time ! "
At Aerschot up leaped of a sudden the sun.
And against him the cattle stood black every one.
To stare through the mist at us galloping past ;
And I saw my stout galloper Roland at last,
"With resolute shoulders, each butting away
The haze, as some bluff river headland its spray ;
And his low head and crest, just one sharp ear
bent back
For my voice, and the other pricked out on his
track ; '
And one eye's black intelligence, — ever that
glance
O'er its white edge at me, his own master,
askance ;
And the thick heavy spume-flakes, which aye
and anon
His fierce lips shook upward in galloping on.
By Hasselt, Dirck groaned ; and cried Joris,
" Stay spur !
Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault's not in
her ;
We'U remember at Aix," — for one heard the
quick wheeze
Of her chest, saw the stretched neck, and stag¬
gering knees.
And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the flank.
As down on her haunches she shuddered and sank.
So we were left galloping, Joris and I,
Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in the sky ;
The broad sun above laughed a pitiless laugh ;
'Neath our feet broke the brittle, bright stubble
like chaff ;
Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang white.
And "Gallop," gasped Joris, "for Aix is in
sight ! "
" How they '11 greet us ! "—and all in a moment
his roan
Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as a stone ;
And there was my Roland to bear the whole
weight
Of the news which alone could save Aix from
her fate.
With his nostrils like pits full of blood to the
brim.
And with circles of red for his eye-sockets' rim.
Then I cast loose my buff-coat, each holster let
fall.
Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt and all.
Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted his ear.
Called my Roland his pet name, my horse with¬
out peer, —
Clapped my hands, laughed and sung, any noise,
bad or good,
Tül at length into Aix Roland galloped and stood.
And all I remember is, friends flocking round.
As I sate with his head 'twixt my knees on the
ground ;
And no voice but was praising this Roland of
mine.
As I poured down his throat our last measure of
wine.
Which (the burgesses voted by common consent)
Was no more than his due who brought good
news from Ghent.
Robert Browning.
THE PRIVATE OF THE BUFFS;* OR,
THE BRITISH SOLDIER IN CHINA.
[" Some Seiks, and a private of the Buffs, having remained behind
with the grog-carts, fell into the hands of the Chinese. On the next
day they were brought before the authorities and' ordered to per¬
form iCotou. The Seiks obeyed, but Moyse, the English soldier,
declared he would not prostrate himself before any Chinaman alive,
and was immediately knocked upon the head, and his body thrown
upon a dunghill."— China CorrespondefU of the Lotidon Times, j
Last night, among his fellow roughs.
He jested, quaffed, and swore ;
A drunken private of the Buffs,
Who never looked before.
To-day, beneath the foeman's frown.
He stands in Elgin's place.
Ambassador from Britain's crown.
And type of aU her race.
Poor, reckless, rude, low-bom, untaught.
Bewildered, and alone,
A heart, with Énglish instinct fraught.
He yet can call his own.
Ay, tear his body limb from limb.
Bring cord or axe or flame.
He only knows that not through him
Shall England come to shame.
* 'Bhe " Bufis" are the East Kent regiment.
,r
i -t , p
1
WAR. 515 *-
Far Kentish hop-fields round him seemed, It was smoke and roar and powder-stench,
Like dreams, to come and go ; And hopeless waiting for death ;
Bright leagues of cherry-blossom gleamed. And the soldier's wife, like a full-tired child,
One sheet of living snow ; Seemed scarce to draw her breath.
The smoke above his father's door
In gray soft eddyings hung ; ^ sank to sleep ; and 1 had my dream
Must he then watch it rise no more. Of English village-lane.
Doomed by himself so young ? And wall and garden ; — but one wild scream
Brought me back to the roar again.
Yes, honor calls ! — with strength like steel , ,. .
He put the vision by ; There Jessie Brown stood listening
Let dusky Indians whine and kneel, 'Till a sudden gladness broke
An English lad must die. . f'®'' f®®® 5 ®1»®
And thus, with eyes that would not shrink, drew me near as she spoke .
With knee to man unbent,
Unfaltering on its dreadful brink. The Hielanders 10, dinna ye hear
To his red grave he went. The slogan far av^?
The McGregor s, — O, I ken it weel ;
Vain mightiest fleets of iron framed, '
Vain those all-shattering guns, -l tt-, ,
Unless proud England keep Ltamed God bless the bonny Hielanders ! _
The strong heart of her sons ; , f,® \
o 1 i. v ^1. v t7 • And lell on her knees ; and thanks to God
So let his name through Europe nng, — j ^ vi V n a j j
A man of mean estate. Flowed forth like a full flood-tide.
Who died, as firm as Sparta's kinff,
■a ^ ® Along the battery-lme her cry
Because his soul was great. tt j ^ h xt.
„ ^ Had fallen among the men,
Sir Francis Hastings Doyle. . , , , i .v.
And they started back ; — they were there to die ;
But was life so near them, then ?
»
They listened for life ; the rattling fire
THE RELIEF OF LÜCKNOW. ÍT' r. -h A
Were aU ; and the colonel shook his head,
0, THAT last day in Lucknow fort ! -A^nd they turned to their guns once more.
We knew that it was the last ;
That the enemy's lines crept surely on, Jessie said, "The slogan s done ;
And the end was coming fast. winna ye hear it noo.
The Campbells are comin' ? It's no a dream ;
To yield to that foe meant worse than death ; succors hae broken through !
And the men and we all worked on ; .t. , , , , , ,
It was one day more of smoke and roar. We heard the roar and the rattle afar,
And then it would all be done. „ the pipes we could not hear ;
So the men plied their work of hopeless war,
And knew that the end was near.
There was one of us, a corporal s wife,
A fair, young, gentle thing, ^ ^ —
Wacted with fever in the siege, ^ thrilling, ceaseless sound :
And her mmd was wandering. noise from the strife afar.
Or the sappers under ground.
She lay on the ground, in her Scottish plaid,
And I took her head on my knee ; It was the pipes of the Highlanders !
" When my father comes hame frae the pleugh," And now they played AuM Long Syne !
she said. It came to our men like the voice of God,
"Oh ! then please wauken me." And they shouted along the line.
She slept like a child on her father's floor. And they wept, and shook one another's hands
In the flecking of woodbine-shade. And the women sobbed in a crowd ;
When the house-dog sprawls by the open door. And every one knelt down where he stood.
And the mother's wheel is stayed. And we all thanked God aloud. '
Î- -g
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T
[&-
516
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
-a
That happy time, when we welcomed them,
Our men put Jessie first ;
And the general gave her his hand, and cheers
Like a storm from the soldiers burst.
And the pipers' ribbons and tar^n streamed,
Marching'round and round our line ;
And our joyful •cheers were broken with tears.
As the pipes played Auld Lang Syne.
Robert t. S. Lowell.
BY THE ALMA RIVER.
I
I,
y-
WlLLIE, fold your little hands
Let itldrop, — that *" soldier toy ;
Look whereffather'ipicture^tands, —
Father^ that here'kissed his'boy
Not a month since, —father kind.
Who this night may (never mind
Mother's sob, my Willie dear)
Cry out loud that He may hear
Who is God of battles, — cry,
" God keep father safe this day
By the Alma River ! "
Ask no more, child. Never heed
Either Russ, or Frank, or Turk ;
Right of nations, trampled creed.
Chance-poised victory's bloody work ;
Any flag i' the wind may roll
On thy heights, Sevastopol !
Willie, all to you and me
Is that spot, whate'er it be.
Where he stands — no other word —
Stands — God sure the child's prayers heard-
Near the Alma River.
Willie, listen to the bells
Ringing in the town to-day ;
That's for ■victory. No knell swells
For the many swept away, —
Hundreds, thousands. Let us weep.
We, who need not, —just to keep
Reason clear in thought and brain
Till the morning comes again ;
Till the third dread morning tell
Who they were that fought and — fell
By the Alma River.
Come, we '11 lay us down, my child ;
Poor the bed is, — poor and hard j
But thy father, far exiled.
Sleeps upon the open sward.
Dreaming of us two at home ;
Or, beneath the starry dome.
Digs out trenches in the dark.
Where he buries — Willie, mark ! —
Where he huríes those who died
Fighting — fighting at his side —
By the Alma River.
Willie, Willie, go to sleep ;
God will.^help us, 0 my boy !
He wilLmake the, dull hours\creep
Faster, and send news of joy ;
When I peed not^shrink to^meet
Those great placards in the street.
That for weeks will ghastly stare
In some eyes — child, say that prayer
Once again, — a different one, —
Say, " 0 God ! Thy will be done
By the Alma River."
DINAH Maria mulock Craie.
BALAKLAVA-
0 THE charge at Balaklava !
0 that rash and fatal'charge t
Never was a fiercer, braver.
Than that charge at Balaklava,
On the battle's bloody marge !
All the day the Russian columns.
Fortress huge, and blazing banks.
Poured their dread destructive volumes
On the French and English ranks, —
On the gallant allied ranks !
Earth and sky seemed rent asunder
By the loud incessant thunder !
When a strange but stern command —
Needless, heedless, rash command —
Came to Lucan's little band, —
Scarce six hundred men and horses
Of those vast contending forces : —
" England's lost unless you save her I
Charge the pass at Balaklava ! "
0 that rash and fatal charge.
On the battle's bloody marge 1
Far away the Russian Eagles
Soar o'er smoking hill and dell.
And their hordes, like howling beagles.
Dense and countless, round them yell 1
Thundering cannon, deadly moi-tar.
Sweep the field in every quarter !
Never, since the days of Jesus,
Trembled so the Chersonesus 1
Here behold the Gallic Lilies —
Stout St. Louis' golden Lilies —
Float as erst at old Ramillies !
And beside them, lo ! the Lion !
With her trophied Cross, is flying !
Glorious standards ! —shall they waver
On the field of Balaklava ?
ñ
WAR.
517
a
No, by Heavens ! at that command —
Sudden, rash, but stern command —
Charges Lucan's little band !
Brave Six Hundred ! lo ! they charge.
On the battle's bloody marge !
Down yon deep and skirted valley.
Where the crowded cannon play, —
Where the Czar's fierce cohorts rally,
Cossack, Calrauck, savage Kalli, —
Down that gorge they swept away !
Down that new Thermopylae,
Flashing swords and helmets see !
Underneath the iron shower.
To the brazen cannon's jaws.
Heedless of their deadly power.
Press they without fear or pause, —
To the very cannon's jaws !
Gallant Nolan, brave as Roland
At the field of Roncesvalles,
Dashes down the fatal valley.
Dashes on the bolt of death.
Shouting with his latest breath,
"Charge, then, gallants ! do not waver.
Charge the pass at Balaklava ! "
0 that rash and fatal charge,
On the battle's bloody marge !
Now the bolts of volleyed thunder
Rend that little band asunder.
Steed and rider wildly screaming.
Screaming wildly, sink away;
Late so proudly, proudly gleaming.
Now but lifeless clods of clay, —
Now but bleeding clods of clay !
Never, since the days of Jesus,
Saw such sight the Chersonesus !
Yet your remnant, brave Six Hundred,
Presses onward, onward, onward.
Till they storm the bloody pass, —
Till, like brave Leonidas,
They storm the deadly pass,
SabringvCossack,^CalmuckAKalli, 1
In that(,wild shot\rended Valley, —^
Drenched with fire and blood, like lava.
Awful pass at Balaklava !
O that rash and fatal charge.
On the battle's bloody marge !
For now Russia's rallied forces.
Swarming hordes of Cossack horses.
Trampling o'er the reeking corses.
Drive the thinned assailants back.
Drive the feeble remnant back.
O'er their late heroic track !
Vain, alas ! now rent and sundered.
Vain your struggles, brave Two Hundred I
Thrice your number lie asleep.
In that valley dark and deep.
Weak and wounded you retire
From that hurricane of fire, —
That tempestuous storm of fire, —
But no soldiers, firmer, braver.
Ever trod the field of fame.
Than the Knights of Balaklava, —
Honor to each hero's name !
Yet their country long shall moum
For her rank so rashly shorn, —
So gallantly, but madly shorn
In that fierce and fatal charge.
On the battle's bloody marge.
ALEXANDER BEAUFORT MEEK.
CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.
Half a league, half a league.
Half a league onward.
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
" Forward, the Light Brigade Í
Charge for the guns ! " he said ;
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
" Forward, the Light Brigade ! "
Was there a man dismayed ?
Not though the soldier knew
Some one had blundered :
Theirs not to make reply.
Theirs not to reason why.
Theirs but to do and die :
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them.
Cannon to left of them.
Cannon in front of them
Volleyed and thundered ;
Stormed at with shot and shell.
Boldly they rode and well ;
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell,
Rode the six hundred.
Flashed all their sabres bare,
Flashed as they tunied in air,
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging àn ai-my, while
All the world wondered ;
Plunged in the battery-smoke.
Eight through the line they broke :
Cossack and Russian
Reeled from the sabre-stroke.
Shattered and sundered.
Then they rode back, but not —
Not the six hundred.
■0
e
518
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them.
Cannon behind them
Volleyed and thundered :
Stormed at with shot and shell.
While horse and hero fell.
They that had fought so well
Came through the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell, —
All that was left of them.
Left of six hundred.
When can their glory fade ?
O the wild charge they made !
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made !
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred !
ALFRED Tennyson.
CAVALRY SONG.
from " alice of monmouth."
Our good steeds snuff the evening air.
Our pulses with their purpose tingle ;
The foeman's fires are twinkling there ;
He leaps to hear our sabres jingle !
Halt !
Each carbine send its whizzing ball :
Now, cling ! clang ! forward all.
Into the fight !
Dash on beneath the smoking dome :
Through level lightnings gallop nearer !
One look to Heaven ! No thoughts of home :
The guidons that we bear are dearer.
Charge !
Cling ! clang ! forward all !
Heaven help those whose horses fall :
Cut left and right !
They flee before our fierce attack !
They fall ! they spread in broken surges.
Now, comrades, bear our wounded back,
And leave the foeman to his dirges.
Wheel !
The bugles sound the swift recall :
Cling ! clang ! backward all !
Home, and good night !
Edmund Clarence stedman.
e-
PIBROCH OF DONUIL DHU.»
Pibroch of Donuil Dhu,
Pibroch of Donuil,
Wake thy wild voice anew,
Summon Clan Conuü.
Gathering-song of Donald the Black.
Come away, come away.
Hark to the summons !
Come in your war array.
Gentles and commons.
Come from deep glen, and
From mountains so rocky ;
The war-pipe and pennon
Are at Inverlochy.
Come every hill-plaid, and
True heart that wears one.
Come every steel blade, and
Strong hand that bears one.
Leave untended the herd.
The flock without shelter ;
Leave the corpse uninterred.
The bride at the altar ;
Leave the deer, leave the steer.
Leave nets and barges ;
• Come with your fighting gear.
Broadswords and targes.
Come as the winds come, when
Forests are rended ;
Come as the waves come, when.
Navies are stranded ;
Faster come, faster come.
Faster and faster.
Chief, vassal, page and groom.
Tenant and master.
Fast they come, fast they come";
See how they gather !
Wide waves the eagle plume
Blended with heather.
Cast your plaids, draw your blades.
Forward each man set !
Pibroch of Donuil Dhu,
Knell for the onset !
SIR WALTER SCOTT.
THE TROOPER'S DEATH,
The weary night is o'er at last !
We ride so stUl, we ride so fast !
We ride where Death is lying.
The morning wind doth coldly pass.
Landlord ! we 'U take another glass.
Ere dying.
Thou, springing grass, that art so green,
Shalt soon be rosy red, 1 ween.
My blood the hue supplying !
1 drink the first glass, sword in hand.
To bim who for the Fatherland
Lies dying !
"WAR.
519
Now quickly comes the second draught,
And that shall he to freedom quaffed
While freedom's foes are flying !
The rest, 0 land, our hope and faith !
We'd drink to thee with latest breath.
Though dying !
My darling ! — ah, the glass is out !
The bullets ring, the riders shout —
No time for wine or sighing !
There ! bring my love the shattered glass —
Charge ! on the foe ! no joys surpass
Such dying !
From the German. Translation of
R. W. RAYMOND.
SONG OF CLAN-ALPINE.
from " the lady of the lake," canto 11.
Hail to theiChlef who inWiumph au vanees !
Honored find blessed bdlthli evergreeif Pine !
Long may the free, in his banner that glances,
Flourish, the shelter and grace of our line !
Heaven send it happy dew.
Earth lend it sap anew,
Gayly to bourgeon, and broadly to grow.
While every Highland glen
Sends our shout back again,
" Eoderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! "
Ours is no sapling, chance-sown by the fountain.
Blooming at Beltane, in winter to fade ;
When the whirlwind has stripped every leaf on
the mountain,
The more shall Clan-Alpine exult in her shade.
Moored in the rifted rock.
Proof to the tempest's shock,
Firmer he roots him the ruder it blow ;
Menteith and Breadalbane, then.
Echo his praise again,
"Eoderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! "
Proudly our pibroch has thrilled in Glen Fruin,
And Bannachar's groans to our slogan replied ;
Glen Luss and Ross-dhu, they are smoking in ruin.
And the best of Loch-Lomond lie dead on her
side.
Widow and Saxon maid
Long shall lament our raid.
Think of Clan-Alpine with fear and with woe ;
Lennox and Leven-glen
Shake when they hear again,
"Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! "
Row, vassals, row, for the pride of the Highlands !
Stretch to your oars for the evergreen Pine !
0 that the rosebud that graces yon islands
Were wreathed in a garland around him to
twine !
0 that some seedling gem.
Worthy such noble stem.
Honored and blessed in their shadow might grow !
Loud should Clan-Alpine then
Ring from her deepmost glen,
" Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho ! ieroe ! "
Sir Walter Scott.
«
THE BATTLE-SONG OF GUSTAVÜS
ADOLPHUS.
Fear not, 0 little flock ! the foe
"Who madly seeks your overthrow.
Dread not his rage and power ;
What though your courage sometimes faints ?
His seeming triumph o'er God's saints
Lasts but a little hour.
Be of good cheer ; your cause belongs
To him who can avenge your wrongs,
Leave it to him, our Lord.
Though hidden now from all our eyes.
He sees the Gideon who shall rise
To save us, and his word.
As true as God's own word is true.
Not earth or hell with all their crew
Against us shall prevail.
A jest and by-word are they grown ;
God is with us, we are his own.
Our victory cannot fail.
Amen, Lord Jesus ; grant our prayer !
Great Captain, now thine arm make bare :
Fight for us once again !
So shall the saints and martyrs raise
A mighty chorus to thy praise.
World without end ! Amen.
From the German of MICHAEL ALTBNBURG«
SWORD SONG.
[Charles Theodore Kömer was a young German soldier, scholar,
poet, and patriot He was bom at Dresden in the autumn of 179z,
and fell in battle for his country at the early age of twenty-two. The
"Sword Song," so called, was written in his pocket-book only two
hours before he fell, during a halt in a wood previous to the engage¬
ment, and was read by him to a comrade juát as the signal was
given for battle. This bold song represents the soldier chiding his
sword, which, under the image of his iron bride, is impatient to
come forth from her chamber, the scabbard, and be wedded to him
on the ñeld of battle, where each soldier shall press the blade to his
lips.
Kömer fell in an engagement with superior numbers near a thicket
in the neighborhood of Rosenburg. He had advanced in pursuit
of the flying foe too far beyond his comrades. They buried him
under an old oak on the site of the battle, and carved his name on
the trunk.)
Sword, on my left side gleaming.
What means tliy bright eye's beaming ?
It makes my spirit dance
To see thy friendly glance.
Hurrah !
[fi-
520
POEMS OF PEACE AND "WAR.
"A valiant rider bears me ;
"0, in the field to prance
A free-born German wears me :
The glorious wedding dance !
That makes my eye so bright ;
How, in the sun's bright beams.
That is the sword's delight."
Bride-like the clear steel gleams ! "
Hurrah !
Hurrah !
Yes, good sword, I am free,
Then forward, valiant fighters !
And love thee heartily.
And forward, German riders !
And clasp thee to my side,
And when the heart grows cold.
E'en as a plighted bride.
Let each his love infold.
Hurrah !
Hurrah !
"And I to thee, by Heaven,
Once on the left it hung.
My light steel life have given ;
And stolen glances flung ;
When shall the knot be tied ?
Now clearly on your right
When wilt thou take thy bride ? "
Doth God each fond bride plight.
Hurrah !
Hurrah !
The trumpet's solemn warning
Then let your hot lips feel
Shall hail the bridal morning.
That virgin cheek of steel ;
When cannon-thunders wake
One kiss, — and woe betide
Then my true-love I take.
Him who forsakes the bride.
Hurrah !
Hurrah !
"0 blessèd, blessed meeting !
Now let the loved one sing ;
My heart is wildly beating :
Now let the clear blade ring.
Come, bridegroom, come for me ;
Till the bright sparks shall fly.
My garland waiteth thee."
Heralds of victory !
Hurrah !
Hurrah !
"Why in the scabbard rattle.
For, hark ! the trampet's warning
So wüd, so fierce for battle ?
Proclaims the marriage morning ;
What means this restless glow "
It dawns in festal pride ;
My sword, why clatter so ?
Hurrah, thou Iron Bride !
Hurrah !
Hurrah !
From the German of CHARLES THEODORE KÖRHER.
"Well may thy prisoner rattle ;
Translation of CHARLES T. BROOKS.
My spirit yearns for battle.
Rider, 't is war's wild glow
That makes me tremble so."
THE NOBLEMAN AND THE PENSIONER.
Hmrah !
"Old man, God bless you ! does your pipe taste
Stay in thy chamber near.
sweetly ?
My love ; what wilt thou here ?
A beauty, by my soul !
Still in thy chamber bide :
A red-clay flower-pot, rimmed with gold so neatly !
Soon, soon I take my bride.
What ask you for the bowl ? "
HuiTah !
"0 sir, that bowl for worlds I would not part
" Let me not longer wait :
with ;
Love's garden blooms in state.
A brave man gave it me.
With roses bloody-red.
Who won it—now what think you ? —of a ba¬
And many a bright death-bed."
shaw
Hurrah !
At Belgrade's victory.
Now, then, come forth, my bride 1
" There, sir, ah ! there was booty worth the
Come forth, thou rider's pride !
showing, —
Come out, my good sword, come !
Long life to Prince Eugene !
Forth to thy father's home !
Like after-grass you might have seen us mowing
à-
Hurrah !
The Turkish ranks down clean. "
-d
f
WAR.
521
a
"Another time I '11 hear your story ; —
Come, old man, be no fool ;
Take these two ducats, — gold for glory, —
And let me have the bowl ! "
" I'm a poor churl, as you may say, sir ;
My pension's all I'm worth :
Yet I'd not give that bowl away, sir.
For all the gold on earth.
"Just hear now ! Once, as we hussars, all merry.
Hard on the foe's rear pressed,
A blundering rascal of a janizary
Shot through our captain's breast.
" At once across my horse I hove him, —
The same would he have done, —
And from the smoke and tumult drove him
Safe to a nobleman.
" I nursed him, and, before his end, bequeathing
His money and this bowl
To me, he pressed my hand, just ceased his
breathing.
And so he died, brave soul !
" The money thou must give mine host, — so
thought I, —
Three plunderings suffered he :
And, in remembrance of my old friend, brought I
The pipe away with me.
" Henceforth in all campaigns with me I bore it.
In flight or in pursuit ;
It was a holy thing, sir, and I wore it
Safe-sheltered in my boot.
"This very limb, I lost it by a shot, sir.
Under the walls of Prague :
First at my precious pipe, be sure, I caught, sir.
And then picked up my leg."
"You move me even to tears, old sire ;
What was the brave man's name ?
Tell me, that I, too, may admire,
And venerate his fame."
" They called him only the brave Walter ;
His farm lay near the Rhine." —
"God bless your old eyes ! 't was my father.
And that same farm is mine.
"Come, friend, you've seen some stormy weather.
With me is now your bed ;
We' 11 drink of Walter's grapes together.
And eat of Walter's bread."
"Now, — done ! I march in, then, to-morrow,;
You 're his true heir, I see ;
And when I die, your thanks, kind master.
The Turkish pipe shall be."
From the German of pfeffel. Trant-
latioD of Charles T. Brooks.
BINGEN ON THE RHINE.
A SOLDIER of the Legion lay dying in Algiers,
There was lack of woman's nursing, there was
dearth of woman's tears ;
But a comrade stood beside him, while his life-
blood ebbed away.
And bent, with pitying glances, to hear what he
might say.
The dying soldier faltered, and he took that
comrade's hand.
And he said, "I nevermore shall see my own,
my native land ;
Take a message, and a token, to some distant
friends of mine.
For I was born at Bingen, — at Bingen on the
Rhine.
" Tell my brothers and companions, when they
meet and crowd around.
To hear my mournful story, in the pleasant
vineyard ground.
That we fought the battle bravely, and when the
day was done.
Full many a corse lay ghastly pale beneath the
setting sun ;
And, mid the dead and dying, were some gi-own
old in wars, —
The death-wound on their gallant breasts, the
last of many scars ;
And some were young, and suddenly beheld life's
mom decline, —
And one had come from Bingen, — fair Bingen
on the Rhine.
" Tell my mother that her other sou shall com¬
fort her old age ;
For I was still a tmant bird, that thought his
home a cage.
For my father was a soldier, and even as a child
My heart leaped forth to hear him tell of strug¬
gles fierce and wild ;
And when he died, and left us to divide his
scanty hoard,
I let them take whate'er they would, —but kept
my father's sword ;v
And with boyish love I hung it where the bright
light used to shine.
On the cottage wall at Bingen, — calm Bingen
on the Rhine.
POEMS GE PEACE AND WAR.
a
And the soft moon rose up slowly, and calmly
she looked down
On the red sand of the battle-field, with bloody
corses strewn ;
Yes, calmly on that dreadful scene her pale light
seemed to shine,
As it shone on distant Bingen, — fair Bingen on
the Rhine.
Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton.
"Tell my sister not to weep for me, and sob
with drooping head,
When the troops come marching home again
with glad and gallant tread.
But to look upon them proudly, with a calm and
steadfast eye.
For her brother was a soldier too, and not afraid
to die ;
And if a comrade seek her love, I ask her in my
name
To listen to him kindly, without regret or shame.
And to hang the old sword in its place (my fath¬
er's sword and mine)
For the honor of old Bingen, — dear Bingen on
the Rhine.
"There's another, —not a sister ; in the happy
days gone by
You'd have known her by the merriment that
sparkled in her eye 5
Too innocent for coquetry, — too fond for idle
scorning, —
0 friend ! I fear the lightest heart makes some¬
times heaviest mourning !
Tell her the last night of my life (for, ere the
moon be risen.
My body will be out of pain, my soul be out of
prison), —
1 dreamed I stood with her, and saw the yellow
sunlight shine
On the vine-clad hills of Bingen, — fair Bingen
on the Rhine.
" I saw the blue Rhine sweep along, — I heard,
or seemed to hear.
The German songs we used to sing, in chorus
sweet and clear ;
And down the pleasant river, and up the slant¬
ing hill.
The echoing chorus sounded, through the evening
calm and still ;
And her glad blue eyes were on me, as we passed,
with friendly talk,
Down many a path beloved of yore, and well-
remembered walk !
And her little hand lay lightly, confidingly in
mine, —
But we '11 meet no more at Bingen, — loved
Bingen on the Rhine."
His trembling voice grew faint and hoarse, —
his gi'asp was childish weak, —
His eyes put on a dying look, — he sighed and
ceased to speak ;
His comrade bent to lift him, but the spark of
life had fled, —
The soldier of the Legion in a foreign land is
dead !
y
MY WIFE AND CHILD.*
The tattoo beats, — the lights are gone.
The camp around in slumber lies.
The night with solemn pace moves on,
The shadows thicken o'er the skies ;
But sleep my weary eyes hath flown.
And sad, uneasy thoughts arise.
I think of thee, 0 darling one.
Whose love my early life hath blest —
Of thee and him — our baby son —
Who slumbers on thy gentle breast.
God of the tender, frail, and lone,
0, guard the tender sleeper's rest !
And hover gently, hover near
To her whose watchful eye is wet, —
To mother, wife, — the doubly dear.
In whose young heart have freshly met
Two streams of love so deep and clear,
And cheer her drooping spirits yet.
Now, while she kneels before thy throne,
0, teach her. Ruler of the skies.
That, while by thy behest alone
Earth's mightiest powers fall or rise.
No tear is wept to thee unknown.
No hair is lost, no sparrow dies !
That thou canst stay the ruthless hands
Of dark disease, and soothe its pain ;
That only by thy stem commands
The battle's lost, the soldier's slain ;
That from the distant sea or land
Thou bring'st the wanderer home again.
And when upon her pillow lone
Her tear-wet cheek is sadly pressed.
May happier visions beam upon
The brightening current of her breast,
No frowning look or angry tone
Disturb tlie Sabbath of her rest !
* Written in the year 1846, in Mexico, the author being at that
time Colonel of the ist Regiment Georgia Volunteers.
El
WAR.
Whatever fate these forms may show.
Loved with a passion almost wild,
By day, by night, in joy or woe.
By fears oppressed, or hopes beguiled.
From every danger, every foe,
0 God, protect my wife and child !
Henry R. Jackson.
MONTEREY.
We were not many, — we who stood
Before the iron sleet that day ;
Yet many a gallant spirit would
Give half his years if but ho could
Have been with us at Monterey.
Now here, now there, the shot it hailed
In deadly drifts of fiery spray.
Yet not a single soldier quailed
When wounded comrades round them wailed
Their dying shout at Monterey.
And on, still on our column kept.
Through walls of ñame, its withering way ;
Where fell the dead, the living stept.
Still charging on the guns which swept
The slippery streets of Monterey.
The foe himself recoiled aghast,
When, striking where he strongest lay.
We swooped his flanking batteries past.
And, braving full their murderous blast.
Stormed home the towers of Monterey.
Our banners on those turrets wave,
And there our evening bugles play ;
Where orange boughs above their grave.
Keep green the memory of the brave
Who fought and fell at Monterey. '
We are not many, —we who pressed
Beside the brave who feU that day ;
But who of us has not confessed
He'd rather share their warrior rest
Than not have been at Monterey ?
Charles fenno Hoffman.
♦
IN STATE.
i.
0 Keeper of the Sacred Key,
And the Great Seal of Destiny,
Whose eye is the blue canopy,
Look down upon the warring world, and teU us
1 what the end will be.
t. 1—
"Lo, through the wintry atmosphere.
On the white bosom of the sphere,
A cluster of five lakes appear ;
And all the land looks like a couch, or warrior's
shield, or sheeted bier.
"And on that vast and hollow field.
With both lips closed and both eyes sealed,
A mighty Figure is revealed, —
Stretched at full length, and stiff and stark, as
in the hoUow of a shield.
"The winds have tied the drifted snow
Around the face and chin ; and lo.
The sceptred Giants come and go.
And shake their shadowy crowns and say : 'We
always feared it would be so ! '
" She came of an heroic race :
A giant's strength, a maiden's grace,
Like two in one seem to embrace.
And match, and blend, and thorough-blend, in
her colossal form and face.
"Where can her dazzling falchion be ?
One hand is fallen in the sea ;
The Gulf Stream drifts it far and free ;
And in that hand her shining brand gleams from
the depths resplendently.
" And by the other, in its rest.
The starry banner of the West
Is clasped forever to her breast ;
And of her silver helmet, lo, a soaring eagle is
the crest.
" And on her brow, a softened light.
As of a star concealed from sight
By some thin veil of fleecy white.
Or of the rising moon behind the raining vapors
of the night.
" The Sisterhood that was so sweet.
The Starry System sphered complete.
Which the mazed Orient used to greet.
The Four-and-Thirty fallen Stars glimmer and
glitter at her feet.
" And over her, — and over all.
For panoply and coronal, —
The mighty Immemorial,
And everlasting Canopy and Starry Arch and
Shield of All.
ii.
" Three cold, bright moons have marched and
wheeled ;
And the white cerement that revealed
A Figure stretched upon a Shield,
Is turned to verdure ; and the Land is now one
mighty Battle-field.
Ù
624
POEMS OP PEACE AND WAR.
"And lo, the children which she bred,
And more than all else cherishèd.
To make them true in heart and head.
Stand face to face, as mortal foes, with their
swords crossed above the dead.
" Each hath a mighty stroke and stride :
One true, — the more that he is tried ;
The other dark and evil-eyed ; —
And by the hand of one of them, his own dear
mother surely died !
" A stealthy step, a gleam of hell, —
It is the simple trath to tell, —
The Son stabbed and the Mother fell :
And so she lies, all mute and pale, and pure and
irreproachable !
"And then the battle-trumpet blew ;
And the true brpther sprang and drew
His blade to smite the traitor through ;
And so they clashed above the bier, and the
Night sweated bloody dew.
"And all their children, far and wide.
That are so greatly multiplied.
Rise up in frenzy and divide ;
And choosing, each whom he will serve, un¬
sheathe the sword and take their side.
"And in the low sun's bloodshot rays.
Portentous of the coming days.
The Two great Oceans blush and blaze.
With the emergent continent between them,
wrapt in crimson haze.
"Now whichsoever stand or fall.
As God is great, and mau is small.
The Truth shall triumph over all :
F orever and forevermore, the Truth shall triumph
over all !
iii.
" I see the champion sword-strokes flash ;
I see them fall and hear them clash ;
I hear the murderous engines crash ;
I see a brother stoop to loose a foeman-brother's
bloody sash.
" I see the torn and mangled corse.
The dead and dying heaped in scores.
The headless rider by his horse,
The wounded captive bayoneted through and
through without remorse.
" I hear the d3dng sufferer cry.
With his crushed face turned to the sky,
I see him crawl in agony
To the foul pool, and bow his head into
bloody slime, and die.
" I see the assassin crouch and fire,
I see his victim fall, — expire ;
I see the murderer creeping nigher
To strip the dead. He turns the head, — the
face ! The son beholds his sire !
I hear the curses and the thanks ;
I see the mad charge on the flanks.
The rents, the gaps, the broken ranks.
The vanquished squadrons driven headlong down
the river's bridgeless banks.
" I see the death-gripe on the plain.
The grappling monsters on the main.
The tens of thousands that are slain.
And all the speechless suflFering and agony of
heart and brain.
" I see the dark and bloody spots.
The crowded rooms and crowded cots.
The bleaching bones, the battle blots, —
And writ on many a nameless grave, a legend of
forget-me-nots.
" I see the gorged prison-den.
The dead line and the pent-up pen.
The thousands quartered in the fen.
The living-deaths of skin and bone that were the
goodly shapes of men.
"And stUl the bloody Dew must fell !
And His great Darkness with the PaU
Of His dread Judgment cover all,
Till the Dead Nation rise Transformed by Truth
to triumph over all ! "
"And Last — and Last 1 see — The Deed."
Thus saith the Keeper of the Key,
And the Great Seal of Destiny,
Whose eye is the blue canopy.
And leaves the Pall of His great Darkness over
all the Land and Sea.
FORCEYTHE WlLLSON.
THE PICKET-GUARD.
"All quiet along the Potomac," they say,
" Except now and then a stray picket
Is shot, as he walks on his béat, to and fro.
By a rifleman hid in the thicket.
'T is nothing : a private or two, now and then.
Will not count in the news of the battle ;
Not an officer lost, — only one of the men.
Moaning out, all alone, the death-rattle."
All quiet along the Potomac to-night.
Where the soldiers lie peacefully drèaming ;
Their tents in the rays of the clear autumn moon.
Or the Ught of the watch-fires, are gleaming.
WAR.
525
ra
A tremulous sigh, as the gentle night-wind
Through the forest leaves softly is creeping ;
While stars up above, with their glittering eyes.
Keep guard, — for the army is sleeping.
There's only the sound of the lone sentry's tread
As he tramps from the rock to the fountain.
And he thinks of the two in the low trundle-bed,
Far away in the cot on the mountain.
His musket falls slack ; his face, dark and grim,
Grows gentle with memories tender.
As he mutters a prayer for the children asleep.
For their mother, —may Heaven defend her !
The moon seems to shine just as brightly as then,
That night when the love yet unspoken
Leaped up to his lips,—when low, murmured vows
Were pledged to be ever unbroken ;
Then drawing his sleeve roughly over his eyes.
He dashes off tears that are welling.
And gathers his gun closer up to its place.
As if to keep down the heart-swelling.
He pas.ses the fountainJ the blasted' pine-tree, —
The footstep! is lagging and wearyi ;
Yet onward he goes, through the broad belt of
light,
Toward the shades of the forest so dreary.
Hark ! was it the night-wind that rustled the
leaves ?
Was it moonlight so wondrously flashing ?
It looked like a rifle : " Ha ! Mary, good-by ! "
And the life-blood is ebbing and plashing.
All qniet along the Potomac to-night, —
No sound save the rush of the river ;
While soft falld the dew on Ithè face of the dead, —
The picket 'sjoif duty forever. '•
1 ' Ethelin Eliot Beers.
3-.
CIVIL WAR.
"Rifleman, shoot me a faucy shot
Straight at the heart of yon prowling vidette ;
Ring me a ball in the glittering spot
That shines on his breast like an amulet ! "
" Ah, captain ! here goes for a flne-drawn bead.
There's music around when my barrel's in
tune ! "
Crack ! went the rifle, the messenger sped.
And dead from hishorse fell the ringing dragoon.
"Now, rifleman, steal through the bushes, and
snatch
From your victim some trinket to handsel fu'st
blood ;
A button, a loop, or that luminous patch
That gleams in the moon like a diamond stud !"
" 0 captain ! I staggered, and sunk on my track,
When I gazed on the face of that fallen vidette.
For he looked so like you, as he lay on his back.
That my heart rose upon me, and masters me
yet.
"But I snatched off the trinket, —this locket
of gold ;
An inch from the centre my lead broke its way.
Scarce grazing the picture, so fair to behold.
Of a beautiful lady in bridal array."
" Ha ! rifleman, fling me the locket I —'t is she.
My brother's young bride, and the fallen dra- ■
goon
Was her husband— Hush! soldier,'twas Heav¬
en's decree.
We must bury him there, by the light of the
moon !
"But, hark ! the far bugles their warnings unite ;
War is a virtue, — weakness a sin ;
There's a lurking and loping around us to-night ;
Load again, rifleman, keep your hand in ! "
Charles Dawson Shanly.
THE BRIER-W^GOD PIPE.
Ha ! bully for me again, when my turn for
picket is over.
And now for a smoke as I lie, with the moon¬
light, out in the clover.
My pipe, it's only a knot from the root of a
brier-wood tree.
But it turns my heart to the Northward — Harry
gave it to me.
And I'm but a rough at best, bred up to the
row and the riot ;
But a softness comes over my heart, when all
are asleep and quiet.
For, many a time, in the night, strange things
appear to my eye.
As the breath from my brier-wood pipe curls up
between me and the sky.
Last night a beautiful spirit arose with the
wisping smoke ;
0, I shook, but my heart felt good, as it spread
out its hands and spoke ;
Saying, " I am the soul of the brier ; we grew
at the root of a tree
Where lovers would come in the twilight, two
ever, for company.
#1
ß-
526
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
■a
h
" Where lovers would come in the morning —
ever but two, together ;
When the flowers were full in their blow ; the
birds, in their song and feather.
" Where lovers would come in the noontide,
loitering — never but two.
Looking in each other's eyes, like pigeons that
kiss and coo.
*' And 0, the honeyed words that came when
the lips were parted.
And the passion that glowed in the eyes, and the
lightning looks that darted !
" Enough : Love dwells in the pipe — so ever it
glows with fire !
I am the soul of the bush, and the spirits call
me Sweet Brier."
That's what the brier-wood said, as nigh as my
tongue can tell.
And the words went straight to my heart, like
the stroke of the fire-bell.
To-night I lie in the clover, watching the blos-
somy smoke ;
I'm glad the boys are asleep, for I ain't in the
humor to joke.
I lie in the hefty clover : up between me and
the moon
The smoke of my pipe arises : my heart will be
quiet, soon.
My thoughts are back in the city, I'm every¬
thing I've been ;
I hear the bell from the tower, I run with the
swift machine,
I see the red shirts crowding around the engine-
house door.
The foreman's hail through the trumpet comes
with a hollow roar.
The reel in the Bowery dance-house, the row in
the beer-saloon.
Where I put in my licks at Big Paul, come be¬
tween me and the moon.
I hear the drum and the bugle, the tramp of the
cow-skin boots.
We are marching on our muscle, the Fire-Zouave
recruits !
White handkerchiefs wave before me — 0, but
the sight is pretty
On the white marble steps, as we march through
the heart of the city.
Bright eyes and clasping arms, and lips that
bade us good hap ;
And the splendid lady who gave me the havelock
for my cap.
0, up from my pipe-cloud rises, there between
me and the moon,
A beautiful white-robed lady ; my heart will be
quiet, soon.
The lovely golden-haired lady ever in dreams I
see.
Who gave me the snow-white havelock — but
what does she care for me ?
Look at my grimy features ; mountains between
us stand :
I with my sledge-hammer knuckles, she with
her jewelled hand !
What care I ? — the day that's dawning may see
me, when all is over.
With the red stream of my life-blood staining
the hefty clover.
Hark ! the reveille sounding out on the morning
air ;
Devils are we for the battle — WUl there be
angels there ?
Kiss me again. Sweet Brier, the touch of your
lip to mine
Brings back the white-robed lady with hair like
the golden wine !
Charles dawson Shanly.
WOUNDED TO DEATH.
Steady, boys, steady !
Keep your arms ready,
God only knows whom we may meet here.
Don't let me be taken ;
I'd mther awaken.
To-morrow, in — no matter where.
Than lie in that foul prison-hole — over there.
Step slowly !
Speak lowly !
These rocks may have life.
Lay me down in this hollow ;
We are out of the strife.
By heavens ! the foemen may track me in blood.
For this hole in my breast is outpouring a flood.
No ! no surgeon for me ; he can give me no aid ;
The surgeon 1 want is pickaxe and spade.
What, Morris, a tear? Why, shame on ye, man !
I thought you a hero ; but since you began
To whimper and cry like a girl in her teens.
By George ! I don't know what the devü it means !
4^3
r
"1 • >—
L
1
1 ' j
WAR. 527
J
Well ! well ! I am rough ;'t is a very rough school, " Throw wide thy gates to let him in,
This life of a trooper, — but yet I'm no fool ! And take him, pleading, to thine arms ;
I know a brave man, and a friend from a foe ; Forgive, 0 Lord ! his life-long sin.
And, boys, that you love me I certainly know ; And quiet all his fierce alarms."
But was n't it grand
When they came down the hill over sloughing God bless you, my comrade, for saying that
and sand ! ' h3rmn ;
But we stood — did we not ? — like immovable It is light to my path when my eye has grown
rock, diriK
Unheeding their halls and repelling their shock. I am dying — bend down till I touch you once
Did you mind the loud cry more —
When, as turning to fly. Don't forget me, old fellow, — God prosper this
Our men sprang upon them, determined to die ? war !
0, was n't it grand ! Confusion to traitors ! — keep hold of my hand —
And float the old flag o'er a prosperous land 1
God help the poor wretches that fell in that fight ; john w. watson.
No time was there given for prayer or for flight ;
They fell by the score, in the crash, hand to hand, —♦—
And they mingled their blood with the sloughing
and sand. LEFT ON THE BATTLE-FIELD.
Huzza !
Great Heavens ! this bullet-hole gapes like a W hat, was it a dream ? am I all alone
grave ; In the dreary night and the drizzling rain ?
A curse on the aim of the traitorous knave ! Hist ! — ah, it was only the river's moan ;
Is there never a one of ye knows how to pray. They have left me behind with the mangled
Or speak for a man as his life ebbs away 1 slain.
Pray !
Pray ! Yes, now 1 remember it all too well !
We met, from the battling ranks apart ;
Our Father ! our Father !... why don t ye pro- Together our weapons flashed and fell,
' And mine was sheathed in his quivering heart.
Can't you see 1 am dying ? Great Gnd, how 1
bleed ! gyprggg gloom, where the deed was done,
Ebbmg ®^^y ! . , , But 1 heard his death-groans, one by one.
The light of the day holds me stUl in a cold embrace.
Is turmng to gray.
■ , He spoke but once, and I could not hear
- _ ^ The words he said, for the cannon's roar ;
Our Father m Heaven, — boys, teU me the rest, ^ . i, _i. u -.i, i ji i
.1. • i_ , . But my heart grew cold with a deadly fear, —
While I stanch the hot blood from this hole m , , -, , j , j .v • i, / i
, . 0 God ! 1 had heard that voice before I
my breast.
There's something about the forgiveness of sin — tx j , j x x xx > i
T> . xx X • 1 X xx X ■ . J xx Had heard it before at our mother s knee,
ruttliatm! put that m I — and then ,,,, i- j xx j ^ •
T „ J J When we lisped the words ot our evenmg
I 11 foUow your words and say an amen. , °
•' ■' prayer !
Here, Morris, old feUow, get hold of my hand ; brother ! would I had died for thee.
And, Wilson, my comrade — 0, was n't it grand This burden is more than my soul can bear !
When they came down the hill like a thunder-
charged cloud ! ^ pressed my lips to his death-cold cheek.
Where *s Wilson, my comrade ? — Here, stoop -^<1 Pegged him to show me, by word or sign,
down your head ; That he knew and forgave me : he could not
Can't you say a short prayer for the dying and speak,
¿gad ! nestled his poor cold face to mine.
"Christ God, who died for sinners all. The blood flowed fast from my wounded side.
Hear thou this suppliant wanderer's cry ; And then for a while 1 forgot my pain.
Let not e'en this poor sparrow fall And over the lakelet we seemed to glide
Unheeded by thy gracious eye. In our little boat, two boys again.
3-^ ^
e-
528
POEMS OP PEACE AND WAR.
And then, in my dream, we stood alone
On a forest path where the shadows fell ;
And I heard again the tremulous tone,
And the tender words of his last farewell.
But that parting was years, long years ago,
He wandered away to a foreign land ;
And our dear old mother will never know
That he died to-night by his brother's hand.
The soldiers who buried the dead away
Disturbed not the clasp of that last embrace.
But laid them to sleep till the judgment-day.
Heart folded to heart, and face to face.
Sarah T. Bolton.
y-
THE DRUMMEB-BOY'S BURIAL.
All day long .the storm of, battle through the
startled valley swept
All night long the stars in heaven o'er the slain
sad vigils kept.
O, the ghastly upturned faces gleaming whitely
through the night !
0, the heaps of mangled corses in that dim sepul¬
chral light !
One by one the pale stars faded, and at length
the morning broke ;
But not one of all the sleepers on that field of
death awoke.
Slowly passed the golden hours of that long
bright summer day.
And upon that field of carnage still the dead
unburied lay.
Lay there stark and cold, but pleading with a
dumb, unceasing prayer.
For a little dust to hide them from the staring
sun and air.
But the foeman held possession of that hard-won
battle-plain.
In unholy wrath denying even burial to our
slain.
Once again the night dropped round them,—
night so holy and so calm
That the moonbeams hushed the spirit, like the
sound of prayer or psalm.
On a couch of trampled grasses, just apart from
all the rest.
Lay a fair young boy, with small hands meekly
folded on his breast.
Death had touched him very gently, and he lay
as if in sleep ;
Even his mother scarce had shuddered at that
slumber calm and deep.
For a smile of wondrous sweetness lent a radi¬
ance to the face.
And the hand of cunning sculptor could have
added naught of grace
To the marble limbs so perfect in their passion¬
less repose.
Robbed of all save matchless purity by hard,
unpitying foes.
And the broken drum beside him all his life's
short story told :
How he did his duty bravely till the death-tide
o'er him rolled.
Midnight came with ebon garments and a diadem
of stars.
While right upward in the zenith hung the fiery
planet Mars.
Hark ! a sound of stealthy footsteps and of voices
whispering low.
Was it nothing but the young leaves, or the
brooklet's murmuring flow ?
Clinging closely to each other, striving never to
look round
As they passed with silent shudder the pale
corses on the ground.
Came two little maidens, — sisters, — with a
light and hasty tread.
And a look upon their faces, half of sorrow, half
of dread.
And they did not pause nor falter tiU, with
throbbing hearts, they stood
Where the drummer-boy was lying in that par¬
tial solitude.
They had brought some simple garments from
their wardrobe's scanty store.
And two heavy iron shovels in their slender
hands they bore.
Then they quickly knelt beside him, crushing
back the pitying tears.
For they had no time for weeping, nor for any
girlish fears.
And they robed the icy body, while no glow of
maiden shame
Changed the pallor of their foreheads to a flush
of lambent flame.
For their saintly hearts yearned o'er it in that
hour of sorest need,
And they felt that Death was holy, and it sanc¬
tified the deed.
But they smiled and kissed each other when
their new strange task was o'er,
And the form that lay before them its unwonted
garments wore.
Then with slow and weary labor a small grave
they hollowed out.
And they lined it with the withered grass and
leaves that lay about.
But the day was slowly breaking ere their holy
work was done.
And in crimson pomp the morning heralded
again the sun.
Gently then those little maidens — they were
children of our foes —
Laid the body of our drummer-boy to undis¬
turbed repose.
Anonymous.
BEFOEE SEDAN.
"The dead hand clasped a letter." — Special Corresporkdent*
Here in this leafy place.
Quiet he lies.
Cold, with his sightless face
Turned to the skies ;
'Tis but another dead —
AU you can say is said.
Carry his body hence, —
Kings must have slaves ;
Kings climb to eminence
Over men's graves.
So this man's eye is dim —
Throw the earth over him. .
What was the white you touched,
There at his side ?
Paper his hand had clutched
Tight ere he died ;
Message or wish, may be ; —
Smooth out the folds and see.
Hardly the worst of us
Here could have smiled ! -
Only the tremulous
Words of a chüd ; —
Prattle, that had for stops
Just a few ruddy drops.
t3.,_
529 ^
Look. She is sad to miss.
Morning and night.
His — her dead father's — kiss,
Tries to be bright.
Good to mamma, and sweet.
That is all. "Marguerite."
Ah, if beside the dead
Slumbered the pain !
Ah, if the hearts that bled
Slept with the slain !
If the grief died ! — But no : —
Death wiU not have it so.
AUSTIN DOBSON.
THE SOLDIER'S DREAM.
Our bugles.sang truce, —for the night-cloud had
lowered.
And the sentinel stars set their watch in the
sky;
And thousands had sunk on the ground over¬
powered.
The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die.
When reposing that night on my pallet of straw.
By the wolf-scaring fagot that guarded the
slain ;
At the dead of the night a sweet vision I saw.
And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again.
Methought from the battle-field's dreadful array,
Far, far I had roamed on a desolate track :
'T was autumn, — and sunshine arose on the way
To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me
back.
I flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft
In life's morning march, when my bosom was
young ;
I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft.
And knew the sweet strain that the corn-
reapers sung.
Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I
swore.
From my home and my weeping friends never
to part ;
My little ones kissed me a thousand times o'er.
And my wife sobbed aloud in her fulness of
heart.
" Stay, stay with us, — rest, thou art weary and
worn ; " |
And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay ; —
But sorrow returned with the dawning of mom, |
And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away.
thomas Campbell.
-E3
530
POEMS OP PEACE AND WAR.
WHERE ARE THE MEN?
Where are the men who went forth in the
morning,
Hope brightly beaming in every face ?
Fearing no danger, — the Saxon foe scorning, —
Little thought they of defeat or disgrace !
Fallen is their chieftain — his glory departed —
Fallen are the heroes who fought by his side !
Fatherless children now weep, broken-heai-ted.
Mournfully wandering by Ehuddlan's dark
tide !
Small was the band that escaped from the
slaughter.
Flying for life as the tide 'gan to flow ;
Hast thou no pity, thou dark rolling water ?
More cruel still than the merciless foe !
Death is behind them, and death is before them ;
Faster and faster rolls on the dark wave ;
One wailing cry — and the sea closes o'er them ;
Silent and deep is their watery grave.
From the Welsh of Talhaiarn. Trans¬
lation of Thomas Oliphant.
THE SOLDIER'S RETURN.
r I . ' \
How sweet it was to breathe that cooler air.
And take possession of'my father's chaii !
Beneath my elbow, on the solid frame.
Appeared the rough initials of my name.
Cut forty years before ! The same old clock
Struck the same bell, and gave my heart a shock
I never can forget. A short breeze sprung.
And while a sigh was trembling on my tongue.
Caught the old dangling almanacs behind,
And up they flew like banners in the wind ;
Then gently, singly, down, down, down they
went,
And told of twenty years that I had spent
Far from my native land. That instant came
A robin on the threshold ; though so tame.
At first he looked distrustful, almost shy.
And cast on me his coal-black steadfast eye.
And seemed to say, —past friendship to renew, —
" Ah ha ! old worn-out soldier, is it you ? "
While thus I mused, still gazing, gazing still.
On beds of moss that spread the window-sül,
I deemed no moss my eyes had ever seen
Had been so lovely, brilliant, fresh, and green.
And guessed some infant hand had placed it
there.
And prized its hue, so exquisite, so rare.
Feelings on feelings mingling, doubling rose ;
My heart felt everything but calm repose ;
I could not reckon minutes, hours, nor years.
But rose at once, and bursted into tears ;
Then, like a fool, confused, sat down again.
And thought upon the past with shame and pain ;
I raved at war and all its horrid cost.
And glory's quagmire, where the brave are lost.
On carnage, fire, and plimder long I mused.
And cursed the murdering weapons I had used.
Two shadows then I saw, two voices heard.
One bespoke age, and one a child's appeared.
In stepped my father with convulsive start.
And in an instant clasped me to his heart.
Close by him stood a little blue-eyed maid ;
And stooping to the child, the old man said,
"Come hither, Nancy, kiss me once again ;
This is your Uncle Charles, come home from
Spain."
The child approached,'and with her fingers light
Stroked my old eyes, almost deprived of sight.
But why thus spin my tale, — thus tedious be ?
Happy old soldier ! what's the world to me ?
robert bloomfield.
SOLDIER, REST! THY WARFARE O'ER.
from "the lady of the lake." cahto i.
Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er.
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking ;
Dream of battled fields no more.
Days of danger, nights of waking.
In our isle's enchanted hall.
Hands unseen thy couch are strewing.
Fairy strains of music fall.
Every sense in slumber dewing.
Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er.
Dream of fighting fields no more ;
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking,
Mom of toil, nor night of waking.
No rade sound shall reach thine ear.
Armor's clang, or war-steed champing.
Trump nor pibroch summon here
Mustering clan, or squadron tramping.
Yet the lark's shrill fife may come
At the daybreak from the fallow.
And the bittern sound his dram.
Booming from the sedgy shallow.
Ruder sounds shall none be near,
Guards nor warders challenge here ;
Here's no war-steed's neigh and champing.
Shouting clans or squadrons stamping.
Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done.
While our slumberous spells assail ye.
Dream not, with the rising sun.
Bugles here shall sound reveille.
Sleep ! the deer is in his den ;
Sleep I thy hounds are by thee lying ;
Sleep ! nor dream iij yonder glen
How thy gallant steed lay dying.
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WAR.
531
Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done ;
Think not of the rising sun,
For, at dawning to assail ye.
Here no bugles sound reveille.
Sir Waltrr Scott.
—«—
DRIVING HOME THE COWS.
v 1 > /
Out of the clover and blue-eyed grass
He turned them into the river-lane ;
One after another he let them pass.
Then fastened the meadow bars again.
Undei the willows, and over the hiU,
He patiently followed their sober pace ;
The merry whistle for once was still.
And something shadowed the sunny face.
Only'a boy ! and his father had said
He never could let his youngest go ;
Two already were lying dead
Under the feet of the trampling foe.
But after the evening work was done.
And the frogs were loud in the meadow-swamp.
Over his shoulder he slung his gun
And stealthily followed the foot-path damp.
Across the clover and through the wheat
With resolute heart and purpose grim.
Though cold was the dew on his hurrying feet.
And the blind bat's flitting startled him.
Thrice since then had the lanes been white.
And the orchards sweet with apple-bloom ;
And now, when the cows came back at night,
The feeble father drove them home.
For news had come to the lonely farm
That three were lying where two had lain ;
And the old man's tremulousj palsied arm
Could never lean on a son's again.
The summer day grew cool and late.
He went for the cows when the work was done ;
But down the lane, as he opened the gate.
He saw them coming one by one, —
Brindle, Ebony, Speckle, and Bess,
Shaking their horns in the evening wind ;
Cropping the buttercups out of the grass, —
But who was it following close behind ?
Loosely swung in the idle air
The empty sleeve of army blue ;
And worn and pale, from the crisping hair.
Looked out a face that the father knew.
For Southern prisons wiU sometimes yawn.
And yield their dead unto life again ;
And the day that comes with a cloudy dawn
In golden glory at last may wane.
The great tears sprang to their meeting eyes ;■
Förtha heart must speak when the lips are dumb;
And under the silent evening skies
Together they followed the cattle home.
Kate Putnam Osgood.
I
*—
DIRGE FOR A SOLDIER.*
I 1
Close his,eyes ; his^work is done !
What tojiim is, friend or,foeman, ^
Rise of,moon or^set of^un.
Hand of,man or |ciss of ^oman ? ,
Lay him low, lay him low.
In the clover or the snow !
What cares he ? he cannot know ;
Lay him low !
As man may, he fought his fight.
Proved his truth by his endeavor ;
Let him sleep in solemn night.
Sleep forever and forever.
Lay him low, lay him low.
In the clover or the snow !
What cares he ? he cannot know ;
Lay him low !
Fold him in his country's stars.
Roll the drum and fire the volley !
What to him are all our wars ? —
What but death-bemocking folly ?
Lay him low, lay him low.
In the clover or the snow !
What cares he ? he cannot know ;
Lay him low !
Leave him to God's watching eye ;
Trust him to the hand that made him.
Mortal love weeps idly by ;
God alone has power to aid him.
Lay him low, lay him low.
In the clover or the snow !
What cares he ? he cannot know ;
Lay him low !
george henry boker.
SOMEBODY'S DARLING.
prom "south songs."
Into a ward of the whitewashed walls
Where the dead and the dying lay —
Wounded by bayonets, shells, and balls —
Somebody's darling was borne one day.
* MaJor>GeneraI Philip Kearney, U. S. V«, killed at Chantill/t
Va., Sept, z, i86a.
-1 . • r
L
r
J L
532 POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
Somebody's darling ! so young and so brave, List, Songs ! your watch is long !
Wearing stiU on his pale, sweet face— The soldiers' guard was brief.
Soon to be hid by the dust of the grave — Whilst right is right, and wrong is wrong.
The lingering light of his boyhood's grace. Ye may not seek relief.
Matted and damp are the curls of gold, Go ! wearing the gray of grief !
Kissing the snow of that fair young brow ; Go ! watch o'er the Dead in Gray !
Pale are the lips of delicate mould — Go guard the private and guard the chief.
Somebody's darling is dying now. And sentinel their clay !
Back from the beautiful blue-veined face
Brush every wandering, silken thread ; the songs, in stately rhyme.
Cross his hands as a sign of grace — And with softly sounding tread.
Somebody's darling is still and dead ! forth, to watch for a time — a time.
Where sleep the Deathless Dead.
Kiss him once for Somebody's sake ;
Murmur a prayer, soft and low ; And the songs, like funeral dirge.
One bright curl from the cluster take — In music soft and low.
They were Somebody's pride, you know. Sing round the graves, — whilst hot tears surge
Somebody's hand hath rested there ; From hearts that are homes of woe.
Was it a mother's, soft and white ? , , , , ,
And have the lips of a sister fair ™ «0 sculptured shaft
Been baptized in those waves of light ? Immortahze each brave ?
What though no monument epitaphed
God knows best. He was Somebody's love ? built above each grave ?
Somebody's heart enshrined him here ;
Somebody wafted his name above, monuments are dust, -
Night and mom on the wings of prayer. ^he songs that guard our soldiers' clay
Somebody wept when he marched away,
Looking so handsome, brave, and grand ;
Somebody s kiss on his forehead lay ; With lifted head, and steady tread,
Somebody clung to his parting hand — Like stars that guard the skies,
Go watch each bed, where rest the dead.
Somebody s watchmg and waiting for him, j ^leepiess eyes.
Yearning to hold him again to her heart : abram j. ryan.
There he lies — with the blue eyes dim.
And smiling, child-like lips apart.
Tenderly bury the fair young dead, ODE
Pausing to drop on his grave a tear,
CalVe on the wooden slab at his head, [Sung on the occasion of decorating the graves of the Confederate
" Somebody's darling lies buried here ! " Cemetery. Charleston, s. C.j
ANONYMOUS. Sleep sweetly in your humble graves, —
1) Sleep, martyrs, of a fallen cause !
Though yet no marble column craves
SENTINEL SONGS. pilgrim here to pause.
When falls the soldier brave In seeds of laurel in the earth
Dead — at the feet of wrong, — The blossom of your fame is blown.
The poet sings, and guards his grave And somewhere, waiting for its birth.
With sentinels of song. The shaft is in the stone !
Songs, march ! he gives command, Meanwliile, behalf the tardy years
Keep faithful watch and true ; Which keep in trust your storied tombs.
The living and dead of the Conquered Land Behold ! your sisters bring their tears.
Have now no guards save you. And these memorial blooms.
Grave Ballads ! mark ye well ! Small tributes ! but your shades will smile
Thrice holy is your trust ! More proudly on these wreaths to-day.
Go ! halt ! by the fields where warriors fell. Than when some cannon-moulded pile
Rest arms ! and guard their dust. Shall overlook this bay.
1 - r
J
1
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WAR.
533
Stoop, angels, hither from the skies !
There is no holier spot of ground
Than where defeated valor lies.
By mourning beauty crowned !
Henry Timrod.
THE BLUE AND THE GRAY.
[The women of Columbus, Mississippi, strewed flowers alike on
the graves of the Confederate and the National soldiers. J
By the flow of the inland river.
Whence the fleets of iron have fled.
Where the blades of the grave-grass quiver,
Asleep are the ranks of the dead ; —
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment-day ; —
Under the one, the Blue ;
Under the other, the Gray.
These in the rollings of glory.
Those in the gloom of defeat.
All with the battle-blood gory.
In the dusk of eternity meet ; —
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment-day ; —
Under the laurel, the Blue ;
Under the willow, the Gray.
From the silence of sorrowful hours
The desolate mourners go.
Lovingly laden with flowers
Alike for the friend and the foe, —
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment-day ; —
Under the roses, the Blue ;
Under the lilies, the Gray.
So with an equal splendor
The morning sun-rays fall.
With a touch, impartially tender.
On the blossoms blooming for all ; —
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment-day ; —
'Broidered with gold, the Blue ;
Mellowed with gold, the Gray.
So, when the summer calleth.
On forest and field of grain
With an equal murmur falleth
The cooling drip of the rain ; —
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment-day ; —
Wet with the rain, the Blue ;
Wet with the rain, the Gray.
Sadly, but not with upbraiding.
The generous deed was done ;
In the storm of the years that are fading.
No braver battle was won ; —
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment-day ; —
Under the blossoms, the Blue ;
Under the garlands, the Gray.
No more shall the war-cry sever.
Or the winding rivers be red ;
They banish our anger forever
When they laurel the graves of our dead !
Under the sod and the dew.
Waiting the judgment-day ; —
Love and tears for the Blue,
Tears and love for the Gray.
Francis Miles Finch.
PEACE.
0 Land, of every land the best, —
0 Land, whose glory shall increase ;
Now in your whitest raiment drest
For the great festival of peace :
Take from your flag its fold of gloom.
And let it float undimmed above.
Till over all our vales shall bloom
The sacred colors that we love.
On mountain high, in valley low.
Set Freedom's living fires to burn ;
Until the midnight sky shall show
A redder glory than the mom.
Welcome, with shouts of joy and pride.
Your veterans from the war-path's track :
You gave your boys, untrained, untried ;
You bring them men and heroes back !
And shed no tear, though think you must
With sorrow of the martyred band ;
Not even for him whose hallowed dust
Has made our prairies holy land.
Though by the places where they fell.
The places that are sacred ground.
Death, like a sullen sentinel.
Paces his everlasting round.
Yet when they set their country free.
And gave her traitors fitting doom.
They left their last great enemy.
Baffled, beside an empty tomb.
Not there, but risen, redeemed, they go
Where all the paths are sweet with flowers ;
They fought to give us peace, and lo !
They gained a better peace than ours.
PHŒBE CARY.
534
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
PEACE.
ODE TO PEACE.
DAtTGHTEE of God ! that sitt'st on high
Amid the dances of the sky,
And guidest with thy gentle sway
The planets on their tuneful way ;
Sweet Peace ! shall ne'er again
The smile of thy most holy face,
From thine ethereal dwelling-place.
Rejoice the wretched, weary race
Of discord-breathiug meu ?
Too long, 0 gladness-giving Queen !
Thy tarrying in heaven has been ;
Too long o'er this fair blooming world
The flag of blood has been unfurled.
Polluting God's pure day ;
Whilst, as each maddening people reels.
War onward drives his scythed wheels.
And at his horses' bloody heels
Shriek Murder and Dismay.
Oft have I wept to hear the cry
Of widow wailing bitterly ;
To see the parent's silent tear
For children fallen beneath the spear ;
And I have felt so sore
The sense of humau guilt and woe.
That I, in Virtue's passioned glow.
Have cursed (my soul was wounded so)
The shape of man I bore !
Then come from thy serene abode.
Thou gladness-giving child of God !
And cease the world's ensanguined strife.
And reconcile my soul to life ;
For much I long to see.
Ere I shall to the gi-ave descend.
Thy hand its blessèd branch extend.
And to the. world's remotest end
Wave Love and Harmony !
William Tennant.
THE BATTLE-FIELD.
Once this soft turf, this rivulet's sands.
Were trampled by a hurrying crowd.
And fiery hearts and armed hands
Encountered in the battle-cloud.
Ah ! never shall the land forget
How gushed the life-blood of her brave, —
Gushed, warm with hope and courage yet.
Upon the soil they fought to save.
Now all is calm and fresh and still ;
Alone the chirp of flitting bird,
And talk of children on the hill.
And hell of wandering kine, are heard.
No solemn host goes trailing by
The black-mouthed gun and staggering wain ;
Men start not at the battle-cry, —
0, be it never heard again !
Soon rested those who fought ; but thou
Who minglest in the harder strife
For truths which men receive not now.
Thy warfare only ends with life.
A friendless warfare ! lingering long
Through weaiy day and weary year ;
A wild and many-weaponed throng
Hang on thy front and flank and rear.
Yet nerve thy spirit to the proof,
And blench not at thy chosen lot ;
The timid good may stand aloof.
The sage may frown, — yet faint thou not.
Nor heed the shaft too surely cast.
The foul and hissing bolt of scorn ;
For with thy side shall dwell, at last.
The victory of endurance born.
Truth, crushed to earth, shall rise again, —
The eternal yeai-s of God are hers ;
But Error, wounded, writhes in pain.
And dies among his worshippers.
Yea, though thou lie upon the dust.
When they who helped thee flee in fear.
Die full of hope and manly trust.
Like those who fell in battle here I
Another hand thy sword shall wield.
Another hand the standard wave,
Tül from the trumpet's mouth is pealed
The blast of triumph o'er thy grave.
William Gullen Bryant.
NOT ON THE BATTLE-FIELD.
•' To fall on the battle-field fighting for my dear country, — that
would not be hard. " — The Neighbors.
o NO, no, — let me lie
Not on a field of battle when I die !
Let not the iron tread
Of the mad war-horse crush my helmed head ;
PEACE.
535
a
Nor let the reeking knife,
That I have drawn again.st a brother's life,
Be in my hand when Death
Thunders along, and tramples me beneath
His heavy squadron's heels,
Or gory felloes of his cannon's wheels.
From such a dying bed,
Though o'er it float the stripes of white and red,
And the bald eagle brings
The clustered stars upon his wide-spread wings
To sparkle in my sight,
0, never let my spirit take her flight !
I know that beauty's eye
Is all the brighter where gay pennants fly.
And brazen helmets dance.
And sunshine flashes on the lifted lance ;
1 know that bards have sung,
And people shouted till the welkin rung.
In honor of the brave
Who on the battle-field have found a grave ;
I know that o'er their bones
Have grateful hands piled monumental stones.
Some of those piles I've seen :
The one at Lexington upon the green
Where the first blood was shed.
And to my country's independence led ;
And others, on our shore.
The " Battle Monument " at Baltimore,
And that on Bunker's Hill.
Ay, and abroad, a few more famous still ;
Thy "tomb," Themistocles,
That looks out yet upon the Grecian seas.
And which the waters kiss
That issue from the gulf of Salamis.
And thine, too, have I seen.
Thy mound of earth, Patroclus, robed in green.
That, like a natural knoll.
Sheep climb and nibble over as they stroll.
Watched by some turbaned boy.
Upon the margin of the plain of Troy.
Such honors grace the bed,
I know, whereon the warrior lays his head.
And hears, as life ebbs out.
The conquered flying, and the conqueror's shout ;
But as his eye grows dim.
What is a column or a mound to him ?
What, to the parting soul,
The mellow note of bugles ? What the roll
Of drums ? No, let me die
Where the blue heaven bends o'er me lovingly,
And the soft summer air.
As it goes by me, stirs my thin white hair.
And from my forehead dries
The death-damp as it gathers, and the skies
Seem waiting to receive
My soul to their clear depths ! Or let me leave
The world when round my bed
Wife, children, weeping friends are gatherèd.
And the calm voice of prayer
And holy hymning shall my soul prepare
To go and he at rest
With kindred spirits, — spirits who have blessed
The human brotherhood
By labors, cares, and counsels for their good.
John fierpont.
MY AUTUMN WALK.
On woodlands ruddy with autumn
The amber sunshine lies ;
I look on the beauty round me.
And tears come into my eyes.
For the wind that sweeps the meadows
Blows out of the far Southwest,
Where our gallant men are fighting.
And the gallant dead are at rest.
The golden-rod is leaning.
And the purple aster waves
In a breeze from the land of battles,
A breath from the land of graves.
Full fast the leaves are dropping
Before that wandering breath ;
As fast, on the field of battle.
Our brethren fall in death.
Beautiful over my pathway
The forest spoils are shed ;
They are spotting the grassy hillocks
With purple and gold and red.
Beautiful is the death-sleep
Of those who bravely fight
In their country's holy quarrel.
And perish for the Right.
But who shall comfort the living.
The light of whose homes is gone :
The bride that, early widowed.
Lives broken-hearted on ;
The matron whose sons are lying
In graves on a distant shore ;
The maiden, whose promised husband
Comes back from the war no more ?
I look on the peaceful dwellings
Whose windows glimmer in sight.
With croft and garden and orchard
That bask in the mellow light ;
■g
536
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
And 1 know that, when our couriers
With news of victory come,
They will bring a bitter message
Of hopeless grief to some.
Again I turn to the woodlands,
And I shudder as I see
The mock-grape's * hlood-red banner
Hung out on the cedar-tree ;
And I think of days of slaughter,
And the night-sky red with flames.
On the Chattahoochee's meadows.
And the wasted banks of the James.
O for the fresh spring-season.
When the groves are in their prime.
And far away in the future
Is the frosty autumn-time !
0 for that better season.
When the pride of the foe shall yield,
And the hosts of God and Freedom
March back from the well-won field ;
And the matron shall clasp her first-bom
With tears of joy and pride ;
And the scarred and war-worn lover
Shall claim his promised bride !
The leaves are swept from the branches ;
But the living buds are there.
With folded flower and foliage.
To sprout in a kinder air.
William Collen Bryant.
BARCLAY OF URY.
Up the streets of Aberdeen,
By the kirk and college green.
Rode the laird of'Ury ;
Close behind him, close beside,'
Foul of mouth and evil-eyed.
Pressed the mob in fury.
Flouted him the drunken churl,
Jeered at him the serving-girl.
Prompt to please her master ;
And the begging carlin, late
Fed and clothed at Ury's gate.
Cursed him as he passed her.
Yet vrith calm and stately mien
Up the streets of Aberdeen
Came he slowly riding ;
* Ampélopsis, mock>grapô the botanical name of the Virginia
creeper.
And to all he saw and heard
Answering not with bitter word.
Turning not for chiding.
Came a troop with broadswords swinging.
Bits and bridles sharply ringing.
Loose and free and froward :
Quoth the foremost, " Ride him down !
Push him ! prick him ! through the town
Drive the Quaker coward ! "
But from out the thickening crowd
Cried a sudden voice and loud :
" Barclay ! Ho ! a Barclay ! "
And the old man at his side
Saw a comrade, battle-tried.
Scarred and sunburned darkly j
Who, with ready weapon bare.
Fronting to the troopers there.
Cried aloud : " God save us !
Call ye coward him who stood
Ankle-deep in Lutzen's blood,
With the brave Gustavus ? "
"Nay, I do not need thy sword.
Comrade mine," said Ury's lord ;
" Put it up, I pray thee.
Passive to his holy will,
Trast I in my Master still.
Even though he slay me.
" Pledges of thy love and faith.
Proved on many a field of death.
Not by me are needed."
MarveRed much that henchman bold.
That his laird, so stout of old.
Now so meekly pleaded.
" Woe's the day," he sadly said.
With a slowly shaking head.
And a look of pity ;
" Ury's honest lord reviled.
Mock of knave and sport of child.
In his own good city !
" Speak the word, and, master mine.
As we charged on Tilly's line.
And his Walloon lancers.
Smiting through their midst, we '11 teach
CivU look and decent speech
To these boyish prancers ! "
" Marvel not, mine ancient friend, —
Like beginning, like the end ! " '
Quoth the laird of Ury ;
*' Is the sinful servant more
Than his gracious Lord who bore -
Bonds and stripes in Jewry ?
f
PEACE.
537
a
" Give me joy that in his name
1 can bear, with patient frame,
All these vain ones offer ;
While for them he suffered long.
Shall I answer wrong with wrong,
Scoffing with the scoffer ?
" Happier I, with loss of all, —
Hunted, outlawed, held in thrall.
With few friends to greet me,—
Than when reeve and squire were seen
Hiding out from Aberdeen
With bared heads to meet me ;
" When each goodwife, o'er and o'er.
Blessed me as I passed her door ;
And the snooded daughter.
Through her casement glancing down.
Smiled on him who bore renown
From red fields of slaughter.
" Hard to feel the stranger's scoff.
Hard the old friends' falling off.
Hard to leam forgiving ;
But the Lord his own rewards.
And his love with theirs accords
Warm and fresh and living.
" Through this dark and stormy night
Faith beholds a feeble light
Up the blackness streaking ;
Knowing God's own time is best,
In a patient hope I rest
For the full day-breaking ! "
So the laird of Ury said.
Turning slow his horse's head
Towards the Tolbooth prison.
Where, through iron gates, he heard
Poor disciples of the Word
Preach of Christ arisen !
Not in vain, confessor old.
Unto us the tale is told
Of thy day of trial !
Every age on him who strays
From its broad and beaten ways
Pours its seven-fold vial.
Happy he whose inward ear
Angel comfortings can hear.
O'er the i-abble's laughter ;
And, while hatred's fagots burn.
Glimpses through the smoke discern.
Of the good hereafter.
Knowing this, —that never yet
Share of truth was vainly set
In the world's wide fallow :
After hands shall sow the seed.
After hands from hill and mead
Heap the harvests yellow.
Thus, with somewhat of the seer.
Must the moral pioneer
From the future borrow, —
Clothe the waste with dreams of grain.
And, on midnight's sky of rain.
Paint the golden morrow !
John Greenlbap Whittier.
TUBAL CAIN.
Old Tubal Cain was a man of might.
In the days when earth was young ;
By the fierce red light of his furnace bright,
The strokes of his hammer rung :
And he lifted high his brawny hand
On the iron glowing clear.
Till the sparks rushed out in scarlet showers.
As he fashioned the sword and the spear.
And he sang : " Hurrah for my handiwork !
Hurrah for the spear and the sword !
Hurrah for the hand that shall wield them well.
For he shall be king and lord."
To Tubal Cain came many a one.
As he wrought by bis roaring fire.
And each one prayed for a strong steel blade
As the crown of his desire :
And he made them weapons sharp and strong.
Till they shouted loud for glee.
And gave him gifts of pearl and gold.
And spoils of the forest free.
And they sang : " Hurrah for Tubal Cain,
Who hath given us strength anew !
Hurrah for the smith, hurrah for the fire.
And hurrah for the metal true ! "
But a sudden change came o'er his heart,
Ere the setting of the sun.
And Tubal Cain was filled with pain
For the evil he had done ;
He saw that men, with rage and hate.
Made war upon their kind.
That the land was red with the blood they shed.
In their lust for carnage blind.
And he said ; " Alas ! that ever I made.
Or that skill of mine should plan.
The spear and the sword for men whose joy
Is to slay their fellow-man ! "
And for many a day old Tubal Cain
Sat brooding o'er his woe ;
And his hand forbore to smite the ore.
And his furnace smouldered low.
-0
fi¬
sse
POEMS OF PEACE AND WAR.
But he rose at last with a cheerful face,
And a bright courageous eye,
And bared his strong right arm for work.
While the quick flames mounted high.
And he sang : " Hurrah for my handiwork ! "
And the red sparks lit the air ;
"Not alone for the blade was the bright steel
made," —
And he fashioned the first ploughshare.
And men, taught wisdom from the past.
In friendship joined their hands.
Hung the sword in the hall, the spear on the wall.
And ploughed the willing lands ;
And sang : " Hurrah for Tubal Cain !
Our stanch good friend is he ;
And for the ploughshare and the plough
To him our praise shall be.
But while oppression lifts its head.
Or a tyrant would be lord,
Though we may thank him for the plough.
We 'U not forget the sword ! "
Charles Mackay.
o-
THE BATTLE OF BLENHEIM.
[The battle of Blenheim in Bavaria was fought Aug. 13, 1704,
between the troops of the English and Austrians on one side, under
the Duke of Marlborough and Prince Eugene, and the French and
Bavarians on the other side, led by Marshal Tallart and the Elec¬
tor of Bavaria. The latter party was defeated, and the schemes of
Louis XIV. of France were materially checked thereby.]
It was a summer evening, —
Old Kaspar's work was done.
And he before his cottage door
Was sitting in the sun ;
And by him sported on the green
His little grandchild Wilhelmine.
She saw her brother Peterkin
Roll something large and round.
Which he beside the rivulet.
In pla3ring there, had found ;
He came to ask what he had found
That was so large and smooth and round.
Old Kaspar took it from the hoy,
Who stood expectant by ;
And then the old man shook his head.
And, with a natural sigh, —
" 'T is some poor fellow's skull," said he,
" Who fell in the great victory.
" I find them in the garden.
For there's many hereabout ;
And often, when I go to plough.
The ploughshare turns them out ;
For many thousand men," said he,
" Were slain in the great victory."
" Now tell us what't was all about;"
Young Peterkin he cries ;
And little Wilhelmine looks up
With wonder-waiting eyes, —
" Now tell us aU about the war,
And what they fought each other for."
" It was the English," Easpar cried,
" Who put the French to rout ;
But what they fought each other for
I could not well make out ;
But everybody said," quoth he,
"That't was a famous victory.
" My father lived at Blenheim then.
Yon little stream hard by ;
They burnt his dwelling to the ground.
And he was forced to fly ;
So with his wife and child he fled.
Nor had he where to re.st his head.
" With fire and sword the country round
Was wasted far and wide ;
And many a childing mother there.
And new-bom baby died ;
But things like that, you know, must be
At every famous victory.
" They say it was a shocking sight
After the field was won, —
For many thousand bodies here
Lay rotting in the sun ;
But things like that, you know, must be
After a famous victory.
" Great praise the Duke of Marlborough won.
And our good Prince Eugene."
"Why, 't was a very wicked thing ! "
Said little Wilhelmine.
" Nay, nay, my little girl ! " quoth he,
" It was a famous victory.
" And everybody praised the duke
Who this great fight d'd win."
"But what good came ^*it at last?"
Quoth little Peterki 1.
" Why, that I cannot tell," .«aid he ;
" But 'twas a famous victory."
Robert sowthev.
THE KNIGHT'S TOMB.
Where is the grave of Sir Arthur O'Kellyn ?
Where may the grave of that good man be ? —
By the side of a spring, on the breast of Hel-
vellyn.
Under the twigs of a young birch-tree !
(&
FRAGMENTS.
539
ra
The oak that in summer was sweet to hear,
And rustled its leaves in the fall of the year,
And whistled and roared in the winter alone.
Is gone, — and the birch in its stead is grown. -
The knight's bones are dust.
And his good sword rust ; —
His soul is with the saints, I trust.
samuel Taylor Coleridge.
FRAGMENTS.
"Warfare.
In every heart
Are sown the sparks that kindle fiery war ;
Occasion needs but fan them, and they blaze.
The Task : Winter Maminff Walk. CoWPER.
And Csesar's spirit, ranging for revenge.
Cry " Havock ! " and let slip the dogs of war.
Julius Casar, Actm. Se. i. SHAKESPEARE.
My sentence is for open war ; of wiles
More unexpert I boast not : them let those
Contrive who need, or when they need, not now.
Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTON.
A weak invention of the enemy.
Richard III., Act. v. Sc, 3. COLLEY ClBBER.
All delays are dangerous in war.
Tyrannic Love, Act i. Sc u Drvden.
Dangers of Peace.
Long peace, I find.
But nurses dangerous humors up to strength.
License and wanton rage, which war alone
Can purge away.
Miulafha. D. MALLET.
They sit them down just where they were before,
Till for new scenes of woe peace shall their force
restore.
Castle of Indolence, Cant, x* J- THOMSON«
War its thoiisanda slays, Peace its ten thousands.
Deaths b. porteus.
'S
Pleasures of "War.
0 War ! thou hast thy fierce delight.
Thy gleams of joy intensely bright !
Such gleams as from thy polished shield
Fly dazzling o'er the battle-field !
Lordof the Isles. scott.
O, the sight entrancing,
When morning's beam is glancing
O'er files airayed
With helm and blade.
And plumes, in the gay wind dancing I
When hearts are all high beating.
And the trumpet's voice repeating
That song, whose breath
May lead to death.
But never to retreating.
0, the sight entrancing.
When morning's beam is glancing
O'er files arrayed
With helm and blade.
And plumes, in the gay wind dancing.
O, the sight entrancing-. T; moore.
The tyrant custom, most grave senators.
Hath made the fiinty and steel couch of war
My thrice-driven bed of down.
Othello, Act L Sc. 3.
SHAKESPEARE.
The True Soldier.
Unbounded courage and compassion joined.
Tempering each other in the victor's mind.
Alternately proclaim him good and great.
And make the hero and the man complete.
And, pleased the Almighty's orders to perform.
Rides in the whirlwind and directs the storm.
The Campaign. addison.
So restless Cromwell could not cease
In the inglorious arts of peace.
But through adventurous war
Urged his active star.
A Horatian Ode: Upon CromtvelCs Return from Ireland.
a. marveli.
Wut's words to them whose faith an' truth
On War's red techstone rang true metal.
Who ventered life an' love an' youth
For the gret prize o' death in battle ?
The Biglov* Papers, Second Series, No. x. J« R. LOWELC
Who, doomed to go in company with Pain,
And Fear, and Bloodshed, miserable train !
Turns his necessity to glorious gain.
In face of these doth exercise a power
Which is our human nature's highest dower ;
Controls them and subdues, transmutes, bereaves
Of their bad influence, and their good receives.
But who, if he be called upon to face
Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined
Great issues, good or bad for humankind.
Is happy as a Lover ; and attired
With sudden brightness, like a Man inspired ;
-SI
— -a
540 POEMS OP PEACE AND WAR.
And, through, the heat of conflict, keeps the law
In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw.
Who, not content that former worth stand fast,
Looks forward persevering to the last
Prom well to better, daily self-surpast ;
Finds comfort in himself and in his cause ;
And while the mortal mist is gathering, draws
His breath in confidence of Heaven's applause.
Character of the Happy fVarrior^ wordsworth.
Challenge and Defiance.
Dnder which king, Bezonian ? speak, or die.
Hing Henry IV-, Part II. Act v. Sc. 3. SHAK£SP£ARE1
Fly they that need to fly ;
Wördes fearen babes. I meane not to thee entreat
To passe ; but maugre thee wül passe or dy.
Fairie Quant. SPENSER.
Hang out our banners on the outward walls ;
The cry is still, They arme. Our castle's strength
Will laugh a siege to scorn : here let them lie
Till famine and the ague eat them up.
Macàtth, Act.. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE-
Peeparation and Battle.
Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel ; but, being in.
Bear't that the opposèd may beware of thee.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 3.
SHAKESPEARE.
From the tents,
The armorers, accomplishing the knights,
With busy hammers closing rivets up,
Give dreadful note of preparation.
King Henry V., Act iv. Chorus. SHAKESPEARE.
Now the storm begins to lower,
(Haste, the loom of hell prepare, )
Iron sleet of arrowy shower
Hurtles in the darkened air.
Glitteiing lances are the loom.
Where the dusky warp we strain.
Weaving many a soldier's doom,
Orkney's woe, and Randoer's bane.
The Fatal Sisters.
T. Gray.
That voice . . . heard so oft
In worst extremes, and on the perilous edge
Of battle when it raged.
Paradise Lost, Book l milton.
Lay on, Macduff ;
And damned be him that first cries, " Hold,
enough ! "
Mscteth, Act v. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
A horse ! a horse ! My kingdom for a horse !
King Richard IH„ Act.. Sc. h. SHAKESPEARE.
The neighyinge of the war-horse prowde,
The rowlinge of the drum,
The clangor of the trumpet lowde.
Be soundes from heaven that come ;
And oh! the thundering presse of knightes,
Whenas their war-cryes swell.
May tole from heaven an angel brighte.
And rouse a fiend from heU.
Cazmlier's Song. W. MOTHERWELU
Defeat.
What though the field be lost?
All is not lost ; the unconquerable wUl,
And study of revenge, immortal hate.
And courage never to submit or yield.
And what is else not to be overcome.
Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON«
At a frown they in their glory die.
The painful warrior, famoused for fight.
After a thousand victories ®nce foiled.
Is from the books of honor razed quite,
And all the rest forgot for which he toiled.
Sonnet KKK. SHAKESPEARE.
CotTRAGE AND FeAE.
He called so loud that aU the hollow deep
Of Hell resounded.
Awake, arise, or be forever fallen !
Paradise Lost, Book i.
Miltok,
Ay me ! what perils do environ
The man that meddles with cold iron.
Hudibras, Part I. Cant. iii. S. BUTLER.
For he who fights and runs away*
May live to fight another day ;
But he who is in battle slain
Can never rise and fight again.
The Art <1/ Poetry on a New Plan.
Goldsmith.
* Bartlett, in his Familiar Quoiatiotis, groups with this stanza
thefoUowing
He that fights and runs away
May turn and fight another day
But he that is in battle slain
Will never rise to fight again.
Ray's History of the Rebellion, p. 48. Bristol. X752.
That same man, that runnith awaie,
Maie again fight an other daie.
Erasmus, Apothegms, Trans, by Udall, 1543.
For those that fly may fight ^ain.
Which be can never do that's slain.
Butler, Hudibras. Part HI, Cant, 3.
-3
FRAGMENTS.
541
a
Never be it said
That Fate itself could awe the soul of Richard.
Hence, babbling dreams ; you threaten here in
vain I
Conscience, avaunt, Richard's himself again !
Hark ! the shrill trumpet sounds. To horse !
away !
My soul's in arms, and eager for the fray.
Shakespeavis Richard III (Altered), Act, v. Sc. 3.
Colley Gibber.
When Greeks joined Greeks, then was the tug
of war.
Alexander the Great, Act iv. Sc. a* N. Lee.
War, war is still the cry,— "war even to the
knife!"
Childe Harold, Cant, i. BYRON,
By how much unexpected, by so much
We must awake endeavor for defence.
For courage mounteth with occasion.
King John, ActW. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
Blow, wind! come, wrack!
At least we '11 die with harness on our back.
liacbilh. Act v. Sc. S- SHAKESPEARE.
Hoeroes of Wae.
He is come to ope
The purple testament of bleeding war ;
But ere the crown he looks for live in peace,
Ten thousand bloody crowns of mothers' sons
Shall iU become the flower of England's face,
Change the complexion of her maid-pale peace
To scarlet indignation, and bedew
Her pastures' grass with faithful English blood.
Kit%g Richard II,, Act iii. Sc, 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Some undone widow sits upon mine arm.
And takes away the use of it ; and my sword.
Glued to my scabbard with wronged orphans'
tears,
WUl not be drawn.
A New Way to pay Old Debts, Acty, Se, u P. MASSINGER.
Mark where his carnage and his conquest cease !
He makes a solitude, and calls it — peace !
The Bride oPAbydos, Cant. ii. BYRON.
Criminauty of War.
One to destroy is murder by the law ;
And gibbets keep the lifted hand in awe ;
To murder thousands takes a specious name.
War's glorious art, and gives immortal fame.
Love ((fFame, Satire vU. DR. £. YOUNC;
Ez fer war, I call it murder, —
There you hev it plain an' flat ;
I don't want to go no furder
Than my Testyment fer that.
The Biglow Papers, First Series, No. i. J, R. LOWELL.
One murder made a villain.
Millions a hero. Princes were privileged
To kill, and numbers sanctified the crime.
Death. B. PORTEOS.
Great princes have great playthings.
But war's a game which, were their subjects wise.
Kings would not play at.
The Task ; Winter Morning Walk, COWPER.
Peace.
Take away the sword ;
States can be saved without it.
Richelieu, Act ii. Sc. 2. E. BULWER-LVTTOM.
Now is the winter of our discontent
Made glorious summer by this sun of York,
Apd aU the clouds that lowered upon our house
In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.
Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths ;
Our bruisëd arms hung up for monuments ;
Our stem alarums changed to merry meetings.
Our dreadful marches to delightful measures.
Grim-visaged War hath smoothed his wrinkled
front.
And now, instead of mounting barbëd steeds
To fright the souls of fearful adversaries.
He capers nimbly in a lady's chamber.
To the lascivious pleasing of a lute.
King RichardJII., Act i. Sc, z. SHAKESPEARE.
Ay, but give me worship and quietness ;
I like it better than a dangerous honor.
King Henry VI., Part III, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
0 Peace ! thou source and soul of social life ;
Beneath whose calm inspiring influence
Science his views enlarges. Art refines.
And swelling Commerce opens aU. her ports.
Britannia, J. THOMSON.
Till each man finds his own in all men's good.
And all men work in noble brotherhood.
Breaking their mailed fleets and armfed towers.
And ruling by obeying Nature's powers.
And gathering all the fruits of peace and crowned
with all her flowers.
Ode, sung at the Opening of the International Exhibition.
Tennyson.
e-
•a
e
POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
¡B-
■s
POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
TEMPERANCE.
MORAL COSMETICS.
Ye who would have your features florid,
Lithe limbs, bright eyes, unwrinkled forehead,
From age's devastation horrid.
Adopt this plan, —
'T will make, in climate cold or torrid,
A hale old man :
Avoid in youth luxurious diet.
Restrain the passions' lawless riot ;
Devoted to domestic quiet.
Be wisely gay ;
So shall ye, spite of age's fiat.
Resist decay.
Seek not in Mammon's worship pleasure.
But find your richest, dearest treasure
In God, his word, his work, not leisure :
The mind, not sense.
Is the sole seale by whieh to measure
Your opulence.
This is the solace, this the science,
Life's purest, sweetest, best appliance.
That disappoints not man's reliance,
Whate'er his state ;
But challenges, with calm defiance.
Time, fortune, fate.
Horace Suith.
THE WATER-DRINKER.
0, water for me ! Bright water for me I
Give wine to the tremulous debauchee !
It cooleth the brow, it cooleth the brain.
It maketh the faint one strong again ;
It comes o'er the sense like a breeze from the sea.
All freshness, like infant purity.
0, water, bright water, for me, for me !
Give wine, give wine to the debauchee !
Pill to the brim ! Fill, fill to the brim !
Let the flowing crystal kiss the rim !
'3
My hand is steady, my eye is true.
For I, like the flowers, drink naught but dew.
0, water, bright water's a mine of wealth.
And the ores it yieldeth are vigor and health.
So water, pure water, for me, for me !
And wine for the tremulous debauchee !
Fill again to the brim ! again to the brim !
For water strengtheneth life and limb.
To the days of the aged it addeth length ;
To the might of the strong it addeth strength ;
It freshens the heart, it brightens the sight ;
*T is like quaffing a goblet of morning light.
So, water, I will drink naught but thee.
Thou parent of health and energy !
Edward Johnson.
THE OLD MAN'S COMFORTS,
and how he gained them.
" You are old. Father William," the young man
cried ;
" The few locks which are left you are gray ;
You are hale. Father William, a hearty old man ;
Now tell me the reason, I pray."
" In the days of my youth," Father William
replied,
" I remembered that youth would fly fast.
And abused not my health and my vigor at first.
That I never might need them at last."
" You are old. Father WiUiam," the young man
cried,
" And pleasures with youth pass away ;
And yet you lament not the days that are gone ;
Now tell me the reason, I pray."
"In the days of my youth," Father William
replied,
" I remembered that youth could not last ;
I thought of the future, whatever I did.
That I never might grieve for the past."
546
POEMS OP TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
" You are old, Father William," the young man
cried,
" And life must be hastening away ;
You are cheerful, and love to converse upon death ;
Now tell me the reason, I pray."
"I am cheerful, young man," Father William
replied ;
" Let the cause thy attention engage ;
In the days of my youth I remembered my God !
And he hath not forgotten my age."
Robert Southev.
♦
OLD AGE OF TEMPERANCE.
from "as you like it," act ii. sc. 3.
Adam. Let me be your servant ;
Though I look old, yet am I strong and lusty :
For in my youth I never did apply
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood ;
Nor did not with unbashful forehead woo
The means of weakness and debility.
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter.
Frosty, but kindly : let me go with you ;
I '11 do the service of a younger man
In all your business and necessities.
shakespeare.
—«—
TEMPERANCE, OR THE CHEAP
PHYSICIAN.
Go now ! and with some daring drug
Bait thy disease ; and, whUst they tug.
Thou, to maintain their precious strife,
Spend the dear treasures of thy life.
Go ! take physic — dote upon
Some big-named composition.
The oraculous doctor's mystic bills —
Certain hard words made into pills ;
And what at last shalt gain by these ?
Only a costlier disease.
That which makes us have no need
Of physic, that's physic indeed.
Hark, hither, reader ! wilt thou see
Nature her own physician be ?
Wilt see a man all his own wealth.
His own music, his own health —
A man whose sober soul can tell
How to wear her garments well—
Her garments that upon her sit
As garments should do, close and fit —
A well-clothed soul that's not oppressed
Nor choked with what she should be dressed —
A soul sheathed in a crystal shrine.
Through which all her bright features shine :
As when a piece of wanton lawn,
A thin aerial veil, is drawn
O'er beauty's face, seeming to hide.
More sweetly shows the blushing bride —
A soul whose intellectual beams
No mists do mask, no lazy streams —
A happy soul, that all the way
To heaven hath a summer's day ?
Wouldst see a man whose well-warmed blood
Bathes him in a genuine flood ? —
A man whose tunèd humors be
A seat of rarest harmony ?
Wouldst see blithe looks, fresh cheeks beguile
Age? Wouldst see December smile ?
Wouldst see nest of new roses grow
In a bed of reverend snow ?
Warm thoughts, free .spirits flattering
Winter's self into a spring ? —
In sum, wouldst see a man that can
Live to be old, and still a man ?
Whose latest and most leadened hours
Fall with soft wings, stuck with soft flowera ;
And when life's sweet fable ends,
Soul and body part like friends —
No quarrels, murmurs, no delay —
A kiss, a sigh, and so away ?
This rare one, reader, wouldst thou see ?
Hark, hither ! and thyself be he !
Richard Crashaw.
GO, FEEL WHAT I HAVE FELT.
[By a young lady, who was told that she was a monomaniac in hef
hatred of alcoholic liquors.]
Go, feel what I have felt.
Go, bear what I have borne ;
Sink 'neath a blow a father dealt.
And the cold, proud world's scorn :
Thus struggle on from year to year.
Thy sole relief the scalding tear.
Go, weep as I have wept
O'er a loved father's fall ;
See every cherished promise swept.
Youth's sweetness turned to gall ;
Hope's faded flowers strewed all the way
That led me up to woman's day.
Go, kneel as I have knelt ;
Implore, beseech, and pray.
Strive the besotted heart to melt.
The downward course to stay ;
Be cast with bitter curse aside, —
Thy prayers burlesqued, thy tears defied.
Go, stand where I have stood.
And see the strong man bow ;
With gnashing teeth, lips bathed in blood.
And cold and livid brow ;
Go, catch his wandering glance, and see
There mirrored his soul's misery.
fl-
TEMPERANCE.
547
a
Go, hear what I have heard, —
The sobs of sad despair.
As memory's feeling-fount hath stirred.
And its revealings there
Have told him what he might have been.
Had he the drunkard's fate foreseen.
Go to a mother's side.
And her crushed spirit cheer ;
Thine own deep anguish hide.
Wipe from her cheek the tear ;
Mark her dimmed eye, her furrowed brow.
The gray that sti'eaks her dark hair now.
The toil-worn frame, the trembling limb.
And trace the ruin back to him
Whose plighted faith, in early youth,
Promised eternal love and truth.
But who, forsworn, hath yielded up
This promise to the deadly cup.
And led her down from love and light,
From aU that made her pathway bright.
And chained her there mid want and strife,
That lowly thing, — a drunkard's wife !
And stamped on childhood's brow, so mild.
That withering blight, — a drunkard's child !
Go, hear, and see, and feel, and know
AU that my soul hath felt and known.
Then look within the wine-cup's glow ;
See if its brightness can atone ;
Think if its flavor you would try.
If aU proclaimed, — 'Tisdrink and die
TeU me I hate the bowl, —
Hate is a feçble word ;
I loathe, abhor, —my very soul
By strong disgust is stirred
Whene'er I see, or hear, or teU
Of the dabk beverage of hell !
ANONYMOUS,
10-
THE VAGABONDS.
We are two traveUers, Roger and I.
Roger's my dog : — come here, you scamp !
Jump for the gentlemen, — mind your eye !
Over the table, — look out for the lamp ! —
The rogue is growing a little old ;
Five years we've tramped through wind and
weather.
And slept out-doors when nights were cold.
And ate and drank — and starved together.
We've learned what comfort is, I tell you I
A bed on the floor, a bit of rosin,
A fire to thaw our thumbs (poor feUow !
The paw he holds up there's been frozen).
Plenty of catgut for my fiddle
(This out-door business is bad for the strings).
Then a few nice buckwheats hot from the griddl^
And Roger and I set up for kings !
No, thank ye, sir, —I never drink ;
Roger and 1 are exceedingly moral, —
Are n't we, Roger ? — see him wink ! —
Well, something hot, then — we won't quarreh
He's thirsty too, — see him nod his head ?
What a pity, sir, that dogs can't talk !
He understands every word that's said, —
And he knows good milk from water-and-chalk
The truth is, sir, now I reflect,
I've been so sadly given to grog,
I wonder I've not lost the respect
(Here's to you, sir !) even of my dog.
But he sticks by through thick and thin ;
And this old coat, with its empty pockets.
And rags that smell of tobacco and gin.
He '11 follow while he has eyes in his sockets.
There is n't another creature living
Would do it, and prove, through every disaster.
So fond, so faithful, and so forgiving
To such a miserable, thankless master !
No, sir ! — see him wag his tail and grin !
By^George ! it makes my old eyes water ! —
That is, there's something in this gin
That chokes a fellow. But no matter !
We '11 have some music, if you 're willing.
And Roger (hem ! what a plague a cough is,
sir !)
Shall march a little. Start, you villain !
Stand straight ! 'Bout face ! Salute your offi¬
cer !
Put up that paw ! Dress ! Take your rifle !
(Some dogs have arms, you see !) Now hold
your
Cap while the gentlemen give a trifle,
To aid a poor old patriot soldier !
March ! Halt ! Now show how the rebel shakes
When he stands up to hear his sentence.
Now tell us how many drams it takes
To honor a jolly new acquaintance.
Five yelps, — that's five ; he's mighty knowing !
The night's before us, fill the glasses ! —
Quick, sir ! I'm ill, — my brain is going !
Some brandy, — thank you, — there ! — it
Why not reform ? That's easily said.
But I've gone through such wretched treat¬
ment.
Sometimes forgetting the taste of bread.
And scarce remembering what meat meant.
548
POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
That my poor stomach's past reform ;
And there are times when, mad with thinking,
I'd sell out heaven for something warm
To prop a horrible inward sinking.
Is there a way to forget to think ?
At your age, sir, home, fortune, friends,
A dear girl's love, — but I took to drink, —
The same old story-; you know how it ends.
If you could have seen these classic features, —
You need n't laugh, sir ; they were not then
Such a burning libel on God's creatures ;
I was one of your handsome men !
If you had seen her, so fair and young.
Whose head was happy on this breast !
If you could have heard the songs I sung
When the wine went round, you would n't
have guessed
That ever I, sir, should be straying
From door to door, with fiddle and dog.
Ragged and penniless, and playing
To you to-night for a glass of gi-og !
She's married since, — a parson's wife ;
'T was better for her that we should part, —
Better the soberest, prosiest life
Than a blasted home and a broken heart.
I have seen her ? Once : I was weak and spent
On the dusty road, a carriage stopped ;
But little she dreamed, as on she went.
Who kissed the coin that her fingers dropped !
You 've set me talking, sir ; I'm sorry;
It makes me wild to think of the change !
What do you care for a beggar's story ?
Is it amusing ? you find it strange ?
I had a mother so proud of me !
'T was well she died before — Do you kuow
If the happy spirits in heaven can see
The ruin and wretchedness here below ?
Another glass, and strong, to deaden
This pain ; then Roger and I will start.
I wonder, has he such a lumpish, leaden.
Aching thing in place of a heart ?
He is sad sometimes, and would weep, if he could.
No doubt, remembering things that were, —
A virtuous kennel, with plenty of food.
And himself a sober, respectable cur.
I'm better now ; that glass was warming.
You rascal ! limber your lazy feet !
We must be fiddling and performing
For supper and bed, or starve in the street
Not a very gay life to lead, you think ?
But soon we shall go where lodgings are free,
And the sleepersneed neithervictualsnordrink;—
The sooner the better for Roger and me !
John Townsend Trowbridge.
A FAREWELL TO TOBACCO.
Mat the Babylonish curse
Straight confound my stammering verse,
If I can a passage see
In this word-perplexity.
Or a fit expression find.
Or a language to my mind
(Still the phrase is wide or scant).
To take leave of thee, great plant I
Or in any terms relate
Half my love, or half my hate ;
For I hate, yet love, thee so.
That, whichever thing I show.
The plain truth will seem to be
A constrained hyperbole.
And the passion to proceed
More from a mistress than a weed.
Sooty retainer to the vine !
Bacchus' black servant, negro fine !
Sorcerer ! that mak'st us dote upon
Thy begrimed complexion.
And, for thy pernicious sake.
More and greater oaths to break
Than reclaimèd lovers take
'Gainst women ! Thou thy siege dost lay
Much, too, in the female way.
While thou suck'st the laboring breath
Faster than kisses, or than death.
Thou in such a cloud dost bind us
That our^worst foes cannot find us.
And ill fortune, that would thwart us.
Shoots at rovers, shooting at us ;
While each man, through thy heightening steam,
Does like a smoking Etna seem ;
And all ahout us does express
(Fancy and wit in richest dress)
A Sicilian fruitfulness.
Thou through such a mist dost show us
That our best friends do not know us.
And, for those allowed features
Due to reasonable creatures,
Liken'st us to fell chimeras.
Monsters, — that who see us, fear us ;
Worse than Cerberus or Geryon,
Or, who first loved a cloud, Ixior
Bacchus we know, and we aUow
His tipsy rites. But what art thou.
That but by refiex canst show
What his deity can do, —
As the false Egyptian spell
Aped the true Hebrew miracle f
Some few vapors thou mayst raise
The weak brain may serve to amaze ;
ñ
TEMPERANCE.
549
■a
But to the reins and nobler heart
Canst nor life nor heat impart.
Brother of Bacchus, later born !
The old world was sure forlorn,
Wanting thee, that aidest more
The god's victories than, before.
All his panthers, and the brawls
Of his piping Bacchanals.
These, as stale, we disallow.
Or judge of thee meant ; only thou
His true Indian conquest art ;
And, for ivy round his dart.
The reformed god now weaves
A finer thyrsus of thy leaves.
Scent to match thy rich perfume
Chemie art did ne'er presume,
Through her quaint alembic strain.
None so sovereign to the brain.
Nature, that did in thee excel.
Framed again no second smell.
Roses, violets, but toys
For the smaller sort of boys.
Or for greener damsels meant ;
Thou art the only manly scent.
Stinkingest of the stinking kind !
Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind !
Africa, that brags her foison.
Breeds no such prodigious poison !
Henbane, nightshade, both together.
Hemlock, aconite —
Nay, rather.
Plant divine, of rarest virtue ;
Blisters on the tongue would hurt you !
'T was but in a sort I blamed thee ;
None e'er prospered who defamed thee ;
Irony all, and feigned abuse.
Such as perplexed lovers use
At a need, when, in despair
To paint forth their fairest fair.
Or in part but to express
That exceeding comeliness
Which their fancies doth so strike.
They borrow language of dislike ;
And, instead of dearest Miss,
Jewel, honey, sweetheart, bliss.
And those forms of old admiring,
CaR her cockatrice and siren.
Basilisk, and all that's evil.
Witch, hyena, mermaid, devil,
Ethiop, wench, and blackamoor.
Monkey, ape, and twenty more ;
Friendly trait'ress, loving foe, —
Not that she is truly so.
But no other way they know,
A contentment to express
Borders so upon excess
That they do not rightly wot
Whether it be from pain or not.
Or, as men, constrained to part
With what's nearest to their heart.
While their sorrow's at the height
Lose discrimination quite.
And their hasty wrath let fall.
To appease their frantic gaU,
On the darling thing, whatever.
Whence they feel it death to sever,
Though it be, as they, perforce.
Guiltless of the sad divorce.
For I must (nor let it grieve thee.
Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee.
For thy sake. Tobacco, I
Would do anything but die.
And but seek to extend my days
Long enough to sing thy praise.
But, as she who once hath been
A king's consort is a queen
Ever after, nor will bate
Any tittle of her state
Though a widow, or divorced.
So I, from thy converse forced.
The old name and style retain,
A right Katherine of Spain ;
And a seat, too, 'mongst the joys
Of the blest Tobacco Boys ;
Where, though I, by sour physician.
Am debarred the full fruition
Of thy favors, I may catch
Some collateral sweets, and snatch
Sidelong odors, that give life
Like glances from a neighbor's wife ;
And still live in the by-places
And the suburbs of thy graces ;
And in thy borders take delight,
An unconquered Ganaanite.
CHAJILBS LAUB.
&
9
[&
550
POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
■a
LABOR.
THE HAPPY HEART.
from " patient crissell," act 1. sc. i.
Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers ?
0 sweet content !
Art thou'rich, yet' is thji mind perplexed ?
0 punishment !
Dost thovi laugh to see how fools are vexed
To add to golden numbers, golden numbers ?
0 sweet content ! 0 sweet, 0 sweet content !
Work apace, apace, apace, apace ;
Honest labor hears a lovely face ;
Then hey nonny nonny, hey nonny nonny !
Canst drink the waters of the crispëd spring ?
O sweet content !
Swimm'st thou in wealth, yet sink'st in thine
own tears ?
0 punishment !
Then he that patiently want's burden bears
No burden bears, but is a king, a king !
O sweet content ! O sweet, O sweet content !
Work apace, apace, apace, apace ;
Honest labor bears a lovely face ;
Then hey nonny nonny, hey nonny nonny !
THOMAS DEKKER.
tQ-
THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH.
Under a spreading chestnut-tree
The village smithy stands ;
The smith, a mighty man is he.
With large and sinewy hands ;
And the muscles of his brawny arms
Are strong as iron bands.
His hair is crisp and black and long ;
His face is like the tan ;
His brow is wet with honest sweat, —
He earns whate'er he can.
And looks the whole world in the face.
For he owes not any man.
Week in, week out, from mom till night.
You can hear his bellows blow ;
You can hear him swing his heavy sledge,
With measured beat and slow.
Like a sexton ringing the village bell.
When the evening sun is low.
And children coming home from school.
Look in at the open door ;
They love to see the flaming forge.
And hear the bellows roar.
And catch the burning sparks that fly
Like chaff from the threshing-floor.
He goes on Sunday to the church.
And sits among his boys ;
He hears the parson pray and preach ;
He hears his daughter's voice.
Singing in the village choir.
And it makes his heart rejoice.
It sounds to him like her mother's voice,
Singing in Paradise !
He needs must think of her once more.
How in the grave she lies ;
And with his hard, rough hand he wipes
A tear out of his eyes.
Toiling, rejoicing, sorrowing.
Onward through life he goes ;
Each morning sees some task begin,
Each evening sees it close ;
Something attempted, something done.
Has earned a night's repose.
Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend.
For the lesson thou hast taught !
Thus at the flaming forge of life
Our fortunes must be wrought ;
Thus on its sounding anvil shaped
Each burning deed and thought !
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
TO THE HARVEST MOON.
Pleasing't is, 0 modest Moon !
Now the night is at her noon,
'Neath thy sway to musing lie.
While around the zephyrs sigh.
Fanning soft the sun-tanned wheat.
Ripened by the summer's heat ;
Picturing all the rustic's joy
When boundless plenty greets his eye.
And thinking soon,
O modest Moon !
How many a female eye will roam
Along the road.
To see the load.
The last dear load of harvest home.
Storms and tempests, floods and rains,
Stem despoilers of the plains.
-ff
LABOR.
551
Hence, away, the season flee.
Toes to light-heart jollity !
May no winds careering high
Drive the clouds along the sky.
But may all Nature smile with aspect boon,
Wlien in the heavens thou show'st thy face, 0
harvest Moon !
'Neath yon lowly roof he lies.
The husbandman, with sleep-sealed eyes :
He dreams of crowded barns, and round
The yard he hears the flail resound ;
0, may no hurricane destroy
His visionary views of joy !
God of the winds ! 0, hear his humble prayer.
And while the Moon of Harvest shines, thy blus¬
tering whirlwind spare !
Sons of luxury, to you
Leave I Sleep's dull power to woo ;
ï'ress ye still the dowmy bed.
While feverish dreams surround your head ;
I will seek the woodland glade.
Penetrate the thickest shade.
Wrapped in Contemplation's dreams,
Musing high on holy themes,
While on the gale
Shall softly sail
The nightingale's enchanting tune,
And oft my eyes
Shall grateful rise
To thee, the modest Harvest Moon !
henry kirice White.
THE USEFUL PLOUGH.
A coTTNTRV life is sweet !
In moderate cold and heat.
To walk in the air how pleasant and fair !
In every field of wheat.
The fairest of flowers adorning the bowers.
And every meadow's brow ;
So that I say, no courtier may
Compare with them who clothe in gray,
And follow the useful plough.
They rise with the morning lark.
And labor till almost dark.
Then, folding their sheep, they hasten to
sleep
While every pleasant park
Next morning is ringing with birds that are
singing
On each green, tender bough.
With what content and merriment
Their days are spent, whose minds are bent
To follow the useful plough.
Anonymous.
THE PLOUGHMAN.
Clear the brown path to meet his coulter's
gleam !
Lo ! on he comes, behind his smoking team,
With toil's bright dew-drops on his sunburnt
brow.
The lord of earth, the hero of the plough !
First in the field before the reddening sun.
Last in the shadows when the day is done.
Line after line, along the bursting sod,
Marks the broad acres where his feet have trod.
Still where he treads the stubborn clods divide.
The smooth, fresh furrow opens deep and wide ;
Matted and dense the tangled turf upheaves.
Mellow and dark the ridgy cornfield cleaves ;
Up the steep hillside, where the laboring train
Slants the long track that scores the level plain.
Through the moist valley, clogged with oozing
clay.
The patient convoy breaks its destined way ;
At eveiy turn the loosening chains resound.
The swinging ploughshare circles glistening
round.
Till the wide field one billowy waste appears.
And wearied hands unbind the panting steers.
These are the hands whose sturdy labor brings
The peasant's food, the golden pomp of kings ;
This is the page whose letters shall be seen.
Changed by the sun to words of living green ;
This is the scholar whose immortal pen
Spells the first lesson hunger taught to men ;
These are the lines that heaven-commanded Toil
Shows on his deed, —the charter of the soil !
0 gracious Mother, whose benignant breast
Wakes us to life, and lulls us all to rest.
How thy sweet features, kind to every clime.
Mock with their smile the wrinkled front of
Time !
We stain thy flowers, —they blossom o'er the
dead ;
We rend thy bosom, and it gives us bread ;
O'er the red field that trampling strife has torn.
Waves the gi een plumage of thy tasselled corn ;
Our maddening conflicts scar thy fairest plain.
Still thy soft answer is the growing grain.
Yet, 0 our Mother, while uncounted charms
Steal round our hearts in thine embracing arms.
Let not our virtues in thy love decay.
And thy fond sweetness waste our strength away.
No, by these hills whose banners now displayed
In blazing cohorts Autumn has arrayed ;
By yon twin summits, on whose splintery crests
The tossing hemlocks hold the eagles' nests ;
^ 552 POEMS OP TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
I&
By these fair plains the mountain circle screens,
And feeds with streamlets from its dark ra¬
vines, —
True to their home, these faithful arms shall toil
To crown with peace their own untainted soil ;
And, true to God, to freedom, to mankind.
If her chained ban-dogs Faction shall unbind,
These stately forms, that, bending even now.
Bowed their strong manhood to the humble
plough.
Shall rise erect, the guardians of the land.
The same stem iron in the same right hand.
Till o'er their hills the shouts of triumph run, —
The sword has rescued what the ploughshare
won !
Oliver Wendell holmes.
THE MOWERS.
The sunburnt mowers are in the swath —
Swing, swing, swing !
The towering lilies loath
Tremble and totter and fall ;
The meadow-rue
Dashes its tassels of golden dew ;
And the keen blade sweeps o'er all—
Swing, swing, swing!
The flowers, the berries, the feathered grass.
Are thrown in a smothered mass ;
Hastens away the butterfly ;
With half their burden the brown bees hie ;
And the meadow-lark shrieks distrest.
And leaves the poor younglings all in the nest.
The daisies clasp and fall ;
And totters the Jacob's-ladder tall.
Weaving and winding and curving lithe.
O'er plumy hillocks — through dewy hollows.
His subtle scythe
The nodding mower follows —
Swing, swing, svring !
Anon, the chiming whetstones ring—
Ting-a-ling ! ting-a-lmg !
And the mower now
Pauses and wipes his beaded brow.
A moment he scans the fleckless sky ;
A moment, the fish-hawk soaring high ;
And watches the swallows dip and dive
Anear and far.
They whisk and glimmer, and chatter and strive ;
What do they gossip together ?
Cunning fellows they are.
Wise prophets to him I
" Higher or lower they circle and 'skim —
Fair or foul to-morrow's hay-weather ! "
Tallest primroses, or loftiest daisies.
Not a steel-blue feather
Of slim wing grazes :
" Fear not ! fear not ! " cry the swallows.
Each mower tightens his snath-ring's wedge.
And his finger daintily follows
The long blade's tickle-edge ;
Softly the whetstone's last touches ring—
Ting-ailing / ting-a-ling !
Like a leaf-muffled bird in the woodland nigh.
Faintly the fading echoes reply—
Ting-Oilingt ting-a-ling!
" Perchance the swallows, that flit in their glee.
Of to-morrow's hay-weather know little as we ! "
Says Farmer Russet. " Be it hidden in shower
Or sunshine, to-morrow we do not own —
To-day is ours alone ! —
Not a twinkle we '11 waste of the golden hour.
Grasp tightly the nibs—giveheeland give toe ! —•
Lay a goodly swath, shaved smooth and low I
Prime is the day —
Swing, swing, swing ! "
Farmer Russet is aged and gray —
Gray as the frost, but fresh as the spring.
Straight is he
As the green fir-tree ;
And with heart most blithe, and sinews lithe.
He leads the row with his merry scythe.
" Come, boys ! strike up the old song
While we circle around —
The song we always in haytime sing —
And let the woods ring.
And the echoes prolong
The merry sound ! "
song.
July is just in the nick of time !
(Hay-weather, hay-weather j)
The midsummer month is the golden prime
For haycocks smeUing of clover and thyme ; —
(Swing all together !)
July is just in the nick of time !
Chorus.
0, we'U make our hay while the good sun
shines —
We '11 waste not a golden minute !
No shadow of storm the blue arch lines ;
We 'U waste not a minute —not a minute !
For the west-wind iß fair ;
O, the hay-day is rare I—
The sky is without a brown cloud in it !
June is too early for richest hay ;
(Fair weather, fair weather ;)
-4
LABOE.
The corn stretches taller the livelong day ;
But grass is ever too sappy to lay ; —
(Clip aU together !)
June is too early for richest hay.
August's a month that too far goes by ;
(Late weather, late weather;)
Grasshoppers are chipper and kick too high !
And grass that's standing is fodder scorched
dry; —
(PuU all together !)
August's a month that too far goes by.
July is just in the nick of time !
(Best weather, best weather ;)
The midsummer month is the golden prime
For haycocks smelling of clover and thyme ; —
(Strike all together !)
July is just in the nick of time !
Still hiss the scythes !
Shudder the grasses' defenceless blades —
The lüy-throng writhes ;
And, as a phalanx of wild-geese streams.
Where the shore of April's cloudland gleams.
On their dizzy way, in serried grades —
Wing on wing, wing on wing—
The mowers, each a step in advance
Of his fellow, time their stroke with a glance
Of swerveless force ;
And far through the meadow leads their course —
Swing, swing, swing !
Myron B. Benton.
FROM "THE FARMER'S BOY."
Fled now the sullen murmurs of the north.
The splendid raiment of the Spring peeps forth ;
But unassisted, through each toilsome day.
With smiling brow the ploughman cleaves his
way.
Draws his fresh paraUels, and, widening still.
Treads slow the heavy dale, or climbs the hül.
Strong on the wing his busy followers play.
Where writhing earthworms meet the unwelcome
day.
Till all is changed, and hill and level down
Assume a livery of sober brown ;
Again disturbed, when Giles with wearying strides
From ridge to ridge the ponderous harrow guides,
His heels deep sinking, every step he goes.
Till dirt adhesive loads his clouted shoes.
Welcome, green headland ! firm beneath his feet :
T Welcome, the friendly bank's refreshing seat ;
There, warm with toil, his panting horses browse
Their sheltering canopy of pendent boughs ;
Till rest delicious chase each transient pain.
And new-bom vigor swell in every vein.
Hour after hour and day to day succeeds.
Till every clod and deep-drawn furrow spreads
To cmmbling mould, — a level surface clear.
And strewed with com to crown the rising year ;
And o'er the whole Giles, once transverse again,
In earth's moist bosom buries up the grain.
The work is done ; no more to man is given ;
The grateful farmer trusts the rest to Heaven.
His simple errand done, he homeward hies ;
Another instantly its place supplies.
The clattering dairy-maid, immersed in steam.
Singing and scmbbing midst her milk and cream,
Bawls out, "Go fetch the cows!"—he hears
no more ;
For pigs and ducks and turkeys throng the door.
And sitting hens for constant war prepared, —
A concert strange to that which late he heard.
Straight to the meadow then he whistling goes ;
With well-known halloo calls his lazy cows ;
Down the rich pasture heedlessly they graze.
Or hear the summons with an idle gaze.
For well they know the cow-yard yields no more
Its tempting fragrance, nor its wintry store.
Reluctance marks their steps, sedate and slow.
The right of conquest all the law they know ;
The strong press on, the weak by turns succeed.
And one superior always takes the lead.
Is ever foremost wheresoe'er they stray,
AUowed precedence, undisputed sway :
With jealous pride her station is maintained.
For many a broil that post of honor gained.
At home, the yard afibrds a grateful scene.
For spring makes e'en a miry cow-yard clean.
Thence from its chalky bed behold conveyed
The rich manure that drenching winter made.
Which, piled near home, grows green with many
a weed,
A promised nutriment for autumn's seed.
Forth comes the maid, and like the morning
smiles ;
The mistress too, and foUowed close by Giles.
A friendly tripod forms their humble seat.
With pails bright scoured and delicately sweet.
Where shadowing elms obstruct the morning ray
Begins the work, begins the simple lay ;
The full-charged udder yields its willing stream
While Mary sings some lover's amorous dream ;
And crouching Giles, beneath a neighboring tree.
Tugs o'er his pail, and chants with equal glee ;
Whose hat with battered brim, of nap so bare.
From the cow's side purloins a coat of hair, —
A mottled ensign of his harmless trade.
An unambitious, peaceable cockade.
gi
554
POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
As unambitious, too, that cheerful aid
The mistress yields beside her rosy maid ;
With joy she views her plenteous reeking store,
And bears a brimmer to the dairy door ;
Her cows dismissed, the luscious mead to roam,
Tül eve again recall them loaded home.
Robert Bloohfield.
Ö-
THE FORGING OF THE ANCHOR.
Come, see the Dolphin's anchor forged ; 't is at
a white heat now :
The bellows ceased, the flames decreased ; though
on the forge's brow
The little flames still fltfully play through the
sable mound ;
And fitfully you still may see the grim smiths
ranking round,
AR clad in leathern panoply, their broad hands
only bare ;
Some rest upon their sledges here, some work
the windlass there.
The windlass strains the tackle-chains, the black
mound heaves below,
And red and deep a hundred veins burst out at
every throe ;
It rises, roars, rends aU outright,—O Vulcan,
what a glow !
'Tis blinding white, 'tis blasting bright, the
high sun shines not so !
The high sun sees not, on the earth, such a fiery,
fearful show, —
The roof-ribs swarth, the candent hearth, the
ruddy, lurid row ^
Of smiths that stand, an ardent band, like men
before the foe.
As, quivering through his fleece of flame, the
sailing monster slow
Sinks on the anvil, — aU about the faces fiery
grow.
"Hurrah ! " they shout, "leap out, leap out ; "
bang, bang, the sledges go ;
Hurrah ! the jetted lightnings are hissing high
and low ;
A hailing fount of fire is struck at every squash¬
ing blow ;
The leathern maü rebounds the haü ; the rattling
cinders strew
The ground around ; at every bound the swelter¬
ing fountains flow ;
And thick and loud the swinking crowd, at every
stroke, pant " Ho ! "
Leap out, leap out, my masters ; leap out and
lay on load !
Let's forge a goodly anchor, a bower, thick and
broad ;
For a heart of oak is hanging on every blow, I
bode.
And I see the good ship riding, all in a perRous
road,—
The low reef roaring on her lee, the roll of ocean
poured
From stem to stem, sea after sea ; the mainmast
by the board ;
The bulwarks down, the rudder gone, the boats
stove at the chains, —
But courage stiR, brave mariners, the bower stiR
remains.
And not an inch to flinch he deigns save when
ye pitch sky-high.
Then moves his head, as though he said, " Fear
nothing, —here am I ! "
Swing in your strokes in order, let foot and hand
keep time ;
Your blows make music sweeter far tban any
steeple's chime.
But whUe you sRng your sledges, sing ; and let
the burden be.
The Anchor is the Anvil King, and royal crafts¬
men we !
Strike in, .strike in, the sparks begin to duR
their rustling red !
Our hammers ring with sharper din, our work
wiR soon be sped ;
Our anchor soon must change his bed of fiery
rich array
For a hammock at the roaring bows, or an oozy
couch of clay ;
Our anchor soon must change the lay of merry
craftsmen here.
For the Yeo-heave-o, and the Heave-away, and
the sighing seaman's cheer ;
"When, weighing slow, at eve they go — far, far
from love and home.
And sobbing sweethearts, in a row, waR o'er the
ocean foam.
In Rvid and obdurate gloom, he darkens down
at last :
A shapely one he is, and strong as e'er from cat
was cast.
0 trusted and trustworthy guard, if thou hadst
life like me,
"What pleasures would thy toRs reward beneath
the deep green sea !
0 deep-sea diver, who might then behold such
sights as thou ?
The hoary monsters' palaces ! methinks what joy
't were now
To go plumb plunging down amid the assembly
of the whales.
And feel the churned sea round me boR beneath
their scourging taRs !
fi-
LABOR.
555
üi
Then deep in tangle-woods to fight the fierce sea
unicorn.
And send him foiled and bellowing back, for all
his ivory horn ;
To leave the subtle sworder-fish of bony blade for¬
lorn ;
And for the ghastly-grinning shark, to laugh his
jaws to scorn ;
To leap down on the kraken's back, where mid
Norwegian isles
He lies, a lubber anchorage for sudden shallowed
miles.
Tul snorting, like an under-sea volcano, off he
rolls ;
MeanwhUe to swing, a-buffeting the far-aston¬
ished shoals
Of his back-browsing ocean calves ; or, haply in
a cove,
SheU-strewn, and consecrate of old to some Un-
dinë's love.
To find the long-haired mermaidens ; or, hard
by icy lands.
To wrestle with the sea-serpent upon cerulean
sands.
0 broad-armed fisher of the deep, whose sports
can equal thine ?
The Dolphin weighs a thousand tons that tugs
thy cable line ;
And mght by night't is thy delight, thy glory
day by day.
Through sable sea and breaker white, the giant
game to play ;
But, shamer of our little sports ! forgive the
name I gave,—
A fisher's joy is to destroy, thine office is to save.
0 lodger in the sea-king's halls, couldst thou but
understand
Whose be the white bones by thy side, or who
that dripping band,
Slow swaying in the heaving waves that round
about thee bend.
With sounds like breakers in a dream, blessing
their ancient friend :
0, couldst thou know what heroes glide with
larger steps round thee.
Thine iron side would swell with pride ; thou 'dst
leap within the sea I
Give honor to their memories who left the pleas¬
ant strand
To shed their blood so freely for the love of
fatherland, —
Who left their chance of quiet age and grassy
churchyard grave
So freely for a restless bed amid the tossing
wave :
0, though our anchor may not be all I have
fondly sung.
Honor him for their memory whose bones he
goes among !
SAMUEL FERGUSON.
THE SONG OF STEAM.
Harness me down with your iron bands.
Be sure of your curb and rein.
For I scorn the strength of your puny hands
As a tempest scorns a chain.
How I laughed as I lay concealed from sight
For many a countless hour.
At the childish boasts of human might,
And the pride of human power !
WThen I saw an army upon the land,
A navy upon the seas.
Creeping along, a snail-like band.
Or waiting the wayward breeze ;
Wben I marked the peasant faintly reel
With the toü that he daily bore.
As he feebly turned the tardy wheel.
Or tugged at the weary oar ;
When I measured the panting courser's speed.
The flight of the carrier dove.
As they bore the law a king decreed.
Or the lines of impatient love,
I could but think how the world would feel.
As these were outstripped afar,
When I should be bound to the rushing keel.
Or chained to the flying car.
Ha ! ha ! ha ! they found me at last.
They invited me forth at length.
And I rushed to my throne with a thunder blast.
And laughed in my iron strength !
0, then ye saw a wondrous change
On the earth and ocean wide,
"Where now my fiery armies range.
Nor wait for wind or tide !
Hurrah ! hurrah ! the waters o'er.
The mountain's steep decline ;
Time — space — have yielded to my power :
The world, the world is mine !
The rivers the sun hath earliest blest.
Or those where his beams decline.
The giant streams of the queenly Westj
Or the Orient floods divine.
The ocean pales wherever I sweep
To hear my strength rejoice.
And monsters of the briny deep
Cower trembling at my voice.
Ö"
556
POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
I carry the wealth of the lord of earth,
The thoughts of his godlike mind ;
The wind lags after my going forth,
The lightning is left behind.
In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine
My tireless arm doth play.
Where the rocks ne'er saw the sun's decline
Or the dawn of the glorious day ;
I bring earth's glittering jewels up
From the hidden caves below.
And I make the fountain's granite cup
With a crystal gush o'erflow.
I blow the bellows, I forge the steel.
In all the shops of trade ;
I hammer the ore and turn the wheel
Where my arms of strength are made ;
I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint,
I carry, I spin, I weave.
And all my doings I put into print
On every Saturday eve.
I 've no muscles to weary, no brains to decay.
No bones to be laid on the shelf.
And soon I intend you may go and play.
While I manage the world myself.
But harness me down with your iron bands.
Be sure of your curb and rein.
For I scorn the strength of your puny hands
As the tempest scorns the chain.
George w. cutter.
■a
LABOR SONO.
froh "the bell-founder."
Ah 1 little they know of true happiness, they
whom satiety fiUs,
Who, flung on the rich breast of luxury, eat of
the rankness that kills.
Ah ! little they know of the blessedness toil-
purchased slumber enjoys
Who, stretched on the hard rack of indolence,
taste of the sleep that destroys ;
Nothing toj hope for, or i labor for ; nothing to
sigh for, oi! gain ; '
Nothing t(]i' light in its i vividness, Ughtning-like^
bosom and braiii ; i
Nothing to break life's monotony, rippling it o'er
with its breath ; —
Nothing buti dulness and jlethargy,j weariness, |
sorrow, and death !
w f ^
But bl^èd'that child of,humanly, happiest
^an aiiong men, | I
Who, with iam^ner or chi^l or penjîil, with
ruc|der or ploughshare or pen.
Laboi^th'ever| and evenwith hope through'the
m<)rning|of life, '
Winning home and its darling divinities, —love-
worshipped children and wife.
Round swings the hammer of industry, quickly!
the sharp chfeel rings, ' i '
And the heart of thi toiler has throbbings that
stir not the bosom of kings, —
He theltrue rulerj and conquetor, he the truei
king oflhis, race, ' .
Who nerveth 'his arm foi^life's combat! and looks
the
strong world ik' the face. 1
DENIS ^LORENCE MAC-CARTHY.
A LANCASHIRE DOXOLOGY.
" Some cotton has lately been imported into Farringdoo, where
the mills have been closed for a considerable time. The people,
who were previously in the deepest distress, went out to meet the
cotton : the women wept over the bales and kissed them, and
finally sang the Doxology over them."—Spectator of May 14, x8^
" Praise God from whom all blessings flow,"
Praise him who sendeth joy and woe.
The Lord who takes, the Lord who gives,
0, praise him, all that dies, and lives.
He opens and he shuts his hand.
But why we cannot understand :
Pours and dries up his mercies' flood.
And yet is still All-perfect Good.
We fathom not the mighty plan.
The mystery of God and man ;
We women, when auctions come.
We only suffer and are dumb.
And when, the tempest passing by.
He gleams out, sunlike, through our sky.
We look up, and through black clouds riven
We recognize the smile of Heaven.
Ours is no wisdom of the wise.
We have no deep philosophies ;
Childlike we take both kiss and rod.
For he who loveth knoweth God.
Dinah Maria Mulock Craik,
TO LABOR IS TO PRAY.
Pause not to dream of the future before us ;
Pause not to weep the wild cares that come o'er us ;
Hark, how Creation's deep musical chorus,
Unintermitting, goes up into heaven !
Never the ocean wave falters in flowing ;
Never the little seed stops in its growing ;
More and more richly the rose-heart keeps glow-
ing,
TÜ1 from its nourishing stem it is riven.
-B
&
LABOR.
557
-a
fr.-
" Labor is worship ! " the robin is singing ;
" Labor is worship ! " the wild bee is ringing ;
Listen ! that eloquent whisper, upspringing,
Speaks to thy soul from out Nature's great
heart.
From the dark cloud flows the life-giving shower ;
From the rough sod blows the soft-breathing
flower ;
From the small insect, the rich coral bower ;
Only man, in the plan, shrinks from his part.
Labor is life ! 't is the still water faüeth ;
Idleness ever despaireth, bewaileth ;
Keep the watch wound, or the dark rust assail-
eth ;
Flowers droop and die in the stillness of noon.
Labor is glory ! — the flying cloud lightens ;
Only the waving wing changes and brightens ;
Idle hearts only the dark future frightens ;
Play the sweet keys, wouldst thou keep them
in tune !
Labor is rest — from the sorrows that greet us ;
Rest from all petty vexations that meet us ;
Rest from sin-promptings that ever entreat us ;
Rest from world-sirens that lure us to ill.
Work,—and pure slumbers shall wait on thy
pillow ;
Work, —^thou shalt ride over Care's coming bil¬
low ;
Lie not down wearied 'neath Woe's weeping wil¬
low,
Work with a stout heart and resolute will !
Labor is health ! Lo, the husbandman reaping,
How through his veins goes the life-current
leaping !
How his strong arm in its stalworth pride
sweeping.
True as a sunbeam the swift sickle guides.
Labor is wealth, — in the sea the pearl giweth ;
Rich the queen's robe from the frail cocoon
floweth ;
From the fine acorn the strong forest bloweth ;
Temple and statue the marble block hides.
Droop not,—though shame, sin, and anguish
are round thee !
Bravely fling off the cold chain that hath bound
thee !
Look to the pure heaven smiling beyond thee !
Rest not content in thy darkness, — a clod 1
Work for some good, be it ever so slowly !
Cherish some flower, be it ever so lowly !
Labor !—all labor is noble and holy ;
Let thy great deed be thy prayer to thy God.
Frances Sargent Osgoob.
THE LABORER.
Toiling in the naked fields.
Where no bush a shelter yields.
Needy Labor dithering stands.
Beats and blows his numbing hands.
And upon the crumping snows
Stamps in vain to warm his toes.
Though all's in vain to keep him warm.
Poverty must brave the storm.
Friendship none its aid to lend.
Constant health his only friend.
Granting leave to live in pain.
Giving strength to toil in vain.
John Clare.
CORN-LAW HYMN.
Lord ! call thy pallid angel.
The tamer of the strong !
And bid him whip with want and woe
The champions of the wrong !
O, say not thou to ruin's flood,
" Up, sluggard ! why so slow ? "
But alone, let them groan.
The lowest of the low ;
And basely beg the bread they curse.
Where millions curse them now !
No ; wake not thou the giant
Who drinks hot blood for wine ;
And shouts unto the east and west.
In thunder-tones like thine ;
Till the slow to move rush all at once.
An avalanche of men.
While he raves over waves
That need no whirlwind then ;
Though slow to move, moved all at once,
A sea, a sea of men !
ebenezer Elliott.
DUTY.
I SLEPT and dreamed that life was Beauty :
I woke and found that life was Duty :
Was then thy dream a shadowy lie ?
Toil on, sad heart, courageously.
And thou shalt find thy dream to be
A noonday light and truth to thee.
anonymous.
TRUE REST.
Sweet is the pleasure
Itself cannot spoil !
Is not true leisure
One with true toil ?
e-
668
POEMS OF TEMPERANCE AND LABOR.
-a
Thou that wouldst taste it,
Still do thy best ;
Use it, not waste it, —
Else't is no rest.
Wouldst behold beauty
Near thee ? all round ?
Only hath duty
Such a sight found.
Rest is not quitting
The busy career ;
Rest is the fitting
Of self to its sphere.
'T is the brook's motion,
Clear without strife.
Fleeing to ocean
After its life.
Deeper devotion
Nowhere hath knelt ;
Fuller emotion
Heart never felt.
'T is loving and serving
The highest and best ;
'T is onwards ! unswerving, —
And that is true rest.
John Sullivan dwight.
GOOD NIGHT.
Good night.
To each weary, toil-worn wight !
Now the day so sweetly closes.
Every aching brow reposes
Peacefully till morning light.
Good night !
Home to rest !
Close the eye and calm the breast ;
Stillness through the streets is stealing.
And the watchman's horn is pealing.
And the night caUs softly, " Haste !
Home to rest ! "
Sweetly sleep !
Eden's breezes round ye sweep.
O'er the peace-forsaken lover
Let the darling image hover.
As he lies in transport deep.
Sweetly sleep !
So, good night I
Slumber on till morning light ;
Slumber till another morrow
Brings its stores of joy and sorrow ;
Fearless, in the Father's sight,
Slumber on. Good night !
From the German of KÖRNER. Trant-
lation of CHARLES T. BROOKS
FEAGMENTS.
The Intoxicating Cup.
Bacchus, that first from out the purple grape
Crushed the sweet poison of misusèd wine.
Comtts. MILTON.
Ah ! sly deceiver ; branded o'er and o'er.
Yet still believed ! Exulting o'er the wreck
Of sober vows.
The Art of Preserving Health. t, ARMSTRONG.
In courts and palaces he also reigns.
And in luxurious cities, where the noise
Of riot ascends above their loftiest towers.
And injury, and outrage : and when night
Darkens the streets, then wander forth the sons
Of Belial, fiown with insolence and wine.
Paradise Lost. Book L MiLTON.
0, when we swallow down
Intoxicating wine, we drink damnation ;
Naked we stand, the sport of mocking fiends.
Who grin to see our nobler nature vanquished.
Subdued to beasts.
Wifis Rtici. C. JOHNSON.
A drunkard clasp his teeth, and not undo 'em.
To suffer wet damnation to run through 'em.
The Revenger's Tragedy, Act iii. Sc. i, C. TOURNEUR.
Temperance.
Of my merit
On thet point you yourself may jedge ;
All is, I never drink no sperit.
Nor I haint never signed no pledge.
The BigUrw Papers, First Series, No. vîL J. R. LOWELI.
Tobacco Smokers.
Such often, like the tube they so admire.
Important triflers ! have more smoke than fire.
Pernicious weed ! whose scent the fair annoys.
Unfriendly to society's chief joys.
Thy worst effect is banishing for hours
The sex whose presence civilizes ours.
Conversation. cowpbiu
FRAGMENTS.
55Í)
Labor.
From labor health, from health conteatment
springs.
Tht Minstrel. Beattie.
Like a lackey, from the rise to set.
Sweats in the eye of Phoebus, and all night
Sleeps in Elysium ; next day after dawn
Doth rise and help Hyperion to his horse.
And follows so the ever-running year
With profitable labor to his grave.
And, but for ceremony, such a wretch
Winding up days with toil and nights with sleep.
Hath the forehand and vantage of a king.
King Henry y„ Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Cheered with the view, man went to till the
ground
From whence he rose ; sentenced indeed to toil.
As to a punishment, yet (even in wrath.
So merciful is heaven) this toil became
The solace of his woes, the sweet employ
Of many a livelong hour, and surest guard ^
Against disease and death.
Death. . B. PORTEUS.
MACDtrFF. I know this is a joyful trouble to
you,
But yet, 't 'is one.
Macbeth. The laborwe delight in physics pain.
Macbeth^ Act\i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Overwork.
Why such impress of shipwrights, whose sore
task
Does not divide the Sunday from the week ?
What might be toward, that this sweaty haste
Doth make the night joint-laborer with the day ?
Hamlet, Hcti. Sc. í shakespeare.
Work and Song.
Verse sweetens toil, however rude the sound,
She feels no biting pang the whUe she sings ;
Nor, as she turns the giddy wheel around.
Revolves the sad vicissitudes of things.
Contemplation. R. GIFFORD.
There was a jolly miller once,
Lived on the river Dee ;
He worked and sung from mom tiU night.
No lark more blithe than he.
Love in a Village. Act i. Sc- a. L BICKERSTAFF.
Feels, and owns in carols rude
That all the ch-cling joys are his
Of dear Vicissitude.
From toil he wins his spirits light.
From busy day the peaceful night ;
Rich, from the very want of wealth.
In heaven's best treasures, peace and health.
Ode on the Pleasure arisingfrom Vicissitude. T. GRAY.
Prudence.
And for my means, I '11 husband them so well
They shall go far with little.
Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE
Borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
Hamlet, Acti. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE
Nobility of Labor.
When Adam doive, and Eve span.
Who was then the gentleman ? *
J. Ball-
* "Lines used by John Ball, to encourag;« the Rebels in Wat
Tyler's i RebeMîon. Hume's Hittory of England, VoL L Ch. 17,
Note 8," says BartleTT.
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
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■a
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^te/iítníi.''^ ¿Ss^'T^fc^ • yâitc-'
¿i^ ¿i/^ ^^ïël/
^t^CA.'^ Tl •»! < ■
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Li'
E\
fe-
■ff
POEMS
OF
PATRIOTISM AND
FREEDOM.
BREATHES THERE THE MAN.
prom " the lay of the last minstrel." canto vi.
Beeathes there the man with soul so dead
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land !
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned,
As home his footsteps he hath turned
From wandering on a foreign strand ?
If such there breathe, go, mark him well ;
For him no minstrel raptures sw^lL^
High though his titles, proud his^Kame,
Boundless his wealth as wish can claim.
Despite those titles, power, and pelf.
The wretch, concentred all in self.
Living, shall forfeit fair renown.
And, doubly dying, shall go down
To the vile dust from whence he sprung.
Unwept, unhonored, and unsung.
Sir Walter Scott.
MY COUNTRY.
There is a land, of every land the pride.
Beloved by Heaven o'er all the world beside,
WTiere brighter suns dispense serener light.
And milder moons imparadise the night ;
Aland of beauty, virtue, valor, truth,
Time-tutored age, and love-exalted youth :
The wandering mariner, whose eye explores
The wealthiest isles, the most enchanting shores.
Views not a realm so bountiful and fair.
Nor breathes the spirit of a purer air.
In every clime, the magnet of his soul.
Touched by remembrance, trembles to that pole ;
For in this land of Heaven's peculiar race.
The heritage of nature's noblest grace.
There is a spot of earth supremely blest,
A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest.
Where man, creation's tyrant, casts aside
His sword and sceptre, pageantry and pride.
While in his softened looks benignly blend
The sire, the son, the husband, brother, friend.
Here woman reigns ; the mother, daughter, wife.
Strew with fresh flowers the narrow way of life :
13-
In the clear heaven of her delightful eye
An angel-guard of love and graces lie ;
Around her knees domestic duties meet.
And fireside pleasures gambol at her feet.
" Where shall that land, that spot of earth be
found ? "
Art thou a man ? — a patriot ? — look around ;
O, thou shalt find, howe'er thy footsteps roam.
That land thy country, and that spot thy home !
Man, through all ages of revolving time.
Unchanging man, in every varying clime.
Deems his own land of every land the pride.
Beloved by Heaven o'er all the world beside ;
His home the spot of earth supremely blest,
A dearer, sweeter spot than all the rest.
James Montgomery.
HOW SLEEP THE BRAVE.
How sleep the brave, who sink to rest
By all their country's wishes blest !
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold.
Returns to deck their hallowed mould.
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.
By fairy hands their knell is rung ;
By forms unseen their dirge is sung ;
There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray.
To bless the turf that wraps their clay ;
And Freedom shall awhile repair.
To dwell a weeping hermit there !
WILLIAM Collins.
THE BRAVE AT HOME.
The maid who binds her warrior's sash
With smile that well her pain dissembles.
The while beneath her drooping lash
One starry tear-drop hangs and trembles,
Though Heaven alone records the tear.
And Fame shall never know her story.
Her heart has shed a drop as dear
As e'er bedewed the field of glory !
r-i . , r
L
r
^ ... ■ L
664 POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
J
1
The wife who girds her husband's sword, Then double darkness fell,
Mid little ones who weep or wonder. And the forest ceased its moan ;
And bravely speaks the cheering word. But there came a clash of steel.
What though her heart be rent asunder. And a distant dying groan.
Doomed nightly in her dreams to hear
The bolts of death around him rattle. Anon, a trumpet blew,
Hath shed as sacred blood as e'er And a fiery sheet burst high.
Was poured upon the field of battle ! That o'er the midnight threw
A blood-red canopy.
The mother who conceals her grief
While to her breast her son she presses, glared on the hiU ;
Then breathes a few brave words and brief, glared by the bay ;
Kissing the patriot brow she blesses, the Greeks rushed onward still.
With no one but her secret God Like leopards in their play.
To know the pain that weighs upon her.
Sheds holy blood as e'er the sod ^ >
Received on Freedom's field of honor ! the earth w^ all a ñame
Thomas Buchanan Read. Where the Spartan s bloody steel
On the silken turbans came ;
* And still the Greek rushed on
Where the fiery torrent rolled,
THE DEATH OF LEONIDAS. Till like a rising sun
, ., . ,. Shone Xerxes' tent of gold.
It was the wild midnight, —
A storm was on the sky ; They found a royal feast.
The hghtnmg gave its light, jji, midnight banquet, there ;
And the thunder echoed by. treasures of the East
Lay beneath the Doric spear.
The torrent swept the glen.
The ocean lashed the shore j Then sat to the repast
Then rose the Spartan men, The bravest of the brave I
To make their bed in gore ! That feast must be their last.
That spot must be their grave.
Swift from the deluged ground
Three hundred took the shield ; They pledged old Sparta's name
Then, silent, gathered round Id cups of S3TÍan wine,
The leader of the field ! And the warrior's deathless fame
Was sung in strains divine.
He spake no warrior word, , , ,
He bade no trumpet blow, ^^ey took the rose-wreathed lyres
•D A Av • 1 4.1, J J ^ roiû eunuch and irom slave,
But the Bienal thunder roared, . i .
And they rushed upon the foe. And taught the languid wires
^ The sounds that Freedom gave.
The fiery element morning star
Showed, with one mighty gleam. Crowned (Eta's twUight brow ;
Rampart, and flag, and tent,
Like the spectres of a dream.
All up the mountain's side, Up jose the glorious rank.
All down the woody vale. To Greece one cup poured high.
All by the rolling tide Then hand in hand they drank.
Waved the Persian banners pale. «< To immortality ! "
And foremost from the pass. Fear on King Xerxes fell.
Among the slumbering band. When, like spirits from the toml:^
Sprang King Leonidas, With shout and trumpet knell.
Like the lightning's living brand. He saw the wamors come.
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u • u
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
565
But down swept all his power,
With chariot and with charge ;
Down poured the arrows' shower,
Till sank the Dorian's targe.
They gathered round the tent,
With all their strength unstrung ;
To Greece one look they sent.
Then on high their torches flung.
The king sat on the throne.
His captains by his side.
While the flame rushed roaring on.
And their Paean loud replied.
Thus fought the Greek of old !
Thus will he fight again !
Shall not the self-same mould
Bring forth the self-same men ?
George Croly.
HORATIUS AT THE BRipGE.
Lars Porsena of Clusium,
By the Nine Gods he .swore
That the great house of Tarquín
Should suffer wrong no more.
By the Nine Gods he swore it.
And named a trysting-day.
And bade his messengers ride forth.
East and west and south and north,
To summon his array.
East and west and south and north
The messengers ride fast.
And tower and town and cottage
Have heard the trumpet's blast.
Shame on the false Etruscan
Who lingers in his home.
When Porsena of Clusium
Is on the march for Rome !
The horsemen and the footmen
Are pouring in amain
From many a stately market-place.
From many a fruitful plain.
From many a lonely hamlet.
Which, hid by beech and pine.
Like an eagle's nest hangs on the crest
Of purple Apennine :
From lordly Volaterrse,
Where scowls the far-famed hold
Piled by the hands of giants
For godlike kings of old ;
From sea-girt Populonia,
Whose sentinels descry
Sardinia's snowy mountain-tops
Fringing the southern sky ;
From the proud mart of Pisae,
Queen of the western waves,
Where ride Massilia's triremes.
Heavy with fair-haired slaves ;
From where sweet Clanis wanders
Through corn and vines and flowers.
From where Cortona lifts to heaven
Her diadem of towers.
Tall are the oaks whose acoms
Drop in dark Auser's rill ;
Fat are the stags that champ the boughs
Of the Ciminian hill ;
Beyond all streams, Clitumnus
Is to the herdsman dear ;
Best of all pools the fowler loves
The great Volsinian mere.
But now no stroke of woodman
Is heard by Auser's rill ;
No hunter tracks the stag's green path
Up the Ciminian hill ;
Unwatched along Clitumnus
Grazes the milk-white steer ;
Unharmed the water-fowl may dip
In the Volsinian mere.
The harvests of Arretium,
This year, old men shall reap ;
This year, young boys in Umbro
Shall plunge the struggling sheep ;
And in the vats of Luna,
This year, the must shall foam
Round the white feet of laughing girls
Whose sires have marched to Rome.
There be thirty chosen prophets.
The wisest of the laud.
Who always by Lars Pomena
Both morn and evening stand.
Evening and morn the Thirty
Have turned the verses o'er.
Tr aced from the light on linen white
By mighty seers of yore ;
And with one voice the Thirty
Have their glad answer given :
" Go forth, go forth, Lars Porsena, —
Go forth, beloved of Heaven !
Go, and return in glory
To Clusium's royal dome.
And hang round Nurscia's altars
The golden shields of Rome ! "
And now hath every city
Sent up her tale of men ;
The foot are fourscore thousand.
The horse are thousands ten.
[S-
566
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
Before the gates of Sutrium
Is met the great array ;
A proud man was Lars Porsena
Upon the trysting-day.
For all the Etruscan armies
Were ranged beneath his eye,
And many a banished Roman,
And many a stout ally ;
And with a mighty following.
To join the muster, came
The Tusculan Mamilius,
Prince of the Latian name.
But by the yellow Tiber
Was tumult and affright ;
From all the spacious champaign
To Rome men took their flight.
A mile around the city
The throng stopped up the ways ;
A fearful sight it was to see
Through two long nights and days.
For aged folk on crutches.
And women great with child.
And mothers, sobbing over babes
That clung to them and smiled.
And sick men borne in litters
High on the necks of slaves.
And troops of sunburned husbandmen
With reaping-hooks and staves,
And droves of mules and asses
Laden with skins of wine.
And endless flocks of goats and sheep.
And endless herds of kine.
And endless trains of wagons.
That creaked beneath the weight
Of corn-sacks and of household goods.
Choked every roaring gate.
Now, from the rock Tarpeian,
Could the wan burghem spy
The line of blazing villages
Red in the midnight sky.
The Fathere of the City,
They sat all night and day.
For every hour some horseman came
With tidings of dismay.
To eastward and to westward
Have spread the Tuscan bands.
Nor house, nor fence, nor dovecote
In Crustumerium stands.
Verbenna down to Ostia
Hath wasted all the plain ;
Astur hath stormed Janicnlum,
And the stout guards are slain.
I wis, in all the Senate
There was no heart so bold
But sore it ached, and fast it beat.
When that ill news was told.
Forthwith up rose the Consul,
Up rose the Fathers all ;
In haste they girded up their gowns.
And hied them to the wall.
They held a council, standing
Before the River-gate ;
Short time was there, ye well may guess.
For musing or debate.
Out spake the Consul roundly :
" The bridge must straight go down ;
For, since Janiculum is lost.
Naught else can save the town."
Just then a scout came flying.
All wild with haste and fear :
" To arms ! to arms ! Sir Consul, —
Lars Porsena is here."
On the low hills to westward
The Consul fixed his eye.
And saw the swarthy storm of dust
Rise fast along the sky.
And nearer fast and nearer
Doth the red whirlwind come ;
And louder still, and still more loud.
From underneath that rolling cloud.
Is heard the trumpets' war-note proud.
The trampling and the hum.
And plainly and more plainly
Now through the gloom appears,
Far to left and far to right.
In broken gleams of dark-blue light.
The long array of hehnets bright.
The long array of spears.
And plainly and more plainly.
Above that glimmering line.
Now might ye see the banners
Of twelve fair cities shine ;
But the banner of proud Clusium
Was highest of them all, —
The terror of the Umbrian,
The terror of the Gaul.
And plainly and more jffainly
Now might the burghei-s know.
By port and vest, by horse and crest,
Each warlike Lucumo :
There Cilnius of Arretium
On his fleet roan was seen ;
And Astur of the fourfold shield,
Girt with the brand none else may wield ;
Tolumnius with the belt of gold.
And dark Verbenna from the hold
By reedy Thrasymene.
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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
567
Fast by the royal standard,
O'erlooking all the war,
Lars Porsena of Clusium
Sat in his ivory car.
By the right wheel rode Mamilius,
Prince of the Latian name ;
And by the left false Sextus,
That wr ought the deed of shame.
But when the face of Sextus
Was seen among the foes,
A yell that rent the firmament
From all the town arose.
On the house-tops was no woman
But spat towards him and hissed.
No child but screamed out curses.
And shook its little fist.
But the Consul's brow was sad.
And the Consul's speech was low,
And darkly looked he at the wall.
And darkly at the foe :
" Their van will be upon us
Before the bridge goes down ;
And if they once may win the bridge,
What hope to save the town ? "
Then out spake brave Horatius,
The Captain of the gate :
"To every man upon this earth
Death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better
Than facing fearful odds
For the ashes of his fathers
And the temples of his gods,
" And for the tender mother
Who dandled him to rest.
And for the wife who nurses
His baby at her breast.
And for the holy maidens
Who feed the eternal flame, —
To save them from false Sextus
That wrought the deed of shame ?
" Hew down the bridge. Sir Consul,
With all the speed ye may ;
I, with two more to help me.
Will hold the foe in play.
In yon strait path a thousand
May well be stopped by three ;
Now who will stand on either hand.
And keep the bridge with me ? "
Then out spake Spurius Lartius, —
A Ramnian proud was he ;
*' Lo, I will stand at thy right hand.
And keep the bridge with thee."
And out spake strong Herminius, —
Of Titian blood was he :
" I will abide on thy left side.
And keep the bridge with thee."
" Horatius," quoth the Consul,
" As thou sayest so let it be."
And straight against that great array
Went forth the dauntless three.
For Romans in Rome's quarrel
Spared neither land nor gold.
Nor son nor wife, nor limb nor life,
In the brave days of old.
Then none was for a party —
Then all were for the state ;
Then the great man helped the poor.
And the poor man loved the great ;
Then lands were fairly portioned !
Then spoils were fairly sold :
The Romans were like brothers
In the brave days of old.
Now Roman is to Roman
More hateful than a foe.
And the tribunes beard the high.
And the fathers grind the low.
As we wax hot in faction.
In battle we wax cold ;
Wherefore men fight not as they fought
In the brave days of old.
Now while the three were tightening
Their harness on their backs.
The Consul was the foremost man
To take in hand an axe ;
And fathers, mixed with commons.
Seized hatchet, bar, and crow.
And smote upon the planks above.
And loosed the props below.
Meanwhile the Tuscan army.
Right glorious to behold.
Came flashing back the noonday light.
Rank behind rank, like surges bright
Of a broad sea of gold.
Four hundred trumpets sounded
A peal of warlike glee.
As that gi eat host with measured tread.
And spears advanced, and ensigns spread.
Rolled slowly towards the bridge's head.
Where stood the dauntless three.
The three stood calm and silent.
And looked upon the foes.
And a great shout of laughter
From all the vanguard rose :
568
POEMS OP PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
And forth three chiefs came spurring
Before that deep array ;
To earth they sprang, their swords they drew,
And lifted high their shields, and flew
To win the narrow way.
«
Annus, from green Tifernum,
Lord of the HUI of Vines ;
And Seius, whose eight hundred slaves
Sicken in Ilva's mines ;
And Picus, long to Clusium
Vassal in peace and war,
"Who led to fight his Umbrian powers
From that gray crag where, girt with towers,
The fortress of Nequinum lowers
O'er the pale waves of Nar.
Stout Lartius hurled down Annus
Into the stream beneath ;
Herminius struck at Seius,
And clove him to the teeth ;
At Pious brave Horatius
Darted one fiery thrust.
And the proud Umbrian's gilded arms
Clashed in the bloody dust.
Then Ocnus of Falerii
Rushed on the Roman three ;
And Lausulus of Urgo,
The rover of the sea ;
And Aruns of Volsinium,
Who slew the great wild boar, —
The great wild boar that had his den
Amidst the reeds of Cosa's fen.
And wasted fields, and slaughtered men.
Along Albiiiia's shore.
Herminius smote down Aruns ;
Lartius laid Ocnus low ;
Right to the heart of Lausulus
Horatius sent a blow :
"Lie there," he cried, "fell pirate !
No more, aghast and pale.
From Ostia's walls the crowd shall mark
The track of thy destroying bark ;
No more Campania's hinds shall fly
To woods and caverns, when they spy
Thy thrice-accursëd sail ! "
But now no sound of laughter
Was heard among the foes ;
A wild and wrathful clamor
From all the vanguard rose.
Six spears' length from the entrance.
Halted that mighty mass.
And for a space no man came forth
To win the narrow pass.
But, hark ! the cry'is Astur :
And lo ! the ranks divide ;
And the great lord of Luna
Comes with his stately stride.
Upon his ample shoulders
Clangs loud the fourfold shield.
And in his hand he shakes the brand
Which none but he can wield.
He smiled on those bold Romans,
A smile serene and high ;
He eyed the flinching Tuscans,
And scorn was in his eye.
Quoth he, "The she-wolf's litter
Stand savagely at bay ;
But will ye dare to follow.
If Astur clears the way ? "
Then, whirling up his broadsword
With both hands to the height.
He rushed against Horatius,
And smote with all his might.
With shield and blade Horatius
Right deftly turned the blow.
The blow, though turned, came yet too nigh ;
It missed his helm, but gashed his thigh.
The Tuscans raised a joyful cry
To see the red blood flow.
He reeled, and on Herminius
He leaned one breathing-space,
Then, like a wild-cat mad with wounds.
Sprang right at Astur's face.
Through teeth and skull and helmet
So fierce a thrust he sped.
The good sword stood a handbreadth out
Behind the Tuscan's head.
And the great lord of Luna
Fell at that deadly stroke,
As falls on Mount Avemus
A thunder-smitten oak.
Far o'er the crashing forest
The giant aiuns lie spread ;
And the pale augurs, muttering low.
Gaze on the blasted head.
On Astur's throat Horatius
Right fiimly pressed his heel.
And thrice and four times tugged amain.
Ere he wrenched out the steel.
And " See," he cried, " the welcome.
Fair guests, that waits you here !
What noble Lucumo comes next
To taste our Roman cheer ? "
But at his haughty challenge
A sullen murmur ran.
Mingled with wrath and shame and dread.
Along that glittering van.
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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
569
There lacked not men of prowess,
Nor men of lordly race,
For all Etruria's noblest
Were round the fatal place.
But all Etruria's noblest
Felt their hearts sink to see
On the earth the bloody corpses,
In the path the dauntless three ;
And from the ghastly entrance,
Where those bold Romans stood,
All shrank, — like boys who, unaware.
Ranging the woods to start a hare.
Come to the mouth of the dark lair
Where, growling low, a fierce old bear
Lies amidst bones and blood.
Was none who would be foremost
To lead such dire attack ;
But those behind cried " Forward ! "
And those before cried " Back !"
And backward now and forward
Wavers the deep array ;
And on the tossing sea of steel
To and fro the standards reel.
And the victorious trumpet-peal
Dies fitfully away.
Yet one man for one moment
Strode out before the crowd ;
Well known was he to all the three.
And they gave him greeting loud :
" Now welcome, welcome, Sextus !
Now welcome to thy home !
Why dost thou stay, and turn away ?
Here lies the road to Rome."
Thrice looked he at the city ;
Thrice looked he at the dead ;
And thrice came on in fury,
And thrice turned back in dread ;
And, white with fear and hatred.
Scowled at the narrow way
Where, wallowing in a pool of blood.
The bravest Tuscans lay.
But meanwhile axe and lever
Have manfuUy been plied ;
And now the bridge hangs tottering
Above the boiling tide.
"Come back, come back, Horatius I "
Loud cried the Fathers all, —
"Back, Lartius ! back, Herminius !
Back, ere the ruin fall ! "
Back darted Spurius Lartius, —
Herminius darted back ;
And, as they passed, beneath their feet
They felt the timbers crack.
But when they turned their faces.
And on the farther shore
Saw brave Horatius stand alone.
They would have crossed once more ;
But with a crash like thunder
Fell every loosened beam,
And, like a dam, the mighty wreck
Lay right athwart the stream ;
And a long shout of triumph
Rose from the walls of Rome,
As to the highest turret-tops
Was splashed the yellow foam.
And like a horse unbroken,
When first he feels the rein,
The furious river struggled hard.
And tossed his tawny mane,
And burst the curb, and bounded.
Rejoicing to be free ;
And whirling down, in fierce career.
Battlement and plank and pier.
Rushed headlong to the sea;
Alone stood brave Horatius,
But constant still in mind, —
Thrice thirty thousand foes before.
And the broad flood behind.
" Down with him ! " cried false Sextu^
With a smile on his pale face ;
"Now yield thee," eried Lars Porsena,
" Now yield thee to our grace 1 "
Round turned he, as not deigning
Those craven ranks to see ;
Naught spake he to Lars Porsena,
To Sextus naught spake he ;
But he saw on Palatinus
The white porch of his home ;
And he spake to the noble river
That roUs by the towers of Rome :
" O Tiber I Father Tiber !
To whom the Romans pray,
A Roman's life, a Roman's arms,
Take thou in charge this day I "
So he spake, and, speaking, sheathed
The good sword by his side.
And, with his harness on his back.
Plunged headlong in the tide.
No sound of joy or sorrow
Was heard from either bank.
But friends and foes in dumb surprise.
With parted lips and straining eyes,
Stood gazing where he sank ;
And when above the surges
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670
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
u
They saw his crest appear,
AU Rome sent forth a rapturous cry,
And even the ranks of Tuscany
Could scarce forbear to cheer.
But fiercely ran the current,
Swollen high by months of rain ;
And fast his blOod was flowing.
And he was sore in pain.
And heavy with his armor.
And spent with changing blows ;
And oft they thought him sinking.
But stiU again he rose.
Never, I ween, did swimmer.
In such an evil case.
Struggle through such a raging flood
Safe to the landing-place ;
But his limbs were borne up bravely
By the brave heart within,
And our good Father Tiber
Bare bravely up his chin.
"Curse on him !" quoth false Sextus, —
" Will not the villain drown ?
But for this stay, ere close of day
We should have sacked the town ! "
*' Heaven help him ! " quoth Lars Porsena,
" And bring him safe to shore ;
For such a gallant feat of arms
Was never seen before."
And now he feels the bottom ;
Now on dry earth he stands ;
Now round him throng the Fathers
To press his gory hands ;
And now, with shouts and clapping.
And noise of weeping loud.
He enters through the River-gate,
Borne by the joyous crowd.
They gave him of the corn-land.
That was of public right.
As much as two strong oxen
Could plough from mom till night ;
And they made a molten image,
And set it up on high, —
And there it stands unto this day
To witness if I lie.
It stands in the Comitium,
Plain for all folk to see, —
Horatius in his harness.
Halting upon one knee ;
And underneath is written.
In letters all of gold,
How valiantly he kept the bridge
In the brave days of old.
And still his name sounds stirring
Unto the men of Rome,
As the trumpet-blast that cries to them
To charge the Volscian home ;
And wives still pray to Juno
For boys with hearts as bold
As his who kept the bridge so well
In the brave days of old.
And in the nights of winter.
When the cold north-winds blow.
And the long howling of the wolves
Is heard amidst the snow ;
When round the lonely cottage
Roars loud the tempest's din.
And the good logs of Algidus
Roar louder yet within ;
When the oldest ca.sk is opened.
And the largest lamp is Rt ;
When the chestnuts glow in the embers.
And the kid turns on the spit ;
When young and old in circle
Around the firebrands close ;
When the girls are weaving baskets.
And the lads are shaping bows ;
When the goodman mends his armor.
And trims his helmet's plume ; '
When the goodwife's shuttle merrily
Goes flashing through the loom ;
With weeping and with laughter
Still is the story told.
How well Horatius kept the bridge
In the brave days of old.
Thomas Babington Macauiav.
SEMPRONIUS'S SPEECH FOR WAR.
from "cato." act ii. sc. i.
Mr voice is still for war.
Gods ! can a Roman senate long debate
I Which of the two to choose, slavery or death ?
I No ; let us rise at once, gird on our swords.
And at the head of our remaining troops
' Attack the foe, break through the thick array
Of his thronged legions, and charge home upon
him.
Perhaps some arm, more lucky than the rest.
May reach his heart, and free the world from
bondage.
Rise ! Fathers, rise ! 't is Rome demands your
help :
Rise, and revenge her slaughtered citizens.
Or share their fate ! The corpse of half her
senate
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POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
571
■a
Manures the fields of Thessaly, while we
Sit here deliberating, in cold debate,
If we should sacrifice our lives to honor.
Or wear them out in servitude and chains.
Rouse up, for shame ! our brothers of Pharsalia
Point at their wounds, and cry aloud, — "To
battle ! "
Great Pompey's shade complains that we are
slow.
And Scipio's ghost walks unrevenged amongst us.
Joseph Addison.
&
CARACTACUS.
Before proud Rome's imperial throne
In mind's unconquered mood.
As if the triumph were his own.
The dauntless captive stood.
None, to have seen his free-bom air.
Had fancied him a captive there.
Though, through the crowded streets of Rome,
With slow and stately tread.
Far from his own loved island home.
That day in triumph led, —
Unbound his head, unbent his knee,
Undimmed his eye, his aspect free.
A free and fearless glance he cast
On temple, arch, and tower.
By which the long procession passed
Of Rome's victorious power ;
And somewhat of a scornful smüe
Upcurled his haughty lip the while.
And now he stood, with brow serene.
Where slaves might prostrate fall.
Bearing a Briton's manly mien
In Caesar's palace hall ;
Claiming, with kindled brow and cheek.
The liberty e'en there to speak.
Nor could Rome's haughty lord withstand
The claim that look preferred.
But motioned with uplifted hand
The suppliant should be heard, —
If he indeed a suppliant were
Whose glance demanded audience there.
Deep stillness fell on all the crowd.
From Claudius on his throne
Down to the meanest slave that bowed
At his imperial throne ;
Silent his fellow-captive's grief
As fearless spoke the Island Chief :
"Think not, thou eagle Lord of Rome,
And master of the world.
Though victory's banner o'er thy dome
In triumph now is furled,
I would address thee as thy slave.
But as the bold should greet the brave !
" I might, perchance, could I have deigned
To hold a vassal's throne.
E'en now in Britain's isle have reigned
A king in name alone.
Yet holding, as thy meek ally,
A monarch's mimic pageantry.
" Then through Rome's crowded streets to-day
I might have rode with thee.
Not in a captive's base an-ay.
But fetterless and free, —
If freedom he could hope to find.
Whose bondage is of heart and mind.
" But canst thou marvel that, freebom.
With heart and soul unquelled.
Throne, crown, and sceptre I should scorn.
By thy permission held ?
Or that I should retain my right
Till wrested by a conqueror's might ?
" Rome, with her palaces and towers.
By us unwished, unreft.
Her homely huts and woodland bowers
To Britain might have left ;
Worthless to you their wealth must be.
But dear to us, for they were free !
"I might have bowed before, but where
Had been thy triumph now ?
To my resolve no yoke to bear
Thou ow'st thy laurelled brow ;
Inglorious victory had been thine.
And more inglorious bondage mine.
" Now I have spoken, do thy will ;
Be life or death my lot.
Since Britain's throne no more I fill.
To me it matters not.
My fame is clear ; but on my fate
Thy glory or thy shame must wait."
He ceased ; from all around upsprung
A murmur of applause.
For well had truth and freedom's tongue
Maintained their holy cause.
The conqueror was the captive then ;
He bade the slave be free again.
Bernard barton.
572
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
BOADICEA.
When the British warrior queen.
Bleeding from the Roman rods,
Sought, with an indignant mien.
Counsel of her country's gods.
Sage beneath the spreading oak
Sat the Druid, hoaiy chief ;
Every burning word he spoke
Full of i-age and fuU of grief.
" Princess ! if our aged eyes
Weep upon thy matchless wrongs,
'T is because resentment ties
AH the terrors of our tongues.
" Rome shall perish — write that word
In the blood that she has spilt, —
Perish, hopeless and abhorred.
Deep in ruin as in guilt.
" Rome, for empire far renowned.
Tramples on a thousand states ;
Soon her pride shall kiss the ground, —
Hark ! the Gaul is at her gates !
" Other Romans shall arise.
Heedless of a soldier's name ;
Sounds, not arms, shall win the prize.
Harmony the path to fame.
" Then the urogeny that springs
From the forests of our land,
Armed with thunder, clad with wings.
Shall a wider world command.
" Regions Caesar never knew
Thy posterity shall sway ;
Where his eagles never flew.
None invincible as they."
Such the bard's prophetic words.
Pregnant with celestial fire.
Bending as he swept the chords
Of his sweet but awful lyre.
She, with all a monarch's pride.
Felt them in her bosom glow ;
Rushed to battle, fought, and died, —
Dying, hurled them at the foe.
Ruffians, pitiless as proud.
Heaven awards th.e vengeance due ;
Empire is on us bestowed,
Shame and ruin wait for you !
William Cowper.
RIENZI TO THE ROMANS.
from "rienzi."
Friends !
I come not here to talk. Ye know too well
The story of our thraldom. We are slaves !
The bright sun rises to his course, and lights
A race of slaves ! he sets, and his last beam
Falls on a slave ! Not such as, swept along
By the full tide of power, the conqueror leads
To crimsou glory and undying fame.
But base, ignoble slaves ! — slaves to a horde
Of petty tyrants, feudal despots ; lords
Rich in some dozen paltry villages.
Strong in some hundred spearmen, only great
In that strange spell, — a name ! Each hour,
dark fi-aud.
Or open rapine, or protected murder.
Cries out against them. But this very day
An honest man, my neighbor (pointing to Pa¬
olo), — there he stands, —
Was struck — struck Rke a dog — by one who
wore
The badge of Ursini ! because, forsooth.
He tossed not high his ready cap in air.
Nor lifted up his voice in servile shouts.
At sight of that great ruffian ! Be we men.
And suffer such dishonor ? men, and wash not
The stain away in blood ? Such shames are com¬
mon.
I have known deeper wrongs. I, that speak to ye.
I had a brother once, a gracious boy.
Full of all gentleness, of calmest hope.
Of sweet and quiet joy ; there was the look
Of Heaven upon his face which limners give
To the beloved disciple. How I loved
That gracious boy ! younger by fifteen years.
Brother at once and son ! He left my side ;
A summer bloom on his fair cheeks, a smile
Parting his innocent lips. In one short hour
The pretty, harmless boy was slain ! I saw
The corse, the mangled corse, and then I cried
For vengeance ! Rouse ye, Romans ! Rouse
ye, slaves !
Have ye hrave sons ? — Look in the next fierce
brawl
To see them die ! Ha ve ye fair daughters ?—Look
To see them live, torn from your arms, distained.
Dishonored ; and, if ye dare call for justice.
Be answered by the lash ! Yet this is Rome,
That sat on her seven hUls, and from her throne
Of beauty ruled the world ! Yet we are Romans !
Why, in that elder day, to be a Roman
Was greater than a king ! And once again —
Hear me, ye walls, that echoed to the tread
Of either Brutus ! — once again, I swear.
The eternal city shall be free ; her sons shall
walk with princes.
Mary Russell mitford.
f
POEMS GE PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
573
BRUCE AND THE SPIDER.
Fob Scotland's and for freedom's right
The Bruce his part had played,
In five successive fields of fight
Been conquered and dismayed ;
Once more against the English host
His band he led, and once more lost
The meed for which he fought ;
And now from battle, faint and worn.
The homeless fugitive forlorn
A hut's lone shelter sought.
And cheerless was that resting-place
For him who claimed a throne :
His canopy, devoid of grace.
The rude, rough beams alone ;
The heather coueh his only bed, —
Yet well I ween had slumber fled
From couch of eider-down !
Through darksome night till dawn of day.
Absorbed in wakeful thoughts he lay
Of Scotland and her crown.
The sun rose brightly, and its gleam
Fell on that hapless bed.
And tinged with light each shapeless beam
Which roofed the lowly shed ;
When, looking up with wistful eye.
The Bruce beheld a spider try
His filmy thread to fling
From beam to beam of that rude cot ;
And well the insect's toilsome lot
Taught Scotland's future king.
Six times his gossamery thread
The wary spider threw ;
In vain the filmy line was sped.
For powerless or untrue
Each aim appeared, and back recoiled
The patient insect, six times foiled.
And yet unconquered still ;
And soon the Bruce, with eager eye.
Saw him prepare once more to try
His courage, strength, and skilL
One effort more, his seventh and last —
The hero hailed the sign ! —
And on the wished-for beam hung fast
That slender, silken line !
Slight as it was, his spirit caught
The more than omen, for his thought
The lesson well could trace.
Which even " he who runs may read,"
That Perseverance gains its meed.
And Patience wins the race.
Bernard Barton.
BANNOCKBURN,
At Bannockburn the English lay, —
The Scots they were na far away.
But waited for the break o' day
That glinted in the east.
But soon the sun broke thi-ough the heath
And lighted up that field o' death.
When Bruce, wi' saul-inspiriug breath.
His heralds thus addressed : —
Scots, wha hae wi' Wallace bled,
Scots, wham Bruce has aften led ;
Welcome to your gory bed,
Or to victorie.
Now's the day, and now's the hour
See the front o' battle lour :
See approach proud Edward's power, —
Chains and slaverie !
Wha wiU be a traitor knave ?
Wha can fill a coward's grave ?
Wha sae base as be a slave ?
Let him turn and flee !
Wha for Scotland's king and law
Freedom's sword will strongly draw.
Freeman stand, or freeman fa' ?
Let him follow me !
By Oppression's woes and pains 1
By your sons in servile chains.
We will drain our dearest veins,
But they shall be free I
Lay the proud usurpers low I
Tyrants fall in every foe !
Liberty's in every blow !
Let us do, or die !
robert Burns.
LOCHIEL'S WARNING.
wizard. —lochiel.
Lochiel, Lochiel ! beware of the day
When the Lorylands shall meet thee in battle
array !
For a field of the dead rushes red on my sight, '
And the clans of Culloden are scattered in fight.
They rally, they bleed, for their kingdom and
crown ;
Woe, woe to the riders that trample them down !
Proud Cumberland prances, insulting the slain.
And their hoof-beaten bosoms are trod to the
plain.
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
But hark ! through the fast-flashing lightning of
war,
What steed to the desert flies frantic and far ?
'T is thine, 0 GlenuUin ! whose bride shall await.
Like a love-lighted watch-fire, all night at the
gate.
A steed comes at morning : no rider is there ;
But its bridle is red with the sign of despair.
Weep, Albin ! to death and captivity led !
0, weep ! but thy tears cannot number the dead ;
For a merciless sword on Culloden shall wave,
CuUoden ! that reeks with the blood of the brave.
LOCHIEL.
Go, preach to the coward, thou death-telling
seer !
Or, if gory Culloden so dreadful appear.
Draw, dotard, around thy old wavering sight
This mantle, to cover the phantoms of fright.
WIZABD.
Ha ! laugh'st thou, Lochiel, my vision to scorn ?
Proud bird of the mountain, thy pltune shall be
torn !
Say, rushed the bold eagle exultingly forth
From his home in the dark rolling clouds of the
north ?
Lo ! the death-shot of foemen outspeeding, he
rode
Companionless, bearing destruction abroad ;
But down let him stoop from his havoc on high !
Ah ! home let him speed, — for the spoiler is
nigh.
Why flames the far summit ? Why shoot to the
blast
Those embers, like stars from the firmament cast ?
'T is the fire-shower of ruin, all dreadfully driven
From his eyrie, that beacons the darkness of
heaven.
0 crested Lochiel ! the peerless in might.
Whose banners arise on the battlements' height.
Heaven's fire is around thee, to blast and to burn ;
Return to thy dwelling ! all lonely return !
For the blackness of ashes shall mark where it
stood.
And a wild mother scream o'er her famishing
brood.
LOCHIEL.
FalseWizard, avaunt ! I have marshalled myclan.
Their swords are a thousand, their bosoms are
one !
They are true to the last of their blood and their
breath.
And like reapers descend to the harvest of death.
Then welcome be Cumberland's [steed to the
shock !
Let him dash his proud foam like a wave on the
rock !
But woe to his kindred, and woe to his cause.
When Albin her claymore indignantly draws ;
When her bonneted chieftains to victory crowd,
Clanronald the dauntless, ánd Moray the proud.
All plaided and plumed in their tartan array —
WIZARD.
— Lochiel, Lochiel ! beware of the day ;
For, dark and despairing, my sight I may seal.
But man cannot cover what God would reveal ;
'T is the sunset of life gives me mystical lore.
And coming events cast their shadows before.
I tell thee, Culloden's dread echoes shall ring
With the bloodhounds that bark for thy fugitive
king.
Lo ! anointed by Heaven with the vials of wrath.
Behold where he flies on his desolate path !
Now in darkness and biUows he sweeps from my
sight —
Rise, rise ! ye wild tempests, and cover his flight !
'T is finished. Their thunders are hushed on the
moors :
Culloden is lost, and my country deplores.
But where is the iron-bound prisoner ? Where ?
For the red eye of battle is shut in despair.
Say, mounts he the ocean-wave, banished, for¬
lorn.
Like a limb from his country cast bleeding and
torn?
Ah no ! for a darker departure is near ;
The war-drum is muffled, and black is the bier ;
His death-bell is tolling : O mercy, dispel
Yon sight, that it freezes my spirit to tell !
Life flutters convulsed in his quivering limbs.
And his blood-streaming nostril in agony swims.
Accursed be the fagots that blaze at his feet.
Where his heart shall be thrown ere it ceases to
beat.
With the smoke of its ashes to poison the gale ■—
— Down, soothless insulter ! I trust not the tale ;
For never shall Albin a destiny meet.
So black with dishonor, so foul with retreat !
Though my perishing ranks should be strewed
in their gore.
Like ocean-weeds heaped on the surf-beaten shore,
Lochiel, untainted by flight or by chains.
While the kindling of life in his bosom remains.
Shall victor exult, or in death be laid low.
With his back to the field, and his feet to the foe ;
And leaving in battle no blot on his name.
Look proudly to Heaven from the death-bed of
fame !
Thomas Campbelu
4rH
f
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
575
-a
SCOTLAND.
from " the lay of the last minstrel," canto vi.
0 Caledonia ! stern and wild,
Meet nurse for a poetic child !
Land of brown heath and shaggy wood,
Land of the mountain and the flood,
Land of my sires ! what mortal hand
Can e'er untie the filial band
That knits me to thy rugged strand ?
Still, as I view each well-known scene.
Think what is now, and what hath been.
Seems as, to me, of all bereft,
Sole friends thy woods and streams were left ;
And thus I love them better still,
Even in extremity of ill.
By Yarrow's stream still let me stray,
Though none should guide my feeble way ;
Still feel the breeze down Ettrick break.
Although it chilled my withered cheek ;
Still lay my head by Teviot stone.
Though there, forgotten and alone.
The bard may draw his parting groan.
Sir Walter Scott.
ENGLAND.
from "the timepiece " : "the task," book ii.
England, with all thy faults, I love thee still, —
My country ! and, while yet a nook is left
Where English minds and manners may be found.
Shall be constrained to love thee. Though thy
clime
Be fickle, and thy year most part deformed
With dripping rains, or withered by a frost,
I would not yet exchange thy sullen skies.
And fields without a flower, for warmer France
With all her vines ; nor for Ausonia's groves
Of golden fruitage and her myrtle bowers.
To shake thy senate, and from height sublime
Of patriot eloquence to flash down fire
Upon thy foes, was never meant my task :
But I can feel thy fortunes, and partake
Thy joys and sorrows with as true a heart
As any thunderer there. And I can feel
Thy follies too ; and with a just disdain
Frown at effeminates whose very looks
Reflect dishonor on the land I love.
How, in the name of soldiership and sense.
Should England prosper, when such things, as
smooth
And tender as a girl, all essenced o'er
With odors, and as profligate as sweet.
Who sell their laurel for a myrtle wreath,
And love when they should fight, — when such
as these
Presume to lay their hand upon the ark
Of her magnificent and awful cause ?
Time was when it was praise and boast enough
In every clime, and travel where we might.
That we were born her children. Praise enough
To fill the ambition of a private man.
That Chatham's language was his mother
tongue.
And Wolfe's great name compatriot with his
own.
William Cowper.
THE ROAST BEEF OF OLD ENGLAND.
When mighty roast beef was the Englishman's
food.
It ennobled our hearts, and enrichèd our blood ;
Our soldiers were brave, and our courtiers were
good.
O, the Boast Beef of old England,
And 0, the old English Roast Beefl
But since we have learned from effeminate
France
To eat their ragouts, as well as to dance.
We are fed up with nothing but vain complai¬
sance.
0, the Roast Beef, etc.
Henry Fielding.
Our fathers of old were robust, stout, and strong,
And kept open house with good cheer all day
long.
Which made their plump tenants rejoice in this
song,
0, the Roast Beef, etc.
When good Queen Elizabeth sat on the throne.
Ere coffee and tea, and such slip-slops, were
known.
The world was in terror, if e'en she did frown.
0, the Roast Beef, etc.
In those days, if fleets did presume on the main.
They seldom or never returned back again ;
As witness the vaunting Armada of Spain.
0, the Roast Beef, etc.
0, then we had stomachs to eat and to fight.
And when wrongs were cooking, to set ourselves
right;
But now we're a—hum!—I could, but—
good night !
0, the Roast Beef, etc.
The/our last stanzas added by richard loveridgb*
Ç 576
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
a
RULE, BRITANNIA.
from "alfred," act ii. sc. 5.
When Britain first, at Heaven's command.
Arose from out the azure main.
This was the charter of the land.
And guardian angels sung the strain :
Eule, Britannia, rule the waves I
For Britons never will be slwves.
The nations not so blest as thee
Must, in their turns, to tyrants fall ;
Whilst thou shalt fiourish, great and free.
The dread and envy of them alL
Rule, Britannia! etc.
Still more majestic shalt thou rise.
More dreadful from each foreign stroke ;
As the loud blasts that tear the skies
Serve but to root thy native oak.
Rule, Britannia ! etc.
Thee haughty tyrants ne'er shall tame ;
All their attempts to bend thee down
WiU but arouse thy generous flame.
And work their woe — but thy renown.
Rule, Britannia! etc.
To thee belongs the rural reign ;
Thy cities shall with commerce shine ;
All thine shall be the subject main.
And every shore it circles thine.
Rule, Britannia ! etc.
The Muses, still with Freedom found.
Shall to thy happy coast repair ;
Blest Isle ! with matchless beauty crowned.
And manly hearts to guard the fair.
Rule, Britannia ! etc.
James Thomson.
NASEBY.
By Obadiah Bind-their-kings-in-chains-and-their-no-
BLES-WITH>LINKS-OF-lRON ; SERGEANT IN IRETON'S
Regiment.
0, WHEREFORE come ye forth, in triumph from
the north.
With your hands and your feet and your raiment
all red ?
And wherefore doth your rout send forth a joy¬
ous shout ?
And whence be the grapes of the wine-press that
ye tread ?
O, evil was the root, and bitter was the fruit.
And crimson was the juice of the vintage that we
trod;
For we trampled on the throng of the haughty
and the strong.
Who sate in the high places and slew the saints
of God.
It was about the noon of a glorious day of June,
That we saw their banners dance and their
cuirasses shine.
And the man of blood was there, with his long
essenced hair.
And Astley, and Sir Marmaduke, and Rupert of
the Rhine.
Like a servant of the Lord, with his Bible and
his sword.
The General rode along us to form us to the fight ;
When a murmuring sound broke out, and swelled
into a shout
Among the godless horsemen upon the tyrant's
right.
And hark ! like the roar of the billows on the
shore.
The cry of battle rises along their charging line !
For God ! for the cause ! — for the Church ! for
the laws !
For Charles, king of England, and Rupert of the
Rhine !
The furious German comes, with his clarions and
his drums.
His bravoes of Alsatia, and pages of Whitehall ;
They are bursting on our flanks. Grasp your
pikes ! Close your ranks !
For Rupert never comes but to conquer, or to
fall.
They are here ! They rush on ! We are broken !
We are gone !'
Our left is borne before them like stubble on the
blast.
0 Lord, put forth thy might ! O Lord, defend
the right !
Stand back to back, in God's name ! and fight it
to the last !
Stout Skippon hath a wound ; the centre hath
given ground :
Hark ! hark ! what means the trampling of
horsemen on our rear ?
Whose banner do I see, boys ? 'T is he ! thank
God ! 't is he, boys !
Bear up another minute ! Brave Oliver is here.
Their heads all stooping low, their points all in
a row,
Like a whirlwind on the trees, like a deluge on
the dikes.
W
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
&
Our cuirassiers have burst on the ranks of the
Accurst,
And at a shock have scattered the forest of his
pikes.
Fast, fast the gallants ride, in some safe nook to
hide
Their coward heads, predestined to rot on Tem¬
ple Bar ;
And he, — he turns, he flies : — shame on those
cruel eyes
That bore to look on torture, and dare not look
on war !
Ho ! comrades, scour the plain ; and, ere ye strip
the slain.
First give another stab to make your search se¬
cure ;
Then shake from sleeves and pockets their broad-
pieces and lockets.
The tokens of the wanton, the plunder of the
poor.
Fools ! your doublets shone with gold, and your
hearts were gay and bold,
^Yhen you kissed your lily hands to your lemans
to-day ;
And to-morrow shall the fox, from her chambers
in the rocks.
Lead forth her tawny cubs to howl above the prey.
Where be your tongues that late mocked at
heaven and hell and fate ?
Andtheflngers that once were so busy with your
blades.
Your perfumed satin clothes, your catches and
your oaths !
Your stage-plays and your sonnets, your dia¬
monds and your spades ?
Down ! down ! forever down, with the mitre and
the crown !
With the Belial of the court, and the Mammon
of the Pope !
There is woe in Oxford halls ; there is wail in
Durham's stalls ;
The Jesuit smites his bosom ; the bishop rends
his cope.
And she of the seven hills shall mourn her chil¬
dren's ills.
And tremble when she thinks on the edge of
England's sword ;
And the kings of earth in fear shall shudder
when they hear
What the hand of God hath wrought for the
Houses and the Word !
Thomas Babington macaulav.
THE HARP THAT ONCE THROUGH
TARAS HALLS.
The harp that once through Tara's halls
The soul of music shed.
Now hangs as mute on Tara's walls
As if that soul were fled.
So sleeps the pride of former days.
So glory's thrill is o'er.
And hearts that once beat high for praise
Now feel that pulse no more !
No more to chiefs and ladies bright
The harp of Tara swells ;
The chord alone that breaks at night
Its tale of ruin tells.
Thus Freedom now so seldom wakes.
The only throb she gives
Is when some heart indignant breaks.
To show that still she lives.
Thomas Moore
AS BY THE SHORE AT BREAK OF
DAY.
As by the shore, at break of day,
A vanquished chief expiring lay.
Upon the sands, with broken sword.
He traced his farewell to the free ;
And there the last unflnished word
He dying wrote, was " Liberty ! "
At night a sea-bird shrieked the knell
Of him who thus for freedom feU ;
The words he wrote, ere evening came.
Were covered by the sounding sea ; —
So pass away the cause and name
Of him who dies for liberty !
Thomas Moore,
GOUGAUNE BARRA.
fThe lake of Gougaune Barra, i. e. the hollow, or recess of St.
Finn Bar, in the rugged territory of Ibh*Laoghaire (the O'Learys'
country) in the west end of the county of Cork, is the parent of the
river Lee. Its waters embrace a small but verdant island of about
half an acre in extent, which approaches its eastern shore. The
lake, as its name implies, is situate in a deep hollow, surrounded on
every side (save the east, where its superabundant waters are dis¬
charged) by vast and almost perpendicular mountains, wliose dark
inverted shadows are gloomily reflected in its still waters beneath.]
There is a green island in lone Gougaune Ban'a,
Where Allua of songs rushes forth as an arrow ;
In deep-valleyed Desmond — a thousand wild
fountains
Come down to that lake from their home in the
mountains.
There grows the wild ash, and a time-stricken
willow
Looks chidingly down on the mirth of the billow ;
■0
a-
578
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
-a
As, like some gay child, that sad monitor scorn¬
ing,
It lightly laughs back to the laugh of the morning.
And its zone of dark hills, — 0, to see them all
brightening,.
"When the tempest flings out its red banner of
lightning.
And the waters rush down, mid the thimder's
deep rattle.
Like clans from their hills at the voice of the
battle ;
And brightly the fire-crested billows are gleaming.
And wildly from Mullagh the eagles are scream¬
ing !
0, where is the'dwelling, in valley or highland.
So meet for a bard as this lone little island ?
How oft, whan^he summerl sun reste^n Claräy
And lit the'^darK heath on^tne hills of^vera.
Have I sought thee, sweet spoA from 'my hom'i^
by the ocean.
And trod all^thy wilds witlM minstrel"^ devotion.
And thought of thy bards, when\ assembling to¬
gether, ^ I
In the cleft I of thy rockg^ or the depth of thy
heather ; . '
They fled from'^the Saxon'sldark bondage^ and
slaughter.
And waked their last song b)^ the rush oí thy
water. ' ' ^
High sons of the lyre, 0, how proud was the
feeling.
To think while alone through that solitude steal¬
ing.
Though loftier minstrels green Erin can number,
I only awoke your wild harp from its slumber.
And mingled once more with the voice of those
fountains
The songs even Echo forgot on her mountains ;
And gleaned each gray legend that darkly was
sleeping
Where the mist and the rain o'er their beauty
were creeping !
Least bard of the hills, — were it mine to inherit
The fire of thy harp and the wing of thy spirit.
With the wrongs which like thee to our country
have bound me.
Did your mantle of song fling its radiance around
me.
Still, still in those wilds might young Liberty
rally.
And send her strong shout over mountain and
valley.
The star of the west might yet rise in its glory.
And the land that was darkest be brightest in
story.
I too shall be gone ; — but my name shall be
spoken
When Erin awakes and her fetters are broken.
Some minstrel^will come, in^the summer^eve's
gleaming,\
When Freedom'!^ young light on his spirit 'is
beaming, » ^
And bend o'er jmy grave with a tear o^ emotion.
Where calm Ayon-Bue¿ seeks the kisses of ocean.
Or plant a wild wreath, from the banks of that
river.
O'er the heart and the harp that are sleeping
forever.
James Joseph Callanan.
EXILE OF ERIN.
There came to the beach a poor exile of Erin,
The dew on his thin robe was heavy and chill ;
For his country he sighed, when at twilight re¬
pairing
To wan(^er alone by the wind-beaten hill.
But the day-star attracted his eye's sad devotion.
For it rose o'er his own native isle of the ocean.
Where once, in the fire of his youthful emotion.
He sang the bold anthem of Erin go bragh.
Sad is my fate ! said the heart-broken stranger ;
The wild deer and wolf to a covert can flee.
But I have no refuge from famine and danger,
A home and a country remain not to me.
Never again in the green sunny bowers
Where my forefathers lived shall I spend the
sweet hours.
Or cover my harp with the wild-woven flowers.
And strike to the numbers of Erin go bragh !
Erin, my country ! though sad and forsaken,
In dreams I revisit thy sea-beaten shore ;
But, alas ! in a far foreign land 1 awaken.
And sigh for the friends who can meet me no
more !
0 cruel fate ! wilt thou never replace me
In a mansion of peace, where no perils can chase
me ?
Never again shall my brothers embmce me ?
They died to defend me, or live to deplore !
Where is my cabin door, fast by the wildwood ?
Sisters and sire, did ye weep for its fall ?
Where is the mother that looked on my child¬
hood ?
And where is the bosom-friend, dearer than all ?
0 my sad heart ! long abandoned by pleasure.
Why did it dote on a fast-fading treasure ?
Tears, like the luin-drop, may fall without
measure.
But rapture and beauty they cannot recall. ♦
&
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
579
n
Yet, all its sad recollections suppressing,
One dying wish my lone bosom can draw, —
Enn, an exile bequeaths thee his blessing !
Land of my forefathers, Erin go bragh !
Buried and cold, when my heart stills her motion.
Green be thy fields, sweetest isle of the ocean !
And thy harp-striking bards sing aloud with
devotion, —
Erin mavoumeen, Erin go bragh ! •
thomas Campbell.
MY NATIVE LAND.
It chanced to me upon a time to sail
Across the Southern ocean to and fro ;
And, landing at fair isles, by stream and vale
Of sensuous blessing did we ofttimes go.
And months of dreamy joys, like joys in sleep.
Or like a clear, calm stream o'er mossy stone.
Unnoted passed our hearts with voiceless sweep.
And left us yearning still for lands unknown.
And when we found one, — for 't is soon to find
In thousand-isled Cathay another isle, —
For one short noon its treasures filled the mind.
And then again we yearned, and ceased to
smile.
And so it was, from isle to isle we passed.
Like wanton bees or boys on flowers or lips ;
And when that all was tasted, then at last
We thirsted still for draughts instead of sips.
I learned from this there is no Southern land
Can fill with love the hearts of Northern men.
Sick minds need change ; but, when in health
they stand
'Neath foreign skies, their love flies home agen.
And thus with me it was : the yearning turned
From laden airs of cinnamon away.
And stretched far westward, while the full heart
burned
With love for Ireland, looking on Cathay !
My first dear love, all dearer for thy grief !
My land, that has no peer in all the sea
For verdure, vale, or river, flower or leaf, —
If first to no man else, thou 'rt first to me.
New loves may come with duties, but the first
Is deepest yet,—the mother's breath and
smiles :
Like that kind face andbrs.ast where I was nursed
Is my poor land, the Niobe of isles.
John Boyle O'Reilly.
* Ireland my darlinsf, Ireland forever I
IRELAND.
1847.
They » ¡dying !|they are dying! where the |
'golden com is Mowing ;
They are dying !' they are dying ! where the
crowded herds are lowing ;
They are gasping for existence where the streams
of life are flowing.
And they perish of the plague where the breeze
of health is blowing !
God of justice ! God of power !
Do we dream ? Can it be.
In this land, at this hour.
With the blossom on the tree.
In the gladsome month of'May,
When the young lambs pl^y.
When Nature looks around
On her waking children nowj
The seed within the ground.
The bud upon the bough ?
Is it right, is it fair.
That we perish of despair
In this land, on this soil.
Where our destiny is set,
Wliich we cultured with our toil.
And watered with our sweat ?
We have ploughed, we have sown
But the crop was not our own ;
We have reaped, but harpy hands
Swept the harvest from our lands ;
We were perishing for food,
When lo ! in pitying mood.
Our kindly rulers gave
The fat fluid of the slave,
Wliile our com filled the manger
Of the war-horse of the stranger !
God of mercy ! must this last ?
Is this land preordained.
For the present and the past
And the future, to be chained, —
To be ravaged, to be drained,
To be robbed, to be spoiled.
To be hushed, to be whipt.
Its soaring pinions dipt.
And its every effort foiled ?
Do our numbers multiply
But to perish and to die ?
Is this all our destiny below, —
That our bodies, as they rot.
May fertilize the spot
Where the harvests of the stranger grow?
If this be, indeed, our fate.
Far, far better now, though late.
9
580
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
That we seek some other land and try some other
zone ;
The coldest, bleakest shore
Will surely 3deld us more
Than the storehouse of the stranger that we dare
not call our own.
Kindly brothers of the West,
Who from Liberty's full breast
Have fed us, who are orphans beneath a step-
dame's frown.
Behold our happy state.
And weep your wretched fate
That you share not in the splendors of our em¬
pire and our crown !
Kindly brothers of the East, —
Thou great tiaraed priest.
Thou sanctified Rienzi of Rome and of the
earth, —
Or thou who bear'st control
Over golden Istambol,
Who felt for our misfortunes and helped us in
our dearth, —
Turn here your wondering eyes.
Call your wisest of the wise,
Your muftis and your ministers, your men of
deepest lore ;
Let the sagest of your sages
Ope our island's mystic pages.
And explain unto your highness the wonders of
our shore.
A fruitful, teeming soil.
Where the patient peasants toil
Beneath the summer's sun and the watery winter
sky;
Where they tend the golden grain
TiU it bends upon the plain.
Then reap it for the stranger, and turn aside to die ;
Where they watch their fiocks increase.
And store the snowy fieece
Till they send it to their masters to be woven
o'er the waves ;
Where, having sent their meat
For the foreigner to eat.
Their mission is fulfilled, and they creep into
their graves.
'T is for this they are dying where the golden
corn is growing,
'T is for this they are dying where the crowded
herds are lowing,
'T is for this they are d3dng where the streams
of life are flowing.
And they perish of the plague where the breeze
of health is blowing !
Denis Florence Mac-Carthy.
SONG OF THE GREEK POET.
prom "don juan." canto ih.
The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece !
Where burning Sappho loved and sung, —
Where grew the arts of war and peace, —
Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung !
Eternal summer gilds them yet ;
But all, except their sun, is set.
The Scian and the Teian muse.
The hero's harp, the lover's lute.
Have found the fame your shores refuse ;
Their place of birth alone is mute
To sounds which echo farther west
Than yoiu: sires' "Islands of the Blest."
The mountains look on Marathon,
And Marathon looks on the sea ;
And musing there an hour alone,
I dreamed that Greece might still be free ;
For, standing on the Persians' grave,
I could not deem myself a slave.
A king sat on the rocky brow
Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis ;
And ships by thousands lay below.
And men in nations, — all were his !
He counted them at break of day, —
And when the sun set, where were they ?
And where are they ? and where art thou.
My country ? On thy voiceless shore
The heroic lay is tuneless now, —
The heroic bosom beats no more !
And must thy lyre, so long divine.
Degenerate into hands like mine ?
'T is something, in the dearth of fame.
Though linked among a fettered race.
To feel at least a patriot's shame.
Even as I sing, suffuse my face ;
For what is left the poet here ?
For Greeks a blush, — for Greece a tear.
Must we but weep o'er days more blest ?
Must we but blush ? — our fathers bled.
Earth ! render back from out thy breast
A remnant of our Spartan dead !
Of the three hundred, grant but three
To make a new Thermopylae !
What, silent still ? and silent all ?
Ah, no ! the voices of the dead
Sound like a distant torrent's fall.
And answer, " Let one living head.
But one, arise, — we come, we come ! *
'T is but the living who are dumb.
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
581
a
In vain, — in vain ; strike other chords ;
FUI high the cup with Samian wine !
Leave battles to the Turkish hordes,
And shed the blood of Scio's vine !
Hark ! rising to the ignoble call.
How answers each bold Bacchanal !
You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet, —
Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone ?
Of two such lessons, why forget
The nobler and the manlier one ?
You have the letters Cadmus gave, —
Think ye he meant them for a slave ?
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine !
We wUl not think of themes like these !
It made Anacreon's song divine :
He served, but served Polycrates, —
A tyrant ; but our masters then
Were still, at least, our countrymen.
The tyrant of the Chersonese
Was freedom's best and bravest friend ;
That tyrant was Miltiades !
0 that the present hour would lend
Another despot of the kind !
Such chains as his were sure to bind.
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine 1
On Suli's rock and Parga's shore
Exists the remnant of a line
Such as the Doric mothers bore ;
And there perhaps some seed is sown
The Heracleidan blood might own.
Trust not for freedom to the Franks, —
They have a king who buys and sells :
In native swords, and native ranks.
The only hope of courage dwells ;
But Tuikish force, and Latin fraud.
Would C/.eak your shield, however broad.
Fill high the bowl with Samian wine !
Our virgins dance beneath the shade, —
I see their glorious black eyes shine ;
But, gazing on each glowing maid.
My own the burning tear-drop laves.
To think such breasts must suckle slavea.
Place me on Sunium's marbled steep.
Where nothing, save the waves and I,
May hear our mutual murmurs sweep ;
There, swan-like, let me sing and die.
A land of slaves shall ne'er be mine, —
Dash down yon cup of Samian wine !
LORD ByROM
GREECE.
FROM "CHILDE HAROLD." CANTO. II.
Fair Greece ! sad relic of departed worth ! .
Immortal, though no more ; though fallen,
great !
Who no w shall lead thy scattered children forth,
And long-accustomed bondage uncreate ?
Not such thy sons who whilom did await.
The hopeless warriors of a willing doom.
In bleak Thermopylae's sepulchral strait, —
0, who that gallant spirit shall resume.
Leap from Eurotas' banks, and call thee from
the tomb ?
Spirit of Freedom ! when on Phyle's brow
Thou sat'st with Thrasybulus and his train,
Couldst thou forebode the dismal hour which
now
Dims the green beauties of thine Attic plain ?
Not thirty tyrants now enforce the chain.
But every carle can lord it o'er thy land ;
Nor rise thy sons, but idly rail in vain.
Trembling beneath the scourge of Turkish hand,
From birth till death enslaved ; in word, in deed,
unmanned.
In all save form alone, how changed ! and who
That marks the fire still sparkling in each eye.
Who but would deem their bosoms burned anew
With thy unquenohèd beam, lost Liberty !
And many dream withal the hour is nigh
That gives them back their fathers' heritage ;
For foreign arms and aid they fondly sigh.
Nor solely dare encounter hostile rage.
Or tear their name defiled from Slavery's mourn¬
ful page.
Hereditary bondsmen ! know ye not.
Who would be free themselves must strike the
blow ?
By their right arms the conquest must be
wrought ?
Will Gaul or Muscovite redress ye ? No !
True, they may lay your proud despoilers low.
But not for you will Freedom's altars flame.
Shades of the Helots ! triumph o'er your foe !
Greece ! change thy lords, thy state is still the
same ;
Thy glorious day is o'er, but not thy years of
shame !
LORD BYRON.
GREECE.
FROM "THE GIAOUR.'
Clime of the uuforgotten brave !
Whose land, from plain to mountain-cave,
Was Freedom's home or Glory's grave !
Shrine of the mighty ! can it be
e
582
POEMS OP PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
That this is all remains of thee ?
Approach, thou craven, crouching slave ;
Say, is not this Thermopylae ?
These waters blue that round you lave,
0 servile offspring of the free, —
Pronounce what sea, what shore is this ?
The gulf, the rock of Salamis !
These scenes, their stoiy not unknown.
Arise, and make again your own ;
Snatch from the ashes of your sires
The embers of their former ñres ;
And he who in the strife expires
Will add to theirs a name of fear
That Tyranny shall quake to hear.
And leave his sons a hope, a fame.
They too will rather die than shame ;
For Freedom's battle once begmi,
Bequeathed by bleeding sire to son.
Though baffled oft is ever won.
Bear witness, Greece, thy living page ;
Attest it, many a deathless age :
While kings, in dusty darkness hid.
Have left a nameless pyramid.
Thy heroes, though the general doom
Hath swept the column from their tomb,
A mightier monument command,
The mountains of their native land !
There points thy Muse to stranger's eye
The graves of those that cannot die !
'T were long to tell, and sad to trace,
Each step from splendor to disgrace ;
Enough, — no foreign foe could quell
Thy soul, tiU from itself it fell ;
Yes ! self-abasement paved the way
To villain-bonds and despot sway.
What can he tell who treads thy shore ?
No legend of thine olden time.
No theme on which the Muse might soar.
High as thine own in days of yore.
When man was worthy of thy clime.
The hearts within thy valleys bred.
The fiery souls that might have led
Thy sons to deeds sublime.
Now crawl from cradle to the grave.
Slaves — nay, the bondsmen of a slave.
And callous save to crime.
Lord Byron.
MARCO BOZZARIS.
[Marco Borzaris, the Epaminondas of modem Greece, fell in a
ni^ht attack upon the Turkish camp at Laspi. the site of the an*
cient Platan, Aug'. 20,1823, and expired in the moment of victory.
His last words were : " To die for liberty is a pleasure, and not a
pain. "J
At midnight, in his guarded tent.
The Turk was dreaming of the hour
When Greece, her knee in suppliance bei
Should tremble at his power.
In dreams, through camp and court, he bore
The trophies of a conqueror ;
In dreams his song of triumph heard ;
Then wore his monarch's signet-ring.
Then pressed that monarch's throne — a king ;
As wild his thoughts, and gay of wing,
As Eden's garden bird.
At midnight, in the forest shades,
Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band, —
True as the steel of their tried blades.
Heroes in heart and hand.
There had the Persian's thousands stood.
There had the glad earth drunk their blood.
On old Platma's day ;
And now there breathed that haunted air
The sons of sires who conquered there.
With arm to strike, and soul to dare.
As quick, as far, as they.
An hour passed on, the Turk awoke :
That bright dream was his last ;
He woke — to hear his sentries shriek,
' ' To arms ! they come ! the Greek ! the Greek ! "
He woke — to die midst flame, and smoke.
And shout, and groan, and sabre-stroke.
And death-shots falling thick and fast
As lightnings from the mountain-cloud ;
And heard, with voice as trumpet loud,
Bozzaris cheer his band ;
"Strike — till the last armed foe expires ;
Strike —- for your altars and your fires ;
Strike — for the green graves of your sires,
God, and your native land ! "
They fought — like brave men, long and well ;
They piled that ground with Moslem slain :
They conquered — but Bozzaris fell.
Bleeding at every vein.
His few surviving comrades saw
His smile when rang their proud hurrah.
And the red field was won ;
Then saw in death his eyelids close
Calmly, as to a night's repose.
Like flowers at set of sun.
Come to the bridal chamber, Death,
Come to the mother, when she feels.
For the first time, her first-bom's breath ;
Come when the blessed seals
That close the pestilence are broke.
And crowded cities wail its stroke ;
Come in consumption's ghastly form.
The earthquake shock, the ocean storm ;
Come when the heart beats high and warm.
With banquet song and dance and wine, —
And thou art terrible ; the tear.
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.,
583~^^
The groan, the knell, the pall, the hier,
And all we know, or dream, or fear
Of agony, are thine.
But to the hero, when his sword
Has won the battle for the free.
Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word.
And in its hollow tones are heard
The thanks of millions yet to be.
Come when his task of fame is wrought ;
Come with her laurel-leaf, blood-bought ;
Come in her crowning hour, — and then
Thy sunken eye's unearthly light
To him is welcome as the sight
Of sky and stars to prisoned men ;
Thy grasp is welcome as the hand
Of brother in a foreign land ;
Thy summons welcome as the cry
That told the Indian isles were nigh
To the world-seeking Genoese,
When the land-wind, from woods of palm.
And orange-groves, and fields of balm.
Blew o'er the Haytian seas.
Bozzaris ! with the storied brave
Greece nurtured in her glory's time.
Rest thee ; there is no prouder grave.
Even in her own proud clime.
She wore no funeral weeds for thee.
Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume.
Like torn branch from death's leafless tree,
In sorrow's pomp and pageantry.
The heartless luxury of the tomb.
But she remembers thee as one
Long loved, and for a season gone.
For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed.
Her marble wrought, her music breathed ;
For thee she rings the birthday bells ;
Of thee her babes' first lisping tells ;
For thine her evening prayer is said
At palace couch and cottage bed.
Her soldier, closing with the foe.
Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow ;
His plighted maiden, when she fears
For him, the joy of her young years.
Thinks of thy fate, and checks her tears.
And she, the mother of thy boys.
Though in her eye and faded cheek
Is read the grief she will not speak.
The memory of her buried joys, —
And even she who gave thee Ijirth, —
Will, by her pilgrim-circled hearth.
Talk of thy doom without a sigh ;
For thou art freedom's now, and fame's, —
One of the few, the immortal names
That were not bom to die.
fitz.greene halleck.
[g
POLAND.
from " the pleasures of hope," part i.
Warsaw's last champion from her height sur¬
veyed.
Wide o'er the fields, a waste of ruin laid ;
" 0 Heaven ! " he cried, " my bleeding country
save ! —
Is there no hand on high to shield the brave ?
Yet, though destruction sweep these lovelyplains.
Rise, fellow-men ! our coimtry yet remains !
By that dread name, we wave the sword on high.
And swear for her to live — with her to die ! "
He said, and on the rampart-heights arrayed
His trusty warriors, few, but undismayed ;
Firm-paced and slow, a horrid front they form.
Still as the breeze, but dreadful as the storm ;
Low murmuring sounds along their banners fly.
Revenge, or death, — the watchword and reply ;
Then pealed the notes, omnipotent to charm,
And the loud tocsin tolled their last alarm ! —
In vain, alas ! in vain, ye gallant few !
Fram rank to rank your volleyed thunder flew : —
0, bloodiest picture in the book of Time !
Sarmatia fell, unwept, without a crime ;
Found not a generous friend, a pitying foe.
Strength in her arms, nor mercy in her woe !
Dropped from her nerveless grasp the shattered
spear.
Closed her bright eye, and curbed her high career ;
Hope, for a season, bade the world farewell.
And Freedom shrieked — as Kosciusko fell !
thomas campeelu
MEN AND BOYS.
The storm is out ; the land is roused ;
Where is the coward who sits well housed ?
Fie on thee, boy, disguised in curls.
Behind the stove, 'mong gluttons and girls !
A graceless, worthless wight thou must be ;
No German maid desires thee.
No German song inspires thee.
No German Rhine-wine flres thee.
Forth in the van,
Man by man.
Swing the battle-sword who can !
When we stand watching, the livelong night.
Through piping storms, tül morning light.
Thou to thy downy bed canst creep.
And there in dreams of rapture sleep.
A graceless, worthless wight, etc.
When, hoarse and shrill, the trumpet's blast.
Like the thunder of God, makes our hearts beat
fast;
E]
, POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
Thou in the theatre lov'st to appear,
Where trills and quavers tickle the ear.
A graceless, worthless wight, etc.
When the glare of noonday scorches the brain.
When our parched lips seek water in vain.
Thou canst make champagne corks fly
At the groaning tables of luxury.
A graceless, worthless wight, etc.
When we, as we rush to the strangling fight.
Send home to our true-loves a long " Good¬
night,"
Thou canst hie thee where love is sold,
And buy thy pleasure with paltry gold.
A graceless, worthless wight, etc.
When lance and bullet come whistling by.
And death in a thousand shapes draws nigh.
Thou canst sit at thy cards, and kill
King, queen, and knave with thy spadille.
A graceless, worthless wight, etc.
If on the red field our bell should toll.
Then welcome be death to the patriot's soul !
Thy pampered flesh shall quake at its doom.
And crawl in silk to a hopeless tomb.
A pitiful exit thine shall be ;
No,German maid shall weep for thee.
No German song shall.they sing for thee.
No German goblets shall ring for thee.
Forth in the van,
Man for man.
Swing the_battle-sword who can !
From the German of körner. Trans¬
lation of Charles T. brooks.
THE MARSEILLAISE.
Ye sons of freedom, wake to glory !
Hark ! hark ! what myriads bid you rise !
Your children, wives, and grandsires hoary.
Behold their tears and hear their cries !
Shall hateful tyrants, mischiefs breeding.
With hireling hosts, a ruffian band.
Affright and desolate the land.
While peace and liberty lie bleeding ?
To arms ! to arms ! ye brave !
The avenging sword imsheathe ;
March on ! march on ! all hearts resolved
On victory or death.
Now, now the dangerous storm is rolling.
Which treacherous kings confederate raise ;
The dogs of war, let loose, are howling.
And lo ! our fields and cities blaze ;
And shall we basely view the ruin.
While lawless force, with guilty stride.
Spreads desolation far and wide.
With crimes and blood his hands imbruing.
To arms ! to arms ! ye brave, etc.
O Liberty ! can man resign thee.
Once having felt thy generous flame ?
Can dungeons, bolts, or bars confine thee ?
Or whips thy noble spirit tame ?
Too long the world has wept, bewailing
That falsehood's dagger t3Tants wield.
But freedom is our sword and shield.
And all their arts are unavailing.
To arms ! to arms ! ye brave, etc.
Abbreviated, from the French of rouget de Lisle,
MAKE WAY FOR LIBERTY.
fOn the exploit of Arnold Winkelried at the battle of Sempach,
in the fourteenth century, in which the Swiss, fighting for their in¬
dependence, totally defeated the Austrians.J
" Make way for Liberty !" — he cried ;
Made way for Liberty, and died I
In arms the Austrian phalanx stood,
A living wall, a human wood !
A wall, where every conscious stone
Seemed to its kindred thousands grown ;
A rampart all assaults to bear.
Till time to dust their frames should wear ;
A wood, like that enchanted gi-ove
In which with fiends Rinaldo strove.
Where eveiy silent tree possessed
A spirit prisoned in its breast.
Which the first stroke of coming strife
Would startle into hideous life :
So dense, so still, the Austrians stood,
A living wall, a human wood !
Impregnable their front appears.
All horrent with projected spears.
Whose polished points before them shine.
From flank to flank, one brilliant line.
Bright as the breakers' splendors run
Along the billows to the sun.
Opposed to these, a hovering band
Contended for their native land ;
Peasants, whose new-found strength had broke
From manly necks the ignoble yoke.
And forged their fetters into swords.
On equal terms to fight their lords.
And what insm'gent rage had gained
In many a mortal fray maintained :
Marshalled once more at Freedom's call.
They came to conquer or to fall.
Where he who conquered, he who fell.
Was deemed a dead, or living, Tell ! ^
ö
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
585
Such virtue had that patriot breathed,
So to the soil his soul bequeathed,
That wheresoe'er his arrows flew
Heroes in his own likeness grew.
And warriors sprang from every sod
Which his awakening footstep trod.
And now the work of life and death
Hung on the passing of a breath ;
The fire of conflict burnt within.
The battle trembled to begin :
Yet, while the Austrians held their ground,
Point for attack was nowhere found ;
Where'er the impatient Switzers gazed.
The unbroken line of lances blazed :
That line't were suicide to meet.
And perish at their tyrants' feet, —
How could they rest within their graves.
And leave their homes the homes of slaves ?
Would they not feel their children tread
With clanging chains above their head ?
It must not be ; this day, this hour.
Annihilates the oppressor's power ;
All Switzerland is in the field.
She will not fly, she cannot yield, —
She must not fall ; her better fate
Here gives her an immortal date.
Few were the numbers she could boast ;
But every freeman was a host,
And felt as though himself were he
On whose sole arm hung victory.
It did depend on one indeed ;
Behold him, — Arnold Winkelried !
There sounds not to the trump of fame
The echo of a nobler name.
Unmarked he stood amid the throng.
In rumination deep and long.
Till you might see, with sudden grace.
The very thought come o'er his face.
And by the motion of his form
Anticipate the bursting storm.
And by the uplifting of his brow
Tell where the bolt would strike, and how.
But't was no sooner thought than done
The field was in a moment won : —
"Make way for Liberty 1 " he cried.
Then ran, with arms extended wide.
As if his dearest friend to clasp ;
Ten spears he swept within his grasp.
" Make way for Liberty I " he cried ;
Their keen points met from side to side ;
He bowed amongst them like a tree,
And thus made way for Liberty.
Swift to the breach his comrades fly ;
"Make way for Liberty ! " they cry.
And through the Austrian phalanx dart.
As rushed the spears through Arnold's heart ;
While, instantaneous as his fall.
Rout, ruin, panic, scattered all :
An earthquake could not overthrow
A city with a surer blow.
Thus Switzerland again was free ; •
Thus Death made way for Liberty !
JAHBS MONTGOMERY.
SWITZERLAND.
from " william tell."
Once Switzerland was free ! With what a pride
I used to walk these hills, — look up to heaven.
And bless God that it was so ! It was free
From end to end, from cliff to lake't was free !
Free as our torrents are, that leap our rocks.
And plough our valleys, without asking leave ;
Or as our peaks, that wear their caps of snow
In very presence of the regal sun !
How happy was I in it then ! I loved
Its very storms. Ay, often have I sat
In my boat at night, when, midway o'er the lake.
The stars went out, and down the mountain gorge
The wind came roaring, — I have sat and eyed
The thunder breaking from his cloud, and smiled
To see him shake his lightnings o'er my head.
And think — 1 had no master save his own !
James Sheridan Knowles.
A COURT LADY.
Her hair was tawny with gold, her eyes with
purple were dark.
Her cheeks' pale opal burnt with a red and rest¬
less spark.
Never was lady of Müan nobler in name and in
race ;
N ever was lady of Italy fairer to see in the face.
Never was lady on earth more true as woman and
wife,
Larger in judgment and instinct, prouder in
manners and life.
She stood in the early morning, and said to her
maidens, "Bring
That silken robe made ready to wear at the court
of the king.
POEMS OP PATRIOTISM AND PREEDOM.
" Bring me the clasps of diamond, lucid, clear
of the mote,
Clasp me the large at the waist, and clasp me
the small at the throat.
- J u
" Diamonds to fasten the hair, and diamonds to
fasten the sleeves.
Laces to drop from their rays, like a powder of
snow from the eaves."
Gorgeous she entered the sunlight which gath¬
ered her up in a flame.
While straight, in her open carriage, she to the
hospital came.
In she went at the door, and gazing, from end
to end,
"Many and low are the pallets, but each is the
place of a friend."
Up she passed through the wards, and stood at
a young man's bed :
Bloody the band on his brow, and livid the
droop of his head.
" Art thou a Lombard, my brother ? Happy
art thou ! " she cried.
And smiled like Italy on him ; he dreamed in
her face and died.
Pale with his passing soul, she went on still to
a second :
JSe was a grave, hard man, whose years by dun¬
geons were reckoned.
Wounds in his body were sore, wounds in his
life were sorer.
" Art thou a Romagnole ? " Her eyes drove
lightnings before her.
"Austrian and priest had joined to double and
tighten the cord
Able to bind thee, O strong one, — free by the
stroke of a sword.
" Now be grave for the rest of us, using the life
overcast
To ripen our wine of the present (too new) in
glooms of the past."
Down she stepped to a pallet where lay a face
like a girl's.
Young, and pathetic with dying, — a deep black
hole in the curls.
"Art thou from Tuscany, brother? and seest
thou, dreaming in pain.
Thy mother stand in the piazza, searching the
list of the slain ? "
Kind as a mother herself, she touched his cheeks
with her hands :
"Blessed is she who has home thee, although
she should weep as she stands."
On she passed to a Frenchman, his arm carried
off by a ball :
Kneeling, . . " O more than my brother ! how
shall I thank thee for aU ?
" Each of the heroes around us has fought for
his land and line.
But thou hast fought for a stranger, in hate of a
wrong not thine.
" Happy are aU free peoples, too strong to be dis¬
possessed ;
But blessèd are those among nations who dare to
be strong for the rest ! "
Ever she passed on her way, and came to a
couch where pined
One with a (face from Venetia, white with a
hope out of mind.
Long she stood and gazed, and twice she tried at
the name.
But two great crystal tears were all that faltered
and came.
Only a tear for Venice ? — she turned as in pas¬
sion and loss.
And stooped to his forehead and kissed it, as if
she were kissing the cross.
Faint with that strain of heart, she moved on
then to another.
Stem and strong in his death. "And dost thou
suffer, my brother ? "
Holding his hands in hers ; — " Out of the Pied¬
mont lion
Cometh the sweetness of freedom ! sweetest to
live or to die on."
Holding his cold, rough hands, — "Well, O,
well have ye done
In noble, noble Piedmont, who would not be
noble alone."
Back he fell while she spoke. She rose to her
feet with a spring, —
"That was a Piedmontese ! and this is the
Court of the King."
Elizabeth Barrett Browning
f
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
587
■a
THE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM
FATHERS IN NEW ENGLAND.
The breaking waves dashed high
On a stern and rock-bound coast,
And the woods against a stormy sky
Their giant branches tossed ;
And the heavy night hung dark
The hills and waters o'er,
When a band of exiles moored their bark
On the wild New England shore.
Not as the conqueror comes.
They, the true-hearted, came ;
Not with the roll of the stining drums.
And the trumpet that sings of fame :
Not as the flying come.
In silence and in fear ; —
They shook the depths of the desert gloom
With their hymns of lofty cheer.
Amidst the storm they sang.
And the stars heard, and the sea ;
And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang
To the anthem of the free.
The ocean eagle soared
From his nest by the white wave's foam.
And the rocking pines of the forest roared, —
This was their welcome home.
There were men with hoary hair
Amidst that pilgrim-band :
Why had they come to wither there.
Away from their childhood's land ?
There was woman's fearless eye.
Lit by her deep love's truth ;
There was manhood's brow serenely high,
And the fiery heart of youth.
What sought they thus afar ?
Bright jewels of the mine ?
The wealth of seas, the spoils of war ? —
They sought a faith's pure shrine !
Ay, call it holy ground.
The soil where first they trod ;
Theyhaveleft unstained what there they found,—
Freedom to worship God.
Felicia Hemans.
ON THE PROSPECT OF PLANTING ARTS
AND LEARNING IN AMERICA.
The Muse, disgusted at an age and clime
Barren of every glorious theme.
In distant lands now waits a better time,
Producing subjects worthy fame.
In happy climes, where from the genial sun
And virgin earth such scenes ensue.
The force of art by nature seems outdone.
And fancied beauties by the true :
In happy climes, the seat of innocence.
Where nature guides and virtue rules.
Where men shall not impose for truth and sense
The pedantry of courts and schools :
There shall be sung another golden age,
The rise of empire and of arts.
The good and great inspiring epic rage.
The wisest heads and noblest hearts.
Not such as Europe breeds in her decay :
Such as she bred when fresh and young,
When heavenly flame did animate her clay.
By future poets shall be sung.
Westward the course of empire takes its way ;
The first four acts already past,
A fifth shall close the drama with the day ;
Time's noblest offspring is the last.
Bishop George Berkeley.
AMERICA.
O MOTHER of a mighty race.
Yet lovely in thy youthful grace !
The elder dames, thy haughty peers.
Admire and hate thy blooming years ;
With words of shame
And taunts of scorn they join thy name.
For on thy cheeks the glow is spread
That tints thy morning hills with red ;
Thy step, — the wild deer's rustling feet
Within thy woods are not more fleet ;
Thy hopeful eye
Is bright as thine own sunny sky.
Ay, let them rail, those haughty ones,
While safe thou dwellest with thy sons.
They do not know how loved thou art.
How many a fond and fearless heart
Would rise to throw
Its life between thee and the foe.
They know not, in their hate and pride.
What virtues with thy children bide, —
How true, how good, thy graceful maids
Make bright, like flowers, the valley shades ;
What generous men
Spring, like thine oaks, by hill and glen ;
What cordial welcomes greet the guest
By thy lone rivers of the west ;
•Ö
[&
688
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
m
How faith is kept, and truth revered,
And man is loved, and God is feared,
In woodland homes,
And where the ocean border foams.
There's freedom at thy gates, and rest
For earth's down-trodden and opprest,
A shelter for the hunted head.
For the starved laborer toil and bread.
Power, at thy bounds.
Stops, and calls back his baffled hounds.
0 fair young mother ! on thy brow
Shall sit a nobler grace than now.
Deep in the brightness of thy skies,
The thronging years in glory rise.
And, as they fleet.
Drop strength and riches at thy feet.
Thine eye, with every coming hour,
Shall brighten, and thy form shall tower ;
And when thy sisters, elder born,
Would brand thy name with words of scorn.
Before thine eye
Upon their lips the taunt shall die.
William Collen Bryant.
COLUMBIA.
Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise,
The queen of the worlds and the childjof the'skies!
Thy geniufe commands thee ; with rapture behold.
While ages on ages thy splendors unfold.
Thy reign is the last and the noblest of time.
Most fruitful thy soil, most inviting thy clime ;
Let the crimes of the east ne'er encrimson thy
name,
Be freedom and science and virtue thy fame.
To conquest and slaughter let Europe aspire ;
Whelm nations in blood, and wrap cities in fire ;
Thy heroes the rights of mankind shall defend.
And triumph pursue them, and glory attend.
A world is thy realm ; for a world be thy laws
Enlarged as thine empire, and just as thy cause-;
On Freedom's broad basis that empire shall rise.
Extend with the main, and dissolve with the skies.
Fair Science her gates to thy sons shall imbar.
And the East see thy mom hide the beams of her
star;
New bards and new sages unrivalled shall soar
To fame unextinguished when time is no more ;
To thee, the last refuge of virtue designed,
Shall fly from all nations the best of mankind ;
Here, grateful to Heaven, with transport shall
bring
Their incense, more fragrant than odors of spring.
Nor less shall thy fair ones to glory ascend.
And genius and beauty in harmony blend ;
The graces of form shall awake pure desire.
And the charms of the soul ever cherish the fire ;
Their sweetness unmingled, their manners refined.
And virtue's bright image, enstamped on the
mind.
With peace and soft rapture shall teach life to
glow.
And light up a smile on the aspect of woe.
Thy fleets to all regions thy power shall display.
The nations admire, and the ocean obey ;
Each shore to thy glory its tribute unfold,
And the East and the South yield their spices and
gold.
As the dayspring unbounded thy splendor shall
flow.
And earth's little kingdoms before thee shall bow.
While the ensigns of union, in triumph unfurled.
Hush the tumult of war, and give peace to the
world.
Thus, as down a lone valley, with cedars o'er-
spread.
From war's dread confusion, I pensively strayed,—
The gloom from the face of fair heaven retired ;
The wind ceased to murmur, the thunders ex¬
pired ;
Perfumes, as of Eden, flowed sweetly along.
And a voice, as of angels, enchantingly sung :
" Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise,
The queen of the world, and the child of the
skies ! "
Timothy Dwight.
AMERICA TO GREAT BRITAIN.
All hail ! thou noble land.
Our Fathers' native soil !
O, stretch thy mighty hand.
Gigantic grown by toil.
O'er the vast Atlantic wave to our shore !
For thou with magic might
Canst reach to where the light
Of Phoebus travels bright
The world o'er !
The genius of our clime
From his pine-embattled steep
Shall hail the guest sublime ;
While the Tritons of the deep
With their conchs the kindred league shall pro¬
claim.
Then let the world combine, —
O'er the main our naval line
Like the Milky Way shall shine
Bright in fame !
-»■
f
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
589
a
Though ages long have passed
Since our Fathers left their home,
Their pilot in the blast,
O'er untravelled seas to roam,
Yet lives the blood of England in our veins !
And shall we not proclaim
That blood of honest fame
Which no tyranny can tame
By its chains ?
While the language free and bold
Which the Bard of Avon sung.
In which our Milton told
How the vault of heaven rung
When Satan, blasted, fell with his host ;
While this, with reverence meet.
Ten thousand echoes greet.
From rock to rock repeat
Round our coast ;
While the manners, while the arts.
That mould a nation's soul.
Still cling around our hearts, —
Between let Ocean roll.
Our joint communion breaking with the sun ;
Yet still from either beach
The voice of blood shall reach.
More audible than speech,
"We are One."
WASHINGTON ALLSTON.
SONG OF MARION'S MEN.
Our band is few, but true and tried.
Our leader frank and bold ;
The British soldier trembles
When Marion's name is told.
Our fortress is the good greenwood.
Our tent the cypress-tree ;
We know the forest round us.
As seamen know the sea ;
We know its walls of thorny vines.
Its glades of reedy grass.
Its safe and silent islands
Within the dark morass.
Woe to the English soldiery
That little dread us near !
On them shall light at midnight
A strange and sudden fear ;
When, waking to their tents on fire.
They grasp their arms in vain.
And they who stand to face us
Are beat to earth again ;
And they who fly in terror deem
A mighty host behind.
And hear the tramp of thousands
Upon the hollow wind.
Then sweet the hour that brings release
From danger and from toil ;
We talk the battle over.
And share the battle's spoil.
The woodland rings with laugh and shout,
As if a hunt were up.
And woodland flowers are gathered
To crown the soldier's cup.
With merry songs we mock the wind
That in the pine-top grieves.
And slumber long and sweetly
On beds of oaken leaves.
Well knows the fair and friendly moon
The band that Marion leads, —
The glitter of their rifles.
The scampering of their steeds.
'T is life to guide the fiery barb
Across the moonlight plain ;
'T is life to feel the night-wind
That lifts his tossing mane.
A moment in the British camp —
A moment — and away
Back to the pathless forest.
Before the peep of day.
Grave men there are by broad Santee,
Grave men with hoary hairs ;
Their hearts are all with Marion,
For Marion are their prayers.
And lovely ladies greet our band
With kindliest welcoming.
With smiles like those of summer.
And tears like those of spring.
For them we wear these trusty arms.
And lay them down no more
Till we have driven the Briton
Forever from our shore.
WILLIAM Collen Bryant.
HYMN :
sung at the completion of the concord monument,
april 19, 1s36.
By the rude bridge that arched the flood.
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled.
Here once the embattled farmers stood.
And fired the shot heard round the world.
The foe long since in silence slept ;
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps ;
And Time the ruined bridge has swept
Down the dark stream which seaward creeps.
On this green bank, by this soft stream.
We set to-day a votive stone ;
That memory may their deed redeem.
When, like our sires, our sons are gone.
590
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
Spirit, that made those heroes dare
To die, or leave their children free.
Bid Time and Nature gently spare
The shaft we raise to them and thee.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
♦
WARREN'S ADDRESS.
Stand ! the ground's your own, my braves !
Will ye give it up to slaves ?
Will ye look for greener graves ?
Hope ye mercy still ?
What's the mercy despots feel ?
Hear it in that battle-peal !
Read it on yon bristling steel !
Ask it, — ye who will.
Fear ye foes who kill for hire ?
WUl ye to your homes retire ?
Look behind you ! — they 're afire !
And, before you, see
Who have done it ! From the vale
On they come ! — and will ye quail I
Leaden rain and iron háil
Let their welcome be !
In the God of battles trust !
Die we may, — and die we must :
But, 0, where can dust to dust
Be consigned so well.
As where heaven its dews shaU shed
On the martyred patriot's bed.
And the rocks shall raise their head.
Of his deeds to tell ?
john pierpont.
CARMEN BELLICOSUM.
In their ragged regimentals
Stood the old Continentals,
Yielding not.
When the gi-enadiers were lunging.
And like hail fell the plunging
Cannon-shot ;
When the files
Of the isles.
From the smoky night encampment, bore the
banner of the rampant
Unicom,
And grummer, grummer, grummer roUed the
roll of the drummer.
Through the mom !
Then with eyes to the front all.
And with guns horizontal.
Stood our sires ;
And the balls whistled deadly.
And in streams flashing redly
Blazed the fires ;
As the roar
On the shore.
Swept the strong battle-breakers o'er the green-
sodded acres
Of the plain ;
And louder, louder, louder, cracked the black
gunpowder.
Cracking amain !
Now like smiths at their forges
Worked the red St.' George's
Cannoneers ;
And the " villanous saltpetre "
Rung a fierce, discordant metre
Round their ears ;
As the swift
Storm-drift.
With hot sweeping anger, came the horseguards'
clangor
On our flanks ;
Then higher, higher, higher, bumed the old-
fashioned fire
Through the ranks !
Then the old-fashioned colonel
GaUoped through the white infernal
Powder-cloud ;
And his broad sword was swinging.
And his brazen throat was ringing
Trumpet-loud.
Then the blue
Bullets flew.
And the trooper-jackets redden at the touch of
the leaden
Rifle-breath ;
And rounder, rounder, rounder, roared the iron
six-pounder.
Hurling death !
Guy Humphrey mcMastek.
PAUL REVERE'S RIDE.
Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in 'Seventy-five ;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.
He said to his friend, " If the British march
By land or sea from the town to-night.
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
Of the North Church tower as a signal light, —
One, if by land, and two, if by sea ;
And 1 on the opposite shore wiU be.
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm.
For the country folk to be up and to arm."
«
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM,
591
Then he said, " Good night ! " and with muffled
oar
Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore,
Jnst as the moon rose over the hay,
Where swinging wide at her moorings lay
The Somerset, British man-of-war ;
A phantom ship, with each mast and spar
Across the moon like a prison bar.
And a huge black hulk, that was magnified
By its own reflection in the tide.
Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street.
Wanders and watches with eager ears.
Till in the sUence around him he hears
The muster of men at the barrack door.
The sound of afms, and the tramp of feet.
And the measured tread of the grenadiers.
Marching down to their boats on the shore.
Then he climbed the tower of the Old North
Church
By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread.
To the belfry-chamber overhead.
And startled the pigeons from their perch
On the sombre rafters, that round him made
Masses and moving shapes of shade, —
By the trembling ladder, steep and tall,
To the highest window in the wall.
Where he paused to listen and look down
A moment on the roofs of the town.
And the moonlight flowing over all.
Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead.
In their night-encampment on the hill.
Wrapped in silence so deep and still
That he could hear, like a sentinel's tread.
The watchful night-wind, as it went
Creeping along from tent to tent.
And seeming to whisper, "All is well ! "
A moment only he feels the spell
Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread
Of the lonely belfry and the dead ;
For suddenly all his thoughts are bent
On a shadowy something far away.
Where the river widens to meet the bay, —
A line of black that bends and floats
On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats.
Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride.
Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride.
On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.
Now he patted his horse's side.
Now gazed at the landscape far and near,
Then, impetuous, stamped the earth.
And turned and tightened his saddle-girth;
But mostly he watched with eager search
The belfry-tower of the Old North Church,
As it rose above the graves on the hill.
Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.
And lo ! as he looks, on the belfry's height
A glimmer, and then a gleam of light !
He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns.
But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight
A second lamp in the belfry burns !
, » I » J
A hurry of hoofs in a village street,
A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark.
And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a
spark
Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet :
That was all ! And yet, through the gloom and
the light.
The fate of a nation was riding that night ;
And the spark struck out by that steed, in his
flight.
Kindled the land into flame with its heat.
He has left the village and mounted the steep.
And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep.
Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides ;
And under the alders, that skirt its edge.
Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge.
Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides.
It was twelve by the village clock
When he\ crossed thé bridge into Meáford town.
He heardriihe crowing o^the cock,
And the bàrking of the farmer's dog.
And felt the damp of the river fog.
That rises after the sun goes down.
It was one by the village clock
When he galloped into Lexington.
He saw the gilded weathercock
Swim in the moonlight as he passed.
And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare.
Gaze at him with a spectral glare.
As if they already stood aghast
At the bloody work they would look upon.
It was two by the village clock
When he came to the bridge in Concord town.
He heard the bleating of the flock.
And the twitter of birds among the trees.
And felt the breath of the morning breeze
Blowing over the meadows brown.
And one was safe and asleep in his bed
Who at the bridge would be first to fall.
Who that day would be lying dead.
Pierced by a British musket-ball.
You know the rest. In the books you have read.
How the British Regulars fired and fled, —
How the farmers gave them ball for ball.
From behind each fence and farm-yard wall.
592
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
Chasiug the redcoats down the lane,
Then croasing the fields to emerge again
Under the trees at the turn of the road.
And only pausing to fire and load.
So through the night rode Paul Revere ;
And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Middlesex village and farm, —
A cry of defiance and not of fear,
A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door.
And a word that shall echo forevermore !
For, home on the night-wind of the Past,
Through all our history, to the last.
In the hour of darkness and peril and need.
The people will waken and listen to hear
The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed
And the midnight message of Paul Revere.
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
THE AMERICAN FLAG.
When Freedom, from her mountain height.
Unfurled her standard to the air.
She tore the azure robe of night.
And set the stars of glory there !
She mingled with its gorgeous dyes
The müky baldric of the skies.
And striped its pure, celestial white
With streakings of the morning light ;
Then, from his mansion in the sim.
She called her eagle-bearer down.
And gave into his mighty hand
The symbol of her chosen land !
Majestic monarch of the cloud !
Who rear'st aloft thy regal form.
To hear the tempest trumping loud.
And see the lightning lances driven.
When strive the warriors of the storm.
And rolls the thunder-drum of heaven, —
Child of the Sun ! to thee't is given
To guard the banner of the free.
To hover in the sulphur smoke.
To ward away the battle-stroke.
And bid its blendings shine afar.
Like rainbows on the cloud of war.
The harbingers of victory !
Flag of the brave ! thy folds shall fly.
The sign of hope and triumph high' !
When speaks the signal-tinmpet tone.
And the long line comes gleaming on.
Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet.
Has dimmed the glistening bayonet.
Each soldier's eye shall brightly turn
To where thy sky-bom glories burn.
And, as his springing steps advance,
* Catch war and vengeance from the glance.
And when the cannon-mouthings loud
Heave in wild wreaths the battle shroud.
And gory sabres rise and fall
Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall.
Then shall thy meteor glances glow.
And cowering foes shall shrink beneath
Each gallant arm that strikes below
That lovely messenger of death.
Flag of the seas ! on ocean wave
Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave ;
When death, careering on the gale.
Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail.
And frighted waves rush wildly back
Before the broadside's reeling rack.
Each dying wanderer of the sea
Shall look at once to heaven and thee.
And smUe to see thy splendors fly
In triumph o'er his closing eye.
Flag of the free heart's hope and home.
By angel hands to valor given !
Tliy stars have lit the welkin dome,
And all thy hues were born in heaven.
Forever float that standard sheet !
Where breathes the foe but falls before us.
With Freedom's soil beneath our feet.
And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us !
Joseph Rodman Drake.
•
THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER
O SAT, can you see by the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last
gleaming ? —
Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through
the perilous fight
O'er the ramparts we watched, were so gallantly
streaming !
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting
in air.
Gave proof through the night that our flag was
still there ;
0 say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the fi-ee and the home of the
brave ?
On that shore,\ dimly seenj thmugh the mista of
the deep,\
Where the foe's'haughty hostvin dread silence
repos'fes.
What is that which the breeze, o'er the tofrering
steep, N
As it fitfully blows, now conceals,'now discloses ?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first
beam.
In full glory reflected, now shines on the stream ;
fi-
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
593
'T is the star-spangled banner ! 0, long may it
wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave !
And where is that band who so vaimtingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more ?
Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps'
pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight or the gloom of the
grave ;
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth
wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave !
0, thus be it ever when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homesf and the war's desola¬
tion !
Blest with viet'ry and peace, may the Heaven-
rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved
us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,
And this be our motto, " In God is our trust ; "
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall
wave
O'er the land of the free and the home of the
brave.
Francis Scott Key.
4
THE LITTLE CLOUD.
[1853.]
As when, on Carmel's sterile steep.
The ancient prophet bowed the knee.
And seven times sent his servant forth
To look toward the distant sea ;
There came at last a little cloud.
Scarce larger than the human hand.
Spreading and swelling tiU it broke
In showers on all the herbless land ;
And hearts were glad, and shouts went up,
And praise to Israel's mighty God,
As the sear hills grew bright with flowers.
And verdure clothed the valley sod, —
Even so our eyes have waited long ;
But now a little cloud appears,
Spreading and swelling as it glides
Onward into the coming years.
Bright cloud of Liberty ! full soon.
Far stretching from the ocean strand.
Thy glorious folds shall spread abroad.
Encircling our beloved land.
Like the sweet rain on Judah's hills.
The glorious boon of love shall fall.
And our bond millions shall arise.
As at an angel's trumpet-call.
Then shall a shout of joy go up, —
The wild, glad cry of freedom come
From hearts long crushed by cruel hands.
And songs from lips long sealed and dumb ;
And every bondman's chain be broke.
And every soul that moves abroad
In tbis wide realm shall know and feel
The blessed Liberty of God.
John Howard Bryant.
SONNET.
written while in prison for denouncing the
domestic slave-trade.
High walls and huge the body may confine.
And iron gates obstruct the prisoner's gaze.
And massive bolts may baffle his design.
And vigilant keepers watch his devious ways ;
But scorns the immortal mind such base control :
No chains can bind it and no cell enclose.
Swifter than light it flies from pole to pole.
And in a flash from earth to heaven it goes.
It leaps from mount to mount ; from vale to vale
Itwanders, pluckinghoneyed fruits and flowers ;
It visits home to hear the fireside tale
And in sweet converse pass the joyous hours ;
'T is up before the sun, roaming afar.
And in its watches wearies every star.
william lloyd garrison.
SLAVERY.
from "the timepiece": "the task," book ii.
0 fob a lodge in some vast wilderness.
Some boundless contiguity of shade,
Where rumor of oppression and deceit.
Of unsuccessful or successful war,
Might never reach me more ! My ear is pained.
My soul is sick, with every day's report
Of wrong and outrage with which earth is filled.
There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart ;
It does not feel for man ; the natural bond
Of brotherhood is severed as the flax.
That falls asunder at the touch of fire.
He finds his fellow guilty of a skin
Not colored like his own, and, having power
To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause
Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey.
Lands intersected by a narrow frith
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed
Ú
594
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
Make enemies of nations, who had else
Like kindred drops been mingled into one.
Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys ;
And, worse than all, and most to be deplored
As human nature's broadest, foulest blot.
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts his sweat
With stripes, that Mercy, with a bleeding heart.
Weeps, when she sees inflicted on a beast.
Then what is man ? And what man, seeing this.
And having human feelings, does not blush.
And hang his head, to think himself a man ?
I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep.
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
That sinews bought and sold have ever earned.
No ; dear as freedom is, and in my heart's
Just estimation prized above all price,
I had much rather be myself the slave.
And wear the bonds, than fasten them on him.
We have no slaves at home. — Then why abroad ?
And they themselves once ferried o'er the wave
That parts us are emancipate and loosed.
Slaves cannot breathe in England ; if their lungs
Receive our air, that moment they are free ;
They touch our country, and their shackles fall.
That's noble, and,bespeaks a nation proud
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then.
And let it circulate through every vein
Of all your empire ; that, where Britain's power
Is felt, mankind may feel her mercy too.
WILLIAM COWPER.
BATT^.E-HYMN OF THE REPUBLIC.
Mine eyes'have ^een'the glo¿y of I the c((iiiing off
, I the Lord j ' \ 1
He is trampling'out the vintage (where the! grapes
' of^wrath ard stored ; ' * ^ ,
He hatl^ loosed the fateful^ liglitnind of his terri j
ble s^ft fword : >
His trutl^is marcliing on.
/
I have seen jiim' ip Jthe)watch-fires ^f a hundred
circling camps ;
They have iuilded him an altar in the evening
dews and damps ;
I can read his righteous Sentence by the dim and
flaring lamps : ^
líís day is mârching on.
I have read a fiery gospel, writ in burnished rows
of steel :
" As ye deal with my contemners, so with you
my grace shall deal ;
Let the Hero, born of woman, crush the serpent
with his heel.
Since God is marching on."
He has sounded forth the trumpet that .shall
never call retreat ;
He is sifting out the hearts of men before his
judgment-seat :
0, be swift, my soul, to answer him ! be jubilant,
my feet !
Our God is marching on.
In the beauty of the lilies Christ w£(s bern across
the sea.
With a glory in his bosom that trarisfigures ymu
and me ;
As he died to make men holy, let us die to make
men free,
While God is marching on.
julia ward howb.
SHERIDAN'S RIDE.
Up from, the South at break of day.
Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay,
The affrighted air with a shudder bore.
Like a herald in haste, to the chieftain's door.
The terrible grumble and rumble and roar.
Telling the battle was on once more,
And Sheridan twenty miles away.
And wider still those billows of war
Thundered along the horizon's bar ;
And louder yet into Winchester rolled
The roar of that red sea uncontrolled.
Making the blood of the listener cold
As he thought of the stake in that fiery fray.
With Sheridan twenty miles away.
But there is a road from Winchester town,
A good, broad highway, leading down ;
And there, through the flash of the morning light,
A steed as black as the steeds of night
Was seen to pass as with eagle flight.
As if he knew the terrible need.
He stretched away with the utmost speed ;
Hills rose and fell, — but his heart was gay.
With Sheridan fifteen miles away.
Still sprung from those swift hoofs, thundering
South,
The dust, like smoke from the cannon's mouth ;
Or the trail of a comet, sweeping faster and faster.
Foreboding to traitors the doom of disaster.
The heart of the steed and the heart of the master
Were beating, like prisoners assaulting their
walls,
Impatient to be where the battle-field calls ;
Every nerve of the charger was strained to full
play,
With Sheridan only ten miles away.
&-
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
595
a
Under his spuming feet, the road
Like an arrowy Alpine river flowed,
And the landscape sped away behind.
Like an ocean flying before the wind ;
And the steed, like a bark fed with furnace ire,
Swept on, with his wild eyes full of fire ;
But, lo ! he is Hearing his heart's desire.
He is snuffing the smoke of the roaring fray.
With Sheridan only five miles away.
The first that the General saw were the groups
Of stragglers, and then the retreating troops ;
What was done, — what to do, — a glance told
him both,
And, striking his spurs with a terrible oath.
He dashed down the line mid a storm of huzzas.
And the wave of retreat checked its course there,
because
The sight of the master compelled it to pause.
With foam and with dust the black charger was
gray;
By the flash of his eye, and his nostril's play.
He seemed to the whole gi-eat army to say,
" I have brought you Sheridan all the way
From Winchester down, to save the day ! "
Hurrah, hurrah for Sheridan !
Hurrah, hurrah for horse and man !
And when their statues are placed on high.
Under the dome of the Union sky, —
The American soldier's Temple of Fame, —
There with the glorious General's name
Be it said in letters both bold and bright ;
" Here is the steed that saved the day
By carrying Sheridan into the fight.
From Winchester, — twenty miles away ! "
Thomas Buchanan read.
THE BLACK REGIMENT.
[May 27, 1863.J
Dark as the clouds of even.
Ranked in the western heaven.
Waiting the breath that lifts
All the dead mass, and drifts
Tempest and falling brand
Over a ruined land, —
So still and orderly.
Arm to arm, knee to knee.
Waiting the great event.
Stands the black regiment.
Down the long dusky line
Teeth gleam and eyeballs shine ;
And the bright bayonet,
Bri.stling and firmly set.
Flashed with a purpose grand.
Long ere the sharp command
Of the fierce rolling drum
Told them their time had come.
Told them what work was sent
For the black regiment.
"Now," the flag-sergeant cried,
"Though death and hell betide.
Let the whole nation see
If we are fit to be
Free in this land ; or bound
Down, like the whining hound, —
Bound with red stripes of pain
In our cold chains again ! "
0, what a shout there went
From the black regiment !
" Charge ! " Trump and drum awoke ;
Onward the bondmen broke ;
Bayonet and sabre-stroke
Vainly opposed their rush.
Through the wild battle's crush.
With but one thought aflush.
Driving their lords like chaff.
In the guns' mouths they laugh ;
Or at the slippery brands
Leaping with open hands,
Down they tear man and horse,
Down in their awful course ;
Trampling with bloody heel
Over the crashing steel, —
All their eyes forward bent.
Rushed the black regiment.
"Freedom ! " their battle-cry, —
"Freedom ! or leave to die ! "
Ah ! and they meant the word.
Not as with us't is heard.
Not a mere party shout ;
They gave their spirits out.
Trusted the end to God,
And on the gory sod
Rolled in triumphant blood.
Glad to strike one free blow.
Whether for weal or woe ;
Glad to breathe one free breath.
Though on the lips of death ;
Praying, — alas ! in vain ! —
That they might fall again.
So they could once more see
That burst to liberty !
This was what " freedom " lent
To the black regiment.
Hundreds on hundreds fell ;
But they are resting well ;
Scourges and shackles strong
Never shall do them wrong.
--gi
596
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
0, to the living few.
Soldiers, be just and true !
Hall them as comrades tried ;
Fight with them side by side ;
Never, in field or tent.
Scorn the black regiment !
ceorge hemry boker.
BARBARA FRIETCHIE.
Up from the meadows rich with com.
Clear in the cool September morn.
The clustered spires of Frederick stand
Green-walled by the hills of Maryland.
Round about them orchards sweep,
Apple and peach tree fruited deep.
Fair as a garden of the Lord
To the eyes of the famished rebel horde.
On that pleasant morn of the early fall
When Lee marched over the mountain wall, —
Over the mountains, winding down.
Horse and foot into Frederick town.
Forty flags with their silver stars.
Forty flags with their crimson bars.
Flapped in the morning wind ; the sun
Of noon looked down, and saw not one.
Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then.
Bowed with her fourscore years and ten ;
Bravest of all in Frederick town,
She took up the flag the men hauled down ;
In her attic-window the staff she set.
To show that one heart was loyal yet.
Up the street came the rebel tread.
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead.
Under his slouched hat left and right
He glanced ; the old flag met his sight.
" Halt ! " — the dust-brown ranks stood fast ;
" Fire ! " — out blazed the rifle-blast.
It shivered the window, pane and sash ;
It rent the banner with seam and gash.
Quick, as it fell, from the broken staff
Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf ;
She leaned far out on the window-sill.
And shook it forth with a royal will.
" Shoot, if you must, this old gray head.
But spare your country's flag, " she said.
A shade of sadness, a blush of shame.
Over the face of the leader came ;
The nobler nature within him stirred
To Ufe at that woman's deed and word ;
" Who touches a hair of yon gray head
Dies like a dog ! March on ! " he said.
All day long through Frederick street
Sounded the tread of marching feet ;
All day long that free flag tost
Over the heads of the rebel host.
Ever its torn folds rose and fell
On the loyal winds that loved it well ;
And through the hill-gaps sunset light
Shone over it with a warm good-night.
Barbara Frietchie's work is o'er.
And the rebel rides on his raids no more.
Honor to her ! and let a tear
Fall, for her sake, on Stonewall's bier.
Over Barbara Frietchie's grave.
Flag of freedom and union, wave !
Peace and order and beauty draw
Round thy symbol of light and law ;
And ever the stars above look down
On thy stars below in Frederick town !
John Greenleaf whittier.
THE CAUSE OF THE SOUTH.
from " sentinel songs."
The fallen cause still waits, —
Its bard has not come yet.
His song — through one of to-morrow's gates
Shall shine — but never set.
But when he comes — he '11 sweep
A harp with tears all stringed.
And the very notes he strikes will weep,
As they come, from his hand, woe-winged.
Ah ! grand shall be his strain.
And his songs shall fill all climes.
And the Rebels shall rise and march again
Down the lines of his glorious rhymes.
■ff
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
597
a
And through his verse shall gleam
The swords that flashed in vain,
And the men who wore the gray shall seem
To he marshalling again.
But hush ! between his words
Peer faces sad and pale,
And you hear the sound of broken chords
Beat through the poet's wail.
Through his verse the orphans cry —
The terrible undertone !
And the father's curse and the mother's sigh.
And the desolate young wife's moan.
I sing, with a voice too low
To be heard beyond to-day,
In minor keys of my people's woe ;
And my songs pass away.
To-morrow hears them not —
To-morrow belongs to fame :
My songs — like the birds' — will be forgot.
And forgotten shall be my name.
And yet who knows ! betimes
The grandest songs depart.
While the gentle, humble, and low-toned rhymes
Will echo from heart to heart.
Abram Ji Ryan.
LAUS DEO!
[On hearing the bells ring on the passage of the Constitutional
Amendment abolishing slavery.]
It is done I
Clang of bell and roar of gun
Send the tidings up and down.
How the belfries rock and reel I
How the great guns, peal on peal.
Fling the joy from town to town !
Ring, 0 bells !
Every stroke exulting tells
Of the burial hour of crime.
Loud and long, that all may hear.
Ring for every listening ear
Of Eternity and Time !
Let us kneel :
God's own voice is in that peal.
And this spot is holy ground.
Lord, forgive us ! What are we.
That our eyes this glory see.
That our ears have heard the sound !
For the Lord
On the whirlwind is abroad ;
In the earthquake he has spoken ;
He has smitten with his thunder
The iron walls asunder.
And the gates of brass are broken I
Loud and long
Lift the old exulting song ;
Sing with Miriam by the sea :
He has cast the mighty down ;
Horse and rider sink and drown ;
He has triumphed gloriously 1
Did we dare.
In our agony of prayer.
Ask for more than He has done ?
When was ever his right hand
Over any time or land
Stretched as now beneath the sun %
How they pale.
Ancient myth and song and tale.
In this wonder of our days.
When the cruel rod of war
Blossoms white with righteous law.
And the wrath of man is praise !
Blotted out !
All within and all about
Shall a fresher life begin ;
Freer breathe the universe
As it rolls its heavy curse
On the dead and buried sin.
It is done I
In the circuit of the sun
Shall the sound thereof go forth.
It shaU bid the sad rejoice.
It shall give the dumb a voice.
It shall belt with joy the earth !
Ring and swing.
Bells of joy ! On morning's wing
Send the song of praise abroad I
With a sound of broken chains.
Tell the nations that He reigns.
Who alone is Lord and God !
John Greeni.eaf Whittier.
BOSTON HYMN.
READ IN MUSIC HALL. JAN. I, 1863.
The word of the Lord by night
To the watching Pilgrims came.
As they sat by the seaside.
And filled their hearts with flame.
ÍP
God said, I am tired of kings,
I suffer them no more ;
Up to my ear the moming brings
The outrage of the poor.
Think ye I made this ball
A field of havoc and war,
Where tyrants great and tyrants small
Might harry the weak and poor ?
My angel, — his name is Freedom, —
Choose him to be your king ;
He shall cut pathways east and west,
And fend you with his wing.
Lo ! I uncover the land
Which I hid of old time in the West,
As the sculptor uncovers the statue
When he has wrought his best ;
1 show Columbia, of the rocks
Which dip their foot in the seas,
And soar to the air-borne flocks
Of clouds, and the boreal fleece.
I will divide my goods ;
Call in the wretch and slave :
None shall rule but the humble,
And none but Toil shaU have.
I will have never a noble.
No lineage counted great ;
Fishers and choppers and ploughmen
Shall constitute a state.
Go, cut down trees in the forest.
And trim the straightest boughs ;
Cut down trees in the forest,
And build me a wooden house.
Call the people together.
The young men and the sires.
The digger in the harvest-field.
Hireling, and him that hires ;
And here in a pine state-house
They shall choose men to rule
In every needful faculty.
In church and state and school.
Lo, now ! if these poor men
Can govern the land and sea.
And make just laws below the sun.
As planets faithful be.
And ye shall succor men ;
'T is nobleness to serve ;
Help them who cannot help again :
Beware from right to swerve.
I break your bonds and masterships.
And I unchain the slave :
Free be his heart and hand henceforth
As wind and wandering wave.
I cause from every creature
His proper good to flow ;
As much as he is and doeth.
So much he shall bestow.
But, laying hands on another
To coin his labor and sweat.
He goes in pawn to his victim
For eternal years in debt.
To-day unbind the captive,
So only are ye unbound ;
Lift up a people from the dust,
Trump of their rescue, sound !
Pay ransom to the owner.
And fill the bag to the brim.
Who is the owner ? The slave is owner,
And ever was. Pay him.
0 North ! give him beauty for rags.
And honor, 0 South ! for his shame ;
Nevada ! coin thy golden crags
With Freedom's image and name.
Up ! and the dusky race
That sat in darkness long.
Be swift their feet as antelopes.
And as behemoth strong.
Come, East and West and North,
By races, as snow-flakes.
And carry my purpose forth.
Which neither halts nor shakes.
My will fulfilled shall be.
For, in daylight or in dark.
My thunderbolt has eyes to see
His way home to the mark.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
THE PEOPLE'S SONG OF PEACE.
from the '■ song of the centennial."
The grass is green on Bunker Hill,
The waters sweet in Brandywine ;
The sword sleeps in the scabbard still.
The farmer keeps his flock and vine ;
Then who would mar the scene to-day
With vaunt of battle-field or fray ?
J
POEMS OP PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
599
fil
The brave com lifts in regiments
Ten thousand sabres in the sun ;
The ricks replace the battle-tents,
The bannered tassels toss and run.
The neighing steed, the bugle's blast.
These be but stories of the past.
The earth has healed her wounded breast,
The cannons plough the field no more ;
The heroes rest ! O, let them rest
In peace along the peaceful shore !
They fought for peace, for peace they fell ;
They sleep in peace, and all is well.
The fields forget the battles fought.
The trenches wave in golden grain :
Shall we neglect the lessons taught,
And tear the wounds agape again ?
Sweet Mother Nature, nurse the land.
And heal her wounds with gentle hand.
Lo ! peace on earth ! Lo ! fiock and fold !
Lo ! rich abundance, fat increase.
And valleys clad in sheen of gold !
0, rise and sing a song of peace !
For Theseus roams the land no more.
And Janus rests with rusted door.
Joaquin Miller.
BROWN OF OSSAWATOMIE.
John Bkown of Ossawatomie spake on his
dying day :
" 1 wül not have to shrive my soul a priest in
Slavery's pay ;
But let some poor slave-mother whom I have
striven to free.
With her children, from the gallows-stair put up
a prayer for me ! "
John Brown of Ossawatomie, they led him out
to die ;
And lo ! a poor slave-mother with her little child
pressed nigh :
Then the bold, blue eye grew tender, and the old
harsh face grew mild,
As he stooped between the jeering ranks and
kissed the negro's child !
L t » > '
The shadows of his stoimy life that moment fell
apart, \
And they who blamed the bloody hand forgave
the loving heart ;
That kiss from all its guilty means redeemed the
good intent.
And round the grisly fighter's hair the martyr's
aureole bent !
Perish with him the folly that seeks through
evil good !
Long live the generous purpose unstained with
human blood !
Not the raid of midnight terror, but the thought
which underlies ;
Not the borderer's pride of daring, but the Chris¬
tian's sacrifice.
Nevermore may yon Blue Ridges the Northern
riñe hear.
Nor see the light of blazing homes flash oA the
negro's spear;
But let the free-winged angel Truth their guarded
passes scale.
To teach that right is more than might, and jus¬
tice more than mail !
So vainly shall Virginia set her battle in array ;
In vain her trampling squadrons knead the win¬
ter snow with clay !
She may strike the pouncing eagle, but she dares
not harm the dove ;
And every gate she bars to Hate shall open wide
to Love !
john greenleaf whittier.
WHAT CONSTITUTES A STATE?
What constitutes a State ?
Not high-raised battlement or labored mound.
Thick wall or moated gate ;
Not cities proud with spires and turrets crowned ;
Not bays and broad-armed ports.
Where, laughing at the storm, rich navies ride ;
Not stan-ed and spangled courts.
Where low-browed baseness wafts perfume to
pride.
No : — men, high-minded men.
With powers as far above dull brutes endued
In forest, brake, or den.
As beasts excel cold rocks and brambles rude, —
Men who their duties know.
But know their rights, and, knowing, dare main¬
tain,
Prevent the long-aimed blow.
And crush the tyrant while they rend the chain ;
These constitute a State ;
And sovereign law, that State's collected will.
O'er thrones and globes elate
Sits empress, crowning good, repressing ill.
Smit by her sacred frown.
The fiend. Dissension, like a vapor sinks ;
And e'en the all-dazzling crown
Hides his faint rays, and at her bidding shrinks.
-EP
I&
600
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
Such was this heaven-loved isle,
Than Lesbos fairer and the Cretan shore !
No more shall freedom smile ?
Shall Britons languish, and be men no more ?
Since all must life resign,
Those sweet rewards which decorate the brave
'T is folly to decline.
And steal inglorious to the silent grave.
Sir William Jones.
O-
THE FREEMAN.
from "the winter morning walk:"
" the task," book vi.
He is the freeman whom the truth makes free.
And all are slaves beside. There's not a chain
That hellish foes confederate for his harm
Can wind around him, but he casts it off
With as much ease as Samson his green withes.
He looks abroad into the^varied field
Of nature ; and though poor, perhaps, compared
With those whose mansions glitter in his sight.
Calls the delightful scenery all his own.
His are the mountains, and the valley his.
And the resplendent rivers. His to enjoy
With a propriety that none can feel
But who, with filial confidence inspired.
Can lift to heaven an unpresumptuous eye.
And smiling say, "My Father made them all ! "
Are they not his by a peculiar right.
And by an emphasis of interest his.
Whose eyes they fill with tears of holy joy.
Whose heart with praise, and whose exalted mind
With worthy thoughts of that unwearied love
That planned and built, and still upholds, a
world
So clothed with beauty for rebellious man 1
Yes, ye may fill your garners, ye that reap
The loaded soil, and ye may waste much good
In senseless riot ; but ye will not find
In feast, or in the chase, in song or dance,
A liberty like his, who, unimpeached
Of usurpation, and to no man's wrong.
Appropriates nature as his Father's work,
■ And has a richer use of yours than you.
He is indeed a freeman. Free by birth
Of no mean city, planned or e'er the hills
Were built, the fountains opened, or the sea
With all his roaring multitude of waves.
His freedom is the same in eveiy state ;
And no condition of this changeful life.
So manifold in cares, whose every day
Brings its own evil with it, makes it less.
For he has wings that neither sickness, pain.
Nor penury can cripple or confine ;
No nook so narrow but he spreads them there
With ease, and is at large. The oppressor holds
His body bound ; but knows not what a range
His spirit takes, unconscious of a chain ;
And that to bind him is a vain attempt.
Whom God delights in, and in whom he dwells.
William Cowper.
THE REFORMER.
All grim and soiled and brown with tan,
1 saw a Strong One, in his wrath.
Smiting the godless shrines of man
Along his path.
The Church beneath her trembling dome
Essayed in vain her ghostly charm :
Wealth shook within his gilded home
With strange alarm.
Fraud from his secret chambers fled
Before the sunlight bursting in :
Sloth drew her pillow o'er her head
To drown the din.
"Spare," Art implored, "yon holy pile ;
That grand old time-worn turret spare
Meek Reverence, kneeling in the aisle.
Cried out, " Forbear ! "
Gray-bearded Use, who, deaf and blind,
Groped for his old accustomed stone.
Leaned on his staff, and wept to find
His seat o'erthrown.
Young Romance raised his dreamy eyes,
O'erhuiig with paly locks of gold, —
"Why smite," he asked in sad surprise,
" The fair, the old ? "
Yet louder rang the Strong One's stroke.
Yet nearer flashed his axe's gleam ;
Shuddering and sick of heart 1 woke.
As from a dream.
1 looked : aside the dust-cloud rolled, —
The Waster seemed the Builder too ;
Upspringing from the ruined Old
1 saw the New.
'T was but the roin of the bad, —
The wasting of the wi ong and U1 ;
Whate'er of good the old time had
Was living still.
Calm grew the brows of him I feared ;
The frown which awed me passed away.
And left behind a smile which cheered
Like breaking day.
4
íTT
FRAGMENTS.
601
ra
The grain grew green on battle-plains,
O'er swarded war-mounds grazed the cow ;
The slave stood forging from Iiis chains
The spade and plough.
Where frowned the fort, pavilions gay
And cottage windows, flower-entwined,
Looked out upon the peaceful hay
And hills behind.
Through vine-wreathed cups with wine once red.
The lights on brimming crystal fell,
Drawn, sparkling, from the rivulet head
And mossy well.
Through prison-walls, like Heaven-sent hope.
Fresh breezes blew, and sunbeams strayed,
And with the idle gallows-rope
The young child played.
Where the doomed victim in his cell
Had counted o'er the weary hours.
Glad school-girls, answering to the bell.
Came crowned with flowers.
Grown wiser for the lesson given,
1 fear no longer, for I know
That where the share is deepest driven
The best fruits grow.
The outworn rite, the old abuse.
The pious fraud transparent grown.
The good held captive in the use
Of wrong alone, —
These wait their doom, from that great law
Which makes the past time serve to-day ;
And fresher life the world shall draw
From their decay.
0 backward-looking son of time !
The new is old, the old is new.
The cycle of a change sublime
Still sweeping through.
So wisely taught the Indian seer ;
Destroying Seva, forming Bi-ahm,
Who wake by turn Earth's love and fear,
Are one, the same.
Idly as thou, in that old day
Thou moumest, did thy sire repine ;
So, in his time, thy child grown gray
Shall sigh for thine.
But life shall on and upward go ;
Th' eternal step of Progress beats
To that great anthem, calm and slow,
Which God repeats.
Take heart ! — the Waster builds again, —
A charmed life old Goodness hath ;
The tares may perish, —but the grain
Is not for death.
God works in all things ; all obey
His first propulsion from the night ;
Wake thou and watch ! — the world is gray
With morning light !
John greenleap Whittier.
FEAGMENTS.
The Love of Country,
No factious voice
Crdled them unto the field of generous fame.
But the poor consecrated love of home ;
No deeper feeling sways us, when it wakes
In all its greatness.
The Graves of the Patriots. j. g. percival
What pity is it
That we can die but once to save our country!
Cato, Act iv. Sc. 4. ADDISON.
The inextinguishable spark, which fires
The soul of patriots.
Leónidas. r. Glover.
Evil Times.
Resolved to ruin or to rule the state.
Absalom atid Achitophel, Part II, DrYDEN.
That bawl for freedom in their senseless mood.
And still revolt when truth would set them free.
License they mean, when they cry Liberty ;
For who loves that must first be wise and good.
On the Detraction -which followed upon my -writing Certain
Treatises, II. MILTON.
The man that is not moved at what he reads,
That takes not fire at their heroic deeds.
Unworthy of the blessings of the brave.
Is base in kind, and bom to be a slave.
Tabu Talk. cowper.
Content thyself to be obscurely good.
When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway.
The post of honor is a private station.
CMo, Act iv. Sc. 4. Addison.
The Tyrant's Plea.
So spake the Fiend, and with necessity,
The tyrant's plea, excused hit devilish deeds.
Paradise Lost, Book iv. MILTON»
[&
602
POEMS OF PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
Soldiers of Freedom.
Yet't is not helm or feather, —
For ask yon despot, whether
His plumèd bands
Could bring such hands
And hearts as ours together.
Leave pomps to those who need 'em, —
Give man but heart and freedom.
And proud he braves
The gaudiest slaves
That crawl where monarehs lead 'em.
The sword may pierce the beaver.
Stone walls in time may sever ;
'T is mind alone.
Worth steel and stone.
That keeps men free forever.
Ot the sight entrancing, t. moore.
When once more her hosts assemble,
Let the tyrants only tremble ;
Smile they at this idle threat ?
Crimson tears wUl follow yet.
Waterloo. BVRON.
But William said, " He don't deserve
The name of Faith's defender.
Who would not venture life and limb
To make a foe surrender.
" Brave boys," he said, "be not dismayed.
For the loss of one commander.
For God will be our king this day.
And I '11 be general under."
Front the Battle of the Boyne. OLD BALLAD.
The Power that led his chosen, by pillared cloud
and flame,
Through parted sea and desert waste, that Power
is still the same ;
He fails not — He — the loyal hearts that firm on
Him rely ;
So put your trust in God, my boys, and keep
your powder dry.*
Olivtf's Advice, CoL. BLACKER.
But whether on the scaffold high
Or in the battle's van.
The fittest place where man can die
Is where he dies for man !
M. J. Barky.
Freedom.
I must have liberty
Withal, as large a charter as the wind.
To blow on whom I please.
At You Like It, Act Ü. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
Of old sat Freedom on the heights.
The thunders breaking at her feet :
Above her shook the starry lights :
She heard the torrents meet.
Her open eyes desire the truth.
The wisdom of a thousand years
Is in them. May perpetual youth
Keep dry their light from tears ;
That her fair form may stand and shine.
Make bright our days and light our dreams.
Turning to scorn with lips divine
The falsehood of extremes !
Of old sat Freedom on the heights. tennyson.
So Thought flung forward is the prophecy
Of Truth's majestic march, and shows the way
Where future time shaU lead the proud array
Of peace, of power, and love of liberty.
Sir John bowring.
No. Freedom has a thousand charms to show.
That slaves, howe'er contented, never know.
Religion, virtue, truth, whate'er we call
A blessing — Freedom is the pledge of all.
Humanity's Heroes.
No common object to your sight displays.
But what with pleasure Heaven itself surveys,
A brave man struggling in the storms of fate.
And greatly falling with a falling state.
While Cato gives his little senate laws,
What bosom beats not in his country's cause ? j
Who hears him groan, and does not wish to bleed ? ^
Who sees him act, but envies every deed ?
Prologue to Mr, Addison^s Cato. pope.
* Cromwell, on n certain occasion, when his troops were about
crossios: a river to attack the enemy, concluded an address with
these words * " Pot your trust ta God ; but mind to keep your
powder dry."
England.
Daddy Neptune, one day, to Freedom did say,
" If ever I lived upon dry land.
The spot I should hit on would be little Britain ! "
Says Freedom, "Why, that's my own island ! "
O, it's a snug little island !
A right little, tight little island !
Search the globe round, none can be found
So happy as this little island.
The Tight Little Island. t. dibdin.
We must be free or die, who speak the tongue
That Shakespeare spake ; the faith and morals
hold
Which Milton held. In everything we are sprung
Of earth's first blood, have titles manifold.
Poems dedicated to National Independence, Part I. Sonnet xvL
WORDSWORTH.
á
FRAGMENTS.
603
This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle.
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise ;
This fortress, built by Nature for herself,
Against infection and the hand of war ;
This happy breed of men, this little world.
This precious stone set in the silver sea.
Which serves it in the oflSce of a wall.
Or as a moat defensive to a house.
Against the envy of less happier lands ;
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this
England.
Kt>tg Richard II., Act 'ú.Sc.i. shakespeare.
This England never did, nor never shall.
Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror.
King Jahn, Act v. Sc. 7. Shakespeare.
Fired at the sound, my genius spreads her
wing.
And flies where Britain courts the western spring ;
Pride in their port, defiance in their eye,
I see the lords of humankind pass by ;
Intent on high designs, a thoughtful band.
By forms unfashioned fresh from nature's hand.
Fierce in their native hardiness of soul.
True to imagined right, above control, —
While even the peasant boasts these rights to
scan.
And learns to venerate himself as man.
Thine, Freedom, thine the blessings pictured
here.
Thine are those charms that dazzle and endear.
The TrcncUcr. Goldsmith.
A land of settled government,
A land of just and old renown.
Where freedom broadens slowly down.
From precedent to precedent :
Where faction seldom gathers head ;
But, by degrees to fulness wrought.
The strength of some diffusive thought
Hath time and space to work and spread.
The Land of Lande. tennyson.
God save our gracious king.
Long live our noble king,
God save the king.
Send him victorious,
Happy and glorious.
Long to reign over us,
God save the king.
dod can tht King. Hbnrv CarbV.
Switzerland.
Thus every good his native wilds impart.
Imprints the patriot passion on his heart ;
And e'en those ills, that roimd his mansion rise.
Enhance the bliss his scanty fund supplies.
Dear is that shed to which his soul conforms.
And dear that hill which lifts him to the storms ;
And as a child, when scaring soimds molest.
Clings close and closer to the mother's breast.
So the loud torrent and the whirlwind's roar
But bind him to his native mountains more.
The Traveller. goldsmith.
America.
Hail Columbia ! happy land !
Hail ye heroes, heaven-bom band !
Who fought and bled in freedom's cause,
Who fought and bled in freedom's cause
And when the storm of war was gone,
Enjoyed the peace your valor won !
Let independence be our boast,
Ever mindful what it cost ;
Ever grateful for the prize.
Let its altar reach the skies.
Firm — united — let us be.
Rallying round our liberty ;
As a band of brothers joined.
Peace and safety we shall find.
Hail Columbia. joseph hopkinson.
They love their land because it is their own.
And scorn to give aught other reason why ;
Would shake hands with a king upon his throne.
And think it kindness to his majesty.
Conructicutt f. G. Halleck.
The Ballot-Box.
Along the street
The shadows meet
Of Destiny, whose hands conceal
The moulds of fate
That shape the State,
And make or mar the common weal.
Around I see
The powers that be ;
I stand by Empire's primal springs ;
And princes meet
In every street.
And hear the tread of uncrowned kings !
Not lightly fall
Beyond recall
The written scrolls a breath can float ;
The crowning fact
The kingliest act
Of Freedom is the freeman's vote !
The Eve EUfiion, WHlTTISIt.
a-
604
POEMS OP PATRIOTISM AND FREEDOM.
A weapon that comes down as still
As snow-flakes fall upon the sod ;
But executes a freeman's will,
As lightning does the will of God ;
And from its force, nor doors nor locks
Can shield you ; — 't is the ballot-box.
A Word from a PetOioner. J. PIERPONT.
"Centennial" Echoes.
Sun of the stately Day,
Let Asia into the shadow drift,
Let Europe bask in thy ripened ray.
And over the severing ocean lift
A brow of broader splendor !
Give light to the eager eyes
Of the Land that waits to behold thee rise :
The gladne.ss of morning lend her.
With the triumph of noon attend her.
And the peace of the vesper skies !
For lo ! she cometh now
With hope on the lip and pride on the hrow.
Stronger, and dearer, and fairer.
To smile on the love we bear her, —
To Uve, as we dreamed her and sought her.
Liberty's latest daughter !
In the clefts of the rocks, in the secret places,
We found her traces ;
On the hills, in the crash of woods that fall.
We heard her call ;
When the lines of battle broke.
We saw her face in the fiery smoke ;
Through toil, and anguish, and desolation.
We followed, and found her
With the grace of a virgin Nation
As a sacred zone around her !
Who shall rejoice
With a righteous voice.
Far-heard through the ages, if not she ?
For the menace is dumb that defied her.
The doubt is dead that denied her.
And she stands acknowledged, and strong, and
free !
The NcUional Ode : read at the Celebration in Independence Hall,
Philadelphia, yuly 4,1876 BayarO taylor.
Our fathers' God ! from out whose hand
The centuries fall like grains of sand.
We meet to-day, united, free.
And loyal to our land and thee,
To thank thee for the era done.
And trust thee for the opening one.
O, make thou us, through (Tenturies long.
In peace secure, in justice strong ;
Around our gift of freedom draw
The safeguards of thy righteous law ;
And, cast in some diviner mould.
Let the new cycle shame the old i
Centennial Hymn ,
May 10,1876.
Jniernatùmal Exposition^ Philadelphia,
whittier.
Long as thine Art shall love true love,
Long as thy Science truth shaU know.
Long as thine Eagle harms no Dove,
Long as thy Law by law shall grow.
Long as thy God is God above.
Thy brother every man below, —
So long, dear Land of aU my love.
Thy name shall shine, thy fame shall glow !
Centennial Meditation 0/ Columbia:
Philadelphia, May zo, x8;6.
International Exposition,
S. Lanier
Who cometh over the hills.
Her garments with morning sweet,
The dance of a thousand rills
Making music before her feet ?
Her presence freshens the air.
Sunshine steals light from her face.
The leaden footstep of Care
Leaps to the tune of her pace.
Fairness of all that is fair,
Grace at the heart of all grace 1
Sweetener of hut and of hall.
Bringer of life out of naught.
Freedom, 0, fairest of all
The daughters of Time and Thought !
Ode to Freedom : Centennial Anniversary 0/the Battle of Concord,
April 19, 1875. J« R. lowell.
é
POEMS OF THE SEA.
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POEMS OF THE SEA.
THE SEA.
PROM "CHILDE HAROLD," CANTO IV.
There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society where none intrudes
By the deep sea, and music in its roar :
I love not man the less, but nature more.
From these our interviews, in which I steal
From all I may be, or have been before.
To mingle with the universe, and feel
What I can ne'er express, yet cannot all conceal.
Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean, — roll !
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain ;
Man marks the earth with ruin, — his control
Stops with the shore ; — upon the watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own.
When, for a moment, like a drop of rain.
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan.
Without a grave, unknelled, uncoffined, and un¬
known.
His steps are not upon thy paths, — thy fields
Are not a spoil for him, — thou dost arise
And shake him from thee ; the vile strength
he wields
For earth's destruction thou dost all despise.
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies.
And send'st him, shivering in thy playful spray
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies
His petty hope in some near port or bay.
And dashesthim again to earth : — there let him
lay.
The armaments which thunderstrike the walls
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake
And monarchs tremble in their capitals.
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make
Their clay creator tlie vain title take
Of lord of thee and arbiter of war, —
These are thy toys, and, as the snowy flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar
Alike the Armada's pride or spoils of Trafalgar.
Thy shores are empires, changed in all save
thee ;
Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are
they ?
Thy waters wasted them while they were free.
And many a tyrant since ; their shores obey
The stranger, slave, or savage ; their decay
Has dried up realms to deserts : not so thou ;
Unchangeable save to thy wild waves' play.
Time writes no wrinkles on thine azure brow ;
Such as creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now.
Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's
form
Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time.
Calm or convulsed, — in breeze, or gale, or
storm.
Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime
Dark-heaving ; boundless, endless, and sub¬
lime.
The image of Eternity, — the throne
Of the Invisible ! even from out thy slime
The monsters of the deep are made ; each zone
Obeys thee ; thou goest forth, dread, fathomless,
alone.
And 1 have loved thee. Ocean ! and my joy
Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be
Borne, like thy bubbles, onward ; from a boy
I wantoned with thy breakers, — they to me
Were a delight ; and if the freshening sea
Made them a terror, 't was a pleasing fear ;
For I was as it were a child of thee.
And trusted to thy billows far and near,
And laid my hand upon thy mane, — as I do
here.
LORD BYRON.
THE SEA.
Beatttiful, sublime, and glorious ;
Mild, majestic, foaming, free, —
Over time itself victorious.
Image of eternity !
gj
608
POEMS OF
THE SEA.
Sun and moon and stars shine o'er thee,
See thy surface ebb and flow,
Yet attempt not to explore thee
In thy soundless depths below.
Whether morning's splendoi-s steep thee
With the rainbow's glowing grace.
Tempests rouse, Oi navies sweep thee,
'T is but for a moment's space.
Earth, — her valleys and her mountains.
Mortal man's behests obey ;
The unfathomable fountains
Scoff his search and scorn his sway.
Such art thou, stupendous Ocean !
But, if overwhelmed by thee.
Can we think, without emotion.
What must thy Creator be ?
bernard Barton.
THE OCEAN.
[Written at Scarborough, in the Summer of 1805.]
All hail to the ruins, the rocks, and the shores !
Thou wide-rolling Ocean, all hail !
Now brilliant with sunbeams and dimpled with
oars,
Now dark with the fresh-blowing gale.
While soft o'er thy bosom the cloud-shadows sail.
And the silver-winged sea-fowl on high.
Like meteors bespangle the sky,
Or dive in the gulf, or triumphantly ride.
Like foam on the surges, the swans of the tide.
From the tumult and smoke of the city set free.
With eager and awful delight.
From the crest of the mountain I gaze upon thee,
I gaze, — and am changed at the sight ;
For mine eye is illumined, my genius takes flight.
My soul, like the sun, with a glance
Embraces the boundless expanse.
And moves on thy waters, wherever they roll.
From the day-darting zone to the night-shadowed
pole.
My spirit descends where the dayspring is born.
Where the billows are rabies on fire.
And the breezes that rock the light cradle of
mom
Are sweet as the Phœnix's pyre.
0 regions of beauty, of love and desire !
O gardens of Eden ! in vain
Placed far on the fathomless main.
Where Nature with Innocence dwelt in her
youth.
When pure was her heart and unbroken her
But now the fair rivers of Paradise wind
Through countries and kingdoms o'erthrown ;
Where the giant of tyranny crushes mankind.
Where he reigns, —and will soon reign alone ;
For wide and more wide, o'er the sun-beaming
zone
He stretches his hundred-fold arms.
Despoiling, destroying its charms ;
Beneath his broad footstep the Ganges is dry,
And the mountains recoil from the flash of his
eye.
Thus the pestilent Upas, the demon of trees.
Its houghs o'er the wilderness spreads.
And with livid contagion polluting the breeze.
Its mildewing influence sheds ;
The birds on the wing, and the flowers in their
beds.
Are slain by its venomous breath.
That darkens the noonday with death.
And pale ghosts of travellers wander around.
While their mouldering skeletons whiten the
ground.
Ah ! why hath Jehovah, in forming the world.
With the waters divided the land.
His ramparts of rocks round the continent
hurled.
And cradled the deep in his hand.
If man may transgress his eternal command.
And leap o'er the bounds of his birth.
To ravage the uttennost earth.
And violate nations and realms that should be
Distinct as the billows, yet one as the sea ?
There are, gloomy Ocean, a brotherless clan,
Who traverse thy banishing waves.
The poor disinherited outcasts of man.
Whom Avarice coins into slaves.
From the homes of their kindred, their fore¬
fathers' graves.
Love, friendship, and conjugal bliss.
They are dragged on the hoary abyss ;
The shark hears their shrieks, and, ascending
to-day.
Demands of the spoiler his share of the prey.
Then joy to the tempest that whelms them be¬
neath,
And makes their destraction its sport ;
But woe to the winds that propitiously breathe.
And waft them in safety to port.
Where the vultures and vampires of Mammon
resort ;
Where Europe exultingly drains
The life-blood from Africa's veins ;
Where man rules o'er man with a merciless rod,
And spurns at his footstool the image of God !
f
POEMS OP THE SEA.
609
C-
The hour is approaching, — a terrible hour !
And Vengeance is bending her bow ;
Already the clouds of the hurricane lower,
And the rock-rending whirlwinds blow ;
Back rolls the huge Ocean, hell opens below ;
The floods return headlong, — they sweep
The slave-cultured lands to the deep.
In a moment entombed in the horrible void,
By their Maker himself in his anger destroyed.
Shall this be the fate of the cane-planted isles.
More lovely than clouds in the west.
When the sun o'er the ocean descending in smiles.
Sinks softly and sweetly to rest ?
No ! — Father of mercy ! befriend the opprest ;
At the voice of thy gospel of peace
May the sorrows of Africa cease ;
And slave and his master devoutly unite
To walk in thy freedom and dwell in thy light !
As homeward my weary-winged Fancy extends.
Her star-lighted course through the skies.
High over the mighty Atlantic ascends.
And turns upon Europe her eyes ;
Ah me ! what new prospects, new horrors, arise !
I see the war-tempested flood
All foaming, and panting with blood ;
The panic-strack Ocean in agony roars,
Bebounds from the battle, and flies to his shores.
For Britannia is wielding the trident to-day.
Consuming her foes in her ire.
And hurling her thunder with absolute sway
From her wave-ruling chariots of fire.
She triumphs ; the winds and the waters conspire
To spread her invincible name ;
The universe rings with her fame ;
But the cries of the fatherless mix with her
praise.
And the tears of the widow are shed on her bays.
0 Britain, dear Britain ! the land of my birth ;
0 Isle most enchantingly fair !
Thou Pearl of the Ocean ! thou Gem of the
Earth !
0 my Mother, my Mother, beware.
For wealth is a phantom, and empire a snare !
0, let not thy birthright be sold
For reprobate glory and gold !
Thy distant dominions like wild graftings shoot,
They weigh down thy trunk, they will tear up
thy root, —
The root of thine oak, 0 my country ! that stands
Rock-planted and flourishing free ;
Its branches are stretched o'er the uttermost
lands.
And its shadow eclipses the sea.
The blood of our ancestors nour ished the tree ;
From their tombs, from their ashes, it sprung ;
Its boughs with their trophies are hung ;
Their spirit dwells in it, and — hark ! for it
spoke.
The voice of our fathers ascends from their oak :
"Ye Britons, who dwell where we conquered of
old.
Who inherit our battle-field graves ;
Though poor were your fathers, — gigantic and
bold.
We were not, we could not be, slaves ;
But fii-m as our rocks, and as free as our waves.
The spears of the Romans we broke.
We never stooped under their yoke.
In the shipwreck of nations we stood up alone, —
The world was great Caesar's, but Britain our
own."
James Montgomery.
HAMPTON BEACH.
The sunlight glitters keen and bright.
Where, miles away.
Lies stretching to my dazzled sight
A luminous belt, a misty light.
Beyond the dark pine blufis and wastes of sandy
gray.
The tremulous shadow of the Sea !
Against its ground
Of silvery light, rock, hill, and tree.
Still as a picture, clear and free.
With varying outline mark the coast for mUes
around.
On — on — we tread with loose-flung rein
Our seaward way.
Through dark-green fields and blossoming
grain.
Where the wild brier-rose skirts the lane.
And bends above our heads the flowering locust
spray.
Ha ! like a kind hand on my brow
Comes this fresh breeze.
Cooling its dull and feverish glow.
While through my being seems to flow
The breath of a new life, — the healing of the
seas !
Now rest we, where this grassy mound
His feet hath set
In the great waters, which have bound
His granite ankles greenly round
With long and tangled moss, and weeds with
cool spray wet.
610 POEMS OP THE SEA.
à-
Grood-by to pain and care ! I take
Mine ease to-day ;
Here, where the sunny waters break.
And ripples this keen breeze, I shake
All burdens from the heart, all weary thoughts
away.
I draw a freer breath — I seem
Like all I see —
Waves in the sun — the white-winged gleam
Of sea-birds in the slanting beam —
And far-off sails which flit before the south-wind
free.
So when Time's veil shall fall asunder,
The soul may know
No fearful change, nor sudden wonder.
Nor sink the weight of mystery under.
But with the upward rise, and with the vastness
grow.
And all we shrink from now may seem
No new revealing, —
Familiar as our childhood's stream.
Or pleasant memory of a dream.
The loved and cherished Past upon the new life
stealing.
Serene and mild, the untried light
May have its dawning ;
And, as in summer's northern night
The evening and the dawn unite.
The sunset hues of Time blend with the soul's
new morning.
I sit alone ; in foam and spray
Wave after wave
Breaks on the rocks which, stem and gray,
Shoulder the broken tide away.
Or murmurs hoarse and strong through mossy
cleft and cave.
What heed I of the dusty land
And noisy town ?
I see the mighty deep expand
From its white line of glimmering sand
To where the blue of heaven on bluer waves
shuts down !
In listless quietude of mind,
I yield to all
The change of cloud and wave and wind ;
And passive on the flood reclined,
I wander with the waves, and with them rise
and fall.
But look, thou dreamer ! — wave and shore
In shadow lie ;
The night-wind wams me back once more
To where, my native hill-tops o'er.
Bends like an arch of fire the glowing sunset
sky !
So then, beach, bluff, and wave, farewell !
I bear with me
No token stone nor glittering shell.
But long and oft shall Memory tell
Of this brief thoughtful hour of musing by the
Sea.
john greenleap whittier.
TWILIGHT AT SEA
The twilight hours, like birds, flew by.
As lightly and as free.
Ten thousand stars were in the sky.
Ten thousand on the sea ;
For every wave, with dimpled face.
That leaped upon the air.
Had caught a star in its embrace.
And held it trembling there.
amelia b. welby.
OCEAN.
from "the course of time," book i.
Geeat Ocean ! strongest of creation's sons.
Unconquerable, unreposed, untired.
That rolled the wüd, profound, etemal bass
In nature's anthem, and made music such
As pleased the ear of God ! original,
Unmarred, unfaded work of Deity !
And unburlesqued by mortal's puny skiU ;
From age to age enduring, and unchanged,
Majestical, inimitable, vast.
Loud uttering satire, day and night, on each
Succeeding race, and little pompous work
Of man ; Unfällen, religious, holy sea !
Thou bowedst thy glorious head to none, fearedst
none,
Heardst none, to none didst honor, but to God
Thy Maker, only worthy to receive
Thy great obeisance.
Robert Pollok.
THE SEA.
Behold the Sea
The opaline, the plentiful and strong.
Yet beautiful as is the rose in June,
Fresh as the trickling rainbow of July :
Sea fuU of food, the nourisher of kinds.
Purger of earth, and medicine of men ;
Creating a sweet climate by my breath.
Washing out harms and griefs from memory.
And, in my mathematic ebb and flow,
f
POEMS OF THE SEA.
611
a
Giving a hint of that which changes not.
Eich are the sea-gods :—who gives gifts but they ?
They grope the sea for pearls, but more than pearls :
They pluck Force thence, and give it to the wise.
For every wave is wealth to Daedalus,
Wealth to the cunning artist who can work
This matchless strength. Where shall he find,
O waves !
A load your Atlas shoulders cannot lift ?
I with my hammer pounding evermore
The rocky coast, smite Andes into dust.
Strewing my bed, and; in another age.
Rebuild a continent of better men.
Then I unbar the doors : my paths lead out
The exodus of nations : I disperse
Men to all shores that front the hoary main.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
THE DISAPPOINTED LOVER.
from "the triumph of time."
I will go back to the great sweet mother —
Mother and lover of men, the Sea.
I will go down to her, I and none other.
Close with her, kiss her, and mix her with me ;
Cling to her, strive with her, hold her fast.
0 fair white mother, in days long past
Bom without sister, bom without brother.
Set free my soul'as thy soul is free.
0 fair green-girdled mother of mine.
Sea, that art clothed with the sun and the rain.
Thy sweet hard kisses are strong like wine,
Thy large embraces are keen like pain.
Save me and hide me with all thy waves.
Find me one grave of thy thousand graves.
Those pure cold populous graves of thine, —
Wrought without hand in a world without stain.
1 shall sleep, and move with the moving ships.
Change as the winds change, veer in the tide ;
My lips will feast on the foam of thy lips,
I shall rise with thy rising, with thee subside ;
Sleep, and not know if she be, if she were, —
Filled full with life to the eyes and hair.
As a rose is fuU filled to the rose-leaf tips
With splendid summer and perfume and pride.
This woven raiment of nights and days.
Were it once cast off and unwound from me.
Naked and glad would I walk in thy ways.
Alive and aware of thy waves and thee ;
Clear of the whole world, hidden at home.
Clothed with the green, and crowned with the
11
A pulse of the life of thy straits and bays,
A vein in the heart of the streams of the Sea.
Algernon Charles Swinburne.
DOVER BEACH.
The sea is calm to-night.
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the Straits ; —on the French coast, the light
Gleams and is gone ; the cliffs of England stand.
Glimmering and vast, ont in the tranquil bay.
Come to the window ; sweet is the night air !
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the ebb meets the moon-blanched sand.
Listen ! you hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves suck back, and fling.
At their return, up the high strand.
Begin and cease, and then again begin.
With tremulous cadence slow, and bring
The eternal note of sadness in.
Matthew Arnold.
ADDRESS TO THE OCEAN.
0 thou vast Ocean ! ever-sounding Sea !
Thou symbol of a drear immensity !
Thou thing that windest round the solid world
Like a huge animal, which, downward hurled
From the black clouds, lies weltering and alone,
Lashing and writhing till its strength be gone !
Thy voice is like the thunder, and thy sleep
Is as a giant's slumber, loud and deep.
Thou speakest in the east and in the west
At once, and on thy heavily laden breast
Fleets come and go, and shapes that have no life
Or motion, yet are moved and meet in strife.
The earth has naught of this ; no chance or
change
Ruffles its surface, and no spirits dare
Give answer to the tempest-wakened air ;
But o'er its wastes the weakly tenants range
At will, and wound its bosom as they go :
Ever the same, it hath no ebb, no flow :
But in their stated rounds the seasons come.
And pass like visions to their wonted home ;
And come again, and vanish ; the young Spring
Looks ever bright with leaves and blossoming ;
And Winter always winds his sullen horn.
When the wild Autumn, with a look forlorn.
Dies in his stormy manhood ; and the skies
Weep, and flowers sicken, when the summer flies
O, wonderful thou art, great element,
And fearful in thy spleeny humors bent.
And lovely in repose ! thy summer form
Is beautiful, and when thy silver waves
Make music in earth's dark and winding caves,
1 love to wander on thy pebbled beach.
Marking the sunlight at the evening hour.
And hearken to the thoughts thy waters teach,—
Eternity — Eternity — and Power.
Bryan Waller Procter (Rarry CarnviaH).
fl-
612
POEMS OP THE SEA.
ÖI
ON THE LOSS OF THE ROYAL GEORGE.
written when the news arrived j 1782.
Toll for the brave, —
The brave that are no more !
All sunk beneath the wave,
Fast by their native shore.
Eight hundred of the brave.
Whose courage well was tried.
Had made the vessel heel,
And laid her on her side.
A land-breeze shook the shrouds.
And she was overset ;
Down went the Royal George,
With all her crew complete.
Toll for the brave !
Brave Kempenfelt is gone ;
His last sea-fight is fought.
His work of glory done.
It was not in the battle ;
No tempest gave the shock ;
She sprang no fatal leak ;
She ran upon no rock.
His sword was in its sheath.
His fingers held the pen,
When Kempenfelt went down
With twice four hundred men.
Weigh the vessel up,
Once dreaded by our foes !
And mingle with our cup
The tear that England owes.
Her timbers yet are sound,
And she may fioat again.
Full charged with England's thunder.
And plough the distant main.
But Kempenfelt is gone ;
His victories are o'er ;
And he and his eight hundred
Shall plough the wave no more.
William Cowper.
1&
THE SHIPWRECK.
In vain the cords and axes were prepared.
For now the audacious seas insult the yard ;
High o'er the ship they throw a horrid shade.
And o'er her burst in terrible cascade.
Uplifted on the surge, to heaven she flies.
Her shattered top half buried in the skies.
Then headlong plunging thunders on the gi ound ;
Earth groans ! air trembles ! and the deeps re¬
sound !
Her giant-bulk the dread concussion feels.
And quivering with the wound in torment reels.
So reels, convulsed with agonizing throes.
The bleeding bull beneath the murderer's blows.
Again she plunges ! hark ! a second shock
Tears her strong bottom on the marble rock :
Down on the vale of death, with dismal cries.
The fated victims, shuddering, roll their eyes
In wild despair ; while yet another stroke.
With deep convulsion, rends the solid oak ;
Till like the mine, in whose infernal cell
The lurking demons of destruction dwell.
At length asunder torn her frame divides.
And, crashing, spreads in ruin o'er the tides.
O, were it mine with tuneful Maro's art
To wake to sympathy the feeling heart ;
Like him the smooth and mournful verse to dress
In all the pomp of exquisite distress.
Then too severely taught by cruel fate.
To share in all the perils I relate.
Then might I with unrivalled strains deplore
The impervious horrors of a leeward shore !
As o'er the surge the stooping mainmast hung.
Still on the rigging thirty seamen clung ;
Some, struggling, on a broken crag were cast.
And there by oozy tangles grappled fast.
Awhile they bore the o'erwhelming billows' rage,
Unequal combat with their fate to wage ;
Till, all benumbed and feeble, they forego
Their slippery hold, and sink to shades below.
Some, from the main-yard-arm impetuous thrown
On marble ridges, die without a groan.
Three with Palemón on their skill depend.
And from the wreck on oars and rafts descend.
Now on the mountain wave on high they ride.
Then downward plunge beneath the involving
tide.
Till one, who seems in agony to strive.
The whirling breakers heave on shore alive ;
The rest a speedier end of anguish knew.
And pressed the stony beach, a lifeless crew !
William Falconer.
THE SEA FIGHT.
as told by an ancient mariner.
Ah, yes, — the fight ! Well, messmates, well,
I served on board that Ninety-eight ;
Yet what I saw I loathe to tell.
To-night be sure a crushing weight
Upon my sleeping breast, a hell
Of dread, will sit. At any rate.
Though land-locked here, a watch I '11 keep, —
Grog cheers us still. Who cares for sleep ?
■51
POEMS OF
THE SEA.
613
That Ninety-eight I sailed on board ;
Along the Frenchman's coast we flew ;
Eight aft the rising tempest roared ;
A noble flrst-rate hove in view ;
And soon high in the gale there soared
Her streamed-out bunting, — red, white, blue !
We cleared for fight, and landward bore,
To get between the chase and shore.
Masters, I cannot spin a yarn
Twice laid with words of silken stuff.
A fact's a fact ; and ye may larn
The rights o' this, though wild and rough
My words may loom. 'T is your consarn.
Not mine, to understand. Enough ; —
We neared the Frenchman where he lay.
And as we neared, he blazed away.
We tacked, hove to ; we filled, we wore ;
Did all that seamanship could do
To rake him aft, or by the fore, —
Now rounded off, and now broached to ;
And now our starboard broadside bore.
And showers of h-on through and through
His vast hull hissed ; our larboard then
Swept from his threefold decks his men.
As we, like a huge serpent, toiled.
And wound about, through that wild sea.
The Frenchman each manœuvre foiled, —
'Vantage to neither there could be.
Whilst thus the waves between us boiled.
We both resolved right manfully
To fight it side by side ; — began
Then the fierce strife of man to man.
Gun bellows forth to gun, and pain
Rings out her wild, delirious scream !
Eedpubling thunders shake the main ;
Loud crashing, falls the shot-rent beam.
The timbers with the broadsides strain ;
The slippery decks send up a steam
From hot and living blood, and high
And shrill is heard the death-pang cry.
The shredded limb, the splintered bone.
The unstiffened corpse, now block the way !
Who now can hear the dying groan ?
The trumpet of the judgment-day.
Had it pealed forth its mighty tone.
We should not then have heard, — to say
Would be rank sin ; but this I tell.
That could alone our madness quell.
Upon the forecastle I fought
As captain of the for'ad gun.
A scattering shot the carriage caught !
What mother then had known her son
Of those who stood around ? — distraught.
And smeared with gore, about they run.
Then fall, and writhe, and howling die !
But one escaped, — that one was I !
Night darkened round, and the storm pealed ;
To windward of us lay the foe.
As he to leeward over keeled.
He could not fight his guns below ;
So just was going to strike, — when reeled
Our vessel, as if some vast blow
From an Almighty hand had rent
The huge ship from her element.
Then howled the thunder. Tumult then
Had stunned herself to silence. Round
Were scattered lightning-blasted men !
Our mainmast went. All stifled, drowned.
Arose the Frenchman's shout. Again
The bolt burst ou us, and we found
Our masts all gone, — our decks all riven ;
Man's war mocks faintly that of heaven !
Just then, — nay, messmates, laugh not now,-
As I, amazed, one minute stood
Amidst that rout, — I know not how, ■—
'T was silence all, —the raving flood.
The guns that pealed from stem to bow.
And God's own thunder, — nothing could
I then of all that tumult hear.
Or see aught of that scene of fear,—
My aged mother at her door
Sat mildly o'er her humming wheel ;
The cottage, orchard, and the moor, —
I saw them plainly all. 1 '11 kneel.
And swear I saw them ! 0, they wore
A look aU peace ! Could I but feel
Again that bliss that then I felt.
That made my heart, like childhood's, melt !
The blessèd tear was on my cheek.
She smiled with that old smile I know :
"Turn to me, mother, turn and speak,"
Was on my quivering lips, — when lo !
All vanished, and a dark, red streak
Glared wild and vivid from the foe.
That flashed upon the blood-stained water, —
For fore and aft the flames had caught her.
She struck and hailed us. On us fast
All burning, helplessly, she came, —
Near, and more near ; and not a mast
Had we to help us from that flame.
'T was then the bravest stood aghast, —
'T was then the wicked on the name
(With danger and with guilt appalled)
Of God, too long neglected, caUed.
614
POEMS OF THE SEA.
The eddying flames with ravening tongue
Now on our ship's dark bulwarks dash, —
We almost touched, — when ocean rung
Down to its depths with one loud crash !
In heaven's top vault one instant hung
The vast, intense, and blinding flash !
Then all was darkness, stillness, dread, —
The wave moaned o'er the valiant dead.
She's gone ! blown up ! that gallant foe !
And though she left ns in a plight,
We floated still ; long were, I know.
And hard, the labors of that night
To clear the wreck. At length in tow
A frigate took us, when't was light ;
And soon an English port we gained, —
A hulk all battered and blood-stained.
So many slain, — so many drowned !
I like not of that fight to tell.
Come, let the cheerful grog go round !
Messmates, I 've done. A spell, ho ! spell, —
Though a pressed man, I '11 still be found
To do a seaman's duty well.
I wish our brother landsmen knew
One half we jolly tars go through.
Anonymous.
CASABIANCA.
pToung Casabianca, a boy about thirteen years old, son of the
Admiral of the Orient, remained at his post (in the Battle of the Nile)
after the ship had taken fire and all the guns had been abandoned,
and perished in the explosion of the vessel, when the flames had
reached the powder. J
The boy stood on the burning deck,
Whence all but him had fled ;
The flame that lit the battle's wreck
Shone round him o'er the dead.
Yet beautiful and bright he stood.
As bom to rale the storm ;
A creature of heroic blood,
A proud though childlike form.
The flames rolled on ; he would not go
Without his father's word ;
That father, faint in death below.
His voice no longer heard.
He called aloud, " Say, father, say.
If yet my task be done ! "
He knew not that the chieftain lay
Unconscious of his son.
*' Speak, father ! " once again he cried,
" If I may yet be gone ! "
And but the booming shots replied,
And fast the flames rolled on.
Upon his brow he felt their breath.
And in his waving hair.
And looked from that lone post of death
In still yet brave despair ;
And shouted but once more aloud,
" My father ! must I stay ?"
While o'er him fast, through sail and shroud.
The wreathing fires made way.
They wrapt the ship in splendor wüd.
They caught the flag on high.
And streamed above the gallant child.
Like banners in the sky.
There came a burst of thunder sound ;
The boy, — Oh ! where was he ?
Ask of the winds, that far around
With fragments strewed the sea, —
With shroud and mast and pennon fair.
That well had borne their part, —
But the noblest thing that perished there
Was that young, faithful heart.
Felicia Hemans.
THE MARINER'S DREAM.
In slumbers of midnight the sailor-boy lay ;
His hammock swung loose at the sport of the
wind ;
But watch-wom and weary, his cares flew away.
And visions of hapjiiness danced o'er his mind.
He dreamt of his home, of his dear native
bowers.
And pleasures that waited on life's merry
mora ;
While Memoiy stood sideways, half covered with
flowers.
And restored every rose, but secreted its thom.
Then Fancy her magical pinions spread wide.
And bade the young dreamer in ecstasy rise ;
Now far, far behind him the green waters glide.
And the cot of his forefathers blesses his eyes.
The jessamine clambers in flowers o'er the thatch.
And the swallow chirps sweet from her nest in
the wall ;
All trembling with transport he raises the latch.
And the voices of loved ones reply to his call.
A father bends o'er him with looks of delight ;
His cheek is impearled with a mother's warm
tear ;
And the lips of the boy in a love-kiss unite
With the lips of the maid whom his bosom
holds dear.
f
POEMS OF THE SEA.
615
n
t.
The heart of the sleeper beats high in his breast ;
Joy quickens his pulse, all his hardships seem
o'er ;
And a murmur of happiness steals through his
rest,—
" 0 God ! thou hast blest me, — I ask for no
more." ,
Ah ! whence is I that flame which now bursts i
his eye ? 1
Ah ! what is that sound whicll now lamms
his ear ? j
'Tis the lightning's red glare! painting belli on
the skjr !
'T is the crash of the thunder, the groan of the
sphere !
He springs from his hammock, fhe flies to the
deck ; 1 . Í
Amazement coraronts him\with images dire i
Wild winds and Wad waves drivel the vessel a
wreck ; i \ ''
The masts fly in splinters^ the shrouds are on
fire. '
Like mountains the billows tremendously swell ;
In vain the lost wretch calls on mercy to save ;
Unseen hands of spirits are ringing his knell,
And the death-angel flaps his broad wing o'er
the wave !
0 sailor-boy, woe to thy dream of delight !
In darkness dissolves the gay frost-work of
bliss.
Where now is the picture that Fancy touched
bright, —
Thy parents' fond pressure, and love's honeyed
kiss ?
0 sailor-boy ! sailor-boy ! never again
Shall home, love, or kindred thy wishes repay ;
Unblessed and unhonored, down deep in the
main.
Full many a fathom, thy frame shall decay.
No tomb shall e'er plead to remembrance for
thee.
Or redeem form or fame from the merciless
surge ;
But the white foam of waves shall thy winding-
sheet be.
And winds in the midnight of winter thy
dirge !
On a bed of green sea-flowers thy limbs shall be
laid, —
Around thy white bones the red coral shall
grow ;
Of thy fair yellow locks threads of amber be
made.
And every part suit to thy mansion below.
Days, months, years, and ages shall circle away.
And still the vast waters above thee shall roll ;
Earth loses thy pattern forever and aye, —
0 sailor-boy ! sailor-boy ! peace to thy soul !
WILUAM DIHOND,
EOOE JACK.
Go, patter to lubbers and swabs, do ye see,
'Bout danger, and fear, and the like ;
A tight-water boat and good sea-room give me.
And it a'n't to a little I '11 strike.
Though the tempest topgallant-masts smack
smooth should smite.
And shiver each splinter of wood.
Clear the deck, stow the yards, and bouse every¬
thing tight.
And under reefed foresail we '11 scud :
Avast ! nor don't think me a milksop so soft
To be taken for trifles aback;
For they say there's a Providence sits up aloft.
To keep watch for the life of poor Jack !
I heard our good chaplain palaver one day
About souls, heaven, mercy, and such ;
And, my timbers ! what lingo he'd coil and belay;
Why, 't was just all as one as High Dutch ;
For he said how a sparrow can't founder, d'ye see.
Without orders that come down below ;
And a many fine things that proved clearly to me
That Providence takes us in tow :
"For," says he, do you mind me, "let storms
e'er so oft
Take the topsails of sailors aback.
There's a sweet little cherub that sits up aloft.
To keep watch for the life of poor Jack ! "
1 said to our Poll, — for, d' ye see, she would
cry,—
When last we weighed anchor for sea,
' ' What argufies snivelling and piping your eye ?
Why, what a blamed fool you must be !
Can't you see, the world's wide, and there's
room for us all.
Both for seamen and lubbers ashore ?
And if to old Davy I should go, friend Poll,
You never will hear of me more.
What then ? All's a hazard : come, don't be so
soft :
Perhaps I may laughing come back ;
For, d' ye see, there's a cherub sits smiling aloft.
To keep watch for the life of poor Jack !
-51
Ö"
616
POEMS OP THE SEA.
D' ye mind me, a sailor should he every inch
All as one as a piece of the ship,
And with her brave the world, notoSering to flinch
From the moment the anchor's a-trip.
As for me, in all weathers, all times, sides, and
ends.
Naught's a trouble from duty that springs.
For my heart is my PoU's, and my rhino 's my
friend's.
And as for my will, 't is the king's.
Even when my time comes, ne'er believe me so soft
As for grief to be taken aback ;
For the same little cherub that sits up aloft
Will look out a good berth for poor Jack !
Charles Dibdin.
NAPOLEON AND THE BRITISH SAILOR.
I LOVE contemplating — apart
From all his homicidal glory —
The traits that soften to our heart
Napoleon's glory !
'T was when his banners at Boulogne
Armed in our island every freeman.
His navy chanced to capture one
Poor British seaman.
They sufiered him — I know not how —
Unprisoned on the shore to roam ;
And aye was bent his longing brow
On England's home.
His eye, methinks ! pursued the flight
Of birds to Britain half-way over ;
With envy they could reach the white
Dear cliffs of Dover.
A stonny midnight watch, he thought.
Than this sojourn would have been dearer.
If but the storm his vessel brought
To England nearer.
At last, when care had banished sleep.
He saw one morning, dreaming, doting.
An empty hogshead from the deep
Come shoreward floating ;
He hid it in a cave, and wrought
The livelong day laborious ; lurking
Until he launched a tiny boat
By mighty working.
Heaven help us ! 't was a thing beyond
Description wretched ; such a wherry
Perhaps ne'er ventured on a pond.
Or crossed a ferry.
For, ploughing in the salt-sea field.
It would have made the boldest shudder ;
Untarred, uncompassed, and unkeeled, —
No sail, no rudder.
From neighboring woods he interlaced
His sorry skiff with wattled willows ;
And thus equipped he would have passed
The foaming billows, —
But Frenchmen caught him on the beach,
His little Argo sorely jeering ;
Till tidings of him chanced to reach
Napoleon's hearing.
With folded arms Napoleon stood.
Serene alike in peace and danger ;
And, in his wonted attitude.
Addressed the stranger : —
" Rash man, that wouldst yon Channel pass
On twigs and staves so rudely fashioned.
Thy heart withsome sweet British lass
Must be impassioned."
" 1 have no sweetheart," said the lad ;
" But — absent long from one another —
Great was the longing that I had
To see my mother."
"And so thou shalt," Napoleon said,
" Ye 've both my favor fairly won ;
A noble mother must have bred
So brave a son."
He gave the tar a piece of gold.
And, with a flag of truce, commanded
He should be shipped to England Old,
And safely landed.
Our saUor oft could scarcely shift
To find a dinner, plain and hearty.
But never changed the coin and gift
Of Bonapartè.
Thomas Campbell.
HOW'S MY BOY?
" Ho, sailor of the sea !
How's my boy — my boy ? "
" What's your boy's name, good wife.
And in what ship sailed he ? "
"My boy John —
He that went to sea —
What care I for the ship, sailor ?
My boy's my boy to me.
POEMS OP THE SEA.
617
■a
"You come back from Sea,
And not know my John ?
1 might as well have asked some landsman,
Yonder down in the town.
There's not an ass in all the parish
But he knows my John.
" How's my boy — my boy t
And unless you let me know,
I '11 swear you are no sailor.
Blue jacket or no.
Brass buttons or no, sailor.
Anchor and crown or no !
Sure his ship was the 'Jolly Briton'" —
"Speak low, woman, speak low ! "
" And why should I speak low, sailor.
About my own boy John Î
If I was loud as I am proud
I'd sing him over the town !
Why should 1 speak low, sailor ? "
" That good ship went down."
" How's my boy — my boy ?
What care I for the ship, sailor ?
I was never aboard her.
Be she afloat or be she aground.
Sinking or swimming, I '11 be bound
Her owners can afford her !
I say, how's my John ? "
" Every man on board went down.
Every man aboard her."
" How's my boy—my boy ?
What care I for the men, sailor 1
I'm not their mother —
How's my boy — my boy ?
Tell me of him and no other !
How's my boy—my boy ? "
Sydney dobbll.
Î}-
HERVÉ RIEL.
On the sea and at the Hogue, sixteen hundred
ninety-two.
Did the English fight the French,—woe to
France !
And, the thirty-first of May, helter-skelter
through the blue.
Like a crowd of fnghtened porpoises a shoal of
sharks pursue.
Came crowding ship on ship to St. Malo on
the Ranee,
With the English fleet in view.
'T was the squadron that escaped, with the vic¬
tor in full chase.
First and foremost of the drove, in his great
ship, Damfreville ;
Close on him fled, great and small.
Twenty-two good ships in all ;
And they signalled to the place,
" Help the winners of a race !
Get us guidance, give us harbor, take us quick,
— or, quicker still.
Here's the English can and will ! "
Then the pilots of the place put out brisk and
leaped on board.
"Why, what hope or chance have ships like
these to pass ? " laughed they ;
" Rocks to starboard, rocks to port, all the pas¬
sage scarred and scored,
ShaU the Formidable here, with her twelve and
eighty guns.
Think to make the river-mouth by the single
narrow way.
Trust to enter where't is ticklish for a craft of
twenty tons.
And with flow at full beside ?
Now 'tis slackest ebb of tide.
Reach the mooring ? Rather say.
While rock stands or water runs.
Not a ship will leave the bay ! "
Then was called a council straight ;
Brief and bitter the debate :
" Here's the English at our heels ; would you
have them take in tow
All that's left us of the fleet, linked together
stem and bow.
For a prize to Plymouth Sound ?
Better mn the ships aground ! "
( Ended Damfreville his speech.)
" Not a minute more to wait !
Let the captains all and each
Shove ashore, then blow up, bum the vessels
on the beach !
France must undergo her fate."
" Give the word ! " But no such word
Was ever spoke or heard ;
For up stood, for out stepped, for in stmck
amid all these,
A captain ? A lieutenant ? A mate, — first,
second, third ?
No such man of mark, and meet
With his betters to compete !
But a simple Breton sailor pressed by Tour-
ville for the fleet, —
A poor coasting-pilot he, Hervé Riel the Croi-
sickese.
618
POEMS OF
THE SEA.
a
!&
And " What mockery or malice have we here ? "
cries Hervé Eiel ;
" Are you mad, you Malouins ? Are you cow¬
ards, fools, or rogues ?
Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who took the
soundings, tell
On my fingers every bank, every shallow, evei-y
swell
'Twixt the offing here and Greve, where the
river disembogues ?
Are you bought by English gold ? Is it love the
lying's for ?
Mom and eve, night and day.
Have I piloted your bay.
Entered free and anchored fast at the foot of
Solidor.
Burn the fieet, and ruin France ? That were
worse than fifty Hogues !
Sirs, they know I speak the tmth ! Sirs,
believe me, there's a way !
Only let me lead the line.
Have the biggest ship to steer.
Get this Formidable clear.
Make the others follow mine.
And I lead them most and least by a passage I
know well.
Eight to Solidor, past Greve,
And there lay them safe and sound ;
And if one ship misbehave, —
Keel so much as grate the ground, —
Why, I've nothing but my life ; here's my
head ! " cries Hervé Eiel.
Not a minute more to wait.
" Steer us in, then, small and great !
Take the helm, lead the line, save the squad¬
ron ! " cried its chief.
Captains, give the sailor place !
He is Admiral, in brief.
Still the north-wind, by God's grace.
See the noble fellow's face
As the big ship, with a bound.
Clears the entry like a hound.
Keeps the passage as its inch of way were the
wide sea's profound !
See, safe through shoal and rock.
How they follow in a flock.
Not a ship that misbehaves, not a keel that
grates the ground.
Not a spar that comes to grief !
The peril, see, is past.
All are harbored to the last ;
And just as Hervé Eiel halloos " Anchor ! " —
sure as fate.
Up the English come, too late.
So the stomi subsides to calm ;
They see the green trees wave
On the heights o'erlooking Greve :
Hearts that bled are stanched with balm.
" Just our rapture to enhance.
Let the English rake the bay.
Gnash their teeth and glare askance
As they cannonade away !
'Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding on the
Eance ! "
How hope succeeds despair on each captain's
countenance !
Outburst all with one accord,
" This is Paradise for Hell !
Let France, let France's King
Thank the man that did the thing !
What a shout, and all one word,
"Hervé Eiel,"
As he stepped in front once more.
Not a symptom of surprise
In the frank blue Breton eyes.
Just the same man as before.
Then said Damfreville, " My friend,
1 must speak out at the end.
Though I find the speaking hard :
Praise is deeper than the lips ;
You have saved the king his ships.
You must name your own reward.
Faith, our sun was near eclipse !
Demand whate'er you will,
France remains your debtor still.
Ask to heart's content, and have ! or my name's
not Damfreville."
Then a beam of fun outbroke
On the bearded mouth that spoke.
As the honest heart laughed through
Those frank eyes of Breton blue :
" Since I needs must say my say.
Since on board the duty's done.
And from Malo Eoads to Croisic Point, what
is it but a run ?
Since't is ask and have I may, —
Since the others go ashore, —
Come ! A good whole holiday !
Leave to go and see my wife, whom 1 call the
Belle Aurore ! "
Thathe asked, and that he got,— nothingmore.
Name and deed alike are lost ;
Not a pillar nor a post
In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it befell ;
Not a head in white and black
On à single fishing-smack
In memory of the man but for whom had gone
to wrack
All that France saved from the fight whence
England bore the bell.
Go to Paris ; rank on rank
Search the heroes flung pell-mell
&
POEMS OF THE SEA.
619
a
On the Louvre, face and flank ;
You shall look long enough ere you come to
Hervé Riel.
So, for better and for worse,
Hervé Riel, accept my verse !
In my verse, Hervé Riel, do thou once more
Save the squadron, honor France, love thy wife
the Belle Aurore.
Robert Browning.
n
TACKING SHIP OFF SHORE.
The weather leach of the topsail shivers.
The bowlines strain and the lee shrouds slacken,
The braces are taut and the lithe boom quivers.
And the waves with the coming squall-cloud
blacken.
Open one point on the weather bow
Is the light-house tall on Fire Island Head ;
There's a shade of doubt on the captain's brow.
And the pilot watches the heaving lead.
I stand at the wheel and with eager eye
To sea and to sky and to shore I gaze.
Till the muttered order of " Full and by ! "
Is suddenly changed to " Full for stats ! "
The ship bends lower before the breeze.
As her broadside fair to the blast she lays ;
And she swifter springs to the rising seas
As the pilot caUs, " Stand by for stays ! "
It is silence all, as each in his place.
With the gathered coils in his hardened hands.
By tack and bowline, by sheet and brace.
Waiting the watchword impatient stands.
And the light on Fire Island Head draws near.
As, trumpet-vringed, the pilot's shout
From his post on the bowsprit's heel I hear.
With the welcome call of " Ready ! about ! "
No time to spare ! it is touch and go.
And the captain gi-owls, "Down helm! hard
down i "
As my weight on the whirling spokes I throw.
While heaven grows black with the storm-
cloud's frown.
High o'er the knight-heads flies the spray.
As we meet the shock of the plunging sea ;
And my shoulder stiff to the wheel I lay, —
As I answer, "Ay, ay, sir I hard a lee I "
With the swerving leap of a startled steed
The ship flies fast in the eye of the wind.
The dangerous shoals on the lee recede,
And the headland white we have left behind.
The topsails flutter, the jibs collapse
And belly and tug at the groaning cleats ;
The spanker slaps and the mainsail flaps.
And thunders the order, " Tacks and sheets !"
Mid the rattle of blocks and the tramp of the
crew
Hisses the rain of the rushing squall ;
The sails are aback from clew to clew,
And now is the moment for "Mainsail,
haul !"
And the heavy yards like a baby's toy
By fifty strong arms are swiftly swung ;
She holds her way, and I look with joy
For the first white spray o'er the bulwarks
flung.
" Let go, and haul ! "'t is the last command.
And the head-sails fill to the blast once more ;
Astern and to leeward lies the land.
With its breakers white on the shingly shore.
What matters the reef, or the rain, or the squall ?
I steady the helm for the open sea ;
The first-mate clamors, " Belay there, all ! "
And the captain's breath once more comes free.
And so off shore let the good ship fly ;
Little care I how the gusts may blow.
In my fo'castle-bunk in a jacket dry, —
Eight beUs have struck, and ray watch is below.
Walter f. Mitchell.
THE TREASURES OF THE DEEP.
What hid'st thou in thy treasure-caves and
cells ?
Thou hollow-soundingand mysterious main ! —
Pale glistening pearls and rainbow-colored shells.
Bright things which gleam unrecked of and in
vain I —
Keep, keep thy riches, melancholy sea !
We ask not such from thee.
Yet more, the depths have more I — what wealth
untold.
Far down, and shining through their stillness
lies !
Thou hast the starry gems, the burning gold.
Won from ten thousand royal argosies I —
Sweep o'er thy spoils, thou wild and wrathful
main !
Earth claims not these again.
fi-
620
POEMS OF THE SEA.
Yet more, the depths have more! — thy waves
have rolled
Above the cities of a world gone by !
Sand hath filled up the palaces of old.
Sea-weed o'ergrown the halls of revelry.
Dash o'er them, Ocean, in thy scornful play !
Man yields them to decay.
Yet more, the billows and the depths have more !
High hearts and brave are gathered to thy
breast !
They hear not now the booming waters roar,
The battle-thunders will not break their rest. —
Keep thy red gold and gems, thou stormy grave I
Give back the true and brave !
Give back the lost and lovely I — those for whom
The place was kept at board and hearth so long !
The prayer went up through midnight's breath¬
less gloom.
And the vain yearning woke midst festal song I
Hold fast thy buried isles, thy towers o'er-
thrown, —
But all is not thine own.
To thee the love of woman hath gone down.
Dark flow thy tides o'er manhood's noble head.
O'er youth's bright locks, and beauty's flowery
crown ;
Yet must thou hear a voice, — Restore the
dead !
Earth shall reclaim her precious things from
thee ! —
Restore the dead, thou sea !
felicia hehans.
4-
"OLD IRONSIDES."
(Written with reference to the proposed breaking up of the famous
U> S. frigate " Constitution."J
Ay, tear her tattered ensign down !
Long has it waved on high.
And many an eye has danced to see
That banner in the sky ;
Beneath it rung the battle-shout.
And burst the cannon's roar :
The meteor of the ocean air
Shall sweep the clouds no more !
Her deck, once red with heroes' blood.
Where knelt the vanquished foe.
When winds were hurrying o'er the flood
And w.aves were white below.
No more shall feel the victor's tread.
Or know the conquered knee :
The harpies of the shore shall pluck
The eagle of the sea !
O better that her shattered hulk
Should sink beneath the wave !
Her thunders shook the mighty deep,
And there should be her grave :
Nail to the mast her holy flag.
Set every threadbare sail,
And give her to the god of storms.
The lightning and the gale I
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
THE INCHCAPE ROCK.
No stir in the air, no stir in the sea, —
The ship was as still as she could be ;
Her sails from heaven received no motion ;
Her keel was steady in the ocean.
Without either sign or sound of theii" shock.
The waves flowed over the Inchcape rock ;
So little they rose, so little they fell.
They did not move the Inchcape bell.
The holy Abbot of Aberbrothok
Had placed that bell on the Inchcape rock ;
On a buoy in the storm it floated and swung,
And over the waves its warning rung.
When the rock was hid by the surges' swell.
The mariners heard the warning bell ;
And then they knew the perilous rock,
And blessed the Abbot of Aberbrothok.
The sun in heaven was shining gay, —
All things were joyful on that day ;
The sea-birds screamed as they wheeled around,
And there was joyance in their sound.
The buoy of the Inchcape bell was seen,
A darker speck on the ocean green ;
Sir Ralph, the rover, walked his deck.
And he fixed his eye on the darker speck.
He felt!the cheering power of spring, —
It made him whistle, it made him sing ;
His heart was mirthful to excess ;
But the rover's mirth was wickedness.
His eye was on the bell and float :
Quoth he, "My men, put out the boat ;
And row me to the Inchcape rock,
And 1 '11 plague the priest of Aberbrothok."
The boat is lowered, the boatmen row.
And to the Inchcape rock they go ;
Sir Ralph bent over from the boat.
And cut the warning bell from the float.
-B
THE TREASURES OF THE DEEP,
must thou hear a voice^—Restore the deactí
Earth shall reclaim her precious things from thee»
Restore the dead, thou sea / "
f
POEMS OF THE SEA.
621
a
Down sank the bell with a gurgling sound ;
The bubbles rose, and burst around.
Quoth Sir Ralph, "The next who comes to the
rock
Will not bless the Abbot of Aberbrothok."
Sir Ralph, the rover, sailed away, —
He scoured the seas for many a day ;
And now, grown rich with plundered store.
He steers his course to Scotland's shore.
So thick a haze o'erspreads the sky
They cannot see the sun on high ;
The wind hath blown a gale all day ;
At evening it hath died away.
On the deck the rover takes his stand ;
So dark it is they see no land.
Quoth Sir Ralph, " It will be lighter soon.
For there is the dawn of the rising moon."
"Canst hear," said one, "the breakers roar ?
For yonder, methinks, should be the shore.
Now where we are I cannot tell.
But I wish we could hear the Inchcape bell."
They hear no sound ; the swell is strong ;
Though the wind hath fallen, they drift along ;
Till the vessel strikes with a shivering shock, —
0 Christ ! it is the Inchcape rock !
Sir Ralph, the rover, tore his hair ;
He cursed himself in his despair.
The waves rush in on every side ;
The ship is sinking beneath the tide.
But ever in his dying fear
One dreadful sound he seemed to hear, -
A sound as if with the Inchcape bell
The Devil below was ringing his knell.
Robert Southey.
0^-
THE THREE FISHERS.
Three fishers went sailing out into the west, —
Out into, the west as, the sun went down ;
Each thought of the woman who loved him the
best.
And the children stood watching their, out of
the town ;
For men must work, and women must weep ;
And there's little to earn, and many to keep.
Though the harbor bar be moaning.
Three wives sat up in the light-house tower.
And trimmed the lamps as the sun went down ;
And they looked at the squall, and they looked
at the shower.
And the rack it came i-olling up, ragged and
brown ;
But men must work, and women must weep.
Though storms be sudden, and waters deep.
And the harbor bar be moaning.
Three corpses lay out on the shining sands
In the morning gleam as the tide went down.
And the women are watching and wringing their
hands.
For those who will never come back to the
town ;
For men must work, and women must weep, —
And the sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep, —
And good-by to the bar and its moaning.
Charles Kingslev.
THE SANDS ^ DEE.
" 0 Mart, go and call the cattle home.
And call the cattle home.
And call the cattle home.
Across the sands o' Dee ! "
The western wind was wild and dank wi' foam.
And all alon^wmit she.
The creeping along the sand.
And |ir® the sand.
And round the sand.
As far as^pl^uld see ;
The blinding mist came down and hid the land :
And never home came she.
" 0, is it weed, or fish, or floating hair, —
A tiess o' golden hair,
O' drownèd maiden's hair, —
Above the nets at sea ?
Was never salmon yet that shone so fair.
Among the stakes on Dee."
They rowed her in across the rolling foam, —
The cruel, crawling foam,
The cruel, hungry foam, —
To her grave beside the sea ;
But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle home
Across the sands o' Dee.
Charles Kingsley.
FLOTSAM AND JETSAM.
The sea crashed over the grim gray rocks.
It thundered beneath the height.
It swept by reef and sandy dune.
It glittered beneath the harvest moon,
That bathed it in yellow light.
Shell, and sea-weed, and sparkling stone,
It flung on the golden sand.
Strange r-elics torn from its deepest caves.
Sad trophies of wild victorious waves,
It scattered upon the strand.
POEMS OF THE SEA.
a
Spars that had looked so strong and true,
At many a gallant launch,
Shattered and broken, flung to the shore.
While the tide in its wild triumphant roar
Rang a dirge for the vessel stanch.
Petty trifles that lovers had brought
From many a foreign clime.
Snatched by the storm from the clinging clasp
Of hands that the lonely will never gmsp.
While the world yet measures time.
Back, back to its depths went the ebbing tide,
Leaving its stores to rest.
Unsought and unseen in the silent bay.
To be gathered again, ere close of day.
To the ocean's hieast-
Kinder than man art thou, 0 sea ;
Frankly we give our best.
Truth, and hope, and love, and faith.
Devotion that challenges time and death
Its sterling worth to test.
We fling them down at
Indifférence leaves theii
The careless footstep turns
Weariness, changefulness.
Bring little of thought or care.
jjridfl,
No tide of human feeling turns ;
Once ebbed, love never flows ;
The pitiful wreckage of time and strife.
The flotsam and jetsam of human life.
No saving reflux knows.
Anonymous.
SEA WEED.
When descends on the Atlantic
The gigantic
Storm-wind of the equinox.
Landward in his wrath he scourges
The toiling surges.
Laden with sea-weed from the rocks :
From Bermuda's reefs ; from edges
Of sunken ledges.
In some far-off, bright Azore ;
From Bahama, and the dashing.
Silver-flashing
Surges of San Salvador ;
From the tumbling surf, that buries
The Orkneyan skerries.
Answering the hoarse Hebrides ;
And from wrecks of ships, and drifting
Spars, uplifting
On the desolate, rainy seas ; —
Ever drifting, drifting, drifting
On the shifting
Currents of the restless main ;
Till in sheltered coves, and reaches
Of sandy beaches.
All have found repose again.
So when storms of wild emotion
Strike the ocean
Of the poet's soul, erelong.
From each cave and rocky fastness
In its vastness.
Floats some fragment of a song :
From the far-off isles enchanted
Heaven has planted
With the golden fruit of Truth ;
From the flashing surf, whose vision
Gleams Elysian
In the tropic clime of Youth ;
From the strong Wül, and the Endeavor
That forever
Wrestles with the tides of Fate ;
From the wreck of Hopes far-scattered.
Tempest-shattered,
Floating waste and desolate ; —
Ever drifting, drifting, drifting
On the shifting
Currents of the restless heart ;
Till at length in books recorded.
They, like hoarded
Household words, no more depart.
Henry wadsworth Longfellow;
GULF-WEED.
A WEARY weed, tossed to and fro.
Drearily drenched in the ocean brine,
Soaring high and sinking low.
Lashed along without will of mine ;
Sport of the spume of the surging sea ;
Flung on the foam, afar and anear,
Mark my manifold mystery,—
Growth and grace in their place appear
I bear round berries, gray and red.
Rootless and rover though I be ;
My spangled leaves, when nicely spread,
Arboresce as a trunkless tree ;
Corals curious coat me o'er,
White and hard in apt array ;
Mid the wild waves' rude uproar
Gracefully grow I, night and day.
-gi
Hearts there are on the sounding shore,
Something whispers soft to me,
Restless and roaming forevermore.
Like this weary weed of the sea ;
Bear they yet on each beating breast
The eternal type of the wondrous whole.
Growth unfolding amidst unrest,
Grace informing with silent soul.
Cornelius George Fenner.
*
SEA LIFE.
prom "the pelican island."
Light as a flake of foam upon the wind
Keel-upward from the deep emerged a shell.
Shaped like the moon ere half her bom is filled ;
Fraught with young life, it righted as it rose.
And moved at will along the yielding water.
The native pilot of this little bark
Put out a tier of oars on either side.
Spread to the wafting breeze a twofold sail.
And mounted up and glided down the billow
In happy freedom, pleased to feel the air.
And wander in the luxury of light.
Worth all the dead creation, in that hour.
To me appeared this lonely Nautilus,
My fellow-being, like myself, alive.
Entranced in contemplation, vague yet sweet,
I watched its vagrant course and rippling wake.
Till I forgot the sun amidst the heavens.
It closed, sunk, dwindled to a point, then
nothing ;
While the last bubble crowned the dimpling
eddy.
Through which mine eyes still giddily pursued it,
A joyous creature vaulted through the air, —
The aspiring fish that fain would be a bird.
On long, light wings, that flung a diamond-
shower
Of dew-drops round its evanescent form.
Sprang into light, and instantly descended.
Ere I could greet the stranger as a friend.
Or mourn his quick departure on the surge,
A shoal of dolphins tumbling in wild glee.
Glowed with such orient tints, they might have
been
The rainbow's offspring, when it met the ocean
In that resplendent vision I had seen.
While yet in ecstasy I hung o'er these,
With eveiy motion pouring out fresh beauties.
As though the conscious colors came and went
At pleasure, glorying in their subtle changes, —
Enormous o'er the flood. Leviathan
Looked forth, and from his roaring nostrils sent
Two fountains to the sky, then plunged amain
In headlong pastime through the closing gulf.
These were but preludes to the revelry
That reigned at sunset : then the deep let loose
Its blithe adventurers to sport at large.
As kindly instinct taught them ; buoyant shells.
On stormless voyages, in fleets or single,
Wherried their tiny mariners ; aloof.
On wing-like fins, in bow-and-arrow figures.
The flying-fishes darted to and fro ;
While spouting whales projected watery col¬
umns.
That turned to arches at their height, and seemed
The skeletons of crystal palaces
Built on the blue expanse, then perishing.
Frail as the element which they were made of ;
Dolphins, in gambols, lent the lucid brine
Hues richer than the canopj of.eve.
That overhung the scene SQ gorgeous clouds.
Decaying into gloom more beautiful
Than the sun's golden liveries which they lost :
Till light that hides, and darkness that reveals
The stars, — exchanging guard, like sentinels
Of day and night, — transformed the face of
nature :
Above was wakejjilr|t^ silence around,
Beneath, reached even me.
Power, will, ^ ^íítoTniemory, failed in turn ;
My very d|á Jmed to pass away.
Like a thin MM^hat melts across the moon.
Lost in the blue immensity of heaven.
james Montgomery.
THE CORAL INSECT.
Toil on ! toil on ! ye ephemeral train.
Who build in the tossing and treacherous main ;
Toil on ! fir the wisdom of man ye mock,
With your sand-based structures and domes of
rock.
Your columns the fathomless fountains' cave,
And your arches spring up to the crested wave ;
Ye 're a puny race thus to boldly rear
A fabric so vast in a realm so drear.
Ye bind the deep with your secret zone, —
The ocean is sealed, and the surge a stone ;
Fresh wreaths from the coral pavement spring,
Like the terraced pride of Assyria's king ;
The turf looks green where the breakers rolled ;
O'er the whirlpool ripens the rind of gold ;
The sea-snatched isle is the home of men,
And mountains exult where the wave hath been.
But why do ye plant, 'neath the billows dark.
The wrecking reef for the gallant bark ?
There are snares enough on the tented field.
Mid the blossomed sweets that the valleys yield ;
There are serpents to coil ere the flowers are up.
There's a poison drop in man's purest cup.
poems of the sea,
There are foes that watch for his cradle breath,
And why need ye sow the floods with death ?
With mouldering bones the deeps are white,
From the ice-clad pole to the tropics bright ;
The mermaid hath twisted her fingers cold
With the mesh of the sea-boy's curls of gold.
And the gods of the ocean have frowned to see
The mariner's bed in their halls of glee ;
Hath earth no graves, that ye thus must spread
The boundless sea for the thronging dead ?
Ye build — ye build — but ye enter not in.
Like the tribes whom the desert devoured in
their sin ;
From the land of promise ye fade and die
Ere its verdure gleans forth on your weary eye :
As the kings of th^loud-crowned pyramid.
Their noiseless bones in oblivion hid.
Ye slumber unmarked mid the desolate main.
While the wonder and pride of your works re¬
main.
Lydia Huntley sigousney.
the cora:
[e pelicaa^ ijß
Eveb
I&
froh "the pelic
Every one.
By instinct taught, performed its little task, —
To build its dwelling and its sepulchre.
From its own essence exquisitely modelled ;
There breed, and die, and leave a progeny,
Still multiplied beyond the reach of numbers.
To frame new cells and tombs ; then breed and die
As all their ancestors had done, — and rest,
Hennetically sealed, each in its shrine,
A statue in this temple of oblivion !
Millions of millions thus, from age to age.
With simplest skill and toil unweariable.
No moment and no movement unimproved.
Laid line on line, on terrace terrace spread.
To swell the heightening, brightening, gradual
mound.
By marvellous structure climbing towards the day.
A point at first
It peered above those waves ; a point so small
I just perceived it, fixed where all was floating ;
And when a bubble crossed it, the blue film
Expanded like a sky above the speck ;
That speck became a hand-breadth ; day and
night
It spread, accumulated, and erelong
Presented to my view a dazzling plain.
White as the moon amid the sapphire sea ;
Bare at low water, and as still as death.
But when the tide came gurgling o'er the surface
"T was like a resurrection of the dead :
From graves innumerable, punctures fine
In the close coral, capillary swarms
Of reptiles, horrent as Medusa's snakes.
Covered the bald-pate reef ;
Erelong the reef o'ertopt the spring-flood's height.
And mocked the billows when they leapt upon it.
Unable to maintain their slippery hold.
And falling down in foam-wreaths round its
verge.
Steep were the flanks, with precipices sharp,
Descending to their base in ocean gloom.
Chasms few and narrow and irregular
Formed harbors, safe at once and perilous, —
Safe for defence, but perilous to enter.
A sea-lake shone amidst the fossil isle.
Reflecting in a ring its cliffs and caverns.
With heaven itself seen like a lake below.
james montgomery.
THE CORAL GROVK
Deep in the wave is a coral grove.
Where the purple mullet and gold-fish rove ;
Where the sea-flower spreads its leaves of blue
That never are wet with falling dew.
But in bright and changeful beauty shine
Far down in the green and glassy brine.
The floor is of sand, like the mountain drift.
And the pearl-shells spangle the flinty snow ;
From coral rocks the sea-plants lift
Their boughs, where the tides and billows flow :
The water is calm and still below.
For the winds and waves are absent there.
And the sands are bright as the stars that glow
In the motionless fields of upper air.
There, with its waving blade of green.
The sea-flag streams through the silent water.
And the crimson leaf of the dulse is seen
To blush, like a banner bathed in slaughter.
There, with a light and easy motion.
The fan-coral sweeps through the clear deep sea ;
And the yellow and scarlet tufts of ocean
Are bending like com on the upland lea :
And life, in rare and beautiful forms.
Is sporting amid those bo were of stone.
And is safe when the wrathful Spirit of storms
Has made the top of the wave his own.
And when the ship from his fury flies.
Where the myriad voices of Ocean roar ;
When the wind-god frowns in the murky skies.
And demons are waiting the wreck on shore ;
Then, far below, in the peaceful sea.
The purple mullet and gold-fish rove.
Where the waters murmur tranquilly.
Through the bending twigs of the coral grove.
James Gates Percival.
■tr
f
POEMS OF THE g&A.
625
tt!
THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS.
This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign.
Sails the unshadowed main, —
The venturous hark that flings
On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings
In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings.
And coral reefs lie bare.
Where the cold- sea-maids rise to srm their
streaming hair.
Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl ;
Wrecked is the ship of pearl !
And every chambered cell.
Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell.
As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell.
Before thee lies revealed, —
Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed !
Year after year beheld the silent toil
That spread his lustrous coU ;
Still, as the spiral grew.
He left the past year's dwelling for the new.
Stole with soft step its shining archway through,
Built up its idle door.
Stretched in his last-found home, and knew the
old no more.
Thanks for the heavenly message brought by
thee.
Child of the wandering sea.
Cast from her lap, forlorn !
From thy dead lips a clearer note is born
Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn !
While on mine ear it rings,
Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice
that sings : —
Build thee more stately mansions, 0 my soul.
As the swift seasons roll !
Leave thy low-vaulted past !
Let each new temple, nobler than the last,
Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast.
Till thou at length art free.
Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting
sea 1
oliver Wendell Holmes.
&
THE SEA.
The sea ! the sea ! the open sea !
The blue, the fresh, the ever free !
Without a mark, without a bound.
It runneth the earth's wide regions round ;
It plays with the clouds ; it mocks the skies ;
Or like a cradled creature lies.
1 'm on the sea ! 1 'm on the sea !
1 am where 1 would ever be ;
With the blue above, and the blue belo v.
And silence wheresoe'er 1 go ;
If a storm should come and awake the deep,
What matter ? I shall ride and sleep.
I love, 0, how 1 love to ride
On the floree, foaming, bursting tide.
When every mad wave drowns the moon.
Or whistles aloft his tempest tune.
And tells how goeth the world below.
And why the sou'west blasts do blow.
1 never was on the dull, tame shore.
But 1 loved the great sea more and more.
And backwards flew to her billowy breast,
Like a bird that seeketh its mother's nest ;
And a mother she was, and is, to me ;
For 1 was bom on the open sea !
The waves were white, and red the mom.
In the noisy hour when I was born ;
And the whale it whistled, the porpoise rolled.
And the dolphins bared their backs of gold ;
And never was heard such an outcry wild '
As welcomed to life the ocean-child !
I've lived since then, in calm and strife.
Full fifty summers, a sailor's life.
With wealth to spend and a power to range.
But never have sought nor sighed for change ;
And Death, whenever he comes to me.
Shall come on the wild, unbounded sea !
bryan Waller Procter {Bany Cornwall).
SONG OF THE EMIGRANTS IN BERMUDA.
Where the rernote Bermudas ride
In the ocean's bosom unespied.
From a small boat that rowed along
The listening winds received this song :
" AVhat should we do but sing His praise
That led us through the water}' maze
AYlierc he the huge sea monsters wracks.
That lift the deep upon their backs.
Unto an isle so long unknown.
And yet far kinder than our own ?
He lands us on a grassy stage.
Safe from the storms, and prelate's rage ;
He gave us this eternal spring
AVhich here enamels everything.
And sends the fowls to us in care
On daily visits through the air.
He hangs in shades the orange bright
Like golden lamps in a green night.
-3
626
POEMS OF THE Sa.
And does in the pomegranates close
Jewels more rich than Ormus shows :
He makes the figs our mouths to meet,
And tlirows the melons at our feet ;
But apples, plants of such a price,
No tree could ever bear them twice.
With cedars chosen by his hand
From Lebanon he stores the land ;
And makes the hollow seas that roar
Proclaim the ambergris on shore.
He cast (of which we rather boast)
The gospel's pearl upon our coast ;
And in these rocks for us did frame
A temple where to sound his name.
0, let our voice his praise exalt
Till it anive at heaven's vault.
Which then perhaps rebounding may
Echo beyond the Mexique bay ! "—
Thus sung they in the English boat
A holy and a cheerful note ;
And all the way, to guide their chime,
With falling oars they kept the time.
Andrew Marvell,
A WET SHEET AND A FLOWING
A WET sheet and a flowing sea, —
A wind that follows fast.
And fills the white and rustling sail,
And bends the gallant mast, —
And bends the gallant mast, my boys,
While, like the eagle free.
Away the good ship tiles, and leaves
Old England on the lee.
O for a soft and gentle wind !
I heard a fair one cry ;
But give to mo the snoring breeze
And white waves heaving high, —
And white waves heaving high, my boys.
The good ship tight and free ;
The world of waters is our home,
And merry men are we.
Tliere's tempest in yon horned moon.
And lightning in yon cloud ;
And hark the music, mariners !
The wind is piping loud, —
The wind is piping loud, my bo5's.
The lightning flashing free ;
While the hollow oak our palace is,
Our heritage the sea.
allan Cunningham.
SONG OF THE ROVER.
from "the corsair," canto i.
O'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea,
Our thoughts as boundless and our souls as free.
Far as the breeze can bear, the billows foam.
Survey our empire, and behold our home !
These are our realms, no limits to their sway, —
Our flag the sceptre all who meet obey.
Ours the wild life in tumult still to range
From toil to rest, and joy in every change.
0, who can tell ? not thou, luxurious slave !
Whose soul would sicken o'er the heaving wave;
Not thou, vain lord of wantonness and ease !
Whom slumber soothes not, — pleasure cannot
please.—
0, who can tell save he whose heart hath tried.
And danced in triumph o'er the waters wide,
The exulting sense, the pulse's maddening iday.
That thrills the wanderer of that trackless way ?
That for itself can woo the approaching fight.
And turn what some deem danger to delight ;
That seeks what cravens shun with more than
zeal,
And where the feebler faint can only feel —
Feel to the rising bosom's inmost core.
Its hope awaken and its spirit soar ?
No dread of death — if with us die our foes —
Save that it seems even duller than repose ;
Come when it will — we snatch the life of life —
When lost — what recks it — by disease or strife ?
Let him who crawls enamored of decay.
Cling to his couch and sicken years away ;
Heave his thick breath, and shake his palsied
head :
Ours — the fresh turf, and not the feverish bed.
While gasp by gasp he falters forth his soul.
Ours with one pang — one bound— escapes con¬
trol.
His corse may boast its urn and narrow cave,
And they who loathed his life may gild his gi-ave;
Ours are the tears, though few, sincerely shed.
When Ocean shrouds and sepulchres our dead.
For us, even banquets fond regrets supply
In the red cup that crowns our memory ;
And the brief epitaph in danger's day.
When those who win at length divide the prey.
And cry, Remembrance saddening o'er each brow.
How had the brave who fell exulted now !
lord byron.
—•
MY BRIGANTINE.
from "the water witch."
Just in thy mould and beauteous in thy fomi.
Gentle in roll and buoyant on the surge.
Light as the sea-fowl rocking in the storm.
In breeze and gale thy onward course we urge,
POEMS OF THE SEA.
627
My water-queen ! '
Lady of mine,
More light and swift than thou none thread the
sea
With surer keel or steadier on its path.
We brave each waste of ocean-mystery
And laugh to hear the howling tempest's wrath.
For we are thine.
My brigantina !
Trust to the mystic power that points thy way.
Trust to the eye that pierces from afar ;
Trust the red meteors that around thee play.
And, fearless, trust the Sea-Green Lady's star.
Thou bark divine !
James Fenimore Cooper.
THE HEAVING OF THE LEAD.
Fon England when with favoring gale
Our gallant ship up channel steered,
And, scudding under easy sail.
The high blue western land appeared ;
To heave the lead the seaman sprung.
And to the pilot cheerly sung,
" By the deep — nine ! "
And bearing up to gain the port.
Some well-known object kept in view, —
An abbey-tower, a harbor-fort.
Or beacon to the vessel true ;
While oft the lead the seaman flung.
And to the pilot cheerly sung,
" By the mark — seven ! "
And as the much-loved shore we near.
With transport we behold the roof
Where dwelt a friend or partner dear.
Of faith and love a matchless proof.
The lead once more the seaman flung.
And to the watchful pilot sung,
" Quarter less — five ! "
Now to her berth the ship draws nigh :
AVe shoiten sail, — she feels the tide, —
" Stand clear the cable " is the cry, —
The anchor's gone ; we safely ride.
The watch is set, and through the night
We hear the seamen with delight
Proclaim, — "All's well ! "
Charles Dibdi.v.
AtX 'S \HibL.
prom "the british fleet."
Deserted by the waning moon.
When skies proclaim night's cheerless noon.
On tower, or fort, or tented ground
The sentry walks his lonely round ;
And should a footstep haply stray
Where caution marks the guarded way,
" Who goes there ? Stranger, quickly tell ! "
" A friend ! " "The word ?" "Good-night ; "
all's well.
Or, sailing on the midnight deep.
When weary messmates soundly sleep,
The careful watch patrols the deck.
To guard the ship from foes or wreck ;
And while his thoughts oft homewards veer.
Some friendly voice salutes his ear, —
" What cheer ? Brother, quickly tell ;
Above, — below." Good-night ; all's well.
Thomas Diedin.
XHE TEMPEST.
We were crowded in the cabin.
Not a soul would dare to sleep, —
It was midnight on the waters
And a storm was on the deep.
'T is a fearful thing in winter
To be shattered by the blast.
And to hear the rattling trumpet
Thunder, " Out away the mast ! "
So we shuddered there in silence, —
For the stoutest held his breath.
While the hungry sea was roaring.
And the breakers talked with Death.
As thus we sat in darkness.
Each one busy in his prayers,
" We are lost ! " the captain shouted
As he staggered down the stairs.
But his little daughter whispered.
As she took his icy hand,
" Is n't God upon the ocean
Just the same as on the land ?"
Then we kissed the little maiden.
And we spoke in better cheer.
And we anchored safe in harbor
When the mom was shining clear.
James Thomas Fields.
THE MINUTE-GUN.
When in the storm on Albion's coast.
The night-watch guards his weary post.
From thoughts of danger free.
He marks some vessel's dusky form,
And hears, amid the howling storm.
The minute-gun at sea.
628
s
POEMS OF THE SEA.
Swift on the shore a hardy few
The life-boat man with a gallant crew
And dare the dangerous wave ;
Through the wild surf they cleave their way.
Lost in the foam, nor know dismay.
For they go the crew to save.
But 0, what rapture fills each breast
Of the hopeless crew of the ship distressed !
Then, landed safe, what joy to tell
Of all the dangers that befell !
Then is heard no more.
By the watch on shore.
The minute-gun at sea.
r. S. Sharps.
*
THE BAY OF BISCAY.
Loud roared the dreadful thunder.
The rain a deluge showers.
The clouds were rent asunder
By lightning's vivid powers ;
The night both drear and dark.
Our poor devoted bark.
Till next day, there she lay.
In the Bay of Biscay, O !
Now dashed upon the billow.
Her opening timbers creak.
Each fears a watery pillow,
None stops the dreadful leak ;
To cling to slippery shrouds
Each breathless seaman crowds.
As she lay, till the day,
In the Bay of Biscay, 0 !
At length the wished-for morrow
Bi-oke through the hazy sky,
Absorbed in silent sorrow.
Each heaved a bitter sigh ;
The dismal wreck to view
Struck horror to the crew.
As she lay, on that day,
In the Bay of Biscay, 0 !
Her yielding timber's sever.
Her pitchy seams are rent.
When Heaven, all bounteous ever.
Its boundless mercy sent, —
A sail in sight appeai-s !
We hail her with three cheers ;
Now we sail, with the gale.
From the Bay of Biscay, 0 !
Andrew cherry.
THE STORM.
Cease, rude Boreas, blustering railer !
List, ye landsmen all, to me ;
Me.ssmates, hear a brother sailor
. Sing the dangers of the sea ;
From bounding billows, first in motion.
When the distant whirlwinds rise.
To the tempest-troubled ocean.
Where the seas contend with skies.
Hark ! the boatswain hoarsely bawling.
By topsail-sheets and haulyards stand !
Down top-gallants quick be hauling !
Down your stay-sails, — hand, boys, hand !
Now it freshens, set the braces,
.Quick the topsail sheets let go ;
Luff, boys, luff ! don't make wry faces.
Up your topsails nimbly clew.
Round us roars the tempest louder.
Think what fear our minds inthralls !
Harder yet it blows, still harder,
Now again the boatswain calls.
The topsail-yard point to the wind, boys.
See all clear to reef each course ;
Let the foresheet go, — don't mind, boys.
Though the weather should be worse.
Fore and aft the spritsail-yard get.
Reef the mizzen, see all clear ;
Hand up, each preventer-brace set !
Man the foreyards, — cheer, lads, cheer !
Now the dreadful thunder's roaring,
Peal on peal contending clash.
On our heads fierce rain falls pouring.
In our eyes blue lightnings flash.
One wide water all around us.
All above us one black sky ;
Different deaths at once surround us ;
Hark ! what means that dreadful cry ?
The foremast's gone ! cries evei-y tongue out,
O'er the lee twelve feet 'bove deck ;
A leak beneath the chest-tree's sprung out.
Call all hands to clear the wreck.
Quick the lanyards cut to pieces ;
Come, my hearts, be stout and bold ;
Plumb the well, — the leak increases.
Four feet water in the hold !
POEMS OF THE SEA.
While o'er the ship wild waves are beating.
We our wives and children mourn ;
Alas ! from hence there's no retreating,
Alas ! to them there's uo return !
Still the leak is gaining on us I
Both chain-pumps are choked below :
Heaven have mercy here upon us !
For only that can save us now.
O'er the lee-beam is the land, boys.
Let the guns o'erboard be thrown ;
To the pumps call every hand, boys.
See ! our mizzen-mast is gone.
The leak we've found, it cannot pour fast ;
We've lightened her a foot or more ;
Up and rig a jury foremast.
She rights ! she rights, boys ! we're off shore.
George Alexander Stev£.ns.
i
YE MARINERS OF ENGLAND.
Ye mariners of England !
That guard our native seas ;
Whose flag has braved, a thousand years,
The battle and the breeze !
Your glorious standard launch again
To match another foe !
And sweep through the deep,
While the stormy winds do blow ;
While the battle rages loud and long.
And the stormy winds do blow.
The spirits of your fathers ■
Shall start from every wave ! —
For the deck it was their field of fame.
And ocean was their giuve :
Where Blake and mighty Nelson fell.
Your manly hearts shall glow,
As ye sweep through the deep.
While the stormy winds do blow ;
While the battle rages loud and long.
And the stormy winds do blow.
Britannia needs no bulwarks.
No towers along the steep ;
Her march is o'er the mountain-waves.
Her home is on the deep.
With thunders from her native oak.
She quells the floods below, —
As they roar on the shore.
When the stormy winds do blow ;
When the battle rages loud and long
And the stormy winds do blow.
The meteor flag of England
Shall yet terrific burn ;
Till danger's troubled night depart.
And the star of peace return.
Then, then, ye ocean warriors !
Our song and feast shall flow
To the fame of your name.
When the storm has ceased to blow ;
When the fiery fight is heard no more,
And the storm has ceased to blow.
Thomas Campbell.
TOM BOWLING.
Here, a sheer hulk, lies poor Tom Bowling,
The darling of our crew ;
No more he '11 hear the tempest howling.
For death has broached him to.
His form was of the manliest beauty.
His heart was kind and soft ;
Faithful, below, he did his duty ;
But now he's gone aloft.
Tom never from his word departed.
His virtues were so rai'e.
His friends were many and true-hearted.
His Poll was kind and fair :
And then he'd sing, so blithe and jolly.
Ah, many's the time and oft !
But mirth is turned to melancholy.
For Tom is gone aloft.
Yet shall poor Tom find pleasant weather.
When He who all commands
Shall give, to call life's crew together.
The word to "pipe all hands."
Thus Death, who kings and tars despatches,
In vain Tom's life has doffed ;
For though his body's under hatches.
His soul has gone aloft.
Charles Djbdin.
THE WHITE SQUALL.
The sea was bright, and the bark rode well ;
The breeze bore the tone of the vesper bell ;
'T was a gallant bark with a crew as bi-ave
As ever launched on the heaving wave.
She shone in the light of declining day.
And each sail was set, and each heart was gay.
They neared the land where in beauty smiles
The sunny shore of the Grecian Isles ;
.\11 thought of home, of that welcome dear
Which soon should greet each wanderer's ear ;
And in fancy joined the social throng
In the festive dance and the joyous song.
630
POEMS OP THE SEA.
A white cloud glides through the azure sky, —
What means that wild despairing cry ?
Farewell the visioned scenes of home !
That cry is " Help," where no help can come ;
Por the White Squall rides on the surging wave.
And the bark is 'gulfed in an ocean gi ave.
Bryan Waller Procter {Barry CormaaU).
OUR BOAT TO THE WAVES.
Our boat to the waves go free.
By the bending tide, where the curled wave
breaks.
Like the track of the wind on the white snow-
flakes :
Away, away ! 'T is a path o'er the sea.
Blasts may rave,.— spread the sail.
For our spirits can -wrest the power from the
wind.
And the gray clouds yield to the sunny mind.
Fear not we the whirl of the gale.
William Ellery Channinc.
TO SEA!
To sea ! to sea ! the calm is o'er.
The wanton water leaps in sport.
And rattles down the pebbly shore,
The dolphin wheels, the sea-cows snort.
And unseen mermaid's pearly song
Comes bubbling up, the weeds among.
Fling broad the sail, dip deep the oar :
To sea I to sea ! the calm is o'er.
To sea I to sea ! our white-winged bark
Shall billowing cleave its watery way.
And with its shadow, fleet and dark.
Break the caved Triton's azure day.
Like mountain eagle soaring light
O'er antelopes on Alpine height.
The anchor heaves ! The ship swings free
Our sails swell full ! To sea I to sea !
Thomas lovell Beddoes.
THE SAILOR'S CONSOLATION.
OxE night came on a hurricane.
The sea was mountains rolling.
When Barney Buntline turned his quid.
And said to Billy Bowling :
" A strong nor'westcr's blowing. Bill ;
Hark ! don't ye hear it roar now ?
Lord help 'em, how I pities them
Unhappy folks on shore now !
" Foolhardy chaps who live in towns.
What danger they are all in.
And now lie quaking in their beds.
For fear the roof shall fall in ;
Poor creatures ! how they envies us.
And wishes, I've a notion.
For our good luck, in such a storm.
To be upon the ocean !
*' And as for them who 're out all day
On business from their houses.
And late at night are coining home.
To cheer their babes and spouses, —
While you and I, Bill, on tho deck
Are comfortably lying.
My eyes ! what tiles aud chimney-pots
About their heads are flying !
" And very often have we heard
How men are killed and undone
By overturns of carriages.
By thieves and fires in London.
We know what risks all landsmen run.
From noblemen to tailors ;
Then, Bill, let us thank Providence
That you and I are sailors."
William Pitt.
A LIFE ON THE OCEAN WAVE.
A LIFE on the ocean wave,
A home on the rolling deep ;
AVhere the scattered waters rave.
And the winds their revels keep 1
Like an eagle caged I pine
On this dull, unchanging shore :
O, give me the flashing brine.
The spray and the tempest's roar !
Once more on the deck I stand.
Of my own swift-gliding craft :
Set sail ! fareweU to the land ;
The gale follows fair abaft.
We shoot through the sparkling foam.
Like an ocean-bird set free,—
Like the ocean-bird, our home
We '11 find far out on the sea.
The land is no longer in view.
The clouds have begun to frown ;
But with a stout vessel and crew.
We '11 say. Let the storm come down !
And the song of our hearts shall be.
While the winds and the waters rave,
A home on the rolling sea !
A life on the ocean wave !
Epes Sarcent.
h-
FRAGMENTS.
631
TTl
THE OCEAN.
The Ocean at the bidding of the moon
Forever changes with his restless tide :
Flung shoreward now, to be regathered soon
With kingly pauses of reluctant pride,
And semblance of return. Anon from home
He issues forth anew, high ridged and free, —
The gentlest murmur of his seething foam
Like armies whispering where great echoes be.
0, leave me here upon this beach to rove.
Mute listener to that sound so grand and lone !
A glorious sound, deep drawn, and strongly
thrown.
And reaching those on mountain heights above,
To British ears (as who shall scorn to own ?)
A tutelar fond voice, a savior tone of love.
Charles Turner.
FKAGMENTS.
The Sea-Shore.
I have seen
A curious child, who dwelt upon a tract
Of inland ground, applying to his ear
The convolutions of a smooth-lipped shell ;
To which, in silence hushed, his very soul
Listened intensely ; and his countenance soon
Brightened with joy ; for from within were heard
Murmurings, whereby the monitor expressed
Mysterious union with its native sea.
Even such a shell the universe itself
Is to the ear of Faith ; and there are times,
I doubt not, when to you it doth impart
Authentic tidings of invisible things ;
Of ebb and flow, and ever-during power ;
And central peace, subsisting at the heart
Of endless agitation.
Tne Excursion, Boot iv. WORDSWORTH.
And there, where the smooth, wet pebbles be.
The watem gurgle longingly.
As if they fain would seek the shore,
To be at rest from the ceaseless roar.
To be at rest foievennore.
The Sirens. ]. R. LOWELL.
I am as a weed.
Flung from the rock, on Ocean's foam, to sail
Where'er the surge may sweep, the tempest's
bicath prevail.
Dtn yuan, Can/. iiL ByroK.
3-
Peace on the Sea.
Calm and unruffled as a summer sea.
When not a breath of wind flies o'er its surface.
Cafy, ADDISON.
Winds and Waves.
Watching the waves with all their white crests
dancing
Come, like thick-plumed squadrons, to the shore
Gallantly bounding.
Julian. Sir a. hunt.
I have seen tempests when the scolding winds
Have rived the knotty oaks ; and I have seen
The ambitious ocean swell, and rage, and foam.
To be exalted with the threat'ning clouds.
Julius Casar, Act Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
But chief at sea, whose every flexile wave
Obeys the blast, the aerial tumult swells.
In the dread Ocean undulating wide.
Beneath the radiant line that girts the globe.
The Seasons: St/mmer. THOMSON'
Once more upon the waters ! yet once more !
And the waves bound beneath me as a steed
That knows his rider.
Don Jnan, Cant. m. byron.
Strongly it bears us along in swelling and limit¬
less billows.
Nothing before and nothing behind but the sky
and the ocean.
The Homeric Hexameter. Tr. o/ coieridce, schiller.
Ships.
Build me straight, 0 worthy Ma.ster !
Stanch and strong, a goodly vessel.
That .shall laugh at all disaster
And with wave and whirlwind wrestle.
The Buildinso/the Ship. LONGFELLOW.
Behold the threaden sails.
Borne with the invisible and creeping wind.
Draw the huge bottoms through the furrowed sea,
Brca.sting the lofty surge.
King Henry K, rtct iii. Chorus. SHAKESPEARE.
Sailing
Like a stately ship
Of Tarsus, bound for the isles
Of Javan or Gadhe,
With all her bravery on, and tackle trim.
Sails filled, and streamers waving.
Courted by all the winds that hold them play.
An amber scent of odorous perfume
Her harbinger.
Samson A^onisics, MILTON.
Hearts of oak are our ships.
Hearts of oak are our men.
Hearts o/Oah. dl cakrick.
632
POBMS OP THE SEA.
Storms and Shipwreck.
Ye gentlemen of England
That live at home at ease,
Ah ! little do you think upon
The dangers of the seas.
Ye CoUletnen of England, M. PARKER.
0 pilot ! 't is a fearful night.
There's danger on the deep.
The Pilot. T. H. BAYLY.
God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform ;
. He plants his footsteps in the sea
And rides upon the storm.
Light shiuittg out of Darkness, * COWPER.
Seas
Kough with black winds, and storms
Unwonted.
Book X, Odes* Translation of yLll.TOii. HORACE.
Her deck is crowded with despairing souls.
And in the hollow pauses of the storm
We hear their piercing cries.
Bertram. C. MATURIN.
Fierce o'er the wreck the whelming wateis
passed,
Tlie helpless crew sunk in the roaring main !
The Mariner. MRS. ANNE RADCUFFE.
A solitary shriek, the bubbling cry
Of some strong swimmer in his agony.
Don yuan, Ca>it, ü BVRON.
Dangerous rocks.
Which touching but my gentle vessel's side.
Would scatter all her spices on the stream.
Enrobe the roaring waters with my silks.
And, in a word, but even now worth this.
And now worth nothing.
Merchant of yenice^ Act i. Sc. x* SHAKESPEARE.
As rich . . .
As is the ooze and bottom of the sea
With sunken wreck and sumless treasuries.
Kins Henry K. Act i. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
No, here's to the pilot that weathered the storm.
The Pilot that weathered the Storm. C. CANNING.
The Low Countries.
To men of other minds my fancy flies.
Embosomed in the deep where Holland lies.
Methinks her patient sons before me stand.
Where the broad Ocean leans against the laud.
And, sedulous to stop the coming tide.
Lift the tall rampire's artificial pride.
Onward methinks, and diligently slow.
The firm connected bulwark seems to grow.
Spreads its long arms amidst the watery i-oar.
Scoops out an empire, and usurps the shore.
While the pent Ocean, rising o'er the pile.
Sees an amphibious world beneath him smile ;
The slow canal, the yellow-blossomed vale.
The willow-tufted bank, the gliding sail.
The crowded mart, the cultivated plain,
A new creation rescued from his reign.
The Traveller. GOLDSMITH.
As when the sea breaks o'er its bounds.
And overflows the level grounds.
Those banks and dams that like a screen
Did keep it out, now keep it in.
Uudibras. DR. S. BUTLER.
England.
Broad-based upon her people's will.
And compassed by the inviolate sea.
To the Queen. TENNYSON.
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POEMS
OF
ADVENTURE AND RURAL
SPORTS.
ADVENTURE.
CHEVY-CHASE.
[Percy, Ear! of Northumberland, had vowed to hunt for three
days in the Scottish border, without condescending to ask leave
from Earl Douglas, who was either lord of the soil or lord warden
of the Marches. This provoked the condict which was celebrated
ill the old ballad of the " Hunting o" the Cheviot." The circum¬
stances of the battle of Otterbourne (A. D 1388) are woven into the
ballad, and the affairs of the two events arc confounded. The bal¬
lad preserved in the Percy Reliques is probably as old as 1574.
The one following is a modernized form, of the time of James I.j
God prosper long our noble king,
Our lives and safeties all ;
A woful hunting once there did
In Chevy-Chase befall.
To drive the deer with hound and horn
Earl Percy took his way ;
The child may rue that is unborn
The hunting of that day.
The stout Earl of Northumberland
A vow to God did make,
His pleasure in the Scottish woods
Three summer days to take, —
The chiefest harts in Chevy-Chase
To kill and hear away.
These tidings to Earl Douglas came.
In Scotland where he lay ;
Who sent Earl Percy present word
He would prevent his sport.
The English earl, not fearing that.
Did to the woods resort.
With fifteen hundred bowmen hold.
All chosen men of might.
Who knew full well in time of need
To aim their shafts aright.
The gallant greyhounds swiftly ran
To chase the fallow deer ;
On Monday they began to hunt.
When daylight did appear ;
And long before high noon they had
A hundred fat bucks slain ;
Then, having dined, the drovers went
To rouse the deer again.
The bowmen mustered on the hills.
Well able to endure ;
And all their rear, with special care.
That day was guarded sure.
The hounds ran swiftly through the woods
The nimble deer to take.
That with their cries the hills and dales
An echo shrill did make.
Lord Percy to the quarry went.
To view the slaughtered deer ;
Quoth he, "Earl Douglas promised
This day to meet me heré ;
" But if 1 thought he would not come.
No longer would 1 stay ; "
With that a brave young gentleman
Thus to the earl did .say : —■
"Lo, yonder doth Earl Douglas come,—
His men in armor bright ;
Full twenty hundred Scottish spears
All marching in our sight ;
" All men of pleasant Teviotdale,
Fast by the river Tweed ; "
" Then cease your sports," Earl Percy said,
" And take your Imws with speed ;
" And now with me, my countrymen.
Your courage forth advance ;
For never was there champion yet,
111 Scotland or in France,
" That ever did on horseback come.
But if my hap it were,
1 durst encounter man for man.
With him to break a spear."
636
POEMS GE ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
Eaii Douglas on his milk-white steed,
Most like a baron bold,
Rode foremost of his company.
Whose armor shone like gold.
" Show me," said he, " whose men you be,
That hunt so boldly here.
That, without my consent, do chase
And kill my fallow-deer. "
The firet man that did answer make.
Was noble Percy, he —
Who said, "We list not to declare,
Nor show whose men we be :
" Yet will we spend our dearest blood
Thy chiefest harts to slay."
Then Douglas swore a solemn oath,
And thus in rage did say ; —
" Ere thus I will out-bravfed be.
One of us two shall die ;
I know thee well, an earl thou art, —
Lord Percy, so am I.
"But trust me, Percy, pity it were.
And great offence, to kill
Any of these our guiltless men.
For they have done no ill.
" Let you and me the battle try.
And set our men aside."
" Accursed be he," Earl Percy said,
" By whom this is denied."
Then stepped a gallant squire forth,
Witherington was his name,
Who said, " I would not have it told
To Henry, our king, for shame,
" That e'er my captain fought on foot.
And I stood looking on.
You two be earls," said Witherington,
"And 1 a squire alone ;
"I '11 do the best that do I may.
While 1 have power to stand ;
While I have power to wield my sword
I '11 fight with heart and hand."
Our English archers bent their bows, —
Their hearts were good and tine ;
At the first fiight of arrows sent,
Full fourscore Scots they slew.
Yet stays Earl Douglas on the bent.
As chieftain stout and good ;
As valiant captain, all unmoved.
The shock he firmly stood.
His host he parted had in three.
As leader ware and tried ;
And soon his spcannen on their foes
Bore down on every side.
Tliroughout the English archery
They dealt full many a wound ;
But still om- valiant Englishmen
All firmly kept their ground.
And throwing straight their bows away.
They grasped their swords .so bright ;
And now sharp blows, a heavy shower,
On shields and helmets light.
They closed full fast on every side, —
No slackness there was found ;
And many a gallant gentleman
Lay gasping on the ground.
In truth, it was a grief to see
How each one chose his spear,
And how the blood out of their breasts
Did gush like water clear.
At last these two stout earls did meet ;
Like captains of great might,
Like lions wode, they laid on lode.
And made a cruel fight.
They fought until they both did sweat,
With swords of tempered steel.
Until the blood, like drops of rain,
They trickling down did feel.
"Yield thee, Lord Percy," Douglas said,
"In faith I will thee bring
Where thou shalt high advanced be
By James, our Scottish king.
" Thy ransom I will freely give.
And this report of thee, —
Thou ait the most courageous knight
That ever I did see."
" No, Douglas," saith Earl Percy then,
" Thy proffer I do scorn ;
I will not yield to any Scot
That ever yet was born."
With that there came an arrow keen
Out of an English bow,
AVhich struck Earl Douglas to the heart, —
A deep and deadly blow ;
Who never spake more woi-ds than these :
" Fight on, my merry men all ;
For why, my life is at an end ;
Lord Percy sees my fall."
ADVENTURE.
Then leaving life, Earl Percy took
The dead man by the hand ;
And said, " Earl Douglas, for thy life
Would I had lost my land.
" In truth, my very heart doth bleed
With sorrow for thy sake ;
For sure a more redoubted knight
Mischance did never take."
A knight amongst the Scots there was
Who saw Earl Douglas die.
Who straight in wrath did vow avenge
Upon the Earl Percy.
Sir Hugh Monntgomery was he called,
Who, with a spear full bright.
Well mounted on a gallant steed.
Ran fiercely through the fight ;
And past the English archers all.
Without a dread or fear ;
And through Earl Percy's body then
He thrust his hateful spear.
With such vehement force and might
He did his body gore,
The stair ran through the other side
A large cloth-yard and more.
So thus did both these nobles die.
Whose courage none could stain.
An English archer then perceived
The noble earl was slain.
He had a bow bent in his hand.
Made of a trusty tree ;
Au arrow of a cloth-yard long
To the hard head haled he.
Against Sir Hugh Monntgomery
So right the shaft he set.
The gr ay goose wing that was thereon
In his heart's blood was wet.
This fight did last from break of day
Till setting of the sun ;
For when they rung the evening-bell
The battle scarce was done.
With stout Earl Percy there were slain
Sir John of Egerton,
Sir Robert Ratclifif, and Sir John,
Sir James, that bold baron.
And with Sir George and stout Sir James,
Both knights of good account.
Good Sir Ralph Baby there was slain,
Whose prowess did surmount.
For Witherington my heart is woe
That ever he slain should be.
For when his legs were hewn in two.
He knelt and fought on his knee.
And with Earl Douglas there were slain
Sir Hugh Monntgomery,
Sir Charles Murray, that from the field
One foot would never flee ;
Sir Charles Murray of Ratcliff, too, —
His sister's son was he ;
Sir David Lamb, so well esteemed.
But saved he could not be.
And the Lord Ma.vwell in like case
Did with Earl Douglas die :
Of twenty hundred Scottish spears.
Scarce fifty-five did fiy.
Of fifteen hundred Englishmen,
Went home but fifty-three ;
• The rest in Chevy-Chase were slain.
Under the greenwood tree.
Ne.xt day did many widows come.
Their husbands to bewail ;
They washed their wounds in brinish tears.
But all would not prevail.
Their bodies, bathed in purple blood.
They bore with them away ;
They kissed them dead a thousand times.
Ere they were clad in clay.
The news was brought to Edinburgh,
Where Scotland's king did reign.
That brave Earl Douglas suddenly
Was with an areow slain :
" 0 heavy news," King James did say ;
" Scotland can witness be
I have not any captain more
Of such account as he."
Like tidings to King Henry came
Within as short a space.
That Percy of Northumberland
Was slain in Chevy-Chase :
" Now God bo with him," said our King,
"Since't will no better be ;
I trust I have within my realm
Five hundred as good as he :
"Yet shall not Scots or Scotland say
But I will vengeance take ;
I '11 be revengèd on them all
For brave Earl Percy's sake." ,
¿
638
POEMS OF ADVENTÜRE AND RURAL SPORTS.
This vow full well the king performed
After at Humbledown ;
In one day fifty knights were slain
, With lords of higk renown ;
And of the rest, of small account.
Did many hundreds die :
Thus endeth the hunting of Chevy-Chase,
Made by the Earl Percy.
God save the king, and bless this land.
With plenty, joy, and peace ;
And gi'ant, henceforth, that foul debate
'Twixt noblemen may cease.
RICHARD SHEALE.
LAMENT OF THE BOEDER WIDOW.
[Sir Walter Scott says : " This ballad relates to the execution of
Cockburne of Henderland, a border freebooter, hanged over the
gate of his own tower by James V. in his fatnoub expedition, in 1529,
against the marauders of the border. In a deserted burial-place
near the ruins of the castle, the monument of Cockburne and hi^
lady is still shown. The following inscription is still legible, though
defaced :—
** ' HERE LYES PERVS OF COKBURNE AND HIS WYFE
MARJORY.'"J
My love he built me a bonnie bower
And clad it a' wi' lily flower ;
A brawer bower ye ne'er did see.
Than my true-love he built for me.
There came a man, by middle day.
He spied his sport, and went away ;
And brought the king that very night.
Who brake my bower, and slew my knight.
He slew my knight, to me sae dear ;
He slew my knight, and poin'd his gear
My servants all for life did flee.
And left me in extrem itie.
I sewed his sheet, making my mane ;
I watched the corpse inysell alane ;
I watched his body night and day ;
No living creature came that way.
I took his body on my back,
And whiles I gaed, and whiles I sat ;
I digged a grave, and laid him in.
And happed him with the sod sae green.
But think nae ye my heart was sair.
When I laid the moul' on his yellow hair
O, think nae ye my heart "was wae.
When I turned about, away to gae ?
Nae living man I '11 love again.
Since that my lively knight is slain ;
Wi' ae lock o' his yellow hair
I '11 chain my heart forevermair.
ROBIN HOOD AND ALLEN-A-DALE.
[Of Robin Hood, the famous outlaw of Sherwood Forest, and
his merry men, there are many ballads ; but the limits of this volume
forbid our giving more than a single selection.
Various periods, ranging from the time of Richard I. to the end
of the reign of Edward II., have been assigned as the age in which
Robin Hood lived. He is usually described as a yeoman, abiding
in Sherwood Forest, in Nottinghamshire. His most noted follow¬
ers, generally mentioned in the ballads, are Little John. Friar Tuck,
Iiis chaplain, and his maid Marian. Nearly all tJie legends extol
his courage, his generosity, his humanity, and his skill as an archer.
He robbed the rich only, who could afford to lose, and gave freely
to the poor. He protected the needy, was a champion of the fair
sex, and took great delight in plundering prelates. The followii^
ballad exhibits the outlaw in one of his most attractive aspects,—
affording assistance to a distressed lover.]
Come, listen to me, you gallants so free.
All you that love mirth for to hear.
And 1 wül tell you of a bold outlaw,
That lived in Nottinghamshire.
As Robin Hood in the forest stood.
All under the greenwood tree.
There he was aware of a brave young man.
As fine as fine might he.
The youngster was clad in scarlet red.
In scarlet fine and gay ;
And he did frisk it over the plain,
And chanted a roundelay.
As Robin Hood next morning stood
Amongst the leaves so gay.
There did he espy the same young man
Come drooping along the way.
The scarlet he wore the day before
It was clean cast away ;
And at every stej) he fetched a sigh,
" Alack and well-a-day ! "
Then stepped forth brave Little John,
And Midge, the miller's son ;
Which made the young man bend his bow,
Whenas he see them come.
" Stand off ! stand off ! " the young man said,
" What is your will with me ? "
"You must come before our master straight.
Under you greenwood tree."
And when he came bold Robin before,
Robin asked him courteously,
" 0, hast thou any money to spare.
For my merry men and me ? "
"1 have no money," the young man said,
" But five shillings and a ring ;
And that 1 have kept these seven long years.
To have at my wedding.
ADVENTURE.
•
Üo'.)
" Yesterday I should have married a maid,
But she was from me ta'en,
And chosen to be an old knight's delight,
" Whereby my poor heart is slain."
"What is thy name ?" then said Robin Hood,
" Come tell me without any fail."
" By the faith of my body," then said the young
man,
" My name it is Allen-a-Dale."
" What wilt thou give me," .said Robin Hood,
" In ready gold or fee.
To help thee to thy true-love again.
And deliver her unto thee ? "
" I have no money," then quoth the young man,
"No ready gold nor fee.
But I will swear upon a book
Thy true servant for to be."
" How many miles is it to thy true-love ?
Come tell mo without guile."
" By the faith of my bodj%" then said the young
man,
" It is but five little mile."
Then Robin he hasted over the plain.
He did neither stint nor lin,*
Until he came unto the church
Where Allen should keep his wedding.
"What hast thou here ? " the bishop then said,
" I prithee now tell unto me."
"I am a bold harper," quoth Robin Hood,
"And the Irest in the north country."
" 0, welcome, 0, weleome," the bishop ho said,
"That musio best pleaseth mo."
" You .shall have no music," quoth Robin Hood,
"TÜ1 the bride and bridegroom I see."
With that came in a wealthy knight.
Which was both grave and old ;
And after him a finikin lass.
Did shine like the glistering gold..
"This is not a fit match," quoth Robin Hood,
"That you do seem to make here ;
For since we are come into the church.
The bride shall chuso her own dear."
Then Robin Hood put his horn to his mouth,
And blew blasts two and three ;
When four-and-twenty yeomen bold
Came leaping over the lea.
And when they came into the churchyard.
Marching all in a row.
The very first man was Allen-a-Dale,
To give bold Robin his bow.
" This is thy true-love," Robin he said,
" Young Allen, as I hear say;
And you shall be married at this same time.
Before we depart away."
" That shall not be," the bishop he cried,
"For thy word shall not stand ;
They shall be three times asked in the church.
As the law is of our land."
Robin Hood pulled off the bishop's coat.
And put it upon Little John ;
" By the faith of my body," then Robin said,
"This cloth doth make thee a man."
When Little John went into the quire.
The people began to laugh ;
He asked them seven times in the church
Lest three times should not be enough.
" Who gives me this maid?" said Little John,
Quoth Robin Hood, ' ' That do I ;
And he that takes her from Allen-a-Dale,
Full dearly he shall her buy."
And then, having ended this merry wedding,
The bride looked like a queen ;
And so they returned to the merry greenwood.
Amongst the leaves so green.
ANON'YMOUS.
JOCK JOHNSTONE, THE TINKLER.
" 0, CAME ye ower by the Yoke-burn Ford,
Or down the King's Road of the clench ? *
Or saw ye a knight and a lady bright,
Wha ha'e gane the gate they baitli shall rue ? "
" I saw a knight and a lady bright
Ride up the clench at the break of day
The knight upon a coal-black steed.
And the dame on one of a silver-gray.
" And the lady's palfrey flew the first.
With many a clang of silver bell ;
Swift as the raven's morning flight
The two went scouring ower the fell.
" By this time they are man and wife.
And standing in St. Mary's fane ;
And the lady in the grass-green silk
A maid you will never see again."
* Stop nor stay.
• Dell.
[&
640
POEMS OP ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
" But I can tell thee, saucy wight, —
And that the runaway shall prove, —
Revenge to a Douglas is as sweet
As maiden charms or maiden's love."
" Since thou say'st that, my Lord Douglas,
Good faith some clinking there will be ;
Beshrew my heart but and my sword.
If 1 winna turn and ride with thee ! "
They whipped out ower the Shepherd Cleuch,
And doun the links o' the Corsecleuch Burn ;
And aye the Douglas swore by his sword
To win his love, or ne'er return.
" First fight your rival. Lord Douglas,
And then brag after, if you may ;
For the Earl of Ross is as brave a lord
As ever gave good weapon sway.
"But I for ae poor siller merk.
Or thirteen {)ennics and a bawbee,!
Will tak in hand to fight you baith.
Or beat the winner, whiche'er it be."
The Douglas turned him on his steed.
And I wat a loud laughter leuch he :
" Of a' the fools 1 have ever met,
Man, I ha'e never met ane like thee.
"Art thou akin to lord or knight.
Or courtly squire or wan ior leal ? "
"I am a tinkler," quo' the wight,
" But 1 like croun-cracking unco weel."
When they came to St. Mary's kirk,
The chaplain shook for very fear ;
And aye he kissed the cross, and said,
" What deevil has sent that Douglas here !
" He neither values book nor ban.
But curses all without demur ;
And cares nae mair for a holy man
Than I do for a worthless cur."
" Come here, thou bland and brittle priest,
And tell to me without delay
Where you have hid the lord of Ross
And the lady that came at the break of day."
"No knight or lady, good Lord Douglas,
Have 1 beheld since break of morn ;
And 1 never saw the lord of Ross
Since the woful day that I was born."
Lord Douglas turned him round about,
And looked the Tinkler in the face ;
Where he beheld a lurking smile.
And a deevil of a dour grimace.
" How's this, how's this, thou Tinkler loun 1 •
Hast thou presumed to lie on me ? "
" Faith that I have ! " the Tinkler said,
" And a right good turn I have done to thee ;
" For the lord of Ross and thy own true-love, .
The beauteous Harriet of Thirlestane,
Rade west away, ere the break of day ;
And you '11 never see the dear maid again ;
" So I thought it best to bring you here.
On a wrang scent, of my own accord ;
For had you met the Johnstone clan.
They wad ha'e made mince-meat of a lord."
At this the Douglas was so wroth
He wist not what to say or do ;
But he strak the Tinkler o'er the croun,
Till the blood came dreeping ower his brow.
" Beshrew my heart," quo' the Tinkler lad,
" Thou bear'st thee most ungallantlye !
If these are the manners of a lord.
They are manner's that winna gang doun wi' me."
" Hold up thy hand," the Douglas cried,
" And keep thy distance. Tinkler loun ! "
"That will 1 not," the Tinkler said,
"Though I and my mare should both go
doun ! "
" I have armor on," cried the Lord Douglas,
"Cuirass and helm, as you may see."
" The dell me care ! " quo' the Tinkler lad ;
" 1 shall have a skelp at them and thee."
" You are not horsed," quo' the Lord Douglas,
"And no remorse this weapon brooks."
"Mine's a right good yaud," quo' the Tinkler lad,
" And a gr eat deal better nor she looks.
" So stand to thy weapons, thou haughty lord,
What 1 have taken I needs must give ;
Thorr shalt never strike a tinkler again.
For the langest day thou hast to live."
Then to it they fell, both sharp and snell.
Till the fire from both their weapons flew ;
Brrt the very first shock that they rrret with.
The Douglas his rashness 'gan to rue.
For though he had on a sark of mail.
And a cuirass orr his breast wore he.
With a good steel bonnet oir his head.
Yet the blood ran trickling to his knee.
The Douglas sat upright and firur,
Aye as together their hor-ses ran ;
But the Tinkler laid on like a very deil, —
Siccau strokes were rrever laid orr by urarr.
■ff'
ADVENTURE.
641
" Hold up thy hand, thoa Tinkler loan,"
Cried the poor priest, with whining din ;
" If thou hurt the brave Lord James Douglas,
A curse he on thee and all thy kin ! "
"I care no more for Lord James Douglas
Than Lord James Douglas cares for me ;
But I want to let his proud heart know
That a tinkler's a man as well as he."
So they fought on, and they fought on,
Till good Lord Douglas' breath was gone ;
And the Tinkler bore him to the ground.
With rush, with rattle, and with groan.
" 0 hon ! 0 hon ! " cried the proud Douglas,
" That I this day should have lived to see !
For sure my honor I have lost.
And a leader again I can never be !
" But tell me of thy kith and kin.
And where was bred thy weapon hand ?
For thou art the wale of tinkler louns
That ever was horn in fair Scotland."
" My name's Jock Johnstone," quo' the wight ;
" I winna keep in my name frao thee ;
And here, tak thou thy sword again.
And better friends we two shall be."
But the Douglas swore a solemn oath.
That was a debt he could never owe ;
He would rather die at the back of the dike
Than owe his sword to a man so low.
" But if thou wilt ride under my banner.
And hear my livery and my name.
My rightdiand warrior thou shalt be
And I '11 knight thee on the field of fame."
" Woe worth thy wit, good Lord Douglas,
To think I'd change my trade for thine ;
Far better and wiser would you be.
To live a journeyman of mine,
" To mend a kettle or a casque.
Or clout a goodwife's yettlin' pan, —
Upon my life, good Lord Douglas,
You'd make a noble tinkler-man !
" I would give you a drammock twice a day.
And sunkets on a Sunday mom.
And you should he a rare adept
In steel and copper, brass and hem !
" I '11 fight you every day you rise.
Till you can act the hero's pai-t ;
Therefore, I pray you, think of this.
And lay it seriously to heart."
The Douglas writhed beneath the lash.
Answering with an inward curse, —
Like salmon wriggling on a spear.
That makes his deadly wound the worse.
But up there came two squires renowned ;
In search of Lord Douglas they came ;
And when they saw their master down.
Their spirits mounted in a flame.
And they flew upon the Tinkler wight.
Like perfect tigers on their prey :
But the Tinkler heaved his trusty sword.
And made him ready for the fray.
"Come one to one, ye coward knaves,—
Come hand to hand, and steed to steed ;
I would that ye were better men.
For this is glorious work indeed ! "
Before you could have counted twelve.
The Tinkler's wondrous chivalrye
Had both the squires upon the sward.
And their horses galloping o'er the lea.
The Tinkler tied them neck and heel.
And mony a biting jest gave he :
" O fie, for shame ! " said the Tinkler lad ;
" Siccan fighters I did never see ! "
He slit one of their bridle reins, —
0, what disgrace the conquered feels ! —
And he skelpit the squires with that good tawse.
Till the blood ran off at baith their heels.
The Douglas he was forced to laugh
Till down his cheek the salt teal- i-an :
" 1 think the deevil be come here
In the likeness of a tinkler man ! "
Then he has to Lord Douglas gone.
And he raised him kindly by the hand.
And he set him on his gallant steed,
And bore him away to Henderland :
" Be not cast down, my Lord Douglas,
Nor writhe beneath a broken bane ;
For the leech's art will mend the part.
And your honor lost will spring again.
"'Tis true, Jock Johnstone is my name ;
I'm a right good tinkler, as you see ;
For I can crack a casque betimes.
Or clout one, as my need may be.
"Jock Johnstone is my name, 'tis true,-
But noble hearts are allied to me ;
For I am the lord of jVnnandale,
And a knight and earl as well as thee."
642
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
■a
Then Douglas strained the hero's hand,
And took from it his sword again :
" Since thou art the lord of Annandale,
Thou hast eased my heart of meikle pain.
"I might have known thy noble form
In that disguise thou 'rt pleased to wear ;
All Scotland knows thy matchless arm,
And England by experience dear.
"We have been foes as well as friends.
And jealous of each other's sway ;
But little can 1 comprehend
Thy motive for these pranks to-day."
" Sooth, my good lord, the truth to teU,
'T was I that stole your love away.
And gave her to the lord of Ross
An hour before the break of day ;
"For the lord of Ross is my brother.
By all the laws of chivalrye ;
And I brought with me a thousand men
To guard him to my ain countryc.
" But I thought meet to stay behind.
And try your lordship to waylay.
Resolved to breed some noble sport,
By leading you so far astray.
"Judging it better some lives to spare, —
Which fancy takes me now and then, —
And settle our quarrel hand to hand,
Than each with our ten thousand men.
" Goel send you soon, my Lord Douglas,
To Border foray sound and haill !
But never strike a tinkler again.
If he be a Johnstone of Annandale."
James hocg.
MORT D'ARTHUR,
So all day long the noise of battle rolled
Among the mountains by the winter sea ;
Until King Arthur's Table, man by man.
Had fallen in Lyoness about their lord.
King Arthur : then, because his wound was deep.
The hold Sir Bedivere uplifted him.
Sir Bedivere, the last of all his Knights,
And bore him to a chapel nigh the field,
A broken chancel with a broken cross.
That stood on a dark strait of barren land.
On one side lay the Ocean, and on one
Lay a great water, and the moon was full.
Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedivere :
" The sequel of to-day unsolders all
The goodliest fellowship of famous knights
Whereof this world holds record. Such a sleep
They sleep — the men I loved. 1 think that we
Shall nevermore, at any future time.
Delight our souls with talk of knightly deeds.
Walking about the gardens and the haUs
Of Camelot, as in the days that were.
I perish by this people which I made, —
Though Merlin sware that I should come again
To rule once more ; but let what will be, be.
I am so deeply smitten through the helm
That without help I cannot last till morn.
Thou therefore take my brand Excalibur,
Which was my pride ; for thou rememberest
how
In those old days, one summer noon, an arm
Rose up from out the bosom of the lake.
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful.
Holding the sword — and how 1 rowed across
And took it, and have worn it, like a king ;
And, wheresoever I am sung or told
In after-time, this also shall be known:
But now delay not : take Excalibur,
And fling him far into the middle mere :
Watch what thou seest, and lightly bring me
word.
To him replied the hold Sir Bedivere :
" It is not meet. Sir King, to leave thee thus.
Aidless, alone, and smitten through the helm.
A little thing may haim a wounded man ;
Yet I thy hest will all perform at full.
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee word."
So saying, from the ruined shrine he stept
And in the moon athwart the place of tombs.
Where lay the mightj' hones of ancient men.
Old knights, and over them the sea-wind' sang
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, stepping
down
By zigzag paths, and juts of pointed rock.
Came on the shining levels of the lake.
There drew he forth the brand Excalibur,
And o'er him, drawing it, the winter moon.
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth
And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt:
For all the haft twinkled with diamond studs.
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work
Of subtlest jewelry. He gazed so long
That both his eyes were dazzled as he stood.
This way and that dividing the swift mind.
In act to throw : but at the last it seemed
Better to leave Excalibur concealed
There in the many-knotted water-flags.
That whistled stiff and dry about the marge.
So strode he back slow to the wounded King.
-Í?
ADVENTURE.
Then spake King Artluir to Sir Bedivere :
'* Hast thou performed my mission which I
gave ?
What is it thou hast seen ? or what hast heard ? "
And answer made the hold Sir Bedivere :
" 1 heard the ripple washing in the reeds.
And the wild water lapping on the crag."
To whom replied King Arthur, faint and pale :
" Thou hast betrayed thy nature and thy name,
Not rendering true answer", as beseemed
Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight :
For surer sign had followed, either hand.
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere. .
This is a shameful thing for men to lie.
Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go again.
As thou art lief and dear, and do the thing
I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring me word."
Then went Sir Bedivere the second time
Across the ridge, and paced beside the mere.
Counting the dewy pebbles, fixed in thought ;
But when he saw Hie wonder of the hilt.
How curiously and strangely chased, he smote
His palms together, and he cried aloud : —
" And if indeed I cast the brand away.
Surely a precious thing, one worthy note.
Should thus be lost forever from the earth.
Which might have pleased the eyes of many men.
What good should follow this, if this were done ?
What harm, undone 1 deep hai"m to disobey.
Seeing obedience is the bond of rule.
Were it well to obey then, if a king demand
An act unprofitable, against himself?
The King is sick, and knows not what he does.
What r-ecord, or what relic of my lord
Should be to after-time, but empty breath
And rumors of a doubt ? but were this kept.
Stored in some treasure-house of mighty kings.
Some one might show it at a joust of arms.
Saying, ' King Arthur's sword, Excalibur,
Wrought by the lonely maiden of the Lake.
Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the deeps
Upon the hidden bases of the hills.'
So might some old man speak in the after-time
To all the people, winning revereno,e.
But now much honor and much fame were lost."
So spake he, clouded with his own conceit.
And hid Excalibur the second time.
And so sti"ode back slow to the wounded King.
Then spoke King Arthur, breathing heavily ;
" What is it thou hastseen ? or what hast heard ? "
And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere :
" 1 heard the water lapping on the crag.
And the long ripple washing in the reeds."
To whom replied King Arthur, much in wrath :
" Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue,
Unknightly, traitor-hearted ! Woe is me !
Authority forgets a dying king.
Laid widowed of the power in his eye
That bowed the will. I see thee what thou art.
For thou, the latest-left of all my knights
In whom should meet the offices of all.
Thou wouldst betray me for the precious hilt ;
Either from lust of gold, or like a gir l
Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes.
Yet, for a man may fail in duty twice.
And the third time may prosper", get thee hence :
But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur,
I will arise and slay thee with my hands."
Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and ran.
And, leaping down the ridges lightly, plunged
Among the bulrush-beds, and clutched the sword.
And strorrgly wheeled and threw it. The great
brand
Made lightnings in the splendor of the moon.
And flashing round and round, and whirled iir an
arch.
Shot like a streamer of the northern mom.
Seen where the moving isles of winter shock
By night, with noises of the northern sea.
So flashed and fell the brand Excalibur :
But ere he dipt the surface, rose an arm
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful.
And caught him by the hilt, and brandished him
Three times, and drew him under in the mere.
.\nd lightly went the other to the King.
Then spoke King Arthur, drawing thicker
breath :
'* Now see I by thine eyes that this is done.
Speak out : what is it thou hast heard, or seen ? "
And answer made the bold Sir Bedivere ;
"Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest the gems
Should blind my purpose, for I never saw.
Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I die.
Not though I live three lives of mortixl men.
So great a miracle as yonder hilt.
Then with both hands I flung him, wheeling
him ;
But when I looked again, behold an ami.
Clothed in white samite, mystic, wonderful.
That caught him by the hilt, and brandished him
Three times, and drew him under in the mere.''
And answer made King Arthur, breathing
hard :
" My end draws nigh ;'t is time that I were gone.
Make broad thy shoulders to receive my weight.
And bear me to the margin ; yet I fear
My wound hath taken cold, and I shall die."
r
644
rOE.MS OE AUVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
So saying, from the pavement he half rose,
Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm.
And looking wistfully with wide blue eyes
As in a picture. Him Sir Bedivere
Remorsefully regarded through his tears.
And would have spoken, but he found not words ;
Then took with care, and kneeling on one knee.
O'er both his shoulders drew the languid hands.
And rising bore him through the place of tombs.
But, as he walked, King Arthur panted hard.
Like one that feels a nightmare on his bed
When all the house is mute. So sighed the
King,
Muttering and murmuring at his ear "Quick,
quick !
I fear it is too late, and I shall die."
But the Äther swiftly strode from ridge to ridge.
Clothed with his breath, and looking, as he
walked.
Larger than human on the frozen hills.
He heard the deep behind him, and a ciy
Before. His own thought drove him like a goad.
Dry clashed his harness in the icy caves
And barren chasms, and all to left and right
The bare black cliff clangèd round him, as he
based
His feet on juts of slippery crag that rang
Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed heels —
And on a sudden, lo ! the level lake.
And the long glories of the winter moon.
Then saw they how there hove a dusky barge.
Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to stern.
Beneath them ; and descending they were ware
That all the decks were dense with stately forms,
Black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream, — by
these
Three Queens with crowns of gold, — and from
them rose
A cry that shivered to the tingling stars,
And, as it were one voice, an agony
Of lamentation, like a wind that shrills
All night in a waste land, where no one comes,
Or hath come, since the making of the world.
Then murmured Arthur, "Place me in the
barge;"
So to the barge they came. There those three
Queens
Put forth their hands, and took the King, and
wept.
But she that rose the tallest of them all,
And fairest, laid his head upon her lap.
And loosed the Shattered casque, and chafed his
hands.
And called him by his name, complaining loud,
And dropping bitter tears agaimst his brow
Striped with dark blood : for all his face wds
white
And colorless, and like the withered moon
Smote by the fresh beam of the springing cast ;
And all his greaves and cuisses dashed with drops
Of onset ; and the light and lustrous curls —
That made his forehead like a ri.sing sun
High from the dais-throne — were parched with
dust ;
Or, clotted into points and hanging loose,
Mi.\ed with the knightly growth that fringed his
lips.
So like a shattered column lay the King ;
!Ñ'ot like that Arthur, who, with lance in rest.
From spur to plume a star of tournament.
Shot through the lists at Camelot, and charged
Before the eyes of ladies and of kings.
Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere :
"Ah ! my Loi-d Arthur, whither shall 1 go ?
Where shall 1 hide my forehead and my eyes ?
For now I see the true old times are dead.
When every morning brought a noble chance.
And every chance brought out a noble knight. .
Such times have been not since the light that led
The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh.
But now the whole Round Table is dissolved
Which was an image of the mighty world ;
And I, the last, go forth companionless.
And the days darken round me, and the years,
Among new men, strange faces, other minds."
And slowly answered Arthur from the barge :
" The old order changeth, yielding place to new.
And God fulfils himself in many ways,
Le.st one good custom should corrupt the world.
Comfort thyself ; what comfort is in me ?
I have lived my life, and that which 1 have done
M.ay He within himself make pure ! but thou.
If thou shouldst never see my face again.
Pray for nry soul. More things are wrought by
prayer
Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy
voice
Rise like a fountain for me night and day.
For what are men better than sheep or goats
Th.at nourish a blind life within the brain.
If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer
Both for themselves and those who call tliei»
friend ?
For so the whole round earth is every way
Bound by gold chains about the feet of God.
But now farewell. I am going a long way
With these thou seest, — if indeed I go
( For all my mind is clouded with a doubt) —
To the island-valley of Avilion ;
ADVENTURE.
645
Where falls not hail, or rain, or any snow.
Nor ever wind blows loudly ; but it lies
Deep-meadowed, happy, fair with orcUai-d-lawns
And bowery hollows erowned with summer sea.
Where I will heal me of my grievous wound."
So said he, and the barge with oar and sail
Moved from the brink, like some full-breasted
swan.
That, fluting a wild carol ore her death.
Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes the flood
With swarthy webs. Long stood Sir Bedivere
Revolving many memories, till the hull
Looked one black dot against the verge of dawn.
And on the mere the wailing died away.
ALFRED TEMNVSON.
—♦—
ALFRED THE HARPER.
Dark fell the night, the watch was set,
The host was idly spread.
The Danes around their watchflres met,
Caroused, and fiercely fed.
The chiefs beneath a tent of leaves.
And Guthruin, king of all.
Devoured the flesh of England's beeves.
And laughed at England's fall.
Each warrior proud, each Danish earl.
In mail and wolf-skin clad.
Their bracelets white with plundered pearl.
Their eyes with triumph mad.
From Humber-land to Severn-land,
And on to Tamar stream.
Where Thames makes green the towery strand.
Where Medway's waters gleam, —
With hands of steel and mouths of flame
They raged the kingdom through ;
And where the Norseman sickle came.
No crop but hunger grew.
They loaded many an English horse
With wealth of cities fair ;
They dragged from many a father's corse
The daughter by her hair.
And English slaves, and gems and gold.
Were gathered round the feast ;
Till midnight in their woodland hold,
0, never that riot ceased.
In stalked a wamor tall and rude
Before the strong .sea-kings ;
"Ye Lords and Earls of Odin's brood.
Without a harper sings.
He seems a simple man and poor.
But well he .sounds the lay ;
And well, ye Norseman chiefs, be sure.
Will ye the song repay."
In trod the bard with keen cold look.
And glanced along the board.
That with the shout and war-cry shook
Of many a Danish lord.
But thirty brows, inflamed and stern.
Soon bent on him their gaze.
While calm he gazed, as if to learn
Who chief deserved his praise.
Loud Guthrum spake, — " Nay, gaze not thus,
Thou Harper weak and poor !
By Thor ! who bandy looks with us
Must worse than looks endure.
Sing high the praise of Denmark's host, *
High praise each dauntle.s.s Earl ;
The brave who stun this English coast
With war's unceasing whirl."
The Hai-per slowly bent his head.
And touched aloud the sti ing ;
Then raised his face, and boldly said,
" Hear thou my lay, O King !
High praise from every mouth of man
To all who boldly strive.
Who fall whei e first the fight began.
And ne'er go back alive.
" Fill high your cups, and swell the shout.
At famous Regnar's name !
Who sank his host in bloody rout.
When he to Humber came.
His men were chased, his sons were slain.
And he was left alone.
They bound him in an iron chain
Upon a dungeon stone.
" With iron links they bound him fast ; -
With snakes they filled the hole.
That made his flesh their long repast.
And bit into his soul.
" Great chiefs, why sink in gloom your eyes ?
Why champ your teeth in pain ?
Still lives the song though Regnar dies !
Fill high your cups again !
Ye too, perchance, O Norseman lords !
Who fought and swayed so long.
Shall soon but live in minstrel words.
And owe your names to song.
" This land has graves by thousands more
Than that where Regnar lies.
When conquests fade, and rule is o'er.
The sod must close your eyes.
f
646
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
■a
How soon, wliQ knows ? Not chief, nor bard ;
And yet to me't is given.
To see your foreheads deeply scarred.
And guess the doom of Heaven.
"I may not read or when or how.
But, Earls and Kings, l)e sure
I see a blade o'er every brow.
Where pride now sits secure.
Fill high the cu))3, raise lond the strain !
When chief and monarch fall.
Their names in song shall breathe again.
And thrill the feastful hall."
Grim sat the chiefs ; one heaved a groan.
And one grew pale with dre;ui.
His iron mace was grasped by one,
By one his wine was shed.
And Guthrum cried, " Nay, bard, no more
We hear thy boding lay ;
Make dmnk the song with spoil and gore !
Light up the joyous fray ! "
" Quick throbs my brain,"— so burst the song,—
" To hear the strife once more.
The mace, the axe, they rest too long ;
Earth cries. My thirst is sore.
More blithely twang the strings of bows
Than strings of harps in glee ;
Red wounds are lovelier than the rose
Or rosy lips to me.
" 0, fairer than a field of flowers.
When flowers in England grew.
Would be the battle's marshalled powers.
The plain of cai nage new.
With all its deaths before my soul
The vision rises fair ;
Raise loud the song, and drain the bowl !
I would that I were there ! "
Lond rang the harp, the minstrel's eye
Rolled fiercely round the throng ;
It seemed two crashing hosts were nigh.
Whose shock aroused the song.
A golden cup King Guthrum gave
To him who strongly played ;
And said, " I won it from the slave
Who once o'er England swayed."
King Guthrum cried, " 'T was Alfred's own ;
Thy song befits the brave ;
The King who cannot guard his throne
. Nor wine nor song shall have."
The minstrel took the goblet bright.
And said, " I drink the wine
To him who owns by justest right
The cup thou bid'st be mine.
" To him, your Lord, O shout ye all !
His meed be deathless praise !
The King who dares not nobly fall.
Dies basely all his days."
"The praise thou speakest," Gutlirum said,
"With sweetness fills mine ear ;
For Alfred swift before me fled.
And left me monarch here.
Tlie royal coward never dared
Beneath miue eye to stand.
O, would that now this feast he shared,
And saw me rule his land ! "
Then stern the minstrel rose, and spake.
And gazed upon the King, —
"Not now the golden cup I take.
Nor more to thee 1- sing.
Another day, a happier hour.
Shall bring me here again :
The cup shall stay in Guthrum's power.
Till I demand it then."
The Harper turned and left the shed.
Nor bent to Guthrum's crown ;
And one who marked his visage said
It wore a ghastly frown.
The Danes ne'er saw that Harper more.
For soon as moraing rose.
Upon their camp King Alfred bore,
And slew ten thousand foes.
JOHN STEancNc.
THE EARL O' QUARTERDECK.
A NEW OLD BALLAD.
The wind it blew, and the ship it flew ;
And it was " Hey for hame !
And ho for hame ! " But the skipper cried,
" Hand her oot o'er the saut sea faem."
Then up and spoke the King hinisel' :
" Hand on for Dumferliue ! "
Quo the skipper, " Ye 're king upo' the land —
I'm king upo' the brine."
And he took the helm intil his hand.
And he .steered the ship sae free ;
Wi' the wind astarn, he crowded sail.
And stood right out to sea.
Quo the king, " There's treason in this, I vow ;
This is something underhand !
'Bout ship ! " Quo the skipper, " Yer grace for¬
gets
Ye are king but o' the land ! "
&
ADVENTURE.
647
And still he held to the open sea ;
And the east-wind sank behind ;
And the west had a bittev word to say,
Wi' a white-sea roarin' wind.
And he turned her head into the north.
Said the king : "Gar fling him o'er."
Quo the fearless skipper : " It's a' ye 're worth !
Ye '11 ne'er see Scotland more."
The king crept down the cabin-stair,
To dunk the gude French wine.
And up she came, his daughter fair,
And luikit ower the brine.
She turned her face to the drivin' hail.
To the hail but and the weet ;
Her snood it brak, and, as lang 's herseT,
Her hair drave out i' the sleet.
She turned her face frae the drivin' win' —
" What's that ahead ? " quo she.
The skipper he threw hiinsel' frae the win',
And he drove the helm a-lee.
" Put to ycr hand, my lady fair !
Put to yer hand," quo he ;
" Gin she dinna face the win' the mair.
It's the warn' for you and me."
For the skipper kenned that strength is strength.
Whether woman's or man's at last.
To tlie tiller the lady she laid her han'.
And the ship laid her cheek to the blast.
For that slender body w.as full o' soul.
And the will is mair than shape ;
As the skipper saw when they cleared the berg,
And he heard her quarter scrape.
Quo the skipper : "Ye are a lady fair.
And a princess gi-and to see ;
But ye are a woman, and a man wad sail
To hell in yer company."
She liftit a pale and queenly face ;
Her een flashed, and syne they swim.
" And what for no to heaven ? " she says.
And she turned awa' frae him.
Btd she took na her han' frae the good ship's helm,
Until the day did daw ;
And the skipper he spak, but what he said
It was said atween them twa.
And then the good ship she lay to.
With the land far on the lee ;
And up came the king upo' the deck,
Wi' wan face and.bluidshot ee.
The skipper he louted to the king :
" Gae wa', gae wa'," said the king.
Said the king, like a prince, "1 was a' wrang,
Put on this ruby ring."
And the wind blew lowne, and the stars cam' cot.
And the ship turned to the shore ;
And, afore the sun was up again.
They saw Scotland ance more.
That day the ship hung at the pier-hcid.
And the king he stcpt on the land.
"Skipper, kneel down," the king he said,
" Hoo daur ye afore me stand ? "
The skipper he louted on his knee.
The king his blade he drew :
Said the king, " How daured ye contre me ?
1 'm aboard my ain ship noo.
"I canna mak ye a king," said he,
" For the Lord alone can do that ;
And besides ye took it intil yer ain han'
And crooned yersel' sae pat !
" But wi' what ye will 1 redeem my ring ;
For ance I am at your beck.
And first, as ye loutit Skipper o' Doon,
Rise up Yerl o' Quarterdeck."
The skipper he rose and looked at the king
In his een for all his croon ;
Said the skipper, " Here is yer grace's ring,
And yer daughter is my boon."
The reid binde sprang into the king's face, —
A wrathful man to see :
" The rascal loon abuses our grace ;
Gae hang him upon yon tree."
But the skipper he sprang aboard his ship.
And he drew his biting blade ;
And he struck the chain that held her fast,
But the iron was ower weel made.
And the king he blew a whistle loud ;
And tramp, tramp, down the pier.
Cam' twenty riders on twenty steeds,
Clankin' wi' spur and spear.
"He saved your life !" cried the lady fair ;
" His life ye daurna spill ! "
" Will ye come atween me and my hate ?"
Quo the lady, " And that 1 will ! "
And on cam' the knights wi' spur and spear.
For they heard the iron ring.
" Gin ye care na for yer father's grace,
Mind ye that I am the king."
-.-0^
G48
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
" I kneel to my father for his grace,
Right lowly on niy knee ;
But I stand and look the king in the face,
For the skipper is king o' me."
She turned and .she sprang upo' the deck.
And the cable splashed in the sea.
The good ship spread her wings sae white.
And away with the skipper goes she.
Now was not this a king's daughter.
And a brave lady beside ?
And a woman with whom a man might sail
Into the heaven wT pride ?
George Macoonald.
—«
HARMION AND DOUGLAS.
from " marmion," canto vi.
Not far advanced was morning day.
When Marmion did his troop array
To Surrey's camp to ride ;
He had safe-conduct for his band.
Beneath the royal seal and hand.
And Douglas gave a guide :
The ancient Earl, with stately grace.
Would Clara on her palfrey place.
And whispered in an undertone,
" Let the hawk stoop, his prey is flown."
The train from out the castle drew.
But Marmion stopped to bid adieu : —
" Though something I might plain," he said,
" Of cold respect to stranger guest.
Sent hither by j'our king's behest.
While in Tantallon's towers I stayed.
Part we in friendship from your land.
And, noble Earl, receive my hand." —
But Douglas round him drew his cloak.
Folded his anns, and thus he. spoke : —
*' My manors, halls, and bowera shall still
Be open, at my sovereign's will.
To each one whom he lists, howe'er
Unmeet to be the owner's peer.
My castles are my king's alone.
From turret to foundation-stone, -
The hand of Douglas is his own ;
And never shall in friendly grasp
The hand of such as Marmion clasp." —
Burned Marmion's swarthy cheek like fire,
And shook his very frame for ire.
And — " This to me ! " he said, —
" An't were not for thy hoaiy beard.
Such hand as Mannion's had not spared
To cleave the Douglas' head !
And, fii-st, I tell thee, haughty Peer,
He who does England's message here.
Although the meanest in her state,
May well, proud Angus, be thy mate :
And, Douglas, more 1 tell thee here.
Even in thy pitch of pride.
Here in thy hold, thy vassals near,
(Nay, never look ujion your lord.
And lay your hands upon your sword,)
I tell thee, thou 'rt defied !
And if thou said'st I am not peer
To any lord in Scotland here.
Lowland or Higliland, far or near.
Lord Angus, thou hast lied ! " —
On the Earl's cheek the flush of rage
O'ercame the ashen hue of age :
Fierce he broke forth, — " And dar'st thou then
To beard the lion in his den.
The Douglas in his hall ?
And hop'st thou hence unscathed to go ?
No, by St. Bride of Bothwell, no !
Up drawbridge, grooms, — what. Warder, ho !
Let the portcullis fall." —
Lord Marmion turned, — well was his need ! —
And dashed the rovvels in his steed ;
Like arrow througli the archway sprung ;
The ponderous grate behind him rung :
To pass there was such scanty room,
The bare, descending, razed his plume.
The steed along the drawbridge flies.
Just as it trembled on the rise ;
Not ligliter does the swallow skim
Along the smooth lake's level brim ;
And when Lord Marmion reached his band.
He halts, and turns with clenched hand.
And shout of loud defiance pours.
And shook his gauntlet at tho towers.
" Horse ! horse ! " the Douglas cried, " and
chase ! "
But soon he reined his fury's pace :
" A royal messenger he came.
Though most unworthy of the n.ome.
St. Mary, mend my fieiy mood !
Old age ne'er cools the Douglas blood,
1 thought to slay him where he stood.
'T is pity of him too," he cried ;
" Bold can he speak, and fairly ride :
1 warrant him a warrior tried."
With this his mandate he r ecalls.
And slowly seeks his castle balks.
Sir Walter Scott.
JAMES FITZ-JAMES AND ELLEN.
from " the lady of the uike," canto vi.
A FOOTSTEP struck her ear.
And Snowdouu's graceful Knight was near.
She turned tho hastier, lest again
The prisoner should renew his strain.
ADVENTÜKE.
649
"O welcome, brave Fitz-Jaines ! " she said ;
" How may an almost orphan maid
Pay the deep debt" — " O, say not so !
To me no gratitude you owe.
Not mine, alas ! the boon to give,
And bid thy noble father live ;
1 can but be thy guide, sweet maid.
With Scotland's King thy suit to aid.
No tyrant he, though ire and pride
May lead his better mood aside.
Come, Ellen, come ; 't is more than time.
He holds his court at morning prime."
AVith beating heart and bosom wrung,
As to a brother's arm she clung.
Gently he dried the fiilling tear.
And gently whispered hope and cheer ;
Her faltering steps half led, half stayed.
Through gallery fair and high arcade.
Till, at his touch, its wings of pride
A portal arch unfolded wide.
Within't was brilliant all and light,
A thronging scene of figures bright ;
It glowed on Ellen's dazzled sight, j
As when the setting sun has given
Ten thousand hues to summer even.
And from their tissue fancy frames
Aerial knights and fairy dames.
Still by Fitz-James her footing stayed ;
A few faint steps she forward made.
Then slow her drooping head she raised.
And fearful round the presence gazed :
For him she sought who owned this state.
The dreaded ijriuce whose will was fate !
She gazed on many a princely port
Might well have ruled a loyal court ;
On many a splendid garb she gazed, —
Then turned bewildered and amazed.
For all stood bare ; and in the room
Fitz-James alone wore cap and plume.
To him each lady's look was lent.
On him each courtier's eye was bent,
Miilst furs and silks aud jewels sheen
He stood, in simple Lincoln green.
The centre of the glittering ring, —
And Snowdoun's Knight is Scotland's King !
As wreath of snow, on mountain breast.
Slides from the roek that gave it rest.
Poor Ellen glided from her stay.
And at the Monarch's feet she lay ;
No word her choking voice commands :
She showed the ring, she clasped her hands.
0, not a moment could he brook.
The generous prince, that suppliant look !
Gently he i-aised her, and the while
Checked with a glance the circle's smile ;
Gracefid, but gmve, her brow he kissed.
And bade her terrors be dismissed : —
" Yes, fair ; the wandering poor Fitz-James
The fealty of Scotland claims.
To him thy woes, thy wishes bring ;
He will redeem his signet-ring.
Ask naught for Douglas ; yester even
His prince and he have much foigiven :
Wrong hath he had from slanderous tongue,
I, from his rebel kinsmen, wrong.
We would not to the vulgar crowd
Yield what they craved with clamor loud ;
Calmly we heard and judged his cause,
Our council aided and our laws.
1 stanched thy father's death-feud stern.
With stout De Vaux and gray Glencairn ;
And Bothwell's Lord henceforth we own
The friend and bulwark of our Throne.
But, lovely infidel, how now ?
What clouds thy misbelieving brow ?
Lord James of Douglas, lend thine aid ;
Thou must confirm this doubting maid."
Then forth the noble Douglas sprung.
And on his neck his daughter hung.
The Monarch drank, that happy hour.
The sweetest, holiest draught of Power, —
When it can say, the godlike voice.
Arise, sad Virtue, and rejoice !
Yet would not James the general eye
On nature's raptures long should pry :
He stepped between — " Nay, Douglas, nay.
Steal not my proselyte away !
The riddle't is my right to read.
That brought this happy chance to speed.
Yes, Eden, when disguised I stray
In life's more low but happier way,
T is under name which veils my power.
Nor falsely veils, — for Stirling's tower
Of yore the name of Snowdoun claims.
And Normans call me James Fitz-James.
Thus watch I o'er insulted laws.
Thus learn to right the injured cause."
Then, in a tone apart and low,
" Ah, little trait'ress ! none must know
What idle dream, what lighter thought.
What vanity full dearly bought.
Joined to thine eye's dark witchcraft, drew
My spell-bound steps to Benvenue,
In danger-ous hour, and all but gave
Thy Monarch's life to mountain glaive I "
Aloud he spoke, — " Thou still dost hold
That little talisman of gold.
Pledge of my faith, Fitz-James's ring ;
What seeks fair Ellen of the King ? "
Full well the eonscious maiden guessed.
He probed the weakness of her breast ;
650
POEMS OP ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
But with that consciousness there came
A lightening of her fears for Gi'iemc,
And more she deemed the monarch's ire
Kindled 'gainst him, who, for her sire,
Rebellious broadsword boldly drew ;
And, to her generous feeling true.
She craved the grace of Roderick Dhu.
" Forbear thy suit ; the King of kbigs
Alone can stay life's parting wings.
I know his heart, I know his hand.
Have shared his cheer, and proved his brand.
My fairest earldom would 1 give
To bid Clan-Alpine's Chieftain live I —
Hast thou no other boon to crave ?
No other captive friend to save ? "
Blushing, she turned her from the King,
And to the Douglas gave the ring.
As if she wished her sire to speak
The suit that stained her glowing cheek.
" Nay, then, my pledge has lost its force,
And stubborn justice holds her course.
Malcolm, come forth ! " — And, at the word,
Down knelt the Graeme to Scotland's Lord.
"For thee, rash youth, no suppliant sues.
From thee may Vengeance claim her dues.
Who, nurtured underneath our smile.
Hast paid our care by treacherous wile.
And sought, amid thy faithful clan,
A refuge for an outlawed man.
Dishonoring thus thy loyal name,—
Fetters and warder for the Graeme ! "
His chain of gold the King unstrung.
The links o'er Malcolm's neck he flung.
Then gently drew the glittering band.
And laid the clasp on Ellen's hand.
Sir Walter Scott.
NORVAL.
from the tragedy of " douglas," act 11. sc. i.
Lady Randolph. How fares my lord ?
Loud Randolph. That it fares well, thanks
to this gallant youth.
Whose valor saved me from a wretched death.
As down the winding dale I walked alone.
At the cross way four armed men attacked mc.
Rovers, I judge, from the licentious camp.
Who would have rjuickly laid Lord Randolph low.
Had not this brave and generous stranger come.
Like my good angel, in the hour of fate.
And, mocking danger, made my foes his own.
They turned upon him : but his active arm
Struck to the ground, from whence they rose no
more.
The flercest two ; the others fled amain.
And left him master of the bloody field.
Speak, Lady Randolph ; upon beauty's tongue
Dwell accents pleasing to the brave and bold.
Speak, noble dame, and thank him for thy lord.
Lady Ran. My lord, I cannot speak what
now I feel.
My heart o'erflows with gratitude to Heaven,
And to this noble youth, who, all unknown
To you and yours, delibeiuted not.
Nor paused at perU, but, humanely brave.
Fought on your side against such fearful odds.
Have you yet learnt of him whom we should
thank.
Whom call the savior of Lord Randolph's life ?
Lokd Ran. I asked that question, and he
answered not ;
But I must know who my deliverer is. {To the
Stranger. )
NoiiVAL. A low-born man, of parentage ob.
scure,
Who naught can boast but his desire to be
A soldier, and to gain a name in arms.
Loud Ran. Whoe'er thou art, thy spirit is
ennobled
By the great King of kings : thou art ordained
And stamped a hero by the sovereign hand
Of nature I Blush not, flower of modesty
As well as valor, to declare thy birth.
Nokv. My name is Nerval : on the Grampian
hills
My father feeds his flocks, — a frugal swain.
Whose constant cares were to increase his store.
And keep his only son, myself, at home.
For I had heard of battles, and I longed
To follow to the field some warlike lord ;
And Heaven soou granted what my sire denied.
This moon which rose last night, round as my
shield.
Had not yet filled her horns, wlien, by her light,
A band of fierce barbarians from the hills
Rushed like a torrent down upon the vale.
Sweeping our flocks and herds. The shepherds
fled
For safety and for succor. I alone.
With bended bow, and quiver full of arrows.
Hovered about the enemy, and marked
The road he took ; then hasted to my friends,
Whom, with a troop of fifty chosen men,
I met advancing. The pui-suit 1 led.
Till we d'ertook the spoil-encumbered foe.
We fought and conquered. Ere a sword was
drawn
An arrow from my bow had jiicrced their chief.
Who wore that day the arms which now 1 wear.
Returning home in triumph, I disdained
The shepherd's slothful life ; and having heard
That our good king had summoned his bold jeers
To lead their wairiors to the Carrón side,
I left my father's house, and took with mc
ADVENTURE.
A chosen servant to conduct my steps, —
Yon trembling coward, who foi-sook his master.
Journeying with this intent, I X'^^ssed these
towers.
And, Heaven-directed, came this day to do
The happy deed that gilds my humble name.
Louu Ran. He is as wise as brave : was ever
tale
With such a gallant modesty rehearsed ?
My brave deliverer ! thou shalt enter now
A nobler list ; and, in a monarch's sight.
Contend with i)rinccs for the prize of fame.
I will jwesent thee to our Scottish king.
Whose valiant spirit ever valor loved.
Ha ! my Matilda ! wherefore starts that tear ?
Lady Ran. 1 cannot say ; for various affec¬
tions.
And strangely mingled, in my bosom swell :
Yet each of them may well command a tear.
I joy that thou art safe ; and I admire
Him and his fortunes, who hath wrought thy
safety ;
Yea, as my mind predicts, with thine his own.
Obscure and friendless, he the army sought ;
Bent in>on peril, in the range of death
Resolved to hunt for fame, and witli his sword
To gain distinction which his birth «lenied.
In tins attempt unknown he might have perished.
And gained with all his valor but oblivion.
Now graced by thee, his virtue serves no more
Beneath despair. The soldier now of hope.
He stands conspicuous ; fame and great renown
Are brought within the comiiass of his sworci
On this my mind reflected, whilst you spoke.
And blessed the wonder-working hand of Heaven.
Loud Ran. Pious and grateful ever are thy
thoughts !
My deeds shall follow where thou xwint'st the way.
Next to myself, and equal to Glenalvon,
In honor and command shall Norval be.
Norv. I know not how to thank you : rude
I am
In speech and manners ; never till this hour
Stooil 1 in sucli a presence ; yet, my lord.
There's something in my breast which makes
me bold
To say that Norval ne'er will shame thy favor.
JOH.N HOME.
JORASSE.
FROM •' ITALV."
JoRASSE was in his three-and-twentieth year ;
Graceful and active as a stag just roused ;
Gentle withal, and x>leasant in his speech.
Yet seldom seen to smile. He had grown up
Among the hunters of the Higher Alxis ;
Had caught their starts and fits of thoughtful-
ness.
Their haggard looks, and strange soliloquies.
Arising (so say they that dwell below)
From frequent dealings with the Mountain-
Spirits.
But other ways had taught him better things ;
And now he numbered, marching by my side.
The great, the learnèd, that with him had crossed
The frozen tract, — with him familiarly
Through the rough day and rougher night con¬
versed
In many a chalet round the Peak of Terror,
Round Tacul, Tour, Well-horn, and Roseulau,
And her whose throne is inaccessible.
Who sits, withdrawn in virgin majesty.
Nor oft unveils. Anon an avalanche
Rolled its long thunder ; and a sudden crash,
Sharp and metallic, to the startled ear
Told that far down a continent of ice
Had burst in twain. But he had now begun ;
And with what transport he recalled the hour
When, to deserve, to win his blooming bride,
Madelaine of Annecy, to his feet he bound
The iron crampons, and, ascending, trod
The upper realms of frost ; then, by a cord
Let half-way down, entered a grot .star-bright.
And gathered from above, below, around.
The pointed crystals ! — Once, nor long before
(Thus did his tongue run on, fast as his foot.
And with an eloquence that Nature gives
To all her children, — breaking oil' by starts
Into the harsh and rude, oft as the mule
Drew his disjAeasure), — once, nor long before.
Alone at daybreak on the Mcttenberg,
He slipped, he fell ; and, through a fearful cleft
Gliding from ledge to ledge, from deex) to deepci'.
Went to the under-world ! Long while he lay
Upon his rugged bed, — then waked like one
Wishing to sleep again and slecqi forever I
For, looking round, he saw, or thought he saw.
Innumerable branches of a cave.
Winding beneath that solid crust of ice ;
With here and there a rent that showed the stars !
What then, alas ! was left him but to die ?
What else in those immeasurable chambers.
Strewn with the bones of miserable men.
Lost like himself? Yet must he wander on.
Till cold and hunger .set his spirit free !
And, rising, he began his dreary round ;
When hark ! the noise as of some mighty river
Working its way to light ! Back he withdrew.
But soon returned, and, fearless from de.spair.
Dashed down the dismal channel ; and all day.
If day could be where utter darkne.ss was,
Ti'avelled incessantly ; the craggy roof
Just overhead, and the impetuous waves.
fr-
652
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
■a
Nor broad nor deep, yet with a giant's strength,
Lashing him on. At last, as in a pool.
The water slept ; a pool sullen, profound.
Where if a billow chanced to heave and swell
It broke not ; and the r-oof, that long
Had threatened, suddenly descending, lay
Flat on the surface. Statue-like he stood.
His journey ended, when a ray divine
Shot through his soul. Breathing a prayer to her
Whose ears are never shut, the Blessed Virgin,
He plunged, he swain, — and in an instant rose.
The barrier passed, in sunshine ! Through a vale.
Such as in Arcady, where many a thatch
Gleams through the trees, half seen and half
embowered.
Glittering the river ran ; and on the bank
The young were dancing ("t was a festival-day)
All in their best attire. There first he saw
His Madelaine. In the crowd she stood to hear.
When all drew round, inquiring ; and her face.
Seen behind all, and varying, as he spoke.
With hope and fear and generous sympathy.
Subdued him. From that very hour he loved.
Samuel Rogers.
THE GLOVE AND THE LIONS.
King Frangís was a hearty king, and loved a
royal sport.
And one day, as his lions fought, sat looking on
the court.
The nobles filled the benches, with the ladies in
their pride.
And 'mongst them sat the Count de Lorge, with
one for whom he sighed :
And truly 'twas a gallant thing to see that crown¬
ing show.
Valor and love, and a king above, and the royal
beasts below.
Ramped and roared the lions, with horrid laugh¬
ing jaws ;
They bit, the}' glared, gave blows like beams, a
wind went with their paws ;
With wallowing might and stifled roar they rolled
on one another.
Till all the pit with sand and mane was in a
thunderous smother ;
The bloody foam above the bars came whisking
through the air ;
Said Francis then, "Faith, gentlemen, we're
better here than there."
De Lorge's love o'erheard the King, a beauteous
lively dame.
With smiling lips and sharp bright eyes, which
always seemed the same ;
She thought, the Count, my lover, is brave as
brave can be ;
He surely would do wondrous things to show his
love of me ; -
King, ladies, lovers, all look on ; the occasion is
divine ;
I '11 drop my glove, to piove his love ; gi-eat glory
will be mine.
She dropped her glove, to prove his love, then
looked at him and smiled ;
He bowed, and in a moment leaped among the
lions wild ;
The leap was quick, return was quick, he has
regained his place.
Then threw the glove, but not with love, right
in the lady's face.
"By Heaven," said Francis, "rightly done!"
and he rose from where he sat ;
"No love," quoth he, "but vanity, sets love a
task like that."
leigh hunt.
PRINCE ADEB,
In Sa^ia, 0,^in SaW God,\he Lord,
Was very kind ana merciful to me !
Forth from the Desert in my rags I came,
Weary and sore of foot. I saw the spires
And swelling bubbles of the golden domes
Rise through the trees of Sana, and my heart
Gr^v gi-eat within me with the strength of God ;
And I cried out, "Now shall I right myself, —
I, Adeb the despised, —for God is just ! "
There he whowronged myfather dwelt in peace,—
My warlike father, who, when gray hairs crept
Around his forehead, as on Lebanon
Tlie whitening snows of winter, was betrayed
To the sly Imam, and his tented wealth
Swept from him, 'twixt the roosting of the cock
And his first crowing, — in a single night :
And 1, poor Adeb, sole of all my race.
Smeared with myfather'sandmy kinsmen'sblood.
Fled through the Desert, till one day a tribe
Of hungry Bedouins found me in the sand.
Half mad with famine, and they took me up.
And made a slave of me, — of me, a prince !
All was fulfilled at last. I fled from them,
lu rags and sorrow. Nothing but my heart.
Like a strong swimmer, bore me up against
The howling sea of my adversity.
At length o'er Sana, in the act to swoop,
I stood like a young eagle on a crag.
The traveller passeil me with suspicious fear :
I asked for nothing ; I was not a thief.
The lean dogs snuHed around me : my lank bouea,
Fed on the berries and the crusted pools.
'S-
■EP
ADVENTURE.
+■
653
Were a scant morsel. Once a brown-skinned girl
Called mo a little from the common path,
And gave me figs and barley in a bag.
1 paid her with a kiss, with nothing more.
And she looked glad ; for I was beautiful.
And virgin as a fountain, and as cold.
I stretched her bounty, pecking like a bird
Her figs and barley, till ray strength returned.
So when rich Sana lay beneath ray eyes.
My foot was as the leopard's, and ray hand
As heavy as the lion's brandished paw ;
And underneath ray burnished skin the veins
And stretching ranscles played, at every step.
In wondrous motion. I was very strong.
I looked upon my body, as a bird
That bills his feathers ere he takes to flight, —
I, watching over Sana. Then I prayed ;
And on a soft stone, wetted in the brook,
Ground my long knife ; and then I prayed again.
God heard my voice, preparing all for rae.
As, softly stepping down the hills, I saw
The Imam's snmraer-palace all ablaze
In the last flash of sunset. Every fount
Was spouting fire, and all the orange-trees
Bore blazing coals, and from the marble walls
Aiidgildedspires and columns, strangely wrought.
Glared the red light, until ray eyes were pained
With the fierce splendor. Till the night grew
thick,
I lay within the bushes, next the door.
Still as a serpent, as-invisible.
The guard hung ronnd the portal. Man by man
They dropped away, save one lone sentinel.
And on his eyes God's finger lightly fell ;
He slept half standing. Like a summer wind
That threads the grove, yet never turns a leaf,
I stole from shadow unto shadow forth ;
Crossed all the marble court-yard, swung the door,
Like a soft gust, a little way ajar, —
My body's narrow width, no more, — and stood
Beneath the cresset in the painted hall.
• I marvelled at the riches of ray foe ;
I marvelled at God's ways with wicked men.
Then I reached forth, and took God's waiting
hand :
And so he led me over mossy floors,
Flowered with the silken summer of Shiraz,
Straight to the Imam's chamber. At the door
Stretched a brawn eunueh, blacker than my eyes:
His woolly head lay like the Kaba-stono
In Mecca's mosque, as silent and as huge.
I stepped across it, with my pointed knife
Just missing a full vein along his neck.
And, pnshing by the cnrtains, there I was, —
I, Adeb the despised, — upon the spot
That, next to heaven, I longed for most of all.
I could have shouted for the joy in me.
Fierce pangs and flashes of bewildering light
Leaped through my brain and danced before my
eyes.
So loud my heart beat, that I feared its sound
Would wake the sleeper ; and the bubbling blood
Choked in my throat till, weaker than a child,
I reeled against a column, and there hung
In a blind stupor. Then I prayed again :
And, sense by sense, I was made whole once more.
I touched myself ; I was the same ; I knew
Myself to be lone Adeb, young and strong.
With nothing but a stride of empty air
Between me and God's jnstice. In a sleep.
Thick with the fnraes of the accui-sèd grape,
Sprawled the false Imam. On his shaggy breast.
Like a white lily heaving on the tide
Of some foul stream, the fairest woman slept
These roving eyes have ever looked upon.
Almost a child, her bosom barely showed
The change beyond her girlhood. All her charms
Were budding, but half opened ; for I saw
Not only beauty wondrous in itself.
But possibility of more to be
In the full process of her blooming da3''3.
I gazed upon her, and my heart grew soft.
As a parched pasture with the dew of heaven.
While thus I gazed she smiled, and slowly raised
The long curve of her lashes ; and we looked
Each upon each in wonder, not alarm, —
Not eye to eye, but soul to soul, we held
Each other for a moment. , All her life
Seemed centred in the circle of her eyes.
She stirred no limb ; her long-di-awn, equal breath
Swelled out and ebbed away beneath her breast.
In calm unbroken. Not a sign of fear
Touched the faint color on her oval cheek.
Or pinched the arches of her tender mouth.
She took me for a vision, and she lay
With her sleep's smile unaltered, as in doubt
Whether real life had stolen into her dreams,
Or dreaming stretched into her outer life.
I was not graceless to a woman's eyes.
The girls of Damar paused to see me pass,
I walking in my r.ags, yet beautiful.
One maiden said, He has a prince's air ! "
I am a prince ; the air was all my own.
So thought the lily on the Imam's breast ;
And lightly as a summer mist, that lifts
Before the morning, so she floated up.
Without a sound or rustle of a robe.
From her coarse pillow, and before me stood
With asking eyes. The Imam never moved.
A stride and blow were all my need, and they
Were wholly in my power. I took her hand,
I held a warning finger to my lips,
And whispered in her small, expectant ear,
"Adeb, the son of Akem ! " She replied
654
POEMS OP ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
In a low murmur whose bewildering sound
Almost lulled wakeful me to sleep, and sealed
The sleeper's lids in tenfold slumber, " Prince,
Lord of the Imam's life and of my heart.
Take all thou seest, — it is thy right, I know, —
But spare the Imam for thy own soul's sake ! "
Then 1 an'ayed me in a robe of state.
Shining with gold and jewels ; and I bound
In my long turban gems that might have bought
The lands 'twi.xt Babelmandeb and Sahan.
I girt about me, with a blazing belt,
A scimitar o'er which the sweating smiths
In far Damascus hammered for long years.
Whoso hilt and scabbard shot a trembling light
From diamonds and rubies. And she smiled.
As piece by piece 1 put the treasures on,
To see me look so fair, — in pride she smiled.
I hung long purses at my side. I scooped,
From off a table, figs and dates and lice,
And bound them to my girdle in a sack
Then over all I flung a snowy cloak.
And beckoned to the maiden. So she stole
Forth like my shadow, past the sleeping wolf
Who wronged my father, o'er the woolly head
Of the swart eunuch, down the painted court.
And by the sentinel who standing slept.
Strongly against the portal, through my rags, —
My old base rags,—and through the maiden's veil,
I pressed my knife, — upon the wooden hilt
Was " Adeb, son of Akem," carved by me
In my long slavehood, — as a passing sign
To wait the Imam's waking. Shadows cast
From two high-sailing clouds upon the sand
Passed not more noiseless than we two, as one.
Glided beneath the moonlight, till I smelt
The fragrance of the stables. As I slid
The wide doors open, with a sudden bound
Uprose the startleil horees : but they stood
Still as the man who in a foreign land
Hears his strange language, when my Desert call.
As low and plaintive as the nested dove's.
E'en on their listening ears. From stall to stall.
Feeling the horses with my groping hands,
I crept in darkness ; and at length 1 came
Upon two sister mares whose rounded sides.
Fine muzzles, and small heads, and pointed ears.
And foreheads spreading'twixt their eyelids wide.
Long slender tails, thin manes, and coats of silk.
Told me, that, of the hundred steeds there stalled.
My hand was on the treasures. O'er and o'er
I felt theii' bony joints, and down their legs
To the.cool hoofs ; — no blemish anywhere :
These I led forth and saddled. Upon one
I set the lily, gathered now for me, —
My own, henceforth, forever. So we rode
Across the grass, beside the stony path.
Until we gained the highway that is lost,
Leading from Sana, in the eastern sands :
When, with a cry that both the desert-born
Knew without hint from whip or goading spur.
We dashed into a gallop. Far behind
In sparks and smoke the dusty highway rose ;
And ever on the maiden's face I saw.
When the moon flashed upon it, the strange smile
It wore on waking. Once I kissed her mouth.
When she grew weary, and her strength retumed.
All through thenightwe scoured between thehills;
The moon went down behind us, and the stars
Dropped after her ; but long before I saw
A planet blazing straight against our eyes.
The road had softened, and the shadowy hills
Had flattened out, and I coirld hear the hiss
Of sand spumed backward by the flying mares.
Glory to God ! I was at home again !
The. sun rose on us ; far and near I saw
The level Desert ; sky met sand all round.
We paused at midday by a palm-crowned well.
And ate and slumbered. Somewhat, too, was said :
The words have slipped my memory. That
same eve
We rode sedately through a Hamoum camp, —
I, Adeb, prince amongst them, and my bride.
And ever since amongst them I have ridden,
A head and shoulders taller than the best ;
And ever since my days have been of gold.
My nights have been of silver, — God is just !
George Henry Borer.
HELVELLYN.
[In the sprin;? of 1805, a youn^ $^ntleman of talents, and of a
most amiable disposition, perished by losing his w.ny on the moun¬
tain Helvellyn. His remains were not discovered till three months
afterwards, when they were found guarded by a faithful terrier, hi«
constant attendant during frequent solitary ronibies through the
wilds of Cumberland and Westmoreland, j
I CLIMBED the dark brow of the mighty Hel-
vellyn,
Lakes and mountains beneath me gleamed
misty and wide ;
All was still, save, by fits, when the eagle was
yelling.
And starting around me the echoes replied.
On the right, Striden Edge round the Red Tarn
was bending.
And Catchedicam its left verge was defending.
One huge nameless rock in the front was ascend¬
ing.
When I marked the sad spot where the wan¬
derer had died.
Dark green was that spot mid the brown moun¬
tain heather.
Where the Pilgrim of Nature lay stretched in
decay,
r
ADVENTURE.
Goo
Like the corpse of an outcast abandoned to
weather,
Till the mountain winds wasted the tenantless
clay ;
Not yet quite deserted, though lonely extended.
For, faithful in death, his mute favorite attended.
The much-loved remains of her master defended.
And chased the hill-fox- and the raven away.
How long.didst thovL ihink thatjiis silençe was
slumber ?
When the wind waved his garment, how oft
didst thou start ?
How many long days and long nights didst thou
number
Ere he faded before thee, the friend of thy
heart ?
And, 0, was it meet that — no requiem read o'er
him.
No mother to weep, and no friend to deplore him.
And thou, little guardian, alone stretched before
him —
Unhonorcd the Pilgrim from life should de¬
part ?
AVhen a prince to the fate of the peasant has
yielded.
The tapestry waves dark round the dim-
lighted hall.
With 'scutcheons of silver the coffin is shielded.
And pages stand mute by the canopied pall :
Through the courts, at deep midnight, the
torches are gleaming ;
In the proudly arched chapel the banners are
beaming ;
Far adown the long aisle sacred music is stream¬
ing.
Lamenting a Chief of the People should fall.
But meeter for thee, gentle lover of nature,
To lay down thy head like the meek mountain
lamb,
When, wildered, he drops from some cliff huge
in stature.
And draws his last sob by the side of his dam.
And more stately thy couch by this desert lake
lying.
Thy obsequies sung by the gray plover flying.
With one faithful friend but to witness thy dying.
In the arms of Helvellyn and Catchedicam.
Sir Walter Scott.
FITZ-JAMES AND RODERICK DHU. ,
from "the ladv of the lake," canto v.
" I AM by promise tied
To match me with this man of pride :
Twice have I sought Clan-Alpine's glen
In peace ; but when 1 come again,
I come with banner, brand, and bow.
As leader seeks his mortal foe.
For lovelorn swain, in lady's bower.
Ne'er panted for the appointed hour.
As I, until before me stand
This rebel Chieftain and his band."
" Have, then, thy wish ! "— He whistled shrill.
And he was answered from the hill ;
Wild as the scream of the curlew.
From crag to crag the signal Hew.
Instant, through copse and heath, arose
Bonnets and spears and bended bows ;
On right, on left, above, below.
Sprung up .at once the lurking foe ;
From shingles gray their lances start.
The bracken bush sends forth the dart.
The rushes and the willow-wand
Are bristling into axe and brand.
And every tuft of broom gives life
To plaided warrior ai-med for strife. .
That whistle garrisoned the glen
At once with full five hundred men.
As if the yawning hill to heaven
A subterranean host had given.
Watching their leader's beck and will.
All silent there they stood, and still.
Like the loose crags whose threatening mass
Lay tottering o'er the hollow pass.
As if au infant's touch could urge
Their headlong passage down the verge,
With step and weapon forward flung.
Upon the mountain-side they hung.
The Mountaineer cast glance of pride
Along Benledi's living side.
Then fixed his eye and sable brow
Full on Fitz-James : " Plow say'st thou now ? ■
Tliese are Clan-Alpine's warriors true ;
And, Saxon, — I am Roderick Dhu ! "
Fitz-James was brave ; — though to his heart
The life-blood thrilled with sudden start.
He manned himself with dauntless air.
Returned the Chief his haughty stare.
His back against a rock he bore.
And firmly jilaced his foot before : —
"Come one, come all ! this rock shall fly
From its firm base as soon as I."
Sir Roderick marked, — and in his eyes
Respect was mingled with surprise.
And the stern joy which warriors feel
In foemen worthy of their steel.
Short space he stood, — then waved his hand :
Down sunk the disappearing band ;
Each warrior vanished where he stood.
In broom or bracken, heath or wood :
Sunk brand and spear, and bended bow.
In osiers pale and copses low :
C5G.
POEMS OP ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
It seemed as if their mother Earth
Had swallowed up her warlike birth.
The wind's last breath liad tossed in air
Pennon and [ilaid and plumage fair, —
The next but swept a lone hillside,
Where heath and fern were waving wide ;
Tlie sun's last glance >vas glinted back.
From spear and glaive, from targe and jack, —
The next, all unreflected, shone
On bracken gi-een, and cold gray stone.
Fitz-James looked round, — yet scarce believed
The witness that his sight received ;
Such apparition well might seem
Delusion of a dreadful dream.
Sir Roderick in suspense he eyed.
And to his look the Chief replied ;
" Fear naught — nay, that I need not say —
But — doubt not aught from mine array.
Thou art my guest ; — I pledged my word
As far as Coilantogle ford :
Nor would I call a clansman's brand
For aid against one valiant hand.
Though on our strife lay every vale
Rent by the Saxon from the Gael.
So move we on ; — 1 only meant
To show the reed on which you leant,
Deeming this path you might pursue
Without a pass from Roderick Dhu."
They moved ; — I said Fitz-James was brave.
As ever knight that belted glaive ;
Yet dare not say that now his blootl
Kept on its wont and tempered flood.
As, following Roderick's stride, he drew
That seeming lonesome pathway through.
Which yet, by fearful proof, was rife
With lances, that, to take his life.
Waited but signal from a guide.
So late dishonored and defied.
Ever, by stealth, his eye sought, round
The vanished guardians of the ground.
And still, from copse and heather deep.
Fancy saw spear and broadsword peep.
And in the plover's shrilly strain
The signal whistle heard again.
Nor breathed ho free till far behind
The pass was left ; for then they wind
Along a wide and level green.
Where neither tree nor tuft was seen.
Nor rush nor bush of broom was near.
To hide a bonnet or a spear.
The Chief in silence strode before.
And reached that torrent's sounding shore.
Which, daughter of three mighty lakes.
From Vennachar in silver breaks.
Sweeps through the plain, and ceaseless mines
On Bochastle the mouldering lines.
Where Rome, the Empress of the woild,
Of yore her eagle wings unfurled.
And here his course the Chieftain stayed.
Threw down his target and his jilaid,
And to the Lowland wanior said :
" Bold Saxon ! to his promise just,
Vich-Alpine has discharged his trust.
This murderous Chief,- this ruthless man.
This head of a rebellious clan.
Hath led thee safe through watch and ward,
Far past Clan-Alpine's outmost guard.
Now, man to man, and steel to steel,
A Chieftain's vengeance thou shalt feel.
See, here, all vantageless I stand.
Armed, like thyself, with single brand ;
For this is Coilantogle ford,
And thou must keep thee with thy sword."
The Saxon paused : " I ne'er delayed.
When foeman bade me draw my blade ;
Nay more, brave Chief, 1 vowed thy death :
Yet sure thy fair and generous faith.
And my deep debt for life preserved,
A better meed have well deseired :
Can naught but blood our feud atone ?
Are there no means ? " " No, Stranger, none
And hear, — to fire thy flagging zeal, —
The Saxon cause rests on thy steel ;
For thus spoke Fate, by prophet bred
Between the living and the dead :
' Who spills the foremost foemaa's life.
His party conquers in the strife.' "
" Then, by my word," the Saxon said,
" The riddle is already read.
Seek yonder brake beneath the clilf, —
There lies Red Murdoch, stark and stiff.
Thus Fate hath solved her prophecy,
Then yield to Fate, and not to me.
To James, at Stirling, let us go.
When, if thou wilt be still his foe.
Or if the King shall not agrco
To gi'ant thee grace and favor free,
1 plight mine honor, oath, and word.
That, to thy native strengths restoml,
With each advantage shalt thou stand,
That aids thee now to guard thy land. "
Dark lightning flashed from Roderick's eye :
" Soars thy presumption, then, so high,
Because a wretched kern ye slew.
Homage to name to Roderick Dhu ?
He yields not, he, to man nor fate !
Thou add'st but fuel to my hate : —
My clansman's blood demands revenge.
Not yet prepared ? — By Heaven, 1 change
My thought, and hold thy valor light
As that of some vain carpet knight.
AÜVENTLRE.
657
Who ill deserved my coui-teous care,
And whose best boast is but to wear
A braid of his fair lady's hair."
"I thank thee, Roderiek, for the word !
It nerves my heart, it steels my sword ;
For I have sworn this braid to stain
In the best blood that warms thy vein.
Now, truce, farewell ! and ruth, begone ! —
Yet think not that by thee alone.
Proud Chief ! can courtesy be shown ;
Though not from copstf, or heath, or cairn.
Start at my whistle clansmen stern.
Of this small horn one feeble blast
Would fearful odds against thee cast.
But fear not — doubt not — which thou wilt —
We try this quarrel hilt to hilt."
Then each at once his falchion drew.
Each on the ground his scabbard threw.
Each looked to sun and stream and plain.
As what they ne'er might see again ;
Then, foot and point and eye opposed.
In dubious strife they darkly closed.
Ill fared it then with Roderick Dhu,
That on the field his targe he threw.
Whose brazen studs and tough bull-hide
Had death so often dashed aside ;
For, trained abroad his arms to wield,
Fitz-James's blade was sword and shield.
He practised every pass and ward.
To thrust, to strike, to feint, to guard ;
While less expert, though stronger far.
The Gael maintained unequal war.
Three times in closing strife they stood.
And thrice the Saxon blade drank blood :
No stinted draught, no scanty tide.
The gushing floods the tartans dyed.
Fierce Roderick felt the fatal drain.
And showered his blows like wintry rain ;
And, as firm rock or castle-roof
Against the winter shower is proof.
The foe, invulnerable still.
Foiled his wild rage by steady skill ;
Till, at advantage ta'en, his brand
Forced Roderick's weapon from his hand.
And, backwards borne upon the lea.
Brought the proud Chieftain to his knee.
"Now yield thee, or, by Him who made
The world, thy heart's blood dyes my blade ! "
" Thy threats, thy mercy, 1 defy !
Let lecreant yield, who fears to die."
Like adder darting from his coil.
Like wolf that dashes through the toil.
Like mountain-cat who guards her young.
Full at Fitz-James's throat he sprung ;
Received, but recked not of a wound.
And locked his arms his foeman round.
Now, gallant Saxon, hold thine own !
No maiden's hand is lomul thee thrown !
That desperate giasp thy frame might feel
Through bars of brass and triide steel !
They tug, they strain ! down, down they go.
The Gael above, Fitz-James below.
The chieftain's gripe his throat comjiressed.
His knee was planted in his breast ;
His clotted locks he backward threw.
Across his brow his hand he drew.
From blood aiid mist to clear his sight.
Then gleamed aloft his dagger bright !
But hate and fnry ill supplied
The stream of life's exhausted tide.
And all too late the advantage came.
To turn the odds of deadly game ;
For, while the dagger gleamed on high.
Reeled soul and sense, reeled brain and eye.
Down came the blow ! but in the heath
The eiTing blade found bloodless sheath.
The struggling foe may norv unclasp
The fainting ChieTs relaxing grasp ;
Unwounded from the dreadful close.
But breathless all, Fitz-James arose.
He faltered thanks to Heaven for life.
Redeemed, unhoped, from desperate strife ;
Next on his foe his look he cast.
Whose every gasp appeared his last ;
In Roderick's gore he dipped the braid, —
"Poor Blanche ! thy wrongs are dearly paid :
Yet with thy foe must die, or live.
The praise that faith and valor give."
With that he blew a bugle note,
Undid the collar from his throat,
Unbonneted, and by the wave
Sat down his brow and hands to lave.
Then faint afar are heard the feet
Of rushing steeds in gallop fleet ;
The sounds increase, and now are seen
Four mounted squires in Lincoln green ;
Two who bear lance, and two who lead.
By loosened rein, a saddled steed ;
Each onward held his headlong course.
And by Fitz-James reined up his horse, —
Wilh wonder viewed the bloody spot, —
" Exclaim not, gallants ! question not, —
You, Herbert and Luffness, alight.
And bind the wounds of yonder knight ;
Let the gray palfrey bear his weight.
We destined for a fairer freight.
And bring him on to Stirling straight ;
I will before at better speed.
To seek fresh horse and fitting weed.
The sun rides high ; — I must be boune
To see the archer-game at noon ;
But lightly Bayard clears the lea.
De Vaux and Herries, follow me."
Sir Walter Scott.
058
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
RURAL
WAKEN, LORDS AND LADIES GAY.
Waken, lords and ladies gay.
On the mountain dawns the day ;
All the jolly chase is here.
With hawk and horse and huntiug-spear !
Hounds are in their couples yelling,
Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling.
Merrily, merrily mingle they,
" Waken, lords and ladies gay."
Waken, lords and ladies gay.
The mist has left the mountain gra.}',
Springlets in the dawn are steaming.
Diamonds on the brake are gleaming.
And foresters have busy been
To track the buck in thicket green ;
Now we come to chant our lay,
"Waken, lords and ladies gay."
Waken, lords and ladies gaj'.
To the greenwood haste away ;
We can show you where he lies.
Fleet of foot and tall of size ;
We can show the marks he made
When 'gainst the oak his antlers frayed ;
You shall see him brought to bay ;
Waken, lords and ladies gay.
Louder, louder chant the lay.
Waken, lords and ladies gay !
Tell them, youth and mirth and glee
Run a coui-se as well as we ;
Time, stem huntsman, who can balk.
Stanch as hound and Reet as hawk ?
Think of this, and rise with day.
Gentle lords and ladies gay !
sir Walter Scott.
—*
THE STAG HUNT.
from "the lady of the lake." canto i.
The stag at eve had drunk his fill.
Where danced the moon on Monan's riU,
And deep his midnight lair had made
In lone Glenartney's hazel shade ;
But, when the sun his beacon red
Had kindled on Benvoirlioh's head,
The deep-mouthed bloodhound's heavy bay
Resounded up the rocky way.
And faint, from faither distance home,
Weie heard the clanging hoof and horn.
SPORTS.
As Chief who hears his warder call,
" To arms ! the foemen stoim the wall,"
The antlered monarch of the waste
Sprung from his heathery couch in haste.
But, ere his fleet careerhe took.
The dew-drops from his flanks he shook ;
Like ciested leader proud and high
Tossed his beamed frontlet to the sky ;
A moment gazed adown the dale,
A moment snuffed the tainted gale,
A moment listened to the cry.
That thickened as the chase drew nigli ;
Then, as the headmost foes appeared.
With one brave bound the copse he cleared.
And, stretching forward free and far.
Sought the wild heaths of Uam-Var.
YeUed on the view the opening pack ;
Rock, glen, and cavern paid them back ;
To many a mingled sound at once
The awakened mountain gave response.
A hundred dogs bayed deep and strong.
Clattered a hundi-ed steeds along.
Their peal the meny horns rung out,
A hundred voices joined the shout ;
With hark and whoop and wild halloo.
No rest Benvoirlich's echoes knew.
Far from the tumult fled the roe ;
Close in her covert cowered the doe ;
The falcon, from her caim on high.
Cast on the rout a wondering eye.
Till far beyond her piercing ken
The hurricane had swept the glen.
Faint, and more faint, its failing din
Returned fi-om cavern, cliff, and linn.
And silence settled, wide and still.
On the lone wood and mighty hill.
'T were long to tell what steeds gave o'er.
As swept the hunt through Cambus-more ;
What reins were tightened in despair.
When rose Benledi's ridge in air ;
Who flagged upon Bochastle's heath.
Who shunned to stem the flooded Teith,
For twice that day, from shore to shore.
The gallant stag swam stoutly o'er.
Few were the stra^lers, following fer.
That reached the lake of Vennach.ar ;
And when the Brigg of Turk was won.
The headmost horseman rode alone.
Alone, but with unbated zeal.
That horseman plied the scourge and steel
RURAL
SPORTS.
G59
For, jaded now, and spent with toil,
Embossed with foam, and dark with soil.
While every gasp with sobs he drew.
The laboring stag strained full in view.
Two dogs of black St. Hubert's breed.
Unmatched for coui-age, breath, and speed.
Fast on his flying traces came.
And all but won that desperate game ;
For, scarce a spear's length from his haunch,
Vindictive toiled the bloodhounds stanch ;
Nor nearer might the dogs attain.
Nor farther might the quarry straiu.
Thus up the ntargin of the lake.
Between the precipice and brake.
O'er stock and rock theii' race they take.
The hunter marked that mountain high.
The lone lake's western boundaiy.
And deemed the stag must turn to bay,
Where that huge rampart barred the way ;
Already glorying in the prize.
Measured his antlers with his eyes ;
For the death-wound and death-halloo
Mustered his breath, his whiuyard drew ;
But thundering as he came prepared.
With ready arm and weapon bared.
The wily quarry shunned the shock.
And turned him from the opposing rock ;
Then, dashing down a darksome glen.
Soon lost to hound and hunter's ken.
In the deep Trosachs' wildest nook
His solitary refuge took.
There while, close couched, the thicket shed
Cold dews and wild-flowers on his head.
He heard the baffled dogs in vain
Rave through the hollow pass amain.
Chiding the rocks that yelled again.
Close on the hounds the hunter eame,
To cheer them on the vanished game ;
But, stumbling in the rugged dell.
The gallant horse exhausted fell.
The impatient rider strove in vain
To rouse him with the spur and rein.
For the good steed, his labors o'er.
Stretched his stiff limbs, to rise no more ;
Then, touched with pity and remorse.
He sorrowed o'er the expiring horse :
"I little thought, when first thy rein
I slacked upon the banks of Seine,
That Highland eagle e'er should feed
On thy fleet limbs, my matchless steed !
Woe worth the chase, woe worth the day.
That costs thy life, my gallant gray ! "
Then through the dell his horn resounds.
From vain pursuit to call the hounds.
Back limped, with slow and crippled pace.
The sulky leadei-s of the chase ;
Close to their master's side they pressed.
With drooping tail and humbled crest ;
But still the dingle's hollow throat
Prolonged the swelling bugle-note.
The owlets started from their dream,
The eagles answered with their scream.
Round aud around the souuds were cast.
Till echo seemed an answering blast ;
And on the hunter hied his way.
To join some comrades of the day ;
Yet often paused, so strange the road.
So wondrous were the scenes it showed.
Sir walier Scott.
MY HEART'S IN THE HIGHLANDS.
My heart/s in the Higlilands, my heart/is not
hc/c ; ' /
My heart's iu the Highlands a-chasing the deer ;
Chasing the wild deer, and following the roe.
My heart's iu the Highlands wherever 1 go.
Farewell to the Highlands, farewell to the North,
The birthplace of valor, the country of worth ;
Wherever I wander, wherever I rove.
The hills of the Highlands forever I love.
Farewell to the mountains high covered with
snow ;
Farewell to the straths and green valleys below ;
Farewell to the forests and wild-hanging woods ;
Farewell to the ton-ents and loud-pouring Hoods.
My heart's in the Highlands, my heart is not
here ;
My heart's iu the Highlands a-chasing the deer
Chasing the wild deer, and following the roe,
My heart's in the Highlands wherever I go.
roeert bur.\&
THE STAG HUNT.
from "the seasons: autumn."
The stag too, singled from the herd where long
He ranged, the branching monarch of the shades,
Before the tempest drives. At first, in sjjeed
He, sprightly, puts his faith ; aud, roused by
fear.
Gives all his swill aerial soul to flight.
Against the breeze he darts, that way the more
To leave the lessening murderous eiy behind :
Deeeption short ! though fleeter than the winds
Blown o'er the keen-aired mountain by the north.
He bur-sts the thickets, glances through the
glades.
And plunges deep into the wildest wood, —
fl-
660
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
If slow, yet sure, adhesive to the track
Hot-steaming, up behind him come again
The inhuman rout, and from the shady depth
Expel liim, circling through his cveiy shift.
He sweeps the forest oft ; and sobbing sees
The glades, mild opening to the golden day.
Where, in kind contest, with his butting friends
He wont to struggle, or his loves enjoy.
Oft in the full-descending flood he tries
To lose the scent, and lave his burning sides ;
Oft seeks the herd ; the watchful herd, alarmed.
With selfish care avoid a brother's woe.
What .shall he do ? His once so vivid nerves.
So full of buoyant spirit, now no more
Inspire the course ; but fainting breathless toil.
Sick, seires on his heart : he stands at bay ;
And jiuts his last weak refuge in despair.
The big round tears run down his dappled face ;
He groans in anguish ; while the gi'owling pack.
Blood-happy, hang at his fair jutting chest.
And mark his beauteous checkered sides with gore.
JA.mes Thomson.
HART-LEAP WELL.
"Hart«Leap Well is a small spring of water about five miles
from Richmond in Vorkshire, and near the side of the road that
leads from Riclmiond to Askrigg. Its name is derived from a
remarkable chase, the memory of which is preserved by the monu-
incnts spoken of in the second part of the following poem, which
monuments do now exist fiSooJ as 1 have there described them." —
the Author.
part first.
The knight had ridden down from Wensley
Moor,
With the slow motion of a summer's cloud ;
And now, as he approached a vas.saTs door,
" Bring forth another horse ! " ho cried aloud.
"Another horse ! "—That shout the vassal heard.
And saddled his best steed, a comely gray ;
Sir Walter mounted him ; he was the third
Which he had mounted on that glorious day.
Joy sparkled in the prancing courser's eyes ;
The hoi-se and horseman are a hapjjy pair ;
But, though Sir AValter like a falcon flies.
There is a doleful silence in the air.
A rout this morning left Sir Walter's hall.
That as they galloped made thcf echoes roar ;
But horse and man are vanished, one and all ;
Such mce, I tliink, was never seen before.
Sir Walter, restless as the veering wind.
Calls to the few tired dogs that yet remain :
Blanche, Swift, and Music, noblest of their kind.
Follow, and up the weary mountain strain.
The knight hallooed, he cheered and chid them on
With sujipliant gestures and upbraidings stern ;
But breath and eyesight fail ; and, one by one.
The dogs are stretched among the mountain fern.
Where is the throng, the tumult of the race ?
The bugles that so joyfully were blown ?
— This chase it looks not like an earthly chase ;
Sir Walter and the hart are left alone.
The poor hart toils along the mountain-side ;
1 will not stop to tell how far he fled.
Nor will 1 mention by what death he died ;
But now the knight beholds him lying dead.
Dismounting, then, he leaned against a thorn ;
He had no follower, dog, nor man, nor boy :
He neither cracked his whip, nor blew his horn,
But gazed upon the spoil with silent joy.
Close to the thorn on which Sir Walter leaned
Stood his dumb partner in this glorious feat ;
Weak as a lamb the hour that it is yeaned.
And white with foam as if with cleaving sleet.
Upon his side the hart was lying stretched :
His nostril touched a spring beneath a hill.
And with the last deep gi-oan his breath had
fetched
The waters of the spring were trembling still.
And now, too happy for repose or rest,
(Never had living man such joyful lot !)
Sir Walter walked all round, north, south, and
west.
And gazed and gazed upon that darling spot.
And climbing up the hill (it was at least
Four roods of sheer ascent). Sir Walter found
Three several hoof-marks which the hunted beast
Had left imprinted on the grassy ground.
Sir Walter wiped his face, and cried, "Till now
Such sight was never seen by human eyes :
Three leaps have borne him from this lofty brow,
Down to the very fountain where he lies.
"I '11 build a pleasure-house upon this spot.
And a small arbor, made for rural joy ;
'T will bo the traveller's shed, the pilgrim's cot,
A place of love for damsels that are coy.
" A cunning artist will 1 have to frame
A basin for that fountiiiu in the dell !
And they who do make mention of the same.
From this day forth, shall call it Hart-Leap WelL
"And, gallant stag ! to make thy praises known,
.Another monument sliall hem be raised ;
RURAL SPORTS.
661
Three several pillars, each a rough-hewn stone,
And planted where thy hoofs the turf have grae.ed.
"And in the summer-time, when days are long,
I will come hither with my paramour ;
And with the dancers and the minstrel's song
We will make merry in that pleasant bower.
"Till the foundations of the mountains fail
My mansion with its arbor shall endure ; —
The joy of them who till the fields of Swale,
And them who dwell among the woods of Ure ! "
Then home he went, and left the hart, stone-dead.
With breathless nostrils stretched above the
spring.
— Soon did the knight perform what he had said.
And far and wide the fame thereof did ring.
Ere thrice the moon into her port had steered,
A cup of stone received the living well ;
Three pillars of r-ude .stone Sir Walter roared.
And built a house of pleasure in the dell.
And near the fountain, flowers of stature tall
With trailing plants and trees were intertwined, —
Which soon composed a little .sylvan hall,
A leafy shelter from the sun and wind.
And thither, when the summer days were long,
Sir Walter led his wondering paramour ;
And with the dancers and the minstrel's song
Made merriment within that pleasant bower.
The knight. Sir Walter, died in course of time.
And his bones lie in his paternal vale. —
But there is matter for a second rhyme.
And I to this would add another tale.
part second.
The moving accident is not my trade ;
To freeze the blood I have no ready arts ;
'T is my delight, alone in summer shade,
To pipe a simple song for thinking hearts.
As I from Hawes to Richmond did repair.
It chanced that I saw standing in a dell
Three aspens at three corners of a scpiare ;
And one, not four yards distant, near a well.
What this imported I could ill divine ;
And, pulling now the rein my horse to stop,
1 saw three pillars standing in a line, —
The hast stone pillar on a dark hill-top.
The trees were gray, with neither arms nor head ;
Half wasted the sipiare mound of tawny green ;
So that you just might say, as then I said,
" Here iu old time the hand of man hath been."
I looked upon the hill both far and near, —
More doleful place did never eye suiwey ;
It seemed as if the spring-time came not here.
And nature here were willing^to decay.
I stood in various thoughts and fancies lost.
When one, who was in shepherd's garb attired.
Came up the hollow ; — him did I accost.
And what this place might be I then inquired.
The shepherd stopped, and that same story told
Which in my former rhyme I have rehearsed.
" A jolly place," said he, "in times of old !
But something ails it now ; the spot is curst.
"You see these lifeless stumps of aspen-wood, —
Some say that they are beeches, others elms, —
These were the bower ; and here a mansion stood.
The finest palace of a hundred realms !
" The arbor does its own condition tell ;
You see the stones, the fountain, and the stream ;
But as to the great lodge ! you might as well
Hunt half a day for a forgotten dream.
"There's neither dog nor heifer, horse nor sheep.
Will wet his lips within that cup of stone ;
And oftentimes, when all are fast asleep.
This water doth send forth a dolorous groan.
" Some say that here a murder has been done.
And blood cries out for blood ; but, for my part,
I've guessed, when I've been sitting in the sun,
That it was all for that unhappy hart.
" What thoughts must through the creature's
brain have past !
Even from the topmost stone, upon the steep.
Are but three bounds, — and look, sir, at this last !
0 master ! it has been a cruel leap.
"For thirteen hours he ran a desperate race ;
And in my simple mind we cannot tell
What cause the hart might have to lo\'e this place.
And come and make his death-bed near the well,
" Here on the grass perhaps asleep he sank.
Lulled by the fountain iu the summer-tide ;
This water was perhaps the first he drank
When he had wandered from his mother's side.
" In April here beneath the flowering thorn
He heard the birds their morning carols sing ;
And he, perhaps, for aught we know, was bom
Not half a furlong from that self-same spring.
"Now, here is neither grass nor pleasant shade ;
The sun on drearier hollow never shone ;
So will it be, as I have often said.
Till trees, and stones, and fountain, all aie gone."
..-pp
662 POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
" Gray-headed shepherd, thou hast spoken well ;
Small difference lies between thy creed and mine ;
This beast not unobserved by nature fell ;
His death was mourned by sympathy divine.
" The Being, that is in the clouds and air.
That is in the green leaves among the gi'ovcs,
Maintains a deep and reverential care
For the unoffending creatures whom he loves.
" The pleasure-house is dust ; behind, before.
This is no common waste, no common gloom ;
But Nature, in due course of time, once more
Shall here put on her beauty and her bloom.
"She leaves these objects to a slow decay,
That what we arc, and have been, may be known ;
But at the coming of the milder day
These monuments shall all be overgi-own.
"One lesson, shepherd, let us two divide,
Taught both by what she shows and what con¬
ceals ;
Never to blend our pleasure or our pride
With sorrow of the meanest thing that feels."
William Wordsworth.
BETH GÊLERT.
The spearmen heard the bugle sound.
And cheerily smiled the morn ;
And many a brach, and many a hound.
Obeyed Llewellyn's horn.
And still he blew a louder blast.
And gave a lustier cheer,
" Come, Gêlert, come, wert never last
Llewellyn's horn to hear.
"0, where does faithful Gêlert roam.
The flower of all his race ;
So true, so brave, — a lamb at home,
A lion in the chase ? "
In sooth, he was a peerless hound.
The gift of royal John ;
But now no Gêlert could be found.
And all the chase rode on.
That day Llewell3Ti little loved
The chase of hart and hare ;
And scant and small the booty proved.
For Gêlert was not there.
Unpleased, Llewellyn homeward hied.
When, near the portal seat,
His tniant Gêlert he espied.
Bounding his lord to greet.
But, when he gained his castle-door.
Aghast the chieftain stood ;
The hound all o'er was smeared with gore ;
His lips, his fangs, ran blood.
Llewellyn gazed with fierce surprise ;
Unused such looks to fneet.
His favorite checked his joyful guise.
And crouched, and licked his feet.
Onward, in haste, Llewellyn passed.
And on went Gêlert too ;
And still, where'er his eyes he cast.
Fresh blood-gouts shocked his view.
O'ertumed his infant's bed he found.
With blood-stained covert rent ;
And all around the walls and ground
With recent blood besprent.
He called his child, — no voice replied, —
He searched with terror wild ;
Blood, blood he found on every side.
But nowhere found his child.
" Hell-hound ! my child's by thee devoured,"
The frantic father cried ;
And to the hilt his vengeful sword
He plunged in Gêleil's side.
Aroused by Gêlert's dying yell.
Some slumberer wakened nigh ;
What words the parent's joy could tell
To hear his infant's cry !
Concealed beneath a tumbled heap
His hurried search had missed.
All glowing from his rosy sleep.
The cherub boy he kissed.
Nor scathe had he, nor harm, nor dread.
But, the same couch beneath.
Lay a gaunt wolf, all torn and dead.
Tremendous still in death.
Ah, what was then Llewellyn's pain !
For now the truth was clear ;
His gallant hound the wolf had slain
To save Llewellyn's heir.
William Robert spencer.
A HUNTING WE WILL GO.
The dusky night rides down the sky.
And ushers in the morn :
The hounds all join in glorious cry.
The huntsman winds his horn.
And a hunting we will go.
RURAL
SPORTS.
663
The wife around her husband tlirows
Her arms to nuke biin stay ;
" My dear, it rains, it hails, it blows ;
Yen cannot hunt to-day."
Yet a hunting we will go.
Away they fly to 'scape the rout.
Their steeds they soundly switch ;
Some are thrown in, and some thrown out,
And some thrown in the ditch.
Yet a hunting we will go.
Sly Reynard now like lightning flies,
And sweeps aeross the vale ;
And when the hounds too near he spies,
He drops his bushy tail.
Then a hunting we will go.
Fond Echo seems to like the sport.
And join the jovial cry ;
The woods, the hills, the sound retort.
And music Alls the sky.
When a hunting we do go.
At last his sti-ength to faintness worn.
Poor Reynard ceases flight ;
Then hungry, homeward we return.
To feast away the night.
And a drinking we do go.
Ye jovial hunters, in the morn
Prepare then for the chase ;
Rise at the sounding of the honi
And health with sport embrace.
When a hunting we do go.
Henry Fíelding.
LIFE m THE AUTUAIK WOODS.
[virginia.l
Summer has gone.
And fruitful Autumn has advanced so far
That there is warmth, not heat, in the broad sun.
And you may look, with naked eye, upon
Tlie ardors of his car ;
The stealthy frosts, whom his spent looks em¬
bolden.
Are making the gi'een leaves golden.
What a brave splendor
Is in the October air ! how rich, and clear.
And braeing, and all-joyous ! We must render
Love to the Spring-time, with its sproutings
tender.
As to a child quite dear ;
But Autumn is a thing of perfect glory,
A manhood not yet hoary.
1 love the woods.
In this good season of the liberal year ;
1 love to seek their leafy solitudes.
And give myself to melancholy moods.
With no intruder near.
And And strange lessons, as I sit and ponder.
In every natural wonder.
But not alone.
As Shakespeare's melancholy courtier loved
Ardennes,
I.K)vc I the browning forest ; and I own
I would not oft have mused, as he, but flown
To hunt with Amiens —
And little thought, as up the bold deer bounded.
Of the sad creature wounded.
A brave and good.
But world-worn knight — soul-wearied with his
part
In this vexed life—gave .nan for solitude.
And built a lodge, and lived in Wautley wood.
To hear the belling hart.
It was a gentle taste, but its sweet sadness
Yields to the hunter's madness.
What passionate
And keen delight is in t'ne proud swift chase !
Go out what time the lark at heaven s red gate
Soars joyously singing — quite infuriate
With the high pride of his place ;
What time the unrisen sun arrays the moniing
In its first bright adorning.
Hark ! the quick horn —
As sweet to hear as any clarion —
Piercing with silver call the car of morn ;
And mark the steeds, stout Curtal and Toptliome,
And Greysteil and the Don —
Each one of them his fiery mood displaying
With pawing and with neighing.
Urge your swift horse
After the crying hounds in this fresh hour ;
Vanquish high hills, stem perilous streams per¬
force.
On the free plain give free wings to your course.
And you will know the power
Of the bi-ave chase, — and how of griefs the sorest
A cure is in the forest.
Or stalk the deer ;
The same red lip of dawn has kissed the hills.
The gladdest sounds are crowding on your ear.
There is a life in all the atmosphere : —
Your very nature fills
With the fresh hour, as up the hills aspiring
You climb with limbs untiring.
664
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
It is a fair
And goodly sight to see the antlered stag
With the long sweep of his swift walk repair
To join his brothers ; or the plethoric bear
Lying in some high crag,
With pinky eyes half closed, but broad h
shaking.
As gadflies keep him waking.
And these you see.
And, seeing them, you travel to their death
With a slow, stealthy step, from tree to tree.
Noting the wind, however faint it be.
The hunter draws a breath
In times like these, which, he will say, repays him
For all care that waylays him..
A .strong joy fills
(A joy beyond the tongue's expressive power)
My lieart in Autumn weather — fills and thrills !
And I would rather- stalk the breezy hills
Descending to my bower-
Nightly, by the sweet spirit of Peace attended.
Than pine where life is splendid.
Philip Pendleton Cooke.
♦
THE ARAB TO HIS FAVORITE STEED.
My beautiful ! my beautiful ! that standest
meekly by.
With thy proudly arched arrd glossy neck, and
dark and fiery eye.
Fret not to roam the desert now, with all thy
winged speed ;
I may not mount on thee again, — thou 'rt sold,
my Arab steed !
Fret not with that impatient hoof, — snulT not
the breezy wind, —
The farther that thou fliest now, so far am I be¬
hind ;
Tlio stranger hath thy bridle-rein, — thy irraster
hath his gold, —
Fleet-limbed and beautiful, farewell; thou'rt
sold, my steed, thou 'rt sold.
Farewell ! those free, untired limbs full many a
mile must roam.
To reach the chill and wintry sky which clouds
the stranger's home ;
Some other hand, less fond, must now thy corn
and bed prepare.
Thy silky mane, 1 braided once, must be another's
care !
The morning sun shall dawn again, but never¬
more with thee
Shall I gallop through the desert paths, where
we were wont to be ;
Evening shall darken on the earth, and o'er the
sandy plain
Some other steed, with slower step, shall bear me
home again.
Yes, thou must go ! the wild, free breeze, the
brilliant sun and sky.
Thy master's house, — from all of these my
exiled one must fly ;
Thy proud dark eye will grow loss proud, thy
step become less fleet,
And vainly shalt thou arch thy neck, thy mas¬
ter's hand to meet.
Only in sleep shall I behold that dark eye, glan¬
cing bright ; —
Only in sleep shall hear again that step so firm
and light ;
And when I raise my dreaming arm to check or
cheer thy speed,
Then must I, starting, wake to feel, — thou 'rt
sold, my Arab steed !
Ah ! rudely then, unseen by me, some cruel han-l
may chide.
Till foam-wreaths lie, like crested waves, along
thy panting side :
And the rich blood that's in thee swells, in thy
indignant pain.
Till careless eyes, which rest on thee, may count
each starting vein.
Will they ill-use thee ? If I thought — but no,
it cannot be, —
Thou art so swift, yet easy curbed ; so gentle,
yet so free :
And yet, if haply, when thou 'rt gone, my lonely
heart should yearn, —
Can the hand which casts thee from it now com¬
mand thee to return ?
Return! alas! my Arab steed! what shall thy
master do.
When thou, who wast his all of joy, hast vanished
from his view ?
When the dim distance cheats mine eye, awl
through the gathering tears
Thy bright form, for a moment, like the false
mirage appears ;
Slow and unmounted shall I roam, with weary
step alone.
Where, with fleet step and joyous bound, thou
oft hast borne mo on ;
I And sitting down by that green well, I '11 pause
and sadly think,
"It was here he bowed his glossy ucck when last
I saw him drink ! "
RURAL SPORTS.
665
-a
W¡uii last I saw thee drink /—Away ! the fevered
dream is o'er, —
I could not live a day, and know that we should
meet no more !
They tempted me, my beautiful ! — for hunger's
power is strong, —
They tempted mo, my beautiful ! but I have
loved too long.
Who said that I had given thee up ? who said
that thou wast sold ?
'T is false, —'t is false, my Arab steed ! I fling
them back their gold !
Thus, thus, I leap upon thy back, and scour the
distant jilains ;
Away ! who overtakes us now shall claim thee
for his pains !
Caroline Elizabeth Sarah Norton.
THE HORSEBACK RIDE.
When troubled in spirit, when weary of life.
When 1 faint 'ueath its burdens, and shrink from
its strife.
When its fruits, turned to ashes, are mocking my
taste,
And its fairest scene seems but a desolate waste.
Then come ye not near me, my sad heart to
cheer
With friendship's soft accents or sympathy's tear.
Ki) pity I ask, and no counsel 1 need,
But bring me, 0, bring me my gallant young
steed.
With his high arched neck, and his nostril spread
wide,
His eye full of fire, and his stop full of pride !
As 1 spring to his back, as I seize the strong
rein,
Tlio strength to my spirit returneth again !
The bonds are all broken that fettered my mind,
And my cares borne away on the wings of the
wind ;
My pride lifts its head, for a season bowed down,
And the queen in my nature now puts on her
crown !
Now we 're off — like the winds to the plains
whence they came ;
And the rapture of motion is thrilling my frame !
On, on speeds my courser, scarce printing the sod,
S. arce crushing a daisy to mark where he trod !
On, on like a deer, when the hound's early bay
Awakes the wild echoes, away, and away !
Still faster, still farther, he leaps at my cheer.
Till the rush of the startled airwliirs in my ear !
Now 'long a elc.ar rivulet licth his track, —
See his glancing hoofs tossing the white pebbles
buck !
Now a glen dark as midnight — what matter ? —
we '11 down.
Though shadows are round us, and rocks o'er us
frown ;
The thick branches shake as we 're hurrying
through.
And deck us with spangles of silvery dew !
What a wild thought of triumph, that this girlish
hand
Such a steed in the might of his strength may
command !
What a glorious creature ! Ah ! glance at him
now.
As I check him a while on this green hillock's
brow ;
flow he tosses his mane, with a shrill joyous
neigh.
And paws the firm earth in his proud, stately
play !
Hurrah ! off again, dashing on as in ire.
Till the long, flinty pathway is flashing with fire ¡
Ho ! a ditch ! — Shall we pause ? No ; the bold
leap we dare.
Like a swift-winged arrow wo rush through th e air !
0, not all the pleasures that poets may praise,
Not the 'wildering waltz in the ball-room's blaze.
Nor the chivalrous joust, nor the daring race.
Nor the swift regatta, nor merry chase.
Nor the sail, high heaving waters o'er.
Nor the rural dance on the moonlight shore,
fan the wild ami thrilling joy exceed
Of a fearless leap on a fiery steed I
Sara Jane "Li^VIIíQOTT (Grace Crcenwood),
A CANADIAN BOAT-SONG.
Faintly as tolls the evening chime.
Our voices keep tune, and our oars keep time.
Soon as the woods on shore look dim.
We'll sing at St. Ann's our parting hymn.
Row, brothers, row ! the stream runs fast.
The rapids are near, and the daylight s past !
Why should wo yet our sail unfurl ? —
There is not a breath the blue wave to curl.
But when the wind blows off the shore,
0, sweetly we '11 rest our weary oar !
Blow, breezes, blow ! the stream runs fast.
The rapids are near, and the daylight's past !
Utawa's tide ! this trembling moon
Shall see us float "over thy surges soon.
Saint of this green isle, hear our pmyers, —
0, grant us cool heavens and favoring airs !
Blow, breezes, blow ! the stream luns fast.
The rapids are near, and the daylight's past !
Thohias Moore.
3-
-di'
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
a
THE SNOWa*
OvEii the Snows
Buoyantly goes
The lumberei-s' bark canoe :
Lightly they sweep,
Wilder each leap.
Rending the white-caps throngh.
Away ! Away !
With the speed of a startled deer,
While the steersman true
And his laughing crew
Sing of their wild career :
" Mariners glide
Far o'er the tide
In ships that are stanch and strong :
Safely as they
Speed we away.
Waking the woods with song."
Away ! Away !
With the speed of a startled deer,
While the laughing crew
Of the swift canoe
Sing of the raftsmen's cheer :
"Through forest and brake.
O'er rapid and lake.
We 're sport for the sun and rain ;
Free as the child
Of the Arab wild.
Hardened to toil and pain.
Away ! Away !
With the speed of a startled deer,
W[hile our buoyant flight
And the rapid's might
Heighten our swift career."
Over the Snows
Buoyantly goes
The lumberers' bark canoe :
Lightly they sweep.
Wilder each leap.
Tearing the white-caps through.
Away ! Away !
With the speed of a startled deer.
There's a fearless crew
In each light canoe
To sing of the raftsmen's cheer.
CHARLES SANGSTER.
THE PLEASURE-BOAT.
Co.ME, hoist the sail, the fast let go !
They 're seated side by side ;
Wave chases wave in pleasant flow ;
The bay is fair and wide.
* The name given to a foaming rapid on the Upper Ottawa River,
la Canada.
The ripples lightly tap the boat ;
Loose ! Give her to the wind !
She shoots ahead ; they 're all afloat ;
The strand is far behind.
No danger reach so fair a crew I
Thou goddess of the foam,
I '11 ever pay thee worship due.
If thou wilt bring them home.
Fair ladies, fairer than the spray
The prow is dashing wide.
Soft breezes take you on your way,
Soft flow the blessèd tide.
0, might I like those breezes be.
And touch that arching brow,
I'd dwell forever on the sea
Where ye are floating now.
The boat goes tilting on the waves ;
The waves go tilting by ;
There dips the duck, — her back she laves ;
O'erhead the sea-gulls fly.
Now, like the gulls that dart for prey,
The little vessel stoops ;
Now, rising, shoots along her way.
Like them, in easy swoops.
The sunlight falling on her sheet.
It glitters like the drift.
Sparkling, in scorn of summer's heat,
High up some mountain rift.
The winds are fresh ; she's driving fast
Upon the bending tide ;
The crinkling sail, and crinkling mast.
Go with her side by side.
Why dies the breeze away so soon ?
Why hangs the pennant down ?
The sea is glass ; the sun at noon. —
Nay, lady, do not frown ;
For, see, the wingëd fisher's plume
Is painted on the sea ;
Below, a cheek of lovely bloom.
Whose eyes look up to thee ?
She .smiles ; thou need'st must smile on her.
And.see, beside her face,
A rich, white cloud that doth not stir :
What beauty, and what giaco I
And pictured beach of yellow sand.
And peaked rock and hill.
Change the smooth sea to faiiy-land ;
How lovely and how still !
RURAL
SPORTS.
667
From that far isle the thresher's flail
Strikes close upon the ear ;
The leaping fish, the swinging sail
Of yonder sloop, sound near.
The parting sun sends out a glow
Across the placid bay.
Touching with glory all the show. —
A breeze ! Up helm ! Away !
Careening to the wind, they reach.
With laugh and call, the shore.
They 've left their footprints on the beach,
But them I hear no more.
Richard Henry Dana.
THE ANGLER'S TRYSTING-TREE.
SiXG, sweet thrushes, forth and sing !
Meet the morn upon the lea ;
Are the emeralds of the spring
On the angler's trysting-tree ?
Tell, sweet thrushes, tell to me !
Are there buds on our willow-tree ?
Buds and birds on our trysting-tree ?
Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing !
Have yon met the honey-bee.
Circling upon rapid wing.
Bound the angler's trysting-tree ?
Up, sweet thrushes, up and see !
Are there bees at our willow-tree ?
Birds and bees at the trysting-tree ?
Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing !
Are the fountains gushing free ?
Is the south-wind wandering
Through the angler's trysting-tree ?
Up, sweet thrushes, tell to me !
Is there wind up our willow-tree ?
Wind or c.ilni at our trysting-tree ?
Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing 1
Wile us with a merry glee
To the flowery haunts of spring, —
To the angler's trysting-tree.
Tell, sweet thrushes, tell to mo !
Arc there flowers 'neath our willow-tree .
Spring and flowers at the trysting-tree ?
Thomas tod Stoddard.
IN PRAISE OF ANGLING.
QtnvEnixo fears, heart-tearing cares.
Anxious sighs, untimely tears.
Fly, fly to courts.
Fly to fond worldlings' sports.
Where strained sardonic smiles are glozing still.
And grief is forced to laugh against her will,
Wbere mirth's but mummery,
And sorrows only real be.
Fly from our country jiastimes, fly.
Sad troops of human misery ;
Come, serene looks.
Clear as the crystal brooks.
Or the pure azured heaven that smiles to see
The rich attendance on our poverty ;
Peace and a secure mind.
Which all men seek, we only find.
Abusèd mortals ! did you know
Where joy, heart's ease, and comforts grow.
You'd scorn proud towers
And seek them in these bowers.
Where winds, sometimes, our woods perhaps may
shake.
But blustering care could never tempest make ;
Nor murmurs e'er come nigh us.
Saving of fountains that glide by us.
Here's no fantastic mask or dance.
But of our kids that frisk and prance ;
Nor wars are seen.
Unless upon the green
Two harmless lambs are butting one the other.
Which done, both bleating nin, each tohismother;
And wounds are never found.
Save what the ploughshare gives the ground.
Here are no entrapping baits
To hasten to, too hasty fates ;
Unless it be
The fond credulity
Of silly fish, which (worldling like) still look
Upon the bait, but never on the hook ;
Nor envy, 'less among
The birds, for price of their sweet song.
Go, let the diving negro seek
For gems, hid in some forlorn creek :
We all pearls scorn
Save what the dewy mom
Congeals upon each little spire of grass.
Which careless shepherds beat down as they
pass ;
And gold ne'er here appears.
Save what the yellow Ceres bears.
Blest silent groves, 0, may you be.
Forever, mh-th's best nursery !
May pure contents
Foi-ever pitch their tents
fi-
668
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
Upon these downs, these meads, these rocks,
these mountains !
And peace still slumber by these purling foun-
■ tains.
Which we may every year
Meet, when we come a-fishing here.
Sir Henry wotton.
THE ANGLER.
0 THE gallant fisher's life,
It is the best of any !
'T is full of pleasure, void of strife,
And't is beloved by many ;
Other joys
Are but toys ;
Only thia
Lawful is
For our skill ,
Breeds no ill, ■■
But content and pleasure.
In a morning, up we rise.
Ere Aurora's peeping ;
Drink a cup to wash our eyes.
Leave the sluggard sleeping ;
Then we go
To and fro.
With our knacks
At our backs,
To such streams
As the Thames,
If we have the leisure.
When we please to walk abroad
For our recreation,
the fields is our abode.
Full of delectation.
Where, in a brook.
With a hook, —
Or a lake, —
Fish we take ; •
There rve sit.
For a bit,
Till we fish entangle.
We have gentles in a horn,
We have paste and worms too ;
We can watch both night and morn,
Suffer rain and storms too ;
None do hero
Use to swear ;
Oaths do fray
Fish away ;
We sit still,
Watch our quill :
Fishers must not wrangle.
If the sun's excessive heat
Make our bodies swelter.
To an osier hedge we get.
For a friendly shelter ;
Where, in a dike.
Perch or pike.
Roach or dace, ,
We do chase.
Bleak or gudgeon.
Without grudging ;
We are still contented.
Or we sometimes pass an hour
Under a green willow.
That defends us from a shower.
Making earth our pillow ;
Where we may
Think and pray.
Before death
Stops our breath ;
Other joys
Are but toys.
And to be lamented.
john chalkhiix.
THE ANGLER'S WISH.
I IN these flowery meads would be.
These crystal streams should solace me ;
To whose harmonious bubbling noise
I, with my angle, would rejoice.
Sit here, and see the turtle-dove
Court his chaste mate to acts of loVe ;
Or, on that bank, feel the west-wind
Breathe health and plenty ; please my mind.
To see sweet dew-drops kiss these flowers.
And then washed off by April showers ;
Here, hear my Kenna* sing a song :
There, see a blackbird feed her young.
Or a laverock build her nest;
Here, give my wearj' spirits rest.
And raise my low-pitched thoughts above
Earth, or what poor mortals love.
Thus, fi'ee from lawsuits, and the noise
Of princes' courts, I would rejoice ;
Or, with niy Bryan and a book.
Loiter long days near Shawford brook ;
There sit by him, and eat my meat ;
Tliere see the sun both rise and set ;
There bid good morning to next day ;
There meditate my time away ;
And angle on ; and beg to have
A quiet jiassage to a welcome grave.
izaak walton.
• •• Kenna," the name of his supposed mistress, seems to have
beenformud irom th&; name of his wife, which was Ken.
43-
f
RURAL SPORTS.
669
■a
ANGLING.
from "the seaso.nsl spring."
Just in the dubious point, where with the pool
Is mixed the trembling stream, or where it boils
Around the stone, or from the hollowed bank
Reverted plays in undulating flow,
There throw, nice-judging, the delusive fly ;
And, as you lead it round in artful curve.
With eye attentive mark the springing game.
Straight as above the surface of the flood
They wanton rise, or urged by hunger leap.
Then fix, with gentle twitch, the barbid hook ;
Some lightly tossing to the grassy bank.
And to the shelving shore slow dragging some.
With various hand proportioned to their force.
If yet too young, and easily deceived,
A worthless prey scarce bends your pliant rod.
Him, piteous of his youth, and the short space
He has enjoyed the vital light of heaven.
Soft disengage, and back into the stream
The speckled infant throw. But should you lure
From his dark haunt, beneath the tangled roots
Of pendent trees, the monarch of the brook.
Behooves you then to ply your finest art.
Long time he, following cautious, scans the fly ;
And oft at tempts to geize it, but as oft
The dimpled water speaks his jealous fear.
,4t last, while haply o'er the shaded sun
Passes a cloud, he desperate takes the death.
With sullen plunge. At once he darts along.
Deep-struck, and runs out all the lengthened line ;
Then seeks the farthest ooze, the sheltering weed.
The caverned bank, his old secure abode ;
And flies aloft, and flounces round the pool.
Indignant of the guile. With yielding hand.
That feels him still, yet to his furious cour.se
Gives way, you, now retiring, following now
Across the stream, exhaust his idle rage ;
Till, floating broad upon his breathless side.
And to his fate abandoned, to the shore
You gayly drag your unresisting prize.
James Thomson.
THE ANGLER.
But look ! o'er the fall see the angler stand.
Swinging his rod with skilful hand ;
The fly at the end of his gossamer line
Swims through the .sun like a summer moth.
Till, dropt with a careful precision line.
It touches the pool beyond the froth.
A-sudden, the speckled hawk of the brook
Darts from his covert and seizes the hook.
Swift spins the reel ; with easy slip
The line pays out, aud the rod, like a whip,
Lithe and arrowy, tapering, slim.
Is bent to a bow o'er the brooklet's brim.
Till the trout leaps up in the sun, and flings
The spray from the flash of his finny wings ;
Then falls on his side, and, drunken with fright,
Is towed to the shore like a staggering barge.
Till beached at last on the sandy marge.
Where he dies with the hues of the morning light.
While lus sides with a cluster of stars are bright.
The angler in his basket lays
The constellation, and goes his ways.
Thomas Buchanan Reao.
SWIMMING.
from "the two foscari."
How many a time have I
Cloven, with arm still lustier, breast more daring.
The wave all roughened ; with a swimmer's stroke
Flinging the billows back from my drenched hair.
And laughing from my lip the audacious brine,
Which kissed it like a wine-cup, rising o'er
The waves as they arose, and prouder still
The loftier they uplifted me ; and oft.
In wantonness of spirit, plunging down
Into their green aud glassy gulfs, and making
My way to shells and sea-weed, all unseen
By those above, till they waxed fearful ; then
Returning with my grasp full of such tokens
As showed that I had searched the deep ; exult¬
ing.
With a far-dashing stroke, and drawing deep
The long-suspended bi'eath, again I spumed
The foam which broke around me, and pureued
My track like a sea-binl. — I was a boy then.
lord bvron.
BATHING.
from "the seasons: summer."
The sprightly youth
Speeds to the well-known pool, whose crystal
depth
A sandy bottom shows. A while he stands
Gazing th' inverted landscape, half afraid
To meditate the blue profound below ;
Then plunges headlong down the circling flood.
His ebon ticsses and his rosy cheek
Instant emerge ; and through the obedient wave.
At each short breathing by his lip repelled.
With arras and legs according well, he makes.
As humor leads, an easy-winding path ;
While from his polished sides a dewy light
Effuses on the pleased spectators round.
y-
-51
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
a
Tliis is the purest e.\.ercise of health,
The kind refresher of the summer-heats ;
Nor, whcu cold winter keens the brightening
flood,
Would I weak-shivering linger on the brink.
Thus life redoubles, and is oft preserved,
Dy the bold swimmer, in the swift elapse
Of accident disastrous. Hence the limbs
Knit into force ; and the same Roman ann.
That rose victorious o'er the conquered earth.
First learned, while tender, to subdue the wave.
Even from the body's purity, the mind
Receives a secret sympathetic aid.
James tuouso.n.
OUR SKATER BELLE.
AlLOXG the frozen lake she comes
In linking crescents, light and fleet ;
The ice-imprisoned Undine hums
A welcome to hei' little feet.
I see the jaunty hat, the plume
Swei-ve birdlike in the joyous gale, —
The cheeks lit up to buniiug bloom.
The young eyes sparkling through the veiL
The quick breath parts her laughing lips.
The white neck shines through tossing curls ;
Her vesture gently sways and dips.
As on she sjieeds in shell-like whirls.
Men stop and smile to see her go ;
They gaze, they smile in pleased surprise ;
They ¡isk her name ; they long to show
Some silent friendship in their eyes.
She glances not ; she passes on ;
Her steely footfall quicker rings ;
She guesses not tlie benisou
Which follows her on noiseless wings.
Smooth be her ways, secure her tread
Along the devious lines of life.
From grace to grace successive led, —
A noble maiden, nobler wife !
Anonymous
SLEIGH SONG.
Jingle, jingle, clear the way,
T is the merry, meny sleigh !
As it swiftly scuds along.
Hear the burst of happy song ;
See the gleam of glances bright,
Flashing o'er the pathway white !
Jingle, jingle, past it flies,
, Sending shafts from hooded eyes, —
h
Roguish archei-s, I '11 be bound.
Little heeding whom they wound ;
See them, with capricious pranks.
Ploughing now the drifted banks ;
Jingle, jingle, mid the glee
Who among them cares for me ?
Jingle, jingle, on they go.
Capes and bonnets white with snow.
Not a single robe they fold
To protect them from the cold ;
Jingle, jingle, mid the storm,
Fim and frolic keep tliem warm ;
Jingle, jingle, down the hills.
O'er the meadows, past the mills.
Now't is slow, and now't is fast ;
Winter will not always last
Jingle, jingle, clear the way !
'T is the meiTy, merry sleigh.
g. w. pettee.
FEAGMENTS.
The Soul of Adventuke.
Fierce warres, and faithfuR loves shall moralize
my song.
Fairù Queetu, Book i , Proem, SPE;<ISEfL
Send danger from the east unto the west.
So honor cross it from the north to south.
And let them grapple ; O ! the blood more stirs
To rouse a lion than to start a hare !
By Heaven, methinks, it were an easy leap.
To pluck bright honor from the pale-faced moon.
Or dive into the bottom of the deep.
Where fathom-line could never touch the ground,
And pluck up drowned honor by the locks.
JCiH^ Henry /K, Part /. Act \. Sc. 3. s H AK£:àP£AR£.
Adventurous Daring.
On his bold visage middle age
Had slightly pressed his signet sage.
Yet had not quenched the open truth.
And flery vehemence of youth ;
Fomard and frolic glee was there.
The will to do, the soul to dai-e.
The sparkling glance, soon blown to fli-o
Of liasty love or headlong ire.
r/ic Laij L^tx. Cant. l scott.
Dar'st thou, Cassius, now
Leap in with me into this angry Hood,
And swim to j'onder point ?— Upon the word.
Accoutred as I was, I plunged in,
And bade him follow.
yuSitto Casar, Act i. Sc. ii, S»AiCF.áPliARr.. ''
ff
&
FRAGMENTS.
671
-a
Through thick and thin, both over bank and bush.
In hope her to attain by hook or crook.
FaHrie Queetu, Book iU. CaiU. L SPBNSER.
The intent and not the deed
Is in our power ; and therefore who dares greatly
Does greatly.
Barbarossa. J, BROWN.
Out of this nettle, danger, we pluck this flower,
safety.
Henry JV. Part I, Act iL Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
"Youfool! I tell you no one means you harm."
"So much the better," Juan said, "for them."
Don yuan, BVRON.
Housemanship.
I saw young Han-y, with his beaver on,
His cuisses on his thighs, gallantly armed.
Eise from the ground like feathered Mereuiy,
And vaulted with such ease into his seat.
As if an angel dropped down from the clouds.
To turn and wind a fiery Pegasus,
And witch the world with noble horsemanship.
King Henry /K, Part 1. Act iv. Sc, 1; SHAKESPEARE.
" Stand, Bayard, stand I " The steed obeyed.
With arching neck and bended head.
And glancing eye, and quivering ear.
As if he loved his lord to hear.
No foot Fitz-Janies in stirrup staid.
No grasp upon the saddle laid, '
But wreathed his left hand in the roanc.
And lightly bounded from the plain.
Tinned on the horse his armed heel.
And stirred Iiis courage with the steel.
Bounded the fiery steed in air.
The rider sate erect and fair.
Then, like a holt from steel cross-bow
Forth launched, along the plain they go.
The Lady 0/ the Lake, Cant. v. SCOTT.
After many strains and heaves.
Ho got up to the saddle eaves.
From whence he vaulted into th' seat
With so much vigor, strength, and heat.
That he had almost tumbled over
With his own weight, but did recover.
By laying hold of tail and mane.
Which oft he used instead of rein.
Hitdiirai. Da. S. BUTLER.
Hunting.
Better to hunt in fields for health unbought.
Than fee the doctor for a nauseous draught.
The wise for cure on exercise depend ;
God never made his work for man to mend.
Cjmm and Ifhie'nta. DKYDEN.
Hunting is the noblest exereise.
Makes men laborious, active, wise,
Bi ings health, and doth the spirits delight.
It helps the hearing and the sight ;
It teacheth arts that never slip
The memory, good horacmanship.
Search, sharpness, courage and defence.
And chascth aU ill habits hence.
Masques, Ben Jokson.
My hoarse-sounding lioru
Invites thee to the chase, the sjiort of kings ;
Image of war without its guilt.
The Chase» W. SOMERVlLLE.
Contusion hazarding of neck or spine.
Which rural gentlemen call sport divine.
Madias Alarm. cowi>ek.
My hawk is tired of perch and hood.
My idle greyhound loathes his food.
My horse is weary of his stall.
And I am sick of captive thralL
I wish I were as I have been
Hunting the hart in forests green.
With bended bow and bloodhound free.
For that's the life is meet for me !
Lay 0/ the Imprisoned Huntsman: The Lady 0/ the Lake,
Cant, vi. SCOTT.
The healthy huntsman, with a cheerful horn.
Summons the dogs and greets the dappled morn."
Rural Sports. * j. gay.
Wliy, let the Strücken deer go weep,
The hart ungallèd play ;
For some must watch, while some must sleep ;
Thus runs the world away.
Hamlet, Aa ÜL Sc. 2. Shakespeare.
Shooting.
See from the brake the whirring pheasant springs.
And mounts exulting on triumphant wings ;
Short is his joy ; he feels the fiery wound.
Flutters in blood, and panting beats the ground.
Wutdsor Forest. Pope.
But as some muskets so contrive it.
As oft to miss the mark they drive at,
And though well aimed at duck or plover.
Bear wide, and kick their owners over.
McFingal, Cant.i _ j. TRUMBULL.
Swimming.
The torrent roared ; and we did buffet it
With lusty sinews, throwing it aside.
And stemming it with hearts of controversy.
yuitus Casar, Act L Sc, a. sh akesfearb.
POEMS OF ADVENTURE AND RURAL SPORTS.
I saw him beat the surges under him,
And ride upon their backs ; lie trod the water,
Whose enmity he flung aside, and breasted
The surge most swoln that met him.
The Tempest, Act iL Sc, it SHAKESPEARE.
Angling.
All's ñsh they get
That Cometh to net.
Five Hundred Poùits of Good Husbandry.
T. TUSSER.
In genial spring, beneath the quivering shade.
Where cooling vapors breathe along the mead,
The patient fisher takes his silent stand.
Intent, his angle trembling in his hand ;
With looks unmoved, he hopes the scaly breed.
And eyes the dancing cork, and bending reed.
WiTtdsor forest. POPE,
Now is the time.
While yet the dark-brown water aids the guile.
To tempt the trout. The \yell-dissembled fly,
Thoood fine tapering with elastic spring.
Snatched from the hoary steed the floating line.
And all thy slender wat'ry stores pirepare.
Th-. Seasons : Sprùtg, THOMSON.
His angle-rod made of a sturdy oak ;
His Hue a cable which in storms ne'er broke ;
His hook he baited with a dragon's tail.
And sat upon a rock, and bobbed for whale.
upon a Giant's Angling, W. KING.
Skati.ng.
All shod with steel.
We hissed along the polished ice, in games
Confedei ate, imitative of the chase
And woodland pleasure.s, — the resounding horn,
The pack loud-chiming, and the hunted hare.
So through the darkness and the cold we flew.
And not a voice was idle ; with the din
Smitten, the precipices rang aloud ;
The leafless trees and every icy cr.ag
Tinkled like iron.
Inßitence o/Natural Objects. wordsworth.
Ruiial Life.
Rustic mirth goes round ;
The simple joke that takes the shepherd's heart.
Easily pleased ; the long loud laugh sincere ;
The kiss snatched hasty from the sidelong maid.
On purpose guardless, or pretending sleep ;
The leap, the slap, the haul ; and, .shook to notes
Of native music, the res])ondent dance.
Thus jocund fleets with thera the winter night.
The Seasons: IVinter, THOMSON.
God made the country, and man made the town ;
What wonder then, that health and virtue, gifts
That can alone make sweet the bitter draught
That life holds out to all, should most abound
And least be threatened in the fields and groves.
The Task^ Booh i. t The Sofa, Cowper.
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
A THING OF BEAUTY IS A JOY
FOREVER.
from "endymion," book t.
A THING of beauty is a joy forever :
Its loveliness increases ; it will never
Pass into nothingness ; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet
breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth.
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days.
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkened ways
Made for our searching : yes, in spite of all.
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon.
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep ; and such are daffodils
With the gi'een world they live in ; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
'Gainst the hot season ; the mid-forest brake.
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms :
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
We have imagined for the mighty dead ;
All lovely tales that we have heard or read :
An endless fountain of immortal drink.
Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink.
JOHN Keats.
MELROSE ABBEY.
from " the lav of the last minstrel." canto 11.
If thou wouldst view fair Melrose aright,
Go visit it by the pale moonlight ;
For the gay beams of lightsome day
Gild, but to flout, the ruins gray.
When the broken arches are black in night,
And each shafted oriel glimmers white ;
When the cold light's uncertain shower
Streams on the ruined central tower ;
When buttress and buttress, alternately.
Seem fituned of ebon and ivory ;
When silver edges the imagery.
And the scrolls that teach thee to live and die ;
When distant Tweed is heard to rave,
And the owlet to hoot o'er the dead man's grave.
Then go, — but go alone the while, —
Then view St. David's ruined pile ;
And, home returning, soothly swear.
Was never scene so sad and fair !
The pillared arches were over their head.
And beneath their feet were the bones of the dead.
Spreading herbs and flowerets bright
Glistened with the dew of night ;
Nor herb nor floweret glistened there.
But was carved in the cloister-arches as fair.
The monk gazed long on the lovely moon.
Then into the night he looked forth ;
And red and bright the streamers light
Were dancing in the glowing north.
So had he seen, in fair Castile,
The youth in glittering squadrons start,
Sudden the flying jennet wheel.
And hurl the unexpected dart.
He knew, by the streamers that shot so brigh..
That spirits were riding the northern light.
By a steel-clenched postern door.
They entered now the chancel taU ;
The darkened roof rose high aloof
On pillars lofty and light and small ;
The keystone, that locked each ribbed aisle.
Was a fleur-de-lys, or a qnatre-feuille :
The corbells were carved grotesque and grim ;
And the pillars, with clustered shafts so trim.
With base and with capital flourished around.
Seemed bundles of lances which garlands had
bound.
Full many a scutcheon and banner, riven.
Shook to the cold night-wind of heaven.
Around the screened altar's pale ;
And there the dying lamps did bmn.
Before thy low and lonely urn,
0 gallant Chief of Otterburne !
And thine, dark Knight of Liddesdale 1
•—« — - ■ ■ —■ ■ ' ~
676 DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
0 fading honors of the dead !
0 high ambition, lowly laid !
The moon on the east oriel shone
Through slender shafts of shapely stone,
By foliaged tracery combined ;
Thou wouldst have thought some fairy's hand
'Twixt poplars straight the osier wand
In many a freakish knot had twined ;
Then framed a spell, when the work was done.
And changed the willow wreaths to stone.
The silver light, so pale and faint.
Showed many a prophet, and many a saint.
Whose image on the glass was dyed ;
Full in the midst, his Cross of Red
Triumphant Michael brandished.
And trampled the Apostate's pride.
The moonbeam kissed the holy pane.
And threw on the pavement a bloody stain.
Sir Walter Scott.
0
NORHAM CASTLE.
from "marmion," canto i.
[The ruinous castle of Norham (anciently called Ubbanford) is
situated on the southern bank of the Tweed, about six utiles above
Berwick, and where that river is still the boundary between Engf-
land and Scotland. The extent of its ruins, as well as its historical
importance, shows it to have been a place of magnificence as well
as strength. Edward I. resided there when he was cVeated umpire
of the dispute concerning the Scottish succession. It was repeat¬
edly taken and retaken during the wars between England and
Scotland, and, indeed, scarce any happened in which it had not
a principal share. Norham Castle is situated on a steep bank
which overhangs the river. The ruins of the castle are at present
considerable, as well as picturesque They consist of a large
shattered tower, with many vaults, and fragments of other edlñces
enclosed within an outward wall of great circuit. J
Day set on Norham's castled steep.
And Tweed's fair river, broad and deep.
And Cheviot's mountains lone :
The battled towers, the donjon keep.
The loop-hole grates where captives weep.
The flanking walls that round it sweep.
In yellow lustre shone.
The warriors on the turrets high.
Moving athwart the evening sky.
Seemed forms of giant height ;
Their armor, as it caught the rays.
Flashed back again the western blaze
In lines of dazzling light.
St. George's banner, broad and gay.
Now faded, as the fading ray
Less bright, and less, was flung ;
The evening gale had scarce the power
To wave it on the donjon tower.
So heavily it hung.
The scouts had parted ou their search.
The castle gates were barred ;
Above the gloomy portal arch.
Timing his footsteps to a march,
The warder kept his guard ;
Low humming, as he paced along.
Some ancient Border-gathering song.
A distant trampling sound he hears ;
He looks abroad, and soon appears.
O'er Horncliff hill, a plump of spears.
Beneath a pennon gay ;
A horseman, darting from the crowd.
Like lightning from a summer cloud,
Spui-s on his mettled courser proud
Before the dark array.
Beneath the sable palisade.
That closed the castle barricade.
His bugle-hom he blew ;
The warder hasted from the wall.
And warned the captain in the hall,
For well the blast he knew ;
And joyfully that knight did call
To sewer, squire, and seneschal.
"Now broach ye a pipe of Malvoisie,
Bring pasties of the doe.
And quickly make the entrance free,
And hid my heralds ready he.
And every minstrel sound his glee.
And all our trumpets blow ;
And, from the platform, spare ye not
To ñre a noble salvo-shot :
Lord Marmion waits below."
Then to the castle's lower ward
Sped forty yeomen tall.
The iron-studded gates unbarred.
Raised the portcullis' ponderous guard.
The lofty palisade unsparred.
And let the drawbridge falL
Along the bridge Lord Marmion rode.
Proudly his red-roan charger trode.
His helm hung at the saddle-how ;
Well by his visage you might know
He was a stalworth knight, and keen.
And had in many a battle been.
The scar on his brown cheek revealed
A token true of Bosworth field ;
His eyebrow dark, and eye of fire,
Showed spirit proud, and prompt to ire ;
Yet lines of thought upon his cheek
Did deep design and counsel speak.
His forehead, by his casque worn hare.
His thick mustache, and curly hair.
Coal-black, and grizzled here and there.
But more through toil than age ;
THE CONVENT
" fier hofesy her /earSy her joys, were ail
Bounded within the < loister wait
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
677
His square-tumed joints, and strength of limb,
Showed him no carpet-knight so trim,
But in close fight a champion grim,
In camps a leader sage.
Well was he armed from head to heel.
In mail and plate of Milan steel ;
But his strong helm, of mighty cost.
Was all with burnished gold embossed ;
Amid the plumage of the crest,
A falcon hovered on her nest.
With wings outspread, and forward breast ;
E'en such a falcon, on his shield.
Soared sable in an azure field :
The golden legend bore aright,
mi)a at tne to Deatl) is htgijt.
Blue was the charger's broidered rein ;
Blue ribbons decked his arching mane ;
The knightly housing's ample fold
Was velvet blue, and trapped with gold.
Behind him rode two gallant squires
Of noble name and knightly sires ;
They burned the gilded spurs to claim ;
For well could each a war-horse tame.
Could draw the bow, the sword could sway.
And lightly bear the ring away ;
Nor less with courteous precepts stored.
Could dance in hall, and carve at board.
And frame love-ditties passing rare.
And sing them to a lady fair.
Four men-at-arms came at their backs,
With halbert, bill, and battle-axe ;
They bore Lord Marmion's lance so strong.
And led his sumpter-mules along.
And ambling palfrey, when at need
Him listed ease his battle-steed.
The last and trustiest of the four
On high his forky pennon bore ;
Like swallow's tail, in shape and hue.
Fluttered the streamer glossy blue.
Where, blazoned sable, as before,
The towering falcon seemed to soar.
Last, twenty yeomen, two and two.
In hosen black, and jerkins blue.
With falcons broidered on each breast.
Attended on their lord's behest :
Each, chosen for an archer good.
Knew hunting-craft by lake or wood ;
Each one a six-foot bow could bend.
And far a cloth-yard shaft could send ;
Each held a boar-spear tough and strong.
And at their belts their quivers rung.
Their dusty palfreys and array
Showed they had marched a weary way.
sik Walter Scott.
ALNWICK CASTLE.
Home of the Percy's high-bom race.
Home of their beautiful and brave.
Alike their birth and burial place.
Their cradle and their gi-ave !
Still sternly o'er the castle gate
Their house's Lion stands in state.
As in his proud departed hours ;
And warriors ñ-own in stone on high.
And feudal banners " flout the sky "
Above his princely towers.
A gentle hill its side inclines.
Lovely in England's fadeless green,
To meet the quiet stream which winds
Through this romantic scene
As silently and sweetly still
As when, at evening, on that hill.
While summer's wind blew soft and low.
Seated by gallant Hotspur's side.
His Katherine was a happy bride,
A thousand years ago.
I wandered through the lofty halls
Trod by the Percys of old fame.
And traced upon the chapel walls
Each high, heroic name.
From him who once his standard set
Where now, o'er mosque and minaret.
Glitter the Sultan's crescent moons.
To him who, when a younger son.
Fought for King George at Lexington,
A major of dragoons.
That last half-stanza, — it has dashed
From my warm lip the sparkling cup ;
The light that o'er my eyebeam flashed,
The power that bore my spirit up
Above this bank-note world, is gone ;
And Alnwick's but a market town.
And this, alas ! its market day,
And beasts and borderers throng the way ;
Oxen and bleating lambs in lots,
Northumbrian boors and plaided Scots
Men in the coal and cattle line ;
From Teviot's bard and hero land.
From royal Berwick's beach of sand.
From Wooller, Morpeth, Hexham, and
N ewcastle-upon-Tyne.
These are not the romantic times
So beautiful in Spenser's rhymes.
So dazzling to the dreaming boy ;
Ours are the days of fact, not fable.
Of knights, but not of the round table.
Of Bailie Jarvie, not Rob Roy ;
'T is what " Our President," Monroe,
678
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
Has called " the era of good feeling ; "
The Highlander, the bitterest foe
To modem laws, has felt their blow.
Consented to be taxed, and vote.
And put on pantaloons and coat,
And leave off cattle-stealing ;
Lord Stafford mines for coal and salt,
The Duke of Norfolk deals in malt.
The Douglas in red herrings ;
And noble name and cultured land.
Palace, and park, and vassal band.
Are powerless to the notes of hand
Of Rothschild or the Barings.
The age of bargaining, said Burke,
Has come : to-day the turbaned Turk
(Sleep, Richard of the lion heart !
Sleep on, nor from your cerements start
Is England's friend and fast ally ;
The Moslem tramples on the Greek,
And on the Cross and altar-stone.
And Christendom looks tamely on.
And hears the Christian maiden shriek.
And sees the Christian father die ;
And not a sabre-blow is given
For Greece and fame, for faith and heaven.
By Europe's craven chivalry.
You '11 ask if yet the Percy lives
In the aimed pomp of feudal state.
The present representatives
Of Hotspur and his " gentle Kate,"
Are some half-dozen serving-men
In the drab coat of William Penn ;
A chambermaid, whose lip and eye.
And cheek, and brown hair, bright and curling.
Spoke nature's aristocracy ;
Aud one, half groom, half seneschal.
Who bowed me through court, bower, and hall.
From donjon keep to turret wall.
For teu-and-sixpence sterling.
fitz-greene halleck.
—«—
SONNET.
composed upon westminster bridge, london, isoa.
Earth has not anything to show more fair ;
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty ;
This city now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning ; silent, bare.
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky.
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
, In his first splendor valley, rock, or hill ;
tg
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep !
The river glideth at his own sweet will :
Dear God ! the very houses seem asleep ;
And all that mighty heart is lying still !
William Wordsworth
N CREMBERG.
In the valley of the Pegnitz, where across broad
meadow-lands
Rise the blue Franconian mountains, Nuremberg,
the ancient, stands.
Quaint old town of toil and traffic, quaint old
town of art and song.
Memories haunt thy pointed gables^ike the rooks,^
that round them throng :
Memories of the Middle Ages, when the em¬
perors rough and bold
Had their dwellings in thy castle, time-defying,
centuries old ;
And thy brave and thrifty burghers boasted, in
their uncouth rhyme.
That their great, imperial city stretched its hand
to every clime.
In the court-yard of the castle, bound with many
an iron band.
Stands the mighty linden planted by Queen
Cunigunde's hand ;
On the square, the oriel window, where in old
heroic days
Sat the poet Melchior, singing Kaiser Maximil¬
ian's praise.
Everywhere I see around me rise the wondrous
world of art ;
Fountains wrought with richest sculpture stand¬
ing in the common mart j
And above cathedral doorways saints and bishops
carved in stone.
By a former age commissioned as apostles to our
own.
In the church of sainted Sebald sleeps enshrined
his holy dust.
And in bronze the Twelve Apostles guard from
age to age their trust :
In the church of sainted Lawrence stands a pix
of sculpture rare.
Like the foamy sheaf of fountains, rising through
the painted air.
iS-
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
679
a
t
Here, when art was still religion, with a simple
reverent heart.
Lived and labored Albrecht Dürer, the Evan¬
gelist of Art ;
Hence in silence and in sorrow, toiling stUl with
busy hand.
Like an emigrant he wandered, seeking for the
Better Land.
Emigravit is the inscription on the tombstone
where he lies.
Dead he is not — but departed — for the artist
never dies :
Fairer seems the ancient city, and the sunshine
seems more fair
That he once has trod its pavement, that he once
has breathed its air.
Through these streets so broad and stately, these
obscure and dismal lanes,
Walked of yore the Mastersingers, chanting rude
poetic strains ;
From remote and sunless suburbs came they to
the friendly guild,
Budding nests in Fame's great temple, as in
spouts the swallows buüd.
As the weaver plied the shuttle, wove he too the
mystic rhyme.
And the smith his iron measures hammered to
the anvil's chime.
Thanking God, whose boundless wisdom makes
the flowers of poesy bloom
In the forge's dust and cinders, in the tissues of
the loom.
Here Hans Sachs, the cobbler-poet, laureate of
the gentle craft.
Wisest of the Twelve Wise Masters, in huge
folios sang and laughed.
But his house is now an alehouse, with a nicely
sanded floor.
And a garland in the window, and his face above
the door.
Painted by some humble artist, as in Adam
Puschman's song.
As the old man gray and dovelike, with his
great beard white and long.
And at night the swart mechanic comes to drown
his cark and care,
Quafiing ale from pewter tankards, in the mas¬
ter's antique chair.
Vanished is the ancient splendor, and before my
dreamy eye
Wave these mingling shapes and figures, like a
faded tapestry.
Not thy Councils, not thy Kaisers, win for thee
the world's regard.
But thy painter, Albrecht DUrer, and Hans Sachs,
thy cobbler-bard.
Thus, 0 Nuremberg, a wanderer from a region
far away.
As he paced thy streets and court-yards, sang in
thought his careless lay ;
Gathering from the pavement's crevice, as a
floweret of the soil.
The nobility of labor, — the long pedigree of toü.
Henry Waosworth longfeuow.
ITALY.
from "italy."
0 Italy, how beautiful thou art !
Yet 1 could weep, —for thou art lying, alas !
Low in the dust ; and they who come admire
thee
As we admire the beautiful in death.
Thine was a dangerous gift, the gift of beauty.
Would thou hadst less, or wert as once thou wast.
Inspiring awe in those who now enslave thee !
But why despair ? Twice hast thou lived already.
Twice shone among the nations of the world.
As the sun shines among the lesser lights
Of heaven ; and shalt again. The hour shall
come.
When they who think to bind the ethereal spirit,
IVho, like the eagle cowering o'er his prey.
Watch with quick eye, and strike and strike again
If but a sinew vibrate, shall confess
Their wisdom folly.
Samuel Rogers.
VENICE.
from "italy."
There is a glorious City in the Sea.
The Sea is in the broad, the narrow streets.
Ebbing and flowing ; and the salt sea-weed
Clings to the marble of her palaces.
No track of men, no footsteps to and fro.
Lead to her gates. The path lies o'er the Sea,
Invisible ; and from the land we went.
As to a floating City, — steering in.
And gliding up her streets as in a dream,
So smoothly, silently, —by many a dome
-3
680
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
Mosque-like, and many a stately portico,
The statues ranged along an azure sky ;
By many a pile in more than Eastern splendor.
Of old the residence of merchant kings ;
The fronts of some, though Time had shattered
them.
Still glowing with the richest hues of art.
As though the wealth within them had run o'er.
A few in fear.
Flying away from him whose boast it was
That the grass grew not where his horse had
trod.
Gave birth to Venice. Like the waterfowl, ■
They built their nests among the ocean waves ;
And where the sands were shifting, as the wind
Blew from the north, the south ; where they that
came
Had to make sure the ground they stood upon.
Rose, like an exhalation, from the deep,
A vast Metropolis, with glittering spires.
With theatres, basilicas adorned ;
A scene of light and glory, a dominion.
That has endured the longest among men.
And whence the talisman by which she rose
Towering ? 'T was found there in the barren sea.
Want led to Enterprise ; and, far or near.
Who met not the Venetian ? — now in Cairo ;
Ere yet the Califa came, listening to hear
Its bells approaching from the Red Sea coast ;
Now on the Euxine, on the Sea of Azoph,
In converse with the Persian, with the Russ,
The Tartar ; on his lowly deck receiving
Pearls from the gulf of Ormus, gems from Bagdad,
Eyes brighter yet, that shed the light of love
From Georgia, from Circassia. Wandering round.
When in the rich bazaar he saw, displayed.
Treasures from unknown climes, away he went.
And, travelling slowly upward, drew erelong
From the well-head supplying all below ;
Making the Imperial City of the East
Herself his tributary.
Thus did Venice rise.
Thus flourish, till the unwelcome tidings came.
That in the Tagus had arrived a fleet
From India, from the region of the Sun,
Fragrant with spices, —that a way was found,
A channel opened, and the golden stream
Turned to enrich another. Then she felt
Her strength departing, and at last she fell.
Fell in an instant, blotted out and razed ;
She who had stood yet longer than the longest
Of the Four Kingdoms, —who, as in an Ark,
Had floated down amid a thousand wrecks.
Uninjured, from the Old World to the New.
• Samuel Rogers.
ROME.
from " italy."
I AM in Rome ! Oft as the morning ray
Visits these eyes, waking at once I cry.
Whence this excess of joy ? What has befallen
me ?
And from within a thrilling voice repRes,
Thou art in Rome ! A thousand busy thoughts
Rush on my mind, a thousand images ;
And I spring up as girt to nm a race !
Thou art in Rome 1 the City that so long
Reigned absolute, the mistress of the world ;
The mighty vision that the prophets saw.
And trembled ; that from nothing, from the
least.
The lowliest vUlage (what but here and there
A reed-roofed cabin by a river-side ?)
Grew into everything ; and, year by year,
Patiently, fearlessly working her way
O'er brook and field, o'er continent and sea,
Not like the merchant with his merchandise.
Or traveUer with staff and scrip exploring.
But hand to hand and foot to foot tlirough hosts,
Through nations numberless in battle array.
Each behind each, each, when the other fell.
Up and in arms, at length subdued them all.
Samuel Rogers.
COLISEUM BY MOONLIGHT.
from " manfred." act iii. sc. 4.
The stars are forth, the moon above the tops
Of the snow-shining mountains. Beautiful !
I Rnger yet with Nature, for the night
Hath been to me a more familiar face
Than that of man ; and in her starry shade
Of dim and solitary loveliness
I learned the language of another world.
I do remember me, that in my youth.
When I was wandering, — upon such a night
I stood within the Coliseum's wall.
Midst the chief relics of almighty Rome.
The trees which grew along the broken arches
Waved dark in the blue midnight, and the stars
Shone through the rents of ruin ; from afar
The watch-dog bayed beyond the Tiber ; and
More near, from out the Caesars' palace came
The owl's long cry, and, interruptedly.
Of distant sentinels the fitful song
Begun and died upon the gentle wind.
Some cypresses beyond the time-worn breach
Appeared to skirt the hoiizon, yet they stood
Within a bowshot, —where the Caesars dwelt,
And dwell the tuneless birds of night, amidst
or
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS. 681
A grove which springe through levelled battle¬
ments,
And twines its roots with the imperial hearths.
Ivy usui-ps the laurel's place of growth ; —
But the gladiators' bloody Circus stands,
A noble wreck in i-uiuous perfection,
"While Caesar's chambers and the Angnstan halls
Grovel on earth in indistinct decay. —
And thou didst shine, thou rolling moon, upon
All this, and cast a wide and tender light.
Which softened down the hoar austerity
Of rugged desolation, and filled up.
As't were anew, the gaps of centuries.
Leaving that beautiful which still was so.
And making that which was not, till the place
Became religion, and the heart ran o'er
With silent worship of the great of old ! —
The dead, but sceptred sovereigns, who still mle
Our spirits from their urns.
Lord Byron.
THE COLISEUM.
proh "childe harold," canto iv.
Akches on arches ! as it were that Rome,
Collecting the chief trophies of her line.
Would build up all her triumphs in one dome.
Her Coliseum stands ; the moonbeams shine
As't were its natural torches, for divine
Should be the light which streams here, to
illume
This long-explored, but still exhaustless, mine
Of contemplation ; and the azure gloom
Of an Italian night, where the deep skies assume
Hues which have words, and speak to ye of
heaven.
Floats o'er this vast and wondrous monument.
And shadows forth its glory. There is given
Unto the thingsof earth, whichTime hath bent,
A spirit's feeling, and where he hath leant
His hand, but broke his scythe, there is a power
And magic in the ruined battlement.
For which the palace of the present hour
Must yield its pomp, and wait till ages are its
dower.
And here the buzz of eager nations ran.
In murmured pity, or loud-roared applause.
As man was slaughtered by his fellow-man.
And wherefore slaughtered ? wherefore, but
because
Such were the bloody Circus' genial laws.
And the imperial pleasure. — Wherefore not ?
What matters where we fall to fill the maws
Of worms, —on battle-plains or listed spot ?
Both are but theatres where the chief actors rot.
1 see before me the Gladiator lie ;
He leans upon his hand, — his manly brow-
Consents to death, but conquers agony.
And his drooped head sinks gi-adually low, —
And through his side the last drops, ebbing slow
From the red gash, fall heavy, one by one.
Like the first of a thunder-shower ; and now
The arena swims around him, — he is gone.
Ere ceased the inhuman shont which hailed the
wretch who won.
He heard it, but he heeded not, — his eyes
Were with his heart, and that was far away.
He recked not of the life he lost nor prize.
But where his rude hut by the Danube lay.
There were his young barbarians all at play.
There was their Dacian mother, — he, their sire.
Butchered to make a Roman holiday ! —
AU. this rushed with his blood. — Shall he
expire.
And unavenged ? Arise, ye Goths, and glut your
ire !
But here, where Murder breathed her bloody
steam.
And here, where buzzing nations choked the
ways.
And roared ormurmnred likeamountain stream
Dashing or winding as its torrent strays ;
Here, where the Roman millions' blame or praise
Was death or life, the playthings of a crowd.
My voice sounds much, — and fall the stars'
faint rays
On the arena void, seats crushed, walls bowed.
And galleries, where my steps seem echoes strange¬
ly loud.
A ruin, —yet what ruin ! from its mass
Walls, palaces, half-cities, have been reared ;
Yet oft the enormous skeleton ye pass.
And marvel where the spoil could haveappeared.
Hath it indeed been plundered, or but cleared ?
Alas ! developed, opens the decay,
"When the colossal fabric's form is neared ;
It wUl not bear the brightness of the day.
Which streams too much on all years, man, have
reft away.
But when the rising moon begins to climb
Its topmost arch, and gently pauses there ;
When the stars twinkle through the loops of
time.
And the low night-breeze waves along the air
The garland-forest, which the gray waUs wear.
Like laurels on the bald first Caesar's head ;
When the light shines serene, but doth not
glare,—
Then in this magic circle raise the dead ;
Heroes have trod this spot, — 't is on their dust
ye tread.
f
682
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
" While stands the Coliseum, Rome shall stand;
When falls the Coliseum, Rome shall fall ;
And when Rome falls — the World." From
our own land
Thus spake the pilgrims o'er this mighty wall
In Saxon times, which we are wont to call
Ancient ; and these three mortal things are still
On their foundations, and unaltered all ;
Rome and her Ruin past Redemption's skill,
The World, the same wide den —of thieves, or
what ye will.
Lord Byron.
THE PANTHEON.
from " childe harold," canto iv.
Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime, —
Shrine of all saints and temple of all gods,
From Jove to Jesus, —spared and blest by time;
Looking tranquillity, while falls or nods
Arch, empire, each thing round thee, and man
plods
His way through thorns to ashes, — glorious
dome !
Shalt thou not last ? Time's scythe and tyrants'
rods
Shiver upon thee, — sanctuary and home
Of art and piety, — Pantheon ! — pride of Rome !
Relic of nobler days and noblest arts !
Despoiled yet perfect, with thy cii'cle spreads
A holiness appealing to all hearts.
To art a model ; and to him who treads
Rome for the sake of ages, Glory sheds
Her light through thy sole aperture ; to those
Who worship, here are altars for their beads ;
And they who feel for genius may repose
Their eyes on honored forms, whose busts around
them close.
lord byron.
A DAY IN THE PAMFILI DORIA,
near rome.
Though the hills are cold and snowy.
And the wind drives chill to-day,
My heart goes back to a spring-time.
Far, far in the past away.
And I see a quaint old city.
Weary and worn and brown.
Where the spring and the birds are so early.
And the sun in such light goes down.
I remember that old-time villa
Where our afternoons went by.
Where the suns of March flushed warmly.
And spring was in earth and sky.
Out of the mouldering city, —
Mouldering, old, and gray, —
We sped, with a lightsome heart-thrill.
For a sunny, gladsome day, —
For a revel of fresh spring verdure,
For a race mid springing flowers.
For a vision of plashing fountains.
Of birds and blossoming bowers.
There were violet banks in the shadows,
Violets white and blue ;
And a world of bright anemones.
That over the teri'ace grew, —
Blue and orange and purple.
Rosy and yellow and white.
Rising in rainbow bubbles.
Streaking the lawns with light.
And down from the old stone-pine trees.
Those far-off islands of air.
The birds are flinging the tidings
Of a joyful revel up there.
And now for the grand old fountains.
Tossing their silvery spray ;
Those fountains, so quaint and so many.
That are leaping and singing all day ;
Those fountains of strange weird sculpture.
With lichens and moss o'ergrown, —
Are they marble greening in moss-wreaths,
Or moss-wreaths whitening to stone '
Down many a wUd, dim pathway
We ramble from morning till noon ;
We linger, unheeding the hours.
Till evening comes all too soon.
And from out the ilex alleys.
Where lengthening shadows play.
We look on the dreamy Cainpagna,
All glowing with setting day, —
All melting in bands of purple.
In swathings and foldings of gold.
In ribbons of azure and lilac.
Like a princely banner unrolled.
And the smoke of each distant cottage.
And the flash of each villa white.
Shines out with an opal glimmer.
Like gems in a casket of light.
And the dome of old St. Peter's
With a strange translucence glows.
Like a mighty bubble of amethyst
Floating in waves of rose.
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
In a trance of dreamy vagueness,
We, gazing and yearning, behold
That city beheld by the prophet.
Whose walls were transparent gold.
And, dropping all solemn and slowly.
To hallow the softening spell.
There falls on the dying twilight
The Ave Maria bell.
With a mournful, motherly softness.
With a weird and weary care.
That strange and ancient city
Seems calling the nations to prayer.
And the words that of old the angel
To the mother of Jesus brought
Rise like a new evangel.
To hallow the ti-ance of our thought.
With the smoke of the evening incense
Our thoughts are ascending then
To Mary, the mother of Jesus,
To Jesus, the Master of men.
0 city of prophets and martyi-s !
0 shrines of the sainted dead !
When, when shall the living day-spring
Once more on your towers be spread ?
When He who is meek and lowly
Shall rule in those lordly halls.
And shall stand and feed as a shepherd
The flock which his mercy calls, —
0, then to those noble churches.
To picture and statue and gem.
To the pageant of solemn worship.
Shall the meaning come back again.
And this strange and ancient city.
In that reign of his truth and love.
Shall be what it seems in the twilight.
The type of that City above.
Harriet Beecher Stowe.
A VIEW ACROSS THE ROMAF
CAMPAGNA.
x86i.
Over the dumb campagna-sea.
Out in the offing through mist and rain,
St. Peter's Church heaves silently
Like a mighty ship in pain.
Facing the tempest with struggle and strain.
Motionless waifs ofruined towers.
Soundless breakers of desolate land 1
B
The sullen surf of the mist devours
That mountain-range upon either hand.
Eaten away from its outline grand.
And over the dumb campagna-sea
Where the ship of the Church heaves on to
wreck.
Alone and silent as God must be
The Christ walks ! — Ay, but Peter's neck
Is stiff to turn on the foundering deck.
Peter, Peter, if such be thy name.
Now leave the ship for another to steer,
And proving thy faith evermore the same
Come forth, tread out through the dark and
drear.
Since He who walks on the sea is here !
Peter, Peter ! —he does not speak, —
He is not as rash as in old Galilee.
Safer a ship, though it toss and leak.
Than a reeling foot on a rolling sea !
— And he's got to be round in the girth,
thinks he.
Peter, Peter ! — he does not stir, —
His nets are heavy with silver fish :
He reckons his gains, and is keen to infer,
"The broil on the shore, if the Lord should
wish, —
But the sturgeon goes to the Caesar's dish."
Peter, Peter, thou fisher of men.
Fisher of fish wouldst thou live instead, —
Haggling for pence with the other Ten,
Cheating the market at so much a head.
Griping the bag of the traitor dead ?
At the triple crow of the Gallic cock
Thou weep'st not, thou, though thine eyes be
dazed :
What bird comes next in the tempest shock ?
Vultures ! See, —as when Romulus gazed.
To inaugurate Rome for a world amazed !
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
NAPLES.
frou "italy."
This region, surely, is not of the earth.
Was it not dropt from heaven ? Not a grove.
Citron or pine or cedar, not a grot
Sea-worn and mantled with the gadding vine.
But breathes enchantment. Not a cli ff but flings
On the clear wave some image of delight.
Some cabin-roof glowing with crimson flowers.
Some mined temple or fallen monument,
á
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
To muse on as the bark is gliding by,
And be it mine to muse there, mine to glide.
From daybreak, when the mountain pales bis fire
Yet more and more, and from the mountain-top.
Till then invisible, a smoke ascends.
Solemn and slow, as erst from Ararat,
When be, the Patriarch, who escaped the Flood,
Was with bis household sacrificing there, —
From daybreak to that hour, the last and best,
When, one by one, the fishing-boats come forth.
Each with its glimmering lantern at the prow.
And, when the nets are thrown, the evening hymn
Steals o'er the trembling waters.
Everywhere
Fable and Truth have shed, in rivalry.
Each her peculiar influence. Fable came.
And laughed and sung, arraying Truth in flowers.
Like a young child her grandam. Fable came ;
Earth, sea, and sky reflecting, as she flew,
A thousand, thousand colore not their own :
And at her bidding, lo ! a dark descent
To Tartarus, and those thrice happy fields.
Those fields with ether pure and purple light
Ever invested, scenes by him described
Who here was wont to wander and record
What they revealed, and on the western shore
Sleeps in a silent grove, o'erlooking thee.
Beloved Parthenope.
Yet here, methinks.
Truth wants no ornament, in her own shape
Filling the mind by turns with awe and love.
By turns inclining to wild ecstasy
And soberest meditation.
Samuel Rogers.
DRIFTING.
Mt soul to-day
Is far away.
Sailing the Vesuvian Bay ;
My winged boat,
A bird afloat.
Swims round the purple peaks remote
Round purple peaks
It sails, and seeks
Blue inlets and their crystal creeks.
Where high rocks throw.
Through deeps below,
A duplicated golden glow.
Far, vague, and dim
The mountains swim ;
While, on Vesuvius' misty brim,
With outstretched hands.
The gray smoke stands
O'erlooking the volcanic lands.
Here Ischia smiles
O'er liquid miles ;
And yonder, bluest of the isles,
Calm Capri waits.
Her sapphire gates
Beguiling to her bright estates.
I heed not, if
My rippling skiff
Float swift or slow from cliff to cliff ; —
With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Under the walls of Paradise.
Under the walls
Where swells and falls
The Bay's deep breast at intervals, •
At peace I lie.
Blown softly by,
A cloud upon this liquid sky.
The day, so mild.
Is Heaven's own child.
With Earth and Ocean reconciled ; —
The airs I feel
Around me steal
Are murmuring to the murmuring keeL
Over the rail
My hand I trail
Within the shadow of the sail ;
A joy intense,
The cooling sense
Glides down my drowsy indolence.
With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Where Summer sings and never dies, —
O'erveiled with vines.
She glows and shines
Among her future oil and wines.
Her children, hid
The cliffs amid.
Are gambolling with the gambolling kid ;
Or down the walls.
With tipsy calls.
Laugh on the rocks like waterfalls.
The fisher's child.
With tresses wild.
Unto the smooth, bright sand beguiled.
With glowing lips
Sings as she skips.
Or gazes at the far-off ships.
Yon deep bark goes
Where Traflfic blows.
From lands of sun to lands of snows ; —
-t—9^
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
685
This happier one,
Its course is run
From lands of snow to lands of sun.
0 happy ship,
To rise and dip.
With the blue crystal at your lip !
O happy crew.
My heart with you
Sails, and sails, and sings anew !
No more, no more
The worldly shore
Upbraids me with its loud uproar !
With dreamful eyes
My spirit lies
Under the walls of Paradise !
In lofty lines.
Mid palms and pines,
And olives, aloes, elms, and vines,
Sorrento swings
On sunset wings.
Where Tasso's spirit soars and sings.*
Thomas Buchanan Read.
WEEHAWKEN AND THE NEW YORK
BAY.
from "fanny."
Weehawken ! In thy mountain scenery yet.
All we adore of Nature in her wild
And frolic hour of infancy is met ;
And never has a summer's morning smiled
Upon a lovelier scene than the full eye
Of the enthusiast revels on, —when high
Amid thy forest solitudes he climbs
O'er crags that proudly tower above the deep,
And knows that sense of danger which sublimes
The breathless moment, — when his daring
step
Is on the verge of the cliff, and he can hear
The low dash of the wave with startled ear.
Like the death-music of his coming doom.
And clings to the green turf with desperate
force.
As the heart clings to life ; and when resume
The currents in his veins their wonted course.
There lingers a deep feeling, — like the moan
Of wearied ocean when the storm is gone.
pt
3"
* The last stanza was written Just before the author's death, and
published shortly after in the Cincinnati Gazette»
In such an hour he turns, and on his view
Ocean and earth and heaven burst before him ;
Clouds slumbering at his feet, and the clear blue
Of summer's sky in beauty bending o'er him, —
The city bright below ; and far away.
Sparkling in golden light, his own romantic bay.
Tall spire, and glittering roof, and battlement.
And banners floating in the sunny air ;
And white sails o'er the calm blue waters bent.
Green isle, and circling shore, are blended
there
In wild reality. When life is old.
And many a scene forgot, the heart will hold
Its memory of this ; nor lives there one
Whose infant breath was drawn, or boyhood's
days
Of happiness were passed beneath that sun.
That in his manhood's prime can calmly gaze
Upon that bay, or on that mountain stand.
Nor feel the prouder of his native land.
Fitz-Greene Halleck.
CALM AND STORM ON LAKE LEMAN.
from "childe harold," canto iii.
Clear, placid Leman ! thy contrasted lake.
With the wild world 1 dwelt in, is a thing
Which warns me, with its stillness, to forsake
Earth's troubled waters for a purer spring.
This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing
To waft me from distraction ; once I loved
Torn ocean's roar, but thy soft murmuring
Sounds sweet as if a sister's voice reproved.
That I with stem delights should e'er have been
so moved.
It is the hush of night, and all between
Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet
clear.
Mellowed and mingling, yet distinctly seen.
Save darkened Jura, whose capt heights appear
Precipitously steep ; and drawing near.
There breathes a living fragrance from the
shore.
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar.
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol
He is an evening reveller, who makes
His life an infancy, and sings his fill ;
At intervals, some hird from out the brakes
Starts into voice a moment, then is still.
e-
686
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
There seems a floating whisper on the hill,
But that is fancy ; for the starlight dews
All silently their tears of love instil,
Weeping themselves away, till they infuse
Deep into Nature's breast the spirit of her hues.
The sky is changed ! — and such a change !
0 night.
And storm, and darkness, ye are wondrous
strong,
Yet lovely in your strength, as is the light
Of a dark eye in woman ! Far along,
From peak to peak, the rattling crags among
Leaps the live thunder ! Not from one lone
cloud.
But every mountain now hath found a tongue.
And Jura answers, through her misty shroud.
Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her aloud !
And this is in the night : — most glorious
night !
Thou wert not sent for slumber ! let me be
A sharer in thy fierce and far delight, —
A portion of the tempest and of thee !
How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric sea.
And the big rain comes dancing to the earth !
And now again't is black, — and now, the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with its mountain-
mirth.
As if they did rejoice o'er a young earthquake's
birth.
Lord Byron.
THE HURRICANE.
Lord of the winds ! I feel thee nigh,
I know thy breath in the burning sky !
And I wait, with a thrill in every vein.
For the coming of the hurricane !
And lo ! on the wing of the heavy gales.
Through the boundless arch of heaven he sails.
Silent and slow, and terribly strong.
The mighty shadow is borne along.
Like the dark eternity to come ;
While the world below, dismayed and dumb.
Through the calm of the thick hot atmosphere
Looks up at its gloomy folds with fear.
They darken fast ; and the golden blaze
Of the sun is quenched in the lurid haze.
And he sends through the shade a funeral ray -
A glare that is neither night nor day,
A beam that touches, with hues of death.
The clouds above and the earth beneath.
To its covert glides the silent bird.
While the hurricane's distant voice is heard
Uplifted among the mountains round.
And the forests hear and answer the sound.
He is come ! he is come ! do ye not behold
His ample robes on the wind unrolled ?
Giant of air ! we bid thee hail ! —
How his gray skirts toss in the whirling gale ;
How his huge and writhing arms are bent
To clasp the zone of the firmament.
And fold at length, in their dark embrace.
From mountain to mountain the visible space !
Darker, — still darker ! the whirlwinds bear
The dust of the plains to the middle air ;
And hark to the crashing, long and loud.
Of the chariot of God in the thunder-cloud !
You may trace its path by the flashes that start
From the rapid wheels where'er they dart.
As the fire-bolts leap to the world below.
And flood the skies with a lurid glow.
What roar is that ? — 't is the rain that breaks
In torrents away from the airy lakes.
Heavily poured on the shuddering ground.
And shedding a nameless horror round.
Ah! well-known woods, and mountains, and skies.
With the very clouds ! —ye are lost to my eyes.
I seek ye vainly, and see in your place
The shadowy tempest that sweeps througn space,
A whirling ocean that fills the wall
Of the crystal heaven, and buries all.
And I, cut off from the world, remain
Alone with the terrible hurricane.
William Collen Bryant.
THE DESERTED VILLAGE.
Sweet Auburn ! loveliest village of the plain.
Where health and plenty cheered the labeling
swain.
Where smiling spring its earliest visit paid.
And parting summer's lingering blooms delayed.
Dear lovely bowers of innocence and ease.
Seats of my youth, when every sport could please.
How often have I loitered o'er thy green.
Where humble happiness endeared each scene !
How often have I paused on every charm.
The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm.
The never-failing brook, the busy mill.
The decent church that topped the neighboring
hill.
The hawthom-bush, with seats beneath the
shade.
For talking age and whispering lovers made !
How often have I blessed the coming day.
When toil remitting lent its turn to play.
And all the village train, from labor free.
Led up their sports beneath the spreading tree.
While many a pastime circled in the shade.
The young contending as the old surveyed ;
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And many a gambol frolicked o'er the ground,
And sleights of art and feats of strength went
round ;
And still, as each repeated pleasure tired.
Succeeding sports the mirthful band inspired ;
The dancing pair that simply sought renown,
By holding out, to tire each other down ;
The swain mistrustless of his smutted face,
While secret laughter tittered round the place ;
The bashful virgin's sidelong looks of love.
The matron's glance that would those looks re¬
prove, —
These were thy charms, sweet village ! sports like
these.
With sweet succession, taught e'en toil to please ;
These round thy bowers their cheerful influence
shed.
These were thy charms, — but all these charms
are fled !
Sweet smiling village, loveliest of the lawn.
Thy sports are fled, and all thy charms with¬
drawn ;
Amidst thy bowers the tyrant's hand is seen.
And desolation saddens all thy green ;
One only master grasps the whole domain.
And half a tillage stints thy smiling plain ;
No more thy glassy brook reflects the day.
But, choked with sedges, works its weedy way ;
Along thy glades, a solitary guest.
The hollow-sounding bittern guards its nest ;
Amidst thy desert walks the lapwing flies.
And tires their echoes with unvaried cries.
Sunk are thy bowers in shapeless ruin all.
And the long grass o'ertops the mouldering wall.
And, trembling, shrinking from the spoiler's hand.
Far, far away thy children leave the land.
Ill fares the land, to hastening ills a prey,
Where wealth accumulates and men decay :
Princes and lords may flourish, or may fade ;
A breath can make them, as a breath has made ;
But a bold peasantry, their country's pride.
When once destroyed, can never be supplied.
A time there was, ere England's griefs began,
When every rood of ground maintained its man ;
For him light Labor spread her wholesome store.
Just gave what life required, but gave no more ;
His best companions, innocence and health ;
And his best riches, iguoiaiice of wealth.
But times are altered ; trade's unfeeling train
Usuip the land and dispossess the swain ;
Along the lawn, where scattered hamlets rose.
Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose.
And every want to luxury allied.
And every pang that folly pays to pride.
Those gentle hours that plenty bade to bloom.
Those calm desires that asked but little room.
Those healthful sports that graced the peaceful
scene.
Lived in each look, and brightened all the
green,—
These, far departing, seek a kinder shore.
And rural mirth and manners are no more.
Sweet Auburn ! parent of the blissful hour.
Thy glades forlorn confess the tyrant's power.
Here, as 1 take my solitary rounds.
Amidst thy tangling walks and ruined grounds.
And, many a year elapsed, return to view
Where once the cottage stood, the hawthorn grew.
Remembrance wakes, with all her busy train.
Swells at my breast, and turns the past to pain.
In all my wanderings round this world of care.
In all my griefs — and God has given my share —
I still had hopes my latest hours to crown.
Amidst these humble bowers to lay me down ;
To husband out life's taper at the close.
And keep the flame from wasting by repose ;
I still had hopes— for pride attends us still —
Amidst the swains to show my book-leamed skill.
Around my flre an evening group to draw.
And tell of all I felt and all I saw ;
And, as a hare, whom hounds and horns pursue.
Pants to the place from whence at first she flew,
I still had hopes, my long vexations past.
Here to return, —and die at home at last.
O blest retirement ! friend to life's decline.
Retreats from care, that never must be mine.
How blest is he who crowns in shades like these
A youth of labor with an age of ease ;
Who quits a world where strong temptations try.
And, since't is hard to combat, leams to fly !
For him no wretches, born to work and weep.
Explore the mine, or tempt the dangerous deep ;
No surly porter stands in guilty state.
To spurn imploring famine from the gate :
But on he moves to meet his latter end.
Angels around befriending virtue's friend ;
Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay.
While resignation gently slopes the way ;
And, all his prospects brightening to the last.
His heaven commences ere the world be past.
Sweet was the sound, when oft, at evening's
close.
Up yonder hill the village murmur rose ;
There, as I passed with careless steps and slow,
The mingling notes came softened from below ;
The swain responsive as the milkmaid sung.
The sober herd that lowed to meet their young ;
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool,
The playful children just let loose from school ;
The watch-dog's voice that bayed the whispering
wind,
And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind, —
These all in sweet confusion sought the shade.
And filled each pause the nightingale had made.
But now the sounds of population fail.
No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale.
No busy steps the grass-grown foot-way tread.
But all the bloomy flush of life is fled.
All but yon widowed, solitary thing.
That feebly bends beside the plashy spring ;
She, wretched matron, forced in age, for bread.
To strip the brook with mantling cresses spread.
To pick her wintry fagot from the thorn.
To seek her nightly shed, and weep till mom ;
She only left of all the harmless train.
The sad historian of the pensive plain.
Near yonder copse, where once the garden
smiled.
And still where many a garden-flower grows ^vild;
There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose.
The village preacher's modest mansion rose.
A man he was to all the country dear.
And passing rich with forty pounds a year ;
Remote from towns he ran his godly race.
Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his
place ;
UnskUful he to fawn, or seek for power.
By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour ;
Far other aims his heart had learned to prize.
More bent to raise the wretched than to rise.
His house was known to all the vagrant train.
He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain ;
The long-remembered beggar was his guest,
"Whose beard descending swept his aged breast.
The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud.
Claimed kindred there, and had his claims al¬
lowed ;
The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay.
Sate by his fire, and talked the night away ;
Wept o'er his wounds, or tales of soitow done.
Shouldered his crutch, and showed how fields
were won.
Pleased with his guests, the good man learned to
glow.
And quite forgot their vices in their woe ;
Careless their merits or their faults to scan.
His pity gave ere charity began.
Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride.
And e'en his failings leaned to Vii-tue's side ;
But in his duty prompt at every call.
He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all ;
And, as a bird each fond endearment tries.
To tempt its new-fledged offspring to the skies.
He tried each art, reproved each dull delay.
Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way.
Beside the bed where parting life was laid.
And sorrow, guilt, and pain by turns dismayed.
The reverend champion stood. At his control.
Despair and anguish fled the struggling soul ;
Comfort came down the trembling wretch to raise.
And his last faltering accents whispered praise.
At church, with meek and unaffected grace.
His looks adorned the venerable place ;
Truth from his lips prevailed with double sway,
And fools, who came to scoff, remained to pray.
The service past, around the pious man.
With steady zeal, each honest rustic ran ;
E'en children followed with endearing wile.
And plucked his gown, to share the good man's
smile.
His ready smile a parent's warmth expressed.
Their welfare pleased him, and their cares dis¬
tressed ;
To them his heart, his love, his griefs were given.
But all his serious thoughts had rest in heaven.
As some tall cliff, that lifts its awful form,
Swells from thevale, and midway leaves the storm.
Though round its breast the rolling clouds are
spread.
Eternal sunshine settles on its head.
Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way.
With blossomed furze unprofitably gay.
There, in his noisy mansion, skilled to rule.
The village master taught his little school ;
A man severe he was, and stem to view,
I knew him well, and every traant knew ;
Well had the boding tremblers learned to trace
The day's disasters in his morning face ;
Full well they laughed with counterfeited glee
At all his jokes, for many a joke had he ;
Full well the busy whisper circling round
Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned ;
Yet he was kind, or, if severe in aught.
The love he bore to learning was in fault.
The village all declared how much he knew,
'T was certain he could write, and cipher too ;
Lands he could measure, times and tides presage.
And e'en the story ran that he could gauge ;
In arguing too, the pareon owned his skill.
For, e'en though vanquished, he could argue still,
While words of learnèd length and thundering
sound
Amazed the gazing rustics i-auged around ;
And still they gazed, and still the wonder grew
That one small head could cany all he knew.
But past is all his fame. The very spot
"Where many a time he triumphed is forgot. —
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
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Near yonder thorn, that lifts its head on high,
Where once the sign-post caught the passing eye.
Low lies that house where nut-brown draughts
inspired.
Where graybeard mirth and smiling toil retired.
Where village statesmen talked with looks pro¬
found.
And news much older than their ale went round.
Imagination fondly stoops to trace
The parlor splendors of that festive place, —
The whitewashed wall ; the nicely sanded floor ;
The varnished clock that ticked behind the door ;
The chest, contrived a double debt to pay,
A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day ;
The pictures placed for ornament and use ;
The twelve good rules ; the royal game of goose ;
The hearth, except when winter chilled the day.
With aspen boughs and flowers and fennel gay ;
While broken teacups, wisely kept for show.
Ranged o'er the chimney, glistened in a row.
Vain, transitory splendor ! could not all
Reprieve the tottering mansion from its fall ?
Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impart
An hour's importance to the poor man's heart ;
Thither no moi-e the peasant shall repair
To sweet oblivion of his daily care ;
No more the farmer's news, the barber's tale.
No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail ;
No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear.
Relax his ponderous strength, and lean to hear ;
The host himself no longer shall be found
Careful to see the mantling bliss go round ;
Nor the coy maid, half willing to be prest.
Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest.
Yes ! let the rich deride, the proud disdain.
These simple blessings of the lowly train ;
To me more dear, congenial to my heart.
One native charm, than all the gloss of art.
Spontaneous joys, where nature has its play,
The soul adopts, and owns their first-born sway ;
Lightly they frolic o'er the vacant mind,
Unenvied, unmolested, unconfined :
But the long pomp, the midnight masquerade.
With all the freaks of wanton wealth arrayed, —
In these, ere triflers half their wish obtain.
The toiling pleasure sickens into pain ;
And, e'en while fashion's brightest arts decoy.
The heart, distrusting, asks if this be joy.
Ye friends to truth, ye statesmen, who survey
The rich man's joys increase, the poor's decay,
T is yours to judge, how wide the limits stand
Between a splendid and a happy land.
Proud swells the tide with loads of freighted ore.
And shouting Folly hails them from her shore ;
Hoards e'en beyond the miser's wish abound.
And rich men flock from all the world around.
Yet count our gains. This wealth is but a name
That leaves our useful products still the same.
Not so the loss. The man of wealth and pride
Takes up a space that many poor supplied ;
Space for his lake, his park's extended bounds.
Space for his horses, equipage, and hounds :
The robe that wraps his limbs in silken sloth
Has robbed the neighboring fields of half their
growth ;
His seat, where solitary sports are seen.
Indignant spurns the cottage from the green ;
Around the world each needful product flies.
For all the luxuries the world supplies :
While thus the land, adorned for pleasure all.
In barren splendor feebly waits the fall.
As some fair female unadorned and plain.
Secure to please while youth confirms her reign.
Slights every borrowed charm that dress supplies.
Nor shares with art the triumph of her eyes.
But when those charms are past, — for charms
are frail, —
When time advances, and when lovers faU,
She then shines forth, solicitous to bless.
In all the glaring impotence of dress ;
Thus fares the land by luxury betrayed.
In nature's simplest charms at first arrayed.
But verging to decline, its splendors rise.
Its vistas strike, its palaces surprise ;
While, scourged by famine from the smiling land.
The mournful peasant leads his humble band ;
And while he sinks, without one arm to save.
The country blooms, — a garden and a grav<4
Where then, ah ! where shall poverty reside.
To 'scape the pressure of contiguous pride ?
If to some common's fenceless limits strayed
He drives his flock to pick the scanty blade.
Those fenceless fields the sons of wealth divide.
And e'en the bare-worn common is denied.
If to the city sped, —what waits him there ?
To see profusion that he must not share ;
To see ten thousand baneful arts combined
To pamper luxury and thin mankind ;
To see each joy the sons of pleasure know
Extorted from his fellow-creature's woe.
Here while the courtier glitters in brocade.
There the pale artist plies the sickly trade ;
Here while the proud their long-drawn pomps
display.
There the black gibbet glooms beside the way.
The dome where Pleasure holds her midnight
reign.
Here, richly decked, admits the gorgeous train ;
Tumultuous grandeur crowds the blazing square.
The rattling chariots clash, the torches glare.
•ßl
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
Sure scenes like these no troubles e'er annoy !
Sure these denote one universal joy !
Aie these thy serious thoughts ? — Ah, turn
thine eyes
Where the poor houseless shivering female lies.
She once, perhaps, in village plenty blest,
Has wept at tales of innocence distrest ;
Her modest looks the cottage might adorn.
Sweet as the primrose peeps beneath the thorn ;
Now lost to all ; her friends, her virtue fled.
Near her betrayer's door she lays her head,
And, pinched with cold, and shrinking from the
shower,
With heavy heart deplores that luckless hour.
When idly first, ambitious of the town.
She left her wheel and robes of country brown.
Do thine, sweet Auburn, thine, the loveliest
train.
Do thy fair tribes participate her pain ?
E'en now, perhaps, by cold and hunger led.
At proud men's doors they ask a little bread !
Ah, no ! To distant climes, a dreary scene.
Where half the convex world intrudes between.
Through torrid tracks with fainting steps they go.
Where wild Altama murmurs to their woe.
Far different there from all that charmed before.
The various terrors of that horrid shore, —
Those blazing suns that dart a downward ray.
And fiercely shed intolerable day ;
Those matted woods where birds forget to sing.
But silent bats in drowsy clusters cling ;
Those poisonous fields with rank luxuriance
crowned.
Where the dark scorpion gathers death around ;
Where at each step the stranger fears to wake
The rattling terrors of the vengeful snake ;
Where crouching tigers wait their hapless prey.
And savage men more murderous still than they ;
While oft in whirls the mad tornado flies.
Mingling the ravaged landscape with the skies.
Far different these from every former scene.
The cooling brook, the grassy vested green,
The breezy covert of the warbling grove.
That only sheltered thefts of harmless love.
Good Heaven ! what sorrows gloomed that
parting day
That called them from their native walks away ;
When the poor exiles, every pleasure past.
Hung round the bowers, and fondly looked their
last.
And took a long farewell, and wished in vain
For seats like these beyond the western main ;
And shuddering still to face the distant deep.
Returned and wept, and still returned to weep.
The good old sire the first prepared to go
To new-found worlds, and wept for others' woe ;
But for himself in conscious virtue brave.
He only wished for worlds beyond the grave.
His lovely daughter, lovelier in her tears.
The fond companion of his helpless years.
Silent went next, neglectful of her charms.
And left a lover's for her father's arms.
With louder plaints the mother spoke her woes.
And blessed the cot where every pleasure rose ;
And kissed her thoughtless babes with many a tear.
And clasped them close, in sorrow doubly dear ;
Whilst her fond husband strove to lend relief
In all the silent manliness of grief.
0 Luxury ! thou curst by Heaven's decree.
How ill exchanged are things like these for thee !
How do thy potions, with insidious joy.
Diffuse their pleasures only to destroy !
Kingdoms by thee, to sickly greatness grown.
Boast of a florid vigor not their own.
At every draught more large and large they grow,
A bloated mass of rank, unwieldy woe ;
Till, sapped their strength, and every part un¬
sound,
Down, down they sink, and spread a ruin round.
Even now the devastation is begun.
And half the business of destruction done ;
Even now, methinks, as pondering here I stand,
I see the ruiul virtues leave the land.
Down where yon anchoring vessel spreads the sail
That idly waiting flaps with every gale.
Downward they move, a melancholy band.
Pass from the shore, and darken all the strand.
Contented toil, and hospitable care.
And kind connubial tenderness, are there ;
And piety with wishes placed above,
And steady loyalty, and faithful love.
And thou, sweet Poetry, thou loveliest maid.
Still first to fly where sensual joys invade ;
Unfit, in these degenerate times of shame,
To catch the heart, or strike for nonest fame ;
Dear charming nymph, neglected and decried.
My shame in crowds, my solitary pride ;
Thou source of all my bliss and aU my woe.
That found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so ;
Thou guide, by which the nobler arts excel.
Thou nurse of every virtue, fare thee well !
Farewell ; and O, where'er thy voice be tried.
On Torno's cliffs, or Pambamarca's side.
Whether where equinoctial fervors glow,
Or winter wraps the polar world in snow.
Still let thy voice, prevailing over time.
Redress the rigors of the inclement clime ;
Aid slighted truth with thy persuasive strain ;
Teach erring man to spurn the rage of gain ;
' H^e sat by the fisher's cottage
A nd looked at the sformv tide "
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
691
a
Teiwh him, that states of native strength possest,
Though very poor, may still be very West ;
That trade's proud empire hastes to swift decay.
As ocean sweeps the labored mole away ;
While self-dependent power can time defy,
As rocks resist the billows and the sky.
OuvER Goldsmith.
THE FISHER'S COTTAGE.
Wb sat by the fisher's cottage.
And looked at the stormy tide ;
The evening mist came rising.
And floating far and wide.
One by one in the light-bouse
The lamps shone out on high ;
And far on the dim horizon
A ship went sailing by.
We spoke of storm and shipwreck, —
Of sailors, and how they live ;
Of journeys 'twixt sky and water.
And the sorrows and joys they give.
We spoke of distant countries.
In regions strange and fair.
And of the wondrous beings
And curious customs there ;
Of perfumed lamps on the Ganges,
Which are launched in the twilight hour ;
And the dark and silent Brahmins,
Who worship the lotos flower.
Of the wretched dwarfs of Lapland, —
Broad-headed, wide-mouthed, and small, —
Who crouch round their oil-fires, cooking.
And chatter and scream and bawl.
And the maidens earnestly listened.
Till at last we spoke no more ;
The ship like a shadow had vanished.
And darkness fell deep on the shore.
From the German of Heinrich Heine. Translation
of Charles G. Leland.
' «
THE ISLAND.
from "thb buccaneer.*
The island lies nine leagues away.
Along its solitary shore,
Ofcra^ rock and sandy bay.
No sound but ocean's roar.
Save where the bold, wild sea-bird makes her
home.
Her shrill cry coming through the sparkling foam.
But when the light winds lie at rest.
And on the glassy, heaving sea
The black duck, with her glossy breast.
Sits swinging silently.
How beautiful ! no ripples break the reach.
And silvery waves go noiseless up the beach
And inland rests the green, warm dell ;
The brook comes tinkling down its side ;
From out the trees the Sabbath bell
Rings cheerful, far and wide.
Mingling its sound with bleatings of the flocks.
That feed about the vale among the rocks.
Nor holy bell, nor pastoral bleat.
In former days within the vale ;
Flapped in the bay the pirate's sheet ;
Curses were on the gale ;
Rich goods lay on the sand, and murdered men ;
Pirate and wrecker kept their revels then.
But calm, low voices, words of grace.
Now slowly fall upon the ear ;
A quiet look is in each face.
Subdued and holy fear :
Each motion's gentle ; all is kindly done ; —
Come, listen how from crime this isle was won.
Richard henry Dana.
SMOKE.
Light-wingèd Smoke ! Icarian bird.
Melting thy pinions in thy upward flight ;
Lark without song, and messenger of dawn.
Circling above the hamlets as thy nest ;
Or else, departing dream, and shadowy form
Of midnight vision, gathering up thy skirts ;
By night star-veiling, and by day
Darkening the light and blotting out the sun ;
Go thou, my incense, upward from this hearth.
And ask the gods to pardon this clear flame.
henry david thqreau.
MIST.
Low-anchored cloud,
Newfoundland air.
Fountain-head and source of rivers.
Dew-cloth, dream-drapery.
And napkin spread by fays ;
Drifting meadow of the air.
Where bloom the daisied banks and violets.
And in whose fenny labyrinth
The bittern booms and heron wades ;
Spirit of lakes and seas and rivers, —
Bear only perfumes and the scent
Of healing herbs to just men's fields.
Henry David Thoreau.
Bi
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
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THE EVENING CLOUD.
A clottd lay cradled near the setting sun,
A gleam of crimson tinged its braided snow ;
Long had I watched the glory moving on
O'er the still radiance of the lake below.
Tranquil its spirit seemed, and floated slow !
Even in its very motion there was rest ;
"While every breath of eve that chanced to blow
Wafted the traveller to the beauteous west.
Emblem, methought, of the departed soul !
To whose white robe the gleam of bliss is given.
And by the breath of mercy made to roll
Right onwards to the golden gates of heaven,
"Where to the eye of faith it peaceful lies.
And tells to man his glorious destinies.
john wilson (CKristifHtr North).
NEWPORT BEACH.
Wave after wave successively rolls on
And dies along the shore, untU more loud
One billow with concentrate force is heard
To swell prophetic, and exultant rears
A lucent form above its pioneers.
And rushes past them to the farthest goal.
Thus our unuttered feelings rise and fall.
And thought wiU follow thought in equal waves.
Until reflection nerves design to will.
Or sentiment o'er chance emotion reigns.
And all its wayward undulations blends
In one o'erwhelming surge !
Henry Theodore Tuckerman.
A STILL DAY IN AUTUMN.
I LOVE to wander through the woodlands hoary
In the soft light of an autumnal day.
When Summer gathers up her robes of glory.
And like a dream of beauty glides away.
How through each loved, familiar path she lingers.
Serenely smiling through the golden mist.
Tinting the wild grape with her dewy fingers
Till the cool emerald turns to amethyst ;
Kindling the faint stars of the hazel, shining
To light the gloom of Autumn's mouldering
halls.
With hoary plumes the elematis entwining
Where o'er the rock her withered garland falls.
Warm lights are on the sleepy uplands waning
Beneath soft clouds along the horizon rolled,
TUl the slant sunbeams through their fringes
raining
Bathe aU the hiUs in melancholy gold.
The moist winds breathe of crispèd leaves and
flowers
In the damp hollows of the woodland sotvn.
Mingling the freshness of autumnal showers
With spicy airs from cedam alleys blown.
Beside the brook and on the umbered meadow,
Where yellow fem-tufts fleck the faded ground.
With folded lids beneath their palmy shadow
The gentian nods, in dewy slumbers bound.
Upon those soft, fringed lids the bee sits brooding.
Like a fond lover loath" to say farewell.
Or with shut wings, through gilken folds in¬
truding.
Creeps near her heart his drowsy tale to tell.
The little birds npon the hillside lonely
Flit noiselessly along from spray to spray.
Silent as a sweet wandering thought that only
Shows its bright wings and softly glides away.
Sarah Helen whitman.
THE BIRCH STREAM.
At noon, within the dusty town.
Where the wild river rushes down.
And thunders hoarsely all day long,
I think of thee, my hennit stream.
Low singing in thy summer dream
Thine idle, sweet, old, tranquil song.
Northward, Katahdin's chasmed pile
Looms through thy low, long, leafy aisle ;
Eastward, Olamon's summit shines ;
And I upon thy grassy shore.
The dreamful, happy child of yore.
Worship before mine olden shrines.
Again the sultry noontide hush
Is sweetly broken by the thrush.
Whose clear bell rings and dies away
Beside thy banks, in coverts deep,
"Where nodding buds of orchis sleep
In dusk, and dream not it is day.
Again the wild cow-Hly floats
Her golden-freighted, tented boats
In thy cool coves of softened gloom,
O'ershadowed by the whispering reed.
And purple plumes of pickerel-weed.
And meadow-sweet in tangled bloom.
The startled minnows dart in flocks
Beneath thy glimmering amber rocks.
If but a zephyr stirs the brake ;
The silent swallow swoops, a flash
Of light, and leaves, with dainty plash,
A ring of ripples in her wake.
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
693
Without, the land is hot and dim ;
The level fields in languor swim,
Their stubble-grasses brown as dust ;
Aud all along the upland lanes.
Where shadeless noon oppressive reigns.
Dead roses wear their crowns of rust.
Within, is neither blight nor death ;
The fierce sun wooes with ardent breath.
But eannot win thy sylvan heart.
Only the child who loves thee long.
With faithful woi'ship pure and strong,
Can know how dear and sweet thou art.
So loved I thee in days gone by.
So love I yet, though leagues may lie
Between us, and the years divide ;
A breath of coolness, dawn, and dew,
A joy forever fresh and true, «
Thy memory doth with me abide.
Anna Bovnton Averill.
THE BLACKBIRD.
How sweet the harmonies of afternoon !
The Blackbird sings along the sunny breeze
His ancient song of leave.s, and summer boon ;
Rich breath of hayfields streams through whis¬
pering trees ;
And birds of morning trim their bustling wings,
And listen fondly — while the Blackbird sings.
How soft the lovelight of the west reposes
On this green valley's cheery solitude.
On the trim cottage with its screen of roses.
On the gray belfry with its ivy hood.
And murmuring mill-race, and the wheel that
flings
Its bubbling freshness—¡while the Blackbird
sings.
The very dial on the village church
Seems as't were dreaming in a dozy rest ;
The scribbled benches underneath the porch
Bask in the kindly welcome of the west :
But the broad casements of the old Three Kings
Blaze like a furnace — while the Blackbird sings.
And there beneath the immemorial elm
Three rosy revellers round a table sit.
And through gray clouds give laws unto the
realm.
Curse good and great, but worship their own wit,
And roar of fights, and fairs, and junketings.
Com, colts, and curs — the while the Blackbird
sings.
Before her home, in her accustomed seat.
The tidy grandam spins beneath the shade
Of the old honeysuckle, at her feet
The dreaming pug and purring tabby laid ;
To her low chair a little maiden clings.
And spells in silence —while the Blackbird sings.
Sometimes the shadow of a lazy cloud
Breathes o'er the hamlet with its gardens green.
While the far fields with sunlight overflowed
Like golden shores of Fairyland are seen ;
Again the sunshine on the shadow springs.
And fires the thicket — where the Blackbird
sings.
The woods, the lawn, the peakèd manor-house.
With its peach-covered walls, and rookery loud.
The trim, quaint garden-alleys, screened with
boughs.
The lion-headed gates, so grim and proud.
The niossy fountain with its murmurings.
Lie in warm sunshine — while the Blackbird
sings.
The ring of silver voices, and the sheen
Of festal garments, — and my lady streams
With her gay court across the garden green ;
Some laugh and dance, some whisper their
love-dreams ;
And one calls for a little page : he strings
Her lute beside her— while the Blackbird sings.
A little while, — and lo ! the charm is heard :
A youth, whose life has been all summer, steals
Forth from the noisy guests around the board.
Creeps by her softly, at her footstool kneels.
And, when she pauses, murmurs tender things
Into her fond ear— while the Blackbird sings.
The smoke-wreaths from the chimneys curl up
higher.
And dizzy things of eve begin to float
Upon the light ; the breeze begins to tire.
Half-way to sunset with a drowsy note
The ancient clock from out the valley swings ;
The grandam nods — and still the Blackbird
sings.
Far shouts and laughter from the farm-stead peal.
Where the gi'eat stack is piling in the sun ;
Through narrow gates o'erladen wagons reel.
And barking curs into the tumult run ;
While the inconstant wind bears off, and brings
The merry tempest — and the Blackbird sings.
On the high wold the last look of the sun
Burns, like a beacon, over dale and stream ;
The shouts have ceased, the laughter and the fun ;
The grandam sleeps, and peaceful be her dream ;
10
[fi-
694
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
Only a hammer on an anvil rings ;
The day is, dying— still the Blackbird sings.
Now the good vicar passes from his gate,
Serene, with long white hair ; and in his eye
Bums the clear spirit that hath conquered Fate,
And felt the wings of immortality ;
His heart is thronged with great imaginings
And tender mercies — while the Blackbird sings.
Down by the brook he bends his steps, and
through
A lowly wicket ; and at last he stands
Awful beside the bed of one who grew
From boyhood with him, — who with lifted
hands
And eyes seems listening to far welcomings
And sweeter music — than the Blackbii'd sings.
Two golden stars, like tokens from the blest.
Strike on his dim orbs from the setting sun ;
His sinking hands seem pointing to the west ;
He smiles as though he said, "Thy will be
done ! "
His eyes they see not those illuminings ;
His ears they hear not—what the Blackbird sings.
FKBOERJCIC TEN.WSON.
THE PHILOSOPHER TOAD.
Dowk deep in a hollow, so damp and so cold.
Where oaks are by ivy o'ergrown.
The gray moss and lichen creep over the mould.
Lying loose on a ponderous stone.
Now within this huge stone, like a king on
his throne,
A toad has been sitting more years than is
known ;
And, strange as it seems, yet he constantly
deems
The world standing still while he's dreaming
his dreams, —
Does this wonderful toad, in his cheerful abode
In the innermost heart of that flinty old stone.
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown.
Down deep in the hollow, from morning fill
night.
Dun shadows glide over the ground,
Where a watercourse once, as it sparkled with
light,
Turned a ruined old mill-wheel around ;
Long years have passed by since its bed became
dry.
And the trees grow so close, scarce a glimpse
of the sky
Is seen in the hollow, so dark and so damp.
Where the glow-worm at noonday is trimming
his lamp.
And hardly a sound from the thicket around.
Where the rabbit and squfrrel leap over the
ground.
Is heard by the toad in his spacious abode
In the innermost heart of that ponderous stone.
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown.
Down deep in that hollow the bees never come.
The shade is too black for a flower ;
And jewel-winged birds, with their musical
hum.
Never flash in the night of that bower ;
But the cold-blooded snake, in the edge of the
brake.
Lies amid the rank grass, half asleep, half
awake ;
And the ashen-white snail, with the slime in
its trail.
Moves wearily on like a life's tedious tale.
Yet disturbs not the toad in his spacious abode.
In the innermost heart of that flinty old stone.
By the gray-haired moss and the lichen o'ergrown.
Down deep in a hollow some wiseacres sit,
Like a toad in his cell in the stone ;
Around them in daylight the blind owlets flit.
And their creeds are with ivy o'ergrown ; —
Their streams may go drj', and the wheels
cease to ply.
And their glimpses be few of the sun and the
sky,
StiU they hug to their breast every time-
honored guest.
And slumber and doze in inglorious rest ;
For no progress they find in the wide sphere
of mind.
And the world's standing still with all of their
kind ;
Contented to dwell deep down in the well.
Or move like the snail in the crust of his shell.
Or live hke the toad in his narrow abode.
With their souls closely wedged in a thick wall
of stone.
By the gray weed« of prejudice rankly o'ergrown.
Rebecca s Nichols.
THE MUSICAL DUEL.
FROM "THE LOVER'S MELANCHOLY."
Menaphon. Passing from Italy to Greece the
tales
Which poets of an elder time have feigned
To glorify their Tempe, bred in me
Desire of visiting that paradise.
B-
E?
fl-
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS,
695
a
To Thessaly I came ; and, living private,
Without acquaintance of more sweet companions
Than the old inmates to my love, my thoughts,
1 day by day frequented silent groves
And solitary walks. One morning early
This accident encountered me : I heard
Tlie sweetest and most ravishing contention
That art and nature ever were at strife in.
Amethus. I cannot yet conceive what you
infer
By art and nature.
Men. I shall soon resolve you.
A sound of music touched mine ears, or rather.
Indeed, entranced my soul. As I stole nearer.
Invited by the melancholy, I saw
This youth, this fair-faced youth, upon his lute.
With strains of strange variety and harmony,
Proclaiming, as it seemed, so bold a challenge
To the clear choristers of the woods, the birds.
That, as they flocked about him, all stood silent,
Wondering at what they heard. I wondered too.
Am. And so do I ; good ! — On !
Men. a nightingale.
Nature's best skilled musician, undertakes
The challenge, and, for every several strain
The well-shaped youth could touch, she sung her
own ;
He could not ran division with more art
Upon his quaking instrument than she.
The nightingale, did with her various notes
Reply to ; for a voice, and for a sound,
Amethus, 't is much easier to believe
That such they were than hope to hear again.
Am. How did the rivals part ?
Men. You term them rightly ;
For they were rivals, and their mistress. Har¬
mony. —
Some time thus spent, the young man grew at last
Into a pretty anger, that a bird
Whom art had never taught clefs, moods, or
notes.
Should vie with him for mastery, whose study
Had busied many hours to perfect practice :
To end the controversy, in a rapture
Upon his instrument he plays so swiftly.
So many voluntaries, and so quick.
That there was curiosity and cunning.
Concord in discord, lines of differing method
Meeting iu one full centre of delight.
Am. Now for the bird.
Men. The bird, ordained to be
Music's first martj'r, strove to imitate
These several sounds ; which, when her warbling
throat
Failed in, for giief, down dropped she on his lute.
And broke her heart ! It was the quaintest sad-
L-
To see the conqueror upon her hearse
To weep a funeral elegy of tears ;
That, trust me, my Amethus, I could chide
Mine own unmanly weakness, that made me
A fellow-mourner with him.
Am. I believe thee.
Men. He looked upon the trophies of his art,
Then sighed, then wiped his eyes, then sighed,
and cried,
" Alas, poor creature ! I v/ill soon revenge
This cruelty upon the author of it ;
Henceforth this lute, guilty of innocent blood.
Shall nevermore betray a harmless peace
To an untimely end and in that sorrow.
As he was pashing it against a tree,
I suddenly stept in.
John Ford.
THE CANTERBURY PILGRIMS.
from "the canterbury tales: prologue."*
Whan that Aprille with hise shoures sooted
The droghte of March hath percèd to the roote.
And bathèd every veyne in swich 2 licour.
Of which vertue engendred is the flour ;
Whan Zephiras eek with his swete breeth
Inspired hath in every holt ® and heeth
The tendre croppès, and the yonge sonne
Hath in the Ram his halfè cours y-ronne.
And smalè fowelès maken melodye
That slepen al the nyght with open eye, —
So priketh hem nature in hir corages,* —
Thanno longen folk to goon on pilgrimages.
And palmeres for to seken straungè strondes.
To ferne halwes,® kowthe® in sondiy londes ;
And specially, from every shires ende
Of Engelond, to Caunterbury they wende
The hooly blisful mártir ' for to sekc.
That hem hath holpen whan that they were seeke"
Bifil that, in that seson on a day.
In Southwerk at the Tabard as I lay,
Redy to wenden on my pilgrymage
To Caunterbury with ful devout corage.
At nyght were come in-to that hostelrye
Wei nyne-and-twenty in a compaignye.
I sweet.
4 their hearts
7 Thoinas à Becket.
2 such.
5 ancient saints.
3 -wood.
6 renowned.
♦ The following passages from the Prologue to The Canterbury
Tales give excellent specimens of Chaucer's close observation of
nature, men, and manners, and of his clear, graphic, descriptive
style. The text followed is that of the " Riverside Edition," edited
by Mr. Arthur Gilman, which is based chieñy on that of the manu¬
script in possession of Lord Ellesmere, publislied by the Chaucer
Society of London. That edition, however, is not responsible for
the explanatory notes, nor for the addition of the grave accent, used
to indicate syllables which the rhythm requires to be pronounced, in
order to simplify the reading for those unaccustomed to the old-thne
irregularities of spelling.
fi¬
eos
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
Of sondry folk, by aventure y-falle
In felaweshipe, and pilgrymes were thei alle,
That toward Caunterbury wolden ryde.
A Kntght ther was, and that a worthy man,
That fro the tymè that he first bigan
To riden out, he loved chivalrie,
Trouthe and honour, fredom and curteisie.
Ful worthy was he in his lordès werre.
And therto hadde he riden, nornan ferre,^
As wel in cristendom as in hethenesse.
And evere honoured for his wortfiynesse.
And though that he were worthy, he was wys.
And of his port as meeke as is a mayde.
He nevere yet no vileynye ^ ne sayde
In al his lyf unto no maner wight.
He was a verray parfit, gentil knyght.
With hym ther was his sone, a yong Squier,
A lovyere and a lust}' bacheler.
With lokkès cruUe ^ as they were leyd in presse.
Of twenty yeer of age he was I gesse.
Of his stature he was of evene lengthe.
And wonderly delyvere,^ and of greet strengths.
And he hadde ben somtyme in chyvachie,®
In Flaundres, in Artoys, and Pycardie,
And born hym weel, as of so litel space.
In hope to stonden in his lady grace.
Embrouded ® was he, as it were a meede
Al ful of fresshè flourès whyte and reede.
Syngynge he was, or floytynge,'' al the day ;
He was as fressh as is the monthe of May.
Short was his gowne, with sieves longe and wyde.
Wel cowde he sitte on hors, and fairë ryde.
He koudè songès make and wel endite.
Juste and eek daunee, and weel purtreye ® and
write.
So hoote he lovedo, that by nyghtertale ®
He sleep nomore than dooth a nyghtyngale ;
Curteis he was, lowely and servysable.
And carf biforn his fader at the table.
Ther was also a Nonne, a Prioeesse,
That of hire smylyng was ful symple and coy ;
Hire gretteste ooth ue was but by seint Loy ;
And she was clepèd madame Eglentyne.
Ful weel she soonge the service dyvyue,
Entunèd in hir nose ful semeely ;
And Frenssh she spak ful faire and fetisly.i^
After the seole of Stratford-attè-Bowe,
For Frenssh of Parys was to hire uukuowe.
I farther.
3 curled.
5 a military expedition.
7 playing on a ñute.
9 night-time.
II probably St. Louis.
2 nothing unmannerly.
4 active.
6 embroidered.
8 portray — draw.
10 carved.
12 featly—neatly.
At metè ^ wel ytaught was she with alle.
She leet no morsel from hir lippès falle.
Ne wette hire fyngres in hire saucé deepe.
Wel koude she carie a morsel and wel kepe.
That no dropè ne fille up-on hire breste ;
In curteisie was set ful muchel hir leste. 2
Hire over-lippfe wypèd she so dene.
That in hir coppe ther was no ferthyng ® sene
Of grecè, whan she dronken hadde hir draughte.
Ful semèly after hir mete she raughte,^
And sikerly ® she was of greet disport.
And ful plesaunt, and amyable of port.
And peyned hir ® to countrefetè cheere
Of Court, and to ben estatlich of manere.
And to ben holden digne of reverence ;
But for to speken of hire conscience.
She was so charitable and so pitous.
She woldè wepe if that she saugh a mous
Kaught in a trappe, if it were deed or bledde.
Of smalè houndès hadde she, that she fedde
With rested fiessh, or mylk and wastel-breed
But soore wepte she if any of hem were deed.
Or if men smoot it with a yerdè ® sinerte :
And al was conscience and tendre herte.
Ful semèly hire wynipul pynchèd was ;
Hire nose tretys,® hire even greye as glas,
Hir mouth ful smal, and ther to softe and reed.
But sikerly she hadde a fair forheed ;
It was almoost a spannè brood, I trowe.
For hardily she was nat undergrowe.
Ful fetys was hir cloke, as I was war ;
Of smal coral aboute hire arm she bar
A peire of bedes gauded al with grene ;
And ther-on heng a broch of gold ful scheue.
On which ther was first write a crowned A,
And after. Amor vincit omnia.
Another Nonne with hire haddè she.
That was hire Chapeleyne, and Preestès thre.
A Clerk ther was of Oxenford also
That un-to logyk haddè longe ygo.
And leenè was his hors as is a rake.
And he nas nat right fat, I undertake.
But looked holwe, and ther to sobrely ;
Ful thredbare was his overeste courtepy,"
For he hadde geten hym yet no benefice.
Ne was so worldly to have office ;
For hym was levere have at his beddes heed
Twenty bookès, clad in blak or reed.
Of Aristotle and his philosophie.
Than robes riche, or fithele,^® or gay sautrie.i®
But al be that he was a philosoiffire.
Yet haddè he but litel gold in cofre ;
X meat — table. 2 pleasure.
3 morsel. 4 reached.
5 surely. 6 took pains.
7 cake (gasteau) bread. 8 rod.
9 straight. 10 Thc^^aM^térwere the latter beads.
XI uppermost short cloak. 12 fiddle. 13 psaltery.
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
697
But al that he mights of his freendès hente,i
On hookès and his lemynge he it spente,
And bisily gan for the soulès preye
Of hem that gaf him wher with to seoleye,®
Of Studie took he moost cure and moost heede,
Noght o word spak he moorè than was needs,
And that was seyd in forme and reverence
And short and quyk and ful of hy sentence.
Sownynge in ' moral vertu was his speche
And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche.
A Sergeant of the Lawe, war^ and wys,
That often haddè hen at the Parvys,®
Ther was also ful riche of excellence.
Discreet he was and of greet reverence ;
He semèd swich, hise wordès weren so wise.
Justice he was ful often in Assise,
By patente, and hy pleyn commissioun.
For his science and for his heigh renoun.
Of fees and rohës hadde he many oon ;
So gret a purchasour® wa^ nowher noon.
Al was fee symple to hyra in effect.
His purchasyng myghte nat hen infect.'
Nowher so hisy a man as he ther nas,®
And yet he semèd hisier than he was.
A good man was ther of religioun.
And was a Povrè Persoun ® of a Toun ;
But riche he was of hooly thoght and werk ;
He was also a lemèd man, a clerk
That Cristas Gospel trewèly wolde preche,
Hise parisshens devoutly wolde he teche.
Benygne he was, and wonder diligent.
And in adversitee ful pacient ;
And such he was y-preved oftfe sithes.'"
Ful both were hym to cursé for his tythes.
But rather wolde he geven," out of doute,
Un-to his povi-é parisshens ahoute.
Of his offryng and eek of his suhstaunce.
He koude in litel thyng have sufflsaunce.
Wyd was his parisshe, and houses fer a-sonder.
But he ne laftè nat for reyn ne thonder.
In siknesse nor in meschief to visite
The ferreste " in his parisshe muche and lite
Up-on his feet, and in his hand a staf.
This noble ensample to his sheepe he gaf,'®
That firste he wroghte, and afterwai-d he taughte,
A hettre preest, I trowe, that nowher noon is •
He waiteth after no pompe and reverence.
Ne makèd him a spiced conscience.
I get 3 study.
3 tending toward. 4 wary — prudent.
5 portico of St Paul's, where lawyers met.
6 prosecutor. 7 tainted.
8 ne was« was not. 9 Poor Parson,
10 times. XI give.
13 ceased. 13 farthest.
S4 great and smalL 15 gave.
But Cristès loore, and his Apostles twelve.
He taughte, but first he folwed it hym selve.
Now have I toold you shortly in a clause
The Staat, tharray, the nombre, and eek the cause
Why that assembled was this compaignye
In Southwerk at this gentil hostelrye.
That highte the Tabard, fa.stè hy the Belle.
But now is tymè to yow for to telle
How that we baren us that like ' nyght.
Whan we were in that hostelrie alyght.
And after wol I telle of our viage.
And al the remenaunt of oure pilgrimage.
But first, I pray yow of your curteisye.
That ye narette it nat my vileinye,'''
Thogh that I pleynly speke in this mateere.
To tellfe yow hir wordès and hir cheere ;
Ne thogh I speke hir wordès proprely.
For this ye knowen al so wel as I,
Whoso shal telle a tale after a man.
He moote reherce, as ny as evere he kan
Everich a word, if it he in his charge,
Al speke he never so rudèliche ® or large ; ®
Or ellis he moot telle his tale untrewe.
Or feynè thyng, or fyndè wordès newe.
He may nat spare al thogh he were his brother,
He moot as wel seye o word as another.
Crist spak hym self ful brode in hooly writ
And wel ye woot no vileynye is it.
Eek Plato seith, who so can hym rede,
"The wordès moote be cosyn® to the dede."
Also I prey yow to forgeve it me,
Al have I nat set folk in hir degree
Heere in this tale, as that they scholdè stonde ;
My wit is short, ye may wel understonde.
Greet chierè made oure host us everichon,
And to the soper sette he us anon
And servèd us with vltaille at the beste.
Strong was the wyn and wel to drynke us leste.®
A semely man Dure Hoost he was withaUe
For to han been a marchai in an halle ;
A largè man he was with eyen stepe,
A fairer burgeys was ther noon in Chepe :
Boold of his speche, and wys and wel ytaught.
And of manhod hym lakkedè right naught.
Eek therto he was right a myrie ' man.
And after soper pleyen he hygan.
And spak of myrthè amonges othere thinges.
Whan that we haddè maad our rekenynges ;
And seydè thus : " Lo, lordynges, trewèly
Ye ben to me right welcome hertèly :
For by my trputlie, if that I shal nat 13'e,
I saugh nat this yeer so myiie a compaignye
Atones in this herber we® as is now.
X same. 3 that ye ascribe it not to my ill-breeding.
3 rudely. 4 free.
5 germane. 6 pleased. 7 merry. 8 harborage — inn
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
Fayn wolde I doon i yow myrthè, wiste I how.
And of a myrthe I am right now bythoght,
To doon you ese, and it shal costé noght.
Ye goon to Canterbury, God you speede,
The blisful mártir quité yow youre meede ! ®
And wel I woot as ye goon by the weye
Ye shapen yow® to talen* and to pleye ;
For trewèly confort ne myrthe is noon
To ride by the weye doumb as the stoon ;
And therefore wol I maken you disport,
As I seyde erst, and doon you som confort.
That ech of yow to shortè with oure weye.
In this viage shal tellé talés tweye,® —
To Caunterburyward, I mean it so.
And homward he shal teilen othere two, —
Of aventures that whilom ban bifalle.
And which of yow that bereth hym best of alle.
That is to seyn, that telleth in this caas
Talés of best sentence,® and most solaas,^
Shal have a soper at oure aller cost,
Heere in this place, syttynge by this po.st.
Whan that we come agayn fro Caunterbury.
And, for to make you the moore mury,
I wol my-selfé gladly with yow ryde.
Eight at myn owenè cost, and be youre gyde.
And who so wole my juggément withseye®
Shal paye al that we spenden by the weye.
And if ye vouchè-sauf that it be so,
Tel me anon, with-outen wordès mo.
And I wol erly shapè* me therfore."
This thyng was graunted, and oure othèA swore
With ful glad herte, and preyden hym also
That he would vouché-sauf for to do so.
And that he woldè been oure governour.
And of oure talés juge and reporteur.
And sette a soper at a certeyn pris
And we wol reuléd been at his devys
In heigh and lough ; and thus by oon assent
We been acorded to his juggément.
And ther-up-on the wyn was fet anon ;
We dronken and to resté wente echon
With-outen any lenger taryynge.
GEOFFREY CHAUCER.
CHRISTMAS IN THE OLDEN TIME.
FROM "MARMION, " INTROD TO CANTO VI.
Heap on more wood ! — the wind is cliill ;
But, let it whistle as it will.
We '11 keep our Christmas merry still.
Each age has deemed the new-born year
I make. 2 reward.
3 purpose. 4 tell tales.
5 two. 6 sense.
7 solace—mirth. 8 gainsay
9 shape my aflairs—prepare, zo be ruled.
The fittest time for festal cheer :
Even, heathen yet, the savage Dane
At lol more deep the mead did drain ;
High on the beach his galleys drew.
And feasted all his pirate crew ;
Then in his low and pine-built hall.
Where shields and axes decked the wall.
They gorged upon the half-dressed steer ;
Caroused in seas of sable beer ;
While round, in brutal jest, were thrown
The half-gnawed rib and marrow-bone ;
Or li.stened all, in grim delight.
While scalds yelled out the joys of fight.
Then forth in frenzy would they hie.
While wildly loo.se their red locks fly ;
And, dancing round the blazing pile.
They make such barbarous mirth the while.
As best might to the mind recall
The boisterous joys of Odin's hall.
And well our Christian sires of old
Loved when the year its course had rolled
And brought blithe Christmas back again
With all his hospitable train.
Domestic and religious rite
Gave honor to the holy night :
On Christmas eve the bells were rung ;
On Christmas eve the mass was sung ;
That only night, in all the year.
Saw the stoled priest the chalice rear.
The damsel donned her kirtle sheen ;
The hall was dressed with holly green ;
Forth to the wood did merry-men go.
To gather in the mistletoe.
Then opened wide the baron's hall
To vassal, tenant, serf, and all ;
Power laid his rod of rule aside.
And Ceremony doffed her pride.
The heir, with roses in his shoes.
That night might village partner choose ;
The lord, underogating, share
The vulgar game of "post and pair."
All hailed, with uncontrolled delight.
And general voice, the happy night
That to the cottage, as the crown.
Brought tidings of salvation down.
The fire, with well-dried logs supplied.
Went roaring up the chimney wide ;
The huge hall-table's oaken face,
Scmbbed till it shone, the day to grace.
Bore then upon its massive board
No mark to part the squire and lord.
Then was brought in the lusty brawn.
By old blue-coated serving-man ;
Then the grim boar's-head frowned on high.
Crested with bays and rosemary.
Well can the green-garbed i-anger teU
How, when, and where the monster fell ;
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
What dogs before his death he tore,
And all the baiting of the boar.
The wassail round, in good brown bowls.
Garnished with ribbons, blithely trowls.
There the huge sirloin reeked ; hard by
Plum-porridge stood, and Christmas pie ;
Nor failed old Scotland to produce.
At such high-tide, her savory goose.
Then came the merry maskers in.
And carols roared with blithesome din ;
If unmelodious was the song,
It was a hearty note, and strong.
Who lists may in their mumming see
Traces of ancient mystery ;
White skirts supplied the imasquerade.
And smutted cheeks the visors made :
But, 0, what maskers richly dight
Can boast of bosoms half so light !
England was merry England, when
Old Christmas brought his sports again.
T was Christmas broached the mightiest ale ;
'T was Christmas told the merriest tale ;
A Christmas gambol oft could cheer
The poor man's heart through half the year.
Sir Walter Scott.
0, THE PLEASANT DAYS OF OLD !
0, THE pleasant days of old, which so often people
praise !
True, they wanted all the luxuries that grace our
modern days ;
Bare floors were strewed with rushes, the walls
let in the cold ;
0, how they must have shivered in those pleasant
days of old !
0, those ancient lords of old, how magnificent
they were !
They threw down and imprisoned kings, — to
thwart them who might dare ?
They ruled their serfs right sternly ; they took
from Jews their gold, —
Above both law and equity were those great lords
of old !
0, the gallant knights of old, for their valor so
renowned !
With sword and lance and armor strong they
scoured the country round ;
And whenever aught to tempt them they met by
wood or wold.
By right of sword they seized the prize, — those
gallant knights of old !
0, the gentle dames of old ! who, quite free from
fear or pain.
Could gaze on joust and tournament, and see
their champions slain ;
They lived on good beefsteaks and ale, which
made them strong and bold, —
0, more like men than women were those gentle
dames of old !
0, those mighty towers of old ! with their turrets,
moat, and keep.
Their battlements and bastions, their dungeons
dark and deep.
Full many a baron held his court within the
castle hold ;
And many a captive languished there, in those
strong towers of old.
0, the troubadours of old ! with the gentle min-
strelsie
Of hope and joy, or deep despair, whiche'cr their
lot might be ;
For years they served their ladye-loves ere they
their passions told, —
0, wondrous patience must have had those trou¬
badours of old !
0, those blessèd times of old, with their chivalry
and state !
I love to read their chronicles, which such brave
deeds relate ;
I love to sing their ancient rhymes, to hear their
legends told, —
But, Heaven be thanked ! I live not in those
blessèd times of old !
frances Brown.
THE TRUMPETS OF DOOLKARNEIN.
[In Eastern history are two Iskanders. or Alexanders, who are
sometimes confounded, and both of whom are called Doolkarnein,
or the Two-Horned, in allusion to their subjugation of East and
West, horns being an Oriental symbol of power.
One of these heroes is Alexander of Macedón ; the other a con¬
queror of more ancient times, who built the marvellous series of
ramparts on Mount Caucasus, known in fable as the wall of Gog
and Magog, that is to say, of the people of the North. It reached
from the Euxine Sea to the Caspian, where its flanks originated the
subsequent appellation of the Caspian Gates.J
"With awful walls, far glooming, that possessed
Tbe passes 'twixt the snow-fed Caspian foun¬
tains,
Doolkarnein, tbe dread lord of East and West,
Shut up the northern nations in their moun¬
tains ;
And upon platforms where the oak-trees grew.
Trumpets he set, huge beyond dreams of
wonder,
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700
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
Craftily purposed, when his arms withdrew,
To make him thought still housed there, like
the thunder :
And it so fell ; for when the winds blew right.
They woke these trumpets to their calls of might.
Unseen, but heard, their calls the trumpets blew.
Ringing the granite rocks, their only bearers.
Till the long fear into religion grew,
And nevermore those heights had human
darers.
Dreadful Doolkamein was an earthly god ;
His walls but shadowed forth his mightier
frowning ;
Armies of giants at his bidding trod
From realm to realm, king after king dis¬
crowning.
When thunder spoke, or when the earthquake
stirred.
Then, muttering in accord, his host was heard.
But when the winters marred the mountain
shelves.
And softer changes came with vernal mornings.
Something had touched the trumpets' lofty selves.
And less and less rang forth their sovereign
warnings ;
Fewer and feebler ; as when silence spreads
In plague-struck tents, where haughty chiefs,
left dying.
Fail by degrees upon their angry beds.
Till, one by one, ceases the last stern sighing.
One by one, thus, their breath the trumpets drew.
Till now no more the imperious music blew.
Is he then dead ? Can great Doolkamein die ?
Or can his endless hosts elsewhere be needed ?
Were the great breaths that blew his minstrelsy
Phantoms, that faded as himself receded ?
Or is he angered ? Surely he still comes ;
This silence ushers the dread visitation ;
Sudden will burnt the torrent of his drums.
And then will follow bloody desolation.
So did fear dream ; though now, with not a sound
To scare good hope, summer had twice crept
round.
Then gathered iu a band, with lifted eyes.
The ueighboi's, and those silent heights as¬
cended.
Giant, nor aught blasting their bold emprise.
They met, though twice they halted, breath
suspended :
Once, at a coming like a god's iu rage
With thunderous leaps, —but 'twas the piled
snow, falling ;
And once, wlien in the woods an oak, for age,
F^ell dead, the sileuce with its groau appalling.
At last they came where still, in dread array,
As though they still might speak, the tmmpets
lay.
Unhurt they lay, like caverns above ground,
The rifted rocks, for hands, about them cling¬
ing.
Their tubes as straight, their mighty mouths as
round
And firm as when the rocks were first set
ringing.
Fresh from their unimaginable mould
They might have seemed, save that the storms
had stained them
With a rich mst, that now, with gloomy gold
In the bright sunshine, beauteously ingrained
them.
Breathless the gazers looked, nigh faint for awe.
Then leaped, then laughed. What was it now
they saw ?
Myriads of birds. Myriads of birds, that filled
The trumpets all with nests and nestling
voices !
The great, huge, stormy music had been stilled
By the soft needs that nursed those small,
sweet noises !
0 thou Doolkamein, where is now thy wall ?
Where now thy voice divine and all thy forces ?
Great was thy cunning, but its wit was small
Compared with nature's least and gentlest
courses.
Fears and false creeds may fright the realms
awhile ;
But heaven and earth abide their time, and smile.
Leigh hunt.
MAHMOUD.
There came a man, making his hasty moan
Before the Sultan Mahmoud on his throne.
And crying out, " My sorrow is my right.
And I ^Dill see the Sultan, and to-night."
" Sorrow," said Malunoud, " is a reverend thing :
I recognize its right, as king with king ;
Speak on." " A fiend has got into my house,"
Exclaimed the staring man, " and tortures us, —
One of thine officers ; he comes, the abhoned.
And takes possession of my house, my board.
My bed ; — I have two daughters and a wife.
And the wild villain comes and makes me mad
with life."
"Is he there now ? " said Mahmoud. "No ; he
left
The house when I did, of my wits bereft.
And laughed me down the street, because I vowed
1 'd bring the priuce himself to lay him in his
shroud.
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
I'm mad with want, I'm mad with misery,
And, 0 thou Sultan Mahmoud, God cries out for
thee 1 "
The Saltan comforted the man, and said,
" Go home, and I will send thee wine and bread "
(For he was poor) " and other comforts. Go ;
And should the wretch return, let Sultan Mah¬
moud know."
In three days' time, with haggard eyes and beard.
And shaken voice, the suitor reappeared.
And said, "He's come." Mahmoud said not a
word.
But rose and took four slaves, each with a sword.
And went with the vexed man. They reach the
place.
And hear a voice, and see a woman's face.
That to the window fluttered in affright :
"Go in," said Mahmoud, " and put out the light ;
But tell the females first to leave the room ;
And when the drunkard follows them, we come."
The man went in. There was a cry, and hark !
A table falls, the window is struck dark :
Forth rush the breatliless women, and behind
With curses comes the fiend in desperate mind.
In vain ; the sabres soon cut short the strife.
And chop the shrieking wretch, and drink his
bloody life.
"Now lighi the light," the Sultan cried aloud :
'T was done : he took it in his hand and bowed
Over the corpse, and looked upon the face ;
Then turned and knelt, and to the throne of grace
Put up a prayer, and from his lips there crept
Some gentle words of pleasure, and he wept.
In reverent silence the beholders wait.
Then bring him at his call both wine and meat -,
And when he had refreshed his noble heart.
He bade his host be blest, and rose up to depart.
The man amazed, all mildness now and tears.
Fell at the Sultan's feet with many prayers.
And begged him to vouchsafe to tell his slave
The reason first of that command he gave
About the light ; then, when he saw the face,
Why he knelt down ; and lastly, how it was
That fare so poor as his detained him in the place.
The Sultan said, with a benignant eye,
" Since first I saw thee come, and heard thy cry,
I could not rid me of a dread, that one
By whom such daring villanies were done,
Must be some lord of mine, — ay, e'en perhaps a
son.
For this I had the light put out ; but when
I saw the face, and found a stranger slain.
I knelt and thanked the sovereign Arbiter,
Whose work I had performed through pain and
fear ;
And then I rose and was refreshed with food.
The first time since thy voice had marred my
solitude."
Leigh hunt.
♦
THE LEPER.
" Room for the leper ! room ! " And as he came
The cry passed on, —' ' Room for the leper ! room ! "
And aside they stood.
Matron, and child, and pitiless manhood, — all
Who met him on his way, — and let him pass.
And onward through the open gate he came
A leper with the ashes on his brow,
Sackcloth about his loins, and on his lip
A covering, stepping painfully and slow.
And with a difficult utterance, like one
Whose heart is with an iron nerve put down.
Crying, " Unclean ! unclean ! "
Day was breaking
When at the altar of the temple stood
The holy priest of God. The incense-lamp
Burned with a struggling light, and a low chant
Swelled through the hollow arches of the roof,
Like an articulate wail, and there, alone.
Wasted to ghastly thinness, Helon knelt.
The echoes of the melancholy strain
Died in the distant aisles, and he rose up.
Struggling with weakness, and bowed down his
head
Unto the sprinkled ashes, and put off
His costly raiment for the leper's garb.
And with the sackcloth round him, and his lip
Hid in a loathsome covering, stood still.
Waiting to hear his doom : —
" Depart ! depart, 0 child
Of Israel, from the temple of thy God,
For he has smote thee with his chastening rod.
And to the desert wild
From all thou lov'st away thy feet must flee,
That from thy plague his people may be free.
" Depart ! and come not near
The busy mart, the crowded city, more ;
Nor set thy foot a human threshold o'er ;
And stay thou not to hear
Voices that call thee in the way ; and fly
From all who in the wilderness pass by.
" Wet not thy burning lip
In streams that to a human dwelling glide ;
Nor rest thee where the covert fountains hide,
Nor kneel thee down to dip
S!
e
702
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
The water where the pilgrim bends to drink.
By desert well, or river's grassy brink.
"And pass not thou between
The weary traveller and the cooling breeze.
And lie not down to sleep beneath the trees
Where human tracks are seen ;
Nor milk the goat that browseth on the plain.
Nor pluck the standing corn or yeUow grain.
" And now depart ! and when
Thy heart is heavy, and thine eyes are dim,
Lift up thy prayer beseechingly to Him
Who, from the tribes of men.
Selected thee to feel his chastening rod.
Depart ! 0 leper ! and forget not God ! "
And he went forth — alone ! not one of all
The many whom he loved, nor she whose name
Was woven in the fibres of the heart
Breaking within him now, to come and speak
Comfort unto him. Yea, he went his way,
Sick and heart-broken and alone, — to die !
For God had cursed the leper !
It was noon,
And Helon knelt beside a stagnant pool
In the lone wilderness, and bathed his brow,
Hot with the burning leprosy, and touched
The loathsome water to his fevered lips.
Praying that he might be so blest, — to die !
Footsteps approached, and with no strength to
fiee.
He drew the covering closer on his lip,
Crying, " Unclean ! unclean ! " and in the folds
Of the coarse sackcloth shrouding up his face.
He fell upon the earth till they should pass.
Nearer the stranger came, and, bending o'er
The leper's prostrate form, pronounced his name.
— " Helon ! " — the voice was like the master-
tone
Of a rich instrument, — most strangely sweet ;
And the dull pulses of disease awoke.
And for a moment beat beneath the hot
And leprous scales with a restoring thrill.
" Helon ! arise ! " and he forgot his curse.
And rose and stood before him.
Love and awe
Mingled in the regard of Helon's eye
As he beheld the stranger. He was not
In costly raiment clad, nor on his brow
The symbol of a princely lineage wore ;
No followers at his back, nor in his hand
Buckler or sword or spear, —yet in his mien
Command sat throned serene, and if he smiled,
A kingly condescension graced his lips
The lion would have crouched to in his lair.
His garb was simple, and his sandals worn ;
h
His stature modelled with a perfect grace ;
His countenance, the impress of a God,
Touched with the open innocence of a child ;
His eye was blue and calm, as is the sky
In the serenest noon ; his hair unshorn
Fell to his shoulders ; and his curling beard
The fulness of perfected manhood bore.
He looked on Helon earnestly awhile.
As if his heart was moved, and, stooping down.
He took a little water in his hand
And laid it on his brow, and said, " Be clean ! "
And lo ! the scales fell from him, and his blood
Coursed with delicious coolness through his veins.
And his dry palms grew moist, and on his brow
The dewy softness of an infant's stole.
His leprosy was cleansed, and he fell down
Prostrate at Jesus' feet, and worshipped him.
Nathaniel Parker Willis.
GODIVA.
Not only we, the latest -seed of Time,
New men, that in the flying of a wheel
Cry down the past ; not only we, that prate
Of rights and wrongs, have loved the people well,
And loathed to see them overtaxed ; but she
Did more, and rmderwent, and overcame.
The woman of a thousand summers back,
Godiva, wife to that grim Earl who ruled
In Coventry : for when he laid a tax
Upon his town, and all the mothers brought
Their children, clamoring, " If we pay, we
starve ! "
She sought her lord, and found him, where he
strode
About the hall, among his dogs, alone.
His beard a foot before him, and his hair
A yard behind. She told him of their tears.
And prayed him, " If they pay this tax, they
■ starve."
Whereat he stared, replying, half amazed,
"You would not let your little finger ache
For such as <Äese" " But 1 would die," said she.
He laughed, and swore by Peter and by Paul :
Then filliped at the diamond in her ear ;
" 0, ay, ay, ay, you talk ! " " Alas ! " she said,
" But prove me what it is 1 would not do."
And from a heart as rough as Esau's hand,
He answered, " Ride you naked through the town,
And 1 repeal it ; " and nodding, as in scorn,
He parted, with great strides among his dogs.
So left alone, the passions of her mind.
As winds from all the compass shift and blow.
Made war upon each other for an hour.
Till pity won. She sent a herald forth.
And bade him cry, with sound of trumpet, all
The hard condition ; but that she would loose
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
703
a
The people : therefore, as they loved her well,
From then till noon no foot should pace the street.
No eye look down, she passing ; but that all
Should keep within, door shut and window barred.
Then fled she to her inmost bower, and there
Unclasped the wedded eagles of her belt.
The grim Earl's gift ; but ever at a breath
She Ungered, looking like a summer moon
Half dipt in cloud : anon she shook her head.
And showered the rippled ringlets to her knee ;
Unclad herself in haste ; adown the stair
Stole on ; and, like a creeping sunbeam, slid
From pillar unto pillar, until she reached
The gateway ; there she found her palfrey trapt
In purple blazoned with armorial gold.
Then she rode forth, clothed on with chastity :
The deep air listened round her as she rode.
And all the low wind hardly breathed for fear.
The little wide-mouthed heads upon the spout
Had cunning eyes to see : the barking cur
Made her cheek flame : her palfrey's footfall shot
Light horrors through her pulses : the blind walls
Were full of chinks and holes ; and overhead
Fantastic gables, crowding, stared : but she
Not less through all bore up, till, last, she saw
The white-flowered elder-thicket from the field
Gleam through the Gothic archways in the wall.
Then she rode hack, clothed on with chastity :
And one low churl, compact of thankless earth.
The fatal byword of all years to come.
Boring a little auger-hole in fear.
Peeped — but his eyes, before they had their will.
Were shrivelled into darkness in his head.
And dropt before him. So the Powers, who wait
On noble deeds, cancelled a sense misused ;
And she, that knew not, passed ; and all at once.
With twelve great shocks of sound, the shameless
noon
Was clashedandhammered from a hundred towers.
One after one : but even then she gained
Her bower ; whence reissuing, robed and crowned.
To meet her lord, she took the tax away.
And btdlt herself an everlasting name.
Alfred Tennyson.
THE PRISONER OF CHILLON.
Eternal spirit of the chainless mind !
Brightest in dungeons. Liberty ! thou art.
For there thy haUtation is the heart, —
The heart which love of thee alone can bind ;
And when thy sons to fetters are consigned, —
To fetters, and the damp vault's day less gloom,—
Their country conquers with their martyrdom.
And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind.
Chillón ! thy prison is a holy place.
And thy sad floor an altar, — for't was trod.
Until his very steps have left a trace
Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod.
By Bonnivard ! — May none those marks efface 1
For they appeal from tyranny to God.
My hair is gray, but not with years.
Nor grew it white
In a single night.
As men's have grown from sudden fears :
My limbs are bowed, though not with toil.
But rusted with a vile repose.
For they have been a dungeon's spoU,
And mine has been the fate of those
To whom the goodly earth and air
Are banned, and barred, — forbidden fare ;
But this was for my father's faith
I suffered chains and courted death ;
That father perished at the stake
For tenets he would not forsake ;
And for the same his lineal race
In darkness found a dwelling-place j
We were seven, — who now are one.
Six in youth, and one in age.
Finished as they had begun.
Proud of Persecution's rage ;
One in fire, and two in field.
Their belief with blood have sealed !
Dying as their father died.
For the God their foes denied ;
Three were in a dungeon cast,
Of whom this wreck is left the last.
There are seven pillars of Gothic mould
In Chillon's dungeons deep and old,
There are seven columns, massy and gray,
Dim with a dull imprisoned ray, —
A sunbeam which hath lost its way,
And through the crevice and the cleft
Of the thick wall is fallen and left.
Creeping o'er the floor so damp.
Like a marsh's meteor lamp, —
And in each pillar there is a ring.
And in each ring there is a chain ;
That iron is a cankering thing.
For in these limbs its teeth remain
With marks that will not wear away.
Till I have done with this new day.
Which now is painful to these eyes.
Which have not seen the sun to rise
For years, — I cannot count them o'er,
I lost their long and heavy score
When my last brother drooped and died.
And I lay living by his side.
They chained us each to a column stone,
And we were three, yet each alone ;
We could not move a single pace.
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[&
704
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS,
We could not see each other's face,
But with that pale and livid light
That made us strangers in our sight ;
And thus together, yet apart.
Fettered in hand, but pined in heart ;
T was still some solace, in the dearth
Of the pure elements of earth.
To hearken to each other's speech.
And each turn comforter to each
With some new hope, or legend old,
Or song heroically bold ;
But even these at length grew cold.
Our voices took a dreary tone.
An echo of the dungeon-stone,
A grating sound, — not fuU and free
As they of yore were wont to be ;
It might be fancy, — but to me
They never sounded like our own.
I was the eldest of the three.
And to uphold and cheer the rest
I ought to do — and did — my best.
And each did well in his degree.
The youngest, whom my father loved,
Because our mother's brow was given
To him, with eyes as blue as heaven, —
For him my soul was sorely moved ;
And truly might it be distrest
To see such bird in such a nest ;
For he was beautiful as day
(When day was beautiful to me
As to young eagles, being free), —
A polar day, which will not see
A sunset tiU its summer's gone.
Its sleepless summer of long light.
The snow-clad offspring of the .sun ;
And thus he was as pm'e and bright.
And in his natural spirit gay.
With tears for naught but others' ills.
And then they flowed like mountain rills,
Unless he could assuage the woe
Which he abhorred to view below.
The other was as pure of mind.
But formed to combat with his kind ;
Strong in his frame, and of a mood
Which 'gainst the world in war had stood.
And perished in the foremost rank
With joy ; — but not in chains to pine ;
His spirit withered with their clank,
I saw it silently decline, —
And so perchance in sooth did mine ;
But yet I forced it on to cheer
Those relics of a home so dear.
He was a hunter of the hills,
Had followed there the deer and wolf ;
To him this dungeon was a gulf
And fettered feet the worst of ills.
Lake Leman lies by Chillon's walls :
A thousand feet in depth below
Its massy waters meet and flow ;
Thus much the fathom-line was sent
From Chillon's snow-white battlement,
Which round about the wave inthralls ;
A double dungeon wall and wave
Have made, — and like a living grave.
Below the surface of the lake
The dark vault lies wherein we lay,
We heard it ripple night and day ;
Sounding o'er our heads it knocked ;
And I have felt the winter's spray
Wash through the bars when winds were high
And wanton in the happy sky;
And then the very rock hath rocked.
And I have felt it shake, unshocked.
Because I could have smiled to see
The death that would have set me free.
I said my nearer brother pined,
I said his mighty heart declined.
He loathed and put away his food ;
It was not that't was coarse and rude,
For we were used to hunter's fare.
And for the like had little care ;
The milk drawn from the mountain goat
Was changed for water from the moat.
Our bread was such as captives' tears
Have moistened many a thousand years,
Since man flrst pent his fellow-men
Like brutes within an iron den ;
But what were these to us or him ?
These wasted not his heart or limb ;
My brother's soul was of that mould
Which in a palace had grown cold.
Had his free breathing been denied
The range of the steep mountain's side ;
But why delay the truth ? — he died.
I saw, and could not hold his head.
Nor reach his dying hand, —nor dead, —
Though hard I strove, but strove in vain.
To rend and gnash my bonds in twain.
He died, — and they unlocked his chain.
And scooped for him a shallow grave
Even from the cold earth of our cave.
I begged them, as a boon, to lay
His corse in dust whereon the day
Might shine, — it was a foolish thought.
But then within my brain it wrought.
That even in death his free-bom breast
In such a dungeon could not rest.
I might have spared my idle prayer, —
They coldly laughed, and laid him there.
The flat and turfless earth above
The being we so much did love ;
His empty chain above it leant.
Such murder's fltting monument !
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705
But he, the favorite and the flower,
Most cherished since his natal hour.
His mother's image in fair face.
The infant love of aU his race.
His martyred father's dearest thought.
My latest care, for whom I sought
To hoard my life, that his might be
Less wretched now, and one day free ;
He, too, who yet had held untired
A spirit natural or inspired, —
He, too, was struck, and day by day
Was withered on the stalk away.
0 God ! it is a fearful thing
To see the human soul take wing
In any shape, in any mood : —
I've seen it rushing forth in blood,
1 've seen it on the breaking ocean
Strive with a swoln convulsive motion,
I've seen the sick and ghastly bed
Of Sin delirious with its dread ;
But these were horrors, — this was woe
Unmixed with such, —but sure and slow :
He faded, and so calm and meek.
So softly worn, so sweetly weak,
So tearless, yet so tender, — kind.
And grieved for those he left behind ;
With all the while a cheek whose bloo
Was as a mockery of the tomb.
Whose tints as gently sunk away
As a departing rainbow's raj', —
An eye of most transparent light.
That almost made the dungeon bright.
And not a word of murmur,'— not
A groan o'er his untimely lot, —
A little talk of better days,
A httle hope my own to raise.
For 1 was sunk in silence, —lost
In this last loss, of all the most ;
And then the sighs he would suppress
Of fainting nature's feebleness.
More slowly drawn, grew less and less :
I listened, but 1 could not hear, —
1 called, for 1 was wild with fear ;
1 knew't was hopeless, but my dread
Would not be thus admonished ;
1 called, and thought 1 heard a sound, —
1 burst my chain with one strong bound.
And rushed to him ;—1 found him not,
I only stirred in this black spot,
I only lived, — I only drew
The accursèd breath of dungeon-dew ;
The last — the sole — the dearest link
Between me and the eternal brink.
Which bound me to my failing race.
Was broken in this fatal place.
One on the earth, and one beneath, —
My brothers — both had ceased to breathe.
®
1 took that hand which lay so still,
Alas ! my own was full as chill ;
1 had not strength to stir or strive.
But felt that 1 was stiU alive, —
A frantic feeling when we know
That what we love shall ne'er be so.
1 know not why
1 could not die,
I had no earthly hope — but faith.
And that forbade a selfish death.
What next befell me then and there
1 know not well — 1 never knew.
First came the loss of light and air.
And then of darkness too ;
1 had no thought, no feeling — none :
Among the stones 1 stood a stone.
And was, scarce conscious what 1 wist.
As shruhless crags within the mist ;
For all was blank and bleak and gray ;
It was not night, — it was not day ;
It was not even the dungeon-light.
So hateful to my heavy sight ;
But vacancy absorbing space.
And fixedness, without a place :
There were no stars—no earth—no time —
No check —no change — no good — no crime ;
But silence, and a stirless breath
Which neither was of life nor death : —
A sea of stagnant idleness.
Blind, boundless, mute, and motionless
A light broke in upon my brain, —
It was the carol of a bird ;
It ceased, and then it came again, —
The sweetest song ear ever heard.
And mine was thankful till my eyes
Ran over with the glad surprise.
And they that moment could not see
1 was the mate of misery ;
But then by dull degrees came back
My senses to their wonted track,
1 saw the dungeon walls and floor
Close slowly round me as before,
I saw the glimmer of the sun
Creeping as it before had done.
But through the crevice where it came
That bird was perched, as fond and tam
And tamer than upon the tree ;
A lovely bird, with azure wings.
And song that said a thousand things.
And seemed to say them all for me .
1 never saw its like before,
1 ne'er shall see its likeness more.
It seemed, like me, to want a mate.
But was not half so desolate.
And it was come to love me when
706
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
None lived to love me so again,
And cheering from my dungeon's brink.
Had brought me back to feel and think.
I know not if it late were free,
Or broke its cage to perch on mine,
But knowing well captivity.
Sweet bird ! I could not wish for thine !
Or if it were, in wingèd guise,
A visitant from Paradise :
For — Heaven forgive that thought ! the while
Which made me both to weep and smile —
I sometimes deemed that it might be
My brother's soul come down to me ;
But then at last away it flew.
And then't was mortal, — well I knew.
For he would never thus have flown.
And left me twice so doubly lone, —
Lone—as the corse within its shroud.
Lone — as a solitary cloud,
A single cloud on a sunny day.
While all the rest of heaven is clear,
A frown upon the atmosphere.
That hath no business to appear
When skies are blue and earth is gay.
A kind of change came in my fate.
My keepers grew compassionate ;
I know not what had made th«m so,
They were inured to sights of woe.
But so it was : — my broken chain
With links imfastened did remain.
And it was liberty to stride
Along my cell from side to side.
And up and down, and then athwart.
And tread it over every part ;
And round the pillars one by one.
Returning where my walk begun.
Avoiding only, as I trod.
My brothers' graves without a sod ;
For if I thought with heedless tread
My step profaned their lowly bed.
My breath came gaspingly and thick.
And my crushed heart fell blind and sick.
I made a footing in the waU,
It was not therefrom to escape.
For I had buried one and all
Who loved me in a human shape :
And the whole earth would henceforth be
A wider prison unto me :
No child, —no sire, —no kin had I,
No partner in my misery ;
I thought of this and I was glad.
For thought of them had made me mad ;
But I was curious to ascend
To my barred windows, and to bend
Once more, upon the mountains high.
The quiet of a loving eye.
I saw them, — and they were the same.
They were not changed like me in frame ;
I saw their thousand years of snow
On high, — their wide long lake below,
And the blue Rhone in fullest flow ;
I heard the torrents leap and gush
O'er channelled rock and broken bush ;
I saw the white-walled distant town.
And whiter sails go skimming down ;
And then there was a little isle.
Which in my very face did smile.
The only one in view ;
A small green isle, it seemed no more.
Scarce broader than my dungeon floor.
But in it there were three tall trees.
And o'er it blew the mountain breeze.
And by it there were waters flowing.
And on it there were young flowers growing.
Of gentle breath and hue.
The fish swam by the castle wall.
And they seemed joyous each and all ;
The eagle rode the rising blast,
Methought he never flew so fast
As then to me he seemed to fly.
And then new tears came in my eye.
And I felt troubled, — and would fain
I had not left my recent chain ;
And when I did descend again,
The darkness of my dim abode
Fell on me as a heavy load ;
It was as in a new-dug grave
Closing o'er one we sought to save.
And yet my glance, too much oppressed.
Had almost need of such a rest.
It might be months, or years, or days,
I kept no count, — I took no note,
I had no hope my eyes to raise.
And clear them of their dreary mote ;
At last men came to set me free,
I asked not why and recked not where.
It was at length the same to me.
Fettered or fetterless to be,
I learned to love despair.
And thus when they appeared at last.
And all my bonds aside were cast.
These heavy walls to me had grown
A hermitage, and all my own !
And half 1 felt as they were come
To tear me from a second home ;
With spiders I had friendship made.
And watched them in their sullen trade.
Had seen the mice by moonlight play.
And why should I feel less than they ?
We were all inmates of one place.
And I, the monarch of each race.
Had power to kill, — yet, strange to tell !
In quiet we had learned to dwell, —
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
707
a
My very chains and I grew friends,
So much a long commimion tends
To make us what we are : — even I
Regained my freedom with a sigh.
Lord Byron.
DIVINA COMMEDIA.
Opt have I seen, at some cathedral door,
A laborer, pausing in the dust and heat.
Lay down his burden, and with reverent feet
Enter, and cross himself, and on the floor
Kneel to repeat his paternoster o'er ;
Far off the noises of the world retreat ;
The loud vociferations of the street
Become an undistinguishable roar.
So, as I enter here from day to day.
And leave my burden at this minster gate.
Kneeling in prayer, and not ashamed to pray.
The tumult of the time disconsolate
To inarticulate murmurs dies away,
"While the eternal ages watch and wait.
How strange the sculptures that adorn these
towers !
This crowd of statues, in whose folded sleeves
Birds build their nests ; whUe canopied with
leaves
Parvis and portal bloom like trellised bowers.
And the vast minster seems a cross of flowers !
But fiends and dragons on the gargoyled eaves
Watch the dead Christ between the living
thieves.
And, underneath, the traitor Judas lowers !
Ah ! from what agonies of heart and brain.
What exultations trampling on despair,
"What tenderness, what tears, what hate of
wrong.
What passionate outcry of a soul in pain.
Uprose this poem of the earth and air.
This mediaeval miracle of song !
I enter, and I see thee in the gloom
Of the long aisles, 0 poet saturnine !
And strive to make my steps keep pace with
thine.
The air is filled with some unknown perfume ;
The congregation of the dead make room
For thee to pass ; the votive tapers shine ;
Like rooks that haunt Ravenna's groves of pine
The hovering echoes fly from tomb to tomb.
From the confessionals I hear arise
Rehearsals of forgotten tragedies.
And lamentations from the erypts below ;
And then a voice celestial, that begins
With the pathetic words, "Although your sins
As scarlet be," and ends with "as the snow."
With snow-white veil and garments as of flame,
She stands before thee, who so long ago
Filled thy young heart with passion and the woe
From which thy song and all its splendors came ;
And while with stern rebuke she speaks thy name.
The ice about thy heart melts as the snow
On mountain heights, and in swift overflow
Comes gushing from thy lips in sobs of shame.
Thou makest full confession ; and a gleam.
As if the dawn on some dark forest cast.
Seems on thy lifted forehead to increase ;
Lethè and Eunoe — the remembered dream
And the forgotten sorrow — bring at last
That perfect pardon which is perfect peace.
I lift mine eyes, and all the windows blaze
With forms of saints and holy men who died.
Here martyred and hereafter glorified ;
And the great Rose upon its leaves displays
Christ's Triumph, and the angelic roundelays.
With splendor upon splendor multiplied ;
And Beatrice again at Dante's side
No more rebukes, but smiles her words of praise.
And then the organ sounds, and unseen choirs
Sing the old Latin hymns of peace and love.
And benedictions of the Holy Ghost ;
And the melodious bells among the spires
O'er aU the house-tops and through heaven
above
Proclaim the elevation of the Host !
0 star of morning and of liberty !
0 brrnger of the light, whose splendor shines
Above the darkness of the Apennines,
Forerunner of the day that is to be !
The voices of the city and the sea.
The voices of the mountains and the pines.
Repeat thy song, till the familiar lines
Are footpaths for the thought of Italy !
Thy fame is blown abroad from all the heights.
Through all the nations, and a sound is heard.
As of a mighty wind, and men devout,
Strangers of Rome, and the new proselytes.
In their own language hear thy wondrous word,
And many are amazed and many doubt.
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
THE "FILLAGE SCHOOLMISTRESS.
from " the schoolmistress."
In every village marked with little spire.
Embowered in trees, and hardly known to fame.
There dwells, in lowly shed and mean attire,
A matron old, whom we Schoolmistress name ;
"Who boasts unruly brats with birch to tame :
They grieven sore, in piteous durance pent.
Awed by the power of this relentless dame ;
(&
708
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
And ofttimes, on vagaries idly bent,
For unkempt hair, or task unconned, are sorely
sbent.
Her cap, far whiter than the driven snow,
Emblem right meet of decency does yield :
Her apron dyed in grain, as blue, I tro we.
As is the harebell that adorns the field :
And in her hand, for sceptre, she does wield
Tway birchen sprays ; with anxious fear en¬
twined,
"With dark distrust, and sad repentance filled ;
And steadfast hate, and sharp affliction joined.
And fury uncontrolled, and chastisement unkind.
A russet stole was o'er her shoulders thrown ;
A russet kirtle fenced the nipping air :
'T was simple russet, but it was her own ;
'T was her own country bred the flock so fair,
'T was her own labor did the fleece prepare ;
And, sooth to say, her pupils, ranged around.
Through pious awe, did term it passing rare ;
For they in gaping wonderment abound.
And think, no doubt, she been the greatest wight
on ground.
Albeit ne flattery did corrupt her truth.
Ne pompous title did debauch her ear ;
Groody, good-woman, gossip, n'aunt forsooth.
Or dame, the sole additions she did hear ;
Yet these she challenged, these she held right
dear :
Ne would esteem him act as mought behove,
"Who should not honor eld with these revere ;
For never title yet so mean could prove.
But there was eke a mind which did that title love.
In elbow-chair (like that of Scottish stem.
By the sharp tooth of cankering eld defaced.
In which, when he receives his diadem.
Our sovereign prince and liefest liege is placed)
The matron sat; and some with rank she graced,
(The sourceof children's and of courtiers'pride!)
Redressed affronts, — for vile affronts there
passed ;
And warned them not the fretful to deride.
But love each other dear, whatever them betide.
Eight well she knew each temper to descry.
To thwart the proud, and the submiss to raise ;
Some with vile copper-prize exalt on high.
And some entice with pittance small of praise ;
And other some with balefiü sprig she 'frays :
Even absent, she the reins of power doth hold,
"While with quaint arts the giddy crowd she
sways ;
Forewarned, if little bird their pranks behold,
T wUl whisper in her ear, and all the scene unfold.
Lo I now with state she utters her command ;
Eftsoous the urchins to their tasks repair.
Their books of stature small they take in hand.
Which with pellucid horn secured are.
To save from finger wet the letters fair :
The work so gay, that on their back is seen,
St. George's high achievements does declare ;
On which thilk wight that has y-gazing been.
Kens the forthcoming rod, — unpleasing sight, I
But now Dan Phœbus gains the middle sky,
And Liberty unbars her prison door ;
And like a rushing torrent out they fly ;
And now the grassy cirque han covered o'er
With boisterous revel rout and wild uproar ;
A thousand ways in wanton rings they run.
Heaven shield their short-lived pastimes, I im¬
plore ;
For well may freedom erst so dearly won
Appear to British elf more gladsome than the sun.
William She.n'stone.
THE JOLLY OLD PEDAGOGUE.
'T WAS a jolly old pedagogue, long ago,
TaU and slender, and sallow and dry ;
His form was bent and his gait was slow,
His long thin hair was as white as snow,
But a wonderful twinkle shone in his eye ;
And he sang every night as he went to bed,
" Let us be happy down here below ;
The living should live, though the dead be dead,"
Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago.
He taught his scholars the rule of three.
Writing, and reading, and histoiy too ;
He took the little ones up on his knee.
For a kind old heart in his breast had he.
And the wants of the littlest child he knew :
" Leam while you 're young," he often said,
"There's much to enjoy down here below;
Life for the living and rest for the dead ! "
Said the joUy old pedagogue, long ago.
With the stupidest boys he was kind and cool.
Speaking only in gentlest tones ;
The rod was hardly known in his school, —
Whipping, to him, was a barbarous rule.
And too hard work for his poor old bones ;
" Besides, it is painful," he sometimes said ;
"We should make life pleasant down here
below.
The living need charity more than the dead,"
Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago.
B-
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
709
He lived in the house by the hawthorn lane,
With roses and woodbine over the door ;
His rooms were quiet and neat and plain.
But a spirit of comfort there held reign.
And made him forget he was old and poor ;
"I need so little," he often said ;
" And my friends and relatives here below
Won't litigate over me when I am dead,"
Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago.
But the pleasantest times that he had, of all.
Were the sociable hours he used to pass.
With his chair tipped back to a neighbor's wall,
Making an unceremonious call.
Over a pipe and friendly glass :
This was the finest pleasure, he said.
Of the many he tasted here below ;
" Who has no cronies had better be dead,"
Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago.
Then the jolly old pedagogue's wrinkled face
Melted aU over in sunshiny smiles ;
He stirred his glass with an old-school grace.
Chuckled, and sipped, and prattled apace,
Till the house grew merry, from cellar to tiles.
"I'm a pretty old man," he gently said,
" I have lingered a long while here below ;
But my heart is fresh, if my youth is fled,"
Said the joUy old pedagogue, long ago.
He smoked his pipe in the balmy air
Every night when the sun went down.
While the soft wind played in his silvery hair.
Leaving his tenderest kisses there.
On the jolly old pedagogue's jolly old crown ;
And feeling the kisses, he smiled, and said,
'T was a glorious world, down here below ;
" Why wait for happiness till we are dead ? "
Said the jolly old pedagogue, long ago.
He sat at his door, one midsummer night.
After the sun had sunk in the west.
And the lingering beams of golden light
Made his kindly old face look warm and bright.
While the odorous night-wind whispered,
"Rest!"
Gently, gently, he bowed his head, —
There were angels waiting for him, I know ;
He was sure of happiness, living or dead, —
This jolly old pedagogue, long ago !
George Arnold.
•
THE SETTLER.
His echoing axe the settler .swung
Amid the sea-like solitude.
And, rushing, thundering, down were flung
The Titans of the wood ;
I Loud shrieked the eagle, as he dashed
From out his mossy nest, which crashed
With its supporting bough.
And the first sunlight, leaping, flashed
On the wolf's haunt below.
Rude was the garb and strong the frame
Of him who plied his ceaseless toil :
To form that garb the wildwood game
Contributed their spoil ;
The soul that warmed that frame disdained
The tinsel, gaud, and glare that reigned
Where men their crowds collect ;
The simple fur, untrimmed, unstained.
This forest-tamer decked.
The paths which wound mid gorgeous trees.
The stream whose bright lips kissed theb
flowers.
The winds that swelled their harmonies
Through those sun-hiding bowers.
The temple vast, the green arcade,
I The nestling vale, the grassy glade,
j Dark cave, and swampy lair ;
These scenes and sounds majestic made
His world, his pleasures, there.
His roof adorned a pleasant spot ;
Mid the black logs green glowed the grain.
And herbs and plants the woods knew not
Throve in the sun and rain.
The smoke-wreath curling o'er the dell,
I The low, the bleat, the tinkling beU,
All made a landscape strange.
Which was the living chronicle
Of deeds that wrought the change.
The violet sprung at spring's first tinge.
The rose of summer spread its glow.
The maize hung out its autumn fringe.
Rude winter brought his snow ;
And still the lone one labored there,
I His shout and whistle broke the air,
I As cheerily he plied
His garden-spade, or drove his share
Along the hillock's side.
He marked the fire-.storm's blazing flood
Roaring and crackling on its path,
And scorching earth, and melting wood.
Beneath its greedy wrath ;
He marked the rapid whirlwind shoot.
Trampling the pine-tree with its foot.
And darkening thick the day
With streaming bough and severed root.
Hurled whizzing on its way.
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
His gaunt hound yelled, his rifle flashed,
The grim bear hushed his savage growl ;
In blood and foam the panther gnashed
His fangs, with dying howl ;
The fleet deer ceased its flying bound.
Its snarling wolf-foe bit the ground.
And, with its moaning cry.
The beaver sank beneath the wound
Its pond-buUt Venice by.
Humble the lot, yet his the race.
When Liberty sent forth her cry.
Who thronged in conflict's deadliest place.
To fight, — to bleed, — to die !
Who cumbered Bunker's height of red.
By hope through weary years were led,
And witnessed Yorktown's sun
Blaze on a nation's banner spread,
A nation's freedom won.
Alfred B. Street.
THE CLOSING SCENE.
Within the sober realm of leafless trees.
The russet year inhaled the dreamy air ;
Like some tanned reaper, in his hour of ease.
When all the fields are lying brown and bare.
The gray bams looking from their hazy hills,
O'er the dun waters widening in the vales,
Sent down the air a greeting to the miUs
On the dull thunder of alternate flails.
All sights were mellowed and all sounds subdued.
The hills seemed further and the stream sang
low.
As in a dream the distant woodman hewed
His winter log with many a muffled blow.
The embattled forests, erewhile armed with gold.
Their banners bright with every martial hue.
Now stood like some sad, beaten host of old.
Withdrawn afar in Time's remotest blue.
On slumb'rous wings the vulture held his flight ;
The dove scarce heard its sighing mate's com¬
plaint ;
And, like a star slow drowning in the light.
The village church-vane seemed to pale and
faint.
The sentinel-coek upon the hillside crew, —
Crew thrice, — and all was stiller than before ;
Silent, till some replying warden blew
His alien bora, and then was heard no more.
Where erst the jay, within the elm's tall crest.
Made garrulous trouble round her unfledged
young ;
And where the oriole hung her swaying nest.
By every light wind like a censer swung ; —
Where sang the noisy martens of the eaves,
The busy swallows circling ever near, —
Foreboding, as the rustic mind believes.
An early harvest and a plenteous year ; —
Where every bird which charmed the vernal feast
Shook the sweet slumber from its wings at
mom.
To wam the reaper of the rosy east : —
All now was sunless, empty, and forlom.
Alone from out the stubble piped the quaü.
And croaked the crow through all the dreamy
gloom ;
Alone the pheasant, dmmming in the vale.
Made echo to the distant cottage-loom.
There was no bud, no bloom upon the bowers ;
The spiders moved their thin shrouds night by
night.
The thistle-down, the only ghost of flowers.
Sailed slowly by, — passed noiseless out of
sight.
Amid all this—in this most cheerless air.
And where the woodbine shed upon the porch
Its crimson leaves, as if the Year stood there
Firing the floor with his inverted torch, —
Amid all this, the centre of the scene.
The white-haired matron with monotonous
tread
Plied the swift wheel, and with her joyless mien
Sat, like a fate, and watched the flying thread.
She had known Sorrow, — he had walked with
her.
Oft supped, and broke the bitter ashen cmst ;
And in the dead leaves still she heard the stir
Of his black mantle trailing in the dust.
WhUe yet her cheek was bright with summer
bloom.
Her country summoned and she gave her all ;
And twice War bowed to her his sable plume, —
Re-gave the swords to rust upon the wall.
Re-gave the swords, but not the hand that drew
And stmck for Liberty the dying blow ;
Nor him who, to his sire and country trae,
FeU mid the ranks of the invading foe.
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
711
■a
Long, but not loud, the droning wheel went on,
Like the low murmur of a hive at noon ;
Long, hut not loud, the memory of the gone
Breathed through her lips a sad and tremulous
tune.
At last the thread was snapped ; her head was
bowed ;
Life dropt the distaff through his hands se¬
rene ;
And loving neighbors smoothed her careful
shroud,
While Death and Winter closed the autumn
scene.
THOMAS BUCHANAN READ.
SEVEN AGES OF MAN.
from "as you like it," act ii. sc.
All the world's a stage.
And all the men and women merely players : "
They have their exits and their entrances ;
And one man in his time plays many parts.
His Acts being seven ages. At first the Infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
Then the whining School-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the Lover,
^ Sighing like furnace, with a woful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a Soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard ;
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel.
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the
Justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined.
With eyes severe, and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modem instances, —
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered Pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose, and pouch on side ;
His youthful hose, weU saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank ; and his big manly voice.
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all.
That ends this strange eventful history.
Is second childishness, and mere oblivion, —
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.
shakespeare.
à
GIRLHOOD.
An exquisite incompleteness, blossom fore¬
shadowing fmit ;
A sketch faint in its beauty, with promise of
future worth';
A plant with some leaves unfolded, and the rest
asleep at its root.
To deck with their future sweetness the fairest
thing on the earth.
Womanhood, wifehood, motherhood — each a
potsible thing, ^
Dimly seen through the silence that lies be¬
tween then and now ; i '
Something of each and all has woven a magic
ring.
Linking the three together in glory on girl¬
hood's brow.
ANONYMOUS.
SONG.
How near to good is what is fair.
Which we no sooner see.
But with the lines and outward air
Our senses taken be.
We wish to see it still, and prove
What ways we may deserve ;
We court, we praise, we more than love.
We are not grieved to serve.
Ben jonson.
ADAM AND EVE.
from " paradise lost," book iv.
Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall.
Godlike erect, with native honor clad
In naked majesty, seemed lords of all :
And worthy seemed ; for in their looks divine
The image of their glorious Maker shone,
Trath, wisdom, sanctitude severe and pure,
(Severe, but in true filial freedom placed,)
Whence true authority in men ; though both
Not equal, as their sex not equal seemed ;
For contemplation he and valor formed ;
For softness she and sweet attractive grace ;
He for God only, she for God in him :
His fair large front and eye sublime declared
Absolute rule ; and hyacinthine locks
Round from his parted forelock manly hung
Clustering, but not beneath his shoulders broad ;
She, as a veil, down to the slender waist
Her unadomèd golden tresses wore
Dishevelled, but in wanton ringlets waved.
As the vine curls her tendrils, which implied
Subjection, but required with gentle sway.
And by her yielded, by him best received.
Yielded with coy submission, modest pride.
And sweet, reluctant, amorous delay.
So passed they naked on, nor shunned the sight
Of God or angel ; for they thought no iU :
9
a-
712
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
So hand in hand they passed, the loTeliest pair,
That ever since in love's embraces met :
Adam the goodliest man of men since bom
His sons, the fairest of her daughters Eve.
Under a tuft of shade that on a green
Stood whispering soft, by a fresh fountain side
They sat them down : and, after no more toil
Of their sweet gardening labor than sufficed
To recommend cool Zephyr, and made ease
More easy, wholesome thirst and appetite
More grateful, to their supper-fmits they fell.
Nectarine fruits which the compliant boughs
Yielded them, sidelong as they sat recline
On the soft downy bank damasked with flowers :
The savory pulp they chew, and in the rind.
Still as they thirsted, scoop the brimming stream ;
Nor gentle purpose, nor endearing smiles
"Wanted, nor youthful dalliance, as beseems
Fair couple, linked in happy nuptial league.
Alone as they. About them frisking played
All beasts of the Earth, since wild, and of all chase
In wood or wilderness, forest or den ;
Sporting the lion ramped, and in bis paw
Dandled the kid ; bears, tigers, ounces, pards,
Gambolled^bclure them ; thejonwieldy elephant,
To make them mirth, used all his might, and
wreathed
His little proboscis ; close the serpent sly,
Insinuating, wove with Gordian twine
His braided train, and of his fatal guile
Gave proof unheeded ; others on the grass
Couched, and now filled with pasture gazing sat.
Or bedward ruminating ; for the Sun,
Declined, was hastening now with prone career
To the ocean isles, and in the ascending scale
Of Heaven the stars that usher evening rose.
CLEOPATRA.
FROM "ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA," ACT 11. SC. 2.
Enobarbus. The barge she sat in, like a bur¬
nished throne,
ßnmed on the water : the poop was beaten gold ;
Purple the sails, and so perfumèd that
The winds were lovesick with them ; the oars
were silver,
"Which to the tune of flutes kept stroke, and made
The water, which they beat, to follow faster.
As amorous of their strokes. For her own person.
It beggared all description : she did lie
In her pavilion (cloth-of-gold of tissue),
O'erpicturing that Venus, where we see
The fancy outwork nature ; on each side her
Stood pretty dimpled boys, like smiling Cupids,
"With divers-colored fans, whose wind did seem
To glow the delicate cheeks which they did cool.
And what they undid, did.
Agrippa. O, rare for Antony !
End. Her gentlef^omen, like the Nereides,
So many mermaids, tended her i' the eyes,
And made their bends adornings : at the helm
A seeming mermaid steers ; the silken tackle
Swell with the touches of those flower-soft hands.
That yarely frame the office. From the barge
A strange invisible perfume hits the sense
Of the adjacent wharfs. The city cast
Her people out upon her ;^nd Antony,
Enthronèd in the market-place, did sit alone,
"Whistling to the air ; which, but for vacancy.
Had gone to gaze on Cleopatra too.
And made a gap in nature.
Agr. Rare Egyptian !
Eng. Upon her landing, Antony sent to her.
Invited her to supper : she replied.
It should be better he became her guest ;
W^hich she entreated. Our courteous Antony,
"Whom ne'er the word of "No" woman heard
speak.
Being barbered ten times o'er, goes to the feast ;
And, for his ordinary, pays his heart
For what his eyes eat only.
Agr. Royal wench !
Mecenas. Now Antonymust leave herutterly.
Eng. Never ; he will not :
Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale
Her infinite variety r other women cloy
The appetites they feed, but she makes hungry
Where most she satisfies. For vilest things
Become themselves in her ; that the holy priests
Bless her when she is riggish.
shakespeare.
THE VANITY OF THE BEAUTIFUL.
Thet course the glass, and let it take no rest ;
They pass and spy who gazeth on their face ;
They darkly ask whose beauty seemeth best ;
They hark and mark who marketh most their
grace ;
They stay their steps, and stalk a stately pace ;
They jealous are of every sight they see ;
They strive to seem, but never care to "be.
What grudge and grief our joys may then sup¬
press.
To see our hairs, which yellow were as gold.
Now gray as glass ; to feel and find them less ;
To scrape the bald skull which was wont to hold
Our lovely locks with curling sticks controul'd ;
To look in glass, and spy Sir Wrinkle's chair
Set fast on fronts which erst were sleek and fair
George Gascoigne.
I&
"4
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
713
THE TOILET.
VROU "the rape of the lock," canto l
And now, unveiled, the toilet stands displayed.
Each silver vase in mystic order laid.
First, robed in white, the nymph intent adores,
With head uncovered, the cosmetic powers.
A heavenly image in the glass appears,
To that she bends, to that her eyes she rears ;
The inferior priestess, at her altar's side.
Trembling begins the sacred rites of pride.
Unnumbered treasures ope at once, and here
The various offerings' of the world appear ;
From each she nicely culls with curious toil.
And decks the goddess with the glittering spoil.
This casket India's glowing gems unlocks.
And all Arabia breathes from yonder box.
The tortoise here and elephant unite,
Transformed to combs, thespeckled and the white.
Here files of pins extend their shining rows.
Puffs, powders, patches, bibles, bUlets-doux.
Now awful beauty puts on all its arms ;
The fair each moment rises in her charms.
Repairs her smiles, awakens every grace.
And calls forth aU the wonders of her face ;
Sees by degrees a purer blush arise.
And keener lightnings quicken in her eyes.
The busy sylphs surround their darling care.
These set the head, and those divide the hair.
Some fold the sleeve, while others plait the gown ;
And Betty's praised for labors not her own.
Alexander Pope.
FREEDOM IN DRESS.
prom "rpicœne. or, the silent woman," act i. sc. i.
Still to be neat, stUl to be drest.
As you were going to a feast ;
Still to be powdered, still perfumed, —
Lady, it is to be presumed.
Though art's hid causes are not found.
All is not sweet, all is not sound.
Give me a look, give me a face.
That makes simplicity a grace ;
Robes loosely Rowing, hair as free, —
Such sweet neglect more taketh me
Than all the adulteries of art :
They strike mine eyes, but not my heart.
ben jonson.
DELIGHT IN DISORDER.
'A sweet disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness ;
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into 8 fine distraction ;
U-
An erring lace, which here and there
Inthralls the crimson stomacher ;
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribbons to flow confusedly ;
A winning wave, deserving note.
In the tempestuous petticoat ;
A careless shoestring, in whose tie
I see a wüd civility ; —
Do more bewitch me than when art
Is too precise in every part.
robert Herrick.
—4
SILLY FAIR.
When Lesbia first 1 saw, so heavenly fair.
With eyes so bright and with that awful air,
1 thought my heart which durst so high aspire
As bold as his who snatched celestial fire.
But soon as e'er the beauteous idiot spoke.
Forth from her coral lips such folly broke.
Like balm the trickling nonsense healed my
wound.
And what her eyes inthraUed her tongue un¬
bound.
William Concreve.
CONSTANCY.
One eve of beauty, when the sun
Was on the streams of Guadalquiver,
To gold converting, one by one.
The ripples of the mighty river.
Beside me on the bank was seated
A Seville girl, with auburn hair.
And eyes that might the world have cheated, —
A wild, bright, wicked, diamond pair !
She stooped, and wrote upon the sand.
Just as the loving sun was going.
With such a soft, small, shining hand,
I could have sworn't was silver flowing.
Her words were three, and not one more.
What could Diana's motto be ?
The siren wrote upon the shore, —
"Death, not incrnistaivcy ! "
And then her two large languid eyes
So turned on mine, that, devil take me !
I set the air on fire with sighs,
And was the fool she chose to make me !
Saint Francis would have been deceived
With such an eye and such a hand ;
But one week more, and 1 believed
As much the woman as the sand.
anonvmous.
714
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
TO lANTHE, SLEEPING.
frou "queen mab" : i.
How wonderful is Death !
Death and his brother Sleep !
One, pale as yonder waning moon,
With lips of lurid blue ;
The other, rosy as the mom
When, throned on ocean's wave,
It blushes o'er the world :
Yet both so passing wonderful !
Hath then the gloomy Power,
Whose reign is in the tainted sepulchres.
Seized on her sinless soul ?
Must then that peerless form
Which love and admiration cannot view
Without a beating heart, those azure veins
Which steal like streams along a field of snow,
That lovely outline, which is fair
As breathing marble, perish ?
Must putrefaction's breath
Leave nothing of this heavenly sight
But loathsomeness and ruin ?
Spare nothing but a gloomy theme.
On which the lightest heart might moralize ?
Or is it only a sweet slumber
Stealing o'er sensation.
Which the breath of roseate moming
Chaseth into darkness ?
Wül lanthe wake again.
And give that faithful bosom joy.
Whose sleepless spirit waits to catch
Light, Ufe, and rapture from her smile ?
Yes ! she will wake again.
Although her glowing Umbs are motionless.
And silent those sweet Ups,
Once breathing eloquence
That might have soothed a tiger's rage.
Or thawed the cold heart of a conqueror.
Her dewy eyes are closed.
And on their Uds, whose texture fine
Searce hides the dark blue orbs beneath.
The baby Sleep is pUlowed :
Her golden tresses shade
The bosom's stainless pride.
Curling like tendrils of the parasite
Around a marble column.
A gentle start convulsed lanthe's frame :
Her veiny eyelids quietly unclosed ;
Moveless awhüe the dark blue orbs remained.
She looked around in wonder, and beheld
Henry, who kneeled in silence by her couch.
Watching her sleep with looks of speechless love.
And the bright-beaming stars
That through the casement shone.
percy bvsshb shelley.
THE BELLS.
Heae the sledges with the bells —
Silver bells !
What a world of merriment their melody foretells !
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle.
In the icy air of night !
While the stars that oversprinkle
AU the heavens seem to twinkle
With a crystalline deUght, —
Keeping time, time, time.
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically weUs
From the beUs, beUs, beUs, bells,
BeUs, beUs, bells, —
From the jingUug and the tinkling of the bells.
Hear the mellow wedding bells —
Golden beUs !
What a world of happiness their harmony fore-
teUs !
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their deUght !
From the molten-golden notes.
And aU in time.
What a Uquid ditty fioats
To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon !
0, from out the sounding cells.
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells !
How it swells !
How it dwells
On the Future ! how it teUs
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells.
Of the beUs, beUs, bells, beUs,
BeUs, bells, bells, —
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells.
Hear the loud alarum beUs —
Brazen beUs !
What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells !
In the startled ear of night
How they scream out their affright !
Too much horrified to speak.
They can only shriek, shriek.
Out of tune.
In the clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire.
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic
fire
Leaping higher, higher, higher.
With a desperate desire.
And a resolute endeavor.
Now— now to sit, or never.
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
O the bells, bells, bells.
What a tale their terror tells
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
715
Of despair !
How they clang and clash and roar !
What a horror they outpour
On the hosom of the palpitating air !
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging,
And the clanging.
How the danger ebbs and flows ;
Yet the ear distinctly tells.
In the jangling.
And the wrangling.
How the danger sinks and swells.
By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of
the beUs, —
Of the belle, —
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells.
Bells, beUs, bells, —
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells !
Hear the tolling of the bells —
Iron bells !
What a world of solemn thought their monody
compels !
In the silence of the night,
How we shiver with affright
At the melancholy menace of their tone !
For eveiy sound that floats
From the rust within their throats
Is a groan.
And the people — ah, the people —
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone.
And who tolling, tolling, tolling.
In that muffled monotone.
Feel a glory in so rolling
On the human heart a stone, —
They are neither man nor woman, —
They are neither brute nor human, —
They are ghouls ;
And their king it is who tolls ;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls.
Rolls,
A psean from the bells !
And his merry bosom swells
With the psean of the bells I
And he dances and he yells ;
Keeping time, time, time.
In a sort of Runic rhyme.
To the psean of the bells, —
Of the bells :
Keeping time, time, time.
In a sort of Runic rhyme.
To the throbbing of the bells, —
Of the bells, bells, bells, —
To the sobbing of the heUs ;
Keeping time, time, time.
As he knells, knells, kneUs,
In a happy Rimic rhyme.
To the rolling of the bells, —
Of the beUs, bells, beUs, —
To the tolling of the beUs,
Of the bells, bells, bells, beUs —
Bells, bells, bells, —
To the moaning and the groaning of the beUs.
Edgar Allan Foe.
THE BELLS OF SHANDON.
Sabbata pang:o ;
Fuñera plango ;
Solemnia clangOi
inscription on an old bgllt
With deep affection
And recollection
I often think of
Those Shandon bells.
Whose sounds so wild would.
In the days of childhood.
Fling round my cradle
Their magic spells.
On this I ponder
Where'er I wander.
And thus grow fonder.
Sweet Cork, of thee, —
With thy beUs of Shandon,
That sound so grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the river Lee.
I've heard bells chiming
FuU many a clime in.
Tolling sublime in
Cathedral shrine.
While at a glib rate
Brass tongues would vibrate ;
But aU their music
Spoke naught like thine.
For memory, dwelling
On each proud swelling
Of thy belfry, knelling
Its bold notes free.
Made the bells of Shandon
Sound far more grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the river Lee.
I've heard bells tolling
"Old Adrian's Mole" in.
Their thunder rolling
From the Vatican, —
And cymbals glorious
Swinging uproarious
In the gorgeous turrets
Of Notre Dame ;
716
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
But thy sounds were sweeter
Than the dome of Peter
Flings o'er the Tiber,
Pealing solemnly.
0, the bells of Shandon
Sound far more grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the river Lee.
There's a bell in Moscow ;
While on tower and kiosko
In St. Sophia
The Turkman gets,
And loud in air
Calls men to prayer,
From the tapering summit
Of tall minarets.
Such empty phantom
I freely grant them ;
But there's an anthem
More dear to me, —
'T is the bells of Shandon,
That sound so grand on
The pleasant waters
Of the river Lee.
Francis Mahony (Father Prout).
CITY BELLS,
from " the lav of st. alov's."
Loud and clear
From the St. Nicholas tower, on the listening
ear.
With solemn swell.
The deep-toned bell
Flings to the gale a funeral knell ;
And hark ! — at its sound.
As a cunning old hound.
When he opens, at once causes all the young
whelps
Of the cry to put in their less dignified yelps,
So the little bells all,
No matter how small.
From the steeples both inside and outside the
wall.
With bell-metal throat
Respond to the note.
And join the lament that a prelate so pious is
Forced thus to leave his disconsolate diocese.
Or, as Blois' Lord May'r
Is heard to declare,
"Should leave this here world for to go to that
there."
Richard Harris Barham.
THOSE EVENING BELLS.
Those evening bells' ! those evening bells !
How many a tale their music tells
Of youth, and home, and that sweet time
When last I heard their soothing chime !
Those joyous hours are passed away ;
And many a heart that then was gay
Within the tomb now darkly dwells.
And hears no more those evening bells.
And so't wUl be when I am gone, —
That tuneful peal will still ring on ;
While other bards shall walk these dells.
And sing your praise, sweet evening beUs.
Thomas Moorb.
CARILLON.
In the ancient town of Bruges,
In the quaint old Flemish city.
As the evening shades descended.
Low and loud and sweetly blended.
Low at times and loud at times.
And changing like a poet's rhymes.
Rang the beautiful wild chimes
From the Belfry in the market
Of the ancient town of Bruges.
Then, with deep sonorous clangor
Calmly answering their sweet anger.
When the wrangling bells had ended,
Slowly struck the clock eleven.
And, from out the silent heaven.
Silence on the town descended.
Silence, silence everywhere.
On the earth and in the air.
Save that footsteps here and there
Of some burgher home returning.
By the street lamps faintly burning.
For a moment woke the echoes
Of the ancient town of Bruges.
But amid my broken slumbers
Still I heard those magic numbers.
As they loud proclaimed the flight
And stolen marches of the night ;
Till their chimes in sweet collision
Mingled with each wandering vision.
Mingled with the fortune-telling
Gypsy-bands of dreams and fancies.
Which amid the waste expanses
Of the silent land of trances
Have their solitary dwelling.
All else seemed asleep in Bruges,
In the quaint old Flemish city.
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DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
717
And I thought how like these chimes
Are the poet's airy rhymes,
All his rhymes and roundelays,
His conceits, and songs, and ditties.
From the belfry of his brain.
Scattered downward, though in vain.
On the roofs and stones of cities !
For by night the drowsy ear
Under its curtains cannot hear,
And by day men go their ways.
Hearing the music as they pass.
But deeming it no more, alas !
Than the hollow sound of brass.
Yet perchance a sleepless wight.
Lodging at some humble inn
In the narrow lanes of life.
When the dusk and hush of night
Shut out the iucessant din
Of daylight and its toil and strife,
May listen with a calm delight
To the poet's melodies.
Till he hears, or dreams he hears.
Intermingled with the song.
Thoughts that he has cherished long ;
Hears amid the chime and singing
The bells of his own village ringing.
And wakes, and finds his slumberous eyes
Wet with most delicious tears.
Thus dreamed I, as by night I lay
In Bruges, at the Fleur-de-Blé,
Listening with a wild delight
To the chimes that, through the night.
Rang their changes from the Belfry
Of that quaint old Flemish city.
HENR'Y WADSVVORTH LONGFELLOW.
THE CUCKOO CLOCK.
FROM "THE BIRTHDAV.''
But chief — surpassing all — a cuckoo clock !
That crowning wondei ! miracle of art !
How have I stood entranced uncounted minutes.
With held-in breath, and eyes intently fixed
On that small magic door, that when complete
The expiring hour — the irreversible —
Flew open with a startling suddenness
That, though expected, sent the rushing blood
In mantling ñushes o'er my upturned face ;
And as the bird, (that more than mortal fowl !)
With perfect mimicry of natural tone.
Note after note exact Time's message told.
How my heart's pulse kept time with the charmed
voice !
And when it ceased made simultaneous pause
As the small door clapt to, and all was stiU.
CAROLINE BOWLES (MRS. SOUTHEY).
OZYMANDIAS OF EGYPT.
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said : Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand.
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown
And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless
things.
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal these words appear :
"My name is 02)Tnandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair ! "
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare.
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
PERCY Bysshe Shelley.
ADDRESS TO THE MUMMY AT BEL-
ZONI'S EXHIBITION.
And thou hast walked about (how strange a
story !)
In Thebes's streets three thousand years ago.
When the Memnonium was in all its glory.
And time had not begun to overthrow
Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous.
Of which the very i-uins are tremendous.
Speak ! for thou long enough hast acted dummy ;
Thou hast a tongue, — come, let us hear its
tune ;
Thou 'rt standing on thy legs, above ground,
mummy !
Revisiting the glimpses of the moon, —
Not like thin ghosts or disembodied creatures.
But with thy bones and flesh and limbs and
features.
Tell us — for doubtless thou canst recollect —
To whom should we assign the Sphinx's fame ?
Was Cheops or Cephrenes architect
Of either pyramid that bears his name?
Is Pompey's Pillar really a misnomer ?
Had Thebes a hundred gates, as sung by Homer ?
Perhaps thou wert a Mason, and forbidden
By oath to tell the secrets of thy trade, —
Then say what secret melody was hidden
In Memnon's statue, which at sunrise played ?
Perhaps thou wert a priest, — if so, my struggles
Are vain, for priestcraft never owns its juggles.
Perhaps that very hand, now pinioned flat.
Has hob-a-nobbed with Pharaoh, glass to glass ;
Or dropped a halfpenny in Homer's hat ;
Or dofled thine own to let Queen Dido pass ;
w
fi-
718
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
-m
Or held, by Solomon's own invitation,
A torch at the great temple's dedication.
I need not ask thee if that hand, when armed.
Has any Roman soldier mauled and knuckled ;
For thou wert dead and buried and embalmed
Ere Romulus and Remus had been suckled :
Antiquity appears to have begun
Long after thy primeval race was run.
Thou couldst develop — if that withered tongue
Might tell us what those sightless orbs have
seen—
Howtheworld looked when it was fresh and young,
And the great deluge still had left it green ;
Or was it then so old that history's pages
Contained no record of its early ages ?
Still silent ! incommunicative elf !
Art sworn to secrecy ? then keep thy vows }
But prithee tell us something of thyself.
Reveal the secrets of thy prison-house ;
Since in the world of spirits thou hast slumbered,
"What hast thou seen, what strange adventures
numbered ?
Since first thy form was in this box extended
"We have, above ground, seen some strange
mutations :
The Roman empire has begun and ended.
New worlds have risen, we have lost old na¬
tions ;
And countless kings have into dust been humbled.
While not a fragment of thy flesh has crumbled.
Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thy head,
"When the great Persian conqueror, Cambyses,
Marched armies o'er thy tomb with thundering
tread, —
O'erthrew Osiris, Grus, Apis, Isis ;
And shook the pyramids with fear and wonde.,
When the gigantic Memnon fell asunder ?
If the tomb's secrets may not be confessed.
The nature of thy private life unfold :
Aheart has throbbed beneath that leathern breast.
And tears adown that dusty cheek have roUed ;
Have children climbed those knees, and kissed
that face ?
What was thy name and station, age and race ?
Statue of flesh, — immortal of the dead !
Imperishable type of evanescence !
Posthumous man, — who quit'st thy narrow bed,
And standest nndecayed within our presence !
Thou wüt hear nothing till the j udgment morning.
When the great trump shall thiill thee with its
warning.
Why should this worthless tegument endure.
If its undying guest be lost forever ?
0, let us keep the soul embalmed and pure
In living virtue, that when both must sever.
Although corruption may our frame consume.
The immortal spirit in the skies may bloom !
horace Smith.
ODE ON A GRECIAN URN.
Thou still unravished bride of quietness !
Thou foster-child of Silence and slow Time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme :
What leaf-fringed legend haunts about thy shape
Of deities or mortals, or of both.
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady ?
"What men or gods are these ? What maidens
loath ?
"What mad pursuit ? "What struggles to escape ?
What pipes and timbrels ? "What wüd ecstasy ?
Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
Are sweeter ; therefore, ye soft pipes, play on ;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endeared.
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone.
Fair youth beneath the trees, thou canst not
leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare.
Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss.
Though winning near the goal, — yet do not
grieve :
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy
bliss ;
Forever wilt thou love, and sne be fair !
Ah, happy, happy boughs ! that cannot shed
Your leaves, nor ever bid the spring adieu ;
And happy melodist, unwearièd.
Forever piping songs forever new ;
More happy love ! more happy, happy love !
Forever warm and still to be enjoyed.
Forever panting and forever young ;
All breathing human passion far above.
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloyed,
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.
Who are these coming to the sacrifice ?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead'st thou that heifer lowing at the skies.
And all her silken flanks with garlands drest ?
"What Uttle town by river or sea-shore.
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel.
Is emptied of its folk, this pious morn ?
And, little town, thy streets forevermore
Will silent be, and not a soul to tell
"Why thou art desolate can e'er return.
tzr
FRAGMENTS.
719
O Attic shape ! Fair attitude ! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed ;
Thou, silent form ! dost tease us out of thought
As doth etemity. Cold Pastoral !
When old age shall this generation waste.
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other wo
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou
say'st,
"Beauty is truth, truth beauty," — that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.
john Keats.
FRAGMENTS.
The King of Day.
0 thou that, with surpassing glory crowned,
Look'st from thy sole dominion like the God
Of this new world, at whose sight all the stars
Hide their diminished heads . . .
0 Sun !
Paradise Lost, Book it. MiLTON.
Fires the proud tops of the eastern pines.
King Richard //., Act iii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
The lessening cloud.
The kindling azure, ana the mountain's brow.
Illumed with fluid gold, his near approach
Betoken glad. Lo ! now, apparent all
Aslant the dew-bright earth, and colored air.
He looks in boundless majesty abroad ;
And sheds the shining day, that burnished plays
On rocks, and hills, and towers, and wand'ring
streams.
High gleaming from afar.
The Seasons : Summer. thomson.
StlNSET IN THE MOUNTAINS.
The western waves of ebbing day
Rolled o'er the glen their level way ;
Each purple peak, each flinty spire.
Was bathed in floods of living fire.
But not a setting beam could glow
Within the dark ravines below.
Where twined the path in shadow hid.
Round many a rocky pyramid.
Shooting abruptly from the deU
Its thunder-splintered pinnacle ;
Round many an insulated mass,
The native bulwarks of the pass.
Their rocky summits, split and rent,
Formed turret, dome, or battlement,
V
Or seemed fantastically set
With cupola or minaret.
Wild crests as pagod ever decked.
Or mosque of Eastern architect.
Nor were these earth-bom castles bare.
Nor lacked they many a banner fair ;
For, from their shivered brows displayed.
Far o'er the unfathomable glade.
All twinkling with the dew-drops' sheen.
The brier-rose fell in streamers green.
And creeping shrubs, of thousand dyes.
Waved in the west-wind's summer sighs.
The Lady of the Lake, Cant. i. SCOTT,
Indian Summee.
From gold to gray
Our mild sweet day
Of Indian summer fades too soon ;
But tenderly
Above the sea
Hangs, white and calm, the hunter's moon.
The Bve of Election. J. G. WHITTIER.
The Poet's Retirement.
Fair Quiet, have I found thee here.
And Innocence, thy sister dear ?
Mistaken long, I sought you then
In busy companies of men.
Your sacred plants, if here below.
Only among the plants wiU grow ;
Society is all but rude
To this delicious solitude.
Here at the fountain's sliding foot.
Or at some fruit-tree's mossy root.
Casting the body's vest aside.
My soul into the boughs does glide :
There, like a bird, it sits and sings.
Then whets and claps its silver wings,
And, till prepared for longer flight.
Waves in its plumes the various light.
The Garden ( Transtated). A. MAKVBLL
Eden.
Yea, more,
A heaven on earth : for blissful paradise
Of God the garden was, by him in the east
Of Eden planted.
Paradise Lost, Book iv. MlLTOM*
Athens.
On the .lEgean shore a city stands,
BuUt nobly, pure the air, and light the soil,
Athens, the eye of Greece, mother of arts
And eloquence, native to famous wits.
e-
720
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
"Ö1
Or hospitable, in her sweet recess,
City or suburban, studious walks and shades ;
See there the olive grove of Academe,
Plato's retirement, where the Attic bird
Trills her thick-warbled notes the summer long.
Paradise Regained, Book iv. MiLTON.
Rome.
0 Rome ! my country ! city of the soul !
The orphans of the heart must tum to thee,
Lone mother of dead empires !
The Niobe of nations ! there she stands,
Childless and crownless, in her voiceless woe ;
An empty urn within her withered hands,
"Whose holy dust was scattered long ago.
Childs Harold, Cant. iv. BVRON.
Temple of the Clitumnus.
But thou, Clitumnus l' in thy sweetest wave
Of the most living crystal that was e'er
The haunt of river nymph, to gaze and lave
Her limbs where nothing hid them, thou dost
rear
Thy grassy banks. . . .
And on thy happy shore a temple still.
Of small and delicate proportion, keeps,
Upon a mUd declivity of hill.
Its memory of thee ; beneath it sweeps
Thy current's calmness ; oft from out it leaps
The finny darter with the glittering scales,
"Who dwells and revels in thy glassy deeps ;
"While, chance, some scattered water-lily sails
Down where the shallower wave stUl tells its
bubbling tales.
Childs Harold, Cant, iv. BYRON.
The Fall of Teeni.
The roar of waters ! — from the headleng height
Velino cleaves the wave-worn precipice ;
The fall of waters ! rapid as the light
The flashing mass foams shaking the abyss ;
The hell of waters ! where they howl and hiss.
And boil in endless torture.
Childe Harold, Cant, iv. BVRON.
Venice.
I stood in Venice, on the Bridge of Sighs ;
A palace and a prison on each hand :
I saw from out the wave her structures rise
As from the stroke of the enchanter's wand :
A thousand years their cloudy wings expand
Around me, and a dying glory smiles
O'er the far times, when many a subject land
Looked to the wingfed Lion's marble piles.
Where Venice sate in state, throned on her hun¬
dred isles !
Chitde Harald. CatU. iv. BVRON4
An Italian Ravine.
Beneath this crag,
Huge as despair, as if in weariness.
The melancholy mountain yawns ; below.
You hear but see not an impetuous torrent
Raging among the caverns, and a bridge
Crosses the chasm ; and high above there grow.
With intersecting trunks, from crag to crag.
Cedars and yews and pines, whose tangled hair
Is matted into one solid roof of shade
By the dark ivy's twine. At noonday here
'T is twilight, and at sunset blackest night.
The Cenci SHEIXEY.
The River Thames.
My eye descending from the Hill, surveys
Where Thames among the wanton valleys strays.
Thames ! the most loved of all the Ocean's sons.
Though with those streams he no resemblance
hold,
"Whose foam is amber, and their gravel gold :
His genuine and less guilty wealth to explore.
Search not his bottom, but survey his shore.
O'er which he kindly spreads his spacious wing
And hatches plenty for the ensuing spring.
ÎÎO unexpected inundations spoil
The mower's hopes, nor mock the ploughman's
toil ;
But godlike his unwearied bounty flows ;
First loves to do, then loves the good he does.
Cooper's Hill. SIR j. DenhaM.
Macbeth's Castle.
Duncan. This castle hath a pleasant seat : the
air
Nimbly and sweetly reeominends itself
Unto our gentle senses.
Banquo. . . . The heaven's breath
Smells wooingly here : nojutty, frieze.
Buttress, nor coigne of vantage, but this bird
Hath made his pendent bed and procréant cradle :
Where they most breed and haunt, I have ob¬
served.
The air is delicate.
Macielh, Act i. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE.
Personal Appearance.
Who hath not proved how feebly words essay
To fix one spark of Beauty's heavenly ray f
"Who doth not feel, until his failing sight
Faints into dimness with its own delight.
His changing cheek, his sinking heart confess
The might — the majesty of Loveliness ?
The Bride o/^Abydcs, Cant, i. BYRQM.
fl-
FRAGMENTS.
721
■a
Framed in the prodigality of nature.
King Richard IÍL, Act t. Sc, a. SHAKESPEARE.
First likes the whole, then separates what he sees ;
On several parts a several praise bestows,
The ruby lips, the well-proportioned nose.
The snowy skin, and raven-glossy hair.
The dimpled cheek, and forehead rising fair,
And e'en in sleep itself, a smUing air.
From thence his eyes descending viewed the rest.
Her plump round arms, white hands, and heaving
breast.
Cymon and iphigenia, DRYDEN.
That whiter skin of hers than snow.
And smooth as monumental alabaster.
OtktUo, Act,. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
There she sees a damsel bright,
Brest in a silken robe of white.
That shadowy in the moonlight shone :
The neck that made that white robe wan,
Her stately neck, and arms were bare ;
Her blue-veined feet unsandalled were.
And wildly glittered here and there
The gems entangled in her hair.
1 guess, 't was frightful there to see
A lady so richly clad as she, —
Beautiful exceedingly !
Chriclaici S. T. COLERIDGE.
Rich and rare were the gems she wore.
And a bright gold ring on her wand she bore.
Rich and Rare* MOORB.
Her beauty hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiop's ear.
Romeo and Juliet, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Alas ! how little can a moment show
Of an eye where feeling plays
In ten thousand dewy rays ;
A face o'er which a thousand shadows go.
The Triad. wordsworth.
Stabbed with a white wench's black eye.
Romeo and J^utiet, Act ii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
The fringèd curtains of thine eye advance.
The Temfiert, Acti.Sc.2. SHAKESPEARE.
Heart on her lips, and soul within her eyes.
Soft as her clime, and sunny as her skies.
Seffo. Byron.
As she fled fast through sun and shade.
The happy winds upon her played,
Blowing the ringlets from the braid.
Sir Launulot and Queen Guinevere. TbnnvsON.
And ne'er did Grecian chisel trace
A Nymph, a Naiad, or a Grace,
Of ñner form, or lovelier face.
What though no rule of courtly grace
To measured mood had trained her pace —
A foot more light, a step more true,
Ne'er from the heath-flower dashed the dew.
The Lady of the Lake, Cant. i. SCOTT.
Her pretty feet
Like snailes did creep
A little out, and then.
As if they playèd at bo-peep.
Did soon draw in agen.
upon her Feet. R. HERRICK.
No longer shall thy bodice, aptly laced.
From thy full bosom to thy slender waist.
That air and harmony of shape express.
Fine by degrees, and beautifuUy less.
Henry and Emma, M« PRIOR.
A rosebud set with little wilful thorns.
And sweet as English air could make her, she.
The Princess. TENNYSON.
It was a lovely sight to see
The Lady Christabel, when she
Was praying at the old oak-tree.
Amid the jagged shadows
Of mossy leafless boughs.
Kneeling in the moonlight.
To make her gentle vows ;
Her slender palms together prest.
Heaving sometimes on her breast ;
Her face resigned to bliss or bale, —
Her face, 0, caU it fair, not pale.
Christalel. S. T. COLERIDGE.
Look here, upon this picture, and on this ;
The counterfeit presentment of two brothers.
See, what a grace was seated on this brow :
Hyperion's curls ; the front of Jove himself ;
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command ;
A station like the herald Mercury,
New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hUl ;
A combination, and a form, indeed.
Where every god did seem to set his seal.
To give the world assurance of a man.
Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Hoe. I saw him once : he was a goodly king.
Ham. He was a man, take him for all in all,
I shall not look upon his like again.
Hamlet, Actu Sc. 2.
Ay, every inch a king.
King Lear, Act iv. Sc* 6.
Shakespeare
shakespeare
&
i&t;
722
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
■a
The glass of fashion, and the mould of form,
The observed of aU observers !
HatnUt, Act iii. Se, i.
Shakespeare.
The wealthy curled darlings of our nation.
Othello, Act i. Sc. o. SHAKESPEARE.
We '11 have a swashing and a martial outside.
As You Like It, Act i. Sc. j. SHAKESPEARE.
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not expressed in fancy ; rich, not gaudy :
For the apparel oft proclaims the man.
Hamlet^ Act i Se. 3 SHAKESPEARE.
They brought one Pinch, a hungry lean-faced
villain,
A mere anatomy, a mountebank,
A threadbare juggler, and a fortune-teller,
A needy, hollow-eyed, sharp-looking wretch,
A living-dead man.
Comedy of Errors, Act v. Sc. x. SHAKESPEARE.
Mislike me not for my complexion,
The shadowed livery of the burnished sun.
To whom I am a neighbor, and near bred.
Bring me the fairest creature northward bom.
Where Phœbus' fire scarce thaws the icicles.
And let us make incision for your love.
To prove whose blood is reddest, his or mine.
Merchant of Venice, Act ü. Se. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Falstaff sweats to death.
And lards the lean earth as he walks along.
Were't not for laughing, I should pity him.
King Henry IV, Part t. Act ii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Yond' Cassius has a lean and hungry look ;
He thinks too much : such men are dangerous.
yulius Casar, Act i. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
The ornament of beauty is suspect,
A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest air.
Sonnet LXX. SHAKESPEARE.
My tables, my tables, —meet it is, I set it down.
That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Conditions of Life.
My nature is subdued
To what it works in, like the dyer's hand.
Sonnet CXI. SHAKESPEARE.
I saw a smith stand with his hammer, thus.
The whilst his iron did on the anvil cool.
With open mouth swallowing a tailor's news ;
Who, with his shears and measure in his hand.
Standing on slippers (which his nimble haste
Had falsely thrust upon contrary feet).
Told of a many thousand warlike French
That were embattaUèd and ranked in Kent :
Another lean, unwashed artificer
Cuts off his tale and talks of Arthur's death.
King John, Actvto Scata SHAKESPEARE*
Mechanic slaves
With greasy aprons, rules, and hammers.
Antony and Cleopatra, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
The charge is prepared, the lawyers are met.
The judges all ranged ; a terrible show !
The Beggar's Opera, Act iii. Sc. 2. J. GAY.
The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling.
Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to
heaven.
Midsummer NighPS Dream, Act t. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
O, now, forever
Farewell the tranquil mind ! farewell content !
Farewell the plumèd troop, and the big wars.
That make ambition virtue ! 0, farewell !
Farewell the neighing steed, and the shrill trump.
The spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife.
The royal banner, and aU quality.
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war !
And, O you mortal engines, whose rude throats
The immortal Jove's dread clamors counterfeit.
Farewell ! Othello's occupation's gone !
Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Lives like a drunken sailor on a mast
Ready with every nod to tumble down.
King Richard HI., Actm. Sc. te . SHAKESPEARE.
Not all the water in the rough rude sea
Can wash the halm from an anointed king.
King Richard 11,, Act iii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
There's such divinity doth hedge a king.
That treason can but peep to what it would.
Acts little of his will.
Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Besides, the king's name is a tower of strength.
King Richard III., Act VaScaSHAKESPEARE.
High on a throne of royal state, which far
Outshone the wealth of Ormus and of Ind,
Or where the gorgeous East with richest hand
Showers on her kings barbaric pearl and gold,
Satan exalted sat, by merit raised
To that bad eminence.
Paradise Lost, Book iL MILTON.
Personal Characteristics—Women.
A maid
That paragons description and wild fame ;
One that excels the quirks of blazoning pens
And in th' essential vesture of creation
Does bear all excellency.
Othello, ii. Ä. I. SHAKESPEAR E.
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FRAGMENTS.
723
I have marked
A thousand blushing apparitions
To start into her face, a thousand innocent
shames,
In angel whiteness, beat away those blushes.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act iv. Sc-, x. SHAKESPEARE.
Ladies like variegated tulips show,
'Tis to their changes half their charms we owe.
Fine by defect, and delicately weak.
Their happy spots the nice admirer take.
Moral Essays, Part II. POPE.
Or ere those shoes were old
With which she followed my poor father's body.
Like Niobe, all tears ; — why she, even she
(0 God ! a beast that wants discourse of reason
Would have mourned longer) married with my
uncle,
My father's brother.
HamUt, Act i. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
I have no other but a woman's reason ;
I think him so because I think him so.
Two Gentlemen of Verona, Act L Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE.
Had she been true.
If heaven would make me such another world
Of one entire and perfect chrysolite,
I'd not have sold her for it.
OticUc, Act y. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Iago. Come on, come on ; you are pictures
out of doors.
Bells in your parlors, wild-cats in your kitchens.
Saints in your injuries, devils being offended.
For I am nothing, if not critical.
Desdemona. . . . But what praise couldst
thou bestow on a deserving woman indeed ?...
Iago. She that was ever fair and never proud,
Had tongue at will and yet was never loud.
Never lacked gold and yet went never gay,
Fled from her wish, and yet said, — " Now I
may;"
She that being angered, her revenge being nigh.
Bade her wrong stay and her displeasure fly ;
She that in wisdom never was so frail
To change the cod's head for the salmon's tail ;
She that could think and ne'er disclose her mind,
See suitors following and not look behind ;
She was a wight, — if ever such wight were, —
Des. To do what ?
Iago. To suckle fools and chronicle small beer.
Des. 0, most lame and impotent conclusion !
OOiMr, Act U. &. I. SHAKESPEARE. .
Her voice was ever soft,
Gentle, and low, — an excellent thing in woman.
King Lear, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Not stepping o'er the bounds of modesty.
Romeo and Juliet, Actlw. Sc, 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Shalt show us how divine a thing
A woman may be made.
To a Young Lady,
wordsworth.
Earth's noblest thing, a woman perfected.
trcnè. j. r. lowell.
Personal Characteristics — Men.
Patience, my lord ! why, 't is the soul of peace ;
Of all the virtues't is nearest kin to heaven ;
It makes men look like gods. The best of men
That e'er wore earth about him was a sufferer,
A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit.
The first true gentleman that ever breathed.
The Honest Whore, Part I. Act i. Sc. 12. T. DeKKER.
0, could I flow like thee,* and make thy stream
My great example, as it is my theme !
Though deep yet clear, though gentle yet not
dull ;
Strong without rage, without o'erflowing full.
Ccofer-s Hiil. SIR J. DENHAM.
He was a scholar, and a ripe and good one ;
Exceeding wise, fair-spoken, and persuading :
Lofty, and sour to them that loved him not ;
But to those men that sought him sweet as
summer.
King Henry VIII., Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Delivers in such apt and gracious words.
That aged ears play truant at his tales.
And younger hearings are quite ravishèd.
So sweet and voluble is his discourse.
Love's Labor Lost, Act\\. Sc. i.
SHAKESPEARE«
Frank, haughty, rash, — the Rupert of debate.
The New Timon, Part I,
e. bulwer-Lytton.
For though I am not splenetive and rash.
Yet have I in me something dangerous.
Hamlet, Act v. Sc. x.
Shakespeare«
Tum him to any cause of policy.
The Gordian knot of it he will unloose,
Familiar as his garter : that, when he speaks.
The air, a chartered libertine, is stül.
King Henry t-.. Act U Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
A Daniel come to judgment 1 . . .
0 wise young judge !
Merchant of Venice, Act iv* Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE*
• The river Thames.
fl-
724
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
■a
A merrier man,
Within the limit of becoming mirth,
I never spent an hour's talk withaL
Lovis Labor Lost, Act ii Sc. x/ SHAKESPEARE.
As merry as the day is long.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act iL Sc- x*
Shakespeare.
In aU thy humors, whether grave or mellow.
Thou 'rt such a touchy, testy, pleasant fellow ;
Hast so much wit and mirth and spleen about
thee,
There is no living with thee, nor without thee.
Sfectalor, No. 6a J. ADDISON.
Who the silent man can prize.
If a fool he be or wise ?
Yet, though lonely seem the wood.
Therein may lurk the beast of blood ;
Often bashful looks conceal
Tongue of fire and heart of steel ;
And deem not thou in forest gray.
Every dappled skin thy prey,
Lest thou rouse, with luckless spear.
The tiger for the faUow-deer !
The Gulistan.
Bishop Heber.
A shallow brain behind a senior's mask.
An oracle within an empty cask,
The solemn fop ; significant and budge ;
A fool with judges, amongst fools a judge.
Conversation. COWPER.
A snapper-up of unconsidered trifies.
Winter's TaU, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Dubious is such a scrupulous good man —
Yes — you may catch him tripping if you can.
He would not, with a peremptory tone.
Assert the nose upon his face his own ;
With hesitation admirably slow.
He humbly hopes — presumes — it may be so.
Conversation. COWPER.
Seemed washing his hands with invisible soap
In imperceptible water.
Miss Kilmansegg. T. HOOD.
In a bondman's key.
With 'bated breath, and whisp'ring humbleness.
Merchant0/Venice, ActL Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
I am the very pink of courtesy.
Romeo and Juliet, Act iL Sc. 4.
SHAKESPEARE.
Smooth runs the water where the brook is deep.
And in his simple show he harbors treason.
The fox barks not, when he would steal the lamb.
Kinz Henry VI., Part Iii Actm. Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
AH was false and hoUow ; though his tongue
Dropped manna, and could make the worse
appear
The better reason, to perplex and dash
Maturest counsels ; for his thoughts were low ;
To vice industrious, but to nobler deeds
Timorous and slothful : yet he pleased the ear.
And with persuasive accent thus began.
Paradise Lost, Book iL MILTON.
A Uttle more than kin, and less than kind.
Hamlet, Act L Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Yet do I fear thy nature :
It is too fuU 0* the milk of human kindness.
Macbeth, Act MXf. 5. Shakespeare.
Of manners gentle, of affections mUd ;
In wit a man, simplicity a child.
A safe companion and an easy Mend
IJnblamed through life, lamented in thy end.
Epitaph on Gay. POPE.
Here lies David Garrick, describe me who can.
An abridgment of aU that was pleasant in man.
Retaliation. GOLDSMITH.
He hath a tear for pity, and a hand
Open as day for melting chanty.
King Henry IV., Part II. Act iv. Sc. ^ SHAKESPEARE.
He was the mildest mannered man
That ever scuttled ship or cut a throat.
Don yuan. Cant. Ui. BYRON.
An idler is a watch that wants both hands ;
As useless if it goes as if it stands.
Retirement. COWPER.
A lazy lolling sort.
Unseen at church, at senate, or at court.
Of ever-listless idlers, that attend
No cause, no trust, no duty, and no friend.
There too, my ParideU ! she marked thee there.
Stretched on the rack of a too easy chair.
And heard thy everlasting yawn confess
The pains and penalties of idleness.
The Dunciad, Book ir. POPE.
I pray you, in your letters.
When you shall these imlucky deeds relate.
Speak of me as I am ; nothing extenuate.
Nor set down aught in malice : then, must you
speak
Of one that loved, not wisely, but too weU ;
Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought.
Perplexed in the extreme ; of one, whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away.
Richer than all his tribe ; of one, whose subdued
eyes.
•fl
FRAGMENTS.
Albeit unused to tbe melting mood,
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Their medicinal gum. Set you down this.
Othella, Actv.Sc.t. SHAKESPEARE.
Moods.
Unpack my heart with words,
And fall a cursing, like a very drab.
A scullion !
Fie upon't ! Fob !
Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
I am very sorry, good Horatio,
That to Laertes I forgot myself.
But, sure, the bravery of his grief did put me
Into a toweling passion.
HamUt, Act v. Sc* 2. SHAKESPEARE.
A woman moved is like a fountain troubled.
Muddy, ill-seeming, thick, bereft of beauty.
Taming o/the Skrcw, Act v. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Had it pleased Heaven
To try me with affliction ; had he rained
All kinds of sores and shames on my bare head.
Steeped me in poverty to the very lips,
Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes, —
I should have found in some part of my soul
A drop of patience : but, alas, to make mo
A fixèd figure, for the time of scorn
To point his slow unmoving finger at !
oihellc. Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
But that I am forbid
To tell the secrets of my prison-house,
I could a tale unfold, whose lightest word
Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young
blood.
Make thy two eyes, like stars, start from their
spheres.
Thy knotted and combinèd locks to part.
And each particular hair to stand on end.
Like quills upon the fretful porcupine :
But this eternal blazon must not be
To ears of flesh and blood.
HamUt, Act\. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
1 feel my sinews slacken with the fright,
And a cold sweat thrills down o'er all my limbs.
As if I were dissolving into water.
The Tempest. DRYDEN.
Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind :
The thief doth fear each bush an officer.
King Richard //., Act v. 5c. 6. SHAKESPEARE.
1 cannot speak, tears so obstruct my words.
And choke me with unutterable joy.
Caius Marius. T* OTWAY.
Men met each other with erected look.
The steps were higher that they took.
Friends to congratulate their friends made haste ;
And long-inveterate foes saluted as they passed.
Threnodia Augustalis. DRYDEN.
There is a mood
(1 sing not to the vacant and the young).
There is a kindly mood of melancholy'
That wings the soul and points her to the skies.
Ruins o/Romc* ]. DVER.
Battle.
By Heaven ! it is a splendid sight to see
(For one who hath no friend, no brother there)
Their rival scarfs of mixed embroidery.
Their various arms that glitter in the air !
What gallant war-hounds rouse them from
their lair.
And gnash their fangs, loud yelling for the prey !
All join the chase, but few the triumph share ;
The grave shall bear the chiefest prize away.
And havoc scarce for joy can number their array.
Childc Haroldt Cant. i. BYRON.
From the glittering staff unfurled
Th' imperial ensign, which, full high advanced.
Shone like a meteor, streaming to the wind.
With gems and golden lustre rich imblazed.
Seraphic arms and trophies ; all the while
Sonorous metal blowing martial sounds :
At which the universal host up sent
A shout that tore hell's concave, and beyond
Frighted the reign of Chaos and old Night.
Parodist Lost* Book L Milton.
Panic.
Such a numerous host
Fled not in silence through the frighted deep.
With ruin upon ruin, rout on rout,
Confusion worse confounded.
Paradist Lost* Book u. milton.
Distance.
How he fell
From heaven they fabled, thrown by angry Jove
Sheer o'er the crystal battlements ; from morn
To noon he fell, from noon to dewy eve,
A summer's day ; and with the setting sun
Dropt from the zenith like a falling star.
Paradise Lost, Book i. MiLTON.
What ! will the line stretch out to the crack of
doom ?
Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
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72C
DESCRIPTIVE POEMS.
St. Peter's at Rome.
Vastness which grows, but grows to harmonize,
All musical in its immensities ;
Eich marbles, richer painting, shrines where
flame
The lamps of gold, and haughty dome which
vies
In air with earth's chief structures, though
their frame
Sits on the firm-set ground,—and this the cloud
must claim.
Here condense thy soul
To more immediate objects, and control
Thy thoughts untU thy mind hath got by heart
Its eloquent proportions, and unroll
In mighty graduations, part by part.
The glory which at once upon thee did not dart.
Ckilde Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON.
The Apollo Belviderb.
Or view the lord of the unerring bow.
The god of life, and poesy, and light, —
The sun in human limbs arrayed, and brow
All radiant from his triumph in the fight ;
The shaft hath just been shot,—the arrow
bright
With an immortal's vengeance ; in his eye
And nostril beautiful disdain, and might
And majesty, flash their fuU lightnings by.
Developing in that one glance the Deity.
But in his delicate form — a dream of love.
Shaped by some solitary nymph, whose breast
Longed for a deathless lover from above.
And maddened in that vision — are exprest
All that ideal beauty ever blessed
The mind with in its most unearthly mood.
When each conception was a heavenly guest,
A ray of immortahty, and stood.
Starlike, around, until they gathered to a god I
Ckilde Harold, Cant, ir, BYRON.
A Lady's Chamber.
The moon shines dim in the open air,
And not a moonbeam enters here.
But they without its light can see
The chamber carved so curiously.
Carved with figures strange and sweet.
All made out of the carver's brain.
For a lady's chamber meet :
The lamp with twofold silver chain
Is fastened to an angel's feet.
The silver lamp bums dead and dim ;
But Christabel the lamp will trim.
She trimmed the lamp, and made it bright.
And left it swinging to and fro.
While Géraldine, in wretched plight.
Sank down upon the floor below.
1 OiristaicU s. t. coleridge.
Music.
Can any mortal mixture of earth's mould
Breathe such divine enchanting ravishment ?
Sure something holy lodges in that breast,
And with these raptures moves the vocal air
To testify his hidden residence.
How sweetly did they float upon the wings
Of silence, through the empty-vaulted night.
At every fall smoothing the raven down
Of darkness till it smüed.
Perfection.
To gild refinèd gold, to paint the lüy.
To throw a perfume on the violet.
To smooth the ice, or add another hue
Unto the rainbow, or with taper-light
To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish.
Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.
Kine John, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Anthology.
Infinite riches in a little room.
Tke Jew 0/Malta, Act i.
c marlowe.
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
POEMS GE SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
GOOD LIFE, LONG LIFE.
It is not growing like a tree
In bulk, doth make man better be ;
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log at last, dry, hald, and sear :
A Uly of a day
Is fairer far in May,
Although it faU and die that night, —
It was the plant and flower of Light.
In small proportions we just beauties see.
And in short measures life may perfect be.
BEN JONSON.
MY MINDE TO ME A KINGDOM IS.
My minde to me a kingdom is ;
Such perfect joy therein I finde
As farre exceeds all earthly bUsse
That God or nature hath assignde ;
Though much I want that most would hare.
Yet still my minde forbids to crave.
Content I live ; this is my .stay, —
I seek no more than may suffice.
I presse to beare no haughtie sway ;
Look, what 1 lack my mind suppUes.
Loe, thus I triumph Uke a king,
Content with that my mind doth bring.
I see how plentie surfets oft.
And hastie clymbers soonest fall ;
I see that such as sit aloft
Mishap doth threaten most of all.
These get with toile, and keepe with feare ;
Such cares my mind could never beare.
No princely pompe nor welthie store.
No force to win the victorie.
No wyUe wit to salve a sore.
No shape to winne a lover's eye, —
To none of these I yeeld as thrall ;
For why, my mind despiseth all.
Some have too much, yet still they crave ;
I little have, yet seek no more.
They are but poore, though much they have^
And I am rich with little store.
They poor, I rich ; they beg, I give ;
They lacke, I lend ; they pine, I Uve.
I laugh not at another's losse,
I grudge not at another's gaine ;
No worldly wave my mind can tosse ;
I brooke that is another's bane.
I feare no foe, I fawne no friend ;
I lothe not life, nor dread mine end.
I joy not in no earthly blisse ;
I weigh not Cresus' wealth a straw ;
For care, I care not what it is ;
I feare not fortune's fatal law ;
My mind is such as may not move
For beautie bright, or force of love.
I wish hut what I have at wiU ;
I wander not to seeke for more ;
I like the plaine, I cUme no hUl ;
In greatest stormes I sitte on shore.
And laugh at them that toile in vaine
To get what must be lost againe.
I kisse not where I wish to kiU ;
I feigne not love where most I hate ;
I breake no sleepe to winne my wül ;
I wayte not at the mightie's gate.
I scome no poore, I feare no rich ;
I feele no want, nor have too much.
The court ne cart I like ne loath, —
Extreames are counted worst of all ;
The golden meane betwixt them both
Doth surest sit, and feares no faU ;
This is my choyce ; for why, I finde
No wealth is Uke a quiet minde.
My wealth is health and perfect ease ;
My conscience clere my chiefe defence ;
730
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
I neither seeke by bribes to please,
Nor by desert to breed offence.
Thus do I live ; thus will I die ;
Would all did so as well as I !
SIR Edward Dyer.*
TO THE HON. CHARLES MONTAGUE.
Our hopes, like towering falcons, aim
At objects in an airy height ;
But all the pleasure of the game
Is afar off to view the ñight.
" The worthless prey but only shows
The joy consisted in the strife ;
Whate'er we take, as soon we lose
In Homer's riddle and in life.
So, whilst in feverish sleeps we think
We taste what waking we desire.
The dream is better than the drink.
Which only feeds the sickly fire.
To the mind's eye things well appear.
At distance through an artful glass ;
Bring but the flattering objects near.
They 're all a senseless gloomy mass.
Seeing aright, we see our woes :
Then what avails it to have eyes ?
From ignorance our comfort flows,
The only wretched are the wise.
Matthew Prior.
OF MYSELF.
This only grant me, that my means may lie
Too low for envy, for contempt too high.
Some honor I would have.
Not from great deeds, but good alone ;
The unknown are better than ill known :
Rumor can ope the grave.
Acquaintance I would have, but when't depends
Not on the number, but the choice, of friends.
Books should, not business, entertain the light,
And sleep, as undisturbed as death, the night.
My house a cottage more
Than palace ; and should fitting be
For all my use, no luxury.
My garden painted o'er
With Nature's hand, not Art's ; and pleasures
yield,
Horace might envy in his Sabine field.
* This is frequently attributed to William Byrd. Bartlett, how>
ever, gives it to Sir Edward Dyer, referring to Hannah's Courtly
Pûets as authority ; so, also, Ward, in his English Poets, VoL I., 1880.
Thus would I double my life's fading space ;
For he that runs it well twice runs his race.
And in this true delight.
These unbought sports, this happy state,
I would not fear, nor wish, my fate ;
But boldly say each night.
To-morrow let my sun his beams display,
Or in clouds hide them ; I have lived to-day.
Abraham Cowley.
BEAUTY.
Yet oft it falls that many a gentle mind
DweUs in deformèd tabernacle drowned.
Either by chance, against the course of kind.
Or through unaptnesse in the sfftstance found.
Which it assumèd of some stubboihe ground.
That will not yield unto her form's direction.
But is performed with some foul imperfection.
'T IS much immortal beauty to admire.
But more immortal beauty to withstand;
The perfect soul can overcome desire.
If beauty with divine delight be scanned.
For what is beauty but the blooming child
Of fair Olympus, that in night must end.
And be forever from that bHss exiled.
If admiration stand too much its friend ?
The wind may be enamored of a flower.
The ocean of the green and laughing shore.
The silver lightning of a lofty tower, —
But must not with too near a love adore ;
Or flower and margin and cloud-capped tower
Love and delight shall with delight devour !
Lord Edward Thurlow.
BEAUTY.
from " hymn in honor of beauty."
So every spirit, as it is most pure.
And hath in it the more of heavenly light.
So it the fairer body doth procure
To habit in, and it more fairly flight
With cheerful grace and. amiable sight ;
For of the soul the body form doth take ;
For soul is form, and doth the body make.
Therefore wherever that thou dost behold
A comely corpse, with beauty fair endued.
Know this for certain, that the same doth hold
A beauteous soul, with fair conditions thewed.
Fit to receive the seed of virtue strewed ;
For all that fair is, is by nature good ;
That is a sign to know the gentle blood.
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
731
And oft it falls (aye me, the more to rue !)
That goodly beauty, albeit heavenly bom.
Is foul abused, and that celestial hue,
Which doth the world with her delight adom,
Made but the bait of sin, and sinners' scom,
Whilst every one doth seek and sue to have it,
But every one doth seek but to deprave it.
Yet nathhmore is that faire beauty's blame.
But theirs that do abuse it unto ill :
Nothing so good, but that through guilty shame
May be eorrapt, and wrested unto will :
Natheless the soule is fair and beauteous stiU,
However fleshe's fault it filthy make ;
For things immortal no corruption take.
edward spenser.
THOUGHT.
Thought is deeper than all speech,
Feeling deeper than all thought ;
Souls to souls can never teach
What unto themselves was taught.
We are spirits clad in veils ;
Man by man was never seen ;
All our deep conuuuning fails
To remove the shadowy screen.
Heart to heart was never known ;
Mind with mind did never meet ;
We are columns left alone
Of a temple once eomplete.
Like the stars that gem the sky,
Far apart, though seeming near.
In our light we scattered lie ;
All is thus but starlight here.
What is social company
But a babbling summer stream ?
What our wise philosophy
But the glancing of a di-eam ?
Only when the sun of love
Melts the scattered stars of thought.
Only when we live above
What the dim-eyed world hath taught,
Only when our souls are fed
By the fount which gave them birth,
And by inspiration led
Which they never drew from earth,
We, like parted drops of rain.
Swelling till they meet and run,
Shall be aU absorbed again.
Melting, flowing into one.
Christopher Pearse Cbanch-
CONTENTMENT.
I weigh not foi-tune's frown or smUe ;
I joy not much in earthly joys ;
I seek not state, I reck not style ;
I am not fond of fancy's toys :
I rest so pleased with what I have,
I wish no more, no more I crave.
I quake not at the thunder's crack ;
I tremble not at news of war ;
I swound not at the news of wrack ;
I shrink not at a blazing star ;
I fear not loss, I hope not gain,
I envy none, I none disdain.
I see ambition never pleased ;
I see some Tantals starved in store ;
I see gold's dropsy seldom eased ;
I see even Midas gape for more ;
I neither want nor yet abound, —
Enough's a feast, content is crowned.
I feign not friendship where I hate ;
I fawn not on the great (in show) ;
I prize, I praise a mean estate, —
Neither too lofty nor too low :
This, this is all my choice, my cheer, —
A mind content, a conscience clear.
Joshua Sylvester.
CONTENT.
from " farewell to follie," 1617.
Sweet are the thoughts that savor of content ;
The quiet mind is richer than a crown ;
Sweet are the nights in careless slumber spent, —■
The poor estate scorns Fortune's angry frown :
Such sweet content, such minds, such sleep, such
bliss.
Beggars enjoy, when princes oft do miss.
The homely house that harbors quiet rest.
The cottage that affords no pride or c^re.
The mean, that 'grees with country music best.
The sweet consort of mirth's and music's fare.
Obscurèd life sets down a type of bliss ;
A mind content both crown and kingdom is.
robert greene.
IN PRISON.
Beat on, proud billows ; Boreas, blow ;
Swell, curlèd waves, high as Jove's roof ;
Your incivility doth show
That innocence is tempest proof ;
Though surly Nereus frown, my thoughts are calm ;
Then strike, Affliction, for thy wounds are balm.
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732
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND KEFLECTION.
That which the world miscalls a jail
A p'ivate closet is to me ;
Whilst a good conscience is my bail,
And innocence my liberty :
Locks, bars, and solitude together met.
Make me no prisoner, but an anchoret.
I, whilst I wisht to be retired.
Into this private room was turned ;
As if their wisdoms had conspired
The salamander should be burned ;
Or like those sophists, that would drown a fish,
I am constrained to suffer what I wish.
The cynic loves his poverty ;
The pelican her wilderness ;
And't is the Indian's pride to be
Naked on frozen Caucasus ;
Contentment cannot smart ; stoics we see
Make torments easier to their apathy.
These manacles upon my arm
I as my mistress' favors wear ;
And for to keep my ankles warm
I have some iron shackles there :
These walls are but my garrison ; this cell.
Which men call jaü, doth prove my citadel.
I'm in the cabinet lockt up.
Like some high-prizèd margarite.
Or, like the Great Mogul or Pope,
Am cloistered up from public sight :
Retiredness is a piece of majesty.
And thus, proud Sultan, I'm as great as thee.
Sir roger L'EStrange.
[0
CLEON AND , I.
Clepn hath a million acres ne'er ^ one have I ;
Cleon dweUetii in a palace, in a cottage -I ;
Cleoq. hathH, dozen fortunes, not a penny I ;
Yet the poorer of the twain is Cleon, and not I.
Cleon, true, possesseth acres, but the landscape I ;
Half the charms to me it yieldeth money can¬
not buy.
Cleon harbors sloth and dulness, freshening
vigor I ;
He in velvet, I in fustian, richer man am I.
Cleon is a slave to grandeur, free as thought am I ;
Cleon fees a score of doctors, need of node have I ;
Wealfh-surronnded, care-enviioned, Cleon fears
to dio ;
Death may come, he '11 find me ready, —happier
man am I.
Cleon sees no charms in nature, in a daisy I ;
Cleon hears no anthems ringing in the sea and
sky ;
Nature sings to me forever, earnest listener I ;
State for state, with all attendants, who would
change ? Not I.
Charles Mackay.
THE WANTS OF MAN.
" Man wants but little here below.
Nor wants that little long."
'T is not-witlíjn« exactly so ;
But't is so in the song.
My wants are many and, if told.
Would muster many a score ;
And were each wish a mint of gold,
I still should long for more.
What first I want is daily bread —
And canvas-backs — and wine —
And all the realms of nature spread
Before me, when I dine.
Four courses scarcely can provide
My appetite to quell ;
With four choice cooks from France beside.
To dress my dinner well.
What next I want, at princely cost.
Is elegant attire :
Black sable furs for winter's frost.
And silks for summer's fire.
And' Cashmere shawls, and Brussels lace
My bosom's front to deck, —
And diamond rings my hands to grace.
And rubies for my neck.
I want (who does not want ?) a wife, -
Affectionate and fair ;
To solace aU the woes of life.
And all its joys to share.
Of temper sweet, of yielding will.
Of firm, yet placid mind, —
With all my faults to love me stUl
With-sentiment refined.
And as Time's car incessant runs.
And Fortune fills my store,
I want of daughters and of sons
From eight to half a score.
I want (alas ! can mortal dare
Such bliss on earth to crave ?)
That aU the girls be chaste and fair.
The boys all wise and brave.
I want a warm and faithful friend.
To cheer the adverse hour ;
-S
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POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND EEPLBCTION.
733
Who ne'er to flatter will descend,
Nor bend the knee to power, —
A fiiend to chide me when I'm wrong,
My inmost soul to see ;
And that my friendship prove as strong
For him as his for me.
I want the seals of power and place.
The ensigns of command ;
Charged by the People's unbought grace
To rule my native land.
Nor crown nor sceptre would 1 ask
But from my country's will.
By day, by night, to ply the task
Her cup of bliss to fiU.
1 want the voice of honest praise
To follow me behind.
And to be thought in future days
The friend of human kind.
That after ages, as they rise.
Exulting may proclaim
In choral union to the skies
Their blessings on my name.
These are the Wants of mortal Man, —
1 cannot want them long.
For life itself is but a span.
And earthly bliss — a song.
My last great W ant — absorbing all —
Is, when beneath the sod.
And summoned to my final call.
The Mercy of my God.
JOHN QUmcy ADAMS.
CONTENTMENT.
" Man wants but little here below."
Little 1 ask ; my wants are few ;
1 only wish a hut of stone,
(A very plain brown stone will do,)
That 1 may call my own ;
And close at hand is such a one,
In yonder street that fronts the sun.
Plain food is quite enough for me ;
Three courses are as good as ten ; —
If nature can subsist on three.
Thank Heaven for three. Amen !
1 always thought cold victual nice ; —
My choice would be vanilla-ice.
1 care not much for gold or land ; —
Give me a mortgage here and there, —
Some good bank-stock, — some note of hand.
Or trifling railroad share, —
1 only ask that Fortune send
A lütie more than 1 shaU spend.
Honors are silly toys, 1 know.
And titles are but empty names ;
1 would, perhaps, be Plenipo, —
But only near St. James ;
1 'm very sure 1 should not care
To fill our Gubemator's chair.
Jewels are baubles ; 't is a sin
To care for such unfruitful things ; —
One good-sized diamond in a pin, —
Some, not so large, in rings, —
A ruby, and a pearl or so.
Will do for me ; — 1 laugh at show.
My dame should dress in cheap attire ;
(Good heavy silks are never dear ;) —
1 own perhaps 1 might desire
Some shawls of true Cashmere, —
Some marrowy crapes of China silk.
Like wrinkled skins on scalded nulk.
1 would not have the horse 1 drive
So fast that folks must stop and stare ;
An easy gait — two, forty-five —
Suits me ; 1 do not care ; —
Perhaps, for just a single spurt.
Some seconds less would do no hurt.
Of pictures, 1 should like to own
Titians and Raphaels three or four —
1 love so much their style and tone —
One Turner, and no more,
(A landscape— foreground golden dirt —
The sunshine painted with a squirt.)
Of books but few, — some fifty score
For daily use, and bound for wear ;
The rest upon an upper floor ; —
Some little luxury there
Of red morocco's gilded gleam.
And vellum rich as country cream.
Busts, cameos, gems, — such things as these.
Which others often show for pride,
I value for their power to please.
And selfish churls deride ;
One Stradivarius, 1 confess.
Two meerschaums, 1 would fain possess.
Wealth's wasteful tricks 1 will not leam.
Nor ape the glittering upstart fool ;
Shall not carved tables serve my turn.
But all must be of buhl ?
Give grasping pomp its double share, —
1 ask but one reciunbent chair.
Thus humble let me live and die.
Nor long for Midas' golden touch ;
&
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
If Heaven more generous gifts deny,
I shall not miss them mttcÄ, —
Too grateful for the blessing lent
Of simple tastes and mind content !
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
CONTENTATION.
directed to my dear father. and most worthy
friend, mr. isaak walton.
Heaven, what an age is this 1 what race
Of giants are sprung up, that dare
Thus fly in the Almighty's face,
And with his providence make war !
/
I can'^go'nowhere'but I meet
"With malcontents and mutineers,
As if in life was nothing, sweet, '
And we must blessings reap in tears.
0 senseless man ! that murmurs stiU
For happiness, and does not know.
Even though he might enjoy his will,
"What he would have to make him so.
Is it true happiness to be
By undisceming Fortune placed
In the most eminent degree,
"Where few arrive, and none stand fast ?
Titles and wealth are Fortune's toils,
"Wherewith the vain themselves insnare :
The great are proud of borrowed spoils.
The miser's plenty breeds his care.
The one supinely yawns at rest.
The other eternally doth toil ;
Each of them equally a beast,
A pampered horse, a laboring moil :
The titulado 's oft disgraced
By public hate or private frown.
And he whose hand the creature raised
Has yet a foot to kick him down.
The drudge who would all get, all save.
Like a brute beast, both feeds and lies ;
Prone to the earth, he digs his grave.
And in the very labor dies.
Excess of iU-got, iU-kept pelf
Does only death and danger breed ;
"Whilst one rich worldling starves himself
"With what would thousand others feed.
By which we see that wealth and power.
Although they make men rich and great.
The sweets of life do often sour.
And gull ambition with a cheat.
Nor is he happier than these,
"Who, in a moderate estate,
"Where he might safely live at ease.
Has lusts that are immoderate.
For he, by those desires misled.
Quits his own vine's securing shade,
To expose his naked, empty head
To all the storms man's peace invade.
Nor is he happy who is trim.
Tricked up in favors of the fair.
Mirrors, with every breath made dim.
Birds, caught in every wanton snare.
"Woman, man's greatest woe or bliss.
Does oftener far than serve, enslave.
And with the magic of a kiss
Destroys whom she was made to save.
O fruitful grief, the world's disease 1
And vainer man, to make it so.
Who gives his miseries increase
By cultivating his own woe !
There are no ills but what we make
By giving shapes and names to things, —
"Which is the dangerous mistake
That causes all our sufierings.
We call that sickness which is health.
That persecution which is grace.
That poverty which is true wealth.
And that dishonor which is praise.
Alas ! our time is here so short
That in what state soe'er't is spent,
Of joy or woe, does not import.
Provided it be innocent.
But we may make it pleasant too,
If we will take our measures right.
And not what Heaven has done undo
By an unruly appetite.
The world is full of beaten roads.
But yet so slippery withal.
That where one walks secure't is odds
A himdred and a hundred fall.
Untrodden paths are then the best.
Where the frequented are unsure ;
And he comes soonest to his rest
Whose journey has been most secure.
It is content alone that makes
Our pilgrimage a pleasure here ;
And who buys sorrow cheapest takes
An HI commodity too dear.
Charles Cotton.
MILTON ON HIS BLINDNESS.
Doth God exact day-labor^ light denied
/ fondly ask : But Patience^ to prevent
That murmur^ soon replies^ . • • •
They also serve who only s*and and wait-^'
POBMSitilM'BNTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
-a
735
THE TOUCHSTONE.
A MAN there came, whence none could tell,
Bearing a Touchstone in his hand.
And tested all things in the land
By its unerring spell.
A thousand transformations rose
From fair to foul, from foul to fair :
The golden crown he did not spare.
Nor scorn the beggar's clothes.
Of heirloom jewels, prized so much,
Were many changed to chips and clods ;
And even statues of the Gods
Crumbled beneath its touch.
Then angrily the people cried,
" The loss outweighs the profit far ;
Our goods suffice us as they are ;
We will not have them tried."
And, since they could not so avail
To check his unrelenting quest.
They seized him, saying, " Let him test
How real is our jail ! "
But though they slew him with the sword.
And in a fire his Touchstone burned.
Its doings could not be o'ertumed.
Its undoings restored.
And when, to stop all future harm.
They strewed its ashes on the breeze.
They little guessed each grain of these
Conveyed the perfect charm.
William allingham.
ON HIS OWN BLINDNESS.
to cyriack skinner,
OntjACK, this three years' day, these eyes, though
clear,
To outward view, of blemish or of spot.
Bereft of light, their seeing have forgot :
Nor to their idle orbs doth sight appear
Of sun, or moon, or star, throughout the year.
Or man or woman, yet I argue not
Against Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jot
Of heart or hope ; but stUl bear up and steer
Bight onward. What supports me, dost thou ask ?
The conscience, friend, to have lost them overpUed
In Liberty's defence, my noble task.
Of which all Europe rings from side to side.
This thought might lead me through the world's
vain mask.
Content, though blind, had 1 no better guide.
V Milton.
THE HAPPY MAN.
prom "the winter walk at noon:"
"the task," book vi.
He is the happy man whose life even now
Shows somewhat of that happier life to come ;
Who, doomed to an obscure but tranquil state.
Is pleased with it, and, were he free to choose.
Would make his fate his choice ; whom peace,
the fruit
Of virtue, and whom virtue, fruit of faith.
Prepare for happiness ; bespeak him one
Content indeed to sojourn while he must
Below the skies, but having there his home.
The world o'erlooks him in her busy search
Of objects, more illustrious in her view ;
And, occupied as earnestly as she.
Though more sublimely, he o'erlooks the world.
She scorns his pleasures, for she knows them
not ;
He seeks not hers, for he has proved them vain.
He cannot skim the ground like summer birds
Pursuing gilded flies ; and such he deems
Her honors, her emoluments, her joys.
Therefore in contemplation is his bliss.
Whose power is such that whom she lifts from
earth
She makes famüiar with a heaven unseen.
And shows him glories yet to be revealed.
Not slothful he, though seeming unemployed.
And censured oft as useless. Stillest streams
Oft water fairest meadows, and the bird
That flutters least is longest on the wing.
WILLIAM COWREK.
THE PROBLEM.
I LIKE a church ; I like a cowl ;
I love a prophet of the soul ;
And on my heart^monasljic aisles
Fall like sweet strains or pensive smiles ¡
Yet not for all his faith can see
Would I that cowlèd churchman be.
Why should the vest on him allure.
Which I could not on me endure ?
Not from a vain or shallow thought
His awful Jove young Phidias brought ;
_ Never from lips of cunning fell
The thrilling Delphic oracle :
Out from the heart of nature roUed
The burdens of the Bible old ;
The litanies of nations came.
Like the volcano's tongue of flame.
Up from the burning core below, —
The canticles of love and woe.
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736
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND
The hand that rounded Peter's dome,
And groined the aisles of Christian Rome
Wrought in a sad sincerity ;
Himself from God he could not free ;
He buUded better than he knew ; —
The conscious stone to beauty grew.
Know'st thou what wove yon woodbird's nest
Of leaves, and feathers from her breast ?
Or how the fish outbuilt her shell.
Painting with morn each annual cell ?
Or how the sacred pine-tree adds
To her old leaves new m3m.ads ?
Such and so grew these holy piles.
Whilst love and terror laid the tiles.
Earth proudly wears the Parthenon,
As the best gem upon her zone ;
And Morning opes with haste her lids.
To gaze upon the P)rramids ;
O'er England's abbeys bends the sky.
As on its friends, with kindred eye ;
For, out of Thought's interior sphere.
These wonders rose to upper air ;
And Nature gladly gave them place,
Adopted them into her race.
And granted them an equal date
With Andes and with Ararat.
These temples grew as grows the grass ;
Art might obey, but not surpass.
The passive Master lent his hand
To the vast Soul that o'er him planned ;
And the same power that reared the shrine
Bestrode the tribes that knelt within.
Ever the fiery Pentecost
Girds with one flame the countless host,
Trances the heart through chanting choirs.
And through the priest the mind inspires.
The word unto the prophet spoken
Was writ on tables yet unbroken ;
The word by seers or sibyls told.
In groves of oak, or fanes of gold.
Still floats upon the morning wind.
Still whispers to the willing mind.
One accent of the Holy Ghost
The heedless world hath never lost.
I know what say the fathers wise, —
The Book itself before me lies, —
Old Chrysostom, best Augustine,
And he who blent both in his line.
The younger Golden Lips or mines,
Taylor, the Shakespeare of divines.
His words are music in my ear,
1 see his cowlfed portrait dear ;
And yet, for all his faith could see,
I would not the good bishop be.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
HAPPINESS.
from "an essay on man." epistle iv.
0 Happiness ! our being's end and aim !
Good, Pleasure, Ease, Content ! whate'er thy
name :
That something stiU which prompts the eternal
sigh.
For which we bear to live or dare to die,
Which stiU so near us, yet beyond us lies,
O'erlooked, seen double, by the fool, and wise.
Plant of celestial seed ! if dropped below,
Sa3q in what mortal soil thou deign'st to grow ?
Fair opening to some court's propitious shine.
Or deep with diamonds in the flaming mine ?
Twined with the wreaths Parnassian laurels yield.
Or reaped in iron harvests of the field ?
Where grows ?—where grows it not? If vain
our toü.
We ought to blame the culture, not the soil :
Fixed to no spot is happiness sincere ;
'T is nowhere to be foimd, or everywhere :
'T is never to be bought, but always free.
And, fled from monarchs, St. John ! dwells with
thee.
Ask of the learned the way ? The learned are
blind ;
This bids to serve, and that to shun, mankind ;
Some place the bliss in action, some in ease.
Those call it pleasure, and contentment these ;
Some, sunk to beasts, find pleasure end in pain ;
Some, swelled to gods, confess even virtue vain ;
Or, indolent, to each extreme they fall, —
To trust in everything, or doubt of aU.
Who thus define it, say they more or less
Than this, that happiness is happiness ?
Take Nature's path, and mad Opinion's leave ;
All states can reach it, and all heads conceive ;
Obvious her goods, in.no extreme they dwell ;
There needs, but thinking right, and meaning
well ;
And, mourn our various portions as we please.
Equal is commoil sense and cominon ease.
Alexander pope.
THE CHARACTER OF A HAPPY LIFE.
How happy is he bom and taught
That serveth not another's will ;
Whose armor is his honest thought.
And simple truth his utmost skill !
Whose passions not his masters are ;
Whose soul is still prepared for death.
Not tied unto the world with care
Of public fame or private breath ;
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
737
Who envies none that chance doth raise,
Or vice ; who never understood
How deepest wounds are given by praise,
Nor rules of state, but rules of good ;
Who hath his life from rumors freed ;
Whose conscience is his strong retreat ;
Whose state can neither flatterers feed,
Nor ruin make accusers great ;
Who God doth late and early pray
More of his grace than gifts to lend.
And entertains the harmless day
With a weU-chosen book or friend, —
This man is freed from servile bands
Of hope to rise, or fear to fall ;
Lord of himself, though not of lands ;
And, having nothing, yet hath all.
Sir Henry Wotton.
THE HERMIT.
At the close of the day, when the hamlet is still,
And mortals the sweets of forgetfulness prove.
When naught but the torrent is heard on the hill.
And naught but the nightingale's song in tnegrove,
'T was thus, by the cave of the mountain afar.
While his harp rung symphonious, a hermit be¬
gan ;
No more with himself or with nature at war.
He thought as a sage, though he felt as a man :
" Ah ! why, all abandoned to darkness and woe.
Why, lone Philomela, that languishing faU ?
For spring shall return, and a lover bestow.
And sorrow no longer thy bosom inthrall.
But, if pity inspire thee, renew the sad lay, —
Mourn, sweetest complainer, man calls thee to
mourn !
0, soothe him whose pleasures like thine pass
away;
FuU quickly they pass, — but they never return.
"Now, gliding remote on the verge of the sky.
The moon, half extinguished, her crescent dis¬
plays ;
But lately I marked when majestic on high
She shone, and the planets were lost in her blaze.
Roll on, thou fair orb, and with gladness pursue
The path that conducts thee to splendor again !
But man's faded glory what change shall renew ?
Ah, fool ! to exult in a glory so vain !
"'T is night, and the landscape is lovely no more.
I mourn, —but, ye woodlands, I mourn not for
you;
For morn is approaching your charms to restore.
Perfumed with fresh fragrance, and glittering
with dew.
Nor yet for the ravage of winter I mourn, —
Kind nature the embryo blossom will save ;
But when shall spring visit the mouldering urn ?
0, when shall day dawn on the night of the grave ?
' "T was thus, by the glare of false science betrayed.
That leads to bewilder, and dazzles to blind.
My thoughts wont to roam from shade onward to
shade.
Destruction before me, and sorrow behind.
' 0 pity, great Father of light,' then I cried,
' Thy creature, who fain would not wander from
thee!
Lo, humbled in dust, I relinquish my pride ;
From doubt and from darkness thou only canst
free.'
" And darkness and doubt are now flying away ;
No longer I roam in conjecture forlorn.
So breaks on the traveller, faint and astray.
The bright and the balmy effulgence of mom.
See truth, love, and mercy in triumph descending.
And nature all glowing in Eden's flrst bloom !
On the cold cheek of death smiles and roses are
blending.
And beauty immortal awaxes from the tomb.'
James Beattie.
THE RETIREMENT.
Fakewell, thou busy world, and may
We never meet again ;
Here I can eat and sleep and pray.
And do more good in one short day
Than he who his whole age outwears
Upon the most conspicuous theatres.
Where naught but vanity and vice appears.
Good God ! how sweet are all things here !
How beautiful the fields appear I
How cleanly do we feed and lie I
Lord ! what good hours do we keep !
How quietly we sleep I
I^at peace, what unanimity !
How innocent from the lewd fashion
Is all our business, aU our recreation I
0, how happy here's our leisure !
O, how innocent our pleasure !
O ye valleys I 0 ye mountains !
0 ye groves and crystal fountains !
How I love, at liberty.
By turns to come and visit ye !
738
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Dear solitude, the soul's best friend.
That man acc[uainted with himself dost make,
And all his Maker's wonders to intend.
With thee I here converse at will.
And would be glad to do so still.
For it is thou alone that keep'st the soul awake.
How calm and quiet a delight
Is it, alone.
To read and meditate and write.
By none offended, and offending none !
To walk, ride, sit, or sleep at one's own ease ;
And, pleasing a man's self, none other to'displease.
0 my belovèd nymph, fair Dove,
Princess of rivers, how I love
Upon thy flowery banks to lie,
And view thy silver stream,
'When gilded by a summer's beam !
And in it all thy wanton fry
Playing at liberty,
And with my angle upon them
The all of treachery
1 ever learned, industriously to try !
Such streams Rome's yellow Tiber cannot show.
The Iberian Tagus, or Ligurian Po ;
The Maese, the Danube, and the Rhine,
Are puddle-water, all, compared with thine ;
And Loire's pure streams yet too polluted are
With thine, much purer, to compare ;
The rapid Garonne and the winding Seine
Are both too mean,
Bolovèd Dove, with thee
To vie priority ;
Nay, Tame and Isis, when conjoined, submit.
And lay their trophies at thy silver feet.
0 my belovèd rocks, that rise
To awe the earth and brave the skies !
From some aspiring mountain's crown
How dearly do I love.
Giddy with pleasure to look down.
And from the vales to view the nohle heights
above !
O my belovèd caves ! from dog-star's heat.
And all anxieties, my safe retreat ;
What safety, privacy, what true delight.
In the artiflcial night
Your gloomy entrails make.
Have I taken, do I take !
How oft, when grief has made me fly.
To hide me from society
E'en of my dearest friends, have I,
In your recesses' friendly shade.
All my sorrows open laid.
And my most secret woes intrusted to your
privacy !
Lord ! would men let me alone.
What an over-happy one
Should I think myself to be, —
Might I in this desert place
(Which most men in discourse disgrace) '
Live but undisturbed and free !
Here in this despised recess.
Would I, maugre winter's cold
And the summer's worst excess.
Try to live out to sixty full years old ;
And, all the while.
Without an envious eye
On any thriving under Fortune's smile,
Contented live, and then contented die.
Charles Cotton.
VERSES
supposed to be written by alexander selkirk
during his solitary abode in the island of juan
fernandez.
I AM monarch of all I survey, —
My right there is none to dispute ;
From the centre all round to the sea,
I am lord'of the fowl and the bmte.
0 Solitude ! where are the charms
That sages have seen in thy face ?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms
Than reign in this horrible place.
1 am out of humanity's reach ;
I must finish my journey alone.
Never hear the sweet music of speech, —
I start at the sound of my own.
The beasts that roam over the plain
My form with indifference see ;
They are so unacquainted with man.
Their tameness is shocking to me.
Society, friendship, and love.
Divinely bestowed upon man !
0, had I the wings of a dove.
How soon would I taste you again !
My sorrows I then might assuage
In the ways of religion and truth, —
Might learn from the wisdom of age.
And be cheered by the sallies of youth.
Religion ! what treasure untold
Resides in that heavenly word ! —
More precious than silver and gold.
Or all that this earth can afford ;
But the sound of the church-going bell
These valleys and rocks never heard.
Never sighed at the sound of a knell.
Or smiled when a Sabbath appeared.
f
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
739
a
Ye winds that have made me your sport,
Convey to this desolate shore
Some cordial, endearing report
Of a land I shall visit no more !
My friends, — do they now and then send
A wish or a thought after me ?
0, tell me I yet have a friend.
Though a friend I am never to see.
How fleet is a glance of the mind !
Compared with the speed of its flight,
The tempest itself lags behind.
And the swift-wingèd arrows of light.
When I think of my own native land.
In a moment I seem to he there ;
But, alas ! recollection at hand
Soon hurries me hack to despair.
But the sea-fowl is gone to her nest.
The beast is laid down in his lair ;
Even here is a season of rest.
And I to my cabin repair.
There's mercy in every place.
And mercy— encouraging thought ! -
Gives even affliction a grace.
And reconciles man to his lot.
william cowper.
THE GOOD GREAT MAN.
How seldom, friend, a good great man inherits
Honor and wealth, with all his worth and pains !
It seems a story from the world of spirits
When any man obtains that which he merits.
Or any merits that which he obtains.
For shame, my friend ! renounce this idle strain !
What wouldst thou have a good great man obtain ?
Wealth, title, dignity, a golden chain.
Or heap of corses which his sword hath slain ?
Goodness and greatness are not means, but ends.
Hath he not always treasures, always friends, —
The good great man ? Three treasures, — love,
and hght.
And cahn thoughts, equable as infant's breath ;
And three fast friends, more sure than day or
night, —
Himself, his Maker, and the angel Death.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
EXAMPLE.
We scatter seeds with careless hand.
And dream we ne'er shaU see them mora ;
But for a thousand years
Their fruit appears.
In weeds that mar the land.
Or healthful store.
The deeds we do, the words we say, —
Into still air they seem to fleet.
We count them ever past ;
But they shall last, —
In the dread judgment they
And we shall meet.
I charge thee by the years gone by,
For the love's sake of brethren dear.
Keep thou the one true way,
In work and play.
Lest in that world their ciy
Of woe thou hear.
John Keble.
LIVING WATERS.
There are some hearts like weUs, green-mossed
and deep
As ever Summer saw ;
And cool their water is, — yea, cool and sweet ;—
But you must come to draw.
They hoard not, yet they rest in calm content.
And not unsought wiU give ;
They can be quiet with their wealth unspent.
So self-contained they live.
And there are some like springs, that bubbling
burst
To follow dusty ways.
And run with offered cup to quench his thirst
Where the tired traveUer strays ;
That never ask the meadows if they want
What is their joy to give ;—■
Unasked, their lives to other life they grant.
So self-hestowed they live !
And One is like the ocean, deep and wide.
Wherein aU waters faU ;
That girdles the broad earth, and draws the tide.
Feeding and bearing aU ;
That broods the mists, that sends the clouds
abroad.
That takes, again to give ; —
Even the great and loving heart of God,
Whereby all love doth live.
Caroline s. spencer.
THE SEASIDE WELL.
''Waters 6owed over my head; then I said, Z am cut oS."
Lamentations, iii. 54.
One day I wandered where the salt sea-tide
Backward had drawn its wave.
And found a spring as sweet as e'er hillside
To wild-flowers gave.
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740
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REPLECTION.
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Freshly it sparkled in the sun's bright look.
And mid its pebbles strayed,
As if it thought to join a happy brook
In some green glade.
But soon the heavy sea's resistless swell
Came rolling in once more,
Spreading its bitter o'er the clear sweet well
And pebbled shore.
Like a fair star thick buried in a cloud.
Or life in the grave's gloom,
The well, enwrapped in a deep watery shroud.
Sunk to its tomb.
As one who by the beach roams far and wide.
Remnant of wreck to save.
Again I wandered when the salt sea-tide
Withdrew its wave ;
And there, unchanged, no taint in all its sweet.
No anger in its tone.
Still as it thought some happy brook to meet,
The spring flowed on.
While waves of bitterness rolled o'er its head.
Its heart had folded deep
Within itself, and quiet fancies led.
As in a sleep ;
Tül, when the ocean loosed his heavy chain.
And gave it back to day.
Calmly it turned to its own life again
And gentle way.
Happy, I thought, that which can draw its life
Deep from the nether springs.
Safe 'neath the pressure, tranquil mid the strife.
Of surface things.
Safe — for the sources of the nether springs
Up in the far hills lie ;
Calm — for the life its power and freshness brings
Down from the sky.
So, should temptations threaten, and should sin
Roll in its whelming flood.
Make strong the fountain of thy grace within
My soul, 0 God !
If bitter scorn, and looks, once kind, grown
strange.
With crushing chillness fall.
From secret weUs let sweetness rise, nor change
My heart to gall !
When sore thy hand doth press, and waves of
thine
Afflict me like a sea, —
Deep calling deep, —infuse from source divine
Thy peace in me !
And when death's tide, as with a brimful cup.
Over my soul doth pour.
Let hope survive, — a weU that springeth up
Forevermore !
Above my head the waves may come and go.
Long brood the deluge dire.
But life lies hidden in the depths below
TiU waves retire, —
Till death, that reigns with overflowing flood.
At length withdraw its sway.
And life rise sparkling in the sight of God
An endless day.
anonymous.
THE MEN OF OLD.
I KNOW not that the men of old
Were better than men now.
Of heart more kind, of hand more bold.
Of more ingenuous brow ;
I heed not those who pine for force
A ghost of time to raise.
As if they thus could check the course
Of these appointed days.
Still it is true, and over-true.
That I delight to close
This book of life self-wise and new.
And let my thoughts repose
On all that humble happiness
The world has since foregone, —
The daylight of contentedness
That on those faces shone !
With rights, though not too closely scanned.
Enjoyed as far as known.
With will by no reverse unmanned.
With pulse of even tone.
They from to-day, and from to-nigh1^
Expected nothing more
Than yesterday and yesternight
Had proffered them before.
To them was life a simple art
Of duties to be done,
A game where each man took his part,
A race where all must run ;
A battle whose great scheme and scope
They little cared to know.
Content, as men-at-arms, to cope
Each with his fronting foe.
Man now his virtue's diadem
Puts on, and proudly wears . —
Great thoughts, great feelings, came to them.
Like instincts unawares ;
Blending their souls' sublimest needs
With tasks of every day
They went about their gravest deeds
As noble boys at play.
B-
•Ö
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
741
■a
And what if Nature's fearful wound
They did not probe and bare,
For that their spirits never swooned
To watch the misery there, —
For that their love but flowed more fast.
Their charities more free.
Not conscious what mere drops they cast
Into the evil sea.
A man's best things are nearest him,
Lie close about his feet ;
It is the distant and the dim
That we are sick to greet ;
For flowers that grow our hands beneath
We struggle and aspire, —
Our hearts must die, except they breathe
The air of fresh desire.
Yet, brothers, who up reason's hill
Advance with hopeful cheer, —
Oh, loiter not, those heights are chill.
As chill as they are clear ;
And stül restrain your haughty gaze
The loftier that ye go.
Remembering distance leaves a haze
On all that lies below.
Richard monckton Milnes, Lord Houghton.
HISTORY OF A LIFE.
Day dawned ; — within a curtained room.
Filled to faintness with perfume,
A lady lay at point of doom.
Day closed ; — a Child had seen the light :
Bat, for the lady fair and bright.
She rested in undreaming night,
Spring rose ; — the lady's grave was green ;
And near it, oftentimes, was seen
A gentle Boy with thoughtful mien.
Years fled ; — he wore a manly face.
And struggled in the world's rough race.
And won at last a lofty place.
And then he died ! Behold before ye
Humanity's poor sum and story ;
Life, —Death, —and all that is of Glory.
Bryan Waller Procter {Barry Cornwall).
THE ROSE-BUSH.
A child sleeps imder a rose-bush fair,
■ The buds swell out in the soft May air ;
Sweetly it rests, and on dream-wings flies
To play with the angels in Paradise.
And the years glide by.
A Maiden stands by the rose-bush fair.
The dewy blossoms perfume the air ;
She presses her hand to her throbbing breast.
With love's first wonderful rapture blest.
And the years glide by.
A Mother kneels by the rose-bush fair.
Soft sigh the leaves in the evening air ;
Sorrowing thoughts of the past arise.
And tears of anguish bedim her eyes.
And the years glide by.
Naked and lone stands the rose-bush fair.
Whirled are the leaves in the autumn ai.'.
Withered and dead they fall to the ground.
And silently cover a new-made mound.
And the years glide by.
From the German, by WILLIAM W. CALDWELL*
LIFE.
I made a posie, while the day ran by :
" Here will I smeU my remnant out, and tie
My life within this band."
But Time did beckon to the flowers, and they
By noon most cimningly did steal away.
And withered in my hand.
My hand was next to them, and then my heart ;
I took, without more thinking, in good part
Time's gentle admonition ;
Who did so sweetly death's sad taste convey.
Making my minde to smell my fatall day.
Yet sug'ring the suspicion.
Farewell, dear flowers ! sweetly your time ye
spent ;
Fit, while ye lived, for smell or ornament.
And after death for cures.
I follow straight ■without complaints or grief ;
Since, if my scent be good, I care not if
It be as shoi-t as yours.
George Herbert.
THE RIVER OF LIFE.
The more we live, more brief appear
Our life's succeeding stages ;
A day to childhood seems a year.
And years like passing ages.
The gladsome current of our youth.
Ere passion yet disorders.
Steals lingering like a river smooth
Along its grassy borders.
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742
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND KEPLECTION.
But, as the careworn cheek grows wan,
And sorrow's shafts fly thicker,
Ye stars, that measure life to man.
Why seem your courses quicker ?
When joys have lost their bloom and breath,
And life itself is vapid,
Why, as we near the Falls of Death,
Feel we its tide more rapid ?
It may he strange, — yet who would change
Time's course to slower speeding,
When one by one our friends have gone.
And left our bosoms tleeding ?
Heaven gives our years of fading strength
Indemnifying fleetness ;
And those of youth, a seeming length.
Proportioned to their sweetness.
Thomas Campbell.
THE VOYAGE OF LIFE.
from "the spleen."
Thus, then, I steer my bark, and sail
On even keel with gentle gale ;
At helm I make my reason sit.
My crew of passions all submit.
If dark and blustering prove some nights,
Philosophy puts forth her lights ;
Experience holds the cautious glass,
To shun the breakers, as I pass.
And frequent throws the wary lead.
To see what dangers may he hid ;
And once in seven years I'm seen
At Bath or Tunbridge to careen.
Though pleased to see the dolphins play,
I mind my compass and my way.
With store sufficient for belief.
And wisely still prepared to reef.
Nor wanting the dispersive howl
Of cloudy weather in the soul,
I make (may Heaven propitious send
Such wind and weather to the end),
Neither becalmed nor overblown,
Life's voyage to the world unknown.
Matthew Green.
THE ROSARY OF MY TEARS.
Some reckon their age by years.
Some measure their life by art ;
But some teU their days by the flow of their tears.
And their lives by the moans of their heart.
The dials of earth may show
The length, not the depth of years, —
Few or many they come, few or many they go, —
But time is best measured by tears.
Ah ! not by the silver gray
That creeps through the sunny hair.
And not by the scenes that we pass on our way,
And not by the furrows the fingers of care
On forehead and face have made, —
Not so do we count our years ;
Not by the sun of the earth, but the shade
Of our souls, and the fall of om- tears.
For the young are ofttimes old.
Though their brows be bright and fair ;
While their blood beats warm, their hearts are
cold —
O'er them the spring — but winter is there.
And the old are ofttimes young
When their hair is thin and white ;
And they sing in age, as in yonth they sung,
And they laugh, for their cross was light.
But, bead by bead, I tell
The Rosary of my years ;
From a cross — to a cross they lead ;'t is well,
And they 're blest with a blessing of tears.
Better a day of strife
Than a century of sleep ;
Give me instead of a long stream of life
The tempests and tears of the deep.
A thousand joys may foam
On the billows of all the years ;
But never the foam brings the lone back home, —
He reaches the haven through tears.
abram J. Ryan.
THE AIM OF LIFE.
from " festus."
We live in deeds, not years ; in thoughts, not
breaths ;
In feelings, not in figures on a dial.
We should count time by heart-throbs. He most
lives.
Who thinks most, feels the noblest, acts the best.
And he whose heart beats quickest lives the
longest :
Lives in one hour more than in years do some
Whose fat blood sleeps as it slips along their
veins.
Life is but a means unto an end ; that end.
Beginning, mean, and end to all things, — God.
The dead have all the glory of the world.
PHILIP James Bailey.
6-
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 743
LIFE.
My life is like the summer rose,
That opens to the morning sky,
But, ere the shades of evening close.
Is scattered on the ground — to die !
Yet on the rose's humble bed
The sweetest dews of night are shed.
As if she wept the waste to see, —
But none shall weep a tear for me !
My life is like the autumn leaf
That trembles in the moon's pale ray ;
Its hold is frail, — its date is brief.
Restless, and soon to pass away !
Yet, ere that leaf shall fall and fade.
The parent tree will mourn its shade.
The winds bewail the leafless ti'ee, —
But none shall breathe a sigh for me !
My life is like the prints which feet
Have left on Tampa's desert strand ;
Soon as the rising tide shall beat,
All trace will vanish from the sand ;
Yet, as if grieving to efface
All vestige of the human race.
On that lone shore loud moans the sea, —
But none, alas ! shall mourn for me !
Richard Henry Wilde.
BY THE SEA.
Upon the lonely shore I lie ;
The wind is faint, the tide is low.
Someway there seems a human sigh
In the great waves that inward flow, -
As if all love, and loss, and pain.
That ever swept their shining track.
Had met within the cavemed main.
And, rising, meaningly come back.
Upon the lonely shore I lie.
And gaze along its level sands.
Still from the sea steals out the cry
I left afar in crowded lands.
Upon the sea-beach, cool and still,
I press my cheek ; and yet I hear
The jar of earth, and catch the thrUl
Of human effort, hot and near.
Come, Peace of nature ! Lone I lie
Within the cahn Midsummer noon.
All human want I fain would fly.
Sing, Summer sea, in silvery croon I
In Noon's great gladness hush thy moan.
In vast possession unbereft ;
No music, haunting all thy tone.
Can make me want the world I've left.
Mary Clemmer.
HOPE.
from " the pleasures of hope."* |
' ' / '
Unfadiijîg Hope ! when life's last ^mbers bum,
When soul to soul, and dust to dust return !
Heaven to thy charge fesigns the awful hour !
0, then thy kingdom comes ! Immortal Power !
What though each spark of earth-born rapture fly
The quivering lip, pale cheek, and closing eye !
Bright to the soul thy seraph hands convey
The morning dream of life's eternal day, —
Then, then, the triumph and the trance begin,
And aU the phœnix spirit burns within !
Daughter of Faith, awake, arise, illume
The dread unknown, the chaos of the tomb ;
Melt, and dispel, ye spectre-doubts, that roll
Cimmerian darkness o'er the parting soul !
Fly, like the moon-eyed herald of Dismay,
Chased on his night-steed by the star of day !
The strife is o'er, —the pangs of Nature close.
And life's last rapture triumphs o'er her woes.
Hark ! as the spirit eyes, with eagle gaze.
The noon of Heaven undazzled by the blaze.
On heavenly winds that waft her to the sky.
Float the sweet tones of star-born melody ;
Wild as that hallowed anthem sent to hail
Bethlehem's shepherds in the lonely vale.
When Jordan hushed his waves, and midnight still
Watched on the holy towers of Zion hiU !
Eternal Hope ! when yonder spheres sublime
Pealed their first notes to sound the march of Time,
Thy joyous youth began, —but not to fade.
When all the sister planets have decayed ;
When wrapt in fire the realms of ether glow.
And Heaven's last thunder shakes the world
below ;
Thou, undismayed, shalt o'er the ruins smile.
And light thy torch at Nature's funeral pile.
Thomas Campbell.
THE VANITY OF THE WORLD.
False world, thou ly'st : thou canst not lend
The least delight ;
Thy favors cannot gain a friend,
They are so slight :
* This poem was written when the author was bat twenty>OBe
years of age.
744
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Thy morning pleasures make an end
To please at night :
Poor are the wants that thou supply'st,
And yet thou vaunt'st, and yet thou vy'st
With heaven : fond earth, thou hoasts ; false
world, thou ly'st.
Thy babbling tongue teUs golden tales
Of endless treasure ;
Thy bounty offers easy sales
Of lasting pleasure ;
Thou ask'st the conscience what she ails.
And swear'st to ease her ;
There's none can want where thou supply'st ;
There's none can give where thou deny'st.
Alas ! fond world, thou boasts ; false world, thou
ly'st.
What well-advisèd ear regards
What earth can say ?
Thy words are gold, but thy rewards
Are painted clay :
Thy cunning can but pack the cards.
Thou canst not play ;
Thy game at weakest, still thou vy'st ;
If seen, and then rev/d, deny'st :
Thou art not what thou seem'st ; false world,
thou ly'st.
Thy tinsel bosom seems a mint
Of new-coined treasure ;
A paradise, that has no stint.
No change, no measure ;
A painted cask, but nothing in't.
Nor wealth, nor pleasure :
Vain earth ! that falsely thus comply'st
With man ; vain man ! that thou rely'st
On earth ; vain man, thou dot'st ; vain earth,
thou ly'st.
What mean duU souls, in this high measure.
To haberdash
In earth's base wares, whose greatest treasure
Is dross and trash ?
The height of whose enchanting pleasure
Is but a ffash ?
Are these the goods that thou supply'st
Us mortals with ? Are these the high'st ?
Can these bring cordial peace ? false world, thou
ly'st.
Frances Quarles.
♦
GOOD BY.
Good by, proud world, I'm going home :
Thou art not my friend, and I'm not thine.
Long through thy weary crowds I roam ;
A river-ark on the ocean brine.
Long I've been tossed like the driven foam.
But now, proud world, I'm going home.
Good by to Flattery's fawning face ;
To Grandeur with his wise grimace ;
To upstart Wealth's averted eye ;
To supple Office, low and high ;
To crowded haUs, to court and street ;
To frozen hearts and hasting feet ;
To those who go, and those who come ;
Good by, proud world ! I'm going home.
I'm going to my own hearth-stone,
Bosomed in yon green hiUs alone, —
A secret nook in a pleasant land,
Whose groves the frolic fairies planned ;
Where arches green, the livelong day.
Echo the blackbird's roundelay.
And vulgar feet have never trod
A spot that is sacred to thought and God.
O, when I aip safe iij, my ^Ivan home,
I tread on the pride of Greece and Rome ;
And when I am stretched beneath the pines.
Where the evening star so holy shines,
I laugh at the lore and the pride of man.
At the sophist schools, and the leamëd clan ;
For what are they all, in their high conceit.
When man in the bush with God may meet ?
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
THE NEVERMORE.
Look in Wy face my name lis Might-|iave-beenV
I am also called No-more,'Too-late, Farewell ;
Unto thine ear I hold the dead-sea shell
Cast up thy Life's foam-fretted feet between ;
Unto thine eyes the glass where that is seen
Which had Life's form and Love's, but by my
spell
Is now a shaken shadow intolerable.
Of ultimate things unuttered the frail screen.
Mark me, how still I am ! But should there dart
One moment through my soul the soft surprise
Of that winged Peace which lulls the breath of
sighs, —
Then shalt thou see me smile, and turn apart
Thy visage to mine ambush at thy heart
Sleepless with cold commemorative eyes.
Dante Gabriel rossetti.
THE GENIUS OF DEATH.
What is death ? 'T is to be free.
No more to love or hope or fear.
To join the great equality ;
All, all alike are humbled there.
rT-r
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION. 745
The mighty grave
"Wraps lord and slave ;
Nor pride nor poverty dares come
"Within that refuge-house, — the tomb.
Spirit with the drooping wing
And the ever-weeping eye,
Thou of all earth's kings art king ;
Empires at thy footstool lie ;
Beneath thee strewed,
Their multitude
Sink like waves upon the shore ;
Storms shall never raise them more.
"What's the grandeur of the earth
To the grandeur round thy throne ?
Riches, glory, beauty, birth.
To thy kingdom all have gone.
Before thee stand
The wondrous band, —
Bards, heroes, sages, side by side.
Who darkened nations when they died.
Earth has hosts, but thou canst show
Many a million for her one ;
Through thy gates the mortal flow
Hath for countless years rolled on.
Back from the tomb
No step has come.
There fixed till the last thunder's sound
Shall bid thy prisoners be unbound.
GEORGE CROLY.
LINES
WRITTEN BY ONE IN THE TOWER, BEING YOUNG AND
CONDEMN'iD TO DIE.
My prime of youth is but a frost of cares ;
My feast of joy is but a dish of pain ;
My crop of com is but a field of tares ;
And all my good is but vain hope of gain :
The day is [fled], and yet I saw no sun ;
And now I live, and now my life is done !
The spring is past, and yet it hath not sprung ;
The fruit is dead, and yet the leaves are green ;
My youth is gone, and yet I am but young ;
I saw the world, and yet I was not seen :
My thread is cut, and yet it is not spun ;
And now I live, and now my life is done !
I sought my death, and found it in my womb ;
I looked for life, and saw it was a shade ;
I trod the earth, and knew it was my tomb ;
And now I die, and now I am but made :
The glass is full, and now my glass is mn ;
And now I live, and now my life is done !
chidiock tychborn.
LINES
found in his bible in the gate-house AT
westminster.
E'en such is time ; that takes in trast
Our youth, our joys, our aU we have.
And pays us but with earth and dust ;
"Who in the dark and silent grave,
"When we have wandered all our ways.
Shuts up the story of our days ;
But from this earth, this grave, this dust.
My God shall raise me up, I trast.
Sir Walter Raleigh.
THE SOUL'S ERRAND.
Go, soul, the body's guest.
Upon a thankless arrant !
Fear not to touch the best.
The truth shall be thy warrant :
Go, since I needs must die.
And give the world the he.
Go, tell the court it glows
And shines like rotten wood ;
Go, tell the church it shows
"What's good, and doth no good.
If church and court reply.
Then give them both the lie.
Tell potentates they live
Acting by others' action.
Not loved unless they give.
Not strong but by a faction :
If potentates reply.
Give potentates the lie.
Tell men of high condition
That manage the estate.
Their pmpose is ambition.
Their practice only hate :
And if they once reply.
Then give them all the lie.
Tell them that brave it most.
They beg for more by spending,
"Who, in their greatest cost.
Seek nothing but commending :
And if they make reply.
Then give them all the lie.
Tell zeal it wants devotion ;
Tell love it is but lust ;
Tell time it is but motion ;
Tell flesh it is but dust :
And wish them not reply.
For thou must give the lie
f
746
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Tell age it daily wasteth ;
Tell honor how it alters ;
Tell beauty how she blasteth ;
Tell favor how it falters :
And as they shall reply,
Give every one the lie.
Tell wit how much it wrangles
In tickle points of uiceness ;
Tell wisdom she entangles
Herself in over-wiseness :
And when they do reply.
Straight give them both the lie.
Tell physic of her boldness ;
Tell skill it is pretension ;
Tell charity of coldness ;
Tell law it is contention :
And as they do reply.
So give them stUl the lie.
Tell fortune of her blindness ;
TeU nature of decay ;
Tell friendship of unkindness ;
Tell justice of delay :
And if they will reply.
Then give them all the lie.
Tell arts they have no soundness.
But vary by esteeming ;
Tell schools they want profoundness.
And stand too much on seeming :
If arts and schools reply.
Give arts and schools the lie.
Tell faith it's fled the city ;
Tell how the country erreth ;
Tell, manhood shakes off pity ;
Tell, virtue least preferreth :
And if they do reply.
Spare not to give the lie.
So when thou hast, as I
Commanded thee, done blabbing, —
Although to give the lie
Deserves no less than stabbing, —
Yet, stab at thee that wiU,
No stab the soul can kill.
Sir Walter Raleigh.
BRAHMA.
If the red slayer think he slays.
Or if the slain think he is slain.
They know not well the subtle ways
I keep, and pass, and turn again.
Far or forgot to me is hear ;
Shadow and sunlight are the same ;
The vanished gods to me appear ;
And one to me are shame and fame.
They reckon ill who leave me out ;
When me they fly, I am the wings ;
I am the doubter and the doubt.
And I the hymn the Brahmin sings.
The strong gods pine for my abode.
And pine in vain the sacred Seven ;
But thou, meek lover of the good !
Find me, and turn thy back on heaven.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
LETTERS.
Evert day brings a ship.
Every ship brings a word ;
Well for those who have no fear,
Looking seaward well assured
That the word the vessel brings
Is the word they wish to hear.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
BRAHMA'S ANSWER.
Once, when the days were ages.
And the old Earth was young.
The high gods and the sages
From Nature's golden pages
Her open secrets wrung.
Each questioned each to know
Whence came the Heavens above, and whence the
Earth below.
Indra, the endless giver
Of every gracious thing
The gods to him deliver.
Whose bounty is the river
Of which they are the spring —
Indra, with anxious heart.
Ventures with Vivochunu where Brahma is a
part.
" Brahma ! Supremest Being !
By whom the worlds are made.
Where we are blind, all-seeing.
Stable, where we are fleeing.
Of Life and Death afraid, —
Instruct us, for mankind.
What is the body, Brahma ? O Brahma ! what
the mind ? "
Hearing as though he heard not
So perfect was his rest.
So vast the soul that erred not,
So wise the lips that stirred not —
His hand upon his breast
He laid, whereat his face
Was mirrored in the river that girt that holy
place.
B-
-Si
(&
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
747
a
They questioned each the other
What Brahma's answer meant.
Said Vivochunu, " Brother,
Through Brahma the great Mother
Hath spoken her intent :
Man ends as he began, —
The shadow on the water is all there is of man ! "
"The earth with woe is cumbered.
And no man understands ;
They see their days are numbered
By one that never slumbered
Nor stayed his dreadful hands.
I see with Brahma's eyes —
The body is the shadow that on the water lies : "
Thus Indra, looking deeper.
With Brahma's self possessed.
So dry thine eyes, thou weeper !
And rise again, thou sleeper !
The hand on Brahma's breast
Is his divine assent.
Covering the soul that dies not. This is what
Brahma meant.
Richard Henry Stoddard.
RETRIBUTION.
*0^i BeSiv àXéovat ilhíAoi, áÁéoviri Se Senrá.
("The mills of the gods grind late, but they grind fine.")
Greek poet.
Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they
grind exceeding small ;
Though with patience he stands waiting, with
exactness grinds he all.
From the German of F. VON LOGAU. Trans¬
lation of H. W. LONGFELLOW.
TIME.
prom 'night thoughts," night i.
The bell strikes one : we take no note of time,
But from its loss. To give it, then, a tongue.
Is wise in man. As if an angel spoke,
I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright.
It is the knell of my departed hours :
Where are they ? With the years beyond the flood.
It is the signal that demands despatch ;
How much is to be done ! my hopes and fears
Start up alarmed, and o'er life's narrow verge
Look down — on what ? a fathomless abyss ;
A dread eternity ; how surely mine !
An ' ja eternity belong to me.
Poor pensioner on the bounties of an hour ?
Time the supreme! —Time is eternity ;
Pregnant with all eternity can give ;
Pregnant with all that makes archangels smile.
Who murders time, he crushes in the birth
A power ethereal, only not adored.
Ah 1 how unjust to Nature and himself.
Is thoughtless, thankless, inconsistent man !
Like children babbling nonsense in their sports.
We censure Nature for a span too short :
That span too short, we tax as tedious too ;
Torture invention, all expedients tire.
To lash the lingering moments into speed,
And whirl us (happy riddance I) from ourselves.
Art, brainless Art ! our furious charioteer
(For Nature's voice, unstifled, would recall).
Drives headlong towards the precipice of death I
Death, most our dread ; death, thus more dread¬
ful made :
0, what a riddle of absurdity I
Leisure is pain ; takes oil our chariot wheels :
How heavily we drag the load of life I
Blest leisure is our curse : like that of Cain,
It makes us wander ; wander earth around
To fly that tyrant, Thought. As Atlas groaned
The world beneath, we groan beneath an hour
We cry for mercy to the next amusement :
The next amusement mortgages our fields ;
Slight inconvenience I prisons hardly frown.
From hateful Time if prisons set us free.
Yet when Death kindly tenders us relief.
We call him cruel ; years to moments shrink.
Ages to years. The telescope is turned.
To man's false optics (from his folly false)
Time, in advance, behind him hides his wings.
And seems to creep, decrepit with his age ;
Behold him when past by ; what then is seen
But his broad pinions, swifter than the winds ?
And all mankind, in contradiction strong.
Rueful, aghast, cry out on his career.
Ye well arrayed ! ye blies of our land !
Ye lilies male ! who neither toil nor spin
(As sister-libes might) if not so wise
As Solomon, more sumptuous to the sight !
Ye delicate I who nothing can support.
Yourselves most insupportable I for whom
The winter rose must blow, the sun put on
A brighter beam in Leo ; silky-soft
Favonius, breathe stbl softer, or be chid ;
And other worlds send odors, sauce, and song,
And robes, and notions, framed in foreign looms !
0 ye Lorenzos of our age ! who deem
One moment unamused a misery
Not made for feeble man ! who call aloud
For every bawble drivelled o'er by sense ;
For rattles, and conceits of every cast.
For change of follies and relays of ioy.
"5-
■Ö
fl-
748
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
To drag you patient through the tedious length
Of a short winter's day, — say, sages ! say.
Wit's oracles ! say, dreamers of gay dreams !
How will you weather an eternal night.
Where such expedients fail ?
dr. Edward young.
PROCRASTINATION.
from "night thoughts," night I.
Be wise to-day ; 't is madness to defer ;
Next day the fatal precedent will plead ;
Thus on, till wisdom is pushed out of life.
Procrastination is the thief of time ;
Year after year it steals, tül all are fled.
And to the mercies of a moment leaves
The vast concerns of an eternal scene.
If not so frequent, would not this be strange ?
That't is so frequent, this is stranger stiU.
Of man's miraculous mistakes this bears
The palm, " That all men are about to live,"
Forever on the brink of being bom.
All pay themselves the compliment to think
They one day shall not drivel : and their pride
On this reversion takes up ready praise ;
At least, their own ; their future selves applaud :
How excellent that life they ne'er will lead !
Time lodged in their own hands is folly's veils ;
That lodged in Fate's, to wisdom they consign ;
The thing they can't but purpose, they postpone ;
'T is not in folly not to scorn a fool.
And scarce in human wisdom to do more.
AU promise is poor dilatory man.
And that through every stage. When young,
indeed.
In full content we sometimes nobly rest,
Unanxious for ourselves, and only wish.
As duteous sons, our fathers were more wise.
At thirty, man suspects himself a fool ;
Knows it at forty, and reforms his plan ;
At fifty, chides his infamous delay.
Pushes his prudent purpose to resolve ;
In aU the magnanimity of thought.
Resolves, and re-resolves ; then dies the same.
And why ? Because he thinks himself immortal.
All men think aU men mortal but themselves ;
Themselves, when some alarming shock of fate
Strikes through their wounded hearts the sudden
dread ;
But their hearts wounded, like the wounded air,
Soon close ; where passed the shaft, no trace is
found.
As from the wing no scar the sky retains,
The parted wave no furrow from the keel,
So dies in human hearts the thought of death ■:
Even with the tender tears which Nature sheds
O'er those we love, we drop it in their grave.
Dr. Edward young.
WHAT IS TIME?
I ASKED an aged man, with hoary hairs.
Wrinkled and curved with worldly cares :
" Time is the warp of life," said he ; " 0, tell
The young, the fair, the gay, to weave it well ! "
I asked the ancient, venerable dead.
Sages who wrote, and warriors who bled :
From the cold grave a hollow murmur flowed,
" Time sowed the seed we reap in this abode ! "
1 asked a dying sinner, ere the ide
Of life had left his veins : " Time ! " he replied ;
" I've lost it ! ah, the treasure ! " and he died.
I asked the golden sun and silver spheres.
Those bright chronometers of days and years :
They answered, "Time is but a meteor glare,"
And bade me for eternity prepare.
I asked the Seasons, in their annual round.
Which beautify or desolate the ground ;
And they replied (no oracle more wise),
"'Tis Folly's blank, and Wisdom's highest
prize ! "
1 asked a spirit lost, — but 0 the shriek
That pierced my soul ! I shudder while I speak.
It cried, "A particle ! a speck ! a mite
Of endless years, duration infinite ! "
Of things inanimate my dial I
Consulted, and it made me this reply, —
" Time is the season fair of living well.
The path of glory or the path of heU."
I asked my Bible, and methinks it said,
" Time is the present hour, the past has fled ;
Live ! live to-day ! to-morrow never yet
On any human being rose or set."
1 asked old Father Time himself at last ;
But in a moment he flew swiftly past ;
His chariot was a cloud, the viewless wind
His noiseless steeds, which left no trace behind.
I asked the mighty angel who shall stand
One foot on sea and one on solid land :
"Mortal ! " he cried, "the mystery now is o'er ;
Time was. Time is, but Time shall be ^o more ! "
William marsden.
THE JESTER'S SERMON.
The Jester shook |^iis hogd Ifihd bells, j^nd leaAd
upon\a cham: , "
The phges lau^hed;\ the wo^en screamed,\ and
tossqd tfieir scentfed hair K
The falcon whistled, staghounds bayed,^the lap-
dog barkek withour.
The scullion dropped the pitcher brown, the cook
railed at the lout ;
The steward, counting out his gold, let pouch
and money fall, —
And why ? because the Jester rose to say grace
in the haU !
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POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
749
The page played with the heron's plume, the
steward with his chain ;
The butler drummed upon the board, and laughed
with might and main ;
The grooms beat on their metal cans, and roared
till they were red, —
But still the Jester shut his eyes and rolled his
witty head.
And when they grew a little still, read half a
yard of text.
And, waving hand, struck on the desk, then
frowned like one perplexed.
"Dear sinners all," the fool began, "man's life
is but a jest,
A dream, a shadow, bubble, air, a vapor at the
best.
In a thousand pounds of law I find not a single
ounce of love ;
A bUnd man killed the parson's cow in shooting
at the dove ;
The fool that eats till he is sick must fast tUl he
is well ;
The wooer who can flatter most will bear away
the belle.
" Let no man halloo he is safe till he is through
the wood ;
He who wiU not when he may, must tarry when
he should ;
He who laughs at crooked men should need walk
very straight ;
0, he who once has won a name may lie abed
tiU eight ;
Make haste to purchase house and land, be very
slow to wed ;
True coral needs no painter's brush, nor need be
daubed with red.
"The friar, preaching, cursed the thief (the
pudding in his sleeve) ;
To fish for sprats with golden hooks is foolish,
by your leave ;
To travel well, —• an ass's ears, hog's mouth, and
ostrich legs ;
He does not care a pin for thieves who limps
about and begs ;
Be always first man at a feast and last man at a
fray;
The short way round, in spite of all, is still the
longest way ;
When the hungry curate licks the knife, there's
not much for the clerk ;
When the pUot, turning pale and sick, looks up
— the storm grows dark."
Then loud they laughed ; the fat cook's tears ran
down into the pan ;
The steward shook, that he was forced to drop
the brimming can ;
And then again the women screamed, and every
staghound bayed, —
And why ? because the motley fool so wise a ser¬
mon made.
George Walter Thornbury.
ON AN INTAGLIO HEAD OF MINERVA.
The cunning hand that carved this face,
A little helmeted Minerva, —
The hand, I say, ere Phidias wrought.
Had lost its subtile skill and fervor.
Who was he ? Was he glad or sad,
Who knew to carve in such a fashion ?
Perchance he shaped this dainty head
For some brown girl that scorned his passio n
But he is dust ; we may not know
His happy or unhappy story :
Nameless, and dead these thousand years.
His work outlives him, — there's his glory !
Both man and jewel lay in earth
Beneath a lava-buried city ;
The thousand summers came and went.
With neither haste nor hate nor pity.
The years wiped out the man, but left
The jewel fresh as any blossom.
Till some Visconti dug it up, —
To rise and fall on Mabel's bosom !
0 Roman brother ! .see how Time
Your gracious handiwork has guarded.
See how your loving, patient art
Has come, at last, to be rewarded !
Who would not suffer slights of men.
And pangs of hopeless passion also.
To have his carven agate-stone
On such a bosom rise and fall so !
Thomas bailey Aldrich
ON A FAN
that belonged to the marquise de pompadour.
(ballade. )
Chicken-skin, delicate, white.
Painted by Carlo Vanloo,
Loves in a riot of light.
-3
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Roses and vaporous blue ;
Hark to tbe dainty frou-frou!
Picture above, if you can.
Eyes that could melt as the dew, —
This was the Pompadour's fan !
See how they rise at the sight,
Tlironging the Œil de Bœuf through.
Courtiers as butterflies bright,
Beauties that Fragonard drew,
Talou-rauge, falaba, queue.
Cardinal, duke, — to a man.
Eager to sigh or to sue, —
This was the Pompadour's fan !
Ah, but things more than polite
Hung on this toy, voyez-vous!
Matters of state and of might.
Things that great ministers do ;
Things that, maybe, overthrew
Those in whose brains they began ; —
Here was the sign and the cue, —
This was the Pompadour's fan !
ENVOY.
Where are the secrets it knew ?
Weavings of plot and of plan ?
— But where is the Pompadour, too ?
This was the Pompadour's/«»/
Austin Dobson.
THE FLOOD OF YEARS.
A MIGHTY Hand, from an exhaustless urn.
Pours forth the never-ending Flood of Years
Among the nations. How the rushing waves
Bear all before them ! On their foremost edge.
And there alone, is Life ; the Present there
Tosses and foams and fills the air with roar
Of mingled noises. There are they who toü.
And they who strive, and they who feast, and they
Who hurry to and fro. The sturdy hind —
Woodman and delver with the spade—are there.
And busy artisan beside his bench.
And pallid student with his written roU. •
A moment on the mounting billow seen —
The flood sweeps over them and they are gone.
There groups of revellers, whose brows are twined
With roses, ride the topmost swell awhile.
And as they raise their flowing cups to touch
The clinking brim to brim, are whirled beneath
The waves and disappear. I hear the jar
Of beaten drums, and thunders that break forth
From cannon, where the advancing billow sends
Up to the sight long files of armèd men.
That hurry to the charge through flame and smoke.
The torrent bears them under, whelmed and hid.
Slayer and slain, in heaps of bloody foam.
Down go the steed and rider ; the plumed chief
Sinks with his followers ; the head that wears
The imperial diadem goes down beside
The felon's with cropped ear and branded cheek.
A funeral train — the torrent sweeps away
Bearers and bier and mourners. By the bed
Of one who dies men gather sorrowing.
And women weep aloud ; the flood rolls on ;
The wail is stifled, and the sobbing group
Borne under. Hark to that shrill sudden shout—
The cry of an applauding multitude
Swayed by some loud-tongued orator who wields
The living mass, as if he were its soul.
The waters choke the shout and all is still.
Lo, next, a kneeling crowd and one who spreads
The hands in prayer ; the engulfing wave o'er-
takes
And swallows them and him. A sculptor wields
The chisel, and the stricken marble grows
To beauty ; at his easel, eager-eyed,
A painter stands, and sunshine, at his touch.
Gathers upon the canvas, and life glows ;
A poet, as he paces to and fro.
Murmurs his sounding line. Awhile they ride
The advancing billow, till its tossing crest
Strikes them and flings them under while their
tasks
Are yet unfinished. See a mother smile
On her young babe that smiles to her again —
The torrent wrests it from her arms ; she shrieks.
And weeps, and midst her tears is carried down.
A beam like that of moonlight turns the spray
To glistening pearls ; two lovers, hand in hand.
Rise on the billowy swell and fondly look
Into each other's eyes. The rushing flood
Flings them apart ; the youth goes down ; the
maid.
With hands outstretched in vain and streaming
eyes.
Waits for the next high wave to foUow him.
An aged man succeeds ; his bending form
Sinks slowly ; mingling with the sullen stream
Gleam the white locks and then are seen no more.
Lo, wider grows the stream ; a sea-like flood
Saps earth's walled cities ; massive palaces
Crumble before it ; fortresses and towers
Dissolve in the swift waters ; populous realms.
Swept by the torrent, see their ancient tribes
Engulfed and lost, their very languages
Stifled and never to be uttered more.
I pause and turn my eyes, and, looking back.
Where that tumultuous flood has passed, I see
The silent Ocean of the Past, a waste
Of waters weltering over graves, its shores
Strewn with the wreck of fleets, where mast and
hull
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POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND KEFLECTION.
751
a
Drop away piecemeal ; battlemented walls
Frown idly, green with moss, and temples stand
Unroofed, forsaken by the worshippers.
There lie memorial stones, whence time has
gnawed
The graven legends, thrones of kings o'erturned.
The broken altars of forgotten gods.
Foundations of old cities and long streets
"Where never fall of human foot is heard
Upon the desolate pavement. I behold
Dim glimmerings of lost jewels far within
The sleeping waters, diamond, sardonyx.
Ruby and topaz, pearl and chrysolite.
Once glittering at the banquet on fair brows
That long ago were dust ; and all around.
Strewn on the waters of that silent sea.
Are withering bridal wreaths, and glossy locks
Shorn from fair brows by loving hands, and scrolls
O'erwritten — haply with fond words of love
And vows of friendship — and fair pages flung
Fresh from the printer's engine. There they lie
A moment and then sink away from sight.
I look, and the quick tears are in my eyes.
For I behold, in every one of these,
A blighted hope, a separate history
Of human sorrow, telling of dear ties
Suddenly broken, dreams of happiness
Dissolved in air, and happy days, too brief.
That sorrowfully ended, and I think
How painfully must the poor heart have beat
In bosoms without number, as the blow
Was struck that slew their hope or broke their
peace
Sadly I turn, and look before, where yet
The Flood must pass, and I behold a mist
Where swarm dissolving forms, the brood of Hope,
Divinely fair, that rest on banks of flowers
Or wander among rainbows, fading soon
And reappearing, haply giving place
To shapes of grisly aspect, such as Fear
Moulds from the idle air ; where serpents lift
The head to strike, and skeletons stretch forth
The bony arm in menace. Further on
A belt of darkness seems to bar the way,
Long, low and distant, where the Life that Is
Touches the Life to come. The Flood of Years
Rolls toward it, nearer and nearer. It must pass
That dismal barrier. "What is there beyond ?
Hear what the wise and good have said. Beyond
That belt of darkness still the years roll on
More gently, but with not less mighty sweep.
They gather up again and softly bear
All the sweet lives that late were overwhelmed
And lost to sight — all that in them was good.
Noble, and truly great and worthy of love-^
The lives of infants and ingenuous youths.
Sages and saintly women who have made
Their households happy — all are raised and borne
By that great current on its onward sweep.
Wandering and rippling with caressing waves
Around green islands, fragrant with the breath
Of flowers that never wither. So they pass.
From .stage to stage, along the shining course
Of that fair river broadening like a sea.
As its smooth eddies curl along their way,
They bring old friends together ; hands are
clasped
In joy imspeakable ; the mother's arms
Again are folded round the child she loved
And lost. Old sorrows are forgotten now.
Or but remembered to make sweet the hour
That overpays them ; wounded hearts that bled
Or broke are healed forever. In the room
Of this grief-shadowed Present there shall be
A Present in whose reign no grief shall gnaw
The heart, and never shall a tender tie
Be broken — in whose reign the eternal Change
That waits on growth and action shall proceed
With everlasting Concord hand in hand.
william Gullen Bryant.
THREE DAYS.
So much to do : so little done !
Ah ! yesternight I saw the sun
Sink beamless down the vaulted gray, —
The ghastly ghost of Yesteeday.
So little done : so much to do !
Each morning breaks on conflicts new ;
But eager, brave, I '11 join the fray,
And fight the battle of To-day.
So much to do : so little done !
But when it's o'er, — the victory won, —
Oh ! then, my soul, this strife and sorrow
Will end in that great, glad To-mokrow.
James R. Gilmore.
INSIGNIFICANT EXISTENCE.
There are a number of us creep
Into this world, to eat and sleep ;
And know no reason why we 're born.
But only to consume the com.
Devour the cattle, fowl, and fish,
And leave behind an empty dish.
The crows and ravens do the same.
Unlucky birds of hateful name ;
Ravens or crows might fill their places.
And swallow com and carcasses.
-5!
752
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Then if their tombstone, when they die,
Be n't taught to flatter and to lie.
There 'a nothing better will be said
Than that " they've eat up all their bread.
Drunk up their drink, and gone to bed."
isaac Watts.
NEW YEAR'S EVE.
from "in mbhoriam."
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky.
The flying cloud, the frosty light ;
The year is dying in the night ;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.
Ring out the old, ring in the new ;
Ring, happy bells, across the snow
The year is going, let him go ;
Ring out the false, ring in the true
Ring out the grief that saps the mind.
For those that here we see no more ;
Ring out the feud of rich and poor.
Ring in redress to all mankind.
Ring out a slowly dying cause
And ancient forms of party strife ,
Ring in the nobler modes of life.
With sweeter manners, purer laws.
Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite ;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.
Ring out old shapes of foul disease.
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold ;
Ring out the thousand wars of old.
Ring in the thousand years of peace.
Ring in the valiant man and free.
The larger heart, the kindlier hand ;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.
Alfred Tennyson.
THE CLOSING YEAR.
'T is midnight's holy hour, — and silence now
Is brooding like a gentle spirit o'er
The still and pulseless world. Hark ! on the
winds
The bell's deep tones are swelling,—'tis the
knell
Of the departed year. No funeral train
Is sweeping past ; yet, on the stream and wood.
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest
Like a pale, spotless shroud ; the air is stirred
As by a mourner's sigh ; and on yon cloud
That floats so still and placidly through heaven.
The spirits of the seasons seem to stand, —
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn
form.
And Winter with its aged locks, —and breathe.
In mournful cadences that come abroad
Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail,
A melancholy dirge o'er the dead year.
Gone from the earth forever.
'T is a time
For memory and for tears. Within the deep.
Still chambers of the heart, a spectre dim.
Whose tones are like the wizard's voice of Time
Heard from the tomb 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
On the dead waste of life. That spectre lifts
The coffin-lid of Hope and Joy and Love,
And bending mournfully above the pale.
Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead
flowers
O'er what has passed to nothingness.
The year
Has gone, and with it, many a glorious throng
Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow.
Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course
It waved its sceptre o'er the beautiful.
And they are not It laid its pallid hand
Upon the strong man, and the haughty form
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged
The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail
Of stricken ones is heard where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded.
It passed o'er
The battle-plain where sword and spear and
shield
Flashed in the light of midday, and the strength
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass.
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came.
And faded like a wreath of mist at eve ;
Yet ere it melted in the viewless air
It heralded its millions to their home
In the dim land of dreams.
Remorseless Time !
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
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
753
Through heaven's unfathomahle deptlis, or brave
The fury of the northern hurricane,
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks
down
To rest upon his mountain crag, — but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness.
And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind
His rushing pinions.
Revolutions sweep
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
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 caverns ; mountains rear
To heaven theii" bald and blackened cliflFs, and
bow
Their tall heads to the plain ; new empires rise.
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries.
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche.
Startling the nations ; and the very stars.
Yon bright and burning blazonry of God,
Glitter awhile in their eternal depths.
And, like the Pleiads, loveliest of their train.
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away
To darkle in the trackless void, — yet Time,
Time the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career.
Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not
Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path
To sit and muse, like other conquerors.
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.
George denison Prentice.
THE DEATH OF THE OLD YEAR.
Füll knee-deep lies the winter snow.
And the winter winds aro wearily sighing :
Toll ye the church-bell sad and slow.
And tread softly and speak low.
For the old year lies a-dying.
Old year, you must not die ;
You came to us so readily.
You lived with us so steadily.
Old year, you shall not die.
He lieth stUI : he doth not move :
He will not see the dawn of day.
He hath no other life above.
He gave me a friend, and a true true-love,
And the New-year will take 'em away.
Old year, you must not go ;
So long as you have been with us,
Such joy as you have seen with us.
Old year, you shall not go.
He frothed his bumpers to the brim ;
A joUier year we shall not see.
But, though his eyes are waxing dim.
And though his foes speak ill of him.
He was a friend to me.
Old year, you shall not die ;
We did so laugh and cry with you,
I've half a mind to die with you.
Old year, if you must die.
He was full of joke and jest.
But aU his merry quips are o'er.
To see him die, across the waste
His son and heir doth ride post-haste.
But he '11 be dead before.
Every one for his o^vn.
The night is starry and cold, my friend.
And the New-year, blithe and bold, my friend.
Comes up to take his own.
How hard he breathes ! over the snow
I heard just now the crowing cock.
The shadows flicker to and fro :
The cricket chirps : the light burns low :
'T is nearly twelve o'clock.
Shake hands before you die.
Old year, we '11 dearly rue for you :
What is it we can do for you ?
Speak out before you die.
His face is growing sharp and thin.
Alack ! our friend is gone.
Close up his eyes : tie up his chin :
Step from the corpse, and let him in
That standeth there alone.
And waiteth at the door.
There's a new foot on the floor, my friend,
And a new face at the door, my friend,
A new face at the door.
alfred Tennyson.
THE APPROACH OF AGE.
sonnet xn.
When I do count the clock that tells the time.
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night ;
When I behold the violet past prime.
And sable curls all silvered o'er with white ;
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves.
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd.
And summer's green aU girded up in sheaves.
Borne on the bier with white and bristly beard ;
Then of thy beauty do I question make.
That thou among the wastes of time must go.
Since sweets and beauties do themselves forsake.
754
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
And die as fast as they see others grow ;
And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make
defence,
Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee
hence.
Shakespeare.
TO THE VIRGINS.
Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a flying ;
And this same flower that smiles to-day
To-morrow will be dying.
The glorious lamp of Heaven, the sun.
The higher he's a getting.
The sooner wül his race be run.
And nearer he's to setting.
The age is best which is the first.
When youth and blood are warmer ;
But being spent, the worse and worst
Times still succeed the former.
Then be not coy, but use your time.
And, while ye may, go marry ;
For having lost but once your prime,
You may forever tarry.
Robert Herrick.
TO-MORROW.
prom "irene"
To-morrow's action ! can that hoary wisdom,
Borne down with years, still doatupon to-morrow !
The fatal mistress of the young, the lazy.
The coward and the fool, condemned to lose
An useless life in waiting for to-morrow.
To gaze with longing eyes upon to-morrow.
Tul interposing death destroys the prospect.
Strange that this general fraud from day to day
Should fill the world with wretches, undetected !
The soldier, laboring through a winter's march.
Still sees to-morrow drest in robes of triumph ;
Still to the lover's long-expecting arms
To-morrow brings the visionary bride.
But thou, too old to bear another cheat,
Leam that the present hour alone is man's.
Samuel Johnson.
GOHJG AND COMING.
Going — the great round Sun,
Dragging the captive Day
Over behind the frowning hill.
Over beyond the bay, —
Dying :
Coming — the dusky Night,
SUently stealing in,
Wrapping himself in the soft warm couch
Where the golden-haired Day hath been
Lying.
Going — the bright, blithe Spring ;
Blossoms ! how fast ye fall,
Shooting out of your starry sky
Into the darkness all
Blindly !
Coming — the mellow days :
Crimson and yellow leaves ;
Languishing purple and amber fruits
Kissing the bearded sheaves
Kindly !
Going — our early friends ;
Voices we loved are dumb ;
Footsteps grow dim in the morning dew ;
Fainter the echoes come
Ringing :
Coming to join our march, —
Shoulder to shoulder pressed, —
Gray-haired veterans strike their tents
For the far-off purple West —
Sieging !
Going — this old, old life ;
Beautiful world, farewell !
Forest and meadow ! river and hill !
Ring ye a loving knell
O'er us !
Coming — a nobler Ufe ;
Coming — a better land ;
Coming — a long, long, nightless day ;
Coming — the grand, grand
Chorus !
EDWARD A. JENKS.
THE FOOLISH VIRGINS.
from " idyls of the king."
The Queen looked up, and said,
" O maiden, if indeed you list to sing.
Sing, and unbind my heart, that I may weep."
Whereat full willingly sang the Uttle maid :
" Late, late, so late ! and dark the night and
ebill !
Late, late, so late ! but we can enter still.
Too late, too late ! Ye cannot enter now.
"No Ught had we ; for that we do repent
And learning this, the bridegroom will relent
Too late, too late ! Ye cannot enter now.
f
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
755
a
"No light ; so late ! and dark and chill the
night !
0, let us in, that we may find the light !
Too late, too late ! Ye cannot enter now.
' ' Have we not heard the bridegroom is so sweet ?
0, let us in, though late, to kiss his feet !
No, no, too late ! Ye cannot enter now."
So sang the novice, while full passionately,
».Her head upon her hands, wept the sad Queen.
alfred Tennyson.
OLD AGE AND DEATH.
from "verses upon his divine poesy."
The seas are quiet when the winds give o'er ; '
So calm are we when passions are no more.
For then we know how vain it was to boast
Of fieeting things, too certain to be lost.
Clouds of affection from our younger eyes
Conceal that emptiness which age descries.
The soul's dark cottage, battered and decayed,
Lets in new light thrpugh chinks that time has
made :
Stronger by weakness, wiser men become.
As they draw near to their eternal home.
Leaving the old, both worlds at once they view.
That stand upon the threshold of the new.
EDMUND Waller.
THE ONE GRAY HAIR.
The wisest of the wise
Listen to pretty lies.
And love to hear them told ;
Doubt not that Solomon
Listened to many a one, —
Some in] his youth, and more when he grew old.
1 never sat among
The choir of Wisdom's song.
But pretty lies loved 1
As much as any king; —
When youth was on the wing.
And (must it then be told ?) when youth had
quite gone by.
Alas ! and 1 have not
The pleasant hour forgot,
When one pert lady said, —
" 0 Landor ! 1 am quite
Bewildered with affright ;
I see (sit quiet now !) a white hair on your head ! "
Another, more benign.
Drew out that hair of mine,
And in her own dark hair
Pretended she had found
That one, and twirled it round. —
Fair as she was, she never was so fair.
walter Savage Landor.
GROWING GRAY.
" On a Tage de son cœur." — A. d'HoudetOT.
A little more toward the light.
Me miserum. Here's one that's white,
And one that's turning ;
Adieu to song and "salad days."
My Muse, let's go at once to Jay's
And order mourning.
We must reform our rhymes, my dear.
Renounce the gay for the severe, —
Be grave, not witty ;
We have no more the right to find
That Pyrrha's hair is neatly twined.
That Chloe's pretty.
Young Love's for us a farce that's played ;
Light canzonet and serenade
No more may tempt us ;
Gray hairs but ill accord with dreams ;
From aught but sour didactic themes
Our years exempt us.
"Ala, honne heure ! " You fancy so ?
You think for one white streak we grow
At once satiric ?
A fiddlestick ! Each hair's a string
To which our graybeard Muse shall sing
A younger lyric.
Our heart's still sound. Shall " cakes and ale "
Grow rare to youth because we rail
At school-boy dishes ?
Perish the thought ! 'T is ours to sing.
Though neither Time nor Tide can bring
Belief with wishes.
Austin dobson.
TOO LATE.
"Ahl si !a jeunesse savait.—si la vieillesse pouvaitl"
There sat an old man on a rock.
And unceasing bewailed him of Fate, —
That concern where we all must take stock,
Though our vote has no hearing or weight ;
And the old man sang him an old, old song, —
Never sang voice so clear and strong
That it could drown the old man's long,
F or he sang the song "Too late ! too late ! '
&
■0
756
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND KEFLECTION.
" When we want, we have for our pains
The promise that if we but wait
Tül the want has burned out of our brains,
Every means shall be present to sate ;
While we send for the napkin the soup gets
cold,
While the bonnet is trimming the face grows
old,
When we've matched our buttons the pat¬
tern is sold.
And everything comes too late — too late !
" When strawberries seemed like red heavens,
Terrapin stew a wild dream.
When my brain was at sixes and sevens.
If my mother had ' folks ' and ice-cream.
Then I gased with a lickerish hunger
At the restaurant man and fruit-monger
But 0, how I wished I were younger
When the goodies all came in a stream —
in a stream !
"I've a splendid blood-horse, and — a liver
That it jars into torture to trot ;
My row-boat's the gem of the river, —
Gout makes every knuckle a knot !
I can buy boundless credits on Paris and
Eome,
But no palate for menus, no eyesfor a dome—
Those belonged to the youth who must tarry
at home.
When no home but an attic he'd got —
he'd got !
" How I longed, in that lonest of garrets.
Where the tiles baked my brains all July,
For ground to grow two peeks of carrots.
Two pigs of my own in a sty,
A rosebush — a little thatched cottage —
Two spoons — love — a basin of pottage ! —
Now in freestone I sit — and my dotage —
With a woman's chair empty close by —
close by !
" Ah ! now, though I sit on a rock,
I have shared one seat with the great ;
I have sat — knowing naught of the clock —
On love's high throne of state ;
But the lips that kissed, and the arms that
caressed.
To a mouth grown stem with delay were
pressed.
And circled a breast that their clasp had
blessed
Had they only not come too late — too
late ! "
FiTz Hugh ^udlow.
THE THREE WARNINGS.
The tree of deepest root is found
Least willing still to quit the ground ;
'T was therefore said by ancient sages.
That love of life increased with years
So much, that in our latter stages.
When pains grow sharp and sickness rages.
The greatest love of life appears.
This great affection to believe.
Which all confess, but few perceive.
If old assertions can't prevail.
Be pleased to hear a modem tale.
When sports went round, and all were gay.
On neighbor Dodson's wedding-day.
Death called aside the jocund groom
With him into another room.
And, looking grave, " You must," says he,
" Quit your sweet bride, and come with me."
" With you ! and quit my Susan's side ?
With you ! " the hapless husband cried ;
" Young as I am, 't is monstrous hard 1
Besides, in trath, I'm not prepared :
My thoughts on other matters go ;
This is my wedding-day, you know."
What more he urged I have not heard.
His reasons could not well be stronger ;
So Death the poor delinquent spared.
And left to live a little longer.
Yet calling up a serious look.
His hour-glass trembled while he spoke —
"Neighbor," he said, "farewell ! no more
Shall Death disturb your mirthful hour ;
And further, to avoid aU blame
Of cruelty upon my name.
To give you time for preparation.
And fit you for your future station.
Three several warnings you shall have.
Before you 're summoned to the grave ;
Willing for once I '11 quit my prey.
And grant a kind reprieve.
In hopes you '11 have no more to say.
But when I call again this way.
Well pleased the world will leave."
To these conditions both consented.
And parted perfectly contented.
What next the hero of our tale befell.
How long he hved, how wise, how well.
How roundly he pursued his course.
And smoked his pipe, and stroked his horse.
The willing muse shall tell :
He chaffered then, he bought and sold.
Nor once perceived his growing old.
Nor thought of Death as near ;
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His friends not false, his wife no shrew,
Many his gains, his children few.
He passed his hours in peace.
But while he viewed his wealth increase.
While thus along life's dusty road
The beaten track content he trod.
Old Time, whose haste no mortal spares.
Uncalled, unheeded, unawares.
Brought on his eightieth year.
And now, one night, in musing mood.
As all alone he sate,
The unwelcome messenger of Fate
Once more before him stood.
Half killed with anger and surprise,
" So soon returned ! " Old Dodson cries.
"So soon, d' ye call it ! " Death replies ;
"Surely, my friend, you're but in jest !
Since I was here before
'T is six-and-thirty years at least.
And you are now fourscore."
" So much the worse," the clown rejoined ;
"To spare the aged would be kind :
However, see your search be legal ;
And your authority, — is't regal ?
Else you are come on a fool's errand.
With but a secretary's warrant.
Beside, you promised me three warnings.
Which 1 have looked for nights and mornings ;
But for that loss of time and ease
I can recover damages."
" 1 know," cries Death, " that at the best
I seldom am a welcome guest ;
But don't be captious, friend, at least :
1 little thought you'd still be able
To stump about your farm and stable :
Your years have run to a great length ;
1 wish you joy, though, of your strength ! "
"Hold," says the farmer, "not so fast !
1 have been lame these four years past."
"And no gi'cat wonder," Death replies :
" However, you stUl keep youi- eyes ;
And sure, to see one's loves and friends
For legs and arms would make amends."
"Perhaps," says Dodson, "so it might.
But latterly 1 ve lost my sight."
" This is a shocking tale, 't is true ;
But still there's comfort left for you :
Each strives your sadness to amuse ;
I warrant you hear all the news."
" There's uone," cries he ; " and if there were,
I'm grown so deaf, I could not hear."
"Nay, then," the spectre stern rejoined,
" These are unjustifiable yearnings ;
If you are lame and deaf and blind.
You've had your three sufficient warnings ;
So come along, no more we '11 part."
He said, and touched him with his dart.
And now. Old Dodson, turning pale.
Yields to his fate, — so ends my tale.
Hester Lynch Thrale.
WITHOUT AND WITHIN.
If every man's internal care
Were written on his brow.
How many would our pity share
Who raise our envy now ?
The fatal secret, when revealed.
Of every aching breast.
Would prove that only while concealed
Their lot appeared the best.
metastasio.
ODE.
i.vtimations of immortality from recollections of
early childhood.
There was a time when meadow, grove, and
stream.
The earth, and every common sight.
To me did seem
Apparelled in celestial light, —
The glory and the freshness of a dream.
It is not now as it hath been of yore :
Turn wheresoe'er I may.
By night or day.
The things which I have seen I now can see no
more.
The rainbow comes and goes.
And lovely is the rose ;
The moon doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare ;
Waters on a starry night
Are beautiful and fair ;
The sunshine is a glorious birth ;
But yet I know, where'er I go.
That there hath passed away a glory from the
earth.
Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song.
And while the young lambs bound
As to the tabor's sound.
To me alone there came a thought of grief ;
A timely utterance gave that thought relief.
And I again am strong.
The cataracts blow their trumpets from the
steep, —
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong.
I hear the echoes through the mountains throng ;
The winds come to me from the fields of sleep.
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
And all the earth is gay ;
Land and sea
Give themselves up to jollity ;
And "with the heart of May
Doth every beast keep holiday ; —
Thou child of joy.
Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou
happy shepherd boy !
Ye blessèd creatures ! I have heard the call
Ye to each other make ; I see
The heavens laugh with you in your jubüee ;
My heart is at your festival.
My head hath its coronal, —
The fulness of your bliss, I feel, I feel it aU.
0 evil day ! if I were sullen
While Earth herself is adorning,
This sweet May morning.
And the children are culling.
On every side,
In a thousand valleys far and wide.
Fresh flowers ; while the sun shines warm,
And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm ; —
1 hear, I hear, with joy I hear ! —
But there's a tree, of many, one,
A single field which I have looked upon, —
Both of them speak of something that is gone ;
The pansy at my feet
Doth the same tale repeat.
Whither is fled the visionary gleam ?
Where is it now, the glory and the dream
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting ;
The soul that rises with us, our life's star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting.
And Cometh from afar :
Not in entire forgetfulness.
And not in utter nakedness.
But trailing clouds of glory, do we come
From God, who is our home :
Heaven lies about us in our infancy !
Shades of the prison-house begin to close
Upon the growing Boy ;
But he beholds the light, and whence it flows, —
He sees it in his joy ;
The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is nature's priest
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended :
At length the Man perceives it die away.
And fade into the light of common day.
Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own ;
Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind.
And even with something of a mother's mind.
And no unworthy aim.
The homely nurse doth all she can
To make her foster-child, her inmate man,
Forget the glories he hath known,
And that imperial palace whence he came.
Behold the child among his new-bom blisses, —
A six years' darling of a pygmy size !
See, where mid work of his own hand he lies,
Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses.
With light upon him from his father's eyes !
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart.
Some fragment from his dream of human life.
Shaped by himself with newly leamèd art, —
A wedding or a festival,
A mourning or a funeral ;—
And this hath now his heart,
And unto this he frames his song :
Then will he fit his tongue
To dialogues of business, love, or strife ;
But it will not be long
Ere this be thrown aside.
And with new joy and pride
The little actor cons another part, —
FUling from time to time his " humorous stage "
With all the persons, down to palsied age.
That Life brings with her in her equipage ;
As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.
Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie
Thy soul's immensity !
Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage ! thou eye among the blind.
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep.
Haunted forever by the eternal mind ! —
Mighty prophet ! Seer blest !
On whom those truths do rest
Which we are toüing all our lives to find.
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave ;
Thou over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave,
A presence which is not to be put by ;
Thou little child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-bom freedom on thy being's height.
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke
The years to bring the inevitable yoke.
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife ?
FuU soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon thee with a weight
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as Ufe !
0 joy ! that in our embers
Is something that doth live ;
That Nature yet remembers
Wkat was so fugitive !
The thought of our past years in me doth breed
Perpetual benediction ; not, indeed.
For that which is most worthy to be blest, —
DeUght and liberty, the simple creed
Of chUdhood, whether busy or at rest.
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With new-fledged hope stiU fluttering in his
breast : —
Not for these I raise
The song of thanks and praise ;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings ;
Blank misgivings of a creature
Moving about in worlds not realized.
High instincts, before which our mortal nature
Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised :
But for those first affections.
Those shadowy recollections.
Which, be they what they may.
Are yet the fountain-light of all our day.
Are yet a master light of aU our seeing ;
Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal silence : truths that wake.
To perish never ;
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavor.
Nor man nor boy.
Nor all that is at enmity with joy.
Can utterly abolish or destroy !
Hence, in a season of calm weather.
Though inland far we be,
Om souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither, —
Can in a moment travel thither.
And see the children sport upon the shore.
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.
Then sing, ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song !
And let the young lambs bound
As to the tabor's sound !
We in theught will join your throng.
Ye that pipe and ye that play.
Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of the May !
What though the radiance which was once so
bright
Be now forever taken from my sight.
Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the flower ;
We wiU grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind ;
In the primal sympathy
Which, having been, must ever be ;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering ;
In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.
And 0 ye fountains, meadows, hills, and groves.
Forebode not any severing of our loves !
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might ;
I only have relinquished one delight
To live beneath your more habitual sway.
I love the brooks which down their channels fret,
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they ;
The innocent brightness of a new-born day
Is lovely yet ;
The clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober coloring from an eye
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality ;
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears, —
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
William Wordsworth.
SOLILOQUY: ON IMMORTALITY.
from " cato," act v. sc. i.
Scene. — Cato, sitting in a th<ntgkt/ul posture, uaith Plato's
book on the Immortality of the Soul in his hand, and a drawn
sword on the table by him.
It must be so — Plato, thou reasonest well !—
Else whence this pleasing hope, this fond desire.
This longing after immortality ?
Or whence this secret dread, and inward horror.
Of falling into naught ? Why shrinks the soul
Back on herself, and startles at destruction ?
'T is the divinity that stirs within us ;
'T is Heaven itself, that points out a hereafter.
And intimates eternity to man.
Eternity ! — thou pleasing, dreadful thought !
Through what variety of untried being.
Through what new scenes and changes, must we
pass !
The wide, the unbounded prospect lies before me ;
But .shadows, clouds, and darkness rest upon it.
Here will I hold. If there's a Power above us
(And that there is, all Nature cries aloud
Through all her works), he must delight in
virtue ;
And that which he delights in must be happy.
But when ? or where ? This world was made for
Caesar.
I'm weary of conjectures, — this must end 'em.
(Laying hü hand on hisüioord.)
Thus am I doubly armed : my death and life,
My bane and antidote, are both before me :
This in a moment brings me to an end ;
But this informs me I shall never die.
The soul, secured in her existence, smiles
At thé drawn dagger, and defies its point.
The stars shall fade away, the sun himself
Grow dim with age, and Nature sink in years ;
But thou shalt flourish in immortal youth.
Unhurt amid the war of elements,
The wrecks of matter, and the crush of worlds !
Joseph Addison.
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
0, MAY I JOIN THE CHOIR INVISIBLE !
0, MAT I join the choir invisible
Of those immortal dead who live again
In minds made better by their presence ; live
In pulses stirred to generosity,
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn
Of miserable aims that end with self.
In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like
stars.
And with their mild persistence urge men's minds
To vaster issues.
So to live is heaven :
To make undjdng music in the world,
Breathing a beauteous order, that controls
With growing sway the growing Kfe of man.
So we inherit that sweet purity
For which we stniggled, failed, and agonized
With widening retrospect that bred despair.
Rebellious flesh that would not be subdued,
A vicious parent shaming still its child.
Poor anxious penitence, is quick dissolved ;
Its discords quenched by meeting harmonies.
Die in the large and charitable air.
And all our rarer, better, truer self,
That sobbed religiously in yearning song.
That watched to ease the burden of the world.
Laboriously tracing what must be.
And what may yet be better, — saw within
A worthier image for the sanctuary.
And shaped it forth before the multitude,
Divinely human, raising worship so
To higher reverence more mixed with love,
That better self shall live till human Time
Shall fold its eyelids, and the human sky
Be gathered like a scroll within the tomb,
Unread forever.
This is life to come.
Which martyred men have made more glorious
For us, who strive to follow.
May I reach
That purest heaven, — be to other souls
The cup of strength in some great agony.
Enkindle generous ardor, feed pure love.
Beget the smiles that have no cruelty.
Be the sweet presence of a good diffused,
And in diffusion ever more intense !
So shall I join the choir invisible.
Whose music is the gladness of the world.
Marian Evans Lewes Cross (George Eliot)-
PRE-EXISTENCE.
While sauntering through the crowded street,
Some half-remembered face I meet.
Albeit upon no mortal shore
That face, methinks, has smiled before.
Lost in a gay and festal throng,
I tremble at some tender song, —
Set to an air whose golden bars
I must have heard in other stars.
In sacred aisles I pause to share
The blessings of a priestly prayer, —
When the whole scene which greets mine eyes
In some strange mode I recognize
As one whose every mystic part
I feel prefigured in my heart.
At sunset, as I calmly stand,
A stranger on an alien strand,
FamUiar as my childhood's home
Seems the long stretch of wave and foam.
One sails toward me o'er the bay.
And what he comes to do and say
I can foretell. A prescient lore
Springs from some life outlived of yore.
0 swift, instinctive, startling gleams
Of deep soul-knowledge ! not as dreams
For aye ye vaguely dawn and die.
But oft with lightning certainty
Pierce through the dark, oblivious brain.
To make old thoughts and memories plain.
Thoughts which perchance must travel back
Across the wild, bewildering track
Of countless aeons ; memories far.
High-reaching as yon pallid star,
Unknown, scarce seen, whose flickering grace
Faints on the outmost rings of space !
paul Hamilton Haynb.
A LOST CHORD.
Seated one day at the organ,
I was weary and ill at ease,
And my fingers wandered idly
Over the noisy keys.
I do not know what I was pla37ing.
Or what I was dreaming then.
But I struck one chord of music.
Like the sound of a great Amen.
It flooded the crimson twilight.
Like the close of an angel's psalm.
And it lay on my fevered spirit.
With a touch of infinite cahu.
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It quieted pain and sorrow,
Like love overcoming strife ;
It seemed the harmonious echo
From our discordant life.
It linked all perplexed meanings
Into one perfect peace,
And trembled away into silence.
As if it were loath to cease.
I have sought, but I seek it vainly.
That one lost chord divine.
That came from the soul of the organ.
And entered into mine.
It may be that Death's bright angel
Will speak in that chord again ;
It may be that only in heaven
I shall hear that grand Amen.
Adelaide anme Froctee.
TO A SKELETON.
fThe MS, of tiUs poem, which appeared during the first quarter
of the present century, was said to have been found in the Museum
of the Royal College of Su^eons, in London, near a perfect human
skeleton, and to have been sent by the curator to the Morning
Chronicle for publication. It excited so much attention that every
effort was made to discover the author, and a responsible party
went so far as to offer a reward of fifty guineas for information that
would discover its origin. The author preserved bisineognilOf and,
we believe, has never been discovered.]
Behold this ruin ! 'T was a skull
Once of ethereal spirit full.
This narrow cell was Life's retreat ;
This space was Thought's mysterious seat.
What beauteous visions filled this spot !
What dreams of pleasure long forgot !
Nor hope, nor joy, nor love, nor fear
Has left one trace of record here.
Beneath this mouldering canopy
Once shone the bright and busy eye :
But start not at the dismal void, —
If social love that eye employed.
If with no lawless fire it gleamed.
But through the dews of kindness beamed.
That eye shall be forever bright
When stars and sim are sunk in night.
Within this hollow cavern hung
The ready, swift, and tuneful tongue :
If Falsehood's honey it disdained.
And when it could not praise was chained ;
If bold in Virtue's cause it spoke.
Yet gentle concord never broke, —
This silent tongue shall plead for thee
When Time unveils Eternity !
Say, did these fingers delve the mine.
Or with the envied rubies shine ?
To hew the rock, or wear a gem.
Can little now avail to them ;
But if the page of Truth they sought.
Or comfort to thé mourner brought.
These hands a richer meed shall claim
Than all that wait on Wealth and Fame.
Avails it whether bare or shod
These feet the paths of duty trod ?
If from the bowers of Ease they fled.
To seek Affliction's humble shed ;
If Grandeur's guilty bribe they spumed.
And home to Virtue's cot returned, —
These feet with angel wings shall vie.
And tread the palace of the sky !
Anonymous.
THE BROTHERS.
SLfMBEK, Sleep, —they were two brothers, ser¬
vants to the gods above ;
Kind Prometheus lured them downwards, ever
filled with earthly love ;
But what gods could bear so lightly, pressed too
hard on men beneath ;
Slumber did his brother's duty, — Sleep was
deepened into Death.
From the Gennan of GOETHB.
INVOCATION TO SLEEP.
from "valentinian."
Come, Sleep, and with thy sweet deceiving
Lock me in delight awhile ;
Let some pleasing dreams beguile
All my fancies, that from thence
I may feel an influence.
All my pov^ers of care bereaving !
Though but a shadow, but a sliding.
Let me know some little joy !
We that suffer long annoy
Are contented with a thought.
Through an idle fancy wrought :
0, let my joys have some abiding !
john fletcher.
SLEEP.
Come, gentle sleep ! attend thy votary's prayer.
And, though death's image, to my couch repair ;
How sweet, though lifeless, yet with life to he.
And, without dying, O how sweet to die !
Dr. John Wolcott (ä/w- Pimütr).
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
SLEEP.
Weep ye no more, sad fountains !
What need you flow so fast ?
Look how the snowy mountains
Heaven's sun doth gently waste.
But my sun's heavenly eyes
View not your weeping,
That now lies sleeping
Softly, now softly lies
Sleeping.
Sleep is a reconciling, —
A rest that peace begets ;
Doth not the sun rise smiling.
When fair at even he sets ?
Rest you then, rest, sad eyes, —
Melt not in weeping,
While she lies sleeping
Softly, now softly lies
Sleeping.
John Dowland.
SLEEP.
from "astrophel and stella."
Come, Sleep, 0 Sleep, the certain knot of peace.
The baiting-place of wit, the balm of woe.
The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release.
The indifferent judge between the high and low,
With shield of proof shield me from out the prease"^
Of those fierce darts Despair at me doth throw ;
O, make me in those civil wars to cease :
I will good tribute pay, if thou do so.
Take thou of me smooth pillows, sweetest bed,
A chamber deaf to noise, and blind to light,
A rosy garland, and a weary head :
And if these things, as being thine in right.
Move not thy heavy grace, thou shalt in me
Livelier than elsewhere Stella's image see.
Sir philip Sidney.
SLEEP.
" He giveth his beloved sleep." — Psalm cxxvi s.
Of all the thoughts of God that are
Borne inward unto souls afar,
Among the Psalmist's music deep.
Now tell me if that any is.
For gift or grace, surpassing this, —
" He giveth his belovèd sleep " ?
What would we give to our beloved ?
The hero's heart, to be unmoved, —
The poet's star-tuned harp, to sweep, —
The patriot's voice, to teach and rouse, —
The monarch's crown, to light the brows ?
" He giveth his belovèd sleep."
• Press — throng.
What do we give to our beloved ?
A little faith, aU undisproved, —
A little dust to overweep.
And bitter memories, to make
The whole earth blasted for our sake,
" He giveth his belovèd sleep."
"Sleep soft, beloved ! " we sometimes say.
But have no tune to charm away
Sad dreams that through the eyelids creep ;
But never doleful dream again
Shall break the happy slumber when
"He giveth his belovèd sleep."
0 earth, so full of dreary noise !
0 men, with wailing in your voice I
0 delvèd gold the wallers heap !
0 strife, 0 curse, that o'er it fall !
God strikes a silence through you all,
And "giveth his belovèd sleep."
His dews drop mutely on the hiU,
His cloud above it saileth still.
Though on its slope men sow and reap ;
More softly than the dew is shed,
Or cloud is floated overhead,
" He giveth his belovèd sleep."
For me, my heart, that erst did go
Most like a tired child at a show.
That sees through tears the mummers leap.
Would now its wearied vision close.
Would childlike on his love repose
Who " giveth his belovèd sleep."
elizabeth Barrett Brownin&
SLEEP.
from second part of henry iv.," act hi. sc. i.
/ t
King Henkt. How many thousand of my
poorest subjects
Are at this hour asleep ! — O sleep ! 0 gentle
sleep !
Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee.
That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down.
And steep my senses in forgetfulness ?
Why rather, sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs.
Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee.
And hushed with buzzing night-flies to thy
slumber.
Than in the perfumed chambers of the great.
Under the canopies of costly state.
And lulled with sounds of sweetest melody ?
0 thou dull god ! why liest thou with the vile.
In loathsome beds, and leav'st the kingly couch
A watch-case, or a common 'larum-bell ?
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Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast
Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains
In cradle of the rude imperious surge.
And in the visitation of the winds.
Who take the ruffian billows by the top.
Curling their monstrous heads, and hanging them
With deafening clamors in the slippery clouds.
That, with the hurly, death itself awakes ?
Canst thou, 0 partial sleep ! give thy repose
To the wet sea-boy in an hour so rude ;
And in the calmest and most stillest night.
With all appliances and means to boot.
Deny it to a king ? Then, happy low, lie down ;
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
Shakespeare.
SLEEPLESSNESS.
A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by
One after one ; the sound of rain, and bees
Murmuring ; the fall of rivers, winds and seas.
Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure
sky ; —
I've thought of all by turns, and still I lie
Sleepless ; and soon the small birds' melodies
Must hear, first uttered from my orchard trees.
And the first cuckoo's melancholy cry.
Even thus last night, and two nights more, I lay.
And could not win thee. Sleep, by any stealth :
So do not let me wear to-night away :
Without thee what is all the morning's wealth ?
Come, blessed barrier between day and day,
Dearmother of fresh thoughts and joyous health !
WILLIAM Wordsworth.
HYMN TO NIGHT.
Yes ! bear them to their rest ;
The rosy babe, tired with the glare of day.
The prattler, fallen asleep e'en in his play ;
Clasp them to thy soft breast,
O night !
Bless them in dreams with a deep, hushed delight.
Yet must they wake again.
Wake soon to all the bitterness of life.
The pang of sorrow, the temptation strife.
Aye to the conscience pain :
O night !
Canst thou not take with them a longer flight ?
Canst thou not bear them far
E'en now, all innocent, before they know
The taint of sin, its consequence of woe.
The world's distracting jar,
O night !
To some ethereal, holier, happier height ?
Canst thou not bear them up
Through starlit skies, far from this planet dim
And sorrowful, e'en while they sleep, to Him
Who drank for us the cup,
0 night !
The cup of wrath, for hearts in faith contrite ?
To Him, for them who slept
A babe all holy on his mother's knee,
And from that hour to cross-crowned Calvary,
In all our sorrow wept,
0 night !
That on our souls might dawn Heaven's cheering
light.
Go, lay their little heads
Close to that human heart, with love divin«
Deep-breathing, while his arms immortal twine
Around them, as he sheds,
0 night !
On them a brother's grace of God's own bound¬
less might.
Let them immortal wake
Among the deathless flowers of Paradise,
Where angel songs of welcome with surprise
This their last sleep may break,
0 night !
And to celestial joy their kindred souls invil
. There can come no sorrow ;
The brow shall know no shade, tne eye no tears,
Forever young, through heaven's eternal years
In one unfading morrow,
O night !
Nor sin nor age nor pain their cherub beauty
blight.
Would we could sleep as they.
So stainless and so calm, — at rest with Thee, —■
And only wake in immortality !
Bear us with them away,
O night !
To that ethereal, holier, happier height.
George Washington Bethune.
WATCHING.
Sleep, love, sleep !
The dusty day is done.
Lo ! from afar the freshening breezes sweep
Wide over groves of balm,
Down from the towering palm.
In at the open casement cooling run.
And round thy lowly bed.
Thy bed of pain.
Bathing thy patient head.
Like grateful showers of rain,
-0
764
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
They come ;
While the white curtains, waving to and fro,
Fan the sick air ;
And pityingly the shadows come and go.
With gentle human care.
Compassionate and dumb.
The dusty day is done.
The night begun ;
While prayerful watch I keep.
Sleep, love, sleep !
Is there no magic in the touch
Of fingers thou dost love so much ?
Fain would they scatter poppies o'er thee now ;
Or, with its mute caress.
The tremulous lip some soft nepenthe press
Upon thy weary lid and aching brow ;
While prayerful watch 1 keep.
Sleep, love, sleep !
On the pagoda spire
The beUs are swinging.
Their little golden circlet in a flutter
With tales the wooing winds have dared to utter.
Till all are ringing,
As if a choir
Of golden-nested birds in heaven were singing
And with a lulling sound
The music floats around.
And drops like balm into the drowsy ear ;
Commingling with the hum
Of the Sepoy's distant drum.
And lazy beetle ever droning near.
Sounds these of deepest silence born.
Like night made visible by mom ;
So silent that 1 sometimes start
To hear the throbbings of my heart.
And watch, with shivering sense of pain.
To see thy pale lids lift again.
The lizard, with his mouse-like eyes.
Peeps from the mortise in surprise
At such strange quiet after day's harsh din
Then boldly ventures out.
And looks about.
And with his hollow feet
Treads his small evening beat.
Darting upon his prey
In such a tricky, winsome sort of way.
His delicate marauding seems no sin.
And still the curtains swing.
But noiselessly ;
The bells a melancholy murmur ring.
As tears were in the sky :
More heavily the shadows fall.
Like the black foldings of a pall.
Where juts the rough beam from the wall ;
The candles flare
With fresher gusts of air ;
The beetle's drone
Tums to a dirge-like, solitary moan ;
Night deepens, and 1 sit, in cheerless doubt alone.
Emily chubbuck Judson.
THE DREAM.
Our life is twofold ; sleep hath its own world,
A boundary between the things misnamed
Death and existence : sleep hath its own world.
And a wide realm of wild reality.
And dreams in their development have breath.
And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy ;
They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts.
They take a weight from oif our waking toils.
They do divide our being ; they become
A portion of ourselves as of our time.
And look like heralds of eternity ;
They pass like spirits of the past, — they speak
Like sibyls of the future ; they have power, —
The tyranny of pleasure and of pain ;
They make us what we were not, — what they
will.
And shake us with the vision that's gone by.
The dread of vanished shadows. — Are they so ?
Is not the past aU shadow ? What are they ?
Creations of the mind ? — The mind can make
Substances, and people planets of its own
With beings brighter than have been, and give
A breath to forms which can outlive aU flesh.
1 would recall a vision which 1 dreamed
Perchance in sleep, — for in itself a thought,
A slumbering thought, is capable of years.
And curdles a long life into one hour.
1 saw two beings in the hues of youth
Standing upon a hül, a gentle hül.
Green and of a mild declivity, the last
As't were the cape of a long ridge of such.
Save that there was no sea to lave its base.
But a most living landscape, and the wave
Of woods and cornfields, and the abodes of men
Scattered at intervals, and wreathing smoke
Arising from such rustic roofs ; the hül
Was crowned with a peculiar diadem
Of trees, in circular airay, so fixed.
Not by the sport of nature, but of man ;
These two, a maiden and a youth, were there
Gazing, — the one on all that was beneath
Fair as herself, — but the boy gazed on her ;
And both were young, and one was beautiful ;
And both were young, — yet not alike in youth.
As the sweet moon on the horizon's verge.
The maid was on the eve of womanhood ;
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
765
The boy had fewer summers, but his heart
Had far outgrown his years, and to his eye
There was but one belovèd face on earth.
And that was shining on him ; he had looked
Upon it till it could not pass away ;
He had no breath, no being, but in hers ;
She was his voice ; he did not speak to her.
But trembled on her words ; she was his sight.
For his eye followed hers, and saw with hers.
Which colored all his objects ; — he had ceased
To live within himself : she was his life.
The ocean to the river of his thoughts.
Which terminated all ; upon a tone,
A touch of hers, his blood would ebb and flow.
And his cheek change tempestuously, — his heart
Unknowing of its cause of agony.
But she in these fond feelings had no share :
Her sighs were not for him ; to her he was
Even as a brother, — but no more ; 't was much.
For brotherless she was, save in the name
Her infant friendship had bestowed on him ;
Herself the solitary seion left
Of a time-honored race. It was a name
Which pleased him, and yet pleased him not, —
and why ?
Time taught him a deep answer — when she
loved
Another ; even now she loved another.
And on the summit of that hill she stood.
Looking afar if yet her lover's steed
Kept pace with her expectancy, and flew.
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream.
There was an ancient mansion, and before
Its walls there was a steed caparisoned ;
Within an antique oratory stood
The boy of whom I spake ; — he was alone.
And pale, and pácing to and fro : anon
He sate him down, and seized a pen, and traced
Words which I could not guess of ; then he leaned
His bowed head on his hands and shook, as
'twere
With a convulsion, — then arose again.
And with his teeth and quivering hands did tear
What he had written, but he shed no tears.
And he did calm himself, and fix his brow
Into a kind of quiet ; as he paused.
The lady of his love re-entered there ;
She was serene and smiling then, and yet
She knew she was by him beloved ; she knew—
For quickly comes such knowledge — that his
heart
Was darkened with her shadow, and she saw
That he was wretched, but she saw not all.
He rose, and with a cold and gentle grasp
He took her hand ; a moment o'er his face
A tablet of unutterable thoughts
Was traced, and then it faded, as it came ;
He dropped the hand he held, and with slow
steps
Retired, but not as bidding her adieu.
For they did part with mutual smiles ; he passed
From out the massy gate of that old Hall,
And mounting on his steed he went his way ;
And ne'er repassed that hoary threshold more.
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream.
The boy was sprung to manhood ; in the wilds
Of fiery climes he made himself a home.
And his soul drank their sunbeams ; he was girt
With strange and dusky aspects ; he was not
Himself like what he had been ; on the sea
And on the shore he was a wanderer ;
There was a mass of many images
Crowded like waves upon me, but he was
A part of all ; and in the last he lay
Reposing from the noontide sultriness.
Couched among fallen columns, in the shade
Of ruined walls that had survived the names
Of those who reared them ; by his sleeping side
Stood camels grazing, and some goodly steeds
Were fastened near a fountain ; and a man.
Clad in a flowing garb, did watch the while.
While many of his tribe slumbered around :
And they were canopied by the blue sky.
So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful.
That God alone was to be seen in heaven.
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream.
The lady of his love was wed with one
Who did not love her better : in her home,
A thousand leagues from his, — her native home.
She dwelt, begirt with growing infancy,
Daughters and sons of beauty, — but behold !
Upon her face there was the tint of grief.
The settled shadow of an inward strife.
And an unquiet drooping of the eye.
As if its lid were charged with unshed tears.
What could her grief be ? — she had all she loved.
And he who had so loved her was not there
To trouble with bad hopes, or evil wish.
Or Hi-repressed afiBiction, her pure thoughts.
What could her grief be ? — she had loved him
not.
Nor given him cause to deem himself beloved.
Nor could he be a part of that which preyed
Upon her mind — a spectre of the past.
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream.
The wanderer was returned. — I saw him stand
Before an altar — with a gentle hride ;
Her face was fair, but was not that which made
The starlight of his boyhood ; — as he stood
Even at the altar, o'er his brow there came
L
r
—1 , t ^
766 POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
J
1
The selfsame aspect and the quivering shock My dream was past ; it had no further change.
That in the antique oratory shook It was of a strange order, that the doom
His bosom in its solitude ; and then — Of these two creatures should be thus traced out
As in that hour — a moment o'er his face Almost like a reality, — the one
The tablet of unutterable thoughts To end in madness — both in misery.
Was traced, —and then it faded as it came, lord hvron.
And he stood cabn and quiet, and he spoke •
The fitting vows, but heard not his own words, THE SCHOLAR
And all things reeled around bim ; he could see
Not that which was, nor that which should have from "edwin the fair."
been, — This life, and all that it contains, to him
But the old mansion, and the accustomed hall. Is but a tissue of illuminons dreams
And the remembered chambers, and the place, FiUed with book-wisdom, pictured thought and
The day, the hour, the sunshine, and the shade, love
All things pertaining to that place and hour,. That on its own creations spends itself.
And her who was his destiny, came back All things he understands, and nothing does.
And thrust themselves between him and the Profusely eloquent in copious praise
light ; Of action, he will talk to you as one
What business had they there at such a time ? Whose wisdom lay in dealings and transactions ;
Yet so much action as might tie his shoe
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. Cannot his will command ; himself alone
The lady of his love ; — 0, she was changed. By his own wisdom not a jot the gainer.
As by the sickness of the soul ! her mind Of silence, and the hundred thousand things
Had wandered from its dwelling, and her eyes, T is better not to mention, he will speak.
They had not their own lustre, but the look And still most wisely.
Which is not of the earth ; she was become henry Taylor.
The queen of a fantastic realm ; her thoughts
Were combinations of disjointed things, UNKNOWN POETS.
And forms impalpable and unperceived
. . 1 . r -i- il from " the excursion," book i.
Of others sight familiar were to hers.
And this the world calls frenzy ; but the wise 0> many are the poets that are sown
Have a far deeper madness, and the glance By nature ; men endowed with highest gifts.
Of melancholy is a fearful gift ; The vision and the faculty divine ;
What is it but the telescope of truth. Yet wanting the accomplishment of verse
Which strips the distance of its fantasies, (Which, in the docile season of their youth.
And brings life near in utter nakedness. It was denied them to acquire, through lack
Making the cold reality too real ! Of culture and the inspirmg aid of books.
Or haply by a temper too severe,
A change came o'er the spirit of my dream. backwardness afraid of shame)
The wanderer was alone as heretofore, ® advanced, been led
The beings which surrounded him were gone, circumstance to take unto the height
Or were at war with him ; he was a mark The measure of themselves, these favored beings.
For blight and desolation, compassed round ^ I s • l ^ ° T'
With hatred and contention ; pain was mixed Husbandmg that which they possess withm,
In all which was served up to him, untü, of. Strongest
Like to the Pontic monarch of old days, . . _
TT„ A *1 « Are often those of whom the noisy world
H e led on poisons, and they had no power, ^
But were a kind of nutriment ; he lived xiears east. William Wordsworth.
Through that which had been death to many men.
And made him friends of mountains : with the
stars THE POET OF NATURE.
And the quick Spirit of the universe
He held his dialogues ; and they did teach from festus.
To him the magic of their mysteries ; He had no times of study, and no plaee ;
To him the book of Night was opened wide, All places and all times to him were one.
And voices from the deep abyss revealed His soul was like the wind-harp, which he loved,
A marvel and a secret. — Be it so. And sounded only when the spirit blew.
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
767
Sometime in feasts and follies, for he went
Lifelike through all things ; and his thoughts
then rose
Like sparkles in the bright wine, brighter still ;
Sometimes in dreams, and then the shining words
Would wake him in the dark before his face.
All things talked thoughts to him. The sea
went mad
To show his meaning ; and the awful sun
Thundered his thoughts into him ; and at night
The stars would whisper theirs, the moon sigh
hers.
philip james Bailey.
THE POET'S IMPULSE.
from "childe harold's pilgrimage," canto iii.
Sky, mountains, river, winds, lake, lightnings !
ye !
With night, and clouds, and thunder, and a
soul
To make these felt and feeling, well may be
Things (that have made me watchful ; the far
roll
Of your departing voices is the knoll
Of what in me is sleepless, — if I rest.
But where of ye, O tempests ! is the goal ?
Are ye like those within the human breast ?
Or do ye find, at length, like eagles, some high
nest ?
Could I embody and unbosom now
That which is most within me, — could I wreak
My thoughts upon expression, and thus throw
Soul, heart, mind, passions, feelings, strong or
weak.
All that I would have soug...,, and all ±. see_.
Bear, know, feel, and yet breathe — into one
word.
And that one worv. were Lightning, I would
speak ;
But as it is, 1 live an.» die unheard.
With a most voiceless thought, sheathing it as a
sword.
Lord Byron.
THE INNER VISION.
Most sweet it is with unuplifted eyes
To pace the ground, if path there be or none,
While a fair region round the traveller lies
Which he forbears again to look upon ;
Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene.
The work of fancy, or some happy tone
Of meditation, slipping in between
The beauty coming and the beauty gone.
Í3-.
If Thought and Love desert us, from that day
Let us break off all commerce with the Muse :
With Thought and Love companions of our way,—
Whate'er the senses take or may refuse, —
The mind's internal Heaven shall shed her dews
Of inspiration on the humblest lay.
william wordsworth.
THE POET OF TO-DAY.
Moke than the soul of ancient song is given
To thee, 0 poet of to-day ! — thy dower
iComes, from a higher than Olympian heaven.
In holier beauty and in larger power.
To thee Humanity, her woes revealing.
Would all her griefs and ancient wrongs re¬
hearse ;
Would make thy song the voice of her appealing.
And sob her mighty sorrows through thy verse.
While in her season of great darkness sharing.
Hail thou the coming of each promise-star
Which climbs the midnight of her long despair¬
ing.
And watch for morning o'er the hills afar.
Wherever Truth her holy warfare wages.
Or Freedom pines, there let thy voice be heard;
Sound like a prophet-warning down the ages
The human utterance of God's living word.
But bring not thou the battle's stormy chorus.
The tramp of armies, and the roar of fight.
Not war's hot smoke to taint the sweet morn
o'er us.
Nor blaze of pillage, reddening up the night.
0, let thy lays prolong that angel-singing.
Girdling with music the Redeemer's star.
And breathe God's peace, to earth "glad tidings "
bringing
From the near heavens, of old so dim and far !
Sarah Jane Lippincott {Groa Grcmwaodi,
BOOKS.
from "the kaleder of sheperdes," i5ä
He that many bokes redys,
Cunnyinge shall he be.
Wysedóme is soone caught ;
In many leues it is sought :
But slouth, that no boke bought.
For reason taketh no thought ;
His thryfte cometh behjmde.
Anonymous.
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND EEFLECTION.
BOOKS.
For why, who writes such histories as these
Doth often bring the reader's heart such ease.
As when they sit and see what he doth note,
"Well fare his heart, say they, this book that
wrote !
john higgins.
THE FLOWER.
How fresh, 0 Lord, how sweet and clean
Are thy returns ! even as the flowers in spring ;
To which, besides their own demean,
The late-past frosts tributes of pleasure bring.
Grief melts away
Like snow in May,
As if there were no such cold thing.
Who would have thought my shrivelled heart
Could have recovered greenness ! It was gone
Quite underground ; as flowers depart
To see their mother root, when they have blown ;
Where they together
All the hard weather,
, Dead to the world, keen house unknown.
These are thy wonders. Lord of power.
Killing and quickning, bringing down to hell
And up to heaven in an houre ;
Making a chiming of a passing-bell.
We say amisse.
This or that is :
Thy word is all, if we could spell.
0 that I once past changing were.
Fast in thy paradise, where no flower can wither !
Many a spring I shoot up fair,
Ofiring at heav'n, growing and groning thither ;
Nor doth my flower
Want a spring-showre.
My sinnes and I joining together.
But, while I grow in a straight line.
Still upwards bent, as if heav'n were mine own.
Thy anger comes, and 1 decline :
What frost to that ? what pole is not the zone
Where all things burn.
When thou dost turn.
And the least frown of thine is shown ?
And now in age I bud again ;
After so many deaths I live and write ;
1 once more smell the dew and rain.
And relish versing : 0 my only light.
If cannot be
That I am he
On whom thy tempests fell all night !
These are thy wonders. Lord of love,
To make us see we are but flowers that glide ;
Which when we once can finde and prove.
Thou hast a garden for us where to bide.
Who would be more.
Swelling through store.
Forfeit their paradise by their pride.
GEORGE HERRERn
—»—
YUSSOUF.
A STRANGER came one night to Yussoufs tent.
Saying, " Behold one outcast and in dread.
Against whose life the bow of power is bent.
Who flies, and hath not where to lay his head ;
I come to thee for shelter and for food.
To Yussouf, called through all our tribes 'The
Good.' "
" This tent is mine, " said Yussouf, " but no more
Than it is God's ; come in, and be at peace ;
Freely shalt thou partake of all my store
As I of his who buildeth over these
Our tents his glorious roof of night and day.
And at whose door none ever yet heard Nay."
So Yussouf entertained his guest that night.
And, waking him ere day, said : " Here is gold.
My swiftest horse is saddled for thy flight.
Depart before the prying day grow bold."
As one lamp lights another, nor grows less.
So nobleness enkindleth nobleness.
That inward light the stranger's face made grand.
Which shines from all self-conquest ; kneeling low.
He bowed his forehead upon Yussoufs hand.
Sobbing : "0 Sheik, I cannot leave thee so ;
I will repay thee ; all this thou hast done
Unto that Ibrahim who slew thy son ! "
" Take thrice the gold," said Yussouf, " for with
thee ' _•
Into the desert, never to return.
My one black thought shall ride away from me ;
First-bom, for whom by day and night I yearn.
Balanced and just are all of God's decrees ;
Thou art avenged, my first-born, sleep in peace ! "
James Russell Lowell.
ABOU BEN ADHEM.
Abott Ben Adhem (may his tribe increase !)
Awoke one night from a deep dream of peace.
And saw within the moonlight in his room.
Making it rich and like a lily in bloom,
An angel writing in a book of gold :
Exceeding peace had made Ben Adhem bold.
'S-
■tr
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
769
And to the presence in the room he said,
"What writest thou ? " The vision raised its head,
And, with a look made of all sweet accord,
Answered, "The names of those who love the Lord."
" And is mine one ? " said Abou. " Nay, not so,"
Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low.
But cheerly still ; and said, " I pray thee, then.
Write me as one that loves his fellow-men."
The angel wrote, and vanished. The next night
It came again, with a great wakening light.
And showed the names whom love of God had
blessed, —
And, lo ! Ben Adhem's name led all the rest !
LEIGH HUNT.
BEAUTY.
I HAD a dream,.one glorious, summer night.
In the rich bosom of imperial June.
Languid I lay upon an odorous couch.
Golden with amber, festooned wildly o'er
With crimson roses ; and the longing stars
Wept tears of light upon their clustered leaves.
Above me soared the azure vault of heaven.
Vast and majestic ; cinctured with that path
Whereby, perchance, the sea-born Venus found
Her way to higher spheres ; that path which seems
A coronet of silver, gemmed with stars.
And bound upon the forehead of the night.
There, as I lay, the musical south wind
Shook all the roses into muimurous life,
And poured their fragrance o'er me, in a shower
Of crimson mist ; and softly, through the mist.
Came a low, sweet, enchanting melody,
A far-off echo from the land of dreams.
Which with delicious languor filled the air.
And steeped in bliss the senses and the soul.
Then rose a shape, a dim and ghostly shape.
Whereto no feature was, nor settled fonn,
A shadowy splendor, seeming as it came
A pearly summer cloud, shot through and through
With faii\test rays of sunset ; yet within
A spirit dwelt ; and, floating from within,
A murmur trembled sweetly into words : —
I am the ghost of a most lovely dream.
Which haunted, in old days, a poet's mind.
And long he sought for, wept, and prayed for me ;
And searched through all the chambers of his soul.
And searched the secret places of the earth.
The lonely forest and the lonely shore ;
And listened to the voices of the sea.
What time the stars shone out, and midnight cold
Slept on the dark waves whispering at his feet ;
And sought the mystery in a human form.
Amid the haunts of men, and found it not ;
And looked in woman's fond, bewildering eyes.
And mirrored there his own, and saw no sign :
But only in his sleep I came to him.
And gave him fitful glimpses of my face.
Whereof he after sang, in sweetest words ;
Then died, and came to me. But evermore.
Through lonely days, and passion-haunted nights,
A life of starlit gloom, do poets seek
To rend the mystic veil that covers me.
And evermore they grasp the empty air.
For only in their dreams I come to them.
And give them fitful glimpses of my face.
And lull them, siren-like, with words of hope —
That promise, sometime, to their ravished eyes.
Beauty, the secret of the universe,
God's thought, that gives the soul eternal peace.
Then thevoice ceased, and only, through the mist.
The shaken roses murmured, and the wind.
William Winter.
VANITY.
The sun comes up and the sun goes down.
And day and night are the same as one ;
The year grows green, and the year grows brown.
And what is it all, when all is done ?
Grains of sombre or shining sand.
Gliding into and out of the hand.
And men go down in ships to the seas.
And a hundred ships are the same as one ;
And backward and forward blows the breeze.
And what is it all, when all is done ?
A tide with never a shore in sight
Getting steadily on to the night.
The fisher droppeth his net in the stream.
And a hundred streams are the same as one ;
And the maiden dreameth her love-lit dream.
And what is it all, when all is done ?
The net of the fisher the burden breaks.
And alway the dreaming the dreamer wakes.
Harriet Prescott Spofford.
A PSALM OF LIFE.
Tell me not, in mournful numbers,
Life is but an empty dream !
For the soul is dead that slumbers.
And things are not what they seem.
Life is real ! Life is earnest !
And the grave is not its goal ;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest.
Was not spoken of the soul.
Not enjoyment, and not soitow.
Is our destined end or way ;
But to act, that each to-morrow
Find us farther than to-day.
Art is long, and Time is fleeting,
And our hearts, though stout and brave.
Still, like muffled drums, are beating
Funeral marches to the grave.
In the world's broad field of battle.
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle !
Be a hero in the strife !
Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant !
Let the dead Past bury its dead !
Act, — act in the living Present !
Heart within, and God o'erhead !
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And, departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time ; —
Footprints, that perhaps another.
Sailing o'er life's solemn main,
A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,
Seeing, shall take heart again.
Let us, then, be up and doing.
With a heart for any fate ;
Still achieving, still pursuing.
Learn to labor and to wait.
Henry wadsworth Longfellow.
MY LEGACY.
Thet told me I was heir : I turned in haste.
And ran to seek my treasure,
And wondered, as I ran, how it was placed, —
If I should find a measure
Of gold, or if the titles of fair lands
And houses would be laid within my hands.
I journeyed many roads ; I knocked at gates ;
I spoke to each wayfarer
I met, and said, "A heritage awaits
Me. Art not thou the bearer
Of news ? some message sent to me whereby
I leam which way my new possessions lie ? "
Some asked me in ; naught lay beyond their door ;
Some smüed, and would not tarry.
But said that men were just behind who bore
More gold than I could cany ;
And so the mom, the noon, the day, were spent.
While empty-handed up and down I went.
At last one cried, whose face I could not see.
As through the mists he hasted ;
" Poor child, what evil ones have hindered thee
Till this whole day is wasted ?
Hath no man told thee that thou art joint heir'
With one named Christ, who waits the goods to
share ? "
The one named Christ I sought for many days,
In many places vainly ;
I heard men name his name in many ways ;
I . saw his temples plainly ;
But they who named him most gave me no sign
To find him by, or prove the heirship mine.
And when at last I stood before his face,
I knew him by no token
Save subtle air of joy which filled the place ;
Our greeting was not spoken ;
In solemn silence I received my share.
Kneeling before my brother and "joint heir."
My share ! No deed of house or spreading lands,
As I had dreamed ; no measure
Heaped up with gold ; my elder brother's hands
Had never held such treasure.
Foxes have holes, and birds in nests are fed :
My brother had not where to lay his head.
My share ! The right like him to know all pain
Which hearts are made for knowing ;
The right to find in loss the surest gain ;
To reap my joy from sowing
In bitter tears ; the right with him to keep
A watch by day and night with all who weep.
My share ! To-day men call it grief and death ;
1 see the joy and life to-morrow ;
I thank my Father with my every breath.
For this sweet legacy of sorrow ;
And through my tears I call to each "joint heii- "
With Christ, "Make haste to ask him for thy
share."
Helen Hunt Jackson.
SYMPATHY.
prom " ion." act i. sc. 2.
'T is a little thing
To give a cup of water ; yet its draught
Of cool refreshment, drained by fevered lips.
May give a shock of pleasure to the frame
More exquisite than when nectarean juice
Renews the life of joy in happier hours.
It is a little thing to speak a phrase
Of common comfort which by daily use
Has almost lost its sense, yet on the ear
Of him who thought to die unmoumed't will fall
Like choicest music, fill the glazing eye
With gentle tears, relax the knotted hand
To know the bonds of fellowship again ;
And shed on the departing soul a sense.
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
771
•a
More precious than the becison of friends
About the honored death-bed of the rich,
To him who else were lonely, that another
Of the great family is near and feels.
sir Thomas Noon Talfourd.
ALEXANDER'S FEAST ; OR, THE POWER
OF MUSIC.
'T WAS at the royal feast, for Persia won
By Philip's warlike son :
Aloft in awful state
The godlike hero sate
On his imperial throne :
His valiant peers were placed around.
Their brows with roses and with myrtles bound
(So should desert in arms be crowned) ;
The lovely Thais, by his side.
Sate like a blooming Eastern bride
In flower of youth and beauty's pride.
Happy, happy, happy pair !
None but the brave.
None but the brave,
None but the brave deserves the fair.
CHORUS.
Happy, happy, happy pair !
Neme hut the brave, ^
Neme but the bram.
None but the brave deserves the fair.
Timotheus, placed on high ■
Amid the tuneful choir.
With flying fingers touched the lyre ;
The trembling notes ascend the sky.
And heavenly joys inspire.
The song began from Jove,
Who left his blissful seats above
(Such is the power of mighty love).
A dragon's fiery form belied the god ;
Sublime on radiant spires he rode.
When he to fair Olympia pressed,
And while he sought her snowy breast ;
Then round her slender waist he curled,
And stamped an image of himself, a sovereign
of the world.
The listening crowd admire the lofty sound,
A present deity ! they shout around ;
A present deity ! the vaulted roofs rebound.
With ravished ears
The monarch hears.
Assumes the god.
Affects to nod.
And seems to shake the spheres.
CHORUS.
With ravished ears
The monarch hears.
Assumes the god.
Affects to nod.
And seems to shake the spheres.
The praise of Bacchus then the sweet musician
sung.
Of Bacchus — ever fair and ever young :
The jolly god in triumph comes ;
Sound the trumpets ; beat the drums :
Flushed with a purple grace
He shows his honest face :
Now give the hautboys breath. He comes ! he
comes !
Bacchus, ever fair and young.
Drinking joys did first ordain ;
Bacchus' blessings are a treasure.
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure ;
Rich the treasure.
Sweet the pleasure.
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
CHORUS.
Bacchus' blessings are a breaswre.
Drinking is the soldier's pleasure
B,ich the treasm-e.
Sweet the pleasure.
Sweet is pleasure after pain.
Soothed with the sound the king grew vain ;
Fought all his battles o'er again ;
And thrice he routed all his foes, and thrice he
slew the slain.
• The master saw the madness rise ;
His glowing cheeks, his ardent eyes ;
And, while he heaven and earth defied.
Changed his hand and checked his pride.
He chose a mournful muse.
Soft pity to infuse :
He sung Darius, great and good.
By too severe a fate.
Fallen, faUen, fallen, fallen.
Fallen from his high estate.
And weltering in his blood ;
Deserted, at his utmost need.
By those his former bounty fed ;
On the bare earth exposed he lies.
With not a friend to close his eyes.
With downcast looks the joyless victor sate.
Revolving in his altered soul
The various turns of chance below ;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole ;
And tears began to flow.
•g
772
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
CHOEUS.
Bevolving in his altered soul
The various turns of chance helovj;
And, now and then, a sigh he stole ;
And tears began to flow.
The mighty master smiled, to see
That love was in the next degree ;
'T was but a kindred sound to move.
For pity melts the mind to love.
Softly sweet, in Lydian measures.
Soon he soothed his soul to pleasures.
"War, he sung, is toil and trouble ;
Honor, but an empty bubble ;
Never ending, still beginning.
Fighting still, and still destroying ;
If the world be worth thy winning.
Think, 0, think it worth enjoying !
Lovely Thais sits beside thee.
Take the good the gods provide thee.
The many rend the skies with loud applause ;
So Love was crowned, but Music won the cause.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain.
Gazed on the fair
Who caused his care.
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked.
Sighed and looked, and sighed again :
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed.
The vanquished victor sunk upon her breast.
CHORUS.
The prince, unable to conceal his pain,
Gazed on the fair
Who caused his care.
And sighed and looked, sighed and looked.
Sighed and looked, and sighed again :
At length, with love and wine at once oppressed.
The vanquished victor swnk upon her breast.
Now strike the golden lyre again :
A louder yet, and yet a louder strain.
Break his bands of sleep asunder.
And rouse him, like a rattling peal of thunder.
Hark, hark, the horrid sound
Has raised up his head ;
As awaked from the dead.
And amazed, he stares around.
Revenge ! revenge ! Timotheus cries.
See the furies arise !
See the snakes that they rear.
How they hiss in their hair.
And the sparkles that flash from their eyes !
Behold a ghastly band.
Each a torch in his hand !
Those are Grecian ghosts, that in battle were slain.
And unburied remain.
Inglorious on the plain :
Give the vengeance due
To the valiant crew.
Behold how they toss their torches on high.
How they point to the Persian abodes.
And glittering temples of their hostile gods !
The princes applaud with a furious joy ;
And the king seized a flambeau with zeal to de¬
stroy :
Thais led the way.
To light him to his prey.
And, like another Helen, flred another Troy !
CHORUS.
And the king seized a flamJbeau with zeal to de¬
stroy :
Thais led the way.
To light him to his prey.
And, like another Helen, fired another Troy !
Thus, long ago.
Ere heaving bellows learned to blow,
"While organs yet were mute ;
Timotheus, to his breathing flute.
And sounding lyre.
Could swell the soul to rage, or kindle soft desire.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame ;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store.
Enlarged the former narrow bounds.
And added length to solemn sounds.
With nature's mother-wit, and arts unknown
before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize.
Or both divide the crown ;
He raised a mortal to the skies.
She drew an angel down.
GRAND CHORUS.
At last divine Cecilia came,
Inventress of the vocal frame ;
The sweet enthusiast, from her sacred store,
Enlarged the former narrow bounds.
And added length to solemn sounds.
With naiure's mother-wit, and arts unlcnowit
before.
Let old Timotheus yield the prize.
Or both divide the crown ;
He raised a mortal to the skies.
She drew an angel dawn.
JOHN DRYDEK
«
INVOCATION.
FROH " THE DAVIDEIS."
Awake, awake, my Lyre !
And tell thy silent master's humble tale
In sounds that may prevail ;
Soimds that gentle thoughts inspire :
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
773
■a
Though so exalted she,
And I so lowly be,
Tell her, such different notes make all thy har¬
mony.
Hark ! how the strings awake :
And, though the moving hand approach not near.
Themselves with awful fear
A kind of numerous trembling make.
Now all thy forces try ;
Now all thy charms apply ;
Revenge upon her ear the conquests of her eye.
Weak L3ri'e ! thy virtue sure
Is useless here, since thou art only found
To cure, but not to wound.
And she to wound, but not to cure.
Too weak, too, wilt thou prove
My passion to remove ;
Physic to other ills, thou 'rt nourishment to love.
Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre !
For thou canst never tell my humble tale
In sounds that will prevail.
Nor gentle thoughts in her inspire ;
All thy vain mirth lay by.
Bid thy strings silent lie.
Sleep, sleep again, my Lyre, and let thy master
die.
Abraham Cowley.
THE PASSIONS.
an ode for music.
When Music, heavenly maid, was young.
While yet in early Greece she sung,
The Passions oft, to hear her shell.
Thronged around her magic cell, —
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting.
Possessed beyond the muse's painting ;
By turns they felt the glowing mind
Disturbed, delighted, raised, refined ;
Till once, 't is said, when all were fired.
Filled with fury, rapt, inspired,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatched her instruments of sound ;
And, as they oft had heard apart
Sweet lessons of her forceful art.
Each (for madness ruled the hour)
Would prove his own expressive power.
First Fear his hand, its skill to try.
Amid the chords bewildered laid.
And back recoiled, he knew not why.
E'en at the sound himself had made.
Next Anger rushed ; his eyes, on fire.
In lightnings owned his secret stings :
In one rude clash he struck the lyre.
And swept with hurried hand the strings.
With woful measures wan Despair,
Low, sullen sounds, his grief beguiled,—
A solemn, strange, and mingled air ;
'T was sad by fits, by starts't was wild.
But thou, 0 Hope, with eyes so fair, —
What was thy delightful measure ?
Still it whispered promised pleasure.
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail '
StiU would her touch the strain prolong ;
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale.
She called on Echo still, through all the song ;
And where her sweetest theme she chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close;
And Hope, enchanted, smiled, and waved her
golden hair.
And longer had she sung — but, with a frown,
Revenge impatient rose ;
He threw his blood-stained sword in thunder
down ;
And, with a withering look.
The war-denouncing trumpet took.
And blew a blast so loud and dread,
Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe !
And ever and anon he beat
The doubling drum with furious heat ;
And though, sometimes, each dreary pause be¬
tween.
Dejected Pity, at his side.
Her soul-subduing voice applied.
Yet still he kept his wild, unaltered mien.
While each strained ball of sight seemed bursting
from his head.
Thy numbers. Jealousy, to naught were fixed,—
Sad proof of thy distressful state ;
Of differing themes the veering song was mixed ;
And now it courted Love, — now, raving,
called on Hate.
With eyes upraised, as one inspired.
Pale Melancholy sate retired ;
And from her wild sequestered seat.
In notes by distance made more sweet.
Poured through the mellow horn her pensive
soul :
And, dashing soft from rocxs around.
Bubbling runnels joined the sound ;
Through glades and glooms the mingled meas¬
ure stole ;
Or o'er some haunted stream, with fond delay.
Round an holy calm diffusing.
Love of peace, and lonely musing,
In hollow murmurs died away.
L
■
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7* 774 POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
1
But 0, how altered was its aprightlier tone
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healtldest hue,
Her how across her shoulder flung,
Her buskins gemmed with morning dew.
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket
rung, —
The hunter's call, to faun and dryad known !
The oak-crowned sisters, and their chaste-eyed
queen.
Satyrs and sylvan boys, were seen
Peeping from forth their alleys green ;
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear ;
And Sport leapt up, and seized his heechen
spear.
Last came Joy's ecstatic trial :
He, with viny crown advancing.
First to the lively pipe his hand addrest ;
But soon he saw the brisk-awakening viol.
Whose sweet entrancingvoice he loved the best ;
They would have thought, who heard the strain.
They saw, in Tempo's vale, her native maids
Amidst the festal-sounding shades,
To some unwearied minstrel dancing.
While, as his flying fingers kissed the strings.
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round ;
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound ;
And he, amidst his frolic play.
As if he would the charming air repay.
Shook thousand odors from his dewy wings.
0 Music ! sphere-descended maid.
Friend of pleasure, wisdom's aid !
Why, goddess, why, to us denied,
Lay'st thou thy ancient lyre aside ?
As, in that loved Athenian bower.
You learned an all-commanding power.
Thy mimic soul, 0 nymph endeared,
Can well recall what then it heard.
Where is thy native simple heart.
Devote to virtue, fancy, art ?
Arise, as in that elder time.
Warm, energetic, chaste, sublime !
Thy wonders, in that godlike age.
Fill thy recording sister's page ;
'T is said—and 1 believe the tale —
Thy humblest reed could more prevail.
Had more of strength, diviner rage,
Than all which charms this laggard age, —
E'en aU at once together found, —
Cecilia's mingled world of sound.
0, bid our vain endeavors cease ;
Revive the just designs of Greece !
Return in all thy simple state, —
Confirm the tales her sons relate !
William Collins.
THE NIGHTINGALE'S SONG.
from "music's duel."
Now westward Sol had spent the richest beams
Of noon's high glory, when, hard by the streams
Of Tiber, on the scene of a green plat.
Under protection of an oak, there sat
A sweet lute's-master, in whose gentle airs
He lost the day's heat and his own hot cares.
Close in the covert of the leaves there stood
A nightingale, come from the neighboring wood
(The sweet inhabitant of each glad tree.
Their muse, their siren, harmless siren she) :
There stood she listening, and did entertain
The music's soft report, and mould the same
In her own murmurs ; that whatever mood
His curious fingers lent, her voice made good.
This lesson too
She gives them back ; her supple breast thrills
out
Sharp airs, and staggers in a warbling doubt
Of dallying sweetness, hovers o'er her skiU,
And folds in waved notes, with a trembling bill.
The pliant series of her slippery song ;
Then starts she suddenly into a throng
Of short thick sobs, whose thundering volleys
float.
And roll themselves over her lubric throat
In panting murmurs, stilled out of her breast ;
That ever-bubbling spring, the sugared nest
Of her delicious soul, that there does lie
Bathing in streams of liquid melody ;
Music's best seed-plot ; when in ripened airs
A golden-headed harvest fairly rears
His honey-dropping tops ploughed by her breath
Which there reciprocally laboreth.
In that sweet soil it seems a holy quire.
Sounded to the name of great Apollo's lyre ;
Whose silver roof rings with the sprightly notes
Of sweet-lipped angel-imps, that S'will their
throats
In cream of morning Helicon, and then
Prefer soft anthems to the ears of men.
To woo them from their beds, still murmuring
That men can sleep while they their matins sing
(Most divine service), whose so early lay
Prevents the eyelids of the blushing day.
There might you hear her kindle her soft voice
In the close murmur of a sparkling noise ;
And lay the groundwork of her hopeful song.
Still keeping in the forward stream so long.
Till a sweet whirlwind (striving to get out)
Heaves her soft bosom, wanders round about.
And makes a pretty earthquake in her breast.
Till the fledged notes at length forsake their nest.
Fluttering in wanton shoals, and to the sky.
Winged -with their own wild echoes, prattling fly.
r
f
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
775
n
She ope^the floo(|gate, and|lets loose\a tide
Of streaming sweetness, which in state doth ride
On the waved back of every swelling strain,
Rising and falling in a pompous train ;
And while she thus discharges a shriU peal
Of flashing airs, she qualifies their zeal
With the cool epode of a graver note ;
Thus high, thus low, as if her silver throat
Would reach the brazen voice of war's hoarse bird;
Her Uttle soul is ravished, and so poured
Into loose ecstasies, that she is placed
Above herself, music's enthusiast.
Richard Crashaw.
A SONG FOR ST. CECILIA'S DAY, 1687.
: hai|mony,^from heavenly harmony
fhis universal frame Began ;
From 1
This'i
When Nature underneath a heap
Of jarring atoms lay.
And could not heave her head.
The tuneful voice was heard from high.
Arise, ye more than dead !
Then cold and hot, and moist and dry.
In order to their stations leap.
And Music's power obey.
From harmony, from heavenly harmony, *
This universal frame began ;
From harmony to harmony.
Through all the compass of the notes it ran,
The diapason closing full in man.
What passion cannot Music raise and quell ?
When Jubal struck the chorded sheU,
His listening brethren stood around.
And, wondering, on their faces fell.
To worship that celestial sound.
Less than a God they thought there could not dwell
Within the hollow of that shell.
That spoke so sweetly and so well.
What passion cannot Music raise and quell 1
The trumpet's loud clangor
Excites us to arms,
With shrill notes of anger.
And mortal alarms.
The double double double beat
Of the thundering drum
Cries, Hark ! the foes come ;
Charge, charge, 't is too late to retreat 1
The soft complaining flute
In dying notes discovers
The woes of hopeless lovers.
Whose dirge is whispered by the warbling lute.
Sharp violins proclaim
Their jealous pangs, and desperation.
Fury, frantic indignation.
Depth of pains, and height of passion
For the fair, disdainful dame.
But 0, what art can teach.
What human voice can reach,
The sacred organ's praise ?
Notes inspiring holy love.
Notes that wing their heavenly ways
To mend the chohs above.
Orpheus could lead the savage race ;
And trees uprooted left their place.
Sequacious of the lyre ;
But bright Cecilia raised the wonder higher ;
When to her organ vocal breath was given.
An angel heard, and straight appeared
Mistaking earth for heaven.
grand chorus.
As from the power of sacred lays
7%« spheres began to tnove,
And sung the great Creator's praise
To all the blessed above ;
So, when the last and dreadful hour
This crumblingpctgeant shall devour.
The trumpet shall be heard on high.
The dead shall live, the living die.
And Musie shall untwne the sky.
John drvden.
MUSIC.
from "the merchant of venice." act v. sc. i.
Lorenzo. How sweet the moonlight sleeps
upon this bank !
Here will we sit, and let the sounds of music
Creep in our ears : soft stillness, and the night,
Become the touches of sweet harmony.
Sit, Jessica ; look, how the floor of heaven
Is thick inlaid with patines of bright gold :
There's not the smallest orb which thou be-
hold'st.
But in his motion like an angel sings,
Still quiring to the young-eyed chérubins ;
Such harmomy is in immortal souls :
But whilst this muddy vesture of decay
Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.
Jessica. I am never merry when I hear sweet
music.
Lor. The reason is your spirits are attentive.
Therefore the poet
Did feign that Orpheus drew trees, stones, and
floods ;
e-
776
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Since naught so stockish, hard, and full of rage,
But music for the time doth change his nature.
The man that hath no music in himself.
Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds.
Is fit for treasons, stratagems, an(} spoils ;
The motions of his spirit are dull as night.
And his affections dark as Erebus :
Let no such man be trusted.
Shakespeare.
TO
Mtisic, when soft voices die.
Vibrates in the memory, —
Odors, when sweet violets sicken.
Live within the sense they quicken.
Rose-leaves, when the rose is dead.
Are heaped for the belovèd's bed ;
And so thy thoughts, when thou art gone.
Love itself shall slumber on.
Percy Bvsshe Shelley.
MAN.
from " night thoughts," night i.
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august,
How complicate, how wonderful, is man !
How passing wonder He who made him such !
Who centred in our make such strange extremes,
From different natures marvellously mixed.
Connection exquisite of distant worlds !
Distinguished link in being's endless chain !
Midway from nothing to the Deity !
A beam ethereal, sullied, and absorpt !
Though sullied and dishonored, still divine !
Dim miniature of greatness absolute !
An heir of glory ! a fraU child of dust !
Helpless immortal ! insect infinite !
A worm ! a god ! — I tremble at myself.
And in myself am lost. At home a stranger.
Thought wanders up and down, surprised, aghast.
And wondering at her own. How reason reels !
0, what a miracle to man is man !
Triumphantly distressed ! What joy ! what dread !
Alternately transported and alarmed !
What can preseiwe my life ? or what destroy ?
An angel's arm can't snatch me from the grave ;
Legions of angels can't confine me there.
Dr. Edward Young.
MAN —WOMAN.
Man's home is everywhere. On ocean's flood.
Where the strong ship with storm-defying tether
Doth link in stormy brotherhood
Earth's utmost zones together,
Where'er the red gold glows, the spice-trees wave.
Where the rich diamond ripens, mid the flame
Of vertic suns that ope the stranger's grave.
He with bronzed cheek and daring step doth
rove ;
He, with short pang and slight.
Doth turn him from the checkered light
Of the fair moon through his own foresta
dancing.
Where music, joy, and love
Were his young hours entrancing ;
And where ambition's thunder-claim
Points out his lot.
Or fitful wealth aUures to roam.
There doth he make his home.
Repining not.
It is not thus with Woman. The far halls.
Though ruinous and lone.
Where first her pleased ear drank a nursing-
mother's tone ;
The home with humble walls.
Where breathed a parent's prayer around her
bed ;
The valley where, with playmates true.
She culled the strawberry, bright with dew ;
The bower where Love her timid footsteps led ;
The hearthstone where her children grew •
The damp soil where she cast
The flower-seeds of her hope, and saw them bide
the blast, —
AfiTection with unfading tint recalls.
Lingering round the ivied walls.
Where every rose hath in its cup a bee.
Making fresh honey of remembered things, —
Each rose without a thorn, each bee bereft of
stings.
lydia huntley slgourney.
WOMAN.
There in the fane a beauteous creature stands.
The first best work of the Creator's hands,
Whose slender limbs inadequately bear
A full-orbed bosom and a weight of care ;
Whose teeth like pearls, whose lips like cherries,
show.
And fawn-like eyes still tremble as they giow.
From the Sanskrit of CaliDASA.
Translation of wilson.
APEES.
Down, down, Ellen, my little one.
Climbing so tenderly up to my knee ,
Why should you add to the thoughts that are
taunting me,
Dreams of your mother's arms clinging to me 1
4>
LONGFELLOW IN HIS LIBRARY.
** The heights by great men reached and kept
IVere not attained by sudden flighty
But they^ while their companions slepty
H'ere toiling upward in the nighti'*
f
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
777
Cease, cease, Ellen, my little one,
"Warbling so fairily close to my ear ;
"Why should you choose, of all songs that are
haunting me.
This that I made for your mother to hear ?
Hush, hush, Ellen, my little one.
Wailing so wearily under the stars ;
Why should I think of her tears, that might
light to me
Love that had made life, and sorrow that mars ?
Sleep, sleep, Ellen, my little one !
Is she not like her whenever she stirs ?
Has she not eyes that will soon be as bright to me.
Lips that will some day be honeyed like hers ?
Yes, yes, Ellen, my little one.
Though her white bosom is stilled in the grave.
Something more white than her bosom is spared
to me, —
Something to cling to and something to crave.
Love, love, Ellen, my little one !
Love indestructible, love undefiled,
. Love through all deeps of her spirit lies bared
to me.
Oft as 1 look on the face of her child.
ARTHUR J. MUNBV.
FORTUNE.
from "fanny."
Btrr Fortune, like some others of her sex,
Delights in tantalizing and tormenting.
One day we feed upon their smiles, — the next
Is spent in swearing, sorrowing, and repenting.
Eve never walked in Paradise more pure
Than on that mom when Satan played the devil
With her and aU her race. A lovesick wooer
Ne'er asked a kinder maiden, or more civil.
Than Cleopatra was to Antony
The day she left him on the Ionian sea.
The serpent — loveliest in his coUèd ring.
With eye that charms, and beauty that outvies
The tints of the rainbow — bears upon his sting
The deadliest venom. Ere the dolphin dies
Its hues are brightest. Like an infant's breath
Are tropic winds before the voice of death
Is heard upon the waters, summoning
The midnight earthquake from its sleep of years
To do its task of woe. The clouds that fling
The lightning brighten ere the bolt appears ;
The pantings of the warrior's heart are proud
Upon that battle-mom whose night-dews wet his
shroud ;
The sun is loveliest as he sinks to rest ;
The leaves of autumn smile when fading fast ;
The swan's last song is sweetest.
fitz-crebne hau.eck.
ENID'S SONG.
from " idyls of the king."
Tuen, Fortune, turn thy wheel and lower the
proud ;
Turn thy wild wheel through sunshine, storm,
and cloud ;
Thy wheel and thee we neither love nor hate.
Turn, Fortune, tum thy wheel with smile or
frown ;
With that wild wheel we go not up or down ;
Our hoard is little, but our hearts are great.
Smile and we smile, the lords of many lands ;
Frown and we smile, the lords of our own hands :
For man is man and master of his fate.
Tum, tum thy wheel above the staring crowd ;
Thy wheel and thou are shadows in the cloud ;
Thy wheel and thee we neither love nor hate.
Alfred Tennyson.
EXCELSIOR.
The shades of night were falling fast.
As through an Alpine village passed
A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice,
A banner with the strange device —
Excelsior !
His brow was sad ; his eye beneath
Flashed like a falchion from its sheath ;
And like a silver clarion mng
The accents of that unknown tongue —
Excelsior !
In happy homes he saw the light
Of household fires gleam warm and bright •
Above, the spectral glaciers shone.
And from his lips escaped a groan —
Excelsior !
"Try not the pass," the old man said :
" Dark lowers the tempest overhead ;
The roaring torrent is deep and wide ! "
And loud that clarion voice replied.
Excelsior !
a
í&
778
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
" O stay," the maiden said, "and rest
Thy weary head upon this breast ! "
A tear stood in his bright blue eye.
But still he answered, with a sigh.
Excelsior !
" Beware the pine-tree's withered branch !
Beware the awful avalanche ! "
This was the peasant's last good-night :
A voice replied, far up the height.
Excelsior !
At break of day, as heavenward
The, pious monks of Saint Bernard
Uttered the oft-repeated prayer,
A voice cried, through the startled air.
Excelsior !
A traveller, by the faithful hound.
Half buried in the snow was found,
Still grasping in his hand of ice
That banner with the strange device —
Excelsior !
There in the twilight cold and gray,
Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay.
And from the sky, serene and far,
A voice fell, like a falling star—
Excelsior !
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
THE GIFTS OF GOD.
When God at first made man.
Having a glass of blessings standing by.
Let us (said he) pour on him all we can :
Let the world's riches, which dispersèd lie.
Contract into a span. '
So strength first made a way ;
Then beautyfiowed, then wisdom,honor, pleasure :
When almost all was out, God made a stay,
Perceiving that, alone, of all his treasure,
Rest in the bottom lay.
For if I should (said he)
Bestow this jewel also on my creature.
He would adore my gifts instead of me,
And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature :
So both should losers be.
Yet let him keep the rest.
But keep them with repining restlessness :
Let him be rich and weary, that, at least.
If goodness lead him. not, yet weariness
May toss biin to my breast.
george Herbert.
A RIDDLE.*
the letter " h."
'T WAS in heaven pronounced, and't was mut¬
tered in hell.
And echo caught faintly the sound as it feU ;
On the confines of earth't was permitted to rest.
And the depths of the ocean its presence con¬
fessed ;
'T will be found in the sphere when't is riven
asunder.
Be seen in the lightning and heard in the thunder.
'T was allotted to man with his earliest breath.
Attends him at birth, and awaits him in death.
Presides o'er his happiness, honor, and health,
Is the prop of his house, and the end of his wealth.
In the heaps of the miser't is hoarded with care.
But is sure to be lost on his prodigal heir.
It begins every hope, every wish it must bound.
With the husbandman-toils, and with monarchs
is crowned.
Without it the soldier, the seaman may roam.
But woe to the wretch who expels it from home !
In the whispers of conscience its voice wiR be
found.
Nor e'en in the whirlwind of passion be drowned.
'T will not soften the heart ; but though deaf be
the ear.
It wül make it acutely and instantly hear.
Yet in shade let it rest, like a delicate flower,
Ah, breathe on it softly, — it dies in an hour.
catharine fanshawe.
FATHER LAND AND MOTHER TONGUE.
Our Father Land ! and wouldst thou know
Why we should call it Father Land ?
It is that Adam here below
Was made of earth by Nature's hand ;
And he, our father made of earth.
Hath peopled earth on every hand ;
And we, in memory of his birth.
Do call our country Father Land.
At first, in Eden's bowers, they say.
No sound of speech had Adam caught.
But whistled like a bird all day, —
And maybe't was for want of thought :
But Nature, with resistless laws,
Made Adam soon surpass the birds ;
She gave him lovely Eve because
If he'd a wife they must have words.
And so the native land, I hold.
By male descent is proudly mine ;
The language, as the tale hath told.
Was given in the female line.
* Sometimes attributed to Byron.
a
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
And thus we see on either hand
We name our blessings whence they've sprang;
We caU our country Father Land,
We call our language Mother Tongue.
Samuel Lover.
»
SMALL BEGINNINGS.
A TRAVELLER through a dusty road strewed
acoms on the lea ;
And one took root and sprouted up, and grew
into a tree.
Love sought its shade, at evening time, to breatne
its early vows ;
An age was pleased, in heats of noon, to bask
beneath its boughs ;
The dormouse loved its dangling twigs, the birds
sweet music bore ;
It stood a glory in its place, a blessing evermore.
A little spring had lost its way amid the grass
and fem,
A passing stranger scooped a well, where weary
men might tum ;
He walled it in, and hung with care a ladle at
the brink ;
He thought not of the deed he did, but judged
that toil might drink.
He passed again, and lo 1 the well, by summers
never dried,
Had cooled ten thousand parching tongues, and
saved a life beside.
A dreamer dropped a random thought ; 't was
old, and yet't was new ;
A simple fancy of the brain, but strong in being
• true.
It shone upon a genial mind, and lo ! its light
became
A lamp of life, a beacon ray, a monitory flame.
The thought was small ; its issue great ; a watch-
fire on the hill.
It sheds its radiance far adown, and cheers the
valley still !
A nameless man, amid a crowd that thronged
the daily mart.
Let faU a word of Hope and Love, unstudied,
from the heart ; -
A whisper on the tumult thrown, — a transitory
breath,—
It raised a brother from the dust ; it saved a
soul from death.
0 germ ! O fount ! O word of love ! 0 thought
at random cast I
Ye were but little at the first, but mighty at the
last.
Charles Mackay.
THE RULING PASSION.
from " moral essays," epistle 1.
Search thou the ruling passion ; there, alone,
The wild are constant, and the cunning known ;
The fool consistent and the false sincere ;
Priests, princes, women, no dissemblers here.
In this the lust, in that the avarice.
Were means, not ends ; ambition was the vice.
In this one passion man can strength enjoy,
As fits give vigor just when they destroy.
Time, that on all things lays his lenient hand.
Yet tames not this ; it sticks to our last sand.
Consistent in our follies and our sins.
Here honest Nature ends as she begins.
Old politicians chew on wisdom past.
And totter on in business to the last ;
As weak, as earnest ; and as gravely out.
As sober Lanesborough dancing in the gout.
Behold a reverend sire, whom want of grace
Has made the father of a nameless race.
Shoved from the waU perhaps, or rudely pressed
By his own son, that passes by unblessed ;
¡Still to his wench he crawls on knocking knees.
And envies every sparrow that he sees.
A salmon's belly, Helluo, was thy fate.
The doctor, called, declares all help too late.
" Mercy ! " cries Helluo, " mercy on my soul !
Is there no hope ? —Alas !—then bring the jowl."
The frugal crone, whom praying priests attend.
Still tries to save the haUowed taper's end.
Collects her breath, as ebbing life retires.
For one puflf more, and in that puff expires.
" Odious ! in woollen ! 'twould a saint pro¬
voke,"
Were the last words that poor Narcissa spoke ;
"No, let a charming chintz and Brussels lace \
Wrap my cold limbs, and shade my lifeless face :\
One would not, sure, be frightful when one's
dead,—
And — Betty— give this cheek a little red."
The courtier smooth, who forty years had
shined
An humble servant to all human-kind,
Ju.st brought out this, when scarce his tongue
could stir,
"If— where I'mgoing—I could serve you, sir ? "
" I give and I devise " (old Euclio said.
And sighed) " my lands and tenements to Ned."
Your money, sir ? " My money, sir ! what, all ?
Why — if I must "(then wept)—"I give it
Paul."
The manor, sir ? " The manor, hold ! " he cried,
"Not that, —I cannot part with that," —and
died.
[&
780
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
And you, brave Cobham ! to the latest breath
Shall feel your ruling passion strong in death ;
Such in those moments as in all the past,
" 0, save my country. Heaven ! " shall be your
last.
Alexander pope.
*
CONTRADICTION.
from "conversation.'
Ye powers who rule the tongue, if such there
are.
And make coUoquial happiness your care.
Preserve me from the thing I dread and hate,
A duel in the form of a debate.
The clash of arguments and jar of words.
Worse than the mortal brunt of rival swords.
Decide no question with their tedious length.
For opposition gives opinion strength.
Divert the champions prodigal of breath.
And put the peacefully disposed to death.
0, thwart me not. Sir Soph, at every turn.
Nor carp at every flaw you may discern !
Though syllogisms hang not on my tongue,
I am not surely always in the wrong ;
'T is hard if aU is false that I advance,
A fool must now and then be right by chance.
Not that aU freedom of dissent I blame ;
No, — there I grant the privilege I claim.
A disputable point is no man's ground ;
Rove where you please, 't is common all around.
Discourse may want an animated No,
To brush the surface, and to make it flow ;
But still remember, if you mean to please.
To press your point with modesty and ease.
The mark at which my juster aim I take.
Is contradiction for its own dear sake.
Set your opinion at whatever pitch.
Knots and impediments make something hitch ;
Adopt his own, 't is equally in vain.
Your thread of argument is snapped again.
The wrangler, rather than accord with you,
WiU judge himself deceived, and prove it too.
Vociferated logic kills me quite ;
A noisy man is always in the right.
I twirl my thumbs, fall back into my chair.
Fix on the wainscot a distressful stare.
And, when I hope his blunders are all out.
Reply discreetly, — " To be sure — no doubt ! "
William cowper.
DUELLING.
from "conversation."
The point of honor has been deemed of use.
To teach good manners, and to curb abuse ;
Admit it true, the consequence is clear.
Our polished manners are a mask we wear.
And, at the bottom, barbarous BtiU and rude,
We are restrained, indeed, but not subdued.
The very remedy, however sure.
Springs from the mischief it intends to cure.
And savage in its principle appears.
Tried, as it should be, by the fruit it bears.
'T is hard, indeed, if nothing will defend
Mankind from quarrels but their fatal end ;
That now and then a hero must decease.
That the surviving world may live in peace.
Perhaps at last close scrutiny may show
The practice dastardly and mean and low ;
That men engage in it compelled by force.
And fear, not courage, is its proper source ;
The fear of tyrant custom, and the fear
Lest fops should censure us, and fools should
sneer ;
At least, to trample on our Maker's laws,
And hazard life for any or no cause.
To rush into a fixed eternal state
Out of the very flames of rage and hate.
Or send another shivering to the bar
With aU the guilt of such unnatural war.
Whatever Use may urge, or Honor plead.
On Reason's verdict is a madman's deed.
Am I to set my life upon a throw
Because a bear is rude and surly ? No, —
A moral, sensible, and well-bred man
Will not aflTront me ; and no other can.
Were I empowered to regulate the lists.
They should encounter with well-loaded fists ;
A Trojan combat would be something new.
Let Dares beat Erdellus black and blue ;
Then each might show, to his admiring friends,
In honorable bumps his rich amends.
And carry, in contusions of his skull,
A satisfactory receipt in full.
William Cowper.
FAME.
from " an essay on man." epistle tv.
What's fame?—a fancied life in others'
breath,
A thing beyond us, e'en before our death.
Just what you hear, you have ; and what's un¬
known
The same (my lord) if Tully's, or your own.
All that we feel of it begins and ends
In the small circle of our foes or friends ;
To all beside, as much an empty shade
A Eugene living as a Caesar dead ;
Alike or when or where they shone or shine.
Or on the Rubicon, or on the Rhine.
A wit's a feather, and a chief a rod ;
An honest man's the noblest work of God.
•S
f
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND KEPLECTION.
781
Fame but from deatb a villain's name can save,
As justice tears his body from the grave ;
When what to oblivion better were resigned
Is hung on high, to poison half mankind.
All fame is foreign, but of true desert ;
Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart
One self-approving hour whole years outweighs
Of stupid starers and of loud huzzas ;
And more true joy Marcellus exiled feels
Than Csesar with a senate at his heels.
Alexander pope.
FAME.
Her house is all of Echo made
Where never dies the sound ;
And as her brows the clouds invade.
Her feet do strike the ground.
Ben Jonson.
PERSEVERANCE.
In facile natures fancies quickly grow.
But such quick fancies have but little root.
Soon the narcissus flowers and dies, but slow
The tree whose blossoms shall mature to fruit.
Grace is a moment's happy feeling. Power
A life's slow growth ; and we for many an hour
Must strain and toil, and wait and weep, if we
The perfect fruit of all we are would see.
From the Italian of leonardo da vinci.
Translation of W. W. STORY.
GREATNESS.
prom " an essay on man," epistle iv.
Honor and shame from no condition rise ;
Act well your part, there all the honor lies.
Fortune in men has some small difference made.
One flaunts in rags, one flutters in brocade ;
The cobbler aproned, and the parson gowned.
The friar hooded, and the monarch crowned.
"What differ more (you cry) than crown and
cowl ? "
I '11 tell you, friend ; a wise man and a fool.
You '11 ñnd, if once the monarch acts the monk
Or, cobbler-like, the parson will be drunk.
Worth makes the man, and want of it the feUow ;
The rest is all but leather or prunella.
Stuck o'er with titles, and hung round with
strings.
That thou mayst be by kings, or whores of kings ;
Boast the pure blood of an illustrious race.
In quiet flow from Lucrece to Lucrece ;
But by your fathers' worth if yours you rate.
Count me those only who were good and great.
Go ! if your ancient but ignoble blood
Has crept through scoundrels ever since the flood
Go ! and pretend your family is young.
Nor own your fathers have been fools so long.
What can ennoble sots, or slaves, or cowards ?
Alas ! not all the hlood of all the Howards.
Who wickedly is wise, or madly brave,
' Is but the more a fool, the more a knave.
Who noble ends by noble means obtains,
Or, failing, smUes in exile or in chains.
Like good Aurelius let him reign, or bleed
Like Socrates, that man is great indeed.
Alexander Pope.
REASON AND INSTINCT.
froh "an essay on man," epistle iii.
Whether with reason or with instinct blest.
Know, all enjoy that powerwhich suits them best;
To bliss alike by that direction tend.
And find the means proportioned to their end.
Say, where full instinct is the unerring guide.
What pope or council can they need beside ?
Reason, however able, cool at best.
Cares not for service, or but serves when prest.
Stays till we call, and then not often near ;
But honest instinct comes a volunteer.
Sure never to o'ershoot, but just to hit ;
While still too wide or short is human wit,
Sure by quick nature happiness to gain.
Which heavier reason labors at in vain.
This too serves always, reason never long ;
One must go right, the other may go wrong.
See then the acting and comparing powers
One in their nature, which are two in ours ;
And reason raise o'er instinct as you can.
In this't is God directs, in that't is man.
Who taught the nations of the field and wood
To shun their poison and to choose their food ?
Prescient, the tides or tempests to withstand,
Build on the wave, or arch beneath the sand ?
Who made the spider parallels design.
Sure as De Moivre, without rule or line ?
Who bid the stork, Columbus-like, explore
Heavens not his own, and worlds unknown before?
Who calls the councU, states the certain day.
Who forms the phalanx, and who points the way?
Alexander Pope.
SCANDAL.
from "epistle to dr. arbuthnot," being the "pro¬
logue to the satires."
Cursed be the verse, how well soe'er it flow,
That tends to make one worthy man my foe.
Give virtue scandal, innocence a fear.
Or from the soft-eyed virgin steal a tear !
6^-
e-
782
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
-m
But he who hurts a harmless neighbor's peace,
Insults fallen worth, or beauty in distress.
Who loves a lie, lame slander helps about.
Who writes a libel, or who copies out ;
That fop whose pride affects a patron's name.
Yet absent wounds an author's honest fame ;
Who can your merit selfishly approve.
And show the sense of it without the love ;
Who has the vanity to call you friend.
Yet wants the honor, injured, to defend ;
Who tells whate'er you think, whate'er you
say,
And, if he lie not, must at least betray ;
Who to the Dean and silver bell can swear.
And sees at Canons what was never there ;
Who reads but with a lust to misapply.
Make satire a lampoon, and fiction lie ;
A lash like mine no honest man shall dread,
But all such babbling blockheads in his stead.
alexander pope.
HUMANITY.
hroh "the winter walk at noon : "
"the task," book vi.
I would not enter on my list of friends
(Though graced with polished manners and fine
sense.
Yet wanting sensibility) the man
Who needlessly sets foot upon a worm.
An inadvertent step may crush the snail
That crawls at evening in the public path ;
But he that has humanity, forewarned.
Will tread aside, and let the reptile live.
The creeping vennin, loathsome to the sight.
And charged perhaps with venom, that intrudes,
A visitor unwelcome, into scenes
Sacred to neatness and repose, the alcove,
The chamber, or refectory, may die :
A necessary act incurs no blame.
Not so when, held within their proper bounds.
And guiltless of offence, they range the air.
Or take their pastime in the spacious field :
There they are privileged ; and he that hunts
Or harms them there is guilty of a wrong.
Disturbs the economy of Nature's realm.
Who, when she formed, designed them an abode.
The sum is this ; If man's convenience, health.
Or safety interfere, his rights and claims
Are paramount, and mnst extinguish theirs.
Else they are aU — the Hieane.st things that are —
As free to live, and to enjoy that life.
As God was free to form them at the first.
Who in his sovereign wisdom made them all.
Ye, therefore, who love mercy, teach your sons
To love it too.
William cowper.
OF CRUELTY TO ANIMALS.
from "proverbial philosophy."
Shame upon thee, savage monarch-man, proud
monopolist of reason ;
Shame upon creatioil's lord, the fierce ensan¬
guined despot :
What, man ! are there not enough, hunger and
diseases and fatigue, —
And yet must thy goad or thy thong add another
sorrow to existence ?
What ! art thou not content thy sin hath dragged
down suffering and death
On the poor dumb servants of thy comfort, and
yet must thou rack them with thy spite ?
The prodigal heir of creation hath gambled away
his all, —
Shall he add torment to the bondage that is
galling his forfeit serfs ?
The leader in nature's paean himself hath marred
her psaltery, —
Shall he multiply the din of discord by over¬
straining all the strings ?
The rebel hath fortified his stronghold, shutting
in his vassals with him, —
Shall he aggravate the woes of the besieged by
oppression from within ?
Thou twice-deformed image of thy Maker, thou
hateful representative of Love,
For very shame be merciful, be kind unto the
creatures thou hast ruined !
Earth and her million tribes are cursed for thy
sake„
Earth and her million tribes stUl writhe beneath
thy cruelty :
Liveth there but one among the miUion that shall
not bear witness against thee,
A pensioner of land or air or sea that hath not
whereof it will accuse thee ?
From the elephant toiling at a launch, to the
shrew-mouse in the harvest-field.
From the whale which the harpooner hath
stricken, to the minnow caught upon a pin.
From the albatross wearied in its flight, to the
wren in her covered nest.
From the death-moth and lace-winged dragon-fly
to-the lady-bird and the gnat.
The verdict of all-things is unanimous, flnding
their master cruel :
The dog, thy humble friend, thy trusting, honest
friend ;
The ass, thine uncomplaining slave, drudging
from mom till even ;
The lamb, and the timorous hare, and the laboring
ox at plough ;
The speckled trout basking in the shallow, and
the partridge gleaming in the stubble,
á
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
783
And the stag at bay, and the wenn in thy path,
and the wild bird pining in captivity.
And all things that minister alike to thy life and
thy comfort and thy pride,
Testify with one sad voice that man is a cruel
master.
Martin farquhar Tupfer.
PLEA FOR THE ANIMALS.
from "the seasons: spring."
Ensanguineb man
Is now become the lion of the plain.
And worse. 'The wolf, who from the nightly fold
Fierce drags the bleating prey, ne'er drunk her
milk.
Nor wore her warming fleece ; nor has the steer.
At whose strong chest the deadly tiger hangs.
E'er ploughed for him. They too are tempered
high.
With hunger stung and wild necessity ;
Nor lodges pity in their shaggy breast.
But man, whom nature formed of milder clay.
With every kind emotion in his heart.
And taught alone to weep, — while from her lap
She pours ten thousand delicacies, herbs.
And fruits as numerous as the chops of rain
Or beams that gave them birth, — shall he, fair
form !
Who wears sweet smiles, and looks erect on
heaven,
E'er stoop to mingle with the prowling herd.
And dip his tongue in gore ? The beast of prey.
Blood-stained, deserves to bleed ; but you, ye
flocks.
What have ye done ? ye peaceful people, what.
To merit death ? you who have given us milk
In luscious streams, and lent us your own coat
Against the winter's cold ? And the plain ox.
That haimless, honest, guileless animal.
In what has he offended ? he whose toil.
Patient and ever-ready, clothes the land
With all the. pomp of harvest, — shall he bleed.
And struggling groan beneath the cruel hand.
Even of the clown he feeds ? and that, perhaps.
To sweU the riot of the autumnal feast.
Won by his labor ?
james Thomson.
QUACK MEDICINES.
from "the borough."
But now our Quacks are gamesters, and they
play
With craft and skUl to ruin and hetray ;
With monstrous promise they delude the mind.
And thrive on all that tortures human-kind.
Void of all honor, avaricious, rash.
The daring tribe compound their boasted trash, —
Tincture or, syrup, lotion, drop or pill ;
All tempt the sick to trust the lying bill ;
And twenty names of cobblers turned to squires
Aid the bold language of these blushless liars.
There-are among them those who cannot read.
And yet they 'U buy a patent, and succeed ;
Will dare to°I)romise dying sufferers aid.
For who, when dead, can threaten or upbraid ?
With cruel avarice still they recommend
More draughts, more syrup, to the journey's end.
" I feel it not." "Then take it every hour."
" It makes me worse." " Why, then it shows
its power."
" I fear to die." " Let not your spirits sink.
You're always safe while you believe and drink.'
Troubled with something in your bile or blood.
You think your doctor does you little good ;
And, grown impatient, you require in haste
The nervous cordial, nor dislike the taste ;
It comforts, heals, and strengthens ; nay, you
think
It makes you better every time you drink ;
Who tipples brandy will some comfort feel.
But will he to the medicine set his seal ?
'No class escapes them—from the poor man's pay
The nostrum takes no trifling part away ;
See ! those square patent bottles from the shop
Now decoration to the cupboard's top ;
And there a favorite hoard you '11 find within.
Companions meet ! the julep and the gin.
Observe what ills to nervous females flow.
When the heart flutters and the pulse is low ;
If once induced these cordial sips to try.
All feel the ease, and few the danger fly ;
For, while obtained, of drams they 've all the
force.
And when denied, then drams are the resource.
Who would not lend a sympathizing sigh.
To hear yon infant's pity-moving cry ?
Then the good nurse (who, had she home a brain.
Had sought the cause that made her babe com¬
plain)
Has all her efforts, loving soul ! applied
To set the cry, and not the cause, aside ;
She gave her powerful sweet without remorse.
The sleeping cordial, — she had tried its force.
Repeating oft ; the infant, freed from pain.
Rejected food, but took the dose again.
Sinking to sleep, whUe she her joy expressed,
That her dear charge could sweetly take his rest.
Soon may she spare her cordial ; not a doubt
Remains but quickly he wiU rest without.
George Crabse.
784
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
TO THE UNCO QUID.
My son, these maxims make a rule
And lump them aye thegither :
The Rigid Righteous is a fool,
The Rigid Wise anither :
The cleanest com that e'er was dight
May hae some pyles o' caff in ;
Sae ne'er a fellow-creature slight
For random fits o' daffin.
solomon. BecUs, ^ 16.
o TE wha are sae guid yoursel',
Sae pious and sae holy.
Te 've nought to do but mark and tell
Your neebor's fauts and folly : —
Whase life is like a weel-gaun mill,
Supplied wi' store 0' water,
The heapèt happer's ebbing still,
And still the clap plays clatter.
Hear me, ye venerable core.
As counsel for poor mortals.
That frequent pass douce Wisdom's door.
For glaikit Folly's portals !
I, for their thoughtless, careless sakes,
Would here propone defences,
Their donsie tricks, their black mistakes.
Their failings and mischances.
Ye see your state wi' theirs compared.
And shudder at the niffer ;
But cast a moment's fair regard.
What maks the mighty differ ?
Discount what scant occasion gave
That purity ye pride in.
And (what's aft mair than a' the lave)
Your better art o' hidin'.
Think, when your castigated pulse
Gies now and then a wallop,
What ragings must his veins convulse.
That still eternal gallop :
Wi' wind and tide fair i' your tail.
Eight on ye scud your sea-way ;
But in the teeth o' haith to sail.
It makes an unco leeway.
See Social life and Glee sit down.
All joyous and unthinking.
Till, quite transmugrified, they 're grown
Debauchery and Drinking :
0, would they stay to calculate
The eternal consequences ;
Or your more dreaded hell to state.
Damnation of expenses !
Ye high, exalted, virtuous dames.
Tied up in godly laces.
Before ye gie poor Frailty names,
Suppose a change o' cases ;
A dear-loved lad, convenience snug,
A treacherous inclination,—
But, let me whisper i' your lug.
Ye 're aiblins nae temptation.
Then gently scan your brother man.
Still gentler sister woman ;
Though they may gang a kennin' wrang.
To step aside is human.
One point must still be greatly dark.
The moving why they do it ;
And just as lamely can ye mark
How far perhaps they rue it.
Who made the heart, 't is He alone
Decidedly can try us ;
He knows each chord, — its various tone.
Each spring, — its various bias :
Then at the balance let's be mute.
We never can adjust it ;
What's done we partly may compute.
But know not what's resisted.
Robert buris.
JUDGE NOT.
Judge not ; the workings of his brain
And of his heart thou canst not see ;
What looks to thy dim eyes a stain.
In God's pure light may only be
A scar, brought from some well-won field.
Where thou wouldst only faint and yield.
The look, the air, that frets thy sight
May be a token that below
The soul has closed in deadly fight
With some infernal fiery foe.
Whose glance would scorch thy smiling grace.
And cast thee shuddering on thy face !
The fall thou darest to despise, —
May be the angel's slackened hand
Has suffered it, that he may rise
And take a firmer, surer stand ;
Or, trusting less to earthly things.
May henceforth learn to use his wings.
And judge none lost ; but wait and see.
With hopeful pity, not disdain ;
The depth of the abyss may be
The measure of the height of pain
And love and glory that may raise
This soul to God in after days !
adeuudb anne procter.
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
785
a
L' ALLEGRO.
Hence, loathed Melancholy,
Of Cerberus and blackest Midnight bom,
In Stygian cave forlorn,
'Mongst horrid shapes, and shrieks, and sights
unholy !
Find out some uncouth ceU,
Where brooding Darkness spreads his jealous
wings.
And the night-raven sings ;
There under ebon shades, and low-browed rocks.
As ragged as thy locks.
In dark Cimmerian desert ever dwell.
But come, thou goddess fair and free.
In heaven ycleped Euphrosyne,
And, by men, heart-easing Mirth ;
Whom lovely Venus, at a birth,
With two sister Graces more,
To ivy-crownèd Bacchus bore ;
Or whether (as some sager sing)
The frolic wind that breathes the spring,
Zephyr, with Aurora playing, —
As he met her once a-Marring, —
There, on beds of violets blue
uAnd fresh-blown roses washed in dew,
Filled her with thee, a daughter fair.
So buxom, blithe, and debonair.
Haste thee, nymph, and bring with thee
Jest,^and youthful Jollityj —
Quips and cranks and wanton wiles.
Nods and becks and wreafhèd smiles,
Such Ss hang en Hebe's cheek.
And love, to live jn dimple sleek, —
Sport, that wrinkled Care derides,
And Laughter, holding both his sides.
Come ( aná tripl it, .ashou go.
On theV light faritastic'toe ;
And in thy right hand lead with thee
The mountain nymph, sweet Liberty ;
And if I give thee honor duej
Mirth, admit me of thy crewj
To live with her, and live with thee.
In unreproved pleasures free, —
To hear the lark begin his flight.
And singing startle the dull Night,
From his watch-tower in the skies,
Till the dappled dawn doth rise ;
Then to come, in spite of sorrow.
And at my window hid good morrow.
Through the sweet-brier, or the vine,
Or the twisted eglantine ;
While the cock with lively din
Scatters the rear of darkness thin.
And to the stack, or the barn door.
Stoutly struts his dames before ;
Oft listening how the hounds and hom
Cheerly rouse the slumbering Mom,
From the side of some hoar hill
Through the high wood echoing shrill ;
Sometime walking, not unseen.
By hedgerow elms, on hillocks green.
Right against the eastern gate.
Where the great Sun begins his state.
Robed in flames, and amber light.
The clouds in thousand liveries dight ;
While the ploughman, near at hand.
Whistles o'er the furrowed land.
And the milkmaid singeth blithe.
And the mower whets his scythe.
And every shepherd tells his tale
Under the hawthorn in the dale.
Straight mine eye Jiath caught new pleasure^,
Whilst the landscape round it measures
Russet lawns, and fallows gray.
Where the nibbling flocks do stray, —
Mountains, on whose barren breast
The laboring clouds do often rest, —
Meadows trim with daisies pied.
Shallow brooks, and rivers wide.
Towers and battlements it sees
Bosomed high in tufted trees.
Where perhaps some beauty lies.
The cynosure of neighboring eyes.
Hard by, a cottage chimney smokes
From betwixt two aged oaks.
Where Corydon and Thyrsis, met.
Are at their savory dinner set
Of herbs, and other country mesSes, v
Which the , neat-handed Phillis dresses :
And then in haste her bower she leaves.
With ThestyUs to bind the sheaves ;
Or, if ithe earlier season lead.
To thel tanned haycOck in the mead.
Sometimes with secure delight
The upland hamlets will invite.
When the merry bells ring round.
And the jocund rebecks sound
To many a youth and many a maid.
Dancing in the checkered shade ;
And young and old come forth to play
On a sunshine holiday.
Till the livelong dayUght fail ;
Then to the spicy nut-brown ale
With stories told of many a feat :
How fairy Mab the junkets eat, —
She was pinched and pulled, she said.
And he, by friar's lantern led ;
Tells how the drudging goblin sweat
To earn his cream-bowl duly set.
When in one night, ere glimpse of morn.
His shadowy flail had thrashed the com
That ten day-laborers could not end ;
Then lies him down the lubber fiend.
&
-0
786
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
And, stretched out aU the chimney's length,
Basks at the fire his hairy sti'ength,
And, crop-full, out of doors he dings
Ere the first cock his matin rings.
Thus done the tales, to bed they creep,
By whispering winds soon lulled asleep.
Towered cities please us then.
And the busy hum of men.
Where throngs of knights and barons bold
In weeds of peace high triumphs hold, —
With store of ladies, whose bright eyes
Rain infiuence, and judge the prize
Of wit or arms, whUe both contend
To win her grace whom all commend.
There let Hymen oft appear
In saffron robe, with tai>er clear.
And pomp and feast and revelry.
With masque, and antique pageantry, —
Such sights as youthful poets dream
On summer eves by haunted stream ;
Then to the well-trod stage anon.
If Jonson's learnèd sock be on.
Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child.
Warble his native wood-notes wild.
And ever, against eating cares,
Ijap me in soft Lydian airs.
Married to immortal verse, —
Such as the meeting soul may pierce.
In notes with many a winding bout
Of linked sweetness long drawn out.
With wanton heed and giddy cunning
The melting voice thr ough mazes running.
Untwisting all the chains that tie
The hidden soul of harmony, —
That Orpheus' self may heave his head
From golden slumber on a bed
Of heaped Elysian flowers, and hear
Such strains as would have won the ear
Of Pluto, to have quite set free
His half-regained Eurydice.
These delights if thou canst give.
Mirth, with thee I mean to live.
IL PENSEROSO.
Hence, vain deluding joys.
The brood of Folly without father bred !
How little you bestead.
Or fill the fixed mind with all your toys !
Dwell in some idle brain.
And fancies fond with gaudy shapes possess,
As thick and numberless
As the gay motes that people the sunbeams, ■
Or likest hovering dreams.
The fickle pensioners of Moi'pheu»' train.
But hail, thou goddess, sage and holy !
Hail, divinest Melancholy !
Whose saintly visage is too bright
To hit the sense of human sight.
And therefore, to our weaker view,
O'erlaid with black, staid Wisdom's hue, —
Black, but such as in esteem
Prince Memnon's sister might beseem.
Or that starred Ethiop queen that strove
To set her beauty's praise above
The Sea-Nymphs, and their powers offended.
Yet thou art higher far descended ;
Thee bright-haired Vesta, long of yore,
To solitary Saturn bore, —
His daughter she (in Saturn's reign
Such mixture was not held a stain).
Oft in glimmering bowers and glades
He met her, and in secret shades
Of woody Ida's inmost grove.
While yet there was no fear of Jove.
Come, pensive nun, devout and pure.
Sober, steadfast, and demure.
All in a robe of darkest grain
Flowing with majestic train.
And sable stole of cyprus-lawn
Over thy decent shoulders drawn.
Come, but keep thy wonted state.
With even step, and musing gait.
And looks commercing with the skies.
Thy rapt soul sitting in thine eyes ;
There held in holy passion still.
Forget thyself to marble, till
With a sad, leaden, downward cast
Thou fix them on the earth as fast ;
And join vrith thee calm Peace, and Quiet, —
Spare Fast, that oft with gods doth diet.
And hears the Muses in a ring
Aye round about Jove's altar sing ;
And add to these retired Leisure,
That in trim gardens takes his pleasure :
But first and chiefest, with thee bring
Him that yon soars on golden wing.
Guiding the fiery-wheeled throne, —
The cherub Contemplation ;
And the mute Silence hist along,
'Less Philomel will deign a song
In hei -sweetest, saddest plight.
Smoothing the rugged brow of Night,
While.Cynthia checks her dragon yoke
Gently o'er the accustomed oak. -
Sweet bird, that shun'st the noise of folly, —
Most musical, most melancholy !
Thee, chantress, oft, the woods among,
I woo, to hear thy even-song.
And, missing thee, I walk unseen
On the dry, smooth-shaven green.
-fcP
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
I To behold the wandering moon
Riding near her highest noon,
Like one that had been led astray
Through the heaven's wide pathless way ;
And oft, as if her head she bowe(^
Stooping through a fleecy cloud.
Oft, on a plat of rising ground,
I hear the far-off curfew sound
Over some wide-watered shore.
Swinging slow with sullen roar ;
Or if the air will not permit.
Some still removèd place will fit.
Where glowing embers through the room
Teach light to counterfeit a gloom, —
Far from all resort of mirth.
Save the cricket on the hearth.
Or the bellman's drowsy charm.
To bless the doors from nightly harm ;
Or let my lamp at midnight hour
Be seen in some high lonely tower.
Where I may oft out-watch the Bear
With thrice-great Hermes, or unsphera
The spirit of Plato, to unfold
What worlds or what vast regions hold
The immortal mind that hath forsook
Her mansion in this fleshly nook ;
And of those demons that are found
In fire, air, flood, or under ground.
Whose power hath a true consent
With planet or with element.
Sometime let gorgeous Tragedy
In .sceptred pall come sweeping by.
Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line.
Or the tale of Troy divine,
Or what (though rare) of later age
Ennobled hath the buskined stage.
But, 0 sad Virgin, that thy power
Might raise Musaeus from his bower !
Or bid the soul of Orpheus sing
Such notes as, warbled to the string.
Drew iron tears down Pluto's cheek.
And made hell grant what love did seek !
Or call up him that left half told
The story of Cambuscan bold, —
Of Camball, and of Algarsife, —
And who had Canacé to wife.
That owned the virtuous ring and glass, —
And of the wondrous horse of brass.
On which the Tartar king did ride !
And, if aught else great bards beside
In sage and solemn tunes have sung, —
Of tourneys and of trophies hung.
Of forests, and enchantments drear.
Where more is meant than meets the ear.
Thus, Night, oft see me in thy pale career,
Till civil-suited Morn appear, —
Not tricked and frounced, as she was wont
With the Attic boy to hunt.
But kerchiefed in a comely cloud.
While rocking winds are piping loud.
Or ushered with a shower still
When the gust hath blown his fill.
Ending on the rustling leaves.
With minute drops from off the eaves.
And when the sun begins to fling
His flaring beams, me, goddess, bring
To archèd walks of twilight groves.
And shadows brown, that Sylvan loves.
Of pine, or monumental oak.
Where the rude axe with heavèd stroke
Was never heard the Nymphs to daunt.
Or fright them from their hallowed hatmt.
There in close covert by some brook.
Where no profaner eye may look.
Hide me from day's garish eye.
While the bee with honeyed thigh.
That at her flowery work doth sing.
And the waters murmuring
With such consort as they keep.
Entice the dewy-feathered Sleep ;
And let some strange mysterious dream
Wave at his wings, in airy stream
Of lively portraiture displayed.
Softly on my eyelids laid ;
And, as I wake, sweet music breathe
Above, about, or underneath.
Sent by some Spirit to mortals good,
Or the unseen Genius of the wood.
But let my due feet never faü
To walk the studious cloisters pale.
And love the high embowèd roof.
With antic pillars massy proof.
And storied windows, richly dight.
Casting a dim religious light.
There let the pealing organ blow
To the full-voiced quire below.
In service high and anthems clear.
As may with sweetness, through mine ear.
Dissolve me into ecstasies.
And bring all heaven before mine eyes.
And may at last my weary age
Find out the peaceful hermitage.
The hairy gown and mossy cell.
Where I may sit and rightly spell
Of every star that heaven doth shew.
And every herb that sips the dew.
Till old experience do attain
To something like prophetic strain.
These pleasures. Melancholy, give.
And I with thee will choose to live.
Milton.
é
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
HALLOWED GROUND.
What's hallowed ground ?' Has earth a clod
Its Maker meant not should be trod
By man, the image of his God,
Erect and free,
Vnscourged by Superstition's rod
To bow the knee ?
That's hallowed ground where, mourned and
missed.
The lips repose our love has kissed ; —
But where's their memory's mansion ? Is't
Yon church yaid's bowers ?
No ! in ourselves their souls exist,
A part of ours.
A kiss can consecrate the ground
Where mated hearts are mutual bound :
The spot where love's first links were wound.
That ne'er are riven.
Is hallowed down to earth's profound.
And up to heaven !
For time makes all but true love old ;
The burning thoughts that then were told
Run molten still in memory's mould ;
And will not cool
Until the heart itself be cold
In Lethe's pooL
What hallows ground where heroes sleep t
'T is not the sculptured piles you heap !
In dews that heavens far distant weep
Their turf may bloom ;
Or Genii twine beneath the deep ,
Their coral tomb.
But strew his ashes to the wind
Whose sword or voice has served mankind, —
And is he dead, whose glorious mind
Lifts thine on high ? —
To live in hearts we leave behind
Is not to die.
Is't death to fall for Freedom's right ?
He's dead alone that lacks her light !
And murder sullies in heaven's sight
The sword he draws : —
What can alone ennoble fight ?
A noble cause !
Give that, — and welcome War to brace
Her drums, and rend heaven's reeking space !
The colors planted face to face.
The charging cheer.
Though Death's pale horse lead on the chase.
Shall still be dear.
And place our trophies where men kneel
To Heaven ! — but Heaven rebukes my zeal !
The cause of Truth and human weal,
O God above !
Transfer it from the sword's appeal
To Peace and Love.
Peace, Love ! the cherubim, that join
Their spread wings o'er Devotion's shrine,
Prayere sound in vain, and temples shine.
Where they are not, —
The heart alone can make divine
Religion's spot.
To incantations dost thou tru.st.
And pompous rites in domes august ?
See mouldering stones and metal's rust
Belie the vaunt,
That man can bless one pile of dust
With chime or chant.
The ticking wood-worm mocks thee, man !
Thy temples, — creeds themselves grow wan !
But there's a dome of nobler span,
A temple given
Thy faith, that bigots dare not ban, —
Its space is heaven !
Its roof, star-pictured Nature's ceiling.
Where, trancing the rapt spirit's feeling.
And God himself to man revealing.
The harmonious spheres
Make music, though unheard their pealing
By mortal ears.
Fair stars ! are not your beings pure ?
Can sin, can death, your worlds obscure ?
Else why so swell the thoughts at your
Aspect above ?
Ye must be heavens that make us sure
Of heavenly love !
And in your harmony sublime
I read the doom of distant time ;
That man's regenerate soul from crime
Shall yet be drawn.
And reason on his mortal clime
Immortal dawn.
What's hallowed ground ? 'T is what gives birth
To sacred thoughts in souls of worth ! —
Peace ! Independence ! Truth ! go forth
Earth's compass round ;
And your high-priesthood shall make earth
All hallowed ground.
thouas caupbeu.
CEDARMERE.
Bryant's Home at Roslyn.
^^IVAai^s hallowed ground? ^Tis what gix<€S birth
To sacred thoughts in souls of worth
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
789
FLOWERS WITHOUT FRUIT.
Prune thou thy words ; the thoughts control
That o'er thee swell and throng ; —
They will condense within thy soul,
And change to purpose strong.
But he who lets his feelings run
In soft luxurious flow,
Shrinks when hard service must be done.
And faints at every woe.
Faith's meanest deed more favor bears.
Where hearts and wills are weighed.
Than brightest transports, choicest prayers,
Which bloom their hour, and fade.
JOHN HENRY NEWMAN.
REVENGE OF INJURIES.
from "mariam."
The fairest action of our human life
Is scorning to revenge an injury :
For who forgives without a further strife
His adversary's heart to him doth tie :
And't is a flrmer conquest truly said
To win the heart than overthrow the head.
If we a worthy enemy do find.
To yield to worth, it must be nobly done ;
But if of baser metal be his mind,
In base revenge there is no honor won.
Who would a worthy courage overthrow ?
And who would wrestle with a worthless foe ?
We say our hearts are great, and cannot yield ;
Because they cannot yield, it proves them poor ;
Great hearts are tasked beyond their power but
seid :
The weakest lion will the loudest roar.
Truth's school for certain does this same allow,
High-heartedness doth sometimes teach to bow.
lady Elizabeth Carew.
A TEAR.
0 TH/rithe cl/emist's magic art
Couldlcrys^llize |this sacted treasure !
Long should, it glitter near |my heart,
A secret sourcejof pensive pleasure.
The little brilliant, ere it fell.
Its lustre caught from Chloe's eye ;
Then, trembling, left its coral cell, —
The spring of Sensibility !
Sweet drop of pure and pearly light !
In thee the rays of Virtue shine.
More calmly clear, more mildly bright.
Than any gem that gilds the mine.
Benign restorer of the soul 1
Who ever fliest to bring relief.
When first we feel the rude control
Of Love or Pity, Joy or Grief.
The sage's and the poet's theme.
In every clime, in every age.
Thou charm'st in Fancy's idle dream.
In Reason's philosophic page.
That very law which moulds a tear.
And bids it trickle from its source, —
That law preseiwes the earth a sphere.
And guides the planets in their course.
samuel Rogers.
MIGNON'S SONG.
FROM "WILHELM MEISTER."
Know'st thou the land where bloom the citron
bowers.
Where the gold-orange lights the dusky grove ?
High waves the laurel there, the myrtle flowei-s,
And through a still blue heaven the sweet winds
rove.
Know'st thou it well ?
There, there with thee,
0 friend, 0 loved one ! fain my steps would flee.
Know'st thou the dwelling ? — there the pillars
rise,
Soft shines the hall, the painted chambers glow ;
And forms of marble seem with pitying eyes
To say, " Poor child ! what thus hath wrought
thee woe ? "
Know'st thou it well ?
There, there with thee,
O my protector ! homewards might I flee !
Know'st thou the mountain ? — high its bridge
is hung,
Where the mule seeks through mist and cloud
his way ; *
There lurk the dragon-race, deep caves among,
O'er beetling rocks there foams the torrent spray.
Know'st thou it well ?
With thee, with thee.
There lies my path, 0 father ! let us flee !
From the German of GoETHE. Trans¬
lation of FELICIA HEMANS. , ,
^
ö
790
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
THE OLD MAID.
Why sits she thus in solitude ? Her heart
Seems melting in her eyes' delicious blue ;
And as it heaves, her ripe lips lie apart,
As if to let its heavy throbbings through ;
In her dark eye a depth of softness swells.
Deeper than that her careless girlhood wore ;
And her cheek crimsons with the hue that tells
The rich, fair fruit is ripened to the core.
It is her thirtieth birthday ! With a sigh
Her soul hath turned from youth's luxuriant
bowers.
And her heart taken up the last sweet tie
That measured out its links of golden hours !
She feels her inmost soul within her stir
With thoughts too wild and passionate to
speak ;
Yet her full heart — its own interpreter —
Translates itself in silence on her cheek.
Joy's opening buds, affection's glowing flowers.
Once lightly sprang within her beaming track ;
O, life was beautiful in those lost hours.
And yet she does not wish to wander back !
No ! she but loves in loneliness to think
On pleasures past, though nevermore to be ;
Hope links her to the future, — but the link
That binds her to the past is memory.
AMELIA B. WELBY.
LOVE AGAINST LOVE.
As unto blowing roses summer dews,
Or morning's amber to the tree-top choirs.
So to my bosom are the beams that use
To rain on me from eyes that love inspires.
Your love, —vouchsafe it, royal-hearted Few,
And I will set no common price thereon ;
0, I will keep, as heaven his holy blue.
Or night her diamonds, that dear treasure won.
But aught of inward faith must I fo.rego.
Or miss one drop from truth's baptismal hand.
Think poorer thoughts, pray cheaper prayers,
and grow
Less worthy trust, to meet your heart's demand, —
Farewell ! Your wish I for your sake deny :
Rebel to love, in truth to love, am I.
David A. Wasson.
A RENUNCIATION.
If women could be fair, and yet not fond,
Or that their love were firm, not fickle still,
I would not marvel that they make men bond
By service long to purchase their good-will ;
But when I see how frail those creatures are,
I muse that men forget themselves so far.
To mark the choice they make, and how they
change.
How oft from Phoebus they do flee to Pan ;
Unsettled still, like haggards wild they range.
These gentle birds that fly from man to man ;
Who would not scorn and shake them from the
fist.
And let them fly, fair fools, which way they list ?
Yet for disport we fawn and flatter both.
To pass the time when nothing else can please.
And train them to our lure wdth subtle oath.
Till, weary of their wiles, ourselves we ease ;
And then we say when we their fancy try.
To play wdth fools, 0, what a fool was I !
edward Verb, Earl op Oxford.
FAITH.
Better trust all and be deceived.
And weep that trust and that deceiving.
Than doubt one heart that, if believed.
Had blessed one's life wdth true believing.
0, in this mocking world too fast
The doubting fiend o'ertakes our youth ;
Better be cheated to the last
Than lose the blessed hope of truth.
Frances Anne Kemble Butler.
THE SUM OF LIFE.
from "the garden" : "the task." book vi.
I was a stricken deer, that left the herd
Long since ; with many an arrow deep infixed
My panting side was charged, when I withdrew.
To seek a tranquil death in distant shades.
There was I found by one who had himself
Been hurt by the archers. In his side he bore.
And in his hands and feet, the cruel scars.
With gentle force soliciting the darts.
He drew them forth, and healed, and bade me live.
Since then, with few associates, in remote
And silent woods I wander, far frorù those
My former partners of the peopled scene ;
With few associates, and not wishing more.
Here much I ruminate, as much I may.
With other views of men and manners now
Than once, and others of a life to come.
I see that all are wanderers, gone astray
Each in his own delusions ; they are lost
In chase of fancied happiness, still wooed
And never won. Dream after dream ensues ;
B-
-5"
FRAGMENTS.
791
And still they dream, that they shall still succeed ;
And still are disappointed. Rings the world
With the vain stir. I sum up half mankind,
And add two-thirds of the remaining half.
And find the total of their hopes and fears
Dream.s, empty dreams.
WILLIAM COWPER.
THE WILL.
Before 1 sigh my last gasp, let me breathe.
Great Love, some legacies : here I bequeathe
Mine eyes to Argus, if mine eyes can see.
If they be blind, then. Love, I give them thee ;
My tongue to Fame ; to embassadors mine ears ;
To women, or the sea, my tears ;
Thou, Love, hast taught me heretofore
By making me serve her who had twenty more,
That I should give to none, but such as had too
much before.
My constancy I to the planets give ;
My truth to them who at the court do live ;
Mine ingenuity and openness
To Jesuits ; to buffoons my pensiveness ;
My silence to any who abroad have been ;
My money to a Capuchm.
Thou, Love, taught'st me, by appointing me
To love there, where no love received can be.
Only to give to such as have an incapacity. *
My faith I give to Roman Catholics ;
All my good works unto the schismatics
Of Amsterdam ; my best civility
And courtship to an University ;
My modesty I give to shoulders bare ;
My patience let gamesters share.
Thou, Love, taught'st me, by making me
Love her, that holds my love disparity.
Only to give to those that count my gifts indig¬
nity.
I give my reputation to those
Which were my friends ; mine industry to foes ;
To schoolmen 1 bequeathe my doubtfulness ;
My sickness to physicians, or excess ;
To Nature all that I in rhyme have writ ;
And to my company my wit.
Thou, Love, by making me adore
Her, who begot this love in me before,
Taught'st me to make, as though I gave, when I
do but restore.
To him, for whom the passing-bell next tolls,
I give my physic-books ; my written rolls
Of moral counsels I to Bedlam give :
My brazen medals unto them which Uve
* No good capacity.
In want of bread ; to them which pass among
All foreigners, mine English tongne.
Thou, Love, by making me love one
Who thinks her friendship a fit portion
For younger lovers, dost my gifts thus dispro¬
portion.
Therefore I '11 give no more, but I '11 imdo
The world by dying ; because Love dies too.
Then all your beauties will be no more worth
Than gold in mines, where none doth draw it
forth ;
And all your graces no more use shall have.
Than a sun-dial in a grave.
Thou, Love, taught'st me, by making me
Love her, who doth neglect both me and thee.
To invent and practise this one way to annihilate
aU three.
Dr. John Donns.
FEAGMENTS.
THE COURSE OF LIFE.
Time.
Time rolls his ceaseless course.
Lady of the Lahe, Cant. iii. SCOTT.
The heavens on high perpetually do move ;
By minutes meal the hour doth steal away.
By hours the days, by days the months remove,
And then by months the years as fast decay ;
Yea, VirgU's verse and Tally's truth do say
That Time flieth, and never claps her wings ;
But rides on clouds, and forward still she flings.
G. GASCOICNE.
On our quick'st decrees
Th' inaudible and noiseless foot of Time
Steals, ere we can effect them.
AU'i ¡VeU that Ends WeU, Act y. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
And then he drew a dial from his poke.
And, looking on it with lack-lustre eye.
Says very wisely, "It is ten o'clock :
Thus may we see," quoth he, "how the world
wags :
'T is but an hour ago since it was nine ;
And after one hour more't will be eleven ;
And so, from hour to hour, we ripe and ripe.
And then, from hour to hour, we rot and rot ;
And thereby hangs a tale."
As Ycu Lite It, Act U. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
Come what come may.
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day.
Idacbetht Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
e-
792
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
LIFÄ.
Let us (since life can little more supply
Than just to look about us, and to die)
Expatiate free o'er all this scene of man ;
A mighty maze ! but not without a plan.
Together let us beat this ample field,
Try why the open, what the covert yield.
Essay.on Man, EpistU I, POPE.
The world's a theatre, the earth a stage
Which God and nature do with actors fill.
Apology/or Actors, t. hevwood.
To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow.
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day.
To the last syllable of recorded time ;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle !
Life's but a walking shadow ; a poor player.
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage.
And then is heard no more ; it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifjring nothing.
MtutetH, Act V. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Life is a jest, and all things show it ;
1 thought so once, hut now 1 know it.
My Own Epitaph. J. GAY.
The web of our life is of a mingled .
Yarn, good and ill together.
All's WeU that Ends I'/eU, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
And what's a life ? — a weary pilgrimage.
Whose glory in one day doth fill the stage
With childhood, manhood, and decrepit age.
What is Li/ct F. QUARLES.
But thought's the slave of life, and life time's
fool.
King Henry IV., Ft. I. Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
On life's vast ocean diversely we sail.
Reason the card, but passion is the gale.
Essay on Man, EpistU II. POPE.
Mankind.
Man !
Thou pendulum betwixt a smile and tear.
ChiltU Harold, Cant. iv. BYRON.
More servants wait on man
Than he '11 take notice of. In ev'ry path
He treads down that which doth befriend him
When sicknesse makes him pale and wan.
0 mightie love ! Man is one world, and hath
Another to attend him.
Man. g. HERBERT.
Like leaves on trees the race of man is found,
Nowgreen in youth, now withering on theground:
Another race the following spring supplies ;
They fall successive, and successive rise.
Iliad, Book vL Translation of POPE. Homer.
Know then thyself, presume not God to scan ;
The proper study of mankind is man.
Created half to rise, and half to fall ;
Great lord of all things, yet a prey to all ;
Sole judge of truth, in endless error hurled ;
The glory, jest, and riddle of the world !
Essay on Man, EpistU II. POPE.
The Past.
0, call back yesterday, bid time return.
To-day, unhappy day, too late.
King Richard //., Act iU. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Things without all remedy,
Should be without regard : what's done is done.
Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Gone, glimmering through the dream of things
that were,
A school-boy's tale, the wonder of an hour !
Childe Harold, Cant. ii. BYRON.
Not heaven itself upon the past has power ;
But what has been, has been, and 1 have had my
hour.
Imitation of Horace, Book i. Ode 99. Drvoen.
Applause
To that blest son of foresight ; lord of fate !
That awful independent on to-morrow
Whose work is done ; who triumphs in the past ;
Whose yesterdays look backwards with a smile.
Night Thoughts, Night'Ú. dr. e. young.
Achilles. . . . What ! are my deeds forgot ?
Ulysses. Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his
back.
Wherein he puts alms for oblivion.
For time is like a fashionable host,
That slightly shakes his parting guest by the
hand.
And with his arms outstretched, as he would fly,
Grasps-in the comer. Welcome ever smiles.
And farewell goes out sighing.
Troilus and Crcesida, Act iiL Sc. 3. SHAICBSPBAR&
ö-
FRAGMENTS.
793
The Present.
This narrow isthmus 'twixt two boundless seas,
The past, the future, two eternities !
iatia Rookh : The Veiled Prephet ^Khorassan, T. MoORE.
Lo ! on a narrow neck of land,
'Twixt two imbounded seas I stand.
Hymn. C. Wesley.
Heaven from all creatures hides the book of Fate,
All but the page prescribed, their present state.
£ssay on Man, Epistle /. POPE.
Nothing is there to come, and nothing past.
But an eternal Now does always last.
Davideis, Vol. /. Book i. A. Cowlby*
Defer not till to-morrow to be wise,
To-morrow's sun to thee may never rise.
Letter to Cobham, W. CONGREVE.
Happy the man, and happy he alone.
He who can call to-day his own :
He who, secure within, can say.
To-morrow, do thy worst, for I have lived to-day.
Imitation o/Horace, Book i. Ode 29. DRYDEN.
The Future.
The best of prophets of the Future is the Past.
Letter, y an. 38,1S2U BYRON.
As though there were a tie.
And obligation to posterity.
We get them, bear them, breed and nurse.
What has posterity done for us.
That we, lest they their rights should lose,
Should trust our necks to gripe of noose.
McFingal, Cant. Ü. J. TRUMBULL.
All that's bright must fade, —
The biightest still the fleetest ;
All that's sweet was made
But to be lost when sweetest !
National Airs : All that's briz'ht must fade, T. MOORB.
When I consider life, 't is all a cheat.
Yet, fooled with hope, men favor the deceit ;
Trust on, and think to-morrow will repay ;
To-morrow's falser than the former day ;
Lies worse ; and, whUe it says we shall be blest
With some new joys, cuts oflf what we possest.,
Strange cozenage ! none would live past years
again.
Yet all hope pleasure in what yet remain.
Aurmg-Zebe: or. The Great Mogul, Act'w.SeaX, DRYDEN*
Beware of desperate steps. The darkest day.
Live till to-morrow, will have passed away.
The Needless Alarm, COWPER.
Fate.
Men at some time are masters of their fates ;
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars.
But in ourselves, that we are imderlings.
yulius Casar, Act L Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE*
Man is his own star, and the soul that can
Bender an honest and a perfect man
Commands all light, all influence, all fate.
Nothing to him falls early, or too late.
Upon an Honest Man's Fortune. J. FLETCHER*
Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie.
Which we ascribe to Heaven : the fated sky
Gives us free scope ; only, doth backward pull
Our slow designs, when we ourselves are dull.
AU's WeU that Ends Well, Act i. Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
There's a divinity that shapes our ends.
Rough-hew them how we will.
Hamlet, Act t. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE,
I '11 make assurance doubly sure.
And take a bond of Fate.
Macbeth, Act ir. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Youth.
Gay hope is theirs, by fancy fed,
Less pleasing when possessed ;
The tear forgot as soon as shed.
The sunshine of the breast.
Theirs buxom health of rosy hue.
Wild wit, invention ever new.
And lively cheer of vigor bom ;
The thoughtless day, the easy night.
The spirits pure, the slumbers light. ,
That fly the approach of morn.
On a Distant Prospect of Eton College* T. GRAY.
Long as the year's dull circle seems to run
When the brisk minor pants for twenty-one.
Imitations bf Horace, Epistle I, Book\a pope.
Returning, he proclaims by many a grace.
By shrugs and strange contortions of his face.
How much a dunce that has been sent to roam.
Excels a dunce that has been kept at home.
The Progress of Error, cowper.
The nimble-footed mad-cap Prince of Wales,
And his comrades, that daflfed the world aside.
And bid it pass.
King Henry IK,, Part I. Act iv. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE
Manhood.
Be wise with speed :
A fool at forty is a fool indeed.
Lave of Fame, Satire ü. Dr. E- YOUNG»
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Not two strong men the enonnous weight could
raise ;
Such men as lire in these degenerate days.
¡liad, BooJty» Translation 0/Homer.
Nor love thy life, nor hate ; but what thou liv'st
Live well ; how long or short permit to heaven.
Parodist Lost, Book xi. MlLTON.
What tho' short thy date ?
Virtue, not rolling suns, the mind matures.
That life is long which answers life's great end.
The time that bears no fruit deserves no name.
The man of wisdom is the man of years.
In hoary youth Methusalems may die ;
O, how misdated on their flatt'ring tombs !
Night Thoughts, Night v. DR. E. YOUNG.
Live while you live, the epicure would say.
And seize the pleasures of the present day ;
Live while you live, the sacred preacher cries.
And give to God each moment as it flies.
Lord, in my views, let both united be ;
I live in pleasure when I live to thee.
Epigram on his Family Arms. [Dum vivimus vivamus.]
P. Doddridge.
Old Age.
My May of life
Is faU'n into the sear, the yellow leaf ;
And that which should accompany old age.
As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends,
I must not look to have ; but, in their stead.
Curses, not loud, but deep, mouth-honor, breath.
Which the poor heart would fain deny, and dare
not.
Mactah, Act t. Sc. 3. shakespeare.
And wrinkles, the d-
Don yuattf Cant. z.
I democrats, won't flatter.
byron.
Strange ! that a harp of thousand strings
Should keep in tune so long.
Hymns and Spiritual Soptgs, Book iL Hymn 19. WaTTS
In sober state.
Through the sequestered vale of rural life.
The venerable patriarch guileless held
The tenor of his way.
Death. B. porteus.
Time has laid his hand
Upon my heart, gently, not smiting it.
But as a harper lays his open palm
Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations.
The Golden Legend. longfellow.
But grant, the virtues of a temp'rate prime
Bless with an age exempt from scorn or crime ;
An age that melts with unperceived decay.
And glides in modest innocence away.
yemtgyo/Hnnum Witha. Dr. S. Johnson.
0 Heavens,
If you do love old men, if your sweet sway
Allow obedience, if yourselves are old.
Make it your cause ; send down, and take my
part !
King Lear, Act ii .Vc; A SHAKESPEARE
Death.
Man wants but little, nor that little long.
How soon he must resign his very dust !
Night Thoughts, Night vt, DR. E. YOUNG.
" While there is life, there's hope," he cried ;
" Then why such haste ?" so ^oaned and died.
Tfu Sick Man and tho Angel. J. Gay.
Lovely in death the beauteous ruin lay ;
And if in death still lovely, lovelier there ;
Far lovelier ! pity swells the tide of love.
Night Thoughts, Night m. Dr. E YounU
Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wad.
Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt.
Dispraise or blame, nothing but well and fair.
And what may quiet us in a death so noble.
Samson Agonistos. MlLTON.
There is a calm for those who weep,
A rest for weary pilgrims found.
They softly lie and sweetly sleep
Low in the ground.
The Grave. J. MONTGOMERY.
Immortality.
1 know no evil death can show, which life
Has not already shown to those who live
Embodied longest. If there be indeed
A shore, where mind survives, 't will be as mind
All unincorporate.
Sardanapalus. BYRON*
To be no more — sad cure ; for who would lose.
Though full of pain, this intellectual being.
Those thoughts that wander through eternity,
To perish rather, swallowed up and lost
In the wide womb of uncreated night.
Devoid of sense and motion ?
Paradise Lost, Book ii. MiLTON.
1 have asked that dreadful question of the hills
That look eternal ; of the flowing streams
That lucid flow forever ; of the stars.
Amid whose fields of azure my raised spirit
Hath trod in glory : all were dumb ; but now.
While I thus gaze upon thy living face,
1 feel the love that kindles through its beauty
Can never wholly perish : we shaU meet
Again, Clemanthe !
ton. t. N. TalfoURD.
-Ö
f
FRAGMENTS.
795
THE SEXES.
Woman.
First, then, a woman will, or won't, depend on't ;
If she will do't, she will ; and there's an end on't.
But if she won't, since safe and sound your trust is.
Fear is affront, and jealousy injustice.
Epilogtie to Zara» A. HiLL.
Women, like princes, find few real friends.
Advice to a Lady. lord lyttelton.
What mighty ills have not Been done by woman ?
Who was't betrayed the Capitol ? A woman !
Who lost Mark Antony the world ? A woman !
Who was the cause of a long ten years' war.
And laid at last old Troy in ashes ? Woman !
Destructive, damnable, deceitful woman I
The Orphan, Aetm- Sc, i. T. OTWAY.
She and comparisons are odious.
The Comparison,
Dr. J. Donne.
So doth one sound the sleeping spirit wake
To brave the danger, and to bear the harm —
A low and gentle voice — dear woman's chiefest
charm.
An excellent thing it is ! and ever lent
To truth and love, and meekness ; they who
own
This gift, by the all-gracious Giver sent.
Ever by quiet step and smile are known ;
By kind eyes that have wept, hearts that have
sorrowed —
By patience never tired, from their own trials
borrowed.
Womaris Voice, e. Arnold.
Woman's gentle brain. #
As You Like It, Act iw- Sc. 3.
Shakespeare.
Not she with traitorous kiss her Saviour stung,
Not she denied him with unholy tongue ;
She, while apostles shrank, could danger brave,
Last at his cross and earliest at his grave.
JVoman, her Character and Inßiunce, E. S. BARRETT.
And yet believe me, good as well as ill.
Woman's at best a contradiction still.
Moral Essays, Epistle IT, Pope.
A native grace
Sat fair-proportioned in her polished limbs.
Veiled in a simple robe their best attire.
Beyond the pomp of dress ; for loveliness
Needs not the foreign aid of ornament,
But is, when unadorned, adorned the most.
The Seasons: Autumn. J. THOMSON.
The maid who modestly conceals
Her beauties, while she hides, reveals ;
Give but a glimpse, and fancy draws
Whate'er the Grecian Venus was.
The Spider and the Bee,
Ei MOORE.
Th' adorning thee with so much art
Is but a barb'rous skUl ;
'T is like the poisoning of a dart.
Too apt before to kill.
The Waiting-Maid,
A. Cowley.
For where is any author in the world
Teaches such beauty as a woman's eye ?
Love's Labor's Lost, Act iv. Sc, 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Woman may err, woman may give her mind
To evil thoughts, and lose her pure estate ;
But, for one woman who affronts her kind
By wicked passions and remorseless hate,
A thousand make amends in age and youth.
By heavenly pity, by sweet sympathy.
By patient kindness, by enduring truth.
By love, supremest in adversity.
Praise oß Women, Ch. Mackav.
Accuse not Nature, she hath done her part ;
Do thou but thine.
Paradise Lost, Book viii. MlLTON.
Man — Woman.
If the heart of a man is depressed with cares,
The mist is dispelled when a woman appears.
The Beggar's Opera, Act ii. Sc. x. J. GAY.
Without the smile from partial beauty won,
0, what were man ? — a world without a sun.
Pleasures 0/Hope, Part II. T. CAMPBELL.
She's beautifnl, and therefore to be wooed ;
She is a wom.an, therefore to be won.
King Henry VI., Part I, Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
He was a lover of the good old school.
Who still become more constant as they cool.
Beppo, Cant, xxxiv. byron.
We cannot fight for love as men may do ;
We should be wooed, and were not made to woo.
Midsummer Nighls Dream, ActW.Sc.i. SHAKESPEARE.
I give thee all — I can no more.
Though poor the offering be ;
My heart and lute are all the store
That I can bring to thee.
My Heart and Lute. T. moors.
796
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Since maids, in modesty, say " No " to that I
Which they woiüd have the profferer construe'
"Ay."
Two GofUUnten 0/ Verona, Act i. Sc. a.
Shakespeare.
The woman that deliberates is lost.
Cato, Act iv. Sc. I. T. ADDISON.
My friends were poor but honest ; so's my love.
Be not offended, for it hurts not him
That he is loved of me. '
All's Well that Ends Well, Act i. Sc, 3. SHAKESPEARE.
In her first passion, woman loves her lover :
In all the others, all she loves is love.
Don Juan, Cant. iii. BYRON.
True as the needle to the pole,
Or as the dial to the sun ;
Constant as gliding waters roll.
Whose swelling tides obey the moon ;
From every other charmer free.
My life and love shall follow thee.
Song, B. Booth.
Was ever woman in this humor wooed ?
Was ever woman in this humor won ?
King Richard III., Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Man's love is of man's life a thing apart ;
'T is woman's whole existence. Man may range
The court, camp, church, the vessel, and the mart.
Sword, gown, gain, glory, offer in exchange
Pride, fame, ambition, to fill up his heart.
And few there are whom these cannot estrange :
Men have all these resources, we but one, —
To love again, and be again undone.
Don yuan. Cant. i. BYRON,
Thou wouldst be loved ? — then let thy heart
From its present pathway part not !
Being everything which now thou art.
Be nothing which thou art not.
So with the world thy gentle ways.
Thy grace, thy more than beauty.
Shall be an endless theme of praise.
And love — a simple duty.
To F. S. O. E. A. FOE
All these good parts a perfect woman make ;
Add love to me, they make a perfect wife ;
Without her love, her beauty I should take
As that of pictures dead — that gives it life ;
Till then her beauty, like the sun, doth shine
Alike to all ; — that only makes it mine.
A Wi/c. Sir t. Overburv.
And oft, when half induced to tread
Such paths as unto sin decoy,
I've felt her fond hand press my head.
And that soft touch hath saved her boy !
The Mothers Hand. c. swain.
CHARACTER AND ACTION.
Virtue.
The world in all doth but two nations bear.
The good, the bad, and these mixed everywhere.
The Loyal Scot. A. Marvell.
He that has light within his own clear breast
May sit in the centre and enjoy bright day ;
But he that hides a dark soul and foul thoughts
Benighted walks under the midday sun.
Comus. Milton.
What nothing earthly gives or can destroy, —
The soul's calm sunshine, and the heartfelt joy.
Is Virtue's prize.
Essay on Man, Epistle IV, pope,
The morning pearls
Dropt in the lily's spotless bosom
Are less chastely cold.
Ere the meridian sun
Has ki.ssed them into heat.
Chastity, W. CHAMBERLAVNE.
1st Brother. What hidden strength.
Unless the strength of Heaven, if you mean that ?
2d Brother. I mean that too, but yet a
hidden strength
Which, if Heaven gave it, may be termed her arm;
'T is chastity, my Brother, chastity :
She that has that is clad in complete steeL
So dear to heaven is saintly chastity.
That, when a soul is found sincerely so,
A thousand liveried angels lacky her.
Driving far off each thing of sin and guilt.
Comus. Milton.
Adieu, dear, amiable youth !
Your heart can ne'er be wanting !
May prudence, fortitude, and truth
Erect your brow Äidaunting !
In ploughman phrase, " God send you speed,"
Still daily to grow wiser ;
And may you better reck the rede.
Than ever did the adviser !
Epistle to a Young Friend. r. burns.
What stronger breastplate than a heart untainted ?
Thrice is he armed that has his quarrel just ;
And he but naked, though locked up in steel.
Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted.
King Henry VI., Part It, Act üi. Sc. s. SHAKESPEARE.
True, conscious honor is to feel no sin ;
He's armed without that's innocent within.
hnitations of Horace, Epistle /■ Book i. pope.
Be noble ! and the nobleness that lies
In other men, sleeping, but never dead.
Will rise in majesty to meet thine own.
Sonnet. j. r. LOWELL.
FRAGMENTS.
797
This above all, — to thine own self be true ;
And it must follow, as the night the day.
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
Sc.^ SHAKESPEARE.
And thus he bore without abuse
The grand old name of gentleman,
Defamed by every charlatan.
And soiled with all ignoble use.
IÁ Memcriam, ex. Tennyson.
Noble Living.
If our virtues
Did not go forth of us, 'twere all alike
As if we had them no^. Spirits are not finely
touched.
But to fine issues ; nor Nature never lends
The smallest scruple of her excellence.
But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines
Herself the glory of a creditor—
Both thanks and use.
Mtaxure/or Measure, Actu Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
The flighty purpose never is o'ertook.
Unless the deed go with it.
Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
Our acts our angels are, or good or ill.
Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.
An Honest Man's Fortune. J. FLETCHER.
That light we see is burning in my hall.
How far that little caudle throws his beams .
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
Merchant 0/Venice, Act v- Sc, i. SHAKESPEARE.
3-
Duty.
When I'm not thanked at all, I'm thanked
enough.
I've done my duty, and I 've done no more.
Tom Thumb the Great, Act i. Sc.- 3, H. FIELDING.
Stem Daughter of the Voice of God !
0 Duty !
Through no disturbance of my soul.
Or strong compunction in me wrought,
1 supplicate for thy control ;
But in the quietness of thought.
To humbler functions, awful Power I
1 call thee : I myself commend
Unto thy guidance from this hour ;
0, let my weakness have an end !
Give unto me, made lowly wise.
The spirit of self-sacrifice ;
The confidence of reason give ;
And in the light of truth thy bondman let me live !
Ode to Duty. WORDSWORTH.
Honesty.
You yourself
Are much condemned to have an itching palm.
There is no terror, Gassius, in your threats ;
For I am armed so strong in honesty.
That they pass by me as the idle wind.
Which I respect not.
Julius Casar, Aa iv. Sc. 3. Shakespeare
Falsehood.
Who dares think one thing, and another tell.
My heart detests him as the gates of hell.
Iliad, Book VU. Translation of^Qi^^. houer.
Like one,
Who having, unto truth, by telling of it,
Made such a sinner of his memory.
To credit his own lie.
T>te Tcmfcst, Acl i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE
He was a man
Who stole the livery of the court of Heaven
To serve the Devil in.
Course 0/Time, Book \'ú\. R. POLLOK.
The Devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
An evil soul, producing holy witness.
Is like a villain with a smiling cheek,
A goodly apple rotten at the heart.
0, what a goodly outside falsehood hath !
Merchant 0/ Venice, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Benevolence.
That man may last, but never lives.
Who much receives but nothing gives ;
Whom none can love, whom none can thank.
Creation's blot, creation's blank.
When Jesus dwelt. t. GIBBONS.
Do good by stealth, and blush to find it fame.
Epilogtte to Satires, Dial, i POPE.
Who builds a church to God, and not to fame.
Will never mark the marble with his name :
Go, search it there, where to be born and die.
Of rich and poor makes all the history ;
Enough that virtue filled the space between.
Proved by the ends of being to have been.
Moral Essays, Epistle III, POPE.
B.* O say, what sums that generous hand
supply ?
What mines to swell that boundless charity ?
P.t Of debts and taxes, wife and children clear.
This man possessed—five hundred pounds a year.
Blush, grandeur, blush ; proud courts, withdraw
your blaze !
Ye little stars, hide your diminished rays !
Moral Essays, Epistle III. POPE.
* Lord Bathurst t Pop«.
á
e-
798
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
-a
Mekct.
Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge.
Titus AftdfOfticus, Act i. Sc. a.
SHAKESPEARE.
The quality of mercy is not strained, —
It droppetli as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath : it is twice blessed, —
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes :
'T is mightiest in the mightiest ; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown ;
His sceptre shows the force of temporal power.
The attribute to awe and majesty.
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings :
But mercy is above this sceptred sway, —
It is enthronëd in the hearts of kings.
It is an attribute to God himself ;
And earthly power doth then show likest God's,
When mercy seasons justice.
Merchant of Venice, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Folly and Wisdom.
Wisdom is ofttimes nearer when we stoop
Than when we soar.
The Excursion, Book iii. WoRDSWORTH.
To know
That which before us lies in daily life
Is the prime wisdom.
Paradise Lost, Book viii. MiLTON.
Good sense, which only is the gift of Heaven,
And though no science, fairly worth the seven.
Moral Essays, Epistle IV. POPE.
The weak have remedies, the wise have joys,
Superior wisdom is superior bliss.
Night Thoughts, Night viii. DR. E. YOUNG.
Be wisely worldly, be not worldly wise.
Emblems, Book ii. F. QUARLBS.
With wisdom fraught.
Not such as books, but such as practice taught.
On the Kinfs Return, E. WALLER.
Who are a little wise the best fools be.
Tht Tripu FooL DR. J. DONNB.
For fools rush in where angels fear to tread.
Essay on Criticism, Part HI, POPE.
Those that I rev'rence, those I fear — the wise ;
At fools I laugh, not fear them.
Cymbeline, Act'w. Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE.
In idle wishes fools supinely stay ;
Be there a will, and wisdom finds a way.
The Birth of Flattery, g. CRABBE
Some positive, persLsting fools we know.
Who, if once wrong, will need be always so ;
But you with pleasure own your errors past.
And make each day a critique on the last.
Pope.
Yet proud of parts, with prudence some dispense.
And play the fool because they 're men of sense.
Epistle to Pope, DR. E. YOUNG.
This fellow's wise enough to play the fool ;
And to do that well craves a kind of wit.
Twelfth Night, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Good Natdkb and Recklessness.
Care to our coffin adds a nail, no doubt.
And every grin, so merry, draws one out.
Expostulatory Odes : xv. DR. WOLCOTT {Peter Pindar).
But evil is wrought by want of thought
As well as want of heart.
The Lady's Dream, T. HOOD.
Forgiveness and Resentment.
The smallest worm will turn, being trodden on.
And doves will peck in safeguard at their brood.
King Henry VI., Part III, Act iL Sc, a, SHAKESPEARE.
Forgiveness to the injured does belong ;
But they ne'er pardon who have done the wrong.
Conquest of Granada, Part IL ActLSc, 2, Dryden.
Good nature and good sense must ever join ;
To err is human, to forgive, divine.
Essay on Criticism, Part II, POPE.
Ambition.
I have no spur
To prick the sides of my intent ; but only
Vaulting ambition, which o'er-leaps itself.
And falls on the other.
Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 7. shakespeare.
But wild ambition loves to slide, not stand.
And Fortune's ice prefers to Virtue's land.
Absalom and Achitophel, Parti. Drvoen.
And he that stands upon a slippery place
Makes nice of no vile hold to stay him up.
King yohn. Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARa
Ambition's monstrous stomach does increase
By eating, and it fears to starve unless
It still may feed, and all it sees devour.
Playhouse to Let, SIR W. DA VENANT.
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FRAGMENTS.
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Lowliness is young ambition's ladder,
Whereto the climber-upward turns his face ;
But when he once attains the upmost round,
He then unto the ladder turns his back.
Looks in the clouds, scorning the base degrees
By which he did ascend.
yulius CœsaTt ActiLSc. X. shaicespearb.
To reign is worth ambition, though in hell :
Better to reign in hell, than serve in heaven.
Paradise Lost, Book i. MILTON.
The Ruling Passion.
The ruling passion, be it what it will.
The ruling passion conquers reason still.
Hear then the truth ; 'T is Heav'n each passion
sends.
And different men directs to different ends.
Extremes in nature equal good produce ;
Extremes in man concur to general use.
Moral Essays, Epistle III, POPE.
And hence one master-passion in the breast.
Like Aaron's serpent, swallows up the rest.
Essay on Man, Epistle II. POPE.
Self-Conoeit.
To observations which ourselves we make.
We grow more partial for the observer's sake.
Moral Essays, Epistle I. Pope.
'T is with our judgments as our watches, none
Go just alike, yet each believes his own.
Esmy on Criticism, Part I. POPE.
Pride and Vanity.
'T is pride, rank pride, and haughtiness of soul ;
I think the Romans call it stoicism.
Cato, Act i- Sc. 4.
J. ADDISON.
è
In pride, in reasoning pride, our error lies ;
All quit their sphere and rush into the skies.
Essay on Man, Epistle I, ' POPE,
Pride, like an eagle, builds among the stars.
Night Thoughts, Night v. Dr. E. YOUNG.
Of all the causes which conspire to blind
Man's erring judgment, and misguide the mind,
What the weak head with strongest bias rules,
Is pride, the never failing vice of fools.
Essay on CriOcism, Part II, POPE.
As eddies draw things frivolous and light.
How is man's heart by vanity drawn in !
Night Thoughts, Night viii. DR. E. YOUNfr
The fashion wears out more apparel than the man.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act'úx. Sc, 3. shakespeare.
Nothing exceeds in ridicule, no doubt,
A fool in fashion, but a fool that's out ;
His passion for absurdity's so strong
He cannot bear a rival in the wrong.
Though wrong the mode, comply ; more sense
is shown
In wearing others' follies than our own.
Night Thoughts, DR. e. YOUNG
Sir Plume (of amber snuff-box justly vain.
And the nice conduct of a clouded cane).
With earnest eyes, and round unthinking face,
He first the snuff-box opened, then the case.
Rape of the Lock FOPB-
PHASES OF FEELING.
Pain and Weariness.
So when a raging fever bums.
We shift from side to side by turns.
And't is a poor relief we gain
To change the place, but keep the pain.
Hymns and Spiritual Songs, Book ii. Hymn 146. WATTS.
Till this heroic lesson thou hast learned :
To frown at pleasure, and to smile in pain.
Night Thoughts, Night viii. DTL E. YOUNC.
There's nothing in this world can make me joy:
Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale,
Vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man.
King yokn. Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
My heart is drowned with grief.
My body round engirt with misery ;
For what's more miserable than discontent ?
King Henry VI., Part II. Act ïà. Sc, x. SHAKESPEARE.
Grief hath changed me.
And careful hours, with Time's deformèd hand.
Hath written strange defeatures in my face.
Comedy of Errors, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Remorse and Rétribution.
The mind is its own place, and in itself
Can make a heaven of hell, a heU of heaven.
Paradise Lost, Book L MlLTON.
Amid the roses fierce Repentance rears
Her snaky crest.
The Seasons : spring. J.THOMSON.
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
The thoms which I have reaped are of the tree
I planted — they have torn me, and I bleed ;
I should have known what fruit would spring
from such a seed.
Ckxlde Haroldt Cant, iv. BYRON.
We but teach
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return
To plague the inventor. This even-handed jus¬
tice
Commends the ingredients of our poisoned chalice
To our own lips. ■
Macbeth, Act\. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
So the struck eagle, stretched upon the plain.
No more through rolling clouds to soar again.
Viewed his own feather on the fatal dart,
And winged the shaft that quivered in his heart.
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. BVRGN.
Despair.
Talk not of comfort ; 't is for lighter ills :
I will indulge my sorrows, and give way
To all the pangs and fury of despair.
Cote. J. Addison.
And, in that deep and utter agony.
Though then than ever most unfit to die,
I fell upon my knees and prayed for death.
Bertram, C. Maturin.
AU hope is lost
Of my reception into grace ; what worse.
For where no hope is left, is left no fear.
Paradise Regained. MiLTON.
Hope ! let the wretch, once conscious of the joy,
Whom now despairing agonies destroy.
Speak, for he can, and none so well as he.
What treasures centre, what delights, in thee.
Hope. cowper.
It is to hope, though hope were lost.
Came here,/ondyouth. A. L. BARBAULD*
Feae and Dottbt.
Our doubts are traitors,
And make us lose the good we oft might win.
By fearing to attempt.
Measure for Measure» Act L Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Lady Macbeth. Letting I dare not wait
upon 1 would,
Like the poor cat i' the adage.
Macbeth. Prythee, peace :
I dare do aU that may become a man ;
Who dares do more, is none.
Macbeth, Acti. Sc. e. SHAKESPEARE
But now, 1 am cabined, cribbed, confined, bound in
To saucy doubts and fears.
Macbeth, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt ;
Nothing's so hard but search wUl find it out.
Seek ami Find. r. herrick.
Tender-handed stroke a nettle.
And it stings y u for your pains ;
Grasp it like a man of mettle.
And it soft as silk remains.
Verses -written on a Window in Scotland. A. HiLL.
Fortune her gifts may variously dispose.
And these be happy caUed, unhappy those ;
But Heaven's just balance equal will appear.
When those are placed in hope, and these in fear.
Not present good or ill the joy or curse.
But future views of better or of worse.
Essay on Man, Epistle III. POPE
Often do the spirits
Of great events stride on before the events.
And in to-day already walks to-morrow.
TheDeeUh (tf WaUenstein* S. T« COLERIDGE
Hope.
Hope ! of aU Uls that men endure.
The only cheap and universal cure !
Hope ! thou first-fruits of happiness !
Thou gentle dawning of a bright success !
Brother of Faith! 'twixt whom and thee
The joys of Heaven and Earth divided be 1
For Hope, A. COWLEY.
Hope ! thou nurse of young deeire.
Love in a Village, Act I Sc. i. l bickerstaff.
True hope is swift, and flies with swallow's wings ;
Kings it makes gods, and meaner creatures kings.
ICing Richard IIJ., Act t. ac. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Hope, like a cordial, innocent though strong,
Man's heart at once inspirits and serenes ;
Nor makes him pay his wisdom for his joys.
Night Thoughts. dr. e. vouhg.
Hope, like the glimm'ring taper's light,
Adoms and cheers the way ;
And still, as darker grows the night.
Emits a brighter ray.
The Captivitp, Act U. GOLDSMITH.
Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought.
King Henry IV., Part II, Act iv. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Cease, every joy, to glimmer on my mind,
But leave—oh ! leave the light of Hope behind I
Pleasures 0/Hope, PartII. T, Campbell.
B-
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FRAGMENTS.
801
a
Besides what hope the never-ending flight
Of future days may bring.
Paradise Lost, Book ii MlLTON.
Hope humbly then ; with trembling pinions
soar ;
Wait the great teacher Death, and God adore.
What future bliss he gives not thee to know,
But gives that hope to be thy blessing now.
Hope springs eternal in the human breast :
Man never is, but always to be, blest.
The soul, uneasy and conflned from home,
Rests and expatiates in a life to come.
Essay on Man, EpistU I. POPE.
And, when the stream
Which overflowed the soul was passed away,
A consciousness remained that it had left,
Deposited upon the silent shore
Of memory, images and precious thoughts
That shall not die, and cannot be destroyed.
The Excursion, Book vii. WORDSWORTH.
Joys too exquisite to last,
—And yet more exquisite when past.
The Little Cloud.
J. MONTGOMERY.
How blessings brighten as they take their flight I
Night Thoughts, Night iL DR. E. YOUNG.
'T is expectation makes a blessing dear ; recalls some face, as t were with pain.
Heaven were not heaven, if we knew what it were. | You once have seen, but ne er wUl see again.
Aeoinst Fruition. sir john suckling. I byron.
Disappointment.
We 're charmed with distant views of happiness.
But near approaches make the prospect less.
Against Enjoyment. T- YALDEN.
Oft expectation faik, and most oft there
Where most it promises ; and oft it hits
Where hope is coldest, and despair most fits.
AU's WeU that Ends WeU, ActiL Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE:
As distant prospects please us, but when near
We find but desert rocks and fleeting air.
The Dispensatory, Cant. ilL S. GArTH.
Why wish for more ?
Wishing, of all employments, is the worst ;
Philosophy's reverse and health's decay.
Night Thoughts, Night iv. DR. E. YOUNG.
I Absent or dead, still let a friend be dear,
j (A sigh the absent claims, the dead a tear.)
' Epistle to Robert, Earl o/Oxford, and Earl of Mortimer. POPE.
For it so falls out.
That what we have we prize not to the worth.
Whiles we enjoy it, but being lacked and lost,
Why, then we rack the value ; then we find
The virtue, that possession would not show us
Whiles it was oum. So will it fare with Claudio:
When he shall hear she died upon his words,
Th' idea of her life shall sweetly creep
Into his study of imagination.
And every lovely organ of her life
Shall come apparelled in more precious habit.
More moving-delicate, and full of life.
Into the eye and prospect of his soul.
Than when she lived indeed.
Much Ado about Nothing, Act iy. Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
Memory.
While memory holds a seat
In this distracted globe. Remember thee ?
Yea, from the table of my memory
I 'U wipe away all trivial fond records.
All saws of books, all forms, all pressures past.
That youth and observation copied there ;
And thy commandment all alone shall live
Within the book and volume of my brain.
Hamlet, Act I: Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
The leaves of memory seem to make
A mournful rustling in the dark.
The Eire of Dr\fi.yvood.
Longfellow.
Remembrance and reflection how allied !
What thin partitions sense from thought divide !
Essay on Man, Epistle /. POPE.
PHASES OF FORTUNE.
Fortune.
Fortune, men say, doth give too much to many.
But yet she never gave enough to any.
I Epigrams. Sir j. harrington.
! Are there not, dear Michal,
Two points in the adventure of the diver,
One— when, a beggar, he prepares to plunge ?
One — when, a prince, he rises with his pearl Î
Festus, I plunge.
Paracelsus. r. BROWNING.
When Fortune means to men most good.
She looks upon them with a threatening eye.
King yohn. Act iü. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
î}-
■51
802
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
a
Yet true it is, as cow chews cud,
And trees, at spring, do yield forth bu
Except wind stands, as never it stood.
It is an ill wind turns none to good.
The vyiHdt. T. TUSSER.
There is some soul of goodness in things evü.
Would men ohserviugly distil it out.
King Henry K, Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
For 'tis a truth well known to most.
That whatsoever thing is lost.
We seek it, ere it come to light.
In every cranny but the right.
Tßü Retired Cat.
COWPER.
I have set my life upon a cast.
And I will stand the hazard of the die.
King Richard III., Act r. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Elements of Success.
Macbeth. If we should fail, —
Lady Macbeth. We fail !
But screw your courage to the sticking place.
And we '11 not fail.
Macbeth, Act !. Sc. j. SHAKESPEARE.
In the lexicon of youth, which fate reserves
For a bright manhood, there is no such word
As — fail. '
Richelieu, Act !L Sc. ». BULWER-LYTTON.
The star of the unconquered wül.
The Light oyStars. LONGFELLOW.
'T is not in mortals to command success.
But we '11 do more, Sempronius ; we '11 deserve it.
Cato, Act i. Sc. 2. J. ADDISON.
To maken vertue of nécessita.
The Knightes Tale.
Chaucer.
And many strokes, though with a little axe.
Hew down and fell the hardest-timbered oak.
King Henry VI.^ Part III., Actxx. Sc. i. shakespeare.
striving to better, oft we mar what's well.
King Lear, Actl Sc. 4. shakespeare.
A wild dedication of yourselves
To unpathed waters, undreamed shores.
IVinteVs Tale, Actvr. Se. 3.
Shakespeare.
There is a tide in the affairs of men.
Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune ;
Omitted, all the voyage of their life
Is bound in shallows and in miseries.
On such a full sea are we now afloat ;
And we must take the current when it serves.
Or lose our ventures.
Tulins Casar, Aetiw, Sc. 3. shakespeare.
In my school-days, when I had lost one shaft,
I shot his fellow of the self-same flight
The self-same way, with more advisèd watch.
To ñnd the other forth ; and by adventuring both,
I oft found both.
Merchant of Venice, Act 1. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
Who breaketh his credit, or cracketh it twice.
Trust such, with a siierty, if ye be wise :
Or if he be angry, for asking thy due.
Once even, to him afterward, lend not anew.
Good Hnsbattdry Lessons. T. TusSER.
He is well paid that is well satisfied.
Merchant of Venice, Activ. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
A Prophecy of Enterprise.
[1781.1
Soon shall thy ai-m, unconquered steam ! afar
Drag the slow barge, or drive the rapid car ;
Or on wide waving wings expanded bear
The flying-chariot through the field of air.
TheJBotanic Garden, Part I. Ch. z. E. Darwin.
Poverty.
Take physic, pomp ;
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel.
King Lear, Act iiL Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
Through tattered clothes small vices do appear ;
Robes and furred gowns hide all.
King Uar, Act iv. Ac. 6. SHAKESPEARE.
Yon friendless man, at whose dejected eye
Th' unfeeling proud one looks, and passes by.
Condemned on penury's barren path to roam.
Scorned by the world, and left without a home.
Pleasures of Hope. t, campbell.
Rest here, distrest by poverty no more.
Efitafh on C. Phihfs, DR. S. JOHNSON.
Riches.
Gold ! gold ! gold ! gold !
Bright and yellow, hard and cold.
Molten, graven, hammered and rolled ;
Heavy to get, and light to hold ;
Hoarded, bartered, bought, and sold.
Stolen, borrowed, squandered, doled :
Spumed by the young, but hugged by the old
To the very verge of the churchyard mould ;
Price of many a crime untold :
Gold ! gold ! gold ! gold !
Good or bad a thousand-fold !
How widely its agencies vary, —
To save, to ruin, to curse, to bless, —
As even its minted coins express,
Now stamped with the image of good Queen Bess,
And now of a Bloody Mary.
Mtss Kihnansegg. T. HoOD.
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FRAGMENTS.
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a
4
Mammon, the least erected spirit that fell
From heaven ; for even in heaven his looks and
thoughts
Were always downward bent, admiring more
The riches of heaven's pavement, trodden gold.
Than aught divine or holy else enjoyed
In vision beatific.
Paradise Last, Book L MlLTON.
Religious, punctual, frugal, and so forth ;
His word would pass for more than he was worth.
One solid dish his week-day meal affords.
An added pudding solemnized the Lord's.
Constant at church and change, his gains were
sure.
His giving rare, save farthings to the poor.
Moral Essays, Epistle III. POPE.
The devil was piqued such saintship to behold.
And longed to tempt him, like good Job of old ;
For Satan now is wiser than of yore.
And tempts by making rich, not making poor.
Moral Essays, Epistle III. PoPE.
Here Wisdom calls, " Seek virtue first, he bold ;
As gold to silver, virtue is to gold."
There London's voice, " Get money, money still.
And then let Virtue follow if she will."
Imitations ^Horau, Epistle I. Book i. POPE.
Be but great.
With praise or infamy —leave that to fate ;
Get place and wealth ; if possible, with grace ;
If not, by any means get wealth and place.
Imitations qf Horace, Epistle I. Book i. POPE.
For what is worth in anything.
But so much money as 't will bring ?
Hudibras, Part II. dr. s. butler.
You have too much respect upon the world :
They lo.se it, that do buy it with much care.
Merchant of Venice, Act j. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
INTELLECTUAL ACTIVITY.
Conversation.
Words are like leaves ; and where they most
abound.
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.
Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE.
And 1 oft have heard defended.
Little said is soonest mended.
The Shepherd's Hunting. G. WITHER.
Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit.
And tediousness the limbs and outward fiour-
ishes,
1 will be brief.
Hamlet, Act ii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
King Richard. Be eloquent in my behalf to her.
Queen Elizabeth. An honest tale speeds best,
being plainly told.
King Richard III,, Act iv. Sc, 4. SHAKESPEARE.
And, when you stick on conversation's burrs.
Don't strew your pathway with those dreadful
urs,
Urania. o. w. holues.
In his brain —
Which is as dry as the remainder biscuit
After a voyage — he hath strange places crammed
With observation, the which he vents
In mangled forms.
As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7 SHAKESPEARE.
They never taste who always drink ;
They always talk who never think.
Upon a Passage in the Scaligerana. M. PRIOR.
0 dear discretion ! how his words are suited.
Merchant 0/ Venice, Act Ui. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
His wit invites you by his looks to come.
But, when you knock, it never is at home.
Conversation. COWPER.
Bid me discourse, I wiU enchant thine ear.
Venus and Adonis, SHAKESPEARE.
A man in all the world's new fashion planted.
That hath a mint of phrases in his brain.
Lotids Labor Lost, Acta, Sc. 4, SHAKESPEARE.
And gentle Dulness ever loves a joke.
The DuTtciad, Book ii. POPE.
O, many a shaft, at random sent.
Finds mark the archer little meant !
And many a word, at random spoken.
May soothe, or wound, a heart that's broken !
Lord 0/the Isles, Cant. v. SCOTT.
Argument.
And why, sir, must they so ?
The why is plain as way to parish church.
As You Like It, Act iL Sc. 7.
SHAKESPEARE
Who shall decide, when doctors disagree.
And soundest casuists doubt, like you and me ?
Moral Essays, Epistle III, POPE.
Much may be said on both sides.
The Covent Garden Tragedy, Sc. 8»
He that complies against his will
Is of his own opinion still.
Hudibras, Part III,
h. fleldina
Dr. s. Butler.
Quoth she, I've heard old cunning stagers
Say, fools for argtiments use wagers.
Hudibras, Part II, dr. s. butler.
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POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
n
A second Daniel, a Daniel, Jew !
Now, infidel, I have thee on the hip.
A Daniel, still say I ; a second Daniel ! —
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word.
MtrcHant 0/ ymtce. Act iv. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
To leave this keen encounter of our wits.
King Richard III,, Act i. Sc, a. SHAKESPEARE.
orator.t.
For rhetoric, he could not ope
His mouth, but out there flew a trope.
For all a rhetorician's rules
Teach nothing hut to name his tools.
HudibraSt Part I. Cant, dr. s. butler.
Where nature's end of language is declined.
And men talk only to conceal the mind.
Lovt of Fame, Satire U. Dr. E. YOUNG.
To syllable-dissectors they appeal.
Allow them accent-cadence, — fools may feel ;
But, spite of all the criticising elves.
Those who would make us feel — must feel them¬
selves.
The Rosciad, c. churchill.
Thence to the famous orators repair.
Those ancient, whose resistless eloquence
Wielded at will that fierce démocratie.
Shook the arsenal, and fulmined over Greece, ■
To Macedón, and Artaxerxes' throne.
Paradise Regained, Book iv. milto.v.
Words that weep and tears that speak.
The Prophet, a. Cowley.
The Stage.
I have heard
That guilty creatures, sitting at a play.
Have by the very cunning of the scene
Been struck so to the soul, that presently
They have proclaimed their malefactions.
The play's the thing
Wherein I '11 catch the conscience of the King.
Hamlet, Acta. Sc. a, SHAKESPEARE
Lo, where the stage, the poor, degraded stage.
Holds its warped mirror to a gaping age.
Curiosity, c. sprague
Nay, an thou 'It mouth,
I '11 rout as well as thou.
Hamlet, Act y. Sc. I, SHAKESPEARE
There still remains, to mortify a wit.
The many-headed monster of the pit.
Imitations 0/Horace, Epistte /. Book ii*
POPE.
New forms arise, and different views engage.
Superfluous lags the vet'ran on the stage.
Till pitying Nature signs the last release.
And bids afflicted worth retire to peace.
Vanity of Human fVishes, Dr. S. Johnson.
A veteran see ! whose last act on the stage
Entreats your smiles for sickness and for age ;
Their cause I plead, — plead it in heart and
mind ;
A fellow-feeling makes one wondrous kind.
Prologue on Quitting the Stage in 1776. D. Garrick.
I hold the world but as the world, Gratiano ;
A stage, where every man must play a part.
And mine a sad one.
Merchant of Venice, Acti, Sc, i SHAKESPEARE.
Learning.
'Tis education forms the common mind ;
Just as the twig is bent the tree's inclined.
Moral Essays, Epistle I, POPE.
With too much quickness ever to be taught ;
With too much thinking to have common
thought.
Moral Essays, Epistle II, POPE.
Glad that you thus continue your resolve
To suck the sweets of sweet philosophy ;
Only, good master, while we do admire
This virtue and this moral discipline.
Let's be no stoics, nor no stocks, I pray.
No profit grows where is no pleasure ta'en ;
In brief, sir, study what you most affect.
Taming of the Shrew, Act i. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
Some, for renown, on scraps of learning dote.
And think they grow immortal as they quote.
Lozk of Fame, Satire L DR. E, YOUNG.
With just enough of learning to misquote.
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, BYRON.
Whence is thy learning ? Hath thy toil
O'er books consumed the midnight oil ?
Fables : The Shepherd and the Philosopher. J. GAY.
Small have continual plodders ever won.
Save base authority from others' books.
These earthly godfathers of heaven's lights.
That give a name to every fixèd star.
Have no more profit of their shining nights
Than those that walk, and wot not what they
are.
Levds Labor Lost, Act L Sr. x. SHAKESPEARE.
B-
-51
FRAGMENTS.
805
Lore seldom haunts the breast where learning
lies,
And Venus sets ere Mercury can rise.
The Wife (tfBath : Her Prehgtte. pope.
 little learning is a dangerous thing ;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring :
There shallow draughts intoxicate the brain.
And drinking largely sobers us again.
Essay on Criticism, Part II. Pope.
Authors.
Shut, shut the door, good John ! fatigued I said.
Tie up the knocker, say I'm sick, I'm dead.
The Dog-star rages ! nay, 't is past a doubt.
All Bedlam, or Parnassus, is let out :
Fire in each eye, and papers in each hand.
They rave, recite, and madden round the land.
Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot : Prologue to the Satires. POPE.
Why did I write ? what sin to me unknown
Dipped me in ink, — my parents', or my own ?
Epistle to Dr. A rbuthnot : Prologue to the Satires. POPE.
Whether the charmer sinner it, or saint it.
If folly grow romantic, I must paint it.
Moral Essays, Epistle II. POPE.
Beneath the rule of men entirely great
The pen is mightier than the sword.
RUIulteu, Act U. Sc. 2. E. BULWER-LYTTON.
And so I penned
It down, until at last it came to be,
For length and breadth, the bigness which you
Pilgrim's Progress : Apology for his Book*
J. BUNVAN.
Books.
If there's a hole in a' your coats,
I rede ye tent it ;
A chiel's amang ye takin' notes.
And, faith, he '11 prent it.
On Captain Grose's Peregrinations through Scotland, BURNS.
'Tis pleasant, sure, to see one's name in print ;
A book's a book, although there's nothing in't.
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. BYRON.
Lest men suspect your tale untrue.
Keep probability in view.
The traveller leaping o'er those bounds.
The credit of his book confounds.
The Painter who pleased Nobody and Everybody. J, GAY.
Immodest words admit of no defence.
For want of decency is want of sense.
But foul descriptions are offensive still.
Either for being like or being ill.
Essay on Translated Eerse, EARL OP ROSCOMMON.
But words are things, and a small drop of ink.
Falling, like dew, upon a thought, produces
That which makes thousands, perhaps millions,
think.
Don yuan. Cant. iiL BVRON.
Me, poor man ! — My library
Was dukedom large enough.
Tempest, Act i. Se. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
His study ! with what authors is it stored ?
In books, not authors, curious is my lord ;
To all their dated backs he turns you round ;
These Aldus printed, those Du Sueü has bound !
Lo, some are vellum, and the rest as good
For all his lordship knows, but they are wood.
For Locke or Milton't is in vain to look.
These shelves admit not any modern book.
Moral Essays, Epistle IV. POPE.
'T is strange — but true ; for truth is always
strange ;
Stranger than fiction.
Don yuan. Cant. xiv. BVRON.
Oh ! rather give me commentators plain.
Who with no deep researches vex the brain ;
Wlio from the dark and doubtful love to lun.
And hold their glimmering tapers to the sun.
The Parish Register, Part I., Introduction. G. CRABBE.
The readers and the hearers like my books.
But yet some writers cannot them digest ;
But what care I ? for when I make a feast
I would my guests should praise it, not the
cooks.
Epigrams. SIR J. HARRINGTON.
Dreams, books, are each a world ; and books, we
know.
Are a substantial world, both pure and good ;
Bound these, with tendrils strong as flesh and
blood.
Our pastime and our happiness will grow.
Personal Talk.
Wordsworth.
And choose an author as you choose a friend.
Essay on Translated Verse. EARL OP ROSCOMMON.
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken ;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
He stared at the Pacific — and all his men
Looked at each other with a wüd surmise —
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
On first looking into Chapman*s Homer* KEATS.
fl-
806
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
My days among the Dead are passed ;
Around me I behold,
Where'er these casual eyes are cast,
The mighty minds of old ;
My never-failing friends are they,
With whom I converse day by day.
Occasional Pieces, xvüi.
R. SOUTHEY.
There studious let me sit,
And hold high converse with the mighty dead ;
Sages of ancient time, as gods revered.
As gods beneficent, who blest mankind
With arts, with arms, and humanized a world.
The Seasons: fVinter. THOMSON.
Ceiticism and Satire.
And finds, with keen, discriminating sight.
Black's not so black ; — nor white so very white.
New Aforaliiy. G. CANNING.
In words, as fashions, the same rule will hold,
Alike fantastic if too new or old :
Be not the first by whom the new are tried.
Nor yet the last to lay the old aside.
Essay on Criticism, Part //. popb.
Poets lose half the praise they should have got.
Could it be known what they discreetly blot.
Upon RoscommotCs Translation of Horace's De Arte Poética.
E. Waller.
Even copious Dryden wanted, or forgot.
The last and greatest art, the art to blot.
Imitations qf Horace, Epistle I, Book U. POPE.
True ease in writing comes from art, not chance.
As those move easiest who have learned to dance.
'T is not enough no harshness gives offence ;
The sound must seem an echo to the sense.
Soft is the strain when zephyr gently blows,
And the smooth stream in smoother numbers
flows ;
But when loud surges lash the sounding shore.
The hoarse rough verse should like the torrent
roar.
When Ajax strives some rock's vast weight to
throw.
The line too labors, and the words move slow ;
Not so when swift Camilla scours the plain.
Flies o'er th' unbending com, and skims along
the main.
Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE.
Then, at the last and only couplet fraught
With some unmeaning thing they call a thought,
A needless Alexandrine ends the song.
That, like a wounded snake, drags its slow length
along.
Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE.
As soon
Seek roses in December, —ice in June ;
Hope constancy in wind, or com in chafif.
Believe a woman, or an epitaph.
Or any other thing that's false, before
You trust in critics.
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, BYRON.
Vex not thou the poet's mind
With thy shallow wit :
Vex not thou the poet's mind ;
For thou canst not fathom it.
The PxTs Mind. TENNYSON,
Prepare for rhyme — I '11 publish, right or wrong :
Fools are my theme, let satire be my song.
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, BYRON.
Satire's my weapon, but I'm too discreet
To run amuck, and tüt at all I meet.
Imitation of Horace, Satire /. Book ii* POPE.
Satire should, like a polished razor keen.
Wound with a touch that's scarcely felt or seen.
To the Imitator of thefirst Satire of Horace, Book iL
Lady m. w. Montagu.
Poets and Poetry.
Of all those arts in which the wise excel.
Nature's chief masterpiece is writing well ;
No writing lifts exalted man so high
As sacred and soul-moving poesy.
Essay OH Poetry. DUKE OP BUCKINGHAMSHIRE.
For his chaste Muse employed her heaveu-taught
lyre
None but the noblest passions to inspire.
Not one immoral, one corrapted thought.
One line which, dying, he could wish to blot.
Prologue to Thomson's Coriolanus. LORD LVTTELTON.
Wisdom married to immortal verse.
The Excursion, Book vii. WORDSWORTH.
There is a pleasure in poetic pains
Which only poets know.
The Timepiece : The Task, Book ü. COWPER.
Most wretched men
Are cradled into poetry by wrong ;
They lea m in suffering what they teach in song.
Julian and Afaddalo. SHELLEY.
Lovers and madmen have such seething brains.
Such shaping fantasies, that apprehend
More than cool reason ever comprehends.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet
Are of imagination all compact.
Midsummer Night's Dream, Act v. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
C-
FRAGMENTS.
807
a
I do but sing because I must,
And pipe but as the linnets sing.
In Memoriam, xxi.
Tennyson.
While pensive poets painful vigils keep,
Sleepless themselves to give their readers sleep.
DuHa'aä, Book l pope.
For wheresoe'er I turn my ravished eyes.
Gay gilded scenes and shining prospects rise.
Poetic fields encompass me around.
And still 1 seem to tread on classic ground.
A LetUr/rom Italy, addison.
Eye Nature's walks, shoot folly as it dies,
And catch the manners living as they rise ;
Laugh where we must, be candid where we can.
But vindicate the ways of God to man.
Essay on Man, Epistle I, pope.
Poets, like painters, thus unskilled to trace
The naked nature and the living grace.
With gold and jewels cover every part.
And hide with ornaments their want of art.
True wit is nature to advantage dressed.
What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed.
Essay on Criticism, Part II, pope.
Apt alliteration's artful aid.
The Prophecy o/ Famine,
C. Churchill.
But those that write in rhyme still make
The one verse for the other's sake ;
For one for sense, and one for rhyme,
I think's sufficient at one time.
Hudibrai, Part II. DR. S. BUTLER.
For rhyme the rudder is of verses.
With which, like ships, they steer their courses.
Hudibras, Part I, DR. S, BUTLER.
I had rather be a kitten, and cry, mew.
Than one of these same metre ballad-mongers ;
1 had rather hear a brazen can'stick turned.
Or a dry wheel grate on the axle-tree ;
And that would set my teeth nothing on edge.
Nothing so much as mincing poetry :
'T is like the forced gait of a shuffling nag.
King Henry IV,, Part /. Act Ui. Sc, x. SHAKESPEARE.
Go boldly forth, my simple lay.
Whose accents flow with artless ease.
Like orient pearls at random strung.
A Persian Song o/ Htsfis.
Sir w. Jones.
One simile that solitary shines
In the dry desert of a thousand lines.
Imitations of Horace, Epistle I. Book ii.
Jewels five-words long.
That on the stretched forefinger of all time
Sparkle forever.
Tke PriKcess, Cant. u. tennyson.
Choice word and measured phrase above the reach
Of ordinary men.
Resolution and Independence. wordsworth#
A poem round and perfect as a star.
A Life Drama, a. smith.
My eyes make pictures, when they are shut.
A Day-Dream. s. t. coleridge#
The poet in a golden clime was bom,
With golden stars above ;
Dowered with the hate of hate, the scom of scom,
I The love of love.
The Poet. tennyson.
Give me that growth which some perchance deem
sleep.
Wherewith the steadfast coral-stems arise.
Which, by the toil of gathering energies.
Their upward way into clear sunshine keep,
Until, by Heaven's sweetest influences.
Slowly and slowly spreads a speck of green
Into a pleasant island in the seas,
Where, midtallpalmSjthecane-roofed home is seen
And wearied men shall sit at sunset's hour,
Hearing the leaves and loving God's dear power.
Smnct VII. j. r. lowhll.
Still govern thou my song,
Urania, and fit audience find, though few.
Paradise Lost, Book vii. MiLTQN.
Thanks untraced to lips unknown
Shall greet me like the odors blown
From unseen meadows newly mown,
Or lilies floating in some pond,
Wood-fringed, the wayside gaze beyond ;
The traveller owns the grateful sense
Of sweetness near, he knows not whence.
And, pausing, takes with forehead bare
The benediction of the air.
Snrw-Bonnd. J. G. WHITTIER.
The Mind.
How small, of all that human hearts endure.
That part which laws or kings can cause or cure !
Still to ourselves in every place consigned, ■
Our own felicity we make or find.
With secret course, which no loud storms annoy.
Glides the smooth current of domestic joy.
Lines added to Goldsmith's Traveller. Dr. S. johnson.
-Bi
Ö-
808
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
I'
Now see that noble and most sovereign reason.
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune and harsh.
Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. z.
SHAKESPEARE.
Measure your mind's height by the shade it
casts !
Paracelsus, R. BROWNING.
He that of such a height hath built his mind.
And reared the dwelling of his thoughts so strong.
As neither fear nor hope can shake the frame
Of his resolved powers ; nor all the wind
Of vanity or malice pierce to wrong
His settled peace, or to disturb the same ;
What a fair seat hath he, from whence he may
The boundless wastes and wilds of man survey ?
Unless above himself he can
Erect himself, how poor a thing is man !
To the Countess of Cumberland, S. DANIEL.
Were I so tail to reach the pole.
Or grasp the ocean with my span,
I must be measured by my soul ;
The mind's the standard of the man.
Horce Lyrica, Book U. : False Greatness. DR. I. WATTS.
Philosophy.
Hoeatio. 0 day and night, but this is won¬
drous strange !
Hamlet. And therefore as a stranger give it
welcome.
There are more things in heaven and earth,
Horatio,
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.
Hamlet, Act L Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Philosophy will clip an angel's wings.
Lamia, Part II. j. keats.
Sure, He that made us with such large discourse.
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and godlike reason.
To fust in us imused.
Hamlet, Act iv. Sc. 4. . SHAKESPEARE.
Thinking is but an idle waste of thought.
And naught is everything and ever3rthing is
naught.
Jtejected Addresses : Cut Bono 1 H. and J. SMITH.
When Bishop Berkeley said " there was no mat¬
ter,"
And proved it — 't was no matter what he said.
Don yuan. Cant. zi. BYRON.
His cogitative faculties immersed
In cogibundity of cogitation.
Chronan, Act L Sc. z. H. CAREY.
Hot philosophers
Stood banding factions, all so strongly propt ;
I staggered, knew not which was firmer part.
But thought, quoted, read, observed, and pried,
Stufift noting-books ; and still my spaniel slept.
At length he waked, and yawned ; and by yon sky
For aught I know, he knew as much as I.
A Scholar and his Dog. J. MaRSTON.
He knew what's what, and that's as high
As metaphysic wit can fly.
Httdibras, Part I. DR. S. BUTLER.
There is nothing either good or bad, but think¬
ing makes it so.
Hamlet, Act ii. Sc, a, Shakespeare
Not so the son ; he marked this oversight.
And then mistook reverse of wrong for right ;
( For What to shun, will no great knowledge need.
But What to follow, is a task indeed !)
Moral Essays, Efistle III. POPE.
The intellectual power, through words and things.
Went sounding on, a dim and perilous way !
The Excursion, Book iii WORDSWORTH.
In discourse more sweet,
(For eloquence the soul, song charms the sense,)
Others apart sat on a hill retired.
In thoughts more elevate, and reasoned high
Of providence, foreknowledge, will, and fate.
Fixed fate, free will, foreknowledge absolute ;
And found no end, in wand'ring mazes lost.
Of good and evil much they argued then.
Of happiness and final misery.
Passion and apathy, and glory and shame ;
Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy.
Paradise Lost, Book ii Milton.
Slave to no sect, who takes no private road.
But looks through nature up to nature's God.
And knows where faith, law, morals, all began.
All end, in love of God and love of man.
Essay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE.
Mtrsic.
If music be the food of love, play on ;
Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.
That strain again — it had a dying fall :
0, it came o'er my ear like the sweet south,
That breathes upon a bank of violets.
Stealing, and giving odor.
Twelfth Night, Act Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE
1&
■Ú
&
FRAGMENTS.
809
There is a charm, a power, that sways the breast ;
Bids every passion revel or be still ;
Inspires with rage, or all our cares dissolves ;
Can soothe distraction, and almost despair.
ArtofPraenring Health. J. ARMSTRONG.
Music hath charms to soothe a savage breast,
To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.
I've read that things inanimate have moved.
And, as with living souls, have been informed
By magic numbers and persuasive sound.
The Mourning Bride, Act L Sc. i, W. CONGRBVE.
Where music dwells
Lingering and wandering on, as loath to die.
Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldethproof
That they were born for immortality.
Ecclesiastical Sonnets, Part III. xliii. WORDSWORTH.
SCULPTUBE.
As when, O lady mine.
With chiselled touch
The stone unhewn and cold
Becomes a living mould.
The more the marble wastes
The more the statue grows.
Smnet. Tr. o/Uts. Henry Roscoe. m. Angelo.
THE PROFESSIONS.
The Clergy and the Pulpit.
0 for a forty parson power !
Don yuan. Cant. v. BYRON
Wel oughte a prest ensample for to yive,
By his clennesse, how that his sheep shulde ly ve.
To draw folk to heven by faimesse
By good ensample, this was his busynes.se.
Canterbury Tales : Prologue. CHAUCER.
What makes all doctrines plain and clear f
About two hundred pounds a year.
And that which was proved true before.
Prove false again ? Two hundred more.
HadOras. Part III. Dr. S. botler.
Bo not, as some ungracious pastors do.
Show me the steep and thorny way to Heaven,
Wliilst, like a puffed and reckless libertine.
Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads.
And recks not his own rede.
Hamlet, Act l Sc. 3. shakespeare,
He 'stablishes the strong, restores the weak.
Reclaims the wanderer, binds the broken heart.
The Timepiece: The Tack, Beek u. cowper.
Of right and wrong he taught
Truths as refined as ever Athens heard ;
And (strange to tell !) he practised what he
preached.
Art of Preserving Health. J. ARMSTRONG.
Medicine and Doctors.
I do remember an apothecary.
Sharp misery had worn him to the bones :
And in his needy shop a tortoise hung.
An alligator stuffed, and other skins
Of ill-shaped fishes ; and about his shelves
A beggarly account of empty boxes.
Romeo and yuliet. Act v. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARB»
With us ther was a Doetour of Phisik,
In a^this world^ne wa^ther no^him lyk
To speke of phisik and of surgbrye.
He knew the cause of every maladye.
Were it of hoot or colde, or moyste or drye.
And wherjengendjpred and lof whafj humour ;
He was a verrey parfight practisour.
For gold in phisik is a cordial,
Therfore he lovedè gold in speciaL
Canterbury Tales: Prologue. CHAUCER.
"Is there no hope ? " the sick man said.
The silent doctor shook his head
And took his leave with signs of sorrow.
Despairing of his fee to-morrow.
The Sick Man and the AngeL J. GAY.
But when ill indeed.
E'en dismissing the doctor don't always succeed.
Lodgings/or Single Gentlemen. G. COLMAN, the Younger.
Lawyers and the Law.
So wise, so grave, of so perplexed a tongue
And loud withal, that could not wag, nor scarce
Lie still, without a fee.
Vatpone. B. JONSON.
While lawyers have more sober sense
Than t' argue at their own expense.
But make their best advantages
Of others' quarrels, like the Swiss.
Hudibras. DR. s. BUTLER.
Each wanton judge new penal statutes draw,
Laws grind the poor, and rich men rule the law.
The Traveller. GOLDSMITH.
t]-
&
810
POEMS OP SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Laws, as we read in ancient sages,
Have been like cobwebs in all ages.
Cobwebs for little flies are spread.
And laws for little folks are made ;
But if an insect of renown.
Hornet or beetle, wasp or drone.
Be caught in quest of sport or plunder.
The flimsy fetter flies in sunder.
j. beattie.
Between two hawks, which flies the higher pitch.
Between two dogs, which hath the deeper mouth,
Between two horses, which doth bear him best.
Between two girls, which hath the merriest eye,
I have, perhaps, some shallow spirit of judg¬
ment;
But in these nice sharp quillets of the law.
Good faith, I am no wiser than a daw.
KingHtnry VI., Part I.Act \\. Sc. 4. shakespeare.
Mastering the lawless science of our law.
That codeless myriad of precedent.
That wilderness of single instances.
Aylmer's Field. tennyson.
for twelve honest men have decided the cause.
Who are judges alike of the facts and the laws.
Tlu Honest yury. w. pulteney.
The hungry judges soon the sentence sign.
And wretches hang, that jurymen may dine.
Ra^e of the Lock, Cant. Hi. Pope.
Dame Justice, weighing long the doubtful right.
Takes, opens, swallows it before their sight.
The cause of strife removed so rarely well.
There, take (says Justice), take ye each a shell ;
We thrive at Westminster on fools like you ;
'T was a fat oyster — live in peace — adieu.
Verbatim from Boileau. pope.
The Press.
Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round.
And while the bubbling and loud hissing urn
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups.
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each.
So let us welcome peaceful evening in.
This folio of four pages, happy work !
Which not e'en critics criticise ; that holds
Inquisitive attention while I read.
What is it but a map of busy life.
Its fluctuations and its vast concerns ?
'T is pleasant, through the loop-holes of retreat,
To peep at such a world, — to see the stir
Of the great Babel, and not feel the crowd.
h
While fancy, like the finger of a clock.
Runs the great circuit, and is stUl at home.
Winter Evening: The TasktBookvi. COWPBR.
The Jester.
When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time.
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer.
That fools should be so deep contemplative ;
And I did laugh, sans intermission.
An hour by his dial. — 0 noble fool !
A worthy fool ! — Motley's the only wear.
As You Like It, Act U. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
PERSONAL AND PUBLIC OPINION.
Praise.
The love of praise, howe'er concealed by art.
Reigns more or less, and glows in every heart.
Love of Fame, Satire i. DR. E. YOUNG.
To things of sale a seller's praise belongs.
Love's Labor Lost, Activ. Sc. ^ SHAKESPEARE.
I have bought
Golden opinions from all sorts of people.
Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE
Who hath not owned, with rapture-smitten frame.
The power of grace, the magic of a name ?
Pleasures of Hope, Part //. T. CAMPBELL,
Flattery.
'T is an old maxim in the schools.
That flattery's the food of fools ;
Yet now and then your men of wit
Will condescend to take a bit.
Cadenas and Vanessa, Dean SwiFT.
But flattery never seems absurd ;
The flattered always takes your word :
Impossibilities seem just ;
They take the strongest praise on trust.
Hyperboles, though ne'ei so great.
Will still come short of self-conceit.
Tßte Painter tohopleased Nobody and Everybody, J. GAY«
He loves to hear
That unicorns may be betrayed with trees.
And bears with glasses, elephants with holes.
Lions with toils, and men with flatterers.
But when I tell him he hates flatterers.
He says he does, being then most flattered.
Julius Casar, Act ii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
51
FRAGMENTS.
811
Ne'er
Was flattery lost on Poet's ear :
A simple race ! they waste their toil
For the vain tribute of a smile.
Lay o/the Last Afinstrel, Cant iv. SCOTT.
ScaNDAL AMD SlAMDER.
There's nothing blackens like the ink of fools.
If true, a woful likeness ; and, if lies,
" Praise undeserved is scandal in disguise."
Imitations o/HoraoSt Epistle I. Book it POPE.
And there's a lust in man no charm can tame
Of loudly publishing our neighbor's shame ;
On eagles' wings immortal scandals fly.
While virtuous actions are but bom and die.
Satire bt. Tratte, of S. HARVEV. JUVENAL.
A third interprets motions, looks and eyes ;
At every word a reputation dies.
Rape ^ the Lock, Cant, iii. PoPE.
No, 't is slander.
Whose edge is sharper than the sword ; whose
tongue
Outvenoms all the worms of Nile ; whose breath
Rides on the posting winds, and doth belie
All comers of the world.
Cymbcline, Act Ui. Sc. 4. Shakespeare.
Reputation.
Good name in man and woman, dear my lord.
Is the immediate jewel of their souls :
Who steals my purse, steals trash; 'tis something,
nothing ;
'Twas mine, 'tis his, and has been slave to
thousands ;
But he that filches from me my good name
Robs me of that which not enriches him.
And makes me poor indeed.
Othello, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
After my death I wish no other herald.
No other speaker of my living actions.
To keep mine honor from corruption.
But such an honest chronicler as Griffith.
King Henry VIH,, Act y. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
Hamlet. Horatio, I am dead ;
Thou liv'st ; report me and my cause aright
To the unsatisfied.
Horatio. Never believe it :
{Taking the cup.)
I am more an antique Roman than a Dane :
Here's yet some liquor left.
Ham. As thou 'rt a man.
Give me the cup : let go ; by heaven 1 '11 have't. —
{Struggling i 'tí.Km.Kí gets the cntp.)
0 God ! — Horatio, what a wounded name.
Things standing thus unknown, shall live behind
me !
If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,
Absent thee from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
To tell my story.
Hamlet, Act v. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE,
Fame.
What shall I do to be forever known,
And make the age to come my own ?
The Motto. A. COWLEV.
By Jove ! I am not covetous for gold ;
But, if it be a sin to covet honor,
1 am the most offending soul alive.
King Henry Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Your name is great
In mouths of wisest censure.
Othello, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
It deserves with characters of brass
A forted residence 'gainst the tooth of time
And razure of oblivion.
Measure/or Measure, Act v. Sc. z. SHAKESPEARE.
What is glory but the blaze of fame.
The people's praise, if always praise unmixt ?
And what delight to be by such extolled.
To live upon their tongues and be their talk.
Of whom to be dispraised were no small praise ?
Paradise Regained, Book UL MiLTON.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,—
That all with one consent praise new-bom gawds.
And give to dust, that is a little gilt.
More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.
Troilus and Cressida, Act iii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Thrice happy he whose name has been well spelt
Tn the despatch : I knew a man whose loss
Was printed Grore, although his name was Grose.
Don yuan. Cant. viii. BYRON.
What is the end of Fame ? 'T is but to fill
A certain portion of uncertain paper.
Don yuan. Cant, i, BYRON.
Nor Fame I slight, nor for her favors call ;
She comes unlooked for, if she comes at all.
Unblemished let me live, or die unknown ;
O grant an honest fame, or grant me none !
The Temple of Fame. POPB.
[&
812
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
Ah ! who can tell how hard it is to climb
The steep where fame's proud temple shines
afar !
Ah ! who can tell how many a soul sublime
Has felt the influence of malignant star,
And waged with Fortune an eternal war ;
Checked by the scoff of pride, by envy's frown.
And poverty's ur conqnerable bar.
In life's low vale remote has pined alone.
Then dropt into the grave, unpitied and un¬
known !
Tht Minstrel, Book i. J. BEATTIE
Fame is the spur that the clear spirit doth raise
(That last infirmity of noble mind )
To scorn delights, and live laborious days ;
But the fair guerdon when we hope to find.
And think to burst out into sudden blaze,
Comes the blind Fury with the abhorred shears.
And slits the thin-spun life. But not the praise,
Phœbus replied, and touched my trembling ears ;
Fame is no plant that grows on mortal soil.
But lives and spreads aloft by those pure eyes
And perfect witness of all-judging Jove.
As he pronounces lastly in each deed.
Of so much fame in heaven expect thy meed.
Ltcidat. Milton.
CLASS AND CASTE.
Aristocracy.
Order is Heaven's first law, and, this confest.
Some are, and must be, greater than the rest.
Essay on Man, Epistle ly. POPE.
"Whoe'er amidst the sons
Of reason, valor, liberty, and virtue.
Displays distinguished merit, is a noble
Of Nature's own creating.
Curzoianus, Act iii. Sc. 3. j. THOMSON.
None but himself can be his parallel.
The Double Falsehood. LOUIS THEOBALD.
He lives to bnild, not boast, a generous race ;
No tenth transmitter of a foolish face.
The Sctctard. R. savage.
Such souls,
"Whose sudden visitations daze the world,
"Vanish like lightning, but they leave behind
A voice that in the distance far away
Wakens the slumbering ages.
Philip Fan Artevelde, Act i. Sc. 7. SIR H. TAYLOR.
Snobbery.
Let wealth and commerce, laws and learning die.
But leave us stUl our old nobility.
Englands Trust, and other Poems. lord j. manners.
In men this blunder still you find.
All think their little set mankind.
Florio, Part /.
Hannah more.
Glendowbr. And all the courses of my life
do show,
I am not in the roll of common men.
1 can call spirits from the vasty deep.
Hotspur. Why, so can 1, or so can any man ;
But will they come when you do call for them ?
King Henry IV., Part I. Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Know ye not then, said Satan, flUed with scorn,—
Know ye not me ?
Not to know me argues yourselves unknown.
The lowest of your throng.
Paradise Lost, Book !v. MiLTON.
And if his name be George, I '11 call him Peter;
For new-made honor doth forget men's names.
King John, Act i. Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
What woful stuff this madrigal would be
In some starved hackney sonneteer, or me.
But let a lord once own the happy lines.
How the wit brightens ! how the style refines !
Essay on Criticism, Part II. POPE.
'T is from high life high characters are drawn ;
A saint in crape is twice a saint in lawn.
Moral Essays, Epistle J. POPE.
State-craft.
For just experience tells, in every soU,
That those that think must govern those that toil.
The TravctUr.
Goldsmith.
'T is thus the spirit of a single mind
Makes that of multitudes take one direction.
Don Juan. BYRON.
"What should it be, that thus their faith can bind ?
The power of Thought — the magic of the Mind !
Linked with .success, assumed and kept with skill.
That moulds another's weakness to its will.
The Corsair. BYRON.
Treason doth never prosper : what's the reason I
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
Epigrams. SIR J. HARRINGTON.
■5
FRAGMENTS.
813
A cutpurse of the empire and the rule,
That from a shelf the precious diadem stole,
And put it in his pocket I
Hamlet, Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE,
Measures, not men, have always been my mark.
The Good-Natured Man, AcCn. GOLDSMITH.
Abuse of Authority.
Oh ! it is excellent
To have a giant's strength ; but it is tyrannous
To use it like a giant.
Could great men thunder
As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet ;
For every pelting, petty officer
Would use his heaven for thunder, —
Nothing but thunder. Merciful Heaven !
Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt.
Split'St the unwedgeable and gnarled oak.
Than the soft myrtle : but man, proud man I
Drest in a little brief authority, —
Most ignorant of what he's most assured.
His glassy essence, — like an angry ape.
Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven.
As make the angels weep ; who, with our spleens.
Would all themselves laugh mortal.
Measure/or Measure, Act \\. SC'Ta SHAKESPEARE.
The People.
Who o'er the herd would wish to reign.
Fantastic, fickle, fierce, and vain ! —
Vain as the leaf upon the stream.
And fickle as a changeful dream ;
Fantastic as a woman's mood.
And fierce as Frenzy's fevered blood.
Thou many-headed monster thing,
0, who would wish to be thy king !
Lxidy o/the Lake, Cant. v. SCOTT.
He that depends
Upon your favors swims with fins of lead.
And hews down oaks with rushes. Hang ye !
Trust ye ?
With every minute you do change a mind ;
And call him noble that was now your hate.
Him vile that was your garland.
Cerielanus, Act i. Sc. x. SHAKESPEARE.
The scum
That rises upmost when the nation boils.
Den Sebastian. DRYDEN.
Prom lowest place when virtuous things proceed.
The place is dignified by the doer's deed.
All's HCtll thai Ends IVell, Act ii. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Through all disguise, form, place or name.
Beneath the flaunting robes of sin.
Through poverty and squalid shame.
Thou lookest on the man within.
On man, as man, retaining yet,
Howe'er debased, and soiled, and dim.
The crown upon his forehead set —
The immortal gift of God to him.
Democracy. J. G. WHITTIER.
MISCELLANEOUS.
Solitude.
Alone !—that worn-out word.
So idly spoken, and so coldly heard ;
Yet all that poets sing, and grief hath known.
Of hopes laid waste, knells in that word — Alon e !
The New Timon, Part II. E. BULWER-LATTON.
All heaven and earth are still, — though not in
sleep.
But breathless, as we grow when feeling most ;
And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep ; —
All heaven and earth are still ; from the high
, host
Of stars, to the lulled lake and mountain-coast.
All is concentred in a life intense.
Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost.
But hath a part of being, and a sense
Of that which is of all Creator and defence.
Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt
In solitude, where we are least alone.
Childe Harold, Cant. iii. BYRON.
Such was that happy garden-state.
While man there walked without a mate :
After a place so pure and sweet,
What other help could yet be meet !
But't was beyond a mortal's share
To wander solitary there :
Two paradises are in one.
To live in paradise alone.
Tfu Garden ( Translated). A. MARVELL.
Pacing through the forest.
Chewing the cud of sweet and bitter fancy.
As You Like It, Act iv. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
A feeling of sadness and longing.
That is not akin to pain.
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.
The Day is Done. LONGFELLOW
Converse with men makes sharp the glittering wit.
But God to man doth speak in solitude.
Hishland Solitude. J- S. Blackie.
I&
814
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
-a
But if much converse perhaps
Thee satiate, to short absence I could yield ;
For solitude sometimes is best society,
And short retirement urges sweet return.
Paradise Lost, Book ix., milton.
Social Pleasures.
Here thou, great Anna ! whom three realms obey.
Dost sometimes counsel take—and sometimes tea.
Rape o/the Lock, Cant. Ui. POPE.
She that asks
Her dear five hundred friends, contemns them all.
And hates their coming.
The Timepiece: The Task, Book iL COWPER.
The company is " mixed " (the phrase I quote is
As much as saying, they 're below your notice).
Byron.
Hands promiscuously applied.
Round the slight waist or down the glowing side.
ta« wa/te. bvron.
o give me the sweet shady side of Pall Mall.
Tovm and Country, C. MORRIS.
"We may live without poetry, music, and art ;
"We may live without conscience and live without
heart ;
"We may live without friends ; we may live
without books ;
But civilized man cannot live without cooks.
"We may live without books, — what is knowledge
but grieving ?
"We may live without hope, — what is hope but
deceiving ?
"We may live without love,—what is passion
but pining ?
But where is the man that can live without
dining ?
Lucile, Cant. ii. R. BULWER LYTTON {Owen Meredith).
There my retreat the best companions grace.
Chiefs out of war, and statesmen out of place ;
There St. John mingles with my friendly bowl,
The feast of reason and the flow of soul.
Imitations of Horace, Satire i. Book 2. POPB,
Across the walnuts and the wine.
The Miller's Daughter.
Tennyson.
When in the Hall of Smoke they congress hold.
And the sage beriy sunburnt Mocha bears
Has cleared their inward eye ; then, smoke-
enrolled.
The Castle of Indolence, Cant. L J. thomson.
Sublime tobacco ! which from east to west.
Cheers the tar's labor or the Turkman's rest.
Divine in hookahs, glorious in a pipe.
When tipped with amber, mellow, rich and ripe ;
Like other charmers, wooing the caress
More dazzlingly when daring in full dress ;
Yet thy true lovers more admire by far
Thy naked beauties — Give me a cigar !
The Island, Cant. ii. BVRON.
Yes, social friend, 1 love thee well.
In learned doctors' spite ;
Thy clouds all other clouds dispel.
And lap me in delight.
To my Cigar.
C. SPRAGUB.
And when the smoke ascends on high.
Then thou behold'st the vanity
Of worldly stuff.
Gone with a puff :
Thus think, and smoke tobacco.
And seest the ashes cast away.
Then to thyself thou mayest say.
That to the dust
Return thou must.
Thus think, and smoke tobacco.
Anonymous.—Before 1Í89.
Manners and CrsTOMS.
Such is the custom of Brauk some HalL
The Lay of the Last Minstrel, Cant, u SCOTT.
But to my mind, — though 1 am native here.
And to the manner bom, — it is a custom
More honored in the breach, than the observance.
HamUt, Act l Sc. 4. shakespeare.
Manners with fortunes, humors tum with climes,
Tenets with books, and principles with times.
Moral Essays, Epistle I. POPE-
Plain living and high thinking are no more.
The homely beauty of the good old cause
Is gone ; our peace, our fearful innocence.
And pure religion breathing household laws.
tVriticn in London, September, 1803. wordsworth.
Differing Tastes.
Diffei-ent minds
Incline to different objects : one pmsues
The vast alone, the wonderful, the wild ;
Another sighs for harmony, and grace.
And gentlest beauty.
Such and so various are the tastes of men.
Pleasures of the Imagination, Book III. M. AKENSIDB
Ö-
JZ]
FRAGMENTS.
815
What's one man's poison, signor,
(s another's meat or drink.
Levis Cure, Act Ui. Sc. u. BeauUOHT and fletchbr.
Variety's the very spice of life,
That gives it all its flavor.
The Timepiece : The Task, Book'ú. COWPER.
Not chaos-like together crushed and bruised.
But, as the world, harmoniously confused.
Where order in variety we see.
And where, though all things differ, all agree.
H^ifiäsor Forest. POPE.
Quarrelling.
0, shame to men ! devil with devil damned
Firm concord holds, men only disagree
Of creatures rational.
Paradise Lost, BookMiLTON.
Trifles.
Think naught a trifle, though it small appear ;
Small sands the mountain, moments make the
year.
And trifles life.
Love of Fame, Satire-^. DR. E. YOUNG.
Pretty ! in amber to observe the forms
Of hair, or straws, or dirt, or grubs, or worms !
The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare.
But wonder how the devil they got there !
Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot ; Prologue to Satires, POPE.
What dire offence from amorous causes springs.
What mighty contests rise from trivial tMngs.
The Rape of the Lock, Cant. i. POPE.
A little flre is quickly trodden out.
Which, being suffered, rivers cannot quench.
¡Cmg Henry F7., Part III. Act iv. Sc, A SHAKESPEARE.
Craft.
Our better part remains
To work in close design, by fraud or guile.
What force effected not ; that he no less
At length from us may find, who overcomes
By force hath overcome but half his foe.
Paradise Lost, Book i. Milton.
Temptation.
How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds
Makes ill deeds done !
King John, Act iv. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Prudent Speech.
Let it be tenable in your silence still. '
Give it an understanding, but no tongue.
Hamlet, Act\, Sc* 2. SHAKESPEARE.
Give every man thine ear, but few thy voice ;
Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judg¬
ment.
Hamlet, Act i. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
And oftentimes excusing of a fault
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse,
I As patches, set upon a little breach.
Discredit more in hiding of the fault
Than did the fault before it was so patched.
King John, Act iv. Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE.
Moderation.
Reason's whole pleasure, all the joys of sense.
Lie in three words, — health, peace, and compe¬
tence.
But health consists with temperance alone.
And peace, 0 Virtue ! peace is all thine own.
Essay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE.
These violent delights have violent ends.
And in their triumph die ; like fire and powder.
Which as they kiss consume.
Therefore love moderately ; long love doth so ;
Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.
Romeo and Juliet, Act u. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE
They surfeited with honey ; and began
To loathe the taste of sweetness, whereof a little
More than a little is by much too much.
King Henry IV„ Part t. Act iii. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE
He that holds fast the golden mean.
And lives contentedly between
The little and the great,
Feels not the wants that pinch the poor.
Nor plagues that haunt the rich man's door.
Translation of Horace, Book U. Ode x. COWPER.
If then to all men happiness was meant,
God in externals could not place content.
Essay on Man, Epistle IV, PoPE,
Idleness and Ennui.
'T is the voice of the sluggard ; I heard him
complain,
"You have waked me too soon, I must slumber
again."
The Sluggard. Dr. i. watts.
Absence of occupation is not rest,
A mind quite vacant is a mind distressed.
Retirement. cowper.
POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND REFLECTION.
To sigh, yet feel no pain.
To weep, yet scarce know why ;
To sport an hour with Beauty's chain.
Then throw it idly by.
The Blue Stochine. T. MOORE.
The keenest pangs the wretched find
Are rapture to the dreary void,
The leafless desert of the mind,
The waste of feelings unemployed.
The Giaour. BVRON.
Their only labor was to kill the time
(And labor dire it is, and weary woe) ;
They sit, they loll, turn o'er some idle rhyme ;
Then, rising sudden, to the glass they go.
Or saimter forth, with tottering step and slow ;
This soon too rude aa exercise they find ;
Straight on the couch their limbs again they
throw.
Where hours on hours they sighing lie reelined,
And court the vapory god, soft breathing in the
wind.
The Castle of Indolence, Cant. L J. THOMSON.
Hang Sorrow !
And this the burden of his song forever used
to be,
I care for nobody, no not I, if nobody cares for
me.
Lave in a Village, Act i. Xi. a. I. BICKERSTAFF.
Without the door let sorrow lie ;
And if for cold it hap to die.
We '11 bury't in a Christmas pie.
And evermore be merry.
And Jack shall pipe, and Gill shall dance.
And all the town be merry.
For Christmas comes but once a year.
And then they shall be merry.
Though others' purses be more fat.
Why should we pine, or grieve at that ?
Hang sorrow ! care will kill a cat.
And therefore let's be merry.
Christmas, G. WITHER.
Night and Sleep.
Tired nature's sweet restorer, balmy Sleep !
He, like the world, his ready visit pays
Where fortune smiles ; the wretched he forsakes ;
Swift on his downy pinions flies from woe.
And lights on lids unsullied with a tear.
Night Thoughts, Nightï. DR. E. YOUNG.
Thou hast been called, 0 sleep ! the friend of
woe ;
But't is the happy that have called thee so.
Curse o/ Kehama, Cant. xv. R. SOUTH EY.
She bids you on the wanton rushes lay you down.
And rest your gentle head upon her lap.
And she will sing the soug that pleaseth you.
And on your eyelids crown the god of sleep.
Charming your blood with pleasing heaviness ;
Making such difference betwixt wake and sleep
As is the difference betwixt day and night.
The hour before the heavenly-harnessed team
Begins his golden progress in the east.
King Henry IV., Part I. Act ul Sc. i. Shakespears.
Weariness
Can snore upon the flint, when restive sloth
Finds the down pillow hard.
Cymbeline, Act iii. Sc. 6. SHAKESPEARE.
Care-charming sleep, thou easer of all woes.
Brother to Death, sweetly thyself dispose
On this afflicted prince ; fall like a cloud
In gentle showers ; . . . sing his pain
Like hollow murmuring wind or silver rain.
yalentxnian. BEAUMONT and FLETCHER.
Midnight brought on the dusky hour
Friendliest to sleep and silence.
Paradise Lost, Book v. MlLTON.
And the night shall be filled with music.
And the cares that infest the day
Shall fold their tents like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away.
The Day is Done. LONGFELLOW.
To all, to each, a fair good-night.
And pleasing dreams, and slumbers light !
Marmion : L'Envoy, To the Reader, scott.
u
d=H
POEMS OF FANCY.
a
POEMS OF FANCY.
FANTASY.
prom "the vision of delight."
Break, Fantasy, from thy cave of cloud.
And spread thy purple wings.
Now aU thy figures are allowed.
And various shapes of things ;
Create of airy forms a stream.
It must have blood, and naught of phlegm ;
And though it be a waking dream.
Yet let it like an odor rise
To all the senses here.
And fall like sleep upon their eyes.
Or music in their ear.
Ben Jonson.
—*—
DELIGHTS OF FANCY.
from " the pleasures of imagination."
As Memnon's marble harp renowned of old
By fabling Nilus, to the quivering touch
Of Titan's ray, with each repulsive string
Consenting, sounded through the warbling air
Unbidden strains ; e'en so did Nature's hand
To certain species of external things
Attune the finer organs of the mind ;
So the glad impulse of congenial powers.
Or of sweet sound, or fair-proportioned form,
The grace of motion, or the bloom of light.
Thrills through imagination's tender frame.
From nerve to nerve ; all naked and alive
They catch the spreading rays ; till now the soul
At length discloses every tuneful spring.
To that harmonious movement from without,
Kesponsive. Then the inexpressive strain
Diffuses its enchantment ; Fancy dreams
Of sacred fountains and Elysian groves.
And vales of bliss ; the Intellectual Power
Bends from his awful throne a wondering ear.
And smiles ; the passions gently soothed away.
Sink to divine repose, and love and joy
Alone are waking ; love and joy serene
As airs that fan the summer. O attend.
Whoe'er thou art whom these delights can touch,
13
Whose candid bosom the refining love
Of nature warms ; 0, listen to my song,
And I will guide thee to her favorite walks.
And teach thy solitude her voice to hear.
And point her loveliest features to thy view.
Mark akensioe.
FANCY,
Evee let the Fancy roam, v-i'
Pleasure never is at home :
At a touch sweet Pleasm-e melteth.
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth ;
Then let wingèd Fancy wander
Through the thought still spread beyond her :
Open wide the mind's cage-door.
She 'U dart forth, and cloudward soar.
O sweet Fancy ! let her loose ;
Summer'^ joys are^spoilt bjj use.
And the enjoying of the Spring
Fades as does its blossoming :
Autumn's red-lipped fruitage too.
Blushing through the mist and dew.
Cloys with tasting. What do then
Sit thee by the ingle, when
The sear fagot blazes bright.
Spirit of a winter's night ;
When the soundless earth is muffled.
And the cakèd snow is shuffled
From the ploughboy's heavy shoon ;
When the Night doth meet the Noon
In a dark conspiracy
To banish Even from her sky.
— Sit thee there, and send abroad
With a mind self-overawed
Fancy, high-commissioned : — send her I
She has vassals to attend her ;
She will bring, in spite of frost.
Beauties that the earth hath lost ;
She will bring thee, all together,
AU delights of summer weather ;
All the buds and bells of May
From dewy sward or thorny spray ; ■
— ^
820
POEMS OF FANCÏ.
All the heaped Autumn's wealth,
With a still, mysterious stealth ;
She will mix these pleasures up
Like three fit wines in a cup,
And thou shalt quaff it ; — thou shalt hear
Distant harvest-carols clear ;
Eustle of the reapèd corn ;
Sweet birds antheming the morn ;
And in the same moment — hark !
'T is the early April lark,
Or the rooks, with husy caw.
Foraging for sticks and straw.
Thou shalt, at one glance, behold
The daisy and the marigold ;
White-plumed lilies, and the first
Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst ;
Shaded hyacinth, alway
Sapphire queen of the mid-May ;
And every leaf, and every flower
Pearled with the self-same shower.
Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep
Meagre from its cellèd sleep ;
And the snake aU winter-thin
Cast on sunny bank its skin ;
Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see
Hatching in the hawthorn tree.
When the hen-bird's wing doth rest
Quiet on her mossy nest ;
Then the hnrry and alarm
When the bee-hive casts its swarm ;
Acoms ripe down-pattering
While the autumn breezes sing.
O sweet Fancy ! let her loose ;
Everything is spoilt by use :
Where's the cheek that doth not fade.
Too much gazed at ? Where's the maid
Whose lip mature is ever new ?
Where *s the eye, however blue,
Doth not weary ? Where's the face
One would meet in every place ?
Where's the voice, however soft.
One would hear so very oft ?
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth.
Let then winged Fancy find
Thee a mistress to thy mind :
Dulcet-eyed as Ceres' daughter.
Ere the god of torment taught her
How to frown and how to chide ;
With a waist and with a side
White as Hehe's, when her zone
SUpt its golden clasp, and down
Fell her kirtle to her feet
While she held the goblet sweet.
And Jove grew languid. — Break the mesh
Of the Fancy's silken leash ;
Quickly break her prison-string.
And such joys as these she '11 bring :
— Let the winged Fancy roam.
Pleasure never is at home.
John Keats.
HALLO, MY FANCY.
(1650.J
In melancholic fancy.
Out of myself.
In the vulcan dancy.
All the world surveying.
Nowhere staying.
Just like a fairy elf ;
Out o'er the tops of highest mountains skipping.
Out o'er the hUls, the trees and valleys tripping.
Out o'er the ocean seas, without an oar or shipping.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
Amidst the misty vapors.
Fain would I know
What doth cause the tapei-s ;
Why the clouds benight us.
And affright us
While we travel here below.
Fain would I know what makes the roaring
thunder.
And what these lightnings be that rend the
clouds asunder.
And what these comets are on which we gaze
and wonder.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
Fain would I know the reason
Why the little ant,
All the summer season,
Layeth up provision.
On condition
To know no winter's want :
And how these little fishes, that swim beneath
salt water.
Do never blind their eye ; methinks it is a matter
An inch above the reach of old Erra Pater !
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
Fain would I be resolved
How things are done ;
And where the bull was calved
Of bloody Phalaris,
And where the tailor is
That works to the man i' the moon !
Fain would I know how Cupid aims so rightly ;
And how these little fairies do dance and leap
so lightly ;
And where fair Cjmthia makes her ambles
nightly.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
POEMS OF FANCY.
821
In conceit like Phaeton,
I '11 mount Phoebus' chair,
Having ne'er a hat on.
All my hair a-burning
In my journeying.
Hurrying through the air.
Fair would I hear his fiery horses neighing,
And see how they on foamy bits are playing ;
All the stars and planets I will be surveying !
Hallo, my fancy, whither wüt thou go ?
0, from what ground of nature
Doth the pelican.
That self-devouring creature,
Prove so froward
And untoward.
Her vitals for to strain ?
And why the subtle fox, while in death's wounds
is lying.
Doth not lament his pangs by howling and by
crying ;
And why the milk-white swan doth sing when
she's a-dying.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
Fain would 1 conclude this,
At least make essay.
What similitude is ;
Why fowls of a feather
Flock and fly together.
And lambs know beasts of prey :
How Nature's alchymists, these small laborious
creatures,
Acknov;ledge still a prince in ordering their
matters,
And suffer none to live, who slothing lose their
features.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
1 'm rapt with admiration.
When 1 do ruminate.
Men of an occupation.
How each one calls him brother.
Yet each envieth other.
And yet still intimate !
Yea, 1 admire to see some natures farther sun-
d'red.
Than antipodes to us. Is it not to be wond'red ?
In myriads ye '11 find, of one mind scarce a hun¬
dred ?
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
What multitude of notions
Doth perturb my pate,
• Considering the motions.
How the heavens are preserved.
And this world served
In moisture, light, and heat !
If one spirit sits the outmost circle turning.
Or one tiuns another, continuing in journeying.
If rapid circles' motion be that which they call
burning !
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
Fain also would 1 prove this.
By considering
What that, which you call love, is :
Whether it be a folly
Or a melancholy.
Or some heroic thing !
Fain 1 'd have it proved, by one whom love hath
wounded.
And fully upon one his desire hath founded.
Whom nothing else could please though the
world were rounded.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
To know this world's centre.
Height, depth, breadth, and length.
Fain would 1 adventure
To search the hid attractions
Of magnetic actions.
And adamantine strength.
Fain would 1 know, if in some lofty mountain.
Where the moon sojourns, if there be trees or
fountain ;
If there be beasts of prey, or yet be fields to
hunt in.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
Fain would 1 have it tried
By experiment.
By none can be denied !
If in this bulk of nature.
There be voids less or greater.
Or all remains complete.
Fain would 1 know if beasts have any reason ;
If falcons killing eagles do commit a treason ;
If fear of winter's want make swallows fly the
season.
Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go ?
Hallo, my fancy, hallo !
Stay, stay at home with me,
1 can thee no longer follow.
For thou hast betrayed me.
And bewrayed me ;
It is too much for thee.
Stay, stay at home with me ; leave off thy lofty
soaring ;
Stay thou at home with me, and on thy books
be poring ;
For he that goes abroad lays little up in stoiing t
Thou 'rt welcome home, my fancy, welcome
home to me.
William cleland.
Ö22
POEMS OF FANCY.
THE CLOUD.
I BRING fresh showera for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams ;
I bear light shade for the leaves when laid
In their noonday dreams.
From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet birds every one,
When rocked to rest on their mother's breast,
As she dances about the sun.
I wield the flail of the lashing hail.
And whiten the green plains under ;
And then again I dissolve it in rain.
And laugh as I pass in thunder.
I sift the snow on the mountains below.
And their great pines groan aghast ;
And all the night't is my pillow white.
While I sleep in the arms of the blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skyey bowers
Lightning, my pUot, sits :
In a cavern under is fettered the thunder ;
It struggles and howls by fits.
Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion.
This pilot is guiding me.
Lured by the love of the genii that move
In the depths of the purple sea ;
Over the rills and the crags and the hills.
Over the lakes and plains.
Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream,
The spirit he loves remains ;
And I aU the while bask in heaven's blue smile.
Whilst he is dissolving in rains.
The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes.
And his burning plumes outspread.
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack.
When the morning star shines dead.
As, on the jag of a mountain erag
Which an earthquake rocks and swings.
An eagle, alit, one moment may sit
In the light of its golden wings ;
And when sunset may breathe, from the lit sea
beneath.
Its ardors of rest and of love.
And the crimson pall of eve may fall
From the depth of heaven above.
With wings folded I rest on mine airy nest.
As still as a brooding dove.
That orbèd maiden with white fire laden.
Whom mortals call the moon.
Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor
By the midnight breezes strewn ;
And wherever the beat of her unseen feet.
Which only the angels hear.
May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof.
The stars peep behind her and peer ;
And I laugh to see them whiil and flee.
Like a swarm of golden bees,
When I widen the rent in my wind-buüt tent,
TiU the calm rivers, lakes, and sea.s.
Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high.
Are each paved with the moon and these.
I bind the son's throne with a burning zone.
And the moon's with a girdle of pearl ;
The volcanoes aredim, and thestars reel and swim.
When the whirlwinds my banner unfurl.
From cape to cape, with a bridge-like shape.
Over a torrent sea.
Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof.
The mountains its columns be.
The triumphal arch through which I march
With hurricane, fire, and snow.
When the powers of the air are chained to my
chair.
Is the million-colored bow ;
The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove.
While the moist earth was laughing below.
I am the daughter of the earth and water ;
And the nursling of the sky ;
I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores ;
I change, but I cannot die.
For after the rain, when, with> never a stain.
The pavilion of heaven is bare.
And the winds and sunbeams, with their convex
gleams.
Build up the blue dome of air, —
I silently laugh at my own cenotaph.
And out of the caverns of rain.
Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from
the tomb,
I rise and upbuUd it again.
percy bysshe shelley.
«
FANCY IN NUBIBUS.
O, IT is pleasant, with a heart at ease.
Just after sunset, or by moonlight skies.
To make the shifting clouds be what you please.
Or let the easily persuaded eyes
Own each quaint likeness issuing from the mould
Of a friend's fancy ; or, with head bent low.
And cheek aslant, see rivers flow of gold,
'Twixt crimson banks ; and then a traveller go
From mount to moimt, through Cloudland, gor¬
geous land !
Or, listening to the tide with closèd sight.
Be that blind Bard, who on the Chian sti-and.
By those deep sounds possessed with inward light.
Beheld the Iliad and the Odyssey,
Rise to the swelling of the voiceful sea.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge-
POEMS OP FANCY.
— I I •-
823
THE SUNSET CITY.
Thekb's a city that lies in the Kingdom of Clouds,
In the glorious country on high,
Which an azure and silvery curtain enshrouds.
To screen it from mortal eye ;
A city of temples and turrets of gold.
That gleam by a sapphire sea.
Like jewels more splendid than earth may behold.
Or are dreamed of by you and by me.
And about it are highlands of amber that reach
Far away till they melt in the gloom ;
And waters that hem an immaculate beach
With fringes of luminous foam.
Aerial bridges of pearl there are.
And belfries of marvellous shapes.
And lighthouses lit by the evening star.
That sparkle on violet capes ;
And hanging gardens that far away
Enchantedly float aloof ;
Rainbow pavilions in avenues gay,
And banners of glorious woof !
When the Sununer sunset's crimsoning fires
Are aglow in the western sky.
The pilgrim discovers the domes and spires
Of this wonderful city on high ;
And gazing enrapt as the gathering shade
Creeps over the twilight lea.
Sees palace and pinnacle totter and fade.
And sink in the sapphire sea ;
Till the vision loses by slow degrees
The magical splendor it wore ;
The silvery curtain is drawn, and he sees
The beautiful city no more !
henry sylvester cornwell.
THE CASTLE IN THE AIR.
addressed to a lady who dated her letters from
"the little corner of the world."
In the re^on of clouds,^ where the whirlwinds
arise.
My castle of fancy was built.
The tvurets reflected the blue of the skies,
And the windows with sunbeams were gilt.
The rainbow sometimes in its beautiful state
Enamelled the mansion around ;
And the figures that fancy in clouds can create
Supplied me with gardens and ground.
1 had grottos and fountains and orange-tree
giwes ;
I had aU that enchantment has told ;
I had sweet shady walks for the gods and their
loves ;
I had mountains of coral and gold.
But a storm that I felt not had risen and rolled.
While wrapped in a slumber I lay ;
And when I awoke in the morning, behold,
My castle was carried away !
It passed over rivers and valleys and groves ;
The world, it was all in my view ;
I thought of my friends, of their fates, of their
loves.
And often, full often, of you.
At length it came over a beautiful scene.
Which Nature in silence had made ;
The place was but small, but 'twas sweetly serene.
And checkered with sunshine and shade.
I gazed and I envied, with painful good-will.
And grew tired of my seat in the air.
When all of a sudden my castle stood stül
As if some attraction was there.
Like a lark in the sky it came fluttering down.
And placed me exactly in view.
When, whom should I meet in this charming
retreat.
This comer of calmness, but you ?
Delighted to find you in honor and ease,
1 felt no more sorrow nor pain.
But, the wind coming fair, I ascended the nreeze.
And went back to my castle again.
Thomas Paine.
IN THE MIST.
Sitting alliday in a Lilver mist.
In silver silence all the day.
Save for the low, soft kiss of spray
And the lisp of sands by waters kissed.
As the tide draws up the bay.
Little I hear and nothing I see.
Wrapped in that veil by fairies spun ;
The solid earth is vanished for me,
And the shining hours speed noiselessly,
A woof of shadow and sun.
Suddenly out of the shifting veil
A magical bark, by the sunbeams lit,
Flits like a dream—or seems to flit —
With a golden prow and a gossamer sail,
And the waves make room for it.
824
POEMS OF FANCY.
A fair, swift bark from some radiant realm, —
Its diamond cordage cuts the sky
In glittering lines ; all silently
A seeming spirit holds the helm.
And steers. Wül he pass me by!
Ah ! not for me is the vessel here ;
Noiseless and swift as a sea-bird's flight
She swerves and vanishes from the sight ;
No flap of aaü, no parting cheer, —
She has passed into the light.
Sitting some day in a deeper mist.
Silent, alone, some other day.
An unknown bark, from an unknown bay.
By unknown waters lapped and kissed,
Shall near me through the spray.
No flap of sail, no scraping of keel.
Shadowy, dim, with a banner dark.
It wül hover, will pause, and I shall feel
A hand which grasps me, and shivering steal
To the cold strand, and embark, —
Embark for that far, mysterious realm
Where the fathomless, trackless waters flow.
Shall I feel a Presence dim, and know
Thy dear hand. Lord, upon the helm.
Nor be afraid to go ?
And through black waves and stormy blast
And out of the fog-wreaths, dense and dun.
Guided by thee, shall the vessel run.
Sain cne fair haven, night being past.
And anchor in the sun ?
Sarah Woolsev {Siaan Omlülgi).
THE BLESSED DAMOZEL.
The blessed damozel leaned out
From the gold bar of heaven ;
Her eyes were deeper than the depth
Of waters stilled at even ;
She had three lilies in her hand,
And the stars in her hair were seven.
Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem.
No wrought flowers did adorn.
But a white rose of Mary's gift.
For service neatly worn ;
Her hair that lay along her back
Was yellow like ripe corn.
Her seemed she scarce had been a day
One of God's choristers ;
TLe wonder was not yet quite gone
From that still look of hers ;
Albeit, to them she left, her day
Had counted as ten years.
It was the rampart of God's house
That she was standing on ;
By God built over the sheer depth
The which is space begun ;
So high, that looking downward thence
She scarce could see the sun.
It lies in heaven, across the flood
Of ether, as a bridge.
Beneath, the tides of day and night
With flame and darkness ridge
The void, as low as where this earth
Spins like a fretful midge.
Heard hardly, some of her new friends
Amid their loving games
Spake ever-more among themselves
Their virginal chaste names ;
And the souls mounting up to God
Went by her like thin flames.
And stül she bowed herself and stopped
Out of the circling charm ;
Untü her bosom must have made
The bar she leaned on warm,
And the lilies lay as if asleep
Along her bended arm.
From the flxed place of heaven she saw
Time like a pulse shake flerce
Through all the worlds. Her gaze stiU stro-ve
Within the gulf to pierce
The path ; and now she spoke as when
The stars sang in their spheres.
" I wish that he were come to me.
For he will come," she said.
" Have I not prayed in heaven ? — on earth.
Lord, Lord, has he not prayed ?
Are not two prayers a perfect strength ?
And shall I feel afraid ? "
She gazed and listened, and then said.
Less sad of speech than mild, —
"All this is when he comes." She ceased
The light thrilled toward her, filled
With angels in strong level flight.
Her eyes prayed, and she smüed.
(I saw her smile.) But soon their path
Was vague in distant spheres ;
And then she cast her arms along
The golden barriers.
And laid her face between her hands.
And wept. (I heard her tears.)
Dante Gabriel Rossettx
I&
POEMS OF FANCY.
825
a
THE SUNKEN CITY.
Hakk ! the faint beUs of the sunken city
Peal once more their wonted evening chime !
From the deep abysses floats a ditty,
Wild and wondrous, of the olden time.
Temples, towers, and domes of many stories
There lie buried in an ocean grave, —
Undescried, save when their golden glories
Gleam, at sunset, through the lighted wave.
And the mariner who had seen them glisten.
In whose ears those magic bells do sound.
Night by night bides there to watch and listen.
Though death lurks behind each dark rock
round.
So the bells of memory's wonder-city
Peal for me their old melodious chime ;
So my heart pours forth a changeful ditty.
Sad and pleasant, from the bygone time.
Domes and towers and castles, fancy-builded.
There lie lost to daylight's garish beams, —
There lie hidden tiU unveiled and gilded.
Glory-gilded, by my nightly dreams !
And then hear I music sweet upknelling
From many a well-known phantom band,
And, through tears, can see my natural dwelling
Far off in the spirit's luminous land !
From the German of Wilhelm Mueller. Trans¬
lation of James Clarence Mangan.
THE LORE-LEI.
1 know not whence it rises.
This thought so full of woe ; —
But a tale of the times departed
Haunts me — and will not go.
The air is cool, and it darkens.
And calmly flows the Rhine ;
The mountain peaks are sparkling
In the sunny evening-shine.
And yonder sits a maiden.
The fairest of the fair ;
With gold is her garment glittering.
And she combs her golden hair.
With a golden comb she combs it,
And a wüd song singeth she,
That melts the heart with a wondrous
And powerful melody.
The boatman feels his bosom
With a nameless longing move ;
He sees not the gulfs before him.
His gSLze is fixed above.
Till over boat and boatman
The Rhine's deep waters run ;
And this with her magic singing
The Lore-Lei hath done !
From the German of HEINRICH HEINE.
THE FISHER.
The waters purled, the waters swelled, —
A fisher sat near by.
And earnestly his line beheld
With tranquü heart and eye ;
And while he sits and watches there.
He sees the waves divide.
And, lo ! a maid, with glistening hair.
Springs from the troubled tide.
She sang to him, she spake to him, —
"Why lur'st thou from below.
In cruel mood, my tender brood.
To die in day's fierce glow ?
Ah ! didst thou know how sweetly there
The little fishes dwell.
Thou wouldst come down their lot to share.
And be forever well.
" Bathes not the smiling sun at night —
The moon too — in the waves ?
Comes he not 5orth more fresh and bright
From ocean's cooling caves ?
Canst thou unmoved that deep world see.
That heaven of tranquil blue.
Where thine own face is beckoning thee
Down to the eternal dew ? " '
The waters purled, the waters swelled, —
They kissed his naked feet ;
His heart a nameless transport held.
As if his love did greet.
She spake to him, she sang to him ;
Then all with him was o'er, —
Half drew she him, half sank he in, —
He sank to rise no more.
From the German of goethe. Trans¬
lation of Charles T. brooks.
THE SIRENS' SONG.
from the " inner temple masque."
Steer hither, steer your wingèd pines.
All beaten mariners :
Here lie undiscovered mines,
, A prey to passengers ;
826
POEMS OF FANCY.
-a
Perfumes far sweeter than the hest
That make the phœnix um and nest ;
Fear not your ships,
Nor any to oppose you save our lips ;
But come on shore,
Where no joy dies till love has gotten more.
For swelling waves our panting breasts.
Where never storms arise.
Exchange^ and be awhile our guests :
For stars, gaze on our eyes.
The compass, love shall hourly sing ;
And, as he goes about the ring.
We will not miss
To tell each point he nameth with a kiss.
William Browne.
THE FORSAKEN MERMAN.
Come, dear children, let us away ;
Down and away below.
Now my brothers caU from the hay ;
Now the great winds shorewards blow ;
Now the salt tides seaward flow ;
Now the wild white horses play.
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray.
Children dear, let us away.
This way, this way.
CaU her once before you go.
Call once yet.
In a voice that she will know :
"Margaret ! Margaret ! "
Children's voices should be dear
(CaU once more) to a mother's ear :
ChUdren's voices wild with pain,
Surely she will come again.
Call her once, and come away.
This way, this way.
" Mother dear, we cannot stay !
The wild white horses foam and fret,
Margaret ! Margaret ! "
Come, dear chUdren, come away down.
CaU no more.
One last look at the white-walled town.
And the little gray church on the windy shore,
Then come down.
She WÜ1 not come, though you caU aU day.
Come away, come away.
ChUdren dear, was it yesterday
We heard the sweet hells over the hay ?
In the caverns where we lay.
Through the surf and through the swell.
The far-off sound of a sUver beU ? «
Sand-strewn caverns cool and deep.
Where the winds are all asleep ;
Where the spent lights quiver and gleam ;
Where the salt weed sways in the stream ;
Wliere the sea-heasts, ranged all round.
Feed in the ooze of their pasture-ground ;
Where the sea-snakes coil and twine.
Dry their' mail and bask in) the brine ;
Where great whales come s^Uing by,
SaU and saU, with unshut eye.
Round the world forever and aye ?
When did music come this way ?
Children dear, was it yesterday ?
ChUdren dear, was it yesterday
(Call yet once) that she went away Î
Once she sat with you and me.
On a red gold throne in the heart of the sea.
And the youngest sat on her knee.
She combed its bright hair, and she tended it well.
When down swung the sound of the far-off hell.
She sighed, she looked up through the clear
green sea.
She said, "I must ¿o, for my kinsfolk pray
In the Uttle gray church on the shore to-day.
'T wUl he Easter-time in the world, — ah me !
And I lose my poor soul. Merman, here with
thee."
I said : " Go up, dear heart, through the waves :
Say thyj prayer, and come back to the kind sea-
caves/" ^ r ■ i'
She smUed, she went^^up througl| the surf/in the
ChUdren dear, was it yesterday ?
Children dear, were we long alone ? •
The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan ;
Long prayers," I said, "in the world they say."
" Come," I said, and we rose through the surf in
the hay.
We went up the beach in the sandy down
Where the sea-stocks bloom, to the white-waUed
town.
Through the naiTow paved streets, where all was
still.
To the little gray church on the windy hill.
From the church came a murmur of folk at
their prayers,
But we stood without in the cold blowing airs.
We climbed on the graves, on the stones worn
with rains.
And we gazed up the aisle through the small
leaded panes.
She sat by the pillar ; we saw her clear ;
" Margaret, hist ! come quick, we are here.
Dear heart," I said, "we are here alone.
The sea grows stormy, the little ones moan."
e
POEMS OP PANCY.
827
But, ah, she gave me never a look.
For her eyes were sealed to the holy book.
" Loud prays the priest ; shut stands the
door."
Come away, children, call no more.
Come away, come down, call no more.
Down, down, down,
Down to the depths of the sea.
She sits at her wheel in the humming town.
Singing most joyfully.
Hark what she sings : " O joy, O joy.
From the humming street, and the child with
its toy.
From the priest and the bell, and the holy well.
Prom the wheel where I spun.
And the blessed light of the sun.'.'
And so she sings her fill.
Singing most joyfully.
Till the shuttle falls from her hand.
And the whizzing wheel stands still.
She steals to the window, and looks at the sand.
And over the sand at the sea ;
And her eyes are set in a stare ;
And anon there breaks a sigh.
And anon there drops a tear.
Prom a sorrow-clouded eye.
And a heart sorrow-laden,
A long, long sigh.
For the cold strange eyes of a little Mermaiden,
And the gleam of her golden hair.
Come away, away, children.
Come, children, come down.
The hoarse wind blows colder.
Lights shine in the town.
She will start from her slumber
When gusts shake the door ;
She will hear the winds howling,
WiU hear the waves roar.
We shall see, while above us
The waves roar and whirl,
A ceiling of amber,
A pavement of pearl, —
Singing, " Here came a mortal.
But faithless was she.
And alone dwell forever
The kings of the sea."
^ But, children, at midnight,
When soft the winds blow.
When clear falls the moonlight.
When spring-tides are low ;
When sweet airs come seaward
Prom heaths starred with broom ;
And high rocks throw mildly
On the blanched sands a gloom :
Up the still, glistening beaches.
Up the creeks we will hie ;
Over banks of bright seaweed
The ebb-tide leaves dry.
We will gaze from the sand-hills.
At the white sleeping town ;
At the church on the hillside —
And then come back, down.
Singing, " There dwells a loved one.
But cruel is she :
She left lonely forever
The kings of the sea."
Matthew Arnold.
UNA AND THE BED CROSSE KNIGHT.
from "the faerie queene," book i. canto i.
A GESTAE Knighi was pricking o^ the plaine,
Ycladd m mightie armes and silver shielde.
Wherein old dints of deepe woundes did ro¬
maine.
The cruell markes of many a bloody fielde ;
Yet armes till that time did he never wield :
His angry steede did chide his foming bitt.
As much disdayning to the curbe to yield ;
Full iolly knight he seemd, and faire did sitt.
As one^or kriightjy giusts jknd fierce |enc£>uijters
And on his brest a bloodie crosse he bore.
The deare remembrance of his dying Lord,
For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he
wore.
And dead, as living ever, him ador'd ;
Upon his shield the like was also scor'd.
For soveraine hope, which in his helpe he had.
Right, faithfull, tiue he was in deede and word ;
But of his cheere,* did seeme too solemne sad :
Yet nothing did he dread, but ever was ydrad.t
Upon a great adventure he was bond.
That greatest Gloriana to him gave.
That greatest glorious queene of Faery lond,
To winne him worshippe, and her grace to have.
Which of all earthly thinges he most did crave :
And ever, as he rode, his hart did eame
To prove his puissance in battell brave
Upon his foe, and his new force to leame ;
Uponjhisjio^ a,Dr^on horjTblejmd stearne.
A lovely Ladle rode him faire beside.
Upon a lowly asse more white then snow ;
Yet she much whiter ; but the same did hide
Under a vele, that wimpled was full low ;
» countenance.
t dreaded
828
POEMS OF FANCY.
And over all a blacke stole shee did throw :
As one that inly mournd, so was she sad.
And heavie sate upon her palfrey slow ;
Seemèd in heart some hidden care she had ;
And by her in a line a müke-white lambe she lad.
So pure and innocent as that same lambe
She was in life and every vertuous lore ;
And by descent from royall lynage came
Of ancient kinges and queenes, that had of yore
Their scepters stretcht from east to westerne
shore,
And all the world in their subiection held ;
Till that infernall feend with foule uprore
Forwasted * aU their land, and then expeld ;
Whom to avenge, she had this Knight from far
compeld.
Behind her farre away a Dwarfe did lag,
That lasie seemd, in being ever last.
Or wearièd with bearing of her bag
Of needments at his backe. Thus as they past.
The day with cloudes was suddeine overcast.
And angry love an hideous storme of raine
Did poure into his lemans lap so fast.
That everie wight to shrowd it did constrain ;
And this faire couple eke to shroud themselves
were fain.
Enforst to seeke some covert nigh at hand,
A shadie grove not farr away they spide,
That promist ayde the tempest to withstand ;
Whose loftie trees, yclad with sommers pride.
Did spred so broad, that heavens hght did hide.
Not perceable with power of any starr :
And all within were pathes and alleies wide.
With footing worne, and leading inward farr :
Fairs harbour that them seemes ; so in they
entred ar.
Edmund Spenser.
•
THE CAVE OF SLEEP.
from the "faerie queene," book i. canto i.
Hb, making speedy way through spersed + ayre.
And through the world of waters wide and deepe.
To Morpheus house doth hastily repaire.
Amid the bowels of the earth fuU steepe.
And low, where dawning day doth never peepe.
His dwelling is ; there Tethys his wet bed
Doth ever wash, and Cynthia still doth steepe
In silver deaw his ever-drouping hed.
Whiles sad Night over him her mantle black doth
spred.
And, more to lulle him in his slumber soft,
A trickling streams from high rock tumbling
downe.
And ever-drizling raine upon the loft.
Mixt with a murmuring winde, much like the
sowne *
Of swarming bees, did cast him in a swowne.t
No other noyse, nor peoples troublous cryes.
As still are wont t' annoy the wallèd towne,
Might there be heard ; but carelesse Quiet lyes
Wrapt in etemall silence, faire from enimyes.
edmund Spenser.
—♦
UNA AND THE LION.
from the "faerie queene." book i. canto hi.
One day, nigh wearie of the yrkesome way.
From her unhastie beast she did alight ;
And on the grasse her dainty limbs did lay
In secrete shadow, far from all mens sight ;
From her fayre head her fiUet she undight.
And layd her stole aside. Her angels face.
As the great eye of heaven, shyned bright.
And made a ^unshine in the shady place ;
Did never mortall eye behold such heavenly grace.
It fortunèd, out of the thickest wood
A ramping lyon rushed suddeinly.
Hunting full greedy after salvage blood : J
Soone as the royall virgin he did spy.
With gaping mouth at her ran greedily.
To have attonce devoured her tender corse ;
But to the pray whenas he drew more ny.
His bloody rage aswagèd with remorse, §
And, with the sight amazd, forgat his furious
forse.
Instead thereof, he kist her wearie feet.
And lickt her lilly hands with fawning tong ;
As he her wronged innocence did weet. ||
O how can beautie maister the most strong.
And simple truth subdue avenging wrong !
Whose yielded pryde and proud submission.
Still dreading death, when she had markèd long.
Her hart gan melt in great compassion ;
And drizling teares did shed for pure affection.
" The lyon, lord of everie beast in field," ^
Quoth she, "his princely puis.sance doth abate,
And mightie proud to humble weake does yield, ^
ForgetfuU of the hungry rage, which late -v
Him prickt, in pittie of my sad estate : — ■>
But he, my lyon, and my noble lord,
How does he find in cruell hart to hate "V
Her, that him lovd, and ever most adord
As the god o.f my life ? why hath he me abhord ?"
For is here inrensive. f dispersed.
•sound. t swoon—deep sleep,
t blood of wild animale ^ g understand.
POEMS OF FANCY.
829
Redounding tears did choke th' end of her plaint,
Which softly ecchoed from the neighbour wood ;
And, sad to see her sorrowfull constraint,
The kingly beast upon hej:.gazing stood ;
With pittie calmd, downe fell his angry mood.
At last, in close hart shutting up her payne,
Arose the virgin borne of heavenly brood,
And to her snowy palfrey got agayne,
To seeke her strayèd champion if she might at-
tayne.
The lyon would not leave her desolate,
But with her went along, as a strong gard-
Of her chast person, and a faythfull mate
Of her sad troubles and misfortunes hard ^
Still, when she slept, he kept both watch and
ward ;
And, when she wakt, he wayted diligent,
With humble service to her will prepard ;
From her fayre eyes he took commandment.
And ever by her lookes conceivèd her intent.
EDMUND SPENSER.
THE BOWER OF BLISS.
FROM THE "FAERIE QUEENE," BOOK II. CANTO XII.
Theee the most daintie paradise on ground
Itselfe doth offer to his sober eye,
In which all pleasures plenteously abownd.
And none does others happinesse envye ;
The painted flowres ; the trees upshootinghye;
The dales for shade ; the billes for breathing
space ;
The trembling groves; the christall running by;
And, that which all faire workes doth most
aggrace,*
The art, which all that wrought, appearèd in no
place.
Onewouldhavethought (so cunningly the rude
And scomëd partes were mingled with the fine)
That Nature had for wantonesse ensude +
Art, and that Art at Nature did repine ;
So striving each th' other to imdermine,
Each did the others worke more beautify ;
So diíTring both in willes agreed in fine :
So all agreed, through sweete diversity,
This gardin to adorne with all variety.
And in the midst of all a fountaine stood.
Of richest substance that on earth might bee.
So pure and shiny that the silver flood
Through every channell running one might see ;
Most goodly it with curious ymageree
Was over wrought, and shapes of naked boyes,
Of which some seemed with lively iollitee
To fly about, playing their wanton toyes,
Whylest others did themselves embay * in liquid
ioyes.
And over all,' of purest gold, was spred
A trayle of yvie in his native hew ;
For the rich metall was so colourèd.
That wight, who did not well avised+ it vew,
Would surely deeme it to bee yvie trew :
Low his lascivious armes adown did creepe.
That, themselves dipping in the silver dew,
Their fleecy flowres they fearefully did steepe.
Which drops of christall seemed for wantones to
weep.
Infinit streames continually did well
Out of this fountaine, sweet and faire to see.
The which into an ample laver fell.
And shortly grew to so great quantitie.
That like a little lake it seemed to bee ;
Whose depth exceeded not three cubits hight,
That through the waves one might the bottom
see.
All pav'd beneath with iaspar shining bright.
That seemd the fountaine in that sea did sayle
upright.
Eftsoons Î they heard a most melodious sound.
Of all that mote delight'a daintie eare.
Such as attonce might not on living ground.
Save in this paradise, be heard elsewhere.
Right hard it was for wight which did it heare,,
To read what manner mnsicke that mote bee¿
For all that pleasing is to living eare ''
Was there consorted in one harmonee ;
Birdes, voices, instruments, windes, waters, all
agree :
The ioyous birdes, shrouded inchearefull shade.
Their notes unto the voice attempred sweet ;
Th' angelical! soft trembling voyces made
To th' instruments divine respondence meet ;
The silver-sounding instruments did meet
With the base murmure of the waters fall ;
The waters fall, with difference discreet,
Novj soft, now loud, unto the wind did call ;
The gentle warbling wiiid low answerèd to all.
Edmund Spenser.
THE LADY LOST IN THE WOOD.
FROM "COMUS."
This way the noise was, if mine ear be true.
My best guide now ; methought it was the sound
Of riot and ill-managed merriment.
Such as the jocund flute or gamesome pipe
• give grace to.
t imitated.
* bathe. t with attention.
I immediately.
POEMS OP FANCY.
Stirs up amongst the loose, unlettered hinds,
When for their teeming flocks and granges full
In wanton dance they praise the bounteous Pan,
And thank the gods amiss. I should be loath
To meet the rudeness and swilled insolence
Of such late wassaUers ; yet 0, where else
Shall I inform my unacquainted feet
In the blind mazes of this tangled wood ?
My brothers, when they saw me wearied out
With this long way, resolving here to lodge
Under the spreading favor of these pines.
Stepped, as they said, to the next thicket side
To bring me berries, or such cooling fruit
As the kind, hospitable woods provide.
They left me then, when the gray-hooded even.
Like a sad votarist in palmer's weed.
Rose from the hindmost wheels of Phoebus' wain.
But where they are, and why they came not
back.
Is now the labor of my thoughts : 't is likeliest
They had engaged their wandering steps too far.
And envious darkness, ere they could return.
Had stole them from me ; else, 0 thievish night.
Why shouldst thou, but for some felonious end,
In thy dark lantern thus close up the stars,
That nature hung in heaven, and filled their
lamps
With everlasting oil, to give due light
To the misled and lonely traveller ?
This is the place, as Well as I may guess,
Whence even now the tumult of loud mirth
Was rife, and perfect in my listening ear.
Yet naught hut single darkness do I find.
What might this be ? A thousand fantasies
Begin to throng into my memory,
Of calling shapes, and beckoning shadows dire.
And airy tongues, that syllable men's names
On sands and shores and desert wildernesses.
These thoughts may startle well, but not astound
The virtuous mind, that ever walks attended
By a strong-siding champion. Conscience.
0 welcome, pure-eyed Faith, white-handed Hope,
Thou hovering angel girt with golden wings.
And thou unblemished form of Chastity ;
1 see you visibly, and now believe
That he, the Supreme Good, to whom all things ill
Are but as slavish officers of vengeance.
Would send a glistering guardian, if need were.
To keep my life and honor unassailed.
Milton.
THE NYMPH OF THE SEVERN.
from " comus."
Theee is a gentle nymph not far from hence
That with moist curh sways the smooth Severn
stream.
Sabrina is her name, a virgin pure ;
Whilom she was the daughter of Locrine,
That had the sceptre from his father Brute.
She, guiltless damsel, flying the mad pursuit
Of her enragèd stepdame Guendolen,
Commended her fair innocence to the flood.
That stayed her flight with his cross-flowing
course.
The water-nymphs that in the bottom played.
Held up their pearlfed wrists, and took her in.
Bearing her straight to aged Nereus' hall.
Who, piteous of her woes, reared her lank head.
And gave her to his daughters to imbathe
In nectared lavers strewed with asphodel.
And through the porch and inlet of each sense
Dropped in ambrosial oüs, till she revived.
And underwent a quick immortal change.
Made Goddess of the river : still she retains
Her maiden gentleness, and oft at eve
Visits the herds along the twilight meadows.
Helping all urchin blasts, and ill-luck signs
That the shrewd meddling elf delights to make.
Which she with precious vialed liquors heals ;
For which the shepherds at their festivals
Carol her goodness loud in rustic lays.
And throw sweet garland wreaths into her stream
Of pansies pinks, and gaudy daflbdils.
MILTOM.
THE HAUNT OF THE SORCERER.
from "comus."
Within the navel of this hideous wood,
Immured in cypress shades a sorcerer dwells.
Of Bacchus and of Circè bom, great Comus,
Deep skilled in all his mother's witcheries ;
And here to every thirsty wanderer
By sly enticement gives his baneful cup.
With many murmurs mixed, whose pleasing
poison
The visage quite transforms of him that drinks.
And the inglorious likeness of a beast
Fixes instead, unmoulding reason's mintage
Charactered in the face : this I have leamt
Tending my flocks hard by i' the hilly crofts.
That brow this bottom-glade, whence night by
night.
He and his monstrous rout are heard to howl.
Like stabled wolves, or tigers at their prey.
Doing abhorrfcd rites to Hecatë
In their obscured haunts of inmost bowers.
Yet have they many baits, and guileful spells,
T' inveigle and invite the imwary sense
Of them that pass unweeting by the way.
This evening late, by them the chewing flocks
Had ta'en their supper on the savory herb
Of knot-grass dew-besprent, and were in fold
fi-
POEMS OF FANCY.
831
I sat me down to watch upon a bank
With ivy canopied, and interwove
With flaunting honeysuckle, and began.
Wrapt in a pleasing fit of melancholy.
To meditate my rural minstrelsy.
Till fancy had her fiU, but ere a close.
The wonted roar was up amidst the woods.
And filled the air with barbarous dissonance ;
At which 1 ceased, and listened them awhile.
Till an unusual stop of sudden silence
Gave respite to the drowsy frighted steeds.
That draw the litter of close-curtained sleep ;
At last a soft and solemn-breathing sound
Rose like a stream of rich distilled perfumes.
And stole upon the air, that even Silence
Was took ere she was ware, and wished she might
Deny her nature, and be never more.
Still to be so displaced. I was all ear.
And took in strains that might create a soul
Under the ribs of death : but 0, ere long
Too well I did perceive it was the voice
Of my most honored Lady, your dear sister.
Amazed I stood, harrowed with grief and fear.
And 0, poor hapless nightingale, thought I,
How sweet thou sing'st, how near the deadly
snare !
Milton.
THE CASTLE OF INDOLENCE.
from canto i.
The castle bight of Indolence,
And its false luxury ;
Where for a little time, alas !
We lived right jollily.
0 MORTAL man, who livest here by toil.
Do not complain of this thy hard estate ;
That like an emmet thou must ever moil.
Is a sad sentence of an ancient date ;
And, certes, there is for it reason great ;
For, though sometimes it makes thee weep and
wail.
And curse thy star, and early drudge and late ;
Withouten that would come a heavier bale.
Loose life, unruly passions, and diseases pale.
In lowly dale, fast by a river's side.
With woody hill o'er bill encompassed round
A most enchanting wizard did abide.
Than whom a fiend more fell is nowhere found.
It was, I ween, a lovely spot of ground ;
And there a season atween June and May,
Half prankt with spring, with summer half
embrowned,
A listless climate made, where, sooth to say.
No living wight could work, ne cared even for
play.
Was naught around but images of rest :
Sleep-soothing groves, and quiet lawns be¬
tween ;
And flowery beds that slumbrous influence kest.
From poppies breathed ; and beds of pleasant
green.
Where never yet was creeping creature seen.
Meantime, unnumbered glittering streamlets
played.
And hurlèd everywhere their waters sheen ;
That, as they bickered through the sunny glade.
Though restless still themselves, a lulling mur¬
mur made.
Joined to the pi-attle of the purling rills
Were heard the lowing herds along the vale.
And flocks loud beating from the distant hills,
And vacant shepherds piping in the dale ;
And, now and then, sweet Philomel would wail.
Or stockdoves plain amid the forest deep.
That drowsy rustled to the sighing gale ;
And still a coil the grasshopper did keep ;
Yet all these sounds yblent inclinèd all to sleep.
FuU in the passage of the vale, above,
A sable, silent, solemn forest stood ;
Where naught but shadowy forms was seen to
move.
As Idless fancied in her dreaming mood :
And up the hills, on either side, a wood
Of blackening pines, aye waving to and fro.
Sent forth a sleepy horror through the blood ;
And where this valley winded out, below.
The murmuring main was heard, and scarcely
heard, to flow.
A pleasing land of drowsyhed it was.
Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye ;
And of gay castles in the clouds that pass.
Forever flushing round a summer sky :
There eke the soft delights, that witchingly
Instil a wanton sweetness through the breast.
And the calm pleasures always hovered nigh ;
But whate'er smacked of noyance or unrest
Was far, far off expelled from this delicious nest.
The landscape such, inspiring perfect ease.
Where Indolence (for so the wizard hight)
Close-hid his castle mid embowering trees,
That half shut out the beams of Phœbus bright.
And made a kind of checkered day and night ;
Meanwhile, unceasing at the massy gate.
Beneath a spacious palm, the wicked wight
Was placed ; and to his lute, of cruel fate
And labor harsh, complained, lamenting man's
estate.
&
832
POEMS OF FANCY.
Thither continixal pilgrims crowded still,
From all the roads of earth that pass there by :
For, as they chanced to breathe on neighbor¬
ing hill.
The freshness of this valley smote their eye.
And drew them ever and anon more nigh ;
Till clusteiing round the enchanter false they
hung,
Ymolten with his siren melody ;
While o'er the enfeebling lute his hand he
flung.
And to the trembling chords these tempting
verses sung :
" Behold ! ye pilgrims of this earth, behold !
See all, but man, with unearned pleasure gay :
See her bright robes the butterfly unfold.
Broke from her wintry tomb in prime of May !
What youthful bride can equal her array ?
Who can with her for easy pleasure vie ?
From mead to mead with gentle wing to stray.
From flower to flower on balmy gales to fly.
Is all she has to do beneath the radiant sky.
" Behold the merry minstrels of the morn.
The swarming songsters of the careless grove.
Ten thousand throats ! that, from the flower¬
ing thorn.
Hymn their good God, and carol sweet of love.
Such grateful kindly raptures them emove ;
They neither plough nor sow ; ne, fit for flail.
E'er to the barn the nodden sheaves they
drove :
Yet theirs each harvest dancing in the gale.
Whatever crowns the hill, or smiles along the
vale.
"Outcast of nature, man ! the wretched thrall
Of bitter dropping sweat, of sweltry pain.
Of cares that eat away the heart with gall.
And of the vices, an inhuman train.
That all proceed from savage thirst of gain :
For when hard-hearted interest first began
To poison earth, Astraea left the plain ;
Guile, violence, and murder seized on man.
And, for soft mUky streams, with blood the
rivers ran.
" Come, ye who still the cumbrous load of life
Push hard up hill ; but as the furthest steep
You trust to gain, and put an end to strife,
Down thunders back the stone with mighty
sweep.
And hurls your labors to the valley deep.
Forever vain : come, and withouten fee,
I in oblivion wiU your sorrows steep,
Your cares, your toils ; will steep you in a sea
Of full delight : 0, come, ye weary wights, to me !
" With me, you need not rise at early dawn.
To pass the joyless day in various stounds ;
Or, louting low, on upstart fortune fawn.
And sell fair honor for some paltry pounds ;
Or through the city take your dirty roimds.
To cheat, and dun, and lie, and visit pay.
Now fl atteiing base, now giving secret wounds ;
Or prowl in courts of law for human prey.
In venal senate thieve, or rob on broad highway.
"No cocks, with me, to rustic labor call.
From village on to village sounding clear ;
To tardy swain no shrill-voiced matrons squall ;
No dogs, no babes, no wives, to stun yom ear ;
No hammers thump ; no horrid blacksmith
sear.
Ne noisy tradesman your sweet slumbers start,
, With sounds that are a misery to hear :
But all is calm, as would delight the heart
Of Sybarite of old, all nature, and all art.
"Here naught but candor reigns, indulgent
ease,
Good-natured lounging, sauntering up and
down :
They who are pleased themselves must always
please ;
On others' ways they never squint a frown.
Nor heed what haps in hamlet or in town :
Thus, from the source of tender Indolence,
With milky blood the heart is overflown.
Is soothed and sweetened by the social sense ;
For interest, envy, pride, and strife are banished
hence.
" What, what is virtue, but repose of mind,
A pure ethereal calm, that knows no storm ;
Above the reach of wild ambition's wind.
Above those passions that this world deform.
And torture man, a proud malignant worm ?
But here, instead, soft gales of passion play.
And gently stir the heart, thereby to form
A quicker sense of joy ; as breezes stray
Across the enlivened skies, and make them still
more gay.
" The best of men have ever loved repose :
They hate to mingle in the filthy fray ;
Where the soul sours, and gradual rancor
grows,
Imbittered more from peevish day to day.
E'en those whom fame has lent her fairest ray.
The most renowned of worthy wights of yore.
From a base world at last have stolen away :
So Scipio, to the soft Cumaean shore
Eetiring, tasted joy he never knew before.
POEMS OP FANCY.
833
" But if a little exercise you choo.se,
Some zest for ease, 't is not forbidden here :
Amid the groves you may indulge the Muse,
Or tend the blooms, and deck the vernal year ;
Or softly stealing, with your watery gear.
Along the brooks, the crimson-spotted fry
You may delude : the whilst, amused, you hear
Now the hoarse stream, and now the zephyr's
sigh,
Attunèd to the birds, and woodland melody.
" 0 grievous folly ! to heap up estate.
Losing the days you see beneath the sun ;
When, sudden, comes blind unrelenting fate.
And gives the untasted portion you have won
With ruthless toil, and many a wretch undone.
To those who mock you, gone to Pluto's reign.
There with sad ghosts to pine, and shadows
dun ;
But sure it is of vanities most vain.
To toil for what you here untoiliug may obtain."
He ceased. But still their trembling ears re¬
tained
The deep vibrations of his witching song ;
That, by a kind of magic power, constrained
To enter in, pell-mell, the listening throng.
Heaps poured on heaps, and yet they slipt
along.
In silent ease ; as when beneath the beam
Of summer moons, the distant woods among.
Or by some flood all silvered with the gleam.
The soft-embodied fays through airy portal
stream :
By the smooth demon so it ordered was.
And here his baneful bounty first began :
Though some there were who would not fur¬
ther pass.
And his alluring baits suspected han.
The wise distrust the too fair-spoken man.
Yet through the gate they cast a wishful eye:
Not to move on, perdie, is all they can :
For do their very best they cannot fly.
But often each way look, and often sorely sigh.
When this the watchful wicked wizard saw.
With sudden spring he leaped upon them
straight ;
And soon as touched by his unhallowed paw,
They found themselves within the eui-sèd gate :
Full hard to be repassed, like that of fate.
Not stronger were of old the giant crew.
Who sought to pull high Jove from regal state ;
Though feeble wretch he seemed, of sallow hue :
Certes, who bides his grasp, will that encounter
rue.
Ye gods of quiet, and of sleep profound !
Whose soft dominion o'er this castle sways.
And all the widely silent places round.
Forgive me, if my trembling pen displays
What never yet was sung in mortal lays.
But how shall I attempt such arduous string ?
1 who have spent my nights and nightly days
In this soul-deadening place loose-loitering :
Ah ! how shall 1 for this uprear my moulted wing ?
Come on, my Muse, nor stoop to low despair.
Thou imp of Jove, touched by celestial lire !
Thou yet shalt sing of war, and actions fair,
Which the bold sons of Britain will inspire :
Of ancient bards thou yet shalt sweep the lyre ;
Thou yet shalt tread in tragic pall the stage.
Paint love's enchanting woes, the hero's ire".
The sage's calm, the patriot's noble rage.
Dashing corruption down through every worth¬
less age.
The doors, that knew no shrill alarming bell
Ne eursèd knocker plied by villain's hand,
Self-opened into halls, where who can tell
AVhat elegance and grandeur wide expand ;
The pride^of Turkey and of Persia land ?
Soft quilts on quilts, on carpets carpets spread.
And couches stretched around in .seemly band ;
And endless pillows rise to prop the head ;
So that each spacious room was one full-swelling
bed ;
And everywhere huge covered tables stood.
With wines high-flavored and rich viands
crowned ;
Whatever sprightly juice or tasteful food
On the green bosom of this earth are found.
And all old ocean 'genders in his round :
Some hand unseen these silently displayed.
Even undemanded by a sign or sound ;
You need but wish, and instantly obeyed,
Fair ranged the dishes rose, and thick the glasses
played.
Here freedom reigned, without the least alloy ;
Nor gossip's talc, nor ancient maiden's gall.
Nor saintly spleen durst murmur at our joy.
And with envenomed tongue our pleasures pall.
For why ? there was but one great rule for all ;
To wit, that each .should work his own desire.
And cat, drink, study, sleep, as it may fall.
Or melt the time in love, or wake the lyre.
And carol what, unhid, the Muses might in¬
spire.
The room.s with costly tapestiy were hung.
Where was inwoven many a gentle tale ;
Such as of old the rural poets sung.
Or of Arcadian or Sicilian vale :
834
POEMS OF FANCY.
Reclining lovers, in the lonely dale.
Poured forth at large the sweetly tortured
heart ;
Or, sighing tender passion, swelled the gale,
And taugtit charmed echo to resound their
smart ;
While flocks, woods, streams around, repose and
peace impart.
Each sound too here to langnishment inclined.
Lulled the weak bosom, and inducèd ease ;
Aerial music in the warbling wind.
At distance rising oft, by small degrees.
Nearer and nearer came, till o'er the trees
It hung, and breathed such soul-dissolving airs,
As did, alas ! with soft perdition please :
Entangled deep in its enchanting snares.
The listening heart forgot all duties and all cares.,
A certain music, never known before,
Here lulled the pensive, melancholy mind ;
Full easily obtained. Behooves no more.
But sidelong, to the gently waving wind,
I'o lay the well-tuned instrument reclined ;
From which, with airy flying fingers light.
Beyond each mortal touch the most refined.
The god of winds drew sounds of deep delight :
Whence, with just cause, the harp of jEoIus it
hight.
Ah me! what hand can touch the string so fine ?
Who up the lofty diapason roll
Such sweet, such sad, such solemn airs divine.
Then let them down again into the soul :
Now rising love they fanned ; now pleasing dole
They breathed, in tender musings, through the
heart ;
And now a graver sacred strain they stole.
As when seraphic hands a hymn impart :
Wild warbling nature all, above the reach of art !
James Thomson.
KUBLA KHAN.*
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan
A stately pleasure-dome decree
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran.
Through caverns measureless to man,
Down to a sunless sea.
• •' In the summer of the year T797 the author, then in ill-health,
had retired to a lonely farm-house between Porlock and Linton, on
the Exmoor confines of Somerset and Devonshire. In consequence
of a sl^ht indisposition, an anodyne had been prescribed, from the
efiTect of which he fell adeep in his chair at the moment he was read-
in>; the following sentence, or words of the same substance, in
Putxkas's Ptlgrimogt: ' Here tnc Khan Kubla commanded a pal¬
ace to be built, and a stately garden thereunto : and thus ten miles
of fertile ground were enclosed with a wall.' The author continued
for about three hours in a profound sleep, at least of the external
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were gii-dled round ;
And there were gardens, bright with sinuous rills.
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree ;
And here were forests ancient as the bills.
Infolding sunny spots of greenery.
But 0 that deep romantic chasm, which slanted
Down the green hill athwart a cedam cover I
A savage place ! as holy and enchanted
As e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover !
And from this chasm, with ceaseless turmoil
seething,
As if this earth in fast thick pants were breathing,
A mighty fountain momently was forced.
Amid whose s\vift, half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher's flail ;
And mid these dancing rocks at once'and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Five miles, meandering with a mazy motion
Through wood and dale, the sacred river ran, —
Then reached the caverns measureless to man.
And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean.
And mid this tumult Kuhla heard from far
Ancestral voices prophesying war.
The shadow of the dome of pleasure
Floated midway on the waves
MTiere was heard the mingled measure
From the fountain and the caves.
It was a miracle of rare device, —
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice !
A damsel with a dulcimer
In a vision once I saw ;
It was an Abyssinian maid.
And on her dulcimer she played.
Singing of Mount Ahora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song.
To such a deep delight 'twould win me
That, with music loud and long,
I would build that dome in air, —
That sunny dome ! those caves of ice !
senses, during which time he has the most vivid confidence that he
could not have composed less than from two to three hundred lines ;
if that indeed can be called composition in which all the images rose
up before him as things, with a parallel production of the corre¬
spondent expressions, without any sensation or consciousness of
effort. On awaking he appeared to himself to have a distinct recol¬
lection of the whole, and. taking his pen, ink, and paper, instantly
and eagerly wrote down the lines that are here preserved. At this
moment he was unfortunately called out by a person on business
from Porlock, and detained by him above an hour, and on his return
to his room found, to his no smalt surprise and inortificatioR, that
though he still retained some vague and dim recollection of the
general purport of the vision, yet, with the exception of some eight
or ten scattered lines and images, all the rest had passed away,
like the images on the surface of a stream into which a stone had
been cast, but, alas I without tlie after restoration of the lailcrt"-*
The Author, iSifi.
B
POEMS OF FANCY.
835
And all who heai-d should see them there,
And all should cry, Beware ! beware
HLs flashing eyes, his floating hair !
Weave a circle round him thrice.
And close your eyes with holy dread.
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of Paradise.
Sahuei. Taylor Coleridge.
SONO OF WOOD-NYMPHS.
Come here, come here, and dwell
In forest deep 1
Come here, come here, and tell
Why thou dost weep !
Is it for love (sweet pain !)
That thus thou dar'st complain
Unto our pleasant shades, our summer leaves.
Where naught else grieves ?
Come here, come here, and lie
By whispering stream !
Here no one dares to die
For love's sweet dream ;
But health all seek, and joy.
And shun perverse annoy.
And race along green paths tiU close of day.
And laugh — alway !
Or else, through half the year.
On rushy floor.
We lie by waters clear.
While skylarks pour
Their songs into the sun !
And when bright day is done.
We hide 'neath bells of flowers or nodding com,
And dieam —till morn !
Bryan Waller Procter (Barry CamwaU).
THE FAIRIES' LULLABY.
from "midsummer nights dream," act ii. sc. 3.
Enter Titania, icUh her train.
Titania. Come, now a roundel, and a fairy
song;
Then, for the third part of a minute, hence ; —
Some, to kill cankers in the musk-rose buds ;
Some war with rear-mice for their leathern wings.
To make my small elves coats ; and some keep
back
The clamorous owl, that nightly hoots, and
wonders
At our quaint spirits. Sing me now asleep ;
Then to your ofiices, and let me rest.
song.
1 Fairt. Youspotted snakes,toithdovhletongve.
Thorny hedgehogs, be not seen ;
Newts and blind-worms, do no wrong;
Come not near our fairy queen.
Chorus. Philomel, vrith melody.
Sing in our sweet lullaby ;
Lulla, lulla, lullaby ; lulla, lulla, lullaby:
Never harm.
Nor spell nor charm.
Come our lovely lady nigh }
So, good-night, with lullaby.
2 Fairt. Weaving spiders, come not here.
Hence, you long-legged spinners,
hence !
Beetles black, approach not near ;
Worm, nor snail, do no offence.
Chorus. Philomel, with melody, etc.
1 Fairy. Hence away ; now all is well :
One, aloof, stand sentinel.
\Exeunt Fairies. Titania sleeps,
shakespeare.
FAIRIES' SONG.
We the fairies blithe and antic.
Of dimensions not gigantic,
Though the moonshine mostly keep us.
Oft in orchards frisk and peep us. .
Stolen sweets are always sweeter ;
Stolen kisses much completer ;
Stolen looks are nice in chapels ;
Stolen, stolen be your apples.
When to bed the world are bobbing.
Then's the time for orchard-robbing ;
Yet the froit were scarce worth peeling
Were it not for stealing, stealing.
From the Latin of Thomas Randolph.*
Translation of Leigh Hunt.
COMPLIMENT TO QUEEN ELIZABETH.
from " midsummer nights dream," act ii. sc. 2.
Oberon. My gentle Puck, come hither. Thou
remember'st
Since once I sat upon a promontory.
And heard a mermaid, on a dolphin's back.
Uttering such dulcet and harmonious breath,
* Randolph was a masterly scholar, and a profound student of
the Creek and Latin poets, whose vrritings he imiwtcd in those tan¬
kages, and whose influence was marked in his English writings.
He died (1634) at the age of twenty^nine, not fuifiliiog the fame
promised by his early years.
[0—
836
POEMS OF FANCY.
That the ruile sea grew civil at her song,
And certain sfcirs shot madly from their spheres,
To hear the sea-maid's music.
PüCK. I remember.
Ode. That very time I saw (but thou couldst
not).
Flying between the cold moon and the earth,
Cupid all armed : a certain aim he took
At a fair vestal thronèd by the west.
And loosed his love-shaft smartly from his how.
As it should pierce a hundred thousand hearts :
But I might see young Cupid's fiery shaft
Quenched in the chaste beams of the watery moon,
And the imperial votaress passed on,
In maiden meditation, fancy free.
Yet marked I where the bolt of Cupid fell ;
It fell upon a little western Hower
Before milk-white, now purple with love's wound.
And maidens call it Love-in-idleness.
Fetch me that flower.
SHAK£SPCAR£.
QUEEN MAB.
PROU "ROMEO AND JULIET." ACT I. SC. 4-
0, then, I see. Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife ; and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an aldennan.
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep :
Her wagon-spokes made of long spinners' legs ;
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers ;
The traces, of the smallest spider's web ;
The collars, of the moonshine's wateiy beams ;
Her whip, of cricket's bone ; the lash, of film ;
Her wagoner, a small gray-coated gnat.
Not half so big as a round little worm
Pricked from the lazy finger of a maid :
Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut.
Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub.
Time out of mind the fairies' coach-makers.
And in this state she gallops night by night
Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of
love ;
On courtiers' knees, that dream on court'sies
straight ;
O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees ;
O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream, —
AVhich oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues.
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are :
Sometime slm gallops o'er a courtier's nose.
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit ;
And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig's tail.
Tickling a jiarson's nose as 'a lies asleep,
Then dreams he of another benefice :
Sometime she driveth o'er a soldier's neck.
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades.
Of healths five fathom deep ; and then anon
Drams in his ear, at which he starts, and wakes ;
And, being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two.
And sleeps again. This is that very Mab
That plats the manes of horses in the night ;
And bakes the elf-locks in foul sluttish hairs,
Which, once untangled, much misfortune bodes ;
This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs.
That presses them, and leams them first to bear.
Making them women of good carriage.
SHAKESPEARE.
THE FAIRIES
Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
Vfe dare n't go a hunting
For fear of little men ;
Wee folk, good folk.
Trooping all together ;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl's feai her !
Down along the rocky shore
Some make their homo, —
They live on crispy pan :u\es
Of yellow tide-foam ;
Some in the reeds
Of the black mountain-lake.
With frogs for their watch-dog%
All night awake.
High on the hill-top
The old King sits ;
He is now so old and gray
Ho's nigh lost his wits.
With a bridge of white mist i
Columbkill he crosses.
On his .stately journeys
From Slievelcague to Rosses :
Or going up with music
On cold starry nights.
To sup with the queen
Of the gay Northern Lights.
They stole little Bridget.
For seven years long ;
When she came down agaia
Her friends were all gone.
They took her lightly back.
Between the night and morrow ;
They thought that she was fiist aideep.
But she was dead with sorrow.
6^-
&
POEMS OF FANCY.
837
They have kept her ever since
Deep within tiie lakes,
On a bed of flag-leaves,
Watching till she wakes.
By the craggy hillside,
Through the mosses bare.
They have planted thorn-trees
For pleasure here and there.
Is any man so daring
To dig one up in spite,
lie shall find the thornies set
In his bad at night.
Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen.
We daren't go a hunting
For fear of little men ;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together ;
Green jacket, red cap,
And white owl's feather !
WIILLIAM ALLIXCHAM.
&
KILMENY.
FROM "THE QUEEN'S WAKE."
BoniîT Kilmeny gaed up the glen ;
But it wasna to meet Duneira's men.
Nor the rosy monk of the isle to sec.
For Kilmeny was pure as pure could be.
It was only to hear the yorlin sing.
And pu' the cress-flower round the spring, —
The scai'lct hypp, and the hindberrye.
And the nut that hung frae the hazel-tree ;
For Kilmeny was pure as pure could be.
But lang may her minny look o'er the wa'.
And lang may she seek i' the gi-een-wood shaw ;
Lang the laird of Duneira blame.
And lang, lang greet or Kilmeny come hame.
When many a day had come and fled.
When grief grew calm, and hope was dead.
When màss for Kilmeny's sbùl had been sung.
When the bedesman had prayed, and the dead-
bell rung ;
Late, late in a gloamln, when all was still.
When the fringe was red on the westlin hill.
The wood was sear, the moon i' the wane.
The reek o' the cot hung over the plain, —
Like a little wee cloud in the world its lane ;
When the ingle lowed with an eiry lerne.
Late, late in the gloamiu Kilmeny came hame !
"Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been ?
Lang hae we sought baith holt and den, —
By linn, by ford, and green-wood tree ;
Yet you are halesome and fair to see.
Where got you that joup o' the lily sheen ?
That bonny snood of the birk sae green ?
And these roses, the fairest that ever was seen ?
Kilmeny, Kilmeny, where have you been ? "
Kilmeny looked up with a lovely grace,
But nae smile was seen on Kilmeny's face ;
As still was her look, and as still was her ec.
As the stillness that lay on the emerant lea.
Or the mist that sleeps on a waveless sea.
For Kilmeny had been she knew not where.
And Kilmeny had seen what she could not
declare.
Kilmeny had been where the cock never crew.
Where the rain never fell, and the wind never
blew ;
But it seemed as the harp of the sky had rung,
And the airs of heaven played round her tongue.
When she spake of the lovely forms she had seen.
And a land where sin had never been, —■
A land of love, and a land of light,
Withouten sun or moon or night ;
Where the river swa'd a living stream.
And the light a pure celestial beam :
The land of vision it would seem,
A still, an everlasting dream.
In yon green-wood there is a waik.
And in that waik there is a wene,
And in that wene there is a maike.
That neither has flesh, blood, nor bane ;
And down in yon gi een-wood he walks his lane.
In that green wene Kilmeny lay.
Her bosom happed wi' the flowerets gay ;
But the air was soft, and the silence deep.
And bonny Kilmeny fell sound asleep ;
She kend nae mair, nor opened her ee.
Till waked by the hymns of a far countrye.
She awaked on a couch of the silk sae slim.
All striped wi' the bars of the rainbow's rim ;
And lovely beings around were rife.
Who erst had travelled mortal life ;
And aye they smiled, and 'gan to speer :
" What spirit has brought this mortal here ? "
" Lang have I journeyed the world wide,"
A meek and reverend fere replied ;
" Baith night and day I have watched the fair
Eident a thousand years and mair.
Yes, I have watched o'er ilk degree.
Wherever blooms femenitye ;
But sinless virgin, free of stain.
In mind and body, fand I nane.
Never, since the banquet of timé.
Found I a virgin in her prime.
Till late this bonny maiden I saw.
As spotless as the morning snaw.
f
a
838 POEMS OF FANCY.
Full twenty years she has lived as free
As the spirits that sojourn in this countiye.
I have brought her away frae the snares of men,
That sin or death she may never ken."
They clasped her waist and her hands sae fair ;
They kissed her cheek, and they kerned her hair ;
And round came many a blooming fere.
Saying, " Bonny Kilmeny, ye 're welcome here ;
Women are freed of the littand scorn ;
0, blest be the day Kilmeny was born !
Now shall the land of the spirits see.
Now shall it ken, what a woman may be !
Many a lang year in sorrow and pain.
Many a lang year through the world we've gane.
Commissioned to watch fair womankind.
For it's they who nurice the immortal mind.
We have watched their steps as the dawning
shone.
And deep in the greenwood walks alone ;
By lily bower and silken bed
The viewless tears have o'er them shed ;
Have soothed their ardent minds to sleep,
Or left the couch of love to weep.
AYe have seen I we have seen ! but the time must
come.
And the angels will weep at the day of doom !
" 0, would the fairest of mortal kind
Aye keep the holy truths in mind.
That kindred spirits their motions see,
Who watch their ways with anxious o'e.
And grieve for the guilt of humanitye !
0, sweet to Heaven the maiden's prayer.
And the .sigh that heaves a bosom sae fair !
And dear to Heaven the words of truth
And the praise of virtue frae beauty's mouth !
And dear to the viewless forms of air
The minds that kythe as the body fair !
" 0 bonny Kilmeny ! free frae stain.
If ever you seek the world again, —
That world of sin, of sorrow and fear, —
O, tell of the joys that are waiting here ;
And tell of the signs you shall shortly see ;
Of the times that are now, and the times that
shall be."
They lifted Kilmeny, they led her away.
And she walked in the light of a sunless day ;
The sky was a dome of crystal bright.
The fountain of vision, and fountain of light ;
The emerald fields were of dazzling glow.
And the flowers of everlasting blow.
Then deep in the stream her body they laid,
That her youth and beauty never might fade ;
And they smiled on heaven, when they saw her lie
In the stream of life that wandered by.
And she heard a song, — she heard it sung.
She kend not where ; but sae sweetly it rung.
It fell on her ear like a dream of the morn, —
" 0, blest be the day Kilmeny was born 1
Now shall the land of the spirits see.
Now shall it ken, what a woman may be !
The sun that shines on the world sae bright,
A bon'owed gleid frae the fountain of light ;
And the moon that sleeks the sky sae dun.
Like a gouden bow, or a beamless sun.
Shall wear away, and be seen nae mair ;
And the angels shall miss them, travelling the air.
But lang, lang after baith night and day.
When the sun and the world have edyed away.
When the sinner has gane to his waesome doom,
Kilmeny shall smUe in eternal bloom ! "
They bore her away, she wist not how.
For she felt not arm nor rest below ; _
But so swift they wained her through the light,
'T was like the motion of sotmd or sight ;
They seemed to split the gales of air.
And yet nor gale nor breeze was there.
Unnumbered groves below them grew ;
They came, they past, and backward flew,
Like floods of blossoms gliding on.
In moment seen, in moment gone.
0, never vales to mortal view
Appeared like those o'er which they flew.
That land to human spirits given.
The lowermost vales of the storied heaven ;
From whence they can view the world below.
And heaven's blue gates with sapphires glow, —.
More glory yet unmeet to know.
They bore her far to a mountain green.
To see what mortal never had seen ;
And they seated her high on a purple sward.
And bade her heed what she saw and heard,
And note the changes the spirits wrought ;
For now she lived in the land of thought. —
She looked, and she saw nor sun nor skies.
But a crystal dome of a thousand dyes ;
She looked, and she saw nae land aright.
But an endless whirl of glory and light ;
And radiant beings went and came.
Far swifter than wind or the linkèd flame ;
She hid her een frae the dazzling view ;
She looked again, and the scene was new.
She saw a sun on a summer sky.
And clouds of amber sailing by.;
A lovely land beneath her lay.
And that land had glens and mountains gray ;
And that land had valleys and hoary piles.
And marlèd seas, and a thousand isles ;
Its fields were speckled, its forests green.
And its lakes were all of the dazzling sheen.
POEMS OF FANCY. Sj'J
Like magic mirrors, where slumbering lay
The sun and the sky and the cloudlet gray,
Which heaved and trembled, and gently swung ;
On every shore they seemed to be hung ;
For there they were seen on their downward plain
A thousand times and a thousand again ;
In winding lake and placid firth, —
Little peaceful heavens in the bosom of earth.
Kilmeny sighed and seemed to grieve.
For she found her heart to that land did cleave ;
She saw the com wave on the vale ;
She saw the deer run down the dale ;
She saw the plaid and the broad claymore.
And the brows that the badge of freedom bore ;
And she thought she had seen the land before.
She saw a lady sit on a throne.
The fairest that ever the sun shone on ;
A lion licked her hand of milk.
And she held him in a leish of silk ;
And a leifu' maiden stood at her knee,
With a silver wand and melting ee ;
Her sovereign shield till love stole in,
And poisoned all the fount within.
Then a gruff untoward bedesman came.
And hundit the lion on his dame ;
And the guardian maid wi' the dauntless ee.
She dropped a tear, and left her knee ;
And she saw till the queen frae the lion fled.
Till the bonniest flower of the world lay dead ;
A cofiin was set on a distant plain,
And she saw the red blood fall like rain :
Then bonny Kilmeny's heart grew sair,
And she turned away, and could look nae mair.
Then the gnrff grim carle girnèd amain.
And they trampled him down, but he rose again ;
And he baited the lion to deeds of weir.
Till he lapped the blood to the kingdom dear ;
And weening his head was danger-preef.
When crowned with the rose and clover leaf,
He gowled at tha carle, and chased him away
To feed wi' the deer on the mountain giay.
He gowled at the carle, and he geeked at Heaven ;
But his mark was set, and his arles given.
Kilmeny a while her een withdrew ;
She looked again, and the scene was new.
She saw below her fair unfurled
One half of all the glowing world.
Where oceans roUed, and rivers ran.
To bound the aims of sinful man.
She saw a people, fierce and fell.
Burst frae their bounds like fiends of hell ;
There lilies grew, and the eagle flew.
And she herked on her laveuing crew.
Till the cities and towers were wrapt in a blaze.
And the thunder it roared o'er the lands and the
seas.
The widows they wailed, and the red blood ran.
And she threatened an end to the race of man :
She never lened, nor stood in awe.
Till caught by the lion's deadly paw.
Oh ! then the eagle swinked for life.
And brainzelled up a mortal strife ;
But flew she north, or flew she south.
She met wi' the gowl of the lion's mouth.
With a mooted wing and waefu' maen.
The eagle sought her eiry again ;
But lang may she cower in her bloody nest.
And lang, lang sleek her wounded breast.
Before she sey another flight.
To play wi' the norland lion's might.
But to sing the sights Kilmeny saw.
So far surpassing nature's law,
The singer's voice wad sink away.
And the string of his harp wad cease to play.
But she saw till the sorrows of man were by.
And all was love and harmony ; —
Till the stars of heaven fell calmly away.
Like the flakes of snaw on a winter's day.
Then Kilmeny begged again to see
The friends she had left in her own countrye.
To tell the place where she had been,
And the glories that lay in the land unseen ;
To warn the living maidens fair,
The loved of heaven, the spirits' care.
That all whose minds unmeled remain
Shall bloom in beauty when time is gane.
With distant music, soft and deep.
They lulled Kilmeny sound asleep ;
And when she awakened, she lay her lane.
All happed with flowers in the gicen-wood wene.
When seven long years had come and fled ;
When grief was calm, and hope was dead ;
When scarce was remembered Kilmeny's name.
Late, late in a gloamin, Kilmeny came hame !
And O, her beauty was fair to see.
But still and steadfast was her ee !
Such beauty bard may never declare.
For there was no pride nor p,assion there ;
And the soft desire of maidens' een
In that mild face could never be seen.
Her seymar was the lily flower,
And her cheek the moss-rose in the shower ;
And her voice like the distant melodye
That floats along the twilight sea.
But she loved to raike the lanely glen.
And keeped afar frae the haunts of men ;
840
POEMS OF FANCy.
Her holy hymns unheard to sing,
To suck the flowers and drink the spring.
But wherever her peaceful form appeared,
The wild beasts of the hills were cheered ;
The wolf played blythely round the field ;
The lordly hyson lowed and kneeled ;
Tiie dun deer wooed with manner bland.
And cowered aneath her lily hand.
And when at even the woodlands rung.
When hymns of other worlds she sung
In ecstasy of sweet devotion,
O, then the glen was all in motion 1
The wild beasts of the forest came.
Broke from their bugbts and faulds the tame,
And goved around, charmed and amazed ;
Even the dull cattle crooned, and gazed.
And murmured, and looked with anxious pain
For something the mystery to explain.
The buzzard came with the throstle-cock.
The corby left her houf in the rock ;
The blackbird alang wi' the eagle flew ;
The hind came tripping o'er the dew ;
The wolf and the kid j^eir mike began ;
And the tod, and the lamb, and the leveret ran ;
The hawk and the hern attour them hung.
And the merl and the mavis forhooyed their
young ;
And all in a peaceful ring were hurled :
It was like an eve in a sinless world !
When a month and day had come and gane,
Kilmeny sought the green-wood wene ;
There laid her down on the leaves sao green.
And Kilmeny on earth was never mair seen.
But 0 the words that fell from her mouth
Were words of wonder, and words of truth !
But all the land were in fear and dread,
For they kend na whether she was living or dead.
It wasna her hame, and sue couldna remain ;
She left this world of soitow and pain,
And returned to the land of thought again.
jaues hogg.
THE FAIRY CHILD.
Thk summer sun was sinking
With a mild light, calm and mellow ;
It shone on my little boy's boniiie cheeks.
And his loose locks of yellow.
The robin was singing sweetly.
And his song was sad and tender ;
And my little boy's eyes, while he heard the song,
Smiled with a sweet, soft splendor.
My little boy lay on my bosom
While his soul the song was quaflflng ;
The joy of his soul had tinged his cheek,
And his heart and his eye were laughing.
I sate alone in my cottage,
Tlie midnight needle plying ;
I feared for my child, for the rush's light
In the socket now was dying ;
There came a hand to my lonely latch.
Like the wind at midnight moaning ;
I knelt to pray, but rose again.
For I heard my little boy groaning.
I crossed my brow and I crossed my breast.
But tliat night my child departed, —
They left a weakling in his .stead.
And I am broken-hearted !
0, it cannot be my own sweet boy.
For his eyes are dim and hollow ;
My little boy is gone — is gone,
And his mother soon will follow.
The dirge for the dead will be sung for me,
And the mass be chanted meetly.
And I shall sleep with my little boy.
In the moonlight churchyard sweetly.
John Anster.
THE CULPRIT FAY.
" My visual orbs are purged from film, and. lot
Instead of Anster's turnip-bearing vales»
I see old fairy land's miraculous show I
Her trees of tinsel kissed by freakish gales,
lier ouphs that, cloaked in leaf-gold, skim the breeze.
And fairies, swarming - —— ■ - —."
Tennant's Anster fair.
'T is the middle watch of a summer's night, —
The earth is dark, hut tlie heavens are bright ;
Naught is seen in the vault on high
But tlie moon, and the stara, and the cloudless
sky.
And the flood which rolls its milky hue,
A river of light on the welkin blue.
The moon looks down on old Cro'nest ;
She mellows the shades on his shaggy breast.
And seems his huge gray form to throw
In a silver cone on the wave below.
His sides are broken bj' spots of shade.
By the walnut bough and the cedar made ;
And through their clustering branches dark
Olimmers and dies the firefly's spark, —
[.ike staiTy twinkles that momently break
Through the rifts of the gathering tempest's rack.
The stars are on the moving stream.
And fling, as its rijiples gently flow,
A burnished length of wavy beam
In an eel-Iike, spiral line below ;
POEJIS OP PANCY.
841
The winds are whist, and the owl is still ;
The bat in the slielvy rock is liid ;
And naught is heard on tlie lonely hill
But the ericket's chirp, and tlie answer shrill
Of the gauze-winged katydid ;
And the plaint of the wailing whippoorwill.
Who moans unseen, and ceaseless sings
Ever a note of wail and woe,
Till morning spreads her rosy wings.
And earth and sky in her glances glow.
'T is the hour of fairy ban and spell :
The wood-tick has kept the minutes we'l ;
Ho has counted them all with click and stroke
Deep in the heart of the mountain-oak,
And he has awakened the sentry elve
Who sleeps with him in the haunted tree.
To bid him ring the hour of twelve.
And call the fays to their reveliy ;
Twelve small strokes on his tinkling bell
('T was made of the white snail's pearly shell) :
" Midnight comes, and all is well !
Hither, hither wing your way !
'T is the dawn of the fairy-day."
They come from beds of lichen green.
They creep from the mullein's velvet screen ;
Some on the backs of beetles fly
From the silver tops of moon-touched trees.
Where they swung in their cobweb hammocks
high.
And rocked about in the evening breeze ;
Some from the hum-bird's downy nest, —
They had driven him out by elfin power.
And, pillowed on plumes of his rainbow breast.
Had slumbered there till the charmed hour ;
Some had lain in the scoop of the rock.
With glittering ising-stars inlaid ;
And some had opened the four-o'clock.
And stole within its purple shade.
And now they throng the moonlight glade.
Above, below, on evei-y side, —
Their little minim forms arrayed
In the tricksy pomp of fairy pride !
Tliey come not now to print the lea.
In freak and dance around the tree,
Or at the mushroom board to sup.
And drink the dew from the buttercup :
A scene of soiiow waits them now,
Per an ouphe has broken his vestal vow ;
He has loved an earthly maid.
And left for her his woodland shade ;
He has lain upon her lip of dew,
And sunned him in her eye of blue.
Fanned her cheek with his wing of air.
Played in the ringlets of her hair,
And, nestling on her snowy breast.
Forgot the lily-king's behest.
For this the shadowy tribes of air
To the elfin court must haste away ;
And now they stand expectant there.
To hear the doom of the culprit fay.
The throne was reared upon the grass.
Of spice-wood and of sassafras ;
On pillars of mottled tortoise-shell
Hung the burnished canopy, —
And o'er it gorgeous curtains fell
Of the tulip's crimson drapeiy.
The monarch sat on his judgment-seat.
On his brow the crown imperial shone,
The prisoner fay was at his feet.
And his peers were ranged around the throne.
He waved his sceptre in the air.
He looked around and calmly spoke ;
His brow was grave and his eye severe.
But his voice in a softened accent broke ;
" Fairy ! fairy ! list and mark :
Thou hast broke thine elfin chain ;
Thy flame-wood lamp is quenched and dark.
And thy wings are dyed with a deadly stain, —
Thou hast sullied thine elfin purity
In the glance of a mortal maiden's eye ;
Thou hast scorned our dread decree.
And thou shouldst pay the forfeit high.
But well I know her sinless mind
Is pure as the angel forms above,
Gentle and meek, and chaste and kind.
Such as a spirit well might love.
Fairy ! had she spot or taint.
Bitter had been tby punishment :
Tied to the hornet's shardy wings ;
Tossed on the pricks of nettles' stings ;
Or seven long ages doomed to dwell
With the lazy worm in the walnut-shell
Or every night to writhe and bleed
Beneath the tread of the centipede ;
Or bound in a cobweb-dungeon dim.
Your jailer a spider, huge and grim.
Amid the carrion bodies to lie
Of the worm, and th» bug, and the mui-dered fly :
These it had been your lot to bear.
Had a stain been found on the earthly fair.
Now list, and mark our mild decree, —
Fairy, this your- doom must be :
" Thou shalt seek the beach of sand
Where the water bounds the elfin land ;
Thou shalt watch the oozy brine
Till the sturgeon leaps in the bright moonshine,
Then dait the glistening arch below.
And catch a drop from his silver bow.
Ö-
842
POEMS OF FANCY.
n
The water-sprites will wield their arms
And dash aronnd, with roar and rave,
And vain are the woodland spirits' charms ;
They are the imps that rule the wave.
Yet trust thee in thy single might :
If thy heart be pure and thy spirit right,
Thou shalt win the warlock fight.
" If the spray-bead gem be won,
The stain of thy wing is washed away ;
But another errand must be done
Ere thy crime be lost for aye :
Thy flame-wood lamp is quenched and dark,
Thou must re-illume its spark.
Mount thy steed, and spur him high
To the heaven's blue canopy ;
And when thou seest a shooting star.
Follow it fast, and follow it far, —
The last faint spark of its burning train
Shall light the elfin lamp again.
Thou hast heard our sentence, fay ;
Hence ! to the water-side, away ! "
The goblin marked his monarch well ;
He spake not, but he bowed him low.
Then plucked a crimson colen-bell,
And turned him round in act to go.
The way is long, he cannot fly.
His soiled wing has lost its power.
And he winds adown the mountain high.
For many a sore and weary hour.
Through dreary beds of tangled fern.
Through groves of nightshade dark and dem.
Over the grass and through the brake.
Where toils the ant and sleeps the snake ;
Now o'er the violet's azure flush
He skips along in lightsome mood ;
And now he thrids the bramble-bush.
Till its points are dyed in fairy blood.
He has leaped the bog, he has pierced the brier.
He has swum the brook, and waded the mire.
Till his spirits sank, and his limbs grew weak.
And the red waxed fainter in his cheek.
He had fallen to the ground outright.
For rugged and dim was his onward track.
But there came a spotted tosKi in sight.
And he laughed as he jumped upon her
back ;
He bridled her mouth with a silkweed twist.
He lashed her sides with an osier thong ;
And now, through evening's dewy mist,
AVith leap and spring they bound along.
Till the mountain's magie verge is past.
And the beach of sand is reached at last.
Soft and pale is the moony beam.
Moveless still the glassy stream ;
The wave is clear, the beach is bright
With snowy shells and sparkling stones ;
The shore-surge comes in ripples light.
In murmurings faint and distant moans ;
And ever afar in the silence deep
Is heard the splash of the sturgeon's leap.
And the bend of his graceful bow is seen, —
A glittering arch of silver sheen.
Spanning the wave of burnished blue.
And dripping with gems of the river-dew.
The elfin cast a glance around.
As he lighted down from his courser toad,
Then round his breast his wings he wound,
And close to the river's brink he strode ;
He sprang on a rock, he breathed a prayer.
Above his head his arms he threw.
Then tossed a tiny cui-ve in air.
And headlong plunged in the waters blue.
üp sprang the spirits of the waves
From the sea-silk beds in their coral caves ;
With snail-plate armor, snatched in haste.
They speed their way through the liquid waste ;
Some are rapidly borne along
On the mailed shrimp or the prickly prong ;
Some on the blood-red leeches glide.
Some on the stony star-fish ride,
So7ne on the back of the lancing squab.
Some on the sideling soldier-crab ;
And some on the jellied quarl, that flings
At once a thousand streamy stings ;
They cut the wave with the living oar.
And hurry on to the moonlight shore.
To guard their realms and chase away
The footsteps of the invading fay.
Fearlessly ho skims along.
His hojie is high, and his limbs are strong ;
He spreads his aims like the swallow's wing.
And throws his feet with a frog-like fling ;
His locks of gold on the watei-s shine.
At his breast the tiny foam-bees rise.
His back gleams bright above the brine.
And the wake-line foam behind him lies.
But the water-sprites are gathering near
To check his course along the tide ;
Their wamore come in swift career
And hem him round on every side ;
On his thigh the leech has fixed his hold.
The quarl's long arms are round him rolled.
The prickly prong has pierced his skin.
And the squab has thrown his javelin ;
The gritty star has i-ubbed him raw.
And the ciab has strack with his giant claw ;
He howls with rage, and he shrieks with pain
He strikes around, but his blows are vain ;
B-
Ú
POEMS OF FANCY.
843
Hopeless is the unequal fight.
Fairy ! naught is left but flight.
He turned him round, and fled amain.
With hurry and dash, to the beach again ;
He twisted over from side to side,
And laid his cheek to the cleaving tide ;
The strokes of his plunging arras are fleet,
And with all his might he flings his feet.
But the water-sprites are round him still.
To cross his path and work him ill.
They bade the wave before him rise ;
They flung the sea-fire in his eyes ;
And they stunned his ears with the scallop-stroke.
With the porpoise heave and the drum-fish croak.
0, but a weary wight was he
When he reached the foot of the dogwood-tree.
Gashed and wounded, and stiff and sore.
He laid him down on the sandy shore ;
He blessed the force of the charmed line.
And he banned the water-goblins' spite.
For he saw around in the sweet moonshine
Their little wee faces above the brine.
Giggling and laughing with all their might
At the piteous hap of the fairy wight.
Soon he gathered the balsam dew
From the sorrel-leaf and the henbane bud ;
Over each wound the balm he drew.
And with cobweb lint he stanched the blood.
The mild west-wind was soft and low.
It cooled the heat of his burning brow ;
And he felt new life in his sinews shoot.
As he drank the juice of the calamus-root ;
And now he treads the fatal shore
As fresh and vigorous as before.
Wrapped in musing stands the sprite ;
'T is the middle wane of night ;
His task is hard, his way is far.
But he must do his errand right
Ere dawning mounts her beamy car.
And rolls her chariot wheels of light ;
And vain are the spells of fairy-land, —
He must work with a human hand.
He cast a saddened look around ;
But he felt new joy his bosom swell.
When, glittering on the shadowed ground.
He saw a purple muscle-shell ;
Thither he ran, and he bent him low.
He heaved at the stern and he heaved at the bow.
And he pushed her over the jdelding sand
Till he came to the verge of the haunted land.
She was as lovely a pleasure-boat
As ever fairy had paddled in.
For she glowed with purple paint without.
And shone with silvery pearl within ;
A sculler's notch in the stern he made.
An oar he shaped of the bootle-blade ;
Then sprung to his seat with a lightsome leap.
And launched afar on the calm, blue deep.
The imps of the river yell and rave.
They had no power above the wave ;
But they heaved the billow before the prow.
And they dashed the surge against her side.
And they struck her keel with jerk and blow,
Till the giuiwale bent to the rocking tide.
She wimpled about to the pale moonbeam,
Like a feather that floats on a wind-tossed stream ;
And momently athwart her track
The quarl upreared his island back.
And the fluttering scallop behind would float.
And patter the water about the boat ;
But he bailed her out with his colen-bell.
And he kept her trimmed with a wary tread.
While on every side, like lightning, fell
The heavy strokes of his bootle-blade.
Onward still he held his way.
Till he came where the column of moonshine lay,
And saw beneath the surface dim
The brown-backed sturgeon slowly swim ;
Around him were the goblin train, —
But he sculled with all his might and main.
And followed wherever the sturgeon led.
Till he saw him upward point his head ;
Then he dropped his paddle-blade.
And held his colen-goblet up
To catch the drop in its crimson cup.
With sweeping tail and quivering fin
Through the wave the sturgeon flew.
And, like the heaven-shot javelin.
He sprung above the waters blue.
Instant as the star-fall light
He plnnged him in the deep again.
But he left an arch of silver bright.
The rainbow of the moony main.
It was a strange and lovely sight
To see the puny goblin there ;
He seemed an angel form of light.
With azure wing ând sunny hair.
Throned on a cloud of puiple fair.
Circled with blue and edged with white.
And sitting, at the fall of even.
Beneath the bow of summer heaven.
A moment, and its lustre fell ;
But ere it met the billow blue
He caught within his crimson bell
A droplet of its sparkling dew ! —
Joy to thee, fay ! thy task is done.
Thy wings are pure, for the gem is won, —
844
POE.MS OF FANCY.
Cheerly ply thy drijipiiig oar,
And haste away to the elliii shore.
He turns, and, lo 1 on either side
The ripples on his path divide ;
And the track o'er which his boat must pass
Is smooth as a sheet of polished glass.
Around, their limbs the sea-nymphs lave.
With snowy arms half swelling out.
While on the glossed and gleamy wave
Their sea-green ringlets loosely float.
They swim around with smile and song ;
They press the bark with pearly hand.
And gently urge her course along
Toward the beach of speckled sand.
And, as he lightly leaped to land.
They bade adieu with nod and bow ;
Then gayly kissed each little hand.
And dropped in the crystal deep below.
A moment stayed the fairy there ;
He kissed the beach and breathed a prayer ;
Then spread his wings of gilded blue.
And on to the elfin court he flew.
As ever ye saw a bubble rise,
And shine with a thousand changing dyes.
Till, lessening far, through ether driven.
It mingles with the hues of heaven ;
As, at the glimpse of morning palj.
The lance-fly spreads his silken sail.
And gleams with blendings soft and bright
Till lost in the shades of fading night, —
So rose from earth the lovely fay ;
So vanished, far in heaven away !
• « • * •
Up, fairy ! quit thy chickweed bower.
The cricket has called the second hour ;
Twice again, and the lark will rise
To kiss the streaking of the skies, —
Up ! thy charmed armor don,
Thou 'It need it ere the night be gone.
He put his acorn helmet on ;
It was plumed of the silk of the thistle-down ;
The corselet plate that guarded his breast
Was once the wild bee's golden vest ;
His cloak, of a thousand mingled dyce.
Was formed of the wings of butterflies ;
His shield was the shell of a lady-bug queen.
Studs of gold on a gi-ound of green ;
And the quivering lance which he brandished
bright
Was the sting of a wasp he had slain in fight.
Swift he bestrode his firefly steed ;
He bared his blade of the bent-grass blue ;
He drove his spurs of the cockle-seed.
And away like a glance of thought he flew
^
To skim the heavens, and follow far
The fiery trail of the rocket-star.
The moth-fly, as he shot in air.
Crept under the leaf, and hid her there ;
The katydid forgot its lay.
The prowling gnat fled fast away.
The fell mosquito checked his drone
And folded his wings till the fay was gone.
And the wily beetle dropped his head.
And fell on the ground as if he were dead ;
They crouched them close in the darksome shade.
They quaked all o'er with awe and fear.
For they had felt the blue-bent blade.
And writhed at the prick of the elfin spear.
Many a time, on a summer's night.
When the sky was clear, and the moon was bright.
They had been roused from the haunted ground
By the yelp and bay of the fairy hound ;
They had heard the tiny bugle-horn.
They had heard the twang of the maize-silkstring.
When the vine-twig bows were tightly drawn,
And the needle-shaft through air was borne.
Feathered with down of the hum-bird's wing.
And now they deemed the courier ouphe
Some hunter-sprite of the elfin ground.
And they watched till they saw him mount the roof
That canopies the world around ;
Then glad they left their covert lair.
And freaked about in the midnight air.
Up to the vaulted firmament
His path the firefly courser bent.
And at every gallop on the wind
He flung a glittering spark behind ;
He flies like a feather in the blast
Till the first light cloud in heaven is past.
But the shapes of air have begun their work.
And a drizzly mist is round him cast ;
He cannot see through the mantle murk ;
He shivers with cold, but he urges fast ;
Through storm and darkness, sleet and shade,
He lashes his steed, and spurs amain, —
For shadowy hands have twitched the rein.
And flame-shot tongues around him played.
And near him many a fiendish eye
Glared with a fell malignity.
And yells of rage, and shrieks of fear.
Came screaming on his startled car.
His wings are wet around his breast.
The plume hangs dripping from his crest,
His eyes are blurred with the lightning's glare.
And his ears are stunned with the thunder's blare.
But he gave a shout, and his blade he drew.
He thrust before and he struck behind.
Till he pierced their cloudy bodies through.
And gashed their- shadowy limbs of wind :
tö-
POEMS DP FANCY.
845
-a
Howling the misty spectres flew.
They rend the air with frightful cries ;
For he has gained the welkin blue,
And the land of clouds beneath him lies.
Up to the cope careering swift,
In breathless motion fast.
Fleet as the swallow cnts the drift.
Or the sea-roc rides the blast.
The sapphire sheet of eve is shot.
The sphered moon is past.
The earth but seems a tiny blot
On a sheet of azure cast.
0, it was sweet, in the clear moonlight.
To tread the starry plain of even !
To meet the thousand ej'es of night.
And feel the cooling breath of heaven !
But the elfin made no stop or stay
Till he came to the bank of the Milky Way ;
Then he checked his courser's foot.
And watched for the glimpse of the planet-shoot.
Sudden along the snowy tide
That swelled to meet their footsteps' fall.
The sylphs of heaven were seen to glide,
Attired in sunset's crimson pall ;
Around the fay they weave the dance,
Tliey skip before him on the plain,
And one has taken his wasp-sting lance.
And one upholds his bridle-rein ;
With warblings wild they lead him on
To where, through clouds of amber seen.
Studded with stars, resplendent shone
The palace of the sylphid queen.
Its spiral columns, gleaming bright.
Were streamers of the northern light ;
Its curtain's light and lovely flush
Was of the morning's rosy blush ;
And the ceiling fair that rose aboou.
The white and feathery fleece of noon.
But, 0, how fair the shape that lay
Beneath a rainbow bending bright !
She seemed to the entrancèd fay
The loveliest of the foms of light ;
Her mantle was the purple rolled
At twilight in the west afar ;
'T was tied with threads of dawning gold.
And buttoned with a sparkling star.
Her face was like the lily roon
That veils the vestal planet's hue ;
Her eyes, two beamlets from the moon.
Set floating in the welkin blue.
Her hair is like the sunny beam.
And the diamond gems which round it gleam
Are the pure drops of dewy even
That ne'er have left their native heaven.
She raised her eyes to the wondering sprite.
And they leaped with smiles ; for well I ween
Never before in the bowers of light
Had the form of an earthly fay been seen.
Long she looked in his tiny face ;
lauig with his butterfly cloak she played ;
She smoothed his wings of azure lace.
And handled the tassel of his blade ;
And as he told, in accents low,
The story of his love and woe.
She felt new pains in her bosom rise.
And the tear-drop started in her eyes.
And "O, sweet spirit of earth," she cried,
" Return no more to your woodland height.
But ever here with me abide
In the land of everlasting light !
Within the fleecy drift we '11 lie.
We '11 hang upon the rainbow's rim ;
And all the jewels of the sky
Around thy brow shall brightly beam !
And thou shalt bathe thee in the stream
That rolls its whitening foam aboon.
And ride upon the lightning's gleam.
And dance upon the orbed moon 1
We'll sit within the Pleiad ring.
We'll rest on Orion's starry belt.
And I will bid my sylphs to sing
The song that makes the dew-mist melt ;
Their harps are of the umber shade
That hides the blush of waking day.
And every gleamy string is made
Of silvery moonshine's lengthened ray ;
And thou shalt pillow on my breast.
While heavenly breathings float around.
And, with the sylphs of ether blest.
Forget the joys of fairy ground."
She was lovely and fair to see.
And the elfin's heart beat fitfully ;
But lovelier far, and still more fair.
The earthly form imprinted there ;
Naught he saw in the heavens above
Was half so dear as his mortal love,
For he thought upon her looks so meek.
And he thought of the light flush on her cheek.
Never again might he bask and lie
On that sweet cheek and moonlight eye ;
But in his dreams her form to see.
To clasp her in his revery,
To think upon his virgin bride.
Was worth all heaven, and earth beside.
" Lady," he cried, " I have sworn to-night.
On the word of a fairy knight.
To do my sentence-task aright ;
My honor scarce is free from stain, —
I may not soil its snows again ;
846 POEMS
Betide me weal, betide me woe,
Its mandate must be answered now."
Her bosom heaved witli many a sigh.
The tear was in her drooping eye ;
But she led him to the palace gate.
And called the sylphs who hovered there.
And bade them fly and bring him straight.
Of clouds condensed, a sable «ir.
With charm and spell she blessed it there,
From all the fiends of upper air ;
Then round him cast the shadowy shroud.
And tied his steed behind the cloud ;
And pressed his hand as she bade him fly
Far to the verge of the northern sky,
For by its wane and wavering light
There was a star would fall to-night.
Borne afar on the wings of the blast,
Northward away he speeds him fast.
And his courser follows the cloudy wain
Till the hoof-strokes fall like pattering rain.
The elouds roll backward as he flies.
Each flickering star behind him lies.
And he has reached the northern plain.
And backed his firefly steed again.
Ready to follow in its flight
The streaming of the rocket-light.
The star is yet in the vault of heaven,
But it rocks in the summer gale ;
And now't is fitful and uneven.
And now't is deadly pale ;
And now't is wrapped in sulphur-smoke.
And quenched is its rayless beam ;
And now with a rattling thunder-stroke
It bursts in flash and flame.
As swift as the glance of the arrowy lance
That the storm-spirit flings from high.
The star-shot flew o'er the welkin blue.
As it fell from the sheeted sky.
As swift as the wind in its ti'ain behind
The elfin gallops along :
The fiends of the clouds are bellowing loud.
But the sylphid charm U strong ;
He gallops unhurt in the shower of fire.
While the cloud-fiends fly from the blaze ;
He watches each flake till its sparks expire.
And rides in the light of its rays.
But he drove his steed to the lightning's speed,
And caught a glimmering spark ;
Then wheeled around to the fairy ground.
And sped through the midnight dark.
• ♦ » • »
Ouphe and goblin ! imp and sprite !
Elf of eve ! and starry fay I
Ye that love the moon's soft light,
,, Hither, — hither wend your way ;
y
PANCy.
Twine ye in a jocund ring.
Sing and trip it merrily.
Hand to hand, and wing to vdng.
Round the wild witch-hazel tree.
Hail the wanderer again
With dance and song, and lute and lyre ;
Pure his wing and strong his chain.
And doubly bright his fairy fire.
Twine ye in an airy round.
Brush the dew and print the lea ;
Skip and gambol, hop and bound.
Round the wild witch-hazel ti-ee.
The beetle guards our holy ground.
He flies about the haunted place.
And if mortal there be found.
He hums in his ears and flaps his face ;
The leaf-harp sounds our roundelay,
The owlet's eyes our lanterns be ;
Thus we sing and dance and play
Round the wild witch-hazel tree.
But hark ! from tower to tree-top high.
The sentry-elf his call has made ;
A streak is in the eastern sky.
Shapes of moonlight ! flit and fade !
The hill-tops gleam in morning's spring.
The skylark shakes his dappled wing.
The day-glimpse glimmers on the lawn.
The cock has crowed, and the fays are gone.
Joseph Rodham Drakh.
•
FAIRY SONG.
Shed no tear ! O, shed no tear !
The flower will bloom another year.
Weep no more ! O, weep no more !
Young buds sleep in the root's white core.
Dry your eyes ! 0, dry your eyes !
For I was taught in Paradise
To ease my breast of melodies, —
Shed no tear.
Overhead ! look overhead ! '
'Mong the blossoms white and red, —
Look up, look up ! I flutter now *
On this fresh pomegranate bough. ]
See me ! 't is this silvery bill '
Ever cures the good man's ill, ^
Shed no tear ! O, shed no tear !
The flower will bloom another year.
Adieu, adieu — I fly — adieu !
I vanish in the heaven's blue, —
Adieu, adieu !
John Keats.
ü
POEMS OF FANCY.
847
-Si
FAREWELL TO THE FAIRIES.
Fabewell rewards and fairies,
Good housewifes now may say,
For now foul sluts in dairies
Do fare as well as they.
And though they sweep their hearths no less
Than maids were wont to do.
Yet who of late, for cleanliness.
Finds sixpence in her shoe ?
Lament, lament, old Abbeys,
The fairies' lost command :
They did but change priests' babies.
But some have changed your land ;
And all your children sprung from thence
Are now grown Puritans,
Who live as changelings ever since,
For love of your domains.
At morning and at evening both.
You merry were and glad.
So little care of sleep or sloth
These pretty ladies had ;
AVhen Tom came home from labor.
Or Cis to milking rose,
Then merrily went their tabor.
And nimbly went their toes.
Witness those rings and roundelays
Of theirs, which yet remain.
Were footed in Queen Mary's days
On many a grassy plain ;
But since of late Elizabeth,
And later, James came in,
They never danced on any heath
As when the time hath been.
By which we note the fairies
Were of the old profession.
Their songs were Ave- Maries,
Their dances were procession :
But now, alas ! they all are dead.
Or gone beyond the seas ;
Or farther for religion fled.
Or else they take their ease.
A tell-tale in their company
They never could endure,
And whoso kept not secretly
Their mirth, was punished sure ;
It was a just and Christian deed.
To pinch such black and blue :
0, how the commonwealth doth need
Such justices as you !
Richard Corbet.
TAM O'SHANTER.
*' Of Brownyls and of Bóbilis Bill Is this Buke."
Cawin DouGLAsa
When chapman billies leave the street.
And drouthy neebors neebors meet.
As market-days are wearing late.
An' folk begin to tak the gate ;
While we sit bousing at the nappy.
An' getting fou and unco happy.
We think na on the lang Scots miles.
The mosses, waters, slaps, and styles.
That lie between us and our hame,
Whare sits our sulky, sullen dame.
Gathering her brows like gathering storm.
Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.
This truth fand honest Tam O'Shanter,
As he frae Ayr ae night did canter
(Auld Ayr, wham ne'er a town surpasses,
For honest men and bonnie lasses).
0 Tam ! hadst thou been but sae wise
As taen thy ain wife Kate's advice !
She tauld thee weel thou was a skellum,
A blethering, blustering, drunken blellum:
That frae November till October,
Ae market-day thou was na sober ;
That ilka melder, wi' the miller,
Thou sat as lang as thou had siller ;
That every naig was ca'd a shoe on.
The smith and thee gat roaring fou on ;
That at the L—d's house, ev'n on Sunday,
Thou drank wi' Kirton Jean till Monday.
She prophesied that, late or soon.
Thou would be found deep drowned in Doon ;
Or catched wi' warlocks in the mirk.
By Alloway's auld haunted kirk.
Ah, gentle dames ! it gars me greet
To think how monie counsels sweet.
How monie lengthened sage advices.
The husband frae the wife despises !
But to our tale : Ae market night
Tam had got planted unco right.
Fast by an ingle, bleezing flnely,
Wi' reaming swats, that drank divinely ;
And at his elbow souter Johnny,
His ancient, trusty, drouthy crony.
Tam lo'ed him like a vera brither ;
They had been fou for weeks thegither.
The night drave on wi' sangs .and clatter.
And aye the ale was growing better ;
The landlady and Tam grew gracious,
Wi' favors secret, sweet, and precious ;
The souter tauld his queerest stories ;
The landlord's laugh was ready chorus ;
The storm without might rair and rustle,
Tam did na mind the storm a whistle.
'S-
■s
POEMS OP FANCY.
Care, mad to .see a man sae liappy,
E'en drowned himself amang the nappy ;
As bees flee hame wi' lades o" treasure,
The minutes winged their way wi' pleasure ;
Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious.
O'er a' the ills o' life victorious.
But pleasures are like poppies spread ;
You seize the flower, its bloom is shed ;
Or like the snow-fall in the liver,
A moment white, — then melts forever ;
Or like the borealis race,
That flit ere you can point their place ;
Or like the rainbow's lovely form
Evanishing amid the storm.
Nae man can tether time or tide ;
The hour approaches Tam maun ride ;
That hour o' night's black arch the keystane,
That dreai-y hour he mounts his beast in ;
And sic a night he takes the road in
As ne'er poor sinner was abroad in.
The wind blew as't wad blawn its last ;
The rattling showers rose on the blast ;
The speedy gleams the darkness swallowed ;
Loud, deep, and lang the thunder bellowed ;
That night a child might understand
The Deil liad business on his hand.
Weel mounted on his gray mare, Meg
(A better never lifted leg,)
Tam skelpit on thro' dub and mire,
Despising wind and rain and fire, —
Whyles holding fast his guid blue bonnet,
YVhyles crooning o'er some auld Scots sonnet,
AVhyles glowering round wi' prudent cares.
Lest bogles catch him unawares ;
Kirk-Alloway was drawing nigh,
\Vhare ghaists and houlets nightly cry.
By this time he was cross the ford,
Whare in the snaw the chapman sinoored ;
And past the birks and meikle stane,
Whare drunken Charlie brak's neck-bane ;
And through the whins, and by the cairn,
AVhare hunters fand the murdered bairn ;
And near the thorn, aboon the well,
Whare Mungo's mither hanged hersel'.
Before him Doon pours all his floods ;
The doubling storm roars through the woods ;
The lightnings flash from pole to pole ;
Near and more near the thunders roll ;
When, glimmering through the groaning trees,
Kirk-Alloway seemed in a bleeze !
Through ilka bore the beams were glancing.
And loud resounded mirth and dancing.
Inspiring bold John Barleycorn !
What dangers thou canst make us scorn !
Wi' tippenny we fear nae evil ;
Wi' usquebae we '11 face the Devil ! —
The swats sac rc.amcd in Tammic's noddle.
Fair play, he cared na Deils a bodle.
But Maggie stood right sair astonished.
Till, by the heel and hand admonished,
She ventured forward on the light ;
And, wow ! Tam saw an unco sight I
Warlocks and witches in a dance :
Nae cotillon brent new frae France,
But hornpipes, jigs, strathsjieys, and reels
Put life and mettle in their heels.
A winnock-bunker in the east.
There sat auld Nick, in shape o' beast, —
A towzio tyke, black, grim, and large, —
To gie them music was his charge ;
He screwed the pipes and gart them skirl
Till roof an' rafters a' did dirl.
Coffins stood round like open presses.
That shawed the dead in their last dresses ;
And by some devilish cantrip sleight.
Each in its cauld hand held a light, —
By which heroic Tam was able
To note, upon the lialy table,
A murderePs banes, in gibbet aims ;
Twa span-lang, wee, unchristened bairns ;
A thief, new cutted frae a rape,
Wi' his last gasp his gab did gape ;
Five tomahawks, wi' bluid red nisted ;
Five scymitars, wi' murder crusted ;
A garter, which a babe had strangled ;
A knife, a father's throat had mangled.
Whom his ain son o' life bereft, —
The giuy hairs yet stack to the heft ;
Three lawyers' tongues turned inside out,
Wi' lies seamed like a beggar's clout ;
And priests' hearts, rotten, black as muck.
Lay stinking, vile, in every neuk :
Wi' mair o' horrible and awfu'
Which even to name wad be unlawfu'.
As Tanimie glowered, amazed and curious,
The mirth an<ibfun grew fast and furious ;
The piper loud and louder blew ;
The dancers quick and qrricker flew ;
They reeled, they set, they crossed, they deck it,
Till ilka carUn swat and reekit.
And coost her duddies to the wark.
And linket at it in her sark !
Now Tam, 0 Tam ! had they been queans,
A' plump and strapping in their teens ;
Their sacks, instead of creeshie flannen.
Been snaw-white seventeen-hunder linen ;
Thir breeks o' mine, my only pair,
That anee were plash, o' girid blue hair,
1 wad hae gi'en them aff my hurdies
For ae blink o' the bonnie burdies !
But withered beldams, auld and droll,
Rigwoodie hags wad spearr a foal,
Lowping an' flinging ort a crnmmock, —
I wonder didna turn thy stomach.
?
POEMS OP FANCY.
849
-a
But Tarn kenn'd what was what fu' brawlie.
There was ae winsome wench and walie.
That night inlisted in the core
(Lang after kenn'd on Carrick shore ;
For monie a beast to dead she shot.
And perished monie a bonnie boat,
And shook baith meikle corn and bear.
And kept the country-side in fear).
Her cutty-sark o' Paisley harn.
That while a lassie she had worn,
In longitude though sorely scanty.
It was her best, and she was vaunty. —
Ah ! little kenned thy reverend grannie
That sark she coft for her wee Nannie
Wi' twa pund Scots ('t was a' her riches)
Wad ever graced a dance o' witches !
But here my Muse her wing maun cower,
Sic flights are far beyond her power ;
To sing how Nannie lap and flang
(A souple jade she was and Strang),
And how Tam stood like ane bewitched.
And thought his very ecu enriched.
Ev'n Satan glowered, and fldged fu' fain.
And hotched and blew wi' might and main ;
Till flrst ae caper, syne anither, —
Tam tint his reason a' thegither.
And roars out, " Weel done, Cutty-sark ! "
And in an instant a' was dark ;
And scarcely had he Maggie rallied,
When out the hellish legion sallied.
As bees bizz out wi' angry fyke.
When plundering herds assail their byke ;
As open pussie's mortal foes.
When, pop ! she starts before their nose ;
As eager runs the market-crowd.
When Oatch ÜM thief! resounds aloud ;
So Maggie runs, — the witches follow,
Wi' monie an eldritch skreech and hollow.
Ah, Tam ! ah, Tam ! thou '11 get thy fairin' !
In hell they 'II roast thee like a herrin !
In vain thy Kate awaits thy comin' —
Kate soon will be a woefu' woman !
Now, do thy speedy utmost, Meg,
And win the key-stane of the brig ;
There at them thou thy tail may toss, —
A running stream they dare na cross.
But ere the key-stane she could make,
The fient a tail she had to shake ;
For Nannie, far before the rest.
Hard upon noble Maggie prest.
And flew at Tam wi' furious ettle :
But little wist she Maggie's mettle,.—
Ae spring brought aff her master hale.
But left behind her aiu gray tail :
The carlin claught her by the rump.
And left poor Maggie scarce a stump.
Now, wha this tale o' truth shall read.
Ilk man and mother's son take heed ;
Whene'er to drink you are inclined.
Or cutty-sarks run in your mind.
Think, ye may buy the joys o'er dear,
Remember Tam O'Shanter's mare.
robert burns.
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN.
Hamelin Town's in Brunswick,
By famous Hanover City ;
The river Weser, deep and wide.
Washes its wall on the southern side ;
A pleasanter spot you never spied ;
But when begins my ditty.
Almost five hundred years ago.
To see the townsfolk suffer so
From vermin was a pity.
Rats !
They fought the dogs, and killed the cats,
And bit the babies in the cradles.
And ate the cheeses out of the vats.
And licked the soup from the cook's own ladles,
Sxdit open the kegs of salted sprats.
Made nests inside men's Sunday hats.
And even spoiled the women's chats.
By drowning their speaking
With shrieking and squeaking
In fifty different sharps and flats.
At last the people in a body
To the Town Hall came flocking :
" 'T is clear," cried they, " our Mayor's a noddy ;
And as for our Corporation, — shocking
To think we buy gowns lined with ermine
For dolts that can't or won't determine
What's best to rid us of our vermin ! "
At this the Mayor and Corporation
Quaked with a mighty consternation.
An hour they sate in counsel, —
At'length the Mayor broke silence :
" For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell ;
I wish I were a mile hence !
It's easy to bid one rack one's brain, —
I'm sure my poor head aches again.
I've scratched it so, and all in vain.
0 for a trap, a trap, a trap ! "
Just as he said this, what should hap
At the chamber door but a gentle tap ?
" Bless us," cried the Mayor, "what's that ? "
" Come in ! " — the Mayor cried, looking bigger ;
And in did come the strangest figure ;
He advanced to the council-table :
And, " Please your honors," said he, *' I'm able.
&
-51
850
POEMS OF FANCY.
a
By means of a secret charm, to draw
All creatures living beneath the sun,
That creep or swim or fly or run.
After me so as you never saw !
Yet," said he, "poor piper as I am,
In Tartary I freed the Cham,
Last June, from his huge swarm of gnats ;
I eased in Asia the Nizam
Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats ;
And as for what your brain bewilders, —
If I can rid your town of rats.
Will you give me a thousand guilders ? "
" One ? fifty thousand ! " was the exclamation
Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation.
Into the street the piper stept.
Smiling first a little smile.
As if he knew what magic slept
In his quiet pipe the while ;
Then, like a musical adept.
To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled.
And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled.
Like a candle flame where salt is sprinkled ;
And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered.
You heard as if an army muttered ;
And the muttering grew to a grumbling ;
And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling ;
And out of the houses the rats came tumbling.
Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats.
Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats,
Grave old plodders, gay young friskers.
Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins.
Cocking tales and pricking whiskers ;
Families by tens and dozens.
Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives, —
Followed the piper for their lives.
From street to street he piped advancing,
And step for step they followed dancing,
Until they came to the river Weser,
Wherein all plunged and perished
Save one who, stout as Julius Csesar,
Swam across and lived to carry
(As he the manuscript he cherished)
To Rat-land home his commentary,
Which was ; " At the first shrill notes of the pipe,
I heard a sound as of scraping tripe.
And putting apples, wondrous ripe.
Into a cider-press's gripe, —
And a moving away of piokle-tub-boards.
And a leaving ajar of conserve-cupboards.
And a drawing the corks of train-oil-flasks,
And a breaking the hoops of butter-casks ;
And it seemed as if a voice
(Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery
Is breathed) called out, 0 rats, rejoice I
The world is grown to one vast drysaltery !
So munch on, crunch on, take your nuncheon.
Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon !
And just as a bulky sugar-puncheon.
Already staved, like a great sun shone
Glorious scarce an inch before me.
Just as methought it said, Come, bore me ! —
I fovmd the Weser rolling o'er me."
You should have heard the Hamelin people
Ringing the bells till they rocked the steeple ;
"Go," cried the Mayor, " and get long poles !
Poke out the nests and block up the holes !
Consult with carpenters and builders.
And leave in our town not even a trace
Of the rats ! " —when suddenly, up the face
Of the piper perked in the market-place.
With a " First, if you please, my thousand guil¬
ders ! "
A thousand guilders ! the Mayor looked blue;
So did the Corporation too.
For council-dinners made rare havoc
With Claret, Moselle, Vin-de-Grave, Hock ;
And half the money would replenish
Their cellar's biggest butt with Rhenish.
To pay this sum to a wandering fellow
With a gypsy coat of red and yellow !
"Beside," quoth the Mayor, with a knowing
wink,
"Our business was done at the river's brink ;
We saw with our eyes the vermin sink,
And what's dead can't come to life, I think.
So, friend, we 're not the folks to shrink
From the duty of giving you something to drink,
And a matter of money to put in your poke ;
But as for the guilders, what we spoke
Of them, as you very well know, was in joke.
Beside, our losses have made us thrifty ;
A thousand guilders I Come, take fifty ! "
The pi]>er's face fell, and he cried,
"No trifling I I can't wait ! beside,
I've promised to visit by dinner time
Bagdat, and accept the prime
Of the head cook's pottage, all he's rich in.
For having left, in the Caliph's kitchen.
Of a nest of scorpions no survivor, —
With him I proved no bargain-driver ;
With you, don't think I 'U bate a stiver !
And folks who put me in a passion
May find me pipe to another fashion."
"How?" cried the Mayor, "d'ye think I'll
brook
Being worse treated than a cook ?
Insulted by a lazy ribald
With idle pipe and vesture piebald ?
You threaten ns, fellow ? Do your worst.
Blow your pipe there till you burst ! "
■B-
o
POEMS
Oiicc more he stept into the street ;
And to his lips again
Laid his long pipe of smooth straight cane ;
And ere he blew three notes (such sweet
Soft notes as yet musician's cunning
Never gave the enraptured air)
There was a rustling that seemed like a bustling
Of merrycrowdsjustlingat pitching and hustling;
Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clatter¬
ing.
Little hands clapping, and little tongues chat¬
tering ;
And, like fowls in a farm-yard when barley is
scattering.
Out came the children running :
All the little boys and girls.
With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls.
And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls.
Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after
The wonderful music with shouting and laughter.
The Mayor was dumb, and the Council stood
As if they were changed into blocks of wood.
Unable to move a step, or cry
To the children merrily skipping by, —
And could only follow with the eye
That joyous crowd at the piper's back.
But how the Mayor was on the rack.
And the wretched Council's bosoms beat.
As the piper turned from the High Street
To where the Weser rolled its waters
Eight in the way of their sons and daughters I
However, he turned from south to west.
And to Koppelberg Hill his steps addressed.
And after him the children pressed ;
Great was the joy in every breast.
" He never can cross that mighty top I
He's forced to let the piping drop.
And we shall see our children stop ! "
When, lo, as they reached the mountain's side,
A wondrous portal opened wide.
As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed ;
And the piperadvanced and the children followed;
And when all were in, to the very last.
The door in the mountain-side shut fast.
Did I say all ? No ! One was lame.
And could not dance the whole of the way ;
And in after years, if you would blame
His sadness, he was used to say, —
" It's dull in our town since my playmates left !
I can't forget that I'm bereft
Of all the pleasant sights they see.
Which the piper also promised me ;
For he led us, he said, to a joyous land.
Joining the town and just at hand.
Where waters gushed, and fruit-trees grew,
And flowers put forth a fairer hue.
And everything was strange and new ;
^
FANCY. 851 "
The sparrows were brighter'than peacocks here.
And their dogs outran our fallow deer.
And honey-bees had lost their stings.
And horses were bom with eagles' wings ;
And just as I became assured
My lame foot would be speedily cured.
The music stopped and I stood still.
And found myself outside the Hill,
Left alone against my will.
To go now limping as before.
And never hear of that country more ! "
Robert Browning.
THE TOAD'S JOURNAL.
[It is said that Belzoni, the traveller in Eçypt, discovered a liv¬
ing toad in a temple, which had been for ages buried in the sand-]
In a land for antiquities greatly renowned
A traveller had dug wide and deep under ground,
A temple, for ages entombed, to disclose, —
\Vhen, lo ! he disturbed, in its secret repose,
A toad, from whose journal it plainly appears
It had lodged in that mansion some thousands
of years.
The roll which this reptile's long history records,
A treat to the sage antiquarian affords :
The sense by obscure hieroglyphics concealed,
Deep learning at length, with long labor, revealed.
The first thousand years as a specimen take, —
The dates are omitted for brevity's sake :
" Crawled forth from some rubbish, and winked
with one eye ;
Half opened the other, but could not tell why ;
Stretched out my left leg, as it felt rather queer.
Then drew all together and slept for a year.
Awakened, felt chilly, — crept under a stone ;
Was vastly contented with living alone.
One toe became wedged in the stone like a peg.
Could not get it away, —had the cramp in my leg.
Began half to wish for a neighbor at hand
To loosen the stone, which was fast in the sand ;
Pulled harder, then dozed, as I found't was no
use ; —
Awoke the next summer, and lo ! it was loose.
Crawled forth from the stone when completely
awake ;
Crept into a comer and grinned at a snake.
Retreated, and found that I needed repose ;
Curled up my damp limbs and prepared for a doze;
Fell sounder to sleep than was usual before.
And did not awake for a century or more ;
But had a sweet dream, as I rather believe :
Methought it was light, and a fine summer's eve ;
And I in some garden deliciously fed
In the pleasant moist shade of a strawberry-bed.
There fine speckled creatures claimed kindred
with me.
And others that hopped, most enchanting to see. ,
852
POEMS OF FANCY.
Here long I regaled with emotion extreme ; —
Awoke, — disconcerted to find it a dream ;
Grew pensive, — discovered that life is a load ;
Began to get weary of being a toad ;
Was fretful at first, and then shed a few tears
Here ends the account of the first thousand years,
MORAL.
It seems that life is all a void,
On selfish thoughts alone employed ;
That length of days is not a good.
Unless their use be understood.
Jane Taylor.
THE RAVEN.
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered,
weak and weary.
Over many a quaint and curious voltime of for¬
gotten lore, —
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there
came a tapping.
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my
chamber door.
'"Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at
my chamber door ;
Only this, and nothing more."
Ah, distinctly! I remember, it was! in the^ bleak
December,'
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost
upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow ; vainly I had
sought to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow, — sorrow for
the lost Lenore, —
F or the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels
named Lenore, —»
Nameless here forevermore.
And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each
purple curtain
Thrilled me, — filled me with fantastic terrors
never felt before ;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I
stood repeating,
" 'T is some visitor entreating entrance at my
chamber door, —
Soííe late visitor entreating entrance at my
chamber door ;
That it is, and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger ; hesitating then
no longer,
"Sir," said I, "or madam, truly your forgive¬
ness I implore ;
But the fact is, I was napping, and so gently you
came rapping.
• And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my
chamber door.
That I scarce was sure I heard you " — Here I
opened wide the door ;
Darkness there, and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood
there, wondering, fearing.
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared
to dream before ;
But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness
. gave no token.
And the only word there spoken was the whis¬
pered word " Lenore ! "
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back
the word "Lenore ! "
Merely this, and nothing more.
Back into the chamber turning, aU my soul within
me burning.
Soon again I heard a tapping, something louder
than before :
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at
my window-lattice ;
Let me see then what thereat is, and this mys¬
tery explore, —
Let my heart be still a moment, and this mystery
explore ; —
'T is the wind, and nothing more."
Open then I flung the shutter, when, with many
a flirt and flutter.
In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly
days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he ; not an instant
stopped or stayed he ;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above
my chamber door, —
Perched upon a bust of Pallas, just above my
chamber door, —
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into
smiling.
By the grave and stem decorum of the counte¬
nance it wore,
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,"
I said, "art sure no craven ;
Ghastly, grim, and ancient raven, wandering
from the nightly shore,
TeU me what thy lordly name is on the night's
Plutonian shore ? "
Quoth the raven, "Nevermore ! "
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear
discourse so plainly.
Though its answer little meaning, little rele¬
vancy bore ;
POEMS OF FANCy.
For we cannot help agreeing that no living hu¬
man being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his
chamber door,
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his
chamber door,
With such name as " Nevermore ! "
But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust,
spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he
did outpour.
Nothing further then he uttered, ■— not a feather
then he fluttered, —
Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other
friends have flown before, —
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes
have flown before."
Then the bird said, " Nevermore ! "
Startled at the stillness, broken by reply so aptly
spoken,
"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only
stock and store.
Caught from some unhappy master, whom un¬
merciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster, till his song
one burden bore,
TUl the dirges of his hope that melancholy bur¬
den bore,—
Of ' Nevermore, — nevermore ! ' "
But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into
smiling.
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of
bird and bust and door.
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself
to linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous
bird of yore —
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and
ominous bird of yore —
Meant in croaking " Nevermore ! "
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable
expressing
To the fowl whose flery eyes now burned into
my bosom's core ;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at
ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp¬
light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining, with the lamp¬
light gloating o'er.
She shall press — ah ! nevermore !
Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed i
from an unseen censer,
Swung by seraphim, whose footfalls tinkled on
the tufted floor.
" Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee, —
by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite, — respite and nepenthe from the memo¬
ries of Lenore !
Quafif, 0, quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget
this lost Lenore ! "
Quoth the raven, " Nevermore ! "
" Prophet ! " said I, " thing of evil ! — prophet
still, if bird or devil !
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest
tossed thee here ashore.
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land
enchanted, —
On this home by horror haunted, — tell me truly,
I implore, —
Is there — is there balm in Gilead ? ;— tell me, —
tell me, I implore ! "
Quoth the raven, " Nevermore ! "
" Prophet ! " said I, "thing of evil ! — prophet
still, if bird or devil !
By that heaven that bends above us, — by that
God we both adore.
Tell this soul with sorrow laden, if, within the
distant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden, whom the angels
name Lenore,
Clasp a fair and radiant maiden, whom the angels
name Lenore ! "
Quoth the raven, " Nevermore ! "
" Be that word our sign of parting, bird or
flend ! " I shrieked, upstarting, —
" Get thee back into the tempest and the night's
Plutonian shore !
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy
soul hath spoken !
Leave my loneliness unbroken ! — quit the bust
above my door !
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy
form from off my door ! "
Quoth the raven, " Nevermore ! "
And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting,
still is sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas, Just above my
chamber door ;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon
that is dreaming.
And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws
his shadow on the floor ;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies
floating on the floor
Shall be lifted — nevermore !
edgar Allan poe.
-0
e
864
POEMS OF FANCY.
RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.
PART I.
An Ancient Jt is an Auclent Mariner,
Manner '
meeteth^ And he stoppsth One of three.
lante Sdden " By thy long gray beard and glittering
to a wed-
dii^ feast,
Ith one!'"' Now wherefore stopp'st thou me ?
The Bridegroom's doors are opened wide,
And I am next of kin ;
The guests are met, the feast is set, —
Mayst hear the merry din."
He holds him with his skinny hand :
" There was a ship," quoth he.
" Hold off ! unhand me, gray beard
loon ! " —
Eftsoons his hand dropt he.
The Wed-
ding-Guest
is spell¬
bound by
the eye of
the old sea¬
faring man,
and con¬
strained to
bear his
tale.
He holds him with his glittering eye, —
The Wedding-Guest stood still ;
He listens like a three years' child ;
The Mariner hath his wUl.
The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone, —
He cannot choose but hear ;
And thus spake on that ancient man.
The bright-eyed Mariner :
" The ship was cheered, the harbor
cleared ;
Merrily did we drop
Below the kirk, below the hUl,
Below the light-house top.
The sun came up upon the left.
Out of the sea came he ;
And he shone bright, and on the right
Went down into the sea ;
Higher and higher every day.
Till over the mast at noon — "
TheWedding-Guest here beat his breast.
For he heard the loud bassoon.
The Wed. The Bnde hath paced into the hall—
ding-Guest ,
hearetl^ ^ ^ ® '
music ; but Nodding their heads before her goes
couthîunh" The merry minstrelsy.
hi& tale.
The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast.
Yet he cannot choose but hear ;
And thus spake on that ancient man.
The bright-eyed Mariner :
The ship "And now the Storm-blast came, and he
drawn by a '
"°'d'the tjnrannous and strong ;
south pole. He struck with his o'ertaking wings.
And chased us south along.
The Mari¬
ner tells
how the
ship sailed
soutliward,
with a good
wind and
fair weather,
till it
reached the
line.
With sloping masts and dipping prow—
As who pursued with yell and blow
Still treads the shadow of his foe.
And forward bends his head —
The ship drove fast ; loud roared the
blast.
And southward aye we fled.
And now there came both mist and snow.
And it grew wondrous cold ;
And ice, mast-high, came floating by.
As green as emerald.
And through the drifts the snowy cliffs T""® '»nä oi
■TN. . 1 , - . , ice and of
Did send a dismal sheen ; fearful
Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken — where no
The ice was all between. w^fo'bè"'
seen.
The ice was here, the ice was there.
The ice was all around ;
It cracked and growled, and roared and
howled.
Like noises in a swound !
Tin a great
sea-bird,
called the
Albatross,
Came
through
the snow-
fog, and was
received
with great
joy and hos¬
pitality.
And to ! the
Albatross
Eroveth a
ird of good
omen, and
foiloweth
the ship as it
returned
northward
through fog
and floating
ice.
At length did cross an Albatross —
Thorough the fog it came ;
As if it had been a Christian soul.
We hailed it in God's name.
It ate the food it ne'er had eat.
And round and round it flew.
The ice did split with a thunder-fit ;
The helmsman steered us through !
And a good south wind sprung up be¬
hind ;
The -Albatross did follow.
And every day, for food or play.
Came to the mariners' hoUo !
In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud.
It perched for vespers nine ;
Whiles all the night, through fog-smoke
white,
Glimmered the white moonshine."
" God save thee, Ancient Mariner ! The Ancient
From the fiends, that plague thee thus!— hospitably
Why look'st thou so?"—"With my pious bird of
cross-bow gcodonten.
1 shot the Albatross.
PART II.
The Sun now rose upon the right :
Out of the sea came he,
Still hid in mist, and on the left
Went down into the sea.
And the good south wind still blew
behind.
But no sweet bird did follow.
ifr
r
POEMS OF FANCY.
855
-a
Nor any day, for food or play,
Came to the mariners' hollo <
And I had done an hellish thing,
His ship¬
mates
cjit gainst And it would work 'em woe
the Ancient
Mariner, for Fof all aveiTed, I had killed the bird
good That made the breeze to blow.
Ah wretch ! said they, the bird to slay.
That made the breeze to blow !
Bja when NoY dim nor red, like God's own head
cleared off, The clorious Sun uprist :
they justify
the same,
maltÄem- That brought the fog and mist.
«mpHces in'T wasright,said they, suchbirdsto slay,
the Clime. bring the fog and mist.
The fair The fairbreezeblew, the whitefoam flew,
breeze con» « /»
tinues; the The luiTow followed free ;
the^Pacific We were the flrst that ever burst
Eífs'ñónh- Into that silent sea.
ward, even
till it reaches the line.
Then all averred, I had killed the bird
The ship
hath been
suddenly
becalmed}
Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt
down, —
'T was sad as sad could be ;
And we did speak only to break
The silence of the sea.
All in a hot and copper sky
The bloody Sun, at noon.
Right up above the mast did stand.
Day after day, day after day.
We stuck, — nor breath nor motion ;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.
Albatross Water everywhere,
bé aim^ed. boards did shrink ;
Water, water everywhere.
Nor any drop to drink.
The very deep did rot : 0 Christ !
That ever this should be !
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs
Upon the slimy sea !
About, about, in reel and rout.
The death-tires danced at night ;
The water, like a witch's oils.
Burnt green, and blue, and white.
A Spirit
had fol-
And some in dreams assurèd were
OTe'of""" ' Spirit that plagued us so ;
theinvisi-. Nine fathom deep he had followed us
ble inhabit» i i •» íT •
ants cf this From the land of mist and snow.
planet,
neither departed souls nor angels ; concerning whom the learned
Jew losephus, and the Platonic Constantinopohtan, Michael Pselius,
may be consulted. They are very numerous, and there is no cli¬
mate or element without one or more.
And everj' tongue, through utter
drought.
Was withered at the root ;
We could not speak, no more than if
We had been choked with soot.
Ah ! well-a-day ! what evil looks
Had I from old and young !
Instead of the cross the Albatross
About my neck was hung.
PART III.
There passed a weary time. Each
throat
Was parched, and glazed each eye —
A weary time ! a weary time !
How glazed each weary eye ! —
When, looking westward, I beheld,
A something in the sky.
At first it seemed a little speck,
And then it seemed a mist ;
It moved and moved, and took at last
A certain shape, I wist—
A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist !
And still it neared and neared ;
As if it dodged a water-sprite.
It plunged and tacked and veered.
With throats unslaked, with black lips At its near-
, , J er approach
DâlCeCi| h seemeth
We could nor laugh nor wail ; sh^rand at
Through utter drought all dumb wesom"e""
freeth his
leech from
The ship¬
mates, in
their sore
distress,
would fain
throw the
whole guilt
on the An¬
cient Mari¬
ner : in sign
whereof
they hai^
the dead
sea-bird^
round his
neck«
The Ancient
Mariner be-
holdeth a
sign in the
element afar
off.
stood !
I bit my arm, I sucked the blood.
And cried, ' A sail ! a sail ! '
spe<
ttie bonds of
thirst.
With throats unslaked, with black lips
baked.
Agape they heard me call ;
Gramercy ! they for joy did giun,
And all at once their breath drew in, A «ash of
As they were drinking all.
'See ! see ! ' I cried, 'she tacks no more ! And horror
Hither to work us weal — can it be a
Without a breeze, without a tide, comes on-
She steadies with upright keel ! ' ou^tiíS'or
tidef
The western wave was all a-flame ;
The day was well nigh done ;
Almost upon the western wave
Rested the broad bright sun.
When that strange shape drove suddenly
Betwixt us and the Sun.
And straight the Sun was flecked with it secmcth
.. him but the
DS-TS, skeleton of
(Heaven's Mother send us grace ! )
b-
9
fi¬
sse
POEMS OP FANCY.
As if through a dungeon-grate he peered
With broad and burning face.
Alas ! thought I — and my heart beat
loud —
How fast she nears and nears !
Arethose her sails thatglanceinthe sun,
Like restless gossameres ?
are'sMn Ï those her ribs through which the Sun
bars on the
face of the
setting sun.
The spec¬
tre-woman
and her
death-mate,
and no other
on board the skeleton ship.
Did peer, as through a grate ?
And is that woman all her crew ?
Is that a death ? and are there two ?
Is Death that woman's mate ?
Her lips were red, her looks were free,
lUtecr^f'' iocks were yellow as gold ;
Her skin was as white as leprosy :
The night-mare, Life-in-Death, was she.
Who thieks man's blood with cold.
wKî The naked hulk alongside came.
Death have And the twain were casting dice :
diced for the . , "
ship s crew. The game is done. I ve won ! I ve
and she (the , »
latter) win- WOn !
deít'Mari" Quoth she, and whistles thiice.
ner.
No twilight The Sun's rim dips : the stara rush out :
withm the i, 1 1
courts of the At one stride comes the dark ;
With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea.
Off shot the spectre-bark.
At the rising We listened and looked sideways up !
of the Moon, ^ , J c
r ear at my heart, as at a cup ;
My life-blood seemed to sip !
The stars were dim, and thick the night.
The steersman's face by his lamp
gleamed white ;
From the sails the dew did drip —
Till clombe above the eastern bar,
The hornèd Moon, with one bright star
Within the nether tip.
one after
another,
One after one, by the star-dogged Moon,
Too quick for groan or sigh,
Each turned his face with a ghastly pang.
And cursed me with his eye.
his ship- Four times fifty living men
mates drop , , , , , , . ,
down dead. (And I heard nor sigh nor groan).
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump.
They dropped down one by one.
But Life-in- The souls did from their bodies fly, -
Death be- . ■'
gins her They fled to bliss or woe !
work on the . i i y
Ancient And eveiy soul, it passed me by.
Mariner.
Like the whizz of my cross-bow
"I FEAS thee, Ancient Mariner ! ding-&fMt
I fear thy skinny hand ! ''"'fru
And thou art long, and lank, andtJicingta
•1 him ;
brown.
As is the ribbed sea-sand.
I fear thee and thy glittering eye.
And thy skinny hand so brown." —
"Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-
Guest !
This body dropt not down.
but the An¬
cient Mari¬
ner assureth
him of his
bodily life,
and pro-
ceedeth to
relate his
horrible
penance.
He despis-
eth the
creatures of
the calm ;
and'envieth
that they
should live,
and so many
lie dead.
Alone, alone, all, all alone.
Alone on a wide, wide sea !
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.
The many men so beautiful !
And they all dead did lie ;
And a thousand thousand slimy things
Lived on ; and so did I.
I looked upon the rotting sea.
And drew my eyes away ;
I looked upon the rotting deck.
And there the dead men lay.
I looked to heaven, and tried to pray ;
But, or ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.
I closed my lids, and kept them close.
And the halls like pulses beat ;
For the sky and the sea, and the sea
and the sky.
Lay like a load on my weary eye.
And the dead were at my feet.
The cold sweat melted from their limbs, fu¿J''iiveth
Nor rot nor reek did they : the eye of
The look with which they looked on me "1= dead
TV J J
Had never passed away.
An orphan's curse would drag to hell
A spirit from on high ;
But oh ! more horrible than that
Is a curse in a dead man's eye !
Seven days, seven nights, I saw that
curse.
And yet I could not die.
The moving Moon went up the sky, '"neifness
And nowhere did abide : fixed-
ness he
Softly she was soinff up, yeameth
A J i X 1. -J towards the
And a star or two oeside — joumeyine
Moon, ana
the stars that still sojourn, yet still move onward ; and everywhere
the blue sky belongfs to them, and is their appointed rest, and their
native country, and their own natural homes, which they enter
unannounced, as lords that are certainly expected, and yet there
is a silent Joy at their arrival.
--ff.
&
POEMS OP FANCÏ.
857
■a
Her beams bemocked the sultry main.
Like April hoar-frost spread ;
But where the ship's huge shadow lay
The charmèd water burnt alway,
A still and awful red.
STïiiè'iifêon shadow of the ship
he^^tjofd- I watched the water-snakes ,
creatures of They moved in tracks of shining white ;
caji^ And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.
Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire —
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam ; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
■ ^ ^^PPy tongue
happiness. Their beauty might declare ;
A spring of love gushed from my heart.
He biesseth J blessed them unaware —
them m his
heart Sure my kind saint took pity on me.
And I blessed them unaware.
The spell The selfsame moment I could pray :
begins to , - far
break. And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.
PART y.
0 SLEEP ! it is a gentle thing.
Beloved from pole to pole !
To Mary Queen the praise be given !
She sent the gentle sleep from heaven
That slid into tny soul.
rtieSy° ®^''y buckets on the deck.
Mother, the That had so long remained.
Ancient " '
MtóneHs I dreamt that they were filled with dew ;
with rain. And when I awoke, it rained.
My lips were wet, my throat was eold.
My garments all were dank ;
Sure I had drunken in my dreams.
And still my body drank.
1 moved, and could not feel my limbs ;
I was so light — almost
I thought that I had died in sleep.
And was a blessèd ghost.
He heareth And soon I heard a roaring wind —
soun^and come anear ;
Strange
sights and
in the sky"" That Were so thin and sere.
and the elC'
ment, upper air burst into life ;
But with its sound it shook the sails.
And a hundred fire-flags sheen.
To and fro they were hurried about ;
And to and fro, and in and out.
The wan stars danced between.
And the coming wind did roarmoreloud.
And the sails did sigh like sedge ;
And the rain poured down from one
black cloud —
The Moon was at its edge.
The thick black cloud was cleft, and
still
The Moon was at its side ;
Like waters shot from some high crag.
The lightning fell with never a jag —
A river steep and wide.
The loud wind never reached the ship,
Yet now the ship moved on ! crew are m-
^ Spired, and
Beneath the lightning and the Moon the
The dead men gave a groan.
he ship
moves on ;
They groaned, they stirred, they all
uprose —
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes ;
It had been strange, even in a dream.
To have seen those dead men rise.
The helmsman steered, the ship moved
on ;
Yet never a breeze up blew ;
The mariners all 'gan work the ropes.
Where they were wont to do ;
They raised their limbs like lifeless
tools —
We were a ghastly crew.
The Body of my brother's son
Stood by me, knee to knee :
The Body and I pulled at one rope.
But he said naught to me."
" I fear thee. Ancient Mariner ! "
"Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest !
'T was not those souls that fled in pain.
Which to their corses came again.
But a troop of spirits blest :
For when it dawned—they dropped
their arms.
And clustered round the mast ;
Sweet sounds rose slowly through their
mouths.
And from their bodies passed.
Around, around, flew each sweet sound.
Then darted to the Sun ;
Slowly the sounds came back again.
Now mixed, now one by one.
but not by
the souls of
the men, nor
by dcemons
of earth or
middle air,
but by a
blessed
troop of
angelic spir*
its, sent
down by the
invocation
of the guar¬
dian saint.
-51
e-
858
POEMS OF FANCY.
The lone¬
some spirit
from the
south pole
carries on
the ship as
far as the
Gne, in obe>
dienceto the
angelic
troop, but
still requlr*
eth ven¬
geance.
The Polar
Spirit's fel¬
low-dae¬
mons, the
invisible in¬
habitants of
the element,
take part in
his wrong ;
and two of
them relate,
one to the
other, that
penance
longand
heavy for
the Ancient
Mariner hath
beenaccord-
ed to the
Polar Spirit,
who return-
eth south¬
ward.
Sometimes a-dropping from the sky,
I heard the skylark sing ;
Sometimes all little birds that are,
How they seemed to fill the sea and air
With their sweet jargoning !
And now't was like all instruments.
Now like a lonely ñute ;
And now it is an angel's song
That makes the heavens be mute.
It ceased ; yet still the sails made on
A plea.sant noise till noon,
A noise like of a hidden brook
In the leafy month of June,
That to the sleeping woods all night
Singeth a quiet tune.
Till noon we quietly sailed on.
Yet never a breeze did breathe :
Slowly and smoothly went the ship.
Moved onward from beneath.
Under the keel nine fathom deep.
From the land of mist and snow.
The Spirit slid : and it was he
That made the ship to go.
The sails at noon left oflf their tune.
And the ship stood still also.
The Sun, right up above the mast,
Had fixed her to the ocean :
But in a minute she 'gan stir.
With a short uneasy motion —
Backwards and forwards half her length
With a short uneasy motion.
Then like a pawing horse let go.
She made a sudden bound :
It flung the blood into my head
And I fell down in a swound.
How long in that same fit I lay,
I have not to declare ;
But ere my living life returned,
T heard, and in my soul discerned
Two voices in the air.
' Is it he ? ' quoth one, ' Is this the man?
By Him who died on cross.
With his cruel how he laid fuU low
The harmless Albatross !
The Spirit who bideth by himself
In the land of mist and snow.
He loved the bird that loved the man
Who shot him with his how.'
The other was a softer voice.
As soft as honey-dew :
Quoth he, ' The man hath penance done.
And penance more will do.'
part vi.
FIRST VOICE-
' But tell me, tell me ! speak again.
Thy soft response renewing —
What makes that ship drive on so fast ?
What is the ocean doing ? '
SECOND VOICE.
' Still as a slave before hia lord.
The ocean hath no blast ;
His great bright eye most silently
Up to the Moon is cast —
If he may know which way to go ;
For she guides him smooth or grim.
See, brother, see ! how graciously
She looketh down on him.'
FIRST VOICE.
' But why drives on that ship so fast,
Without or wave or wind ? '
SECOND VOICE.
' The air is cut away before.
And closes from behind.
Fly,brother, fly ! more high, more high!
Or we shall be belated ;
For slow and slow that ship will go.
When the Mariner's trance is abated.'
TheMariner
hath been
cast into a
trance ; for
the angelic
power caus-
eth the ves¬
sel to drive
northward
faster than
human life
could en¬
dure.
I woke, and we were sailing on
As in a gentle weather ;
The super¬
natural mo¬
tion is re¬
tarded : the
T was night, calm night — the moon Manner
. ^ . awaJceSf and
was high ; Ws penance
The dead men stood together. anew.
All stood together on the deck,
For a chamel-dungeon fitter ;
All fixed on me their stony eyes.
That in the Moon did glitter.
The pang, the curse, with which they
died.
Had never passed away ;
1 could not draw my eyes from theirs,
Nor turn them up to pray.
And now this spell was snapt; once more
I viewed the ocean green, "«i-
And looked far forth, yet little saw
Of what had else been seen —
Like one that on a lonesome road
Doth walk in fear and dread.
f
POEMS OF FANCY.
859
And, having once turned round, walks
on.
And turns no more his head ;
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.
But soon there breathed a wind on me.
Nor sound nor motion made ;
Its path was not upon the sea.
In ripple or in shade.
It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek.
Like a meadow-gale of Spring—
It mingled strangely with my fears.
Yet it felt like a welcoming.
Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship.
Yet she sailed softly too ;
Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze —
On me alone it blew.
0 dream of joy ! is this indeed
And the An. The light-house top I see ?
cient Man- , i i.,
ner behold- Is this the hill ? IS this the kirk ?
eth his na- - ., . . x n
dve country. Is this mine owu countrec ?
We drifted o'er the harbor-bar.
And I with sobs did pray —
0 let me be awake, my God !
Or let me sleep alway.
The harbor-bay was clear as glass.
So smoothly it was strewn I
And on the bay the moonlight lay.
And the shadow of the moon.
The rock shone bright, the kirk no less
That stands above the rock ;
The moonlight steeped in silentness
The steady weathercock.
And the bay was white with silent light,
Till rising from the same.
The angelic FuH many shapes, that shadows were,
spirits leave i
the dead In crimson colors came.
bodies,
and appear A little distance from the prow
in their own . , , *
fpnns of Those cnmson shadows were :
1 turned my eyes upon the deck —
0 Christ ! what saw I there !
Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat.
And, by the holy rood !
A man all light, a seraph man.
On every corse there stood.
This seraph-band, each waved his hand :
It was a heavenly sight !
They stood as signals to the land,
Each one a lovely light ;
This seraph-band, each waved his hand,
No voice did they impart —
No voice ; but oh ! the silence sank
Like music on my heart.
But soon I heard the dash of oars,
I heard the pilot's cheer ;
My head was turned perforce away.
And I saw a boat appear.
The pilot and the pilot's boy,
1 heard them coming fast :
Dear Lord in Heaven ! it was a joy
The dead men could not blast.
I saw a third — I heard his voice :
It is the hermit good !
He singeth loud his godly hymns
That he makes in the wood.
He '11 shrieve my soul, he '11 wash away
The Albatross's blood.
PART VII.
This hermit good lives in that wood
Which slopes down to the sea.
How loudly his sweet voice he rears !
He loves to talk with marineres
That come from a far countree.
He kneels at mom, and noon, and eve—
He hath a cushion plump :
It is the moss that wholly hides
The rotted old oak-stump.
The skiff-boat neared : I heard them
talk,
' Why, this is strange, I trow !
Where are those lights so many and fair.
That signal made but now ? '
The hermit
of the wood
' strange, by my faith ! ' the hermit approach-
eth the ship
said — with won-
' And they answered not our cheer !
The planks look'd warped ! and see
those sails
How thin they are and sere !
I never saw aught like to them.
Unless perchance it were
Brown skeletons of leaves that lag
My forest-brook along ;
When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow.
-51
•m-
860
POEMS OF FANCY.
The ship
suddenly
sinketh.
And the owlet whoops to the wolf below,
That eats the she-wolfs young.'
' Dear Lord ! it hath a fiendish look
(The pilot made reply) —
I am a-feared.'— ' Push on, push on ! '
Said the hermit cheerily.
The boat came closer to the ship.
But I nor spake nor stirred ;
The boat came close beneath the ship.
And straight a sound was heard.
Under the water it rumbled on.
Still louder and more dread :
It reached the ship, it split the bay ;
The ship went down like lead.
The Andent Stunned by that loud and dreadful
Mariner is «
saved in the S0UI1(1|
pilots boat, ocean smote,
Like one that hath been seven days
drowned
My body lay afioat ;
But swift as dreams, myself I found
Within the pilot's boat.
Upon the whirl where sank the ship
The boat span roimd and round ;
And all was still, save that the hill
Was telling of the sound.
I moved my lips — the pilot shrieked
And fell down in a fit ;
The holy hermit raised his eyes,
And prayed where he did sit.
1 took the oars ; the pilot's boy,
Who now doth crazy go.
Laughed loud and long ; and all the while
His eyes went to and fro :
* Ha ! ha ! ' quoth he, ' full plain I see.
The Devil knows how to row.'
And now, all in my own countree,
I stood on the firm land !
The hermit stepped forth from the boat,
And scarcely he could stand.
me, shrieve me, holy
The Ancient ' 0 shlieve
Mariner ear- ,
nestly en- man ! —
hermit to The hermit crossed his brow :
Ind'hepCT-' ' Say quick,' quoth he, ' I bid thee
anceoflife
falls on Hitn So-j
What manner of man art thou ? '
Forthwith this frame
wrenched
With a woful agony.
of mine was
AVhich forced me to begin my tale -
And then it left me free.
Since then, at an uncertain hour.
That agony returns ;
And till my ghastly tale is told
This heart within me bums.
I pass, like night, from land to land •,
I have strange power of speech ;
That moment that his face I see
I know the man that must hear me—
To him my tale I teach.
What loud uproar bursts from that
door !
The wedding-guests are there ;
But in the garden-bower the Brida
And bride-maids singing are ;
And hark the little vesper bell.
Which biddeth me to prayer !
0 Wedding-Guest ! this soul hath been
Alone on a wide, wide sea—
So lonely't was, that God himself
Scarce seemed there to be.
0 sweeter than the marriage-feast;
'T is sweeter far to me.
To walk together to the kirk
With a goodly company ! —
To walk together to the kirk.
And all together pray.
While each to his great Father bends —
Old men, and babes, and loving friends.
And youths and maidens gay 1
And ever
end anon
throug^hout
his future
life an agony
constrain-
eth him to
travel from
land to land .2
and to teach
by his own
example,
love and
reverence to
all things,
that God
made and
loveth.
Farewell ! farewell 1 but this I tell
To thee, thou Wedding-Guest !
He prayeth well who loveth well
Both man and bird and beast.
He prayeth best who loveth best
All things both great and small ;
For the dear God who loveth us.
He made and loveth all."
The Mariner, whose eye is bright,
Wliose beard with age is hoar,
Is gone. And now the Wedding-Guest
Turned from the Bridegroom's door.
He went like one that hath been
stunned.
And is of sense forlorn ;
A sadder and a wiser man
He rose the morrow morn.
Samuel Taylor colerroce.
POEMS OF FANCY.
861 ;
ALONZO THE BRAVE AND THE PAIR
IMOGINE.
A WARRIOR SO bold, and a virgin so bright,
Conversed as they sat on the green ;
They gazed on each other with tender delight :
Alonzo the Brave was the name of the knight, —
The maiden's, the Fair Imogine.
" And O," said the youth, " since to-morrow I go
To fight in a far distant land.
Your tears for my absence soon ceasing to flow.
Some other will court you, and you will bestow
On a wealthier suitor your hand ! "
"0, hush these suspicions," Fair Imogine said,
" Offensive to love and to me ;
For, if you be living, or if you be dead,
I swear by the Virgin that none in your stead
Shall husband of Imogine be.
" If e'er I, by lust or by wealth led aside.
Forget my Alonzo the Brave,
God grant that, to punish my falsehood and pride.
Your ghost at the marriage may sit by my side.
May tax me with perjury, claim me as bride.
And bear me away to the grave ! "
To Palestine hastened the hero so bold,
His love she lamented him sore ;
But scarce had a twelvemonth elapsed when, be¬
hold !
A baron, all covered with jewels and gold,
Ai rived at Fan- Imogine's door.
His treasures, his presents, his spacious domain,
Soon made her untrue to her vows ;
He dazzled her eyes, he bewildered her brain ;
He caught her affections, so light and so vain.
And carried her home as his spouse.
And now had the marriage been blest by the
priest ;
The revelry now was begun ;
The tables they groaned with the weight of the
feast.
Nor yet had the laughter and merriment ceased,
When the bell at the castle tolled — one.
Then first with amazement Fair Imogine found
A stranger was placed by her side :
His air was terrific ; he uttered no sound, —
He spake not, he moved not, he looked not
around, —
But earnestly gazed on the bride.
His visor was closed, and gigantic his height.
His armor was sable to view ;
Ail pleasure and laughter were hushed at his
sight ;
The dogs, as they eyed him, drew back in affright;
The lights in the chamber burned blue !
His presence all bosoms appeared to dismay ;
The guests sat in silence and fear ;
At length spake the bride, — while she trembled,
— " I pray,
Sir knight, that your helmet aside you would lay.
And deign to partake of our cheer."
The lady is silent ; the stranger complies —
His visor he slowly unclosed ;
0 God I what a sight met Fair Imogine's eyes !
What words can express her dismay and surprise.
When a skeleton's head was exposed !
All present then uttered a terrified shout.
All turned with disgust from the scene ;
The worms they crept in, and the worms they
crept out.
And sported his eyes and his temples about.
While the spectre addressed Imogine :
"Behold me, thou false one, behold me!" he
cried,
" Remember Alonzo the Brave I
God grants that, to punish thy falsehood and pride.
My ghost at thy marriage should sit by thy side ;
Should tax thee with perjury, claim thee as bride.
And bear thee away to the grave ! "
Thus saying his arms round the lady he wound,
Whüe loudly she shrieked in dismay ;
Then sunk with his prey through the wide-
yawning ground.
Nor ever again was Fair Imogine found.
Or the spectre that bore her away.
Not long lived the baron ; and none, since that
time.
To inhabit the castle presume ;
For chronicles tell that, by order .sublime.
There Imogine suffers the pain of her crime.
And mourns her deplorable doom.
At midnight, four times in each year, does her
sprite.
When mortals in slumber are bound,
Arrayed in her bridal apparel of white.
Appear in the hall with the skeleton knight.
And shriek as he whirls her around I
While they drink out of skulls newly torn from
the grave.
Dancing round them the spectres are seen ;
Their liquor is blood, and this horrible stave
They howl : " To the health of Alonzo the Brave,
And his consort, the Fair Imogine ! "
Matthew Gregory l.Ewia
e
862
POEMS OF FANCY.
THE KING OF THÜLE.
UARGAKErs SONG IN "FAUST."
There was a king in Thüle,
Was faithful till the grave, —
To whom his mistress, dying,
A golden goblet gave.
Naught was to him more precious ;
He drained it at every bout :
His eyes with tears ran over,
As oft as he drank thereout.
When came his time of dying,
The towns in his land he told,
Naught else to his heir denying
Except the goblet of gold.
He sat at the royal banquet
With his knights of high degree.
In the lofty hall of his fathers.
In the Castle by the Sea-
There stood the old carouser,
And drank the last life-glow ;
And hurled the hallowed goblet
Into the tide below.
He saw it plunging and filling,
And sinking deep in the sea, —
Then fell his eyelids forever.
And never more drank he.
From the German of Goethe. Trans-
lation of Bavard Taylor.
THE PHILOSOPHER'S SCALES.
A MONK, when bis rites sacerdotal were o'er.
In the depth of his cell with its stone-covered
floor.
Resigning to thought his chimerical brain.
Once formed the contrivance we nowshall explain;
But whether by magic's or alchemy's powers
We know not ; indeed, 't is no business of ours.
Perhaps it was only by patience and care.
At last, that he brought his invention to bear.
In youth't was projected, but years stole away.
And ere 'twas complete he was wrinkled and
gray;
But success is secure, unless energy fails ;
And at length he produced the Philosopher's
Scales.
" What were they ? '' you ask. You shall pres¬
ently see ;
These scales were not made to weigh sugar and tea.
[fe
O no ; for such properties wondrous had they,
That qualities, feelings, and thoughts they could
weigh.
Together with articles small or immense.
From mountains or planets to atoms of sense.
Naught was there so bulky but there it would lay.
And naught so ethereal but there it would stay.
And naught so reluctant but in it must go :
AU which some examples more clearly wiU show.
The first thing he weighed was the head of Vol¬
taire,
Which retained all the wit that had ever been
there ;
As a weight, he threw in the torn scrap of a leaf
Containing the prayer of the penitent thief ;
When the skull rose aloft with so sudden a spell
That it bounced like a ball on the roof of the cell.
One time he put in Alexander the Great,
With the garment that Dorcas had made, for a
weight ;
And though clad in armor from sandals to crown.
The hero rose up, and the garment went down.
A long row of almshouses, amply endowed
By a well-esteemed Pharisee, busy and proud.
Next loaded one scale ; while the other was
pressed
By those mites the poor widow dropped into the
chest :
Up flew the endowment, not weighing an ounce.
And down, down the farthing-worth came with
a bounce.
By further experiments (no matter how)
He found that ten chariots weighed less than one
plough ;
A sword with gilt trapping rose up in the scale.
Though balanced by only a ten-penny nail ;
A shield and a helmet, a buckler and spear.
Weighed less than a widow's uncrystallized tear.
A lord and a lady went up at full sail,
When a bee chanced to light on the opposite
scale ;
Ten doctors, ten lawyers, two courtiers, one earl.
Ten counsellors' wigs, full of powder and curl,
AU heaped in one balance and swinging from
thence.
Weighed less than a few grains of candor and
sense ;
A first-water diamond, with brilUants begirt.
Than one good potato just washed from the dirt ;
Yet not mountains of sUver and gold could suffice
One pearl to outweigh, — 't was the pearl of
great price.
POEMS OF FANCY.
863
Last of all, the whole world was bowled in at the
grate,
With the soul of a beggar to serve for a weight,
When the former sprang up with so strong a re-
huff
That it made a vast rent and escaped at the roof !
When balanced in air, it ascended on high.
And sailed up aloft, a balloon in the sky ;
While the scale with the soul in't so mightily
fell
That it jerked the philosopher out of his cell.
Jane Taylor.
♦
THE NIGHTINGALE AND GLOW-WORM.
A NIGHTINGALE, that all day long
Had cheered the village with his song,
Nor yet at eve his note suspended.
Nor yet when eventide was ended.
Began to feel — as well he might —
The keen demands of appetite
When, looking eagerly around.
He spied, far off, upon the ground,
A something shining in the dark,
And knew the glow-worm by his spark ;
So, stooping down from hawthorn top.
He thought to put him in his crop.
The worm, aware of his intent.
Harangued him thus, quite eloquent, —
"Did you admire my lamp," quoth he,
" As much as I your minstrelsy,
You would abhor to do me wrong,
As much as I to spoil your song ;
For't was the self-same Power divine
Taught you to sing, and me to shine ;
That you with music, I with light.
Might beautify and cheer the night. "
The songster heard his short oration.
And, warbling out his approbation.
Released him, as my story tells.
And found a supper somewhere else.
William Cowper.
THE PETRIFIED FERN.
In a valley, centuries ago.
Grew a little fem-leaf, green and slender,
Veiniug delicate and fibres tender ;
Waving when the wind crept down so low.
Rushes tall, and moss, and gi'ass grew round it.
Playful sunbeams darted in and found it.
Drops of dew stole in by night, and crowned it.
But no foot of man e'er trod that way ;
Earth was young, and keeping holiday.
Monster fishes swam the silent main.
Stately forests waved their giant branches.
Mountains hurled their snowy avalanches.
Mammoth creatures stalked across the plain ;
Nature revelled in grand mysteries,
But the little fern was not of these, •
Did not number with the hills and trees ;
Only grew and waved its wild sweet way,
No one came to note it day by day.
Earth, one time, put on a frolic mood.
Heaved the rocks and changed the mighty
motion
Of the deep, strong currents of the ocean ;
Moved the plain and shook the haughty wood.
Crushed the little fern in soft moist clay, —
Covered it, and hid it safe away.
0, the long, long centuries since that day 1
0, the changes ! 0, life's bitter cost,
Since that useless little fern was lost I
Useless ? Lost ? There came a thoughtful man
Searching Nature's secrets, far and deep ;
From a fissure in a rocky steep
He withdrew a stone, o'er which there ran
Fairy pencillings, a quaint design,
Veinings, leafage, fibres clear and fine.
And the fern's life lay in every line !
So, I think, God hides some souls away.
Sweetly to surprise us, the last day.
Mary l. Bolles Branch.
THE COMET.
october, 1858.
Erratic Soul of some great Purpose, doomed
To track the wild illimitable space.
Till sure propitiation has been made
For the divine commission unperformed !
What was thy crime ? Ahasuerus' curse
Were not more stem on earth than thine in
heaven !
Art thou the Spirit of some Angel World,
For grave rebellion banished from thy peers.
Compelled to watch the calm, immortal stars
Circling ill rapture the celestial void.
While the avenger follows in thy train
To spur thee on to wretchedness eteme ?
Or one of Nature's wildest fantasies.
From which she files In terror so profound.
And with such whirl of torment in her breast.
That mighty earthquakes yawn where'er she
treads ;
While War makes red its terrible right hand.
And Famine stalks abroad all lean and wan ?
864
POEMS OF FANCY.
To us thou art as exquisitely fair
As the ideal visions of the seer,
Or gentlest fancy that e'er floated down
Imagination's bright, unruffled stream.
Wedding the thought that was too deep for words
To the low breathings of inspirèd song.
When the stars sang together o'er the birth
Of the poor Babe at Bethlehem, that lay
In the coarse manger at the crowded Inn,
Didst thou, perhaps a bright exalted star.
Refuse to swell the grand, harmonious lay.
Jealous as Herod of the birth divine ?
Or when the crown of thorns on Calvary
Pierced the Redeemer's brow, didst thou disdain
To weep, when all the planetary worlds
Were blinded by the fulness of their teaia ?
E'en to the flaming sun, that hid his face
At the loud cry, " Lama Sabachthani ! "
No rest! No rest! the very damned have that
In the dark councils of remotest Hell,
Where the dread scheme was perfected that sealed
Thy disobedience and accruing doom.
Like Adam's sons, hast thou, too, forfeited
The blest repose that never pillowed Sin ?
No ! none can tell thy fate, thou wandering
Sphinx !
Pale Science, searching by the midnight lamp
Through the vexed mazes of the human brain.
Still fails to read the secret of its soul
As the superb enigma flashes by,
A loosed Prometheus burning with disdain.
charles sangster.
SONG OF THE LIGHTNING.
" Puck. I '11 put a girdle round about the earth
In forty minutes."
Midsummev's Night Dream*
Away ! away ! through the sightless air
Sti'etch forth your iron thread I
For I would not dim my sandals fair
With the dust ye tamely tread !
Ay, rear it up on its million piers.
Let it circle the world around.
And the journey ye make in a hundi'ed years
I 'II clear at a single bound !
Though I cannot toil, like the groaning slave
Ye have fettered with iron skill
To feriy you over the boundless wave.
Or gi'iud in the noisy mill.
Let him sing his giant strength and speed I
Why, a single shaft of mine
Would give that monster a flight indeed, —
To the depths of the ocean's brine 1
No ! no ! I'm the spirit of light and love I
To my unseen hand't is given
To pencil the ambient clouds above
And polish the stars of heaven !
I scatter the golden rays of ñre
On the horizon far below.
And deck the sky where storms expire
With my red and dazzling glow.
With a glance I cleave the sky in twain ;
I light it with a glare.
When fall the boding drops of rain
Through the darkly curtained air !
The rock-built towers, the turrets gray.
The piles of a thousand years.
Have not the strength of potter's clay
Beneath my glittering spears.
From the Alps' or the Andes' highest crag,
From the peaks of eternal snow,
The blazing folds of my fiery flag
Illume the world below.
The earthquake heralds my coming power.
The avalanche bounds away.
And howling storms at midnight's hour
Proclaim my kingly sway.
Ye tremble when my legions come, —
When my quivering sword leaps out
O'er the hills that echo my thunder down.
And rend with my joyous shout.
Ye quail on the land, or upon the sea
Ye stand in your fear aghast.
To see me bum the stalworth trees.
Or shiver the stately mast.
The hieroglyphs on the Persian wall, —
The letters of high command, —
Where the prophet read the tyrant's fall.
Were traced by my burning hand.
And oft in fire have I wrote since then
What angry Heaven decreed ;
But the sealëd eyes of sinful men
Were all too blind to read.
At length the hour of light is here.
And kings no more shall bind.
Nor bigots cmsh with craven fear
The forward march of mind.
The words of Truth and Freedom's rays
Are from my pinions hurled ;
And soon the light of better days
Shall rise upon the world.
george w. cotter.
I&
■Ö
POEMS OP FANCY.
865
ORIGIN OF THE OPAL.
A DBW.DROP came, with a spark of flame
He bad caught from the sun's last ray,
To a violet's breast, where he lay at rest
Till the hours brought back the day.
The rose looked down, with a blush and frown ;
But she smiled all at once, to view
Her own bright form, with its coloring warm,
Reflected back by the dew.
Then the stranger took a stolen look
At the sky, so soft and blue ;
And a leaflet green, with its silver sheen,
Was seen by the idler too.
A cold north-wind, as he thus reclined.
Of a sudden raged around ;
And a maiden fair, who was walking there.
Next morning, an opal found.
Anonyhous.
THE ORIGIN OF THE HARP.
'T IS believed that this harp, which 1 wake now
for thee.
Was a Siren of old, who sung under the sea ;
And who often, at eve, through the bright billow
roved.
To meet, on the green shore, a youth whom she
loved.
Bnt she loved him in vain, for he left her to
weep.
And in tears, all the night, her gold ringlets to
steep.
Till Heaven looked with pity on true-love so
warm.
And changed to this soft harp the sea-maiden's
form.
Still her bosom rose fair — still her cheek smiled
the same —
While her sea-beauties gracefully curled round
the frame ;
And her hair, shedding tear-drops from all its
bright rings.
Fell o'er her white arm, to make the gold strings !
Hence it came, that this soft harp so long hath
been known
To mingle love's language with sorrow's sad tone ;
Till thou didst divide them, and teach the fond
lay
To be love when I'm near thee, and grief when
away !
Thomas Moorb.
—
ECHO AND SILENCE.*
Iii eddying course when leaves began to fly.
And Autumn in her lap the store to strew.
As mid wild scenes 1 chanced the Muse to woo.
Through glens untrod, and woods that frowned
on high.
Two sleeping nymphs with wonder mute 1 spy !
And, lo, she's gone ! — In robe of dark-green hue,
'T was Echo from her sister Silence flew.
For quick the hunter's hom resounded to the sky !
In shade affrighted Silence melts away.
Not so her sister. Hark ! for onward still,
With far-heard step, she takes her listening way.
Bounding from rock to rock, and hiU to hill.
Ah, mark the merry maid in mockful play
With thousand mimic tones the laughing forest
fiUI
am Samuel Ecbrton brvdgb&
A MUSICAL INSTRUMENT.
What was he doing, the great god Pan,
Down in the reeds by the river ?
Spreading ruin and scattering ban.
Splashing and paddling with hoofs of a goat.
And breaking the golden lilies afloat
With the dragon-fly on the river ?
He tore out a reed, the great god Pan,
From the deep, cool bed of the river.
The limpid water turbidly ran.
And the broken lilies a-dying lay.
And the dragon-fly had fled away.
Ere he brought it out of the river.
High on the shore sat the great god Pan,
While turbidly flowed the river.
And hacked and hewed as a great god can
With his hard, bleak steel at the patient reed,
Till there was not a sign of a leaf indeed
To prove it fresh from the river.
He cut it short, did the great god Pan,
(How tall it stood in the river !)
Then drew the pith like the heart of a man,
Steadily from the outside ring.
Then notched the poor dry empty thing
In holes, as he sate by the river.
" This is the way," laughed the great god Pan,
(Laughed while he sate by the river !)
" The only way since gods began
To make sweet music, they could succeed."
Then dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed.
He blew in power by the river.
♦ Declared by Wordsworth to be the best Sonnet in the English
^guagc.
866
POEMS OF FANCY.
Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan,
Piercing sweet by the river !
Blinding sweet, O great god Pan !
The sun on the hill forgot to die.
And the lilies revived, and the dragon-fly
Came back to dream on the river.
Yet half a beast is the great god Pan,
To laugh, as he sits by the river,
Making a poet out of a man.
The true gods sigh for the cost and the pain, —
For the reed that grows nevermore again
As a reed with the reeds of the river.
Elizabeth Barkett Browking.
♦
THE CALIPH AND SATAN.
VERSIFIED FROM THOLUCKS TRANSLATION OUT OF THE
PERSIAN.
In heavy sleep the Caliph lay.
When some one called, " Arise, and pray ! "
The angry Caliph cried, " Who dare
Bebuke his king for slighted prayer ? "
Then, from the comer of the room,
A voice cut shaiply through the gloom :
" My name is Satan. Eise! obey
Mohammed's law ; awake, and pray ! "
" Thy words are good," the Caliph said,
" But their intent I somewhat dread.
For matters cannot well be woi-se
Than when the thief says, ' Guard your purse ! '
I cannot trust your counsel, friend.
It surely hides some wicked end."
Said Satan, " Near the throne'of God,
In ages past, we devils trod ;
Angels of light, to us't was given
To guide each wandering foot to heaven.
Not wholly lost is that first love,
Nor those pure tastes we knew above.
Beaming across a continent,
The Tartar moves his shifting tent.
But never quite forgets the day
When in his father's arms he lay ;
So we, once bathed in love divine,
Becall the taste of that rich wine.
God's finger rested on my brow, —
That magic touch, I feel it now !
I fell, 't is trae — 0, ask not why.
For still to God I tum my eye.
It was a chance by which I fell,
Another takes me back from hell.
'T was but my envy of mankind.
The envy of a loving mind.
Jealous of men, I could not bear
God's love with this new race to share.
But yet God's tables open stand.
His guests flock in from eveiy land ;
Some kind act toward the race of men
May toss us into heaven again.
A game of chess is all we see, —
And God the player, pieces we.
White, black — queen, pawn, —'t is all the same.
For on both sides he plays the game.
Moved to and fro, from good to ill.
We rise and fall as suits his wül."
The Caliph said, " If this be so,
I know not, but thy guile I know ;
For how can I thy words believe.
When even God thou didst deceive ?
A sea of lies art thou,— our sin
Only a drop that sea within."
" Not so," said Satan, " I serve God,
His angel now, and now his rod.
In tempting I both bless and curse.
Make good men better, bad men worse.
Good coin is mixed with bad, my brother,
I but distinguish one from the other."
" Granted," the Caliph said, "but still
You never tempt to good, but ilL
TeU then the truth, for well I know
You come as my most deadly foe."
Loud laughed the fiend. "You know rue well.
Therefore my purpose I will tell.
If you had missed your prayer, I knew
A swift repentance would ensue ;
And such repentance would have been
A good, outweighing far the sin.
FRAGMENTS.
867
I chose this humbleness divine,
Bome out of fault, should not be thine.
Preferring prayers elate with pride
To sin with penitence allied."
James Freeman Clarke.
AIRY NOTHINGS.
PROM " THE TEMPEST," ACT IV. SC. i.
OüR revels now are ended. These our actors,
As 1 foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air ;
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision.
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself.
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve.
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded.
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made on, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.
SHAKESPEARE.
FRAGMENTS.
Imagination.
Within the soul a faculty abides.
That with interpositions, which would hide
And darken, so can deal that they become
Contingencies of pomp ; and serve to exalt
Her native brightness. As the ample moon.
In the deep stillness of a summer even
Rising behind a thick and lofty grove.
Bums, like an unconsuming fire of light.
In the green trees ; and, kindling on all sides
Their leafy umbrage, turns the dusky veil
Into a substance glorious as her own.
The Excursion, Bookvv. WORDSWORTH.
And, as imagination bodies forth
The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen
Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing
A local habitation and a name.
Midsummer Nigkes Dream, Act \,Sc, x. SHAKESPEARE.
0 for a muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention !
King Henry k, Chorus. shakespeare.
Hark, his hands the lyre explore !
Bright-eyed Fancy, hovering o'er.
Scatters from her pictured urn
Thoughts that breathe and words that bum.
Progress oj Poesy. t. gray.
Conception and Execution.
We figure to ourselves
The thing we like, and then we build it up
As chance will have it, on the rock or sand ;
For thought is tired of wandering o'er the world.
And home-bound Fancy runs her hark ashore.
Philip Van Artevelde, Part I, ActuSc» ^ SIR H, taylor.
Of its own beauty is the mind diseased.
And fevers into false creation : — where,
Where are the forms the sculptor's soul hath
seized ?
In him alone. Can Nature show so fair ?
Where are the charms and virtues which we
dare
Conceive in boyhood and pursue as men.
The unreached Paradise of our despair.
Which o'er-inforins the pencil and the pen.
And overpowers the page where it would bloom
again ?
Childe Harold, Cant. It. Byron.
Cloud-Visions.
A step,
A single step, that freed me from the skirts
Of the blind vapor, opened to my view
Glory beyond all glory ever seen
By waking sense or by the dreaming soul I
The appearance, instantaneously disclosed.
Was of a mighty city, —boldly say
A wilderness of building, sinking far
And self-withdrawn into a boundless depth.
Far sinking into splendor, — without end !
Fabric it seemed of diamond and of gold.
With alabaster domes, and silver spires,
And blazing terrace upon terrace, high
Uplifted ; here, serene pavilions bright.
In avenues disposed ; there, towers begirt
With battlements that on their restless fronts
Bore stars, — illumination of all gems !
The Excursion, Book ii, WORDSWORTH.
The Mind's Eye.
Hamlet. My father, — methinks I see my
father.
Horatio. 0 ! where, my lord !
Ham. In my mind's eye, Horatio.
Hamlet, Acti. Sc. a. shakespeare.
On man, on nature, and on human life.
Musing in solitude, I oft perceive
Fair trains of imagery before me rise.
Accompanied by feelings of delight.
Pure, or with no unpleasing sadness mixed.
The Exatrsion: Prelude. WORDSWORTH.
0-
868
POEMS OF FANCY.
But 0, what solemn scenes on Snowdon's height
Descending slow their glittering skirts unroll ?
Visions of glory, spare my aching sight !
Ye unborn ages, crowd not on my soul !
The Bard. T. GRAY.
Spirits.
Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth
Unseen, both when we wake, and when we sleep.
Paradise Lost^ Book iv. MILTON.
Spirits when they please
Can either sex assume, or both.
Can execute their airy purposes.
And works of love or enmity fulfil.
Paradise Lost» Book ir MiLTON.
"Worse
Than fables yet have feigned, or fear conceived,
Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimseras dire.
Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON.
'T is the djinns' wild-streaming swarm
"Whistling in their tempest-flight ;
Snap the tall yews 'neath the storm.
Like a pine-flame crackling bright ;
Swift and heavy, low, their crowd
Through the heavens rushing loud ! —
Like a lurid thunder-cloud
With its bolt of fiery night !
The Djinnsm Trans, o^ J. L. O'SULLIVAN. V.HUGO.
But shapes that come not at an earthly call
Will not depart when mortal voices bid ;
Lords of the visionary eye, whose lid,
Once raised, remains aghast, and will not fall !
Dion. Wordsworth.
Ghosts of the Dead.
Macbeth. Thou canst not say I did it ; never
shake thy gory locks at me.
Ladt Macbeth. O proper stuff !
This is the very painting of your fear ;
This is the air-drawn dagger which, you said.
Led you to Duncan.
Macbeth. Pr'ythee, see there ! behold ! look !
lo ! how say you ?
The times have been,
That, when the brains were out, the man would
die,
And there an end ; but now they rise again.
With twenty mortal murders on their crowns.
And push us from our stools.
Avaunt ! and quit my sight. Let the earth hide
thee !
Thy bones are marrowless, thy blood is cold ;
Thou hast no speculation in those eyes.
Which thou dost glare with !
Hence, horrible shadow !
Unreal mockery, hence !
Macbeth, Act iU. Sc. 4.
SHAKESPEARE.
And then it started, like a guilty thing
Upon a fearful summons. I have heard.
The cock, that is the trumpet to the morn.
Doth with his lofty and shrül-sounding throat
Awake the god of day ; and at his warning.
Whether in sea or fire, in earth or air.
The extravagant and erring spirit hies
To his confine.
Hamlet, Act L Sc. I. SHAKESPEARE.
This is the very coinage of your brain.
Hamlet Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
By the apostle Paul, shadows to-night
Have struck more terror to the soul of Richard
Than can the substance of ten thousand soldiers.
KingRuhardHI., Act.. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Witches.
Banqtjo. What are these.
So withered, and so wild in their attire ;
That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth.
And yet are on't ?
The earth hath bubbles, as the water has.
And these are of them. — Whither have they
vanished ?
Macbeth. Into the air, and what seemed
corporal melted
As breath into the wind.
Macbeth, Acti. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
Show his eyes, and grieve his heart ;
Come like shadows, so depart.
Macbeth, Act iv. Sc. 1. SHAKESPEARE.
Fairies.
They're fairies ! he that speaks to them shall die;
I '11 wink and couch ; no man their sports must
eye.
Merry Wives c/ Windsor, Act v. Sc. s, SHAKESPEARE
This is the fairy land : 0, spite of spites !
We talk with goblins, owls, and elvish sprites.
Comedy of Errors, Actii. Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
FEAGMENTS.
869
I took it for a faery vision
Of some gay creatures of the element.
That in the colors of the rainbow live
And play i' th' plighted clouds.
Comus, Milton.
Ariel. Where the bee sucks, there suck I :
In a cowslip's hell I lie ;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the hat's hack I do fly
After summer, merrily.
Merrily, merrily, shall I live now.
Under the blossom that hangs on the hough.
THeTmfest.Acl-vSc.i. SHAKESPEARE,
Ptjok. How now, spirit, whither wander you ?
Fairy. Over hUl, over dale,
Thorough hush, thorough brier.
Over park, over pale.
Thorough flood, thorough ñre,
I do wander everywhere.
Swifter than the moon's sphere ;
And I serve the fairy queen.
To dew her orbs upon the green :
The eowslips tall her pensioners be ;
In their gold coats spots you see ;
Those he rubies, fairy favors.
In those freckles live their savors :
I must go seek some dewdrops here,
And hang a pearl in every cowslip's ear.
Midsummer Nights Dream, Act ii. Sc* z. SHAKESPEARE.
Fairies use flowers for their charactery.
Merry ¡Vives of ¡Vindsor, Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Water Sprites.
Come unto these yellow sands.
And then take hands ;
Court'sied when you have, and kissed
The wild waves whist.
Foot it featly here and there ;
And, sweet sprites, the burden bear.
Hark, hark !
Bowgh, wowgh.
The watch-dogs bark :
Bowgh, wowgh.
Hark, hark ! I hear
The strain of strutting chanticleer
Cry, Cock-a-doodle-doo.
Full fathom five thy father liee
Of his bones are coral made :
Those are pearls that were his eyes :
Nothing of him that doth fade.
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell :
[Burden] Ding-dong.
Hark ! now I hear them, — Ding-dong, bell.
The Tempest, Act t. Sc* x. SHAKESPEARE;
Sabrina fair.
Listen where thou art sitting.
Under the glassy, cool, translucent wave.
In twisted braids of lilies knitting
The loose train of thy amber-dropping hair.
Listen for dear honor's sake,
Goddess of the silver lake.
Listen and save.
Comus, Milton.
Wood-Nymphs.
Egeria ! sweet creation of some heart
Which found no mortal resting-place so fair
As thine ideal breast ; whate'er thou art
Or wert, — a young Aurora of the air.
The nympholepsy of some fond despair ;
Or, it might be, a beauty of the earth.
Who found a more than eommon votary there
Too much adoring ; whatsoe'er thy birth.
Thou wert a beautiful thought, and softly bodied
forth.
Childs Harold, Cant* iv. BYR9N.
Quite spent and out of breath he reached the
tree.
And, listening fearfully, he heard once more
The low voice murmur " Bhoecus ! " close at hand:
Whereat he looked around him, but could see
Naught but the deepening glooms beneath the
oak.
Then sighed the voice, " 0 Rhœcus ! nevermore
Shalt thou behold me or by day or night.
Me, who would fain have blessed thee with a love
More ripe and bounteous than ever yet
Filled up with nectar any mortal heart ;
But thou didst scorn my humble messenger.
And sent'st him back to me with bruisèd wings.
We spirits only show to gentle eyes.
We ever ask an undivided love.
And he who scorns the least of Nature's works
Is thenceforth exiled and shut out from all.
Farewell ! for thou canst never see me more."
Rhcecus. J. R. Lowbu.
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
POEMS
OF TRAGEDY.
IPHIGENEIA AND AGAMEMNON.
Iphigeneia, when she heard her doom
At Aulis, and when all beside the king
Had gone away, took his right hand, and said :
" 0 father ! I am yormg and very happy.
I do not think the pious Calchas heard
Distinctly what the goddess spake ; old age
Obscures the senses. If my nurse, who knew
My voice so weU, sometimes misunderstood,
While I was resting on her knee both arms.
And hitting it to make her mind my words.
And looking in her face, and she in mine,
Might not he, also, hear one word amiss,
Spoken from so far off, even from Olympus ? "
The father placed his cheek upon her head.
And tears dropt down it ; but the king of men
Replied not. Then the maiden spake once more :
" 0 father ! sayest thou nothing ? Hearest thou
not
Me, whom thou ever hast, until this hour.
Listened to fondly, and awakened me
To hear my voice amid the voice of birds,
When it was inarticulate as theirs.
And the down deadened it within the nest ? '
He moved her gently from him, silent still ;
And this, and this alone, brought tears from her.
Although she saw fate nearer. Then with sighs :
" I thought to have laid down my hair before
Benignant Artemis, and not dimmed
Her polished altar with my virgin blood ;
I thought to have selected the white flowers
To please the nymphs, and, to have asked of each
By name, and with no sorrowful regret.
Whether, since both my parents willed the change,
I might at Hymen's feet bend my dipt brow ;
And (after these who mind us girls the most)
Adore our own Athene, that she would
Regard me mildly with her azure eyes, —
But, father, to see you no more, and see
Your love, 0 father ! go ere I am gone ! "
Gently he moved her off, and drew her back.
Bending his lofty head far over hers ;
And the dark depths of nature heaved and burst.
He turned away, — not far, but silent still.
She now first shuddered ; for in him, so nigh.
So long a silence seemed the approach of death,
And like it. Once again she raised her voice :
" O father ! if the ships are now detained.
And all your vows move not the gods above.
When the knife strikes me there will be one prayer
The less to them ; and purer can there be
Any, or more fervent, than the daughter's prayer
For her dear father's safety and success ? "
A groan that shook him shook not his resolve.
An aged man now entered, and without
One word stepped slowly on, and took the wrist
Of the pale maiden. She looked up, and saw
The fillet of the priest and calm, cold eyes.
Thentumed she where her parent stood, andcried :
" O father ! grieve no more ; the ships can sail."
walter Savage Lanoor.
THE ROMAN FATHER'S SACRIFICE.
from "virginia."
Straightway Virginius led the maid
A little space aside.
To where the reeking shambles stood.
Piled up with horn and hide ;
Close to yon low dark archway.
Where, in a crimson flood.
Leaps down to the great sewer
The gurgling stream of blood.
Hard by, a fiesher on a block
Had laid his whittle down :
Virginius caught the whittle up.
And hid it in his gown.
And then his eyes grew very dim.
And his throat began to swell.
And in a hoarse, changed voice he spake,
" Farewell, sweet child ! Farewell !
" 0, how 1 loved my darling !
Though stem 1 sometimes be.
To thee, thou know'st, I was not so, —
Who could be so to thee ?
a-
874
■a
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
And how my darling loved me !
How glad she was to hear
My footstep on the threshold
When I came back last year !
" And how she danced with pleasure
To see my civic crown,
And took my sword, and hung it up.
And brought me forth my gown !
Now, all those things are over, —
Yes, all thy pretty ways.
Thy needlework, thy prattle.
Thy snatches of old lays ;
" And none will grieve when I go forth.
Or smile when I return.
Or watch beside the old man's bed.
Or weep upon his uin.
The house that was the happiest
Within the Roman walls.
The house that envied not the wealth
Of Capua's marble halls,
"Now, for the brightness of thy smile,
Must have eternal gloom.
And for the music of thy voice.
The silence of the tomb.
The time is come ! See how he points
His eager hand this way !
See how his eyes gloat on thy grief.
Like a kite's upon the prey !
"With all his wit, he little deems
That, spurned, betrayed, bereft.
Thy father hath, in his despair.
One fearful refuge left.
He little deems that in this hand
I clutch what still can save
Thy gentle youth from taunts and blows.
The portion of the slave ;
"Yea, and from nameless evil,
That passeth taunt and blow, —
Foul outrage which thou knowest not.
Which thou shalt never know.
Then clasp me round the neck once more.
And give me one more kiss ;
And now, mine own dear little girl.
There is no way but this."
With that he lifted high the steel.
And smote her in the side.
And in her blood she sank to earth.
And with one sob she died.
Then, for a little moment.
All people held their breath ;
And through the crowded forum
Was stillness as of death ;
And in another moment
Brake forth, from one and all,
A cry as if the Volscians
Were coming o'er the wall.
Some with averted faces
Shrieking iled home amain ;
Some ran to call a leech ; and some
Ran to lift up the slain.
Some felt her lips and little wrist.
If life might there be found ;
And some tore up their garments fast.
And strove to stanch the wound.
In vain they ran, and felt, and stanched ;
For never truer blow
That good right arm had dealt in fight
Against a Volscian foe.
When Appius Claudius saw that deed,
He shuddered and sank down.
And hid his face some little space
With the comer of his gown ;
Till, with white lips and bloodshot eyes,
Virginius tottered nigh.
And stood before the judgment-seat.
And held the knife on high.
" O dwellers in the nether gloom.
Avengers of the slain.
By this dear blood I cry to you
Do right between us twain ;
And even as Appius Claudius
Hath dealt by me and mine.
Deal you by Appius Claudius,
And all the Claudian line ! "
So spake the slayer of his child.
And turned and went his way ;
But first he cast one haggard glance
To where the body lay.
And writhed, and groaned a fearful groan,
And then, with steadfast feet.
Strode right across the market-place
Unto the Sacred Street.
Then up sprang Appius Claudius :
" Stop him ; alive or dead !
Ten thousand pounds of copper
To the man who brings his head."
He looked upon his clients ;
But none would work his will.
He looked upon his lictors ;
But they trembled, and stood still.
And as Virginius through the press
His way in silence cleft.
Ever the mighty multitude
Fell back to right and left.
■P
POEMS OF TBAGEDY.
875
And he hath passed in safety
Unto his woful home,
And there ta'en horse to tell the camp
What deeds are done in Borne.
Thomas Babington Macaulay.
LUCIUS JUNIUS BBUTUS OVER THE
BODY OF LUCRETIA.
from " brutus.■■
Would you know why I summoned you together ?
Ask ye what brings me here ? Behold this dagger,
Clotted with gore ! Behold that frozen corse !
See where the lost Lucretia sleeps in death !
She was the mark and model of the time.
The mould in which each female face was formed.
The very shrine and sacristy of virtue !
Fairer than ever was a form created
By youthful fancy when the blood strays wild.
And never-resting thought is all on fire !
The worthiest of the worthy ! Not the nymph
Who met old Numa in his hallowed walks.
And whispered in his ear her strains divine.
Can I conceive beyond her ; — the young choir
Of vestal virgins bent to her. 'T is wonderful
Amid the darnel, hemlock, and base weeds.
Which now spring rife from the luxurious com¬
post
Spread o'er the realm, how this sweet lily rose, —
How from the shade of those ill-neighboring
plants
Her father sheltered her, that not a leaf
Was blighted, but, arrayed in purest grace.
She bloomed unsullied beauty. Such perfections
Might have called back the torpid breast of age
To long-forgotten rapture ; such a mind
Might have abashed the boldest libertine
And turned desire to reverential love
And holiest affection ! 0 my countrymen !
You all can witness when that she went forth
It was a holiday in Borne ; old age
Forgot its crutch, labor its task, — all ran.
And mothers, turning to their daughters, cried,
" There, there's Lucretia ! " Now look ye where
she lies !
That beauteous flower, that innocent sweet rose,
Tom up by ruthless violence,—gone ! gone ! gone !
Say, would you seek instruction ? would ye ask
What ye should do ? Ask ye yon conscious walls.
Which saw his poisoned brother, —
Ask yon deserted street, where Tullia drove
O'er her dead father's corse, 't will cry. Revenge !
Ask yonder senate-house, whose stones are purple
With human blood, and it will cry. Revenge !
Go to the tomb where lies his murdered wife.
I And the poor queen, who loved him as her son,
I Their unappeasèd ghosts will shriek. Revenge !
The temples of the gods, the all-viewing heavens.
The gods themselves, shall justify the cry.
And swell the general sound. Revenge ! Revenge !
And we will be revenged, my countrymen !
Brutus shall lead you on ; Brutus, a name
Which will, when you 're revenged, be dearer to
him
Than aU the noblest titles earth can boast.
Brutus your king ! — No, fellow-citizens !
If mad ambition in this guilty frame
Had strung one kingly fibre, yea, but one, —
By all the gods, this dagger which I hold
Should rip it out, though it intwined my heart.
Now take the body up. Bear it before us
To Tarquin's palace ; there we '11 light our torches.
And in the blazing conflagration rear
A pile, for these chaste relics, that shall send
Her soul amongst the stars. On ! Brutus leads
you!
John Howard Payne,
*
ANTONY'S ORATION OVER THE BODY
OF CiESAR.
from "julius c.esar." act iii. sc. 3.
Antony. 0 mighty Caesar! dost thou lie so low?
Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoils.
Shrunk to this little measure ?—Fare thee well.—
(To the people.)
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your
ears ;
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them ;
The good is oft interred with their bones ;
So let it be with Caesar. The noble Bmtus
Hath told you Caesar was ambitious :
If it were so, it was a grievous fault ;
And grievously hath Caesar answered it.
Here, under leave of Brutus and the rest,
(For Brutus is an honorable mam ;
So are they all, all honorable men,)
Come I to speak in Caesar's funeral.
He was my friend, faithful and just to me :
But Brutus says he was ambitious ;
And Brutus is an honorable man.
He hath brought many captives home to Rome,
Whose ransoms did the general coffers fill :
Did this in Caesar seem ambitious ?
When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept :
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff :
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious ;
And Brutus is an honorable man.
You all did see that on the Lupercal
876
POEMS OP TRAGEDY.
I thrice presented him a kingly crown,
Which he did thrice refuse : was this ambition ?
Yet Brutus says he was ambitious ;
And, sure, he is an honorable man.
I speak not to disprove what Brutus spoke.
But here I am to speak what I do know.
You all did love him once, — not without cause •
What cause withholds you, then, to mourn for
him ?
0 judgment, thou art fled to brutish beasts.
And men have lost their reason !—Bear with me ;
My heart is in the coffin there with Caesar,
And I must pause, till it come back to me.
But yesterday, the word of Caesar might
Have stood against the world • now lies he there.
And none so poor to do him reverence.
0 masters ! if I were disposed to stir
Your hearts and minds to mutiny and rage,
1 should do Brutus wrong, and Cassius wrong.
Who, you all know, are honorable men :
I will not do them wrong ; I rather choose
To wrong the dead, to wrong myself, and you,
Than I will wrong such honorable men.
But here's a parchment, with the seal of Caesar, —
I found it in his closet, — 't is his will ;
Let but the commons hear this testament,
(Which, pardon me, 1 do not mean to read,)
And they would go and kiss dead Caesar's wounds,
And dip their napkins in his sacred blood :
Yea, beg a hair of him for memory.
And, dying, mention it within their wills.
Bequeathing it, as a rich legacy.
Unto their issue.
4 Citizen. We '11 hear the wül : read it, Mark
Antony.
Citizens. The will, the will ! we will hear
Caesar's will.
Ant. Have patience, gentle friends, I must
not read it ;
It is not meet you know how Caesar loved you.
You are not wood, you are not stones, but men ;
And, being men, hearing the will of Caesar,
It wiU inflame you, it will make you mad ;
'T is good you know not that you are his heirs,
For if you should, O, what would come of it !
4 Cit. Read the will ; we '11 hear it, Antony ;
You shall read us the will, — Caesar's will.
Ant. Will you be patient ? Will you stay
awhile ?
I have o'ershot myself to tell you of it.
I fear I wrong the honorable men
Whose daggers have stabbed Caesar ; I do fear it.
4 Cit. They were traitors : honorable men !
Cit. The will ! the testament !
2 Cit. They were villains, murderers : the
wiU ! read the will !
Ant. You will compel me, then, to read the
wiU ?
Then make a ring about the corse of Caesar,
And let me show you him that made the wül.
Shall I descend ? and wUl you give me leave ?
Citizens. Come down.
Ant. Nay, press not so upon me ; stand far ofif.
Citizens. Stand back ; room ; bear back.
Ant. If you have tears, prepare to shed them
now.
You aU do know this mantle : I remember
The first time ever Caesar put it on ;
'T was on a summer's evening, in his tent ;
That day he overcame the Nervii : —
Look, in this place ran Cassius' dagger through ;
See what a rent the envious Casca made :
Through this the well-belovàd Brutus stabbed ;
And, as he plucked his cursèd steel away,
Mark how the blood of Cajsar followed it.
As rushing out of doors, to be resolved
If Brutus so unkindly knocked, or no ;
For Brutus, as }'ou know, was Caesar's angel :
Judge, O you gods, how dearly Caesar loved him !
This was the most unkindest cut of all ;
For when the noble Caesar saw him stab,
Ingratitude, more strong than traitors' arms.
Quite vanquished him : then burst his mighty
heart ;
And, in his mantle muffling up his face,
Even at the base of Pompey's statua.
Which all the while ran blood, great Caesar feU.
0, what a fall was there, my countrymen !
Then I, and you, and all of us fell down.
Whilst bloody treason flourished over us.
0, now you weep ; and, I perceive, you feel
The dint of pity : these are gracious drops.
Kind souls, what, weep you when you but behold
Our CiBsar's vesture wounded ? Look you here.
Here is himself, marred, as you see, with traitors.
Good friends, sweet friends, let me not stir
you up
To such a sudden flood of mutiny.
They that have done this deed are honorable ; —
What private griefs they have, alas, I know not.
That made them do it ; — they are wise and
honorable.
And will, no doubt, with reasons answer you.
I come not, friends, to steal away your hearts ;
I am no orator, as Brutus is ;
But, as you know me all, a plain blunt man.
That love my friend ; and that they know full
well
That gave me public leave to speak of him :
For 1 have neither wit, nor words, nor worth.
Action, nor utterance, nor the power of speech.
To stir men's blood ; I only speak right on ;
POEMS OF
TRAGEDY.
I tell you that which you yourselves do know ;
Show you sweet Csesar's wounds, poor, poor
dumb mouths.
And bid them speak for me : but were I Brutus,
And Bnitus Antony, there were an Antony
Would ruffle up your spirits, and put a tongue
In every wound of Caesar, that should move
The stones of Rome to rise in mutiny.
Here is the will, and under Caesar's seal : —
To every Roman citizen he gives.
To every several man, seventy-five drachmas.
2 Cit. Most noble Caesar ! — we '11 revenge
his death.
3 Cit. O royal Caesar !
Ant. Hear me with patience.
Citizens. Peace, ho !
Ant. Moreover, he hath left you all his walks.
His private arbors, and new-planted orchards.
On this side Tiber ; he hath left them you.
And to your heirs forever, — common pleasures.
To walk abroad, and recreate yourselves.
Here was a Caesar ! when comes such another ?
1 CiT. Never, never ! — Come away, away !
We '11 bum his body in the holy place.
And with the brands fire the traitors' houses.
Take up the body.
SHAKESPEARE.
—»—
OTHELLO'S REMORSE.
FROM " OTHELLO," ACT V. SC. 3.
Behold, I have a weapon ;
A better never did itself sustain
Upon a soldier's thigh : I have seen the day.
That, with this little arm and this good sword,
I have made my way through more impediments
Than twenty times your stop : — but, O vain
boast !
Who can control his fate ? 't is not so now. —
Be not afraid, though you do see me weaponed ;
Here is my journey's end, here is my butt.
And very sea-mark of my utmost sail.
Do you go back dismayed ? 't is a lost fear ;
Man but a rush against Othello's breast,
And he retires : — where should Othello go ? —
Now, how dost thou look now ? 0 ill-starred
wench !
Pale as thy smock ! when we shall meet at compt.
This look of thine will hurl my soul from heaven.
And fiends will snatch at it. Cold, cold, my girl ?
Even like thy chastity — 0, cursed slave ! —
Whip me, ye devils.
From the possession of this heavenly sight !
Blow me about in winds ! roast me in sulphur !
Wash me in steep-down gulfs of liquid fire ! —
0 Desdemona ! Desdemona ! dead ? 0 ! O !
SHAKESPEARE.
G
THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE.
(James Graham, Marquis of Montrose, was executed in Edin¬
burgh, May 21, 1650, for an attempt to overthrow the Common«
wealth, and restore Charles II.]
Come hither, Evan Cameron J
Come, stand behind my knee —
I hear the river roaring down
Toward the wintry sea.
There's shouting on the mountain-side.
There's war within the blast —
Old faces look upon me.
Old forms go trooping past.
I hear the pibroch wailing
Amidst the din of fight.
And my dim spirit wakes again
Upon the verge of night.
'T was I that led the Highland host
Through wild Lochaber's snows,
What time the plaided clans came down
To battle with Montrose.
I've told thee how the Southrons fell
Beneath the broad claymore.
And how we smote the Campbell clan
By Inverlochy's shore.
I've told thee how we swept Dundee,
And tamed the Lindsays' pride ;
But never have I told thee yet
How the great Marquis died.
A traitor sold him to his foes ;—
O deed of deathless shame !
I charge thee, boy, if e'er thou meet
With one of Assynt's name —
Be it upon the mountain's side.
Or yet within the glen.
Stand he in martial gear alone.
Or backed by armèd men —
Face him as thou wouldst face the man
Who wronged thy sire's renown ;
Remember of what blood thou art.
And strike the caitiff down !
They brought him to the Watergate,
Hard bound with hempen span,
As though they held a lion there.
And not a 'fenceless man.
They set him high upon a cart —
The hangman rode below —
They drew his hands behind his back,
And bared his noble brow.
Then, as a hound is slipped from leash.
They cheered the common throng.
And blew the note with yell and shout.
And bade him pass along.
878
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
It would have made a brave man's heart
Grow sad and sick that day,
To watch the keen, malignant eyes
Bent down on that array.
There stood the Whig west-country lords
In balcony and bow ;
There sat their gaunt and withered dames,
And their daughters all a-row.
And every open window
Was full as full might bo
With black-robed Covenanting carles.
That goodly sport to see !
But when he came, though pale and wan.
He looked so great and high.
So noble was his manly front.
So calm his steadfast eye ; —
The rabble rout forbore to shout.
And each man held his breath.
For well they knew the hero's soul
Was face to face with death.
And then a mournful shudder
Through all the people crept.
And some that came to scoff at him
Now turned aside and wept.
But onward — always onward.
In silence and in gloom.
The dreary pageant labored.
Till it reached the house of doom.
Then first a woman's voice was heard
In jeer and laughter loud.
And an angry cry and a hiss arose
From the heart of the tossing crowd :
Then, as the Grœme looked upward.
He saw the ugly smile
Of him who sold his king for gold —
The master-fiend Argjde !
The Marquis gazed a moment.
And nothing did he say.
But the cheek of Argyle grow ghastly pale.
And he turned his eyes away.
The painted harlot by his side.
She shook through everj' limb.
For a roar like thunder swept the street.
And hands were clenched at him ;
And a Saxon soldier cried aloud,
" Back, coward, from thy place !
For seven long years thou hast not dared
To look him in the face."
Had I been there with sword in hand.
And fifty Camerons by.
That day through high Dunedin's streets
Had pealed the slogan-cry.
Not all their troops of trampling horse.
Nor might of mailèd men —
Not all the rebels in the south
Had home us backward then !
Once more his foot on Highland heath
Had trod as free as air.
Or I, and all who bore my name.
Been laid around him there !
It might not be. They placed him next
Within the solemn hall.
Where once the Scottish kings were throned
Amidst their nobles all.
But there was dust of vulgar feet
On that polluted floor.
And perjured traitors filled the place
Where good men sate before.
With savage glee came Warriston
To read the murderous doom ;
And then uprose the great Montrose
In the middle of the room :
" Now, by my faith as belted knight
And by the name I bear.
And by the bright St. Andrew's cross
That waves above us there —
Yea, by a greater, mightier oath —
And 0 that such should be ! —
By that dark stream of royal blood
That lies 'twixt you and me —
I have not sought in battle-field
A wreath of such renown.
Nor dared I hope on my d3dng day
To win the martyr's crown !
" There is a chamber far away
Where sleep the good and brave.
But a better place ye have named for me
Than by my fathers' grave.
For truth and right, 'gainst treason's might,
This hand hath always striven.
And ye i-aise it up for a witness still
In the eye of earth and heaven.
Then nail my head on yonder tower —
Give every town a limb —
And God who made shall gather them .
I go from }'ou to Him ! "
The morning dawned fuU darkly.
The i-ain came flashing down.
And the jagged streak of the levin-bolt
Lit up the gloomy town.
The thunder crashed across the heaven.
The fatal hour was come ;
Yet aye broke in, with muffled beat.
The 'larum of the drum.
POEMS OP TRAGEDY.
879
-a
Theie was madness on the earth helow
And anger in the sky,
And young and old, and rich and poor.
Came forth to see him die.
Ah God ! that ghastly gihhet !
How dismal't is to see
The great tall spectral skeleton.
The ladder and the tree !
Hark ! hark ! it is the clash of arms, —
The bells begin to toll, —
" He is coming ! he is coming !
God's mercy on his soul ! "
One last long peal of thunder, —
The elouds are cleared away.
And the glorious sun once more looks down
Amidst the dazzling day.
" He is coming ! he is coming ! "
Like a bridegroom from his room
Came the hero from his prison
To the scaffold and the doom.
There was glory on his forehead.
There was lustre in his eye.
And he never walked to battle
More proudly than to die.
There was color in his visage.
Though the cheeks of all were wan ;
And they marvelled as they saw him pass.
That great and goodly man !
He mounted up the scaffold.
And he turned him to the crowd ;
But they dared not trust the people.
So he might not speak aloud.
But he looked upon the heavens.
And they were clear and blue,
And in the liquid ether
The eye of God shone through :
Yet a black and murky battlement
Lay resting on the hill.
As though the thunder slept within, —
All else was calm and still.
The grim Geneva ministers
With anxious scowl drew near.
As you have seen the ravens flock
Around the dying deer.
He would not deign them word nor sign.
But alone he bent the knee ;
And veiled his face for Christ's dear grace
Beneath the gallows-tree.
Then, radiant and serene, he rose.
And cast his cloak away ;
For he had ta'en his latest look
Of earth and sun and day.
A beam of light fell o'er him.
Like a glory round the shriven.
And he climbed the lofty ladder
As it were the path to heaven.
Then came a flash from out the cloud,
And a stunning thunder-roll ;
And no man dared to look aloft, —
Fear was on every soul.
There was another heavy sound,
A hush, and then a groan ;
And darkness swept across the sky, —
The work of death was done !
William Edmondstoune Avtoun.
GOD'S JUDGMENT ON A WICKED
BISHOP.
[Hatto, Archbishop of Mentz, in the year 914, barbarously mur-
dered a number of poor people to prevent their consuming a por¬
tion of the food during that year of famine. He was afterwards
devoured by rats lin his tower on an island in the Rhine.
The summer and autumn had been so wet.
That in winter the corn was growing yet ;
'T was a piteous sight to see all around
The grain lie rotting on the ground.
Every day the starving poor
Crowded around Bishop Hatto's door ;
For he had a plentiful last-year's store.
And all the neighborhood could tell
His granaries were furnished well.
At last Bishop Hatto appointed a day
To quiet the poor without delay ;
He bade them to his great bam repair.
And they should have food for the winter there.
Rejoiced the tidings good to hear.
The poor folks flocked from far and near,-
The great bam was full as it could hold
Of women and children, and young and old.
Then, when he saw it could hold no more,
Bishop Hatto he made fast the door ;
And whilst for mercy on Christ they call.
He set fire to the bam, and burnt them aU.
" I' faith't is an excellent bonfire ! " quoth he ;
" And the country is greatly obliged to me
For ridding it, in these times forlom.
Of rats that only consume the corn."
So then to his palace retumèd he.
And he sate down to supper merrily.
And he slept that night like an innocent man ;
But Bishop Hatto never slept again.
e-
880
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
In the morning, as he entered the hall,
Where his picture hung against the wall,
A sweat like death all over him came.
For the rats had eaten it out of the frame.
As he looked, there came a man from his farm, —
He had a countenance white with alarm :
" My lord, I opened your granaries this morn.
And the rats had eaten all your com."
Another came running presently.
And he was pale as pale could be.
" Fly ! my lord bishop, fly ! " quoth he,
" Ten thousand rats are coming this way, —
The Lord forgive you for yesterday ! "
" I 'U go to my tower in the Rhine," replied he ;
" 'T is the safest place in Germany, —
The walls are high, and the shores are steep.
And the tide is strong, and the water deep."
Bishop Hatto fearfully hastened away ;
And he crossed the Rhine without delay,
And reached his tower, and barred with care
AR the windows, doors, and loop-holes there.
He laid him down and closed his eyes.
But soon a scream made him arise ;
He started, and saw two eyes of flame
On his piUow, from whence the screaming came.
He listened and looked, — it was only the cat ;
But the bishop he grew more fearful for that.
For she sate screaming, mad with fear.
At the army of rats that were drawing near.
For they have swum over the river so deep.
And they have climbed the shores so steep.
And now by thousands up they crawl
To the holes and the windows in the waU.
Down on his knees the bishop fell,
And faster and faster his beads did he tell.
As louder and louder, drawing near.
The saw of their teeth without he could hear.
And in at the windows, and in at the door.
And through the walls, by thousands they pour ;
And down from the ceiling and up through the
floor.
From the right and the left, from behind and
before.
From within and without, from above and be¬
low, —
And all at once to the bishop they go.
They have whetted their teeth against the stones.
And now they pick the bishop's bones ;
They gnawed the flesh from every Umb,
For they were sent to do judgment on him !
Robert southey.
THE SACK OF BALTIMORE.
>fBaltimore is a small seaport in the barony of Carbery. in South
Munster. It grew uparound a castle of O'DriscoU's. and was, after
his ruin, colonized by the English. On the soth of June, 163z, the
crews of two Algerine galleys landed in the dead of the night,
sacked the town, and bore off into slavery all who were not too old,
or too young, or too fierce, for their purpose. The pirates were
steered up the intricate channel by one Hackett, a Dungarvan fish¬
erman, whom they had taken at sea for the purpose. Two years
after, he was convicted of the crime and executed. Baltimore never
recovered from this.)
The summer sun is falling soft on Carbery's
hundred isles.
The summer sun is gleaming still through
Gabriel's rough defiles, —
Old Inisherkin's crumbled fane looks Rke a
moulting bird ;
And in a calm and sleepy swell the ocean tide is
heard :
The hookers lie upon the beach ; the children
cease their play ;
The gossips leave the little inn ; the households
kneel to pray ;
And fuR of love and peace and rest, — its daily
labor o'er, —
Upon that cosy creek there lay the town of Balti¬
more.
A deeper rest, a starry trance, has come with
midnight there ;
No sound, except that throbbing wave, in earth
or sea or air.
The massive capes and ruined towers seem con¬
scious of the calm ;
The fibrous sod and stunted ti-ees are breathing
heavy balm.
So stiR the night, these two long barks round
Dunashad that gUde
Must trust their oars — methinks not few —
against the ebbing tide.
0, some sweet mission of true love must urge
them to the shore, —
They bring some lover to his bride, who sighs in
Baltimore !
AR, aR asleep within each roof along that rocky
street.
And these must be the lover's friends, with gen¬
tly gUding feet.
A stifled gasp ! a dreamy noise ! The roof is in
a flame !
From out their beds, and to their doors, rush
maid and sire and dame.
And meet, \^on the threshold stone, the gleam¬
ing sabre's fall.
And o'er each black and bearded face the white
or crimson shawl.
The yell of " Allah ! " breaks above the prayer
and shriek and roar —
0 blessed God ! the Algerine is lord of Baltimore !
^ 1 •-»
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
881
à
Then flung the youth his naked hand against the
shearing sword ;
Then sprung the mother on the brand with which
her son was gored ;
Then sunk the grandsiro on the floor, his grand-
babes clutching wild ;
Then fled the maiden moaning faint, and nestled
with the child.
But sec, yon pirate strangling lies, and crushed
with splashing heel.
While o'er him in an Irish hand there sweeps his
Syrian steel ;
Though virtue sink, and courage fail, and misers
yield their store,
There's one hearth well avenged in the sack of
Baltimore !
Midsummer morn, in woodland nigh, the birds
begin to sing ;
They see not now the milking-maids, deserted is
the spring !
Midsummer day, this gallant rides from distant
Bandon's town,
These hookers crossed from stormy Skull, that
skill" from Afl'adown.
They only found the smoking walls with neigh¬
bors' blood besprent,
And on the strewed and trampled beach awhile
they wildly went.
Then dashed to sea, and passed Cape Clear, and
saw, five leagues before,
The pirate-galleys vanishing that ravaged Balti-
0, some must tug the galley's oar, and some
must tend the steed, —
This bey will bear a Scheik's chibouk, and that
a Bey's jerreed.
0, some are for the arsenals by beauteous Darda¬
nelles,
And some are in the caravan to Mecca's sandy
dells.
Tlie maid that Bandon gallant sought is chosen
for the Dey,
She's safe, — she's dead, — she stabbed him in
the midst of his Serai ;
And when to die a death of fire that noble maid
f they bore.
She only smiled, — O'Driscoll's child, — she
thought of Baltimore.
'T is two long years since sunk the town beneath
that bloody band.
And all around its trampled hearths a larger
concourse stand.
Where high u^mn a gallows-tree a yelling wretch
is seen,—
'T is Ilackett of Dungarvan, — he who steered
the Algerine !
He fell amid a sullen shout, with scarce a passing
prayer.
For he had slain the kith and kin of many a
hundred there :
Some muttered of MacMorrogh, who had brought
the Norman o'er.
Some cursed him with Iscariot, that day in Bal¬
timore.
THO.MAS DAVIS.
PARRHASIÜS.
Paruhasitts stood, gazing forgetfully
Upon the canvas. There Prometheus lay.
Chained to the cold rocks of Mount Caucasus,
The vulture at his vitals, and the links
Of the lame Lemnian festering in his flesh ;
And, as the painter's mind felt through the dim
Rapt mystery, and plucked the shadows forth
With its far-reaclring fancy, and with fonn
And color clad them, his fine, earnest eye
Flashed with a passionate fire, and the quick curl
Of his thin nostril, and his quivering lip.
Were like the winged god's breathing from his
flights.
" Bring me the captive now !
My hand feels skilful, and the shadows lift
From my waked spirit airily and swift ;
And 1 could paint the bow
Upon the bended heavens, —around me play
Colors of such divinity to-day.
" Ha ! bind him on his back !
Look ! as Prometheus in my picture here ;
Quick, — or he faints ! — stand with the cordial
near !
Now, — bend him to the rack !
Press down the poisoned links into his flesh .'
And tear agape that healing wound afresh !
" So, •— let him writhe ! How long
Will he live thus ? Quick, my good pencil, now !
What a fine agon)' woiks upon his brow !
Ha ! gray-haired, and so strong !
How fearfully he stifles that short moan !
Gods ! if I could but paint a dying groan Î
" Pity thee ! so I do !
1 pity the dumb victim at the altar.
But does the robed priest for his pity falter ?
1 'd rack thee, though I knew
A thousand lives were jierishing in thine ;
What were ten thousand to a fame like mine ?
832
rOEMS OF
TRAGEDY.
" Ah ! there's a deathless name ! —
A spirit that the smothering vaults shall spurn,
And, like a steadfast planet, mount aud bum ;
And though its ci-own of flamo
Consumed my brain to ashes as it shone,
By all the fiery stars, I'd bind it on !
"Ay ! thotigh it bid me rifle
My heart's last fount for its insatiate thirst, —
Though every life-strung nerve be maddened
first,—
Though it should bid me stifle
The yearnings in my heart for my sweet child.
And taunt its mother till my brain went wild, —
" All, — I would do it all, —
Sooner than die, like a dull wonn, to rot
Thrust foully in the earth to be forgot.
O Heavens ! — but I appall
Your heart, old man ! — forgive — ha ! on your
lives
Let him not faint ! rack him till he revives !
" Vain, — vain, — give o'er. His eye
Glazes apace. He does not feel you now,—
Stand back ! I '11 paint the death-dew on his brow !
Gods ! if he do not die.
But for one moment — one — till I eclipse
Conception with the scorn of those calm lips !
" Shivering ! Hark ! he mutters
Brokenly now, — that was a difficult breath, —
Another ? Wilt thou never come, 0 Death ?
Look ! how his temple flutters !
Is his heart still ? Alia ! lift up his head !
He shudders, — gasps, —Jove help him ! — so,
— he's dead ! "
How like a mounting devil in the heart
Rules the unreined ambition ! Let it once
But play the monarch, and its haughty brow
Glows with a beauty that bewilders thought
And unthrones peace forever. Putting on
Tlie very pomp of Lucifer, it turns
The heart to ashes, and with not a spring
Left in the bosom for the spirit's lip.
We look upon our splendor, and forget
The thirst of which we perish !
Nathaniel Parker Willis.
—«
A DAGGER OF THE MIND.
from " macbeth," act ii. sc. j.
[Macbeth before the murder of Duncan, medftnting; alone, sees
the image of a dagger in the air, and thus soliloquiaes :J
Is this a dagger which I see before me.
The handle toward my hand ? Come, let me
clutch thee : —
1 have thee not, and yet I see thee still.
Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible
To feeling as to sight ? or art thou but
A dagger of the mind, a false creation,
Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain ?
I see thee yet, in form as palpable
As this which now I draw.
Thou marshal'st me the way that I was going ;
And such an instrument I was to use.
Mine eyes are made the fools o' the other senses.
Or else worth all the rest : I see thee still ;
And on thy blade and dudgeon gouts of blood.
Which was not so before. — There's no such
thing :
It is the bloody busine.ss, which informs
Thus to mine eyes.—Now o'er the one half
world
Nature seems dead, and wicked dreams abuse
The curtained sleep ; witchcraft celebrates
Pale Hecate's offerings ; and withered murder,
Alaramed by his sentinel, the wolf.
Whose howl's his watch, thus with his stealthy
pace.
With Tavquin's ravishing strides, towards his
design
Moves like a ghost. — Thou sure and firm-set
earth.
Hear not my steps, which way they walk, for
fear
The very stones prate of my whereabout.
And take the present horror from the time.
Which now suits with it. — Whiles I threat, he
lives :
Words to the heat of deeds too cold breath gives.
(A bell rings.)
I go, and it is done ; the bell invites me.
Hear it not, Duncan ; for it is a knell
That summons thee to heaven or to hell.
Shakespeare.
THE MURDER.
from ■■ macbeth," act ii. SC. 2.
Scene m the Castle. Enter Lady Macbeth.
Lady Macbeth. That which hath made them
drunk hath made me bold ,
What hath quenched them hath given me fire.
Hark ! — Peace !
It was the owl that shrieked, the fatal bellman.
Which gives the stern'st good night. Ho is
about it :
The doors are open ; and the surfeited grooms
Do mark their charge with snores : I have
drugged their possets.
That death and nature do contend about them,
Whether they live or die.
Macbeth Who's there ? What, ho !
POEMS OP
TRAGEDY.
883
Lady M. Alack, I am afraid they have
awaked
And'tis not done : — the attempt and not the
deed
Confounds us. — Hark ! — I laid their daggers
ready ;
He could not miss them. — Had he not resembled
My father, as he slept, I had done't. — My hus¬
band !
Macb. I have done the deed. Didst thou
not hear a noise ?
Lady M. I heard the owl scream, and the
crickets cry.
Did not you speak ?
Macb. "When ?
Lady M. Now.
Macb. As I descended ?
Lady M. Ay.
Macb. Hark ! —
Who lies i' the second chamber ?
Lady M. Donalhain.
Macb. (looking on his hands). This is a sorry
sight
Lady M. A foolish thought, to say a sorry
sight.
Macb. There's one did laugh in's sleep, and
one cried, "Murder ! "
That they did wake each other : I stood and
heard them ;
But they did say their prayers, and addressed
them
Again to sleep.
Lady M. There are two lodged together.
Macb. One cried, " God bless us ! " and,
" Amen," the other ;
As they had seen me with these hangman's
. hands.
Listening their fear, I could not say, "Amen,"
When they did say, " God bless us."
Lady M. Consider it not so deeply.
Macb. But wherefore could not 1 pronounce
"Amen" ?
I had most need of blessing, and " Amen "
Stuck in my throat.
Lady M. These deeds must not be thought
After these ways ; so, it will make us mad.
Macb. Methought I heard a voice cry, "Sleep
no more !
Macbeth does murder sleep,"—the innocent
sleep.
Sleep that knits up the ravelled sleave of care.
The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath.
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course.
Chief nourisher in life's feast, —
Lady M. What do you mean ?
Macb. Still it cried, " Sleep no more ! " to
all the house :
" Glamis hath murdered sleep ; and therefore
Cawdor
Shall sleep no more, — Macbeth shall sleep no
more ! "
Lady M. Who was it that thus cried ? Why,
worthy thane.
You do unbend your noble strength, to think
So brainsickly of things. — Go, get some water,
And wash this filthy witness from your hand.
Why did you bring these daggers from the place ?
They mu.st lie there : go carry them ; and smear
The sleepy grooms with blood.
Macb. I '11 go no more !
I am afraid to think what I have done ;
Look on't again, I dare not.
Lady M. Infirm of purpose !
Give me the daggers ; the sleeping, and the
dead.
Are but as pictures : 't is the eye of childhood
That fears a painted devil. If he do bleed,
I '11 gild the faces of the grooms withal ;
For it must seem their guilt.
[jEm'í. Knocking within.
Macb. AVhence is that knocking ?
How is't with me, when every noise appalls mo?
What hands are here ! Ha ! they pluck out
mine eyes !
Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood
Clean from my hand ? No ; this my hand will
rather
The multitudinous seas incarnadine.
Making the green — one red.
(Re-enter Lady Macbeth.)
Lady M. My hands are of your color ; but I
shame
To wear a heart so white. (Knocking.) I hear
a knocking
At the south entry ; — retire we to our chamber:
A little water cleai-s us of this deed :
How easy is it, then ! Your constancy
Hath left you unattended. (Knocking.) Hark,
more knocking.
Get on your nightgown, lest occasion call us.
And show us to be watchers : — be not lost
So poorly in your thoughts.
Macb. To know my deed, 'twere best not
know myself. (Knocking.)
Wake Duncan with thy knocking ! I would thou
couldst.
SHAKESPEARE.
BIDING TOGETHER.
For many, many days together
The wind blew steady from the east ;
For many days hot grew the weather,
About the time of our Lady's feast.
ft
884
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
■a
For many days we rode together.
Yet met we neither friend nor foe ;
Hotter and clearer grew the weather.
Steadily did the east-wind blow.
We saw the ti-ees in the hot, bright weather.
Clear-cut, with shadows very black.
As freely we rode on together
With helms unlaced and bridles slaek.
And often as we rode together.
We, looking down the green-banked stream.
Saw flowers in the sunny weather.
And saw the bubble-making bream.
And in the night lay down together.
And hung above our heads the rood.
Or watched night-long in the dewy weather.
The while the moon did watch the wood.
Our epears stood bright and thick together.
Straight out the tenners streamed behind.
As we galloped on in the sunny weather,
With faces turned towards the wind.
Down sank our threescore spears together.
As thick we saw the pagans ride ;
His eager face in the clear fresh weather
Shone out that last time by my side.
Up the sweep of the bridge we dashed together.
It rocked to the erash of the meeting speai-s,
Down rained the buds of the dear spring weather,
The elm-tree flowers fell like tears.
There, as we rolled and writhed together,
I threw my arms above my head,
For close by my side, in the lovely weather,
I saw him reel and fall back dead.
I and the slayer met together.
He waited the death-stroke there in his place,
With thoughts of death, in the lovely weather
Gapingl}' mazed at my maddened face.
Madly I fought as we fought together ;
In vain : the little Christian band
The pagans drowned, as in stormy weathcTi
The river drowns low-lying land.
They bound my blood-stained hands together.
They bound his coi'pse to nod by my side :
Then on we rode, in the bright March weather.
With clash of cymbals did we ride.
We ride no more, no more together ;
My prison-bars are thick and strong,
I take no heed of any weather.
The sweet Saints grant I live not long.
WlLLlA« MORRIS.
THE ROSE AND THE GAUNTLET.
Low spake the knight to the peasant maid,
" O, be not thus of my suit afmid !
Fly with me from this garden small.
And thou shalt sit in my castle halL
" Thou shalt have pomp and wealth and pleasure,
.Toys beyond thy fancy's measure ;
Here with my sword and horse I stand.
To bear thee away to my distant land.
" Take, thou fairest ! this full-blown rose
A token of love that as ripely blows."
With his glove of steel he plucked the token.
And it fell from the gauntlet crushed and broken.
The maiden exclaimed, "Thou seest. Sir Kniglit,
Thy fingers of iron can only smite ;
And, like the rose thou hast torn and scattered,
I in thy grasp should be wrecked and shattered ¡ "
She trembled and blushed, and her glances fell.
But she turned from the knight, and said, " Fare¬
well."
" Not so," he cried, " will I lose my prize ;
I heed not thy words, but I read thine eyes."
He lifted her up in his grasp of steel.
And he mounted and spurred with fiery heel ;
But her cry drew forth her hoary sire.
Who snatched his bow from above the fire.
Swift from the valley the warrior fled.
But swifter the bolt of the cross-bow sped ;
And the weight that pressed on the fleet-foot
horse
Was the living man and the woman's corse.
That morning the rose was bright of hue.
That morning the maiden was sweet to view ;
But the evening sun its beauty shed
On the withered leaves and the maiden dead.
John Wilson is:hrisiofhtr nonn.
THE KING IS COLD.
Rake the embers, blow the coals,
Kindle at once a roaring fire ;
Here's some paper — 't is nothing, sir —
Light it (they 've saved a thousand souls).
Run for fagots, ye scurvy knaves.
There are plenty out in the public square.
You know they fiy the heretics there.
(But God remember their nameless graves !)
Fly, fly, or the king may die !
-á
r
POEMS OP TllAGEDY.
Ugh ! his royal feet are like snow,
And the cold is mounting up to his heart.
(But that was frozen long ago !)
Rascals, varlets, do as you are told, —
The king is cold.
His hed of state is a grand affair.
With sheets of satin and pillows of down.
And close beside it stands the crown, —
But that won't keep him from dying there !
His hands are wrinkled, his hair is gray,
And his ancient blood is sluggish and thin ;
When he was young it was hot with sin, —
But that is over this many a day !
Under these sheets of satin and lace
He slept in the arms of his concubines ;
Now they carouse with the prince instead,
Drinking the maddest, merriest wines ;
It's pleasant to hear such catches trolled.
Now the king is cold !
What shall I do with His Majesty now ?
For, thanks to my potion, the man is dead ;
Suppose I bolster him up in bed.
And fix the crown again on his brow ?
That would be merry ! but then the prince
Would tumble it down, I know, in a triee ;
T would puzzle the Devil to name a vice
That would make his Excellent Highness wince !
Hark ! he's coming, I know his step ;
He's stealing to see if his wishes are true ;
Sire, may your father's end be yours !
(With just such a son to murder you !)
Peace to the dead ! Let the bells be tolled —
The king is cold !
robert Browning.
'S-
FEA GIACOMO.
Alas, Fra Giacorao,
Too late ! — but follow me ;
Hush ! draw the curtain, — so ! —
She is dead, quite dead, you see.
Poor little lady ! she lies
With the light gone out of her eyes.
But her features still wear that soft
Gray meditative expression.
Which you must have noticed oft.
And admired too, at confession.
How saintly she looks, and how meek !
Though this be the chamber of death,
I fancy I feel her breath
As I kiss her on the cheek.
With that pensive religious face.
She has gone to a holier place !
And I hardly appreciated her, —
Her praying, fasting, confessing,
Poorly, I own, I mated her ;
I thought her too cold, and rated her
For her endless image-caressing.
Too saintly for me by far.
As pure and as cold as a star.
Not fashioned for kissing and pressing, —
But made for a heavenly crown.
Ay, father, let us go down, —
But first, if you please, your blessing.
Wine ? No ? Come, come, you must !
You '11 bless it with your prayers.
And quaff a cup, I trust,
To the health of the saint up stairs Î
My heart is aching so !
And I feel so weaiy and sad,
■ Through the blow that I have had, —
You '11 sit, Fra Giacomo ?
My friend ! (and a friend I rank you
For the sake of that saint,) — nay, nay !
Here's the wine, — as you love me, stay ! —
'T is Montepulciano ! — Thank you.
Heigh-ho ! 'T is now six summers
Since I won that angel and married her :
I was rich, not old, and carried her
Off in the face of all comers.
So fresh, yet so brimming with soul !
A tenderer morsel, I swear.
Never made the dull black coal
Of a monk's eye glitter and glare.
Your pardon ! — nay, keep your chair !
I wander a little, but mean
No offence to the gray gaberdine ;
Of the church, Fra Giacomo,
I'm a faithful upholder, you know,
But (humor me !) she was as sweet
As the saints in your convent windows.
So gentle, so meek, so discreet,
She knew not what lust does or sin does.
I '11 confess, though, before we were one,
I deemed her less saintly, and thought
The blood in her veins had caught
Some natural warmth from the sun.
I was wrong, — I was blind as a bat, —
Brute that I was, how I blundered !
Though such a mistake as that
Might have occurred as pat
To ninety-nine men in a hundred.
Youi-self, for example ? you 've seen her ?
Spite her modest and pious demeanor,
And the manners so nice and precise,
Seemed there not color and light,
Bright motion and appetite.
That were scarcely consistent with ice ?
Externals implying, you see,
Internals less saintly than human ? —
Pray speak, for between you and me
You 're not a bad judge of a woman !
—
n . t r
L
|¡
J L
, 886 POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
A jest, — but a jest ! — Very true : Of crimson back to your cheeks ;
'T is hardly becoming to jest. Come, drink again to the saiut
And that saint irp stairs at rest, — Whose virtues you loved to paint.
Her soul may be listening, too ! Who, stretched on her wifely bed,
I was always a brute of a fellow ! With the tender, grave expression.
Well may your visage turn yellow, — You used to admire at confession.
To think how 1 doubted and doubted. Lies poisoned, overhead !
Suspected, grumbled at, flouted
That golden-haired angel, — and solely l'y heaven, you die !
Because she was zealous and holy ! Face to face, soul to soul, you and I
Noon and night and morn Have settled accounts, in a flue
She devoted herself to piety ; Pleasant fashion, over our wine.
Not that she seemed to scorn ®Hr not, and seek not to fly, —
Or dislike her husband's society ; Nay, whether or not, you are mine J
But the claims of her soul superseded Thank Montepulciano for giving
All that I asked for or needed. You death in such delicate sips ;
And her thoughts were far away 'T is not every monk ceases living
From the level of sinful clay, With so pleasant a taste on his lips ;
And she trembled if earthly matters But, lest Montepulciano unsurely should kiss,
Interfered with her aves and paters. Take this ! and this ! and this !
Poor dove, she so fluttered in flying ^ . t..
Above the dim vapors of hell- him over, Pietro,
Bent on self-sanctifying - bury him in the court below, _
That she never thought of trying x You can be secret, .ad, I know !
To save her husband as well. ^ hark you, tnen to the convent go, -
And while she was duly elected Bid every bell of the convent toll.
For place in the heavenly roll. ^he monks say mass for your mistress souL
t /i. x xi- i. t x j Robert Buchanan.
1 (brute that 1 was I) suspected
Her manner of saving her soul. . . ♦ .
So, half for the fun of the thing,
"What did I (blasphemer !) but fling COUNTESS LAURA.
On niy shoulders the gown of a monk —• i t . •r^ ^
-..TV T J f xu x J It was a dreary day m Padua.
Whom I managed for that very day m, ^ i !<■ ■ t
rr J. r } xrxi. The Countcss Laura, lor a Single year
To get safely out of the way — „ a . •/. v i Í j
ai x i-ipv 11 e j 1 Fernando s Wife, upon her bndal bed.
And seat me, hait sober, half drank,
iir-xu xu 1 xi. r Like an uprooted lily on the snow,
With the cowl thrown over my face, ..i j . : ^ -,
T xi. r xi. r » 1 The withered outcast oi a festival.
In the father confessor s place. t i i m a- i ^ ^
rfj ,7 J- -x » Lay dead. She died of some uncertain ill,
Eheu ! hcnedicite / x_ i a i x a. i i- a
t 7 j x • t 'x— That struck her almost on her wedding day,
In her orthodox sweet simplicity, *11 xi. ia ai i ia
ttr-xi. xu x • • And clung to her, and dragged her slowly down.
With that pensive gray expression, . T , 7 a • r- 1. x-n i-
ct7 . rx. 11 1 ix x / • Ihmnmg her cheeks and pinching her full hps.
She sightully knelt at confession, 7 a xi f -xi.
1171--1 T 1.-X 1- x-11 XI A-1 A lill, in her chance, it seemed that with a year
While I bit my lips till they bled, wiîi-ir x x
.77 . 77 Full half a century w^as overpast.
And dug my nails in my hand, t -t-at» 1 x av
a j 1- r -xi- _x j v 1 In vain had Paracelsus taxed his art,
And heard with averted head xax«- ai ia x-i_ ia
1171- x t *a 1 a M a x 1 And feigned a knowledge of her malady ;
What 1 d guessed and could understand. , • v a n xi a ? x» i
t7 1. a x» X- In vain had all the doctors, far and near,
Each word was a serpent s sting, ^ , » a xi x x-i 77
■d x x • 1 Gathered around the mystery of her bed.
But, wrapt in my gloomy gown, , . 1 , 7 7, x
I sat, like a marble thing, ^
As she told me all ! - Sit down. ^ jargon m a fruitless quest
ror causes equal to the dread result.
The Countess only smiled when they were gone,
More wine, Fra Giacomo ! Hugged her fair body with her little hands.
One cup, — if you love me ! No ? And turned upon her pillows wearily,
What, have these dry lips drank As though she fain would sleep no common sleep,
So deep of the sweets of pleasure — But the long, breathless slumber of the grave.
Sub rasa, but quite without measure-7- She hinted nothing. Feeble as she was.
That Montepulciano tastes rauk ? The rack could not have wrung her secret out.
Come, drink ! 't will bring the streaks The Bishop, when he shrived her, coming forth,
3^ .-B
Í
•i
1
Î
1
Cried, in a voice of heavenly ecstasy,
" 0 blessèd soul ! with nothing to confess
Save virtues and good deeds, which she mis¬
takes —
So humble is she — for our human sins ! "
Praying for death, she tossed upon her bed
Day after day ; as might a shipwrecked bark
That rocks upon one billow, and can make
No onward motion towards her port of hope.
At length, one mom, when those around her said,
" Surely the Countess mends, so fresh a light
Beams from her eyes and beautifies her face," —
One morn in spring, when every flower of earth
Was opening to the sun, and breathing up
Its votive incense, her impatient soul
Opened itself, and so exhaled to heaven.
When the Count heard it, he reeled back a pace ;
Then turned with anger on the messenger ;
Then craved his pardon, and wept out his heart
Before the menial ; tears, ah me ! such tears
As love sheds only, and love only once.
Then he bethought him, " Shall this wonder die.
And leave behind no shadow ? not a trace
Of all the glory that environed her.
That mellow nimbus circling round my star ?"
So, with his sorrow glooming in his face.
He paced along his gallery of art.
And strode among the painters, where they stood.
With Carlo, the Venetian, at their head,
Studying the Masters by the dawning light
Of his transcendent genius. Through the groups
Of gayly vestured artists moved the Count,
As some lone cloud of thick and leaden hue.
Packed with the secret of a coming stonn,
Moves through the gold and crimson evening
mists.
Deadening their splendor. In a moment still
Was Carlo's voice, and still the prattling crowd ;
And a great shadow overwhelmed them all.
As their white faces and their anxious eyes
Pursued Fernando in his moody walk.
He paused, as one who balances a doubt,
Weighing two coui"ses, then burat out with this :
" Ye all have seen the tidings in my face ;
Or has the dial ceased to register
The workings of my heart ? Then hear the bell,
That almost cracks its frame in utterance ;
Tlic Countess, —she is dead ! " " Dead ! " Carlo
groaned.
And if a bolt from middle heaven had .struck
His splendid features full upon the brow,
Ho could not have appeared more scathed and
blanched.
" Dead ! — dead ! " He staggered to Iiis easel-
frame.
And clung around it, buffeting the air
With one wild arm, as though a drowning man
t
a
TKAGEDir. 887
Hung to a spar and fought against the waves.
The Count resumed : " I came not here to grieve.
Nor see my sorrow in another's eyes.
Who '11 paint the Countess, as she lies to-night
In state within the chapel ? Shall it be
That earth must lose her wholly ? that no hint
Of her gold tresses, beaming eyes, and lips
That talked in silence, and the eager soul
That ever seemed outbreaking through her clay.
And scattering glory round it, —shall all these
Be dull corruption's heritage, and we.
Poor beggars, have no legacy to show
That love she bore us ? That were shame to love.
And shame to you, my masters." Carlo stalked
Forth from his easel stiffly as a thing
Moved by mechanic impulse. His thin lips.
And sharpened nostrils, and wan, sunken checks.
And the cold glimmer in his dusky eyes.
Made him a ghastly sight. The throng drew
back
As though they let a spectre through. Then he.
Fronting the Count, and speaking in a voice
Sounding remote and hollow, made reply :
" Count, I shall paint the Countess. 'T is my
fate, —
Not pleasure, — no, nor duty." But the Count,
Astray in woe, but understood assent.
Not the strange woivls that bore it ; and he flung
His arm round Carlo, drew him to his breast,
And kissed his forehead. At which Carlo shrank;
Perhaps't was at the honor. Then the Count,
A little reddening at his public state, —
Unseemly to his near and recent loss, —
Withdrew in has1.e between the downcast eyes
That did him reverence as he rustled by.
Night fell on Padua. In the chapel lay
The Countess Laura at the altar's foot.
Her coronet glittered on her pallid bi ows ;
A crimson pall, weighed down with golden work.
Sown thick with pearls, and heaped with early
flowers,
Draped her still body almost to the chin ;
And over all a thousand candles flamed
Against the winking jewels, or streamed down
The marble aisle, and flashed along the guard
Of men-at-aims that .slowly wove their turns.
Backward and forward, through the distant
gloom.
When Carlo entered, his unsteady feet
Scarce bore him to the altar, and his head
Drooped down so low that all his shining curls
Poured on his breast, and veiled his countenance.
Upon his easel a half-finished work.
The secret labor of his studio.
Said from the canv.as, so that none might eiT,
" I am the Countess Laura." Carlo kneeled, I
—-Ú
fi-
888
--fi
POEMS OP TRAGEDY
And gazed upon the picture ; as if thus,
Through tliose clear eyes, ho saw tire way to
heaven.
Then he arose ; and as a swimmer comes
Forth from the waves, he shook his locks aside,
Emergbig from his dream, and standing firm
U pou a purpose with his sovereign will.
He took his palette, murmuring, " Not yet !"
Confidingly and softly to the corpse ;
And as the veriest drudge, who plies his alt
Against his fancy, he addressed himself
With stolid resolution to his task,
Turning his vision on his memory,
And shutting out the present, till the dead.
The gilded pall, the lights, the pacing guard,
And all the meaning of that solemn scene
Became as nothing, and creative Art
Resolved the whole to chaos, and reformed
The elements according to her law :
So Carlo wrought, as though his eye and hand
Were Heaven's unconscious instruments, and
worked ,
The seitlcd pur^se of Omnip|otence.|
And it was wondrous h6w the red, the white.
The ochre, and the umber, and the blue.
From mottled blotches, hazy and opaque.
Grew into rounded forms and sensuous lines ;
How just beneath the lucid skin the blood
Glimmered with warmth ; the scarlet lips apart
Bloomed with the moisture of the dews of life ;
How the light glittered through and underneath
The golden tresses, and the deep, soft eyes
Became intelligent with conscious thought.
And somewhat troubled underneath the arch
Of eyebrows but a little too intense
For perfect beauty ; how the pose and poise
Of the lithe figure on its tiny foot
Suggested life just ceased from motion ; so
That any one might cry, far mai-velling joy,
" That creature lives, — has senses, mind, a soul
To win God's love or dare hell's subtleties ! "
The artist paused. The ratifying " Good ! '
Trembled upon his lips. He saw no touch
To give or soften. " It is done," he cried, —
"My task, my duty ! Nothing now on earth
Can taunt me with a work left unfulfilled ! "
The lofty flame, which bore him up so long.
Died in the ashes of humanity ;
And the mere man rocked to and fro again
Upon the centre of his wavering heart.
He put aside his palette, as if thus
He stepped from sacred vestments, and assumed
A mortal function in the common world.
"Now for my rights!" he muttered, and ap¬
proached
The noble body. " 0 lily of the world !
So withered, yet so lovely ! what wast thou
To those who came thus near thee — for I stood
Without the pale of thy half-royal rank —
When thou wast budding, and the streams of life
Made eager struggles to maintain thy bloom.
And gladdened heaven dropped down in gi'acious
■ dews
On its transplanted darling ? Hear me now 1
I say this but in justice, not iu pride.
Not to insult thy high nobility.
But that the jxiise of things iu God's own sight
May be adjusted ; and hereafter I
May urge a claim that all the powers of heaven
Shall sanction, and with clarions blow abroad. —
Laura, you loved me I Look not so severe.
With your cold brows, and deadly, close-druwn
lips !
You proved it. Countess, when you died for it, —
Let it consume you in the wearing strife
It fought with duty in your ravaged heart.
I knew it ever since that summer day
I jjainted LiUa, the pale beggar's child.
At rest beside the fountain ; when I felt —
0 Heaven ! — the warmth and moisture of your
breath
Blow through my hair, as with your eager soul —
Forgetting soul and body go as one —
You leaned across my easel till our cheeks —
Ah me I 't was not your purpose — touched, and
clung I
Well, grant't was genius ; and is genius naught ?
1 ween it wears as proud a diadem —
Here, in this very world — as that you wear.
A king has held my palette, a grand-duke
Has picked my brush up, and a pope has begged
The favor of my presence in his Rome.
I did not go ; I put my fortune by.
I need not ask you why : you knew too well.
It was but natural, it was no way strange.
That I should love you. Everything that saw.
Or had its other senses, loved you, sweet.
And I among tlxem. Martyr, holy saint, —
I see the halo curving round your head, —
I loved you once ; but now I worship you.
For the great deed that held my love aloof.
And killed you in the action ! I absolve
Your soul from any taint. For from the day
Of that encounter by the fountain-side
Until this moment, never turned on me
Those tender eyes, unle.ss they did a wrong
To nature by the cold, defiant glare
With which they chilled me. Never heard I word
Of softness spoken by those gentle lips ;
Never received a bounty from that hand
Which gave to all the world. I know tlie cause.
You did your duty, — not for honor's sake,
N or to save sin, or suHeiing, or remorae.
Or all the ghosts that haunt a woman's shame.
fi¬
fi
POEMS OF
TRAGEDY.
889
But for the sake of that pure, loyal love
Your husband bore you. Queen, by grace of God,
I bow before the lustre of your throne !
I kiss the edges of your garment-hem.
And hold myself ennobled ! Answer me, —
If 1 had wronged you, you would answer me
Out of the dusty porches of the tomb : —
Is this a dream, a falsehood ? or have I
Spoken the very truth ? " "The very truth ! "
A voice replied ; and at his side he saw
A form, half shadow and half substance, stand.
Or, rather, rest ; for on the solid earth
It had no footing, more than some dense mist
That wavers o'er the surface of the ground
It scarcely touches. With a i-everent look
The siiadow's waste and wretched face was bent
Above the picture ; as though greater awe
Subdued its awful being, and appalled,
With memories of terrible delight
And fearful wonder, its devouring gaze.
"You make what God makes, —beauty," said
the shape.
"And might not this, this second Eve, console
The emptiest heart ? Will not this thing outlast
The fairest creature fashioned in the flesh ?
Before that figure. Time, and Death himself.
Stand baffled and disarmed. What would you
ask
More than God's power, from nothing to create ? "
The artist gazed upon the boding form.
And answered : "Goblin, if you had a heart.
That were an idle question. What to me
Is my creative power, bereft of love ?
Or what to God would be that self-same power.
If so bereaved ? " " And yet the love, thus
mourned.
You calmly forfeited. For had you said
To living Laura — in her burning ears —
One half that you professed to Laura dead.
She would have been your own. These contraries
Sort not with my intelligence. But speak.
Were Laura living, would the same stale play
Of raging passion tearing out its heart
Upon the rock of duty be performed ?"
" The same, 0 phantom, while the heart I bear
Trembled, but turned not its magnetic faith
From God's fixed centre." " If I wake for you
This Laura, —give her all the bloom and glow
Of that midsummer day you hold so dear, —
The smile, the motion, the impulsive soul,
The love of genius, — yea, the very love.
The mortal, hungry, passionate, hot love,
Slie bore you, flesh to flesh, — would you receive
That gift, in all its glory, at my hands ? "
A smile of malice curled the tempter's lips.
And glittered in the caverns of his eyes.
Mocking the answer. Carlo paled and shook ;
A woful spasm went shuddering through his
frame.
Curdling his blood, and twisting his fair face
With nameless torture. But he cried aloud.
Out of the clouds of anguish, from the smoke
Of very maityrdom, " 0 God, she is thine !
Do with her at thy pleasure ! " Something grand,
And radiant as a sunbeam, touched the head
He bent in awful sorrow. " Mortal, see — "
" Dare not ! As Christ was sinless, 1 abjure
These vile abominations ! Shall slie bear
Life's burden twice, and life's temptations twice.
While God is justice ?" " Who has made you
judge
Of what you call God's good, and what you think
God's evil ? One to him, the source of both.
The God of good and of permitted ill.
Have you no dream of days that might have been.
Had you and Laura filled another fate ? —•
Some cottage on the sloping Apennines,
Roses and lilies, and the rest all love ?
I tell you that this tranquil dream may be
Filled to repletion. Speak, and in the sh.ade
Of my dark pinions I shall bear you hence,
And land you where the mountain-goat himself
Struggles for footing." He outspread his wings.
And all the chapel darkened, as though hell
Had swallowed up the tapers ; and the air
Grew thick, and, like a current sensible.
Flowed round the person, with a wash and dash.
As of the waters of a nether sea.
Slowly and calmly through the dense obscure,
Dove-like and gentle, rose the artist's voice :
" 1 dare not bring her spirit to that shame !
Know my full meaning, — I who neither fear
Your mystic person nor your dreadful power.
Nor shall I now invoke God's potent name
For my deliverance from your toils. I stand
Upon the founded structure of his law.
Established from the first, and thence defy
Your arts, reposing all my trust in that ! "
The darkness eddied off ; and Carlo saw
The figure gathering, as from outer space.
Brightness on brightness ; and his former shape
Fell from him, like the ashes that fall off.
And show a core of mellow fire within.
Adown his wings there poured a lambent flood.
That seemed as molten gold, which plashing fell
Upon the floor, enringing him with flame ;
And o'er the tresses of his beaming head
Arose a stream of many-colored light.
Like that which crowns the morning. Carlo stood
Steadfast, for all the splendor, reaching up
The outstretched palms of his untainted soul
Towards heaven for strength. A moment thus ;
then asked.
With reverential wonder quivering through
890
POEMS OF ÏRAGEDÏ.
His sinking voice, " Who, spirit, and what, art
thou ? "
" I am that blessing which men ily from, —
Death."
" Then take my hand, if so God orders it ;
For Laura waits me." " But, bethink thee, man.
What the world loses in the loss of thee !
What wondrous art will suffer with eclipse !
What unwon glories are in store for thee !
What fame, outreachingtimeand temporal shocks.
Would shine upon the letters of thy name
Graven in marble, or the brazen height
Of columns wise with memories of thee ! "
" Take me ! If I outlived the Patriarchs,
I could but paint those features o'er and o'er ;
Lo ! that is done." A smile of pity lit
The seraph's features, as he looked to heaven.
With deep inquiry in his tender eyes.
The mandate came. He touched with downy wing
The sufferer lightly on his aching heart ;
And gently, as the skylark settles down
T'pon the clustered treasures of her nest.
So Carlo softly slid along the prop
Of his tall easel, nestling at the foot
As though he slumbered ; and the morning broke
In silver whiteness over Padua.
George Henry Boker.
GINEVRA.
If thou shouldst ever come by choice or < hance
To Modena, where still religiously
Among her ancient trophies is preserved
Bologna's bucket (in its chain it hangs
M'ithiu that reverend tower, the Guirlandina),
Stop at a palace near the Eeggio gate,
Dwelt in of old by one of the Orsini.
Its noble gardens, terrace above terrace,
And rich in fountains, statues, cypresses.
Will long detain thee ; through their arched
walks.
Dim at noonday, discovering many a glimpse
Of knights and dames, such as in old romance,
And lovers, such as in heroic song,
Perhaps the two, for groves were their delight.
That in the spring-time, as alone they sat.
Venturing together on a tale of love.
Read only part that day. ■— A summer sun
Sets ere one half is seen ; but ere thou go,
Enter the house — prythee, forget it not —
And look awhile upon a picture there.
'T is of a Lady in her earliest 5'outh,
The last of that illustrious race ;
Done by Zampieri — but I care not whom.
He who observes it, ere he passes on.
Gazes his fiU, and comes and comes again.
That he may call it up when far away.
She sits inclining foivrard as to speak.
Her lips half open, and her finger up.
As though she said " Beware ! " her vest of gold
Broidered with flowers, and clasped from head to
foot.
An emerald stone in every golden clasp ;
And on her brow, fairer than alabaster,
A coronet of pearls. But then her face.
So lovely, yet so arch, so full of mirth.
The overflowings of an innocent heart, —
It haunts me still, though many a year has fled.
Like some wüd melody !
Alone it hangs
Over a mouldering heirloom, its companion.
An oaken chest, half eaten by the worm.
But richly carved by Antony of Trent
With Scripture stories from the life of Christ ;
A chest that came from Venice, and had held
The ducal robes of some old Ancestor,
That, by the way — it may be true or false —
But don't forget the picture ; and thou wilt not
When thou hast heard the tale they told me there.
She was an only child ; from infancy
The joy, the pride, of an indulgent Sire ;
Her Mother dying of the gift she gave,
That precious gift, what else remained to him ?
The young Ginevra was his all in life.
Still as she grew, for ever in his sight ;
And in her fifteenth year became a bride.
Marrying an only son, Francesco Doria,
Her playmate from her birth, and her first love..
Just as she looks there in her bridal dress.
She was all gentleness, all gayety.
Her pranks the favorite theme of every tongue.
But now the day was come, the day, the hour ;
Now, frowning, smiling, for the hundredth time.
The nurse, that ancient lady, preached decorum ;
And, in the lustre of her youth, she gave
Her hand, with her heart in it, to Francesco.
Great was the joy ; but at the Bridal-feast,
When all sate down, the bride was wanting
there.
Nor was she to be found ! Her Father cried,
" 'T is but to make a trial of our love ! "
And filled his glass to all ; but his hand shook.
And soon from guest to guest the panic spread.
'T was but that instant she had left Francesco,
Laughing and looking back, and flying still.
Her ivory tooth imprinted on his finger.
But now, alas, she was not to be found ;
Nor from tliat hour could anything be guessed.
But that she was not !
f
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
891
-a
"Weary of his life,
Francesco flew to Venice, and, forthwith.
Flung it away in battle with the Turk.
Orsini lived, — and long mightst thou have seen
An old man wandering as in quest of something,
Something he could not flnd, he knew not what.
When he was gone, the house remained awhile
Silent and tenantless, — then went to strangers.
Full ñfty year's were past, and all forgot.
When, on an idle day, a day of search
Mid the old lumber in the Gallery,
That mouldering chest was noticed ; and 't was
said
By one as young, as thoughtless as Ginevra,
" Why not remove it from its lurking-place ? "
'T was done as soon as said ; but on the way
It burst, it fell ; and lo, a skeleton.
With here and there a pearl, an emerald stcnj,
A golden clasp, clasping a shred of gold !
All else had perished, — save a nuptial-ring.
And a small seal, her mother's legacy.
Engraven with a name, the name of both,
" GiNEVllA."
There then had she found a grave !
Within that chest had she concealed herself.
Fluttering with joy, the happiest of the happy ;
When a spring-lock, that lay in ambush there.
Fastened her down for ever !
Samuel Rogers.
THE MISTLETOE BOUGH.
The mistletoe hung in the castle hall.
The holly branch shone on the old oak wall ;
And the baron's retainers were blithe and gay.
And keeping their Christmas holida}'.
The baron beheld with a father's pride
His beautiful child, young Lovell's bride ;
While she with her bright eyes seemed to be
The star of the goodly company.
" I'm weary of dancing now," she cried ;
" Here tarry a moment, — I '11 hide, I '11 hide !
And, Lovell, be sure thou 'rt first to trace
The clew to my secret lurking-place."
Away she ran, — and her friends began
Each tower to search, and each nook to scan ;
And young Lovell cried, " 0, where dost thou
hide ?
I'm lonesome without thee, my own dear bride."
They sought her that night, and they sought her
next day.
And they sought her in vain when a week passed
away :
In the highest, the lowest, the loneliest spot.
Young Lovell sought wildly,— but found her not.
And years flew by, and their grief at last
Was told as a soiTowful tale long past ;
And when Lovell appeared, the children cried,
"See ! the old man weeps for his fairy bride."
At length an oak chest, that had long lain hid.
Was found in the castle, — they raised the lid.
And a skeleton form lay mouldering there
In the bridal wreath of that lady fair !
O, sad was her fate | —in sportive jest
She hid from her lord in the old oak chest.
It closed with a spring ! — and, dreadful doom.
The bride lay clasped in her living tomb !
Thomas Haynes Bayly.
THE YOUNG GRAY HEAD.
Grief hath been known to turn the young head
gray, —
To silver over in a single day
The bright locks of the beautiful, their prime
Scarcel}' o'erpast ; as in the fearful time
Of Gallia's madness, that discrownèd head
Serene, that on the aecursfed altar bled
Miscalled of Liberty. 0 martyred Queen !
What must the sufferings of that night have
been —•
That one — that sprinkled thy fair tresses o'er
With time's untimely snow ! But now no more.
Lovely, augu.st, unhappy one ! of tliee —
I have to tell a humbler history ;
A village tale, whose only charm, in sooth
(If any), will be sad and simple truth.
" Mother," quoth Ambrose to his thrifty dame,—
So oft our peasant's use his wife to name,
"Father " and " Master" to himself applied.
As life's grave duties matronize the bride, —■
" Mother," quoth Ambrose, as he faced the north
With hard-set teeth, before he issued forth
To his day labor, from the cottage door, —■
" I'm thinking that, to-night, if not before.
There '11 be wild work. Dost hear old Chewton •
roar ?
It's brewing up, down westward ; and look there.
One of those sea-gulls ! ay, there goes a pair ;
And sueh a sudden thaw ! If rain comes on.
As threats, the waters will be out anon.
That path by the ford's a nasty bit of way, —
Best let the young ones bide from school to-day.'
" Do, mother, do ! " the quick-eared urchins cried ;
Two little lasses to the father's side
* A fresh'Watcr spring rushing into the sea, called Chewton
Bunuy.
892
POEMS or TRAGEDY.
Close clinging, as they looked from hira, to spy
The answering language of the mother's eye.
There was denial, and she shook her head :
"Nay, nay, — no harm will come to them," she
said,
" The mistress lets them off these short dark days
An hour the earlier ; and our Liz, she says.
May quite be trusted — and I know't is tme —
To take care of herself and Jenny too.
And so she ought, — she's .seven come first of
May, —
Two years the oldest ; and they give away
The Christmas bounty at the school to-day."
The mother's will was law (alas, for her
That hapless day, poor soul !) — she conld not err,
Thought Ambrose ; and his little fair-haired Jane
(Her namesake) to his heai't he hugged again.
When each had had her tura ; she clinging so
As if that day she could not let him go.
But Labor's sons must snatch a hasty bliss
In nature's tenderest mood. One last fond kiss,
" God bless my little maids ! " the father said,
And cheerly went his way to win their bread.
Then might be seen, the playmate parent gone,
What looks demure the sister pair put on, —
Not of the mother as afraid, or shy.
Or questioning the love that could deny ;
But simply, as their simple training tauglit.
In quiet, plain straightforwardness of thought
(Submissively resigned the hope of play)
Towards the serious business of the day.
To me there's something touching, I confess.
In the grave look of early thoughtfulness.
Seen often in some little childish face
Among the poor. Not that wherein we trace
(Shame to our land, our rulers, and our race !)
The unnatm-al sufferings of the factoi-y child.
But a staid quietness, reflective, mild.
Betokening, in the depths of those young eyes.
Sense of life's cares, without its miseries.
So to the mother's charge, with thoughtful brow.
The docile Lizzy stood attentive now.
Proud of her years and of imputed sense.
And prudence justifying confidence, —
And little Jenny, more demurely still.
Beside her waited the maternal will.
So standing hand in hand, a lovelier twain
Gainsborough ne'er painted : no — nor he of
Spain,
Glorious Murillo ! — and by contrast shown
More beautiful. The younger little one.
With large blue eyes and silken ringlets fair.
By nut-brown Lizzy, with smooth parted hair.
Sable and glossy as the raven's wing.
And lusti-ous eyes as dark.
" Now, mind and bring
Jenny safe home," the mother said, — " don't
stay
To pull a bough or berry by the way :
And when you come to cross the ford, hold fast
Your little sister's hand, till you 're quite past, —
That plank's so crazy, and so slippery
(If not o'erflowcd) the stepping-stones will be.
But you 're good children — steady as old folk —
I'd trust ye anywhere." Then Lizzy's cloak,
A good gray duffle, lovingly she tied.
And amply little Jenny's lack supplied
With her own wannest shawl. " Be sure," said
she,
" To wrap it round and knot it carefully
(Like this), when you come home, just leaving
free
One hand to hold hy. Now, make haste away —
Good will to school, and then good right to play.''
Was there no sinking at the mother's heart
When, all equipt, they turned them to depart ?
When down the lane she watched them as they
went
Till out of sight, was no forefeeling sent
Of coming ill ? In truth I cannot tell ;
Such waraings have been sent, we know full well
And must believe — believing that they are —
In mercy then — to rouse, restrain, prepare.
And now I mind me, something of the kind
Did surely haunt that day the mother's mind.
Making it irksome to bide all alone
By her own quiet heal th. Though never known
For idle gossipry was Jenny Gray,
Yet so it was, that mom she could not stay
At home with her own thoughts, but took her
way
To her next neighbor's, half a loaf to borrow, —
Yet might her store have lasted out the mor¬
row, —
And with the loan obtained, she lingered still.
Said she, " My master, if he'd had his will.
Would have kept back our little ones from school
This dreadful morning ; and I'm such a fool.
Since they've been gone, I've wished them back.
But then
It won't do in such things to humor men, —
Our Ambrose specially. If let alone
He'd spoil those wenches. But it's coming on.
That storm he said was brewing, sure enough, —
Well ! what of that ? To think what idle stuff
Will come into one's head ! And here with you
I stop, as if I'd nothing else to do —
And they '11 come home, drowned rats. I must
be gone
To get diy things, and set the kettle on."
&
POEMS OF TRAGEÜF.
893
-a
His day's \work done, three mol^tal milea and
' more, I
Lay between Ambrose and his cottage-door.
A weary way, God wot, for weary wight !
But yet far off the curling smoke in sight
From his own chimney, and Ids heart felt light.
How pleasantly the humble homestead stood,
Down the greeu lane, by sheltering Shirley wood!
How sweet the wafting of the evening breeze.
In spring-time, from his two old cherry-trees.
Sheeted with blossom ! And in hot July,
From the brown moor-track, shadowless and dry,
How grateful the cool covert to regain
Of his own avenue, — that shady lane.
With the white cottage, in a slanting glow
Of sunset glory, gleaming bright below,
And jasmine porch, his rustic portico !
With what a thankful gladness in his face,
(Silent heart-homage, — plant of special grace !)
At the lane's entrance, slackening oft his pace.
Would Ambrose send a loving look before,
Conceiting the caged blackbird at the door ;
The very blackbird strained its little throat.
In welcome, with a more rejoicing noté ;
And hone.st Tinker, dog of doubtful breed.
All bristle, back, and tail, but "good at need,"
Pleasant his greeting to the accustomed ear ;
But of all welcomes pleasantest, most dear.
The ringing voices, like sweet silver bells.
Of his two little ones. How fondly swells
The father's heart, as, dancing np the lane.
Each clasps a hand in her small hand again.
And each must tell her tale and " say her say,"
Impeding as she leads with sweet delay
(Childhood's blest thoughtlessness I) his onward
way.
And when the winter day closed in so fast ;
Scarce for his task would dreary daylight last ;
And in all weathers — driving sleet and snow —
Home by that bare, bleak moor-track must he go,
Darkling and lonely. 0, the blessed sight
(His polestar) of that little twinkling light
From one small window, through the leafless
trees,—
Glimmering so fitfully ; no eye but his
Had spied it so far olf. And sure was he.
Entering the lane, a steadier beam to see.
Buddy and broad as peat-fed hearth could pour.
Streaming to meet him from the open door.
Then, though the blackbird's welcome was un¬
heard, —
Silenced by winter, — note of summer bird
Still hailed him from no mortal fowl alive.
But from the cuckoo clock jast striking five.
And Tinker's ear and Tinker's nose were keen,—
Off .started he, and then a fonu was seen
Darkening the doorway ; and a smaller sprite.
And then another, peered into the night.
Ready to follow free on Tinker's track.
But for the mother's hand that held her back :
And yet a moment — a few steps — and there.
Pulled o'er the threshold by that eager pair.
He sits by his own hearth, in his own chair ;
Tinker takes post beside with eyes that say,
" Master, we've done our business for the day."
The kettle sings, the cat in chorus purrs.
The busy housewife with her tea-things stirs ;
The door's made fast, the old stuff cuitain
drawn ;
How the hail clatters I Let it clatter on !
How the wind raves and rattles I What cares he ?
Safe housed and warm beneath his own roof-tree.
With a wee lassie prattling on each knee.
Such was the hour—hour sacred and apart —
Warmed in expectancy the poor man's heart.
Summer and winter, as his toil he plied.
To him and his the literal doom applied.
Pronounced on Adam. But the bread was sweet
So earned, for such dear mouths. The weary feet,
Hope-shod, stept lightly on the homeward way ;
So specially it fared with Ambro.se Gray
That time I tell of. He had worked all day
At a great clearing ; vigorous .stroke on stroke
Striking, till, when he stopt, his back seemed
broke.
And the strong arms dropt nerveless. What of
that ?
There was a treasure hidden in his hat, —
A plaything for the j'oung ones. He had found
A dormouse nest ; the living ball coiled round
For its long winter sleep ; and all his thought.
As he trudged stoutly homeward, was of naught
But the glad wonderment in Jenny's eyes.
And graver Lizzy's quieter surprise.
When he should yield, by guess and kiss and
prayer
Hard won, the frozen captive to their care.
'T was a wild evening, — wild and rough. " I
knew,"
Thought Ambrose, "those unlucky gulls spoke
true, —
And Gaffer Chewton never growls for naught, —■
I should be moital 'mazed now if I thought
My little maids were not safe housed before
That blinding hail-storm, — ay, tliis hour and
more, —
Unless by that old crazy bit of board.
They've not p<assed dry-foot over Shallow ford.
That I '11 be bound for, — swollen as it must
be —
AVeil ! if my mistress had been ruled by me — "
But, checking the half-thought as licresy.
ß"
894
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
-a
He looked out for the Home Star. There it
shone,
And with a gladdened heart he hastened on.
He's in the lane again, — and there below,
Streams from the open doorway that red glow.
Which warms him hut to look at. For his prize
Cautious he feels, — all safe and snug it lies. —
"Down, Tinker ! down, old boy ! — not quite so
free, —
The thing thou sniffest is no game for thee. —
But what's the meaning ? no lookout to-night !
No living soul astir ! Pray God, all's right !
Who's flittering round the peat-stack in such
weather ?
Mother 1 " you might have felled him with a
feather,
When the short answer to his loud "Hillo ! "
And huiried question, "Are they come?" was
" No." .
To throw his tools down, hastily unhook
The old cracked lantern from its dusty nook.
And, while he lit it, speak a cheering word.
That almost choked him, and was scarcely heard,
Wils but a moment's act, and he was gone
To where a fearful foresight led him on.
Passing a neighbor's cottage in his way, —
Mark Fenton's, —him he took with short delay
To bear him company, — for who could say
What need might be ? They struck into the track
The children should have taken coming back
From school that day ; and manya call and shout
Into the pitch}' darkness they sent out.
And, by the lantern light, peered all about,
In every roadside thicket, hole, and nook,
Till suddenly — as Hearing now the brook —
Something brushed past them. That was Tink¬
er's bark,—
Unheeded, he had followed in the dark.
Close at his master's heels ; but, swift as light,
Darted before them now. " Be sure he's right, —
He's on the track," cned Ambrose. " Hold the
light
Low down, — he's making for the water. Hark !
I know that whine, — the old dog's found them,
Mark."
So speaking, breathlessly he hurried on
Toward the old crazy foot-bridge. It was gone !
And all his dull contracted light could show
Was the black void and dark swollen stream below.
"Yet there's life somewhere, — more than Tink¬
er's whine, —
That's sure,'' said Mark. " So, let the lantern
shine
Down yonder. There's the dog, — and, hark I "
" 0 dear 1 "
And a low sob came faintly on the ear.
Mocked by the sobbing gust. Down, quick as
thought.
Into the stream leapt Ambrose, where he caught
Fa.st hold of something,—a dark huddled heap, —
Half in the water, where't was scarce knee-deep
For a tall man, and half above it, propped
By some old ragged side-piles, that had stopt
Endways the broken plank, when it gave way
With the two little ones that luckless day !
" My babes ! — my lambkins ! " was the father's
cry.
One Ultle voice made answer, " Here am I ! "
'T was Lizzy's. There she crouched with face as
white.
More ghastly by the flickering lantern-light
Than sheeted corpse. The pale blue lips drawn
tight,
AVide parted, showing all the pearly teeth,
And eyes on some dark object underneath.
Washed by the turbid water, fixed as stone, —
One aim and hand stretched out, and rigid
grown.
Grasping, as in the death-gripe, Jenny's frock.
There she lay drowned. Could he sustain that
shock.
The doting father ? Where's the unriven rock
Can bide such blasting in its flintiest part
As that soft sentient thing, — the human heart ?
They lifted her from out her watery bed, —
Its covering gone, the lovely little head
Hung like a broken snowdrop all aside ;
And one small hand, — the mother's shawl was
tied.
Leaving t/ia( free, about the child's small form,
As was her last injunction— "ßist and warm " —
Too well obeyed, —too fast ! A fatal hold
Affording to the scrag by a thick fold
That caught and pinned her in the river's bed,
AVhile through the reckless water overhead
Her life-breath bubbled up.
"She might have lived.
Straggling like Lizzy," was the thought that
rived
The wretched mother's heart, when she knew all,
" But for my foolishness about that shawl !
And Master would have kept them back the day ;
But I was wilful, —driving them away
In such wild weather ! "
Thus the toitau-ed heart
Unnaturally against itself takes part,
Drmng the sharp edge deeper of a woe
Too deep already. They had raised her now.
And parting the wet ringlets from her brow.
To that, and the cold cheek, and lips as cold,
The father glued his warm ones, ere they rolled
Once more the fatal shawl — her winding-sheet —
About the precious clay. One heart still beiit.
B-
■5
POEMS OP
TRAGEDY.
Warmed by his heart's blood. To his only child
He turned hiin, but her piteous moaning mild
Pierced him afresh, —and now she knew him not.
" Mother ! " she murmured, "who says I forgot ?
Mother ! indeed, indeed, I kept fast hold.
And tied the shawl quite close—she can't be cold—
But she won't move — we slipt — I don't know
how —
But I held on — and I'm so weary now —
And it's so dark and cold ! O dear ! O dear ! —
And she won't move ; — if daddy was but here ! "
Poor lamb ! she wandered in her mind, 't was
clear ;
But soon the piteous murmur died away.
And quiet in her father's aims she lay, —
They their dead burden had resigned, to take
The living, so near lost. For her dear sake.
And one at home, ho armed himself to boar
His misery like a man, — with tender care
Doffing his coat her shivering form to fold
(His neighbor bearing that which felt no cold).
He clasped her close, and so, with little said.
Homeward they bore the living and the dead.
From Ambrose Gray's poor cottage all that night
Shone fitfully a little shifting light.
Above, below, — for all were watchers there.
Save one sound sleeper, lier, parental care.
Parental watchfulness, ávailed not now.
But in the young suiwivor's throbbing brow.
And wandering eyes, delirious fever burned ;
And all night long from side to side she turned,
Piteously plaining like a wounded dove,
AVith now and then the murmur, "She won't
move."
And lo ! when morning,'as in mockery, bright
Shone on that pillow, passing strange the sight, —
That young head's raven hair was streaked with
white !
No idle fiction this. Such things have been,
AVe kno w. And now I tell what I have seen.
Life struggled long with death in that small frame.
But it was strong, and conquered. All became
As it had been with the poor family, —
All, saving that which nevermore might be :
There was an empty place, — they were but three.
Caroline Bowles Southev.
THE DREAM OF EUGENE ARAM.
'T WAS in the prime of summer time.
An evening calm and cool.
And four-and-twenty happy boys
Came bounding out of school ;
g
There were some that ran, and some that leapt
Like troutlets in a pool.
Away they sped with gamesome minds
And souls untouched by sin ;
To a level mead they came, and there
They dravo the wickets in ;
Pleasantly shone the setting sun
Over the town of Lynn.
Like .sportive deer they coursed about.
And .shouted as they ran.
Turning to mirth all things of earth
As only boyhood can ;
But the usher sat remote from all,
A melancholy man I
His hat was off, his vest apart.
To catch heaven's blessed breeze ;
For a burning thought was in his brow.
And his bosom ill at ease ;
So he leaned his head on his hands, and read
The book between his knees.
Leaf after leaf he turned it o'er.
Nor over glanced aside, —
For the peaee of his soul he read that book
In the golden eventide ;
Much study had made him very lean,
And pale, and leaden-eyed.
At last he shut the ponderous tome ;
AV^ith a fast and fervent grasp
He strained the dusky covers close,
And fixed the brazen hasp :
" 0 God I could I so close my mind.
And clasp it with a clasp I "
Then leaping on his feet upright.
Some moody turns he took, —
Now up the mead, then down the mead,
And past a shady nook, —
And, lo I he saw a little boy
That pored upon a book.
" My gentle lad, what is't you read, —
Romance or fairy fable ?
Or is it some historic page.
Of kings and crowns unstable ? "
The young boy gave an upward glance, —
" It is 'The Death of Abel.' "
The usher took six hasty strides,
As smit with sudden pain, —
Six hasty strides beyond the place,
Then slowly back again ;
And down he sat beside the lad.
And talked with him of Cain ; .
á
896
POEMS OF TRAGEDY.
a
And, long since then, of bloody men.
Whose deeds tradition saves ;
And lonely folk cut off unseen.
And hid in sudden graves ;
And horrid stiibs, in groves forlorn ;
And murders done in caves ;
And how the sprites of injured men
Shriek upward from the sod ;
Ay, how the ghostly hand will point
To show the burial clod ;
And unknown facts of guilty acts
Are seen in dreams from God.
He told how murderers walk the earth
Beneath the curse of Cain, —
With crini.son clouds before their eyes,
And flames about their bi-ain ;
For blood has left upon their souls
Its everlasting stain !
"And well," quoth he, "I know for truth
Their j)angs must be extreme —
Woe, woe, unutterable woe ! —
Who .spill life's .sacred stream.
For why ? Methought, last night I wrought
A murder, in a dream !
" One that had never done me wrong, —
A feeble man and old ;
I led him to a lonely held, —
The moon shone clear and cold :
Now here, said I, this man shall die.
And I will have his gold !
"Two sudden blows with a ragged stick.
And one with a heavy stone.
One hurried gash with a hasty knife, —
And then the deed was done :
There was nothing lying at my feet
But lifeless flesh and bone !
"Nothing but lifeless flesh and bono,
That could not do me ill ;
And yet 1 feared him all the mora
For lying there so still ;
There was a manhood in his look
That murder could not kill !
" And, lo ! the universal air
Seemed lit with ghastly flame, —
Ten thousand thousand dreadful eyas
Were looking down in blame ;
I took the dead man by his hand.
And called upon his name.
"0 God ! it made me quake to see
Such sense within the slain ;
But, when I touched the lifeless clay.
The blood gushed out amain !
For every clot a burning spot
Was scorching in my brain I
" My head was like an ardent coal.
My heart as solid ice ;
My wretched, wretched .soul, I knew.
Was at the Devil's price.
A dozen times I groaned, — the dead
Had never groaned but twice.
"And now, from forth the frowning sky.
From the heaven's topmost height,
I heard a voice, — the awful voice
Of the blood-avenging sprite :
' Thou guilty man ! take up thy dead.
And hide it from my sight ! '
"And I took the dreary body up.
And cast it in a stream, —
The sluggish water black as ink.
The depth was so extreme : —
My gentle boy, remember, this
Is nothing but a dream !
" Down went the corse with a hollow plunge.
And vanished in the pool ;
Anon I cleansed my bloody hands.
And washed my forehead cool.
And sat among the urchins young.
That evening, in the school.
" 0 Heaven ! to think of their white souls.
And mine so black and grim !
I could not share in childi.sh prayer, ^
Nor join in evening hymn ; /
Like a devil of the pit I seemed, /
Mid holy cherubim !
" And Peace went with them, one and all.
And each calm pillow spread ;
But Guilt was my grim chamberlain.
That lighted me to bed.
And drew my midnight curtains round
With fingers bloody red !
" All night I lay in agony.
In anguish dark and deep ;
My fevered eyes 1 dared not close, '
But stared aghast at Sleep ;
For Sin had rendered unto her
The keys of liell to keep !
"All night I lay in agony.
From weary chime to chime ;
With one besetting horrid hint
That racked me all tl»e time, —
ß-
POEMS OP TRAGEDY.
897
-a
A mighty yearning, like the first
Fierce impulse unto crime, —
" One stem tyrannic thought, that made
All other thoughts its slave !
Stronger and stronger every pulse
Did that temptation crave, —
Still urging me to go and see
The dead man in his gmve !
" Heavily I rose vip, as soon
As light was in the sky.
And sought the black accursèd pool
With a wild, misgiving eye ;
And I saw the dead in the river-bed.
For the faithless stream was dry.
" Merrily rose the lark, and shook
The dew-drop from its wing ;
But I never marked its morning flight,
I never heard it sing.
For I was stooping once again
Under the horrid thing.
" With breathless speed, like a soul in chase,
I took him up and ran ;
There was no time to dig a gravo
Before the day began, —
In a lonesome wood, with heaps of leaves,
I hid the murdered man !
"And all that day I read in school.
But my thought was otherwhere ;
As soon as the midday task was done.
In secret I was there, —
And a mighty wind had swept the leaves,
And still the corse was bare !
" Then down I cast me on my face.
And first began to weep.
For I knew my secret then was one
That earth refused to keep, —
Or land or sea, though he should bo
Ten thousand fathoms deep.
" So wills the fierce avenging sprite.
Till blood for blood atones !
Ay, though he's buried in a cavo.
And trodden down with stones.
And years have rotted off his flesh, —
The world shall see his bones !
" 0 God ! that lionid, horrid dream
Besets me now awake !
Again — again, with dizzy brain.
The human life I take ;
And my red right hand grows raging hot.
Like Ci-anmer's at the stake.
" And still no peace for the restless clay
Will wave or mould allow ;
The horrid thing pursues my soul, —
It stands before me now 1 "
The fearful boy looked up, and saw
Huge drops upon his brow.
That very night, while gentle sleep
The urchin's eyelids kissed.
Two stern-faced men set out from Lynn
Through the cold and heavy mist ;
And Eugene Aram walked between,
With gyves upon his wrist.
Thomas Hood.
RAMON".
refugio mine, northern mexico.
DEtTNK and senseless in his place.
Prone and sprawling on his face.
More like brute than any man
Alive or dead, —
By his great pump out of gear.
Lay the peon engineer.
Waking only just to hear.
Overhead,
Angry tones that called his name.
Oaths and cries of bitter blame, —
Woke to hear all this, and waking, turned and
fled!
" To the man who '11 bring to me,"
Cried Intendant Harry Lee, —
Hairy Lee, the English foreman of the mine, —
" Bring the sot alive or dead,
I will give to him," he said,
" Fifteen hundred pesos down.
Just to set the rascal's crown
Underneath this heel of mine ;
Since but death
Deserves the man whose deed.
Be it vice or want of heed.
Stops the pumps that give us breath, —
Stops the pumps that suck the death
From the poisoned lower levels of the mine I "
No one answered, for a cry
From the shaft rose up on high ;
And shuffling, scrambling, tumbling from below.
Came the miners each, the bolder
Mounting on the weaker's shoulder.
Grappling, clinging to their hold or
Letting go.
As the weaker gasped and fell
From the ladder to the well, —
To the poisoned pit of hell
Down below !
•-51
898
POEMS OP TRAGEDY.
" To the man who sets them free,"
Cried the foreman, Harry Lee, —
Harry Lee,-the English foreman of the mine,—
" Brings them out and sets them free,
1 will give that man," said he,
" Twice tliat sum, who with a rope
Face to face with death shall cope :
Let him come who dares to hope ! "
" Hold your peace ! " some one replied.
Standing by the foreman's side ;
" There has one already gone, whoe'er he be I "
Then they held their breath with awe.
Pulling on the rope, and saw
Fainting figures reappear.
On tlie black rope swinging clear.
Fastened by some skilful hand from below ;
Till a score the level gained.
And but one alone remained, —
He the hero and the last.
He whose skilful hand made fast
The long line that brought them back to hope
and cheer !
Haggard, gasping, down dropped he
At the feet of Harry Lee, —
Harry Lee, the English foreman of the mine ;
" I have come," he gasped, " to claim
Both rewards. Señor, — my name
Is Ramon !
I'm the drunken engineer, —
1 'm the coward. Señor—" Here
He fell over, by that sign
Dead as stone !
Bret Harte.
REVELRY OF THE DYING.
[Supposed to be written in India, while the plague was raging,
and playing havoc among the British residents and troops stationed
there. This has been attributed to Alfred Domett and to Bar¬
tholomew Dowling, but was written by neither of them. It first
appeared in the Nnv York Albion, but the author is absolutely un-
knoMrn.J
AVe meet 'neath the sounding rafter.
And the walls around are bare ;
As they shout to our peals of laughter.
It seems that the dead are there.
But stand to your glasses, steady !
AVe drink to our comrades' eyes ;
Quaff a cup to the dead already —
And hurrah for the next that dies I
Not here are the goblets glowing.
Not here is the vintage sweet ;
T is cold, as our hearts are growing,
And dark as the doom we meet.
But stand to your glasses, steady !
And soon shall our pulses rise ;
A Clip to the dead already —
Hurrah for the next that dies !
Not a sigh for the lot that darkles.
Not a tear for the friends that sink ;
We '11 fall, midst the wine-cup's sparkles,
As mute as the wine we drink.
So stand to your glasses, steady !
'T is this that the respite buys ;
One cup to the dead already —
Hurrah for the next that dies I
Time was when we frowned at others ;
We thought we were wiser then ;
Ha ! ha ! let those think of their mothers.
Who hope to see them again.
No ! stand to your glasses, steady !
The thoughtless are here the wise ;
A cup to the dead already —
Hurrah for the next that dies !
There's many a hand that's shaking.
There's many a cheek that's sunk ;
But soon, though our hearts are breaking.
They '11 burn with the wine we've drunk.
So stand to your glasses, steady !
'T is here the revival lies ;
A cup to the dead already —
HuiTah for the next that dies !
There's a mist on the glass congealing,
'T is the hurricane's fiery breath ;
And thus does the warmth of feeling
Turn ice in the grasp of Death.
Ho ! stand to your glasses, steady !
For a moment the vapor flies ;
A cup to the dead already —
Hurrah for the next that dies !
AVho dreads to the dust returning ?
Who shrinks from the sable shore.
Where the high and haughty yearning
Of the soul shall sting no more !
Ho ! stand to yonr glasses, steady 1
The world is a world of lies ;
A cup to the dead already —
Hurrah for the next that dies !
Cut off from the land that bore us.
Betrayed by the land we find.
Where the brightest have gone before us.
And the dullest remain behind —
Stand, stand to yonr glasses, steady f
'T is all wc have left to prize ;
A Clip to the dead already —
And hurrah for the next that dies I
FRAGMENTS.
— §-
899
FRAGMENTS.
The Fikst Tragedy.
So saying, her rash hand in evil hour
Forth reaching to the fruit, she plucked, she eat :
Earth felt the wound ; and Nature from her seat.
Sighing through all her works, gave signs of woe,
That all was lost.
Paradise Lost, Book \x» MiLTON.
He scrupled not to eat
Against his better knowledge, not deceived.
But fondly overcome with female charm.
Earth trembled from her entrails, as again
In pangs, and Nature gave a second groan.
Paradise Lost, Book ix. MiLTON.
Death
Grinned horrible a ghastly smile, to hear
His famine should be filled, and blessed his maw
Destined to that good hour.
Paradise Lost, Book ii. MILTON.
Eefecis of Crime and Grief.
The stings of Falsehood those shall try.
And hard Uukindness' altered eye,
That mocks the tear it forced to ñow ;
And keen Remorse with blood defiled,
And moody Madness laughing wild
Amid severest woe.
On a Distant Prospect o/Eton College, T. GRAY.
My heart is as an anvil unto sorrow,
AVhich beats upon it like a Cyclop's hammer.
And with the noise turns up my giddy brain
And makes me frantic !
P.d-ioardll. c. MARLOWE.
Every sense
Had been o'er.strung by pangs intense ;
And each frail fibre of her b.-ain
(As bowstrings, when relaxed by rain.
The erring arrow haunch aside)
Sent forth her thoughts all wild and wide.
Parisifta, BYRON.
1 am not mad ; — I would to heaven I were !
For then, 'tis like 1 should forget myself ;
0, if I could, what grief 1 should forget !
Kirtg yohn. Act iii. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEARE.
porte.nts and Fears.
CilSAP.. Speak ! Ctesar is tumed to hear.
Soothsayer. Beware the Ides of March !
Julius Casar. Act j. Sc. 2, SHAKESPEARE.
Fierce fieiy wariiore fought upon the clouds.
In ranks and squadrons, and right form of war.
Which drizzled blood upon the Capitol.
O Caesar ! these things are beyond all use.
And I do fear them.
IVTien beggars die there are no comets seen ;
The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of
princes.
yulins Casar, Act >i. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEAREi
Danger knows full well
That Caesar is more dangerous than he.
We are two lions littered in one day.
And 1 the elder and more terrible.
yulins Casar, Act 0. Sc. 2. SHAKESPEARE.
What is danger
More than the weakness of our apprehensions ?
A poor cold part o' th' blood ; who takes it hold of?
Cowards and wicked livers ; valiant minds
Were made the masters of it.
diattccs. Beaumont and Fletcher.
C.a!sar. The Ides of March are come.
Soothsayer. Ay, Ctesar ; but not gone.
yulitcs Casar, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Eyes, look your last :
Arms, take your last embrace ; and lips,
O ! you.
The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss
A dateless bargain to engi'ossing death.
Romeo and yuliet. Act v. Sc. 3. SHAKESPEARE.
The King's Enemy.
Thou art a traitor. —
Off with his head ! — now by Saint Paul I swear
1 will not dine until I see the same.
Kin¿ Richard III., Act iii. Sc. 4, SHAKESPEARE.
Off with his head ! so much for Buckingham 1
Shakespeare's Richard III. (Altered), Activ, Sc. 3.
Revenge.
And if we do but watch the hour.
There never yet was human power
Which could evade, if unforgiven.
The patient search and vigil long
Of him who treasures up a wrong.
Mazeppa. BYRON.
I will feed fat the ancient grudge I bear him.
Merchant 0/ Venice, Act L Sc. a. SHAKESPEARE.
If it will feed nothing else, it will feed my re¬
venge.
tferchant 0/Pctticc, Act iii. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Vengeance to God alone belongs ;
But when 1 think on all my wrongs.
My blood is liquid flame.
Marmion, Cant. vi. SCOTT.
[0-
900
POEMS OP TRAGEDY.
-a
FOIIEI-HOUOHT OF MUHDEIl.
There shall be done
A deed of dreadful note.
Macht*, jict Hi. Sc. 2. Shakespeare.
Between the acting of a dreadful thing,
And the first motion, all the interim is
Like a phantasma, or a hideous dream :
The Genius, and the mortal instruments.
Are then in council ; and the state of man.
Like to a little kingdom, sulfers then
The nature of an insurrection.
yuliiis Cesar, Act i. Sc. u SHAKESPEARE.
If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well
It were done quickly : if the assassination
Could trammel up the consequence, and catch
With his surcease, success ; that but this blow
Might be the be-all and the end-all here,
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, —
We'd jump the life to come.
Besides, this Duncan
Hath home his faculties so meek, hath been
So clear in his gieat office, that his virtues
Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against
The deep damnation of his taking-off.
Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 7. SHAKESPEARE.
Put out the light, and then — put out the light.
If I quench thee, thou flaming minister,
I can again thy former light restore.
Should 1 repent me ; but once put out thy light.
Thou cunning'st pattern of excelling nature,
I know not where is that Promethean heat.
That can thy light relume. When I have plucked
thy rose
I cannot give it vital growth again.
It needs must wither.
Othello, Act ▼, Sc. a.
SHAKESPEAiyit.
Stop up th' access and passage to remorse.
That no compunctious visitings of nature
Shake my fell purpose, nor keep peace between
Th' effect and it.
Macbeth, Act i. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE,
Let's kill him boldly, but not wrathfully ;
Let '3 carve him as a dish fit for the gods.
Not hew him as a carcase fit for hounds.
Julius Casar, Act U« Sc. i. Shakespeare,
Afterwards.
0, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven ;
It hath the primal eldest curse upon't,
A brother's murder.
//ainkt, ActUL Sc. 3, SHAKESPEARE.
o horror ! horror ! horror ! Tongue nor heart
Cannot conceive nor name thee.
Confusion now hath made his ma.ster-pieco.
Most sacrilegious murder hath broke ope
The Lord's anointed temple, and stole thenco
The life o' the building.
Macbeth, Act iU Sc. 3.
SHAKESPEARa
Blood, though it sleep a time, yet never dies ;
The gods on murderers fix revengeful eyes.
IVidotiis Tears. CHAPMAN.
Foul deeds will rise.
Though all the earth o'erwhelm them, to men's
eyes.
Hamlet, Act I Sc, a. SHAKESPEARE.
0 blisful God, that art so just and trewe !
Lo, howe that thou biwreyest mordre alway !
Mordre wol out, that so we day by day.
The Nonnes Preestes Tale. CllAUCER.
For murder, though it have no tongue, will .^peak
With most miraculous organ.
HamUt, Act it. Sc. ,. SHAKESPEARE.
The Hardened Criminal.
1 have almost forgot the taste of fear.
The time has been, my senses would have quailed
To hear a night-shriek ; and my fell of hair
Would at a dismal treatise rouse, and stir.
As life were in't. I have supped full with h.or-
rors ;
Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts.
Cannot once start me.
Macbeth, Act v. Sc. 4. SHAKESPEA.RE.
Suicide.
All mankina
Is one of the.se two cowards ;
Either to wish to die
When he should live, or live when he should die.
The Blind Lady. SIR R. Howard.
Our enemies have beat us to the hip :
It is more worthy to leap in ourselves
Than tairy till they push us.
Julius Casar, Act v. Sc. 5. SHAKESPEARE.
Ho
That kills himself t' avoid misery, fears it.
And at the best shows but a bastard valor :
This life's a fort committed to my trust.
Which I must not 3deld up, till it be forced ;
Nor will I ; he's not valiant that dares die.
But he that boldly beam calamity.
The Maidc/limer. P. MASSINGRR.
PERSONAL POEMS.
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7t^<^Cd^CcY'
'S 31
PERSONAL POEMS,
PRAXITELES.
FROM THE CREEK.
Venus (loquitur). Paris, Anchises, and Adonis
— three,
Three only, did me ever naked see ;
But this Praxiteles — when, where, did he ?
DIRGE OF ALARIO THE VISIGOTH.
fAUnc stormed and spoiled the city of Rome, and was afterwards
buried in the channel of the river Busentlus, the water of which
had been diverted from its course that the body might be interred.]
When I am dead, no pageant train
Shall waste their sorrows at my bier.
Nor worthless pomp of homage vain
Stain it with hypocritic tear ;
For I will die as I did live, •
Nor take the boon I cannot give.
Ye shall not raise a marble bust
Upon the spot where I repose ;
Ye shall not fawn before my dust.
In hollow circumstance of woes ;
Nor sculptured clay, with lying breath.
Insult the clay that moulds beneath.
Ye shall not pile with servile toil
Your monuments upon my breast.
Nor yet within the common soil
Lay down the wreck of power to rest ;
Where man can boast that he has trod
On him that was "the scourge of God."
But ye the mountain-stream .shall turn.
And lay its secret channel bare
And hollow, for your sovereign's urn
A resting-place forever there ;
Then bid its everlasting springs
Flow biick upon the king of kings ;
And never be the seciet said,
Until the deep give up his dead.
My gold and silver ye shall fling
Back to the clods that gave them birth
The captured crowns of many a king.
The ransom of a conquered earth ;
Foi e'en though dead will I control
The trophies of the capitol.
But when, beneath the mountain-tide.
Ye've laid your monarch down to rot,
Ye shall not rear upon its side
Pillar or mound to mark the spot ;
For long enough the world has shook
Beneath the terrors of my look ;
And now, that I have run my race,
The astonished realms shall rest a space.
My course was like a river deep,
And from the northern hills I burst.
Across the world in wrath to sweep.
And where I went the spot waä cursed.
Nor blade of grass again was seen
Where Alaiic and his hosts had been.
See how their haughty bairiere fail
Beneath the terror of the Goth,
Their iron-breasted legions quail
Before my ruthless sabaoth,
And low the queen of empires kneels.
And grovels at my chariot-wheels.
Not for myself did I ascend
In judgment my triumphal car ;
'T was God alone, on high, did send
The avenging Scythian to the war.
To shake abroad, with iron hand.
The appointed scourge of his command.
With iron hand that scourge I reared
O'er guilty king and guilty realm ;
Destruction was the ship I steered.
And Vengeance sat upon the helm.
When, launched in fury on the flood,
I ploughed my way through seas of blood.
Ami, in the stream their heaits had spilt.
Washed out the long arrears of guilt.
[fi a
,, 904 PERSONAL POEMS.
Across the everlasting Alp
I poured the torrent of my powers.
And feeble Ciesars shrieked for help.
In vain, within their seven-hilled towers !
I quenched in blood the brightest gem
That glittered in their diadcni.
And struck a darker, deeper dye
In the purple of their majesty.
And bade my Northern banners shine
Upon the conquered Palatine.
My course is run, my ei-rand done ;
I go to Him from whom I came ;
But never yet shall set the sun
Of glory that adorns my name ;
And Roman hearts shall long be sick,
When men shall think of Alaiic.
My course is run, my errand done ;
But darker ministem of fate.
Impatient, round the eternal throne.
And in the caves of vengeance, wait ;
And soon mankind shall blench away
Before the name of Attila.
Edward Everett.
1&
THE COMPLEYNTE OF CHAUCER TO
HIS PURSE.*
To you, my purse, and to noon other wight
Compleyn I, for ye be my lady dere !
I am so sony now that ye been lyght.
For certes, but-yf ye make me bevy chere,
Me were as leaf be layde upon my here,
For whiche unto your mercy thus I crye, —
Beeth hevy ageyne, or ellès mote I dye !
Now voucheth sauf this day, or it be nyghte,
That I of you the blissful soune may here.
Or see your colour lyke the sonné bryghte.
That of yclownesse haddè never i)ere.
Ye be my lyfe ! ye be myn hertys stere !t
Quene of comfort and good companye !
Beth hevy ageyne, or ellès mote I dye.
Now, purse, that ben to me my lyves lyght
And saveour, as doun in this worlde here.
Cute of this toune helpe me thurgh your myght,
• " From this unique petition," says Mr. Gilman in his "River¬
side " Chauttr, " there seems to have resulted an additional pension
of forty marks a year, on the strength oí which Chaucer took a lease
of a house in the garden of St. Mary's Chapel, Westminster, for
fifty-three years, at an annual rent of two pounds thirteen shillings
and fourpcnce, the lease to be void on the poet's death." So that
the practical results of this poetical plaint show that Chaucer well
described one of his own characteristics in his description of the
Marchant, among his Canterbury Pilgrims, —
" This worthy loau ful wel his wit blsette [used]» "
t guide.
Syn that ye wole not ben my tresorere ;
For 1 am shave as :iye as is a frere.
But I praye unto your curtesye
Beth hevy ageyn, or elles irioote I dye !
L'ENVOYE DE CHAUCER.
O conquerour of Brutes Albyoun,*
Whiclie that by lygne and free eleccionn
Been verray Kynge,t this song to you I sende,
And ye that mowen J alle myn harine amende,
Have mynde upon my supplicacioun !
Geoffrev Chaucer.
SIR PHILIP SIDNEY.
FROM "AN ELEGY ON A FRtEND'S PASSION FOR HIS
ASTROPHILL."
Within these woods of Arcadie
He chiefe delight and pleasure tooke.
And on the mountaine Partheiiie,
Upon the chrystall liquid brooke,
The Muses met him ev'ry day,
That taught him sing, to write, and say.
When he descended downe to the mount.
His personage seemed most divine,
A thousand graces one might count
Ujwm his lovely, cheerfull eine ;
To heare him speake and sweetly smile,
You were in Paradise the while.
A sweet attractive kinde of grace,
A full assurance given by lookes,
Continuall comfort in a face.
The lineaments of Gospell bookes ;
I trowe that countenance cannot lie.
Whose thoughts are legible in the eie.
Was never eie did see that face,
Was never care did heare that tong.
Was never minde did minde his grace.
That ever thought the travell long ;
But eies, and eares, and ev'ry thought.
Were with his sweete perfections caught.
Matthew royden.
ANNE HATHAWAY.
to the idol op my eve and delight of my heart,
anne hathaway.
Woui.D ye be taught, ye feathered throng,
With love's sweet notes to grace your soug.
To pierce the heart with thrilling lay.
Listen to mine Anne Hathaway !
* The Albion of Brutus, a descendant of Eneas,
t Kmg Heury IV. seems to be ineanL { may.
á
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PERSONAL POEMS.
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905
She hath a way to sing so clear,
Phoebus might wondering stop to hear.
To melt the sad, make blithe the gay.
And nature charm, Anne hath a way ;
She hath a way,
Anne Hathaway ;
To breathe delight Anne hath a way.
When Envy's breath and rancorous tooth
Bo soil and bite fair worth and truth.
And merit to distress betr.ay.
To soothe the heart Anne hath a way ;
She hath a way to chase despair.
To heal all grief, to cure all care.
Turn foulest night to fairest day.
Thou know'st, fond heart, Anne hath a way ;
She hath a way,
Anne Hathaway ;
To make grief bliss. Aune hath a way.
Talk not of gems, the orient list,
The diamond, topaz, amethyst.
The emerald mild, the ruby gay ;
Talk of my gem, Anne Hathaway !
She hath a way, with her bright eye,
Their various lustres to defy, —
The jewels she, and the foil they.
So sweet to look Anne hath a way ;
She hath a way,
Anne Hathaway ;
To shame bright gems, Anne hath a way.
But were it to my fancy given
To rate her charms, I'd call them heaven ;
For, though a mortal made of clay.
Angels must love Anne Hathaway ;
She hath a way so to control,
To rapture, the imprisoned soul.
And sweetest heavep on earth display.
That to be heaven Anne hath a way ;
She hath a way,
Anne Hathaway ;
To be heaven's self, Anne hath a way.
Anonymous*
ON THE PORTRAIT t OF SHAKESPEARE.
•
This figure, that thou here seest put.
It was for gentle Shakespeare cut ;
Wherein the Graver had a strife
With Nature to outdo the life :
O, could he but have drawn his wit
As well in brass, as he hath hit
* This poem ha.s sometimes, but without much reason, been
attributed to Shakespeare,
i The engraving by Martin Droeshout.
His face ; the Print would then surpass
All that was ever writ in brass.
But since he cannot. Reader, look
Not at his picture, but his book.
Ben Jo.nson.
SHAKESPEARE.
from " prolooue " spoken by mr. gareick at the open¬
ing of the theatre in druky lane, in 1747.
When Learning's triumph o'er her barbarous
foes
First reared the stage, immortal Shakespeare rose;
Each change of many-colored life he drew.
Exhausted worlds, and then imagined new :
Existence saw him spurn her bounded reign.
And panting Time toiled after him m vain :
Iiis powerful strokes presiding Truth impressed,
And unresisted Passion stormed the breast.
Dr Samuel Johnson.
TO THE MEMORY OF MY BELOVED
MASTER, WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE,
AND WHAT HE HATH LEFT US.
To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name.
Am I thus ample to thy book and fame ;
While I confess thy writings to be suc h
As neither man nor Muse can praise too much.
'T is true, and all men's suffrage. But these ways
Were not the paths I meant unto thy praise j
For silliest ignorance on these would light.
Which, when it sounds at best, but echoes right;
Or blind alfection, which doth ne'er advance
The truth, but gropes, and urges all by chance ;
Or crafty malice might pretend this jiraise.
And think to ruin, where it seemed to raise.
But thou art proof against them, and, indeed,
Above the ill fortune of them, or the need.
I therefore will begin : Soul of the age !
The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage !
My Shakespeare, rise ! I will not lodge thee by
Chaucer, or Spenser, or hid Beaumont lie
A little further off, to make thee room :
Thou art a monument without a tomb.
And art alive still, while thy book doth live.
And we have wits to read, and praise to give.
That I not mix thee so, my brain excuses,
I mean with great but disproportioned Muses :
For if I thought my judgment were of years,
I should commit thee surely with thy peers.
And tell how far thou didst our Lyly outshine.
Or sporting Kyd or Marlowe's mighty line.
And though thou had small Latin and less Greek,
From thence to honour thee I will not seek
For names ; but call forth thundering Eschylus,
Euripides, and Sophocles to us,
f
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PERSONAL POEMS.
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Pacuvius, Accius, him of Cordova dead,
To live again, to hear thy buskin tread.
And shake a stage : or when thy socks were on.
Leave thee alone for the comparison
Of all, that insolent Greece or haughty Rome
Sent forth, or since did from their ashes come.
Triumph, my Britain, thou hast one to show.
To whom all scenes of Europe homage owe.
He was not of an age, but for all time !
And all the Muses still were in their prime,
"When, like Apollo, he came forth to warm
Our ears, or like a Mercury, to charm !
Nature herself was proud of his designs.
And joyed to wear the dressing of his lines !
Which were so richly spun, and woven so fit.
As, since, she will vouchsafe no other wit.
The merry Greek, tart Aristophanes,
Neat Terence, witty Plautus, now not please :
But antiquated and deserted lie.
As they were not of nature's family.
Yet must I not give nature all ; thy art.
My gentle Shakesfieare, must enjoy a part.
For though the poet's matter nature be.
His art doth give the fashion ; and, that ho
Who casts to write a living line, must sweat
(Such as thine are) and strike the second heat
Upon the Muses' anvil ; turn the same.
And himself with it, that he thinks to frame ;
Or for the laurel, he may gain a scorn ;
For a good poet's made as well as bom.
And such wert thou ! Look how the father's face
Lives in his issue, even so the race
Of Shakespeare's mind and manners brightly
shines
In his well turned and true filed lines ;
In each of which he seems to shake a lance.
As brandished at the eyes of ignorance.
Sweet Swan of Avon ! what a sight it were
To see thee in our water yet appear.
And make those flights upon the banks of Thames
That so did take Eliza and our James !
But stay, I see thee in the hemisphere
Advanced, and made a constellation there !
Shine forth, thou Star of Poets, and with rage.
Or influence, chide, or cheer the drooping stage
Which since thy flight from hence hath mourned
like night.
And despairs day, but for thy volume's light !
Ben Jonson.
SHAKESPEARE.
The soul of man is larger than the sky.
Deeper than ocean, or the abysmal dark
Of the unfathomed centre. Like that ark.
Which in its sacred hold uplifted high,
O'er the drowned hills, the human family.
And stock reserved of every living kind.
So, in the compass of the single mind.
The seeds and pregnant forms in essence lie.
That make all worlds. Great poet, 'twas thy
aii
To know thyself, and in thyself to hß.
Whate'er love, hate, ambition, destiny.
Or the firm fatal purpose of the heajit
Can make of man. Yet thou wert still the
same.
Serene of thought, unhurt by thy own flame.
Hartley Colhriuce.
AN EPITAPH ON THE ADMIRABLE
DRAMATIC POET, W. SHAKESPEARE.
What needs my Shakespeare for his honored
bones.
The labor of an age in piled stones ?
Or that his hallowed relics should be hid
Under a star-y-pointing pyramid ?
Dear son of memory, great heir of fame.
What need'st thou such weak witness of thy
name ?
Thou in our wonder and astonishment
Hast built thyself a livelong monument.
For whilst to the shame of slow-endeavoring art
Thy easy numbers flow, and that each heart
Hath from the leaves of thy unvalued book
Those Delphic lines with deep itnpression took.
Then thou our fancy of itself bereaving.
Dost make us marble with too much conceiv-
i"g;
And so sepulchred in such pomp dost lie.
That kings for such a tomb would wish to die.
Milton.
TO THE MEMORY OF BEN JONSON.
The Muse's fairest light in no dark time-.
The wonder of a leamèd age ; the line
Which none can pass ! the most proportioned
wit, —
To nature, the best judge of what was fit i/
The deepest, plainest, highest, clearest peu \
The voice most echoed by consenting men -j
Tlic soul which answered best to all well .saiiR
By other's, and which most requital made
Tuned to the highest key of ancient Romey
Returning all her music with his own ; ^
In whom, with nature, study claimed a parU
And yet who to himself owed all his art
Here lies Ben Jonson ! every age will look\
With sorrow here, with wonder on his boolç
John Cleveland.
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PERSONAL POEMS.
907
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ODE TO BEN JONSON.
Ah Ben !
Say how or when
Shall we, thy guests,
Meet at those lyric feasts,
Made at the Sun,
The Dog, .the Triple Tun ;
Where we such cluster's had
As made us nobly wild, not mad ;
And yet each verse of thine
Outdid the meat, outdid the frolic wine.
My Ben !
Or come again.
Or send to us
Thy wit's great overplus ;
But teach us yet
Wisely to husband it.
Lest we that talent spend :
And having once brought to an end
That precious stocrk, the store
Of such a wit, the world should have no more.
Rodert iTerricr.
BEN JONSON'S COMMONPLACE BOOK.
His learning such, no author, old or new.
Escaped his reading that deserved his view ;
And such his judgment, so exact his taste.
Of what was best in books, or what books best.
That had he joined those notes his labor's took
From each most praised and praise-deserving
book.
And could the world of that choice treasure boast.
It need not care though all the rest were lust.
Lucius Gary (Loro falkior.mj).
à
EPITAPH ON THE COUNTESS OF
PEMBROKE.
Unberneath this sable hearse
Lies the subject of all verse,
Sydney's sister, — Pembroke's mother.
Death, ere thou hast slain another
Fair and wise and good as she,
Time shall throw a dart at thee !
Marble piles let no man raise
To her name in after days ;
Some kind woman, born as she,
Reading this, like Niobe
Shall turn marble, and become
Both her mourner and her tomb.
13un jo.sson.
EPITAPH ON ELIZABETH L. H.
WouLDST thou heare what man can say ^
Ina little ? — reader, stay !
Underneath this stone doth lye
As much beauty as could dye, —
Which in life did harbor give
To more vertue than doth live.
If at all she had a fault.
Leave it buried in this vault.
One name was Elizabeth, —
The Other, let it sleep with death :
Fitter where it dyed to tell.
Than that it lived at all. Farewell !
Ben Jo-nso.n.
UNDER THE PORTRAIT OF JOHN
MILTON.
prefixed to " paradise lost."
Three Poets, in three distant ages bom,
Greece, Italy, and England did adorn.
The first in loftiness of thought surpassed ;
The next in majesty ; in both the last.
The force of nature could no further go :
■Pp make ^ third,íshe joined Rhe forrcfer
V ^ JofiN
■ twd.
r drvden.
TO MILTON.
•'london, 1302."
Milton 1 thou should^t be li\^g at this hour : "
England hath need of thee ; sne is a len t-
Of stagnant waters : altar, sword, and pen, v
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower, t
Have forfeited their ancient English dower '
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men ;
Oh ! raise us up, return to us again ; '•*
And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power. •'
Thy soul was like a star, and dwelt apart : ''
Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea ; «•
Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free, it
So didst thou travel on life's common way, S
In cheerful godliness ; and yet thy heart
The lowliest duties on herself did lay^ ''
William Wordsworth.
THE SONNET. , ,
/ / / / ^
Scorn not the sonnet ; critic, you have frowned.
Mindless of its just honors ; with this key
Shakespeare unlocked his heart ;. the melody
Of this small lute gave ease to Petrarch's wound ;
A thousand times this pipe did Tasso sound ;
With it Camoëns soothed an exile's grief ;
The sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf
908
PEllSOxNAL POEMS.
Amid/the cyj^ess with/which Dante^crowned
His vistôuary brow;, a glow-wo^u lamp,.
It cheered müd Spàser^ called fronufaii/y-lánd
To struggle through dark ways ; aild when a damp
Fell round the path of Milton, in his hand
The thing became a trumpet ; whence he blew
Soul-animating strains, — alas ! too few.
William Wordsworth.
—«
ON A BUST OF DANTE.
See, from this counterfeit of him
Whom Arno shall remember long,
How stern of lineament, how grim.
The father was of Tuscan song !
There but the burning sense of wrong.
Perpetual care, and scorn, abide —
Small friendship for the lordly throng.
Distrust of all the world beside.
Faithful if this wan image be.
No dream his life was — but a fight ;
Could any Beatrice see
A lover in that anchorite ?
To that cold Ghibeline's gloomy sight
Who could have guessed the visions came
Of beauty, veiled with heavenly light.
In circles of eternal flame ?
The lips as Cumse's cavern close.
The cheeks with fast and sorrow thin.
The rigid front, almost morose.
But for the patient hope within.
Declare a life whose course hath been
Unsullied still, though still severe.
Which, through the wavering days of sin.
Kept itself icy-chaste and clear.
Not wholly such his haggard look
When wandering once, forlorn, he strayed.
With no companion save his book.
To Corvo's hushed monastic shade ;
Where, as the Benedictine laid
His palm upon the pilgrim guest.
The single boon for which he prayed
The convent's charity was rest.
Peace dwells not here — this rugged face
Betrays no spirit of repose ;
The sullen warrior sole we trace.
The marble man of many woes.
Such was his mien when first arose
The thought of that strange tale divine —
When hell he peopled with his foes.
The scourge of many a guilty line.
War to the last he waged with all
The tyrant canker-worms of earth ;
Baron and duke, in hold and hall,
Cui-sed the dark hour that gave him birth >
He used Rome's harlot for his mirth ;
Plucked bare hypocrisy and crime ;
But valiant souls of knightly worth
Transmitted to the roUs of time.
0 time ! whose verdicts mock our own.
The only righteous judge art thou ;
That poor, old exile, sad and lone.
Is Latium's other Virgil now.
Before his name the nations bow ;
His words are parcel of mankind.
Deep in whose hearts, as on his brow.
The marks have sunk of Dante's mind.
thomas william parsons.
•
WALTON'S BOOK OF LIVES.
from ■' ecclesiastical sonnets." part iii.
There are no colors in the fairest sky «
So fair as these. The feather, whence the pen
Was shaped that traced the lives of these good
men.
Dropped from an angel's wing. With moistened
eye
We read of faith and purest charity
In statesman, priest, and humble citizen :
0, could we copy their mild virtues, then
What joy to live, what blessedness to die !
Methinks their veiy names shine still and bright ;
Apart, —like glow-worms on a summer night ;
Or lonely tapers when from far they fling
A guiding my ; or seen, like stars on high.
Satellites buiming in a lucid ring
Around meek Walton's heavenly memory.
William Wordsworth.
CHARACTER OF THE EARL OF
SHAFTESBURY.
from "absalom and achitophel," part i.
For close designs and crooked councils fit ;
Sagacious, bold, and turbulent of wit ;
Restless, unfixed, in principles and place ;
In power unpleased, impatient of disgrace :
A fiery soul, which, working out its way.
Fretted the pygmy-body to decay.
And o'er informed the tenement of clay.
A daring pilot in extremity ;
Pleased with the danger, when the waves went
high
f
PERSONAL POEMS. Í909
He souglit the storms ; but for a calm unfít,
Would steer too nigh the .sands to boast his wit.
Great wits are sure to madness near allied,
And thin partitions do their bounds divide.
John Dryden.
ZIMRI.
[gEOKGE VILLIEnS, DUKE OF BUCKINGHAM, 1682.]
from "absalom and achitophel." part I-
Some of their chiefs were princes of the land ;
In the first rank of these did Zimri stand ;
A man so various, that he seemed to be
Not one, but all mankind's epitome :
Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong ;
Was everything by starts, and nothing long ;
But, in the course of one revolving moon.
Was chjrmist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon ;
Then all for women, painting, rhyming, drinking.
Besides ten thousand freaks that died in thinking.
Blest madman, who could every hour employ.
With something new to wish or to enjoy !
Railing and praising were his usual themes ;
And both, to show his judgment, in extremes :
So over-violent or over-civil.
That every man with him was god or devil.
In squandering wealth was his peculiar art ;
Nothing went unrewarded but. desert.
Beggared by fools, whom still he found too late :
He had his jest, and they had his estate.
He laughed himself from court, then sought relief
By forming parties, but could ne'er be chief ;
For, spite of him, the weight of business fell
On Absalom, and wise Achitophel.
Thus, wicked but in will, of means bereft.
He left no faction, but of that was left.
john drvden.
BHARLES XII.
from "vanity of human wishes."
On what foundations stands the warrior's pride.
How just his hopes, let Swedish Charles decide;
A frame of adamant, a soul of fire.
No dangers fright him, and no labors tire ;
O'er love, o'er fear, extends his wide domain,
Unconquered lord of pleasure and of pain.
No joys to him pacific sceptres yield.
War sounds the trump, he rushes to the field ;
Behold suiTOunding kings their power combine,
' And one capitulate, and one resign ;
Peace courts his hand, but spreads her charms in
vain ;
"Think nothing gained," he cries, "till naught
remain,
B
On Moscow's walls till Gothic standards ffy.
And all be mine beneath the polar sky."
The march begins in military state.
And nations on his eye suspended wait ;
Stem famine guards the solitary coast.
And winter barricades the realms of frost.
He comes, nor want nor'cold his course delay ;
Hide, blushing glory, hide Pultowa's day !
The vanquished hero leaves his broken bands.
And shows his miseries in distant lands ;
Condemned a needy supplicant to wait.
While ladies interpose and slaves debate.
But did not chance at length her error mend ?
Did no subverted empire mark his end ?
Did rival monarchs give the fatal wound.
Or hostile millions press him to the ground ?
His fall was destined to a barren strand,
A petty fortress, and a dubious hand ;
He left the name, at which the world grew pale.
To point a moml or adorn a tale.
Dr. Samuel Johnson.
TO THE LORD-GENERAL CROMWELL.
Cromwell, our chief of men, who through a
cloud.
Not of war only, but detractions rude.
Guided by faith and matchless fortitude.
To peace and truth thy glorious way hast
ploughed.
And on the neck of crownèd fortune proud
Hast reared God's trophies, and his work pur¬
sued.
While Darwen stream, with blood of Scots im¬
bued.
And Dunbar field resounds thy praises loud.
And Worcester's laureate wreath. Yet much re¬
mains
To conquer still ; Peace hath her victories
No less renowned than War : new foes arise.
Threatening to bind our souls with secular chains :
Help us to save free conscience from the paw
Of hireling wolves, whose gospel is their maw.
milton.
—•—
SPORUS.
[lord hervey.]
from the " prologue to the satires."
Let Sporns tremble,—A.* What ? that thing
of silk,
Sporns, that mere white curd of asses' milk ''
Satire or sense, alas ! can Sporns feel ?
Who breaks a butterfly upon a wheel ?
• Arbmhnot.
S"
910
PERSONAL POEMS.
P.* Yet let me flap tliis bug with gilded
wings,
This painted child of dirt that stinks and stings ;
Whose buzz the witty and the fair annoys,
Yet wit ne'er tastes, and beauty ne'er enjoys :
So well-bred spaniels civilly delight
In mumbling of the game they dare not bite.
Etenial smiles his emptiness betray.
As shallow streams run dimpling all the way.
Whether in florid impotence he speaks.
And, as the prompter breathes, the puppet
squeaks.
Or at the ear of Eve, familiar toad.
Half froth, half venom, spits himself abroad.
In puns, or politics, or tales, or lies.
Or spite, or smut, or rhymes, or blasphemies ;
His wit all seesaw, between that and this,
Now high, now low, now master up, now miss.
And he himself one vile antithesis.
Amphibious thing ! that, acting either part.
The trifling head, or the corrupted heart.
Fop at the toilet, flatterer at the board.
Now trips a lady, and now struts a loi-d.
Eve's tempter thus the rabbins have exprest,
A cherub's face, a reptile all the i-est ;
Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will trust.
Wit that can creep, and pride that licks the dust.
ALEXANDEK POPE.
ADDISON.
FROM THE " PROLOGUE TO THE SATIRES- '
pnace tofall suchl but werfe there one frhpso fire^
Trae genius kindles, and Hair fame ijhspires ;
Elest withj each tafent and iach artigo please.
And bornlto write,V.converse, and live with ease :
Should such a man, too fond to rule alone.
Bear, like the Turk, no brother near the throne.
View him with scornful, yet with jealous eyes.
And hate for arts that caused himself to rise ;
Damn with faint praise, assent with civil leer.
And, without sneering, teach the rest to srieer ;
Willing to wound, and yet afraid to strike.
Just hint a fault, and hesitate dislike ;
Alike reseiwed to blame, or to commend,
A timorous foe, and a suspicious friend ;
Dreading even fools, by flatterers besieged,
And so obliging that he ne'er obliged ;
Like Cato, give his little senate laws.
And sit attentive to his own applause ;
Whilst wits and templars every sentence raise.
And wonder with a foolish face of praise ; —
Who but must laugh, if such a one there be ?
Who would not weep, if Atticus were he ?
Alexander pope.
• Pope.
TO THE EARL OF WARWICK, ON THE
DEATH OF ADDISON.
If, dumb too long, the drooping Muse hath
stayed.
And left her debt to Addison unpaid.
Blame not her silence, Warwick, but bemoan.
And judge, O, judge my bosom by your own.
What mourner ever felt poetic fires !
Slow comes the verse that real woe inspires :
Grief unaffected suits but ill with art.
Or flowing numbers with a bleeding heart.
Can I forget the dismal night that gave
My soul's best part forever to the grave ?
How silent did his old companions treail.
By midnight lamps, the mansions of the dead.
Through breathing statues, then unheeded things.
Through rows of warriors and through walks of
kings !
WTiat awe did the slow, solemn knell inspire ;
The pealing organ, and the pausing choir;
The duties by the lawn-robed prelate paid ;
And the last words, that dust to dust conveyed !
While speechless o'er thy closing grave we bend.
Accept these tears, thou dear departed friend.
0, gone forever ! take this long adieu ;
And sleep in peace next thy loved Montague.
To strew fresh laurels let the ta.sk be mine,
A frequent pilgrim at thy sacred shrine ;
Mine with true sighs thy absence to bemoan.
And grave with faithful epitaphs thy stone.
If e'er from me thy loved memorial )>art.
May .shame afflict this alienated heart ;
Of thee forgetful if I form a song.
My lyre be broken, and untuned my tongue.
My grief be doubled, from thy image free.
And mirth a torment, unchastised by thee !.
Oft let me range the gloomy aisles alone.
Sad luxury ! to vulgar minds unknown.
Along the walls where speaking marbles show
What worthies form the hallowed mould below ;
Proud names, who once the reins of empire held ;
In arms who triumphed, or in arts excelled ;
Cliiefs, gi'aced with scars, and prodigal of blood.
Stem patriots, who for sacred freedom stood ;
Just men, by whom impartial laws were given ;
And saints, who taught and led the way to
heaven ;
Ne'er to these chambers, where the mighty rest.
Since their foundation came a nobler guest ;
Nor e'er was to the bowers of blLss conveyed
A fairer spirit or more welcome shade.
In what new region, to the just a-ssigned.
What new employments please the unbodied
mind t
■í?,
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PERSONAL POEMS.
911
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A winged Virtue, through the ethereal sky,
From world to world unwearied does he fly ?
Or curioits trace the long laborious maze
Of Heaven's decrees, where wondering angels
gaze ?
Does he delight to hear bold seraphs tell
How Michael battled and the dragon fell ;
Or, mixed with milder cherubim, to glow
In hymns of love, not ill-essayed below ?
Or dost thou warn poor mortals left behind,
A bask well suited to thy gentle mind ?
0, if sometimes thy spotless form descend.
To mo thy aid, thou guardian genius, lend !
When rage misguides me, or when fear alarms.
When pain distresses, or when pleasure charms,
In silent whisperings purer thoughts impart.
And turn from ill a frail and feeble heart ;
Lead through the paths thy virtue trod before.
Till bliss shall join, nor death can part us more.
That awful form which, so the heavens decree.
Must still be loved and still deplored by me.
In nightly visions seldom fails to rise.
Or, roused by fancy, meets my waking eyes.
If business calls, or crowded courts invite.
The unblemished statesman seems to strike my
sight ;
If in the stage I seek to soothe my care,
I meet his soul which breathes in Cato there ;
If Ilusivo to the rural shades I rove.
His shape o'ertakes me in the lonely grove ;
'T was there of just and good he reasoned strong.
Cleared some great truth, or raised some serious
song:
There patient showed us the wise course to steer,
A candid censor and a friend severe ;
There taught us how to live, and (O, too high
The price for knowledge !) taught us how to die.
Thou Hill, whoso brow the antique structures
grace.
Reared by bold chiefs of Warwick's noble race.
Why, once so loved, whene'er thy hower ap¬
pears.
O'er my dim eyeballs glance the sudden tears ?
How sweet were once thy prospects fresh and fair.
Thy sloping walkb, and unpolluted air !
How sweet the glooms beneath thy aged trees.
Thy noontide shadow, and thy evening breeze !
His image thy forsaken bowers restore ;
Thy walks and airy prospects chaim no more ;
No more the summer in thy glooms allay,
Thy evening breezes, and thy noonday shade.
From other hills, however fortune frowned,
Some refuge in the Muse's art I found ;
Reluctant now 1 touch the trembling string.
Bereft of him who taught me how to sing ;
And these sad accents, murmured o'er his urn.
Betray that absence they attempt to mourn.
0, must I then (now fresh my bosom bleeds.
And Craggs in death to Addison succeeds)
The verse, begun to one lost friend, prolong.
And weep a second in the unñnished song !
These works divine, which on his death-bed laid
To thee, 0 Craggs ! the expiring sage conveyed,
Great, but ill-omened, monument of fame.
Nor he survived to give, nor thou to claim.
Swift after him thy social spirit flies.
And close to his, how soon ! thy coffin lies.
Blest pair ! whose union future bards shall tell
In future tongues: each other's boast ! farewell 1
Farewell ! whom, joined in fame, in friendship
tried.
No chance could sever, nor the grave divide.
Thomas Tickell.
THE POET'S FRIEND.
[lord bolingbroke.]
from "an essay on man," epistle iv.
Come then, my friend ! my genius ! come along;
0 master of the .poet, and the song !
And while the muse now stoops, or now ascends.
To man's low passions, or their glorious ends.
Teach me, like thee, in various nature wise.
To fall with dignity, with temper rise ;
Formed by thy converse happily to steer
From grave to gay, from lively to severe ;
Correct with spirit, eloquent with ease.
Intent to reason, or polite to please.
O, while along the .stream of time thy name
Expanded flies, and gathers all its fame ;
Say, shall my little bark attendant sail.
Pursue the triumph, and paitake the gale ?
When statesmen, heroes, kings, in dust repose.
Whose sons shall blush their fathers were thy foe.s.
Shall then this verse to future age pretend
Thou wert my guide, philosopher, and friend !
That, urged by thee, I turned the tuneful art
From sounds to things, from fancy to the heart;
For wit's false mirror held up Nature's light ;
Showed erring pride, whatever is, is right.
* alexander pope.
prom "childe harold," canto hi.
"Phf.re sunk the gieatest, nor the worst of men,
Whose .spirit antithetically mixed
One moment of the mightiest, and again
On little objects with like firmness fixed.
-"it
e-
912
PERSONAL POEMS.
Extreme in all things ! hadst thou been betwixt,
Thy thione had still been thine, or never been ;
For daring made thy rise as hill : thou seek'st
Even now to reassume the im|)erial mien.
And shake again the world, the Thunderer of the
scene !
Conqueror and captive of the earth art thou !
She trembles at thee still, and thy wild name
Was ne'er more bruited in men's minds than
now
That thou art nothing, save the jest of Fame,
Who wooed thee once, thy vassal, and became
Tlie flatterer of thy fierceness, till thou wert
A god unto thyself : nor less the same
To the astounded kingdoms all inert.
Who deemed thee for a time whate'er thou didst
assert.
0 more or less than man — in high or low.
Battling with nations, flying from the field ;
Now making monarchs' necks thy footstool,
now
More than thy meanest soldier taught to yield :
An empire thou couldst crush, command, re¬
build,
But govern not thy pettiest passion, nor
However deeply in men's spirits skilled,
Look through thine own, nor curb the lust of
war.
Nor leam that tempted Fate will leave the lofti¬
est star.
Yet well thy soul hath brooked the turning
tide
With that untaught innate philosophy.
Which, be it wisdom, coldness, or deep pride,
Is gall and wormwood to an enemy.
When the whole host of hatred stood hard by,
To watch and mock thee shrinking, thou hast
smiled
With a sedate and all-enduring eye, —
When Fortune fled her spoiled and favorite
child.
He stood unbowed beneath the ills upon him
piled.
Sager than in thy fortunes ; for in them
Ambition steeled thee on too far to show
That just habitual scorn which could contemn
Men and their thoughts ; 't was wise to feel,
not so
To wear it ever on thy lip and brow.
And spurn the instruments thou wert to use
Till they were turned unto thine overthrow ;
'T is but a worthless worhl to win or lose ;
So hath it proved to thee, and all such lot who
choose.
If, like a tower upon a headlong rock.
Thou hadst been made to stand or fall alone,
Such scorn of man had helped to brave the
shock ;
But men's thoughts were the steps which iiavcd
thy throne.
Their admiration thy liest weapon shone ;
The part of Philip's son was thine, not then
(Unless aside thy purple had been thrown)
Like stem Diogenes to mock at men ;
For sceptred cynics earth were far too wide a
den.
But quiet to quick bosoms is a hell,
And Ihere hath been thy vane ; there is a fire
And motion of the soul which will not dwell
In its own naiTow being, but aspire
Beyond the fitting medium of desire ;
And, but once kindled, quenchless evemiore.
Preys upon high adventure, nor can tire
Of aught but rest ; a fever at the core.
Fatal to him who bears, to all who ever bore.
This makes the madmen who have made men
mad
By their contagion ! Conquerors and Kings,
Founders of sects and systems, to whom add
Sophists, Bards, Statesmen, all unquiet things
Which stirtoo strongly the soul's secret spring.s,
And are themselves the fools to those they
fool ;
Envied, yet how unenviable ! what stings
Are theirs ! One breast laid open were a school
Which would unteach mankind the lust to shine
or rule.
Their breath is agitation, and their life
A storm whereon they ride, to sink at last.
And yet so niu-sed and bigoted to strife,
That should their days, surviving perils past.
Melt to calm twilight, they feel overcast
With sorrow and supineness, and so die ;
Even as a flame, unfed, which runs to waste
With its own flickering, or a sword laid by.
Which eats into itself, and rusts ingloiiously.
He who ascends to mountain-tops shall find
The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds and
snow ;
He who surpasses or subdues mankind
Must look down on the hate of those below.
Though high above the sun of glory glow,
And far beneath the earth and ocean sjiread.
Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow
Contending tempests on his naked head,
And thus reward the toils which to those sum¬
mits led.
Lord Cyrox.
u
-B!
PERSONAL POEMS.
913
POPULAR RECOLLECTIONS OF
BONAPARTE.
Á. rendering of bêranger's "souvenirs du peuple."
Tiiey ti talk of him for years to come,
In cottage chronicle and tale ;
When, for aught else, renown is dumb.
His legend shall prevail !
When in the hamlet's honored chair
Shall sit some aged dame.
Teaching to lowly clown and villager
That narrative of fame.
" 'T is tnie," they '11 say, "his gorgeous throne
France bled to raise ;
But he was all our own ! "
" Mother, say something in his praise, —
O, speak of him always ! "
" I saw him pass, —his was a host
Countless beyond your young imaginings, —
My children, he could boast
A train of conquered kings !
And when he came this road,
T was on my bridal day.
He wore, for near to him I stood.
Cocked hat and surcoat gray.
I bluslied ; he said, ' Be of good cheer !
Courage, my dear ! '
That was his very word."
" Mother ! O, then, this really occurred.
And you his voice could hear."
" A year rolled on, when next at Paris I,
Lone woman that I am.
Saw him pass by,
Girt with his peers to kneel at Notre Dame,
I knew, by merry chime and signal gun,
God granted him a son.
And 0, I wept for joy !
For why not weep when warrior men did.
Who gazed upon that sight so splendid,
And blessed the imperial boy?
Never did noonday sun shine out so bright !
0, what a sight ! "
" Mother, for you that must have been
A glorious scene. "
" But when all Europe's gathered strength
Burst o'er the French frontier at length,
'T will scarcely be believed
What wonders, single-handed, he achieved ;
Such general ne'er lived !
One evening on my threshold stood
A guest, — 't was he ! Of warriors few
He had a toil-worn retinue.
He Hung himself into this chair of wood.
Muttering, meantime, with fearful air,
' Quelle guerre ! O, quelle guerre ! * "
" Mother ! and did our emperor sit there.
Upon that very chair ? "
"He said, 'Give me some food.'
Brown loaf I gave, and homely wine.
And made the kindling fire-blocks shine
To dry his cloak with wet bedewed.
Soon by the bonny blaze he slept,
Then waking chid me, — for I wept ;
' Courage ! ' he cried, ' I '11 strike for all
Under the sacred wall
Of France's noble capital ! '
Those were his words : I've treasured up
With pride that same wine-cup ;
And for its weight in gold
It never shall be sold ! "
" Mother, on that proud relic let us gaze.
0, keep that cup always ! "
" But through some fatal witcheiy
He, whom a pope had crowned and blest.
Perished, my .sons, by foulest treachery,
Cast on an isle far in the lonely West !
Long time sad rumors were afloat, —
The fatal tidings we would spurn.
Still hoping from that isle remote
Once more our hero would return.
But when the dark announcement drew
Tears from the virtuous and the brave.
When the sad whisper proved too tnie,
A flood of grief I to his memory gave.
Peace to the glorious dead ! "
" Mother, may God his fullest blessing shed
Upon your aged head ! "
Francis Mahosv {fiukir pmui),
MURAT.
from "ode from the french."
Theee, where death's brief pang was quickest.
And the battle's wreck lay thickest.
Strewed beneath the advancing banner
Of the eagle's burning cre.st —
(There with thunder-clouds to fan her.
Who could then her wing arrest —
Victory beaming from her breast ?)
While the broken line enlarging
Fell, or fled along the plain ; —
There be sure Murat was charging Î
There he ne'er shall charge again !
Lo&o Bvro.m.
914
-PERSONAL POEMS.
TO MADAME DE SEVIGNÉ,
playing blind-man's-buff.
You charm when you talk, walk, or move,
Still more on this day than another ;
When blinded — you 're taken for Love ;
When the bandage is off—for his mother !
de montreuii-
#
ON A PORTRAIT OF WORDSWORTH,
by r. b. haydon.
WoRDS'ivoRTn upon Helvellyn ! Let the cloud
Ebb audibly along the mountain-wind.
Then break against the roek, and show behind
The lowland valleys floating up to crowd
The sense with beauty. He, with forehead bowed
And humble-lidded eyes, as one inclined
Before the sovran thought of his own mind,
And very meek with inspirations proud, —
Takes here his rightful place as poet-priest
By the high-altar, singing prayer and prayer
To the higher Heavens. A noble vision free,
Our Haydon's hand hath flung out from the mist !
No portrait this, with Academic air, —
This is the poet and his poetry.
Elizabeth Barrett Browning.
BURNS.
a poet's epitaph.
Stop, mortal ! Here thy brother lies, —
The poet of the poor.
His books were rivers, woods, and skies.
The meadow and the moor ;
His teachers were the torn heart's wail.
The tyrant, and the slave.
The street, the factory, the jail.
The palace, — and the grave !
Sin met thy brother everywhere !
And is thy brother blamed ?
From passion, danger, doubt, and care
He no exemption claimed.
The meanest thing, earth's feeblest worm,
He feared to scorn or hate ;
But, honoring in a peasant's form
The equal of the great.
He blessed the steward, whose wealth makes
The poor man's little more ;
Yet loathed the haughty wretch that takes
From plundered labor's store.
A hand to do, a head to plan,
A heart to feel and dare, —
Tell man's worst foes, here lies the man
Who drew them as they are.
ebenezer elliott.
BURNS.
on receiving a sprig of heather in blossom.
No more these simple flowera belong
To Scottish maid and lover ;
Sown in the common soil of song.
They bloom the wide world over.
In smiles and tears, in sun and showers^
The minstrel and the heather.
The deathless singer and the flowers
He sang of live together.
Wild heathcr-liclls and Robert Burns !
The moorland flower and peasant !
How, at their mention, memory turns
Her pages old and pleasant !
The gray sky wears again its gold
And purple of adorning.
And manhood's noond.ay shadows hold
The dews of boyhood's morning :
The dews that washed the dust and soil
From off the wings of pleasure.
The sky, that fleckeil the ground of toil
With golden threads of leisure.
I call to mind the summer day.
The early harvest mowing.
The .sky with sun and clouds at play.
And flowers with breezes blowing.
I hoar the blackbird in the corn.
The locust in the haying ;
And, like the fabled hunter's Imrn,
Old tunes my heart is playing.
How oft that day, with fond delay,
1 sought the maple's shadow.
And sang with Burns the hours awaj'.
Forgetful of the meadow !
Bees hummed, birds twittered, overhead
I heard the squirrels leaping ;
The good dog listened while I read,
And wagged his tail in keeping.
I watched him while in sportive mood
I read " The Twa Dogs' " story,
And half believed he understood
The poet's allegory.
Sweet day, sweet songs ! — The golden hours
Grew brighter for that singing.
From brook and bird and meadow flowers
A dearer welcome bringing.
f
PERSONAL POEMS.
915
-a
New light on home-seen Nature beamed,
New glory over Woman ;
And daily life and duty seemed
No longer poor and common.
I woke, to find the simple truth
Of fact and feeling better
Than all the dreams that held my youth
A still repiniug debtor :
That Nature gives her handmaid. Art,
The themes of sweet discoursing ;
The tender idyls of the heart
In every tongue rehearsing.
Why dream of lands of gold and pearl,
Of loving knight and lady.
When farmer boy and barefoot girl
Were wandering there already ?
I saw through all familiar things
The romance underlying ;
The joys and griefs that plume the wings
Of Fancy skyward flying.
I saw the same blithe day return.
The same sweet fall of even,
That rose on wooded Craigie-burn,
And sank on crystal Devon.
I matched with Scotland's heathery hills
The sweet-brier and the clover ;
With Ayr and Doon, my native rills.
Their wood-hymns chanting over.
O'er rank and pomp, as he had seen,
I saw the Man uprising ;
No longer common or unclean.
The child of God's baptizing.
With clearer eyes I saw the worth
Of life among the lowly ;
The Bible at his Cotter's hearth
Had made my own more holy.
And if at times an evil strain.
To lawless love appealing.
Broke in upon the sweet refrain
Of pure and healthful feeling.
It died upon the eye and ear.
No inward answer gaining ;
No heart had I to see or hear
The discord and the staining.
Let those who never erred forget
His worth, in vain bewailings ;
Sweet Soul of Song ! — I own my debt
Uncancelled by his failings !
Lament who will the ribald line
Which tells his lapse from duty.
How kissed the maddening lips of wine.
Or wanton ones of beauty ;
But think, while falls that shade between
The erring one and Heaven,
That he who loved like Magdalen,
Like her may be forgiven.
Not his the song whose thunderous chime
Eternal echoes render, —
The mournful Tuscan's haunted rhyme,
And Milton's starry splendor ;
But who his human heart has laid
To Nature's bosom nearer ?
Who sweetened toil like him, or paid
To love a tribute dearer ?
Through all his tuneful art, how strong
The human feeling gushes !
The very moonlight of his song
Is warm with smiles and blushes I ,
Give lettered pomp to teeth of Time,
So " Bonny Doon " but tarry ;
Blot out the Epic's stately rhyme.
But spare his " Highland Mary" !
john Creenleaf Whittier,
BURNS.
to A rose brought from near allowav kirk, in ayr¬
shire. in the autumn of 1822.
Wild rose of Alloway ! my thanks :
Thou 'mind'st me of that autumn noon
When first we met upon " the banks
And braes o' bonny Doon."
Like thine, beneath the thom-tree's bough.
My sunny hour was glad and brief ;
We've crossed the winter sea, and thou
Art withered — flower and leaf.
And will not thy death-doom be mine —
The doom of all things wrought of clay ?
And withered my life's leaf like thine.
Wild rose of Alloway ?
Not so his memory for whose sake
My bosom bore thee far and long —
His, who a humbler flower could make
Immortal as his song.
The memory of Bums — a name
That calls, when brimmed her festal cup,
A nation's gloiy and her shame.
In silent sadness up.
-3
&•
916
PERSONAL POEMS.
A nation's gloiy — be the rest
Forgot — she's canonized his mind,
And it is joy to speak the best
We may of humankind.
I 'Ve stood beside the cottage-bed
Where the bard-peasant first drew breath ;
A straw-thatched roof above his head,
A straw-wrought couch beneath.
And I have stood beside the pile,
His monument — that tells to Heaven
The homage of earth's proudest isle
To that bard-peasant given.
Bid thy thoughts hover o'er that spot.
Boy-minstrel, in thy dreaming hour ;
And know, however low his lot,
A poet's pride and power-;
The pride that lifted Bums from earth.
The power that gave a child of song
Ascendency o'er rank and birth.
The rich, the brave, the strong ;
And if despondency weigh down
Thy spirit's fluttering pinions then.
Despair — thy name is written on
The roll of common men.
There have been loftier themes than his,
And longer scrolls, and louder lyres.
And lays lit up with Poesy's
Purer and holier fires ;
Yet read the names that know not death ;
Few nobler ones than Burns are there ;
And few have won a greener wreath
Than that which binds his hair.
His is that language of the heart
In which the answering heart would speak.
Thought, word, that bids the warm tear start.
Or the smile light the cheek ;
And his that music to whose tone
The common pulse of man keeps time.
In cot or castle's mirth or moan.
In cold or sunny clime.
And who hath heard his song, nor knelt
Before its spell with willing knee,
And listened and believed, and felt
The poet's mastery
O'er the mind's sea, in calm and storm,
O'er the heart's sunshine and its showers.
O'er Passion's moments, bright and warm, '
O'er Reason's dark, cold hours ;
On fields where brave men " die or do," •
In halls where rings the banquet's mirth.
Where mourners weep, where lovers woo.
From throne to cottage hearth ?
What sweet tears dim the eye unshed.
What wild vows falter on the tongue.
When " Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled,"
Or " Auld Lang Syne," is sung !
Pure hopes, that lift the soul above.
Come with his Cotter's hymn of praise.
And dreams of youth, and truth, and love
With " Logan's " banks and braes.
And when he breathes his master-lay
Of Alloway's witch-haunted wall.
All passions in our frames of clay
Come thronging at his call.
Imagination's world of air.
And our own world, its gloom and glee.
Wit, pathos, poetry, are there.
And death's sublimity.
And Bums— though brief the race he ran.
Though rough and dark the path he trod
Lived, died, in form and soul a man.
The image of his God.
Through care, and pain, and want, and woe;
With wounds that only death could heal.
Tortures the poor alone can know.
The proud alone can feel ;
He kept his honesty and trath.
His independent tongue and pen.
And moved, in manhood as in youth.
Pride of his fellow-men.
Strong sense, deep feeling, passions strong,
A hate of tyrant and of knave,
A love of right, a scorn of wrong.
Of coward and of slave ;
A kind, tme heart, a spirit high.
That could not fear, and would not bow.
Were written in his manly eye
And on his manly brow.
Praise to the bard ! his words are driven.
Like flower-seeds by the far winds sown.
Where'er, beneath the sky of heaven.
The birds of fame have flown.
Praise to the man ! a nation stood
Beside his coffin with wet eyes.
Her brave, her beautiful, her good.
As when a loved one dies.
A
PERSONAL POEMS.
Äh4 still, as oa his funeral-day,
Men stand his cold earth-couch around.
With the mute homage that we pay
To consecrated ground.
And consecrated gi'ound it is.
The last, the hallowed home of one
Who lives upon all memories.
Though with the buried gone.
Such graves as his are pilgrim-shrines.
Shrines to no code or creed confined —
The Delphian vales, the Palestines,
The Meecas, of the mind.
Sages, with Wisdom's garland wreathed.
Crowned kings, and mitred priests of power.
And warriors with their bright swords sheathed.
The mightiest of the hour ;
And lowlier names, whose humble home
Is lit by Fortune's dimmer star.
Arc there — o'er wave and mountain come.
From countries near and far ;
Pilgrims, whose wandering feet have pressed
The Switzer's snow, the Arab's sand,
Or trod the piled leaves of the West,
My own green forest-land.
All ask the cottage of his birth.
Gaze on the scenes he loved and sung,
And gather feelings not of earth
His fields and streams among.
They linger by the Boon's low trees.
And pastoral Nith, and wooded Ayr,
And round thy sepulchres, Dumfries !
The Poet's tomb is there.
But what to them the sculptor's art.
His funeral columns, wreaths, and urns ?
Wear they not graven on the heart
The name of Robert Burns ?
fitzj3ree.n'e kalleck.
—«—
A BARD'S EPITAPH.
Is there a whim-inspired fool,
Owrc fast for thought, owre hot for rule,
Owre blate * to seek, owre proud to snool ; +
Let him draw near,
And owre this grassy heap sing dool.
And drap a tear.
Is there a bard of rustic song.
Who, noteless, steals the crowd among.
That weekly this area throng ;
0, pass not by ;
But, with a frater-feeling strong.
Here heave a sigh !
Is there a man whose judgment clear
Can others teach the course to steer.
Yet runs himself life's mad career.
Wild as tiie wave ;
Here pause, and, through the starting tear.
Survey this grave.
The poor inhabitant below
Was quick to learn and wise to know.
And keenly felt the friendly glow.
And sober flame ;
But thoughtless follies laid him low.
And stained his name !
Reader, attend, — whether thy soul
Soars fancy's flights beyond the pole.
Or darkly grubs this earthly hole.
In low pursuit ;
Know, prudent, cautious self-control
Is wisdom's root.
Robert Burns.
$
ELEGY ON CAPTAIN MATTHEW
HENDERSON.
He's gane, he's gane ! he's frae us torn,
The ae best fellow e'er was born !
Thee, Matthew, Nature's sel' shall mourn
By wood and wild.
Where, haply, pity strays forlorn,
Frae man exiled.
Ye hills, near neebors o' the starns.
That proudly cock }*our cresting cairns !
Yd cliffs, the haunts of sailing yearns,*
Where echo slumbers !
Come join, ye Nature's sturdiest bairns.
My wailing numbers !
Mourn, ilka grove the cushat kens !
Ye hazelly shaws and briery dens !
Ye burnics, wimplin' down your glens,
Wi' toddlin' din.
Or foaming Strang, wi' hasty stens,
Frae lin to lin !
Mourn, little harebells o'er the lea.
Ye stately foxgloves fair to see ;
Ye woodbines hanging bonniUe
* bashful.
t tamely submit.
* eagles.
918
PERSONAL POEMS.
In scented bowers ;
Ye roses on your thoiny tree,
The firet o' flowers.
At dawn, when every grassy blade
Droops with a diamond at his head,
At even, when beans their fragrance shed,
I' the rustling gale,
Ye maukins whiddin through the glade.
Come join my wail.
Mourn, ye wee songsters o' the wood ;
Ye grouse that crap the heather bud ;
Ye curlews calling through a clud ;
Ye whistling plover ;
And mourn, ye whirring paitrick brood ;
He's gaiie forever !
Mourn, sooty coots, and speckled teals,
Ye fisher herons, watching eels ;
Ye duck and drake, wi' airy wheels
Circling the lake ;
Ye bitterns, till the quagmire reels,
Rair for his sake.
Mourn, clamoring craiks at close o' day,
'Mang fields o' flowering clover gay ;
And when ye wing your annual way
Frae our cauld shore.
Tell thae far warlds wha lies in clay.
Wham we deplore.
Ye houlets, frae your ivy bower.
In some auld tree, or eldritch tower,
What time the moon, wi' silent glower.
Sets up her horn.
Wail thro' the dreary midnight hour
Till waukrife morn.
0 rivers, forests, hills and plains !
Oft have ye heard my canty strains ;
But now, what else for me remains
But tales of wo ?
And frae my een the drapping rains
Maun ever flow.
Moum, Spring, thou darling of the year I
Ilk cowslip cup shall keep a tear :
Thou, Simmer, while each corny spear
Slioots up its head.
Thy gay, green flowei-y tresses shear,
For him that's dead !
Thou, Autumn, wi' thy yellow hair.
In grief thy sallow mantle tear !
Thou, Winter, hurling through the air
The roaring blast.
Wide o'er the naked world declare
The worth we've lost
Mourn him, thou sun, great source of light !
Mourn, empress of the silent night !
And you, ye twinkling starnies bright.
My Matthew moum !
For thro' your orbs he's ta'en his flight.
Ne'er to return.
0 Henderson, the man ! the brother !
And art thou gone, and gone forever !
And hast thou crost that unknown river.
Life's dreary bound !
Like thee where shall I find another.
The world around !
Go to your sculptured tombs, ye great.
In a' the tinsel trash o' state !
But by thy honest turf 1 'II wait.
Thou man of worth !
And weep the ae best fellow's fate
E'er lay in earth.
Robert Burns.
BYRON.
from "the course of time," book iv.
Take one example — to our purpose quite.
A man of rank, and of capacious soul.
Who riches had, and fame, beyond desire.
An heir of flattery, to titles born,
And reputation, and luxurious life :
Yet, not content with ancestorial name.
Or to be known because his fathers were.
He on this height hereditaiy stood,
And, gazing higher, purposed in his heart
To take another step. Alwve him seemed, ,
Alone, the mount of song, the lofty seat
Of canonized bards ; and thitherward.
By nature taught, and inward melody.
In prime of youth, he bent his eagle eye.
No cost was spared. What books he wished, he
read ;
What sage to hear, he heard ; what scenes to see.
He saw. And first, in rambling school-boy days,
Britannia'smountain-walks, and heath-girt lakes.
And story-telling glens, and founts, and brooks.
And maids, as dew-drops pure and fair, his soul
With grandeur filled, and melody, and love.
Then travel came, and took him where he wished :
He cities saw, and courts, and princely pomp ;
And mused alone on ancient mountain-brows ;
And mused on battle-fields, where valor fought
In other days ; and mused on ruins gray
With years ; and drank from old and fabulous
wells.
And plucked the vine that fir-st-bora prophets
plucked ;
PERSONAL POEMS.
919
And mused on famous tombs, and on the wave
Of ocean mused, and on the desert waste ;
The heavens and earth of every country saw :
Where'er the old inspiring Genii dwelt.
Aught that could rouse, expand, refine the soul.
Thither he went, and meditated there.
He touched his hai-p, and nations heard en¬
tranced.
As some vast river of unfailing source.
Rapid, exhaustless, deep, his numbers flowed.
And opened new fountains in the human heart.
Where Fancy halted, weary in her flight.
In other men, his fresh as morning rose.
And soared untrodden heights, and seemed at
Lome,
Where angels bashful looked. Others, though
great.
Beneath their argument seemed struggling ;
whiles
He, from above descending, stooped to touch
The loftiest thought ; and proudly stooped, as
though
It scarce deserved his verse. With Nature's self
He seemed an old acquaintance, free to jest
At will with all her glorious majesty.
He laid his hand upon " the Ocean's mane,"
And played familiar writh his hoary locks ;
Stood on the Alps, stood on the Apennines,
And with the thunder talked as friend to friend ;
And wove his garland of the lightning's wing.
In sportive twist, — the lightning's fiery wing,
Wliich, as the footsteps of the dreadful God,
Marching upon the storm in vengeance, seemed ;
Then turned, and with the grasshopper, who
sung
His evening song beneath his feet, conversed.
Suns, moons, and stars, and clouds his sisters
were ;
Rocks, mountains, meteors, seas, and winds, and
storms
His brothers, younger brothers, whom he scarce
As equals deemed. All passions of all men.
The wild and tame, the gentle and severe ;
All thoughts, all maxims, sacred and profane ;
All creeds ; all seasons, time, eternity ;
All that was hated, and all that was dear ;
All that was hoped, all that was feared, by man,—
He tossed about, as tempest-withered leaves ;
Then, smiling, looked upon the wreck he made.
With terror now he froze the cowering blood.
And now dissolved the heart in tenderness ;
Yet would not tremble, would not weep himself ;
But back into his soul retired, alone.
Dark, sullen, proud, gazing contemptuou.sly
On hearts and passions prostrate at bis feet.
So Ocean, from the plains his waves had late
To desolation swept, retired in pride.
/ • « »
Exulting in the glory of his might.
And seemed to mock the ruin he had wrought.
As some fierce comet of tremendous size.
To which the stars did reverence as it passed.
So he, through learning and through fancy, took
His flight sublime, and on the loftiest top
Of Fame's dread mountain sat ; not soiled and
worn.
As if he from the earth had labored up.
But as some bird of heavenly plumage fail-
He looked, which down from higher regions came.
And perched it there, to see what lay beneath.
The nations gazed, and wondered much and
praised.
Critics before him fell in humble plight ;
Confounded fell ; and made debasing signs
To catch his eye ; and stretched and swelled
themselves
To bursting nigh, to utter bulky words
Of admiration vast ; and many too.
Many that aimed to imitate his flight.
With weaker wing, unearthly fluttering made.
And gave abundant sport to after days.
Great man ! the nations gazed and wondered
much.
And praised ; and many called his evil good.
Wits wrote in favor of his wickedness ;
And.kings to do him honor took delight.
Thus full of titles, flattery, honor, fame ;
Beyond desire, beyond ambition, full, —
He died, — he died of what ? Of wretchedness ;
Drank every cup of joy, heard every trump
Of fame ; di-ank early, deeply drank ; drank
draughts
That common millions might have quenched, —
then died
Of thirst, because there was no more to drink.
His goddess. Nature, wooed, embraced, enjoyed.
Fell from his arms, abhorred ; his passions died ;
Died, aU but dreary, solitary Pride ;
And all his sympathies in being died.
As some ill-guided bark, well built and tall.
Which angry tides cast out on desert shore.
And then, retii ing, left it there to rot
And moulder in the winds and rains of heaven ;
So he, cut from the sympathies of life.
And cast ashore from pleasure's boisterous surge,
A wandering, weary, worn, and wretched thing,
A scorched and desolate and blasted soul,
A gloomy wilderness of dying thought, —
Repined, and groaned, and withered from the
earth.
His groanings filled the land his numbere filled :
And yet he seemed ashamed to groan. — Poor
man !
Ashamed to ask, and yet he needed help.
ROBaaT rocLOK.
-yj
920 ' PERSONAL POEMS.
TO CAMPBELL.
True bard and simple, — as the race
Of heaven-bom poets always are.
When stooping from their starry place
They 're children near, though gods afar.
TUOUAS MOOKE.
CAMP-BELL.
Come from my first, ay, come !
The battle-dawn is nigh -,
And the screaming trump and the thundering
drum
Are calling thee to die !
Fight as thy father fought ;
FaU as thy father fell ;
Thy task is taught ; thy shroud is wrought ;
So forward and farewell !
ToU ye my second, toll !
Fling high the flambeau's light,
And sing the hymn for a paited soul
Beneath the silent night !
The wreath upon his head.
The cross upon his breast.
Let the prayer be said and the tear be shed.
So, — take him to his rest !
Call ye my whole, — ay, call
The lord of lute and lay ;
And let him greet the sable pall
With a noble song to-day.
Go, call him by his name !
No fitter hand may crave
To light the flame of a soldier's fame
On the turf of a soldier's grave.
Winthrop Mackworth Praed.
TO THOMAS MOORE.
My boat is on the shore.
And my bark is on the sea ;
But before I go, Tom Moore,
Here's a double health to thee !
Here "^s a sigh to those who love me.
And a smile to those who hate ;
And, whatever sky's above me,
Here's a heart for every fate 1
Though the ocean roar around me.
Yet it still sliall bear nie on ;
Though a desert should surround me.
It hath springs that may be won.
Were't the last drop in the well.
As 1 gasped upon the brink.
Ere my fainting spirit fell,
'T is to thee that I would drink.
With that water, as this wine.
The libation I would pom-
Should be, — Peace with thine and mine.
And a health to thee, Tom Moore !
Lord Byron.
BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.
Not a drum was heard, nota funeral note.
As his corse to the rampart we hurried ;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly, at dead of night.
The sods with our bayonets turning ;
By the struggling moonbeams' misty light.
And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless cofihi enclosed his breast.
Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him ;
But he lay, like a warrior taking his rest.
With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said.
And we spoke not a word of sorrow ;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face of the dead.
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed.
And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er
his head.
And we far away on the billow !
Lightly they '11 talk of the spirit that's gone^
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him ;
But little he '11 reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him !
But half of our heavy task was done.
When the clock struck the hour for retiring ;
And we heanl the distant and random gun
That the foe was suddenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down.
From the field of his fame fresh and gory !
We cawed not a line, and we raised not a stone,
But we left him alone with his glory.
charles Wolfe.
PERSONAL POEMS.
921
EMMET'S EPITAPH.
(Robert Emmet, the celebrated Irish Revolutionist, at his trial
for high treason, which resulted in his conviction and execution,
September 20,1803, made an eloquent and pathetic defence, con*
eluding with these words s "Lettlierebe no inscription upon my
tomb. Let no man write my epitaph. Let my character and my
motives repose in security and peace till other times and other men
can do them justice. Then shall my character be vindicated ; then
may my epitaph be written. I have done." It was immediately
upon reading this speech that the following lin^ were written. J
" Lkt no man write my epitaph ; let my gi-ave
Be uiiinscribcil, and let my memory rest
Till other times are come, and other men,
IVho then may do me justice."
Emmet, no !
No withering curse hath dried my spirit up.
That I should now bo silent, — that my soul
Sliould from the stirring inspiration shrink.
Now when it shakes her, and withhold her voice.
Of that divinest impulse nevermore
Worthy, if impious 1 withheld it now.
Hardening my heart. Here, here in this free Isle,
To which in thy young virtue's erring zeal
Thou wert so perilous an enemy.
Here in free England shall an English hand
Build thy imperishable monument
0, to thine own misfortune and to ours.
By thine own deadly error so beguiled.
Here in free England shall an English voice
Raise up thy mourning-song. For thou hast paid
The bitter penalty of that misdeed ;
Justice hath done her unrelenting part.
If she in truth be Justice who drives on.
Bloody and blind, tlie chariot-wheels of death.
So young, so glowing for the general good,
0, what a lovely manhood had been thine.
When all the violent workings of thy youth-
Had passed away, hadst thou been wisely spared,
Left to the slow and certain influences
Of silent feeling and maturing thought !
How h.ad that heart, — that noble heart of thine.
Which even now had snapped one spell, which
beat
With such brave indignation at the shame
And guilt of F ranee, and of her miscreant lord, —
How had it clung to England ! With wliat love.
What pure and perfect love, returned to her.
Now worthy of thy love, the champion now
For freedom, — yea, the only champion now.
And soon to be the avenger. But the blow
Hath fallen, the undiscriminating blow.
That for its portion to the grave consigned
Youth, Genius, generous Virtue. O, grief, grief !
0, sorrow and reproach I Have ye to learn.
Deaf to the past, and to the future blind.
Ye who thus irremissibly exact
The forfeit life, how lightly life is staked, .
When in distempered times the feverish mind
To strong delusion yields ? Have ye to learn
With what a deep and spirit-stirring voice
Pity doth call Revenge ? Have ye no hearts
To feel and understand how Mercy tames
The rebel nature, maddened by old wrongs.
And binds it in tiie gentle bands of love.
When steel and adamant were weak to hold
That Samson-strength subdued !
Let no man write
Thy epitaph ! Emmet, nay ; thou shalt not go
Without thy funeral strain ! O young and good.
And wise, though ei-ring here, thou shalt not go
Unhonored or unsung. And better thus
Beneath that undiscriminating stroke,
Better to fall, than to have lived to mourn.
As sure thou wouldst, in misery and remorse.
Thine own disastrous triumph ; to have seen.
If the Almighty at that awful hour
Had turned away his face, wild Ignorance
Let loose, and frantic Vengeance, and dark zeal,
And all bad passions tyrannous, and the fires
Of Persecution once again ablaze.
How had it sunk into thy soul to see.
Last curse of all, the ruffian slaves of France
In thy dear native country lording it !
How happier thus, in that heroic mood
That takes away the sting of death, to die.
By all the good and all the wise forgiven !
Yea, in all ages by the wise and good
To be remembered, mourned, and honored still !
Robert Southey.
0, BREATHE *NOT HIS NAME.
robert emmet.
O, BREATHE not his name ! let it sleep in the
shade.
Where cold and unhonored his relics are laid ;
Sad, silent, and dark he the tears that we shed,
As the night-dew that faUs on the grave o'er his
head.
But the night-dew that falls, though in silenco
it weeps.
Shall brighten with verdure the grave where he
sleeps ;
And the tear that we shed, though in secret it
rolls,
ShaR long keep his mcmoiy green in our souls.
Thomas Moore.
TO TOUSSAINT L'OUVERTURE.
Toussaint ! the most unhappy man of men !
Whether the whbtling rustic tend his plough
Within thy hearing, or thy head be now
Pillowed in some deep dungeon's earless den,
922
PERSONAL POEMS.
a
0 miserable cbieftaln ! where and when
Wilt thou find patience? Yet die not; do
thou
Wear rather in thy bonds a cheerful brow :
Though fallen thyself, never to rise again,
Live and take comfort. Thou hast left behind
Powei-s that will work for thee ; air, earth, and
skies :
There's not a breathing of the common wind
That will forget thee ; thou hast great allies ;
Thy friends are exultations, agonies.
And love, and man's unconquerable mind.
William Wokdsworth.
DEATH-BED OF BOMBA, KING OF
NAPLES,
at barl 1859.
Could I pass those lounging sentries, through
the aloe-bordered entries, up the sweep of
squalid stair,
On through chamber after chamber, where the
sunshine's gold and amber turn decay to
beauty rare,
I should reach a guarded ' portal, where for strife
of issue knortal,'face to'face two'kings are
met :
One the grisly King of Terrors ; one a Bourbon,
with his errors, late to conscience-clearing
set. •
Well his fevered pulse may flutter, and the priests
their mass may mutter with such fervor as
they may ;
Cross and chrism, and genuflection, mop and
mow, and interjection, will not frighten
Death away.
By the dying despot sitting, at the hard heart's
poi-tals hitting, shocking the dull brain to
work.
Death makes clear what life has hidden, chides
what life has left unchidden, quickens truth
life tried to burke.
He but ruled within his borders after Holy
Church's orders, did what Austria bade him
do ;
By their guidance flogged and tortured ; high-
bom men and gently nurtured chained with
crime's felonious crew.
What if summer fevers gripped them, what if
winter freezings nipped them, till they rotted
in their chains ?
He had word of Pope and Kaiser ; none could
holier be or wiser ; theirs the counsel, his
the reins.
So he pleads excuses eager, clutching, with his
fingers meagre, at the bedclothes as he
speaks ;
But King Death sits grimly grinning at the
Bourbon's cobweb-spinning, — as each cob¬
web-cable breaks.
And the poor soul, from life's eylot, rudderless,
without a pilot, drifteth slowly down the
dark ;
While mid rolling incense vapor, chanted dirge,
and flaring taper, lies the body, stiff and
stark.
TO THE MEMORY OF THOMAS HOOD.
Take back into thy bosom, earth.
This joyous. May-eyed morrow.
The gentlest child that ever mirth
Gave to be reared by sorrow !
'T is hard — while rays half green, half gold.
Through vernal bowers are burning.
And streams their diamond mirrors hold
To Summer's face returning —
To say we 're thankful that his sleep
Shall nevermore be lighter.
In whose sweet-tongued companionship
Stream, bower, and beam grow brighter !
But all the more intensely true
His soul gave out each feature
Of elemental love, — each hue
And grace of golden nature, —
The deeper still beneath it all
Lurked the keen jags of anguish ;
The more the laurels clasped his brow
Their poison made it languish.
Seemed it that, like the nightingale
Of his own mournful singing.
The tenderer would his song prevail
While most the thorn was stinging.
So never to the desert-worn
Did fount bring freshness deeper
Than that his placid rest this mom
Has brought the shrouded sleeper.
That rest may lap his weary head
Where charnels choke the city.
Or where, mid woodlands, by his bed
The wren shall wake its ditty ;
But near or far, while evening's star
Is dear to hearts regretting.
Around that spot admiring thought
Sliall hover, imforgetting.
Bartholomew Simmons
-a
PERSONAL POEMS.
923
A VOICE, AND NOTHING ELSE.
" I WONDER if Brougliam tliinks as much as he
talks,"
Said a punster, perusing a trial ;
" I vow, since his lordship was made Baron
Vaux,
He's been Vaiix et prœlerea nihil ! "
Anonymoos.
MACAULAY.
The dreamy rhymer's measured snore
Falls heavy on our ears no more ;
And by long strides are left behind
The dear delights of womankind.
Who wage their battles like their loves.
In satin waistcoats and kid gloves.
And have achieved the crowning work
When they have trussed and skewered a Turk.
Another comes with stouter tread.
And stalks among the statelier dead.
He rushes on, and hails by turns
High-crested Scott, broad-brea.sted Bums ;
And shows the British youth, who ne'er
Will lag behind, what Romans were.
When all the Tuscans and their Lars
Shouted, and shook the towers of Mars.
Walter savage Landor.
SONNETS TO GEORGE SAND.
a desire.
Thou large-brained woman and large-hearteil
man.
Self-called George Sand ! whose soul amid the
lions
Of thy tumultuous senses, moans defiance.
And answers roar for roar, as spirits can,
1 would some mild miraculous thunder ran
Above the applauded circus, in appliance
Of thine own nobler nature's strength and sci¬
ence.
Drawing two pinions, white as wings of swan.
From thy strong shoulders, to amaze the place
With holier light ! that thou to woman's claim,
And man's, might join beside the angel's grace
Of a pure genius sanctified from blame ;
Till child and maiden pre-ssed to thine embrace.
To kiss upon thy lips a stainless fame.
a recognition.
Trüe genius, but true woman ! dost deny
Thy woman's nature with a manly scorn.
And break away the gauds and armlets worn
By weaker women in captivity ?
Ah, vain denial ! that revolted cry
Is sobbed in by a woman's voice forlorn ;
Thy woman's hair, my sister, all unshorn.
Floats back dishevelled strength in agony.
Disproving thy man's name ; and while before
The world thou burnest in a poet-fire.
We see thy woman-heart beat evemore
Through the large flame. Beat purer, heart, and
higher.
Till God unsex thee on the heavenly shore.
Where unincarnate spirits purely aspire.
elizabeth Barrett browning.
HEINE'S GRAVE.
" Henei Heine " — 't is here !
The black tombstone, the name
Carved there — no more ! and the smooth.
Swarded alleys, the limes
Touched with yellow by hot
Summer, but under them still
In September's bright afternoon
Shadow and verdure and cool !
Trim Montmartre ! the faint
Murmur of Paris outside ;
Crisp everlasting-flowers.
Yellow and black on the graves.
Half blind, palsied, in pain.
Hither to come, from the streets'
ITprosr, surely not loath
Wast thou, Heine, — to lie
Quiet ! to ask for closed
Shutters, and darkened room.
And cool drinks, and an eased
Posture, and opium, no more !
Hither to come, and to sleep
Under the wings of Renown.
Ah ! not little, when pain
Is most quelling, and man
Easily quelled, and the fine
Temper of genius alive
Quickest to ill, is the praise
Not to have yielded to pain !
No small boast for a weak
Son of mankind, to the earth
Pinned by the thunder, to rear
His bolt-scathed front to the stais.
And, undaunted, retort
'Gainst thick-crashing, insane.
Tyrannous tempests of bale.
Arrowy lightnings of soul !
Hark ! through the alley resounds
Mocking laughter ! A film
Creeps o'er the sunshine ; a breeze
Rufiles the warm afternoon.
Saddens my soul with its chill.
Gibing of spirits in scorn
Shakes every leaf of the grove,
Mars the benignant repose
Of this amiable home of the dead.
Bitter spirits ! ye claim
Heine ? — Alas, he is yours !
Only a moment I longed
Here in the quiet to snatch
From such mates the outworn
Poet, and steep him in calm.
Only a moment ! I knew
Whose he was who is here
Buried ; 1 knew he was yours !
Ah, I knew that I saw
Here no, sepulchre built
In the laurelled rock, o'er the Wue
Naples bay, for a sweet
Tender Virgil ! no tomb
On Ravenna sands, in the shade
Of Ravenna pines, for a high
Austere Dante ! no grave
By the Avon side, in the bright
Stratford meadows, for thee,
Shakespeare ¡ loveliest of souls,
Peerless in radiance, in joy.
What so harsh and malign,
Heine ! distils from thy life.
Poisons the peace of thy grave I
Charm is the glory which makes
Song of the poet divine ;
Love is the fountain of charm.
How without charm wilt thou draw.
Poet, the world to thy way ?
Not by the lightnings of wit.
Not by the thunder of scorn !
These to the world, too, are given ;
Wit it possesses, and scorn, —
Charm is the poet's alone.
Hollow and dull are the greed,
And artists envious, and the moib profane.
We know all this, we know !
Cam'st thou from heaven, 0 child
Of light ! but this to declare ?
Alas ! to help us forget
Such bairen knowledge awhile,
God gave the poet his song.
Therefore a secret imrest
Tortured thee, brilliant and bold !
Therefore triumph itself
Tasted amiss to thy soul.
Therefore, with blood of thy foes.
Trickled in silence thine own.
Therefore the victor's heart
Broke on the held of his fame.
Ah ! as of old from the pomp
Of Italian Milan, the fair
Flower of marble of white
Southern palaces, —steps
Bordered by statues, and walks
Terraced, and orange bowers
Heavy with fragrance, —the blond
German Kaiser full oft
Longed himself back to the fields.
Rivers, and high-roofed towns
Of his native Germany ; so.
So, how often ! from hot
Paris drawing-rooms, and lamp»
Blazing, and brilliant crowds.
Starred and jewelled, of men
Famous, of women the queens
Of dazzling converse, and fumes
Of praise, — hot, heady fumes, to the poor brain
That mount, that madden !'—how oft
Heine's .spirit, outworn.
Longed itself out of the din
Back to the tranquil, the cool.
Far German home of his youth !
See ! in the May afternoon.
O'er the fresh short turf of the Hartz,
A youth, with the foot of youth,
Heine ! thou climbest again.
Up, through the tall dark firs
Warming their heads in the sun.
Checkering the grass with their shade.
Up, by the stream with its huge
Moss-hung bowlders and thin
Musical water half-hid.
Up o'er the rock-strewn slope.
With the sinking sun, and the air
Chill, and the shadows now
Long on the gray hillside.
To the stone-roofed hut at the top.
Or, yet later, in watch
On the roof of the Brocken tower
Thou standest, gazing ! to see
The broad red sun, over field.
Forest and city and spire
And mist-tracked stream of the wide.
Wide German land, going down
In a bank of vapors, —again
Standest ! at nightfall, alone ;
Or, next morning, with limbs
Rested by slumber, and heart
Freshened and light with the May,
O'er the gracious spurs coming down
Of the lower Hartz, among oaks.
And beechen coverts, and copse
Of hazels green in whose depth
Use, the fairy transformed.
In a thousand water-breaks light
lö
PERSONAL POEMS. 925
Pours her petulant youth, —
Climbing the rock which juts
O'er the valley, the dizzily perched
Rock ! to its Iron Cross
Once more thou cling'st ; to the Cross
Clingest ! with smiles, with a sigh.
But something prompts me : Not thus
Take leave of Heine, not thus
Speak the last woi-d at his grave !
Not in x>ity, and not
With half-censure, —with awe
Hail, as it passes from earth.
Scattering lightnings, that soul !
The spirit of the world.
Beholding the absurdity of men, —
Their vaunts, their feats, — let a sardonic smile
For one short moment wander o'er his lips.
That smile was Heine ! for its earthly hour
The strange guest sparkled ; now 'tis passed away.
That was Heine ! and we.
Myriads who live, who have lived,
Wliat are we all, but a mood,
A single mood, of the life
Of the Being in whom we exist.
Who alone is all things in one.
Spirit, who fillest us all !
Spirit, who utterest in each
New-coming son of mankind
Such of thy thoughts as thou wilt !
0 thou, one of whose moods.
Bitter and strange, was the life
Of Heine, — his strange, alas !
His bitter life, —may a life
Other and milder be mine !
Mayst thou a mood more serene.
Happier, have uttered in mine !
Mayst thou the rapture of peace
Deep have embreathed at its core !
Made it a i-ay of thy thought.
Made it a beat of thy joy !
Matthew Arnold.
A WELCOME TO "BÔZ."
on his first visit to the west
Come as artist, come as guest,
Welcome to tlie expectant West,
Hero of the charmèd pen.
Loved of children, loved of men.
We have felt thy spell for years ;
Oft with laughter, oft with tears.
Thou hast touched the tenderest part
Of our inmost, hidden heart.
We have fixed our eager gaze
On thy pages nights and days,
■le
Wishing, as we turned them o'er.
Like poor Oliver, for "more,"
And the creatures of thy brain
In our memory remain.
Till through them we seem to be
Old acquaintances of thee.
Much we hold it thee to greet.
Gladly sit we at thy feet j
On thy features we would look.
As upon a living book.
And thy voice would grateful hear.
Glad to feel that Boz were near.
That his veritable soul
Held us by direct control :
Therefore, author loved the best.
Welcome, welcome to the West.
In immortal Weller's name.
By the rare Micawber's fame.
By the flogging wreaked on Squeers,
By Job Trotter's fluent tears.
By the beadle Bumble's fate
At the hands of shrewish mate.
By the famous Pickwick Club,
By the dream of Gabriel Grubb,
In the name of Snodgrass' muse,
Tupman's amorous interviews.
Winkle's ludicrous mishaps.
And the fat boy's countless naps ;
By Ben Allen and Bob Sawyer,
By Miss Sally Brass, the lawyer.
In the name of Newman Noggs,
River Thames, and London fogs,
Richard Swiveller's excess.
Feasting with the Marchioness,
By Jack Bunsby's oracles.
By the chime of Christmas bells.
By the cricket on the hearth.
By the sound of childish mirth.
By spread tables and good cheer.
Wayside inns and pots of beer.
Hostess pluiTipi and jolly host.
Coaches for the turnpike post.
Chambermaid in love with Boots,
Toodles, Traddles, Tapley, Toots,
Betsey Trotwood, Mister Dick,
Susan Nipper, Mistress Chick,
Snevellicci, Lilyvick,
Mantalini's predilections
To transfer his warm affections.
By poor Bamaby and Grip,
Flora, Dora, Di, and Gip,
Perrybingle, Pinch, and Pip, —
Welcome, long-expected guest.
Welcome to the grateful West.
In the name of gentle Nell,
Child of light, belovèd well, —
926
PERSONAL POEMS.
Weeping, did we not behold
Roses on her bosom cold ?
Better we for every tear
Shed beside her snowy bier, —
By the mournful group that played
Round the grave where Smike was laid.
By the life of Tiny Tim,
And the lesson taught by him,
Asking ill his plaintive tone
God to " bless us every one,"
By the sounding waves that bore
Little Paul to Heaven's shore, •
By thy yearning for the human
Good ill every man and woman,
By each noble deed and word
That thy story-books record,
And each noble sentiment
Dickens to the world hath lent.
By the effort thou hast made
Truth and true reform to aid.
By thy hope of man's relief
Finally from want and grief,
By tliy never-failing trast
That the God of love is just, —
We would meet and welcome thee.
Preacher of humanity :
Welcome (ills the throbbing breast
Of the sympathetic West.
W. H. VEN.^BLE.
DICKENS IN CAMP.
Above the pines the moon was slowly drifting.
The river sang below ;
The dim Sierras, far beyond, uplifting
Their minarets of snow.
The roaring camp-f.re, with rude humor, painted
The raddy tints of health
On haggard face and form that droopedand fainted
■ In the fierce race for wealth ;
Tin one arose, and from his pack's scant treasure
A hoarded volume drew,
And cards were dronped from hands of listless
leisure,
To hear the.^ ^
And then, while round them shadows gathered
faster.
And as the firelight fell.
He read aloud the book wherein the Master
Had writ of "Little Nell."
Perhaps 'twas bo_yish fancy, —for the reader
Was youngest of them all, —
But, as he read, from clustering pine and cedar
, A silence seemed to fall :
The fir-trees, gathering closer in the shadows.
Listened in every spray.
While the whole camp, with " Nell," on English
meadows
Wandered and lost their way.
And so in mountain solitudes— o'ertaken
As by some spell divine —
Their cares dropped from them like the needles
shaken
From out the gusty pine.
Lost is that camp, and wasted all its fire ;
And he who wrought that spell ? —
Ah, towering pine and stately Kentish spire,
Ye have one tale to tell !
Lost is that camp ! hut let its fragrant story
Blend with the breath that thrills
With hop-vines' incense all the pensive glory
That fills the Kentish hills.
And on that grave where English oak and holly
And laurel wreaths intwine.
Deem it not all a too presumptuous folly, —•
This spray of Western pine.
bret Harte.
TO VICTOR HUGO.
VirroTi in poesy ! Victor in romance !
' ' ' f phantasmal hopes and fears !
il 1 . i . . Fiench and lord of human
ti ai.s !
Child-lover, bard, who.se fame-lit laurels glance.
Darkening the wreaths of all that would ad¬
vance
Beyond our strait their claim to he thy peers !
Weird Titan, by thy wintry weight of years
As yet unbroken ! Stormy voice of France,
Who does not love our England, so they say ;
I know not ! England, France, all men to be,
Will make one people, ere man's race ho
run ;
And I, desiring that diviner day.
Yield thee full thanks for thy full courtesy
To younger England in the boy, niy son.
Alfred Ten.nyson.
•
DANIEL BOONE.
from "don juan."
Of all men, saving Sylla the man-slaj'er.
Who passes for in life and death most lucky,
Of the great names which in our faces stare.
The General Boone, backwoodsman of Ken¬
tucky,
PERSONAL POEMS.
— •
027
Was happiest amongst mortals anywhere ;
For, killing nothing hut a bear or buck, he
Enjoyed the lonely, vigorous, harmless days
Of his old age in wilds of deepest maze.
Crime came not near him, she is not the child
Of solitude ; Health shrank not from him, for
Her home is in the rarely trodden wild.
Where if men seek her not, and death he more
Their choice than life, forgive them, as beguiled
By habit to what their own hearts abhor,
In cities caged. The present case in point I
Cite is, that Boone lived hunting up to ninety ;
And, what's still stranger, left behind a name
For which men vainly decimate the throng.
Not only famous, but of that good fame.
Without which glory's but a tavern song, —
Simple, sei-ene, the antipodes of shame.
Which hate nor envy e'er could tinge with
wrong ;
An active hermit, even in age the child
Of nature, or the Man of Ross run wild.
'T is true he shrank from men, even of his nation ;
When they built up unto his darling trees.
He moved some hundred miles off, for a station
Where there were fewer houses and more ease ;
The inconvenience of civilization
Is that you neither can be pleased nor please ;
But where he met the individual man.
He showed himself as kind as mortal can.
He was not all alone ; around him grew
A sylvan tribe of children of the chase.
Whose young, unwakenod world was ever new ;
Nor sword nor sorrow yet had left a trace
On her unwrinkled brow, nor corrld yort view
A frown on nature's or on human face :
The freeborn forest found and kept them free.
And fr esh as is a torrent or a tree.
And tall, and strong, and swift of foot, were they.
Beyond the dwarfing city's pale abortions.
Because their thoughts had never been the prey
Of care or gain : the green woods were their
portions ;
No sinking spirits told them they grew gray ;
No fashion made them apes of her distortions ;
Simple they were, not .savage ; and their rifles.
Though very true, were not yet used for trifles.
Motion was in their days, rest in their slumbers.
And cheerfulness the handmaid of their toil ;
Nor yet too nrany nor too few their numbers ;
Corruption could not make their hearts her
soil. J
The lust which stings, the splendor which en¬
cumbers.
With the free foi'esters divide no spoil :
Serene, not sullen, were the solitudes
Of this unsighing people of the woods.
lord Byron,
WASHINGTON.
from "under the elm." read at cambridge, july 3,
1875, o.v the hundredth anmversar'v of washing¬
ton's taking command of the american army.
Beneath our consecrated elm
A century ago he stood,
Famed vaguely for that old fight in the wood.
Which retlly foamed round him but could not
overwhelm
The life foredoomed to wield our rough-hewn
helm.
From colleges, where now the gown '
To arms had yielded, from the town.
Our rude self-summoned levies flocked to see
The new-come chiefs and wonder which was he.
No need to question long ; close-lipped and tall.
Long trained in mqrder-hrooding forests lone
To bridle others' clamors and his own,
Finnly erect, ho towered above them all.
The incarnate discipline that was to free
With iron curb that armed democracy.
Haughty they said he was, at fiist, severe.
But owned, as all men owned, the steady hand
Upon the bridle, patient to command.
Prized, as all prize, the justice pure from fear.
And learned to honor first, then love him, then
revere.
Such power there is in clear-eyed self-restraint.
And purpose clean as light from every selfish
taint.
Musing beneath the legendary tree.
The years between furl off : I seem to see
The sun-flecks,shaken the stirred foliage through,
Dapple with gold his sober huff and blue,
And weave prophetic aureoles round the. head
That shines our beacon ajgw, nor darkens with
the dead.
0 man of silent mood,
A stranger among strangers then.
How art thou since renownfed the Great, the
Good,
Familiar as the day in all the homes of men !
The winged years, that winnow praise and blame,
Blow many names out : they but fan to ñame
The self-renewing splendors-of thy fame.
0, for a drop of that terse Roman's ink
Who gave Agrícola dateless length of days,
c&
928
-E
PERSONAL POEMS.
To celebrate him fitly, neither swerve
To phrase unkempt, nor pass discretion's brink.
With him so statuelike in sad reserve.
So diffident to claim, so forward to deserve !
Nor need I shun due iufiuence of his fame
Who, mortal among mortals, seemed as now
The equestrian shape with unim passioned brow,
That paces silent on through vistas of acplaim.
What figure more immovably august
Than that grave strength so patient and so pure.
Calm in good fortune, when it wavered, sure,
That soul serene, impenetrably just.
Modelled on classic lines, so simple they endure ?
That soul so softly radiant and so white
The track it left seems less of fire than light,
Cold but to such as love distemperature ?
And if pure light, as some deem, be the force
That drives rejoicing planets on their course.
Why for his powey benign seek an impurer
source ?
His was the true enthusiasm that burns long,
Domestically bright.
Fed from itself and shy of human sight.
The hidden force that makes a lifetime strong.
And not the short-lived fuel of a song.
Passionless, say you ? What is passion for
But to sublime our natures and control
To front heroic toils with late return.
Or none, or such as shames the conqueror ?
That fire was fed with substance of the soul.
And not with holiday stubble, that could burn
Through seven slow years of unadvancing war.
Equal when fields were lost or fields were won,
With breath of popular applause or blame.
Nor fanned nor damped, unquenchably the same,
Too inward to be reached by flaws of idle fame.
Soldier and statesman, rarest unison;
High-poised example of great duties done
Simply as breathing, a world's honors worn
As life's indifferent gifts to all men bom ;
Dumb for himself, unless it were to God,
But for his barefoot soldiers eloquent.
Tramping the snow to coral where they trod.
Held by his awe in hollow-eyed content ;
Modest, yet firm as Nature's self ; unblamed
Save by the men his nobler temper shamed ;
Not honored then or now because he wooed
The popular voice, but that he still withstood ;
Broad-minded, higher-souled, there is but one
Who was all this, and ours, and all men's, —
Washington.
Minds strong by fits, irregularly great.
That flash and darken like revolving lights.
Catch more the vulgar eye unschooled to wait
On the long curve of patient days and nights.
Rounding a whole life to the circle fair
Of orbed completeness ; and this balanced soul.
So simple in its grandeur, coldly bare
Of draperies theatric, standing there
In perfect symmetry of self-control,
Seems not so great at first, but greater grows
Still as we look, and by experience learn
How grand this quiet is, how nobly stern
The discipline that wrought through life-long
throes
This energetic passion of repose.
A nature too decorous and severe.
Too self-respectful in its griefs and joys
For ardent girls and boys,
Who find no genius in a mind so clear
That its grave depths seem obvious and near,
Nor a soul great that made so little noise.
They feel no force in that calm, cadenccd phrase.
The habitual full-dress of his well-bred mind.
That seems to pace the minuet's courtly maze
And tell of ampler leisures, roomier length of
days.
His broad-built brain, to self so little kind
That no tumultuary blood could blind.
Formed to control men, not amaze.
Looms not like those that borrow height of haze :
It was a world of statelier movement then
Than this we fret in, he a denizen
Of that ideal Rome that made a man for men.
Placid completeness, life without a fall
From faith or highest aims, truth's breachless
wall.
Surely if any fame can bear the touch.
His will say " Here ! " at the last trumpet's call.
The unexpressive man whose life expressed so
much.
James Russeu. Lowell.
GEORGE WASHINGTON.
By broad Potomac's silent shore
Better than Trajan lowly lies.
Gilding her green declivities
With glory now and evermore ;
Art to his fame no aid hath lent ;
His country is his monument.
Anonymous.
DANIEL WEBSTER.
When, stricken by the freezing blast,
A nation's living pillars fall.
How rich the storied page, how vast,
A word, a whisper, can recall 1
PERSONAL POEMS.
•
929
No medal lifts its fretted face,
Nor speaking marble cheats your eye ;
Yet, while these pictured lines I trace,
A living image passes by :
■ A roof beneath the mountain pines ;
The cloisters of a hill-girt plain ;
The front of life's embattled lines ;
A mound beside the heaving main.
These are the scenes : a boy appears ;
Set life's round dial in the sun.
Count the swift arc of seventy years.
His frame is dust ; his task is done.
Yet pause upon the noontide hour,
Ere the declining sun has laid
His bleaching rays on manhood's power.
And look upon the mighty shade.
No gloom that stately shape can hide.
No change uncrown his brow ; behold !
Dark, calm, large-fronted, lightning-eyed,
Earth has no double from its mould !
Ere from the fields by valor won
The battle-smoke had rolled away,
And bared the blood-red setting sun.
His eyes were opened on the day.
His land was but a shelving strip.
Black with the strife that made it free ;
He lived to see its banners dip
Their fringes in the western sea.
The boundless prairies learned his name,
His words the mountain echoes knew ;
The northern breezes swept his fame
From icy lake to warm bayou.
In toil he lived ; in peace he died ;
When life's full cycle was complete.
Put off his robes of power and pride.
And laid them at his Master's feet.
His rest is by the storm-swept waves.
Whom life's wild tempests roughly tried.
Whose heart was like the streaming caves
Of ocean, throbbing at his side.
Death's cold white hand is like the snow
Laid softly on the furrowed hill ;
It hides the broken seams below.
And leaves the summit brighter still.
In vain the envious tongue upbraids ;
His name a nation's heart shall keep.
Till morning's latest sunlight fades
On the blue tablet of the deep !
Oliver Wendell Holues.
ICHABOD.
daniel webster. rsso.
So fallen ! so lost ! the light withdrawn.
Which once he wore !
The glory from his gi-ay hairs gone
Forevermore !
Revile him not, — the Tempter hath
A snare for all !
And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath,
Befit his fall !
O, dumb be passion's stormy rage.
When he who might
Have lighted up and led his ago
Falls back in night !
Scorn ! would the angels laugh to mark
A bright soul driven,
Fiend-goaded, down the endless dark.
From hope and heaven ?
Let not the land, once proud of him,
Insult him now ;
Nor brand with deeper shame his dim,
Dishonored brow.
But let its humbled sons instead.
From sea to lake,
A long lament, as for the dead.
In sadness make.
Of all we loved and honored, naught
Save power remains, —
A fallen angel's pride of thought.
Still strong in chains.
All else is gone ; from those great eyes
The soul has fled :
When faith is lost, when honor dies.
The man is dead !
Then pay the reverence of old days
To his dead fame ;
Walk backward, with averted gaze.
And hide the shame !
John Greenleaf whittieb.
THE DEAD CZAR NICHOLAS.
Lay him beneath his snows.
The gi'eat Norse giant who in these last days
Troubled the nations. Gather decently
The imperial robes about him. 'T is but man, —
fl-
930
PERSONAL POEMS.
This demi-god. Or rather it wols man,
And is — a little dust, that will corrupt
As fast as any nameless dust which sleeps
'Neath Alma's grass or Balaklava's vines.
No vineyard grave for higi. No quiet tomb
By river margin, where across the seas
Children's fond thoughts and women's memories
come.
Like angels, to sit by the sepulchre.
Say i iig : " All these were men who knew to count.
Front-faced, the cost of honor, nor did shrink
F rom its full payment ; coming here to die.
They died —like men."
But this man ? Ah ! for him
Funereal state, and ceremonial grand.
The stone-engi'aved sarcophagus, and then
Oblivion.
Nay, oblivion were as bliss
To that fierce howl which rolls from land to land
Exulting, — "Alt thou fallen, Lucifer,
Son of the morning ?" or condemning,— "Thus
Perish the wicked ! " or blaspheming,—"Here
Lies our Belshazzar, our Sennacherib,
Our Pharaoh, — he whose heart God hardened.
So that he would not let the people go."
Self-glorifying sinners 1 Why, this man
Was but like other men, — you, Levite .small.
Who shut your saintly ears, and prate of hell
And heretics, because outside church-doors,
KfUir church-doors, congregations poor and small
Praise Heaven in their own way ; you, autocrat
Of all the hamlets, who add field to field
And house to house, whose slavish children cower
Before your tyrant footstep ; you, foul-tongued
Fanatic or ambitious egotist.
Who think God stoops from his high majesty
To lay his finger on yonr puny head.
Ami crown it, that you henceforth may parade
Your maggotship throughout the wondering
world, —
" I am the Lord's anointed ! "
Fools and blind '
This czar, this emperor, this disthronèd corpse.
Lying so straightly in an icy calm
Grander than sovereignty, was but as ye,—
No better and no worse ; Heaven mend us all !
Carry him forth and bury him. Death's peace
Rest on his memory ! Mercy by his bier
Sits silent, or says only these few words, —
" Let him who is without sin 'mongst ye all
Cast the first stone."
Dinah Maria Mulock Craik.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.
from the "commemoration ode."
Life may be given in many ways.
And loyalty to Truth be sealed
As bravely in the closet as the field,
So bountiful is Fate ;
But then to stand beside her.
When craven churls deride her.
To front a lie in anns and not to yield,
This shows, inethinks, God's plan
And measure of a stalwart man.
Limbed like the old heroic breeds.
Who stand self-poised on manhood's solid
earth.
Not forced to frame excuses for his birth.
Fed from within with all the strength he needs.
Such was he, our Martyr-Chief,
AVhom late the Nation he had led,
AYith ashes on her head.
Wept with the passion of an angry grief :
Foigive me, if from present things 1 turn
To speak what in my heart will beat and burn.
And hang my wreath on his world-honored urn.
Nature, they say, doth dote,
And cannot make a man
Save on some woni-out plan,
Repeating us by rote :
For him her Old-AVorld moulds aside he threw,
And, choosing sweet clay from the breast
Of the unexhausted Y'est,
With stuir untainted shaped a hero new.
Wise, steadfast in the strength of God, and true.
How beautiful to see
Once more a sheiiherd of mankind indeed.
Who loved his charge, but never loved to lead ;
One whose meek (lock the people joyed to be,
Not lured by any cheat of birth.
But by his clear-grained human worth.
And brave old wisdom of sincerity !
They knew that outward grace is dust ;
They could not choose but trust
In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill, •
And supple-tempered will
That bent like perfect steel to spring again and
thrust.
His was no lonely mountain-peak of mind.
Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars,
A sea-mark now, now lost in vapors blind ;
Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined,
Frnitful and friendly for all human kind.
Yet also nigh to heaven and loved of loftiest stars.
Nothing of Europe here.
Or, then, of Euro[)e fronting mornward still,
Ere any names of Serf and Peer
Could Nature's equal scheme defaee ;
B-
4?
PERSONAL POEMS.
931
Here was a type of the true elder l'ace,
And one of Plutarch's men talked with us face
to face.
I praise him not ; it wete too late ;
And some innative weakness there must be
In him who condescends to victory
Such as the Pre.sent gives, and cannot wait,
Safe in himself as in a fate.
So always firmly he :
He knew to bide his time.
And can his fame abide.
Still patient in his simple faith sublime.
Till the wise years decide.
Great captains, with their guns and drums,
Disturb our judgment for the hour,
But at last silence comes ;
These all are gone, and, standing like a tower,
Our children shall behold his fame.
The kindly-eaniest, brave, foreseeing man.
Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame,
New birth of our new soil, the first American.
James Russell Lowell.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.*
foully assassinated april 14, 1865.
You lay a wreath onjnurdered Lincoln's bi'er,
Yoa, itho with ihocking pencil w\mt to trace.
Broad for the self-complacent British sneer.
His length of shambling limb, his furrowed face.
His gaunt, gnarled hands, his unkempt, brist¬
ling hair,
11 is garb uncouth, his bearing ill at ease
His lack of all we piize as debonair,
Of power or will to shine, of art to please ;
You, whose smart pen backed up the pencil's
laugh.
Judging each step as though the way were
plain.
Reckless, so it could point its paragraph
Of chief's perplexity, or people's pain :
Beside this corpse, that bears for winding-sheet
The Stars and Stripes he lived to rear anew.
Between the mourners at his head and feet.
Say, scurrile jester, is there room for you ?
Yes : he had lived to shame me from my sneer,
To lame my pencil, and confute my pen ;
To make me own this hind of princes peer*,
This rail-splitter a true-bom king of men.
• This tribute appeared in the London Punch, which, up to
the time of the assassination of Mr. Lincoln, had ridiculed and
unaligned him with all its well-known powers of pen and pencil.
My shallow judgment I had learned to rue.
Noting how to occasion's height he rose ;
How his (juaint wit made home-truth seem more
true ;
How, iron-like, his temper grew by blows.
How humble, yet how hopeful, he could be ;
How, ill good fortune and in ill, the same ;
Nor bitter in success, nor boastful he.
Thirsty for gold, nor feverish for fame.
He went about his work, — such work as few
Ever had laid on head and heart and hand, —
As one who knows, where there's a task to do,
Man's honest will must Heaven's good grace
command ;
Who trusts the strength will with the burden
grow.
That God makes instruments to work his will.
If but that will we can arrive to know.
Nor hamper with the weights of good and ill.
So he went forth to battle, on the side
That he felt clear was Liberty's and Right's,
As in his peasant boyhood he had plied
His warfare with mde Nature's thwarting
mights ;
The uncleared forest, the unbroken soil.
The iron-bark, that turns the lumberer's axe.
The rapid, that o'erbears the boatman's toil.
The prairie, hiding the mazed wanderer's tracks.
The ambushed Indian, and the prowling bear,—
Such were the deeds that helped his youth to
train :
Rough culture, but such trees large fruit may
bear.
If but their stocks be of right girth and grain.
So he grew up, a destined work to do.
And lived to do it : four long-suffering years'
Ill-fate, ill-feeling, ill-report, lived through,
And then he heard the hisses change to cheers.
The taunts to tribute, the abuse to praise,
And took both with the same unwavering mood ;
Till, as he came on light, from darkling days.
And seemed to touch the goal from where he
stood,
A felon hand, between the goal and him.
Reached from behind his back, a trigger prest,
And those perplexed and patient eyes were dim.
Those gaunt, long-laboring hmbs were laid to
rest I
932
PERSONAL POEMS.
The words of mercy were, upon his lips.
Forgiveness in his heart and on his pen.
When this vile murderer brought swil't eclipse
To thoughts of peace on earth, good-will to men.
The Old World and the New, from sea to sea,
Utter one voice of sympathy and shame :
Sore heart, so stopped when it at last beat high ;
Sad life, cut short just as its triumph came !
A deed accurst ! Strokes have been struck before
By the aissassin's hand, whereof men doubt
If more of horror or disgrace they bore ;
But thy foul crime, like Cain's, stands darkly
out.
Vile hand, that brandest murder on a strife,
Whate'erits grounds, stoutlyaud uoblystriven ;
And with the martyr's crown crownest a life
With much to praise, little to be forgiven.
Tom Taylor.
WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON.
" Some time afterward, it was reported to me by the city officers
that they had ferreted out the paper and its editor ; that his office
w<'u> an obscure hole, his only visible auxiliary a ne^'b boy, and his
supporters a few very insi^ificant persons of all colors. " —
H. G. OTIS.
In a small chamber, friendless and unseen.
Toiled o'er bis types one poor, unlearned young
man ;
The i)Iace was dark, unfurnitured, and mean :
Yet there the freedom of a race began.
Help came but slowly ; surely no man yet
Put lever to the heavy world with less :
What need of help ? He knew bow types were set,
He had a dauntless spirit, and a press.
Such earnest natures are the ßery pith.
The compact nucleus, round which systems
grow :
Mass after mass becomes inspired therewith,
And whirls impregnate with the central glow.
0 Tmth ! O Freedom ! how are ye still bom
In the rude stable, in the manger nursed !
Wliat humble hands unbar those gates of mom
Through which the splendors of the New Day
burst !
What ! shall one monk, scarce known beyond his
cell.
Front Rome's far-reaching holts, and scom her
frown ?
Brave Luther answered Yes ; that thunder's swell
Rocked Europe, and discharmed the triple
crown.
Whatever can he known of earth we know.
Sneered Europe's wise men, in their snail-
shells curled ;
No ! said one man in Genoa, and that No
Out of the dark created this New World.
Who is it will not dare himself to trust ?
Who is it hath not strength to stand alone ?
Who is it thwarts and bilks the inward Must ?
He and his works, like sand, from earth are
blown.
Men of a thousand shifts and wiles, look here !
See one straightforward conscience put in pawn
To win a world ; see the obedient sphere
By bravery's simple gravitation drawn !
Shall we not heed the lesson taught of old.
And by the Present's lips repeated still.
In our own single manhood to he hold,
Fortressed in conscience and impregnable will ?
We stride the river daily at its spring,
Nor, in our childish thoughtlessness, foresee
What myriad vassal streams shall tribute bring,
How like an equal it shaU gi-eet the sea.
0 small beginnings, ye are great and strong.
Based on a faithful heart and weariless brain !
Ye build the future fair, ye conquer wrong.
Ye cam the crown, and wear it not in vain.
James Russell Lowell,
THE OLD ADMIRAL.
admiral stewart. u. s. navy.
Gone at last.
That brave old hero of the past !
His spirit has a second birth.
An unknown, grander life ;
All of him that was earth
Lies mute and cold.
Like a wrinkled sheath and old.
Thrown off forever from the shimmering blade
That has good entrance made
Upon some distant, glorious strife.
From another generation,
A simpler age, to ours Old Ironsides came ;
The morn and noontide of the nation
Alike he knew, nor yet outlived his fame, -
O, not outlived his fame !
The dauntless men whose service guai-dsour shore
Lengthen still their glory-roll
With his name to lead the scroll.
As a flagship at her fore
Carries the Union, with its azure and the stars.
Symbol of times that are no more
And the old heroic wars.
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PERSONAL POEMS.
Í
933 T
He was the one
Whom Death had spared alone
Of all the captains of that lusty age,
Who sought the foeman where he lay.
On sea or sheltering hay,
Nor till the prize was theirs repressed their
lage.
They are gone, — all gone :
They rest with glory and the undying Powers ;
Only their name and fame, and what they
saved, are ours !
It was fifty years ago.
Upon the Gallic Sea,
He bore the banner of the free.
And fought the fight whereof our ehildren
know, —
The deathful, desperate fight !
Under the fair moon's light
The frigate squared, and yawed to left and right.
Every broadside swept to death a score !
Roundly played her guns and weU, till their
fiery ensigns fell.
Neither foe replying more.
All in silence, when the night-breeze cleared the
air.
Old Ironsides rested there,
Locked in between the twain, and drenched with
blood.
Then homeward, like an eagle with her prey I
O, it was a gallant fray, —
That fight in Biscay Bay !
Fearless the captain stood, in his youthful hardi¬
hood :
I He was the boldest of them all.
Our brave old Admiral 1
And still our heroes bleed.
Taught by that olden deed.
Whether of iron or of oak
The ships we marshal at our country's need.
Still speak their cannon now as then they
spoke ;
Still floats our unstruck banner from the mast
As in the stormy past.
Lay him in the ground :
Let him rest where the ancient river rolls ;
Let him sleep beneath the shadow and the sound
Of the bell whose proclamation, as it tolls.
Is of Freedom and the gift our fathers gave.
Lay him gently down :
The clamor of the town
Will not break the slumbers deep, the beautiful,
ripe sleep.
Of this lion of the wave.
Will not trouble the old Admiral in his grave.
Earth to earth his dust is laid.
Methinks his stately shade
On the shadow of a gi'eat ship leaves the shore ;
Over cloudless western seas
Seeks the far Hesperides,
The islands of the blest.
Where no turbulent billows roar, —
Where is rest.
His ghost upon the shadowy quarter stands
Nearing the deathless lands.
There all his martial mates, renewed and
strong.
Await his coming long.
I see the happy Heroes rise
With gratulation in their eyes :
" Welcome, old comrade," Lawrence cries ;
" Ah, Stewart, tell us of the wars !
Who win the glory and the scars ?
How floats the skyey flag, — how many
stars ?
Still speak they of Decatur's name ?
Of Bainbridge's and Perry's fame ?
Of me, who earliest camfe ?
Make ready, all :
Room for the Admiral !
Come, Stewart, tell us of the wars ! "
Edmund Clarence stedman.
KANE.
" died february l6, tStJ.
Aloft upon an old basaltic crag.
Which, scalped by keen winds that defend
the Pole,
Gazes with dead face on the seas that roll
Around the secret of the mystic zone,
A mighty nation's star-bespangled flag
Flutters alone.
And underneath, upon the lifeless front
Of that drear cliff, a simple name is traced ;
Fit type of him who, famishing and gaunt.
But with a rocky purpose in his soul.
Breasted the gathering snows.
Clung to the drifting floes.
By want beleaguered, and by winter chased.
Seeking the brother lost amid that frozen waste.
Not many months ago we greeted him.
Crowned with the icy honors of the North,
Across the land his hard-won fame went forth.
And Maine's deep woods were shaken limb by
limb.
His own mild Keystone State, sedate and prim.
Burst from decorous quiet, as he came.
Hot Southern lips, with eloquence aflame.
Sounded his triumph. Texas, wild and grim.
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934
PERSONAL POEMS.
Proífered its horny hand. The large-luiiged West,
From out his giant breast,
Yelled its frank welcome. And from main to m.ain
Jubilant to the sky,
Thundered the mighty cry.
Honor to Kane !
In vain, — in vain beneath his feet we flung
The reddening roses ! All in vain we poured
The golden wine, and round the sliining board
Sent the toast circling, till the rafters rung
With the thrice-tripled honors of the feast !
Scarce the buds wilted and the voices ceased
Ere the pure light that sparkled in his eyes.
Bright as auroral fires in Southern skies.
Faded and faded ! And the brave young heart
That the relentless Arctic winds had robbed
Of all its vital heat, in that Jong quest
For the lost captain, now within his breast
More and more faintly throbbed.
His was the victory ; but as his grasp
Closed on the laurel crown with eager clasp.
Death launched a whistling dart ;
And ere the thunders of applause were done
His bright eyes closed forever on the sun !
Too late, — too late the splendid prize he won
In the Olympic race of Science and of Art !
Like to some shattered berg that, pale and lone.
Drifts from the white North to a Tropic zone.
And in the burning day
Wastes peak by peak away.
Till on some rosy even
It dies with sunlight blessing it ; so he
Tranquilly floated to a Southern sea,
And melted into heaven !
He needs no tears who lived a noble life !
We will not weep for him who died so well ;
But we will gather round the hearth, and tell
The story of his strife ;
Such homage suits him well.
Better than funeral pomp or passing bell >
What tale of peril and self-sacrifice !
Prisoned amid the fastnesses of ice.
With hunger howling o'er the wastes of snow !
Night lengthening into months ; the ravenous
floe
Cninching the massive ships, as the white bear
Crunches his prey. The insufficient share
Of loathsome food ;
The lethargy of famine ; the despair
Urging to labor, nervelessly pursued ;
Toil done with skinny arms, and faces hued
Like pallid masks, while dolefully behind
Glimmered the fading embers of a mind !
That awful hour, when through the prostrate band
Delh'ium stalked, laying his burning hand
Upon the ghastly foreheads of the crew ;
The whispers of rebellion,»faint and few
At first, but deepening ever till they grew
Into black thoughts of murder, —such the throng
Of horrors bound the hero. High the song
Should be that hymns the noble part he played !
Sinking himself, yet ministering aid
To all around him. By a mighty will
Living defiant of the wants that kill.
Because his death would seal his comiudes' fate ;
Cheering with ceaseless and inventive skill
Those polar waters, dark and desolate.
Equal to every trial, every fate.
He stands, until spring, tardy with relief.
Unlocks the icy gate.
And the pale prisoners thread the world once
more.
To the steep clifls of Greenland's pastoral shore
Bearing their dying chief I
Time was when he should gain his spurs of gold !
From royal hands, who wooed the knightly
state ;
The knell of old formalities is tolled,
And the world's knights are now self-conse¬
crate.
No grander episode doth chivalry hold
In all its annals, bivck to Charlemagne,
Than that lone vigil of unceasing pain.
Faithfully kept through hunger and through cold.
By the good Christian knight, ElLsha Kane !
fitz-jaues o'brien.
■ *
MAZZINL
A light is out in Italy,
A golden tongue of purest flame.
We watched it burning, long and lone,
And every watcher knew its name.
And knew from whence its fervor came :
That one rare light of Italy,
Which put self-seeking souls to shame !
This light which burnt for Italy
Through all the blackness of her night.
She doubted, once upon a time.
Because it took away her sight.
She looked and said, ' There is no light ! "
It was thine eyes, poor Italy !
That knew not dark apart from bright.
This flame which burnt for Italy,
It would not let her hatera sleep.
They blew at it with angry breath.
And only fed its upward le.ep.
And only made it hot and deep.
PERSONAL POEMS.
035
Its burning showed us Italy,
And all the hopes she had to keep.
This light is out in Italy,
Her eyes shall seek for it in vain !
For her sweet sake it spent itself.
Too early flickering to its wane, —
Too long blown over by her pain.
Bow down and weep, O Italy,
Thou canst not kindle it again !
L.AURA C« Redden {Howard Clyndon\
.TOHN CHARLES FREMONT.
Thí ei^or, Fre(nonL sim (•ly was''to avt
A brave Anan's part/without/hc stati jiman's taet.
And, taking counsel but of common sense,
To strike at cause as well as consccjuence.
0, never yet since Roland wound his horn
At Roncesvalles has a blast been blown
Far-heard, wide-echoed, startling as thine own.
Heard from the van of freedom's hope forlorn !
It had been safer, doubtless, for the time,
To flatter treason, and avoid oflTeiice
To that Dark Power whose undeilying crime
Heaves upward its perpetual turbulence.
But, if thine be the fate of all wdio break
The ground for truth's seed, or forerun their
years
Till lost in distance, or with stout hearts make
A lane for freedom through the level spears.
Still take thou courage ! God has spoken through
thee.
Irrevocable, the mighty words. Be free !
The land shakes with them, and the slave's dull
ear
Turns from the rice-swamp stealthily to hear.
Who would recall them now must first arrest
The winds that blow down from the free North¬
west,
Ruffling the Gulf ; or like a scroll roll back
The Mississippi to its upper springs.
Such words fulfil their prophecy, and lack
But the full time to harden into things.
john CREENLEAF whittier.
TO THE MEMORY OF FLETCHER
HARPER.
No soldier, statesman, hierophant, or king ;
None of the heroes that you poets sing ;
A toiler ever since his days began.
Simple, though shrewd, just-judging, man to
man;
God-fearing, leamèd in life's hard-taught school ;
By long obedience lessoned how to rule ;
Through many an early struggle led to find
That crown of prosperous fortune, — to be kind.
Lay on his breast these English daisies sweet !
Good rest to the gray head and the tired feet
That walked this world for seventy steadfast
years !
Buiy him with fond blessings and few tears.
Or only of remembrance, not regret.
On his full life the eternal seal is set.
Unbroken till the resurrection day.
So let his children's children go their way.
Go and do likewise, leaving 'neath this soil
An honest man, " the noblest work of God."
Dinah Maria mulock Ckaik.
THE FIFTIETH BIRTHDAY OF AGASSIZ.
MAY 28, 1857.
)
It was fifty years ago.
In the pleasant month of May,
In the beautiful Pays de Vaud,
A child in its cradle lay.
And Nature, the old nurse, took
The child upon her knee.
Saying, "Here is a story-book
Thy Father has WTitteu for thee."
"Come, wander with me," she said,
"Into regions yet untrod.
And read what is still unread
In the manuscripts of God."
And he wandered away and away
With Nature, the dear old nurse.
Who sang to him night and day
The rhymes of the universe.
._nd whenever the way seemed long.
Or his heart began to fail.
She would sing a more wonderful song.
Or tell a more marvellous talc.
So she keeps him still a child.
And will not let him go.
Though at times his heart beats wild
For the beautiful Pays de Vaud ;
Though at times he heai-s in his dreams '
The Ranz des Vaches of old.
And the rush of mountain streams
From glaciers clear and cold ;
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936
PERSONAL POEMS.
n
And the mother at home says, "Hark !
For his voice I listen and yearn :
It is growing late and dark,
And my hoy does not return ! "
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
THE PRAYER OF AGASSIZ.
On the isle of Penikese, .
Ringed about by sapphire seas.
Fanned by breezes salt and cool.
Stood the Master with his school.
Over sails that not in vain
"Wooed the west-wind's steady strain,
Line of coast that low and far
Stretched its undulating bar,
AVings aslant along the rim
Of the waves they stooped to skim.
Rock and isle and glistening bay.
Fell the beautiful white day.
Said the Master to the youth :
" We have come in search of truth.
Trying with uncertain key
Door by door of mystery ;
AVe are reaching, through His laws.
To the garment-hem of Cause,
Him, the endless, unbegun.
The Unnamcable, the One,
Light of all our light the Source,
Life of life, and Force of force.
As with fingers of the blind,
AVe are groping here to find
AVhat the hieroglyphics mean
Of the Unseen in the seen,
AVhat the Thought which underlies
Nature's masking and disguise,
AVhat it is that hides beneath
Blight and bloom and birth and death.
By past efforts unavailing.
Doubt and error, loss and failing.
Of our weakness made aware.
On the threshold of our task
Let us light and guidance ask.
Let us pause in silent prayer ! "
Tlien the Master in his place
Bowed his head a little space.
And the leaves by soft airs stirred.
Lapse of wave and cry of bird,
Left the solemn hush unbroken
Of that wordless prayer unspoken,
AVhile its wish, on earth unsaid.
Rose to heaven intei"preted.
As in life's best hours we hear
By the spirit's finer ear
His low voice within us, thus
The All-Father lieareth us ;
And his holy ear we pain
With our noisy words and vain.
Not for him our violence.
Storming at the gates of sense.
His the primal language, his
The eternal silences !
Even the careless heart was moved.
And the doubting gave assent.
With a gesture reverent.
To the Master well-beloved.
As thin mists are glorified
By the light they cannot hide, [
All who gazed upon him saw.
Through its veil of tender awe.
How his face was still uplit
By the old sweet look of it.
Hopeful, trustful, full of cheer.
And the love that casts out fear.
Who the secret may declare
Of that brief, unuttered prayer ?
Did the shade before him come
Of the inevitable doom.
Of the end of earth so near.
And Eternity's new year ?
In the lap of sheltering seas
Rests the isle of Penikese ;
But the lord of the domain
Comes not to his own again :
AVhere the eyes that follow fail.
On a vaster sea his sail
Drifts beyond our beck and hail !
Other lips within its bound
Shall the laws of life expound ;
Other eyes from rock and shell
Read the world's old riddles well ;
But when breezes light and bland
Blow from Summer's blossomed land.
When the air is glad with wings.
And the blitlre song-sparrow sings.
Many an eye with his still face
Shall the living ones displace.
Many an ear the word shall seek
He alone could fitly speak.
And one name forevermore
Shall be uttered o'er and o'er
By the waves that kiss the shore.
By the curlew's whistle, sent
Down the cool, sea-scented air ;
In all voices known to her
Nature own her worshipper.
Half in triumph, half lament.
Thither love shall tearful turn.
Friendship pause uncovered there,
Aud the wisest reverence leam
From the Master's silent prayer.
John Greenleaf Whitticr.
--[?
PERSONAL POEMS.
937
TO HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW,
on his birthday. 27th february, 1867.
I NEED not praise the sweetness of his song,
Where limpid verse to limpid verse succeeds
Smooth as our Charles, when, fearing lest he
wrong
The new moon's mirrored skiff, he slides along,
Full without noise, and whispers in his reeds.
With loving breath of all the winds his name
Is blown about the world, but to his friends
A sweeter secret hides behind his fame.
And Love steals shyly through the loud acclaim
To murmur a God bless you / and there ends.
As I'muse backward up the checkered years,
Wherein so ipuch was given, so mueh was lost.
Blessings in both kinds, such as cheapen tears —
But hush ! this is not for profaner ears ;
Let them drink molten pearls nor dream the
cost.
Some suck up poison from a sorrow's core.
As naught but nightshade grew upon earth's
ground ;
Love turned all his to heart's-ease, and the more
Fate tried his bastions, she but forced a door.
Leading to sweeter manhood and more sound.
Even as a wind-waved fountain's swaying shade
Seemsof mixed race, a gray wraith shot with sun.
So through his trial faith translucent rayed.
Till darkness, half disnatured so, betrayed
A heart of sunshine that would fain o'errun.
Surely if skill in song the shears may stay,
And of its purpose cheat the charmed abyss.
If our poor lile be lengthened by a lay,
He shall not go, although his presence may.
And the next age in praise shall double this.
Long days be his, and each as lusty-sweet
As gracious natures find his song to be ;
May Age steal on with softly cadenced feet
Falling in music, as for him were meet
Whose choicest verse is harsher-toned than he !
James Russell Lowell.
JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE.
died in new york, september, isja
Gkeen be the turf above thee.
Friend of my better days !
None knew thee but to love thee.
Nor named thee but to praise.
Tears fell, when thou wert dying.
From eyes unused to weep.
And long, where thou art lying.
Will tears the cold turf steep.
When hearts, whose truth was proven.
Like thine, are laid in earth.
There should a wreath be woven
To tell the world their worth ;
And I, who woke each morrow
To clasp thy hand in mine.
Who shared thy joy and sorrow.
Whose weal and woe were thine.
It should be mine to braid it
Around thy faded brow.
But I've in vain essayed it.
And feel I cannot now.
While memory bids me weep thee.
Nor thoughts nor words are free.
The grief is fixed too deeply
That mourns a man like thee.
fitz.creene halleck.
FITZ-GREENE HALLECK.
read at the unveiling of his statue in central
park, may, 1877.
Among their graven shapes to whom
Thy civic wreaths belong,
O city of his love ! make room
For one whose gift was song.
Not his the soldier's sword to wield.
Nor his the helm of state.
Nor glory of the stricken field.
Nor triumph of debate.
In common ways, with common men.
He served his race and time
As well as if his clerkly pen
Had never danced to rhyme.
If, in the thronged and noisy mart.
The Muses found their son.
Could any say his tuneful art
A duty left undone ?
He toiled and sang ; and year by year
Men found their homes more sweet,
And through a tenderer atmosphere
Looked down the brick-walled street.'
The Greek's wild onset Wall Street knew.
The Red King walked Broadway ;
And Alnwick Castle's roses blew
From Palisades to Bay.
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938
PERSONAL POEMS.
Pair City by the Sea ! upraise
His veil with reverent hands ;
And mingle with thy own the praise
And piide of other lauds.
Let Greece Iiis fiery l}'ric breathe
Above her hero-ums ;
And Scotland, with her holly, wreathe
The flower he culled for Hums.
O, stately stand thy palace walls,
Thy tall ships ride tlie seas ;
To-day thy poet's name recalls
A prouder thought than these.
Not less thy pulse of trade shall beat,
Nor less thy tall fleets swim.
That shaded square and dusty street
Are classic ground through him.
Alive, he loved, like all who sing.
The echoes of his song ;
Too late the tardy meed we bring,
The praise delayed so long.
Too late, alas I — Of all who knew
The living man, to-day
Before his unveiled face, how few
Make bare their locks of gi'ay !
Our lips of praise must soon be dumb.
Our grateful eyes be dim ;
O, brothers of the days to come,
Take tender charge of him !
New hands the wires of song may sweep.
New voices challenge fame ;
But let no moss of years o'crcreep
The lines of Halleck's name.
John Creenleaf whittier.
FEAGLIENTS.
Chaucer.
As that renowmed poet them compyled '
With warlike numbers and heroicke sound,
Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled.
On Fame's etemall beadroll worthic to be fyled.
Fatrie Qmene, Book Iv. Cttnt. IL SpeN'ser.
The Eari, op Warwick.
Peace, impudent and shameless Wni-wick !
Proud setter-up and puller-down of kings.
King Hmry VI., Part HI. Act lU. Sc. 3. Shakespeare.
The Duke of Glostf.r.
I, that am rudely stamped and want love's
majesty
To strut before a wanton ambling nymph ;
I, that am curtailed of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Defoitned, unfinished, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scai ce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by tlicm, —
Why, 1, in this weak piping time of peace.
Have no delight to pass away the time.
Unless to see my shadow in the sun.
Richardlll.f Act i. Sc. i. SHAKESPEARE.
Galileo.
The starry Galileo, with his woes.
Chiide Harold, Cant. iv. BVRO>f.
Sir Philip Sidxet.
The admired mirror, glory of our isle.
Thou far, far more than mortal man, whose style
Struck more men dumb to hearken to thy song
Than Orpheus' harp, or Tally's golden tongi'e.
To him, as right, for wit's deep quintessence,
For honor, valor, virtue, excellence.
Be all the garlands, crown his tomb with bay.
Who spake as much as e'er our tongue can say.
BritannidS Pastorals, Book iL Song 2. W. Ci;o\V.\E.
Edmund Spenser.
Divinest Spenser, heaven-bred, happy Muse !
Would any power into my brain inl'use
Thy worth, or all that poets had before,
I could not praise till thou deserv'st no more.
Britannia's Pastorals, Book ii. Song t, W. BROWNE.
I was promised on a time
To have reason for my rhyme ;
From that time unto this season,
I received nor rhyme nor reason.
Lines on his promised Pensiotu SPENCER.
Chp.istopher Marlowe.
For that fine madness stUl he did retain.
Which rightly should possess a poet's brain.
To Henry Reynolds : 0/Poets and Poesy* M. Dra\'TON.
Lord Bacon.
If parts allure thee, think how Bacon shined.
The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind I
Essay on Man, Epistle ty, PoPB*
Í3-
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FRAGMENTS.
939
Ben Jonson.
0 rare Ben Jonson !
Epitaph,
Sir j. Younc.
What things have we seen
Done at the Mermaid ! heard words that have
been
So nimble, and so full of subtle flame,
As if that every one from whence they came
Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest.
And had resolved to live a fool the rest
Of his dull life ; then when there hath been
thrown
Wit able enough to justify the town
For three days past ; wit that might warrant be
For the whole city to talk foolishly
Till that were cancelled; and when that was gone.
We left an air behind us, which alone
Was able to make the two next companies
(Right witty, though but downright fools) more
wise.
UtUr to Bm yonson. f.beaumont.
William Shakespeare.
Far from the sun and summer gale.
In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid.
What time, where lucid Avon strayed.
To him the mighty mother did unveil
Her awful face : the dauntless child
Stretched forth his little arms and smiled.
"This pencil take," she said, " whose colors clear
Richly paint the vernal year :
Thine too these golden keys, immortal boy !
This can unlock the gates of joy ;
Of horror that, and thrilling fears.
Or ope the sacred source of .sympathetic tears."
Progress of Poesy. T. Gray.
RenownM Spenser, lie a thought more nigh
To learned Chaucer, and rare Bea\imont lie
A little nearer Spenser, to make room
For Shakespeare in your threefold, fourfold tomb.
On Shakespeare. w. basse.
&
Abraham Cowley.
Old mother-wit and nature gave
Shakespeare and Fletcher all they have ;
In Spenser and in Jonson art
Of slower nature got the start ;
But both in him so equal arc.
None knows which bears the happiest share ;
To him no author was unknown,
Yet what he wrote was all his own.
Btezy on Cotoley. StR J DENHAM.
Eaul of Marlborough.
[Lord'President of the Council to King James i. Parliament was
dissolved March xo, and he died March 14, iteS.J
Till the sad breaking of that Parliament
Broke him. . . .
Killed with report that old man eloquent.
To the Lady Margaret Ley* MILTON#
John Wickliffe.
As thou these ashes, little Brook ! wilt bear
Into the Avon, Avon to the tide
Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas.
Into main ocean they, this deed accursed
An emblem yields to friends and enemies,
How the bold Teacher's doctrine, sanctified
By truth, shall spread, throughout the world
dispersed.
EcclesCSonnets, Part It, xvii. t To Wickliffe, WORDSWORTH.
[Dartlett quotes, in this connection, the following:]
" Some prophet of that day said :
' The Avon to the Severn runs.
The Severn to the sea ;
And Wickliffe's dust shall spread abroad.
Wide as the waters be.' "
From Address be/ore the " Sons of New Hampshire *' (1349V
Daniel Webster.
John Milton.
Nor second he, that rode sublime
Upon the seraph-wings of ecstasy.
The secrets of the abyss to spy.
He passedthe flaming bounds of place and time;
The living throne, the sapphire blaze,
Where angels tremble while they gaze.
He saw ; but, blasted with excess of light.
Closed his eyes in endless night.
Progress 0/Poesy. T. CRAY.
Oliver Cromwell.
How shall I then begin, or where conclude.
To draw a fame so truly circular ?
For in a round what order can be showed.
Where all the parts so equal perfect are ?
His grandeur he derived from Heaven alone ;
For he was great, ere fortune made him so :
And wars, like mists that rise against the sun,
Made him but greater seem, not greater grow.
Oliver Cromwell. J. DrYDEN.
Or, ravished with the whistling of a name.
See Cromwell, damned to everlasting fame !
Essay on Man, Epistle IV. POPE,
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940
PERSONAL POEMS.
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Kino Charles II.
Here lies our sovereign lord the king,
Whose word no man relies on ;
He never says a foolish thing,
Nor ever does a wise one.
Written on the Bedchamber Door of Charles IT,
Earl of Rochester.
James Thomson.
A hard here dwelt, more fat than hard heseems
Who, void of envy, guile, and lust of gain,
On virtue still, and nature's pleasing themes.
Poured forth his unpremeditated strain :
The world forsaking with a calm disdain,
Here Lughed he careless in his easy seat ;
Here quaffed, encircled with the joyous train.
Oft moralizing sage : his ditty sweet
He loathed much to write, ne carèd to repeat.
Stanza introduced into Thomson's " Castle of indolence," CantA.
lord lyttelton.
In yonder grave a Druid lies,
Where slowly winds the stealing wave ;
The year's best sweets shall duteous rise
To deck its poet's sylvan grave,
• • • • •
And see, the fairy valleys fade ;
Dun night has veiled the solemn view I
Yet once again, dear parted shade.
Meek Nature's child, again adieu !
Cde on the Death of Thomson, w. collins.
William Hogarth.
The hand of him here torpid lies
That drew the essential form of grace ;
Here closed in death the attentive eyes
That saw the manners in the face.
Efiiafh. Dr. S. Johnson.
William Wordsworth.
Thine is a strain to read among the hills.
The old and full of voices ;—by the source
Of some free stream, whose gladdening presence
fills
The solitude with sound ; for in its course
Even such is thy deep song, that seems a part
Of those high scenes, a fountain from their heart.
Wordsauorih, F, D. Hbmans.
Richard Brinslet Sheridan.
Whose humor, as gay as t^e firefly's light.
Played round every subject, and shone as it
played ; —
Whose wit, in the combat, as gentle as bright,
Ne'er carried a heart-stain away on its blade ; —
Whose eloquence — brightening whatever it
tried,
Whether reason or fancy, the gay or the grave—
Was as rapid, as deep, and as brilliant a tide.
As ever bore freedom aloft on its wave !
Lines on the Death of Sheridan. t. moorb«
Ye men of wit and social eloquence !
He was your brother, — bear his ashes hence !
While powers of mind almost of boundless range.
Complete in kind, as various in their change, —
MTiile eloquence, wit, poesy, and mirth.
That humbler harmonist of care on earth.
Survive within our souls,—while lives our sense
Of pride in merit's proud pre-eminence.
Long shall we seek his likeness, — long in vain,
And turn to all of him which may remain,
Sighing that Nature formed but one such man.
And broke the die — in moulding Sheridan !
Monody on the Death of Sheridan, byron*
Amos Cottle.
Oh ! Amos Cottle ! *— Phœbus ! what a name
To fill the speaking trump of future fame ! —
Oh ! Amos Cottle ! for a moment think
What meagre profits spring from pen and ink !
English Bards and Scotch Reviewers* Byron.
The Duke of Wellington.
0 good gray head which all men knew,
O voice from which their omens all men drew,
O iron nerve to true occasion true,
O fallen at length that tower of strength
Which stood four-square to all the winds that
blew !
Such was he whom we deplore.
The long self-sacrifice of life is o'er.
The great World-victor's victor will be seen no
more.
On the Death of the Duhe of Wellington, tennyson.
Nathaniel Hawthorne.
There in seclusion and remote from men
The wizard hand lies cold.
Which at its topmost speed let fall the pen,
And left the tale half told.
Ah ! who shall lift that wand of magic power.
And the lost clew regain ?
The unfinished window in Aladdin's tower
Unfinished must remain !
Hawthorne, May 23, 1864. longfellow,
• " Mr. Cottle, Amos or Jc«eph. I don't know which, but one or
both, once sellers of books they did not write, but now writers of
books that do not sell, have publislted a pair of epics.
AUTHOR.
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HUMOROUS POEMS.
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KING JOHN AND THE ABBOT OF
CANTERBURY.
FROM " PERCY'S RELIQUES."
An ancient story I '11 tell you anon
Of a notable prince that 'was called King John ;
And he ruled England with main and with might,
For he did great wrong, and maintained little
right.
And 1 '11 tell you a story, a stoiy so merry.
Concerning the Abbot of Canterbury ;
How for his house-keeping and high renown.
They rode poste for him to fair London towne.
An hundred men the king did heare say.
The abbot kept in his house every day ;
And fifty golde chaynes without any douht.
In velvet coates waited the abbot about.
" How now, father ahhot, 1 heare it of thee,
Thou keepest a farre better house than mee ;
And for thy house-keeping and high renowne,
1 fearo thou work'st treason against my crown."
"My liege," quo' the abbot, "I would it were
knowne
1 never spend nothing, hut what is my owne ;
And 1 trust your grace will doe me no deere.
For spending of my owne true-gotten geere."
"Yes, yes, father abbot, thy fault it is highe.
And now for the same thou needest must dye ;
For excejit thou canst answer me questions three,
Thy head shall be smitten from thy bodie.
" And first," quo' the king, " when I'm in this
stead.
With my crowne of golde so faire on my head.
Among, all my liege-men so noble of birthe.
Thou must tell me to one penny what I am
worthe.
"Secondly, tell me, without any doubt.
How soono 1 may ride the whole world about ;
.And at the third question thou must not shrink.
But tell me hero truly what 1 do think."
" O these are hard questions for my shallow witt.
Nor I cannot answer your grace as yet :
But if you will give me but three weeks' space,
lie do my endeavor to answer your grace."
"Now three weeks' space to thee will I give.
And that is the longest time thou hast to live ;
For if thou dost not answer my questions three,
Thy lands and thy livings are forfeit to mee."
Away rode the abbot all sad at that word.
And he rode to Cambridge, and Oxenford ;
But never a doctor there was so wise.
That could with his learning an answer devise.
Then home rode the abbot of comfort so cold.
And ho met his shepheard a-going to fold ;
" How now, my lord abbot, you are welcome
home ;
What nowes do you bring us from good King
John ? "
" Sad news, sad news, shepheard, I must give.
That 1 have but three days more to live ;
For if 1 do not answer him questions three.
My head will he .smitten from my bodie.
" The first is to tell him, there in that stead.
With his erowne of golde so fair on his head.
Among all his liege-men so noble of birth.
To within one penny of what he is worth.
" The seconde, to tell him without any doubt.
How soone he may ride this whole world about ;
And at the third question 1 must not shrinke.
But tell him there truly what he does thinke."
" Now cheare up, sire abbot, did you never hear
yet.
That a fool he may leame a wise man ■witt ?
Lend me horse, and serving-men, and your ap¬
parel.
And He ride to London to answere your quarrel.
" Nay, frowne not, if it hath bin told unto me,
I am like your lordship, as ever may be ;
pq - r-
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94i HUMOROUS POEMS.
And if you will but lend me your gowne, JOHN BARLEYCORN.*
ïheieis none shall know us at fail-London towne."
There was three kings into the East,
" Now horses and serving-men thou shalt have, Three kings both great and high.
With sumptuous ari-ay most gallant and brave, sworn a solemn oath
With crozier, and mitre, and lochet, and cope, John Barleycorn should die.
Fit to appear 'fore our fader the pope."
They took a plough and ploughed him down,
" Now welcome, sire abbot," the king he did say, Put clods upon his head,
" 'T is well thou 'rt come back to kecpe thy day ; And they hae sworn a solemn oath.
For and if thou canst answer my questions three, John Barleycorn was dead.
Thy life and thy living both saved shall be.
But the cheerful spring came kindly on,
"And first, when thou seest me here in this stead, -^nd showers began to fall ;
With my crowne of golde so fair on my head, John Barleycorn got up again.
Among all my liege-men so noble of birthe, -^ud sore surprised them all.
Tell me to one penny what I am worth."
The sultry suns of summer came,
"For thirty pence our Saviour was sold grew thick and strong.
Among the false Jewes, as I have bin told, head well armed wi pointed spears.
And twenty-nine is the worth of thee. That no one should him wrong.
For I thinke thou art one penny worser than he." , , , ,
The sober autumn entered mild.
The king he laughed, and swore by St. Bittel, ,
" I did not think I had been worth so littel ! His bending joints and drooping head
— Now secondly tell me, without any doubt, ®^® ® ®®^'^
How soone I may ride this whole world about." -tt. i
His color sickened more and more,
"You must rise with the sun, and ride with the ^ faded into age ;
And then his enemies began
Until the next morning he riseth againe ; To show their deadly rage.
And then your grace need not make any doubt m , . . , , ,
But in twenty.four hours you '11 ride it about." 7® ^ ®?^
And cut him by the knee ;
The king he laughed, and swore by St. Jone, 'IP"" the cart, .
" I did not think it could be gone so soone ! ^ rogue for forgene.
— Now from the third question thou must not _ , , . , , . , ,
shrinks They laid him down upon his back,
■t> i 11 I. ' i- 1 I. i T 1 iv 1 " And cudgelled him full sore ;
But teU me here truly what I do thinke. . . . ... ,
They hung him up before the storm,
«< -v ti. i. 1. 11 T J 1 1 And turned him o'er and o'er.
"Yea, that shaU I do, and make your grace
X- 4.1,™ i"^ '' 4.1, A vx 4. r n 4. V They fillèd up a darksome pit
YOU thinke I m the Abbot of Canterbury ; „t-.t, , •
T,.T. !-• 1-, J ,. With water to the brim.
But 1 m his poor shepheard, as plain you may , , , . , i t> i
^ r > 1 J J Thev heaved m John Barleycorn,
SP6 " J
mr.. ' .V jir- J/. M There let him sink or swim,
i hat am come to beg pardon for him and for me.
rru ^ ' v 1 -L J J 1 XT- -»r Thev laid liim out upon the flooF,
The King he laughed, and swore by the Masse, i i-. r xiî
«T1 i xv 1 1 i-v xxi.- J • 1 1»» To work him further woe,
" lie make thee lord abbot this day in his place ! . , n-i- j
.«XT 1- T_ X • 1- J And still, as signs 01 lite appeared,
" Now naye, my liege, be not m such speede, ' j ?. x j x»
t:> tit -x J « They tossed him to and fro.
£ or alacke I can neither write ne reade.
T .11 . .1 They wasted, o'er a scorching flame,
" Fom nohles a week then I will give thee, .
For this merry jest thou hast showne unto me ; ^
And tell the old ab^t when thou comest honm, j
Thou hast brought him a pardon from good King
John." * An improvement on a very old ballad found ina black-letter
J
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Anonymous. volume in the Pepys library, Cambridge University.
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HUMOROUS POEMS.
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And they hae ta'cn Iiis veiy heart's blood,
And drank it round and round ;
And still the more and more they drank.
Their joy did more abound.
John Barleycorn was a hero bold.
Of noble enterprise ;
For if you do but taste his blood,
'T will make your courage rise.
Then let us toast John Barleycorn,
Each man a glass in hand ;
And may his great posterity
hi e'er fail iu old Scotland !
Robert Burns.
OF A CERTAINE MAN.
There was (not certaine when) a certaine
preacher.
That never learned, and yet became a teacher.
Who having read in Latine thus a text
Of met quidam homo, much pcrplext.
He seemed the same with studie great to scan.
In English thus, There luas a certaine man.
But now (quoth he), good people, note you this.
He saith there was, he doth not say there is ;
For in these daies of ours it is most plaine
Of promise, oath, word, deed, no man's certaine ;
Yet by my text you see it comes to passe
That surely once a certaine man there was :
But yet, I think, in all your Bible no man
Can finde this text, Tha-e was a certaine
woman.
Sir John Harrington.
LOGIC OF HUDIBRAS.
from " hudibras." part i. canto i.
He was in logic a great critic.
Profoundly skilled in analytic ;
He could distinguish and divide
A hair, 'twixt south and southwest side ;
On either which he would dispute.
Confute, change hands, and still confute ;
He'd undertake to prove, by force
Of argument, a man's no horse ;
He'd prove a buzzard is no fowl.
And that a lord may be an owl,
A calf an alderman, a goose a justice.
And rooks committee-men and trastees.
He'd run in debt by disputation,
And pay with ratiocinàtion ;
All this by syllogism true.
In mood and figure he would do.
Dr. samuel Butler.
THE VICAR OF BRAY.
t" The Vicar of Bray in Berk.shlre. England, was Simon Alteyn,
or Allen, and held Iiis place from 1540 10 1583. 11c was a PaiiiNt
under the reign of Henry the Eighth, and a Protestant under Ed¬
ward the Sixth. He was a Papist again under Mary, and once more
became a Protestant in the reign of Elizabeth. Wheh this scandal
to the gown was reproached for his versatility of religious creeds,
and taxed for being a turn-coat and an inconstant cliangoling, as
Fuller expresses it. he replied : ' Not so neither ; for if I changed
my religion. 1 am sure I kept true to iny principle, which is to live
and die the Vicar of Bray.' " — DISRAELI.]
In good King Charles's golden days.
When loyalty no harm meant,
A zealous higii-churchman was I,
And so I got preferment.
To teach my flock I never missed :
Kings were by God appointed.
And lost are those that dare resist
Or touch the Lord's anointed.
And this is law that I'll maintain
Until my dying day, sir.
That whatsoever king shall reign,
Still I'll be the Vicar of Bray, sir.
When royal James possessed the crown.
And popery came in fashion.
The penal laws I hooted down.
And read the Declaration ;
The Church of Rome I found would fit
Full well my constitution ;
And I had been a Jesuit
But for the Revolution.
And this is law, etc.
When William was our king declared.
To ease the nation's grievance ;
With this new wind about I steered.
And swore to him allegiance ;
Old principles I did revoke.
Set conscience at a distance ;
Passive obedience was a joke,
A jest was non-resistance.
And this is law, etc.
When royal Anne became onr queen,
The Church of England's glory.
Another face of things was seen.
And I became a Tory ;
Occasional conformists base,
I blamed their moderation ;
And thought the Church in danger was,
By such prevarication.
And this is law, etc.
When George in puddiiig-time came o'er.
And moderate men looked big, sir,
My principles I changed once more.
And so became a Whig, sir ;
e-
946
HUMOROUS POEMS.
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And thus preferment I procured
From our new faith's-defender,
And almost every day abjured
The Pope and the Pretender.
And this is law, etc.
The illustrious house of Hanover,
And Protestant succession,
To these I do allegiance swear—
While they can keep possession :
Tor in my faith and loyalty
I neveiTUore will falter,
And George my lawful king shall be—
Until the times do alter.
And this is law, etc.
anonymous.
GOOD ALE.
I CANNOT eat but little meat, —
My stomach is not good ;
But, sure, I think that I can drink
With him that wears a hood.
Though I go bare, take ye no care ;
I nothing am a-cold, —
I stuff my skin so full within
Of jolly good ale and old.
Back and side go hare, go hare;
Both foot and hand go cold ;
But, belly, God send thee good ale enough.
Whether it be new or old !
I love no roast but a nut-brown toast.
And a crab laid in the firo ;
A little bread shall do me stead, —
Much bread I not desire.
No frost, nor snow, nor wind, I trow.
Can hurt me if I w'old, —
I am so wrapt, and thorowly lapt
Of jolly good ale and old.
Back and side, etc.
And Tyb, my wife, that as her life
Loveth well good ale to seek.
Full oft drinks she, till you may see
The tears run down her cheek ;
Then doth she trowl to me the bowl,
Even as a malt-worm should ;
And saith, "Sweetheart, I took my part
Of this jolly good ale and old."
Back and side, etc.
Now let them drink till they nod and wink,
Even as good fellows should do ;
They shall not miss to have the bliss
Good ale doth bring men to ;
And all poor souls that have scoured bowls.
Or have them lustily trowled,
God save the lives of them and their wives.
Whether they be young or old !
Back and side, etc.
John Stilu
GLUGGITY GLUG.
from " the myrtle and the vine."
A JOLLY fat friar loved liquor good store,
And he had drunk stoutly at supper ;
He mounted his horse in the night at the door.
And sat with his face to the crupper :
"Some rogue," quoth the friar, " quite dead to
remorse.
Some thief, whoih a halter will throttle.
Some scoundrel has cut off the head of my horse.
While I was engaged at the bottle.
Which went gluggity, gluggity — glug
— glug —glug."
The tail of the steed pointed south on the dale,
'T was the friar's road home, straight and level;
But, when spurred, a horse follows his nose, not
his tail.
So he scampered due north, like a devil ;
"This new mode of docking," the friar then said,
"I perceive doesn't make a horse trot ill ;
And't is cheap, — for he never can eat off Iiis head
While I am engaged at the bottle.
Which goes gluggity, gluggity— glug
— glug—glug."
The steed made a stop, —in a pond he had got.
He was rather for drinking than grazing ;
Quoth the friar, " 'T is strange headless horses
should trot.
But to drink with their tails is amazing ! "
Turning round to see whence this phenomenon
rose.
In the pond fell this son of a pottle ;
Quoth he, " The head's found, for I'm under
his nose, —
I wish I were over a bottle,
Which goes gluggity, gluggity —glug
—glug —glug !"
George Colman, the Younger.
THE VIRTUOSO.*
"Vidcmus
Nugarl solilos."— PERSIUS.
Whilom by silver Thames's gentle stream.
In London town there dwelt a subtle wight, —
A wight of mickle wealth, and mickle fame.
Book-learned and quaint : a Virtuoso hight.
* In imitation of Spenser's style and stansa.
■s
Uncommon things, and rare, were his delight ;
From musings deep his brain ne'er gotten
ease.
Nor ceased he from study, day or night,
Until (advancing onward by degrees)
e knew whatever breeds on earth or air or
seas-
He many a creature did anatomize,
Almost unpeopling water, air, and land ;
Beasts, fishes, birds, snails, caterpillars, flies.
Were laid full low by his relentless hand,
That oft with gory crimson was distained ;
He many a dog destroyed, and many a cat ;
Of fleas his bed, of frogs the marshes drained.
Could teilen if a mite were lean or fat.
And read a lecture o'er the entrails of a
gnat.
He knew the various modes of ancient times.
Their arts and fashions of each different guise,
Their weddings, funerals, punishments for
crimes.
Their strength, their learning eke, and rarities ;
Of old habiliments, each sort and size,
Male, female, high and low, to him were known ;
Each gladiator dress, and stage disguise ;
With leamèd, clerkly phrase he could have
shown
How the Greek tunic differed from the Roman
gown.
A curious medallist, I wot, he was.
And boasted many a course of ancient coin ;
Well as his wife's be knewen every face.
From Julius Cœsar down to Constantino :
For some rare sculpture he would oft ypine,
(As green-sick damosels for husbands do ;)
And when obtainèd, with enraptured eyne.
He'd run it o'er and o'er with greedy view,
And look, and look again, as he would look it
through.
His rich museum, of dimensions fair.
With goods that spoke the owner's mind was
fraught :
Things ancient, curious, value-worth, and rare,
From sea and land, from Greece and Rome,
were brought.
Which he with mighty sums of gold had bought :
On these all tides with joyous eyes he pored ;
And, sooth to say, himself he greater thought.
When he beheld his cabinets thus stored.
Than if he'd been of Albion's wealthy cities lord.
Mark akenside.
THE SPLENDID SHILLING.*
"Sing, heavenly Muse.
Things unattempted yet In prose or rliyine;"
A shilling, breeches, and chimeras dire.
Happy the man, who, void of cares and strife.
In silken or in leathern purse retains
A Splendid Shilling : he nor hears with pain
New oysters cried, nor sighs for cheerful ale ;
But with his friends, when nightly mists arise.
To Juniper's Magpie, or Town Hall repairs ;
Where, mindful of the nymph, whose wanton eye
Transfixed his soul, and kindled amorous flames,
Chloe or Phyllis, he each circling glass
Wisheth her health and joy and equal love.
Meanwhile he smokes, and laughs at merry tale.
Or pun ambiguous or conundrum quaint.
But I, whom griping penury surrounds.
And hunger, sure attendant upon want.
With scanty otlals, and small acid tiff
(Wretched repast !) my meagre corpse sustain ;
Then solitary walk, or doze at home
In garret vile, and with a warming puff
Regale chilled fingers ; or from tube as black
As winter-chimney or well-polished jet.
Exhale mundungus, ill-perfuming scent.
Not blacker tube, nor of a shorter size.
Smokes Carabro-Briton (versed in pedigree.
Sprung from Cadwallador and Arthur, kings
Full famous in romantic tale) when he
O'er many a craggy hill and barren cliff.
Upon a cargo of famed Cestrian cheese.
High overshadowing rides, with a design
To wend his wares at the Arvonian mart.
Or Maridunum, or the ancient town
y.cleped Brechinia, or where Vaga's stream
Encircles Ariconium, fruitful soil !
Whence flow nectareous wines, that well may vie
With Massic, Setin, or renowned Falern.
Thus, while my joyless minutes tedious flow.
With looks demure, and silent pace, a Dun,
Horrible monster ! hated by gods and men.
To my aerial citadel ascends, f
With vocal heel thrice thundering at my gate.
With hideous accent thrice he calls ; I know
The voice ill-boding, and the .solemn sound.
What should I do ? or whither turn ? Amazed,
Confounded, to the dark recess I fly
Of wood-hole ; straight my bristling haii-s erect
Through sudden fear ; a chilly sweat bedews
My shuddering limbs, and (wonderful to tell !)
My tongue forgets her faculty of speech ;
So horrible he seems ! His faded brow
Intrenched with many a frown, and conic beai'd.
And spreading band, admired by modern saints.
Disastrous acts forebode ; in his right hand
* A burlesque imitation of MUton's style»
t To >vit, his garret.
948
HUMOROUS POEMS.
a
Long scrolls of paper solemnly he waviîs,
With characters and figures dire inscribed,
Grievous to mortal eyes, (ye gods, avert
Such plagues from righteous men !) Behind him
stalks
Another monster, not unlike itself.
Sullen of aspect, by the vulgar called
A Catchpole, whose polluted hands the gods
With force incredible, and magic charms,
First have endued : if he his ample palm
Should haply on ill-fated shoulder lay
Of debtor, straight his body to the touch
Obsequious (as whilom knights were wont)
To some enchanted castle is conveyed.
Where gates impregnable, and coercive chains.
In durance strict detain him, till, in form
Of money, Pallas sets the captive free.
Beware, ye debtors ! when ye walk, beware.
Be circumspect ; oft with insidious ken
The caitiff eyes your steps aloof, and oft
Lies perdue in a nook or gloomy cave.
Prompt to enchant some inadvertent wretch
With his unhallowed touch. So (poets sing)
Grimalkin to domestic veimin sworn
An everlasting foe, with watchful eye
Lies nightly brooding o'er a chiuky gap.
Portending her fell claws, to thoughtless mice
Sure ruin. So her disembowelled web
Arachne, in a hall or kitchen, spreads
Obvious to vagrant fiiea : she secret stands
Within her woven cell ; the humming prey,
Regardless of their fate, rush on the toils
Inextricable, nor will aught avail
Their arts, or arms, or shapes of lovely hue.
The wasp insidious, and the buzzing drone.
And butterfly proud of expanded wings
Distinct with gold, entangled in her snares.
Useless resistance make ; with eager strides.
She towering flies to her expected spoils :
Then with envenomed jaws the vital blood
Drinks of reluctant foes, and to heb cave
Their bulky carcasses triumphant drags.
So pass my days. But when nocturnal shades
This world envelop, and the inclement air
Persuades men to repel benumbing frosts
With pleasant wines and crackling blaze of wood.
Me, lonely sitting, nor the glimmering light
Of make-weight candle, nor the joyous talk
Of loving friend, delights ; distressed, forlorn.
Amidst the horrors of the tedious night.
Darkling I sigh, and feed with dismal thoughts
My anxious mind ; or sometimes mournful verse
Indite, and sing of groves and myrtle shades.
Or desperate lady near a purling stream.
Or lover pendent on a willow-tree.
Meanwhile I labor with eternal drought,
And restless wish, and rave ; my parched throat
Finds no relief, nor heavy eyes repose :
But if a slumber haply does invade
My weary limbs, my fancy, still awake.
Thoughtful of drink, and eager, in a dream.
Tipples imaginary pots of ale ;
In vain ; — awake I flnd the settled thirst
Still gnawing, and the pleasant phantom curse.
Thus do I live, from pleasure quite debarred.
Nor taste the fruits that the sun's genial rays
Mature, johu-apple, nor the downy peach.
Nor walnut in rough-furrowed coat secure.
Nor medlar fruit delicious in decay ;
Afflictions great ! yet greater still remain.
My galligaskins, that have long withstood
The winter's fury and encroaching frosts.
By time subdued, (what will not time subdue !)
An horrid chasm disclose with orifice
Wide, discontinuous ; at which the winds
Eurus and Auster and the dreadful force
Of Boreas, that congeals the Cronian waves.
Tumultuous enter with dire chilling blasts.
Portending agues. Thus a well-fraught ship.
Long sails secure, or through the iEgean deep.
Or the Ionian, till cruising near
The Lilybean shore, with hideous crush
On Scylla or Charybdis (dangerous rocks)
She strikes rebounding ; whence the shattered
oak.
So fierce a shock unable to withstand.
Admits the sea. In at the gaping side
The crowding waves gush with impetuous rage,
Re.sistless, overwhelming ; horrors seize
The marinere ; Death in their eyes appears,
They stare, they lave, they pump, they swear,
they pray :
(Vain efforts !) still the battering waves rush in,
Implacable, till, deluged by the foam.
The ship sinks foundering in the vast abyss.
John philips.
ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF A MAD DOG.
Good people all, of every sort.
Give ear unto my song ;
And if you find it wondrous short.
It cannot hold you long.
In Islington there was a man
Of whom the world might say.
That still a godly race he ran —
Whene'er he went to pray.
A kind and gentle heart he had.
To comfort friends and foes :
The naked every day he clad —
When he put on his clothes.
r
HUMOROUS POEMS.
940
;
And in that town a dog was found,
As many dogs there be,
Both mongrel, puppy, whelp, and hound,
And curs of low degree.
This dog and man at first were friends ;
But when a pique began.
The dog, to gain his private ends.
Went mad, and bit the man.
Around from all the neighboring streets
The wondering neighbors ran.
And swore the dog had lost his wits.
To bite so good a man !
The wound it seemed both sore and sad
To every Christian eye :
And while they swore the dog was mad.
They swore the man would die.
But soon a wonder came to light.
That showed the rogues they lied : —
The man recovered of the bite.
The dog it was that died !
Oliver Goldsmith.
ELEGY ON MADAM BLAIZE.
Good people all, with one accord.
Lament for Madam Blaize ;
Who never wanted a good word —
From those who spoke her praise.
The needy seldom passed her door,
And always found her kind ;
She freelj' lent to all the poor —
Who left a pledge behind.
She strove the neighborhood to please.
With manner wondrous winning ;
She never followed wicked ways —
Unless when she was sinning.
At church, in silk and satins new.
With hoop of monstrous size.
She never slumbered in her pew —
But when she shut her eyes.
Her love was sought, I do aver.
By twenty beaux, or more ;
The king himself has followed her —
When she has walked before.
But now, her wealth and finery fled.
Her hangers-on cut short all,
Her doctors found, when she was dead-
Her last disorder mortal.
Let us lament, in sorrow sore ;
For Kent Street well may say.
That, had she lived a twelvemonth more —
She had not died to-day.
Oliver goldsmith.
THE DEVIL'S WALK.
From his brimstone bed at break of day
A walking the Devil has gone.
To look at his little, snug farm of the world,
And see how his stock went on.
Ovei;the hill and over the dale,
And he went over the plain.
And backward- and forward he swished his tail.
As a gentleman swishes a cane.
How tlien was the Devil dressed ?
0, he was in his Sunday's best ;
His coat was red, and his breeches were blue.
And there was a hole where his tail came through.
A lady drove by in her pride.
In whose face an expre-ssion he spied.
For which he could have kissed her ;
Such a flourishing, fine, clever creature was she.
With an eye as wicked as wicked can be :
"I should take her for my aunt," thought he ;
" If my dam had had a sister."
He met a lord of high degree, —
No matter what was his name, —
Whose face with his own when he came to com¬
pare
The expression, the look, and the air.
And the character too, as it seemed to a hair, —
Such a twin-likeness there was in the pair.
That it made the Devil start and stare ;
For he thought there was surely a looking-glass
there *
But he could not see the frame.
He saw a lawyer killing a viper
On a dunghill beside his stable ;
" Ho ! " quoth he, " thou put'st me in mind
Of the story of Cain and Abei."
An apothecary on a white horse
Rode by on his vocation ;
And the Devil thought of his old friend
Death in the Revelation.
He pas.sed a cottage with a double coach-house,
A cottage of gentility ;
And he owned with a grin
That his favorite sin
Is pride that apes humility.
0^-
950
HUMOROUS POEMS.
He saw a pig rapidly
Down a river float ;
The pig swam well, hut every stroke
Was cutting his own throat ;
And Satan gave thereat his tail
A twirl of admiration ;
For he thought of his daughter War
And her suckling babe Taxation.
Well enough, in sooth, he liked that truth.
And nothing the worse for the jest ;
But this was only a first thought ;
And in this he did not rest :
Another came presently into his head ;
And here it proved, as has often been said.
That second thoughts are best.
•
For as piggy plied, with wind and tide.
His way with such celerity.
And at every stroke the water dyed
With his own red blood, the Devil cried,
" Behold a swinish nation's pride
In cotton-spun prosperity ! "
He walked into London leisurely ;
The streets were dirty and dim ;
But there he saw Brothers the prophet, 1
And Brothers the prophet saw him.*
He entered a thriving bookseller's shop ;
Quoth he, "We are both of one college,
For I myself sate like a cormorant once
Upon the tree of knowledge."
As he passed through Cold-Bath Fields, he looked
At a solitary cell ;
And he was well pleased, for it gave him a hint
For improving the prisons of hell.
He saw a turnkey tie a thief s hands
With a cordial tug and jerk ;
" Nimbly," quoth he, "a man's fingers move
When his heari is in his work."
He saw the same turnkey unfettering a man
With little expedition ;
And he chuckled to think of his dear slave-trade.
And the long debates and delays that were made
Concerning its abolition.
• • •
At this good news, so great
The Devil's pleasure grew.
That with a joyful swish he rent
The hole where his tail came through.
♦ ** After this I was In a vision, having the angel of God near me,
and saw Satan walking leisurely into Loadoa." — BROTHERS'
Prc/ßucüs, Part 1. p. 41.
His countenance fell for a moment
When he felt the stitches go ;
"Ah!" thought ho, " there's a job now
That I've made for my tailor below."
"Great news ! bloody news I " cried a newsman ;
The Devil said, " Stop, let me see !
Great news ? bloody news ? " thought the Devil,
"The bloodier the better for me."
So he bought the newspaper, and no news
At all for his money he had.
"Lying varlet," thought he, "thus to take in
Old Nick !
But it's some satisfaction, my lad.
To know thou art paid beforehand for the trick
For the sixpence I gave thee is bad."
And then it came into his head,
By oracular inspiration.
That what he had seen and what he had said.
In the course of this visitation.
Would be published in the Homing Post
For all this reading nation.
Therewith in second-sight he saw
The place and the manner and time.
In which this mortal story
Would be put in immortal rhymei.
That it would happen when two poets ' y
Should on a time be met /
In the town of Nether Stowey,
In the shire of Somerset.
There, while the one was shaving.
Would he the song begin ;
And the other, when he heard it at breakfast^
In ready accord join in.
So each would help the other.
Two heads being better than one ;
And the phrase and conceit
Would in unison meet.
And so with glee the verse flow free
In ding-dong chime of sing-song rh3Tne,
Till the whole were merrily done.
And because it was set to the razor.
Not to the lute or harp.
Therefore it was that the fancy
Should be bright, and the wit be sliarp.
" But then," said Satan to himself
" As for that said beginner,
Against my infernal Majesty
There is no greater sinner, j
HUMOROUS POEMS.
" He hath put me in ugly ballads
With libellous pictures for sale ;
He hath scoffed at my hoofs and my horns,
Aud has made very free with my tail.
" But this Mister Poet sliall find
1 am uut a safe subject for whim ;
For I '11 set up a school of my own,
And my poets shall set upon him."
As he went along the Strand
Between three in the morning and four,
He observed a queer-looking person *
Who staggered from Perry's door.
And he thought that all the world over
In vain for a man you might seek,
Who eould drink more like a Trojan,
Or talk more like a Greek.
The Devil then he prophesied
It would one day be matter of talk,
That with wine when smitten,
And with wit moreover being ha])pily bitten.
This erudite bibber was ho who had written
The story of this walk.
" A pretty mistake," quoth the Devil ;
"A pretty mistake, I opine !
I have put many ill thoughts in his mouth ;
He will never put good ones in mine."
Now the morning air was cold for him.
Who was used to a waim abode ;
And yet he did not immediately wish
To set out on his homeward road.
For he had some morning calls to make
Before he went back to hell ;
"So," thought he, "I'll step into a gaming¬
house.
And that will do as well ; "
But just before he could get to the door
A wonderful chance beleih
For all on a sudden, in a dark place.
He came upon General 's burning face ;
Aud it struck him with such consternation.
That liome in a hurry his way did he take.
Because he thought by a slight mistake
'T was the general œaflagration.
Robert southey.
* Porsou, the Creek scholar.
THE DEVIL AT HOME.
from "the devils progress."
The Devil sits in his easy-cliair.
Sipping his sulphur tea,
And gazing out, with a pensive air.
O'er the broad bitumen sea ;
Lulled into sentimental mood
By the spirits' far-olf wail.
That sweetly, o'er the burning ftood.
Floats on the brimstone gale ! —
The Devil, who can be sad at times.
In spite of all his mummery.
And grave, — though not so prosy quite
As drawn by his friend Montgomery, —
The Devil to-day has a dreaming air,
Aqd his eye is raised, and his throat is hare.
His musings are of many things.
That — good or ill — befell.
Since Adam's sous macadamized
The highways into hell : —
And the Devil—whose mirth is neuer loud
Laughs with a quiet mirth.
As he thinks how well his serpent-tricks
Have been mimicked upon earth ;
Of Eden and of England, soiled
And darkened by the foot
Of those who preach with adder-tongues.
And those who eat the fruit ;
Of eieeping things, that drag their slime
Into God's chosen places.
And knowledge leading into crime.
Before the angels' faces ;
Of lauds — from Nineveh to Spain —
That have bowed beneath his sway.
And men who did his work, — from Cain
To Viscount Castlereagh !
Thomas Kibble Hervev.
THE NOSE AND THE EYES.
Between Nose and Eyes a strange contest arose ;
The spectacles set them, unhappily, wrong ;
The point in dispute was, as all the world knows.
To whom the said spectacles ought to belong.
So Tongue was the lawyer, and argued the cause.
With a great deal of skill, and a wig full of
learning.
While chief baron Ear sat to balance the laws, —
So famed for his talent in nicely discerning.
" In behalf of the Nose, it will quickly appear
(And your lordship," he said, "will undoubt¬
edly find)
[S Ri
952 HUMOROUS POEMS.
That the Nose has the spectacles always to wear,
Which amounts to possession, time out of
mind."
Then, holding the spectacles up to the court,
" Your lordship observes, they are made with
a straddle.
As wide as the ridge of the Nose is ; in short.
Designed to sit close to it, just like a saddle.
" Again, would your lordship a moment suppose
('Ï is a case that has happened, and may hap¬
pen again)
That the visage or countenance had ivot a Nose,
Pray, who would, or who œuld, wear spectacles
then ?
"On the whole, it appears, and my argument
shows, ' '
With a reasoning the court will nevercondemn,
That the spectacles, plainly, were made for the
Nose,
And the Nose was, as plainly, intended for
them."
Then shifting his side (as a lawyer knows how).
He pleaded again in behalf of the Eyes ;
5ut what were his arguments, few people know.
For the court did not think them equally wise.
So his lordship decreed, with a grave, solemn
tone.
Decisive and clear, without one if or hut,
That whenever the Nose put his spectacles on.
By daylight or candlelight, — Eyes should be
shut.
William Cowper.
ADDRESS TO THE TOOTHACHE.
JIt curse upon thy venomed stang.
That shoots my tortured gums alang ;
An' through my lugs gies mony a twang,
Wi' gnawing vengeance !
Tearing my nerves wi' bitter pang.
Like racking engines.
When fevers burn, or ague freezes.
Rheumatics gnaw, or cholic squeezes ;
Our neighbor's sympathy may ease us,
Wi' pitying moan ;
But thee, — thou hell o' a' diseases.
Aye mocks our groan.
Adown my beard the slavers trickle ;
I throw the wee stools o'er the mickle,
As round the fire the giglets keckle .
To see me loup ;
WTiile, raving mad, I wish a heckle
Were in their doup.
O' a' the numerous human dools,
HI har'sts, daft bargains, cutty-stools.
Or worthy friends raked i' the mools.
Sad sight to see !
The tricks o' knaves or fash o' fools.
Thou bear'st the gree.
Where'er that place be priests ca' hell.
Whence a' the tones o' mis'ry yell.
And rankèd plagues their numbers tell, j
In dreadfu' raw.
Thou, Toothache, surely bear'st the bell.
Among them a' ;
0 thou grim mischief-making chiel.
That gars the notes of discord squeal.
Till daft mankind aft dance a reel
In gore a shoe-thick ! —
Gie a' the faes o' Scotland's weal
A fowmond's Toothache !
Robert Burns.
THE FRIEND OF HUMANITY AND THE
KNIFE-GRINDER.*
friend of humanitv.
Needy knife-grinder ! whither are you going ?
Rough is the road ; your wheel is out of order.
Bleak blows the blast ; — your hat has got a hole
in't ;
So have your breeches !
• A burlesque upon the humanitarian sentiments of Southey in
his younger days, as well as of the Sapphic gran yac ût which be
sometimes embodied them.
Weary knife-grinder! little think the proud ones.
Who in. their coaches roll along the turnpike-
Road, what hard work 't is crying all day,
' Knives and
Scissors to grind 0 ! '
Tell me, knife-grinder, how came yon to giind
knives ?
Did some rich man tyrannically use you ?
Was it the squire ? or parson of the parish I
Or the attorney ?
Was it the squire for killing of his game ? or
Covetous pareon for his tithes distraining ?
Or roguish lawyer made you lose your little
All in a lawsuit ?
(Have you not read the Rights of Man, by Tom
Paine ?)
Drops of compassion tremble on my eyelids.
Ready to fall as soon as you have told your
Pitiful story.
HUMOROUS POEMS.
953
KNIFE-GRINDER.
Story ! God bless you ! I have none to tell, sir ;
Only, last night, a-drinking at the Chequers,
This poor old hat and breeches, as you see, were
Torn in a scufBe.
Constables came up for to take me into
Custody ; they took me before the justice ;
Justice Oldniixon put me into the parish
Stocks for a vagrant.
I should be glad to drink your honor's health in
A pot of beer, if 5mu will give me sixpence ;
But for my part, I never love to meddle
With politics, sir.
FRIEND OF HUMANITY.
I give thee sixpence 1 I will see thee damned
first, —
Wretch ! whom no sense of wrongs can rouse to
vengeance, —
Sordid, unfeeling, reprobate, degraded.
Spiritless outcast !
{Kicks the knife-grinder, overturns his wheel, and
exit in a transport of repuhlimjn enthusiasm
and universal philanthropy.)
George Canning.
»—
EPITAPH
FOR THE TOMBSTONE ERECTED OVER THE MAR¬
QUIS OF ANGLESEA'S LEG, LOST AT THE BATTLE
OF WATERLOO.
Here rests, and let no saucy knave
Presume to sneer and laugh.
To learn that mouldering in the grave
Is laid a British Calf.
For he who writes these lines is sure,
That those who read the whole
Will find such laugh was premature,
For here, too, lies a sole.
And here five little ones repose.
Twin born with other five.
Unheeded by their brother toes.
Who all are now alive.
A leg and foot, to speak more plain.
Rests here of one commanding ;
Who, though his wits he might retain.
Lost half his understanding.
And when the guns, with thunder fraught.
Poured bullets thick as hail.
Could only in this way be taught
To give the foe leg-bail.
And now in England, just as gay
As in the battle brave.
Goes to a rout, review, or play.
With one foot in the grave.
Fortune in vain here showed her spite.
For he will still be found.
Should England's sons engage in fight.
Resolved to stand his ground.
But Fortune's pardon I must beg ;
She meant not to disarm.
For when she lopped the hero's leg.
She did not seek his harm.
And but indulged a harmless whim ;
Since he could walk with one.
She saw two legs were lost on him.
Who never meant to i-un.
GEORGE Canning
THE PILGRIMS AND THE PEAS.
A BRACE of sinners, for no good.
Were ordered to the Virgin Mary's shrine.
Who at Loretto dwelt, in wax, stone, wood.
And in a fair white wig looked wondrous fine.
Fifty long miles had those sad rogues to travel.
With something in their shoes much worse than
gravel ;
In short, their toes so gentle to amuse.
The priest had ordered peas into their shoes :
A no.strum famous in old popish times
For purifying souls that stunk of crimes ;
A sort of apostolic salt.
Which popish parsons for its powers exalt.
For keeping souls of sinners sweet.
Just as our kitcheu salt keeps meat.
The knaves set off on the same day.
Peas in their shoes, to go and pray ;
But very different was their speed, I wot :
One of the sinners galloped on.
Swift as a bullet from a gun ;
The other limped, as if he had been shot.
One saw the Virgin soon, Peccavi cried.
Had his soul whitewashed all so clever ;
Then home again he nimbly hied.
Made fit with saints above to live forever.
In coming back, however, let me saj'.
He met his brother rogue about half-way, —
Hobbling, with outstretched arms and bended
knees.
Cursing the souls and bodies of the peas ;
His eyes in tears, his cheeks and brow in sweat.
Deep sympathizing with his groaning feet.
[fi-
954
HUMOROUS FORMS.
-a
" How now," the light-toed, whitewashed pil¬
grim broke,
" You lazy lubber ! "
" Ods curse it ! " cried the other, "'t is no joke ;
My feet, once hard as any rock.
Are now as soft as blubber.
" Excuse me. Virgin Mary, that I swear.
As for Loretto, I shall not get there ;
No, to the devil my sinful soul must go,
For damme if I ha'n't lost every toe.
But, brother sinner, pray explain
How't is that you are not in pain.
What power hath worked a wonder for your
toes,
Whilst I just like a snail am crawling.
Now swearing, now on saints devoutly bawling.
Whilst not a rascal comes to ease my woes ?
" How is't that you can like a gre}'hound go.
Merry as if that naught had happened, bum
ye!"
"Why," cried the other, grinning, "you must
know.
That just before I ventured on my journey.
To walk a little more at ease,
I took the liberty to boil my peas."
Dr. John Wolcott {Peler Pindar).
THE RAZOR-SELLER.
A FELLOW in a market-town.
Most musical, cried razors up and down.
And offered twelve for eighteen pence ;
Which certainly seemed wondrous cheap.
And, for the money, quite a heap,
As every man would buy, with cash and sense.
A country bumpkin the great offer heard, —
Poor Hodge, who suffered by a broad black beard.
That seemed a shoe-brush stuck beneath his
nose ;
With cheerfulness the eighteen pence he paid.
And proudly to himself in whispers .said,
" This rascal stole the razors, I suppose.
" No matter if the fellow he a knave.
Provided that the razors shave ;
It certainly will be a monstrous prize."
So home the clown, with his good fortune, went.
Smiling, in heart and soul content,
And quickly soaped himself to ears and eyes.
Being well lathered from a dish or tub,
Hodge now began with giinning pain to grab,
Just like a hedger cutting furze ;
'T was a vile razor ! —then the rest he tried, —
All were impostors. " Ah ! " Hodge sighed,
"I wish my eighteen pence within my purse."
In vain to chase his beard, and bring the giaces.
He cut, and dug, and winced, and stamped,
and swore ;
Brought blood, and danced, blasphemed, and
made wiy faces.
And cursed each razor's body o'er and o'er :
His muzzle formed of opposition stuff.
Firm as a Foxite, would not lose its raff ;
So kejjt it, —laughing at the steel and suds.
Hodge, in a passion, stretched his angry jaws.
Vowing the direst vengeance with clenched claws,
On the vile cheat that sold the goods.
" Razors ! a mean, confounded dog.
Not fit to scrape a hog ! "
Hodge sought the fellow, — found him, — and
begun :
" P'rhaps, Master Razor-rogue, to you't is fun.
That people flay themselves out of their lives.
You rascal ! for an hour have I been grubbing.
Giving my crying whiskers here a scrubbing.
With razors just like oyster-knives.
Sirrah ! I tell you you 're a knave.
To cry up razors that can't shave ! "
"Friend," quoth the razor-man, "I'm not a
knave ;
As for the razors you have bought.
Upon my soul, I never thought
That they would shave."
" Not think they'd shave ! " quoth Hodge, with
wondering eyes,
And voice not much unlike an Indian yell ;
"What were they made for, then, you dog?"
he cries.
"Made," quoth the fellow with a smile,—
"to sell."
Dr. john Wolcott {Peter Pindar).
EPIGRAMS BY S. T. COLERIDGE.
cologne.
In Köln, a town of monks and bones.
And pavements fanged with murderous stones.
And rags, and hags, and hideous wenches, —
I counted two-and-seventy stenches.
All well-defined and several stinks !
Ye nymphs that reign o'er sewers and sinks.
The river Rhine, it is well known.
Doth wash your city of Cologne ;
But tell me, nymphs ! what power divine
Shall henceforth wash the river Rhine 1
HUMOROUS POEMS.
955
Sly Beelzebub took all occasions
To try Job's constancy and patience.
He took his honor, took his health ;
He took his children, took his wealth.
His servants, oxen, horses, cows —
But cunuing Satan did not take his s2)onse.
But Heaven, that brings out good from evil.
And loves to disappoint the devil.
Had predetermined to restore
Twofold all he had before ;
His servants, horses, oxen, cows—
Short-sighted devil, not to take his spouse !
Hoarse Msevius reads his hobbling verse
To all, and at all times.
And finds them both divinely smooth.
His voice as well as rhymes.
Yet folks say Maevius is no ass ;
But Maevius makes it clear
That he's a monster of an ass, —
An ass without an ear !
Swans sing before they die, —'twere no bad thing
Did certain persons die before they sing.
THE WELL OF ST. KEYNE.
" In the parish of St. Neots, Cornwall, is a well arched over with
the robe.s of four kinds of trees,— withy, oak, elm, and ash, —and
dedicated to St. Kcync. The reported virtue of the water is this,
that, whether husband or wife first drink thereof, they get the mas¬
tery thereby."— FULLER.
A well there is in the West country.
And a clearer one never was seen ;
There is not a wife in the West country
But has heard of the Well of St. Keyne.
An oak and an elm tree stand beside.
And behind does an ash-tree grow.
And a willow from the bank above
Droops to the water below.
A traveller came to the Well of St. Keyne ;
Pleasant it was to his eye.
For from cock-crow he had been ti-avelling.
And there was not a cloud in the sky.
He drank of the water so cool and clear.
For thirsty and hot was he.
And he sat down upon the bank,
Under the willow-tree.
There came a man from the neighboring town
At the well to fill his pail.
On the well-side he rested it,
And bade the stranger haU.
"Now aii thou a bachelor, stranger ? " quoth he,
" For au if thou hast a wife,
The hajrpiest draught thou hast drank this day
That ever thou didst in thy life.
" Or has your good woman, if one you have.
Irr Conrwall ever beert ?
For an if she have, I '11 venture my life
She has drunk of the Well of St. Keyne.
"1 have left a good woman who never was here,"
The stranger he made reply ;
"But that my draught should be better for that,
" 1 pray you answer me why."
"St. Keyne," quoth the countryman, "manya
time
Drank of this crystal well.
And before the angel summoned her
She laid on the water a spelL
" If the husband of this gifted well
Shall drink before his wife,
A happy man thenceforth is he.
For he shall be master for life.
" But if the wife should drink of it firsl^
Heaven help the husband then ! "
The stranger stooped to the Well of St. Keyne,
And drank of the waters again.
"You drank of the well, I warrant, betimes?"
He to the countryman said.
But the countryman smiled as the stranger spake.
And sheepishly shook his head.
"I hastened, as soon as the wedding was done.
And left my wife in the porch.
But i' faith, she had been wiser than me^
For she took a bottle to church."
Robert Southey.
THE EGGS AND THE HORSES.
A matrimonial epic
John Dobbins was so captivated
By Mary Trueman's fortune, face, and cap,
(With near two thousand pounds the hook was
baited,)
That in he popped to matrimony's trap.
One small ingredient towards happiness.
It seems, ne'er occupied a single thought ;
For his accomplished bride
Appearing well supplied
With the three charms of riches, beauty, dress.
He did not, as he ought.
Think of aught else ; so no inquiry made he
As to the temper of the lady.
e-
956
HUMOROUS POEMS.
■a
And here was certainly a great omission ;
None should accept of Hymen's gentle fetter,
"For worse or better,"
Whatever be their prospect or condition.
Without acquaintance with each other's nature ;
For many a mild and quiet creature
Of charming disposition,
Alas ! by thoughtless marriage has destroyed it.
So take advice ; let girls dress e'er so tastily.
Don't enter into wedlock hastily
Unless you can't avoid it.
Week followed week, and, it must be confest.
The bridegroom and the bride had both been
blest ;
Month after month had languidly transpired.
Both parties became tired :
Year after }'ear dragged on ;
Their happiness was gone.
Ah ! foolish nair !
" Bear and forbear "
Should be the rule for married folks to take.
But blind mankind (poor discontented elves !)
Too often make
The misery of themselves.
At length the husband said, " This will not do !
Mary, I never will be ruled by yon ;
So, wife, d' ye see ?
To live together as we can't agree.
Suppose we part ! "
With woman's pride,
Mary replied,
" With all my heart ! "
John Dobbins then to Mary's father goes.
And gives the list of his imagined woes.
" Dear son-in-law ! " the father .said, "1 see
All is quite true that you've been telling me ;
Yet there in marriage is such strange fatality.
That when as much of life
You shall have seen
As it has been
My lot to see, I think you '11 own your wife
As good or better than the generality.
" An interest in your case I really take.
And therefore gladly this agi'eement make :
An hundred eggs within this basket lie.
With which your luck, to-morrow, you shall try ;
Also my five liest horses, with my cart ;
And from the farm at dawn you shall depart.
All round the country go.
And be particular, I beg ;
Where husbands rale, a horse bestow.
But where-the wives, an egg.
And if the horses go before the eggs,
I '11 ease you of your wife, — I will, — I' fegs ! "
Away the married man departed.
Brisk and light-hearted :
Not doubting that, of course,
The first five houses each would take a horse.
At the first house he knocked.
He felt a little shocked
To hear a female voice, with angry roar.
Scream out, — " Hullo !
Who's there below 'Í
Wh}', husband, are you deaf ? go to the door,
See who it is, I beg. "
Our poor friend John
Tradged quickly on.
I will not all his journey through
The discontented traveller pursud ;
Suffice it here to say
That when his first day's task was nearly done,
Ho'd seen an hundred husbands, minus one.
And eggs just ninety-nine had given awaj'.
" Ha ! there's a house where he I seek must
dwell,"
At length cried John ; " I '11 go and ling the
bell."
The servant came, — John asked him,
" Pray,
Friend, is your master in the way ? "
"No," said the man, with smiling phiz,
" My master is not, but my mistress is ;
Walk in that parlor, sir, my lady's in it :
Master will be himself there — inaminute."
The lady said her husband then was dressing.
And, if his business was not very pressing.
She would prefer that he .should wait until
His toilet was completed ;
Adding, " Pray, sir, be seated."
" Madam, I will,"
Said John, with gi-eat politeness ; " but I own
That you alone
Can tell me aU I wish to know ;
Will you do so ?
Pardon my rudeness.
And just have the goodness
(A wager to decide) to tell me — do —
Who governs in this house, — your spouse or
you ? "
" Sir," said the lady, with a doubting nod,
"Your question's veiy odd ;
But as I think none ought to be
Ashamed to do their duty (do you see ?)
On that account I scrapie not to say
It always is my pleasure to obey.
HUMOROUS POEMS.
957
But here's my husband (always sad without
me);
Take not my word, but ask him, if you doubt
me."
"Sir," said the husband, "'tis most true ;
I promise you,
A more obedient, kind, and gentle woman
Does not exist."
" Give us your flst,"
Said John, " and, as the case is something moi'e
than common.
Allow me to present you with a beast
Worth fifty guineas at the very least.
" There's Smiler, sir, a beauty, you must own.
There's Prince, that handsome black,
Ball the gray mare, and Saladin the roan,
Besides old Dunn ;
■Come, sir, choose one ;
But take advice from me.
Let Prince be he ;
Why, sir, you '11 look the hero on his back."
1 '11 take the black, and thank you too."
" Nay, husband, that will never do ;
You know, you've often heard me say
How much I long to have a gray ;
And this one will exactly do for me."
" No, no," said he,
" Friend, take the four others back,
And only leave the black."
"Nay, husband, I declare
I must have the gray mare ; "
Adding (with gentle force),
" The gray mare is, I'm sure, the better horse."
" Well, if it must be so, — good sir.
The gray mare we prefer ;
So we accept your gift." John made a leg :
"Allow me to present you with an egg ;
'T is my last egg remaining.
The cause of my regaining,
I trust, the fond affection of my wife.
Whom I will love the better all my life.
" Home to content has her kind father brought
me ;
I thank him for the lesson he has taught me."
Anonymous.
«—
THE MILKMAID.
A MILKMAID, who poised a full pail on her head.
Thus mused on her prospects in life, it is said :
"Let me see, —I should think that this milk
will procure
One hundred good eggs, or fourscore, to be sure.
" Well then, — stop a bit, — it must not be for¬
gotten.
Some of these may be broken, and some may be
rotten ;
But if twenty for accident should be detached.
It will leave me just sixty sound eggs to be
hatched.
" Well, sixty sound eggs, — no, sound chickens,
1 mean :
Of these some may die,—we '11 suppose seventeen.
Seventeen ! not so many, — say ten at the most.
Which will leave fifty chickens to boil or to roast.
" But then there's their barley : how much will
they need ?
Why, they take but one grain at a time when
they feed, —
So that's a mere trifle ; now then, let us see.
At a fair market price how much money there '11
be.
"Six shillings a pair — five — four — three-and-
six.
To prevent all mistakes, that low price I will fix ;
Now whatwill that make? fifty chickens, 1 said,—
Fifty times three-and-sixpence — I'll ask Brother
Ned.
" 0, but stop, — three-and-sixpence upair I must
sell 'em ;
Well, a pair is a couple, — now then let us tell
'em ;
A couple in fifty will go (my poor brain ! )
Why, just a score times, and five pair will remain.
"Twenty-five pair of fowls—now how tiresome
it is
That I can't reckon up so much money as this !
Well, there's no use in trying, so let's give a
guess, —
I '11 say twenty pounds, and it can't he no less.
"Twenty pounds, I am certain, will buy me a cow.
Thirty geese, and two turkeys, — eight pigs and
a sow ;
Now if these turn out well, at the end of the year,
I shall fill both my pockets with guineas, 'tis
clear."
Forgetting her burden, when this she had said.
The maid superciliously tos.sed up her head ;
When, alas for her prospects ! her milk-pail de¬
scended.
And so all her schemes for the future were ended.
This moral, I think, may be safely attached, —
" Reckon not on your chickens before they are
hatched."
Jeffreys Taylor.
958
HUMOROUS POEMS.
a
WHERE ARE YOU GOING, MY PRETTY
MAID?
"Where are you going, my pretty maid ?"
" I am going a-milking, sir," .she said.
" May I go with you, my pretty maid ? "
"You 're kindly welcome, sir," she said.
" What is your father, my pretty maid ? "
" My father's a farmer, sir," she said.
" What is your fortune, my pretty maid ? "
" My face is ray fortune, sir," she said.
" Then I won't marry you, my pretty maid ?"
"Nobody asked you, sir," she said.
Anonymous.
TOBY TOSSPOT.
Alas ! what pity't is that regularity,
I.ike Isaac Shove's, is such a rarity !
But there are swilling wights in London town.
Termed jolly dogs, choice spirits, alias swine.
Who pour, in midnight revel, bumpers down.
Making their throats a thoroughfare for wine.
These spendthrifts, who life's pleasures thus run on.
Dozing with headaches till the afternoon.
Lose half men's regular estate of sun.
By borrowing too largely of the moon.
One of this kidney — Toby Tosspot hight —
Was coming from the Bedford late at night ;
And being Bacchi plcnus, full of wine.
Although he had a tolerable notion
Of aiming at progressive motion,
'T was n't direct, — 't was serpentine.
He worked with sinuosities, along.
Like Monsieur Corkscrew, worming through a
cork.
Not straight, like Corkscrew's proxy, stiff Don
Prong, — a fork.
At length, with near four bottles in his pate.
He saw the moon shining on Shove's brass plate.
When reading, " Please to ring the bell,"
And being civil beyond measure,
" Ring it ! " says Toby, — " very well ;
I '11 ring it with a deal of pleasure."
Toby, the kindest soul in all the town.
Gave it a jerk that almost jerked it down.
He waited full two minutes, — no one came ;
He waited full two minutes more ; — and then
Says Toby, " If he's deaf, I'm not to blame ;
I '11 pull it for the gentleman again."
But the first peal woke Isaac in a fright.
Who, quick as lightning, popping up his head.
Sat on his head's antipodes, in bed.
Pale as a parsnip, — bolt upright.
At length he wisely to himself doth say, calming
his fears, —
" Tush ! 't is some fool has rung and run away ; "
When peal the second rattled in his ears.
Shove jumped into the middle of the floor ;
And, trembling at each breath of air that
stirred.
He groped down stairs, and opened the street
door.
While Toby was performing peal the third.
Isaac eyed Toby, fearfully askant.
And saw he was a strapper, stout and tall ;
Then put this question, " Pray, sir, what d' ye
want ? "
Says Toby, " I want nothing, sir, at all.'
" Want nothing ! Sir, you've pulled my bell, I
vow.
As if you'd jerk it off the wire."
Quoth Toby, gravely making him a bow,
"I pulled it, sir, at your desire."
"At mine?" "Yes, yours; I hope I've done
it well.
High time for bed, sir ; I was hastening to it ;
But if you write up, ' Please to ring the bell,'
Common politeness makes me stop and do it"
Ceorcb colman the Younger.
__4
SIR MARMADUKE.
Sir Marmaduke was a hearty knight, —
Good man ! old man !
He's painted standing bolt upright.
With his hose rolled over his knee ;
His periwig's as white as chalk.
And on his fist he holds a hawk ;
And he looks like the head
Of an ancient family.
His dining-room was long and wide, —
Good man ! old man !
His spaniels lay by the fireside ;
And in other parts, d' ye see.
Cross-bows, tobacco-pipes, old hats,
A saddle, his wife, and a litter of cats ;
And he looked like the head
Of an ancient family.
He never turned the poor from the gate, —
Good man ! old man !
But was always ready to break the pate
Of his country's enemy.
f
HUMOROUS POEMS.
959
"What knight could do a better thing
Than serve the poor and fight for his king ?
And so may every head
Of an ancient family.
George Colman the younger.
THE FINE OLD ENGLISH GENTLEMAN.*
I'll sing you a good old song,
Made by a good old pate,
Of a fine old English gentleman
Who had an old estate,
And who kept up his old mansion
At a bountiful old rate ;
With a good old porter to relieve
The old poor at his gate.
Like a fine old English gentleman
All of the olden time.
His hall so old was hung around
With pikes and guns and bows.
And swords, and good old bucklers.
That had stood some tough old blows ;
'T was there " his worship " held his state
In doublet and trunk hose,
And quaffed his cup of good old sack.
To warm his good old nose.
Like a fine, etc.
When winter's cold brought frost and snow,
He opened house to all ;
And though threescore and ten his years.
He featly led the ball ;
Nor was the houseless wanderer
E'er driven from his hall ;
For while he feasted all the great,
He ne'er forgot the small ;
Like a fine, etc.
But time, though old, is strong in flight,
And yeais rolled swiftly by ;
And Autumn's falling leaves proclaimed
This good old man must die !
He laid him down right tranquilly.
Gave up life's latest sigh ;
And moumful stillness reigned around.
And tears bedewed each eye.
For this good, etc.
Now surely this is better far
Than all the new parade
Of theatres and fancy balls,
" At home " and masquerade :
* Modelled upon an old black-letter song, called " The Old and
Young Courtier."
And much more economical.
For all his bills were paid.
Then leave your new vagaries quite,
And take up the old trade
Of a fine old English gentleman.
All of the olden time.
Anonymous.
THE DIVERTING HISTORY OP JOHN
GILPIN.
showing how he went farther than he intended.
and came safe home again.
John Gilpin was a citizen
Of credit and renown,
A trainband captain eke was he
Of famous London town,
John Gilpin's spouse said to her dear—
" Though wedded we have been
These twice ten tedious years, yet wo
No holiday have seen.
" To-morrow is our wedding-day,
And we will then repair
Unto the Bell at Edmonton
All in a chaise and pair.
" My sister and my sister's child,
Myself and children three.
Will fill the chaise ; so you must ride
On horseback after we."
He soon replied, " I do admire
Of womankind but one,
And you are she, my dearest dear î
Therefore it shall be done.
" I am a linendraper bold.
As all the world doth know.
And my good friend the calender
Will lend his horse to go."
Quoth Mrs. Qilpin, "That's well said j
And for that wine is dear.
We will be furnished with our own,
Which is both Wight and clear."
John Gilpin kissed his loving wife ;
O'erjoyed was he to find.
That, though on pleasure she was bent,
She had a frugal mind.
The morning came, the chaise was brought,
But yet was not allowed
To drive up to the door, lest all
Should say that she was proud.
HUMOROUS POEMS.
So tliree doors off the chaise was stayed,
W'liere they did all get in ;
Six precious souls, and all agog
Ï0 dash through thick and thin.
Smack went the whip, round went the wheels,
AVere never folks so glad ;
The stones did rattle underneath.
As if Cheapside were mad.
John Gilpin at his horse's side
Seized fast the flowing mane.
And up he got, in haste to ride.
But soon came down again ;
For saddle-tree .scarce reached had he.
His journey to begin.
When, turning round his head, he saw
Three customers come in.
So down he came ; for loss of time.
Although it grieved him sore.
Yet loss of pence, full well he knew,
Would trouble him much more.
'T was long before the customers
Were suited to their mind.
When Betty screaming came down stairs,
" The wine is left behind ! "
" Good lack ! " quoth he, "yet bring it me.
My leathern belt likewise.
In which I bear my trusty sword
When I do exercise."
Now Mistress Gilpin (careful soul !)
Had two stone bottles found.
To hold the liquor that she loved.
And keep it safe and sound.
Each bottle had a curling ear.
Through which the belt he drew,
And hung a bottle on each side.
To make his balance true.
Then over all, that he might be
E<[uipped from top to toe,
His long red cloak, well brushed and neat.
He manfully did throw.
Now see him mounted once again
Upon his nimble steed.
Full slowly pacing o'er the stones.
With caution and good heed.
But finding soon a smoother road
Beneath his well-shod feet.
The snorting beast began to trot,
Which galled him in his seat.
" So, fair and softly," John he cried.
But John he cried in vain ;
That trot became a gallop soon.
In spite of curb and rein.
So stooping down, as needs he must
Who cannot sit upright.
He grasped the mane with both his hands.
And eke with all his might.
His horse, who never in that sort
Had handled been before.
What thing upon his back had got
Did wonder more and more.
Away went Gilpin, neck or naught ;
Away went hat and wig ;
He little dreamt, when he set out.
Of running such a rig.
The wind did blow, the cloak did fly.
Like streamer long and gay.
Till, loop and button failing both.
At last it flew away.
Then might all people well discern.
The bottles he had slung ;
A bottle swinging at each side.
As hath been said or sung.
The dogs did bark, the children screamed,
Up flew the windows all ;
And every soul cried out, " Well done ! "
As loud as he could bawl.
Away went Gilpin, — who but he ?
His fame soon spread around,
" He carries weight ! he rides a race !
'T is for a thousand pound ! ''
And still as fast as he drew near,
'T was wonderful to view.
How in a trice the turnpike men
Their gates wide open threw.
And now, as he went bowing down
His reeking bead full low.
The bottles twain behind his back
Were shattered at a blow.
Down ran the wine into the road.
Most piteous to be seen.
Which made his horse's flanks to smoke
As they had basted been.
But still he seemed to carry weight.
With leathern girdle braced ;
For all might see the bottle necks
Still dangling at his waist.
u
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Thus all through merry Islington
These gambols did he play,
Until he came unto the Wash
Of Edmonton so gay ;
And there he threw the wash about
On both sides of the way,
Just like unto a trundling mop.
Or a wild goose at play.
At Edmonton his loving wife
From the balcony spied
Her tender husband, wondering much
To see how he did ride.
"Stop, stop, John Gilpin ! — Here's the house,"
They all at once did cry ;
"The dinner waits, and we are tired."
Said Gilpin, " So am I ! "
But yet his horse was not a whit
Inclined to tarry there ;
For why ? — his owner had a house
Full ten miles off, at Ware.
So like an arrow swift he flew.
Shot by an archer strong ;
So did he fly —which brings me to
The middle of my song.
Away went Gilpin out of breath.
And sore against his will.
Till at his friend the calender's
His horse at last stood still.
The calender, amazed to see
His neighbor in such trim.
Laid down his pipe, flew to the gate,
Aud thus accosted him :
" What news ? what news ? your tidings tell ;
Tell me you must and shall, —
Say why bareheaded you are come.
Or why you come at all ?"
Now Gilpin had a pleasant wit.
And loved a timely joke ;
And thus unto the calender
In merry guise he spoke :
" I came because your horse would come ;
And, if I well forebode.
My hat and wig will soon be here.
They are upon the road."
The calender, right glad to find
His friend in merry pin,
Retunied him not a single word.
But to the house went in ;
Whence straight he came with hat and wig ;
A wig that flowed behind,
A hat not much the worse for wear.
Each comely in its kind.
He held them up, and in his turn
Thus showed his ready wit,
"My head is twice as big as yours.
They therefore needs must lit.
" But let me scrape the dirt away
That hangs upon your face ;
And stop and eat, for well you may
Be in a hungry case."
Said John, " It is my wedding-day.
And all the world would stare.
If wife should dine at Edmonton,
And I should dine at Ware."
So turning to his horse, ho said,
" I am in haste to dine ;
'T was for your pleasure you came here.
You shall go back for mine."
Ah, luckless speech, and bootless boast !
For which he paid full dear ;
For, while he spake, a braying ass
Did sing most loud and clear ;
Whereat his horse did snort, as he
Had heard a lion roar.
And galloped off with all his might.
As he had done before.
Away went Gilpin, and away
Went Gilpin's hat and wig :
He lost them sooner than at first.
For why ?— they were too big.
Now Mistress Gilpin, when she saw
Her husband posting down
Into the country far away.
She pulled out half a crown ;
And thus unto the youth she said,
That drove them to the Bell,
"This shall be yours when you bring back
My husband ^fe and well."
The youth did ride, and soon did meet
John coming back amain ;
Whom in a tiice he tried to stop
By catching at his rein ;
But not performing what he meant.
And gladly would have done.
The frighted steed he frighted more.
And made him faster run.
962
HUMOROUS POEMS
Away went Gilpin, and away
Went postboy at his heels,
The postboy's horse right glad to miss
The lumbering of the wheels. , *
Six gentlemen upon the road.
Thus seeing Gilpin fly,
With postboy scampering in the rear,
They raised the hue and cry : —
" Stop thief ! stop thief ! — a highwayman ! "
Not one of them was mute ;
And all and each that passed that way
Did join in the pursuit.
And now the turnpike-gates again
Flew open in short space ;
The toll-men thinking, as before.
That Gilpin rode a race.
And so he did, and won it too.
For he got first to town ;
Nor stopped till where he had got up
lie did again get down.
Now let us sing, " Long live the king,
And Gilpin, long live he ;
And when he next doth ride abroad,
May I be there to see ! "
William Cowper.
THE GOUTY MERCHANT AND THE
STRANGER.
In Broad Street building (on a winter night),
Snug by his parlor-fire, a gouty wight
Sat all alone, with one hand rubbing
His feet, rolled up in fleecy hose :
With t' other he'd beneath his nose
The Public Ledger, in whose columns grubbing.
He noted all the sales of hops.
Ships, shops, and slops ;
Gum, galls, and groceries ; ginger, gin.
Tar, tallow, turmeric, turpentine, and tin ;
When lo ! a decent personage in black
Entered and most politely said, —
" Your footman, sir, has gone his nightly
track
To the King's Head,
And left your door ajar ; which I
Observed in passing by.
And thought it neighborly to give you notice."
" Ten thousand thanks ; how very few get,
In time of danger.
Such kind attentions from a stranger !
Assuredly, that fellow's throat is
Doomed to a final drop at Newgate :
He knows, too, (the unconscionable elf !)
That there's no soul at home e.xcept myself."
" Indeed," replied the stranger (looking gi-ave),
" Then he's a double knave ;
He knows that rogues and thieves by scores
Nightly beset unguarded doom ;
And see, how easily might one
Of these domestic foes,
Even beneath your very nose.
Perform his knavish tricks ;
Enter your room, as I have done.
Blow out your candles — thus — and thus —
Pocket your silver candlesticks.
And—walk off—thus " —
So said, so done ; he made no more remark
Nor waited for replies.
But marched oil' with his prize.
Leaving the gouty merchant in the dark.
. Horace Smith.
ORATOR PUFF.
Mr. Orator Puff had two tones in his voice,
The one squeaking thus, and the other down so;
In each sentence he uttered he gave 3-011 your
choice.
For one half was B alt, and the rest G below.
O ! 0 ! Orator Puff,
One voice for an orator's surely enough.
But he still talked away, spite of coughs and of
frowns.
So distracting all ears with his ups and his
downs.
That a wag once, on hearing the oi-ator say,
" My voice is for war ! " asked, " Which of
them, pra3' ? "
0 ! O ! Orator Puff, etc.
Reeling homewards one evening, top-heavy with
gin,
And rehearsing his speech on the weight of
the crown.
He tripped near a saw-pit, and tumbled right in,
"Sinking fund " the last words as his noddle
came down.
0 ! O ! Orator Puff, etc.
" Good Lord ! " he exclaimed, in his he-and-she
tones,
" Help me out ! Help me out ! I have broken
my bones ! "
" Help you out ? " said a Paddy who passed,
" what a bother !
Why, there's two of you there—can't you help
one another ? "
O ! O ! Orator Puff,
One voice for an orator's surely enough.
Thomas Moore.
r
HUMOROUS POEMS.
■a
MORNING MEDITATIONS.
Let Taylor preach, upon a morning breezy,
How well to rise while nights andlarks are flying,—
For my part, getting up seems not so easy
By half as lying.
What if the lark does carol in the sky.
Soaring beyond the sight to find him out,—
Wherefore am I to rise at suoh a fly ?
I'm not a trout.
Talk not to me of bees and such-like hums.
The smell of sweet herbs at the morning piime,—
Only lie long enough, and bed becomes
A bed of time.
To me Dan Phœbus and his car are naught.
His steeds that paw impatiently about, —
Let them enjoy, say I, as horses ought.
The first turn-out I
Right beautiful the dewy meads apjiear
Besprinkled by the rosy-fingered girl ;
What then, — if I prefer my pillow-beer
To early, pearl ?
My stomach is not ruled by other men's.
And, grumbling for a reason, quaintly begs
Wherefore should master rise before the hens
Have laid their eggs ?
Why from a comfortable pillow start
To see faint flushes in the east awaken î
A fig, say I, for any streaky part.
Excepting bacon.
An early riser Mr. Gray has drawn.
Who used to haste the dewy grass among,
" To meet the sun upon the upland lawn,"—
Well, —he died young.
With charwomen such early hours agree.
And sweeps that earn betimes their bit and sup ;
But I'm no climbing boy, and need not be
All up, — aU up I
So here I lie, my morning calls deferring.
Till something nearer to the stroke of noon ; —
A man that's fond precociously of stirring
Must be a spoon. ,
Thomas Hood.
FAITHLESS SALLY BROWN.
Young Ben he was 3 nice young man,
A carpenter by trade ;
And he fell in love with Sally Brown,
That was a lady's maid.
But as they fetched a walk one day.
They met a press-gang crew ;
And Sally she did faint away,
Whilst Ben he was brought to.
The boatswain swore with wicked words
Enough to shock a saint.
That, though she did seem in a fit,
'T was nothing but a feint.
"Come, girl," said he, "hold up your head.
He '11 be as good as me ;
For when your swain is in our boat
A boatswain he will be."
So when they'd made their game of her.
And taken off her elf.
She roused, and found she only was
A coming to herself.
" And is he gone, and is he gone ?"
She cried and wept outright ;
" Then I will to the water-side.
And see him out of sight."
A waterman came up to her ;
"Now, young woman," said he,
"If you weep on so, you will make
Eye-water in the sea."
" Alas ! they've taken my beau, Ben,
To sail with old Benbow ; "
And her woe began to run afresh.
As if she'd said, Gee woe !
Says he, " They've only taken him
To the tender-ship, you see."
"The tender-ship," cried Sally Brown,—
" What a hard-ship that must be ! "
" O, would I were a mermaid now.
For then I'd follow him !
But 0, I'm not a fish-woman.
And so I cannot swim.
" Alas ! I was not bom beneath
The Virgin and the Scales,
So I must curse my cruel stars.
And walk about in Wales."
Now Ben had sailed to many a place
That's underneath the world ;
But in two years the ship came home.
And all her sails were furled.
But when he called on Sally Brown,
To see how she got on.
He found she'd got another Ben,
Whose Christian-name was John.
964
HUMOROUS POEMS.
" 0 Sally Brown ! 0 Sally Brown !
How could you serve me so ?
I've met with many a breeze before,
But never such a blow ! "
Then, reading on his 'bacco box.
He heaved a heavy sigh,
And then began to eye his pipe.
And then to pipe his eye.
And then he tried to sing, "All's Well ! "
But could not, though he tried ;
His head was turned, — and so he chewed
His pigtail till he died.
His death, which happened in his berth,
At forty-odd befell ;
They went and told the sexton, and
The sexton tolled the bell.
THOMAS Hooo.
FAITHLESS NELLY GRAY.
A pathetic ballad.
Ben Battle was a soldier bold.
And used to war's alarms ;
But a cannon-ball took off his legs.
So he laid down his arms.
Now as they bore him off the field.
Said he, " J^et others shoot ;
For here I leave my second leg.
And the Forty-second Foot."
The army-surgeons made him limbs :
Said he, " They 're only pegs ;
But there's as wooden members quite.
As represent my legs."
Now Ben he loved a pretty maid, —
Her name was Nelly Gray ;
So he went to pay her his devours.
When he devoured his pay.
But when he called on Nelly Gray,
She made him quite a scoff ;
And when she saw his wooden legs.
Began to take them off.
"0 Nelly Gray Î 0 Nelly Gray !
Is this your love so warm ?
The love that loves a scarlet coat
Should be more uniform."
Said she, " I loved a soldier once.
For he was blithe and brave ;
But I will never have a man
With both legs in the grave.
" Before you had those timlier toes
Your love 1 dhl allow ;
But then, you know, you stand upon
Another footing now."
" O Nelly Gray ! 0 Nelly Gray 1
For all your jeering speeches.
At duty's call I left my legs
In Badajos's breaches."
" Why, then," said she, "you've lost the feet
Of legs in war's alarms.
And now you cannot wear your shoes
Upon your feats of arms ! "
" 0 false and fickle Nelly Gray !
I know why you refuse :
Though I've no feet, some other man
Is standing in my shoes.
" I wish I ne'er had seen your face ;
But, now, a long farewell !
For you will be my death ; — alas Í
You will not be my Nell !"
Now when he went from Nelly Gray
His heart so heavy got.
And life was such a burden grown.
It made him take a knot.
So round his melancholy neck
A rope he did intwine.
And, for his second time in life,
Enlisted in the Line.
One end he tied around a beam.
And then removed his pegs ;
And, as his legs were off, — of course
He soon was off his legs.
And there he hung till he was dead
As any nail in town ;
For, though distress had cut him up.
It could not cut him down.
A dozen men sat on his corpse.
To find out why he died, —
And they buried Ben in four cross-roads.
With a stake in his inside.
Thomas Hood.
■ ♦ ■
I AM A FRIAR OF ORDERS GRAY.
■ prom the opera of " robin hood."
I am a friar of orders gray.
And down in the valleys I take my way ;
I pull not blackberry, haw, or hip, —
Good store of venison fills my scrip ;
ß-
HUMOROUS POEMS. 965
Jly long bead-roll I merrily chant ;
Where'er I walk no money I want ;
And why I'm so plump the reason I tell, —
Who leads a good life is sure to live well.
AVhat baron or squire.
Or knight of the shiie.
Lives half so well as a holy friar ?
After supper of heaven I dream,
Unt that is a pullet and clouted cream ;
Myself, by denial, I mortify —
With a dainty bit of a warden-pie ;
I'm clothetl in sackcloth for my sin, —
AVith old sack wine I'm lined within ;
A chirping cup is my matin song.
And the vesper's bell is my bowl, ding dong.
What baron or squire.
Or knight of the shire.
Lives half so well as a holy friar ?
John O'Keefe.
•
THE JACKDAW OF RHEIMS.
The Jackdaw sat on the Cardinal's chair !
Bishop and abbot and prior were there ;
Many a monk, and many a friar.
Many a knight, and many a squire,
AVith a gi'eat many more of lesser degi'ee, —
In sooth, a goodly company ;
And they served the Lord Primate on bended
knee.
Never, I ween.
Was a prouder seen.
Read of in books, or dreamt of in dreams.
Than the Cardinal Lord Archbishop of Rheims !
In and out.
Through the motley rout.
That little J.ackdaw kept hopping about :
Here and there.
Like a dog in a fair.
Over comfits and cates,
And dishes and plates.
Cowl and cope, and rochet and pall.
Mitre and crosier, he hopped upon all.
AVith a saucy air.
He perched on the chair
Where, in state, the great Lord Cardinal sat.
In the great Lord Cardinal's great red hat ;
And he peered in the face
Of his Lordship's Grace,
AA'ith a satisfied look, as if he would say,
"We two are the greatest folks here to-day ! "
And the priests, with awe.
As such freaks they saw.
Said, "The Devil must be in that little Jack¬
daw!"
The feast was over, the board was cleared.
The flawiis and the custards had all disappeared,
And six little Singing-boys, — dear little souls
In nice clean faces, and nice white stoles, —
Came, in order due.
Two by two,
Marching that grand refectory through !
A nice little boy held a golden ewer.
Embossed and filled with water, as pure
As any that Hows between Rheims and Namur,
Which a nice little boy stood ready to catch
In a fine golden hand-bakin made to match.
Two nice little boys, rather more grown.
Carried lavender-water and eau-de-Cologne ;
And a nice little boy had a nice cake of soap.
Worthy of washing the hands of the Pope !
One little boy more
A napkin bore.
Of the best white diaper, fringed with pink.
And a cardinal's hat marked in " permanent
ink."
The great Lord Cardinal turns at the sight
Of these nice little boys dressed all in white ;
From his finger ho draws
His costly turquoise :
And, not thinking at all about little Jackdaws,
Deposits it straight
By the side of his plate,
AA^hile the nice little boys on his Eminence wait ;
Till, when nobody's dreaming of any .such thing,
That little Jackdaw hops off with the ring !
There's a cry and a shout.
And a deuce of a rout.
And nobody seems to know what they 're about.
But the monks have their pockets all turned in¬
side out ;
The friars are kneeling.
And hunting and feeling
The carpet, the floor, and the walls, and the ceiling.
The Cardinal drew
Off each plum-colored shoe.
And left his red stockings exposed to the view ;
He peeps, and he feels
In the toes and the heels.
They turn up the dishes, — they turn up the
plates,—
They take up the poker and poke out the grates,
— They turn up the nigs.
They examine the mugs ;
But, no ! — no such thing, —
They can't find the uing I
And the Abbot declared that " when nobody
twigged it.
Some rascal or other had popped in and prigged
it!"
^^966
HUMOROUS POEMS.
The Cardinal rose with a dignified look,
Jle called for his candle, his bell, and his book !
In holy anger and pious grief
He solemnly cursed that rascally thief !
He cursed him at board, he cursed him in bed ;
From the sole of his foot to the crown of his
head ;
He cursed him in sleeping, that every night
He should dream of the Devil, and wake in a
fright.
He cursed him in eating, he cursed htm in
drinking, '
He cursed him in coughing, in sneezing, in
winking ;
He cursed him in sitting, in standing, in lying ;
He cursed him in walking, in riding, in flying ;
He cursed him living, he cursed him dying ! —
Never was heard such a terrible curse 1
But what gave rise
To no little surprise, •
Nobody seemed one penny the worse !
The day was gone.
The night came on.
The monks and the friars they searched till dawn ;
When the sacristan saw.
On crumpled claw.
Come limping a poor little lame Jackdaw !
No longer gay.
As on yesterday ;
His feathers all seemed to be turned the wrong
way ; —
His pinions drooped, —he could hardly stand, —
His head was as bald as the palm of your band ;
His eye so dim.
So wasted each limb.
That, heedless of grammar, they all cried,
"That's him ! — ,
That's the scamp that has done this scandalous
thing.
That's the thief that has got my Lord Cardinal's
Ring ! "
The poor little Jackdaw,
When the monks he saw.
Feebly gave vent to the ghost of a caw ;
And turned his bald head as much as to say,
" Pray be so good as to walk this way ! "
Slower and slower
He limped on before.
Till they came to the back of the belfry-door.
Where the first thing they saw.
Midst the sticks and the stiaw,
Was the king, in the nest of that little Jackdaw !
Then the great Lord Cardinal called for his book.
And off that terrible curse he took :
The mute expression
Served in lieu of confession.
And, being thus coupled ^vith full restitution.
The Jackdaw got plenary absolution !
— When those words were heard.
That poor little bird
Was so changed in a moment, 't was really ab¬
surd :
He grew sleek and fat ;
In addition to that,
A fresh crop of feathers came thick as a mat !
His tail waggled more
Even than before ;
But no longer it wagged with an impudent air.
No longer he perched on the Cardinal's chair :
He hopped now about
With a gait devout ;
At Matins, at Vespers, he never was out ;
And, so far from any more pilfering deeds,
He always seemed telling the Confessor's beads.
If any one lied, or if any one swore.
Or slumbered in prayer-time and happened to
snore.
That good Jackdaw
Would give a great " Caw ! "
As much as to say, " Don't do so any-more ! '*
While many remarked, as his manners they saw.
That they "never had known such a pious Jack¬
daw ! "
He long lived the pride
Of that country side.
And at last in the odor of sanctity died ;
When, as words were too faint
His merits to paint.
The Conclave determined to make him a Saint.
And on newly made Saints and Popes, as you
know.
It's the custom of Rome new names to bestow.
So they canonized him by the name of Jem Crow !
Richard Harris Barham .
( Thomas Itigoldsby, Esq."^
MISADVENTURES AT MARGATE.
Mr. Simpkinson {loquitur).
I was in Margate last July, I walked upon the
pier,
1 saw a little vulgar Boy, — I said, " What make
you here ?
The gloom upon your youthful cheek speaks any¬
thing but joy ; "
Again I said, " What make you here, you little
vulgar Boy ? "
He frowned, that little vulgar Boy, — he deemed
I meant to scoff, —
And when the little heart is big, a little " sets
it ofl'."
HUMOROUS POEMS.
967
He put his finger in his mouth, his little bosom
rose, —
He had uo little handkerchief to wipe his little
nose !
"Hark ! don't you hear, my little man ?—it's
striking Nine," I said,
" An hour when all good little boys and girls
should be in bed.
Run home and get your supper, else your Ma
will scold, — O fie !
It's very wrong indeed for little boys to stand
and cry ! "
The tear-drop in his little eye again began to
spring.
His bosom throbbed with agony, — he cried like
anything !
I stooped, and thus amidst his sobs I heard him
murmur, — " Ah !
I have n't got no supper ! and I have n't got no
Ma!
"My father, he is on the seas,—my mother's
dead and gone !
And I am here, on this here pier, to roam the
world alone ;
I have not had, this livelong day, one drop to
cheer my heart.
Nor 'Irown' to buy a bit of bread with, —let
alone a tart.
" If there's a soul will give me food, or find me
in employ.
By day or night, then blow me tight ! " (he was
a vulgar Boy ;)
" And now I'm here, from this here pier it is my
fixed intent
To jump as Mister Levi did from off the Monu¬
ment ! "
• "Cheer up I cheer up! my little man, — cheer
up ! " I kindly said,
"You are a naughty boy to take such things
into your head ;
If you should jump from off the pier, you'd surely
break your legs.
Perhaps your neck, — then Bogey'd have you,
sure as eggs are eggs !
" Come home with me, my little man, come home
with me and sup !
My landlady is Mrs. Jones, — we must not keep
her up, —
There's roast potatoes at the fire, — enough for
me and you, —
Come home, you little vulgar Boy, — I lodge at
Number 2."
I took him home to Number 2, the house beside
"The Foy,"
I bade him wipe his dirty shoes, —that little
vulgar Boy, —
And then I said to Mistress Jones, the kindest of
her sex,
" Pray be so good as go and fetch a pint of
double X ! "
But Mrs. Jones was rather cross, she made a little
noise.
She said she " did not like to wait on little vul¬
gar Boys."
She with her apron wiped the plates, and, as she
rubbed the delf,
Said I might "go to Jericho, and fetch my beer
myself ! "
I did not go to Jericho, — I went to Mr. Cobb, —
I changed a shilling (which in town the people
call a Bob), —
It was not so much for myself as for that vulgar
child, —
And I said, " A pint of double X, and please to
draw it mild ! "
When I came back I gazed about, — I gazed on
stool and chair, —
I could not see my little friend, because he was
not there !
I peeped beneath the table-cloth, beneath the
sofa, too, —
I said, "You little vulgar Boy! why, what's
become of you ! "
I could not see my table-spoons, —I looked, but
could not see
The little fiddle-patterned ones I use when I'm
at tea ;
I could not see my sugar-tongs, my silver watch,
— O, dear !
I know't was on the mantel-piece when I went
out for beer.
I could not see my Macintosh, — it was not to
be seen !
Nor yet my best white beaver hat, broad-brimmed
and lined with green ;
My carpet-bag, — my cruet-stand, that holds my
sauce and soy, —
My roast potatoes I — all are gone ! — and so's
that vulgar Boy I
I rang the bell for Mrs. Jones, for she was down
below,
" 0 Mrs. Jones, what do you think ? — ain't this
a pretty go ?
[&
'Jü8
MOROUS POEMS.
■a
Tbat horrid little vulgar Boy whom I brought
here to-iiight
He '» stolen my things and run away ! " Says
she, " And sarve you right ! "
Next morning I was up betimes, — I sent the
Crier round,
All with his bell and gold-laced hat, to say I'd
give a pound
To find that little vulgar Boy, who'd gone and
used me so ;
But when the Crier cried, " 0 Yes ! " the people
cried, "O No ! "
I went to " Jai-vis' Landing-place," the glory of
the town.
There was a common sailor-man a walking up
and down, ^
1 told my tale, — he seemed to think 1 'd not
been treated well.
And called me " Poor old Buffer ! " —what that
means I cannot tell.
That Sailor-man, he said he'd seen that morning
on the shore
A son of — something— 't was a name I'd never
heard before, —
A little "gallows-looking chap,"—dear me,
what could he mean ? —
With a "carpet-swab" and "mucking-togs,"
and a hat turned up with green.
He spoke about his "precious eyes," and said
he'd seen him " sheer," —
It's very odd that Sailor-men should talk so very
queer ;
And then he hitched his trousers up, as is, I'm
told, their use, —
It's very odd that Sailor-men should wear those
things so loose.
I did not understand him well, but think he
meant to say
He'd seen that little vulgar Boy, that morning,
swim away
In Captain Lai-ge's Royal George, about an hour
before.
And they were now, as be supposed, "some-
whcres" about the Nore.
A landsman said, " I twig the chap, he's been
upon the Mill, —
And 'cause he gammons .so the flats, ve calls him
Yeeping Bill ! "
He said " he'd done me werry brown, and nicely
stowed the swag," —
That's French, I fancy, for a hat, or else a car¬
pet-bag.
1 went and told the constable my property to
track ;
He asked me if " I did not wish that I might get
it back."
1 answered, " To be sure I do ! — it's what I'm
come about."
He smiled and said, " Sir, does your mother know
that you are out ? "
Not knowing what to do, I thought I'd hasten
back to town.
And beg our own Lord Mayor to catch the boy
who'd " done me brown,"
His Lordship very kindly said he'd try and find
him out.
But he "rather thought that there were several
vulgar boys about."
He sent for Mr. Whithair then, and I described
" the swag,"
My Macintosh, my sugar-tongs, my spoons, and
carpet-bag ;
He promised that the New Police should all
their powers employ.
But never to this hour have I beheld that vidgar
Boy!
moral.
Remember, then, that when a boy I've heard my
Grandma tell,
" Be warned in time by others' harm, and
you shall do full well ! "
Don't link yourself with vulgar folks, who've
got no fixed abode.
Tell lies, use naughty words, and say they "wish
they may be blowed ! "
Don't take too much of double X ! — and don't
at night go out
To fetch your beer youreelf, but make the pot¬
boy bring your stout !
And when you go to Margate next, just stop,
and ring the bell.
Give my respects to Mrs. Jones, and say I'm
pretty well I
Richard Harris Harham
{TAomas Ittsoläiöy,
THE YARN OF THE "NANCY BELL.'
froh "the bab ballads."
'T was on the shores that round our coast
From Deal to Ramsgate span.
That I found alone, on a piece of stone,
An elderly naval man.
e
HUMOROUS POEMS.
96Ü
His hair wa,s weedy, his beard was long,
And weedy and long was he ;
And I heard this wight on the shore recite,
In a singular minor key : —
" 0, I am a cook and a captain bold,
And the mate of the Nancy brig.
And a bo's\m tight, and a midshipmite.
And the crew of the captain's gig."
And he shook his fists and he tore his hair.
Till 1 really felt afraid.
For I could n't help thinking the man had been
drinking.
And so I simply said ; —
" 0 elderly man, it's little I know
Of the duties of men of the sea.
And I '11 eat my hand if 1 understand
How you can po.ssibly be
" At once a cook and a captain bold.
And the mate of the Nancy brig.
And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite.
And the crew of the captain's gig ! "
Then he gave a hitch to his trousers, which
Is a trick all seamen larn.
And having got rid of a thumping quid
He spun this painful yarn : —
"'T was in the good ship Nancy Bell
That we sailed to the Indian sea,
And there on a reef we come to grief.
Which has often occurred to me.
" And pretty nigh all o' the crew was drowned
(Tliere was seventy-seven o' soul) ;
And only ten of the Nancy's men
Said ' Here ' to the muster-roll.
" There was me, and the cook, and the captain
bold.
And the mate of the Nancy brig.
And the bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite.
And the crew of the captain's gig.
" For a month we'd neither wittles nor drink.
Till a-hungry we did feel.
So we drawed a lot, and, accordin', shot
The captain for our meal.
"The next lot fell to the Nancy's mate.
And a delicate dish he made ;
Then our appetite with the midshipmite
We seven suivivors stayed.
" And then we murdered the bo'sun tight.
And he much resembled pig ;
Then we wittled free, did the cook and me,
On the crew of the captain's gig.
"Then only the cook and me was left.
And the delicate question, ' Which
Of us two goes to the kettle ? ' aio.se.
And we argued it out as sich.
" For I loved that cook as a brother, I did.
And the cook he worshippeil rue ;
But we'd both be blowed if we'd cither be stowed
In the other chap's hold, you see.
" ' 1 '11 be eat if you dines off me,' says Tom.
' Yes, that,' says I, 'you'll be.
1 'm boiled if 1 die, my friend,' quoth 1 ;
And ' Exactly so,' quoth he.
" Says he : ' Dear James, to murder me
Were a foolish thing to do.
For don't you see that you can't cook me.
While I can — and will — cook you ? '
"So he boils the water, and takes the salt
And the pepper in portions true
(Which he never forgot), and some chopped sha-
lot.
And some sage and parsley too.
" ' Come here,' says he, with a proper pride.
Which his smiling features tell ;
' 'T will soothing be if 1 lot you see
How extremely nice you '11 smell.'
" And he stirred it round, and round, and round,
And he sniffed at the foaming froth ;
When 1 ups with his heels, and smothei-s his
squeals
In the scum of the boiling broth.
"And I eat that cook in a week or less.
And as I eating be
The last of his chops, why I almost drops.
For a Wessel in sight I see.
♦ • » » »
" And 1 never larf, and I never smile.
And I never lark nor play ;
But I sit and croak, ami a single joke
1 have — which is to say ;
" O, I am a cook and a captain bold
And the mate of the Nancy brig.
And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite.
And the crew of the captain's gig ! "
WILLI.UI SCHWENCK GILBERT.
970
HUMOROUS POEMS.
CAPTAIN REECE.*
Of all the ships upon the blue,
No ship contained a better crew
Than that of worthy Captain Reece,
Commanding of The Mantelpiece.
He was adored by all his men,
For worthy Captain Reece, R. N.,
Did all that lay within him to
Promote the comfort of his crew.
If ever they were dull or sad.
Their captain danced to them like mad.
Or told, to make the time pass by.
Droll legends of his infancy.
A feather-bed had every man,
Warm slippers and hot-water can.
Brown Windsor from the captain's store,
A valet, too, to every four.
Did they with thirst in summer burn,
Lo, seltzogenes at every turn,
And on all very sultry days
Cream ices handed round on trays.
Then currant wine and ginger pops
Stood handily on all the " tops : "
And, also, with amusement rife,
A " Zoetrope, or Wheel of Life."
New volumes came across the sea
From Mister Mudie's libraree ;
The Times and Saturday Review
Beguiled the leisure of the crew.
Kind-hearted Captain Reece, R. N.,
Was quite devoted to his men ;
In point of fact, good Captain Reece
Beatified The Mantelpiece.
One summer eve, at half past ten.
He said (addressing all his men),
"Come, tell me, please, what I can do.
To please and gratify my crew.
" By any reasonable plan
I '11 make you happy if I can ;
My own convenience count as nil ;
It is my duty, and I wilL"
Then up and answered William Lee
(The kindly captain's coxswain he,
A nervous, shy, low-spoken man);
He cleared his throat, and thus began ;
• In this delicious piece of absurdity will be found the genns of
Gilbert's two famous comic operas, — " //. M. S. Ptvet/ore" with its
amiable captain, cheerful crew, and the " sisters and the cousins
and tlie aunts," and " Th< Pirates o/ Penzance, or The Slave o/
Duty:'
"You have a daughter. Captain Reece,
Ten female cousins and a niece,
A ma, if what I'm told is true.
Six sisters, and an aunt or two.
" Now, somehow, sir, it seems to me.
More friendly-like we all should be.
If you united of 'em to
Unmarried members of the crew.
" If you'd ameliorate our life.
Let each select from them a w ife ;
And as for nervous me, old pal.
Give me your own enchanting gal ! "
Good Captain Reece, that worthy man.
Debated on his coxswain's plan :
" I quite agree," he said, "0 Bill ;
It is my duty, and I will.
" My daughter, that enchanting gurl,
Has just been promised to an earl.
And all my other familee
To peers of various degree.
" But what are dukes and viscounts to
The happiness of all my crew ?
The word I gave you I '11 fulfil ;
It is my duty, and I will.
" As you desire it shall befall,
I '11 settle thousands on you all.
And I shall be, despite my hoard,
The only bachelor on board."
The boatswain of The Mantelpiece,
He blushed and spoke to Captain Reece ;
"I beg your honor's leave," he said,
" If you would wish to go and wed,
" I have a widowed mother who
Would be the very thing for you —
She long has loved you from afar.
She washes for you. Captain R."
The captain saw the dame that day —
Addressed her in his playful way —
" And did it want a wedding-ring ?
It was a tempting ickle sing !
"Well, well, the chaplain I will seek.
We '11 all be married this day week
At yonder church upon the hill ;
It is my duty, and I will ! "
The sisters, cousins, aunts, and niece.
And widowed ma of Captain Reece,
Attended there as they were bid ;
It was their duty, and they did.
William schwen'ck Gilbert.
rf] B
^ IIUMOllOUS POEMS. 971
LITTLE BILLEE.
There were three sailors of Bristol City
Who took a boat and went to sea,
But first with beef and captain's biscuits
And pickled pork they loaded she.
There was gorging Jack, and guzzling Jimmy,
And the youngest he was little Billee ;
Now when they'd got as far as the Equator,
They'd nothing left but one split pea.
Says gorging Jack to guzzling Jimmy,
"I am extremely hungaree."
To gorging Jack says guzzling Jimmy,
" We 'vc nothing left, us must eat we."
Says gorging Jack to guzzling Jimmy,
"With one another we should n't agree !
There's little Bill, he's young and tender.
We 're old and tough, so let's eat he."
" 0 Billy ! we 're going to kill and eat you.
So undo the button of your chemie."
When Bill received this information.
He used his pocket-handkerchie.
" First let me say my catechism
Which my poor mother taught to me."
"Make haste ! make haste !" says guzzling Jimmy,
While Jack pulled out his snickersnee.
Billy went up to the main-top-gallant mast,
And down he fell on his bended knee.
He scarce had come to the Twelfth Command¬
ment
When up he jumps — " There's land I see I
"Jerusalem and Madagascar
And North and South Ameiikee,
There's the British flag a riding at anchor.
With Admiral Napier, K. C. B." «
So when they got aboard of the Admiral's,
He hanged fat Jack and flogged Jimmee,
But as for little Bill he made him
The Captain of a Seventy-three.
William makepeace Thackeray.
THE BELLE OF THE BALL.
Years, years ago, ere yet my dreams
Had been of being wise or witty.
Ere I had done with writing themes.
Or yawned o'er this infernal Chitty, -
Years, years ago, while all my joys
Were in my fowling-piece and filly
In short, while I was yet a boy,
I fell in love with Laura Lilly.
I saw her at the county ball ;
There, when the sounds of flute and fiddle
Gave signal sweet in that old hall
Of hands across and down the middle,
Hers was the subtlest spell by far
Of all that sets young hearts romancing :
She was our queen, our rose, our star ;
And then she danced,—0 Heaven I her danc¬
ing.
Dark was her hair ; her hand was white ;
Her Voice was exquisitely tender ;
Her eyes were full of liquid light ;
I never saw a waist so slender ;
Her every look, her every smile,
Shot right and left a score of arrows :
I thought't was Venus from her isle.
And wondered where she'd left her sparrows.
She talked of politics or prayers.
Of Southey's prose or Wordsworth's sonnets,
Of danglers or of dancing beara.
Of battles or the last new bonnets ;
By candle-light, at twelve o'clock, —
To me it mattered not a tittle, —
If those bright lips had quoted Locke,
I might have thought they murmured Little.
Through sunny May, through sultry June,
I loved her with a love eternal ;
I spoke her praises to the moon,
I wrote them to the Sunday Journal.
M3' mother laughed ; I soon found out
That ancient ladies have no feeling ;
My father frowned ; but how should gout
See any happiness in kneeling ?
She was the daughter of a dean, —
Rich, fat, and rather apoplectic ;
She had one brother just thirteen.
Whose color was extremely hectic ;
Her grandmother for many a year
Had fed the parish with her bounty ;
Her second cousin was a peer.
And lord-lieutenant of the county.
But titles and the three-per-cents.
And mortgages, and great relations.
And India bonds, and tithes and rents,
O, what are they to love's sensations ?
Black eyes, fair forehead, elustering locks, —
Such wealth, such honors Cupid chooses ;
He cares as little for the stocks
As Baron Rothschild for the muses.
She sketched ; the vale, the wood, the beach,
Grew lovelier from her pencil's shading;
She botanized ; I envied each
Young blossom in her boudoir fading :
4
972
HUMOROUS POßMS.
Slie warbled Handel ; it was grand, —
She made the Catilina jealous :
She touched the organ ; I could stand
For houm and horn's to blow the bellows.
Sire kept an album too, at home,
Well filled with all an album's glories, —
Paintings of butterflies and Kome,
Patterns for trimmings, Pei'siau stories.
Soft songs to Julia's cockatoo.
Fierce odes to famine and to slaughter.
And autographs of Prince Leeboo,
And recipes for elder-water.
And she was flattered, worshipped, bored ;
Her steps were watched, her dress was noted ;
Her poodle-dog was quite adored ;
Her sayings were extremely quoted.
She laughed, — and every heart was glad.
As if the taxes were abolished ;
Slie frowned, — and every look was sad.
As if the opera were demolished.
She smiled on many just for fun, —
I knew that there was nothing in it ;
I was the first, the only one.
Her heart had thought of for a minute.
I knew it, for she told me so.
In phrase which was divinely moulded ;
She wrote a charming hand, — and 0,
How sweetly all her notes were folded !
Our love was most like other loves, —
A little glow, a little shiver,
A rosebud and a pair of gloves.
And " Fly Not Yet," upon the river ;
Some jealousy of some one's heir.
Some hopes of dying broken-hearted ;
A miniature, a lock of hair,
Tlie usual vows, — and then we parted.
'Wo parted : months and years rolled by ;
We met again four summers after.
Our parting was all sob and sigh.
Our meeting was all mirth and laughter !
For in my heart's most secret cell
There had been many other lodgers ;
And she was not the ball-room's belle.
But only Mre. — Something — Rogers !
Winthrop Mackworth praed.
SORROWS OF WERTHER.
Werther had a love for Charlotte
Such as words could never utter ;
Would you know how first he met her ?
She was cutting bread and butter.
Charlotte was a married lady.
And a moral man was Werther,
And for all the wealth of Indies
Would do nothing for to hurt her.
So he sighed and pined and ogled.
And his passion boiled and bubbled.
Till he blew his silly brains out,
And no more was by it troubled.
Charlotte, having seen his body
Bome before her on a shutter.
Like a well-conducted person.
Went on cutting bread and butter.
William Makepeace Thackeray.
»
A LIFE'S LOVE.
I loved him in my dawning years —
Far years, divinely dim ;
My blithest smiles, my saddest tears.
Were evennore for him.
My dreaming when the day began.
The latest thought I had,
"Was still some little loving plan.
To make my darling glad.
They deemed he lacked the conquering wiles.
That other children wear ;
To me his face, in frowns or smiles.
Was never aught but fair.
They said that self was all his goal.
He knew no thought beyond ;
To me, 1 know, no living soul
AVas half so true and fond.
In love's eclipse, in friendship's dearth.
In grief and feud and bale.
My heart has learnt the sacred worth
Of one that cannot fail ;
And come what mu.st, and come what may.
Nor power, nor praise, nor pelf.
Shall lure my faith from thee to stray.
My sweet, my own — Myself.
ANONYMOUS.
ON AN OLD MUFF.
Time has a magic wand !
"What is this meets my hand.
Moth-eaten, mouldy, and
Covered with fluff.
Faded and stiff and scant ?
Can it lie ? no, it can't, —
Yes, — I declare't is Aunt
Prudence's Muff 1
HUMOROUS POEMS.
973
Years ago — twenty-three !
Old Uncle Barnaby
Gave it to Annty P.,
Laughing and teasing, —
" Pi-u. of the breezy curls,
Whisper these solemn churls.
What holds a pretty girl's
Hand without squeezing ? "
Uncle was then a lad.
Gay, but, I grieve to add.
Gone to what's called "the bad,"—
Smoking, —and wome !
Sleek sable then was this
Muff, lined with pinkiness, —
Bloom to which beauty is
Seldom averse.
I see in retrospect
Aunt, in her best bedecked.
Gliding, with mien erect.
Gravely to meeting :
Psalm-book, and kerchief new.
Peeped from the Muff of Pru.,
Young men — and pious, too —■
Giving her greeting.
Pure was the life she led
Then : from her Muff, 't is said.
Tracts she distributed ; —
Scapegraces many.
Seeing the grace they lacked,
- Followed her ; one attacked
Prudence, and got his tract
Oftener than any !
Love has a potent spell !
Soon this bold ne'er-do-well.
Aunt's sweet susceptible
Heart undermining.
Slipped, so the scandal runs.
Notes in the pretty nun's
Muff, — triple-cornered ones, —
Pink as its lining !
Worse, even, soon the jade
Fled (to oblige her blade !)
Whilst her friends thought that they'd
Locked her up tightly :
After such shocking games.
Aunt is of wedded dames
Gayest, — and now her name 'a
Mrs. Golightly.
In female conduct flaw
Sadder I never saw.
Still I've faith in the law
Of compensation.
G
Once uncle went astray, —
Smoked, joked, and swore away ;
Swoni by, he's now, by a
Large congregation !
Changed is the child of sin ;
Now he's (he once was thin)
Grave, with a double chin, —
Blest be his fat form !
Changed is the garb he wore :
Preacher was never more
Prized than is uncle for
Pulpit or platform.
If all's as best befits
Mortals of slender wits.
Then beg this Muff, and its
Fair owner pardon ;
All's for the best, —indeed.
Such is my simple creed ;
Still I must go and weed
Hard in my garden.
Frederick Locker.
«
JACK HORNER.
prom " mother goose for crown folks."
" Little Jack Horner
Satlnacbmer
Eating a Christmas Pie ;
Ho put in his thumb.
And puiicd out a plum.
And said, ' What a great boy am It"*
Ah, the world hath many a Horner,
Who, seated in his corner.
Finds a Christmas Pie provided for his thumb ¡
And cries out with exultation,
When successful exploration
Doth discover the predestinated plum !
Little Jack outgrows his 'tire.
And becometh John, Esquire ;
And he finds a monstrous pasty ready made.
Stuffed with stocks and bonds and bales.
Gold, currencies, and sales.
And all the mixed ingredients of Trade.
And again it is his luck
To be just in time to pluck.
By a clever " operation," from the pie
An unexpected " plum ; "
So he glorifies his thumb.
And says proudly, " What a mighty man am I !"
Or, perchance to science turning.
And with weary labor learning
All the formulas and phrases that oppress her, —
For the fruit of others' baking
So a fresh diploma taking.
Comes he forth, a full accredited Professor !
974
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Or he's not too nice to mix
In thç dish of politics ;
And the dignity of office he puts on ;
And he feels as big again
As a dozen nobler men,
While he writes himself the Honorable John !
Ah me, for the poor nation !
In her hour of desperation.
Her worst foe is that unsparing Homer thumb !
To which War and Death and Hate,
Right, Policy, and State,
Are but pies wherefrom his greed may grasp a
plum 1
0, the work was fair and trae,
But't is riddled through and through,
And plundered of its glories everywhere ;
And before men's cheated eyes
Doth the robber triumph rise
And magnify itself in all the air.
Why, if even a good man dies,
And is welcomed to the skies
In the glorious resurrection of the just,
They must ruffle it below
With some vain and wretched show.
To make each his little mud-pie of the dust !
Shall we hint at Lady Homers,
Who, in their exclusive comers.
Think the world is only made of upper-crast Î
Who in the queer mince-pie
That we call Society,
Do their dainty fingers delicately thrast ;
Till, if it come to pass.
In the sjdced and sugared mass.
One should compass — don't they call it so ? —
a catch.
By the gratulation given
It would seem the very heaven
Had outdone itself in making such a match I
Or the Woman Homer, now.
Who is raising such a row
To prove that Jack's no bigger boy than Jill ;
And that she won't sit by.
With her little saucer pie.
While he from the Great Pastry picks his fill.
Jealous-wild to be a sharer
In the fruit she thinks the fairer.
Flings by all for the swift gaining of her wish ;
Not discerning in her blindness.
How a tender Loving Kindness
Hid the best things in her own rejected dish I
0, the world keeps Christmas Day
In a queer, perpetual way ;
Shouting always, "What a great big boy am I ! "
Yet how many of the crowd
Thus vociferating loud.
And their honors or pretensions lifting high.
Have really, more than Jack,
With their boldness or their knack.
Had a finger in the making of the Pie ?
Adeline D. T. Whitney.
^—♦—
COMFORT.
Who would care to pass his life away
Of the Lotos-land a dreamful denizen, —
Lotos-islands in a waveless bay.
Sung by Alfred Tennyson ?
Who would care to be a dull new-comer
Far across the wild sea's wide abysses,
Where, about the earth's three thousandth sum*
mer.
Passed divine Ulysses ?
Rather'give me coffee, art, a book.
From my windows a delicious sea-view.
Southdown mutton, somebody to cook, —
"Music ?" — I believe you.
Strawberry icebergs in the summer time, —
But of elm-wood many a massive splinter.
Good ghost stories, and a classic rhyme.
For the nights of winter.
Now and then a friend and some Sauteme,
Now and then a haunch of Highland venison.
And for Lotos-land I '11 never yearn.
Malgré Alfred Tennyson.
Mortimer coluns.
THE WOMEN FO'K.»
0, SAir.LT may I me the day
I fancied first the womenkind ;
For aye sins3me I ne'er can hae
Ae quiet thought or peace o' mind I
They hae plagued my heart an' pleased my e'e.
An' teased an' fiattered me at will.
But aye for a' their witcherj'e.
The pawky things I lo'e them still.
• The atr of this song^ is my own. It was first set to music by
Heather, and most beautifully set too. It was afterwords set by
Dewar, whether with the same accompaniments or not, I have for*
got. It is my own favorite humorous song, when forced to sing by
ladies against my will, which too frequently happens ; and, notwith*
standing my wood>notes wild, it will never be sung by any so well
again.«-The AUTHOR.
HUMOROl
[JS POEMS.
975
O the women fo'k ! O the women fo'k !
But they hae been the wreck o' me ;
0 weary fa' the women fo'k,
For they winna let a body be !
I hae thought an' thought, but darena tell,
1 've studied them wi' a' my skill,
1 've lo'd them better than mysell,
I've tried again to like them ill.
Wha sairest strives, will sairest rue.
To comprehend what nae man can ;
"When he has done what man can do,
He '11 end at last where he began.
0 the women fo'k, etc.
That they hae gentle forms an' meet,
A man wi' half a look may see ;
An gracefu' airs, an' faces sweet,
An' waving curls aboon the bree ;
An' smiles as soft as the young rosebud.
And een -sae pawky, bright, an' rare,
"Wad lure the laverock frae the cludd, —
But, laddie, seek to ken nae mair !
0 the women fo'k, etc.
Even but this night nae farther gane.
The date is neither lost nor lang,
I tak ye witness ilka ane.
How fell they fought, and fairly dang.
Their point they've carried right or wrang.
Without a reason, rhyme, or law.
An' forced a man to sing a sang.
That ne'er could sing a verse ava.
0 the women fo'k ! 0 the women fo'k !
But they hae been the wreck o' me ; •
O weary fa' the women fo'k,
For they winna let a body be !
James Hocc.
WOMAN.
"Whex Eve brought woe to all mankind
Old Adam called her wo-rcian ;
But when she wooed with love so kind.
He then pronounced her woo-inan.
But now, with folly and with pride.
Their husbands' pockets trimming.
The women are .so full of vjhims
That men pronounce them ivimmen !
ANONYMOUS.
PAPER.
A CONVERSATIONAL PLEASANTRY.
Some wit of old — such wits of old there were.
Whose hints showed meaning, whose allusions
care —
By one brave stroke to mark all human kind.
Called clear, blank paper every infant mind ;
Where still, as opening scn.se her dictates wrote,
Fair virtue put a seal, or vice a blot.
The thought was happy, pertinent, and tme ;
Methinks a genius might the plan pursue.
I (can you pardon my presumption ?) — I,
No wit, no genius, yet for once will try.
Various the paper various wants produce, —
The wants of fashion, elegance, and use.
Men are as various ; and, if right I scan.
Each sort of paper represents some man.
Pray note the fop, half powder and half lace ;
Nice, as a bamlbox were his dwelling-place ;
He's the gilt-paper, which apart you store.
And lock from vulgar hands in the 'scrutoire.
Mechanics, servants, farmers, and so forth.
Are copy-paper, of inferior worth ;
Less prized, more useful, for your desk decreed ;
Free to all pens, and prompt at every need.
The wretch whom avarice bids to pinch and spare.
Starve, cheat, and pilfer, to enrich an heir.
Is coarse hrown paper, such as pedlers choose
To wrap up wares, which better men will use.
Take next the miser's contrast, who destroys
Health, fame, and fortune in a round of joys ;
Will any paper match him ? Yes, throughput ;
He's a true sinking-paper, past all doubt.
The retail politician's anxious thought
Deems this side always right, and that stark
naught ;
He foams with censure ; with applause he raves ;
A dupe to rumors, and a tool of knaves ;
He '11 want no type, his weakness to proclaim.
While such a thing as foolscap has a name.
The hasty gentleman, whose blood runs high.
Who picks a quarrel, if you step awry.
Who can't a jest, a hint, or look endure, —
What is he ? — what ? Touch-paper, to be sure.
What are our poets, take them as they fall,
Good, bad, rich, poor, much read, not read at all ?
They and their works in the same class you '11
find ;
They are the mere wa^te-paper of mankind.
Ob-serve the maiden, innocently sweet !
She's fair, white paper, an unsullied sheet ;
On which the happy man whom fate ordains
May write his name, and take her for his pains.
One instance more, and only one I '11 bring ;
'T is the gi-eat man who scorns a little thing ;
-é-—
976
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Whose thoughts, whose deeds, whose maxims,
are his own.
Formed on the feelings of his heart alone.
True, genuine, royal paper is his breast ;
Of all the kinds most precious, purest, best.
be.s;amin Franklin.
«
OLD GRIMES.
Old Grimes is dead, that good old man, —
We ne'er shall see him more ;
He used to wear a long black coat,
All buttoned down before.
His heart was open as the day.
His feelings all were true ;
His hair was some inclined to gray, —
He wore it in a queue.
Whene'er he heard the voice of pain.
His breast with pity burned ;
The large round head upon his cane
From ivory was turned.
Kind words he ever had for all ;
He knew no base design ;
His eyes were dark and rather small.
His nose was aquiline.
He lived at peace with all mankind.
In friendship he was true ;
His coat had pocket-holcs behind.
His pantaloons were blue.
Unharmed, the sin which earth pollutes
fie passed securely o'er, —
And never wore a pair of boots
For thirty years or more.
But good Old Grimes is now at rest.
Nor fears misfortune's frown ;
He wore a double-breasted vest, —
The stripes ran up and down.
He modest merit sought to find.
And pay it its desert ;
He had no malice in his mind, ' [
No i-uffles on his shirt.
HLs neighbors he did not abuse, —
Was sociable and gay ;
He wore large buckles on his shoes.
And changed them every day.
His knowledge, hid from iniblic gaze,
He did not bring to view,
Nor make a noise, town-meeting days.
As many people do. I
His worldly goods he never threw
In trust to fortune's chances,
But lived (as all his brothers do)
In easy circumstances.
Thus undisturbed by anxious cares
His peaceful moments lan ;
And everybody said he was
A fine old gentleman.
ALDERT C. CKEENE.
THE HEIGHT OF THE RIDICULOUS.
I WROTE some lines once on a time
In wondrous merry mood,
And thought, as usual, men wouhl say
They were exceeding good.
They were so queer, so very queer,
I laughed as I would die ;
Albeit, in the general way,
A sober man am I.
I called my servant, and he came ;
How kind it was of him, •
To mind a slender man like me.
He of the mighty limb !
" These to the printer," I exclaimed,
And, in my humorous waj',
I added (as a trifling jest),
"There'11 be the devil to pay."
He took the paper, and I watched,
And saw him peep within ;
At the first line he read, his face
Was all upon the grin.
He read the next ; the grin grew broad.
And shot from ear to ear ;
He read the third ; a chuckling noise
I now began to hear.
The fourth ; he broke into a roar ;
The fifth ; his waistband split ;
The sixth ; he burst five buttons off.
And tumbled in a fit.
Ten days and nights, with sleepless eye,
I watched that wretched man.
And since, I never dare to write
As funny as I can.
OLIVER Wendell Ilomr.s
f
HUMOROUS POEMS.
977
Tí
THE ONE-HOSS SHAY ;
ok, the deacon's masterpiece.
A LOGICAL STORY.
Have yon heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay,
That was built in such a logical way
It ran a hundred years to a day,
And then of a sudden, it — ah, but stay,
I '11 tell you what happened without delay,
Scarmg the pareen into fits.
Frightening people out of their wits, —
Have you ever heard of that, I say ?
Seventeen hundred and fifty-five.
Peorgius Sccundus was then alive, —
Snuffy old drone from the German hive,
^at was the year when Lisbon-town
Saw the earth open and gulp her down.
And Braddock's army was done so brown.
Left without a scalp to its crown.
It was on the terrible Earthquake-day
That the Deacon finished the one-hoss shay.
Ifow in building of chaises, I tell you what.
There is always somewhere a weakest spot, —
In hub, tire, felloe, in spring or thill.
In panel, or crossbar, or fioor, or sill.
In screw, bolt, thoroughbrace, —lurking still.
Find it somewhere yon must and will, —
Above.or below, or within or without, —
And that's the reason, beyond a doubt,
A chaise breaks ¿town, but does n't wear out.
But the Deacon swore (as Deacons do.
With an "I dew vum," or an " I tell ycoM,")
He would build one shay to beat the taown
'u' the keounty 'n' all the kentry raoun' ;
It should be so built that it could n' break daown ;
— " Fur," said the Deacon, "'t's mighty plain
Thut the weakes' place mus' sbin' the strain ;
'n' the way t' fix it, nz I maintain.
Is only jest
T' make that place uz strong uz the rest."
So the Deacon inquired of the village folk
Where he could find the strongest oak.
That could n't be split nor bent nor broke, —
That was for spokes and floor and sills ;
He sent for lancewood to make the thills ;
The crossbare were ash, from the straightest trees ;
The panels of whitewood, that cuts like cheese.
But lasts like iron for things like these ;
The hubs of logs from the "Settler's ellura," —
Last of its timber, —they could n't sell 'em.
Never an axe had seen their chips,
And the wedges flew from between their lips.
Their blunt ends fiizzled like celery-tips ;
Stop and prop-iron, bolt and screw.
Spring, tire, axle, and linchpin too.
Steel of the finest, bright and blue ;
Thoroughbrace bison-skin, thick and wide ;
Boot, top, dasher, from tough old hide
Found in the pit when the tanner died.
That was the way he " put her through."
" There ! " said the Deacon, " uaow she '11 dew ! "
Do ! I tell you, I rather guess
She was a wonder, and nothing less !
Colts grew horses, beards turned gray.
Deacon and deaconess dropped away.
Children and grandchildren, — where were they ?
But there .stood the stout old one-hoss shay
As fresh as on Lisbon-earthquake-day !
Eightee.v hundred ; — it came and found
The Deacon's masterpiece strong and sound.
Eighteen hundred increased by ten ; —
" Hahnsum kerridge " they called it then.
Eighteen hundred and twenty came ; —
Running as usual ; much the same.
Thiity and forty at last arrive.
And then came fifty, and fifty-five.
Little of all we value here
Wakes on the morn of its hundredth year
Without both feeling and looking queer.
In fact, there's nothing that keeps its youth.
So far as I know, but a tree and truth.
(This is a moral that runs at large ;
Take it. —You 're welcome. — No extra charge.)
First of November, — the Earthquake-day. —
There are traces of age in the one-hoss shay,
A general flavor of mild decay.
But nothing local as one may say.
There could n't be, — for the Dc.acon's art
Had made it so like h. every part
That there was n't a chance for one to start.
For the wheels were just as strong as the thills.
And the floor was just as strong as the sills,
And the panels just as strong as the floor,
And the whippletree neither less nor more.
And the back-crossbar as strong as the fore.
And spring and axle and hub encore.
And yet, as a whole, it is past a doubt
In another hour it will be worn out !
First of November, 'Fiftj'-five !
This morning the parson takes a drive.
Now, small boys, get out of the way !
Here comes the wonderful one-hoss shay.
Drawn by a rat-bailed, ewe-necked bay.
" Huddup ! " said the parson. — Off went they.
The parson was working his Sunday's text, —
Had got to fifthly, and stopped perplexed '
978
HUMOROUS POEMS.
At what the — Moses — was coming next.
All at once the horse stood still,
Close by the meet'n'-house on the hill.j
— First a shiver, and then a thrill.
Then something decidedly like a spill, —
And the parson was sitting upon a rock,
At half past nine by the meet'n'-house clock, —
Just the hour of the Earthquake shock !
— What do you think the parson found.
When he got up and stared around ?
The poor old chaise in a heap or mound.
As if it had been to the mill and ground !
You see, of course, if you 're not a dunce.
How it went to pieces all at once, —
All at once, and nothing first, —
Just as bubbles do when they burst.
End of the wonderful one-hoss shay.
Logic is logic. That's all I say.
Cliver Wendell Holmes.
*
RUDOLPH THE HEADSMAN".
Rudolph, professor of the headsman's trade.
Alike was famous for his arm and blade.
One day a prisoner Justice had to kill
Knelt at the block to test the artist's skill.
Bare-armed, swart-visaged, gaunt, and shaggy-
browed,
Rudolph the headsman rose above the crowd.
His falchion lightened with a sudden gleam.
As the pike's armor flashes in the stream.
He sheathed his blade ; he turned as if to go ;
The victim knelt, still waiting for the blow.
" "Why strikest not ? Perform thy murderous
act,"
The prisoner said. (His voice was slightly
cracked.)
•' Friend, I have struck," the artist straight re¬
plied ;
''■Wait but one moment, and yourself decide."
He held his snuff-box, — "Now then, if you
please ! "
The prisoner sniffed, and, with a crashing sneeze.
Off his head tumbled, bowled along the floor.
Bounced down the steps ; — the prisoner said no
more 1
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
THE BOYS.
Has there ¿ay old fellow got i^ixed with the
boys?
If there has, take him out, without making a
noise.
Hang the Almanac's cheat and the Catalogue's
spite I
Old Time is a liar I Wo 're twenty to-night !
We're twenty ! We're twenty ! "Who says we
are more ?
He's tipsy, —young jackanapes !—show him the
door I
" Gray temples at twenty ?" — Yes ! while, if we
plea.se ;
Where the snow-flakes fall thickest there's noth¬
ing can freeze !
Was it snowing I spoke of ? Excuse the mis¬
take !
Look close, — you will see not a sign of a flake !
We want some now garlands for those we have
shed,—
And these are white roses in place of the red.
We've a trick, wo young fellows, you may have
been told.
Of talldng (in public) as if we were old :
That boy wo call " Doctor," and this we call
" Judge ;" —
It's a neat little fiction, — of course it's all
fudge.
That fellow's the "Speaker," — the one on the
right ;
" Mr. Mayor," my young one, how are you to¬
night ?
That's our " Member of Congress," we say when
we chaff ;
There's the " Reverend " What's his name ?—•
don't make mo laugh !
That boy with the grave mathematical look
Made believe he had written a wonderful book.
And the Royal Society rhought it was true !
So they chose him right in, — a good joke it was
too !
There's a boy, we pretend, with a three-deeker
brain.
That could harness a team with a logical chain ;
When he spoke for our manhood in syllabled
fire.
We called him "The Justice," but now he's
"The Squire."
And there's a nice youngster of excellent pith,—
Fate tried to conceal him by naming him Smith»
But he shouted a song for the brave and the
free, —
Just read on his medal, "M3' countiy," "of
thee ! "
r
TUMOROUS POEMS.
979
ñ
You hear that boy laughing ? — You thiuk he's
all fun ;
But the angels laugh, too, at the good he has
done ;
The children laugh loud as they troop to his call,
And the poor man that knows him laughs loudest
of all 1
Yes, we 're boys, — always playing with tongue
or with pen ;
And 1 sometimes hare asked, Shall we ever be
men ?
Shall we always be youthful, and laughing, and
gay.
Till the last dear companion drop smiling away ?
Then here's to our boyhood, its gold and its
gray!
The stars of its winter, the dews of its May !
And when we have done with our life-lasting
toys.
Dear Father, take care of thy children. The
Boys.
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
THE OLD MAN DREAM&
O FOR one hour of youthful joy 1
Give back my twentieth spring !
I'd rather laugh a bright-haired hoy
Than reign a gray-beard king !
Off with the spoils of wrinkled age !
Away with learning's crown !
Tear out life's wisdom-written page, ■
And dash its trophies down !
One moment let my life-blood stream
From boyhood's fount of flame !
Give me one giddy, reeling dream
Of life all love and fame !
My listening angel heard the prayer,
And, calmly smiling, said,
" If 1 but touch thy silvered hair,
Thy hasty wish hath sped.
" But is there nothing in thy track
To bid thee fondly stay,
"VSfhile the swift seasoifs hurry back
To find the wished-for day I "
Ah t truest soul of womankind !
Without thee what were life ?
One bliss I cannot leave behind :
1 '11 take—my—precious — wife I
The angel took a sapphire pen
And wrote in rainbow dew,
" The man would be a boy again,
And be a husband, too ! "
" And is there nothing yet unsaid
Before the change appears ?
Remember, all their gifts have fled
With those dissolving years ! "
" Why, yes ; for memory would recall
My fond paternal joys ;
I could not bear to leave them aU :
I '11 take — my—girl — and—boys I "
The smiling angel dropped his pen —
" Why, this will never do ;
The man would be a boy again.
And be a father, too ! "
And so I laughed — my laughter woke I
The household with its noise —
And wrote my dream, when morning broke.
To please the gray-haired boys.
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
WHITTLING.
A "national portrait."
The Yankee boy,\before he*^ sen^ to school.
Well knows the mysteries of that magic tool.
The pocket-knife. To that his wistful eye
Turns, while he hears his mother's lullaby ;
His hoarded cents he gladly gives to get it.
Then leaves no stone unturned till he can whet it ;
And in the education of the lad
No little part that implement hath had.
His pocket-knife to the young whittler brings
A growing knowledge of material things.
Projectiles, music, and the sculptor's art.
His chestnut whistle and his shingle dart.
His elder popgun with its hickoiy rod.
Its sharp explosion and rebounding wad.
His cornstalk fiddle, and the deeper tone
That murmurs from his pumpkin-stalk trombone.
Conspire to teach the boy. To these succeed
His bow, his arrow of a feathered seed.
His windmill, raised the passing breeze to win.
His water-wheel, that turns upon a pin ;
Or, if his father lives upon the shore.
You'll see his ship, " beam ends upon the floor,"
Full rigged with raking masts, and timbers
stanch.
And waiting near the wash-tub for a launch.
"a-
980
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Thus by his genius and his jack-knife driven,
Erelong he '11 solve you any problem given ;
Make any gimcrack musical or mute,
A plough, a couch, an organ or a flute ;
Make you a locomotive or a clock.
Cut a canal, or build a floating-dock.
Or lead forth Beauty from a marble block ; —
Make anything in short, for sea or shore.
From a child's rattle to a seventy-four ; —
Make it, said I ?—Ay, when he undertakes it,
He '11 make the thing and the machine that
makes it.
And when the thing is made, — whether it be
To move on earth, in air, or on the sea ;
Whether on water, o'er the waves to glide.
Or upon land to roll, revolve, or slide ;
Whether to whirl or jar, to strike or ring.
Whether it be a piston or a spring.
Wheel, pulley, tube sonorous, wood or brass,
TJie thing designed shall surely come to pass ;
For, when his hand's upon it, you may know
That there's go in it, and he '11 make it go.
john pierpont
—♦—
RAILROAD RHYME.
i
Singing through the forests.
Rattling over ridges ;
Shooting under arches.
Rumbling over bridges
Whizzing through the mountains,
Buzzing o'er the vjile, —
Bless me ! this is pleasant.
Riding on the rail !
Men of different " stations "
In the eye of fame.
Here are very quickly
Coming to the same ;
High and lowly people.
Birds of every feather.
On a common level.
Travelling together.
Gentleman in shorts.
Looming very tall ;
Gentleman at large
Talking very small ;
Gentleman in tights.
With a loose-ish mien ;
Gentleman in gray.
Looking rather green ;
Gentleman quite old.
Asking for the news ;
Gentleman in black.
In a fit of blues ;
Gentleman in claret.
Sober as a vicar ;
Gentleman in tweed.
Dreadfully in liquor !
Stranger on the right
Looking very sunny.
Obviously reading
Something rather funny.
Now the smiles are thicker, —
Wonder what they mean !
Faith, he's got the Kuicker-
Bocker Magazine !
Sti-anger on the left
Closing up his peepers ;
Now he snores amain.
Like the Seven Sleepers ;
At his feet a volume
Gives the explanation.
How the man grew stupid
From " Association " Î
Ancient madden lady
Anxiously remarks.
That there must be peril
'Mong so many sparks ; '
Roguish-looking fellow,
'Turning to the stranger.
Says it's his opinion
She is out of danger t
Woman with her baby.
Sitting vis-àyvis ;
Baby keefs a-squalling.
Woman looks at me ;
Asks about the distance.
Says it's tiresome talking.
Noises of the cars
Are so very shocking !
Market-woman, careful
Of the precious casket.
Knowing eggs are eggs,
Tightly holds her basket ;
Feeling that a smash.
If it came, would surely
Send her eggs to pot.
Rather prematurely.
Singing through the forests.
Rattling over ridges ;
Shooting under arches,
Rumbling over bridges ;
r
HUMOROUS POEMS.
981
Whizzing through the mountains,
Buzzing o'er the vale, —
Bless me ! this is pleasant.
Riding on the lail !
John Codfrev Saxe.
OMAN'S WILL.
an epigram.
Mem, dying, make their wills, but wives
Escape a work so sad ;
Why should they make what all their lives
The gentle dames have had ?
John Godfrey Saxe.
"NOTHING TO WEAR."
Miss Flora MoFlimset, of Madison Square,
Has made three separate journeys to Paris,
And her father assures me, each time she was
there.
That she and her friend Mrs. Harris
(Not the lady whose name is so famous in his¬
tory.
But plain Mrs. H., without romance or mystery)
Spent six consecutive weeks without stopping
In one continuous round oi shopping, —
Shopping alone, and shopping together,
At all hours of the day, and in all sorts of
weather, —
For all manner of things that a woman can put
On the crown of her head or the sole of her foot.
Or wrap round her shoulders, or fit round her
waist.
Or that can be sewed on, or pinned on, or laced.
Or tied on with a string, or stitched on with a
bow.
In fronrt or beliind, above or below ;
For bonnetsj mantillas, capes, collars, and shawls;
Dresses for breakfasts and^ylinners and balls ;
Dresses to sit in and stand in and walk in ;
Dresses to dance in and flirt in and talk in ;
Dresses in which to do nothing at all ;
Dresses for winter, spring, slimmer, and fall ;
All of them different in Color and pattern.
Silk, muslin, and lace, crape, Velvet, and satin.
Brocade, and broadcloth, and other material.
Quite as expensive and much more ethereal ;
In short, for all things that could ever be thought
of.
Or milliner, modiste, or tradesmen be bought of.
From ten-thousand-francs robes to twenty-
sous frills ;
In all quarters of Paris, and to every store.
While McFlimsey in vain stormed, scolded, and
swore.
They footed the streets, and he footed the bills.
The last tiip, their goods shipped by the steamer
Arago,
Formed, McFlimsey declares, the bulk of her
cargo.
Not to mention a quantity kept from the rest, •
Sufficient to fill the largest-sized chest,
Which did not appear on the ship's manifest.
But for which the ladies themselves manifested
Such particular interest, that they invested
Their own proper persons in layers and rows
Of muslins, embroideries, workedunder-clothes, '
Gloves, handkerchiefs, scarfs, and such trifles as
those ;
Then, wrapped in great shawls, like Circassian
beauties.
Gave good-iy to the ship, and go-hy to the duties.
Her relations at home all marvelled, no doubt,
Miss Flora had grown so enoimously stout
For an actual belle and a possible bride ;
But the miracle ceased when she turned inside
out.
And the truth came to light, and the dry-goods
beside.
Which, in spite of collector and custom-house
sentry.
Had entered the port without any entry.
And yet, though scarce three months have passed
since the day
This merchandise went, on twelve carts, up
Broadway,
This same Miss McFlimsey, of Madison Square,
The last time we met was in utter despair.
Because she had nothing whatever to wear !
Nothing wear ! Now, as this is a true ditty
1 do not assert — this, you know, is between
us —^ y
That she's in a state of absolute nudity^
Like Powers'Greek Slave, or the Mediei Venus;
But I do mean to say, I have heard her declare.
When, at the same moment, she had on a dress
Which cost five hundred dollars, and not a cent
less.
And jewelry worth ten times more, 1 should
guess.
That she had not a thing in the wide world to
. wear !
1 should mention just here, that out of Miss
Flora's
Two hundred and fifty or sixty adorers,
I had just been selected as'he who should throw all
The rest in the shade, by the gracious bestowal
Ifl-
■-ff
[&
982
HUMOROUS POEMS.
n
On myself, after twenty or thirty rejections.
Of tliose fossil remains which she called her
"affections,"
And that rather decayed, but well-known work
of art.
Which Miss Flora persisted in styling. " her
heart"
So we were engaged. Our troth had been plighted.
Not by moonbeam or starbeam, by fountain or
grove.
But in a front parlor, most brilliantly lighted.
Beneath the gas-fixtures we whispered our love,
Without any romance or raptures or sighs.
Without any tears in Miss Flora's blue eyes.
Or blushes, or transports, or such silly actions.
It was one of the quietest business transactions.
With a very small sprinkling of sentiment, if any.
And a very large diamond imported by Tiffany.
On her virginal lips while I printed a kiss,
She exclaimed, as a sort of parenthesis.
And by way of putting me quite at my ease,
"You know, I'm to polka as much as I please.
And flirt when I like, — now, stop, don't you
speak, —
And you must not come here more than twice in
the Week,
Or talk to me either at party or ball.
But always be ready to come when I call ;
So don't prose to me about duty and stuff.
If we don't break this off, there will be time
enough
For that sort of thing ; but the bargain must be
That, as long as I choose, I am perfectly free,
For this is a sort of engagement, you see.
Which is binding on you but not binding on me."
Well, having thus wooed Miss McFlimsey and
gained her,
With the silks, crinolines, and hoops that con¬
tained her,
I had, as I thought, a contingent remainder
At least in the property, and the best right
To appear as its escort by day and by night ;
And it being the week of the Stuckups' grand
ball,—
Tlieir cards had been out a fortnight or so.
And set all the Avenue on the tiptoe, —
I considered it only my duty to call.
And see if Miss Flora intended to go.
I found her, — as ladies are apt to be found.
When the time intervening between the first
sound ,
Of the bell and the visitor's entry is shorter
Than usual, — I found—I won't say, I caught
her, —
Intent on the pier-glasS", undoubtedly meaning
To see if perhaps it did n't need cleaning.
She turned as I entered, — " Why, Harry, you
sinner,
I thought that you went to the Flasheis' to din¬
ner ! "
"So I did," I replied ; "but the dinner is swal¬
lowed
And digested, 1 trust, for 'tis now nine and
more.
So being relieved from that duty, I followed
Inclination, which led me, you see, to your
door;
And now will your ladyship so condescend
As just to inform me if you intend
Your beauty and graces and presence to lend
(All of which, when I own, I hope no one will
borrow)
To the Stuckups, whose party, you know, is to-
moiTow ? "
The fair Flora looked up with a pitiful air.
And answered quite promptly, " Why, Harry,
mon cher,
I should like above all things to go with you
there ;
But really and truly—I 've nothing to wear."
" Nothing to wear ! go just as you are ;
Wear the dress you have on, and you '11 be by
far,
I engage, the most bright and particular star
On the Stuckup horizon" — I stopped—for
her eye.
Notwithstanding this delicate onset of flattery.
Opened on me at once a most terrible battery
Of scorn and amazement. She made no reply.
But gave a slight turn to the end of her nose
(That pure Grecian feature), as much as to say,
' ' How absurd that any sane man should suppose
That a lady would go to a ball in the clothes,
No matter how fine, that she wears every day ! "
So I ventured again : "Wear your crimson bro¬
cade " »
(Second tum-up of nose) — " That's too dark by
a shade."
" Your blue silk"— "That's too heavy." "Your
pink"—"That's too light."
"Wear tulle over satin" — "1 can't endure
white."
"Your rose-colored, then, the best of the
batch " —
" I have n't a thread of point lace to match."
" Your brown moire antique " — " Yes, and look
like a Quaker."
"The pearl-colored"—"I would, but that
plaguy dressmaker
Has had it a week." " Then that exquisite lilac
In which you would melt the heart of a Shylock,"
U
HUMOROUS POEMS.
983
(Here the nose took again the same elevation) —
" I would n't weai- that for the whole of creation."
" Why not ? It's my fancy, there's nothing
could strike it
As more arnnie il faut "—" Yes, but, dear me !
that lean
Sophronia Stuckup has got one just like it.
And 1 won't appear dressed likea chit of sixteen."
"Then that splendid purple, that sweet Maza¬
rine,
Tha,t superb point (Taiguül«, that imperial green.
That zephyr-like tarlatan, that richgrenadine "—
" Not one of all which is fit to be seen,"
Said the lady, becoming excited and flushed.
" Then wear, " I exclaimed, in a tone which quite
crushed
• Opposition, " that gorgeous toiklU which you
sported
In Paris last spring, at the grand presentation,
When you quite turned the head of the head of
the nation ;
And by all the grand court were so very much
courted."
The end of the nose was portentously tipped up.
And both the bright eyes shot forth indignation.
As she burst upon me with the fierce exclamation,
" I have worn it three times at the least calcula¬
tion.
And that and most of my dresses are ripped
up!"
Here I ripped out something, perhaps rather rash.
Quite innocent, though ; but, to use an ex¬
pression
More striking than classic, it "settled my hash,"
And proved very soon the last act of our ses¬
sion.
" Fiddlesticks, Ls it, sir ? I wonder the ceiling
Hoes n't fall down and crush you — oh ! you men
have no feeling ;
You selfish, unnatural, illiberal creatures.
Who set yourselves up as patterns and preachers.
Your silly pretence, — why, what a mere guess
it is !
Pray, what do you know of a woman's necessities ?
I have told you and showed you I've nothing to
wear.
And it's perfectly plain you not only don't care,
But you do not believe me " (here the nose went
still higher),
" 1 suppose, if you dared, you would call me a
liar.
Our engagement is ended, sir — yes, on the spot ;
You 're a brute, and a monster, and — I don't
know what."
1 mildly suggested the words — Hottentot,
Pickpocket, and cannibal, Tartar, and thief.
As gentle e.xpletivea which might give relief ;
But this only proved as a spark to the powder.
And the storm I had raised came faster and
louder ;
It blew and it rained, thundered, lightened, and
hailed
Interjections, verbs, pronouns, till language quite
failed
To express the abusive, and then its arrears
Were brought up all at once by a torrent of teai-s,
And my last faint, despairing attempt at an obs-
Ervation was lost in a tempest of sobs.
Well, I felt for the lady, and felt for my hat,
too.
Improvised on the crown of the latter a tattoo,
111 lieu of expressing the feelings which lay
Quite too deep for words, as Wordsworth would
say;
Then, without going through the form of a bow,
Found myself in the entry — I hardly knew
how, —
On doorstep and sidewalk, past lamp-post and
square.
At home and up stairs, in my own easy-chair ;
Poked my feet into slippei-s, my fire into blaze.
And said to myself, as I lit my cigar.
Supposing a man had the wealth of the Czar
Of the Eussias to boot, for the rest of his days.
On the whole, do you think he would have much,
to spare.
If he married a woman with nothing to wear ?
Since that nightl taking pains that it should not
be bruited
Abroad in society, I've instituted
A eourse of inquiry, extensive and thorough.
On this vital subject, and find, to my honor.
That the fair Flora's case is by no means sur¬
prising.
But that there exists the greatest distress
In our female community, solely arising
From this unsupplied destitution of dress.
Whose unfortunate victims are filling ¿he air
With the pitiful wail of "Nothing to wear."
Researches in some of the " Upper Ten " districts
Reveal the most painful and startling statistics.
Of which let me mention only a few :
In one single house, on Fifth Avenue,
Three young ladies were found, all below twenty-
two.
Who have been three whole weeks without any¬
thing new
In the way of flounced silks, and thus left in th«
lurch
Are unable to go to ball, concert, or church.
In another large mansion, near the same place,
Was found a deplorable, heartrending case
ö-
984
HUMOROUS POEMS.
-a
Of entire destitution of Brussels point lace.
In a neighboring block there was found, in three
calls,
Total want, long continued, of camel's-hair
shawls ;
And a suffering family, whose case exhibits
The most pressing need of real ermine tippets ;
One deserving young lady almost unable
To survive for the want of a new Russian sable ;
Another confined to the house, when it's windier
Than usual, because her shawl isn't India.
Still another, whose tortures have been most
terrific
Ever since the sad loss of the steamer Pacific,
In which were engulfed, not friend or relation
(For whose fate she perhaps might have found
consolation.
Or borne it, at least, with serene resignation).
But the choicest assortment of French sleeves
and collars
Ever sent out from Paris, worth thousands of
dollars.
And all as to style most recherché and rare.
The want of which leaves her with nothing to
wear.
And reudei-s her life so drear and dyspeptic
That she's q^uite a recluse, and almost a scep¬
tic ;
For she touchingly says that this sort of grief
Cannot find in Religion the slightest relief.
And Philosophy has not a maxim to spare
For the victim of such overwhelming despair.
But the saddest by far of all these sad features
Is the cruelty practised upon the poor creatures
By husbands and fathers, real Bluebeards and
Timons,
Who resist the most touching appeals made for
diamonds
By their wives and their daughters, and leave
them for days
Unsupplied with new jewelry, fans, or bouquets,
Even laugh at their miseries whenever they have
a chance.
And deride their demands as useless extrava¬
gance ;
One case of a bride was brought to my view,
Too s.ad for belief, but, alas ! 't was too true.
Whose h\isband refused, as savage as Charon,
To pci-mit her to take more than ten trunks to
Sharon.
The consequence was, that when she got there.
At the end of three weeks she had nothing to
wear.
And when she proposed to finish the season
At Newport, the monster refused out and out.
For his infamous conduct alleging no reason.
Except that the waters were good for his gout.
Such treatment as this was too shocking, of course.
And proceedings are now going on for divorce.
But why harrow the feelings by lifting the cur¬
tain
From these scenes of woe ? Enough, it is certain.
Has here been disclosed to stir up the pity
Of every benevolent heart in the fit}'.
And spur up Humanity iuto a canter
To rush and relieve these sad cases instanter.
Won't somebody, moved by this touching de¬
scription.
Come foiward to-morrow and head a subscription ?
Won't some kind philanthropist, seeing that
aid is
So needed at once by these indigent ladies.
Take charge of the matter ? Or won't Peter
Cooper
The comer-stone lay of some splendid super-
Structure, like that which to-day links his name
In the Union unending of honor and fame ;
And found a new charity just for the care
Of these unhappy women with nothing to wear.
Which, in view of the cash which would daily
be claimed,
The Layirvg-mit Hospital well might be named ?
Won't Stewart, or some of our dry-goods im¬
porters.
Take a contract for clothing our wives and our
daughters ?
Or, to furnish the cash to supply these distresses.
And life's pathway strew with shawls, collam,
and dresses.
Ere the want of them makes it much rougher and
thornier.
Won't some one discover a new California ?
O ladies, dear ladies, the next sunny day
Please trundle your hoops just out of Broadway,
From its whirl and its bustle, its fashion and
pride.
And temples of trade which tower on each side,
To the allejs and lanes, where Misfortune and
Guilt
Their children have gathered, their city have
built ;
Where Hunger and Vice, like twin beasts of prey.
Have hunted their victims to gloom and de¬
spair ;
Raise the rich, dainty dress, and the fine broi-
dered skirt.
Pick your delicate way through dampness and
dirt.
Grope through the dark dens, climb the
rickety stair
To the garret, where wretches, the young and
the old.
B-
■3
iö-
HUMOROUS POEMS.
985
■a
Half starved and half naked, lie crouched from
the cold.
See those skeleton limbs, those frost-bitten feet,
Ail bleeding and bruised by the stones of the
street ;
Hear the sharp cry of childhood, the deep groans
that swell
From the poor dying creature who writhes on
the floor.
Hear the curses that sound like the echoes of
Hell,
As you sicken and shudder and fly froin the
door ;
Then home to your wardrobes, and say, if you
dare, —
Spoiled children of Fashion, — you 've nothing to
wear !
And 0, if^perchance there should be a sphere
Where alMs made right which so puzzles us
here.
Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of Time
Fade and die in the light of that region sublime,
Where the soul, disenchanted of flesh and of
sense.
Unscreened by its trappings and shows and
pretence.
Must be clothed for the life and the service above.
With purity, truth, faith, meekness, and love ;
0 daughters of Earth ! foolish virgins, beware !
Lest in that upper realm you have nothing to
wear !
William Alle.n Butler.
THE PROUD MISS MACBEIDE.
A legend of gotham.
/ ^ \ \
0, TMRjBLT çroip^was^ Miss MacBride, ^
Tlie very personification,\>f pride.
As she minced along inda^ion's tide,
Adown BroadiVay — on the proper side —
When the golden sun was setting ;
There was pride in the head she carried so high.
Pride in her lip, and pride in her eye,
And a world of pride in the very sigh
That her stately bosom was fretting !
/ f ^ ^
0, terribly proud was Miss MacBiide,, '
Proud of her dieauty, and proud of her pride.
And proud of fifty matters beside —
That would n't have borne dissection ;
Proud of hei| wit, and proud of her walk.
Proud of het^'teeth, and prouà,of her talk.
Proud of "khovwng cheese from chalk,"
On a veVy slight irtspection K
Proud abroad, and proud at home,
Proud wherever she chanced to come —
When she was glad, and when she was glum ;
Proud as the head of a Saracen
Over the door of a tippling-shop ! —
Proud as a duchess, proud as a fop,
"Proud as a boy with a brand-now top,"
Proud beyond comparison !
It seems a singular thing to say.
But her very senses led her astray
Respecting all humility ;
In sooth, her dull auricular drum
Could find in humble only a "hum,"
And heard no sound of "gentle" come,
In talking about gentility.
What lowly meant slie did n't know.
For she always avoided " everything low,"
With, care the most punctilious ;
And, queerer still, tlie audible sound
Of "super-silly" she never had found
In the adjective supercilious !
The meaning of meek she never knew.
But imagined the phrase had something to do
With " Moses," a peddling German Jew,
Who, like all hawkers, the country through.
Was " a person of no position ; "
And it seemed to her exceedingly plain.
If the word was really known to pertain
To a vulgar Gennan, it was n't germane
To a lady of high condition !
Even her graces — not her grace —
For that was in the " vocative rase " —
Chilled with the touch of her icy face.
Sat very stiffly upon her !
She never confessed a favor aloud,
Like one of the simple, common crowd —
But coldly smiled, and faintly bowed.
As who should say, " Yoi: do me proud.
And do yourself an honor ! "
And yet the pride of Miss MacBride,
Although it had fifty hobbies to ride.
Had really no fonndation ;
But, like the fabrics that gossips devise —
Those single stories that often arise
And grow till they reach a four-story size —•
Was inerely a fancy creation !
Her birth, indeed, was uncommonly high —
For Miss MacBride first opened her eye
Through a skylight dim, on the light of the sky
li
fl-
986
HUMOROUS POEMS.
■a
But pride is a curious passion —
And in talking about her wealth and worth,
She always forgot to mention her birth
To people of rank and fashion !
Of all the notable things on earth.
The queerest one is pride of birth
Among our " fierce democracie ! "
A bridge across a hundred years,
Without a prop to save it from sneers, —
Not even a couple of rotten ^cers, —
A thing for laughter, fieers, and jeers.
Is American aristocracy !
English and Irish, French and Spanish,
German, Italian, Dutch and Danish,
Crossing their veins until they vanish
In one conglomeration !
So subtle a tangle of blood, indeed.
No Heraldry Harvey will ever succeed
In finding the circulation.
Depend upon it, my snobbish friend.
Your family thread you can't ascend.
Without good reason to apprehend
You may find it waxed, at the farther end.
By some plebeian vocation !
Or, woi-se than that, your boasted line
May end in a loop of stronger twine.
That plagued some worthy relation !
But Miss MacBride had something beside
Her lofty birth to nourish her pride —
For rich was the old paternal MacBride,
According to public rumor ;
And he lived "up town," in a splendid square.
And kept his daughter on dainty fare.
And gave her gems that were rich and rare.
And the finest rings and things to wear.
And feathers enough to plume her.
A thriving tailor begged her hand.
But she gave "the fellow " to understand.
By a violent manual action.
She perfectly scorned the best of his clan.
And reckoned the ninth of any man
An exceedingly vidgar fraction !
Another, whose sign was a golden boot.
Was mortified with a bootless suit.
In a way that was quite appalling ;
For, though a regular sutor by trade.
He was n't a suitor to suit the maid.
Who cut him off with a saw — and bade
" The cobbler keep to his calling ! "
A rich tobacconist comes and sues.
And, thinking the lady would scarce refuse
A man of his wealth, and liberal views.
Began, at once, with " If you choose —
And could you really love him—"
But the lady spoiled his speech in a huff.
With an answer rough and ready enough.
To let him know she was up to snuff.
And altogether above him !
A young attorney, of winning grace.
Was scarce allowed to "open his face,"
Ere Miss MacBride had closed his case
With true judicial celerity ;
For the lawyer was poor, and " seedy " to booti
And to say the lady discarded his suit,
Is merely a double verity I
The last of those who came to court.
Was a lively beau, of the dapper sort,
" Without any visible means of support,"
A crime % no means flagrant
In one who wears an elegant coat.
But the very point on which they vote
A ragged fellow "a vagrant ! "
Now dapper Jim his courtship plied
(I wish the fact could be denied)
With an eye to the purse of the old MacBride,
And really " nothing shorter ! "
For he said to himself, in his greedy lust,
" Whenever he dies — as die he must —
And yields to Heaven his vital trust.
He's very sure to ' come down with his dust,'
In behalf of his only daughter."
And the very magnificent Miss MacBride,
Half in love, and half in pride.
Quite graciously relented ;
And, tossing her head, and turning her back.
No token of proper pride to lack —
To be a bride, without the "Mac,"
With much disdain, consented !
Old John MacBride, one fatal day.
Became the unresisting prey
Of fortune's undertakeis ;
And staking all on a single die.
His foundered bark went high and dry
Among the brokers and breakeis !
But, alas, for the haughty Miss MacBride,
'T was such a shock to her precious pride ! j
She could n't recover, although she tried
Her jaded spirits to rally ;
HUMOROUS POEMS.
987
'T was a dreadful change in human affairs,
From a place " up town " to a nook " up stairs,"
From an avenue down to an alley !
'T was little condolence she had, God wot.
From her " troops of friends," who had n't forgot
The airs she used to borrow !
They had civil phrases enough, but yet
'T was plain to see that their "deepest regret "
Was a different thing from sorrow !
And one of those chaps who make a pun,
As if it were quite legitimate fun
To be blazing away at every one
With a regular, double-loaded gun —
Remarked that moral transgression
Always brings retributive stings
To candle-makers as well as kings ;
For "making light of cereous things"
Was a very wicfc-ed profession !
And vulgar people — the saucy churls —
Inquired about "the price of pearls,"
And mocked at her situation :
" She was n't ruined — they ventured to hope —
Because she was poor, she need n't mope ;
Few people were better off for soap.
And that was a consolation ! "
And to make her cup of woe run over,
Her elegant, aident plighted lover
Was the veiy first to forsake her ;
" He quite regretted the step, 't was true —
The lady had pride enough ' for two,'
But that alone would never do
To quiet the butcher and baker ! "
And now the unhappy Miss MacBride —
The merest ghost of her early pride —
Bewails her lonely position ;
Cramped in the very nari owest niche.
Above the poor, and below the rich —
Was ever a worse condition !
moral.
Because you flourish in worldly affairs.
Don't be haughty, and put on airs.
With insolent pride of station !
Don't be proud, and turn up your nose
At poorer people in plainer clothes,
But learn, for the sake of your miud's repose.
That wealth's a bubble that conies — and goes !
And that aU proud flesh, wherever it grows.
Is subject to irritation !
John Godfrey Saxe.
PLAIN LANGUAGE FROM TRUTHFUL
JAMES.
popularly known as the " heathen chinee."
Which I wish to remark —
And my language is plain —
That for ways that are dark
And for tricks that are vain.
The heathen Chinee is peculiar :
Which the same I would rise to explain.
Ah Sin was his name ;
And I shall not deny
In regard to the same
What that name might imply ;
But his smile it was pensive and childlike.
As I frequent remarked to BUI Nye.
It was August the third.
And quite soft was the skies,
Which it might be inferred
That Ah Sin was likewise ;
Yet he played it that day upon William
And me in a way I despise.
Which we had a small game.
And Ah Sin took a hand :
It was euchre. The same
He did not understand.
But he smiled, as he sat by the table.
With the smile that was childlike and bland.
Yet the cards they were stocked
In a way that I grieve,
And my feelings were shocked
At the state of Nye's sleeve.
Which was stuffed full of aces and bowers.
And the same with intent to deceive.
But the hands that were played
By that heathen Chinee,
And the points that he made.
Were quite frightful to see, —
Till at last he put down a right bower.
Which the same Nye had dealt unto me.
Then I looked up at Nye,
And he gazed upon me ;
And ho rose with a sigh.
And said, " Can this be ?
We are ruined by Chinese cheap labor," —
And he went for that heathen Chinee.
In the scene that ensued
I did not take a hand.
But the floor it was strewed.
Like the leaves on the strand.
With the cards that Ah Sin had been hiding
In the game " he did not understand."
J8S
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Ill his sleeves, which were long,
He had twenty-four jacks, —
Which was coming it strong.
Yet I state but the facts.
And we found on his nails, which were taper, —
What is frequent in tapers, — that's wax.
Which is why I remark.
And my language is plain.
That for ways that are dark,
And for tricks that are vain.
The heathen Chinee is peculiar, —
Which the same I am free to maintain.
Bret Harte.
THE SOCIETY UPON THE STANISLAUS.
I reside at ^Table I'Mountain] and myjname is\
^Trdtli^l/jaiÀes : ^
I am not up to fcmall deceit or any sinful games ;
And I '11 tell in simple latiguage what I know
about the row
That broke up our Society upon the Stanislow.
But first I would remark, that't is not a proper
plan
For any scientific gent to whale his fellow-man ;
And, if a member don't agree with his peculiar
whim,
To lay for that same member for to " put a
head " on him.
Now, nothing could be finer, or more beautiful
to see.
Than the first six months' proceedings of that
same society ;
Till Brown of Calaveras brought a lot of fossil
bones
That he found within a tunnel near the tene¬
ment of Jones.
Then Brown he read a paper, and he recon¬
structed there.
From those same bones, an animal that was
extremely rare ;
And Jones then asked the Chair for a suspen¬
sion of the rules.
Till he could prove that those same bones was
one of his lost mules.
Then Brown he smiled a bitter smile, and said
he was at fault ;
It seemed he had been trespassing on Jones's
family vault ;
He was a most sarcastic man, this quiet Mr.
Brown,
And on several occasions he had cleaned out
the town.
Now I hold it is not decent for a scientific gent
To say another is an ass, — at least, to all intent ;
Nor should the individual who happens to be
meant
Reply by heaving rocks at him to any great
extent.
Then Abner Dean of Angel's raised a point of
order, when
A chunk of old red sandstone took him in the
abdomen ;
And he smiled a kind of sickly smile, and
curled up on the floor.
And the subsequent proceedings interested him
no more.
For in less time than I write it, every member
did engage
In a warfare with the remnants of a palaeozoic
age ;
And the way they heaved those fossils in their
anger was a sin.
Till the skull of an old mammoth caved the
head of Thompson in.
And this is allí have to say of these improper
games.
For 1 live at Table Mountain and my name is
Truthful James,
And I've told in simple language what 1 know
about the row
That broke up our Society upon the Stanislow.
Bret Harte.
THE NANTUCKET SKIPPER.
Many a long, long year ago,
N.Tntucket skippers had a plan
Of finding out, though "lying low,"
How near New York their schooners i-an.
They greased the lead before it fell.
And then by sounding, through the night.
Knowing the soil that stuck so well.
They always guessed their reckoning right.
A skipper gray, whose eyes were dim.
Could tell, by tasting, just the spot.
And so below he'd " douse the glim,"—
After, of course, his " something hot."
Snug in his birth, at eight o'clock.
This ancient skipper might be found ;
No matter how his craft would rock.
He slept, — for skippers' naps are sound.
The watch on deck would now and then
Run down and wake him, with the lead ;
He'd up, and taste, and tell the men
How many miles they went ahead.
HUMOROUS POEMS.
989
One night 'twas Jotham Marden's watch,
A curious wag, — the pedler's son ;
And so he mused, (the wanton wretcli !)
"To-night I '11 have a grain of fun.
" We 're all a set of stupid fools.
To think the skipper knows, by tasting.
What ground he's on ; Nantucket schools
Don't teach such stuff, with all their basting! "
And so he took the well-greased lead.
And rubbed it o'er a box of earth
That stood on deck, —a parsnip-bed, —
And then he sought the skipper's berth.
" Where are we now, sir ? Please to taste."
The skipper yawned, put out his tongue.
Opened his eyes in wondrous haste.
And then upon the floor he sprung I
The skipper stormed, and tore his hair.
Hauled on his boots, and roared to Marden,
"Nantucket's sunk, and here we are
Right oyer old Marm Hackett's garden I "
James Thomas Fields.
THE ART OF BOOK-KEEPING.
How hard, when those who do not wish
To lend, thus lose, their books,
Ave snared by anglers — folks that fish
With literary hooks —
Who call and take some favorite tome.
But never read it through ;
They thus complete their set at home
By making one at you.
I, of my "Spenser" quite bereft.
Last winter sore was shaken ;
Of " Lamb" I've but a quarter left.
Nor could I save my " Bacon
And then I saw my " Crabbe " at last.
Like Hamlet, backward go.
And, as the tide was ebbing fast.
Of course I lost my "Rowe."
My " Mallet " served to knock me down,
Which makes me thus a talker.
And once, when I was out of town,
My "Johnson " proved a " Walker."
While studying o'er the fire one day
My "Hobbes" amidst the smoke.
They bore my " Colman " clean away.
And carried off my " Coke."
They picked my "Locke," to me far more
Than Bramah's patent worth.
And now my losses I deplore.
Without a " Homo " on earth.
t .
If once a book you let them lift.
Another they conceal.
For though I caught them stealing "Swift,"
As swiftly went my "Steele."
" Hope " is not now upon my shelf.
Where late he stood elated.
But, what is strange, my " Pope " himself
Is excommunicated.
My little " Suckling" in the grave
Is sunk to swell the ravage.
And what was Crusoe's fate to save,
'T was mine to lose — a "Savage."
Even " Glover's " works I cannot put
My frozen hands upon.
Though ever since I lost my " Footc "
My " Bunyan" has been gone.
My "Hoylo " with "Cotton " went oppressed.
My "Taylor," toó, must fail.
To save my Goldsmith " from anest.
In vain I offered " Bay le."
I "Prior" sought, but could not see
The " Hood " so late in front.
And when I turned to hunt for " Lee,"
0, where was my "Leigh Hunt " Ï
I tried to laugh, old Care to tickle.
Yet could not " Tiekell " touch.
And then, alack I I missed my "Micklc,"
And surely mickle's much.
'T is quite enough my griefs to feed.
My sorrows to excuse.
To think I cannot read my "Reid,"
Nor even use my " Hughes."
My classics would not quiet lie, —
A thing so fondly hoped ;
Like Dr. Primrose, I may cry, >
My " Livy " has eloped.
My life is ebbing fast away ;
I suffer from the.se shoolcs ;
And though I fixed a lock on " Gray,"
There's gray upon my locks.
I'm far from " Young," am growing pale,
I see my "Butler" fly.
And when they ask about my ail,
'T is " Burton " I reply.
They still have made me slight returns.
And thus my griefs divide ;
For 0, they cured me of my " Bums,"
And eased my " Akenside."
But all I think I shall not say.
Nor let my anger burn.
For, as they never found me " Gay,"
They have not left me " Stemo."
Thomas Hood.
—
990
HUMOROUS POEMS.
ODE TO TOBACCO.
Thou who, when fears attack,
Bid'st them avaunt, and Black
Care, at the horseman's back
Perching, unseatest ;
Sweet when the morn is gray ;
Sweet, when they *ve cleared away
Lunch ; and at close of day
Possibly sweetest :
I have a liking old
For thee, though manifold
Stories, I know, are told,
Not to thy credit ;
How one (or two at most)
Drops make a cat a ghost —
Useless, except to roast —
Doctors have said it :
How they who use fusees
All grow by slow degrees
Brainless as chimpanzees.
Meagre as lizards ;
Go mad, and beat their wives ;
Plunge (after shocking lives)
Razors and carving-knives
Into their gizzards.
Confound such knavish tricks !
Yet know I five or six
Smokers who freely mix
Still with their neighbors ;
Jones— (who, I'm glad to say,
Asked leave of Mrs. J. ) —
Daily absorbs a clay
After his labors.
Cats may have had their goose
Cooked by tobacco-juice ;
Still why deny its use
Thoughtfully taken Î
We 're not as tabbies are ;
Smith, take a fresh cigar !
Jones, the tobacco-jar !
Here's to thee. Bacon I
Charles s. Calverlev.
DISASTER.
T WAS ever thus from childhood's hour
My fondest hopes would not decay ;
I never loved a tree or flower
Which was the first to fade away !
The garden, where I used to delve
Short-frocked, still yields me pinks in plenty ;
The pear-tree that 1 climbed at twelve,
I see still blossoming, at twenty.
I never nursed á dear gazelle.
But I was given a piiroquet —
How I did nurse him if unwell !
He's imbecile, but lingers yet.
He's green, with an enchanting tuft ;
He melts me with his small black eye :
He'd look inimitable stuifed.
And knows it — but he will not die I
I had a kitten — I was rich
In pets — but all too soon my kitten
Became a full-sized cat, by which
I 've more than once been scratched and bitten;
And when for sleep her limbs she curled
One day beside her untouched plateful,
And glided calmly from the world,
I freely own that I was grateful.
And then I bought a dog — a queen I
Ah, Tiny, dear departing pug !
She lives, but she is past sixteen.
And .scarce can crawl across the rug.
I loved her beautiful and kind ;
Delighted in her pert Bow-wow :
But now she snajis if you don't mind ;
'T were lunacy to love her now.
I used to think, should e'er mishap
Betide my crumple-visaged Ti,
In shape of prowling thief, or trap.
Or coarse bull-terrier— I should die.
But ah ! disasters have their use ;
And life might e'en be too sunshiny :
Nor would I make myself a goose.
If some big dog should swallow Tiny.
Charles S. Calverlev.
MOTHERHOOD.
She laid it where the sunbeams fall
Unscanned upon the broken wall.
Without a tear, without a groan.
She laid it near a mighty stone.
Which some rude swain had haply cast
Thither in sport, long ages past.
And Time with mosses had o'erlaid,
And fenced with many a tall grass-blade.
And all about bid roses bloom
And violets shed their soft perfume.
There, in its cool and quiet bed.
She set her burden down and fled :
Nor flung, all eager to escape.
One glance upon the perfect shape.
That lay, still warm and fresh and fair.
But motionless and soundless there.
cB
HUMOROUS POEMS. 991
No human eye had marked her pass
Across the linden-shadowed gi-ass
Ere yet the minster clock chimed seven :
Only the innocent birds of heaven —
The magpie, and the rook whose nest
Swings as the elm-tree waves his crest—
And the lithe cricket, and the hoar
And huge-limbed hound that guards the door,
Looked on when, as a summer wind
That, passing, leaves no trace behind,
All unapparelled, barefoot all.
She mn to that old ruined wall.
To leave upon the chill dank earth
(For ah ! she never knew its worth).
Mid hemlock rank, and fern and ling.
And dews of night, that precious thing !
And then it might have lain forlorn
From morn to eve, from eve to mom :
But that, by some wild impulse led.
The mother, ere she turned and fled.
One moment stood erect and high ;
Then poured into the silent sky
A ci-y so jubilant, so strange.
That Alice — as she strove to range
Her rebel ringlets at her glass —
Sprang up and gazed across the grass ;
Shook back those curls so fair to see.
Clapped her soft hands in childish glee ;
And shrieked — her sweet face all aglow.
Her very limbs with rapture shaking —
" My hen has laid an egg, I know ;
And only hear the noise she's making ! "
CHARLES S. CALVERLEV.
THE HEN.
A FAMOTTS hen's my story's theme.
Which ne'er was known to tire
Of laying eggs, but then she'd scream
So loud o'er every egg, 't would seem
The house must l>e on flre.
A turkey-cock, who ruled the walk,
A wiser bird and older.
Could bear't no more, so off did stalk
Right to the hen, and told her :
""Madam, that scream, I apprehend.
Adds nothing to the matter ;
It surely helps the egg no whit ;
Then lay your egg, and done with it !
I pi-ay you, madam, as a friend.
Cease that supei-fluous clatter !
You know not how't goes through my head.
" Humph ! very likely ! " madam said.
Then, proudly putting forth a leg, —
" Uneducated barnyard fowl !
You know, no moro than any owl.
The noble privilege and praise
Of authoiship in modern days —
I '11 tell you why I do it :
Fii-st, yon perceive, I lay the egg.
And then — review it."
From tlie German of CLAUDIUS.
THE COSMIC EGG.
Upon a rock yet uncreate.
Amid a chaos inchoate.
An uncreated being sate}
Beneath him, rock.
Above him, cloud.
And the cloud was rock.
And the rock was cloud.
The rock then growing soft and warm.
The cloud began to take a form,
A form chaotic, vast, and vague.
Which issued in the cosmic egg.
Then the Being uncreate
On the egg did incubate.
And thus became the incubator ;
And of the egg did allégate.
And thus became the alligator ;
And the incubator was potentate.
But the alligator was poteutator.
ANONYMOUSí
DARWIN.
Theee was an ape in the days that were earlier ;
Centuries passed, and his hair grew curlier ;
Centuries more gave a thumb to his wrist.
Then he was a Man and a Positivist.
MORTIMER Collins.
TO THE PLIOCENE SKULL.
A GEOLOGICAL ADDRESS.
" A human skull has been found in California, In the pliocene
formation. This skull is the remnant, not only of the earliest pio-
necr of this State, but the oldest known human being. . . . The
skull was found in a shaft one hundred and fifty feet deep, two
miles from Angel's, in Calaveras County, by a miner named James
Matson, who gave it to Mr. Scribncr, a merchant, and he gave it to
Dr. Jones, who sent it to the State Geological Survey. . . . The
published volume of the State Survey on the Geology of California
states that man existed contemporaneously with the mastodon, but
this fossil proves that he was here before the mastodon was known
to exist." —Daiiy Paper,
"Speak, Ö man, Ipss recent ! Fragmentary fossil !
Primal pioneer of plicicene formation.
Hid in! lowest drifts below the earliest stratum
Of Volcanic tufa !
" Older than the beasts, the oldest Palceotherium ;
Older than the trees, the oldest Cryptogamia ;
Older than the hills, those infantile eruptions
Of eai-th's epidermis !
cB-
992
-a
HUMOROUS POEMS.
" Eo — Mio — riio — whatsoe'er the ' cene ' was
That those vacant sockets filled with awe and
wonder, —
Whether shores Devonian or Silurian heaches, —
Tell us thy strange story !
" Or has the Professor slightly antedated
By some thousand years thy advent on this planet,
Giving thee an air that's somewhat better fitted
For cold-blooded creatures ?
" Wert thou true spectator of that mighty forest.
When above thy head the stately Sigillaria
Reared its columned trunks in that remote and
distant.
Carboniferous epoch ?
"Tell us^of thal( scene, —theldim and ^aterjf
woodland,
Songlessl silentj^hushedj with^ever^bird.or^in-
' sect.
Veiled with spreading fronds and screened with
tall club-mosses,
Lycopodiacea —
" When beside thee walked the solemn Plesio-
saurus.
And around thee crept the festive Ichthyosaunrs,
While from time to time above thee flew and
circled
Cheerful Pterodactyls.
" Tell us of thy food, —those half-inariçe refec¬
tions, ■ ■
Crinoids on the shell, and Brachipods a?i 7ialu-
rcl, —
Cuttle-fish to wliich the pieuvre of Victor Hugo
Seems a periwinkle.
"Speak, thod awful vestige of the earth's crea¬
tion, —
Solitary fragment of remains organic !
Tell the wondrous secrets of thy past existence, —
Speak ! thou oldest pi'imate ! "
Even as I gazed, a thrill of the maxilla
And a lateral movement of the condyloid process,
With post-]iliocene sounds of healthy mastica¬
tion.
Ground the teeth together ;
And from that imperfect dental exhibition.
Stained with expressed juices of the weed Nico¬
tian,
Came these hollow accents, blent with softer
murmui-s
Of expectoration :
" Which my name is Bowers, and my crust was
busted
Falling down a shaft, in Calaveras County,
But I'd take it kindly if you'd send the pieces
Home to old Missouri ! "
BREr Harte.
PHYSICS.
[the unconscious poetizing op A philosopher.]
There is no force however great
Can stretch a cord however fine
Into a horizontal line
That shall be accurately straight.
william whewell.
THE COLLEGIAN TO HIS BRIDE :
being a mathematical madrigal in the simplest form.
Charmer, on a given straight line,
And which we will call B C,
Meeting at a common point A,
Draw the lines A C, A B.
But, my sweetest, so arrange it
That they 're equal, all the three ;
Then you '11 find that, in the sequel.
All their angles, too, are equal.
Equal angles, so to term them.
Each one opjiosite its brother !
Equal joys and eijual sorrows.
Equal liope.s, 't were sin to smother.
Equal, — O, divine ecstatics, —
Based on Button's mathematics !
THE LAWYER'S INVOCATION TO
SPRING.
Whereas, on certain boughs and sprays
Now divera birds are heard to sing.
And sundry flowers their heads upraise.
Hail to the coming on of spring !
The songs of those said birds arouse
The memory of our youthful hours.
As green as those said sprays and boughs.
As fresh and sweet as those said flowers.
The birds aforesaid, — happy pairs, —
Love, mid the aforesaid boughs, inshrines
In freehold nests ; themselves, their heirs.
Administrators, and assigns.
ifl-
HUMOROUS POEMS.
993
0 busii'st tenn of Ciij)i(l'3 Court,
Where tender plaintiffs actions bring,—
Season of frolic and of sport,
Hail, as aforesaid, coming Spring !
Henry Howard browneu-
TONIS AD RESTO MARE.
Air : " o Mary, heave a sigh for uuf
o mare eeva si forme ;
Forme ure tonitru ;•
lambicum as amandum,
Olet Hymen promptu ;
Mihi is vetas an ne se.
As humano erebi ;
Olet mecum marito te.
Or eta beta pi.
Alas, piano more meretrix.
Mi ardor vel uno ;
Inferiam ure artis base,
Tolerat me urcbo.
Ah me ve ara silicet.
Vi laudu vimin thus ?
Hiatu as arandum sex —
Illuc lonicus.
Heu sed heu vix en imago.
My missis mare sta ;
O cantu redit in mihi
Hibernas arida ?
A veri vafer heri si.
Mihi resolves indu ;
Totius olet Hymen cum —
Accepta tonitru.
jonathan Swift.
NURSERY RHYMES.
"JOHN, JOHN, THE PIl'EU's SON."
Johannes, Johannes, tibicine natus
Fugit perniciter porcum furatus.
Sed porcus voratus, Johannes dclatus.
Et plorans per vias est fur ilagcllatus.
"twinkle, twinkle, little star."
Mica, mica, parva Stella ;
Mirer, quaenam si tam bella !
Splendens eminus in illo.
Alba velut gemma, ccelo.
*b0ys and girls, come out to play.
Garçons et filles venez toujours,
La lune est brillante eomme le jour.
Venez au bruit d'un joyeux éclat
Venez du bons cœurs, ou no venez pas.
'three wise men of gotham.
Tres Philosophi de Túsenlo
Mare navigarunt vásculo :
Si vas id esset tutius
Tibi canerem diutius.
"ding dong bell, the cat's in the well."
AIANON aiXtvov ciVe • ^péap Xdßei/, oíaoc &ßu<r-
ero»,
Tj/v ya\é-qv' ría rrjaS' oÎtioî à/it\ax(ris ;
Tvrffbs 'laáyvr]!, yávoí, aí<Tv\a fiSaii"
Tov yuAeTju ßu9iaai vi¡Trtov êS' Íkokov.
THE COURTIN'.
God makes sech nights, all white an' still
Fur "z you can look or listen ;
Moonshine an' snow on field an' hill.
All silence an' all glisten.
Zekle erep' up quite unbeknown
An' peeked in thru' the winder.
An' there sot Huldy all alone,
'Ith no one nigh to hender.
A fireplace filled the room's one side.
With half a cord o' wood in —
There warn't no stoves (tell comfort died)
To bake ye to a puddin'.
The wa'nut logs shot sparkles out
Towards the pootiest, bless her !
An' leetle flames danced all about
The chiny on the dresser.
Agin the chimbley crook-necks hung.
An' in amongst 'em rusted
The ole queen's arm thet gran'ther Young
Fetched back from Concord busted.
The very room, coz she was in.
Seemed warm from floor to ceilin'.
An' she looked full ez rosy agin
Ez the apples she was peelin'.
'T was kin o' kingdom-come to look
On sech a blessed cretur,
A dogrose blushin' to a brook
Ain't modester nor sweeter.
He was six foot o' man, A 1,
Clean grit an' human natur' ;
None could n't quicker pitch a ton.
Nor di'or a furrer straighter.
994
HUMOROUS POEMS.
He'd sparked it with full twenty gals,
Hed squired 'em, danced 'em, druv 'em.
Fust this one, an' then thet, by spells —
All is, he could n't love 'em.
But long o' her his veins 'ould run
All crinkly like curled maple.
The side she breshed felt full o' sun
Ez a south slope in Ap'il.
She thought no v'ice hed such a swing
Ez hisn in the choir ;
My ! when he made Ole Hundred ring.
She knowed the Lord was nigher.
An' she'd blush scarlit, right in prayer.
When her new meetin'-bunnet
Felt somehow thru' its crown a pair
0' blue eyes sot upon it.
Thet night, I tell ye, she looked some !
She seemed to've gut a new soul.
For she felt sartin-sure he'd come,
Down to her very shoe-sole.
She heered a foot, an' knowed it tu,
A-raspin' on the scraper, —
All ways to once her feelin's flew
Like sparks in bumt-up paper.
He kin' o' I'itered on the mat.
Some doublfle o' the sekle,
His heart kep' goin' pitty-pat.
But hem went pity Zekle.
An* yit she gin her cheer a jerk
Ez though she wished him furder.
An' on her apples kep' to work,
Parin' away like murder.
" Yon want to see my Pa, I s'pose ? "
"Wal . . . no . . . I come dasignin'" —
" To see my Ma ? She's sprinklin' clo'es
Agin to-morrer's i'nin'."
To say why gals acts so or so.
Or don't, 'ould be presumin' ;
Mebby to mean yes an' say no
Comes nateral to women.
ÎHe stood a spell on one foot fust.
Then stood a spell on t' other.
An' on which one he felt the wust
He couldn't ha' told ye nuther.
Says he, " I'd better call agin ; "
Says she, "Think likely. Mister ; "
Thet last word pricked him like a pin.
An' . . . Wal, he up an' kist her.
When Ma bimeby upon 'em slips,
Huldy sot pale ez ashes.
All kin' o' smily roun' the lips
An' tcary roun' the lashes.
For she was jes' the quiet kind
Whose naturs never vary.
Like streams that keep a summer mind
Snow-hid in Jenooary.
The blood clost roun' her heart felt glued
Too tight for all expressin',
Tell mother see how metiers stood.
And gin 'em both her blessin'.
Then her red come back like the tide
Down to the Bay o' Fundy,
An' all I know is they was cried
In meetin' come nex' Sunday.
James Russell Lowell.
WHAT MR. ROBINSON THINKS.*
from " the biclow papers." no. iii.
Guvener B. is a sensible man ;
He stays to his home an' looks arter his folks;
He draws his furrer ez straight ez he can.
An' into nobody's tater-patch pokes ; —
But John P.
Robinson he
Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B.
My ! ain't it terrible ? Wut shall we du ?
We can't never choose him o' course, —thet's
flat ;
Guess we shall hev to come round, (don't you ?)
An' go in fer thunder an' guns, an' all that ;
Fer John P.
Robinson he
Sez he wunt vote fer Guvener B.
Gineral C. is a dreffle smart man :
He's ben on all sides thet give places or pelf ;
But con.sistency stUl wuz a part of his plan, —
Ho's ben true to one party, — an' thet is him¬
self ; —
So John P.
Robinson he
Sez he shall vote fer Gineral C.
Gineral C. he goes in fer the war ; t
He don't vally principle more 'n an old cud ;
Wut did God make us raytional creeturs fer.
But glory an' gunpowder, plunder an' blood ?
• Preserved here because the essential humor of the satire has
outlived its local and temporary application.
t Written at the time of the Mexican war, which was strongly
opposed by the Antislavery party as being unnecessary and wrong*
f
HUMOROUS POEMS. 995
So John P.
Robinson he
Sez he shall vote fer Gineral C.
We were gittin' on nicely up here to our village,
With good old idees o' wut 's right an' wut
ain't,
We kind o' thought Christ went agin war an'
pillage.
An' thet eppyletts worn't the best mark of a
saint ;
But John P.
Robinson he
Sez this kind o' thing's an exploded idee.
The side of our country must oilers be took.
An' Présidant Polk, yon know, he is our coun¬
try ;
An' the angel thet writes all our sins in a book
Puts the dehü to him, an' to us the per contry ;
An' John P.
Robinson he
Sez this is his view o' the thing to a T.
Parson Wilbur he calls all these argimunts lies ;
Sez they 're nothin' on airth but jest fee, faw,
fum:
And thet all this big talk of our destinies
Is half ov it ign'ance, an't' other half rum ;
But John P.
Robinson he
Sez it ain't no sech thing ; an', of course, so
must we.
Pai-son Wilbur sez he never heerd in his life
Thet th' Apostles rigged out in their swaller-
tail coats.
An' marched round in front of a dmm an' a fife,
To git some on 'em ofiice, an' some on 'em
votes ;
But John P.
Robinson he
Sez they didn't know everythin' down in
Judee.
Wal, it's a marcy we've gut folks to tell us
The rigltts an' the wrongs o' these matters, I
vow, —
God sends country lawyers, an' other wise fellers.
To drive the world's team wen it gits in a
slough ;
Fer John P.
Robinson he
Sez the world '11 go right, ef he hollers out
Gee !
JAMES RusSEu. Lowell.
WIDOW BEDOTT TO ELDER SNIFFLES.
from "the widow bedott papers."
O reverend sir, I do declare
It drives me most to frenzy.
To think of you a lying there
Down sick with intiuenzy.
A body'd thought it was enough
To mourn your wive's departer,
Without sich trouble as this ere
To come a follerin' arter.
But sickness and affliction
Are sent by a wise creation.
And always ought to be underwent
By patience and resignation.
O, I could to your bedside fly.
And wipe your weeping eyes.
And do my best to cure you up.
If't would n't create surprise.
It's a world of trouble we tarry in,
But, Elder, don't despair ;
That you may soon be movin' again
Is constantlj' my prayer.
Both sick and well, you may depend
You '11 never be forgot
By your faithful and affectionate friend,
Priscilla Pool Beuott.
Frances Miriam Whitcher.
THE NEW CHURCH ORGAN.
They've got a bran new organ. Sue,
For all their fuss and search ;
They've done just as they said they'd do.
And fetched it into church.
They 're bound the critter shall be seen.
And on the preacher's right.
They've hoisted up their new machine
In cveiybody's sight.
They've got a chorister and choir,
Ag'in my voice and vote ;
For it was never my desire
To praise the Lord by note I
I've been a sister good an' true.
For five an' thirty year ;
I've done what seemed my part to do.
An' prayed my duty clear ;
I've sung the hymns both slow and quick.
Just as the preacher read ;
And twice, when Deacon Tubhs was sick,
I took the fork an' led !
y
r&
996
HUMOROUS POEMS.
■a
An' now, their bold, new-fanglod ways
Is comin' all about ;
And I, light in niy latter days.
Am i'airly crowded out !
To-day, the preacher, good old dear,
With tears all in his eyes,
Bead— " I can read my title clear
To mansions in the skies." —
I al'ays liked that blessed hymn —
I s'pose 1 al'ays will ;
It somehow gratifies my whim.
In good old Ortonville ;
But when that choir got up to sing,
I could n't catch a word ;
They sung the most dog-gonedest thing
A body ever heard !
Some worldly chaps was standin' near.
An' when I see them gi in,
I bid farewell to every fear.
And boldly waded in.
I thought I'd chase the tune along.
An' tried with all my might ;
But though my voice is good, an' strong,
I could n't steer it right.
When they was high, then I was low.
An' also contra'wise ;
And I too fast, or they too slow.
To "mansions in the skies."
An' after every verse, you know.
They played a little tune ;
I did n't understand, an' so
I started in too soon.
I pitched it purty middlin' high.
And fetched a lusty tone.
But O, alas ! I found that I
Was singin' there alone !
They laughed a little, I am told ;
But I had done my be.st ;
And not a wave of trouble rolled
Across my peaceful breast.
And Sister Brown, — I could but look, —
She sits right front of me ;
She never was no singin' book.
An' never went to be ;
But then she al'ays tried to do
The best she could, she said ;
She understood the time, right througli.
An' kep' it with her head ;
But when she tried this momin', O,
I had to laugh, or cough !
It ksp' her head a bobbin' so.
It e'en a'most come off !
An' Deacon Tubbs, — he all broke down.
As one might well supi>ose ;
He took one look at Sister Brown,
And meekly scratched his nose.
He looked his hymn-book through aud through.
And laid it on the seat.
And then a pensive sigh he drew,
And looked completely beat.
An' when they took another bout,
He didn't even rise ;
But drawed his red bandanner out.
An' wiped his weeping eyes.
I 've been a sister, good an' trae.
For five an' thirty year ;,
I've done what seemed my part to do.
An' prayed my duty clear ;
But death will stop my voice, I know.
For he is on my track ;
And some day, I '11 to meetin' go.
And nevermore come back.
And when the folks get up to sing —
Whene'er that time shall be —
I do not want no patent thing
A squealin' over me !
wiu. m. cakletoh.
THE RETORT.
Old Birch, who taught the village school.
Wedded a maid of homespun habit ;
He was as stubborn as a mule.
And she as playful as a rabbit.
Poor Kate had scarce become a wife
Before her husband sought to make her
The pink of country polLshed life.
And prim and formal as a Quaker.
One day the tutor went abroad.
And simple Katie sadly missed him ;
When he returned, behind her lord
She shyly stole, and fondly kissed him.
The hu.sband's anger rose, and red
And white his face alternate grew :
" Less freedom, ma'am ! " Kate sighed and said,
" O, dear ! I did, n't know 't was you ! "
George Perkixs morris.
DOW'S FLAT.
1856.
Dew's Flat. That's its name.
And I reckon that you
Are a stranger ? The same ?
Well, I thought it was true.
For thar is n't a man on the river as can't spot
the place at first view.
-3
HUMOROUS POEMS.
997 ''
It was called after Dow,—
Which the same was an ass ;
And as to the how
Thet the thing kern to pass, —
Just tie up your hoss to that buckeye, and sit ye
down here in the grass.
You see this yer Dow
Hed the worst kind of luck ;
He slipped up somehow
On each thing thet he struck.
Wh}', ef he'd a' straddled thet fence-rail the
derned thing 'ed get up and buck.
He mined on the bar
Till he could n't pay rates ;
He was smashed by a car
When he tunnelled with Bates ;
And right on the top of his trouble kern his wife
and five kids from the States.
It was rough, —mighty rough ;
But the boys they stood by.
And they brought him the stuff
For a house, on the sly ;
And the old woman, — well, she did washing, and
took on when no one was nigh.
But this yer luck of Dow's
Was so powerful mean
That the spring near his house
Dried right up on the green ;
And he sunk forty feet down for water, but nary
a drop to be seen.
Then the bar petered out.
And the boys would n't stay ;
And the chills got about.
And his wife fell away ;
But Dow, in his well, kept a peggin' in his usual
ridikilous way.
One day, —it was June, —
And a year ago, jest, —
This Dow kem at noon
To his work like the rest.
With a shovel and pick on his shoulder, and a
derringer hid in his breast.
He goes to the well.
And he stands on the brink.
And stops for a spell
Jest to listen and think :
For the sun in his eyes, (jest like this, sir !) you
see, kinder made the cuss blink.
His two ragged gals
In the gulch were at play,
t And a gownd that was Sal's
Kinder flapped on a bay :
Not much for a man to be leavin', but his all, —
as I've heer'd the folks say.
And — that's a peart hoss
Thet you've got — ain't it now i
What might be her cost ?
Eh ? Oh ! — Well then, Dow —
Let's see, — well, that forty-foot grave was n't
his, sir, that day, anyhow.
For a blow of his pick
Sorter caved in the side,
And he looked and turned sick.
Then he trembled and cried.
For you see the dern cuss had stnick — "Wa¬
ter?" —beg your parding, young man,
there you lied !
It was ffold, — in the quartz.
And it ran all alike ;
And I reckon five oughts
Was the worth of that strike ;
And that house with the coopilow's his'n, —
which the same is n't bad for a Pike.
Thet's why it's Dow's Flat ;
And the thing of it is
That he kinder got that
Through sheer contrairiness :
For't was water the derned euss was seekin*, and
his luck made him certain to miss.
Thet's so. Thar's your way
To the left of yon tree ;
But — a — look h'yur, say.
Won't you come up to tea ?
No ? Well, then the next time you 're passin' ;
andask after Dow, —and thet's mc.
Bret Harts.
JIM.
Sat there ! P'Faps
Some on you chaps
Might know Jim Wild f
Well, — no offence :
Thar ain't no sense
In gittin' riled !
Jim was my chum
Up on the Bar :
That's why I come
Down from up thar,
Lookin' for Jim.
Thank ye, sir ! you
Ain't of that crew, —
Blest if you are !
998
HUMOROUS POEMS.
a
Money ?—Not much :
That ain't my kind ;
I ain't DO such.
Bum ? — I don't mind,
Seein' it's you.
Well, this yer Jim,
Did you know him ?—
Jess 'bout your size ;
Same kind of eyes ? —
Well, that is strange ;
Why, it's two year
Since he come here.
Sick, for a change.
Well, here's to us ;
Eh?
The dewx you say !
Dead ? —
That little cuss ?
What makes yon star,—
You over thar ?
Can't a man drop
's glass in yer shop
But you must rar' ?
It would n't take
Demed much to break
You and your bar.
Dead !
Poor — little — Jim ?
—Why, there was me,
Jones, and Bob Lee,
Harry and Ben, —
No-account men :
Then to take him !
Well, thar— Good-by,—
No more, sir, — I —
Eh?
What's that you say ? —
Why, dem it ! — sho ! —
No ? Yes ! By Jo !
Sold!
Sold ! Why yon limb^
You ornery,
Demed old
Long-legged Jim !
Bret Harte.
BANTY TIM.
fRemarks of Serjeant Tilmon Joy to the White Man's Com»
oiittee of Spunky Point, Il)inois.J
I RECKON I git your drift,' gents —
You 'loV the boy sha'n't stay ;
This is a white man's country :
You 're Dimocrats, you say :
And whereas, and seein', and wherefore,
The times bein' all out o' jint.
The nigger has got to mosey
From the limits o' Spunky P'int I
Let's reason the thing a minute ;
I'm an old-fashioned Dimocrat, too^
Though I laid my politics out o' the way
For to keep till the war was through-
But I come back here allowiu'
To vote as I used to do.
Though it gravels me like the devil to train
Along o' sich fools as you.
Now dog my cats ef I kin see,
In all the light of the day.
What you've got to do with the question
Ef Tim shall go or stay.
And furder than that I give notice,
Ef one of you tetches the boy.
He kin check his trunks to a warmer clime
Than he '11 find in Illanoy.
Why, blame your hearts, jist hear me !
You know that ungodly day
When our left struck Vicksburg Heights, how
ripped
And torn and tattered we lay.
When the rest retreated, I stayed behind.
Fur reasons sufficient to me, —
With a rib caved in, and a leg on a strike,
I sprawled on that cursed glacoe.
Lord I how the hot sun went for us.
And br'iled and blistered and burned !
How the rebel bullets whizzed round us
When a cuss in his death-grip turned !
Till along toward dusk I seen a thing
I could n't believe for a spell ;
That nigger —that Tim — was a-crawlin' to me
Through that fire-proof, gilt-edged hell 1
The rebels seen him as quick as me.
And the bullets buzzed like bees ;
But he jumped for me, and shouldered me.
Though a shot brought him once to his knees ;
But he staggered up, and packed me off.
With a dozen stumbles and falLs,
Till safe in our lines he drapped us both.
His black hide riddled with balls.
So, my gentle gazelles, thar's my answer.
And here stays Banty Tim :
He trumped Death's ace for me that day.
And I'm not goin' back on him I
You may rezoloot till the cows come home.
But ef one of you tetches the boy,-
He '11 wrastle his hash to-night in hell.
Or my name's not Tilmon Joy !
john hay.
HUMOROUS POEMS.
999
LITTLE BREECHES.
A PIKE COUNTY VIEW OP SPECIAL PROVIDENCE.
I don't go much on religion,
I never ain't had no show ;
But I've got a middliu' tight grip, sir,
On the handful o' things I know.
I don't pan out on the prophets
And free-will, and that sort of thing, —
But I b'lieve in God and the angels.
Ever sence one night last spring.
I come into town with some turnips,
And my little Gabe come along, —
No four-year-old in the county
Could beat him for pretty and strong.
Peart and chipper and sassy.
Always ready to swear and fight, —
And I'd larnt him ter chaw terbacker.
Jest to keep his milk-teeth white.
The snow come down like a blanket
As I passed by Taggart's .store ;
I went in for a jug of molasses
And left the team at the door.
They scared at something and started, —
I heard one little squall.
And hell-to-split over the prairie
Went team. Little Breeches and all.
Hell-to-split over the prairie !
I was almost froze with skeer ;
But we rousted up some torches,
And sarched for 'em far and near.
At last we stmck bosses and wagon.
Snowed under a soft white mound,
Upsot, dead beat, — but of little Gabe
No hide nor hair was found.
And here all hope soured on mo
Of my fellow-critter's aid, —
I jest flopped down on my marrow-bones.
Crotch-deep in the snow, and prayed.
* « « * «
By this, the torches was played out.
And me and Isrul Parr
Went off for some wood to a sheepfold
That ho said was somewhar thar.
We found it at last, and a little shed
Where they shut up the lambs at night.
We looked in, and seen them huddled thar,
So warm and sleepy and white ;
And THAR sot Little Breeches and chirped.
As peart as ever you see,
"I want a chaw of terbacker.
And that's what's the matter of me."
How did he git thar Î Angels.
He could never have walked in that storm.
They jest scooped down and toted hiui
To whar it was safe and warm.
And I think that saving a little child.
And bringing him to his own.
Is a derned sight better business
Thau loafing around The Throne.
John Hay.
HANS BREITMANN'S PARTY.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty.
Dey had biano-blayin ;
I felled in lofe mit a Merican frau.
Her name was Madilda Yane.
She had haitr as prown ash a pretzel.
Her eyes vas himmcl-plue.
Und ven dey looket indo mine.
Dey shplit mine heart in two.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty,
I vent dere you '11 pe pound.
I valtzet mit Madilda Yane
Und vent shpinnen round und round.
De pootiest Frauelein in de House,
She vayed 'pout dwo hoondred pound,
Und efery dime she gife a shoomp
She make de vindows sound.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty,
I dells you it cost him dear.
Dey rolled in more as sefen kecks
Of foost-rate Lager Beer.
Und venefer dey knocks de shpicket in
De Deutschers gifes a cheer.
I dinks dat so vine a barty
Nefer coom to a het dis year.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty ;
Dere all vas Souse und Brouse.
Ven de sooper comed in, de gompany
Did make demselfs to house ;
Dey ate das Brot und Gensy broost,
De Bratwurst und Braten fine.
Und vash der Abendessen down
Mit four parrels of Neckarwein.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty ;
We all cot troonk ash bigs.
I poot mine mout to a parrel of bier.
Und emptied it oop rait a schwigs.
Und denn I gissed Madilda Yane
Und she shlog me on de kop.
Und de gompany fited mit daple-lecks
Dill de coonshtahle made oos shtop.
1000
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Hans Breitmann gife a barty —
Where isli dat barty now ?
Where ish Je lofely golden cloud
Uat float on dc moundain's prow ?
AVhere ish de himinelstrahlende Stem —
De shtar of de shpirit's light ?
All goned afay mit de Lager Beer —
Al'ay in de Ewigkeit !
CHARLES G. LELA.NO.
PJTTER HUGO.
Deii noble Ritter Hugo
Von Schwillensanfenstein
Rode out mit shpeer und helmet,
Und he coom to de panks of de Rhine.
Und oop dere rose a meermaid,
Vot had n't got nodings on,
Und she say, " O, Ritter Hugo,
Vare you goes mit yourself alone ?"
Und he says, " I ride in de ereen-wood.
Mit helmet and mit shpeer.
Till I eooms into ein Gasthaus,
Und dere I drinks some peer."
Und den outshpoke de maiden,
Vot had n't got nodings on,
"I ton't dink mooch of beebles
Dat goes mit demselfs alone.
*' You'd petter coom down in de wasser,
Vare dere's heaps of dings to see.
Und hafe a shplendid dinner.
Und trafel along mit me.
" Dare you sees de fish a sehwimmin,
Und you catches dem efery one."
So sang dis wasser maiden,
Vat had n't got nodings on.
"Dare is dranks all full mit money.
In ships dat vent down of old ;
Und yo.i helpsh yourself, by dunder !
To shimmerin crowns of gold.
" Shoost look at dese shpoons und vatches !
Shoost look at dese diamond rings !
Come down und fill your bockets.
Und 1 '11 kiss you like eferydings !
" Vat you vantsh mit your schnapps und your
lager ?
Coom down into der Rhine !
Dere ish pottles der Kaiser Charlemagne,
Vonce filled mit gold-red wine ! "
Dat fetched him, — he shtood all shpeli-pound.
She pulled his coat-tails down.
She drawed him under de wasser.
Dis maiden mit nodings on.
CHARLES G. LELAND.
COLLUSION BETWEEN A ALEGAITER
AND A WATER-SNAIK.
tkiumpu of the water-snaik : deth of the
alegaiter.
There is a niland on a river lying.
Which runs into Gautimaly, a warm country.
Lying near the Tropicks, covered with sand ;
Hoar and their a symptum of a Wilow,
Hanging of its umberagious limbs & bi-anches
Over the clear streme meandering far below.
This was the home of the now silent Alcgaiter,
When not in his other element couline'd :
Here he wood set upon his eggs asleep
With 1 ey observant of Iiis and other pa.ssing
Objects : a while it kept a going on so :
Fereles of danger was the hapjiy Alcgaiter !
But a las ! in a nevil our he was fourccd to
Wake ! that dreme of Blis was two sweet for
him.
1 morning the sun arose with unusool sjilcnder
Whitch aliso did our Alegaiter, coming from the
water.
His scails a flinging of the rais of the son back.
To the fountain-head which tha originly sprung.
But having not had nothing to eat for some time,
he
Was slepy and gap'd, in a short time, widely.
Unfoalding soon a welth of perl-white teth.
The rais of the son soon shet his sinister ey
Because of their mutool splendor and warmth.
The evil Our (which I sed) was now come ;
Evidently a good chans for a water snailc
Of the large specie, which soon ap])eared
Into the horison, near the bank where repos'd
Calmly in slepe the Alegaiter before spoken of.
About 60 feet was bis Length (not the 'gaiter)
And he was aperiently a well-proportioned snaik.
When he wa.s all ashore he glared upon
The iland with approval, hut was soon
" Astonished with the view and lost to wonder "
(from AVats)
(For jest then he began to see the Alegaiter)
Being a nateral enemy of his'n, he worked hls-
self
Into a fury, also a ni position.
Before the Alegaiter well could ope
His eye (in other words perceive his danger)
The Snaik had enveloped his body just 19
Times with "foalds voluminous and vast" (from
Milton)
f
HUMOROUS POEMS. 1001
And liad tore off several scail.s in the confusion,
Resides squeazing him awfully into his stomoc.
Just then, by a fortiiiate turn in his affairs.
He eeazcd into his mouth the careless tale
Of the unrellecting water-snaik ! Grown des¬
perate
He, finding that his talc was fast squesed
Terrible while they roaled all over the Hand.
It was a well-conduckted Affair ; no noise
Disturbed the harmony of the seen, ecsept
Onct when a Wilow was snaped into by the
roaling.
Eeach of the combatence hadn't a minit for
holering.
So the confliek was naterally tremenjous !
Hut soon by grate force the tale was bit complete-
J.y of ; but the eggzeration was too much
For his delicate Constitootion : he felt a com¬
pression
Onto his chest and generally over his body ;
When he eespress'd his breathing, it was with
Grate dilliculty that he felt inspired again onct
more.
Of cour.se this State must suffer a revolootion.
So the Alegaiter give but one, yel, and cgspired.
The waiter-siiaik realed hisself off, & survay'd
For say 10 niinits, the condition of
His fo : then wondering what made his tail hurt.
He sloly went off for to cool.
j. w. morris.
SWELL'S SOLILOQUY.
I don't appwove this hawid waw ;
Those dwcadful bannahs hawt my eyes ;
And guns and dwums are such a baw, —
Why don't the pawties compwamise ?
Of cawce, the twoilet has its chawms ;
But why must all the vulgah cwowd
Pawsist in spawting nnifawms.
In cullahs so extwemely loud ?
And then the ladies, pwecious deahs ! —
I mawk the change on cv'wy bwow ;
Bid Jove ! 1 weally have my feahs
They wathah like the hawid wow !
To heah the chawming cweatures talk.
Like patwons of the bloody wing,
Of waw and all its dawty wawk, —
It does n't seem a pwappah thing !
I called at Mi's. Gweere's last night.
To see her niece. Miss Mawy Hertz,
And found her making — cwushing sight !-
The weddest kind of flannel shirts !
Of cawce, I wose, and sought the daw.
With fawyah flashing from my eyes !
I can't appwove this hawid waw ; —
Why don't the pawties compwamise ?
Anonymous.
TO THE "SEXTANT."
0 Sextant oá the meetin house, ^dch sweeps
And dusts, or IS supposed to ! and makes fires.
And lites the gass, and sumtimes leaves a screw
loose,
in wich case it smells orful, woree than lamp ile ;
And wrings the Bel and toles it when men (lye.s,
to the grief of survivin pardners, and sweeps paths
And for the servusses gets $ 100 per annum.
Wich them that thinks deer, let 'em try it ;
Gettin up before"starlite in all wethers and
Kindlin fires when the wether is as cold
As zero, and like as not green wood for Idndling
1 would n't be hired to do it for no sura, ,
But 0 Sextant ! there are 1 kermoddify
Wich 's more than gold, wich doant cost nothin,
Worth more than anything except the sole of man!
i mean pewer Are, Sextant, i mean pewer are I
0 it is plenty out of doors, so plenty it doant no
What on airth to dew with itself, but flys about
Scatterin leaves and bloin off men's hatts !
in short, it's jest as " fre as are " out dores.
But O Sextant, in our church its scarce as buty.
Scarce as bank bills, when agints begs for misch-
uns.
Wich some say is purty offten (taint nothin to
me, wat I give aint nothin to nobody) but
0 Sextant
U shet 500 men, wimmin, and children,
Speshally the latter, up in a tite place.
And every 1 on em brethes in and out, and out
and in.
Say 50 times a minnit, or 1 million and a half
brcths an our.
Now how long will a church ful of are last at
that rate,
1 ask you — say 15 minits — and then wats tobe
did?
"Wliy then they must brethe it all over agin.
And then agin, and so on till each has took it
down
At least 10 times, and let it up agin, and wats
more
The same individoal don't have the priviledgo
of brethin his own are, and no ones else.
Each one must take whatever comes to him.
0 Sextant, doant you no our lungs is bellusses.
To bio the fier of life, and keep it from goin out;
and how can bellusses bio without wind
And aint wind are 1 i put it to your eonschens.
B-
fl-
1002
HUMOROUS POEMS.
n
Are is the same to Us as milk to babies.
Or water is to fish, or peudlums to clox.
Or roots aud airbs unto an injun doctor.
Or little pills unto an omepath.
Or boys to gurls. Are is for us to brethe.
What signifies who preaches if i cant brethe ?
Wats Pol ? Wats Poilus to sinners who are
ded ?
Ded for want of breth, why Sextant, when we dy
Its only coz we cant brethe no more, tliats all.
Aud now 0 Sextant, let me beg of you
To let a little ai-e into om- church.
(Fewer are is sertain proper for the pews)
And do it weak days, and Sundays tew.
It aint much ti-ouble, only make a hole
And the are will come of itself ;
(It luvs to come in where it can git warm)
And 0 how it will rouze the people up.
And speiTit up the preacher, and stop garps,
And yawns and figgits, as effectooal
As wind on the dry boans the Profit tells of.
Akabslla m. willson.
MR. MOLONY'S ACCOUNT OF THE BALL.
given to the nepaolese ambassador by the penin¬
sular and oriental company.
0, WILL ye choose to hear the news ?
Bedad, I cannot pass it o'er :
I '11 tell you all about the ball
To the Nay paulase Amlxissador.
Begor : this fete all balls does bate.
At which I worn a pump, and I
Must here relate the splendthor great
Of th' Oriental Company.
These men of sin se dispoised expinse.
To fête these black Achilleses.
"We '11 show the blacks," says they, "Almack's,
And take the rooms at Willis's."
With fiags and shawls, for these Nepauls,
They hung the rooms of Willis up.
And decked the walls and staii-s and halls
With roses and with lilies up.
And Jullien's band it tuck its stand
So sweetly in the middle there.
And soft bassoons played heavenly chuñes.
And violins did fiddle there.
And when the Coort was tired of spooit,
I'd lave you, boys, to think there was
A nate buffet before them set.
Where lashins of good dlirink there was !
At ten before the ball-room door.
His moighty Excellency was ;
He smoiled and bowed to all the crowd.
So gorgeous and immense he was.
His dusky shuit, sublime aud mute,
Into the doorway followed him ;
And 0 the noise of the blackguard boys.
As they huiTood and hollowed him !
The noble Chair stud at the stair.
And bade the dthmms to thump ; and he
Did thus evince to that Black Prince
The welcome of his Company.
0 fair the girls, and rich the curls.
And bright the oys, you saw there, was ;
And fixed each oye, ye there could spoi,
On Gineral Jung Bahawther was 1
This Gineral great then tuck his sate^
With all the other gineials
(Bedad, his troat, his belt, his coat;
All bleezed with precious mineials) ; /
And as he there, with princely air,
llecloinin on his cushion was.
All round about his royal chair.
The squeezin and the pushin was.
0 Pat, such girls, such Jukes and Earls,
Such fashion and nobilitee !
Just think of Tim, and fancy him
Amidst the hoigh gentility !
There was Lord De L'Huys, and the Port3'geese
Ministher and his lady there.
And I reckonized, with much surprise.
Our messmate. Bob O'Grady, there ;
There was Baroness Brunow, that looked like
Juno,
And Baroness Eehausen there.
And Countess Eoullier, that looked peculiar
Well, in her robes of gauze in there.
There was Lord Crowhurst (I knew him first
"Vnien only Mr. Pips he was).
And Mick O'Toole, the great big fool.
That after supper tipsy was.
There was Lord Fingall and his ladies all,
And Lords Killeen and Dufi'erin,
And Paddy Fife, with his fat wife, —
I wondther how he could stuff her in.
There was Lord Belfast, that by me past.
And seemed to ask how should I go there ?
And the Widow Macrae, and Lord A. Hay,
And the Marchioness of Sligo there.
Yes, Jukes and Earls, and diamonds and pearls.
And pretty girls, was spoorting there ;
And some beside (the rogues ! ) 1 spied.
Behind the windies, coorting there.
■&
■SI
HUMOROUS POEMS.
1003
O, there's one I know, bedad, would show
As beautiful as any there ;
And I'd like to hear the pipers blow,
And shake a fut with Fanny there !
WIU.1am Makepeace Thackeray.
WIDOW MALONE.
Did you hear of the Widow Malone,
Ohone !
Who lived in the town of Athlone,
Alone !
O, she melted the hearts
Of the swains in them parts ;
So lovely the Widow Malone,
Ohone !
So lovely the Widow Malone.
Of lovers she had a full score.
Or more.
And fortunes they all had galore.
In store ;
From the minister down
To the clerk of the Crown
All were courting the Widow Malone,
Ohone !
All were courting the Widow Malone.
But so modest was Mistress Malone,
'T was known
That no one could see her alone,
Ohone !
Let them ogle and sigh.
They could ne'er cateh her eye.
So bashful the Widow Malone,
Ohone !
So bashful the Widow Malone.
Till one Misther O'Brien, from Clare
(How quare !
It's little for blushing they care
Down there),
Put his arm round her waist, —
Gave ten kisses at laste, —
" O," says he, "you 're my Molly Malone,
My own !
0," says he, " you 're my Molly Malone ! "
And the widow they all thought so shy.
My eye !
Ne'er thought of a simper or sigh, —
For why ?
But, "Lucius," says she,
" Since you've now made so free.
You may many your Mary Malone,
Ohone !
You may mairy your Mary Malone."
There's a moral contained in my song,
Not wrong ;
And one comfort, it's not very long.
But strong, —
If for widows you die.
Learn to kiss, not to sigh ;
For they 're all like sweet Mistress Malone,
Ohone !
0, they 're all like sweet Mistress Malone !
charles Lever.
BACHELOR'S HALL.
Bachelor's Hall, what a quare-lookin' place
it is !
Eape me from such all t^e days ,of my life !
Sure but I think what a bnrnin' disgrace it is,
Niver at all to be gettin' a wife.
Pots, dishes, pans, an' such gi-asy commodities.
Ashes and praty-skins, kiver the floor ;
His cupboard's a storehouse of eomical oddities.
Things that had niver been neighbors bidore.
Say the old bachelor, gloomy an' sad enough,
Placin' hisHay-kettle'over the'fire ;
Soon it tips over — Saint Patrick ! he's mad
enough,
If he were prisent, to flght with the squire !
He looks for the platter — Grimalkin is scourin'
it !
Sure, at a baste like that, swearin' 's no sin ;
His dishcloth is missing ; the pigs are devourin'
it —
Tnnder and turf! what a pickle he's in I
Dishes, take icare of yourselves if you can ;
Divil ajdrop of hotiwater Will yisit ye, —
Och, let him alorie for a baste of a man !
Now, like a pig in a mortar-bed wallowin',
Say the old bachelor kneading his dough ;
Troth, if his bread he could ate without swal-
lowin'.
How it would favor his palate, ye know !
Late in the night, when he goes to bed shiverin',
Niver a bit is the bed made at all ;
He crapes like a terrapin under the kiverin' ; —
Bad luck to the pictui- of Bachelor's Hall !
John Finlev.
1004
HUMOROUS POEMS.
ST. PATRICK WAS A GENTLEMAN.
0, St. Patrick was a gentleman,
Who came of decent people ;
He built a church in Dublin town,
And on it put a steeple.
His father was a Gallagher ;
His mother was a Brady ;
His aunt was an O'Shaughnessy,
His uncle an O'Grady.
So, success attend St. Patrick's fist.
For he's a Saint .so clever ;
0, he gave the snakes and toads a twist.
And bothered them forever !
The Wicklow hills are very high.
And so's the Hill of Howth, sir ;
But there's a hill, much bigger still.
Much higher nor them both, sir.
'T was on the top of this high hill
St. Patrick preached his sai-mint
That drove the frogs into the bogs.
And banished all the varmint.
So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc.
There's not a mile in Ireland's isle
Where dirty varmin musters.
But there he put his dear fore-foot.
And murdered them in clusters.
Tlie toads went pop, the frogs went hop.
Slap-dash into the water ;
And the snakes committed suicide
To save themselves from slaughter.
So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc.
Nine hundred thousand reptiles blue
He charmed with sweet discourses.
And dined on them at Killaloe
In soups and second courses.
Where blind worms crawling in the grass
Disgusted all the nation.
He gave them a rise, which opened their eyes
To a sense of tlieir situation.
So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc.
No wonder that those Irish lads
Should be so gay and frisky.
For sure St. Pat he taught them that.
As well as making whiskey ;
No wonder that the saint himself
Should understand distilling.
Since his mother kept a shebeen shop
In the town of Enniskillen.
So, success attend St. Patrick's fist, etc.
O, was I but so fortunate
As to be back in Munster,
'T is I'd be bound that from that ground
1 ueveimore would once stir.
For there St. Patrick planted turf.
And plenty of the praties.
With pigs galore, ma gra, ma 'store.
And cabbages — and ladies !
Then my blessing on St. Patrick's fist.
For he's the darling Saint 0 !
0, he gave the snakes and toads a twist ;
He's a beauty without paint, 0 !
Henkv beknett.
THE BIRTH OF ST. PATRICK.
On the eighth day of March it was, some people
say.
That Saint Pathrick at midnight he first saw the
day ;
While others declare 'twas the ninth he was
born.
And't was all a mistake between midnight and
morn ;
For mistakes will occur in a hurry and shock.
And some blamed the babby — and some blamed
the clock —
Till with all their cross-questions sure no one
could know
If the child was too fast, or the clock was too
slow.
Now the first faction-fight in owld Ireland, they
say.
Was all on account of Saint Pathrick's birthday :
Some fought for the eighth — for the ninth more
would die.
And who would n't see right, sure they blackened
his eye !
At last, both the factions so po.sitive grew.
That each kept a birthday, so Pat then had two.
Till Father Mulcahy, who showed them their
sins.
Said, "No one could have two birthdays, but a
twins."
Says he, " Boys, don't be fightin' for eight or for
nine.
Don't be always dividin' —but sometimes com¬
bine ;
Combine eight with nine,,and seventeen is the
mark.
So let that be his birthday," — "Amen," says
the clerk.
" If he was n't a twins, sure our hist'ry will show
That, at least, he's worthy any two saints that
we know ! "
Then they all got blind dhrunk — which com-
plated their bliss.
And Vie keep up the practice fi-om that day to
this.
SAUUEL LOVEX.
à
fi-
IIUMOKOUS POEMS,
1005
-a
THE LOVERS. ,
Sally Salter, she was a young teacher who
taught,
And her friend, Charley Church, was a preacher
who praught,
Though his enemies called him a screecher who
scraught.
His heart, when he saw her, kept sinking and
sunk.
And his eye, meeting hers, began winking, and
wuiik ;
While she, in her turn, kept thinking, and
thunk.
He hastened to woo her, and sweetly he wooed,
For his love grew until to a mountain it grewcd.
And what he was longing to do then he docd.
In secret he wanted to speak, and he spoke.
To seek with his lips what his heart long had
soke ;
So he managed to let the truth leak, and it loke.
He asked her to ride to the church, and they
rode ;
They so sweetly did glide that they both thought
they glode.
And they came to the place to be tied, and were
toed.
Then homeward, he said, let us drive, and they
drove.
And as soon as they wished to arrive, they
arrove.
For whatever he could n't contrive she controve.
The kiss he was dying to steal, then ho stole ;
At the feet where he wanted to kneel then he
knole ;
And he said, "I foci better than over I fole."
So they to each other kept clinging, ana clung,
While Time his swift circuit was winging, and
wung ;
And this was the thing he was bringing, and
brung :
The man Sally wanted to catch, and had caught ;
That she wanted from others to snatch, and had
snaught;
Was the one she now liked to scratch, and she
scraught.
And Charley's warm love began freezing, and
froze.
While ho took to teazing, and cruelly tozo
The girl he had wished to be Sfjueezing, and
squoze.
"Wretch!" he cried, wlien she threatened to
leave him, and left,
"How could you deceive me, as you have de-
ceft?"
And she answered, "I promised to cleave, and
I've cleft."
phœbe Gary.
DEBORAH LEE.*
'T is a dozen or so of years ago.
Somewhere in the West countiee.
That a nice girl lived, as ye Hoosicra know
By the name of Deborah Lee ;
Her sister was loved by Edgar Pee,
But Deborah by me.
îTow I was green, and she was green,
As a summer's squa.sh might be ;
And we loved as wannly as other folks, —
I and my Deborah Lee, —
With a love that the lasses of Hoosierdom
Coveted her and me.
But somehow it happened a long time ago.
In the aguish West countree.
That a chill March morning gave the sJuikes
To my beautiful Deborah Lee ;
And the grim steam-doctor (drat him I) came.
And bore her away from me, —
The doctor and death, old partners they, —
In the aguish West countree.
The angels wanted her in heaven
(But they never asked for me).
And that is the reason, I rather guess.
In the aguish West countree.
That the cold March wind, and the doctor, and
death.
Took off my Dchorah Lee —
My beautiful Deborah Lee —
From the warm sunshine and the opening flower.
And bore her away from me.
Our love was as strong as a six-horse team.
Or the love of folks older than we,
Or possibly wiser than we ;
But death, with the aid of doctor and steam.
Was rather too many for me ;
He closed the peepers and silenced the breath
Of my sweetheart Deborah Lee,
And her form lies cold in the prairie mould.
Silent and cold, — ah me I
The foot of the hunter shall press her grave,
And the prairie's sweet wild flowers
In their odorous beauty around it wave
Through all the .sunny hours, —
i V..,,. ..aje =23.
.-Xi
1006
HUMOROUS POEMS.
a
The still, bright summer hours ;
And the birds shall sing in the tufted grass
And the nectar-laden bee,
With his dreamy hum, on his gauze wings pass, —
She wakes no more to me ;
Ah, nevermore to me !
Though the wild birds sing and the wild flowers
spring,
She wakes no more to me.
Yet oft in the hush of the dim, still night,
A vision of beauty I see
Gliding soft to my bedside, —a phantom of light.
Dear, beautiful Deborah Lee, —
My bride that was to be ;
And I wake to mourn that the doctor, and
death.
And the cold March wind, should stop the breath
Of my darling Deborah Lee, —
Adorable Deborah Lee, —
That angels should want her up in heaven
Before they wanted me.
william h. burleigh.
ONLY SEVEN.»
A pastoral story, after wordsworth.
I mahvelled why a simple child.
That lightly draws its breath.
Should utter groans so very wild
And look as pale as Death.
Adopting a parental tone,
I asked her why she cried.
The damsel answered, with a groan,
" 1 've got a pain inside !
" I thought it would have sent me mad
Last night about eleven."
Said I, " What is it makes you bad ?
How many apples have you had ? "
She answered, " Only seven ! "
" And are you sure you took no more.
My little maid ? " quoth I.
" 0, please, sir, mother gave me four.
But they were in a pie ! "
•' If that's the case," I .stammered out,
" Of course you've had eleven."
The maiden answered with a pout,
" I ain't had more nor seven ! "
I wondered hugely what she meant.
And said, " 1 'm bad at riddles.
But I know where little girls are sent
For telling taradiddles.
" Now if you don't reform," said I,
" You 'U never go to heaven 1 "
But all in vain ; each time I try
The little idiot makes reply,
" I ain't had more nor seven 1 "
POSTSCRIPT.
To borrow Wordsworth's name was wrong.
Or slightly misapplied ;
And so I'd better call my song,
" Lines after Ache-inside."
H. S. Leigh.
A TALE OF DRURY LANE.»
from "rejected addresses."
** Thus he went on, stringing one extravagance upon another. In
the style his books of chivalry had taught him, and imitating, as
near as he could, their very phrase. ' — Don ^uixotb»
To he spoken by Mr. Kemhle, in a suit of the Black
Prince's armory borrowed from the Tower.
Rest there awhile, my bearded lance.
While from green curtain I advance.
To yon foot-lights, no trivial dance,
And tell the town what sad mischance
Did Drury Lane befall.
As Chaos, which, by heavenly doom,
Had slept in everlasting gloom,
Started with terror and surprise
When light first flashed upon her eyes, —
So London's sons in nightcap woke,
In bedgown woke her dames ;
For shouts were heard mid fire and smoke,
And twice ten hundred voices spoke, —
" The playhouse is in flames 1 "
And, lo ! where Catherine Street extends,
A fiery tail its lustre lends
To every window-pane ;
Blushes each spout in Martlet Court,
And Barbican, moth-eaten fort,
And Covent Garden kennels sport,
A bright ensanguined drain ;
Meux's new Brewhouse shows the Ught, '
Rowland Hill's Chapel, and the height
Where Patent Shot they sell ;
The Tennis Court, so fair and tall.
Partakes the ray, with Surgeons' Hall,
The Ticket-Porters' House of Call,
Old Bedlam, close by London Wall,
Wright's shrimp and oyster shop withal, j
And Richardson's Hotel.
Nor these alone, but far and wide.
Across red Thames's gleaming tide.
To distant fields the blaze was home,
And daisy white and hoary thorn
• Seo page 87.
* An imitation of Sir Walter Scott.
HUMOROUS POEMS.
1007
In borrowed lustre seemed to sham
The rose, or red Sweet Wil-li-am.
To those who on the hills around
Beheld the flames from Drury's mound,
As from a lofty altar rise.
It seemed that nations did conspire
To offer to the god of fire
Some vast, stupendous sacrifice 1
The summoned firemen woke at call.
And hied them to their stations all :
Starting from short and broken snooze.
Each sought his ponderous hob-nailed shoes,
But first his worsted hosen plied ;
Plush breeches next, in crimson dyed,
His nether bulk embraced ;
Then jacket thick, of red or blue,
Whose massy shoulder gave to view
The badge of each respective crew.
In tin or copper traced.
The engines thundered through the street,
Fire-hook, pipe, bucket, all complete.
And torches glared, and clattering feet
Along the pavement paced.
And one, the leader of the band.
From Charing Cross along the Strand,
Like stag by beagles hunted hard.
Ban till he stopped at Vin'gar Yard.
The burning badge his shoulder bore.
The belt and oil-skin hat he wore.
The cane he had, his men to bang.
Showed foreman of the British gang, —
His name was Higginbottom. Now
'T is meet that 1 should tell you how
The others came in view :
Tlie Hand-in-Hand the race begun.
Then came the Phoenix and the Sun,
The Exchange, where old insurers run.
The Eagle, where the new ;
With these came Rumford, Bumford, Cole,
Robins from Hockley in the Hole,
Lawson and Dawson, cheek by jowl.
Cramp from St. Giles's Pound ;
Whitford and Mitford joined the train,
Huggins and Muggins from Chick Lane,
And Clutterbuck, who got a sprain
Before the plug was found.
Hobson and Jobson did not sleep.
But ah ! no trophy could they reap.
For both were in the Donjon Keep
Of Bridewell's gloomy mound I
E'en Higginbottom now was posed.
For sadder scene was ne'er disclosed ;
Without, within, in hideous show.
Devouring flames resistless glow.
And blazing rafters downward go.
And never halloo " Heads below ! "
Nor notice give at all.
The firemen terrified ore slow
To bid the pumping torrent flow.
For fear the roof should fall.
Back, Robins, back ! Crump, stand aloof !
Whitford, keep near the walls !
Huggin-s, regard your own behoof.
For, lo ! the blazing, rocking roof
Down, down in thunder falls !
An awful pause succeeds the stroke.
And o'er the ruins volumed smoke.
Rolling around its pitchy shroud.
Concealed them from the astonished crowd.
At length the mist awhile was cleared.
When, lo ! amid the wreck upreared.
Gradual a moving head appeared.
And Eagle firemen knew
'T was Joseph Muggins, name revered.
The foreman of their crew.
Loud shouted all in signs of woe,
" A Muggins ! to the rescue, ho ! "
And poured the hissing tide :
Meanwhile the Muggins fought amain,
And strove and struggled all in vain.
For, rallying but to fall again.
He tottered, sunk, and died I
Did none attempt, before he fell.
To succor one they loved so well f
Yes, Higginbottom did aspire
(His fireman's soul was all on fire)
His brother chief to save ;
But ah ! his reckless generous ire
Served but to share his grave !
Mid blazing beams and scalding streams.
Through fire and smoke he dauntless broke.
Where Muggins broke before.
But sulphury stench and boiling drench.
Destroying sight, o'erwhelmed him quite.
He sunk to rise no more.
Still o'er his head, while Fate he braved.
His whizzing water-pipe he waved :
" Whitford and Mitford, ply your pumps t
You, Clutterbuck, come, stir your stumps !
Why are you in such doleful dumps ?
A fireman, and afraid of bumps ! —
What are they feared on ? fools ! 'od rot 'em ! "
Were the last words of Higginbottom.
Horace smith.
POEMS
received in response to an advertised call for a
national anthem.
KATIONAL ANTHEM.
by dr. oliver wendell h 1
A DIAGNOSIS of our history proves
Our native land a laud its native loves ;
1008
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Its birth a deed obstetric without peer,
Its growth a source of wonder far and near.
To love it more, behold how foreign shores
Sink into nothingness beside its stores.
Hyde Park at best — though eonnted ultra
grand —
The " Boston Common " of Victoria's land —
Tlie committee must not be blamed for rejectinfj the above after
reading thus far, for such an " antlicin " couUI only be sung by a
college of surgeons or a Beacon Street tea-party.
Turn we now to a
NATIONAL ANTHEM,
by william gullen b—.
The sun sinks softly to his evening post.
The sun swells grandly to his morning crown ;
Yet not a star our flag of heaven has lost.
And not a sunset stripe with him goes down.
So thrones may fall ; and from the dust of those
New thrones may rise, to totter like the last ;
But still our counti-y's nobler planet glows.
While the eternal stars of Heaven are fast.
Upon finding that this does not go well to the air of "Yankee
Doodle," the committee feel justified in declining it ; it being further-
more prejudiced against It by a suspicion that the poet has crowded
an advertisement of a paper which he edits into tlie first line.
Next we quote from a
NATIONAL ANTHEM.
by general george p. m—
In the days that tried our fathers.
Many years ago.
Our fair land achieved her freedom
Blood-bought, you know.
Shall we not defend her ever.
As we'd defend
That fair maiden, kind and tender.
Calling us friend ?
Yes ! Let all the echoes answer,
From hill and v.ale ;
Yes ! Let other nations hearing,
Joy in the tale.
Our Columbia is a lady.
High-bom and fair,
. We have .sworn allegiance to her, —
Touch her who dare.
The tone of this " anthem " not being devotional enough to suit
the committee, it should be printed on an edition of linen-cambric
handkerchiefs for ladies especially.
Observe this
NATIONAL ANTHEM.
by n. p. w—.
One hue of our flag is taken
From the cheeks of my blushing pet,
And its stars beat time and sparkle
Like the studs on her chemisette.
Its blue is the ocean shadow
That hides in her dreamy eyes,
And it conquers all men, like her,
And still for a Union Hies.
Several members of the committee find that this *'antliem " lus
too much of the Anacreon spicc to suit them.
We next peruse a
NATIONAL ANTHEM.
by thomas bailey a
The little brown squiiTcthops in the com,
The cricket quaintly sings ;
The emerald pigeon nods his head.
And the shad in the river springs ;
The dainty sunflower hangs its head
On the shore of the .summer sea ;
And better far that I were dead,
If Maud did not love me.
I love the squirrel that hops in the com.
And the cricket that quaintly sings ;
And the emerald pigeon that nods his head.
And the shad that gayly spring-s.
I love the dainty sunflower, too.
And Maud with her snowy breast ;
I love them all ; but I love — I love —
I love my country best.
This is certainly very beautiful, and sounds somewhat like Tan
nyson. Though it may be rejected by the comiiiiitee, it can never
lose its value as a piece of excellent reading for cliildrcn. U ih
calculated to fill the youthful mind with patriotism and natural
tory, beside touching the youthful heart with an emotion palpitating n .
for all.
Robert H, NE>\'ELL {OrpJicus C- Kerr).
THE COCK AND THE BULL.*
You see this pebble-stone? It's a thing I bought
Of a bit of a chit of a boy i' the mid o' the day —
I like to dock the smaller parts-o'-speech.
As we curtail the already cur-tailed ciir
(You catch the p.aronomasia, play o' words ?) —
Did, rather; i' the pre-Landsecrian days.
AVell, to my muttons. I purchased the concern.
And clapt it i' my poke, and gave for same
By way, to-wit, of barter or exchange —
"Chop" was my snickering dandi[)!at'3 own
term —
One shilling and fourpcncc, cument coin o' the
realm.
0-n-e one and f-o-u-r four
Pence, one and foumence — you arc with mo.
Sir? —
What hour it skills not: ten oreleven o' the clock.
One day (and what a roaring day it Wils !)
* la Imitation of Robeit Browning.
HUMOROUS POEMS.
In February, eighteen sixty-nine,
Alexandrina Victoria, Fidei
Hm — hm — how runs the jargon ? — being on
throne.
Such, sir, are all the facts, succmctly put.
The basis or substratum — what you will —
Of the impending eighty thousand lines.
" Not much in 'em either," quoth perhaps simple
Hodge.
But there's a superstructure. Wait a bit
Mark first the rationale of the thing :
Hear logic rival and levigate the deed.
That shilling — and for matter o' that, the
pence —
I had o' course upo' me — wi' me, say —
(Mecum's the Latin, make a note o' that)
When I popped pen i' stand, blew snout,
scratched ear.
Sniffed — tch ! — at snuff-box ; tumbled up, he-
heed.
Haw-hawed (not hee-hawed, that's another guess
thing :)
Then fumbled at, and stumbled out of, door,
I shoved the door ope wi' my omoplat ;
And in vestíbulo, i' the entrance-hall.
Donned galligaskins, antigropeloes.
And so forth ; and, complete with hat and gloves.
One on and one a-dangle i' my hand.
' ■•d ombrifuge, (Lord love you !) case o' rain,
aopped forth, 's buddikins ! on my own ten toes,
(I do assure you there be ten of them,)
And went clump-clumping up hill and down dale
To find myself o' the sudden i' front o' the boy.
Put case I had n't 'em on me, could I ha' bought
This sort-o'-kiud-o'-what-you-might-caU toy,
This pebble-thing, o' the boy-thing ? Q. E. D.
That's proven without aid from mumping Pope,
Sleek porporate or bloated Cardinal,
(Is n't it, old Fatchaps ? You 're in Euclid now.)
So, having the shilling — having i' fact a lot —
And pence and halfpence, ever so many o' them,
purchased, as I think I said before.
The pebble (lapis, lapidis, — di, — dem, — de, —
What nouns 'crease short i' the genitive. Fat-
chaps, eh ?)
O' the boy, a bare-legged beggarly son of a gun.
For one and fouvpence. Here we are again.
Now Law steps in, big-wigged, voluminous-
jawed ;
Investigates and re-investigates.
Was the transaction illegal ? Law shakes head.
Perpend, sir, all the bearings of the case.
At first the coin was mine, the chattel his.
But now (by virtue of the said exchange
And barter) vice versa all the coin.
Per juris operaiionem, vests
1' the boy and his assigns till ding o' doom ;
{In soecula sceculo-o-o-orum ;
I think I hear the Abbate mouth out that.)
To have and hold the same to him and them . . .
Confer some idiot on Conveyancing,
Whereas the pebble and every part thereof.
And all that appertaineth thereunto.
Or shall, will, may, might, can, could, would, or
should,
(Subandi ccetera — clap me to the close —
For what's the good of law in a case o' the kind ?)
Is mine to all intents and purposes.
This settled, 1 resume the thread o' the tale.
Now for a touch o' the vendor's quality.
He says a gen'lman bought a pebble of him,
(This pebble i' sooth, sir, which I hold i' my
hand) —
And paid for't, like a gen'lman, on the nail.
" Did I o'ercharge him a ha'penny ? Devil a bit.
Fiddlestick's end ! Get out, you blazing ass !
Gabble o' the goose. Don't bugaboo-baby me I
Go double or quits ? Yah ! tittup ! what's the
odds?"
— There's the transaction viewed, i' the vendor's
light.
Next ask that dumpled hag, stood snufiling by.
With her three frowsy-browsy brats o' babes.
The scum o' the kennel, cream o' the filth-heap
— Faugh ?
Aie, aie, aie, aie ! ¿tototototo?,
('Stead which we blurt out Hoighty-toighty
now) —
And the baker and candlestick-maker, and Jack
and Gill,
Bleared Goody this and queasy Gaffer that.
Ask the schoolmaster. Take schoolmaster first.
He saw a gentleman purchase of a lad
A stone, and pay for it rite, on the square.
And carry it off per saltum, jauntily.
Propria quoe maribus, gentleman's property now
( Agreeably to the law explained above).
In proprium usum, for his private ends.
The boy he chucked a brown i' the air, and bit
r the face the shilling ; heaved a thumping stone
At a lean hen that ran cluck-clucking by,
(And hit her, dead as naü i' post o' door,)
Then abiit — what's the Ciceronian phrase ? —
Excessit, evasit, erupit, — off slogs boy ;
Off in three flea-skips. Haclenus, so far.
So good, tarn bene. Bene, satis, male, —
Where was I ? who said what of one in a quag ?
I did once hitch the syntax into verse :
Verbum personale, a verb personal.
Concordat, — ay, " agrees," old Fatchaps — cum
ö-
1010
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Nominativo, with its nominative,
Genere, i' point o' gender, numero,
O' number, et persona, and person, üt.
Instance : Sol mit, down flops sun, et, and,
Montes vmibrantwr, snufls out mountains. Pah !
Excuse me, sir, I think I'm going mad.
You see the trick on 't though, and can yourself
Continue the discourse ad libitum.
It takes up about eighty thousand lines,
A thing imagination boggles at :
And might, odds-bobs, sir ! in judicious hands.
Extend from here to Mesopotamy.
CHARLES S. CALVERLEY.
LOVERS, AND A REFLECTION.»
In mossiprankt dells which the sunbeams flatter
(And heaven it knoweth what that may mean ;
Meaning, however, is no great matter)
Where woods are a-tremble, with rifts atween ;
Through God's own heather we wonned together,
I and my Willie (0 love my love) :
I need hardly remark it was glorious weather.
And flitterbats wavered alow, above :
Boats were curtseying, rising, bowing
(Boats in that climate are so polite).
And sands were a ribbon of green endowing,
And 0 the sun-dazzle on bark and bight !
Through the rare red heather we danced together,
(0 love my Willie !) and smelt for flowers :
I must mention again it was glorious weather.
Rhymes are so scarce in this world of ours ;—
By rises that flushed with their purple favors.
Through becks that brattled o'er grasses sheen,
We walked or waded, we two young shavers.
Thanking our stars we were both so green.
We journeyed in parallels, I and Willie,
In " fortunate paraUels ! " Butterflies,
Hid in weltering shadows of daffodilly
Or marjoram, kept making peacock's eyes :
Song-birds darted about, some inky
As coal, some snowy (I ween) as curds ;
Or rosy as pinks, or as roses pinky—
They reck of no eerie To-come, those birds !
But they skim over bents which the mül-stream
washes.
Or hang in the lift 'neath a white cloud's hem ;
They need no parasols, no galoshes ;
And good Mrs. Tiimmer she feedeth them.
• In imitation of Jean Ingelow.
Then we thrid God's cowslips (as erst his heather)
That endowed the wan grass with their golden
blooms ;
And snapt—(it was perfectly charming weather)—
Our fingers at Fate and her goddess-glooms :
And Willie 'gan sing — (O, his notes were fluty ;
Wafts fluttered them out to the white-winged
sea) —
Something made up of rhymes that have done
much duty.
Rhymes (better to put it) of " ancientry : "
Bowers of flowers encountered showers
In William's carol (0 love my Willie !)
When he bade sorrow borrow from blithe To¬
morrow
I quite forget what — say a dafibdilly :
A nest in a hollow, " with buds to follow,"
I think occurred next in his nimble strain ;
And clay that was "kneaden" of course in Eden—
A rhyme most novel, I do maintain :
Mists, bones, the singer himself, love-stories.
And all least furlable things got " fiu'led ; "
Not with any design to conceal their glories.
But simply and solely to rhyme with " world."
0, if billows and pillows and hours and flowers.
And all the brave rhymes of an elder day.
Could be furled together this genial weather.
And carted, or carried on wafts away.
Nor ever again trotted out — ay me !
How much fewer volumes of verse there'd be !
CHARLES S. CALVERLEY.
THE ARAB.
On, on, my brown Arab, away, away !
Thou hast trotted o'er many a mile to-day.
And I trow right meagre hath been thy fare
Since they roused thee at dawn from thy straw-
piled lair.
To tread with those echoless, unshod feet
Yon weltering flats in the noontide heat.
Where no palm-tree proffers a kindly shade.
And the eye never rests on a cool grass blade ;
And lank is thy flank, and thy frequent cough,
0, it goes to my heart—but away, friend, off !
And yet, ah ! what sculptor who saw thee stand.
As thou standest now, on thy native strand.
With the wild wind ruffling thine uncombed hair.
And thy nostiil upturned to the odorous air.
Would not woo thee to pause, tUl his skUl might
trace
At leisure the lines of that eager face ;
-a
HUMOROUS POEMS.
1011
The collarless neck and the coal-black paws
And the bit grasped tight in the massive jaws ;
The delicate curve of the legs, that seem
Too slight for their burden — and, 0, the gleam
Of that eye, so sombre and yet so gay !
Still away, my lithe Arab, once more away !
Nay, tempt me not, Arab, again to stay ;
Since I crave neither Echo nor Fun to-day.
For thy hand is not Echoless— there they are.
Fun, Glowworm, and Echo, and Evening Star,
And thou hintest withal that thou fain wouldst
shine.
As I read them, these bulgy old boots of mine.
But I shrink from thee, Arab ! Thou eatest
eel-pie.
Thou evermore hast at least one black eye ;
There is brass on thy brow, and thy swarthy hues
Are due not to nature, but handling shoes ;
And the bit in thy mouth, I regret to see.
Is a bit of tobacco-pipe — Flee, child, flee !
Charles S. Calverley.
THE MODERN HOUSE THAT JACK
BUILT.
Behold the mansion reared by dsedal Jack.
See the malt, stored in many a plethoric sack.
In the proud cirque of Ivan's bivouac.
Mark how the rat's felonious fangs invade
The golden stores in John's pavilion laid.
Anon, with velvet foot and Tarquín strides,
Subtle grimalkin to his quarry glides, —
Grimalkin grim, that slew the fierce rodenX
Whose tooth insidious Johann's sackcloth rent.
Lo ! now the deep-mouthed canine foe's assault.
That vexed the avenger of the stolen malt ;
Stored in the hallowed precincts of the hall
That rose complete at Jack's creative call.
Here stalks the impetuous cow, with crumpled
horn.
Whereon the exacerbating hound was torn.
Who bayed the feline slaughter-beast, that slew
The rat predacious, whose keen fangs ran through
The textile fibres that involved the grain
That lay in Hans' inviolate domain.
Here walks forlorn the damsel crowned with rue.
Lactiferous spoils from vaccine dugs who drew,
Of that corniculate beast whose tortuous horn
Tossed to the clouds, in fierce vindictive scorn.
The haiTowing hound, whose braggart bark and
stir
Arched the lithe spine and reared the indignant fur
Of puss, that with verminicidal claw
Struck the weird rat, in whose insatiate maw
Lay reeking malt, that erst in Ivan's courts we
saw.
Robed in senescent garb, that seemed, in sooth.
Too long a prey to Chronos' iron tooth.
Behold the man whose amorous lips incline.
Full with young Eros' osculative sign.
To the lorn maiden, whose lac-albic hands
Drew albu-lactic wealth from lacteal glands
Of the immortal bovine, by whose horn.
Distort, to realm ethereal was borne
The beast catulean, vexer of that sly
Ulysses quadrupedal who made die
The old mordacious rat, that dared devour
Anteccdaneous ale in John's domestic bower.
Lo ! here, with hirsute honors doflfed, succinct
Of saponaceous locks, the priest who linked
In Hymen's golden bands the torn unthrift.
Whose means exiguous stared from many a rift.
Even as he kissed the virgin all forlorn.
Who milked the cow with implicated horn.
Who in fine wrath the canine torturer skied.
That dared to vex the insidious muricide.
Who let auroral effluence through the pelt
Of the sly rat that robbed the palace Jack had
built.
The loud cantankerous Shanghai comes at last.
Whose shouts aroused the shorn ecclesiast.
Who sealed the vows of Hymen's sacrament
To him who, robed in garments indigent,
Exosculates the damsel lachrymose.
The emulgator of that homèd brute morose
That tossed the dog that worried the cat that kilt
The rat that ate the malt that lay in the house
that Jack built.
ANONYMOUS.
JONES AT THE BARBER'S SHOP.
Scene, a Barber's Shop. Barber's man engorged
in CMtting hair, making wigs, and other bar-
beresque operations.
Enter Jones, meeting Oilt the barber.
Jones. I wish my hair cut.
Oilt. Pray, sir, take a seat.
(filisr puts a chair for Jones, who sits. During
the follovnng dialogue Oilt continues cutting
Jones's hair.)
Oilt. We've had much wet, sir.
Jones, Very much indeed.
B-
fl-
1012
HUMOROUS POEMS.
■ÜI
Oily. And yet November's days were fine.
Jones. They were.
Oily. I hoped fair weathermight have lasted us
Until the end.
Jones. At one time — so did I.
Oily. But we have had it very wet.
Jones. We have.
(A pause of some ten minutes.)
Oily. I know not, sir, who cut your hair last
time ;
But this I say, sir, it was badly cut :
No doubt 'twas in the country.
Jones. No ! in town !
Oily. Indeed ! I should have fancied other¬
wise.
Jones. 'Twas cut in town and in this very
room.
Oily. Amazement ! — but I now remember
well —
We had an awkward, new provincial hand,
A feUow from the country. Sir, he did
More damage to my business in a week
Than all my skill can in a year repair.
He must have cut your hair.
Jones (looking at him). No, 't was yourself.
Oily. Myself? Impossible! You must mis¬
take.
Jones. I don't mistake — 'twas you that cut
my hair.
(A long pause, interrupted only by the clipping
of the scissors.)
Oily. Your hair is very dry, sir.
Jones. Oh I indeed.
Oily. Our Yegetable Extract moistens it.
Jones. I like it dry.
Oily. But, sir, the hair when dry
Turns quickly gray.
Jones. That color I prefer.
Oily. But hair, when gray, wül rapidly fall
off.
And baldness will ensue.
Jones. I would be bald.
Oily. Perhaps you mean to say you'd like a
wig,—
We 've wigs so natural they can't be told
From real hair.
Jones. Deception I detest.
(Another pause ensues, during which OiLY blows
down Jones's neck, and relieves him from the
linen wrapper in which he has been enveloped
during the process of hair-cwliing.)
Oily. We've brushes, soaps, and scent of
every kind.
Jones. I see you have. (Pays G d.) I think
you '11 find that right.
Oily. If there is nothing I can show you, sir.
Jones. No; nothing. Yet — there may be
something, too.
That you may show me.
Oily. Name it, sir.
Jones. The door.
Oily (to his man). That's a rum customer
at any rate.
Had I cut him as short as he cut me.
How little hair upon his head would be I
But if kind friends will all our pains requite.
We'll hope for better luck another night.
[^Shop bell rings, and curtain falls.
Punch.
TO THE TERRESTRIAL GLOBE.
bv a miserable wretch.
Roll on, thou ball, roll on !
Through pathless realms of space
Roll on !
What though I'm in a sorry case ?
What though I cannot meet my bills ?
What though I suffer toothache's ills ?
What though I swallow countless pills ?
Never you mind I
Roll on !
RoU on, thou ball, roll on !
Through seas of inky air
Roll on I
It's true I've got no shirts to wear.
It's true my butcher's bill is due.
It's true my prospects aU look blue, —
But don't let that unsettle you !
Never you mind !
Roll on !
[It rolls on.
William schwenck Gilbert.
MY LOVE.*
I only knew she came and went
Like ti'outlets in a pool ;
She was a phantom of delight.
And I was like a fool.
Powell.
Hood.
Wordsworth.
Eastman.
One kiss, dear maid, I said, and sighed, Coleridge.
Out of those lips unshorn : Longfellow.
She shook her ringlets round her head, Stoddard.
And laughed in merry scorn. Tennyson.
Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, Tennyson.
You heard them, 0 my heart ; Alice Cary.
'T is twelve at night by the castle clock, Coleridge.
Beloved, we must part. Alice Cary.
* A specimen of what are called *' Cento Verses : " patchwork.
'S
HUMOROUS POEMS.
1013
" Come back, come back ! " she cried in grief,
Camphell.
' ' My eyes are dim with tears, —Bayamd Taylor.
How shall I live through aU the days ? Osgood.
All through a hundred years ? " T. S. Perry.
'T was in the prime of summer time Mood.
She blessed me with her hand ; Moyt.
We strayed together, deeply blest, Edwards.
Into the dreaming land. Cornwall.
The laughing bridal roses blow, Patmore.
To dress her dark-brown hair ; Bayard Taylor.
My heart is breaking with my woe, Tennyson.
Most beautiful ! most rare ! Read.
I clasped it on her sweet, cold hand. Browning.
The precious golden link ! Smith.
I calmed her fears, and she was calm, Coleridge.
"Drink, pretty creature, drink." Wordsworth.
And so I won my Genevieve,
And walked in Paradise ;
The fairest thing that ever grew
Atween me and the skies.
Coleridge.
Hervey.
Wordsworth.
Osgood.
Anomymous.
RECIPES.
boasted sucking-pig.
Air, — Scots wha hae," etc.
Cooks who'd roast a sucking-pig.
Purchase one not over big ;
Coarse ones are not worth a fig ;
So a young one buy.
See that he is scalded well
(That is done by those who sell),
Therefore on that point to dwell
Were absurdity.
Sage and bread, mix just enough,
Salt and pepper quantum suff..
And the pig's interior stuff.
With the whole combined.
To a fire that's rather high.
Lay it tiU completely dry ;
Then to every part apply
Cloth, with butter lined.
Dredge with flour o'er and o'er,
Till the pig will hold no more ;
Then do nothing else before
'T is for serving fit.
Then scrape off the flour with care ;
Then a buttered cloth prepare ;
Rub it well ; then cut — not tear —
Off the head of it.
Then take out and mix the brains
With the gravy it contains ;
While it on the spit remains.
Cut the pig in two.
Chop the sage and chop the bread
Fine as very finest shred ;
O'er it melted butter spread, —
Stinginess won't do.
When it in the dish appears.
Garnish with the jaws and ears ;
And when dinner-hour nears.
Ready let it be.
Who can offer such a dish
May dispense with fowl and fish ;
And if he a guest should wish.
Let him send for me !
punch's Potticat Cootery Bcok.
a recipe for salad.
i
To make this condiment your poet begs
The pounded yellow of two hard-boiled eggs ;
Two boiled potatoes, passed through kitchen
sieve.
Smoothness and softness to the salad give ;
Let onion atoms lurk within the bowl,
And, half suspected, animate the whole ;
Of mordant mustard add a single spoon.
Distrust the condiment that bites so soon ;
But deem it not, thou man of herbs, a fault
To add a double quantity of salt ;
Four times the spoon with oil from Lucca
crown.
And twice with vinegar, procured from town ;
And lastly, o'er the flavored compound toss
A magic soupçon of anchovy sauce.
0 green and glorious ! 0 herbaceous treat !
'T would tempt the dying anchorite to eat ;
Back to the world he'd turn his fleeting soul.
And plunge his fingers in the salad-bowl ;
Serenely full, the epicure would say,
" Fate cannot harm me, — I have dined to-day."
sydnby suith.
SIEGE OF BELGRADE.
An Austrian army, awfuUy arrayed.
Boldly by battery besieged Belgrade.
Cossack commanders cannonading come.
Dealing destruction's devastating doom.
Every endeavor engineers essay.
For fame, for fortune fighting, — furious fray !
Generals 'gainst generals grapple—gracious God !
How honors Heaven heroic hardihood !
r
^
1014 HUMOROUS POEMS.
Infuriate, indiscriminate in ill, ECHO.
Kindred kill kinsmen, kinsmen kindred kilL
Labor low levels longest loftiest lines ; ^ asked of Echo, t other day,
Men march mid mounds, mid moles, mid mur- (Whose words are few and often funny,)
derous mines ; Wh^t to a novice she could say
Now noxious, noisy numbers nothing, naught courtship, love, and matrimony.
Of outward obstacles, opposing ought ; Echo, plainly, - " Matter-o -money ! "
Poor patriots, partly purchased, partly pressed ^ manyî-should it be
Quite quaking, quickly ** Quarter I Quarter! ají. ^ i j
A dashing damsel, gay and pert,
Reason returns, religious right redounds, ^ >
Suwarrow stops such sanguinary soimds. ^ ® > njercenary i
Truce to thee^Turkey ! Triumph to thy train, "^uoth Echo, sharply, - Nary flirt !
Unvrise, unjust, unmerciful Ukraine ! ^^at if, aweary of the strife
Vanish, vam victory ! vanish victoiy vain ! ^hat long has lured the dear deceiver.
Why wish we warfare ? Wherefore welcome
„ „ -^nd sin no more ; can I believe her ?
Xerxes, Ximenes, Xanthus, Xavier . Quoth Echo, very promptly, — " Leave her !
Yield, yield, ye youths ! ye yeomen, 3n.eld your
yell ! But if some maiden with a heart
Zeus s, Zarpater s, Zoroaster s zeal. On me should venture to bestow it.
Attracting aU, arms against acts appeal ! Pray, should 1 act the wiser part
anonvhous. To take the treasure or forego it ?
J Qnntli Eclinj witVi doniainn, — " Cn it ! "
But what if, seemingly afraid
ECHO AND THE LOVER. To bind her fate in Hymen's fetter.
She vow she means to die a maid.
Lover. Echo ! mysterious nymph, declare answer to my loving letter ?
Of what you're made, and what you are. Qn^th Echo, rather coolly. — " Let her ! "
Echo. Air!
Lover. Mid airy cliffs and places high. What if, in spite of her disdain.
Sweet Echo 1 listening love, you lie. I find my heart intwined about
Echo. You lie ! With Cupid's dear delicious chain
Lover. Thou dost resuscitate dead sounds, — So closely that 1 can't get out ?
Hark ! how my voice revives, resounds ! Quoth Echo, laughingly, — " Get out !"
Echo. Zounds !
Lover. 1 '11 question thee before 1 go, — But if some maid with beauty blest.
Come, answer me more apropos I As pure and fair as Heaven can make her.
Echo. Poh ! poh ! Vfül share my labor and my rest
Lover. Tell me, fair n3anph, if e'er you saw TiB envious Death shall overtake her ?
So sweet a girl as Phoebe Shaw. Quoth Echo (sotto voce), — " Take her ! "
Echo. Pshaw ! 1°"" ctodprev saxb.
Lover. Say, what wUl turn that frisking coney *
Into the toils of matrimony ? NOCTURNAL SKETCH.
Echo. Money !
Lover. Has Phoebe not a heavenly brow ? blank verse in rhvme.
Is not her bosom white as snow ? Even is come ; and from the dark Park, hark.
Echo. Ass ! No I The signal of the setting sun — one gun !
Lover. Her eyes ! was ever such a pair ? And six is sounding from the chime, prime time
Are the stars brighter than they are ? To go and see the Drury-Lane Dane slain, —
Echo. They are ! Or hear Othello's jealous doubt spout out, —
Lover. Echo, thou liest, but can't deceive me. Or Macbeth raving at that shade-made blade.
Echo. Leave me I Denying to his frantic clutch much touch ;
Lover. But come, thou saucy, pert romancer. Or else to see Ducrow with wide stride ride
Who is as fair as Phcebe ? Answer ! Four horses as no other man can span ;
Ekho. Ann, sir. Or in the small Olympic pit sit split
Anonvmous. Laughing at Liston, while you quiz his phiz.
"I . r
1
U - • td
HUMOROUS POEMS.
Anon Night comes, and with her wings bring.<
things
Such as, with his poetic tongue. Young sung ;
The gas upblazes with its bright white light,
And paralytic watchmen prowl, howl, growl
About the streets, and take up Pail-Mall Sal,
Who, hasting to her nightly jobs, robs fobs.
Now thieves to enter for your cash, smash, crash.
Past drowsy Charley, in a deep sleep, creep.
But, frightened by Policeman B. 3, flee.
And while they 're going, whisper low, " No go ! "
Now puss, when folks are in their beds, treads
leads.
And sleepers, waking, grumble, ' ' Drat that cat ! "
Who in the gutter caterwauls, squalls, mauls
Some feline foe, and screams in shrill ill-will.
Now Bulls of Bashan, of a prize size, rise
In childish dreams, and with a roar gore poor
Georgy, or Charley, or Billy, willy-niUy ; —
But Nursemaid in a nightmare rest, chest-pressed,
Dreameth of one of her old flames, James Games,
And that she hears — what faith is man's ! —
Ann's banns
And his, from Reverend Mr. Rice, twice, thrice ;
White ribbons flourish, and a stout shout out.
That upward goes, shows Rose knows those bows'
woes !
Thomas Hood. ,
ODE FOR A SOCIAL MEETING;
with slight alterations by a teetotaler.
Come ! flll a fresh bumper, — for why should
we go
logwood
While the nootox stUl reddens our cups as they
flow ?
^decoction
Pour out the rich jnioca stUl bright with the sun,
dye-stuff
Till o'er the brimmed crystal the lul^s shall run.
half-ripened apples
The purple globed cluatore their life-dews have
bled;
H 'Il f h. of lead
rank poisons tvines III
For summer's laot roooo lie hid in the wises
stable-boys smoking long-nines
That were garnered by maidono who laughed
scowl howl scoff
Then aamile, and a glass, and ateast, and a ^eer.
Strychnine and whiskey, and ratsbane and beer
For ail the goed wine, ond wo 'vo noma of it here 1
In cellar, in pantry, in attic, in hall,
Down, down with the tyrant that masters us all 1
LINES WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM.
[A farmer's daughter, during the rage for albums, handed to the
author an old account-book ruled for pounds, shillings, and pence,
and requested a contribution.]
This world's a scene as dark as Styx,
Where hope is scarce worth
Our joys are borne so fleeting hence
That they are dear at
And yet to stay here most are willing.
Although they may not have
willis gavlord.
£.
S.
ä.
2
6
18
1
METRICAL FEET.
Trochee trips from long to short ;
From long to long in solemn sort
Slow Spondee stalks ; strong foot ! yet ill able
Ever to come up with dactyl trisyllable.
Iambics march from short to long ; —
With a leap and a bound the swift Anapaests
throng ;
One syllable long, with one short at each side,
Amphibrachys hastes with a stately stride ; —
First and last being long, middle short, Amphi-
macer
Strikes his thundering hoofs like a proud high¬
bred racer.
Samuel Taylor Coleridge.
Oliver Wbndbll Holmes.
SNEEZING.
What a moment, what a doubt !
All my nose is inside out, —
All my thrilling, tickling caustic.
Pyramid rhinocerostic,
Wants to sneeze and cannot do it!
How it yearns me, thrills me, stings me,
How with rapturous toiment wrings me !
Now says, "Sneeze, you fool, — get through
it."
Shee — shee — oh ! 't is most del-ishi —
Ishi — ishi — most del-ishi !
(Hang it, I shall sneeze till spring !)
Snuff is a delicious thing.
Leigh hunt.
TO MY NOSE.
Knows he that never took a pinch.
Nosey, the pleasure thence which flows?
Knows he the titillating joys
Which my nose knows ?
0 nose, I am as proud of thee
As any mountain of its snows ;
1 gaze on thee, and feel that pride
A Roman knows !
alfred a. Forrester {Alfred CrovjquiU^
[&
1016
HUMOROUS POEMS.
BELAGCHOLLY DAYS.
Chilly Dovebber with its boadigg blast
Dow cubs add stiips the beddow add the lawd,
Eved October's suddy days are past —
Add Subber's gawd !
I kdow dot what it is to which I cligg
That stirs to sogg add sorrow, yet I trust
That still I sigg, but as the liddets sigg —
Because I bust.
Dear leaves that rustle sadly 'death by feet —
By liggerigg feet — add fill by eyes with tears,
Ye bake be sad, add, oh ! it gars be greet
That ye are sear 1
The sud id sulled skies too early sigks ;
Do trees are greed but evergreeds add ferds ;
Gawd are the orioles add boboligks —
Those Robert Burds !
Add dow, farewell to roses add to birds.
To larded fields and tigkligg streablets eke ;
Farewell to all articulated words
I faid would speak^
Farewell, by cherished strolliggs od the sward.
Greed glades add forest shades, farewell to you ;
With sorrowigg heart I, wretched add forlord.
Bid you — achew 1 ! !
Anonymous
•-Bi
INDEX
OF
FIRST LINES.
PAGE I
A bai^ was sleeping.. i 81
AbouÍBeií A^bem (mayj his trib^ •) 768
Abové^tbe pltfeç the moon 926
A brace of sinnei^ for no good 953
A chieftain, to the Hlgiüands bound 839
A child sleeps uPder a rosè-bush fair 741
A cloud l&y cradle'd near the setting sun 693
A country life is sweet ! 551
Across the narrow beach we flit 483
A dew-drop came, with a spark of flame 863
A diagnosis of our history proves 1007
Adieu, adieu, my native shore , 238
A district school not far away 99
Ae fond kiss and then we sever. 283
A fair little girl sat under a tree. 103
A famous hen's my story's theme 991
Afar in the desert 1 love to ride 319
A fellow in a market-town 954
A flock of merry singing-birds 475
A flock of sheep that leisurely pass by.... 763
A footstep struck her ear 648
Again the violet of our early days. 421
A gentle knight was pricking on the plaine 827
A girl who has so many willful ways ISO
A good wife rose from her bed one mom 220
A happy bit hamè this auld world would be 117
Ah, Ben \ say how or when 907
Ah I County Guy, the hour is nigh 194
Ah, Chloiis, could I now but sit 147
Ah, how sweet It is to love ! 145
Ah I little they know of true happiness. 556
Ah ! my heart is weary waiting 419
Ah, my sweet sweeting 123
Ah, sweet Kitty Neil ! .174
Ah, then, how sweetly closed those crowded days.« 87
Ah, the world hath many a Homer 973
Ah I what is love ? It is a pretty thing 136
Ah I whence yon glare 499
Ah, yes,—the flght ? Well, messmates, well 612
A jolly fat friar loved liquor good store 946
Alas, Fra Oiacomo 883
Alas, bow light a cause may move 264
Alas I they had been friends in youth 116
Alas what pity't is that regularity 958
A life on the ocean wave 630
A lighter scarf of richer fold 81
A light is out in Italy 934
A little more toward the light 755
All daylong ^e btorm^f\ battle l^hrough thá start¬
led ^alley^wept .V ~ \ 523
All glim and soUed and brown with tan 600
All hail I thou noble land 588
All hail to the ruins, the rocks, and the shores ! 608
All in our marriage garden 83
All in the Downs the fleet was moored 235
*• All quiet along the Potomac" 524
All the world's a stage 711
PAGI
All things that are ön earth|ShaU whoAly pass 888
All thougots, all passions, all delights 162
Aloft upon an old basaltic crag 933
Along the frozen lake she comes 670
Although I enter not 132
A man there came, whence none could tell 735
Amazing, beauteous change ! 377
A mighty fortress is our God 871
A mighty hand, from an ezhaustless urn 750
A milkmaid, who poised a full pail 957
A moment then Lord Marmlon stayed 507
Among the beautiful pictures 89
Among their graven shapes 937
Among thy fancies tell me this 186
A Monk, when his rites sacerdotal were o'er 862
An ancient story I'll tell you 943
An Austrian army awfully arrayed 1013
And are ye sure the news is true ? 246
And bast thou sought thy heavenly home 279
And is the swallow gone ? 478
And is there care in heaven ? 373
And now behold your tender nurse, the air 451
And now, unveiled, the toilet stands displayed 713
And said I that my limbs were old 202
And there two nmners did the sign abide 164
And thou hast walked about 717
And wilt thou leave me thus ? 240
And ye sail walk in silk attire 155
An ezqutsite incompleteness 711
An exquisite invention this 195
A nightingale, that all day long 863
Announced by all the trumpets of the sky 489
An old farm-house with meadows wide 229
A poet loved a star 202
Appeared the princess with that merry child 172
Arches on arches ! as it were that Rome 681
Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers ? 550
Art thou weary, art thou languid 864
A ruddy drop of manly blood 112
As beautiful Kitty one morning was tripping. 187
As by the shore, at break of day 577
A sentinel angel sitting high in glory 270
A simple child 87
As into blowing roses summer dews 790
As it fell upon a day 480 -
As Memnon's marble harp renowned of old 819
A soldier of the Legion lay dying in Algiers 521
As once a Grecian maiden wove 103
A song for the plant of my own native West 458
A song to the oak, the brave old oak 454
As, rising on its purple wing 267
As ships becalmed at eve, that lay 233
As slow our ship her foamy track 237
A stranger came one night to Yussouf's tent 768
A sr allow in the spring 477
A sweet disorder in the dress 713
As when, on Carmel's sterile steep 593
1018
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
At Bannockburn the English lay 573
At early dawn I marked them in the sky 480
"A temple to friendship," ciied Laura 120
A thing of beauty is a joy forever C75
A thousand miles from land are we 483
At midnight, in his guarded tent 582
At noon, within the dusty town.. 692
At Paris it was, at the opera there 264
A traveller through a dusty road 779
At setting day and rising mom 161
At the close of the day, when the hamlet is still.... 737
Ave Maria! o'er the eai^h and sea. .* ? 413
A violet in her lovely hair 126
Awake, awake, my Lyre 772
A warrior so bold, and a virgin so bright 861
Away 1 away i through the sightless air 864
A weary weed, tossed to and fro 622
A well there is in the West country 955
A wet sheet and a flowing sea 625
A widow—she had only one 1 282
A wind came up out of the sea 408
Ay, but I know 251
Ay, tear her tattered ensign down ! 620
Bachelor's hall, what a^iuare-lookin' place It is !.. .1003
Backward,jtum baclonra^d, OjTime, Inyyour flight.. 222
Balow, myH>abe, ly sM and sleipe ! 269
Beat on, proud billows, Boreas, blow 731
Beautiful Evelyn Hope Is dead 284
Beautiful, sublime, and glorious 607
Beautiful was the night 432
Because I breathe not love to everie one 144
Before I sigh my last gasp, let me breathe .. 791
Before I trust my fate to thee 143
Behave yoursel' before folk 157
Behold, I have a weapon 877
Behold the mansion reared by dmdal Jack 1011
Behold the sea 610
Behold the young, the rosy Spring 422
Behold this ruin ! 'T was a skull 761
Believe me, if ^11 those endearing young charms... 174
Ben Battle was a soldier bolá « 964
Beneath a shivering canopy reclined 410
Beneath our consecrated elm 927
Beneath this stony roof reclined 406
Better trust all and be deceived 790
Between Nose and Eyes a strange contest arose.... 951
Between the dark and the daylight 98
Be wise to-day ;'t Is madness to defer 748
Beyond the smiling and the weeping 296
Beyond these chilling winds and gloomy skies 368
Bird of the wilderness 473
Birds, the free tenants of land, air, and ocean 470
Blessings on thee, little man 99
Blest as the immortal gods is he 184
Blossom of the almond-trees 457
Blow, blow, thou winter wind 316
Blue gulf all around us 573
Bobolink ! that in the meadow 475
Bonnie wee thing ! cannie wee thing 123
Bonny Eilmeny gaed up the glen 837
Break, break, break 315
Break, Fantasy, from thy cave of cloud 819
Breathes there the man with soul so dead 563
Buried to-day 272
Burly, dozing humble-bee ! 484
But chief-surpassing all—a cuckoo clock 717
But Enoch yearned to see her face again 223
But Fortune, like some others of her sex 777
But happy they 1 the happiest of their kind 214
But I remember, when the fight wm done 506 |
But look 1 o'er the fall see the angler stand 669 |
But now our quacks are gamesters 783
But where to find that happiest spot below. 229
But who the melodies of morn can tell ?. 409
" But why do you go ?" said the lady 217
By broad Potomac's silent shore 928
By Nebo's lonely mountain 383
By the flow of the inland river. 533
By the rude bridge that arched the flood 589
By the wayside, on a mossy stone 323
. 290
. 414
. 153
. 628
. 992
. 76
. 749
. 662
.1016
. 192
, 359
117^
Clear and cool, clear and cool 448
Clear, placid Leman ! thy contrasted lake 685
Clear the brown path to meet bis coulter's gleam.. 551
Cleon hath a million acres 732
Clime of the unforçotten brave ! 581
Cling to thy home I if there the meanest shed 225
Close his eyes ; his work is done ! 531
Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise 58S
Come a little nearer, doctor 541
Come, all ye Jolly shepherds 163
Come as artist, come as guest 925
Come, brother, turn with me from pining thought. 3<Ä
Come, dear children, let us away 827
Come, dear old comrade, you and 1 112
Come ! fill a fresh bumper, for why should we go. .1015
Come from my first, ay, come Î 920
Come, gentle sleep, attend thy votary's prayer. 7GI
Come here, come here, and dwell 835
Come hither, Evan Cameron 877
Come, hoist the sail, the fast let go ! 666
Come In the evening, or come in the morning 152
Come into the garden, Maud 152
Come, let us plant the apple-tree 457
Come, listen to me, you gallants so free 638
Come live with me, and be my love 157
Come, now a roundel, and a fairy song 835
Come on, sir : here's the place 445
Come, O thou Traveller unknown 371
Come over, come over 153
Come, rest in this bosom 185 -
Come, see the Dolphin's anchor forged 554
Come, Sleep, and with thy sweet deceiving. 761
Come, Sleep, O Sleep, the certain knot of peace.... 762
Come then, my friend I my genius ! come along 911
Come to me, dearest 247
Come to me, O my Mother ! 223
Come to these scenes of peace 403
Comrades, leave me here a little 254
Cooks who »d roast a sucking pig, 1013
Could I pass those lounging sentries 922
Could ye come back to me, Douglas. Douglas 289
Cromwell, I did not think to shed a tear. 321
Cromwell, our chief of men 909
Cupid and my Campaspe played 186
Cursed be the verse, how well soe'er it flow. 781
Cyriack, this three years' day. 735
593
645
860
Calm is the mom without a sound
Care-charmer Sleep, son of the sable night.
Ca' the yowes to the knowes
Cease, rude Boreas, blustering railer
Charmer, on a given straight line
Cheeks as soft as July peaches
Chicken-skin, delicate, white
Child of the later days !
Chilly Dovebber with its boadigg blast
Chloe, we must not always be in heaven...
Christ ! I am Christ's I and let the name....
Christmas is here
Dark as the clouds of even
Dark fell the night, the watch was set.
Darkness is thinning.
e-
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
1019
-a
Daughter of God I that sitt'st on high 534
Day dawned;—within a curtained room 741
Day in melting purple dying 245
Day iß dying! Float» O song .• 411
Day set on Norham's castled steep 676
Day stars ! that ope your frownless eyes 459
Dead ! one of them shot by the sea 283
Dear Chloe» while the busy crowd 226
Dear friend» whose presence in the house 388
Dear hearts, you were waiting a year ago 277
Dear Ned, no doubt you 'II be surprised 201
Deep in the wave is a coral grove 624
Der Noble Ritter Hugo 1000
Deserted by the waning moon 627
Did you hear of the Widow Halene» Ohone ! 1003
Die down, O dismal day, and let me live 419
Dies irse» dies illai .0
Dip down upon the northern shore. 418
Does the road wind up-hlll all the way Y 363
Down deep in a hollow so damp 694
Down, down, Ellen, my little one 776
Down swept the chill wind from the mountain
Down the dimpled greensward dancing. 85
Down to the wharves, as the sim goes down 818
Dow'sFlat. That *B its name 996
Do you ask what the birds say ? 474
Drink to me only with thine eyes 125
Drunk and senseless in his place 897
Drop, drop, slow tears ; 360
Duncan Gray cam' here to woo 196
Each day, when the glow of sunset 281
Earl Gawain wooed the Lady Barbara 163
Early on a sunny morning 169
Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us 424
Earth has not anything to show more fair 678
Earth with its dark and dreadful ills 391
Echo! mysterious nymph,declare 1014
E'en such is time ; which takes on trust 745
England, with all thy faults, I love thee still 575
Ensanguined man 783
Erratic Soul of some great Purpose, doomed 863
Eternal spirit of the chainless mind 703
. Ethereal minstrel ! pilgrim of the sky ! 475
Even is come ; and from the dark Park, hark 1014
Ever let the Fancy roam 819
Every day brings a ship 746
Every one, by Instinct taught ©4
Faintly as tolls the evening chime 665
Fair daffodils, we weep to see 464
Fair Greece ! sad relic of departed worth ! 581
Fair insect, that, with thread-like legs 487
Fair lady, when you see the grace 125
Fair pledges of a fruitful tree 456
Fair Portia's counterfeit ? 122
Fair ship that from the Italian shore 290
Fair stood the wind for France 502
False diamond set in flint ! 166
False world, thou ly'st ; thou canst not lend 743
Fare thee well ! and if forever 238
Farewell, a long farewell, to all my greatness 1 321
Farewell ! but whenever you welcome the hour.... 240
"Farewell! farewell!" is often heard 233
Farewell, farewell to thee, Araby's daughter ! 294
Farewell ! if ever fondest prayer 238
Farewell, life ! my senses swim 327
Farewell rewards and fairies ! 847
Farewell ! thou art too dear for my possessing 239
Farewell, .thou busy world, and may 72^1
Farewell to Lochaber, and farewell, my Jean 237
Father of all ! in every age 870
Father ! thy wonders do not singly stand 368
Fear no more the heat o' the sun 301
Fear not, O little flock 1 the foe 519
First time he kissed me, he but only kissed 190
Five years have past ; five summers 403
Fled now the sullen murmur of the north 553
Flowers are fresh, and bushes green 261
Flowers to the fair : to you these flowers I bring.... 128
Flow gently, sweet Afton, among thy green braes.. 447
Flung to the heedless winds 865
"Fly to the desert, fly with me" 151
For aught that ever I could read 250
For close designs and crooked councils fit 908
For England when with favoring gale 627
Forever with the Lord 389
Forget thee ? If to dream by night 161
For many, many days together 883
For Scotland's and for freedom's right 578
For why, who writes such histories as these 768
Fresh from the fountains of the wood 447
Friend after friend departs 114
Friends ! I came here not to talk. 572
From harmony, from heavenly harmony 775
From his brimstone bed at break of day 949
From the desert I come to thee 186
From the recesses of a lowly spirit 375
Full knee-deep lies the winter snow 753
Gamarra is a dainty steed 467
Garçons et filles, venez toujours 993
Gather ye rosebuds as ye may 754
Gay, guiltless pair 478
Genteel In personage 142
Gin a body meet a body 187
Give me more love or more disdain 144
Give me my scallop-shell of quiet 361
Give me three grains of com, mother 338
Give place, ye ladies, and begone 127
Give place, ye lovers 123
" Give us a song !" the soldiers cried 155
God makes sech nights, all white an' still 993
God might have bade the earth bring forth 466
God of the thunder ! from whose cloudy seat 372
God prosper long our noble king 635
God shield ye, heralds of the spring 421
God's love and peace be with thee Ill
Go, feel what I have felt 546
Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall stand 189
Going—the great round Sun 754
Golden hair climbed up on Grandpapa's knee 85
Go, lovely rose !. 125
Gone at last 932
Go now ! and with some daring drug 546
Good-by, proud world, I'm going home 744
Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off 294
Good morrow to thy sable beak 477
Good night ! 558
Good people all of every sort 948
Good people all, with one accord 949
Go, patter to lubbers, and swabs, do ye see 615
Go, soul, the body's guest 745
Go to thy rest, fair child 282
Gro where glory waits thee 237
Great ocean ! strongest of creation's sons 610
Green be the turf above thee 937
Green grow the rashes 0 191
Green little vaulter in the sunny grass 485
Grief hath been known to turn 891
Guvener B. is a sensible man 994
Ha \ bnllj for me^^gainlwhen my tumWor picket^Is
■.{ } 525
B-
-3
1020
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
Rail, beauteous stranger of the grove! 471
Hail, holy Light, offspring of Heaven 1 407
Hail to the Chief who in triumph advances 1 519
Hail to thee, blithe spirit ! 473
Half a league, half a league 517
Bamelin Town's in Brunswick 848
Hans Breitmann gife a barty 999
Happy insect ! ever blest 484
Happy insect, what can be 484
Happy the man, whose wish and care 225
Happy the man who. void 947
Hark ! ah, the nightingale ! 479
Hark \ hark ! the lark at heaven^s gate sings 474
Hark ! the faint bells of the sunken city 825
Harness me down with your iron bands 555
Has there any old fellow got mixed with the boys.. 978
Hast thou a charm to stay the morning star. 876
Have other lovers—say my love 194
Have you heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay.... 977
Have you not heard the poets tell. 79
Ha ! whare ye gaun, ye crawlin' ferlle ? 486
Heap on more wood ! the wind is chill 696
Hear the sledges with the bells 714
Heaven, what an age is this 734
He clasps the crag with hooked hands 483
He had no times of study, and no place 766
Heigh-ho ' daisies and buttercups 86
He is gone on the mountain. 283
He is the freeman whom the truth makes free 600
He is the happy man whose life even now. 735
He. making speedy way through spersed ayre. 828
Hence, all ye vain delights 815
Hence, loathed Melancholy 785
Hence, vain deluding joys 786
"Henri Heine"—'t is here : ; 923
Here, a sheer hulk, lies poor Tom Bowling 629
Here I come creeping, creeping everywhere 465
Here in this leafy place 529
Here is one leaf reserved for me 133
Here rests, and let no saucy knave 953
Here rests his head upon the lap of earth 307
Here's the garden she walked across 147
Here's to the maiden of bashful fifteen 131
Her hair was tawny with gold 585
Her house Is all of echo made 781
Her window opens to the bay. 241
He's gane, he's gane j 917
He that loves a rosy cheek ... 141
He that many bokes redys 767
He was In logic a great critic 945
He was of that stubborn crew 387
He who hath bent him o'er the dead 303
High walls and huge the body may confine 593
His echoing axe the settler swung 709
His learning such, no author, old or new 907
His puissant sword unto his side. 506
Home of the Percy's hlgh-bom race 677
Home they brought her warrior dead 292
Honor and shame from no condition rise 781
Ho I pretty page with the dimpled chin. 202
Horatio, thou art e'en as just a man Ill
Ho, sailor of the sea ! 616
How beautiful is the rain ! 428
How beautiful this night I the balmiest sigh 415
How calm they sleep beneath the shade 305
How dear to this heart are the scenes of my child¬
hood 100
How delicious is the winning 185
How desolate were nature 488
How does the water come down at Lodore 449
How do I love thee ? Let me count the ways 190
How fares my lord ? 650
How fine has the day been ! how bright the sun !.. 431
How fresh, O Lord, how sweet and clean 768
How happy is he bom and taught 736
How hard.when those who do not wish 969
How many a time have 1 669
How many summers, love 219
How many thousand of my poorest subjects 762
How near to good is what is fair 711
How poor, how rich, how abject, how august 776
How pure at heart and sound of head 291
How seldom, friend, a good great man inherits 739
How shall I know thee in the sphere which keeps.. 275
How sleep the brave, who sink to rest. 563
How still the morning of the hallowed day 378
How sweet it was to breathe that cooler air 530
'* How sweetly," said the trembling maid 251
How sweet the harmonies of afternoon 693
How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank I. • 775
How wonderful Is death ! 714
Husband and wife t no converse now ye hold 304
Hush, my dear, lie still and slumber 76
I am a friar of orders gray 964
I am by promise tied 655
I am dying, Egypt, dying 296
I am in Rome ! Oft as the morning ray 680
lam monarch of all I survey 738
I am undone : there is no living, none 242
I am watching for the early buds to wake 289
I arise from dreams of thee 188
1 asked an aged man with hoary hairs 748
I asked of echo, t'other day 1014
I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers 822
1 cannot eat but little meat 946
I cannot make him dead ! 278
I cannot think that thou shouldst pass away 216
I care not, though it be 131
I cUmbedtthe.dark ^row ofithe mighty Helyellyn.. 654
Icomefroin-haunt6K}f coot and hern 446
I'd been /away from her three years,—about that... 201
I do not love thee for that fair ! 126
I don'lappwove this hawld waw 1001
I don't go much on religion 999
If all the world and love were young 158
If doughty deeds my lady please 146
I bear th^ kisses, gentle maiden 131
If dumb |too lonÀ the dropping mu^ hath stayed... 910
1 feel a n'ewer li^in evei^ gale 423
If every man's internal care 757
I All this cup to one made up 129
If it be true that any beauteous thing 135
If I were told that 1 must die to-morrow. 381
If love were what the rose is 148
If sleep and death be truly one 290
If solitude hath ever led thy steps 412
If stores of dry and learned lore we gain 112
If the red slayer think he slays 746
If this fair rose offend thy sight 123
If thou must love me, let it be for naught 189
If thou khouldst e^r come jc>y choice or chancy.... 890
If thou wert by my side, mi. love 219
If thou wilt ease thine heart 803
If thou wouldstvlew fair Melrose aright 675
If to be absent were to be 242
If women could be fair and i^ever fond 790
If you're waking, pall me ektly 328
I gazed upon the glorious sky 425
I grew assured before I asked . 170
I had sworn to be a bachelor 119
I hae seen great anes and set in great ba's 227
I have a name, a little name 89
1 have a son. a little son 89
INDEX OP FIRST LINES.
1021
I have got a new-born sister. 76
I haTc had playmates 274
I have ships that went to sea
I heard the trailing garments of the night 416
I in these flowery meads would be 668
I knew by the smoke that so gracefully curled 228
1 know not that the men of old 740
I know not whence It rises 825
Llay me down to sleep 295
I leaned out of window, I smelt the white clover... 172
I lent my girl a book one day 253
I like a church ; I like a cowl 735
I like that ancient Saxon phrase 305
1*11 sing you a good old song) 959
I love, and have some cause to love, the earth 860
I love at eventide to walk alone 427
I love contemplating—apart 616
I loved him In my dawning years 972
I loved him not ; and yet, now he is gone 260
I loved thee once, I*U love no more 267
I love it, I love It ! and who shall dare 101
I love thee, love thee, Giulio ! 236
I love to hear thine earnest voice 485
I love to wander through the woodlands hoary 692
1 made a posie, while the day ran by 741
I marvelled why a simple child 1006
I met a traveller from an antique land 717
I'm in love with you, baby Louise 1 78
I'm sitting alone by the Are 199
I'm sittin' on the stile, Mary 292
I'm weaiin awa*, Jean 296
In a dirty old house lived a dirty old man 253
In a land for antiquities greatly renowned 851
In a small chamber, friendless and unseen 932
In a valley, centuries ago 863
In Broad Street building (on a winter night) 962
Indeed this very love which is my boast 189
In eddying course when leaves began to fly 865
I need not praise the sweetness of his song 937
In either hand the hastening angel caught 321
I never gave a lock of hair away ^. 189
In every village marked with little spire 707
In facile natures fancies quickly grow 781
In good King Charles's golden days 945
In heavy sleep the Caliph lay H 866
In holy might we made the vow 268
In Köln, a town of monks and bones 954
In May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes 461
In melancholic fancy 820
In moss-prankt dells which the sunbeams flatter.. .1010
In my poor mind it is most sweet to muse 86
In Sana, O, in Sana, God, the Lord 652
In slumbers of midnight the sailor-boy lay 614
In summer, when the days were long 160
In the ancient town of Bruges 716
In the bam, the tenant cock 408
In the days that tried our fathers 1008
In the fair gardens of celestial peace 273
In the hollow tree in the old gray tower 483
In the hour of my distress 359
In the low-raftered garret 251
In the merry month of May. • *
In their ragged regimental&^^^T'V^lL • • • • • «
In the region of clouds.. 823
In the still air the wC''-'' ^
In the valley of the Pegnitz 678
Into a ward of the whitewashed walls ."'531
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 834
In vain the cords and axes were prepared 612
I only knew she came and went 1012
Iphigeneia, when she heard her doom 873
1 praised the speech, but cannot now abide it 503
I prithee send me back my heart 146
I reckon I git your drift, gents 998
I remember, I remember 93
I reside at Table Mountain 988
I saw him kiss your cheek 186
I saw Mrn oncc before 328
I saw thee when, as twilight fell 393
I saw two clouds at moming 137
Is it the palm, the cocoa palm 455
I slept and dreamed that life was Beauty 557
I sometimes hold it half a sin 290
I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris and he 573
Is there a whim-inspired fool 917
Is there for honest poverty 341
Is there when the winds are singing 84
Is this a dagger which I see before me 882
Is this a fast,—to keep 861
I stood, one Sunday moming 334
It chanced to me upon a time to sail 579
I thought our love at full, but I did err 216
I thought to pass away before 829
It is an Ancient Mariner 854
It is done! 597
It is not beauty I demand 141
It is not growing like a tree 729
It is the miller's daughter 183
It kindles all my soul 372
It lies around us like a cloud 387
It miist be so. Plato, thou reasonest well 1 759
It's we two, it's we two for aye 213
It was a beauty that I saw... 123
It was a dreary day in Padua 886
It was a friar of orders gray 137
It was a summer evening 538
It was a time of sadness, and my heai*t 374
It was fifty years ago 935
It was many and many a year ago 285
"It was our wedding day" 218
It was the autumn of the year 250
It was the wild midnight 564
It was upon an April mom 504
I've wandered east, I've wandered west 242
I wandered by the brookside 149
I^wandered lonely as a cloud 463
I was a stricken deer, that left the herd. 790
I was in Margate last July 966
I weigh not fortune's frown or smile 731
I will go back to the great sweet mother 611
I will not have the mad Clytie 460
I will not let you say a woman's part 143
I will paint her as I see her 97
I wish my hair cut 1011
I wonder if Brougham 923
I would I were an excellent divine 362
I would not enter on my list of friends 782
I wrote some lines 976
Jaffar, the Barmecide, the good Vizier 115
Jenny kissed me when we met 98
Jingle, jingle, clear the way 670
Johannes^ Johannes! tiblcine natus 993
John Anderson, my jo, John 222
John Brown ^of Ossawatomie spake on his d^lng
day * ' ' T 599
John Dobbins was so captivated 955
John Gilpin was a citizen 959
Jorasse was In his three-and-twentieth year 651
Judge not. the workings of his brain 784
Just in the dubious point, where with the pool 669
Just in thy mould and beauteous in thy form 626
King Francis was a hearty king. 657
1022
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
a
Eissing her hair, I sat against her feet 188
Kiss me, though you make believe 188
Enows he that never took a pinch 1015
Enow*8t thou the land where bloom the citron
bowers 789
Enow ye the land where the cypress and myrtle... 451
Lady Clara Vere de Vere 267
Ijars Porsena of Clusium 565
Last night, among his fellow roughs 514
Lay him beneath his snows 929
Lead, kindly Light, amid the encircling gloom 864
Let me be your servant 546
Let me not to the marriage of true minds 203
Let no man write my epitaph 921
Let not woman e*er complain 194
Let Sporns tremble 909
Let Taylor preach, upon a morning breezy 963
Life ! I know not what thou art 803
Life may be given in many ways 980
Light as a flake of foam upon the wind 623
Light-winged smoke I Icarian bird... 691
Like as the armèd Enighte 866
Like as the damask rose you see 802
Like to the clear In highest sphere 127
Like to the falling of a star 301
Linger not long. Home is not home without thee.. 244
Listen, my children, and you shall hear 590
Lithe and long as the serpent train 456
Little EUie sits alone 102
Little Gretchen, little Gretchen wanders 336
Little 1 ask ; my wants are few 733
Little inmate, full of mirth 485
Little thinks, in the fleld, yon red-cloaked clown... 405
Lochiel, Lochlel ! beware of the day. 573
Long pored St. Austin o'er the sacred page 362
Look at me with thy large brown eyes 75
Look in my face ; my name Is Might-have-been 744
Look round our world ; behold the chain of love... 405
Lord I call thy pallid angel 657
Lord of the winds ! I feel thee nigh 686
Lord ! when those glorious lighis 1 see. 376
Lo, when the Lord made north and south 128
liO 1 where she comes along with portly pace 212
Lo ! where the rosy-bosomed Hours tól
^ Loud and clear 716
Loud roared the dreadful thunder 628
Love divine, all love excelling 892
Love in my bosom like a bee 194
Love is a little golden fish 185
Love is a sickness full of woes 136
Love me little, love me long ! 141
Love not, love not ! ye hapless sons of clay 1 820
Love not me for comely grace 141
Love scorns degrees ; the low he lifteth high 136
Low-anchored cloud 691
Low biu-ns the summer afternoon 412
Low on the utmost boundary of the sight 4^
Low spake the Enight 881
Lucy is a golden girl 732
Maiden ! with the meek brown eyes 104
Maid of Athens, ere we part 234
" Make way for Liberty !" he cried 5$É
Han's home is everywhere. On ocean*s flood 77?
" Man wants but littie here below" 732
Many a green isle needs must be 441
Many a long, long year ago 988
Many a year is in its grave 291
Margarita first possessed 191
Martial, the things that do attain 226
Maud Muller, on a summer's day 158
Maxwelton banks are bonnie 155
May the Babylonish curse 54S
Meantime, the moist malignity to shun 445
Mellow the moonlight to shine is beginning 173
Men dying make their wills—but wives 981
Merrily swinging on brier and weed 476
Merry Margaret 122
Methinks it were no pain to die 295
Mica, mica, parva Stella 993
Michaël bid sound the archangel trumpet 500
Midnight past ! Not a sound of aught 265
Mid pleasures and palace though we may roam... 225
Mild offspring of a dark and sullen sire ! 461
Milton i thou shouldst be living 907
Mine be a cot beside the hlU 225
Mine eyes have seen the glory 594
Mine eyes he closed, but open left the cell. 209
Miss Flora McFUmsy 981
Moan, moan, ye dying gales ! 315
More than the soul of ancient song. 767
Most potent, grave, and reverend 145
Most sweet it is with unupUfted eyes 767
Mr. Orator Puff had two tones in his voice 962
Muses, that sing Love's sensual empiric 135
Music, when soft voices die 776
My beautiful, my beautiful! 664
My boat is on the shore 920
My curse upon thy venomed stang 952
My dear and only love, I pray 150
" My ear-rings, my ear-rings" 171
My eyes I how I love you 195
My fairest child, I have no song 97
My gentle Puck, come hither 835
My girl hath violet eyes and yellow hair 181
My God, I love thee I not because 860
My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains 316
My heart leaps up when I behold 432
My heart's in the Highlands 659
My held is like to rend, WUlie 269
My letters 1 all dead paper, mute and white 189
My life is like the summer rose 743
My little love, do you remember. 160
My loved, my honored, much-respected friend 886
My love and I for kisses played 186
My love he built me a bonnie bower. 638
My love, I have no fear that thou shouldst die 216
My mlnde to me a kingdom is 729
My mule refreshed, his bells 446
My prime of youth is but a frost of cares 745
My sister ! my sweet sister ■ if a name 223
My soul to-day 684
Mysterious night ! when our first parent knew..... 415
My time, O ye Muses, was happily spent 245
My true love hath my heart, and I have his 137
My voice is still for war 570
Nae shoon to hide her tiny taes 79
Naked on parent's knees 78
Nay I if you will not sit upon my knee 488
Nay, you wrong her, my friend 263
Nearer, my God, to thee 873
Needy laiife-grindgg|fl^ther are you going?. 952
Never 260
jMmrer wemjägyere to be. Jk 144
Çext to thee, fair and^, - 454
Night to the tlmllCgU me e^ly 416
No baby in the house, 1 ¿now 80
No more these simple flowers belong 914
No soldier, statesman 935
No splendor 'neath the sky's proud dome 126
No stir in the air, no stir in the sea. 620
No sun—no moon !
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
Kot a drum was heard« nor a funeral note
Not as you meant, O learned man
Not far advanced was morning day
Nothing but leaves ; the spirit grieves
Not In the laughing bowers
Not only we, the latest seed of Time
Not ours the vows of such as plight
Not yet, the flowers are In my path
Now came still evening on, and twilight gray ....
Now gentle sleep hath closèd up those eyes
Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger...
Now the third and fatal conflict
Now upon Syria's land of roses
Now went forth the mom
Now westward Sol had spent the richest beam....
O, a dainty plant Is the ivy green
O beauteous God I unclrcumscribed treasure
O blithe new comer I I have heard
O. breathe not his name !
O Caledonia ! stern and wild....
O. came ye ower by the Yoke-bum Ford
O. deem not they are blest alone
O, dlnna ask me gin I lo'e ye.
O, don't be sorrowful, darling !
O, do not wanton with those eyes
O'er a low couch the setting sun
O'er the glad waters of the dark blue sea
O, ever from the deeps
O faint« delicious, springtime violet !
O fairest of creation, last and best
O fairest of the rural maids
Of all men, saving Sylla the man-slayer
Of all the flowers in the mead
Of all the girls that are so smart
Of all the ships upon the blue
Of all the thoughts of God that are
Of all the torments, all the cares
Of a' the airts the wind can blaw.
O Father, let me not die young !
O first of human blessings, and supreme !
O for a lodge in some vast wilderness
O forest dells and streams I O Doriantide
O, formed by nature, and refined by art
O for one hour of youthful joy
Oft have I seen, at some cathedral door
Oft in the stilly night
O gentle, gentle summer rain
O God, methlnks, it were a happy life
O God ! though sorrow be my fate
O go not yet, my love
O, greenly and fair in the lauds of the sun
O happiness ! our being's end and aim !
O hearts that never cease to yearn
O how the thought of God attracts
O Italy, how beautiful thou art !
O, it is hard to work for God
O, it Is pleasant, with a heart at ease
O keeper of the Sacred Key
O land, of every land the best
O. lay thy hand in mine, dear !
Old Birch who taught the viU^^school....^
Old Grimes Is dead:
Old man. God bless you£Hw|j||n
Old Master Brown bro4^^H|||p«^hown
Old Tubal Cain was a
Old wine to drink !
O loss of sight, of thee T most complain
O lovely Mary Donelly, It's you I love the best !..
O, many are the poets that are sown
O Marclus, Marcius
O mare seva si forme.«
O Mary, at thy window be ! 149
O Mary, go and call the cattle home 621
O, may 1 Join the choir invisible 760
O melancholy bird, a vrinter's day 482
O mighty Csesar I dost thou lie so low 875
O Mistress mine, where are you roaming ?. 122
O mortal man, who 11 vest here by toll 831
O mother dear, Jerusalem, 358
O mother of a mighty race 587
O, my love's like the steadfast sun 219
O, my love's like a red, red rose 234
On a hill there grows a flower 124
On Alpine heights the love of God Is shed 445
O Nancy, wilt thou go with me 156
Once in the flight of ages past 308
Once more unto the breach, dear friends 503
Once more upon the waters 1 yet once more ! 563
Once on a golden afternoon 476
Once, Paumauok, when the snows had melted 470
Once Switzerland was free I 585
Once this soft turf, this rivulet's sands 534
Once upon a midnight dreary 852
Once when the days were ages 74$
One day, as I was going by 94
One day I wandered where the salt sea-tide 739
One day, nigh weary of the yrksome way 928
One eve of beauty, when the sun 713
One hue of our flag Is taken.. 1008
One more unfortunate 335
One night came on a hurricane 630
One sweetly solemn thought 375
One year ago,—a ringing voice 278
On her white breast a sparkling cross she wore.... 128
On Linden, when the sun was low 513
Only waiting till the shadows 368
On, on, my brown Arab lOlO
O no, no,—let me lie 534
On Richmond Hill there lives a lass 149
On the cross-beam under the Old South bell 472
On the eighth day of March it was, some people
say 1004
On the isle of Penikese 936
On the sea and at the Hogue 617
On thy fair bosom, silver lake 449
On what foundations stands the warrior's pride.... 909
On woodlands ruddy with autumn 535
O perfect Light, which shaid away 426
O, pour upon my soul again 817
O reader, hast thou ever stood to see 455
O, reverend sir, I do declare 995
O Rosamond, thou fair and good 113
O sacred Head, now wounded 373
O, sairly may I rue the day 974
O, saw ye bonnie Lesley 242
O, saw ye the lass wl' the bonnie blue een 149
O say, can ye seejby the dawn'pearly light.^ 592
O say, what is that thing called Light 343
O sextant of the meetln-house 1001
O singer of the field and fold 405
O sing unto my roundelay ! 289
O, snatched away in beauty's bloom ! 288
O, St. Patrick was a gentleman 1004
O swallow, swallow, flying, flying south 171
O, terribly proud was Miss MacBrlde 985
O, that last day in Lucknow fort 515
O that the chemist's magic art 789
O that those lips had language 92
O the charge of Balaklava ! 516
O the days are gone when beauty bright 262
O the gallant fisher's life 668
O then I see Queen Mab bath been with you. 836
O, the pleasant days of old 699
.. 920
.. 391
.. 648
.. 370
.. 330
.. 702
.. 213
.. 270
,., 413
.. 186
.. 422
.. 769
..451
.. 500
... 774
..465
... 367
472
921
... 575
... 639
...743
... 161
... 231
... 184
... 293
... 626
... 394
... 461
... 216
... 130
... 926
...462
... 198
...970
... 762
... 147
... 242
... 380
... 499
... 598
... 282
... 209
... 979
... 707
... 318
... 428
... 225
...365
... 235
... 459
... 736
... 272
...374
... 679
... 890
... 822
... 523
... 533
... 221
... 99G
976
.... 53T
... 118
.... 321
,... 198
... 766
.... 114
.... 993
1024
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
O the snow, the beautiful snow 334
O, those Uttel, those little blue shoes 82
O thou, great Friend to all the sons of men 389
O thou of home the guardian Lar 228
O thou vast Ocean ! 611
O unexpected stroke, worse than of death 321
O unseen spirit : now a calm divine 406
Our band is few, but true and tried 589
Our boat to the waves go free 630
Our bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had low¬
ered 529
Our Fatherland ! and wouldst thou know 778
Our good steeds snuff the evening air 518
Our hopes, Uke towering falcons 730
Our life is twofold • sleep has its own world 764
Our love is nota fading earthly flower 216
Our revels now are ended 867
Out of the bosom of the Air 440
Out of the clover and blue-eyed grass 531
Outstretched beneath the leafy shade 383
Out upon it. 1 have loved 124
Over the dumb campagna sea 683
Over the hill to the poor-house 342
Over the river they beckon to me 276
Ovef the snows 666
O, wad that my time were owre but 243
O, waly, waly up the bank 268
O water for me ! Bright water for mc ! 545
O, when't is summer weather 454
O, wherefore come ye forth 575
O whistle, and I'll come to you, my lad 156
O, why should the spirit of mortal be proud ? 302
O, will ye choose to hear the news ? 1002
O winter ! wilt thou never, never go ? 441
O World r O Life ! O Time ! 322
O ye wha are sae guld yoursel' 784
O yet we trust that somehow good - 392
O, Young Lochinvar is come out of the west 175
Pack clouds away, and welcome day 409
Pale is the February sky 62
Paris, Anchlses, and Adonis, three 903
Parrhaslus stood, gazing forgetfully 881
Passing from Italy to Greece 694
Pause not to dream of the future before us 556
Peace to all such Î 910
PhilVs is myi only joy 124*
Pib^ch of Donull Dhu 518
Piped the blackbird on the beechwood spray 88
Pity the sorrows of a poor old man 840
Piping down the valleys wild 85
Pleasing't is, O modest Moon ! 550
Poor Rose I I lift you from the street 2G6
"Praise God from whom all blessings flow" 556
Prune thou thy words 7S9
Prize thou the nightingale 479
Quivering fears, heart-tearing cares 667
Rake the embers, blow the coals 884
Rest there awhile, my bearded lance 1006
Rifleman, shoot me a fancy shot 525
Ring out wild bells, to the wild sky 752
Rise, said the Master ; come unto the feast 801
"Rockof Ages" 367
Roll on, thou ball, roll on 1012
" Room for the leper ! Room !" 701
Rudolph, professor of the headsman's 978
Sad Is our youth, for It is ever going 816
Said I not so,—that I would sin no more ? 866
Sally Salter, she was a young teacher who taught. .1006
Saviour, when in dust to thee 858
Say, from what golden quivers of the sky 4C7
Say over again, and yet once over again 189
Say there I P'r'aps 997
Say, ye that know, ye who have felt 469
Scorn not the sonnet : critic, you have frowned.... 907
Search thou the ruling passion ; there alone 779
Seated I see the two again 79
Seated one day at the organ 760
See, from this counterfeit of him. 908
See how the orient dew 430
See yon robin on the spray 475
Shall I tell you whom I love ? 140
Shall I, wasting In despair 193
Shame upon thee, savage monarch—man 782
Shame upon you, Robin 168
Shed no tear, O, shed no tear 846
She dwelt among the untrodden ways 104
She Is a winsome wee thing. 216
" She is dead !" they said to him 298
She is not fair to outward view 129
She laid it where the sunbeams fall 930
Shepherds all, and maidens fair 469
She says, " The cock crows,—hark !" 236
She shrank from all, and her silent mood 330
She stood alone amidst the April fields 322
She stood breast high amid the com 106
She walks in beauty, like the night ISO
She was a creature framed by love divine 213
She was a phantom of delight 128
Should auld acquaintance be foi^ot 118
Silent nymph, with curious eye ! 443
Simple, erect, severe, austere, sublime. 682
Since there's no helpe,—come, let us kisse and parte 239
Sing, sweet thrushes, forth and sing ! 667
Singing through the forests 980
Sir Marmaduke was a hearty knight 958
Sit down, sad soul, and count 369
Sitting all day in a silver mist... 823
Six skeins and three, six skeins and three 172
Six years had passed, and forty ere the six. 323
Sky, mountains, river, winds, lake, lightnings 767
Slayer of winter, art thou here again ?. 413
Sleep breathes at last from out thee 88
Sleep, little baby of mine 77
Sleep, love, sleep ! 763
Sleep on Î and dream of Heaven awhile ! 100
Sleep, sleep to-day, tormenting cares 389
Sleep sweetly in your humble graves 532
Slowly England's sun was setting. 180
Slumber, Sleep,—they were two brothers. 761
Small service Is true service while It lasts 89
So all day long the noise of battle rolled 642
So every spirit, as It is most pure. 730
So fallen ! so lost I the light withdrawn 929
Softly woo away her breath 200
Soldier, rest ! thy warfare o'er 530
So many words, so much to do 291
Somebody's courting somebody 173
Some murmur when their sky is clear 388
Some of their chiefs were pxinees of the land 909
Some reckon theirM|^toj»ar8 742
Some say 187
Some wit of 973
So much to do :
So spake the Son, changed 500
So the truth's out. I'll grasp it like a snake 258
Sound all to arms ! 501
Speak, O man, less recent ! Fragmentary fossil !... 991
Spirit that breathes through my lattice 411
Spring it is cheery 322
Spring, the sweet spring 422
e
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
1025
Spring with the nameless pathos in the air. 422
Stabat mater dolorosa 355
St. Âgnes' Eve,—ah, bitter chill it was 176
Stand here, by my side and turn, I pray 440
Stand I the ground's your own, my braves ! 590
^tar of the mead ' sweet daughter of the day 46;i
Star that bringest home the bee 412
Stay. Jailer, stay and hear my woe ! 339
Steady, boys, steady î 526
Steer hither, steer your winged pines 825
Still to be neat, still to be drest 713
Strong Son of God, immortal love 393
Stop, mortal ' here thy brother lies 914
Straightway Virginias ied the maid 873
Summer has gone 663
Summer joys are o'er 434
Sweet and low, sweet and low 81
Sweet are the thoughts that savor of content 731
Sweeet Auburn ' loveliest village of the plain 686
Sweet, be not proud of those two eyes 133
Sweet bird ! that slng'st away the early hours 479
Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright 301
Sweeter and sweeter.. 104
Sweet Highland Girl, a very shower 105
Sweet Is the pleasure ST)?
Sweet Is the voice that calls 433
Sweetly breathing vernal air. 422
Sweet stream that winds through yonder glade.... 106
Swiftly walkover the western wave 414
Sword, on my left side gleaming 519
Take back into thy bosom, earth 922
Take one example to our purpose quite 918
Take. O, take those lips away 253
Tears, idle tears, I know not what they mean 315
Tell me^ot in mournful numbers 7C9
Tell me not. sweet, I am unkinde 235
Tell me where is fancy bred 125
Tell me, ye wingèd winds 3C9
Thank Heaven I the crisis 299
That each who seems a separate whole 290
That I love thee, charming maid 190
That which hath made them drunk 832
That whl<Hi her slender waist confined 125
The angel of the flowers, one day 464
The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold. 501
The autumn is old 433
The Autumn time is with us 434
The baby sits in her cradle 433
The baby wept 282
The bard has sung, God never formed a soul 261
The barge she sat in, like a burnished throne 712
The bell strikes one; we take no note of time 747
The black-haired gaunt Paulinus 389
The blessed damozel leaned out 824
The blessed morn has come again 440
The boy stood on the burning deck 614
The breaking waves dashed high. 587
The brilliant black eye 131
The bubbling brook doth leap when I come by 403
The busy larke, messager of daye. 418
The careful hen 470
The castle crag of Brachenfels 446
The cold winds swept the mountain's height 86
The conscious water saw its God and blushed 362
The country ways are full of mire 210
The cunning band that carved this face 749
The curfew tolls the knell of parting day 305
The day had been a calm and sunny day 438
The day is cold, and dark, and dreary 344
The day returns, my bosom burns 218
The devil aits in easy-chair. 951
The dreamy rhymer's measured snore. 923
The dule's i' this bonnet o' mine 196
The dusky night rid^ down the sky 662
The earth goes on, the earth glittering in gold 307
The elder folk shook hands at last 378
The fairest action of oar human Ufe 282
The fallen cause still waits 596
The farmer sat in his easy chair 229
The farmer's wife sat at the door 282
The fire of love in youthful blood 202
The first time that the sun rose on thine oath 190
The forward violet thus did I chide 123
The fountains mingle with the river 188
The Frost looked forth, one still, clear night 96
The frugal snail, with forecast of repose 487
The glories of our bii-th and state 301
The gorse is yellow on the heath 478
The grass is green on Bunker Hill 598
The gray sea and the long black land 170
The groves were God's first temples 452
The half-seen memories of childish days Ill
The harp that one© through Tara's halls 577
The heart of man, walk it which way it will 229
The heath this night must be my bed.. 234
The hollow winds begin to blow. 427
The island lies nine leagues away 691
The Isles of Greece, the Isles oí Greece! 580
The Jackdaw sat on the Cardinal's chair 965
The jester shook his hood and bells 743
The keener tempests rise, and fuming dun 439
The kiss, dear maid, thy Up has left....... 2Si
The knight had ridden down from Wenslcy Moor.. 660
The laird o' Cockpen he's proud and he 's great.... 200
The lark sings for joy in her own loved land. 483
The latter rain,—it falls in anxious haste 433
The lion is the desert's king 467
The little brown squirrel hops in the com 1008
The little gate was reached at last. 170
The maid, and thereby hangs a tale 211
The maid who binds her warrior's sash 563
The melancholy days are come 466
The merry brown hares came leaping 330
The merry, merry lark was up and singing 280
The midges dance aboon the burn 411
The might of one fair face sublimes my love. 135
The mistletoe bung in the castle haU 891
The moon It shines 78
The more we live, more brief appear. 741
The Moth's kiss, first ! 188
The moving accident is not my trade 661
The muse disgusted at an age and clime 587
The Muse's fairest light in no dark time 906
Then before all they stand, the holy vow. 2:2
Then hear me, bounteous Heaven ?.... 2C9
Then took the generous host 464
The night has a thousand eyes 135
The night is late, the bouse is still 277
The night was dark, though sometimes a faint star 409
The night was winter in his roughest mood......... 437
The ocean at the bidding of the moon 631
The old mayor climbed the belfry tower 286
The path by which we twain did go 113
The play is done,—the curtain drops 344
The poetry of earth is never dead 485
The point of honor has been deemed of use. 780
The Queen looked up, and said 754
The rain has ceased, and in my room 430
There are a number of us creep 751
There are gains for all our losses 106
There are no colors In the fairest sky 908
There are some hearts like wells. 739
There are who say the lover's heart 20Ö
102G
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
There came a man, making his hasty moan 700
There came to the beach a poor exile of Erin 578
There in the fane a beauteous creature stands 776
There is a dungeon in whose dim drear light 222
There Is a flower, a little flower 463
There is a garden in her face 123
There is a niland on a river lying 10UÜ
Th' Is no force, however great 992
TL - was an ape, In the days that were earlier 991
The summer and autumn had been so wet 879
The summer sun Is falling soft 880
The summer sun was sinking 840
The sunburnt mowers are in the swath 552
The sun comes up and the sun goes down 769
The sun has gane down o'er the lofty Bod Lomond. 148
The sun is warm, the sky is clear 317
The sunlight fills the trembling air 460
The sunlight glitters keen and bright COO
The sun shines bright in our old Kentucky home... 238
The sun sinks softly to his evening post 1008
The sun that brief December day 436
The tattoo beats ; the lights are gone 522
The thoughts are stiange that crowd into my brain 449
The time hath laid his mantle by 421
The tree of deepest root is found 756
The twilight hours, like birds, flew by 610
The wanton troopers, riding by 259
The waters purled, the waters swelled 825
The weary night is o'er at last 518
The weather leach of the topsail shivers 619
The wind blew wide the casement 81
The wind it blew, and the ship it flew &16
The winds transferred into the friendly sky 414
The winter being over 420
The wisest of the wise 755
The word of the Lord by night 597
The world goes up and the world goes down 214
The world is too much with us 403
The world is very evil 351
The world's a bubble, and the life of mau 320
The Yankee boy before he's sent to school 979
They are all gone Into the world of light 274
They are dying ! they are dying î 579
They come I the merry summer months 423
They course the glass, and let It take no rest 712
The year stood at its equinox 132
They'll talk of him for years to come 913
They told me I was heir : I turned in haste 770
They tell me I am shrewd with other men 116
They*ve got a bran new organ. Sue 905
Think not I love him, though I ask for him 144
This figure, that thou here see'st put 905
This book is all that's left me now 100
This is the forest primeval 453
This is the ship of pearl which poets feign 625
This life, and all that it contains 7C6
This only grant me that my means may lie 700
This region, surely. Is not of the earth 683
This way the noise was, If mine ear be true 829
This world's a scene as dark as Styx 1015
Those evening bells ' those evening bells ! 710
Thou blossom, bright with autumn dew 465
Though the mills of God grind slowly 747
Thought is deeper than all speech 731
Though when other maids stand by 156
Thou Grace Divine, encircling all 092
Thou happy, happy elf ' 93
Thou hast sworn by thy God, my Jeanie 203
Thou hidden love of God, whose height 090
Thou large-brained woman.... 923
Thou lingering star, W'th lessening ray 288
Thou little bird, thou dweller by the sea 482
Thou still unravished bride of quietness 718
Thou who dost dwell alone 3.79
Thou who, when fears attack 990
Thou whose sweet youth 364
Three flsbers went sailing out into the west 621
Three poets, in three distant ages born 907
Three students were travelling over the Rhine 142
Three years she grew In sun and shower 103
Through her forced, abnormal quiet 159
Thus, then, I steer my bark 74S
Thy braes were bonny, Yarrow stream 288
Thy error, Fremont 935
Tiger! tiger! burning bright 463
Time has a magic wand 972
'Tis a dozen or so of years ago 1005
'Tis a fearful night in the winter time 440
'Tis an old dial dark with many a stain 184
'Tis a little thing "0
'Tis beauty truly blent, whose red and white 122
'Tis believed that this harp 365
'Tis midnight's holy hour 752
•Tis morning : and the sun with ruddy orb 435
'Tis much immortal beauty to admire 730
'Tis night, when Meditation bids us feci 415
'Tis past,—the sultry tyrant of the South 430
'Tis sweet to hear I66
"lis the last rose of summer 465
'Tis the middle watch of a summer's night 840
'Tis time this heart should be unmoved 250
To bear, to nurse, to rear 213
To be, or not to be,—that is the question 297
To claim the Arctic came the sun 409
To draw no envy, Shakespeare, on thy name 905
To heaven approached a Sufi saint 365.
To him who, in the love of Nature, holds 3it7
Toiling in the naked fields' 557
Toil on ! toil on ! ye ephemeral train 623
Toll for the brave 612
To make my lady's obsequies SCO
To make this condiment your pviet beg.s 1013
To-morrow's action ! can that hoary wisdom 754
Toolate, alas! I must confess 160
Too late I stayed,—forgive the crime Î 117
To sea I to sea ! the calm is o'er 630
T other day, as I was twining 195
To the sounds of timbrels sweet 212
Toussaint ! the most unhappy man of men 921
To weary hearts, to mourning homos 275
To write a verse or two is all the praise 363
To you, my purse, and to noon other wight 204
Tread softly,—bow the head 811
Tres Philosophi deTusculo 991
Trochee trips from long to short 1015
True bard and simple,—as the race 920
True genius, but true woman ! dost deny 923
Turn, Fortune, turn thy wheel 777
Turn, gentle Hermit of the dale 138
Turn, turn, for my cheeks they bum 168
'Twasa jolly old pedagogue, long ago 703
'Twas at the royal feast, for Persia won 771
"Twas in heaven pronounced, and 'twas muttered
In hell 778
'Twas ever thus from childhood's hour 990
'Twas In the prime of summer time 895
'Twas mom, and beautiful the mountain's brow... 447
'Twas on the shores that round our coast 96S
'Twas the night before Christmas 96
Two barks met on the deep mid-sea 115
Two hands upon the breast 295
Two little feet, so small that both may nestle 77
Two mites, two drops, yet all her house and land.. 362
1 Two of far nobler shape, erect and tall 711
3
INDEX OP riRST LINES.
Two pilgrims from the distant plain 150
Two went to pray ? O, rather say S62
Tying her bonnet under her chin 190
Under a spreading chestnut-tree 550
Under my window, under my window 85
Underneath this marble hearse 907
Unfading Hope ! when life's last embers burn 743
Untremulous in the river clear 429
Up from the meadows rich with corn 596
Up from the South at break of day 594
Upon ane stormy Sunday 187
Upon a roch yet uncreate 991
Upon the white sea-sand 333
Up Î quiithy bower 408
Up springs the lark 469
Up the airy mountain 836
Up the dale and down the bourne 435
Up the streets of Aberdeen 536
Venl, Creator Spiritus 357
Veni, Sánete Spiritus 356
Victor in poesy ! Victor in romance u 926
Vital spark of heavenly flame Í 365
Waken, lords and ladies gay 658
Warsaw's last champion from her height surveyed 583
Wave after wave of greenness rolling down 692
We are two travellers. Roger and 1 547
Weehawken ! In thy mountain scenery yet 685
Wee, modest, crlmson-tippèd flower 462
Weep ye no more, sad fountains ! 762
Wee, sleekit, cow'rin, tlm'rous beastie 468
Wee Willie Winkle rins through the town 83
We have been friends together 116
We knew it would rain, for all the morn 427
We know not what it is, dear, this sleep so deep.... 297
Welcome, maids of honor; 461
Welcome, welcome, do 1 sing 126
We live In deeds, not years 742
We meet 'neath the sounding rafter 898
We parted in silence, we paited by night 240
We pledged our hearts, my love and 1 192
Were I as base as Is the lowly plain 135
Werther had a love for Charlotte 972
We sat by the fisher's cottage 691
We scatter seeds with careless hand 739
We see not, know not, all our way 375
We stood upon the ragged rocks 412
We the fairies blithe and antic 835
We were crowded in the cabin 627
We were not many,—we who stood 523
We wreathed about our darling's head 280
Whan that Aprille with hise shourès soote 695
What a moment, what a doubt : 1015
What alls this heart o' mine 245
What change has made the pastures sweet 167
What constitutes a state ? 599
What does little birdie say 80
What hid'st thou in thy treasure caves and cells ?.. 619
What hope is here for modern rhyme 291
What is death ? 'Tis to be free 744
What is it fades and flickers m the fire 227
What is the little one thinking about ? 75
What needs my Shakespeare for his honored bones. 906
What's fame ?—a fancied life in others' breath 780
What shall I do with all the days and hours 244
What's hallowed ground? Has earth a clod 788
What's this dull town to me ? 154
What was he doing, the great God Pan ? 865
What, was It a dream ? am I all alone 527
Wheel me into the sunshine ■ 325
When a'ither baimies are hushed to their hame.... 91
Whenas in silks my Julia goes 126
When Britain first, at Heaven's command 576
Whence comes my love ? O heart, disclose 268
When chapman billies leave the street 847
When chili November's surly blast 332
When Delia on the plain appears 137
When descends on the Atlantic
When Eve brought woe
When falls the soldier brave ^
When first X saw sweet Peggy 197
When flrst thou earnest, gentle, shy, and fond 83
When Freedom, from her mountain height 592
When God at flrst made man 778
When I am dead, no pageant train 903
When Icicles hang by the wall 439
When I consider how my light is spent 366
When I do count the clock that tells the time 753
When In the chronicle of wasted time 122
When in the storm on Albion's coast 627
When Israel, of the Lord beloved 372
When I think on the happy days 247
When Learning's triumph o'er her barbarous foes . 905
When leaves grow sere all things take sombre hue. 434
When Lesbia first 1 saw so heavenly fair 713
When lovely woman stoops to folly 336
When Love with unconfined wings 146
When maidens such as Hester die 2S5
When mighty roast beef was the Englishman's food 57^
When Music, heavenly maid, was young 773
When o'er the mountain steeps 410
When on my bed the moonlight falls 2S5
When shall we all meet again 322
When stricken by the freezing blast 928
When Summer o'er hernatlve hills 247
When that my mood is sad and in the noise 448
When the black-lettered list to the gods was pre¬
sented 220
When the British warrior queen 572
When the hounds of spring 419
When the hours of day are numbered 273
When the humid shadows hover 97
When the lamp is shattered 262
When the lessons and tasks are all ended 230
When the sheep are in the fauld 249
When to the sessions of sweet silent thought 115
When troubled in spirit, when weary of life 665
When your beauty appears 185
Where are the men who went forth in the morning 5.T0
Where are the swallows fled ? 318
Where are you going, my pretty maid 958
Whereas, on certain boughs and sprays 992
Where did you come from, baby dear ? 78
Where is the grave of Sir Arthur O'Kellyn ? 5^78
Where the remote Bermudas ride 623
Whether with reason or with instinct blest 781
Which is the wind that brings the cold ? 451
Which 1 wish to remark, and my language is plain. 987
Which shall It be ? which shall It be ? 230
While on the cliff with calm delight she kneels 81
While sauntering through the crowded street 760
Whilom by silver Thames's gentle stream 946
Whither, midst falling dew 481
Whoe'er she be 192
Who has not dreamed a world of bliss 410
Who has not heard of the Vale of Cashmere 452
Who would care to pass his life 974
Why came the rose ? Because the sun is shining... 143
Why, lovely charmer, tell me why 146
Why sits she thus in solitude ? 790
Why scvpale an|il wan, foqd lover ? 363
Why thus longing, thus forever sighing 392
&
1028
INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
Widow Machree, it's no wonder you frown
Wild rose of Alloway 1 my chanks
Willie, fold your little hands
With awful walls, far glooming, that possessed....
With deep affection
With fingers weary and worn
With how sad steps, O moon ! thou climb'st
Within the navel of this hideous wood
Within these walls of Arcadie
Within the sober realm of leafless trees
With silent awe I hall the sacred mom
With sorrow and heart's distress
Woodman, spare that tree !
Wordsworth upon Helvellyn ! let the cloud
Word was brought to the Danish king
Wouldst thou hear what man can say
Would ye be taught, ye feathered throng
Would you know why I summoned you together ?..
Year after year unto her feet
Years, years ago, ere yet my dreams...
Ye banks and braes o' bonnle Doon
Ye little snails
Ye mariners of England 629
Ye powers who rule the tongue 780
Ves! bear them to their rest 763
" Yes," I answered you last night 144
Ye sons of freedom, wake to glory ! 584
Ye who would have your features florid. 545
Yield to me now, for I am weak 371
"You are old, Father William," the young man
cried 545
You bells in the steeple lOi
You charm when you talk 914
" You have heard," said a youth 156
You know we French stormed Ratlsbon 513
You lay a wreath on murdered Lincoln's bier 9C1
You meaner beauties of the night 1C4
You must wake and call me early SCT
Young Ben he was a nice young man 9C3
" Young, gay, and fortunate Î" Each yields a theme. ICG
Young Rory O'More courted Kathleen Bawn 19G
Your fav'rite picture rises up before me 81
Your horse is faint, my king, my lord 5CÎ
Your wedding-ring wears thin, dear wife 2Cl
You see pebble stone ? It's a thing I bought. ..10Û3
200
913
516
699
715
337
249
830
m
TIO
410
321
101
914
293
907
904
875
174
971
249
486
woo
voo
l->00