SELECTIONS FROM AMERICAN POETRY

By Various Authors

With Special Reference to Poe, Longfellow, Lowell and Whittier

Edited by Margaret Sprague Carhart

CONTENTS

SELECTIONS OF AMERICAN POETRY

INTRODUCTION

ANNE BRADSTREET

CONTEMPLATIONS

THE DAY OF DOOM

PHILIP FRENEAU

THE WILD HONEYSUCKLE

TO A HONEY BEE

THE INDIAN BURYING-GROUND

EUTAW SPRINGS

FRANCIS HOPKINSON

THE BATTLE OF THE KEGS

JOSEPH HOPKINSON

HAIL COLUMBIA

ANONYMOUS

THE BALLAD OF NATHAN HALE

A FABLE

TIMOTHY DWIGHT

LOVE TO THE CHURCH

SAMUEL WOODWORTH

THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

THANATOPSIS

THE YELLOW VIOLET

TO A WATERFOWL

GREEN RIVER

THE WEST WIND

"I BROKE THE SPELL THAT HELD ME LONG"

A FOREST HYMN

THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS

THE GLADNESS OF NATURE

TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN

SONG OF MARION'S MEN

THE CROWDED STREET

THE SNOW-SHOWER

ROBERT OF LINCOLN

THE POET

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

FRANCIS SCOTT KEY

THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER

JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE

THE AMERICAN FLAG

THE CULPRIT FAY (Selection)

FITZ-GREENE HALLECK

MARCO BOZZARIS

ON THE DEATH OF JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE

JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

HOME, SWEET HOME

EDGAR ALLAN POE

TO HELEN

ISRAFEL

LENORE

THE COLISEUM

THE HAUNTED PALACE

TO ONE IN PARADISE

EULALIE. —A SONG

THE RAVEN

TO HELEN

ANNABEL LEE

THE BELLS

ELDORADO

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

HYMN TO THE NIGHT

A PSALM OF LIFE

THE SKELETON IN ARMOR

THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS

THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH

IT IS NOT ALWAYS MAY

THE RAINY DAY

THE ARROW AND THE SONG

THE DAY IS DONE

WALTER VON DER VOGELWEIDE

THE BUILDERS

SANTA FILOMENA

THE DISCOVERER OF THE NORTH CAPE

SANDALPHON

THE LANDLORD'S TALE

THE SICILIAN'S TALE

THE THEOLOGIAN'S TALE

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER

PROEM

THE FROST SPIRIT

SONGS OF LABOR

THE LUMBERMEN

BARCLAY OF URY

ALL'S WELL

RAPHAEL

SEED-TIME AND HARVEST

THE PROPHECY OF SAMUEL SEWALL

SKIPPER IRESON'S RIDE

THE DOUBLE-HEADED SNAKE OF NEWBURY

MAUD MULLER

BURNS

THE HERO

THE ETERNAL GOODNESS

THE PIPES AT LUCKNOW

COBBLER KEEZAR'S VISION

THE MAYFLOWERS

RALPH WALDO EMERSON

GOOD-BYE

EACH AND ALL

THE PROBLEM

THE RHODORA

THE HUMBLE—BEE

THE SNOW-STORM

FABLE

FORBEARANCE

CONCORD HYMN

BOSTON HYMN

THE TITMOUSE

JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL

HAKON'S LAY

FLOWERS

IMPARTIALITY

MY LOVE

THE FOUNTAIN

THE SHEPHERD OF KING ADMETUS

ODE RECITED AT THE HARVARD COMMEMORATION

THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL

BIGLOW PAPERS

II. THE COURTIN'

III. SUNTHIN' IN THE PASTORAL LINE

AN INDIAN-SUMMER REVERIE

A FABLE FOR CRITICS

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES

OLD IRONSIDES

THE LAST LEAF

MY AUNT

THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS

CONTENTMENT

THE DEACON'S MASTERPIECE;

THOMAS BUCHANAN READ

STORM ON ST. BERNARD

DRIFTING

WALT WHITMAN

PIONEERS! O PIONEERS!

O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN!

NOTES

SELECTIONS OF AMERICAN POETRY

INTRODUCTION

If we define poetry as the heart of man expressed in beautiful language, we shall not say that we have no national poetry. True, America has produced no Shakespeare and no Milton, but we have an inheritance in all English literature; and many poets in America have followed in the footsteps of their literary British forefathers.

Puritan life was severe. It was warfare, and manual labor of a most exhausting type, and loneliness, and devotion to a strict sense of duty. It was a life in which pleasure was given the least place and duty the greatest. Our Puritan ancestors thought music and poetry dangerous, if not actually sinful, because they made men think of this world rather than of heaven. When Anne Bradstreet wrote our first known American poems, she was expressing English thought; "The tenth muse" was not animated by the life around her, but was living in a dream of the land she had left behind; her poems are faint echoes of the poetry of England. After time had identified her with life in the new world, she wrote "Contemplations," in which her English nightingales are changed to crickets and her English gilli-flowers to American blackberry vines. The truly representative poetry of colonial times is Michael Wigglesworth's "Day of Doom". This is the real heart of the Puritan, his conscience, in imperfect rhyme. It fulfills the first part of our definition, but shows by its lack of beautiful style that both elements are necessary to produce real poetry.

Philip Freneau was the first American who sought to express his life in poetry. The test of beauty of language again excludes from real poetry some of his expressions and leaves us a few beautiful lyrics, such as "The Wild Honeysuckle," in which the poet sings his love of American nature. With them American poetry may be said to begin.

The fast historical event of national importance was the American Revolution. Amid the bitter years of want, of suffering, and of war; few men tried to write anything beautiful. Life was harsh and stirring and this note was echoed in all the literature. As a result we have narrative and political poetry, such as "The Battle of the Kegs" and "A Fable," dealing almost entirely with events and aiming to arouse military ardor. In "The Ballad of Nathan Hale," the musical expression of bravery, pride, and sympathy raises the poem so far above the rhymes of their period that it will long endure as the most memorable poetic expression of the Revolutionary period.

Poetry was still a thing of the moment, an avocation, not dignified by receiving the best of a man. With William Cullen Bryant came a change. He told our nation that in the new world as well as in the old some men should live for the beautiful. Everything in nature spoke to him in terms of human life. Other poets saw the relation between their own lives and the life of the flowers and the birds, but Bryant constantly expressed this relationship. The concluding stanza of "To a Waterfowl" is the most perfect example of this characteristic, but it underlies also the whole thought of his youthful poem "Thanatopsis" (A View of Death). If we could all read the lives of our gentians and bobolinks as he did, there would be more true poetry in America. Modern thinkers urge us to step outside of ourselves into the lives of others and by our imagination to share their emotions; this is no new ambition in America; since Bryant in "The Crowded Street" analyzes the life in the faces he sees.

Until the early part of the nineteenth century American poetry dealt mainly with the facts of history and the description of nature. A new element of fancy is prominent in Joseph Rodman Drake's "The Culprit Fay." It dances through a long narrative with the delicacy of the fay himself.

Edgar Allan Poe brought into our poetry somber sentiment and musical expression. Puritan poetry was somber, but it was almost devoid of sentiment. Poe loved sad beauty and meditated on the sad things in life. Many of his poems lament the loss of some fair one. "To Helen," "Annabel Lee" "Lenore," and "To One In Paradise" have the theme, while in "The Raven" the poet is seeking solace for the loss of Lenore. "Eulalie—A Song" rises, on the other hand to intense happiness. With Poe the sound by which his idea was expressed was as important as the thought itself. He knew how to make the sound suit the thought, as in "The Raven" and "The Bells." One who understands no English can grasp the meaning of the different sections from the mere sound, so clearly distinguishable are the clashing of the brass and the tolling of the iron bells. If we return to our definition of poetry as an expression of the heart of a man, we shall find the explanation of these peculiarities: Poe was a man of moods and possessed the ability to express these moods in appropriate sounds.

The contrast between the emotion of Poe and the calm spirit of the man who followed him is very great. In Henry Wadsworth Longfellow American poetry reached high-water mark. Lafcadio Hearn in his "Interpretations of Literature" says: "Really I believe that it is a very good test of any Englishman's ability to feel poetry, simply to ask him, 'Did you like Longfellow when you were a boy?' If he eats 'No,' then it is no use to talk to him on the subject of poetry at all, however much he might be able to tell you about quantities and metres." No American has in equal degree won the name of "household poet." If this term is correctly understood, it sums up his merits more succinctly than can any other title.

Longfellow dealt largely with men and women and the emotions common to us all. Hiawatha conquering the deer and bison, and hunting in despair for food where only snow and ice abound; Evangeline faithful to her father and her lover, and relieving suffering in the rude hospitals of a new world; John Alden fighting the battle between love and duty; Robert of Sicily learning the lesson of humility; Sir Federigo offering his last possession to the woman he loved; Paul Revere serving his country in time of need; the monk proving that only a sense of duty done can bring happiness: all these and more express the emotions which we know are true in our own lives. In his longer narrative poems he makes the legends of Puritan life real to us; he takes English folk-lore and makes us see Othere talking to Arthur, and the Viking stealing his bride. His short poems are even better known than his longer narratives. In them he expressed his gentle, sincere love of the young, the suffering, and the sorrowful. In the Sonnets he showed; that deep appreciation of European literature which made noteworthy his teaching at Harvard and his translations.

He believed that he was assigned a definite task in the world which he described as follows in his last poem:

"As comes the smile to the lips,

The foam to the surge;

So come to the Poet his songs,

All hitherward blown

From the misty realm, that belongs

To the vast unknown.

His, and not his, are the lays

He sings; and their fame

Is his, and not his; and the praise

And the pride of a name.

For voices pursue him by day

And haunt him by night,

And he listens and needs must obey,

When the Angel says: 'Write!'

John Greenleaf Whittier seems to suffer by coming in such close proximity to Longfellow. Genuine he was, but his spirit was less buoyant than Longfellow's and he touches our hearts less. Most of his early poems were devoted to a current political issue. They aimed to win converts to the cause of anti-slavery. Such poems always suffer in time in comparison with the song of a man who sings because "the heart is so full that a drop overfills it." Whittier's later poems belong more to this class and some of them speak to-day to our emotions as well as to our intellects. "The Hero" moves us with a desire to serve mankind, and the stirring tone of "Barbara Frietchie" arouses our patriotism by its picture of the same type of bravery. In similar vein is "Barclay of Ury," which must have touched deeply the heart of the Quaker poet. "The Pipes of Lucknow" is dramatic in its intense grasp of a climactic hour and loses none of its force in the expression. We can actually hear the skirl of the bagpipes. Whittier knew the artiste of the world and talked to us about Raphael and Burns with clear-sighted, affectionate interest. His poems show varied characteristics; the love of the sterner aspects of nature, modified by the appreciation of the humble flower; the conscience of the Puritan, tinged with sympathy for the sorrowful; the steadfastness of the Quaker, stirred by the fire of the patriot.

The poetry of Ralph Waldo Emerson is marked by serious contemplation rather than by warmth of emotional expression. In Longfellow the appeal is constantly to a heart which is not disassociated from a brain; in Emerson the appeal is often to the intellect alone. We recognize the force of the lesson in "The Titmouse," even if it leaves us less devoted citizens than does "The Hero" and less capable women than does "Evangeline." He reaches his highest excellence when he makes us feel as well as understand a lesson, as in "The Concord Hymn" and "Forbearance." If we could all write on the tablets of our hearts that single stanza, forbearance would be a real factor in life. And it is to this poet whom we call unemotional that we owe this inspiring quatrain:

"So nigh is grandeur to our dust,

So near is God to man,

When duty whispers low, Thou must,

The youth replies, I can!"

James Russell Lowell was animated by a well-defined purpose which he described in the following lines:

"It may be glorious to write

Thoughts that make glad the two or three

High souls like those far stars that come in sight

Once in a century.

But better far it is to speak

One simple word which, now and then

Shall waken their free nature in the weak

And friendless sons of men.

To write some earnest verse or line

Which, seeking not the praise of art,

Shall make a clearer faith and manhood shine

In the untutored heart."

His very accomplishments made it difficult for him to reach this aim, since his poetry does not move "the untutored heart" so readily as does that of Longfellow or Whittier. It is, on the whole, too deeply burdened with learning and too individual in expression to fulfil his highest desire. Of his early poems the most generally known is probably "The Vision of Sir Launfal," in which a strong moral purpose is combined with lines of beautiful nature description:

"And what is so rare as a day in June?

Then, if ever, come perfect days.

Two works by which he will be permanently remembered show a deeper and more effective Lowell. "The Biglow Papers" are the most successful of all the American poems which attempt to improve conditions by means of humor. Although they refer in the main to the situation at the time of the Mexican War, they deal with such universal political traits that they may be applied to almost any age. They are written in a Yankee dialect which, it is asserted, was never spoken, but which enhances the humor, as in "What Mr. Robinson Thinks." Lowell's tribute to Lincoln occurs in the Ode which he wrote to commemorate the Harvard students who enlisted in the Civil War. After dwelling on the search for truth which should be the aim of every college student, he turns to the delineation of Lincoln's character in a eulogy of great beauty. Clear in analysis, far-sighted in judgment, and loving in sentiment, he expresses that opinion of Lincoln which has become a part of the web of American thought. His is no hurried judgment, but the calm statement of opinion which is to-day accepted by the world:

"They all are gone, and, standing like a tower,

Our children shall behold his fame,

The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man,

Sagacious, patient, dreading, praise, not blame,

Now birth of our new soil, the first American."

With Oliver Wendell Holmes comes the last of this brief American list of honor. No other American has so combined delicacy with the New England humor. We should be poorer by many a smile without "My Aunt" and "The Deacon's Masterpiece." But this is not his entire gift. "The Chambered Nautilus" strikes the chord of noble sentiment sounded in the last stanza of "Thanatopsis" and it will continue to sing in our hearts "As the swift seasons roll." There is in his poems the smile and the sigh of the well-loved stanza,

"And if I should live to be

The last leaf upon the tree

In the Spring.

Let them smile; as I do now;

As the old forsaken bough

Where I cling."

And is this all? Around these few names does all the fragrance of American poetry hover? In the hurry, prosperity, and luxury of modern life is the care if the flower of poetry lost? Surely not. The last half of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth have brought many beautiful flowers of poetry and hints of more perfect blossoms. Lanier has sung of the life of the south he loved; Whitman and Miller have stirred us with enthusiasm for the progress of the nation; Field and Riley have made us laugh and cry in sympathy; Aldrich, Sill, Van Dyke, Burroughs, and Thoreau have shared with us their hoard of beauty. Among the present generation may there appear many men and women whose devotion to the delicate flower shall be repaid by the gratitude of posterity!

ANNE BRADSTREET

CONTEMPLATIONS

Some time now past in the Autumnal Tide,

When Phoebus wanted but one hour to bed,

The trees all richly clad, yet void of pride

Were gilded o'er by his rich golden head.

Their leaves and fruits, seem'd painted, but was true

Of green, of red, of yellow, mixed hue,

Rapt were my senses at this delectable view.

I wist not what to wish, yet sure, thought I,

If so much excellence abide below,

How excellent is He that dwells on high!

Whose power and beauty by his works we know;

Sure he is goodness, wisdom, glory, light,

That hath this underworld so richly dight:

More Heaven than Earth was here, no winter and no night.

Then on a stately oak I cast mine eye,

Whose ruffling top the clouds seem'd to aspire;

How long since thou wast in thine infancy?

Thy strength, and stature, more thy years admire;

Hath hundred winters past since thou wast born,

Or thousand since thou breakest thy shell of horn?

If so, all these as naught Eternity doth scorn.

I heard the merry grasshopper then sing,

The black-clad cricket bear a second part,

They kept one tune, and played on the same string,

Seeming to glory in their little art.

Shall creatures abject thus their voices raise?

And in their kind resound their Master's praise:

Whilst I, as mute, can warble forth no higher lays.

When I behold the heavens as in their prime,

And then the earth (though old) still clad in green,

The stones and trees, insensible of time,

Nor age nor wrinkle on their front are seen;

If winter come, and greenness then do fade,

A spring returns, and they more youthful made;

But Man grows old, lies down, remains where once he's

laid.

MICHAEL WIGGLESWORTH

THE DAY OF DOOM

SOUNDING OF THE LAST TRUMP

Still was the night, Serene & Bright,

when all Men sleeping lay;

Calm was the season, & carnal reason

thought so 'twould last for ay.

Soul, take thine ease, let sorrow cease,

much good thou hast in store:

This was their Song, their Cups among,

the Evening before.

Wallowing in all kind of sin,

vile wretches lay secure:

The best of men had scarcely then

their Lamps kept in good ure.

Virgins unwise, who through disguise

amongst the best were number'd,

Had closed their eyes; yea, and the wise

through sloth and frailty slumber'd.

For at midnight brake forth a Light,

which turn'd the night to day,

And speedily a hideous cry

did all the world dismay.

Sinners awake, their hearts do ake,

trembling their loynes surprizeth;

Amaz'd with fear, by what they hear,

each one of them ariseth.

They rush from Beds with giddy heads,

and to their windows run,

Viewing this light, which shines more bright

than doth the Noon-day Sun.

Straightway appears (they see 't with tears)

the Son of God most dread;

Who with his Train comes on amain

to Judge both Quick and Dead.

Before his face the Heav'ns gave place,

and Skies are rent asunder,

With mighty voice, and hideous noise,

more terrible than Thunder.

His brightness damps heav'ns glorious lamps

and makes them hang their heads,

As if afraid and quite dismay'd,

they quit their wonted steads.

No heart so bold, but now grows cold

and almost dead with fear:

No eye so dry, but now can cry,

and pour out many a tear.

Earth's Potentates and pow'rful States,

Captains and Men of Might

Are quite abasht, their courage dasht

at this most dreadful sight.

Mean men lament, great men do rent

their Robes, and tear their hair:

They do not spare their flesh to tear

through horrible despair.

All Kindreds wail: all hearts do fail:

horror the world doth fill

With weeping eyes, and loud out-cries,

yet knows not how to kill.

Some hide themselves in Caves and Delves,

in places under ground:

Some rashly leap into the Deep,

to scape by being drown'd:

Some to the Rocks (O senseless blocks!)

and woody Mountains run,

That there they might this fearful sight,

and dreaded Presence shun.

In vain do they to Mountains say,

fall on us and us hide

From Judges ire, more hot than fire,

for who may it abide?

No hiding place can from his Face

sinners at all conceal,

Whose flaming Eye hid things doth 'spy

and darkest things reveal.

The Judge draws nigh, exalted high,

upon a lofty Throne,

Amidst a throng of Angels strong,

lo, Israel's Holy One!

The excellence of whose presence

and awful Majesty,

Amazeth Nature, and every Creature,

doth more than terrify.

The Mountains smoak, the Hills are shook,

the Earth is rent and torn,

As if she should be clear dissolv'd,

or from the Center born.

The Sea doth roar, forsakes the shore,

and shrinks away for fear;

The wild beasts flee into the Sea,

so soon as he draws near.

Before his Throne a Trump is blown,

Proclaiming the day of Doom:

Forthwith he cries, Ye dead arise,

and unto Judgment come.

No sooner said, but 'tis obey'd;

Sepulchres opened are:

Dead bodies all rise at his call,

and 's mighty power declare.

His winged Hosts flie through all Coasts,

together gathering

Both good and bad, both quick and dead,

and all to Judgment bring.

Out of their holes those creeping Moles,

that hid themselves for fear,

By force they take, and quickly make

before the Judge appear.

Thus every one before the Throne

of Christ the Judge is brought,

Both righteous and impious

that good or ill hath wrought.

A separation, and diff'ring station

by Christ appointed is

(To sinners sad) 'twixt good and bad,

'twixt Heirs of woe and bliss.

PHILIP FRENEAU

THE WILD HONEYSUCKLE

Fair flower, that dost so comely grow,

Hid in this silent, dull retreat,

Untouched thy homed blossoms blow,

Unseen thy little branches greet:

No roving foot shall crush thee here,

No busy hand provoke a tear.

By Nature's self in white arrayed,

She bade thee shun the vulgar eye,

And planted here the guardian shade,

And sent soft waters murmuring by;

Thus quietly thy summer goes,

Thy days declining to repose.

Smit with those charms, that must decay,

I grieve to see your future doom;

They died—nor were those flowers more gay,

The flowers that did in Eden bloom;

Unpitying frosts, and Autumn's power,

Shall leave no vestige of this flower.

From morning suns and evening dews

At first thy little being came;

If nothing once, you nothing lose,

For when you die you are the same;

The space between is but an hour,

The frail duration of a flower.

TO A HONEY BEE

Thou, born to sip the lake or spring,

Or quaff the waters of the stream,

Why hither come on vagrant wing?

Does Bacchus tempting seem,—

Did he for you this glass prepare?

Will I admit you to a share?

Did storms harass or foes perplex,

Did wasps or king-birds bring dismay—

Did wars distress, or labors vex,

Or did you miss your way?

A better seat you could not take

Than on the margin of this lake.

Welcome!—I hail you to my glass

All welcome, here, you find;

Here, let the cloud of trouble pass,

Here, be all care resigned.

This fluid never fails to please,

And drown the griefs of men or bees.

What forced you here we cannot know,

And you will scarcely tell,

But cheery we would have you go

And bid a glad farewell:

On lighter wings we bid you fly,

Your dart will now all foes defy.

Yet take not, oh! too deep a drink,

And in this ocean die;

Here bigger bees than you might sink,

Even bees full six feet high.

Like Pharaoh, then, you would be said

To perish in a sea of red.

Do as you please, your will is mine;

Enjoy it without fear,

And your grave will be this glass of wine,

Your epitaph—a tear—

Go, take your seat in Charon's boat;

We'll tell the hive, you died afloat.

THE INDIAN BURYING-GROUND

In spite of all the learned have said,

I still my old opinion keep;

The posture that we give the dead

Points out the soul's eternal sleep.

Not so the ancients of these lands;—

The Indian, when from life released,

Again is seated with his friends,

And shares again the joyous feast.

His imaged birds, and painted bowl,

And venison, for a journey dressed,

Bespeak the nature of the soul,

Activity, that wants no rest.

His bow for action ready bent,

And arrows, with a head of stone,

Can only mean that life is spent,

And not the old ideas gone.

Thou, stranger, that shalt come this way,

No fraud upon the dead commit,—

Observe the swelling turf, and say,

They do not die, but here they sit.

Here still a lofty rock remains,

On which the curious eye may trace

(Now wasted half by wearing rains)

The fancies of a ruder race.

Here still an aged elm aspires,

Beneath whose far projecting shade

(And which the shepherd still admires)

children of the forest played.

There oft a restless Indian queen

(Pale Shebah with her braided hair),

And many a barbarous form is seen

To chide the man that lingers there.

By midnight moons, o'er moistening dews,

In habit for the chase arrayed,

The hunter still the deer pursues,

The hunter and the deer—a shade!

And long shall timorous Fancy see

The painted chief, and pointed spear,

And Reason's self shall bow the knee

To shadows and delusions here.

EUTAW SPRINGS

At Eutaw Springs the valiant died;

Their limbs with dust are covered o'er;

Weep on, ye springs, your tearful tide;

How many heroes are no more!

If in this wreck of ruin, they

Can yet be thought to claim a tear,

O smite thy gentle breast, and say

The friends of freedom slumber here!

Thou, who shalt trace this bloody plain,

If goodness rules thy generous breast,

Sigh for the wasted rural reign;

Sigh for the shepherds sunk to rest!

Stranger, their humble groves adorn;

You too may fall, and ask a tear:

'Tis not the beauty of the morn

That proves the evening shall be clear.

They saw their injured country's woe,

The flaming town, the wasted field;

Then rushed to meet the insulting foe;

They took the spear—but left the shield.

Led by thy conquering standards, Greene,

The Britons they compelled to fly:

None distant viewed the fatal plain,

None grieved in such a cause to die—

But, like the Parthian, famed of old,

Who, flying, still their arrows threw,

These routed Britons, full as bold,

Retreated, and retreating slew.

Now rest in peace, our patriot band;

Though far from nature's limits thrown,

We trust they find a happier land,

A bright Phoebus of their own.

FRANCIS HOPKINSON

THE BATTLE OF THE KEGS

Gallants attend and hear a friend

Trill forth harmonious ditty,

Strange things I'll tell which late befell

In Philadelphia city.

'Twas early day, as poets say,

Just when the sun was rising,

A soldier stood on a log of wood,

And saw a thing surprising.

As in amaze he stood to gaze,

The truth can't be denied, sir,

He spied a score of kegs or more

Come floating down the tide, sir.

A sailor too in jerkin blue,

This strange appearance viewing,

First damned his eyes, in great surprise,

Then said, "Some mischief's brewing.

"These kegs, I'm told, the rebels hold,

Packed up like pickled herring;

And they're come down to attack the town,

In this new way of ferrying."

The soldier flew, the sailor too,

And scared almost to death, sir,

Wore out their shoes, to spread the news,

And ran till out of breath, sir.

Now up and down throughout the town,

Most frantic scenes were acted;

And some ran here, and others there,

Like men almost distracted.

Some fire cried, which some denied,

But said the earth had quaked;

And girls and boys, with hideous noise,

Ran through the streets half naked.

Sir William he, snug as a flea,

Lay all this time a snoring,

Nor dreamed of harm as he lay warm,

In bed with Mrs. Loring.

Now in a fright, he starts upright,

Awaked by such a clatter;

He rubs both eyes, and boldly cries,

"For God's sake, what's the matter?"

At his bedside he then espied,

Sir Erskine at command, sir,

Upon one foot he had one boot,

And th' other in his hand, sir.

"Arise, arise," Sir Erskine cries,

"The rebels—more's the pity,

Without a boat are all afloat,

And ranged before the city.

"The motley crew, in vessels new,

With Satan for their guide, sir,

Packed up in bags, or wooden kegs,

Come driving down the tide, sir.

"Therefore prepare for bloody war;

These kegs must all be routed,

Or surely we despised shall be,

And British courage doubted."

The royal band now ready stand

All ranged in dread array, sir,

With stomach' stout to see it out,

And make a bloody day, sir.

The cannons roar from shore to shore.

The small arms make a rattle;

Since wars began I'm sure no man

E'er saw so strange a battle.

The rebel dales, the rebel vales,

With rebel trees surrounded,

The distant woods, the hills and floods,

With rebel echoes sounded.

The fish below swam to and fro,

Attacked from every quarter;

Why sure, thought they, the devil's to pay,

'Mongst folks above the water.

The kegs, 'tis said, though strongly made,

Of rebel staves and hoops, sir,

Could not oppose their powerful foes,

The conquering British troops, sir.

From morn to night these men of might

Displayed amazing courage;

And when the sun was fairly down,

Retired to sup their porridge.

A hundred men with each a pen,

Or more upon my word, sir,

It is most true would be too few,

Their valor to record, sir.

Such feats did they perform that day,

Against these wicked kegs, sir,

That years to come: if they get home,

They'll make their boasts and brags, sir.

JOSEPH HOPKINSON

HAIL COLUMBIA

Hail, Columbia! happy land!

Hail, ye heroes! heaven-born band!

Who fought and bled in Freedom's cause,

And when the storm of war was gone,

Enjoyed the peace your valor won.

Let independence be our boast,

Ever mindful what it cost;

Ever grateful for the prize,

Let its altar reach the skies.

Firm, united, let us be,

Rallying round our Liberty;

As a band of brothers joined,

Peace and safety we shall find.

Immortal patriots! rise once more:

Defend your rights, defend your shore:

Let no rude foe, with impious hand,

Invade the shrine where sacred lies

Of toil and blood the well-earned prize.

While offering peace sincere and just,

In Heaven we place a manly trust,

That truth and justice will prevail,

And every scheme of bondage fail.

Firm, united, let us be,

Rallying round our Liberty;

As a band of brothers joined,

Peace and safety we shall find.

Sound, sound, the trump of Fame!

Let WASHINGTON'S great name

Ring through the world with loud applause,

Ring through the world with loud applause;

Let every clime to Freedom dear,

Listen with a joyful ear.

With equal skill, and godlike power,

He governed in the fearful hour

Of horrid war; or guides, with ease,

The happier times of honest peace.

Firm, united, let us be,

Rallying round our Liberty;

As a band of brothers joined,

Peace and safety we shall find.

Behold the chief who now commands,

Once more to serve his country, stands—

The rock on which the storm will beat,

The rock on which the storm will beat;

But, armed in virtue firm and true,

His hopes are fixed on Heaven and you.

When hope was sinking in dismay,

And glooms obscured Columbia's day,

His steady mind, from changes free.

Resolved on death or liberty.

Firm, united, let us be,

Rallying round our Liberty;

As a band of brothers joined,

Peace and safety we shall find.

ANONYMOUS

THE BALLAD OF NATHAN HALE

The breezes went steadily through the tall pines,

A-saying "oh! hu-ush!" a-saying "oh! hu-ush!"

As stilly stole by a bold legion of horse,

For Hale in the bush, for Hale in the bush.

"Keep still!" said the thrush as she nestled her young,

In a nest by the road; in a nest by the road.

"For the tyrants are near, and with them appear

What bodes us no good, what bodes us no good."

The brave captain heard it, and thought of his home

In a cot by the brook; in a cot by the brook.

With mother and sister and memories dear,

He so gayly forsook; he so gayly forsook.

Cooling shades of the night were coming apace,

The tattoo had beat; the tattoo had beat.

The noble one sprang from his dark lurking-place,

To make his retreat; to make his retreat.

He warily trod on the dry rustling leaves.

As he passed through the wood; as he passed through the wood;

And silently gained his rude launch on the shore,

As she played with the flood; as she played with the flood.

The guards of the camp, on that dark, dreary night,

Had a murderous will; had a murderous will.

They took him and bore him afar from the shore,

To a hut on the hill; to a hut on the hill.

No mother was there, nor a friend who could cheer,

In that little stone cell; in that little stone cell.

But he trusted in love, from his Father above.

In his heart, all was well; in his heart, all was well.

An ominous owl, with his solemn bass voice,

Sat moaning hard by; sat moaning hard by:

"The tyrant's proud minions most gladly rejoice,

For he must soon die; for he must soon die."

The brave fellow told them, no thing he restrained,—

The cruel general! the cruel general!—

His errand from camp, of the ends to be gained,

And said that was all; and said that was all.

They took him and bound him and bore him away,

Down the hill's grassy side; down the hill's grassy side.

'Twas there the base hirelings, in royal array,

His cause did deride; his cause did deride.

Five minutes were given, short moments, no more,

For him to repent; for him to repent.

He prayed for his mother, he asked not another,

To Heaven he went; to Heaven he went.

The faith of a martyr the tragedy showed,

As he trod the last stage; as he trod the last stage.

And Britons will shudder at gallant Hales blood,

As his words do presage, as his words do presage.

"Thou pale king of terrors, thou life's gloomy foe,

Go frighten the slave; go frighten the slave;

Tell tyrants, to you their allegiance they owe.

No fears for the brave; no fears for the brave."

A FABLE

Rejoice, Americans, rejoice!

Praise ye the Lord with heart and voice!

The treaty's signed with faithful France,

And now, like Frenchmen, sing and dance!

But when your joy gives way to reason,

And friendly hints are not deemed treason,

Let me, as well as I am able,

Present your Congress with a fable.

Tired out with happiness, the frogs

Sedition croaked through all their bogs;

And thus to Jove the restless race,

Made out their melancholy case.

"Famed, as we are, for faith and prayer,

We merit sure peculiar care;

But can we think great good was meant us,

When logs for Governors were sent us?

"Which numbers crushed they fell upon,

And caused great fear,—till one by one,

As courage came, we boldly faced 'em,

Then leaped upon 'em, and disgraced 'em!

"Great Jove," they croaked, "no longer fool us,

None but ourselves are fit to rule us;

We are too large, too free a nation,

To be encumbered with taxation!

"We pray for peace, but wish confusion,

Then right or wrong, a—revolution!

Our hearts can never bend to obey;

Therefore no king—and more we'll pray."

Jove smiled, and to their fate resigned

The restless, thankless, rebel kind;

Left to themselves, they went to work,

First signed a treaty with king Stork.

He swore that they, with his alliance,

To all the world might bid defiance;

Of lawful rule there was an end on't,

And frogs were henceforth—independent.

At which the croakers, one and all!

Proclaimed a feast, and festival!

But joy to-day brings grief to-morrow;

Their feasting o'er, now enter sorrow!

The Stork grew hungry, longed for fish;

The monarch could not have his wish;

In rage he to the marshes flies,

And makes a meal of his allies.

Then grew so fond of well-fed frogs,

He made a larder of the bogs!

Say, Yankees, don't you feel compunction,

At your unnatural rash conjunction?

Can love for you in him take root,

Who's Catholic, and absolute?

I'll tell these croakers how he'll treat 'em;

Frenchmen, like storks, love frogs—to eat 'em.

TIMOTHY DWIGHT

LOVE TO THE CHURCH

I love thy kingdom, Lord,

The house of thine abode,

The church our blest Redeemer saved

With his own precious blood.

I love thy church, O God!

Her walls before thee stand,

Dear as the apple of thine eye,

And graven on thy hand.

If e'er to bless thy sons

My voice or hands deny,

These hands let useful skill forsake,

This voice in silence die.

For her my tears shall fall,

For her my prayers ascend;

To her my cares and toils be given

Till toils and cares shall end.

Beyond my highest joy

I prize her heavenly ways,

Her sweet communion, solemn vows,

Her hymns of love and praise.

Jesus, thou friend divine,

Our Saviour and our King,

Thy hand from every snare and foe

Shall great deliverance bring.

Sure as thy truth shall last,

To Zion shall be given

The brightest glories earth can yield,

And brighter bliss of heaven.

SAMUEL WOODWORTH

THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET

How dear to this heart are the scenes of my childhood,

When fond recollection presents them to view!

The orchard, the meadow, the deep-tangled wild-wood,

And every loved spot which my infancy knew!

The wide-spreading pond, and the mill that stood by it,

The bridge, and the rock where the cataract fell,

The cot of my father, the dairy-house nigh it,

And e'en the rude bucket that hung in the well—

The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,

The moss-covered bucket which hung in the well.

That moss-covered vessel I hailed as a treasure,

For often at noon, when returned from the field,

I found it the source of an exquisite pleasure,

The purest and sweetest that nature can yield.

How ardent I seized it, with hands that were glowing,

And quick to the white-pebbled bottom it fell;

Then soon, with the emblem of truth overflowing,

And dripping with coolness, it rose from the well

The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,

The moss-covered bucket arose from the well.

How sweet from the green mossy brim to receive it,

As poised on the curb it inclined to my lips!

Not a full blushing goblet could tempt me to leave it,

The brightest that beauty or revelry sips.

And now, far removed from the loved habitation,

The tear of regret will intrusively swell,

As fancy reverts to my father's plantation,

And sighs for the bucket that hangs in the well

The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,

The moss-covered bucket that hangs in the well!

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

THANATOPSIS

To him who in the love of Nature holds

Communion with her visible forms, she speaks

A various language; for his gayer hours

She has a voice of gladness, and a smile

And eloquence of beauty, and she glides

Into his darker musings, with a mild

And healing sympathy, that steals away

Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts

Of the last bitter hour come like a blight

Over thy spirit, and sad images

Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,

And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,

Make thee to shudder and grow sick at heart;—

Go forth, under the open sky, and list

To Nature's teachings, while from all around—

Earth and her waters, and the depths of air—

Comes a still voice:—

Yet a few days, and thee

The all-beholding sun shall see no more

In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground

Where thy pale form was laid with many tears,

Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist

Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim

Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,

And, lost each human trace, surrendering up

Thine individual being, shalt thou go

To mix forever with the elements,

To be a brother to the insensible rock

And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain

Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak

Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.

Yet not to thine eternal resting place

Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish

Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down

With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,

The powerful of the earth—the wise, the good,

Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,

All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills

Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun,—the vales

Stretching in pensive quietness between;

The venerable woods—rivers that move

In majesty, and the complaining brooks

That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,

Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste,—

Are but the solemn decorations all

Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,

The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,

Are shining on the sad abodes of death

Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread

The globe are but a handful to the tribes

That slumber in its bosom.—Take the wings

Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness,

Or lose thyself in the continuous woods

Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,

Save his own dashing—yet the dead are there;

And millions in those solitudes, since first

The flight of years began, have laid them down

In their last sleep—the dead reign there alone.

So shalt thou rest, and what if thou withdraw

In silence from the living, and no friend

Take note of thy departure? All that breathe

Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh

When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care

Plod on, and each one as before will chase

His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave

Their mirth and their employments, and shall come

And make their bed with thee. As the long train

Of ages glides away, the sons of men—

The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes

In the full strength of years, matron and maid,

The speechless babe, and the grayheaded man—

Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,

By those who in their turn shall follow them.

So live, that when thy summons comes to join

The innumerable caravan, which moves

To that mysterious realm, where each shall take

His chamber in the silent halls of death,

Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,

Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed

By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave

Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch

About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

THE YELLOW VIOLET

When beechen buds begin to swell,

And woods the blue-bird's warble know,

The yellow violet's modest bell

Peeps from the last year's leaves below.

Ere russet fields their green resume,

Sweet flower, I love, in forest bare,

To meet thee, when thy faint perfume

Alone is in the virgin air.

Of all her train, the hands of Spring

First plant thee in the watery mould,

And I have seen thee blossoming

Beside the snow-bank's edges cold.

Thy parent sun, who bade thee view

Pale skies, and chilling moisture sip,

Has bathed thee in his own bright hue,

And streaked with jet thy glowing lip.

Yet slight thy form, and low thy seat,

And earthward bent thy gentle eye,

Unapt the passing view to meet,

When loftier flowers are flaunting nigh.

Oft, in the sunless April day,

Thy early smile has stayed my walk;

But midst the gorgeous blooms of May,

I passed thee on thy humble stalk.

So they, who climb to wealth, forget

The friends in darker fortunes tried.

I copied them—but I regret

That I should ape the ways of pride.

And when again the genial hour

Awakes the painted tribes of light,

I'll not o'erlook the modest flower

That made the woods of April bright.

TO A WATERFOWL

Whither, midst falling dew,

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,

Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue

Thy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eye

Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,

As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,

Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brink

Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,

Or where the rocking billows rise and sink

On the chafed ocean-side?

There is a Power whose care

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast—

The desert and illimitable air—

Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned,

At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere,

Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,

Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end;

Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,

And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend,

Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest.

Thou'rt gone, the abyss of heaven

Hath swallowed up thy form; yet, in my heart

Deeply has sunk the lesson thou hast given,

And shall not soon depart.

He who, from zone to zone,

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,

In the long way that I must tread alone,

Will lead my steps aright.

GREEN RIVER

When breezes are soft and skies are fair,

I steal an hour from study and care,

And hie me away to the woodland scene,

Where wanders the stream with waters of green,

As if the bright fringe of herbs on its brink

Had given their stain to the waves they drink;

And they, whose meadows it murmurs through,

Have named the stream from its own fair hue.

Yet pure its waters—its shallows are bright

With colored pebbles and sparkles of light,

And clear the depths where its eddies play,

And dimples deepen and whirl away,

And the plane-tree's speckled arms o'ershoot

The swifter current that mines its root,

Through whose shifting leaves, as you walk the hill,

The quivering glimmer of sun and rill

With a sudden flash on the eye is thrown,

Like the ray that streams from the diamond-stone.

Oh, loveliest there the spring days come,

With blossoms, and birds, and wild-bees' hum;

The flowers of summer are fairest there,

And freshest the breath of the summer air;

And sweetest the golden autumn day

In silence and sunshine glides away.

Yet, fair as thou art, thou shunnest to glide,

Beautiful stream! by the village side;

But windest away from haunts of men,

To quiet valley and shaded glen;

And forest, and meadow, and slope of hill,

Around thee, are lonely, lovely, and still,

Lonely—save when, by thy rippling tides,

From thicket to thicket the angler glides;

Or the simpler comes, with basket and book,

For herbs of power on thy banks to look;

Or haply, some idle dreamer, like me,

To wander, and muse, and gaze on thee.

Still—save the chirp of birds that feed

On the river cherry and seedy reed,

And thy own wild music gushing out

With mellow murmur of fairy shout,

From dawn to the blush of another day,

Like traveller singing along his way.

That fairy music I never hear,

Nor gaze on those waters so green and clear,

And mark them winding away from sight,

Darkened with shade or flashing with light,

While o'er them the vine to its thicket clings,

And the zephyr stoops to freshen his wings,

But I wish that fate had left me free

To wander these quiet haunts with thee,

Till the eating cares of earth should depart,

And the peace of the scene pass into my heart;

And I envy thy stream, as it glides along

Through its beautiful banks in a trance of song.

Though forced to drudge for the dregs of men,

And scrawl strange words with the barbarous pen,

And mingle among the jostling crowd,

Where the sons of strife are subtle and loud—

I often come to this quiet place,

To breathe the airs that ruffle thy face,

And gaze upon thee in silent dream,

For in thy lonely and lovely stream

An image of that calm life appears

That won my heart in my greener years.

THE WEST WIND

Beneath the forest's skirt I rest,

Whose branching pines rise dark and high,

And hear the breezes of the West

Among the thread-like foliage sigh.

Sweet Zephyr! why that sound of woe?

Is not thy home among the flowers?

Do not the bright June roses blow,

To meet thy kiss at morning hours?

And lo! thy glorious realm outspread—

Yon stretching valleys, green and gay,

And yon free hill-tops, o'er whose head

The loose white clouds are borne away.

And there the full broad river runs,

And many a fount wells fresh and sweet,

To cool thee when the mid-day suns

Have made thee faint beneath their heat.

Thou wind of joy, and youth, and love;

Spirit of the new-wakened year!

The sun in his blue realm above

Smooths a bright path when thou art here.

In lawns the murmuring bee is heard,

The wooing ring-dove in the shade;

On thy soft breath, the new-fledged bird

Takes wing, half happy, half afraid.

Ah! thou art like our wayward race;—

When not a shade of pain or ill

Dims the bright smile of Nature's face,

Thou lov'st to sigh and murmur still.

"I BROKE THE SPELL THAT HELD ME LONG"

I broke the spell that held me long,

The dear, dear witchery of song.

I said, the poet's idle lore

Shall waste my prime of years no more,

For Poetry, though heavenly born,

Consorts with poverty and scorn.

I broke the spell—nor deemed its power

Could fetter me another hour.

Ah, thoughtless! how could I forget

Its causes were around me yet?

For wheresoe'er I looked, the while,

Was Nature's everlasting smile.

Still came and lingered on my sight

Of flowers and streams the bloom and light,

And glory of the stars and sun;—

And these and poetry are one.

They, ere the world had held me long,

Recalled me to the love of song.

A FOREST HYMN

The groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned

To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,

And spread the roof above them—ere he framed

The lofty vault, to gather and roll back

The sound of anthems; in the darkling wood,

Amid the cool and silence, he knelt down,

And offered to the Mightiest solemn thanks

And supplication. For his simple heart

Might not resist the sacred influences

Which, from the stilly twilight of the place,

And from the gray old trunks that high in heaven

Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound

Of the invisible breath that swayed at once

All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed

His spirit with the thought of boundless power

And inaccessible majesty. Ah, why

Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect

God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore

Only among the crowd, and under roofs

That our frail hands have raised? Let me, at least,

Here, in the shadow of this aged wood,

Offer one hymn—thrice happy, if it find

Acceptance in His ear.

Father, thy hand

Hath reared these venerable columns, thou

Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down

Upon the naked earth, and, forthwith, rose

All these fair ranks of trees. They, in thy sun,

Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze,

And shot toward heaven. The century-living crow

Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died

Among their branches, till, at last, they stood,

As now they stand, massy, and tall, and dark,

Fit shrine for humble worshipper to hold

Communion with his Maker. These dim vaults,

These winding aisles, of human pomp or pride

Report not. No fantastic carvings show

The boast of our vain race to change the form

Of thy fair works. But thou art here—thou fill'st

The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds

That run along the summit of these trees

In music; thou art in the cooler breath

That from the inmost darkness of the place

Comes, scarcely felt; the barley trunks, the ground,

The fresh moist ground, are all instinct with thee.

Here is continual worship;—Nature, here,

In the tranquillity that thou dost love,

Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly, around,

From perch to perch, the solitary bird

Passes; and yon clear spring, that, midst its herbs

Wells softly forth and wandering steeps the roots

Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale

Of all the good it does. Thou halt not left

Thyself without a witness, in the shades,

Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace

Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak

By whose immovable stem I stand and seem

Almost annihilated—not a prince,

In all that proud old world beyond the deep,

E'er wore his crown as loftily as he

Wears the green coronal of leaves with which

Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root

Is beauty, such as blooms not in the glare

Of the broad sun. That delicate forest flower,

With scented breath and look so like a smile,

Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mould,

Au emanation of the indwelling Life,

A visible token of the upholding Love,

That are the soul of this great universe.

My heart is awed within me when I think

Of the great miracle that still goes on,

In silence, round me—the perpetual work

Of thy creation, finished, yet renewed

Forever. Written on thy works I read

The lesson of thy own eternity.

Lo! all grow old and die—but see again,

How on the faltering footsteps of decay

Youth presses—ever gay and beautiful youth

In all its beautiful forms. These lofty trees

Wave not less proudly that their ancestors

Moulder beneath them. Oh, there is not lost

One of earth's charms: upon her bosom yet,

After the flight of untold centuries,

The freshness of her far beginning lies

And yet shall lie. Life mocks the idle hate

Of his arch-enemy Death—yea, seats himself

Upon the tyrant's throne—the sepulchre,

And of the triumphs of his ghastly foe

Makes his own nourishment. For he came forth

From thine own bosom, and shall have no end.

There have been holy men who hid themselves

Deep in the woody wilderness, and gave

Their lives to thought and prayer, till they outlived

The generation born with them, nor seemed

Less aged than the hoary trees and rocks

Around them;—and there have been holy men

Who deemed it were not well to pass life thus.

But let me often to these solitudes

Retire, and in thy presence reassure

My feeble virtue. Here its enemies,

The passions, at thy plainer footsteps shrink

And tremble and are still. O God! when thou

Dost scare the world with tempest, set on fire

The heavens with falling thunderbolts, or fill,

With all the waters of the firmament,

The swift dark whirlwind that uproots the woods

And drowns the villages; when, at thy call,

Uprises the great deep and throws himself

Upon the continent, and overwhelms

Its cities—who forgets not, at the sight

Of these tremendous tokens of thy power,

His pride, and lays his strifes and follies by?

Oh, from these sterner aspects of thy face

Spare me and mine, nor let us need the wrath

Of the mad unchained elements to teach

Who rules them. Be it ours to meditate,

In these calm shades, thy milder majesty,

And to the beautiful order of thy works

Learn to conform the order of our lives.

THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS

The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year,

Of wailing winds, and naked woods, and meadows brown and sere.

Heaped in the hollows of the grove, the autumn leaves lie dead;

They rustle to the eddying gust, and to the rabbit's tread;

The robin and the wren are flown, and from the shrubs the jay,

And from the wood-top calls the crow through all the gloomy day.

Where are the flowers, the fair young flowers, that lately sprang

and stood

In brighter light and softer airs, a beauteous sisterhood?

Alas! they all are in their graves, the gentle race of flowers

Are lying in their lowly beds, with the fair and good of ours.

The rain is falling where they lie, but the cold November rain

Calls not from out the gloomy earth the lovely ones again.

The wind-flower and the violet, they perished long ago,

And the brier-rose and the orchis died amid the summer glow;

But on the hills the golden-rod, and the aster in the wood,

And the yellow sun-flower by the brook, in autumn beauty stood,

Till fell the frost from the clear cold heaven, as falls the

plague on men,

And the brightness of their smile was gone, from upland, glade,

and glen.

And now, when comes the calm mild day, as still such days will come,

To call the squirrel and the bee from out their winter home:

When the sound of dropping nuts is heard, though all the trees are

still,

And twinkle in the smoky light the waters of the rill,

The south wind searches for the flowers whose fragrance late he

bore,

And sighs to find them in the wood and by the stream no more.

And then I think of one who in her youthful beauty died,

The fair meek blossom that grew up and faded by my side.

In the cold moist earth we laid her, when the forests cast the

leaf,

And we wept that one so lovely should have a life so brief:

Yet not unmeet it was that one, like that young friend of ours,

So gentle and so beautiful, should perish with the flowers.

THE GLADNESS OF NATURE

Is this a time to be cloudy and sad,

When our mother Nature laughs around;

When even the deep blue heavens look glad,

And gladness breathes from the blossoming ground?

There are notes of joy from the hang-bird and wren,

And the gossip of swallows through all the sky;

The ground-squirrel gayly chirps by his den,

And the wilding bee hums merrily by.

The clouds are at play in the azure space

And their shadows at play on the bright-green vale,

And here they stretch to the frolic chase,

And there they roll on the easy gale.

There's a dance of leaves in that aspen bower,

There's a titter of winds in that beechen tree,

There's a smile on the fruit, and a smile on the flower,

And a laugh from the brook that runs to the sea.

And look at the broad-faced sun, how he smiles

On the dewy earth that smiles in his ray,

On the leaping waters and gay young isles;

Ay, look, and he'll smile thy gloom away.

TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN

Thou blossom bright with autumn dew,

And colored with the heaven's own blue,

That openest when the quiet light

Succeeds the keen and frosty night.

Thou comest not when violets lean

O'er wandering brooks and springs unseen,

Or columbines, in purple dressed,

Nod o'er the ground-bird's hidden nest.

Thou waitest late and com'st alone,

When woods are bare and birds are flown,

And frosts and shortening days portend

The aged year is near his end.

Then doth thy sweet and quiet eye

Look through its fringes to the sky,

Blue—blue—as if that sky let fall

A flower from its cerulean wall.

I would that thus, when I shall see

The hour of death draw near to me,

Hope, blossoming within my heart,

May look to heaven as I depart.

SONG OF MARION'S MEN

Our band is few but true and tried,

Our leader frank and bold;

The British soldier trembles

When Marion's name is told.

Our fortress is the good greenwood,

Our tent the cypress-tree;

We know the forest round us,

As seamen know the sea.

We know its walls of thorny vines,

Its glades of reedy grass,

Its safe and silent islands

Within the dark morass.

Woe to the English soldiery

That little dread us near!

On them shall light at midnight

A strange and sudden fear:

When, waking to their tents on fire,

They grasp their arms in vain,

And they who stand to face us

Are beat to earth again;

And they who fly in terror deem

A mighty host behind,

And hear the tramp of thousands

Upon the hollow wind.

Then sweet the hour that brings release

From danger and from toil:

We talk the battle over,

And share the battle's spoil.

The woodland rings with laugh and shout,

As if a hunt were up,

And woodland flowers are gathered

To crown the soldier's cup.

With merry songs we mock the wind

That in the pine-top grieves,

And slumber long and sweetly

On beds of oaken leaves.

Well knows the fair and friendly moon

The band that Marion leads—

The glitter of their rifles,

The scampering of their steeds.

'Tis life to guide the fiery barb

Across the moonlight plain;

'Tis life to feel the night-wind

That lifts the tossing mane.

A moment in the British camp—

A moment—and away

Back to the pathless forest,

Before the peep of day.

Grave men there are by broad Santee,

Grave men with hoary hairs;

Their hearts are all with Marion,

For Marion are their prayers.

And lovely ladies greet our band

With kindliest welcoming,

With smiles like those of summer,

And tears like those of spring.

For them we wear these trusty arms,

And lay them down no more

Till we have driven the Briton,

Forever, from our shore.

THE CROWDED STREET

Let me move slowly through the street,

Filled with an ever-shifting train,

Amid the sound of steps that beat

The murmuring walks like autumn rain.

How fast the flitting figures come!

The mild, the fierce, the stony face;

Some bright with thoughtless smiles, and some

Where secret tears have left their trace.

They pass—to toil, to strife, to rest;

To halls in which the feast is spread;

To chambers where the funeral guest

In silence sits beside the dead.

And some to happy homes repair,

Where children, pressing cheek to cheek,

These struggling tides of life that seem

With mute caresses shall declare

The tenderness they cannot speak.

And some, who walk in calmness here,

Shall shudder as they reach the door

Where one who made their dwelling dear,

Its flower, its light, is seen no more.

Youth, with pale cheek and slender frame,

And dreams of greatness in thine eye!

Go'st thou to build an early name,

Or early in the task to die?

Keen son of trade, with eager brow!

Who is now fluttering in thy snare!

Thy golden fortunes, tower they now,

Or melt the glittering spires in air?

Who of this crowd to-night shall tread

The dance till daylight gleam again?

Who sorrow o'er the untimely dead?

Who writhe in throes of mortal pain?

Some, famine-struck, shall think how long

The cold dark hours, how slow the light;

And some, who flaunt amid the throng,

Shall hide in dens of shame to-night.

Each, where his tasks or pleasures call,

They pass, and heed each other not.

There is who heeds, who holds them all,

In His large love and boundless thought.

These struggling tides of life that seem

In wayward, aimless course to tend,

Are eddies of the mighty stream

That rolls to its appointed end.

THE SNOW-SHOWER

Stand here by my side and turn, I pray,

On the lake below thy gentle eyes;

The clouds hang over it, heavy and gray,

And dark and silent the water lies;

And out of that frozen mist the snow

In wavering flakes begins to flow;

Flake after flake

They sink in the dark and silent lake.

See how in a living swarm they come

From the chambers beyond that misty veil;

Some hover awhile in air, and some

Rush prone from the sky like summer hail.

All, dropping swiftly or settling slow,

West, and are still in the depths below;

Flake after flake

Dissolved in the dark and silent lake.

Here delicate snow-stars, out of the cloud,

Come floating downward in airy play,

Like spangles dropped from the glistening crowd

That whiten by night the milky way;

There broader and burlier masses fall;

The sullen water buries them all—

Flake after flake—

All drowned in the dark and silent lake.

And some, as on tender wings they glide

From their chilly birth-cloud, dim and gray,

Are joined in their fall, and, side by side,

Come clinging along their unsteady way;

As friend with friend, or husband with wife,

Makes hand in hand the passage of life;

Each mated flake

Soon sinks in the dark and silent lake.

Lo! While we are gazing, in swifter haste

Stream down the snows, till the air is white,

As, myriads by myriads madly chased,

They fling themselves from their shadowy height.

The fair, frail creatures of middle sky,

What speed they make, with their grave so nigh;

Flake after flake

To lie in the dark and silent lake!

I see in thy gentle eyes a tear;

They turn to me in sorrowful thought;

Thou thinkest of friends, the good and dear,

Who were for a time, and now are not;

Like those fair children and cloud and frost,

That glisten for a moment and then are lost,

Flake after flake

All lost in the dark and silent lake.

Yet look again, for the clouds divide;

A gleam of blue on the water lies;

And far away, on the mountain-side,

A sunbeam falls from the opening skies,

But the hurrying host that flew between

The cloud and the water, no more is seen;

Flake after flake,

At rest in the dark and silent lake.

ROBERT OF LINCOLN

Merrily swinging on brier and weed,

Near to the nest of his little dame,

Over the mountain-side or mead,

Robert of Lincoln is telling his name:

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

Snug and safe is that nest of ours,

Hidden among the summer flowers,

Chee, chee, chee.

Robert of Lincoln is gayly drest,

Wearing a bright black wedding-coat;

White are his shoulders and white his crest

Hear him call in his merry note:

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

Look, what a nice coat is mine.

Sure there was never a bird so fine.

Chee, chee, chee.

Robert of Lincoln's Quaker wife,

Pretty and quiet, with plain brown wings,

Passing at home a patient life,

Broods in the grass while her husband sings

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

Brood, kind creature; you need not fear

Thieves and robbers while I am here.

Chee, chee, chee.

Modest and shy is she;

One weak chirp is her only note.

Braggart and prince of braggarts is he,

Pouring boasts from his little throat:

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

Never was I afraid of man;

Catch me, cowardly knaves, if you can!

Chee, chee, chee.

Six white eggs on a bed of hay,

Flecked with purple, a pretty sight!

There as the mother sits all day,

Robert is singing with all his might:

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

Nice good wife, that never goes out,

Keeping house while I frolic about.

Chee, chee, chee.

Soon as the little ones chip the shell,

Six wide mouths are open for food;

Robert of Lincoln bestirs him well,

Gathering seeds for the hungry brood.

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

This new life is likely to be

Hard for a gay young fellow like me.

Chee, chee, chee.

Robert of Lincoln at length is made

Sober with work, and silent with care;

Off is his holiday garment laid,

Half forgotten that merry air:

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Nobody knows but my mate and I

Where our nest and out nestlings lie.

Chee, chee, chee.

Summer wanes; the children are grown;

Fun and frolic no more he knows;

Robert of Lincoln's a humdrum crone;

Off he flies, and we sing as he goes:

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

When you can pipe that merry old strain,

Robert of Lincoln, come back again.

Chee, chee, chee.

THE POET

Thou, who wouldst wear the name

Of poet mid thy brethren of mankind,

And clothe in words of flame

Thoughts that shall live within the general mind!

Deem not the framing of a deathless lay

The pastime of a drowsy summer day.

But gather all thy powers,

And wreak them on the verse that thou dust weave,

And in thy lonely hours,

At silent morning or at wakeful eve,

While the warm current tingles through thy veins,

Set forth the burning words in fluent strains.

No smooth array of phrase,

Artfully sought and ordered though it be,

Which the cold rhymer lays

Upon his page with languid industry,

Can wake the listless pulse to livelier speed,

Or fill with sudden tears the eyes that read.

The secret wouldst thou know

To touch the heart or fire the blood at will?

Let thine own eyes o'erflow;

Let thy lips quiver with the passionate thrill;

Seize the great thought, ere yet its power be past,

And bind, in words, the fleet emotion fast.

Then, should thy verse appear

Halting and harsh, and all unaptly wrought,

Touch the crude line with fear,

Save in the moment of impassioned thought;

Then summon back the original glow, and mend

The strain with rapture that with fire was penned.

Yet let no empty gust

Of passion find an utterance in thy lay,

A blast that whirls the dust

Along the howling street and dies away;

But feelings of calm power and mighty sweep,

Like currents journeying through the windless deep.

Seek'st thou, in living lays,

To limn the beauty of the earth and sky?

Before thine inner gaze

Let all that beauty in clear vision lie;

Look on it with exceeding love, and write

The words inspired by wonder and delight.

Of tempests wouldst thou sing,

Or tell of battles—make thyself a part

Of the great tumult; cling

To the tossed wreck with terror in thy heart;

Scale, with the assaulting host, the rampart's height,

And strike and struggle in the thickest fight.

So shalt thou frame a lay

That haply may endure from age to age,

And they who read shall say

"What witchery hangs upon this poet's page!

What art is his the written spells to find

That sway from mood to mood the willing mind!"

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

Oh, slow to smite and swift to spare,

Gentle and merciful and just!

Who, in the fear of God, didst bear

The sword of power, a nation's trust!

In sorrow by thy bier we stand,

Amid the awe that hushes all,

And speak the anguish of a land

That shook with horror at thy fall.

Thy task is done; the bond are free:

We bear thee to an honored grave

Whose proudest monument shall be

The broken fetters of the slave.

Pure was thy life; its bloody close

Hath placed thee with the sons of light,

Among the noble host of those

Who perished in the cause of Right.

FRANCIS SCOTT KEY

THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming?

Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the perilous fight,

O'er the ramparts we watched were so gallantly streaming;

And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there;

O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?

On the shore dimly seen through the mists of the deep,

Where the foes haughty host in dread silence reposes,

What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,

As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses?

Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,

In full glory reflected now shines on the stream;

'Tis the star-spangled banner; O long may it wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore

That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion

A home and a country should leave us no more?

Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.

No refuge could save the hireling and slave,

From the terror of flight and the gloom of the grave;

And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!

O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand

Between their loved homes and the war's desolation

Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land,

Praise the power that hath made and preserved us a nation.

Then conquer we must, for our cause it is just.

And this be our motto—"In God is our trust";

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.

JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE

THE AMERICAN FLAG

When Freedom from her mountain height

Unfurled her standard to the air,

She tore the azure robe of night,

And set the stars of glory there.

And mingled with its gorgeous dyes

The milky baldric of the skies,

And striped its pure celestial white

With streakings of the morning light;

Then from his mansion in the sun

She called her eagle bearer down,

And gave into his mighty hand

The symbol of her chosen land.

Majestic monarch of the cloud,

Who rear'st aloft thy regal form,

To hear the tempest trumpings loud

And see the lightning lances driven,

When strive the warriors of the storm,

And rolls the thunder-drum of heaven,

Child of the sun! to thee 'tis given

To guard the banner of the free,

To hover in the sulphur smoke,

To ward away the battle stroke,

And bid its blendings shine afar,

Like rainbows on the cloud of war,

The harbingers of victory!

Flag of the brave! thy folds shall fly,

The sign of hope and triumph high,

When speaks the signal trumpet tone,

And the long line comes gleaming on.

Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet,

Has dimmed the glistening bayonet,

Each soldier eye shall brightly turn

To where thy sky-born glories burn,

And, as his springing steps advance,

Catch war and vengeance from the glance.

And when the cannon-mouthings loud

Heave in wild wreaths the battle shroud,

And gory sabres rise and fall

Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall,

Then shall thy meteor glances glow,

And cowering foes shall shrink beneath

Each gallant arm that strikes below

That lovely messenger of death.

Flag of the seas! on ocean wave

Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave;

When death, careering on the gale,

Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail,

And frighted waves rush wildly back

Before the broadside's reeling rack,

Each dying wanderer of the sea

Shall look at once to heaven and thee,

And smile to see thy splendors fly

In triumph o'er his closing eye.

Flag of the free heart's hope and home!

By angel hands to valor given;

Thy stars have lit the welkin dome,

And all thy hues were born in heaven.

Forever float that standard sheet!

Where breathes the foe but falls before us,

With Freedom's soil beneath our feet,

And Freedom's banner streaming o'er us?

THE CULPRIT FAY (Selection)

'Tis the hour of fairy ban and spell:

The wood-tick has kept the minutes well;

He has counted them all with click and stroke,

Deep in the heart of the mountain oak,

And he has awakened the sentry elve

Who sleeps with him in the haunted tree,

To bid him ring the hour of twelve,

And call the fays to their revelry;

Twelve small strokes on his tinkling bell

('Twas made of the white snail's pearly shell)

"Midnight comes, and all is well!

Hither, hither, wing your way!

'Tis the dawn of the fairy-day."

They come from beds of lichen green,

They creep from the mullen's velvet screen;

Some on the backs of beetles fly

From the silver tops of moon-touched trees,

Where they swung in their cobweb hammocks high,

And rocked about in the evening breeze;

Some from the hum-bird's downy nest—

They had driven him out by elfin power,

And, pillowed on plumes of his rainbow breast,

Had slumbered there till the charmed hour;

Some had lain in the scoop of the rock,

With glittering ising-stars' inlaid;

And some had opened the four-o'clock,

And stole within its purple shade.

And now they throng the moonlight glade,

Above, below, on every side,

Their little minim forms arrayed

In the tricksy pomp of fairy pride.

They come not now to print the lea,

In freak and dance around the tree,

Or at the mushroom board to sup

And drink the dew from the buttercup.

A scene of sorrow waits them now,

For an Ouphe has broken his vestal vow

He has loved an earthly maid,

And left for her his woodland shade;

He has lain upon her lip of dew,

And sunned him in her eye of blue,

Fanned her cheek with his wing of air,

Played in the ringlets of her hair,

And, nestling on her snowy breast,

Forgot the lily-king's behest.

For this the shadowy tribes of air

To the elfin court must haste away;

And now they stand expectant there,

To hear the doom of the Culprit Fay.

The throne was reared upon the grass,

Of spice-wood and of sassafras;

On pillars of mottled tortoise-shell

Hung the burnished canopy,—

And over it gorgeous curtains fell

Of the tulip's crimson drapery.

The monarch sat on his judgment-seat,

On his brow the crown imperial shone,

The prisoner Fay was at his feet,

And his peers were ranged around the throne.

He waved his sceptre in the air,

He looked around and calmly spoke;

His brow was grave and his eye severe,

But his voice in a softened accent broke:

"Fairy! Fairy! list and mark!

Thou halt broke thine elfin chain;

Thy flame-wood lamp is quenched and dark,

And thy wings are dyed with a deadly stain;

Thou hast sullied thine elfin purity

In the glance of a mortal maiden's eye:

Thou bast scorned our dread decree,

And thou shouldst pay the forfeit high,

But well I know her sinless mind

Is pure as the angel forms above,

Gentle and meek and chaste and kind,

Such as a spirit well might love.

Fairy! had she spot or taint,

Bitter had been thy punishment

Tied to the hornet's shardy wings,

Tossed on the pricks of nettles' stings,

Or seven long ages doomed to dwell

With the lazy worm in the walnut-shell;

Or every night to writhe and bleed

Beneath the tread of the centipede;

Or bound in a cobweb dungeon dim,

Your jailer a spider huge and grim,

Amid the carrion bodies to lie

Of the worm, and the bug and the murdered fly:

These it had been your lot to bear,

Had a stain been found on the earthly fair.

Now list and mark our mild decree

Fairy, this your doom must be:

"Thou shaft seek the beach of sand

Where the water bounds the elfin land;

Thou shaft watch the oozy brine

Till the sturgeon leaps in the bright moonshine;

Then dart the glistening arch below,

And catch a drop from his silver bow.

The water-sprites will wield their arms,

And dash around with roar and rave;

And vain are the woodland spirits' charms—

They are the imps that rule the wave.

Yet trust thee in thy single might:

If thy heart be pure and thy spirit right,

Thou shalt win the warlock fight." . . .

The goblin marked his monarch well;

He spake not, but he bowed him low;

Then plucked a crimson colen-bell,

And turned him round in act to go.

The way is long, he cannot fly,

His soiled wing has lost its power;

And he winds adown the mountain high

For many a sore and weary hour

Through dreary beds of tangled fern,

Through groves of nightshade dark and dern,

Over the grass and through the brake,

Where toils the ant and sleeps the snake;

Now over the violet's azure flush

He skips along in lightsome mood;

And now he thrids the bramble-bush,

Till its points are dyed in fairy blood;

He has leaped the bog, he has pierced the brier,

He has swum the brook, and waded the mire,

Till his spirits sank and his limbs grew weak,

And the red waxed fainter in his cheek.

He had fallen to the ground outright,

For rugged and dim was his onward track,

But there came a spotted toad in sight,

And he laughed as he jumped upon her back;

He bridled her mouth with a silkweed twist,

He lashed her sides with an osier thong;

And now through evening's dewy mist

With leap and spring they bound along,

Till the mountain's magic verge is past,

And the beach of sand is reached at last.

Soft and pale is the moony beam,

Moveless still the glassy stream;

The wave is clear, the beach is bright

With snowy shells and sparkling stones;

The shore-surge comes in ripples light,

In murmurings faint and distant moans;

And ever afar in the silence deep

Is heard the splash of the sturgeon's leap,

And the bend of his graceful bow is seen—

A glittering arch of silver sheen,

Spanning the wave of burnished blue,

And dripping with gems of the river-dew.

The elfin cast a glance around,

As he lighted down from his courser toad,

Then round his breast his wings he wound,

And close to the river's brink he strode;

He sprang on a rock, he breathed a prayer,

Above his head his arms he threw,

Then tossed a tiny curve in air,

And headlong plunged in the waters blue.

Up sprung the spirits of the waves,

from the sea-silk beds in their coral caves;

With snail-plate armor snatched in haste,

They speed their way through the liquid waste.

Some are rapidly borne along

On the mailed shrimp or the prickly prong,

Some on the blood-red leeches glide,

Some on the stony star-fish ride,

Some on the back of the lancing squab,

Some on the sideling soldier-crab,

And some on the jellied quarl that flings

At once a thousand streamy stings.

They cut the wave with the living oar,

And hurry on to the moonlight shore,

To guard their realms and chase away

The footsteps of the invading Fay.

Fearlessly he skims along;

His hope is high and his limbs are strong;

He spreads his arms like the swallow's wing,

And throws his feet with a frog-like fling;

His locks of gold on the waters shine,

At his breast the tiny foam-beads rise,

His back gleams bright above the brine,

And the wake-line foam behind him lies.

But the water-sprites are gathering near

To check his course along the tide;

Their warriors come in swift career

And hem him round on every side:

On his thigh the leech has fixed his hold,

The quad's long arms are round him rolled,

The prickly prong has pierced his skin,

And the squab has thrown his javelin,

The gritty star has rubbed him raw,

And the crab has struck with his giant claw.

He howls with rage, and he shrieks with pain;

He strikes around, but his blows are vain;

Hopeless is the unequal fight

Fairy, naught is left but flight.

He turned him round and fled amain,

With hurry and dash, to the beach again;

He twisted over from side to side,

And laid his cheek to the cleaving tide;

The strokes of his plunging arms are fleet,

And with all his might he flings his feet.

But the water-sprites are round him still,

To cross his path and work him ill:

They bade the wave before him rise;

They flung the sea-fire in his eyes;

And they stunned his ears with the scallop-stroke,

With the porpoise heave and the drum-fish croak.

Oh, but a weary wight was he

When he reached the foot of the dog-wood tree.

Gashed and wounded, and stiff and sore,

He laid him down on the sandy shore;

He blessed the force of the charmed line,

And he banned the water-goblins spite,

For he saw around in the sweet moonshine

Their little wee faces above the brine,

Giggling and laughing with all their might

At the piteous hap of the Fairy wight.

Soon he gathered the balsam dew

From the sorrel-leaf and the henbane bud;

Over each wound the balm he drew,

And with cobweb lint he stanched the blood.

The mild west wind was soft and low;

It cooled the heat of his burning brow,

And he felt new life in his sinews shoot

As he drank the juice of the calamus root.

And now he treads the fatal shore

As fresh and vigorous as before.

Wrapped in musing stands the sprite

'Tis the middle wane of night;

His task is hard, his way is far,

But he must do his errand right

Ere dawning mounts her beamy car,

And rolls her chariot wheels of light;

And vain are the spells of fairy-land,

He must work with a human hand.

He cast a saddened look around;

But he felt new joy his bosom swell,

When glittering on the shadowed ground

He saw a purple mussel-shell;

Thither he ran, and he bent him low,

He heaved at the stern and he heaved at the bow,

And he pushed her over the yielding sand

Till he came; to the verge of the haunted land.

She was as lovely a pleasure-boat

As ever fairy had paddled in,

For she glowed with purple paint without,

And shone with silvery pearl within

A sculler's notch in the stern he made,

An oar he shaped of the bootle-blade;

Then sprung to his seat with a lightsome leap,

And launched afar on the calm, blue deep.

The imps of the river yell and rave

They had no power above the wave,

But they heaved the billow before the prow,

And they dashed the surge against her side,

And they struck her keel with jerk and blow,

Till the gunwale bent to the rocking tide.

She wimpled about to the pale moonbeam,

Like a feather that floats on a wind-tossed stream;

And momently athwart her track

The quad upreared his island back,

And the fluttering scallop behind would float,

And patter the water about the boat;

But he bailed her out with his colon-bell,

And he kept her trimmed with a wary tread,

While on every side like lightning fell

The heavy strokes of his Bootle-blade.

Onward still he held his way,

Till he came where the column of moonshine lay,

And saw beneath the surface dim

The brown-backed sturgeon slowly swim.

Around him were the goblin train;

But he sculled with all his might and main,

And followed wherever the sturgeon led,

Till he saw him upward point his head;

"Mien he dropped his paddle-blade,

And held his colen-goblet up

To catch the drop in its crimson cup.

With sweeping tail and quivering fin

Through the wave the sturgeon flew,

And like the heaven-shot javelin

He sprung above the waters blue.

Instant as the star-fall light,

He plunged him in the deep again,

But left an arch of silver bright,

The rainbow of the moony main.

It was a strange and lovely sight

To see the puny goblin there:

He seemed an angel form of light,

With azure wing and sunny hair,

Throned on a cloud of purple fair,

Circled with blue and edged with white,

And sitting at the fall of even

Beneath the bow of summer heaven.

A moment, and its lustre fell;

But ere it met the billow blue

He caught within his crimson bell

A droplet of its sparkling dew.

Joy to thee, Fay! thy task is done;

Thy wings are pure, for the gem is won.

Cheerly ply thy dripping oar,

And haste away to the elfin shore!

He turns, and to on either side

The ripples on his path divide;

And the track o'er which his boat must pass

Is smooth as a sheet of polished glass.

Around, their limbs the sea-nymphs lave,

With snowy arms half swelling out,

While on the glossed and gleamy wave

Their sea-green ringlets loosely float:

They swim around with smile and song;

They press the bark with pearly hand,

And gently urge her course along,

Toward the beach of speckled sand;

And as he lightly leaped to land

They bade adieu with nod and bow,

Then gaily kissed each little hand,

And dropped in the crystal deep below.

A moment stayed the fairy there:

He kissed the beach and breathed a prayer;

Then spread his wings of gilded blue,

And on to the elfin court he flew.

As ever ye saw a bubble rise,

And shine with a thousand changing dyes,

Till, lessening far, through ether driven,

It mingles with the hues of heaven;

As, at the glimpse of morning pale,

The lance-fly spreads his silken sail

And gleams with bleedings soft and bright

Till lost in the shades of fading night;

So rose from earth the lovely Fay,

So vanished far in heaven away!

FITZ-GREENE HALLECK

MARCO BOZZARIS

At midnight, in his guarded tent,

The Turk was dreaming of the hour

When Greece, her knee in suppliance bent,

Should tremble at his power;

In dreams, through camp and court he bore.

The trophies of a conqueror;

In dreams his song of triumph heard;

Then wore his monarch's signet ring;

Then pressed that monarch's throne—a king:

As wild his thoughts and gay of wing

As Eden's garden bird.

At midnight, in the forest shades,

Bozzaris ranged his Suliote band,

True as the steel of their tried blades,

Heroes in heart and hand.

There had the Persian's thousands stood,

There had the glad earth drunk their blood

On old Plataea's day;

And now there breathed that haunted air

The sons of sires who conquered there,

With arm to strike, and soul to dare,

As quick, as far as they.

An hour passed on—the Turk awoke;

That bright dream was his last;

He woke—to hear his sentries shriek,

"To arms! they come! the Greek! the Greek!"

He woke—to die midst flame and smoke,

And shout and groan and sabre-stroke,

And death-shots falling thick and fast

As lightnings from the mountain-cloud;

And heard, with voice as trumpet loud,

Bozzaris cheer his band:

Strike—till the last armed foe expires!

Strike—for your altars and your fires!

Strike—for the green graves of your sires,

God, and your native land!"

They fought like brave men, long and well;

They piled that ground with Moslem slain;

They conquered—but Bozzaris fell,

Bleeding at every vein.

His few surviving comrades saw

His smile when rang their proud hurrah,

And the red field was won;

Then saw in death his eyelids close

Calmly, as to a night's repose,

Like flowers at set of sun.

Come to the bridal chamber, Death!

Come to the mother's when she feels,

For the first time, her first-horn's breath;

Come when the blessed seals

That close the pestilence are broke,

And crowded cities wail its stroke;

Come in consumption's ghastly form,

The earthquake shock, the ocean storm;

Come when the heart beats high and warm

With banquet-song and dance and wine;

And thou art terrible—the tear,

The groan, the knell, the pall, the bier,

And all we know or dream or fear

Of agony, are thine.

But to the hero, when his sword

Has won the battle for the free,

Thy voice sounds like a prophet's word,

And in its hollow tones are heard

The thanks of millions yet to be.

Come when his task of fame is wrought,

Come with her laurel-leaf, blood-bought,

Come in her crowning hour, and then

Thy sunken eye's unearthly light

To him is welcome as the sight

Of sky and stars to prisoned men;

Thy grasp is welcome as the hand

Of brother in a foreign land;

Thy summons welcome as the cry

That told the Indian isles were nigh

To the world-seeking Genoese,

When the land-wind, from woods of palm

And orange-groves and fields of balm,

Blew oer the Haytian seas.

Bozzaris, with the storied brave

Greece nurtured in her glory's time,

Rest thee—there is no prouder gave.

Even in her own proud clime.

She wore no funeral-weeds for thee,

Nor bade the dark hearse wave its plume,

Like torn branch from death's leafless tree,

In sorrow's pomp and pageantry,

The heartless luxury of the tomb.

But she remembers thee as one

Long loved and for a season gone;

For thee her poet's lyre is wreathed,

Her marble wrought, her music breathed;

For thee she rings the birthday bells;

Of thee her babes' first lisping tells;

For throe her evening prayer is said

At palace-couch and cottage-bed;

Her soldier, closing with the foe,

Gives for thy sake a deadlier blow;

His plighted maiden, when she fears

For him, the joy of her young years,

Thinks of thy fate and checks her tears;

And she, the mother of thy boys,

Though in her eye and faded cheek

Is read the grief she will not speak,

The memory of her buried joys,

And even she who gave thee birth,

Will, by their pilgrim-circled hearth,

Talk of thy doom without a sigh,

For thou art Freedom's now and Fame's,

One of the few, the immortal names,

That were not born to die.

ON THE DEATH OF JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE

Green be the turf above thee,

Friend of my better days!

None knew thee but to love thee,

Nor named thee but to praise.

Tears fell, when thou went dying,

From eyes unused to weep,

And long where thou art lying,

Will tears the cold turf steep.

When hearts, whose truth was proven,

Like throe, are laid in earth,

There should a wreath be woven

To tell the world their worth;

And I, who woke each morrow

To clasp thy hand in mine,

Who shared thy joy and sorrow,

Whose weal and woe were thine;

It should be mine to braid it

Around thy faded brow,

But I've in vain essayed it,

And I feel I cannot now.

While memory bids me weep thee,

Nor thoughts nor words are free,

The grief is fixed too deeply

That mourns a man like thee.

JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

HOME, SWEET HOME

Mid pleasures and palaces though we may roam,

Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home;

A charm from the sky seems to hallow us there,

Which, seek through the world, is ne'er met with elsewhere.

Home, Home, sweet, sweet Home!

There's no place like Home! there's no place like Home!

An exile from home, splendor dazzles in vain;

O, give me my lowly thatched cottage again!

The birds singing gayly, that came at my call,—

Give me them,—and the peace of mind, dearer than all!

Home, Home, sweet, sweet Home!

There's no place like Home! there's no place like Home!

How sweet 'tis to sit 'neath a fond father's smile,

And the cares of a mother to soothe and beguile!

Let others delight mid new pleasures to roam,

But give me, oh, give me, the pleasures of home!

Home, Home, sweet, sweet Home!

There's no place like Home! there's no place like Home!

To thee I'll return, overburdened with care;

The heart's dearest solace will smile on me there;

No more from that, cottage again will I roam;

Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home.

Home, Home, sweet, sweet Home!

There's no place like Home! there's no place like Home!

EDGAR ALLAN POE

TO HELEN

Helen, thy beauty is to me

Like those Nicean barks of yore,

That gently, o'er a perfumed sea,

The weary, way-worn wanderer bore

To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam,

Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,

Thy Naiad airs have brought me home

To the glory that was Greece,

And the grandeur that was Rome.

Lo! in yon brilliant window-niche

How statue-like I see thee stand,

The agate lamp within thy hand!

Ah, Psyche, from the regions which

Are Holy-Land!

ISRAFEL

In Heaven a spirit doth dwell

"Whose heart-strings are a lute;"

None sing so wildly well

As the angel Israel,

And the giddy stars (so legends tell)

Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell

Of his voice, all mute.

Tottering above

In her highest noon,

The enamoured moon

Blushes with love,

While, to listen, the red levin

(With the rapid Pleiads, even,

Which were seven,)

Pauses in Heaven.

And they say (the starry choir

And the other listening things)

That Israeli's fire

Is owing to that lyre

By which he sits and sings—

The trembling living wire

Of those unusual strings.

But the skies that angel trod,

Where deep thoughts are a duty—

Where Love's a grown-up God—

Where the Houri glances are

Imbued with all the beauty

Which we worship in a star.

Therefore, thou art not wrong,

Israfeli, who despisest

An unimpassioned song;

To thee the laurels belong,

Best bard, because the wisest!

Merrily live, and long!

The ecstasies above

With thy burning measures suit—

Thy grief, thy joy, thy hate, thy love,

With the fervour of thy lute—

Well may the stars be mute!

Yes, Heaven is thin-e; but this

Is a world of sweets and sours;

Our flowers are merely—flowers,

And the shadow of thy perfect bliss

Is the sunshine of ours.

If I could dwell

Where Israfel

Hath dwelt, and he where I,

He might not sing so wildly well

A mortal melody,

While a bolder note than this might swell

From my lyre within the sky.

LENORE

Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever!

Let the bell toll!—a saintly soul floats on the Stygian river;

And, Guy De Vere, halt thou no tear?—weep now or never more!

See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore!

Come! let the burial rite be read—the funeral song be sung!—

An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young—

A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young.

"Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride,

"And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed her—that she died!

"How shall the ritual, then, be read?—the requiem how be sung

"By you—by yours, the evil eye,—by yours, the slanderous tongue

"That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?"

Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and let a Sabbath song

Go up to God so solemnly the dead may feel no wrong!

The sweet Lenore hath "gone before," with Hope, that flew beside,

Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should have been thy bride

For her, the fair and debonair, that now so lowly lies,

The life upon her yellow hair but not within her eyes—

The life still there, upon her hair—the death upon her eyes.

"Avaunt! avaunt! from fiends below, the indignant ghost is riven—

"From Hell unto a high estate far up within the Heaven—

"From grief and groan, to a golden throne, beside the King of

Heaven."

Let no bell toll then!—lest her soul, amid its hallowed mirth,

Should catch the note as it doth float up from the damned Earth!

And I!—to-night my heart is light! No dirge will I upraise,

But waft the angel on her flight with a Paean of old days!

THE COLISEUM

Type of the antique Rome! Rich reliquary

Of lofty contemplation left to Time

By bunted centuries of pomp and power!

At length—at length—after so many days

Of weary pilgrimage and burning thirst,

(Thirst for the springs of lore that in thee lie,)

I kneel, an altered and an humble man,

Amid thy shadows, and so drink within

My very soul thy grandeur, gloom, and glory!

Vastness! and Age! and Memories of Eld!

Silence! and Desolation! and dim Night!

I feel ye now—I feel ye in your strength—

O spells more sure than e'er Judaean king

Taught in the gardens of Gethsemane!

O charms more potent than the rapt Chaldee

Ever drew down from out the quiet stars!

Here, where a hero fell, a column falls!

Here, where the mimic eagle glared in gold,

A midnight vigil holds the swarthy bat!

Here, where the dames of Rome their gilded hair

Waved to the wind, now wave the reed and thistle!

Here, where on golden throne the monarch lolled,

Glides, spectre-like, unto his marble home,

Lit by the wan light of the horned moon,

The swift and silent lizard of the stones!

But stay! these walls—these ivy-clad arcades—

These mouldering plinths—these sad and blackened shafts—

These vague entablatures—this crumbling frieze—

These shattered cornices—this wreck—this ruin—

These stones—alas! these gray stones—are they all—

All of the famed, and the colossal left

By the corrosive Hours to Fate and me?

"Not all"—the Echoes answer me—"not all!

"Prophetic sounds and loud, arise forever

"From us, and from all Ruin, unto the wise,

"As melody from Memnon to the Sun.

"We rule the hearts of mightiest men—we rule

"With a despotic sway all giant minds.

"We are not impotent—we pallid stones.

"Not all our power is gone—not all our fame—

"Not all the magic of our high renown—

"Not all the wonder that encircles us—

"Not all the mysteries that in us lie—

"Not all the memories that hang upon

"And cling around about us as a garment,

"Clothing us in a robe of more than glory."

THE HAUNTED PALACE

In the greenest of our valleys

By good angels tenanted,

Once a fair and stately palace—

Radiant palace—reared its head.

In the monarch Thought's dominion—

It stood there!

Never seraph spread a pinion

Over fabric half so fair!

Banners yellow, glorious, golden,

On its roof did float and flow,

(This—all this—was in the olden

Time long ago,)

And every gentle air that dallied;

In that sweet day,

Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,

A winged odor went away.

Wanderers in that happy valley,

Through two luminous windows, saw

Spirits moving musically,

To a lute's well-tuned law,

Round about a throne where, sitting,

(Porphyrogene!)

In state his glory well befitting,

The ruler of the realm was seen.

And all with pearl and ruby glowing

Was the fair palace door,

Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing

And sparkling evermore,

A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty

Was but to sing,

In voices of surpassing beauty,

The wit and wisdom of their king.

But evil things, in robes of sorrow,

Assailed the monarch's high estate.

(Ah, let us mourn!—for never morrow

Shall dawn upon him desolate!)

And round about his home the glory

That blushed and bloomed,

Is but a dim-remembered story

Of the old time entombed.

And travellers, now, within that valley,

Through the red-litten windows see

Vast forms, that move fantastically

To a discordant melody,

While, like a ghastly rapid river,

Through the pale door

A hideous throng rush out forever

And laugh—but smile no more.

TO ONE IN PARADISE

Thou wast all that to me, love,

For which my soul did pine—

A green isle in the sea, love,

A fountain and a shrine

All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers,

And all the flowers were mine.

Ah, dream too bright to last!

Ah, starry Hope! that didst arise

But to be overcast!

A voice from out the Future cries,

"On! on!"—but o'er the Past

(Dim gulf!) my spirit hovering lies

Mute, motionless, aghast!

For, alas! alas! with me

The light of Life is o'er!

"No more—no more—no more—"

(Such language holds the solemn sea

To the sands upon the shore)

Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree,

Or the stricken eagle soar!

And all my days are trances,

And all my nightly dreams

Are where thy grey eye glances,

And where thy footstep gleams—

In what ethereal dances,

By what eternal streams.

EULALIE.—A SONG

I dwelt alone

In a world of moan,

And my soul was a stagnant tide,

Till the fair and gentle Eulalie became my blushing bride—

Till the yellow-haired young Eulalie became my smiling bride.

Ah, less—less bright

The stars of the night

Than the eyes of the radiant girl!

And never a flake

That the vapor can make

With the moon-tints of purple and pearl,

Can vie with the modest Eulalie's most unregarded curl—

Can compare with the bright-eyed Eulalie's most humble

and careless curl.

Now Doubt—now Pain

Come never again,

For her soul gives me sigh for sigh,

And all day long

Shines, bright and strong,

Astarte within the sky,

While ever to her dear Eulalie upturns her matron eye—

While ever to her young Eulalie upturns her violet eye.

THE RAVEN

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore

While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,

As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door

"'Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my chamber door—

Only this and nothing more."

Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;

And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor—

Eagerly I wished the morrow;—vainly I had sought to borrow

From my books surcease of sorrow—sorrow for the lost Lenore—

For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore—

Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain

Thrilled me—filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before;

So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating

"'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door—

Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door;—

This it is and nothing more."

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer,

"Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore;

But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping

And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,

That I scarce was sure I heard you"—here I opened wide the door;—

Darkness there and nothing more.

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering,

fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;

But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token,

And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore!"

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word "Lenore!"

Merely this and nothing more.

Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,

Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before.

"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice;

Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore—

Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;—

'Tis the wind and nothing more!"

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter

In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.

Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;

But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door—

Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door—

Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,

By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,

"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art

sure no craven,

Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore—

Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!"

Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,

Though its answer little meaning—little relevancy bore;

For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being

Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door—

Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door,

With such name as "Nevermore."

But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only

That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour.

Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered—

Till I scarcely more than muttered "Other friends have flown before—

On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before."

Then the bird said "Nevermore."

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,

"Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and store,

Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster

Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore

Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore—

Of 'Never—nevermore.'"

But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smiling,

Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and

door;

Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking

Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore—

What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore

Meant in croaking "Nevermore."

Thus I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing

To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;

This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining

On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,

But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er,

She shall press, ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer

Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor.

"Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee—by these angels he hath

sent thee

Respite—respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore;

Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!"

Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! prophet still, if bird or devil!-

Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,

Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted

On this home by Horror haunted—tell me truly, I implore—

Is there—is there balm in Gilead?—tell me—tell me, I implore!"

Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil—prophet still, if bird or devil!

By that Heaven that bends above us—by that God we both adore—

Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn,

It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore:

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore."

Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

"Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked,

upstarting—

"Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore!

Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken!

Leave my loneliness unbroken!—quit the bust above my door!

Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my

door!"

Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting

On the pallid bust of Pallas dust above my chamber door;

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,

And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted—nevermore!

TO HELEN

I saw thee once—once only—years ago

I must not say how many—but not many.

It was a July midnight; and from out

A full-orbed moon, that, like thine own soul, soaring,

Sought a precipitate pathway up through heaven,

There fell a silvery-silken veil of light,

With quietude and sultriness and slumber,

Upon the upturn'd faces of a thousand

Roses that grew in an enchanted garden,

Where no wind dared to stir, unless on tiptoe—

Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses

That gave out, in return for the love-light,

Their odorous souls in an ecstatic death—

Fell on the upturn'd faces of these roses

That smiled and died in this parterre, enchanted

By thee, and by the poetry of thy presence.

Clad all in white, upon a violet bank

I saw thee half reclining; while the moon

Fell on the upturn'd faces of the roses,

And on throe own, upturn'd—alas, in sorrow!

Was it not Fate, that, on this July midnight—

Was it not Fate, (whose name is also Sorrow),

That bade me pause before that garden-gate,

To breathe the incense of those slumbering roses?

No footstep stirred: the hated world all slept,

Save only thee and me. (Oh, heaven!—oh, God!

How my heart beats in coupling those two words!)

Save only thee and me. I paused—I looked—

And in an instant all things disappeared.

(Ah, bear in mind this garden was enchanted!)

The pearly lustre of the moon went out:

The mossy banks and the meandering paths,

The happy flowers and the repining trees,

Were seen no more: the very roses' odors

Died in the arms of the adoring airs.

All—all expired save thee—save less than thou:

Save only the divine light in throe eyes—

Save but the soul in throe uplifted eyes.

I saw but them—they were the world to me.

I saw but them—saw only them for hours—

Saw only there until the moon went down.

What wild heart-histories seemed to lie enwritten

Upon those crystalline, celestial spheres!

How dark a wo! yet how sublime a hope!

How silently serene a sea of pride!

How daring an ambition! yet how deep—

How fathomless a capacity for love!

But now, at length, dear Dian sank from sight,

Into a western couch of thunder-cloud;

And thou, a ghost, amid the entombing trees

Didst glide away. Only thine eyes remained.

They would not go—they never yet have gone.

Lighting my lonely pathway home that night,

They have not left me (as my hopes have) since.

They follow me—they lead me through the years—

They are my ministers—yet I their slave.

Their office is to illumine and enkindle—

My duty, to be saved by their bright light,

And purified in their electric fire,

And sanctified in their elysian fire.

They fill my soul with Beauty (which is Hope),

And are far up in Heaven—the stars I kneel to

In the sad, silent watches of my night;

While even in the meridian glare of day

I see them still—two sweetly scintillant

Venuses, unextinguished by the sun!

ANNABEL LEE

It was many and many a year ago,

In a kingdom by the sea

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

By the name of ANNABEL LEE;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,

In this kingdom by the sea,

But we loved with a love that was more than love—

I and my ANNABEL LEE—

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven

Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,

In this kingdom by the sea,

A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling

My beautiful ANNABEL LEE;

So that her highborn kinsmen came

And bore her away from me,

To shut her up in a sepulchre

In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,

Went envying her and me—

Yes!—that was the reason (as all men know,

In this kingdom by the sea)

That the wind came out of the cloud by night,

Chilling and killing my ANNABEL LEE.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

Of those who were older than we—

Of many far wiser than we—

And neither the angels in heaven above,

Nor the demons down under the sea,

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul

Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE:

For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE;

And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes

Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE:

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side

Of my darling—my darling—my life and my bride

In the sepulchre there by the sea—

In her tomb by the sounding sea.

THE BELLS

Hear the sledges with the bells—

Silver bells!

What a world of merriment their melody foretells!

How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,

In the icy air of night!

While the stars that oversprinkle

All the heavens, seem to twinkle

With a crystalline delight

Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells

From the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells—

From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

Hear the mellow wedding bells,

Golden bells!

What a world of happiness their harmony foretell:

Through the balmy air of night

How they ring out their delight!

From the molten-golden notes,

And all in tune,

What a liquid ditty floats,

To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats

On the moon!

Oh, from out the sounding cells,

What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!

How it swells!

How it dwells

On the Future!—how it tells

Of the rapture that impels

To the swinging and the ringing

Of the bells, bells, bells—

Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells—

To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!

Hear the loud alarum bells—

Brazen bells!

What a tale of terror, now their turbulency tells!

In the startled ear of night

How they scream out their affright!

Too much horrified to speak,

They can only shriek, shriek,

Out of tune,

In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,

In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,

Leaping higher, higher, higher,

With a desperate desire,

And a resolute endeavor

Now—now to sit, or never,

By the side of the pale-faced moon.

Oh, the bells, bells, bells!

What a tale their terror tells

Of Despair!

How they clang, and clash, and roar!

What a horror they outpour

On the bosom of the palpitating air!

Yet, the ear, it fully knows,

By the twanging,

And the clanging,

How the danger ebbs and flows;

Yet the ear distinctly tells,

In the jangling,

And the wrangling,

How the danger sinks and swells,

By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells

Of the bells—

Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, belts, bells—

In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!

Hear the tolling of the bells—

Iron bells

What a world of solemn thought their monody compels!

In the silence of the night,

How we shiver with affright

At the melancholy menace of their tone:

For every sound that floats

From the rust within their throats

Is a groan.

And the people—ah, the people—

They that dwell up in the steeple,

All alone,

And who, tolling, tolling, tolling,

In that muffled monotone,

Feel a glory in so rolling,

On the human heart a stone—

They are neither man or woman—

They are neither brute nor human—

They are Ghouls:—

And their king it is who tolls:—

And he rolls, rolls, rolls,

Rolls

A paean from the bells!

And his merry bosom swells

With the paean of the bells!

And he dances, and he yells;

Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the paean of the bells:—

Of the bells

Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the throbbing of the bells—

Of the bells, bells, bells—

To the sobbing of the bells:—

Keeping time, time, time,

As he knells, knells, knells,

In a happy Runic rhyme,

To the rolling of the bells—

Of the bells, bells, bells:—

To the tolling of the bells—

Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells

To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.

ELDORADO

Gaily bedight,

A gallant knight,

In sunshine and in shadow,

Had journeyed long,

Singing a song,

In search of Eldorado.

But he grew old—

This knight so bold—

And o'er his heart a shadow

Fell as he found

No spot of ground

That looked like Eldorado.

And, as his strength

Failed him at length,

He met a pilgrim shadow—

"Shadow," said he,

"Where can it be—

This land of Eldorado?"

"Over the Mountains

Of the Moon,

Down the Valley of the Shadow,

Ride, boldly ride,"

The shade replied,

"If you seek for Eldorado."

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

HYMN TO THE NIGHT

I heard the trailing garments of the Night

Sweep through her marble halls!

I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light

From the celestial walls!

I felt her presence, by its spell of might,

Stoop o'er me from above;

The calm, majestic presence of the Night,

As of the one I love.

I heard the sounds of sorrow and delight,

The manifold, soft chimes,

That fill the haunted chambers of the Night,

Like some old poet's rhymes.

From the cool cisterns of the midnight air

My spirit drank repose;

The fountain of perpetual peace flows there—

From those deep cisterns flows.

O holy Night! from thee I learn to bear

What man has borne before!

Thou layest thy finger on the lips of Care,

And they complain no more.

Peace! Peace! Orestes-like I breathe this prayer!

Descend with broad-winged flight,

The welcome, the thrice-prayed for, the most fair,

The best-beloved Night!

A PSALM OF LIFE

WHAT THE HEART OF THE YOUNG MAN SAID TO THE PSALMIST

Tell me not, in mournful numbers,

"Life is but an empty dream!"

For the soul is dead that slumbers,

And things are not what they seem.

Life is real! Life is earnest!

And the grave is not its goal;

"Dust thou art, to dust returnest,"

Was not spoken of the soul.

Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,

Is our destined end or way;

But to act, that each to-morrow

Find us farther than to-day.

Art is long, and Time is fleeting,

And our hearts, though stout and brave,

Still, like muffled drums, are beating

Funeral marches to the grave.

In the world's broad field of battle,

In the bivouac of Life,

Be not like dumb, driven cattle;

Be a hero in the strife!

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant

Let the dead Past bury its dead!

Act,—act in the living Present!

Heart within, and God o'erhead!

Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime,

And, departing, leave behind us

Footprints on the sands of time;

Footprints, that perhaps another,

Sailing o'er life's solemn main,

A forlorn and shipwrecked brother,

Seeing, shall take heart again.

Let us, then, be up and doing,

With a heart for any fate;

Still achieving, still pursuing,

Learn to labor and to wait.

THE SKELETON IN ARMOR

"Speak! speak! thou fearful guest!

Who, with thy hollow breast

Still in rude armor drest,

Comest to daunt me!

Wrapt not in Eastern balms,

But with thy fleshless palms

Stretched, as if asking alms,

Why dost thou haunt me?"

Then, from those cavernous eyes

Pale flashes seemed to rise,

As when the Northern skies

Gleam in December;

And, like the water's flow

Under December's snow,

Came a dull voice of woe

From the heart's chamber.

"I was a Viking old!

My deeds, though manifold,

No Skald in song has told,

No Saga taught thee!

Take heed, that in thy verse

Thou dost the tale rehearse,

Else dread a dead man's curse;

For this I sought thee.

"Far in the Northern Land,

By the wild Baltic's strand,

I, with my childish hand,

Tamed the ger-falcon;

And, with my skates fast-bound,

Skimmed the half-frozen Sound,

That the poor whimpering hound

Trembled to walk on.

"Oft to his frozen lair

Tracked I the grisly bear,

While from my path the hare

Fled like a shadow;

Oft through the forest dark

Followed the were-wolf's bark,

Until the soaring lark

Sang from the meadow.

"But when I older grew,

Joining a corsair's crew,

O'er the dark sea I flew

With the marauders.

Wild was the life we led;

Many the souls that sped,

Many the hearts that bled,

By our stern orders.

"Many a wassail-bout

Wore the long Winter out;

Often our midnight shout

Set the cocks crowing,

As we the Berserk's tale

Measured in cups of ale,

Draining the oaken pail,

Filled to o'erflowing.

"Once as I told in glee

Tales of the stormy sea,

Soft eyes did gaze on me,

Burning yet tender;

And as the white stars shine

On the dark Norway pine,

On that dark heart of mine

Fell their soft splendor.

"I wooed the blue-eyed maid,

Yielding, yet half afraid,

And in the forest's shade

Our vows were plighted.

Under its loosened vest

Fluttered her little breast,

Like birds within their nest

By the hawk frighted.

"Bright in her father's hall

Shields gleamed upon the wall,

Loud sang the minstrels all,

Chaunting his glory;

When of old Hildebrand

I asked his daughter's hand,

Mute did the minstrels stand

To hear my story.

"While the brown ale he quaffed,

Loud then the champion laughed,

And as the wind-gusts waft

The sea-foam brightly,

So the loud laugh of scorn,

Out of those lips unshorn,

From the deep drinking-horn

Blew the foam lightly.

"She was a Prince's child,

I but a Viking wild,

And though she blushed and smiled,

I was discarded!

Should not the dove so white

Follow the sea-mew's flight,

Why did they leave that night

Her nest unguarded?

"Scarce had I put to sea,

Bearing the maid with me,—

Fairest of all was she

Among the Norsemen!—

When on the white sea-strand,

Waving his armed hand,

Saw we old Hildebrand,

With twenty horsemen.

"Then launched they to the blast,

Bent like a reed each mast,

Yet we were gaining fast,

When the wind failed us;

And with a sudden flaw

Come round the gusty Skaw,

So that our foe we saw

Laugh as he hailed us.

"And as to catch the gale

Round veered the flapping sail,

Death! was the helmsman's hail

Death without quarter!

Mid-ships with iron keel

Struck we her ribs of steel;

Down her black hulk did reel

Through the black water!

"As with his wings aslant,

Sails the fierce cormorant,

Seeking some rocky haunt,

With his prey laden,

So toward the open main,

Beating to sea again,

Through the wild hurricane,

Bore I the maiden.

"Three weeks we westward bore,

And when the storm was o'er,

Cloud-like we saw the shore

Stretching to lee-ward;

There for my lady's bower

Built I the lofty tower,

Which to this very hour,

Stands looking sea-ward.

"There lived we many years;

Time dried the maiden's tears;

She had forgot her fears,

She was a mother;

Death closed her mild blue eyes,

Under that tower she lies;

Ne'er shall the sun arise

On such another!

"Still grew my bosom then,

Still as a stagnant fen!

Hateful to me were men,

The sun-light hateful.

In the vast forest here,

Clad in my warlike gear,

Fell I upon my spear,

O, death was grateful!

"Thus, seamed with many scars

Bursting these prison bars,

Up to its native stars

My soul ascended!

There from the flowing bowl

Deep drinks the warrior's soul,

Skoal! to the Northland! skoal!"

—Thus the tale ended.

THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS

It was the schooner Hesperus,

That sailed the wintry sea:

And the skipper had taken his little daughter,

To bear him company.

Blue were her eyes as the fairy-flax,

Her cheeks like the dawn of day,

And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds,

That ope in the month of May.

The skipper he stood beside the helm,

His pipe was in his mouth,

And he watched how the veering flaw did blow

The smoke now West, now South.

Then up and spake an old Sailor,

Had sailed the Spanish Main,

"I pray thee, put into yonder port

For I fear a hurricane.

"Last night, the moon had a golden ring,

And to-night no moon we see!"

The skipper, he blew a whiff from his pipe,

And a scornful laugh laughed he.

Colder and louder blew the wind,

A gale from the Northeast;

The snow fell hissing in the brine,

And the billows frothed like yeast.

Down came the storm, and smote amain,

The vessel in its strength;

She shuddered and paused, like a frighted steed,

Then leaped her cable's length,

"Come hither! come hither! my little daughter,

And do not tremble so;

For I can weather the roughest gale,

That ever wind did blow."

He wrapped her warm in his seaman's coat

Against the stinging blast;

He cut a rope from a broken spar,

And bound her to the mast.

"O father! I hear the church-bells ring,

O say, what may it be?"

"'Tis a fog-bell on a rock-bound coast!"

And he steered for the open sea.

"O father! I hear the sound of guns,

O say, what may it be?"

"Some ship in distress, that cannot live

In such an angry sea!"

"O father! I see a gleaming light,

O say, what may it be?"

But the father answered never a word,

A frozen corpse was he.

Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark,

With his face turned to the skies,

The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow

On his fixed and glassy eyes.

Then the maiden clasped her hands and prayed

That saved she might be;

And she thought of Christ, who stilled the wave,

On the Lake of Galilee.

And fast through the midnight dark and drear,

Through the whistling sleet and snow,

Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept

Towards the reef of Norman's Woe.

And ever the fitful gusts between,

A sound came from the land;

It was the sound of the trampling surf,

On the rocks and the hard sea-sand.

The breakers were right beneath her bows,

She drifted a dreary wreck,

And a whooping billow swept the crew

Like icicles from her deck.

She struck where the white and fleecy waves

Looked soft as carded wool,

But the cruel rocks, they gored her side

Like the horns of an angry bull.

Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice,

With the masts went by the board;

Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank,

Ho! ho! the breakers roared!

At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach,

A fisherman stood aghast,

To see the form of a maiden fair,

Lashed close to a drifting mast.

The salt sea was frozen on her breast,

The salt tears in her eyes;

And he saw her hair, like the brown sea-weed,

On the billows fall and rise.

Such was the wreck of the Hesperus,

In the midnight and the snow!

Christ save us all from a death like this,

On the reef of Norman's Woe!

THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH

Under a spreading chestnut tree

The village smithy stands;

The smith, a mighty man is he,

With large and sinewy hands;

And the muscles of his brawny arms

Are strong as iron bands.

His hair is crisp, and black, and long,

His face is like the tan;

His brow is wet with honest sweat,

He earns whate'er he can,

And looks the whole world in the face,

For he owes not any man.

Week in, week out, from morn till night,

You can hear his bellows blow;

You can hear him swing his heavy sledge,

With measured beat and slow,

Like a sexton ringing the village bell,

When the evening sun is low.

And children coming home from school

Look in at the open door;

They love to see the flaming forge,

And hear the bellows roar,

And catch the burning sparks that fly

Like chaff from a threshing-floor.

He goes on Sunday to the church,

And sits among his boys

He hears the parson pray and preach,

He hears his daughter's voice,

Singing in the village choir,

And it makes his heart rejoice.

It sounds to him like her mother's voice,

Singing in Paradise!

He needs must think of her once more,

How in the grave she lies;

And with his hard, rough hand he wipe

A tear out of his eyes.

Toiling,—rejoicing,—sorrowing,

Onward through life he goes;

Each morning sees some task begin,

Each evening sees it close;

Something attempted, something done,

Has earned a night's repose.

Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend,

For the lesson thou hast taught!

Thus at the flaming forge of life

Our fortunes must be wrought;

Thus on its sounding anvil shaped

Each burning deed and thought!

IT IS NOT ALWAYS MAY

NO HAY PAJAROS EN LOS NIDOS DE ANTANO

Spanish Proverb,

The sun is bright,—the air is clear,

The darting swallows soar and sing,

And from the stately elms I hear

The bluebird prophesying Spring.

So blue yon winding river flows,

It seems an outlet from the sky,

Where, waiting till the west wind blows,

The freighted clouds at anchor lie.

All things are new;—the buds, the leaves,

That gild the elm tree's nodding crest.

And even the nest beneath the eaves;

There are no birds in last year's nest!

All things rejoice in youth and love,

The fulness of their first delight!

And learn from the soft heavens above

The melting tenderness of night.

Maiden, that read'st this simple rhyme,

Enjoy thy youth, it will not stay;

Enjoy the fragrance of thy prime,

For O! it is not always May!

Enjoy the Spring of Love and Youth,

To some good angel leave the rest;

For Time will teach thee soon the truth,

There are no birds in last year's nest!

EXCELSIOR

The shades of night were falling fast,

As through an Alpine village passed

A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice,

A banner with the strange device,

Excelsior!

His brow was sad; his eye beneath,

Flashed like a falchion from its sheath,

And like a silver clarion rung

The accents of that unknown tongue,

Excelsior!

In happy homes he saw the light

Of household fires gleam warm and bright;

Above, the spectral glaciers shone,

And from his lips escaped a groan,

Excelsior!

"Try not the Pass!" the old man said;

"Dark lowers the tempest overhead,

The roaring torrent is deep and wide!"

And loud that clarion voice replied,

Excelsior!

"O stay," the maiden said, "and rest

Thy weary head upon this breast!"

A tear stood in his bright blue eye,

But still he answered, with a sigh,

Excelsior!

"Beware the pine tree's withered branch!

Beware the awful avalanche!"

This was the peasant's last Good-night,

A voice replied, far up the height,

Excelsior!

At break of day, as heavenward

The pious monks of Saint Bernard

Uttered the oft-repeated prayer,

A voice cried through the startled air,

Excelsior!

A traveller, by the faithful hound,

Half-buried in the snow was found,

Still grasping in his hand of ice

That banner with the strange device,

Excelsior!

There in the twilight cold and gray,

Lifeless, but beautiful, he lay,

And from the sky, serene and far,

A voice fell, like a falling star,

Excelsior!

THE RAINY DAY

The day is cold, and dark, and dreary;

It rains, and the wind is never weary;

The vine still clings to the mouldering wall,

But at every gust the dead leaves fall,

And the day is dark and dreary.

My life is cold, and dark, and dreary;

It rains, and the wind is never weary;

My thoughts still cling to the mouldering Past,

But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast,

And the days are dark and dreary.

Be still, sad heart! and cease repining;

Behind the clouds is the sun still shining;

Thy fate is the common fate of all,

Into each life some rain must fall,

Some days must be dark and dreary.

THE ARROW AND THE SONG

I shot an arrow into the air,

It fell to earth, I knew not where;

For, so swiftly it flew, the sight

Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,

It fell to earth, I knew not where;

For who has sight so keen and strong,

That it can follow the flight of song?

Long, long afterward, in an oak

I found the arrow, still unbroke;

And the song, from beginning to end,

I found again in the heart of a friend.

THE DAY IS DONE

The day is done, and the darkness

Falls from the wings of Night,

As a feather is wafted downward

From an eagle in his flight.

I see the lights of the village

Gleam through the rain and the mist,

And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me,

That my soul cannot resist:

A feeling of sadness and longing,

That is not akin to pain,

And resembles sorrow only

As the mist resembles the rain.

Come, read to me some poem,

Some simple and heartfelt lay,

That shall soothe this restless feeling,

And banish the thoughts of day.

Not from the grand old masters,

Not from the bards sublime,

Whose distant footsteps echo

Through the corridors of Time.

For, like strains of martial music,

Their mighty thoughts suggest

Life's endless toil and endeavor;

And to-night I long for rest.

Read from some humbler poet,

Whose songs gushed from his heart,

As showers from the clouds of summer,

Or tears from the eyelids start;

Who, through long days of labor,

And nights devoid of ease,

Still heard in his soul the music

Of wonderful melodies.

Such songs have power to quiet

The restless pulse of care,

And come like the benediction

That follows after prayer.

Then read from the treasured volume

The poem of thy choice,

And lend to the rhyme of the poet

The beauty of thy voice.

And the night shall be filled with music,

And the cares, that infest the day,

Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,

And as silently steal away.

WALTER VON DER VOGELWEIDE

VOGELWEID, the Minnesinger,

When he left this world of ours,

Laid his body in the cloister,

Under Wurtzburg's minster towers.

And he gave the monks his treasures,

Gave them all with this behest

They should feed the birds at noontide

Daily on his place of rest;

Saying, "From these wandering minstrels

I have learned the art of song;

Let me now repay the lessons

They have taught so well and long."

Thus the bard of love departed;

And, fulfilling his desire,

On his tomb the birds were feasted

By the children of the choir.

Day by day, o'er tower and turret,

In foul weather and in fair,

Day by day, in vaster numbers,

Flocked the poets of the air.

On the tree whose heavy branches

Overshadowed all the place,

On the pavement, on the tombstone;

On the poet's sculptured face,

On the cross-bars of each window,

On the lintel of each door,

They renewed the War of Wartburg,

Which the bard had fought before.

There they sang their merry carols,

Sang their lauds on every side;

And the name their voices uttered

Was the name of Vogelweid.

Till at length the portly abbot

Murmured, "Why this waste of food?

Be it changed to loaves henceforward

For our fasting brotherhood."

Then in vain o'er tower and turret,

From the walls and woodland nests,

When the minster bells rang noontide,

Gathered the unwelcome guests.

Then in vain, with cries discordant,

Clamorous round the Gothic spire,

Screamed the feathered Minnesingers

For the children of the choir.

Time has long effaced the inscriptions

On the cloister's funeral stones,

And tradition only tells us

Where repose the poet's bones.

But around the vast cathedral,

By sweet echoes multiplied,

Still the birds repeat the legend,

And the name of Vogelweid.

THE BUILDERS

All are architects of Fate,

Working in these walls of Time;

Some with massive deeds and great,

Some with ornaments of rhyme.

Nothing useless is, or low:

Each thing in its place is best;

And what seems but idle show

Strengthens and supports the rest.

For the structure that we raise,

Time is with materials filled;

Our to-days and yesterdays

Are the blocks with which we build.

Truly shape and fashion these;

Leave no yawning gaps between

Think not, because no man sees,

Such things will remain unseen.

In the elder days of Art,

Builders wrought with greatest care

Each minute and unseen part!

For the Gods see everywhere.

Let us do our work as well,

Both the unseen and the seen;

Make the house, where Gods may dwell,

Beautiful, entire, and clean.

Else our lives are incomplete,

Standing in these walls of Time,

Broken stairways, where the feet

Stumble as they seek to climb.

Build to-day, then, strong and sure,

With a firm and ample base

And ascending and secure

Shall to-morrow find its place.

Thus alone can we attain

To those turrets, where the eye

Sees the world as one vast plain,

And one boundless reach of sky.

SANTA FILOMENA

Whene'er a noble deed is wrought,

Whene'er is spoken a noble thought,

Our hearts, in glad surprise,

To higher levels rise.

The tidal wave of deeper souls

Into our inmost being rolls,

And lifts us unawares

Out of all meaner cares.

Honor to those whose words or deeds

Thus help us in our daily needs,

And by their overflow

Raise us from what is low!

Thus thought I, as by night I read

Of the great army of the dead,

The trenches cold and damp,

The starved and frozen camp,

The wounded from the battle-plain,

In dreary hospitals of pain,

The cheerless corridors,

The cold and stony floors.

Lo! in that house of misery

A lady with a lamp I see

Pass through the glimmering gloom,

And flit from room to room.

And slow, as in a dream of bliss,

The speechless sufferer turns to kiss

Her shadow, as it falls

Upon the darkening walls.

As if a door in heaven should be

Opened and then closed suddenly,

The vision came and went,

The light shone and was spent.

On England's annals, through the long

Hereafter of her speech and song,

That light its rays shall cast

From portals of the past.

A Lady with a Lamp shall stand

In the great history of the land,

A noble type of good,

Heroic womanhood.

Nor even shall be wanting here

The palm, the lily, and the spear,

The symbols that of yore

Saint Filomena bore.

THE DISCOVERER OF THE NORTH CAPE

A LEAF FROM KING ALFRED'S OROSIUS

Othere, the old sea-captain,

Who dwelt in Helgoland,

To King Alfred, the Lover of Truth,

Brought a snow-white walrus-tooth,

Which he held in his brown right hand.

His figure was tall and stately,

Like a boy's his eye appeared;

His hair was yellow as hay,

But threads of a silvery gray

Gleamed in his tawny beard.

Hearty and hale was Othere,

His cheek had the color of oak;

With a kind of laugh in his speech,

Like the sea-tide on a beach,

As unto the King he spoke.

And Alfred, King of the Saxons,

Had a book upon his knees,

And wrote down the wondrous tale

Of him who was first to sail

Into the Arctic seas.

"So far I live to the northward,

No man lives north of me;

To the east are wild mountain-chains,

And beyond them meres and plains;

To the westward all is sea.

"So far I live to the northward,

From the harbor of Skeringes-hale,

If you only sailed by day,

With a fair wind all the way,

More than a month would you sail.

"I own six hundred reindeer,

With sheep and swine beside;

I have tribute from the Finns,

Whalebone and reindeer-skins,

And ropes of walrus-hide.

"I ploughed the land with horses,

But my heart was ill at ease,

For the old seafaring men

Came to me now and then,

With their sagas of the seas;

"Of Iceland and of Greenland

And the stormy Hebrides,

And the undiscovered deep;—

I could not eat nor sleep

For thinking of those seas.

"To the northward stretched the desert,

How far I fain would know;

So at last I sallied forth,

And three days sailed due north,

As far as the whale-ships go.

"To the west of me was the ocean,

To the right the desolate shore,

But I did not slacken sail

For the walrus or the whale,

Till after three days more,

"The days grew longer and longer,

Till they became as one,

And southward through the haze

I saw the sullen blaze

Of the red midnight sun.

"And then uprose before me,

Upon the water's edge,

The huge and haggard shape

Of that unknown North Cape,

Whose form is like a wedge.

"The sea was rough and stormy,

The tempest howled and wailed,

And the sea-fog, like a ghost,

Haunted that dreary coast,

But onward still I sailed.

"Four days I steered to eastward,

Four days without a night

Round in a fiery ring

Went the great sun, O King,

With red and lurid light."

Here Alfred, King of the Saxons,

Ceased writing for a while;

And raised his eyes from his book,

With a strange and puzzled look,

And an incredulous smile.

But Othere, the old sea-captain,

He neither paused nor stirred,

Till the King listened, and then

Once more took up his pen,

And wrote down every word.

"And now the land," said Othere,

"Bent southward suddenly,

And I followed the curving shore

And ever southward bore

Into a nameless sea.

"And there we hunted the walrus,

The narwhale, and the seal;

Ha! 't was a noble game!

And like the lightning's flame

Flew our harpoons of steel.

"There were six of us all together,

Norsemen of Helgoland;

In two days and no more

We killed of them threescore,

And dragged them to the strand!

Here Alfred the Truth-Teller

Suddenly closed his book,

And lifted his blue eyes,

with doubt and strange surmise

Depicted in their look.

And Othere the old sea-captain

Stared at him wild and weird,

Then smiled, till his shining teeth

Gleamed white from underneath

His tawny, quivering beard.

And to the King of the Saxons,

In witness of the truth,

Raising his noble head,

He stretched his brown hand, and said,

"Behold this walrus-tooth!"

SANDALPHON

Have you read in the Talmud of old,

In the Legends the Rabbins have told

Of the limitless realms of the air,—

Have you read it.—the marvellous story

Of Sandalphon, te Angel of Glory,

Sandalphon, the Angel of Prayer?

How, erect, at the outermost gates

Of the City Celestial he waits,

With his feet on the ladder of light,

That, crowded with angels unnumbered,

By Jacob was seen as he slumbered

Alone in the desert at night?

The Angels of Wind and of Fire,

Chant only one hymn, and expire

With the song's irresistible stress;

Expire in their rapture and wonder,

As harp-strings are broken asunder

By music they throb to express.

But serene in the rapturous throng,

Unmoved by the rush of the song,

With eyes unimpassioned and slow,

Among the dead angels, the deathless

Sandalphon stands listening breathless

To sounds that ascend from below;—

From the spirits on earth that adore,

From the souls that entreat and implore

In the fervor and passion of prayer;

From the hearts that are broken with losses,

And weary with dragging the crosses

Too heavy for mortals to bear.

And he gathers the prayers as he stands,

And they change into flowers in his hands,

Into garlands of purple and red;

And beneath the great arch of the portal,

Through the streets of the City Immortal

Is wafted the fragrance they shed.

It is but a legend, I know,—

A fable, a phantom, a show,

Of the ancient Rabbinical lore;

Yet the old mediaeval tradition,

The beautiful, strange superstition

But haunts me and holds me the more.

When I look from my window at night,

And the welkin above is all white,

All throbbing and panting with stars,

Among them majestic is standing

Sandalphon the angel, expanding

His pinions in nebulous bars.

And the legend, I feel, is a part

Of the hunger and thirst of the heart,

The frenzy and fire of the brain,

That grasps at the fruitage forbidden,

The golden pomegranates of Eden,

To quiet its fever and pain.

THE LANDLORD'S TALE

PAUL REVERES RIDE

Listen, my children, and you shall hear

Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,

On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;

Hardly a man is now alive

Who remembers that famous day and year.

He said to his friend, "If the British march

By land or sea from the town to-night,

Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch

Of the North Church tower as a signal light,—

One, if by land, and two, if by sea;

And I on the opposite shore will be,

Ready to ride and spread the alarm

Through every Middlesex village and farm,

For the country-folk to be up and to arm."

Then he said, "Good night!" and with muffled oar

Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore,

Just as the moon rose over the bay,

Where swinging wide at her moorings lay

The Somerset, British man-of-war;

A phantom ship, with each mast and spar

Across the moon like a prison bar,

And a huge black hulk that was magnified

By its own reflection in the tide.

Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street,

Wanders and watches with eager ears,

Till in the silence around him he hears

The muster of men at the barrack door,

The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet,

And the measured tread of the grenadiers,

Marching down to their boats on the shore.

Then he climbed to the tower of the church,

Up the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread,

To the belfry-chamber overhead,

And startled the pigeons from their perch

On the sombre rafters, that round him made

Masses and moving shapes of shade,—

Up the trembling ladder, steep and tall,

To the highest window in the wall,

Where he paused to listen and look down

A moment on the roofs of the town,

And the moonlight flowing over all.

Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead,

In their night-encampment on the hill,

Wrapped in silence so deep and still

That he could hear, like a sentinel's tread,

The watchful night-wind, as it went

Creeping along from tent to tent,

And seeming to whisper, "All is well!"

A moment only he feels the spell

Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread

Of the lonely belfry and the dead;

For suddenly all his thoughts are bent

On a shadowy something far away,

Where the river widens to meet the bay,

A line of black that bends and floats

On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats.

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride,

Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride

On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.

Now he patted his horse's side,

Now gazed at the landscape far and near,

Then, impetuous, stamped the earth,

And turned and tightened his saddlegirth;

But mostly he watched with eager search

The belfry-tower of the Old North Church,

As it rose above the graves on the hill,

Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.

And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height

A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!

He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns,

But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight

A second lamp in the belfry burns!

A hurry of hoofs in a village street,

A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark,

And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, a spark

Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet;

That was all! And yet, through the gloom and the light,

The fate of a nation was riding that night;

And the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight,

Kindled the land into flame with its heat.

He has left the village and mounted the steep,

And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep,

Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides;

And under the alders, that skirt its edge,

Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge,

Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides.

It was twelve by the village clock

When he crossed the bridge into Medford town.

He heard the crowing of the cock,

And the barking of the farmer's dog,

And felt the damp of the river fog,

That rises after the sun goes down.

It was one by the village clock,

When he galloped into Lexington.

He saw the gilded weathercock

Swim in the moonlight as he passed,

And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare,

Gaze at him with a spectral glare,

As if they already stood aghast

At the bloody work they would look upon.

It was two by the village clock,

When he came to the bridge in Concord town.

He heard the bleating of the flock,

And the twitter of birds among the trees,

And felt the breath of the morning breeze

Blowing over the meadows brown.

And one was safe and asleep in his bed

Who at the bridge would be first to fall,

Who that day would be lying dead,

Pierced by a British musket-ball.

You know the rest.

In the books you have read,

How the British Regulars fired and fled,—

How the farmers gave them ball for ball,

From behind each fence and farmyard wall,

Chasing the red-coats down the lane,

Then crossing the fields to emerge again

Under the trees at the turn of the road,

And only pausing to fire and load.

So through the night rode Paul Revere;

And so through the night went his cry of alarm

To every Middlesex village and farm,

A cry of defiance and not of fear,

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,

And a word that shall echo forevermore!

For, borne on the night-wind of the Past,

Through all our history, to the last,

In the hour of darkness and peril and need,

The people will waken and listen to hear

The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed,

And the midnight message of Paul Revere.

THE SICILIAN'S TALE

KING ROBERT OF SICILY

Robert of Sicily, brother of Pope Urbane

And Valmond, Emperor of Allemaine,

Apparelled in magnificent attire,

With retinue of many a knight and squire,

On St. John's eve, at vespers, proudly sat

And heard the priests chant the Magnificat.

And as he listened, o'er and o'er again

Repeated, like a burden or refrain,

He caught the words, "Deposuit potentes

De sede, et exaltavit humiles;"

And slowly lifting up his kingly head

He to a learned clerk beside him said,

"What mean these words?" The clerk made answer meet,

"He has put down the mighty from their seat,

And has exalted them of low degree."

Thereat King Robert muttered scornfully,

"'Tis well that such seditious words are sung

Only by priests and in the Latin tongue;

For unto priests and people be it known,

There is no power can push me from my throne!"

And leaning back, he yawned and fell asleep,

Lulled by the chant monotonous and deep.

When he awoke, it was already night;

The church was empty, and there was no light,

Save where the lamps, that glimmered few and faint,

Lighted a little space before some saint.

He started from his seat and gazed around,

But saw no living thing and heard no sound.

He groped towards the door, but it was locked;

He cried aloud, and listened, and then knocked,

And uttered awful threatenings and complaints,

And imprecations upon men and saints.

The sounds re-echoed from the roof and walls

As if dead priests were laughing in their stalls!

At length the sexton, hearing from without

The tumult of the knocking and the shout,

And thinking thieves were in the house of prayer,

Came with his lantern, asking, "Who is there?"

Half choked with rage, King Robert fiercely said,

"Open: 'tis I, the King! Art thou afraid?"

The frightened sexton, muttering, with a curse,

"This is some drunken vagabond, or worse!"

Turned the great key and flung the portal wide;

A man rushed by him at a single stride,

Haggard, half naked, without hat or cloak,

Who neither turned, nor looked at him, nor spoke,

But leaped into the blackness of the night,

And vanished like a spectre from his sight.

Robert of Sicily, brother of Pope Urbane

And Valmond, Emperor of Allemaine,

Despoiled of his magnificent attire,

Bare-headed, breathless, and besprent with mire,

With sense of wrong and outrage desperate,

Strode on and thundered at the palace gate;

Rushed through the court-yard, thrusting in his rage

To right and left each seneschal and page,

And hurried up the broad and sounding stair,

His white face ghastly in the torches' glare.

From hall to hall he passed with breathless speed;

Voices and cries he heard, but did not heed,

Until at last he reached the banquet—room,

Blazing with light, and breathing with perfume.

There on the dais sat another king,

Wearing his robes, his crown, his signet-ring,

King Robert's self in features, form, and height,

But all transfigured with angelic light!

It was an Angel; and his presence there

With a divine effulgence filled the air,

An exaltation, piercing the disguise,

Though none the hidden Angel recognize.

A moment speechless, motionless, amazed,

The throneless monarch on the Angel gazed,

Who met his looks of anger and surprise

With the divine compassion of his eves;

Then said, "Who art thou? and why com'st thou here?"

To which King Robert answered with a sneer,

"I am the King, and come to claim my own

From an impostor, who usurps my throne!"

And suddenly, at these audacious words,

Up sprang the angry guests, and drew their swords;

The Angel answered, with unruffled brow,

"Nay, not the King, but the King's Jester, thou

Henceforth shalt wear the bells and scalloped cape,

And for thy counsellor shaft lead an ape;

Thou shalt obey my servants when they call,

And wait upon my henchmen in the hall!"

Deaf to King Robert's threats and cries and prayers,

They thrust him from the hall and down the stairs;

A group of tittering pages ran before,

And as they opened wide the folding-door,

His heart failed, for he heard, with strange alarms,

The boisterous laughter of the men-at-arms,

And all the vaulted chamber roar and ring

With the mock plaudits of "Long live the King!

Next morning, waking with the day's first beam,

He said within himself, "It was a dream!"

But the straw rustled as he turned his head,

There were the cap and bells beside his bed,

Around him rose the bare, discolored walls,

Close by, the steeds were champing in their stalls,

And in the corner, a revolting shape,

Shivering and chattering sat the wretched ape.

It was no dream; the world he loved so much

Had turned to dust and ashes at his touch!

Days came and went; and now returned again

To Sicily the old Saturnian reign

Under the Angel's governance benign

The happy island danced with corn and wine,

And deep within the mountain's burning breast

Enceladus, the giant, was at rest.

Meanwhile King Robert yielded to his fate,

Sullen and silent and disconsolate.

Dressed in the motley garb that Jesters wear,

With looks bewildered and a vacant stare,

Close shaven above the ears, as monks are shorn,

By courtiers mocked, by pages laughed to scorn,

His only friend the ape, his only food

What others left,—he still was unsubdued.

And when the Angel met him on his way,

And half in earnest, half in jest, would say,

Sternly, though tenderly, that he might feel

The velvet scabbard held a sword of steel,

"Art thou the King?" the passion of his woe

Burst from him in resistless overflow,

And, lifting high his forehead, he would fling

The haughty answer back, "I am, I am the King!"

Almost three years were ended; when there came

Ambassadors of great repute and name

From Valmond, Emperor of Allemaine.

Unto King Robert, saying that Pope Urbane

By letter summoned them forthwith to come

On Holy Thursday to his city of Rome.

The Angel with great joy received his guests,

And gave them presents of embroidered vests,

And velvet mantles with rich ermine lined,

And rings and jewels of the rarest kind.

Then he departed with them o'er the sea

Into the lovely land of Italy,

Whose loveliness was more resplendent made

By the mere passing of that cavalcade,

With plumes, and cloaks, and housings, and the stir

Of jewelled bridle and of golden spur.

And lo! among the menials, in mock state,

Upon a piebald steed, with shambling gait,

His cloak of fox-tails flapping in the wind,

The solemn ape demurely perched behind,

King Robert rode, making huge merriment

In all the country towns through which they went.

The Pope received them with great pomp and blare

Of bannered trumpets, on Saint Peter's square,

Giving his benediction and embrace,

Fervent, and full of apostolic grace.

While with congratulations and with prayers

He entertained the Angel unawares,

Robert, the Jester, bursting through the crowd,

Into their presence rushed, and cried aloud,

"I am the King! Look, and behold in me

Robert, your brother, King of Sicily!

This man, who wears my semblance to your eyes,

Is an impostor in a king's disguise.

Do you not know me? does no voice within

Answer my cry, and say we are akin?"

The Pope in silence, but with troubled mien,

Gazed at the Angel's countenance serene;

The Emperor, laughing, said, "It is strange sport

To keep a madman for thy Fool at court!"

And the poor, baffled Jester in disgrace

Was hustled back among the populace.

In solemn state the Holy Week went by,

And Easter Sunday gleamed upon the sky;

The presence of the Angel, with its light,

Before the sun rose, made the city bright,

And with new fervor filled the hearts of men,

Who felt that Christ indeed had risen again.

Even the Jester, on his bed of straw,

With haggard eyes the unwonted splendor saw,

He felt within a power unfelt before,

And, kneeling humbly on his chamber floor,

He heard the rushing garments of the Lord

Sweep through the silent air, ascending heavenward.

And now the visit ending, and once more

Valmond returning to the Danube's shore,

Homeward the Angel journeyed, and again

The land was made resplendent with his train,

Flashing along the towns of Italy

Unto Salerno, and from there by sea.

And when once more within Palermo's wall,

And, seated on the throne in his great hall,

He heard the Angelus from convent towers,

As if the better world conversed with ours,

He beckoned to King Robert to draw nigher,

And with a gesture bade the rest retire;

And when they were alone, the Angel said,

"Art thou the King?" Then bowing down his head,

King Robert crossed both hands upon his breast,

And meekly answered him: "Thou knowest best!

My sins as scarlet are; let me go hence,

And in some cloister's school of penitence,

Across those stones, that pave the way to heaven,

Walk barefoot, till my guilty soul is shriven!"

The Angel smiled, and from his radiant face

A holy light illumined all the place,

And through the open window, loud and clear,

They heard the monks chant in the chapel near,

Above the stir and tumult of the street

"He has put down the mighty from their seat,

And has exalted them of low degree!"

And through the chant a second melody

Rose like the throbbing of a single string

"I am an Angel, and thou art the King!"

King Robert, who was standing near the throne,

Lifted his eyes, and lo! he was alone!

But all apparelled as in days of old,

With ermined mantle and with cloth of gold;

And when his courtiers came, they found him there

Kneeling upon the floor, absorbed in silent prayer.

THE THEOLOGIAN'S TALE

THE LEGEND BEAUTIFUL

"HADST thou stayed, I must have fled!"

That is what the Vision said.

In his chamber all alone,

Kneeling on the floor of stone,

Prayed the Monk in deep contrition

For his sins of indecision,

Prayed for greater self-denial

In temptation and in trial;

It was noonday by the dial,

And the Monk was all alone.

Suddenly, as if it lightened,

An unwonted splendor brightened

All within him and without him

In that narrow cell of stone;

And he saw the Blessed Vision

Of our Lord, with light Elysian

Like a vesture wrapped about Him,

Like a garment round Him thrown.

Not as crucified and slain,

Not in agonies of pain,

Not with bleeding hands and feet,

Did the Monk his Master see;

But as in the village street,

In the house or harvest-field,

Halt and lame and blind He healed,

When He walked in Galilee.

In an attitude imploring,

Hands upon his bosom crossed,

Wondering, worshipping, adoring,

Knelt the Monk in rapture lost.

Lord, he thought, in heaven that reignest,

Who am I, that thus thou deignest

To reveal thyself to me?

Who am I, that from the centre

Of thy glory thou shouldst enter

This poor cell, my guest to be?

Then amid his exaltation,

Loud the convent bell appalling,

From its belfry calling, calling,

Rang through court and corridor

With persistent iteration

He had never heard before.

It was now the appointed hour

When alike in shine or shower,

Winter's cold or summer's heat,

To the convent portals came

All the blind and halt and lame,

All the beggars of the street,

For their daily dole of food

Dealt them by the brotherhood;

And their almoner was he

Who upon his bended knee,

Rapt in silent ecstasy

Of divinest self-surrender,

Saw the Vision and the Splendor.

Deep distress and hesitation

Mingled with his adoration;

Should he go or should he stay?

Should he leave the poor to wait

Hungry at the convent gate,

Till the Vision passed away?

Should he slight his radiant guest,

Slight this visitant celestial,

For a crowd of ragged, bestial

Beggars at the convent gate?

Would the Vision there remain?

Would the Vision come again?

Then a voice within his breast

Whispered, audible and clear

As if to the outward ear

"Do thy duty; that is best;

Leave unto thy Lord the rest!"

Straightway to his feet he started,

And with longing look intent

On the Blessed Vision bent,

Slowly from his cell departed,

Slowly on his errand went.

At the gate the poor were waiting,

Looking through the iron grating,

With that terror in the eye

That is only seen in those

Who amid their wants and woes

Hear the sound of doors that close,

And of feet that pass them by;

Grown familiar with disfavor,

Grown familiar with the savor

Of the bread by which men die!

But to-day, they know not why,

Like the gate of Paradise

Seemed the convent gate to rise,

Like a sacrament divine

Seemed to them the bread and wine.

In his heart the Monk was praying,

Thinking of the homeless poor,

What they suffer and endure;

What we see not, what we see;

And the inward voice was saying

"Whatsoever thing thou doest

To the least of mine and lowest,

That thou doest unto me!"

Unto me! but had the Vision

Come to him in beggar's clothing,

Come a mendicant imploring.

Would he then have knelt adoring,

Or have listened with derision,

And have turned away with loathing?

Thus his conscience put the question,

Full of troublesome suggestion,

As at length, with hurried pace,

Towards his cell he turned his face,

And beheld the convent bright

With a supernatural light,

Like a luminous cloud expanding

Over floor and wall and ceiling.

But he paused with awe-struck feeling

At the threshold of his door,

For the Vision still was standing

As he left it there before,

When the convent bell appalling,

From its belfry calling, calling,

Summoned him to feed the poor.

Through the long hour intervening

It had waited his return,

And he felt his bosom burn,

Comprehending all the meaning,

When the Blessed Vision said,

"Hadst thou stayed, I must have fled!"

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER

PROEM

To EDITION of 1847

I love the old melodious lays

Which softly melt the ages through,

The songs of Spenser's golden days,

Arcadian Sidney's silvery phrase,

Sprinkling our noon of time with freshest morning dew.

Yet, vainly in my quiet hours

To breathe their marvellous notes I try;

I feel them, as the leaves and flowers

In silence feel the dewy showers,

And drink with glad, still lips the blessing of the sky.

The rigor of a frozen clime,

The harshness of an untaught ear,

The jarring words of one whose rhyme

Beat often Labor's hurried time,

Or Duty's rugged march through storm and strife, are here.

Of mystic beauty, dreamy grace,

No rounded art the lack supplies;

Unskilled the subtle lines to trace,

Or softer shades of Nature's face,

I view her common forms with unanointed eyes.

Nor mine the seer-like power to show

The secrets of the hear and mind;

To drop the plummet-line below

Our common world of joy and woe,

A more intense despair or brighter hope to find.

Yet here at least an earnest sense

Of human right and weal is shown;

A hate of tyranny intense,

And hearty in its vehemence,

As if my brother's pain and sorrow were my own.

O Freedom! if to me belong

Nor mighty Milton's gift divine,

Nor Marvell's wit and graceful song,

Still with a love as deep and strong

As theirs, I lay, like them, my best gifts on thy shrine!

THE FROST SPIRIT

He comes,—he comes,—the Frost Spirit comes! You

may trace his footsteps now

On the naked woods and the blasted fields and the brown

hill's withered brow.

He has smitten the leaves of the gray old trees where their

pleasant green came forth,

And the winds, which follow wherever he goes, have shaken

them down to earth.

He comes,—he comes,—the Frost Spirit comes!—from

the frozen Labrador,—

From the icy bridge of the Northern seas, which the white

bear wanders o'er,—

Where the fisherman's sail is stiff with ice, and the luckless

forms below

In the sunless cold of the lingering night into marble statues

grow!

He comes,—he comes,—the Frost Spirit comes!—on the

rushing Northern blast,

And the dark Norwegian pines have bowed as his fearful

breath went past.

With an unscorched wing he has hurried on, where the fires

of Hecla glow

On the darkly beautiful sky above and the ancient ice below.

He comes,—he comes,—the Frost Spirit comes!—and

the quiet lake shall feel

The torpid touch of his glazing breath, and ring to the

skater's heel;

And the streams which danced on the broken rocks, or sang

to the leaning grass,

Shall bow again to their winter chain, and in mournful

silence pass.

He comes,—he comes,—the Frost Spirit comes!—let us

meet him as we may,

And turn with the light of the parlor-fire his evil

power away;

And gather closer the circle round, when that fire-light

dances high,

And laugh at the shriek of the baffled Fiend as his sounding

wing goes by!

SONGS OF LABOR

DEDICATION

I would the gift I offer here

Might graces from thy favor take,

And, seen through Friendship's atmosphere,

On softened lines and coloring, wear

The unaccustomed light of beauty, for thy sake.

Few leaves of Fancy's spring remain

But what I have I give to thee,—

The o'er-sunned bloom of summer's plain,

And paler flowers, the latter rain

Calls from the weltering slope of life's autumnal

Above the fallen groves of green,

Where youth's enchanted forest stood,

Dry root and mossed trunk between,

A sober after-growth is seen,

As springs the pine where falls the gay-leafed maple wood!

Yet birds will sing, and breezes play

Their leaf-harps in the sombre tree,

And through the bleak and wintry day

It keeps its steady green alway,—

So, even my after-thoughts may have a charm for thee.

Art's perfect forms no moral need,

And beauty is its own excuse;

But for the dull and flowerless weed

Some healing virtue still must plead,

And the rough ore must find its honors in its use.

So haply these, my simple lays

Of homely toil, may serve to show

The orchard bloom and tasseled maize

That skirt and gladden duty's ways,

The unsung beauty hid life's common things below.

Haply from them the toiler, bent

Above his forge or plough, may gain

A manlier spirit of content,

And feel that life is wisest spent

Where the strong working hand makes strong the working brain.

The doom which to the guilty pair

Without the walls of Eden came,

Transforming sinless ease to care

And rugged toil, no more shall bear

The burden of old crime, or mark of primal shame.

A blessing now,—a curse no more;

Since He whose name we breathe with awe.

The coarse mechanic vesture wore,

A poor man toiling with the poor,

In labor, as in prayer, fulfilling the same law.

THE LUMBERMEN

Wildly round our woodland quarters,

Sad-voiced Autumn grieves;

Thickly down these swelling waters

Float his fallen leaves.

Through the tall and naked timber,

Column-like and old,

Gleam the sunsets of November,

From their skies of gold.

O'er us, to the southland heading,

Screams the gray wild-goose;

On the night-frost sounds the treading

Of the brindled moose.

Noiseless creeping, while we're sleeping,

Frost his task-work plies;

Soon, his icy bridges heaping,

Shall our log-piles rise.

When, with sounds of smothered thunder,

On some night of rain,

Lake and river break asunder

Winter's weakened chain,

Down the wild March flood shall bear them

To the saw-mill's wheel,

Or where Steam, the slave, shall tear them

With his teeth of steel.

Be it starlight, be it moonlight,

In these vales below,

When the earliest beams of sunlight

Streak the mountain's snow,

Crisps the hoar-frost, keen and early,

To our hurrying feet,

And the forest echoes clearly

All our blows repeat.

Where the crystal Ambijejis

Stretches broad and clear,

And Millnoket's pine-black ridges

Hide the browsing deer:

Where, through lakes and wide morasses,

Or through rocky walls,

Swift and strong, Penobscot passes

White with foamy falls;

Where, through clouds, are glimpses given

Of Katahdin's sides,—

Rock and forest piled to heaven,

Torn and ploughed by slides!

Far below, the Indian trapping,

In the sunshine warm;

Far above, the snow-cloud wrapping

Half the peak in storm!

Where are mossy carpets better

Than the Persian weaves,

And than Eastern perfumes sweeter

Seem the fading leaves;

And a music wild and solemn

From the pine-tree's height,

Rolls its vast and sea-like volumes

On the wind of night;

Not for us the measured ringing

From the village spire,

Not for us the Sabbath singing

Of the sweet-voiced choir

Ours the old, majestic temple,

Where God's brightness shines

Down the dome so grand and ample,

Propped by lofty pines!

Keep who will the city's alleys,

Take the smooth-shorn plain,—

Give to us the cedar valleys,

Rocks and hills of Maine!

In our North-land, wild and woody,

Let us still have part:

Rugged nurse and mother sturdy,

Hold us to thy heart!

O, our free hearts beat the warmer

For thy breath of snow;

And our tread is all the firmer

For thy rocks below.

Freedom, hand in hand with labor,

Walketh strong and brave;

On the forehead of his neighbor

No man writeth Slave!

Lo, the day breaks! old Katahdin's

Pine-trees show its fires,

While from these dim forest gardens

Rise their blackened spires.

Up, my comrades! up and doing!

Manhood's rugged play

Still renewing, bravely hewing

Through the world our way!

BARCLAY OF URY

Up the streets of Aberdeen,

By the kick and college green,

Rode the Laird of Ury;

Close behind him, close beside,

Foul of mouth and evil-eyed,

Pressed the mob in fury.

Flouted him the drunken churl,

Jeered at him the serving-girl,

Prompt to please her master;

And the begging carlin, late

Fed and clothed at Ury's gate,

Cursed him as he passed her.

Yet, with calm and stately mien,

Up the streets of Aberdeen

Came he slowly riding;

And, to all he saw and heard,

Answering not with bitter word,

Turning not for chiding.

Came a troop with broadswords swinging,

Bits and bridles sharply ringing,

Loose and free and froward;

Quoth the foremost, "Ride him down!

Push him! prick him! through the town

Drive the Quaker coward!"

But from out the thickening crowd

Cried a sudden voice and loud

"Barclay! Ho! a Barclay!"

And the old man at his side

Saw a comrade, battle tried,

Scarred and sunburned darkly;

Who with ready weapon bare,

Fronting to the troopers there,

Cried aloud: "God save us,

Call ye coward him who stood

Ankle deep in Lutzen's blood,

With the brave Gustavus?"

"Nay, I do not need thy sword,

Comrade mine," said Ury's lord;

"Put it up, I pray thee:

Passive to His holy will,

Trust I in my Master still,

Even though He slay me.

"Pledges of thy love and faith,

Proved on many a field of death,

Not, by me are needed."

Marvelled much that henchman bold,

That his laud, so stout of old,

Now so meekly pleaded.

"Woe's the day!" he sadly said,

With a slowly shaking head,

And a look of pity;

"Ury's honest lord reviled,

Mock of knave and sport of child,

In his own good city!

"Speak the word, and, master mine,

As we charged on Tilly's line,

And his Walloon lancers,

Smiting through their midst we'll teach

Civil look and decent speech

To these boyish prancers!"

"Marvel not, mine ancient friend,

Like beginning, like the end:"

Quoth the Laird of Ury,

"Is the sinful servant more

Than his gracious Lord who bore

Bonds and stripes in Jewry?

"Give me joy that in His name

I can bear, with patient frame,

All these vain ones offer;

While for them He suffereth long,

Shall I answer wrong with wrong,

Scoffing with the scoffer?

"Happier I, with loss of all,

Hunted, outlawed, held in thrall,

With few friends to greet me,

Than when reeve and squire were seen,

Riding out from Aberdeen,

With bared heads to meet me.

"When each goodwife, o'er and o'er,

Blessed me as I passed her door;

And the snooded daughter,

Through her casement glancing down,

Smiled on him who bore renown

From red fields of slaughter.

"Hard to feel the stranger's scoff,

Hard the old friend's falling off,

Hard to learn forgiving;

But the Lord His own rewards,

And His love with theirs accords,

Warm and fresh and living.

"Through this dark and stormy night

Faith beholds a feeble light

Up the blackness streaking;

Knowing God's own time is best,

In a patient hope I rest

For the full day-breaking!"

So the Laird of Ury said,

Turning slow his horse's head

Toward the Tolbooth prison,

Where, through iron grates, he heard

Poor disciples of the Word

Preach of Christ arisen!

Plot in vain, Confessor old,

Unto us the tale is told

Of thy day of trial;

Every age on him who strays

From its broad and beaten ways

Pours its sevenfold vial.

Happy he whose inward ear

Angel comfortings can hear,

O'er the rabble's laughter;

And, while Hatred's fagots burn,

Glimpses through the smoke discern

Of the good hereafter.

Knowing this, that never yet

Share of Truth was vainly set

In the world's wide fallow;

After hands shall sow the seed,

After hands from hill and mead

Reap the harvest yellow.

Thus, with somewhat of the Seer,

Must the moral pioneer

From the Future borrow;

Clothe the waste with dreams of grain,

And, on midnight's sky of rain,

Paint the golden morrow!

Читать бесплатно онлайн книгу автора Selections from American poetry, with special reference to Poe, Longfellow, Lowell and WhittierMargaret Sprague Carhart

SELECTIONS FROM AMERICAN POETRY

By Various Authors

With Special Reference to Poe, Longfellow, Lowell and Whittier

Edited by Margaret Sprague Carhart

SELECTIONS OF AMERICAN POETRY

INTRODUCTION

ANNE BRADSTREET

CONTEMPLATIONS

THE DAY OF DOOM

SOUNDING OF THE LAST TRUMP

PHILIP FRENEAU

THE WILD HONEYSUCKLE

TO A HONEY BEE

THE INDIAN BURYING-GROUND

EUTAW SPRINGS

FRANCIS HOPKINSON

THE BATTLE OF THE KEGS

JOSEPH HOPKINSON

HAIL COLUMBIA

ANONYMOUS

THE BALLAD OF NATHAN HALE

A FABLE

TIMOTHY DWIGHT

LOVE TO THE CHURCH

SAMUEL WOODWORTH

THE OLD OAKEN BUCKET

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT

THANATOPSIS

THE YELLOW VIOLET

TO A WATERFOWL

GREEN RIVER

THE WEST WIND

"I BROKE THE SPELL THAT HELD ME LONG"

A FOREST HYMN

THE DEATH OF THE FLOWERS

THE GLADNESS OF NATURE

TO THE FRINGED GENTIAN

SONG OF MARION'S MEN

THE CROWDED STREET

THE SNOW-SHOWER

ROBERT OF LINCOLN

THE POET

ABRAHAM LINCOLN

FRANCIS SCOTT KEY

THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER

JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE

THE AMERICAN FLAG

THE CULPRIT FAY (Selection)

FITZ-GREENE HALLECK

MARCO BOZZARIS

ON THE DEATH OF JOSEPH RODMAN DRAKE

JOHN HOWARD PAYNE

HOME, SWEET HOME

EDGAR ALLAN POE

TO HELEN

ISRAFEL

LENORE

THE COLISEUM

THE HAUNTED PALACE

TO ONE IN PARADISE

EULALIE.—A SONG

THE RAVEN

TO HELEN

ANNABEL LEE

THE BELLS

ELDORADO

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW

HYMN TO THE NIGHT

A PSALM OF LIFE

WHAT THE HEART OF THE YOUNG MAN SAID TO THE PSALMIST

THE SKELETON IN ARMOR

THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS

THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH

IT IS NOT ALWAYS MAY

NO HAY PAJAROS EN LOS NIDOS DE ANTANO

THE RAINY DAY

THE ARROW AND THE SONG

THE DAY IS DONE

WALTER VON DER VOGELWEIDE

Читать бесплатно онлайн книгу автора Selections from American poetry, with special reference to Poe, Longfellow, Lowell and Whittier
Margaret Sprague Carhart