AMERICAN POETRY . ' s -.' * BBHEi rED-BY-W-M-ROSSETTl LIBRARY s * $$-?& 'SSyi *'^ ' sQr5g^r? 5|H ill ' jfi^' '.^wri-- ._Jt. '-^" ~! AMERICAN POEMS. SELECTED AND EDITED WILLIAM MICHAEL ROSSETTI. Nature and the Soul expressed, America and Freedom expressed. WHITMAN. WARD, LOCK AND CO., LONDON : WARWICK HOUSE, SALISBURY SQUARE, E.C. NEW YORK : BOND STREET. DEDICATED WITH HOMAGE AND I. O V E JO WALT WHIT MAN > CONTENTS. PREFACE ' . AUTHOR UNKNOWN New England's Annoyances . ANNE BRADSTREET Elegy on a Grandchild To her Husband, written in the Piospect ol Death WASHINGTON ALLSTON Rosalie . . . JOHN PIERPONT For the Charlestown Centennial Celebration The Exile at Rest , NATHANIEL LANGDON FROTHINGHAM The Four Halcyon Points of the Year . WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT To a Waterfowl T he Prairies . PAGE xix 10 II viii CONTEXTS. PAGE WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT continued. Thanatopsis . . . ... . 15 The Antiquity of Freedom . . . . 17 The Winds ... 19 O Mother of a Mighty Race . . . . 21 The Rivulet . . . . . . 22 To the Evening Wind . . .25 Hymn of the City . . . 26 The Maiden's Sorrow ', . . . f , 27 October . . . . 28 CAROLINE OILMAN Music on the Canal . , * . . 29 To the Ursulines , " - . . 30 FITZ-GREENE HALLECK Marco Bozzaris . , . . . . 31 A Poet's Daughter . , ', . , 34 To Louis Gaylord Clark 37 JAMES GATES PERCIVAL New England . - . . . , ., 40 Night .-'..._, . , 41 Sonnet ...., 42 SAMUEL GRISWOLD GOODRICH- Lake Superior . c '-'' 4 2 JOHN GARDNER CALKINS BRAINARD Stanzas . , r i , /j4 ROBERT C. SANDS Dream of the Princess Pa.iantzin , .-. 45 GEORGE W. DOANE Malleus Domini .. . . , , " .. $& RALPH WALDO EMERSON- The Apology _. _ . , & The Humble Bee co ' **y Each and All . c .61 g CONTENTS. rx PAGE RALPH WAI.DO EMKRSON continued. Dirge ...... 62 The World-Soul ..... 64 Ilamatreya ...... 67 Wood-Notes, T. . . . , 69 n. 73 Astrsea ... .83 Ode to Beauty .... 84 To Eva ... 87 Erob ....... 88 Hermione r Bacchus - , , . . 90 Saadi ...... 92 Blight . . 97 May-day . .... 98 Boston Hymn . , , . 116 Una ..... .118 Solution . , . . , . 119 Song of Natu-" , . 121 Two Rivers . . ... 124 Terminus . . . . . .124 The Past . , . , . .126 Compensation . 126 WILLIAM GILMORF. SIMMS The Lost Pleiad . , 127 GEORGE LUNT Pilgrim Song . . . . r 129 NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS The Confessional . ' . . , . 130 THEODORE S. FAY Song 133 THOMAS WARD To an Infant in Heaven . . . .134 CONTENTS. WILLIAM D. GALLAGHER The Invalid . . ' , JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER Cassandra Southwick , My Playmate Telling the Bees The Gift of Tritemius , Abraham Davenport . The Ranger . . , The River Path Forgiveness . . - , Gone ... Autumn Thoughts . . Questions of Life . . Noon . . , A Memorial M. A. C. The Reformer , , Clerical Oppressors . , The Christian Slave . , The Pastoral Letter . Ichabod . ' , , The Peace of Europe The Rendition . . What of the Day? . Laus Deo . OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES The Philosopher to his Love The Last Reader . , Stanzas . . , ALBERT PIKE To Somnus . . To Spring . . , S. MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI Orpheus . . Encouragement . To , with Sub Rosa Crux 135 137 144 146 15' 156 157 158 1 60 1 60 165 167 169 172 174 176 179 1 80 182 183 184 1 86 187 1 88 189 191 193 193 194 194 CONTENTS. u PACK JONES VERY Enoch . ... , .19^ The Trees of Life ..... iq ALFRED B. STREET A Forest Walk ... . 197 An American Forest in Spring 4 , 199 EDGAR ALLAN FOE The Haunted Palace ..... 202 Annabel Lee , 203 The City in the Sea . . 205 To Zante . , , . 206 Dreamland ...... 207 Israfel , . . , , . 208 For Annie ...,,. 210 To One in Paradise .... 213 The Sleeper . . . . . .214 A Dream within a Dream . .. . 215 To F .' 216 Ulalume ..... 216 To Helen . . . , , 219 The Bells . . . . . . 220 The Raven ...... 223 CHRISTOPHER PEASE CRANCH Stanzas .... . 228 HARRIET ELIZABETH BEECHER STOWE- Only a Year ..... . 229 WILLIAM JEWETT PABODIE On the Death of a Friend .... 231 EPES SARGENT A Calm . . . , . 232 FRANCES SARGENT OSGOOD The Soul's Lament for Home . , 232 Lianca ..... 233 xn CONTENTS. ANNE CHARLOTTE LYNCH To the Saviour Faith . . . Love .... The Lake and Star . Bones in the Desert . E. SPENCER MILLER The Wind .... The Bluebeard Chambers of the Heart ARTHUR CLEVELAND COXE- March . WILLIAM LORD The Brook 234 235 235 236 236 238 239 241 WILLIAM WALLACE Greenwood Cemetery WALT WHITMAN A Song Envy Parting Friends Salut au Monde Song of the Broad-Axe Crossing Brooklyn Ferry There was a Child went forth To a Foiled European Revolutionnairc France To You Years of the Modem . To think of Time A Dream . .. The Last Invocation . Sea-Shore Memories . Tears Aboard at a Ship's Helm 244 247 248 248 249 261 273 281 283 285 286 289 290 297 298 298 305 306 CONTENTS. xiii PAGE WALT WHITMAN continued. Who learns my Lesson complete ? . . . 307 To One shortly to Die . . . . 308 Beat ! beat ! Drums . . . . . 309 Rise, O Days ! from your fathomless Deeps . 310 A Letter from Camp . . . . . 312 Vigil on the Field . . . . . 314 A March in the Ranks . . . . 316 A Sight in Camp . . . . . - 317 Manhattan Faces . . . . 318 Reconciliation ..... 320 In Midnight Sleep . . . 3 2 Camps of Green . . . . .321 The Mother of All .... 322 O Captain ! My Captain 323 President Lincoln's Burial Hymn . . , 324 THOMAS WILLIAM PARSONS Dirge . . 333 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL Summer Storm ..... 335 A Prayer ...... 337 The Heritage . . . .^338 The Sower ...... 340 An Indian-Summer Reverie . . . .341 A Contrast . . . . 35 Above and Below . . . . 35 On the Death of a Friend's Child . . . 352 A Parable ...... 354 To . . 356 Bibliolatres ... . 357 To A. C. L. . 358 Sonnet .... 35& The Street .... 359 Sonnet ...... 359 MARIA LOWELL The Morning-Glorv .... 360 J xiv LON TENTS. PAG ALICE CAREY Palestine ...... 362 Old Stories . . : " -. " ' . j . 363 To Lucy .... \. f ' . 364 PHCEBE CAREY Death Scene .,.,., 366 THOMAS BUCHANAN READ The Closing Scene . . . -.- 367 Bertha . . . , . , 369 Aurelia . . . . - . 369 A Glimpse of Love . . . ., .-' 370 The Deserted Farm . . . . -, . - 371 Balboa . . . ' fc . , -_"' 372 Fragments from the Realm of Dreams . . 374 The Way . . . . 4- 378 GEORGE HENRY BOKER A Ballad of Sir John Franklin . ., ' ' . 380 To the Memory of ?1. A. R. .' ' . : ;. 384 ToJ. M. B. . V ' . . 384 Sonnet . . . . ** 385 JAMES BAYARD TAYLOR Metempsychosis of the Pine . ."'. , . 385 Kubleh . . . . . : t , 390 An Oriental Idyi . . . '. -f. 394 From the North ..... 395 RICHARD HENRY STODDARD Spring . .... 396 A Dirge 398 The Yellow Moon . . . . , 398 HENRY W. PARKKR The Dead- Watch ..... 399 JOHN HAY The Monks of Basle The Prairie xv PAGE 401 Remorse 403 404. LUCY LARCOM Rock and Rill ..... 406 Lines 4 407 The Rose Enthroned . , , . 408 Re-enlisted ...... 410 ?syche at School . . . . . 413 Thirty-five . . , . .414 417 419 421 The Still Hour Near Shore . Across the River THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH December 1863 ..... 422 The Moorland . . , . .42^ Piscataqua River ..... 424 Pythagoras ...... 425 Invocation to Sleep , , 438 Pursuit and Possession .... 429 Miracles ... 429 Fredericksburg ..... 410 EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN Ilium Fuit . . , 4,0 The Mountain . . . . ,43- The Feast of Harvest . . , 437 F. BRET HARTE The Miracle of Padre Junipero , , , 439 The Reveille ..... 44^ To a Sea-Bird . , , , *i-\ ADAH ISAACS MENKEN One Year Ago ..... 445 Aspiration . . . . .446 xvi CONTENTS. PAG 5 AUAH ISAACS MENKEN -continued. Infelix . . . ..'~;.; . 446 Answer Me . . . . . . 447 JOAQUIN MILLER Arizonian . . i 450 With Walker in Nicaragua . . ,.- 46? ELIZABETH F. ELLET Sonnet . . . - . . r 485 SARAH HELEN WHITMAN Summer's Invitation to the Orphan , . -" - , . 486 A Song of Spring . . - '..*, . , - . 487 T. H. CHIVERS Apostrophe to Time . . .. , . 489 Carol ... . ... , 489 Lament on the Death of my Mother . . * 490 ELIZABETH OAKES SMITH - Despondency . . . . , , , 492 Charity, in despair of Justice . , , ' -.'..- 492 EMILY JUDSON My Bird .... . 493 SARAH J. CLARKE-- Illumination for the Triumph of our Arms in Mexicc 494 PAUL H. HAYNE Sonnet . . . , . 496 ALICE BRADLEY NEAL Midnight ..... 496 JOHN JAMES PIATT The Mower in Ohio, June 1864 ." , , 497 Fires in Illinois ..... 499 Land in Cloud . . . , . 501 CONTENTS. xvli JOHN JAMES PIATT continued. Rose and Root The Blackberry Farm . The Lost Horizon To One in a Darkened House Awake in Darkness . Sonnet In 1862 The Unbended Bow . AUTHOR UNKNOWN Little Children, then won't you be glad INDEX TO FIRST LINES . 502 502 504 505 55 506 506 507 508 | : ' 4*. \ PREFACE. THIS is, as far as I know, the first miscellaneous collection of American Poetry, of any considerable size, that has been published in England. It gives examples from 65 authors (including two anonymous), the total number of the com positions being 255. In America there have naturally been several such com pilations. The first project of the kind was that of James Rivington, a printer in New York, who in 1773 proposed to publish a collection on the same plan as Dodsley's in England. The revolution of the American colonies stopped this scheme. In 1791 appeared Matthew Carey's Beauties of Poetry, British and American, in which nineteen native writers were represented. Various other works of the same class followed ; among which may be named those of Samuel Kettell in 1829, and of the poet Bryant in 1839, and especially that of Mr. Rufus Willmot Griswold in 1842. xx PREFACE. The last-named voluminous compendium, in its edition dated 1863, furnishes specimens of no less than 146 poets of the male sex, beginning with Philip Freneau (born in 1752, died in 1832); besides several earlier writers who are .mentioned, with some brief indication of their performances, in Mr. Gris wold's Introduction. In addition to these, there are still the poetesses, filling a separate volume to them selves, and numbering 94 in the edition of that volume dated 1854. I will here at once confess my obligations to this industrious and in many respects well-qualified compiler. For the purposes of the book now presented to the reader I have perused many works of American poets including, in various instances, the complete poetical writings of the author ; but, where these primary sources of material had to be supplemented, it is very generally to Mr. Griswold that I am indebted, both for the poems selected, and for the brief biographical particulars appended. Another much smaller volume which I have consulted, Golden Leaves from the American Poets, 1865, edited by Mr. J. W. S. Hows, I find to be little more than an evisceration of Mr. Griswold's so far as the male poets (more especially) are concerned. Looking back to the opening era of British settlements in North America, we have to note the first known writer in- eluded in the present collection, Mrs. Anne Bradstreet, who published in 1640 a volume of poetry which earned her some considerable celebrity. This is one of the earliest works in the form of verse printed in British America. Probably the first native-born poet was Benjamin Thomson, born at Dor chester (now named Quincey) in 1640 : he wrote New Eng land's Crisis towards the year 1676, and died in 1714, at PREFACE. xxi the age ol seventy-four. James Ralph, a friend of Franklin, wrote several plays, some of which were acted at Drury Lane, and various poems as well. Two of these, Cynthia, and Night, are ridiculed in a couplet of Pope's Dunciad. The satirized author died in 1762. Franklin himself com posed some verses ; those named Paper art among the best known. The first tragedy written on American soil, and by a native author, was The Prince of Parthia, by Thomas Godfrey, who died in 1763, at the early age of twenty-six. These few and brief details are some of the leading points which have to be observed concerning American poetry of a date antecedent to that of the second known author here represented, Washington Allston. On the first page of our volume will be found a few verses, the oldest now known as extant from the pen of an English colonist in America, dating about 1630 : but these remain to us, in the lapse of time, anonymous. The reader will understand that my selection, while it goes over a wide area, does not nevertheless aim to be ex haustive. Indeed, one whole class of American poetry, comprising (especially in the Biglow Papers of Lowell, and in the writings oS Bret Harte) some of the very best work of their respective authors, or of the poetic art of America, is entirely omitted ; it having been found more convenient to transfer all writings of this description to the volume of Humorous Poems pertaining to our series. 1 But, even apart from this, I do not profess that the only American poets deserving to figure in such a book as the present one are 1 The writers thus represented are President Adams, Haileck, Brainard, G. P. Morris, Whittier, Holmes, Park Benjamin, M. C. Field, Saxe, Whitman, Lowell, Lelnnd, Hay, Stedman. Harte, Newell. xxti PREFACE. those who have found a place here ; nor yet that, in every instance, the pieces here chosen are absolutely the best of their respective authors still less, that they are the only ones deserving admittance. In the case, however, of those poets whom I have had the opportunity of reading through, my selection does with a near approach to accuracy indi cate my own opinion of what is best subject to this quali fication : that I have made it a rule to leave aside any such compositions as are already well known and popularly diffused in an excessive degree one might say, fulsomely or mawkishly well known. I have not expressly deviated from this rule, save in the case of Edgar Poe. That great genius would, without his Raven, be almost as forlorn as Barnaby Rudge without his. This endlessly reprinted poem therefore, as well as the hardly less often-clanged Bells of the author, I have not thought it reasonable to omit ; and the selection here made from Poe, inclusive of these two archetypal examples, gives all that appears to me to be of his highest quality culled from the few but precious pages of poetical work that he has left us. I should add that, as the general bulk of American poetry is not extremely well known in England, the instances in which I have omitted poems on this ground of superabundant popularity are very few. To these voluntary exclusions I must add that of the works of Longfellow, without any exception : the reason for this anomalous treatment of so important and celebrated an American poet being simply that his collected works consti tute one whole volume in this same series of Moxorfs Popular Poets, and I have therefore deemed it more appro priate and convenient to omit him altogether here, and so PREFACE. xxiii make room for other writers. I have moreover wholly eschewed everything in the way of extracts from poems of considerable length a sort of sample most unfair, as 1 conceive, to the author himself, and tedious and disgust ful to the reader, if I may judge of other tastes by my own. I regard such extracts as the trifling of dabblers in poetic reading ; almost worthless for the purpose of giving an idea of an author's performances, and sometimes really worse than worthless misleading and misrepresenting ; in fact, a contempt of court against the Astrsea of Poesy. An other limitation in my field of selection arises from the copy right system. There are, of course, but few American poems to which this system applies, more or less fully, in England: some, however, there have been of late years, and this is the reason why I have left out the finest (as I conceive) of all Mr. Lowell's serious poems the Ode Recited at the Harvard Commemoration in 1865, published here in 1869. As to the quality of my selections, I have not admitted anything which does not appear to me entitled, in some moderately fair degree, to the name of poetry, 1 and a hand some proportion I apprehend to be excellent. On the other hand, I have aimed to give the whole volume a representative character ; and have been more disposed to let in a second- rate composition by some writer accredited in America, if it seemed to me just up to the mark, than to stiffen the standard of quality, and so exclude the author altogether. Even as it stands, there are several names, well-reputed in the States, that do not appear at all in my pages. This 1 I should except the first anonymous composition; which, though unpoetic enough, is included in virtue of its early date, quaintness, and nationalism. PREFACE. result may be due to a variety of causes. The strength of the author may perhaps lie in long compositions, which I cannot print entire, and will not cut slices from ; or I may know his works only through books of selections, which may have chosen amiss ; or my own judgment may be at fault : not to hint at the possibility that Columbia may in this instance have regarded her goose as a swan. Probably the reader would not thank me were I to hold forth at any considerable length on the merits of American poetry and poets. I shall say a little, but only a little, on each subject. Walt Whitman, a person well able to break a butterfly without having recourse to a wheel, has spoken of the ordi nary run of American verse as " either the poetry of an elegantly weak sentimentalism, at bottom nothing but maudlin puerilities or more or less musical verbiage, arising out of a life of depression and enervation as their result ; or else that class of poetry, plays, &c., of which the foundation is feudalism, with its ideas of lords and ladies, its imported standard of gentility, and the manners of European high- life below-stairs in every line and verse." These are harsher expressions than one would be minded to use, were one's purpose critical rather than objurgatory : still they require to be respectfully and candidly considered, and they seem to be not far from expressing the truth, as it must present itself to a nature so strong and so abounding as Whitman's. This writer himself entered the poetic arena in 1855, and performed therein some feats of athletics which have re mained an astonishment to the spectators ever since. When we reflect that, at the present time, America has to show such masculine and exceptional poets as Whitman, Emer- PREFACE. xxv son, Joaquin Miller, and (in the line of national humour) Lowell along with other eminent though less strictly robust writers, such as Poe, Bryant, Whittier, and Longfellow we must admit that the contemptuous phrases just cited are only partially applicable to the existing condition of things. Partially applicable, but nevertheless truly applicable. In reading through a collection like that of Mr. Griswold, one is led to perceive that American poetry, in its ordinary character and main current, is strictly reflex poetry, and even factitious. The writers have little to announce or com municate to us : they take up with all the most accepted and well-ratified assumptions in point of character and emotion of moral and religious begged-questions and flood us with the wordiness born of mild and artificial enthusiasms, and of petted sympathies. These the author feels to be a credit to himself, and a claim upon the good will of the reader, unless indeed the latter is content to con fess the thickness of his hide, and the obtuseness of his yearnings. Poetry of this sort has an invalided character, rather than a morbid one : its likings are healthy, and it asserts its right to mingle with the vigorous, and take its enjoyments along with them ; but it has neither the same endurance of arduous things, nor the same indifference to slight ones the same readiness to take all ordinary vicissi tudes as they come, debts punctually payable to nature because they are down " in the bond," and to pass on undis mayed after paying them. In especial, the invalid naturally fancies that, when he has done with effort what the sound man does with ease, he has exhibited uncommon energy of character and body a fine spirit and rich capabilities : the display of adventurous fire, active sympathies, and virtuous xxvi PREFACE. sentiment, in the general run of American poetry, reminds me very much of this state of mind. It is not the forte of the invalid, but the faible of the invalid, to entertain and express such feelings : and equally it is the faible of the American Muse which appears in such strains as I am referring to. Longfellow's Excelsior is a typical example. Certainly no mental condition is to be more respectfully approached than that which thinks reverently and tenderly of the beloved in life, now dead ; and a poet suffering such a loss is more than likely to give utterance to his emotions, and this without incurring the faintest shadow of blame. Yet I was struck with the extremely bereaved condition of the American poets, as revealed in Mr. Griswold's compila tion : one comes upon them time after time bending over tombs, and confident of a blissful re-union in heaven. I counted in the volume of male poets (not to speak of the more readily tearful females) no less than fifty-four such mortuary wreaths of poetry, personal to the writers ; and this without taking into account the sufficiently numerous compositions in which deceased national or local celebrities are acclaimed or bewailed. On the whole, it may not un truthfully be said that there is a hectic tinge in American verse, of ordinary and average quality ; and, what is worse, it is a hectic which speaks of the more commonplace not the more poetically related forms of consumption. We have next to glance at the magnates of poetry in the New World. I conceive Walt Whitman to be beyond com pare the greatest of American poets, and indeed one of the greatest now living in any part of the world. He is just what one could conceive a giant to be, if all the mental faculties and aspirations of such a being were on the same PREFA CE. xxvii scale with his bodily presence. We should expect his emotions and his intellectual products to be colossal, mag nificent, fervid, far-reaching, many-sided showing the most vivid perceptions and the strongest grasp. Capable of esti mating all matters, but not willing to attend minutely to minutitE, his mind would naturally go out towards the volume of things, rather than cling to the graces of things. If he were somewhat indifferent to charm of form and sub tlety of art, we should be neither surprised nor offended : we should regard it as scarcely a derogation from the calibre of his intellect, but a symptom of its proportions. This is what we find in Whitman. He is not insensible to grace, nor yet to art, for his mind, besides all its other large endowments, is distinctly that of a poet ; but the scale of his intuitions, his sympathies, and his observation, is so massive, and his execution has so wide a sweep, that he does not linger over the forms or the finish of his work not at least over forms and finish of such sort as most poets delight in, though he has his own standard of performance which he willingly and heedfully observes. 1 To carve the Egyp tian Sphinx is, by analogy, his endowment not to elaborate a Greek gem. The Greek gem is undoubtedly the more artistic product of the two, in an accurate though also a restricted sense of the word "artistic :" but the Sphinx is likewise a work of art, and its relations to all things in the world of nature and of mind, being vast like itself, have attained a proportional and commensurate type in its mode of execution. 1 In fact, Whitman even goes too far in perpetual revision of his old poems : though we are assured that the latest edition is to be the final one in this respect. To me at least (with all respect be it said) it seems that he goes too far, and alters and refits where neither alteration nor refitting is in demand. xxviii PREFACE. Next to Whitman, I think Edgar Poe is distinctly the foremost poet of America : and certainly no two moulds of the poetic mind and hand could be more diverse. Poe's sense of form, and exquisiteness of touch, were intense : not indeed that his taste was always impeccable, for the reverse must, I think, be admitted but every delicate resource of which he acknowledged the need was his at command. If Whitman is an aboriginal writer, Poe is not less truly an original one : imaginative fantasy was his great gift, along with a power of expression so closely allied to the essence of his mind that, although artificial enough in some of its external aspects, it is as spontaneous in quality as brilliant in effect. Some of the subtler oscillations of the modern imagination for Poe's mind was vividly modern, for all its romantic abstruseness of colouring have been given by him with final and inimitable perfection. In this, quality he stands perhaps next to Shelley, ana at times not Shelley himself could refine upon the refinement of Edgar Poe's result. He has gifted us with gold not to be gilt, and lilies unpaintable. I would particularly refer the reader to the stanzas For Annie. For the third place in American poetry there might, I think, be considerable competition. The two poems which I have extracted from, one of the latest members of the poetic band, Joaquin Miller, give him no slight claims to so covet - able a position : for poetic afflatus and power, working in the field of narrative, I certainly think he comes first, and the uncommon quality and splendid hues of his subject- matter lend him peculiar attraction more especially per haps to English readers. Longfellow no doubt shows im measurably more constructive faculty in narrative, with a PREFACE. xxix sureness of hand and cultivated literary sense which Mr. Miller does not pretend to, and perhaps does not greatly, nor even adequately, value ; but, strong as are the claims of the author of Evangcline and Hiawatha, and immensely wide as has been the ratification of them by readers in both hemispheres, I cannot for my part rate his native and essen tial poetic gift so high as that of the Californian adventurer. Mr. Whittier is a writer more naturally comparable with Longfellow. Were it not for the consideration that he has written no poems of any great length none drawing upon the rare and precious power of sustained narrative I should incline to place him fully on a par with Longfellow : for, if we contrast the poems of Whittier, moderately or decidedly short, with those of his brother-poet of the same general scale or range of subject, I apprehend that it would b diffi cult to assign the superiority to the latter. Whittier's seem to me to be clearly freer from a certain self-conscious pre tension a certain audible and visible appeal to "the finest feelings of our nature." These are indeed the things most deserving to be appealed to : but there is a way of appeal ing to them which smacks not less of the assertion, " I am the man who know these feelings myself, and can rouse them in you," than of any more modest frame of mind, or simpler phase of natural emotion : and this may strike some people as too often the way in which Mr. Longfellow apos trophizes them. Mr. Whittier no doubt starts quite as defi nitely from resolute moral good-intention as a motive in writing : but this appears to me to be less ingrained into his poetic style, which is the point just now at issue. There is evidently much beauty, as well as manliness, in his mind and character, with bright well-springs of tenderness, and xxx PREFACE. not less bright of indignation : many of his pieces come home to us with genuine force, and are the productions of a hand cunning in poetic work. His inspiration is neither monotonous nor frittered away. Along with these two dis tinguished writers of regulated and well-ordered verse for neither of them is in any way tempted by his genius into the arbitrary or eccentric may be named another of analo gous powers and performances, Mr. Bryant. Several Ame rican readers, I believe, would incline to rate him the high est of the three for classic tone and execution : my acquaint ance with his works would partly conduce to the same conclusion, and at any rate he may be acknowledged as in every way a worthy colleague in the trio, conferring as well as receiving honour from such an association. Then there is Emerson ; whose attitude of mind and quality of work place him as a poet, I should say, distinctly next to Whitman in point of intellectual scope and incitement. The greatness of his character, his faculty, and his aims, finds no inadequate expression in his verse : and there are indeed thrilling chords of most authentic and even oracular poetry amid his strains. On the whole, however, his posi tion among poets is somewhat that of an outsider ; a lofty potency of mind breathed upon by the Poetic God, and re- exhaling his breath, but not exactly permeated with his spirit, or sealed with his seal. He is as a druid who con sorts with the bards, and snatches a harp now and again, and strikes the strings with almost more than bardic stress; but still with an intonation to be distinguished from theirs, and partly to be disallowed. He often approaches, and sometimes might be said to rival, Blake : yet he is not in the same positive and primarv sense a poet. Last in this PREFACE. company of six " la sesta compagnia" as Dante says -1 must name Lowell : a writer who, whatever varying degree of merit different minds may assign to his ideal or serious poems, has assuredly entitled himself to very eminent rank among American poets by his effusions in Yankee dialect. These exquisite monuments of the national humour and wit can hardly be too highly praised. Even an Englishman enjoys them more deeply than his vocabulary will well serve him to express ; and, if this is the case with the semi-alien Englishman, an American, native and to the manner born, cannot be too grateful for the service truly a patriotic ser vice thus rendered by the poet to the land of his birth. With these few remarks I invite the reader to renew and enlarge in this volume his acquaintance with the Poetry (other than the Humorous Poetry) of America. He will find here some things really and greatly memorable, and many worthy of all cordial acceptance. W. M. ROSSETTI. AMERICAN POEMS. AUTHOR UNKNOWN. NEW ENGLAND'S ANNOYANCES. 1 New England's annoyances, you that would know them, Pray ponder these verses which briefly do show them. THE place where we live is a wilderness wood, Where grass is much wanting that's fruitful and good Our mountains and hills and our valleys below Being commonly covered with ice and with snow : And when the north-west wind with violence blows. Then every man pulls his cap over his nose : But, if any's so hardy and will it withstand, He forfeits a finger, a foot, or a hand. But, when the spring opens, we then take the hoe, And make the ground ready to plant and to sow. Our corn being planted and seed being sown, The worms destroy much before it is grown ; 1 Written towards 1630; the oldest known composition in E ]ish verse by an American colonist. A 2 AUTHOR UNKNOWN. And when it is growing some spoil there is made By birds and by squirrels that pluck up the blade ; And, when it is come to full corn in the ear, It is often destroyed by racoon and by deer. And now do our garments begin to grow thin, And wool is much. wanted to card and to spin. If we get a garment to cover without, Our other in-garments are clout upon clout. Our clothes we brought with us are apt to be torn ; They need to be clouted soon after they're worn ; But clouting our garments they hinder us nothing, Clouts double are warmer than single whole clothing. If fresh meat be wanting, to fill up our dish We have carrots and pumpkins and turnips and fish : And, is there a mind for a delicate dish, We repair to the clam-banks, and there we catch fish. 'Stead of pottage and puddings and. custards and pies, Our pumpkins and parsnips are common supplies : We have pumpkins at morning and pumpkins at noon ; If it was not for pumpkins we should be undone. If barley be wanting to make into malt, We must be contented and think it no fault \ For we can make liquor to sweeten our lips Of pumpkins and parsnips and walnut-tree chips. Now while some are going let others be coming, For while liquor's boiling it must have a scumming ; But I will not blame them, for birds of a feather By seeking their fellows are flocking together. But you whom the Lord intends hither to bring, Forsake not the honey for fear of the sting; But bring both a quiet and contented mind, And all needful blessings you surely will find. ANNE BRADSTREET. ANNE BRADSTREET. [Born in England in 1613, daughter of Thomas Dudley, stewaid to the Earl of Lincoln ; died in New England in 1672. She mar ried in 1629 Simon Bradstreet, who appears at that date to have been the successor to her father as the Earl's steward : in the fol lowing year all three, with other Nonconformists, settled in New England. As may readily be inferred from the very early age at which she left her native shores, Mrs. Bradstreet, as an authoress, belongs exclusively to America. The first collection of her poems was published at Boston in 1640, with the long title of Several Poems, compiled -with great vaiiety of vail and learning, full of de light, -wherein especially is contained a Complete Discourse and De scription of the Four Elements, Constfaiiions, Ages of Man, and Seasons of the Year ; together ivith an Exact Epitome of the Three First Monarchies, viz. : the Assyrian, Persian, and Grecian, and the Beginning of the Roman Commonwealth to the end of their la; I King; with divers other pleasant and serious Poems. By a Gentle- woman of Ne^o England. This volume was reprinted in London in 1650; the lofty title of "The Tenth Muse, lately sprung up in America," being awarded to the authoress. Besides her literary deservings, Mrs. Bradstreet appears to have been a loveable and excellent woman. Both her father and her husband became Go vernors of Massachusetts. After her death, the latter married again ; and, living not much less than a century.^vas termed "the Nestor of New England." Many of Mrs. Bradstreet's descendants among them the poet Dana have been distinguished for ability.] ELEGY ON A GRANDCHILD. FAREWELL, dear child, my heart's too much content Farewell, sweet babe, the pleasure of mine eye; Farewell, fair flower, that for a space was lent, Then ta'en away into eternity. Blest babe, why should I once bewail thy fate, Or sigh the days so soon were terminate, Sith thou art settled in an everlasting state ? By Nature trees do rot when they are grown, And plums and apples throughly ripe do fall, And corn and grass are in their season mown, And time brings down what is both strong and tall. But plants new-set to be eradicate, And buds new-blown to have so short a date, Is by His hand alone that Nature guides, and Fate. ANNE BRADSTREET. TO HER HUSBAND : WRITTEN IN THE PROSPECT OF DEATH. How soon, my dear, death may my steps attend, How soon't may be thy lot to lose thy friend, We both are ignorant. Yet love bids me These farewell lines to recommend to thee, That, when that knot's untied that made us one, I may seem thine, who in effect am none. And, if I see not half my days that's due, What Nature would God grant to yours and you. The many faults that well you know I have Let be interred in my oblivious grave; If any worth or virtue is in me, Let that live freshly in my memory. And when thou feel'st no grief, as I no harms, Yet love thy dead, who long lay in thine arms ; And, when thy loss shall be repaid with gains, Look to my little babes, my dear remains, And, if thou lov'st thyself or lovest me, These oh protect from stepdame's injury ! And, if chance to thine eyes doth bring this verse, With some sad sighs honour my absent hearse ; And kiss this paper, for thy love's dear sake, Who with salt tears this last farewell doth take. ALLSTON'. WASHINGTON ALLSTON. [Born in 1779, died in 1843. Known principally as a painter. His longest poem is named The Svlphs of the Seasons, published in 1813], ROSALIE. " OH 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. " No never came from aught below This melody of wo, 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. Oh 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 reverie First fell the strain of him who stole In music to her soul. PIERPONT. JOHN PIERPONT. [Born in 1785, died towards I865. 1 Served as a Unitarian minister from 1819 to 1856. His principal poem is The Airs of Palestine, published in 1816]. FOR THE CHARLESTOWN CENTENNIAL CELEBRATION. Two hundred years ! two hundred years ! How much of human power and pride, What glorious hopes, what gloomy fears, Have sunk beneath their noiseless tide ! . The red man at his horrid rite, Seen by the stars at night's cold noon; His bark canoe, its track of light Left on the wave beneath the moon ; His dance, his yell, his council-fire, The altar where his victim lay, His death-song and his funeral pyre, That still, strong tide hath borne away. And that pale pilgrim band is gone That on this shore with trembling trod, Ready to faint, yet bearing on The ark of freedom and of God. And war that since o'er ocean came, And thundered loud from yonder hill, And wrapped its foot in sheets of flame, To blast that ark its storm is still. Chief, sachem, sage, bards, heroes, seers, That live in story and in song, Time, for the last two hundred years, Has raised, and shown, and swept along. 1 In this and some other cases, where I say "towards" sucfi a year as the date of death, I have reason to infer that the authors were alive in 1863, but have died since then, though the precise year of death is uncertain to me. I name 1865, as an approxima tion, in each instance. PIERPONT. 'Tis like a dream when one awakes, This vision of the scenes of old ; 'Tis like the moon when morning breaks, 'Tis like a tale round watchfires told. Then what are we ? then what are we ? Yes, when two hundred years have rolled O'er our green graves, our names shall be A morning dream, a tale that's told. God of our fathers, in whose sight The thousand years that sweep away Man and the traces of his might Are but the break and close of day- Grant us that love of truth sublime, That love of goodness and of thee, That makes thy children in all time To share thine own eternity. THE EXILE AT REST. His falchion flashed along the Nile ; His hosts he led through Alpine snows ; O'er Moscow's towers that shook the while. His eagle flag unrolled and froze. Here sleeps he now alone : not one Of all the kings whose crowns he gave, Nor sire nor brother, wife nor son, Hath ever seen or sought his grave. Here sleeps he now alone ; the star That led him on from crown to crown Hath sunk ; the nations from afar Gazed as it faded and went down. He sleeps alone: the mountain cloud That night hangs round him, and the breath Of morning scatters, is the shroud That wraps his mortal form in death. FROTH1NGHAM. High is his couch ; the ocean flood Far, far below by storms is curled, As round him heaved, while high he stood, A stormy and inconstant world. Hark ! Comes there from the Pyramids, And from Siberia's wastes of snow, And Europe's fields, a voice that bids The world he awed to mourn him? No. The only, the perpetual dirge That's heard there is the seabird's cry, The mournful murmur of the surge, The cloud's deep voice, the wind's low sigh. NATHANIEL LANGDON FROTHINGHAM. [Born in 1793. Was minister of a Congregational Church from 1815 to 1850]. THE FOUR HALCYON POINTS OF THE YEAR. FOUR points divide the skies, Traced by the Augur's staff in days of old : "The spongy South," the hard North gleaming cold, And where days set and rise. Four seasons span the year : The flowering Spring, the Summer's ripening glow, Autumn with sheaves, and Winter in its snow ; Each brings its separate cheer. Four halcyon periods part, With gentle touch, each season into twain, Spreading o'er all in turn their gentle reign. Oh mark them well, my heart ! Janus ! the first is thine. After the freezing solstice locks the ground ; When the keen blasts, that moan or rave around^ Show not one softening sicm. FROTIIINGHAM. It interposes then. The air relents ; the ices thaw to streams ; A mimic Spring shines down with hazy beams, Ere Winter roars again. Look thrice four weeks from this. The vernal days are rough in our stern clime, Yet fickle April wins a mellow time, Which chilly May shall miss. Another term is run. She comes again the peaceful one though less Or needed or perceived in summer dress Half lost in the bright sun ; Yet then a place she finds, And all beneath the sultry calm lies hush ; Till o'er the chafed and darkening ocean rush The squally August winds. Behold her yet once more, And oh how beautiful ! Late in the wane Of the dishevelled year; when hill and plain Have yielded all their store ; When the leaves thin and pale And they not many tremble on the bough ; Or, noisy in their crisp decay, e'en now Roll to the sharpening gale ; In smoky lustre clad, its warm breath flowing in a parting hymn, The Indian Summer, upon Winter's rim, Looks on us sweetly sad. So with the Year of Life. An ordering goodness helps its youth and age, Posts quiet sentries midway every stage, And gives it truce in strife. BRYANT. The Heavenly Providence, With varying methods but a steady hold, Doth trials still with mercies interfold, For human soul and sense. The Father that's above Remits, assuages ; still abating one Of all the stripes due to the ill that's done, In his compassionate love. Help Thou our wayward mind To own Thee constantly in all our states The world of Nature and the world of Fates- Forbearing, tempering, kind. WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. [Born 3 November 1794, in Cummington, Massachusetts. He published a political satire in verse, The Embargo, in 1 808, when only thirteen years of age. Besides holding eminent rank among American poets, Mr. Bryant has been a conspicuous journalist since 1826, when lie became editor of the New York Evening Post, a paper in the Democratic interest]. 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 billows rise and sink On the chafed ocean-side ? BRYANT. . I 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. 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 tby certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone Will lead my steps aright. THE PRAIRIES. THESE are the gardens of the desert, these The unshorn fields, boundless and beautiful, For which the speech of England has no name The prairies. I behold them for the first, And my heart swells, while the dilated sight Takes-in the encircling vastness. Lo ! they stretch In airy undulations, far away, As if the ocean, in his gentlest swell, Stood still, with all his rounded billows fixed, And motionless forever. Motionless ? Nothey are all unchained again. The clouds Sweep over with their shadows, and, beneath, The surface rolls and fluctuates lo the eye; 12 BRYANT. Dark hollows seem to glide along and chase The sunny ridges. Breezes of the south ! Who toss the golden and the flame-like flowers, And pass the prairie-hawk that, poised on high, Flaps his broad wings, yet moves not ye have played Among the palms of Mexico and vines Of Texas, and have crisped the limpid brooks That from the fountains of Sonora glide Into the calm Pacific have ye fanned A nobler or a lovelier scene than this? Man hath no part in all this glorious work : The hand that built the firmament hath heaved And smoothed these verdant swells, and sown their slopes With herbage, planted them with island groves, And hedged them round with forests. Fitting floor For this magnificent temple of the sky With flowers whose glory and whose multitude Rival the constellations ! The great heavens Seem to stoop down upon the scene in love, A nearer vault, and of a tenderer blue, Than that which bends above the eastern hills. As o'er the verdant waste I guide my steed, Among the high, rank grass that sweeps his sides, The hollow beating of his footstep seems A sacrilegious sound. I think of those Upon whose rest he tramples. Are they here The dead of other days ? and did the dust Of these fair solitudes once stir with life And burn with passion ? Let the mighty mounds That overlook the rivers, or that rise In the dim forest, crowded with old oaks, Answer. A race that long has passed away Built them ; a disciplined and populous race Heaped, with long toil, the earth, while yet the Greek Was hewing the Pentelicus to forms Of symmetry, and rearing on its rock The glittering Parthenon. These ample fields Nourished their harvests ; here their herds were fed, When haply by their stalls the bison lowed, BRYANT. 13 And bowed his maned shoulder to the yoke. All day this desert murmured with their toils, Till twilight blushed, and lovers walked, and wooed In a forgotten language, and old tunes, From instruments of unremembered form, Gave the soft winds a voice. The red man came The roaming hunter-tribes, warlike and fierce, And the mound-builders vanished from the earth. The solitude of centuries untold Has settled where they dwelt. The prairie-wolf Hunts in their meadows, and his fresh-dug den Yawns by my path. The gopher mines the ground Where stood their swarming cities. All is gone All save the piles of earth that hold their bones The platforms where they worshipped unknown gods The barriers which they builded from the soil To keep the foe at bay till o'er the walls The wild beleaguerers broke, and, one by one, The strongholds of the plain were forced, and heaped With corpses. The brown vultures of the wood Flocked to those vast uncovered sepulchres, And sat, unseated and silent, at their feast. Haply some solitary fugitive, Lurking in marsh and forest, till the sense Of desolation and of fear became Bitterer than death, yielded himself to die. Man's better nature triumphed. Kindly words Welcomed and soothed him ; the rude conquerors Seated the captive with their chiefs ; he chose A bride among their maidens, and at length Seemed to forget yet ne'er forgot the wife Of his first love, and her sweet little ones, Butchered, amid their shrieks, with all his race. Thus change the forms of being. Thus arise Races of living things, glorious in strength, And perish, as the quickening breath of God Fills them, or is withdrawn. The red man, too, Has left the blooming wilds he ranged so long, And, nearer to the Rocky Mountains, sought 14 BRYANT. A wider hunting-ground. The beaver builds No longer by these streams ; but far away, On waters whose blue surface ne'er gave back The white man's face among Missouri's springs, And pools whose issues swell the Oregon He rears his little Venice. In these plains The bison feeds no more. Twice twenty leagues Beyond .remotest smoke of hunter's camp, Roams the majestic brute, in herds that shake The earth with thundering steps yet here I meet His ancient footprints stamped beside the pool. Still this great solitude is quick with life. Myriads of insects, gaudy as the flowers They flutter over, gentle quadrupeds, And birds, that scarce have learned the fear of man, Are here, and sliding reptiles of the ground, Startlingly beautiful. The graceful deer Bounds to the wood at my approach. The bee, A more adventurous colonist than man, With whom he came across the eastern deep, Fills the savannas with his murmurings, And hides his sweets, as in the golden age, Within the hollow oak. I listen long To his domestic hum, and think I hear The sound of that advancing multitude Which soon shall fill these deserts. From the ground Comes up the laugh of children, the soft voice Of maidens, and the sweet and solemn hymn Of Sabbath worshipers. The low of herds Blends with the rustling of the heavy grain Over the dark-brown furrows. All at once A fresher wind sweeps by, and breaks my dream, And I am in the wilderness alone. BRYANT. 15 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 narrow 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 is 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 for ever 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 pSst, All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills 1 6 BRYANT. 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, O!d ocean's grey 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, and the Barcan desert pierce, 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 there reign alone. So shalt thou rest, and what if thou withdraw Unheeded by 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 favourite phantom ; yet all these shall leave Their 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 grey-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 that mysterious realm, where each shall take JL * "* XX XR YANT. 1 7 His chamber in the silent halls of death, 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 that draws the drapery of his couch About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. THE ANTIQUITY OF FREEDOM. HERE are old trees, tall oaks, and gnarled pines, That stream with grey-green mosses ; here the ground Was never touched by spade, and flowers spring up Unsown, and die ungathered. It is sweet To linger here, among the flitting Lirds And leaping squirrels, wandering brooks, and winds That shake the leaves, and scatter as they pass A fragrance from the cedars thickly set With pale blue berries. In these peaceful shades Peaceful, unpruned, immeasurably old My thoughts go up the long dim path of years, Back to the earliest days of Liberty. O FREEDOM ! thou art not, as poets dream, A fair young girl, with light and delicate limbs, And wavy tresses gushing from the cap With which the Roman master crowned his slave, When he took off the gyves. A bearded man, Armed to the teeth, art thou : one mailed hand Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword : thy brow Glorious in beauty though it be, is scarred With tokens of old wars ; thy massive limbs Are strong and straggling. Power at thee has launched His bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee ; They could not quench the lifo thou hast from Heaven. Merciless Power has dug thy dungeon deep, And his swart armourers, by a thousand fires, Have forged thy chain ; yet, while he deems thee bound, The links are shivered, and the prison-vails 18 KRYANT. Fall outward ; terribly thou springest forth, As springs the flame above a burning pile, And shoutest to the nations, who return Thy shoutings, while the pale oppressor flies. Thy birthright was not given by human hands : Thou wert twin-born with man. In pleasant fields, While yet our race was few, thou sat'st with him, To tend the quiet flock and watch the stars, And teach the reed to utter simple airs. Thou by his side, amid the tangled wood, Didst war upon the panther and the wolf, His only foes : and thou with him didst draw The earliest furrows on the mountain-side, Soft with the Deluge. Tyranny himself, The enemy, although of reverend look, Hoary with many years, and far obeyed, Is later born than thou : and, as he meets The grave defiance of thine elder eye, The usurper trembles in his fastnesses. Thou shalt wax stronger with the lapse of years, But he shall fade into a feebler age ; Feebler, yet subtler ; he shall weave his snares, And spring them on thy careless steps, and clap His withered hands, and from their ambush call His hordes to fall upon thee. He shall send Quaint maskers, forms of fair and gallant mien, To catch thy gaze, and uttering graceful words To charm thy ear ; while his sly imps, by stealth, Twine round thee threads of steel, light thread on thread, That grow to fetters ; or bind down thy arms With chains concealed in chaplets. Oh not yet Mayst thou unbrace thy corslet, nor lay by Thy sword, nor yet, O Freedom ! close thy lids In slumber ; for thine enemy never sleeps. And thou must watch and combat, till the day Of the new Earth and Heaven. But, wouldst thou rest Awhile from tumult and the frauds of men, BRYANT. 19 These old and friendly solitudes invite Thy visit. They, while yet the forest-trees Were young upon the unviolated earth, And yet the moss-stains on the rock were new, Beheld thy glorious childhood, and rejoiced. THE WINDS, YE winds, ye unseen currents of the air, Softly ye played a few brief hours ago ; Ye bore the murmuring bee ; ye tossed the hair O'er maiden cheeks, that took a fresher glow ; Ye rolled the round white cloud through depths of blue : Ye shook from shaded flowers the lingering dew ; Before you the catalpa's blossoms flew, Light blossoms, dropping on the grass like snow. How are ye changed ! Ye take the cataract's sound, Ye take the whirlpool's fury and its might ; The mountain shudders as ye sweep the ground ; The valley-woods lie prone beneath your flight. The clouds before you sweep like eagles past ; The homes of men are rocking in your blast Ye lift the roofs like autumn leaves, and cast, Skyward, the whirling fragments out of sight. The weary fowls of heaven make wing in vain, To 'scape your wrath ; ye seize and dash them dead. Against the earth ye drive the roaring rain ; The harvest-field becomes a river's bed ; And torrents tumble from the hills around, Plains turn to lakes, and villages are drowned, And wailing voices, midst the tempest's sound, Rise, as the rushing floods close overhead. Ye dart upon the deep, and straight is heard A wilder roar, and men grow pale, and pray ; \ e fling its waters round you, as a bird Flings o'er his shivering plumes the fountain's spray. 20 BRYANT. See ! to the breaking mast the sailor clings ; Ye scoop the ocean to its briny springs, And take the mountain billow on your wings, And pile the wreck of navies round the bay. Why rage ye thus ? No strife for liberty Has made you mad ; no tyrant, strong through fear, Has chained your pinions, till ye wrenched them free, And rushed into the unmeasured atmosphere : For ye were born in freedom where ye blow: Free o'er the mighty deep to come and go ; Earth's solemn woods were yours, her wastes of snow, Her isles where summer blossoms all the year. O ye wild winds ! a mightier power than yours In chains upon the shores of Europe lies ; The sceptred throng, whose fetters he endures, Watch his mute throes with terror in their eyes ; And armed warriors all around him stand, And, as he struggles, tighten every band, And lift the heavy spear, with threatening hand, To pierce the victim, should he strive to rise. Yet Oh, when that wronged spirit of our race Shall break, as soon he must, his long-worn chains, And leap in freedom from his prison-place, Lord of his ancient hills and fruitful plains, Let him not rise, like these mad winds of air, To waste the loveliness that time could spare, To fill the earth with woe, and blot her fair Unconscious breast with blood from human veins. But may he, like the spring-time, come abroad, Who crumbles winter's gyves with gentle might, When in the genial breeze, the breath of God, Come spouting up the unsealed springs to light; Flowers start from their dark prisons at his feet, The woods, long dumb, awake to hymnings sweet, And morn and eve, whose glimmerings almost meet, Crowd back to narrow bounds the ancient BRYANT. 21 O MOTHER OF A MIGHTY RACE. 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 the 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 the lone rivers of the west ; How faith is kept, and truth revered, And man is loved, and God is feared, In woodland homes, And where the solemn ocean foams ! There's freedom at thy gates, and rest For earth's down-trodden and oppressed, A shelter for the hunted head, BRYANT. For the starved labourer toil and bread. Power, at thy bounds, Stops and calls back his baffled hounds. O 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 ! THE RIVULET. THIS little rill that from the springs Of yonder grove its current brings, Plays on the slope a while, and then Goes prattling into groves again, Oft to its warbling waters drew My little feet, when life was new. When woods in early green were dressed. And from the chambers of the west The warmer breezes, travelling out, Breathed the new scent of flowers about, My truant steps from home would stray, Upon its grassy side to play, List the brown thrasher's vernal hymn, And crop the violet on its brim, With blooming cheek and open brow, As young and gay, sweet rill, as thou. And when the days of boyhood came, And I had grown in love with fame, BR YANT. 23 Duly I sought thy banks, and tried My first rude numbers by thy side. Words cannot tell how bright and gay The scenes of life before me lay. Then glorious hopes, that now to speak Would bring the blood into my cheek, Passed o'er me ; and I wrote, on high, A name I deemed should never die. Years change thee not. Upon yon hill The tall old maples, verdant still, Yet tell, in grandeur of decay, How swift the years have passed away, Since first, a child and half-afraid, I wandered in the forest-shade. Thou, ever-joyous rivulet, Dost dimple, leap, and prattle yet ; And sporting with the sands that pave The windings of thy silver wave, And dancing to thy own wild chime, Thou laughest at the lapse of time. The same sweet sounds are in my ear My early childhood loved to hear ; As pure thy limpid waters run, As bright they sparkle to the sun ; As fresh and thick the bending ranks Of herbs that line thy oozy banks ; The violet there, in soft May dew, Comes up, as modest and as blue ; As green amid thy current's stress Floats the scarce-rooted water-cress ; And the brown ground-bird, in thy glen, Still chirps as merrily as then. Thou changest not but I am changed, Since first thy pleasant banks I ranged ; And the grave stranger, come to see The play-place of his infancy, Has scarce a single trace of him Who sported once upon thy brim. 24 BRYANT. The visions of my youth are past Too bright, too beautiful to last. I've tried the world it wears no more The colouring of romance it wore. Yet well has Nature kept the truth She promised to my earliest youth : The radiant beauty, shed abroac On all the glorious works of Cod, Shows freshly, to my sobered eye, Each charm it wore in days goiu, by. A few brief years shall pass away, And I, a'l trembling, weak, and grey, Bowed to the earth; which v/aits to fold My ashes in the embracing mould, (If haply the dark will of fate Indulge my life so long a date) May come for the last time to look Upon my childhood's lavourite brook. Then dimly on my eye shall gleam The sparkle of thy dancing stream ; And faintly on my ear shall fall Thy prattling current's merry call ; Yet shall thou flow as glad and bright As when thou met'st my infani sight. And I shall sleep and on thy side, As ages after ages glide. Children their early sports shall try, And pass to hoary age, and die. But thou, unchanged from year to year, Gayly shalt play and glitter here ; Amid young flowers and tender grass Thy endless infancy shalt pass ; And, singing down thy narrow glen, Shalt mock the fading race of men. BRYANT. 25 TO THE EVENING WIND. SPIRIT that breathest through my lattice, thou That cool'st 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 still 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 26 BRYANT. His temples, while his breathing grows more deep And they who stand about the sick man's bed Shall joy to listen to thy distant sweep, And softly part his curtains to allow Thy visit, grateful to his burning brow. Go but the circle of eternal change, Which is the life of nature, shall restore, With sounds and scents from all thy mighty range, Thee to thy birth-place of the deep once more ; Sweet odours in the sea-air, sweet and strange, Shall tell the home-sick mariner of the shore ; And, listening to thy murmur, he shall deem He hears the rustling leaf and running stream. HYMN OF THE CITY. NOT in the solitude Alone may man commune with Heaven, or see Only in savage wood And sunny vale the present Deity ; Or only hear his voice Where the winds whisper and the waves rejoice. Even here do I behold Thy steps, Almighty ! here, amidst the crowd Through the great city rolled, \Vith everlasting murmur, deep and loud Choking the ways that wind 'Mongst the proud piles, the work of human-kind. Thy golden sunshine comes From the round heaven, and on their dwellings lies, And lights their inner homes For them thou fill'st with air the unbounded skies, And givest them the stores Of ocean, and the harvests of its shores. Thy spirit is around, Quickening the restless mass that sweeps along ; BRYANT. And this eternal sound Voices and footfalls of the numberless throng Like the resounding sea, Or like the rainy tempest, speaks of thee. And when the hours of rest Come, like a calm upon the mid-sea brine, Hushing its billowy breast The quiet of that moment, too, is thine ; It breathes of Him who keeps The vast and helpless city while it sleeps. THE MAIDEN'S SORROW SEVEN long years has the desert rain Dropped on the clods that hide thy face ; Seven long years of sorrow and pain I have thought of thy burial-place ; Thought of thy fate in the distant v/ctt, Dying with none that loved thee ncar^ They who flung the earth on thy breast Turned from the spot without a tear. There, I think, on that lonely grave, Violets spring in the soft May shower; There in the summer breezes wave Crimson phlox and moccasin flower. There the turtles alight, and there Feeds with her fawn the timid doe 3 There, when the winter woods are bare, Walks the wolf on the crackling snow, Soon wilt thou wipe my tears away ; All my task upon earth is done ; My poor father, old and grey, Slumbers beneath the churchyard stone. 28 BRYANT. In the dreams of my lonely bed, Ever thy form before me seems : All night long I talk with the dead, All day long I think of my dreams. This deep wound that bleeds and aches, This long pain, a sleepless pain When the Father my spirit takes I shall feel it no more again. OCTOBER. AY, thou art welcome, heaven's delicious breath, When woods begin to wear the crimson leaf, And suns grow meek, and the meek suns grow brief, And the year smiles as it draws near its death. Wind of the sunny South ! Oh still delay In the gay woods and in the golden air, Like to a good old age released from care, Journeying, in long serenity, away. In such a bright, late quiet, would that I Might wear out life likt, thee, 'mid bowers and brooks, And, dearer yet, the sunshine of kind looks, And music of kind voices ever nigh ; And, when my last sand twinkled in the glass, Pass silently from men, as thou dost pass. CAROLINE OILMAN. 29 CAROLINE OILMAN. [Born in I794> daughter of a Mr. Howard. She manied a Unitarian minister, and wrote a number 01 popular works very generally in prose Recollections of a New England Housekeeper, &c., &c.]. MUSIC ON THE CANAL. I WAS weary with the daylight, I was weary with the shade, And my heart became still sadder As the stars their light betrayed j I sickened at the ripple, As the lazy boat went on, And felt as though a friend was lost When the twilight ray was gone. The meadows, in a firefly glow. Looked gay to happy eyes -. To me they beamed but mournfully, My heart was cold with sighs. They seemed, indeed, like summer friends Alas ! no warmth had they; I turned in sorrow from their glare, Impatient turned away. And tear-drops gathered in my eyes, And rolled upon my cheek, And, when the voice of mirth was heard, I had no heart to speak : I longed to press my children To my sad and homesick breast, And feel the constant hand of love Caressing and caressed. And slowly went my languid pulse, As the slow canal-boat goes, And I felt the pain of weariness, And sighed for home's repose ; And laughter seemed a mockery, And joy a fleeting breath, And life a dark volcanic crust That crumbles over death. f . 30 CAROLINE OILMAN. But a strain of sweetest melody Arose upon my ear, The blessed sound of woman's voice, That angels love to hear. And manly strains of tenderness Were mingled with the song A father's vnth his daughter's notes, The gentle with the strong. And my thoughts began to soften, Like snows when waters fall, And open as the frost-closed buds When spring's young breezes call ; While to my faint and weary soul A better hope was given, And all once more was bright with faith, 'Twixt heart, and earth, and Heaven. TO THE URSUL1NES. OH pure and gentle ones, within your ark Securely rest ! Blue be the sky above your quiet bark By soft winds blest ! Still toil in duty, and commune with Heaven, World-weaned and free ; God to his humblest creatures room has given And space to be. 5pace for the eagle in the vaulted sky To plume his wing Space for the ringdove by her young to lie, And softly sing. Space for the sunflower, bright with yellow glow, To' court the sky Space for the violet, where the wild woods grow, To live and die. T HALLECK. 31 Space for the ocean, in its giant might, To swell and rave Space for the river, tinged with rosy light, Where green banks wave. Space for the sun to tread his path in might And golden pride Space for the glow-Avorm, calling, by her light, Love to her side. Then, pure and gentle ones, within your ark Securely rest ! Blue be the skies above, and your still bark By kind winds blest ! FITZ-GREENE HALLECK. 1 [Born in I795> died in 1868. His maternal descent was from John Eliot, " the Apostle of the Indians." He engaged in busi ness, acting for several years as agent to the great capitalist Astor]. MARCO BOZZARIS. AT midnight, in his guarded tent, The Turk was dreaming of the hour When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent, 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, 1 In the case of Halleck, and of other American poets who figure also in our selection of Humorous Poems, the notice here yiven of the wriler is repeated from that volume without alteration save in the case of Whitman. HALLECK. True as the steel of their tried blades, Heroes in heart and hand. There had the Persian's thousands stood, There had the ^lad earth drunk their blood On old Plataea'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 ; Thai, 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 j 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's, when she feels, For the first time, her first-born's breath ; Come when the blessed seals HALLECK. 33 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, The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier, And all we know or dream or fear Of agony, are thine. But to the. herOj, 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 c A, 34 HALLECK. Long loved, and for a season gone. For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed, Her marble wrought, her music breathed ; For thee she wrings 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 birth, Will, by their 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 born to die. A POET'S DAUGHTER. FOR THE ALBUM OF MISS , AT THE REQUEST OF HER FATHER. " A LADY asks the Minstrel's rhyme/' A Lady asks ? There was a time When, musical as play-bell's chime To wearied boy, That sound would summon dreams sublime Of pride and joy. But now the spell hath lost its sway; Life's first-born fancies first decay, Gon.2 are the plumes and pennons gay Of young Romance ; There linger but her ruins grey, And broken lance. . HALLECK. 35 'Tis a new world no more to maid, Warrior, or bard, is homage paid ; The bay-tree's, laurel's, myrtle's shade^ Men's thoughts resign ; Heaven placed us here to vote and trade, Twin tasks divine ! " 'Tis youth, 'tis beauty asks ; the green And growing leaves of seventeen Are round her ; and, half hid, half seen. A violet flower, Nursed by the virtues she hath been From childhood's hour." Blind passion's picture yet for this We woo the life-long bridal kiss, And blend our every hope of bliss With hers we love ; Unmindful of the serpent's hiss In Eden's grove. Beauty the fading rainbow's pride, Youth 'twas the charm of her who died At dawn, and by her coffin's side A grandsire stands, Age-strengthened, like the oak storm-tried Of mountain lands. Youth's coffin hush the tale it tells ! Be silent, memory's funeral bells ! Lone in one heart, her home, it dwells Untold till death, And where the grave-mound greenly swells O'er buried faith. " But what if hers are rank and power, Armies her train, a throne her bower> A kingdom's gold her marriage dower. Broad seas and lands ? What if from bannered hall and tower A queen commands?" - 36 HALLECK. A queen? Earths regal moons have set. Where perished Marie Antoinette ? Where's Bordeaux's mother?. Where the jet- Black Haytian dame ? And Lusitania's coronet ? And Angouleme ? Empires to-day are upside down, The castle kneels before the town, The monarch fears a printer's frown A brickbat's range ; Give me, in preference to a crown, Five shillings change. " But her who asks, though first among The good, the beautiful, the young, The birthright of a spell more strong Than these hath brought her ; She is your kinswoman in song, A Poet's daughter." A Poet's daughter? Could I claim The consanguinity of fame, Veins of my intellectual frame ! Your blood would glow Proudly to sing that gentlest name Of aught below. A Poet's daughter dearer word Lip hath not spoke nor listener heard, Fit theme for song of bee and bird From morn till even, And wind-harp by the breathing stirred Of star-lit heaven. My spirit's wings are weak, the fire Poetic comes but to expire, Her name needs not my humble lyre To bid it live ; She hath already from her sire All bard can give. - HALLECK. 37 TO LOUIS GAYLORD CLARK. I'VE greeted many a bonny bride On many a bridal day, In homes serene and summer-skied, Where Love's spring-buds, with joy and pride, Had blossomed into May; But ne'er on lovelier bride than thine Looked these delighted eyes of mine, And ne'er in happier bridal bower Than hers smiled rose and orange-flower Through green leaves glad and gay, When bridesmaids, grouped around her rooir. In youth's, in truth's, in beauty's bloom, Entwined, with merry fingers fair, Their garlands in her sunny hair ; Or bosomed them, with graceful art, Above the beatings of her heart. I well remember, as I stood Among the pleasant multitude, A stranger, mateless and forlorn, Pledged bachelor and hermit sworn, That, when the holy voice had given, In consecrated words of power, The sanction of approving Heaven To rnarriage-ring, and roof, and dower ; When she, a Wife, in matron pride, Stood, life-devoted, at thy side ; When happy lips had pressed her cheek, And happiest lips her " bonny mou'," And she had smiled with blushes meek On my congratulating bow, A sunbeam, balmy with delight, Entranced, subdued me, till I quite Forgot my anti-nuptial vow, And almost asked, with serious brow And voice of true and earnest tone, The bridesmaid with the prettiest face 4T 38 HALLECK. To take me, heart and hand, and grace A wedding of my own. Time's years, it suits me not to say How many, since that joyous day, Have watched and cheered thee on thy way O'er Duty's chosen path severe, And seen thee, heart and thought full-grown, Tread manhood's thorns and tempters down, And win, like Pythian charioteer, The wreaths and race-cups of renown Seen thee, thy name and deeds, enshrined Within the peerage-book of mind And seen my morning prophecy Truth-blazoned on a noonday sky, That he whose worth could win a wife Lovely as thine, at life's beginning, Would always wield the power, through life, Of winning all things worth the winning. Hark ! there are songs on Summer's breeze, And dance and song in Summer's trees, And choruses of birds and bees In Air, their world of happy wings ; What far-off minstrelsy, whose tone And words are sweeter than their own, Has waked these cordial welcomings ? 'Tis nearer now, and now more near, And now rings out like clarion clear. They come the merry bells of Fame ! They come to glad me with thy name, And, borne upon their music's sea, From wave to wave melodiously, Glad tidings bring of thine and thee. They tell me that, Life's tasks well done, Ere shadows mark thy westering sun, Thy bark has reached a quiet shore, And rests, with slumbering sail and oar, Fast anchor, d near a cottage door, Thy home of pleasantness and peace, HALLECK. Of Love, with eyes of heaven' s blue, And Health, with cheek of rose's hue, And Riches, with "the Golden Fleece;" Where she, the Bride, a Mother now. Encircled round with sons and daughters, Waits jiiy congratulary bow To grest her cottage woods and waiers; And ib.ou art proving, as in youth, By daily kindnesses, the truth And wisdom of the Scottish rhyme " To make a happy fireside clime For children and lor wife, Is #. true pathos and sublime, And green and gold oi Life, From long-neglected garden-bowers" Come these, my songs' memorial flowers ; With greetings from my heart, they come To seek the shelter of thy home. Though faint their hues, and brief their bloom, And all unmeet for gorgeous room Of " honour, love, obedience, And troops of friends," like thine, I hops thou wilt not banish thence These few and fading flowers of mine. But let their theme be their defence, The love, the joy, the frankincense, And fragrance o' Lang Syne. 40 PERCIVAL. JAMES GATES PERCIVAL [Born in I795 died towards 1865. A physician, and a man of extensive scientific and linguistic acquirements]. NEW ENGLAND, HAIL to the land whereon we tread, Our fondest boast ; The sepulchre of mighty dead, The truest hearts that ever bled, Who sleep on Glory's brightest bed, A fearless host : No slave is here ; our unchained feet Walk freely as the waves that beat Our coast. Our fathers crossed the ocean's wave To seek this shore ; They left behind the coward slave To welter in his living grave ; With hearts unbent and spirits brave, They sternly bore Such toils as meaner souls had quelled; But souls like these such toils impelled To soar. Hail to the morn when first they stood On Bunker's height, And fearless stemmed the invading flood, And wrote our dearest rights in blood, And mowed in ranks the hireling brood In desperate fight ! Oh 'twas a proud, exulting day, For even our fallen fortunes lay In light. There is no other land like thee, No dearer shore ; Thou art the shelter of the free ; The home, the port of Liberty, Thou hast been, and shalt ever be, PERCIVAL. 41 Till time is o'er. Ere I forget to think upon My land, shall mother curse the son She bore. Thou art the firm unshaken rock On which we rest ; And, rising from thy hardy stock, Thy sons the tyrant's frown shall mock, And slavery's galling chains unlock, And free the oppressed : All who the wreath of Freedom twine Beneath the shadow of their vine Are blessed. We love thy rude and rocky shore, And here we stand ! Let foreign navies hasten o'er, And on our heads their fury pour, And peal their cannon's loudest roar, And storm our land ; They still shall find our lives are given To die for home, and leant on Heaven Our hand. NIGHT. AM I not all alone ? The world is still In passionless slumber, not a tree but feels The far-pervading hush, and softer steals The misty river by. Yon broad bare hill Looks coldly up to heaven, and all the stars Seem eyes deep-fixed in silence, as if bound By some unearthly spell, no other sound But the owl's unfrequent moan. Their airy cars The winds have stationed on the mountain peaks. Am I not all alone ? A spirit speaks From the abyss of night, " Not all alone : Nature is round thee with her banded powers, And ancient genius haunts thee in these hours ; Mind and its kingdom now are all thine own." 42 GOODRICH. SONNET. THE bin 2 heaven spreads before me: with its keen And countless eyes of brightness, worlds are there. The boldest spirit cannot spring, and dare The peopled universe that burns between This earth and nothing. Thought can wing its way Swifter than lightning-flashes, or the beam That hastens on the pinions of the morn ; But, quicker than the glowing dart of day, It tires and faints along the starry stream, A wave of suns through countless ether borne, Though infinite, eternal ! Yet one power Sits on the Almighty Centre, whither tend All worlds and beings from time's natal hour, Till suns and all their satellites shall end. SAMUEL GRISWOLD GOODRICH. [Born about i"jg6. 1 A publisher, and author of the once im mensely popular juvenile bocks issued under the pseudonym of "Peter P'arley"], LAKE SUPERIOR. " FATHER OF LAKES ! " thy waters bend Beyond the eagle's utmost view, When, throned in heaven, he sees thee send Back to the sky its world of blue. Boundless and deep, the forests weave Their twilight shade thy borders o'er, And threatening cliffs, like giants, heave Their rugged forms along thy shore. Pale Silence, 'mid thy hollow caves, With listening ear, in sadness broods ; Or startled Echo, o'er thy waves, Sends the hoarse wolf-notes of thy woods. 1 It has been stated to me (but not as a certainty) that Mr. Goodrich died in some recent year in Paris. GOODRICH, 43 Nor can the light canoes, that glide Across thy breast like things of air, Chase from thy lone and level tide The spell of stillness reigning there. Yet round this waste of wood and wave, Unheard, unseen, a spirit lives, That, breathing o'er each rock and cave, To all a wild, strange aspect gives. The thunder-riven oak, that flings Its grisly arms athwart the sky, A sudden, startling image brings To the lone traveller's kindled eye. The gnarled and braided boughs, that show Their dim forms in the forest shade, Like wrestling serpents seem, and throw Fantastic horrors through the glade. The very echoes round this shore Have caught a strange and gibbering tone ; For they have told the war-whoop o'er, Till the wild chorus is their own. Wave of the wilderness, adieu ! Adieu, ye rocks, ye wilds and woods 1 Roll on, thou element of blue, And fill these awful solitudes ! Thou hast no tale to tell of man God is thy theme. Ye sounding ca'ves s Whisper of Him, whose mighty plan Deems as a bubble all your waves ! 44 BRAINARD. JOHN GARDNER CALKINS BRAINARD [Born in 1796, died in 1828, In his brief career he was first called to the bar ; then undertook the editorship of a weekly ga zette ; and consumption closed a somewhat desultory and melan choly "ifel. STANZAS. THE dead leaves -asw the ioiest walk, A-.d withered are ihs pale wild flowers The frost hangs blackening on the stalk, The dew-drops fall in frozen showers. Gone are the spring's green sprouting bowers, Gone summer's rich and mantling vines, And autumn, with her yellow hours, On hill and plain no longer shines. I learned a clear and wild-toned note, That rose and swelled from yonder tree A gay bird, with too sweet a throat, There perched, and raised her song for me. The winter comes, and where is she ? Away where summer wings will rove, Where buds are fresh, and every tree Is vocal with the notes of love. Too mild the breath of southern sky, Too fresh the flower that blushes there ; The northern breeze that rustles by Finds leaves too green, and buds too fair ; No forest-tree stands stripped and bare, No stream beneath the ice is dead, No mountain-top, with sleety hair, Bends o'er the snows its reverend head. Go there, with all the birds, and seek A happier clime, with livelier flight ; Kiss, with the sun, the evening's cheek, And leave me lonely with the night. I'll gaze upon the cold north light, And mark where all its glories shone, See that it all is fair and bright, Feel that it all is cold and gone. SANDS. 45 ROBERT C. SANDS, [Born in 1799, died in 1832. At first a lawyer ; afterwards a miscellaneous writer of poems, memoirs, humorous pieces, &c.]. DREAM OF THE PRINCESS PAPANT2IN. 1 MEXITLIS' power was at its topmost pride ; The name was terrible from sea to sea> From mountains, where the tameless Ottomite Maintained his savage freedom, to the shores Of wild Higueras. Through the nations passed, As stalks the angel of the pestilence, The great king's messengers. They marked the young. The brave and beautiful, and bore them on For their foul sacrifices. Terror went Before the tyrant's heralds. Giief and wrath Remained behind their steps : but they were dumb. 1 " Papantzin, a Mexican princess, sister of Moteuczoma, and widow of the governor of Tlatelolco, died, as was supposed, in the palace of the latter, in 1509. Her funeral rites were celebrated with the usual pomp ; her brother and all the nobility attending. She was buried in a cave, or subterranean grotto, in the gardens of the same palace, near a reservoir in which she usually bathed. The entrance of the cave was closed with a stone of no great size. On the day after the funeral, a little girl, five or six years old, who lived in the palace, was going from her mother's house to the residence of the princess's major-domo, in a farther part of the garden ; and passing by, she heard the princess calling to her toeoton, a phrase used to call and coax children, &c. &c. The princess sent the little girl to call her mother, and much alarm was of course excited. At length the King of Tezcuco was notified of her resurrection ; and, on his representation, Moteuczoma himself, full of terror, visited her with his chief nobility. He asked her if she was his sister. ' I am,' said she, ' the same whom you buried yesterday. I am alive, and desire to tell you what I have seen, as it imports to know it.' Then the kings sat down, and the others remained standing, marvelling at what they heard. "Then the princess, resuming her discourse, said : 'After my life, or, if that is possible, after sense and the power of motion de parted, incontinently I found myself in a vast plain, to which there was no bound in any direction. In the midst I discerned a road, which divided into various paths, and on one side was a great river, whose waters made a frightful rushing noise. Being minded to leap into it to cross to the opposite side, a fair youth stood before 46 SANDS: He was as God. Yet in his capital Sat Moteuczoma, second of that name, Trembling with fear of dangers long foretold In ancient prophecies, and now announced By signs in heaven and portents upon earth \ By the reluctant voices of pale priests ; By the grave looks of solemn counsellors ; But chief, by sickening heaviness of heart That told of evil, dimly understood, But evil which must come. With face obscured, And robed in night, the giant phantom rose my eyes, of noble presence, clad in long robes, white as snow, and resplendent as the sun. He had two wings of beautiful plumage, and bore this sign on his forehead, (so saying, ''ie princess made with her fingers the sign of the cross ;) ' and taking me by the hand, said, ' Stay, it is not yet time to pass this river. God loves thee, although thou dost not know it.' Thence he led me along the shores of the river, where I saw many skulls and human bones, and heard such doleful groans that they moved me to compassion. Then, turning my eyes to the river, I saw in it divers great barks, and in them many men, different from those of these regions in dress and complexion. They were white and bearded, having standards in their hands, and helmets on their heads. Then the young man said to me, ' God wills that thou shouldst live, that thou mayst bear testimony of the revolutions which are to occur in these countries. The clamours thou hast heard on these banks are those of the souls of thine ancestors, which are and ever will be tormented in punishment of their sins. The men whom thou seest passing in the barks are those who with arms will make themselves masters of this country ; and with them will come also an annun ciation of the true God, Creator of heaven and earth. When the war is finished, and the ablution promulgated which washes away sin; thou shalt be first to receive it, and guide by thine example all the inhabitants of this land.' Thus having sa'id, the young man disappeared ; and I found myself restored to life rose from the place on which I lay lifted the stone from the sepulchre, and issued forth from the garden, where the servants found me.' "Moteuczoma went to his house of mourning, full of heavy thoughts, saying nothing to his sister (whom he would never see again), nor to the King of Tezcuco, nor to his courtiers, who tried to persuade him that it was a feverish fantasy of the princess. She lived many years afterward, and in 1524 was baptized." This incident, says Clavigero, was universally known, and made a great noise at the time. It is described in several Mexican pic tures, and affidavits of its truth were sent to the court of Spain. SANDS. 47 Of his gieat empire's ruin and his own. Happier, though guiltier, he before whose glance Of reckless triumph moved the spectral hand That traced the unearthly characters of fate. 'Twas then, one eve, when o er the imperial lake, And all its cities glittering in their pomp. The lord of glory threw his parting smiles, In Tlatelolco's palace, in her bower, Papantzin lay reclined ; sister of him At whose name monarchs trembled. Yielding there To musings various, o'er her senses crept Or sleep, or kindred death. It seemed she stood In an illimitable plain, that stretched Its desert continuity around, Upon the o'erwearied sight ; in contrast strange With that rich vale where only she had dwelt, Whose everlasting mountains, girdling it, As in a chalice held a kingdom's wealth ; Their summits freezing, where the eagle tired But found no resting-place. Papantzin looked On endless barrenness, and walked perplexed Through the dull haze, along the boundless heath, Like some lone ghost in Mictlan's cheerless gloom Debarred from light and glory. Wandering thus, She came where a great sullen river poured Its turbid waters with a rushing sound Of painful moans ; as if the inky waves Were hastening still "on their complaining course To escape the horrid solitudes. Beyond What seemed a highway ran, with branching paths Innumerous. This to gain, she sought to plunge Straight in the troubled stream : for well she knew To shun with agile limbs the current's force, Nor feared the noise of waters, She had played From infancy in her fair native lake, Amid the gay-plumed creatures floating round, Wheeling or diving, with their changeful hues, As fearless and as innocent as they. . 48 SANDS. A vision stayed her purpose. By her side Stood a bright youth ; and, startling as she gazed On his effulgence, every sense was bound In pleasing awe and in fond reverence. For not Tezcatlipoca, as he shone Upon her priest-led fancy, when from heaven By filmy thread sustained he came to earth, In his resplendent mail reflecting all Its images with dazzling portraiture, Was, in his radiance and immortal youth, A peer to this new god. His stature was Like that of men ; but matched with his, the port Of kings all-dreaded was the crouching mien Of suppliants at their feet Serene the light That floated round him, as the lineaments It cased with its mild glory. Gravely sweet The impression of his features, which to scan Their lofty loveliness forbade. His eyes She felt, but saw not : only, on his brow From over which, encircled by what seemed A ring of liquid' diamond in pure light Revolving ever, backward flowed his locks In buoyant, waving clusters on his brow She marked a cross described ; and lowly bent, She knew not wherefore, to the sacred sign. From either shoulder mantled o'er his front Wings dropping feathery silver ; and his robe, Snow-white, in the still air was motionless, As that of chiselled god, or the pale shroud Of some fear-conjured ghost. Her hand he took, And led her passive o'er the naked banks Of that black stream, still murmuring angrily. But, as he spoke, she heard its moans no more ; His voice seemed sweeter than the hymnings raised By brave and gentle souls in Paradise. To celebrate the outgoing of the sun On his majestic progress over heaven. " Stay, princess," thus he spoke, " thou mayst not yet O'erpass these waters. Though thou know'st it not, Nor Him, God loves thee." So he led her on, ifr SANDS. 49 Unfainting, amid hideous sights and sounds : For now o'er scattered skulls and grisly bones They walked ; while underneath, before, behind, Rise dolorous wails and groans protracted long, Sobs of deep anguish, screams of agony, And melancholy sighs, and the fierce yell Of hopeless and intolerable pain. Shuddering, as, in the gloomy whirlwind's pause, Through the malign, distempered atmosphere, The second circle's purple blackness, passed The pitying Florentine, who saw the shades Of poor Francesca and her paramour, The princess o'er the ghastly relics stepped, Listening the frightful clamour; till a gleam, Whose sickly and phosphoric lustre seemed Kindled from these decaying bones, lit up The sable river. Then a pageant came Over its obscure tides, of stately barks, Gigantic, with their prows of quaint device, Tall masts, and ghostly canvas, huge and high, Hung in the unnatural light and lifeless air. Grim, bearded men, with stern and angry looks, Strange robes, and uncouth armour, stood behind Their galleries and bulwarks. One ship bore A broad sheet-pendent, where, inwrought with gold, She marked the symbol that adorned the brow Of her mysterious guide. Down the dark stream Swept on the spectral fleet, in the false light Flickering and fading. Louder then uprose The roar of voices from the accursed strand, Until in tones solemn and sweet again Her angel-leader spoke. " Princess, God wills That thou shouldst live, to testify on earth What changes are to come : and, in the world Where change comes never, live when earth, and all Its changes, shall have passed, like earth, away. The cries that pierced thy soul and chilled thy veins Are those of thy tormented ancestors. Nor shall their torment cease ; for God is just. D $0 SANDS. Foredoomed, since first from Aztlan led to rove, Following, in quest of change, their kindred tribes, Where'er they rested, with, foul sacrifice They stained the shuddering earth, Their monuments, By blood cemented, after ages passed, With idle wonder of fantastic guess The traveller shall behold. For broken then, Like their own ugly idols, buried, burned, Their fragments spurned for every servile use, Trampled and scattered to the reckless winds, The records of their origin shall be. Still in their cruelty and untamed pride They lived and died condemned ; whether they dwelt Outcasts, upon a soil that was not theirs, All sterile as it was, and won by stealth Food from the slimy margent of the lake, And digged the earth for roots and unclean worms ; Or served in bondage to another ra.ce, Who loved them not. Driven forth, they wandered then In miserable want, until they came Where from the thriftless rock the nopal grew, On which the hungry eagle perched and screamed, And founded Tenochtitlan ; rearing first, With impious care, a cabin for their god Huitzilopochtli, and with murderous rites Devoting to his guardianship themselves And all their issue. Quick the nopal climbed, Its harsh and bristly growth towering o'er all The vale of Anahuac. Far for his prey, And farther still, the ravenous eagle flew ; And still with dripping beak, but thirst unslaked, With savage cries wheeled home. Nine kings have reigned, Their records blotted and besmeared with blood So thick that none may read them. Down the stairs And o'er the courts and winding corridors Of their abominable piles, upreared In the face of heaven, and naked to the sun, More blood has flowed than would have filled the lakes O'er which, enthroned midst carnage, they have sat, I SANDS. 51 Heaping their treasures for the stranger's spoil. Prodigious cruelty and waste of life, Unnatural riot and blaspheming pride, All that God hates, and all that tumbles down Great kingdoms and luxurious commonwealths, After long centuries waxing all corrupt, In their brief annals aggregated, forced, And monstrous, are compressed. And now the cup Of wrath is full ; and now the hour has come. Nor yet unwarned shall judgment overtake The tribes of Aztlan, and in chief their lords, Mexitlis' blind adorers. As to one Who feels his inward malady remain, Howe'er health's seeming mocks his destiny, In gay or serious mood the thought of death Still comes obtrusive ; so old prophecy, From age to age preserved, has told thy race How strangers, from beyond the rising sun, Should come with thunder armed, to overturn Their idols, to possess their lands, and hold Them and their children in long servitude. " Thou shalt bear record that the hour is nigh ; The white and bearded men whose grim array Swept o'er thy sight are those who are to come, And with strong arms, and wisdom stronger far, Strange beasts, obedient to their masters' touch. And engines hurling death, with Fate to aid, Shall wrest the sceptre from the Azteques' line, And lay their temples flat. Horrible war, Rapine, and murder, and destruction wild, Shall hurry like the whirlwind o'er the land. Yet with the avengers comes the word of peace ; With the destroyers comes the bread of life ; And, as the wind-god, in thine idle creed, Opens a passage with his boisterous breath Through which the genial waters over earth Shed their reviving showers, so, when the storm Of war has passed, rich dews of heavenly grace Shall fall on flinty hearts. And thou, the flower 'A 4 52 SANDS. Which, when huge cedars and most ancient pines, Coeval with the mountains, are uptorn, The hurricane shall leave unharmed, thou, then, Shalt be the first to lift thy drooping head, Renewed, and cleansed from every former stain. " The fables of thy people teach that when The deluge drowned mankind, and one sole pair, In fragile bark preserved, escaped, and climbed The steeps of Colhuacan, daughters and sons Were bom to them, who knew not how to frame Their simplest thoughts in speech ; till from the grove A dove poured forth, in regulated sounds, Each varied form of language. Then they spake, Though neither by another understood. But thou shalt then hear of that holiest Dove Which is the Spirit of the eternal God When all was void and dark, he moved above Infinity ; and from beneath his wings Earth and the waters and the islands rose ; The air was quickened, and the world had life Then all the lamps of heaven began to shine, And man was made to gaze upon their fires. " Among thy fathers' visionary tales, Thou'st heard how once near ancient Tula dwelt A woman, holy and devout, who kept The temple pure, and to its platform saw A globe of emerald plumes descend from heavea Placing it in her bosom to adorn Her idol's sanctuary, (so the tale Runs) she conceived, and bore Mexitli. He, When other children had assailed her life, Sprang into being, all equipped for war ; His green plumes dancing in their circlet bright, Like sheaf of sun-lit spray cresting the bed Of angry torrents. Round, as Tonatiuh Flames in mid-heaven, his golden buckler shone ; Like nimble lightning flashed his dreadful lance ; And unrelenting vengeance in his eyes SANDS. 53 Blazed with its swarthy lustre. He, they tell, Led-on their ancestors ; and him, the god Of wrath and terror, with the quivering hearts And mangled limbs of myriads, and the stench Of blood-washed shrines and altars, they appease. But then shall be revealed to thee the name And vision of a virgin undefined, Embalmed in holy beauty, in whose eyes, Downcast .and chaste, such sacred influence lived That none might gaze in their pure spheres and feel One earth-born longing. Over her the Dove Hung, and the Almighty Power came down. She bore In lowliness, and as a helpless babe, Heir to man's sorrows and calamities, His great Deliverer, Conqueror of Death ; And thou shalt learn how when in years he grew Perfect, and fairer than the sons of men, And in that purifying rite partook Which thou shalt share, as from his sacred locks The glittering waters dropped, high overhead The azure vault was opened, and that Dove, Swiftly, serenely floating downwards, itretched His silvery pinions o'er the anointed Lord, Sprinkling celestial dews. And thou ohalt heav How, when the sacrifice for man had. gone In glory home, as his chief messengers Were met in council, on a mighty wind The Dove was borne among them ; on each brow A forked tongue of fire unquenchable lit , And, as the lambent points shot up and waved, Strange speech came to them ; thence to every land,. In every tongue, they, with antinng steps, Bore the glad tidings of a world redeemed " Much more, which now it suits not to rehearse, The princess heard. The historic prophet told Past, present, future, things that since have been, And things that are to come. And, as he ceased, O'er the black river and the desert plain, As o'er the close of counterfeited scenes 54 SANDS. Shown by the buskined Muse, a veil came down, Impervious ; and his figure faded swift In the dense gloom. But then, in starlike light, That awful symbol which adorned his brow In size dilating showed : and up, still up, In its clear splendour still the same, though still Lessening, it mounted ; and Papantzin woke. She woke in darkness and in solitude. Slow passed her lethargy away, and long To her half-dreaming eye that brilliant sign Distinct appeared. Then damp and close she felt The air around, and knew the poignant smell Of spicy herbs collected and confined. As those awakening from a troubled trance Are wont, she would have learned by touch if yet The spirit to the body was allied. Strange hindrances prevented. O'er her face A mask thick-plated lay : and round her swathed Was many a costly and encumbering robe, Such as she wore on some high festival, O'erspread with precious gems, rayless and cold, That now pressed hard and sharp against her touch. The cumbrous collar round her slender neck, Of gold, thick studded with each valued stone Earth and the sea-depths yield for human pride The bracelets and the many twisted rings That girt her taper limbs, coil upon coil What were they in this dungeon's solitude ? The plumy coronal that would have sprung Light from her fillet in the purer air, Waving in mockery of the rainbow tints, Now drooping low, and steeped in clogging dews, Oppressive hung. Groping in dubious search, She found the household goods, the spindle, broom, Gicalli quaintly sculptured, and the jar That held the useless beverage for the dead. By these, and by the jewel to her lip Attached, the emerald symbol of the soul, In its green life immortal, soon she knew SANDS, 55 Her dwelling was a sepulchre. She loosed The mask, and from her feathery bier uprose, Casting away the robe, which like long alb Wrapped her ; and with it many an aloe-leaf (Inscribed with Azteque characters and signs, To guide the spirit where the serpent hissed, Hills towered, and deserts spread, and keen winds blew), And many a "flower of death;" though their frail leaves Were yet unwithered. For the living warmth Which in her dwelt their freshness had preserved ; Else, if corruption had begun its work, The emblems of quick change would have survived Her beauty's semblance. What is beauty worth, If the cropped flower retains its tender bloom When foul decay has stolen the latest lines Of loveliness in death ? Yet even now Papantzin knew that her exuberant locks Which unconfined had round her flowed to earth, Like a stream rushing down some rocky steep, Threading ten thousand channels had been shorn Of half their waving length, and liked it not But through a crevice soon she marked a gleam Of rays uncertain ; and, with staggering steps, But strong in reckless dreaminess, while still Presided o'er the chaos of her thoughts The revelation that upon her soul Dwelt with its power, she gained the cavern's throat, And pushed the quarried stone aside, and stood In the free air, and in her own domain. But now obscurely o'er her vision swam The beauteous landscape, with its thousand tints And changeful views : long alleys of bright trees Bending beneath their fruits ; espaliers gay With tropic flowers, and shrubs that filled the breeze With odorous incense ; basins vast where birds With shining plumage sported ; smooth canals Leading the glassy wave; or towering grove 56 SANDS. Of forest veterans. On a rising bank, Her seat accustomed, near a well hewn out From ancient rocks, into which waters gushed From living springs, where she was wont to bathe, She threw herself to muse. Dim on her sight The imperial city and its causeways rose, With the broad lake and all its floating isles And glancing shallops, and the gilded pomp Of princely barges, canopied with plumes Spread fan-like, or with tufted pageantry Waving magnificent. Unmarked around The frequent huitzilin, with murmuring hum Of ever-restless wing, and shrill sweet note, Shot twinkling, with the ruby star that glowed Over his tiny bosom, and all hues That loveliest seem in heaven, with ceaseless change. Flashing from his fine films. And all in vain Untiring, from the rustling branches near, Poured the centzontli all his hundred strains Of imitative melody. Not now She heeded them. Yet pleasant was the shade Of palms and cedars ; and through twining boughs And fluttering leaves the subtle god of air, The serpent armed with plumes, most welcome crept, And fanned her cheek with kindest ministry. A dull and dismal sound came booming on; A solemn, wild, and melancholy noise, Shaking the tranquil air ; and afterward A clash and jangling, barbarously prolonged, Torturing the unwilling ear, rang dissonant. Again the unnatural thunder rolled along, Again the crash and clamour followed it. Shuddering she heard ; who knew that every peal From the dread gong announced a victim's heart Torn from his breast, and each triumphant clang, A mangled corse down the great temple's stairs Hurled headlong. And she knew, as lately taught, How vengeance was ordained for cruelty ; How pride would end ; and uncouth soldiers tread SANDS. 57 Through bloody furrows o'er her pleasant groves And gardens ; and would make themselves a road Over the dead, choking the silver lake, And cast the battered idols down the steps That climbed their execrable towers, and raze Sheer from the ground Ahuitzol's mighty pile. There had been wail for her in Mexico, And with due rites and royal obsequies, Not without blood at devilish altars shed, She had been numbered with her ancestry. Here when beheld revisiting the light, Great marvel rose, and greater terror grew, Until the kings came trembling, to receive The foreshown tidings. To his house of woe, Silent and mournful, Moteuczoma went. Few years had passed, when by the rabble hands Of his own subjects, in ignoble bonds, He fell ; and on a hasty gibbet reared By the road-side, with scorn and obloquy, The brave and gracious Guatemotzin hung ; While to Honduras, thirsting for revenge, And gloomier after all his victories, Stern Cortes stalked. Such was the will of God. And then, with holier rites and sacred pomp Again committed to the peaceful grave, Papantzin slept in consecrated earth. 58 EMERSON. GEORGE W. DOANE. [Born in 1799 : Bishop of the Diocese of New Jersey, in the Protestant Espiscopal Church. His sole volume of poems was published in 1824. His son, the Rev. William Croswell Doane, has also attained some poetical repute]. MALLEUS DOMINI. Jeremiah xxiii. 29. SLEDGE of the Lord, beneath whose stroke The rocks are rent the heart is broke I hear thy ponderous echoes ring, And fall, a crushed and crumbled thing. Meekly these mercies I implore, Through Him whose cross our sorrow bore : On earth, thy new-creating grace ; In heaven, the very lowest place. Oh might I be a living stone Set in the pavement of thy throne ! For sinner saved, what place so meet As at the Saviour's bleedinsr feet ? RALPH WALDO EMERSON. [Born about 1803 in Boston, son of the Rev. William Emerson. Became a Unitarian minister in 1829 ; but subsequently, seceding from all forms of Christianity, relinquished this position, and has continued to live, at the town of Concord, a lofty life of spiritual thought and philosophic speculation varied by travelling, the de livery of lectures, and especially the publishing of several books precious to many. One of the finest souls of our time]. THE APOLOGY. THINK me not unkind and rude, That I walk alone in grove and glen ; I go to the god of the wood, To fetch his word to men. Tax not my sloth that I Fold my arms beside the brook Each cloud that floated in the sky Writes a letter in my book. EMERSON. 59 Chide me not, laborious band, For the idle flowers I brought ; Every aster in my hand Goes home loaded with a thought, There was never mystery But 'tis figured in the flowers ; Was never secret history But birds tell it in the bowers. One harvest from thy field Homeward brought the oxen strong ; A second crop thine acres yield, Which I gather in a song. THE HUMBLE BEE, BURLY dozing humble bee ! W'here 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 ! Zig-zag 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, 60 Silvers the horizon wall, And, with softness touching all, Tints the human countenance With a colour 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 tune, Telling of countless sunny hours, Long days, and solid banks of flowers, Of gulfs of sweetness without bound In Indian wildernesses found, Of Syrian peace, immortal leisure, Firmest cheer, and bird-like pleasure, Aught unsavoury or unclean Hath my insect never seen ; But violets and bilberry bells, Maple sap and daffodels, Grass with green flag half-mast high, Succory to match the sky, Columbine .vith horn of honey, Scented fern, and agrimony, Clover, catch-fly, adder's tongue, And briar-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 chaff and take the wheat. When the fierce north-western blast i EMERSON. 6 1 Cools sea and land so far and fast, Thou already slumberest deep, Woe and want thou canst out-sleep, Want and woe, which torture us, Thy sleep makes ridiculous. EACH AND ALL. LITTLE thinks, in the field, yon red-cloaked clown. Of thee, from the hill-top looking down ; And the heifer, that lows in the upland farm, Far-heard, lows not thine ear to charm ; The sexton tolling the bell at noon Dreams not that great Napoleon Stops his horse, and lifts with delight, Whilst his files sweep round yon Alpine height ; Nor knowest thou what argument Thy life to thy neighbour'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 j The bubbles Of the latest wave Fresh pearls to their enamel gave ; And the bellowing of the savage sea Greeted their sate escape to me. I wiped away the weeds and foam, And fetched my sea-born 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, 62 EMERSON. Nor knew her beauty's best attire Was woven still by the snow-white quire. 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 burns j I inhaled the violet's breath ; Around me stood the oaks and firs ; Pine-cones and acorns lay on the ground ; Above me soared the eternal sky, Full of light and deity ; Again I saw, again I heard, The rolling river, the morning bird ; Beauty through my senses stole, I yielded myself to the perfect whole. DIRGE. KNOWS he who tills this lonely field, To reap its scanty corn, What mystic fruit his acres yield At midnight and at morn ? In the long sunny afternoon The plain was full of ghosts ; I wandered up, I wandered down, Beset by pensive hosts. The winding Concord gleamed below. Pouring as wide a flood As when my brothers long ago Came with me to the wood. EMERSON. 63 But they are gone, the holy ones Who trod with me this lonely vale, The strong star-bright companions Are silent, low, and pale. My good, my noble, in their prime, Who made this world the feast it was, Who learned with me the lore of time, Who loved this dwelling-place. They took this valley for their toy, They played with it in every mood, A cell for prayer, a hall for joy, They treated Nature as they would. They coloured the horizon round, Stars flamed and faded as they bade, All echoes hearkened for their sound, Thev made the woodlands glad or mad. I touch this flower of silken leaf Which once our childhood knew, Its soft leaves wound me with a grief Whose balsam never grew. Hearken to yon pine- warbler Singing aloft on the tree ; Hearest thou, O traveller ! What he singeth to me ? Not unless God made sharp thine ear With sorrow such as mine Out of that delicate lay couldst thou The heavy dirge divine. " Go, lonely man," it saith ; " They loved thee from their birth ; Their hands were pure, and pure their faith, There are no such hearts on earth. 64 EMERSON. " Ye drew one mother's miik, One chamber held ye all; A very tender history Did in your childhood fall. " Ye cannot unlock your heart, The key is gone with them ; The silent organ loudest chants The master's requiem." THE WORLD SOUL. THANKS to the morning light, Thanks to the seething sea, To the uplands of New Hampshire, To the green-haired forest free ; Thanks to each man of courage, To the maids of holy mind, To the boy with his games undaunted. Who never looks behind. Cities of proud hotels, Houses of rich and great, Vice nestles in your chambers, Beneath your roofs of slate. It cannot conquer folly, Time-and-space-conquering steam, And the light-outspeeding telegraph Bears nothing on its beam. The politics are base, The letters do not cheer, And 'tis far in the deeps of history-- The voice that speaketh clear. Trade and the streets ensnare us, Our bodies are weak and worn, We plot and corrupt each other, And we despoil the unborn. EMEfiSON. 6v Yet there in the parlour sits Some figure of noble guise, Our angel in a stranger's form, Or woman's pleading eyes ; Or only a flashing sunbeam In at the window-pane ; Or music pours on mortals Its beautiful disdain. The inevitable morning Finds them who in cellars be ; And be sure the all-loving Nature Will smile in a factory. Yon ridge of purple landscape, Yon sky between the walls, Hold all the hidden wonders In scanty intervals. Alas, the sprite that haunts us Deceives our rash desire ; It whispers of the glorious gods, And leaves us in the mire. We cannot learn the cipher That's writ upon our cell ; Stars help us by a mystery Which we could never spell. If but one hero knew it, The world would blush in flame ; The sage, till he hit the secret, Would hang his head for shame. But our brothers have not read it, Not one has found the key; And henceforth we are comforted, We are but such as they. Still, still the secret presses, The nearing clouds draw down. The crimson morning flames into The fopperies of the town. 66 EMERSON. Within, without the idle earth Stars weave eternal rings ; The b-un himself shines heartily, And shares the joy he brings. And what if trade sow cities Like shells along the shore, A.nd thatch with towns the prairie broad With railways ironed o'er; They are but sailing foam-bells Along Thought's causing stream, And take their shape and sun-colour From him that sends the dream. For Destiny does not like To yield to men the helm, And shoots his thought by hidden nerve? Throughout the solid realm. The patient Daemon sits With roses and a shroud ; He has his way, and deals his ifts But ours is not allowed. He is no churl or trifler, And his viceroy is none, Love-without-weakness, Of genius sire and son ; And his will is not thwarted, The seeds of land and sea Are the atoms of his body bright, And his behest obey. He serveth the servant, The brave he loves amain, He kills the cripule and the sick, And straight begins again; For gods delight in gods, And thrust the weak aside ; To him who scorns their charities Their arms fly open wide. EMERSON. AVhen the old world is sterile, And the ages are effete, He will from wrecks and sediment The fairer world complete. He forbids to despair, His cheeks mantle with mirth, And the unimagined good of men Is yeaning at the birth. Spring still makes spring in the mind When sixty years are told ; Love wakes anew this throbbing heart, And we are never old. Over the winter glaciers I see the summer glow, And through the wild-piled snowdrift The warm rose buds below. HAMATREYA. MINOTT, Lee, Willard, Hosmer, Meriam, Flint, Possessed the land, which rendered to their toil Hay, corn, roots, hemp, flax, apples, wool, and wood. Each of these landlords walked amidst his farm, Saying, " 'Tis mine, my children's, and my name's. How sweet the west wind sounds in my own trees ; How graceful climb those shadows on my hill ; I fancy those pure waters and the flies Know me as does my dog : we sympathize, And, I affirm, my actions smack of the soil." Where are those men ? Asleep beneath their grounds. And strangers, fond as they, their furrows plough. "Carth laughs in flowers to see her boastful boys Earth-proud, proud of the earth which is not theirs; Who steer the plough, but cannot steer their feet Clear of the grave. They added ridge to valley, brook to pond, And sighed for all that bounded their domain ;- " This suits me for a pasture ; that's my park; 68 EMERSON. We must have clay, lime, gravel, granite-ledge, And misty lowland where to go for peat. The land is well, lies fairly to the south. 'Tis good, when you have crossed the sea and back, To find the sitfast acres where you left them." Ah ! the hot owner sees not Death, who adds Him to his land, a lump of mould the more. Hear what the Earth says : EARTH-SONG. Mine and yours, Mine, not yours. Earth endures, Stars abide, Shine down in the old sea ; Old are the shores, But where are old men ? I, who have seen much, Such have I never seen. The lawyer's deed Ran sure In tail To them and to their heirs Who shall succeed Without fail For evermore. Here is the land, Shaggy with wood, With its old valley, Mound, and flood. But the heritors Fled like the flood's foam ; The lawyer, and the laws, And the kingdom, Clean swept herefrom. They called me theirs, Who so controlled me ; Yet every one Wished to stay, and is gone. EMERSOX 69 How am I theirs, If they cannot hold me, But I hold them ? \ When I heard the Earth-song, I was no longer brave ; My avarice cooled Like lust in the chill of the grave. WOOD-NOTES. I. FOR this present, hard Is the fortune of the bard Born out of time ; All his accomplishment From Nature's utmost treasure spent Booteth not him. When the pine tosses its cones To the song of its waterfall tones, (Tie speeds to the woodland walks, To birds and trees he talks. Caesar of his leafy Rome, There the poet is at home. He goes to the river side, Not hook nor line hath he : He stands in the meadows wide, Nor gun nor scythe to see ; With none has he to do, And none seek him, Nor men below, Nor spirits dim. Sure some good his eye enchants; What he knows nobody wants. In the wood he travels, glad Without better fortune had, Melancholy without bad. Planter of celestial plants, What he knows nobody wants, 70 EMERSON. What he knows he hides, not vaunts. Knowledge this man prizes best Seems fantastic to the rest ; Pondering shadows, colours, clouds, Grass-buds, and caterpillars' shrouds, Boughs on which the wild bees settle, Tints that spot the violet's petal, Why Nature loves the number five, And why the star-form she repeats. Lover of all things alive, Wonderer at all he meets, Wonderer chiefly at himself, Who can tell him what he is, Or how meet in human elf Coming and past eternities ? And such I knew, a forest seer, A minstrel of the natural year, Forteller of the vernal ides, Wise harbinger of spheres and tides. A lover true who knew by heart Each joy the mountain-dales impart ; It seemed that Nature could not raise A plant in any secret place, In quaking bog, on snowy hill, Beneath the grass that shades the rill, Under the snow, between the rocks, In damp fields known to bird and fox, But he would come in the very hour It opened in its virgin bower, As if a sunbeam showed the place, And tell its long-descended race. It seemed as if the breezes brought him, It seemed as if the sparrows taught him As if by secret sight he knew . Where in far fields the orchis grew. There are many events in the field Which are not shown to common eyes, But all her shows did Nature yield EMERSON 1 . To please and win this pilgrim wise. He saw the partridge drum in the woods, He heard the woodcock's evening hymn, He found the tawny thrush's broods, And the shy hawk did wait for him. What others did at distance hear, And guessed within the thicket's gloom, Was showed to this philosopher, And at his bidding seemed to come. In unploughed Maine, he sought the lumberer's gang, Where from a hundred lakes young rivers sprang ; He trod the unplanted forest-floor, whereon The all-seeing sun for ages hath not shone, Where feeds the mouse, and walks the surly bear, And up the tall mast runs the woodpecker. He saw, beneath dim aisles, in odorous beds, The slight Linnasa hang its twin-born heads, And blessed the monument of the man of flowers, Which breathes his sweet fame through the Northern bowers. He heard when in the grove, at intervals, With sudden roar the aged pine-tree falls, One crash, the death-hymn of the perfect tree, Declares the close of its green century. Low lies the plant to whose creation went Sweet influence from every element ; Whose living towers the years conspired to build, Whose giddy top the morning loved to gild. Through these green tents, by eldest Nature dressed, He roamed, content alike with man and beast. Where darkness found him, he lay glad at night ; There the red morning touched him with its light. Three moons his great heart him a hermit made, So long he roved at will the boundless shade. The timid it concerns to ask their way, And fear what foe in caves and swamps can stray, To make no step until the event is known, And ills to come as evils past bemoan. 72 EMERSON. Not so the wise ; no coward watch he keeps, To spy what danger on his pathway creeps. Go where he will, the wise man is at home, His hearth the earth, his hall the azure dome ; Where his clear spirit leads him, there's his road, By God's own light illumined and foreshowed. 'Twas one of the charmed days When the genius of God doth flow, The wind may alter twenty ways, A tempest cannot blow : It may blow north, it still is warm j Or south, it still is clear ; Or east, it smells like a clover farm ; Or west, no thunder fear. The musing peasant lowly great Beside the forest- water sate : The rope-like pine-root crosswise grown Composed the net- work of his throne ; The wide lake edged with sand and grass Was burnished to a floor of glass, Painted with shadows green and proud Of the tree and of the cloud. He was the heart of all the scene,, On him the sun looked more serene ; To hill and cloud his face was known, It seemed the likeness of their own. They knew by secret sympathy The public child of earth and sky. " You ask," he said, " what guide Me through trackless thickets led, Through thick-stemmed woodlands rough and wide ? I found the waters' bed : I travelled grateful by their side, Or through their channel dry ; They led me through the thicket damp, Through brake and fern, the beaver's camp, Through beds of granite cut my road, " 'Twas one of the charmed days When the genius of God doth flow, A iiurican Poems, j EMERSON. 73 And their resistless friendship showed. The falling waters led me, The foodful waters fed me, And brought me to the lowest land, Unerring to the ocean-sand. The moss upon the forest bark Was pole-star when the night was dark ; The purple berries in the wood Supplied me necessary food. For Nature ever faithful is , To such as trust her faithfulness. When the forest shall mislead me, When the night and morning lie, When sea and land refuse to feed me, 'Twill be time enough to die ; Then will yet my mother yield A pillow in her greenest field, Nor the June flowers scorn to cover The clay of their departed lover." II. As sunbeams stream through liberal space, And nothing jostle or displace, So waved the pine-tree through my thought, And fanned the dreams it never brought. " Whether is better, the gift or the donor ? Come to me," Quoth the pine-tree, " I am the giver of honour. My garden is the cloven rock, And my manure the snow, And drifting sand-heaps feed my stock In summer's scorching glow. Ancient or curious, Who knoweth aught of us ? Old as Jove, Old as Love, 74 EMERSON: AVho of me Tells the pedigree ? Only the mountains old, Only the waters cold, Only moon and star My coevals are. Ere the first fowl sung My relenting boughs among, Ere Adam wived, Ere Adam lived, Ere the duck dived, Ere the bees hived, Ere the lion roared, Ere the eagle soared, Light and heat, land and sea, Spake unto the oldest tree. Glad in the sweet and secret aid Which matter unto matter paid, The water flowed, the breezes fanned. The tree confined the roving sand, The sunbeam gave me to the sight, The tree adorned the formless light And once again O'er the grave of men We shall talk to each other again Of the old age behind, Of the time out of mind Which shall come again. " Whether is better, the gift or the donor ? Come to me," Quoth the pine-tree, " I am the giver of honour. He is great who can live by me; The rough and bearded forester Is better than the lord ; God fills the scrip and canister, Sin piles the loaded board. The lord is" the peasant that was, The peasant the lord that shall be ; EMERSON; 75 The lord is hay, the peasant grass, One dry, and one the living tree. Genius with my boughs shall flourish, Want and cold our roots shall nourish. Who liveth by the ragged pine Foundeth a heroic line ; Who liveth in the palace-hall Waneth fast and spendeth all. He goes to my savage haunts, With his chariot and his care ; My twilight realm he disenchants, And finds his prison there. "What prizes the town and the tower? Only what the pine-tree yields, Sinew that subdued the fields, The wild-eyed boy who in the woods Chants his hymn to hill and floods, Whom the city's poisoning spleen Made not pale, or fat, or lean, Whom the rain and the wind purgeth, Whom the dawn and the day-star urgeth, In whose cheek the rose-leaf blusheth, In whose feet the lion rusheth, Iron arms and iron mould, That know not fear, fatigue, or cold. I give my rafters to his boat, My billets to his boiler's throat, And I will swim the ancient sea To float my child to victory, And grant to dwellers with the pine Dominion o'er the palm and vine. Westward I ope the forest-gates ; The train along the railroad skates ; It leaves the land behind, like ages past, The foreland flows to it in river fast. Missouri I have made a mart, I teach Iowa Saxon art. Who leaves the pine-tree leaves his friend, Unnerves his strength, invites his end. 76 EMERSON. Cut a bough from my parent steu>, And dip it in thy porcelain ware; A little while each russet gem Will swell and rise with wonted grace, But, when it seeks enlarged supplies, The orphan of the forest dies. " Whoso walketh in solitude, And inhabiteth the wood, Choosing light, wave, rock, and bird, Before the money-loving herd, Into that forester shall pass From these companions power and grace. Clean shall he be without, within, From the old adhering sin; Love shall he, but not adulate, The all-fair, the all-embracing Fate, All ill dissolving in the light Of his triumphant piercing sight, Not vain, sour, nor frivolous, Not mad, athirst, nor garrulous ; Grave, chaste, contented, though retired, And of all other men desired. On him the light of star and moon Shall fall with purer radiance down ; All constellations of the sky Shed their virtue through his eye. Him Nature giveth for defence His formidable innocence; The mountain-sap, the shells, the sea, Ul spheres, all stones, his helpers be. He shall never be old, Nor his fate shall be foretold ; He shall see the speeding year, Without wailing, without fear. He shall be happy in his love, Like to like shall joyful prove. He shall be happy whilst he wooes Muse-born a daughter of the Muse ; But if with gold she bind her hair, EMERSON. 77 And deck her breast with diamond, Take off thine eyes, thy heart forbear, Though thou lie alone on the ground. The robe of silk in which she shines, It was woven of many sins, And the shreds Which she sheds In the wearing of the same Shall be grief on grief, And shame on shame. " Heed the old oracles, Ponder my spells ; Song wakes in my pinnacles When the wind swells. Soundeth the prophetic wind, The shadows shake on the rock behind, And the countless leaves of the pine are strings Tuned to the lay the wood-god sings. Hearken ! hearken ! If thou would st know the mystic song Chanted when the sphere was young ; Aloft, abroad, the paean swells, O wise man, hear'st thou half it tells ? O wise man ! hear'st thou the least part ? 'Tis the chronicle of art. To the open ear it sings The early genesis of things ; Of tendency through endless ages, Cf star-dust and star-pilgrimages, Of rounded worlds, of space, and time, Of the old flood's subsiding slime, Of chemic matter, force, and form, Of poles and powers, cold, wet, and warm ; The rushing metamorphosis, Dissolving all that fixture is, Melts things that be to things that seem, And solid nature to a dream. Oh listen to the under-song, The ever-old, the ever-young, 78 EMERSON. And, far within those cadent pauses, The chorus of the ancient Causes. Delights the dreadful destiny To fling his voice into the tree, And shock thy weak ear with a note Breathed from the everlasting throat. In music he repeats the pang Whence the fair flock of nature sprang. O mortal ! thy ears are stones ; These echoes are laden with tones Which only the pure can hear. Thou canst not catch what they recite Of Fate and Will, of Want and Right, Of man to come, of human life, Of Death and Fortune, Growth and Strife." Once again the pine-tree sung ; " Speak not thy speech my boughs among, Put off thy years, wash in the breeze, My hours are peaceful centuries. Talk no more with feeble tongue ; No more the fool of space and time, Come weave with mine a nobler rhyme. Only thy Americans Can read thy line, can meet thy glance ; But the runes that I rehearse Understands the universe. The least breath my boughs which tossed Brings again the Pentecost ; To every soul it soundeth clear In a voice of solemn cheer, 'Am I not thine? are not these thine? And they reply, 'For ever mine.' My branches speak Italian, English, German, Basque, Castilian, Mountain speech to Highlanders, Ocean tongues to islanders, To Fin, and Lap, and swart Malay, To each his bosom-secret say. wfc*. .EMERSON, 79 "Come learn with me the fatal song Which knits the world in music strong, Whereto every bosom dances, Kindled with courageous fancies. Come lift thine eyes to lofty rhymes Of things with things, of times with times, Primal chimes of sun and shade, Of sound and echo, man and maid; The land reflected in the flood; Body with shadow still pursued. For Nature beats in perfect tune, And rounds with rhyme her every rune, Whether she work in land or sea, Or hide underground her alchemy. Thou canst not wave thy staff in air, Or dip thy paddle in the lake, But it carves the bow of beauty there, And the ripples in rhymes the oar forsake. The wood is wiser far than thou : The wood and wave each other know Not unrelated, unaffied, But to each thought and thing allied, Is perfect Nature's every part, Rooted in the mighty heart. But thou, poor child! unbound, unrhymed, Whence earnest thou, misplaced, mistimed? Whence, O thou orphan and defrauded? Is thy land peeled, thy realm marauded? Who thee divorced, deceived, and left? Thee of thy faith who hath bereft, And torn the ensigns from thy brow, And sunk the immortal eye so low? Thy cheek too white, thy form too slender, Thy gait too slow, thy habits tender, For royal man; they thee confess An exile from the wilderness, The hills where health with health agrees, And the wise soul expels disease. Hark! in thy ear I will tell the sign By which thy hurt thou mayst divine. 8o EMERSON; When thou shalt climb the mountain cliff, Or see the wide shore from thy skiff, To thee the horizon shall express Only emptiness and emptiness. There is no man of nature's worth In the circle of the earth ; And to thine eye the vast skies fall Dire and satirical On clucking hens, and prating fools, On thieves, on drudges, and on dolls. And thou shalt say to the Most High, 'Godhead! all this astronomy, And Fate, and practice, and invention, Strong art, and beautiful pretension, This radiant pomp of sun and star, Throes that were, and worlds that are, Behold ! were in vain and in vain ; It cannot be, I will look again, Surely now will the curtain rise, And earth's fit tenant me surprise; But the curtain doth not rise, And Nature has miscarried wholly Into failure, into folly.' "Alas! thine is the bankruptcy, Blessed Nature so to see. Come lay thee in my soothing shade, And heal the hurts which sin has made. I will teach the bright parable Older than time, Things*Hin declarable, Visions sul lime. I see thee in the crowd alone; I will be thy companion. Let thy friends be as the dead in doom, And build to them a final tomb ; Let the starred shade which mighty falls Still celebrate their funerals, And the bell of beetle and of bee Knell their melodious memory. -A EMERSON. 8 1 Behind thee leave thy merchandise, Thy churches and thy charities, And leave thy peacock wit behind; Enough for thee the primal mind That flows in streams, that breathes in wind. Leave all thy pedant lore apart; God hid the whole world in thy heart Love shuns the sage, the child it crowns, And gives them all who all renounce. The rain comes when the wind calls; The river knows the way to the sea; Without a pilot it runs and falls, Blessing all lands with its charity. The sea tosses and foams to find Its way up to the cloud and wind; The shadow sits close to the flying ball, The date fails not on the palm-tree tall; And thou, go burn thy wormy pages, Shalt outsee the seer, outwit the sages. Oft didst thou thread the woods in vain To find what bird had piped the strain, Seek not, and the little eremite Flies gaily forth and sings in sight. "Hearken once more; I will tell the mundane lore. Older am I than thy numbers wot; Change I may, but I pass not. Hitherto all things fast abide, And anchored in the tempest ride. Trendrant time behoves to hurry All to yean and all to bury; All the forms are fugitive, But the substances survive. Ever fresh the broad creation, A divine improvisation, From the heart of God proceeds, A single will, a million deeds. Once slept the world an egg of stone, And pulse and sound and light was none; 82 EMERSON. And God said, 'Throb;' and there was motion, And the vast mass became vast ocean. Onward and on, the eternal Pan, Who layeth the world's incessant plan, Halteth never in one shape, But for ever doth escape, Like wave or flame, into new forms Of gem and air, of plants and worms. I, that to-day am a pine, Yesterday was a bundle of grass. He is free and libertine, Pouring of his power the wine To every age, to every race; Unto every race and age He emptieth the beverage; Unto each, and unto all, Maker and original The world is the ring of his spells, And the play of his miracles. As he giveth to all to drink, Thus or thus they are and think. He giveth little or giveth much, To make them several or such: With one drop sheds form and feature, With the second a special nature; The third adds heat's indulgent spark; The fourth gives light which eats the dark. In the fifth drop himself he flings. And conscious Law is King of Kings. Pleaseth him the Eternal Child To play his sweet will, glad and wild. As the bee through the garden ranges, From world to world the godhead changes ; As the sheep go feeding through the waste. From form to form he maketh haste. This vault which glows immense with light Is the inn where he lodges for a night. What recks such Traveller if the bowers, Which bloom and fade like summer flowers, A bunch of fragrant lilies be, EMERSOM 83 Or the stars of eternity? Alike to him the better, the worse, The glowing angel, the outcast corse, Thou metest him by centuries, And lo! he passes like the breeze; Thou seek'st in globe and galaxy, He hides in pure transparency; Thou askest in fountains and in fires, He is the essence that enquires. He is the axis of the star; . He is the sparkle of the spar; He is the heart of every creature; He is the meaning of each feature; And his mind is the sky, Than all it holds more deep, more high." ASTRJEA. HIMSELF it was who wrote His rank, and quartered his own coat There is no king nor sovereign state That can fix a hero's rate ; Each to all is venerable, Cap-a-pie invulnerable, Until he write, where all eyes rest, Slave or master on his breast I saw men go up and down In the country and the town, With this prayer upon their neck, "Judgment and a judge we seek." Not to monarchs they repair, Xor to learned jurist's chair ; But they hurry to their peers. To their kinsfolk and their dears ; Louder than with speech they pray, " What am I ? companion ; say."' And the friend not hesitates To assign just place and mates, EMERSON. Answers not in word or letter, Yet is understood the better ; Is to his friend a looking-glass, Reflects his figure that doth pass. Every wayfarer he meets What himself declared, repeats ; What himself confessed, records ; Sentences him in his words. The form is his own corporal form, And his thought the penal worm. Yet shine for ever virgin minds, Loved by stars and purest winds, Which, o'er passion throned sedate, Have not hazarded their state, Disconcert the searching spy, Rendering to a curious eye The durance of a granite ledge To those who gaze from the sea's edge. It is there for benefit, It is there for purging light, There for purifying storms, And its depths reflect all forms ; It cannot parley with the mean, Pure by impure is not seen. For there's no sequestered grot, Lone mountain-tarn, or isle forgot, But Justice journeying in the sphere Daily stoops to harbour there. ODE TO BEAUTY. WHO gave thee, O Beauty ! The keys of this breast, Too credulous lover Of blest and unblest? Say when in lapsed ages Thee knew I of old ; Or what was the service For which I was sold ? EMERSON. 85 When first my eyes saw thee, I found me thy thrall, By magical drawings, Sweet tyrant of all ! I drank at thy fountain False waters of thirst ; Thou intimate stranger, Thou latest and first ! Thy dangerous glances Make women of men ; New-born we are melting Into nature again. Lavish, lavish promiser, Nigh persuading gods to err, Guest of million painted forms Which in turn thy glory warms, The frailest leaf, the mossy bark, The acorn's cup, the raindrop's arc, The swinging spider's silver line, The ruby of the drop of wine, The shining pebble of the pond, Thou inscribest with a bond, In thy momentary play, Would bankrupt Nature to repay. Ah ! what avails it To hide or to shun Whom the Infinite One Hath granted his throne? The heaven high over Is the deep's lover; The sun and sea, Informed by thec, Before me run, And draw me on,-^ Yet fly me still. As Fate refuses To me the heart Fate for me chooses. Is it that my opulent soul 86 EMERSON: Was mingled from the generous whole, Sea-valleys and the deep of skies Furnished several supplies, And the sands whereof I'm made Draw me to them self-betrayed? I turn the proud portfolios Which hold the grand designs Of Salvator, of Guercino, And Piranesi's lines. I hear the lofty Paeans Of the masters of the shell, Who heard the starry music, And recount the numbers well : Olympian bards who sung Divine Ideas below, Which always find us young, And always keep us so. Oft in streets or humblest places I detect far-wandered Graces, Which from Eden wide astray In lowly homes have lost their way. Thee gliding through the sea of form, Like the lightning through the storm, Somewhat not to be possessed, Somewhat not to be caressed, No feet so fleet could ever find, No perfect form could ever bind. Thou eternal fugitive Hovering over all that live, Quick and skilful to inspire Sweet extravagant desire, Starry space and lily-bell Filling with thy roseate smell, Wilt not give the lips to taste Of the nectar which thou hast. All that's good and great with thee Stands in deep conspiracy. Thou hast bribed .the dark and lonely EMERSON. 87 To report thy features only ; And the cold and purple morning, Itself with thoughts of thee adorning, The leafy dell, the city mart, Equal trophies of thine art, E'en the flowing azure air, Thou hast touched for my despair; And, if I languish into dreams, Again I meet the ardent beams. Queen of things ! I dare not die In Being's deeps past ear and eye, Lest there I find the same deceiver, And be the sport of Fate for ever. Dread power, but dear ! if God thou be, Unmake me quite, or give thyself to me. TO EVA. O FAIR and stately maid, whose eye Was kindled in the upper sky At the same torch that lighted mine For so I must interpret still Thy sweet dominion o'er my will, A sympathy divine, Ah ! let me blameless gaze upon Features that seem in heart my own, Nor fear those watchful sentinels Which charm the more their glance forbids ; Chaste glowing underneath their lids With fire that draws while it repels. THINE eyes still shined for me, though far I lonely roved the land or sea, As I behold yon evening star, Which yet beholds not me. This morn I climbed the misty hill, And roamed the pastures through ; How danced thy form before my path, Amidst the deep ^"M dew ! 88 EMERSON. When the red bird spread his sable wing, And showed his side of flame, When the rose-bud ripened to the rose, In both I read thy name. EROS. THE sense of the world is short, Long and various the report, To love and be beloved ; Men and gods have not outlearned it ; And, how oft soe'er they've turned it, 'Tis not to be improved. HERMIONE. ON a mound an Arab lay, And sung his sweet regrets, And told his amulets. The summer bird His sorrow heard ; And, when he heaved a sigh profound, The sympathetic swallows swept the ground. " If it be as they said, she was not fair ; Beauty's not beautiful to me, But sceptred Genius aye inorbed, Culminating in her sphere. This Hermione absorbed The lustre of the land and ocean, Hills and islands, vine and tree, In her form and motion. I ask no bauble miniature, Nor ringlets dead Shorn from her comely head, Now that morning not disdains, Mountains and the misty plains * Her colossal portraiture ; XIX EMERSON. 89 They her heralds be, Steeped in her quality, And singers of her fame, Who is their muse and dame. " Higher, dear swallows, mind not what I say. Ah ! heedless how the weak are strong, Say, was it just In thee to frame, in me to trust, Thou to the Syrian couldst belong ? "I am of a lineage That each for each doth fast engage. In old Bassora's schools I seemed Hermit vowed to books and gloom, Ill-bested for gay bridegroom : I was by thy touch redeemed ; When thy meteor glances came, We talked at large of worldly Fate, And drew truly every trait. Once I dwelt apart, Now I live with all. As shepherd's lamp on far hill-side Seems, by the traveller espied, A door into the mountain heart : So didst thou quarry and unlock Highways for me through be rock. " Now deceived thou wanderest In strange lands, unblest, And my kindred come to soothe me. South wind is my next of blood ; He is come through fragrant wood, Drugged with spice from climates warm, And in every twinkling glade And twilight nook Unveils thy form. i Out of the forest way Forth paced it yesterday ; And, when I sat by the water-course, 90 EMERSON. Watching the daylight fade, It throbbed up from the brook. River, and rose, and crag, and bird, Frost, and sun, and eldest night, To me their aid preferred, To me their comfort plight : * Courage ! we are thine allies ; And with this hint be wise, The chains of kind The distant bind. Deed thou doest she must do. Above her will, be true ; And, in her strict resort To winds and waterfalls, And autumn's sun-lit festivals, To music, and to music's thought, Inextricably bound, She shall find thee, and be found. Follow not her flying feet; Come to us, herself to meet.' " BACCHUS. BRING me wine, but wine which never grew In the belly of the grape, Or grew on vine whose taproots reaching through Under the Andes to the Cape, Suffered no savour of the world to scape. Let its grapes the morn salute From a nocturnal root Which feels the acrid juice Of Styx and Erebus, And turns the woe of night, By its own craft, to a more rich delight. We buy ashes for bread, We buy diluted wine ; Give me of the true, Whose ample leaves and tendrils, curled EMERSON. 91 Among the silver hills of heaven, Draw everlasting dew; Wine of wine, Blood of the world, Form of forms and mould of statures, That I, intoxicated, And by the draught assimilated, May float at pleasure through all natures, The bird-language rightly spell, And that which roses say so well. Wine that is shed Like the torrents of the sun Up the horizon walls ; Or like the Atlantic streams which run When the South Sea calls. Water and bread ; Food which needs no transmuting, Rainbow-flowering, wisdom-fruiting ; Wine which is already man, Food which teach and reason can. Wine which music is ; Music and wine are one ; That I, drinking this, Shall hear far chaos talk with me, Kings unborn shall walk with me, And the poor grass shall plot and plan What it will do when it is man : Quickened so, will I unlock Every crypt of every rock. I thank the joyful juice For all I know ; Winds of remembering Of the ancient being blow, And seeming-solid walls of use Open and flow. 92 EMERSON. Pour, Bacchus, the remembering wine Retrieve the loss of me and mine; Vine for vine be antidote, And the grape requite the lote. Haste to cure the old despair, Reason in Nature's lotus drenched, The memory of ages quenched ; Give them again to shine. Let wine repair what this undid ; And, where the infection slid, A dazzling memory revive. Refresh the faded tints, Recut the aged prints, And write my old adventures, with the per* Which, on the first day, drew Upon the tablets blue The dancing Pleiads, and the eternal men. SAADT. TREES in groves, Kine in droves, In ocean sport the scaly herds, Wedge-like cleave the air the birds, To northern lakes fly wind-borne ducks, Browse the mountain sheep in flocks, Men consort in camp and town : But the poet dwells alone. God who gave to him the lyre, Of all mortals the desire, For all breathing men's behoof, Straitly charged him, "Sit aloof;" Annexed a warning, poets say, To the bright premium, " Ever when twain together play, Shall the harp be dumb." Many may come, 4* : EMERSON. 93 But one shall sing; Two touch the string, The harp is dumb. Though there come a million, Wise Saadi dwells alone. Yet Saadi loved the race of men, No churl immured in cave or den, In bower and hall He wants them all, Nor can dispense With Persia for his audience; They must give ear, Grow red with joy, and white with fear. Yet he has no companion ; Come ten, or come a million, Good Saadi dwells alone. Be thou ware where Saadi dwells. Gladly round that golden lamp Sylvan deities encamp, And simple maids and noble youth Are welcome to the man of truth. Most welcome they who need him most, They feed the spring which they exhaust : For greater need Draws better deed. But, critic, spare thy vanity, Nor show thy pompous parts, To vex with odious subtlety The cheerer of men's hearts. Sad-eyed Fakirs swiftly say Endless dirges to decay ; Never in the blaze of light Lose the shudder of midnight; And at overflowing noon Hear wolves barking at the moon ; In the bower of dalliance sweet Hear the far Avenger's feet; 94 EMERSON. And shake before those awful Powers Who in their pride forgive not ours. Thus the sad-eyed Fakirs preach ; " Bard, when thee would Allah teach, And lift thee to his holy mount, He sends thee, from his bitter fount, Wormwood, saying, ' Go thy ways ; Drink not the Malaga of praise, But do the deed thy fellows hate, And compromise thy peaceful state. Smite the white breasts which thee fed, Stuff sharp thorns beneath the head Of them thou shouldst have comforted. For out of woe and out of crime Draws the heart a lore sublime.' " And yet it seemeth not to me That the high gods love tragedy; For Saadi sat in the sun, And thanks was his contrition ; For haircloth and for bloody whips, Had active hands and smiling lips ; And yet his runes he rightly read, And to his folk his message sped. Sunshine in his heart transferred Lighted each transparent word ; And well could honouring Persia learn What Saadi wished to say; For Saadi's nightly stars did burn Brighter than Dschami's day. Whispered the Muse in Saadi's cot ; " O gentle Saadi, listen not, Tempted by thy praise of wit, Or by thirst and appetite For the talents not thine own, To sons of contradiction. Never, sun of eastern morning, Follow falsehood, follow scorning. Denounce who will, who will, deny, And pile the hills to scale the sky ; EMERSON. 95 Let theist, atheist, pantheist, Define and wrangle how they list, Fierce conserver, fierce destroyer; But thou, joy-giver and enjoyer, Unknowing war, unknowing crime, Gentle Saadi, mind thy rhyme. Heed not what the brawlers say, Heed thou only Saadi's lay. Let the great world bustle on With war and trade, with camp and town. A thousand men shall dig and eat, At forge and furnace thousands sweat, And thousands sail the purple sea, And give or take the stroke of war, Or crowd the market and bazaar. Oft shall war end, and peace return, And cities rise where cities burn, Ere one man my hill shall climb Who can turn the golden rhyme; Let them manage how they may, Heed thou only Saadi's lay. Seek the living among the dead: Man in man is imprisoned. Barefooted Dervish is not poor, If fate unlock his bosom's door, So that what his eye hath seen His tongue can paint, as bright, as keen, And what his tender heart hath felt With equal fire thy heart shall melt. For whom the Muses shine upon, And touch with soft persuasion, His words like a storm-wind can bring Terror and beauty on their wing; In his every syllable Lurketh nature veritable ; And though he speak in midnight dark, In heaven no star, on earth no spark, Yet before the listener's eye Swims the world in ecstasy, The forest waves, the morning breaks, The pastures sleep, ripple the lakes, EMERSON. Leaves twinkle, flowers like persons be, And life pulsates in rock or tree. Saadi ! so far thy words shall reach ; Suns rise and set in Saadi's speech." And thus to Saadi said the Muse; " Eat thou the bread which men refuse ; Flee from the goods which from thee flee ; Seek nothing; Fortune seeketh thee. Nor mount, nor dive ; all good things keep The midway of the eternal deep. Wish not to fill the isles with eyes To fetch thee birds of paradise. On thine orchard's edge belong All the brass of plume and song ; Wise Ali's sunbright sayings pass For proverbs in the market-place ; Through mountains bored by regal art Toil whistles as he drives his cart. Nor scour the seas, nor sift mankind, A poet or a friend to find ; Behold, he watches at the door, Behold his shadow on the floor Open innumerable doors, The heaven where unveiled Allah pours The flood of truth, the flood of good, The seraph's and the cherub's food ; Those doors are men; the pariah kind Admits thee to the perfect Mind. Seek not beyond thy cottage-wall Redeemer that can yield thee all. While thou sittest at thy door, On the desert's yellow floor, Listening to the grey-haired crones, Foolish gossips, ancient drones, Saadi, see, they rise in stature To the height of mighty Nature, And the secret stands revealed Fraudulent Time in vain concealed, That blessed gods in servile masks Plied for thee thy household tasks." EMERSON. 97 BLIGHT. GIVE me truths, For I am weary of the surfaces, And die of inanition. If I knew Only the herbs and simples of the wood, Rue, cinquefoil, gill, vervain and pimpernel, Blue-vetch and trillium, hawkweed, sassafras, Milkweeds and murky brakes, quaint pipes and sun dew, And rare and virtuous roots which in these woods Draw untold juices from the common earth* Untold, unknown, and I could surely spell Their fragrance, and their chemistry apply By sweet affinities to human flesh, Driving the foe and stablishing the friend, Oh that were much, and I could be a part Of the round day, related to the sun, And planted world, and full executor Of their imperfect functions ! But these young scholars who invade our hills. Bold as the engineer who fells the wood, And travelling often in the cut he makes, Love not the flower they pluck, and know it not, And all their botany is Latin names. The old men studied magic in the flower, And human fortunes in astronomy, And an omnipotence in chemistry, Preferring things to names ; for these were men, Were Unitarians of the united world, And, wheresoever their clear eyebeams fell, They caught the footsteps of the SAME. Our eyes Are armed, but we are strangers to the stars, And strangers to the mystic beast and bird, And strangers to the plant and to the mine. The injured elements say " Not in us;" And night and day, ocean and continent, Fire, plant, and mineral, say " Not in us," And haughtily return us stare for stare. For we invade them impiously for gain, G 98 EMERSON. We devastate them unreligiously, And coldly ask their pottage, not their love. Therefore they shove us from them, yield to us Only what to our griping toil is due. But the sweet affluence of love and song, The rich results of the divine consents Of- man and earth, of world beloved and lover, The nectar and ambrosia, are withheld ; And in the midst of spoils and slaves, we thieves And pirates of the universe, shut out Daily to a more thin and outward rind, Turn pale and starve. Therefore, to our sick eyes, The stunted trees look sick, the summer short, Clouds shade the sun, which will not tan our hay. And nothing thrives to reach its natural term ; And life, shorn of its venerable length, Even at its greatest space, is a defeat, And dies in anger that it was a dupe, And, in its highest noon and wantonness, Is early frugal like a beggar's child: With most unhandsome calculation taught, Even in the hot pursuit of the best aims And prizes of ambition, checks its hand, Like Alpine cataracts frozen as they leaped, Chilled with a miserly comparison Of the toy's purchase with the length of life. MAY-DAY. DAUGHTER of Heaven and Earth, coy Spring, With sudden passion languishing, Maketh all things softly smile, Painteth pictures mile on mile, Holds a cup with cowslip-wreaths, Whence a smokeless incense breathes. Girls are peeling the sweet willow, Poplar white, and Gilead-tree ; And troops of boys Shouting with whoop and hilloa, And hip hip three times three ! , A ' EMERSON. 99 The air is full of whistlings bland ; What was that I heard Out of the hazy land ? Harp of the wind, or song of bird, Or clapping of shepherd's hands, Or vagrant booming of the air, Voice of a meteor lost in day? Such tidings of the starry sphere Can this elastic air convey. Or haply 'twas the cannonade Of the pent and darkened lake, Cooled by the pendent mountain's shade, Whose deeps, till beams of noonday break, Afflicted moan, and latest hold Even unto May the iceberg cold. Was it a squirrel's pettish bark, Or clarionet of j ay ? or hark W'here yon wedged line the nestor leads, Steering north with raucous cry Through tracts and provinces of sky, Every night alighting down In new landscapes of romance, Where darkling feed the clamorous clans By lonely lakes to men unknown. Come the tumult whence it will, Voice of sport, or rush of wings, It is a sound, it is a token, That the marble sleep is broken, And a change has passed on things, Beneath the calm, within the light, A hid unruly appetite Of swifter life, a surer hope, Strains every sense to larger scope, Impatient to anticipate The halting steps of aged Fate. Slow grows the palm, too slow the pearl : When Nature falters, fain would zeal Grasp the felloes of her wheel, And grasping give the orbs another whirl. loo EMERSON. " Turn swiftlier round, O tardy ball, And sun this frozen side ! Bring hither back the robin's call, Bring back the tulip's pride ! " Why chidest thou the tardy Spring? The hardy bunting does not chide ; The blackbirds make the maples ring With social cheer and jubilee ; The redwing flutes his o-ka-lee, The robins know the melting snow ; The sparrow meek, prophetic-eyed, Her nest beside the snowdrift weaves, Secure the osier yet will hide Her callow brood in mantling leaves ; And thou, by science all undone, Why only must thy reason fail To see the southing of the sun ? As we thaw frozen flesh with snow, So Spring will not, foolish fond, Mix polar night with tropic glow, Nor cloy us with unshaded sun, Nor wanton skip with bacchic dance ; But she has the temperance Of the gods, whereof she is one, Masks her treasury of heat Under east-winds crossed with sleet. Plants and birds and humble creatures Well accept her rule austere ; Titan-born, to hardy natures Cold is genial and dear. As Southern wrath to Northern right Is but straw to anthracite ; As in the day of sacrifice When heroes piled the pyre The dismal Massachusetts ice Burned more than others' fire ; So Spring guards with surface cold The garnered heat of ages old : EMERSON: 101 Hers to sow the seed of bread, That man and all the kinds be fed ; And, when the sunlight fills the hours, Dissolves the crust, displays the flowers. The world rolls round, mistrust it not, Befalls again what once befell ; Afl things return, both sphere and mote, And I shall hear my bluebird's note, And dream the dream of Auburn dell. When late I walked, in earlier days, All was stiff and stark ; Knee-deep snows choked all the ways, In the sky no spark. Firm-braced I sought my ancient woods, Struggling through the drifted roads. The whited desert knew me not, Snow-ridges masked each darling spot ; The summer dells, by genius haunted, One arctic moon had disenchanted. All the sweet secrets, therein hid By Fancy, ghastly spells undid. Eldest mason, Frost, had piled, With wicked ingenuity, Swift cathedrals in the vild ; The piny hosts were sheeted ghosts In the star-lit minster aisled. I found no joy : the icy wind Might rule the forest to his mind. Who would freeze in frozen brakes ? Back to books and sheltered home, And wood-fire flickering on the walls, To hear when, 'mid our talk and games, Without the baffled north-wind calls. But soft ! a sultry morning breaks ; The cowslips make the brown brook gay; A happier hour, a longer day. Now the sun leads in the May, Now desire of action wakes, And the wish to roam. 102 EMERSON. The caged linnet in the Spring Hearkens for the choral glee, When his fellows on the wing Migrate from the Southern Sea. When trellised grapes their flowers unmask, And the new-born tendrils twine, The old wine darkling in the cask Feels the bloom on the living vine, .. , And bursts the hoops at hint of Spring. And so, perchance, in Adam's race, Of Eden's bower some dream-like trace Survived the Flight, and swam the Flood, And wakes the wish in youngest blood To tread the forfeit Paradise, And feed once more the exile's eyes ; And ever when the happy child In May beholds the blooming wild, And hears in heaven the bluebird sing, " Onward," he cries, " your baskets bring, In the next field is air more mild, And o'er yon hazy crest is Eden's balmier Spring." Not for a regiment's parade, Nor evil laws or rulers made, Blue Walden rolls its cannonade, But for a lofty sign Which the Zodiac threw, That the bondage-days are told, And waters free as winds shall flow. Lo how all the tribes combine To rout the flying foe ! See, every patriot oak-leaf throws His elfin length upon the snows, Not idle, since the leaf all day Draws to the spot the solar ray, Ere sunset quarrying inches down, And half-way to the mosses brown ; While the grass beneath the rime Has hints of the propitious time, And upward pries and perforates EMERSON. 103 Through the cold slab a thousand gates, Till green lances peering through Bend happy in the welkin blue. April cold with dropping rain Willows and lilacs brings again, The whistle of returning birds, And trumpet-lowing of the herds The scarlet maple-keys betray What potent blood hath modest May ; What fiery force the earth renews, The wealth of forms, the flush of hues ; Joy shed in rosy waves abroad Flows from the heart of Love, the Lord. Hither rolls the storm of heat ; I feel its finer billows beat Like a sea which me infolds. Heat with viewless fingers moulds, Swells, and mellows, and matures, Paints, and flavours, and allures, Bird and briar inly warms, Still enriches and transforms, Gives the reed and lily length, Adds to oak and oxen strength, Boils the world in tepid lakes, Burns the world, yet burnt remakes Enveloping heat, enchanted robe, Wraps the daisy and the globe, Transforming what it doth infold, Life out of death, new out of old, Painting fawns' and leopards' fells, Seethes the gulf-encrimsoning shells, Fires gardens with a joyful blaze Of tulips in the morning's rays. The dead log touched bursts into leaf, The wheat-blade whispers of the sheaf. What god is this imperial Heat, Earth's prime secret, sculpture's seat ? Doth it bear hidden in its heart 104 EMERSON. Water-line patterns of all art, All figures, organs, hues, and graces ? Is it Daedalus ? is it Love ? Or walks in mask almighty Jove, And drops from Power's redundant horn All seeds of beauty to be born? Where shall we keep the holiday, And duly greet the entering May? Too strait and low our cottage doors, And all unmeet our carpet-floors ; Nor spacious court, nor monarch's hall, Suffice to hold the festival. Up and away ! where haughty woods Front the liberated floods. We will climb the broad-backed hills, Hear the uproar of their joy; We will mark the leaps and gleams Of the new-delivered streams, And the murmuring rivers of sap Mount in the pipes of the trees, Giddy with day, to the topmost spire, Which for a spike of tender green Bartered its powdery cap ; And the colours of joy in the bird, And the love in its carol heard, Frog and lizard in holiday coats, And turtle brave in his golden spots ; We will hear the tiny roar Of the insects evermore, While cheerful cries of crag and plain Reply to the thunder of river and main. As poured the flood of the ancient sea Spilling over mountain-chains, Bending forests as bends the sedge, Faster flowing o'er the plains, A world-wide wave with a foaming edge That rims the running silver-sheet, So pours the deluge of the heat EMERSON. IDS Broad northward o'er the land, Painting artless paradises, Drugging herbs with Syrian spices, Fanning secret fires which glow In columbine and clover-blow, Climbing the northern zones, Where a thousand pallid towns Lie like cockles by the main, Or tented armies on a plain. The million-handed sculptor moulds Quaintest bud and blossom-folds ; The million-handed painter pours Opal hues and purple dye ; Azaleas flush the island floors, And the tints of heaven reply. Wreaths for the May ! for happy Spring To-day shall all her dowry bring, The love of kind, the joy, the grace, Hymen of element and race, Knowing well to celebrate With song and hue and star and state, With tender light and youthful cheer, The spousals of the new-born year. Lo Love's inundation poured Over space and race abroad ! Spring is strong and virtuous, Broad-sowing, cheerful, plenteous, Quickening underneath the mould Grains beyond the price of gold. So deep and large her bounties are That one broad long midsummer day Shall to the planet overpay The ravage of a year of war. Drug the cup, thou butler s.veet, And send the nectar round ; The feet that slid so long on sleet Are glad to feel the ground. io6 EMERSON. Fill and saturate each kind With good according to its mind, Fill each kind and saturate With good agreeing with its fate, Willow and violet, maiden and man. The bitter-sweet, the haunting air, Creepeth, bloweth everywhere. It preys on all, all prey on it, Blooms in beauty, thinks in wit, Stings the strong with enterprise, Makes travellers long for Indian skies ; And where it comes this courier fleet Fans in all hearts expectance sweet, As if to-morrow should redeem The vanished rose of evening's dream. By houses lies a fresher green, On men and maids a ruddier mien, As if time brought a new relay Of shining virgins every May, And Summer came to ripen maids To a beauty that not fades. The ground-pines wash their rusty green, The maple-tops their crimson tint ; On the soft path each track is seen, The girl's foot leaves its neater print. The pebble loosened from the frost Asks of the urchin to be tost. In flint and marble beats a heart; The kind Earth takes her children's part. The green lane is the schoolboy's friend ; Low leaves his quarrel apprehend; The fresh ground loves his top and ball, The air rings jocund to his call, The brimming brook invites a leap ; He dives the hollow, climbs the steep. The youth reads omens where he goes, And speaks all languages the rose. The wood-fly mocks with tiny noise EMERSON. 107 The far halloo of human voice ; The perfumed berry on the spray Smacks of faint memories far away. A subtle chain of countless rings The next unto the farthest brings ; And, striving to be man, the worm Mounts through all the spires of form. I saw the bud-crowned Spring go forth, Stepping daily onward north To greet staid ancient cavaliers Filing single in stately train. And who, and who are the travellers ? They were Night and Day, and Day and Night, Pilgrims wight with step forthright. I saw the Days deformed and low, Short and bent by cold and snow ; The merry Spring threw wreaths on them, Flower-wreaths gay with bud and bell, Many a flower and many a gem. They were refreshed by the smell, They shook the snow from hats and shoon ? They put their April raiment on ; And those eternal forms, Unhurt by a thousand storms, Shot up to the height of the sky again, And danced as merrily as young men. I saw them mask their awful glance Sidewise meek in gossamer lids ; And, to speak my thought if none forbids, It was as if the eternal gods, Tired of their starry periods, Hid their majesty in cloth Woven of tulips and painted moth. On carpets green the maskers march Below May's well-appointed arch, Each star, each god, each grace amain, Every joy and virtue speed, Marching duly in her train, And fainting Nature at her need Is made whole again. io8 EMERSON. 'Twas the vintage-clay of field and wood, When magic wine for bards is brewed ; Every tree and stem and chink Gushed with syrup to the brink. The air stole into the streets of towns, And betrayed the fund of joy To the high-school and medalled boy: On from hall to chamber ran, From youth to maid, from boy to man, To babes, and to old eyes as well. "Once more," the old man cried, "ye clouds, Airy turrets purple-piled, Which once my infancy beguiled, Beguile me with the wonted spell. I know ye skilful to convoy The total freight of hope and joy Into rude and homely nooks, Shed mocking lustres on shelf of books, On farmer's byre, on meadow-pipes, Or on a pool of dancing chips. I care not if the pomps you show Be what they soothfast appear, Or if yon realms in sunset glow Be bubbles of the atmosphere. . - And if it be to you allowed To fool me with a shining cloud, So only new griefs are consoled By new delights, as old by old, Frankly I will be your guest, Count your change and cheer the best. The world hath overmuch of pain, If Nature give me joy again, Of such deceit I'll not complain." Ah! well I mind the calendar, Faithful through a thousand years, Of the painted race of flowers, Exact to days, exact to hours, Counted on the spacious dial Yon broidered zodiac girds. j JL "">^ EMERSON. 109 I know the pretty almanac Of the punctual coming-back, On their due days, of the birds. I marked them yestermorn, A flock of finches darting Beneath the crystal arch, Piping, as they flew, a march, Belike the one they used in parting Last year from yon oak or larch. Dusky sparrows in a crowd, Diving, darting northward free, Suddenly betook them all, Every one to his hole in the wall, Or to his niche in the apple-tree. I greet with joy the choral trains Fresh from palms and Cuba's canes. Best gems of Nature's cabinet, With dews of tropic morning wet, Beloved of children, bards, and Spring, O birds, your perfect virtues bring, Your song, your forms, your rhythmic flight, Your manners for the heart's delight; Nestle in hedge, or barn, or roof, Here weave your chamber weather-proof; Forgive our harms, and condescend To man, as to a lubber friend, And, generous, teach his awkward race Courage, and probity, and grace! Poets praise that hidden wine Hid in milk we drew At the barrier of Time, When our life was new. We had eaten fairy fruit, We were quick from head to foot; All the forms we looked on shone As with diamond dews thereon. What cared we for costly joys, The museum's far-fetched toys? Gleam of sunshine on the wall *> : I io . EMERSON. Poured a deeper cheer than all The revels of the carnival. We a pine-grove did prefer To a marble theatre, Could with gods on mallows dine, Nor cared for spices or for wine. Wreaths of mist and rainbow spanned, Arch on arch, the grimmest land; Whistle of a woodland bird Made the pulses dance, Note of horn in valleys heard Filled the region with romance. None can tell how sweet, How virtuous, the morning air; Every accent vibrates well. Not alone the wood-bird's call, Or shouting boys that chase their ball, Pass the height of minstrel skill; But the ploughman's thoughtless cry, Lowing oxen, sheep that bleat, And the joiner's hammer-beat, Softened are above their will. All grating discords melt, No dissonant note is dealt; And, though thy voice be shrill Like rasping file on steel, Such is the temper of the air, Echo waits with art and care, And will the faults of song repair. So by remote Superior Lake, And by resounding Mackinac, When northern storms and forests shake, And billows on the long beach break, The artful Air doth separate Note by note all sounds that grate, Smothering in her ample breast All but godlike words, Reporting to the happy ear J EMERSON. . Ill Only purified accords. Strangely wrought from barking waves, Soft music daunts the Indian braves, Convent-chanting which the child Hears pealing from the panther's cave And the impenetrable wild. One musician is sure, His wisdom will not fail ; He has not tasted wine impure, Nor bent to passion frail. Age cannot cloud his memory, Nor grief untune his voice, Ranging down the ruled scale From tone of joy to inward wail, Tempering the pitch of all In his windy cave. He all the fables knows, And in their causes tells, Knows Nature's rarest moods, Ever on her secret broods. The Muse of men is coy, Oft courted will not come; In palaces and market-squares Entreated, she is dumb. But my minstrel knows and tells The counsel of the gods, Knows of Holy Book the spells, Knows the law of Night and Day, And the heart of girl and boy, The tragic and the gay, And what is writ on Table Round Of Arthur and his peers, What sea and land discoursing say In siderial years. He renders all his lore In numbers wild as dreams, Modulating all extremes, What the spangled meadow saith To the children who have faith; 112 . .EMERSON. Only to children children sing, Only to youth will spring be spring. Who is the Bard thus magnified? When did he sing, and where abide? Chief of song where poets feast Is the wind-harp which thou seest In the casement at my side. y^Eolian harp, How strangely wise thy strain ! Gay for youth, gay for youth, (Sweet is art, but sweeter truth) In the hall at summer eve Fate and Beauty skilled to weave. From the eager opening strings Rung loud and bold the song. Who but loved the wind-harp's note? How should not the poet doat On its mystic tongue, With its primeval memory, Reporting what old minstrels said Of Merlin locked the harp within, Merlin paying the pain of sin, Pent in a dungeon made of air, And some attain his voice to hear, Words of pain and cries of fear, But pillowed all on melody, As fits the griefs of bards to be. And what if that all-echoing shell, Which thus the buried Past can tell, Should rive the Future, and reveal What his dread folds would fain conceal? It shares the secret of the earth, And of the kinds that owe her birth. Speaks not of self that mystic tone, But of the Overgods alone : It trembles to the cosmic breath, As it heareth, so it saith ; EMERSON. 113 Obeying meek the primal Cause, It is the tongue of mundane laws. And this, at least, I dare affirm, Since genius too has bound and term, There is no bard in all the choir Nor Homer's self, the poet sire, Wise Milton's odes of pensive pleasure, Or Shakspeare, whom no mind can measure, Nor Collins' verse of tender pain, Nor Byron's clarion of disdain, Scott, the delight of generous boys, Or Wordsworth, Pan's recording voice Not one of all can put in verse, Or to this presence could rehearse, The sights and voices ravishing The boy knew on the hills in Spring, When pacing through the oaks he heard Sharp queries of the sentry-bird, The heavy grouse's sudden whirr, The rattle of the kingfisher ; Saw bonfires of the harlot flies In the lowland, when day dies ; Or marked, benighted and forlorn, The first far signal-fire of morn. These syllables that Nature spoke, And the thoughts that in him woke, Can adequately utter none Save to his ear the wind-harp lone. And best can teach its Delphian chord How Nature to the soul is moored, If once again that silent string, As erst it wont, would thrill and ring. Not long ago, at eventide, It seemed, so listening, at my side A window rose, and, to say sooth, I looked forth on the fields of youth. I saw fair boys bestriding steeds, I knew their forms in fancy weeds, Long, long concealed by sundering fates, 114 EMERSON. Mates of my youth, yet not my mates, Stronger and bolder far than I, With grace, with genius, well attired, And then as now from far admired, Followed with love They knew not of, With passion cold and shy. O joy, for what recoveries rare ! Renewed, I breathe Elysian air, See youth s glad mates in earliest bloorn,- Break not my dream, obtrusive tomb ! Or teach thou, Spring ! the grand recoil Of life resurgent from the soil Wherein was dropped the mortal spoil. Soft on the south-wind sleeps the haze So on thy broad mystic van Lie the opal-coloured days, And waft the miracle to man. Soothsayer of the eldest gods, Repairer of what harms betide, Revealer of the inmost powers Prometheus proffered, Jove denied ; Disclosing treasures more than true, Or in what far to-morrow due ; Speaking by the tongues of flowers, By the ten-tongued laurel speaking, Singing by the oriole songs, Heart of bird the man's heart seeking j Whispering hints of treasure hid Under morn's unlifted lid, Islands looming just beyond The dim horizon's utmost bound ; Who can, like thee, our rags upbraid, Or taunt us with our hope decayed ? Or who like thee persuade, Making the splendour of the air, The morn and sparkling dew, a snare ? Or who resent Thy genius, wiles, and blandishment ? EMERSON. 115 There is no orator prevails To beckon or persuade Like thee the youth or maid : Thy birds, thy songs, thy brooks, thy gales, Thy blooms, thy kinds, Thy echoes in the wilderness, Soothe pain, and age, and love's distress, Fire fainting will, and build heroic minds. For thou, O Spring! canst renovate All that high God did first create. Be still his arm and architect, Rebuild the ruin, mend defect ; Chemist to vamp old worlds with new, Coat sea and sky with heavenlier blue, New-tint the plumage of the birds, And slough decay from grazing herds, Sweep ruins from the scarped mountain, Cleanse the torrent at the fountain, Purge Alpine air by towns defiled, Bring to fair mother fairer child, Not less renew the heart and brain, Scatter the sloth, wash out the stain, Make the aged eye sun-clear, To parting soul bring grandeur near. Under gentle types, my Spring Masks the might of Nature's king, An energy that searches thorough From Chaos to the dawning morrow ; Into all our human plight, The soul's pilgrimage and flight ; In city or in solitude, Step by step, lifts bad to good, Without halting, without rest, Lifting Better up to Best ; Planting seeds of knowledge pure, Through earth to ripen, through heaven endure. 116 EMERSON. BOSTON HYMN. READ IN MUSIC HALL, JANUARY 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. God said, " I am tired of kings, I suffer them no more ; Up to my ear the morning 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 ; " I 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 shall have. " I will have never a noble, No lineage counted great ; Fishers and choppers and ploughmen Shall constitute a state. EMERSON. " Go, cut down trees in the forest, And trim the straightes* boughs ; Cut down the 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 before the sun. As planets faithful be! " And ye shall succour men ; 'Tis 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 labour and sweat, He goes in pawn to his victim For eternal years in debt. " To-day unbind the captive, So only are ye unbound ; ii8 EMERSON. 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. " O North ! give him beauty for rags, And honour, O 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." UNA. ROVING, roving, as it seems, Una lights my clouded dreams ; Still for journeys she is dressed; We wander far by east and west. In the homestead, homely thought.; At my work I ramble not ; If from home chance draw me wide, Half-seen Una sits beside. EMERSON'. 119 In my house and garden-plot, Though beloved, I miss her not ; But one I seek in foreign places, One face explore in foreign faces. At home a deeper thought may light The inward sky with chrysolite, And I greet from far the ray, Aurora of a dearer day. But if upon the seas I sail, Or trundle on the glowing rail, I am but a thought of hers, Loveliest of travellers. So the gentle poet's name To foreign parts is blown by fame j Seek him in his native town, He is hidden and unknown. SOLUTION. I AM the Muse who sung alway By Jove, at dawn of the first day. Star-crowned, sole-sitting, long I wrought To fire the stagnant earth with thought : On spawning slime my song prevails, Wolves shed their fangs, and dragons scales; Flushed in the sky the sweet May-morn, Earth smiled with flowers, and man was born. Then Asia yeaned her shepherd race, , And Nile substructs her granite base, Tented Tartary, columned Nile, And, under vines, on rocky isle, Or on wind-blown sea-marge bleak, Forward stepped the perfect Greek : That wit and joy might find a tongue, And earth grow civil, Homer sung. 120 EMERSON. Flown to Italy from Greece, I brooded long, and held my peace, For I am wont to sing uncalled, And in days of evil plight Unlock doors of new delight ; And sometimes mankind I appalled With a bitter horoscope, With spasms of terror for balm of hope. Then by better thought I lead Bards to speak what nations need. So I folded me in fears, And Dante searched the triple spheres, Moulding nature at his will, So shaped, so coloured, swift or still, And, sculptor-like, his large design Etched on Alp and Apennine. Seethed in mists of Penmanmaur, Taught by Plinlimmon's Druid power, England's genius filled all measure Of heart and soul, of strength and pleasure, Gave to the mind its emperor, And life was larger than before : Nor sequent centuries could hit Orbit and sum of Shakspeare's wit. The men who lived with him became Poets, for the air was fame. Far in the North, where polar night Holds in check the frolic light, In trance upborne past mortal goal The Swede Emanuel leads the soul. Through snows above, mines underground, The inks of Erebus he found ; Rehearsed to men the damned wails On which the seraph music sails. In spirit-worlds he trod alone, But walked the earth unmarked, unknown. The near by-stander caught no sound, Yet they who listened far aloof ^w EMERSON: 121 Heard rendings of the skyey roof, And felt, beneath, the quaking ground; And his air-sown, unheeded words, In the next age, are flaming swords. In newer days of war and trade, Romance forgot, and faith decayed, When Science armed and guided war, And clerks the Janus-gates unbar, When France, where poet never grew. Halved and dealt the globe anew, Gothe, raised o'er joy and strife, Drew the firm lines of Fate and Life, And brought Olympian wisdom down To court and mart, to gown and town ; Stooping, his finger wrote in clay The open secret of to-day. So bloom the unfading petals five, And verses that all verse outlive. SONG OF NATURE. MTNE are the night and morning, The pits of air, the gulf of space, The sportive sun, the gibbous moon, The innumerable days. i hide in the solar glory, I am dumb in the pealing song, I rest on the pitch of the torrent, In slumber I am strong. No numbers have counted my tallies, No tribes my house can fill; I sit by the shining Fount of Life, And pour the deluge still; And, ever by delicate powers Gathering along the centuries From race on race the rarest flowers, My wreath shall nothing miss. 12?. EMERSON. And many a thousand summers My apples ripened well, And light from meliorating stars With firmer glory fell. I wrote the past in characters Of rock and fire the scroll, The building in the coral sea, The planting of the coal. And thefts from satellites and rings And broken stars I drew, And out of spent and aged things I formed the world anew; What time the gods kept carnival, Tricked out in star and flower, And in cramp elf and saurian forms They swathed their too-much power. Time and thought were my surveyors, They laid their courses well; They "boiled the sea, and baked the layers Of granite, marl, and shell. But he, the man-child glorious, Where tarries he the while? The rainbow shines his harbinger, The sunset gleams his smile. My boreal lights leap upward, Forthright my planets roll, A.nd still the man-child is not born, The summit of the whole. Must time and tide for ever run? Will never my winds go sleep in the west? Will never my wheels which whirl the sun And satellites have rest? Too much of donning and doffing, Too slow the rainbow fades, I weary of my robe of snow, My leaves and my cascades; EMERSON. 123 I tire of globes and races, Too long the game is played; What without him is summer's pomp, Or winter's frozen shade? I travail in pain for him, My creatures travail and wait; His couriers come by squadrons, He comes not to the gate. Twice I have moulded an image, And thrice outstretched my hand) Made one of day, and one of night, And one of the salt sea-sand. One in a Judean manger, And one by Avon stream, One over against the mouths of Nile, And one in the Academe. I moulded kings and saviours, And bards o'er kings to rule; But fell the starry influence short, The cup was never full. Yet whirl the glowing wheels once more And mix the bowl again; Seethe, Fate! the ancient elements, Heat, cold, wet, dry, and peace, and pain. Let war and trade and creeds and song Blend, ripen race on race; The sunburnt world a man shall breed Of all the zones, and countless days, No ray is dimmed, no atom worn ; My oldest force is good as new; And the fresh rose on yonder thorn Gives back the bending heavens in dew. 124 EMERSON. TWO RIVERS. THY summer voice, Musketaquit, Repeats the music of the rain ; But sweeter rivers pulsing flit Through thee, as thou through Concord Plain. Thou in thy narrow banks art pent : The stream I love unbounded goes Through flood and sea and firmament; Through light, through life, it forward flows. I see the inundation sweet, I hear the spending of the stream Through years, through men, through nature fleet, Through passion, thought, through power and dream. Musketaquit, a goblin strong, . Of shard and flint makes jewels gay; They lose their grief who hear his song, And where he winds is the day of day. So forth and brighter fares my stream, Who drinks it shall not thirst again ; No darkness stains its equal gleam, And ages drop in it like rain. TERMINUS. IT is time to be old, To take in sail: The god of bounds, Who sets to seas a shore, Came to me in his fatal rounds. And said: "No more! No farther spread Thy broad ambitious branches, and thy root. Fancy departs: no more invent; EMERSON. 125 Contract thy firmament To compass of a tent. There's not enough for this and that; Make thy option which of two. Economize the failing river; Not the less revere the Giver; Leave the many and hold the few. Timely wise accept the terms, Soften the fall with wary foot; A little while Still plan and smile, And, fault of novel germs, Mature the unfallen fruit. Curse, if thou wilt, thy sires, Bad husbands of their fires, Who, when they gave thee breath. Failed to bequeath The needful sinew stark as once, The Baresark marrow to thy bones, But left a legacy of ebbing veins, Inconstant heat and nerveless reins, Amid the Muses, left thee deaf and dumb, Amid the gladiators, halt and numb." As the bird trims her to the gale, I trim myself to the storm of time, I man the rudder, reef the sail. Obey the voice at eve obeyed at prime. " Lowly faithful, banish fear, Right onward drive unarmed; The peart, well worth the cruise, is near, And every wave is charmed." 126 EMERSON. THE PAST. THE debt is paid, The verdict said, The Furies laid, The plague is stayed, All fortunes made; Turn the key and bolt the door, Sweet is death for evermore. Nor haughty hope, nor swart chagrin, Nor murdering hate, can enter in. All is now secure and fast; Not the gods can shake the Past; Flies-to the adamantine door, Bolted down for evermore. None can re-enter there, No thief so politic, No Satan with a royal trick, Steal in by window, chink, or hole, To bind or unbind, add what lacked, Insert a leaf, or forge a name, New-face or finish what is packed, Alter or mend eternal Fact. COMPENSATION. THE wings of Time are black and white, Pied with morning and with night. Mountain tall and ocean deep Trembling balance duly keep. In changing moon and tidal wave Glows the feud of Want and tjave. Gauge of more and less through space, Electric star or pencil plays ; The lonely Earth amid the balls That hurry through the eternal halls, A makeweight flying to the void, Supplemental asteroid, Or compensatory spark, Shoots across the neutial Dark. - SIMMS. 127 Man's the elm, and Wealth the vine; Staunch and strong the tendrils twine: Though the frail ringlets thee deceive, None from its stock that vine can reave. Fear not, then, thou child infirm, There's no god dare wrong a worm; Laurel crowns cleave to deserts, And power to him who power exerts. Hast not thy share ? On winged feet, Lo ! it rushes thee to meet; And all that Nature made thy own, Floating in air or pent in stone, Will rive the hills and swim the sea, And, like thy shadow, follow thee. WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS. [Born in 1806, died in 1871. LL.D. of the University of Alabama. A remarkably voluminous author journalist, poet, dramatist, novelist, biographer, historian. Mr. Simms was a native of South Carolina, and an ardent Southerner in the War of Se cession]. THE LOST PLEIAD. NOT in the sky Where it was seen, Nor or. the white tops of the glistering wave, Nor in the mansions of the hidden deep, Though green And beautiful its caves of mystery, Shall the bright watcher have A place and, as of old, high station keep. Gone, gone ! Oh never more to cheer The mariner who holds his course alone On the Atlantic, through the weary night, When the stars turn to watchers and do sleep, Shall it appear, With the sweet fixedness of certain light, Down-shining on the shut eyes of the deep. 128 SIMMS. Vain, vain ! Hopeful most idly then, shall he look forth, That mariner from his bark Hovve'er the north Doth raise his certain lamp when tempests lour He sees no more that perished light again ! And gloomier grows the hour Which may not, through the thick and crowding dark, Restore that lost and loved one to her tower. He looks, the shepherd on Chaldea's hills, Tending his flocks, And wonders the rich beacon doth not blaze, Gladdening his gaze, And, from his dreary watch along the rocks, Guiding him safely home through perilous ways ! How stands he in amaze, Still wondering, as the drowsy silence fills The sorrowful scene, and every hour distils Its leaden dews how chafes he at the night, Still slow to bring the expected and sweet light, So natural to his sight ! And lone, Where its first splendours shone, Shall be that pleasant company of stars : How should they know that death Such perfect beauty mars ? And, like the earth, its common bloom and breath Fallen from on high, Their lights grow blasted by its touch, and die All their concerted springs of harmony Snapped rudely, and the generous music gone. A strain a mellow strain Of wailing sweetness filled the earth and sky ; The stars lamenting in unborrowed pain That one of the selectest ones must die, Must vanish, when most lovely, from the rest ! LUNT. 129 Alas ! 'tis evermore the destiny, The hope heart-cherished is the soonest lost ; The flower first budded soonest feels the frost : Are not the shortest-lived still loveliest? And, like the pale star shooting down the sky, Look they not ever brightest when they fly The desolate home they blessed ? GEORGE LUNT. [Born about 1807, of a naval family. Has held various legal and other public offices in Massachusetts. Besides divers volumes of poetry, he has published, under the pseudonym of Wesley Brooke, a novel named Eastford]. PILGRIM SONG. OVER the mountain wave, see where they come ; Storm-cloud and wintry wind welcome them home ; Yet, where the sounding gale howls to the sea, There their song peals along, deep-toned and free : " Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come ; Where the free dare to be this is our home ! " England hath sunny dales, dearly they bloom ; Scotia hath heather-hills, sweet their perfume : Yet through the wilderness cheerful we stray, Native land, native land home far away ! " Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come ; Where the free dare to be this is our home ! " Dim grew the forest-path : onward they trod ; Firm beat their noble hearts, trusting in God. Grey men and blooming maids, high rose their song : Hear it sweep, clear and deep, ever along : " Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come ; Where the free dare to be this is our home ! " Not theirs the glory -wreath, torn by the blast; Heavenward their holy steps, heavenward they passed. Green be their mossy graves ! ours be their fame, While their song peals along, ever the same : "Pilgrims and wanderers, hither we come; Where the free dare to be this is our home ! " 130 WILLIS. NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS. [Born in 1807, died in 1867. \YhiIe still at college, he acquired a showy but unstable reputation by certain Scripture Sketches in verse ; and continued producing various metrical and more numer ous prose compositions, of a light and miscellaneous kind for the most part. He travelled in England and in Europe ; making numerous acquaintances, some friends, and not a few enemies, by his social talents and his pen]. THE CONFESSIONAL. I THOUGHT of thee I thought of thee, On ocean many a weary night, When heaved the long and sullen sea, With only waves and stars in sight. We stole along by isles of balm, We furled before the coming gale, We slept amid the breathless calm, We flew beneath the straining sail, But thou wert lost for years to me, And day and night I thought of thee ! I thought of thee I thought of thee, In France, amid the gay saloon, Where eyes as dark as eyes may be Are many as the leaves in June : Where life is love, and e'en the air Is pregnant with impassioned thought, And song and dance and music are With one warm meaning only fraught. My half-snared heart broke lightly free, And, with a blush, I thought of thee ! I thought of thee I thought of thee, In Florence, where the fiery hearts Of Italy are breathed away In wonders of the deathless arts ; Where strays the Contadina down Val d'Arno, with a song of old ; Where clime and women seldom frown, And life runs over sands of gold. " I thought of thee I thought ol thee, In Rome, when, on the Palatine." American I'M/IIS.} WILLIS. 131 I strayed to lonely Fiesole On many an eve, and thought of theCc I thought of thee I thought of thee, In Rome, .when, on the Palatine, Night left the Caesars' palace free To Time's forgetful foot and mine. Or on the Coliseum's wall, When moonlight touched the ivied stone, Reclining, with a thought of all That o'er this scene hath come and gone, The shades of Rome would start and flee Unconsciously I thought of thee. I thought of thee I thought of thee, In Vallombrosa's holy shade, Where nobles born the friars be, By life's rude changes humbler made. Here Milton framed his Paradise ; I slept within his very cell ; And, as I closed my weary eyes, I thought the cowl would fit me well ; The cloisters breathed, it seemed to me, Of heart's-ease but I thought of thee. I thought of thee I thought of thee, In Venice, on a night in June ; When, through the city of the sea, Like dust of silver, slept the moon. Slow turned his oar the gondolier, And, as the black barks glided by, The water, to my leaning ear, Bore back the lover's passing sigh ; It was no place alone to be ; I thought of thee I thought of thee. I thought of thee I thought of thee In the Ionian isles, when straying With wise Ulysses by the sea, Old Homer's songs around me playing ; Or, watching the bewitched caique WILLIS. That o'er the star-lit waters flew, I listened to the helmsman Greek, Who sung the song that Sappho knew : The poet's spell, the bark, the sea, All vanished as I thought of thee. I thought of thee I thought of thee, In Greece, when rose the Parthenon Majestic o'er the Egean sea, And heroes with it, one by one ; When, in the grove of Academe, Where Lais and Leontium strayed Discussing Plato's mystic theme, I lay at noontide in the shade The Egean wind, the whispering tree, Had voices and I thought of thee. I thought of thee I thought of thee, In Asia, at the Dardanelles, Where, swiftly as the waters flee, Each wave some sweet old story tells And, seated by the marble tank Which sleeps by Ilium's ruins old (The fount where peerless Helen drank, And Venus laved her locks of gold), I thrilled such classic haunts to see, Yet even here I thought of thee. I thought of thee I thought of thee, Where glide the Bosphor's lovely waters, All palace-lined from sea to sea : And ever on its shores the daughters Of the delicious east are seen, Printing the brink with slippered feet, And O the snowy folds between, What eyes of heaven your glances meet ! Peris of light no fairer be ; Yet, in Stamboul, I thought of thee. I've thought of thee I've thought of thee, Through change that teaches to forget ; FAY. 133 Thy face looks up from every sea, In every star thine eyes are set. Though roving beneath orient skies, Whose golden beauty breathes of rest, I envy every bird that flies Into the far and clouded west ; I think of thee I think of thee ! O dearest ! hast thou thought of me ? THEODORE S. FAY. [Born in 1807. Became a barrister ; settled in Europe in 1833, and has for the most part resided there since then, having been appointed Minister to Switzerland in 1853. His chief poem is named Ulric, or the Voices, 1851-55 : but he is better known as a writer of prose fiction]. SONG. A CARELESS simple bird, one day Fluttering in Flora's bowers, Fell in a cruel trap which lay All hid among the flowers, Forsooth, the pretty, harmless flowers. The spring was closed ; poor silly soul, He knew not what to do, Till, pressing through a tiny hole, At length away he flew ; Unhurt at length away he flew. And now, from every fond regret And idle anguish free, He singing says, " You need not set Another trap for me, False girl ! another trap for me." 4* 134 WARD, THOMAS WARD. [Born in 1807. Adopted the medical profession ; but eventually quitted it for literature and general studies. Passaic, a Group of Poeins touching that River, published in 1841, is his ieading work in verse]. TO AN INFANT IN HEAVEN. THOU bright and star-like spirit, That, in my visions wild, I see mid heaven's seraphic host Oh canst thou be my child ? My grief is quenched in wonder, And pride arrests my sighs ; A branch from this unworthy stock Now blossoms in the skies! Our hopes of thee were lofty, But have we cause to grieve ? Oh could our fondest, proudest wish A nobler fate conceive ? The little weeper tearless, The sinner snatched from sin ; The babe, to more than manhood grown, Ere childhood did begin. And I, thy earthly teacher, Would blush thy powers to see ; Thou art to me a parent now, And I a child to thee ! Thy brain, so uninstructed While in this lowly state, Now threads the mazy track of spheres, Or reads the book of fate. Thine eyes, so curbed in vision, Now range the realms of space Look down upon the rolling stars, Look up to God's own face. GALLAGHER. i.\? Thy little hand, so helpless, That scarce its toys could hold, Now clasps its mate in holy prayer, Or twangs a harp of gold. Thy feeble feet, unsteady, That tottered as they trod, With angels walk the heavenly paths, Or stand before their God. Nor is thy tongue less skilful ; Before the throne divine 'Tis pleading for a mother's weal, As once she prayed for thine. What bliss is born of sorrow ! 'Tis never sent in vain The heavenly surgeon maims to save, He gives no useless pain. Our God, to call us homeward, His only Son sent down : And now, still more to tempt our hearts, Has taken up our own. WILLIAM D. GALLAGHER. [Born in Philadelphia in 1808, of an Irish father. Mr, Gallagher has been mainly occupied as a journalist in Cincinnati, and other cities of the West]. THE INVALID. SHE came in Spring, when leaves were green, And birds sang blithe in bower and tree A stranger, but her gentle mien It was a calm delight to see. In every motion grace was hers ; On every feature sweetness dwelt ; Thoughts soon became her worshipers Affections soon before her knelt. I3 6 GALLAGHER. She bloomed through all the summer days As sweetly as the fairest flowers, And till October's softening haze Came with its still and dreamy hours. So calm the current of her life, So lovely and serene its flow, We hardly marked the deadly strife Disease for ever kept below. But autumn winds grew wild and chill, And pierced her with their icy breath ; And, when the snow on plain and hill Lay white, she passed, and slept in death. Tones only of immortal birth Our memory of her voice can stir ; With things too beautiful for earth Alone do we remember her. She came in Spring, when leaves were green, And birds sang blithe in bower and tree, And flowers sprang up and bloomed between Low branches and the quickening lea. The greenness of the leaf is gone, The beauty of the flower is riven, The birds to other climes have flown, And there's an angel more in heaven. WHITTIER. 137 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. [Born in 1808 at Haverhill, Massachusetts, where his ancestors, of the Quaker denomination, had long been settled. Mr. Whittier was early engaged in farming operations ; and afterwards as a poli tical, and more especially a protectionist, journalist. In 1836 he became one of the secretaries of the Anti-Slavery Society : and some of his most vigorous and rousing poems are devoted to that noble cause. He has also written various prose works ; one of the chief among which is Supernaturalisin in Neiv England, pub lished in 1847. The bulk of Mr. Whittier's poetical writings is considerable. His name stands high in the United States, and ought in England to be better known than as yet it is. An upright manly energy, and the tenderness of a strong yet delicate nature, are constantly conspicuous in his writings. These fine qualities are mostly associated with a genuine poetic grace, and in many in stances with art truly solid and fine]. CASSANDRA SOUTHWICK. 1 To the God of all sure mercies let my blessing rise to day, From the scoffer and the cruel He hath plucked the spoil away, Yea, He who cooled the furnace around the faithful three, And tamed the Chaldean lions, hath set his handmaid free ! Last night I saw the sunset melt through my prison bars, Last night across my damp earth-floor fell the pale gleam of stars ; 1 This ballad has its foundation upon a somewhat remarkable event in the history of Puritan intolerance. Two young persons, son and daughter of Lawrence Southwick, of Salem, who had him self been imprisoned and deprived of all his property for having entertained two Quakers at his house, were fined ten pounds each for non-attendance at church, which they were unable to pay. The case being represented to the General Court at Boston, that body issued an order which may still be seen on the court records, bearing the signature of Edward Rawson, Secretary, by which the treasurer of the County was " fully empowered to sell the said persons to any of the English nation at Virginia or Barbadoes, to answer said fines." An attempt was made to carry this barbarous order into execution, but no shipmaster was found willing to convey them to the West Indies. Vide SeivalCs History, pp. 225-6. 138 WHIT TIER. In the coldness and the darkness all through the long night time, My grated casement whitened with Autumn's early rime. Alone, in that dark sorrow, hour after hour crept by; Star after star looked palely in and sank adown the sky; No sound amid night's stillness, save that which seemed to be The dull and heavy beating of the pulses of the sea. All night I sat unsleeping, for I knew that on the mor row The ruler and the cruel priest would mock me in my sorrow, Dragged to fheir place of market, and bargained for and sold, Like a lamb before the shambles, like a heifer from the fold. Oh the weakness of the flesh was there the shrinking and the shame ; And the low voice of the Tempter like whispers to me came : ''Why sit'st thou thus forlornly?" the wicked murmur said, " Damp walls thy bower of beauty, cold earth thy maiden bed ? " Where be the smiling faces, and voices soft and sweet, Seen in thy father's dwelling, heard in the pleasant street ? Where be the youths, whose glances the summer Sab bath through Turned tenderly and timidly into thy father's pew ? " Why sit'st thou here, Cassandra? Bethink' thee with what mirth Thy happy schoolmates gather around the warm bright hearth; How the crimson shadows tremble on foreheads white and fair, On eyes of merry girlhood half hid in golden nair. 139 " Not for thee the hearth-fire brightens, ttC_ ror thee kind words are spoken, Not for thee the nuts of Wenhara woods by laughing boys are broken ; No first-fruits of the orchard within thy lap are laid, For thee no flowers of Autumn the youthful hunters braid. *' Oh weak, deluded maiden ! by crazy fancies led, With wild and raving railers an evil path to tread ; To leave a wholesome worship, and teaching pure and sound ; And mate with maniac women, loose-haired and sack cloth-bound. " Mad scoffers of the priesthood, who mock at things divine, Who rail against the pulpit, and holy bread and wine; Sore from their cart-tail scourgings, and from the pillory lame, Rejoicing in their wretchedness, and glorying in their shame. "And what a fate awaits thee ! a sadly toiling slave, Dragging the slowly lengthening chain of bondage to the grave ! Think of thy woman's nature, subdued in hopeless thrall, The easy prey of any, the scoff and scorn of all ! " Oh ever as the Tempter spoke, and feeble Nature's fears Wrung drop by drop the scalding floAV of unavailing tears, I wrestled down the evil thoughts, and strove in silent prayer To feel, O Helper of the weak ! that Thou indeed wert there ! I thought of Paul and Silas, within Philippi's cell, And how from Peter's sleeping limbs the prison-shackles fell, jr. 14 WHITT1ER. Till I seemed to hear the trailing of an angel's robe of white, And to feel a blessed presence invisible to sight. Bless the Lord for all His mercies ! for the peace and love I felt, Like dew of Hermon's holy hill, upon my spirit melt ; When "Get behind me, Satan!" was the language of my heart, And I felt the evil Tempter with all his doubts depart. Slow broke the grey cold morning ; again the sunshine fell, Flecked with the shade of bar and grate, within my lonely cell ; The hoarfrost melted on the wall, and upward from the street Came careless laugh and idle word, and tread of passing feet. At length the heavy bolts fell back, my door was open cast, And slowly at the sheriff's side up the long street I passed ; I heard the murmur round me, and felt, but dared not see, How, from every door and window, the people gazed on me. And doubt and fear fell on me, shame burned upon my cheek, Swam earth and sky around me, my trembling limbs grew weak ; " O Lord ! support thy handmaid ; and from her soul cast out The fear of man which brings a snare the weakness and the doubt." Then the dreary shadows scattered like a cloud in morning's breeze, And a low deep voice within me seemed whispering words like these : WHIT TIER. 141 " Though thy earth be as the iron, and thy heaven a brazen wall, Trust still His loving-kindness whose power is overall." We paused at length where at my feet the sunlit waters broke On glaring reach of shining beach, and shingly wall of rock; The merchant-ships lay idly there, in hard clear lines on high Tracing with rope and slender spar their net-work on the sky. And there were ancient citizens, cloak -wrapped and grave and cold, And grim and stout sea-captains with faces bronzed and old, And on his horse, with Rawson his cruel clerk at hand, Sat dark and haughty Endicott, the ruler of the land. And, poisoning with his evil words the ruler's ready ear, The priest leaned o'er his saddle, with laugh and scoff and jeer; It stirred my soul, and from my lips the seal of silence broke, As if through woman's weakness a warning spirit spoke. I cried; ''The Lord rebuke thee, thou smiter of the meek, Thou robber of the righteous, thou trampler of the weak ! Go light the dark cold hearth-stones go turn the prison lock Of the poor hearts thou hast hunted, thou wolf amid the flock!" Dark loured the brows of Endicott, and with a deeper red O'er Rawson's wine-empurpled cheek the flush of anger spread. " Good people," quoth the white-lipped priest, " heed not her words so wild ; Her master speaks within her the Devil owns his child !" 142 WHITTIER. But grey heads shook, and young brows knit, the while the sheriff read That law the wicked rulers against the poor have made Who to their house of Rimmon and idle priesthood bring No bended knee of worship nor gainful offering. Then to the stout sea-captains the sheriff turning said : " Which of ye, worthy seamen, will take this Quaker maid? In the Isle of fair Barbadoes, or on Virginia's shore, You may hold her at a higher price than Indian girl or Moor." Grim and silent stood the captains ; and when again he cried, "Speak out, my worthy seamen:" no voice or sign re plied ; But I felt a hard hand press my own, and kind words met my ear: " God bless thee and preserve thee, my gentle girl and dear!" A weight seemed lifted from my heart, a pitying friend was nigh, I felt it in his hard rough hand, and saw it in his eye; And, when again the sheriff spoke, that voice, so kind to me, Growled back its stormy answer like the roaring of the sea: " Pile my ship with bars of silver pack with coins of Spanish gold, From keel-piece up to deck-plank, the roomage of her hold, By the living God who made me! I would sooner in your bay Sink ship and crew and cargo than bear this child away !" WHITTIER. 143 " Well answered, worthy captain, shame on their cruel laws!" Ran through the crowd in murmurs loud the people's just applause. " Like the herdsman of Tekoa, in Israel of old, Shall we see the poor and righteous again for silver sold?" I looked on haughty Endicott ; with weapon half-way drawn, Swept round the throng his lion glare of bitter hate and scorn ; Fiercely he drew his bridle-rein, and turned in silence back, And sneering priest and baffled clerk rode murmuring in his track. Hard after them the sheriff looked in bitterness of soul; Thrice smote his staff upon the ground, and crushed his parchment roll. " Good friends," he said, " since both have fled, the ruler and the priest, Judge ye if from their further work I be not well re leased." Loud was the cheer which, full and clear, swept round the silent bay, As, with kind words and kinder looks, he bade me go my way; For He who turns the courses of the streamlet of the glen, And the river of great waters, had turned the hearts of men. Oh at that hour the very earth seemed changed beneath my eye, A holier wonder round me rose the blue walls of the sk >\ . A lovelier light on rock and hill and stream and wood land lay, And softer lapsed on sunnier sands the waters of the bay. 144 WHITTIER. Thanksgiving to the Lord of life ! to Him all praises be, Who from the hands of evil men hath set his handmaid free; All praise to Him before whose power the mighty are afraid, Who takes the crafty in the snare which for the poor is laid! Sing, O my soul, rejoicingly; on evening's twilight calm Uplift the loud thanksgiving pour forth the grateful psalm ; Let all dear hearts with me rejoice, as did the saints of old When of the Lord's good angel the rescued Peter told. And weep and howl, ye evil priests and mighty men of wrong ; The Lord shall smite the proud, and lay His hand upon the strong. Woe to the wicked rulers in His avenging hour ! Woe to the wolves who seek the flocks to raven and devour ! But let the humble ones arise, the poor in heart be glad, And let the mourning ones again with robes of praise be clad, For He who cooled the furnace, and smoothed the stormy wave, And tamed the Chaldean lions, is mighty still to save ! MY PLAYMATE. THE pines were dark on Ramoth hill, Their song was soft and low : The blossoms in the sweet May wind Were falling like the snow. The blossoms drifted at our feet, The orchard birds sang clear; The sweetest and the saddest day It seemed of all the year. XD WH1TTIER. 145 For, more to me than birds or flowers, My playmate left her home, And took with her the laughing spring, The music and the bloom. She kissed the lips of kith and kin, She laid her hand in mine : What more could ask the bashful boy Who fed her father's kine ? -4 She left us in the bloom of May: The constant years told o'er Their seasons with as sweet May morns, But she came back no more. I I walk, with noiseless feet, the round Of uneventful years ; Still o'er and o'er I sow the spring, And reap the autumn ears. She lives where all the golden year Her summer roses blow; The dusky children of the sun Before her come and go. There haply with her jewelled hands She smooths her silken gown, No more the homespun lap wherein I shook the walnuts down. The wild grapes wait us by the brook, The brown nuts on the hill, And still the May-day flowers make sweet The woods of Follymill. The lilies blossom in the pond, The bird builds in the tree, The dark pines sing on Ramoth hill The slow song of the sea. I wonder if she thinks of them, And how the old time seems, WH1TTIER. If ever the pines of Ramoth wood Are sounding in her dreams. L see her face, I hear her voice : Does she remember mine ? And what to her is now the boy Who fed her father's kine ? What cares she that orioles build For other eyes than ours, That other hands with nuts are filled, And other laps with flowers ? O playmate in the golden time ! Our mossy seat is green, Its fringing violets blossom yet, The old trees o'er it lean. The winds so sweet with birch and fern A sweeter memory blow; And there in spring the veeries sing The song of long ago. And still the pines of Ramoth wood Are moaning like the sea, The moaning of the sea of change Between myself and thee ! TELLING THE I3EES. 1 HERE is the place ; right over the hill Runs the path I took ; You can see the gap in the old wall still, And the stepping-stones in the shallow brook. * A remarkable custom, brought from the Old Country, formerly prevailed in the rural districts of New England. On the death of a member of the family, the bees were at once informed of the event, and their hives dressed in mourning. This ceremonial was sup posed to be necessary to prevent tha swarms from leaving their hives and seeking; a new home. WHITTIER. 147 There is the house, with the gate red-barred, And the poplars tall ; And the barn's brown length, and the cattle-yard, And the white horns tossing above the wall. There are the beehives ranged in the sun; And down by the brink Of the brook are her poor flowers, weed-o'errun, Pansy and daffodil, rose and pink. A year has gone, as the tortoise goes, Heavy and slow ; And the same rose blows, and the same sun glows, And the same brook sings, of a year ago. There's the same sweet clover-smell in the breeze ; And the June sun warm Tangles his wings of fire in the trees, Setting, as then, over Fernsi.de farm. I mind me how with a lover's care From my Sunday coat I brushed off the burrs, and smoothed my hair, And cooled at the brookside my brow and throat. Since we parted, a month had passed, To love, a year; Down through the beeches I looked at last On the little red gate and the well-sAveep near. I can see it all now, the slantwise rain Of light through the leaves, The sundown's blaze on her window-pane, The bloom of her roses under the eaves. Just the same as a month before, The house and the trees, The barn's brown gable, the vine by the door, Nothing changed but the hives of bees. Before them, under the garden wall, Forward and back, 148 WHITT1ER. Went drearily singing the chore-girl small, Draping each hive with a shred of black. Trembling, I listened : the summer sun Had the chill of snow; For I knew she was telling the bees of one Gone on the journey we all must go ! Then I said to myself, " My Mary weeps For the dead to-day : Haply her blind old grandsire sleeps The fret and the pain of his age away." But her dog whined low; on the doorway sill, With his cane to his chin, The old man sat ; and the chore-girl still Sung to the bees stealing out and in. And the song she was singing ever since In my ear sounds on : " Stay at home, pretty bees, fly not hence ! Mistress Mary is dead and gone ! " THE GIFT OF TRITEMIUS. TRITEMIUS of Herbipolis, one day, While kneeling at the altar's foot to pray, Alone with God, as was his pious choice, Heard from without a miserable voice, A sound which seemed of all sad things to tell, As of a lost soul crying out of hell. Thereat the Abbot paused, the chain whereby His thoughts went upward broken by that cry; And, looking from the casement, saw below A wretched woman, with grey hair a-flow, And withered hands held up to him, who cried For alms as one who might not be denied. She cried, " For the dear love of Him who gave His life for ours, my child from bondage save, WHITTIER. 149 My beautiful, brave first-born, chained with slaves In the Moor's galley, where the sun-smit waves Lap the white walls of Tunis ! " " What I can I give," Tritemius said : " my prayers." " O man Of God !" she cried, for grief had made her bold, " Mock me not thus ; I ask not prayers, but gold. Words will not serve me, alms alone suffice ; Even while I speak perchance my first-born dies." "Woman !" Tritemius answered, "from our door None go unfed ; hence are we always poor : A single soldo is our only store. Thou hast our prayers ; what can we give thee more?" " Give me," she said, " the silver candlesticks On either side of the great crucifix. God well may spare them on his errands sped, Or He can give you golden ones instead." Then spake Tritemius, " Even as thy word, Woman, so be it ! (Our most gracious Lord, Who loveth mercy more than sacrifice, Pardon me if a human soul I prize Above the gifts upon his altar piled !) Take what thou askest, and redeem thy child." But his hand trembled as the holy alms He placed within the beggar's eager palms ; And, as she vanished down the linden shade, He bowed his head and for forgiveness prayed. So the day passed, and when the twilight came He woke to find the chapel all aflame, And, dumb with grateful wonder, to behold Upon the altar candlesticks of gold ! 150 WHIT TIER. ABRAHAM DAVENPORT. IN the old days (a custom laid aside With breeches and cocked hats) the people sent Their wisest men to make the public laws. And so, from a brown homestead, where the Sound Drinks the small tribute of the Mianas, Waved over by the woods of Rippowams, And hallowed by pure lives and tranquil deaths, Stamford sent up to the councils of the State Wisdom and grace in Abraham Davenport. 'Twas on a May-day of the far old year Seventeen hundred eighty that there fell Over the bloom and sweet life of the Spring, Over the fresh earth and the heaven of noon, A horror of great darkness, like the night In day of which the Norland sagas tell, The Twilight of the Gods. The low-hung sky Was black with ominous clouds, save where its rim Was fringed with a dull glow, like that which climbs The crater's sides from the red hell below. Birds ceased to sing, and all the barnyard fowls Roosted ; the cattle at the pasture-bars Lowed, and looked homeward ; bats on leathern wings Flitted abroad ; the sounds of labour died ; Men prayed, and women wept ; all ears grew sharp To hear the doom-blast of the trumpet shatter The black sky, that the dreadful face of Christ Might look from the rent clouds, not as he looked A loving guest at Bethany, but stern As Justice and inexorable Law. Meanwhile in the old State-House, dim as ghosts, Sat the lawgivers of Connecticut, Trembling beneath their legislative robes. " It is the Lord's Great Day ! Let us adjourn," Some said ; and then, as if with one accord, All eyes were turned to Abraham Davenport. He rose, slow cleaving with his steady voice WHIT TIER. 151 The intolerable hush. " This well may be The Day of Judgment which the world awaits ; But, be it so or not, I only know My present duty, and my Lord's command To occupy till he come. So, at the post Where he hath set me in his providence, I choose, for one, to meet him face to face, No faithless servant frightened from my task, But ready when the Lord of the harvest calls ; And therefore, with all reverence, I would say, Let God do his work, we will see to ours. Bring in the candles." And they brought them in. Then by the flaring lights the Speaker read, Albeit with husky voice and shaking hands, An act to amend an act to regulate The shad and alewive fisheries. Whereupon Wisely and well spake Abraham Davenport, Straight to the question, with no figures of speech Save the ten Arab signs, yet not without The shrewd dry humour natural to the man : His awe-struck colleagues listening all the while, Between the pauses of his argument, To hear the thunder of the wrath of God Break from the hollow trumpet of the cloud. And there he stands in memory to this day, Erect, self-poised, a rugged face, half seen Against the background of unnatural dark, A witness to the ages as they pass That simple duty hath no place for fear. THE RANGER. ROBERT Rawlin ! Frosts were falling- When the ranger's horn was calling Through the woods to Canada. Gone the winter's sleet and snowing, Gone the spring-time : s bud and blowing, Gone the summer's harvest-mowing, - 152 WHITT1ER. And again the fields are grey. Yet away, he's away ! Faint and fainter hope is growing In the hearts that mourn his stay. Where the lion, crouching high on Abraham's rock with teeth of iron, Glares o'er wood and wave away, Faintly thence, as pines far sighing, Or as thunder spent and dying, Come the challenge and replying, Come the sounds of flight and fray. Well-a-day ! Hope and pray ! Some are living, some are lying In their red graves far away. Straggling rangers, worn with dangers, Homeward faring weary strangers, Pass the farm-gate on their way ; Tidings of the dead and living, Forest march and ambush, giving, Till the maidens leave their weaving, And the lads forget their play. " Still away, still away ! " Sighs a sad one, sick with grieving, "Why does Robert still delay?" Nowhere fairer, sweeter, rarer, Does the golden-locked fruit-bearer Through his painted woodlands stray, Than where hillside oaks and beeches Overlook the long, blue reaches, Silver coves and pebbled beaches, And green isles of Casco Bay; Nowhere day for delay With a tenderer look beseeches, " Let me with my charmed earth stay." On the grain-lands of the mainlands Stands the serried corn like train-bands, Plume and pennon rustling gay ; WHIT TIER. 153 Out at sea, the islands wooded, Silver birches, golden-hooded, Set with maples, crimson-blooded, White sea-foam and sand-hills grey, Stretch away, far away, Dim and dreamy, over-brooded By the hazy autumn day. Gayly chattering to the clattering Of the brown nuts downward pattering, Leap the squirrels, red and grey. On the grass-land, on the fallow, Drop the apples, red and yellow ; Drop the russet pears and mellow, Drop the red leaves all the day. And away, swift away, Sun and cloud, o'er hill and hollow Chasing, weave their web of play. " Martha Mason, Martha Mason Prithee tell us of the reason Why you mope at home xo-day ! Surely smiling is not sinning; Leave your quilling, leave your spinning ; What is all your store of linen, If your heart is never gay ? Come away, come away ! Never yet did sad beginning Make the task of life a play." Overbending, till she's blending With the flaxen skein she's tending Pale brown tresses smoothed away From her face of patient sorrow, Sits she, seeking but to borrow, From the trembling hope of morrow, Solace for the weary day. " Go your way, laugh and play; Unto Him who heeds the sparrow , And the lily let me pray." 4* , k 154 IVH2TTIER. " With our rally rings the valley, Join us!" cried the blue-eyed Nelly. "Join us!" cried the laughing May: " To the beach we all are going, And, to save the task of rowing, West by north the wind is blowing, Blowing briskly down the bay ! Come away, come away! Time and tide are swiftly flowing, Let us take them while we may ! " Never tell us that you'll fail us, Where the purple beach-plum mellows On the bluffs so wild and grey. Hasten, for the oars are falling ; Hark, our merry mates are calling : Time it is that we were all in, Singing tideward down the bay!" " Nay, nay, let me stay ; Sore and sad for Robert Rawlin Is my heart," she said, " to-day." " Vain your calling for Rob Rawlin! Some red squaw his moose-meat's broiling, Or some French lass, singing gay . Just forget as he's forgetting; What avails a life of fretting? If some stars must needs be setting, Others rise as good as they." "Cease, I pray; go your way!" Martha cries, her eyelids wetting ; " Foul and false the words you say!" "Martha Mason, hear to reason! Prithee, put a kinder face on!" " Cease to vex me," did she say. " Better at his side be lying, With the mournful pine-trees sighing, And the wild birds o'er us crying, WHITTIER. 155 Than to doubt like mine a prey ; While away, far away, Turns my heart, for ever trying Some new hope for each new day. " When the shadows veil the meadows, And the sunset's golden ladders Sink from twilight's walls of grey, From the window of my dreaming, I can see his sickle gleaming, Cheery-voiced can hear him teaming Down the locust-shaded way; But away, swift away, Fades the fond delusive seeming, And I kneel again to pray. " When the growing dawn is showing, And the barn-yard cock is crowing, And the horned moon pales away ; From a dream of him awaking, Every sound my heart is making Seems a footstep of his taking. Then I hush the thought, and say, ' Nay, nay, he's away!' Ah ! my heart, my heart is breaking For the dear one far away." Look up, Martha ! worn and swarthy, Glows a face of manhood worthy : " Robert !" " Martha!" all they say. O'er went wheel and reel together, Little cared the owner whither; Heart of lead is heart of feather, Noon of night is noon of day ! Come away, come away! When such lovers meet each other, Why should prying idlers stay? Quench the timber's fallen embers, Quench the red leaves in December' Hoary rime and chilly spray. .. 156 IVHITTIER. But the hearth shall kindle clearer, Household welcomes sound sincerer, Heart to loving heart draw nearer, When the bridal bells shall say : " Hope and pray, trust alway; Life is sweeter, love is dearer, For the trial and delay!" THE RIVER PATH. No bird-song floated down the hill, The tangled bank below was still ; No rustle from the birchen stem, No ripple from the water's hem. The dusk of twilight round us grew, We felt the falling of the dew ; For from us, ere the day was done, The wooded hills shut out the sun. But on the river's farther side We saw the hill-tops glorified, A tender glow, exceeding fair, A dream of day without its glare. With us the damp, the chill, the gloom : With them the sunset's rosy bloom ; While dark, through willowy vistas seen, The river rolled in shade between. From out the darkness where we trod, We gazed upon those hills of God, Whose light seemed not of moon or sun. We spake not, but our thought was one. We paused, as if from that bright shore Beckoned our dear ones gone before ; WHITTIER. 157 And stilled our beating hearts to hear The voices lost to mortal ear. Sudden our pathway turned from night ; The hills swung open to the light; Through their green gates the sunshine showed. A long, slant splendour downward flowed. Down glade and glen and bank it rolled; It bridged the shaded stream with gold ; And, borne on piers of mist, allied The shadowy with the sunlit side. " So," prayed we, " when our feet draw near The river dark, with mortal fear, " And the night cometh chill with dew, O Father ! let thy light break through ! " So let the hills of doubt divide, So bridge with faith the sunless tide ! " So let the eyes that fail on earth On thy eternal hills look forth ; " And in thy beckoning angels know The dear ones whom we loved below!" FORGIVENESS. MY heart was heavy, for its trust had been Abused, its kindness answered with foul wrong. So, turning gloomily from my fellow-men, One summer Sabbath-day I strolled among The green mounds of the village burial-place ; Where, pondering how all human love and hate Find one sad level ; and how, soon or late, 158 WHITTIER. Wronged and wrongdoer, each with meekened face, And cold hands folded over a still heart, Pass the green threshold of our common grave, Whither all footsteps tend, whence none depart, Awed for myself, and pitying my race, Our common sorrow, like a mighty wave, Swept all my pride away, and trembling I forgave ! GONE. ANOTHER hand is beckoning us, Another call is given ; And glows once more with angel-steps The path which reaches Heaven. Our young and gentle friend, whose smile Made brighter summer hours, Amid the frosts of autumn time Has left us with the flowers. No paling of the cheek of bloom Forewarned us of decay ; No shadow from the Silent Land Fell round our sister's way. The light of her young life went down, As sinks behind the hill The glory of a setting star, Clear, suddenly, and still. As pure and sweet, her fair brow seemed Eternal as the sky ; And like the brook's low song, her voice,- A sound which could not die. . And half we deemed she needed not The changing of her sphere, To give to Heaven a Shining One, Who walked an angel here. WHITTIEK. 159 The blessing of her quiet life Fell on us like the dew ; And good thoughts, where her footsteps pressed- Like fairy blossoms grew. Sweet promptings unto kindest deeds Were in her very look ; We read her face, as one who reads A true and holy book : The measure of a blessed hymn To which our hearts could move ; The breathing of an inward psalm ; A canticle of love. We miss her in the place of prayer, And by the hearth-fire's light ; We pause beside her door to hear Once more her sweet " Good-night ! " There seems a shadow on the day Her smile no longer cheers ; A dimness on the stars of night, Like eyes that look through tears. Alone unto our Father's will One thought hath reconciled ; That He whose love exceedeth ours Hath taken home his child. Fold her, Father ! in thine arms, And let her henceforth be A messenger of love between Our human hearts and thee. Still let her mild rebuking stand Between us and the wrong, And her dear memory serve to make Our faith in Goodness strong. And grant that she who, trembling, here Distrusted all her powers, May welcome to her holier home The well-beloved of ours. l&o WHITTIER. AUTUMN THOUGHTS. GONE hath the Spring, with all its flowers, And gone the Summer's pomp and show, And Autumn, in his leafless bowers, Is waiting for the Winter's snow. I said to Earth, so cold and grey, " An emblem of myself thou art." :; Not so," the Earth did seem to say, " For Spring shall warm my frozen heart. " I soothe my wintry sleep with dreams Of warmer sun and softer rain, And wait to hear the sound of streams, And songs of merry birds again. " But thou, from whom the Spring hath gone, For whom the flowers no longer blow, Who standest blighted and forlorn, Like Autumn waiting for the snow : " No hope is thine of sunnier hours, Thy Winter shall no more depart ; No Spring revive thy wasted flowers, Nor Summer warm thy frozen heart." QUESTIONS OF LIFE. " And the angel that was sent unto me, whose name was Uriel, gave me an answer, and said, " ' Thy heart hath gone too far in this world, and thinkest thou to comprehend the way of the Most High ?' " Then said I, ' Yea, my Lord.' " Then said he unto me, ' Go thy way, weigh me the weight of the fire, or measure me the blast of the wind, or call me again the day that is past.' " 2 ESDRAS iv. A BENDING staff I would not break, A feeble faith I would not shake, Nor even rashly pluck away The error which some truth may stay, Whose loss might leave the soul without A shield against the shafts of doubt. WHITTIER. 161 And yet, at times, when over all A darker mystery seems to fall, (May God forgive the child of dust Who seeks to know, where Faith should trust!) I raise the questions, old and dark, Of Uzdom's tempted patriarch, And, speech-confounded, build again The baffled tower of Shinar's plain. I am : how little more I know ! Whence came I ? Whither do I go? A centred self, which feels and is ; A cry 'between the silences ; A shadow-birth of clouds at strife With sunshine on the hills of life; A shaft from Nature's quiver cast Into the Future from the Past; Between the cradle and the shroud, A meteor's flight from cloud to cloud. Thorough the vastness, arching all, I see the great stars rise and fall, The rounding seasons come and go, The tided oceans ebb and flow; The tokens of a central force, Whose circles, in their widening course, O'erlap and move the universe ; The workings of the law whence springs The rhythmic harmony of things, Which shapes in earth the darkling spar, And orbs in heaven the morning star. Of all I see, in earth and sky, Star, flower, beast, bird, what part have I ? This conscious life is it the same Which thrills the universal frame, Whereby the caverned crystal shoots, And mounts the sap from forest-roots, Whereby the exiled wood-bird tells When Spring makes green her native dells? How feels the stone the pang of birth L 162 WHITT1ER. Which brings its sparkling prism forth ? The forest-tree, the throb which gives The life-blood to its new-born leaves ? Do bird and blossom feel, like me, Life's many-folded mystery, The wonder which it is TO BE ? / Or stand I severed and distinct, From Nature's chain of life unlinked ? Allied to all, yet not the less Prisoned in separate consciousness, Alone o'erburdened with a sense Of life, and cause, and consequence ? In vain to me the Sphinx propounds The riddle of her sights and sounds ; Back still the vaulted mystery gives The echoed question it receives. What sings the brook? What oracle Is in the pine-tree's organ-swell ? What may the wind's low burden be ? The meaning of the moaning sea ? The hieroglyphics of the stars?' Or clouded sunset's crimson bars ? I vainly ask, for mocks my skill The trick of Nature's cipher still. I turn from Nature unto men, I ask the stylus and the pen. What sang the bards of old ? What meant The prophets of the Orient ? The rolls of buried Egypt, hid In painted tomb and pyramid ? What mean Idiimea's arrowy lines, Or dusk Elora's monstrous signs? How speaks the primal thought of man From the grim carvings of Copan ? Where rests the secret ? Where the keys Of the old death-bolted mysteries ? Alas ! the dead retain their trust ; Dust hath no answer from the dust. " How speaks the primal thought ot man From the grim carvings of Capan?" Anu'iicait [Page i6a. XlA WHITTIER. 163 The great enigma still unguessed , Unanswered the eternal quest ; I gather up the scattered rays Of wisdom in the early days, Faint gleams and broken, like the light Of meteors in a northern night, Betraying to the darkling earth The unseen sun which gave them birth. I listen to the sibyl's chant, The voice of priest and hierophant; I know what Indian Kreeshna saith, And what of life and what of death The daemon taught to Socrates ; And what, beneath his garden-trees Slow-pacing with a dream-like tread, The solemn-thoughted Plato said ; Nor lack I tokens, great or small, Of God's clear light in each and all, While holding with more dear regard The scroll of Hebrew seer and bard, The starry pages promise-lit With Christ's Evangel over-writ, Thy miracle of life and death, O holy one of Nazareth ! On Aztec ruins, grey and lone, The circling serpent coils in stone, Type of the endless and unknown ; Whereof we seek the clue to find, With groping fingers of the blind. For ever sought, and never found, We trace that serpent-symbol round Our resting-place, our starting-bound. O thriftlessness of dream and guess ' O wisdom which is foolishness ! Why idly seek from outward things The answer inward silence brings ; Why stretch, beyond our proper sphere And age, for that which lies so near ? L 164 WHITT1ER. Why climb the far-off hills with pain, A nearer view of heaven to gain? In lowliest depths of bosky dells The hermit Contemplation dwells : A fountain's pine-hung slope his seat, And lotus-twined his silent feet, Whence, piercing heaven, with screened sight, He sees at noon the stars, whose light Shall glorify the coming night. Here let rne pause, my quest forego ; Enough for me to feel and know That He in whom the cause and end, The past and future, meet and blend, Who, girt with his immensities, Our vast and star-hung system sees Small as the clustered Pleiades, Moves not alone the heavenly choirs, But waves the spring-time's grassy spires ; Guards not archangel feet alone, But deigns to guide and keep my own; Speaks not alone the words of fate Which worlds destroy, and worlds create, But whispers in my spirit's ear, In tones of love, or warning fear, A language none beside may hear. To Him, from wanderings long and wild, I come, an over-wearied child, In cool and shade his peace to find, Like dew-fall settling on my mind. Assured that all I know is best, And humbly trusting for the rest, I turn from Fancy's cloud-built scheme, Dark creed, and mournful eastern dream Of power, impersonal and cold, Controlling all, itself controlled, Maker and slave of iron laws, Alike the subject and the cause, From vain philosophies, that try WHITTIER. 165 The sevenfold gates of mystery, And, baffled ever, babble still, Word-prodigal of fate and will ; From Nature, and her mockery, Art, And book and speech of men apart, To the still witness in my heart ; With reverence waiting to behold His Avatar of love untold, The Eternal Beauty new and old ! NOON. WHITE clouds, whose shadows haunt the deep, Light mists, whose soft embraces keep The sunshine on the hills asleep ! O isles of calm ! O dark, still wood ! And stiller skies that overbrood Your rest with deeper quietude ! shapes and hues, dim beckoning, through Yon mountain gaps, my longing view Beyond the purple and the blue, To stiller sea and greener land, And softer lights and airs more bland, And skies the hollow of God's hand ! Transfused through you, O mountain friends ! With mine your solemn spirit blends, And life no more hath separate ends. 1 read each misty mountain sign, I know the voice of wave and pine, And I am yours, and ye are mine. Life's burdens fall, its discords cease, I lapse into the glad release Of Nature's own exceeding peace. 166 WH1TTIER. Oh welcome calm of heart and mind. 1 As falls yon fir-tree's loosened rind To leave a tenderer growth behind, So fall the weary years away ; A child again, my head I lay Upon the lap of this sweet day. This western wind hath Lethean powers, Yon noonday cloud nepenthe showers, The lake is white with lotus-flowers ! Even Duty's voice is faint and low, And slumberous Conscience, waking slow, Forgets her blotted scroll to show. The Shadow which pursues us all, Whose ever-nearing steps appal, Whose voice we hear behind us call, That Shadow blends with mountain grey, It speaks but what the light waves say, Death walks apart from Fear to-day ! Rocked on her breast, these pines and I Alike on Nature's love rely ; And equal seems to live or die. Assured that He whose presence fills With light the spaces of these hills No evil to his creatures wills, The simple faith remains, that He Will- do, whatever that may be, The best alike for man and tree : What mosses over one shall grow, What light and life the other know, Unanxious, leaving Him to show. WHITTIER. 167 A MEMORIAL. M. A. C. OH, thicker, deeper, darker growing, The solemn vista to the tomb Must know henceforth another shadow, And give another cypress room. In love surpassing that of brothers We walked, O friend, from childhood's day ; And, looking back o'er fifty summers, Our footprints track a common way. One in our faith, and one our longing To make the world within our reach Somewhat the better for our living, And gladder for our human speech. Thou heard'st with me the far-off voices, The old beguiling song of fame, But life to thee was warm and present, And love was better than a name. To homely joys and loves and friendships . Thy genial nature fondly clung ; And so the shadow on the dial Ran back and left thee always young. And who could blame the generous weakness Which, only to thyself unjust, So overprized the worth of others, And dwarfed thy own with self-distrust ? All hearts grew warmer in the presence Of one who, seeking not his own, Gave freely for the love of giving, Nor reaped for self the harvest sown. Thy greeting smile was pledge and prelude Of generous deeds and kindly words : In thy large heart were fair guest-chambeis Open to sunrise and the birds ! 1 68 WHIT TIER. The task was thine to mould and fashion Life's plastic newness into grace : To make the boyish heart heroic. And light with thought the maiden's face. O'er all the land, in town and prairie, With bended heads of mourning, stand The living forms that owe their beauty And fitness to thy shaping hand. Thy call has come in ripened manhood, The noonday calm of heart and mind ; While I, who dreamed of thy remaining To mourn me, linger still behind : Live on, to own, with self-upbraiding, A debt of love still due from me ; The vain remembrance of occasions. For ever lost, of serving thee. It was not mine among thy kindred To join the silent funeral prayers, But all that long sad day of summer My tears of mourning dropped with theirs. All day the sea-waves sobbed with sorrow, The birds forgot their merry trills : All day I heard the pines lamenting With thine upon thy homestead hills. Green be those hillside pines for ever, And green the meadowy lowlands be, And green the old memorial beeches Name-carven in the woods of Lee ! Still let them greet thy life-companions Who thither turn their pilgrim-feet, In every mossy line recalling A tender memory sadly sweet. VVHITTIER. 169 O friend ! if thought and sense avail not To know thee henceforth as thou art, That all is well with thee for ever I trust the instincts of my heart. Thine be the quiet habitations, Thine the green pastures blossom-sown, And smiles of saintly recognition, As sweet and tender as thy own. Thou com'st not from the hush and shadow To meet us, but to thee we come ; With thee we never can be strangers, And where thou art must still be home. THE REFORMER. ALL grim and soiled and brown with tan, I 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 ! " . Grey-bearded Use, who, deaf and blind, Groped for his old accustomed stone, Leaned on his staff, and wept to find His seat o'erthrown. 170 WHIT TIER, Young Romance raised his dreamy eyes, O'erhung 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 I woke, As from a dream. I looked : aside the dust-cloud rolled, The Waster seemed the Builder too ; Up-springing from the ruined Old I saw the New. 'Twas but the ruin of the bad, The wasting of the wrong and ill ; 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. The grain grew green on battle-pla'ins, O'er swarded war-mounds grazed the cow ; The slave stood forging from his chains The spade and plough. Where frowned the fort, pavilions gay, And cottage windows flower-entwined, Looked out upon the peaceful bay 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, WHITTIER. 171 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, I 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. O 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 Brahm, Who wake by turns Earth's love and fear, Are one, the same. Idly as thou, in that old day Thou mournest, did thy sire repine j So, in his time, thy child grown grey Shall sigh for thine. But life shall on and upward go ; The eternal step of Progress beats To that great anthem, calm and slow, Which God repeats. 172 WHITTIEK. 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 grey With morning light ! CLERICAL OPPRESSORS. [In the report of the celebrated pro-slavery meeting in Charles ton, S. C., on the 4th of the gth month, 1835, published in the Courier of that city, it is stated, " The clergy of all denominations attended in a body, lending their sanction to the proceedings, and adding by their presence to the impressive character of the scene."] JUST God ! and these are they Who minister at thine altar, God of Right ! Men who their hands with prayer and blessing lay On Israel's Ark of light 1 What ! preach, and kidnap men ? Give thanks, and rob thy own afflicted poor ? Talk of thy glorious liberty, and then Bolt hard the captive's door? What ! servants of thy own Merciful Son, who came to seek and save The homeless and the outcast, fettering down The tasked and plundered slave ! Pilate and Herod friends ! Chief priests and rulers as of old combine ! Just God and holy ! is that church, which lends Strength to the spoiler, thine ? Paid hypocrites, who turn Judgment aside, and rob the Holy Book Of those high words of truth which search and burn In warning and rebuke ; ' AjA WIIITTIER. 173 Feed fat, ye locusts, feed ! And, in your tasselled pulpits, thank the Lord That, from the toiling bondman's utter need, Ye pile your own full board. How long, O Lord ! how long Shall such a priesthood barter truth away, And, in thy name, for robbery and wrong At thy own altars pray ? Is not thy hand stretched forth Visibly in the heavens, to awe and smite ? Shall not the living God of all the earth, And heaven above, do right ? Woe then to all who grind Their brethren of a common Father down ! To all who plunder from the immortal mind Its bright and glorious crown ! Woe to the priesthood ! woe To those whose hire is with the price of blood, Perverting, darkening, changing, as they go, The searching truths of God ! Their glory and their might Shall perish ; and their very names shall be Vile before all the people, in the light Of a world's liberty. Oh speed the moment on When Wrong shall cease, and Liberty and Love And Truth and Right throughout the earth be known, As in their home above ! 174 WHITTIER. THE CHRISTIAN SLAVE. [In a late publication of L. T. Tasistro, Random Shots and Southern Breezes, is a description of a slave auction at New Orleans, at which the auctioneer recommended the woman on the stand as " A GOOD CHRISTIAN ! '] "A CHRISTIAN! going, gone!" Who bids for God's own image? for his grace, Which that poor victim of the market-place Hath in her suffering won? My God! can such things be? Hast thou not said that whatsoe'er is done Unto thy weakest and thy humblest one Is even done to thee? In that sad victim, then, Child of thy pitying love, I see thee stand, Once more the jest-word of a mocking band, Bound, sold, and scourged again! A Christian up for sale! \Vet with her blood your whips, o'ertask her frame, Make her life loathsome with your wrong and shame, Her patience shall not fail ! A heathen hand might deal Back on your heads the gathered wrong of years: But her low broken prayer and nightly tears Ye neither heed nor feel. Con well thy lesson o'er, Thou prudent teacher, tell the toiling slave No dangerous tale of Him who came to save The outcast and the poor. But wisely shut the ray Of God's free Gospel from her simple heart, And to her darkened mind alone impart One stern command, OBEY! WHITT1ER. 175 So shalt thou deftly raise The market-price of human flesh j and, while On thee their pampered guest the planters smile, Thy church shall praise. Grave, reverend men shall tell From Northern pulpits how thy work was blest, While, in that vile South Sodom, first and best Thy poor disciples sell. O shame! the Moslem thrall, Who, with his master, to the Prophet kneels, While turning to the sacred Kebla feels His fetters break and fall. Cheers for the turbaned Bey Of robber-peopled Tunis! he hath torn The dark slave-dungeons open, and hath borne Their inmates into day. But our poor slave in vain Turns to the Christian shrine his aching eyes, Its rites will only swell his market-price, And rivet on his chain. God of all right ! how long Shall priestly robbers at thine altar stand, Lifting, in prayer to Thee, the bloody hand And haughty brow of wrong? Oh, from the fields of cane, From the low rice-swamp, from the trader's cell, From the black slave-ship's foul and loathsome hell, And coffle's weary chain, Hoarse, horrible, and strong, Rises to Heaven that agonizing cry, Filling the arches of the hollow sky, " How long, O God, how long?" * = : : ^ X 176 WHITTIER. THE PASTORAL LETTER. So, this is all, the utmost reach Of priestly power the mind to fetter ! When laymen think when women preach A war of words, a " Pastoral Letter!" Now, shame upon ye, parish Popes ! Was it thus with those, your predecessors, Who sealed with racks and fire and ropes Their loving-kindness to transgressors ? A " Pastoral Letter," grave and dull Alas ! in hoof and horns and features How different is your Brookfield bull From him who bellows from St. Peter's ! Your pastoral rights and powers from harm, Think ye, can words alone preserve them ? Your wiser fathers taught the arm And sword of temporal power to serve them O glorious days, when Church and State Were wedded by your spiritual fathers, And on submissive shoulders sat Your Wilsons and your Cotton Mathers ! No vile "itinerant" then could mar The beauty of your tranquil Zion, But at his peril of the scar Of hangman's whip and branding-iron. Then, wholesome laws relieved the Church Of heretic and mischief-maker, And priest and bailiff joined in search, By turns, of Papist, witch, and Quaker! The stocks were at each church's door, The gallows stood on Boston Common, A Papist's ears the pillory bore, The gallows-rope, a Quaker woman ! Your fathers dealt not as ye deal With "non-professing" frantic teachers; WI1ITTIER. 177 They bored the tongue with red-hot steel, And flayed the backs of " female preachers." Old Newbury, had her fields a tongue, And Salem's streets, could tell their story Of fainting woman dragged along, Gashed by the whip, accursed and gory! And will ye ask me why this taunt Of memories sacred from the scorner? And why with reckless hand I plant A nettle on the graves ye honour? Not to reproach New England's dead This record from the past I summon, Of manhood to the scaffold led, And suffering and heroic woman. No, for yourselves alone, I turn The pages of intolerance over, That in their spirit, dark and stern, Ye haply may your own discover. For, if ye claim the " pastoral right" To silence Freedom's voice of warning, And from your precincts shut the light Of Freedom's day around ye dawning; If when an earthquake voice of power, And signs in earth and heaven, are showing That forth, in its appointed hour, The Spirit of the Lord is going And, with that Spirit, Freedom's light On kindred, tongue, and people breaking, Whose slumbering millions, at the sight, In glory and in strength are waking When for the sighing of the poor, And for the needy, God hath risen, And chains are breaking, and a door Is opening for the souls in prison If then ye would, with puny hands, Arrest the very work of Heaven, M . 1 78 WHITTIER. And bind anew the evil bands Which God's right arm of power hath riven, What marvel that, in many a mind, Those darker deeds of bigot madness Are closely with your own combined, Yet less in anger than in sadness? What marvel if the people learn To claim the right of free opinion? What marvel if at times they spurn The ancient yoke of your dominion? A glorious remnant linger yet Whose lips are wet at Freedom's fountains, The coming of whose welcome feet Is beautiful upon our mountains: Men who the gospel tidings bring Of Liberty and Love for ever, Whose joy is an abiding spring, Whose peace is as a gentle river. But ye, who scorn the thrilling tale Of Carolina's high-souled daughters, Which echoes here the mournful wail Of sorrow from Edisto's waters, Close while ye may the public ear. With malice vex, with slander wound them, The pure and good shall throng to hear, And tried and manly hearts surround them. Oh ever may the power which led Their way to such a fiery trial, And strengthened womanhood to tread The wine-press of such self-denial, Be round them in an evil land, With wisdom and with strength from Heaven, With Miriam's voice, and Judith's hand, And Deborah's song, for triumph given ! And what are ye who strive with God Against the ark of his salvation, WH1TTIER. Moved by the breath of prayer abroad, With blessings for a dying nation? What but the stubble and the hay To perish, even as flax consuming, With all that bars his glorious way, Before the brightness of his coming? And thou, sad Angel, who so long Hast waited for the glorious token That Earth from all her bonds of wrong To liberty and light has broken, Angel of Freedom! soon to thee The sounding trumpet shall be given, And over Earth's full jubilee Shall deeper joy be felt in Heaven! ICHABOD ! So fallen ! so lost ! the light withdrawn Which once he wore ! The glory from his grey hairs gone For evermore ! Revile him not, the Tempter hath A snare for all; And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath, Befit his fall! Oh dumb be passion's stormy rage, When he who might Have lighted up and led his age 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 Dishonoured brow. i8o WH1TTIER. 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 honoured, nought 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 honour 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! THE PEACE OF EUROPE.. 1852. "'GREAT peace in Europe ! Order reigns From Tiber's hills to Danube's plains !" So say her kings and priests; so say The lying prophets of our day. Go lay to earth a listening ear; The tramp of measured marches hear, The rolling of the cannon's wheel, The shotted musket's murderous peal, The night alarm, the sentry's call, The quick-eared spy in hut and hall! From Polar sea and tropic fen The dying groans of exiled men 1 The bolted cell, the galley's chains, The scaffold smoking with its stains ! Order, the hush of brooding slaves ! Peace in the dungeon-vaults and graves ! WHITTIER. 181 O Fisher of the world-wide net, With meshes in all waters set, Whose fabled keys of heaven and hell Bolt hard the patriot's prison-cell, And open wide the banquet-hall Where kings and priests hold carnival! Weak vassal tricked in royal guise, Boy Kaiser with thy lip of lies ! Base gambler for Napoleon's crown, Barnacle on his dead renown ! Thou, Bourbon Neapolitan, Crowned scandal, loathed of God and man! And thou, fell Spider of the North ! Stretching thy giant feelers forth, Within whose web the freedom dies Of nations eaten up like flies ! Speak, Prince and Kaiser, Priest and Czar! If this be Peace, pray what is War ? White Angel of the Lord ! unmeet That soil accursed for thy pure feet. Never in Slavery's desert flows The fountain of thy charmed repose : No tyrant's hand thy chaplet weaves Of lilies and of olive-leaves ; Not with the wicked shalt thou dwell, Thus saith the Eternal Oracle ; Thy home is with the pure and free ! Stern herald of thy better day, Before thee, to prepare thy way, The Baptist Shade of Liberty, Grey, scarred, and hairy-robed, must press With bleeding feet the wilderness ! Oh that its voice might pierce the ear Of princes, trembling while they hear A cry as of the Hebrew seer : " Repent ! God's kingdom draweth near!" 1 82 WHITTIER. THE RENDITION. I HEARD the train's shrill whistle call, I saw an earnest look beseech, And rather by that look than speech My neighbour told me all. And, as I thought of Liberty Marched hand-cuffed down that sworded street, The solid earth beneath my feet Reeled fluid as the sea. I felt a sense of bitter loss, Shame, tearless grief, and stifling wrath, And loathing fear, as if my path A serpent stretched across. All love of home, all pride of place, All generous confidence and trust, Sank smothering in that deep disgust And anguish of disgrace. Down on my native hills of June, And home's green quiet, hiding all, Fell sudden darkness like the fall Of midnight upon noon ! And Law, an unloosed maniac, strong, Blood-drunken, through the blackness trod, Hoarse-shouting in the ear of God The blasphemy of wrong. " O Mother, from thy memories proud, Thy old renown, dear Commonwealth, Lend this dead air a breeze of health, And smite with stars this cloud. " Mother of Freedom, wise and brave, Rise awful in thy strength," I said. Ah me ! I spake but to the dead ; I stood upon her grave ! , WH1TTIER. 183 WHAT OF THE DAY? A SOUND of tumult troubles all the air, Like the low thunders of a sultry sky Far-rolling ere the downright lightnings glare ; The hills blaze red with warnings; foes draw nigh, Treading the dark with challenge and reply. Behold the burden of the prophet's vision, The gathering hosts, the Valley of Decision, Dusk with the wings of eagles wheeling o'er. Day of the Lord, of darkness and not light! It breaks in thunder and the whirlwind's roar ! Even so, Father! Let thy will be done, Turn and o'erturn, end what thou hast begun In judgment or in mercy: as for me, If but the least and frailest, let me be Evermore numbered with the truly free Who find thy service perfect liberty ! I fain would thank Thee that my mortal life Has reached the hour (albeit through care and pain) When Good and Evil, as for final strife, Close dim and vast on Armageddon's plain; And Michael and his angels once again Drive howling back the Spirits of the Night. Oh for the faith to read the signs aright, And, from the angle of thy perfect sight, See Truth's white banner floating on before; And the Good Cause, despite of venal friends And base expedients, move to noble ends; See Peace with Freedom make to Time amends, And, through its cloud of dust, the threshing-floor, Flailed by thy thunder, heaped with chaffless grain ! * 1 84 WHITTIER. LAUS DEO ! ON HEARING THE BELLS RING ON THE PASSAGE OF THE CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT ABOLISHING SLAVERY. IT is done! Clang of bell and roar of gun Send the tidings up and down. How the belfries rock and reel ! How the great guns, peal on peal, Fling the joy from town to town ! Ring, O 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 ! 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 hath triumphed gloriously!" Did we dare, In our agony of prayer, WHITTIER. 185 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 ! In the circuit of the sun Shall the sound thereof go forth. It shall 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 ! With a sound of broken chains Tell the nations that He reigns Who alone is Lord and God ! 1 86 HOLMES. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. [Born in 1809. A Physician, and Professor of Anatomy in Harvard University. Well known as author of The Autocrat of the Breakfast-table and other prose writings, as well as of poems, humorous, critical, or occasional, for the most part]. THE PHILOSOPHER TO HIS LOVE. DEAREST, a look is but a ray Reflected in a certain way ; A word, whatever tone it wear, Is but a trembling wave of air ; A touch, obedience to a clause In Nature's pure material laws. The very flowers that bend and meet, In sweetening others, grow more sweet ; The clouds by day, the stars by night, Inweave their floating locks of light; The rainbow, Heaven's own forehead's braid, Is but the embrace of sun and shade. How few that love us have we found ! How wide the world that girds them round ! Like mountain-streams we meet and part, Each living in the other's heart, Our course unknown, our hope to be Yet mingled in the distant sea. But Ocean coils and heaves in vain, Bound in the subtle moonbeam's chain ; And love and hope do but obey Some cold, capricious planet's ray, Which lights and leads the tide it charms To Death's dark caves and icy arms. Alas ! one narrow line is drawn, That links our sunset with our dawn ; In mist and shade life's morning rose, And clouds are round it at its close ; But ah ! no twilight beam ascends To whisper where that evening ends. & HOLMES. 187 Oh ! in the hour when I shall feel Those shadows round my senses steal, When gentle eyes are weeping o'er The clay that feels their tears no more, Then let thy spirit with me be, Or some sweet angel, likest thee ! THE LAST READER. I SOMETIMES sit beneath a tree, And read my own sweet songs ; Though nought they may to others be, Each humble line prolongs A tone that might have passed away But for that scarce-remembered lay. I keep them like a lock or leaf That some dear girl has given ; Frail record of an hour as brief As sunset-clouds in heaven, But spreading purple twilight still High over memory's shadowed hill. They lie upon my pathway bleak, Those flowers that once ran wild, As on a father's care-worn cheek The ringlets of his child ; The golden mingling with the grey, And stealing half its snows away. What care I though the dust is spread Around these yellow leaves, Or o'er them his sarcastic thread Oblivion's insect weaves ? Though weeds are tangled on the stream, It still reflects my morning's beam. And therefore love I such as smile On these neglected songs, Nor deem that flattery's needless wile - A viy ->~~tL* *t 1 88 HOLMES. My opening bosom wrongs ; For who would trample, at my side, A few pale buds, my garden's pride? It may be that my scanty ore Long years have washed away, And where were golden sands before, Is nought but common clay ; Still something sparkles in the sun For memory to look back upon. And when my name no more is heard, My lyre no more is known, Still let me, like a winter's bird, In silence and alone, Fold over them the weary wing Once flashing through the dews of spring. Yes, let my fancy fondly wrap My youth in its decline, And riot in the rosy lap Of thoughts that once were mine, And give the worm my little store When the last reader reads no more ! STANZAS. STRANGE that one lightly-whispered tone Is far, far sweeter unto me Than all the sounds that kiss the earth, Or breathe along the sea ! But, lady, when thy voice I greet, Not heavenly music seems so sweet. I look upon the fair blue skies, And nought but empty air I see ; But, when I turn me to thine eyes, It seemeth unto me Ten thousand angels spread their wings Within those little azure rings. -*+ : ^ *y PIKE. 189 The lily hath the softest leaf That ever western breeze hath fanned, But thou shalt have the tender flower, So I may take thy hand ; That little hand to me doth yield More joy than all the broidered field. O lady ! there be many things That seem right fair, below, above ; But sure not one among them all Is half so sweet as love ; Let us not pay our vows alone, But join two altars both in one. ALBERT PIKE. [Born in iSog. 1 Beginning as a school-teacher, he made a wan dering journey about the United States ; became a journalist ; and ultimately a barrister. A volume of Hymns to the Gods, written at an early period, is one of his most noted poetical works]. TO SOMNUS. O THOU the leaden-eyed ! with drooping lid Hanging upon thy sight, and eye half-hid By matted hair: that, with a constant train Of empty dreams, all shadowless and vain As the dim wind, dost sleep in thy dark cave With poppies at the mouth, which night-winds wave, Sending their breathings downward on thy bed, Thine only throne, with darkness overspread, And curtains black as are the eyes of Night: Thou, who dost come at time of waning light, And sleep among the woods, where Night doth hide And tremble at the -sun, and shadows glide 1 An American friend whom I have consulted in various matters connected with this book believes (without however vouching for it as a certainty) that Mr. Pike was a General in the Confederate army during the Civil War, and was killed in the course of that struggle. 1 90 PIKE. Among the waving tree-tops ; if now there Thou sleepest in a current of cool air, Within some nook, amid thick flowers and moss Grey-coloured as thine eyes, while thy dreams toss Their fantasies about the silent earth, In waywardness of mirth Oh come ! and hear the hymn that we are chanting Amid the starlight through the thick leaves slanting. Thou lover of the banks of idle streams O'ershaded by broad oaks, with scattered gleams From the few stars upon them; of the shore Of the broad sea, with silence hovering o'er, The great moon hanging out her lamps to gild The murmuring waves with hues all pure and mild, Where thou dost lie upon the sounding sands, While winds come dancing on from southern lands With dreams upon their backs, and unseen waves Of odours in their hands : thou, in the caves Of the star-lighted clouds, on summer eves Reclining lazily, while Silence leaves Her influence about thee: in the sea That liest, hearing the monotony Of waves far-off above thee, like the wings Of passing dreams, while the great ocean swings His bulk above thy sand-supported head : As chained upon his bed Some giant, with an idleness of motion, So swings the still and sleep-enthralled ocean. Thou who dost bless the weary with thy touch, And makest Agony relax his clutch Upon the bleeding fibres of the heart; Pale Disappointment lose her constant smart, And Sorrow dry her tears, and cease to weep Her life away, and gain new cheer in sleep: Thou who dost bless the birds, in every place Where they have sung their songs with wondrous gract Throughout the day, and now, with drooping wing, Amid the leaves receive thy welcoming: PIKE, 19 Come with thy crowd of dreams, O thou ! to whom All noise is most abhorred, and in this gloom, Beneath the shaded brightness of the sky, Where are no sounds but as the winds go by, Here touch our eyes, great Somnus! with thy wand. Ah ! here thou art, with touch most mild and bland, And we forget our hymn, and sink away; And here, until broad day Come up into the sky, with fire-steeds leaping, Will we recline, beneath the vine-leaves sleeping. TO SPRING. O THOU delicious Spring! Nursed in the lap of thin and subtle showers, Which fall from clouds that lift their snowy wing From odorous beds of light-enfolded flowers, And from enmassed bowers That over grassy walks their greenness fling, Come, gentle Spring! Thou lover of young wind, That cometh from the invisible upper sea Beneath the sky, which clouds, its white foam, bine And, settling in the trees deliciously, Makes young leaves dance with glee, Even in the teeth of that old sober hind, Winter unkind, Come to us ; for thou art Like the fine love of children, gentle Spring, Touching the sacred feeling of the heart, Or like a virgin's pleasant welcoming; And thou dost ever bring A tide of gentle but resistless art Upon the heart. Red Autumn from the south Contends with thee; alas! what may he show? 192 PIKE. What are his purple-stained and rosy mouth, And browned cheeks, to thy soft feet of snow, And timid, pleasant glow, Giving earth-piercing flowers their primal growth, And greenest youth? Gay Summer conquers thee; And yet he has no beauty such as thine. What is his ever-streaming, fiery sea, To the pure glory that with thee doth shine? Thou season most divine, What may his dull and lifeless minstrels} Compare with thee? Come, sit upon the hills, And bid the waking streams leap down their side, And green the vales with their slight-sounding rills ; And when the stars upon the sky shall glide, And crescent Dian ride, I too will breathe of thy delicious thrills, On grassy hills. Alas! bright Spring, not long Shall I enjoy thy pleasant influence; For thou shalt die the summer heat among, Sublimed to vapour in his fire intense, And, gone for ever hence, Exist no more : no more to earth belong, Except in song. So I who sing shall die, Worn unto death, perchance, by care and sorrow; And, fainting thus with an unconscious sigh, Bid unto this poor body a good-morrow Which now sometimes I borrow, And breathe of j oyance keener and more high, Ceasing to sigh ! MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI. 193 S. MARGARET FULLER OSSOLI. [Born in 1810. Miss Fuller was educated by her father, anft applied herself to learning with severe application. She became principal teacher in Greene St. School, Providence, Rhode Island ; published Woman in the Nineteenth Century, and other prose works, and was a contributor to the New York Tribune from 1844. In 1846 she came to Europe, and soon afterwards married the Marchese Ossoli. On her voyage back to America she was drowned, 16 July 1850, along with her husband and their infant, from whom she refused to be divided. Emerson has written the Life of this remarkable woman, who produced a deep impression upon many of her eminent contemporaries. Her published poems are not numerous]. ORPHEUS. EACH Orpheus must to the depths descend, For only thus the poet can be wise ; Must make the sad Persephone his friend, And buried love to second Iffe arise ; Again his love must lose through too much love, Must lose his life by living life too true, For whaV he sought below is passed above, Alread) done is all that he would do; Must tune all being with his single lyre, Must melt all rocks free from their primal pain, Must search all Nature with his one soul's fire, Must bind anew all forms in heavenly chain. If he already sees what he must do, Well may lie shade his eyes from the far-shining view ENCOURAGEMENT. FOR the Power to whom we bow Has given its pledge that, if not now, They of pure and steadfast mind, By faith exalted, truth refined, Shall hear all music loud and clear, Whose first notes they ventured here. Then fear not thou to wind the horn, Though elf and gnome thy courage scorn. ,'N 1 94 jj//f K GA RET PULLER OSSOLI. Ask for the castle's king and queen : Though rabble rout may rush between, Beat thee senseless to the ground, In the dark beset thee round Persist to ask and it will come, Seek not for rest in humbler home: So shalt thou see what few have seen, The palace-home of King and Queen. TO , WITH HEARTSEASE. CONTENT, in purple lustre clad, Kingly serene, and golden glad ; No demi-hues of sad contrition, No pallors of enforced submission -- Give me such content as this, And keep awhile the rosy bliss. SUB ROSA CRUX. IN times of old, as we are told, When men more childlike at the feet Of Jesus sat than now, A chivalry was known, more bold Than ours, and yet of stricter vow, And worship more complete. Knights of the Rosy Cross : they bore Its weight within the breast, but wore, Without, the sign, in glistening ruby bright. The gall and vinegar they drank alone, }.!ut to the world at large would only own The wine of faith, sparkling with rosy light. They knew the secret of the sacred oil Which, poured upon the prophet's head, Could keep him wise and pure for aye, Apart from all that might distract or soil ; With this their lamps they fed, Which burn in their sepulchral shrines, Unfading, night and day. V MARGARET FULLER OSSOLL 195 The pass-word now is lost To that initiation full and free ; Daily we pay the cost Of our slow schooling for divine degree. We know no means to feed an undying lamp, Our lights go out in every wind and damp. We wear the Cross of Ebony and Gold, Upon a dark back -ground a form of light, A heavenly hope within a bosom cold, A starry promise in a frequent night ; And oft the dying lamp must trim again, For we are conscious, thoughtful, striving men. Yet be we faithful to this present trust, Clasp to a heart resigned this faithful Must. Though deepest dark our efforts should enfold, Unwearied, mine to find the vein of gold ; Forget not oft to waft the prayer on high ; The rosy dawn again shall fill the sky. And by that lovely light all truth revealed, The cherished forms which sad distrust concealed. Transfigured yet the same, will round us stand, The kindred angels of a faithful band ; Ruby and Ebon Cross then cast aside, No lamp more needed, for the night has died. " Be to the best thou knowest ever true," Is all the creed. Then, be thy talisman of rosy hue, Or fenced with thorns, that, wearing, thou must bleed, Or gentle pledge of love's prophetic view, The faithful steps it will securely lead. Happy are all who reach that distant shore, And bathe in heavenly day; Happiest are those who high the banner bore, To marshal others on the way, Or waited for them, fainting and way-worn, By burthens overborne. 196 VERY. JONES VERY. [Born about 1810. He was Greek Tutor in Cambridge College, Massachusetts ; but, becoming imbued with strong feelings of re ligious enthusiasm, relinquished that position, and wrote some poems, published in 1839]. ENOCH. I LOOKED to find a man who walked with God, Like the translated patriarch of old ; Though gladdened millions on His footstool trod, Yet none with Him did such sweet converse hold. I heard the wind in low complaint go by, That none its melodies like him could hear; Day unto day spoke wisdom from on high, Yet none like David turned a willing ear. God walked alone unhonoured through the earth : For Him no heart-built temple open stood ; The soul, forgetful of her nobler birth, Had hewn Him lofty shrines of stone and wood, And left unfinished and in ruins still The only temple He delights to fill. THE TREES OF LIFE. FOR those who worship Thee there is no death, For all they do is but with Thee to dwell. Now, while I take from Thee this passing breath, It is but of Thy glorious name to tell. Nor words nor measured sounds have I to find, But in them both my soul doth ever flow; They come as viewless as the unseen wind, And tell Thy noiseless steps where'er I go. The trees that grow along Thy living stream, And from its springs refreshment ever drink, For ever glittering in Thy morning beam, They bend them o'er the river's grassy brink; And, as more high and wide their branches grow, They look more fair within the depths below. JL STREET. 197 ALFRED B. STREET. [Born in 1811, of parents both belonging to distinguished Ame rican houses. Mr. Street is a barrister, thoroughly conversant with the wilder scenery and sports of the banks of the Hudscn, and of high repute among his countrymen as a descriptive poet in this line]. A FOREST WALK. A. LOVELY sky, a cloudless sun, A wind that breathes of leaves and flowers^ O'er hill, through dale, my steps have won To the cool forest's shadowy bowers. One of the paths all round that wind, Traced by the browzing herds, I choose, And sights and sounds of human kind In Nature's lone recesses lose. The beech displays its marbled bark, The spruce its green tent stretches wide, While scowls the hemlock, grim and dark, The maple's scalloped dome beside : All weave on high a verdant roof That keeps the very sun aloof, Making a twilight soft and green Within the columned vaulted scene. Sweet forest-odours have their birth From the clothed boughs and teeming earth, Where pine-cones dropped, leaves piled and dead, Long tufts of grass, and stars of fern, With many a wild-flower's fairy urn, A thick, elastic carpet spread. Here, with its mossy pall, the trunk, Resolving into soil, is sunk; There, wrenched but lately from its throne, By some fierce whirlwind circling past, Its huge roots massed with earth and stone, One of the woodland kings is cast. Above, the forest-tops are bright With the broad blaze of sunny light. But now a fitful air-gust parts 198 STREET. The screening branches, and a glow Of dazzling, startling radiance darts Down the dark stems, and breaks below. The mingled shadows off are rolled, The sylvan floor is bathed in gold : Low sprouts and herbs, before unseen, Display their shades of brown and green Tints brighten o'er the velvet moss, Gleams twinkle on the laurel's gloss; The robin, brooding in her nest, Chirps as the quick ray strikes her breast And, as my shadow prints the ground, I see the rabbit upward bound; With pointed ears an instant look; Then scamper to the darkest nook, Where, with crouched limb and staring eye. He watches while I saunter by. A narrow vista, carpeted With rich green grass, invites my tread. Here showers the light in golden dots, There sleeps the shade in ebon spots, So blended that the very air Seems network as I enter there. The partridge, whose deep-rolling drum Afar has sounded on my ear, Ceasing his beatings as I come, Whirrs to the sheltering branches near; The little milk-snake glides away, The brindled marmot dives from day; And now, between the boughs, a space Of the blue laughing sky I trace. On each side shrinks the bowery shade; Before me spreads an emerald glade; The sunshine steeps its grass and moss That couch my footsteps as I cross. Merrily hums the tawny bee, The glittering humming-bird I see; Floats the bright butterfly along; The insect choir is loud in song. STREET. 199 A spot of light and life, it seems A fairy haunt for fancy dreams. Here stretched, the pleasant turf I press, In luxury of idleness. Sun-streaks, and glancing wings, and sky Spotted with cloud-shapes, charm my eye; While murmuring grass, and waving trees, Their leaf-harps sounding to the breeze, And water-tones that tinkle near, Blend their sweet music to my ear; And by the changing shades alone The passage of the hours is known. AN AMERICAN FOREST IN SPRING. Now fluttering breeze, now stormy blast, Mild rain, then blustering snow: Winter's stern, fettering cold is past, But, sweet Spring ! where art thou? The white cloud floats mid smiling blue, The broad bright sunshine's golden hue Bathes the still frozen earth. 'Tis changed! above, black vapours roll: We turn from our expected stroll, And seek the blazing hearth. Hark ! that sweet carol ! with delight We leave the stifling room ! The little blue-bird greets our sight, Spring, glorious Spring, has come ! The south wind's balm is in the air, The melting snow-wreaths everywhere Are leaping off in showers; And Nature, in her brightening looks, Tells that her flowers, and leaves, and brooks, And birds, will soon be ours. A few soft, sunny days have shone, The air has lost its chill, STREET. A bright-green tinge succeeds the brown Upon the southern hill. Off to the woods ! a pleasant scene! Here sprouts the fresh young wintergreen, There swells a mossy mound; Though in the hollows drifts are piled, The wandering wind is sweet and mild, And buds are bursting round. Where its long rings uncurls the fern, The violet, nestling low, Casts back the white lid of its urn, Its purple streaks to show. Beautiful blossom ! first to rise And smile beneath Spring's wakening skies, The courier of the band Of coming flowers, what feelings sweet Gush, as the silvery gem we meet Upon its slender wand ! A sudden roar a shade is cast We look up with a start, And, sounding like a transient blast, O'erhead the pigeons dart; Scarce their blue glancing shapes the eye Can trace, ere, dotted on the sky, They wheel in distant flight. A chirp ! and swift the squirrel scours Along the prostrate trunk, and cowers Within its clefts from sight. Amid the creeping pine, which spreads Its thick and verdant wreath, The scaurberry's downy spangle sheds Its rich delicious breath. The bee-swarm murmurs by, and now It clusters black on yonder bough : The robin's mottled breast Glances that sunny spot across, As round it seeks the twig and moss To frame its summer nest. POE. 201 Warmer is each successive sky, More soft the breezes pass, The maple's gems of crimson lie Upon the thick green grass. The dogwood sheds its clusters white, The birch has dropped its tassels slight, Cowslips are by the rill; The thresher whistles in the glen, Flutters around the warbling wren, And swamps have voices shrill. A simultaneous burst of leaves Has clothed the forest now; A single day's bright sunshine weaves This vivid, gorgeous show. Masses of shade are cast beneath, The flowers are spread in varied wreath, Night brings her soft sweet moon; Morn wakes in mist, and twilight grey Weeps its bright dew; and smiling May Melts blooming into June. EDGAR ALLAN POE. [Born in Baltimore in January 1811 ; died in the same city on 7th October 1849. The most intense artist among the natives of the American Republic. This most original, fascinating, and admir able inventor in poetry and fiction belonged to a family of very good position. His father married an actress, and became an actor, and both parents died when Edgar, a remarkably beautiful boy, was but two years of age. A wealthy merchant in Richmond, Mr. Allan, adopted him. Foe's life was an intemperate one, in every sense of the word. Getting into scrapes during his Univer sity course in Virginia, he started off to fight for the independence of Greece ; but, straying away to St. Petersburg instead, he spon returned home destitute in 1829. His conduct to the newly-mar ried second wife of Mr. Allan disgusted that kindly old gentleman. The youth then entered and got expelled from the Military Aca demy of West Point ; and his adopted father, dying soon after wards, left him wholly unprovided for. Poe next tried literature, in various miscellaneous forms : in 1841, a collection of his ro mantic fictions, named Tales of the Grotesque and the Arabesque, laid the foundation of his fame. Some years before this, he had married his cousin, Virginia Clemm, who died in 1847. His ex- 202 POE, treme love for his wife, and what is more observable for his mother-in-law, forms the most amiable trait in his personal history. He was afterwards engaged to a literary widow in Rhode Island'- : but at last he purposely disgusted her, and the match was broken off. He next courted a lady of fortune in Richmond ; and was on his way from that city to New York, to settle some literary arrange ments prior to marriage, when, stopping at Baltimore, he met some old acquaintances ; spent the night in a debauch ; wandered out into the streets ; and was found next morning half dead from the excitement and exposure. He was removed to a hospital, and there died. While his bodily remains are mouldering unmarked in the cemetery of Baltimore, his fame has spread apace ; and thousands of men and women bask in the beauty or thrill to the terrors of his mind, without either knowing, or much needing to care, what number or what sorts of antics had been crowded into that brief tragicomedy while he yet had to "strut and fret his hour upon the stage "]. THE HAUNTED PALACE, IN the greenest of our valleys By good angels tenanted, Once a fair and stately palace Radiant palace reared its head. In the monarch Thought's dominion It stood there : Never seraph spread a pinion Over fabric half so fair ! Banners yellow, glorious, golden, On its roof did float and flow, (This all this was in the olden Time long ago) ; And every gentle air that dallied In that sweet day, Along the ramparts plumed and pallid, A winged odour went away. Wanderers in that happy valley, Through two luminous windows, saw 1 It has been stated that this lady was the "Annabel Lee of Foe's poem. But the poem itself seems to be quite inconsistent with such an assumption, and to be more likely to relate to the poet's deceased wife or indeed it may be wholly imaginary. FOE. 20J Spirits moving musically To a lute's well-tuned law, Round about a throne where, sitting Porphyrogene, In state his glory well-befitting, The ruler of the realm was seen. And all with pearl and ruby glowing Was the fair palace door, Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing, And sparkling evermore, A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty Was but to sing, In voices of surpassing beauty, The wit and wisdom of their king. But evil things, in robes of sorrow, Assailed the monarch's high estate : Ah let us mourn ! for never morrow Shall dawn upon him desolate ! And round about his home the glory That blushed and bloomed Is but a dim-remembered story Of the old time entombed. And travellers, now, within that valley, Through the red-litten windows, see Vast forms, that move fantastically To a discordant melody; While, like a ghastly rapid river, Through the pale door A hideous throng rush out for ever, And laugh but smile no more. ANNABEL LEE. IT was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea, That a maiden there lived whom you may know By the name of Annabel Lee ; And this maiden she lived with no other thought Than to love and be loved by me. 204 I was a child and she was a child, In this kingdom by the sea : But we loved with a love which was more than love I and my Annabel Lee ; With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven Coveted her and me. And this was the reason that, long ago, In this kingdom by the sea, A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling My beautiful Annabel Lee ; So that her highborn kinsman came, And bore her away from me, To shut her up in a sepulchre In this kingdom by the sea. The angels, not half so happy in heaven, Went envying her and me Yes ! that was the reason (as all men know In this kingdom by the sea) That the wind came out of the cloud by night, Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee. But our love it was stronger by far than the love Of those who were older than we Of many far wiser than we And neither the angels in heaven above, Nor the demons down under the sea, Can ever dissever my soul from the soul Of the beautiful Annabel Lee. For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams Of the beautiful Annabel Lee ; And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes Of the beautiful Annabel Lee ; And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side Of my darling my darling my life and my bride, In the sepulchre there by the sea, In her tomb by the sounding sea. POE. 205 THE CITY IN THE SEA. Lo ! Death has reared himself a throne In a strange city lying alone Far down within the dim West, Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best Have gone to their eternal rest. There shrines and palaces and towers Time-eaten towers that tremble not Resemble nothing that is ours. Around, by lifting winds forgot, Resignedly beneath the sky The melancholy waters lie. No rays from the holy heaven come down On the long night-time of that town ; But light from out the lurid sea Streams up the turrets silently Gleams up the pinnacles far and free Up domes up spires up kingly halls Up fanes up Babylon-like walls Up shadowy long-forgotten bowers Of sculptured ivy and stone flowers Up many and many a marvellous shrine Whose wreathed friezes intertwine The viol, the violet, and the vine. Resignedly beneath the sky The melancholy waters lie. So blend the turrets and shadows there That all seem pendulous in air, While from a proud tower in the town Death looks gigantically down. There open fanes and gaping graves Yawn level with the luminous waves. But not the riches there that lie In each idol's diamond eye Not the gaily-jewelled dead the waters from their bed ; JL *^ 206 POE. For no ripples curl, alas ! Along that wilderness of glass No swellings tell that winds may be Upon some far-off happier sea No heavings hint that winds have been On seas less hideously serene. But lo, a stir is in the air ! The wave there is a movement there ! As if the towers had thrust aside, In slightly sinking, the dull tide As if their tops had feebly given A void within the filmy heaven. The waves have now a redder glow The hours are breathing faint and low And when, amid no earthly moans, Down, down that town shall settle hence, Hell, rising from a thousand thrones, Shall do it reverence. TO ZANTE. FAIR isle that from the fairest of all flowers Thy gentlest of all gentle names dost take, How many memories of what radiant hours At sight of thee and thine at once awake ! How many scenes of what departed bliss! How many thoughts of what entombed hopes ! How many visions of a maiden that is No more no more upon thy verdant slopes ! No more! alas, that magical sad sound Transforming all ! Thycharms shall please nomoi\ Thy memory no more! Accursed ground Henceforth I hold thy flower-enamelled shore, hyacinthine isle, O purple Zante ! 1 sola d'oro, fiore di levante ! . POE. 207 DREAMLAND. BY a route obscure and lonely, Haunted by ill angels only, Where an Eidolon named Night On a black throne reigns upright, I have reached these lands but newly From an ultimate dim Thule From a wild weird clime that lieth, sublime, Out of Space out of Time. Bottomless vales and boundless floods, And chasms and caves, and Titan woods, With forms that no man can discover For the dews that drip all over; Mountains toppling evermore Into seas without a shore; Seas that restlessly aspire, Surging, unto skies of fire ; Lakes that endlessly outspread Their lone waters, lone and dead Their still waters, still and chilly With the snows of the lolling lily. By the lakes that thus outspread Their lone waters, lone and dead, Their sad waters, sad and chilly With the snows of the lolling lily, By the mountains near the river Murmuring lowly, murmuring ever, By the grey woods, by the swamp Where the toad and the newt encamp, By the dismal tarns and pools Where dwell the Ghouls, By each spot the most unholy In each nook most melancholy, There the traveller meets aghast Sheeted Memories of the Past, Shrouded forms that start and sigh As they pass the wanderer by, 208 POE. White-robed forms of friends long given In agony to the Earth and Heaven. For the heart whose woes are legion 'Tis a peaceful, soothing region For the spirit that walks in shadow 'Tis oh 'tis an Eldorado ! But the traveller, travelling through it, May not dare not openly view it; Never its mysteries are exposed To the weak human eye unclosed; So wills its King, who hath forbid The uplifting of the fringed lid; And thus the sad Soul that here passes Beholds it but through darkened glasses. By a route obscure and lonely, Haunted by ill angels only, Where an Eidolon named Night On a black throne reigns upright, I have wandered home but newly From this ultimate dim Thule. ISRAFEL. 1 IN Heaven a spirit doth dwell Whose heart-strings are a lute; None sing so wildly well As the angel Israfel; And the giddy stars (so legends tell), Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell Of his voice, all mute. Tottering above In her highest noon, The enamoured moon Blushes with love, * And the angel Israfel, whose heart-strings are a lute, and who has the sweetest voice of all God's creatures. KORAN. FOE. While, to listen, the red levin With the rapid Pleiads, even, Which were seven Pauses in Heaven. And they say (the starry choir And the other listening things) That Israfeli's fire Is owing to that lyre By which he sits and sings The trembling living wire Of those unusual strings. But the skies that angel trod; Where deep thoughts are a duty Where Love's a grown-up God Where the Houri glances are Imbued with all the beauty Which we worship in a star. Therefore thou art not wrong, Israfeli, who despisest An unimpassioned song; To thee the laurels belong, Best bard, because the wisest ! Merrily live, and long ! The ecstasies above With thy burning measures suit Thy grief, thy joy, thy hate, thy love, With the fervour of thy lute Well may the stars be mute ! Yes, Heaven is thine; but this Is a world of sweets and sours; Our flowers are merely flowers, And the shadow of thy perfect bliss Is the sunshine of ours. If I could dwell Where Israfel Hath dwelt, and he where I, He might not sing so wildly well A mortal melody, While a bolder note than this might swell From my lyre within the sky. FOR ANNIE. THANK Heaven ! the crisis, The danger, is past, And the lingering illness Is over at last And the fever called " Living" Is conquered at last. Sadly, I know, I am shorn of my strength, And no muscle I move 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. The moaning and groaning, The sighing and sobbing, Are quieted now, With that horrible throbbing At heart : ah that horrible, Horrible throbbing! The sickness the nausea The pitiless pain Have ceased, with the fever POE. That maddened my brain With the fever called "Living" That burned in my brain. And oh ! of all tortures That torture the worst Has abated the terrible Torture of thirst For the napthaline 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 Regretting its roses Its old agitations Of myrtles and roses: For now, while so quietly Lying, it fancies A holier odour About it of .pansies I POE. A rosemary odour 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 I 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 composedly, 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 the sky, For it sparkles with Annie FOE. 213 It glows with the light Of the love of my Annie With the thought of the light Of the eyes of my Annie. TO ONE IN PARADISE. THOU wast all that to me, love, For which my soul did pine A green isle in the sea, love, A fountain, and a shrine All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, And all the flowers were mine. Ah dream too bright to last ! Ah starry hope that didst arise But to be overcast ! A voice from out the future cries, " On ! on ! " but o'er the past (Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies Mute, motionless, aghast ! /' For, alas ! alas ! with me The light of life is o'er ! No more no more no more (Such language holds the solemn sea To the sands upon the shore) Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree, Or the stricken eagle soar ! And all my days are trances, And all my nightly dreams Are where thy dark eye glances, And where thy footstep gleams In what ethereal dances, By what eternal streams ! 214 POE. THE SLEEPER. AT midnight, in the month of June, I stand beneath the mystic moon. An opiate vapour, dewy, dirn, Exhales from out her golden rim, And, softly dripping, drop by drop, Upon the quiet mountain-top, Steals drowsily and musically Into the universal valley. The rosemary nods upon the grave ; The lily lolls upon the wave ; Wrapping the fog about his breast, The ruin moulders into rest ; Looking like Lethe, see ! the lake A conscious slumber seems to take, And would not, for the world, awake. All Beauty sleeps ! and lo ! where lies, Her casement open to the skies, Irene, with her destinies ! Oh lady bright ! can it be right This window open to the night ? The wanton airs, from the tree-top, Laughingly through the lattice drop The bodiless airs, a wizard rout, Flit through thy chamber in and out ; And wave the curtain canopy So fitfully so fearfully Above the closed and fringed lid 'Neath which thy slumbering soul lies hid That o'er the floor and down the wall Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall ! Oh lady dear, hast thou no fear Why and what art thou dreaming here ? Sure thou art come o'er far-off seas, A wonder to these garden-trees ! Strange is thy pallor ! strange thy dress ! Strange, above all, thy length of tress, And this all solemn silentness ! i The lady sleeps ! Oh may her sleep, " I stand amid the roar Of a surf-tormented shore. Amciican Pof>ns.\ [Page 215. POE. 215 Which is enduring, so be deep ! Heaven have her in its sacred keep ! This chamber changed for one more holy, This bed for one more melancholy, I pray to God that she may lie For ever with unopened eye, While the dim sheeted ghosts go by ! My love, she sleeps ! Oh may her sleep, As it is lasting, so be deep ! Soft may the \vt>rms about her creep ! Far in the forest, dim and old, For her may some tall vault unfold Some vault that oft has flung its black And winged pannels fluttering back, Triumphant, o'er the crested palls Of her grand family funerals Some sepulchre, remote, alone, Against whose portal she hath thrown, In childhood, many an idle stone Some tomb from out whose sounding door She ne'er shall force an echo more, Thrilling to think, poor child of sin! It was the dead who groaned within. A DREAM WITHIN A DREAM. TAKE this kiss upon the brow ! And, in parting from you now, Thus much let me avow You are not wrong, who deem That my days have been a dream ; Yet if hope has flown away In a night, or in a day, In a vision, or in none, Is it therefore the less gone ? All that we see or seem Is but a dream within a dream. I stand amid the roar Of a surf-tormented shore, 216 FOE, And I hold within my hand Grains of the golden sand How few ! yet how they creep Through my fingers to the deep, While I weep while I weep ! O God ! can I not grasp Them with a tighter clasp ? O God ! can I not save One from the pitiless wave ? Is all that we see or seem But a dream within a dream ? TO F . Beloved ! amid the earnest woes That crowd around my earthly path (Drear path, alas ! where grows Not even one lonely rose) My soul at least a solace hath In dreams of thee, and therein knows An Eden of bland repose. And thus thy memory is to me Like some enchanted far-off isle In some tumultuous sea Some ocean throbbing far and free With storms, but where meanwhile Serenest skies continually Just o'er that one bright island smile. ULALUME. THE skies they were ashen and sober; The leaves they were crisped and sere The leaves they were withering and sere; It was night in the lonesome October Of my most immemorial year; It was hard by the dim lake of Auber, In the misty mid region of Weir It was down by the dank tarn of Auber, In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir. POE. 217 Here once, through an alley titanic Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul. These were days when my heart was volcanic As the scoriae rivers that roll As the lavas that restlessly roll Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek In the ultimate climes of the pole That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek In the realms of the boreal pole. Our talk had been serious and sober, But our thoughts they were palsied and sere Our memories were treacherous and sere For we knew not the month was October, And we marked not the night of the year (Ah night of all nights in the year!) We noted not the dim lake of Auber (Though once we had journeyed down here) Remembered not the dank tarn of Auber, Nor the ghoul haunted woodland of Weir. And now, as the night was senescent, And star-dials pointed to morn As the star-dials hinted of morn At the end of our path a liquescent And nebulous lustre was born, Out of which a miraculous crescent Arose with a duplicate horn Astarte's bediamonded crescent Distinct with its duplicate horn. And I said " She is warmer than Dian : She rolls through an ether of sighs She revels in a region of sighs: She has seen that the tears are not dry on These cheeks, where the worm never dies, And has come past the stars of the Lion, To point us the path to the skies To the Lethean peace of the skies ; 2 IS POE. Come up, \u despite of the Lion, To shine on us with her bright eyes Come up through the lair of the Lion, With love in her luminous eyes." But Psyche, uplifting her finger, Said "Sadly this star I mistrust Her pallor I strangely mistrust : Oh hasten! oh let us not linger! Oh fly! let us fly! for we must." In terror she spoke, letting sink her Wings till they trailed in the dust In agony sobbed, letting sink her Plumes till they trailed in the dust Till they sorrowfully trailed in the dust. I replied "This is nothing but dreaming: Let us on by this tremulous light ! Let us bathe in this crystalline light ! Its sibylic splendour is beaming With hope and in beauty to-night: See! it flickers up the sky through the night! Ah we safely may trust to its gleaming, And be sure it will lead us aright: We safely may trust to a gleaming That cannot but guide us aright, Since it flickers up to heaven through the night." Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her, And tempted her ouc of her gloom And conquered her scruples and gloom; And we passed to the end of the vista, But were stopped by the door of a tomb By the door of a legended tomb; And I said "What is written, sweet sister, On the door of this legended tomb?" She replied " Ulalume Ulalume 'Tis the vault of thy lost Ulalume!" Then my heart it grew ashen and sober As the leaves that were crisped and sere As the leaves that were withering and sere POE. 219 And I cried "It was surely October On this very night of last year That I journeyed I journeyed down here On this night of all nights in the year. Ah what demon has tempted me here? Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber This misty mid region of Weir Well I know, now, this dark tarn of Auber, This ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir." TO HELEN. HELEN, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore That gently, o'er a perfumed sea, The weary way-worn wanderer bore To his own native shore. On desperate seas long wont to roam, Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face, Thy Naiad airs, have brought me home To the glory that was Greece, And the grandeur that was Rome. Lo, in yon brilliant window-niche How statue-like I see thee stand, The agate lamp within thy hand ! Ah Psyche, from the regions which Are holy land ! 1 This is the form of the poem which obtained, I presume, the ultimate approval of its author. An earlier version gave an addi tional last stanza : Said 've then the two, then " Ah can it Have been that the woodlandish ghouls The pitiful, the merciful ghouls To bar up our way and to ban it From the secret that lies in these wolds From the thing that lies hidden in these wolds Have drawn up the spectre of a planet From the limbo of lunary souls This sinfully scintillant planet From the hell of the planetary souls?" FOE. THE BELLS. I. HEAR 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 All the heavens seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight; Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the tintinabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells. n. Hear the mellow wedding bells, Golden bells! What a world of happiness their harmony foretells 1 Through the balmy air of night How they ring out their delight! From the molten-golden notes, And all in tune, What a liquid ditty floats To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats On the moon! On from out the sounding cells, What a gush of euphony voluminously wells ! How it swells! How it dwells On the future ! how it tells Of the rapture that impels To the swinging and the ringing Of the bells, bells, bells, Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells ! POE. 221 III. Hear the loud alarum bells Brazen bells! 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 a 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 endeavour Now now to sit, or never, By the side of the pale-faced moon. Oh the bells, bells, bells ! What a tale their terror tells Of despair! How they clang, and clash, and roar .' What a horror they outpour On the bosom 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 bells Of the bells Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells In the clamour and the clangour of the bells ! IV. Hear the tolling of the bells Iron bells ! What a world of solemn thought their monody compels! : 222 POE. In the silence of the night, How we shiver with affright At the melancholy menace of their tone ! For every 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 paean from the bells ! And his merry bosom swells With the pasan of the bells ! 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 bells; Keeping time, time, time, As he knells, knells, knells, In a happy Runic rhyme, To the tolling of the bells Of the bells, bells, bells To the tolling of the bells, Of the bells, bells, bells, bells- Bells, bells, bells To the moaning and the groaning of the bells. "Once upon a midnight dreary.' POE. 223 THE RAVEN. ONCE upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. ' 'Tig some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door Only this and nothing more." Ah distinctly I remember it was in the bleak Decem ber, 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 For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore Nameless here for evermore. 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, "'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; This it is and nothing more." Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer, "Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I im plore; 22^ POE. 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 dnrkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before ; But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word "Lenore." This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word " Lenore !"- Merely this and nothing more. Back into the chamber turning, all 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 mystery explore Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery ex plore; 'Tis the wind and nothing more." Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many ^ flirt and flutter, In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore. Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he; But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door FOE. 225 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 stern decorum of the countenance 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 : Tell me what thy lordly name is on the night's Pluto nian shore!" Quoth the Raven "Nevermore." Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly, Though its answer little meaning little relevancy bore; For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blest with seeing bird above his chamber door Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust a"bove his chamber door, With such name as "Nevermore." But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing farther 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. 220 POE. Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore Of 'Never nevermure.'" 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 ex pressing To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into mj bosom's core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er, But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o'er She shall press ah nevermore ! Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed fron> 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 thy memories of Lenore ! POE. 227 Quaff, oh 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 en chanted 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 rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore." Quoth the Raven "Nevermore." "Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend," I shrieked, upstarting " Get thee back into the tempest and the night's Pluto nian 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." 228 CRANCH. 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's 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 ! CHRISTOPHER PEASE CRANCH. [Born in 1813. Originally a Unitarian minister, but, since 1842, a landscape-painter of distinguished reputation in the United States. The sole volume of his Poems was published in 1854]- STANZAS. 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 communing 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 complete. 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 ? HARRIET BEECHER STOVE. 229 What our wise philosophy But the glancing of a dream ? 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 all absorbed again, Melting, flowing into one. HARRIET ELIZABETH BEECHER STOWE. [Born in 1814 ; married to the Rev. Professor Stowe. Mrs. Stowe first attracted notice by a collection of tales and sketches named The Mayflower in 1844: in 1852 she was the subject of world-wide celebrity as authoress of Uncle Tom's Cabin, and in 1869 of world-wide detraction as revealer of Lady Byron's charges again st her ever-illustrious husband]. ONLY A YEAR. 1 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 ! 1 These lines refer to the death, in 1857, of a son of Mrs. Stowe, drowned while bathing in the Connecticut River. 230 HARRIET BEECHER STOWE. 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, one 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 calmly sleeps below The form we love. Where hast thou been this year, beloved? What hast thou seen? What visions fair, what glorious life, Where thou hast been ! The veil, the veil so thin, so strong ; Twixt us and thee ! The mystic veil, when shall 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. PABODIE. 231 WILLIAM JEWETT PABODIE. [Born about 1815. A barrister, principally known as author of Calidore, a Legendaiy Poe/n, published in 1839]. ON THE DEATH OF A FRIEND. GONE in the flush of youth! Gone ere thy heart had felt earth's withering care ; Ere the stern world had soiled thy spirit's truth, Or sown dark sorrow there. Fled like a dream away! But yesterday mid life's auroral bloom To-day, sad winter, desolate and grey, Sighs round thy lonely tomb. Fond hearts were beating high, Fond eyes were watching for the loved one gone, And gentle voices, deeming thou wert nigh, Talked of thy glad return. They watched not all in vain Thy form once more the wonted threshold passed; But choking sobs, and tears like summer rain, Welcomed thee home at last. Friend of my youth, farewell ! To thee, we trust, a happier life is given ; One tie to earth for us hath loosed its spell, Another formed for heaven. FRANCES OSGOOD. EPES SARGENT. [Born in 1816. He began writing for the stage at an early age ; his drama of 71ie Bride of Genoa having been acted in 1836, and his most admired tragedy, Vdasco, in 1837]. A CALM. Oh for one draught of cooling northern air! That it might pour its freshness on me now; That it might kiss my cheek and cleave my hair, And part its currents round my fevered brow ! Ocean, and sky, and earth ! a blistering calm Spread over all ! how weary wears the day ! Oh lift the wave, and bend the distant palm, Breeze ! wheresoe'er thy lagging pinions stray, Triumphant burst upon the level deep, Rock the fixed hull, and swell the clinging sail ! Arouse the opal clouds that o'er us sleep, Sound thy shrill whistle ! we will bid thee hail ! Though wrapped in all the storm-clouds of the north, Yet from thy home of ice, come forth, O breeze, come forth ! FRANCES SARGENT OSGOOD. [Born in 1816, daughter of a merchant named Locke ; died some years ago. Towards 1835 she married the painter Mr. Osgood, and the earlier years of their wedded life were passed in England. Mrs. Osgood published various miscellaneous writings and com pilations, frequently using the pseudonym of " Florence "]. THE SOUL'S LAMENT FOR HOME. As plains the homesick ocean-shell Far from its own remembered sea, Repeating, like a fairy spell Of love, the charmed melody It learned within that whispering wave Whose wondrous and mysterious tone Still wildly haunts its winding cave Of pearl, with softest music-moan FRANCES OSGOOD. 233 So asks my homesick soul below For something loved, yet undefined ; So mourns to mingle with the flow Of music from the Eternal Mind ; So murmurs, with its childlike sigh, The melody it learned above. To which no echo may reply, Save from thy voice, Celestial Love ! BIANCA. A WHISPER woke the air, A soft light tone, and low, Yet barbed with shame and woe. h ! might it only perish there, Nor farther go ! But no ! a quick and eager ear Caught up the little, meaning sound Another voice has breathed it clear And so it wandered round From ear to lip, from lip to ear, Until it reached a gentle heart That throbbed from all the world apart, And that it broke ! It was the only heart it found The only heart 'twas meant to find When first its accents woke. It reached that gentle heart at last, And that it broke ! Low as it seemed to other cars, It came a thunder-crash to hers That fragile girl, so fair and gay. 'Tis said, a lovely humming-bird, That dreaming in a lily lay, Was killed but by the gun's report Some idle boy had fired in sport ; So exquisitely frail its frame, The very sound a death-blow came: 234 ANNE LYNCH, And thus her heart, unused to shame, Shrined in its lily, too (For who the maid that knew But owned the delicate flower-like grace Of her young form and face?) Her light and happy heart, that beat With love and hope so fast and sweet, When first that cruel word it heard, It fluttered like a frightened bird Then shut its wings and sighed, And with a silent shudder died ! ANNE CHARLOTTE LYNCH. [Miss Lynch, born towards 1816, is the daughter of one of the "United Irishmen," who, having joined the Rebellion of 1798, was banished for life after four years' imprisonment. She is a mis cellaneous writer in prose as well as verse]. TO THE SAVIOUR. OH thou who once on earth beneath the weight Of our mortality didst live and move, The incarnation of profoundest love ; Who on the Cross that love didst consummate Whose deep and ample fulness could embrace The poorest, meanest, of our fallen race : How shall we e'er that boundless debt repay ? By long loud prayers in gorgeous temples said? By rich oblations on thine altars laid ? Ah no ! not thus thou didst appoint the way. When thou wast bowed our human woe beneath, Then as a legacy thou didst bequeath Earth's sorrowing children to our ministry And as we do to them we do to thee. ANNE LYNCH. 235 FAITH. SECURELY cabined in the ship below, Through darkness and through storm I cross the sea, A pathless wilderness of Avaves to me : But yet I do not fear, because I know That he who guides the good ship o'er that waste Sees in the stars her shining pathway traced. Blindfold I walk this life's bewildering maze, Up flinty steep, through frozen mountain-pass, Through thornset barren and through deep morass; But strong in faith I tread the uneven ways, And bare my head unshrinking to the blast, Because my Father's arm is round me cast; And, if the way seems rough, I only clasp The hand that leads me with a firmer grasp. LOVE. Go forth in life, oh friend ! not seeking love, A mendicant that with imploring eye And outstretched hand asks of the passers-by The alms his strong necessities may move. For such poor love, to pity near allied, Thy generous spirit may not stoop and wait, A suppliant whose prayer may be denied Like a spurned beggar's at a palace-gate. But thy heart's affluence lavish uncontrolled The largess of thy love give full and free, As monarchs in their progress scatter gold ; And be thy heart like the exhaustless sea, That must its wealth of cloud and dew bestow, Though tributary streams or ebb or flow. 236 ANNE LYNCH. THE LAKE AND STAR. THE mountain lake, o'ershadowed by the hills, May still gaze heavenward on the evening star Whose distant light its dark recesses fills, Though boundless distance must divide them far ; Still may the lake the star's bright image bear, Still may the star from its blue ether dome Shower down its silver beams across the gloom, And light the wave that wanders darkly there. Star of my life ! thus do I turn to thee Amid the shadows that above me roll ; Thus from thy distant sphere thou shin'st on me, Thus does thine image float upon my soul, Through the wide space that must our lives dissever Far as the lake and star, ah me, for ever ! BONES IN THE DESERT. WHERE pilgrims seek the Prophet's tomb Across the Arabian waste, Upon the ever-shifting sands A fearful path is traced. Far up to the horizon's verge The traveller sees it rise A line of ghastly bones that bleach Beneath those burning skies. Across it tempest and simoom The desert-sands have strewed, But still that line of spectral white For ever is renewed. For, while along that burning track The caravans move on, Still do the wayworn pilgrims fall Ere yet the shrine be won. There the tired camel lays him down, And shuts his gentle eyes ; ANNE LYNCH. 217 And there the fiery rider droops, Toward Mecca looks, and dies. They fall unheeded from the ranks : On sweeps the endless train ; But there, to mark the desert path, Their whitening bones remain. As thus I read the mournful tale Upon the traveller's page, I thought how like the march of life Is this sad pilgrimage. For every heart hath some fair dream, Some object unattained, And far off in the distance lies Some Mecca to be gained. But beauty, manhood, love, and power, Go in their morning down, And longing eyes and outstretched arms Tell of the goal unwon. The mighty caravan of life Above their dust may sweep ; Nor shout nor trampjing feet shall break The rest of those who sleep. Oh fountains that I have not reached, That gush far off e'en now, When shall I quench my spirit's thirst Where your sweet waters flow ? Oh Mecca of my lifelong dreams, Cloud-palaces that rise In that far distance pierced by hope, When will ye greet mine eyes ? The shadows lengthen toward the east From the declining sun ; And the pilgrim, as ye still recede, Sighs for the journey done ! 23? SPENCER MILLER. E. SPENCER MILLER [Born in 1817. A barrister, and author of a volume of poems, Caprices, published anonymously in 1 849], THE WIND. I STIR the pulses of the mind, And, with my passive cheek inclined, I lay my ear along the wind. It fans my face, it fans the tree, It goes away and comes to me, I feel it, but I cannot see. Upon my chilly brow it plays, It whispers of forgotten days, It says whatever fancy says. Away, away by wood and plain, About the park and through the lane, It goes, and comes to me again. Away, again away, it roams, By fields of flocks and human homes, And laden with their voices comes. It comes and whispers in my ear, So close I cannot choose but hear; It speaks, and yet I do not fear. Then, sweeping where the shadows lie, Its murmur softens to a sigh That pains me as it passes by, And in its sorrow and reproof Goes wailing round the wall and roof, So sad the swallow soars aloof. Away, the old cathedral-bell Is swinging over hill and dell ; Devoted men are praying well. SPENCER MILLER. 239 Away, with every breath there come The tones of'toil's eternal hum, Man, legion-voiced, yet ever dumb. Away, away, by lake and lea, It cometh ever back to me, I feel it, but I cannot see. "THE BLUEBEARD CHAMBERS OF THE HEART. MOULD upon the ceiling, Mould upon the floor, Windows barred and double-barred, Opening nevermore ; Spiders in the corners, Spiders on the shelves, Weaving frail and endless webs Back upon themselves; Weaving, ever weaving, Weaving in the gloom, Till the drooping drapery Trails about the room. Waken not the echo, Nor the bat that clings In the curious crevices Of the pannelings. Waken not the echo; It will haunt your ear, Wall and ceiling whispering Words you would not hear. Hist ! the spectres gather Gather in the dark, Where a breath has brushed away Dust from off a mark ; SPENCER MILLER. Dust of weary winters, Dust of solemn years, Dust that deepens in the silence, As the minute wears. On the shelf and wainscot, Window-bars and wall, Covering infinite devices With its stealthy fall. Hist! the spectres gather, Break, and group again, Wreathing, writhing, gibbering Round that fearful stain: Blood upon the panels, Blood upon the floor, Blood that baffles wear and washing, Red for evermore. See, they pause and listen, Where the bat that clings Stirs within the crevices Of the pannelings. See, they pause and listen, Listen through the air ; How the eager life has struggled That was taken there! See, they pause and listen, Listen in the gloom ; For a startled breath is sighing, Sighing through the room. Sighing in the corners, Sighing on the floor, Sighing through the window-bars That open nevermore. Waken not those whispers ; They will pain your ears ; COXE. 241 Waken not the dust that deepens Through the solemn years, Deepens in the silence, Deepens in the dark ; Covering closer, as it gathers, Many a fearful mark. Hist ! the spectres gather, Break and group again, Wreathing, writhing, gibbering, Round that fearful stain : Blood upon the panels, Blood upon the floor, Blood that baffles wear and washing Red for evermore. ARTHUR CLEVELAND COXE. [Born in 1818. A Bishop in the Protestant Episcopal Church ; author of Saul, a Mystery, and various other poetical as well as prose writings]. MARCH. MARCH march march ! Making sounds as they tread, Ho-ho ! how they step, Going down to the dead! Every stride, every tramp, Every footfall, is nearer; And dimmer each lamp, As darkness grows drearer; But ho ! how they march, Making sounds as they tread; Ho-ho! how they step, Going down to the dead! March march march ! Making sounds as they tread, Ho-ho, how they laugh, Qoing down to the dead! 242 LORD. How they whirl how they trip, How they smile, how they dally, How blithesome they skip, Going down to the valley; Oh-ho, how they march, Making sounds as they tread; Ho-ho, how they skip, Going down to the dead! March march march ! Earth groans as they tread! Each carries a skull; Going down to the dead! Every stride, every stamp, Every footfall, is bolder; 'Tis a skeleton's tramp, With a skull on his shoulder! But ho ! how he steps With a high-tossing head, That clay-covered bone, Going down to the dead! WILLIAM LORD. [Born about 1818. Author of Christ in Hades, a poem in eight Books, published in 1851. Mr. Lord is a minister of the Protestant Episcopal Church]. THE BROOK. A LITTLE blind girl wandering, While daylight pales beneath the moon; And with a brook meandering, To hear its gentle tune. The little blind girl by the brook, It told her something, you might guess, To see her smile, to see her look Of listening eagerness. Though blind, a never-silent guide Flowed with her timid feet along ; ' LORD. 243 And down she wandered by its side To hear the running song. And sometimes it was soft and low, A creeping music in the ground; And then, if something checked its flow, A gurgling swell of sound. And now, upon the other side, She seeks her mother's cot, And still the noise shall be her guide, And lead her to the spot: For to the blind, so little free To move about beneath the sun, Small things like this seem liberty Something from darkness won. But soon she heard a meeting stream, And on the bank she followed still; It murmured on, nor could she tell It was another rill. "Ah! whither, whither, my little maid? And wherefore dost thou wander he-re?" "I seek my mother's cot," she said, "And surely it is near." "There is no cot upon this brook; In yonder mountains dark and drear, Where sinks the sun, its source it took; Ah wherefore art thou here?" "Oh! sir, you are not true nor kind; It is the brook, I know its sound; Ah! why would you deceive the blind? I hear it in the ground." And on she stepped, but grew more sad, And weary were her tender feet; The brook's small voice seemed not so glad, Its song was not so sweet. 244 WALLACE. "Ah! whither, whither, my little maid? And wherefore dost thou wander here?' "I seek my mother's cot," she said, "And surely it is near." "There is no cot upon this brook." "I hear its sound," the maid replied, With dreamlike and bewildered look "I have not left its side." "Oh go with me; the darkness nears, The first pale star begins to gleam." The maid replied with bursting tears, "It is the stream! It is the stream!" WILLIAM WALLACE. [Born in 1819. A lawyer, author of various poems the longest of which is named Allan, a romance of New York, published in 1848]. GREENWOOD CEMETERY. HERE are the houses of the dead. Here youth, And age, and manhood stricken in his strength, Hold solemn state, and awful silence keep, While Earth goes murmuring in her ancient path, And troubled Ocean tosses to and fro Upon his mountainous bed impatiently, And many stars make worship musical In the dim-aisled abyss, and over all The Lord of Life in meditation sits Changeless, alone, beneath the large white dome Of Immortality. I pause and think Among these walks lined by the frequent tombs; For it is very wonderful. Afar The populous city lifts its tall bright spires, And snowy sails are glancing on the bay, As if in merriment but here al-1 sleep : They sleep, these calm, pale people of the past. WALLACE. 245 Spring plants her rosy feet on their dim homes They sleep. Sweet Summer comes and calls, and calls, \yith all her passionate poetry of flowers AVed to the music of the soft south wind They sleep. The lonely Autumn sits and sobs Between the cold white tombs, as if her heart Would break they sleep. Wild Winter comes and chants Majestical the mournful Sagas learned Far in the melancholy North, where God Walks forth alone upon the desolate seas They slumber still ! Sleep on, O passionless dead ! Ye make our world sublime: ye have a power And majesty the living never had. Here Avarice shall forget his den of gold, Here Lust his beautiful victim, and hot Hate His crouching foe. Ambition here shall lean Against Death's shaft, veiling the stern, bright eye That, over-bold, would take the height of gods, And know Fame's nothingness. The sire shall come, The matron and the child, through many years, To this fair spot, whether the plumed hearse Moves slowly through the winding walks, or Death For a brief moment pauses: all shall come To feel the touching eloquence of graves : And therefore it was well for us to clothe The place with beauty. No dark terror here Shall chill the generous tropic of the soul; But Poetry and her starred comrade Art Shall make the sacred country of the dead Magnificent. The fragrant flowers shall smile Over the low, green graves; the trees shall shake Their soul-like cadences upon the tombs; The little lake, set in a paradise Of wood, shall be a mirror to the moon What time she looks from her imperial tent In long delight at all below; the sea Shall lift some stately dirge he loves to breathe Over dead nations : while calm sculptures stand 246 WALLACE. On every hill, and look like spirits there That drink the harmony. Oh it is well! Why should a darkness scowl on any spot Where man grasps immortality? Light, light, And art, and poetry, and eloquence, And all that we call glorious, are its dower. Oh ye whose mouldering frames were brought and placed By pious hands within these flowery slopes And gentle hills, where are ye dwelling now? For man is more than element. The soul Lives in the body as the sunbeam lives In trees or flowers that were but clay without. Then where are ye, lost sunbeams of the mind? Are ye where great Orion towers and holds Eternity on his stupendous front? Or where pale Neptune in the distant space Shows us how far, in His creative mood, With pomp of silence and concentred brows, Walked forth the Almighty? Haply ye have gone Where other matter roundeth into shapes Of bright beatitude : or do ye know Aught of dull space or time, and its dark load Of aching weariness? They answer not. But He whose love created them of old, To cheer his solitary realm and reign, With love will still remember them. WHITMAN. 247 WALT WHITMAN. [Born on 3ist May 1819, at West Hills, Long Island, in the State of New York. If I may trust ray own judgment, by far the great est of American poets, the most national, and the most world wide. Mr. Whitman has acted as a printer, a school-teacher, a newspaper-writer, a carpenter and builder, and is now a clerk in the office of the Attorney General at Washington. During the Civil War he volunteered to attend on the sick and wounded of both armies ; and is said to have ministered, with boundless bro- therliness and eminent success, to upwards of 100,000 men. In earlier years he had travelled much within the area of the United States. His poems are Leaves of Grass, published in 1855, and since reissued more than once with alterations and additions, 1 and Drum-Taps, published in 1865. The Leaves of Grass, more espe cially, has encountered the usual fat-2 of works of the heroic stature: unmeasured abuse from the many, and from the knowing enthu siastic cherishing from a few, gradually growing less few]. A SONG. COME, I will make the continent indissoluble; I will make the most splendid race the sun ever yet shone upon ; I will make divine magnetic lands, With the love of comrades, With the life-long love of comrades. I will plant companionship thick as trees along all the rivers of America, and along the shores of the great lakes, and all over the prairies ; I will make inseparable cities, with their arms about each other's necks ; By the love of comrades, By the manly love of comrades. For you these, from me, O Democracy, to serve you, ma femme ! For you ! for you, I am trilling these songs, In the love of comrades, In the high-towering love of comrades. 1 In the latest edition of Leaves of Grass there is a separate sec tion named Passage to India. My extracts are taken from, and in all points of diction correspond with, this latest edition. ENVY. WHEN I peruse the conquered fame of heroes, and the victories of mighty generals, I do not envy the generals, Nor the President in his Presidency, nor the rich in his great house ; But when I hear of the brotherhood of lovers, how it was with them, How through life, through dangers, odium, unchanging, long and long, Through youth, and through middle and old age, how unfaltering, how affectionate and faithful, they were, Then I am pensive I hastily walk away, filled with the bitterest envy. PARTING FRIENDS. WHAT think you I take my pen in hand to record ? The battle-ship, perfect-modelled, majestic, that I saw pass the offing to-day under full sail ? The splendours of the past day ? Or the splendour of the night that envelops me ? Or the vaunted glory and growth of the great city spread around me ? No ; But I record of two simple men I saw to-day, on the pier, in the midst of the crowd, parting the part ing of dear friends ; The one to remain .hung on the other's neck, and nas- sionately kissed him, While the one to depart tightly pressed the one to re main in his arms. ' WHITMAN. 249 SALUT AU MOXDE ! I. OH take my hand, Walt Whitman ! Such gliding wonders ! such sights and sounds ! Such joined unended links, each hooked to the next ! Each answering all each sharing the earth with all. What widens within you, Walt W T hitman ? What waves and soils exuding ? What climes ? what persons and lands are here ? Who are the infants? some playing, some slumbering? Who are the girls ? who are the married women ? Who are the groups of old men going slowly with their arms about each other's necks ? What rivers are these ? what forests and fruits are these ? What are the mountains called that rise so high in the mists ? What myriads of dwellings are they, filled with dwellers ? 2. Within me latitude widens, longitude lengthens ; Asia, Africa, Europe, are to the east America is pro vided for in the west ; Banding the bulge of the earth winds the hot equator, Curiously north and south turn the axis-ends ; Within me is the longest day the sun wheels in slant ing rings it does not set for months ; Stretched in due time within me the midnight sun just rises above the horizon, and sinks again ; Within me zones, seas, cataracts, plants, volcanoes, groups, Malaysia, Polynesia, and the great West Indian islands. 3- What do you hear, Walt Whitman ? I hear the workman singing and the farmer's wife sing ing : 250 WHITMAN. I hear in the distance the sounds of children, and of animals early in the day ; I hear quick rifle-cracks from the riflemen of East Ten nessee and Kentucky, hunting on hills ; I hear emulous shouts of Australians, pursuing the wild horse ; I hear the Spanish dance, with castanets, in the chestnut shade, to the rebeck and guitar ; I hear continual echoes from the Thames ; I hear fierce French liberty songs ; I hear of the Italian boat-sculler the musical recitative of old poems ; I hear the Virginia plantation-chorus of negroes, of a harvest-night, in the glare of pine-knots ; I hear the strong baritone of the 'long-shore-men of Mannahatta ; I hear the stevedores unlading the cargoes, and sing ing ; I hear the screams of the water-fowl of solitary north west lakes ; I hear the rustling pattering of locusts, as they strike the grain and grass with the showers of their ter rible clouds; I hear the Coptic refrain, toward sundown, pensively falling on the breast of the black venerable vast mother, the Nile ; I hear the bugles of raft-tenders on the streams of Can ada ; I hear the chirp of the Mexican muleteer, and the bells of the mule ; I hear the Arab muezzin, calling from the top of the mosque; I hear the Christian priests at the altars of their churches I hear the responsive bass and soprano; I hear the wail of utter despair of the white-haired Irish grand-parents, when they learn the death of their grandson; I hear the cry of the Cossack, and the sailor's voice, putting to sea at Okotsk ; WHITMAN. 251 I hear the wheeze of the slave-coffle, as the slaves march on as the husky gangs pass on by twos and threes, fastened together with wrist-chains and ankle-chains; I hear the entreaties of women tied up for punishment I hear the sibilant whisk of thongs through the air; I hear the Hebrew reading his records and psalms; I hear the rhythmic myths of the Greeks, and the strong legends of the Romans; I hear the tale of the divine life and bloody death of the beautiful God the Christ; I hear the Hindoo teaching his favourite pupil the loves, wars, adages, transmitted safely to this day from poets who wrote three thousand years ago. 4- What do you see, Walt Whitman ? Who are they you salute, and that one after another salute you ? I see a great round wonder rolling through the air ; I see diminute farms, hamlets, ruins, grave-yards, jails, factories, palaces, hovels, huts of barbarians, tents of nomads, upon the surface; I see the shaded part on one side, where the sleepers are sleeping and the sun-lit part on the other side, I see the curious silent change of the light and shade, I see distant lands, as real and near to the inhabitants of them as my land is to me. I see plenteous waters ; I see mountain-peaks I see the sierras of Andes and Alleghanies, where they range; I see plainly the Himalayas, Chian Shahs, Altays, Ghauts; I see the giant pinnacles of Elbruz, Kazbek, Bazardjusi, I see the Rocky Mountains, and the Peak of Winds ; I see the Styrian Alps, and the Karnac Alps ; 252 WHITMAN. I see the Pyrenees, Balks, Carpathians and to the north the Dofrafields, and off at sea Mount Hecla ; I see Vesuvius and Etna I see the Anahuacs ; I see the Mountains of the Moon, and the Snow Moun tains, and the Red Mountains of Madagascar; I see the Vermont hills, and the long string of cordil- leras ; I see the vast deserts of Western America ; I see the Libyan, Arabian, and Asiatic deserts ; I see huge dreadful Arctic and Antarctic icebergs ; I see the superior oceans and the inferior ones the Atlantic and Pacific, the sea of Mexico, the Brazilian sea, and the sea of Peru, The Japan waters, those of Hindostan, the China Sea, and the Gulf of Guinea, The spread of the Baltic, Caspian, Bothnia, the British shores, and the Bay of Biscay, The clear-sunned Mediterranean, and from one to another of its islands, The inland fresh-tasted seas of North America, The White Sea, and the sea around Greenland. I behold the mariners of the world ; Some are in storms some in the night, with the watch on the look-out ; Some drifting helplessly some with contagious diseases. I behold the sail and steam ships of the world, some in clusters in port, some on their voyages ; Some double the Cape of Storms some Cape Verde others Cape Guardafui, Bon, or Bajadore ; Others Dondra Head others pass the Straits of Sunda others Cape Lopatka others Behring's Straits; Others Cape Horn others sail the Gulf of Mexico, or along Cuba or Havti others Hudson's Bay or Baffin's Bay ; Others pass the Straits of Dover others enter the Wash others the Firth of Sohvay others round Cape Clear others the Land's End ; WHITMAN. 253 Others traverse the Zuyder Zee, or the Scheld ; Others add to the exits and entrances at Sandy Hook ; Others to the comers and goers at Gibraltar, or the Dardanelles ; Others sternly push their way through the. northern winter-packs ; Others descend or ascend the Obi or the Lena ; Others the Niger or the Congo others the Indus, the Burampooter and Cambodia ; Others wait at the wharves of Manhattan, steamed up, ready to start ; Wait, swift and swarthy, in the ports of Australia ; Wait at Liverpool, Glasgow, Dublin, Marseilles, Lisbon, Naples, Hamburg, Bremen, Bordeaux, the Hague, Copenhagen ; Wait at Valparaiso, Rio Janeiro, Panama ; Wait at their moorings at Boston, Philadelphia, Balti more, Charleston, New Orleans, Galveston, San Francisco. 5- I see the tracks of the railroads of the earth ; I see them welding State to State, city to city, through North America ; I see them in Great Britain, I see them in Europe ; I see them in Asia and in Africa. I see the electric telegraphs of the earth ; I see the filaments of the news of the wars, deaths, losses, gains, passions, of my race. I see the long river-stripes of the earth ; I see where the Mississippi flows I see where the Columbia flows ; I see the Great River, and the Falls of Niagara ; I see the Amazon and the Paraguay; I see the four great rivers of China, the Amour, the Yellow River, the Yiang-tse, and the Pearl; I see where the Seine flows, and where the Danube, the Loire, the Rhone, and the Guadalquiver flow ; I see the windings of the Volga, the Dnieper, the Oder ; 254 WHITMAN, I see the Tuscan going down the Arno, and the Vene tian along the Po ; I see the Greek seaman sailing out of Egina bay. 6. I see the site of the old empire of Assyria, and that of Persia, and that of India ; I see the falling of the Ganges over the high rim of Saukara. I see the place of the idea of the Deity incarnated by ava tars in human forms ; I see the spots of the successions of priests on the earth oracles, sacrificers, brahmins, sabians, lamas, monks, muftis, exhorters ; I see where druids walked the groves of Mona I see the mistletoe and vervain ; I see the temples of the deaths of the bodies of Gods I see the old signifiers. I see Christ once more eating the bread of his last supper, in the midst of youths and old persons ; I see where the strong divine young man, the Hercules, toiled faithfully ?d long, and then died ; I see the place of the Eimocent rich life and hapless fate of the beautiful nocturnal son, the full- limbed Bacchus ; I see Kneph, blooming, dressed in blue, with the crown of feathers on his head ; I see Hermes, unsuspected, dying, well-beloved, saying to the people, " Do not weep for me ; This is not my true country, I have lived banished from my true country I now go back there, I return to the celestial sphere, where every one goes in his turn." 7- I see the battle-fields of the earth grass grows upon them, and blossoms and corn ; I see the tracks of ancient and modern expeditions. WHITMAN. 255 I see the nameless masonries, venerable messages of the unknown events, heroes, records of the earth. I see the places of the sagas ; I see pine-trees and fir-trees torn by northern blasts ; I see granite boulders and cliffs I see green meadows and lakes ; I see the burial-cairns of Scandinavian warriors ; I see them raised high with stones, by the marge of restless oceans, that the dead men's spirits, when they wearied of their quiet graves, might rise up through the mounds, and gaze on the tossing billows, and be refreshed by storms, immensity, liberty, action. I see the steppes of Asia ; I see the tumuli of Mongolia I see the tents of Kal mucks and Baskirs ; I see the nomadic tribes, with herds of oxen and cows ; I see the table-lands notched with ravines I see the jungles and deserts ; I see the camel, the wild steed, the bustard, the fat- tailed sheep, the antelope, and the burrowing wolf. I see the high-lands of Abyssinia ; I see flocks of goats feeding, and see the fig-tree, tama rind, date, And see fields of teff-wheat, and see the places of ver dure and gold. I see the Brazilian vaquero ; I see the Bolivian ascending Mount Sorata; I see the Wacho crossing the plains I see the incom parable rider of horses with his lasso on his arm ; I see over the pampas the pursuit of wild cattle for their hides. 256 WHITMAN. I see little and large sea-dots, some inhabited, some uninhabited ; I see two boats with nets, lying off" the shore of Pau- manok, quite still ; I see ten fishermen waiting they discover now a thick school of mossbonkers they drop the joined seine-ends in the water, The boats separate they diverge and row off, each on its rounding course to the beach, enclosing the mossbonkers ; The net is drawn in by a windlass by those who stop ashore, Some of the fishermen lounge in their boats others stand negligently ankle-deep in the water, poised on strong legs ; The boats are partly drawn up the water slaps against them ; On the sand, in heaps and winrows, well out from the water, lie the green-backed spotted mossbonkers. 9- I see the despondent red man in the west, lingering about the banks of Moingo, and about Lake Pepin ; He has heard the quail and beheld the honey-bee, and sadly prepared to depart. I see the regions of snow and ice ; I see the sharp-eyed Samoiede and the Finn ; I see the seal-seeker in his boat, poising his lance ; I see the Siberian on his slight-built sledge, drawn by dogs; I see the porpoise-hunters I see the whale-crews of the South Pacific and the North Atlantic ; I see the cliffs, glaciers, torrents, valleys, of Switzerland I mark the long winters, and the isolation. I see the cities of the earth, and make myself at random a part of them ; V T WHITMAN. 257 1 arn a real Parisian ; I am a habitan of Vienna, St. Petersburg, Berlin, Con stantinople ; I am of Adelaide, Sidney, Melbourne ; I am of London, Manchester, Bristol, Edinburgh, Limerick ; I am of Madrid, Cadiz, Barcelona, Oporto, Lyons, Brussels, Berne, Frankfort, Stuttgart, Turin, Florence ; I belong in Moscow, Cracow, Warsaw or northward in Christiania or Stockholm or in Siberian Irkutsk or in some street in Iceland ; I descend upon all those cities and rise from them again. 10. I see vapours exhaling from unexplored countries; I see the savage types, the bow and arrow, the poisoned splint, the fetish, and the obi. I see African and Asiatic towns ; I see Algiers, Tripoli, Derne, Mogadore, Timbuctoo, Monrovia ; I see the swarms of Pekin, Canton, Benares, Delhi, Calcutta, Yedo ; I see the Kruman in his hut, and the Dahoman and Ashantee-man in their huts ; I see the Turk smoking opium in Aleppo ; I see the picturesque crowds at the fairs of Khiva, and those of Herat ; I see Teheran I see Muscat and Medina, and the in tervening sands I see the caravans toiling on ward ; I see Egypt and the Egyptians I see the pyramids and obelisks ; I look on chiselled histories, songs, philosophies, cut in slabs of sand-stone, or on granite-blocks ; I see at Memphis mummy-pits, containing mummies, embalmed, swathed in linen cloth, lying there many centuries ; ' ' 258 WHITMAN. I look on the fallen Theban, the large-balled eyes, the side-drooping neck, the hands folded across the breast. I see the menials of the earth, labouring ; I see the prisoners in the prisons ; I see the defective human bodies of the earth ; I see the blind, the deaf and dumb, idiots, hunchbacks, lunatics ; I see the pirates, thieves, betrayers, murderers, slave- makers of the earth ; I see the helpless infants, and the helpless old men and women. I see male and female everywhere ; I see the serene brotherhood of philosophs ; I see the constructiveness of my race; I see the results of the perseverance and industry of my race ; I see ranks, colours, barbarisms, civilizations I go among them I mix indiscriminately, And I salute all the inhabitants of the earth. n. You, whoever you are ! You daughter or son of England ! You of the mighty Slavic tribes and empires! you Russ in Russia ! You dim-descended, black, divine-souled African, large, fine-headed, nobly-formed, superbly destined, on equal terms with me ! You Norwegian ! Swede ! Dane ! Icelander ! you Prus sian ! You Spaniard of Spain ! you Portuguese ! You Frenchwoman and Frenchman of France ! You Beige ! you liberty-lover of the Netherlands ! You sturdy Austrian ! you Lombard ! Hun ! Bohemian ! farmer of Styria ! You neighbour of the Danube ! WHITMAN. 259 You working-man of the Rhine, the Elbe, or the Weser! you working-woman too ! You Sardinian ! you Bavarian ! Swabian ! Saxon ! Wal- lachian ! Bulgarian ! You citizen of Prague ! Roman ! Neapolitan ! Greek ! You lithe matador in the arena at Seville ! You mountaineer living lawlessly on the Taurus or Caucasus ! You Bokh horse-herd, watching your mares and stal lions feeding ! You beautiful-bodied Persian, at full speed in the saddle, shooting arrows to the mark ! You Chinaman and Chinawoman of China ! you Tartar of Tartary ! You women of the earth subordinated at your tasks ! You Jew journeying in your old age through every risk, to stand once on Syrian ground ! You other Jews waiting in all lands for your Messiah ! You thoughtful Armenian, pondering by some stream of the Euphrates ! you peering amid the ruins of Nineveh ! you ascending Mount Ararat ! You foot-worn pilgrim welcoming the far-away sparkle of the minarets of Mecca ! You sheiks along the stretch from Suez to Bab-el-man- deb, ruling your families and tribes ! You olive-grower tending your fruit on fields of Naz areth, Damascus, or Lake Tiberias ! You Thibet trader on the wide inland, or bargaining in the shops of Lassa ! You Japanese man or woman ! you liver in Madagascar, Ceylon, Sumatra, Borneo ! All you continentals of Asia, Africa, Europe, Australia, indifferent of place ! All you on the numberless islands of the archipelagoes of the sea ! And you of centuries hence, when you listen to me ! And you, each and everywhere, whom I specify not, but include just the same ! Health to you ! Good will to you all from me and America sent. 260 WHITMAN. Each of us inevitable ; Each of us limitless each of us with his or her right upon the earth; Each of us allowed the eternal purports of the earth ; Each of us here as divinely as any is here. 12. You Hottentot with clicking palate ! You woolly- haired hordes ! You owned persons, dropping sweat-drops or blood- drops ! You human forms with the fathomless ever-impressive countenances of brutes ! I dare not refuse you the scope of the world, and of time and space, are upon me. You poor Koboo whom the meanest of the rest look down upon, for all your glimmering language and spirituality ! You low expiring aborigines of the hills of Utah, Oregon, California ! You dwarfed Kamtschatkan, Greenlander, Lap! You Austral negro, naked, red, sooty, with protrusive lip, grovelling, seeking your food ! You Caffre, Berber, Soudanese ! You haggard, uncouth, untutored Bedowee ! You plague-swarms in Madras, Nankin, Kaubul, Cairo! You bather bathing in the Ganges ! You benighted roamer of Amazonia ! you Patagonian ! you Fejee-man ! You peon of Mexico ! you slave of Carolina, Texas, Tennessee ! I do not prefer others so very much before you either ; I do not say one word against you, away back there, where you stand; You will come forward in due time to my side. My spirit has passed in compassion and determination around the whole earth; WHITMAN. 261 I have looked for equals and lovers, and found them ready for me in all lands ; I think some divine rapport has equalized me with them. J 3- vapours! I think I have risen with you, and moved away to distant continents, and fallen down there, for reasons ; 1 think I have blown with you, O winds ; waters, I have fingered every shore with you. 1 have run through what any river or strait of the globe has run through ; I have taken my stand on the bases of peninsulas, and on the high embedded rocks, to cry thence. Salut au monde ! What cities the ligkt or warmth penetrates, I penetrate those cities myself; All islands io which birds wing their way, I wing my way myself. Toward all, I raise high the perpendicular hand I make the signal, To remain after me in sight for ever, For all the haunts and homes of men. SONG OF THE BROAD-AXE. WEAPON, shapely, naked, wan ! Head from the mother's bowels drawn ! Wooded flesh and metal bone ! limb only one, and lip only one ! Grey-blue leaf by red-heat grown ! helve produced from a little seed sown ! Resting the grass amid and upon, To be leaned, and to lean on. 262 WHITMAN: Strong shapes, and attributes of strong shapes mascu line trades, sights and sounds ; Long varied train of an emblem, dabs of music ; Fingers of the organist skipping staccato over the keys of the great organ. 2. Welcome are all earth's lands, each for its kind ; Welcome are lands of pine and oak ; Welcome are lands of the lemon and fig ; Welcome are lands of gold ; Welcome are lands of wheat and maize welcome those of the grape ; Welcome are lands of sugar and rice; Welcome the cotton-lands welcome those of the white potato and sweet potato ; Welcome are mountains, flats, sands, forests, prairies ; Welcome the rich borders of rivers, table-lands, open ings ; Welcome the measureless grazing-lands welcome the teeming soil of orchards, flax, honey, hemp ; Welcome just as nuch the other more hard-faced lands ; Lands rich as lands of gold, or wheat and fruit lands ; Lands of mines, lands of the manly and rugged ores ; Lands of coal, copper, lead, tin, zinc ; Lands of Iron ! lands of the make of the axe ! 3- The log at the wood-pile, the axe supported by it ; The sylvan hut, the vine over the doorway, the space cleared for a garden, The irregular tapping of rain down on the leaves, after the storm is lulled, The wailing and moaning at intervals, the thought of the sea, The thought of ships struck in the storm, and put on their beam-ends, and the cutting-away of masts; The sentiment of the huge timbers of old-fashioned houses and barns ; WHITMAN. 263 The remembered print or narrative, the voyage at a venture of men, families, goods, The disembarkation, the founding of a new city, The voyage of those who sought a New England and found it the outset anywhere, The settlements of the Arkansas, Colorado, Ottawa, Williamette, The slow progress, the scant fare, the axe, rifle, saddle bags; The beauty of all adventurous and daring persons, The beauty of wood-boys and wood-men, with their clear untrimmed faces, The beauty of independence, departure, actions that rely on themselves, The American contempt for statutes and ceremonies, the boundless impatience of restraint, The loose drift of character, the inkling through random types, the solidification ; The butcher in the slaughter-house, the hands aboard schooners and sloops, the raftsman, the pioneer, Lumbermen in their winter camp, daybreak in the woods, stripes of snow on the limbs of trees, the occasional snapping, The glad clear sound of one's own voice, the merry song, the natural life of the woods, the strong day's-work, The blazing fire at night, the sweet taste of supper, the talk, the bed of hemlock-boughs, and the bear skin; The house-builder at work in cities or anywhere, The preparatory jointing, squaring, sawing, mortising, The hoist-up of beams, the push of them in their places, laying them regular, Setting the studs by their tenons in the mortises, accord ing as they were prepared, The blows of mallets and hammers, the attitudes of the men, their curved limbs, Bending, standing, astride the beams, driving-in pins, holding on by posts and braces, The hooked arm over the plate, the other arm wielding the axe, 264 WHITMAN. The floor-men forcing the planks close, to be nailed, Their postures, bringing their weapons downward on the bearers, The echoes resounding through the vacant building ; The huge store-house carried up in the city, well under way, The six framing-men, two in the middle, and two at each end, carefully bearing on their shoulders a heavy stick for a cross-beam, The crowded line of masons with trowels in their right hands, rapidly laying the long side-wall, two hundred feet from front to rear, The flexible rise and fall of backs, the continual click of the trowels striking the bricks, The bricks, one after another, each laid so workman like in its place, and set with a knock of the trowel-handle, The piles of materials, the mortar on the mortar-boards, and the steady replenishing by the hod-men ; Spar-makers in the spar-yard, the swarming row of well-grown appentices, The swing of their axes on the square-hewed log, shap ing it toward the shape of a mast, The brisk short crackle of the steel driven slantingly into the pine, The butter-coloured chips flying off in great flakes and slivers, The limber motion of brawny young arms and hips in easy costumes ; The constructor of wharves, bridges, piers, bulk-heads, floats, stays against the sea ; The city fireman the fire that suddenly bursts forth in the close-packed square, The arriving engines, the hoarse shouts, the nimble stepping and daring, The strong command through the fire-trumpets, the falling in line, the rise and fall of the arms forc ing the water, The slender, spasmic, blue-white jets the bringing-to- bear of the hooks and ladders, and their execu tion, " WHITMAN. 265 The crash and cut-away of connecting wood-work, or through floors, if the fire smoulders under them, The crowd with their lit faces, watching the glare and dense shadows ; The forger at his forge-furnace, and the user of iron after him, The maker of the axe large and small, and the welder and temperer, The chooser breathing his breath on the cold steel, and trying the edge with his thumb, The one who clean-shapes the handle, and sets it firmly in the socket ; The shadowy processions of the portraits of the past users also, The primal patient mechanics, the architects and engi neers, The far-off Assyrian edifice and Mizra edifice, The Roman lictors preceding the consuls, The antique European warrior with his axe in combat, The uplifted arm, the clatter of blows on the helmeted head, The death-howl, the limpsey tumbling body, the rush of friend and foe thither ; The siege of revolted lieges determined for liberty, The summons to surrender, the battering at castle-gates, the truce and parley; The sack of an old city in its time, The bursting-in of mercenaries and bigots tumultuously and disorderly, Roar, flames, blood, drunkenness, madness, Goods freely rifled from houses and temples, screams of women in the gripe of brigands, Craft and thievery of camp-foll-owers, men running, old persons despairing, The hell of war, the cruelties of creeds, The list of all executive deeds and words, just or unjust, The power of personality, just or unjust. 4- Muscle and pluck for ever ! What invigorates life invigorates death, 266 WHITMAN. And the dead advance as much as the living advance, And the future is no more uncertain than the present, And the roughness of the earth and of man encloses as much as the delicatesse of the earth and of man, And nothing endures but personal qualities. What do you think endures ? Do you think the great city endures ? Or a teeming manufacturing state ? or a prepared con stitution ? or the best-built steamships ? Or hotels of granite and iron ? or any chefs-d'oeuvre of engineering, forts, armaments? Away! These are not to be cherished for themselves ; They fill their hour, the dancers dance, the musicians play for them ; The show passes, all does well enough of course, All does very well till one flash of defiance. The great city is that which has the greatest man or woman ; If it be a few ragged huts, it is still the greatest city in the whole world. 5- The place where the great city stands is not the place of stretched wharves, docks, manufactures, de posits of produce, Nor the place of ceaseless salutes of new-comers, or the anchor-lifters of the departing, Nor the place of the tallest and costliest buildings, or shops selling goods from the rest of the earth, Nor the place of the best libraries and schools nor the place where money is plentiest, Nor the place of the most numerous population. Where the city stands with the brawniest breed of orators and bards ; Where the city stands that is beloved by these, and loves them in return, and understands them; WHITMAN. 267 Where no monuments exist to heroes but in the com mon words and deeds ; Where thrift is in its place, and prudence is in its place ; Where the men and women think lightly of the laws ; Where the slave ceases, and the master of slaves ceases ; Where the populace rise at once against the never- ending audacity of elected persons ; Where fierce men and women pour forth, as the sea to the whistle of death pours its sweeping and un- ript waves ; Where outside authority enters always after the preced ence of inside authority ; Where the citizen is always the head and ideal and President, Mayor, Governor, and what not, are agents for pay ; Where children are taught to be laws to themselves, and to depend on themselves ; Where equanimity is illustrated in affairs ; Where speculations on the Soul are encouraged ; Where women walk in public processions in the streets, the same as the men, Where they enter the public assembly and take places the same as the men ; Where the city of the faithfullest friends stands ; Where the city of the cleanliness of the sexes stands ; Where the city of the healthiest fathers stands ; Where the city of the best-bodied mothers stands, There the great city stands. 6. How beggarly appear arguments before a defiant deed ! How the floridness of the materials of cities shrivels before a man's or woman's look ! All waits, or goes by default, till a strong being ap pears ; A strong being is the proof of the race, and of the ability of the universe; When he or she appears, materials are overawed, The dispute on the Soul stops, 268 WHITMAN. The old customs and phrases are confronted, turned back, or laid away. What is your money-making now? what can it do now? What is your respectability now ? What are your theology, tuition, society, traditions, statute-books, now? Where are your jibes of being now ? Where are your cavils about the Soul now 7- A sterile landscape covers the ore there is as good as the best, for all the forbidding appearance ; There is the mine, there are the miners ; The forge-furnace is there, the melt is accomplished ; the hammersmen are at hand with their tongs and hammers ', What always served, and always serves, is at hand. Than this, nothing has better served it has served all : Served the fluent-tongued and subtle-sensed Greek, and long ere the Greek: Served in building the buildings that last longer than any; Served the Hebrew, the Persian, the most ancient Hin- dostanee ; Served the mound-raiser on the Mississippi served those whose relics remain in Central America ; Served Albic temples in woods or on plains, with un hewn pillars, and the druids ; Served the artificial clefts, vast, high, silent, on the snow-covered hills of Scandinavia \ Served those who, time out of mind, made on the granite walls rough sketches of the sun, moon, stars, ships, ocean-waves ; Served the paths of the irruptions of the Goths served the pastoral tribes and nomads ; Served the long long distant Kelt served the hardy pirates of the Baltic ; Served, before any of those, the venerable and harmless men of Ethiopia ; WHITMAN. 269 Served the making of helms for the galleys of pleasure, and the making of those for war ; Served all great works on land, and all great works on the sea ; For the mediaeval ages, and before the mediaeval ages ; Served not the living only, then as now, but served the dead. 8. I see the European headsman ; He stands masked, clothed in red, with huge legs, and strong naked arms, And leans on a ponderous axe. (Whom have you slaughtered lately, European heads man? Whose is that blood upon you, so wet and sticky?) I see the clear sunsets of the martyrs; I see from the scaffolds the descending ghosts, Ghosts of dead lords, uncrowned ladies, impeached ministers, rejected kings, Rivals, traitors, poisoners, disgraced chieftains, and the rest. I see those who in any land have died for the good cause ; The seed is spare, nevertheless the crop shall never run out; (Mind you, O foreign kings, O priests, the crop shall never run out.) I see the blood washed entirely away from the axe ; Both blade and helve are clean ; They spirt no more the blood of European nobles they clasp no more the necks of queens. I see the headsman withdraw and become useless ; I see the scaffold untrodden and mouldy I see no longer any axe upon it ; I see the mighty and friendly emblem of the power of my own race the newest, largest race. jtf 70 WHITMAN. 9- (America ! I do not vaunt my love for you ; I have what I have.) The axe leaps ! The solid forest gives fluid utterances ; They tumble forth, they rise and form, Hut, tent, landing, survey, Flail, plough, pick, crowbar, spade, Shingle, rail, prop, wainscot, jamb, lath, panel, gable, Citadel, ceiling, saloon, academy, organ, exhibition- house, library, Cornice, trellis, pilaster, balcony, window, shutter, tur ret, porch, Hoe, rake, pitchfork, pencil, waggon, staff, saw, jack- plane, mallet, wedge, rounce, Chair, tub, hoop, table, wicket, vane, sash, floor, Work-box, chest, stringed instrument, boat, frame, and what not, Capitols of States, and capitol of the nation of States, Long stately rows in avenues, hospitals for orphans, or for the poor or sick, Manhattan steamboats and clippers, taking the measure of all seas. The shapes arise ! Shapes of the using of axes anyhow, and the users, and all that neighbours them, Cutters-down of wood, and haulers of it to the Penob- scot or Kennebec, Dwellers in cabins among the Californian mountains, or by the little lakes, or on the Columbia, Dwellers south on the banks of the Gila or Rio Grande friendly gatherings, the characters and fun, Dwellers up north in Minnesota and by the Yellowstone river dwellers on coasts and off coasts, Seal-fishers, whalers, arctic seamen breaking passages through the ice. The shapes arise ! Shapes of factories, arsenals, foundries, markets ; WHITMAN. 271 Shapes of the two-threaded tracks of railroads ; Shapes of the sleepers of bridges, vast frameworks, girders, arches; Shapes of the fleets of barges, tows, lake and canal craft, river craft. The shapes arise ! Ship-yards and dry-docks along the Eastern and West ern Seas, and in many a bay and by-place, The live-oak kelsons, the pine planks, the spars, the hachmatack-roots for knees, The ships themselves on their ways, the tiers of scaffolds, the workmen busy outside and inside, The tools lying around, the great auger and little auger, the adze, bolt, line, square, gouge, and bead- plane. 10. The shapes arise ! The shape measured, sawed, jacked, joined, stained, The coffin-shape for the dead to lie within in his shroud; The shape got out in posts, in the bedstead posts, in the posts of the bride's bed ; The shape of the little trough, the shape of the rockers beneath, the shape of the babe's cradle ; The shape of the floor-planks, the floor-planks for dancers' feet ; The shape of the planks of the family home, the home of the friendly parents and children, The shape of the roof of the home of the happy young man and woman the roof over the well-married young man and woman, The roof over the supper joyously cooked by the chaste wife, and joyously eaten by the chaste husband, content after his day's work. The shapes arise ! The shape of the prisoner's place in the court-room, and of him or her seated in the place ; The shape of the liquor-bar leaned against by the young rum-drinker and the old rum-drinker ; 272 WHITMAN. The shape of the shamed and angry stairs, trod by sneaking footsteps ; The shape of the sly settee, and the adulterous and un wholesome couple ; The shape of the gambling-board with its devilish win nings and losings ; The shape of the step-ladder for the convicted and sen tenced murderer, the murderer with haggard face and pinioned arms, The sheriff at hand with his deputies, the silent and white-lipped crowd, the dangling of the rope. The shapes arise ! Shapes of doors giving many exits and entrances ; The door passing the dissevered friend, flushed and in haste ; The door that admits good news and bad news ; The door whence the son left home, confident and puffed up ; The door he entered again from a long and scandalous absence, diseased, broken down, without inno cence, without means. ii. Her shape arises, She, less guarded than ever, yet more guarded than ever; The gross and soiled she moves among do not make her gross and soiled ; She knows the thoughts as she passes nothing is con cealed from her ; She is none the less considerate or friendly therefor ; She is the best beloved it is without exception she has no reason to fear, and she does not fear ; Oaths, quarrels, hiccuped songs, smutty expressions, are idle to her as she passes ; She is silent she is possessed of herself they do not offend her; She receives them as the laws of nature receive them she is strong, She too is a law of nature there is no law stronger than she is. Sv WHITMAN. 273 12. The main shapes arise ! Shapes of Democracy, total result of centuries ; Shapes, ever projecting other shapes; Shapes of turbulent manly cities ; Shapes of the friends and home-givers of the whole earth, Shapes bracing the earth, and braced with the whole earth. CROSSING BROOKLYN FERRY. I. FLOOD-TIDE below me ! I watch you face to face ; Clouds of the west ! sun there half an hour high ! I see you also face to face. Crowds of men and women attired in the usual cos tumes ! how curious you are to me ! On the ferry-boats, the hundreds and hundreds that cross, returning home, are more curious to me than you suppose ; And you that shall cross from shore to shore, years hence, are more to me, and more in my medita tions, than you might suppose. 2. The impalpable sustenance of me from all things, at all hours of the day ; The simple, compact, well-joined scheme myself disin tegrated, every one disintegrated, yet part of the scheme ; The similitudes of the past, and those of the future ; The glories strung like beads on my smallest sights and hearings on the walk in the street, and the pas sage over the river ; The current rushing so swiftly, and swimming with me far away ; s 274 WHITMAN. The others that are to follow me, the ties between me and them ; The certainty of others the life, love, sight, hearing of others. Others will enter the gates of the ferry, and cross from shore to shore ; Others will watch the run of the flood-tide; Others will see the shipping of Manhattan north and west, and the heights of Brooklyn to the south and east ; Others will see the islands large and small ; Fifty years hence, others will see them as they cross, the sun half an hour high ; A hundred years hence, or ever so many hundred years hence, others will see them, Will enjoy the sunset, the pouring-in of the flood-tide, the falling-back to the sea of the ebb-tide. 3- It avails not, neither time or place distance avails not; I am with you, you men and women of a generation, or ever so many generations, hence ; I project myself also I return I am with you, and know how it is. Just as you feel when you look on the river and sky, so I felt ; Just as any of you is one of a living crowd, I was one of a crowd ; Just as you are refreshed by the gladness of the river and the bright flow, I was refreshed; Just as you stand and lean on the rail, yet hurry with the swift current, I stood, yet was hurried ; Just as you look on the numberless masts of ships, and the thick-stemmed pipes of steamboats, I looked. I too many and many a time crossed the river, the sun half an hour high ; WHITMAN. 275 I watched the Twelfth-month sea-gulls I saw them high in the air, floating with motionless wings, oscillating their bodies, I saw how the glistening yellow lit up parts of their bodies, and left the rest in strong shadow, I saw the slow-wheeling circles, and the gradual edging toward the south. I too saw the reflection of the summer sky in the water, Had my eyes dazzled by the shimmering track of beams, Looked at the fine centrifugal spokes of light round the shape of my head in the sun-lit water, Looked on the haze on the hills southward and south- westward, Looked on the vapour as it flew in fleeces tinged with violet, Looked toward the lower bay to notice the arriving ships, Saw their approach, saw aboard those that were near me, Saw the white sails of schooners and sloops saw the ships at anchor, The sailors at work in the rigging, or out astride the spars, The round masts, the swinging motion of the hulls, the slender serpentine pennants, The large and small steamers in motion, the pilots in their pilot-houses, The white wake left by the passage, the quick tremulous whirl of the wheels, The flags of all nations, the falling of them at sunset, The scallop-edged waves in the twilight, the ladled cups, the frolicsome crests and glistening, The stretch afar growing dimmer and dimmer, the grey walls of the granite store-houses by the docks, On the river the shadowy group, the big steam-tug closely flanked on each side by the barges the hay-boat, the belated lighter, On the neighbouring shore, the fires from the foundry chimneys burning high and glaringly into the night, 276 WHITMAN. Casting their flicker of black, contrasted with wild red and yellow light, over the tops of houses, and down into the clefts of streets. 4- These, and all else, were to me the same as they are to you; I project myself a moment to tell you also I return. I loved well those cities ; I loved well the stately and rapid river;. The men and women I saw were all near to me ; Others the same others who look back on me, because I looked forward to them ; (The time will come, though I stop here to-day and to night.) 5- What is it, then, between us ? What is the count of the scores or hundreds of years between us ? Whatever it is, it avails not distance avails not, and place avails not. 6. I too lived Brooklyn, of ample hills, was mine ; I too walked the streets of Manhattan Island, and bathed in the waters around it ; I too felt the curious abrupt questionings stir within me, In the day, among crowds of people, sometimes they came upon me, In my walks home late at night, or as I lay in my bed, they came upon me. 1 too had been struck from the float for ever held in solution ; I too had received identity by my Body ; That I w.as, I knew was of my body and what I should be, I knew I should be of my body. WHITMAN.. 277 7- It is not upon you alone the dark patches fall, The dark threw patches down upon me also ; The best I had done seemed to me blank and suspicious ; My great thoughts, as I supposed them, were they not in reality meagre? would not people laugh at me? It is not you alone who know what it was to be evil ; I am he who knew what it is to be evil ; I too knitted the old knot of contrariety, Blabbed, blushed, resented, lied, stole, grudged, Had guile, anger, lust, hot wishes I dared not speak, Was wayward, vain, greedy, shallow, sly, cowardly, malignant ; The wolf, the snake, the hog, not wanting in me, The cheating look, the frivolous word, the adulterous wish, not wanting, Refusals, hates, postponements, meanness, laziness, none of these wanting. But I was Manhattanese, friendly and proud ! I was called by my nighest name by clear loud voices of young men as they saw me approaching or passing, Felt their arms on my neck as I stood, or the negligent leaning of their flesh against me as I sat, Saw many I loved in the street, or ferry-boat, or public assembly, yet never told them a word, Lived the same life with the rest, the same old laughing, gnawing, sleeping, Played the part that still looks back on the actor or actress, The same old role, the role that is what we make it, as great as we like, Or as small as we like, or both great and small. 9- Closer yet I approach you ; 278 WHITMAN: What thought you have of me, I had as much of you I laid in my stores in advance ; I considered long and seriously of you before you were born. Who was to know what should come home to me ? Who knows but I am enjoying this ? Who knows but I am as good as looking at you now, for all you cannot see me ? It is not you alone, nor I alone ; Not a few races, nor. a few generations, nor a few cen turies ; It is that each came, or comes, or shall come, from its due emission, From the general centre of all, and forming a part of all : Everything indicates- the smallest does, and the largest does; A necessary film envelops all, and envelops the Soul for a proper time. 10. Now I am curious what sight can ever be more stately and admirable to me than my mast-hemmed Manhattan, My river and sunset, and my scallop-edged waves of flood-tide, The sea-gulls oscillating their bodies, the hay-boat in the twilight, and the belated lighter ; Curious what Gods can exceed these that clasp me by the hand, and with voices I love call me promptly and loudly by my nighest name as I approach ; Curious what is more subtle than this which ties me to the woman or man that looks in my face, Which fuses me into you now, and pours my meaning into you. We understand, then, do we not ? What I promised without mentioning it, have you not accepted ? WHITMAN. 279 What the study could not teach what the preaching could not accomplish, is accomplished, is it not? What the push of reading could not start is started by me personally, is it not ? ii. Flow on, river ! flow with the flood-tide, and ebb with the ebb-tide ! Frolic on, crested and scallop-edged waves ! Gorgeous clouds of the sunset ! drench with your splen dour me, or the men and women generations after me ; Cross from shore to shore, countless crowds of passen gers ! 3tand up, tall masts of Mannahatta ! stand up, beauti ful hills of Brooklyn ! Throb, baffled and curious brain ! throw out questions and answers ! Suspend here and everywhere, eternal float of solution ! Gaze, loving and thirsting eyes, in the house, or street, or public assembly ! Sound out, voices of young men ! loudly and musically call me by my nighest name ! Live, old life ! play the part that looks back on the actor or actress ! Play the old role, the role that is great or small, accord ing as one makes it ! Consider, you who peruse me, whether I may not in unknown ways be looking upon you ; Be firm, rail over the river, to support those who lean idly, yet haste with the hasting current ; Fly on, sea-birds ! fly sideways, or wheel in large circles high in the air ; Receive the summer sky, you water ! and faithfully hold it, till all downcast eyes have time to take it from you ; Diverge, fine spokes of light, from the shape of my head, or any one's head, in the sun-lit water ; Come on, ships from the lower bay ! pass up or down, white-sailed schooners, sloops, lighters ! 280 WHITMAN. Flaunt away, flags of all nations ! be duly lowered at sunset ; Burn high your fires, foundry chimneys ! cast black shadows at nightfall ! cast red and yellow light over the tops of the houses ; Appearances, now or henceforth, indicate what you are; You necessary film, continue to envelop the soul ; About my body for me, and your body for you, be hung our divinest aromas ; Thrive, cities ! bring your freight, bring your shows, ample and sufficient rivers ; Expand, being than which none else is perhaps more spiritual ; Keep your places, objects than which none else is more lasting. 12. We descend upon you and all things we arrest you all ; We realize the soul only by you, you faithful solids and fluids ; Through you colour, form, location, sublimity, ideality ; Through you every proof, comparison, and all the sug gestions and determinations of ourselves. You have waited, you always wait, you dumb, beautiful ministers ! you novices ! We receive you with free sense at last, and are insatiate henceforward ; Not you any more shall be able to foil us, or withhold yourselves from us ; We use you, and do not cast you aside we plant you permanently within us ; We fathom you not we love you there is perfection in you also ; You furnish your parts toward eternity ; Great or small, you furnish your parts toward the Soul. WHITMAN: 28 1 THERE WAS A CHILD WENT FORTH. THERE was a child went forth every day; And the first object he looked upon, that object he became ; And that object became part of him for the day, or a certain part of the day, or for many years, or stretching cycles of years. The early lilacs became part of this child, And grass, and white and red morning-glories, 1 and white and red clover, and the song of the phcebe- bird, 2 And the Third-month lambs, and the sow's pink-faint litter, and the mare's foal, and the cow's calf, And the noisy brood of the barn-yard, or by the mire of the pond-side, And the fish suspending themselves so curiously below there and the beautiful curious liquid, And the water-plants with their graceful flat heads all became part of him. The field-sprouts of Fourth-month and Fifth-month became part of him ; Winter-grain sprouts, and those of the light-yellow corn, and the esculent roots of the garden, And the apple-trees covered with blossoms, and the fruit afterward, and wood-berries, and the commonest weeds by the road ; And the old drunkard staggering home from the out house of the tavern, whence he had lately risen, And the schoolmistress that passed on her way to the school, And the friendlv boys that passed and the quarrelsome boys, 1 The name of " morning-glory" is given to the bindweed, or a sort of bindweed, in America. 2 A dim-coloured little bird, with a cheerful note, sounding like the word Phcebe, 2S2 WHITMAN. And the tidy and fresh -cheeked girls and the barefoot negro boy and girl, And all the changes of city and country, wherever he went. His own parents, He that had fathered him, and she that had conceived him in her womb, and birthed him, They gave this child more of themselves than that ; They gave him afterward every day they became part of him. The mother at home, quietly placing the dishes on the supper-table ; The mother with mild words clean her cap and gown, a wholesome odour falling off her person and clothes as she walks by ; The father, strong, self-sufficient, manly, mean, angered, unjust ; The blow, the quick loud word, the tight bargain, the crafty lure, The family usages, the language, the company, the fur niture the yearning and swelling heart, Affection that will not be gainsaid the sense of what is real the thought if, after all, it should prove unreal, The doubts of day-time and the doubts of night-time the curious whether and how, Whether that which appears so is so, or is it all flashes and specks? Men and women crowding fast in the streets if they are not flashes and specks, what are they? The streets themselves, and the facades of houses, and goods in the windows, Vehicles, teams, the heavy-planked wharves the huge crossing at the ferries, The village on the highland, seen from afar at sunset the river between, Shadows, aureola and mist, the light falling on roofs and gables of white or brown, three miles off, WHITMAN. 283 The schooner near by, sleepily dropping down the tide the little boat slack -towed astern, The hurrying tumbling waves quick-broken crests slap- The strata of coloured clouds, the long bar of maroon- tint, away solitary by itself the spread of purity it lies motionless in, The horizon's edge, the flying sea-crow, the fragrance of salt marsh and shore-mud ; These became part of that child who went forth every day, and who now goes, and will always go forth every day. TO A FOILED EUROPEAN REVOLUTIONNAIRE. I. COURAGE yet ! my brother or my sister ! Keep on ! Liberty is to be subserved, whatever occurs ; That is nothing that is quelled by one or two failures, or any number of failures, Or by the indifference or ingratitude of the people, or by any unfaithfulness, Or the show of the tushes of power, soldiers, cannon, penal statutes. Revolt ! and still revolt ! revolt ! What we believe in waits latent for ever through all the continents, and all the islands and archipelagoes of the sea ; What we believe in invites no one, promises nothing, sits in calmness and light, is positive and com posed, knows no discouragement, Waiting patiently, waiting its, time. (Not songs of loyalty alone are these, But songs of insurrection also ; For I am the sworn poet of every dauntless rebel, the world over, And he going with me leaves peace 1 and routine behind him, And stakes his life, to be lost at any moment.) 284 WHITMAN. 2. Revolt ! and the downfall of tyrants ! The battle rages with many a loud alarm, and frequent advance and retreat, The infidel triumphs or supposes he triumphs, Then the prison, scaffold, garrote, handcuffs, iron neck lace and anklet, lead-balls, do their work, The named and unnamed heroes pass to other spheres, The great speakers and writers are exiled they lie sick in distant lands, The cause is asleep the strongest throats are still, choked with their own blood, The young men droop their eyelashes toward the ground when they meet ; But, for all this, liberty has not gone out of the place, nor the infidel entered into full possession. When liberty goes out of a place, it is not the first to go, nor the second or third to go, It waits for all the rest to go it is the last. When there are no more memories of heroes and martyrs, And when all life, and all the souls of men and women, are discharged from any part of the earth, Then only shall liberty, or the idea of liberty, be dis charged from that part of the earth, And the infidel come into full possession. 3- Then courage ! European revolter ! revoltress ! For, till all ceases, neither must you cease. I do not know what you are for (I do not know what I am for myself, nor what anything is for), But I will search carefully for it even in being foiled, In defeat, poverty, misconception, imprisonment L for they too are great. WHITMAN. 285 Revolt ! and the bullet for tyrants ! Did we think victory great? So it is But now it seems to me, when it cannot be helped, that defeat is great, And that death and dismay are great. FRANCE, THE l8TH YEAR OF THESE STATES. 1 I. A great year and. place; A harsh/ discordant, natal scream out-sounding, to touch the Mother's heart closer than any yet. I walked the shores of rny Eastern Sea, Heard over the waves the little voice, Saw the divine infant, where she woke, mournfully wail ing, amid the roar of cannon, curses, shouts, crash of falling buildings ; Was not so sick from the blood in the gutters running nor from the single corpses, nor those in heaps, nor those borne away in the tumbrils ; Was not so desperate at the battues of death was not so shocked at the repeated fusillades of the guns. 2. Pale, silent, stern, what could I say to that long-accrued retribution ? Could I wish humanity different ? Could I wish the people made of wood and stone ? Or that there be no justice in destiny or time? 3- O Liberty ! O mate for me ! Here too the blaze, the grape-shot and the axe, in re serve, to fetch them out in case of need, Here too, though long repressed, can never be destroyed ; Here too could rise at last, murdering and ecstatic ; Here too demanding full arrears of vengeance. 1 1793-4- JO 286 WHITMAN. 4- Hence I sign this salute over the sea, And I do not deny that terrible red birth and baptism, But remember the little voice that I heard wailing and wait with perfect trust, no matter how long ; And from to-day, sad and cogent, I maintain the be queathed cause, as for all lands, And I send these words to Paris with my love, And I guess some chansonniers there will understand them, For I guess there is latent music yet in France floods of it. Oh I hear already the bustle of instruments they will soon be drowning all that would interrupt them, Oh I think the east wind brings a triumphal and free march, It reaches hither it swells me to joyful madness, I will run transpose it in words, to justify it, I will yet sing a song for you, ma femme ! TO YOU. WHOEVER you are, I fear you are walking the walks of dreams, I fear these supposed realities are to melt from under your feet and hands ; Even now, your features, joys, speech, house, trade, manners, troubles, follies, costume, crimes, dissi pate away from you, Your true Soul and Body appear before me, They stand forth out of affairs out of commerce, shops, law, science, work, farms, clothes, the house, medicine, print, buying, selling, eating, drinking, suffering, dying. Whoever you are, now I place my hand upon you, that you be my poem ; I whisper with my" lips close to your ear, I have loved many women and men, but I love none better than you. WHITMAN. 287 Oh I have been dilatory and dumb ; I should have made my way straight to you long ago ; I should have blabbed nothing but you, I should have chanted nothing but you. I will leave all, and come and make the hymns of you ; None have understood you, but I understand you ; None have done justice to you you have not done justice to yourself; None but have found you imperfect I only find no im perfection in you ; None but would subordinate you I only am he who will never consent to subordinate you ; I only am he who places over you no master, owner, better, God, beyond what waits intrinsically in yourself. Painters have painted their swarming groups, and the centre figure of all, From the head of the centre figure spreading a nimbus of gold-coloured light ; But I paint myriads of heads, but paint no head with out its nimbus of gold-coloured light ; From my hand, from the brain of every man and womai it streams, effulgently flowing for ever. Oh I could sing such grandeurs and glories about you You have not known what you are you have slumbered upon yourself all your life ; Your eyelids have been the same as closed most of the time; What you have done returns already in mockeries ; Your thrift, knowledge, prayers, if they dc not return in mockeries, what is their return ? The mockeries are not you ; Underneath them, and within them, I see you lurk ; I pursue you where none else has pursued you ; Silence, the desk, the flippant expression, the night, the accustomed routine, if these conceal you from others, or from yourself, they do not conceal you from me ; 288 WHITMAN. The shaved face, the unsteady eye, the impure com plexion, if these balk others, they do not talk me ; The pert apparel, the deformed attitude, drunkenness, greed, premature death, all these I part aside. There is no endowment in man or woman that is not tallied in you'; There is no virtue, no beauty, in man or woman, but as good is in you ; No pluck, no endurance in others, but as good is in you ; . , No pleasure waiting for others, but an equal pleasure waits for you. As for me, I give nothing to any one, except I give the like carefully to you ; I sing the songs of the glory of none, not God, sooner than I sing the songs of the glory of you. Whoever you are ! claim your own at any hazard ! These shows of the east and west are tame, compared to you ; These immense meadows these interminable rivers you are immense and interminable as they ; These furies, elements, storms, motions of Nature, throes of apparent dissolution you are he or she who is master or mistress over them, Master or mistress in your own right over Nature, ele ments, pain, passion, dissolution. The hopples fall from your ankles you find an unfail ing sufficiency ; Old or young, male or female, rude, low, rejected by the rest, whatever you are promulges itself ; Through birth, life, death, burial, the means are pro vided, nothing is scanted ; Through angers, losses, ambition, ignorance, ennui, what you are picks its way. WHITMAN. 289 YEARS OF THE MODERN. YEARS of the modern ! years of the unperformed ! Your horizon rises I see it parting away for more august dramas ; I see not America only I see not only Liberty's nation, but other nations preparing ; I see tremendous entrances and exits I see new com binations I see the solidarity of races ; I see that force advancing with irresistible power on the world's stage \ (Have the old forces, the old wars, played their parts ? are the acts suitable to them closed ?) I see Freedom, completely armed, and victorious, and very haughty, with Law on one side, and Peace on the other, A stupendous Trio, all issuing forth against the idea 01 caste ; What historic denouements are these we so rapidly approach ? I see men marching and countermarching by swift mil lions ; I see the frontiers and boundaries of the old aristocracies broken ; I see the landmarks of European kings removed ; I see this day the People beginning their landmarks, (all others give way ;) Never were such sharp questions asked as this day ; Never was average man, his soul, more energetic, more like a God. Lo ! how he urges and urges, leaving the masses no rest ; His daring foot is on land and sea everywhere he col onizes the Pacific, the Archipelagoes; With ths steam-ship, the electric telegraph, the news paper, the wholesale engines of war, With these, and the world-spreading factories, he inter links all geography, all lands. What whispers are these, O lands, running ahead of you, passing under the seas ? 290 WHITMAN, Are all nations communing ? is there going to be but one heart to the globe ? Is humanity forming en masse ? for lo ! tyrants trem ble, crowns grow dim ; The earth, restive, confronts a new era, perhaps a general divine war ; No one knows what will happen next such portents fill the days and nights. Yars prophetical ! the space ahead as I walk, as I vainly try to pierce it, is full of phantoms ; Unborn deeds, things soon to be, project their shapes around me ; This incredible rush and heat this strange ecstatic fever of dreams, O years ! Your dreams, O years, how they penetrate through me! (I know not whether I sleep or wake !) The performed America and Europe grow dim, retiring in shadow behind me, The unperformed, more gigantic than ever, advance, ad vance upon me. TO THINK OF TIME. I. To think of time of all that retrospection ! To think of to-day, and the ages continued hencefor ward ! Have you guessed you yourself would not continue ? Have you dreaded these earth-beetles ? Have you feared the future would be nothing to you ? Is to-day nothing? Is the beginningless past nothing? If the future is nothing, they are just as surely nothing. To think that the sun rose in the east ! that men and women were flexible, real, alive ! that everything was alive ! To think that you and I did not see, feel, think, nor bear our part ! To think that we are now here, and bear our part ! .- > WHITMAN. 291 2. Not a day passes not a minute or second, without an accouchement ! Not a day passes not a minute or second, without a corpse ! The dull nights go over, and the dull days also, The soreness of lying so much in bed goes over, The physician, after long putting-off, gives the silent and terrible look for an answer, The children come hurried and weeping, and the bro thers and sisters are sent for, Medicines stand unused on the shelf (the camphor- smell has long pervaded the rooms,) The faithful hand of the living does not desert the hand of the dying, The twitching lips press lightly on the forehead of the dying, The breath ceases, and the pulse of the heart ceases, The corpse stretches on the bed, and the living look upon it, It is palpable as the living are palpable. The living look upon the corpse with their eyesight, But without eyesight lingers a different living, and looks curiously on the corpse. 3- To think the thought of Death, merged in the thought of materials ! To think that the rivers will flow, and the snow fall, and fruits ripen, and act upon others as upon us nosv yet not act upon us ! To think of all these wonders of city and country, and others taking great interest in them and we taking no interest in them ! To think how eager we are in building our houses ! To think others shall be just as ea^er, and we quite in different ! 292 WHIT MAN. (I see one building the house that selves him a few years, or seventy or eighty years at most ; I see one building the house that serves him longer than that.) Slow-moving and black lines creep over the whole earth they never cease they are the burial lines, He that was President was buried, and he that is now President shall surely be buried. 4- A reminiscence of the vulgar fate, A frequent sample of the life and death of workmen, Each after his kind. Cold dash of waves at the ferry-wharf posh and ice in the river, half-frozen mud in the streets, a grey discouraged sky overhead, the short last daylight of Twelfth-month, A hearse and stages other vehicles give place the funeral of an old Broadway stage-driver, the cortege mostly drivers. Steady the trot to the cemetery, duly rattles the death- bell, the gate is passed, the new-dug grave is halted at, the living alight, the hearse uncloses, The coffin is passed out, lowered and settled, the whip is laid on the coffin, the earth is swiftly shovelled in, The mound above is flatted with the spades silence, A minute no one moves or speaks it is done, He is decently put away is there anything more? He was a good fellow, free-mouthed, quick-tempered, not bad-looking, able to take his own part, witty, sensitive to a slight, ready with life or death foi a friend, fond of women, gambled, ate hearty, drank hearty, had known what it was to be flush, grew low-spirited toward the last, sickened, was helped by a contribution, died, aged forty-one years and that was his funeral. WHITMAN. 293 Thumb extended, finger uplifted, apron, cape, gloves, strap, wet-weather clothes, whip carefully chosen, boss, spotter, starter, hostler, somebody loafing on you, you loafing on somebody, headway, man before and man behind, good day's work, bad day's work, pet stock, mean stock, first out, last out, turning-in at night ; To think that these are so much and so nigh to other drivers and he there takes no interest in them! 5- The markets, the government, the working-man's wages to think what account they are through our nights and days! To think that other working-men will make just as great account of them yet we make little or no account ! The vulgar and the refined what you call sin, and what you call goodness to think how wide a difference ! To think the difference will still continue to others, yet we lie beyond the difference. To think how much pleasure there is ! Have you pleasure from looking at the sky ? have you pleasure from poems ? Do you enjoy yourself in the city? or engaged in busi ness? or planning a nomination and election? or with your wife and family ? Or with your mother and sisters ? or in womanly house work ? or the beautiful maternal cares ? These also flow onward to others you and I flow onward, But in due time, you and I shall take less interest in them. Your farm, profits, crops, to think how engrossed you are ! To think there will still be farms, profits, crops yet, for you, of what avail ? 294 WHITMAN; 6. What will be will be well for what is is well, To take interest is well, and not to take interest shall be well. The sky continues beautiful, The pleasure of men with women shall never be sated, nor the pleasure of women with men, nor the pleasure from poems, The domestic joys, the daily housework or business, the building of houses these are not phantasms they have weight, form, location ; Farms, profits, crops, markets, wages, government, are none of them phantasms, The difference between sin and goodness is no delusion, The earth is not an echo man and his life, and all the things of his life, are well-considered. You are not thrown to the winds you gather certainly and safely around yourself; Yourself ! Yourself ! Yourself, for ever and ever ! 7- It. is not to diffuse you that you were born of your mother and father it is to identify you ; It is not that you should be undecided, but that you should be decided ; Something long preparing and formless is arrived and formed in you, You are henceforth secure, whatever comes or goes. The threads that were spun are gathered, the weft crosses the warp, the pattern is systematic. The preparations have every one been justified, The orchestra have sufficiently tuned their instruments the baton has given the signal. The guest that was coming he waited long, for reasons he is now housed, WHITMAN. 295 He is one of those who are beautiful and happy he is one of those that to look upon and be with is enough. The law of the past cannot be eluded, The law of the present and future cannot be eluded, The law of the living cannot be eluded it is eternal, The law of promotion and transformation cannot be eluded, The law of heroes and good-doers cannot be eluded, The law of drunkards, informers, mean persons not one iota thereof can be eluded. 8. Slow-moving and black lines go ceaselessly over the earth, Northerner goes carried, and Southerner goes carried, and they on the Atlantic side, and they on the Pacific, and they between, and all through the Mississippi country, and all over the earth. The great masters and kosmos are well as they go the heroes and good-doers are well, The known leaders and inventors, and the rich owners and pious and distinguished, may be well, But there is more account than that there is strict account of all. The interminable hordes of the ignorant and wicked are not nothing, The barbarians of Africa and Asia are not nothing, The common people of Europe are not nothing the American aborigines are not nothing, The infected in the immigrant hospital are not nothing the murderer or mean person is not nothing, The perpetual successions of shallow people are not nothing as they go, The lowest prostitute is not nothing the mocker of re ligion is not nothing as he goes. 296 WHITMAN. 9- Of and in all these things, I have dreamed that we are not to be changed so much, nor the law of us changed, I have dreamed that heroes and good-doers shall be under the present and past law, And that murderers, drunkards, liars, shall be under the present and past law, For I have dreamed that the law they are under now is enough. If otherwise all came but to ashes of dung, If maggots and rats ended us, then Alarum ! for we are betrayed Then indeed suspicion of death. Do you suspect death ? If I were to suspect death, I should die now ; Do you think I could walk pleasantly and well-suited toward annihilation ? 10. Pleasantly and well-suited I walk ; Whither I walk I cannot define, but I know it is good: The whole universe indicates that it is good, The past and the present indicate that it is good. How beautiful and perfect are the animals ! How perfect the earth, and the minutest thing upon it ! What is called good is perfect, and what is called bad is just as perfect, The vegetables and minerals are all perfect, and the imponderable fluids are perfect ; Slowly and surely they have passed on to this, and slowly and surely they yet pass on. n. I swear I think now that everything without exception has an eternal Soul ! The trees have, rooted in the ground ! the weeds of the sea have ! the animals ! WHITMAN. 297 I swear I think there is nothing but immortality ! That the exquisite scheme is for it, and the nebulous float is for it, and the cohering is for it ; And all preparation is for it ! and identity is for it ! and life and materials are altogether for it ! A DREAM. OF him I love day and night, I dreamed I heard he was dead; And I dreamed I went where they had buried him I love but he was not in that place ; And I dreamed I wandered, searching among burial- places, to find him ; And I found that every place was a burial-place ; The houses full of life were equally full of death (this house is now) ; The streets, the shipping, the places of amusement, the Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, the Mannahatta, were as full of the dead as of the living, And fuller, O vastly fuller, of the dead than of the living; And what I dreamed I will henceforth tell to every person and age, And I stand henceforth bound to what I dreamed ; And now I am willing to disregard burial-places, and dispense with them ; And if the memorials of the dead were put up indiffer ently everywhere, even in the room where I eat or sleep, I should be satisfied ; And if the corpse of any one I love, or if my own corpse, be duly rendered to powder, and poured in the sea, I shall be satisfied ; Or if it be distributed to the winds, I shall be satisfied. 298 WHITMAN. THE LAST INVOCATION I. AT the last, tenderly, From the walls of the powerful, fortressed house, From the clasp of the knitted locks from the keep of the well-closed doors, Let me be wafted. 2. Let me glide noiselessly forth ; With the key of softness unlock the locks with a whisper, Set ope the doors, O Soul ! 3- Tenderly ! be not impatient ! (Strong is your hold, O mortal flesh ! Strong is your hold, O love !) SEA-SHORE MEMORIES. I. OUT of the cradle endlessly rocking, Out of the mocking-bird's throat, the musical shuttle, Out of the Ninth-month midnight, Over the sterile sands, and the fields beyond, where the child, leaving his bed, wandered alone, bare headed, barefoot, Down from the showered halo, Up from the mystic play of shadows, twining and twist ing as if they were alive, Out from the patches of briars and blackberries, From the memories of the bird that chanted to me, From your memories, sad brother from the fitful risings and fallings I heard, From under that yellow half-moon, late-risen, and swollen as if with tears, WHITMAN. 299 From those beginning notes of sickness and love, there in the transparent mist, From the thousand responses of my heart, never to cease, From the myriad thence-aroused words, From the word stronger and more delicious than any, From such, as now they start, the scene revisiting, As a flock, twittering, rising, or overhead passing, Borne hither ere all eludes me, hurriedly, A man yet by these tears a little boy again, Throwing myself on the sand, confronting- the waves, I, chanter of pains and joys, uniter of here and hereafter, Taking all hints to use them but swiftly leaping be yond them, A reminiscence sing. 2. Once, Paumanok, When the snows had melted when the lilac-scent was in the air, and the Fifth-month grass was growing, Up this sea-shore, in some briars, 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. 3 " Shine ! shine ! shine ! Pour down your warmth, great Sun ! While we bask we two together. " Two together ! Winds blow South, or winut; blow North,, Day come white, or night come black, 300 WHITMAN. Home, or rivers and mountains from home, Singing all time, minding no time, While we two keep together." 4- Till of a sudden, May-be 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, Over the hoarse surging of the sea, Or flitting from briar to briar by day, I saw, I heard at intervals, the remaining one, the he- bird, The solitary guest from" Alabama. 5- ' Blow ! blow! blow ! Blow up, sea-winds, along Paumanok's shore ! I wait and I wait, till you blow my mate to me." 6. Yes, when the stars glistened, Ml night long, on the prong of a moss-scalloped stake, /)own, almost amid the slapping waves, Sat the lone singer, wonderful, causing tears. He called on his mate ; He poured forth the meanings which I, of all men, know. Yes, my brother, I know ; The rest might not but I have treasured every note ; For once, and more than once, dimly, down to the beach gliding, Silent, avoiding the moonbeams, blending myself with the shadows, WHITMAN. 301 Recalling now the obscure shapes, the echoes, the sounds and sights after their sorts, The white arms out in the breakers tirelessly tossing, I, with bare feet, a child, the wind wafting my hair, Listened long and long. Listened, to keep, to sing now translating the notes, Following you, my brother. 7- " Soothe ! soothe ! soothe ! Close on its waves soothes the wave behind, And again another behind, embracing and lapping, every one close ; But my love soothes not me, not me. " Low hangs the moon it rose late ; O it is lagging O I think it is heavy with love, with love. " O madly the sea pushes, pushes upon the' land, With love with love. " O 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 j 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? O it is the shape, the shape of my mate ! O rnoon, do not keep her from me any longer. " Land ! land ! O land ! Whichever way I turn, O I 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. 302 WHITMAN. " O rising stars Perhaps the one I want so much will rise, will rise with some of you. " O throat ! O 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 ! Carols under that lagging, yellow, waning moon ! O under that moon, where she droops almost down into the sea ! O 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 responding 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. " O darkness ! O in vain ! O I am very sick and sorrowful. " O brown halo in the sky, near the moon, drooping upon the sea ! T WHITMAN. 303 O troubled reflection in the sea ! O throat ! O throbbing heart ! O all and I singing uselessly, uselessly all the night ! " Yet I murmur, murmur on ! murmurs you yourselves make me continue to sing, I know not why. " O past ! O life ! O songs of joy ! In the air in the woods over fields ; Loved ! loved ! loved ! loved ! loved ! But my love no more, no more with me ! We two together no more." The aria sinking ; All else continuing the stars shining, The winds blowing the notes of the bird continuous echoing, With angry moans the fierce old mother incessantly moaning, On the sands of Paumanok's shore, grey and rustling; The yellow half-moon enlarged, sagging down, drooping, the face of the sea almost touching ; The boy ecstatic with his bare feet the waves, with his hair the atmosphere, dallying, The love in the heart long pent, now loose, now at last tumultuously bursting, The aria's meaning, the ears, the soul, swiftly depositing, The strange tears down the cheeks coursing, The colloquy there the trio each uttering, The undertone the savage old mother incessantly crying, To the boy's soul's questions sullenly timing some drowned secret hissing To the outsetting bard of love. 9- " Daemon or bird !" (said the boy's Soul,) " I* h indeed toward your mate you sing ? or is it mostly to me ? 304 WHITMAN. For I, that was a child, my tongue's use sleeping, Now I have heard you, Now in a moment I know what I am for I awake, And already a thousand singers a thousand songs, clearer, louder, and more sorrowful, than yours, A thousand warbling echoes, have started to life within me, Never to die. "O you singer, solitary, singing by yourself projecting me; O solitary me, listening never more, shall I cease per petuating you ; Never more shall I escape, never more, the reverbera tions, Never more the cries of unsatisfied love be absent from me, Never again leave me to be the peaceful child I was be fore wh it, there in the night, By the sea, under the yellow and sagging moon, The messenger there aroused the fire, the sweet hell within, The unknown want, the destiny of me. " O give me the clue ! (it lurks in the night here some where ;) O if I am to have so much, let me have more I O a word ! O what is my destination ? (I fear it is henceforth chaos ;) O how joys, dreads, convolutions, human shapes, and all shapes, spring as from graves around me ! O phantoms ! you cover all the land and all the sea ! O I cannot see in the dimness whether you smile or frown upon me ; O vapour, a look, a word ! O well-beloved ! O you dear women's and men's phantoms ! "A word then, (for I will conquer it,) The word final, superior to all, Subtle, sent up what is it ? I listen ; WHITMA\. 305 Are you whispering it, and have been all the time, you sea-waves ? Is that it from your liquid rims and wet sands?" 10. Whereto answering, the sea, Delaying not, hurrying not, Whispered me through the night, and very plainly be fore daybreak, Lisped to me the low and delicious word " Death " ; And again Death ever Death, Death, Death, Hissing melodious, neither like the bird, nor like my aroused child's heart, But edging near, as privately for me, rustling at my feet, Creeping thence steadily up to my ears, and laving me softly all over, Death, Death, Death, Death, Death. Which I do not forget, But fuse the song of my dusky daemon and brother, That he sang to me in the moonlight on Paumanok's grey beach, With the thousand responsive songs, at random, My own songs, awaked from that hour ; And with them the key, the word up from the waves, The word of the sweetest song, and all songs, That strong and delicious word which, creeping to my feet, The sea whispered me. TEARS. TEARS ! tears ! tears ! In the night, in solitude, tears ; On the white shore dripping, dripping, sucked in by the sand; Tears not a star shining all dark and desolate ; Moist tears from the eyes of a muffled head : u 306 WHITMAN. O who is that ghost ? that form in the dark, with tears ? What shapeless lump is that, bent, crouched there on the sand? Streaming tears sobbing tears throes, choked with wild cries ; O storm, embodied, rising, careering, with swift steps along the beach ; wild and dismal night-storm, with wind ! O belching and desperate ! O shade, so sedate and decorous by day, with calm countenance and regulated pace ; But away, at night, as you f?y, none looking O then the unloosened ocean Of tears ! tears ! tears ! ABOARD, AT A SHIFS_HELM. ABOARD, at a ship's helm, A young steersman, steering with care. A bell through fog on a sea-coast dolefully ringing, An ocean-bell O a warning bell, rocked by the waves. O you give good notice indeed, you bells by the sea-reef ringing, Ringing, ringing, to warn the ship from its wreck-place. For, as on the alert, O steersman, you mind the bell's admonition, The bows turn, the freighted ship, tacking, speeds away under her grey sails, The beautiful and noble ship, with all her precious wealth, speeds away gaily and safe. But O the ship, the immortal ship ! O ship aboard the ship ! ship of the body ship of the soul voyaging, voyag ing, voyaging ! WHITMAN. 307 WHO LEARNS MY LESSON COMPLETE? WHO learns my lesson complete ? Boss, journeyman, apprentice churchman and atheist, The stupid and the wise thinker parents and offspring merchant, clerk, porter, and customer, Editor, author, artist, and schoolboy Draw nigh and commence ; It is no lesson it lets down the bars to a good lesson, And that to another, and every one to another still. The great laws take and effuse without argument; I am of the same style, for I am their friend, I love them quits and quits I do not halt, and make salaams. 1 lie abstracted, and hear beautiful tales of things, and the reasons of things ; They are so beautiful I nudge myself to listen. I cannot say to any person what I hear I cannot say it to myself it is very wonderful. It is no small matter, this round and delicious globe, moving so exactly in its orbit for ever and ever, without one jolt, or the untruth of a single second ; I do not think it was made in six days, nor in ten thousand years, nor ten billions of years, Nor planned and built one thing after another, as an architect plans and builds a house. I do not think seventy years is the time of a man or woman, Nor that seventy millions of years is the time of a man or woman, Nor that years will ever stop the existence of me, or any one else. Is it wonderful that I should be immortal ? as every one is immortal; 308 WHITMAN. I know it is wonderful, but my eyesight is equally won derful, and how I was conceived in my mother's womb is equally wonderful ; And passed from a babe, in the creeping trance of a couple of summers and winters, to articulate and walk All this is equally wonderful. And that my Soul embraces you this hour, and we affect each other without ever seeing each other, and never perhaps to see each other, is every bit as wonderful. And that I can think such thoughts as these is just as wonderful ; And that I can remind you, and you think them, and know them to be true, is just as wonderful. And that the moon spins round the earth, and on with the earth, is equally wonderful, And that they balance themselves with the sun and stars- is equally wonderful. TO ONE SHORTLY TO DIE. I. FROM all the rest I single out you, having a message for you: You are to die Let others tell you what they please, I cannot prevaricate, I am exact and merciless, but I love you There is no escape for you. Softly I lay my right hand upon you you just feel it, I do not argue I bend my head close, and half envelop $ I sit quietly by I remain faithful, I am more than nurse, more than parent or neighbour, I absolve you from all except yourself, spiritual, bodily that is eternal : you yourself will surely escape, The corpse you will leave will be but excrementitious. WHITMAN. 309 2. The sun bursts through in unlooked-for directions ! Strong thoughts fill you, and confidence you smile ! You forget you are sick, as I forget you are sick, You do not see the medicines you do not mind the weeping friends I am with you, I exclude others from you there is nothing to be com miserated, I do not commiserate I congratulate you. BEAT ! BEAT ! DRUMS ! I. BEAT ! beat ! drums ! Blow ! bugles ! blow ! Through the windows through doors burst like a ruthless force, Into the solemn church, and scatter the congregation ; Into the school where the scholar is studying ; Leave not the bridegroom quiet no happiness must he have now with his bride ; Nor the peaceful farmer any peace, ploughing his field or gathering his grain ; So fierce you whirr and pound, you drums so shrill you bugles blow. 2. Beat ! beat ! drums ! Blow ! bugles ! blow ! Over the traffic of cities over the rumble of wheels in the streets. Are beds prepared for sleepers at night in the houses ? No sleepers must sleep in those beds ; No bargainers' bargains by day no brokers or specu lators Would they continue ? Would the talkers be talking ? would the singer attempt to sing? Would the lawyer rise in the court to state his case before the judge? Then rattle quicker, heavier, drums you bugles, wilder blow. 310 WHITMAN. 3- Beat ! beat ! drums ! Blow ! bugles ! blow ! Make no parley stop for no expostulation ; Mind not the timid mind not the weeper or prayer; Mind not the old man beseeching the young man ; Let not the child's voice be heard, nor the mother's entreaties ; Make even the trestles to shake the dead, where they lie awaiting the hearses, So strong you thump, O terrible drums so loud you bugles blow ! RISE, O DAYS, FROM YOUR FATHOMLESS DEEPS. RISE, O days, from your fathomless deeps, till you loftier, fiercer sweep ! Long for my soul, hungering gymnastic, I devoured what the earth gave me ; Long I roamed the woods of the north long I watched Niagara pouring ; I travelled the prairies over, and slept on their breast I crossed the Nevadas, I crossed the plateaus ; I ascended the towering rocks along the Pacific, I sailed out to sea. I sailed through the storm, I was refreshed by the storm; I watched with joy the threatening maws of the waves ; I marked the white combs where they careered so high, curling over ; I heard the wind piping, I saw the black clouds ; Saw from below what arose and mounted (O superb ! O wild as my heart, and powerful !) Heard the continuous thunder, as it bellowed after the lightning ; Noted the slender and jagged threads of lightning, as sudden and fast amid the din they chased each Other across the sky. ' f* WHITMAN. 311 These, and such as these, I, elate, saw saw with wonder, yet pensive and masterful ; All the menacing might of the globe uprisen around me ; Yet there with my soul I fed I fed content, super cilious. 2. Twas well, O soul ! 'twas a good preparation you gave me ! Now we advance our latent and ampler hunger to fill ; Now we go forth to receive what the earth and the sea never gave us. Not through the mighty woods we go, but through the mightier cities ; Something for us is pouring now, more than Niagara pouring ; Torrents of men (sources and rills of the Northwest, are you indeed inexhaustible ?) What, to pavements and homesteads here what were those storms of the mountains and sea ? What, to passions I witness around me to-day, was the sea risen, Was the wind piping the pipe of death under the black clouds ? Lo ! from deeps more unfathomable, something more deadly and savage; Manhattan, rising, advancing with menacing front Cincinnati, Chicago, unchained. What was that swell I saw on the ocean ? Behold what comes here ! How it climbs with daring feet and hands ! how it dashes ! How the true thunder bellows after the lightning ! how bright the flashes of lightning ! How Democracy, with desperate vengeful port, strides on, shown through the dark by those flashes of lightning ! (Yet a mournful wail and low sob I fancied I heard through the dark, In a lull of the deafening confusion.) <$ 312 WHITMAN. Thunder on ! stride on, Democracy ! strike with venge ful stroke ! And do you rise higher than ever yet, O days, O cities ! Crash heavier, heavier yet, O storms ! you have done me good ; My soul, prepared in the mountains, absorbs your im mortal strong nutriment. Long had I walked my cities, my country-roads, through farms, only half satisfied ; One doubt, nauseous, undulating like a snake, crawled on the ground before me, Continually preceding my steps, turning upon me oft, ironically hissing low. The cities I loved so well I abandoned and left I sped to the certainties suitable to me ; Hungering, hungering, hungering, for primal energies, and Nature's dauntlessness, t refreshed myself with it only, I could relish it only; I waited the bursting forth of the pent fire on the water and air I waited long. But now I no longer wait I am fully satisfied I am glutted ; I have witnessed the true lightning I have witnessed my cities electric ; I have lived to behold man burst forth, and warlike America rise. Hence I will seek no more the food of the northern solitary wilds, No more on the mountains roam, or sail the stormy sea. A LETTER FROM CAMP. I. " COME up from the fields, father, here's a letter from our Pete ; And come to the front door, mother here's a letter from thy dear son." WHITMAN. 313 2. Lo, 'tis autumn ; Lo where the trees, deeper green, yellower and redder, Cool and sweeten Ohio's villages, with leaves fluttering in the moderate wind ; Where apples ripe in the orchards hang, and grapes on the trellised vines ; (Smell you the smell of the grapes on the vines ? Smell you the buckwheat, where the bees were lately buzzing ?) Above all, lo, the sky, so calm, so transparent after the rain, and with wondrous clouds ; Below, too, all calm, all vital and beautiful and the farm prospers well. 3- Down in the fields all prospers well ; But now from the fields come, father come at the daughter's call ; And come to the entry, mother to the front door come, right away. Fast as she can she hurries something ominous her steps trembling ; She does not tarry to smooth her hair, nor adjust her cap. Open the envelope quickly ; O this is not our son's writing, yet his name is signed ; O a strange hand writes for our dear son O stricken mother's soul ! All swims before her eyes flashes with black she catches the main words only ; Sentences broken " Gun-shot wound in the breast, cavalry skirmish, taken to hospital, At present low, but will soon be better." 4- Ah now the single figure to me, Amid all teeming and wealthy Ohio, with all it* cities and farms, 314 WHITMAN. Sickly white in the face, and dull in the head, very faint, By the jamb of a door leans. " Grieve not so, dear mother," (the just-grown daughter speaks through her sobs ; The little sisters huddle around, speechless and dis mayed ;) " See, dearest mother, the letter says Pete will soon be better." 5- Alas, poor boy, he will never be better, (nor may-be needs to be better, that brave and simple soul ;) While they stand at home at the door, he is dead already; The only son is dead. But the mother needs to be better ; She, with thin form, presently dressed in black ; By day her meals untouched then at night fitfully sleeping, often waking, In the midnight waking, weeping, longing with one deep longing, O that she might withdraw unnoticed silent from life escape and withdraw, To follow, to seek, to be with her dear dead son ! VIGIL ON THE FIELD. VIGIL strange I kept on the field one night. When you, my son and my comrade, dropped at my side that day, One look I but gave, which your dear eyes returned with a look I shall never forget ; One touch of your hand to mine, boy, reached up as you lay on the, ground. Then onward I sped in the battle, the even-contested battle ; Till, late in the night relieved, to the place at last again I made my way ; WHITMAN, 315 Found you in death so cold, dear comrade found your body, son of responding kisses (never again on earth responding ;) Bared your face in the starlight curious the scene cool blew the moderate night-wind. Long there and then in vigil I stood, dimly around me the battle-field spreading ; Vigil wondrous and vigil sweet, there in the fragrant silent night. But not a tear fell, not even a long-drawn sigh Long, long I gazed ; Then on the earth partially reclining, sat by your side, leaning my chin in my hands ; Passing sweet hours, immortal and mystic hours with you, dearest comrade Not a tear, not a word ; Vigil of silence, love, and death vigil for you, my son and my soldier, As onward silently stars aloft, eastward new ones, up ward stole; Vigil final for you, brave boy, (I could not save you, swift was your death, I faithfully loved you and cared for you living I think we shall surely meet again ;) Till at latest lingering of the night, indeed just as the dawn appeared, My comrade I wrapped in his blanket, enveloped well his form, Folded the blanket well, tucking it carefully over head, and carefully under feet ; And there and then, and bathed by the rising sun, my son in his grave, in his rude-dug grave, I deposited ; Ending my vigil strange with that vigil of night and battle-field dim ; Vigil for boy of responding kisses (never again on earth responding;) v^igil for comrade swiftly slain vigil I never forget, how as day brightened, I rose from the chill ground, and folded my soldier well in his blanket, And buried him where' he fell. s^ 316 WHITMAN. A MARCH IN THE RANKS. A MARCH in the ranks hard-pressed, and the road unknown ; A route through a heavy wood, with muffled steps in the darkness; Our army foiled with loss severe, and the sullen remnant retreating; Till, after midnight, glimmer upon us the lights of a dim-lighted building. We come to an open space in the woods, and halt by the dim-lighted building; 'Tis a large old church at the crossing roads 'tis now an impromptu hospital. Entering but for a minute, I see a sight beyond all the pictures and poems ever made : Shadows of deepest, deepest black, just lit by moving candles and lamps, And by one great pitchy torch, stationary, with wild red flame, and clouds of smoke. By these, crowds, groups of forms, vaguely I see, on the floor, some in the pews laid down ; At my feet more distinctly, a soldier, a mere lad, in danger of bleeding to death (he is shot in the abdomen;) I staunch the blood temporarily (the youngster's face is white as a lily). Then before I depart I sweep my eyes o'er the scene, fain to absorb it all ; Faces, varieties, postures beyond description, most in obscurity, some of them dead; Surgeons operating, attendants holding lights, the smell of ether, the odour of blood; The crowd, O the crowd of the bloody forms of soldiers the yard outside also filled ; Some on the bare ground, some on planks or stretchers, some in the death-spasm sweating; An occasional scream or cry, the doctor's shouted orders or calls; WHITMAN. 317 The glisten of the little steel instruments catching the glint of the torches ; These I resume as I chant I see again the forms, I smell the odour; Then hear outside the orders given, " Fall in, my men, Fall in." But first I bend to the dying lad his eyes open a half-smile gives he me ; Then the eyes close, calmly close; and I speed forth to the darkness, Resuming, marching, ever in darkness marching, on in the ranks, The unknown road still marching. A SIGHT IN CAMP. A SIGHT in camp in the daybreak grey and dim. As from my tent I emerge so early, sleepless, As slow I walk in the cool fresh air, the path near by the hospital tent, Three forms I see on stretchers lying, brought out there, untended lying, Over each the blanket spread, ample brownish woollen blanket, Grey and heavy blanket, folding, covering all. Curious, I halt, and silent stand ; Then with light fingers I from the face of the nearest, the first, just lift the blanket : Who are you, elderly man so gaunt and grim, with well- greyed hair, and flesh ail sunken about the eyes? Who are you, my dear comrade ? Then to the second I step And who are you, my child and darling ? Who are you, sweet boy, with cheeks yet blooming ? Then to the third a face nor child nor old, very calm, as of beautiful yellow-white ivory ; Young man, I think I know you I think this face of yours is the face of the Christ himself; Dead and divine, and brother of all, and here again he lies. 318 WHITMAN. MANHATTAN FACES. I. GIVE me the splendid silent sun, with all his beams full- dazzling; Give me juicy autumnal fruit, ripe and red from the orchard ; Give me a field where the unmowed grass grows; Give me an arbour, give me the trellised grape; Give me fresh corn and wheat give me serene-moving animals, teaching content; Give me nights perfectly quiet, as on high plateaus west of the Mississippi, and I looking up at the stars; Give me odorous at sunrise a garden of beautiful flowers, where I can walk undisturbed; Give me for marriage a sweet-breathed woman, of whom I should never tire ; Give me a perfect child give me, away, asicle from the noise of the world, a rural domestic life ; Give me to warble spontaneous songs, relieved, recluse by myself, for my own ears only; Give me solitude give me Nature give me again, O Nature, your primal sanities ! These, demanding to have them (tired with ceaseless excitement, and racked by the war-strife), These to procure incessantly asking, rising in cries from my heart, While yet incessantly asking, still I adhere to my city ; Day upon day, and year upon year, O city, walking your streets, Where you hold me unchained a certain time, refusing to give me up; Yet giving to make me glutted, enriched of soul you give me for ever faces; (O I see what I sought to escape, confronting, reversing my cries; I see my own soul trampling down what it asked for.) 2. Keep your splendid, silent sun Keep your woods, O Nature, and the quiet places by the woods: 319 Keep your fields of clover and timothy, and your corn fields and orchards; Keep the blossoming buckwheat fields, where the Ninth- month bees hum. Give me faces and streets ' give me these phantoms in cessant and endless along the trottoirs! Give me interminable eyes ! give me women ! give me comrades and lovers by the thousand ! Let me see new ones every day! let me hold new ones by the hand every day! Give me such shows ! give me the streets of Manhat tan! Give me Broadway, with the soldiers marching give me the sound of the trumpets and drums ! (The soldiers in companies or regiments some, start ing away, flushed and reckless; Some, their time up, returning, with thinned ranks young, yet very old, worn, marching, noticing nothing;) Give me the shores and the wharves heavy-fringed with the black ships! O such for me! O an intense life! O full to repletion, and varied The life of the theatre, bar-room, huge hotel, for me! The saloon of the steamer' the crowded excursion for me ! the torch-light procession ! The dense brigade, bound for the war, with high-piled military waggons following; People, endless, streaming, with strong voices, passions, pageants ; Manhattan streets, with their powerful throbs, with the beating drums, as now; The endless and noisy chorus, the rustle and clank of muskets, even the sight of the wounded; Manhattan crowds, with their turbulent musical chorus with varied chorus, and light of the sparkling eyes; Manhattan faces and eyes for ever for me. 320 WHITMAN. RECONCILIATION. WORD over all, beautiful as the sky! Beautiful that war, and all its deeds of carnage, must in time be utterly los* ; That the hands of the sisters Death and Night, inces santly, softly, wash again, and ever again, this soiled world: For my enemy is dead a man divine as myself is dead; I look where he lies, white-faced and still, in the coffin I draw near; I bend down, and touch lightly with my lips the white face in the coffin. IN MIDNIGHT SLEEP. I. IN midnight sleep, of many a face of anguish, Of the look at first of the mortally wounded of that indescribable look; Of the dead on their backs, with arms extended wide, I dream, I dream, I dream. 2. Of scenes of nature, fields and mountains; Of skies, so beauteous after a storm and at night the moon so unearthly bright, Shining sweetly, shining down, where we dig the trenches and gather the heaps, I dream, I dream, I dream. 3- Long, long have they passed faces and trenches and fields Where through the carnage I moved with a callous com posure or away from the fallen Onward I sped at the time But now of their forms at night I dream, I dream, I dream. WHITMAN. 321 CAMPS OF GREEN. NOT alone those camps of white, O soldiers, When, as ordered forward, after a long march, Footsore and weary, soon as the light lessened, we halted for the night; Some of us so fatigued, carrying the gun and knapsack, dropping asleep in our tracks; Others pitching the little tents, and the fires lit up began to sparkle; Outposts of pickets posted, surrounding, alert through the dark, And a word provided for countersign, careful for safety; Till, to the call of the drummers at daybreak loudly beating the drums, We rose up refreshed, the night and sleep. passed over, and resumed our journey, Or proceeded to battle. Lo! the camps of the tents of green, Which the days of peace keep filling, and the days of war keep filling, With a mystic army, (is it too ordered forward? is it too only halting awhile Till night and sleep pass over?) Now in those camps of green in their tents dotting the world; In the parents, children, husbands, wives, in them in the old ad young, Sleeping under the sunlight, sleeping under the moon light, content and silent there at last, Behold the mighty bivouac-field and waiting-camp of all, Of corps and generals all, and the President over the corps and generals all, And of each of us, O soldiers, and of each and all in the ranks we fought, There without hatred we shall all meet. For presently, O soldiers, we too camp in our place in the bivouac-camps of green; 322 WHITMAN. But we need not provide for outposts, nor word for the countersign, Nor drummer to beat the morning drum. THE MOTHER OF ALL. PENSIVE, on her dead gazing, I heard the Mother of All, Desperate, on the torn bodies, on the forms covering the battle-fields gazing (As the last gun ceased but the scent of the powder- smoke lingered;) As she called to her earth with mournful voice while she stalked: " Absorb them well, O my earth," she cried " I charge you, lose not my sons! lose not an atom; And you streams, absorb them well, taking their dear blood; And you local spots, and you airs that swim above lightly, And all you essences of soil and growth and you, my rivers' depths; And you, mountain-sides and the woods where my dear children's blood, trickling, reddened; And you trees, down in your roots, to bequeath to all future trees, My dead absorb my young men's beautiful bodies absorb and their precious, precious, precious blood; Which holding in trust for me, faithfully back again give me, many a year hence, In unseen essence and odour of surface and grass, cen turies hence; In blowing airs from the fields, back again give me'my darlings give my immortal heroes; Exhale me them centuries hence breathe me their breath let not an atom be lost. O years and graves ! O air and soil ! O my dead, an aroma sweet! Exhale them perennial, sweet death. 1 years, centuries hence." 1 Sic in all the editions : should it be " earth "? WHITMAN. 323 O CAPTAIN ! MY CAPTAIN ! (FOR THE DEATH OF LINCOLN). I. O CAPTAIN ! my Captain ! our fearful trip is done ; The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won ; The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exult ing, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring : But O heart ! heart ! heart ! O the bleeding drops of red Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead ! 2. O Captain ! my Captain ! rise up and hear the bells ; Rise up for you the flag is flung for you the bugle trills ; For you bouquets and ribboned wreaths for you the shores a-crowding ; For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning ; Here Captain ! dear father ! This arm beneath your head ; It is some dream that on the deck You've fallen cold and dead. 3- My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still ; My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will; The ship is anchored safe and sound, its voyage closed and done ; From fearful trip, the victor ship comes in with object won. Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells ! But I, with mournful tread, Walk the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. 324 WHITMAN. PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S BURIAL HYMN. I. WHEN lilacs last in the door-yard bloomed, And the great star early drooped in the western sky in the night, I mourned and yet shall mourn with ever-returning spring. O ever-returning spring ! trinity sure to me you bring ; Lilac blooming perennial, and drooping star in the west, And thought of him I love. 2. O powerful, western, fallen star ! O shades of night ! O moody, tearful night ! O great star disappeared ! O the black murk that hides the star ! O cruel hands that hold me powerless ! O helpless soul of me ! O harsh surrounding cloud, that will not free my soul ! 3- In the door-yard fronting an old farm-house, near the white-washed palings, Stands the lilac bush, tall-growing, with heart-shaped leaves of rich green, With many a pointed blossom, rising delicate, with the perfume strong I love, With every leaf a miracle : and from this bush in the door-yard, With delicate-coloured blossoms, and heart-shaped leaves of rich green, A sprig, with its flower, I break. 4- In the swamp, in secluded recesses, A shy and hidden bird is warbling a song. WHITMAN. 325 Solitary, the thrush, The hermit, withdrawn to himself, avoiding the settle ments, Sings by himself a song. Song of the bleeding throat ! Death's outlet song of life for well, dear brother, I know, If thou wast not gifted to sing, thou wouldst surely die. 5- Over the breast of the spring, the land, amid cities, Amid lanes, and through old woods (where lately the violets peeped from the ground, spotting the grey debris ; ) Amid the grass in the fields each side of the lanes passing the endless grass ; Passing the yellow-speared wheat, every grain from its shroud in the dark-brown fields uprising ; Passing the apple-tree blows of white and pink in the orchards ; Carrying a corpse to where it shall rest in the grave, Night and day journeys a coffin. 6. Coffin that passes through lanes and streets, Through day and night, with the great cloud darkening the land, With the pomp of the inlooped flags, with the cities draped in black, With the show of the States themselves, as of crape- veiled women, standing, With processions long and winding, and the flambeaus of the night, With the countless torches lit with the silent sea of faces, and the unbared heads, With the waiting depot, the arriving coffin, and the sombre faces, With dirges through the night, with the thousand voices rising strong and solemn ; 326 WHITMAN. With all the mournful voices of the dirges poured around the coffin, The dim-lit churches and the shuddering organs Where amid these you journey, With the tolling, tolling bells' perpetual clang ; Here ! coffin that slowly passes, I give you my sprig of lilac. 7- (Nor for you, for one, alone ; Blossoms and branches green to coffins all I bring : For fresh as the morning thus would I carol a song for you, O sane and sacred death. All over bouquets of roses, O death ! I cover you over with roses and early lilies ; But mostly and now the lilac that blooms the first, Copious, I break, I break the sprigs from the bushes ; With loaded arms I come, pouring for you, For you, and the coffins all of you, O death.) 8. O western orb, sailing the heaven ! Now I know what you must have meant, as a month since we walked, As we walked up and down in the dark blue so mystic, As we walked in silence the transparent shadowy night, As I saw you had something to tell, as you bent to me night after night, As you drooped from the sky low down, as if to my side, while the other stars all looked on ; As we wandered together the solemn night (for some thing, I know not what, kept me from sleep ;) As the night advanced, and I saw Qn the rim of the west, ere you went, how full you were of woe ; As I stood on the rising ground in the breeze, in the cold transparent night, As I watched where you passed and was lost in the netherward black of the night, As my soul in its trouble, dissatisfied, sank, as where you, sad orb, Concluded, dropped in the night, and was gone. WHITMAN. 327 9- Sing on, there in the swamp ! singer bashful and tender ! I hear your notes I hear your call ; 1 hear I come presently I understand you ; But a moment I linger for the lustrous star has de tained me ; The star, my departing comrade, holds and detains me. 10. how shall I warble myself for the dead one there I loved ? And how shall I deck my song for the large sweet soul that has gone ? And what shall my perfume be for the grave of him I love? Sea-winds, blown from east and west, Blown from the eastern sea, and blown from the west ern sea, till there on the prairies meeting : These, and with these, and the breath of my chant, 1 perfume the grave of him I love. ii. O what shall I hang on the chamber-walls ? And what shall the pictures be that I hang on the walls, To adorn the burial-house of him I love ? Pictures of growing spring, and farms, and homes, With the Fourth-month eve at sundown, and the grey smoke lucid and bright, With floods of the yellow gold of the gorgeous, indolent, sinking sun, burning, expanding the air ; With the fresh sweet herbage under foot, and the pale green leaves of the trees prolific ; In the distance the flowing glaze, the breast of the river, with a wind-dapple here and there ; With ranging hills on the banks, with many a line against the sky, and shadows ; . 328- WHITMAN. And the city at hand, with dwellings so dense, and stacks of chimneys, And all the scenes of life, and the workshops, and the workmen homeward returning. 12. Lo ! body and soul ! this land ! Mighty Manhattan, with spires, and the sparkling and hurrying tides, and the ships ; The varied and ample land the South and the North in the light- Ohio's shores, and flashing Mis souri, And ever the far-spreading prairies, covered with grass and corn. Lo ! the most excellent sun, so calm and haughty ; The violet and purple morn, with just-felt breezes ; The gentle, soft-born, measureless light ', The miracle, spreading, bathing all the fulfilled noon ; The coming eve, delicious the welcome night, and the stars, Over my cities shining all, enveloping man and land. Sing on ! sing on, you grey-brown bird ! Sing from the swamps, the recesses pour your chant from the bushes ; Limitless out of the dusk, out of the cedars and pines. Sing on, dearest brother warble your reedy song ; Loud human song, with voice of uttermost woe. O liquid, and free, and tender ! O wild and loose to my soul ! O wondrous singer ! You only I hear ......... vet the star holds me (but will soon depart;) Yet the lilac, with mastering odour, holds me. WHITMAN. 329 14. Now while I sat in the day, and looked forth, In the close of the day, with its light, and the fields of spring, and the farmer preparing his crops, In the large unconscious scenery of my. land, with its lakes and forests, In the heavenly aerial beauty (after the perturbed winds, and the storms ; ) Under the arching heavens of the afternoon swift pass ing, and the voices of children and women, The many-moving sea-tides, and I saw the ships how they sailed, And the summer approaching with riches, and the fields all busy with labour, And the infinite separate houses, how they all went on, each with its meals and minutia of daily usages; And the streets, how their throbbings throbbed, and the cities pent lo ! then and there, Falling upon them all, and among them all, enveloping me with the rest, Appeared the cloud ; appeared the long black trail ; And I knew Death, its Thought, and the sacred Know lede of Death. Then with the Knowledge of Death as walking one side of me, And the Thought of Death close-walking the other side of me, And I in the middle, as with companions, and as hold ing the hands of companions, I fled forth to the hiding receiving night, that talks not, Down to the shores of the water, the path by the swamp in the dimness, To the solemn shadowy cedars, and ghostly pines so still. And the singer, so shy to the rest, received me ; fe- A 33 WHITMAN". The grey-brown bird I know received us comrades three ; And he sang what seemed the carol of death, and a verse for him I love. From deep secluded recesses, From the fragrant cedars, and the ghostly pines so still, Came the carol of the bird. And the charm of the carol rapt me, As I held, as if by their hands, my comrades in the night ; And the voice of my spirit tallied the song of the bird. DEATH CAROL. ~jf Come, lovely and soothing Death, Undulate round the world, serenely arriving, arriving, In the day, in the night, to all, to each, Sooner or later, delicate Death. Praised be the fathomless universe, For life and joy, and for objects and knowledge curious, And for love, sweet love But praise ! praise ! praise ! For the sure-enwinding arms of cool-enfolding Death. Dark Mother, always gliding near, with soft feet, Have none chanted for thee a chant of fullest welcome? Then I chant it for thee I glorify thee above all ; I bring thee a song that, when thou must indeed come, come unfalteringly. Approach, strong Deliveress ! When it is so when thou hast taken them, I joyously sing the dead, Lost in the loving, floating ocean of thee, Laved in the flood of thy bliss, O Death. WHITMAN. 331 From me to thee glad serenades,. Dances for thee I propose, saluting thee adornments and feastings for thee ; And the sights of the open landscape, and the high- spread sky, are fitting, And life and the fields, and the huge and thoughtful night. The night, in silence, under many a star ; The ocean shore, and the husky whispering wave, whose voice I know ; And the soul turning to thee, O vast and well-veiled Death, And the body gratefully nestling close to thee. Over the tree-tops I float thee a song ! Over the rising and sinking waves over the myriad fields, and the prairies wide ; Over the dense-packed cities all, and the teeming wharves and ways, I float this carol with joy, with joy to thee, O Death ! To the tally of my soul, Loud and strong kept up the grey-brown bird, With pure, deliberate notes, spreading, filling the night. Loud in the pines and cedars dim, Clear in the freshness moist, and the swamp-perfume ; And I with my comrades there in the night. While my sight that was bound in my eyes unclosed, As to long panoramas of visions. 1 8. I saw askant the armies ; And I saw, as in noiseless dreams, hundreds of battle- flags; Borne through the smoke of the battles, and pierced with missiles, I saw them, 332 WHITMAN. And carried hither and yon through the smoke, and torn and bloody ; And at last but a few shreds left on the staffs (and all in silence,) And the staffs all splintered and broken. I saw battle-corpses, myriads of them, And the white skeletons of young men I saw them ; I saw the debris and debris of all the dead soldiers of the war. But I saw they were not as was thought ; They themselves were fully at rest they suffered not ; The living remained and suffered the mother suffered, And the wife and the child, and the musing comrade suffered, And the armies that remained suffered. 19. Passing the visions, passing the night ; Passing, unloosing the hold of my comrades' hands ; Passing the song of the hermit bird, and the tallying song of my soul, (Victorious song, death's outlet song, yet varying, ever- altering song, As low and wailing, yet clear the notes, rising and falling, flooding the night, Sadly sinking and fainting, as warning and warning, and yet again bursting with joy, Covering the earth, and filling the spread of the heaven, As that powerful psalm in the night I heard fron? recesses,) Passing, I leave thee, lilac with heart-shaped leaves ; I leave thee there in the door-yard, blooming, returning with spring. I cease trom my song for thee ; From my gaze on thee in the west, fronting the west, communing with thee, O comrade lustrous, with silver face in the night. ^ , PARSONS. 333 20. Yet each I keep, and all, retrievements out of the night ; The song, the wondrous chant of the grey-brown bird, And the tallying chant, the echo aroused in my soul, With the lustrous and drooping star with the counte nance full of woe, With the lilac tall, and its blossoms of mastering odour j With the holders holding my hand, nearing the call of the bird, Comrades mine, and I in the midst, and their memory ever I keep for the dead I loved so well ; For the sweetest, wisest soul of all my days and lands and this for his dear sake ; Lilac and star and bird, twined with the chant of my soul, There in the fragrant pines, and the cedars dusk arid' dim. THOMAS WILLIAM PARSONS. [Born in 1819. Entered upon, but has not eventually pursued, the medical career. Passed some portion of his youth in Europe, more especially in Italy ; and is best known by his translation of Dante's Injerno\. DIRGE FOR ONE WHO FELL IN BATTLE. ROOM for a Soldier ! lay him in the clover ; He loved the fields, and they shall be his cover ; Make his mound with hers who called him once her lover : Where the rain may rain upon it, Where the sun may shine upon it, Where the lamb hath lain upon it, And the bee will dine upon it. Bear him to no dismal tomb under city churches ; Take him to the fragrant fields, by the silver birches, Where the whippoorwill shall mourn, where the oriole perches : 334 PARSONS. Make his mound with sunshine on it, Where the bee will dine upon it, Where the lamb hath lain upon it, And the rain will rain upon it. Busy as the busy bee, his rest should be the clover ; Gentle as the lamb was he, and the fern should be his cover ; Fern and rosemary shall grow my soldier's uillow over : Where the rain may rain upon it, Where the sun may shine upon it, Where the lamb hath lain upon it, And the bee will dine upon it. Sunshine in his heart, the rain would come full often Out of those tender eyes which evermore did soften : He never could look cold till we saw him in his coffin. Make his mound with sunshine on it, Where the wind may sigh upon it, Where the moon may stream upon it, And Memory shall dream upon it. " Captain or Colonel," whatever invocation Suit our hymn the best, no matter for thy station, On thy grave the rain shall fall from the eyes of a mighty nation ! Long as the sun doth shine upon it Shall glow the goodly pine upon it, Long as the stars do gleam upon it Shall Memory come to dream upon it. LOWELL. 335 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. [Born in Boston in 1819 ; Professor of Modern Languages in Harvard College. A writer of critical and other prose works, as well as of poetry. His serious poems have secured a large, and deserved a not inconsiderable, measure of admiration ; but his humorous Biglcno Papers, written in Yankee dialect, seem more likely to live with a genuine life than anything else from his pen], SUMMER STORM. UNTREMULOUS in the river clear, Towards 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. 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 ; 336 LOWELL. 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 grey 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 never more? Hush! Still as death, The tempest holds his breath, yiy i . LOWELL. 337 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, 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. A PRAYER. GOD ! do not let my loved-one die. But rather wait until the time That I am grown in purity Enough to enter thy pure clime- Then take me, I will gladly go, So that mv love remain below ! V 338 LOWELL. Oh let her stay ! She is by birth What I through death must learn to be. We need her more on our poor earth Than Thou canst need in heaven with Thee She hath her wings already; I Must burst this earth-shell ere I fly. Then, God, take me! We shall be near, More near than ever, each to each: Her angel ears will find more clear My heavenly than my earthly speech ; And still, as I draw nigh to Thee, Her soul and mine shall closer be. THE HERITAGE. THE rich man's son inherits lands, And piles of brick, and stone, and gold, And he inherits soft white hands, And tender flesh that fears the cold, Nor dares to wear a garment old ; A heritage, it seems to me, One scarce would wish to hold in fee. The rich man's son inherits cares; The bank may break, the factory burn, A breath may burst his bubble shares, And soft white hands could hardly earn A living that would serve his turn; A heritage, it seems to me, One scarce would wish to hold in fee. The rich man's son inherits wants, His stomach craves for dainty fare; With sated heart, he hears the pants Of toiling hinds with brown arms bare, And wearies in his easy chair ; A heritage, it seems to me, One scarce would wish to hold in fee. LOWELL. 339 What doth the poor man's son inherit ? Stout muscles and a sinewy heart, A hardy frame, a hardier spirit ; King of two hands, he does his part In every useful toil and art ; A heritage, it seems to me, A king might wish to hold in fee. What doth the poor man's son inherit ? Wishes o'erjoyed with humble things, A rank adjudged by toil-won merit, Content that from employment springs, A heart that in his labour sings ; A heritage, it seems to me, A king might wish to hold in fee. What doth the poor man's son inherit? A patience learned of being poor, Courage, if sorrow come, to bear it, A fellow-feeling that is sure To make the outcast bless his door ; A heritage, it seems to me, A king might wish to hold in fee. O rich man's son ! there is a toil That with all others level stands ; Large charity doth never soil, But only whiten, soft white hands, This is the best crop from thy lands ; A heritage, it seems to be, Worth being rich to hold in fee. O poor man's son ! scorn not thy state ; There is worse weariness than thine, In merely being rich and great ; Toil only gives the soul to shine, And makes rest fragrant and benign: A heritage, it seems to me. Worth being poor to hold in fee. 34 LOWELL. Both, heirs to some six feet of sod, Are equal in the earth at last ; Both, children of the same dear God, Prove title to your heirship vast By record of a well-filled past ; A heritage, it seems to me, Well worth a life to hold in fee. THE SOWER. I SAW a Sower walking slow Across the earth, from east to west ; His hair was white as mountain snow, His head drooped forward on his breast. With shrivelled hands he flung his seed, Nor ever turned to look behind ; Of sight or sound he took no heed ; It seemed he was both deaf and blind. His dim face showed no soul beneath; Yet in my heart I felt a stir, As if I looked upon the sheath That once had clasped Excalibur. I heard, as still the seed he cast, How, crooning to himself, he sung, "I sow again the holy Past, The happy days when I was young. "Then all was wheat without a tare, Then all was righteous, fair, and true; And I am he whose thoughtful care Shall plant the Old World in the New. "The fruitful germs I scatter free, With busy hand, while all men sleep; In Europe now, from sea to sea, The nations bless me as they reap." LOWELL. 341 Then I looked back along his path, And heard the clash of steel on steel, Where man faced man, in deadly wrath, While clanged the tocsin's hurrying peal. The sky with burning towns flared red, Nearer the noise of fighting rolled, And brothers' blood, by brothers shed, Crept, curdling, over pavements cold. Then marked I how each germ of truth Which through the dotard's fingers ran Was mated with a dragon's tooth Whence there sprang up an armed man. I shouted, but he could not hear; Made signs, but these he could not see; And still, without a doubt or fear, Broadcast he scattered anarchy. Long to my straining ears the blast Brought faintly back the words he sung: " I sow again the holy Past, The happy days when I was young." AN INDIAN-SUMMER REVERIE. WHAT visionary tints the year puts on, When fallen leaves falter through motionless air, Or nimbly cling, and shiver to be gone ! How shimmer the low flats and pastures bare, As with her nectar Hebe Autumn fills The bowl between me and those distant hills, And smiles and shakes abroad her misty, tremulous hair! No more the landscape holds its wealth apart, Making me poorer in my poverty, But mingles with my senses and my heart; My own projected spirit seems to me 342 LOWELL. In her own reverie the world to steep; 'Tis she that waves to sympathetic sleep, Moving, as she is moved, each field and hill and tree. How fuse and mix, with what unfelt degrees, Clasped by the faint horizon's languid arms, Each into each, the hazy distances! The softened season all the landscape charms; Those hills, my native village that embay, In waves of dreamier purple roll away, And floating in mirage seem all the glimmering farms. Far distant sounds the hidden chickadee Close at my side ; far distant sound the leaves ; The fields seem fields of dream, where Memory Wanders like gleaning Ruth ; and as the sheaves Of wheat and barley wavered in the eye Of Boaz as the maiden's glow went by, So tremble and seem remote all things the sense receives. The cock's shrill trump that tells of scattered corn, Passed breezily on by all his flapping mates, Faint and more faint, from barn to barn is borne, Southward, perhaps to far Magellan's Straits ; Dimly I catch the throb of distant flails ; Silently overhead the henhawk sails, With watchful, measuring eye, and for his quarry waits. The sobered robin, hunger-silent now. Seeks cedar-berries blue, his autumn cheer; The squirrel on the shingly shagbark's bough, Now saws, now lists with downward eye and ear ; Then drops his nut, and, with a chipping bound. Whisks to his winding fastness underground; The clouds like swans drift down the streaming atmos phere. O'er yon bare knoll the pointed cedar-shadows Drowse on the crisp, grey moss ; the ploughman's call Creeps faint as smoke from black, fresh-furrowed meadows; LOWELL. 343 The single crow a single caw lets fall ; And all around me every bush and tree Says Autumn's here, and Winter soon will be, Who snows his soft white sleep and silence over all. The birch, most shy and ladylike of trees, Her poverty, as best she may, retrieve?, And hints at her foregone gentilities With some saved relics of her wealth of leaves ; The swamp-oak, with his royal purple on, Glares red as blood across the sinking sun, As one who proudlier to a falling fortune cleaves. He looks a sachem, in red blanket wrapped, Who, 'mid some council of the sad-garbed whites, Erect and stern, in his own memories lapped, With distant eye broods over other sights, Sees the hushed wood the city's flare replace, The wounded turf heal o'er the railway's trace, And roams the savage past of his undwindled rights. The red-oak, softer-grained, yields all for lost, And, with his crumpled foliage stiff and dry, After the first betrayal of the frost, Rebuffs the kiss of the relenting sky; The chestnuts, lavish of their long-hid gold, To the faint Summer, beggared now and old, Pour back the sunshine hoarded 'neath her favouring eye. The ash her purple drops forgivingly And sadly, breaking not the general hush The maple-swamps glow like a sunset sea, Each leaf a ripple with i(s separate flush; All round the wood's e. Ige creeps the skirting blaze Of bushes low, as when, on cloudy days, Ere the rain falls, the cautious farmer burns his brush. O'er yon low wall, which guards one unkempt zone, Where vines, and weeds, and scrub-oaks intertwine, 344 LOWELL. Safe from the plough, whose rough, discordant stone Is massed to one soft grey by lichens fine, The tangled blackberry, crossed and re-crossed, weaves A prickly network of ensanguined leaves ; Hard by, with coral beads, the prim black-alders shine. Pillaring with flame this crumbling boundary, Whose loose blocks topple 'neath the ploughboy's foot, Who, with each sense shut fast except the eye, Creeps close and scares the jay he hoped to shoot, The woodbine up the elm's straight stem aspires, Coiling it, harmless, with autumnal fires ; In the ivy's paler blaze the martyr oak stands mute. Below, the Charles a stripe of nether sky, Now hid by rounded apple-trees between, Whose gaps the misplaced sail sweeps bellying by, Now flickering golden through a woodland screen, Then spreading out at his next turn beyond, A silver circle like an inland pond Slips seaward silently through marshes purple and green. Dear marshes ! vain to him the gift of sight Who cannot in their various incomes share, From every season drawn, of shade and light, Who sees in them but levels brown and bare ; Each change of storm or sunshine scatters free On them its largesse of variety, For Nature with cheap means still works her wonders rare. In Spring they lie one broad expanse of green, O'er which the light winds run with glimmering feet; Here, yellower stripes track out the creek unseen, There, darker growths o'er hidden ditches meet ; And purpler stains show where the blossoms crowd, As if the silent shadow of a cloud Hung there becalmed, with the next breath to fleet. LOWELL. 345 All round, upon the river's slippery edge, Witching to deeper calm the drowsy tide, Whispers and leans the breeze-entangling sedge; Through emerald glooms the lingering waters slide, Or, sometimes wavering, throw back the sun, And the stiff banks in eddies melt and run Of dimpling light, and with the current seem to glide. In Summer 'tis a blithesome sight to see, As step by step with measured swing they pass, The wide-ranked mowers wading to the knee, Their sharp scythes panting through the thick-set grass ; Then, stretched beneath a rick's shade in a ring, Their nooning take, while one begins to sing A stave that droops and dies 'neath the close sky of brass. Meanwhile that devil-may-care, the bobolink, Remembering duty, in mid-quaver stops Just ere he sweeps o'er rapture's tremulous brink, And 'twixt the winrows most demurely drops, A decorous bird of business, who provides For his brown mate and fledglings six besides, And looks from right to left, a farmer 'mid his crops. Another change subdues them in the Fall, But saddens not ; they still show merrier tints, Though sober russet seems to cover all. When the first sunshine through their dew-drops glints, Look how the yellow clearness, streamed across, Redeems with rarer hues the season's loss, As Dawn's feet there had touched and left their rosy prints. Or come when sunset gives its freshened zest; Lean o'er the bridge, and let the ruddy thrill, While the shorn sun swells down the hazy west, Glow opposite ; the marshes drink their fill, And swoon with nurple veins, then slowly fade 346 LOWELL. Through pink to brown, as eastward moves the shade, Lengthening with stealthy creep, of Simond's darkening hill. Later, and yet ere Winter wholly shuts, Ere through the first dry snow the runner grates, And the loth cart-wheel screams in slippery ruts, While firmer ice the eager boy awaits, Trying each buckle and strap beside the fire, And until bed-time plays with his desire, Twenty times putting on and off his new-bought skates ; Then, every morn, the river's banks shine bright With smooth plate-armour, treacherous and frail, By the frost's clinking hammers forged at night, 'Gainst which the lances of the sun prevail, Giving a pretty emblem of the day When guiltier arms in light shall melt away, And states shall move free-limbed, loosed from war's cramping mail. And now those waterfalls the ebbing river Twice every day creates on either side Tinkle, as through their fresh-sparred grots they shiver grass-arched channels to the sun denied ; High flaps in sparkling blue the far-heard crow, The silvered flats gleam frostily below, Suddenly drops the gull and breaks the glassy tide. But, crowned in turn by vying seasons three, Their winter halo hath a fuller ring ; This glory seems to rest immovably, The others were too fleet and vanishing ; When the hid tide is at its highest flow, O'er marsh and stream one breathless trance of snow With brooding fulness awes and hushes everything. LOWELL. 347 The sunshine seems blown off by the bleak wind, As pale as formal candles lit by day ; Gropes to the sea the river dumb and blind ; The brown ricks, snow-thatched by the storm in play, Show pearly breakers combing o'er their lee, White crests as of some just-enchanted sea, Checked in their maddest leap and hanging poised mid way. But when the eastern blow, with rain aslant, From mid-sea's prairies green and rolling plains Drives-in his wallowing herds of billows gaunt, And the roused Charles remembers in his veins Old Ocean's blood and snaps his gyves of frost, That tyrannous silence on the shores is tost In dreary wreck, and crumbling desolation reigns. Edgewise or flat, in druid-like device, With leaden pools between or gullies bare, The blocks lie strewn, a bleak Stonehenge of ice ; No life, no sound, to break the grim despair, Save sullen plunge, as through the sedges stiff Down crackles riverward some thaw-sapped cliff, Or when the close-wedged fields of ice crunch here and there. But let me turn from fancy-pictured scenes To that whose pastoral calm before me lies : Here nothing harsh or rugged intervenes ; The early evening with her misty dyes Smooths off the ravelled edges of the nigh, Relieves the distant with her cooler sky, And tones the landscape down, and soothes the wearied eyes. There gleams my native village, dear to me, Though higher change's waves each day are seen, Whelming fields famed in boyhood's history, Sanding with houses the diminished green ; There, in red brick, which softening time defies, Stand square and stiff the Muse's factories ; How with my life knit up is every well-known scene ! JJL 348 LOWELL. Flow on, dear river ! Not alone you flow To outward sight, and through your marshes wind ; Fed from the mystic springs of long-ago, Your twin flows silent through my world of mind. Grow dim, dear marshes, in the evening's grey ! Before my inner sight ye stretch away, And will for ever, though these fleshly eyes grow blind. Beyond that hillock's house-bespotted swell, Where Gothic chapels house the horse and chaise, Where quiet cits in Grecian temples dwell, Where Coptic tombs resound with prayer and praise, Where dust and mud the equal year divide, There gentle Allston lived, and wrought, and died, Transfiguring street and shop with his illumined gaze. Virgilium vidi tantitm, I have seen But as a boy, who looks alike on all, That misty hair, that fine Undine-like mien, Tremulous as down to feeling's faintest call; Ah dear old homestead ! count it to thy fame That thither many times the Painter came ; One elm yet bears his name, a feathery tree and .tall. Swiftly the present fades in memory's glow, Our only sure possession is the past. The village blacksmith died a month ago, And dim to me the forge's roaring blast. Soon fire-new mediasvals we shall see Oust the black smithy from its chestnut tree ; And that hewn down, perhaps, the beehive green and . vast. How many times, prouder than king on throne, Loosed from the village school-dame's A-s and B-s, Panting have I the creaky bellows blown, And watched the pent volcano's red increase, Then paused to see the ponderous sledge, brought down By that hard arm voluminous and brown, From the white iron swarm its golden vanishing bees. LOWELL. 349 Dear native town ! whose choking elms each year With eddying dust before their time turn grey, Pining for rain, to me thy dust is dear. It glorifies the eve of summer day, And, when the westering sun half-sunken burns, The mote-thick air to deepest orange turns, The westward horseman rides through clouds of gold away, So palpable, I've seen those unshorn few, The six old willows at the causey's end, (Such trees Paul Potter never dreamed nor drew) Through this dry mist their chequering shadows send, Striped, here and there, with many a long-drawn thread, Where streamed through leafy chinks the trembling red, Past which, in one bright trail, the hangbird's flashes blend. Yes, dearer far thy dust than all that e'er, Beneath the awarded crown of victory, Gilded the blown Olympic charioteer ; Though lightly prized the ribboned parchments three, Yet collegissejuvat, I am glad That here what colleging was mine I had, It linked another tie, dear native town, with thee ! Nearer art thou than simply native earth ; My dust with thine concedes a deeper tie. A closer claim thy soil may well put forth, Something of kindred more than sympathy ; For in thy bounds I reverently laid away That blinding anguish of forsaken clay, That title I seemed to have in earth and sea and sky, That portion of my life more choice to me (Though brief, yet in itself so round and whole) Than all the imperfect residue can be ; The Artist saw his statue of the soul Was perfect ; so, with one regretful stroke, The earthen model into fragments broke, And without her the impoverished seasons roll. 350 LOWELL. A CONTRAST. THY love thou sentest oft to me, And still as oft I thrust it back ; Thy messengers I could not see In those who everything did lack, The poor, the outcast, and the black. Pride held his hand before mine eyes, The World with flattery stuffed mine ears ; I looked to see a monarch's guise, Nor dreamed thy love would knock for years, Poor, naked, fettered, full of tears. Yet, when I sent my love to thee, Thou with a smile didst take it in, And entertain'dst it royally, Though grimed with earth, with hunger thin, And leprous with the taint of sin. Now every day thy love I meet, As o'er the earth it wanders wide, With weary step and bleeding feet, Still knocking at the heart of pride, And offerir ''grace, though still denied. ABOVE AND BELOW. I. O DWELLERS in the valley-land, Who in deep twilight grope and cower, Till the slow mountain's dial-hand Shortens to noon's triumphal hour, While ye sit idle, do ye think The Lord's great work sits idle too ? That light dare not o'erleap the brink Of morn, because 'tis dark with you ? Though yet your valleys skulk in night, In God's ripe fields the day is cried, And reapers, with their sickles bright, Troop singing down the mountain-side : ^OWELL. 351 Come up, and feel what health there is In the frank Dawn's delighted eyes, As, bending with a pitying kiss, The night-shed tears of Earth she dries ! The Lord wants reapers : Oh mount up, Before Night comes, and says, " Too late ! " Stay not for taking scrip or cup, The Master hungers while ye wait ; 'Tis from these heights alone your eyes The advancing spears of day can see, Which o'er the eastern hill-tops rise, To break your long captivity. ii. Lone watcher on the mountain-height ! It is right precious to behold The first long surf of climbing light Flood all the thirsty east with gold ; But we, who in the shadow sit, Know also when the day is nigh, Seeing thy shining forehead lit With his inspiring prophecy. Thou hast thine office ; we have ours ; God lacks not early service here, But what are thine eleventh hours He counts with us for morning cheer; Our day, for Him, is long enough, And, when he giveth work to do, The bruised reed is amply tough To pierce the shield of error through. But not the less do thou aspire Light's earlier messages to preach ; Keep back no syllable of fire, Plunge deep the rowels of thy speech. Yet God deems not thine aeried sight More worthy than our twilight dim, For meek Obedience, too, is light, And following that is finding Him. 352 LOWELL. ON THE DEATH OF A FRIEND'S CHILD. DEATH never came so nigh to me before, Nor showed me his mild face. Oft had I mused Of calm and peace and deep forgetfulness, Of folded hands, closed eyes, and heart at rest, And slumber sound beneath a flowery turf, Of faults forgotten, and an inner place Kept sacred for us in the heart of friends ; But these were idle fancies, satisfied With the mere husk of this great mystery, And dwelling in the outward shows of things. Heaven is not mounted to on wings of dreams, Nor doth the unthankful happiness of youth Aim thitherward, but floats from bloom to bloom, With earth's warm patch of sunshine well content : Tis sorrow builds the shining ladder up, Whose golden rounds are our calamities, Whereon our firm feet planting, nearer God The spirit climbs, and hath its eyes unsealed. True is it that Death's face seems stern and cold, When he is sent to summon those we love. But all God's angels come to us disguised ; Sorrow and Sickness, Poverty and Death, One after other lift their frowning masks, And we behold the seraph's face beneath, All radiant with the glory and the calm Of having looked upon the front of God. With every anguish of our earthly part The spirit's sight grows clearer ; this was meant When Jesus touched the blind man's lids with clay. Life is the jailer, Death the angel sent To draw the unwilling bolts and set us free. He flings not ope the ivory gate of Rest, Only the fallen spirit knocks at that, But to benigner regions beckons us, To destinies of more rewarded toil. In the hushed chamber, sitting by the dead, LOWELL. 353 It grates on us to hear the flood of life Whirl rustling onward, senseless of our loss. The bee hums on ; around the blossomed vine Whirs the light humming-bird ; the cricket chirps ; The locust's shrill alarum stings the ear ; Hard by, the cock shouts lustily; from farm to farm, His cheery brothers, telling of the sun, Answer, till far away the joyance dies : We never knew before how God had filled The summer air with happy living sounds ; All round us seems an overplus of life, And yet the one dear heart lies cold and still. It is most strange, when the great miracle Hath for our sakes been done, when we have had Our inwardest experience of God, When with his presence still the room expands, And is awed after him, that nought is changed, That Nature's face looks unacknowledging, And the mad world still dances heedless on After its butterflies, and gives no sign 'Tis hard at first to see it all aright ; In vain Faith blows her trump to summon back Her scattered troop ; yet, through the clouded glass Of our own bitter tears, vre learn to look Undazzled on the kindness of God's face ; Earth is too dark, and Heaven alone shines through. It is no little thing, when a fresh soul And a fresh heart, with their unmeasured scope For good, not gravitating earthward yet, But circling in diviner periods, Are sent into the world, no little thing, When this unbounded possibility Into the outer silence is withdrawn. All in this world, where every guiding thread Ends suddenly in the one sure centre, death, The visionary hand of Might-have-been Alone can fill Desire's cup to the brim ! How changed, dear friend, are thy part and thy child's ! He bends above thy cradle now, or hold? 2 354 LOWELL. His warning finger out to be thy guide. Thou art the nurseling now ; he watches thee Slow learning, one by one, the secret things Which are to him used sights of every day ; He smiles to see thy wondering glances con The grass and pebbles of the spirit-world, To thee miraculous ; and he will teach Thy knees their due observances of prayer. Children are God's apostles, day by day Sent forth to preach of love, and hope, and peace ; Nor hath thy babe his mission left undone. To me, at least, his going hence hath given Serener thoughts and nearer to the skies, And opened a new fountain in my heart For thee, my friend, and all : and oh, if Death More near approaches meditates, and clasps Even now some dearer, more reluctant hand, God, strengthen thou my faith, that I may see That 'tis thine angel, who, with loving haste, Unto the service of the inner shrine Doth waken thy beloved with a kiss ! A PARABLE. SAID Christ our Lord, " I will go and see How the men, my brethren, believe in me." He passed not again through the gate of birth, But made himself known to the children of earth. Then said the chief priests, and rulers, and kings, " Behold now the Giver of all good things ; Go to. let us welcome with pomp and state Him who alone is mighty and great." With carpets of gold the ground they spread Wherever the Son of Man should tread, And in palace-chambers lofty and rare They lodged him, and served him with kingly fare. Great organs surged through arches dim Their jubilant floods in praise of him, ; LOWELL. 355 And in church and palace and judgment-hall He saw his image high over all. But still, wherever his steps they led, The Lord in sorrow bent down his head, And from under the heavy foundation-stones The Son of Mary heard bitter groans. And in church and palace and judgment-hail He marked great fissures that rent the wall, And opened wider and yet more wide As the living foundation heaved and sighed. " Have ye founded your thrones and altars, then, On the bodies and souls of living men ? And think ye that building shall endure Which shelters the noble and crushes the poor ? " With gates of silver and bars of gold Ye have fenced my sheep from their Father's fold : I have heard the dropping of their tears In heaven, these eigh teen-hundred years." " O Lord and Master, not ours the guilt, We build but as our fathers built; Behold thine images, how they stand, Sovereign and sole, through all our land. " Our task is hard, with sword and flame To hold thy earth for ever the same, And with sharp crooks of steel to keep Still, as thou leftest them, thy sheep." Then Christ sought out an artisan, A low-browed, stunted, haggard man, And a motherless girl, whose fingers .thin Pushed from her faintly want and sin. These set he in the midst of them ; And as they drew back their garment-hem. For fear of defilement, " Lo here," said he. " The im^es ve have made of me !" 356 LOWELL. TO WE too have autumns, when our leaves Drop loosely through the dampened air, When all our good seems bound in sheaves, And we stand reaped and bare. Our seasons have no fixed returns, Without our will they come and go ; At noon our sudden summer burns, Ere sunset all is snow. But each day brings less summer cheer, Crimps more our ineffectual spring. And something earlier every year Our singing birds take wing. As less the olden glow abides, And less the chillier heart aspires, With drift-wood beached in past spring-tides We light our sullen fires. By the pinched rushlighfs starving beam We cower and strain our wasted sight, To stitch youth's shroud up, seam by seam, In the long arctic night It was not so we once were young When Spring, to womanly Summer turning. Her dew-drops on each grass-blade strung, In the red sunrise burning. We trusted then, aspired, believed - That earth could be remade to-morrow; Ah why be ever undeceived ? Why give up faith for sorrow ? O thou whose days are yet all spring, Faith, blighted once, is past retrieving ; Experience is a dumb, dead thing ; The victory's in believing. LOWELL. 357 BIBLIOLATRES. BOWING thyself in dust before a Book, And thinking the great God is thine alone, O rash iconoclast, thou wilt not brook What gods the heathen carves in wood and stone ; As if the Shepherd who from outer cold Leads all his shivering lambs to one sure fold Were careful for the fashion of his crook. There is no broken reed so poor and base, No rush, the bending tilt of swamp-fly blue, But he therewith the ravening wolf can chase, And guide his flock to springs and pastures new; Through ways unlocked for, and through many lands, Far from the rich folds built with human hands, The gracious footprints of his love I trace. And what art thou, own brother of the clod, That from his hand the crook wouldst snatch away, And shake instead thy dry and sapless rod, To scare the sheep out of the wholesome day? Yea, what art thou, blind, unconverted Je\v, That with thy idol-volume's covers two Wouldst make a jail to coop the living God ? Thou hear'st not well the mountain organ-strains By prophet ears from Hor and Sinai caught, Thinking the cisterns of those Hebrew brains Drew dry the springs of the All-knower's thought ; Nor shall thy lips be touched with living fire, Who blow'st old altar-coals with sole desire To weld anew the spirit's broken chains. God is not dumb, that he should speak no more ; If thou hast wanderings in the wilderness And find'st not Sinai, 'tis thy soul is poor. There towers the mountain of the Voice no less, Which whoso seeks shall find ; but he who bends, Intent on manna still and mortal ends, Sees it not, neither hears its thundered lore. ;8 LOWELL. Slowly the Bible of the race is writ, And not on paper leaves nor leaves of stone ; Each age, each kindred, adds a verse to it, Texts of despair or hope, of joy or moan. While swings the sea, while mists the mountains shroud, While thunder's surges burst on cliffs of cloud. Still at the prophets' feet the nations sit. TO A. C. I, THROUGH suffering and sorrow thou hast passed To show us what a woman true may be. They have not taken sympathy from thee, Nor made thee any other than thou wast ; Save as some tree which, in a sudden blast, Sheddeth those blossoms that are weakly grown Upon the air, but keepeth every one Whose strength gives warrant of good fruit at last, So thou hast shed some blooms of gaiety, But never one of steadfast cheerfulness ; Nor hath thy knowledge of adversity Robbed thee of any faith in happiness, But rather cleared thine inner eyes to see How many simple ways there are to bless. SONNET. 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 cloth lie, Love, whose forgetfulness is beauty's death, IT , LOWELL. 359 Whose mystic key these cells of Thou and I Into the infinite freedom openeth, And makes the body's dark and narrow grate The wide-flung leaves of Heaven's palace-gate. THE STREET. THEY pass me by like shadows, crowds on crowds, Dim ghosts of men, that hover to and fro, Hugging their bodies round them, like thin shrouds Wherein their souls were buried long ago : They trampled on their youth, and faith, and love, They cast their hope of human-kind away, With Heaven's clear messages they madly strove, And conquered, and their spirits turned to clay. Lo ! how they wander round the world, their grave, \Vhose ever-gaping maw by such is fed, Gibbering at living men, and idly rave, "We, only, truly live, but ye are dead." Alas ! poor fools, the anointed eye may trace A dead soul's epitaph in every face ! SONNET. 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 happy world must be Love's deepest spokesman and interpreter. But, as a mother feels her child first 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 enfold 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. 360 MARIA LOWELL. MARIA LOWELL. [Born towards 1820, daughter of Mr. White, an opulent citizen of Watertown, Massachusetts ; married the poet Lowell in 1844 ; died towards 1856]. 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, sure as morning came, Behind her cradle-bars she smiled To catch the first faint ray, As from the trellis smiles the flower 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 ; And 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, ^L T MARIA LOWELL. 361 As on the little dewdrops round Shines back the heart of day. We never could have thought, O 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 Upspringing from the ground ; The tender things the winter killed Renew again their birth, But the glory of our morning Has passed away from earth. Oh 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. 362 ALICE CAREY. ALICE CAREY. [Born in 1820, died in 1871. Miss Carey, who was mainly self- educated, published her first volume of poems at the age of eighteen: her longest poetical work is named 1 'he Maiden of Tlascala, in cluded in a collection issued in 1855. Her Clovernook Papers and other prose writings have earned considerable popularity, both in America and in England]. PALESTINE. BRIGHT inspiration ! shadowing ray heart Like a sweet thing of beauty could I see Tabor and Carmel ere I hence depart, And tread the quiet vales of Galilee, And look from Hermon, with its dew and flowers, Upon the broken walls and mossy towers O'er which the Son of Man in sadness wept, The golden promise of my life were kept. Alas ! the beauteous cities, crowned with flowers, And robed with royalty ! no more in thee, Fretted with golden pinnacles and towers, They sit in haughty beauty by the sea : Shadows of rocks, precipitate and dark, Rest still and heavy where they found a grave ; There glides no more the humble fisher's bark, And the wild heron drinks not of the wave. But still the silvery willows fringe the rills, Judea's shepherd watches still his fold ; And round about Jerusalem the hills Stand in their solemn grandeur as of old ; And Sharon's roses still as sweetly bloom As when the apostles, in the days gone by, Rolled back the shadows from the dreary tomb, And brought to light Life's Immortality. The East has laid down many a beauteous bride In the dim silence of the sepulchre, Whose names are shrined in story, but beside Their lives no sign to tell they ever were The imperial fortresses of old renown AT.ICE CARRY. 363 Pvome, Carthage, Thebes alas ! where are they now ? In the dim distance lost and crumbled down ; The glory that was of them from her brow Took off the wreath in centuries gone by, And walked the path of shadows silently. But Palestine ! what hopes are born of thee ! I cannot paint their beauty ; hopes that rise, Linking this perishing mortality To the bright deathless glories of the skies : Where the sweet Babe of Bethlehem was born Love's mission finished there in Calvary's gloom There blazed the glories of the rising morn, And Death lay gasping there at Jesus' tomb ! OLD STORIES. No beautiful star will twinkle To-night through my window-pane, As I list to the mournful falling Of the leaves and the autumn rain. High up in his leafy covert The squirrel a shelter hath ; And the tall grass hides the rabbit, Asleep in the churchyard path. On the hills is a voice of wailing For the pale dead flowers again, That sounds like the heavy trailing Of robes in a funeral train. Oh if there were one who loved me A kindly and grey-haired sire, To sit and rehearse old stories To-night by my cabin fire : The winds as they would might rattle The boughs of the ancient trees In the tale of a stirring battle My heart would forget all these. 364 ALICE CAREY. Or if by the embers dying We talked of the past, the while, I should see bright spirits flying From the pyramids and the Nile. Echoes from harps long silent Would troop through the aisles of time, And rest on the soul like sunshine, If we talked of the bards sublime. But hark ! did a phantom call me, Or was it the wind went by ? Wild are my thoughts and restless, But they have no power to fly. In place of the cricket humming, And the moth by the candle's light, I hear but the deathwatch drumming I've heard it the livelong night. Oh for a friend who loved me Oh for a grey-haired sire, To sit with a quaint old story, To-night by my cabin fire ! TO LUCY. THE leaves are rustling mournfully, The yellow leaves and sere ; For Winter with his naked arms And chilling breath is here : The rills, that all the autumn-time Went singing to the sea, Are waiting in their icy chains For Spring to set them free ; No bird is heard the live-long day Upon its mates to call, And coldly and capriciously The slanting sunbeams fall. ALICE CAREY. 365 There is a shadow on my heart I cannot fling aside Sweet sister of my soul, with thee Hope's brightest roses died ! I'm thinking of the pleasant hours That vanished long ago, When summer was the goldenest, And all things caught its glow : I'm thinking where the violets In fragrant beauty lay, Of the buttercups and primroses That blossomed in our way. I see the willow, and the spring O'ergrown with purple sedge ; The lilies and the scarlet pinks That grew along the hedge ; The meadow where the elm-tree threw Its shadows dark and wide, And sister-flowers in beauty grew, And perished side by side. O'er the accustomed vale and hill Now Winter's robe is spread ; The beetle and the moth are still, And all the flowers are dead. I mourn for thee, sweet sister, When the wintry hours are here ; But when the days grow long and bright, And skies are blue and clear Oh when the summer's banquet Among the flowers is spread, My spirit is most sorrowful That thou art with the dead. We laid thee in thy narrow bed When autumn winds were high Thy life had taught us how to live, And then we learned to die. 366 P1KEBE CAREY. THCEBE CAREY. [Born towards 1822, died in 1871. Sister of Alice Carey, with whom she was closely associated both in daily life and in literary work]. DEATH SCENE. DYING, still slowly dying, As the hours of night rode by, She had lain since the light of sunset Was red on the evening sky, Till after the middle watches, As we softly near her trod, When her soul from its prison-fetters Was loosed by the hand of God. One moment her pale lips trembled With the triumph she might not tell, As the sight of the life immortal On her spirit's vision fell ; Then the look of rapture faded, And the beautiful smile was faint, As that in some convent-picture On the face of a dying saint. And we felt in the lonesome midnight, As we sat by the silent dead, What a light on the path going downward The feet of the righteous shed ; When we thought how with faith unshrinking She came to the Jordan's tide, And, taking the hand of the Saviour, Went up on the heavenly side. READ. 567 THOMAS BUCHANAN READ. [Born in 1822, died in 1872. Mr. Read was a painter, and of late years lived mostly in Florence. His longest poem is named The New Pastoral, in 37 books, published in 1855]. THE CLOSING SCENE. WITHIN his sober realm ofleafless 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 grey barns, looking from their hazy hills O'er the dim waters widening in the vales, Sent down .the air a greeting to the mills, On the dull thunder of alternate flails. All sights were mellowed and all sounds subdued, The hills seemed farther and the streams sang low ; As in a dream the distant woodman hewed His winter log, with many a muffled blow. On slumbrous wings the vulture held his flight, The dove scarce heard his sighing mate's complaint, And like a star slow drowning in the light The village church-vane seemed to pale and faint. The sentinel-cock upon the hill-side crew Crew thrice, and all was stiller than before, Silent till some replying warder blew His alien horn, 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 masons ot the eaves, The busy swallows, circling ever near, Foreboding, as the rustic mind believes, \r\ early harvest and a plenteous year ; , 368 READ. Where every bird which charmed the vernal feast Shook the sweet slumber from its wings at morn, To warn the reaper of the rosy east, All now was songless, empty, and forlorn. Alone from out the stubble piped the quail, And croaked the crow through all the dreamy gloom : Alone the pheasant drumming in the vale Made echo to the distant cottage-loom. There was no bud, no bloom, upon the bowers ; The spiders wove 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 crust, And in the dead leaves still she heard the stir Of his black mantle trailing in the dust While yet her cheek was bright with summer bloom, Her country summoned, and she gave her all ; And War, to her twice bowing his dark plume, Regave the swords to rust upon her wall. Long, but not loud, the droning wheel went on, Like the low murmur of a hive at noon ; Long, but 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 dropped the distaff through his hands serene, And neighbours came and smoothed the careful shroud, Where double winter closed the autumn scene. READ. 369 BERTHA. MILD Bertha's was a home withdrawn Beyond the city's din; Tall Lombard-trees hemmed all the lawn ; And, up the long straight walks, a dawn Of blossoms shone within. Along the pebble paths the maid Walked with the early hours, With careful hands the vines arrayed, And plucked the small intruding blade From formal plots of flowers. A statued Dian to the air Bequeathed its mellow light; She called the flying figure fair, The forward eyes and backward hair, And praised the marble's white. Her pulses coursed their quiet ways, From heart to brain controlled ; She read and praised in studied phrase The bards whom it were sin to prais In measured words and cold. I love the broad bright world of snow, And every strange device Which makes the woods a frozen show, The rivers hard and still ; but oh Ne'er loved a heart of ice ! AURELIA. WHERE flamed a field of flowers, and where Sang noisy birds and brooks, Aurelia to the frolic air Shook down her wanton waves of hair, With laughter-loving looks. 2 A 370 READ. Her large and lustrous eyes of blue, Dashed with the dew of mirth, Bequeathed to all their brilliant hue ; She saw no shades, nor even knew She walked the heavy earth. Her ringing laughter woke the dells, When fell the autumn blight ; She sang through all the rainy spells ; For her the snow was full of bells Of music and delight. She swept on her bewildering way, By every pleasure kissed, Making a mirth of night and day, A brook all sparkle and all spray, Dancing itself to mist. I love all bright and happy things. And joys which are not brief; All sights and sounds whence pleasure springs ~ s But weary of the harp whose strings Are never tuned to grief. A GLIMPSE OF LOVE. SHE came, as comes the summer wind, A gust of beauty to my heart ; Then swept away, but left behind Emotions that shall not depart. Unheralded she came and went, Like music in the silent night, Which, when the burthened air is spent. Bequeaths to memory its delight; Or, like the sudden April bow That spans the violet-waking rain, She made those blessed flowers to grow Which may not fall or fade ago*" w Ijp READ. 371 Far sweeter than all things most sweet, And fairer than all things most fair, She came and passed with footsteps fleet, A shining wonder in the air. THE DESERTED FARM. THE elms were old, and gnarled, and bent ; The fields, untilled, were choked with weeds, Where, every year, the thistles sent Wider and wider their winged seeds. Farther and farther the nettle and dock Went colonizing o'er the plain ; Growing, each season, a plenteous stock Of burrs to protect their wild domain. The last who ever had ploughed the soil Now in the furrowed churchyard lay ; The boy who whistled to lighten his toil Was a sexton somewhere far away. Instead, you saw how the rabbit and mole Burrowed and furrowed with never a fear ; How the tunnelling fox looked out of his hole, Like one who notes if the skies are clear. No mower was there to startle the birds With the noisy whet of his reeking scythe ; The quail, like a cow-boy calling his herds, Whistled to tell that his heart was blithe. Now all was bequeathed, with pious care The groves and fields fenced round with briars To the birds that sing in the cloisters of air, And the squirrels, those merry woodland friars. xu 372 READ. BALBOA. FROM San Domingo's crowded \vharf Fernandez' vessel bore, To seek in unknown lands afar The Indian's golden ore. And hid among the freighted casks, Where none might see or know, Was one of Spain's immortal men, Three hundred years ago. But, when the fading town and land Had dropped below the sea, He met the captain face to face, And not a fear had he. "What villain thou ?" Fernandez cried. "And wherefore serve us so?" " To be thy follower," he replied, Three hundred years ago. He wore a manly form and face, A courage firm and bold ; His words fell on his comrades' hearts Like precious drops of gold. They saw not his ambitious soul ; He spoke it not for lo ! He stood among the common ranks Three hundred years ago. But when Fernandez' vessel lay At golden Darien, A murmur, born of discontent, Grew loud among the men : And with the word there came the act j And with the sudden blow They raised Balboa from the ranks, Three hundred years ago. -4* , READ. 373 And, while he took command beneath The banner of hii lord, A mighty purpose grasped his soul, As he had grasped the sword. He saw the mountain's far blue height, Whence golden waters flow ; Then with his men he rcaled the crags, Three hundred years ago. He led them up through tangled brakes, The rivulet's sliding bed, And through ihe storm of poisoned darts From many an ambush shed. He gained the turret crag alone And wept to see below An ocean boundless and unknown, Three hundred years ago. And, while he raised upon that height The banner of his lord, The mighty purpose grasped him still. As still he grasped his sword. Then down he rushed with all his men, As headlong rivers flow, And plunged knee-deep into the sea, Three hundred years ago. And, while he held above his head The conquering flag of Spain, He waved his gleaming sword, and smote The waters of the main : For Rome ! for Leon ! and Castile ! Thrice gave the cleaving blow ; And thus Balboa claimed the sea., Three hundred years ago. -4* 374 READ. FRAGMENTS FROM THE REALM OF DREAMS. "Th? baseless fabric of a vision." OFT have I wandered through the Realm of Dreams, By shadowy mountains and clear running streams, Catching at times strange transitory gleams Of Eden vistas, glimmering through a haze Of floral splendour, where the birds, ablaze With colour, streaked the air like flying stars, With momentary bars ; And heard low music breathe above, around, As if the air within itcelf made sound, Vs if the soul of Melody were pent Wit'.iin some unseen instrument, Hung in a viewless tower of air, And with enchanted pipes beguiled its own despair. But stranger than all other dreams which led, Asleep or waking, my adventurous tread Were these vhich came of late to me Through fields of slumber, and did seem to be Wrapped in an awful robe of prophecy. I walked the woods of March, and through the boughs The earliest bird was calling to his spouse ; And in the sheltered nooks Lay spots of snow, Or with a noiseless flow Stole down into the brooks; And where the springtime sun haa longest shone The violet looked up and found itself alone. Anon I came unto a noisy river, And felt the bridge beneath me sw? y and quiver ; Below, the hungry waters howled and hissed, And upward blew a blinding cloud of mist ; B-it there the friendly Iris built its arch, And I in safety took my onward march Now coming to a mighty hill, Along the shelvy pathway of a rill Which danced itself to foam and spray, I clomb my steady way. READ. 375 It may be that the music of the brook Gave me new strength It may be that I took Fresh vigour from the mountain air Which cooled my cheek and fanned my hair ; Or was it that adown the breeze Came sounds of wondrous melodies, Strange sounds as of a maiden's voice Making her mountain home rejoice? Following that sweet strain, I mounted still, And gained the highest hemlocks of the hill, Old guardians of a little lake, which sent Adown the brook its crystal merriment, Blessing the valley where the planter went Sowing the furrowed mould and whistling his content. Through underwood of laurel, and across A little lawn shoe-deep with sweetest moss, I passed, and found the lake, which, like a shield Some giant long had ceased to wield, Lay with its edges sunk in sand and stone, With ancient roots and grasses overgrown. But far more beautiful and rare Than any strange device that e'er Glittered upon the azure field Of ancient warrior's polished shield Was the fair vision which did lie Embossed upon the burnished lake, And in its sweet repose did make A second self that sang to the inverted sky. Not she who lay on banks of thornless flowers Ere stole the Serpent into Eden's bowers ; Not she who rose from Neptune's deep abodes The wonder of Olympian Gods ; Nor all the fabled nymphs of wood or stream Which blest the Arcadian's dream, Could with that floating form compare, Lying with her golden harp and hair Bright as a cloud in the sunset air. Her tresses gleamed with many stars, And on her forehead one, like Mars, A lovely crown of light dispread - 376 READ. Around her shining head. And now she touched her harp, and sung Strange songs in a forgotten tongue ; And, as my spirit heard, it seemed To feel what it had lived or dreamed In other worlds beyond our skies, In ancient spheres of paradise ; And as I gazed upon her face It seemed that I could dimly trace Dear lineaments long lost of yore Upon some unremembered shore, Beyond an old and infinite sea, In the realm of an unknown century. For very joy I clapped my hands, And leaped upon the nearest sands ! A moment, and the maiden glanced Upon me where I stood entranced ; Then noiselessly as moonshine falls Adown the ocean's crystal walls, And with no stir or wave attended, Slowly through the lake descended ; Till from her hidden form below The waters took a golden glow, As if the star which made her forehead bright Had burst and filled the lake with light ! Long standing there I watched in vain, The vision would not rise again. Again, in sleep, I walked by singing streams, And it was May-day in my Realm of Dreams The flowering pastures and the trees Were full of noisy birds and bees ; And, swinging roses like sweet censers, went The village children making merriment, Followed by older people ; as they passed, One beckoned, and I joined the last. We crossed the meadow, crossed the brool; ? And through the scented woodland took Our happy way, until we found An open space of vernal ground ; READ. 377 And there around the flowery pole I joined the joyous throng, and sang with all my soul. But, when the little ones had crowned their queen, And danced their mazes to the wooded scene, To hunt the honeysuckles, and carouse Under the spice-wood boughs, I turned, and saw with wondering eye A maiden in a bower near by, Wreathed with unknown blossoms, such as bloom In orient isles with wonderful perfume. And she was very beautiful and bright ; And in her face was much of that strange light Which on the mountain lake had blessed my sight ; Her speech was like the echo of that song Which on the hillside made me strong. Now with a wreath, now with a coin she played, Pursuing a most marvellous trade Buying the lives of young and old, Some with fame, and some with gold. And there with trembling steps I came; But ere I asked for gold or fame, Or ere I could announce my name, The wreath fell withered from her head, And from her face the mask was shed ; Her mantle dropped and lo ! the morning sun Looked on me through a nameless skeleton ! Again I stood within the Realm of Dreams, At midnight, on a huge and shadowy tower ; And from the east the full moon shed her beams. And from the sky a wild meteoric shower Startled the darkness ; and the night Was full of ominous voices and strange light, Like to a madman's brain. Below Prophetic tongues proclaiming woe Echoed the sullen roar Of ocean on the neighbouring shore ; And in the west a forest caught the sound, And bore it to its utmost bound. And then, for hours, all stood as to behold 378 READ. Some great event by mighty seers foretold; And all the while the moon above the sea Grew strangely large and red, and suddenly, Followed by a myriad stars, Swung at one sweep into the western sky, And, widening with a melancholy roar. Broke to a hundred flaming bars, Grating the heavens as with a dungeon-door. Then to that burning gate A radiant spirit came, and through the grate Smiled till I knew the Angel, Fate ! And in its hand a golden key it bore To open that celestial door. Sure, I beheld that angel thrice ; Twice met on earth, it mocked me twice ; But now behind those bars it beamed Such love as I had never dreamed, Smiling my prisoned soul to peace With eyes that promised quick release ; And looks thus spake to looks, where lips on earth were dumb, " Behold, behold, the hour is come !" THE WAY. A WEARY, wandering soul am I, O'erburthened with an earthly weight ; A pilgrim through the world and sky, Toward the Celestial Gate. Tell me, ye sweet and sinless flowers, Who all night gaze upon the skies, Have ye not in the silent hours Seen aught of Paradise ? Ye birds, that soar and sing, elate With joy, that makes your voices strong, Have ye not at the golden gate Caught somewhat of your song ? READ. 379 Ye waters, sparkling in the morn, Ye seas, which glass the starry night, Have ye not from the imperial bourn Caught glimpses of its light ? Ye hermit oaks, and sentinel pines, Ye mountain forests old and grey, In all your long and winding lines Have ye not seen the way? O moon, among thy starry bovvers, Know'st thou the path the angels tread ? Seest thou beyond thy azure towers The shining gates dispread ? Ye holy spheres, that sang with earth When earth was still a sinless star, Have the immortals heavenly birth Within your realms afar ? And thou, O sun ! whose light unfurls Bright banners through unnumbered skies, Seest thou among thy subject worlds The radiant portals rise ? All, all are mute ! and still am I O'erburthened with an earthly weight ; A pilgrim through the world and sky, Toward the Celestial Gate. No answer wheresoe'er I roam From skies afar no guiding ray ; But hark ! the voice of Christ says, " Come ! Arise ! I am the way !" 380 BOKER. GEORGE HENRY BOKER. [Born in 1823. A gentleman of fortune, author of Anne Boleyi n. tragedy, and of various other dramas and poems]. A BALLAD OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN. " The ice was here, the ice was there, The ice was all around." COLERIDGE. " O WHITHER sail you, Sir John Franklin ?" Cried a whaler in Baffin's Bay. " To know if between the land and the pole I may find a broad sea-way." " I charge you back, Sir John Franklin, As you would live and thrive ; For between the land and the frozen pole No man may sail alive." But lightly laughed the stout Sir John, And spoke unto his men : " Half England is wrong, if he is right; Bear off to westward then." " whither sail you, brave Englishman ?'"' Cried the little Esquimaux. '' Between your land and the polar star My goodly vessels go." " Come down, if you would journey there," The little Indian said ; " And change your cloth for fur clothing, Your vessel for a sled." But lightly laughed the stout Sir John, And the crew laughed with him too : A sailor to change from ship to sled, I ween, were something new ! All through the long, long polar day, The vessels westward sped ; And, wherever the sail of Sir John was blown, The ice gave way and fled : BOKEK, 381 Gave way with many a hollow groan, And with many a surly roar ; But it murmured and threatened on every side, And closed wheie he sailed before. ' Ho ! see ye not, my merry men, The broad and open sea ? Bethink ye what the whaler said, Think of the little Indian's sled !" The crew laughed out in glee. " Sir John, Sir John, 'tis bitter cold, The scud drives on the breeze, The ice comes looming from the north, The very sunbeams freeze." " Bright summer goes, dark winter comes We cannot rule the year ; But, long e'er summer's sun goes down, On 3 r onder sea we'll steer." The dripping icebergs dipped and rose, And floundered down the gale : The ships were stayed, the yards were manned, And furled the useless sail. " The summer's gone, the winter's come, We sail not on yonder sea : Why sail we not, Sir John Franklin?" A silent man was he. " The summer goes, the winter comes We cannot rule the year." " I ween, we cannot rule the ways, Sir John, wherein we'd steer." The cruel ice came flo'iting on, And closed beneath the lee, Till the thickening waters dashed no more ; 'Twas ice around, behind, before My God ! there is no sea! 382 BOKRR. What think you of the whaler now ? What of the Esquimaux ? A sled were better than a ship, To cruise through ice and snow. Down sank the baleful crimson sun, The northern light came out, And glared upon the ice-bound ships, And shook its spears about. The snow came down, storm breeding storm, And on the decks was laid : Till the weary sailor, sick at heart. Sank down beside his spade. " Sir John, the night is black and long, The hissing wind is bleak, The hard, green ice is strong as death : I prithee, Captain, speak ! " " The night is neither bright nor short, The singing breeze is cold ; The ice is not so strong as hope The heart of man is bold !" " What hope can scale this icy wall, High o'er the main flag-staff? Above the ridges the wolf and bear Look down with a patient, settled stare, Look down on us and laugh." " The summer went, the winter came We could not rule the year ; But summer will melt the ice again, And open a path to the sunny main, Whereon our ships shall steer." The winter went, the summer went, The winter came around : But the hard green ice was strong as death, And the voice of hope sank to a breath, Yet caught at every soun<*. BOKER. 383 " Hark ! heard ye not the noise of guns? And there, and there, again ?'' " 'Tis some uneasy iceberg's roar, As he turns in the frozen main." " Hurrah ! hurrah ! the Esquimaux Across the ice-fields steal : God give them grace for their charity !"' "Ye pray for the silly seal." " Sir John, where are the English fields, And where are the English trees, And where are the little English flowers That open in the breeze?" " Be still, be still, my brave sailors ! You shall see the fields again, And smell the scent of the opening flowers, The grass and the waving grain." " Oh ! when shall I see my orphan child ? My Mary waits for me." " Oh ! when shall I see my old mother And pray at her trembling knee?" " Be still, be still, my brave sailors ! Think not such thoughts again." But a tear froze slowly on his cheek ; He thought of Lady Jane. Ah ! bitter, bitter grows the cold, The ice grows more and more ; More settled stare the wolf and bear, More patient than before. " Oh ! think you, good Sir John Franklin, We'll ever see the land ? Twas cruel to send us here to starve, Without a helping hand. " 'Twas cruel, Sir John, to send us here, So far from help or home, 384 BOKER. To starve and freeze on this lonely sea: I ween, the Lords of the Admiralty Would rather send than come." " Oh ! whether we starve to death alone, Or sail to our own country, We have done what man has never done- The truth is founded, the secret won We passed the Northern Sea !" TO THE MEMORY OF M. A. R. WITH the mild light some unambitious star Illumes her pathway through the heavenly blue,- So unobtrusive that the careless view Scarce notes her where her haughtier sisters are, So ran thy life. Perhaps, from those afar, Thy gentle radiance little wonder drew, And all their praise was for the brighter few. Yet mortal vision is a grievous bar To perfect judgment. Were the distance riven, Our eyes might find that star so faintly shone Because it journeyed through a higher zone, Had more majestic sway and duties given, Far loftier station on the heights of heaven, Was next to God, and circled round his throne. TO J. M. B. I WONDER, darling, if there does not wear Something from love, with love's so daily use,- If in the sweetness of his vigorous juice Time's bitter finger dips not here and there. What thing of earthly growth itself can bear Above its nature, overrule abuse, And, like the marvel of the widow's cruse, Freshen its taint, and all its loss repair ? I can but wonder at the faithful heart BAYARD TAYLOR. 385 That makes thy face so joyous in my sight, And fills each moment with a new delight. I can but wonder at the shades that start Across thy features as we stand to-night, With lips thus clinging, in the act to part SONNET. ABSENCE from thee is something worse than death ; For, to the heart that slumbers in the shroud, What are the mourners' tears and clamours loud, The open grave, the dismal cypress-wreath ? The quiet body misses not its breath ; The pain that shivers through the weeping crowd Is idle homage to the visage proud That changeth not for all Affliction saith. But to be thus, from thee so far away, Is as though I, in seeming death, might be Conscious of all that passed about my clay ; As though I saw my doleful obsequy, Mourned my own loss, rebelled against decay, And felt thy tear-drops trickling over me. JAMES BAYARD TAYLOR. [Born in 1825. Best known in this country as a traveller : be tween the summer of 1851 and the close of 1853 he went round the world, and has made various other long tours, including an early experience of the gold-fields of California. His Poems of the Orient, published in 1854, and various other works in verse and prose, are the result of his travels. Mr. Taylor has also been one of the editors of the Neiv York Tribnne\. METEMPSYCHOSIS OF THE PIXE. As when the haze of some wan moonlight makes Familiar fields a land of mystery, Where all is changed, and some new presence wakes In flower, and bush, and tree, 2 B 386 BAYARD TAYLOR. Another life the life of day o'erwhelms ; The past from present consciousness takes hue, And we remember vast and cloudy realms Our feet have wandered through : So, oft, some moonlight of the mind makes dumb The stir of outer thought : wide-open seems The gate wherethrough strange sympathies have come, The secret of our dreams ; The source of fine impressions, shooting deep Below the failing plummet of the sense ; Which strike beyond all time, and backward sweep Through all intelligence. We touch the lower life of beast and clod, And the long 7 process of the ages see From blind old Chaos, ere the breath of God Moved it to harmony. All outward wisdom yields to that within, Whereof nor creed nor canon holds the key ; We only feel that we have ever been, And evermore shall be ; And thus I know, by memories unfurled In rarer moods, and many a nameless sign, That once in time, and somewhere in the world, I was a towering Pine, Rooted upon a cape that overhung The entrance to a mountain-gorge ; whereon The wintry shadow of a peak was flung, Long after rise of sun. Behind, the silent snows ; and, wide below, The rounded hills made level, lessening down To where a river washed with sluggish flow A many-templed town. BAYARD TAYLOR. 387 There did I clutch the granite with firm feet, There shake my boughs above the roaring gulf, When mountain whirlwinds through the passes beat. And howled the mountain wolf. There did I louder sing than all the floods Whirled in white foam adown the precipice, And the sharp sleet that stung the naked woods Answer with sullen hiss. But, when the peaceful clouds rose white and high On blandest airs that April skies could bring, Through all my fibres thrilled the tender sigh, The sweet unrest of Spring. She, with warm fingers laced in mine, did melt In fragrant balsam my reluctant blood ; And with a smart of keen delight I felt The sap in every bud, And tingled through my rough old bark, and fast Pushed out the younger green, that smoothed my tones, When last year's needles to the wind I cast, And shed my scaly cones. I held the eagle, till the mountain mist Rolled from the azure paths he came to soar, And, like a hunter, on my gnarled wrist The dappled falcon bore. Poised o'er the blue abyss, the morning lark Sang, wheeling near in rapturous carouse, And hart and hind, soft-pacing through the dark, Slept underneath my boughs. Down on the pasture-slopes the herdsman lay, And for the flock his birchen trumpet blew- There ruddy children tumbled in their play, And lovers came to woo. 388 BAYARD TAYLOR. And once an army, crowned with triumph, came Out of the hollow bosom of the gorge, With mighty banners in the wind aflame, Borne on a glittering surge Of tossing spears, a flood that homeward rolled, While cymbals timed their steps of victory, And horn and clarion from their throats of gold Sang with a savage glee. I felt the mountain-walls below me shake, Vibrant with sound, and through my branches poured The glorious gust : my song thereto did make Magnificent accord. Some blind harmonic instinct pierced the rind Of that slow life which made me straight and high, And I became a harp for every wind, A voice for every sky ; When fierce autumnal gales began to blow, Roaring all day in concert hoarse and deep ; And then made silent with my weight of snow, A spectre on the steep ; Filled with a whispering gush, like that which flows Through organ-stops, when sank the sun's red disk Beyond the city, and in blackness rose Temple and obelisk ; Or breathing soft, as one who sighs in prayer, Mysterious sounds of portent and of might, What time I felt the wandering waves of air Pulsating through the night. And thus for centuries my rhythmic chant Rolled down the gorge or surged about the hill : Gentle, or stern, or sad, or jubilant, At every season's will. BAYARD TAYLOR. 389 No longer Memory whispers whence arose The doom that tore me from my place of pride : Whether the storms that load the peak with snows, And start the mountain-slide, Let fall a fiery bolt to smite my top, Upwrenched my roots, and o'er the precipice Hurled me, a dangling wreck, ere long to drop Into the wild abyss ; Or whether hands of men, with scornful strength And force from Nature's rugged armoury lent, Sawed through my heart, and rolled my tumbling length Sheer down the steep descent. All sense departed, with the boughs I wore ; And, though I moved with mighty gales at strife, A mast upon the seas, I sang no more, And music was my life. Yet still that life awakens, brings again Its airy anthems, resonant and long, Till earth and sky, transfigured, fill my brain With rhythmic sweeps of song. .Thence am I made a poet : thence are sprung Those motions of the soul that sometimes reach Beyond all grasp of Art, for which the tongue Is ignorant of speech. And, if some wild full-gathered harmony Roll its unbroken music through my line, Believe there murmurs, faintly though it be, The Spirit of the Pine. 390 BAYARD TAYLOR. KUBLEH ; A STORY OF THE ASSYRIAN DESERT. THE black-eyed children of the Desert drove Their flocks together at the set of sun. The tents were pitched ; the weary camels bent Their suppliant necks, and knelt upon the sand ; The hunters quartered by the kindled fires The wild boars of the Tigris they had slain ; And all the stir and sound of evening ran Throughout the Shammar camp. The dewy air Bore its full burden of confused delight Across the flowery plain ; and, while afar The snows of Koordish Mountains in the ray Flashed roseate amber, Nimroud's ancient mound Rose broad and black against the burning West. The shadows deepened, and the stars came out, Sparkling in violet ether ; one by one Glimmered the ruddy camp-fires X)n the plain, And shapes of steed and horseman moved among The dusky tents with shout and jostling cry, And neigh and restless prancing. Children ran To hold the thongs, while every rider drove His quivering spear in the earth, and by his door Tethered the horse he loved. In midst of all Stood Shammeriyah, whom they dared not touch, The foal of wondrous Kubleh, to the Sheik A dearer wealth than all his Georgian girls. But when their meal was o'er, when the red fires Blazed brighter, and the dogs no longer bayed, When Shammar hunters with the boys sat down To cleanse their bloody knives, came Alimar, The poet of the tribe, whose songs of love Are sweeter than Bassora's nightingales, Whose songs of war can fire the Arab blood Like war itself: who knows not Alimar? Then asked the men : " O poet, sing of Kubleh !" And boys laid down the knives half burnished, saying ; " Tell us of Kubleh, whom we never saw Of wondrous Kubleh !" Closer flocked the group BAYARD TAYLOR. W With eager eyes about the flickering fire, While Alimar, beneath the Assyrian stars, Sang to the listening Arabs : " God is great ! O Arabs, never yet since Mahmoud rode The sands of Yemen, and by Mecca's gate The winged steed bestrode whose mane of fire Blazed up the zenith, when, by Allah called, He bore the prophet to the walls of heaven, Was like to Kubleh, Sofuk's wondrous mare : Not all the milk-white barbs, whose hoofs dashed flame, In Bagdad's stables, from the marble floor Who, swathed in purple housings, pranced in state The gay bazaars, by great Al-Raschid backed : Not the wild charger of Mongolian breed That went o'er half the world with Tamerlane : Nor yet those flying coursers, long ago From Ormuz brought by swarthy Indian grooms To Persia's kings the foals of sacred mares, Sired by the fiery stallions of the sea ! " Who ever told, in all the Desert Land, The many deeds of Kubleh ? Who can tell Whence came she, whence her like shall come again? O Arabs, like a tale of Scherezade Heard in the camp, when javelin-shafts are tried On the hot eve of battle, is her story. " Far in the Southern sands, the hunters say, Did Sofuk find her, by a lonely palm. The well had dried; her fierce, impatient eye Glared red and sunken, and her slight young limbs Were lean with thirst. He checked his camel's pace. And, while it knelt, untied the water-skin ; And, when the wild mare drank, she followed him. Thence none but Sofuk might the saddle gird Upon her back, or clasp the brazen gear About her shining head, that brooked no curb From even him ; for she, alike, was royal. 392 BAYARD TAYLOR. " Her form was lighter, in its shifting grace, Than some impassioned Almee's, when the dance Unbinds her scarf, and golden anklets gleam Through floating drapery, on the buoyant air. Her light, free head was ever held aloft ; Between her slender and transparent ears The silken forelock tossed ; her nostril's arch, Thin-drawn, in proud and pliant beauty spread, Snuffing the desert winds. Her glossy neck Curved to the shoulder like an eagle's wing, And all her matchless lines of flank and limb Seemed fashioned from the flying shapes of air By hands of lightning. When the war-shouts rang From tent to tent, her keen and restless eye Shone like a blood-red ruby, and her neigh Rang wild and sharp above the clash of spears, " The tribes of Tigris and the Desert knew her. Sofuk before the Shammar bands she bore To meet the dread Jebours, who waited not To bid her welcome ; and the savage Koord, Chased from his bold irruption on the plain, Has seen her hoofprints in his mountain-snow. Lithe as the dark-eyed Syrian gazelle, O'er ledge and chasm and barren steep, arnid The Sindjar hills, she ran the wild ass down. Through many a battle's thickest brunt she stormed, Reeking with sweat and dust, and fetlock -deep In curdling gore. When hot and lurid haze Stifled the crimson sun, she swept before The whirling sand-spout, till her gusty mane Flared in its vortex, while the camels lay Groaning and helpless on the fiery waste. " The tribes of Taurus and the Caspian knew her : The Georgian chiefs have heard her trumpet-neigh Before the walls of Teflis. Pines that grow On ancient Caucasus have harboured her, Sleeping by Sofuk in their spicy gloom. The surf of Trebizond has bathed her flanks, BAYARD TAYLOR. 393 When from the shore she saw the white-sailed bark That brought him home from Stamboul. Never yet, O Arabs, never yet was like to Kubleh ! ' And Sofuk loved her. She was more to him Than all his snowy-bosomed odalisques For many years, beside his tent she stood, The glory of the tribe. " At last she died : Died, while the fire was yet in all her limbs Died for the life of Sofuk, whom she loved. The base Jebours on whom be Allah's curse ! Came on his path when far from any camp, And would have slain him, but that Kubleh sprang Against the javelin-points and bore them down, And gained the open desert. Wounded sore, She urged her light limbs into maddening speed, And made the wind a laggard. On and on The red sand slid beneath her, and behind Whirled in a swift and cloudy turbulence, As when some star of Eblis, downward hurled By Allah's bolt, sweeps with its burning hair The waste of darkness. On and on, the bleak Bare ridges rose before her, came, and passed ; And every flying leap with fresher blood Her nostril stained, till Sofuk's brow and breast Were flecked with crimson foam. He would have turned To save his treasure, though himself were lost, But Kubleh fiercely snapped the brazen rein. At last, when through her spent and quivering frame The sharp throes ran, our distant tents arose, And, with a neigh whose shrill excess of joy O'ercame its agony, she stopped and fell. The Shammar men came round her as she lay, And Sofuk raised her head, and held it close Against his breast. Her dull and glazing eye Met his, and with a shuddering gasp she died. Then like a child his bursting grief made way 394 BAYARD TAYLOR. In passionate tears, and with him all the tribe Wept for the faithful mare. " They dug her grave Amid Al-Hather's marbles, where she lies Buried with ancient kings ; and since that time Was never seen, and will not be again, O Arabs, though the world be doomed to live As many moons as count the desert sands, The like of wondrous Kubleh. God is great !" AN ORIENTAL IDYL. A SILVER javelin which the hills Have hurled upon the plain below, The fleetest of the Pharpar's rills Beneath me shoots in flashing flow. I hear the never-ending laugh Of jostling waves that come and go, And suck the bubbling pipe, and quaff The sherbet cooled in mountain-snow The flecks of sunshine gleam like stars Beneath the canopy of shade ; And in the distant dim bazaars I scarcely hear the hum of trade. No evil fear, no dream forlorn, Darkens my heaven of perfect blue ; My blood is tempered to the morn My very heart is steeped in dew. What Evil is I cannot tell, But half I guess what Joy may be ; And, as a pearl within its shell, The happy spirit sleeps in me. I feel no more the pulse's strife, The tides of passion's ruddy sea, fc^ > ^4 BAYARD TAYLOR. 395 But live the sweet unconscious life That breathes from yonder jasmine-tree. Upon the glittering pageantries Of gay Damascus streets I look, As idly as a babe that sees The painted pictures of a book. Forgotten now are name and race ; The past is blotted from my brain ; For Memory sleeps, and will not trace The weary pages o'er again. I only know the morning shines, And sweet the dewy morning air ; But does it play with tendrilled vines ? Or does it lightly lift my hair ? Deep sunken in the charmed repose, This ignorance is bliss extreme : And, whether I be Man or Rose, Oh pluck me not from out my dream ! FROM THE NORTH. ONCE more without you ! sighing, dear, once more, For all the sweet accustomed ministries Of wife and mother : not as when the seas That parted us my tender message bore From the grey olives of the Cretan shore To those that hid the broken Phidian frieze Of our Athenian home, but far degrees^ Wide plains, great forests, part us now. My door Looks on the rushing Neva, cold and clear : The swelling domes in hovering splendour lie, Like golden bubbles eager to be gone, But the chill crystal of the atmosphere Withholds them; and along the northern sky The amber midnight smiles in dreams of dawn. 396 STODDARD. RICHARD HENRY STODDARD. [Born in 1825. Author of Footprints, a volume of poems pub lished in 1848 ; Adventures in Fairyland^ in prose ; and many mis cellaneous writings]. SPRING. THE trumpet winds have sounded a retreat, Blowing o'er land and sea a sullen strain ; Usurping March, defeated, flies again, And lays his trophies at the Winter's feet. And lo ! where April, coming in his turn, In changeful motleys, half of light and shade, Leads his belated charge, a delicate maid, A nymph with dripping urn. Hail ! hail ! thrice hail ! thou fairest child of Time, With all thy retinue of laughing Hours, Thou paragon from some diviner clime, And ministrant of its benignest powers ! Who hath not caught the glancing of thy wing, And peeped beneath thy mask, delicious Spring ? Sometimes we see thee on the pleasant morns Of lingering March, with wreathed crook of gold, Leading the Ram from out his starry fold, A leash of light around his jagged horns ! Sometimes in April, goading up the skies The Bull, whose neck Apollo's silvery flies Settle upon, a many-twinkling swarm; And when May days are warm, And drawing to a close, And Flora goes With Zephyr from his palace in the west, Thou dost upsnatch the Twins from cradled rest, And strain them to thy breast, And haste to meet the expectant bright new-comer, The opulent queen of Earth, the gay, voluptuous Summer. Unmuffled now, shorn of thy veil of showers, Thou tripp'st along the mead with shining hair Blown back, and scarf out-fluttering on the air, STODDARD. 397 White-handed, strewing the fresh sward with flowers. The green hills lift their foreheads far away ; But where thy pathway runs the sod is pressed By fleecy lambs, behind the budding spray ; And troops of butterflies are hovering round, And the small swallow drops upon the ground Beside his mate and nest. A little month ago, the sky was grey ; Snow tents were pitched along the mountain-side, Where March encamped his stormy legions wide, And shook his standard o'er the fields of Day. But now the sky is blue, the snow is flown, And every mountain is an emerald throne, And every cloud a dais fringed with light, And all below is beautiful and bright. The forest waves its plumes, the hedges blow, The south wind scuds along the meadowy sea Thick-flecked with daisied foam, and violets grow Blue-eyed, and cowslips star the bloomy lea. The skylark floods the scene with pleasant rhyme ; The ousel twitters in the swaying pine ; And wild bees hum about the beds of thyme, And bend the clover-bells and eglantine ; The snake casts off his skin in mossy nooks; The long-eared rabbits near their burrows play ; The dormouse wakes ; and see ! the noisy rooks Sly foraging about the stacks of hay ! What sights ! what sounds ! what rustic life and mirth ! Housed all the winter long from bitter cold, Huddling in chimney-corners, young and old Come forth and share the gladness of the Earth. The ploughmen whistle as the furrows trail Behind their glittering shares, a billowy row j The milkmaid sings a ditty while her pail Grows full and frothy ; and the cattle low ; The hounds are yelping in the misty wood, Starting the fox : the jolly huntsmen cheer ; And winding horns delight the listening ear, And startle Echo in her solitude ; MH- 39 STODDARD. The teamster drives his waggon down the lane, Flattening a broader rut in weeds and sand ; The angler fishes in the shady pool ; And, loitering down the road with cap in hand, The truant chases butterflies in vain, Heedless of bells that call the village lads to school. Methinks the world is sweeter than of yore, More fresh and fine, and more exceeding fair ; There is a presence never felt before, The soul of inspiration everywhere ; Incarnate Youth in every idle limb, My vernal days, my prime, return anew ; My tranced spirit breathes a silent hymn, My heart is full of dew ! A DIRGE. A FEW frail summers had touched thee, As they touch the fruit ; Not so bright as thy hair, the sunshine, Not so sweet as thy voice, the lute. Hushed the voice, shorn the hair, all is over An urn of white ashes remains ; Nothing else save the tears in our eyes, And our bitterest, bitterest pains ! We garland the urn with white roses, Burn incense and gums on the shrine, Play old tunes with the saddest of closes, Dear tunes that were thine ! But in vain, all in vain ; Thou art gone we remain ! THE YELLOW MOON. THE yellow moon looks slantly down, Through seaward mists, upon the town ; And like a dream the moonshine falls Between the dim and shadowy walls. L PARKER. 399 I see a crowd in every street, But cannot hear their falling feet ; They float like clouds through shade and light, And seem a portion of the night. The ships have lain, for ages fled, Along the waters, dark and dead ; The dying waters wash no more The long black line of spectral shore. There is no life on land or sea, Save in the quiet moon and me ; Nor ours is true, but only seems, Within some dead old world of dreams. HENRY W. PARKER. [Born in 1825. Mr. Parker, a grand-nephew of the eminent lexicographer Noah Webster, is a minister of the Presbyterian Church], THE DEAD-WATCH. EACH saddened face is gone, and tearful eye,. Of mother, brother, and of sisters fair ; With ghostly sound their distant footfalls die Through whispering hall, and up the rustling stair. In yonder room the newly dead doth sleep ; Begin we thus, my friend, our watch to keep. Ami now both feed the fire and trim the lamp; Pass cheerly, if we can, the slow-paced hours ; For all without is cold, and drear, and damp, And the wide air with storm and darkness lours ; Pass cheerly, if we may, the livelong night, And chase pale phantoms, paler fear, to flight. We will not talk of death, of pall and knell Leave that, the mirth of brighter hours to check ; But tales of life, love, beauty, let us tell, Or of stern battle, sea, and stormy wreck ; Call up the visions gay of other days Our boyhood's sports and merry youthful ways. 400 PARKER. Hark to the distant bell ! an hour is gone ! Enter yon silent room with footsteps light ; Our brief appointed duty must be done To bathe the face, and stay death's rapid blight To bare the rigid face, and dip the cloth That hides a mortal, " crushed before the moth." The bathing liquid scents the chilly room ; How spectral white are shroud and veiling lace On yonder side-board, in the fearful gloom ! Take off the muffler from the sleeper's face : You spoke, my friend, of sunken cheek and eye Ah what a form of beauty here doth lie ! Never hath Art, from purest wax or stone, So fair an image and so lustrous wrought ; It is as if a beam from heaven had shown A weary angel in sweet slumber caught ! The smiling lip, the warmly tinted cheek, And all so calm, so saint-like, and so meek ! She softly sleeps, and yet how unlike sleep ! No fairy dreams flit o'er that marble face, As ripples play along the breezy deep, As shadows o'er the field each other chase ; The spirit dreams no more, but wakes in light, And freely wings its flashing seraph-flight. She sweetly sleeps, her lips and eyelids sealed ; No ruby jewel heaves upon her breast, With her quick breath now hidden, now revealed, As setting stars long tremble in the west; But white and still as drifts of moonlit snow Her folded cerements and her flushless brow. Oh there is beauty in the winter moon, And beauty in the brilliant summer flower, And in the liquid eye and luring tone Of radiant Love's and rosy Laughter's hour; But where is beauty, in this blooming world, Like death upon a maiden's lip impearled ? m IIA Y. 401 Veil we the dead, and close the open door. Perhaps the spirit, ere it soar above, Would watch its clay alone, and hover o'er The face it once had kindled into love ; Commune we hence, O friend, this wakeful night, Of death made lovely by so blest a sight. JOHN HAY. [Born about 1830. A Colonel in the United States' Army, an& author of the volume, Little Breeches, and other Pieces. The more distinctive side of Colonel Hay's talent is the humorous], THE MONKS OF BASLE. I TORE this weed from the rank dark soil Where it grew in the monkish time ; I trimmed it close, and set it again In a border of modern rhyme. i. Long years ago, when the Devil was loose, And faith was sorely tried, Three monks of Basle went out to walk In the quiet eventide. A breeze as pure as the breath of Heaven Blew fresh through the cloister-shades ; A sky as glad as the smile of Heaven Blushed rose o'er the minster-glades. But, scorning the lures of summer and sense,. The monks passed on in their walk ; Their eyes were abased, their senses slept, Their souls were in their talk. In the tough grim talk of the monkish days They hammered and slashed about Dry husks of logic old scraps of creed And the cold grey dreams of doubt 2C And whether Just or Justified Was the Church's mystic Head-- And whether the bread was changed to uod, Or God became the bread. But of human hearts outside their walls They never paused to dream, And they never thought of the love of God That smiled in the twilight gleam. 2. As these three monks went bickering on By the foot of a spreading tree, Out from its heart of verdurous gloom A song burst wild and free A wordless carol of life and love, Of nature free and wild ; And the three monks paused in the evening shade, Looked up at each other, and smiled. And tender and gay the bird sang on, And cooed and whistled and trilled ; And the wasteful wealth of life and love From his happy heart was spilled. The song had power on the grim old monks In the light of the rosy skies ; And as they listened the years rolled back, And tears came into their eyes. The years rolled back, and they were young, With the hearts and hopes of men ; They plucked the daisies, and kissed the girls, Of dear dead summers again. 3- But the eldest monk soon broke the spell. " Tis sin and shame," quoth he, " To be turned from talk of holy things By a bird's cry from a tree. HA Y ^0 " Perchance the Enemy of Souls Hath come to tempt us so ! Let us try by the power of the Awful Word If it be he, or no!" To Heaven the three monks raised their hands. "We charge thee, speak !" they said, " By His dread Name who shall one day come To judge the quick and the dead " Who art thou ? Speak !" The bird laughed loud " I am the devil," he said. The monks on their faces fell ; the bird Away through the twilight sped. A horror fell on those holy men (The faithful legends say) ; And one by one from the face of earth They pined and vanished away. 4- So goes the tale of the monkish books ; The moral who runs may read He has no ears for Nature's voice Whose soul is the slave of creed. Not all in vain with beauty and love Has God the world adorned ; And he who Nature scorns and mocks By Nature is mocked and scorned. REMORSE. SAD is the thought of sunniest days Of love and rapture perished, And shine through memory's tearful haze The eyes once fondliest cherished ; Reproachful is the ghost of toys That charmed while life was wasted : But saddest is the thought of joys That never yet were tasted. 404 HA Y. Sad is the vague and tender dream Of dead love's lingering kisses, To crushed hearts haloed by the gleam Of unreturning blisses ; Deep mourns the soul in anguished pride For the pitiless death that won them But the saddest wail is for lips that died With the virgin dew upon them. THE PRAIRIE. THE skies are blue above my head, The prairie green below, And flickering o'er the tufted grass The shifting shadows go, Vague-sailing, where the feathery clouds Fleck white the tranquil skies, Black javelins darting where aloft The whirring pheasant flies. A glimmering plain in drowsy trance The dim horizon bounds, Where all the air is resonant With sleepy summer sounds The life that sings among the flowers, The lisping of the breeze, The hot cicala's sultry cry, The murmurous dream of bees. The butterfly a flying flower Wheels swift in flashing rings, And flutters round his quiet kin, With brave flame-mottled wings. The wild pinks burst in crimson fire, The phlox' bright clusters shine, And prairie-cups are swinging free To spill their airy wine. HA Y: 405 And lavishly beneath the sun, In liberal splendour rolled, The fennel fills the dipping plain With floods of flowery gold ; And widely weaves the iron-weed A woof of purple dyes Where Autumn's royal feet may tread When bankrupt Summer flies. In verdurous tumult far away The prairie-billows gleam ; Upon their crests in blessing rests The noontide's gracious beam. Low quivering vapours steaming dim The level splendours break Where languid lilies deck the rim Of some land-circled lake. Far in the East like low-hung clouds The waving woodlands lie ; Far in the West the glowing plain Melts warmly in the sky. No accent wounds the reverent air. No footprint dints the sod- Lone in the light the prairie lies, Rapt in a dream of God. XIX 406 LUCY LARCOM. LUCY LARCOM. [Born about I833. 1 Miss Larcom is authoress of a volume of Poems published in 1869]. ROCK AND RILL. " INTO the sunshine out of shade !" The rill has heard the call, And, babbling low, her answer made, A laugh, 'twixt slip and fall. Out from her cradle-roof of trees, Over the free, rough ground ! The peaceful blue above she sees; The cheerful green around. A pleasant world for running streams To steal unnoticed through, At play with all the sweet sky-gleams, And nothing else to do ! A rock has stopped the silent rill, And taught her how to speak : He hinders her ; she chides him still ; He loves her lispings weak. And still he will not let her go : But she may chide and sing, And o'er him liquid freshness throw, Amid her murmuring. The harebell sees herself no more In waters clear at play ; Yet never she such azure wore, Till wept on by the spray. 1 1 must apologize for guessing at a lady's age. My surmise is based partly (but not solely) on the fact that Miss Larcom's poem, Thirty-five, which seems to relate to herself, is printed in her vo lume dated 1869. W. M. R- LUCY LARCOM. 407 And many a woodland violet Stays charmed upon the bank ; Her thoughtful blue eye brimming wet, The rock and rill to thank. The rill is blessing in her talk What half she held a wrong, The happy trouble of the rock That makes her life a song. LINES. THOU mayst not rest in any lovely thing, Thou, who wert formed to seek and to aspire ; For no fulfilment of thy dreams can bring The answer to thy measureless desire. The beauty of the round green world is not Of the world's essence ; far within the sky The tints which make this bubble bright are wrought The bubble bursts ; the light can never die. Thou canst not make a pillow for thy head Of anything so brittle and so frail ; Yet mayst thou by its transient glow be led Into the heaven where sun and star grow pale; Where out of burning whiteness flows the light Light, which is but the visible stream of love ; Hope's ladder brightening upward through the night, Whereon our feet grow winged as they move. Let beauty sink in light ; in central deeps Of love unseen let dearest eyes grow dim : They draw us after, up the infinite steeps Where souls familiar track the seraphim. V rff LUCY LAP COM. THE ROSE ENTHRONED. IT melts and seethes, the chaos that shall grow To adamant beneath the house of life ; In hissing hatred atoms clash, and go To meet intenser strife. And, ere that fever leaves the granite veins, Down thunders over them a torrid sea : Now Flood, now Fire, alternate despot reigns, Immortal foes to be. Built by the warring elements, they rise, The massive earth-foundations, tier on tier, Where slimy monsters with unhuman eyes Their hideous heads uprear. The building of the world is not for you, That glare upon each other, and devour : Race floating after race fades out of view, Till Beauty springs from Power. Meanwhile from crumbling rocks and shoals of death Shoots up rank verdure to the hidden sun ; The gulfs are eddying to the vague, sweet breath Of richer life begun ; Richer and sweeter far than aught before, Though rooted in the grave of what has been. Unnumbered burials yet must heap Earth's floor Ere she her heir shall win ; And ever nobler lives and deaths more grand, For nourishment of that which is to come ; While mid the ruins of the work she planned Sits Nature, blind and dumb. For whom or what she plans she knows no more Than any mother of her unborn child : Yet beautiful forewarnings murmur o'er Her desolations wild. LUCY LARCOM. 409 Slowly the clamour and the clash subside ; Earth's restlessness her patient hopes subdue ; Mild oceans shoreward heave a pulse-like tide ; The skies are veined with blue. And life works through the growing quietness, To bring some darling mystery into form : Beauty her fairest Possible would dress In colours pure and warm. Within the depths of palpitating seas A tender tint, anon a line of grace Some lovely thought from its dull atom frees, The coming joy to trace : A pencilled moss on tablets of the sand, Such as shall veil the unbudded maiden-blush Of beauty yet to gladden the green land ; A breathing, through the hush, Of some sealed perfume longing to burst out, And give its prisoned rapture to the air; A brooding hope, a promise through a doubt, Is whispered everywhere. And, every dawn a shade more clear, the skies A flush as from the heart of heaven disclose : Through earth and sea and air a message flies, Prophetic of the Rose. At last a morning comes, of sunshine still, When not a dewdrop trembles on the grass, When all winds sleep, and every pool and rill Is like a burnished glass Where a long looked-for guest might lean to gaze ; When Day on Earth rests royally, a crown Of molten glory, flashing diamond rays, From heaven let lightly down. \f 4 io LUCY LAKCOM. In golden silence, breathless, all things stand ; What answer waits this questioning repose ? A sudden gush of light and odours bland, And lo the Rose ! the Rose ! The birds break into canticles around ; The winds lift Jubilate to the skies ; For, twin-born with the rose on Eden-ground, Love blooms in human eyes. Life's marvellous queen-flower blossoms only so, In dust of low ideals rooted fast. Ever the Beautiful is moulded slow From truth in errors past. What fiery fields of Chaos must be won, What battling Titans rear themselves a tomb, What births and resurrections greet the sun, Before the Rose can bloom ! And of some wonder-blossom yet we dream Whereof the time that is infolds the seed ; Some flower of light, to which the Rose shall seem A fair and fragile weed. RE-ENLISTED. MAY 1864. O DID you see him in the street, dressed up in army- blue, When drums and trumpets into town their storm of music threw, A louder tune than all the winds could muster in the air, The Rebel winds, that tried so hard our flag in strips to tear? You didn't mind him? Oh you looked beyond him then, perhaps, To see the mounted officers rigged out with trooper-caps, And shiny clothes, and sashes, and epaulets and all ; It wasn't for such things as these he heard his country call \*s " Stretched out upon the trampled turf," American Poentt.} (faff 411. LUCY LARCOM. 411 She asked for men ; and up he spoke, my handsome, hearty Sam, " I'll die for the dear old Union, if she'll take me as I am." And, if a better man than he there's mother that can show From Maine to Minnesota, then let the nation know. You would not pick him from the rest by eagles or by stars, By straps upon his coat-sleeve, or gold or silver bars, Nor a corporal's strip of worsted; but there's some thing in his face, And something in his even step, a-marching in his place, That couldn't be improved by all the badges in the land : A patriot, and a good, strong man ; are generals much more grand ? We rest our pride on that big heart wrapped up in army- .)\ue, The girl he loves, Mehitabel, and I, who love him too. He's never shirked a battle yet, though frightful risks he's run. Since treason flooded Baltimore, the spring of Sixty-one; Through blood and storm he's held out firm, nor fretted once, my Sam, At swamps of Chickahominy, or fields of Antietam. Though many a time, he's told us, when he saw them lying dead, The boys that came from Newburyport, and Lynn, and Marblehead, Stretched out upon the trampled turf, and wept on by the sky, It seemed to him the Commonwealth had drained her life-blood dry. " But then," he said, " the more's the need the country has of me : 412 LUCY LA ROOM. To live and fight the war all through, what glory it will be! The Rebel balls don't hit me ; and, mother, if they should, You'll know I've fallen in my place, where I have always stood." He's taken out his furlough, and short enough it seemed: I often tell Mehitabel he'll think he only dreamed Of walking with her nights so bright you couldn't see a star, And hearing the swift tide come in across the harbour bar. The Stars that shine above the Stripes, they light him southward now ; The tide of war has swept him back; he's made a solemn vow To build himself no home-nest till his country's work is done; God bless the vow, and speed the work, my patriot, my son ! And yet it is a pretty place where his new house might be; An orchard-road that leads your eye straight out upon the sea. The boy not work his father's farm ? it seems almost a shame ; But any selfish plan for him he'd never let me name. He's re-enlisted for the war, for victory or for death, A soldier's grave, perhaps ! the thought has half-way stopped my breath, And driven a cloud across the sun ; my boy, it will not be! The war will soon be over ; home again you'll come to me ! He's re-enlisted : and I smiled to see him going, too ! There's nothing that becomes him ha lf c/ ^ well as army- blue. LUCY LARCOM. 413 Only a private in the ranks ! but sure I am indeed, If all the privates were like him, they'd scarcely captains need. And I and Massachusetts share the honour of his birth, The grand old State ! to me the best in all the peopled earth ! I cannot hold a musket, but I have a son who can ; And I'm proud for Freedom's sake to be the mother of a man ! PSYCHE AT SCHOOL. YOUNG Psyche came to school, Down here in Being's lower vestibule, Where many voices unto her did call, " Welcome ! be studious ! and in Mammon's hall Shalt thou cup-bearer be to Mammon-king." Thought Psyche, " No such thing ! " A volume Pleasure brought, Of glowing pictures in earth-colours wrought. Temptation's alphabet in ambush lay Among the leaves ; but Psyche turned away, And said, " Those tints are mixed with poisonous paint ; It makes me sick and faint." Then one approached, called Love, Whose fingers o'er illumined print did move. Psyche looked on and sighed : " The page is vexed ; Your notes and your translations mar the text. The angels write Love's idioms on the heart ; They are not learned by art." Pride took an ancient book, To teach the high-bred air, the scornful look. Psyche returned her gaze with meek surprise* > 414 LUCY LARCOM. And said, " Mine are not glass, but real eyes, And will not stare like dead men's ; since I see, I cannot learn of thee." "The child rebels," said Pride; " Now be the lash by some rough teacher plied." Then Poverty her rudest blows did give. Said Psyche, " Pain assures me that I live. " My robes are torn ; but courage, faith, and love, My triple mail I prove." Grief brought a scroll, writ o'er With ink of nightshade and of hellebore. Its damps were rainbows under Psyche's smile. Despair with black tome open stood the while, But said, " Her eyes would make the page too bright," And stole away from sight. A guest undid the gate ; One who expects no welcome soon or late. Then Psyche took the parchment that he bore, And whispered, gliding by him through the door, " Kind Death, best friend ! 'tis my diploma given ; A graduate for heaven." THIRTY-FIVE. The run hangs calm at summer's poise ; The earth lies bathed in shimmering noon, At rest from all her cheerful noise, With heartstrings silently in tune. The time how beautiful and dear When early fruits begin to blush, And the full leafage of the year Sways o'er them with a sheltering hush ! The clouds that fleck the warm blue deep Like shoals of tinted fishes float ; LUCY LARCOM. From breathless groves the birds asleep Send now and then a dreaming note. A traveller through the noonday calm, Not weary yet in love with rest, Glad of the air's refreshing balm, Stays where yon threshold waits a guest. Her half-way house of life is this : She sees the road wind up from far ; From the soft dells of childhood's bliss, Where twinkles home's remembered star. She feels that glimmer, out of sight, A tender radiance of the past, That drowned itself in deeper light ; A joy that Joy forbade to last. O morn of Spring ! O green, green fields, Pressed by white feet of innocence ! The lilies that young verdure shields Yet send a pure faint sweetness thence. Those lilies yet perfume her heart ; That morning lingers in her eye : From God's first gifts she will not part, Half the sweet light she travels by. Yet think not she would wander back For childhood pure or merrier youth. A mist is on the fading track, Here rounds the brightening orb of truth, Nor painless can she look behind On pitfalls that she did not shun, Sure paths her heart refused to find, And guides that led her from the sun. Then good seemed false, and evil true ; Now out of evil blossoms good ; Life maps into a broader view, Its needed shadows understood. 416 LUCY LARCOM. Here at the half-way house of life, Upon these summer highlands raised, Her thoughts are quieted from strife, Peace grows wherever she has gazed. The spirit of the beauteous Now She deeply quaffs, for future strength, And forward leans her shaded brow To scan the journey's waiting length. Not down-hill all the afternoon ; Though hides the path in many a vale, It upward winds to sunset soon ; To mountain summits far and pale. Though lone those mountains seem, and cold, To such as know not of her Guide, He gently leads to Love's warm fold ; She sees them from their heaven-lit side. And of the way that lies between, The mystery is the loveliest thing. All yet a miracle has been, And life shall greater wonders bring, The soul, to God's heart moving on, Owns but the Infinite for home ; Whatever with the past has gone, The best is always yet to come. 'Twill not be growing old, to feel The spirit, like a child, led on By unseen presences, that steal For earth the light of heavenly dawn 'Twill not be terrible to bear Of inward pain the heaviest blow, Since thus the rock is smitten where Fountains of strength perennial flow. LUCY LARCOM. 417 To wait to suffer or to do ; Each key unlocks its own deep bliss ; For every grief a comfort new A mine for gems the heart may miss. Thus on she looks, with thoughts that sing Of happy months that follow June : Life were not a completed thing Without its summer afternoon ; Without its summery autumn hours That softened, spiritual time, When o'er bright woods and frost-born flowers The seasons ring their perfect chime. The time to bless and to be blest , For gathering and bestowing fruit ; When grapes are waiting to be pressed, And storms have fixed the tree's firm root. Heaven's inmost sunshine earth has warmed ; Heaven's peace floods each dark mystery ; And all the present glows, transformed, In the fair light of what shall be. The traveller girds her to depart ; She turns her toward the setting sun : With morning's freshness in her heart, Her evening journey is begun. THE STILL HOUR. THE quiet of a shadow-haunted pool Where light breaks through in glorious tenderness. Where the tranced pilgrim in the shelter cool Forgets the way's distress ; Such is this hour, this silent hour with Thee ! The trouble of the restless heart is still, And every swaying wish breathes reverently The whisper of Thy will. 2 D 418 LUCY LARCOM. Father, our thoughts are rushing wildly on, Tumultuous, clouded with their own vain strife, Darkened by cares from our own planting grown ; We call the tumult life. And something of Thy presence still is given : The keen light flashing from the seething foam, Through tangled boughs the sudden glimpse of heaven, From Thee, Thee only, come. And beautiful it is to catch Thy smile Amid the rush, the hurrying flow of mind ; To feel Thy glance upon us all the while, Most holy and most kind ! But oh ! this hour of heavenly quietness, When, as a lake that opens to the sky, The soul serene in its great blessedness Looks up to meet Thine eye ! Fountain of Life, in Thee alone is Light ! Shine through our being, cleansing us of sin, Till we grow lucid with Thy presence bright, The peace of God within. Yet not alone as Light pervading come ; O Thou Divine One, meet us as a Friend ! Only with Thee is every heart at home : Stay with us to the end ! By the stream's windings let us with Thee talk Of this strange earth-life Thou so well hast known ; In Thy fresh footprints let us heavenward walk, No more to grope alone ! If in our thoughts, by Thee made calm and clear, The brightening image of Thy face we see, What hour of all our lives can be so dear As this still hour with Thee? " LUCY LARCOM. 419 NEAR SHORE. THE seas of thought are deep and wide ; Let those who will, O friend of mine, Sail forth without a chart or guide Or plummet-line ; A blank of waters all around, A blank of azure overhead, An infinite of nothing found, Whence faith has fled. The Name that we with reverence speak Echoes across those wastes of thought : But they who go far off to seek, They hear it not. The shores give back its sweetest sound From rivulet cool, and shadowing rock, And voices that calm hearths surround With friendly talk. Earth is our little island home, And heaven the neighbouring continent, Whence winds to every inlet come With balmiest scent ; And tenderest whispers thence we hear From those who lately sailed across. They love us still ; since heaven is near, Death is not loss. From mountain slopes of breeze and balm, What melodies arrest the oar ! What memories ripple through the calm ! We'll keep near shore. By sweet home instincts wafted on, By all the hopes that life has nursed, We hasten where the loved have gone, Who landed first. 420 LUCY LARCOM. If God be God, then heaven is real : We need not lose ourselves and Him In some vast sea of the ideal, Dreamy and dim. He cheats not any soul. He gave Each being unity like His ; Love, that links beings, he must save ; Of Him it is. Dear friend, we will not drift too far Mid billows, fogs, and blinding foam, To see Christ's beacon-light, the star That guides us home. Moving toward heaven, we'll meet half-way Some pilot from that unseen strand ; Then, anchoring safe in perfect day, Tread the firm land. Then onward and for ever on Toward summits piled on summits bright The lost are found, and we have won The Land of Light ! God is that country's glory : He Alike the confidence is found Of those who try the uncertain sea Or solid ground. Yet we, for love of those who bend From yon clear heights, passed on before To wait our coming, we, dear friend, Will keep near shore. LUCY LARCOM. 421 ACROSS THE RIVER. WHEN for me the silent oar Parts the Silent River, And I stand upon the shore Of the strange For-ever, Shall I miss the loved and known ? Shall I vainly seek mine own ? Mid the crowd that come to meet Spirits sin-forgiven, Listening to their echoing feet Down the streets of heaven, Shall I know a footstep near That I listen, wait for here ? Then will one approach the brink With a hand extended, One whose thoughts I loved to think Ere the veil was rended, Saying " Welcome ! we have died, And again are side by side." Saying " I will go with thee, That thou be not lonely, To yon hills of mystery : I have waited only Until now, to climb with thee Yonder hills of mystery." Can the bonds, that make us here Know ourselves immortal, Drop away, like foliage sere, At life's inner portal ? What is holiest below Must for ever live and grow. I shall love the angels well, After I have found them In the mansions where they dwell, With the glory round them ; 422 T. B. ALDRICH. But at first, without surprise, Let me look in human eyes. Step by step our feet must go Up the holy mountain ; Drop by drop within us flow Life's unfailing fountain. Angels sing with crowns that burn ; We shall have a song to learn. He who on our earthly path Bids us help each other Who his Well-beloved hath Made our Elder Brother Will but clasp the chain of love Closer, when we meet above. Therefore dread I not to go O'er the Silent River. Death, thy hastening oar I know ; Bear me, thou Life-giver, Through the waters, to the shore Where mine own have gone before ! THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH. [Born about 1835. Son of James Aldrich, himself a writer of some poetic repute]. DECEMBER 1863. ONLY the sea intoning, Only the wainscot-mouse, Only the wild wind moaning Over the lonely house. Darkest of all Decembers Ever my life has known, Sitting here by the embers, Stunned and helpless, alone, - T. B. ALDRICH. 423 Dreaming of two graves lying Out in the damp and chill ; One where the buzzard, flying, Pauses at Malvern Hill : The other, alas ! the pillows Of that uneasy bed Rise and fall with the billows Over our sailor's head. Theirs the heroic story, Died, by frigate and town ! Theirs the calm and the glory, Theirs the cross and the crown. Mine to linger and languish Here by the wintry sea. Ah faint heart ! in thy anguish, What is there left to thee ? Only the sea intoning, Only the wainscot-mouse, Only the wild wind moaning Over the lonely house. THE MOORLAND. THE moorland lies a dreary waste ; The night is dark with drizzling rain ; In yonder yawning cave of cloud The snaky lightning writhes with pain. O sobbing rain outside my door, O wailing phantoms, make your moan ; Go through the night in blind despair, Your shadowy lips have touched my own. No more the robin breaks its heart Of music in the pathless woods : The ravens croak for such as I, The plovers screech above their broods. 424 T. B. ALDRICH. All mournful things are friends of mine, (That weary sound of falling leaves !) Ah there is not a kindred soul For me on earth, but moans and grieves ! I cannot sleep this lonesome night : The ghostly rain goes by in haste, And, further than the eye can reach, The moorland lies a dreary waste. PISCATAQUA RIVER. 1860. THOU singest by the gleaming isles, By woods and fields of corn, Thou singest, and the heaven smiles Upon my birthday morn. But I within a city, I, So full of vague unrest, Would almost give my life to lie An hour upon thy breast ; To let the wherry listless go, And, rapt in dreamy joy, Dip, and surge idly to and fro, Like the red harbour-buoy ; To sit in happy indolence, To rest upon the oars, And catch the heavy earthy scents That blow from summer shores ; To see the rounded sun go down, And with its parting fires Light up the windows of the town, And burn the tapering spires : And then to hear the muffled tolls From steeples slim and white, L T. B. ALDR1CH. 425 And watch, among the Isles of Shoals, The beacon's orange light. O River ! flowing to the main Through woods and fields of corn, Hear thou my longing and my pain This sunny birthday morn : And take this song which sorrow shapes To music like thine own, And sing it to the cliffs and capes And crags where I am known ! PYTHAGORAS. ABOVE the petty passions of the crowd I stand in frozen marble like a god, Inviolate, and ancient as the moon. The thing I am, and not the thing Man is, Fills my deep dreaming. Let him moan and die ; For he is dust that shall be laid again : I know my own creation was divine. Strewn on the breezy continents I see The veined shells and burnished scales which once Enclosed my being, husks that had their use; I brood on all the shapes I must attain Before I reach the Perfect, which is God, And dream my dream, and let the rabble go ; For I am of the mountains and the sea, The deserts, and the caverns in the earth, The catacombs and fragments of old worlds. I was a spirit on the mountain-tops, A perfume in the valleys, a simoom On arid deserts, a nomadic wind Roaming the universe, a tireless Voice. I was ere Romulus and Remus were ; I was ere Nineveh and Babylon ; I was, and am, and evermore shall be, Progressing, never reaching to the end. 426 T. B. ALDRICH. A hundred years I trembled in the grass, The delicate trefoil that muffled warm A slope on Ida ; for a hundred years Moved in the purple gyre of those dark flowers The Grecian women strew upon the dead. Under the earth, in fragrant glooms, I dwelt ; Then in the veins and sinews of a pine On a lone isle, where, from the Cyclades, A mighty wind, like a leviathan, Ploughed through the brine, and from those solitudes Sent Silence, frightened. To and fro I swayed, Drawing the sunshine from the stooping clouds. Suns came and went, and many a mystic moon, Orbing and waning, and fierce meteors, Leaving their lurid ghosts to haunt the night. I heard loud voices by the sounding shore, The stormy sea-gods, and from fluted conchs Wild music, and strange shadows floated by, Some moaning and some singing. So the years Clustered about me, till the hand of God Let down the lightning from a sultry sky, Splintered the pine and split the iron rock ; And from my odorous prison-house a bird, I in its bosom, darted : so we fled, Turning the brittle edge of one high wave, Island and tree and sea-gods left behind ! Free as the air from zone to zone I flew, Far from the tumult to the quiet gates Of daybreak ; and beneath me I beheld Vineyards, and rivers that like silver threads Ran through the green and gold of pasture-lands, And here and there a hamlet, a white rose, And here and there a city, whose slim spires And palace-roofs and swollen domes uprose Like scintillant stalagmites in the sun ; I saw huge navies battling with a storm By ragged reefs along the desolate coasts, And lazy merchantmen, that crawled, like flies, Over the blue enamel of the sea To India or the icy Labradors. 4* T. B. ALDRICH. 427 A century was as a single day. What is a day to an immortal soul ? A breath, no more. And yet I hold one hour Beyond all price, that hour when from the sky I circled near and nearer to the earth, Nearer and nearer, till I brushed my wings Against the pointed chestnuts, where a stream, That foamed and Chattered over pebbly shoals, Fled through the briony, and with a shout Leapt headlong down a precipice. And there, Gathering wild-flowers in the cool ravine, Wandered a woman more divinely shaped Than any of the creatures of the air, Or river-goddesses, or restless shades Of noble matrons marvellous in their time For beauty and great suffering ; and I sung, I charmed her thought, I gave her dreams, and then Down from the dewy atmosphere I stole And nestled in her bosom. There I slept From moon to moon, while in her eyes a thought Grew sweet and sweeter, deepening like the dawn, A mystical forewarning ! When the stream, Breaking through leafless brambles and dead leaves, Piped shriller treble, and from chestnut boughs The fruit dropped noiseless through the autumn night, I gave a quick low cry, as infants do. We weep when we are born, not when we die ! So was it destined ; and thus came I here, To walk the earth and wear the form of Man, To suffer bravely as becomes my state, One step, one grade, one cycle, nearer God. And, knowing these things, can I stoop to fret, And lie, and haggle in the market-place, Give dross for dross, or everything for nought ? No ! let me sit above the crowd, and sing, Waiting with hope for that miraculous change Which seems like sleep ; and, though I waiting starve, I cannot kiss the idols that are set By every gate, in every street and park - } 428 T. B. ALDRICH. I cannot fawn, I cannot soil my soul : For I am of the mountains and the sea, The deserts and the caverns in the earth, The catacombs and fragments of old worlds. INVOCATION TO SLEEP. THERE is a rest for all things. On still nights There is a folding of a million wings, The swarming honey-bees in unknown woods, The speckled butterflies, and downy broods In dizzy poplar-heights : Rest for innumerable nameless things, Rest for the creatures underneath the Sea, And in the Earth, and in the starry Air. Why will it not unburden me of care? It comes to meaner things than my despair. O weary, weary night, that brings no rest to me! Spirit of dreams and silvern memories, Delicate Sleep ! One who is sickening of his tiresome days Brings thee a soul that he would have thee keep A captive in thy mystical domain, With Puck and Ariel, and the grotesque train That do inhabit slumber. Give his sight Immortal shapes, and bring to him again His Psyche that went out into the night ! Thou who dost hold the priceless keys of rest, Strew lotus-leaves and poppies on my breast, And bear me to thy castle in the land Touched with all colours like a burning west, The Castle of Vision, where the unchecked thought Wanders at will upon enchanted ground, Making no sound In all the corridors. The bell sleeps in the belfry, from its tongue A drowsy murmur floats into the air, T. B. ALDRICH. 429 Like thistle-down. Slumber is everywhere. The rook's asleep, and, in its dreaming, caws; And silence mopes where nightingales have sung; The Sirens lie in grottos cool and deep, The Naiads in the streams : But I, in chilling twilight, stand and wait On the portcullis, at thy castle-gate, Yearning to see the magic door of dreams Turn on its noiseless hinges, delicate Sleep ! PURSUIT AND POSSESSION. WHEN I behold what pleasure is Pursuit, What life, what glorious eagerness, it is ; Then mark how full Possession falls from this, How fairer seems the blossom than the fruit, I am perplexed, and often stricken mute, Wondering which attained the higher bliss, The winged insect, or the chrysalis It thrust aside with unreluctant foot. Spirit of verse which still eludes my art, You shapes of loveliness that still do haunt me, O never, never rest upon my heart, If when I have thee I shall little want thee ! Still flit away in moonlight, rain, and dew, Wills o 1 the wisp, that I may still pursue ! MIRACLES. SICK of myself and all that keeps the light Of the blue skies away from me and mine, I climb this ledge, and, by this wind-swept pine Lingering, watch the coming of the night. 'Tis ever a new wonder to my sight. Men look to God for some mysterious sign, For other stats than those that nightly shine, .For some unnatural symbol of His might. 4* 43 STEDMAN. Wouldst see a miracle as grand as those The prophets wrought of old in Palestine ? Come watch with me the shaft of fire that glows In yonder West : the fair frail palaces, The fading alps and archipelagoes, And great cloud-continents of sunset-seas. FREDERICKSBURG. THE increasing moonlight drifts across my bed, And on the churchyard by the road, I know, It falls as white and noiselessly as snow. 'Twas such a night two weary summers fled ; The stars, as now, were waning overhead. Listen ! Again the shrill-lipped bugles blow Where the swift currents of the river flow Past Fredericksburg, far off the heavens are red With sudden conflagration : on yon height, Linstock in hand, the gunners hold their breath : A signal-rocket pierces the dense night, Flings its spent stars upon the town beneath : Hark ! the artillery massing on the right ; Hark ! the black squadrons wheeling down to Death ! EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN. [Born about 1835. Author of The Blameless Prince, and other Poems, published in 1869 ; and of at least two other volumes of poetry, previously issued]. ILIUM FUIT. ONE by one they died, Last of all their race ; Nothing left but pride, Lace, and buckled hose. Their quietus made, On their dwelling-place Ruthless hands are laid : Down the old house goes \ STEDMAN. 431 See the ancient manse Meet its fate at last ! Time, in his advance, Age nor honour knows ; Axe and broadaxe fall, Lopping off the Past : Hit with bar and maul, Down the old house goes ! Sevenscore years it stood : Yes, they built it well, Though they built of wood When that house arose. For its cross-beams square Oak and walnut fell ; Little worse for wear, Down the old house goes ! Rending board and plank, Men with crow-bars ply, Opening fissures dank, Striking deadly blows. From the gabled roof How the shingles fly ! Keep you here aloof, Down the old house goes ! Holding still its place, There the chimney stands, Staunch from top to base, Frowning on its foes. Heave apart the stones, Burst its iron bands ! How it shakes and groans ! Down the old house goes ! Round the mantel -piece Glisten scripture tiles ; Henceforth they shall cease Painting Egypt's woes, 432 STEDMAN. Painting David's fight, Fair Bathsheba's smiles. Blinded Samson's might, Down the old house goes ! On these oaken floors High-shoed ladies trod ; Through those panelled doors Trailed their furbelows : Long their day has ceased ; Now, beneath the sod, With the worms they feast, Down the old house goes ! Many a bride _has stood In yon spacious room ; Here her hand was wooed Underneath the rose ; O'er that sill the dead Reached the family-tomb : All that were have fled, Down the old house goes ! Once in yonder hall Washington, they say, Led the New- Year's ball, Stateliest of beaux. O that minuet, Maids and matrons gay ! Are there such sights yet? Down the old house goes ! British troopers came Ere another year, With their coats aflame, Mincing on their toes ; Daughters of the house Gave them haughty cheer, Laughed to scorn their vows, Down the old house goes ! STEDMAN. 433 Doorway-high the box In the grass-plot spreads ; It has borne its locks Through a thousand snows In an evil day, From those garden-beds Now 'tis hacked away, Down the old house goes ! Lo ! the sycamores, Scathed and scrawny mates, At the mansion-doors Shiver, full of woes ; With its life they grew, Guarded well its gates ; Now their task is through, Down the old house goes ! On this honoured site Modern trade will build What unseemly fright Heaven only knows ! Something peaked and high, Smacking of the guild : Let us heave a sigh, Down the old house goes ! THE MOUNTAIN. Two thousand feet in air it stands Betwixt the bright and shaded lands, Above the regions it divides And borders with its furrowed sides. The seaward valley laughs with light Till the round sun o'erhangs this height ; But then the shadow of the crest No more the plains that lengthen west Enshrouds, yet slowly, surely creeps Eastward, until the coolness steeps A darkling league of tilth and wold, And chills the flocks that seek their fold. 434 STEDMAN. Not like those ancient summits lone, Mont Blanc, on his eternal throne, The city-gemmed Peruvian peak, The sunset portals landsmen seek, Whose train, to reach the Golden Land, Crawls slow and pathless through the sand, Or that whose ice-lit beacon guides The mariner on tropic tides, And flames across the Gulf afar, A torch by day, by night a star, Not thus, to cleave the outer skies, Does my serener mountain rise, Nor aye forget its gentle birth Upon the dewy, pastoral earth. But ever, in the noonday light, Are scenes whereof I love the sight, Broad pictures of the lower world Beneath my gladdened eyes unfurled. Irradiate distances reveal Fair nature wed to human weal ; The rolling valley made a plain ; Its chequered squares of grass and grain"; The silvery rye, the golden wheat, The flowery elders where they meet, Ay, even the springing corn I see, And garden-haunts of bird and bee ; And, where in daisied meadows shines The wandering river through its vines, Move specks at random, which I know Are herds a-grazing to and fro. Yet still a goodly height it seems From which the mountain pours his streams, Or hinders, with caressing hands, The sunlight seeking other lands. Like some great giant, strong and proud, He fronts the louring thunder-cloud, And wrests its treasures, to bestow A guerdon on the realm below ; STEDMAN. 435 Or, by the deluge roused from sleep Within his bristling forest-keep, Shakes all his pines, and far and wide Sends down a rich, imperious tide. At night the whistling tempests meet In tryst upon his topmost seat, And all the phantoms of the sky Frolic and gibber, storming by. By day I see the ocean-mists Float with the current where it lists, And from my summit 1 can hail Cloud-vessels passing on the gale, The stately argosies of air, And parley with the helmsmen there ; Can probe their dim mysterious source, Ask of their cargo and their course, Whence come ? where bound ? and wait reply, As, all sails spread, they hasten by. If, foiled in what I fain would know, Again I turn my eyes below And eastward, past the hither mead Where all day long the cattle feed, A crescent gleam my sight allures, And clings about the hazy moors, The great, encircling, radiant sea, Alone in its immensity. Even there, a queen upon its shore, I know the city evermore Her palaces and temples rears, And wooes the nations to her piers. Yet the proud city seems a mole To this horizon-bounded whole ; And, from my station on the mount, The whole is little worth account Beneath the overhanging sky, That seems so far, and yet so nigh. Here breathe I inspiration rare, T 436 STEDMAN. Unburdened by the grosser air That hugs the lower land, and feel Through all my finer senses steal The life of what that life may be, Freed from this dull earth's density, When we, with many a soul-felt thrill, Shall thrid the ether at our will, Through widening corridors of morn And starry archways swiftly borne. Here, in the process of the night, The stars themselves a purer light Give out than reaches those who gaze Enshrouded with the valley's haze. October, entering Heaven's fane, Assumes her lucent, annual reign. Then what a dark and dismal clod, Forsaken by the Sons of God, Seems this sad world, to those which march Across the high, illumined arch, And with their brightness draw me forth To scan the splendours of the North ! I see the Dragon, as he toils With Ursa in his shining coils, And mark the Huntsman lift his shield, Confronting on the ancient field The Bull, while in a mystic row The jewels of his girdle glow ; Or haply I may ponder long On that remoter sparkling throng, The orient sisterhood around Whose chief our Galaxy is wound. Thus, half enrapt in classic dreams, And brooding over Learning's gleams, I leave to gloom the under-land, And from my watch-tower, close at hand. Like him who led the favoured race, I look on glory face to face ! So, on the mountain-top, alone I dwell, as one who holds a throne. STEDMAN. 437 Or prince or peasant, him I count My peer who stands upon a mount, Sees farther than the tribes below, And knows the joys they cannot know ; And, though beyond the sound of speech They reign, my soul goes out to reach, 'Far on their noble heights elsewhere, My brother-monarchs of the air. THE FEAST OF HARVEST. THE fair Earth smiled and turned herself and woke, And to the Sun with nuptial greeting said : " I had a dream, wherein it seemed men broke A sovran league, and long years fought and bled, Till down my sweet sides ran my children's gore, And all my beautiful garments were made red, And all my fertile fields were thicket-grown, Nor could thy dear light reach me through the air ; At last a voice cried, ' Let them strive no more !' Then music breathed, and lo ! from my despair I wake to joy, yet would not joy alone ! " For, hark ! I hear a murmur on the meads, Where as of old my children seek my face, The low of kine, the peaceful tramp of steeds, Blithe shouts of men in many a pastoral place, The noise of tilth through all my goodliest land ; And happy laughter of a dusky race Whose brethren lift them from their ancient toil, Saying : 'The year of jubilee has come ; Gather the gifts of Earth with equal hand ; Henceforth ye too may share the birthright soil, The corn, the wine, and all the harvest-home.' " O my deal 1 lord, my radiant bridegroom, look ! Behold their joy who sorrowed in my dreams, The sword a share, the spear a pruning-hook ; Lo, I awake, and turn me toward thy beams Even as a bride again ! Oh shed thy light 438 STEDMAN^ Upon my fruitful places in full streams ! Let there be yield for every living thing ; The land is fallow, let there be increase After the darkness of the sterile night ; Ay, let us twain a festival of Peace Prepare, and hither all my nations bring ! " The fair Earth spake : the glad Sun speeded forth, Hearing her matron words, and backward drave To frozen caves the icy Wind of the North, And bade the South Wind from the tropic wave Bring watery vapours over river and plain, And bade the East Wind cross her path, and lave The lowlands, emptying there her laden mist, And bade the Wind of the West, the best wind, blow After the early and the latter rain, And beamed himself, and oft the sweet Earth kissed, While her sweet servitors sped to and fro. Forthwith the troop that, at the beck of Earth, Foster her children, brought a glorious store Of viands, food of immemorial worth, Her earliest gifts, her tenderest evermore. First came the Silvery Spirit, whose marshalled files Climb up the glades in billowy breakers hoar, Nodding their crests, and at his side there sped The Golden Spirit, whose yellow harvests trail Across the continents and fringe the isles, And freight men's argosies where'er they sail : Oh what a wealth of sheaves he there outspread ! Came the dear spirit whom Earth doth love the best, Fragrant of clover-bloom and new-mown hay, Beneath whose mantle weary ones find rest, On whose green skirts the little children play : She bore the food our patient cattle crave. Next, robed in silk, with tassels scattering spray, Followed the generous Spirit of the Maize, And many a kindred shape of high renown HARTE. 439 Bore-in the clustering grape, the fruits that wave On orchard branches or in gardens blaze, And those the wind-shook forest hurtles down. Even thus they laid a great and marvellous feast ; And Earth her children summoned joyously, Throughout that goodliest land wherein had ceased The vision of battle, and with glad hands free These took their fill, and plenteous measures poured, Beside, for those who dwelt beyond the sea. Praise, like an incense, upward rose to Heaven For that full harvest, and the autumnal Sun Stayed long above, and ever at the board Peace, white-robed angel, held the high seat given, And War far off withdrew his visage dun. F. BRET HARTE. [Born about 1835. A name now universally known, by the authorship of The Luck of Roaring Camp, and especially of the verses on That Heathen Chinee\. THE MIRACLE OF PADRE JUNIPERO. THIS is the tale that the Chronicle Tells of the wonderful miracle Wrought by the pious Padre Serro, The very reverend Junipero. The Heathen stood on his ancient mound, Looking over the desert bound Into the distant hazy South, Over the dusty and broad champaign Where, with many a gaping mouth, And fissure cracked by the fervid drouth, For seven months had the wasted plain Known no moisture of dew or rain. The wells were empty and choked with sand ; The rivers had perished from the land ; Only the sea-fogs to and fro Slipped like ghosts of the streams below. \Y 440 HARTE. Deep in its bed lay the river's bones, Bleaching in pebbles and milk-white stones ; And, tracked o'er the desert faint and far, Its ribs shone bright on each sandy bar. Thus they stood as the sun went down Over the foot-hills bare and brown ; Thus they looked to the South, wherefrom The pale-face medicine-man should come. Not in anger or in strife, But to bring so ran the tale The welcome springs of eternal life, The living waters that should not fail. Said one, " He will come like Manitou, Unseen, unheard, in the falling dew." Said another, " He will come full soon Out of the round-faced watery moon." And another said, " He is here !" and lo, Faltering, staggering, feeble and slow, Out from the desert's blinding heat The Padre dropped at the heathen's feet. They stood and gazed for a little space Down on his pallid and careworn face, And a smile of scorn went round the band As they touched alternate with foot and hand This mortal waif, that the outer space Of dim mysterious sky and sand Flung with so little of Christian grace Down on their barren sterile strand. Said one to him : " It seems thy god Is a very pitiful kind of god ; He could not shield thine aching eyes From the blowing desert-sands that rise, Nor turn aside from thy old grey head The glittering blade that is brandished By the sun he set in the heavens high. He could not moisten thy lips when dry ; The desert fire is in thy brain ; HARTE. 441 Thy limbs are racked with the fever-pain. If this be the grace he showeth thee Who art his servant, what may we, Strange to his ways and his commands, Seek at his unforgiving hands ?" " Drink but this cup," said the Padre straight, "And thou shalt know whose mercy bore These aching limbs to your heathen door, And purged my soul of its gross estate. Drink in His name, and thou shalt see The hidden depths of this mystery. Drink !" and he held the cup. One blow From the heathen dashed to the ground below The sacred cup that the Padre bore ; And the thirsty soil drank the precious store Of sacramental and holy wine, That emblem and consecrated sign And blessed symbol of blood divine. Then, says the legend (and they who doubt The same as heretics be accurst), - From the dry and feverish soil leaped out A living fountain ; a well-spring burst Over the dusty and broad champaign, Over the sandy and sterile plain, Till the granite ribs and the milk-white stones That lay in the valley the scattered bones Moved in the river and lived again ! Such was the wonderful miracle Wrought by the cup of wine that fell From the hands of the pious Padre Serro, The very reverend Junipero. . 442 HARTE. THE REVEILLE". HARK ! I hear the tramp of thousands, And of armed men the hum ; Lo ! a nation's hosts have gathered Round the quick alarming drum, Saying, " Come, Freemen, come! Ere your heritage be wasted," said the quick alarming drum. " Let me of my heart take counsel : War is not of Life the sum ; Who shall stay and reap the harvest When the autumn days shall come?" But the drum Echoed, " Come ! Death shall reap the braver harvest." said the solemn- sounding drum. " But, when won the coming battle, What of profit springs therefrom ? What if conquest, subjugation, Even greater ills become?" But the drum Answered, " Come ! You must do the sum to prove it," said the Yankee- answering drum. " What if, 'mid the cannons' thunder, Whistling shot and bursting bomb, When my brothers fall around me, Should my heart grow cold and numb?" But the drum Answered, " Come ! Better there in death united than in life a recreant, come ! " Thus they answered, hoping, fearing, Some in faith, and doubting some, HARTE. 443 Till a trumpet-voice proclaiming Said, " My chosen people, come !" Then the drum Lo! was dumb, For the great heart of the nation, throbbing, answered, "Lord, we come!" TO A SEA-BIRD. SANTA CRUZ, 1869. SAUNTERING hither on listless wings, Careless vagabond of the sea, Little thou heedest the surf that sings, The bar that thunders, the shale that rings, Give me to keep thy company. Little thou hast, old friend, that's new ; Storms and wrecks are old things to thee ; Sick am I of these changes, too ; Little to care for, little to rue, I on the shore, and thou on the sea. All of thy wanderings, far and near, Bring thee at last to shore and me ; All of my journeyings end them here, This our tether must be our cheer, I on the shore, and thou on the sea. Lazily rocking on ocean's breast, Something in common, old friend, have we ; Thou on the shingle seek'st thy nest, I to the waters look for rest, I on the shore, and thou on the sea. 444 ADAH MENKEN. ADAH ISAACS MENKEN. [Born in New Orleans, 1839 ; died of consumption in Paris, August 1868. She was the daughter of a merchant, a Spanish Jew, and her maiden name was Dolores Adios Fuertos. Her father dying when she was only two years of age, she was taken by her mother to Cuba, and brought up in the family of a rich planter. This gentleman also died when she was but thirteen her mother's death had occurred previously. He left her the bulk of his pro perty : but the will was set aside, 1 and the girl of fourteen came out on the stage as a dancer, afterwards playing various parts in tragedy and drama. She next married a Mr. John Isaacs Menken; and, changing her proper name of Adios into Adah, made up the married name by which she thereafter continued to be known. Towards 1860 she married again Mr. Robert H. Newell, author of the Orpheus C. Kerr Papers : this alliance was termi nated by a divorce. The impetuous actress made her southern sympathies, during the war of secession, rather perilously promi nent ; and in 1864 crossed over to England, where her perform ances chiefly as "the female Mazeppa" are fresh in many memories. Of the numbers who admired her lavish graces of face and form, few indeed would have thought that she was predestined the victim of consumption within four years. " She expressed a wish to be buried in accordance with the rites of her religion [the Jewish], with nothing to mark her resting-place but a plain piece of wood bearing the words ' Thou knowest : " an inscription as sublime and profound as it is majestically simple. Living a turbid and irregular life, with uncommon versatility of talent (though she showed no great gift for her professional calling as an actress), Adah Menken had a vein of intense melancholy in her character : it predominates throughout her verses with a weari some iteration of emphasis, and was by no means vamped up for mere purposes of effect. The poems contained in her single pub lished volume are mostly unformed rhapsodies windy and nebu lous ; perhaps only half intelligible to herself, and certainly more than half unintelligible to the reader. Yet there are touches of genius which place them in a very different category from many so-called poems of more regular construction and more definable deservings. They really express a life of much passion, and not a little aspiration ; a life deeply sensible of loss, self-baffled, and 1 In some of the incidents not to speak of the general tenour of Adah Menken's career, the reader may observe a curious paral lelism to that of Edgar Poe : and indeed (allowing for a great dif ference in poetic merit) the tone of mind and inspiration of the two writers were not without some analogy. Poe was a man and an artist in a direction of faculty wherein Adah Menken was a woman find a votary. ADA H MENKEN. 445 mixing the wail of humiliation with that of indignation like the remnants of a defeated army, hotly pursued. It is this life that cries out in the disordered verses, and these have a responsive cry of their own]. ONE YEAR AGO. IN feeling I was but a child When first we met one year ago ; As free and guileless as the bird That roams the dreary woodland through. My heart was all a pleasant world Of sunbeams dewed with April tears : Life's brightest page was turned to me, And nought I read of doubts or fears. We met we loved one year ago, Beneath the stars of summer skies : Alas ! I knew not then, as now, The darkness of life's mysteries. You took my hand one year ago, Beneath the azure dome above ; And, gazing on the stars, you told The trembling story of your love. I gave to you, one year ago, The only jewel that was mine : My heart took off her lovely crown, And all her riches gave to thine. You loved me too when first we met ; Your tender kisses told me so. How changed you are from what you were In life and love one year ago ! With mocking words and cold neglect JVIy truth and passion are repaid ; And of a soul once fresh with love A dreary desert you have made. Why did you fill my youthful life With such wild dreams of hope and bliss ? 446 ADAH MENKEN. Why did you say you loved me then, If it were all to end in this ? You robbed me of my faith and trust In all life's beauty love and truth ; You left me nothing nothing save A hopeless, blighted, dreamless youth. Strike if you will, and let the stroke Be heavy as my weight of woe : I shall not shrink my heart is cold ; 'Tis broken since one year ago. ASPIRATION. POOR impious Soul, that fixes its high hopes In the dim distance, on a throne of clouds, And from the morning's mist would make the ropes To draw it up amid acclaim of crowds Beware ! That soaring path is lined with shrouds ; And he who braves it, though of sturdy breath, May meet half-way the avalanche and death. O poor young Soul, whose year-devouring glance Fixes in ecstacy upon a star (Whose feverish brilliance looks a part of earth, Yet quivers where the feet of angels are, And seems the future crown in realms afar) Beware ! a spark thou art, and dost but see Thine own reflection in eternity. INFELIX. WHERE is the promise of my years, Once written on my brow Ere errors, agonies, and fears, Brought with them all that speaks in tears,- Ere I had sunk beneath my peers ? Where sleeps that promise now? ADAH MENKEN. 447 Nought lingers to redeem those hours, Still, still to memory sweet ! The flowers that bloomed in sunny bowers Are withered all; and Evil towers Supreme above her sister powers Of Sorrow and Deceit. I look along the columned years, And see Life's riven fane, Just where it fell, amid the jeers Of scornful lips, whose mocking sneers For ever hiss within mine ears To break the sleep of pain. I can but own my life is vain, A desert void of peace. I missed the goal I sought to gain ; I missed the measure of the strain That lulls Fame's fever in the brain, And bids earth's tumult cease. Myself ! alas for theme so poor A theme but rich in fear ! I stand a wreck on Error's shore A spectre not within the door A houseless shadow evermore An exile lingering here ! ANSWER ME. IN from the night. The storm is lifting his black arms up to the sky. Friend of my heart, who so gently mark'st out the life- track for me, draw near to-night. Forget the wailing of the low- voiced wind : Shut out the meanings of the freezing and the starving and the dying, and bend your head low to me. Clasp my cold, cold hands in yours ; Think of me tenderly and lovingly. 448 ADAH MENKEN. Look down into my eyes the while I question you; and, if you love me, answer me Oh ! answer me ! Is there not a gleam of peace on all this tiresome earth? Does not one oasis cheer all this desert-world ? When will all this toil and pain bring me the blessing ? Must I ever plead for help to do the work before me set? Must I ever stumble and faint by the dark wayside ? Oh the dark lonely wayside, with its dim-sheeted ghosts peering up through their shallow graves ! Must I ever tremble and pale at the great Beyond ? Must I find rest only in your bosom, as now I do ? Answer me Oh ! answer me ! Speak to me tenderly Think of me lovingly. Let your soft hands smooth back my hair ; Take my cold tear-stained face up to yours. Let my lonely life creep into your warm bosom 3 know ing no other rest but this. Let me question you, while sweet Faith and Trust are folding their white robes around me. Thus am I purified, even to your love, that came like John the Baptist in the wilderness of Sin. You read the starry heavens, and lead me forth. But tell me if, in this world's Judea, there comes never quiet when once the heart awakes. Why must it ever hush Love back ? Must it only labour, strive, and ache ? Has it no reward but this ? Has it no inheritance but to bear and break? Answer me Oh ! answer me ! The storm struggles with the darkness. Folded away in your arms, how little do I heed their battle! ADAH MENKEN. +49 The trees clash in vain their naked swords against the door. I go not forth while the low murmur of your voice is drifting all else back to silence. The Darkness presses his black forehead close to the window-pane, and beckons me without. Love holds a lamp in this little room that hath power to blot back Fear. But will the lamp ever starve for oil ? Will its blood-red flame ever grow faint and blue ? Will it uprear itself to a slender line of light? Will it grow pallid and motionless ? Will it sink rayless to everlasting death ? Answer me Oh ! answer me ! Look at these tear-drops : See how they quiver and die on your open hands. Fold these white garments close to my breast, while I question you. Would you have me think that from the warm shelter of your heart I must go to the grave ? And, when I am lying in my silent shroud, will you love me? When I am buried down in the cold wet earth, will you grieve that you did not save me ? Will your tears reach my pale face through all the withered leaves that will heap themselves upon my grave ? Will you repent that you loosened your arms to let me fall so deep, and so far out of sight ? Will you come and tell me so when the coffin has shut out the storm ? Answer me Oh J answer me ! 2 F 450 JOAQUJ.\ 7 MILLER. JOAQUIN MILLER. [Born about 1840 in California. Known in literature as " Joa- quin," but in society as " Cincinnatus H. Miller." Has passed a rough adventurous life in his native district and the regions of Western and Central America ; gaining the experiences which he has now begun to embody in very striking and picturesque poems] ARIZONIAK " And I have said, and I say it ever, As the years go on and the world goes over, 'Twere better to be content and clever In tending of cattle and tossing of clover, In the grazing of cattle and the growing of grain, Than a strong man striving for fame or gain ; Be even as kine in the red-tipped clover ; For they lie down and their rests are rests, And the days are theirs, come sun come rain, To lie, rise up, and repose again ; While we wish, yearn, and do pray in vain, And hope to ride on the billows of bosoms, And hope to rest in the haven of breasts, Till the heart is sickened and the fair hope dead ; Be even as clover with its crown of blossoms, Even as blossoms ere the bloom is shed, Kissed by kine and the brown sweet bee For these have the sun, and moon, and air, And never a bit of the burthen of care ; And with all of our caring what more have we ? I would court Content like a lover lonely, I would woo her, win her, and wear her only, And never go over this white sea wall For gold or glory or for aught at all." He said these things as he stood with the Squire By the river's rim in the fields of clover, While the stream flowed under and the clouds flew over, With the sun tangled in and the fringes afire. So the Squire leaned with a kind desire 4*3- JO A Q UIN MILLER, 45 1 To humour his guest, and to hear his story ; For his guest had gold, and he yet was clever, And mild of manner ; and, what was more, he, In the morning's ramble, had praised the kine, The clover's reach and the meadows fine, And so made the Squire his friend for ever. His brow was browned by the sun and weather, And touched by the terrible hand of time ; His rich black beard had a fringe of rime, As silk and silver inwove together. There were hoops of gold all over his hands, And across his breast, in chains and bands, Broad and massive as belts of leather ; And the belts of gold were bright in the sun. But brighter than gold his black eyes shone From their sad face-setting so swarth and dun, Brighter than beautiful Santan-stone, Brighter even than balls of fire, As he said, hot-faced, in the face of the Squire : " The pines bowed over, the stream bent -under, The cabin covered with thatches of palm, Down in a canon so deep, the wonder Was what it could know in its clime but calm : Down in a canon so cleft asunder By sabre-stroke in the young world's prime It looked as broken by bolts of thunder, And burst asunder and rent and riven By earthquakes, driven, the turbulent time A red cross lifted red hands to heaven. 1 And this in the land where the sun goes down, And gold is gathered by tide and by stream, And maidens are brown as the cocoa brown, 1 These are the lines as given in the later American edition : the last two are far from perspicuous. The earlier English edition says merely, " It looked as if broken by bolts of thunder, Riven and driven by turbulent time." 452 JO A Q UIN MILLER. And a life is a love and a love is a dream ; Where the winds come in from the far Cathay With odour of spices and balm and bay, And summer abideth for aye and aye, Nor comes in a tour with the stately June, And comes too late, and returns too soon To the land of the sun and of summer's noon. " She stood in the shadows as the sun went down, Fretting her curls with her fingers brown, As tall as the silk-tipped tasselled corn Stood strangely watching as I weighed the gold We had washed that day where the river rolled ; And her proud lip curled with a sun-clime scorn, As she asked, ' Is she better or fairer than I ? She, that blonde in the land beyond, Where the sun is hid and the seas are high That you gather-in gold as the years go on, And hoard and hide it away for her As a squirrel burrows the black pine-burr?' " Now the gold weighed well, but was lighter of weight Than we two had taken for days of late ; So I was fretted, and, brow a-frown, I said, ' She is fairer, and I loved her first, And shall love her last, come the worst to worst.' Now her eyes were black and her skin was brown, But her lips grew livid and her eyes afire As I said this thing : and higher and higher The hot words ran, when the booming thunder Pealed in the crags and the pine-tops under, While up by the cliff in the murky skies It looked as the clouds had caught the fire The flash and fire of her wonderful eyes. "She turned from the door and down to the river, And mirrored her face in the whimsical tide ; Then threw back her hair, as if throwing a quiver, As an Indian throws it back far from his side JO A Q UIN MILLER. 453 And free from his hands, swinging fast to the shoulder, When rushing to battle ; and, rising, she sighed And shook, and shivered as aspens shiver. Then a great green snake slid into the river, Glistening, green, and with eyes of fire. Quick, double-handed she seized a boulder, And cast it with all the fury of passion, As with lifted head it went curving across, Swift darting its tongue with a fierce desire, Curving and curving, lifting higher and higher, Bent and beautiful as a river-moss. Then, smitten, it turned, bent, broken, and doubled, And licked, red-tongued, like a forked fire, And sank, and the troubled waters bubbled, And then swept on in their old swift fashion. " I lay in my hammock. The air was heavy And hot and threatening ; the very heaven Was holding its breath ; and bees in a bevy Hid under my thatch ; and birds were driven In clouds to the rocks in a hurried whirr, As I peered down by the path*for her. She stood like a bronze bent over the river, The proud eyes fixed, the passion unspoken When the heavens broke like a great dyke broken. Then, ere I fairly had time to give her A shout of warning, a rushing of wind, And the rolling of clouds, and a deafening din, And a darkness that had been black to the blind, Came down, as I shouted, ' Come in ! come in ! Come under the roof, come up from the river, As up from a grave come now, or come never ! ' The tasselled tops of the pines were as weeds, The red-woods rocked like to lake-side reeds, And the world seemed darkened and drowned for ever. " One time in the night as the black wind shifted, And a flash of lightning stretched over the stream, I seemed to see her with her brown hands lifted Only seemed to see, as one sees in a dream 454 JOAQUIN MILLER. With her eyes wide-wild, and her pale lips pressed, And the blood from her brow and the flood to her breast ; When the flood caught her hair as the flax in a wheel, And, wheeling and whirling her round like a reel, Laughed loud her despair, then leapt long like a steed, Holding tight to her hair, folding fast to her heel, Laughing fierce, leaping far as if spurred to its speed : Now mind, I tell you all this did but seem Was seen as you see fearful scenes in a dream ; For what the devil could the lightning show In a night like that, I should like to know ? " And then I slept, and sleeping I dreamed Of great green serpents with tongues of fire, And of death by drowning, and of after death Of the day of judgment, wherein it seemed That she, the heathen, was bidden higher, Higher than I ; that I clung to her side, And clinging struggled, and struggling cried, And crying wakened, all weak of my breath. " Long leaves of the sun lay over the floor, And a chipmonk chirped in the open door; But above on his crag the eagle screamed, Screamed as he never had screamed before. I rushed to the river : the flood had gone Like a thief, with only his tracks upon The weeds and grasses and warm wet sand ; And I ran after with reaching hand, And called as I reached, and reached as I ran, And ran till I came to the canon's van, Where the waters lay in a bent lagoon, Hooked and crooked like the horned moon. " Here in the surge where the waters met, And the warm wave lifted, and the winds did fret The wave till it foamed with rage on the land, She lay with the wave on the warm white sand. Her rich hair trailed with the trailing weeds, X > JOAQUIN MILLER. 455 And her small brown hands lay prone or lifted As the wave sang strophes in the broken reeds, Or paused in pity, and in silence sifted Sands of gold, as upon her grave. And as sure as you see yon browzing kine, And breathe the breath of your meadows fine, When I went to my waist in the warm white wave, And stood all pale in the wave to my breast, And reached for her in her rest and unrest, Her hands were lifted and reached to mine. " Now mind, I tell you I cried, ' Come in ! Come into the house, come out from the hollow, Come out of the storm, come up from the river ! ' Cried, and called, in that desolate din, Though I did not rush out, and in plain words give her A. wordy warning of the flood to follow, Word by word and letter by letter : But she knew it as well as I, and better. For once in the desert of New Mexico, When I sought frantically far and wide For the famous spot where Apaches shot With bullets of gold their buffalo, And she followed faithfully at my side, I threw me down in the hard hot sand, Utterly famished and ready to die, And a speck arose in the red-hot sky A speck no larger than a lady's hand While she at my side bent tenderly over, Shielding my face from the sun as a cover, And wetting my face, as she watched by my side, From a skin she had borne till the high noon-tide, (I had emptied mine in the heat of the morning). When the thunder muttered far over the plain Like a monster bound or a beast in pain, She sprang the instant, and gave the warning, With her brown hand pointed to the burning skies. I was too weak unto death to arise, And I prayed for death in my deep despair, And did curse and clutch in the sand in my rage, -"?** 456 JO A Q UIN MILLER. And bite in the bitter white ashen sage That covers the desert like a coat of hair. But she knew the peril, and her iron will, With heart as true as the great North Star, Did bear me up to the palm-tipped hill, Where the fiercest beasts in a brotherhood, Beasts that had fled from the plain and far, In perfectest peace expectant stood, With their heads held high, and their limbs a-quiver. And ere she barely had time to breathe The boiling waters began to seethe From hill to hill in a booming river, Beating and breaking from hill to hill Even while yet the sun shot fire, Without the shield of a cloud above Filling the canon as you would fill A wine-cup, drinking in swift desire, With the brim new-kissed by the lips you love. " So you see she knew knew perfectly well, As well as I could shout and tell The mountains would send a flood to the plain, Sweeping the gorge like a hurricane, When the fire flashed, and the thunder fell. Therefore it is wrong, and I say therefore Unfair, that a mystical brown-winged moth Or midnight bat should for evermore Fan my face with its wings of air, And follow me up, down, everywhere, Flit past, pursue me, or fly before, Dimly limning in each fair place The full fixed eyes and the sad brown face, So forty times worse than if it were wroth. " I gathered the gold I had hid in the earth, Hid over the door and hid under the hearth : Hoarded and hid, as the world went over, For the love of a blonde by a sun-browned lover. And I said to myself, as I set my face To the East, and afar from the desolate place, JOAQUIN MILLER. 457 ' She has braided her tresses, and through her tears Looked away to the West, for years, the years That I have wrought where the sun tans brown. She has waked by night, she has watched by day, She has wept and wondered at my delay, Alone and in tears, with her head held down, Where the ships sail out and the seas swirl in, Forgetting to knit and refusing to spin. She shall lift her head, she shall see her lover, She shall hear his voice like a sea that rushes, She shall hold his gold in her hands of snow, And down on his breast she shall hide her blushes, And never a care shall her true heart know, While the clods are below, or the clouds are above her.' "On the fringe of the night she stood with her pitcher At the old town-pump : and oh ! passing fair. ' I am riper now,' I said, ' but am richer/ And I lifted my hand to my beard and hair ; ' I am burnt by the sun, I am browned by the sea ; I am white of my beard, and am bald may-be ; Yet for all such things what can her heart care?' Then she moved ; and I said, ' How marvellous fair ! She looked to the West, with her arm arched over. ' Looking for me, her sun-browned lover,' I said to myself, with a hot heart-thump, And stepped me nearer to the storm-stained pump, As approaching a friend ; for 'twas here of old Our troths were plighted and. the tale was told. " How young she was and how fair she was ! How tall as a palm, and how pearly fair, As the night came down on her glorious hair ! Then the night grew deep and the eye grew dim, And a sad-faced figure began to swim And float in my face, flit past, then pause, With her hands held up and her head held down, Yet face to face ; and her face was brown. Now why did she come and confront me there, JL, 458 JO A Q UIN MILLER. With the mould on her face and the moist in her hair, And a mystical stare in her marvellous eyes ? I had called to her twice, ' Come in ! come in ! Come out of the storm to the calm within ! ' Now, that is the reason that I make complain That for ever and ever her face should arise, Facing face to face with her great sad eyes. I said then to myself, and I say it again (Gainsay it you, gainsay it who will, I shall say it over and over still, And will say it ever, for I know it true) That I did all that a man could do (Some good men's doings are done in vain) To save that passionate child of the sun, With her love as deep as the doubled main, And as strong and fierce as a troubled sea That beautiful bronze with its soul of fire, Its tropical love and its kingly ire That child as fixed as a pyramid, As tall as a tula and as pure as a nun : And all there is of it the all I did, As often happens, was done in vain. So there is no bit of her blood on me. " ' She is marvellous young and is wonderful fair/ I said again, and my heart grew bold, And beat and beat a charge for my feet. ' Time that defaces us, places and replaces us, And trenches the faces as in furrows for tears, Has traced here nothing in all these years. 'Tis the hair of gold that I vexed of old, The marvellous flowing flower of hair ; And the peaceful eyes in their sweet surprise That I have kissed till the head swam round, And the delicate curve of the dimpled chin, And theTpouting lips and the pearls within, Are the same, the same, but so young, so fair ! My heart leapt out and back at a bound, As a child that starts, then stops, then lingers. ' How wonderful young ! ' I lifted my fingers, JOAQU1N MILLER. 459 And fell to counting the round years over That I had dwelt where the sun goes down. Four full hands, and a finger over ! ' She does not know me, her truant lover,' I said to myself, for her brow was a-frown As I stepped still nearer, with my head held down, All abashed and in blushes my brown face over ; ' She does not know me, her long-lost lover, For my beard's so long and my skin's so brown That I well might pass myself for another.' So I lifted my voice and I spoke aloud : 'Annette, my darling ! Annette Macleod !' " She started, she stopped, she turned, amazed, She stood all wonder with her eyes wild-wide, Then turned in terror down the dusk wayside, And cried as she fled, ' The man is crazed, And calls the maiden name of my mother !' "From a scene that saddens, from a ghost that wearies, From a white isle set in a wall of seas, From the kine and clover and all of these, I shall set my face for the fierce Sierras. I shall make me mates on the stormy border, I shall beard the grizzly, shall battle again, And from mad disorder shall mould me order And a wild repose for a weary brain. " Let the world turn over, and over, and over, And toss and tumble like a beast in pain, Crack, quake, and tremble, and turn full over And die, and never rise up again ; Let her dash her peaks through the purple cover, Let her plash her seas in the face of the sun I have no one to love me now, not one, In a world as full as a world can hold. So I will get gold as I erst have done, I will gather a coffin top-full of gold, To take to the door of Death, to buy Content when I double my hands and die. 460 y OA Q UIiV MILLER. There is nothing that is, be it beast or human, Love of maiden or the lust of man, Curse of man or the kiss of woman, For which I care, or for which I can Give a love for a love or a hate for a hate, A curse for a curse or a kiss for a kiss, Since life has neither a bane nor a bliss To one that is cheek-by-jowl with Fate; For I have lifted and reached far over To the tree of promise, and have plucked of all. And ate ate ashes, and myrrh, and gall. Go down, go down to the fields of clover, Down with the kine in the pastures fine, And give no thought or care or labour For maid or man, good name or neighbour; For I have given, and what have I ? Given all my youth, my years, and labour, And a love as warm as the world is cold, For a beautiful, bright, and delusive lie. Gave youth, gave years, gave love, for gold, Giving and getting ; yet what have I But an empty palm and a face forgotten, And a hope that's dead, and a heart that's rotten ? Red gold on the waters is no-part bread, But sinks dull-sodden like a lump of lead, And returns no more in the face of heaven. So the dark day thickens at the hope deferred, And the strong heart sickens, and the soul is stirred Like a weary sea when his hands are lifted, Imploring peace, with his raiment drifted And driven afar and rent and riven. " The red ripe stars hang low overhead ; Let the good and the light of soul reach up, Pluck gold as plucking a butter-cup. But I am as lead and my hands are red ; There is nothing that is that can wake one passion In soul or body, or one sense of pleasure, No fame or fortune in the world's wide measure, Or love full-bosomed or in any fashion. * : 4- JOAQUIN MILLER. 461 " The doubled sea, and the troubled heaven Starred and barred by the bolts of fire, In storms where stars are riven, and driven As clouds through heaven, as a dust blown higher; The angels hurled to the realms infernal Down from the walls in unholy wars, That man misnameth the falling stars ; The purple robe of the proud Eternal, The Tyrian blue with its fringe of gold, Shrouding his countenance, fold on fold All are dull and tame as a tale that is told. For the loves that hasten and the hates tha l t' linger, The nights that darken and the days that glisten, And men that lie and maidens that listen, I care not even the snap of my finger. " So the sun climbs up, and on, and over, And the days go out and the tides come in, And the pale moon rubs on the purple cover Till worn as thin and as bright as tin ; But the V73ys are dark and the days are dreary, And the dreams of youth are but dust in age, And the heart gets hardened, and the hands grow weary, Holding them up for their heritage. " And the strained heart-strings wear bare and brittle, And the fond hope dies when so long deferred ; Then the fair hope lies in the heart interred, So stiff and cold in its coffin of lead. For you promise so great and you gain so little ; For you promise so great of glory and gold, And gain so little that the hands grow cold ; And for gold and glory you gain instead A fond heart sickened and a fair hope dead. " So I have said, and I say it over, And can prove it over and over again, That the four-footed beasts on the red-crowned clover, The pied and horned beasts on the plain, v H^\ I 462 JOAQUIN MILLER. That lie down, rise up, and repose again, And do never take care or toil or spin, Nor buy, nor build, nor gather-in gold, Though the days go out and the tides come in, Are better than we by a thousand-fold ; For what is it all, in the words of fire, But a vexing of soul and a vain desire?" WITH WALKER IN NICARAGUA. I. HE was a brick : let this be said Above my brave dishonoured dead. I ask no more, this is not much, Yet I disdain a colder touch To memory as dear as his; For he was true as any star, And brave as Yuba's grizzlies are, Yet gentle as a panther is, Mouthing her young in her first fierce kiss Tall, courtly, grand as anyking, Yet simple as a child at play, In camp and court the same alway, And never moved at anything; A dash of sadness in his air, Born, may-be, of his over-care, And, may-be, born of a despair In early love I never knew. I questioned not, as many do, Of things as sacred as this is ; I only knew that he to me Was all a father, friend, could be ; I sought to know no more than this Of history of him or his. A piercing eye, a princely air, A presence like a chevalier, Half angel and half Lucifer ; Fair fingers, jewelled manifold J OA Q UIN MILLER, 463 With great gems set in hoops of gold ; Sombrero black, with plume of snow That swept his long silk locks below ; A red scrape with bars of gold, Heedless falling, fold on fold ; A sash of silk, where flashing swung A sword as swift as serpent's tongue, In sheath of silver chased in gold ; A face of blended pride and pain, Of mingled pleading and disdain, With shades of glory and of grief; And Spanish spurs with bells of steel That dashed and dangled at the heel The famous filibuster chief Stood by his tent 'mid tall brown trees That top the fierce Cordilleras, With brawn arm arched above his brow ; Stood still he stands, a picture, now Long gazing down the sunset seas. n. WHAT strange strong bearded men were these He led toward the tropic seas ! Men sometime of uncommon birth, Men rich in histories untold, Who boasted not though more than bold, Blown from the four parts of the earth. Men mighty-thewed as Samson was, That had been kings in any cause, A remnant of the races past ; Dark -browed as if in iron cast, Broad-breasted as twin gates of brass, Men strangely brave and fiercely true, Who dared the West when giants were, Who erred, yet bravely dared to err ; A remnant of that early few Who held no crime or curse or vice As dark as that of cowardice ; With blendings of the worst and best : 464 JOAQUTN MILLER. Of faults and virtues that have blest Or cursed or thrilled the human breast. They rode, a troop of bearded men, Rode two and two out from the town, And some were blonde and some were brown, And all as brave as Sioux ; but when, From San Bennetto, south the line That bound them in the laws of men Was passed, and Peace stood mute behind, And streamed a banner to the wind The world knew not, there was a sign Of awe, of silence, rear and van. Men thought who never thought before ; I heard the clang and clash of steel From sword at hand or spur at heel And iron feet, but nothing more. Some thought of Texas, some of Maine, But more of rugged Tennessee, Of scenes in Southern vales of wine, And scenes in Northern hills of pine, As scenes they might not meet again *, And one of Avon thought, and one Thought of an isle beneath the sun, And one of Rowley, one the Rhine, And one turned sadly to the Spree. Defeat means something more than death : The world was ready, keen to smite, As, stern and still beneath its ban, With iron will and bated breath, Their hands against their fellow-man, They rode each man an Ishmaelite. But, when we struck the hills of pine, These men dismounted, doffed their cares, Talked loud, and laughed old love-affairs, And on the grass took meat and wine, And never gave a thought again To land or life that lay behind, Or love or care of any kind Beyond the present cross or pain. " They rode each man an Ishraaelite." American Poems.} (faff 464. JOAQUIN MILLER. 465 And I, a waif of stormy seas, A child among such men as these, Was blown along this savage surf. And rested with them on the turf, And took delight below the trees. I did not question, did not care To know the right or wrong. I saw That savage freedom had a spell, And loved it more than I can tell, And snapped my fingers at the law. I bear my burden of the shame, I shun it not, and nought forget, However much I may regret : I claim some candour to my name, And courage cannot change or die. Did they deserve to die ? They died ; Let justice then be satisfied : And as for me, why what am I ? The standing side by side till death, The dying for some wounded friend, The faith that failed not to the end, The strong endurance till the breath And body took their ways apart, I only know. I keep my trust. Their vices ! earth has them by heart : Their virtues ! they are with their dust. How wound we through the solid wood, With all its broad boughs hung in green With lichen-mosses trailed between ! How waked the spotted beasts of prey, Deep sleeping from the face of day, And dashed them like a troubled flood Down some defile and denser wood ! And snakes, long, lithe, and beautiful, As green and graceful-boughed bamboo, Did twist and twine them through and though The boughs that hung red-fruited full. 2 G 466 JOAQUIN MILL F.R. One, monster-sized, above me hung, Close eyed me with his bright pink eyes, Then raised his folds, and swayed and swung, And licked like lightning his red tongue, Then oped his wide mouth with surprise. He writhed and curved, and raised and lowered His folds like liftings of the tide, And sank so low I touched his side, As I rode by, with my broad sword. The trees shook hands high overhead, And bowed and intertwined across The narrow way, while leaves and moss, And luscious fruit gold-hued and red, Through all the canopy of green, Let not one sunshaft shoot between. Birds hung and swung, green-robed and red, Or drooped in curved lines dreamily, Rainbows reversed, from tree to tree f Or sang low-hanging overhead Sang low, as if they sang and slept, Sang faint, like some far \raterfall, And took no note of us at all, Though nuts that in the way were spread Did crush and crackle as we stepped. Wild lilies, tall as maidens are, As sweet of breath, as pearly fair, As fair as faith, as pure as truth, Fell thick before our every tread, As in a sacrifice to ruth ; And all the air with perfume filled More sweet than ever man distilled. The ripened fruit a fragrance shed And hung in hand-reach overhead, In nest of blossoms on the shoot, The bending shoot that bore the fruit. How ran the monkeys through the leaves ! How rushed they through, brown-clad and blue. JOAQUIN MILLER. 467 Like shuttles hurried through and through The threads a hasty weaver weaves ! How quick they cast us fruits of gold, Then loosened hand and all foothold, And hung limp, limber, as if dead, Hung low and listless overhead ; And all the time, with half-oped eyes Bent full on us in mute surprise, Looked wisely too, as wise hens do That watch you with the head askew. The long days through from blossomed trees There came the sweet song of sweet bees, With chorus-tones of cockatoo That slid his beak along the bough, And walked and talked and hung and swung, In crown of gold and coat of blue, The wisest fool that ever sung, Or had a crown, or held a tongue. Oh when we broke the sombre wood . And pierced at last the sunny plain, How wild and still with wonder stood The proud mustangs with bannered mane, And necks that never knew a rein, And nostrils lifted high, and blown, Fierce breathing as a hurricane : Yet by their leader held the while In solid column, square, and file, And ranks more martial than our own ! Some one above the common kind, Some one to look to, lean upon, I think is much a woman's mind ; But it was mine, and I had drawn A rein beside the chief while we Rode through the forest leisurely ; When he grew kind, and questioned me Of kindred, home, and home-affair, 4 6i> yOAQUIN MILLER. Of how I came to wander there, And had my father herds and land And men in hundreds at command? At which I silent shook my head, Then, timid, met his eyes and said, " Not so. Where sunny-foot hills run Down to the North Pacific sea, And Willamette meets the sun In many angles, patiently My father tends his flocks of snow, And turns alone the mellow sod, And sows some fields not over broad, And mourns my long delay in vain, Nor bids one serve-man come or go ; While mother from her wheel or churn, And may-be from the milking-shed, There lifts an humble weary head To watch and wish for my return Across the camas' blossomed plain." He held his bent head very low, A sudden sadness in his air ; Then turned and touched my yellow hair And took the long locks in his hand, Toyed with them, smiled, and let them go, Then thrummed about his saddle bow As thought ran swift across his face ; Then, turning sudden from his place, He gave some short and quick command. They brought the best steed of the band, They swung a bright sword at my side He bade me mount and by him ride ; And from that hour to the end I never felt the need of friend. Far in the wildest quinine wood We found a city old so old Its very walls were turned to mould, And stately trees upon them stood. No history has mentioned it, JOAQ UIN MILL ER. 469 No map has given it a place ; The last dim trace of tribe and race The world's forgetful ness is fit. It held one structure grand and mossed, Mighty as any castle sung, And old when oldest Ind was young, With threshold Christian never crossed ; A temple builded to the Sun, Along whose sombre altar-stone Brown bleeding virgins have been strown Like leaves when leaves are crisp and dun, In ages ere the Sphinx was born, Or Babylon had birth or morn. My chief led up the marble step He ever led, broad blade in hand When down the stones, with double hand Clutched to his blade, a savage leapt, Hot bent to barter life for life. The chieftain drove his bowie-knife Full through his thick and broad breast-bone, And broke the point against the stone, The dark stone of the temple wall. I saw him loose his hold, and fall Full-length, with head hung down the step ; I saw run down a ruddy flood Of rushing pulsing human blood. Then from the crowd a woman crept, And kissed the gory hands and face, And smote herself. Then one by one The dark crowd crept and did the same ; Then bore the dead man from the place. Down darkened aisles the brown priests came, So picture-like, with sandalled feet And long grey dismal grass-wove gowns, So like the pictures of old time, And stood all still and dark of frowns At blood upon the stone and street. So we laid ready hand to sword- JOAQUIN MILLER. And boldly spoke some bitter word ; But they were stubborn still, and stood Dark frowning as a winter wood, And muttering something of the crime Of blood upon the temple-stone, As if the first that it had known. We turned toward the massive door With clash of steel at heel, and with Some swords all red and ready drawn. I traced the sharp edge of my sword Along the marble wall and floor For crack or crevice ; there was none. From one vast mount of marble stone The mighty temple had been cored By nut-brown children of the sun, When stars were newly bright and blithe Of song along the rim of dawn, A mighty marble monolith ! in. THROUGH marches through the mazy wood, And may-be through too much of blood, At last we came down to the seas. A city stood, white-walled, and brown With age, in nest of orange-trees ; And this we won, and many a town And rancho reaching up and down ; Then rested in the red-hot days Beneath the blossomed orange-trees Made drowsy with the drum of bees, And drank in peace the south-sea breeze Made sweet with sweeping boughs of bays. Well ! there were maidens, shy at first, And then, ere long, not over shy, Yet pure of soul and proudly chare. No love on earth has such an eye ! No land there is is blessed or cursed With such a limb or grace of face, JOAQUIN MILLER. 471 Or gracious form, or genial air ! In all the bleak North-land not one Hath been so warm of soul to me As coldest soul by that warm sea, Beneath the bright hot-centred sun. No lands where any ices are Approach or ever dare compare With warm loves born beneath the sun. The one the cold white steady star, The lifted shifting sun the one. I grant you fond, I grant you fair, I grant you honour, trust and truth, And years as beautiful as youth, And many years beyond the sun, And faith as fixed as any star But all the North-land hath not one So warm of soul as sun-maids are. I was but in my boyhood then ; I count my fingers over, so, And find it years and years ago, And I am scarcely yet. of men. But I was tall and lithe and fair, With rippled tide of yellow hair, And prone to mellowness of heart ; While she was tawny-red like wine, With black hair boundless as the night. As for the rest, I knew my part, At least was apt, and willing quite To learn, to listen, and incline To teacher warm and wise as mine. O bright, bronzed maidens of the sun ! So fairer far to look upon Than curtains of the Solomon, Or Kedar's tents, or any one Or anything beneath the sun ! What followed then ? What has been done, And said, and writ, and read, and sung f 472 yOAQUJN MILLER. What will be writ and read again, While love is life, and life remain, While maids will heed, and men have tongues. What followed then ? But let that pass. I hold one picture in my heart, Hung curtained, and not any part Of all its dark tint ever has Been looked upon by any one. But if, may-be, one brave and strong As liftings of the bristled sea Steps forth from out the days to be, And knocks heart-wise, and enters bold A rugged heart inured to wrong As one would storm a strong stronghold Strong-footed, and most passing fair, Of truth and thought beyond her years, We two will lift the crape in tears, Will turn the canvas to the sun, Will trace the features one by one Of my dear dead, in still despair. Love well who will, love wise who can, But love, be loved, for God is love ; Love pure, like cherubim above ; Love maids, and hate not any man. Sit as sat we by orange-tree, Beneath the broad bough and grape-vine Top-tangled in the tropic shine, Close face to face, close to the sea, And full of the red-centred sun, With grand sea-songs upon the soul Rolled melody on melody Like echoes of deep organ's roll, And love, nor question any one. If God is love, is love not God ? As high-priests say, let prophets sing, Without reproach or reckoning ; This much I say, knees knit to sod, And low voice lifted, questioning. XIX JOAQUIN MILLER. 473 Let eyes be not dark eyes, but dreams, Or drifting clouds with flashing fires, Or far delights, or fierce desires, Yet not be more than well beseems ; Let hearts be pure and strong and true, Let lips be luscious and blood-red, Let earth in gold be garmented And tented in her tent of blue, Let goodly rivers glide between Their leaning willow-walls of green, Let all things be filled of the sun, And full of warm winds of the sea, And I beneath my vine and tree Take rest, nor war with any one ; Then I will thank God with full cause Say this is well, is as it was. Let lips be red, for God has said Love is like one gold-garmented, And made them so for such a time. Therefore let lips be red, therefore Let love be ripe in ruddy prime, Let hope beat high, let hearts be true, And you be wise thereat, and you Drink deep, and ask not any more. Let red lips lift, proud-curled, to kiss, And round limbs lean and raise and reach In love too passionate for speech, Too full of blessedness and bliss For anything but this and this ; Let luscious lips lean hot to kiss And swoon in love, while all the air Is redolent with balm of trees, And mellow with the song of bees, While birds sit singing everywhere And you will have not any more Than I in boyhood, by that shore Of olives, had in years of yore. Let the unclean think things unclean ; 474 JOAQUIN MILLER. I swear tip-toed, with lifted hands, That we were pure as sea-washed sands, That not one coarse thought came between. Believe or disbelieve who will, Unto the pure all things are pure ; As for the rest, I can endure Alike their good will or their ill. She boasted Montezuma's blood, Was pure of soul as Tahoe's flood, And strangely fair and princely-souled, And she was rich in blood and gold More rich in love grown over-bold From its own consciousness of strength. How warm ! Oh not for any cause Could I declare how warm she was, In her brown beauty and hair's length. We loved in the sufficient sun, We lived in elements of fire, For love is fire and fierce desire ; Yet lived as pure as priest and nun. We lay slow rocking in the bay In birch canoe beneath the crags, Thick -topped with palm, like sweeping flags Between us and the burning day. The red-eyed crocodile lay low Or lifted from his rich rank fern, And watched us and the tide by turn, And we slow cradled to and fro. And slow we cradled on till night, And told the old tale, overtold, As misers in recounting gold Each time do take a new delight. With her pure passion-given grace She drew her warm self close to me ; And, her two brown hands on my knee, And her two black eyes in my face, She then grew sad and guessed at ill, And in the future seemed to see A JOAQULV MILLER. 475 With woman's ken of prophecy ; Yet proffered her devotion still. And, plaintive so, she gave a sign, A token cut of virgin gold, That all her tribe should ever hold Its wearer as some one divine, Nor touch him with a hostile hand. And I in turn gave her a blade, A dagger, worn as well by maid As man in that half-lawless land ; It had a massive silver hilt, Had a most keen and cunning blade, A gift by chief and comrades made For reckless blood at Rivas spilt. " Show this," said I, " too well 'tis known. And worth an hundred lifted spears, Should ill beset your sunny years ; There is not one in Walker's band But at the sight of this alone Will reach a brave and ready hand, And make your right or wrong his own." IV. LOVE while 'tis day ; night cometh soon, Wherein no man or maiden may ; Love in the strong young prime of day; Drink drunk with love in ripe red noon, Red noon of love and life and sun ; Walk in love's light as in sunshine, Drink-in that sun as drinking wine, Drink swift, nor question any one ; For loves change sure as man or moon, And wane like warm full days of June, O Love, so fair of promises, Bend here thy brow, blow here thy kiss, Bend here thy bow above the storm But once, if only this once more. Comes there no patient Christ to save Touch and re-animate thy form JOAQUIN MILLER. Long three days dead and in the grave? Spread here thy silken net of jet; Since man is false, since maids forget, Since man must fall for his sharp sin, Be thou the pit that I fall in ; I seek no safer fall than this. Since man must die for some dark sin, Blind leading blind, let come to this, And my death-crime be one deep kiss. Lo ! I have found another land ; May I not fin.! another love, True, trusting as a bosomed dove, To lay its whole heart in my hand ? But lips that leap and cling and crush, And limbs that twist and intertwine With passion as a passion-vine, And veins that throb and swell and rush Be ye forbidden fruit and wine ! Such passion is not fair or fit Or fashioned tall touch none of it. ILL conies disguised in many forms : Fair winds are but a prophecy Oi' foulest winds full soon to be The brighter these, the blacker they ; The clearest night has darkest day, And brightest days bring blackest storms. There came reverse* to our arms ; I saw the signal-light's alarms At night red-crescenting the bay. The foe poured down a flood next day As strong as tides when tides are high, And drove us bleeding in the sea, In such wild haste of flight that we Had hardly time to arm and fly. Blown from the shore, borne far a-sea, I lifted my two hands on high With wild soul plashing to the sky, JOAQU1N MILLER. And cried, " O more than crowns to me, Farewell at last to love and thee ! " I walked the deck, I kissed my hand Back to the far and fading shore, And bent a knee as to implore, Until the last dark head of land Slid down behind the dimpled sea. At last I sank in troubled sleep, A very child, rocked by the deep, Sad questioning the fate of her Before the savage conqueror. The loss of comrades, power, placey A city walled, cool shaded ways, Cost me no care at all ; somehow I orily saw her sad brown face, And I was younger then than now. Red flashed the sun across the deck v Slow flapped the idle sails, and slow The black ship cradled to and fro. Afar my city lay, a speck Of white against a line of blue ; Around, half lounging on the deck, Some comrades chatted two by two. I held a new-filled glass of wine, And with the mate talked as in play Of fierce events of yesterday, To coax his light life into mine. He jerked the wheel, as slow he said; Low laughing with averted head, And so, half sad : " You bet they'll fi.cfnt." They followed in canim, canoe, A perfect fleet, that on the blue Lay dancing till the mid of night. Would you believe ! one little cuss" (He turned his stout head slow sidewss?. A ad 'neath his hat-rim took the skies " In petticoats did follow us The livelong night, and at the dawn 47 JO A Q UIN MILLER. Her boat lay rocking in the lee, Scarce one short pistol-shot from me." This said the mate, half mournfully, Then pecked at us ; for he had drawn, By bright light heart and homely wit, A knot of us around the wheel, Which he stood whirling like a reel, For the still ship recked not of it. " And where's she now ?" one careless said, With eyes slow lifting to the brine, Swift swept the instant far by mine. The bronzed mate listed, shook his head, Spirted a stream of amber wide Across and over the ship-side, Jerked at the wheel, and slow replied : " She had a dagger in her hand. She roie, she raised it, tried to stand; But fell, and so upset herself; Yet still the poor brown savage elf, Each time the long light wave would toss And lift her form from out the sea, Would shake a strange bright blade at me, With rich hilt chased a cunning cross. At last she sank, but still the same She shook her dagger in the air, As if to still defy and dare, And sinking seemed to call your name." I dashed my wine against the wall, I rushed across the deck, and all The sea. -I swept and swept again, With lifted hand, with eye and glass, But all was idle and in vain. I saw a red-billed sea-gull pass, A petrel sweeping round and round, I he f