Into the blithe and breathing air, Are gates unto that Paradise,
Into the solemn wood,

Holy thoughts, like stars, arise,
Solemn and silent everywhere !

Its clouds are angels' wings.
Nature with folded hands seemed there,
Kneeling at her evening prayer !

“Learn, that henceforth thy song shall be,

Not mountains capped with snow, Like one in prayer I stood.

Nor forests sounding like the sea, Before me rose an avenue

Nor rivers flowing ceaselessly, Of tall and sombrous pines;

Where the woodlands bend to see Abroad their fan-like branches grew,

The bending heavens below. And, where the sunshine darted through, “There is a forest where the din Spread a vapour soft and blue,

Of iron branches sounds ! In long and sloping lines.

A mighty river roars between,

And whosoever looks therein, And, falling on my weary brain

Sees the heavens all black with sin,– Like a fast-falling shower,

Sees not its depths nor bounds. The dreams of youth came back again, Low lispings of the summer rain, "Athwart the swinging branches cast, Dropping on the ripened grain,

Soft rays of sunshine pour ; As once upon the flower.

Then comes the fearful wintry blast;

Our hopes, like withered leaves, fall fast; Visions of childhood! Stay, oh stay !

Pallid lips say, 'It is past ! Ye were so sweet and wild !

We can return no more !' And distant voices seemed to say, “ It cannot be ! They pass away !

“Look, then, into thine heart, and Other themes demand thy lay;

write ! Thou art no more a child !

Yes, into Life's deep stream !

All forms of sorrow and delight, “The land of Song within thee lies, All solemn Voices of the Night, Watered by living springs ;

That can soothe thee, or affright,The lids of Fancy's sleepless eyes

Be these henceforth thy theme."

6

HYMN TO THE NIGHT.

'Ασπασίη, τρίλλιστος. I HEARD the trailing garments of the From the cool cisterns of the midnight air Night

My spirit drank repose ; Sweep through her marble halls ! The fountain of perpetual peace flows I saw her sable skirts all fringed with there, light

From those deep cisterns flows. From the celestial walls.

O holy Night! from thee I learn to I felt her presence, by its spell of might, bear Stoop o'er me from above ;

What man has borne before : The calm, majestic presence of the Thou layest thy finger on the lips of Night,

Care, As of the one I love.

And they complain no more. I heard the sounds of sorrow and Peace ! Peace! Orestes-like I breathe delight,

this prayer ; The manifold, soft chimes,

Descend with broad-winged flight, That fill the haunted chambers of the The welcome, the thrice-prayed for, tho Night,

most fair, Like some old poet's rhymes.

The best beloved Night!

A PSALM OF LIFE.

WHAT THE HEART OF THE YOUNG MAN SAID TO THE PSALMIST.

seem.

TELL me not, in mournful numbers, In the world's broad field of battle,

* Life is but an empty dream !" In the bivouac of Life, For the soul is dead that slumbers, Be not like dumb, driven cattle! And things are not what they Be a hero in the strife !

Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant !

Let the dead Past bury its dead ! Life is real ! Life is earnest !

Act-act in the living Present !
And the grave is not its goal;

Heart within, and God o'erhead ! “ Dust thou art, to dust returnest," Was not spoken of the soul.

Lives of great men all remind us

We can make our lives sublime, Not enjoyment, and not sorrow,

And, departing, leave behind us
Is our destined end or way;

Footprints on the sands of time ;But to act, that each to-morrow Footprints, that perbaps another, Find us farther than to-day.

Sailing o'er life's solemn main,

A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, Art is long, and Time is fleeting,

Seeing, sball take heart again. And our hearts, though stout and Let us, then, be up and doing, brave,

With a heart for any fate ; Still, like mufiled drums, are beating Still achieving, still pursuing; Funeral marches to the grave.

Learn to labour and to wait.

a

FOOTSTEPS OF ANGELS. When the hours of Day are numbered, And with them the Being Beauteous, And the voices of the Night

Who unto my youth was given, Wake the better soul, that slumbered, More than all things else to love me, To a holy, calm delight;

And is now a saint in heaven. Ere the evening lamps are lighted, With a slow and noiseless footstep

And, like phantoms grim and tall, Comes that messenger divine, Shadows from the fitful fire-light Takes the vacant chair beside me, Dance upon the parlour wall;

Lays her gentle hand in mine, Then the forms of the departed

And she sits and gazes at me Enter at the open door;

With those deep and tender eyes, The beloved, the true-bearted,

Like the stars, so still and saint-like, Come to visit me once more ;

Looking downward from the skies. He, the young and strong, who cherished Uttered not, yet comprehended, Noble longings for the strife,

Is the spirit's voiceless prayer, By the road-side fell and perished, Soft rebukes, in blessings ended, Weary with the march of life !

Breathing from her lips of air. They, the holy ones and weakly, 0, though oft depress'd and lonely, Who the cross of suffering bore,

All my fears are laid aside, Folded their pale bands so meekly, If I but remember only

Spake with us on earth no more! Such as these have lived and died !

THE REAPER AND THE FLOWERS.

THERE is a Reaper, whose name is "My Lord has need of these flowerets Death,

gay,' And, with his sickle keen,

The Reaper said, and smiled ; He reaps the bearded grain at a breath, Dear tokens of the earth are they,

And the flowers that grow between. Where he was once a child. “Shall I have nought that is fai;

“They shall all bloom in fields of light, saith he ;

Transplanted by my care, “Have nought but the bearded And saints, upon their garments wbite, grain ?

These sacred blossoms wear." Though the breath of these flowers is And the mother gave, in tears and pain, sweet to me,

The flowers she most did love ; I will give them all back again."

She knew she should find them all again

In the fields of light above.
He gazed at the flowers with tearful
eyes,

Oh, not in cruelty, not in wrath,
He kissed their drooping leaves ; The Reaper came that day ;
It was for the Lord of Paradise

'Twas an angel visited the green earth, He bound them in his sheaves.

And took the flowers away.

THE LIGHT OF STARS.

The night is come, but not too soon ;

And sinking silently,
All silently, the little moon

Drops down behind the sky.
There is no light in earth or heaven,

But the cold light of stars ;
And the first watch of night is given

To the red planet Mars.
Is it the tender star of love ?

The star love and dreams?
Oh, no! from that blue tent above

A hero's armour gleams.
And earnest thoughts within me rise,

When I behold afar,
Suspended in the evening skies,

The shield of that red star.

Thou beckonest with thy mailèd hand,

And I am strong again.
Within my breast there is no light,

But the cold light of stars ;
I give the first watch of the night

To the red planet Mars.
The star of the unconquered will,

He rises in my breast,
Serene, and resolute, and still,

And calm, and self-possessed.
And thou, too, whosoe'er thou art,

That readest this brief psalm,
As one by one thy hopes depart,

Be resolute and calm.
Oh, fear not in a world like this,

And thou shalt know ere long,
Know how sublime a thing it is

To suffer and be strong.

O star of strength ! I see thee stand

And smile upon my pain ;

FLOWERS. SPAKE full well, in language quaint and olden,

One who dwelleth by the castled Rhine, When he called the flowers, so blue and golden,

Stars, that in earth's firmament do shine.
Stars they are, wherein we read our history,

As astrologers and seers of eld;
Yet not wrapped about with awful mystery,

Like the burning stars, which they beheld.
Wondrous truths, and manifold as wondrous,

God hath written in those stars above; But not less in the bright flowerets under us

Stands the revelation of his love. Bright and glorious is that revelation,

Written all over this great world of ours; Making evident our own creation,

In these stars of earth,—these golden flowers. And the Poet, faithful and far-seeing,

Sees, alike in stars and flowers, a part Of the self-same universal being,

Which is throbbing in his brain and heart. Gorgeous flowerets in the sunlight shining,

Blossoms flaunting in the eye of day,
Tremulous leaves with soft and silver lining,

Buds that open only to decay;
Brilliant hopes, all woven in gorgeous tissues,

Flaunting gaily in the golden light;
Large desires, with most uncertain issues,

Tender wishes, blossoming at night! These in flowers and men are more than seeming;

Workings are they of the self-same powers, Which the Poet, in no idle dreaming,

Seeth in himself and in the flowers. Everywhere about us are they glowing,

Some like stars, to tell us Spring is born ; Others, their blue eyes with tears o'erflowing,

Stand like Ruth amid the golden corn; Not alone in Spring's armorial bearing,

And in Summer's green emblazoned field, But in arms of brave old Autumn's wearing,

In the centre of his brazen shield; Not alone in meadows and green alleys,

On the mountain-top, and by the brink Of sequestered pools in woodland valleys,

Where the slaves of Nature stoop to drink;

Not alone in her vast dome of glory,

Not on graves of bird and beast alone,
But in old cathedrals, high and hoary,

On the tombs of heroes, carved in stone;
In the cottage of the rudest peasant,

In ancestral homes, whose crumbling towers,
Speaking of the Past unto the Present,

Tell us of the ancient Games of Flowers;
In all places, then, and in all seasons,

Flowers expand their light and soul-like wings,
Teaching us, by most persuasive reasons,

How akin they are to human things.
And with childlike, credulous affection

We behold their tender buds expand ;
Emblems of our own great resurrection,

Emblems of the bright and better land.

THE BELEAGUERED CITY.

I have read, in some old marvellous I have read, in the marvellous heart of tale,

man, Some legend strange and vague,

That strange and mystic scroll, That a midnigbt host of spectres pale That an army of phantoms vast and wan

Beleaguered the walls of Prague. Beleaguer the human soul. Beside the Moldau's rushing stream,

Encamped beside Life's rushing stream, With the wan moon overhead,

In Fancy's misty light,
There stood, as in an awful dream, Gigantic shapes and shadows gleam
The army of the dead.

Portentous through the night.
White as a sea-fog, landward bound,

Upon its midnight battle-ground

The spectral camp is seen, The spectral camp was seen,

And, with a sorrowful, deep sound, And, with a sorrowful, deep sound,

Flows the River of Life between. The river flowed between.

No other voice nor sound is there, No other voice nor sound was there,

In the army of the grave; No drum, nor sentry's pace;

No other challenge breaks the air, The mist-like banners clasped the air

But the rushing of Life's wave. As clouds with clouds embrace.

And, when the solemn and deep churchBut, when the old cathedral bell

bell Proclaimed the morning prayer,

Entreats the soul to pray, The white pavilions rose and fell

The midnight phantoms feel the spell, On the alarmed air.

The shadows sweep away.
Down the broad valley fast and far Down the broad Vale of Tears afar
The troubled army fed ;

The spectral camp is fled;
Up rose the glorious morning star, Faith shineth as a morning star,
The ghastly host was dead.

Our ghastly fears are dead.