Identity

HERMANN AND DOROTHEA.

So tow'rd the sun, now fast sinking to rest, the two walk'd together,
Whilst he veil'd himself deep in clouds which thunder portended.
Out-of his veil now here, now there, with fiery glances
Beaming over the plain with rays foreboding and lurid.
"May this threatening weather," said Hermann, "not bring to us shortly
Hail and violent rain, for well does the harvest now promise."
And they both rejoiced in the corn so lofty and waving,
Well nigh reaching the heads of the two tall figures that walk'd there.
Then the maiden spoke to her friendly leader as follows
"Generous youth, to whom I shall owe a kind destiny shortly,
Shelter and home, when so many poor exiles must weather the tempest,
In the first place tell me all about your good parents,
Whom I ...

O say, dear sister, are you coming
    Forth to the fields with me?
The very air is gaily ringing
    With hum of bird and bee,
And crowds of swallows now are chirping
    Up in our ancient thorn,
And earth and air are both rejoicing,
    On this gay summer morn.

Shall we hie unto the streamlet's side
    To seek our little boat,
And, plying our oars with right good will,
    Over its bright waves float?
Or shall we loll on the grassy bank
    For hours dreamy, still,
To draw from its depths some silv'ry prize,
    Reward of angler's skill?

I do not talk of the tempting game
    The forest covers hide,
So dear to the sportsman - plovers shy,
    Pheasants with eye of pride,
For I know your timid nature shrinks
    From flas...

    It is not on her gown
    She fears to tread;
    It is her hair
    Which tumbles down
    And strays
    About her ways
    That she must care.

    And she lives nigh this place:
    The dead would rise
    If they could see her face;
    The dead would rise
    Only to hear her sing:
    But death is blind, and gives not ear nor eye
    To anything.

    We would leave behind
    Both wife and child,
    And house and home;
    And wander blind,
    And wander thus,
    And ever roam,
    If she would come to us
    In Erris.

    Softly she said to me,
    Be patient till the night comes,
    And I will go with thee.

        Wae worth thy power, thou cursed leaf,
        Fell source o' a' my woe an' grief;
        For lack o' thee I've lost my lass,
        For lack o' thee I scrimp my glass.
        I see the children of affliction
        Unaided, through thy cursed restriction
        I've seen the oppressor's cruel smile
        Amid his hapless victim's spoil:
        And for thy potence vainly wished,
        To crush the villain in the dust.
    For lack o' thee, I leave this much-lov'd shore,
    Never, perhaps, to greet old Scotland more.

R. B.

    Now far from my old northern land,
    I live where gentle winters pass;
    Where green seas lave a wealthy strand,
    And unsown is the grass;

        Where gorgeous sunsets claim the scope
    Of gazing heaven to spread their show,
    Hang scarlet clouds in the topmost cope,
    With fringes flaming low;

        With one beside me in whose eyes
    Once more old Nature finds a home;
    There treasures up her changeful skies,
    Her phosphorescent foam.

        O'er a new joy this day we bend,
    Soft power from heaven our souls to lift;
    A wondering wonder thou dost lend
    With loan outpassing gift--

        A little child. She sees the sun--
    Once more incarnates thy old law:
    One born of two, tw...

I.

In reel, in waltz, in lancer's maze,
    She moved with pretty air of grace,
And all the ball-room's brilliant blaze
    Seemed borrowed brightness from her face!
O, winsome maid, demure and sweet!
    I'll ne'er forget when first I met her,
And saw the dainty slippered feet
    Glide o'er the floor at Linnietta!


II.

O, dreams of youth and beauty rare,
    What rose-hued visions thou canst paint!
But none in loveliness compare
    With her who seemed Love's patron saint!
Her pictured image haunts the mind,
    And, oh, I never can forget her,
Nor rarer pleasure hope to find
    Than dance with her at Linnietta!


III.

Arrayed in softly flowing gown,
    The love-light flashing from her eyes--
...

Far, far away is mirth withdrawn
'Tis three long hours before the morn
And I watch lonely, drearily
So come thou shade commune with me

Deserted one! thy corpse lies cold
And mingled with a foreign mould
Year after year the grass grows green
Above the dust where thou hast been.

I will not name thy blighted name
Tarnished by unforgotton shame
Though not because my bosom torn
Joins the mad world in all its scorn

Thy phantom face is dark with woe
Tears have left ghastly traces there,
Those ceaseless tears! I wish their flow
Could quench thy wild despair.

They deluge my heart like the rain
On cursed Gomorrah's howling plain
Yet when I hear thy foes deride
I must cling closely to thy side

Our mutual foes, they will n...

A Broken rainbow on the skies of May,
Touching the dripping roses and low clouds,
And in wet clouds its scattered glories lost:
So in the sorrow of her soul the ghost
Of one great love, of iridescent ray,
Spanning the roses dim of memory,
Against the tumult of life's rushing crowds
A broken rainbow on the skies of May.
A flashing humming-bird among the flowers,
Deep-coloured blooms; its slender tongue and bill
Sucking the syrups and the calyxed myrrhs,
Till, being full of sweets, away it whirrs:
Such was his love that won her heart's rich bowers
To give to him their all, their honied showers,
The bloom from which he drank his body's fill
A flashing humming-bird among the flowers.
A moon, moth-white, that through long mists of fleece
Moves amber-girt into ...

While I translated Baudelaire,
Children were playing out in the air.
Turning to watch, I saw the light
That made their clothes and faces bright.
I heard the tune they meant to sing
As they kept dancing in a ring;
But I could not forget my book,
And thought of men whose faces shook
When babies passed them with a look.

They are as terrible as death,
Those children in the road beneath.
Their witless chatter is more dread
Than voices in a madman's head:
Their dance more awful and inspired,
Because their feet are never tired,
Than silent revel with soft sound
Of pipes, on consecrated ground,
When all the ghosts go round and round.

"I was walking, dearest mother,
    This morning, by the brook,
And tired at last I rested me
    Within a shady nook.

"There all was still and lonely,
    And suddenly I heard
A little voice,--a sweeter one
    Than note of any bird.

"I looked above, around me,
    I saw not whence it came;
And yet that tone of music
    Was calling me by name.

"The violet beside me
    Bloomed with its purple cup,
And a tiny face, so lovely,
    Amidst its leaves peeped up.

"Again the silver music,--
    The voice I loved to hear,--
Upon its sweet breath floated,
    And bade me not to fear.

"'I am the elf,' it whispered,
    'Who in the violet dwells,
And every blossom hides one
    Within its fragrant cells.<...

Sunlight upon Judha's hills!
And on the waves of Galilee;
On Jordan's stream, and on the rills
That feed the dead and sleeping sea!
Most freshly from the green wood springs
The light breeze on its scented wings;
And gayly quiver in the sun
The cedar tops of Lebanon!

A few more hours, a change hath come!
The sky is dark without a cloud!
The shouts of wrath and joy are dumb,
And proud knees unto earth are bowed.
A change is on the hill of Death,
The helmed watchers pant for breath,
And turn with wild and maniac eyes
From the dark scene of sacrifice!

That Sacrifice! the death of Him,
The Christ of God, the holy One!
Well may the conscious Heaven grow dim,
And blacken the beholding, Sun.
The wonted light hath fled away,
Night s...

I dwell in a lonely house I know
That vanished many a summer ago,
And left no trace but the cellar walls,
And a cellar in which the daylight falls,
And the purple-stemmed wild raspberries grow.

O'er ruined fences the grape-vines shield
The woods come back to the mowing field;
The orchard tree has grown one copse
Of new wood and old where the woodpecker chops;
The footpath down to the well is healed.

I dwell with a strangely aching heart
In that vanished abode there far apart
On that disused and forgotten road
That has no dust-bath now for the toad.
Night comes; the black bats tumble and dart;

The whippoorwill is coming to shout
And hush and cluck and flutter about:
I hear him begin far enough away
Full many a time to say his say

You say, "Where goest thou?" I cannot tell,
And still go on. If but the way be straight,
It cannot go amiss! before me lies
Dawn and the Day; the Night behind me; that
Suffices me; I break the bounds; I see,
And nothing more; believe, and nothing less.
My future is not one of my concerns.

PROF. E. DOWDEN.

FAMED Paris ne'er within its walls had got,
Such magick charms as were Aminta's lot,
Youth, beauty, temper, fortune, she possessed,
And all that should a husband render blessed,
The mother still retained her 'neath the wing;
Her father's riches well might lovers bring;
Whate'er his daughter wished, he would provide,
Amusements, jewels, dress, and much beside.

BLITHE Damon for her having felt the dart,
The belle received the offer of his heart;
So well he managed and expressed his flame.
That soon her lord and master he became,
By Hymen's right divine, you may conceive,
And nothing short of it you should believe.

A YEAR had passed, and still our charming pair,
Were always pleased, and blisses seemed to share;
(The honeymoon appeared but just began)<...

Thou art confused, my beloved, at, seeing the thousandfold union

Shown in this flowery troop, over the garden dispers'd;
any a name dost thou hear assign'd; one after another

Falls on thy list'ning ear, with a barbarian sound.
None resembleth another, yet all their forms have a likeness;

Therefore, a mystical law is by the chorus proclaim'd;
Yes, a sacred enigma! Oh, dearest friend, could I only

Happily teach thee the word, which may the mystery solve!
Closely observe how the plant, by little and little progressing,

Step by step guided on, changeth to blossom and fruit!
First from the seed it unravels itself, as soon as the silent

Fruit-bearing womb of the earth kindly allows Its escape,
And to the charms of the light, the holy, the ever-in-mot...

Languid, and sad, and slow, from day to day
I journey on, yet pensive turn to view,
Where the rich landscape gleams with softer hue,
The streams, and vales, and hills, that steal away.
So fares it with the children of the earth:
For when life's goodly prospect opens round,
Their spirits burn to tread that fairy ground,
Where every vale sounds to the pipe of mirth.
But them, alas! the dream of youth beguiles,
And soon a longing look, like me, they cast
Back on the mountains of the morning past:
Yet Hope still beckons us, and beckoning smiles,
And to a brighter world her view extends,
When earth's long darkness on her path descends.

The waves are dashing on the shore,
With wild, glad joy, I stand and view them;
And, as they break with sullen roar,
My heart responds with gladness, to them.

They've pow'r to thrill the human soul,
As on the shore they break so madly,
The spirit, bounding, hears their roll,
And speaks responsive, wildly, gladly.

The heart, with proud, defiant beats,
Re-echoes the triumphant roar,
And, as each wave its course retreats,
The pulse retires to beat once more.

The gull screams wildly o'er the waves,
Defiant in its stormy glee;
It screams, perchance, o'er wat'ry graves
And recks not, heeds not, nor do we.

But comes a time, when waves and wind,
In restful quietude remain,
A change then comes upon the mind,
And stormy passion's r...

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 ...