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IIBRARY 
 
 WNJVERSJTY Of 
 CAUPORUIA 
 
/X/^ J Chf-^ 
 
 ^^(j^ POEMS. f^|^»^ 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD, 
 
 AND OTHEK 
 
 POEMS, 
 
 Bey. C. R. W. WALDY, M.A., 
 
 VICAR or OUBSAOE ALL SAINTS, DOESKT. 
 
 The present world, whose phantom aspects bear 
 E'en while thoy live, their epitaph ''we were," 
 Like painted mauBoIeums, which deride 
 With treacherous smile, the rottenness they hide. 
 Her cliangiug phascH by thuir chiiuges toll 
 The Bucrots of the One Immutable. 
 
 WIMBUUNB : 
 
 A. PURKIS, THE SQUARE. 
 LONDON : W. MACINTOSH, 24, PATERNOSTER ROW. 
 
 186 7. 
 
LOAN STACK 
 
The Labourer's Child 3 
 
 The Death of the Magdalen 19 
 
 A Dream 27 
 
 Proem (The Murderer) 
 
 The Murderer 31 
 
 Lament of the Eobin 41 
 
 Tabitha 47 
 
 The Spring Walk 63 
 
 The Maiden to her Dead Lover 88 
 
 Eephidim 92 
 
 Eizpah, Daughter of Aiah 103 
 
 On hearing of the Death of General Havelock . . 106 
 
 The Shower 109 
 
 Winter Ill 
 
 Mom 117 
 
 Kight 118 
 
 Paraphrases (Isaiah vi. Zech. xiv. 5.) 128 
 
 Ezekiel i 132 
 
 Song of the Winds 131 
 
 Lent iVi 
 
 G86 
 
DEDICATION. 
 
 €n m\] Jllntjitr. 
 
 #^<l^ 
 
 OTHER and Home, twin sacred terms, which move 
 The springs of action in our England slill, 
 I^ Where Duty, aptly joined with household love, 
 '^ Tempers all happiness, affronts each ill ; 
 ^te Foundation of our glory ! ye, the Throne, 
 f^ And straw-thatched cottage of the lowly hind, 
 Compacting, build our Nation into one 
 Grand Edifice, where dwell one heart, one mind : 
 To you these lines, — which purpose much, hut fail 
 The thrice shot web of human life t'unfold ; 
 Thro' the coarse texture of each rustic tale, 
 Would I might weave your threads of living gold, 
 Less bright than fancy's, but how much more sure I 
 I dedicate. Long may ye both endure. 
 
DEDICATION. 
 
 Mother and Home — how swift the hours have Hed, 
 
 Since ye appeared sole arbiters of life ! 
 
 While clinging to your side with drooping head, 
 
 You shadowed forth to us a world of strife. 
 
 We scarce believed that e'er a darker hour 
 
 Could dare beguile our fond simplicity 
 
 Of that whereon it leaned, we deemed no power 
 
 So vast as yours in this wide world could be. 
 
 Then your unselfish cares — unwearied toil, 
 
 Drew but the peevish exigence of youth. 
 
 Ye painful tillers of a thankless soil, 
 
 Care's harrow-tines struck deep have taught us truth, 
 
 Small worth were other praise, could that be woh, 
 
 Unless your loving voices cried — well done ! 
 
THE 
 LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
(FOUNDED ON FACT.) 
 
 JJWELVE hours of toil, at shut of day, 
 ' The labourer leaves, and turns away, 
 And sighs, well pleased, his work is done 
 Together with the setting sun. 
 His spade he strikes in earth to close 
 His piece-work, ere he homeward goes, 
 Puts on the frock which at noontide, 
 O'ercome by heat he cast aside ; 
 And thanks his God that day is past, 
 Come eve, his only rest at last ; 
 Upright he stands — with many a strain 
 To straighten out his back again. 
 One joy to stir each toil-cramped limb, 
 One hope to cheer his eyesight dim, 
 *Tis where within the wicket gate. 
 The limit of his low estate ; 
 A form, he fancies, stands to greet, 
 With merry shout his weary feet, 
 Witli rosy check, and golden curl. 
 There is his youngest sweetest girl, 
 Scarce yet upon her playful head 
 Four summers* health and bloom have shed. 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 Childhood's delight those sunny hours, 
 Meet playmates they of summer flowers. 
 How more than beautiful the green, 
 Where children's wayward steps are seen ! 
 Sweeter than song of nightingale, 
 Their laughter — sunshine of the dale ! 
 This is the only age when mirth. 
 Appears fit music for the earth : 
 O'ershadowed with no thought of sorrow. 
 Unburdened with that sad to-morrow. 
 Laughter spontaneous, round and clear. 
 No tinge of melancholy there. 
 The bounding limbs, the spirits wild. 
 What sight below like happy child! 
 How clear the unfettered mind, which then 
 Asks at its will, the * why ' and * when,* 
 The questions which so artless now, 
 Shall wrinkle by and by their brow. 
 The eager eye with curious look. 
 Hath found new leaves in nature's book ; 
 Children whom nature holds most dear. 
 Pry on her secrets without fear. 
 Their lightest wound when on their couch, 
 She heals herself, with loving touch. 
 Besprinkling them with limpid dew. 
 The velvet skin she tints anew : 
 Embathes their limbs with liquid balm, 
 And soon dispels each sickly qualm. 
 She bids thee safe her nurslings keep 
 On thy soft bosom, gentle sleep ! 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 They droop like buds which for their rest, 
 
 Sink on the warm earth's kindly breast — 
 
 Blest age of innocence — when sin 
 
 Lies hushed his deadly coils within — 
 
 Nor evil deeds obliterate 
 
 Th' impressions of a better state ; 
 
 When swells the heart the generous blood — 
 
 When hides each shoal, the rising flood ; 
 
 The muds of life — the ebbing tide, 
 
 Shall soon bestrew with wrecks of pride. 
 
 Childhood — existence brief — short joy ; 
 Manhood without his favourite toy — 
 The power to torture, or destroy. 
 Creations* Lords ! as yet too young, 
 To hurt with cruel hand or tongue ; 
 Now every creature — bird or beast 
 Consorts with them and fears men least ; 
 The dog — who comprehends their speech, 
 Not yet too learned for his reach, — 
 Who reads each gesture, and can trace 
 The meaning written on their face — 
 The merry eye and open brow, 
 So cheerful and confiding now — 
 Marches along in conscious pride, 
 Not crouched at heel, but by their side, 
 At once their champion and their guide. 
 
 Blest age ! unshackled by a tic, 
 Who longs not for thy liberty ? 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 Life's April morn, half smiles, half tears, 
 — The rainbows spanning darkest fears, 
 Whose shifting gleams form royal tires 
 Wherewith Hope crowns youth's fond desires, 
 — Those airy homes which Titan Fame 
 Builds up for all — but ne'er the same — 
 The withered year about to die 
 Looks back on these with mournful sigh, 
 And shudders as the wintry blast 
 Drives pain's keen-pelting hail storms past, 
 Sombre and chill they thicken fast, 
 Until the atmosphere o'erhead 
 With one dull rayless night is spread. 
 Strange there should be who do not crave, 
 Around themselves such forms to have. 
 To see how nature builds again. 
 Fresh edifice from toil-worn men. 
 The very labourer, loves them more, 
 Nor grudges them his slender store, 
 Altho' he scorns their speech, and tho' 
 He sometimes mocks their feet, so slow — 
 Whose merry footfall at his side 
 Redoubling to his clumsy stride. 
 Is music to the father's ear, 
 While to his hand they cling in fear. 
 He little recks how much more wise. 
 They in their present helpless guise. 
 Than all the richest or the great, 
 Encumbered with fictitious state. 
 Their pleasures surer than the noise, 
 The smoke of manhood's empty joys ; 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 For who can buy with earthly gold 
 This freshness — of our sacred mould ? 
 
 In fancy on his horny grasp 
 
 He feels the soft warm fingers clasp, 
 
 In fancy on her upturned eye, 
 
 He bends with look of sympathy, 
 
 Lays on the head with silky tress 
 
 His heavy hand, in fond caress ; 
 
 Till backward drawn the roguish face. 
 
 Laughs in his own, with wild grimace, 
 
 As still the tiny fingers strain 
 
 To push the burden off again. 
 
 Homeward he hastens, soon shall see. 
 
 His darling seated on his knee. 
 
 Share his coarse bread, with hungry mouth, 
 
 Mimic his thirst with equal drouth. 
 
 Pout at the cup her thievish lip. 
 
 And strive and pant to gain a sip ; 
 
 Then with his eye play hide and seek, 
 
 Pressing against his own her cheek, 
 
 Then start to find his face so rough, 
 
 And threat to quit him in a huff, 
 
 Then sobered as he feigns to cry, 
 
 She'll clamber up and search each eye, 
 
 About his neck sheMI fold each nrm, 
 
 And hug him with embraces warm, 
 
 Soon o'er her play will slumbers creep, 
 She on his breast lie fast asleep. 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 The cautious mother '11 come, — remove 
 To her small cot the maid both love, 
 With whining voice and drowsy head, 
 She'll still refuse to go to bed ; 
 But all too potent slumbers dim, 
 Will seal each eye, relax each limb, 
 And like young bird in downy nest. 
 She'll sink at last in dreamless rest ; 
 Like scarlet threads her lips will show, 
 Her pearly teeth in double row ; 
 Her hands upon the coverlid, 
 With dimpled arms half bare, half hid, 
 Whose rounded rosytinted flesh. 
 The blue veins net with slender mesh. 
 Her little breast will rise and tell. 
 Of slumber's gently breathing swell. 
 Such was the joy for which he dares. 
 His daily task with all its cares, 
 And labours on till evening come 
 The hour which calls him to his home, 
 The household small, whose loves repay 
 The weary handy«work of day. 
 
 Thus musing on the rustic stile, 
 
 He sits and rests his limbs awhile, 
 
 A neighbour greets him — **well what cheer ? 
 
 ** Why do you sit and loiter here ? 
 
 *' Come mate, I'm dry, the day is hot, 
 
 "Let's drink one glass — you wo'nt! why not? " 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 *' Nay, neighbour, nay, my little maid 
 
 *' Will miss her father if I stayed, 
 
 ** Already at the wicket gate 
 
 " She wonders * father * is so late." 
 
 *• But just one glass, twon't keep you long, 
 
 " 'Tis middling drink and not too strong," 
 
 He turned reluctant, o*cr him pass'd, 
 
 A twinge of conscience — not the last, 
 
 He goes but still his heart 's away, 
 
 Yet strives with others to be gay. 
 
 His spirits droop, to him so rough 
 
 And coars€ the jokes — he's had enough, 
 
 He must be off — nay, he must stop. 
 
 And help them with another drop. 
 
 " Sing us a song — You used to be 
 
 ** A good deal better company." 
 
 Alas ! he lingers, dreads the laugh 
 
 Of drunkards, who their liquor quaff. 
 
 Yet conscience smote with sense of paio, 
 
 Upon his^coward mind again ; 
 
 At length when loud and riotous, 
 
 The uproar grew t' avoid a fuss, 
 
 He slips out-door and hurries on, — 
 
 How soon the daylight's all but gone ! 
 
 Too late ! he comes to see no more, 
 
 The mnid lie might havp >iA\iH] hcUnr. 
 
 As swift he goes with stnggcring fed 
 Along the lone deserted street ; 
 
10 THE LABOURER'S CHILD, 
 
 He almost runs, — some dreadful fear 
 Sad harbinger of ill is near — 
 His spirit dull and anxious, now, 
 With its foreboding seemed to grow. 
 Some hundred yards or two or more, 
 Before he reached his cottage door, 
 Where crossed a brook the village road, 
 Swift o'er the wooden bridge he strode — 
 What did he see ? he stood and gazed 
 A moment with a look amazed — 
 God ! what is this ? a heap of rags, 
 Entangled in the water-flags, 
 'Gainst which the current strives to wage, 
 A constant war with petty rage. 
 His heart is stone — he dashes thro' 
 The rippling water, scarce o'er shoe, 
 Alas ! all cold and lifeless there. 
 Is verified his wildest fear. 
 He stoops and lifts her to his breast, 
 With fondest saddest feeling prest. 
 As if he yet would save from harm, 
 What, all too late, is in his arm ; 
 He rushes to the cottage door, 
 Her tiny form shall grace no more, 
 He lays her on her own small bed, 
 He chafes her limbs, sustains her head. 
 Watches with agony for breath — 
 ' Tis useless all, for this is — Death ; 
 Both parents there yet strive again 
 Life to restore, but all is vain, 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. H 
 
 But most the father on whose soul, 
 Remorse had seized beyond control — 
 Bent o'er her with despairing face, 
 — He'll feel no more her warm embrace. 
 Her arms are stiff, her little feet 
 Will come no more his steps to meet. 
 He thinks with anguish of the bank. 
 From whence she slipped and struggling sank, 
 A tuft of grass in one small hand. 
 Marked how she near regained the land, 
 He thought how easy 'twould have been, 
 To save her, had he only seen — 
 
 He hears her voice with struggling cry 
 
 Call for his aid in agony 
 
 Ah ! how unlike the merry fay, 
 
 "Who roused them both at break of day, 
 
 O'erflowing then with mirth and play. 
 
 Can this have been a joyous thing, — 
 
 This butterfly, with broken wing ? 
 
 At morn so full of life and breath, 
 
 Ere night thus cold and stiff in death. 
 
 Her golden hair — its tresses dank. 
 
 Are 'smirched with weeds and grasses rank ; 
 
 As when she tottered from the bank — 
 
 On the young forehead pain and fear 
 
 Have stamped death's signature severe ; 
 
 The swollen eyelids seem to weep. 
 
 No more shall droop for want of sleep ; 
 
 The lips, once like twin roselcavcs round, 
 
 With freshest dews and odours crowned, 
 
12 THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 Are like two crumpled petals — dead, 
 
 The fulness and the colour fled ; 
 
 The mouth once arched with many a wile, 
 
 With artful pout or pretty guile, 
 
 Appears as tho* about to wail, 
 
 And like the cheek is wan and pale. 
 
 And deadly white the tender skin. 
 
 Life's peach-blooms did incarnadine ; 
 
 A stranger would have wept with sadness 
 
 To see such grief o'ershadow gladness. 
 
 To think how sharp the mortal throe 
 
 Such tender limbs did undergo. 
 
 Ere death released them from earth's woe. 
 
 One would have reckoned death would spare 
 
 A life so frail, a form so fair. 
 
 Nor rend away the soul which clung 
 
 So fondly to a shape so young — 
 
 Or would have slain such flower as this 
 
 No ruder way than by a kiss. 
 
 And shall he nevermore rejoice 
 
 In the glad accents of her voice? 
 
 He bent as tho' with load opprest. 
 
 His head declined upon his breast ; 
 
 He saw, and heard, but answered not, 
 
 All other griefs in this forgot — 
 
 For now a barrier dark had grown, 
 
 Between himself and all his own ; 
 
 He and his sorrow were alone, 
 
 He felt as though it were his deed, 
 
 'Twas this which made his heart to bleeds 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILI). 13 
 
 The cry for * father ' — as in fear, 
 
 The plaintive call, he seemed to hear. 
 
 And he had laughed at sorry jest, 
 
 The idle song and words unblest. 
 
 While she was fighting there for breath, 
 
 The shallow waters scarce beneath. 
 
 How long her struggles there had been 
 
 None could say, for none had seen — 
 
 Her mother wrapt in household toil, 
 
 But missed the child a little while, 
 
 * The maiden slyly crept away, 
 
 She thought her in some childish play, 
 
 Nor guessed, she said, that she was gone,' 
 
 Then hid her face, with sob and moan ; 
 
 But he without a single tear. 
 
 The little body seated near, 
 
 Bound one rough finger wound a tress 
 
 As he was wont in fond caress. 
 
 And smoothed it with attentive care, 
 
 Almost addrest her unaware. 
 
 But now within an hour or two, 
 
 To be most happy, and now, so — 
 
 To be like one has heard his doom, 
 
 And sits unmoved in silent gloom, 
 
 He heard one cry as there he sate, 
 
 ** Oh, father, father, why so lute,*' — 
 
 'i lie hiUcic'iit words that ever stung 
 
 The licurt, from lip of hatred flange— 
 
 Though one by one upon llic car 
 
 They <lroppcd an<l smote ihc soul ^im ivai, 
 
14 THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 And shed their deadly venom through 
 The hody, till it palsied grew — 
 Were songs to that reproach he heard 
 Without one gesture or one word, 
 Yet fell upon him as a blow, 
 From that dumb orator of woe. 
 * This is thy work ! thou soul-defiled, 
 Drunkard ! thy sin hath slain thy child.* 
 
 What trifles seem the deadly cause, 
 
 Of ills when o'er the past we pause, 
 
 Oh had we but precaution ta'en. 
 
 Against the scars which still remain, 
 
 Unchanging and unchangeable, 
 
 On us that evil day ne'er fell. 
 
 How awful is the ignorance 
 
 The lightsome step, the merry dance. 
 
 The joyous mirth, the night before, 
 
 The victim dropped and was no more ; 
 
 Yet better thus ; than still to brood. 
 
 On coming ill in solitude, 
 
 More dreadful when to scape the doom 
 
 We vainly strive, we feel must come. 
 
 With prescient care we idly try 
 
 To cheat the approach of destiny. 
 
 'Tis better thus — for not to know, 
 
 Rohs death of half its strength below ; 
 
 And 'tis but folly when too late, 
 
 On what is past we meditate ; 
 
 But, oh what pangs should pierce the heart, 
 
 When we disdain the better part. 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 15 
 
 What strange perverseness still to choose 
 
 The evil course, the good refuse, 
 
 Yet wilful souls which scorn restraint, 
 
 Make o'er their sins but little plaint, 
 
 But mourn th' unexpected hurt. 
 
 No mortal wisdom could avert. 
 
 The burial came — life's darkest hour, 
 When death asserts his utmost power — 
 The last sad wrench — when that is gone, 
 Affection loved to look upon ; 
 And we are twain who once were one. 
 — He follows her with vision dim 
 Who should in time have followed him. 
 Who should have been his only hope ; 
 Of his old age the tender prop. 
 With haggard look, unsteady gait, 
 As one who carries overweight, 
 Supported by her presence there, 
 Who all his sorrows loved to share ; 
 He stands at last beside the grave 
 Of her he was too late to save. 
 Four damsels, each in snow white hood, 
 On either side the body stood ; 
 The little coffin, lowered slow, 
 Creaked as it sank in depths below, 
 There with its kindred dust it lay, 
 — His morrow spent with yesterday — 
 Seemed to the father's troubled heart, 
 As tho' it trembled, loath to part ; — 
 
16 THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 
 
 As snowy dove in some vast jaw, 
 Which gapes with still insatiate maw ; 
 ' Twas but the tears his eyes which blurred, 
 There was no motion — nothing stirred, 
 Nor any voice or answer heard — 
 Save words of comfort and of prayer. 
 Which only mocked his dull despair, 
 And made him long from all to fly, 
 Like wounded beast, to hide and — die. 
 When in the grave at length 'twas hid, 
 The earth fell hollow on the lid. 
 He shuddered, for this pierced again, 
 His wounded heart with sharper pain, 
 He turned to look on it once more. 
 Then left the churchyard as before. 
 As one o'erburdened with a grief, 
 A sorrow ne'er can find relief ; 
 Yet went where'er his partner led. 
 Unmurmuring, but with spirit dead. 
 The sun was bright, but from that tomb 
 Struck to his heart a shivering gloom ; 
 All things around unreal seemed. 
 He felt as tho' he only dreamed, 
 A dream in which one face alone, 
 Looked out of darkness cold as stone ; 
 He saw not others' kindly look, 
 Their sympathy he could not brook. 
 He saw not — heard not — e'en the bell, 
 With clanging note unnoticed fell ; 
 But conscience never ceased to toll 
 A death peal in his inmost soul. 
 
THE LABOURER'S CHILD. 17 
 
 Seed time and harvest — ^heat and cold — 
 Year after year successive rolletl ; 
 He laboured on and ne'er complained, 
 To earn his bread, by want constrained, 
 From youth to middle age and then, 
 Grew sooner old than older men — 
 His daily tasks he'd yet fulfil, 
 But still as one who had no will — 
 Slow grinding on in labour's mill — 
 
 Within the walls where rest the poor, 
 When they can toil and work no more, 
 An aged man upon his bed 
 Shall soon be numbered with the dead. 
 One treasure only left him there, 
 Yet still preserved with jealous care ; 
 Enfolded in a piece of dress, 
 A single wavy golden tress; 
 The tattered print was faded, — you 
 Could hardly trace its former hue — 
 Poor wretched relic, — worn and soiled — 
 Yet spake to him of his lost child, 
 And he while babbling oft would hold, 
 With trembling hand that tress of gold : 
 And praise her beauty, — for 't would bring 
 Remembrance of some loving thing, 
 Some winning trait, or pretty trick, 
 Wliose memory touched him to the quick ; 
 His eyes were glazing now in death, 
 He asked a boon witli failing breath— 
 c 
 
18 THE LABOUREE'S CHILD. 
 
 "Let these be placed," — his sole request, 
 
 **Within my coffin, on my breast." 
 
 At last in accents, low and wild, 
 
 •* I go," he sobbed, " to meet the child — 
 
 Mother, she's there, I see her wait, 
 
 Beside yon wondrous golden gate," — 
 
 Then wandered off in childlike prayer, 
 
 Breathed forth in broken fragments there — 
 
 One sentence of her litany 
 
 " Oh ! gentle Jesu pity me," — 
 
 He feebly gasped — and so was free. 
 
ieatjj of tlie 3Hngklm. 
 
 |T Home — yes liome at last — but not 
 The home which she in youth forgot, 
 From which yet innocent she fled, 
 By specious promises misled. 
 And home, alas, has come to this ! — 
 And Death her bed of nuptial bliss ! — 
 The goal of paths she chose and trod 
 When she forsook her home and God ! 
 Where are her laughs ? her looks of pride ? 
 The smiles which drew men to her side ? 
 Where is her merry life — her scoff? 
 This wasted form — incessant cough — 
 Alas ! are evidence enough. 
 Home she returned in infamy — 
 Home she returned to toil and die. 
 The cup of happiness quite spilt, 
 While still she sought a home of guilt. 
 How bitter were the dregs to drain, 
 When to her home she came again ; 
 At Home at last, yes Home — but not 
 The Home she all too soon forgot. 
 
 fler drooping head sinks languidly, 
 With pallid brow and closing eye, 
 
20 DEATH OF THE MAGDALEN. 
 
 A darkening circle round each lid 
 From whence the latest tear drop slid, 
 The final tear, but not the first, 
 Nor yet of many past the worst ; 
 The final tear when burst in twain, 
 The silver cord o'erstretched by pain ; 
 A settled calm steals over all. 
 As shades of eve on landscapes fall. 
 The glazing orbs, the eyelids shroud, 
 So veils the setting sun a cloud, 
 Affections' fingers resting there 
 Conceal the dull unmeaning stare. 
 When from her lips escaped that moan 
 Then dissolution claimed her own, 
 The stiff 'ning mouth grows wan and pale ; 
 Which quivered with its piteous tale. 
 The Portal where Persuasion dwells 
 And every passing feeling tells, 
 Which ruddier with resentment glows. 
 Or touched by fancy dimpling shows ; 
 Which coyly pouted ere 't would bless 
 Her lover with a mute caress ; 
 On eye, on lip no longer plays 
 The lamp of life, with myriad rays ; 
 How gently passes off again 
 Each sterner line, engraved by pain. 
 The youthful cheek is round and fair 
 As erst, ere anguish brooded there. 
 Can this be death ? a tyrant's rule — 
 Than surely death is merciful. 
 
DEATH OF THE MAGDALEN. 21 
 
 And now upon the tranquil face 
 
 Death sheds his last most touching grace, 
 
 Leaps to the ivory cheek a flush, 
 
 Which hids the noisy mourner " hush," 
 
 Seems there that expectation sate, 
 
 For mortal form too delicate, 
 
 And gave one last prophetic ray 
 
 To glorify the house of clay. 
 
 Pledge of the soul that she will dwell 
 
 Once more in that weak, fragile, shell, 
 
 She consecrates it now for bliss, 
 
 And speaks her love in one fond kiss ; 
 
 Such as the sun, at shut of day, 
 
 Leaves on the cheek of evening grey 
 
 Pure — as the carmine tint which fell, 
 
 From wild rose on the white harebell, 
 
 Yet cold as lip of ocean shell, 
 
 And futile as the after-glow 
 
 Which fires but melts not mountain snow. 
 
 How rapidly a change appears, 
 Bemoved the load of eartlily years, 
 Dark years of torture, wrought by sin. 
 The signature of work within ; 
 You would have thought it was a child 
 Lay there, so innocent and mild ; 
 Again a change, late warm with breath 
 Her form grows sharp defined in death ; 
 Through the blue veins no longer glides 
 The stream of life with purpling tides; 
 
22 DEATH OF THE MAGDALEN. 
 
 No longer courses round each limb, 
 The bosom, or the fingers slim ; 
 All colourless the features be 
 As alabaster effigy. 
 Emaciated shrunken now, 
 The slender figure, and chill brow, 
 As ruined wall which lent her aid, 
 The ivy decks with life-like shade, 
 About the forehead lightly fiings 
 Her golden hair its glossy rings ; 
 The silken tresses clustered there 
 To health a sad resemblance bear. 
 . Transparent grown the snow-white skin. 
 Scarce hides the whiter bones within. 
 Already o*er the silent clay 
 Creeps the grey shadow of decay ; 
 No longer with us mortals one 
 It lies a statue, cold as stone, 
 Yet such a masterpiece, the blow" 
 Of sculptor's chisel, ne'er could show 
 So grand, so solemn, yet so wise! 
 Beyond all fear, beyond surprise ; 
 Looks as it knew all shall be known, 
 By those the grave must call her own. 
 Mysterious aspect striking dread ! 
 Speaks most of life, w'hen life is fled. 
 Thou heedest not the lapse of time. 
 Transplanted to a deathless clime. 
 No more shalt tread the weary track, 
 Which keeps our suffering on the rack. 
 
DEATH OF THE MAGDALEN. 23 
 
 Or is thy spirit lingering still, 
 Above the form it loved to fill ? 
 Or circling high, perchance it towers 
 Towards the amaranthine bowers, 
 Where blazing swords no longer ward 
 The wanderer off, with jealous guard ? 
 Or scales the mighty stairs of God 
 By angel legions ever trod ? 
 Where shall it joyous find its rest ? 
 Where but in gardens of the blest, 
 Where glorious move the martyr throng. 
 Where rises the triumphant son^. 
 There shall it share in joys which eye 
 Of weary mortals ne'er descry, 
 Hear music sweeter than the ear 
 Imagines, or may hope to hear, 
 In this dull melancholy sphere. 
 There see entranced the vision bright, 
 Of Him who dwells in quenchless light ; 
 Happy as bird released from cage ; 
 Escaped from earth and Satan's rage, 
 Oh ! for a glimpse of that Great Love 
 Whose bosom is thy rest Sweet Dove ? 
 Not one with us, but one with more, 
 Yea, one with nil who died before, 
 Dead with the first who bore dcatli's sway. 
 Dead with the dead of yesterday. 
 Can'st not unriddle us our strife ? 
 Can*st v'^f 'i-f'.i-l tin. 1... i.f., / 
 
24 DEATH OF THE MAGDALEN. 
 
 Thou wilt not change that life for this, 
 To which we cling with fancied hliss ; 
 'Tis we who shudder, dying here, 
 Not thou extended on thy bier, 
 Thine is the life, 'tis we who sigh, 
 Encumbered, wayworn, loath to die. 
 
 Yet who can see thee once so glad — 
 So full of hope — and not feel sad — 
 For on thy polished brow alone. 
 The lustre of perfection shone. 
 The glow of life which all surpast, 
 Was beauty's mantle o'er thee cast ; 
 That form, when motionless it stood. 
 Was model of sweet womanhood, 
 Whose gently undulating swell. 
 Of very being seemed to tell. 
 ' Twas when she moved as tho' she trod 
 A stately measure to sweet ode ; 
 And when she danced it seemed again 
 As she herself were blithesome strain ! 
 So true to each harmonious beat. 
 Moved rounded arms, and dainty feet. 
 Ah me ! that thus before mine eye 
 Helpless and cold that form should lie. — 
 Like some frail broken instrument, 
 The soul of music did frequent ; 
 Which its own spirit never more 
 Shall waken as it did before. — 
 
DEATH OF THE MAGDALEN. 25 
 
 The well set head and graceful neck 
 Bright jewels shall no longer deck. 
 More blest that costly gem of grace, 
 The tear which wet her dying face. 
 
 With blossoms crown that low-laid head, 
 
 With snowdrops pure mix pasque flowers red, 
 
 Her thin hands join upon her breast 
 
 As if in prayer, together prest. 
 
 Those hands so early labour-taught 
 
 Which for their daily bread have wrought. 
 
 Sad toil which sadder thoughts relieved, 
 
 Whereon the tears dropped unperceived ; 
 
 Poor feeble hands, ye fought for life 
 
 Full sore — yet sank beneath the strife — 
 
 Ye speak more eloquently thus. 
 
 Than misery when most clamourous : 
 
 And now the world which heedeth not 
 
 The silent mourner's humble lot. 
 
 Until it sees the weapons slight 
 
 With which alone she waged the fight, 
 
 Will pity and will marvel much 
 
 Weak maiden should encounter such — 
 
 Tliat world shall never know the load 
 
 The spirit bore in this abode — 
 
 Ere hence it passed to meet its God. 
 
 Then all her humble coffin fill, 
 
 With wreaths of golden daffodil, 
 
 With primrose, swiftest to decay, 
 
 For she was once as Arail as they. 
 
26 DEATH OF THE MAGDALEN. 
 
 Lo ! we and they still fade on earth, 
 This is the morning of her birth ; 
 She on that shore — we idly shrink, 
 Who stand and tremble on its brink : 
 Soon shall we follow, year, or day. 
 Or month, may summon us away. 
 
 Then scatter round her early tomb, 
 The freshest garlands, newest bloom : 
 Let every thought from joy which flows 
 Assuage our grief, our fears compose, 
 While hope around her odour flings. 
 Fresh rising on her healing wings : 
 She is not dead but sleepeth — blest 
 With never dying tearless rest. 
 
A DREAM. 27 
 
 % iream. 
 
 |lTHIN a Fabric vast, whose height and width 
 Proportionate, responded to its length, 
 Which lessened in the distance to a point, 
 Methought I stood. From pier to pier perplexed 
 Wandered the eye — Arch on Arch, and windows 
 Witli ruby lights above. — Below, the floor 
 Was with mosaic workmanship'^inlaid. 
 Carved ribs of stone the fretted roof sustained, 
 Whose lofty tracery was filled with smoke, 
 From perforated censers which rolled up, 
 Till that in fleecy clouds about the vault 
 It hung. Gold cressets glimmered here and there, 
 Like stars suspended from blue firmament. 
 And seemed to sail as in a cloudy sky. 
 All purple was the atmosphere, wherein 
 Bathed the whole body with a sense of bliss ; 
 And what was strange, yet seemed not wonderful — 
 On every side I saw at once. A power 
 Within my body, unrevealed Hill then, 
 Came forth, and now asserting all its might 
 Took in whate'er was present. — And at will 
 Where e'er 1 wished to be, e'en there I stood 
 Without the labour of a step. — There rose 
 The voice of many harps, mixed with a sound, 
 Like rippling waves, or summer forests* brer -f. 
 And ever and anon there passed a thrill 
 
A DREAM. 
 
 Of happiest enjoyment, thro' the crowd. 
 For crowd there was, close intermingled there ; 
 Yet all were joyous, passing through the aisles, 
 Or wandering where they list, along the nave, 
 All with one spirit, and one feeling went. 
 All those whom one drew nigh, seemed to rejoice 
 As in the meeting of a long lost friend ; 
 And words were few, but seemed a subtler speech, 
 Looked from the eyes, or played upon the lips. 
 Most easy to interpret. There no rage, 
 Or vile detraction, but harmonious all. 
 Glad in their gestures, and a mute embrace. 
 As hand met hand. No fear there was of pain, 
 Or sorrow. All seemed one, in form, in robes ; 
 And every one expressed the same full sweet 
 Contentment. And there were fair tombs around, 
 Of bright chalcedony, and blood stone rare, 
 Whereon some mystic emblems were inwrought ; 
 Which indistinctly other days recalled. 
 By one of these I paused, and longed to bear 
 The glorious prize away. — " Stay do not take," 
 I heard a voice, "my precious charge away," 
 And then I looked, and saw a. sleeping form. 
 (Transparent grew the tomb) with clasped hands, 
 And sweet the smile which on the visage shone, 
 The look composed, of one who bides his time. 
 Certain his friends will fail him not, but come. 
 And he must rest till then, in slumbers lulled 
 Till summoned forth to view. I ceased to long, 
 And straightway thought there fell a joy, 
 
A DREAM. 29 
 
 A yet more placid look upon the dead — 
 
 A smile of thankfulness. — Then some one spoke, 
 
 * We give all costliest gift for those who leave 
 
 * Our present life ; and strive to show our joy 
 
 * At their release ; and they responding true, 
 
 * Rejoice that we about their beds should move 
 
 * With gentle steps. So care ye for the dead ! ' 
 I answered rashly. — * Nay they do but sleep — 
 
 * They rest ! — while we are busy with our thoughts, 
 
 * They slumber peacefully — Their former works 
 
 * Remain their glory — build a tomb thyself. 
 
 * How can I such as this which like the glow 
 
 * Of summer eve with softest light is full, 
 
 * So delicate a green phosphoric shines ? 
 
 * Ah ! that is green because his memory 
 
 * With pleasant verdure fresh, still breathes 
 
 * A chastened "odour o'er the fervid air. 
 
 * His heart was all with nature, and rejoiced 
 
 * To stay each sorrow with his strong support — 
 
 * But wherefore drops of^ blood ? Ah I so they build 
 
 * Whoever spared not toil or grief — ^but have 
 
 * Their very heart outcoined for others* use, 
 
 ' Rob not the dead ! ' With that methought it threw 
 
 A soft embrace around me and was gone, 
 
 And then I wandered on, not envious 
 
 To take the honours of the dead. And near 
 
 And all around still thronged the peaceful crowd. 
 
 Kindness reciprocating pleasure, sat 
 
 On each white brow. From every eye there beamed 
 
 A pure and holy love, af cction*s lamp. 
 
30 A DREAM, 
 
 Nor seemed one weary soul, but all alike 
 
 Pervaded with one feeling — consolation ; 
 
 And as I gazed some splendid banners waved 
 
 Suspended low, with softest rustling noise. 
 
 Emblazoned with quaint images, yet each 
 
 A story had to tell, had taken books 
 
 To explain ; yet one could comprehend 
 
 E'en as they waved a host of wondrous thoughts ; 
 
 And all tiiis time ne'er ceased the melody 
 
 Which filled the lofty Fane, and was the tone 
 
 Prevailing in each heart — And then methought 
 
 I was within an aisle at side of which 
 
 There stood an open portal — out I passed. 
 
 And cold and miserable — pain I felt. 
 
 Such as the sole survivor of his race 
 
 Feels as he turns to leave th' ancestral vault. 
 
 I turned again to enter — all was gone. 
 
THE MURDERER. 31 
 
 €^t Mmkxn. 
 
 ^WAS pitchy dark, and^the tempest came 
 With furious voice, and eyes of flame ; 
 Though indistinct, yet might be heard 
 Now here now there a muttered word. — 
 He spoke, in truth, a terrible tale. 
 Had made a listener's cheek 'grow pale. 
 The old house trembled — pelting rain 
 Lashed the casement's quarried pane ; 
 When rolled the billowy storm away, 
 Like some huge monster in his play, 
 The aged oak, beneath the shock 
 While all was still, ne*er ceased to rock ; 
 The ivy, from her dripping shroud, 
 Stretched a lean finger and tapped aloud ; 
 As suppliant would admittance crave, 
 And flee the shapes around her rave ; 
 '' Hasten ! oh haste ! and let me in 
 ** Before this hapless life they win.**— 
 Tho' on the blast the demons ride. 
 And hurl destruction far and wide ; 
 I'd rather meet their hellish might. 
 Than sleep in yon chamber a tiugle night. 
 
 B 
 
32 THE MURDERER. 
 
 With fitful gust, like wild beast from his lair, 
 The thunders roar, and the lightnings flare ; 
 They strike with a fang of venomous force, 
 And the victim lies prostrate, a blackening corse, 
 And the flash of their wrath is of changeable hue 
 From rosy to straw-coloured, or deepest blue ; 
 As when on the anvil white in their glow, 
 The 'bright steel bars meet many a blow, 
 x\nd change as they cool with a varying show : 
 From the palace of destiny and the dark porch, 
 From whence bolts are summoned the victim to scorch, 
 Tho' resistless the fury with which they rush forth, 
 To scathe and annihilate all things on earth ; 
 Tho* the metal is fused, and the oak it is rent, 
 And the boulders of granite in fragments are sprent ; 
 Tho' the^shepherd is slaughtered along with his sheep 
 Where huddled together for shelter they creep, 
 Beneath some tall tree, or high craggy steep. 
 Yet light are the sufferings, and gentle the deed, 
 Compared to the horrors by which brothers bleed, 
 When anger, or bigotry, rapine or lust, 
 Make hell of the bosom of creatures of dust. 
 Now the lightenings hissed in horrible spite. 
 And the air grew sick with the frequent light, 
 Oppressive, and faint, their sulphurous breath. 
 Was mixed with the taint of a chamber of death, 
 They dallied about a ghastly bed. 
 Where stiff and stark lay the murdered dead. 
 The sheets were blotched with blood stains red ; 
 
THE MUEDERER. 33 
 
 Whenever the winds a moment hush, 
 
 And hold their breath for a fiercer rush, 
 
 Drop by drop on the old oak floor, 
 
 You could hear how fell the thickening gore, 
 
 It crept along until grown cool, 
 
 'Twas curdled in a sluggish pool. 
 
 While over the head, held on by the skin. 
 
 At times there played a horrible grin. 
 
 The sneer of death at the work of sin; 
 
 A hideous sight, a watchman there 
 
 Had maddened soon with a frantic fear ; 
 
 For the window rattled as if from its hasp. 
 
 About to be torn by a giant's grasp ; 
 
 For a flickering light fell over the face. 
 
 And gave of each passion a terrible trace. 
 
 Yet, rather I'd watch the whole of that night 
 
 Although I died perchance of affright, 
 
 Than creep along with yonder form, 
 
 Bent down with conscience, not with the storm ; 
 
 Gold in one hand, in the other a knife 
 
 Which was ruddy still with the victim's life. 
 
 About the haft gray hairs a few. 
 
 Adhering as with stiffening glue, 
 
 And scarce he recks of the burden they hold, 
 
 The weapon or that which it ravished — the gold 
 
 For he hears in the wind the avenger's sliout. 
 
 As ever he turns him, and gazes about 
 
 He sees by each bush the avenger stand, 
 
 He feels on his arm the avenger's hand ; 
 
 As he flies, he mutters o*er and o'er, 
 
 The words which shall haunt him for evermore ; 
 
34 THE MURDERER. 
 
 " God ! that the deed were never done 
 . " To morrow's light must look upon ! 
 " Why would he prolong a useless strife, 
 ** His gold I wanted and not his life ; 
 " His hand was strong, I feared his voice. 
 " A murderer ? nay, I had no choice. 
 ** Hush ! what was that ? I'll never yield, 
 ** Psha ! 'twas a branch in the tempest reeled, 
 ** Swift let me hurry — on to the strand, 
 '* I'll leave for ever this cursed land. 
 ** Hark ! Hark! ah yes it is the bell, 
 ** Fools let them ring — 'lis his funeral knell, 
 " I see where the angry torches flash, 
 ** I hear the salt waves fiercely dash, 
 " Where the heavy strokes of the ground swell fall 
 " With thundering beat like a breaching wall. 
 ** Safe ! Safe ! what hoy ! — the boat is gone, 
 ** Ah no ! she's there — 'twas fear alone, 
 "Comrades I'm here" — then with a spring 
 As leaps the wild bird to its wing. 
 He alights on the planks and with an oar 
 Thrusts in a hurry from the shore. 
 Alone he stands, to help him none 
 Of those whose aid he built upon ; 
 Nor wots he of the raging sea. 
 Whose waves bark at him greedily ; 
 And gnash at his head with glistening spray. 
 Eager to snatch their destined prey. 
 He laughs, well pleased to see how fast, 
 The shallop glides before the blast ; 
 
THE MURDERER. 35 
 
 And hopes to reach yon vestfiers side. 
 
 Which safely rides on the billowy tide. 
 
 She was the refuge of a band 
 
 Of felon outcasts, from each land, 
 
 Whose cowardice and brutal crime. 
 
 Made them the fear of Southern clime ; 
 
 Not theirs like men with courage high 
 
 To cope with worthy enemy. 
 
 To conquer or unmoved to die ; 
 
 Twas theirs for rapine and for gore, 
 
 By day to seek defenceless shore, 
 
 Or else to creep on midnight breeze, 
 
 The unarmed merchant-bark to seize, 
 
 To murder or with lust intense 
 
 To ravish virgin iimocence, 
 
 The plea for mercy, naught avails, 
 
 Their maxim "Dead men tell no tales'* 
 
 They fire the ship, and watch with joy 
 
 The hungry fiames the roasts destroy. 
 
 And as she sinks, with hellish laugh 
 
 ** Health to the homebound crew," they quaff, 
 
 Of blood and violence their boast, 
 
 Of cruel deeds on many a coast, 
 
 He their chief who dared the most, 
 
 But e*cn among themselves, their life 
 
 Was nought but curse, debauch, and strife. 
 
 Deem not they lived in freedom, thty 
 
 Of constant dread, the hopeless prty, 
 
 Bouud by no sense of honour ; — fstr 
 
 Alone the boud of union here. 
 
36 TPIE MURDEKEE. 
 
 To whisper, or appear less glad, 
 
 When all with sport, and drink are mad, 
 
 To be the best among the bad. 
 
 This breeds suspicion ; he must die, 
 
 As recreant cur or meanest spy. 
 
 Who mates not their ferocity. 
 
 Wolves of the sea to whom is given, 
 
 Short shrift by man, but none by heaven. 
 
 fie hears afar the bay of hound, 
 Come swiftly o'er the tainted ground, 
 And on the beach sees many a form 
 Rush hither and thither amid the storm. 
 "Fools, ye are late" he mutters — '* blow 
 ** Fiercer ye winds, the boat is slow, 
 ** But few dare follow where I go. " 
 Yet as hard prest, he tugs each oar. 
 Fresh lengths to conquer from the shore, 
 Still from his bated breath are flung. 
 The words now ever on his tongue ; 
 " God, that the deed were never done, 
 ** To morrow's morn must look upon." 
 Amid the flying scud, appears 
 The sickly moon — for the ship he steers, 
 A reef of rocks ran out from the land, 
 And almost met on either hand. 
 Over the barrier, ceaseless pour. 
 The raging waves with furious roar ; 
 A narrow passage lay between. 
 Through which the sable flood was seen ; 
 
THE MURDERER. 37 
 
 Still dauntless, on for the open sea, 
 
 His oars he pulled courageously : 
 
 As for a moment ceased the rain, 
 
 A lull fell on the winds and main; 
 
 That silence struck upon his soul, 
 
 More than when winds and billows roll, 
 
 Through murky clouds a chasm rent, 
 
 Disclosed the hollow firmament ; 
 
 And as he upward turned his sight, 
 
 More black and dismal grew the night, 
 
 The chilling beams so faintly blue. 
 
 The vast profound scarce struggle through. 
 
 Where on the fleeting clouds they fall, 
 
 He saw a white edged funeral pall. 
 
 While straggling on the dark abyss, 
 
 A few pale rays the waters kiss. 
 
 He ceased to row, the labouring boat 
 
 Seems in a sea of blood to float ; 
 
 Why does he start? why strain his tyo. 
 
 What fears, his efforts paralyze? 
 
 He sees where sits on the gunwale, a torm 
 
 Which looms mysterious in the storm, 
 
 An aged man with hairs once white, 
 
 All dabbled with blood — a piteous sight, 
 
 No longer he seems to plead for life 
 
 As when was raised the murderer's knife: 
 
 When the murderer saw fade out the light 
 
 From each fast glazing orb of sight ; 
 
 But his eyes they glare with malignant ray. 
 
 Green like n tiger's athirst for his prey. 
 
38 THE MUEDERER. 
 
 Tt rose — and the murderer nigh distraught, 
 
 With one loud yell by terror taught, 
 
 Rose — for an instant doubting stood, 
 
 And madly plunged in the boiling flood ; 
 
 Then laughed the wild winds far and wide, 
 
 Danced in its glee the howling tide. 
 
 He sinks, — in vain with struggling feet, 
 
 And frantic hands the waves he beat, 
 
 A whirling eddy caught its prey. 
 
 And *neath the surface bore it away ; 
 
 The frenzy forsakes him in the strife 
 
 Which goaded him on to take his own life. 
 
 And reason comes, alas, to bring 
 
 Remorse with every thrice barbed sting ; 
 
 Too late to save, — a terrible pain 
 
 Like flash of lightening scorched his brain 
 
 His mind crime-stupified at first, 
 
 Wakes fully conscious of the worst ; 
 
 " God if this moment only be 
 
 " Between my soul and eternity! " 
 
 All hope denied — too late for prayer, 
 
 Nothing is his but black despair ; 
 
 A weight bears down his heart like lead, 
 
 The image of the murdered dead ; 
 
 To him convulsed with death throes strong, 
 
 The moments seem like ages long, 
 
 Seems that the lungs must burst comprest 
 
 Within his vainly heaving breast. 
 
 He labours hard to breathe, in vain, 
 
 He only gulps the cruel main. 
 
^c^cr6;^E 
 
 A P K E M. 
 
 ^e9^pc^ 
 
Clje JHurkrEr. 
 
 PROEM. 
 
 (HERE'S a curse on yon Hall, and its roof-tree is 
 bare, 
 
 There no kinsmen assemble, no strangers repair ; 
 There's a curse on its pleasaunce, its paths are untrod — 
 For the voice of the people 's the mouth-piece of God. 
 When the voice of the people pronounces accurst 
 With His sanction, the verdict is never reversed ; 
 Where blood has been spilt, e'en the boldest draw back. 
 And the brutish, tho' hardened, are scared from the track. 
 The sheep will resist at the slaughter-house door, 
 Instinctively shrinking from scent of fresh gore, 
 When, with limbs all a tremble, and heart which is faint, 
 With eyes full of horror, he utters no plaint. 
 But woe ! to the man, whom, more stubborn than brute. 
 No foresight of danger can turn from his route : 
 
A PKOEM. 
 
 But he rushes on blindly, and dies on the plot 
 Which craved for his blood, while he heeded it not. 
 
 The heir of Sir Everard's honours and name — 
 
 Men shun him, and couple his presence with shame : 
 
 Degraded and outcast, unloving, unblest ; 
 
 Of good men the pity, of wicked, the jest ; 
 
 Most bitter his lot when, with sentence severe, 
 
 He judges himself, his abandoned career ; 
 
 And laments for the place whence he*s fallen away, 
 
 To league with the vilest, and yet be their prey. 
 
 For he ponders his wickedness, and in despair 
 
 Would crush from his breast the remorse which is there ; 
 
 And it stings that proud mind, when his comrades in sin, 
 
 Who wait for his signal, each crime to begin, 
 
 Past feeling, themselves, make a mock, with coarse mirth. 
 
 Of the last dregs of conscience which harass high birth — 
 
 Yes, there's something which clings to him still, and their eyes 
 
 Are jealous of that they pretend to despise. 
 
 The chilling demeanour, the sneer at the sight 
 
 Of the low brutal pleasures in which they delight : 
 
 They would fain hold him cheap, yet as oft as they rail 
 
 At the one touch of feeling beyond them — they quail. 
 
 And they hate, in their souls, that sad spirit which turns 
 
 From the fetters which bind it — and inwardly mourns, 
 
 Aye, such is the bondage which galls him who sinks 
 
 To the level of those from whose baseness he shrinks. 
 
 Then he stoops, in his madness, to deeds which may show 
 
 His daring to those whom he loathes in his woe. 
 
A PROEM. 
 
 Thus masterful ever, he knew, when too late, 
 
 How the rest of the pack lured him on to his fate. 
 
 The deer, when encircled by wolves is then driven 
 
 Thro* the plain to the spot where asunder it's riven ; 
 
 And it plunges despairingly over the cliff, 
 
 And lies at the bottom, all mangled and stiff. 
 
 Then the ruffian crew, as they slink back again, 
 
 Descend at their leisure, and feast on the slain ; 
 
 So they talked of his father, and said he was old — 
 
 What use could he make of his life, or his gold ? — 
 
 Of climes where the dauntless, at head of a band, 
 
 May win him a name, and be king o'er the land. — 
 
 The rise of inferiors, whom he had known. 
 
 Promoted to honours, once marked as his own. 
 
 How detractors, in wonder, would speak of his fame, 
 
 Who now in their folly, made light of his name, 
 
 So they goaded him on — men now speak 'neath their breatli 
 
 Of the Parricide's terrible crime — and his death. 
 
 (^^ ^ 
 
THE MURDERErv. 39 
 
 His heart is rent with a mighty tliroh, 
 
 His lips unclose with a dying sob, 
 
 With a rusli in each ear, and dazzling bright 
 
 A blood red mist upon his sight, 
 
 His throat the gurgling waters fill, 
 
 And merciless ocean has worked his will. 
 
 And sweeping on with furious shock. 
 
 Its burden dashes upon the rock, 
 
 Then hurls it forth all mangled and torn, 
 
 Scarce with the shape it once had worn. 
 
 On the morrow with continuous beat, 
 The sullen waves in wrath retreat, 
 On the morrow a corse lies on the beach, 
 A little beyond the water's reach ; 
 Headless and limbless they find it there, 
 And bury it soon with decent care. 
 But ah ! what fiery billows roll. 
 In ceaseless torture over the soul ; 
 Too late, he shrieks with bitter moan, 
 ** God ! that the deed were never done ! " 
 
 And this is hell ! to think and lie, 
 Denied the privilege to die, 
 Without the power from tliouj^ht to fly ; 
 Such is the hell awaits the dead, 
 Nut such us this the vulgar dread, 
 Corporeal pains to writhe and bear 
 Like wounded beast in noisome lair ; 
 
 F 
 
40 THE MURDERER. 
 
 Tliat would be mercy — that relief, 
 
 From burning thoughts, however brief ; 
 
 Far worse all helplessly to lie — 
 
 To long for death, and ne'er to die ; 
 
 To lie inactive, and with pain. 
 
 To rack the self condemning brain ; 
 
 For ever still on thought to feed, 
 
 Thought which had made the body bleed, 
 
 Had caused the broken heart to pour 
 
 From each swoU'n artery its gore ; 
 
 Had numbed with madness human mind, 
 
 Relief alone for human kind. 
 
 Where gnash the teeth — where eyelids weep, 
 
 With tortures which no more may sleep, 
 
 Where tongues no longer may confess 
 
 That grief which language can't express ; 
 
 Or ghostly counsel render less, 
 
 The thought of banished happiness. 
 
 This is the hell must soon be tried 
 
 By intellect, in all its pride. 
 
 This is the curse it must abide, 
 
 In hell to think, in hell to live. 
 
 So darkly, keenly, sensitive ; 
 
 All loveless, lightless, hopeless, there 
 
 To thread the circle oi despair. 
 
LAMENT OF THE EOBIN. 4 j 
 
 IConiBnt nf flje Unliin. 
 
 |UMMER which cherished me, 
 ,^ Alas ! is departing ; 
 ^ Th' insect tribes perished be, 
 The swallows are starting. 
 
 Unshook by gales of strife, 
 Pensive the mellow day, 
 
 Breathes as a happy life, 
 Smiling itself away. 
 
 Autumn is reeling ripe, 
 
 Smeared with his ruddy lees : 
 
 But hark ! already pipe, 
 Gusts to the moody trees. 
 
 Courtiers who stand and wait, 
 Dissembling their sorrow ; 
 
 Clad in their robes of stato 
 Forecasting the morrow. 
 
42 LAMENT OF THE ROBIN. 
 
 Uneasy for their own 
 Possessions and favour, 
 
 For of their monarch's frown, 
 Decay is the savour. 
 
 I only left of all, 
 
 Nature*s sweet choristers, 
 
 Chant to the dying fall, 
 *Neath the dark forest firs. 
 
 Faded my plumage gay, 
 Russet with scarlet breast ; 
 
 Still in my land I stay 
 For still I love it best. 
 
 I who in springtime fought, 
 Eager and combative. 
 
 Warrior and lover sought 
 With my own mate to live. 
 
 Now in my solitude, 
 
 Reft both of friend and foe ; 
 
 Tune to the lonesome wood 
 Snatches of artless woe. 
 
 Ever would I be gay. 
 Ever sing cheerily ; 
 
 But wake at break of day 
 Anxious and wearily. 
 
LAMENT OF TEE ROBIN. 43 
 
 Leaps back to heart and mind 
 
 Sorrow which slept awhile, 
 And no repose I find, 
 
 Save what my tears beguile. 
 
 Nature in moulding me, 
 
 Latest of all my peers, 
 Wrought so that I should be 
 
 Thrice dipped in grief and fears. 
 
 Sad at heart thus I trill 
 
 Tender soliloquy, 
 And without choice or will 
 
 Foster my grief or die. 
 
 Winged from my lab'ring throat, 
 
 Spirit etherial ; 
 Speeds far away a note. 
 
 Vague as an echo-call. 
 
 Voice of mine wilt thou go 
 
 Upward for ever free? 
 Nay thou must sink below. 
 
 Weeping, to dwell with me. 
 
 Piercing thy way on high, 
 
 Ah, but thou secmedst glad, — 
 Soon didst thou gasping lio 
 
 On my breast, dying sad 
 
44 LAMENT OF THE ROBIN. 
 
 Sorrow who gave thee birth, 
 Lent thee a hasty flight : 
 
 Drags thee again to earth, 
 Sorrow as in despite. 
 
 Fledglings of April nest. 
 Plumes of a summer day, 
 
 One by one drop for rest, 
 Thus on their house of clay. 
 
 Scattered afar thus roam, 
 Scions of ancient race — 
 
 Summons one silent home 
 All to their resting place. 
 
 Not to the rose I sing 
 
 Plaintive or amorous stave ; 
 
 Meek eyed with drooping wing, 
 Hymn 1 creation's grave. 
 
 Mine be the purple gem, 
 With safra's spices crowned ; 
 
 Ghost-like whose livid stem 
 
 Cleaves thro' the sullen ground. 
 
 Naked and cold it springs. 
 
 Touched with a strange perfume, 
 
 So freed from earthly things, 
 Cleft One the rocky tomb. 
 
\ 
 
 LAMENT OF THE ROBIN. 45 
 
 Mindful of Him— the King, 
 
 Love I humanity, 
 And would each mortal thing 
 
 Save from profanity. 
 
 Oft my light feet have prest, 
 Where the sere leaves are shed ; 
 
 Often — where sweetly rest, 
 Children untimely dead. 
 
 Wherefore I sing to them, 
 
 Perched on low grassy clod — 
 Many a requiem— 
 
 Singing where once they trod. 
 
 Fain would I for my spouse 
 
 Outvie the vernal throng ; 
 ])oomed thus forlorn to rouse, 
 
 Harsh wrinkled care by song* 
 
 Sunshine too brief delight — 
 
 Let Incredulity, 
 * Babbler ' cry ' cease thy trito, 
 
 Senile garrulity.' 
 
 The' soft and low the note 
 
 Which warbles my ditty, 
 While the leaves round ye float, 
 
 hearken and pity. 
 
46 LAMENT OF THE ROBIN. 
 
 Ere arrive frost and snow, 
 Give heed to my mourning, 
 
 Sharp will the winter blow, 
 Frail mortal take warning. 
 
 Children of earth defer 
 No more your melody ; 
 
 Let cold disdain prefer 
 Silent captivity. 
 
 Bondsmen, awake ! arise. 
 Start into life — the long 
 
 Daybreak bestreaks the skies. 
 Waken a deathless song. 
 
TABITHA 
 
 Cnhitlja. 
 
 
 ||OST Joppa, by the sea, where mmny 
 
 Their voices, to the ceaseless worship of tW ( 
 And hymned the EteniaKs praises to the stnua» 
 The deep full diapason rolling back 
 Harmonious music, homage to its God ; 
 The marvellous echo of^that sovereign 
 Which wills obedience to His i 
 
 At Joppa in an upper cluunber lay 
 The form of one from earthly toil released ; 
 A sleep from whicli few waken. Cold and stiff, 
 Yet lovely still the mould whereia Ittd dwelt. 
 Far lovelier spirit. Onoe in bappy tiii 
 Of marriage and of motherhood aho Ihrad* 
 When those were gone then had the b«d of kft 
 Engirt by narrow cincture, hurst to bloa»| 
 And tilled her neighbourhood with odotft fklu 
 The eye which watched before o*er bowiabald joya, 
 Now softly gleamed in pity on tho poor, 
 Bri^'ht witli (lu- liivc and .tiiirtt of hrr TdOiil. 
 
48 TABITHA. 
 
 As from a fountain, fell from her, the dew 
 Of christian sympathy on all around : 
 Fresh fallen from heaven. And oft her very heart, 
 Deep as a bounteous field, gave forth her fruits 
 Most lovingly ; — nor shrunk when eager hands 
 Would hasty pluck to feed ; nor set with thorns 
 But dressed in pleasantness, as one would woo 
 The wants of all. Where'er she paced abroad. 
 Not for her idle fancy, but to aid — 
 To soothe each sorrow — she was wont to go 
 Where lay the sick ; to bend her stately form, 
 More stately thus to humble office stooped. 
 Where nakedness and hunger, tyrants fierce, 
 Smote the weak side of life. She without stint 
 Toiled with her hand to clothe and feed the poor ; 
 For well she knew and felt how christian love 
 Must with the body yearn and sympathize. 
 The ruined temple here ; hereaft shall be 
 The worthy shrine of a repurchased soul. 
 And e'en where'er the mournful tale of woe 
 Self-bought, was heard ; compassionate, her eye 
 Beamed as her Master's, when the cruel world 
 Brought sin and shame to suffer at His feet. 
 Not horror-struck — but as the Master's self 
 Weeping the wreck, sin made humanity. 
 Then loosed his deadly coils the serpent false. 
 Bounded the stifled heart once more with hope. 
 And beat each pulse with long quenched gratitude. 
 So evil fled her presence, and once more 
 Keviving thoughts of holiness returned, 
 
TABITHA. 49 
 
 Swelled the crushed soul, with new born energy, 
 
 Both purity and peace, at her sweet look 
 
 Sprang up again, regaining long lost strength. 
 
 Sick men once strong in vice, felt that she came 
 
 Their guardian angel, and with tears confessed 
 
 Their late abhorrence of each cherished crime. 
 
 Such tender sorrow rose within each soul, 
 
 And self-abasement at her presence — lest 
 
 She should resign them to their fearful foe, 
 
 As all too guilty for her company. 
 
 Slander and evil-speech beheld her near, 
 
 And hushed their tongue and quenched the baleful light 
 
 Which fired their eyes, and smoothed their angry brow 
 
 Dreading lest ears so pure should drink the foul — 
 
 The bitter venom of their wicked lips — 
 
 Such sounds unmeet for her ; they shrank abased 
 
 Fearing that her rebuke, should wound themselves 
 
 More keenly cutting than their sharpest tale ; 
 
 For when she spake, the sluggard conscience moved 
 
 Uneasy in each breast, and thoughts of self 
 
 Degraded now, once worthy nobler deeds. 
 
 Arose and terrified each guilty mind. 
 
 But most she loved, as still from house to house 
 
 She moved, to visit those, where lay the forms 
 
 Of childhood in its mute appeal for aid ; 
 
 The old, old, weary look of age, which Pain 
 
 Writes with a stricter character than Time ; 
 
 As wind-shook fruit maturcr ripeness shows, 
 
 From hidden wound that catcth out its core. 
 
 Leaving a brighter Hush than health can give 
 
50 TABITHA. 
 
 To the unsullied skin ' Twas there she loved 
 To linger : as a gardener still bestows 
 On tenderest plants his utmost diligence, 
 Removing cankered leaves, and cleansing where 
 Mildew infects each bud ; so she besmoothed 
 Their tangled tresses, and above each frame 
 Spread the light coverlid afresh. Their eyes 
 Watched as she moved ; with looks which paid her well. 
 And she was full of all fair womanhood, 
 Was graceful, gentle, and compassionate. 
 Yet motherlike she thought it no disgrace. 
 Toiling to bear the trace of work and toil ; 
 Richer than ring of gold the fret inworn 
 By needle on her finger delicate. 
 As through sick chamber steals the fresh delight 
 Of new plucked flowers ; so her presence cheered 
 She made no difF'rence 'twixt or rich or poor, 
 Both levelled by affliction — heirs of woe — 
 Nor men nor women her sole care ; but both. 
 Who made them male and female, well she knew. 
 Made both reflection of His character, 
 Who is not only God omnipotent, 
 But also tender, beautiful, and kind. 
 For whose all-seeing eye and wondrous hand, 
 Naught is too small, too vile to beautify ; 
 Who holds the seas in hollow of His palm, 
 Who gives its texture to each flow'ring leaf ; 
 So that, expanding to th' actinic ray. 
 It takes its proper tincture — and with joy 
 Receives the honours due, not unesteemed. 
 Or worthless — but with royal mien endowed, 
 
TABITHA. 5i 
 
 Or blue as heaven's own cope — or opaline, 
 
 Or green of cheerful aspect, or rose-red 
 
 Of softest bloom — clothed by His daedal hand, 
 
 It knows not shame ; but rather confident, 
 
 Expects a nobler change — He scatters scents 
 
 Where'er His breath hath breathed the gift of life. 
 
 And she was dead I The infant church, her loss, 
 
 Who was the loveliness of Christ, deplored ; 
 
 And round her body, laid upon its bier. 
 
 Attended — as to manifest its love. 
 
 And, as the apostle entered, widows stood 
 
 Bemoaning o'er the dead, from whose soft eye. 
 
 Which rivalled that of antelope — her name. 
 
 The soul no more should waken them to bear 
 
 The cross of trial with unshrinking love. 
 
 Speechless awhile the aged man remained, 
 
 As tho' entranced, nor spake, but looked upon 
 
 The face and hands, at last released from toil. 
 
 And all the handy-work of earth. Then came 
 
 The Spirit on his soul, and as he knelt. 
 
 He asked for prolongation of a life 
 
 Which spent itself in Christ, and ministered 
 
 To other lives the living grace of Faith. 
 
 And drew them onward nursing them with shade 
 
 Of Charity — so that they grew apace ; 
 
 And flow'ring caught the ripeness of her bloom, 
 
 Which so matured their fruitage, that the grove 
 
 Was beautiful around : So ye may note 
 
 Amid the orchard some more forward tree 
 
 Stand forth in early blossom and provoke 
 
 The fearful buils to daro the laggard year. 
 
^2 TABtTHA. 
 
 And clothe the earth. And Peter prayed — then turned 
 
 And asked her spirit, would it enter yet 
 
 Once more the vineyard of the Lord and work ? 
 
 She rose most joyful yet to work for Christ. 
 
 And to the saints and widows joy-amazed, 
 
 He gave her back alive. At that appeal 
 
 She left her rest, with holiest love inflamed 
 
 To labour on, till that her second life 
 
 Advanced yet further all her Lord's design. — 
 
 She left the blessed company of those 
 
 Whose work is done, without one thought, but this 
 
 Which from her Lord was shed, the ray 
 
 Which radiates from Him and shall encrown, 
 
 Hereafter, such as Tabitha. The love 
 
 Which counteth not the cost, but incarnates 
 
 God in the world. Of such was she who e'en 
 
 From Paradise responded to the call. 
 
 Again in mortal frame enshrined to dwell, 
 
 Withouten grudge to suffer pain and death, 
 
 For other's sake. All Joppa heard. The Church 
 
 • Eevived, and daily added to her fold. 
 
 Such power, beyond all judgment of the mind 
 
 The heart possesses when it beats for God ; 
 
 So grand, the image of that God, new-wrought, 
 
 That men adore it with a willing soul ; 
 
 The God, who dwells in each and all alike, 
 
 • Speaks forth mysterious truths of Being. — Yea 
 The Heaven within, asserts our ties with Him, 
 Who shall one day be all in all — our God. 
 
THE SPSINO WALK. 53 
 
 €^t idling WA 
 
 ^^M^TEUJ^ winter, in his sullen might, 
 '%^^^ By SoPs gold arrows pierced, — takes flight. 
 Long hover'd foulest bird of prey, 
 On stone grey plumes, *twixt earth and day ; 
 His cruel pounces, trussed for strife, 
 To seize and strangle each new life. 
 Through his stern shadow, half awake. 
 The slanting sunbeams may not break. 
 Sol, in his strength, in vain he tries 
 The King of air to paralyze ; 
 Melted each charm, each numbing spell, 
 By the warm glow which on it fell. 
 Baulked of his greed, with baffled shriek, 
 Wild flapping wings, and unfleshed beak. 
 He rushes back to arctic zone. 
 The frost-bound realm he calls his own. 
 
 Once more, the northern spectre fled, 
 The sky laughs brightly overhead ; 
 And, arching high her domes of blue, 
 Heav*n opes her furthest vsuU to view. 
 
54 THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 Now, of its bounteous mission, proud. 
 Sweeps on her way each swelling cloud. 
 Big with the load conceived by night, 
 Birth of the morning's womb at light ; 
 Through the air-ocean lazy float, 
 With snowy sail, full many a boat ; 
 One decked with light upon her wings. 
 Her treasure, orbed in secret springs. 
 Soft o'er the land the rain shower flings ; 
 Bounded to tears which melt away 
 Beneath thy kisses, Lord of day, 
 A tribute Heaven, in wrath, denied 
 To the stark Ice King's tempest pride. 
 
 So human hearts, when sorrow-bound, 
 By treatment harsh, are harsher found ! 
 Let but affection's loving clasp 
 Loose from the soul grief's icy grasp : 
 Lo ! gushing forth the depths disclose, 
 In one wild burst their hidden woes ! 
 The fount, congealed in crystal bands 
 By winter's corrugating hands ; 
 Dissolving, — in a little while 
 Glistens beneath affection's smile; 
 In babbling language flows along 
 — Strange eloquence, akin to song ! 
 Each grateful sob, each broken moan, 
 Soothed by attention — music grown ; 
 Her griefs in telling half forgot. 
 Told in an ear upbraids them not ; 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 55 
 
 Hope buried long in cheerless tomb, 
 Breaks forth and blossoms with new bloom. 
 No more each duty hateful seems — 
 Bright as of yore, in youthful dreams, 
 Sparkles the eye, — elastic tread 
 The feet ; no longer droops the head ; 
 With sweetest accent, firmer tone. 
 Resounds the voice could only groan, 
 So great the force, so strong the power 
 Affection wields in sorrow's hour. 
 
 Image of Love Divine — bright trace. 
 Centuries of ill can ne'er efface. 
 Thou, with thy nature free from guile, 
 On thunder-clouds art God's own smile, 
 Child of his promise still thy feet 
 Play fearless near the judgment seat, 
 Thy trustful eyes towards Him move. 
 With never falt'ring ceaseless love — 
 Yet mark with wondering pity still. 
 The ruddy drops which stain the sill. 
 The threshold of that mighty throne, 
 Where sits the Absolute alone ; 
 Half wondVing that such costly plan, 
 Alone can draw unyielding roan ; 
 O'er the young face the while are stealing, 
 Thoughts too deep for thy revealing. 
 
56 THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 Thus one may see, with wounded hand, 
 
 Before the sire, his offspring stand ; 
 
 He tents with tender probe the sore. 
 
 Her plaintive sob is heard no more, 
 
 Perplexed at first by solemn face 
 
 The child avoids the close embrace. 
 
 But soon from sympathetic woes 
 
 A bond of mutual union grows ; 
 
 As in a mirror she reads there 
 
 The father's mingled love and care ; 
 
 No longer shrinks in idle fears, 
 
 But smiles, well pleased, amid her tears ; 
 
 Her confidence restored again, 
 
 Submits to bear the needful pain. 
 
 And heart to heart as face to face, 
 
 The daughter vindicates her race. 
 
 So Love to us His glory tell 
 
 To all but Thee, invisible. 
 
 Who talked with man ere Adam fell. 
 
 Sweet messenger descend and hover 
 
 O'er the poor homes thou would'st recover ; 
 
 Then fold thy gentle wings and rest, 
 
 With downy warmth upon thy nest ; 
 
 let not Sin Thy presence banish. 
 
 Woe worth the day beholds thee vanish, 
 
 Let thy glad pinion, spirit, mount 
 
 And bathe .thee in the eternal fount, 
 
 No chiding accent — Hush ! beware ! 
 
 Forbids thy bold intrusion there ; 
 
 For thee no lightning rends the fane 
 
 To fright or rack thee with shrill pain, 
 
THE SPUING Walk. 57 
 
 There freshly dipt in fount of flame. 
 We hail thee with a loftier name. 
 
 Christ of the soul ! no mortal hands 
 Have forged, can burst thy golden bands 
 Regenerate, and abiding still 
 Victorious every threat of ill, 
 Should hellish foes thy rays extinguish, 
 His only hope must man relinquish ; 
 While passion's torch flares darkly, thine 
 With steady radiance loves to shine. 
 Feeding thy sevenfold lamp above. 
 Where burn the quenchless rays of love, 
 On earth, the darkest hour of night. 
 Thy lustre cheers with purest light, 
 Thy task the flame to light again. 
 Within man's desecrated fane. — 
 Descending swift at thy glad call. 
 Transfiguration seems to fall ; 
 From him the Sun, — the Lord, — on all. 
 As erst from swaddling bands of night 
 There issued forth eternal light. 
 From sin shall spring affection bright— 
 To seraph bands to know was given, 
 But man the youngest born of heaven, 
 Eternal monument must shine. 
 Of mercy and of love divine. 
 
 Where strike the sunbeams warm below 
 The tender herbs come forth and grow, 
 
58 THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 The withered grass on sloping banks 
 
 Eises again in serried ranks, 
 
 Emblem of hearts cast down, yet still 
 
 Responsive to their master's will ; 
 
 The linden buds blush coraline, 
 
 Fresh gem'd the amber-scented pine, 
 
 While all along the hedgerow brown 
 
 The cornel's vermeil twigs bend down, 
 
 Each with a darting jewel set 
 
 Propt from Aurora's coronet, 
 
 Nature gives colour ere she weaves 
 
 The silken tissue of the leaves, 
 
 That done — withdraws each gaudy trace 
 
 To clothe them with a rarer grace ; 
 
 Now varnished o'er by wondrous charm 
 
 Which shields them from each wintry harm : 
 
 Not niggard, but as who must show 
 
 Perfect design, her guide below ; 
 
 Nothing is careless from that hand, 
 
 Which stoops to paint the meanest wand. 
 
 And grants each form the hue most fit 
 
 Wrought to a finish exquisite, 
 
 t)n rock, on wave, on field, on wood, 
 
 Who stamps His character — The Good. 
 
 From chrysalis her latest tomb, 
 Vanessa floats on richest plume, 
 Her dainty pinions ope, or fold. 
 Their purple dyes, and lines of gold, 
 Like gorgeous page of missal old, 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 59 
 
 Each feather perfect, yet so frail 
 
 Breathe not too roughly or they fail, 
 
 Brush not her robe, or see dismayed 
 
 Her lovely vesture torn and frayed. 
 
 Her more than royal garments shine 
 
 Unborrowed save from hand divine, 
 
 The mock of art ! what judgment nice 
 
 In secret traced the quaint device, 
 
 Not in confusion colour blending, 
 
 But each to each new honour lending, 
 
 Mark ! still more marvellous the art 
 
 Which framed for use each several part. 
 
 What subtle power the shuttle drove ? 
 
 Who first the mazy pattern wove ? 
 
 What magic tool in fingers bold 
 
 The margin's wide indenture scrolled ? 
 
 What form was His who stood aloof 
 
 And warped with curious thread the woof? 
 
 Long pondering wisdom ? nay one thought — 
 
 Behold ! the work completely wrought. 
 
 True beauty, evidence of skill, 
 Proportions all things to His will. 
 While nature thus her God reveals. 
 Through the soul's windows beauty steals 
 Reciprocating joy ! the heart 
 Enacts creation's noblest part ; 
 High priestess of the fane divine 
 She worships at the inner shrine, 
 
60 ^fl^E SINKING WALK. 
 
 And renders back to Him who gave 
 
 The homage of earth, air, and wave ; 
 
 Lost in her rapture scarcely knows 
 
 To what weird sense her joy she owesj 
 
 Her conscious tongue all vainly tries 
 
 To phrase the marvel of her eyes ; 
 
 Yet strangely moved by links which bind 
 
 Material form to reasoning mind. 
 
 Half spurns as clay, the duller mould, 
 
 Which links sensations manifold. 
 
 The foolish spirit frets as pent 
 
 Within too coarse a tenement, 
 
 Nor sees how one harmonious whole 
 
 Unites her manhood with her soul ; 
 
 The being where 'vanescent plays 
 
 Ethereal thought in myriad ways, 
 
 Thanks to this nature sensitive ; 
 
 In Him we think, we move, we live. 
 
 Our mortal frames like tuneful shell, 
 
 With full responsive echoes swell. 
 
 Diminish slow to faintest sigh 
 
 Or rapid mount to ecstacy, 
 
 Ring out, re-echo back each strain ; 
 
 — Repay to heaven her songs again. 
 
 Our nature of complex device, 
 
 Vibrating on in motion nice ; 
 
 The vital principle the soul 
 
 Springs from the working of the whole, 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 61 
 
 Material? yes! but made by Him, 
 
 With hidden life who fills each limb, 
 
 Not so the spirit which is breath, 
 
 Of Him who only knows not death. 
 
 The subtle essence dreads the most 
 
 In dissolution to be lost : 
 
 Inheritress of many a pain, 
 
 Yet wills not nothingness again ; 
 
 To whom existence present brings, 
 
 The memory of much better things ; 
 
 United to the past by chain 
 
 Of life which craves for life again ; 
 
 Whoe'er could wish to quit this home 
 
 In disembodied shape to roam. 
 
 Or seek a shadowy world of bliss 
 
 Whoe'er hath wept hath wooed in this, 
 
 Rather we long for clothing there 
 
 Than to be stripped of all loved here. 
 
 Rather enfranchised there to range 
 
 A world whose beauty knows not change ; 
 
 We vary here at lightest freak — 
 
 And every passing hour 's unique — 
 
 Now holy ! now degraded, still 
 
 By passions fierce rebellious will, 
 
 There life eternal, brighter glows 
 
 Bathed in the fount which ever flows. 
 
 Deathless and sinless basks above 
 
 Mid circumambient rays of love; 
 
 Most pure, most glad, roost peaceful growB, 
 
 As one to whom no grief is known. 
 
62 THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 Such may we gain! who, as in glass, 
 Behold yon glories darkly pass, 
 Tear-blurred and dim our mortal eyes, 
 Too weak to pierce — the sad disguise — 
 The mask which veils what we but guess 
 Of life, and lasting happiness — 
 If this be so, then, what is life ? 
 On earth with change the ceaseless strife 
 Brief joy for many, long for few, 
 A wasted treasure soon run through, 
 Yet may extend — removed the flaws 
 Which break the first great primal laws. 
 
 In every smallest flower we see 
 
 The germ of immortality. 
 
 The life which forms, which carries on. 
 
 The life in long past ages won. 
 
 From flower to seed, from seed to flower, 
 
 Assigns to each its living hour, 
 
 Granting to each its own short day, 
 
 Before it sinks and fades away. 
 
 Yet life may last — behold the yew 
 
 Each spring his youthfulness renew ! 
 
 A thousand years at least have past 
 
 Since first he battled with the blast ; 
 
 But many a mortal race hath sped, 
 
 Yea ! generations of our dead ! 
 
 Are mouldering here in grassy bed. 
 
TSfi SPRING WALK. 63 
 
 Whose graves his branches in the sun, 
 
 Chequer with shadows broad and dun. 
 Yet six of these successive sprung, 
 From aged stock the scions young, 
 Would reach that cycle of the earth, 
 Which gave our puny race its birth; 
 Still on his dark green foliage see 
 The flower — ^his own posterity. 
 
 Failures there are. There is a bloom, 
 Prognostication of the tomb — 
 The fruitage ripened all too fast, 
 Precocious swells but not to last. 
 Too frail to stand the envious blast. 
 What tho' the brightest colours streak, 
 The glowing roundness of the cheek, 
 There is a beauty which the eye 
 Anticipating with a sigh. 
 Proclaims is only born to die — 
 For nature hastens to decay. 
 All touched by that peculiar ray. 
 Dissolves the work ; the atoms rest 
 Within her own most kindly breast, 
 For which thou wast predestinate, 
 My first-born such thy timeless fat»— 
 *Twas mine to hold thee in my am. 
 Not to avert the coming barm — 
 To see thee in convulsions lie. 
 And sink nt last without a sigh— 
 
64 'i'HE SIRRING WALK. 
 
 All ! how it made my spirit bum, 
 
 When thy young face so strange and stern, 
 
 Towards thy father's chanced to turn, 
 
 A look amazed — -prophetic fire ! 
 
 Could all but very words inspire, 
 
 Or was it that thine eye mistook 
 
 My own o'er anxious troubled look ? 
 
 Death from the tree the blossom shook. 
 
 For months I heard in agony. 
 
 The silent house repeat thy cry, 
 
 I saw thy little garments spread. 
 
 Upon the now deserted bed. 
 
 Where once reposed thine infant head. 
 
 Why should I thus renew my grief, 
 
 But that my sorrow finds relief 
 
 From secret woe, joy's deadliest thief, 
 
 For other buds since then have come. 
 
 To deck the solitary home — 
 
 Yet memory aye must love to tell 
 
 How premature the loveliest fell — 
 
 Sweet Beatrice ! a long farewell ! 
 
 Thy body was unripe, but not thy soul, 
 
 Which as it started gained the hoped for goal. 
 
 Ere thou could'st syllable thy mother's name, 
 
 Or lisp my own — thy guardian angel came ; 
 
 But five short months of earth, to thee belong. 
 
 The never-dying ceaseless days of song. 
 
 But one short hour of pain, and then the grace, 
 
 To gaze for ever on the All-Sovereign face. 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 65 
 
 •Life's cold obstruction — hated death, 
 When shall we scape thy icy breath ? 
 Which chills, and freezes all beneath, 
 Till thought herself sinks helpless down, 
 Opprest by thy tremendous frown. 
 Life is not lost but ever flies 
 From one to other strange disguise. 
 The secret shadowed forth in this, 
 Is somewhere kept in yon abyss, 
 *Tis hid within yon golden shrine 
 Where viewless glows the Form Divine ; 
 Where adoration droops her eyes 
 Abashed ! nor dares the vain surmise, 
 In sweet contentment ever wise- 
 Shall contemplation idly dare 
 The treasure house to enter there? 
 To measure out the winds and seas 
 To set for earth and stars decrees 
 To^call the lightning's matchless force — 
 To seek for day's eternal source — 
 Quick seize the censer ! lest there come 
 From that dread presence, words of doom. 
 Oh I worship Him the Last, the First, 
 Before the day of vengeance burst, 
 At morn, at noon, at set of sun. 
 Let incense steam — the plague's began. 
 Oh ! Thou who Art, from whom all take their birib 
 Full ** choir of henv'ii, rich fiuiiifuro of r.irili,'* 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 Low let us fall, as falls the dust to dust, 
 Confess Thee Lord, Thee merciful, Thee just. 
 
 *Tis early spring, — scarce blooms as yet 
 The white or purple violet ; 
 The burnished crocus rears and shows 
 His flames beside earth's mimic snows ; 
 Primrose and daisies meek unfold 
 Their living pearl and palest gold, 
 While down beside the dancing rill, 
 With golden cup bends daffodil. 
 What trees distil from half closed lip 
 Balsamic odours, insects sip. 
 Then fill the buxom air around, 
 With many a sweet entrancing sound ; 
 See where yon sunbeam gilds the wall, 
 The meiry gnats now rise now fall. 
 Whirling their life-long hours away. 
 Steeped in the lustrous warmth of day ; 
 The bee awakened from her cell, 
 Bids every breeze her labours tell. 
 With solemn boom like organ swell. 
 The merchant vessel of the sky. 
 She lades her treasures leisurely ; 
 Each honeyed flower her busy mart 
 Searched o'er and o'er with curious art, 
 With flexive tube its nectar drains, 
 And stores each thigh with yellow gains ; 
 Her cargo rich complete, with care 
 She launches off upon the air, 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 67 
 
 And sails, no longer apt to roam, 
 With steady course as bound for home — 
 Behold her there at last arrive, 
 And fill with liquid gold the hive. 
 
 O'er the grey misty waterfall, 
 
 The sallow hangs each downy ball, 
 
 The winds with avaricious lust, 
 
 Come stealing past with sudden gust. 
 
 And o'er the wave shake golden dust. 
 
 And citron-scented fragrance bear, 
 
 Along the dewy tell tale air, 
 
 Soon congregate a thievish crew, 
 
 And search the naked branches through; 
 
 While lightly creeps from spray to spray, 
 
 The chiff chaff with his feeble lay. 
 
 The willows of the brook rejoice 
 
 At tidings of his piping voice. 
 
 Lo ! like a living turquoise flashing. 
 
 Kingfisher thro' the shallows dashing, 
 
 Seizes his prey and up the stream, 
 
 Darts like an azure meteor beam. 
 
 The silver minnows — timid clao. 
 
 Forgetful of the robber's plan. 
 
 All in a body restless moye^ 
 
 And thro' the sparkling eddies rove. 
 
 Dispersing widely at the shadi , 
 
 By yonder leafless branches made. 
 
 Still, as I gaze, I sec, as in a dream, 
 
 The willows drooping o*er n nobler ttretm, 
 
 Amid the branches, harps neglected gleam. 
 
Me sprung walk. 
 
 And drooping forms, with sorrow moistened eye 
 Wring their sad hands, with hollow murmurs sigh, 
 Long for their own dear land and often come 
 To sit beside the trees and speak of home, 
 Hark ! louder rising on the pensive gale, 
 The wretched captive's hitter mournful wail ; 
 *Tis fancy ! — nay, it is the merry shout 
 Of giddy childhood, fresh from school let out. 
 And o'er the meadow, swiftly racing by. 
 They hear the willow, badge of victory. 
 
 The brook with eddying rings betrays, 
 Where speckled trout all wanton plays 
 Now shadow-like alarmed he flees 
 Beneath the roots of sunken trees. 
 Or darts below the weed that waves, 
 Beneath the surface as it laves ; 
 Whose tresses green the ripples net 
 With ever dancing golden fret. 
 Bend o'er and mark how clearly shown* 
 Beneath the crystal stream, each stone ; 
 With sparkling sands of mottled hue, 
 Or brownish red, or greyish blue. 
 Lo ! there with lilac tinted sides 
 Safe in the glassy depths he rides. 
 Without an effort he can poise. 
 Can sink, or in a moment rise ; 
 Thro' rosy meshes of his gills. 
 All his light frame with air he fills. 
 
THE SPRING WALK. ed 
 
 Move but your hand, with golden eye, 
 He glances up prepared to fly 
 Already faster he begins, 
 To work the steerage of his fins ; 
 With one bold stroke again he glides 
 Against the stream's opposing tides, 
 In glad security he hides. 
 
 Who gave the elusive form to breathe 
 And safely lurk yon waves beneath, 
 He grants to each in sweet content, 
 To dwell in his own element. 
 Who fashions for their home each limb, 
 Gives wings for flight or scales to swim, 
 Or hoof the mountain ridge to climb. 
 Commands success in every scheme ? 
 Can this be ought but God Supreme ? 
 Who placed them where they freely nmge, 
 By strictest law forbad the change. 
 The eagle, — master of the breeze. 
 The whale, — emerging through the seas, 
 Behemoth — rending down the trees ; 
 None can escape their destined bound, 
 To fly, to swim, or shake the ground. 
 
 But Man, earth's feeblest birth while young, 
 With tottering feet and faltering tongue, 
 
70 THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 Slow in his growth, in acts a fool, 
 
 Till wisdom taught in sorrow's school, 
 
 Shall thousand marvels dare and do, 
 
 His path thro' life's rough quarries hew ; 
 
 Him fierce amhitious fiery zeal, 
 
 And self-sought hardships hut anneal. 
 
 Like tempered glass or well tried steel. 
 
 His hopes as brittle ! exploits rash 
 
 All in a momemt shivering dash. 
 
 Ere the wished draught the goblet yields — 
 
 Snaps with the blow the sword he wields ; 
 
 His fellows wonder at the stroke. 
 
 Whose very force the weapon broke, 
 
 And envious pass the bitter mock, 
 
 At that which could not bide the shock. 
 
 Soon shall he forge with patience strong 
 
 A blade which must succeed ere long ; 
 
 Against the fashion of each limb. 
 
 Controlling what opposes him 
 
 He straightens, changes, — moulds anew 
 
 Till all things serve his purpose true. 
 
 Pleased with th' ideal of his soul, 
 
 Man seeks perfection as his goal, , 
 
 Rears the tall shaft and builds on high 
 
 The palace of his destiny ; 
 
 Binds to the mast the bellying sail. 
 
 Presses with steam 'gainst tide and gale ; 
 
 Or fetters with a stubborn band. 
 
 The lightning with its viewless hand. 
 
 It writes once more upon the wall 
 
 The rise of empires and their fall. 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 71 
 
 Caught from her hand her pencil sure. 
 
 Nature gives up her portraiture ; 
 
 Of all her beauties man makes prize, 
 
 Save the rich coffer of her dyes. 
 
 First thro* the bright converging glass. 
 
 He bids her fleeting image pass, 
 
 Then stealing from the sun a spark, 
 
 Transmits it thro' a chamber dark ; , 
 
 With liquid silver corporate. 
 
 It prints upon the spell-bound plate. 
 
 Whate'er the imprisoned seraph drew ; 
 
 Is fixed by baths of magic dew. 
 
 Nature beholds each beauty rare. 
 
 Transferred and concentrated there. 
 
 Affection marks with fond conceit, 
 
 The countenance he loves, complete. ' 
 
 The smile about to break in speech, 
 
 Like ripple on a sandy beach, 
 
 The rays of light which bead -like rise. 
 
 On the clear margent of the eyes, 
 
 Like silver bubbles round the cool, 
 
 Unfathomed night of mountain pool, 
 
 The fringes of the iris show^ 
 
 All that the pupils hide below. 
 
 Time scowls in hatred at the art. 
 
 Which joins those whom he longed to part. 
 
 Was it for this with crooked scythe 
 
 I smote, to see thee yet most hlythc ? 
 
 Was it for this with fatal stroke, 
 
 The mystic threads of life I broke! 
 
72 THE SPKING WALK. 
 
 Death sees amazed bis lawful prey, 
 'Scape the stern dictates of decay. 
 Who dares again with verge of gold, 
 My brazen double-gates unfold ? 
 Who bids me loose again the ghost, 
 From the dark charnel of the lost ? 
 And consolation soothes each sigh, 
 While mem'ry smiles with pensive eye. 
 
 Tho' wingless, man with pride explores, 
 Where eagle's pinion never soars. 
 With more than eagle's gaze descries, 
 The flaming orbs with dauntless eyes. 
 Piercing the furthest realms of space, 
 He reads the comet's wandering race, 
 The growth of future worlds can trace. 
 The laws the universe restrain, 
 Conceal themselves from him in vain. 
 All weaponless — his mind the tool. 
 Enabling him on earth to rule ; 
 Not so the bird, whose rounded breast. 
 Builds as of yore her downy nest ; 
 Not so the bee, who, just as well, 
 At her first effort formed her cell. 
 Her tiny frame designed to be 
 Both architect and alchemy ; 
 Her workmanship not due to skill, 
 Or any exercise of will ; 
 But simply to her shape confined, 
 And length of limb, not force of mind. 
 
THE SPBING WALK. 73 
 
 Behold the sceptre of command 
 Entrusted man — his own right hand ! 
 Whose natural shape can ne'er design, 
 One perfect round or one straight line, 
 Yet labours on until it gain 
 O'er every obstacle its reign. 
 Next thought-articulating speecli, 
 The social tie combines to teach, 
 New victories upon her page 
 Science inscribes from age to age, 
 And builds aloft the Babel tower 
 Which scorns decay's erosive power. 
 Where intellect may stand, and with a nod 
 Of proud assent, assume the port of God. 
 
 But hark ! from yonder woodland green. 
 Where the grey tower o'ertops tbe scene. 
 Wave after wave comes rippling past, 
 A sound which widens on the blast, 
 As water where a stone is cast ; 
 How soft and full swells forth that boine, 
 Like billow rolling without foam, 
 A cull to man from his last home ; 
 The solemn ^oothing counsellor, 
 Who ever murmurs — never more— 
 And lo ! where wind along the road 
 The bearers slow, with heavy load ; 
 And silent groups of children stand, 
 With awe-struck looks ou either band : 
 
THE SPEING WALK. 
 
 Each hat is off — some potentate, 
 
 Perchance is passing by in state, 
 
 Clad in his robe — to sit upon 
 
 His rightful seat— his father's throne. 
 
 Nay ! 'tis the heir who goes to sleep, 
 
 With his forefathers whom the earth must keep 
 
 Until King death his final harvest reap. 
 
 Approach and hear what death may claim, 
 
 He feeds on ashes, rules in name ; 
 
 Devours not substance ; cease the dirge. 
 
 No more the tear of sorrow urge ; 
 
 To live on earth is ling'ring death — to die 
 
 To share His being with Divinity. 
 
 Their aged limbs engreen'd with moss, 
 
 The chestnuts hoar no longer toss. 
 
 No longer match the tempest's might, 
 
 Like naked wrestlers stripped for fight ; 
 
 No longer shrieks to night-winds rough, 
 
 Their knotted cordage strong and tough ; 
 
 In battle throes with voice of thunder. 
 
 When storms would rend each limb asunder. 
 
 I muse beside each writhed trunk. 
 
 As by stone piers the cloistered monk ; 
 
 bo like cathedral nave they stand. 
 
 In solemn rank on either hand ; 
 
 The vaulting branches interlace 
 
 And roof with checkerwork mid-space. 
 
 Or like the house of Lebanon, or where 
 
 Eose more magnifical the House of prayer. 
 
THE SPEING WALK. 75 
 
 Where pillar, base, and chapiter oppose. 
 Each answering each, in two contending rows, 
 Where on each graven frieze emboss'd there shone 
 Parvaim's gold, inlai;! on wood or stone. 
 Where knops with lilies and pomegranates bound 
 In wreaths and chains each capital surround. 
 Or where still nobler solid plates enrich 
 The cherub shaded ark, within its niche, 
 That awful place where day could never fall, 
 For God His robe of darkness threw o'er all ; 
 But here tho* dim, *mid massive branches stray, 
 The fitful glances of departing day ; 
 From limb to limb the sunbeams upward leap. 
 With trembling radiance earth no longer sweep. 
 
 Soft rises from the distant fold, 
 The suckling's bleat scarce three days old ; 
 The crested lark from grassy clod, 
 Springs up and sings his hymn to God. 
 Louder — his song when upwards presi, 
 Sinks as he sinks towards his nest. 
 Clear chants the tlirush from lofty tree. 
 His untaught strain of Liberty, 
 The softer blackbird flutes his song, 
 Yon catkin*d hazel copse along. 
 Where turns the soil the busy plough. 
 Whose harshest sound is music now, 
 Tlie rook descends and marches near, 
 With sober steps without a fear, 
 
76 THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 Mantles her wings of sable hue, 
 
 Fresh glossed with purple and dark hlue. 
 
 The lapwing wafts her pinions slow, 
 
 Or tumbling shoots towards the foe,- 
 
 Circling o'er head with jealous cry, 
 
 Now bolder grown she settles nigh ; 
 
 Stretches her fans, erects her crest. 
 
 And mincing runs beyond her nest, 
 
 Then sudden stops her swift career, 
 
 And bills the earth as if to hear. 
 
 What dangerous step is drawing near ; 
 
 Maternal love — thou law divine. 
 
 To tame or else to embolden thine ! 
 
 The foe beholds the parent bird, 
 
 Fulfil untaught the written word, 
 
 Or meet with courage or with guile, 
 
 From her own brood the stranger wile ; 
 
 With shivering wing she feigns a wound, 
 
 To lure me from her sacred ground, 
 
 Then rising up with sudden spring. 
 
 Collects her scattered young with rapid wing. 
 
 Sweet harmonies from earth and skies, 
 Commingled with rich odours rise, 
 As when from Israel's altar-stair, 
 Arose the incense breathing prayer, 
 So from her myriad voices given, 
 Ascends creation's praise to Heaven. 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 77 
 
 I heard a little simple lay, 
 Of childhood strolling on his way, 
 His hand and e'en his lap was full, 
 Of weeds he lingered yet to pull, 
 Food for some pets he kept at home, 
 Whence the gay sunshine hade him roam, 
 Wordless the strain, of slender art 
 It came spontaneous from his heart. 
 Music methought to crown the whole, 
 The thanks of an unladen soul. 
 The redbreast came and flew close by 
 As fearing nought such enemy, 
 Inquiring turned his full black eye ; 
 And all of hopeful promise spake. 
 Successive joys without a break. 
 On that bright day of all the year. 
 The brightest, when the spring is near. 
 
 So fresh the air with music and perfume 
 From tuneful birds and scarce unclosing li 
 Steals o'er each sense, a joy beyond compare. 
 Yet mingled still with melancholy there, 
 A longing for we know not what, a train 
 Of happy thought, resumed and loat again ; 
 While all around the soul enamoured fly, 
 Sweet unimagined strains of mtlody, 
 In too expressive saddest cadence die. 
 Music supreme ! the empreaa of the apbertei 
 Suggesting pasaionatc, or hopes, or fearty 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 For ever weaving on th' enraptured sonl, 
 Mysterious fantasies beyond control, 
 And oft recurring, some recondite phrase, 
 A thousand subtle images conveys. 
 As dying embers, windstruck, upward flash. 
 And fall exhausted in a sombre ash, 
 Blaze forth such wond'rous truths, the baffled tongue 
 Dares not attempt what is by angels sung, 
 Stir'd to her very depths the spirit feels 
 A power which music only half reveals. 
 Rather the promise than fufilraent this — 
 An echo caught from yonder realms of bliss. 
 The purest relic of the Elysian bowers, 
 Which God in mercy left this world of ours. 
 A reminiscence faint of that dread sky, 
 Where all are linked in one grand harmony. 
 But here still runs through every golden chord, 
 A gloomy dissonance, untamed, abhorred — 
 A wrangling jar of death — with God at strife, 
 Which there resolves itself amazed in life — 
 When God Himself, Omnipotence unfurled ! 
 Presses the eyelids of a dying world. 
 Nature rejoicing in maternal cares 
 Breathes out her Being in her native airs, 
 Yet almost fears lest she have lost the strain, 
 Cheaply repurchased by a life of pain — 
 Some nearly blind yet arrogant desire 
 Stretches its hands, still seeks for something higher, 
 Still doomed to failure sinks upon the earth 
 Lifeless and chilled — yet longs for holier mirth. 
 
THE BPmSO WALK. 79 
 
 So have I seen within his iron cage, 
 The bird of Jove in sleepy vassalage ; 
 With filmy eyes with plumage soiled and torn, 
 His crooked talons blunt and prison worn ; 
 There came a sudden blast, a whirlwind there, 
 Such as he breathed of old — his mountain air ; 
 He, rushing up with flashing eye and scream, 
 Aroused at once from captive's sullen dream ; 
 Eeat his broad wings and[ forward hurVd his breast. 
 In thought about to spring from mountain crest. 
 To dominate the storm, and proudly ride 
 With conscious strength, upon the tempest-tide ; 
 Then dropped once more with yet indignant look 
 Upon the weary bar he just forsook. 
 
 There may be fairer scenes the southern coast. 
 Her gorgeous skies, her palms, her suns may 
 Her ocean blue, her crags of spotless snow, 
 Her jewelled nights, her mid-day*s saltry glow. 
 Here in the healthy freshness of the wood, 
 Shall Freedom dwell with much loved solitude ; 
 Not enervate with heat, but with a haughty look. 
 Range the green isle begemmed with mtny a brook 
 Work morn and noon and all the tcnperalt jttr, 
 With manly vigour fill his proper sphere. 
 And watch at eve with slow detetodiog flight. 
 Earth's dusky shadows deepen Into night; 
 Nature so calm, so free from aught of fear, 
 Woos us with signs of love to hold her dear. 
 
so THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 Not so of old, tlie Greek in woodland green, 
 
 The jealous nymph, or naiad's form had seen, 
 
 Had fled Colonus' sunless, windless grove, 
 
 The shade of Furies, not of endless love ; 
 
 With head averted hurried on his way. 
 
 Lest the fierce gods the rash intruder slay ; 
 
 The northern Lap beholds the Pixies' form 
 
 On Niemi's steeps presage the coming storm ; 
 
 Uganda's negro, slave of misery. 
 
 With votive offering decks each leafy tree ; 
 
 Poor wretch ! appeases Obi's dreaded rule, 
 
 In the thick forest, or by reedy pool, 
 
 A race whose quick relapse Guiana's shore. 
 
 Betrays the prey of superstition sore : 
 
 So pregnant there with more than earthly might, 
 
 The dreadful beauties Nature brings to light. 
 
 Reason tho' dull instinctively perceives 
 
 A royal handiwork in all she weaves, 
 
 Some more than mortal spell which ever links 
 
 The form corporeal with the power that thinks. 
 
 A higher privilege be ours to space 
 
 Each hidden dell, to search each secret place. 
 
 With thankful hearts the paths of God to trace, 
 
 In every changeful shape a clue to see 
 
 To that grand recreating mystery ; 
 
 Then leaps life's embryo in the startled soul, 
 
 And darts, as steeds, toward the distant goal ; 
 
 Now would the spirit wakening from her sleep, 
 
 With joyous shout, as answers deep to deep ; 
 
THE SPRING WALK. g| 
 
 Clad in her nuptial robe to heav*n aspire. 
 Borne on the incense of the altar fire. 
 Yea, faint with burning, as the altar brand, 
 Gasps for the fountains of that promised land ; 
 Thirsts for the peaceful regions which her Hope 
 Who keeps life's golden key for her shall ope, 
 When thro' the ruby portals rushing free. 
 She casts herself in raptures to her knee. 
 Nor ventures lift, her humble tear-wet face, 
 Till God Himself assure her of His grace. 
 
 The disappointed fiends her life would take« 
 All vainly hiss beneath — their quest forsakci 
 Like poisonous serpents, eye with furious glare, 
 The rescued victim they had hoped to snare, 
 And trail their baffled coils towards their lair. 
 
 Who plunged the deep unfatliomable sky, 
 He tints the eyeball of the infant's eye-^ 
 With colour as diaphanous in hue, 
 As heaven itself, and of as soft a blue. 
 Who o'er yon vault bade airy tpiriu WM?i^ 
 A rosy vapour round the brows of eve, 
 He — on the soles of infants* curling feet. 
 Sheds pink as^tender, delicate and sweet. 
 Who gave tbe worlds their Sun — a golden Nile 
 Of copious floods. He lit the human amilt. 
 Who hung in space each sun-attracled tplitft 
 He« for the cheek of sorrow formed the leer. 
 
82 THE SPKING WALK. 
 
 The pearl of joy, which 'twixt the mother's breasts, 
 Falls on her first-born, where he gently rests — 
 The tear — which scathes as tho* it were a coal 
 Ked from the crucible — the murderer's soul — 
 Who hears the sob — the sigh from love which fell, 
 Hears He not too the fierce demonaic's yell ? 
 Who made the heart its living streams diffuse 
 Thro' every limb, as from a secret cruse. 
 Made it deposit here and there a flush, 
 On maiden's velvet cheek its modest blush ; 
 Made it enscarf the flesh with that strange net, 
 Which gives each varied tint from white to jet, 
 The blood which feeds each fibril and alone 
 Tranforms the gristle till it set in bone. 
 Who planned the convolutions of the brain. 
 Knew He not that 'twould plot and scheme again ? 
 Devising rebel thoughts — ordained to be 
 Th' elaborator of man's destiny ; 
 Each wilful turn, the complications vast, 
 With all their changes He foresav/ — long past ! 
 He still retains, His wonderworking rod. 
 To smite mankind and drive it back to God. 
 His mystery of ill — no vague Desire — 
 Must elevate mankind to something higher — 
 Or shall man rise and win from sense to sense. 
 His gradual way to God's omnipotence ? 
 And for his glory form material things. 
 And things of joy with rich encolourings ? 
 It cannot be — for still a secret fire 
 Directs the soul to what it should admire — 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 33 
 
 Some pre -created forces trtith discern, 
 No effort self-conceived or lucky turn. 
 For that would ever point to one fixed goal, 
 Not give unselfish transport at the whole — 
 Man sprung from lowest being, would despise 
 The lesser grades — avert his scornful eyes — 
 Nor mark with wond'ring eye the master-stamp 
 Of Beauty seen by light of Reason*8 lamp. 
 But Glory, Beauty, sense of fitness, arc 
 Proofs to the soul of some prevenient care. 
 In his own nature man can find the clue, 
 To One who Is — and to Himself is true. 
 
 As steers in haste her rapid passage home, 
 A milk white dove toward some ancient dome— 
 Her dove-cot — wounded sore, and sore afraid — 
 Shot in the fields where recklessly she strayed ; 
 With palpitating bosom, eye of fear, 
 Which asks with pleading look, what foe is near f 
 She pities much the crimson drops which flow. 
 Each after each, successively, tho* tlow^ 
 E'en while rejoicing — safely there to real- 
 Housing her young beneath her mangled breatit 
 She spreads her wings and dies upon her 
 So the struck soul shall find at last rclcaat. 
 In deeds of love shall die and be at peace. 
 
 As to the callow birth of spring, 
 
 Is the midsummer's full fledged wing. 
 
84 THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 As to the blade the soil which breaks, 
 
 The bearded corn the autumn shakes. 
 
 As to the windflower pale, the rose, 
 
 When all her queenly beauty glows 
 
 As to the tamarisk the oak. 
 
 O'er whom his thousandth winter broke 
 
 As to the apple green, the yellow 
 
 As to the unripe plum the mellow. 
 
 When hoary bloom its purple cheeks, 
 
 With tender efflorescence streaks. 
 
 As to the goldcrest's slender note, 
 
 Lone Philomela's luscious throat, 
 
 As to the rain drop from the tree. 
 
 The river rushing to the sea. 
 
 As scintillations horse-hoofs strike, 
 
 Are to volcano's ruddy dike. 
 
 As cradle sleeping infant rocks 
 
 Is to the earthquake's whelming shocks, 
 
 As in the heav'n surpasses far. 
 
 Each lesser the superior star. 
 
 As to the wan and horned moon 
 
 The blazing sun enthroned at noon. 
 
 As to terrestrial shades below, 
 
 Celestial bodies real show ; 
 
 As to the sinners' painful fight. 
 
 The church triumphant is to sight, 
 
 So to weak man — th' Incarnate word. 
 
 Ten thousandfold is Christ the Lord ! 
 
 A thing of nought — man — Lord thro' thee 
 
 Inherits thy eternity, 
 
THE SPRING WALK 35 
 
 For Thee the seasons all advance, 
 And crown the year with solemn dance ; 
 To Thee all natural gifts belong, 
 The tear, the smile, the sacred song ; 
 'Gainst Thee the spirit vainly strives. 
 To rend apart her earthly gyves: 
 Oh ! let her still submissive wait, 
 Soon shall she reign with Thee in state ! 
 How multifarious is Thy way. 
 To Thee as clear by night as day ! 
 Before Thee naked shamefaced lies 
 The rapturous worship of the skies! 
 Thou seest the multitudinous sweU, 
 Of ocean and the abyss of hell. 
 Yet who can search Tliy wondrous road. 
 The paths on which Thy fooUteps trode ? 
 Not ou the edge of crested wave. 
 Not on the mouth of yawning grave. 
 Not on the top of mountain steep, 
 Not on the crater where they sleep ; 
 The fires of vengeance swift to fall ; 
 The earthquake waiting for Thy call. 
 Viewless thou art, now lightnings fleet, 
 The pathway of thy burning fatt* 
 What is Thy throne, not tempttl oiigbtf 
 What is Thy robe the day-break bright f 
 Where is the echo of Tby volot? 
 Where thunders roll ? wbert tiM r4»M«^ ^ 
 Life is the odour of Thy brtatb. 
 What Tby displeasure— living d«uli t 
 
ge ^Et^ St»RlNG WALlt. 
 
 Yes these are Thine but greater far, 
 
 Than sun Thou art, or moon, or star ; 
 
 Softer thy voice than earthly bird, 
 
 Or festive song was ever heard ; 
 
 Sweeter thy breath than incense, or 
 
 The richest blossom earth e'er bore : 
 
 Yet these are thine the shadows dim, 
 
 Thine own bright patterns dulled by time, 
 
 These are the 'broidered robes which passed, 
 
 Before thy Prophet on the blast. 
 
 Where is thy home ? the childlike heart, 
 
 Made by thyself thy counterpart. 
 
 Yes here indeed thy dwelling place. 
 
 Here is the refuge of our race. 
 
 How glorious is the thought from sorrow free, 
 
 To live for ever. Lord to live with Thee ; 
 
 To bask in sunshine, drink the splendour full. 
 
 Of thy great love, thou most beautiful ; 
 
 To dwell with Thee most tender, nor to dream 
 
 Of earthly cravings, loving Thee supreme ; 
 
 To lift the head all dumb and awe-opprest, 
 
 In love unspeakable on thee to rest. 
 
 If e'er on earth such thoughts unbidden rise ! 
 
 What must be. Lord, possession of thy skies ? 
 
 Hail! to Thee Alpha whence we come, 
 Hail ! great Omega, our last home. 
 Hail ! to Thee Lord, by Whom begun, 
 Hail ! to Thee Lord, in whom 'tis done. 
 
THE SPRING WALK. 
 
 87 
 
 Hail ! to Thee Lord on whose vast brow. 
 Not past, or future sits, but Now ; 
 Without Thee incomplete the tale. 
 Maker, Preserver, Saviour, Hail ! 
 
58 THE MAIDEN TO HER DEAD LOVER. 
 
 t 3fMaikn tn jjtr ffnii fnoE. 
 
 ^HE sky above again is blue, 
 
 The budding trees are fresh and green, 
 The brooklet, as 'twas wont to do. 
 Sparkles and laughs amid the scene ; 
 But oh ! my heart doth sorely yearn 
 For him who shall no more return ! 
 
 The spring birds whistle in the wood, 
 As loud as aye, as sweetly clear ; 
 But deep and still my solitude. 
 Thou art, my love, no longer near — 
 'Tis this which makes my heart to yearn. 
 And idly long for thy return. 
 
THE MAIDEN TO HER DEAD LOVER. 89 
 
 It was thy presence by my side, 
 Thy tender glance, thy loving voice, 
 Which gave its sunshine to yon tide. 
 Which made the heavens and earth rejoice ; 
 And oh ! how sore my heart must yearn, 
 For thou can'st never more retoin ! 
 
 There is a chill and gloomy cloud, 
 Which hangs o*er wave, and earth, and skies ; 
 And sorrow cannot rend the shroud 
 Which folds and hides thee from my eyes ; 
 With aching void my heart must yearn, 
 For him*who shall no more return. 
 
 Too late I'd brave my sneering race, 
 Once more within thine arms to rest ; 
 To look once more upon thy face, 
 To lay my head upon thy breast — 
 Oh ! say that 'twas not for my pride, 
 In foreign climes my true love died ! 
 
 There is no answer and no form, 
 No sound of footsteps bold and fleet ; 
 For thou art dead — the cruel worm 
 Is crawling in thy winding sheet — 
 And oh ! my heart must sob and yearn, 
 To think thou can'st no more return ! 
 
90 THE MAIDEN TO HER DEAD LOVER. 
 
 I hate them with their sordid cant, 
 
 Who bade me drive thee far away," 
 
 And this is but a foolish rant, 
 
 That summons thee who art but clay ; 
 
 Yet thou would'st grieve my heart should yearn, 
 
 Could'st thou but only now return. 
 
 T talk, alas, I talk in vain ; 
 There was once one who would not chide, 
 The babbling words I can't restrain — 
 A gulf divides us, ah ! how wide ; 
 And oh ! how oft my heart must yearn 
 For thou cans' t never more return ! 
 
 They spake to me of pride of birth. 
 Said thou wert sprung from humble sire — 
 Ah me ! that noble heart is earth. 
 Extinct that spirit's warmth and fire. 
 And cold and dark my heart must yearn. 
 For thou shall never more return* 
 
 They sapped with selfish words my mind, 
 They made me take so false a view ; 
 I thought, fond wretch, I soon should find — 
 One quite as brave, as good, as true : 
 *Tis right my heart should ever yearn, 
 'Gainst hope should hope, for thy return ! 
 
THE MAIDEN TO HER DEAD LOVER. 91 
 
 I would I were beneath the grass, 
 
 Which shivers gently in the sun — 
 
 I would I lay where none might pass, 
 
 Or look upon me when 'tis done — 
 
 My breaking heart would cease to yearn, 
 
 Nor throb with pain for thy return. 
 
 There is a land where wealth and state. 
 Are dust and ashes in the scale ; 
 Where only ill can separate ; 
 Where nought but goodness shall prevail ; 
 Oh ! there my heart shall cease to yearn, 
 For thou wilt meet me at that bourne ! 
 
92 REPHIDIM. 
 
 jRpjijiiMtn. 
 
 HE giant's vale with many a tent, 
 Is glistening in the sun ; 
 And loudly to the firmament, 
 The cymbals rang ere morn begun ; 
 And ever since the break of day, 
 The tambour groans with sullen beat ; 
 While bands of youth in bright array, 
 Circle around the sea god's seat. 
 And up the silent mountain side ; 
 All darkly wreathed in vapours gray. 
 The distant echoes angry chide, 
 In answer to the noisy lay. 
 Philistia chants her battle song, 
 Before her idol shrine ; 
 And far and wide the vale along 
 Marshals her battle line ; 
 
REPHIDIM. 93 
 
 By Baalira, and by Ashtaroth ; 
 
 But chief by Dagon's azure throne. 
 
 The captive sons of Analhoth, 
 
 As human victims groan. 
 
 " The gods shall quaff their fill of blood 
 
 " Nor want of spoil, their share, 
 
 ** Ere bathes the Sun in yonder flood ; 
 
 ** Only the mountain God beware ! 
 
 ** The God of Israel loves the height 
 
 " Of Judah*s rugged hill ; 
 
 ** There ever rules the stormy fight, 
 
 " There triumphs at his will ; 
 
 ** If thou Philistia keep the plain," 
 
 Thus spake the white robed priest, 
 
 " Our gods shall banquet on the slain, 
 
 " Nor lack ere night a glorious feast. ** 
 
 Far off upon the mountain breast 
 
 Calm in their stedfast hopes, 
 
 In peace the shepherd warriors rest 
 
 Watching the mountain slopes. 
 
 Apart from all his solemn task, 
 
 Where foot of mortal seldom trod ; 
 
 The minstrel monarch kneels to ask 
 
 The expected counsels of his God : 
 
 God of battles I Israel's sword 
 
 Her only hope in woe, 
 
 Shall Israel, fearless at Thy word, 
 
 Kush down upon the foe. 
 
 'Twas silence then, till suddenly thert fell 
 
 Upon the monarch's rapt and liateniiig ftr, 
 
94 REPHIDIM. 
 
 The sweet clear chime of many a golden bell, 
 The high Priest's solemn harbinger. 
 
 Bring forth the ephod, clad in vestments bright 
 Abiathar approaches, on his head 
 The Holy name adorns the mitre white ; 
 His robes are purple, golden, blue, and red, 
 On either shoulder stones of glory shine, 
 Each onyx sculptured with half Israel's tribes ; 
 Two golden chains suspend the plate divine, 
 Whose mystic form a perfect square describes. 
 Blazing with many a gem of costly price. 
 Made yet more precious by the graver's art, 
 Each jewel lettered with a tribe's device. 
 Rests in its place upon the high priest's heart. 
 Here from its shrine the golden vase he drew, 
 Concealed till then within the ephod's folds ; 
 And towards the king the mystic symbols threw, 
 Whose presence dread the sacred vessel holds ; 
 Forth leapt the lot by secret impulse driven. 
 Pointing towards the lonely mountain side ; 
 ** Behold," he cries, ** king the answer given, 
 *' Thither the harnessed bands of Israel guide ; 
 " Go not straight down, but turning hence afar, 
 ** Where yonder trees a distant land-mark stand, 
 " Wait till thou hear the summons to the war, 
 ** Break thro' the branches, signal of command." 
 
 Hotter and hotter grew the day. 
 As Israel took their tutored course, 
 
REPHIDIM. 05 
 
 And fiercer shone the solar ray, 
 
 No cloud to veil its angry force. 
 
 Now grim old rocks reflect the glare, 
 
 From furrowed lips which drink no dew ; 
 
 Closer and closer, yet more bare, 
 
 The pass which Israel hurries through. 
 
 At length they reach all travel worn, 
 
 Where cliffs rose o'er the vale again : 
 
 A narrow gorge between them torn, 
 
 Leads downwards to the level plain : 
 
 Here rugged peaks of sullen hue, , 
 
 The Syrian daylight smote upon, 
 
 Once giant waves which upward threw 
 
 Their crests of flame, and changed to stone. 
 
 It was in truth a wondrous sight, 
 
 A vast tempestuous sea ; 
 
 Which bellowed once with lurid light, 
 
 In wildest uproar free. 
 
 O'er gulfs of darkness hungry waves, 
 
 Had roared with hideoas din; 
 
 Triumphant rolling o'er the graves, 
 
 Of a lost world of sin ; 
 
 Stayed in the moment of their rngf, 
 
 Struck dumb with sudden fear, 
 
 No more in anarchy they wage 
 
 Rebellion's mad career : 
 
 For o*cr their wrath a Pretence came, 
 
 A marvellous brightness shone; 
 
 And quenched its fury each red flame. 
 
 Was corrugated stone. 
 
96 EEPHIDIM. 
 
 The speary rays which shot abroad, 
 And cleft reluctant night ; 
 Now speechless stood, all overawed, 
 By that excessive light. 
 Memorials left of that dread hour, 
 When night and chaos 'neath the feet 
 Of self existent sovereign Power, 
 Three myriad fathom depths retreat. 
 Warnings of what the world may show, 
 Ere all its glories shall expire ; 
 When granite floods once more shall flow, 
 In rolling waves and foam of fire. 
 There still they rage with furious throes, 
 And shuddering earth e'en now complains, 
 And trembles lest her ancient foes — 
 Should rise and desolate her plains. 
 She sees dark Mauna Loa's cone, 
 Disrupt and cleft with mighty flaws ; 
 Or mixed with floods of melting stone. 
 The flames which lick red Etna's jaws. 
 Or where o'ershadowing Ararat, 
 Threatens Araxes' fertile vale ; 
 Huge bosses roll, fierce lavas mat, 
 Giieva-Upas' poisonous dale. 
 From many a crater gray let loose, 
 With earthquake and volcano-shock. 
 From mountain sides, as from a sluice, 
 Descend the sheets of hardening rock. 
 Lo ! blood-red snakes from Pole's crown, 
 With sinuous course pursue their prey, 
 
REPHIDIM. 97 
 
 With subtle motion sliding down, 
 Thro' the dark forest force their way ; 
 The dread embrace in vain the wood 
 Resists — while writhes each mighty limb ; 
 Fire leaps on high, and where it stood, 
 Are hollow shells and ashes dim. 
 One tree is lying shapeless, charred, 
 Emitting puffs of smoke, and one 
 A martyr looks, with bold regard 
 On those by whom to death he's done. 
 And others with scorched arms that speak 
 Of tortures past, like calcined bones 
 Of piteous hands, where women weak 
 Shrieked wildly-supplicating moans, 
 And found no pity — but the stem 
 And unrelenting looks of priests. 
 While stolid crowds beheld them burn. 
 With large calm eyes like grazing beasts. 
 
 Mountains in expectation stand. 
 
 Like statues with their marble eyes, 
 
 Expressionless, but at command, 
 
 Ready for life's fierce energies^ 
 
 Each limb is fettered with the thought, 
 
 The one pervading passion of the mind ; 
 
 Which some old sculptor's cunning fingers wrought. 
 
 And sealed a legacy for all mankind. 
 
 Immoveably austere or with the smiUt 
 
 The proud supremacy of cold disdain; 
 
 As sits the Egyptian King by Thebe's sad pile. 
 
 And with one changeless look surveys the plain. 
 
98 EEPHIDIM. 
 
 Thus motionless o'er all the tract 
 
 Their ancient warfare crags enact, 
 
 Here nods the billow ere it break, 
 
 There sweeps along the cataract, 
 
 Down to the undulating lake. — 
 
 Here peaks spring up in pinnacles 
 
 Of swift-escaping rosy fire, 
 
 There like a sullen torrent swells, 
 
 The crimson mass in sullen ire — • 
 
 Such was the scene through which they past, 
 
 Scarce clianged since that great hour, 
 
 When o'er the raging deep was cast 
 
 The silence of God's power ; 
 
 Ages ere light, fair Eastern bride, 
 
 Came trembling forth to view. 
 
 And hovered blushing by God's side. 
 
 While young creation grew. 
 
 Ages ere nature dared rejoice, 
 
 Or utter'd her first cry — 
 
 But lay an infant without voice. 
 
 In speechless ecstacy ; 
 
 The mulberry leaves are faint and droop, 
 
 !No breeze comes down the mountain pass, 
 
 The weary beasts of burden stoop. 
 
 In vain toward the withered grass ; 
 
 No voice of creature or of bird. 
 
 Only cicada's tedious round, 
 
 Vexing the sated ear is heard. 
 
 Harping her shrill discordant sound. 
 
REPHIDIM. 99 
 
 No living thing about is seen, 
 
 Save where the lizard hurries by, 
 
 The red rock gems with vivid green. 
 
 Or basks beneath the sweltering sky, 
 
 So still and lifeless all things seem, 
 
 Parched by the dry and fervid air. 
 
 Such trifles then as in a dream 
 
 More than their wonted notice share. 
 
 Unnerving langour stole o*er all, 
 
 As rolled the lazy hours away. 
 
 Till lengthening out, the shadows fall 
 
 And slowly from the mountains stray ; 
 
 Philistia leaves her order strong. 
 
 Ceases her loud and taunting boast 
 
 And all the sultry vale along. 
 
 Dispersed in slumber lies her host. 
 
 *Twas now the hour of evening sacrifice, 
 
 And from the incense-altar lightly broke, 
 
 From fires replenished with Arabian spice, 
 
 The thin wreathed cloud of odor-laden smoke. 
 
 In Shiloh's tabernacle, on their knee, 
 
 The suppliant congregation lowly bend, 
 
 Still while the priest recites his litany, 
 
 The answering prayers from Israel ascend. 
 
 ' Twas at the selfsame hour, the watchful eye 
 
 A small white cloud arising from the west, 
 
 Scarce larger than a hand-breadth inighl descry, 
 
 Like distant sail upon blue ocean*t lireatt. 
 
 Then crept a lurid haze about the tuni 
 
 Till full of wrath he glowed with hue of blood, 
 
100 EEPHIDIM. 
 
 Swift o'er the rocks the deepening shadows run. 
 And sounds are heard as of a rushing flood ; 
 And lo ! he comes, the thunder horse of heaven, 
 His dark mane streaming with the tempest-force, 
 With eager rage, and thirst of vengeance driven. 
 He swallows up the daylight in his course, 
 He stooped a^moment o'er the Hehrew host. 
 While frequent lightnings fiercely shone around ; 
 Then, as they stood in thickest darkness lost. 
 He ran with matchless strength upon the ground. 
 Caught in the blast the leaves are madly sent. 
 As birds uprising from a threshingfloor, 
 And mighty fragments from the mountains rent, 
 Down the ravine in wild confusion roar. 
 Nor wanted balls of fire, great stones of hail 
 Together mingled in tremendous rain, 
 Threshing the trees and rocks with iron flail, 
 They hurtled down upon the trembling plain. 
 
 Seemed but a moment and 'twas swiftly past. 
 
 While Israel stood and marked with speechless awe 
 
 The clouds of dust swept onward by the blast. 
 
 Where far below the raging storm they saw ; 
 
 *'Up Israel to the slaughter, this the hour, 
 
 " The battle is the Lord's and his the might, 
 
 " Let every warrior summon all his power, 
 
 ** Grip fast each sword and spear, the heathen smite." 
 
 Philistia, baffled by the sudden storm. 
 
 And panic struck throughout the brass-clad host. 
 
 Amid the darkness quaked at many a form 
 
 Of portent dire, and fled, — her courage lost. 
 
REPHIDIM. 101 
 
 She saw the Hebrew god with vengeful mien, 
 Robed in the blackness of substantial night, 
 His wrathful visage 'mid the lightning seen. 
 Rush from his mountain home to lead the fight. 
 From Geba thro' the valley to the sea, 
 Where Gaza proudly overhangs the wave, 
 The vaunting foe are scattered miserably. 
 And scarce their walls a feeble remnant save. 
 
 The day is o'er, the battle done 
 And weary from pursuit again 
 The Hebrews turn, the victory won. 
 To spoil the bodies of the slain. 
 There heaped in many a ghastly mound 
 Corpse lies on corpse like wood fresh hewn, 
 Some by the sword their death-blow found, 
 More by the hail in death were strewn. 
 There, prostrate, still more hideous seem 
 The mocking idols richly stained. 
 Drunk in the very crimson stream, 
 From their own servants* life-blood drained, 
 By his own altars quenched in gore ; 
 The glozing priest lies stricken down, 
 His foul deceits to weave no more, 
 With festal robe and laurel crown. 
 " Here his red watch let Baal keep, 
 ** Sole guardian of his mystic fire, 
 *• Upon his altar victims heap, 
 '* Light up tie funeral pyre," 
 
x 
 
 102 REPHIDIM. 
 
 Thus spake, as evening grew more dim 
 The taunting voice of Israel's King ; 
 Now peals the victor's battle hymn. 
 The praises of their God they sing ; 
 ** Let God the God of battles rise, 
 " Dissolved like smoke before the blast, 
 ** Before his face the foeman flies, 
 *' Like melting wax in furnace cast. " 
 
 Hark ! voices answer — timbrels sweet 
 And snowy white as ocean's foam ; 
 The torch-lit dance of virgin's feet 
 Conducts the tide of victory home. 
 
RIZPAH, DAUGHTER OF AIAH. 103 
 
 %\]^^, hu0n of lialj. 
 
 ^^0 still — that scarcely heaved her form with breath, 
 ^om ^^6 sat and watched beneath the trees of death ; 
 There was no tear of weakness on her cheek, 
 Her dark hair floated on the night-winds bleak ; 
 Upon her head, and on the sackcloth brown, 
 The summer sun shone pitilesslyjdown : 
 The weary autumn nights, from time to time 
 Scattered around the hoarfrost's silvery rime, 
 Yet all unheeded, cold and heat alike, 
 Or chill her blood, or on her temples strike ; 
 She saw from living forms the spirits riv'u, 
 She watched her dead till water dropped from heaven ; 
 Tranquil she sat — with that unyielding air. 
 Which mocks at grief, but is in truth — Despair ; 
 That rigid look which would the world defy. 
 The tragic mask which fastens every eye : 
 Blank — as appear the features of the blind, 
 To those who fathom not what lurks behind ; 
 For as the sightless strain each sense to hear, 
 And lie as tho' in wait with greedy ear, 
 So this, — to wiser eyes reveals a will 
 Which nerves itself against the coming ill. 
 She saw them die — a mist upon her fell, 
 Indiff 'rence call'd by those who love less well, 
 
104 RIZPAH, DAUGHTER OF AIAH. 
 
 Nature's sole boon to those for whom no more 
 
 Of hope or fear remains on life's cold shore. 
 
 Yet from her parching mouth e*en from the first, 
 
 But one wild murmur half unconscious burst. 
 
 As soldiers, stretched upon the battle plain, 
 
 Long for the brooks they ne'er shall taste again ; 
 
 And, as they see the cup of water nigh, 
 
 Utter one sharp, exceeding bitter cry. 
 
 Wounded, yet mute till then — so she, when died 
 
 On the accursed tree her only pride ; 
 
 At that dread sight her starting eyes grew dim. 
 
 And dark oblivion settled on each limb ; 
 
 Her ears were deaf — no more she saw or heard — 
 
 And when one spake — she answer'd not a word ; 
 
 At times a strange and half sardonic trace. 
 
 Of death-pains flickered o'er her marble face, 
 
 Spasmodic action such as that which past 
 
 Along their limbs while quiv'ring at the last ; 
 
 When horror-struck the wretched mother gazed. 
 
 With arms and tight-clenched hands towards them raised. 
 
 Nor could avert her head — but saw them die, 
 
 Sharing herself each throb of agony. 
 
 And o'er her face at intervals there came 
 
 The self-same throes which had convulsed their frame. 
 
 A ghastly sight to look upon, and then 
 
 That death-like calm fell over her again. 
 
 Childless but clinging desperately still, 
 
 To the poor bones which whitened on the hill, 
 
 O'er those she watched with ever jealous heart. 
 
 Nor from her loathsome office would depart ; 
 
RIZPAH, DAUGHTER OF AIAH. 105 
 
 Had but the storm of battle seen them die, 
 
 She could have borne their loss without a sigh ; 
 
 Nay, watched each body as a holy thing, 
 
 Had they but died for Israel and her King ; 
 
 But thus — now full of life, and now but clay, 
 
 As strangled hound, to see them pass away ; 
 
 This gall'd her very soul, yea, this and this alone, 
 
 Wrung from her lips the involuntary moan. 
 
 Yet ! shall they lose a mother's tender care ? 
 
 She spread her sackcloth, took her station there. 
 
 Could she desert them thus disgraced, and prove 
 
 Faithless herself to all a mother's love? 
 
 The vulture came to banquet on the dead. 
 
 Wheeled high in air above, then, screaming, fled ; 
 
 At eve the jackal, hungering for his food. 
 
 Snuffed from his lair the deadly taint of blood, 
 
 But shrank in terror from the lonely form. 
 
 Which sat and watched unmindful of the storm ; 
 
 What recked she of the curse upon their name ? 
 
 What now to her the tongue of idle fame ? 
 
 Cast out — exposed — no sepulchre allowed. 
 
 No mother's hand to wind with spice their shroud, 
 
 Ungather'd to their kin — of royal birth. 
 
 Her house — home — heart — were on that spot of earth. 
 
 She deemed they would have felt more keen disgrace, 
 
 Had she, their mother, left that fearful place ; 
 
 And so from day to day she kept her guard, 
 
 A mother's love, the mother's sole reward ! 
 
 Devoted to her task while still they grew. 
 
 Less like what memory painted them to view ; 
 
106 DEATH OF HAYELOCK. 
 
 Tho* mould'ring fast and changed from day to day, 
 
 She could not go — for nature bade her stay. 
 
 — Mothers bereaved, thus love to look upon, 
 
 The garments made for some lost little one ; 
 
 And smooth with yearning hands whate'er she wore, 
 
 Whose darling face they shall behold no more ; 
 
 They o'er their treasures bend with pious care, 
 
 Nor brook a stranger's interference there : 
 
 So day nor night nor e'en the whirlwind's shock, 
 
 Could banish Aiah's daughter from the rock ; 
 
 There fancy oft would fill I her eye and ear, 
 
 With voices and with shapes of those' once dear. 
 
 Till shudd'ring reason woke with stifled fmoans 
 
 To look on blackened flesh and bleaching bones, 
 
 Yet ever and anon the busy tale. 
 
 Of the gay world came rising from the vale ; 
 
 She saw unmoved the harvest dance afar, 
 
 And joyless heard the children's mimic war ; 
 
 Without one living tie, she sat like stone, 
 
 No wife, no mother, comfortless, alone. 
 
 dDn liBttrrag nf tlje itailj of (§mml 
 Wmtkik. 
 
 IS well ! and yet we trusted, that thy name 
 So loudly voiced at last by sluggish fame. 
 Would prove thy country's safeguard, and thy head 
 Receive her noblest oifrino: — thou art dead ! 
 
DEATH OF HAVELOCK. 107 
 
 Too lately known ; oh had thy matchless worth, 
 Long known to God, been prized by us on earth ; 
 But now our debt of praise so great is grown. 
 We ne'er can pay, thy glory is thine own ; 
 'Tis well, and yet how much we longed to see, 
 The just requital of thy chivalry ; 
 Nor wast thou soldier one whose red right hand, 
 Had wrung from groaning conquest thy command ; 
 Nor did'st thou deck thy brows with bloody wreath. 
 Torn from a country stretched in pangs of death ; 
 The avenger thou of innocence whose sword, 
 Victorious struck the^ battle of the Lord 
 Struck the fierce tiger in his rebel mood. 
 And laid him lifeless dripping gouts of blood ! 
 "Who hears thy name, the saviour must hail 
 Of women, and must sicken at the tale. 
 Of Cawnpore's laden well,^the ghastly fort, 
 Where fair haired tresses strewed the gory court. 
 Must speak of Lucknow, and the leaguered wall, 
 Which but for thee had totter'd to its fall ; 
 And left its helpless inmates to the burst 
 Of Hellish rage that slak'd in blood its thirst. 
 Thou'rt dead ! 'tis well ! lo ! God who made thee kn«.wn, 
 But lent thee us awhile, now claitas his own ; 
 So oft the sun which through the lab'ring day 
 Contests the envious clouds about his way ; 
 Breaks forth at eve in all his stately might, 
 A moment glows, then sets, and all is night. 
 The lonely shepherds watch his beams, and sigh 
 That such fair promise should so shortly die, 
 
108 DEATH OF HAVELOCE. 
 
 Augur ill omen of the coining dawn, 
 
 And drive their charge across the miry lawn. 
 
 *Tis well ! thy glory, brighter than the sun. 
 
 Shines in those realms we yet may look upon. 
 
 Thy clouds are scattered far, thou without shame. 
 
 Before thy Master's throne hast won thy name. 
 
 Yet must we sadly o'er thy ashes weep. 
 
 Let not a distant land those relics keep ! 
 
 Too precious charge ! thy country claims thy bones. 
 
 To lay beside the heroes twain she owns. 
 
 It is but little, yet this lesson reads 
 
 How much she loved thee for thy noble deeds. 
 
 There, Havelock, altho' thy long tried worth, 
 
 Now recks but little of the things of earth ; 
 
 Thy voice tho' hushed in death shall yet proclaim. 
 
 The memory of the good is more than fame. 
 
 Such honour shall he have whose footsteps trod. 
 
 The narrow path of Duty to his God ! 
 
 With mournful eyes thy country waits the wave. 
 
 That floats thy body homeward to its grave ; 
 
 With mournful steps thy fellow soldiers come, 
 
 To lay their broken swords upon thy tomb. 
 
 Farewell, lost hero ! sadder words ne'er fell. 
 
 From lips than theirs who speak thy fond farewell. 
 
THE SHOWER. 109 
 
 Cjie IjiDintr. 
 
 ITHER descend, lightly veering shower ! 
 No longer veil the lonely mountain tops. 
 Virgin of heaven approach and o'er each bower, 
 Sprinkle benignant all thy crystal drops ; 
 Baptize afresh the parched and withered earth, 
 Till her sad heart grow soft and fresh within, 
 Awake again the breezy song of mirth, 
 Draw music from the cankered soul of sin ! 
 Wash off the dust of sorrow from each leaf, 
 Which breathes not in its fev'rish lethargy ; 
 Soon shall the drooping flowrets stint their grief, 
 And all the forest heave a gladsome sigh. 
 Hither, oh, hither hasten ! — fallows brown. 
 Steam with the welcome dews like rich crown'd bowl ; 
 The greedy meadows suck what falleth down, 
 Towards the brook superfluous moisture roll ; 
 The sycamore, with all her spreading hands. 
 Laughs as she feels the plash of liquid pearl, 
 p 
 
110 THE SHOWER. 
 
 And on the pasture and the marish lands, 
 'Mid dewy grass the snails their horns unfurl. 
 
 From yonder opal cloud a vast eye gleams, 
 
 With half a million slanting far-shot beams ; 
 
 And all the distance melting in blue haze, 
 
 Drinks the effulgence of its sparkling rays; 
 
 And o'er the quivering undulating leas ; 
 
 And through the vistas of the weeping trees ; 
 
 And on the trembling pinions of the breeze. 
 
 Dances a sylphid with her golden hair, 
 
 Floating dishevelled on the misty air. 
 
 Not flesh and blood her limbs, but of that hue, 
 
 When hid by maiden's hand a lamp shines through : 
 
 Bounded and taper yet so delicate, 
 
 A robe of gossamer were overweight ; 
 
 Her supple arms are wreathed with tender grace, 
 
 Above the roguish laughter-loving face. 
 
 Or else held forth, as when a swimmer's rest, 
 
 A moment poised upon a billow's crest. 
 
 Blue as the deepest azure of the skies. 
 
 In which a world of dreamy mischief lies. 
 
 The lustrous radiance of her mocking eyes. 
 
 Two ruby lips, the upper arching shows 
 
 The pearly teeth beneath in tiny rows. 
 
 And ever, as she dances with consummate glee, 
 
 She darts her merry glances, shepherd ! back at thee. 
 
WINTER. 1 1 1 
 
 Wmkt, 
 
 [lERCE Winter is loose, and his pitiless train, 
 Tlie whirlwind and snowstorm heat over the plain ^ 
 Fell hounds of the hunter with horrible bay. 
 O'er field and o*er fallow they quest for their prey ; 
 And the uplands are hidden by mists from the view, 
 Ghostly white are the meads which black rivers cut thro. ' 
 The skeleton trees are enveloped in fog, 
 And loom indistinct on the edge of the bog. 
 From the stem of the birch hangs in tatters the rhind. 
 Like a gibbeted murderer's shreds in the wind ; 
 The linnards have flown to the salt marsh for food, 
 Where the seeds of the thistle in autumn were strewed, 
 They rise in a cloud and they darken the sky, 
 Whenever tlie dog of the fowler draws nigh. 
 Then they settle again and they scoop at the sleet. 
 With their shivering wings and their half frozen feet. 
 Here the Viking first planted his foot on the strand, 
 When he leapt from his ship and invaded the land. 
 At the flow of the tide, sec ! tlie breakers rush in. 
 As though at a bound a new realm they wouKl win — 
 
112 WINTER. 
 
 At the ebb, like an army in shame driven back, 
 
 They will growl disappointed and cease the attack. 
 
 Then down sweeps the wind, and the crest of the deep 
 
 Is shorn from its billow and flung on the steep. 
 
 Thro' the low quickset hedges, by Boreas keen, 
 
 The snow-dust is sifted as meal thro' a screen ; 
 
 And the bright icy particles gather and grow 
 
 Into ribs, like a Mammoth's, half buried in snow, 
 
 Eound the sad face of nature scant herbage is spread. 
 
 Like the locks which escape from the shrouds of the dead. 
 
 Once wooed by the summer breeze — withered and grey, 
 
 Now in gusts of the tempest they helplessly play. 
 
 In gardens the evergreens shrivelled with cold. 
 
 Are stooping like beldams, skin-wrinkled and old. 
 
 See ! the overshot waterwheel by yonder hill. 
 
 No longer discharges its work at the mill. 
 
 For its mossy green shoulders are dressed point device, 
 
 With collars and monograms jewelled with ice. 
 
 The stream hangs above it in one frozen wave. 
 
 As a banner suspended above a knight's grave ; 
 
 And it trembles as tho' it regretted the day, 
 
 When his right hand upheld it in front of the fray. 
 
 There is nothing on earth now to cheer us ; we turn 
 
 And look where the sun used in summer to burn. 
 
 But he sullenly throws, as his red orb goes down, 
 
 On dark russet clouds a significant frown. 
 
 In anger they glow at the last touch of light ; 
 
 He sinks, and they darken at once into night, 
 
 Like the masses of draping which shadow a bed, 
 
 Whose silence betrays the repose of the dead, 
 
 For the funeral of nature the curtain is spread. 
 
WINTER. 113 
 
 The tyrant has hushed with his powerful will, 
 
 The last voice of freedom that rose from the earth ; 
 
 In adamant chains he has fettered the rill, 
 
 Which hahbled in summer in accents of mirth, 
 
 And over the field and over the hill, 
 
 His cold winding sheet hides both mother and birth. 
 
 He would slay vital energy, see ! on the pane. 
 Where the pure subtle element shrank from the blow, 
 Where he smote in his fury it 'scaped him again. 
 And mimics life's features in leaflets of snow. 
 Baulk'd murderer, the victim he'd silence reveals 
 The wonderful secret he fears should be known. 
 When the life blood of nature its full freedom feels, 
 The loveliest and sweetest of beauties are grown, 
 Then let but the daughter of Titan bear sway, 
 Unchecked, save by laws which are ever divine ; 
 Though crushed, beaten down, and e'en driven away, 
 She will spring forth afresh, and her glory will shine. 
 
 The roofs were all weeping the loss of the sun, 
 When in secret he forged as a Fenian his store ; 
 In the space of a night what a deed he hath done ! 
 For pikeheads and bayonets threaten each door. 
 From the eaves hangs an armory — down on the road ; 
 How plainly his actions his dark meaning show ! 
 Tlie print of his sandal crushed all where he trod ; 
 With the hem of his robe he has mantled the trees, 
 And the sweep of his wings hath enfeebled the breeze, 
 And it parts with its tear-drops in plumelets of snow. 
 
114 WINTER. 
 
 A casket he made for his prisoners bold, 
 Of mother o' pearl encrusted with gold, 
 And filagree silverwork, mighty stronghold ! 
 The work is so costly, Cellini of old, 
 Had "beggared his wit and torn at his hair 
 At creatures so fanciful, chasing so rare ; 
 They're harnessed and bridled, and left on the wold- 
 Some sparkle and glitter like diamonds — ^beware ! 
 At a touch of the hand they will melt into air. 
 
 He has left on the pasture a manuscript, writ 
 With marvellous character, Greek or Sanscrit ; 
 He has fashioned with skill on each blade of grass, 
 What for an Assyrian legend may pass : 
 The letter-press all in a moment he hit, 
 The tale of his exploits, but soon it will flit, 
 As soon as Aurora the daylight hath lit ; 
 Let it go, for his language can never be taught. 
 His work is at best congelation of thought ! 
 
 King Frost is abroad and he swears that his reign, 
 Shall yet be asserted on mountain and plain ; 
 He remembers the cycles when over the world, 
 The blue filmy banner of cold was unfurled, 
 When his glaciers scored with a deep biting stroke. 
 His autograph sign on the tables of rock ; 
 He leaves his pavilion, where, streaming on high, 
 The Boreal Aurora inarches the sky. 
 With silver spiked diadem sceptre of gold, 
 
WINTER. 115 
 
 The likeness of royalty, lifeless and cold, 
 
 As the corpse of a Queen displayed on her throne, 
 
 Her presence by rays phosphorescent is shewn. 
 
 There rises a tempest and over the heaven, 
 
 Like serpents uncoiling, her meteors are driven. 
 
 In swift undulations they merrily glance, 
 
 In wild agitations triumphantly dance. 
 
 The image of jubilant life they sweep past. 
 
 Illumine in flashes but warm not the blast ; 
 
 In frolic Frost banters the empress of night, 
 
 With a thin gauzy halo encircling her light ; 
 
 Or decks the chaste virgin with colourings bright. 
 
 At rise of the sun the whole atmosphere red, 
 
 With rich bluish purple is royally spread ; 
 
 Should he dart out his lustre the ice-king will shew 
 
 How hopeless to threaten invasion below. 
 
 Each luminous beam in the crystallized air. 
 
 Disperses refracted, sinks faint with despair : 
 
 Sol, robbed of his majesty, sees in dismay 
 
 The mocking Parhelia baffle his ray, 
 
 From the mansions of solitude hurries away ! 
 
 The blink of the ice on the weather beam shows, 
 
 How wide is the region Frost claims for his snows ; 
 
 There the iceberg of emerald stands out to view, 
 
 Prismatic reflecting the water's dark hue ; 
 
 There the glacier-floes with a thundering roar, 
 
 Grind in their rage on the desolate shore. 
 
 In his cloak of pure ermine in right royal guise, 
 King Frost rides abroad, and cacli evening he tries 
 
116 WINTER. 
 
 To conquer again what he loses at prime : 
 On the chill northern breezes he stealthily flies, 
 And the trees of the forest are plumy with rhime. 
 And the vitrified branches ring out with sweet chime : 
 Grown bolder he treads on the broad stream of life, 
 And he paves o'er the deep as it sweeps to the sea; 
 He hides with his vestment the semblance of strife, 
 And he laughs for a conqueror gladsome is he. 
 Tine sport does he count it to strip nature bare, 
 Or else to oppress her with forms without soul ; 
 Still better when solitude reigns everywhere. 
 For then he is Master and Lord of the whole ; 
 But let him beware, for a sunbeam was sent 
 Thro' his clouds, and directly a throbbing arose, 
 The first apprehension of that discontent, 
 Whtch he mightily dreads as the staunchest of foes ; 
 And a murmur was heard, and he hates argument, 
 And hoped 'twas forgotten and buried in snows ; 
 A bright golden current came out of the blue. 
 And stole a pulsation of joy thro' each heart. 
 And he felt that in spite of whate'er he could do, 
 His dominion was ended and he must depart. 
 Let us shout then and merrily sing — for altho' 
 He sullenly lingers, is wilful, and slow, 
 When the sun is up high the dark tyrant must go ; 
 Then the eyelids of nature shall shudder and ope, 
 And her voice shall respond to the loud trumpet call ; 
 And joyous with gazing at yon azure cope. 
 The bloom of her being shall burst over all. 
 
morn; 117 
 
 3fHnrn. 
 
 1^'ER all the Heav'n, but chief tlie wakeful East, 
 
 Phosphor arising transmutates the sceue : 
 The stars are gold, the firmament soft green, 
 Pure as the light which sleeps in woodlands west, 
 Where round the plashing fount wild mosses rest. 
 And maiden-hair and lady fern are seen ; 
 Where late at eve the glow-worm's lamp hath been. 
 Blue hyacinths conceal the robin and her nest. 
 Each pensile blossom of the linden tree 
 The grateful offring of its incense breathes ; 
 From ev'ry wakeful grove burst floods of melody ! 
 Red-eyed narcissus his lawn-veil unsheaths, 
 And lifts his heavy lidded brows, to be 
 Cool'd with the drops which night to morn bequeaths. 
 
 Night's vast dominion shrinks, 'tis well nigh spent ; 
 Morn, dusk Arabian maid, puts forth her hand, 
 Blushing as if she feared a reprimand, 
 And coyly draws aside the outer tent ; 
 
118 
 
 MORN. 
 
 With modest feet, along the firmament 
 
 She steals, with gentle face, demeanour bland ; 
 
 The rosy clouds, a slow and servile hand, 
 
 Attend her steps and mark her swift ascent ; 
 
 She on her head sustains her well poised urn 
 
 Of sweetest odours, mixed with limpid dew, 
 
 Wherewith she sprinkles earth, lest Phoebus burn 
 
 Her fair complexion ; greeting her anew, 
 
 Earth, pensive bride, no more condemned to mourn, 
 
 Impatient waits the bridal interview. 
 
 ligllt. 
 
 |A.IL ! holy, venerable night, 
 From purple domes. 
 The spirit homes. 
 With starry cressets ever dight ; 
 Where fold their mystic wings the seraph throng, 
 Or strike from golden harps th'undying song. 
 Or pace with solemn feet the sapphire pave along : 
 Mother, compassionate, let fall 
 O'er nature's woes, 
 Sore prest by foes. 
 Thy quiet sorrow-healing pall : 
 
NIGHT. IID 
 
 Within its amply spreading folds 
 
 The Merciful, 
 
 In kindly rule, 
 His myriad weary creatures holds ; 
 And from their deathless home, with wond*ring eyes, 
 Lo ! each immortal cheruh stoops and tries 
 Vainly to pierce his Master's mysteries. 
 
 Truce of the Lord ! in silent prayer 
 
 Babes on the breast. 
 
 Fledglings in nest, 
 Helpless requite Thy gracious care. 
 Since mortal ages first began. 
 
 Dew of thy birth 
 
 God sheds on earth, 
 Refreshing her for beasts and man; 
 He calls from thy mysterious womb, 
 
 Each sense to close 
 
 In deep repose ; 
 Two shadowy beings, lo ! they come — 
 Sleep and her dreaded sister, Death ; 
 
 Both viewless till 
 
 They work their will 
 On every thing endued with life and breath ; 
 Twixt life and time the weakening chain 
 
 Sleep toils to mend ; 
 
 Our better friend 
 Death snaps the feeble links in twain : 
 Sleep's slender fingers, soft and warm. 
 
 Each eyelid press 
 
 With light caress. 
 And twine her health restoring charm ; 
 
120 NIGHT. 
 
 Her task to weave the net again, 
 
 Whose meshes torn 
 
 And labour-worn, 
 Poor fretted nature scarce retain : 
 But death, with solemn presence chill, 
 
 Sets ever free 
 
 From agony ; 
 And hearts o'er-wrought with grief are still. 
 And well she knows her hand to lay- 
 On life's retreat ; 
 
 To stop the beat ; 
 Then on the dial hours no longer play. 
 She comes more cold than th' icy north ; 
 
 Limbs stiff reveal 
 
 Her freezing seal — 
 ** Spirit, return to Him who sent thee forth ! 
 " Return to Him who pent in clay 
 
 "Thy subtle breath, 
 
 ** To suffer death ; 
 **At my dread bidding summons thee away"- 
 And hark ! at last the golden harps are strung, 
 And wide the gates of Paradise are flung ; 
 Another seraph dwells those halls among ! 
 
 Say night, the angry frown art thou, 
 
 Wherewith to chide 
 
 Our foolish pride, 
 God wreathes about creation's brow ? 
 Nay, rather proof of love divine ; 
 
 The veil daylight 
 
 Withdrawn, our sight 
 
NIGHT. 121 
 
 Can gaze more boldly on the Maker's shrine: 
 Stoop then on earth and point on high. 
 
 Where shine enscrolPd 
 
 In living gold, 
 God's record on the sable sky. 
 Who swung thy stars in empty space ? 
 
 Dug from a mine 
 
 Where day-springs shine, 
 Or where the lightnings boast their ancient race ; 
 Whence comes athwart the skies the comet's train. 
 
 His fount the sun ? 
 
 Or whence hath run 
 Yon stream continuous — golden tressed rain?, 
 
 Thy lightnings, who, with swiftness shod, 
 
 They keep the gate 
 
 Of high estate, 
 The hiltless, sheathless swords of GoD ! 
 The unreal, to the real world 
 
 Must now give way ; 
 
 No more dull clay 
 Our soul overmasters — night unfurled ! 
 More lost, full oft, in sensual dream 
 
 At high noontide. 
 
 Than when our guide, 
 Night, flashes out our Maker's scheme. 
 Night ! rear thy cupola above. 
 
 That eager eyes 
 
 Amid thy skies 
 May read the silent witnesses of love. 
 
122 .NiiiflT. 
 
 Hail ! thou majestic nurse of thought ; 
 From earliest time, 
 In every clime, 
 What matchless lessons hast thou taught : 
 E'en as I muse upon thy page. 
 Up start a host 
 Of marvels lost, 
 Forgotten history of remotest age, 
 And olden names and olden days 
 Arise, draw near ; 
 Time flies in fear. 
 Dissolved his drowsy mists amid the blaze : 
 Now fain would I, aweary with dull time. 
 Defraud stern care. 
 And wand'ring there ; 
 Converse familiar with night's distant clime — 
 What wondrous thoughts thy depths disclose ; 
 Star after star 
 Kindling afar. 
 Points where another system glows. 
 Succession cheers the drooping sight, 
 Else could the soul 
 Ne'er grasp the whole. 
 Infinity displayed at night ! 
 The barren sands beside the sea. 
 Time's feeble trace 
 On endless space. 
 Our narrow limit from eternity ; 
 O'er these, night's boundless waves shall sweep, 
 Destroy each line 
 Of frail design, 
 
NIGHT. 123 
 
 And only what is deathless safely keep. 
 Then, what the heathen fabled shall be true, — 
 
 When caught from earth, 
 
 Each gem of worth 
 Sparkles 'eternal in the empyrean blue. 
 Once mortal eyes, immortal grown, 
 
 Look forth more bright 
 
 From realms of night, 
 With kindly pity, on our own ; 
 And still, while mortal ages last, 
 
 Thy glorious reign 
 
 Unites again 
 Present existence with existence past ; 
 Brings forth a truth more forcibly ; 
 
 The scattered dust 
 
 Of ages must 
 Combine to form the realm shall be ; 
 That empire, where shall meet again, 
 
 Hearts which shall throb, 
 
 Lips which shall sob, 
 Ah ! never, never more with earthly pain. 
 Then shall we know as we are known. 
 
 Nor words conceal 
 
 The truths we feel, 
 Thought, self-expressive language grown. 
 Where souls, no longer clothed with shame, 
 
 Shall steady shine 
 
 In light divine 
 Reflection of a brighter, holier name! 
 Gold oaly left ; of all earth's store, 
 
124 NIGHT. 
 
 Each vain alloy, 
 Each transient joy- 
 Like dross rejected from refined ore. 
 
 How oft, at saddest close of day, 
 
 From mournful thought 
 
 Of sorrows, bought 
 By his own act, our grandsire turned away. 
 He *joyed to mark how faded out from earth 
 
 Another hour. 
 
 Whose fatal power 
 Delayed him from the Eden of his birth. 
 Beside Euphrates' ancient stream 
 
 The Patriarch stood, 
 
 And in the flood 
 Beheld a promise brighter than a dream : 
 From Padanaram's land went forth 
 
 At God's command, 
 
 To seek a land, 
 A home was never yet on earth, 
 A kingdom where should multiply, 
 
 More countless spread 
 
 Than stars o'erhead. 
 The seed of glorious destiny. 
 
 Four hundred years in Egypt flown ; 
 That seed, distrest 
 And toil-opprest, , 
 
 From bondsmen to a nation grown ; 
 
NIGHT. 
 
 Then didst thou hear the sharpest cry 
 That ever sprang 
 From lips, and rang 
 Througli every house of tyranny. 
 Then didst thou see how tyrants quake 
 How scornful trust 
 Crouches in dust, 
 When vengeance bids her terrors wake 
 The slaughtering Angel, passing o'er 
 Where portals stood 
 Crimson'd in blood. 
 To smite the uuensanguined door : 
 The midnight march : the cloud of flame ; 
 The baffled tide. 
 On either side 
 Upreared, where trembling Israel came; 
 The pillar darting angry rays, 
 Which fiercely dance 
 On helm and lance, 
 And fright the war horse with their ruddy blaze ; 
 The crested waves' suspended flow, 
 Waiting their prey 
 In fierce array. 
 In thunder charging on their foe. 
 Like mountain avalanche of snow : 
 Such scenes again to look upon, 
 Shall scarce be giv'n 
 Beneath thy heav*n. 
 Till thou and Time alike arc done. 
 
 125 
 
126 NIGHT. 
 
 It is the hour ! Emmanuel's birth ; 
 In haste star-led 
 To the manger bed. 
 The magi bring the choicest gifts of earth: 
 The Virgin Mother, joyful in surprise, 
 Bent o'er her Son, 
 Her only one, 
 Mused of her Saviour in his meek disguise. 
 How sweet the tidings angels sing, 
 While Shepherds keep 
 Their watch o'er sheep ; 
 Heav'n hymns the loving kindness of her King- 
 Earth heard, tho' dull with sin and death, 
 The message giv'n, 
 Her peace with Heav'n, 
 And hushed awhile in awe her lab'ring breath. 
 Few years — and hark, what agony ! 
 The ground is wet 
 With gouts of bloody sweat; 
 With sobs resounds Gethsemane. 
 Now on the day night seized again, 
 For briefest hour, 
 Her ancient pow'r. 
 While shuddering nature feels her Master's pain. 
 Three hours of darkness ! curses roll 
 The heavy load, 
 The wrath of God, 
 Off guilty man, upon Messiah's soul : 
 Then drew the universe a thrilling breath, 
 Nor dared the sun — 
 His course half run, 
 
NIGHT. 
 
 Behold his great Creator stoop to death : 
 
 From Heaven there fell a gentle sigh— 
 From hell burst out 
 The uncertain shout 
 Of those who triumph, yet who doubt 
 
 Their victory: 
 *Tis finished! — taken from the tree; 
 Deep in the gloom, 
 The virgin tomb 
 Receives death's pledge of mastery. 
 Why startedst thou, oh Sin ? what ailed thee Death ? 
 Earth quaked in awe, 
 Night veiled nor saw 
 How burst the double bars that Form beneath. 
 But yet once more at midnight dread 
 A sudden cry 
 Shall rend the sky ; 
 The trumpet's loud alarm shall wake the dead : 
 Earth like a furnace, grim and grey. 
 Whose fires are spent, 
 In ashes blent, 
 Shall sink, in hazy vapours melt away, 
 Till then the heavens reserved, grow old ; 
 The earth with plain 
 And watery main. 
 The sun with shield of living gold^ 
 With all his planet-orbs, in search of rest; 
 With mystic song, 
 Still dance along 
 In grand procession, wheeling to the west ; 
 
 127 
 
128 PAEAPHRASES. 
 
 Day beckons day, night summons night again : 
 
 In silent march, 
 
 Across the sapphire arch 
 The pageant passes on with lengthening train; 
 All looking forward, every figure bent, 
 
 With eager eyes. 
 
 Watching the skies : 
 Till He arise to cleave the firmament. — • 
 The Bridegroom comes, as breaks the eternal day — 
 
 In joy, or else in fear. 
 
 The quick and dead appear, 
 And Heaven, and Earth, and Night for ever flee away. 
 
 ISAIAH vi. ZECH. xiv, 5. 
 
 I^^WAS in the year the royal leper died, 
 ^ffi^^ Smitten by God amid his impious pride; 
 XJzziah — he whose power by heaven increast 
 Pared to usurp the censer of her priest : 
 Long weary years he bore his righteous doom, 
 Denied in life the throne, in death the royal tomb. 
 
PARAPHRASES. 129 
 
 'Twas in the year the earthquake's dreadful shock 
 Mount Zion rent, and e'en the temple rock ; 
 Where trembling Judah, from dumb idols driven, 
 Came to implore the help of wrathful Heaven. 
 The city poured her suppliant litany 
 Within the outer courts, on bended knee ; 
 There, too, I prayed, before the inner shrine. 
 And mourned the sins that moved the blow divine — 
 Behold ! a sudden blaze of light shone through 
 The sacred veil, and gave the ark to view : 
 The Lord, I saw, with all His holy train, 
 Uplifted on His throne, within the fane ; 
 About him thronged the glorious seraphim. 
 Whose three-fold pinions mantled every limb, 
 With twain each hid his face, with twain his feet. 
 With twain each hovered o'er the mercy seat ; 
 One to another cried, and as they sang. 
 With dread response the whole assembly rang, 
 /* 0, holy, holy, holy, Lord of Hosts, Thee, both 
 " The heavens and earth adore, the God of Sabbaoth." 
 
 V 
 
 Another voice I heard, and as it spoke 
 
 The door posts reeled, the House was tilled with smoke 
 
 The Hallowed shrine, by footsteps seldom trod, 
 
 Quaked at the presence of the living God ; 
 
 No mortal ears may hear that searching tone, 
 
 No mortal eyes that form may look upon. 
 
 I heard and saw, and at the awful sound 
 
 Deprived of senses, fell upon the ground ; 
 
130 PARAPHRASES. 
 
 Till raised at length before ray aching sight, 
 
 My hands I clasped to hide the dazzling light ; 
 
 Then cried I, " woe is me, for I, unclean, 
 
 " Jehovah's voice have heard, my God have seen ; 
 
 " I, doomed amidst a guilty race to dwell, 
 
 "A people sullied with the deeds of hell.** 
 
 Then flew a seraph, bearing in his hand, 
 
 Caught from the altar fire, a flaming brand, 
 
 "While on my lips a burning coal he laid ; 
 
 ** Lo ! this has purged thy sin, be not afraid ; 
 
 ** Arise/* he said, and at the touch made whole, 
 
 Within my trembling frame revived my soul; 
 
 Like waters rushing down a rocky steep, 
 
 That thrilling voice poured forth its accents deep. 
 
 And shaped to human tongue this speech I heard, 
 
 " Who will go for us ? who will bear our Word." 
 
 Then said I " Here am I, oh Lord, let me 
 
 ** To Thine own chosen race Thy prophet be," 
 
 " Go, tell this people hearing ye shall hear, 
 
 *' Yet heedless, mock each warning of the seer, 
 
 ** And seeing, ye shall see, but coldly turn 
 
 ** From truths which cause the prophet's soul to burn ; 
 
 " Waxed gross each heart with slavish joy, shall be 
 
 ** Lightly regardless of its destiny. 
 
 " Eyes, ears, and hearts oppressed with sin*s dark load, 
 
 ** False to themselves, their country, and their God." 
 
 Then said I " Lord, how long ? " " Until " He said, 
 
 " Forsaken Zion sees her noblest dead, 
 
 " Her houses, without men, all desolate, 
 
 ** The discrowned land shall mourn her captive fate, 
 
PARAPHRASES. 131 
 
 ** The Lord remove her chosen ones afar, 
 *' Devour her substance with the fire and war : 
 ** Yet, shall a tenth be found, a remnant come— 
 " Wise by experience, to their long lost home, 
 ** There, as an oak or teil, whose life remains, 
 " The* bare of leaves, within its secret veins 
 " A root shall flourish from the stony ground, 
 "Yield its rich fruits to all the nations round — 
 " The tree of life, with healing branches, spread 
 " To save the helpless, and restore the dead,'* 
 
 ^saiflji Ixill 
 
 HO Cometh from Edora from Bozrah*s red land, 
 Dyed with purple his garments, all ruddy his hand. 
 Blood crimson his robe, as the sun in his gloom, 
 Darkly over the desert when rolls the simoom ? 
 Lo ! he travels in strength, in the pride of his might, 
 Like one who has scattered an army in flight ! 
 
 2. 
 
 ** This is I, who am righteous and mighty to save, 
 •* I, the Lord of the living, the King of the Grave." 
 
132 PARAPHRASES. 
 
 Wherefore crimson thy robe and thy vesture divine, 
 Like one who has trodden the rich gushing wine ? 
 
 4. . 
 
 ** I have trodden the wine-fat; yea press'd it alone, 
 ** There was none to withstand me — to aid me, not one, 
 " And I trampled in fury, in wrath where I stood, 
 ** Yea, I trod till my vesture was sprinkled with blood, 
 " Till" my close girded raiment was purpled all o'er, 
 ** And the folds of my garment were dripping in gore. 
 " 'Tis the day of my vengeance ! the terrible year , 
 ** Long sought for by all my redeemed, is here ; 
 ** Long my vengeance has tarried, at last it has come — 
 " Now baste ye, my people ; my chosen, haste home." 
 
 (B}tM I 
 
 HE noise of a whirlwind rushed out of the north, 
 Enwreathed in cloud, ruddy circles rolled forth ; 
 From the midst of the fury there suddenly came, 
 Of the colour of amber four creatures of flame. 
 They seemed multiform, and their feet as they pass. 
 Shone with the sparkles of hot burnished brass ; 
 And each, tho' he seemed to be but one — still 
 Kept changing his features at change of his will ; 
 
PARAPHRASE. 133 
 
 Now a man in his wisdom, now a lion in might. 
 
 Now an ox in his stubbornness, eagle in flight ; 
 
 And wheels were beneath them self poised in their force 
 
 Impelled by his pleasure who ordered their course, 
 
 Whithersoever — like lightning they ran, 
 
 Thither they stopped as their course they begaif ; 
 
 Whithersoever the Spirit would go, 
 
 Thither the wheels stood beneath them, below ; 
 
 And they were of heavenly images plann'd, 
 
 To show how His Providence governs each land — 
 
 Above them, a firmament sapphire reveals 
 
 The creatures of flame and the bright beryl wheels ; 
 
 On their wings as they rose, was the shout of a host. 
 
 All their wings as they stood together were crost, 
 
 And the speech of their swiftness in silence was lost. 
 
 Over these an ineffable glory was shown — 
 
 There a Shape like a man sat at rest on his throne ; 
 
 About him surged up, as a wave of the main, 
 
 Concealing His form, flames of amber again. 
 
 Till they bathed all about Him in one sheet of glow. 
 
 Bright opal, as glitters on rain-clouds the bow : 
 
 And this was the likeness — I knew Him — the Lord : 
 
 Prostrated, I fell, and His presence adored. 
 
 ^ 
 
 [^ 
 
134 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 btig nf tjje B3ink. 
 
 IDSUMMER noon, beneath whose sultry power, 
 O'er-weighted, hangs each drowsy-lidded flower- 
 Rich dyed corollas, cleft in petals full. 
 Soft as floss silk or newly carded wool. 
 Half veil their filaments, whose anthers* dust 
 Is yellow, argent, sable, iron-rust : 
 With nect'ries, which the honey-sucking bee * 
 Embraces in a murmurous ecstacy. 
 As deep he sinks within some lily bell, 
 Oblivious of the labours of his cell : 
 When drooping axils gentle languor lend 
 To all the sleepy leaves which downward bend, 
 And all things flag amid the sluggish air, 
 Which steeps existence in sensations rare ; 
 While melting sunbeams gild the purple shade. 
 Filmy with lustrous vapour is each glade. 
 From earth's broad bosom, heated with the glare, 
 Thin bluish shafts irradiate the air. 
 With quiv'ring motion shake before my sight, 
 Like dying saint's faint auricle of light, 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 135 
 
 Whose spirit answers thus the call it hears 
 
 From the bright homes beyond the rolling spheres. 
 
 Beneath an aged cedar's umbrage dim, 
 
 O'er-canopied by many a mighty limb, 
 
 Reclining on the velvet sward I lay 
 
 Intoxicated with voluptuous day ; 
 
 On the soft green my lazy members fall — 
 
 In polished cup as rests the ivory ball — 
 
 For many a tender blade and mossy stem, 
 
 With myriad slender arms supported them ; 
 
 And on the lashes of each half closed eye, 
 
 In tiny rainbows broken sunbeams lie, 
 
 As when long pencils from a candle stream, 
 
 And daze the soul to yield to sudden dream ; 
 
 E*en so bewildered with the swimming haze, 
 
 As tho* on other limbs I seemed to gaze. 
 
 For that my own were strangers to my sense, 
 
 And mocked with languid scorn its impotence ; 
 
 And fancy with her witch'ry sweet yet strong, 
 
 Swathed my whole being with a viewless thong. 
 
 That captivated, motionless, and still, 
 
 Nothing prevailed the feeble shock of will, 
 
 Th' electric force which from the knotted nerves 
 
 Descends vibrating down in wavy curves — 
 
 The mind — herself enthralled with misty dreams, 
 
 Floating around her, soft as April gleams — 
 
 Light which part dew and partly sunshine seems, — 
 
 Unyoked the gear by which she holds each chord 
 
 Of living fibrils under watch and ward — 
 
136 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 Turned inwardly her lamp and strove, the gloom, 
 
 The depths to pierce, of memory's pregnant womb, 
 
 Where convolutions intricate retain 
 
 Whate'er at times impressed the teeming brain, 
 
 Where raem'ry loves to store each cell, and pile 
 
 With merchandise of fancies volatile ; 
 
 We know not oft our treasures till a ray 
 
 Strikes the weird tablet — brings past scenes to day, 
 
 Viewed by the spirit in forgotten time, 
 
 In some far distant yet still longed for clime — 
 
 Then, in a fit of grief, in some still hour, 
 
 Unlocked our* wonder-frames, comes forfh a power. 
 
 While all the body slumbers — more than mind, 
 
 Erst in the chambers of the soul confined — - 
 
 Feels for the truth, and with a subtle hand 
 
 Grasps at ideas she cannot quite command ; 
 
 Yet now she seems to play with marvellous ease, 
 
 Upstart ten thousand vivid images — 
 
 Most beautiful yet vague, as billows-flow, 
 
 A moment seen 'neath summer-lightnings' glow — 
 
 While disconnected thus from grosser ties. 
 
 On her light essence small encumbrance lies ; 
 
 She sees the brain unbidden sights disclose — 
 
 Unfettered thought like lightning comes and goes ; 
 
 But should she stop to measure why or where. 
 
 Or seek to gauge the operation there. 
 
 How soon each vision blurred and shapeless grew. 
 
 As when a rainbow vanishes from view. 
 
 That many coloured ring by which God plights 
 
 His troth to man, and earth with Heav'n unites. 
 
SONG? OF THE WINDS. 137 
 
 Thus soon our clouds on ev'ry side are spread, 
 
 Dull and unchanging, sullen hued as lead, 
 
 Our inner selves an atmosphere too dark 
 
 To fathom by the mind's Promethean spark, 
 
 As one who standing by a door at night. 
 
 Hold's o'er himself a feeble taper's light. 
 
 And fain would pierce the darkness and descry 
 
 Surrounding objects with a painful eye. 
 
 So gaze we, wond'ring how it is we be — 
 
 That ever present, baffling mystery — 
 
 Yet dare with narrow minds and dubious sense, 
 
 Make question of that vast Intelligence, 
 
 To whom alone is manifest each plan. 
 
 From space unlimited to foolish man ; 
 
 Before whose forehead grave, and patient eyes. 
 
 The universe in all its working lies, 
 
 Who hastens not His time for all our rage. 
 
 But turns, with steady hand, the coming page ; 
 
 Who, with His present handy-work content, 
 
 Waits ever till His ordered days are spent : 
 
 Till then the tields must redden with our blood, 
 
 And Fortune mingle evil deeds with good ; 
 
 The earthquake, tempest, and the poison-breath 
 
 Of deadly pestilence destroy beneath ; 
 
 Dark uaturc's crushing wheels roll on and on, 
 
 Tho' foul with clotted gore, till all be done — 
 
 Yet shall the world stand still, at length, and see 
 
 The God revealed, who rules necessity ; 
 
 When good with seeming ill shall cease her strife, 
 
 And God re-clothe Death's jibing skull with life. 
 
13S SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 While pond'ring thus, my thoughts within me turned, 
 
 For song or voice of sympathy I yearned, 
 
 But all the spring-tide songsters long had ceased 
 
 Their spousal hymns, from greatest to the least, 
 
 From Philomel, who floods with song the glade, 
 
 To nettle creeper, piping in the shade ; 
 
 E'en the hold throstle to his speckled breast 
 
 No longer called the partner of his nest, 
 
 Tho' he was searching in the early dawn, 
 
 With beak inquisitive, the dewy lawn. 
 
 With flight as steady as the pendulum. 
 
 The dusky swallows gliding past were dumb, 
 
 So light and so monotonous their wing. 
 
 As iho' they hung suspended by a string ; 
 
 Only the sparrows prated on the houses, 
 
 Of musty chaff", to weatherbeaten spouses. 
 
 ** 'Tis ever thus with passion's tuneful mood, 
 
 ** The spring soon spent its summer harsh and rude." 
 
 While thus I plained — from some secluded dell 
 
 There came a gently rising, mournful swell. 
 
 As if some love-lorn, meditative sigh. 
 
 Fell from the lips of nymph, close lurking nigh, 
 
 ** Are there no strains but what thy mortal ear 
 
 *' So gross and palpable, alone can hear ? 
 
 ** Is it not, rather, want of dainty sense 
 
 " In thee, and not sweet nature's impotence ? 
 
 *' But hearken!*' — Then it came to pass. 
 
 O'er ev'ry leaf and nodding blade of grass, 
 
 And o'er the broad green lances of the corn, 
 
 Scarce yet in flower, a sough of air was borne — 
 
SOXG 01?' THE WINDS. I39 
 
 It smote the foremost rank with gentle blow, 
 Then swept across the field, with murmurs soft and low ; 
 I saw the verdant tide responsive rise and fall, 
 As whirled the breezes past, like dancers in a hall — 
 Then forth there burst such matchless harmony. 
 So delicately touched, it passed me by. 
 That half I started up, for sure, methought, 
 Some cunning hand a gay deceit hath wrought — 
 It floated onward, where, in solitude. 
 Echo was musing in her dark pine wood. 
 And twice she answered from her citadel. 
 As on her airy round the sound-waves fell. 
 The wind, the wind ! the minstrel flings 
 On every side his wanton wings. 
 And as he worked the strings invisible, 
 ** Thrice welcome " shouted ev*ry leafy dell. 
 Wakened to rapture by his amorous clutch ; 
 No mortal Angers ever mastered such ; 
 From artful instrument no hand could bring 
 Music to equal that wild sweeping wing ; 
 Gradations mixed with interval, 
 Mysterious, yet most musical, 
 According to their shape and hue. 
 From branch and flowery spray it drew, 
 And ev'ry leaflet was a tongue, 
 Which quivering with emotion hung, 
 Words in an unknown language sung, 
 Tune not yet certain, but with meaning fraught, 
 So searchingly within my soul it wrought, 
 That from ihe brimming margcnts of mine eyne 
 Unbidden lushed the drops of limpid brine ; 
 
140 SONG OF THE WINDS.. 
 
 'Twas like a wayward infant's sob 
 
 On mother's breasts, who stints its cry, 
 
 'Twas like the expiring throb 
 
 Of falling melody, 
 
 That gushes forth from music, quite 
 
 Beyond expression of delight. 
 
 When she can sing no more, but heaves a sigh. 
 
 Or such a marvellous tone 
 
 As when earth's shadow — night. 
 
 Upon some tuneful star descends with sleety flight, 
 
 Diminished to a point the mournful cone, 
 
 Draws from the sister world a moan — 
 
 Thus, sorrow-laden, tender, and most sad. 
 
 The echo of that sigh eclipsing what was glad. 
 
 As when on holy being jars an evil thought. 
 
 Not by itself, but by some demon, wrought. 
 
 Now shook each petal, as it would rejoice, 
 
 With gentle shiver and with broken voice ; 
 
 A maiden answers thus her lover's call. 
 
 When he hath caught the long awaited fall 
 
 Of doubtful footsteps — So on me this fell. 
 
 As that to lover sound most tuneable ; 
 
 And next commingled, as the lab'ring sighs 
 
 Which from two loving hearts together rise, 
 
 When in each other's arms, supremely blest, 
 
 The lovers' happiness is scarce exprest, 
 
 But each half-whispered phrase of love seems clear. 
 
 And eloquently strikes on either ear ; 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 141 
 
 Or as with caution and with self-restraint, 
 
 One first records an immature complaint, 
 
 But voices roundly out his discontent, 
 
 Soon as he finds the public ear attent ; 
 
 So gave the wind, as yet, no certain sound, 
 
 But ranged from treble sharp to bass profound, 
 
 As when an aged speaker, shrills in speech, 
 
 Aiming at full mouthed words beyond his reach. 
 
 But no one scoffs, for that they love the man. 
 
 And blemishes of time would lightly scan, 
 
 All, all more gratefully that tongue is prized, 
 
 Which for the public weal grew paralyzed. 
 
 And yet more thrilling to the public ear. 
 
 That struggling utt'rance which they long to hear ; 
 
 Warmed by their kindly looks, as the' by wine, 
 
 Once more returns the rhetoric divine. 
 
 As leaps from sparkling eye and fiery soul. 
 
 Electrifying speech in one grand whole — 
 
 Th' enraptured audience, while they listen, say, 
 
 '* Thus have we heard him in his earlier day." 
 
 E'en as my ears the secret clue had found, 
 Which ravels out sweet labyrinths of sound, 
 So, on the half-drawn curtains of my eyes 
 A joyous company of visions rise. 
 Bright as the golden motes which play, 
 Buoyed on the cradle of a single ray, 
 Rpjoicing in the splendour which gives birth 
 And beauty too to things of slender wortli ; 
 
 T 
 
142 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 Methought a host of shadowy forms were driven, 
 Soft as the snow-flakes floating down from heav'n, 
 Or as through vistas of the greenwood dim, 
 At careless touch the zigzag night moths skim. 
 Or as a troop of flies with gauzy wings 
 Before the large-eyed cattle lightly springs, 
 Disturbed by their loud breathing, as they blow 
 From dewy grass the moisture, browsing slow ; 
 So these on ev'ry side their wanton gambols played, 
 Some crept within the woodbine's tangled shade, 
 And when they left it, still it seemed to play. 
 As when a wild bird leaps from limber spray, 
 One, as a maiden dreaming of her lover, 
 Brushed her white sleepy hand a rose-bush over, 
 Straightway a tinkling shower of petals fell. 
 Round-lipped and hollow as an Eastern shell- 
 Sweet was the music of their dying chime, 
 As some pagoda's bells in far off clime. 
 What time the grateful spirits of the dead 
 Haste to partake the oflfrings for them spread — 
 And then, alarmed at mischief she had done. 
 Like giddy may-fly, sporting in the sun, 
 She towered aloft : and then another stole 
 Along the ground, and past each giant bole, 
 Till rushing on a linden bower 
 She fell, with plaish of pearly shower : 
 The leafy verdure, from repose 
 Bestirred — its under-surface shows. 
 Then settles down like plumes of swan. 
 When from his nest the foe has gone ; 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 143 
 
 Thus oft a ruffling zephyr shakes 
 
 The bosom of secluded lakes, 
 
 The timid wavelets backward shrink, 
 
 Soon as they reach the bank's low brink. 
 
 Thus oft a bather, in his play 
 
 Casts himself forward in the spray — 
 
 In sparkling foam return again 
 
 The scattered waters, light as rain. 
 
 Others who breathed thro' needles thin. 
 
 Of pines, drew tones of violin 
 
 When rapid flutters ev'ry bow 
 
 With the clear, hov'ring tremolo, 
 
 Like hawkmoths, which, of dainty things, 
 
 Sip as they hang on quiv*ring wings ; 
 
 Darting from flow*r to flow*r they poise, 
 
 With still increasing, murmuring noise — 
 
 And then there came a frolic band. 
 
 With glancing feet — yoked hand in hand, 
 
 Whirling along, these, as they past. 
 
 The lily kissed — she stood aghast — 
 
 And o'er the gay parterre they strayed, 
 
 And many a gladsome measure made, 
 
 The honeysuckle's bugles blew — with clang 
 
 Lobelia cardinalis rang ; 
 
 The blue campanula pealed faint. 
 
 Like that sweet bell, surnamed * the saint ' — 
 
 And stranger yet, the scents they bore away 
 
 Seemed snatches of some rich-toDed lay, 
 
 Which modulates from key to key, 
 
 When music struggles to get free. 
 
144 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 And rends her fetters one by one, 
 
 Until her task is fully done ; 
 
 Then mem'ry comes as in a trance, 
 
 With each sweet change and dissonance, 
 
 With half-formed purposes, which turn 
 
 From grave to gay, or fiercely burn. 
 
 Or, with the tender languor of a song, 
 
 A dead friend's strain ; for whose dear face we long 
 
 For music grants to love intense, 
 
 To blend with fancy things of sense. 
 
 So we recall the look again. 
 
 And gait of her who sang that strain ; 
 
 Those eyes which used on ours to rest. 
 
 To guage the thoughts within our breast. 
 
 That dying glance, solicitous, 
 
 Not for itself but all for us ; 
 
 So trustful, gentle, and so meek. 
 
 When the sweet tongue no more could speak. 
 
 Yet told its love till it lay hid, 
 
 Sheathed by the petals of its lid. 
 
 The only touch it had of sorrow, 
 
 Was that it grieved for our to-morrow. 
 
 Such kind solicitude — ah me ! 
 Such looks how seldom may we see, 
 When mirrored in the trustful eyes 
 The spirit dwells without disguise. 
 Nor fails a moment in its watch 
 The assuring look of love to catch. 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 145 
 
 When kindling witli the inward ray, 
 
 The soul through darkness flashes day, 
 
 Nor falters tho' a passing cloud 
 
 The faithful witness seems to shroud, 
 
 But as the wave gives back its sky, 
 
 So, proof to proof, beams eye to eye. 
 
 Who longs not, in a world of scorn. 
 
 From cold neglect or hate to turn 
 
 With his heart's wealth, to purchase him 
 
 That light which death alone can dim ? 
 
 And ah ! how sad to view a scene 
 
 Where those we've lost with us have been. 
 
 To hope, where'er the pathways bend, 
 
 To meet once more such absent friend. 
 
 Yea, soft, and sad, and sweet as these, 
 
 Were those melodious images — 
 
 Then ceased the sprites to wander there, 
 
 And sought in haste the middle air, 
 
 And with a wilder rapture went 
 
 To strike some nobler instrument; 
 
 The broad-leafd chestnuts surged and fell 
 
 With heavy beat like knelling bell, 
 
 It seemed a glorious bass, so full 
 
 Of melancholy, yet not dull — 
 
 They harped a swift arpeggio 
 
 From silver poplars in a row, 
 
 The aspens, tittering at the fun, 
 
 Responded with staccato run — 
 
 They swam above the poet's tomb, 
 
 Overshadowed with a pleasant gloom, 
 
146 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 And weeping willows, lately mute, 
 
 Resounded faint like dying lute ; 
 
 They on the hornbeam's ribb'd leaves beat 
 
 With tuneful clash, like timbrels sweet; 
 
 Then at the birch, fair lady of the wood. 
 
 Where with dishevelled locks she stood, 
 
 They clutched — there came a rippling thrill, 
 
 As when a harper flourishes with skill. 
 
 Each shadow quaint of dancing leaves 
 
 With darkling neighbour interweaves — 
 
 And aye they moved about and crossed. 
 
 As in the wind the branches tossed — 
 
 When fell a beam amongst the crew, 
 
 Where they were thickest pierced them through. 
 
 With sweeping robes in haste they ran 
 
 To chase the straggler from their clan, 
 
 Lest he should creep within and spy 
 
 The airy jugglers* mystery ; 
 
 But still the witches strive in vain 
 
 To stifle it, 'tis idle pain! 
 
 It flickers gaily here and there, 
 
 Maugre the shadows' eager care ; 
 
 Th« child of light which they overlay. 
 
 Will not for that their charms obey — 
 
 Beneath an oak a formal set 
 
 Were practising a minuet, 
 
 With court'sies low but something stiff, 
 
 Like maiden lady in a tiff — 
 
 A coarser set played blind-man's buff. 
 
 And thumped and fought with many a cuff, 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 But as a childless widow in her grief 
 Rocks, half unconscious of relief, 
 The natural cradle of her hreast, 
 Which yearns for lips which soothed it best, 
 A lonely cypress, waving to and fro, 
 Moved me to tears with its incessant woe, 
 The while, with mournful lullabies. 
 The winds repeat her dead child's cries. 
 
 And this was but the symphony, 
 The prelude of what was to be, 
 A moment's pause, as oft before a shower, 
 Then came a rush of wondrous power. 
 As when the leader of a mighty band, 
 Raises on high his sound controlling wand. 
 And summons all his potentates to tell 
 Some lofty passion, with consenting swell, 
 And thus display with their consummate art, 
 A glorious unison of ev'ry part. 
 The trees of God, the waves, the grassy field, 
 And flow'ry banks, united service yield. 
 Till all the huge half round of trembling air 
 Was filled with jubilant responses there — 
 Not in confusion, but with such a tone 
 As rings along a roof of vaulted stone, 
 When the great organ hurls its tempest out, 
 And thrills the crowd of worshippers devout — 
 So now, the branches surging in the voi«l, 
 As on vast billowy rollers they were buoyed — 
 Drowned not the shrill acclaim of joy 
 
 147 
 
148 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 Which mounted up and scaled the highest sky ; 
 
 It seemed a simple hymn, 
 
 Which, evening growing dim, 
 
 They sang with shouts of praise 
 
 Beyond what mortals raise, 
 
 When in some building tall 
 
 They worship Him who orders all : 
 
 But ah ! how feeble that, to this, which came 
 
 As on the pinions of a roaring flame, 
 
 And was the natural song, 
 
 The voice of that glad throng, 
 
 When God, Himself bids each created thing 
 
 Burst into living song, and praise its King. 
 
 And now, my ears so quick were grown, 
 It seemed a language not unknown. 
 It spake ten thousand glorious things, 
 Not incoherent murmurings ; 
 As heretofore, but I could reach. 
 And grasp the spirit of their speech ; 
 For so it seemed, that sundered was the tie 
 Which once restrained me from that company. 
 They sang of life, of death, of strange decay. 
 And change, how all things pass away ; 
 Yet sang most thankfully, and not in fear. 
 But full of joy for life while living here. 
 Nor sorrowful, nor sad, but bold and free — 
 A people's chant of liberty, 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 149 
 
 And ev'ry living thing breathed forth 
 
 The song of its degree with rapturous mirth, 
 
 Rejoicing in their use, their form, their state, 
 
 Their Maker's joy His works participate — 
 
 Into existence at His fiat wrought, 
 
 They knew themselves the likeness of His Thought : 
 
 The shout was one exultant song, 
 
 Through the empyrean home along. 
 
 The glory of creation, where we find 
 
 Unveiled the working of a single Mind — 
 
 Can touch, can handle, yea, can listen, still, 
 
 To the dread converse of mysterious Will, 
 
 Which ever thinks, and as it thinks aloud. 
 
 Its thoughts are beings, life and sense endowed. 
 
 Veiling the day's impassioned eye, 
 
 Thin clouds enwreath the sultry sky — 
 
 Would you inquire whence these had birth? — 
 
 These were the ardent sighs of earth, 
 
 Which to us mortals viewless were. 
 
 Until condensed in upper air; 
 
 From their new home, while gliding past, 
 
 On earth's worn face soft looks they cast; 
 
 The shadows of their footsteps fall 
 
 On ancient haunts, but silent all — 
 
 Then her sad heart a respite brief 
 
 Takes from the image of its grief, 
 
 So mothers joy when infants place 
 
 Their dewy fingers on their face ; 
 
150 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 How many years that pressure lingers, 
 Tho' death has chilled the dainty fingers ! 
 Oft seems to them that spirits meek 
 Press with fond touch their faded cheek — 
 They start, and o'er their barren years 
 Shed the rich memory of their tears. 
 
 The fleeting vapours, as they flew, 
 To shapes yet more substantial grew, 
 Gloomy and threatening to the sight, 
 An army gath'ring for the fight, 
 With waving streamers, beating drums. 
 On its own wings the tempest comes ; 
 The dazzling lightning rends the skies. 
 Divulging their dark mysteries ; 
 Warm torrents of large moulded rain 
 Descend in sheets upon the plain. 
 Glad shouts and loud o'erraast'ring cries, 
 As from a conquering army rise. 
 The hot pursuit of those who've won 
 But battled sore till set of sun — 
 The sturdy foemen flee, downcast. 
 With panic terror struck at last : 
 With such an uproar rushed the wind, 
 Fear in the van, and death behind ; 
 The forest monarchs, who ne'er yield, 
 With all their shattered branches reeled ; 
 Each humble grass and whistling sedge 
 Bowed to the river's very edge, 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 151 
 
 Both leaves and boughs are swept along 
 In one wild intermingled throng, 
 With clouds of dust and angry flash 
 Where waters leap which hailstones thresh ; 
 Nor beauty then, nor strength availed 
 Those whom the angry storm assailed. 
 Which spared not, but as warriors smite 
 The shrieking rout amid their flight, 
 The winds and clouds together roll 
 With one fierce transport o*er the whole. 
 
 As when some vast retreating tide, 
 
 From whelmed shore draws back its pride, 
 
 And only wavelets here and there 
 
 Cross and recross a shallow bar ; 
 
 And bright the struggling pebbles shine, 
 
 Dragged seaward by the hissing brine ; 
 
 And on the half sunk rocks is set 
 
 A light and foamy coronet. 
 
 Thus sucked by whirlwinds, swiftly drew 
 
 The tempest on, and left clear blue. 
 
 The sky was pure as 'twas at noon 
 
 But for some streaks which melted soon. 
 
 By this 'twas sunset. Mellow light 
 Streamed from the lady of the night ; 
 With solemn face she moved, her mien 
 Shed calmness o'er the troubled scene : 
 
152 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 So shows a queen with royal grace, 
 To her own people her sad face, 
 What time her faithful soldiers go 
 To foreign lands to quell her foe. 
 Far distant o'er the aerial surge 
 There floated up a parting dirge, 
 And forms of many colours passed. 
 Far eastward on the sinking blast. 
 
 Now from the shelter where, while raged the storm, 
 Close I had couched, as hare upon her form. 
 Who only hides herself the closer when 
 Bough winds she fears, or steps of rougher men — 
 I rose, and musing with a strange content, 
 Sought the low threshold of my tenement ; 
 For nothing hopeless seemed, or without cause 
 Subjected to the sway of noxious laws, 
 But God, all o'er His creatures, small and great, 
 » Himself stands Guardian compassionate ; 
 A little way withdrawn. His mystic arms 
 Ward oiF awhile the host of greedy Harms, 
 Which aim their fierce assaults and eager strife, 
 Quite to devour the trembling limbs of life ; 
 Until the human soul, once weak and young, 
 For heav'n is disciplined by labours strong — 
 These bars removed. He lets their hellish lust 
 Rush in and mangle that which is but dust. 
 So mothers o'er their tott'ring infants stand. 
 Nor, till they fall, extend their loving hand, 
 
SONG OF THE WINDS. 153 
 
 Convinced that only exercise of will 
 
 Can teach their peevish charge to walk with skill. 
 
 His varied gifts, which, perishable here, 
 
 Consumptive in their usages appear ; 
 
 Yet in imperfect beauty as they grow, 
 
 Semblance of His innate perfection show, 
 
 The present world, whose phantom aspects bear, 
 
 E*en while they live, this epitaph, * wc were,' 
 
 Like painted mausoleums which deride 
 
 With treacherous smile, the rottenness they hide ; 
 
 Her changing phases, e'en in changing, tell 
 
 Th' existence of the One Immutable. 
 
 The very spots of canker which deface 
 
 The glorious picture, leave a lasting grace. 
 
 The unseen, yet well indicated glory. 
 
 Which, permeating, gilds things transitory ; 
 
 The cloud enveloping the inner shrine. 
 
 Trembles already with ^he light divine. 
 
 And draws the spirit out until it yearn 
 
 For Him, who shall to life corruption turn — 
 
 For lands where all things flourish in their use, 
 
 Where beauty is the essence, not th* abuse — 
 
 These thoughts, which to the busy worldling seem 
 
 Mere predilections for a pleasant dream — 
 
 Are they the shadows in a solid world, 
 
 By fancy's idle hand at will unfurled ? 
 
 Or glimpses of another being, cast 
 
 From yonder realms, where things that pass are past. 
 
 Not unperceivcd by man, who sighing stands 
 
 Upon the very confines of those lands ; 
 
154 
 
 SONG OF THE WINDS. 
 
 He sighs — not sorrowful, but to express 
 
 His longing for that phraseless happiness ; 
 
 His soul is drunk with sadness, mixed with this 
 
 Anticipation of an unknown bliss. 
 
 Tho' light as dew-drops hung on gossamer, 
 
 Yet with the burden we o'er-weighted are, 
 
 And reason falters, lest the vision fly — 
 
 Exhaled in vapours — to its parent sky, 
 
 Whence odours, music, hues angelic, come 
 
 As ministers, to warn us to our home ; 
 
 Till strains harmonious swell within each breast, 
 
 Caught from that land — where our forefathers rest. 
 
LENT. 155 
 
 tot. 
 
 ^M^ENTLY descend the large soft flakes of snow — 
 &ih^ These are perchance the penitential sighs, 
 Which, winged by human passions, upward go ; 
 But passing thro' the pure untainted skies, 
 Whate'er of sin is in them straightway dies — 
 With what a dazzling radiance they shine ! — 
 Returning, chastened by their high emprize, 
 They fructify the earth — to us a sign 
 That prayers, thro* Christ ascending, melt in grace divine. 
 
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