Upon the "table-rock" I stand,
And gaze into the depths profound,
In ecstacy at sights so grand,
And deafened by the sound
Of rushing waters, as they leap
Like maddened steeds, down hillside steep.

The falling spray my head bedews,
As gently as a vernal shower;
Or, as the Holy Ghost imbues
In consecrated hour,
The soul that inly yearns for love,
And seeks it from the throne above.

But I see more than chasm deep,
Than falling spray and rushing tide.
Sublime, indeed, the awful leap;
The awe will long abide--
God's rainbow hangs in colors bright,
A thing of beauty in my sight.

Our cousins on the other side
And we too often disagree;
Puffed up, I fear, at times, with pride,
Each strong, and brave, and free;
But we fo...

Thou bud of early promise, may the rose
Which time, methinks, will rear in envied bloom,
By friendship nurs'd, its grateful sweets disclose,
Nor e'er be nipt in life's disast'rous gloom.
For much thou ow'st to him whose studious mind
Rear'd thy young years, and all thy wants supplied;
Whose every precept breath'd affection kind,
And to the friend's, a father's love allied.
Oh! how 'twill glad him in life's evening day,
To see that mind, parental care adorn'd,
With grateful love the debt immense repay,
And realize each hope affection form'd.
The deed be thine 'twill many a care assuage,
Exalt thy worth, and blunt the thorns of age.

No--'tis not the region where Love's to be found--
    They have bosoms that sigh, they have glances that rove,
They have language a Sappho's own lip might resound,
    When she warbled her best--but they've nothing like Love.

Nor is't that pure sentiment only they want,
    Which Heaven for the mild and the tranquil hath made--
Calm, wedded affection, that home-rooted plant
    Which sweetens seclusion and smiles in the shade;

That feeling which, after long years have gone by,
    Remains like a portrait we've sat for in youth,
Where, even tho' the flush of the colors may fly,
    The features still live in their first smiling truth;

That union where all that in Woman is kind,
    With all that in Man most ennoblingly towers,
Grow wreathed into...

Hope smiled when your nativity was cast,
Children of Summer! Ye fresh Flowers that brave
What Summer here escapes not, the fierce wave,
And whole artillery of the western blast,
Battering the Temple's front, its long-drawn nave
Smiting, as if each moment were their last.
But ye, bright Flowers on frieze and architrave
Survive, and once again the Pile stands fast:
Calm as the Universe, from specular towers
Of heaven contemplated by Spirits pure
With mute astonishment, it stands sustained
Through every part in symmetry, to endure,
Unhurt, the assault of Time with all his hours,
As the supreme Artificer ordained.

Love's fiery chariot, Delia, take
Which Vulcan wrought for Venus' sake.
Wings shall not waft thee, but a flame
Hot as my heart, as nobly tame:
Lit by a spark, less bright, more wise
Than linked lightnings of thine eyes!
Seated and ready to be drawn
Come not in muslins, lace or lawn,
But, for thy thrice imperial worth,
Take all the sables of the North,
With frozen diamonds belted on,
To face extreme Euroclydon!
Thus in our thund'ring toy we'll prove
Which is more blind, the Law or Love;
And may the jealous Gods prevent
Our fierce and uncontrouled descent!

Not that dull spleen which serves i' the world for scorn,
Is hers I watch from far off, worshipping
As in remote Chaldaea the ancient king
Adored the star that heralded the morn.
Her proud content she bears as a flag is borne
Tincted the hue royal; or as a wing
It lifts her soaring, near the daylight spring,
Whence, if she lift, our days must pass forlorn.

The pure deriving of her spirit-state
Is so remote from men and their believing,
They shrink when she is cold, and estimate
That hardness which is but a God's dismay:
As when the Heaven-sent sprite thro' Hell sped cleaving,
Only the gross air checkt him on his way.

To be the theme of every hour
The heart devotes to Fancy's power,
When her prompt magic fills the mind
With friends and joys we've left behind,
And joys return and friends are near,
And all are welcomed with a tear:--
In the mind's purest seat to dwell,
To be remembered oft and well
By one whose heart, though vain and wild,
By passion led, by youth beguiled,
Can proudly still aspire to be
All that may yet win smiles from thee:--
If thus to live in every part
Of a lone, weary wanderer's heart;
If thus to be its sole employ
Can give thee one faint gleam of joy,
Believe it. Mary,--oh! believe
A tongue that never can deceive,
Though, erring, it too oft betray
Even more than Love should dare to say,--
In Pleasure's dream or Sorrow's hour,
I...

    If we but knew the weary way,
        The poisoned paths of hostile hate,
        The roughened roads of fiercest fate,
    Through which our brother's journey lay,
    Would we condemn, as now we do,
    His faults and failures,--if we knew?

    Would we forget the shadows grim,
        The lonely hours of grief and pain,
        The follies dead, the pleasures slain,
    The tears and toils that hindered him,
    And only prize the deeds that grew
    To mighty conquest, if we knew?

    Would careless hand sow tares of strife,
        Amid the blooms of happy care,
        And plant, in spite of sigh and prayer,
    Wild thorns amid the blameless life,
    Till sorrows rule the nations through,
    With scarce a rival, if we knew?
<...

To M. H.



We passed where flag and flower
Signalled a jocund throng;
We said: "Go to, the hour
Is apt!" and joined the song;
And, kindling, laughed at life and care,
Although we knew no laugh lay there.

We walked where shy birds stood
Watching us, wonder-dumb;
Their friendship met our mood;
We cried: "We'll often come:
We'll come morn, noon, eve, everywhen!"
- We doubted we should come again.

We joyed to see strange sheens
Leap from quaint leaves in shade;
A secret light of greens
They'd for their pleasure made.
We said: "We'll set such sorts as these!"
- We knew with night the wish would cease.

"So sweet the place," we said,
"Its tacit tales so dear,
Our thoughts, when breath has sped,
Will meet...

For a praiseworthy object we're now gather'd here,

So, brethren, sing: ERGO BIBAMUS!
Tho' talk may be hush'd, yet the glasses ring clear,

Remember then: ERGO BIBAMUS!
In truth 'tis an old, 'tis an excellent word,
With its sound so befitting each bosom is stirr'd,
And an echo the festal hall filling is heard,

A glorious ERGO BIBAMUS!

I saw mine own love in her beauty so rare,

And bethought me of: ERGO BIBAMUS;
So I gently approach'd, and she let me stand there,

While I help'd myself, thinking: BIBAMUS!
And when she's appeased, and will clasp you and kiss,
Or when those embraces and kisses ye miss,
Take refuge, till sound is some worthier bliss,

In the comforting ERGO BIBAMUS!

I am call'd by my fate far away from e...

'T is late at night, and in the realm of sleep
    My little lambs are folded like the flocks;
    From room to room I hear the wakeful clocks
    Challenge the passing hour, like guards that keep
Their solitary watch on tower and steep;
    Far off I hear the crowing of the cocks,
    And through the opening door that time unlocks
    Feel the fresh breathing of To-morrow creep.
To-morrow! the mysterious, unknown guest,
    Who cries to me: "Remember Barmecide,
    And tremble to be happy with the rest."
And I make answer: "I am satisfied;
    I dare not ask; I know not what is best;
    God hath already said what shall betide."

The soul of a nation awaking, -
    High visions of daybreak I saw,
And the stir of a state, the forsaking
    Of sin, and the worship of law.

O pine-tree, shout! And hoarser
    Rush, river, unto the sea,
Foam-fettered and sun-flushed, a courser
    That feels the prairie, free!

Our birth-star beckons to trial
    All faith of the far-fled years,
Ere scorn was our share, and denial,
    Or laughter for patriot's tears.

And lo, Faith comes forth the finer
    From trampled thickets of fire,
And the orient opens diviner
    Before her; the heaven lifts higher.

O deep, sweet eyes, and severer
    Than steel! he knoweth who comes,
Thy hero: bend thine eyes nearer!
    Now wilder than battle-drums

Thy glance in his...

Let others boast ther bit o' brass,
That's moor nor aw can do;
Aw'm nobbut one o'th' workin class,
'At's strugglin to pool throo;
An if it's little 'at aw get,
It's little 'at aw need;
An if sometimes aw'm pinched a bit,
Aw try to nivver heed.

Some fowk they tawk o' brokken hearts,
An mourn ther sorry fate,
Becoss they can't keep sarvent men,
An dine off silver plate;
Aw think they'd show more gradely wit
To listen to my creed,
An things they find they connot get,
Why, try to nivver heed.

Ther's some 'at lang for parks an halls,
An letters to ther name;
But happiness despises walls,
It's nooan a child o' fame.
A robe may lap a woeful chap,
Whose heart wi' grief may bleed,
Wol rags may rest on joyful breast,
Soa ha...

Into life's ocean the youth with a thousand masts daringly launches;
Mute, in a boat saved from wreck, enters the gray-beard the port.

        Now let the hero of our song,
        Be he who gentle treats the throng,
        And would not cruel treat another,
        But to each be as to a brother.

        And he must have both sense and wit,
        And be possessed of strength and grit,
        Then strong as proof of holy writ,
        For to survive he is most fit.

        And according to our test,
        The fittest only is the best,
        These have a right for to survive,
        And well they do deserve to thrive.

        And this kind of evolution
        It will bring no revolution,
        But revolve in Christian sphere,
        Where scripture truths are prized and dear.

        Give us the man doth persevere,
        And presses on in his career,...

This life is all checkered with pleasures and woes,
    That chase one another like waves of the deep,--
Each brightly or darkly, as onward it flows,
    Reflecting our eyes, as they sparkle or weep.
So closely our whims on our miseries tread,
    That the laugh is awaked ere the tear can be dried;
And, as fast as the rain-drop of Pity is shed.
    The goose-plumage of Folly can turn it aside.
But pledge me the cup--if existence would cloy,
    With hearts ever happy, and heads ever wise,
Be ours the light Sorrow, half-sister to Joy,
    And the light, brilliant Folly that flashes and dies.
When Hylas was sent with his urn to the fount,
    Thro' fields full of light, and with heart full of play,
Light rambled the boy, over meadow and mount,
    And neglected his t...

O the precipice Titanic
Of the congregated Fall,
And the angle oceanic
Where the deepening thunders call -
And the Gorge so grim,
And the firmamental rim!
Multitudinously thronging
The waters all converge,
Then they sweep adown in sloping
Solidity of surge.

The Nation, in her impulse
Mysterious as the Tide,
In emotion like an ocean
Moves in power, not in pride;
And is deep in her devotion
As Humanity is wide.

Thou Lord of hosts victorious,
The confluence Thou hast twined;
By a wondrous way and glorious
A passage Thou dost find -
A passage Thou dost find:
Hosanna to the Lord of hosts,
The hosts of human kind.

Stable in its baselessness
When calm is in the air,
The Iris half in tracelessness
Hov...

I.

They who maintained their rights,
Through storm and stress,
And walked in all the ways
That God made known,
Led by no wandering lights,
And by no guess,
Through dark and desolate days
Of trial and moan:
Here let their monument
Rise, like a word
In rock commemorative
Of our Land's youth;
Of ways the Puritan went,
With soul love-spurred
To suffer, die, and live
For faith and truth.
Here they the corner-stone
Of Freedom laid;
Here in their hearts' distress
They lit the lights
Of Liberty alone;
Here, with God's aid,
Conquered the wilderness,
Secured their rights.
Not men, but giants, they,
Who wrought with toil
And sweat of brawn and brain
Their freehold here;
Who, with their blood, each day...