THE BELLS.

BY EDGAR A. POE.

[EDGAR ALLAN POE: An American poet and author; born at Boston, Mass., 1809. Orphaned in his third year, he was adopted by John Allan, a wealthy merchant of Richmond, Va., by whom he was sent to school at StokeNewington, near London. He spent a year at the University of Virginia (1826); enlisted as a private in the United States army under an assumed name, becoming sergeant major (1829); and was admitted to West Point (1830), receiving his dismissal the next year. Thrown upon his own resources, he began writing for the papers. Subsequently he became editor of the Southern Literary Messenger, in Richmond; was on the staff of The Gentleman's Magazine and Graham's Magazine, in Philadelphia, and the Broadway Journal in New York. He died in a Baltimore hospital, October 7, 1849. "The Raven" and "The Bells" are his most popular poems. His fame as a prose writer rests on his tales of terror and mystery.]

I.

HEAR the sledges with the bells,

Silver bells!

What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,

In the icy air of night!

While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells,-

From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

II.

Hear the mellow wedding bells, -
Golden bells!

What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
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 turtledove 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!

III.

Hear the loud alarum bells, -
Brazen bells!

What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night

How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,

They can only shriek, shriek, 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,

And the clanging,

How the danger ebbs and flows;

Yet the ear distinctly tells,

In the jangling,

And the wrangling,

How the danger sinks and swells,

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

Of the bells,

Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells,

In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!

IV.

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 nor woman,
They are neither brute nor human,
They are Ghouls;

And their king it is who tolls, -
And he rolls, rolls, rolls,

Rolls a pæan from the bells!

And his merry bosom swells
With the pean of the bells,
And he dances, and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the pæan 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.

THE FATAL NUPTIALS.

BY EUGÈNE SUE.

(From "The Wandering Jew.")

[EUGÈNE SUE, author, was born in Paris, France, December 10, 1804, son of a naval surgeon. He was educated to his father's profession, and spent six years in the navy, retiring in 1830. He published: "Kernock, the Pirate" (1830), "History of the French Navy" (1835-1837), "History of the War Navies of all Nations" (1841), "The Mysteries of Paris" (1843), "The Wandering Jew" (1845), "Martin the Foundling" (1847), "The Seven Deadly Sins" (1847-1849), "The Mysteries of the People" (1849), "The Jouffroy Family (1854), "The Secrets of the Confessional " (1858), and other works less important. He died at Annecy, Switzerland, July 3, 1857.]

THE morning after Dupont's mission to Prince Djalma, the latter was walking with hasty and impatient step up and down the little saloon, which communicated, as we already know, with the greenhouse from which Adrienne had entered when she first appeared to him. In remembrance of that day, he had chosen to dress himself as on the occasion in question: he wore the same tunic of white cashmere, with a cherry-colored turban, to match with his girdle; his gaiters of scarlet velvet, embroidered with silver, displayed the fine form of his leg, and terminated in small white morocco slippers, with red heels. Happiness has so instantaneous, and, as it were, material an influence upon young, lively, and ardent natures, that Djalma, dejected and despairing only the day before, was no longer like the same person. The pale, transparent gold of his complexion was no longer tarnished by a livid hue. His large eyes, of late obscured like black diamonds by a humid vapor, now shone with mild radiance in the center of their pearly setting; his lips, long pale, had recovered their natural color, which was rich and soft as the fine purple flowers of his country.

Ever and anon, pausing in his hasty walk, he stopped suddenly, and drew from his bosom a little piece of paper, carefully folded, which he pressed to his lips with enthusiastic ardor. Then, unable to restrain the expression of his happiness, he uttered a full and sonorous cry of joy, and with a bound he was in front of the plate glass which separated the saloon from the conservatory, in which he had first seen Mademoiselle de Cardoville. By a singular power of remembrance,