A thousand battles have assailed thy banks, But these and half their fame have passed away, And slaughter heaped on high his weltering ranks; Their very graves are gone, and what are they? Thy tide washed down the blood of yesterday, And all was stainless, and on thy clear stream Glassed with its dancing light the sunny ray; But o'er the blackened memory's blighting dream Thy waves would vainly roll, all sweeping as they seem. Lord Byron.

THE NIBELUNGER'S TREASURE.

T was an ancient monarch

IT

Ruled where the Rhine doth flow,
And naught he loved so little

As sorrow, feud, and wce:
His warriors they were striving
For a treasure in the land;
In sooth they near had perished
Each by his brother's hand.

Then spake he to the nobles:
"What boots this gold," he said,

"If with the finder's life-blood
The price thereof is paid?
The gold, to end the quarrel,
Cast to the Rhine away;
There lie the treasure hidden,
Till dawns the latest day!"

The proud ones took the treasure,
And cast it to the main;
I ween it all hath melted,

So long it there hath lain:
But, wedded to the waters

That long have o'er it rolled,
It clothes the swelling vineyards
With yellow gleam, like gold.

O, that each man were minded,
As thought this monarch good,
That never care might alter

His high, courageous mood!
Then deeply would we bury
Our sorrows in the Rhine,
And, glad of heart and grateful,
Would quaff his fiery wine.

Karl Simrock. Tr. H. W. Dulcken.

RHINE-SONG.

SINGLE VOICE.

is the Rhine our mountain vineyards laving,

It food

shine:

Sing on the march, with every banner waving, —
Sing, brothers, 't is the Rhine! Sing, brothers, 't is

the Rhine!

CHORUS.

The Rhine the Rhine, our own imperial River!

Be glory on thy track, be glory on thy track!

We left thy shores, to die or to deliver;

We bear thee Freedom back, we bear thee Freedom

back!

SINGLE VOICE.

Hail! hail! my childhood knew the rush of water, Even as my mother's song, even as my mother's song;

That sound went past me on the field of slaughter, And heart and arm grew strong, and heart and arm grew strong!

CHORUS.

Roll proudly on! - brave blood is with thee sweeping, Poured out by sons of thine, poured out by sons of thine,

Where sword and spirit forth in joy were leaping, Like thee, victorious Rhine! like thee, victorious Rhine!

SINGLE VOICE.

Home! home!thy glad wave hath a tone of greeting; Thy path is by my home, thy path is by my home: Even now my children count the hours till meeting; O ransomed ones, I come! O ransomed ones, I come!

CHORUS.

Go, tell the seas that chain shall bind thee never, Sound on by hearth and shrine, sound on by hearth and shrine!

Sing through the hills, that thou art free forever,
Lift up thy voice, O Rhine! Lift up thy voice, O

Rhine!

Felicia Hemans.

IN A CARRIAGE, UPON THE BANKS OF THE RHINE.

A

MID this dance of objects sadness steals

O'er the defrauded heart, while sweeping by, As in a fit of Thespian jollity,

Beneath her vine-leaf crown the green earth reels: Backward, in rapid evanescence, wheels

The venerable pageantry of time,

Each beetling rampart, and each tower sublime,
And what the dell unwillingly reveals

Of lurking cloistral arch, through trees espied
Near the bright river's edge. Yet why repine?
To muse, to creep, to halt at will, to gaze,

Such sweet wayfaring, of life's spring the pride, Her summer's faithful joy,- that still is mine, And in fit measure cheers autumnal days.

William Wordsworth.

THE GERMAN RHINE.

[O, no, they shall not have him,

No

Our free-born German Rhine,
Though, like the famished raven,
They, croaking, for it pine!
So long in verdant vesture
He peacefully doth glide,
So long a plashing boat-oar

Shall cleave his rippling tide!

No, no, they shall not have him,
Our free-born German Rhine,

So long there still refresheth

Our heart his fiery wine;
So long the mountains firmly

Shall stand from out his stream,
So long a lofty steeple

Shall from his mirror beam!

No, no, they shall not have him,
Our free-born German Rhine,
While free men and fair maidens
Shall seek the marriage shrine;

So long beneath his waters
A single fish there dives,
So long among his singers
A single lay there lives.

No, no, they shall not have him,
Our free-born German Rhine,

Till, buried 'neath his waters,

The latest man hath lien!

Nicolaus Becker. Tr. H. W. Dulcken.

BY

BEWARE OF THE RHINE.

the Rhine, by the Rhine, dwell not by the Rhine,

My son, I counsel thee fair;

Too beauteous will be that life of thine,

Too lofty thy courage there.

Seest the maidens so frank, and the men all so free,

A noble assembly so bright,