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VOL V NO I
THE
JVIAGAZINE OF POETRY
A QUARTERLY REVIEW
ILLUSXR AXBD
JANUARY 1893
CHARLBS WBLLS MOULTON
BUFFALO N Y
Digitized by VjOOQ IC
XHE MAQA2;iNE OF POETRY.
CONTBNT8 FOR JANUARY, 1893*
ALFRED. LORD TENNYSON FronUspiece
From a photograph by Barraud, London, Eng., engraved by W. A. Hirschmann.
THOMAS BUCHANAN READ Nettie Leila Michel 3
HELEN HUNT JACKSON Jeatmette Ward 9
With portrait.
MARY WARE CoL Benjamin F, Sawyer .... 15
With portrait by Stewart & Friend, Birmingham, Ala.
EDMUND K. HARRIS Mrs. BeUe F, Kerr 17
REV. S. DRYDEN PHELPS, D. D Jane Maria Read 21
With portrait.
H ARRIETTE G. PENNELL George Newell Lovejoy 23
ADELINE HOHF BEERY F. H, Green 27
With portrait by J. M. Hasking, Mt. Morris, Ills.
ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON Eva Marie Kennedy 29
CORELLI C. W. SIMPSON Frances L. Mace 37
With portrait by George Lansil, Bangor, Maine.
WALTER ALLEN RICE Robert RexdaU 39
OLIVIA LOVELL WILSON Lewis Abraham 41
MAY SPENCER FARRAND Samuel Warner 43
REV. OLIVER CRANE, D. D ' . Gen. H. B. Carrington, U. S. A. . 47
W^ith portrait.
EUGENIA PARHAM J.W. Lowber 49
With portrait by H. T. Morton, Marion, Ala.
MARY K. BUCK Mrs, E. L. Bates 53
With portrait by McManus Bros., Traverse City, Mich.
WILLIAM F. McNAMARA WUder W, Perry 55
WILLIAM EDWARD VASSER W. F. Sanders 56
With portrait by Collins, Huntsville, Ala.
WILLIAM SCHWENK GILBERT James Nias .60
FLORENCE V. BRITTINGHAM Mrs. Naomi Everett 65
With portrait by Parsons, Wheeling, W. Va.
HELLEN MARR HURD ' Mrs. G, A, Bullen 67
MINNIE GOW WALSWORTH James M Gow 71
With portrait by S. G. Rogers, Washington, Pa.
REV. JAMES UPHAM, D. D Jane Maria Read 73
With portrait.
FERDINAND BLANCHARD, M. D Alice F Stevens 77
With portrait.
JANE E. D. CONKLIN ComeliaE. Ticknor 79
With portrait by Osbom, Binghamton, N. Y.
HARRY F. O'BEIRNE John Princeton 80
With portrait by Church, Dallas, Texas.
BENJAMIN F. SEE W. G. miliams, D. D., LL. D. . 85
With portrait by Morrison, Bowling Green, Ohio.
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER Helen Manning 89
With portrait.
COLUMBIAN POEMS 95
TRIBUTES TO TENNYSON 98
TRIBUTES TO WHITTIER 104
CURRENT POEMS 106
NOTES. Rev, S, D. Phelps, D, D,, W, Davenport Adams, Walter Starrs Bigelow, Nettie Leila
Michel no
BIBLIOGRAPHY 112
EDITOR'S TABLE 112
BOOK NOTES 113
BIBLIOGRAPHY OF BOOKS PUBLISHED IN 1892 114
TERMS.— 12.00 a year in advance; 50 cents a number. Foreign, nine shillings. Booksellers and Postmaster?; receive subscrip-
tions. Subscribers m«y remit by post-office or express money orders, draft on New York, or registered letters. Money in letters is
at sender's risk. Terms to clubs and canvassers on application. Magazines will be sent to subscribers until ordered discontinued.
Back numbers exchanged, if in good condition, for corresponding bound volumes in half morocco, ele^nt, gilt, gilt top, for |i.oo,
subscribers paying charges both ways. Postage on bound volume, 35 cents. All numbers sent for bindmg should be marked with
owner's name. We cannot bind or exchange copies the edges 0/ which have been trimmed by machine.
Address all communications to CHARI^BS WBIrl^ MOUIrTON, PubUflher,
Buffalo, N. Y.
Copyright, 1893. by Charles Wells Moulton. Entered at Buffalo Post-Oi)ice as Second-Class Mail Matter_^
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THE
-TTTT-". ••
MAGAZINE or POETRY
A QUARTERLY REVIEW
ILLrUSTRAXBD
VOLUME V
CHARLES WEI^LS MOULTON
BUFFAI^O N Y
1893
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CONTENTS OF VOLUME V.
JANUARY— OCTOBER, 1893.
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord. Photo. by Barraud, London, Eng.; eng. by w. A. Hirschmann. Frontispiece.
Read, Thomas Buchanan. ...... NieUie Leila Michel. 3
The Pilgrim to the Land of Song. The Closing Scene. Sheridan's Ride. Song. The Brave at Home. Quotations.
Jackson, Helen Hunt, with portrait. . . . Jeannelte Ward, 9
My Legacy. A Wild Rose of September. Absence. Last Words. Not as I Will. Spinning. That Things are No
Worse, Sire, A Bit of Lace. Best. Quotations.
Ware, Mary with portrait by Stewart & Friend, Birmingham, Ala. Col. Benjamin F, Sawyer, 15
When Nature Wreathed Her Rosy Bowers. The Brook s Wedding. Beautiful Rest. Dost Recollect It, Jennie
Dear ? My Brother. Quotations.
Harris, Edmund K. ...... . Mrs, Belle F, Kerr. 17
stanzas. The Invitation. Midsummer-Night. " I Still Live." Dirge. Quotation.
Phelps, Rev. S. Dryden, D. D. with portrait. .... Jane Maria Read 21
An Italian Sunset. Something fdr Thee. God's Promises to Abraham. The Bethlehem Song. Quotation.
Pennell, Harriette G. ..... . George Newell Lovejoy, 23
•Jnder the Apple Bl ..--.. . -^ ^. -. .. -«^ . ^ ...
Autumn Woods.
Under the Apple Blossoms. Apart. Grieving. A Dream of June. Two Messengers. Through Dreamy Days in
iWoo<'
Beery, AdALINE HOHF. with Portrait by J. M, Hasking, Mt. Morris, ills. . , F, H, Green, 27
A Perfect Day. October Snow. In the Delphic Chamber. On the Beach. Etude. When Comes the Crown ?
Quotattion. *
Tennyson, Alfred, Lord. ...... Eve Marie Kennech, 29
Lady Clara Vere De Vere. The Charge of the Light Brigade. The Sisters. Crossing the Bar. Claribel. The
Deserted House. Quotations.
Simpson, Corelli C. W. with portrait by George Lonsii, Bangor, Maine. . Frances L. Mace, 37
Content. Endeavor. Old-Time Pictures. Sonnet. Myself. Five- Year-Old Perplexities. Quotations.
Rice, Walter Allen. ....... Robert Rexdale, 39
Evening. October. The Heart's Confession. Life.
Wilson, Olivia Lovell. ....... Lewis Abraham. 41
•' The Little Brown Fist.'' The Song of the Daming-Needle.' To My Wee Bit Lad. My Song. An Ideal. Quotations.
Farrand, May Spencer. ....... Samuel Warner. 43
A Parting. Outcast. The Key-Note. The Sea of Silence. My Religion.
Crane, Rev. Oliver, D. D. with portrait. Gen. H. B. Carrington, U. S. A. 47
Sweet Are the Uses of Adversity. Dies Irae. The Gleaner.
ParHAM, Eugenia, with portrait by H. T. Morton, Marion Ala. . . J, W, Lowber, 49
Two Lives. Vanished. Overruled. A Happy Woman. Winter. The Past. The Old Year. Quotations.
Buck, Mary K. WithportraitbyMcManusBros., Traverse City, Mich. . Mrs. E, L. Bales. 53
The Children. Mowing. If I Could Know. A Dream. *• There Shall Be No Night There.',
McNamara, William F. ...... . Wilder W, Perry. 55
A Nook. The Man From the North. Three Score.
Vasser, William Edward, with portrait by Coin ns, Huntsviiie, Ala. . . M, F. Sanders. 56
The Poet's Honeymoon. Serenade. A Fallen laol. Comparisons. Pulchrorum Hutnueuns Pulcher.
Gilbert, William Schwenck. ....... James Mas. 60
The Yam of the Nancy Bell. To Phcebe. The Way of Wooing. Sing for the Garish Eye.
Brittingham, Florence V. with portrait by Parsons, Wheeling, w. Va. . Miss Naomi Everett. 65
An Awakening. October. After-Glow. Gaudeamus Igitur. Vae Victus.
Hurd, Helen Marr. ....... Mrs. G, A. Bullen. 67
In the Cotton Fields. Midsummer Mom. In the Dismal Swamp. Quotations.
WalswORTH, Minnie GOW. WlthportraitbyS.G. Rogers, Washington, Pa. . James M. Gow. 71
Dies Dierum. At the Church Social. Baby in Church. Quotations.
Upham, Rev. James, D. D. with portrait. ..... Jane Maria Read, 73
The Hill-Country. My Morning Prayer. Inner Music. The Bruised Reed. The Morning Glory.
Blanchard, Ferdinand, M. D. with portrait. .... Alice F. Stevens. 77
To John Burroughs. Dickens. A Tribute. Pleasant Days In Winter. From the Class Poem. Quatrains. Music.
CoNKLiN, Jane E. D. With portrait by Osbom, Binghamton, N. Y. Cornelia E. Ticknor, 79
In that Day. Down from the Mountain. Alone.
O'Beirne, Harry F. with portrait by Church, Dallas, Texas. . John Princeton. 80
The Skeptic. The Wild Bee. Our Hopes. Nelly. Mart and Mountain. " We Two are One." QuoUtions.
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iv CONTENTS.
Seb, Benjamin F. with portrait by Morrison, Bowling Green, Ohio. IV. G. WUHams, D.D., LL. D. 85
Washington. The March to the Grave.
Whittier, John Greenleaf. with portrait. .... HeUn Manning, 89
Quotations.
Columbian Poems. ........... 95
Hail, Columbia 1 Joseph Hopkinaon. Columbus, Hezekiah Butterworth. Columbia to the Front. Rev. Oliver Crane,
D. D. Columbia, Harriet Monroe. The Bird that Sang to Columbus, Hezekiah Butterworth. Columbus at the
Spanish Court, Huntington Smith. Columbus, 1492-1893, George E. Merrill.
Tributes to Tennyson. .......... 98
Tennyson, Emeline Sherman Smith. To the Poet-Laureate, Louis Belrose, Jr. Tennyson, Tohn Pullerton. Ten-
nyson. Rev. E. H. I>ewart, D. D. Tennyson, Alfred Austin. Tennyson, Sir Edwin Arnold. Tennyson, Louise
Chandler Moulton. The Laureate Dead, H. D. Rawnsley.
Tributes to Whittier. .......... 104
The Passing of Whittier, Allen Eastman Cross. To Whittier, Jeanie Oliver Smith. John Greenleaf Whittier, John
Fullerton. ToJ.G. Whittier, On His Eightieth Birthday, Oliver Wencfell Holmes. To the Poet Whittier, Paul .
Hamilton Hayne. Our Whittier, David Henry Wright.
Current Poems. ............ 106
Would, John Patterson. Snow, Arthur John Lockhart. The Cities of the Eyes, Edward A. Uffington Valentine.
The Star of Dawn, Rev. Alfred H. Fahnestock, D. D. It Seems So Strange. Mary M. Currier. If Imight Choose,
Carrie Blake Morgan. Blossom. John B. Tabb. America, Rev. Dr. Samuel F. Smith. Columbia's Poet-Laureate,
Walter Storrs Bigelow. Sweetneart, to You I William H. Hayne. Dedication, Algernon Charles Swinburne.
An Elegy for Whittier, Walter Storre Bigelow. Lord Tennyson's Last Poetry.
Notes. ........... no, 242, 341, 421
Bibliography.
The Editor's Table. .
Book Notes.
Bibliography of Poetry for 1892.
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett.
112, 244, 342, 422
112, 244, 342, 422
113, 242
114
Frontispiece
PoB, Edgar Allen, with portrait engraved on steel by F. Haipin. John H. Ingram. 125
The Raven. Lenore. The Bells. For Annie. Annabel Lee.
MaRKELL, Charles F. with portrait by N. H. Buscy, Baltimore, Md. . C, S, Thomos. I37
My Little Girl. Catoctin. Once Again. Resting. The Mission. Sweetheart. Hester.
Bates, Charlotte Fiske. with portrait. .... Lonise Imogen Guiney. 140
Risk. Unhindered. June Song for the Old. How Life's Dark is Lighted. Unsaid. In March. Intimations o^
Genius.
ClEARY, Kate McPheLIM. with portrait by Mosher, Chicago. . ChorUs WelU Moulton, 144
The Com. Drifting Down. Before the Bal Masque. AJapansse Vase. Tired.
Larcom, Lucy, with portrait. ...... Harriet H. Robinson. 149
Rock and Rill. Apple-Blossoms. Hannah Binding Shoes. The Old School-house. The Lamb that was Slain.
Quotations.
Charles, Emily Thornton, with portrait. . Henry Van Fredenberg. 153
Cloud-Land. Insanity. Through Life. Thought. The Dtw Drop. Quotation.
DiBUDONNi^, Florence Carpenter. Mrs, J. A, Armstrong. 159
With portrait by Estabrook, Washington, D. C.
Fate. Man's Power. Beware. Love. Cleopatra. Cast Thy Burden on the Lord. Oblivion. "Parzelia."
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett. ..... Eva Maria Kennedy. 161
Substitution. Finite and Infinite. Work and Contemplation. Tears. Grief. Consolation. The Soul's Expression.
Quotations.
Damon, Frances Lewis Brackett. Rev. Arthur J. Lockhart, D. D. 165
Tranquility. Belief. The Harvestere. The Berry-pickers.
Bigelow. Lettie S. with portrait by g. w. Wnght, Holyoke, Mass. . Helen Manning. 169
Hoarded. How Much ? Epochs. A waking Song. Acquiescence. Transfigured. Tell Me. For Others' Sake.
The Reason Why.
BoHAN, Elizabeth Baker, withportrait by Hamilton, Milwaukee, Wis. Col. J. A. Woirous. 171
Sherman. A Simile. The Time for Rest. Our Harvest Years. September. A Bright Idea. A Nocturne. We.
Striving.
Farmer, Lydia Hoyt. with Portrait by e. Decker, Cleveland, Ohio. . . Jeannette Ward. 176
The Science of Life. The Penalty of Fame. If. Whittier's Mantle. A Lesson in Love. Contrast. The Poet's
Song. Quotations.
Barrows, John Otis. ...... Mrs. E. F. S. Anderson. 178
In Heavenly Places. Household Voices. What Shall Be My Prayer ? Again to the Work.
McCoNiHE, Isabella Wilson, with portrait by Schoiten,st.Louis,Mo. . M. M. Thomson. 181
My Robin and Blue-Jay. Singing In the Rain. Apple- Blossoms. To a Meadow Lark. Easter Morning. Quotations.
McCabe, Andrew. . . J. B. Berteling, M. D. 183
Pictures in the Sky. On Finding a Robin's Egg on the Ground in Early April.
Shaler, Clarence A. with portrait by Place, Chicago, 111. Charles Marsh Gilmore^ M. D. 187
Teara. To Marie Bashkirtseff. Changes. The Music of the Waves.
Hope, James Barron. ....... William R. Gault. 188
Grey Bayard. The Rustic Lover's Soliloquy. How It Fell Calm on Summer Night. A Recollection. My Two Gifts.
Smith, Frances M^ O. withportraitbyEiy Bros., London, Ont. . Thomas G* Hagan. 193
hue's Return. There and Here. Faith's Appeal to Ireland. Christ's Teara.
My Lady June. O'Donoghi
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CONTENTS, V
Baskktt, N. M., M. D. . . , J. H, Rodes, 195
If I Could Only Know. Sonnet. To Memory, Iphigenia.
Holder, Phebb A. with portrait by R. B. Lewis, Hudson, Mass. . Rev. Henry Hyde, D, D, 199
An Hour with Whittier. The Pines. My Books.
Poole, Fanny H. R. . . Fred Lawrence Knowies. 201
Purport. Meditation. A Sunset Thous:ht. William Cullen Bryant. Galatea. In the Cemetery at Frankfort.
Heart of the Rose. A Rose.
HagER, Lucie C. with portrait by R, B. Lewis, Hudson, Mass. . . Jane Maria Read. 205
Sowing and Reaping. Cherish the Flowen. Almost Home. Here and There. Arbutus. A Thought. Quotations.
WoLVERTON, Sarah. ..... Rev, Lee S, McCallester, D, D, Txyj
A Tribute. The Harp and the Winds. Lines to . Grant.
Johnson, Gertrude Tracy, with portrait by Thomson. Kansas City, Mo. . . Eliza S. Pettit. 208
A Little Song. Ich Ruhe Nun. To Her I Sing. Ich Liebie Ungeliebt. Not Always Thus. Life's Treasures.
WiNTERMUTE, MaRTHA. Wtth portrait by McCahon. Newark, Ohio. . J. C McCahon. 212
The Pardon of Psyche. Poesy. Annie O'Neil. Widowed in July. Grief of Hercules. Faith.
Clarke, Mary H. Gray withportraitbvHardy, Boston, Mass. . Cyrus Cobb. 214
Birth of the Lyre. The Eden God Hath Made. Sweet Forget-Me-Not. Bark, the Frailest on the Sea. Quotations.
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. ...... Nettie Leila Michel, 218
Reflections. The Complaint of Ninathoma. The Rose. Kissed. Rime of the Ancient Mariner, part fourth.
Quotations.
War Ballads. ............ 225
Edmund Clarence Stedman. Paul Revere's Ride, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Marching Along, William
Bradbury. " The Women who Went to the Field," Clara Barton. The Reveille, Bret Harte.
Single Poems. II. ........... 233
Hilda's Dream, W. Wilsy Martin. Columbia, i49>-x8o3, Lucy H. Washington. Lawrence Barrett, Robert Rexdale.
Sonnet, Mary E. Ireland. If I Were Only Young, Clara H. Mountcastle. A Candid Proposal, John Paul Bocock.
Olney Hymns, William Cowper. Funeral Hymns, Reginald Heber.
Current Poems. II. ........... 237
The Saint and the Sinner, Madeline Bridges. Tennyson, Florence Earle Coates. Phillips Brooks, Thomas Mac-
Kellar. Aprils Afield, Owen Wister. My Queen, LHla N. Cushman. The Ripples and the Pool, Herbert Ditchett.
Content, .\nna Poole Beardsley. Love's Season, Ella Wheeler Wilcox. The Song of the Rill, Junius L. Hemp-
stead. Fate, Henry Coyle. Quatrains, Florence A. Jones. Florida — A Fragment, Mary Ware. William
Blake, Davia Henry Wright. Eternity. John W. Kaye. To-morrow, Florence Earle Coates. April, Joel Benton.
A March Sunset, Ernest McGaflfey. Bats, Jean La Rue Burnett. A Portrait, Kimball Chase Tapiey.
Dickens, Charles with portrait by d. Maciiae ..... Frontispiece.
Eliot, George with portrait. . . . ' . Carrie Renfrew. 247
Song from " The Spanish Gypsy." Two Lovers. Song from "Agatha." " Oh May I Join the Choir Invisible."
Brother and Sister. Quotations.
Dickens, Charles ....... Ina Russelle Warren. 255
The British Lion. The Hymn of Wiltshire Laborers. Song. The Ivy Green. Song.
Palmer, Fanny Purdy with portrait from Ye Rose studio, Providence, R. I. Frederic A. Hinckley. 259
At an Afternoon Tea. Augusts. Quench not the Fires. Antigone. Oh Great Grey W^ves. At Portsmouth, Va.
Klingle, George with portrait by Fredericks, New York. . Charles Wells Moulton. 261
From Bethlehem to Jerusalem. Torrigiano to his Statue of Christ. Perfection in Division. Make Thy Way Mine.
The silver Cross. Quotations.
Malone, Walter with portrait by Ben. Bingham, Memphis, Tenn. Howard Hawthome McGee. 266
The First Transgression. Confirmation. " He Who Hath Loved." " Mary." Quotations.
Nason, Edwin Francis ..... Emma Huntington Nason. 268
Possession. Yesterday. To-Day. To-Morrow. Omnipresence. Bars. Sonnet. Unfulfilled. Sleep and Death.
On a Picture.
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler with portrait by Rockwood, New York. . . Lela E. Jamison. 272
Solitude. The Fault of the Age. Optimism. What Love Is. Impatience. " Two Sinners." Will. ThefSaddest
Hour. Quotations.
RaGSDALE, LulAH With portrait by R. I. Howell, Brookhaven, Miss. . . Dallas H. James. 275
Galatea. Upton Rey. Promise. Outside.
Busk IRK, Clarence A. ...... Benjamin S. Parker. 277
The Messiah A Sunset. Nature's Balm. The Flowera of Thought. Poesy. Mother's Portrait. Youth and Age.
Patience.
Gorton, Mrs. Cynthia M. R. with portrait by Devereaux, Fenton, Mich. G. Herrick Wilson. 281
Have I Done What I Could? Alone All Night. A Lullaby. " He Leadetb Me." Quotations.
Whitman, Sarah Helen, with portrait from oil painting by c. g. Thompson. H. A. VanFredenberg. 283
A Still Day in Autumn. The Last Flowers. Sonnets to Edgar Allan Poe. Science. Quotations.
Morris, Lewis. . . . . . . F. A. H Eyles. 285
Dear Little Hand. The Treasure of Hope. It Shall be Weil. Caelum non Animum. One Day. Song. Other
Days. " No More, No More." Pictures.
Fitzgerald, Marcella A. ....../. Arthur King. 288
Maud's Hero. The Robin. Slander. Morning. Cheer Up.
Wilstach, John Augustine, with portrait by PWliiM, LaFayette, ind. . J. L. Smith. 291
Ocean Currents. Teach Us Content. Life and Death. The Ballad of Rosalie. What is a Sonnet? What did
They Say ? In What Mood. Quotations.
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vi CONTENTS,
Hamm, Margherita Arlina. With portrait. ... Henry A. Thurman, 294
The Silent Witness. "To Her Lips." The Cooking Scribe. A Tint oi God. A Lentem Study. Christmastide.
Quotations.
Alungham, William. ....... Henry F. Randolph, 298
Lovely Mary Donnelly. The Dirty Old Man. Nanny's Sailor Lad. The Bright Little Girl. Danger.
KiNNB, SOPHRONIA YoUNG. With portrait by Ranger, Syracuse, N. Y. CordeHa Young WUlard, 300
Shadows. The Frost King. When Sinks the Sun.
Bates, Katharine Lee. ....... Marion P. Guild, 304
" He Shall Be Like a Tree." The Organist. Sleep Sorrow Sleep. Robin's Secret. College Song. Sleep.
Wood, Mary C. F. Hall, with portrait by Cook, Santa Barbara, Cal. Annette LaGrange, 309
Coronado Beach in 1870. Atlas. Too Late. Smoke. Death. Quotations.
Patmorb, Coventry. ....... Alexander H Japp, 311
The Rose of the World. Sweet meeting of Desires. Slv Thoughts. Parting. Love's Reality. The Tiibute.
Quotations.
HibBARD, Grace, with portrait by Tabcr, San Francisco, Cal. . . , O, C. Ashbury. 315
Wild Poppies. Suspense. A Cigerette. Bluebells. Up From the Sea. Safe. A White Chrysanthemum.
Victor, Frances Fuller, with portrait by Towne, Portland, Ore. . Horace A, Kimball. 317
Childhood. Moonlight Memories. Souvenir. Lost at Sea. Quotations.
Longfellow, Henry Wadsworth. . . . . .319
Quotations.
Heroines of the Poets. .......... 323
To Lucasta, Richard Lovelace. Highland Mary, Robert Bums. Lines on Isabella Markham, John Harrington.
Maud, Alfred Tenn^rson. Maid 01 Athens, Lord Byron. Rosaline, Thomas Lod^e. Doris, Arthur J. Munby.
Julia, Robert Hemck. Castara, William Habington. Jessie. The Flower O' Dumblane, Robert Tannahill.
Maud Muller, John Oreenleaf Whittier. Ruth, Thomas Hood.
Single Poems. IIL ........... 328
Sonnets of the Southland. Mary H. Leonard. For Thee, Francis Saltus Saltus. The Wanderer, John C. Fremont.
Confessions, Erie Mackay. Francis S. Saltus, Frank L. Stanton. Now and Ever, Elizabeth Henry Miller.
Poem, James O'Reilley. Solace of the Woods, William Gilmore Simms.
Current Poems. IIL ........... 335
The Banner that Welcomes the World, Hezekiah Butterworth. A Circus Reflection, John Kendrick Bangs. Humility,
Frank H. Sweet. The Test. James Riley. A Leaf from the Devil's Jest Book, Charles Edwin Markham. The
Last Battle, Virginia Woodward Clowd. George MacDonald, John Fullerton. Two Hearts, N. J. Clodfelter.
The Bishop of Gretna Green, Wilbur Larremore. At His Gate, Alice S. Deletombe. Travelers, Percy Addle-
shaw. On Some Forgotten Poems, W. J. Henderson. On a Portrait, Madison Cawein. A Vision of Brave Men,
Edith M. Thomas. Dreaming and Doing, William S. Lord.
Norton, Caroline Elizabeth, with portrait. .... Alfred H Miles. 345
Bingen on the Rhine. The King of Denmark's Ride. Love Not. I Do Not Love Thee. lis. A Mother's Love.
We Have Been Friends Together. To My Books. Be Frank with Me. Quotations.
Foss, Sam Walter, with portrait. ..... Ina Russelle Warren. 351
The Volunteer Organist. The Railroad Through the Farm. The Auctioneer's Gift. Two Friends. Ingin Summer.
Sweets for the Sweet. Quotations.
"Arnold, Birch." with portait by Hoicombe & Metzen, Detroit, Mich. H A, Van Fredenberg. 354
The Water Lily's Spirit. The Angel of My Heart. Forgetfulness. To a Butterfly November. Reproof. Youth
and I. Unsatisfied. ,
Rich, Helen Hinsdale, with portrait by Scott, Chicago, 111. . . Charles G. Whiting. 359
Justtce in Leadville. Death and Roses. May Song. Die, Sweet June. Emerson. Red Roses.
Bates, Clara Doty, with portrait by Moree, Chicago. 111. . Charles Wells MotUton. 364
The Sleep-Journey. Ah I Heart, I Know. The Singing Sand. Grandmother's Birthday.
AllERTON, Ellen Palmer, with portrait by Evans, Hiawatha, Kan. . D. W, Wilder. 366
Beautiful Things. Acceptance. My Ambition. October Days. Quotations.
RusKiN, John. With portrait. , ' . . . G. Washington Moon. 370
Agonia. The Glacier. Christ Church, Oxford. Remembrance. Song. Quotations.
Blake, Mary Elizabeth. . . . . . . Oscar Fay Adams. 373
A Dead Summer. Regret. A Greeting. With a Silkken Purse. This and That. Sequence. Hostages. A Bee-*
thoven Symphony. Quotations.
Lazarus, Emma, with portrait. ..... Henry A. Van Fredenberg. 375
The Crowing of the RecTCock. The World's Justice. Ofi* Rough Point. The Elixir. Youth and Death. Success.
Life and Art. The New Collosus. The Undine's Dance.
Ward, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, with portrait. . . . I. Arthur King. 380
Apple-Blossoms. Galatea. Elaine and Elaine. An Acknowledgement. The Room's Width. All the Rivera. Quo-
tations.
Rossetti, Dante Gabriel. ...... H Buxton Forman. 382
The Blessed Damozel. A Little While. Even So. A Sonnet. " Retro Me, Sathana 1 " True Woman. The Heart
of the Night. Genius in Beauty. . Her Gifts. Quotations.
ClAPP, Eva KatHRINE. with portrait by Atelier Scheurich, Berlin. . Inez R. Wood. 389
Golden-Rod. Last Words. When Riley Sings. A Dream of Sappho. The Soldier's Widow. To Victor Hugo.
Hatch, Mary R. P. with portrait by p. Haseltlne, Lancaster, n.h. . Henry A. Thurman. 391
An Indian Legend. Patrick's Letter. How Nice. The Pathos of the Past.
Blunt, Wilfrid Scawen. with portrait. .... Rtchard le Galltenne. 395
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In the Night. At a Funeral. Laughter and Death. There arc Wrongs Done in the Fair Face of Heaven. Fare-
well, Dark Gaol. On the Shortness of Time. To Juliet, Exhorting Her to Patience. To One Who Would Make
a Confession. The Two Highwaymen. A Day In Sussex. Quotations.
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CONTENTS.
V^.l
Wright, Hattie Leonard, with portrait. .... Horace A, Kimball. 401
My View an' His'n. The Old Gray Horae. To a November Violet. Quotations.
Rhodbrick, George Carlton, Jr. .... . Thomas C, Harbaugh, 403
Thanksgiving:. Drifting with the Tide. Christmas Bells. Decoration Day.
Daniel, Marion Delana. with portrait. Rev, /. B. Hawthorne^ D, D, 407
Our Question. Lilies. Soul. To Miss Kate T. Goode.
Creamer, Edward Sherwood. ...... Edward IV. Kieman, 408
Song of the Upland. A WaU for Walt Whitman. Mountains and Foothills. Above Causality. Helicon. Bells
orthe Mormng. Music.
Howe, Julia Ward, with portrait. ...... Dudley Irving. 410
The City of My Love. Spcsok, for Thy Servant Hcareth. Quotations.
Single Poems. IV. ........... 414
The Dance of Death. Austin Doboon. The Praise of Death, Henry A. Van Predenberg. A National Hymn,
F. Marion Crawfora. Jenny Kissed Me. Leigh Hunt. What My Lover Said, Homer Greene. Alas 1 How Easily
Things Go Wrong, George Mac Donald.
Current Poems. IV. .......... . 419
Freedom, Clara Jessup Moore. Enchantment, Robert Bums Wilson. Whom the Gods Love, Edgar Fawcett.
Sunrise from the Peaks of Otter, Cornelia J. M.Jordan. Revealment, Charles P. Nettleton. To my Mother's
Picture. John M. Parrell. Catullus to Lisbia, Eugene Field.
Index of Complete Poems. ......... 423
Index of Quotations. .......... 428
Index oe Poets. . . . . . . 430
Index of Authors of Prose Sketches. ....... 432
Index of First Lines. .......... 433
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feMONAVfO Br
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The Magazine of Poetry.
Vol. V.
No. I.
THOMAS BUCHANAN READ.
WHAT more fitting illustration of the possibili-
ties of the American boy than is given in
the history of Thomas Buchanan Read. The tra-
ditional 'silver spoon ' was lacking in this case. In
place of it was given genius, though I doubt if the
possessor of it ever guessed at his own abilities.
Certainly his mother could not have foreseen any-
thing in the future for her son beyond the acquiring
of a comfortable business through the agency of a
desirable trade; or, being a widow, perhaps her own
necessities were the task-master. However it may
be, he was apprenticed, at an early age, to a tailor,
but the work evidently was uncongenial, as he ran
away to Philadelphia and took up the trade of cigar-
making, and when fourteen years of age made his
way to Cincinnati, where he found a home with
Shobal V. Clevenger, the sculptor. His biog-
raphers do not state upon what terms the home was
secured, and one can only conjecture that Mr.
Clevenger must have taken an interest in the boy
and given him the aid which should finally redound
with such credit to both donator and donatee.
While living with Mr. Clevenger, young Read
learned the trade of sign-painter, attending school
at intervals. He had also learned something of the
art of painting and sculpture from Mr. Clevenger.
Upon that gentl^man'is departure to Europe, Mr.
Read went to Dayton, where he secured an engage-
ment in a theater. He returned to Cincinnati a
year later, and, with the assistance of Nicholas
Longworth, opened a studio for portrait painting.
He remained but a short time in Cincinnati, and
from then on until 1841, when he finally located in
Boston, he lived a migratory existence, going from
one town to another, painting portraits or signs,
giving public entertainments, and, as a last resort,
cigarmaking. It was in 1843 ^r. Read's poetical
talent blossomed forth, and he published in the
Boston "Courier" several lyric poems. In 1846
he removed to Philadelphia. In 1850 he visited
Europe, and from 1853 to 1858 he lived in Florence
and Rome, studying and practicing art Although
he after spent some time in Philadelphia and Cin-
cinnati, Rome was his preferred residence. He
was bom in Chester county. Pa., March 12th, 1822,
and died in New York, May nth, 1872, while on a
visit to this country. Mr. Read also possessed
some dramatic talent During the Civil War he
gave public readings in aid of the soldiers, and
many times recited his war-songs in camp. As a
painter, Mr. Read cannot be considered so great a
success as a writer. His pictures are graceful and
poetic, but they lack fine technique. No doubt, had
he received training in early life, he could have been
classed with some of the great artists of the century.
As it is, he has left some pleasing conceits in ** The
Spirit of the Waterfall," ** The Lost Pleiad," "The
Star of Bethlehem," '* Undine," "Cleopatra and
Her Barge" and "Sheridan's Ride." Some of
his best portraits are. those of George M. Dallas,
the ex-queen of Naples, Elizabeth Barrett Brown-
ing and Henry W. Longfellow, while his group of
Longfellow's daughters was exceedingly popular.
His literary productions include " Poems " (Phila-
delphia, 1847); "Lays and Ballads" (Phildelphia,
1848); " Female Poets of America " (1848); "The
Pilgrims of the Great St Bernard," prose, pub-
lished as serial," "The New Pastoral" (Philadel-
phia, 1854); "The House )Dy the Sea" (1856);
" Sylvia, or the Lost Shepherd and Other Poems,"
(1857); "A Voyage to Iceland" (1857); "The
Wagoner of the AUeghanies " (1862); "A Summer
Story " (1865), and " The Good Samaritan " (Cin-
cinnati, 1867). His complete poetical works were
• published in three volumes in Philadelphia (1865
I and 1867). Some of his poems have been issued in
I England. N. L. M.
THE PliGRIM TO THE LAND OF SONG.
The dews are dry upon my sandal-shoon
Which bathed them on the foreign hills of song,
And now beneath the white and sultry noon
They print the dust which they may wear too long.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
The flowers by delicate fingers wove at mom
Around my pilgrim staff have paled and died,
Or dropped into the sand, and lie forlorn,
Mute orphans of the airy mountain side.
The mingled music in the early gale.
Of bees and birds, and maidens among flowers,
The brooks, like shepherds, piping down the vale.
For these my heart remounts the morning hours.
Oh! that I might reclimb the dewy dawn,
And with the stars sit down by Castalie,
And be once more within the shade withdrawn,
Mantled with music and with Poesy.
Thou blessed bird between me and the heaven.
Thou wingM censer, swinging through the air
With incense of pure song,— how hast thou driven
One to the past, that may not linger there!
Oh! for one wild annihilating hour.
Spent with the minstrels of a loftier time;
Those giants among bards, whose high songs tower
Full many a rood o'er all our new sublime.
Oh! for an hour with Chaucer, the divine,
The morning star of English song confessed;
Ushering a day whose slow but sure decline
Fades with a fitful glimmering in the west.
Oh! for that rare auroral time, which brought
The light of Shakespeare, and the glorious few,
Who, in their glowing robes of deathless thought.
Strode knee-deep through Parnassian flowers and
dew.
The hot sands gleam me, and I thirst, —
The wayside springs have sunk into themselves;
And even the litde blossoms which they nursed,
Have vanished from their side, like faithless elves.
Whence lead the sandy courses of these rills ?
Do they foretell a mightier stream at hand.
With voice triumphant, worthy of these hills ?
Where are thy rivers, oh, my native land ?
A few brave souls have sparkled into sight,
With living flashes of celestial art;
Souls who might flood the world with new delight,
Keep sealed the deepest fountains of the heart
Oh! for a cloud to oversweep the west,
And with a deluge burst these deeper springs, —
A voiceful cloud, with grandeur in its breast,
And lightning on its far impending wings.
Oh! for one mighty heart and fearless hand.
For such, methinks, my country, is thy due, —
The embodied spirit of his forest land,
Who, scorning not the old, shall sing the new.
Here will I rest until the day declines,
A voiceless pilgrim toward the land of song;
And, like a sentinel, catch the herald signs
Of him whose coming hath been stayed too long.
THE CLOSING SCENE.
Within his sober realm of leafless trees
The russet year inhaled the dreamy air;
Like some tanned reaper in his hour of ease,
When all the fields are lying brown and bare.
The gray bams looking from their hazy hills
0*er the dim waters widening in the vales,
Sent down the air a greeting to the mills,
On the dull thunder of alternate flails.
All sights were mellowed and all sounds subdued,
The hills seemed farther and the streams sang
low;
As in a dream the distant woodman hewed
His winter log with many a muffled blow.
The embatded forests, erewhile armed in gold.
Their banners bright with every martial hue.
Now stood, like some sad beaten host of old,
Withdrawn afar in Time's remotest blue.
On slumbrous wings the vulture held his flight;
The dove scarce heard his sighing mate's com-
plaint.
And like a star slow drowning in the light,
The village church vane seemed to pale and
faint.
The sentinel cock upon the hillside crew, —
Crew thrice, and all was stiller than before,
Silent, till some replying warder blew
His alien hom, and then was heard no more.
Where erst the jay, within the elm's tall crest.
Made garmlous trouble round her unfledged
young.
And where the oriole hung her swaying nest.
By every light wind like a censer swung;
Where sang the noisy masons of the eaves,
The busy swallows, circling ever near,
Foreboding, as the mstic mind believes,
An early harvest and a plenteous year;
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THOMAS BUCHANAN READ.
Where every bird which charmed the vernal feast,
Shook the sweet slumber from its wings at mom,
To warn the reaper of the rosy east, —
All now was songless, empty and forlorn.
Alone from out the stubble piped the quail,
And croaked the crow through all the dreamy
gloom;
Alone the pheasant, drumming in the vale,
Made echo to the distant cottage loom.
There was no bud, no bloom upon the bowers;
The spiders wove their thin shrouds night by
night;
The thistle-down, the only ghost of flowers,
Sailed slowly by, passed noiseless out of sight.
Amid all this, in this most cheerless air,
And where the woodbine shed upon the porch
Its crimson leaves, as if the Year stood there.
Firing the floor with his inverted torch;
Amid all this, the centre of the scene,
The white-haired matron, with monotonous
tread.
Plied the swift wheel, and with her joyless mien,
Sat, like a Fate, and watched the flying thread.
She had known Sorrow; he had walked with her,
Oft supped and broke the bitter ashen crust,
And in the dead leaves still she heard the stir
Of his black mantle trailing in the dust
While yet her cheek was bright with summer bloom.
Her country summoned and she gave her all;
And twice War bowed to her his sable plume, —
Regave the swords to rust upon her wall.
R^:ave the swords, but not the hand that drew
And struck for Liberty its dying blow,
Nor him who, to his sire and country true,
Fell 'mid the ranks of the invading foe.
Long, but not loud, the droning wheel went on.
Like the low murmur of a hive at noon;
Long, but not loud, the memory of the gone
Breathed through her lips a sad and tremulous
tune.
At last the thread was snapped; her head was
bowed;
Life dropped the distaff through his hands serene,
And loving neighbors smoothed her careful shroud.
While Death and Winter closed the autumn
scene.
SHERIDAN'S RIDE.
Up from the South at break of day.
Bringing to Winchester fresh dismay,
The affrighted air with a shudder bore,
Like a herald in haste, to the chieftain's door,
The terrible grumble, and rumble, and roar.
Telling the battle was on once more.
And Sheridan twenty miles away.
And wider still those billows of war,
Thundered along the horizon's bar;
And louder yet into Winchester rolled
The roar of that red sea uncontrolled,
Making the blood of the listener cold.
As he thought of the stake in that firery fray.
And Sheridan twenty miles away.
But there is a road from Winchester town,
A good, broad highway leading down;
And there through the flush of the morning light,
A steed as black as the steeds of night.
Was seen to pass, as with eagle flight,
As if he knew the terrible need;
He stretched away with his utmost speed.
Hills rose and fell, but his heart was gay,
With Sheriden fifteen miles away.
Still sprung from those swift hoofs, thundering
South,
The dust, like smoke from the cannon's mouth;
Or the trail of a comet, sweeping faster and faster*
Foreboding to traitors the doom of disaster.
The heart of the steed, and the heart of the
master
Were beating like prisoners assaulting their walls,
Impatient to be where the battle fleld calls;
Every nerve of the charger was strained to full play
With Sheridan only ten miles away.
Under his spuming feet the road
Like an arrowy Alpine river flowed,
And the landscape sped away behind
Like an ocean flying before the wind,
And the steed, like a bark fed with furnace ire,
Swept on, with his wild eye full of fire.
But lo! he is nearing his heart's desire;
He is snuffing the smoke of the roaring fray,
With Sheridan only five miles away.
The first that the general saw were the groups
Of stragglers, and then the retreating troups:
What was done ? what to do ? a glance told him
both.
Then striking his spurs, with a terrible oath.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
He dashed down the line, 'mid a storm of huzzas,
And the wave of retreat checked its course there,
because
The sight of the master compelled it to pause.
With foam and with dust, the black charger was
gray;
By the flash of his eye, and the red nostrirs play.
He seemed to the whole great army to say,
'* I have brought you Sheridan all the way
From Winchester, down to save the day! '*
Hurrah! hurrah for Sheridan!
Hurray! hurrah for horse and man!
And when their statues are placed on high,
Under the dome of the Union sky.
The American soldiers' Temple of Fame,
There with the glorious general's name,
Be it said, in letters both bold and bright,
" Here is the steed that saved the day.
By carrying Sheridan into the fight.
From Winchester, twenty miles away! **
ECONOMY.
Not with a bondmaid's hand, but housewife's care^
Who holds chaste plenty better than rich waste.
— The New Pastoral,
AMERICA.
And let thy stature shine above the world,
A form of terror and of loveliness.
—Ibid.
SONG.
Oh, cold was the bridegroom,
All frozen with pride;
He first slew her lover,
Then made her his bride.
Beneath a green willow.
And under a stone.
The buried her lover.
And left her alone.
With naught but the bridegroom's
Proud breast for her bead,
Oh, how could she live when
Her lover was dead ?
Her body they buried
Beside the church-wall;
Her ghost with the bridegroom
Sat up in the hall: —
Sat up at his table.
Lay down in his bed: —
Oh, cold was the bridegroom,
But colder the dead!
— The Wagoner of the AUeghanUs.
THE BRAVE AT HOME.
The maid who binds her warrior's sash
With smile that well her pain dissembles.
The while beneath her drooping lash
One starry tear-drop hangs and trembles,
Though Heaven alone records the tear.
And Fame shall never know her story.
Her heart has shed a drop as dear
As e'er bedewed the field of glory.
The wife who girds her husband's sword.
Mid litde ones who weep or wonder,
And bravely speaks the cheering word.
What though her heart be rent asunder.
Doomed nightly in her dreams to hear
The bolts of death around him rattle,
Hath shed as sacred blood as e'er
Was poured upon the field of batde.
The mother who conceals her grief
While to her heart her son she presses,
Then breathes a few brave words and brief.
Kissing the patriot brow she blesses.
With no one iMit her secret God
To know the pain that weighs upon her.
Sheds holy blood as e'er the sod
Received on Freedom's field of honor.
—Ibid..
TWINS.
I saw two beautiful children
Of one fair mother bom.
Playing among the dewy buds
That bloomed beneath the mom.
The same in age and beauty,
The same in voice and size.
The same bright hair upon their necks.
The same shade in their eyes.
Singing the same song ever
In the self-same silvery tune.
They passed from April into May,
Toward the fields of June.
They whirled, and danced, and dallied
The beautiful vales amid.
Till under the same thick leaves and flowers
Their future course was hid.
— Th€ Twins.
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HELEN HUNT JACKSON
HELEN HUNT JACKSON.
AMERICA has been the birth-place of a number
of female poets that have given to their coun-
try some of the sweetest songs in the English
tongue. Women who have been revered and loved
for the words of cheer and inspiration they gave to
mankind, yet I doubt if any among them have ever
received the same measure of love, the same
amount of reverence, or have called forth the same
feeling of kinship as Helen Hunt Jackson. Nor is
this to be wondered at, for no other writer has ever
touched so closely upon kindred themes; has ever
so nearly reached the heart and the sensibilities.
The Carey sisters probably came the nearest to this
in their writings, and May Riley Smith has the
faculty of clothing every-day events with a pathetic
grace that voices the sentiments of her readers as
they could not themselves; but while these later-
named have succeeded but in part in expressing
and giving utterance to the only half-acknowledged
tenderness within us, which we may feel but cannot
speak, Helen Hunt has laid bare the whole recesses
of the heart. Hers was a wonderful insight into
human nature. Such intuition must have been
heaven-bom. Her songs are songs of faith, made
perfect through suffering So strong her faith that
others' faith must seem weak in comparison, and if
one were for a moment led to doubt the existence of
a God, that doubt must take flight in a half-hour
with Helen Hunt. This trust and love which pre-
dominated in her, and which pervaded all she wrote,
or thought, or did, was the underlying cause of her
mastery over human hearts. She had suffered, and
by her sufferings was made strong. Who shall say
she was not a chosen vessel to carry the Master's
message to other fainting hearts ?
Mrs. Jackson was bom in Amherst, Mass., Octo-
ber 15th, 1830. She was a daughter of the well-
known Professor Nathan W. Fiske, of Amherst
College. She was graduated from the Ipswich
Female Seminary, Massachusetts, and from the
Messrs. Abbott's school of New York City. Her
first husband, M^'or Edward B. Hunt, U. S. A.,
lost his life in 1863 by the premature explosion
of a submarine battery he had invented. Two
children, boys, were bom to Major and Mrs.
Hunt, one living less than a year, the other dying
two years after the father's death had occurred.
It was during this season of grief, the cmcible
to her as yet, untried soul, that faith gained the
mastery, and, at the end of a year of bitter
mental conflict, she came forth purified by her
trial, ready to give to the world the benefit of her
experience for which she had paid so dearly. She
had written but little previous to that time, but
now her pen became her solace, and from then on
until her death, August 12th, 1885, she wrote un-
ceasingly. Her published works are "Verses"
(Boston, 1871); "Bits of Travel" (1872); "Bits of
Talk About Home Matters" (1873); "The Story
of Boon" (Boston, 1874); "Bits of Talk in Verse
and Prose," for young folks, (Boston, 1876); "Mercy
Philbrick's Choice" (Boston, 1876); "Hetty's
Strange History " (Boston, 1877); " Bits of Travel
at Home" (Boston, 1878); 'f Nelly's Silver-mine:
A Story of Colorado Life" (Boston, 1876); "Let-
ters from a Cat" (Boston, 1878); " Mammy Tittle-
back and Her Family: A Tme Story of Seventeen
Cats" (Boston, 1881); "A Century of Dishonor "
(New York, 1881); "The Training of Children "
(New York, 1882); "Ramona" (Boston, 1884);
" The Hunter Cats of Connorioa " (Boston, 1884);
"Zeph: A Post-humous Story" (Boston, 1885);
" Glimpses of Three Coasts " (Boston, 1886); "Son-
nets and Lyrics" (Boston, 1886); "Between
Whiles" (Boston, 1887); "The Procession of
Flowers in Colorado " (Boston, 1887); with Kinney,
Abbott, " Condition and Needs of the Mission In-
dians of California," published by the United States
govemment, (Washington, 1883). In 1883 Mrs.
Hunt was appointed special commissioner to look
into the condition of the Mission Indians of Cali-
fornia. In 1875 she was married to William S.
Jackson, a banker of Colorado Springs. The years
passed in Colorado were happy ones. Her chosen
resting place on the summit of Cheyenne mountain,
four miles from her home, has never been a lonely
one, for it has been the mecca of hundreds of tour-
ists, until the path leading to her grave has become
well worn from the footsteps of those who have
gone to pay their tribute to her who was poet, sister
and friend to the whole world. J. W.
MY LEGACY.
They told me I was heir. I tumed in haste,
And ran to seek my treasure,
And wondered, as I ran, how it was placed;
If I should find a measure
Of gold, or if the titles of fair lands
And houses would be laid within my hands.
I joumeyed many roads; I knocked at gates;
I spoke to each wayfarer
I met, and said, " A heritage awaits
Me. Art not thou the bearer
Of news ? Some message sent to me whereby
I leam which way my new possessions lie? "
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Some asked me in; naught lay beyond their door;
Some smiled and would not tarry,
But said that men were just behind who bore
More gold than I could carry;
And so the mom, the noon, the day were spent.
While empty-handed up and down I went.
At last one cried, whose face I could not see,
As through the mist he hasted:
" Poor child, what evil ones have hindered thee.
Till this whole day is wasted ?
Hath no man told thee that thou art joint heir
With one named Christ, who waits the goods to
share?"
The one named Christ I sought for many days,
In many places, vainly;
I heard men name his name in many ways,
I saw his temples plainly.
But they who named him most gave me no sign
To find him by, or prove the heirship mine.
And when at last I stood before his face,
I knew him by no token
Save subtle air of joy which filled the place;
Our greeting was not spoken;
In solemn silence I received my share.
Kneeling before my brother and * 'joint heir."
My share! No deed of house or spreading lands,
As I had dreamed; no measure
Heaped up with gold; my elder brother's hands
Had never held such treasure.
Foxes have holes, and birds in nests are fed —
My brother had not where to lay his head.
My share 1 The right like him to know all pain
Which hearts are made for knowing;
The right to find in loss the surest gain;
To reap my joy from sowing
In bitter tears; the right with him to keep
A watch by day and night with all who weep.
My share I To-day men call it grief and death;
I see the joy and life to-morrow;
I thank our Father with my every breath
For this sweet legacy of sorrow;
And through my tears I call to each, "Joint heir
With Christ, make haste to ask him for thy share.''
A WILD ROSE OF SEPTEMBER.
O WILD red rose, what wind has stayed
Till now thy summer of delights ?
Where hid the south wind when he laid
His heart on thine, these autumn nights ?
O wild red rose! Two laces glow
At sight of thee, and two hearts share
All thou and thy south wind can know
Of sunshine in this autumn air.
O sweet wild rose! O strong south windt
The sunny roadside asks no reasons
Why we such secret summer find,
Forgetting calendars and seasons.
Alas! red rose, thy petals wilt;
Our loving hands tend thee in vain;
Our thoughtless touch seems like a guilt;
Ah! could we make thee live again.
Yet joy^ wild rose! Be glad, south wind!
Immortal wind! immortal rose!
Ye shall live on, in two hearts shrined,
With secrets which no words disclose.
ABSENCE.
Thb shortest absence brings to every thought
Of those we love a solemn tenderness.
It is akin to death. Now we confess,
Seeing the loneliness their loss has broi^ht,
That they were dearer far than we had taught
Ourselves to think. We see that nothing less
Than hope of their return could cheer or bless
Our weary days. We wonder how, for aught
Or all of fault in them, we could heed
Or anger, with their loving presence near.
Or wound them by the smallest word or deed.
Dear absent love of mine. It did not need
Thy absence to tell me thou wert dear,
And yet the absence maketh it more clear.
LAST WORDS.
Dear hearts, whose love has been so sweet to know.
That I am looking backward as I go.
Am lingering while I haste, and in this rain
Of tears of joy am mingling tears of pain;
Do not adorn with costly shrub, or tree.
Or flowers, the little grave that shelters me.
Let the wild, wind-sown seeds grow up unharmed*
And back and forth all summer, unalarmed.
Let all the tiny, busy creatures creep;
Let the sweet grass its last year's tangles keep.
And when, remembering me, you come some day
And stand there, speak no praise, but only say,
" How she loved us! 'Twas that which made her
dear.*'
Those are the words that I shall joy to hear.
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HELEN HUNT JACKSON
II
NOT AS I WILL.
Blindfolded and alone I stand,
With unknown thresholds on eadi hand;
The darkness deepens as I grope,
Afraid to fear, afraid to hope;
Yet this one thing I learn to know
Each day more surely as I go,
That doors are opened, ways are made,
Burdens are lifted or are laid
By some great law unseen and still,
Unfathomed purpose to fulfill,
"Not as I will/*
Blindfolded and alone I wait;
Loss seems too bitter, gain too late;
Too heavy burdens in the load.
And too few helpers on the road;
And joy is weak and grief is strong.
And years and days so long, so long!
Yet this one thing I learn to know
Each day more surely as I go,
That I am glad the good and ill
By changeless law are ordered still,
*'NotasIwill*'
** Not as I will I ** the sound grows sweet
Each time my lips the words repeat.
** Not as I will," the darkness feels
More safe than light when this thought steals
Like whispered voice to calm and bless
All unrest and all loneliness.
"Not as I will," because the One
Who loved us first and best has gone
Before us on the road, and still
For us must all His love fulfill,
"Not as I Willi"
SPINNING.
Like a blind spinner in the sun
I tread my days;
I know that all the threads will run
Appointed ways;
I know each day will bring its task.
And being blind, no more I ask.
I do not know the use or name
Of that I spin;
I only know that someone came,
And laid within
My hand the thread, and said, " Since you
Are blind, but one thing you can do."
Sometimes the threads so rough and fast
And tangled fly,
I know ^ild storms are sweeping past.
And fear that I
Shall fall; but dare not try to find
A safer place, since I am blind.
I know not why, but I am sure
That tint and place
In some great fabric to endure
Past time and race
My threads will have; so from the first.
Though blind, I never felt accurst.
I think, perhaps, this trust has sprung
From one short word
Said over me when I was young, —
So young, I heard
It, knowing not that God's name signed
My brow, and sealed me his, though blind.
But whether this be seal or sign
Within, without.
It matters not. The bond divine
I never doubt.
I know He set me here, and still,
And glad, and blind, I wait His will;
But listen, listen, day by day,
To hear their tread
Who bear the finished web away.
And cut the thread.
And bring God's message in the sun,
" Thou poor blind spinner, work is done."
THAT THINGS ARE NO WORSE, SIRE.
From the time of our old Revolution,
When we threw off the yoke of the king,
Has descended this phrase to remember,
To remember, to say and to sing;
'Tis a phrase that is full of a lesson.
It can comfort and warm like a fire,
It can cheer us when days are the darkest:
** Thai things are no worse ^ O, my SireP^
'Twas King George's prime minister said it,
To the king who had questioned in heat.
What he meant by appointing Thanksgiving,
In such times of ill luck and defeat;
" What's the cause for your Day of Thanksgiving,
Tell me, pray," cried the king in his ire;
Said the minister, "This is the reason:
That things are no worse ^ O, my SireP*
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
There has nothing come down in the story,
Of the answer returned by the king;
But I think on his throne he sat silent,
And confessed it a sensible thing.
For there's never a burden so heavy
That it might not be heavier still;
There is never so bitter a sorrow,
That the cup would not fuller fill.
And whatever of care or of sadness
Our life and our duties may bring,
There is always the cause for Thanksgiving,
Which the minister told to the king.
'Tis a lesson to sing and remember;
It can comfort and warm like a fire.
Can cheer us when days are the darkest:
** That things are no worse^ O, my Sire/**
A BIT OF LACE.
Only a bit of lace.
Only a few ells long.
The whirr of a wing in a second's grace
Could blow it away without a trace.
So light was the fairy bit of lace;
Hardly the thing for a song!
Hardly the thing for a song! But wait;
There is a story to relate.
Summer in Calvados;
A woman all bent and old,
So blind that she totters as she goes;
Her hair is white as the driven snows;
Faint with hunger, the whole village knows,
But lace like hers brings gold;
It is so fine, brings gold. Oh! wait.
She is weaving early, she is weaving late.
Calvados leaves are shed;
The sununer is over and gone;
Calvados winters are cold, 'tis said.
There's a house where eyes with tears are red;
The blind old mother is lying dead,
But the bit of lace is done.
" See! the lace is done, Sir Priest. Oh! wait,
The pay is sure, though sometimes late."
Summer across the seas.
Summer on land, in sky.
Summer in a heartless heart at ease,
With swift, white hands to snatch and seize
Gifls from a lover, who kneels to please
Each mood as it flits by.
What mood is this flits by ? " Oh! wait,
My sweet *Tis bought. The man comes late."
Only a bit of lace,
Only a few ells long;
But the whole of a life, and a life's last grace,
Gone in a moment, without a trace.
Were in the threads of that bit of lace.
Oh! the death and doom in the song.
Oh! the death and doom in the song. But wait;
The mills of the gods grind slow, grind late!
BEST.
Mother, I see you, with your nursery light.
Leading your babies, all in white,
To their sweet rest;
Christ, the Good Shepherd, carries mine to-night.
And that is best.
I cannot help tears, when I see them twine
Their fingers in yours, and their bright curls shine
On your warm breast;
But the Savior's is purer than yours or mine.
He can love best
You tremble each hour because your arms
Are weak; your heart is wrung with alarms.
And sore oppressed;
My darlings are safe, out of reach of harms.
And that is best
You know over yours may hang even now
Pain and disease, whose fulfilling slow
Naught can arrest;
Mine in God's gardens run to and fro.
And that is best.
You know that of yours, your feeblest one
And dearest may live long years alone.
Unloved, unblest;
Mine are cherished of saints around God's throne,
And that is best.
You must dread for yours the crime that sears.
Dark guilt unwashed by repentant tears.
And unconfessed;
Mine entered spotless on eternal years;
Oh! how much the best.
But grief is selfish; I cannot see
Always why I should so strickenjbe
More than the rest;
But I know that, as well as for them, for me,
God did the best
HEREDITY.
Because of father's sins the cost
Is counted in the children's blood.
—My House Not Made^mthlHands.
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MARY WARE.
15
MARY WARE.
IT is the glory of poesy and of song that it belongs
to no cx>untry or dime; no national or sectional
lines confine its powers, but wherever the sun shines,
winds sigh, brooklets murmur or birds sing, its spirit
floats free on the blessed air of heaven and its vo-
taries find a shrine. It matters not to us, then,
where or when a poet was bom. North, South,
East or West, the children of song are kindred
all. Had Mary Harris found a home for her
happy childhood among the pleasant fields
of New England instead of the wild, nigged
and yet charmingly beautiful hills of Tennessee,
she would have been no more, no less the favored
daughter of the muse than she is. We may not
deny that the wild woodland beauty that hedged in
her happy girlhood, the deep blue skies above, the
musical ripple of streams and the songs of birds
contributed much to the happy expansion of the
inborn powers, and when, later on, the Tennes-
see home was exchanged for the no less wild and
romantic home in Alabama, the same conditions of
outward loveliness, of peace and gladness, sur-
rounded her. It was there, in that sylvan home,
myself then an awkward boy, I first met her, with
her gifted brother, Edmund K. Harris. Of him,
her t\^'in brother of genius, it is essential to speak.
While living, he was her brother, friend, counsellor
and guide. When he died, ala^! so young, it is no
weird stretch of the fancy to say that his mantle fell
upon her. A sketch, then, of Mrs. Ware's life would
be but half complete without a corollary sketch of
his. Brother and sister, they were the children of
George and Matilda Roper Harris. Their father
was a successful lawyer living in Madisonville,
Monroe county, Tenn., where three children were
bom to him, Mary, Edmund K. and Bmce. In
1844 their father, retiring from the practice of law,
removed to Shelby county, Alabama, where the
literary life of the brother and sister began. The
gentle sister sat and worshiped at her brother's
feet, exulting in his flight, but almost fearing to
essay a trial of her own wing. At length, longing
for a close companionship in achievements as well
as in taste, and encouraged by his brotherly as-
surance, she mustered up the courage to make the
venture, resulting in a bright little poem entitled
"When Nature Wreathed Her Rosy Bowers."
Happily assured by the success of this, her maiden
efibrt, she plumed her wing for still loftier flights.
In 1857 her brother established the Shelby Chron-
icle ^ in Columbiana, Ala., which he conducted with
signal success and ability until he sold it to take a
place on the editorial stafl* of the Mobile Tridune,
then the leading paper of the State. The untimely
death of one so near and doubly dear to her heart
was a prostrating blow to the sister, but the Chris-
tian faith which has ever been her chiefest joy in
life sustained her in her sorrow, and, after a season
of mourning, she took up her pen again to pour out
her soul in song. In September, 1863, Miss Mary
Harris was united in marriage to Horace Ware,
then one of the iron kings of the South. In 1883
she, with her husband, removed to their present
elegant home in the city of Birmingham, where,
surrounded by all that wealth and art can contrive
to make life pleasant, she spends her time in study
and work, finding in both an avocation at once
felicitious and congenial. In July, 1890, Mrs. Ware
was again called to moum, this time, the death of
her husband. B. F. S.
WHEN NATURE WREATHED HER ROSY
BOWERS.
When Nature wreathed her rosy bowers,
And sunlight danced amid the flowers,
Young Love, in gaudy hues arrayed,
Within a fairy bower strayed.
A maiden there, with long, fair hair,
And form so light, and face so fair.
She scarce an earthly creature seems;
(Such visions we have met in dreams.
And wondered from what blissful sphere
So bright a thing had wandered here.)
The rover with delight espied,
And swiftly glided to her side.
A tear-drop in her eye of blue.
Soft as a violet, dropping dew.
The urchin saw, and freely laughed.
As light he waved his glittering shaft.
He kissed the pearly tear so bright.
Then on a zephyr took his flight,
But oh! he left a barbed dart
Deep in the gentle maiden's heart.
THE BROOK'S WEDDING.
A BRIGHT little brook went dancing by.
With many a glance at the soft blue sky.
And saying as plain as words could tell:
** Come to my forest home and dwell!
" Come from the din of noise and strife,
Come from the busy haunts of life.
Come where the sky is bright and blue.
Come where simple hearts are tme!"
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
And singing, dancing and flashing along,
Its life grew into a beautiful song;
It woke up the violets early in spring,
And they smiled to hear the brooklet sing.
And they opened their blue eyes wider still
When they felt the kiss of the laughing rill;
And they could not tell which most to love —
The sky in the brook or the one above.
And some water-lilies, stately and fair,
Look'd down in the brook andtrimm'd their hairj
Each smiled and nodded with peculiar grace,
As it gazed and wondered at its own fair face.
But the merry brook went dancing by,
Loving most of all the bright blue sky,
Till one day, when the sun was warm and bright,
A fairy creature of wondrous light
Bent over the stream, all light and love,
With eyes still bluer than the sky above.
And radiant tresses sprinkled with dew.
Like a rose-tinted cloud in the ether blue.
And what do you think ? This beautiful sprite
Was the spirit of song from the regions of light;
And when summer lay on her rose-curtained bed;
The brook and the spirit were solemnly wed.
Now, the graceful lilies grew stately and wise.
And the beautiful violets drooped their blue eyes,
And the sky sometimes looks angry and tried.
But the brook still clings to its phantom bride.
BEAUTIFUL REST.
Beautiful hands, folded to rest,
Folded to sleep on the calm, cold breast;
Never to labor with brain or pen;
Never to labor for loved ones again.
Calm sweet face, so peaceful and fair
In a shining halo of snow-white hair.
Not a shadow rests on the beautiful brow;
All sorrow and care have left it now.
The angels have smoothed the furrows of care,
And left the soft light of their presence there.
Folded to rest, without anguish or pain,
Never to worry or trouble again.
Folded away! safely folded away!
Waiting the light of eternity's day;
Waiting and watching for me and for you,
With nothing at last— nothing to do.
No more to worry with business and care;
No more to labor for loved ones left here;
No more to long for the beautiful rest,
That only is found in the home of the blest
DOST RECOLLECT IT, JENNIE DEAR?
When summer, like an elfin queen,
With blossom-circled brow.
Sat smiling on the pleasant scene,
So lovely in her sunlit sheen.
But not so fair as thou;
Dost mind it, in the forest green,
Jennie, my heart's own chosen queen.
We plighted first our vow ?
Dost recollect it, Jennie dear?
'Twas such a day as this.
When heaven seems to draw so near;
We quite forgot, my Jennie, dear.
That we were in a world like this;
'Twas such a pleasant place, you know.
That all the world did seem aglow.
Trembling, as we, with bliss.
And love has kept our promise green
Through many changing years;
But frosts have sered the woods, I ween,
And Time's soft fingers, though unseen.
Have planted some gray hairs;
But in our hearts, my Jennie, dear.
The roses bloom as fresh and fair.
Though sometimes wet with tears.
MY BROTHER.
A REMINISCENCE.
Eighty-five! how strange to see
How time hath flitted by.
Since he and I together played
Beneath a soft blue sky.
Ah! many a league I've traveled since
Those early dewy hours.
When hope was painted on the sky,
And life was wreathed with flowers.
We looked upon the sky and earth,
And all was very fair.
And wondered that so bright a place
Could be the home of care.
The music of the running brook.
We fashioned into song;
And gathered whispers from the winds
To bear its notes along.
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EDMUND K. HARRIS.
17
We hailed the new-bom flowers of spring
With joy, like they were human;
The pure white lily of the vale,
Seemed typical of woman.
The daisies and the violets
Were pretty baby faces,
That always looked up lovingly,
From out their hiding places.
And every bird that winged the air,
Was sacred in our sight.
Like gleams of joy they fitted by,
Or sang for our delight.
Our hearts were full of love and truth,
We never doubted others;
We saw no blight on Eden's bloom,
We counted all men brothers.
And much we wondered life could wear,
For some the garb of sadness;
We only saw the bright and good,
That clothed our souls with gladness.
And pity 'tis, that hearts should learn.
Such trusting hearts as ours,
That sin and sorrow left their blight
Upon earth's fairest flowers.
He never knew the wrong and ruth,
That shadow's all life's gladness,
His heart was full of light and truth.
But mine has learned its sadness.
And from that life whose beauty seems
Sometimes a part of ours,
I catch the tender light that gleams
Amid earth's fairest flowers.
JUNE.
Come, beautiful June!
Our hearts are in tune
To welcome thy band,
The sweet minstrel throng;
Oh, gladden our land
With beauty and song!
Thy skies are the brightest,
Thy breezes the lightest,
Thy song bird the sweetest,
And gayest of tune.
And thy roses are fairest,
O, beautiful June!
-June,
EDMUND K. HARRIS.
EDMUND K. HARRIS, brother of Mrs. Mary
Ware, was born in Monroe county, Tenn.,
February 16, 1830. The earliest years of this gifted
writer were spent amid his native mountains, breath-
ing Nature's omnipotence in the strength of her
hills. Thoughtful, studious, literary, diligent in his
research for wisdom, his tastes for books and storied
authors were the consummation of a father's hopes,
whose mind was a reflection of his own. In 1844,
removing with his father's family to Shelby county,
Ala., he was placed under the tutelage of an emi-
nent foreign-bom English scholar, where he made
rapid progress, subsequently assuming control of
the Shelby Chronicle, Here his ability and accom-
plishments were so displayed that in 1857, when
one of the editors of the Mobile Tribune was sum-
mering in the vicinity, he induced Mr. Harris to
return with him to become a member of the edito-
rial stafl" of the Tribune. Mobile was then pros-
perous, influential, the flower of Alabama cities, and
was indeed to the entire South what Venice was
to Mediterranean Europe in the fifteenth century.
Mr. Harris died April 16, 1859, when his adopted
city was gladdened by the garlands and bloom of
a tropic spring. His flnely wrought nature was
spared the soul-harrowing scenes of the Civil War,
and at his death rare tributes were prompted to his
memory from the illustrious in the world of letters
over the South. B. F. K.
STANZAS.
O life! so dark, so bright, so evanescent,
My heart grows sometimes weary of thy thrall.
Then I would burst these bonds of toil incessant.
Thy sin to flee, thy ioy, thy sorrow — all!
Yes, my tired spirit, faint and sorrow-laden.
Would fly away to some sweet isle of rest,
There safe to lie, and, like a low-voiced maiden.
Beguile its woe away on Nature's breast.
In the dim forest I have roved at even.
And, pensive, listened to the birds' sweet lay;
And I have dreamed of a far home in heaven.
Till almost I forgot that I was clay.
Soul of the beautiful, thy spell around me
Would soothe to rest the throbbings of my heart,
But iron fetter's galling chains have bound me.
Whose stubborn links in time will never part
O Freedom! blessed spirit, grand and holy.
Thou hast no dwelling underneath the sky,
For men are bondsmen, weak, and vile, and lowly,
Bom unto suflering, doomed to toil and die.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
In yon bright sphere, far up the heavens eternal,
Spirit divine, is thy pure dwelling found;
Soon may I revel there, mid bowers vernal.
Exempt from sin and toil, with glory crowned.
THE INVITATION.
Will you come with me, my own love ?
Dearest, come with me;
With me, to seek yon distant grove.
And tread the dewy lea.
Ohl sweetly blooms the early rose,
And sweet the hawthorn tree;
And wild, delicious music flows
From rill and bird and bee.
The deer, uprisen from his lair,
Is skipping merrily;
There's gladness in the perfumed air,
Then come, my love, with me.
The squirrel on yon mountain's brow
Plays gayly on the tree;
The rabbit, in the copse below.
Leaps joyfully and free.
Just o'er the hills, in the eastern sky,
The early beams of mom,
In rosy lines of quivering light.
The fleecy clouds adorn.
All Nature calls; then why delay ?
The grove, the spangled lea,
Invite us forth, then come, my love,
Come to the woods with me.
MIDSUMMER-NIGHT.
How beautiful the night! How lovely now
Yon fair, broad moon! Emblem of purity.
Fit type of gentle love, my heart to thee
Leaps with impassionate yearning. Hearts to
thee,
In fond forgetfulness of earth, and sin,
And care, in every age have leaped; and thou
Hast felt their warm devotion, Moon, and with
A smile more sweet, more holy than thy wont.
Repaid the love they gave. E'en so, it seems
Thou smilest now.
Through the deep azure, gleam
The countless stars of heaven. Have ye before
E'er looked so beautiful as now, sweet orbs ?
Ay, oft! and yet my soul was never thrilled
With so deep a sense of your near presence.
Ye tranquil stars; there is a magic in
Your wreath^ charms, that halfway weans me
from
Myself; uplifts my struggling soul from this
Dim life, and purifies, and similates
To essence like yourselves, eternal.
The night is lovely. Far along, where the
Deep shadows of the oak tree lies, the pale
Moonbeams for an instant rest and quiver.
The wind, low whispering in Night's still ear.
Dallies with the umbrageous boughs, soft fans
The trembling leaves of these great trees, and
Ufts
Lightly the streamers on yon distant hilL
Here are some lowly flowers, that uplift their
Dewy eyes to mine. Fair flowers, so fragile,
Yet consummate of beauty, well ye do
Personate that sweetest of all human
Graces— Modesty.
Oh! in an hour like this—
In a spot like this— beside me one dear
Friend, whose smile, calm as the pencilled star*
light,
Should all reflect my soul's deep love— it were
Not pain, methinks, to meet the angel Death;
Passing from heavenly calm on earth to thee,
Serenity of endless bliss above.
"I STILL LIVE."
THE DYING WORDS OF WBBSTRR.
Statesman, yes! tho* cold and lowly.
In the silent tomb,
A living light, intense and holy,
Bursts the gloom.
Bursts the gloom! A Nation, weeping,
Beholds that light.
Like the morning sun-beams creeping
O'er the night.
Still he lives. O, yes, forever
And forever more!
The light of such a life can never
Fade from all Time's shore.
Thoughts immortal, thoughts eternal.
His spirit bore;
These bloom on earth, like flowers vernal,
Bloom evermore.
My Country, in thy darkest hour
Look up, and see
In his words of strength and power,
Hope — Liberty!
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REV. S. DRYDEN PHELPS, D. D.
21
He shall live, and future ages
Hear his voice sublime,
Speaking wisdom unto sages
Through coming time.
He shall live! Our Heavenly Father.
May we so live
That hb teachings we shall gather,
Their light receive.
DIRGB.
Forests that once were so dear to my soul,
Birds I have so much delighted to hear;
Thou mighty river, whose hoarse waters roll.
Gleaming forever so dazzlingly clear,
List to the wail of my spirit's despair,
O list to the cry of a sorrowing soul!
Ye knew her, ye woodlands, my bright one ye knew.
Mid light and affection a freedom-nursed child.
As pure as a rose newly washed by the dew.
Fond as the dove, as the antelope wild;
Her heart, whence all guile and all art were ex-
iled,
But warmly toward all, to her love she was true.
O mourn, ye dark hills and ye deep evei^glades,
Ye trees, mid your wide-spreading branches now
mourn!
Lament her, ye grots and ye thick- woven shades!
For she to your haunts shall never retiun;
Yon blackened heath doth her ashes inum.
Sleep quietly, dust of the loveliest of maids.
Each mourns for the lost one, but seraphs rejoice;
Cora has gone to the angelic throng;
Seraphs her name, with the harp and the voice,
Have added, to sweeten their wonderful song.
To that fair choir does my bright one belong,
Enjoying for ever the home of her choice.
SPRING.
All hail! thou beauteous season, hail!
Our human hearts overflow,
For well do Spring's glad smiles avail
To banish dreams of woe.
The morning breaks, the forests ring,
The bleating lambs reply;
All hail! thou coy young virgin, Spring,
That bidd*st dark winter fly.
—Spring.
REV. S. DRYDEN PHELPS, D. D.
S DRYDEN PHELPS, was bom in Suffield,
• Conn., May 15, 1816. He is a direct de-
scendant of William Phelps who came from
Tewksbury, England, and was one of the first
settlers of Windsor, Conn., where for many years he
was a magistrate and very prominent in church and
state. The parents of Dr. Phelps possessed strong*
characters, made sweet by loving sympathies, and
were devoted Christians. Their influence left an im-
pression on the life of their son. His preparation for
college was in his native town in the Connecticut
Literary Institution. Poems and numerous articles
of his were published in various periodicals at that
time. In 1842, when in college, his first volume,
* 'Eloquence of Nature and Other Poems, * ' appeared.
He was graduated from Brown University, Prov-
idence, R. I., in 1844. For one year he was
engaged in supplying the First Baptist Church of
New Haven, Conn., while a theological student in
Yale Divinity School, and became its pastor in
January, 1846. This relation continued twenty-
eight years, closing December, 1873. 1° 1856 he
published "Sunlight and Hearthlight; or Fidelity
and Other Poems." In 1859-60 he spent a year in
Europe, Egypt and Palestine, and, in 1863, brought
out a book of travels, entitled '' Holy Land with
Glimpses of Europe and Egypt,'* which has
passed through nine editions. In 1867 a third
volume of poems called "The Poet's Song for the
Heart and Home," was placed before an appre-
ciative public. It contained many new poems,
nearly all of those in the second volume and a few
from the first. •• Rest Days in Journeys Abroad,"
appeared in 1887. It consists of sermons preached
during his year of foreign travels, and subsequent
tours in Europe, with prefatory notes and a poem
appropriate to the subject following each sermon.
"Special Sermons," preached chiefly in the First
Baptist Church, New Haven, were collected into
a volume the same year. In May, 1874, he became
pastor of the Jefferson St. Baptist Church, Provi-
dence, R. I., serving two years. In 1876 he took
charge, as publisher and editor, of the ** Christian
Secretary," Hartford, Conn., and conducted that
paper twelve years. He was married, August
26, 1847, to Miss Sophia Emilia Linsley, a
daughter of Rev. James H. Linsley (Yale, 1817)
who was a Baptist minister and noted naturalisti
residing in Stratford, Conn., near New Haven"
Mrs. Phelps has great literary ability, is a con-
stant writer, and her character is of rare loveliness.
Their children were a daughter and four sons.
The second son died when nearly four years of age.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
The daughter, Miss Sophia Lyon Phelps, was
endowed with musical, intellectual and personal
attractions. She died in 187 1, in her twenty-third
year. A memorial pamphlet, by her parents,
includes a touching poem from her father's pen.
Three sons, Rev. Dryden W. Phelps, Rev. Arthur
S. Phelps and Mr. William L. Phelps are living.
Each inherits literary talents.
The residence of Dr. Phelps is in New Haven,
Conn. His poetry is characterized by deep poetic
conception and religious feeling. Among a number
of this author's widely known hymns " Something
for Thee *' has been most used in collections, in
this and in foreign countries. Dr. Phelps' latest
publication, ''Songs for all Seasons," was issued
in 1891. J. M. R.
AN ITALIAN SUNSET.
While I stand on one of her seven hills.
Gray old Rome is under my eye,
And a glorious scene my spirit thrills.
As I gaze on the western sky.
There are gorgeous clouds of vermillion hue,
And splendors untold beside,
That rise and spread on the arching blue,
O'er the whole horizon wide.
'Tis the setting sun in his brilliant dyes,
And what matchless tints are given!
They seem like the light of celestial skies
O'er the jasper walls of heaven.
How sofUy on groves of cypress and pine,
Domes, turrets and temples old.
The blending glories linger and shine,
And bathe St Peter's in gold.
Upon Alban slope and Sabine crown
The purpling sunbeams play,
And they drop on the winding Tiber down
Like glimmerings of upper day.
Beyond this brief and enchanting sight,
I look toward the sky divine,
O City of Light, in a splendor more bright,
For ever thy glories shine.
SOMETHING FOR THEE.
Savior, thy dying love.
Thou gavest me,
Nor should I aught withhold.
Dear Lord, from Thee.
In love my soul would bow.
My heart fulfill its vow,
Some offering bring Thee now.
Something for Thee.
O'er the blest mercy-seat
Pleading for me,
Upward in faith I look,
Jesus, to Thee.
Help me thy cross to bear.
Thy wondrous love declare.
Some song to raise, or prayer,
Something for thee.
Give me a faithful heart —
Likeness to Thee,
That each departing day
Henceforth may see
Some work of love begun.
Some deed of kindness done,
Some wanderer sought and won.
Something for thee.
All that I am and have.
Thy gifts so free,
Ever, in joy or grief,
My Lord, for Thee;
And when thy face I see.
My ransomed soul shall be,
Through all eternity,
Something for Thee.
GOD'S PROMISES TO ABRAHAM.
Fear not, Abraham, saith the Lord,
I'm thy shield and great reward;
I will bless thee now and ever,
Naught from thee my love shall sever.
Promises that I have made,
All the words my mouth hath said,
I'll fulfill them to the letter,
Than thy fears thy God is better.
I from Ur, with guiding hand.
Brought thee to this chosen land;
I have seen thy faith's true merit.
Thou this country shall inherit
Would'st thou have a certain sign
That the blessing shall be thine ?
Canst thou count the stars of heaven ?
So shall seed to thee be given.
From a land of trials sore.
After bondage years are o'er,
They shall here repeat the story
Of their triumph and my glory.
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HARRIETTE G. PENNELL.
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Abraham then his Lord believed,
And the great reward received.
So may all the souls that love him
By their faith unwavering prove him.
THE BETHLEHEM SONG.
No song was ever heard,
No gladsome voice or word,
Since broke o'er earth the blest primeval mom,
Like the celestial sound
That swept the air around
O'er Bethlehem the night that Christ was bom.
Half-dreaming by the rocks,
The shepherds watched their flocks,
But woke, in wonder rapt, the song to hear.
As through the sky-roof riven,
The angel flashed from heaven,
A messenger of mingled awe and fear.
Fear not, the angel said.
But joyful be instead;
Tidings of gladness and delight I bring.
And not alone for you
This revelation new,
O'er the whole earth the rapturous joy shall ring.
This night in swathing folds
The humble manger holds
The Lord, Messiah, Savior, bom for you.
As thither ye repair
To David's city fair,
That wondrous sign shall meet your eager view.
Then round the angel bright
A host in heavenly light
Confirmed the truth in notes of highest praise;
Glory to God! they sang,
Peace and good will they rang.
In chorus grander than all earth-bom lays.
The Lord had come to men;
The Lord will come again;
Is coming now in blest salvation's car.
Dark lands, the joy receive.
Sad souls, your burdens leave.
Transfigured by the glorious Bethlehem Star.
AMERICA.
O beauteous land! grown strong and g^at.
What varied wealth thy stores display,
From rocky shore to Golden Gate,
From icy lake to sunny bay.
— Centennial Hymn,
HARRIETTE G. PENNELL.
MISS PENNELL is a native of Branswick, Me.,
a town in which, until recently, she has
passed all her life amid home and social surround-
ings the most endearing and cultivated. Her
education was acquired in the district schools of
Bmnswick, and, as a supplement to this course of
training, through private teachers. Miss Pennell's
tastes from early childhood were in the direction of
literary accomplishment, a field of labor in which
she has met with pleasant success. Her childhood's
home was close by the shore of Casco Bay, with its
lovely islands and fascinating scenery, and this
vision of her earliest years, with the influence it
wrought upon her mind and affections, had very
much to do in shaping her future career. Her real
ambition was to be a writer of verse, or rather, a
singer, not only of the beautiful in nature, but of
that which had to do with the heart of humanity.
She has been a contributor for years to the press of
the land, and her poems appearing in various papers
and magazines have been widely read, and have
brought her words of high praise, not only from
admiring friends, but admiring strangers. She pre-
fers a quiet life, free from the bustle of large cities,
where she can be apart with nature and enjoy its
beneficial and uplifting influences. At present Miss
Fennel! is a sojoumer in Portland, Me.
G. N. L.
UNDER THE APPLE BLOSSOMS.
Under the trees in the apple orchard
The perfumed blossoms are drifting down,
And Nature is weaving with joy and beauty
Her sweetest gifls for the Maytime crown.
The perfumed blossoms are drifting down;
The grass is growing and summer near;
And Majorie dreams of her handsome lover—
Ah, well she knows he will soon be here!
The grass is growing and summer near;
There's a delicate charm in air and sky;
Comes a tinkling sound in the brooklet's calling,
Like elfin music gliding by.
There's a delicate charm in air and sky;
The mocking-birds try full many a song,
That wings o'er the hills in a merrying measure,
A tumult of rapture sweet and strong.
The mocking-birds try full many a song,
And Marjorie wonders if wishes are heard.
Why flushes her cheek in the happy dreaming ?
And why is her soul so swiftly stirred ?
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
And Maijorie wonders if wishes are heard!
Oh, life seems precious and full and sweet;
There's a spell in the breath of the passing breezes —
Who knows what secrets the winds repeat.
Oh, life seems precious and full and sweet,
For well she knows who is coming soon.
She hears not the steps in the orchard grasses —
Her voice is trilling a merry tune.
For well she knows who is coming soon;
Was ever a day so fair as this!
Quick steps— and a manly form beside her
Closes the song with a lover's kiss.
, Was ever a day so fair as this ?
The perfumed blossoms are drifting down;
And Nature is weaving with joy and beauty
Her sweetest gifts for the Maytime crown.
APART.
From that far land, beloved, where thou dost dwell,
Where suns and stars illume thy full, sweet day.
Canst not thou send to me some rhythmic ray
Of love far reaching, that can fondly tell
Thy peace divine — far from the lonely knell
Of earthly griefs ? Howe'er I call and pray.
The voice melodious comes not to allay
Mine anguish, or breathe what joys may be where
thou dost dwell.
Thine heritage a very part of heaven,
Thy life's sweet love made earth so truly blest.
In what far realm of the eternal mom
Shineth the light that to my soul was given ?
How long, beloved, ere my lone heart find rest
In thy dear presence never more forlorn ?
GRIEVING.
She comes no more,
Whose love enfolding round us.
Her precious jewels, we ne'er thought to lose;
So constant was her care, so sweetly faithful,
It seemed her joy our stony paths to choose;
In her unselfish love to bear our sorrows.
And ne'er complain, but bring a smiling face.
And bide in hopeful trust the coming morrows,
Weaving in looms of faith her sunny grace.
She comes no more,
O, sorrow past believing!
Can it be death that sighs within these walls ?
The soft blue sky, all June's sweet bloom about us,
Makes deeper shadows in the silent halls.
The cheerful face is gone, the gentle presence,
The loved voice, more than music soft and low,
Breaks through my dreams, ah, me I so sweetly
tender,
It leaves a heartache and the sad tears flow.
She comes no more,
Nor love nor longing brings her.
The morning sunl^eams seem not half so fair
As when we used to linger in the garden,
Whose petaled fragrance blossoms everywhere;
The tender dewdrops o'er her dear loved roses
Glisten and vanish; in the selfsame place
Sweet buds unfold, bidding my presence welcome,
And shrined in glory seems her radiant face.
No more on earth,
A fairer world is gladdened.
And soon a brighter dawn will glow for me.
I hold within my own her heart's sweet council,
In tender, reverential memory.
And when the light falls through the open doorway.
And sun-kissed shadows stray among the leaves,
I know a closer love is watching o'er me.
And my impassioned soul do longer grieves.
A DREAM OF JUNE.
O'er mountains and meadows the glad sun smiles;
All Nature is breathing 'twixt earth and sky.
With a thrill of joy in her heart anew,
For the blissful days of June are nigh.
And out in the heather a gem-like bloom
Sways with the gentle breeze, a-chime;
'Mong green of branches, in pure delight.
The runnel notes of the birds keep time.
All day long, though we know it not,
From vale to hight, for thee and me,
Glide unseen angels to and fro,
With Love from Heaven's eternity.
Comes a soothing balm to the care-worn heart.
In the sweetness thrilling earth's purest things.
Till over the land of twilight rest
Gleans the starry light of the angels' wings.
TWO MESSENGERS.
There be two messengers that come to me;
The one that asketh sacrifice and pain.
And says: ** Of life's loved sweetness give,
And minister to others; nor count it gain
To make thine own self happy."
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AD ALINE HOHF BEERY,
27
And one that whispereth oft:
" O, place your hand in mine and live,
Nuxtored in warmth and love, that living brings
Supremest joy."
" But ah! thou hast life's mission to fulfill,"
Answers the voice of conscience, low and still;
" Within thy inmost soul heed first my claim;
Only in doubting me art thou to blame."
THROUGH DREAMY DAYS IN AUTUMN WOODS.
Through dreamy days in autumn woods,
Along the leafy paths we strayed;
'Mong boughs o'erhung with russet vines,
Late summer sunbeams softly played
Through dreamy days in autumn woods.
And here and there, above, below,
Still gleamed the colors summer wore;
.^olian breezes sang to us,
Along the paths we wandered o'er,
Through dreamy days in autumn woods.
Through dreamy days in autumn woods,
The jay's low note sounds clear and cool;
Proud maples float their banners gay,
Athwart the hazy, wind-crisped pool.
Through dreamy days in autumn woods.
Through dreamy days in autumn woods
We loved to linger, loved to climb
The banks where sweetbrier berries g^ew;
Fair fruits of joyous summer time
We've gathered in the autumn woods.
And where the beech leaves rustled down, .
Your soulful life you gave to me;
Beside you on the mossy knoll
My spirit listened lovingly;
Sweet joys we held in autumn woods.
Again through dimmer paths I stray;
The light winds touch, the dead leaves stir;
And where the ripe roseberries glow,
With muffled sounds the pheasants whirr
Makes echo in the autumn woods.
Through dreamy days in autumn woods
The sun looks down on branch and bough;
I love to tread the same dear paths.
Though all my heart is lonely now
That you are dead, yet in my dreams
Your spirit comes and answers mine,
Through lonely light in autumn woods.
ADALINE HOHF BEERY.
ADALINE HOHF was bom in Hanover, Pa.,
December 20th, 1859, and removed with her
parents, at the age of four years, to Maryland,
where she spent her childhood days amid the rural
sights and sounds along the quiet Linganore. In
1870 her family removed to Iowa, where, as a school-
girl in her teens, she first attempted verse. A fond-
ness for composition began its devdopment about
that time, and sketches from her pen, in the form
of both poetry and prose, found their way into the
local papers. . She gave no particular evidence of a
tendency to poetry until 1884, at which time she
resided in Illinois, when the death of a friend called
forth a memorial tribute, which received such com-
mendation from personal friends as to encourage
her to continue attempts at verse, and poems were
frequently written by her afterward. She com-
pleted the academic course of Mt: Morris College,
Illinois, in 1882, and, about six months after gradu-
ation, entered a printing-office as compositor. She
worked at the case over four years, and in May,
1885, undertpok the editing of The Golden Dawn^
an excellent but short-lived magazine published in
Huntingdon, Pa. During her work on the Daivn
she gave evidence of much istrength, grasping and
discussing with almost masculine vigor, yet with
womanly tenderness and sympathy, many of the
important moral questions of the day. She also
edited certain departments of several other period-
icals at diflferent times. On the 20th of June, 1888,
she was married to William JBeery, an instructor in
vocal music, and soon after rendered him valuable
assistance in compiling an excellent sacred song
book, "Gospel Chimes," by writing hymns and some
music for it. Mr. and Mrs. Beery are at present
happily located in Huntingdon, and Mrs. Beery is
editing a child's paper known as The Young Dis-
ciple, Their family consists of one child, a son,
bom in February, 189 1. Mre, Beery is of mixed
ancestry. Her father, Michael Hohf, was of Dutch
extraction, and her mother, whose maiden name
was Elizabeth Bucher, was Swiss in blood.
. _; F. H. G.
A PERFECT DAY.
Out of the South, where dainty heaps of cloud
The pale blue tapestry of heaven emboss.
The warm wind blows the crimson woods across,
And half-forgotten ripples tell aloud
The gladness of the brooks, which float a crowd
Of leaves, like autumn navies; on the moss.
Fit couch for dreaming ease, the grave oaks toss
Their acorns, and the banks in shaidow shroud.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
The half-blown moon is limned against the west,
A lingerer to witness this pure day;
Who knows, when she pursues the stars to rest,
What sweeter smiles may charm her night away!
This is a day when joy flows to the brim,
The stately echo of a summer hymn.
OCTOBER SNOW.
The east glowed like a blush rose fair,
As Phoebus* wheels drove up the air;
But murky banners trailed behind,
Blown like a full sail by the wind.
At noon a gust of feathered rain
A hornpipe danced without the pane,
Then nestled blithely 'mid the leaves.
Whose gold and garnet brushed the eaves.
The green grass took a daintier shade
As the gay phantoms on it played;
Gray vistas with their mirth grew dim,
And earth and sky blent at their rim.
As day declined the storm waxed brave;
The blast a wintry warning gave;
A thickening sheet earth's bosom spanned,
And moonless night crept o'er the land.
IN THE DELPHIC CHAMBER.
As when the buds of oak and maple swell.
We look for early glimpse of emerald spray
Thick-set with blooms, and signs begin to tell
Of daisied valleys bringing in the May,
So the fresh youth, the laugh, the dewy eye.
The pride of mothers and of nature, bring
The promise of rare manhood by and by.
Whose fragrance of kind words and deeds shall
swing
Like censers o'er the brown, dry fields of life.
Into new pastures in the realm of thought,
And vineyards where the wine of wisdom grows.
Bend your young feet; for never deeds are
wrought
Worthy a man, save as his whole face glows
With highest reach of knowledge in his sphere;
With purpose grand, and utmost exercise
Of gift with which his God endowed him. Here
Pluck the full ears of learning, for the prize
Of truth in jewels overturn the soil
With shares thrice tempered by a pliant will
To mould to greatness all the petty toil
With book and pen, and fashion good from ill.
Life at its midday is a stem employ,
Needing all strength of mind and zeal of soul
Gathered in blossom-time, when life was joy
Mainly,— a sweet, brief prelude to the whole.
Enter the gates of noon with loving heart
As well as judging head; no ministry
So crowns a man with true, unconscious art
As loss of self in restless energy
To make wrong right, to brace the souls that faint;
To use his talent for the sake of God,
Distilling patience out of drear complaint,
Smoothing the road by tribulation trod.
To buy, and sell, and gain; to write a book;
To build a house, or sail upon the sea;
To play the master's music, or to cook;
To be well skilled in all the arts that be
Were poor attainment, if above it all
No sense of human brotherhood held sway
As pilot of the craft. The words that fall
Like gracious raindrops on an April day
Drop from the sky for you; the faithful tears
Which water other lives, nor guerdon ask.
Shall bring full harvest in the sunless years
Where God is light and love the only task.
ON THE BEACH.
A SOFT September twilight draped the sea;
In pensive monotone, among the piers
The breakers roared, and dashed their briny tears
Back on its bosom; silence fell on me.
Standing alone upon the sands; the free.
Wide water with an anthem filled my ears.
Ringing a prelude to the eternal years
That, boundless, deep and grand, in heaven shall be.
Along the dim horizon swept a sail
That vanished soon; a flock of gulls flew by
Catching my transient notice; ceased the moan
Of rushing wave one instant, while a trail
Of moonlight quivered o'er it; then the sky
Was blank; the sea and I held tryst alone.
ETUDE.
My love sings like the mavis
All in tune;
Her voice trills thro' the gamut
Of all June.
Her eyes are star-time sapphires
Set in dew;
I think the brook's low laughter
Brims them too.
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ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON,
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Her ears like ocean shell pinks
Brightly blush;
She hears the choirs of cloudland
At eve's hush.
Her tresses fling defiance
To the sun;
She's blossom, bird and fairy
Blent in one.
Her lips, like trim carnations
But half-blown,
I've pressed, in love's emotion,
To my own.
Her haiid is like a leaf-touch,
But a thrill
Enchains me, when I feel it
Speak her will.
Her soul is like the Alpine
Edelweiss;
Her steel-true heart is to me
Shield from vice.
My love's the contemplation
Of my life;
I lay all gifts before her; —
She's my wife!
WHEN COMES THE CROWN?
Thb mom breaks gloriously; refreshed with sleep,
The lithe form pauses at the brink of day
With mind all set for manly toil; we say
He's worthy, but he goes bare-browed to reap.
He's bronzed; the sun has climbed the midday
steep;
The field is treeless; briers line the way
To cooler places; yet no wreath of bay
Garlands his head; he still must work and weep
Till evening folds its silken garments round
His bruised and wearied limbs, and all the
spheres
Break into silent singing; angels bend
Anear to see him by the Father crowned;
*'Thus shall it be to him who wrought with tears
And loved and prayed and trusted to the end."
RETROSPECT.
The yesterdays are risen
All ruthless from their tomb,
And rob the young to-morrow
Of all its hopeful bloom.
— RauHne.
ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON.
ALFRED TENNYSON, England's beloved
poet laureate, and one of the sweetest
singers the world has ever known, passed peace-
fully away, full of years and honors, to unknown
realms, early in the morning of October 6th, 1892.
The announcement of such a sad event could not
help being received by all who speak the English
tongue with a deep sense of personal loss, for he
was not only a poet's poet, but he was also the
people's poet, pleasing, alike, all tastes, and
appealing as he did, to the better nature and sym-
pathies of the masses.
He was bom in 1809, the same year in which
Oliver Wendell Holmes and Gladstone first en-
tered this world, at Somersby, in Lincolnshire,
England. His father was the Rev. George Clayton
Tennyson, LL. D., a man of noble birth and fine
character, while his mother was a sweet, gentle
woman, possessing great imaginative powers and
much ability. His home was picturesquely situ-
ated and abounded with beauty mingled with the
utmost refinement It was partly there and partly
at the village school that Tennyson received his
early education, and at this early period in his life
he showed signs of possessing a strong poetic
vein, writing verses on a slate for pleasure and
recreation. He loved the sea passionately and
when its inspiration was upon him he poured out
verse after verse. But it was not until 1827 that
any of his efforts appeared in print, and then it was
in the form of a small volume, of which almost
nothing has been preserved, and which was en-
titled: '' Poems by Two Brothers."
In 1828 Alfred joined his two brothers at Trinity
College, Cambridge, where he gained the dis-
tinction of carrying off the Chancellor's medal for
a poem in blank verse on **Timbuctoo," in which
one can trace the impress of his rare genius, that
was by degrees developing.
His first volume of poems known by, ** Poems,
Chiefly Lyrical," appeared in 1832, and it was
severely criticized as being weak and immature;
but, ten years hence, when he had completely
revised the former volume, to which had been
added many new poems, he gained for himself a
position of absolute supremacy which has never
since grown less, but has steadily increased.
While at Cambridge he formed an acquaintance
with Arthur Henry Hallam, son of the eminent
historian, which afterwards ripened into a strong
and exceedingly warm friendship, and at whose
death, Tennyson wrote a tribute of affection to his
memory, the world renowned **In Memoriam."
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
In 1847 Tennyson wrote "The Princess, A
Medley,'* which was written in rather a nove^
style, being a combination of an epic and a series
of Ijrrics.
On the death of Wordsworth, Tennyson suc-
ceeded him as poet laureate, in which capacity he
wrote many praiseworthy poems commemorating
great events of national interest Not long after
this, "Maud, and Other Poems,** appeared, but
they lacked the enthusiastic admiration that was
wont to be showered upon his efforts; however*
"The Idylls of the King," which appeared a few
years later more than compensated, in every way»
for any deficiency on the part of the other. It is
difficult to over-estimate the value of Tennyson's
works, and it is not an easy matter to criticize
them dispassionately, as one is apt to become
enamored with their beauties. His verse exem-
plifies the ornate in poetry; nothing can excel the
delicate chiselling, the chaste coloring, and the
exquisite polish of his lines and stanzas, and there
is such a delicious blending of sound and sense
pervading the whole.
He was much beloved by a circle of intimate
friends,— among the number are included Carlyle
and Gladstone — ^but for the most part, he lived a
quiet and retiring life, always shrinking from the
public gaze, and bearing his honors and wealth as
simply and as sweetly as he had done his poverty
and neglect, without the least suspicion of vanity.
He was the first commoner who was ever raised to
the House of Lords for literary eminence alone,
being neither a politician nor a statesman.
The cordial relationship which existed between
Tennyson and the United States was greatly
strengthened by his attachment with Longfellow.
After his marriage with Emily Sellwood, a
niece of Sir John Franklin, the great Arctic voy-
ager, he resided for some time at a romantic spot
in the Isle of Wight, where he and his family spent
many of the happiest years of their lives.
The following is the description given by Carlyle
to Emerson, of the poet:
"One of the finest looking men in the world.
A great shock of rough, dusty dark hair;
bright, laughing hazel eyes; massive, aquiline
face; most massive, yet most delicate; of sallow
brown complexion, almost Indian looking;
clothes cynically loose, free and easy; smokes
infinite tobacco. His voice is musical metallic —
fit for loud laughter and piercing wail and
all that may be between; speech and spec-
ulation free and plenteous; I do not meet, in
these late decades, such company over a pipe."
E. M. K.
LADY CLARA VERB DB VBRE.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
Of me you shall not win renown;
You thought to break a country heart
For pastime, ere you went to town.
At me you smiled, but unbeguiled
I saw the snare, and I retired;
The daughter of a hundred Earls,
You are not one to be desired.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
I know you proud to bear your name,
Your pride is yet no mate for mine.
Too proud to care from whence I came.
Nor would I break for your sweet sake
A heart that doats on truer charms.
A simple maiden in her flower
Is worth a hudred coats-of-anxis.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
Some meeker pupil you must find,
For were you queen of all that is,
I could not stoop to such a mind.
You sought to prove how I could love,
And my disdain is my reply.
The lion on your old stone gates
Is not more cold to you than I.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
You put strange memories in my head;
Not thrice your branching limes have blown
Since I beheld young Laurence dead.
Oh! your sweet eyes, your low replies;
A great enchantress you may be.
But there was that across his throat
Which you had hardly cared to see.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
When thus he met his mother's view.
She had the passions of her kind.
She spake some certain truths of you.
Indeed I heard one bitter word
That scarce is fit for you to hear;
Her manners had not that repose
Which stamps the caste of Vere de Vere.
Lady Clara Vere de Vere,
There stands a spectre in your hall;
The guilt of blood is at your door;
You changed a wholesome heart to gall.
You held your course without remorse,
To make him trust his modest worth,
And, last, you fix'd a vacant stare.
And slew him with your noble birth.
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ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON.
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Trust me, Clara Vere de Vere,
From yon blue heavens above us bent
The grand old gardener and his wife
Smile at the claims of long descent.
However it be, it seems to me,
'Tis only noble to be good.
Kind hearts are more than coronets,
And simple faith than Norman blood.
I know you, Clara Vere de Vere;
You pine among your halls and towers;
The languid light of your proud eyes
Is wearied of the rolling hours.
In glowing health, with boundless wealth,
But sickening of a vague disease,
You know so ill to deal with time.
You needs must play such pranks as these.
Clara, Clara Vere de Vere,
If Time be heavy on your hands,
Are there no beggars at your gate.
Nor any poor about your lands ?
Oh! teach the orphan-boy to read,
Or teach the orphan-girl to sew,
Pray Heaven for a human heart,
And let the foolish yeoman go.
THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.
Half a league, half a league,
Half a league onward.
All in the valley of Death
Rode the six 'hundred.
** Forward, the Light Brigade!
" Charge for the guns!" he said;
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
" Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismay'd ?
Not tho* the soldier knew
Some one had blunder 'd.
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die.
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them
Volley'd and thunder'd.
Storm 'd at with shot and shell,
Boldly they rode and well.
Into the jaws of Death,
Into the mouth of Hell
Rode the six hundred.
Flash'd air.their sabres bare,
Flash'd as they tum*d in air.
Sabring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while
All the world wonder 'd.
Plunged in the battery-smoke,
Right thro' the line they broke;
Cossack and Russian
Reel'd from the sabre-stroke
Shattered and sunder'd.
Then they rode back, but not,
Not the six hundred.
Cannon to right of them.
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them
Volley'd and thunder'd;
Storm'd at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell.
They that had fought so well
Came thro' the jaws of Death
Back from the mouth of Hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.
When can their glory fade ?
O the wild charge they made!
All the world wonder* d.
Honor the charge they made!
Honor the Light brigade!
Noble six hundred.
THE SISTERS.
We were two daughters of one race;
She was the fairest in the face;
The wind is blowing in turret and tree.
They were together, and she fell.
Therefore revenge became me well.
O, the Earl was fair to seel
She died; she went to burning flame;
She mix'd her ancient blood with shame.
The wind is blowing in turret and tree.
Whole weeks and months, and early and late.
To win his love I lay in wait;
O, the Earl was fair to see!
I made a feast; I bade him come;
I won his love, I brought him home.
The wind is roaring in turret and tree.
And after supper, on a bed.
Upon my lap he laid his head.
O, the Earl was fair to seel
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
I kiss'd his eyelids into rest;
His ruddy cheek upon my breast
The wind is raging in turret and tree.
I hated him with the hate of hell,
But I loved his beauty passing well.
O, the Earl was fair to seel
I rose up in the silent night;
I made my dagger sharp and bright.
The wind is raging in turret and tree.
As half-asleep his breath he drew,
Three times I stabbed him thro' and thro'.
O, the Earl was fair to seel
I curPd and comb'd his comely head,
He look'd so grand when he was dead.
The wind is blowing in turret and tree.
I wrapt his body in the sheet,
And laid him at his mother's feet.
O, the Earl was fair to seel
CROSSING THE BAR.
Sunset and evening star.
And one clear call for me,
And may there be no moaning of the bar
When I put out to sea.
But such a tide as, moving, seems asleep;
Too full for sound or foam.
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.
Twilight and evening bell.
And after that the dark,
And may there be no sadness of farewell
When I embark.
For tho' from out our foume of time and place,
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have cross'd the bar.
CLARIBEL.
A MELODY.
Where Claribel low-lieth
The breezes pause and die.
Letting the rose-leaves fall;
But the solemn oak-tree sigheth.
Thick-leaved, ambrosial,
With an ancient melody
Of an inward agony,
Where Claribel low-lieth.
At eve the beetle boometh
Athwart the thicket lone;
At noon the wild bee hummeth
About the moss'd headstone;
At midnight the moon cometh,
And looketh down alone.
Her song the lintwhite swelleth.
The clear-voiced mavis dwelleth,
The callow throstle lispeth.
The slumbrous wave outwelleth.
The babbling runnel crispeth.
The hollow grot replieth
Where Claribel low-lieth.
THE DESERTED HOUSE.
Life and thought have gone away
Side by side.
Leaving the door and windows wide*
Careless tenants theyl
All within is dark as night;
In the windows is no light;
And no murmur at the door,
So frequent on its hinge before.
Close the door, the shutters close.
Or thro' the windows we shall see
The nakedness and vacancy
Of the dark deserted house.
Come away; no more of mirth
Is here or merry-making sound.
The house was builded of the earth,
And shall fall again to ground.
Come away; for Life and Thought
Here no longer dwell;
But in a dty glorious,
A great and distant city, have bought
A mansion incorruptible.
Would they could have stayed with usF
EXPERIENCB.
So fares it since the years began,
Till they be gather'd up;
The truth, that flies the flowing-can,
Will haunt the vacant cup;
And others' follies teach us not.
Nor much their wisdom teaches;
And most, of sterling worth, is what
Our own experience teaches.
"Will Waterproofs Lyrical Monologue,
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ALFRED, LORD TENNYSON.
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PROGRESS.
We sleep and wake and sleep, but all things move;
The sun flies forward to his brother sun;
The dark earth follows wheePd in her ellipse;
And human things returning on themselves
Move onward, leading up the golden year.
— The Golden Year,
NATURE.
And forth into the fields I went,
And Nature's living motion lent
The pulse of hope to discontent.
I wonder' d at the bounteous hours,
The slow result of winter showers;
You scarce could see the grass for flowers.
I wonder* d, while I paced along;
The woods were fill'd so full with song.
There seemed no room for sense of wrong.
— The Two Voices,
DEATH.
Whatever crazy sorrow saith.
No life that breathes with human breath
Has ever truly long'd for death.
—Ibid.
AMBITION.
I heard a saying in Egypt, that ambition
Is like the sea wave, which the more you drink.
The more you thirst; yea, drink too much, as men
Have done on rafte of wrecks — it drives you mad.
— The Cup.
PASSION.
Then what use in passions ?
To warm the cold bounds of our dying life
And, lest we freeze in mortal apathy.
Employ us, heat us, quicken us, help us, keep us
From seeing all too near that urn, those ashes
Which all must be. Well used, they serve us well.
—Ibid.
DOUBT.
In Love, if Love be Love, if Love be ours.
Faith and unfaith can ne'er be equal powers;
Unfaith in aught is want of faith in all.
It is the little rift within the lute.
That by and by will make the music mute.
And ever widening slowly silence all.
— Merlin and Vivien.
WIFE.
My name, once mine, now thine, is closelier mine.
For fame, could fame be mine, that fame were
thine.
And shame, could shame be thine, that shame were
mine.
So trust me not at all, or all in all. — Ibid.
LOVE.
I hold it true, whatever befall;
I feel it, when I sorrow most;
*Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.
— In Memoriam.
SORROW.
Never morning wore
To evening, but some heart did break.
—Ibid.
FAITH.
There lives more faith in honest doubt.
Believe me, than in half the creeds.
—Bid.
PHILOSOPHY.
Hold thou the good; define it well;
For fear divine Philosophy
Should push beyond her mark, and be
Procuress to the Lords of Hell.
—Ibid.
UFE.
Two children in two neighbor villages
Playing mad pranks along the healthy leas;
Two strangers meeting at a festival;
Two lovers whispering by an orchard wall;
Two lives bound fast in one with golden ease;
Two graves grass-green beside a gray church- tower
Wash'd with still rains and daisy-blossomed;
Two children in one hamlet bom and bred;
So runs the round of life from hour to hour.
— Circumstance.
SPRING.
In the spring a fuller crimson comes upon the
robin's breast;
In the spring the wanton lapwing gets himself
another crest;
In the spring a livelier iris changes on the burnish 'd
dove;
In the spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to
thoughts of love.
—Locksley Hall.
EISS.
And our spirits rush'd together at the touching of
the lips.
—Ibid.
LOVE.
Love is love for evermore.
—Ibid.
SORROW.
Comfort? comfort scom'd of devils! this is truth
I the poet sings,
I That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering
happier things.
I —Ibid.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
COMMERCE.
Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever reaping
something new;
That which they have done but earnest of the things
that they shall do;
For I dipt into the future, far as human eye could
see;
Saw the vision of the world, and all the wonder
that would be;
Saw the heavens fill with conmierce, argosies of
magic sails;
Pilots of the purple twilight, dropping down with
costly bales. —Ibid,
AVARICE.
But the jingling of the guinea helps the hurt which
Honor feels.
"Ibid.
ELEANORB.
In thee all passion becomes passionless,
Touch'd by thy spirit's mellowness.
— Eleanore.
FLOWERS.
Dead mountain flowers, dead mountain-meadow
flowers,
Dearer than when you made your mountain gay.
Sweeter than any violet of to-day,
Richer than all the wide world-wealth of May,
To me, tho' all your bloom has died away.
You bloom again, dead mountain-meadow flowers.
• —The Falcon.
BIRDS.
"These birds have joyful thoughts. Think you
they sing
Like poets, from the vanity of song ?
Or have they any sense of why they sing?
And would they praise the heavens for what they
have?"
— The Gardener* s Daughter.
COURTSHIP.
Yet might I tell of meetings, of farewells —
Of that which came between, more sweet than each.
In whispers, like the whispers of the leaves
That tremble round a nightingale; in sighs
Which perfect Joy, perplex'd for utterance.
Stole from her sister Sorrow. Might I not tell
Of difference, reconcilement, pledges given,
And vows where there was never need of vows.
—Ibid.
HYPOCRISY.
And then began to bloat himself, and ooze
All over with the fat affectionate smile
That makes the widow lean.
—Sea Dreams.
SATIRE.
He had never kindly heart.
Nor ever cared to better his own kind,
Who first wrote satire, with no pity in it.
—Ibid.
HYOCRISY.
The sin
That neither God nor man can well forgive.
—Ibid.
MOTHER.
Yet was there one thro* whom I loved her, one
Not learned, save in gracious household ways,
Not perfect, nay, but full of tender wants;
No angel, but a dearer being, all dipt
In angel instincts, breathing Paradise,
Interpreter between the Gods and men,
Who look'd all native to her place, and yet
On tiptoe seem'd to touch upon a sphere
Too gross to tread, and all male minds perforce
Sway'd to her from their orbits as they moved,
And girdled her with music. Happy he
With such a mother! faith in womankind
Beats with his blood, and trust in all things high
Comes easy to him, and tho' he trip and fall
He shall not blind his soul with clay.
— The Princess.
MARRIAGE.
Woman is not undevelopt man,
But diverse; could we make her as the man,
Sweet Love were slain; his dearest bond is this,
Not like to like, but like in difference.
Yet in the long years liker must they grow.
The man be more of woman, she of man;
He gain in sweetness and in moral height,
Nor lose the wrestling thews that throw the world;
She mental breadth nor fail in childward care,
Nor lose the childlike in the larger mind;
Till at the last she set herself to man.
Like perfect music into noble words.
--Ibid.
NIGHT.
** Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white;
Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk;
Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font;
The fire-fly wakens."
—Ibid.
PEACE.
Peace sitting under her olive, and slurring the days
gone by.
When the poor are hovel'd and hustled together,
each sex, like swine;
When only the ledger lives, and when only not all
men lie;
Peace in her vineyard — ^yesl — ^but a company forges
the wine. — Maud.
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CORELLI C Vf^. SIMPSON.
37
HAN.
AVe are puppets, Man in his pride, and Beauty fair
in her flower;
Do we move ourselves, or are moved by an unseen
hand at a game
That pushes us ofl" from the board, and others ever
succeed ?
Ah yet, we cannot be kind to each other here for
an hour;
AVe whisper, and hint, and chuckle, and g^n at a
brother's shame;
However we brave it out, we men are a little breed.
PRIDE.
Often a man's own angry pride
Is cap and bells for a fool.
LOVE.
--Ibid.
Love that hath us in the net
Can he pass, and we forget?
Many suns arise and set,
Many a chance the years beget,
Love the gift is Love the debt;
Even so.
Love is hurt with jar and fret.
Love is made a deep regret.
Eyes with idle tears are wet
Idle habits link us yet
What is love ? for we forget:
Ah, no! no!
— The Miller's Daughter.
IMMORTALITY.
O dear spirit half-lost
In thine own shadow and this fleshly sign
That thou art thou — who wailest being bom
And banish 'd into mystery, and the pain
Of this divisible-indivisible world
Among the numerable-innumerable
Sun, sun, and sun, thro' flnite-inflnite space
In finite-infinite Time — our mortal veil
And shatter'd phantom of that infinite one,
Who made thee unconceivably Thyself
Out of this whole World-self and all in aU.
— De Prq/undis.
PRAYER.
More things are wrought by prayer
Than this world dreams of.
—Morte (tArlhar.
SLANDER.
Soiling another will never make one's self clean.
— The Grandmother,
CORELU C. W. SIMPSON.
AMONG the charming residences which make
Bangor the favorite city of homes in the Pine
Tree State, that over which Mrs. Corelli C. W.
Simpson presides with graceful hospitality is well
known and delightful. To this happy wife and
mother, in a home which gives pleasure to all her
friends, the poetic gift is the crowning happiness
of her life. Mrs. Simpson was one of twin daugh-
ters bom to Capt. Francis Dighton Williams
in Taunton, Mass., February 20, 1837. She is justi-
fiably proud of the best New England ancestry on
her father's side and also that of her mother, Corelli
Caswell. Her grandfather, Cyms Caswell, who
was a lover of music, gave to his daughter the
Italian name Corelli, from an air he was fond of
playing on his violin. She handed it down by giv-
ing to her twin daughters the names Corelli and
Salome. So much alike were these little sisters
that they were designated, even in the family, by
their pink and blue ribbons, and in maturer life the
resemblance is still remarkable.
Corelli C. Williams was thoroughly educated in
schools both public and private, chiefly the Bristol
Academy and Taunton High School. After visit-
ing Bangor, Me., she opened the first kindergarten
known in that city in 1864. A hearty lover of chil-
dren, cheerful, sympathetic and unwearied in her
efforts, she became at once very popular, and it is
not strange that A. L. Simpson, a member of the
Penobscot bar and at that time a widower, as he
led his little Gertrude daily to the kindergarten
teacher, should perceive her rare qualities and covet
the happiness of leading the teacher herself to pre-
side over his home. They were married September
20, 1865. In December, 1866, the little Gertrude
welcomed a sister Maude, and the family circle was
complete on May 22, 1872, upon the advent of a
son, Howard Williams, at present a law student in
his father's office. Mrs. Simpson has written her
poems in moments of inspiration and not as a seri-
ous task. Overflowing with enthusiasm and ardor,
she finds in verse the natural expression of her feel-
ings. Her writings have appeared in various pop-
ular periodicals, and are always warmly received.
A few years ago a fair for the benefit of the Young
Men's Christian Association was held in Bangor,
and she was applied to for something saleable. The
result was a T6te-^-T6te Cook Book, a gem of culi-
nary art, the most of its delicious recipes being
original with her, and this dainty work had an im-
mense sale. She has since had a second copy-
righted edition published. She has absolutely
perfect health, and walks frequently five or six
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
miles for the pleasure of the exercise, "not know-
ing/' as she says, '* what it is to be tired." During
her spare moments she is engaged upon a work
entitled "Leaflets of Artists," which comprises
sketches of the lives of artists by eminent writers.
F. L. M.
CONTENT.
Whilb waiting for the Lily,
We lose the sweet Mayflower;
While longing for the sunshine,
The beauties of the shower.
While dreading distant thunder.
We miss the bird's sweet song;
While fearing all life's evils,
We blind our eyes with wrong.
We wait and long; we fear and dread;
Why may we not enjoy instead ?
If Heaven we ask, to Heaven draw near;
Come with the children; lo! 'tis here.
ENDEAVOR.
LiKB skyward sparks our souls aspire,
To fall as drops the sand.
Mom finds 'mong clouds each heart's desire;
At eve we grope on land.
We've failed our highest to attain.
Shall we then cease to try again ?
Alike to things both near and far.
With gleeful, prattling shout,
To nurse's cap or distant star
The babe's wee hands stretch out.
From striving shall the babe desist
Because the moon meets not his flst ?
How grew that tree with deep-set root ?
By reaching towards the sun.
Though standing at the ladder's foot,
Its rounds are one by one.
By constant striving we shall find
Our sheaves and the wherewith to bind.
OLD-TIME PICTURES.
At play, a boy, just turning eleven
Espies a lovely lass of seven.
They quarrel then "make up " in haste.
Her lips meet his; he clasps her waist;
A fairer picture ne'er was seen,
This little mimic king and queen.
" Not introduced!" Screams her mamma.
And leads her off to Grandpapa.
High, higher up the mountain side,
Far, farther o'er the ocean's tide,
Etown, deeper through the valley's lane,
Wild, searching reckless o'er the plain,
Dear sisters sigh, astonished, sad;
" What motive rules this willful lad ? "
" He will be lost," groans stem papa.
" Let him search on," says grandmama.
She dreams, and wakes, and dreams anew,
As though she'd nothing else to do;
Not heeding cares that come too soon,
Builds castles higher than the moon,
And whispers low, each hope, each fear.
In grandma's arms, to grandma's ear.
" She'll be no usel " cries her papa.
"Disturb her not," sighs grandmama.
'Though ten years 'lapse 'tween that and this,
The same sweet lips unite to kiss.
Birds listen, wondering what they mean;
" I'll be thy king; thou'lt be my queen."
This picture's touched with higher aim.
And too, it needs a latter frame.
Now introduced are pa's and ma's.
And shaking hands, are grandmammas.
SONNET.
Dear friend, in leafy, balmy days of June
Thy rarest gems of verse were sung. Thy hand
Pure thoughts unwrapped and into being fanned
As screened from sun, or neath the silent moon
With " brook and branch " of pine thy heart kept
tune.
Dost dream on California's gold-stored strand
Of rock-built mansions ? one that, towering grand
From banks of waving grass, this quiet noon
O'erlooks and guards our fair Penobscot stream ?
'Mong ferns and sedges which the brooklet wets
Birds, buds and blossoms breathe of thee to-day.
With brush, though faintly, to refresh thy dream
I've traced for thee both home and violets.
These simple tributes at thy feet I lay.
MYSELF.
Though palace grand or humble cot.
Though creams or crusts, it matters not.
All else may prove their falsities,
Within myself my castle is.
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li^ ALTER ALLEN RICE,
39
FIVE YEAR'OLD PERPLEXITIES.
Oh I pity me, dolly; for dolly, I've done
The worst thing that could be done under the sun.
Don't look at me, dolly, so smiling and glad,
When I am so dreadfully, dreadfully sad.
Dear dolly, you know, we were 'bout to take tea;
I went for lump sugar, for you and for me;
I couldn't ask mamma, for she'd gone down town;
Nor Bridget, for she was then changing her gown.
I begged aunt to give me a bit of sweet sauce,
But she's an old maid, ^n^yau know how cross;
I wonder if auntie was ever like us I
She said, " Run away, child, and don't make a
fuss."
I climbed the first shelf, and while thereon my feet,
And tasting of your lump, to know if 'twas sweet,
I reached up for mine, but the next thing I knew,
Such bumps on my head, dear! I'm glad twasn't
you.
But, dolly, I don't mind my fall, or the bumps,
And didn't care much then to pick up the lumps.
To tell it, or whisper it, most makes me choke.
But listen. — The sugar-bowl fell down and broke!
It seems as though, dolly, this day has been years.
I've cried till your dress is all soaked with my tears.
You pity me, dolly; could you, you would cry;
Oh, dolly! my doUyl 'thout you I should die.
When anything's wrong, mamma says we must run
And tell the truth, dolly, 'bout all that we've done;
Now shouldn't I feel, dear, more glad than I do ?
As soon as it happened, I came and told you.
Oh, dear! I'm so sorry 'tis broken! But hark!
I hear carriage wheels! Mamma's come! Though
'tis dark
I'll find the way to her lap, and once in it,
I'll kiss and tell her the whole in a minute.
BABYHOOD.
Sweet Babyland! no myth, no dream.
Though proud, or great, or wise we seem,
Could time fly backward, soon we wonld
Be once again in babyhood,
And in loved arms contented lie,
List'ning to some sweet lullaby.
— Babyland,
WALTER ALLEN RICE.
WALTER ALLEN RICE was born in Bangor;
Me., January 14, 1857, and for a long term
of years that city was his home; but latterly his
employments have called him to various New Eng-
land cities, and more recently he has been engaged
as a lecturer in the interests of secret society work.
This nomadic life naturally has not been favorable
to much literary achievement, but nevertheless he
has done considerable pen-work since leaving Har-
vard College in 1877. Much of this has been in the
direction of verse, and his poems have appeared in
different publications. Whether or not Mr. Rice
published anything before he left Harvard, I am
unable to say, but during freshman years he devoted
himself to verse-making, and in addition to short
stories, he prepared the manuscript of a novel,
which he soon consigned to oblivion, his reason
for not allowing the story to be printed, " That it was
written simply for the pleasure of the thing. ' ' Hav-
ing a strong liking for elocution, Mr. Rice took up
its study professionally, and on leaving college he
gave readings in many of the Maine and New
Hampshire towns. In this connection he prepared
a course of lecture readings, '* Five Evenings With
American Authors," which were very favorably re-
ceived by lovers of good literature, though the young
lecturer soon abandoned the fleld for lack of material
support. The authors treated of were Longfellow,
Whittier, Lowell, Bret Harte and Mark Twain.
Previous to entering Harvard, Mr. Rice graduated
from Phillip's Academy at Exeter, N. H., having
also been a graduate of the Bangor High School in
his eighteenth year. Among other positions he has
ably filled is that of proof-reader with the publish-
ing house of Houghton, Mifflin & Co., of Cam-
bridge, Mass. He left Cambridge to engage in
lecture work for the Order of the Iron Hall, a
vocation giving laige opportunity for travel and
observation, and one in which success attends him.
Mr. Rice was married July 5, 1887, to Miss Lydia
A. Chase, of Roxbury, Mass. A man of thought-
ful, studious habits, a lecturer of recognized ability
and a graceful writer of prose and verse, he is one
of whom the future promises much. R. R.
EVENING.
Whbn Titan reins his fiery steed at last
0*er seas of flame, and gorgeous fleecy isles.
His red-plumed helmet then is proudly cast
At Evening's feet whose face is wreathed in
smiles.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
When she has closed the golden doors of day,
I love to hear her garments' rustling sound,
To feel her eyes meet mine, then turn away
While yet her presence seems to linger 'round.
How tenderly she wafts the cooling breeze
O'er city thronged and pleasure's calm retreat,
Where weary mortals seek a moment's ease
And greet her coming as a respite sweet.
Above the crib some gentle grandma bends
And smooths with loving touch the coverlet;
So Evening, with her spangled spread descends,
And folds away each burden of regret.
As each long sultry day doth reach its close,
And fragrant is the air with new-mown hay,
How softly down the insects' murmur flows,
And blissful quiet steals along the way.
So silently the wondrous change transpires
We cannot mark the time when crimson light
Of sunset fades to blue, or when the fires
Of evening first come twinkling into sight
How heaven and earth now clasp each other's
hands,
And angels' footfalls we can almost hear.
Onr weary feet now press the jasper sands,
And through the mists the City's heights appear.
Ah, now the struggling spirit rends its chains,
And tears the lash from labor's tyrant hand,
And upward soaring to its native plains,
Communes the while with all that's pure and
grand.
OCTOBER.
October! Why do I this month adore ?
I'll tell thee, friend. The years have not been
long,
Nor have I yet forgot that husking song,
And full moon shining through the old bam door.
A merry throng laid bare the golden ears,
While jest and laughter kept the night awake.
And forfeits not a few we had to take;
But under all I bore a world of fears;
That night I meant to know. Was I to blame ?
I thought the time would never come to end,
But when 'twas done, and home we 'gan
wend.
The fire hid in my heart broke into flame;
And though to her 'twas somewhat of a fright,
She's been my wife for five Octobers bright.
to
THE HEART'S CONFESSION.
Ne'er subject bowed before the royal throne
More proudly than do I acknowledge thee
Queen of my heart, that ever had been free
Till thy resistless love made it thine own.
Whether the splendor of thine eyes alone
Conjured the spell, or all thy charms combined^
Swaying at thy sweet will the unwilling mind,
Bound me in fetters I had never known,
I cannot tell; but since that hour supreme
My being's thrilled anew with nobler aim.
And passing fancies that we idly dream
Became, at thought of honoring thy name,
Grand aspirations^ whose bright glories seem
To light the pathway up the heights of fame.
LIFE.
Budding, blooming, dying.
Morning, noon and night,
Pleasure soon is sighing,
Time puts out the light
Beauty's swiftly fleeing.
Youth is lost in age;
Things that are now being
Are for history's page.
Hopes so like the flowers,
Beautiful and sweet,
Cheering summer hours,
But, alas! how fleet
Wintry gales are blowing.
Dead the flowers lie;
Hopes are feebler growing
'Neath a leaden sky.
Laughing, musing, weeping^
Each succeeds in turn;
Each is in our keeping,
All too soon we learn.
Weeping, musing, laughing,
Life is only this;
Tears we're surely quafRng
From the cup of bliss.
Shadows may be lifted.
And the spirit roam.
When the scenes have shifted
In a cloudless home,
Where there is no dying.
Morning, noon or night,
Pleasure never sighing,
But eternal lightl
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OLIVIA LOVELL WILSON.
41
OLIVIA LOVELL WILSON.
OLIVIA GENEVIEVE LOVELL was bom in
1859 >n Glendale, Ohio, a suburban village
near Cincinnati. She is the seventh child of Oliver
S. and Sarah J. (Russell) LovelL Her father was
a distinguished lawyer, an intimate friend of Chief
Justice Chase, and the late Justice Stanley Mathews,
whose residence was close to the Lovell homestead.
For many years Mr. Lovell was chief of an import-
ant bureau in the United States Treasury. Delicate
health in early years prevented Olivia attending a
public school and necessitated a home education.
She conunenced writing at an early age, and when
eleven years old published two short stories in a
New-Church paper. She soon became the center
of a select literary coterie, and, under the pseu-
donym of Tobias Tickeltoe, conducted an amateur
journal called Saturday Gossips aided by a sister
who, because of her physique, was styled tiie *' Slim
Reporter." Under her editorial nomenclature she
produced several humorous short stories, and often
now writes under this nom-de-plume. The young
lady soon developed considerable dramatic talent,
which found opportunity for display upon the stage
of a home theater conducted by herself, who, in
connection with a sister, was the sole representa-
tive of the histrionic art The pieces performed
were generally written by her. Miss Lovell
about this time dramatized a translation of T. B.
Aldrich's " Mere Michel et Son Chat." The
piece was called *• Mere Michel and Her Cat,*' and
was published by the Harpers in Young People^
with elaborate illustrations. It was a very success-
ful play. Many other plays and stories of the author
have appeared from time to time in that journal for
jueveniles. In 1882 Miss I^vel was united in mar-
riage to Henry Neill Wilson, an architect They
removed to Minneapolis, where Mr. Wilson followed
his profession for several years.
In consequence of ill-health Mr. and Mrs. Wilson
removed from the West, and, after a brief sojourn
in the old homestead, they removed permanently to
Pittsfield, Mass., where they now reside in a beauti-
ful home called "Ingleside." L. A.
"THE LITTLE BROWN FIST."
So plump, dimple-dented, covered with tan,
So brown and so hardy, for such a wee man,
Oh! what is the charm, we none can resist,
In the slightest caress of that "little brown fist."
The sun-god hath kissed the dear hand on each side,
All down the knuckles, where wee dimples hide,
In the crease of each finger, the dirty nails small,
The sun-god hath left his fond kiss on them all.
Go ask the bee, whence the charm and the power.
Mayhap he may know, from the honey-sweet flower^
Which by the sun-god is fondled and kiss't.
What spell he has given that " little brown fist."
Nay, the bee is too busy. Well! open the hand;
The laddie's deep fortune we'll understand.
The life-line extends cross the palm to the wrist,
But it baffles our reading— the "naughty brown
fist''
Ah! there we must leave the riddle untold.
The sun-god hath kissed it and left it the gold,
And the power we ne'er fathom, yet may not resist.
Of loving so dearly that ** little brown fist."
THE SONG OF THE DARNING-NEEDLE.
In and out, out and in.
Threading swift and nimble;
Gliding thither bright and slim,
Coquetting with the thimble.
Shining with a kindly gleam
Across the wide dimensions
Of every hole, or gaping rent.
With sharp and keen attention.
Out and in; here's baby's sock!
Can baby's tender flesh
Have wrought a hole so wide depraved
To need a worldly mesh ?
In and out, out and in;
Catch each thread and part,
The holy work that baby does
Is woven in mother's heart
In and out; here's Johnie's hose!
What boy's ambitions are.
Is told in that prodigious rent
Across the knee — a star.
Out and in, in and out.
To do this work of thine.
While mother forecasts other stars
That on his life shall shine.
And here are Nell's hose, Nan's and Sam's!
Ah! such weary days
Mother and I alone can spend
Mending the family ways.
But in and out, out and in.
With patience, and the thread,
We weave the mesh across the way
Where ruthless footsteps tread.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
So out and in, in and out,
"I love you," and all the space, love,
With glances swift and nimble,
That renders us far apart.
I sing the song of mother's love,
Cannot bannish thy face, love.
With needle, thread and thimble.
Or thoughts of thee, from my heart.
Out and in, in and out,
Threading swirtly through,
And how would my thoughts find thee ?
Have patience for the song, I beg,
Winging their weary flight.
We've holy work to do.
To seek a haven of refuge
For their sad part, to-night;
Careless, perhaps— of their presence.
Feeling no fear or alarm,
TO MY WEE BIT LAD.
My own dear lad, my wee bit lad,
That they in this tender endeavor
My bonniest lad of all!
Should battle the wind and the storm!
With eyes like violets sweet with dew,
Lips as the rose when petals fall
Nay— you will never foiget, love.
In golden sunlight by garden wall.
And when my thoughts reach you alone
Ah! lad, wee lad, none loved sae true
You will meet them, and greet them, as yet, love,
In all the world as I love you.
And call them in fondness, your own.
And we will be patient and wait, love.
My dear wee lad, my own dear lad,
Till rendering our lives aright,
The lad I love sae welll
We may both join the song that so sadly
Did ye learn in sooth your secret deep
Rings grief in my heart to-night.
Ere the spirit of Elfland fell asleep ?
May I never learn the mystic spell,
But be content to love thee well,
AN IDEAL.
Knowing none ere loved sae true,
AAAv mm^ mm^^mm^
My wee bit land, as I love you.
Eyes shaded grey, wistful, tender.
Drooping lashes, dark and long;
But, my lad, my wee bit lad,
A rosebud mouth, that doth render
My bonniest lad of all,
The roguish dimple free of wrong.
Trust me, dear, such love as mine
Graceful with the art of winning
Outlives the dreariest wintry snows,
From life and living love's sweet part;
That blight the violet, blast the rose;
Earnest with the power of giving.
Abiding midst, like sweet sunshine.
A child's faith, but a woman's heart
Golden on the garden wall.
With mirth in gladness, tears for sorrow.
It makes life's moments glad.
Trusting God in tender wise,
This is the love, my bonny lad,
For the great unfathomed future.
My wee bit lad, I bear for you,
Which unrevealed. before her lies.
And none in life ere loved sae true!
Jnst a woman, trusting, faithful.
Gladdening where her glances fall;
MY SONG.
Wise by reason of her loving.
Just a woman— that is all.
There's a song in my heart, dear love.
That I dare not sing to-night.
For my thoughts, like storm-driven birds,
SPRING.
To thee would take their flight;
And the bitterness of my longing,
Only the hum of the distant bees
Would wearily beat and throb
Seeking their sweets from the clover;
Through the night wind to thee, love.
The wind in the top of the apple trees;
Like a hopeless, pitiful sob.
Heaven's blue arching over.
Only the song of the joyous birds
For out of the lowering darkness
Afloat on the sunshine's glory,
That bends with the summer rain.
Returning their thanks— grace for food—
I can sing but one song to-night, love,
In the same, never-old sweet story.
Hear but one tender refrain;
Btf^hire,,
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MAV SPENCER FARRAND.
43
MAY SPENCER FARRAND.
IN GLANCING over the columns of the press a
poem sometimes catches the eye which touches
a chord long silent in the heart; a verse which
remains in the memory and we wonder idly who is
the writer. One perhaps unknown to fame, but
singing on with as sweet and pure a note as that
which ripples from the throat of some bird which
warbles near our window and charms us with its
melody. Among the floating poems of the press
for several years past, have appeared from time to
time verses from the pen of Mrs. Farrand.
May Spencer was bom in Philadelphia in 1868.
Her early life was passed in Chicago, where she
attended school until she was eleven years of age,
when she had almost finished the grammar school
course. At this period her eyes became affected
by study and she left school, never to return. Her
mother's ill health rendered a journey to Colorado
necessary, and after the mother's death the child
became her father's constant companion; more of a
woman than a child. At the age of fourteen years
we find her in Pueblo, Colo., even then a contribu.
tor to some of the leading papers of the State.
Though having little school education, Mrs. Far-
rand's natural ability and acquisitiveness, together
with her fondness for reading, have endowed her
with a knowledge which many graduates of high
schools do not possess. As a child her leisure was
rather devoted to the perusal of books and crude
attempts at verse, than to the usual pursuits of
childhood. The first paper to which May Spencer
was a contributor was the Denver Inter-Ocean^ then
owned and edited by the late Henry L. Feldwisch^
who first noted and encouraged the aspirant to
literary fame. From that time on her poems were
printed in the Colorado and Chicago press; no^
always of special merit, but containing the germ of
a vivid fancy, and often ascending to the plane of
true poetic genius.
In 1888 Miss Spencer was married to Capt. P. E.
Farrand of Denver, and is now a resident of that
city. S. W.
A PARTING.
The time drew near that our ling'ring feet
Apart must their way be taking;
Two hearts in passionate protest beat,
Two hearts that were nigh to breaking.
The star-gemmed heavens above us shone,
We saw not the bright June weather,
We only knew we must walk alone
The ways we had known together.
'* Heart to heart," you said, *' we shall meet again,
The parting lie all behind us,
And only the rapture of meeting then
Shall of these days remind us."
Our lips in a lingering pressure met.
And our tears, rebellious, started;
With one last look in eyes dim and wet.
With a kiss and a prayer we parted.
One to wander the wide world o'er,
Nor peace nor contentment gaining;
One to dream of the days no more,
In sorrow behind remaining.
And never on earth, in the ways of men.
While the bonds of life shall bind us,
Shall we meet, lost love, heart to heart again,
And the parting lie all behind us.
OUTCAST.
Flaunting the tinsel of shame in your face.
Heeding no warning;
Living and trading upon her disgrace.
When has she seen in the look of a face
Pity, not scorning ?
Matron, with children who flee to your breast
When griefs assail them,
What if your hands were crossed dumbly in rest,
If you could guard not the birds in your nest,
If you should fail them!
Has she had ever to cheer her, and guide,
Mother's affection ?
Holding her back when she faltered aside,
Softly to praise her, or gently to chide,
For her protection ?
Looking in scorn npon all that she hath.
Her degradation;
Spuming the sinner, astray from the path,
Judge not, ye know not, ye righteous in wrath,
What her temptation.
What wiles have lured her to falter and fall,
Poor sister woman;
Is there between you so mighty a wall,
Barrier iron, impassable, tall ?
Is she not human ?
When has a hand been outstretched her to save,
Not to degrade her.
Erring as human she took what ye gave,
And she will go to her rest in the grave
What man hath made her.
Turn then and scoff at the wreck if you will,
(Sin-hardened features)
Turn, but while scorn doth your scrutiny fill,
Know that for all of her faults she is still
One of God's creatures!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
And in the day when all things shall be known,
By our temptation,
Not by our failures and erring alone,
When we stand up face to face at God's throne,
Be our salvation.
THE KEY-NOTE.
Silent and mute the harp of love is waiting,
Thy touch alone canst wake the tender strain,
Set every chord by master hand vibrating;
Unto its music let me list again.
Love is but sleeping, wake him from his slumbers.
Robing the present in garments of the past,
Change life's low psalm to quick and happy num-
bers.
Over the future love's illusion cast.
Then lift the cloud that o'er that future darkens;
Let the sun shine once more upon life's slope.
Bring words of love unto the ear that hearkens.
Wake in my heart the olden trust and hope;
From winter snows recall fair summer weather.
From dark'ning shadows summon light once
more.
Bring back the love that bound us once together,
Bring back the days, the happy days of yore.
Tune then, with fingers strong, the tender lyre;
Breathe from its strings love's sweetest dulcet
tone;
Let dreams of old its melody inspire,
Wafting thy spirit back to days agone.
Save by one charm the stillness is unshaken,
Thou in thy hand dost hold the magic spell;
Ah, then, dear love, to sweetest music waken
All the long silence of our sad farewell.
THE SEA OF SILENCE.
Thb solem sea of silence is unbroken.
No wave of speech or whisper meets the ear,
No message sent from you or me, no token
That I was ever loved or you were dear;
No ripple on the surface of the ocean
That stretches 'twixt our hearts, so deep and wide,
No sound of breakers and no sight of motion,
No slightest murmur on the quiet tide.
Oh! sea,' across thy vast expanse some message
Send o'er thy waters as the sea-gull flies;
Some wingM traveler, some bird of passage.
To break the strange solemnity that lies
Above a shore where waters are unmoving,
And never sound to break the stillness heard.
To say that I was loved or you were loving.
To mar the reigning calmness by a word.
A silence deep and vast and never ending,
A mighty ocean and a waveless beach,
Where even darkness pauses ere descending.
And all unknown the blessedness of speech.
The waters stretch out ever into distance,
Unchanging, quiet, as beneath a spell.
Of no avail were pleading or resistance.
The waves grew silent at the word "Farewell."
MY RELIGION.
Help to a soul in need, forgiveness, love.
These things are my religion, and my church
On any spot beneath the arching skies
Or in my own heart. Not between four walls
Man consecrates to God and then defiles
By bringing there a heart the world doth rule,
And in brief respite turns from mammon's shrine
To bring voice-worship to the throne of God,
Nay! standing on some massive mountain peak.
Where untold ages have preserved their sway.
Nature's own church, her altars hewn by time,
My heart doth know the strange and wondrous
thrill
That tells how grand and beautiful is life.
Or on the mighty ocean, whose vast waves
Sweep as for prehistoric centuries
They have intoned their mighty, wordless hymn,
And calmed unquiet, weary, restless hearts;
Or when at night the moon's white radiance
glows,
And bright her twinkling satellites appear.
Looking above at that blue, mystic vault,
How small a thing the petty aim of life,
The greed of gold, the form, the rule doth seem,
And the free soul, aspiring above,
Would turn from these to thoughts of better things.
Then come out from your shackles, mighty worid;
Leave your dry histories of ages past,
And learn to know the present. It is fair.
Leave your set praise of One, who, if He is.
Is too grand, tender, great to need that praise.
And prove it in your lives, not on one day.
Set out apart by rule. Come out, come out,
With ready hands, with love-filled, willing hearts;
Scorn no poor wanderer whom faith hath scarred,
For, world, your bitter thrust makes oft to bleed
Some heart sojourning briefly in your paths;
Come out and heal them! Not for a reward
Or hope of heaven's payment, but for love
Of all things human. Rise and tear them down —
The stone walls that environ your religion
And bind it round with iron bands of form —
And 'neath pure stars, fair skies, and angels' smiles>
Dedicate your souls to truth and love.
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REV. OLIVER CRANE, D. D.
47
REV. OLIVER CRANE, D. D.
OLIVER CRANE, clergyman, oriental scholar
and poet, was bom July 12th, 1822, in West
Bloomfield, now Montclair, N. J.; graduated at
Yale University in 1845 and Union Theological
Seminary, New York City, in 1848. He has spent,
at different periods, about nine years in the Turkish
Empire, and has traveled extensively in different
countries. He has been pastor of several churches
in America, but since 1870 he has devoted his time
largely to literary efforts. He published, in 1888, a
unique translation of the^neid of Virgil in dactylic
hexameter, lineal and literal, and the following
year a volume entitled " Minto and Other Poems.**
His varied scholarship has won for him repeated
recognition, the honorary degree of M. A. having
been conferred upon him by his Alma Mater in
1864, of M. D. by the Eclectic Medical College of
New York City in 1867, of D. D. by the University
of Wooster, Ohio, in i88o, and LL.D. by the West-
minster College, of Fulton, Mo., in 1889. He was
■elected a corporate member of the American Ori-
ental Society in 1865, and numerous other societies
•and associations since. He now lives in Boston in
comparative retirement, still occupying his time in
literary pursuits. H. B. C.
SWEEl' ARE THE USES OF ADVERSITY.
Shakespeare's "As You Like It."— Act i, Scene 3.
Shakespeare, thou hast nodded too,
Else thou wast but jesting.
Or wast speaking to the few.
Who, incapable of testing.
Thought, forsooth, it must be true. .
Any honest mind can see
How absurd is much assertion.
And its only valid plea
Is, it was a fool's diversion
To applaud adversity.
Can adversity have use.
When the world a nuisance votes it ?
Any man who, in excuse.
Other than at discount quotes it.
In plain English, is a goose.
Tell the debtor he is blest
When his property is taken,
"When, by poverty oppressed.
Home and all must be forsaken;
He will tell you, " I know best.*'
Tell the prisoner in chains.
Sweet is his enforced confinement;
He will tell you all his gains.
By subservient resignment.
Are his troubles for his pains.
To the man who, scorched by heat,
Sees his house reduced to ashes,
Shakespeare's silly saw repeat.
He will tell you forty lashes
On his bare back are as sweet.
Tell the soldier in the ranks.
Vain is he by glory tempted,
Victories are Fortunes blanks,
And defeat, her prize preempted;
Scorn will be his only thanks.
Yet adversity, no doubt,
Has advantages and uses;
But it somehow comes about,
That, when slipping out of nooses.
Fools are in and rogues are out.
Thieves and swindlers understand
Well the secret how to use it;
Its resources they command,
And, when victims would refuse it,
Bring it on them underhand.
Call not, then, its uses sweet;
Shakespeare, it was downright lying,
And the man who will repeat
What is common sense denying.
Must be styled an arrant cheat.
DIES IRiE.
Day of judgment, awe-investing.
Flames the course of time arresting.
Seer and Sibyl so attesting.
What shall be the awful quaking.
When the Judge, the dead awaking,
Inquest strict of all is making ?
Peals the trump a blast astounding.
Through sepulchral regions sounding,
All the judgment-throne surrounding.
Death aghast and nature trembling.
When each creature shall, assembling,
Give account without dissembling.
Then shall be the volume tendered.
Holding all by sin engendered.
Whence the world's award is rendered.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
When the Judge hath seat selected,
What is hid shall be detected,
Naught remaining uninspected.
What shall wretched I be pleading ?
Who of saints be interceding
When the just are scarce succeeding?
King of awe and glory blending,
Thou art free the saved befriending;
Save me fount of grace transcending.
Think, Dear Jesus, ere discarding,
Me Thy mission's cause regarding.
Be not doom to me awarding.
Waiting, weary, me Thou soughtest.
By Thy passion me Thou boughtest;
Be not wrecked the work Thou wroughtesL
Judge of righteous restitution.
Grant the boon of absolution,
Ere the day of retribution.
Groan I guilty, self-accusing,
Flushed my cheeks with shame confusing.
Spare a suppliant, Lord, excusing.
Thou who Mary pardon wordedst,
Who the thief on Calvery heardest,
Hope to me, too, Thou aifordedst.
True, my prayers deserve Thy spuming.
But benignly be Thou yearning,
Lest I writhe in endless burning.
Place me 'mid the sheep beside Thee,
From the goats sequestered hide me.
Room at Thy right hand provide me.
When the doomed shall stand confounded,
Stand with scorching flames surrounded.
Welcome me to bliss unbounded.
Prostrate, humbly I adore Thee,
Contrite fall as dust before Thee,
Guard my last end, I implore Thee.
Oh, that day of grief surprising.
When from ashes men, arising,
Shall to judgment come to meet Thee,
Spare, oh, spare him, I entreat Thee.
Holy Jesus, Lord divine.
Grant repose to all of Thine.
Amen.
THE GLEANER.
" Where hast thou gleaned to-day ? " — Ruth it, /g.
GLEANER, who homeward^ as if in retreat,
Art wearily plodding thy way,
Thou hast patiently wrought in the dust and the
heat«
But why bringest thou with thee no bundle of
wheat?
Oh where hast thou gleaned to-day ?
1 have all day long, in the wearisome toil,
Been gleaning but stubble and hay;
I have labored as if on a barren soil,
And the elements seemed my endeavors to foil,
I have gleaned but in vain to-day.
gleaner, who comest as if from a field
Where the sheaves in abundance lay.
Oh what by thy diligent hand is the yield.
And why is it close in thy mantle concealed.
Oh where hast thou gleaned to-day ?
1 have come from the fields where the harvesters
throng.
By the brook and the great highway;
As I flitted from field to field along,
I have listened to many a reaper's song;
I have gleaned but a vagrant to-day.
From the harvests that wave as the Master's pride.
Say, what bearest thou, gleaner, away ?
With the earliest dawn thou hast thitherward hied,
But what bringest thou back at the eventide ?
Oh, where hast thou gleaned to-day ?
I have come from the fields on the harvested plain.
Where the reapers are happy and gay;
But the reapers are harvesting all the grain.
And the song that they sang was their own refrain;
I have gleaned but as gleaner to-day.
gleaner, who comest with hands well filled.
As if gleaning where armfuls lay.
Oh, whence is the joy that thy bosom hath filled.
As if singing the song that the harvesters trilled.
Oh where hast thou gleaned to-day ?
1 have gleaned in the field where the Master
assigned.
And have stayed where He bade me stay;
Where the owner and reapers alike were kind.
And permitted me many a sheaf to find,
I have gleaned as a reaper to-day.
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EUGENIA PARHAM.
49
EUGENIA PARHAM.
EUGENIA PARHAM was born in her father's
country house, near Paducah, Ky., which
home bore the poetic title of "Idlewild." 'Her
father Dr. W. H. Parham, was a physician of
ability. Dr. Parham moved to Blandville, Ky.,
in 1872, and it was at that place that much of
Eugenia's early education was acquired. Her
father, however, died before her education was
completed, and she was largely left to her own re-
sources. It is an interesting fact that a large pro-
portion of successful women, as well as men,
especially in the line of literature, were in early life
teachers, and it was in this way that Miss Parham
continued her education. The principal of the
Blandville school soon perceived her great thirst
for knowledge and her decided ability to acquire it,
so he put her to teaching while she was yet a stu-
dent under him. Miss Parham *s success was such
that she was invited to teach in the city schools of
Paducah, where she taught for six years. Her re-
ligious faith is that of the Disciples of Christ
When the Disciples established West Kentucky
College, she was made principal of the normal de-
partment, which she conducted three years. Later
she became principal of the department of literature
in the Judson Female Institute, in Marion, Ala.
While teaching has been Miss Parham's chosen
profession, circumstances at one time caused her to
give some attention to journalism. Before she
moved to Paducah, she edited for a time a weekly
paper called the Blandville News. J. W. L.
TWO LIVES.
Two sons from out two distant homes one day
Went bravely forth in life to win a way.
And one had wealth to shield him from rough cares;
The other, poorer, took his mother's prayers. .
One sought and found high honors at his hand;
One fought to gain a place whereon to stand.
One found his path thick-strewn with roses sweet;
One struggled long through thorns, with bleeding
feet
One came at noon, wealth gone and flowers dead;
One stood in calm with sunshine round his head.
One fell beneath temptation's wiles, unarmed;
The other stood amid all dangers still unharmed.
VANISHED.
When suddenly there passes from your sight,
And from the world around you some sweet face,
Which you have looked to as the ideal grace
Of your best being, and the guiding light
Of each and every common day and night.
By which to measure your ambitition's pace.
Your soul's high aims, your hopes for nobler ways,
Your love of truth, your purer sense of right
And better faith in men, — and when, missed so.
You realize that, as the years unfold.
You shall not greet it in the ebb and flow
Of all the human faces, nor behold
It in your loneliest hour, then you may know
How great a void so small a world may hold.
OVERRULED.
Wb look into to-morrow, and we dream
We see its hours swifl-winged with glad-voiced
cheer
Of happiness long sought, and faintly hear
The imagined sound of melodies, whidi seem
To float triumphant to our human realm;
But when the night has passed, unto our ear
Come tones, faint-touched, from chords no mortal
seer
Has heard, and through the strange, new day there
gleam
Visions of things we had not planned nor known;
New forms, new faces greet us where the old
Were wont to be, and where yesterday shone
Our sweetest love light, all is gray and cold;
Among the ashes of our hopes alone
We sit and read the tale to-day has told.
A HAPPY WOMAN.
" I SHALL be happy!" she said.
As she gathered the poppies white and red.
" I will pull the blue grapes over the wall
And sit in the shade and eat them all,
And count the butterflies one by one,
As they fly along in the morning sun.
I shall be happy," she said.
" I shall be happy," she said.
As they placed the orange-wreath on her head;
" Life will be lovely and love will be true,
I shall drink the wine without the rue;
I will share my joy with the poor and sad
And help to make the world more glad.
I shall be happy," she said.
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50 THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
" I shall be happy/' she said,
No more its breathing hours shall swell
******
With hope, or fear, or sorrow;
And they strewed white lilies over her— dead.
Nor paean grand, nor dirge, shall tell
They closed the eyes and smoothed the hair,
For it a new to-morrow.
And one who stood there dropped a tear;
They folded the hands on the quiet breast;
Its waves have swept the strand where, \o\
Poor empty hands,— and what was the rest?
There can be no returning;
And she was happy, I said.
Eternal silence guides it, we but know
Love's torch beyond is burning.
WINTER.
The mystery of its hidden trust.
The woods are bare, which erst awhile were green
And wooing sweet the song-birds and the sky
To cradle in their leafy tops so high;
A mystery now no longer.
Has told of ashes unto dust,
Of faiths grown weak, or stronger.
The lonely hills against the horizon lean,
Of coffin-lids beneath which lie
And desolate the brown fields lie between,
Vain forms of human greatness;
Unkissed by any glow of fruit, or sigh
Dumb questioners of Life are they.
Of perfumed breeze; far as the longing eye
Mute prayeiB for God's completeness;
Can reach, nothing but solemn gloom is seen;
And this is nature's death! its after thought
Has told of springtime's bloom of light.
Of life, when, with its brilliant dreams all done.
And flowers of summer's wooing.
Its phantasies all faded into naught,
Now drifted into heaps of white.
Ambitions spent, and gilded hopes long spun,
That lonely graves are strewing;
It stands upon the border-world, deep fraught
With awe at the eternity new won.
Of cross, and crown, and scepter bright.
All fallen low together;
Emblems of lives whose silent flight
THE PAST.
Went, asking, "Why" and "whither.'*
Oh the dear, dead days that sleep
In the tangled vales so deep
We see not, hear not, but some hand
OfthePastI
The untried way is showing;
And the faiths, and lovqs, and dreams
And He who gives and takes shall send
Forever by their shadowy gleams
The reaping for the sowing.
Overcast!
Like life, like death, we trust that still
Oh, the hopes that in them lie,
Beyond us and our dreaming,
Coffined in a mute good bye
There lies a "Somewhere " that shall thrill
Of despair!
With newer beauty gleaming;
And the faded flowers that rest
In still hands that we have pressed,
Where mist and shadow, dust and death
Hands so fair!
Our clearer sight concealing
A &CUl\ifti3, 9\/ tati \
Shall vanish but as mortal breath.
Dear, dead daysl forever gone!
Eternity revealing.
Whither, we can know not; God alone
Holds the key
NIGHT.
Of thy keeping; but the soul
Shall thy treasures all unroll
And yet in heaven, they say,
In eternity.
Thou shalt not ever be;
No night shall break the day
THE OLD YEAR.
Of that eternity.
No night! Oh, glorious one!
Again the Christmas bells have rung
Oh, hidden thought of GodI
The old year out forever;
What beauties then, undone.
Its shadow on the white sands flung
Shall fall from out thy shroud ?
Shall cross Time's threshold never.
—NighL
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MARY K. BUCK
53
MARY K. BUCK.
MRS. MARY K. BUCK, of Traverse City,
Mich., is a daughter of Bohemia, in the lit-
eral and not the figurative sense of the word,
though the latter might still be very appropriate.
But the land of the rugged mountain ranges of the
Erzberg and the romantic depths of the Bohmer
Wald were very early exchanged for the evergreen
pine forests of Northern Michigan and the sparkling
blue waters of Grand Traverse bay. So, althoug^h
not native and to the manor bom, this portion of
America's "bonnie northland" is proud to claim
her as its own. She is still on the sunny side of
life's meridian, and personally is a most charming
little lady, with a quaint, sweet originality of her
own that wins her everywhere hosts of warm friends
and admirers. A devoted mother, a shrewd busi-
ness woman doing good work daily in her husband's
office, a model housekeeper, it can easily be seen
that she has not much time to woo the muses. Had
she more leisure and less of the active duties of life,
the world would know more of her. As it is, her
literary work makes up in quality what it lacks in
quantity. Her graceful verse is very often found
among the fugitive poems that have been so often
copied as to have lost name and identity, and are
bound up in many compilations of choice poetry.
Originally, she has written for St Nicholas and
other leading periodicals, but mainly for prominent
newspapers, the ConfrregaHonalisi^ Advance^ Inter-
Ocean, Portland Transcript^ Detroit Free Press
and Good Housekeeping being among the number.
As a prose writer, she has written many bright
short stories for leading periodicals, and is at pres-
ent at work upon a book, of which more will be
known later on. If the past forecast the future,
Mrs. Buck has a brilliant one before her.
E. L. B.
THE CHILDREN.
Through the day, when the children are round me
So full of their laughter and play,
I, busy and careworn, ofl wonder
How they can be always so gay.
While I long for rest, they care only
To frolic and romp all the day.
They weary me so with their chatter.
Their constant demands and their noise;
They leave muddy tracks on the carpet
And litter the room with their toys,
Till at times from a heart that's o'erburdened
I mete out harsh words to my boys.
But at night when so sofUy they're sleeping,
Cuddled down in each snug little bed,
With busy hands safe from all mischief
And quiet each restless young head,
And a look of such peace on their features,
As if never a tear they had shed;
As I gaze .on their dear rosy faces.
So sweet in their innocent sleep,
I pardon, unasked, all their mischief,
Nor thought of their naughtiness keep;
For my heart overflows in the silence
With love that is tender and deep.
How small seem the trifles that vexed me!
How could they have power to annoy!
And gently I fold the worn garments
And pick up each battered old toy,
While I think of the homes where no children
Repay ev'ry care with a joy —
Sad homes, where their merry young voices
No longer the glad echoes start,
To fall, like the sweetest of music,
On a mother's lone, aching heart,
Whose dear ones too soundly are sleeping
From her sheltering arms apart.
Oh, mothers, like me, who are weary
And often too hastily chide.
Keep not your fond words for the sleepers,
Nor wait for the darkness to hide
The love welling up from the heart-spring
When kneeling your darlings* beside.
Let us give of our best in the daytime;
Let mother-love brighten and bless
The pathway the dear ones must travel;
Too soon will life's burdens oppress;
Let theirs be the joy to remember
Mother's smile and the tender caress.
MOWING.
O, HE lightly swings his gleaming scythe
Down in the fragrant clover.
And he hums a gay refrain the while
As he turns the winrows over;
And his heart beats time to the old love rhyme,
The song of a happy lover.
The cool wind fans his sun-butnt cheek.
Then ruffles the rustling grasses
That softly bend their graceful heads
To every breeze that passes.
And a whirring cloud of locusts loud
Springs up from the scented masses.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
He notes the timid meadow lark
Above her low nest hover,
And gently lifts his scythe to leave
The grass uncut above her.
And the live-long day his heart is gay
As the heart of a happy lover.
For walking home with Kate last night,
When the stars were softly shining,
He told the love he long had known,
His arm her waist entwining;
And he knew the bliss of love's first kiss.
Last night when the stars were shining.
And so he hums an old love tune,
As he lightly cuts the clover,
And his dark eyes shine with a tender light,
While he cons the sweet scene over.
And the live-long day his heart is gay —
'Tis the heart of a happy lover.
IF I COULD KNOW.
If by a wish I could withdraw
The future's veil to-night —
Could know what God in tenderness
Holds hidden from my sight —
I would not seek the veil to lift,
Nor make that knowledge mine;
I still would leave all in his hands.
And trust his care divine.
Is some great sorrow waiting me ?
'Tis better not to know;
Why shadow all my happy days
With dread of coming woe ?
Of this Pm sure; if sorrow waits,
God's love is waiting, too;
I'll lean my weakness on his strength
And he will bear me through.
A DREAM.
I dreamed last night that I had died,
My soul had found release;
I lay with weary hands at rest
With troubled heart at peace;
And yet, my spirit hovered near,
I seemed to feel, I seemed to hear.
I dreamed — ah, *twas a gracious dream! —
That, lying so, at rest,
You came and knelt beside me there,
And loving kisses pressed
Upon my brow so white and chill,
Upon my lips so dumb and still.
You called me each endearing name
Our happy love had known;
For all the anguish of the past
Your sorrow did atone;
Yet though your tears rained o'er my face
I could not break from Death's embrace.
Oh, bitter sweet! The boon I craved
While living, came too late!
To know it mine, yet give no sign.
Oh! mockery of fate.
Almost I seemed Death's spell to break
And thrill with life for your dear sake.
I felt my happy pulses throb
My heart with tumult beat;
My pallid cheeks grew warm and red,
Beneath your kisses sweet;
And then — ah me, how real it seemed! —
I woke, to find I had but dreamed.
" THERE SHALL BE NO NIGHT THERE."
When I walk out beneath the starry skies,
And feel night's solemn beauty o'er me steal,
I question oft what meaning underlies
The words that yet so much to us reveal.
No night in heaven. No calm and silent night,
To heal the fret and fever of the day,
Distil its balm upon the restless heart
And bear us on sleep's shadowy wings away.
No far mysterious stars; no changeful moon
With light more grateful than the glare of noon;
No night, to mark the time when toil should
cease,
And weary hands could lie in folded ease.
What wondrous realm is this that knows no
night!
Where eyes grow never weary of the light.
Nor hearts that ache with sorrow and distress
E'er long to welcome sleep's forgetfulness!
What boon to blest immortals can be given
To take thy place, O night, sweet night, in
heaven!
The deepest meaning, if I read aright.
Is that in heaven they have no need of night
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WILLIAM R McNAMARA.
55
WILLIAM F. McNAMARA.
WILLIAM FRANKLIN McNAMARA, pen-
name Harry Hazleton, was bom in Cam-
den, Maine, December ist, 1855, the first of eleven
children, seven boys and four girls, all living, and a
family, too, of natural refinement, with intellects
above the average. The father of this large family,
a hard-working, honest man, who has for some
years been laid away at rest, was bom on the
island of Achill, in Clew Bay, on the west coast of
Ireland. At the age of twenty he came to America.
Ten years later attracted to Camden, the charming
sea-port of the Penobscot, having a natural love for
the beautiful, he fell in love with the town, and also
with Miss Martha Wellman AUenwood, a sterling
young woman of rare Christian grace, whose ances-
tors figured in the annals of the pioneer history of
Maine, resulting in a happy marriage.
The early life of William McNamara " ran quiet as
the brooks by which he sported." It was his inten-
tion early in life, an intention which may yet reach
fruition, to take the profession of medicine, but the
way was not opened; one of a large family of chil-
dren, his help was needed on the farm. An accident
happened to him at the age of twenty by which his
back was injured from a fall on the ice. He slowly
regained his strength, but not wholly, so that a few
years ago, deeming it advisable for his health, he
sought out a pleasant home among the fraitful farms
of the Aroostook, in the northern part of the State,
where he has since married and is living with his
devoted wife. The accident of the fall on the ice,
though apparently a loss to him, was a blessing in
disguise. It led his mind to a world of thought and
fancy, and during the years that he was unable to
do manual labor he wrote many sweet and sad, but
hopeful songs. During the past ten years he has
written more extensively on various subjects for
different publications. W. W. P.
A NOOK.
I KNOW a nook, a sunny nook,
That hides in a dark old wood,
Where fern fronds saucily nod to the brook,
And the rabbit pauses with timid look,
And stmt the partridge's brood.
And I love it well when violets wake;
For the merry thrushes then
Their rarest notes in the soft air shake.
And the swelling buds into leafage break,
When the violets wake again.
And pleasant it is when siunmer noons
On the hills lie last asleep.
With green leaves whispering their tremulous
mnes,
And the warm air full of sounds, the tunes,
Mayhap, of fays who keep —
'Tis said by the old folk everywhere —
Themselves from mortal sight;
And days like these are so wondrous fair
That they float aloft in enchanted air,
Nor wait for the secret night.
The cardinal lifts its fire-plumed head
By the lisping streamlet's side.
When the earlier days of the summer are fled.
And the scattered petals of roses red
Lie low in their perfumed pride.
The locust whirs in the oak's tall crest,
The night mists earlier fall;
Then the provident squirrel fills his nest,
And the rabbit doffs his summer vest,
And winds through the bare trees call.
So the days in this nook of mine steal on,
With never a clanging bell
To herald their birth in the rosy dawn,
Or, when one softly away has gone.
To dolefully peal its knell.
THE MAN FROM THE NORTH.
One night, like a jocky contesting a race,
A quaint little man with a jovial face
Dashed into the town at a rattling pace.
With a six-reindeer team gaily prancing.
** How lucky," he cried, " that I chanced to come
down;
Why, they're all fast asleep in this drowsy old
town —
But a spree will soon set things a-dancing!"
Then he pursed up his lips and a whistle came out
That brought down the North Wind with rollick-
ing rout;
And the trees heard with fear his mad laughter and
shout,
And bent their heads low as he passed them.
Right onward he mshed in most terrible glee.
Till, unsatisfied still with his maudlin spree,
Chimneys, steeples and gables in his arms gathered
he.
And down to the earth mdely cast them.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
In his bed the good man turned uneasily o'er,
While his wife, sore affrighted, concluding her
snore,
First prayed, and then scolded, and then prayed
once more
To all the known saints for protection.
All, roused from their slumbers, in fear looking
forth,
Exclaimed: '' 'Tis the wicked Old Man from the
North!
And little our lives and our homes are worth
With the North Wind at his mad direction/'
The droll little man, when the North Wind grew
still,
Blew a breath that froze hard every babbling rill,
And fastened the wheel of the old village mill
Which for months had been merrily turning;
Then he chuckled and said: "This will do for
to-night;
What a lark there will be when each sluggardly
wight,
With staring eyes greets the old town's sorry plight
And groans, each mad caper discerning!"
Ere mom, like a youth with cheeks rosy and red.
The day up the steeps of the orient led.
Ere slumber arose from her sensuous bed.
O'er the rim in the faint starlight glancing.
And up the cold slopes of the Northland, there
A queer little man, with a voice like the blast.
And a reindeer team dashing so gaily and fast —
Away through the night gaily prancing.
THREE SCORE.
Above the drowsy hum of bees,
That rove amid the garden's bloom,
A clear, young voice comes on the breeze,
As glad and sweet as if no gloom
Hung o'er the dreary world to-day;
And listening to the quaint old lay,
A melody my childhood knew,
I half forget that I am gray.
And softly hum the measures through.
Oh! it does seem so long since then.
When, like this artless boy I sang!
And three-score cannot sing as ten;
For silver bells which sweetly sang
For joyous youth are silent now;
So if I sink, it must be low;
But oh, how gladly would I fling
Aside the spoil of years, to go
And with this careless urchin sing!
WILLIAM EDWARD VASSER.
WILLIAM EDWARD VASSER is thirty-seven
years of age, having been bom in 1855 in
the quiet, highly respectable little town of Athens,
Ala. Reared in an elegant, refined home, and pos-
sessing instinctive culture of mind, Mr. Vasser is
a type of the free-hearted, honorable, southem gen-
tleman. Aside from the refining influences of the
home, and his early fondness for wholesome read-
ing, his school advantages were the very best, his
parents placing him, in 1870 at the age of fifteen in
the Viiiginia Military Institute, where he remained
for four years. Thence he went to the University
of Virginia and matriculated for the session of
1 874-75. Retuming to his native town he spent the
next few years in reading, occasionally scribbling
verse and indulging in social ease which a compe-
tency enabled him to enjoy. The summer of 1878
was spent in Paris. During this short residence
abroad his keen observation served to enrich his
mind with much of useful and pleasurable knowl-
edge. In 1881-82 he edited the Alabama Courier.
In 1883 he left the office and undertook to farm, but,
finding the employment uncongenial, or unprofitable,
abandoned it after one year and embarked in a book-
store enterprise in Athens which he conducted for
two years. In the fall of 1885 he was elected by the
Democratic party to the Lower House of the Ala-
bama Legislature, where he made an able and ac-
ceptable representative. Though a new member
he was at once selected as chairman of the Com-
mittee on Education, an especially important com-
mittee at that time, the Blair Bill for National Aid
to Education being a prominent measure before the
various Legislatures of the country. Although a
zealous advocate of the education of the masses,
believing that a Republic can only safely rest on an
enlightened suffrage, yet his political faith led him
to oppose the proposed national scheme as threat-
ening the autonomy of the States. He, however,
favored as large state appropriations for educa-
tional purposes as the people were able to bear, and
vigorously defended the Normal Schools, against
much opposition. As an earnest of their apprecia-
tion of his faithfulness and capacity as a represen-
tative, he was strongly urged by his friends to an-
nounce himself as a candidate for the State Senate
for the ensuing term, but he persistantly refused to
come forward, having no inclination to enter
political life.
Mr. Vasser* s poetical work has not been great in
amount, he having never devoted himself assidu-
ously to poetry, which has been a past-time with
him rather than an occupation. Only one volume
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WILLIAM EDWARD VASSER.
59
of his poems has been published, a small book
entitled, ** Flower Myths and Other Poems/'
(Louisville, Ky., 1884). Since the publication of
this volume his work has been mainly Jn contribu-
tions to newspapers, and here may be found some
of the best work that he has done. W. T. S.
THE POET'S HONEYMOON.
OCTOBBR.
" I KNOW what your poem will be,'* she said,
And laughed in his face as she reached her arm
Up over his shoulders, and joined her palms,
And plaited her filers behind his head.
*' 'TwUl be about roses all faded and fallen,
'Twill be about grasses all yellow and dead,
'Twill be about heather in clusters of purple,
'Twill be about leaves that are golden and red.
Say, truthfully, won't it ? Just answer me now; "
And merrily twinkled her mischievous eyes,
While warm was the touch of her lips on his brow.
*' A wonderful prophetess you, no doubt,"
He answered her, laughing. ''But you'll agree
A poem without them, this month, would be
Uke Hamlet with Hamlet himself left out.
Whoever would herald October's returning,
Her livery must wear and her colors hang out;
Tho' threadbare the trappings and ancient the
colors,
'Tis cruel the wearer and bearer to flout.
Now isn't it truly ? Just answer me this, ' '
He asked her, with passionate, loving embrace,
And sealed her red lips for a time with a kiss.
"Ah, well! but you'll sigh for the summer past.
For the butterflies gaudy and songs of birds.
And mention in sorrowful, tender words
The blossom that lingers alone, the last;
And plaintively murder in pitiful verses
About the approach of the merciless blast,
The snows and the blight and the wild desolation
That come with the winter that's coming so fast.
Say, honestiy, won't you? Now tell me the
trutii,"
She asked him, and pouted, as though she
believed
That poets were gloomy repiners, forsooth!
"No, never— I swear it! " he then replied.
" Repine I will never, nor care a fig
For vanishing blossom and leafless twig.
As long as my darling is at my side.
The winter may bluster — I dread not its fury.
While, blest with affection, with you I abide.
In summer or winter an Eden I find it —
An Eden where you like a seraph preside."
No poem was written; he lingered all day
To feast on her charms, and the poem foi^got-
And many a poem's forgotten that way.
SERENADE.
Thb musk-rose, love, is sweetest now,
The evening star hath risen;
The closing flower a tardy bee
Hath caught and shut in prison;
And now the moon, on silvery shoon.
Ascends the slopes of blue,
And sends her light, dear maid, this night
To brighten paths for you.
Oh, love, there's music on the breeze!
To soothe his mate to slumber.
The feathered minstrel fills her bower
With many a tuneful number.
And, hark! afar, a soft guitar
And voices sweet and clear;
Your breast, I know, will softer grow
When strains like these you hear.
Oh, come, fair girl, and walk with me
These paths like silver glowing.
And fill with music's honied draught
Thy soul to overflowing;
And lend thine ear again to hear
The tale I would repeat.
Of how my soul were freed from dole
If thou wert mine, oh sweet!
A FALLEN IDOL.
High-niched within the temple of my heart
An Idol stood, all faultiess in my sight:
The rosy tint it wore in love's warm light,
Its pose, finisse de grain, and every part
Proportioned fitly by the sculptor's art,
Combined, it seemed, as seen from its
height.
To make a form divine; and day and night
My soul to it did adoration pay.
Till lo! in time, it fell upon the ground.
And right before my feet it broken lay,
When, scanning it amazedly, I found
'Twas but a coarse and faulty piece of clay.
My partial sight alone had made it seem
A work full meet to fill a master's dream.
great
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
COMPARISONS.
Is it best to be one of a garden of flowers
That blossoms in freedom from cover and wall,
Where butterflies flit in the sunniest hours
And lightly pay court to the charms of them all;
Or best to be only a separate flower
That gladdens a house where it blossoms alone,
Yet blossoms not only in sunniest hour,
But cheers and is cherished when summer has
flown?
Is it best to be one of a concert of songs
Whose varying melodies ravish the ear,
And puzzle the listeners, who gather in throngs.
To tell which is sweeter of all that they hear;
Or best to be only a separate song
Whose resonant harmonies lighten and swell
The heart of a toiler and render him strong
To shoulder his burden and carry it well ?
Is it best to be one of a bevy of maids,
Light-hearted and joyous in youth's sunny days.
Admired ere the bloom of their loveliness fades
By gallants who court them with meaningless
praise;
Or best to be only a dutiful wife,
With cares which the bosoms of wives ever hold,
But loving and loved through the years of her life,
With love that is boundless and never grows cold ?
PDLCHRORUM HDTNUEUNS PDLCHBR.
Hbr summer days are gone,
But well I knew they teemed
With all the sunny glow
Whereof in spring she dreamed.
For see, her brow is smooth.
And look, her eyes are bright;
O, well I know her summer days
Were joyous — filled with light
The autumn days are come,
And beautiful are they,
With pladd loveliness that marks
At eve the perfect day.
Her ways are sweet and kind,
Her voice is soft and low;
O, beautiful this autumn peace
Which follows summer's glow.
WILLIAM SCHWENCK GILBERT.
THE writer of " Bab Ballads " occupies a posi-
tion of marked pre-eminence among his
English brethren. He belongs to a class of verse-
makers whose ranks are certainly not overcrowded,
and whose productions are distinguished chiefly by
their fewness and their feebleness. The comic poet
does not, in short, flourish in England. It was a
day to be marked with a white stone when this
quaint genius met Sir Arthur Sullivan. Their
first joint production was called "Thespis; or.
the Gods Grown Old/' which has already gone
a long way on the road to the limbo of forgotten
plays. Then came '* Trial by Jury," produced at
the Royalty Theatre in March, 1864, the first em-
phatic success in a series of operettas that have
made the names of Gilbert and Sullivan famous
wherever the English language is spoken, and in a
good many places where it is not This pleasantry
at the expense of the Bench and Bar was followed
in 1877 by **The Sorcerer," and next by *'H. M.
S. Pinafore," which ran at the Opera Comique for
the almost unprecedented period of two years.
*'H. M. S. Pinafore" was followed by "The
Pirates of Penzance; " then by '* Patience," which
mocked the folly of the so-called "aesthetic" craze,
and in which the army came in for some of the
good-natured satire that the navy had already had
meted out to it; then by "lolanthe," with its skits
upon Parliament and the famous song of the sentry;
next by "Princess Ida," in which Mr. Gilbert
returned to a subject that he had previously treated
in a blank verse buriesque; then by **The Mikado,"
afterwards by "Ruddigore," and, finally, by "The
Yeomen of the Guard," produced at the Savoy,
which, by-the-way, is one of the few theatres, like
Wagner's at Bayreuth, expressly built for a partic-
ular series of operas. If Mr. Gilbert had done
nothing else, his share in these delightful plays
would have entitled him to lasting gratitude from
all lovers of the stage. They did much to relieve
the English theatre from the reproach of being a
second-hand vehicle for the display of French
opera-boufi'4 showed the world that an English
musician could more than hold his own on their
chosen ground against an Oflenbach or a Lecocq,
and that other sources of humor were available
than the erotic sentiment of a Grand Duchess of
Gerolstein.
The libretti of these operettas, with their many
dainty lyrics, form, however, only a small part of
the work that Mr. Gilbert has done. His first
piece was a buriesque on "L'Elisir d'Amore,"
called "Dulcamara; or, the Little Duck and the
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WILLIAM SCHWENCK GILBERT.
6i
Great Quack," produced in 1866 at the St. James'
Theatre. It met with a success that was shared by
his next effort, a burlesque on "La Figlia del Reg-
gimento." Then followed "The Merry Zingara,"
and next a burlesque on " Robert the Devil." His
first comedy was "An Old Score/* which, however,
was only moderately successful, but his parody of
the Laureate's "Princess," afterwards to be treated
in a different way in the " Princess Ida," made a
hit. This parody was intended, in Mr. Gilbert's
own words, to be "a blank verse burlesque, in
which a picturesque story should be told in a strain
of mock-heroic seriousness," a vein from which he
has not greatly departed in many of his other pro-
ductions. * * The Palace of Truth, ' ' and the charm-
ing, mytholc^cal comedy, " Pygmalion and
Galatea," the fairy comedy, "The Wicked World,"
"Charity," "Randall's Thumb," "On Guard."
"Great Expectations," "Dan'l Druce," "En-
gaged," that pretty little dramatic contrast,
"Sweethearts," "Broken Hearts," "Tom Cobb,"
"Gretchen," "The Ne'er do Weel," "Foggarty's
Fairy," these are among the many pieces with
which Mr. Gilbert has supplied the stage. He has
been a prolific writer in oUier directions. His "Bab
Ballads" first appeared in /««, which was started
in 1861, by the late Mr. H. J. Byron. " With much
labor," Mr. Gilbert turned out an article three-
quarters of a column long, and sent it to the editor
with a half-page drawing on wood, with the result
that he was asked to contribute a column of "copy"
and a half-page drawing every week for the term of
his natural life. The request staggered him, as he
thought he had exhausted himself. The same
feeling of absolute exhaustion has. he sa>'s, re-
curred to him whenever he has completed a drama,
comedy, or operatic libretto, but he has learned to
recognize it as a mere bogey.
Mr. Gilbert, who was bom on November i8th,
1836, at 17 Southampton Street, Strand, was edu-
cated at Great Ealing and at King's College.
When he was nineteen years old, the Crimean War
was at its height, and he meditated joining the
army, but, as the war came suddenly to an end,
that idea was abandoned. Then he obtained a
clerkship in the education department of the Privy
Council Office; afterwards became a barrister, in
which capacity he confesses that his main distinc-
tion was a certain want of eloquence, and at length
g^ve himself up entirely to literature and the stage.
It was a gain all round. Had events run their
course, he might have become a judge, or at least
a general; but there are many generals and many
judges; there is only one Gilbert, and only one
"Pinafore." J. N.
THE YARN OF THE NANCY BELL
'TwAS on the shores that round our coast
From Deal to Ramsgate span.
That I found alone on a piece of stone
An elderly naval man.
His hair was weedy, his beard was long.
And weedy and long was he.
And I heard this wight on the shore recite,
In a singular minor key:
" Oh, I am a cook and a captain bold.
And a mate of the Nancy brig,
And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite.
And the crew of the captain's gig."
And he shook his fists and he tore his hair,
Till I really felt afraid.
For I couldn't help thinking the man had been
drinking,
And so I simply said:
" Oh, elderly man, it's little I know
Of the duties of men of the sea,
And I'll eat my hand if I understand
However you can be
"At once a cook, and a captain bold,
And the mate of the Nancy brig.
And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite,
And the crew of the captain's gig.'*
Then he gave a hitch to his trousers, which
Is a trick all seamen lam.
And having got rid of a thumping quid,
He spun this painful yam:
" 'Twas in the good ship Nancy Bell
That we sailed to the Indian Sea,
And there on a reef we came to grief,
Which has often occurred to me.
"And pretty nigh all the crew was drowned
(There was seventy-seven o' soul,)
And only ten of the Nancy's men
Said * Here! ' to the muster-roll.
"There was me and the cook and the captain bold.
And the mate of the Nancy brig.
And the bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite.
And the crew of the captain's gig.
" For a month we'd neither wittles nor drink.
Till a-hungry we did feel.
So we drawed a lot, and, accordin' shot
The captain for our meal.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
** The next lot fell to the Nancy's mate,
And a delicate dish he made;
Then our appetite with the midshipmite
We seven survivors stayed.
" And then we murdered the bo'sun tight,
And he much resembled pig;
Then we wittled free, did the cook and me,
On the crew of the captain's gig.
" Then only the cook and me was left,
And the delicate question, ' Which
Of us two goes to the kettle ? ' arose,
And we argued it out as sich.
'' For I loved that cook as a brother, I did.
And the cook he worshipped me;
But we'd both be blowed if we'd either be stowed
In the other chap's hold, you see.
*" I'll be eat if you dines off me,' says Tom;
•Yes, that,' says I, * you'll be,'
* I'm boiled if I die, my friend,' quoth I;
And * Exactly so,' quoth he.
" Says he, * Dear James, to murder me
Were a foolish thing to do,
For don't you see that you can't cook me^
While I can, and will, cook^^wf "
'' So he boils the water, and takes the salt
And the pepper in portions true
(Which he never forgot), and some chopped shallot,
And some sage and parsley too.
" * Come here,' says he, with a proper pride,
Which his smiling features tell,
* 'Twill soothing be if I let you see
How extremely nice you'll smell.'
"And he stirred it round and round and round.
And he sniffed at the foaming froth;
When I ups with his heels, and smothers his squeals
In the scum of the boiling broth.
" And I eat that cook in a week or less.
And as I eatiug be
The last of his chops, why, I almost drops.
For a vessel in sight I see ?
"And I never larf, and I never smile,
And I never lark nor play,
But sit and croak, and a single joke
I have — which is to say:
" Oh, I am a cook and a captain bold.
And the mate of the Nancy brig,
And a bo'sun tight, and a midshipmite.
And the crew of the captain's gigl "
TO PH(EBE.
" Gbntlb, modest, little flower,
Sweet epitome of May,
Love me but for half-an-hour.
Love me, love me, little fay."
Sentences so fiercely flaming
In your tiny shell-like ear,
I should always be exclaiming
If I loved you, Phoebe dearl
" Smiles that thrill from any distance
Shed upon me while I sing;
Please ecstaticize existence,
Love me, oh, thou fairy thing!"
Words like these, outpouring sadly,
You'd perpetually hear,
If I loved you, fondly, madly;—
But I do not, Phcebe dear!
THE WAY OF WOOING.
A MAIDEN sat at her window wide.
Pretty enough for a Prince's bride.
Yet nobody came to claim her.
She sat like a beautiful picture there.
With pretty bluebells and roses fair,
And jasmine leaves to frame her.
And why she sat there nobody knows;
But this she sang as she plucked a rose,
The leaves around her strewing:
"I've time to lose and power to choose;
'Tis not so much the gallant who woos,
As the gallant's way of wooing."
A lover came riding by awhile,
A wealthy lover was he, whose smile
Some maid would value greatly—
A formal lover, who bowed and bent.
With many a high-flown compliment.
And cold demeanor stately.
** You've still," said she to her suitor stem,
**The 'prentice- work of your craft to learn.
If thus you come a-cooing.
I've time to lose and power to choose
'Tis not so much the gallant who woos.
As the gallant's way of wooing."
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FLORENCE V. BRITTINGHAM.
65
A second lover came ambling by —
A timid lad with frightened eye
And a color mantling highly.
He muttered the errand on which he'd come
Then only chuckled and bit his tongue,
And simpered, simpered shyly.
"No," said the maiden, **go your way;
You dare but think what a man would say,
Yet dare to come a-suing;
I've time to lose and power to choose;
'Tis not so much the gallant who woos,
As the gallant's way of wooing."
A third rode up at a startling pace —
A suitor poor, with a homely face —
No doubts appeared to bind him.
He kissed her lips and he pressed her waist,
And off he rode with the maiden placed
On a pillion safe behind him.
And she heard the suitor bold confide
This golden hint to the priest who tied
The knot there's no undoing:
'With pretty young maidens who can choose,
'Tis not so much the gallant who woos.
As the gallant's way of wooing."
SING FOR THE GARISH EYE.
• Sing for the garish eye,
When moonless brandlings cling;
Let the froddering crooner cry,
And the braddled sapster sing.
For never, and never again,
Will the tottering beechlings play,
For bratticed wrackers are singing aloud,
And the throngers croon in May.
The wracking globe unstrung.
Unstrung in the frittering light
Of a moon that knows no day,
Of a day that knows no night;
Diving away in the crowd
Of sparkling frets in spray,
The bratticed wrackers are singing aloud.
And the throngers croon in May.
Hasten, O hapful blue,
Blue, of the shimmering brow.
Hasten the deed to do
That shall roddle the welkin now;
For never again shall a cloud
Out-tribble the babbling day.
When bratticed wrackers are singing aloud,
And the throngers croon in May.
FLORENCE V. BRITTINGHAM.
IN the beautiful and picturesque valley of the
South Branch of the Potomac, in the little town
of Moorefield, W. Va., on the 15th of November,
1856, there came into the home of Philip G. and
Susan M. Shearer, a dear baby daughter, whose tiny
frame seemed almost too diminutive and frail to
hold the beautiful soul that was to find a dwelling
place within it for nearly thirty-five years. The
home influence and the surroundings of Florence
Virginia Shearer's early years were of a nature well
calculated to develop all her innate gifts and graces.
From both parents she inherited sterling qualities
and superior mental ability. Her father, bom
in the town of Winchester, Va., is of well-connected
German and English stock, as is his wife, Susan M.
Harness, who was bom near Moorefield.
There is little to record of Mrs. Brittingham's
childhood until at the age of fourteen, she became
a pupil in Mrs. Letitia Tyler Semple's school, Balti-
more, Md. Here she remained three years, when,
having finished the course with high honors, she
retumed to her valley home. The work of self-
improvement, however, was kept up through all
her future life. Her love of leaming was an un-
quenchable thirst and her energy in the pursuit of
knowledge was a marvel to those who knew how
much she accomplished in her quiet, unostentatious
way. When in 1882 she became the happy wife of one
in every way fitted to win her wifely devotion, the
Rev. Jacob Brittingham, her life became one of
almost entire consecration to Christian work. After
a year of married life spent in Parkersburg, W. Va.
Mr. Brittingham accepted a call to Christ Church
Clarksburg, W. Va., and here for six years Mrs.
Brittingham labored faithfully at the many things
which her busy hands found to do. Her literary
work, which she quietly carried on during this period,
was her avocation — ^her recreation; but that she
could find time for it at all would seem surprising
in view of the fact that in addition to the care of
her home and infant son, she had charge of the
choir, for which she was organist, and conducted an
aftemoon Bible class every Sunday, worked in
the mission school, taught classes in French and
Literature, and was always ready to go wherever
there was anything to be done for another's welfare.
Some of her poems and short stories written at that
time were published in different papers and period-
icals, but the greater number have been published
by her husband, since her death, in the volume
entitled "Verse and Story" (Buffalo, 1892). Mrs.
Brittingham's death occurred April 26, 1891, at St.
Luke's rectory. Wheeling, W. Va., to which place
Mr. Brittingham had moved in 1889. N. £.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
AN AWAKENING.
I HAVE honestly tried to love her
But I really never can;
The one thing now is to tell her;
Let her glances the pages scan
That reveal my soul most completely,
In its soberly Plato-guise,
Where the fiery zeal of the lover
Has never yet had its rise.
My books and my work and my studies,
Have crowded completely out
Those sentiment shades of feeling,
Some men cannot do without,
ril picture the case so consoling,
That she through her tears can descry
The form of some future adorer,
A fellow far better than I.
Of course there'll be weeping— the darling!
Well, William, a letter for me?
All dainty perfumed and written
In characters firm and free.
And this ? * ' That she'll faithfully promise
The same future friend to prove.
As of late, where hallowing mem'ries
Embalm her sisterly love."
She sends me a card to her wedding —
Ye saints! that's what I call cool.
To think I've been duped by a woman
Just like any other youi^ fool.
No! — I well know the reason she did it,
(The fact that she loves me is plain, — )
'Twas such a temptation to jilt me,
The truth is she couldn't refrain.
I dallied too long on the border
Of Hymen-enchanted land,
While she with this other companion
Has entered hand in hand,
Hark! far thro' the clustering bowers,
The pealing of marriage-bell;
Ah me! that I ever should write it.
My heart re-echoes a knell.
OCTOBER.
Some days there are with happiness inwrought;
Fair Nature whispers love, and high o'erfraught
With blessings from her store, the laughing hours
Glide gently by and free disburse in showers
Such keen delights as mortals never know,
Except when rare October's sunsets glow.
'Tis then the river finds its lulling tone;
The wind, enfranchised from the dreary moan,
Sinks to a zephyr «oft, whose guileless play
Scarce tips the daisy 'long the king's highway.
The flowers the poppy's secret sure have found;
'Tis Nature's dream not yet in slumber drowned.
The heavens bend nearer, earth b now so fair;
Vast multitudes of sprites from upper air
Descend and their sweet ministry intrude;
They league with frost-elves in the lichened wood»
Lay frustifying touch on forest grape.
While glebe-land with discol'ring fringe they drape.
Heap high the bonfire of Time's gloomy days,
And with ascending smoke the heavens o'er haze;
Veil with the same the sun's autumnal heat;
By river path, romantic tales repeat.
Then join Creation in its glad refrain.
Cheat death of all its semblance, all its pain.
AFTER-GLOW.
By radiant beams the western hill is aureoled;
Dense folds of gray
Veil now the form, erstwhile so animate,
Of sun-bom day.
From out his glorious, iridescent home.
He, Nature's priest,
Sends forth his hallowing, cannonizing power
For day deceased.
Afar above the gloaming's darkening tints,
The sainted one
Gleams bright and reassuring glances down
The earth upon.
We, down among the shadows, hearts a-throb
And, trembling so.
Forget a restoration till we list
The after-glow.
When dies the day within the human soul;
When clouds of grief
Veil from our sight the frail weak frame of day —
Nowhere relief,
We, down among the shadows, sink o'erwhelmed»
Unless we turn
The eye of faith to where the Eternal Son
Doth ceaseless bum.
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HELEN MARR HURD.
67
The aureole of good deeds, touched by one ray
From Source Divine,
Transformed, becomes a glorious crown, which shall
Forever shine.
GAUDEAMUS IGITUR.
There are those who grow prosaic
'Mid this fleeting life of ours,
As they trace a dull mosaic
Unrelieved by glint of flowers.
I, mayhap, some gleesome spirit,
Dowered with a brighter range,
Do but pass their path, or near it;
From without the fret and change
Of the bounding life around them,
They will stop to snear and frown,
And from favored heights beyond them
Seek to drag the blest one down.
But we thank our God devoutly.
There are others in the race
Who will wield the cudgel stoutly
For the higher-up in place.
Those who will promote the welfare
Of the neighbor living by,
Tho' it be no prime advantage
To the potentate called I.
Then just let the gruesome shadows.
Journey on abreast the day.
But we'll join the nobler army,
Those who brighten up the way.
ViE VICTUS.
A SHROUDED Fear came to my gate and knocked;
I bade him enter, trembling though I was,
Then stood on guard to grapple the dread guest
But when in clearer light I scanned him o'er
I saw a conquered foe, slain yester-night.
In combat which, my heart's best blood had drawn.
I told him what he had not known before;
For him there is no resurrection power,
Nor can he touch again my healed heart;
Then driving him afar into the dark,
I stood once more, a Freeman, doubly free,
A victor over e'en the phantom Fear.
HELEN MARR HURD.
HELEN MARR HURD was bom in Harmony,
Me., February 2nd, 1839. Her father, Isaiah
Hurd, was the son of Jeremiah and Nancy Hurd,
who went from New Hampshire, and settled in
Harmony at the time of its incorporation. When
Isaiah grew to manhood, he married Mary, daughter
of John and Hannah Page, and settled in that town.
Helen Marr was their flfth child. As soon as she
could read she manifested a love for poetry and
when eleven years of age, had written many dis-
connected bits of rhyme. On her thirteenth birth-
day she wrote a little poem, which was soon followed
by others. Between the age of thirteen and
eighteen years she composed two stories in verse
and several other short poems, which are not in
print. A great impediment to her studies was
severe myopia. Her father died when she was
sixteen years old, leaving her mother, who was in
feeble health, with the care of a large family, and
threw Helen -upon her own resources for further
advancement in her studies beyond the common
school. Her perserverance overcame her difliculties
to such an extent as to make her studies and read-
ings quite ample, and in the normal class she
prepared for teaching. The trouble with her eyes
had made teaching impossible, and thus poem after
poem followed in quick succession. Miss Hurd
had hoarded her rhymes, making no effort to appear
before the public, until one plan after another of
her life having failed, she began to believe that she
could not bury her talent. Once when asked why
she had not put her works before the world sooner,
she answered, "There are two reasons; the one,
dread of the public; the other, hope of producing
something more worthy. " She has published a vol-
ume, "Poetical Works" (Boston, 1887) illustrated by
Miss Allie Collins, and has ready for publication
another volume of poems, a novel, and a history of
Hallowell.
Miss Hurd has taken an active interest in the
temperance cause and other movements in the
interests of humanity. Her home is now in Athens,
Maine. G. A. B.
IN THE COTTON FIELDS.
The long and heavy hours of cloudless, sultry
day
Succeed the sultry hours of cloudless, starlit
night;
And tawny sunlight pours amain its molten ray
Upon the cotton fields ripened to snowy white.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Beneath tropical heat the humbee and the bird
Drowse under leafy screen and within waxen
cell;
And all the thousand tongues by music's measures
stirred,
Before the high meriden into deep silence fell.
Insect and animal in shady coverts hide;
In the opressive warmth reptile and slug are
still;
Inert within the depth the finny tribes abide,
And not a breath uplifts a leaf upon the hill.
Reclined upon his couch 'mid dainty opulence,
Serene the planter waits the shadows of the west;
And while the glowing day from heaven flames
intense,
In indolent pastime all of his household rest.
But where the meads are white is unremitting toil;
Manhood in hearty prime, and silver head of
age,
And woman's helpful hands pick yields from fertile
soil,—
And youthhood's tender years in almost every
stage.
And stamped upon each form whose hands labors
discharge.
When heat intolerant gives nature animate,
Dull inactivity, there is the mark at laige
Which binds its liberties with slavery's servile
fate.
Some of the agM ones, bending beneath their
loads,
Once basked 'mid lavish growths beside the
flowing Nile,
And near the feathery date constructed rude
abodes,
And tasted priceless joys of freedom for awhile.
Now, in a distant land, filling coffers with gold,
Self-profitless and snug under the slaver's scourge,
Subject to taskmasters, bartered, and bought, and
sold,
Into vile vassalage the hapless victims merge!
Sometimes, wearied, and worn, and burdened to
the dust,
The longings of their hearts to see their native
shore.
Make them forget their tasks and servitude unjust,
And happy visions bring, — and they are free once
more!
Stretches before their eyes the wealth of Afric's
ground;
Mimossa groves and palms, dense woods of
creeping vine.
Whose bloom, and fruit, and leaf by tropic richness
crowned,
With balm of sweets are full, and ripe with
fragrant wine.
SwifUy down its banks the stately river lowers
Under midsummer's sun; and all the region wide
Of inundation thrives. The kingly lion roars;
And they themselves roam free without even a
guide.
But ere their frames, fatigued, a moment find
repose.
And ere their weary feet tarry a moment's space.
The pictures of the past, which in their minds
uprose,
Beneath the cruel lash to present scenes give
place.
Blissless realities force up their naked shapes;
Cane-brake and cotton-plant their scope of vision
bound;
The chain of slavery lies on their helpless napes;
And endless servitude presents its ceaseless
round.
MIDSUMMER MORN.
Soft languor lies upon the hill ;
The scattered yarrow in the vale.
Among the crowded clover-blooms
Lifts phantom faces wierd and pale.
Beneath the hazy, sensuous warmth
The crimson rose-leaves droop and die;
Quivers the slender harebell's blue.
Touched by the serpent gliding by.
The wood with heavy emerald crowned,
Casts an uncertain, perfumed shade,
Stirred only by the transient breath
That labors in the sultry glade.
The sparrow has not hailed the mom;
The robin's song thrills thin and slow;
The seeth of insect cuts the air,
The waters murmur soft and low;
Is heard the clashing of the ferns,
Jostling each other in the breeze;
The sharp tongue of the locust breaks
Monotony of whispering trees.
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MINNIE GOW WALS WORTH.
71
Where whirred the beetle through the night,
Rises the morerain's plaintive woe;
And in its lonesome hiding-place
Pulses the cricket's tremulo;
But at the broadening day's advance
The brooklet seems to laugh and sing;
And fills the valley and the wood
With fuller voice of everything;
Then suddenly from leafy screen
Out darts the joyous bobolink,
-And sparkling drops of melody
In bubbling measures rise and sink;
And from the screens of fern and leaf,
Afar and near, and all about.
In answer from the merry throats
The diamond songs come gushing out;
Music seems into jewels turned,
Sparkling and dancing on the glow
Of tawny sunlight o'er the hill,
Which floods with gold the vales below.
Still swells the fuller voice of day
From air and wave, from branch and sod,
"•Till nature's perfect harmony
Rolls forth in rich accord.
IN THE DISMAL SWAMP.
Upon the branches serpents lie;
"Wheel the cicala and the bat;"
Within the jungles morerains cry,
"And fiercely screams the forest cat"
Alive the marsh is with complaint;
The she- wolf 's lair is in the brake;
And sullied by the dropping taint
Of poisonous weed expands the lake.
Up springs the wildcat from the bough;
Out darts the she- wolf from her den;
And deadly fogs from bog and slough
Unite with blistering dews of fen.
PERPLEXITY.
**'A doubting soul, with tome and staff,
Comes down across the gurgling brook,
And slowly up the rugged hill,
Pondering the texts within his book.
— The Two Voices.
MINNIE GOW WALSWORTH.
MRS. WALSWORTH comes of one of the
earliest families to settle in western Penn-
sylvania, whose line of descent has given many
persons to literary and professional pursuits.
Her grandfather, John L. Gow, of Washington, Pa.,
was a writer of both prose and verse. Her father,
Alex M. Gow, was well known in Pennsyl-
vania and Indiana as an educator and editor. He
was the author of " Good Morals and Gentle Man-
ners," a book used in public schools.
Before Minnie Gow was ten years of age, her
poetic productions were quite numerous, and al-
though those productions were enjoyed and treas-
ured by her friends, no encouragement was given
her to publish until her judgment and taste were
matured by experience and study. . She was gradu-
ated from the Washington Female Seminary. On
December 4th,i89i, she was married to Edgar Doug-
lass Walsworth, of Fontenelle, Iowa, to which place
Miss Gow had removed with her family a few years
previous. Mrs. Walsworth has contributed to the
New York Independent^ Interior^ St Nicholas,
Wide- Awake, Presbyterian Banner, Literary Life
and several other periodicals. " Luaine," a poem,
contains her most mature and careful work.
J. M. G.
DIES DIERUM.
A summer's day, and summer's ripe perfection
Clothed earth, and air, and sky, and August
wood, —
A rare sweet day, as in earth's primal beauty,
When God declared his finished work was
**good."
From where a throng in simple recreation
Had gathered, each to play him Nature's guest.
And from her hand drink draughts of health and
pleasure,
Two wandered all unmindful of the rest.
*' Oh gift of God! oh perfect day!" he murmured.
And in the love of Nature, poet- wise.
With many a grace of speech, he told of secrets
But half concealed in flowers, and rocks, and
skies.
And she who listened, fair, demure and thoughtful,
Upreaching in her thought, his thoughts to
meet,
Beneath the conversation heard, or fancied,
She heard a strain of music, low and sweet.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
O winds, that whispered benedictions o'er them,
*Tis long since on her cheek ye spent your breath,
And years, O flowers, that woke to life that
morning,
Since at her hands ye met a willing death.
But vague and tender as the flowers' awak'ning,
There came, that day, new life within her heart;
Her pulses beat in unison with Nature's,
Her joy but to the day belonged a part.
Ah, yes; perhaps yet, 'mid the summer's beauty.
The words come back and mem'ries sweet arise,
" Oh gift of GodI oh perfect dayl" she murmurs,
But tears well up to dim her wistful eyes.
AT THE CHURCH SOCIAL.
Into the gloom of the summer night.
Through flower-like panes, a shower of light
Dripped through the upturned, dream-hushed
leaves —
A shimmering flood from a thousand eaves —
An invitation, gracious, sweet,
It fell on the throng of a city street.
Where the temple new in its beauty stood.
Awaiting the gathering multitude;
A supper and fair, where good things greet
The eye and palate of all who will eat
Alas! that the pleas are oft in vain
In the cause of the Lord, to heart and brain,
But to pay his dues while he eats, man owns
Is a slaughter of birds with a saving of stones.
From a house as "snug as a robin's nest,"
A bird-of-a-boy in his Sunday-best,
Of kilted suit and hair fresh-curled,
To-night goes forth to see the world.
Grandma acts as his valet, true.
Wields the sponge and buttons the shoe;
But, strange to say, she omits to-night
The fairy-tale— the small boy's right—
And talks, with a joy in her every word.
Of the new and beautiful house of the Lord.
Then, more to herself than the child, perhaps,
As her thoughts run back and the years elapse,
As mem'ries rise and press and crowd,
They escape her lips — she thinks aloud.
And tells of a time when a sainted few,
With godly minds and a purpose true.
The log-house, old and cold and bare.
Had used as the meeting-place of prayer.
But the good seed sown the Lord hath blessed,
And to-night he welcomes each glad guest
To his beautiful house — fit monument ,
Of all the blessings his love has sent
And the child-eyes, meeting the old eyes, dim.
Knows that her thoughts are not for him.
But he hears, with a wonder undefined,
And a gentie awe in the baby-mind.
But soon he had gone, the street door closed.
And grandma, over her knitting, dozed.
Oh, what was that night but unbroken joy
To the waking mind of the littie boy!
And his world of men and sights and sounds
Must stretch away unto broader bounds.
He ate his berries with glad content.
And fond eyes watched him as he went
From vestry floor to gallery seat,
With beaming face and tireless feet
At last it was over; the time had come
When auntie suggested the going home.
The white-haired minister chanced that way,
And paused a moment, a word to say.
His smile was kind and his manner bland.
The pressure warm of his friendly hand.
While a pleasant word, as he passed along.
Was given to each of all the throng.
A groping thought— a glad surprise —
A question lighted the boy's bright eyes,
And he said, with a reverent tone and word,
" Is this his house, and is he the Lord ? "
BABY IN CHURCH.
Aunt Nellie has fashioned a dainty thing.
Of hamburg and ribbon and lace.
And mamma had said, as she settied it 'round
Our beautiful baby's face,
Where the dimples play and the laughter lies
Like sunbeams hid in her violet eyes:
<' If the day is pleasant and baby is good.
She may go to church and wear her new hood."
Then Ben, aged six, began to tell.
In elder-brotherly way.
How very, very good she must be
If she went to church next day.
He told of the church, the choir and the crowd,
And the man up in front who talked so loud,
But she must not talk, nor laugh, nor sing.
But just sit as quiet as anything.
And so, on a beautiful Sabbath in May,
When the fruit-buds burst into flowers,
(There wasn't a blossom on bush or tree
So fair as this blossom of ours),
All in her white dress, dainty and new.
Our baby sat in the family pew.
The grand, sweet music, the reverent air.
The solemn hush and the voice of prayer.
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REV, JAMES UPHAM, D. D.
73
Filled all her baby soul with awe,
As she sat in her little place,
And the holy look that the angels wear
Seemed pictured upon her face.
And the sweet words uttered so long ago
Came into my mind with a rhythmic flow,
'* Of such is the Kingdom of Heaven," said He,
And I knew that He spake of such as she.
The sweet-voiced organ pealed forth again.
The collection-box came round.
And baby dropped her penny in.
And smiled at the chinking sound.
Alone in the choir Aunt Nellie stood.
Waiting the close of the soft prelude,
To begin her solo. High and strong
She struck the first note; clear and long
She held it, and all were charmed but one,
Who, with all the might she had.
Sprang to her little feet and cried:
"Aunt Nellie, you's being bad!**
The audience smiled, the minister coughed.
The little boys in the comer laughed,
The tenor-man shook like an aspen leaf
And hid his face in his handkerchief.
And poor Aunt Nellie never could tell
How she finished that terrible strain.
But says that nothing on earth would tempt
Her to go through the scene again.
So we have decided, perhaps 'tis best,
For her sake, ours, and all the rest,
That we wait, maybe, for a year or two,
Ere our baby reenter the family pew.
LIFE.
For life must come and life must go!
The winters pass, the mayflowers blow
And love is here;
And tho* the bliss be but alloy,
'Tis less of pain, with more of joy.
And life is dear.
— Luaine^ Partii,
UNCERTAINTY.
O woe, whose deep abyss hath heavenly powers!
O joy, whose farthest height is keenest pain!
We start affrighted at these souls of ours.
And long to reach the common-place again.
Oh strange the possibility is given.
That we should know such bliss as makes us
weep!
Is't that the soul hath caught a glimpse of Heaven,
The body, writhing, fears her hold to keep ?
^Luaine^ PartUu
REV. JAMES UPHAM, D. D.
FROM John Upham, who was bom in England,
in 1597, and who came to New England in-
1635, have proceeded all branches of the Upham
family in North America.
Rev. Dr. James Upham was bom January 23rd,
1815, in Salem, Mass., and his childhood was passed
among its historic and literary associations.
He is endowed with the "dominent character-
istics of the Upham family," which are energy,
enterprise, industry, integrity, religiousness and
good sense. He entered the college in Water-
ville, Maine, now Colby University, at the age of six-
teen. After graduation,' in 1835, he was appointed
Preceptor of Farmington Academy, Farmington,
Maine. Here, through too close application to study
and teaching, his health was permanently impaired,
and he was obliged to abandon all work for a time.
In 1837 his health was so far restored that he was
able to enter Newton Theological Institution, which,
however, he left about the middle of the Senior
year, subsequentiy studying Homiletics with Rev.
John Wayland, D. D., of Salem. In 1840 he was ap-
pointed Professor of Biblical Literature and Sacred
Rhetoric in the Maine Baptist Theological Institu-
tion, in Thomaston, and was ordained the same
year. Following this professorship came pastorates
in Manchester, N. H., and Millbury, Mass., whence
he went, September, 1845, to Newhampton, N. H.,
as Professor in the Newhampton Literary and
Theological Institution, where he took charge of
New Testament Greek Interpretation, Archaeology,
Ecclesiastical History and Homiletics. This insti-
tution was removed to Fairfax, Vt., in 1853. While
there, in i860, the degree of D. D. was conferred
upon him by his Alma Mater. In 1861 he was
elected to the presidency of the institution, which
he resigned in 1866 to become one of the editors of
the n^aicAman and Reflector^ now the Watchman^
of Boston, Mass. This connection ended December,
1875. From 1876 to 1882 he was an associate editor
of the Religious Herald^ Richmond, Va. Since
1878 he has had charge of the Health Department
in the YouWs Companion, His public life has
been spent mainly in the teacher's and the
editor's chair — twenty-four years in the former,
and twenty-five years in the latter, which he
still retains. He has always been, and continues
to be, a frequent contributor to various journals.
November 12th, 1841, Mr. Upham married Miss
Cynthia Jane Bailey, of Providence, R. I., a woman,
"filling up the high ideal in all its specialties of
woman's relgitionship." Her death occurred Sep-
tember, 1865. Their children were a daughter who
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74
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
died, December, 1866, and five sons, one of whom
died in infancy. Mrs. Experience S. (Bascom) Up-
ham, to whom he was married, June, 1868, is a most
worthy successor of his first wife. Their children
were, Avie Bascom, born 1873, who died the follow-
ing year, and Elizabeth Webb, born December i8th,
1875, whose young girlhood brightens the home of
her parents, 14 Chestnut St. Chelsea, Mass.
Rev. Dr. Upham has been the writer of much
excellent prose, and many poems which have
appeared in important periodicals.
His poems are solid in thought, simple and un-
pretentious in form, helpful in sentiment, and are
addressed mainly to the religious part of our nature.
They commend themselves to thfe hearts of the
public, but they have never been collected into a
volume. J. M. R.
THE HILL-COUNTRY.
Amid these hills is felt the winter's rigor;
Here spring delays to plant her timid feet;
But here are toughened brawn and high-toned vigor;
Here simple ways and manly courage meet.
Here is the source whence life, as in a river,
Pours in rich volume and unceasing down,
A priceless boon from God, the unstinting Giver,
For crowded city and the lowland town.
Hence comes the brain for all our high professions
That serve our kind in church, or State, or mart,
That fills the columns of the grand processions —
The €lite of science, poetry and art.
O city Christians! help the churches hidden
Beneath the shadows of the far-off hill;
By gravest interests of your own you're bidden;
In them lie couched your good, or else your ill.
'Tis in the virtue of their sons and daughters
That ye shall find your largest weal advanced;
Their voice be as down-rush of waters.
And all the evils of your own enhanced.
Tve heard a voice within me loudly crying.
It has, forsooth, my inner spirit stirred:
** Let ye those churches die, as some are dying,
And ye shall find a famine of the Word.'*
MY MORNING PRAYER.
I THANK thee. Father, for thy care,
Through all the helpless night,
That brought me, with my strength renewed,
To morning's gladsome light
I thank thee for my home and friends,
And for my daily bread;
For all the comforts of my life,
Around so richly spread.
I thank thee for the love I share
With others dear to me;
I thank thee for tlie love I feel
For them, and more for thee.
I thank thee for the mercy-seat
And for thy Holy Word;
And for a heart to pray and praise^
And love and trust my Lord.
Bless, now, the labor of my hands,
And grant me good success;
Or, if sore failure be my lot,
My failure even bless.
And all the homes around me bless,
Make each a house of prayer;
From sickness, sin, and harm and death
Do thou the inmates spare.
Bless my dear pastor and the flock;
Keep all in love and peace;
And make me daily grow in grace.
And see a large increase.
Oh, bless our land, the Pilgrims' land>
Of lands the best and worst;
Thine was our fathers' helping hand,.
Oh, help us, as at first.
Bless all the nations, O my God,
And let them praise, as one,
The name and character and works^
From rise to set of sun.
Accept, O God, this morning prayer,
Repeated yet again.
And help me walk this day with thee,.
As Enoch walked. Amen.
INNER MUSIC.
The lark that thrills us with its song^
So full of life and glee.
Seeks but to voice and send along
The inward harmony.
So souls, kept full of love and cheer^
With love and cheer o'erflow.
And make a songful heaven here,
As on to heaven they go.
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FERDINAND BLANCHARD, M, D,
17
THE BRUISED REED.
Tho* bent to earth and almost broke
By careless blow,
The tree may live and thrive again,
And upward grow.
The scarr and twist may linger long
To pain the eye,
Still all above shoot, straight and fair
Toward the sky.
A soul cast down by wicked foe
Or thoughtless friend,
May yet regain its primal force,
And heavenward tend;
Or sorely smit and struck to earth
By deadly sin,
May rise, though scarred, and still ascend
From might within.
The bruised reed, tho' well nigh crushed,
God will not break;
All is not lost, despairing one.
To hope awake!
THE MORNING GLORY.
Peeping round the world so novel,
Just above the rended cloud,
Comest thou, my feeble floweret.
Planted by the hand of God.
Down below thy little rootlets
Seek and find thy proper food,
Working with their strange alembics,
Sager than our chemists could.
But thy stem, so soft and supple.
Has no power to stand alone;
And thy life, so full and forward,
Brings no prop to be thine own.
Yet thou bearest tendings, reachings.
Power to grasp and power to twine.
And to make another's vigor
Be to thee as strength of thine.
Thus for man, and more for woman,
I have ever found it true —
None are stronger than the weakest,
Leaning, twining, mounting too.
FERDINAND BLANCHARD, M. D.
FERDINAND BLANCHARD was bom in the
town of West Windsor, Vt., November 8th,
185 1. His father, a staunch abolitionist, and one
who supplemented his prayers with his deeds, died
in defense of the cause in 1864. In his life of hon>
est industry and zeal, tempered with a love of the
poetical, we read with interest the early influences
upon the life and character before us.
Mr. Blanchard fitted for college in the Montpelier
high school and Vermont Conference Seminary,
and for those institutions has always felt a warm
regard. Graduating from Dartmouth College in
1874 and from the Medical School in 1877, he
entered directly upon the practice of medicine and
has followed that profession to the present, having
removed, however, from his Vermont fields to the
city of Washington. An enthusiast in botany,
he has devoted such time as could be spared to its
pursuit, and through exchanges and writings upon
the subject, numbers as friends many distinguished
scientists at home and abroad. But essentially a
poet, these studies, with a liberal knowledge of the
best in literature, a keen appreciation of the sub-
lime and its reverse in human nature, and above
all an unswerving allegiance to truth as the spring
whence flows all good, his thoughts have often
found their best expression in verse. Through the
stress of a busy life little attention has been given
to their publication. Still from time to time they
have appeared in various periodicals, and have dis-
closed a depth of thought, quaint originality and
happy fancy, which lead one to read the lines again
and look with eagerness for others from the same
pen. His interest in the burning social problems of
the day make it probable that his best work is not
yet accomplished; tliat we shall yet read earnest
measures portraying the Brotherhood of Man; the
grand possibilities of the future. A. F. S.
TO JOHN BURROUGHS.
O GENIAL John! beneath the shade
Why do you grope and peer and creep so t
Aha! you seek the winsome maid.
The dainty, darling nymph. Calypso.
But vain your quest; from east to west.
From Marblehead to Tallahassee,
For long agone I sought her, John,
And found and wooed and won the lassie.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
She's mine! she's mine! and mine has been
More years than e'er she knew Ulysses;
For me she waits her bower within,
For me she keeps her ruby kisses.
In Arbor vitals deepest shade
With other fairy forms I found her;
The shamrock was her waiting maid.
And Hypnum spUndens nesded round her.
So coy, so pure, my word upon't
Not e'en a bumblebee had kissed her,-
But come in May-time to Vermont,
I'll introduce you to her sister.
DICKENS.
Oft as we turn we catch the gleam again
Of pearly lines that flowed from Dicken's pen!
In words as changeful as the floating smoke,
In simple Saxon clad, his genius spoke.
Now sad, now glad, now tender, now severe.
He quells a laugh to shed the pitying tear,
And laughs again before the tear is dry.
Then turns to hiss demure hypocracy;
Though aiming still to please the vicious herd
He aims a blow at thee with every word.
Howe'er he sings, as bard or mad buffoon,
His thought is harmony if wild the tune.
And when the lighter tones have died away,
A pregnant afler-thought concludes the lay
That bears a balmy meaning ever new.
And lives for aye because so grandly true.
A TRIBUTE.
Fair hand that gleaneth treasures bright.
Best thought in phrases best bedight,
I know I read thy purpose right.
To hearts athirst, the rain of spring;
To joy, the rose of June to bring;
To weary ones, Falls offering.
And o'er unsightly things, and low.
In love a mantle soft to throw
As falling leaves, or falling snow.
PLEASANT DAYS IN WINTER.
The Summer hath kissed the Winter
Across the face of Spring,
And Sol stood by and held the light,
And Tellus awoke and saw the sight.
And sprang from his mattress, bolt upright.
And tore his coverlet all to strings.
And quoted a number of hackneyed things
Rebuking the maiden's wanton freak.
And all he did the following week.
Of any account, was to grumble and cry.
But Luna, esteemed, demure and shy.
Leaned back her shoulders against the sky,
And snapped her fingers, and laughed, and said,
' VxtL laughing at Tellus; but really I'm glad
That Summer has once in kindness dared
To kiss old Winter, in spite of his beard."
And Luna was right; and I'm prepared
To open my window and sing,
Thank God for the sunshine of Winter.
FROM THE CLASS POEM.
1874.
O Dartmouth's Melpomene, gracefully green!
My Pegasus prances, unheeding my rein,
Bellerophone's temple will surely be mine.
Unless I'm upholden by one of the Nine.
And therefore, Melpomene, Pegasus guide.
With saddle and pillion together we'll ride
O'er mountain and river, o'er present and past,
While Logic and History watch us, aghast
In general keep th' equatorial tract,
Between the dominions of fancy and fact,
Where rythmical metaphors float on the breeze.
And similes sit in the shade of the trees.
Whenever we ride over dangerous ground.
With custom or dignity planted around.
Be cautious — remember the rashness of youth,
Remember my weakness for telling the truth.
Your company. Madam, I humbly implore,
A favor I never entreated before;
And now, if you skilfully handle the rein,
I never will trouble your Highness again.
QUATRAINS— MUSIC.
The Spirit of the Summer Night
Met Sweetness wandering in the wild.
They saw each other, loved at sight,
They wed, and Music was their child.
When every chord repeats a word
A loved one used to speak.
No tear we shed; we only dread
That chord or heart may break.
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JANE E. D. CONKLIN.
79
JANE E. D. CONKLIN.
JANE ELIZABETH DEXTER was born in
Utica, N. Y. Her great-grandfather, Gregor
Grant, of Abemethy, Scotland, came to America
in 1774. He joined the Continental army and
served during the Revolutionary War. Her
mother was the daughter of William W. Williams,
architect, of Albany, N. Y. He spent two years in
the dty of Washington, superintending repairs on
the Capitol. During that time he made the ac-
quaintance of Mr. Custis, a nephew of General
Washington, an acquaintance which ripened into a
warm friendship, and when Mr. Williams was about
to return to Albany, Mr. Custis presented him with
a table which had belonged to General Washington.
The table is now in Mrs. Conklin's possession.
Mrs. Conklin's father was bom in Paris, N. Y.
His father had removed to that place from Mans-
field, Conn., in the latter part of the last century.
He was a cousin of John G. Saxe, the poet. From
her earliest childhood Mrs. Conklin was fond of
poetry. She received her education in the Utica
Female Academy and in Mrs. Brinkerhoffs School
for Young Ladies, in Albany, N. Y. Her first
composition was written in verse. When she was
fourteen years old her poems were first given to the
public, and since that time she has been continu-
ously writing. While none of her poems are strictiy
hymns, many of them are sung in religious meet-
ings. She was for many years a regular contributor
to the Gospel Messenger^ a religious weekly pub-
lished in Utica. She also wrote for a New York
weekly and for several local papers, for which she
wrote prose articles as well as poetry. In Decem-
ber, 1865, she was married to Cramer H. Conklin,
a veteran of the late war, and since that time she
has lived in Binghamton, N. Y. Mrs. Conklin
always took great interest in the War of the Rebell-
ion and in the defenders of the Republic. When
the G. A. R. Post, to which her husband belongs,
formed a relief corps of the wives and daughters of
the members, her name was one of the first signed
to a call for a charter. Shortly after the corps was
organized she was elected its president, and for
three years held that office. In 1884 she published
a book of poems, which has been favorably re-
ceived. She has in preparation a second volume of
poems. C. E. T.
IN THAT DAY.
Whbn you and I shall stand before the gates
Which open to the new Jerusalem,
Scanning the record of our life, shall we
Find aught whereof to weave a diadem ?
Will there be thought, word, deed, of yours or mine.
So pure, so spotless, it can bear the light
In His dread presence, of whom Scriptures say
The very heavens are not clean in His sight?
Will there be prayer that had no taint of sin ?
A cup of water that recked no reward ?
A deed of alms that glorified not self?
A talent consecrated to the Lord ?
A world renounced on which we looked not back ?
Our dearest wish and our own will foregone ?
The furnace fires cheerfully endured ?
The rod of discipline in meekness borne ?
Shall we find aught that would adorn a crown ?
One act that aimed not at some selfish end?
Our best endeavors, if probed to the root,
Did they not to self-gratulation tend ?
How then, in that day, shall we dare to raise
Our eyes unto the very lowest place,
Save that the dear Redeemer's precious blood
Can make us fit to stand before his face ?
DOWN FROM THE MOUNTAIN.
Down from the cloud-capped mountain, down,
By the winding foot-path into the town;
Down through the woodland, cool and sweet,
With the slippery pine-leaves 'neath the feet
Down by the quarry's shelving ledge,
Where gentian and peppermint fringe the edge;
Down thiough the meadows, shining bright,
With the dew-drop tears of the gloomy night.
Down through the fields where the waving com
Glints in the light of the early mom;
Down through the groves where the whispering
breeze
Tells its love-tale to the answering trees.
Over the plank that bridges the brook,
Where urchins are angling with pin for a hook;
Down past that silent town where, you know,
'*The houses are all alike, in a row."
Down where the orchard's bending boughs
Droop to the reach of the dappled cows;
And so by the foot-path winding down,
The traveler comes to the bustling town.
The town with its pavements* buming glow,
Where so little is real and so much is show;
The town where the only birds that sing
Are those that never have freedom of wing.
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The town where the rich, if not happy, are gay,
And the poor toil on in their plodding way;
Where the poet dreams within attic bounds,
And heaps up words into shapely mounds.
Where the painter pictures, in colors bright.
The scenes that never have greeted his sight;
Where the bride, as she turns from the sacred fane,
Meets at the door a funeral train.
Where riches and squalor alike abide,
And but few may walk the patrician side;
The busy town where the buzz of mill
And the hum of steam are never still.
Where the streets are filled with a merry throng,
And the air is a-stir with music and song;
And so, from the heaven-kissed mountain down.
The traveler passed through the dusty town —
The town with its sights, its clatter and heat,
Its palace-like mansions, its home-lawns neat
He thought of the hillside's daisied bloom.
The clover and sweet-brier's wild perfume.
These he matched with the toNiTi's unsavory smells.
The mountain's springs, with its covered wells,
And of noisy town or country's rest.
The traveler pondered which was best
ALONE.
I AM sitting alone in the twilight.
And watching the shadows gray,
That are creeping over the tree-tops.
And chasing the light away.
While the dear ones fondly remembered.
Gather around in the gloom.
And memory's beautiful pictures
Are filling my little room.
I am listening again to the voices
That charmed me in days of yore.
' The shadow goes back on the dial,"
And I am a child once more.
And I stand in the dear old home again.
With a loving hand in mine,
Where the crimson roses are blending
Their bloom with the fragrant vine.
Once more — but the vision has faded,
Those voices are hushed in the tomb;
Dear forms and loved faces have vanished, -
Alone, alone in the gloom.
HARRY F. O'BEIRNE.
THE Lone Star State has been the home of at
least four poetic spirits who have contributed
generously, from time to time, to the current litera-
ture of our country. These are Mollie Moore, Lx>u
Bedford, Belle Hunt and H. F. O'Beime. The latter
was bom in Ireland, May 8th, 1857. His father, Ed-
mond O'Beime, still living, was a prosperous
banker. His mother, a member of the Baron and
Netterville families— the latter t>eing the oldest title
in the Irish Peerage. Their son, Harry, was educated
in a French college, where he rapidly acquired a
knowledge of that language, making wonderful
progress in the classics at an early age. At sixteen
he left college, bearing with him the largest number
of prizes ever before conferred upon a pupil of
that institution. From that day he ceased stvdy and
launched widely into the pleasures of the chase with
his brother, one of the famous fox hunters of the
day.
Harry was proficient in field sports and reveled
only in forest, field and stream; but there was
something better beneath the surface of this im-
placable pursuer of partridge and speckled trout.
From May, 1872, dates his first poem, ** The Wild
Bee," contributed to and published in Chambers*
Journal (England). Then followed others till the fall
of 1873, when his father, meeting with reverses,
emigrated with his family to Dallas, Tex. But
Harry preferring forest over home life, became a
hunter and hung upon the border till January, 1876,
when he organized a prolonged expedition in com-
pany with his brother, Captain Jameson, of Stanley
notoriety, and Messrs Elliott and Rosevelt, of New
York. The party breaking up in three months the
brothers remained upon the frontier till 1879. Those
years were rife with adventure for Mr. O'Beime, who
joined in every possible adventure against the hos-
tile Indians with that wild yeaming for excitement,
which is the biggest part of his nature. But the
border days were over in 1881 and he bade a
sorrowful farewell to the scenes of his former
thrilling life. From 1885 until 1S89 we find him in
company with his brother, E. S. O'Beirne, con-
ducting the National Organ of the Choctaw Nation
(Indian Territory) — ^a joumal established by them-
selves and well conducted. In conjunction with
this brother, Mr. O'Beime has published a hand-
somely illustrated work, entitled "Indian Terri-
tory." His love for the aboriginal races is remark-
able. Since the summer of 1890 he has been
engaged in writing a historical and biographical
work on the Five Civilized Tribes, profusely illus-
trated, the first volume of which appeared in
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HARRY F. aBEIRNE.
83
January, 189 1. Mr. O'Beime's poetic productions
are very dissimilar in theme and treatment; many
of them are inlaid with a sympathy which is strongly
characteristic of his nature. During the seventies
he published two satires which, like the majority of
such work, were doomed to premature oblivion.
Mr. O'Beime is an unmarried man. J. P.
THE SKEPTIC.
Some men are reason-proof, and Richard Brown
Was never yet convinced, nor argued down.
Conclusive to a fault, he did not choose
That any theory should change his views.
" If airth was round," he said, *' as some folks tell,
We'd fall off somew*eres — ^mebbe into hell.
That's all too thin; needn't tell Dick Brown
That us here people travels upside down."
A leamM friend, with most polite excuse
Presuming, offered to make known his views.
' ' Allow me to explain, ' ' he said. * ' The cause
Is simply proven by attraction's laws;
An illustration see before you spread;
Yon house-fly on the ceiling overhead.
Behold the greater body draws the less.
Convincing logic, is it not ? Confess. "
And thus his friend by force of reason tried
Full many proofis; when finished Dick replied:
"The proofs is good, I must allow you that;
But all the same / b'lieve the airth is flat."
THE WILD BEE.
I COMB at mom when dewdrops bright
Are twinkling on the grasses.
And woo the balmy breeze— in flight
That o'er the heather passes.
I swarm with many lithesome wings
That join me while I ramble.
In seeking for the honied things
Of heath and hawthorn bramble
And languidly amidst the sedge
When noontide is most stilly,
I loll besides the water's edge
And climb into the lily.
I fly throughout the clover crops
Before the evening doses,
Or swoon amid the amber drops
That swell the pink moss roses.
To poesy I am a friend,
I go with fancy linking,
And all my airy knowledge lend
To aid the poet's thinking.
Deem not these little eyes are dim
To ev'ry sense of duty;
We owe a certain debt to Him
Who clad this earth in beauty;
And therefore I am never sad,
A burden homeward bringing,
But help to make the summer glad
In my own way of singingf.
When idlers seek my honied wine.
In wantonness to drink it,
I sparkle from the Columbine
Like some forbidden trinket
Oh, thoughtless man! if all your tact
And power to me were given,
I would not wound by word or act.
The things beloved of heaven.
That so I should not fear the close.
The final rest before me,
But lay me 'neath some gorgeous rose
Its dewdrops weeping o'er me.
OUR HOPES.
We nurse our hopes as mothers^do
Their infants at the breast.
For they, the children of our dreams,
Were bom to be caressed;
And as they grow we long to find
Fulfillment of their youth.
And laugh to see them loiter round
The blossom-fields of truth.
Devoted parents, while we watch
Their fast maturing powers.
The buoyant step, the brightening eye^
The love of life is ours.
Not so, when sorry seasons come.
When smiles and tears are vain,
To lure the lovely traant ones
Back to the heart again.
Ah! then the light of life dies out.
The singing birds grow sad.
And neither hill, nor vale, nor sky.
Can ever make us glad.
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84
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
They came to us as children come
To bless our lonely lives,
And blest is he who hath one hope
That all the rest survives.
For ah! the saddest gifts are they
That God did ever send,
When hopes that we have cherished long
Desert us in the end.
NELLY.
Quoth Nelly " the will of the Lord be done,
And I stall therefore become a nun,
And bestow a life of wedded love
On Him who beckons to me from above.
The world is sown with seeds of care,
That blossom around us everywhere;
But I know that the dove of peace doth brood,
In the house of the Holy Sisterhood.
No — never a sigh shall my heart set free
When the doors of the world are closed on me,
And nothing is left to profane the eye.
But a rood of earth and a span of sky.
To the world's vain pleasures a long farewell;
Far dearer the chimes of the vesper bell
To the heart of the Bridegroom's chosen one;
So shall the will of the Lord be done.'*
The years flew on as they always fly.
The same green earth, and the same blue sky;
The same old seasons came 'round again
With light and shadow, with sun and rain;
The same soft feet of the summer showers
Went forth on their mission to heal the flowers,
(Like the gentle sisters who bring bright cheer
To the beds of the sick from year to year).
The same Creator above us bent,
Sprinkled our sorrows with sweet content.
And willed that his blessM peace should brood
O'er the house of the Holy Sisterhood.
The same sweet bell at the evening time
Rang out the beautiful vesper chime;
And the will of the Lord was duly done, —
But Nelly— she never became a nun.
MART AND MOUNTAIN.
" Getting and spending we lay waste o\x.x\\\^.^*—WordswortK
We lavish our lives in getting and spending
In reaching to rise or fearing to fall,
In years of losing and years of lending
And for the rest — care nothing at all.
A little remorse but we soon outgrow it
And the end comes on us before we know it
An end to all our plotting and scheming
And fighting hard against fate's decree;
'Twere better our lives were spent in dreaming
'Neath the marvellous moon by the murmuring
sea;
'Twere better thus as the seasons roll
Than to feed the flesh and famish the soul.
r
How Godlike the sun in its rising glory,
The earth how fair— but these sights grow old;
Such themes are threadbare in song and story.
Let us bow down and worship the God-head—
gold.
What a God! what a creed! sublimer far
The heathen that worshippeth moon and star.
But a long farewell to familiar faces,
And now to experience a change of heart;
To herd henceforth with barbaric races
A thousand miles from the cities mart.
A lonely camp where the mustangs troop
To the banks of the rolling Guadaloupe.
Here — ^here are the gifts of God's free giving
Inscribed upon Nature's liberal face;
Yea! here is a life that is worth the living;
How the heart expands in the heat of the chase»
While goring the ribs of the indolent plain
With a flery hoof and a reckless rein.
Now truly a happier man am I,
Though the hair be grayon my upper lip,
And never a dollar as yet laid by,
Climbing the hills on some aimless trip;
Aye! happier breathing this mountain air
Than Wall Street's wealthiest millionaire.
"WE TWO ARE ONE."
RESPONSE TO A BEAUTIFUL POEM.
Oh! let it never more be said.
Our lives are far apart;
Despite the law, we two are wed
Who claim a kindred heart
By whom can we be dispossessed
On earth — ^in heaven above;
Can aught divide us — ^we who rest
Upon each other's love ?
Thou gav'st thine all without r^;ard
To self, — ^nor gave amiss;
The love that seeketh no reward —
There is no love like this.
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BENJAMIN F. SEE.
85
Thou art beloved, and from this hour,
Let peace perch on thy brow.
Misfortune hath no subtle powe):
To separate us now.
Tho* far apart, we two are one, —
Our hearts are ever near;
The sorrows thou hast wooed and won,
But make thee doubly dear.
If scorned by men, and lost to those.
The loved of early days,
And left to pine unto the close,
Or walk in darksome ways,
rd share thy path. The chast'ning rod
Would doubly prove me true;
If thou wer't lost to man and God.
Then wotild I perish too.
If thou wer't in the gloomy grave,
There also would I be —
Low bending o*er thy form to crave,
Love-room to lie with thee.
Living or dead, — ^beneath, above.
By every right divine,
That's based upon the laws of love —
I hold that thou art mine.
I care not whose the prior claim.
Or in whose trust thou art;
No legal tie, nor change of name,
Can counterfeit a heart.
FRIEND.
To me all men are much the same.
Their aims and purposes alike;
The good repute, the evil fame,
The brawny arm, that's wont to strike;
The feebler hand that wields the pen,
The homespun and the broadcloth men;
All these are merely passers by;
But let one step from out the throng.
The souPs flashed lightening in his eye.
In very scorn for human wrong,
And lo! I am beside my friend,
Come life, come death until the end.
— The Wanderers in the West.
LOVE.
Alas that love, so sweet a thing.
Should ever work such woe.
—Ibid,
BENJAMIN F. SEE.
BENJAMIN F. SEE was bom near Lebanon,
Ohio, on the farm where his father, who was
from one of the old families of Virginia, had found
a home among the first settlers of that locality, as
early as 1808.
He had the early education which falls to boys in
the country, a large knowledge of farm life and
work, and a small knowledge of books; yet with
the instinct of a student, he aspired to better things
than the country school furnished, and at the age
of twenty he found his way to the Ohio Wesleyan
University. His work there was honorable to him-
self and satisfactory to his friends, and in 1856 he
was graduated in the classical course.
Mr. See had aspired to a learned profession, but
his overtaxed eyesight changed the course of his
life, and instead of the law he entered into business
vocations; first that of real estate, and then that of
farming. From the old homestead in Warren
county he moved in 1876 to Wood county, Ohio,
where he has since resided, on a beautiful farm.
In i860 he married Miss Melissa C. Priest, a lady
of culture and a pupil in the Ladies* College, in
Delaware, while Mr. See was pursuing his studies
in the university, in the same town. His marriage
has been eminently a happy one. A son and
daughter were bom from this union.
During the Civil War Mr. See*s patriotism was
shown in all loyal directions. He volunteered in
the Sixty-ninth O. V. I., but was discharged at
Camp Dennison on account of defective eyesight,
and he was also one of the ** Squirrel Hunters "
who mustered in 1862 to save Cincinnati from the
expected attack of the enemy.
Of this exciting time Mr. See has written a
lengthy poem, which, however, has not been
published. W. G. W.
WASHINGTON.
PATER PATRIiE.
Freemen extol your Washington,
Whose name adored still stands alone.
Entwined with Liberty!
Who with a tme and well-tried band
Set free his own loved native land.
From threats of Tyranny.
Tho* ages long may pass away
And nations fall, "Empires decay,**
While thrones turn into dust,
His name a watchword still will be.
Defender of our Liberty,
And cherished by the just.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
What tho' ye search thro' hidden love
Of by-gone years, the names of yore
Renowned, to view unfold!
And then compare with Washington!
' His name will blend these names in one '
Of sages, heroes old!
He fought not for an honored name
Tho' on his brow were marks of Fame
As if from Nature's hand —
Ah no! he e'en refused a throne
Declaring that he fought alone
To free his native land.
Well may ye Freemen shout in songs
His name, one who avenged your wrongs
And gained the glorious day!
Then spread your starry banner high
The emblem of our Liberty
Now furled to every sky.
Then cherish well Mt Vernon's tomb
The Freeman's shrine, where e're shall bloom
Fresh flowers of memory!
Where rests a Hero, Statesman, Sage,
Whose name will live thro' every age
Of Freedom's history!
A conqueror "unstained with blood"
His deeds were bold, and great as good,
He truth and wisdom loved;
In peace he lived a spotless life,
In war a Victor, and in strife,
Undaunted, and unmoved.
Posterity will speak his praise
While Poets sing in Epic lays
His deeds worthy of Fame;
His star of glory ne'er will set.
For Freemen never can forget
Their benefactor's name!
And long while yon proud banner waves
Her stars and stripes o'er hallowed graves
Where rest our Fathers now,
And ages still on ages roll
His name on Fame's long written scroll
Will brighter, brigliter glow!
THE MARCH TO THE GRAVE.
Onward, still on! the grave is yawning,
Aye, to receive earth's mighty dead;
The day is come, the nig^ht is dawning,
When Death with millions must be fed.
Each passing moment some frail mortal
To the Destroyer yields his breath,
And enters the wide-open portal
To endless life, or endless death.
Onward, still on! the foe is coming,
Concealed by midnight's gloomy hour,
Or else abroad at noonday roaming.
Invisible, yet felt his pow'r;
No one can tell when it's approaching
With steps as silent as the grave;
Invading hut, palace, encroaching,
And laying low both king and slave.
Onward, still on! the way make ready,
The fell Destroyer '11 soon be here;
While stalwart men with steps yet steady,
Staring aghast, turn pale with fear;
For when the cheek begins its paling,
The death-dews settle on the brow,
And poisoned vapors still inhaling,
The weary frame soon is laid low.
Onward, still on! the deep, deep ocean
Must have its victims to enwave.
While through the earth a wild commotion
Is made by marchers to the grave.
The beaten path they still are treading,
Which all the dead have trod before.
While pale disease her ruin spreading.
Makes desolate each fertile shore.
Onward, still on! our days are fleeting,
Ah! fleeting as the passing cloud;
The sum of life is e'er repeating,
** Man's days are few," in accents loud.
And yet mankind are busy seeking,
A shorter journey to the tomb,
Though fate in thunder tones are speaking,
** They come, the rushing millions come! **
Onward, still on! the dead and dying
Are scattered now from shore to shore,
While in the East red war is crying,
Cr>'ing for human victims more.
In every clime disease is raging.
And linked with war goes hand in hand.
While famime some dire wrath presaging,
Threatens to devastate the land.
Onw*ird, still on! yet never ceasing.
The eager multitudes still come,
While every day is still increasing
The travelers to the open tomb!
List then, and hear the mighty tramping.
Proclaiming that we all must die;
For on the grave there's no encamping.
Each one must pass its threshold by.
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JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.
89
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.
THE year of 1892 has come and gone, and it
will be commemorated in history as having
taken from the world of letters four great poets;
Whitman, Lowell, Whittier and Tennyson, each
supreme in his own realm of versification. Of this
notable quartette, Lowell and Tennyson more
nearly resembled each other, while nothing could
exceed the dissimilarity existing between Whittier
and Whitman. Indeed, some have even gone so
far as to say Whitman was not a poet. Poetical
prose, is the tide they bestow on his writings.
Whittier's position, and his right to the bay have,
however, never been questioned. His place in the
hearts of the American people is unique, and can
only find a parallel with that of Helen Hunt. Lowell,
Longfellow, Holmes, and others of our poets are
admired for the products of their genius, and a
great amount of respect is felt towards the possessor
of so manifestly great capabilities; but with Whittier,
love mingles and even predominates in the tribute
paid to him, and as the years roll on apace, it will
come to be said how we admired those illustrious
ones of the past, but how we loved the " Good
Gray Poet."
John Greenleaf Whittier was bom in Haverhill,
Mass., December 17th, 1807. His parents were
members of the Society of Friends, and to their
beliefs and principles he adhered throughout his
life. His American ancestry dates from the year
1638. Whittier was bom on a farm, and his boy-
liood occupations were such as farmer's boys usu-
ally engage in. He leamed shoemaking from one of
the farm hands and by that means secured enough
money to enable himself to attend Haverhill academy
six mdnths during 1829. This served as a polishing
to his previous education and he then began teach-
ing in the district school of West Amesbury, which
supplied him with the means for another six months
in the academy. In his nineteenth year he began
contributing poems, anonymously, to the Free
PresSy then edited by W. L. Garrison. By this
means an acquaintance with Mr. Garrison was
<established, and thus was gained another pen to
•espouse the cause of the abolitionists. His father
■died and for five years Mr. Whittier conducted the
farm. In 1835 he was sent to the general court
from Haverhill. From the year 1829 he edited at
-different periods, the American Manufacturer^
Boston, the Haverhill Gazette, the New England
Weekly Review^ Hartford, Conn., the Pennsylvania
Preeman, Philadelphia, and the Middlesex Stand-
4irdj Lowell, Mass. He was fearless in doing what
lie believed to be right, and he was a strong factor
in preparing that which later culminated in the
Republican Party. Mr. Whittier was a voluminous
writer and he has left a colossal monument which
time will never efface. H. M.
BAYARD TAYLOR.
He brought us wonders of the new and old.
We shared all climes with him. The Arab's tent
To him its stor>'-telling secret lent.
And, pleased, we listened to the tales he told.
His task, beguiled with songs that shall endure,
In manly, honest thoroughness he wrought;
From humble home-lays to the heights of thought
Slowly he climbed, but every step was sure.
How, with the generous pride that friendship hath,
We, who so loved him, saw at last the crown
Of civic honor on his brows pressed down;
Rejoiced, and knew not that the gift was death.
And now for him, whose praise in deafened ears
Two nations speak, we answer but with tears.
— Bayard Taylor
0. W. HOLMES.
His still the keen analysis
Of men and moods, electric wit,
Free play of mirth and tenderness
To heal the slightest wound from it.
And his the pathos touching all
Lifes, sorrows and regrets,
It's hopes and fears, it's final call
And rest beneath the violets.
His sparkling surface scarce betrays
The thoughtful tide beneath it rolled,
The wishes of the latter days
And tender memories of the old.
— Our Autocrat.
MARTYRS.
Earth may not claim thee. Nothing here
Could be for thee a meet reward;
Thine is a treasure far more dear, —
Eye hath not seen it, nor the ear
Of living mortal heard
The joys prepared, the promised bliss above,
The holy presence of Etemal Love!
— The Female Martyr.
PATIENCE.
There's quiet in that Angel's glance.
There's rest in his still countenance!
He mocks no grief with idle cheer.
Nor wounds with words the moumer's ear
But ills and woes he may not cure
He kindly trains us to endure.
— The Angel of Patience.
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90
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
WINTER.
He comes! he comes! the Frost Spirit comes!
you may trace his footsteps now
On the naked woods and the blasted fields and the
brown hill's withered brow.
He has smitten the leaves of the gray old trees
where their pleasant green came forth.
And the winds, which follow wherever he goes, have
shaken them down to earth.
He comes! he comes! the Frost Spirit comes,
and the quiet lake shall feel
The torpid touch of his glazing breath, and ring to
the skater's heel;
And the streams which danced on the broken rocks,
or sang to the leaning grass.
Shall bow again to their winter chain, and in
mournful silence pass.
— The Frost Spirit,
SCRIPTURES.
"O lady fair, I have yet a gem which a purer lustre
flings.
Than the diamond flash of the jeweled crown on
the lofty brow of kings, —
A wonderful pearl of exceeding price, whose virtue
shall not decay.
Whose light shall be as a spell to thee and a bless-
ing on thy way! "
— The Vaudois Teacher,
DOUBT.
*'Ah, the cloud is dark, and day by day
I am moving thither;
I must pass beneath it on my way;
God pity me!— Whither ? "
—My Soul and L
PRESENT.
The Present, the Present is all thou hast
For thy sure possessing;
Like the patriarch's angel hold it fast
Till it gives its blessing.
'Ilnd,
UNITY.
Like warp and woof all destinies
Are woven fast.
Linked in sympathy like the keys
Of an organ vast.
Pluck one thread, and the web ye mar;
Break but one
Of a thousand keys, and the paining jar
Through all will run.
—Ibid.
NATURE.
Is not Nature's worship thus.
Ceaseless ever, going on ?
Hath it not a voice for us
In the thunder, or the tone
Of the leaf-harp faint and small,
Speaking to the unsealed ear
Words of blended love and fear,
Of the mighty Soul of all ?
— Mogg Megone,
HATRED.
Oh! woman wronged can cherish hate
More deep and dark than manhood may.
—Ibid.
COWARDICE.
Oh! when the soul, once pure and high,
Is stricken down from Virtue's sky,
As with the downcast star of mom.
Some gems of light are with it drawn,
And through its night of darkness, play
Some tokens of its primal day.
Some lofty feelings linger still;
The strength to dare, the nerve to meet
Whatever threatens with defeat
Its all indomitable will;
But lacks the mean of mind and heart.
Though eager for the gains of crime.
Oft, at his chosen place and time.
The strength to bear his evil part.
And, shielded by his very vice,
Escapes from crime by cowardice.
-Ibid.
SPRING.
'Tis springtime on the eastern hills!
Like torrents gush the summer rills;
Through winter's moss and dry dead leaves
The bladed grass revives and lives.
Pushes the mouldering waste away.
And glimpses to the April day.
In kindly shower and sunshine bud
The branches of the dull gray wood;
Out from its sunned and sheltered nooks
The blue eye of the violet looks;
The southwest wind is warmly blowing,
And odors from the springing grass,
The pine-tree and the sassafras,
Are with it on its errands going.
—Ibid
EUTHANASIA.
**Oh, in her meek, forgiving eye
There was a brightness not of mirths
A light whose clear intensity
Was borrowed not of earth.
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JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.
91
Along her cheek a deepening red,
Told where the feverish hectic fed;
And yet, each fatal token gave
To the mild beauty of her face
A newer and a dearer grace,
Unwaming of the grave.
'Twas like the hue which Autumn gives
To yonder changed and dying leaves,
Breathed over by her frosty breath;
Scarce can the gazer feel that this
Is but the spoiler's treacherous kiss,
The mocking-smile of death!
LOVE.
Fond longings dimly understood,
The glow of passion's quickening blood.
And cherished fantasies which press
The young lip with a dream's caress, —
The heart's forecast and prophecy
Took form and life before my eye,
Seen in the glance which met my own.
Heard in the soft and pleading tone.
Felt in the arms around me cast,
And warm heart-pulses beating fast.
Ah! scarcely yet to God above
With deeper trust, with stronger love,
Has prayerful saint his meek heart lent,
Or cloistered nun at twilight bent,
Than I, before a human shrine.
As mortal and as frail as mine,
With heart, and soul, and mind, and form.
Knelt madly to a fellow worm.
^Ibid.
WAR.
Brutal alike in deed and word,
With callous heart and hand of strife.
How like a fiend may man be made,
Plying the foul and monstrous trade
Whose harvest-field is human life.
Whose sickle is the reeking sword!
--Ibid.
WORDSWORTH.
The sweet songs,
Simple and beautiful as Truth and Nature,
Of whose whitened locks on Rydal Mount
Are lifted yet by morning breezes blowing
From the green hills, immortal in his lays.
— The Bridal of Pennacook,
INDIANS.
The Indian's heart is hard and cold.
It closes darkly o'er its care.
And formed in Nature's sternest mould
Is slow to feel, and strong to bear.
—Ibid,
INSTINCT.
Ask why the graceful grape entwines
The rough oak with her arm of vines;
And why the gray rock's rugged cheek
The soft lips of the mosses seek;
Why, with wise instinct. Nature seems
To harmonize her wide extremes,
Linking the stronger with the weak,
The haughty with the soft and meek!
—Ibid.
HOMB.
The hills are dearest which our childish feet
Have climbed the earliest; and the streams most
sweet
Are ever those at which our young lips drank.
Stooped to their waters o'er the grassy bank.
Midst the cold, dreary, sea-watch, home's hearth-
light
Shines round the helmsman plunging through the
night;
And still, with inward eye, the traveler sees
In close, dark, stranger streets, his native trees.
—Ibid,
MAMMON.
Tell us not of banks and tariffs; cease your paltry
pedler cries;
Shall the good State sink her honor that your
gambling stocks may rise ?
Would ye barter man for cotton ? That your gains
may sum up higher.
Must we kiss the feet of Moloch, pass our children
through the fire ?
Is the dollar only real ? God and truth and right a
dream ?
Weighed against your lying ledgers must our man-
hood kick the beam ?
— The Fine-tree.
GARRISON.
Champion of those who groan beneath
Oppression's iron hand;
In view of penury, hate and death,
I see thee fearless stand.
Still bearing up the lofty brow.
In the steadfast strength of truth,
In manhood sealing well the vow
And promise of thy youth.
— To W.L. G.
RETROSPECTION.
Oh, vain the vow, and vain the strife!
How vain do all things seem!
My soul is in the past, and life
To-day is but a dream !
— The Knight of St. John.
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92
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
FAITH.
Watching on the hills of Faith;
Listening what the spirit saith,
Of the dim-seen light afar,
Growing like a nearing star.
God*s interpreter art thou,
To the waiting ones below;
'Twixt them and its light midway
Heralding the l)etter day, —
Catching gleams of temple spires,
Hearing notes of angel choirs.
Where, as yet unseen of them,
Comes the New Jerusalem!
— The Curse of the Charter-breakers.
SPIRITUALITY.
Oh, the outward hath gone! but in glory and power.
The SPIRIT surviveth the things of the hour;
Unchanged, undecaying its Pentecost flame
On the heart's secret altar is burning the same!
^Palestine,
SHIPLEY.
Gendest of spirits! not for thee
Our tears are shed, our sighs are given;
Why mourn to know thou art a free
Partaker of the joys of Heaven ?
Finished thy work, and kept thy faith
In Christian firmness unto death;
And beautiful as sky and earth.
When autumn's sun is downward going.
The bless^ memory of thy worth
Around thy place of slumber glowing!
— To the Memory of Thomas Shipley,
SHADOWS.
What matters it! a few years more,
Life's surge so restless heretofore
Shall break upon the unknown shore!
In that far land shall disappear
The shadows which we follow here, —
The mist- wreaths of our atmosphere!
— Lines,
GRATITUDE.
If through the wreck of wasted powers.
Of garlands wreathed from Folly's bowers,
Of idle aims and misspent hours,
The eye can note one sacred spot
By Pride and Self profanM not,
A green place in the waste of thought.
Where deed or word hath rendered less
" The sum of human wretchedness,"
And Gratitude looks forth to bless.
The simple burst of tenderest feeling
From sad hearts worn by evil-dealing.
For blessing on the hand of healing, —
Better than Glory's pomp will be
That green and blessM spot to me,
A palm-shade in Eternity!
^Ibid,
FORGIVENESS.
Thank God! that I have lived to see the time
When the great truth begins at last to find
An utterance from the deep heart of mankind,
Earnest and clear, that ALL REVENGE IS
CRIME!
That man is holier than a creed; — ^that all
Restraint upon him must consult his good,
Hope's sunshine linger on his prison wall.
And Love look in upon his solitude.
The beautiful lesson which our Savior taught
Through long, dark centuries its way hath wrought
Into the common mind and popular thought;
And words, to which by Galilee's lake shore
The humble fishers listened, with hushed oar.
Have found an echo in the general heart,
And of the public faith become a living part
— Lines,
RANDOLPH.
All parties feared him: each in turn
Beheld its schemes disjointed.
As right or left his fatal glance
And spectral finger pointed.
Sworn foe of Cant, he smote it down
With trenchant wit unsparing.
And, mocking, rent with ruthless hand
The robe Pretence was wearing.
-^Randolph of Roanoke,
BESTIALITY.
God be praised for every instinct which rebels
against a lot
Where the brute survives the human, and man's
upright form is not!
As the serpent-like bejuco winds his spiral fold on
fold
Round the tall and stately ceiba, till it withers in
his hold, —
Slow decays the forest monarch, doser girds the
fell embrace,
Till the tree is seen no longer, and the vine is in its
place,—
So a base and bestial nature round the vassal's
manhood twines,
And the spirit wastes beneath it, like the ceiba
choked with vines.
— The Slaves of Martinique,
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COLUMBIAN POEMS.
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HOMB.
Love of Home, and Love of Woman! — dear to all,
but doubly dear
To the heart whose pulses elsewhere measure only
hate and fear.
All around the desert circles, underneath a brazen
sky,
Only one green spot remaining where the dew is
never dry!
From the horror of that desert, from its atmosphere
of hell,
Turns the fainting spirit thither, as the driver seeks
his bell. — /Wflf.
HOPE.
The Night is mother of the Day
The Winter of the Spring,
And ever upon old Decay
The greenest mosses cling.
Behind the cloud the starlight lurks,
Through showers the sunbeams fall,
For God, who loveth all his works.
Has left His Hope with all!
— A Dream of Summer.
INTROSPBCTION.
Deeper than the gilded surface
Hath thy wakeful vision seen.
Farther than the narrow present
Have thy joumeyings been.
Thou hast midst life's empty noises
Heard the solemn steps of Time,
And the low mysterious voices
Of another dime.
BEAUTY.
To-.
Art's perfect forms no moral need,
And beauty is its own excuse.
— Dedication.
SHOEMAKERS.
Ho! workers of the old time, styled
The Gentle Craft of Leather.
Young brothers of the andent guild,
Stand forth once more together!
Call out agaitf your long array,
In the olden merry manner!
Once more, on gay St. Crispin's day,
Fling out your blazoned banner!
— The Shoemaker.
STRIVING.
There's life alone in duty done,
And rest alone in striving.
— The Drovers.
COLUMBIAN POEMS.
HAIL, COLUMBIA!
Hail, Columbia! happy land!
Hail, ye heroes! heaven-bom band!
Who fought and bled in Freedom's cause;
Who fought and bled in Freedom's cause.
And when the storm of war was gone.
Enjoyed the peace your valor won.
Let independence be our boast,
Ever mindful what it cost;
Ever grateful for the prize.
Let its altar reach the skies.
Firm, united let us be.
Rallying round our Liberty;
As a band of brothers joined.
Peace and safety we shall find.
Immortal patriots! rise once more,
Defend your rights, defend your shore;
Let no rude foe with impious hand,
Let no rude foe with impious hand.
Invade the shrine where sacred lies,
Of toil and blood, the well-earned prize.
While offering peace sincere and just.
In heaven we place a manly trust.
That truth and justice will prevail, '
And every scheme of bondage fail.
Firm, united let us be, etc
Sound, sound the trump of Fame!
Let Washington's great name
Ring through the world with loud applause.
Ring through the world with loud applause;
Let every clime to Freedom dear
Listen with a joyful ear!
With equal skill and godlike power,
He governed in the fearful hour
Of horrid war; or guides with ease
The happier times of honest peace.
Firm, united let us be, etc.
Behold the chief who now commands.
Once more to serve his country stands —
The rock on which the storm will beat,
The rock on which the storm will beat;
But, armed in virtue firm and true.
His hopes are fixed on heaven and you.
When hope was sinking in dismay.
And glooms obscured Columbia's day.
His steady mind, from changes free,
Resolved on death, or liberty.
Firm, united let us be, etc.
TOSBPH HOPKINSON.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
COLUMBUS.
" God made me the messenger of the new heavens and new
earth, and told me where to find them. Reason, charts, and
mathematical knowledge had nothing to do with the case."—
Cohtmbut,
Hbrb, 'mid these paradises of the seas,
The roof beneath of this cathedral old,
That lifts its suppliant arms above the trees,
Each clasping in its hand a cross of gold,
Columbus sleeps — ^his crumbling tomb behold!
By faith his soul rose eagle-winged and free,
And reached that Power whose wisdom never
fails;
Walked mid the kindred stars, and reverently
The light earth weighed in God's own golden
scales.
A man of passions like to men's was he.
He overcame them, and with home and trust
Made strong his soul for highest destiny,
And, following Christ, he walked upon the sea.
The waves upheld him — what is here is dust.
Hbzbkiah Butterworth.
COLUMBIA TO THE FRONT,
(Written July 4, 189a, for Columbian Selections.)
** Forward!" cried the brave Pulaski,
As he charged to meet the brunt;
Forward! Columbia's watchword,
Her position at the front
Let the goal of her achievements
Be the world's ideal aim.
And the triumphs of her genius
Be the ultimate of fame.
Be her rising as the morning,
Her progression as the sun;
Let her undisputed merit
Be the grandest trophy won.
Till the nations catch the spirit
Of the country of the free,
And the reign of peace extending
Bless the world with liberty.
Let the light of her advancement
Shine undimmed on all the world,
And her star-bespangled banner
Be on every breeze unfurled,
Till, by touch of her awakening,
By her bold, inventive lead,
Every land has caught the impulse.
Every people felt her need.
Let Columbia's sacred honor
Be the synonyme of right,
Till the law of equal justice
Shall supplant the law of might;
Let the need of imitation,
Won by her from small and great.
Be the nations' willing tribute,
Making hers the model State.
Glorious be her growing prestige,
Under no oppressor's ban.
And the aim of all her efforts
Be the highest good of man;
Fall the chains from every bondman.
Fall the powers that would oppress.
Till men's voices universal
Shall her name devoutly bless.
On is still Columbia marching.
Waving high her gleaming lance;
Hear her vanguard's bugle sounding.
Bidding all the world advance;
Hear her thrilling watchword shouted
Clearly all along the line,
Calling men to take their birthright
Which b theirs by right divine.
Banner land of human progress,
Hopes of man are in thy trust;
Float aloft thy fateful standards,
Let them never trail the dust;
Be Columbia's fair escutcheon
Never stained by sanctioned crime.
Be her name in highest honor
Held by all of every clime.
Ever onward be advancing.
Hold the right and spurn the wrong;
Take the front, and, ne'er retreating.
Make thine arm for justice strong;
Strong for Freedom's holy conquests,
Strong to lift the trodden-down;
So undimmed shall be thy glory,
And eternal thy renown.
Rev. Oliver Crane, D.
COLUMBIA.
Columbia! Men beheld thee rise
A goddess from the misty sea.
Lady of Joy, sent from the skies,
The nations worshipped thee.
Thy brows were flushed with dawn's first light;
By foamy waves with stars bedight
Thy blue robe floated free.
Now let the sun ride high o'erhead,
Driving the day from shore to shore.
His burning tread we do not dread,
For thou art evermore
Lady of Love whose smile shall bless.
Whom brave deeds win to tenderness,
Whose tears the lost restore.
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COLUMBIAN POEMS.
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Lady of Hope thou art We wait
With courage thy serene command.
Through unknown seas, toward undreamed fate,
We ask thy guiding hand.
On! though sails quiver in the gale! —
Thou at the helm, we cannot fail.
On to God's time-veiled strand!
Lady of Beauty! thou shalt win
Glory and power and length of days.
The sun and moon shall be thy kin,
The stars shall sing thy praise.
All hail! we bring thee vows most sweet
To strew before thy wingM feet.
Now onward t)e thy ways!
Harriet Monroe.
THE BIRD THAT SANG TO COLUMBUS.
*' Padre.
As on we go
Into the unknown sea,
The morning splendors rise and glow.
In new horizons still. — Padre, you know,
They said in old Seville 'twould not be so;
They said black deeps and flaming air
Were ocean's narrow bound;
Light everywhere
We've found,
Padre.
"Behold!
The fronded palms
That fan the earth, and hold
Aloft their mellowed fruit in dusky arms
Above these paradises of the sea.
Hark! hear the birds. — A land bird sang to me
Upon the mast on that mysterious mom
Before the new world rose:
Sang, and was gone,
Who knows.
Padre?
"But he,
That joyful bird.
Was sent by Heaven to me
To sing the sweetest song man ever heard !
He came amid the mutiny and strife,
And sang his song in these new airs of life;
Sang of the Edens of those glorious seas,
Then westward made his flight.
On the land breeze,
From sight.
Padre."
Hezekiah Butter worth.
COLUMBUS AT THE SPANISH COURT.
The wars are ended, and soft-brooding peace
Distends her pinions o'er the ravaged land,
Hard won by Isabel and Ferdinand
From Moorish clutches. At this glad release
Of siege and sally, it is no caprice,
But in thanksgiving, that the royal hand
Hastens a general f^te-day to command,
And bids the mourning in the realm to cease.
While the mad mirth goes forward, and all Spain
Unites the ready cup of joy to quaff,
Columbus, mute and hopeless, worn with pain,
Leans in dejection on his faithful staff,
Bearing potential empires in his brain, —
And fools around him only look and laugh!
Huntington Smith,
-The Independent,
COLUMBUS.
1492-1892.
A lewd, low fellow of the baser sort,
A knave and pirate, seeking slaves and gold.
Tyrant at sea, a roisterer in port, —
So in these later days his tale is told.
We must believe that this far-seeing man,
Persistent, patient, reasonable, bold.
Grasping beyond his fellows' little span.
Cared only for the pelf his palm could hold!
Perhaps 'twas so, and often in those years
Of hope deferred he halted on his way;
Sought some rewards for all his toils and fears;
With boon companions spent a summer day.
But even thus his dream abode with him.
His serious eyes amid the trivial play
Horizons saw beyond his goblet's rim;
Across the table ever loomed Cathay.
And following Faith he won his will at last,
Tho' half the truth was yet in dimness furled,
The issue vaster tho' his scheme was vast;
He only sought a way, but found a world.
This makes the hero, tho' his faults may glare;
To think beyond the age, with prophet's sight
To see the whole round world and boldly dare
To lead men on from darkness into light.
George E. Merrill.
-The Independent.
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98
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
TRIBUTES TO TENNYSON.
For far and wide through all the land
Your words of music flow,
Like silver streams that make more sweet
The places where they go.
Emblinb Sherman Smith.
TENNYSON.
Great Ruler in the realm of Thought,
Dispenser of delight,
TO THE POET-LAUREATE.
Throned in our hearts and duly crowned
King by divinest right.
" Cursed be the social lies that warp us from the Uving:
truthl"— Z^A*A:r HaU,
In loyal servitude we bow
Beneath your sovereign sway,
** Let us hush this cry of forward till ten thousand
That is as sweet and potent now
years are gone!"
As in a long-past day.
Let us stop the stars that, rising, light the night and
bring the dawn!
'the wondrous sceptre that you wield
Is like a magic wand;
What! is this our poet's counsel, he that urged us
It bids all shapes of beauty rise
on the way ?
Obedient to command.
Must we stop because the wolves are howling at an
These fair creations live and speak;
ass's bray ?
They move our smiles and tears;
Dear friends were they in youth's glad day,
Shall we turn because the millions, menacing with
Dearer in darker years.
fire and sword,
Cuise the cleaner hand we give them, bidding^
How pass before us all the knights
backward? No, my Lord!
Who graced King Arthur's reignl
How well we know the tender woe
You, yourself, have called the present "fatal
Of Lily maid, Elaine!
daughter of the past;"
How like sweet bells your tuneful words
How with all that men were learning, how could
Ring for the good and true!
that old England last?
How grand the theme of love's young dream.
Dear singer, sung by you!
''Science moves, but slowly," said you; sdence
moves and turns not back;
O poet "dowered with scorn of scorn
Though we love or though we hate it, what she
And with the love of love,"
wills must clear the track.
Yours is a heritage of wealth
All other wealth above.
Those were pleasant days you tell of, we have
For what so precious as the scorn
lived them o'er with you.
That scorns the base and low ?
Dreamt about the past and future; now the time
And what so rich as love that loves
has come to do.
The right, through weal and woe ?
Those were days for gentie poets' sweet conceits
Melodious minstrel, heaven-endowed
and lady rhymes.
With rarest gifts of mind!
Now we need the man that, singing, fights the
The golden largess you bestow
battle of the times.
So freely on mankind
Enriches many a starving heart,
iEschylus beat back the Persian from the plain of
Cheers many a home of care,
Marathon,
And makes each cross of pain and loss
Brave Saavedra fought the Moslem at I.epanto
Less sad and hard to bear.
with Don John.
Now, though the evening shadows fall
Sidney fell to save an army; fell, but left the word
Upon your flower-strewn way.
divine
Still bright and fair the prospects are
Spoken to the wounded soldier—" Drink, thy need
That gild the closing day
is more than mine."
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TRIBUTES TO TENNYSON.
lOI
Perfect Sidney! Hang the motto where the gilded
dolts may see
How this gendeman demeaned him; he was "Eng-
lish'' as could be.
Hang it where the curse is working, cursed greed
of gain and gold;
Markets, Senates, Courts of Justice where men's
souls are bought and sold.
Hang it where the public press, in sweating for the
golden prize,
Reeks with every stench on earth, and makes a lie
ten thousand lies.
Hang it large above the pulpit where the priest on
bended knee
Smiles upon his chosen flock and counts the mil-
lions he can see.
Well we know the time's corruption, deeply feel
the burning shame,
Well we know the cure is forward; let the cry be
still the same.
When the man puts off his childhood, feels him
free, and falls from grace.
Can we fright him back to virtue with a shroud and
painted face ?
Let us for a man's disorder find and use a man's
restraint;
Though we fail in reformation, still we save our
sheets and paint.
A'^ines upon a leaning tower, tendrils of the heart,
had grown
Till the living plant became as portion of the life-
less stone.
Crushed, the clinging vine lies prostrate; guide is
gone from sea and land;
For the tower was a beacon, but it stood upon the
sand.
Raised again, but rock on rock, about the naked
wall shall spring
Other vines to clothe in beauty, where the nesting
birds may sing.
Men have lost the faith that led them, led with love
or led with fear;
Some are weeping by the wayside, some have
turned to scoff and jeer.
Many who were bribed to virtue lack the sense of
wrong and right,
More but need the common purpose that would
arm the Just with might
Shall we waste divided power while the hosts of
anarch greed.
Join to wreck our fair dominion with the hordes of
anarch need ?
Let us raise on high the standard of a faith that
changing time
Can but strenghten, broaden, deepen, as it spreads
from clime to clime.
Faith in all the facts of Nature, facts the same for
one and all.
Facts before which all men's reason needs must
bow in helpless thrall.
Though the rebel brute within us writhe in anguish
at the sight.
Fact is Lord of Earth and Heaven, fact is truth, and
truth is right.
Science, sifting less from greater, out of all shall
form a creed
Ever growing with our knowledge, ever helping in
our need.
But we'll change this name of science since the
word has given offense;
Let us call it what it should be— simply ordered
common sense.
Patience! While the mind will ever marvel most
when truth is new.
Only time's unrivaled teaching brings the heart to
love the true.
Hopes that hung upon a dream are vanishing, and
now we weep.
Look! the glorious Sun is shining; shall we turn
again to sleep ?
Can we turn with all the splendor of the morning
in the iskies ?
Let us leave our dreams with darkness; let us
wake and let us rise.
With the hope that comes of courage, casting
vainer hopes away,
With the strength of resolution, let us out and face
the day.
One in will, with force united, let us help our
Mother-Earth
Feed and clothe her friendless children; surely here
is toil of worth.
Food and raiment for the body, all that needs to
keep them whole.
But with these things not contented, let us feed and
clothe the soul;
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Fill the mind with ail the vastness hidden by the
noon-day light,
Fill the heart with love for all that wanders with us
in the night;
Till the something in the flower, till the something
in the stone,
Shall become as love within them — ^beating hearts
that hear our own.
Not so changed, illustrious Master, not so changed
in all are we;
Still the grateful heart remembers; witness this our
love for thee.
Courage, aye, and faith, O Poet! Still when first
the warm wind blows
Little birds shall nest in England, hedges bloom
and bear the rose;
England still has men and maidens fit for love and
firm in need;
England still may find salvation though she lose
both crown and creed.
Louis Bblrose, Jr.
TENNYSON.
Born 5U1 August, 1809: Died 6ih October, 1892.
O Tennyson! Of poets loved the best;
Greatest in Queen Victoria's happy reign;
Now thou hast passed thy ** bourne of Time and
Place"
And smiling sees thy ** Pilot face to face *'
With head uncovered and on bended Knee
A rosebud, tear-stained, bring I for thy breast —
(The full-moon, sailing slowly towards the West
This Autumn mom — after the wind and rain)
Or rugged verse, in all its poverty
Feebly to tell how dear thy poetry
To me since ever boyhood's dreamy time:
Master of Song! thy fame in every clime
Shall live — ^for Prophets* voice and vision thine
" Thro* all the ages ** till suns no more shall shine.
John Fullerton.
—For The Magazine 0/ Poetry,
TENNYSON.
The brightest star in Britain's sky of fame
Has passed beyond the range of mortal sight;
But on the hearts of men a deathless name
Is graved in characters of golden light.
The Bard whose peerles songs of live and love
Have charmed the ills of hearts by care opprest^
Has "crossed the bar "—is havened safe above.
Where life is love and service joyous rest
We render thanks, not tears or mournful lays,
For him who, with a manly, stainless life.
Filled up the circle of his lengthened days,
And nerved his fellows in their fateful strife.
Beauty and truth unseen by other eyes
His touch unveiled and clothed in living fire;
Nature's unuttered music found a voice
In the sweet tones of his melodious lyre.
He loved Old England; of her glory proud,
Her weal and woe were of his life a part;
Oft as his bugle blast rang clear and loud,
It stirred the blood in every patriot heart.
His ashes rest with England's kings of song,
But his freed spirit chants a loftier strain,
And his great thoughts and scorn of selfish wrong —
His truer self— shall evermore remain.
Though the wide ocean spreads its stormy sway
Between us and the land he held so dear.
These maple leaves in grateful love I lay
With English roses on his honored bier.
Rbv. E. H. Dewart, D. D.
TENNYSON.
I am Merlin
And I am dying,
I am Merlin who followed the gleam;
Tennyson's Merlin and gleam.
Merlin has gone, has gone; and through the land,.
The melancholy message wings its way
To careless-ordered garden by the bay
Back o'er the narrow strait to island stand
Where Camelot looks down on wild Broceliand.
Merlin has gone; Merlin the wizard, who found
In the past's glimmering tide and hailed him king-
Arthur, great Uther's son, and so did sing
The mystic glories of the Table Round
That ever its name will live so long as song shall
sound.
Merlin has gone; Merlin who followed the gleam
And made us follow it, the fiying tale
Of the last tournament, the Holy Grail,
And Arthur's passing till the enchantress dream
Dwells with us still awake, no visionary theme.
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TRIBUTES TO TENNYSON.
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To-day is dole in Astolat, and dole
In Celidon; the forest dole and tears
In joyous garb blackhooded lean the spears,
The nuns of Almesbury sound a mournful toll,
And Guinevere kneeling weeps and prays for Mer-
lin's soul.
A wailing cometh from the shores that veil
Avilions island valley; on the mere
Looms through the mist and wet winds weeping
blear
A dusky baiige, which without oar or sail
Fades to the far-off fields where falls nor snow nor
haiL
Of all his wounds he will be healM now;
Wounds of harsh time and vulnerable life.
Fatigue of rest and weariness of strife,
Doubt and the long deep questionings that plough
The forehead of age but bring no harvest to the
brow.
And there he will be comforted; but we
Must watch like Percival the dwindling light
That slowly shrouds him darkling from our sight
From that great deep to the great deep hath he
passed,
And if now he knows, is mute eternally.
From Somersby's ivied tower there sinks and swells
A low slow peal that mournfully is rolled
Over the long gray fields and glinunering world,
To where 'twixt sandy tracts and moorland fills
Remembers Locksley Hall his musical farewells.
And many a sinewy youth on Cam to-day.
Suspends the dripping oar and lets his boat
Like dreaming water-lily drift and float;
While murmuring to himself the undying lay,
That haunts the babbling Wye and Severn's diigeful
bay.
The bole of the broad oak whose knotted knees,
Lie hidden in the fern of Cumnor Chase,
Feels stirred afresh as when Olivia's face
Lay warm against its rind, though now it sees —
Not love, but death approach, and shivers in the
breeze.
In many a vicarage garden dense with age.
The haunt of pairing throstles; many a grange
Moted against the assault and siege of chance,
Fair eyes consult anew the cherished S£^e,
And now and then a tear falls, blistering the page.
April will blossom again. Again will ring
With cuckoo's call and yaffel's flying scream
And in veiled sleep the nightingale will dream.
Warbling as if awake, but what will bring
His sweet note back ? He mute, it scarcely will be
spring.
The season's sorrow for him and the hours
Droop like to bees belated in the rain.
The unmoving shadow of a pensive pain
Lies on the lawn and lingers on the 'flowers.
And sweet and sad seem one, in woodbine woven
bowers.
In English gardens fringed with English foam
Or girt with English woods he loved to dwell,
Singing of English lives in thorp or dell.
Orchard or crofl, so that when now we roam
Through them and find him not, it scarcely feels
like home.
And England's glories stirred him, as the swell
Of bluff winds blowing from Atlantic brine
Stirs mightier music in the murmuring pine.
Then sweet notes waxed too strong within his shell
And bristling rose the lines, and billowy rose and
fell.
So England mourns for Merlin, though its tears
Flow not from bitter source that wells in vain,
But kindred rather to the rippling rain
That brings the daffodil sheaths and jonquil spears
When winter weeps away, and April reappears.
For hath England lacked a voice to sing
Her fairness and her fame, nor will she now.
Silence awhile may brood upon the bough.
But shortly once again the isle will ring
With wakening winds of March and riiapsodies of
spring.
From Arthur unto Alfred, Alfred crowned
Monarch and minstrel both, to Edward's day;
From Edward's to Elizabeth's the lay
Of valor and love hath never ceased to sound;
But song and sword are twin, indissolubly bound.
Nor shall in Britain taliessin tire
Transmitting through his stock the sacred strain.
When fresh renown prolongs Victoria's reign.
Some patriot hand will sweep the living lyre
And prove with native notes that Merlin was his
sire. Alfred Austin.
TENNYSON.
No moaning on the bar; sail forth strong ship,
Into that gloam which has God's face for afar light.
Not a dirge, but a proud farewell from each fond
lip.
And praise, abounding praise, and fame's faint
starlight.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Lamping thy tuneful soul to that large noon
When thou shalt quire with angels.
Words of woe are for the unfulfilled, not thee,
Whose moon of genius sinks full-orbed, glorious,
aglow.
No moaning of the bar, but musical drifting
Of time's waves turning to the eternal sea;
Death's soft wind all thy gallant canvas lifting
And Christ thy Pilot to the peace to be.
Sir Edwin Arnold.
TENNYSON.
FROM OVBR THB SBA.
Into the silence of the silent night
He passed, whom all men honor; and the sun
Arose to shine upon a worid undone,
And barren lives bereft of life's delight
The morning air was chill with sudden blight,
And cruel Winter's triumph had begun.
But He to some far Summer shore had won,
Whose splendor hides him from our dazzled sight.
Not England's pride alone, the Lord of Song!
We — ^heirs to Shakespeare's and to Milton's speech —
Claim heritage from Tennyson's proud years;
To us his spacious, splendid lines belong —
We, too, repeat his praises, each to each,
We share his glory, and we share your tears.
LouisB Chandler Moulton.
— London Illustrated News,
THB LAUREATE DEAD.
OCTOBER 6, 1892.
The laurels fall from off as high a brow
As since our Shakespeare wore the poet-bays,
Who breathed Sicilian music through his lays
And felt great Homer's resonant ebb and flow;
Who knew all art of word that man may know
And led us on by love's undying ways.
Who gave us back the old Arthurian days —
The last of laureates, Tennyson, lies low.
Our golden age is shorter, and the spheres
That sooner wane may swiftlier wax to prime;
But when shall sing another as he sung
Who wrought with Saxon purity of tongue
The one great epic of two hundred years.
The one memorial utterance for all time ?
H. D. Rawnsley.
-The Academy.
TRIBUTES TO WHITTIER.
THE PASSING OP WHITTIER.
A CHILD is crying in the street,
A woman sobbing at the busy loom.
And in a sunny room
Among the Granite Hills,
Whose table long has borne
The Bible and his poet's book, well worn,
A farmer's heart with sorrow fills—
For one he loves b dead!
With sunken head
And sadly reverent feet,
A laborer pauses, as the tolling bell he hears;
And in the Soudi,
The quivering, aged mouth
Of a poor negro woman tells her tears.
Perchance it were relief
To hearts else comfortless in grief
To speak our loved one's praise,
His gentle ways,
As well as proud defiance of the wrong;
For, by his gift of song,
This poet was a lover of the peace
And sweet tranquility of Nature,
And no creature
Longed oftener to find his soul's release
From toil and trial amid clover blooms,
Loved more the forest glooms,
The thrush's morning hymn within the pines,
The red horizon lines
That are the silent heralding of night,
Or the still flight
Of day upon the mountains: —
All were fountains
From which his soul drew ever sweet delight.
And he loved, too, man's life upon the farms,
Its kindly innocence from rude alarms.
Its simple maidens leading
Their rustic dance.
Or the glad chance
That brought him to the reaping;
His heart was ever keeping
Its merry rhythmic time
Unto the jocund chime
Of swingii^ scythes or girlish feet;
He loved to watch the beat
Of autumn flails upon the wheat
Fresh garnered; and to his heart 'twas sweet
To view, at set of sun, those pasture lands
With silent cattle feeding.
He grasped the rugged hands
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*Of fanners as his brothers';
"The toiling, patient mothers,
That lived for their dear boys,
Had saindy grace for him.
Time could not dim
The light of happy days and homely joys;
And so he sang his heart,
And people loved the singer,
The sweet bringer
"Of joys that ne*er grow old and ne*er depart
These were his recreations,
These were the inspirations
He drew from field and farm;
But at the quick alarm,
The cry of hearts a-bleeding,
lie left his catde feeding.
His uplands and the stillness of the mom,
And with a heart new bom
-As to redress man's wrong,
He forged his song anew.
Making it firm and tme.
To shield the weak and helpless from the strong.
O, knighdy hand.
That dared to grasp the dark, soiled hand
Which others spumed!
O, tender heart,
That ever longed to bear the sufferers* part,
Ye now are, mid the sufferer's sorrow, laid at rest
Defender of the oppressed!
Stout hater of the wrong!
White soul, that burned
With all a poet's fire
To raise the Nation higher
Into God's purer light, —
On wings of lofty flight.
Which oft have home thee through the realm of
song,
Thou now has sought thy rest upon Death's
holier height,
From which descending to a sunny land.
Thou yet shall greet the children on the strand
Of a bright golden sea,
Bringing a crown for thee,
Great, simple singer of the People's heart!
Allen Eastman Cross.
— New England Magazine^ November^ i8g2.
TO WHITTIER.
ON READING "AN AUTOGRAPH."
Ip thou, O friend, canst say thy name is traced
On sands by waves o'ermn, or frosted pane,
Then why should any seek far heights to gain ?
What human name but must be swift effaced ?
'Tis trae, not all the favored sons of Fame
Can hope to wear her guerdon through the years;
But thy beloved name is writ with tears
Through all our nation's life, through doubt,
through blame;
Through hope, despair; through blood of sacrifice.
Deep-graven where no sands from any shore,
Nor frosts of time, can touch, forevermore —
Beloved bard, upon our heart it lies!
Jeanie Oliver Smith.
JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.
BORN DECEMBER, 1807. DIED 7TH SEPTEMBER,
1892.
Friend, thou and I had known each other long
Thro* letters, legendary verse and song;
And now to-day above thy tear-stained bier
I mourn as for a father loved and dear.
" The Eternal Gate *' is passed, a Freeman thou
The fadeless green leaf round thy sunlit brow.
** Among the Hills " or on *' The Beach '* with thee
At Nature's shrine I still will bow the knee.
** Voices of Freedom " these the nation's heart
Stirred to its depths, as for the poor slave sold
And scourged, and when but few would take his
part,
Thou, his true friend, right fearlessly and bold
Didst plead, till galled with chains no more he lay
But walked with head erect and face as day.
John Fullertqi^i
— For The Magazine of Poetry,
TO J. G. WHITTIER ON HIS EIGHTIETH
BIRTHDAY.
Friend, whom thy fourscore winters leave more
dear
Than when life's roseate summer on thy cheek
Burned in, the flush of manhood's manliest year;
Lonely, how lonely! is the snowy peak
Thy feet have reached, and mine have climbed so
near!
Close on thy footsteps mid the landscape drear
I stretch my hand thine answering grasp to seek.
Warm with the love no rippling rhymes can
speak!
Look backwards! from thy lofty height survey
Thy years of toil, of peaceful victories won.
Of dreams made real, largest hopes outrun!
Look forward! brighter than earth's morning ray
Streams the pure light of Heaven's unsetting sun,
The all unclouded dawn of life's Immortal Day!
Oliver Wendell Holmes.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
TO THE POET WHITTIER.
ON HIS 70th BIRTHDAY.
From this far realm of pines I waft thee now
A brother's greeting, Poet, tried and true;
So thick the laurels on thy reverend brow,
We scarce can see the white locks glimmering
through!
O pure of thought! Earnest in heart as pen.
The tests of time have left thee undefiled;
And o'er the snows of threescore years and ten
Shines the unsullied aureole of a child.
Paul Hamilton Haynk.
OUR WHITTIER.
A soul in unison with God,
As in life's path he trod.
Fearless! He nobly spoke the truth
Whilst even yet a youth.
Convinced of wrong, his voice rang out,
Clear and clean, o'er the shout
Of multitudes, and echoes yet.
Whilst they we all forget,
Who stood for compromise of sin.
Battles without, within.
With flesh of man, with soul of God,
He loved his native sod.
He worked and prayed with hand and brain
Rending slavery's chain.
A woman equal with a man
He held was God's own plan.
One a slave without the other.
Holding each a brother.
One cannot fall without a pall
Of darkness covers all.
Throi^h the long tides of passing years
He doubtless had his fears,
Yet swerved he not; he ne'er forgot,
Nor does one blemish blot
His spotless life of love, yet strife.
Scorn like a keen-edged knife
Pierced through his soul. He sweeter sang,
Because the passing pang
Awoke new melodies to ring.
And freedom sooner bring.
Now his great soul has gone in peace,
From sorrows all surcease.
We know the welcome of his God
From the path he trod.
David Henry Wright.
-From Is Peace on Earth t
CURRENT POEMS.
WOULD.
A full camellia at her heart,
As white and cold
As if of snow-flakes matched and held
In frozen fold.
A flower of haughty beauty pure.
But no perfume;
More suited dead, than living heart,
The scentiess bloom.
Oh! if her heart is free of love's
Perfume as this,
And if her lips so beautiful
Are cold to kiss.
Would that the white camellia
To red rose turn!
Would that the warmest flame of love
Her dear heart bum!
John Pattbrson.
-For The Magazine of Poetry.
SNOW.
Sharp are the thrusts of this keen-bladed wind
'Gainst which I hug my mantie; frosty grim
Its arctic surge into my eyes, — so dim
With night and tears, I scarce my way can And;
No sleighs to-night, with music ring behind,
T' o'ertake my wavering steps; no starry beam;
No skaters gliding o'er the frozen stream.
With shouts and songs, sweet to the cheerful mind;
But the wild-wailing north, the courier-sweep
Of airy cars with frosted flre-dust laden,
Winter's white harvest, winnowing to and fro;
Sad-hearted, I not care, though I should sleep
Wrapt in a shroud cold as some hapless maiden
Has wound about her by the outcast snow.
Arthur John Lockhart.
— For The Magazine of Poetry,
THE CITIES OF THE EYES.
Two cities dwell within thy shadowy eyes.
Twin habitations where thy spirit dwells.
Remote, as visioned up by wizard spells,
Where turrets, spires and columns dimly rise.
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CURRENT POEMS.
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Within those mystic walls my sight descries
And it was in the selfsame yard we walked of old,
A moving throng, and guarded citadels,
And stopped beside the graves to read and chat;
And busy marts and curling smoke that tells
I never knew the gravestones were so still and cold.
Of altars daily lit for sacrifice.
So lifeless all— I never thought of that
To gaze thereon is deadly misery,
How couldst thou bear to go away and leave me
For like the olden cities of the plain,
so!
Doomed are they to an everlasting bane.
Thou never causeth me such pain of yore;
And warned, I from their cursM presence flee,
And I am all alone, my love, to bear this woe,
Yet leaving them to heaven's destructive rain.
When never did I need thee so before.
I feel life turn to bitter salt in me.
Edward A. Uffington Vat.kntinb.
Indeed I know that every living thing shall die;
■^For The Magazine of Poetry.
But, art thou dead ? My darling! can it be ?
And what is Death that thou shouldst choose to
THE STAR OP DAWN.
ever lie
In his embrace, while my arms stretch toward
Star of the eastern sky,
thee!
Herald before the dawn.
There is a hand upon the stone above thy name.
Why does thy beauty fade ?
'Tis not thy hand; and how am. I to know
Where is thy splendor gone ?
The way it showeth me and thy way are the same*
And I shall And thee if I thither go ?
Lo! the great King of Day,
By whose transcendent light
For thou has been so long the only guide I had
Thou hast endured eclipse.
I cannot trust another in this need.
Drives from her throne the Night.
Why didst thou not show me the way and make
me glad.
But, like a bridegroom's friend
Too glad, to follow thee where thou shoudst lead ?
Helping him win his bride,
Making his joy increase.
Thou speakest not; or hath grief dulled my listen-
Thou didst thy glory hide;
ing ear
Until the whispers soft thou breathest me
And, like the rain that falls
I nevermore again, except in Heaven, shall hear!
Into the deep, wide sea.
Is this, my darling, all the mystery?
Thou art invisible.
Lost in immensity.
And dost thou sleep well in that mystic land of
thine?
Yet will the crystal drops
Art thou untroubled, hearing still my moan ?
Glisten again as rain;
Art thou so changed by influences pure, divine.
Thou, too, wilt reappear.
That thou art glad to leave me all alone ?
And thy lost light regain.
Mary M. Curribr.
Rbv. Alfred H. Fahnbstock, D. D.
—For The Magazine of Poetry.
—For The Magazine of Poetry,
IT SEEMS. SO STRANGE.
IF I MIGHT CHOOSE.
It seems so strange to stand beside thy grave
If I might choose my meeting-time with Death,
alone;
rd clasp his hand on some sad autum day.
I cannot understand how it can be;
And with the year's ripe fruit Pd pass away,
I read thy dear, familiar name upon the stone,
If I might time my last faint fleeting breath.
But, darling, what is that to thee and me ?
.
But oh, pale king, thou art no creature's slave!
This mound is newly made, I see, and heaped so
We may choose much in life, but in the end
high;
Thou makest every mortal will to bend
There are no flowers or grasses on it yet
And break above an open, waiting grave!
Except one littie wreath, all faded, torn and dry.
Car rib Blake Morgan.
About whose leaves a spider casts her net
— LippincotPSy January^ iSgj.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
BLOSSOM.
For this the fruit, for this the seed,
For this the parent tree;
The least to man, the most to God,
A fragrant mystery
Where Love, with Beauty glorified,
Forgets Utility.
John B.
'The Costnopolitan, December , 1892,
TABa
AMERICA.
My country,— 'tis of Thee,
Sweet land of liberty,
Of thee I sing;
Land where my fathers died,
Land of the pilgrims' pride.
From every mountain side
Let freedom ring.
My native country, — thee,
Land of the noble, free,
Thy name I love;
I love thy rocks and rills.
Thy woods and templed hills
My heart with rapture thrilb
Like that above.
Let music swell the breeze.
And ring from all the trees
Sweet freedom's song;
Let mortal tongues awake,
Let all that breathe partake.
Let rocks their silence break
The sound prolong.
Our fathers* God,--to Thee,
Author of liberty.
To thee we sing;
Long may our land be bright
With freedom's holy light,—
Protect us by Thy might,
Great God, our king.
Rev. Dr. Samuel F. Smith.
COLUMBIA'S POET LAUREATE.
INSCRIBED TO S. F. S.
Years to a century had grown
Since the explorer hailed
The signs o'er darkened seas unknown,
That proved he had not failed,—
When pilgrims crossed that heaving waste
Whose waters he had dared.
And in the soil of freedom placed
The seed their faith prepared.
They were a stem, unsmiling crew,
That bore the fruitful treasure;
For with so arduous work to do
They had no strength for pleasure.
But now a joyful nation sings,
" My country, 'tis of thee! "
Now to the vault of heaven rings
That anthem of the free.
And he, who could their song beget.
Receives a people's praise, —
Worth more than kingly coronet.
Greener than royal bays.
Walter Stores Bigblow..
-Facts, October 1892.
SWEETHEART, TO YOU!
Sweetheart, to you all things are clear^
The sky a pure perpetual blue.
And Youth's elixir in the air,
Sweetheart, to you!
But Joy to me is never true;
For though her fairy feet draw near,
They swiftly vanish out of view.
My life is like a garden drear
Whose rose of hope has lost its dew;
But morning buds are opening fair.
Sweetheart, to you!
William H. Haynb^
-Lippincotf Sf January, iSgs,
DEDICATION.
Between the sea-clif!s and the sea-shore sleeps
A garden walled about with woodland, fair
As dreams that die or days that memory keeps
Alive in holier light and lovelier air
Than clothed them round long since and blessed
them there
With less benignant blessing, set less fast
For seal on spirit and sense, than time has cast
For all time on the dead and deathless past.
Beneath the trellised flowers, the flowers that shinc^
And lighten all the lustrous length of way
From terrace up to terrace, bear me sign
And keep me record how no word could say
What perfect pleasure of how pure a day
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'A child's remembrance or a child's delight
Drank deep in dreams of, or in present sight
Exulted as the sunrise in its might
The shadowed lawns, the shadowing pines, the
ways
That wind and wander through a world of
flowers,
The radiant orchard where the glad sun's gaze
Dwells, and makes most of all his happiest hours,
The field that laughs beneath the cliff that towers.
The splendor of the slumber that enthralls
With sunbright peace the world within their walls,
Are symbols yet of years that love recalls.
But scarce the sovereign symbol of the sea,
That clasps about the loveliest land alive
With loveliness more wonderful, may be
Fit sign to show what radiant dreams survive
Of suns that set not with the years that drive
Like mists before the blast of dawn, but still
Through clouds and gusts of change that chafe and
chill
Lift up the light that mocks their wrathful will.
A light unshaken of the wind of time,
That laughs upon the thunder and the threat
Of years that thicken and of clouds that climb
To put the stars out that they see not set,
And bid sweet memory's rapturous faith forget
But not the lightning shafts of change can slay
The life of light that dies not with the day,
The glad live past that cannot pass away.
The many colored joys of dawn and noon
That lit with love a child's life and a boy's.
And kept a man's in concord and in tune
With life-long music of memorial joys
Where thought held life and dream in equipoise,
Even now make child and boy and man seem one,
And days that dawned beneath the last year's sun
As days that even ere childhood died were done.
The sun to sport in and the clifl^ to scale,
The sea to clasp and wrestle with, till breath
For rapture more than weariness would fail,
All-golden gifts of dawn, whose record saith
That time nor change may turn their life to death.
Live not in loving thought alone, though there
The life they live be lovelier than they were
When clothed in present light and actual air.
Sun, moon, and stars behold the land and sea
No less than ever lovely, bright as hope
Could hover, or as happiness be;
Fair as of old the lawns to seaward slope, •
The fields to seaward slant and close and ope;
But where of old from strong and sleepless wells
The exulting fountains fed their shapely shells.
Where light once dwelt in water, dust now dwells.
The springs of earth may slacken, and the sun
Find no more laughing lustre to relume
Where once the sunlight and the spring seemed
one;
But not on heart or soul may time or doom
Cast aught of drought or lower with aught of
gloom
If past and future, hope and memory, be
Ringed round about with love, fast bound and free.
As all the worid is girdled with the sea.
Algernon Charles Swinburne.
—From The Sisters: A Tragedy,
AN ELEGY FOR WHITTIER.
In vain for him the buds shall burst their shield,
And chestnut-leaves their tiny tents unfold;
In vain the early violets dot the field:
His heart is cold.
The rose no more shall meet his ardent gaze.
Like tender blushes of the maiden June,
For summer birds repeat for him their lays —
He hears no tune.
Full-breasted Autumn, for the lusty throng
The harvest-feast shall spread with liberal hand;
But he no more shall join their harvest-song.
Nor understand.
When the faint pulsings of the earth shall cease.
And on her naked form the shroud be spread,
He, like the snow-bound world, shall rest in peace.
For he is dead.
Walter Storrs Bigblow.
— American Gardenings Nov,^ i8g2.
LORD TENNYSON'S LAST POETRY.
There on top of the down,
The wild heather round me and over me June's
high blue,
When I looked at the bracken so bright and the
heather so brown,
I thought to myself I would offer this book to you;
This, and my love together,
To you that are seventy-seven.
With a faith as clear as the heights of the June-
blue heaven.
And a fancy as summer-new
As the green of the bracken amid the gloom of the
heather.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
NOTES.
Read. "Sheridan's Ride'' has been the most
frequently quoted of Read's poems. It was written
during the civil war. General Sheridan had
defeated General Early at the battle of Winchester,
1864, and had driven him beyond Cedar Creek.
General Early recovered his position, got his men
into line, and turning upon his adversary, came
near defeating Sheridan's army. Sheridan, hear-
ing of the battle, rode rapidly up the valley, arriv-
ing at a most critical time. He rallied his men;
and again succeeded in putting the enemy to rout
The poem was written shortly after, and soon found
its way into almost every publication in the country,
even including school readers.
Ibid. ** America." This passage was suggested
by Power's statue of " America."
Jackson. Emerson, when asked if Helen Hunt
was not our best female poet, replied: ** Why not
omit the ^ovd/enuUef "
Ware. "When Nature Wreathed Her Rosy
Bowers," is Mrs. Ware's first attempt at verse-
making, and grew out of a desire to emulate her
brother, who had already achieved some reputation
as a poet "My Brother" and "Beautiful Rest,"
are tributes to her brother.
Harris. "Stanzas" was written not a great
while before Mr. Harris' death.
Phelps. "Something for Thee." This hymn,
written in 1862, was first published in the Watch-
man and Rejlecior, and was copied into various
other religious papers. Later, Rev. Robert Lowry
requested Dr. Phelps to furnish some hymns for a
collection he was preparing. Among other hymns
placed in his hands was this one, and it appeared
in "Pure Gold," with the excellent music which
Dr. Lowry composed for it, and with which it will
always be associated. It also appeared in " Gospel
Hymns," No. i, and later in numerous collections
in this land and lands across the sea. It has been
a most helpful hymn to many hearts. A minister
in Glasgow says: "A large family joined my
church lately. The mother told me she had first of
all happened to drop into our chapel, while a
stranger in Glasgow, when she was quite overcome,
as if her heart were lifted up, with the people
singing
'Something for Thee* ••
Professor W. F. Sherwin, a few years ago, was
holding a Sunday-school Institute in Maine, and
during the singing of the third verse of this hymn a
young lawyer was so much afifected that it was the '
means of changing all his plans for life, and conse-
crating himself to Christ's service, he devoted him-
self with his whole heart to evangelistic work.
Says Dr. Phelps: "I have had requests for auto-
graph copies of this hymn and many testimonies
concerning its helpfulness to others. I have heard
it sung in various and distant parts of our land, on
ocean steamers, and in other countries. A friend
recently showed me a hymn book in the Swedish
language containing it"
At the celebration of the author's seventieth
birthday, with other letters, the following words of
sincere congratulation from Rev. Robert Lowry, D.
D., dated in Plainfield, N. J., May 13, 1886, were
read: "It is worth living seventy years even if
nothing comes of it but one such hymn as
Saviorl thy dying love
Thou gavest me.
Happy is the man who can produce one song which
the world will keep on singing after its author shall
have passed away. May the tuneful harp preserve
its strings for many a long year yet, and the last
song reach us only when it is time for the singer to
take his place in the heavenly choir."
At the close of the reading of Dr. Lowry's letter,
the congregation, filling the First Baptist Church,
New Haven, Conn., at once arose and sang the
hymn.
As here printed the hymn, slighdy revised, is in
the form the writer desires it to be used in collec-
tions or elsewhere. S. D. P.
Tennyson. This engraving is made from the
last photograph taken of Lord Tennyson, in 1890.
Ibid "The Charge of the Light Brigade,"
was written after reading the first report of the
Times correspondent, where only 607 sabres are
are mentioned as having taken part in the charge,
and was first published in the Examiner^ Decem-
ber 9th, 1854. The version now selected is that
which the soldiers themselves selected from several
different readings, and sang by their watch-fires in
the Crimea. It bears many points of resemblance
to Drayton's ballad of "The Battle of Agincourt"
W. D. A.
Ibid. " Crossing the Bar " was set to music by
Lady Tennyson, and afterwards sang at Lord
Tennyson's funeral.
Ibid. " Claribel " was published in 1830.
Ibid. "The Deserted House" was also pub-
lished in 1830.
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NOTES,
III
Ibid.
1842.
"The Golden Year" was published in
Ibid. "The Two Voices" was published in
1842. It is a philosophical poem, the "voices"
being those of faith and doubt.
Ibid. "Merlin and Vivien." Merlin was the
sage in "The Idylls." It was also the name under
which Tennyson contributed to the Examiner in
1852, a poem since reprinted, entitled "The Third
of February."' It seems to have been a favorite
with him and no doubt it originated in the old
romance founded mainly on the history of Geoffrey
of Monmouth.
Ibid. "In Memoriam," as is well known, is a
pen-picture of the religious doubts and misgivings
through which Tennyson passed after the death of
Arthur Hallam.
Ibid. " Circumstances " was published in 1830.
Ibid. "Locksley Hall," published in 1842, has
been parodied in the Bon GaulHer Ballads,
Ibid. "The Gardener's Daughter" was pub-
lished in 1842.
Ibid. "The Princess" was published in 1847,
This, however, is merely the rude sketch of "The
Princess" we now read. The poem has been
entirely rewritten since it first appeared, and the
songs, as well as the account of the Princess's
weird seizure, are an afterthought. "It is," says
Stedman, "as he entitles it, a medley, constructed
of ancient and modem materials — a show of med-
iaeval pomp and movement, observed through an
atmosphere of latter-day thought and emotion.
The poet, in his prelude, anticipates every striction
and to me the anachronisms and impossibilities of
the story seem not only lawful, but attractive.
Tennyson's special gift of reducing incongruous
details to a common structure and tone is fully
illustrated in a poem made
" To suit with time and place,
A Gothic ruin and a Grecian house,
A talk at college and of ladies' rights,
A feudal knight in silken masquerade."
Other works of our great poet are greater, but none
is so fascinating. Some of the author's most deli-
cately musical lines are herein contained. The
tournament scene is the most vehement and rapid
passage in the whole range of Tennyson's poetry.
The songs reach the high-water mark of lyrical
compositions. The five melodies, "As thro' the
Land," "Sweet and Low," "The splendor
Falls," "Home they Brought" and "Ask me no
More," constitute the finest group of songs pro-
duced in our century, and the third seems to many
the most perfect English Lyric since the time of
Shakespeare." The name of the Princess is Ida.
W. D. A.
Ibid.
in 1855
"Maud," a "dramatic poem," published
m 1855. The section beginning, "O that 'twere
Possible," having been published in the Tribute
in 1837. W. D. A.
Ibid. "The Miller's Daughter," published in
1830. An idyllic ballad including two short songs,
"It is the Miller's Daughter," and "Love that
Hath us in the Net" W. D. A.
Ibid. "Morte d* Arthur," published in 1842,
and afterwards incorporated in "The Passing of
Arthur," in "The Idylls of the King."
Upham. " The Hill Country," was written Sep-
tember, 1889, at the fort of Monadnock.
HoPKiNSON. "Hail, Columbia!" was written
in 1798, when it was thought America and France
were about to declare war. Coming as it did, at a
time when the people were at fever-heat over the
affairs of the nation, and their desire to maintain
their own government, the lack of lyrical merit was
not taken into account It was patriotic, and gave
utterance to their feelings. It was set to the music
of "The President's March," and for one entire
season held the audiences of the theatres in its
soul-stirring, captivating thrall.
Monroe. "Columbia," is a portion of the
"Ode" written by Miss Harriet Monroe, to be
read at the opening exercises of The World's
Columbian Exposition. This selection, together
with some others from the same ode, were set
to music by G. W. Chadwick, of Boston, and was
sung at the dedicatory exercises in Chicago, by a
chorus of five thousand voices. Miss Monroe was
selected by a committee of the World's Fair
directors to write an ode, and an award of |i,ooo
was offered for it. The ode was written and sub-
mitted to the committee, who in turn submitted it
to three professional literary men, Messrs E. J.
Harding, literary editor of the Chicago Tribune;
F. F. Brown, of the Dial and William Morton
Payne. Some suggestions were offered regarding
changes thought best to be made, but Miss Monroe
accepted but a few of them.
Smith. "America." When a student at An-
dover, Dr. Smith was asked by Dr. Lowell Mason
to write some English verses to suit the tunes in a
German song-book, and adapted to church and
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112
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Sunday-school use. Among that German music
was the tune which he did not then know as that
of " God Save the Queen.'*
When he was looking the book through in his
room, this tune seized upon his fancy, and within a
half-hour he wrote the lines that justly made him
famous. He had no idea that he was composing
a national anthem to the praise of liberty and
freedom and the nation's God, but it was a spark
from heaven, which kindled from heart to heart
throughout the land. W. S. B.
BiGELOW. "Columbia's Poet Laureate.*' This
poem was inspired by a visit to Dr. Samuel F.
Smith on the morning after his birthday, which by
a strange coincidence, happens on the same day
as that on which Columbus discovered America.
During this visit an account of this poem was
given, and the cause which inspired it.
N. L. M.
-)(-
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
WORKS CONSULTED IN THE PREPARATION OF THIS
NUMBER OF **THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY."
Read, Thomas Buchanan. Poetical works,
complete in three volumns. Philadelphia: J. B.
Lippincott & Co., 1890. i6mo., pp. 426-426-420.
Jackson, Helen Hunt. Poems, ill. Boston:
Roberts Bros., 1892. i2mo, cl., pp. xvi and 266.
Ware, Mrs. Mary. Miscellaneous Poems.
Harris, Edmond K. Miscellaneous Poems.
Phelps, Rev. S. Dryden, D. D. Songs for all
Seasons. Boston: Silver, Burdett & Co., 1891.
i2mo, cl., pp. xiv and 406.
Pennell, Harribtte G. Miscellaneous Poems.
Beery, Adeline Hohf. Miscellaneous Poems.
Tennyson, Lord Alfred. Poetical Works,
complete. New York: T. Y. Crowell & Co.,
1885. 8vo, cl., pp. viii and 896.
Tennyson. Miscellaneous Poems.
Simpson, Corelli C. W. Miscellaneous Poems.
Rice, Walter Allen. Miscellaneous Poems.
Wilson, Olivia Lovell. Miscellaneous
Poems.
Farrand, May Spencer. Miscellaneous Poems.
Crane, Rev. Oliver, D. D. Minto, and Other
Poems. New York: Wilbur B. Ketcham, 1888.
i2mo, cl., pp. 259.
Parham, Eugenia. Miscellaneous Poems.
Buck, Mary K. Miscellaneous Poems.
McNamara, William F. Miscellaneous Poems.
Vasser, William Edward. Flower Myths,
and Other Poems. Louisville, Ky. : Author's ed.,
1884. i2mo, cl., pp. 90.
Gilbert, William S. The ** Bab " Ballads, ilL
by author, sec. ed. Philadelphia: Porter &
Coats. i2mo, cl., pp. 222.
Gilbert. Miscellaneous Poems.
Brittingham, Florence V. Verse and Story.
Buffalo: Charles Wells Moulton, 1892. i2mo, cL
pp. vi and 220,
Hurd, Helen Marr. Poetical Works, ilL
Boston: B. B. Russell, 1887. i2mo, cl., pp. 418.
Walsworth, Minnie Gow. Miscellaneous
Poems.
Upham, Rev. James, D. D. Miscellaneous
Poems.
Blanchard, Ferdinand, M. D. Miscellaneous
Poems.
CoNKLiN, Jane E. D. Poems. New York: J.
J. Little & Co., 1884. i6mo, cl., pp. 149.
O'Beirne, Harry F. Miscellaneous Poems.
See, Benjamin F. Miscellaneous Poems.
Whittier, John Grebnleap. Poetical Works.
Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1885. 8vo, d.,
PP- 336.
THE EDITOR'S TABLE.
For engravings in this number of The Maga-
ziEB OP Poetry, the editor acknowledges the
courtesy of Mrs. Frank Leslie and the BufTalo
Electrotype and Engraving Co., Buffalo, N. Y.
For copyright poems and other selections, the
editor returns thanks to J. B. Lippincott Co., Phila-
delphia, Pa.; Roberts Bros., Boston, Mass.; Silver,
Burdette & Co., Boston, Mass.; T. Y. Crowell &
Co., New York; Wilbur B. Ketchum, New York;
W. E. Vasser, Athens, Ala.; Porter & Coates,
Philadelphia, Pa.; C. W. Moulton, Buffalo, N. Y.;
B. B. Russell, Boston, Mass.; J. J. Little & Co.,
New York, and Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Boston,
Mass.
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BOOK NOTES.
"3
BOOK NOTES.
Bush, Bellb. The Clock of Gold. A brochure.
Carleton, Will. City Festivals. New York: Harper &
Bros., i86a. 8vo, 11., gilt, cl., pp. 164,
A companion book to " Farm Ballads/' ** Farm
Legends," "Fann Festivals," "City Ballads,"
"City Leeends." Mr. Carleton is too well and
favorably known to require much comment. He is
a poet of the people, tender and pathetic. This
volume is further enhanced by an addendum of
notes.
DoRMAN, Allen. Poems. Cbicasro: American Publisher's
Ass'n, 1892. i2mo, port, gilt top, cl., pp. 539.
DuFUY, Elizabethe. The Queen's Quire. Author's edition.
24mo, pp. 46, cl. see, pap. 25c.
Twenty- two songs, sonnets and ballads, on themes
fanciful and legendary, mostly pertaining to the
Grecian epoch, and classical in style.
Green, Ernest S., and Von Lowbnpels, Miss H., Eds,
Mexican and South American Poems. San Diego, Cal.:
Dodge & Burbeck. z2mo, gilt, cl., pp. 398. %i.
Translations from the Spanish into English, giv-
ing the Spanish on one i>age and the English on
the opposite, thereby making it of great aid to the
student of the Spanish language.
HoRTON, George. Songs of the Lowly, and Other Poems.
Chicago: F. J. Schulte & Co. i2mo, gilt, gilt top, cl„ pp. 241,
I1.50.
Mr. Horton is a pleasing versifier. True to the
text, his songs are indeed ^ Songs of the Lowly."
Simple themes clothed in metaphorical expression,
reaculy understood and appreciated. Mr. Horton
does not **talk over the beads" of his readers.
He appeals to them directly. His verses are
marked by a smoothness of rhythm and metre.
Jones, William C. Birch-rod Days and Other Poems. Chi-
cago: American Publisher's Ass'n. i2mo, port, gilt, gilt top,
cl., pp. 266.
Lang, Andrew. Helen of Troy. London: George Bell &
Sons. x6mo, gilt, cl. pp. 204.
Mr. Lane is a thorough student of Greek litera-
ture, and this latest addition to his already numer-
ous writings is but an emphasis of his ability.
Helen of Troy is a translation of her life done into
English verse.
Macay, Eric. Love Letters of a Violinist, and Other Poems.
New York: Lovell, Coryell & Co. i2mo, pp. 277, cl., gilt,
gilt top.
Love Letters of a Violinist consists of twelve
letters, representing as many moods, beginning
with the prelude, and closing: with *' victory," the
grand finale. Gladys the Singer, in two cantos,
Ode, Miscellaneous Poems, Sonnets and Italian
Poems constitute the other poems. This is a
special copyright American edition, newly revised
by the author.
Mercier, a. H. Crusaders of '61.
A brochure containing a memorial poem to the
memory and glory of the heroes of 1861.
Reed, J. S. Winnowed Grasses. Indianapolis, Ind.: The
Bowen-Merrill Co., 1892. i2mo, obi., port, pp. 159, cl., |i.
These verses, suggestive of homely, every-day
life, are more pleasing in theme than in metre.
Rice, Alonzo Leora. Prize Poems. Indianapolis, Ind.:
Carlon & HoUenbeck, 1892. i2mo, port, pap., pp. 32.
A collection of prize poems from Judge, Boston
Transcript, Savannah Magazine, Idle Hours, Poets
of America and Magazine of Poetry,
Ritchie, John. Hassan: A Vision of the Desert. Chicago:
F. J. Schulte & Co,, 1892. i2mo, gilt edge, cl., unp., |i.
Robinson, Joseph Carver. A Dream: An Epic Poem. Bos-
ton, Mass.: Author's edition. i2mo, cl., pp. 174.
Swinburne, A. C. Locrine: A Tragedy. New York: United
States Book Co. i2mo, gilt, gilt top, cl., pp. 138.
Swinburne, A. C. The Sisters: A Tragedy. New York:
United States Book Co. X2mo, gilt, gilt top, cl., pp. 126.
Swinburne stands to-day the greatest of dramatic
poets. These two later editions but serve to con-
firm this. **The Sisters," especially, is a poem of
great beauty, with strong scenes and dramatic situ-
ations.
Veatch, Andrew. Over the Line and Other Poems. Jasper,
Texas. Author's edition, 1892. 8vo, pp. 32, pap., 30c.
Williams, Espy. The Dream of Art, and Other Poems. New
York: G. P. Putnam's Sons. z6mo, gilt, gilt top, white d.,
pp. 99. 75c.
These poems are no better, no worse than many
others. They are well written, but denote no strik-
ing originality.
Wright, David Henry. "Is Peace on Earth?" Philadel-
phia, Pa.: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1802. i2mo, leatherette, pp. 64.
Mr. Wright is a young writer, judging from the
photo, which serves as frontispiece. Passing from
the frontispiece to the initial poem, which pves title
to the book, we find strong, sturdy lines, which bear
out the impression given by the photo, and we ven-
ture to predict the author will nave something to
say in the future years, and that he will not fear to
say it. Many of his poems are addressed to famous
men and women, which would proclaim him a
hero-worshiper. His themes are well handled and
show great strength, purity of diction and an ear
attuned to melody.
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Bibliography of Poetry for 1892.
A Blblloflfraphlcal I^Ut of Poetry Published in Book Fomi in America and Great Britain dnrlnff 189a,
mclttdinfl: Cyclopedias and Collections.
ENGLISH AND AMERICAN POETS.
INDIVIDUAL AUTHORS.
AINSLIB, Hew. A Pilgrimage to the Land of
Bums, and Poems, with a memoir of the author
by Thomas C. Latto. Paisley: Gardner. Cr.,
8vo, port., il., pp. 402., 6s.
ALDRICH, Anne Reeve. Songs About Life, Love
and Death. New York: Scribner. i6mo, pp.
141, I1.25.
ARNOLD, Sir Edwin. Potiphar's Wife, and Other
Poems. New York: Scribner. i6mo, pp. 131,
I1.25.
AURINGER, O. C. The Heart of the Golden Roan.
Boston: Lothrop.
AUSTIN, Alfred. Fortunatus the Pessimist New
York and London: Macmillan. i2mo, uncut,
pp. 179, I1.75.
BAILY, William Entrihen. Classical Poems.
Cincinnati: Clarke. Sq. i6mo, pp. 112.
BAINES, Minnie Willis. The Pilgrim's Vision:
An Allegory. Cincinnati: Cranston. i2mo,
port., il., pp* 127, 75c.
BALL, B. W. The Merrimack River; Hellenico,
and Other Poems; ed., with introd. by F. F.
Ayer. New York: Putnam. i2mo, pp. 467, $2,
BARBOUR, Rev. L. G. The End of Time: A Poem
of the Future. New York: Putnam. $1.50.
BARTON, William G., and Breed, George W.
Songs and Saunterings of a Poet and Naturalist.
Salem, Mass. : Salem Press Publishing and Print-
ing Co. i2mo, pp. 270, I1.50.
BATES, Arlo. Told in the Gate. Boston: Rob-
erts. i2mo, pp. 217, I1.25.
BATES, Clara Doty. From Hearts Content.
Chicago: Morrill, Higgins & Co. 8vo, paper,
pp. 131, I1.25.
BEALB, Mary. St. John: A Poem. London:
Digby, Long & Co. 8vo, pp. 35, is. 6d.
BBGBIB, E. H. The God of Fools, and Other
Poems. London: Digby, Long & Co. Cr. 8vo,
3s. 6d.
BEOWULF. The Deeds of. An English Epic of the
Eighth Century. Done into modem prose, with
introd. and notes by John Earle. London:
Clarendon Press. Cr. 8vo, pp. 256, 6s. 6d.
BEOWULF. An Anglo-Saxon Epic Poem. Trans-
lated from the Heyne-Sodn text by John Lesslie
Hall. Boston: Heath. 8vo, pp. 128.
BERANGBR. Songs. Translated into English verse
by William Toynbee. London: Scott Sq. 8vo,
pp. 183, IS.
BLAKB, C. J. Bernard and Constantia, and Other
Poems. London: Digby, Long &, Co. Cr. 8vo,
pp. 55, 2S. 6d.
BLAND, Mrs. Hubert (E. Nbsbit). Lays and
L^^ends. First and second series. London:
Longmans. Cr. 8vo, port, pp. 188 and 150, 3s.
6d. and 5s.
BOND, R. W. An Ode to the Sun, and Other
Poems. London: Paul. i2mo, 3s. 6d.
BOWBN, Henry Wolcott. Losing Ground: A
Series of Sonnets. Boston: Cupples. i2mo,
pp. 90, hf. cl., I1.25.
BRANCO, C. The Lifting of the VeD, and Other
Poems. London: Sonnenschein. Cr. 8vo, pp.
235. 5S.
BRIDGES, Robert. Achilles in Scyros. London:
Bell & Sons. F.cap 8vo, pp. 68, 2s. 6d., n^L
Large paper, 5s.
BRITTINGHAM, Florence V. Verse and Story.
Buffalo: Moulton. i6mo, port, pp. 225, $1.25.
BRODBRICK, John T. The Vagrant Lover's Leap.
Boston: The New Nation Publishing Co. i6mo^
paper, pp. 23.
BBOWN, Colin Rae. The Dawn of Love, and
Other Poems. Complete edition, with portrait
and memoir of the author. Paisley: Gardner.
Cr. 8vo, pp. 364, 5S.
BROWN, John Fleury. Poems: Lyrical and Dra*
matic. Ottawa: Durie.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY OF POETRY FOR 1892.
115
6UCHANNAN, Robert. The Buchannan Ballads.
(Poems for the people). London: Haddon. Cr.
8vo, pp. 112, IS.
BUNNBR, H. C. Rowen: "Second Crop/' Songs.
New York: Scribner. i6mo, pp. 109, $1.25.
BURNS, Robert. Selected Poems, with an intro-
duction by Andrew Lang. New York: Scribner.
i6mo, |2.
BUTLER, A. G. Harold: A Drama in Four Acts;
and Other Poems. London: Clarendon Press,
8vo, 5s.
BYARS, William Vincent. The Tempting of the
King: A Study of the Law. St. Louis: C. W.
Alban & Co. ismo, pp. 53, paper, 25c.
CARDUCCI, G10SU6. Poems; translated, with two
introductory essays: i, Giosu^ Carducd and the
Hellenic Recreation in Italy; 2, Carducci and the
Classic Realism, by Frank Sewall. New York:
Dodd. i2mo, pp. 141, I1.50.
CARLBTON, Will. City Festivals. New York:
Harper. Sq. 8vo, il., pp. 169, $2; full seal, I4.
CAWEIN, Madison. Poems: Moods and Memories.
New York: Putnam. i6mo, pp. 322, |2.
CHAMPLIN, Edwin R. On the White-Birch Road.
Author's edition.
COOKSON, J. C. Fife. A Dream of Other Days: A
Romantic Poem. New York: Putnam. i2mo,
pp. 99, |i.
COOLIDGB, Susan. Rhymes and Ballads for Girls
and Boys. Boston: Roberts. I1.50.
CORNWALLIS, KiNAHAN. The Song of America
and Columbus; or, The Story of the New World.
New York: Office of the Daily Investigator.
i2mo, pp. 278, |i.
COXB, Arthur Cleveland. The Paschal Poems,
for Passion-tide and Easter. Second edition.
New York: Pott. i2mo, pp. 238, |i.
C0X6, Arthur Cleveland. Christian Ballads.
New edition, enlarged. New York: Pott. i2mo,
pp. 252, |i.
CROSS, Mary. Poems. London: Oliphant. i2mo,
pp. 64, 6d.
CUST,R. J. Early Poems. London: Paul. i2mo,
2s. 6d.
DAWSON, C. Avanmore, and Other Poems. Lon-
don: Nisbet 8vo, 5s.
DAWSON, C. Amy. Idyls of Womanhood. Lon-
don: Heinemann. Cr. 8vo, 5s.
DOBSON, Austin. Ballad of Beau Brocade, and
Other Poems. Illustrated by Hugh Thomson.
New York: Dodd. i2mo, |2.
DONNELLY, Eleanor C. Poems; with introd.
by Rev. D. I. McDermott. Philadelphia: H. L.
Kilner & Co. 8vo, pp. 108, $1.50.
DORR, Julia C. R. Poems. New complete edition.
New York: Scribner. i2mo, port., pp. 479,
I2.50.
DORR, Julia C. R. The Fallow Field. Illustrated
with reproductions of charcoal sketches by Zulma
Delacy Steele. Boston: Lee, I3.
DUPUY, Elisabethe. The Queen's Empire; being
a book of songs, sonnets and ballads. St Louis,
Mo. : The Author. 24mo, paper, pp. 46, 25c.
BASTBR, Marguerite E. Clytie, and Other Poems.
Boston: Philpott. i2mo, pp. 139, |i 50.
EGAN, Maurice Francis. Songs and Sonnets,
and Other Poems. Chicago: McClurg. i6mo,
pp, 204, |i.
ELLIOT, W. Scott. The Marriage of the Soul,
and Other Poems. London: Paul. Cr. 8vo, 5s.
ELLIS, Edwin J. Fate in Arcadia, and Other
Poems. London: Ward & Downey. C. 8vo,
il. pp. 205, 7s. 6d.
ENGLE, Dr. W. A. Poems. Chicago: Dibble.
i2mo, port., pp. 307.
ERSKINE, Payne. lona: A Lay of Ancient Greece.
Chicago: Dibble. i2mo, il., pp. 186, lr.25.
EWALD, Johannes (1773). The Death of Balder.
From the Danish. Translated by George Bor-
row. London: Jarrold. Cr. 8vo, pp. 77, 7s. 6d.
PABBRI, Cora. Lyrics. New York: Harper.
i2mo, pp. i68, I1.50.
PANE, Violet. Poems. With portrait by E. Stod-
art. New York: Scribner. Two vols. 8vo, hf.
cf., $8.50, net
PARMER, J. W. The Crucifixion of Our Lord
Jesus Christ, and a History of the Creation and
Fall of Man. London: Digby. Cr. 4to, 9s. 6d.
FEARING, Blanche. In the City by the Lake. In
two books. Chicago: Searle & Gorton. Sq.
i2mo, pp. 192, I1.25.
FIELD, Eugene. Second Book of Verse. New
York: Scribner. i6mo, I1.25.
FIELD, Eugene. With Trumpet and Drum. New
York: Scribner. i6mo, pp. 134, |i.
FIELD, Michael. Sight and Song. London:
Mathews. Cr. 8vo, pp. 125, 5s., net.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
PINCH, Constance. The Vision of a Beginner,
and Other Poems. London: Digby. Cr. 8vo,
3S. 6d.
FLEENOR, Creedmore. Thought Throbs. Louis-
ville: Morton. i2mo, pp. 363.
POSTER, H ANNA A. Zululer, the Maid of Anahuac.
New York: Putnam. %i.
POSTER, W. The Fallen City, and Other Poems.
London: Blackwood. 8vo, 5s.
GALE, Norman R. A Country Muse. London:
Nutt. i2mo, 3s. 6d. New York: Putnam.
GARDNER, William M. Wheels and Wings, and
Other Poems. London: Digby. Cr. 8vo, pp.
78, 3S. 6d.
GAVAN, J. The Sons of Usna, and Other Poems.
Hull, Eng. : Andrews. 8vo, pp. 68, is.
GIBBS, William Alfred. A Prelude to the Idyls
of the Queen. London: Low. Cr. 8vo, paper,
port, pp. 28, IS.
GIBBS, William Alfred. Idyls of the Queen:
The Fire, the Raid and the Rescue. London:
Low. Cr. 8vo, paper, pp. 96, is.
GIPPS, L. M. Jarel, and Other Poems. London:
Stott. Cr. 8vo, 3S. 6.
GLENBRNE,Mme. Higgins (Lida Lewis Watson).
Unrest: Poems. New York: Dillingham. lamo,
pp. 231, I1.25.
GOING, Charles Buxton. Summer-fallow. New
York: Putnam. i2mo, pp. 105, %\.
GOLDSMITH, OLIVER. Poems and Plays. Edited
by Austin Dobson, with frontispiece by Herbert
Railton. New York: Macmillan. i6mo, pp.
233, |i.
GORDON, H. L. The Feast of the Virgins, and
Other Poems. Chicago: Laird & Lee. 8vo,
il., port., pp. 369, I1.50.
GOULD, Elizabeth Porter. Stray Pebbles from
the Shores of Thought. Boston: Press of T. O.
Metcalf & Co. i6mo, port, pp. 220.
GRANT, Lewis Morrison. Protomantis, and
Other Poems. Paisley: Gardner. Cr. 8vo, pp.
309, 5S.
GUINNESS. H. Grattan, D. D. The City of the
Seven Hills: an Illustrated Poem. Chicago:
Revell. i2mo, pp. 302, $1.
HABERSHAM, Alex. Wylly, The Two Sisters: a
Political Poem, and Other Short Prose and
Poetical Sketches. Baltimore: The Author.
i2mo, paper, pp. 145, 50c.
HALIBURTON, H. Ochil Idyls, and Other Poems.
London: Patterson. i2mo, 3s. 6d.
HANBURY, E. O. On Nature, and Odier Verses.
London: Simpkin. Cr. 8vo. pp. 210, 5s.
HANKIN, Mary L. Year by Year. London: Un-
win. Cr. 8vo, pp. 63, 2S. 6d.
HEATLBY, H. R. Ballad, and Other Poems. Lon-
don: Percival. i8mo, pp. 146, is. 6d.
HEDLEY, George Roberts. Sardonicus and Pan-
demus: a Political Satire and History of Eleven
Years of Parliament iry Work, for 1880; with
Other Poems and Odes. London: ScotL Cr.
8vo, pp. 153, 3S. 6d.
HELMUTH, William Tod, M. D. With the
"Pousse CafS": a Collection of Post-prandial
Verses. Philadelphia: Boericke & Tofel. i2mo,
pp. 146, I1.50, net.
HENDERSON, Fred. By the Sea, and Other Poems.
Second edition, with additional poems. London:
Unwin. Cr. 8vo, pp. 78, 2S. 6d.
HENLEY, W. E. The Song of the Sword, and Other
Verses. New York: Scribner. i2mo, pp. 108,
|i.
HERRICK, Robert. The Hesperides and Noble
Numbers. Edited by Alfred Pollard, with a Pre-
face by A. C. Swinburne. London: Lawrence
& BuUen. Two vols. i8mo, pp. 345 and 356,
los., net; large paper, 21s. New York: Scribner.
HIRST, Edith H. Round the Camp-Fire, and
Other Australian Poems. London: Digby. 8vo,
pp. 70, 2S. 6d.
HORACE, (QuiNTUS Horatius Flaccus). Odes
and Epodes; translated, in English Veree, with
Introd. Notes and Latin Text by James B.
Hague. New York: Putnam. 8vo, pp. 200,
I1.75.
HORTON, George. Songs of the Lowly, and Other
Poems. Chicago: Schulte. i2mo, pp. 242, I1.50.
Author's edition, i2mo, I5.
HOSKEN, James Dryden. Phaon and Sappho and
Nimrod. New York: Macmillan. i6mo, pp.
338, |i-5o.
HUBBELL, Walter. Midnight Madness: Passion-
ate Poems in Vigorous Verse. Chicago. The
Bingham Publishing Co. i2mo, pap., port., pp.
152, 25c.
HULL, Mattie E. Wayside Jottings, Essays^
Sketches, Poems and Songs, Gathered from the
Highwa3rs, Byways and Hedges of Life. Chi-
cago: Hull. i2mo, port., pp. 208.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY OF POETRY FOR 1892,
117
HYLTON, J. Dunbar, M. D. Motion, Space and
Time: An Epic of the Universe. Palmyra, N. J.
Published at the Hylton Grange. 8vo, pap.
pp. 74.
HYLTON, J. Dunbar, M. D. The Knights of the
Plow: A Political, Bucolic and Agricultural Idyl,
Treating on the Tariff. Palmyra, N. J. Pub-
lished at the Hylton Grange. 8vo, pap. pp. 27.
IBSEN, H. Peer Gynt: A Dramatic Poem. Lon-
don: Scott; New York: Scribner. I1.25.
ILIOIVUI, Rev. H. The Quest of Columbus: A
Memorial Poem. Philadelphia: Published by the
Author. 8vo, pp. 305, $2.
IRROY, R. E. Verses of Love and Life. London:
Reeves & Turner. F. cap, 8vo, pp, 64, 2s. 6d.
JACKSON, Helen Hunt. Poems. New complete
edition. Illustrated by Bayard; vignettes by
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HORRIS, William. Poems by the Way. London,
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HULLER, Donizetti. Links from Broken Chains.
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Lyrics. London: Stock. i2mo, 3s. 6d.
}fICKERSON, M. H. Carols of the Coast Halifax,
N. S.: Nova Scotia Printing Co.
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France. Philadelphia: Lippincott.
HOURSE, Laura A. Sunderlin. The Lyric of
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Moulton. i6mo, pp. 172, $1.
OBERHOLTZER, Sara Louise. Souvenirs of Oc-
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154, |i. •
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Other Poems. London: Digby. Cr. 8vo, pp.
13I1 3S. 6d.
O'NEILL, H. C. Devonshire Idyls. London: Stott.
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Poems, Sacred and Secular. New York: Mac-
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WARKWORTH, Lord. St Francis of Assisi: The
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WERNER, F. L. Z. The Brethren of the Cross: A
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WHITMAN, Walt. Selected Poems. New York:
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WILLIAMS, Espy. The Dream of Art, and Other
Poems. New York: Putnam. i6mo, pp. 96, 75c.
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London: Stock. Cr. 8vo, pp. 215, 3s. 6d.
WORDSWORTH, William. Lyrics and Sonnets.
Selected and edited by Clement King Shorter.
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Other Poems. Philadelphia: Lippincott i6mo»
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YARRINGTON, W. H. H. Australian Poems. Lon-
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S. , L. Edil the Little Foundling, and Other Poems.
London: Digby. Cr. 8vo, pp. 80, 2s. 6d.
ANON. Vagabond Rhymes, by an idler. Boston:
Cupples. Sq. i6mo, pp. 118, |i.
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BATES, Charlotte Fisk, Comp, The Cam-
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an Introd. by J. W. Churchill. Boston: Little.
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Everybody's Book of Humorous Poetry. Lon-
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MERRY, W. W., D.D., Ed, Selected Fragments of
Roman poetry from the earliest times of the
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MEYNELL, Wilfred, Ed, The Child Set in the
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MILES, Alfred H., Ed. The Poets and the Poetry
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MILES, A. H., Ed, The Poets and the Poetry of the
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and Enlarged Edition. Dublin: Hodge. Cr. 8vo,
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Greek Comic Poets, with renderings in English
Verse. Second edition. New York: Macmillan.
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RAWNSLEY, Hardwicke D., M. A. Notes for the
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VOL V NO 2
THE
MAGAZINE or POETRY
A QUARTERLY REVIEW
II^I^USXR AXED
APRIL 1893
CHARLES WELLS MOULTON
BUFFALO N Y
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TTHB MAGAZINB OF POBTTRY.
CONTENTS FOR APRIi;, 1893-
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING Frontispiece
EDGAR ALLAN POE John H, Ingram 124
With portrait eng^ved on steel by F. Halpin.
CHARLES F. MARKELL C 5. Thomas 137
With portrait by N. H. Buscj', Baltimore, Md.
CHARLOTTE FISKE BATES Louise Imogen Guiney 140
With portrait.
KATE McPHELIM CLEARY CharUs Wells MouUon 144
With portrait by Mosher, Chicago.
LUCY LARCOM Harriet H. Robinson 149
With portrait.
EMILY THORNTON CHARLES Henry Van Fredenberg 153
With portrait.
FLORENCE C. DIEUDONNE Mrs. J, A, Armstrong 159
With portrait by Esubrook, Washington, D. C.
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING Eva Maria Kennedy 161
FRANCES LEWIS B. DAMON Rev, Arthur J. Lockharl D. D , . . . 165
LETTIE S. BIGELOW Helen Manning 169
With portrait by G. W. Wright, Holyoke, Mass.
ELIZABETH BAKER BOHN CoL J, A, Watrous 171
With portrait by Hamilton, Milwaukee, Wis.
LYDIA HOYT FARMER JeannetU Ward 176
With portrait by E. Decker, Cleveland, O.
JOHN OTIS BARROWS Mrs, E, F, S, Anderson 178
ISABELLA WILSON McCONIHE M, M. Thomson 181
With portrait by Scholten, St. Louis, Mo.
ANDREW McCABE J B, Berteling M. D 183
CLARENCE A. SHALER CharUs Marsh Gilmore M. D 187
With portrait by Place, Chicago, 111.
JAMES BARRON HOPE WiUiam R, Gault 188
FRANCES M. O. SMITH Thomas O'Hagan 193
With portrait by Ely Bro's., London, Ont.
N. M. BASKETT, M. D J. H Rodes 195
PHEBE A. HOLDER Rev, Henry Hyde, D, D, 199
With portrait by R. B. Lewis, Hudson, Mass.
FANNY H. R. POOLE Fred Lazvrence Knowles 201
LUCIE C. HAGER Jane Maria Read 205
With portrait by R. B. Lewis, Hudson, Mass.
SARAH WOLVERTON Rev. Lee S, McCaUester, D, V, , . .207
GERTRUDE TRACY JOHNSON Eliza S. Pettit 208
With portrait by Thomson, Kansas City, Mo.
MARTHA WINTERMUTE J, C, McCahon 212
With portrait by McCahon, Newark, Ohio.
MARY H. GREY CLARKE Cyrus Cobb 214
With portrait by Hardy, Boston, Mass.
S. T. COLERIDGE NetHe LeUa Michel 218
WAR BALLADS 225
SINGLE POEMS 233
CURRENT POEMS 237
NOTES. John H Ingram, Francis M, O, Smith, Harper's Young People, George Cary Eggleston,
and the Editor 242
BIBLIOGRAPHY 244
EDITOR'S TABLE 244
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The Magazine of Poetry.
Vol. V.
No. 2.
EDGAR ALLAN POE.
EDGAR ALLAN POE was born in Boston, on
the 19th January, 1809. He was named Allan
after a wealthy and intimate friend of the family,
and when both his parents died his godfather, who,
although long married, was childless, adopted the
little orphan, then only six years old. Even at this
early age Poe was noted for his precocity as well as
for his beauty, and Mr. Allan appears to have been
extremely proud of his youthful prot6g6, and to
have treated him in many respects as his own son.
The boy Is stated to have been made quite a show-
child of by his adopted father; a tenacious memory
and a musical ear, we are informed, enabling him to
learn by rote, and declaim to the evening visitors
assembled at Mr. Allan's house, the finest passages
of English poetry with great effect.
In 1816, the Allans having to visit England on
matters connected with disposal of some property
there, brought their adopted son with them, and
after taking him on a tour through England and
Scodand with them, left him at the Manor-House
School in Church Street, Stoke-Newington. The
school belonged to a Rev. Dr. Bransby, who is so
quaintly described in "William Wilson," one of
Poe's finest stories. Here, in this dreamy place,
Edgar Poe spent from four to five years of his
existence, and, notwithstanding the monotony of
school life, was doubtless fully justified in looking
back upon the days passed in that venerable acad-
emy with pleasurable feelings.
In 182 1, the lad was re-called home, and soon
afterwards was placed by his adopted parents at an
academy in Richmond, Va. Mr. Allan would
seem to have been very proud of his handsome and
precocious godson, and always to have been will-
ing to afford him any amount of education procur-
able; but of parental love, of that deep sympathy
for which the poor orphan yearned, he seems to
have been utterly devoid. Not but what the impe-
rious little fellow was indulged in what money could
purchase, but the petting and spoiling which he still
appears to have received was not of that kind to
touch his tender heart. Throughout life a morbid
sensitiveness to affection was one of his most dis-
tinguishing traits, and this it was that frequently
drove him to seek in the society of dumb creatures
that love which was denied him, or which ha some-
times believed denied him, by human beings.
There is a paragraph in his terrible tale of '* The
Black Cat," which those who were intimately ac-
quainted with Poe will at once recognize the auto-
biographical fidelity of.
Returning to the more commonplace records of
his history, the future poet is described to us at
this period of his life as remarkable for his general
cleverness, his feats of activity, his wayward tem-
per, his extreme personal beauty, and his power of
extemporaneous tale-telling, and, even at diis early
stage, as a great classical scholar, and as well
versed in mathematics, botany, and other branches
of the natural sciences. He appears to have been
a successful student, having obtained distinctions in
Latin and French at the dosing examinations of
1826.
In 1827, aroused by the heroic efforts the Greeks
were making to throw off the yoke of their Turkish
oppressors, and, doubtiess, emulous of Byron,
whose example had excited the chivalric boys of
both continents, Edgar Poe and an acquaintance,
Ebenezer Burling, determined to start for Greece
and offer their aid to the insurgents. Either Mr.
Burling's heart failed, or parental authority was too
strong for him, for he stayed at home, whilst the
embryo poet, doubtiess in headstrong opposition to
the wishes of his adopted parents, started alone for
Europe. Poe was absent for more than a year, but
the adventures of his journey have never been told;
he seems to have been very reticent upon the sub-
ject, and to have left uncontradicted the various
stories invented, and even published during his life-
time, to account for the interregnum in his history.
In 1829 Edgar Poe returned home, if Mr. Allan's
residence may so be termed. He reached Rich-
mond, Va., we have been informed, early in
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126
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
March, but too late to take a last farewell of his
adopted mother, she having died on the 27th of
February, and her funeral having taken place the
very day before Poe's return.
Mr. Allan does not appear to have manifested
any great pleasure at the prodigal's return, but
when Poe expressed his willingness to devote him-
self to the military profession, he exercised his in-
fluence and obtained a nomination for him to a
scholarship in the military academy at West Point.
As, according to the rules of that institution, ap-
pointments are not given to candidates after they
have atttained their twenty-first birth-day, the
young author, for such he now was, was only just
in time to secure his nomination. Meanwhile Poe
had published a litde volume of poems, his first
known essay in literature, under the title of "Al
Aaraaf, Tamerlane, and other poems.*' In 1831,
whilst still a cadet, he published an enlarged col-
lection of his boyish rhymes under the tide of
*' Poems by Edgar A. Poe."
Upon leaving West Point, Poe returned to Mr.
Allan's residence at Richmond, and appears to
have remained there some time on suiferance.
Soon after his return home he became attached to
Miss Royster, and was ultimately, it Is believed,
engaged to her. Mr. Allan, why it is not known,
was violently opposed to the match, and without
his pecuniary aid matrimony was out of the ques-
tion, as Poe was entirely dependent upon him. A
violent quarrel took place between the old man and
his adopted son, and Poe, unable to submit calmly
to the course of events, again left home, this time
with the intention of proceeding to Poland, to ex-
pend his energies in aiding the Poles in their
struggles against Russia. How far he got is not
known, but it is supposed that he did not leave
America, having been stopped by the intelligence
that, on the 6th of September, Warsaw had fallen,
carrying with it the last hopes of the Polish insur-
gents. In the meanwhile, as if to widen the
estrangement at home, Mr. Allan had taken unto
himself a young wife — **the beautiful Miss Pater-
son" — whilst Miss Royster, forgetful of her faith,
was married to a wealthy man, a Mr. Shelton.
Once more aimless, and probably resourceless, the
chivalric young poet again sought his native prov-
ince. Whether he returned to the home that was
home no more is uncertain, but, from what is known
of his proud spirit, it seems unlikely; if he did, i
however, his stay was of short duration, and his
godfather's second wife having given birth to a son
was the death-blow to Poe's prospects of succeed-
ing to the property.
Bankrupt in nearly everything, the unfortunate
poet now turned to literature as a means of obtain-
ing subsistence, but he found the waters of Helicon
were anything but Pactolian. Where he wandered,
and what he did, for nearly two years, still remains
an unravelled mystery, but it is alleged that some
of his finest stories were written during this epoch,
and, although accepted and published by magazine
editors, were scarcely ever paid for. In 1833 he is
heard of in Baltimore competing for prizes offered
by the proprietor of the Saturday Visitor for the
best prose story and the best poem. Here, then,
was an opportunity of deferring, for a while at
least, the starvation which was not far off. For the
competition, Poe selected and sent in six of his
stories, and his poem of "The Coliseum." Some
well-known literary men consented tp adjudicate
upon the mass of papers received, and after a care-
ful consideration of the various contributions,
decided unanimously that Poe, who was unknown
to them, was entitled to both premiums. In August
of 1834 a Mr. White, an energetic and accomplished
man, in opposition to the advice of his friends, com-
menced the publication of the Southern Literary
Messenger y in Richmond, Va. This magazine was
a very daring speculation at such a time and place,
and but for a fortunate accident might have placed
its promoter completely hors de combat. Amongst
the well-know writers whose aid he solicited was
Mr. Kennedy, and he, being fully engaged, advised
Poe to send something. Our poet did so, and Mr.
White, greatly pleased with his contributions, spoke
of them in very flattering terms, in March, 1835,
publishing ** Berenice." Henceforth Poe became
a regular monthly contributor to the Messenger,
In the June number of the magazine appeared
Poe's tale of "Hans Pfaall." Poe's reputation
was now increasing so rapidly that Mr. White
became desirous of retaining his services exclu-
sively for his magazine, and having sounded his
contributor, and found him only too willing, en-
gaged him to assist in the editorial duties of the
Messenger at a salary of about one hundred guineas
(520 dollars) per annum. In consequence of this ap-
pointment Poe at once removed from Baltimore to
Richmond, Virginia, where the magazine was pub-
lished. During the whole of 1836 Poe devoted his
entire attention to the Messenger y producing tales,
poems, essays, and reviews in profusion; indeed,
apparently at Mr. White's suggestion, frittering away
his genius over these last. E^rly in the year a gleam
of hope seemed to break in upon his chequered
career. In Richmond, once more among his kin-
dred, he met and married his cousin Virginia, the
daughter of his father's sister, Maria. Miss Clemm
was but a girl in years, and already manifested
symptoms of the family complaint, consumption,
but, undeterred by this or by his slender income^
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EDGAR ALLAN FOE.
127
the poor poet was married to his kinswoman, and,
it must be confessed, in happier circumstance, a
better helpmate could scarcely have been found for
him, while the marriage had the further advantage
of bringing him under the motherly care of his
aunt, Mrs. Clemm. Until January 1837, Poe con-
tinued the direction of the Messenger^ when he left
it for the more lucrative employment of assisting
Professors Anthon, Hawks, and Henry, in the
management of the New York Quarterly Review^
and, probably, to aid the first in his classical labors
— a work for which his scholarly attainments ren-
dered him invaluable.
From Richmond, Poe removed to New York,
where he and his household resided in Carmine
Street During January and February of this year
(1837) Poe contributed the first portions of "the
Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym" to the Mes-
senger, and, encouraged by the interest it excited,
he determined to complete it It was not published
in book form, however, until July of the following
year, and although it did not excite much attention
in America, it was very successful in England.
The independence which Poe had hoped to earn
by his pen was not obtainable in those days at New
York, and having prospect of constant employment
in Philadelphia, he removed to that city late in
1838, and entered into an arrangement to write for
the GenilematCs Magazine^ a publication of some
years' standing. His talents soon produced the
usual brilliant effects upon this publication, and in
May 1839 he was appointed to the editoral manage-
ment, "devoting to it," says Griswold, "for ten
dollars a week, two hours every day, which left him
abundant time for more important labors."
In the autumn of 1839, Poe made a collection of
his best stories, and published them in two volumes
as "Tales of the Arabesque and Grotesque."
Towards the close of 1840, Mr. George R. Gra-
ham, owner of The Casket^ acquired possession of
the Gentleman^ s Magazine^ and merging the two
publications into one, began the new series as Gra-
ham's Magazine, The new proprietor was only
too willing to retain the services of the brilliant
editor, and he found his reward in so doing.
In April, 1841, he published in Graham's Maga-
zine the tale of "The Murders in the Rue
Morgue," the first of a series illustrating another
analytic phase of his many-sided mind. This story
was the first to introduce his name to the French
public, being translated, and published as an orig-
inal story by Le Commerce^ under the title of
" L'Orang-Otang: " shortly afterwards it was trans-
lated again, and appeared in the pages of La
QuoHdienne, whereupon a cry of theft was raised, a
lawsuit instituted, and untimately the truth discov-
ered, that Edgar Poe, an American, was the author.
In 1842 appeared "The Descent into the Mael-
strom," a tale that in many respects may be
deemed one of his most marvelous and idiosyn-
cratic.
It was during his brilliant editorship of Graham^ s
Magazine that Poe discovered and first introduced
to the American public the genius of Elizabeth
Barrett Browning, and it was whilst he held sway
over it that she contributed to its pages many of
her shorter poems; indeed, it was greatly due to
Poe that her fame in America was coeval with, if it
did not somewhat precede, that won by her in her
native land. In May, 1841, he contributed to the
Philadelphia Saturday Evening Rost—SL paper
belonging to Mr. Graham, and for which Poe
wrote— that prospective notice of the newly-com-
menced story of "Bamaby Rudge," which drew
from Dickens a letter of admiring acknowledgment.
In this notice the poet with mathematical precision
explained and foretold the exact plot of the as yet
unwritten story.
In November, 1842, "The Mystery of Marie
Roget" appeared, and about the same time Poe
resigned his post of joint editor and reviewer of
Graham's Magazine, It was shortly previous to
this epoch in his life that he had the misfortune to
make the acquaintance of Rufus Griswold, a man
who, although several years Poe's junior in age,
had, by many years* " knocking about the world,"
gained an experience of its shifts and subterfuges
that made him far more than a match for the un-
worldly nature of our poet On seceding from
Graham's^ Poe seems to have endeavored to start
a magazine of his own, to be entitled The Stylus ^
and Mr. Thomas C. Clarke, of Philadelphia, was to
have been the publisher. The poet does not ap-
pear to have been enabled to obtain a sufficient
number of subscribers to start the projected public-
ation on a sound basis, and therefore the scheme fell
through. In the spring of 1843 the one hundred dol-
lar prize, offered by The Dollar Magazine, was ob-
tained by Poe for his tale of "The Gold-Bug," a
tale illustrative of and originating with his theory of
ciphers. During this year Poe wrote for Lowell's
Pioneer ^ and other publications. In 1844 he re-
moved to New York, whither his daily increasing
fame had already preceded him, and where he en-
tered into a more congenial literary atmosphere
than that in which he had recently resided.
Towards the autumn of the year Poe sought and
found employment as sub-editor and critic on the
Mirror^ a daily paper belonging to N. P. Willis
and General George Morris. Edgar Poe left the
Mirror to take charge of the Broadway Journal,
the sole management of which, however, did not
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1^8
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
devolve upon him until July, whilst it was not
until the following October that he became pro-
prietor as well as editor of this publication.
It was in the summer of 1846 that the poet re-
moved his dying wife to the quietude and repose
of the cottage at Fordham, Winchester County, near
New York. In January 1847 the poet's darling wife
died, and on a desolate dreary day her remains were
interred in a vault in the neighborhood, in accord-
ance with the permission of its owner. The loss of his
wife threw Poe into a melancholy stupor which lasted
for several weeks; but nature reasserting her
powers, he gradually resumed his wonted avoca-
tions. During the whole of the year the poet lived
a quiet, secluded life with his mother-in-law, receiv-
ing occasional visits from his friends and admirers,
musing over the memory of his lost Lenore, and
thinking out the great and crowning work of his
life — Eureka.
The winter of 1848-49, and the spring of the
latter year, Poe passed at Fordham, and during
this time he is alleged to have written a book en-
titled Phases of American Literature; Mr. M. A.
Daly states that he saw the complete work, but
the manuscript would seem to have disappeared.
In the summer, Poe revisited Richmond, and
spent between two and three months there,
during which time he delivered two lectures, in
the Exchange Concert-Room, on "The Poetic
Principal."
On the 4th of October he left Richmond by
train, with the intention, it is supposed, of going
to Fordham to fetch Mrs. Clemm. Before his
departure he complained to a friend of indis-
position, of chilliness and exhaustion, but, not-
withstanding, determined to undertake the journey.
He left the train at Baltimore, and some hours later
was discovered in the street insensible. How he had
been taken ill no one really knows, and all the ab-
surd reports circulated about his last moments were
absolute inventions. He was dying when found,
and, being unknown, was taken at once to the
Hospital, where he died on Sunday the 7th of Octo-
ber, 1849, of inflammation of the brain, insensible,
it is supposed, to the last. The following day he
was buried in the burial ground of Westminister
Church, close by the grave of his grandfather.
General David Poe. G. R. G.
THE RAVEN.
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered,
weak and weary,
Over many a quaint and curious volume of for-
gotten lore.
While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there
came a tapping,
As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my
chamber door.
***Tis some visitor," I muttered, "tapping at my
chamber door —
Only this and nothing more."
Ah! distinctly I remember it was in the bleak
December,
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost
upon the floor.
Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had sought
to borrow
From my books surcease of sorrow — sorrow for
the lost Lenore —
For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels
name Lenore —
Nameless here for evermore.
And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each pur-
ple curtain
Thrilled me, filled me with fantastic terrors never
felt before;
So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I
stood repeating
"'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my
chamber door,
Some late visitor entreating entrance at my
chamber door;
This it is and nothing more."
Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then
no longer,
" Sir," said I, "or Madam, truly your forgiveness
I implore;
But the fact is I was napping, and so gendy you
came rapping,
And so faindy you came tapping, tapping at my
chamber door,
That I scarce was sure I heard you " — ^here I
opened wide the door.
Darkness there and nothing more.
Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood
there wondering, fearing,
Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever
dared to dream before;
But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness
gave no token,
And the only word there spoken was the whis-
pered word, " Lenore? "
This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the
word, * * Lenore !* * —
Merely this and nothing more.
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'^oe
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EDGAR ALLAN POE,
131
Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within
me burning,
Soon again I heard a tapping something louder
than before.
"Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my
window lattice;
Let me see, then, what thereat is and this mystery
explore,
Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery
f explore;
*Tis the wind and nothing more.**
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a
flirt and flutter.
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly
days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute
stopped or stayed he.
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my
chamber door.
Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my
chamber door,
Perched, and sat, and nothing more.
Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into
smiling,
By the grave and stem decorum of the countenance
it wore,
"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou,** I
said, " art sure no craven.
Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from
the Nightly shore.
Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night*s
Plutonian shore!"
Quoth the Raven, " Nevermore.**
Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear dis-
course so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning — little relevancy
bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human
being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his
chamber door,
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his
chamber door.
With such name as " Nevermore.**
But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust,
spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he
did outpour
Nothing farther then he muttered; not a feather
then he fluttered,
Till I scarcely more than muttered " Other friends
have flown before,
On the morrow he will leave me, as my Hopes
have flown before,**
Then the bird said " Nevermore.**
Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly
spoken,
"Doubtless,** said I, "what it utters is its only
stock and store
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmer-
ciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one
burden bore,
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden
bore
Of 'Never— nevermore.* **
But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into
smiling.
Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of
bird and bust and door;
Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to
linking
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous
bird of yore,
What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and
ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking "Nevermore.**
This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable
expressing
To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my
bosom*s core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at
ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light
gloated o'er.
But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light
gloating o*er
She shall press, ah, nevermore!
Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed
from an unseen censer
Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the
tufted floor.
"Wretch,** I cried, "thy God hath lent thee— by
these angels he hath sent thee
Respite — respite and nepenthe from thy memories
of Lenore!
Quaff", oh quaff" this kind nepenthe and forget this
lost Lenore!'*
Quoth- the Raven, "Nevermore.**
"Prophet!** said I, "thing of evil! prophet still, il
bird or devil!
Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed
thee here ashore,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land
enchanted,
On this home by horror haunted — tell me truly, I
implore —
Is there — is there balm in Gilead ? — ^tell me — ^tell me
I implore!"
Quoth the Raven, *' Nevermore."
"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil— prophet still, if
bird or devil!
By that Heaven that bends above us — ^by that God
we both adore —
Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the dis-
tant Aidenn,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels
name Lenore —
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels
name Lenore."
Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore."
" Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!"
I shrieked, upstarting —
" Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's
Plutonian shore!
Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy
soul hath spoken!
Leave my loneliness unbroken! — quit the bust
above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy
form from off my door!"
Quolii the Raven, " Nevermore."
And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is
sitting
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber
door;
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's
that is dreaming
And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his
shadow on the floor;
And my soul from out that shadow that lies float-
ing on the floor
Shall be lifl:ed — ^nevermore!
LENORE.
Ah, broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown
forever!
Let the bell toll! — a saintly soul floats on the Stygian
river;
And, Guy De Vere, hast thou no tear? — weep now
or never more!
See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love,
Lenore!
Come! let the burial rite be read, the funeral song
be sung,
An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died
so young —
A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so
young.
"Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated
her for her pride,
And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed
her— that she died!
How shall the ritual, then, be read? the requienk.
how be sung
By you— by yours, the evil eye,— by yours, the
slanderous tongue
That did to death the innocence that died, and died
so young?"
Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and let a Sabbatb
song
Go up to God so solemnly the dead may feel no>
wrong!
The sweet Lenore hath "gone before," with Hope,.
that flew beside.
Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should
have been thy bride —
For her, the fair and debonair^ that now so lowly
lies,
The life upon her yellow hair but not within her
eyes.
The life still there, upon her hair— the death upon
her eyes.
"Avaunt! to-night my heart is light No dirge will
I upraise,
But waft the angel on her flight with a psean of old
days!
Let no bell toll!— lest her sweet soul, amid its
hallowed mirth.
Should catch the note, as it doth float up from the
danmM Earth.
To friends above, from friends below, the indignant
ghost is riven —
From Hell unto a high estate far up within the
Heaven —
From grief and groan, to a golden throne, beside
The King of Heaven."
THE BELLS.
Hear the sledges with the bells —
Silvery bells!
What a world of merriment their melody fortellsl
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;
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EDGAR ALLAN POE.
133
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To tiie tintinabulation tiiat so musically welb
From tiie bells, bells, bells, bells
Belb, bells, bells—
From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
Hear the mellow wedding bells.
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony fortells!
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 turtie-dove 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 tiie bells, bells, bells,
Of tiie bells, bells, bells, bells.
Bells, bells, bells—
To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!
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 aflright!
Too much horrified to speak,
They can only shriek, shriek.
Out of tune,
In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a made expostulation with the deep and frantic
fare
Leaping higher, higher, higher.
With a desperate desire,
And a resolute endeavor
Now — now to sit or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
Oh, the bells, bells, bells!
What a tale their terror tells
Of Despair!
How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour
On the bosom of the palpitating airl
Yet the ear it fully knows,
By the twanging.
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 tiie bells, bell, bells, bells.
Bells, bells, bells—
In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!
Hear the tolling of the bells —
Iron bells!
What a word of solemn thought their monody com-
pels!
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 paean from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the paean of the bells!
And he dances and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time.
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the paean 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 the knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme.
To the rolling of the bells—
Of the bells, bells, bells—
To the tolling of tiie bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells-
Bells, bells, bells—
To the moaning and groaning of the bells.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
FOR ANNIE.
Thank Heaven! the crisis—
The danger is past,
And the lingering illness
Is over at last—
And the fever called *' Living "
Is conquered at last.
Sadly, I know
I am shorn of my strength,
And no muscle I move
As I lie at full length,
But no matter! — I feel
I am better at length.
And I rest so composed.
Now, in my bed,
That any beholder
Might fancy me dead —
Might start at beholding me,
Thinking me dead.
The moaning and groaning,
The sighing and sobbing,
Are quieted now,
With that horrible throbbing
At heart: — ^ah, that horrible,
Horrible throbbing!
The sickness, the nausea.
The pitiless pain,
Have ceased, with the fever
That maddened my brain —
With the fever called ** Living "
That burned in my brain.
And oh! of all tortures
That torture the worst
Has abated — ^the terrible
Torture of thirst
For the napthaline river
Of Passion accurst: —
I have drank of a water
That quenches all thirst: —
Of a water that flows.
With a lullaby sound.
From a spring but a very few
Feet under ground —
From a cavern not very far
Down under ground.
And ah! let it never
Be foolishly said
That my room it is gloomy
And narrow my bed;
For man never slept
In a different bed —
And, to sleepy you must slumber
In just such a bed.
My tantalized spirit
Here blandly reposes,
Forgetting, or never
Regretting its roses —
Its old agitations
Of myrdes and roses:
For now, while so quietly
Lying, it fancies
A holier odor
At>out it, of pansies —
A rosemary odor.
Commingled with pansies —
With rue and the beautiful
Puritan pansies.
And so it lies happily.
Bathing in many
A dream of the truth
And the beauty of Annie —
Drowned in a bath
Of the tresses of Annie.
She tenderly kissed me,
She fondly caressed,
And then I fell gently
To sleep on her breast —
Deeply to sleep
From the heaven of her breast.
When the light was extinguished.
She covered me warm,
And she prayed to the angels
To keep me from harm —
To the queen of the angels
To shield me from harm.
And I lie so composedly,
Now, in my bed,
(Knowing her love)
That you fancy me dead —
And I rest so contentedly.
Now in my bed,
(With her love at my breast)
That you fancy me dead —
That you shudder to look at me,
Thinking me dead: —
But my heart it is brighter
Than all of the many
Stars in the sky,
For it sparkles with Annie —
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• ^. * • • ^
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CHARLES R MARKELL,
137
It glows with the light
Of the love of my Annie —
With the thought of the light
Of the eyes of my Annie.
ANNABEL LEE.
It was many and many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived whom you may know
By the name of ANNABEL LEE;
And this maiden she lived with no other thought
Than to love and be loved by me.
ywas a child and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea:
3ut we loved with a love that was more than love —
I and my ANNABEL LEE;
With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful ANNABEL LEE;
So that her highborn kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels, not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me —
Yes! — ^that was the reason (as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea)
That the wind came out of the cloud by night.
Chilling and killing my ANNABEL LEE.
But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we —
Of many far wiser than we —
And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
•Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE:
For the moon never beams, without bringing me
dreams
Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE;
And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful ANNABEL LEE;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling— my darling— my life and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
CHARLES F. MARKELL.
THE Markells of Maryland represent one of the
oldest and most distinguished families in the
Commonwealth, its lineage being traceable back to
the sixteenth century. The house is of Franco-
Prussian origin, and from an old parchment in the
possession of the subject of this sketch it is learned
that the name was primitively spelled Marc-kell and
that its ancestry did honorable service in the armies
of Frederick William I. of Prussia and Louis XV.
of France. But the fires of patriotism which burned
upon the hearthtsones of the father-land lost none
of their lustre when transplanted to American soil
and upon the military annals of the Revolution and
and war of 181 2 the name is found conspicuous in
the cause of freedom and defense of liberty.
Charles Frederick Markell was bom in Frederick
City, Md., October i6th, 1855 and locating, at an
early age, with his parents, in the South, received
an academic and collegiate education, graduating
in 1874. From the Law Department of the Colum-
bian University, Washington D. C. he was gradu-
ated, before attaining his majority with the highest
honors, in 1876, where his legal essay was awarded
the first competitive prize of forty dollars in gold.
He was admitted to practice at the Bar of the Su-
preme Court of the District of Columbia, and after
making an extended tour of Europe, returned to
his native city where he has since been engaged in
the active prosecution of his profession. Mr. Mar-
kell represented his county in the Maryland Legis-
lature in 1884, where he served upon some of the
most important committees and won the reputation
of being the most polished speaker of that body.
For three years he owned and edited a daily Repub-
lican newspaper and, being a fine orator and thor-
oughly conversant with the political issues of the
day has always been active upon the rostrum in the
advocacy of his party faith.
Literary in his tastes and studious in his habits,
he has devoted much of his leisure time to the mas-
tering of modem languages, historical investigation
and local and biographical sketching. In 1886 ap-
peared a small volume entitled ^'Chamodine" a
collection of Mr. Markell' s poems designed only for
circulation among his coterie of friends several se-
lections from which received the warmest encomi-
ums of one of America's most venerable poets.
Possessed of an intense imagination, bordering upon
the wierd and melancholy, he is endowed with a
strange combination of strong dramatic instinct and
delicious versatile humor, and no one listening to
his sparkling passes in polemics, his apt response at
repartee and vivacity of conversation, would suspect
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
or recognize the stratum of deep pathos and sad
phase of his nature that reveals itself in all of his
poetic writings. Mr. Markell was appointed by
President Harrison, in July, 1892, Secretary of Le-
gation at Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. C. S. T.
MY LITTLE GIRL.
My little girl with fluttering heart
Creeps nestling to my bosom.
And trembles, as before the wind
The fragile spring-time blossom.
As some poor bird whose homeward wing
The cruel shot has riven,
She rests at last, dear frightened child,
And asks to be forgiven.
O precious one, could you but know
How void life is without thee;
How dull its sunshine and its fields,
You ne'er again would doubt me.
Then, dear girl, let my bosom be
Henceforth thy home and heaven;
The bitter past we*ll both forget,
Forgiving and forgiven.
CATOCTIN.
Athwart the grain-clad fields and meadows teem-
ing*
Catoctin, old mountain, as thy shadows fall,
They set my soul to throbbing and to dreaming.
And close around me as a melancholy pall.
At mom thy moss-clad crown glints soft in glory,
When mellow dawn first casts its purple ray;
At noon thy peaks repeat thy silent story
And breathe again thy song at vesper's sway.
Upon thy grassy slopes the sunlight, vieing
With drifting clouds, weaves shadows all the day.
Where bending gems in undried dews are lying
Till noontide wipes the tears of heaven away.
How oft thy brow, in hues of pearl and amber.
Glows ere the lingering ray would say good
night,
Or, bursting roseate from its eastern chamber.
It wraps thee in its soft seductive light
Again, within the melting twilight fading,
As some sad spirit of the coming gloom;
Or genii in their silent watch parading.
Condemned to watch until the break of doom,
Thou risest, with thy dark and deep'ning shadow
Flung round thee as a cloak of blissful rest,
Upon the moor, the fallow and the meadow,
The sleeping hamlet and the river's breast
Perched on thy craggy cliff the eagle gazing.
Scans the glad valley resting at thy feet.
Upon the upland sward, the cattle grazing,
Break the deep hush with lowing, softly sweet
And, when they one by one, tired out with roaming.
Wind slowly homeward through the dying light.
Thy outlines pale, and melting in the gloaming.
Blend in the sombre shadings of the night
Through all the night the whip-poor-will is crying.
Its name the only burthen of its lay.
Within thy glens the wandering brook is sighing.
And sighing breathes its song and self away.
And now, when all is peace, and stars above me
Shine softly down, night winds make piteous
moan;
I come to thee, old mount, to say I love thee;
Love every tree, each rill, each path, each stone.
There was a time when shot and shell, Catoctin,
Bathed thee in floods of fire, of steel, of gore;
When every trembling crag and cliff was rocked in
The murderous belchings from Antietam's moor.
Many a limb and heart, grown tired of aching.
Succumbed to die within thy mossy glades;
Craving for rest, nor caring for the waking;
Their dust reposes 'neath thy guardian shades.
Although historic name of Harper's Ferry,
Of old South Mountain, and of Crampton's Gap,
Are told with thine in war's immortal story,
And place thee in the pale of glory's lap;
'Tis not for these, Catoctin, that I love thee;
Beneath thy shadows wont to play was I,
When life was bright as thy proud peak above me;
Beneath thy shadows may my ashes lie.
ONCE AGAIN.
Once again the leaves are falling,
Once again the Autumn's here.
All day long the wind's been calling;
Calling to the fading year.
Once again the grassy mountain
Glints in blue and brown and gold;
And the dreamy haze of Autumn
Wraps it in its purple fold.
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CHARLES R MARKELL,
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Once again the river's sighing
'Mid the hilb of Linganore:
'Mid the rustling and the dying
Leaves that drift across the moor.
Once again the flocks are coming
From the hillsides bare and brown,
To the warm fold, and the gloaming
O'er the fond scene nestles down.
Once again within that gloaming
Pants my heart as if 'twould break,
Over old scenes sadly roaming.
Scenes of which I dare not speak.
Once again the leaves are falling.
Once again the Autunm's here;
All day long my heart's been calling.
Can its pleadings reach you, dear ?
RESTING.
When sleep shall close each weary lid
And cease this tired heart's aching;
When 'neath the grasses I lie hid
In rest that knows no breaking;
When grief and sorrow all are o'er
And care is unmolesting,
I'll only ask to know no more
Than that I'm resting, resting.
'Neath summer suns and winter snows,
Autumnal dews and vernal,
I'll rest in bliss no mortal knows;
For rest will be eternal.
THE MISSION.
Thou limped stream, that laughing flows,
Through mountain, moor and meadow,
By bending fern and clamb'ring rose,
'Neath drooping willow's shadow.
'Tween summer banks of fading hay.
With shade and sunlight laden.
Beside thy tides, far, far away.
There dwells a dark-eyed maiden.
I listen to thy sobbing wave,
I hear the tall pines sighing;
While as a voice bom of the grave.
The sad night-bird is crying.
And as I stand beside thy crest.
The wind a wild rose scatters;
I clasp and press it to my breast.
Then fling it on thy waters.
So dark and deep, O Shenandoah,
With spirit-music swelling;
The frail bark bear thy bosom o'er,
And moor at Rosa's dwelling.
Speed, tiny craft, thy coursing fleet.
Lost now within the gloaming;
Go kiss the beach at Rosa's feet.
And tell her that I'm coming.
And should she pluck thee from the wave.
Thou water-ravished blossom.
To place thee on a luscious grave,
Her white, warm, pulsing bosom.
Then bid her breathe a thought of me,
An angels o'er her hover;
O wild rose, to thy namesake flee.
And tell her that I love her.
SWEETHEART.
Too frail, too false, too faithless to befriend me;
Uncraving, e'en uncaring to defend me;
But when the griefs and trials of life beset thee.
Oh! tell me, sweetheart, canst thou then forget
me?
No, no! my stricken heart shall not reprove thee:
It simply breaths its silent song, '' I love thee;"
And though false friends may teach thee now to
doubt me
And all the pain it brings to live without thee;
Yet when the bloom of fancy 'gins to fade thee
And conscience tender speaks but to upbraid
thee.
E'en then, sweetheart, thou may'st not regret
me.
But then— oh then, thou canst not, sweet, forget
me.
HESTER.
An angel strayed from Heaven's gate
Just after God had blessed her;
And wand'ring off, returned too late;
On earth they call her Hester.
While blessings holy 'round her roll,
A spirit o'er her hovers:
The guardian of that saintiy soul
Her earthly image covers.
But God will call her back to Him
From those who've here caressed her;
For heaven would lose its purest gem
If it should shut out Hester.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
CHARLOTTE FISKE BATES.
CHARLOTTE FISKE BATES, was born in
New York, 30th November, 1838. Her father
died during her infancy, and her home, from the time
she was in her eighth year almost up to her marriage
was with her mother and family in Cambridge,
the Cambridge which is not now on land or sea,
inhabited by such a race of scholars and poets
as her green elms shall not see again. Miss
Bates attended the public schools of the town,
and then engaged herself for twenty-five years in
private teaching. She began to write at eighteen,
and her first paid efibrts appeared in the pages of
"Our Young Folks.'* There is extant but one
volume of her verse, "Risk and Other Poems,"
issued in 1879, though she has much in manuscript
awaiting publication, and contributes occassionally
to the periodicals. She has made two compilations
from the work of her friend, Longfellow, and to his
memory was dedicated her last gift to the reader,
"The Cambridge Book of Poetry and Song, * ' a large
critical collection of British and American verse bear-
ing the date of 1882, to which its publishers gave a
pretty, but too local name. It was arranged en-
tirely by herself; all the laborious details, save only
the indexes, are the outcome of one woman's
unassisted energy, during a period of fifteen
months, or rather, of such leisure as she could
spare, meanwhile, from many pressing duties.
Her life has been a busy and quiet one, diver-
sified during her literature, teaching days in
a celebrated school in her native city, by the
tragic-comedy of her reported death which most
readers will remember. Despite the impend-
ing doom declared one night, by the physi-
cians, she survived a well-nigh fatal attack ot
pneumonia, so that the recording angel has no such
entry as that which figures in Mr. Douglas Sladen's
" Younger American Poets." As Don Adriano says,
in his mischief, " the catastrophy is a nuptial." Miss
Bates, a year and a half afterward, contracted a post-
humous marriage with M. Adolphe-Edouard Rog6,
of New York City, which is certainly in every sense,
a marriage made in heaven. She has done much for
good causes, in this world, especially for those con-
nected with her art, and has proved herself, once
at least, a successful organizer. Alone, and under
difficulties, she carried out the author's reading
in Sander's Theater, Cambridge, which ad-
ded a loyal emphasis and a considerable sum to
the Longfellow memorial fund, and which won the
warmest thanks of its official leaders. She has
given some admirable lectures and readings of her
own. In the literary air of Boston, she has been a
familiar figure for many years; an observant
woman with a free and spontaneous mental life,
and a manner full of sincere, genial kindness.
Chadotte Fiske Bates has "a learned and a manly
soul; " a republican, a poet, and a Christian.
L. I. G.
RISK.
In the quiet of the evening
Two are walking in unrest;
Man has touched a jealous nature, —
Anger bums in woman's breast.
These are neither wed nor plighted.
Yet the maybe hangs as near
And as fragrant as the wild-rose
Which their garments hardly clear.
And as briery, too, you fancy ?
Well, perhaps so— some sad mom
One or both may, for a moment,
Wish they never had been bom.
Happy quips and honest pleadings
Meet with silence or a sneer;
But more keenly has she listened
Since she vowed she would not hear.
Now a great oak parts the pathway.
" Nature gratifies your mood:
To the right, — let this divide you;
It will all be understood."
So Caprice, with childish weakness,
Yet with subtley of thought,
Whispered in the ear of woman.
Love, with dread, the answer sought^
Was it superstitious feeling
Strack at once the hearts of two?
Had he seen proud eyes half-sorry
For what little feet must do ?
For he stretched an arm towards her,.
Folding nothing but the air.
Saying nothing,— just the motion
Drew, without offending there.
In the quiet of the evening
Two are walking back again;
At the oak their happy voices
Whisper of a vanished pain.
What if they to-night be plighted,
And the maybe hangs more near
And more fragrant than the wild-rose
Which their garments hardly clearL
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CHARLOTTE FISKE BATES.
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And more briery, too, you fancy!
Well, perhaps so. Thorns are ill,
But Love draws them out so kindly,
One must trust him, come what will.
UNHINDERED.
Far westward is a snow-bound train;
Eastward, a soul is saying,
"Though I have looked so long in vain
This is not love's delaying;
For I have such a certain sense
Of answer: it is prescience."
The letter, fh>m its barriers free,
Hastes to the love that waited.
Lol its first words: *' So dose are we.
That, if by snow belated,
This message you are sure to feel
The day before you break the seal."
O ye, that never dwell apart.
Though half a globe may sever,
Thus will it be, when heart to heart
Can show no sign forever!
Though death-snows loom like Himalay,
Yet soul to soul, unbarred, will fly.
JUNE SONG FOR THE OLD.
The June is sweet with rose and song.
And all fair things to her belong.
Our sky is gray, and hers is blue;
Pray what have we with her to do ?
Both naught and everything by right;
For June, with her transfusive might.
Quickening old Nature through and through.
Makes all things, even old hearts, new.
HOW LIFrS DARK IS LIGHTED.
The day was black with clouds and care,
No touch of brightness anywhere;
God seemed a myth, and life a thing
To which fear only made me cling.
I looked within, I looked without.
But nothing saw to light my doubt.
' Oh, for the comfort of that friend.
Now at the earth's remotest end!
In such a frame, just he alone
Could, with his strength, my spirit tone,
Or, through his kindred feeling, give
A solace to this life I live."
Thus ran my thought, but like the wind
A strange, strong force swept close behind:
It swept the half of self from me.
And nerved my soul for mastery.
Doubt stood and questioned, " Is it God
Speaking thy soul from out the clod ? "
" No time for parleying," I said;
** Enough, I live, so lately dead.
True life, what is it but the thrust
Of all but duty in the dust;
The souPs brave motion; on, right on,
Without a prop to lean upon ? "
The wind-like Power that swept me through
Moved me a simple deed to do:
To rise from out that dark of doom
And seek the nearest sufferer's room.
Nor looked I then without, within,
Nor dwelt on clouds, or care, or sin;
And, though the eye and hand alert
For others' sorrows, left my hurt.
That hurt held nothing of despair.
Nothing that I was loath to bear;
Nay, I no longer hated pain,
Since now I did not live in vain;
And saw all coming ill might be
God's challenge to fresh victory:
So high the sense, that come what might,
For self I lived not, but the right;
That, should death disappoint me even.
Unselfishness could be my heaven.
UNSAID.
For days and weeks upon the lip has hung
A precious something for an absent ear;
Some tender confidence but lately sprung.
Some dear confession that but one must hear.
The heart repeats it over day by day,
And fancies how and when the words will fall;
What answering smile upon the face will play,
What tender light will linger over all.
But eager eyes that watch for one alone
May grow reluctant; for the open gate
Lets in, with him, perchance a guest unknown.
On whom slow words of courtesy must wait.
Or when the presence waited for has come,
It may be dull or cold, too sad or light;
A look that shows the heart away from home
Can often put the dearest words to flight.
Perhaps the time of meeting, or the form.
May chill or wither what we longed to say;
What fits the sunshine will not fit the storm.
What blends with twilight, jars with noon of day.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Again, when all things seem our wish to serve,
Full opportunity may strike us dumb,—
May sink our precious thoughts in deep reserve,
And to the surface bid the lightest come.
And often ere our friend is out of sight.
We start; the thing can scarce be credited, —
We have been silent, or our words been trite,
And here's the dearest thing of all unsaid!
IN MARCH.
While icy winds so pierce me to the core,
One thought can keep me sunny as the south;
That spring is not behind, but just before—
The one soft rapture missed at June's red mouth.
Full as she is in every other bliss,
Her heaven of roses shuts the spring away.
Large my content, on such a day as this.
That Ripeness is not looking toward Decay,
But Desolution looking forth to Life.
Oh I that my soul esteemed her seasons so;
Prizing sweet passions less than final strife,
With its one hope of all beyond the snow!
INTIMATIONS OF GENIUS.
A HAWTHORN bough in full and snowy bloom;
Strange birds that flitted ever by the ship;
Built on a broken branch, a little nest
Upon whose eggs brooded the parent bird;
Things unfamiliar floating on the tide-
All these to great Columbus gave the sign
Of the new land he was about to touch.
Such sights are manifold with thee, my soul!
Such hints are breaking on thine eager eye.
Strange fancies brood or else go winging past;
Fresh forms and growths of Nature's life appear;
Things old as time, yet to the old world, new;
The new expressions of accustomed thought.
Thou art already on a new world's verge,
That mighty world is Genius— ah! but know
Thou canst expect no better fate than his
Who found that other! poverty, neglect,
Follow the fate of him who finds a world.
Whether it be of matter or of thought.
Not now, not here, will be thy claim allowed.
But long years hence when thou hast left thy clay,
And all thy shackles moulder with its dusL
Then shall men know the greatness of thy work,
The littleness of those that lived with thee.
Through mortal hurts, immortal glories come, —
Push on to kneel upon thy new-found shore.
And take possession in thy Sovereign's name!
KATE McPHEUM CLEARY.
KATE McPHELIM was bom in Richibucto,
Kent county, N. B., August 20th, 1863. Her
parents, James and Margaret McPhelim, were ot
Irish birth, the former with his brothers being dis-
tinguished for intellectual ability and business tal-
ents. They were extensively engaged in the timber
business, and in 1856 her uncle, the Hon. Frauds
McPhelim was Postmaster-General of New Bruns-
wick, and her father held the office of high sheriff
of the county. Her father's death, in 1865, left his
widow with three small children and not very
ample means, which she devoted to their education.
In later years she was well repaid by the success
that attended their literary efforts. Kate was edu-
cated at the Sacred Heart Convent, St. John, N.
B., and later attended other convent schools in
this country and in the old. Her pen which had
been a source of diversion and delight to her since
she was a little girl, became, when necessity re-
quired, an easy means of support. Her first pub-
lished poem iq>peared when she was fourteen years
old, and from that time to the present she has
written almost Continuously poetry and fiction.
On February 26th, 1884, she was married to Michael
T. Cleary, a young lumber merchant of Hubbell,
Neb. Mr. and Mrs. Cleary have kept a hospitable
home, welcoming as guests many distinguished
men and women. Mrs. Cleary's stories are largely
those of adventure and incident, and are published
in newspapers quite as much as magazines. Her
verses are delicate and often humorous and they
are, above all, musical. Frank, unaffected and
vivacious, Mrs. Cleary is a woman who would be
noted anywhere for kindness of heart and clear
cleverness of perception. She is a woman of
thorough adaptability and is equally happy in
society or solitude. She has three little children,
whom she personally cares for. As a housewife
she is more than thorough; she is original and
experimental. Her face is comely, her height is
medium, and her manners are cordial and simple.
C. W. M.
THE CORN.
When the merry April mom
Laughed the mad March winds to scorn.
In the swirl of sun and showers
Were a million legions bom;
Ranked in rippled rows of green,
With a dusky ridge between.
O'er the western world was seen,
The great army of the com.
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KATE McPHELIM CLEAR Y.
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And when in May-time days,
The buttercups' gold blaze
FireJfiy-like flashed o'er hill and hollow
And the pleasant prairie ways;
Each battalion from the sod,
Flags a-flutter and a-nod,
Nearer heaven, nearer God,
Crept to proflfer perfect praise.
And when the June-time heat
Over all the land did fleet,
The melody of meadow-larks
In mellow music beat
Martial measures, to beguile
The royal rank and file,
That kept growing all the while.
To the sounds serene and sweet.
When the fierce sun of July
Rode relentlessly on high,
And in the creeks the water bright
All drop by drop ran dry;
And, as from a furnace mouth,
The hot wind of the south,
Racked the com with cruel drouth,
It seemed that it would die.
But the nights benign and blue
Brought the blessed balm of dew,
And baptized the com in beauty,
Ever fresh and ever new;
Till, in amber August light,
'Twas so golden that you might
Fancy Midas touched the bright,
Tender tassels it out-threw.
Now the sweet September's here,
And the plover pipeth clear,
And each shattered sheath of satin
Holds a guerdon of good cheer;
And the com all ripe and high.
Taller far than you or I,
Standeth spear-like to the sky,
In the sunset of the year!
DRIFTING DOWN.
Gone the ripple and the rushes
Of the love-songs of the thmshes,
Gone the roses in the closes of the garden, and the
blushes
Of the shy verbena creeping
By the old south wall, and steeping
AH its sweetness in the sunshine of the sleepy
summer hushes.
And ever o'er it all, in a gold and crimson pall.
Over mignonette grown tawny, and o'er grass a
bronzing brown,
With a rustle and a whir, and a sad and solemn
stir,
The leaves are drifting down, dear, oh, the leaves
are drifting down.
Come the mornings g^ay and chilly,
Come the nights serene apd stilly.
Comes an airy midnight fairy, tracing fern, and
rose, and lily.
On the window-panes that glisten,
While in dreams the children listen
To the swing of skates that ring, and shouts that
echo shrilly.
And ever, ever still, in the hollow, on the hill,
By the roadside, where the sun-flower lifts aloft a
ruined crown.
Like the dear old dreams of youth, dreams of
honor, fame and tmth,
Foreiver falling from us — do the leaves keep drift-
ing down.
Let the summer set in splendor.
Let the summer tribute render
Bridelike beauty, bridelike duty, every charm di-
vine and tender,
To the conquering king, who loudly
All in trumpet tones and proudly
Tells the story of his captive, and her passionate
surrender.
And with the leaves that fall, in a rich and royal
pall,
O'er the rose-heart's cmmbled crimson, and the
grass grown dull and brown.
Let the bitterness, the strife, all the little ills of
life,
Go drifting, drifting down, dear — with the leaves
go drifting down!
BEFORE THE BAL MASQUE.
And so you have found an old progranmie.
Throw it away, my dear;
In its silken sheath it has lain there hid.
In that old box with the sandal-wood lid.
This many and many a year.
Let us look! A galop with George Bellair.
Bless you, he's tamer now;
A decorous deacon, and leads at prayer.
And, just to look at him, one would swear
To dance he never knew how.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
And Robert! Ah, little that night I dreamed
That his wife I should be;
I was only a child, and the future beamed,
Golden-glamoured and golden-gleamed,
But a foolish child, you see.
That line's illegible — ^pass it over
To this, then— Philip Keene;
A loyal lover, a reckless rover,
Poor boy, beneath the Western clover
His sleep is sweet, I ween.
And this quadrille was with Devere
We use to vote so slow,
Strange and silent, and rather queer,
But the critics trumpet his praise this year,
For his books are the rage, you know.
Can we read the last waltz, faint and blurred ?
Quick! Quick! Take it away!
Charlie! yes, he went at my word,
And at Alexandria, so I have heard,
He died — a hero, they say.
Hark! thrust it deep in the fire — again!
Hear that tread in the hall!
Ah, Robert! a touch of the same old pain,
Nothing more; *twill not remain;
I'm ready, dear, for the ball!
A JAPANESE VASE.
A TIMID little lover, in an attitude of grace,
With a funny little simper on his funny little face;
And a robe of green and amber, and a deferential
air,
And a crown upon his forhead does the little lover
wear;
And I know that he is thinking
Thoughts the sweetest lover can,
Though he silent as a sphinx is
On the vase from far Japan.
And the little lady near him is sedately looking
down,
At the dainty, drifting drapery of her gayly-glowing
gown;
And her hair is smoothly knotted on her pretty little
head,
And her eyes are slanting upward, and her mouth
is rosy red;
As she shyly seems to listen
To the timid little man.
Who is paying her his homage.
On the vase from far Japan.
All around them roses blossom, such as never
elsewhere grew;
Birds above, that in no other clime or country ever
flew;
And foreign fruits hang heavily from slenderest of
stems.
And golden wings of butterflies are crusted thick
with gems;
And the tints of all are tangled
In the tracery on the fan,
Of the coy, coquettish lady,
On the vase from far Japan.
Mine the miracle and magic of the world beyond
the seas.
For I feel the breath and brilliance of the land ot
balm and bees;
And the budding boughs are rustling just without
my window-pane —
Or is it but the patter of the weary winter rain ?
And back to bleak Nebraska,
Must I stumble as I can,
Where upon my desk is glowing
An old vase from far Japan.
TIRED.
Just when all dusky and dreary
Creep up the shadows, and cheery
Flash out the lights, all aweary,
Comes a wee maiden and sweet;
Climbs on my knee in the gloaming.
Tired of romping and roaming;
**Oh, mamma," low murmurs the darling,
"I's tired from head to my feet!"
Hushed is the laughter and singing
That set the house chiming and ringing;
Still the soft arms that are clinging
Warm round my neck, and the fleet,
Light little limbs that were flying.
Till daylight in darkness was dying.
And the frolicsome bit of a baby
Was tired from head to her feet
When with some sunset is ended
The life we once meant to make splendid,
In which gladness and sadness were blended^
Which we vowed to perfect and complete;
Oh, may we meet dealii as a mother,
Only less dear than our other.
To hush us to beautiful slumber
When tired from head to the feet!
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LUCY LARCOM,
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LUCY LARCOM.
ONE of the most curious phases in the life of
the New England people, and one that must
puzzle the future historian of letters, is their sudden
intellectual growth or blossoming, half a century
ago. Emerson says; "The children of New Eng-
ird between 1820 and 1840 were bom with knives
in their trains; " and this would seem to be true as
far as their literary, or thought life is concerned,
since, during, or very near that time were bom the
majority of our best writers and thinkers, those who
have so well and finally answered the question so
scornfully asked by an unknown English writer,—
"Who reads an American book?" This period
can hardly be called the renaissance or revival of
letters, since American authors had no name in
history; the founders of the country having as yet
had very little time for the expression of their
thoughts, being perhaps too busy in living
them, or in getting a scanty subsistance, or in
meeting the exceptional hardships of their lives.
The seeds of this) intellectual growth came sud-
denly, as if blown from some far off cultured land
and were sown broad-cast. They fell not only in
high but also in shady places and in most
unpromising ground. Some found a restiiig-place
in a little comer of New England where were
gathered together many young women, daughters
of the Puritans, who came there for the purpose of
earning their daily bread. The books of our
American writers, particularly the poets, then pub-
lishing, were read eagerly; those women soon
began to feel the intellectual impetus, and amid
their long days work in the cotton mill, they thought
over and digested what they had read and some of
them were impelled to put in writing their own
thoughts. The poets— Bryant, Longfellow, Emer-
son, John Pierpont, Mrs. Sigoumey, Lowell and
Whittier had great influence over the young people
of the day. We loved those poets well, and no one
can over-estimate the value of their books in bring-
ing an ideal element into our hitherto prosaic New
England life.
It was in this atmosphere that Lucy Larcom
received the lasting incentive to her life-work. In
speaking of the love of poetry as felt in that
early time, in her "New England Girlhood** she
says: " It was the greatest blessing to me, in the
long days of toil to which I was shut in much
earlier than most young girls are, that the poetry I
held in my memory breathed its enchanted atmos-
phere through me and around me, and touched
even dull dradgery with its sunshine.*'
The birthplace of Lucy Larcom, was Beverly,
Mass., one of the earliest settled coast towns in
the state. Her father was a sea-captain, who
died while she was a child, and her mother, taking
with her this daughter and two or three others of
her younger children, removed to Lowell, Mass.
The year 1835 found her, a girl of about ten years,
in one of the Lowell grammar schools, where her
education went on until it became necessary for her
to eam her living, which she began to do very early
as an operative in a cotton factory. In her "Idyl
of Work** and also in "A New England Girl-
hood,'* Miss Larcom has well described her early
life, and from these books as from the writers own
experience, this little sketch is drawn.
My first recollection of Miss Larcom is as a pre-
cocious writer of verses in the Lowell dsket^ and
that the editor in his notice of them said ' they were
written under the inspiratin of the nurses,* a mis-
print, of course, for muses; although as the author
was only about ten or twelve years old at that time,
the mistake was not so very far wrong. This how-
ever was not Miss Larcom's first attempt at verse-
making, for she began to write while a child of
seven in the attic of her early home in Beverly.
The last two years of her Lowell life, which
covered in all a period of about ten years, were
spent in the same room, not in measuring cloth, but
as book-keeper, recording the number of pieces
and bales. There she pursued her studies in inter-
vals of leisure. Some texts-book in mathematics,
grammar, English and German literature usually
lay open on her desk, awaiting a spare moment.
The Lowell Offering^ a magazine whose editors
and contributors were "female operatives in the
Lowell mills," was published in 1842, and soon after
Miss Larcom became one of its corps of writers.
One of her first poems was "The River," and
many of her verses and essays, both grave and gay,
may be found in its bound volumes. Some of
these Lowell Offering essays appeared after-
wards in a little volume called "Similitudes."
This was her first published work. Since
then Lucy Larcom's name has found an honored
place among the women poets of America. Of
late her writings have assumed a deeply religious
tone, in which the faith of her whole life finds com-
plete expression. Among her earlier and best
known poems may be mentioned "Hannah Bind-
ing Shoes," and "The Rose Enthroned," Miss Lar-
com's earliest contribution to the AtlanHc Monthly^
when the poet Lowell was its editor, a poem that
in the absence of signature was attributed to Emer-
son by one reviewer, and "A Loyal Woman's No."
The last-named is a patriotic lyric, which attracted
attention during the Civil War. During much of her
earlier life Miss Larcom was teacher in some of the
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I50 THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
principal young women's seminaries of her native
The rill is blessing in her talk
State. While Our Young Folks magazine was pub-
What half she held a wrong,—
lished she was connected with it, part of the time as
The happy trouble of the rock
associate, and part of the time as leading editor. She
That makes her life a song.
has written at length of her own youthful working-
days at Lowell in an article published in The Atlan-
tic Monthly, about 1881 since entitled; *' Among
APPLE-BLOSSOMS.
Lowell Mill Girls." Of late she has turned her at-
tention somewhat more than formerly to prose writ-
Apple-blossoms, budding, blowing,
ing. Miss Larcom has always been inclined to write
In the soft May air;
on religious themes, and has made two volumes of
Cups with sunshine overflowing.
compilations from the world's great religious
Flakes of fragrance, drifting, snowing.
thinkers, "Breathings of a Better Life'* and
Showering everywhere!
'* Beckonings," a Calendar of Thought. Her last
book, issued in 1891, is entitled "As it is in
Fairy promises, outgushing
Heaven," and embodies much of her own thought
From the happy trees;
on matters concerning the deepest spiritual life
White souls into love-light blushing,—
H. H. R.
Heavenly thoughts to utterance rushing, —
Are ye not like these ?
Such an overflow of sweetness
ROCK AND RILL.
Needs the heart of spring;
In her wealth of bloom is meetness.
" Into the sunshine out of shade!"
The rill has heard the call.
Though to the ripe fruit's completeness
All she may not bring.
And, babbling low, her answer made,—
A laugh, 'twixt slip and fall.
Words are more than idle seeming;
Blossoms of good-will.
Out from her cradle-roof of trees,
What she would do. Love is dreaming;
Over the free, rough ground!
What she can, ashamed of scheming,
The peaceful blue above she sees;
Cramped and stinted still.
The cheerful green around.
Apple-blossoms, billowy brightness
A pleasant world for running streams
To steal unnoticed through,
At play with all the sweet sky-gleams,
On the tide of May,
Oh, to wear your rose-touched whiteness!
Flushing into bloom, with lightness
To give life away.
And nothing else to do!
A rock has stopped the silent rill
HANNAH BINDING SHOES.
And taught her how to speak;
He hinders her; she chides him still;
Poor lone Hannah,
He loves her lispings weak.
Sitting at the window, binding shoes.
•
Faded, wrinkled,
And still he will not let her go.
Sitting, stitching, in a mournful muse.
But she may chide and sing.
Bright-eyed beauty once was she,
And over him her freshness throw.
When the bloom was on the tree;
Amid her murmuring.
Spring and winter,
Hannah's at the window, binding shoes.
The harebell sees herself no more
In waters clear at play;
Not a neighbor.
Yet never she such azure wore,
Passing nod or answer will refuse,
Till wept on by the spray.
To her whisper.
" Is there from the fishers any news ? "
And many a woodland violet
Oh, her heart's adrift, with one
Stays charmed upon the bank;
On an endless voyage gone!
Her thoughtful blue eye brimming wet,
Night and morning,
The rock and rill to thank.
Hannah's at the window, binding shoes.
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LUCY LARCOM.
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Fair young Hannah,
Ben, the sunburnt fisher, gayly wooes:
Hale and clever,
For a willing heart and hand he sues.
May-day skies are all aglow.
And the waves are laughing so!
For her wedding
Hannah leaves her window and her shoes.
May is passing;
Mid the apple boughs a pigeon cooes.
Hannah shudders,
For the mild south-wester mischief brews.
Round the rocks of Marblehead,
Outward bound, a schooner sped;
Silent, lonesome,
Hannah's at the window, binding shoes.
*T is November,
Now no tear her wasted cheek bedews.
From Newfoundland
Not a sail returning will she lose.
Whispering hoarsely, '* Fishermen,
Have you, have you heard of Ben ? "
Old with watching,
Hannah's at the winding, binding shoes.
Twenty winters
Bleach and tear the ragged shore she views.
Twenty seasons;
Never one has brought her any news.
Still her dim eyes silendy
Chase the white sails o'er the sea:
Hopeless, faithful,
Hannah's at the window, binding shoes.
THE OLD SCHOOL-HOUSE.
I PASSED it yesterday again,
The school-house by the river.
Where you and I were children, Jane,
And used to glow and shiver
In heats of June, December's frost.
And where, in rainy weather,
The swollen roadside brook we crossed
So many times together.
I felt the trickle of the rain
From your wet ringlets dripping;
I caught your blue eye's twinkle, Jane,
When we were nearly slipping;
And thought, while you in fear and glee
Were clinging to my shoulder,
' Oh, will she trust herself to me.
When we are ten years older? "
For I was full of visions vain,
The boy's romantic hunger;
You were the whole school's darling, Jane,
And many summers younger.
Your head a cherub's used to look.
With sunbeams on it lying,
Bent downward to your spelling-book.
For long and hard words prying.
The mountains through the window-pane
Showered over you their glory;
The awkward farm-boy loved you, Jane —
You know the old, old story.
I never watch the sunset now
Upon those misty ranges,
But your bright lips, and cheek, and brow,
Gleam out of all its changes.
I wonder if you see that chain
On memory's dim horizon;
There's not a lovelier picture, Jane,
To rest even your sweet eyes on.
The haystacks each an airy tent,
The notch a gate of splendor;
And river, sky, and mountains blent
In twilight radiance tender.
I wonder, with a flitting pain.
If thoughts of me returning,
Are mingled with the mountains, Jane;
I stifle down that yearning. —
A rich man's wife, on you no claim
Have I, lost dreams to rally;
Yet Pemigewasset sings you name
Along its winding valley.
And once I hoped that for us twain
Might fall one calm life-closing;
That Campton hills might guard us, Jane,
In one green grave reposing.
They say the old man's heart is rock;
You never thought so, never!
And, loving you alone, I lock
The school-house door forever!
THE LAMB THAT WAS SLAIN.
I HAD a haunting thought at Easter-tide,
Musing between the twilight and the dawn.
Of our dear Lord and Friend, who, having died.
Came to His chosen where they were withdrawn;
Came, while they talked of His mysterious death,
And doubted if He had risen indeed;
Breathed on them His loving, living breath.
Their Master, from the grave's inthrallment freed
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
" Reach hither, Thomas! see and touch my wounds.
Behold! believe that it is I/' He said.
Down unto us the wondrous word resounds;
The death-marks on Him, yet He was not dead.
They were the sure proofs that He was alive;
The doubter's finger traced His dreadful scars;
Bears He not still those fatal tokens five
Within the unseen heavens beyond the stars?
The heart, the hands, the feet, have bled for us;
More than our common curse of death He knew;
Into His spotless nature glorious
The eternal sorrow of our sins He drew.
This is the wonder John in Patmos saw,
The vision of a Lamb that had been slain;
Sacred to us forever is God's Law,
Writ in the awful print-marks of His pain.
Still is He touched with our infirmity;
Yearning to win us from our shame and wrong,
Still must His wounds throb, >vhen we go astray
From his dear Father's House, where we belong.
The memory of the path for us He trod
No splendor of the heaven of heavens can dim;
By His deep human love, the Son of God
Must always draw our human hearts to Him.
ASPIRATION.
Thou mayst not rest in any lovely thing,
Thou, who wert formed to seek and to aspire;
For no fulfillment of thy dreams can bring
The answer to thy measureless desire.
The beauty of the round, green world is not
Of the world's essence; far within the sky
The tints which make this bubble bright ai
wrought;
The bubble bursts; the light can never die.
—Hints,
REALIZATION.
The grace of the bending grasses.
The flush of the dawn-lit sky,
The scent that lingers and passes
When the loitering wind goes by.
Are gushes and hints of sweetness.
From the unseen deeps afar, —
The foam-edge of heaven's completeness
Swept outward through flower and star.
—Ibid,
HOPE.
A brooding hope, a promise through a doubt.
Is whispered everywhere.
— The Rose Enthroned.
BEAUTY.
Say whence, O Beauty, floatest thou.
And whither ?
But in a shade, an echo now
Swept hither.
Bom with the sounds that hurry past ?
Dead with the shapes that flee so fast ?
Oh, never!
The soul of each fair thing must last
Forever.
— The Riddle of Beauty.
PRAYERS.
She likens prayers and hymns unto a stream
Flowing amid the sandy wastes of life.
Watering the roots of action; nerving up
The earnest toiler's strength; the wine of heaven.
Our priests sit at the guarded fountain-head,
To keep the waters pure, and pour the wine
For fainting pilgrims.
— Legend of a Veil,
BITTERSWEET.
All things beautiful grow sad,
Yet even grief is sometimes glad; —
Shade us. Life, with bittersweet!
— Bittersweet Shadows,
REGRET.
" We learn too late.
Little things are more than great
Hearts like ours must daily be
Fed with some kind mystery.
Hidden in a rocky nook.
Whispered from the wayside brook,
Flashed on unexpecting eyes.
In a wingM, swift surprise;
Small the pleasure is to trace
One continuous commonplace."
— Elsie in Illinois,
LOVE.
You have lived and learned this marvel;
That the holiest joy that came
From its beautiful heaven to bless you,
Nor needed nor found a name.
— My Mountain,
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EMILY THORNTON CHARLES.
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CONTENTMENT.
Nature weaves a marvellous braid;
Tints and tones how deftly blent;
Who upwinds the web she made ?
Thou, who wearest her wise content
— Entangled.
SUMMERTIME.
The high sun deepens the scent and color of slow-
blown" flowers;
Intense with the white warmth of heaven, glows
earth, in her mid-noon hours;
The more life, richer the love, else life itself is a lie,
And aspiration and faith on the gusts of April die.
— Her Choice,
LABOR.
He labored with mind and strength, and yet he
could wisely rest;
He toiled for his daily bread, and ate it with
wholesome zest
At the world-wide human board, the brother and
friend of all
With whom he could share a hope, on whom let a
blessing fall.
--Ibid.
MOUNTAINS.
They beckon from their sunset domes afar,
Light's royal priesthood, the eternal hills;
Though bom of earth, robed of the sky they are;
And the anointing radiance heaven distils
On their high brows, the air with glory fills.
— The Distant Range.
PHILANTHROPHY.
There are ends more worthy than happiness;
Who seeks it, is digging joy's grave, we know.
The blessed are they who but live to bless.
— Unwedded.
GENEROSITY.
A generous world indeed it is;
Most generous in its promises.
— So Little.
STRIFE.
Thought must shade and sun the soul
With its glorious mutations;
Every life song is a whole
Sweeter for its variations.
Wherefore with your bliss at strife ?
'T was an angel that withstood you!
Could you change your perfect life
For a dream of living — would you ?
"Would Youf
EMILY THORNTON CHARLES.
EMILY THORNTON was bom in Lafayette,
Ind., March 21st, 1845. She is widely known
by her pen-name, * * Emily Hawthorn. ' ' She comes
of English ancestors, the Thorntons and Parkers.
On the paternal side the Thorntons were noted as
original thinkers. Her great-grandfather, Elisha
Thornton, carried a sword in the War of the Revo-
lution. Her grandfather, also Elisha Thornton,
resident of Sodus, Wayne county, N. Y., served in
the War of 181 2. Her father, James M. Thornton,
gave his life to the cause of the Union, and of her
two brothers, Charles H. lost his life in the Civil
War, and Gardner P. served in General Harrison's
regiment. The Parkers, her maternal ancestors,
were among the primitive Puritans. Deacon Ed-
mund Parker settled in Reading, Mass., about 17 19,
the family removing thence to Pepperell, Mass.,
which town they helped to found. There lived her
great-great-grandfather. Deacon Jonas Parker.
There her great-grandfather, also Deacon Jonas
Parker, married Ruth Farmer and reared a laige
family, and here her grandfather, the third Deacon
Jones, while teaching in the village seminary, fell in
love with Nancy Gachell, whose mother, Eunfce
Diamond, eloped with and married the gallant
Scotch captain, Jerry Gachell, and was disinherited
on that account. For more than a century, from
father to sun, the Parkers were deacons and leaders
of the choir in the Congregational Church. When
Emily's grandfather married the black-eyed daugh-
ter of the Scotch captain and English lady, the
young couple took a wedding journed in a sleigh to
find a new home in Lyons, Wayne county, N. Y.,
taking with them their household goods. Twenty
years later their daughter, Harriet Parker, was
married to James M. Thornton, son of Elisha, a
civil engineer. The young couple moved to La-
fayette, Ind., where Mr. Thornton established a
large manufactory. Emily Thornton was educated
in the free schools of Indianapolis, and at the age of
sixteen she became a teacher. As a child in school
she attracted attention by the excellence of her
written exercises and of her original manner of
handling given subjects. She was married, while
very young, to Mr. Daniel B. Charles, of Indian-
apolis, the son of a wealthy farmer and miller of
Lancaster county, Penn., but for half a century a
business man of Indianapolis. At the age of
twenty-four she was left a widow, in delicate health,
with two little ones dependent upon her. Soon
after the death of her husband, in 1874, she began
to write for a livelihood, doing reportorial and edi-
torial work for Indianapolis city papers, and corres-
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
pondence for outside publications. Having chosen
jouraalism as a profession, she sought to perfect
herself in all its branches. In 1876 she published
her first volume of verse, under the title "Haw-
thorn Blossoms.*' The little book was received
with great favor and proved a literary and financial
success. From the centennial year to 1880, she
continued to do newspaper work and biographical
writing. She was associate editor of "Eminent
Men of Indiana." In 1881 she accepted a position
as managing editor of the Washington Warld^
Afterwards she established The National Veteran
in Washington, D. C, of which she was sole pro-
prietor and editor. In 1883 Mrs. Charles was
prostrated through overwork and was confined to
her bed for an entire year. While recovering
slowly, she spent a year in revising and preparing
for publication her later poems. In 1886 the work
appeared in "Lyrical Poems," a volume of three
hundred pages. That volimie ftiUy established her
reputation as a national poet. She has achieved
success upon the platform. On the occasion of her
departure from Indiana, when a complimentary
farewell testimonial was tendered her by the lead-
ing citizens of .Indianapolis, in 1880, she made a
brilliant address on "Woman Esthetically Con-
sidered." In 1882 she addressed an audience of
fifteen hundred ex-prisoners of war in Cincinnati,
Ohio. Her poetical address on "Woman's
Sphere" was delivered before the National Wom-
an's Suffrage convention. She is a member of the
executive committee of the National Woman's
Press Association, and chairman of the executive
council of the Washington Society of American
Authors. She has been selected as one of its
speakers at the Worid's Fair in 1893. H. V. F.
CLOUD-LAND.
The clouds, the beautiful clouds!
Oh, could I but write,
As I see them to-night!
The beautiful, varying clouds.
The clouds, ever-changing clouds,
Floating airily by,
Weaving webs in the sky,
The beautiful, silvery clouds.
The clouds, the mountainous clouds,
Are uplifted so high
In the blue of the sky,
The towering mountains of clouds.
The clouds, the luminous clouds,
And clouds like lace.
Nearly veiling the face ,
Of the luminous clouds, sunset clouds.
The clouds, most glorious clouds,
Rising higher and higher,
Great pillars of fire.
The grandest of glorious clouds.
The clouds, the terrible^clouds!
They gather and roll,
Like despair o'er the soul,
Most terrible, threatening clouds!
The clouds, the storm-laden clouds!
They with tear-drops of rain
Moisten earth's face again,
The clouds, heavy rain-laden clouds.
The clouds, sunmier, sunset douds!
They are, after the rain,
Golden burnished again,
By the sun peeping under the clouds.
The beautiful, beautiful clouds!
Oh, could I but write,
As I sit here to-night,
All the grandeur, the beauty of clouds!
INSANITY.
A SKETCH.
I'm mad, mad, mad! I know but this— I'm madf
My 'wildered brain doth ever seethe and boil
Like into devil's broth in steaming caldron.
My mind is turmoil, and my thoughts are stirred
Into an endless maze of wild confusion,
And, as my fevered thoughts like misty vapors rise>
Or empty bubbles in uncertain flight,
I seek to reach, to guide and master them;
Yet, ere I have the power, they vanish
Quick as meteor flash, and all is dark.
Another bubble riseth from my throbbing brain;
Brightness gleams upon its wavering surface
As though the mind itself were shining through.
How eagerly! ay, with what frantic haste
I try to grasp it; but, alas, it bursts.
Resolves itself into airy nothingness.
Again I blindly grope in utter darkness.
These scintillating lights, bright bubbles from my
mind,
Do ever rise and vanish in their aimless way.
Their course through space is never pointed out;
No plans, no future destiny have they,
And thus to me they vividly portray
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EMILY THORNTON CHARLES,
155
My madness. And I know, I feel, Pm mad.
For what is madness ? 'Tis the power lost
To train these airy bubbles of the brain aright,
To follow up our thoughts, and still command,
Retain them as obedient servants.
But my mind hath had too many servants;
They have far too well filled their alloted sphere.
They throng the temple, and they crowd the brain;
They beat upon the wall of mind, but ahl the wall
Gives way. My mind is like a broken drum,
On which no echoing tones resound.
They surge and sway, in maddening glee, or harsh
uproar,
As ceaseless breakers of the sea dash on the rock-
bound shore.
Yet they are strong; thoughts have become too
strong.
They have o'erpowered me, and they are my
masters.
I cannot, however much I would, escape them,
And I, henceforth, like abject slave, or culprit
whipped.
Must do their bidding.
Although my weary step, wild eye and haggard brow.
Prove how my strength is taxed beyond endurance.
Yet still these wicked thoughts like phantom forms
Do drive me on, and whisper in my crazed ear,
Do this, do that, or yet the other; thus they say,
And taunt and sneer and make me fiend inhuman;
And though 'twere murder, suicide, or aught else,
I even must obey this mighty power,
This madness that hath me ever in its clutches.
As in the grip of Hercules, or massive iron vise.
From which no hand can save, no human help
avail;
Prom which no wrench, save that given by the
hand of death,
Can set my spirit free.
THROUGH LIFE.
Entering life, we come fearfully
Into the new and unknown;
Trembling and terrified, tearfully,
Lifting life's burden alone.
Braving its danger more cheerfully
When we the stronger have grown.
Still, like old Earth, so receivingly
Taking the bad and the good,
Taking, nor choosing, believingly,
Ever the best, as we could;
Sadly repenting, then grievingly
Striving to do as we should.
Long may we wander suspectingly
Ingrates whom passions enslave;
Scornfully, proudly, rejectingly.
Serving the mercy God gave;
Nor look we to him who protectingly
His arm forth stretches to save.
Thoughtiessly, carelessly, musingly.
Playing at life's chequered game;
Ever the tally-sheet losingly
Scoreth a list to our name;
Bravely our conscience accusingly
Stirreth our senses to shame.
Looking to conscience inquiringly.
Thoughtlessness seemeth a sin;
Working and striving untiringly.
So must the battle begin.
Faith, hope and love will inspiringly
Teach us how life we may win.
May we our duty do darefully,
Strengthening careworn, oppressed;
Threading our way ever carefully
Through snares, to the home of the blest;
Hopefully, cheerfully, prayerfully.
Finding in heaven a rest.
Striving with Sin, Sin enslavingly
Holding us ever so fast;
Looking for mercy most cravingly
Through the dark clouds sweeping past;
Tenderly, lovingly, savingly,
Jesus redeemeth at last.
THOUGHT.
Oh, thought! that is deeper and vaster
Than the cavernous depth of the sea,
I will still be of artists the master,
And portray an ideal of thee.
Sweet lips that are dewy and tender
As the soft budding heart of the rose,
Bright eyes, filled with deepening splendor,
While musing o'er them my thought grows.
'Neath the lips, pearly gems whitely gleaming,
Cheeks, the lily, the rose, and the down,
The brow, pure and fair, 'twould be seeming
To crown with a matronly crown.
In the depth of the eye now is glowing
A smile, or a tear-drop, I see;
Through them the sweet image is showing
A pictured idea to me.
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I am sure 'tis provoking and shocking!
I essayed not to picture a group,
Yet see how the thoughts will come flocking,
'Stead of one, here comes a whole troop.
Now in sadness and deep lamentation
I demolish the daub I had wrought;
Humbly seeking a new avocation,
I will work in the garden of thought.
I will labor and cease all complaining,
Thought still makes my life-work sublime.
For her rosebuds shall bloom by my training
Into beautiful flowers of rhyme.
THE dew-drop.
I SAW a diamond glistening in the grass,
Along a path where once I chanced to pass.
It blazed with changing, scintillating light;
I knew the gem was precious, for it shone so bright.
I stood and watched its iridescent rays.
Now gold, now silver, now in purple, blaze.
Methought such beautiful, such shimmering rays of
Ught
Could ne'er before have gladdened any mortal's
sight;
I closer stepped to grasp the gem, — 'twas but a drop
of dew;
Its glorious rays were Heaven's beams the sun
sent shining through.
GRANT.
His mantle, fold about him — none can wear it.
His sword, lay by his side— there's none to wield
it.
Who fought for Union's life triumphantiy,
Now shorn of strength, lies at his Maker's feet.
A world bowed o'er a grave, is wrapped in grief;
A Hero's dead! A Chieftain's fallen!
— Grant.
CLEOPATRA.
Thou hadst a queenly, haughty pride,
A beauty almost deified;
To win thy love kings would have died.
Thy life was spent in wanton whiling.
From duty's path thy slaves beguiling,
Swaying the mind with studied art,
Moving to sensuous love the heart.
— Cleopatra,
SUMMER.
The buzz of insect life, the slumbrous drone of
bees,
The swish of ripening grain like wave of siunmer
seas,
Unnumbered pipings pure in highest treble notes.
In subtie catches, roll, from tremulous feathered
throats.
Pour fourth in ecstasy, so clear each perfect trill
Affabrous pipes to mock, to scorn the Pan god's
skill.
So blend ten thousand sounds, Vacuna's joy to
share
In orisons that rise on palpitating air.
— VacuncCs Realm.
INDIAN SUMMER.
The breathing space, the solstice fair, between
The autumn's eve and winter's chilling mom.
It is as though the year were now restored
To springtime loveliness and summer's guise
Of throbbing, glowing beauty, and had reached
The autumn's fiill fruition, to be wrapped
In snowy robe of winter, then to die.
—Ibid.
INDUN SUMMER.
Nature it seems, as pausing in her task.
Drew a deep full breath of inspiration,
And breathing forth again, wafted to us.
Like a lingering benediction pure.
The autumn solstice, the Indian summer.
—Ibid.
POETS.
If poets lack sometimes in sense,
Their sense-itiveness is immense.
They suffer from the chilling blast
Of sarcasm, ever sweeping past.
— The Judge,
OCEAN.
Sometimes he is sighing and moaning
Like a longing and yearning soul.
Sometimes he is inwardly groaning
With feelings he cannot control.
Sometimes he so .sadly is sobbing
At her feet, like a weary child;
Or again, see the pulsating throbbing.
As hearts throb with tumult so wild.
Sometimes he comes lovingly creeping,
Like an infant to be caressed;
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FLORENCE CARPENTER DIEUDONNE
159
Or ^^ain, most joyously leaping,
He clings to her neck and her breast.
And when he is tenderly sighing,
And longing the bliss he would taste,
It is true, there can be no denying
He twineth his arm round her waist.
He loves with a love so enslaving,
A devotion so loyal and sweet,
That he joys in quietly laving
Her glistening, sun-burnished feet.
— Ocean Legend.
NATURE.
Nature's realm hath most wonderful glories
For them who do lovingly look;
And lessons and legends and stories
Embellish each page of her book.
The breezes impart them in whispers;
The brooks babble fast as they flow;
The leaves and the zephyrs, fair lispers,
Convey her sweet messages low.
And far the divinest of pleasures
God giveth through Nature, so free,
And volumes of infinite treasures
Her voices interpret for me.
Oh, Mortal, despairingly wailing,
Creep closer, creep close to her heart;
For comfort and solace unfailing
Her beautiful teachings impart.
—Ibid,
BURNS.
O'er Scotia lesser lights have shone;
None like to him the world has known,
He stands without a peer, alone —
God made but one.
Now those who hold his memory dear
In hosts are gathering every year.
In every clime, afar or near.
For Bum's sake.
To honor him who, sad, forlorn,
From mom till eve, from eve till mom,
Still sang inspired. The poet's bom;
Art cannot make.
He sang of Scotia's sea-girt strand;
He sang of toil, and made it grand;
He sang to bless the peasant band,
Pure joy to bring;
Of Caledonia far away,
Where tower those lofty peaks of gray.
The land caressed by ocean-spray,
He loved to sing.
— Robert Bums.
FLORENCE CARPENTER DIEUDONNE.
FLORENCE CARPENTER DIEUDONNJfe,
was born in Stockbridge Falls, Madison
Co., N. Y., September 25th, 1850. In early life
her parents removed to Oshkosh, Wis., where
her education was completed. In her writings
as a school-girl was discemed the characteristic
of exceptional excellence. After her marriage she
resided for some years in Minnesota, and during
that period published her first poem, ** An Arctic
Wreck," in the Oshkosh Times, and "Allie's
Prayer,** published in Peterson's Magazine. In
1878 she traveled extensively in Europe, and her
descriptive letters written for the papers of her own
and other states, gained for her an extended repu-
tation. *'A Prehistoric Romanza,** was the first
poem she published in book form. She also wrote
several cantatas, the most successful of which was
**The Captive Butterfly," for which Prof. J. B.
Carpenter composed the music. Her fondness for
literary pursuits made her many social engagements
burdensome, and her fondness for scientific and
historical reading clashed with the attention which
she felt it her first duty to give to her home; but by
improving spare minutes during the last ten years,
Mrs. Dieudonn^ has written three prose works and
many poems. Her descriptive style is vivid and
complete. She is a member of the Woman's
National Press Association, of Washington, D. C,
vice-president of the Short Story Club, and founder
and president of the Parzelia Circle, a conversa-
tional and literary order. Mrs. Dieudonn6 now
resides in Washington, D. C, and her beautiful
home is located only a few rods from the National.
Capitol. J. A. A.
FATE.
Fate, 'tis the tide eternal of
That shoreless sullen sea
Which floates the cycling universe
In unseen mystery.
Man's life and death are floating
On this current; in it's power
An awful pulse, vibratant still,
From shock of time's first hour.
Upon what sphere, some little time.
We toil and hope and cry;
To what world gleam in gorgeous state,
And pose as sovereigns high.
Of our own borrowed, puzzled souls,
Sad dowered with human pain;
Thereon we stmggel and we pray
To make our * * fate. " In vain !
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Upon what lesser sphere began
Our toils, remembering not,
Cries 'plained, long since, on vanished worlds,
Sunned other where, forgot;
What earlier orb maintained us
To the past now swept away
'Tis that spirit still doth temper
What we call ** Our Fate " to-day.
Fate! 'tis that chant, intoning;
Of all souls the complex chord;
It is wailed from sphere-strained harp strings;
'Tis the music of the Lord.
Begun when first in silent black
Of cold, astonished space
Bloomed forth the blistering, wond'ring suns
To roll their death-goaled race.
And all the woe of universe
With all its worlds of tears.
Rings pathos in that harmony
To mock earth's list'ning ears.
Since suns were lighted "Fate's" stem song
Unchanged has ceaseless rung,
Since loud at the Supreme command
The "Stars together " sung.
MAN'S POWER.
Man were too mighty for this sphere
If his days were not measured;
He would o'erthrow the steadfast moon,
Would free the power treasured
In earth's tumultuous breast
He would unloose the earthquake's strength.
To bind it for a steed;
He would pile up the ocean waves.
That he might make more speed
Across its leveled bed.
He would remove the mountains.
Would chain other worlds to ours,
But that relentless Death comes down
And checks his widening powers
Before his work is done.
The tears of woman! When you see them
Deem them not for deepest woe.
For all the bitterest griefs of woman
None her tears shall ever know.
As her life's hope dies before her,
Like a beauteous child which sleeps.
Shall her lips smile. Rippling laughter
Silent her dread secret keeps.
LOVE.
Woman, this dream, thy love, is dead.
Lay it upon a bier and pale it with
The withered bloom of hope destroyed.
Know, it is death! thy pulse shall quick.
Thy fond heart beat no more, at sight
Of him, for whom thy love is dead.
What's this! Why part thy pallid lips!
Why thrills this rapturous fire thy veins!
Why tolls thy heart, and not a knell!
What moves thy soul like dream of heaven!
* I thought I saw his face, so loved.
I thought I heard hb whisp'ring voice;
I dreamed it lived. It had no death.
'Tis false, this soul's love dyeth not.
Beyond the alons of all time,
Our love shall live on farther shore
Of all eternity."
CLEOPATRA.
Dazzling through the glamour
Of Egypt's yellow years.
Dark, supreme and glorious
Woman without fears,
Gemmed and veiled and jeweled
Throned upon her sands
On an ancient desert,
Lighting all the lands.
CAST THY BURDEN ON THE LORD.
BEWARE.
The heart of woman! Who shall read its
Mystic hieroglyphic page.
The love of woman! Who shall gain its
Changeless faith from youth to age.
When hope is lost,
When hearts are dead.
When earth breathes utter hate;
When slanders frost,
And ruin dread
On fates infliction wait,
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ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING,
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To fright the heart,
When life to come
Looks blacker than the past,
With prayers depart
From fighting doom,
On God thy burdens cast
OBLIVION.
O RESTFUL, silent tomb! Thy night
How dreamless, moveless, still!
What though thy halls are dark and low,
What though thy halls are chilL
Care cannot find one place to cling,
Gold cannot shine to lure;
Dread is departed; death kissed hands
All coldly rest secure.
Sorrow may weep above the grave;
Tears never dim dead eyes.
O restful, voiceless, coming tomb
Where sweet oblivion lies.
"PARZELIA."
Older my realm than other known
Upon this fire-forged earth.
In glacier's ice its altars with
Primeval man had birth.
Volcano taught man stole away
The comfort hiding glare
Laid it in circling stones to bum
And lit " Home's Hearth Fire
there.
Boundless my kingdom. Seas nor land,
Cold death, nor stars above.
May set a limit to my realm;
Its bound is "Woman's Love."
Mighty the guard which keepeth it
Forever! Everywhere,
Thb sacred, circled fire dies not
Its guard is " Woman's Prayer."
Hear ye not my kingdom's music,
Rousing man or throning king.
That song, transcendant, of the hearth.
That wondrous song the mothers sing.
'Tis immortal, my vast kingdom.
As the stars in skies' blue dome.
Deathless, shrined in holiest mem'ries.
Lives "Parzelia, Hearth of Home."
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.
THE mere mention of the name of Elizabeth
Barrett Browning, has the power to awaken
infinite tenderness and reverence. It is so sug-
gestiveness of sweetness, goodness, and all the
lovable qualities that a true woman should possess.
She has been called the ideal woman's woman; and
it is said her poems have been to more women a
Bible, her "Aurora Leigh " to more young girls a
religion, than have the works of any other writer.
She was a great poet, but a greater and grander
woman, and she dearly loved and honored
humanity. Litde is known of her private life and
character from any external incidents, for they
were few, and the details of her family life have
been kept from the public; but, it would be impos-
sible to form a better or truer knowledge of the
poet's inner nature, than that which is so clearly
revealed in her writings. There we may learn of
her love, her griefs, her friendships, her patriotism,
her religion, her philanthropy; *'her queenly soul
shines through them as wine through crystal."
She was born in London in 1809, where she passed
part of her early life, and part of which she spent in
sight of the Malvern Hills. In one of her minor
poems, "The Lost Bower," the beauteous sur-
roundings of her child-life are graphically des-
cribed. Mrs. Browning showed remarkable signs
of genius at the age of ten, when she wrote
small effusions, which she dictated to her father.
He was to her both public and critic. She re-
ceived no ordinary education, being thoroughly
conversant in the classics, sciences, and philos-
ophy, while her Greek literature was most exten-
sive. She studied Greek under the instruction of
Rev. Hugh Boyd, and later in life she alluded to
these hours in a pleasant and graceful manner in
her poem, entitled "The Wine of Cyprus," which
she dedicated to her blind friend and tutor.
At the age of twenty-seven, Mrs. Browning fell
into poor health by the rupture of a blood vessel in
oneof her lungs. A milder climate was an abso-
lute necessity in order to regain health and vigor,
and as a means of prolonging life. Her eldest and
favorite brother took her to Torquay, where they
lived happily for a year, and where she steadily
improved in health; but, unfortunately, a most
shocking and heart-rendering event occurred which
nearly resulted in the death of Mrs. Browning.
While out sailing, her brother was drowned within
sight of the house in which they lived. "This
tragedy," writes her friend, "nearly killed Elizabeth
Barrett. She was utterly prostrated by the horror
and the grief, and by a natural but most unjust
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feeling that she had been in some sort the cause of
this great misery. ♦ * * She told me herself that,
during the whole winter, the sounds of the waves
rang in her ears like the moan of one dying."
It was a year before she regained enough strength
to return to her father's home. There she remained
for seven years, an invalid, in a darkened room, at
times so feeble that life seemed almost extinct
But it was from this sick chamber that some of her
finest poems came, and, although they bear traces
of her saddened life, her imagination and thoughts
were as strong and as bright as ever. Mrs. Brown-
ing, unlike Tennyson, did not write an "In Mem-
oriam;" indeed, she made no direct allusion to her
deep sorrow, and, when ten years afterwards, she
was about to be married, she extracted a promise
from her husband that he would never refer to her
brother's death. Her nature was too strong to
allow grief to master it; instead, it deepened and
elevated her whole life. She was not an egotist,
but in her sonnets on * * Comfort, " * * Bereavement, * '
and *' Consolation," there is a noble expression
of grief bravely endured. In 1844 Mrs. Browning
published a collection of her poems, including
"The Drama of Exile." This volume was dedi-
cated to her father, of whom she speaks so pleas-
antly, recalling olden days; "When your eyes fall
upon this page of dedication, and you start to see
to whom it is inscribed, your first thought will be
of the time, far off, when I was a child, and wrote
verses, and when I dedicated them to you, who
were my public and my critic."
In 1846 she became the wife of the great and
famous poet, Robert Browning, for whom she
poured out the wealth of her love in her " Sonnets
from the Portugese." These beautiful poems re-
veal the innermost and sacred feelings of her
woman's heart, in such a charmingly simple and
truthful manner.
A friend, writing of her, said: "From their
wedding day, Mrs. Browning seemed to be en-
dowed with new life. Her health visibly improved
and she was enabled to make excursions in Eng-
land, prior to her departure for the land of her
adoption, Italy, where she found a second and a
dearer home. For nearly fifteen years, Florence
and the Brownings were one in the thoughts of
many English and Americans.
Mrs. Browning was English bom and reared, but
her best affections were given to Italy. Her sym-
pathy and love of liberty made America and the
Americans especially dear to her, and, to-day, no
nation loves and admires her more than America.
"Aurora Leigh," a novel in blank verse, pub-
lished in 1856, is probably the finest and most
popular of all her works. It was written at a time
when the author had achieved her maturest and
most finished powers. Her death in 1861, came
before she had accomplished her life work of
liberty, and shordy after this, Cabous, the great
statesman, passed away, thus plunging Italy into
mourning for the loss of a great poet and a great
statesman.
In conclusion, we might add the following
description of our dear poet, the advocate of lib-
erty and the lover of humanity. "To those who
loved Mrs. Browning (and to know her was to love
her), she was singulariy attractive. Hers was not
the beauty of feature, it was the loftier beauty of
expression. Her slight figure seemed hardly to
contain the great heart that beat so powerfully
within, and the soul that expanded more and more
as one year g^ve place to another. It was difficult
to believe that such a fairy hand could pen thoughts
of such a ponderous weight, or that such a still,
small voice could utter them with equal force.
But, it was Mrs. Browning's face upon which one
loved to gaze; that face and head which almost
lost themselves in the thick curls of her dark-
brown hair. That jealous hair could not hide the
broad, fair forehead, royal with truth, as smooth as
any girl's, and
' Too large for wreath of modem want.'
Her large, brown eyes were beautifiil, and were,
in truth, the windows of her soul. They combined
the confidingness of a child with the poet-passion
of heart and of intellect, and in gazing into them it
was easy to see why Mrs. Browning wrote. God's
inspiration was her motive-power, and in her eyes
was the reflection of his higher light"
E. M. K.
SUBSTITUTION.
When some belovM voice, that was to you
Both sound and sweetness, faileth suddenly.
And silence against which you dare not cry
Aches round you like a strong disease and new.
What hope? what help? what music will undo
That silence to your sense? Not friendship's
sigh;
Not reason's subde count; not melody
Of viols, nor of pipes that Faunus blew;
Not songs of poets, nor of nightingales
Whose hearts leap upward through the cypress-
trees
To the clear moon; nor yet the spheric laws
Self-chanted, nor the angels' sweet All-hails,
Met in the smile of God: nay, none of these.
Speak THOU, availing Christ! and fill this
pause.
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ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.
1 6s
FINITE AND INFINITE.
Thb wind sounds only in opposing straits,
The sea beside the shore; man's spirit rends
Its quiet only up against the ends
Of wants and oppositions, loves and hates,
Where, worked and worn by passionate debates,
And losing by the loss it apprehends,
The flesh rocks round, and every breath it sends
Is ravelled to a sigh. All tortured states
Suppose a straitened place. Jehovah, Lord,
Make room for rest, around met out of sight
Now float me, of the vexing land abhorred.
Till, in deep calms of space, my soul may right
Her nature, shoot large sail on lengthening cord,
And rush exultant on the Infinite.
WORK AND CONTEMPLATION.
Thb woman singeth at her spinningwheel
A pleasant chant, ballad, or barcarole;
She thinketh of her song, upon the whole.
Far more than of her flax; and yet the reel
Is full, and artfully her fingers feel
With quick adjustment, provident control.
The lines, too subtly twisted to unroll.
Out to a perfect thread. I hence appeal
To the dear Christian Church, that we may do
Our Father's business in these temples mirk,
Thus swift and steadfast, thus intent and strong;
While thus, apart from toil, our souls pursue
Some high, calm, spheric tune, and prove our work
The better for the sweetness of our song.
TEARS.
Thank God, bless God, all ye who suffer not
More grief than ye can weep for. That is well;
That is light grieving! lighter, none befell
Since Adam forfeited the primal lot
Tears! — ^what are tears ? The babe weeps in its cot;
The mother singing; at her marriage-bell
The bride weeps; and before the oracle
Of high-faned hills the poet has forgot
Such moisture on his cheeks. Thank God for
grace.
Ye who weep only! If, as some have done.
Ye grope tear-blinded in a desert place.
And touch but tombs, look up! those tears will
run
Soon in long rivers down the lifted face.
And leave the vision dear for stars and sun.
GRIEF.
I TBLL you hopeless grief is passionless;
That only men incredulous of despair.
Half-taught in anguish, through the midnight air
Beat upward to God's throne in loud access
Of shrieking and reproach. Full desertness.
In souls as countries, lieth silent-bare
Under the blanching, vertical eye-glare
Of the absolute heavens. Deep-hearted man^
express
Grief for thy dead in silence like to death-
Most like a monumental statue set
In everlasting watch and moveless woe
Till itself crumble to the dust beneath.
Touch it; the marble eyelids are not wet:
If it could weep, it could arise and go.
CONSOLATION.
All are not taken: there are left behind
Living beloveds, tender looks to bring
And make the daylight still a happy thing.
And tender voices to make soft the wind:
But if it were not so, if I could find
No love in all the world for comforting.
Nor any path but hollowly did ring
Where ** dust to dust " the love from life disjoined^
And if, before those sepulchres unmoving
I stood alone (as some forsaken lamb
Goes bleating up the moors in weary dearth).
Crying, " Where are ye, O my loved and loving ? *^
I know a Voice would sound, ** Daughter, I AM.
Can I suffice for HEAVEN and not for earth ? *\
THE SOUL'S EXPRESSION.
With stanunering lips and insufficient sound
I strive and struggle to deliver right
That music of my nature, day and night
With dream and thought and feeling interwound,
And inly answering all the senses round
With octaves of a mystic depth and height
Which step out grandly to the infinite
From the dark edges of the sensual ground.
This song of soul I struggle to outbear
Through portals of the sense, sublime and whole,.
And utter all myself into the air;
But if I did it, as the thunder-roll
Breaks its own cloud, my flesh would perish there,.
Before that dread apocalypse of soul.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
BOOKS.
Of writing many books there is no end.
— Aurora Leigh,
MYSTERY.
That murmer of the outer Infinite
Which unweaned babies smile at in their sleep
When wondered at for smiling.
—Ibid,
MOTHERS.
Women know
The way to rear up children (to be just);
They know a simple, merry, tender knack
Of tying sashes, fitting baby-shoes,
And stringing pretty words that make no sense,
And kissing full sense into empty words.
—Ibid.
HABITUDE.
For even prosaic men who wear grief long
Will get to wear it as a hat aside
AA^th a flower stuck in't.
—Ibid,
EGOTISM.
God laughs in heaven when any man
Says, "Here Tm learned; this I understand;
In that I am never caught at fault or doubt.''
—Ibid,
LIFE.
Life, struck sharp on death.
Makes awful lightning.
—Ibid,
SKIES.
The skies themselves looked low and positive.
As almost you could touch them with a hand.
And dared to do it, they were so far off
^xom. God's celestial crystals.
—Ibid,
ENGLAND.
Did Shakspeare and his mates
Absorb the light here ? Not a hill or stone
With heart to strike a radiant color up,
Or active oudine on the indifferent air.
—Ibid.
SELP^OMPLACENT.
Dear Heaven, how silly are the things that live
In thickets, and eat berries!
—Ibid.
MELANCHOLY.
Some people always sigh in thanking God.
—Ibid.
MOTHER'LOVE.
Alas! a mother never is afraid
Of speaking angrily to any child.
Since love, she knows, is justified of love.
—Ibid,
EMULATION.
By the way,
The works of women are symbolical.
We sew, sew, prick our fingers, dull our sight.
Producing what? A pair of slippers, sir.
To put on when you're weary, or a stool
To stumble over, and vex you. . . " Curse that
stool! "
Or else, at best, a cushion, where you lean
And sleep, and dream of something we are not,
But would be for your sake. Alas, alas!
This hurts most, tiiis, — that after all we are paid
The worth of our work, perhaps.
—Ibid.
LUCIFER.
Rejoice in the clefts of Gehenna,
My exiled, my host!
Earth has exiles as hopeless as when a
Heaven's empire was lost
Through the seams of her shaken foundations
Smoke up in great joy!
With the smoke of your fierce exultations
Deform and destroy!
Smoke up with your lurid revenges.
And darken the face
Of the white heavens, and taunt them with changes
From glory and grace!
We in falling, while destiny strangels,
Pull down with us all.
Let them look to the rest of their angels!
Who's safe from a fall ?
HE saves not Where's Adam ? Can pardon
Requicken that sod ?
Unkinged is the King of the Garden,
The image of God.
Other exiles are cast out of Eden,
More curse has been hurled:
Come up, O my locusts, and feed in
The green of the world!
Come up! we have conquered by evil;
Good reigns not alone:
/ prevail now, and, angel or devil,
Inherit a throne.
—A Drama of Exile.
EARTH.
Here's a brave earth to sin and suffer on:
It holds fast still; it cracks not under curse.
—Ibid
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FRANCES LEVVIS BRACKETT DAMON,
165
PITY.
Only pity fitly can chastise.
Hate but avenges.
—Ibid.
CLOUDS.
Yon spectacle of cloud,
Which seals the gate up to the final doom,
Is God's seal manifest There seem to lie
A hundred thunders in it, dark and dead,
The unmolten lightnings vein it motionless;
And, outward from its depth, the self-moved sword
Swings slow its awful gnomon of red fire
From side to side, in penduluous horror slow,
Across the stagnate ghastly glare thrown flat
On the intermediate ground from that to this.
The angelic hosts, the archangelic pomps,
Thrones, domination, princedoms, rank on rank,
Risii^ sublimely to the feet of God,
On either side, and overhead the gate,
Show like a glittering and sustainM smoke
Drawn to an apex.
—Ibid.
DEATH.
Nay, death is fearful; but who saith
**To die, *' is comprehensible.
— The Seraphim.
MYSTERY.
Eve is a twofold mystery;
The stillness Earth doth keep,
The motion wherewith human hearts
Do each to either leap
As if all souls between the poles
Felt " Parting comes in sleep."
-ThePoefs Vow.
AMBITION.
Beauty in the mind
Leaves the hearth cold, and love-refined
Ambitions make the world unkind.
— A Vision of Poets.
LIFE.
Life treads on life, and heart on heart:
We press too close in church and mart
To keep a dream or grave apart.
—Ibid.
GRIEF.
For Grief walks the earth,
And sits down at the foot of each by turns.
— Prometheus Bound.
FRANCES LEWIS BRACKETT DAMON.
MRS. DAMON, who is not only a poet of
phantasy and a sincere lover of nature, but
a person of strong personality and sterling sense as
well, — ^was bom in a farmhouse in the outskirt of
Dexter, Penobscot Co., Maine, May 21st, 1857.
Of her parentage. and ancestry she writes: *' I can
zig-zag back to a good deal of English, a little Irish,
and a probable line of Scotch. My mother's parents
were pioneers in Maine. They were, —Joel To wle, —
of fine, slim build, keen intellect, high blood,
Universalist belief; and Lois Roberts, — robust,
genial, level-headed, Quaker-trained, happily con-
trasted and united, with a life full of honest, homely
interest Father was the youngest of twelve
children, a factory-boy, learning all the ins and outs
of the trade, and for the greater part of his life
supervising a large section. When his health failed
he went to farming. The son of (maternal) Grand-
father, Joel's brother, is George Makepeace Towle. ' *
Her childhood passed contentedly; was not the
world full of glad sights and sounds! she cannot
remember weariness of heart, lonesomeness, or
being ''at a loss how to amuse'' herself, though
her elder sister, some ten years older, left her to
play by herself. She ' 'had scores of paper people' '
made, about whom she "constructed no end of
stories." Of her religious experience, she says:
"When I was fourteen, on a certain day, all
alone in my little room upstairs, I must believe,
I gave my heart to Christ, and he drew instantly
near to me. In a moment the Bible, which
had hitherto been the dullest of dry books,
opened up to me inconceivable splendors." Her
taste in literature was correspondingly improved
and reformed, so that from "dribbling story
papers " she turned to "the sternest truths." The
poets came with their successive charms, till she
had decked her mind with their ornamental
treasures. Whittier was her "first favorite," and
as she was "slow in reaching the romantic age,"
it happened that Tennyson came in later. "Mrs.
Browning banished every other for a time; Long-
fellow came in gently with the rest; " Wordsworth
became '* a specially dear friend; " she likes " a bit
of Bryon, here and there," and "Shelley has a
wonderfully new and beauteous spell," but Poe
came closer to her affections. Of Burns she says, —
"I have a love for 'Bobby,' but I do not by any
means like him all through, and do not care to
have him at hand all the time."
In 1880 she was graduated from the Castine Normal
School. Her husband, to whom she was married
shortly after, was in the same class. Their first
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
year of married life was spent on her husband's
farm in Dixmont; subsequentiy they removed to
the Dexter home, where they continue to reside.
Though not particularly literary or bookish in his
bent, he is declared to have "an active interest"
in and "general sympathy with," all that con-
cerns the life and pursuits of his song-loving com-
panion.
A few words will record, in outline, her literary
progress and achievement. Under the nom de
plume of "Percy Larkin," she has, for several
years past, contributed lyrical pieces to the Port-
land Transcripts The Youth* s Companion, and
other journals, which have not as yet been collected
into a volume. She can write excellent prose, as
many sketches, editorials, etc., attest; and she is said
to be ' the author of two or more novels, one of which
is entitled "Idlewise.* " She was associated with her
sister, Mrs. H. B. Pierce, in the editorship of Quiet
Hours f a literary journal of a class too high to subsist.
Pedagogy is a subject of vital and decided interest
to her, and she has written considerable concerning
it, beside having had several years of experience as
a successful teacher. Reverent and devout, she is
not now a member of any religious organization,
not being in thorough accord with the creed of any.
As she explains it: "I cannot be one with any
denomination in the world, not because I see so
many flaws, but, in truth, because I see so many
virtues, in them all. I have my creed: I am
content." A. J. L.
TRANQUILLITY.
The jewel' d water stretched his length
Upon his winding bed;
The pines were anchored at his feet.
The cedars at his head;
And tall and still on every hand
Their dark sails droop' d upon the sand.
The shining stream had spent his strength,
And now his armor' d breast
Beneath Night's peaceful banners beat
With musical unrest.
He drew a sigh; the darkness heard.
And every pendant sail was stirred.
He shook his helmet from his brow,
And threw it on the sand;
And caught his lance upon his knee,
And broke it in his hand;
Then stretch'd through lapsing pines
arm.
And there unroll' d his weary palm.
his
'Twas then he made with Peace a vow;
Behold unto this day
The palm of his tranquillity
Upon the meadows gray;
A hundred years of rest, unstained,
All snowy-hued and azure- vein' d.
The water-lilies blossom up
In jewel'd offering,
For they are signet-rings that show
The friendship of the King;
The royal-laden swallow dips
Among those glowing finger-tips.
The twilight turns the azure cup
Upon the yellow sand,
And pours libations, sweet and slow
Into the river's hand.
There he may drink whose soul can see
There lies the palm— Tranquillity!
BELIEF.
The brook is frozen from bridge to brink;
Above it the snow is sweeping;
To look at it now, oh! who would think
The ice will shiver, the snowflakes sink,
And blossoms and grasses rush to drink
From ripples in sunlight leaping.
The alder twigs, hung with silver bells,
Stand still to their frozen duty.
Oh! who can look through copse and dells
To see the summer in amber swells
Wash over the trees, creep into their cells,
And burst in a foam of beauty!
Oh! who can think under drifts so deep
The sweetest of bloom is lying;
Or hope to see through apple-snow peep
The nut-brown castles the birdies, keep.
Beneath whose turrets, in guarded sleep,
Are wings in wait of flying.
Anyone, dear, who can love and trust.
Sees under the snow the sunmier;
And all may know from drifting, from dust.
Will blossom at last the pure and just,
For Death his hidden treasures must
Reveal to the fair, sweet comer.
THE HARVESTERS.
Alexander has drunk too deep;
Caesar is dead of his thirty wounds;
Anthony, Hannibal, Sdpio sleep.
And sleep they will till the trumpet sounds.
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LETTIE S. BIGELOW,
169
Better a man in his harvest-field,
Swinging his scythe with a spirit just,
Than he who sword and lance could wield,
And now is dead and turned to dust
Bend and mow, smooth and slow,
Like a river's curving flow.
Rake and heap, round and deep,
All the gold the farmers reap.
Pile the wain high with grain,
Princes of the yeoman's train!
Slithe King Hal, and babbling James,
Louis, Oscar, Peter, Fritz,
-Men of purple — potent names —
Lauded by a thousand wits —
l-eft their thrones and rode away;
Rode in state nor came again;
JBetter swing a scythe to^iay
Than have swung a sceptre then.
Lo, behold! streets of gold
Through the shining wheat unrolled.
Lo in state, slow, sedate.
Chariots approach the gate;
Open wide, they that ride
Are to potentates allied.
THE BERRY-PICKERS.
Sparrows are piping; the bold robins sing,
Shout the wee brooks, and the pasture-bells ring;
Lit are the grasses and burning the briars,
•Golden the pigeons that sit in the spires.
Happy, oh happy, oh happy to-day,
•Out to the gates to the country away!
■Sturdy of arm and with finger and thumb
Eager for service the brown pickers come;
Bright in the morning the empty pails swing
"Timed to the tune the berry-maids sing.
Happy, oh happy, oh happy to-day,
•Out of the gates to the country away!
•Out of the dust and away from the streets.
Into the thickets and reedy retreats;
Ragged and shagged they come from the town —
Never a one in a velvet gown.
Happy, oh happy, oh happy to-day,
Out of the gates to the country away!
Deep in the woods where the summer lies dark
Hark to the merry dog's echoing bark!
Oolden-rods wave in the wide purple shades.
Knights, by the side of the blithe berry-maids.
Happy, oh happy, oh happy to-day,
Out of the gates to the country away!
LETTIE S. BIGELOW.
LETTIE S. BIGELOW was bom in Pelham,
Mass., in 1849. She is the daughter of the
Rev. I. B. Bigelow, an intinerant minister, for more
than half a century an honored member of the New
England Conference of the Methodist Episcopal
Church. Her early education was in the public
schools of the cities and towns where her parents
lived, as they were removed from place to place
every two or three years by the decrees of the pre-
siding bishops, according to the economy of their
church. In 1866 she entered Wesleyan Academy
at Wilbraham, Mass., and remained a student there
two years. Failing health compelled her to re-
linquish her course of study at that institution
before the completion of the regular course, and
she has since made her home with her parents at
their various appointments. Four years ago her
father left the active work of the ministry, and
made for himself and family a permanent home in
Holyoke, Mass., where Miss Bigelow now lives,
tenderly caring for an invalid mother. She has
done considerable literary work, being always a
close student of books and events. She has pub-
lished no book of poems, but her verses have ap-
peared quite frequently in the New York Christian
Advocate, the Zion's Herald of Boston, the New
York Independent^ the Boston Journal and other
papers. Her prose writings, consisting of sketches,
newspaper articles and a serial story, have been for
the most part under a pseudonym. A few years
ago she wrote a book of Sunday-school and anni-
versary exercises, published in New York, which
had a large sale. Miss Bigelow is also an inter-
esting platform speaker. Her lecture on *' Wom-
an's Place and Power" has met with special favor
and most hearty commendation wherever it has
been delivered, *H. M.
HOARDED.
It belongs to other years,
But I keep it just the same.
And sometimes, when no one hears.
Low and soil I speak the name.
Once I wore it like a crown,
Proudest queen beneath the sky!
And like wind-blown thistle down,
Hope and joy went mounting high.
Deeper now than ocean gems
Hides it from the world apart;
Others wear their diadems,
Mine I carry in my heart
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HOW MUCH?
How much do I love you ? Measure the sea,
The beautiful sea, with its shimmer and sheen,
Its wide, blue expanses, and its depths unseen —
If you'd know my love, go measure the sea.
How much do I love you ? Measure the blue
In the sky overhead, the sunset's red bars,
And all the glittering wealth of moon and stars—
If you'd know my love then measure the blue.
How much do I love you ? Weigh if you can
The gladness of song, the fragrance of flowers.
All the dear, sweet enchantment of summer
hours —
How much do I love you ? Tell if you can.
EPOCHS.
There are boundless chasms in time,—
Small moments that are cleft so wide
Years on years fall in and bide,
And life is lived in an hours chime.
Such, Love, was that moment sublime.
When you whispered one word alone
That, like a star, has always shone
In every weather, and clime;
And Summer's dew or Winter's rime,
Are only in jewels spelling
That best word of all your telling.
A WAKING SONO.
Away, my dear, from slumber land,
Spread your sails for the wide-awake strand!
Life is up and the world begun,
Out from the web the fairies have spun!
Open your eyes, your eyes of blue,
That sparkle like violets in the dew;
It was never meant that gems so bright
Should be hid away from mortal sight.
Up, and hurry, or you'll be late,
Fun and frolic will never wait;
Leave unfinished your dream begun —
Up, and run, to catch up with the sun!
The hours are out in their brightest guise,
Aiming their arrows at sleepy eyes;
Boat loads of play go sailing away,
'Cause the children don't wake at break of day.
What a solemn owl is our old earth,
Without the echo of your mirth!
Then come, my dear, with a bound and shout.
Bring plenty of smiles, but never a pout
ACQUIESCENCE.
Life is too short, its days too few,
Counting the joys, forgetting the pain,
Looking through sunshine, leaving out rain.
Fast speeds the morning bright with dew,
Soon comes the night when skies are blue.
But long is life and slow the years.
Reckoned by winter's drear frost and blight-
Measured by hopes bom only for flight;
Without the laughter, counting the tears,
Life is full long, though few the years.
Then be sure the hand of light
Is deftly laying each stroke and line,
Blending the colors of your life and mine.
Making the picture not so bright
As to dim or dazzle the sight
TRANSFIGURED.
There are days that come and go with the sun.
And the hours are only beads that we string;
Carelessly threading them one by one.
Scattered they fall as the daylight takes wing.
There are other days unmeasured by hours.
Save those that in heart notation we hold;
Their sun never sets, nor fade their flowers.
And no age can pale the glint of their gold.
A voice we love, the touch of a hand,
Will transmute into gold the meanest clay,
And unseen by us, a magical wand
With glory is tinging each common day.
W^e walk, without knowing, enchanted ground.
And our fingers dally with gems unguessed;
What's poor to-day, may to-morrow be crowned.
The good unnoted, become bliss confessed.
TELL ME.
Where did you find little maiden fair.
Such soft blue violets for your eyes ?
And how did you catch in your crazy hair
The golden shimmer of summer skies ?
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ELIZABETH BAKER BOHAN.
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Where did you ever learn ways so sweet,
To which no art or seeming belong ?
Were your dinipled hands and restless feet,
Attuned to motion, as harp to song ?
Who told you the secret of the song
That sings itself, and laughter too,
That never tires though the day be long.
Tell me, my little fairy— who ?
And whisper in my ear the magic word
That unlocks the golden gates of sleep;
A word that men have never, never heard,
And only litde children keep.
And teach me to trust, and trust again,
Though hopes prove false and hearts deceive;
And whether the world brings loss or gain,
To ever love, and still believe.
'\^nds blow cold, out of tune is the song,
Roses have thorns, and gold lies deep;
Tell me how to laugh when the world goes wrong,
And I pledge you the secret to keep.
FOR OTHERS' SAKE.
Not rich are we in hoarded gold,
Though multiplied a hundred fold,-
Wealth is just the wealth we use.
And the best by far do we live,
On the silver and gold we give.
As oil from the widow's cruse.
The beauty of the summer hours.
And the fragrance of the flowers.
Are spent for others' good;
And the bread we lovingly break.
With a prayer for another's sake
May to us be richest food.
THE REASON WHY.
Why I love you ? Tell me first
Why rivers to the ocean run,
And dew-drops sparkle in the sun;
Why roses blush, and lilies pale,
Wooed ever by the same love tale.
Cannot help it ? Then you know
The secret of the song of birds,
And fall of dew, like saintly words:
Why daisies bare their hearts to view.
And mine I show to none but you.
ELIZABETH BAKER BOHAN.
MRS. ELIZABETH BAKER BOHAN is a
native of England, but came to America in
1854, with her parents, when she was four years of
age, and has lived most of the time since then in
Wisconsin. She received her education in the
Milwaukee public schools and was for a time a
highly valued teacher. She was married to Mr. M.
Bohan, then editor of the Fond du Lac Journal, in
1872. They now reside in Milwaukee, Wis., have
a pleasant home and are surrounded by four bright,
happy children, — two boys and two girls. Mrs.
Bohan is the fortunate possessor of a combination
of talents. She is a devoted and successful home-
keeper, wife and mother. She is a painter of
acknowledged ability and of far more than local
celebrity. She is something of a musician, and
there are many in Milwaukee and other portions of
the state who take high rank as painters and
musicians, who received their first and only instruc-
tion from her. From her earliest youth she has
practiced composition. At school she not only
wrote her own essays but many for her schoolmates.
As she grew to womanhood the taste for writing
increased. She wrote great numbers of poems and
a still greater number of prose sketches, but
ofl*ered none for publication until within the last five
or six years. Since then large numbers of her
poems and sketches have been published in the
best papers and magazines throughout the country.
Her mental strength is very great and steadily
growing stronger, and her mind is well disciplined.
While she has done much literary work, it has
always been a secondary consideration. Her daily
duties have been as numerous and exacting as those
of almost any mother, wife and home-keeper, and
everything she has done in a literary way has been
accomplished in odd moments, and sometimes
when duty to herself required that she be sleeping.
J. A. W.
SHERMAN.
"THB noblest ROMAN OP THEM ALL."
As some grand sun slow rolling to the west,
Sinks down in splendor when the shadows fall.
So, full of glory, draweth nigh its rest.
Thy mighty life that claims the love of all.
An eagle flying through the trackless sky —
A giant pine upon the mountain side —
Thou hast a name that was not bom to die;
Thou hast a soul of all our land the pride.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Thine is an honor of so vast a kind
That, once within its radiated gleam,
The common man feels stirring in his mind
The noble wish that right shall reign supreme.
The path of perfect justice thou dost take;
Sweet virtue's halo thou dost aye retain;
And seeing thee so loved for honor's sake,
The humblest of thy race doth courage gain.
The baby yet unborn thy name shall hear
Dropped in some tender mother's rev'rent voice.
The unborn patriot shall thy name revere,
And in its deathless strength for aye rejoice.
The hero of a carnival of deeds —
Thine earthly battles all are fought and won.
Our love alone thy greatness still exceeds,
So sink to rest in glory— like the sun.
THE TIME FOR REST.
O HAPPY bee, so heavy-laden, fly!
The shadows deepen in the valleys low;
Still for another night let some sweets lie;
Fly homeward in the sun's last rosy glow.
I
A SIMILE.
I STOOD upon the ocean's brink at dawn
And waited, scarcely breathing, for the scene
I knew would come. A mass of purple cloud
Stretched low across the east. A frowning peak
Of vapor lifted high its angry head
Above its fellows, fearfully sublime,
Coldly impenetrable, as though
In its dark breast a thousand thunderbolts
Might lurk; as though its roomy caves might hold
An army of fierce winds, and its great arms
Might clasp the wildest storms the world
Has ever known. Then up the rosy rays
Came climbing. The awful mass of cloud was
touched,
Illumined. Wave on wave and fold on fold
A mountain grand became, of blushing amber;
A priceless Jewell, rare, clasping all close.
The modest garments of the infant mom.
One long, deep breath, and then I said: " Oh this
Is like our earthly care. How dark and grim it
looms;
How dread, how overwhelming, and how full
Of unborn terrors doth it seem to us;
But when we wait, God's smile doth soon light up
Its darkest depths, and then we see 'twas but
A golden glory for our soul's best good.
O happy bird, with weary, drooping wing,
The shadows gather, leave thy growing nest
Cease work while still thou hast the heart to sing;
Fly to thy shady home, sweet bird, and rest
O happy mother, with unnumbered cares,
Fold thy dear hands, the working hours are o'er.
Put gladly far away the toil that wears.
And let thy soul expand and bloom once more.
O man with wrinkled brow, on gain intent,
The calm night comes, put worldly ways aside.
To labor always was not what God meant;
Smooth out thy brow and now with love abide.
The body is not all, nor wealth, nor toil;
Far more the inner growth, the soul's expanse;
Enough is wealth. God's purpose do not foil
In striving sore for pomp and circumstance.
OUR HARVEST YEARS.
When russet apples turn each bronzM cheek
To catch a final beauty from the sun;
When the first frost with pencil fine and true
The tinting of the leaves has just begun;
Then nature still can turn one fairer page.
It is the mellow year's sweet middle age.
When the bright world hangs out a tender haze
To veil her scarlet colors grown so bold;
When in full fruitage droops the ripened com
And nature's green is tumed to red and gold;
Then do we feel that in loved nature's shrine
Four seasons' wondrous blessings doth combine.
To all the riches of the summer, spring,
The hazel copse now adds its store of wealth;
The nests are empty, but the birdlings gay.
Now sing their own sweet songs of love, by stealth;
From gen'rous laden trees the brown nuts fall.
For earth her treasure now doth yield to all.
Thus, in our human lives, those years are best.
Those harvest years, with love and children blest.
We see our nestlings mate in their glad spring.
And know their love is not so grand a thing
As it will be when autumn's glory sheds
The rapture of all seasons on their heads.
SEPTEMBER.
How tenderly about earth's russet breast
The yellow leaves are dinging;
With what a light and careless air of rest
The lazy bees are singing.
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ELIZABETH BAKER BOHAN.
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How sleepily on yonder woody knolls
I hear the brooklet singing through the lawn.
The gentle sheep are lying;
The sleepy twitter of the nesting bird;
How slowly on the farmer's wagon rolls
I hear the whispers of the growing com
Mid thistle-feathers flying.
That by the cooling night- wind oft is stirred;
I mount to stars and moons, watch meteors fall.
How sunnily the golden-rod stands up,
And drink the knowledge in— Love made thenx
A queenly air assuming;
all.
How crimson is the nodding poppy-cup,
How dear the late flowers blooming.
Far in yon village church, the drowsy clock
Strikes twelve in tones by distance made so dim,
So, longingly, we drop a silent tear;
And grateful dews caress the dreaming flock
We dread to see the ending
That peaceful sleep through Nature's midnight
Of nature's tend'rest sermon of the year—
hymn.
This perfect color-blending.
What pregnant thought, that I'm a needed part
Of wondrous Nature's warmly throbbing heart!
A BRIGHT IDEA.
What the tense care that warps my heart by day,
The ever present greed that mocks life's bliss,
I HAVE a bright idea, lassie,
When I can tread at night the milky way
That's big enough for two;
And greet new soul-lights with a lover's kiss;
Let's wander by the meadow stream
When I can kneel upon the dewy sod
So I can tell it you,—
And give, in estacy, my soul to God?
God gives me courage in the fields
And 'neath the sky's deep blue.
WE.
I had a dream last night, lassie.
You'd changed your pretty name,
We loved.
For one of no celebrity,
Indeed we did!
No fortune and no fame.
As bees fly in the sun.
Unknown, unhonored still of men—
And feel its warmth, and feeling, feel
You loved it just the same.
The sun and they are one.
You've had your share of care, lassie.
We hated.
But far was sadness driven
Yes indeed we did!
When unto you a little home.
As owls sit in the dew
A tiny cot, was given;
And see the moon, and seeing, see
A lowly place all poor and bare—
The moon and they are two.
You turned it into heaven.
We married.
My bright idea is this, lassie;
Sure as fate we did!
Let's make the dream come true;
Our love came back, you see.
The name, the cot, with heart and soul,
Just as it always should, and now.
I offer now to you.
Well — ^now, we number three.
What say you love—'* my bright idea "
Is just the thing for two ?
STRIVING.
A NOCTURNE.
Use thy powers unto the uttermost;
Let no talent dormant lie;
Thb star-flecked robe that wraps the tranquil night.
That thou hast not greater glory
The balmy breaths of hills, the gauzy mist
Do not sorrow, do not sigh;
That spreaded low her garments cool and white,
Not accomplishment, but striving
Proclaim that Nature is an alchemist
Is the virtue, child of earth.
Who tumeth all her beauties into gold
And thy striving, here, or elsewhere.
For those who oft seek knowledge in her fold.
Into glory must have birth.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
LYDIA HOYT FARMER.
ONE of the most enterprising of Ohio's public
women, was bom in the city of Cleveland, July
19, 1842, to Hon. J. M. Hoyt, of Cleveland, and
Mary Ella Beebe, daughter of Alexander M. Beebe,
LL. D. of New York. Of such a parentage it would
only be natural that Lydia Hoyt would receive the
best educational advantages, and having a special
fondness and aptitude for the arts, her tastes and in-
clinations were indulged to their fullest bent. She
was bom under a lucky plant, having escaped the
toils and privation which is the lot of so many. Un-
like many children of the wealthier class, however,
she improved and made use of the talents given her,
so that she is a most fitting representative of a family
already numbering many illustrious names in its
annals. Her husband, Hon. E. J. Farmer, of Cleve-
land, is the author of several works on politics and
finance. For the past ten years Mrs. Farmer has
contributed to the leading newspapers and maga-
zines, on various lines: poems, essays, juvenile
stories, historical sketches and novels. She is of a
deeply religious nature, and endeavors to tinge all
her writings with a moral as well as an amusing
sentiment She is now editing for the Woman's
Department of the Columbian Exposition " What
America Owes to Women,** a souvenir for the
National Exposition. J. W.
THE SCIENCE OF LIFE.
I SOUGHT to learn the cause of things;
Why flowers bloom'd ? why eagle's wings
Cleft the clear air? why grass-blades grew?
If blossom, bird, or leaflet knew
From whence its life ?
I walked through science-beaten tracts,
To question the results of facts;
The springs of motive force to leam,
If perchance there research should earn
The key to life.
1 whispered to the lily white.
Glowing with beauty in the light.
Her perfumed breath with gentle sigh,
Murmured: ''Behold my life on high;
It is the sun!"
I asked the proudly prancing steed,
From whence its action and its speed;
But still the puzzling answer came.
The energy of life the same,
The sunbeam's power.
The science of life revealed to sight,
Electric force and warmth and light.
Are all the sunbeam's various ways,
By which what we call life, displays
Its hidden force
But what this magic force called life;
Unsolved by science through skill or knife ?
Then to the sun himself I turned,
Perchance, the mystery to be learned,
He might reveal.
What is thy power, O King of Day!
Which works through energizing ray.
On man, and beast, and bird, and flower,
And gives to each its wondrous dower,
Of living germ ? •
Then written on the sunbeams bright,
In shining words of golden light,
Flashed forth this answer from the sky:
**A11 life proceeds from God on high,
THE FIRST GREAT CAUSE!"
THE PENALTY OF FAME.
"I WOULD be great, O Lord!" in ignorance I plead.
"I would some mighty task perform in this short
life;
I would my name were carven by Fame's keen-
edged knife,
Upon the highest mountain-peak of human deed!"
Then did the Lord a vision show that I might read
Therein the story of the lives of weary strife,
And note the bloody foot-prints in that path of
life
Made by the bruis^ feet, poisoned by envy's weed,
And torn by the sharp rocks of cruel adversity.
The vision passed, and then I prayed with fervent
voice:
* 'Permit me, O my God, to dwell in valleys low
Of humble duties; there will I gladly serve Thee.
But if the Mount of Difficulty be Thy choice,
May the Love-light from Calv'ry's Cross upon
me glow."
IF.
If is a word bom of sad human doubt;
There is no ^ with the great God above;
"I WILL!" is His mandate of pow'r and love.
And Heaven and earth obey with glad shout;
For Divine Will and Pow'r all chances rout.
When we are sheltered in Infinite Love,
Our wills attuned to that GREAT WILL above;
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LYDIA HOYT FARMER,
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All spirits of error shall be cast out;
There will be no ^ with wailing refrain,
Shadowing our efforts with dread, black wing;
Vulture-like hov'iing o'er every bright joy,
Uttering ill-omened suggestions of pain;
The glad Bird of Certainty then will sing,
And effort be bliss, no doubt can annoy.
WHITTIER'S MANTLE.
Who shall catch his falling mantle,
Stamped with Freedom's emblems bright?
Who shall sing, now he is silent,
In this Crisis, for the Right ?
Who shall sound from mount to hill-top
Bugle tones against the Wrong ?
Who shall lift Love's shining banner,
'Midst earth's toiling, tear-dimmed throng?
Who shall voice the cry of sorrow
Wrung from tortured, weary souls ?
Who shall shout the glad Hosannas,
When Truth's glowing scroll unrolls ?
Who shall climb with steadfast footsteps
By those paths so bleak and dread,
Up those rugged mountains where his
Battle Cry of Freedom led ?
Other poets interpret nature.
In as sweet and clear a song;
Who shall be such valiant minstrel,
Cheering on Truth's hosts 'gainst wrong ?
Who will plead so well for Justice ?
Who will lay on Freedom's shrine.
Love's bright chaplet twined from blossoms
Plucked from Tree of Life Divine ?
A LESSON IN LOVE.
Stranger than aught on earth, is woman's mind;
When thou canst tell whither the wind will blow.
Perchance thou canst predict where woman's
love will go.
Take up the scroll of hist'ry; there you'll find
The maddest freak of love in womankind.
Napoleon to NeippergI note how low
The Empress Marie fell, who could bestow
The love for which the Elban Exile pined,
On one-eyed Neipperg, ugly, old and grim,
With black patch where a bullet ball had struck;
While her illustrious husband sued in vain
For notice from the woman raised by him
To the proud throne of France; when dire ill-luck
Had bowed the mighty Hero's head in pain.
CONTRAST.
Now mark the contrast in a woman's heart!
Divorce, disgrace, the very cruelest blow
By which a woman's love could be laid low.
Had fall'n on Josephine, whose keenest smart,
When from the Tuileries she must depart.
Was that her awful anguish was a blow
From him, for whom she would her life bestow;
*Twas he, whose hand had sent the piercing dart.
Which tore her quiv'ring soul with bitter woe;
'Twould seem but just such blow her hate had
earned;
But when his head was bowed on Elba's Isle,
She would have barter' d life itself to go
And comfort him, whom Marie spumed.
And deem'd it highest bliss, his sorrow to beguile.
THE POET'S SONG.
Joy took up the harp of Life,
And tried to sing the poet's lay;
But mortals heeded not the strains;
"That's not as we find life," they say.
Then Love joined in with rapturous note,
While Joy the chords from harp-springs swept;
Still was the poet's song unheard,
By toiling souls who worked and wept.
But when pale Grief with melting tone.
Which voiced the world's woe, thrilled the strain.
Then mortals listening, whispered low:
** Hark! to that angel's sweet refrain!"
That is in truth the song of life;
We've known the Love, we feel the Pain;
And only Grief's deep S5rmpathy,
Can make the poet's meaning plain."
1HE SONG OP THE UNIVERSE.
The grand Oratoria of Creation,
Flashed forth from the Infinite Mind;
And the rich chords rose as the Master willed,
From sun, stars, seas, trees, flowers and wind,
Till the universe chanted the Song of Love,
Echo'd by nature below, and the choirs above.
When God saw that the harmony thus far was sweet,
His thoughts blossomed in souls, and the Song was
complete. — Doom of the Holy City
ECCE DEUS.
God speaks, and suns flash into light;
God smiles, and flowers the fields adorn;
God breathes, and fragrance fills the air;
God loves, and human souls are bom.
—Ibid,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
JOHN OTIS BARROWS.
ONE day a large boy, tired of the seclusion and
monotony incident to hard and continuous
labor on a poor, rocky farm in Eastern Connecticut,
remarked to his elder brother: "If I had a thousand
dollars I would see the inside of some college."
"Well I wouldn*t," was the reply. The boy was
obliged to remain on the farm, to help his aged father
and mother until he was twenty-one. When relieved
of this duty, he borrowed fifty dollars of a friend,
and set out for Kimball Union Academy, at Meri-
<ien, N. H. There, teaching school one term, and
-working on a farm every vacation, he fitted for
<:ollege in two years, and entered Amherst before
visiting his parents, having never, until he went to
the academy, been absent from the paternal roof
over a single Sabbath in his life. This prolonged
first absence was necessitated by lack of funds; by
no means caused by lack of filial affection. He
was an unusually devoted son, and sent his worthy
parents, regularly, most loving and cheering letters
•during this time. He was enrolled among the
Freshmen as John Otis Barrows, of Mansfield, Conn.
Mr. Barrows can boast of Puritan blood, pure
and simple. His father, Andrew Barrows was
•descended from one, who, if he did not "come
over in the Mayflower," certainly arrived very soon
after. His mother, Sarah Storrs, was a lineal
•descendant of Samuel Storrs who came from Sutton-
cum-Lound, England, to America in 1663.
Mr. Barrows was bom August 4th, 1833. He is
one of six sons, and the youngest of a family of
nine children. Graduating in i860, he studied
divinity one year at East- Windsor Hill, Conn., and
then two years at Andover, Mass. After gradua-
tion, he labored as a pastor, in New Hampshire,
:six years, when, resigning the pastorate of the old
First Church of Exeter, with his wife, Clara Storrs
Freeman, he sailed for Ceserea, Asia Minor, to
labor as a missionary of the American Board.
They had at the time two small children, and some
of the incidents of their journey up through the
Cilician Gates of the Taurus Mountains were more
interesting than agreeable; but at last they reached
their home in safety. After spending six or seven
years in the interior, they removed to Constanti-
nople. At the end of ten years absence from
America, they returned for a visit, but illness in
their family compelled them to forego the privilege
of entering again upon the work they so dearly loved.
Mr. Barrows has spent the years since his return,
in 1880, in pastorates in Atkinson, N. H., and in
Newington, Conn., being at present at tlie latter
place. In 1884 the Congregational Sunday-school
and Publishing Sodety published a charming
book of his, entitled: "On Horseback in Cappa-
doda." His poems are of a more recent date, he
never having attempted anything of the kind until
within two or three years. E. F. S. A.
IN HEAVENLY PLACES.
At sunset oft along the lower sky
The sombre clouds reflect no ray of light,
But dark appear, as if approaching night
Were heralded by them; yet such as high
Above them move, in wondrous beauty lie
Across the wide expanse; these fill our sight
With rapture as we gaze. The lofty height
Now seems a world to which we fain would fly;
For more than fairest day, it is the sun
Reflected in a glory that he hides
Until this hour. And thus the Christian shows
The beauty of the life in him begun.
When in the heavenly places he abides.
And Christ, the light, in his dark bosom glows.
HOUSEHOLD VOICES.
'Tis sweet to hear, in pensive hours.
The murmur of the trees,
Or catch amid the fragrant flowers.
The soft, low hum of bees;
'Tis sweet to wake at morning's birth,
With song birds of the dawn.
But sweetest of the sounds of earth
Are household voices gone.
When thoughts come to the lonely couch
That press the fevered brain,
And in fond dreams is felt the touch,
That erst could soothe the pain;
Then nought remains of any worth
Save lingering sounds of love.
That once made home so sweet on earth.
But now make home above.
When gently fold the wings of night.
And hush the world to rest,
Now oft returns to chastened sight
The birdling in its nest
Then in the song that downward floats
From heavenly realms so fair,
Is heard the music of the notes
Of one bright cherub there.
When tears of grief make dearer still
The mother's precious name.
Her words the quickened memory fill.
But seem no more the same.
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ISABELLA WILSON McCONIHE,
i8i
They come, as borne by gentle wing,
The angel footsteps fall;
They come as words which angels sing,
And sweetest of them all.
Then make the household love so strong,
That household voices true
Will nevermore one buried wrong
In memories renew.
Let every deed we do to-day
To dear ones pleasure give.
For what we do and what we say
In tender hearts will live.
WHAT SHALL BE MY PRAYER?
I ASK Thee not, O Lord, for rest —
A life from toilsome burdens free;
But rather for the strength to-day •
To bear each burden as from Thee.
I ask Thee not to wipe the tears
From eyes that now so often weep;
But rather make these tears a spring
Of new affections pure and deep.
I ask Thee not to lift the hand
That thou hast laid upon me sore;
But rather grace to feel 'tis Thine,
And from its touch to love Thee more.
I ask Thee not to let me see,
Whilst thou would have me live below;
But rather ask in Thee to trust —
*Tis sweet to trust aud wait to know.
AGAIN TO THE WORK.
We would stay on this high mount of vision.
So far from the world and its strife;
Still would wait where the glory of Jesus
Transfigures the daily life.
But look down on the world just below us,
See there the fierce struggle with sin,
For our Leader our toils are not ended,
Then haste. His new work begin.
Yes, with gladness we'll seize our old armor,
Henceforth 'twill be strong and more bright;
For this armor our Lord newly gives us —
'Tis mighty, ** the armor of light."
Oh then, after the conflict is over,
And none of these labors remain.
We will gather again with our Savior
And with Him eternally reign.
ISABELLA WILSON McCONIHE.
MRS. ISABELLA WILSON McCONIHE,
youngest daughter of John and Elizabeth
Buback, was boni January 15, 1826, in the county
of Lancaster, Pa., where she dwelt in an earthly
paradise of beautiful scenery until she was twelve
years of age, when her mother, with her family,
(her father having died), refnoved to the State of
Ohio, afterward to Illinois. The natural and pic-
turesque beauty of the home of her childhood early
inspired her artistic taste to give expression to her
thoughts in poetry. Mrs. McConihe has the true
poet's love for the beautiful in nature and art, and
had she cultivated her love for form and color
might have excelled with pencil and brush as her
work already accomplished gives evidence. At
seventeen she taught her first term of school in
the country, the second in town where many of
her scholars were older than herself. At nine-
teen she was married to Mr. Seth Wilson, a
prosperous business man and honored citizen of
Medina, Ohio. Mr. Wilson died early in life; after
five years she married Mr. Lucian Harper McConihe
of Princeton, 111., where she had a pleasant home
endeared to her by her devoted husband and loving
children, two of whom, a son and daughter are liv-
ing, and a wide circle of friends. For the last few
years her home has been in northern Iowa.
M. M. T.
MY ROBIN AND BLUE-JAY.
The prettiest picture that I ever have seen.
Is a beautiful snow-crowned evergreen;
While in and out the green branches all day.
Idly floateth the brillantly robed Blue-Jay;
His plumage as blue as violets in May,
But his heart, like the charmer's, is cruel and gay.
So while I'm admiring this picture so fair,
I'm thinking of one that last summer was there —
A simple warm nest on a branch of the tree,
So close to my window, I plainly could see
My Robin when planning his pretty home nest,
In his well-known brown coat, and far-famed red
vest —
His sweet cheery tones ring out with the dawn.
First matins, then snatches of songs on the lawn —
He sings while it rains on his darling brown head.
He sings to his mate when she dreams in her bed.
Love mellows each tone of the sweet warbler's
voice.
Like Indostan's thrush to the mate of his choice.
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To-day in the sun-land where oranges bloom,
And offer their white waxen buds in perfume;
On the brim of some cool wood-embowered stream,
Where Love often rambles to dream life's sweet
dream. ,
There sings my old Robin his simple strain —
The mocking birds echo the music again.
Resplendent in plumage the gay paroquets,
And orioles woo thee with sweet luring ways;
The warm eyes of love bewilder and charm,
Till we start from the dream in grief and alarm!
Like murmuring bees in the white lily's cup,
Sip on till the petals forever close up.
When summer is ready to wed the sweet spring,
The glossy magnolias their garlands will bring;
And Jessamine all her sweet censers may swing,
But no bird at the bridal such joy-notes can sing —
Brown Robin, we miss thee; prolong not thy stay;
When rose-trees have blosomed to crown the dear
May.
SINGING IN THE RAIN.
Loving little brownie, darling,
Knows thy heart no pain
That thou sittest all day singing-
Singing in the rain ?
Couldst thon know the pain of waiting
For a step in vain,
Thou wouldst not be gaily singing —
Singing in the rain.
When the sky is full of sumbeams
And the air of song,
Happy moments fly so swiftly
Bearing days along.
So the years will bear us quickly
Where there is no pain;
Where there is no need of singing —
Singing in the rain.
APPLE BLOSSOMS.
The apple trees are laden with blossoms to-day,
White blossoms as pure as the snow that fell
From Heaven, and clothed all the slumbering trees
In robes that would grace the fair angels as well.
But come out to the orchard; I cannot describe
Its poetic glory, its sweetness of bloom;
You must live in it, love in it, all the day long;
Bathe in its perfume — 'twill dissolve all your
gloom.
Blue-crested humming-birds are afloat in the sea
Of red blossoms, as warm as the heart of the rose;
Or pink as the sea shell on its coralline bed.
Where nymphs of the ocean oft seek sweet re-
pose.
The crooked old peach trees, so broken and bare
Of green leaves, are mantled in blushes as red
As e'er dyed the soft check of the sweet and the
fair —
A fit emblem of love, when life's hopes all lie dead.
The wonderful calm stealing o'er the green earth,
The gold of the sunlight falling on the wet flowers.
When the tempest has gone with its lightning and
hail.
Is like meeting with thee in these fragrant pink
bowers.
TO A MEADOW LARK.
Spring to thy wings bright lark of the meadow!
The gates of the morning stand wide for the day.
Fly with thy mates and leave me in shadow.
Thou art a song, but I am shrouded in clay.
EASTER MORNING.
O World in tears, thy Christ lies in the tomb!
O World bereft, His death has sealed thy doom!
We hoped that He had brought immortal Life
To conquer Death and end the mortal strife.
He died! We have no Christ! Our hopes lie dead!
Like him entombed within His nanow bed.
'Risen!" an angel speaks." He's risen from the,
grave!
He came to die, and live the world to save.
Behold where lay your Lord, and do not fear."
O sing my happy Soul! O glad world hear!
Our Lord has conquered Death! He is thy king.
O glorious Easter mom awake and sing.
Sing loud ye morning stars along the skies,
And haste blest Earth to see thy Sun arise;
Bear ye the news, bright angel band to Heaven,
To man a ** resurrection mom " is given.
WINTER.
Thou hast hushed the deep notes of the songs of
the lakes.
And the silvery trill of the brook in the grass.
The wild heave of the river's deep bosom is stilled
By the chill and the frown on thy face as you
pass. —Farewell to Old Winter.
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ANDREW McCABE,
i8j.
ANDREW McCABE.
MR.' McCABE has written so little verse, some
thirty-five or forty short pieces in all, in half
as many years, that one wonders why, having wnt-
ten at all, he has not written more. The fact is he
has never seriously thought of making literature a
pursuit, but on occasions, sometimes years apart,
has simply given way to the impulse of some
momentary influence of the Muses inspiration. He
is not one of those who " lisped in numbers," for at
the mature age of thirty-seven he had written but
one poem, which until that period he had not even
put in print. Then, in 1868, a flourishing literary
society of Milwaukee having on two different occa-
sions offered prizes for the best poems on subjects
of its own choosing, to be competed for anony-
mously, he contested successfully in both instances.
Taking the event altogether it was one that awoke
a lively commotion, and a very intense interest,
amongst the literary people of that city, and is not
yet foiigotten.
A success like this would have stimulated most
persons to earnest and sustained efforts; but the
writer in question was wont to reason that while
the great masters of poesy remain but partially
read, and while here is an abundance of the best
that man's intellect is capable of producing within
the easy reach of all readers, it is irrational for minor
bards to waste their energies for inferior results,
not remembring that the great poets virtually write
for poets, or those of rarest insight, while the less
pretentious, in the nature of things, furnish the
most extended and full enjoyment. Because their
work is not in the form of riddles, are not Whittier,
and Bums, and *' Father Prout" as beneficient as
Browning ? The analogy will hold good all along
the scale. Mr. McCabe may have become aware
of the force of this view when he found that his
little *'Avich Machree,** written to pass away an
interval of leisure in the counting room where he
spends his days, made the circuit of the English
speaking world with the rapidity of steam.
Andrew McCabe was bom near the pretty little
town of Virginia, in the southeast comer of County
of Cavan, Ireland, in June 1831. He came with his
family to Philadelphia at the age of ten, attended
the public grammar school, thence passing to the
Central High School. Went west in 1857, and
settled in Milwaukee, Wis., where he continues to
reside.
Mr. McCabe's poetry has, above all the quality
of spontaneity. If the Greek and Latin classic
forms had never existed, Mr. McCable would have
written as he writes, so inartificial and natural is
his form. If we had only one cup carved by Ben-
venuto Cellini, we should know that Cellini had
genius. It is not quantity of production that makes
a man a poet, and Mr. McCabe rarely as he writes,
deserves that title. J. B. B.
PICTURES IN THE SKY.
Debarred from fragrant wood and field,
And all the rural scenes that yield
Rest to the weary heart and eye,
I seek earth-pictures in the sky.
When storms portend I look above.
And watch the cloud-ships as they move
Like navies vast, their sails unfurled.
Careering through the upper world.
Swiftly and fair one seems to glide.
From port to port, across the tide,
Unfretted by the unseen force
That drives the rest in broken course.
These, in the darkling sea's unrest,
Now dip, now rise on jagged crest.
Now, bearing each the other's shock,
Are dashed and wrecked on isle and rock.
Anon, the dark waves leave the skies: —
Here sleeps a vale, there mountains rise
Peak above peak, in grayish hue,
To their own firmament of blue.
And now the everchanging dome
Doth like a lovely reflex come
Of field, and placid lake, and grove
And all the scenes that poets love.
Where ends the lake a sunny beam
Illumines the margin with its gleam,
And forms beyond a deep cascade,
A rivulet in the broad glade.
Nor all unpeopled now the steep :»-
A shepherd grave leads full-fleeced sheep
Across a stripe of glistening sand
And folds them in this fertile land.
So, when Aeolus and the sun
Work in artistic unison.
On vapory canvas stretched on high,
I find earth pictures in the sky.
AVICH MACHREE.
Across a continent and sea.
Through fifty years of memory,
I hear the words avich nuuhree.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
A wintry night: — ^the flaming peat
With knots of resinous fir combine
To fill the air with fragrant heat,
To make the bog-oak rafters shine,
And this and love suffice for me;
The love that breathes avich machree.
Some soft white rolls of carded wool;
A spinning wheel set near the hearth;
A mother, seated on a stool,
Drawing the spiral fibres forth
To shape the downy-coated thread —
(God bless the hand laid on my head —
A freckled ^v^ years I) — ^and she
Breathes low the words; — avich machree,
** My darling son ** on English tongue;
*' Mon cherfiis^** mellow as the sun
In vineyards of the broad Garonne;
Or deeper-toned **Ach lieber sonn! "
On Weser*s shores, are sweet and strong;
But 'mong the slopes of Irish hills
The hearts deep wells appear to be
Diminished into slenderer rills
Invoked by other tongue than thee —
O tongue that breathes aidch machree!
ON FINDING A ROBIN'S EGG ON THE
GROUND IN EARLY APRIL.
An oval form of greenish blue
Shines on the grass, amid the dew,
Beneath the oaks I ramble through.
Or is it dew, or is it frost
That tips the slender greenspear'd host?
And sleeps young April at his post?
Oh haste and warm the woodland way —
So faint the dream of Summer's day
Last year's red leaves still clutch the spray.
And here, unnested and forlorn —
Oh, love unlit! Oh, song unborn!
Mated with off-cast leaf and thorn,
A robbin's egg reclines, alas!
Where every vandal foot may pass,
Upon the short, unsheltering grass.
So true of mold, the tiny thing,
A shape so fair could never spring
From daintiest touch of penciling.
One glance, and all of. youthful joy
Fills full my heart. Once more a boy
I drink life's wine, and pain and sigh
Have never been; the decades die,
Extinguished in my ecstacy;
And all earth's cares — or worst, or best.
Lie hallowed in a robin's nest!
ye who measure each and all
The ponderous globes that swing on high.
Chained in attraction heavenly,
Nor miss one throb of mutual thrall.
Canst tell us whence the sweet control
A small-bird's egg sways o'er the soul ?
III.
A moment's thought and rapture files: —
1 see a wing in southern skies,
Far, far away, expectant rise.
It skims the blue, and northern bound,
In alternating rest and flight;
Now frolics mid the violets.
Or mingles with the gladdening sound
Of some sweet brook its sweeter might
Of unctuous whistling; or forgets
The stormier hours, in tranquil mood.
In some deep mass of solitude.
Haste not, haste not, O crimson breast!
We've yet no green to roof thy nest;
Our northern spring's too timorous beams
Still leave along the dells and streams
Unconquered lances of the cold;
Fails the soft maple to unfold
The rich green veil we fain would ask
Protective of thy love-bent task.
The glistening rings on sapling's bark.
The tenderest buds on ash and elm,
Give distant pledge of shaded realm
Where every trunk looms gray and stark;
And here art thou, with cluck and call!
Thrice welcome too, thou and thy tune;
But what aerial admiral
Hath signalled thee to sail so soon ?
IV.
How oft, when reasoning failed of truth,
We've said, "The instinct of the beast
And fish, and bird, must be in sooth
Unerring in its kind at least;
They know all seasons and all times
To flee, flit back, build, brood and stay;
They've ears to note unsounded chimes.
Eyes that can read, unerringly.
Books hid from wise humanity —
Birds above all, because their flight
Leads them so nearer heavenly light".
Ah, well! this fragile little shell
But breaks one other cherished spelL
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4,, Jl'^icdUi.
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CLARENCE A, SHALER,
187
CLARENCE A. SHALER.
CLARENCE ADDISON SHALER was bom
in the township of Mackford, Green Lake
Co., Wis,, on the 29th day of May, in the year i860,
one of twins; the other twin being a girl, who
•died in her sixteenth year. I can well remember
the two children. The exact opposites in physical
build and in disposition. She a rosy-faced, light-
hearted child and he pale, slender and quiet almost
to gravity.
Clarence lived on the farm until he was thirteen
years old; at that time his parents moved to Ripon
when he entered college, and where he continued to
study until the year 1879. At that time his health
failed and he was obliged to return to his father's
farm. On the death of his father, in 1882, the care
of the place, some six hundred acres, fell on
him, since which time he has lived upon the farm
during the summer, moving into the more congenial
•atmosphere of town life during the winter months*
A strange fatality seems to hang over the head of
Mr. Shaler. In the year 1887 a gun in the hands of
another person, discharged at short range, part of
the charge passing through the flesh of his leg, but
resulting in no permanent injury. The following
year, however, was more serious in its events. In
the former part of the summer he suffered from a
sunstroke, which came near resulting in death. In
the fall he was leading a horse which reared and
struck him in the head fracturing the skull. The
following winter a runaway team ran into his cutter,
throwing him to the ground and crushing his cutter.
As a result of these accidents, also owing to his
delicate constitution, he suffered a complete nervous
prostration.
Mr. Shaler has become quite skillful with brush
and pencil, and in the line of invention has in-
vented several machines, two of which been
patented. As Poe said of himself: "Poetry with
me has been a passion, not a purpose,'' might be
-said with equal truthfulness of Mr. Shaler. The
first inspiration of the muse was awakened upon
the death of his twin sister, and since that time has
-engaged his pen more or less, as health and cir-
<nmistances would permit. Many of his best poems,
liowever, are on personal subjects, upon which
secrecy places her finger, except to his most intimate
ftiends. C. M. G.
TEARS.
- Tears! Tears! Tears!
Accursed from sorrow's bowl,
Like dews from the night, on the fallen leaf
Palls the tears from the sorrowing soul.
Tears! Tears! Tears!
For my heart is breaking to-day
O'er changes, changes for the day that is done
And thoughts that will live alway.
Tears! Tears! Tears!
Ah nothing, alas, but tears!
What was sown in joy, in the harvest of years
Sadly at last has been gathered in tears.
Tears! Tears! Tears!
Like a day drawn to its close.
By the tender grace of thy gentie balm,
Thou restorest the souls reclose.
TO MARIE BASHKIRTSEFF.
Yes Marie! all child, all woman.
Though thine own hand has laid thy life so bare,
Thy young, impatient heart.
In all that thou wouldst fain attempt or dare.
Thou still doth play a woman's part.
Where others would drag slow feet of clay,
By one sweep of thy radiant fancy's wing,
Thou'd soar beyond this common light of day;
Aye! to no earthly bonds, thy soul would cling.
For thy life shone with a terrestial ray.
It was the working of thy subtle mind.
Thy restless spirit which no will could tame.
That set the fires within thy quivering breast
And consumed thee with their inward flames.
Yes Marie, with all thy longings, thy regrets.
Aye! the remorse thy dark despair begets,
Within thy darker musings we still trace.
As we look on thy eager expectant face.
The musings of a wayward child.
Like a lone Arab, who o'er desert sands,
From the door of his tent, through twilight clear.
Watches with tranquil eye, the caravans.
In glimmering distance drawing near,
So she did watch death's sombre shadows come.
With undimmed eye, with silent tongue,
And we, O child! our hearts all woe, all tears,
Whom there were left so many, many years,
And thou wert given so few.
The unfinished picture on the easel stands;
The unfinished life against the shadowy lands;
With master stroke, death makes the scene com-
plete,
And that for which thou strove with tireless feet,
At last, O child, has been doubly granted thee.
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CHANGES.
Ah! changes! changes! within thy spell,
Are friendships soon forgot,
And faces once to memory dear
Alas! remembered not.
Yet should our minds give other forms
To those near which we dwell;
Though time's light feet have touched their locks
Are we not changed as well ?
A mother o*er her sleeping child
To-day bends down with joy;
To-morrow in her silent prayer,
Prays for her wayward boy.
Bright webs are built within a night,
At mom to be a spotless shroud;
As soon in life's great changing scene
Is pride with sorrow bowed.
THE MUSIC OF THE WAVES.
I LAV dreaming, my soul filled with music.
Like a still that is cast in the depths of the sea,
And over the chords of my feeling, sweet numbers
Were trembling in a light, subdued harmony.
Oh! was it the waves that were lonely thus sighing?
If so could I dwell in the depths of the sea
Where my soul to their music forever could listen,
And their beatings would bring their sweet rest
unto me.
They were strains only such as the soul can
remember,
Those chords that were played to my slumbering
ear,
For no hands that are mortal could wake with each
murmur
A thrill of glad joy, and a heart-rending tear.
They were tones that awake the soul to new
beauties.
They were tones played too fine for a mortals cold
ear;
I slept on as a man, yet my dreams were of angels,
And I felt that their heavenly presence was near.
Oh! will they come back, those numbers not mortal,
Or will they be ever again breathed to me.
Those strains that I heard like soft music from
heaven,
As I lay in deep slumber beside of the sea.
JAMES BARRON HOPE.
JAMES BARRON HOPE was of the best Eng-
lish and Huguenot stock, and his forefathers
have filled a high social position from the early days
of the Colony of Virginia. His great-grandfather
organized and commanded the Virginia Navy dur-
ing the Revolution, and his grandfather was Com-
modore James Barron, U. S. N. A daughter of
the latter. Miss Jane A. Barron, married Wilton
Hope Esq. and their only child was James Barron
Hope. Com. James Barron, was Commandant of
the Norfolk Navy Yard in 1829, where his grandson
was bom, on the 23rd of March of that year.
James Barron Hope received his earlier education
partly at Germantown, Pa. and partly at Hampton,
Va. He afterwards entered William and Mary
College, where he graduated with the degree of A.
B. in 1847. After leaving college he studied law
and practised on the Peninsula for several years.
In 1857 he married Miss Anne Beverly Whiting,
daughter of Kennon Whiting Esq., of Hampton.
The dry details of the legal profession were dis-
tasteful to Mr. Hope, and as he was in easy cir-
cumstances, he was enabled to devote himself to
the much more pleasant occupation of literary pur-^
suits. His writings early attracted attention, and
his critical articles in the Richmond ** South " were
very much admired for their beautiful style and
their great literary ability. He also at various times
published many small poems which bore marks of
high genius. At the Jamestown celebration in
1857, commemorative of the settlement of Virginia,
he recited a poem, and at the aveiling of the statue
of Washington, at Richmond, he delivered the ode.
Both of these poetical productions were remarkable,
for their lofty style and brilliant diction.
Upon the breaking out of the Civil War Mr.
Hope entered the Confederate Army and served'
till the capitulation of the forces of Gen. Joseph E.
Johnston in North Carolina. After the war Cap-
tain Hope settled in Norfolk, where he edited suc-
cessively the Virginian and the Landmark. In-
this new field his talents were acknowledged by all
to be of the highest order. He rose at once to a
most eminent position as a political writer during^
the fctormy period of reconstruction. Strange to
say, even in those exciting times he was personally^
popular with men of every political creed, for all
knew him to be thoroughly honest in his convic-
tions. Such a man became, as he deserved to be
a great power in Virginia.
Though ver>' much engrossed by his editorial
duties, Capt. Hope did not neglect the muses, and
from time to time he delighted the public by his
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JAMES BARRON HOPE,
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poetical contributions to his papers. He also
delivered addresses and poems on many occasions
in various parts of Virginia. The last poem recited
by him was his splendid effort at the celebration in
Yorktown in 1881, which gave him an enviable rep-
utation. Not long before his death he was invited
by the Governor of Virginia to compose a poem to
be recited at the laying of the comer-stone of the
Lee monument in Richmond. He had just finished
this touching and beautiful production, when he
was suddenly stricken by death. It was read by a
friend at the dedication of the momument to the
great confederate conunancfer.
Capt. Hope died of a disease of the heart, on the
15th of September, 1887, leaving a widow and two
married daughters to bewail their irreparable loss.
He was mourned by the whole community that so
admired, honored and loved him, as well as by his
fellow-citizens throughout the commonwealth.
Disdnguised as an essayist, poet, editor and orator,
high-souled, generous and brave, James Barron
Hope has left an imperishable name as one of the
sons of Virginia. W. R. G.
GREY BAYARD.
An Ancient Story.
THE MOUNTING.
The camp is astir, and the men muster fast;
Good Hurbert, ring out on my bugle a blast,
Then saddle me Bayard, my noble grey steed;
Surely soldier had never a better at need.
He can leap any chasm I ever have found;
He Can swim any river with roebuck or hound.
Ho! saddle me BayardI the spears on the plain,
Are thick as the hairs in his torrent-like mane.
And look to the girths; see them trusty and strong;
The harvest's before us; the day will be long
And Death, the great reaper, fair gallants, ye know,
•Goeth forth this fair morning, — Ha! yonder's the
foe.
And there comes grey Bayard! didst ever see, sirs,
A steed upon which ye might sooner win spurs ?
What a neck! what a crest! how the strong muscles
swell!
By my fay, gallant Bayard, I love thee, right well.
See his wide-spreading nostrils breathe forth fire and
mists;
On his back I would front even Fate in the lists.
So, Bayard! ho, fellow! you pant for the fray.
How my heart throbs when mounted, my beautiful
grey.
And Bayard, remember— my banner so grand.
Was wrought in device by my fair Lady's hand.
And hark to the trumpets! and hark to the drum!
Tho' the knaves are base rebels, right proudly they
come.
Hear the clash, and the tramp! how they swell with
a sound
That stirreth the blood like the bay of a hound.
Now, Hurbert, my lance! So! my visor is down;
Let us ride, my gay gallants, and win us renown.
Let us rout these false caitifis; the king's in yon
group;
Shake my banner abroad; let the wild falcon stoop.
THE BATTLE.
There was wheeling of squadrons, the charge of
brigades;
There was clatter of axes, and clashing of blades;
There was clangor of trumpets, and trample of
steeds;
There was shouting of war-cries, and doing of
deeds;
There was rending of harness, and breaking of
spears;
There was slaughter of burghers, and slaughter of
peers.
And where men fell thickest that midsummer day.
Stoutly struck a brave knight on a dark iron grey.
Like a thunderbolt cleaving its way through the
pines.
When the tempest-cloud bursts on the blue Ap-
penines.
So he made thro' his foeman a terrible path —
Dealing death unto all who encountered his wrath.
THE HEALTH.
The moon shone serenely. The gallant knight lay
Sorely wounded, and weary; and down was the
grey.
Near a brook, that in flowing seemed singing a
tune —
A song, as it were, to the beautiful moon.
The soldier was thirsty; he crawl'd to the bank.
But ere of its waters the brave noble drank,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
His helmet all batter'd he fUPd with its tide;
He stagger' d again to his grey charger's side,
Then held it out feebly, and never draAk first,
Tho' his lips were all parching and burning with
thirst.
He sat there with patience. The steed he drank
long;
What a picture, ye gentles, for pencil or song!
And tho' in the moonlight the water shone red.
He carried it next to his own dizzy head.
'* Ho! Bayard, this draught is as crimson as wine —
I drink ... to thee . . . Bayard . . . and . . . fair . . .
Eoline! "
A short broken pray'r, and the cross on his breast —
What need, my fair gallants, to tell you the rest.
The shadows grew long, and the silence fell deep,
Where the knight and his charger had sunk into
sleep.
THE RUSTIC LOVER'S SOLILOQUY.
How like an Alexander now he stands
Between the sunshine of her eyes and me!
And yet, with these embrown'd and brawny hands,
From this heart-conqueror I could set me free —
Could fling him from me, as the clod which now
Lies torn and crumpled, underneath my plough.
Yet sooth it was; I saw that he was able —
This smooth-chinn'd fop, with his pink baby face,
By dropping as the bird in his old fable
His pebble— <:ompliments into the vase
That held her vanity; — I say, such wiles
Were paid with blushes and o'er-running smiles.
But pshaw! my lazy horses know I dream.
Away with such fool fancies! she shall see
That I can find some other beam.
From other eyes upon my destiny.
Which tho' 'tis humble, still may glow in light
From eyes more true, if not indeed more bright.
HOW IT FELL CALM ON SUMMER NIGHT.
My Lady's rest was calm and deep;
She had been gazing at the moon;
And thus it chanced she fell asleep
One balmy night in June.
Freebooter winds stole richest smells
From roses bursting in the gloom.
And rifled half-blown daffodils,
And lilies of perfume.
• These dainty robers of the South
Found "Beauty" sunk in deep repose.
And seized upon her crimson mouth.
Thinking her lips a rose.
The wooing winds made love full fast —
To rouse her up in vain they tried —
They kist and kisi her, till at last.
In ecstacy they died.
A RECOLLECTION.
I REMEMBER, I remember, that in those departed
hours,
I garlanded, right merrily, a coronal of flowers, —
Of rosy buds all gathered in a boy's fantastic dream,
And buried, like Ophelia's, in her bridal with the
stream.
In those days I had bright visions, such as many a
dreamer hath.
And the future seemed before me like a rose-
begirded path,
Down which I longed to wander, while youth's*
foot was strong and fleet.
For a tide of Orient odors stole around me faint
and sweet •
And there was one beside me, and I pointed with
my hand
Down the fixture's blooming vista, which, to me,
was fairy land,
And her laugh rang like a harp-string, as we looked
along the way;
Sooth, I scarcely deemed that moment that we two
should part for aye.
But the vision soon departed— all such come to
sudden ends —
It departed, but, in fading, it has left us tender
friends;
And the past brings, with this memory, neither
sorrow nor delight —
'Twas a pretty lake we rufiled, like two swallows,
in our flight.
Soon I found my rosy garlands falling dead about
my brows;
There was end to all our dreaming; there was end
to all our vows;
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FRANCES M. O, SMITH,
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And alone beside life's pathway, in that sultry
noon-tide's heat,
I sat me down in silence with the dust upon my
feet
As I sat amid the ruin of my dreams around me
cast,
I, with hand that never faltered, sowed with salt
the gloomy past
Then I rose up a new actor in the world's stupen-
dous play,
Soon to find a sweet oblivion to the trials of the
day.
For again there came a vision such as Prophet never
saw,
Such as painter dream-enchanted may conceive,
but never draw;
Such it rose upon my vision, and I trembled with
delight,
As I watched it upward sweeping, as a comet
sweeps the night.
MY TWO GIFTS.
I GAVE that earnest love of mine
Unto a lady fair;
I gave it as a cup of wine,
And bless'd it with a pray'r.
Her vanity athirst drank up
The wine wherewith I fill'd the cup;
And then, her face half smile, half frown,
She laughing shook her tresses brown
And threw the empty goblet down.
She open'd wide her splendid eyes
In very wonder and surprise;
And well I mark'd the lady's glance;
She thought to see it break, perchance.
Since then I've filled it to the brim
With wine to which the first were dim;
With wine that had been trod and press' d,
The purest vintage of my breast;
The last, and yet, the latest, best,
As at the feast of old, we know.
The best was latest in its flow.
That goblet was my heart; and now
'Tis fill'd for one whose look.
Hath more of truth than any vow
E'en plighted on a book.
And to this lady, half divine,
I've given now the latest wine;
And I have said, '* Of old we know
The best was latest in its flow."
And should this wine, my love, disdain,
The cup can ne'er be filled again.
FRANCES M. 0. SMITH.
IT is indeed worthy of note that among the many
who have contributed to the building up of a
Canadian literature during the past quarter of a
century, not a few of the brightest names are those
of women. Some of the best verse written to-day
in Canada is from the pens of such writers as
Agnes M. Machar, Mrs. S. Frances Harrison,
Mrs. Sarah Anne Curzon and Ethelwyn Wetherald.
Poetic inspiration is not a monopoly and comes
more frequently to those whose heart-music is
born of the virtues of home, than of those whose
dreams are inlaid with gain and glory.
One of the latest acquisitions to the goodly com-
pany of Canadian poets is Frances M. Owston
Smith. Miss Smith is of Irish and English extrac-
tion, her father being Ralph Smith, a native of
King's County, Ireland, and her mother, a daughter
of Captain William Owston, of the Royal Navy,
Yorkshire, England. It will be seen therefore that
this admixture of Saxon strength and Celtic fervor,
lends to the poetic gifts of Miss Smith a union of
power and grace which is manifest in nearly all her
poems. Miss Smith's childhood days were spent
in the town of Peterboro, Ont., which nestles like
a dream, 'mid sylvan lakes and forests great and
streams both wide and bold. For a number of
years past, Miss Smith has been a resident of the
little town of Lucan, in western Ontario.
T. OH.
MY LADY JUNE.
She is here in all her glory,
With her favors falling free.
Singing still the same sweet story
She has always sung to me.
Oh the roses blush to meet her.
Sparkling in their diamond dew,
And the stately lilies greet her.
As for her alone they grew.
How her voice, with joy o'erflowing,
Teaches Nature's harp its tune,
Music only hers bestowing;
She is here — my Lady June.
Memory near her gently pressing,
Lends her song one tender tone.
And one touch to her caressing,
For the hearts that she has known.
It may be some picture graven
With the lines too deep to fade,
Or some half-forgotten haven.
For which Faith in youth had prayed.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
But she garlands even sorrow,
With a wreath that dies too soon;
It will wither ere the morrow-
She is here— my Lady June.
She would bear for me less gladness,
Less of loving light to-day,
If she garnered not the sadness
That made shadows on the way.
For I like to think she knows me,
And remembers and is still,
When Life's mom looks back and shows me
What its noon shall ne'er fulfil.
So she ever comes in glory.
With her favors falling free,
Singing still the same sweet story
She has always sung to me.
O'DONOGHUE'S RETURN.
In the earliest dawn of the morning
I went to meet Beauty alone.
While the dew drops her mantle adorning
Were like gems that some fairy had sown.
By the ivy-clad ruin uncertain
I paused, for 'tis dreary and dim
Till the angel of mom lifts the curtain
And the wild birds their matins begin.
Like a star in the ether beclouded,
Still an infant asleep on Love's breast,
The lake in the mist lay enshrouded
Since the sunset had kissed it to rest
But hark! what is this that comes striding
O'er the waters as if they were earth ?
'Tis the chieftain O'Donoghue, riding
To the beautiful land of his birth.
See the fairies strew roses around him,
But their petals lie crushed in his track.
For a spell from the past has enbound him,
And the long, long ago has come back.
The castle, a ruin no longer,
Rises fair as in youth it first rose,
By its legends of valor made stronger.
And its flag floating far o'er its foes.
Fair ladies the harp strings are waking,
Brave chiefs lead the chase o'er the hill,
And the laughter of children is making
Sweet Echo the sport of its will.
But soon over waves and through wildwood,
Ere the sky win the cloud from the lake,
From the dearly loved home of his childhood
His way must O'Donoghue take.
'Tis not known if his home be in Heaven
Or where souls are made perfect through paint
But that once when the years count the seven,
He comes back to Killamey again.
But I know that if I were in Heaven,
Where they nevermore dream about pain,
I would wish for one year in each seven
To visit Killamey again.
THERE AND HERE.
When Dante, following the elder poet,
Unsununoned entered sin's avenging shade.
Never a spirit there could help but know it
By the dark shadow he in passing made.
Things touched were moved — ^and there awoke a
yeaming
In those sad spirits, stronger than their pain,
That he, unto their loved on earth retuming,
Their names unspoken now, might speak, again^
Can we not tell of them the self-same story;
When they come back to us do they not cast
Their shadows over all the sunlight's glory;
And dim the present by the shining past ?
Do they not often from untrodden places
Press back the briers our fears have made too-
much —
And smile assurance from their moumed-for faces.
And with hands folded long, move all they-
touch?
And when the wearing links of pain that bind us
Seem all too heavy for our strength to bear
How often does their mystic coming find us
Turning for solace to remembrance there!
FAITH'S APPEAL TO IRELAND.
Beautiful land, where my home has been ever
Decked with the garlands thy children still bind^
Isle of the sea that has turned from me never,
Though danger and death round my footstepa
have twined.
Trusted and tried one! what fervent devotion
Dwells in thee, deeper than depths of the sea!
And storm God ne'er thrilled the great soul of th&
ocean
As thy soul has thrilled when it trembled for me.
Erin, beloved, thy hands have grown weary,
Held up to God for the lives that were dear;
Hope's radiant star rises slowly and dreary —
The dark hour ere dawn whispers " I>aylight ia.
near."
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N, M, BASKETT, M, D,
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But oh! if thy children should list to the stranger,
And worn with long waiting, without me rise up,
To whom couldst thou turn in the night of thy
danger?
How quaff Pain's dark wine if I kissed not the
cup?
jLook to the sky, soft and blue, spread above thee;
Count time since it first saw thee turn to the
cross;
Ask the low graves of the past if they love me,
And voices shall speak from the marble and
lx)ok at thy little ones kneeling at even,
Small hands so trustfully folded in mine;
Hast thou a gift pure as this I have given ?
More steadfast a star o'er their young lives to
shine ?
Tired art thou I Yes, but would freedom without
me
Be sweeter than chains which together we wear ?
Never, beloved, let my heart learn to doubt thee.
Nor thine turn away from the blessing I bear.
3 have been with thee in joy and in sorrow,
To soothe thee and comfort not vainly have tried.
Have borrowed Hope's language to sing of to-
morrow,
Love's Hps to kiss tears thou hast striven to hide.
I have been welcomed by bright smiling faces.
In pageants of glory have gladly borne part.
Crept hunted away to thy desolate places.
And felt thy warm blood dropping over my heart.
Then cling to me still, for the mariner lying
Becalmed in the loneliest path of the sea.
Would be less lone than thou, with thine altar-lights
dying.
Thy sanctuary darkened — ^and parted from me.
CHRIST'S TEARS.
Why did He weep beside the new-made grave
Where slept His dearly loved ? His word divine
Even from that dark nothingness could save.
I would not weep if I could waken mine;
If I could win from 'neath the unyielding sod
All the pale warder still must coldly keep,
Ko other power would I envy God.
Then wherefore o'er His friend did Jesus weep ?
Silence where once was song is mine to bear,
And darkness, though around me shines the day.
1 miss the careful presence everywhere;
The mute king's beckoning hands have lured
away;
Ah! heart unlearned in love canst thou not see?
Those tears were not for Lazarus — ^but for thee.
N. M. BASKETT, M. D.
NATHANIEL MORTON BASKETT, was
bom in the City of St Louis, Mo., April 5th,
1853, and was the third child ot William and
Mary A. Baskett. He attended his first school in
that city. In the beginning of the Civil War in
i86i, his father m^t financial reverses, and moved
from St. Louis to Pike county, 111., and located in
the small Village of Detroit, where he remained
with his family until 1865, when he returned to St.
Louis and resumed his former occupation, it being
that of book-keeping. During the residence of the
family in Illinois, young Baskett had attended the
public schools of the village, which were taught
only a few months in the year, but, being naturally
of quick mind, industrious habits, and fond of
letters, even with these limited facilities, he ac-
quired the rudiments of an English education.
Upon returning to St. Louis, Nathaniel found em-
ployment in a large mercantile establishment of
that dty, where he remained for eighteen months.
In December, 1866, after a short illness, his father
died with typhoid pneumonia. This misfortune
required the removal of the family from the city,
and in January, 1867, Mrs. Baskett, with her four
sons, which at that time composed the family,
removed to Monroe county, Mo., and located
on a small farm. Here the family grew up, attend-
ing, during the winter, the public schools taught in
the vicinity, and in the spring and summer, follow-
ing agricultural pursuits. Nathaniel was a diligent
student of quick perception and early became an
omniverous reader, and at the age of seventeen
years he had completed the course of study fur-
nished by the public schools and read all the books
found in his father's library, which contained many
valuable works, among which were the poetical
works of Shakespeare, Byron, Moore. Milton,
Gray, Young and others, the perusal of which
doubtless tended to develop a naturally imaginative
and poetical mind. Among other works, in his
father's well-selected library, he found the works of
Josephus, Bunyon's "Pilgrim's Progress," "Dick's
Works on Astronomy," "Macaulay's History of
England " and other books of like character, all of
which he greedily devoured, and at the early age of
fifteen years, he had read many of the best works
of English literature. At the age of seventeen,
with the consent of his mother, he accepted a posi-
tion in a dry goods store in Paris, the county seat
of Monroe county, where he remained for three
years.
Having been denied the privileges of a collegiate
education, young Baskett early resolved upon a
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
plan for self-education and culture, which he has
ever industriously carried into effect In Paris, he
formed many congenial acquaintances and warm
friends, but devoted little of his time to society.
In 1873, he found a warm friend and patron in Dr.
Abner E. Gore, who had observed in the lad the
elements of a strong intellect and an indomitable
energy; and, at the solicitation and with the aid of
Dr. Gore, young Baskett immediately began the
study of medicine, and in the spring of 1876, was
graduated at the Missouri Medical College in St.
Louis, taking high rank in his class. He has since
very successfully practiced his profession, and now
resides in Moberly, Mo. In 1878 he was married
to Miss Kate Coojier of Paris, Mo., and two chil-
dren were bom to them. In 1880, he had the sad
misfortune to lose his mother, and in only a few
days thereafter, his first child died from an acute
attack; this was followed by the death of his wife
and second infant in July, 1881, and he was left
truly desolate.
His first efforts at poetry began when quite a
boy, and were quite crude, as verses by lads of
that age, usually are. At the age of sixteen, he
published a poem in the local papers entitled,
** Life's Shadows," which was regarded as a clever
production and won for him local praise and
renown. At intervals short poems followed, which
were favorably mentioned by the cotemporary
press. In the year 1884, at the solicitation of his
friends, he published some of his poems under the
tide of "Visions of Fancy." Though the author
has a strong poetic imagination, with a tendency
to record his fleeting fancies, still his compositions
have been of a fugitive character and the pen is re-
sorted to, merely as an interlude to fill up the
intervals in the more active and busy employment
of professional life. He is, perhaps, better known
in his profession, than to the literary world, having
contributed many able articles, on various subjects,
to the leading medical journals of the continent and
he has for some time occupied the editorial chair of
the St* Louis ** Medical Advance," a quarterly
journal of medicine and surgery. He is of pleasant
address and very popular among a large circle of
acquaintances in this and other states. J. H. R.
IF I COULD ONLY KNOW.
If I could only count, my love.
Upon thy love for e*er.
Whatever woes in life might come,
I would not care or fear;
For fate is strong and pain is strong.
And bitter is life's gall,
But strong as fate or pain may be,
Love stronger is than all.
If I could only know, my love,
Whatever shall be my doom,
Forever in thy heart of hearts.
My love should find a home:
No night could dim the light, no cloud
Could hide my perfect day;
The knowledge of thy love for me
Would drive the night away.
But Slander's tongue is strong, my love,.
The voice of Hate is deep;
Hints darkly strewn have poisoned life»
As dreams have poisoned sleep.
But oh! if I could only know,
Whate'er shall be my doom —
Forever in thy heart of hearts
My love shall find a home.
SONNET.
Slow from the west the sunbeams fade away;
Eastward I watch the purple veil of night
Drawn up the sky to overspread the light;
The shades of darkness triumph over day.
The song of birds is stilled; through twilight gray
The everlasting stars are shining bright
In peaceful concord from unfathomed height^
Watching the restiess hours glide away.
The lowing herds are waiting for their food;
The plowboy whistles, glad his work is done;
By chimney lug the brown-faced farmer waits
Till the warm meal is ready for his brood;
In the far distance sound the creaking gates;
The work of day is o'er. Night is begun.
TO MEMORY.
SwEKT guardian of the storehouse of the mind,
Open the doors, that I may search and find
The golden words which lie concealed behind.
Come with me; hold thy glimmering candle high
And light each crannied nook, that I may spy
The place where youth's bright diamond treasures
lie.
Draw back the curtains, and display to view
Fancy's bright, silken garb of gorgeous hue,
With warp forever changing into colors new;
And bring me forth those bags of gleaming gold^
Which wit and mirth in jovial concert hold;
And let the treasures they contain be told.
And sorrow's silvery wealth shall be untied;
And melancholy, pale and leaden eyed.
While we are searching, shall stand at our sid^
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PHEBE A. HOLDER.
199
And tell her story. With unstudied art
Love shall reveal the pulsings of the heart,
And hope shall make the shades of night depart.
Help, thou, to form the visions I essay,
The shade and light, the hollow, gleaming day,
And the dark night from which stars pass away.
Bright guardian. Memory! make the vanished
clear;
Whisper sweet recollections in my ear;
Walk thou beside me till my change appear.
IPHIGENIA.
LiKB to a stately palm that lifts its head
On some lone isle, its leaves a coronal
Of verdant beauty, so with stately tread
The queenly maid appeared among them all;
Beauteous as any rose before the fall
Of the first petal; lips, whose rounded swell
And honeyed taste would sweeten bitter gall,
And bid an anchorite forsake his cell.
And eyes where Venus* son continual seemed to
dwell.
An arm Medicean Venus might have dared
To look upon with envy; marble breasts,
Whose sea-shell-tinted pink, just half unbared,
Revealed the glory of their tiny crests;
A stately neck, whose sculptured beauty rests
Upon a bust so full and beautiful,
Their fair perfections with such charms invests
The radiant maid, that each knight, dutiful,
Drank in her charms and sated, sighed,
beauty full.
Thus in the glory of her youth she stood;
I run through nature for a simile;
Fair as the earth when God declared it good;
Dear as the bud to bloom — ^as sweet to bee —
As spring to earth — ^as sunshine to the tree —
As rain to desert — as the gentle calm
To men whose barks are shipwrecked on the sea —
As breezes to the fainting, breathing balm,
She stole into all hearts like a perpetual psalm.
A rosebud opening to the dewy mom;
A white swan pluming gracefully for flight;
A lily on a silent river bom,
A nightingale descanting through the night
When the full moon wakes all the Heavens with
light;
So seemed she flushed with youth — ^the rose in
glow —
The swan in grace — as lily pure and white —
As peaceful as the river in its flow
And joyous as the nightingale when day is low.
by
PHEBE A. HOLDER.
PHEBE A. HOLDER was bom in Berlin,
Mass., November 27th, 1824. A child of na-
ture she early listened to her teachings, holding
'* communion with her visible forms," catching in-
spiration from the woods, flowers, birds, the ocean
and mountains, listening to the myriad voices of
the universe. One gift in particular she possesses
which makes her society the delight of others, and
which is a source of exquisite enjoyment to herself.
It is her love for choice books, and the power of
imparting their beauty and meaning to others.
Her home is in a quiet nook "amid the wind-
ings of a woody vale," often sought by choice
friends. The beloved books, from the best authors
are in lavish profusion, on tables, in the cases, all
about, close at hand.
A graduate of the Westfield Normal School, she
represents its choicest product. Her life work has
been teaching, wdth great love for it Much of her
work in the school room has been done in western
Massachusetts, in beautiful Berkshire the home of
her heart. She taught in the High Schools of Lee
and Hinsdale. She has written much for papers,
magazines and special occasions. Dr. Vincent's
grand Chautauqua idea has no more devoted lover
or consistent follower, and most truly may it be
said of her,
"Only a sweet and virtuous soul, like seasoned
timber, never gives." H. H.
AN HOUR WITH WHITTIER.
Poet believed, again I come
On thy sweet verse to ponder.
And linger o'er thy soulful words.
The while my heart grows fonder.
" Among the Hills " I walk with thee,
Reading the dear home story.
When Autumn comes with Golden Rod
" Heavy with Sunshine " glory.
Within the " Tent Upon the Beach "
I sit with joy to listen
To lords of thought, while peaceful waves
In molten gold-light glisten.
I see the " School House by the Wall,"
The eager children leaving,
The little girl who "Spelt the Word,"
The tender face of grieving —
The " Hazel Blossoms " gleam with gold
In fresher beauty glowing.
Touched by the Poet's loving hand,
Woven in verses flowing.
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The ** Last Walk in the Autumn days
After the regal splendor
Reveals a charm his eye discerns,
A lingering grace and tender.
When "Snow Bound " by the wintry storm,
The tale of farm-life olden
I read, and find the day has flown,
Winged as with sunbeams golden.
The " Pageant " rings its silver bells
With light of crystal morning,
The "tree-bolls chandeliers of frost."
Hold up with sunrise dawning.
'** A glimpse of glory infinite — "
Comes to my raptured vision,
The "white bride coming down from heaven"
Clothed with a grace Elysian.
'" My Psalm " is like a soft clear voice
Soothing to peaceful slumbers.
I listen, while my heart anew
Life's full, rich blessings numbers.
"My Psalm "—it is like finest gold
Among my garnered treasure;
With heart attuned, my soul responds
Unto the June-tuned measure.
The heart's sweet scripture to be read
At night, when Love grows fonder.
An added verse to Heavenly Word,
With hallowed thought I ponder.
" Eternal Goodness " like a chime
Of silver bells is ringing,
The loving kindness of the Lord '
Seems nearer for thy singing;
I read with answering heart and mind
To see in bright " Clear Vision "
New beauty in familiar things
Glowing with light Elysian.
" My triumph " with its stirring words
Of "richer life where Beauty"
Is touched with finer grace and walks
Still "hand in hand with Duty."
No place so dark but thy glad songs
Can make the dull day brighter,
No heavy burden, but thy words
Can make the load seem lighter.
Like wood-thrush sweet whose liquid notes
"Set the wild echoes " ringing,
So "echoes roll from soul to soul "
With music of thy singing.
Enthroned in hearts thy crown is set
With jewels brightly glowing.
The love of myriad lives made sweet,
The pure, rich lustre showing.
I
Poet beloved, again I come
On thy sweet verse to ponder.
And linger o'er thy soulful songs
The while my heart grows fonder.
THE PINES.
To the belov^ sound I listen
Of wind amid the singing pines.
Drink in the fresh and perfumed beauty,
Where gold-light on green pastures shines.
Amid the pine's soft breezes linger
And whisper o'er the woodland path,
The last year's rusty needles falling,
Mid the fresh green of aftermath.
The sweetness of the piney odor
Comes from the woods like breath of balm,
The incense floats on wings of zephyrs
Distilling with a mystic charm.
I sit beside a friend belov^.
List to the pine's sweet soul-like voice,
The while we read from treasured volume
Sweet poems of our own heart's choice.
MY BOOKS.
My books beloved, ye take me backward,
Over the chasm deep of years.
When 'neath the glow of youth's sweet sunrise
Life one long day of joy appears.
With you again I feel fresh-hearted,
As when the leaves their shadows sent.
To dance upon the page I pondered,
And to the thought their music lent.
In the old garden still I'm lingering
With fragrant blossoms all around,
Or on the home piazza sitting
Hear distant cow-bells* tinkling sound.
While reading from some favorite author
The charming tale or poem sweet.
All sights and sounds harmonious blending
All keeping time with rhythmic feet.
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FANNY H. R. POOLE.
20 IX
FANNY H. R. POOLE.
FANNY HUNTINGTON RUNNELLS, a des-
cendant of the early Connecticut Huntingtons,
was bom about twenty-seven years ago in the town
of Orford, New Hampshire. Her father, Rev. M.
T. Runnells, was twenty-three years pastor of the
Congregational Church at Sanborton, a pleasant
country village farther south. Clear hill- top scenery,
vast mountain vistas were the first symbols of eternity
to the mind of the imaginative child. Isolated, to a
large degree, from the comradeship of other children,
her purest delights, we are told, were *' to wander
in the fields, browse at will in her father's library,
or pore over her mother *s music books at the piano. "
In her long out-of-door rambles amongst the birds
and flowers, she found it easy to lisp her love of
things beautiful in rhyme. By some happy chance,
a copy of Palgrave's ** Golden Treasury " was dis-
covered by the little maid, who drank from the fount
with the peculiar zest of a young and true child of
genius. At ten years of age, she would have
confided in you her affection for ** Romeo
and Juliet," "Rasselas,'' "Eve of St. Agnes,"
Wordsworth, Bryant and Tennyson. At thirteen,
her verses, heretofore a guarded secret, began
to appear in the Granite Monthly, Cottage
Hearth^ Journal of EducaHon, The Advance , Bos-
ton Joumaly etc. Soon after, we find her in the
role of student at the New Hampshire Seminary at
Tilton, where her education, superior to most of her
age, was greatly improved by two years of careful
work. Then followed several years of music study
in Boston, of teaching in a New York school, in
the Parkesburgh (Pa.) Classical Institute and in
Frankfort, Ky.
In 1 891, Miss Runnells was married to Allan A.
P. Poole, a Boston business man, a nephew of the
English painter, Paul Poole, R. A. Her home is
in Dorchester, Mass.
Mrs. Poole is far from being a '* hobbyist,"
dearly as she loves her art She can polish a sonnet
or write a clever book-review this morning, and after
dinner invite you to accompany her on a horse-back
ride; or, seated at her piano, she can lose herself in
the intricacies of Beethoven or Chopin. She en-
joys singing, teaching, the care of little chilbren,
the culture of flowers, embroidery and old book and
picture collections. But her absorbing passion is
poetry. F. L. K.
PURPORT.
O, LITTLE clouds! how swift
Ye sail across the blue,
To let the sunshine thto\
t
O, sparkling snowy drift!
You haste in Spring-tide hours.
To leave the fragrant flowers.
O little clouds of life
That o*er us ofttimes stray.
Yet brave the heart alway.
Secure above earth's strife.
The trusting end may rest;
By heavenly sunshine blest.
MEDITATION.
Upon a mossy bank I lie.
The summer sun is low;
The rippling stream that wanders by
Reflects the radiance of the sky,
And spreads a heavenly glow.
Ah! skies of dreamy violet.
What amaranthine bloom ?
What varied jewel deeply set
In hues of Heaven's own coronet.
Lightens the nether gloom ?
From out the cloud-land of the West
There breaks a sudden light;
It touches stream and mountain crest,.
And Nature's wildest haunts are drest.
With roses ever bright!
How blest it were to crown our days
With radiance from above!
Along Life's rude and rugged ways,
To scatter warm, effulgent rays.
Of peace and holy love.
A SUNSET THOUGHT.
Oh radiance mine when day is o'er!
Oh sunset reach of thought to dwell
On ling' ring joys the landscape wore!
And calm the introspective view
Of what was given me to do,
For, if I failed, with purpose true,
God knoweth all, and it is well.
And be it mine at close of life;
This rapture giv'n, whate'er befell.
Of yesterdays unfilled with strife, —
This gleam of the Unlived to lend
Foreglory. Truth the Godward trendy
Were imperfected life's great end,
God knoweth all, and it is well.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
WILLIAM CDLLBN BRYANT.
O POET, crowned with song's supremest powers,
Who, in that realm from sin and death apart,
Dost link responsive to our yearning heart
The Infinite with some stray chord of ours!
As longing Nature greets the sky-bom showers.
Bidding a barren earth in verdure start,
Oh, would that we by thine inspiring art
Might weave thee garlands eloquent in flowers!
And June is here, — Interpeter, who fled,
Her halo still upon thy laureled head,
Divinely bright while countless ages roll, —
Thy pure eyes glow a Juue-day*s ardent fire;
June symphonies awake within the lyre
A June of transport to enthrall our soul!
GALATEA.
Art thou a dream ? When fled to thine
This dark imprisoned heart of mine.
Thy soul ordained from its high throne
Warm life unto the willing stone; —
Henceforth to breath the air divine.
Thy presence holdeth love's rich wine.
Around thyself my thoughts entwine-
So sure to sweet support is grown,
Art thou a dream.
Thine absence ne'er to me is known,
Where'er on earth is beauty shown
I see thee! Ah, Pygmalion, mine
Thou art, as thou hast made me thine!
But thou, dread silence of the stone.
Art thou a dream!
IN THE CEMETERY AT FRANKFORT.
I WANDER in a dty, tranquil, fair,
Upon whose towers the sun's departing beam
Bespeaks the sweet surcease of human care;
Below, the music of a winding stream;
Above, bird songs in the rich, dreamy air,
And still above, blue heavens of which we dream,
And souls of them who sleep the glory wear.
They sleep, to wake unfettered of the clay —
Dear forms who bore unknown, life's better part
And softly stole upon the heavenly way;
The brave, enshrined within a nation's heart —
Are they unmindful of our love to-day ?
Each soul, well-rounded howso'er thou art.
Eternity be good to thee, we pray!
I wander in a dty, tranquil, fair,
I can but think, of all earth's joy 'twere best
To sleep amid so much of beauty there.
Resigning all on Nature's tender breast,
Far from the strife of worlds that do and dare!
O blest foreshadow of most perfect rest!
O heights of God — the soul's eternal share!
HEART OF THE ROSE.
Who knows the inmost heart of the rose,
Treasiu:e hidden of sun and dew ?
Knows ere the wizard Junes unclose
Its magical meaning, who ?
Ere the eager, lightsome wind doth woo,
And waft its fragrance, — ^heart of the rose,
Who knows ?
Altho' in my heart thy beauty grows.
Purely my Love, and still more true.
Not yet of thy deepest heart disclose,
Till I, of the longing view.
May wear thee worthily, without rue;
My June,— the fairest that Nature knows.
My Rose!
A ROSE.
(Pressed in a favorite volume of the In Memariam of
Tennyson.)
Is aught so sweet as is this faded rose ?
But for its fragrance I had passed it by.
In this forgotten comer, wreathed in snows,
Shrouded in damask, lost and left to die.
It lay, till haply did its heart unclose
Her sorrow to a tender-hearted breeze.
And in that self-same comer there mused I
All in a waste of thoughts like unto these:
All glory in oblivion must lie,
All beauty know consuming earth and cease.
And then that breeze love-blown sighed softly
near,
Inside my window, tenderest breath that blows
Rose of the rain and the dust of here,
And minded me of that neglected rose;
I found, I clasped it with a hungry cheer,
I buried it, a death that was a life,
Atween the lines of this immortal song.
And be, to whomso reads, this meaning rife.
This added grace, if aught so sweet belong
To earth or heav'n as is a faded life!
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LUCIE C HAGER.
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LUCIE C. HAGER.
LUCIE CAROLINE HAGER was bom in
Littleton, Mass., December 29th, 1853. Her
parents were Robert Dunn Gilson and Lydia
Gilson. There were nine children in the family,
of whom Mrs. Hager was the youngest. Heavy
and peculiar trials attended her childhood, which
were calculated to expel poetic aspirations from a
mind less delicately and sensitively organized,
supplanting them by practical thoughts and ten-
dencies, yet these circumstances deepened and
intensified her poetical nature, while the more
practical side of her character was strongly devel-
oped. She had a thirst for knowledge and used
all available means to satisfy it Having entered
the Normal School in Framingham, Mass., in 1875,
she was recalled to her home during the first weeks
of the school year, and her studies were exchanged
for days of patient watching with the sick, or such
employment as she could obtain near her home.
Her first poems appeared at that time. With
such private instruction as her country home af-
forded, she again took up her studies, becoming in
time a successful teacher of country schools and
later a book-keeper. In October. 1882, her mar-
riage to Mr. Simon B. Hager occurred. She has
one child, a boy. Most of her poems have ap-
peared over the name ''Lucie C. Gilson.'*
She has also written a number of short prose
stories. Her estimate of her own work is modest
in the extreme and she has done little to bring
herself before the public. Mrs. Hager has recently
written and published a very interesting history of
the town in which she resides, ** Roxborough, a
New England Town and its People."
J. M. R.
SOWING AND REAPING.
In spring we plough the field and till the soil,
And sow the tiny seeds on either hand.
And soon, repaying, as it were, our toil.
The blades of green begin to clothe the land.
Then carefully we work, we watch, we wait,
While nourished by the summer sun and rain,
Till *neath the autumn skies with hearts elate.
We gather in at last the ripened grain.
And so, if we, in Life's fair autumn days.
Would garner in the fruit of loving deeds.
Of Christian word and work, in all our ways.
We must in early springtime sow the seeds.
The loving thoughts we shelter in the heart,
Upspringing there, the blades of good shall grow,
Which kept by watchfiil care from weeds apart.
The evil thoughts which we too often sow,
Shall flourish, grow in strength, and soon increase^
And we in LUe's last days the fruit shall see,
Reward of life well spent, — eternal peace, —
For ** as our sowing, shall our reaping be.'*
CHERISH THE FLOWERS^
The Frost-King lays his icy hand
On garden, field and tree;
Crushed by his grasp the flowers fade.
The leaflets wither in the glade.
And over all the barren land
He holds' supremacy.
But in my sunny windows bloom
Petunia, pink and rose,
While heliotrope, whose fragrance sweet
My every entrance seems to greet,
In spite of all the outer gloom
In modest beauty grows.
So, if we cherish in the heart
The flowers of faith and love,
The world's dread frown can never blight.
Or cast a shadow o'er the light
That bids the wintry gloom depart.
The light from heaven above.
ALMOST HOME.
Yonder from a vine-clad dwelling.
Strains of music softly come,
Like to angel voices, swelling
On the night air; * 'Almost Home."
**AlmostHome!" The brooklet fleetly,
Glideth o'er its bed of stone;
And it seems to murmur sweetly
To my sad heart, "Almost home."
Dark the valley lies before me,
* * Can I enter it ? " I moan;
** Hush!" the night winds whisper o'er me,
" Courage take, thou'rt Almost Home.^*
" Though no earthly ray may brighten
The dark vale thou tread'st alone,
Yet His love the gloom shall lighten
Till is gained thy Heavenly Home.'^
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Sometimes in the earth-strife, weary,
Cheered not by kind look or tone,
We forget Life's journey, dreary,
Leadeth daily nearer Home.
We forget no crown is given
Him who doth the cross disown;
Brighter, that for which we've striven,
When at last we're gathered Home.
Sweet the rest enjoyed at even,
When the laborer's toil is done,
Sweeter far the rest of Heaven,
When the Father calls, "Come Home."
"Almost Home!" O, Father guide me
Upward till I reach Thy throne;
From earth's bitter tempests hide me.
Take my hand and lead me home.
HERE AND THERE.
A LITTLE weeping over glad hopes perished,
A little laying down of work begun,
A little giving up of treasure cherished,
A little mourning o'er the task undone.
A little bearing of the burdens, resting
In Him who ever doeth what is best,
A little longer here, the billows breasting,
Which else would bear us farther from our rest.
And there beside the quiet crystal river,
'Mid pastures green and fair shall we repose;
No tears shall dim the eyes nor sorrow ever
Shall enter there nor aught of human woes;
The Savior's presence makes the whole land
glorious.
And there at last, we'll see Him face to face.
When over all these earthly things victorious
We enter into Heaven, our dwelling place.
ARBUTUS.
On a brown and sheltered hillside,
'Neath the trees with leaflets sere,
'Mid the mosses and the litchens.
In the morning of the year.
While the wind of early springtime
Through the pine grove sobs and grieves,
Gathered we the pale sweet flowers
From their nest beneath the leaves.
Fragrant, frail arbutus blossoms,
Waxen, spotless as the snow;
Just as sweet, and pure, and fragrant.
As they were a year ago.
One short year ago and round me
Friendship bound her silken thread;
O'er my shadowy way her radiance
Like a living glory spread.
And the rocky path and thorny
Smoother grew beneath my feet,
And beside it, just beyond me.
Bloomed hope's flowerets, fair and sweet
But the springtime merged in summer,
And the autumn days drew near;
And the heavens grew dark and threatening.
And the leaves fell brown and sere.
Winter came, and o'er life's landscape
Fell a mantle cold and white,
All the radiance and the beauty
Shut forever from my sight
Spring brings not to me the friendship
That the winter stole away.
But the frail, sweet springtime blossoms
Changeless come to cheer each day.
A THOUGHT.
Glad sunshine clothes the world to-day.
And, as we fed its cheering ray.
So full of light and warmth, we say,
** Oh, would 'twere always thus to stay!
The hills and vales are glorified;
O, that no cloud might never hide
This flood of light, this glorious tide
Of sunshine, sweeping far and wide."
But ah! if clouds ne'er hid from sight
The sunny heavens so high,
We might not think to prize the light
That floods the cloudless sky.
So earthly friends are near to-day,
And as we feel Love's cheering ray
Diflfused from heart to heart, we say,
*' Would life were full of joy alway.
Let not Oblivion's depths ne'er hide
A love which has so beautified
And quickened all the sluggish tide
Of hearts to friendship ne'er allied."
And yet, if friendship ne'er took flight.
If friends ne'er passed us by.
We might forget to prize the light
That rifts the clouded sky.
TWILIGHT.
The day with its cares is dosing,
And the twilight shades enfold
The grey old hills,
The rocks and rills,
And the pines beyond the wold.
--Work for God,
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SARAH WOLVERTON.
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SARAH WOLVERTON.
SOME writers study poetry first, and thus try to
be poetic; others are poetic and study laws of
verse only to express themselves the better. Of
this second and smaller class is Miss Sarah Suter
Taylor, now Mrs. Wolverton. Always a lover of
poetry, she expressed herself poetically before she
was herself aware of her gift. Married earlyi
engrossed in home cares, and saddened by severe
disappointments, she did not give any special
thought to poetic expression, till fourteen years
after her marriage, when, becoming an invalid, she
was given time to think, and her thoughts came in
rhythmic rhyme.
It is now some thirty years since she began to
publish any of her poems, and though subjected to
so many trials, such perhaps as would have dis-
couraged many another, she has written a great
number of poems and a few poetic dialogues.
Her contributions have been printed in the l^av-
erly Magazine^ the Christian Register^ Boston;
Godeys Ladies Book, Scribner's Monthly, and
Liberal Christian, New York, and many maga-
zines, weeklies and dailies in Buffalo, Detroit and
other cities.
Her personal life has been varied. She was
bom in Boston, Mass., and was there married at an
early age to George W. Wolverton, a sea captain.
A few years after their marriage he retired from
the sea, and thereafter they made their home in
the west, living for different periods in Buffalo and
Detroit. Since her husband's death she has lived
in Detroit. She has had four children, three of
whom, two sons and a daughter, are now living.
Her present life in Detroit in spite of her desire to
make it rather quiet, is busy with the constant
demands of the lai^e sodal circle of which she is
so prominent a factor. L. S. M'C.
A TRIBUTE.
'TwAS night! I wondered how I'd breast
The wintry wave,
Suppose a storm arose! what hand
Was there to save ?
Spake low a voice within; alway
Is one; He hears
His children's cry. "The widow's God!"
Calm thou thy fears.
Ah! yes, I know; but I'm of earth;
I crave a hand
To outward reach; a human stay
Of earthly strand.
Do angels list, and bear away
Our every thought ?
And hovering near, are angels too,
With blessings fraught ?
I cannot say; but out beyond
The trials far
And kind, and good, and firm, and clear
Across the bar
There reached an earthly hand. The years
Fold over ten
But still as good, as firm, as kind.
And clear, as when
The dark veil fell around, that hand —
A brother's twine
To prove on earth some hearts are pure —
Yet claspeth mine.
Have been, some days when doubt arose;
We see not plain —
The sun-light fell across, and all
Was clear again.
I think God works on human lives
Through human means;
And what men call, *' but kindly acts,"
God's movements screen.
THE HARP AND THE WINDS.
'TwAS a beautiful harp! but no right hand
Had e'er over its life-cords swept;
And so, through the years 'twere shutting it in,
In the hall it had quietly slept.
But the south wind came, and his breath was
warm
And his wand o'er the wires he flung,
When the strains burst forth like an anthem sweet,
To the voice of the Master sung.
Then it trembled, and shrilled through its every
cord
With the new life waking within,
As you've seen a hush when a flock of birds
Just alight *mong its boughs have been.
But the north wind rose in his region of snow
Bore down o'er the hills in his pride;
When the soft south wind sank down, so low
In the cold and snow-sleets, died.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
You must know how the great dark settles in ?
Sometimes not a sign nor a token;
How the stars go out, how the moon is not?
It is so when some ties are broken.
LINES TO-
I THINK if I were dying, and you came
And took my trembling hand;
And waited by me on the bank of what
They call the Border Land.
And said, in your kind,'gentie voice, "Cross not
That rapid river, dear;
'Twould darker grow, if you were gone;
We'd miss your presence daily here.'*
I think rd know the hand that held; new strength
Through every vein would thrill;
While from the soundings of the heart would wake
To life the sleeping will.
I think my soul would stay its flight, nor care
Although rd wandered far;
The City gleamed but just before, and wide
The golden gates ajar.
Nor question aught of good or ill; Pd know
Joy in ourselves is found;
That if our presence lendeth light, then will
Heaven lie all around.
GRANT.
Solemn and still on the outward wind
My thoughts went from me to-day
And came to the couch where wearied, and wan,
The pride of our Nation lay.
They saw the brave soldier, dowered with fame.
And honors, at home, and abroad.
Who saved us our flag, who conquered a ** Peace,"
Escaped both the bullet and sword.
But memory waits on her evergreen bank
Entwines both the laurel and rose;
The one for our love, the other for fame,
Wreaths over his monument throws.
While down through the years, as history writes
Her annals with grandeur abound,
Methinks not a name more honored of men
Than Grant on the record is found.
GERTRUDE TRACY JOHNSON.
GERTRUDE TRACY JOHNSON was bom
September, i6th, 1844, in Stockton, Chautau-
qua county, N. Y. She is the youngest of nine
children, all of whom are living. She is of English
and Scotch descent, her ancestors having emmi-
grated to America in pre- Revolutionary times.
Her great-uncle, Arthur Fenner, was one of the
eariy governors of Rhode Island. Her ancestors
were a vigorous and hardy race, remarkable for
longevity, as well as for strength and vigor of intel-
lect Miss Johnson retains her full share of this
constitutional and intellectual vigor, her appearance
being that of a person at least fliteen years younger
than her age ordinarily warrants. At an early ag^e
she exhibited a fondness for reading and study.
When but seven years old she was reading biography
and history. At that age she displayed a passion
for poetry, but showed no disposition to write until
eleven years of age. At that time an elder sister
removed to Nebraska, whereupon wild with grief
the little Gertrude hastened to her room and wrote
the poem ** To My Sister." Her mother read the
verses with a smile of approval, but advised her not
to attempt to write poetry until she was older.
This advice was followed, and no other poem was
produced or attempted until the age of sixteen,
when the lines ** Music Everywhere " was published.
The next year she entered upon her chosen voca-
tion as principal assistant in the Oreopolis Semi-
nary, Oreopolis, Neb. From her entrance into the
school-room she was a success, and enjoying her
labor, she gave little time to poetry, writing only to
gratity a desire to give play to thought. For the
last fifteen years she has fllled a lucrative position
as grammar-school principal. She resides in
Kansas City, Mo. E. L. P.
A UTILE SONG.
Six years ago, O Autumn Rain,
I sang a little song to thee,
Not dreaming of the woe and pain
Those six short years would bring to me;
Not dreaming of the sighs and tears
Enveloped by those waiting years.
O Autumn Rain! Gray Autimin Rain!
Again I sit and list to thee.
Thou seem'st to sing an olden strain
That fills my soul with melody.
Again I hear the laughs and lays.
The oft-sung songs of other dayst
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GERTRUDE TRACY JOHNSON,
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Again I sing a little song;
But now my song is sad and slow.
I fear I make my * rests ' too long,
My lower leger notes too low.
My voice has lost its old time glee;
My notes all trill, in spite of me.
Autumn Rain! I love thee still,
But broken, useless is my lyre;
Upon my heart has come a chill;
Within my soul there is no fire;
I try to sing, but woe is me;
The song will have no charm for thee.
1 cannot sing, O Autumn Rain!
Because my heart is full of fears;
My voice is drowned by sobs of pain;
My eyes are dim with unshed tears;
So I will sit beside the pane
And list thy song, O Autumn Rain!
O, softly patter. Autumn Rain!
Thy soothing tones a healing bring.
Thou teachest that my sighs are vain;
That blessings hide 'neath sorrows wing.
Ah! once I joyed that I could sing;
Now Tm content with listening!
ICH RUHE NUN.
'The school is closed! the books are laid away,
High on the shelves, where dust will gather o*er,
JVnd spiders weave their mansions day-by-day.
And scan the leaves so often scanned before;
For I, at last, am granted this one boon;
Ich Ruhe Nun!
"The school is closed! the many little feet.
That oft have climbed the hill to meet me there,
-Are daily patt'ring now upon the street,
While I about their wanderings feel no care,
Nor wonder will they meet me late or soonj
Ich Ruhe Nun!
The school is closed! yet, mayhap, day-by-day.
The little ones will gather blooms of spring.
Or summer's brighter blossoms, by the way,
And to their teacher's silent mansion bring.
'Twould add another joy to this one boon;
Ich Ruhe Nun!
The school is closed! the fledglings stronger grown.
Will enter soon the world's unequal strife.
I, too, shall gamer what my hands have sown.
And enter school within another life.
Waiting the Master's call, or late or soon,
Ich Ruhe Nun!
TO HER I SING.
To her, who caught mine earliest sigh,
Who at Hfe's dawning loved me first,
Who like an angel hovered nigh
And into full completenes nurst
The germs of thought that silent lay
Within that lump of helpless clay.
To her who watched me through life's spring.
When Hope's sweet buds were opening
And Joy was ever on the wing,
To HER my songs I softly sing —
My Mother!
To her, whose eyes through weary years
Have closely watched my wayward feet.
Have watched me, through their smiles and tears.
With looks of love and pity sweet,
To her I sing my simple lays.
Content if they receive her praise;
For one sweet word from her is more
Than all the World may have in store.
Sweet recompense my songs will bring.
If SHE but smile the while I sing —
My Mother!
ICH UEBIE UNGELIEBT.
A German maiden springs the warp.
And throws the shuttle to and fro.
The while she sings a little song
In accents measured, sad, and low.
The sun hangs low; through all the day
Her tears the warp and woof have steeped;
And still, as at the early dawn,
She sings, ''IchLiebie UhgeliebV*
The sun goes down 'mid crimson clouds,
The west with glory is aflame;
The shuttle still goes to and fro;
The maiden's song is still the same.
The light goes out that, all the day
Through window, curtainless, has peeped;
And still the wearied maiden toils.
And sings, ^'Ich Liebe UngeliebV^
Deep silence creeps o'er earth and sea;
A form behind the maiden stands.
And watches while the maiden still
The shuttle throws with weary hands.
The hands are prisoned by a pair
That all the day have bound and reaped;
And now no more the maiden toils.
And sings, *'Ich Liebe Ungeliebty
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
NOT ALWAYS THUS.
MARTHA WINTERMUTE.
Not always thus! Not always thus,
Shall we in blindness grope our way;
Not always gaze with longing eyes,
To catch a gleam of perfect day;
Not always stand with folded palms,
Beside the graves, where buried lie
The hopes that budded in our hearts,
The hopes that blossomed but to die.
Not always thus! Not always thus,
Shall we plod on with weary feet;
Not always clasp the mocking cup
That mingles bitter with its sweet;
Not always strive to catch the gleams
Of golden light that round us play,
Finding our efforts all in vain.
Our sunlight turn to shadows gray.
Not always thus! Not always thus,
Shall we with longing watch the skies;
Not always dream of glories hid
Beyond the reach of mortal eyes;
Not always listen for the sound
Of angel voices calling us;
Not always stand outside the Gate
And sigh, " Not thus! Not always thus!"
LIFE'S TREASURES.
MORNING.
How beautiful this earth, my love,
How beautiful this earth!
Her mother, Nature, smiled on her
And blessed her, at her birth.
How short a time 'tis our, my love,
How short a time 'tis ours!
Let's gather treasures, while we may,
From life's delightful flowers.
EVENING.
Beneath the azure sky, my love.
Beneath the azure sky,
Along the path that we have trod.
The scattered roses lie.
We've gathered up the leaves, my love.
We've gathered up the leaves!
O'er all that's left of what we loved
The broken spirit grieves.
MARTHA VANDERMARK WINTERMUTE
is descended from a patriotic and soldier
ancestry. Her grandfather, Benjamin Hitchcock,
entered the Revolutionary army at the age of
seventeen years, and served to the close of the war.
He was the father of Samuel Hitchcock, the phil-
anthropist, and of the late Benjamin Hitchcock, an
author, and for many years editor of the New
Haven Palladium. His oldest daughter became
the wife of a son of Elbridge Gerry. Another
daughter was the mother of Orvil Hitchcock Piatt,
one of the present United States senators from
Connecticut Roswell Dwight Hitchcock, theo-
logian, Ethan Allen Hitchcock, soldier and author,
and Edward Hitchcock, the geologist, were of the
same ancestry. Mrs. Wintermute's father was a.
descendant of the Symmesses, of Holland, who,
at an early period settled upon the Island of Bar-
badoes, and acquired title to a large portion of it
They were at one time residents of Pennsylvania^
Mrs. Wintermute wrote verses at the age of ten.
At the age of sixteen she wrote a poem entitled
"The Song of Delaware," which she brought
before the public by reading it on her graduation
from the Ohio Wesleyan University, in Delaware,
Ohio. That poem was soon followed by others,
which were received with favor by the public.
She was married at the age' of nineteen, to Dr.
Alfred Wintermute, of Newark, Ohio, and for a
number of years thereafter she did not offer any
poetry to the public. In 1888 she began the revbion
and publication of her poetry. In 1890 she brought,
out a prose story in the interest of temperance,
closing the volume with about one-hundred pages-
of her poetry, revised and corrected. Since the
publication of that volume, she has published in
the newspaper press a number of miscellaneous,
poems consisting of Easter Anthems, Decoration.
Day Poems, verses read before pioneer societies^
and some on moral and religious topics.
J. C. McC.
THF PARDON OF PSYCHE.
Apollo plays on his lyre of gold,
The Arcadian god on his reeds,
The muses chant in chorus grand.
And the beauty of Psyche pleads.
The hours shed roses adown the sky
And the halls of heaven perfume,
Jupiter casteth to her a crown.
And the south wind sends its bloom.
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MARTHA WINTERMUTE.
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Zephyr bedewed the flowers with tears,
And Cupid forgave his bride,
All, all save Venus, the mother-in-law,
And she her mercy denied.
Then Psyche, poor Psyche, stripped of her all,
Besought not of Venus, proud,
But seeking Somnus, she dosed her eyes.
Wrapping herself in a shroud.
To sleep in death — and in beautiful dream,
In helpless dream of her sleep,
She saw fair Venus above her gleam.
Then stoop and caress and weep.
Yet she hasted not, but pale in her grief,
She breathed not from her heart,
But her eyes, as dead, thro' their fringed lids.
Let the crystal teaf drops start
Then Venus in pity took Psyche up
And bore her to Cupid's breast;
While the stars fell down and covered her wings,
And the angels her feet caressed.
POESY.
Within its border land I long did wait
With sight and sound my spirit all elate.
Around me rained the sunshine, and away.
Stretched vistas, and eternal nights of day,
And spirits came to blend their love with mine.
I felt no form — saw no material sign.
But kisses such as earth has never known
From heavenly hearts, into my heart were sown;
And in the perfect bliss, the flood of day.
Their call to me was^ "Come! O, come away!"
ANNIE O'NEIL
PART
In a sunny nook of a sunny room,
Annie was busy with wheel and with loom;
Her flax, soft, silken, and silk flaxen hair.
Bent close to the flyers, in beauty rare;
The twirling wheel, and the spool in its turn,
Whirl gaily together; the sunbeams bum.
And the heart-beams burn, in mingled light.
On the azure slopes of her spirit bright.
The flax breaks not in her fingers white.
That now and then in the gourd dip light.
All pink with beauty; the subtle thread
Trips lightly their tips in a joyous tread.
I gazed from the window, one morning in May;
The dewy deep clover, waved green and gay.
But a wintry breath from th^ clear north sky,
Caused the bursting buds to shiver and sigh;
The apple bough, and the peach-bloom bright,
Whispered of frost in the still midnight.
But Annie had fire, and hope, and will,
And her thread spun on, to the hum of the mill.
Whose dusty great wheels went round and round,
While Henry, the miller, stood and ground.
Annie sang as she spun :
'* Beautiful, flashing beams,
Of my father's mill!
Beautiful water that gleams,
And turns the wheel.
Beautiful dust of snow.
That floweth still.
Beautiful springs that flow,
And turn the mill! "
The miller was lithe, and gay, and young,
As the grain he ground, this song he sung.
As the great, dusty wheels went round and round,
This song, as the grain he ground;
As out of the dusty door he did look.
Over the mill race and turbid brook,
It was midsummer, the flax in bloom,
Stood eyes wide open towards Anna's loom;
He saw in acres the broad square field;
As the miller thought of its promised yield.
This was the song he sung :
*' O! beautiful wheel the flax. to spin;
O! beautiful home; so cozy within.
Where Annie sits at her loom
And beautiful fields of flax in bloom.
And waving com and wheat for the mill.
And I a blissful groom
May work or play at my will. "
But never of beautiful Annie O'Neil,
Who sweetly worked at the spinning wheel;
Never of love sang he that day.
The miller so young, and lithe, and gay.
But Annie held in her heart untold,
Her secret, wrapped in its virgin fold,
As pure and white, and cold as the snow,
That drifted and chained, the brooklets flow.
And silenced the hum of the mill;
And the wintry winds of heaven did blow,
From its barren hill,
And they sent through the veins of harvest a chill.
And the tender corn, and the jointed wheat.
And the flax fields, whispered of frost and sleet,
And the song of the miller was still.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
WIDOWED IN JULY.
Month of the season's garnered gold,
Verdure and bloom and myriad charms,
Behold thy gleaming days unfold,
My lost beloved — a shrouded form.
O, sad! O, unfoi^given month!
Thou standest marked amidst my years,
Forward or backward though I look,
I view thee through a mist of tears.
Thy perfumed palaces of light,
Thy orchestras of music rare,
That bring sweet solace to the sight,
And cadence to the trembling air,
They seem as seems the carol sweet.
They seem as seems the sunlight gay,
Of happy hearts, to one bereft
Of love, that robs the soul of day.
GRIEF OF HERCULES.
Hylas, Hylas, where art thou!
From my ship I saw thee go
Gayly o'er the waters bright,
And I waited till the low,
Lone, red sun sank out of sight.
Hylas, Hylas, where art thou!
Answereth but the sea's low moan.
But the wild wind sad and lone.
I am wandering on the strand,
I am standing by the well,
Where I found thy silver cup
And thy footprints in the sand:
All the gleaming stars are up,
I shall never see thee more:
Never, oh, I pray thee tell.
I have loved thee, Hylas, well.
Is there light in any land,
Is there joy in any spot.
Where thy tender smile is not ?
Where no more I clasp thy hand ?
Is there life in any gale ?
Breath to waft my bark's lone sail ?
Hylas, Hylas, hear my wail!
FAITH.
Give me the rest of faith,
Give me the faith to rest,
My life forever on Thy word,
My heart upon thy breast.
MARY H. GRAY CLARKE.
MARY H. GRAY CLARKE was bom in
Bristol, R. I., March 28, 1835 and was the
daughter of Gideon and Hannah Ome Metcalf
Gray. She was a great-granddaughter of Colonel
Thomas Gray of Bristol, R. I., an officer illustrious
in the war of the Revolution, and was a direct des-
cendant of John Gray, an English gentleman, and
of his son, Edward Gray, who, bom in 1623 in
Stapleford Tawney, Essex County, England, emmi-
grated in 1643 to Plymouth, Mass., and became the
richest merchant of the colony. Mrs. Clarke, after
attending the public schools of her native town,
became a pupil in Miss Easterbrook's school, ia
Bristol, for young ladies. She subsequently studied
in East Greenwich Academy, Rhode Island, and
afterward went to Boston, where she devoted her*
self to the study of fine art, including painting,
poetry and music. She was married, October 23, 186 1 ,
to Dr. Augustus P. Clarke, who was surgeon of the
war of 1 86 1-5, and who has since acquired a national
reputation as a writer on subjects pertaining ta
Obstetrics and Gynecology.
At an early age Mrs. Clarke displayed a marked
genius in the production of story and of verse.
She wrote extensively for magazines and for the
public press. She was also the author of many
dramas, lyric poems and operettas. She assumed
different pen-names but was known as an author
under the name of ''Nina Gray Clarke." Some
of her works are "Effie, Fairy Queen of Dolls,"
for which she received a prize; "Prince Puss in
Boots;" "Golden Hair and her Knight of the
Beanstalk in the Enchanted Forest;" "Obed
Owler and the Prize Writers;" *' How I Came ta
Leave Town and What Came of it;" "Edith
Morton, the Sensible Young Lady." Mrs. Clarke
had the gift of song. She painted many pictures,
some in water-colors, and some in oils. Several ot
her paintings have commanded much attention from
connoisseurs of art Mrs. Clarke was endowed by
nature with many gifts; she had a large and active
brain, and her health for the greater part of her life
continued unimpaired. She traveled extensively,
and accompanied her family in an extended tour
through the British Isles and also through central and
southern Europe, visiting all the great capitals of
those countries, for observation, study and for im-
provement generally. By her marriage she had two
daughters, Inez Louise and Genevieve Clarke, who
have pursued cellegiate studies at the Harvard
Annex. She resided in Cambridge, Mass., near
the New City Hall overlooking the Charles River
Valley. She died May 30, 1892. C. C.
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MARY H. GRAY CLARKE. 217
BIRTH OF THE LYRE.
Oh painting! purest, tend'rest touch.
Still keep our Eden free;
Down, down through by-gone ages,
Sculpture and Poetry must yield
More distant, yet more far.
Fame's greenest palm to thee.
When first from dome of heaven
Shone forth the morning star,
SWEET FORGET'ME-NOT.
That sent rejoicing earthward
A ray, a hallowed line.
SwKET ** Forget-me-not " under the snow.
That caught the breath immortal
Cold is thy bloom that a few hours ago
From out the source divine, —
Blended the yellow of sunshine and light,
Has never ceased to vibrate
With purpling shadows of fast coming night.
Through nature's wide domain.
The soul of song that charmeth,
Deem not thy perfume was lost on the bree7«,
And never charms in vain.
That summer soft wafted of thought and heart's-
It sought the rocky hollow.
ease;
The pine on mountain steep,
Flower still sacred to memory dear,
The ocean's rippling wavelet.
Of light and of shadow, of smile and of tear.
Then pressed the billows deep.
The human heart first finding,
To bard brought forth the shell,
Who stretched the chords most willing
That all his soul might tell.
Many the friends low buried from sight,
Whose life shadows deepened to darkness of night;
Too eariy gone, they speak with us yet,
For their earth-life is with us, we never forget.
His tale of love most tender
Still '* Forget-me-not," softly we hear;
He told to nymphs around
'Tis the loved and the lost whispering near;
Till burst the shell from rapture,
We too, when we die, would not be forgot,
And then the lyre was found;
But e'er plead from the past, ** Forget-me-not."
The listening muse stood waiting.
And made the lyre her throne.
When hero, saint and lover
BARK, THE FRAILEST ON THE SEA.
Claimed lyrics all their own;
But where the band of shadows
Bark, the frailest on the sea.
That touched the hallowed strings ?
Oo ask the trees and flowers.
Can you, can you tell to me,
Where's the strength thou claim'st to hide.
The mountains, rocks and springs.
That bears thee on 'gainst wind and tide ?
The answer!—** None have left us;
Where are the oars, and where the sail ?
The lyre her bard holds dear.
Where the anchor for the gale ?
While heart and wave have motion
Bark the frailest on the sea.
The soul of song is here."
What's thy treasure ? tell to me.
** My bark is laden deep with love,
THE EDEN GOD HATH MADE.
And Faith's the power that can move,
While Truth alone out-spreads the sail,
The artist culls from wood and glade.
And hope the anchor waits each gale.
And fresh beneath his hands.
He paints the impress of the soul,
That with his work expands.
** My bark, the frailest on the sea
Is safe, and bears a bliss for me—
With treasure such, and such to guide,
Untutored eyes look long, and find
An inspiration drawn,
The frailest bark stems wind and tide."
That glads the skies, the woods, the fields.
SPRING.
With tints before unknown.
The sweet little buds from their soft wrapping peep.
Father and son together blend
And deeply enfolded their blandishments keep;
Their gift of rarest good,
Forgetting, no doubt, in the years that have passed
And lead our thoughts, akin to theirs,
They just such rare fragrance around us have cast.
Drawn up to Nature's God.
—BeauHfta Spring,
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THE MAGAZINE 01* POETRY.
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE.
COLERIDGE, the metaphysician, as he has
been called, was bom in i773» >" Ottery
St Mary, Devonshire, England, the son of a clergy-
man. He received his education at Jesus College,
and at Christ's Hospital. Upon his leaving college
he enlisted as a common soldier in the dragoons,
taking the name of Comberback. He did not long
remain, however, and in connection with this, an
interesting anecdote is related.
He was first known to the public by some lines
inserted in Southey's **Joan of Arc," and when in
1796 a collection of his poems were published, he
at once became famous. His drama, " The Fall of
Robespierre," came out soon after, followed by
his " Ode to the Departing Year," and '* Years in
Solitude," (1798). About that time he was intro-
duced to Southey and Lovell, when the three
started in to revolutionize the worid by a series of
lectures, beginning at Bristol, with Coleridge's
lecture on the happiness of the human race, by
means of republicanism. These lectures, which at
first were enthusiastically received, lost their popu-
larity and were discontinued. Another volume of
poems appeared at this time, and proving a finan-
cial success, Coleridge decided to appropriate
those funds to the propagation of his theory in
America, under the name of Pantisocracy. Alas!
cupid, in the disguise of the Frick sisters, here
interfered and left America to darkness. Fortu-
nately the Frick sisters numbered three, and the
trio, Coleridge, Southey and Lovell, were brought
into closer relation by marriage ties. With greater
demands upon his purse, Coleridge found difficulty
in making his pen provide sufficient for his needs,
and the result was financial embarrassment, from
which he was most fortunately relieved by the
celebrated Mr. Wedgewood, who enabled him to
complete his studies in Germany.
After his return home, he wrote the leading
articles for the Morning Post, translated some
dramas of Schiller's, and accompanied Sir Alex-
ander Ball, as secretary, to Malta. On his return
from Malta, he produced a tragedy called " Re-
morse," which raised him to a much higher altitude
of fame than any of his preceeding productions.
He now took up his residence on the borders of
one of the lakes in Cumberland and here was writ-
ten "Chistabel." For nineteen years previous to
his death, Coleridge resided in Hampstead with
two old and valued friends; and here, one Friday
in July, 1834, he breathed his last, and was laid to
rest in the vault of Highgate Church, on the 2nd of
August His last days, though full of suffering,
were abundantly blessed of God. His prayer, that
God would not withdraw His Spirit, and that he
might be able to evince his faith in Christ, was
fully answered. His preparations for death were
made long in advance, and his dying wish, that he
might be as little interrupted as possible, was fully-
complied with. A handsome tablet has been
erected in Highgate New Church, to his memory.
N. L. M.
REFLECTIONS.
ON HAVING LEFT A PLACE OF RETIREMENT.
Low was our pretty cot! our tallest rose
Peeped at the chamber-window. We could hear
At silent noon, and eve, and early mom.
The sea's faint murmur. In the open air
Our myrtles blossomed; and across the porch
Thick jasmins twined: the little landscape round
Was green and woody and refreshed the eye.
It was a spot, which you might aptly call
The Valley of Seclusion! Once I saw
(Hallowing his Sabbath-day by quietness)
A wealthy son of commerce saunter by,
Bristowa's citizen: methought, it calmed
His thirst of idle gold, and made him muse
With wiser feelings: for he paused, and looked
With a pleased sadness, and gazed all around
Then eyed our cottage, and gazed round again^
And sighed, and said, // was a blessM place.
And we were blessed. Oft with patient ear
Long-listening to the viewless sky-lark's note
(Viewless, or haply for a moment seen
Gleaming on sunny wing) — *And such,' I said
* The inobtrusive song of happiness —
Unearthly minstrelsy! then only heard
When the soul seeks to hear; when all is hushed
And the heart listens! '
But the time, when first
From that low dell steep up the stony mount,
I climbed with perilous toil and reached the top,
Oh what a goodly scene! Here the bleak mount,
The bare bleak mountain speckled thin with sheep;
Gray clouds, that shadowing spot the sunny fields
And river, now with bushy rocks o'erbrowed,
Now winding bright and full, with naked banks;
And seats, and lawns, the abbey, and the wood,
And cots, and hamlets, and faint city-spire:
The Channel there, the islands and white sails,
Dim coasts, and cloud-like hills, and shoreless
ocean —
It seemed like omnipresence! God, methought,
Had built him there a temple: the whole world
Seemed imaged in its vast circumference.
No wish profaned my overwhelm^ heart
Blest hour! it was a luxury — to be!
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SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE,
219
Ah quiet dell! dead cot! and mount sublime!
I was constrained to quit you. Was it right,
While my unnumbered brethren toiled and bled,
That I should dream away the entrusted hours
On rose-leaf beds, pamp'ring the coward heart
With feelings all to delicate for use ?
Sweet is the tear that from some Howard's eye
Drops on the cheek on one he lifts from earth:
And he, that works me good with unmoved face,
Does it but half: he chills me while he aids.
My benefactor, not my brother man!
Yet even this, this cold beneficence
Seizes my praise, when I reflect on those,
The sluggard Pity's vision- weaving tribe!
Who sigh for wretchedness, yet shun the wretched,
Nursing in some delicious solitude
Their slothful loves and dainty sympathies!
I therefore go, and join head, heart and hand,
Active and firm, to fight the bloodless fight
Of science, freedom, and the truth in Christ.
Yet oft when after honorable toil
Rests the tired mind, and waking loves to dream,
My spirit shall revisit thee, dear cot!
Thy jasmin and thy window-peeping rose,
And myrtles fearless of the mild sea-air.
And I shall sigh fond wishes — sweet abode!
Ah— had none greater! and that all had such!
THE COMPLAINT OF NINATHOMA.
How long will ye round me be swelling,
O ye blue-tumbling waves of the sea ?
Not always in caves was my dwelling.
Nor beneath the cold blast of the tree.
Thro* the high-sounding halls of Cathl6ma
In the steps of my beauty I stray'd;
The warriors t>eheld Ninath6ma,
And they blessed the white-bosomed maid!
A ghost! by my cavern it darted!
In moon-beams the spirit was drest —
For lovely appear the departed
When they visit the dreams of my rest!
But disturbed by the tempest's commotion
Fleet the shadowy forms of delight —
Ah, cease, thou shrill blast of the ocean!
To howl through my cavern by night
THE ROSE.
As late each flower that sweetest blows
I plucked, the garden's pride!
Within the petals of a rose
A sleeping Love I spied.
Around his brows a beamy wreath
Of many a lucent hue;
All purple glowed his cheek, beneath.
Inebriate with dew.
I softly seized th' unguarded power.
Nor scared his balmy rest;
And placed him, caged within the flower.
On spotless Sara's breast.
But when unweeting of the guile
Awoke the pris'ner sweet,
He struggled to escape awhile
And stamped his fairy feet.
Ah! soon the soul-entrancing sight
Subdued th' impatient boy!
He gazed! he thrilled with deep delight 1
Then clapped his wings for joy.
And oh! he cried— *Of magic kind
What charms this throne endear!
Some other Love let Venus find—
I'll fix my empire here.*
KISSES.
Cupid, if storying legends tell aright,
Once framed a rich elixir of delight.
A chalice o'er love-kindled flames he fixed,
And in it nectar and ambrosia mixed;
With these the magic dews which evening brings,
Brushed from the Idalian star by fairy wings:
Each tender pledge of sacred faith he joined.
Each gender pleasure of th' unspotted mind-
Day-dreams, whose tints with sportive brightness
glow,
And hope, the blameless parasite of woe.
The eyeless chemist heard the process rise,
The steamy chalice bubbled up in sighs;
Sweet sounds transpired as when the enamoured
dove
Pours the soft murmuring of responsive love.
The finished work might envy vainly blame.
And *' kisses " was the precious compound's name.
With half, the god his Cyprian mother blest,
And breathed on Sara's lovelier lips the rest.
RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.
PART FOURTH.
" I FEAR thee, ancient Mariner!
I fear thy skinny hand!
And thou art long, and lank, and brown,
As is the ribbed sea-sand.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
" I fear thee, and thy glittering eye,
And thy skinny hand, so brown.*' —
Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding-Guest!
This body dropped not down.
Alone, alone, all, all alone.
Alone on a wide, wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony. ^
The many men, so beautiful!
And they all dead did lie;
And a thousand, thousand slimy things
Lived on; and so did I.
I looked upon the rotting sea.
And drew my eyes away;
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay.
I looked to Heaven, and tried to pray
But ere ever a prayer had gusht,
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.
I closed my lids and kept them close.
And the balls like pulses beat;
For the sky and sea, and the sea and the sky.
Lay like a load on my weary eye.
And the dead were at my feet.
The cold sweat melted from their limbs.
Nor rot nor reek did they:
The look with which they looked on me
Had never passed away.
An orphan's curse would drag to Hell
A spirit from on high;
But oh! more horrible than that
Is a curse in a dead man's eye!
Seven days, seven nights, I saw that curse,
And yet I could not die.
The moving Moon went up the sky,
And no where did abide:
Softly she was going up,
And a star or two beside —
Her beams bemocked the sultry main.
Like April hoar-frost spread;
But where the ship's huge shadow lay.
The charmed water burnt alway
A still and awful red.
Beyond the shadow of the ship,
I watched the water-snakes:
They moved in tracks of shining white,
And when they reared, the elfish light
Fell off in hoary flakes.
Within the shadow of the ship
I watched their rich attire:
Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,
They coiled and swam; and every track
Was a flash of golden fire.
O happy living things! no tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart.
And I blessed them unaware!
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
The self-same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sunk
Like lead into the sea.
CHATTERTON.
O Chatterton! that thou wert yet alive!
Sure thou would' st spread the canvas to the gale,.
And love, with us, the tinkling team to drive
O'er peaceful freedom's undivided dale;
And we, at sober eve, would round thee throng.
Hanging, enraptured, on thy stately song!
And greet with smiles the young-eyed poesy
All deftle mask'd, as hoar antiquity.
— Monody on the Death of Chatterton^
TEARS.
Oh mark those smiling tears, that swell
The opened rose! From heaven they fell^
And with the sunbeam blend;
Blessed visitations from above:
Such are the tender woes of love
Fost'ring the heart they bend!
—Ode to Sara.
BROOK.
Dear native brook! like peace, so placidly
Smoothing thro' fertile fields thy current meek!
Dear native brook! where first young poesy
Started wildly-eager in her noontide dream,
Where blameless pleasures dimple quiet's cheeky
As water-lilies ripple a slow stream!
—Written in Early Youths
MOON.
The moon, that oft from heaven retires.
Endears her renovated ray.
What tho' she leave the sky unblest
To mourn awhile in murky vest ?
When she relumes her lovely light.
We bless the wanderer of the night.
— Absence, — A Farewell Ode^
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SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE,
223
COQUETRY.
The whispered " No "—how little meant!
Sweet falsehood, that endears consent!
For on those lovely lips the while
Dawns the soft relenting smile,
And tempts with feigned dissuasion coy
The gentle violence of joy.
— To Sara.
MOTHERHOOD.
A mother is a mother still,
The holiest thing alive.
— The Three Graves.
SUPERSTITION.
To see a man tread over graves
I hold it no good mark;
'Tis wicked in the sun and moon,
And bad luck in the dark!
—IHd.
LOVE.
All thoughls, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal shame,
All are but ministers of Love,
And feed his sacred flame.
— Love.
RETROSPECT.
Ofl in my waking dreams do I
Live o'er again that happy hour,
When midway on the mount I lay.
Beside the ruined tower.
The moonshine, stealing o'er the scene.
Had blended with the lights of eve;
And she was there, my hope, my joy.
My own dear Genevieve!
FREEDOM.
—IHd.
For what is freedom, but the unfettered use
Of all the powers which God for use had given ?
— The Destiny of Nations.
AGNOSTICISM.
But some there are who deem themselves most
free
When they within this gross and visible sphere
Chain down the winged thought, scoffing ascent.
Proud of their meaimess: and themselves they
cheat
With noisy emptiness of learned phrase.
Their subtle fluids, impacts, essences,
Self-working tools, uncaused effects, and all .
Those blind omniscients, those almighty slaves.
Untenanting creation of its God.
—Ibid.
FANCY.
For fancy is the power
That first unsensualizes the dark mind.
Giving it new delights, and bids it swell
With wild activity, and peopling air.
By obscure fears of beings invisible.
Emancipates it from the grosser fhrall
Of the present impulse, teaching self-control^
Till Superstition with unconscious hand
Seat Reason on her throne.
—Ibid.
WINTER.
*Twas the cold season, when the rustic's eye
From the drear desolate whiteness of his fields
Rolls for relief to watch the skyey tints
And clouds slow varying their huge imagery.
—Ibid.
FEAR.
From his obscure haunt
Shrieked Fear, of Cruelty the ghastly dam.
Feverous yet freezing, eager-paced yet slow,
As she that creeps from forth her swampy reeds,
Ague, the biform hag, when early Spring
Beams on the marsh-bed vapors.
—Ibid.
SLEEP.
O sleep! it is a gentle thing,
Beloved from pole to pole!
To Mary Queen the praise be given!
She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven,
That slid into my soul.
— The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.
LOVE.
He prayeth best, who loveth best
All things both great and small;
For the dear God who loveth us.
He made and loveth all.
—Ibid.
MIDNIGHT.
*Tis the middle of night by the castle clock.
And the owls have awakened the crowing cock!:
Tu— whit! Tu—whoo!
And hark, again! the crowing cock,
How drowsily it crew.
—Christabel.
SLANDER.
But whispering tongues can poison truth;
And constancy lives in realms above;
And life is thorny, and youth is vain;
And to be wroth with one we love.
Doth work like madness in the brain.
—Ibid.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
KISMET.
To meet, to know, to love — and then to part.
Is the sad tale of many a human heart.
-—A CoupUL
SIMPLICITY.
Oh, I do love thee, meek Simplicity!
For of thy lays the lulling simpleness
<joes to my heart, and soothes each small distress;
Distress tho' small, yet haply great to me!
^Tis true, on Lady Fortune's gentlest pad
I amble on; yet tho' I know not why,
So sad I am! but should a friend and I
•Grow cool and miff, Oh! I am very sad!
And then with sonnets and with sympathy
My dreamy bosom's mystic woes I pall;
"Now of my false friend plaining plaintively,
Now raving at mankind in general:
But whether sad or fierce, 'tis simple all,
All very simple, meek Simplicity.
— Sonnets
TO THB AUTUMNAL MOON.
Mild splendor of the various- vested night!
Mother of wildly- working visions, hail!
I watch thy gliding, while with wat'ry light
Thy weak eye glimmers thro' a fleecy veil,
And when thou lovest thy pale orb to shroud
Behind the gathered blackness lost on high;
And when thou dartest from the wind-rent doud
Thy placid lightning o'er th' awakened sky.
Ah, such is Hope! as changeful and as fair!
Now dimly peering on the wistful sight;
Now hid behind the dragon-winged Despair:
But soon emerging in her radiant might.
She o'er the sorrow-clouded breast of Care
Sails, like a meteor kindling in its flight
^Ibid,
MRS. SIDDONS.
As when a child on some long winter's night,
Afirighted clinging to its Grandam's knees.
With eager wond'ring and pertubed delight
Listens strange tales of fearful dark decrees
Muttered to wretch by necromantic spell;
Or of those hags, who at the witching time
Of murky midnight ride the air sublime,
And mingle foul embrace with friends of Hell:
Cold Horror drinks its blood! Anon the tear
More gentle starts, to hear the Beldame tell
Of pretty babes, that loved each other dear.
Murdered by cruel Uncle's mandate fell:
Ev'n such the shiv'ring joys thy tones impart,
Ev'n so thou, Siddons, meltest my sad heart!
—Ibid.
SHBRIDAN.
It was some spirit, Sheridan, that breath'd
O'er thy young mind such wildly-various power!
My soul hath marked thee in her shaping hour,
Thy temples with Hymettian flowrets wreath'd:
And sweet thy house, as when o'er Laura's bier
Sad music trembled thro' Vauclusa's glade;
Sweet, as at dawn the love-lorn Serenade
That wafts soft dreams to Slumber's list'ning ear.
Now patriot Rage and Indignation high
Swell the full tones! And now thine eye-beams
dance
' Meanings of Scorn and Wit's quaint revelry!
Writhes inly from the bosom-probing glance
The Apostate by the brainless rout adored.
As erst that elder Fiend beneath great Michael's
sword. — Ibid.
SONNET.
My heart has thanked thee, Bowles, for those soft
strains
Whose sadness soothes me, like the murmuring
Of wild bees in the sunny showers of spring!
For hence not callous to the mourner's pains
Thro' Youth's gay prime and thomless paths I
went:
And when the darker day of life began.
And I did roam, a thought-bewildered man.
Their mild and manliest melancholy lent
A mingled charm, which oft the pang condgned
To slumber, tho' the big tear it renewed:
Bidding such strange mysterious pleasure brood
Over the wavy and tumultuous mind,
As made the soul enamoured of her woe:
No common praise, dear Bard, to thee I owe!
—Ibid.
RIVER OTTER.
Dear native Brook! wild Streamlet of the West!
How many various-fated years have passed.
What blissful and what angubhed hours, since
last
I skimmed the smooth thin stone along thy breast.
Numbering its light leaps! Yet so deep imprest
Sink the sweet scenes of Childhood, that mine eyes
I never shut amid the sunny blaze.
But straight with all their tints thy waters rise,
Thy crossing plank, thy margin's willowy maze;
And bedded sand that, veined with various dyes.
Gleamed through thy bright transparence to the
gaze!
Visions of Childhood! oft have ye beguiled
Lone Manhood's cares, yet waking fondest sighs.
Ah! that once more I were a careless child!
—Ibid.
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WAR BALLADS.
THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER.
Oh, say, can you see by the dawn's early light
What so proudly we hail'd at the twilight's last
gleaming —
Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the
perilous fight,
0*er the ramparts we watch'd, were so gallantly
streaming ?
And the rocket's red glare, the bombs bursting in
air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was
still there;
Oh, say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the
brave?
On that shore, dimly seen through the mists of the
deep.
Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence re-
poses.
What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering
steep,
As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses?
Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first
beam,
In full glory reflected, now shines on the stream;
'Tis the star-spangled banner; oh, long may it
wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the
brave!
And where are the foes who so vauntingly swore
That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion
A home and a country should leave us no more ?
Their blood has wash'd out their foul footsteps*
pollution.
No refuge could save the hireling and slave
From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave;
And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
Oh, thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved homes and the war's desola-
tion!
Blest with victory and peace, may the heaven-
rescued land
Praise the Power that hath made and preserved
us a nation.
Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just;
And this be our motto : *' In God is our trust;"
And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave
O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave.
Francis Scott Key.
BARBARA PRIETCHIE.
Up from the meadows rich with com,
Clear in the cool September mom.
The clustered spires of Frederick stand
Green-walled by the hills of Maryland.
Round about them orchards sweep,
Apple and peace tree fraited deep.
Fail as a garden of the Lord
To the eyes of the famished rebel horde.
On that pleasant mom of the early fall
When Lee marched over the mountain wall, —
Over the mountains winding down,
Horses and foot into Frederick town.
Forty flags with their silver stars,
Forty flags with their crimson bars,
Flapped in the moming wind; the sun
Of noon looked down, and saw not one.
Up rose old Barbara Frietchie then.
Bowed with her four-score years and ten;
Bravest of all in Frederick town.
She took up the flag the men hauled down;
In her attic window the staff she set.
To show that one heart was loyal yet.
Up the street came the rebel tread,
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead.
Under his slouched hat left and right
He glanced; the old flag met his sight
" Halt!" — the dust-brown ranks stood fast;
** Fire!"— out blazed the rifle-blast.
It shivered the window, pane and sash;
It rent the banner with seam and gash.
Quick, as it fell, from the broken staff
Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf;
She leaned far out on the window-sill,
And shook it forth with a royal will.
** Shoot, if you must, this old gray head»
But spare your country's flag," she said.
A shade of sadness, a blush of shame.
Over the face of the leader came;
The nobler nature within him stirred
To life at that woman's deed and word:
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
"Who touches a hair of yon gray head
Dies like a dog! March onl'* he said.
All day long through Frederick street
Sounded the tread of marching feet;
All day long that free flag tost
Over the heads of the rebel host
Ever its torn folds rose and fell
On the loyal winds that loved it well;
And through the hill-gaps sunset light
Shone over it with a warm good-night.
Barbara Frietchie's work is o*er,
And the rebel rides on his raids no more.
Honor to her! and let a tear
Fall, for her sake, on Stonewall's bier.
Over Barbara Frietchie's grave,
Flag of freedom and union, wave!
Peace and order and beauty draw
Round thy symbol of light and law;
And ever the stars from above look down
On thy stars below in Frederick town!
John Grbbnleap Whittier.
AMERICA.
O MOTHER of a mighty race.
Yet lovely in thy youthful grace!
The elder dames, thy haughty peers,
Admire and hate thy blooming years;
With words of shame
And taunts of scorn they join thy name.
For on thy cheeks the glow is spread
That tints thy morning hills with red;
Thy step, — the wild deer's rustling feet
Within thy woods are not more fleet:
Thy hopeful eye
Is bright as thine own sunny sky.
Ay, let them rail, those haughty ones,
While safe thou dwellest with thy sons.
They do not know how loved thou art.
How many a fond and fearless heart
Would rise to throw
Its life between thee and the foe.
They know not, in their hate and pride.
What virtues with thy children bide, —
How true, how good, thy graceful maids
Make bright, like flowers, the valley shades;
What generous men
Spring, like thine oaks, by hill and glen;
What cordial welcomes greet the guest
By thy lone rivers of the west;
How faith is kept, and truth revered,
And man is loved, and God is feared,
In woodland homes,
And where the ocean border foams.
There's freedom at thy gates, and rest
For earth's down-trodden and opprest,
A shelter for the hunted head.
For the starved laborer toil and bread.
Power, at thy bounds.
Stops, and calls back his bafiled hounds.
O fair young mother! on thy brow
Shall sit a nobler grace than now;
Deep in the brightness of thy skies.
The thronging years in glory rise.
And, as they fleet,
Drop strength and riches at thy feet.
Thine eye, with every coming hour.
Shall brighten, and thy form shall tower;
And when thy sisters, elder born.
Would brand thy name with words of scorn,
Before thine eye
Upon their lips the taunt shall die.
William Cullen Bryant.
THE AMERICAN FLAG.
When Freedom from her mountain-height
Unfurl' d her standard to the air.
She tore the azure robe of night,
And set the stars of glory there;
She mingled with its gorgeous dyes
The milky baldric of the skies.
And striped its pure celestial white
With streakings of the morning light;
Then from his mansion in the sun
She called her eagle-bearer down.
And gave into his mighty hand
The symbol of her chosen land.
Majestic monarch of the cloud!
Who rear'st aloft thy r^;al form,
To hear the tempest-trumpings loud,
And see the lightning lances driven.
When strive the warriors of the storm.
And rolls the thunder-drum of heaven —
Child of the sun! to thee 'tis given
To guard the banner of the free,
To hover in the sulphur-smoke,
To ward away the battle-stroke,
And bid its blendings shine afar.
Like rainbows on the cloud of war,
The harbingers of victory!
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Flag of the brave! thy folds shall fly,
The sign of hope and triumph high,
When speaks the signal trumpet-tone,
And the long line comes gleaming on;
Ere yet the life-blood, warm and wet,
Has dimmed the glistening bayonet.
Each soldier eye shall brightly turn
To where thy sky-bom glories bum,
And as his springing steps advance
Catch war and vengeance from the glance.
And when the cannon-mouthings loud
Heave in wild wreaths the battle-shroud.
And gory sabres rise and fall
Like shoots of flame on midnight's pall,
Then shall thy meteor glances glow.
And cowering foes shall sink beneath
Each gallant arm that strikes below
That lovely messenger of death.
Flag of the seas! on ocean wave
Thy stars shall glitter o'er the brave;
When death, careering on the gale,
Sweeps darkly round the bellied sail,
And frighted waves rash wildly back
Before the broadside's reeling rack.
Each dying wanderer of the sea
Shall look at once to heaven and thee,
And smile to see thy splendors fly
In triumph o'er his closing eye.
Flag of the free heart's hope and home!
By angel hands to valvor given;
Thy stars have lit the welkin dome.
And all thy hues were bora in heaven.
Forever float that standard sheet!
Where breathes the foe that falls before us.
With freedom's soil beneath our feet.
And freedom's banner streaming o'er us ?
Joseph Rodman Drake.
THE CAUSE OF THE SOUTH.
The fallen cause still waits, —
Its bard has not come yet;
His song— through one of to-morrow's gates
Shall shine — but never set.
But when he comes, he'll sweep
A harp with tears all stringed,
And the very notes he strikes will weep,
As they come, from his hand, woe-winged.
Ah! grand shall be his strain.
And his songs shall All all climes.
And the Rebels shall rise and march again
Down the lines of his glorious rhymes.
And through his verse shall gleam
The swords that flashed in vain,
And the men who wore the gray shall seem
To be marshalling again.
But hush! between his words
Peer faces sad and pale.
And you hear the sound of broken chords
Beat through the poet's wail.
Through his verse the orphans cry,
The terrible undertone!
And the father's curse and the mother's sigh.
And the desolate young wife's moan.
I sing, with a voice too low
To be heard beyond to-day.
In minor keys of my people's woe;
And my songs pass away.
To-morrow hears them not.
To-morrow belongs to fame:
My songs, like the birds', will be forgot.
And foi^tten shall be my name.
And yet who knows! betimes
The grandest songs depart.
While the gentle, humble, and low-toned rhymes
Will echo from heart to heart.
Abram J. Ryan.
COLUMBIA.
Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise,
The queen of the world, and the child of the skies!
Thy genius commands thee; with rapture behold.
While ages on ages thy splendors unfold.
Thy reign is the last and the noblest of time.
Most fraitful thy soil, most inviting thy clime;
Let the crimes of the east ne'er encrimson thy
name.
Be freedom and science and virtue thy fame.
To conquest and slaughter let Europe aspire;
Whelm nations in blood, and wrap cities in Are;
Thy heroes the rights of mankind shall defend.
And triumph pursue them, and glory attend.
A world is thy realm; for a world be thy laws
Enlarged as thine empire, and just as thy cause;
On Freedom's broad basis that empire shall rise.
Extend with the main, and dissolve with the skies.
Fair Science her gates to thy sons shall unbar.
And the East see thy mora hide the beams of her
star;
New bards and new sages unrivalled shall soar
To fame unextinguished when time is no more;
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
To thee, the last refuge of virtue designed,
Shall fly from all nations the best of mankind;
Here, grateful to Heaven, with transport shall
bring
Their incense, more fragrant than odors of spring.
Nor less shall thy fair ones to glory ascend,
And genius and beauty in harmony blend;
The graces of form shall awake pure desire.
And the charms of the soul ever cherish the fire;
Their sweetness unmingled, their manners refined,
And virtue's bright image, enstamped on the mind.
With peace and soft rapture shall teach life to
glow,
And light up a smile on the aspect of woe.
Thy fleets to all regions thy power shall display,
The nations admire, and the ocean obey;
Each shore to thy glory its tribute unfold,
And the East and the South yield their spices and
gold.
As the dayspring unbounded thy splendor shall
flow.
And earth's litde kingdoms before thee shall bow,
While the ensigns of union, in triumph unfurled,
Hush the tumult of war, and give peace to the
world.
Thus, as down a lone valley, with cedars o'er-
spread.
From war's dread confusion, I pensively strayed, —
The gloom from the face of fair heaven retired;
The wind ceased to murmur, the thunders expired;
Perfumes, as of Eden, flowed sweetiy along,
And a voice, as of angels, enchantingly sung:
"Columbia, Columbia, to glory arise.
The queen of the world, and the child of the skies!"
Timothy Dwight.
THE HEART OF THE WAR.
(1864.)
Peace in the clover-scented air,
And stars within the dome;
And underneath, in dim repose,
A plain, New England home.
Within, a murmur of low tones
And sighs from hearts oppressed,
Merging in prayer, at last, that brings
The balm of silent rest.
Pve closed a hard day's work, Marty, -
The evening chores are done;
And you are weary with the house,
And with the littie one.
But he is sleeping sweetly now,
With all our pretty brood;
So come and sit upon my knee,
And it will do me good.
Oh, Marty! I must tell you all
The trouble in my heart.
And you must do the best you can
To take and bear your part
You've seen the shadow on my face;
You've felt it day and night;
For it has filled our litde home,
And banished all its light
I did not mean it should be so,
And yet I might have known
That hearts which live as close as ours
Can never keep their own.
But we are fallen on evil times.
And, do what'er I may.
My heart grows sad about the war.
And sadder every day.
I think about it when I work.
And when I try to rest,
And never more than when your head
Is pillowed on my breast;
For then I see the camp-fires blaze,
And sleeping men around.
Who turn their faces toward their homes.
And dream upon the ground.
I think about the dear, brave boys,
My mates in other years.
Who pine for home and those they love,
Till I am choked with tears.
With shouts and cheers they marched away
On glory's shining track,
But, ah! how long, how long they stay!
How few of them come back!
One sleeps beside the Tennessee,
And one beside the James,
And one fought on a gallant ship
And perished in its flames.
And some, struck down by fell disease,
Are breathing out their life;
And others, maimed by cruel wounds.
Have left the deadly strife.
Ah, Marty! Marty! only think
Of all the boys have done
And suffered in this weary war!
Brave heroes, every one!
Oh, often, often in the night
I heard their voices call:
" Grnie on and help us! Is ii right
That we should bear it allf "
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And when I kneel and try to pray,
My thoughts are never free,
But ding to those who toil and fight
And die for you and me.
And when I pray for victory,
It seems almost a sin
To fold my hands and ask for what
I will not help to win.
Oh, do not cling to me and cry,
For it will break my heart;
Tm sure you'd rather have me die
Than not to bear my part.
Vou think that some should stay at home
To care for those away;
But still Vm helpless to decide
If I should go or stay.
For, Marty, all the soldiers love,
And all are loved again;
And I am loved, and love, perhaps,
No more than other men.
I cannot tell, I do not know.
Which way my duty lies,
Or where the Lord would have me build
My fire of sacrifice.
I feel — I know — I am not mean;
And though I seem to boast,
Pm sure that I would give my life
To those who need it most.
Perhaps the Spirit will reveal
That which is fair and right;
So, Marty, let us humbly kneel
And pray to Heaven for light.
Peace in the clover-scented air.
And stars within the dome;
And underneath, in dim repose,
A plain, New England home.
Within, a widow in her weeds.
From whom all joy is flown,
Who kneels among her sleeping babes,
And weeps and prays alone.
J. G. Holland.
STONEWALL JACKSON'S WAY.
Come, stack arms, men! Pile on the rails,
Stir up the camp-fire bright;
No growling if the canteen fails,
We* 11 make a roaring night.
Here Shenandoah brawls along,
There burly Blue Ridge echoes strong,
To swell the brigade's rousing song
Of '* Stonewall Jackson's way.**
We see him now — the queer slouched hat
Cocked o*er his eye askew;
The shrewd, dry smile; the speech so pat.
So calm, so blunt, so true.
The ** Blue-light Elder *' knows *em well;
Says he, "That's Bank*.<*— he's fond of shell;
Lord save his soul! we'll give him — " well!
That's ** Stonewall Jackson's way."
Silence! ground arms! kneel all! caps off!
Old Blue Light's goin' to pray.
Strangle the fool that dares to scoff.
Attention! it's his way.
Appealing from his native sod.
In forma pauperis to God:
** Lay bare Thine arm; stretch forth Thy rod!
Amen!" That's "Stonewall's way."
He's in the saddle now. Fall in!
Steady! the whole brigade!
Hill's at the ford, cut off; we'll win
His way out, ball and blade!
What matter if our shoes are worn ?
What matter if our feet are torn ?
** Quick step! we're with him before mom!"
That's "Stonewall Jackson's way."
The sun's bright lances rout the mists
Of morning, and, by George!
Here's Longstreet, struggling in the lists,
Hemmed in an ugly gorge.
Pope and his Dutchmen, whipped before;
" Bay' nets and grape!" hear Stonewall roar;
•* Charge, Stuart! Pay off Ashby's score!"
In "Stonewall Jackson's way."
Ah! maiden, wait and watch and yearn
For news of Stonewall's band!
Ah! widow, read, with eyes that bum,
That ring upon thy hand.
Ah! wife, sew on, pray on, hope on;
Thy life shall not be all forlorn;
The foe had better ne'er been bom
That gets in " Stonewall's way."
J. W. Palmer.
CAVALRY SONG.
Our good steeds snuff the evening air.
Our pulses with their purpose tingle;
The foeman's fires are twinkling there;
He leaps to hear our sabres jingle!
HALT!
Each carbine sends its whizzing ball:
Now, cling! .clang! forward all,
Into the fight!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
Dash on beneath the smoking dome:
Through level lightnings gallop nearer!
One look to Heaven! No thoughts of home:
The guidons that we bear are dearer.
CHARGE!
Cling! clang! forward all!
Heaven help those whose horses fall!
Cut left and right!
They flee before our fierce attack!
They fall! they spread in broken surges!
Now, comrades, bear our wounded back,
And leave the foeman to his dirges.
WHEEL!
The bugles sound the swift recall:
Cling! clang! backward all!
Home, and good-night!
Edmund Clarencb Stedman.
PAUL REVERB'S RIDE.
Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in *Seventy-five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers that famous day and year.
He said to his friend, ** If the British march
By land or sea from the town to-night,
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch
Of the North Church tower as a signal light, —
One, if by land, and two, if by sea;
And I on the opposite shore will be.
Ready to ride and spread the alarm
Through every Middlesex village and farm.
For the country folk to be up and to arm.
Then he said, " Good night! " and with muffled oar
Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore,
Just as the moon rose over the bay.
Where, swinging wide at her moorings, lay
The Somerset, British man-of-war;
A phantom ship, with each mast and spar
Across the moon like a prison bar.
And a huge black hulk, that was magnified
By its own reflection in the tide.
Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street,
Wanders and watches with eager ears,
Till in the silence round him he hears
The muster of men at the barrack door,
The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet,
And the measured tread of the grenadiers,
Marching down to their boats on the shore.
Then he climbed the tower of the Old North
Church
By the wooden stairs, with stealthy tread.
To the belfry-chamber overhead.
And startled the pigeons from their perch
On the sombre rafters, that round him made
Masses and moving shapes of shade, —
By the trembling ladder, steep and tall,
To the highest window in the wall.
Where he paused to listen and look down
A moment on the roofs of the town.
And the moonlight flowing over all.
Beneath, in the churchyard, lay the dead,
In their night-encampment on the hill,
Wrapped in silence so deep and still
That he could hear, like a sentinel's tread,
The watchful night-wind, as it went
Creeping along from tent to tent,
And seeming to whisper, "All is well! '*
A moment only he feels the spell
Of the place and the hour, and the secret dread
Of the lonely belfry and the dead;
For suddenly all his thoughts are bent
On a shadowy something far away.
Where the river widens to meet the bay, —
A line of black that blends and floats
On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats.
Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride,
Booted and spurred, with a heavy stride,
On the opposite shore walked Paul Revere.
Now he patted his horse's side.
Now gazed at the landscape far and near,
Then, impetuous, stamped the earth.
And turned and tightened his saddle-girth;
But mostly he watched with eager search
The belfry-tower of the Old North Church,
As it rose above the graves on the hill.
Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.
And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height
A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!
He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns.
But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight
A second lamp in the belfry bums!
A hurry of hoofs in a village street,
A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark.
And beneath, from the pebbles, in passing, spark
Struck out by a steed flying fearless and fleet:
That was all! And yet, through the gloom and the
light.
The fate of a nation was riding that night;
And the spark struck out by that steed,^ in his
flight.
Kindled the land into flame with its heat.
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He has left the village and mounted the steep,
And beneath him, tranquil and broad and deep,
Is the Mystic, meeting the ocean tides;
And under the alders, that skirt its edge,
Now soft on the sand, now loud on the ledge,
Is heard the tramp of his steed as he rides.
It was twelve by the village clock
When he crossed the bridge into Medford town.
He heard the crowing of the cock.
And the barking of the farmer's dog.
And felt the damp of the river fog.
That rises after the sun goes down.
It was one by the village clock
When he galloped into Lexington.
He saw the gilded wethercock
Swim in the moonlight as he passed,
And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare.
Gaze at him with a spectral glare,
As if they already stood aghast
At the bloody work they would look upon.
It was two by the village clock
When he came to the bridge in Concord town.
He heard the bleating of the flock,
And the twitter of birds among the trees,
And felt the breath of the morning breeze
Blowing over the meadows brown.
And one was safe and asleep in his bed
Who at the bridge would be first to fall.
Who that day would be lying dead,
Pierced by a British musket-ball.
You know the rest. In books you have read,
How the British Regulars fired and fled, —
How the farmers gave them ball for ball.
From behind each fence and farm-yard wall,
Chasing the redcoats down the lane.
Then crossing the fields to emerge again
Under the trees at the turn of the road.
And only pausing to fire and load.
So through the night rode Paul Revere;
And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Middlesex village and farm, —
A cry of defiance and not of fear,
A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,
And a word that shall echo forevermore!
For, borne on the night-wind of tlie Past,
Through all our history, to the last,
In the hour of darkness and peril and need,
The people will waken and listen to hear
The hurrying hoof-beats of that steed
And the midnight message of Paul Revere.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
MARCHING ALONG.
The army is gathering from near and from far;
The trumpet is sounding the call for the war;
McClellan's our leader, he's gallant and strong;
We'll gird on our armor and be marching along.
CHORUS.
Marching along, we are marching along,
Gird on the armor and be marching along;
McClellan's our leader, he's gallant and strong;
For God and our country we are marching
along.
The foe is before us in battle array,
But let us not waver, or turn from the way;
The Lord is our strength, and the Union's our
song;
With courage and faith we are marching along.
OftiWT^.— Marching along, etc.
Our wives and our children we leave in your care;
We feel you will help them with sorrow to bear;
'Tis hard thus to part, but we hope 'twon't be long;
We'll keep up our hearts as we're marching along.
Chorus.— MsLTching along, etc.
We sigh for our country, we mourn for our dead;
For them now our last drop of blood we will shed;
Our cause is the right one— our foe's in the wrong;
Then gladly we'll sing as we're marching along.
Ci^nw.— Marching along, etc.
The flag of our country is floating on high;
We'll stand by that flag till we conquer or die;
McClellan's our leader, he's gallant and strong;
We'll gird on our armor and be marching along.
C/iorus.—M&rchmg along, etc.
William B. Bradbury.
"THE WOMEN WHO WENT TO THE FIELD.''
The women who went to the field, you say.
The tvonten who went to the field; and pray
What did they go for?— just to be in the way?
They'd not know the difference betwixt work and
play.
And what did they know about war, anyway?
What could they do"^ — of what i«^ could they be?
They would scream at the sight of a gun, don't you
see?
Just fancy them round where the bugle-notes play,
And the long roll is bidding us on to the fray.
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Imagine their skirts 'mong artillery wheels,
And watch for their flutter as they flee 'cross the
field
When the charge is rammed home and the fire
belches hot;
They never will wait for the answering shot
They would faint at the first drop of blood in their
sight,
What fun for us boys,— (ere we enter the fight);
They might pick some lint, and tear up some sheets,
And make us some jellies, and send on their
sweets,
And knit some soft socks for Uncle Sam's shoes,
And write us some letters, and tell us the news.
And thus it was settled, by common consent,
That husbands, or brothers, or whoever went.
That the place for the women was in their own
homes.
There to patiently wait until victory comes.
But later it chanced— just how, no one knew —
That the lines slipped a bit, and some 'gan to
crowd through;
And they went, — where did they go? — Ah! where
did they not ?
Show us the battle, the field, or the spot
Where the groans of the wounded rang out on the
air
That her ear caught it not, and her hand was not
there;
Who wiped the death sweat from the cold, clammy
brow.
And sent home the message: — '* 'Tis well with him
now;"
Who watched in the tents whilst the fever fires
burned.
And the pain tossing limbs in agony turned;
Who wet the parched tongue, calmed delirium's
strife
Till the dying lips murmured, *' My mother," "My
wife."
And who were they all? — ^They were many, my
men:
Their records were kept by no tabular pen:
They exist in traditions from father to son,
Who recalls, in dim memory, now here and there
one.
A few names were writ, and by chance live to-day;
But's a perishing record, fast fading away.
Of those we recall, there are scarcely a score;
Dix, Dame, Bickerdyke, Edson, Harvey and
Moore,
Fales, Wittenmeyer, Gilson, Saffbrd and Lee,
And poor Cutter dead in the sands of the sea;
And Frances D. Gage, our "Aunt Fanny" of old,
Whose voice rang for freedom when freedom was
sold.
And Husband, and Etheridge, and Harlan and
Case,
Livermore, Alcott, Hancock and Chase,
And Turner, and Hawley, and Potter and Hall.
Ah! the list grows apace, as they come at the calL
Did these women quail at the sight of a gun ?
Will some soldier tell us of one he saw run ?
Will he glance at the boats on the great western
flood,
At Pittsburg and Shiloh, did they faint at the blood >
And the brave wife of Grant stood there with them
then.
And her calm stately presence gave strength to his
men.
And Marie of Logan: she went with them too;
A bride, scarcely more than a sweetheart, 'tis true.
Her young cheek grows pale when the bold troop-
ers ride.
Where the "Black Eagle" soars, she is close at
his side;
She staunches his blood, cools his fever-burnt
breath,
And the wave of her hand stays the Angel of
Death;
She nurses him back, and restores once again
To both army and state the great leader of men.
She has smoothed his black plumes and laid them
to sleep.
Whilst the angels above them their high vigils
keep:
And she sits here alone, with the snow on her
brow —
Your cheers for her, Comrades! Three cheers for
her now.
And these were the women who went to the war:
The women of question; what did they go for?
Because in their hearts God had planted the seed
Of pity for woe, and help for its need;
They saw, in high purpose, a duty to do,
And the armor of right broke the barriers through.
Uninvited, unaided, unsanctioned ofttimes,
With pass, or without it, they pressed on the lines;
They pressed, they implored, 'till they ran the
lines through,
And thai was the "running" the men saw them
do.
'Twas a hampered work, its worth largely lost;
'Twas hindrance, and pain, and effort, and cost;
But through these came knowledge, — knowledge
is power, —
And never again in the deadliest hour
Of war or of peace shall we be so beset
To accomplish the purpose our spirits have met
And what would they do if war came again?
The scarlet cross floats where all was blank then.
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They wound bind on their " brassards " and march
to the fray.
And the man liveth not who could say to them nay;
They would stand with you now, as they stood with
you then, —
The nurses, consolers, and saviors of men.
Clara Barton.
THE REVEILLE.
Hark! I hear the tramp of thousands,
And of armM men the hum;
Lol a nation's hosts have gathered
Round the quick-alarming drum —
Saying: "Come,
Freemen, come!
Ere your heritage be wasted,'' said the quick-
alarming drum.
''Let me of my heart take counsel:
War is not of life the sum;
Who shall stay and reap the harvest
When the autumn days shall come ? "
But the drum
Echoed: "Come!
Death shall reap the braver harvest," said the
solemn-sounding drum.
" But when won the coming batde,
What of profit springs therefrom ?
What if conquest, subjugation.
Even greater ills become ? ' '
But the drum
Answered: "Come!
You must do the sum to prove it," said the
Yankee-answering drum.
"What if, 'mid the cannon's thunder,
Whistling shot and bursting bomb.
When my brothers fall around me,
Should my heart grow cold and numb ? "
But the drum
Answered: "Come!
Better there in death imited than in life a rec-
reant — Come!"
Thus they answered — hoping, fearing.
Some in faith and doubting some,
Till a trumpet-voice proclaiming.
Said: " My chosen people, come!"
Then the drum
Lo! was dumb;
For the great heart of the nation, throbbing,
answered: " Lord, we come!"
Bret Harte.
SINGLE POEMS.
HILDA'S DREAM.
The morning May-beams lean'd on Hilda's brows.
Her low broad brows, and kist the serpent-coil
Of fulvous hair that loosen'd from the mass,
Slid down upon her shoulder gleaming white.
And, like a tawny snake with glists of gold.
Across her bosom trail' d its silken length.
And with her breathing gently rose and fell.
The vagrant fastenings of her sleeping robe
Had dropt and left her pearly throat unclaspt,
And all her beauty veilless to the sun.
The martins building underneath the eaves
Looked in and twitter' d to her at their work;
Her sparrows chatter'd on her window's sill
And, chirping, call'd her, waiting for their crumbs.
The trailing creeper tapp'd her window-pane,
All Spring's sweet sounds rose up to her; but she
Still slept, and dream'd and heard them not. Her
head
Soft-pillowed on one arm, her other arm
In sleep's abandonment flung lightly on
The broider'd cover of her bed.
O sleep!
O rest in sleep! how good a thing art thou!
O morning-sleep! alas, it must be said, 1
She loved to wrap herself within its folds,
To doze in drowsy, dreamy somnolence;
And so, this mom, a willing slave in bonds
And chains of poppy filaments, she lay.
And sweet in sensory-cells her visions seem'd,
For smiles, like ripples on a sunny lake.
Moved, chasing each across her face.
But now.
As when a rough wind wakes the sleeping sea,
A change comes o'er the motion of her dream.
She trembles, moves her hands, and starts with
fear.
The hag-of-night, on her distemper' d mare,
Unfrighted by the crocus-light of mom,
Rides through the mystic passes of her brain.
The terror holds her now: black shadows move
Athwart the mirror of her dream: a dream
Most horrible. She all her life, till now.
Had only dreamt of Love and pleasant things —
Its blackness weighs on her insomnious soul;
A blackness as of midnight on a moor
Moonless and starless howling for the light;
Again, the outer blackness of a vault.
Shut from all light, whose walls of dead men's bones
Closed on her heavy breath.
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Alas! that she
Should suffer anguish even in a dream.
She was so sweet, so like a merry song
That trips in notes of laughter all its way;
The light heart of a careless child had she,
And t>ore her weight of wifehood like a flower
That gave but added color to her charms:
All petty household dues she brush'd away
As they were thistle-down.
Now, in her dream
The darkness lifts, and small white bands move
past.
Fray'd, tattered shapes of things, she knew not
what.
She looks, and in a creeping mist she sees.
Far off, a pale-blue light, and in its rays —
As 'twere a living thing — ^a cofiin looms:
And reeling, swaying, nearer, nearer still.
And nearer yet, it stays beside her bed.
Cold horror seizes her, her blood grows chill.
She cannot screem, she can but stare, and see
The husband of her love in grave<Jothes clad,
In cofiin standing upright by her side;
His eyes with life's last look fix'd stonily
On her; the long white arms, the fingers pale
And shrivell'd of the dead, outstretched at her;
The blue lips moving, giving forth no sound.
Yet— seemingly to thought — upbraiding her.
She clasps her troubled hands, she gasps for breath,
She moans with anguish in her awful sleep.
Clouds fill the chamber; now a wide expanse
Before her eyes. From out the coffin glides
The corpse, thrice waves his wan weird arms, and
lo!
With noiseless tread lean dancing shapes appear,
Strange things to sight, like toeless human feet
Divorced from parent limbs with horrid knife,
Or wrench'd apart: each ghostly foot with rents
And deep-mouth 'd cuts disfigured.
To the right,
Grim sallow forms steal on like human legs.
Faint legs without their feet, a gruesome crew:
And as they dance before her wilder' d eyes
A lurid light gleams through their rended skins;
Some limbs dance by in groups, but here and there
A single limb 'mid others madly whirls.
They pause; again the pale corpse waves his arms;
Forms more uncouth, more ghostly, cluster in.
Sweeping with gliding motion past her eyes;
Blanch'd human bodies without heads or legs,
They join the dance, they wildly toss their arms,
Their handless arms, and ever point at her
Their jagged wrists, while chamel lights illume
Their gaping wounds and lacerated fronts.
And now amidst that spectral company.
From misty heights, on every side, descends
As thick as hail a shower of human hands;
Around they float upon the sulphurous air.
Upborne though wingless, hands without their
arms,
Pointing their Angers as in scorn at her;
Some rough and swollen look, and others soft
And delicately fair— disfigured all;
Some lack a finger, some a thumb, and some
Have riven sides, and open'd palms, whose digits-
Quivering held by little strips of skin —
All nailless, dangle from the parent hand. '
Again the man waves his arms; and from
Each wrist and headless trunk grow toeless feet,
While grisly hands peep from each sever'd leg.
A scream born of her agony escapes;
The dance is stay'd; the pallid forms repose;
The clouds and mists disperse; the scene contracts.
To four known walls, and in those phantoms grim
She sees, she sees — O joy! — ^her husband's socks.
His hose, his pants, his vests, his well-worn shirts,
His long white ties, his limp Geneva bands.
His many sorts of gloves — all buttonless,
All torn, and rent, and slash'd, and ript, and;
fray'd,
Unsewn, undam'd, unmended, full of holes!
The coffin disappears. The glow of life
Returns to that cold corpse. One long drawn sigh.
She wakes.
Her husband — ^he is standing there —
The Vicar of the Parish, best of men.
Alive and well!
** My Hilda, love, these ties!
I've not a neckerchief that isn't fray'd.
And this, and this, and these, just look at that!
The Bishop, love! His Lordship comes to-day.
So glad you've had a sweet refreshing sleep;
But see — ^this collar, love! I can't be seen
Like this. The Bishop, dear! Now do get up,
My darling, just for once, and sew a button on!"
W. WiLsv Martin^
COLUMBIA, 1492-1892.
OCTOBER, 2 1 ST.
Four rounded centuries have rolled
Upon Time's ceaseless flood.
Since hero brave and seaman bold,
Led by a thought from God,
Sailed out upon the boundless main
Across a trackless sea.
And first beheld our favored land»
The Home of Liberty,
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To-day, a nation wondrous £air
Is basking *neath the sun;
In scarlet, gold and purple rare,
Her robes she hath put on
To celebrate in rich estate,
With heart and form aglow.
The landing of that hero great
Four hundred years ago.
When 'meiging from the billows high,
The welcome shore appeared,
With shouts that echoed from the sky,
Those toil worn seamen cheered;
Could anthems backward roll to-day,
The corridors of Time
Would ring with praises, all the way
In tribute mete, sublime.
'But ah! the dead may never hear
The praises that we sing;
The pulseless heart receives no cheer
From offerings we bring;
Though bronze, or marble mountain high
We rear above the breast,
It wakens neither smile nor sigh
From those laid low in rest
Our cities grand they may not see —
Our garden land abloom; —
Awakes our finest pageantry
No echo from the tomb.
'Then lower banners at half-mast,
Once on the march to-day.
In honor of the heroes past
In silence laid away.
Then, while the gathered hosts rejoice,
Rallied from sea to sea —
When martial band and thrilling voice
Swell triumphs of the free,
With hearts subdued, in gratitude
Let us adore the Giver,
Who led Columbus o*er the flood
And watches o'er us ever.
Then hail! to fair Columbia —
Her heroes passed away;
And hail! to our Columbia
With heroes of to-day.
By truest, noblest living, may
Her sons and daughters show
Best honor to her natal day
Four hundred years ago.
Lucy H. Washington.
LAWRENCE BARRETT.
What, — Barrett dead? How soon life's play is
o'er!
It seems but yesternight I saw him last;
And now he to the dim Unknown has passed,
A stately ghost upon a ghostly shore!
You who have felt the warm clasp of his hand.
Or, bending low, received his last good-bye,
Ah! but our hearts your grief can understand.
Though the gods will that earth-bom man should
die.
" Ave et vale!** is our despairing cry;
And the dark curtain falls upon the scene.
Never again, O Elk with kingly mein,
Shall we behold the splendor of thine eye!
But to thy shade I raise this glass of mine;
Pledge me, my brother! in death's dregless wine.
Robert Rbxdalb.
SONNET.
" Too commonplace!" the critic hath averred.
''Brings no high thought which with us will
abide
Aiding the gifted wind to overtide
It's hindrances; verse such as this has erred
In seeking leave to speak, and thus be heard,
Or having sought it, should have been denied."
This ice-cold breath from censure's realm so wide,
Blighted sweet promise; henceforth, songless bird!
Yet undismayed, the simple message sped
To many waiting hearts on land and sea,
Meeting their needs; and some with bended head
Gave thanks for song which they could compre-
hend.
As in His Heaven there many mansions be
So on His earth are minds and minds, oh, friend.
Mary £. Ireland.
IF I WERE ONLY YOUNG.
If I were only young
I'd cull sweet flowers for thee!
The rose should blush a ruby red,
Its opening buds love's incense shed,
Its petals wide their beauty spread
For thee, and only thee!
If I were only young
I'd deck my form for thee
In gleaming silks and satins bright,
And diamonds flashing to the light
To be a glory in thy sight
If I were only young!
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If I were only young,
Pd sing sweet songs for thee!
I'd sing in low contralto tone
To thee, my king, to thee alone!
Ah, love, I'd win thee for mine own.
If I were only young!
Clara H. Mountcastlb.
A CANDID PROPOSAL.
I LOVB you, love you! love you!— yet confess
A consciousness of trifling does come o'er me
When all the other shapes of loveliness-
To whom I've said the same thing rise before me.
They were, you are, the idol of my heart;
An idol it must have — which must be kissed.
Hence,
That which was once but of my life a part
Is now my whole existence.
I see a scornful light grow in your eyes,
And yet they shine like stars half hid by mists
Magnificent! You are the fairest prize
My errant heart e'er fought for in love's lists.
You see, I'm candid; you have bowled me over,
And now I drink and dine and bathe in love;
I puzzled half an hour just to discover
The perfume of your glove!
But now all empty was this heart of mine;
Some woman must be in it. With that rose
Give me yourself, and walk into the shrine
Its sovereign goddess. In short, I propose —
My! Won't the Johnson-Mowbrays be enraged!
This summer's changed the lot of many a rover —
That you and I be genuinely engaged
Until the season's over!
John Paul Bocock.
OLNEY HYMNS.
'LOVEST THOU ME.
Hark, my soul! it is the Lord;
'Tis thy Savior, hear his word;
Jesus speaks, and speaks to thee,
" Say, poor sinner, lovest thou me ?
" I delivered thee when bound,
And, when bleeding, healed thy wound;
Sought thee wandering, set thee right;
Turned thy darkness into light
"Can a woman's tender care
Cease towards the child she bare?
Yes, she may foigetfid be.
Yet will I remember thee.
''Mine is an unchanging love,
Higher than the heights above,
Deeper than the depths beneath.
Free and faithful, strong as death.
''Thou shalt see my glory soon.
When the work of grace is done;
Partner of my throne shalt be;—
Say, poor sinner, lovest thou me ? "
Lord, it is my chief complaint.
That my love is weak and faint;
Yet I love thee and adore;
Oh for grace to love thee more!
William Cowper.
FUNERAL HYMN.
Thou art gone to the grave, but we will not de-
plore thee.
Though sorrows and darkness encompass the
tomb:
Thy Savior has passed through its portal before
thee.
And the lamp of his love is thy guide through the
gloom!
Thou art gone to the grave! we no longer behold
thee.
Nor tread the rough path of the world by thy
side;
But the wide arms of Mercy are spread to enfold
thee.
And sinners may die, for the Sinless has died!
Thou art gone to the grave, and, its mansion for-
saking.
Perchance thy weak spirit in fear lingered long;
But the mild rays of Paradise beam'd on thy wak-
ing,
And the sound which thou heardst was the Sera-
phim's song!
Thou art gone to the grave, but we will not deplore
thee;
Whose God was thy ransom, thy guardian and
guide;
He gave thee, he took thee, and he will restore
thee
And Death has no sting, for the Savior has
died!
Reginald Hbber.
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THE SAINT AND THE SINNER.
HsART-worn and weary the woman sat
Her baby sleeping across her knee,
And the work her fingers were toiling at
Seemed a pitiful task for such as she.
Mending shoes for the little feet
That pattered over the cabin floor.
While the bells of the Sabbath day rang sweet,
And the neighbors passed by the open door.
The children pli^ed, and the baby slept,
And the busy needle went and came.
When lo, on the threshold stone there stept
A priestly figure, and named her name:
*' What shrift is this for the Sabbath day.
When bells are calling, and far and near
The people gather to praise and pray.
Woman, why are you toiling here ? "
Like one in a dream she answered low:
" Father, my days are work-days all;
I know not Sabbath. I dare not go
Where the beautiful bells ring out and call
For who would look to the meat and drink
And tend the children and keep the place ?
I pray in silence, and try to think,
For God's love can listen, and give me grace."
The years passed on, and with fast and prayer
The good priest climbed to the gate of rest,
And a tired woman stood waiting there,
Her work-worn hands to her bosom pressed:
" Oh saint, thrice blessed, mount thou on high.
He heard the welcoming angels say.
When meekly, gently, she passed him by.
Who had mended shoes on the Sabbath day.
Madblinb Bridges.
— Ladies* Homejoumal^ February ^ 18^ j.
TENNYSON.
How beautiful to live as thou didst live!
How beautiful to die as thou didst die.
In moonlight of the night, without a sigh,
At rest in* all the best that love could give!
How excellent to bear into old age
The poet's ardor and the heart of youth,
To keep to the last sleep the vow of truth.
And leave to lands that grieve a glowing page!
How glorious to feel the spirit's power
Unbroken by the near approach of death;
To breathe blest prophecies with failing breath,
Soul-bound to beauty in that latest hourl
How sweet to greet, in final kinship owned.
The master-spirit to thy dreams so dear;
At last from his immortal lips to hear,
The dire for Imogen, and thee, intoned!
How beautiful to live as thou didst live!
How beautiful to die as thou didst die.
In moonlight of the night, without a sigh.
At rest in all the best that love could give!
Florence Earlb Coatbs.
"LippincotP Sy Aprils iSgj,
PHILLIPS BROOKS.
Thus, childlike, '' I am going home!'* he said.
And spake no more. The great, good heart lay
still;
The majesty of death encrown'd his head,
And holy silence all the room did fill.
The nation's pulse, smit with a sudden chill.
Beat feverish strokes that, like a midnight knell
Wild pealing from the lofty-tower'd bell.
Sent through the homes of men a startling thrill.
Well fill'd his part, the man of spotless fame.
The missioner from Jesus Christ to all.
So earnest, tender, yet so nobly grand.
With human heart set in a heavenly frame.
At morning-dawn he heard his Father's call
And homeward pass'd into his Father's land.
Thomas MacKellar.
— Gennantown^ January 24^ i8gj.
APRIL'S AFIELD.
April's afield, April's in the air!
Almost you may see each hour
Willows that at dawn were bare,
Meadows that were brown,
On which the lengthening mellow day has burned,
Creep into green before the sun goes down,
And some black bough, while mortal backs were
turned.
Swift stolen into flower.
April's afield, April's in the air!
Fleeting over Earth's slow dust,
Leaving us behind here, where
Pass and pass the years.
Soulless as Echo, she can never know
Our kisses that she hastens, nor our tears.
Not for us watchers do her blossoms blow;
Their day is come — ^they must.
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April's afield, April's in the air!
Heavy Winter turns his feet
Northward with his load of care;
And on April's wings
Unreasoning our human hearts upsoar,
As hearts have done since they were human things,
As hiunan hearts shall do for evermore
When ours foiiget to beat
Owen Wister.
— LippincotVs Aprils 1893.
MY QUEEN.
She is my Queen — ^though not of royal line;
My ideal is she, mine, and only mine!
We have not met in halls or crowded street,
Yet have I fashioned her as wondrous sweet,
And sometime I shall kneel before her shrine.
And she is loving; like some clinging vine,
Her gentle nature round my own will twine,
When first her soulful eyes mine own eyes meet,
For she's my Queen!
And she is noble, rich, all things in fine,
Which man can ask for at the Hand Divine —
My ideal love! while heart of mine doth beat,
My life-long homage lay I at her feet.
For me no brighter, lovelier eyes may shine —
Than hers — ^my Queen!
LiLLA N. CUSHMAN.
-For 7%^ Magazine of Poetry,
THE RIPPLES AND THE POOL.
Slumberous depths of tired eyes.
Where far in the shadow the spirit lies,
That sweet, brave spirit, whose joyous gleam
Should dance in those eyes like a rippling stream!
Yet the stream oft waits 'neath the forest's shade
In deep, still pools, and is undismayed;
For it knows that soon, in the broad sunlight,
It will dance, with its ripples, o'er pebbles bright.
And the dark, deep pools, mysterious, still
Have a sad, sweet charm of their own, that the trill
And the dancing chime of the ripples gay,
With all their beauty, can ne'er display.
For the ripples, singing their joyous song
In the brilliant sunlight, to all belong;
But the pool in the forest concealed is for him
Who studies and honors and loves the stream.
Close not, then, slumberous, languid eyes!
Let me view the beauty that in you lies!
Your bright, gay glance for the world; for me
Those sad, sweet looks that none ebe may see!
Herbert Ditchett.
^LippincoWs^ March, iSgj,
course
CONTENT.
I AM so happy, dear, when I am near you;
Then with the mad, sad world your
pursue,
But leave for me a comer to revere you:
I am so happy just with love, and you.
When that great life that would be earth's defender
Receives a thrust from them it would have
spared,
Come, then, and learn, oh! bruised heart strong
and tender;
• No lonely joy can equal sorrow shared.
I am not wise, except that I adore you;
Nor strong, except that love its strength hath
lent;
But, dear, if all my life upflung before you
Can soften one hard step, I am content
Anna Poole Bbardslbv.
—Harper's Weekly, January 18, 1893,
LOVE'S SEASON.
In sad sweet days when hectic flushes
Bum red on maple and sumac leaf,
When sorrowful winds wail through the rushes,.
And all things whisper of loss and grief;
When close and closer bold Frost approaches
To snatch the blossom from Nature's breast^
When night forever on day encroaches,
Oh, then I think that I love you best
And yet when Winter, that tyrant master.
Has buried Autumn in walls of snow,
And bound and fettered where bold Frost cast her
Lies outraged Nature in helpless woe;
When all earth's pleasures in four walls centre^
And side by side in the snug home nest
We list the tempests which cannot enter.
Oh, then I say that I love you best. "
But later on, when the Siren Season
Betrays the trust of the senile King,
And glad Earth laughs at the act of treason^
And Winter dies in tlie arms of Spring;
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When buds and birds all push and flutter
To' free fair Nature so long oppressed,
I thrill with feelings I cannot utter,
And then I am certain I love you best.
But when in splendor the queenly Summer
Reigns over the earth and the skies above,
When Nature kneels to the royal comer,
And even the Sun flames hot with Love;
When Pleasure basks in the luscious weather,
And Care lies out on the sward to rest,
Oh, whether apart or whether together,
It is then I know that I love you best.
Ella Wheeler Wilcox.
— LippincoU* s, February^ iSgj.
THE SONG OF THE RILL.
Pm a sprite from the depths of a spring,
An elf on the mountains high,
Where the mosses and lichen cling
To the rocks that are lost in the sky.
Only a wee, wee babbling brook
On my way to the infinite sea,
A welcome guest to each pebbled nook
That hides neath the roots of a tree.
With many a quiver and flirt
I steal on my downward way.
With a twist and a shake, my fanciful skirt
Will vanish in diamond-dewed spray.
I don't even shrink from the time-worn brink
As I splash to the pool below;
Tm a vain little elf, for I only think
How my beauty will catch a rainbow.
I linger beneath the cascade.
And gather with daintiest care,'
The pearls, that wantonly strayed
From the rainbows that play in my hair.
The moonrays are lace for my dress,
My knight a silver-haired beam,
That kisses each tress, with a tender caress.
As we sail on the opaline stream.
To some ice maidens grotto I glide
While I fill the dry pockets of earth,
The jewels of Iris I hide.
And subdue all my innocent mirth.
Her smile is so frigidly cold,
Her fetters a crystal linked chain
To gather into her fold,
The sprites that are children of rain.
I want to be useful to man.
As I flow to the swift rolling main.
I'll slyly slip out if I can.
And never be fettered again.
Sparkling and cool I will sleep
Where a wall climbs over the road,
Where the star-eyed daisies peep
From the nest of the noisy toad.
I'll wait for the men that plowed.
Or reaped thro' the summer day.
For the lowing kine that crowd
The spring on their homeward way.
For the ox with its patient yoke.
As it gees to the leathern goad
Into the pool beneath the oak,
Then plods on its dusty road.
I gather my pale-seamed gown
As I skip from boulder to rock,
Over the fields and thro* the town,
I glide with never a shock,
Into some woodland pool.
Where Puck on his elfish seat.
Giggles and grins from a high toadstool,
While the brownies and goblins meet.
Such wonderful leaps that I make
Over the lofty heights,
Filling the dam for the old mills sake
And setting the wheel to rights.
I rush through the seething race.
And laugh at the miller's son
As he slips the smooth belt in its time-worn place,.
And prepares for the seasons run.
The moss grown pump is my slave.
As it stands in the village street;
With a fevered thirst all crave,
A draught from my gourd so sweet
Tho* the iron cup with rusted chain
Be filled to the level brim.
They'll use the gourd, again and again.
And smile at my elfish whim.
I hear the roar from the sandy shore,
I'm lost in the heaving sea.
To dizzy heights in mist I soar
And drift to the landward lee.
An elf of the sun and air,
I scud where the winds and rain
Bring me back to my mountain lair,
Then down to the sea again.
Junius L. Hempstead.
-For Tke Magazine of Poetry.
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240 . THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
FATE.
Where perpetual summer reigns,
Queen of all her fair domains;
I.
And the orange-scented breeze
Is wafted from fair sunny seas;
The house was packed from pit to dome,
With rich and poor, with youth and age;
And the proud magnolia smiles
The curtain (a street scene in Rome,)
O'er a thousand sunlit isles;
Hid from the front the gaudy stage.
Where the lakelets in their bliss
Love the mossy banks to kiss;
II.
Where the water lilies sleep
A bell rang thrice— the house grew still;
On the bosom of the deep,
The play and author both were new;
And in languid beauty dream
The plot was all about a will
Of the moon's last loving beam,
Of which none but the villain knew.
While the roguish zephyr laughs,
III.
As her sweets he slyly quaf&I
The will was found, the villain fled,
The good young man and maiden sweet
Were brought together and were wed—
The play was a success complete.
Ah! Nature, with a lavish hand.
Hath fashioned that fair sunny land,
With all its wealth of bloom and breeze,
Its laughing skies and summer seas;
Its luscious fruits, that seem to say:
IV.
Come dwell amid our groves for aye!
Mrs. Mary Ware.
And when the curtain fell, a shout
Was heard from gallery and stall;
In vain the orchestra " play out,''
WILLIAM BLAKB.
"Author! Author!" they cry and call.
Thou who walked in those old days
V.
Thro' the streets and London ways
But in a garret, cold and dark,
Connii^ o'er thy quaint odd lays.
The author lay— oh, mocking Fate!
Seeing in the smoky air.
Dead of starvation, stiff and stark-
Visions bright, beyond compare.
Success had come, alas, too late!
—Boston Globe, Henry Coyle.
Talking to the angels there.
Limning with the graver's art.
QUATRAINS.
Writing from thy pure sweet heart,
Scanning close life's human chart
As water lilies from the depths
See yon angel blow the flame
Of mud and slime grow pure and white.
Of the trumpet tongues of fame
So may a spotless, perfect life
Thro' the bony dead man's frame.
Have birth in evil black as night.
Hungry then for words of praise
Nor place nor circumstance can rule
Now the critics chant their lays.
The soul that laughs at t^^ate's intent.
Kneeling to the fashion's craze.
She like a woman loves the best
The one who scorns her blandishment
On thy deathless sheets of brass.
Florence A. Jones.
— For The Magazine of Poetry,
Mirror nations as they pass,
Paint Voltaire and sacred Mass.
Now to-day we gather round.
FLORIDA— A FRAGMENT.
Blake! Blake! A genius found.
On thy brow the crown is bound.
Ah! that sunny southern clime,
Where sweet nature laughs at time!
Thou who needed daily bread,
And the lazy zephyrs play
Thou who walked where angels tread
Hide and seek, the livelong day; .
Now we crown thine ancient head.
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So to-day the wheel of fate
Turneth round to honor Blake.
Angels whisper, Late! Too Late!
David Henry Wright.
— Philadelphia Press^ January ^p, /<ypj.
ETERNITY.
O! VAST unmeasured bound — Eternity,
Who shall uplift the veil upon thy face ?
Or gaze within the Tomb of Time, and trace
The fount and source of Immortality ?
Who shall descry, where ceaseless years all flee.
And unexpiring, clasp in one embrace
Of everlasting Now; where interlace
All height and depth and breath, boundless and
free?
Who shall explore that bourne, which endless ages
holds,
Where cycle into cycle, pauseless runs ?
Eternity! Be such rash thoughts subdued.
Thou are the robe the Almighty round Him folds,
Thron'd in the glory of ten thousand suns,
Tented, pavillion'd in infinitude.
John W. Kavb.
— ^For The Magazine of Poetry,
TO-MORROW.
The robin chants when the thrush is dumb,
Snow smooths a bed for the clover.
Life flames anew, and days to come
Are sweet as the days that are over.
The tide that ebbs by the moon flows back,
Faith builds on the ruins of sorrow.
The halcyon flutters in winter's track.
And night makes way for the morrow.
And ever a strain, of joys the sum,
Sings on in the heart of the lover—
In death sings on — that days to come
Are sweet as the days that are over!
Florence Earle Coates.
-The New Peterson Magazine.
APRIL.
Capricious daughter of the Spring,
Blissful beyond imagining
Are thy undying miracles
Of silver songs and blossom-bells.
The pulsing south-wind stirs and thrills
The golden-hearted daflbdils.
And brings sweet hints, of tranquil ease
From far-ofl* isles and tropic seas.
More dreamful as the days go by
The aiigosies of cloudland lie,
Where, to its April lustre true,
The sky's arch lends a deeper blue.
Drowning the winter chickadee's
Soft chirp, amidst the apple trees.
Down from the orchard's hill-tops floats
The warble of the blue-bird's notes.
Not less the robin's cheery soul
Makes gay the green-glossed grassy knoll;
The passion 'neath his ruddy breast
He leaves not doubtful, or unguessed.
On lakes and streams, among the trees.
In woods where the anemone's
Shy face is bent, what matchless grace
Crowns April's dear, delicious days.
'Godeys, April, 1893, Joel Benton,.
A MARCH SUNSET.
Faint clouds that form a snowy ledge
And through the space that twilight fills,
The gray half-moon with battered edge
Sailing athwart the sunken hills.
And in the west a ragged glint
Of sunset splendor sends its flash
Where night and day, like steel to flint.
All suddenly together clash.
And down the chill wind's rustling flight
From out a waste of desert sky.
Sinks, bubbling into vasty night
A wandering curlew's cry.
— The Independent. Ernest McGaffey.
BATS.
Dusk-devils! Messengers of woe
From some dim-distant unknown world;
Weird, dapple-winged phantom-shades.
Sly, darting mutely to and fro.
Like Hell-bom lokis upward hurled
To taunt the soul with masquerades.
Air-urchins in the amber gloom.
Swift sporting with the tribes of night;
Star-spectres, whose strange presence brings
Thoughts of a vision-haunted tomb,
To tinge the mellow waning light
With fancy's forms of ghostly things.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Black prophets of a sadder day,
By Dante's tortured creatures sent
To lure the weary sm-sought heart
O'er Charon's silent stream away;
Filled with a sudden discontent
Through fell enchantment's mystic art
Here in the twilight's gilded gray
I watch you shyly flitting past,
While vesper shadows creep a-near
And cowled friars kneel to pray —
Dream-elfins from the long-lost past,
Who guard my heart from doubt and fear.
How demon-like your antics seem!
What ghoulish awe your pranks provoke!
Damp incense is your clanuny breath,
Chill with imagination's dream
That turns hot passions fires to smoke,
And brings wild thoughts of after-death.
Why linger longer tempting here ?
To dusky sheol take your flight,
Where is your own Elysium free.
Haste, haste! Back to your native sphere —
My soul is dark enough to-night,
Your presence has no charms for me.
Jean La Rue Burnett.
— Caii/omian, Aprils 18^3,
A PORTRAIT.
I HOLD before me, in weak, trembling hands,
The fading portrait of a woman's face —
A picture not of young or girlish grace.
But one upon whose sacred head the sands
Of Time had dripped, until the gleaming strands
Shone wan witii sprinkled white. — ^A band of lace
Circles the wrinkled throat in fond embrace
E'en as these boyish arms, years gone, their bands
Of love clasped round the then fair neck of her
As softly rained her lullaby upon
My drowsy ear in dreamland's golden drips,
And as I scan that face, now, thro' the blur
Of manhood's tears, I hear a voice long gone
Soft crooning thro' the portal of lost lips!
Kimball Chase Taplbv.
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BOOK NOTES.
"WiLSTACH, John Augustinb. The Anrel and the King and
Other Poems. Buf&lo: Charles Wells Moulton, 1893. i6mo,
gilt, gilt top, cl., pp. 441.
A complete collection of Mr. Wilstach's Original
Verses, including Earlier Poems, Satires, Ballads,
Sonnets, and Humorous and Miscellaneous Poems.
Malonb, Walter. Narcissus and
dephia: J. B. Lippincott Co., 1893.
d., pp. 1x8.
Other Poems. Pbila-
i6mo, gilt, gilt edge.
Narcissus is an imaginative poem musically
woven.
Riley, Jambs Whitcomb. Green Fields and Running Brooks.
Indianapolis: Bowen-Merrill Co., 1883. z6mo, gilt, gilt top,
cl., pp. 224. $i.2S.
In Green Fields and Running Brooks, Mr. Ril^,
always a favorite, has enclosed some gems of deli-
cate pathos and quaint humor stamped with his old
charm.
Poss, Sam Waltrr. Back Country Poems, ninstrated. Bos-
ton: Potter Publishing Co., 1892. z2mo, giltj d., pp. 275.
I1.50.
As the tide suggests this is a collection of poems
on common themes, but Mr. Foss has shown him-
self a true poet in his ability to illuminate the com-
mon.
Sherwood, Kate Brownlbe. Dream of the
Ajees.
'riDune,
lUns-
trated. Washington, D. C: The National TnBune, 1893-
8mo, gilt, cl., pp. 80.
Mrs. Sherwood's verse is notable for its beauty of
style and this poem is a graceful, vivid song dream
of the Columbian epoch. A souvenir. The poem
is attractively illustrated widi original drawings by
J. £. Kelly and George W. Breck.
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NOTES.
Pes. "The Raven." This unique and most
original of poems first appeared in Colton's Atner-
ican Review for February, 1845, as by " Quarles."
It was at once reprinted in the Evening Mirrar,
and in a few weeks had spread over the whole of
the United States, calling into existence parodies
and imitations innumerable. Mrs. Whitman in-
forms us that, when '*The Raven" appeared, Poe
one evening electrified the gay company assembled
at a weekly reunion of not^ artists and men of
letters, held at the residence of an accomplished
poetess in Waverly Place, by the recitation, at the
request of his hostess, of this wonderful poem.
After this, it was of course impossible to keep the
authorship secret. Willis reprinted the poem with
the author's name attached, remarking that, in his
opinion, it was ** the most effective single example
of fugitive poetry ever published in this country,
and is unsurpassed in English poetry for subtle
conception, masterly ingenuity of versification, and
consistent sustaining of imaginative lift ' ' It carried
its author's name and fame from shore to shore;
drew admiring testimony from some of the first of
English poets, and finally made him the lion of the
season. And for this master-piece of genius — this
poem which has probably done more for the re-
nown of American letters than any other sin^e
work— it is alleged that Poe, then at the height of
his renown, received the sum often dollars, that is,
about two pounds. J. H. I.
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NOTES.
245
Ibid. "Lenore" was first written under the
title of "The Paean,'* a juvenile poem. He subse-
quently improved the poem and republished it
under its present title. It was undoubtedly first
inscribed to Mrs. Helen Stannard, the mother of a
schoolmate, who had been very kind to the orphan
boy. Editor.
BoHAN. '' Sherman." During an encampment
of the G. A. R. in Milwaukee, Wis., this poem was
presented to Gen. Sherman by Mattie, the eight-
year-old daughter of Mrs. Bohan. The souvenir
was printed in blue, on white satin ribbon, enclosed
in padded covers, with an illuminated hand-painted
title, decorated with sprays of forget-me-nots, the
entire work having been done by the author of the
poem, Mrs. Bohan. Editor.
Smith. " O'Donoghue's Return." "Once
every seven years, on a fine morning, before the
first rays of the sun have b^^un to disperse the
mists from the bosom of the lake, the O'Donoghue
comes riding over it on a beautiful snow-white
horse, intent upon household aifairs, fairies hover-
ing before him and strewing his path with flowers.
As he approaches his ancient residence everything
returns to its former state of magnificence. Before
the sun has risen the O'Donoghue recrosses the
water and vanishes." F. M. O. S.
Key. "The Star Spangled Banner." One after-
noon in September, 1814, a party of Baltimore
gendemen, grieved at the defeat of the American
troops at North Point, met together in an old house
at Upper Marlborough, and there formed apian for
capturing some of the British soldiers, who would
pass through the village that night Meanwhile the
main body of the British army had gone on to a
point some distance beyond Their plans were so
well laid that they actually took over twenty men
prisoners and put them in "durance vile." News
of this attack was, however, carried to the British
fleet beyond by one man who contrived his escape,
and the tables were unexpectedly turned. A de-
tachment of Britishers descended on the village,
compelled the liberation of the English soldiers,
and took as their prisoners the gentlemen who had
planned the capture.
Angered by what they considered a violation
of the rules of war, the British colonel in command
refused to allow the gendemen, who were all asleep
in their beds, even time to dress. They were
placed on horseback and carried to a british ship,
hooted and jeered at, Dr. Beans, with whom
the idea of the capture had originated, being es-
pecially insulted. A day or two later all but the poor
doctor were set free, but he was detained as a
valuable prize worthy of taking back to England.
Meanwhile his friends in Baltimore went to work
with a hearty will to obtain hb release, and as he
had been known on more than one occasion to
have treated wounded British soldiers with great
kindness, his niece, a girl of eighteen, ventured
herself to write a strong appeal to the English ofii-
cer in command of the fleet She succeeded in
persuading a Mr. Francis Key to take the letter
with a flag of truce, and the young man, procuring
a small boat and permission to use the white flag,
set out. He boarded the admiral's vessel in safety,
but found preparation for the bombardment of Fort
McHenry in full swing, and, as a consequence, he
was detained by Admiral Cockbum's orders.
It was a moment of most critical importance, for
with the fall of McHenry, Baltimore's doom was
sealed, and we can easily fancy Mr. Key's feelings
as from the English flag-ship he watched during
the long hours of that day and night the furious
onslaught upon the fort So long as daylight
lasted, he could hardly take his eyes from the
flag floating from the fort, and with feverish anxiety
he hailed the "dawn's early light" The first
break of day showed him his country's flag proudly
floating to the breeze, and in the first "enthusiasm
of rapture," as he told a friend, he wrote the verses
dear to every American heart, "The Star Span-
gled Banner." H. Y. P.
DwiGHT. " Columbia " was written during the
author's service as an army chaplain in 1777-78.
Palmer. "Stonewall Jackson's Way." Mr.
William Gilmore Simms tells us that this poem,
stained with blood, was found on the person of a
dead soldier of the Stonewall brigade after one of
Jackson's battles in the Shenandoah Valley. Its
authorship, long unknown, has been discovered by
Mr. Francis N. Browne. G. C. E.
Bradbury. "Marching Along." During the
Civil War this song was frequendy sung upon the
march by the soldiers of the Army of the Potomac.
Except "When this Cruel War is Over," and the
doggerel about "John Brown's* Body," there was
scarcely any song so often heard. The name of
^the leader was changed, from time to time, to.
accord with the facts. G. C. E.
Barton. "The Women Who Went to the
Field." This poem was given by Miss Barton at
the Farewell Reception and Banquet by the Ladies
of Potomac Corps, at Willard's Hotel, Washing-
ton, D. C, Friday evening, November 18, 1892, in
response to the toast, "The Women Who Went to
the Field." At the words "Your Cheers for her^
comrades! Three cheers for her now," as by one
impulse, every man in the room sprang to his feet>
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
and led by Gen. W. W. Dudley, gave three rousing
cheers, while Mrs. Logan, with her beautiful white
head bent low vainly sought to staunch the fast
falling tears; the air was white with the sympa-
thetic 'kerchiefs of the ladies, and the imposing
figure of Clara Barton standing with uplifted arm,
as if in signal for the cheers, so grandly given,
completed the historic and never-to-be-forgotten
scene.
Ibid. '' Brassards" — ^the insignia and arm-band
of the Red Cross worn on the field.
Editor.
Rexdalb. "Lawrence Barrett'* This poem,
in memory of the dead tragedian was read by the
author at the . Elks' benefit in Boston Theatre,
April 9, 1891.
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BIBLIOGRAPHY.
WORKS CONSULTBD IN THE PREPARATION OP THIS
NUMBER OF "THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY."
PoE, Edgar Allen. Poems and Essays, me.
mortal edition. New York: W. J. Widdleton, 1880.
i2mo, pp. 178 & 395.
Markell, Charles F. Chamodine. Printed
for private circulation.
Bates, Charlotte Fisks. Risk and Other
Poems. Boston: A. Williams & Co., 1879. 24mo,
pp. 133.
Ibid. Miscellaneous Poems.
Cleary, Kate McPhblim. Miscellaneous
Poems.
Larcom, Lucy. An Idyl of Work. Boston:
lames R. Osgood & Co., 1875. i2mo, pp. 183.
Ibid. The Poetical Works. With illustrations.
Boston: Houghtoti, Mifflin & Co., 1886. i2mo,
pp. 8 %L 321.
Ibid. Easter Gleams. Boston: Houghton,
MifHin & Co., 1890. 24mo, pp. 46.
Charles, EMiLy Thornton. Hawthorn Blos-
soms. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co., 1876.
Z2mo, pp. 165.
Ibid. Lyrical Poems. Philadelphia: J. B. Lip-
pincott & Co., 1887. 8vo, pp. 270.
Dieudonne, Florence C. Miscellaneous
Poems.
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett. PoetfcuX
Works. New York: T. Y. Crowell & Co., iabch
pp. 520.
Damon, Frances 6. D. Miscellaneous Poems.
BiGELOW, Lettie S. Miscellaneous Poems.
BoHN, Elizabeth Baker. Miscellaneous
Poems.
Farmer, Lydia Hoyt. Miscellaneous Poems.
McCoNiHE, Isabella Wilson. Miscellaneous
Poems.
Barrows, John Otis. Miscellaneous Poems.
McCabe, Andrew. Miscellaneous Poems.
Shaler, Clarence A. Miscellaneous Poems.
Hope, James Barron. Miscellaneous Poems.
Smith, Frances M. O. Miscellaneous Poems.
Baskett, N. M., M. D. Visions of Fancy. St
Louis, Mo.: The Commercial Printing Co., 1884.
i2mo, pp. 109.
Holder, Phebe A. Miscellaneous Poems.
PooLE, Fanny H. R. Miscellaneous Poems.
Hager, Lucie C. Miscellaneous Poems.
WoLVERTON, Sarah. Miscellaneous Poems.
Johnson, Gertrude Tracy. Miscellaneous
Poems.
WiNTERMUTE, Martha. Eleven Women and
Thirteen Men, and Other Works. Newaik, Ohio:
Lyon & Ickes, 1887. 8vo, pp. 360 & 2.
Clarke, Mary H. Gray. Miscellaneous Poems.
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor. Poetical Works.
New York: John W. Lovell, i88i. i6mo, pp. 667.
-)(-
THE EDITOR'S TABLE.
For engravings in this number of The Maga-
zine OP Poetry, the editor acknowledges the
courtesy of the Buffalo Electrotyping and Engrav-
ing Co., Buffalo, N. Y.
For cop3Tight poems and other selections, tiie
editor returns thanks to W. J. Widdleton, New
York; A. Williams & Co., Boston; James R. Os-
good & Co., Boston; Houghton, Mifflin & Co.,
Boston; J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia, Pa.; T.
Y. Crowell & Co., New York; The Commercial
Printing Co., St Louis, Mo.; Lyon & Ickes, New-
ark, O.; John W. LoveU, New York.
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^ REMINGTON
TYPEWRITER
THE history of the Remington shows a steadily rising tide
of popularity and success. It is absolutely unrivaled
for all the essential qualities of a first-class writing machine.
1867* First invention of the Typewriter now known as the Remington
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the following years.
l873» The repeated experiments of the Inventors having somewhat
improved upon the first crude attempts, it was brought to the
Remington factory at llion, N. Y.
1874* After more than a year of painstaking labor on the part of many
able mechanical experts, the first Remington-made machines were
put upon the market
l88o. Six years after, only one thousand machines had been sold. The
public were slow to realize the value of the invention.
1882 • The number has increased to twenty-three hundred machines.
1885* Five thousand machines were sold this year. It grew in popular
favor. In
1890, Sales had risen to twenty thousand machines per annum.
189^ Finds our standing orders to our factory of one-hundred machines
per day inadequate to meet the rapidly increasing demand.
8BND FOR IXrXfUSTRATBD CATAX^OOUB.
WYCKOFF, SEAMANS & BENEDICT,
58 Niagara St., BUFFAI^O, N. Y.
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Winning Hand.
A copy of the New York Central's Illustrated Tourist Guide, "Health and Pleasure on
America's Greatest Railroad, "-will be mailed free, postpaid, on receipt of ten cents in stamps, by
GISORGIS H. DANIBI^i General Passengrer Agent,
Grand Central 8f^tic^^^^,^{(>
VOL V NO 3
THE^=:=^
MAGAZINE OF POETRY
A QUARTERLY REVIEW
II^LUSXRAXED
JULY 1893
r
CHARLES ^VEI^I^S MOUI^TON
BUFFALO N Y
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XHB MAQAZINB OP POKTRY.
CONTSNT8 FOR JXTIflZ'. iS93-
CHARLES DICKENS Frontispiece
Portrait by D. Madise.
GEORGE ELIOT Carrie Renfrew 247
With Portrait.
CHARLES DICKENS Ina Russelie Warren 255
FANNY PURDY PALMER Frederic A. Hinckley 259
With portrait from Ye Rose Studio, Providence, R. I.
GEORGE KLINGLE Charles fVells Moulton 261
With portrait by Fredericks, New York.
WALTER MALONE Howard Hawthorne McGee , . 266
With portrait by Ben. Bingham, Memphis, Tenn.
EDWIN FRANCIS NASON Ernnta HunHnglon Nason ... 268
ELLA WHEELER WILCOX ■ • • Lela E. Jamison 272
With portrait by Rock wood, New York.
LULAH RAGSDALE Dallas H James 275
With portrait by R. I. Howell, Brookhaven, Miss.
CLARENCE A. BUSKIRK Benjamin S. Parker 277
CYNTHIA M. R. GORTON G, Herrick Wilson 281
With portrait by Devereaux. Fenton, Mich.
SARAH HELEN WHITMAN Henty A. Van Fredenberg ... 283
With portrait from oil painting by C. G. Thompson.
LEWIS MORRIS F A. H Eyles 285
MARCELLA A. FITZGERALD ,..../. Arthur King 288
JOHN AUGUSTINE WILSTACH ..../. L, Smith 291
With portrait by Phillips, LaFayette, Ind.
MARGHERITA ARLINA HAMM ■ • • • ^^«ry ^. Thurman 294
With portrait.
WILUAM ALLINGHAM Henry F Randolph 298
SOPHRONIA YOUNG KINNE Cordelia Young Willard .... 300
With portrait by Ranger, Syracuse, N. Y.
KATHARINE LEE BATES Marion P. Guild 304
MARY C. F. HALL-WOOD Annette LaGrange 309
With portrait by Cook, Santa Barbara, Cal.
COVENTRY PATMORE Alexander H Jafip 312
GRACE HIBBARD O. C Ashbury 315
With portrait by Taber, San Francisco, Cal.
FRANCES FULLER VICTOR Horace A. Kimball 317
With portrait by Towne, Portland, Ore.
HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 319
HEROINES OF THE POETS 323
SINGLE POEMS 328
THE GRAVE OF FRANCIS SALTUS SALTUS 332
CURRENT POEMS 335
NOTES BY THE EDITOR 341
BIBLIOGRAPHY 342
THE EDITOR'S TABLE 342
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Copyright, 1893, by Charles Wells Monlton. Entered at Buffido Post-Office aa Second-Claas Mail Matter. W r^
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CHARLES DICKENS.
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The Magazine of Poetry.
Vol. v.
No.
GEORGE ELIOT.
WHAT magic in a name; how vivid the person-
alities it recalls; how they cling to our
memory and lead us again through the scenes that
endeared them to us. Through what rocky gorges
and verdant fields we wander, down flowering paths
with high thoughts for company, learning as we go
charity for human failings and tender sympathy for
human strivings. As a novelist George Eliot
carved for herself an enduring place in the temple
of fame. Powerful, intense, with strokes broad
and plain, or touches fine and subtle, with group-
ings and colorings artistic and true to the life she
depicted. One of the strongest intellectual forces
of the age she looked upon that ancient wall of
masculine mental superiority and it shriveled to a
shadow. Whoso reads her work reads to self
improvement. Didactic, stimulative, inspirational,
it brings a clearer atmosphere and a broader
horizon. As a poet we love her for her "Choir
Invisible" and other gems of song, but though
she had many gifts of a great poet her wings were
too weighty to pierce the aerial clouds of poetic
flight. Yet we feel that poesy glides onward with
us through all her prose and lights even the dark
of her own negation. Mary Ann Evans was born
at Asbury Farm, Warwickshire, in 1819. Her
father was a land agent. When about nine years
of age she was sent to a boarding-school at Nun-
eaton, and in 1832 to a school in Coventry. In
1836 her mother died and she took charge of her
father's house, removing with him to Coventry in
1841. At that time an intimacy with the family of
Charles Bray resulted in a change in her religious
views that, for a short time, caused an estrangement
from her father. Her first work published in 1846
was a translation of Strauss's " Life of Jesus. " In
1849 her father died. She then went abroad with
the Brays and spent some months in Geneva in the
home of M. d' Albert, an artist, who painted a por-
trait of her which is now in the library at Geneva,
and afterwards published French translations of
several of her novels. Returning to England she
accepted, in 1851, the position of assistant editor of
the JVeshninsier Review^ of London. Here she
made the acquaintance of Herbert Spencer and
Geoi^e Henry Lewes the editor of the Leader, In
1854 she entered into the connection with George
Henry Lewes which she always regarded as mar-
riage, but which the public did not sanction.
Urged by Lewes she began her first novel, ** Amos
Barton,*» in 1856. ** The Mill on the Floss," *• The
Lifted Veil" and "Brother Jacob" followed in
i860; "Silas Mamer," 1861. "Adam Bede" was
produced in 1862, and brought world-wide fame to
the writer whose personality was still unknown
over the pen-name, "George Eliot." "Ro-
mola" was published in 1863; "Felix Holt" in
1866; "The Spanish Gypsy," a poem, in 1868;
"Agatha," a poem, in 1869; " Middlemarch " in
1872; " The Legend of Jubal and Other Poems" in
1874; "Daniel Deronda " in 1876, and "Impres-
sions of Theophrastus Such " in 1880. After the
death of Mr. Lewes, in 1878, she was engaged for
some time in preparing his writings for the press.
In April, 1880, she was married to J. W. Cross, and
died December 22nd of the same year. It is said
she was a fascinating conversationalist, that the
plainess of her features was glorified by the bril-
liancy of her mind, and that her listeners forgot
time and surroundings and followed with absorb-
ing interest the expression of her thought. She
was tender and sympathetic, beloved by her inti-
mate associates, a helpful companion, a true
woman. She was a pianist of no small ability,
playing the works of the great masters with rare
interpretation and expression. Grateful friends
mourned and an admiring public regretted her
death. q r
SONG FROM "THE SPANISH GYPSY."
The worid is great: the birds all fly from me,
The stars are golden fruit upon a tree
All out of reach: my little sister went,
And I am lonely.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
The world is great: I tried to mount the hill
Above the pines, where the light lies so still,
But it rose higher: little Lisa went,
And I am lonely.
The world is great: the wind comes rushing by,
I wonder where it comes from; sea birds cry i
And hurt my heart: my little sister went, |
And I am lonely.
The world is great: the people laugh and talk,
And make loud holiday: how fast they walk!
I'm lame, they push me: little Lisa went,
And I am lonely.
TWO LOVERS.
Two lovers by a moss-grown spring:
They leaned soft cheeks together there,
Mingled the dark and sunny hair,
And heard the wooing thrushes sing.
O budding time!
O love's blest prime!
Two wedded from the portal stept:
The bell made happy carolings.
The air was soft as fanning wings,
While petals on the pathway slept.
O pure eyed bride!
O tender pride!
Two faces o*er a cradle bent:
Two hands above the head were locked;
These pressed each other while they rocked,
These watched a life which love had sent.
O solemn hour!
O hidden power!
Two parents by an evening fire:
The red light fell about their knees
On heads that rose by slow degrees
Like buds upon the lily spire.
O patient life!
O tender strife!
The two still sat together there,
The red light shone about their knees;
But all the heads by slow degrees
Had gone and left that lonely pair.
O voyage fast!
O vanished past!
The red light shone upon the floor
And made the space between them wide;
They drew their chairs up side by side,
The pale cheeks joined and said "Once more!**
O memories!
O past that is!
SONG FROM "AGATHA."
Midnight by the chapel bell!
Homeward, homeward all, farewell!
I with you, and you with me,
Miles are short with company.
Heart of Mary, bless the way^
Keep tts all by night and day!
Moon and stars at feast with night
Now have drunk their fill of light.
Home they hurry, making time
Trot apace, like merry rhyme.
Heart of Mary^ mystic rose.
Send us all a sweet repose!
Swiftly through the wood down hill,
Run till you can hear the mill.
Toni's ghost is wandering now.
Shaped just like a snow-white cow.
Heart of Mary, morning star.
Ward off danger, near or far!
Toni's wagon with its load
Fell and crushed him in the road
'Twixt these pine-trees. Never fear!
Give a neighbor's ghost good cheer.
Holy Babe, our God and Brother,
Bind us fast to one another!
Hark! the mill is at its work,
Now we pass beyond the murk
To the hollow, where the moon
Makes her silvery afternoon.
Good Saint Joseph, faithful spouse^
Help us all to keep our vows!
Here the three old maidens dwell,
Agatha and Kate and Nell;
See, the moon shines on the thatch,
We will go and shake the latch.
Heart of Mary, cup of joy.
Give us mirth zvithout alloy!
Hush, 'tis here, no noise, sing low.
Rap with gentle knuckles—so!
Like the little tapping birds,
On the door; then sing good words.
Meek Saint Anna, old and fair.
Hallow all the snow-white hair!
Little maidens old, sweet dreams!
Sleep one sleep till morning beams.
Mothers ye, who help us all.
Quick at hand, if ill befall.
Holy Gabriel, lily-laden.
Bless the aged mother-maiden!
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GEORGE ELIOT.
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Forward, mount the broad hillside
Swift as soldiers when they ride.
See the two towers how they peep,
Round-capped giants, o'er the steep.
Heart of Mary, by thy sorrow ,
Keep us upright through the morrow!
Now they rise quite suddenly
Like a man from bended knee,
Now Saint Margen is in sight,
Here the roads branch off— good-night.
Heart of Alary, by thy grace.
Give us Tvith the saints a place/
"0 MAY I JOIN THE CHOIR INVISIBLE.**
Longum illud tempus, quum non ero, magis me movet. quam
hoc exiguum, — Cicero, ad Att., xii. 18.
O MAY I join the choir invisible
Of those immortal dead who live again
In minds made better by their presence: live
In pulses stirred to generosity,
In deeds of daring rectitude, in scorn
For miserable aims that end with self,
In thoughts sublime that pierce the night like stars,
And with their mild persistence urge man's search
To vaster issues.
So to live is heaven:
To make undying music in the world,
Breathing as beauteous order that controls
With growing sway the growing life of man.
So we inherit that sweet purity
For which we struggled, failed, and agonized
With widening retrospect that bred despair.
Rebellious flesh that would not be subdued.
A vicious parent shaming still its child
Poor anxious penitence, is quick dissolved;
Its discords, quenched by meeting harmonies,
Die in the large and charitable air.
And all our rarer, better, truer self,
That sobbed religiously in yearning song.
That watched to ease the burthen of the world.
Laboriously tracing what must be,
And what may yet be better — saw within
A worthier image for the sanctuary.
And shaped it forth before the multitude
Divinely human, raising worship so
To higher reverence more mixed with love —
That better self shall live till human Time
Shall fold its eyelids, and the human sky
Be gathered like a scroll within the tomb
Unread for ever.
This is life to come.
Which martyred men have made more glorious
For us who strive to follow. May I reach
That purest heaven, be to other souls
The cup of strength in some great agony,
Enkindle generous ardor, feed pure love,
Beget the smiles that have no cruelty-
Be the sweet presence of a good diffused,
And in diffusion ever more intense.
So shall I join the choir invisible
Whose music is the gladness of the world.
BROTHER AND SISTER.
I CANNOT choose but think upon the time
When our two lives grew like two buds that kiss
At lightest thrill from the bee'sswinging chime.
Because the one so near the other is.
He was the elder and a little man
Of forty inches, bound to show no dread,
And I the girl that puppy-like now ran,
Now lagged behind my brother's larger tread.
I held him wise, and when he talked to me
Of snakes and birds, and which God loved the
best,
I thought his knowledge marked the boundary
Where men grew blind, though angels knew the
rest.
If he said " Hush! " I tried to hold my breath;
Wherever he said " Come! " I stepped in faith.
Long years have left their writing on my brow,
But yet the freshness and the dew-fed beam
Of those young mornings are about me now,
When we two wandered toward the far-off stream
With rod and line. Our basket held a store
Baked for us only, and I thought with joy
That I should have my share, though he had more.
Because he was the elder and a boy.
The firmaments of daisies since to me
Have had those mornings in their opening eyes.
The bunched cowslip's pale transparency
Carries that sunshine of sweet memories.
And wild-rose branches take their finest scent
From those blest hours of infantine content.
Our mother bade us keep the trodden ways,
Stroked down my tippet, set my brother's frill.
Then with the benediction of her gaze
Clung to us lessening, and pursued us still
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Across the homestead to the rooker>' elms,
Whose tall old trunks had each a grassy mound,
So rich for us, we counted them as realms
With varied products: here were earth-nuts found,
And here the Lady-fingers in deep shade;
Here sloping toward the Moat the rushes grew,
The large to split for pith, the small to braid;
While over all the dark rooks cawing flew,
And made a happy, strange solemnity,
A deep-toned chant from life unknown to me.
Our meadow-path had memorable spots:
One where it bridged a tiny rivulet.
Deep hid by tangled blue Forget-me-nots;
And all along the waving grasses met
My little palm, or nodded to my cheek.
When flowers with upturned faces gazing drew
My wonder downward, seeming all to speak
With eyes of souls that dumbly heard and knew.
Then came the copse, where wild things rushed
unseen,
And black-scathed grass betrayed the past abode
Of mystic gypsies, who still lurked between
Me and each hidden distance of the road.
A gypsy once had startled me at play,
Blotting with her dark smile my sunny day.
Thus rambling we were schooled in deepest lore,
And learned the meanings that give words a soul.
The fear, the love, the primal passionate store,
W^hose shaping impulses make manhood whole.
Those hours were seed to all my after good;
My infant gladness, through eye, ear, and touch,
Took easily as warmth a various food
To nourish the sweet skill of loving much.
For who in age shall roam the earth and find
Reasons for loving that will strike out love
With sudden rod from the hard year-pressed mind ?
Were reasons sown as thick as stars above,
*Tis love must see them, as the eyes see light:
Day is but Number to the darkened sight.
Our brown canal was endless to my thought;
And on its banks I sat in dreamy peace,
Unknowing how the good I loved was wrought.
Untroubled by the fear that it would cease.
Slowly the barges floated into view.
Rounding a grassy hill to me sublime
With some Unknown beyond it, whither flew
The parting cuckoo toward a fresh spring-time.
The wide-arched bridge, the scented elder-flowers,
The wondrous watery rings that died too soon,
The echoes of the quarry, the still hours
With white robe sweeping on the shadeless noon,
Were but my growing self, are part of me,
My present Past, my root of piety.
Those long days measured by my little feet
Had chronicles which yield me many a text;
Where irony still finds an image meet
Of full-grown judgments in this world perplexL
One day my brother left me in high charge,
To mind the rod while he went seeking bait,
And bade me, when I saw a nearing barge,
Snatch out the line, lest he should come too late.
Proud of the task, I watched with all my might
For one whole minute, till my eyes grew wide,
Till sky and earth took on a strange new light
And seemed a dream-world floating on some
tide—
A fair pavilioned boat for me alone
Bearing me onward through the vast unknown.
But sudden came the barge's pitch-black prow,
Nearer and angrier came my brother's cry,
And all my soul was quivering fear, when lo!
Upon the imperilled line, suspended high,
A silver perch! My guilt that won the prey,
Now turned to merit, had a guerdon rich
Of hugs and praises, and made merry play,
Until my triumph reached its highest pitch
When all at home were told the wondrous feat,
And how the little sister had fished well.
In secret, though my fortune tasted sweet,
I wondered why this happiness befell.
"The little lass had luck," the gardener said:
And so I learned, luck was with glory wed.
We had the selfsame world enlarged for each
By loving difference of girl aAd boy:
The fruit that hung on high beyond my reach
He plucked for me, and off he must employ
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GEORGE ELIOT.
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GEORGE ELIOT,
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A measuring glance to guide my tiny shoe
Where lay firm stepping-stones, or call to mind
* ' This thing I like my sister may not do,
For she is little and I must be kind."
Thus boyish Will the nobler mastery learned
Where inward vision over impulse reigns,
Widening its life with separate life discerned,
A Like unlike, a Self that self-restrains.
His years with others must the sweeter be
For those brief days he spent in loving me.
His sorrow was my sorrow, and his joy
Sent little leaps and laughs through all my frame;
My doll seemed lifeless and no girlish toy
Had any reason when my brother came.
I knelt with him at marbles, marked his fling
Cut the ringed stem and make the apple drop,
Or watched him winding close the spiral string
That looped the orbits of the humming top.
Grasped by such fellowship my vagrant thought
Ceased with dream-fruit dream- wishes to fulfil;
My aery-picturing fantasy was taught
Subjection to the harder, truer skill
That seeks with deeds to grave a thought-
tracked line,
And by "What is,*' " What will be *' to define.
School parted us; we never found again
That childish world where our two spirits mingled
Like scents from varying roses that remain
One sweetness, nor can evermore be singled.
Yet the twin habit of that early time
Lingered for long about the heart and tongue:
We had been natives of one happy clime.
And its dear accent to our utterance clung.
Till the dire years whose awful name is Change
Has grasped our souls still yearning in divorce,
And pitiless shaped them in two forms that range
Two elements which sever their life's course.
But were another childhood-world my share,
I would be bom a little sister there.
FAITH.
The faith that life on earth is being shaped
To glorious ends, that order, justice, love,
Mean man's completeness, mean effect as sure
As roundness in the dew-drop— that great faith
Is but the rushing and expanding stream
Of thought, of feeling, fed by all the past.
Our finest hope is finest memory.
As they who love in age think youth is blest
Because it has a life to fill with love.
Full souls are double mirrors, making still
An endless vista of fair things before
Repeating things behind: so faith is strong
Only when we are strong, shrinks when we shrink.
It comes when music stirs us, and the chords
Moving on some grand climax shake our souls
With influx new that makes new energies.
It comes in swelling of the heart and tears
That rise at noble and at gentle deeds—
At labors of the master-artist's hand
Which, trembling, touches to a finer end,
Trembling, before an image seen within.
It comes in moments of heroic love,
Unjealous joy in joy not made for us —
In conscious triumph of the good within
Making us worship goodness that rebukes.
Even our failures are a prophecy.
Even our yearnings and our bitter tears
After that fair and true we cannot grasp;
As patriots who se;em to die in vain
Make liberty more sacred by their pangs.
— ^ Minor Prophet
SORROW.
For purest pity is the eye of love
Melting at sight of sorrow; and to grieve
Because it sees no sorrow, shows a love
Warped from its truer nature, turned to love
Of merest habit, like the miser's greed.
—Ibid,
COURAGE.
I accept the peril.
I choose to walk high with sublimer dread
Rather than crawl in safety.
— Armgart.
PRAISE.
I am not glad with that mean vanity
Which knows no good beyond its appetite
Full feasting upon praise! I am only glad,
Being praised for what I know is worth the praise;
Glad of the proof that I myself have part
In what I worship! — Ibid,
SORROW.
*Tis better that our griefs should not spread far.
—Ibid,
WOMAN.
A woman's rank
Lies in the fulness of her womanhood:
Therein alone she is royal. — Ibid,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
FAME.
For what is fame
But the benignant strength of One, transformed
To joy of Many?
—Ibid,
SELF-CRITICISM.
I can unleash my fancy if you wish
And hunt for phantoms: shoot an airy guess
And bring down airy likelihood,— some lie
Masked cunningly to look like royal truth
And cheat the shooter, while King Fact goes free,
Or else some image of reality
That doubt will handle and reject as false.
Ask for conjecture, — I can thread the sky
Like any swallow, but, if you insist,
On knowledge that would guide a pair of feet
Right to Bedmdr, across the Moorish bounds,
A mule that dreams of stumbling over stones
Is better stored.
— The Spanish Gypsy.
DESPAIR.
Oh, I am sick at heart. The eye of day,
The insistent summer sun, seems pitiless,
Shining in all the barren crevices
Of weary life, leaving no shade, no dark.
Where I may dream that hidden waters lie;
As pitiless as to some shipwrecked man,
Who, gazing from his narrow shoal of sand
On the wide unspecked round of blue and blue,
Sees that full light is errorless despair.
The insects' hum that slurs the silent dark
Startles and seems to cheat me, as the tread
Of coming footsteps cheats the midnight watcher
Who holds her heart and waits to hear them pause.
And hears them never pause, but pass and die.
Music sweeps by me as a messenger
Carrying a message that is not for me.
The very sameness of the hills and sky
Is obduracy, and the lingering hours
Wait round me dumbly, like superfluous slaves,
Of whom I want nought but the secret news
They are forbid to tell.
—Ibid.
CONSCIENCE.
Conscience is harder than our enemies,
Knows more, accuses with more nicety.
Nor needs to question Rumor if we fall
Below the perfect model of our thought,
I fear no outward arbiter.
—Ibid.
VENGEANCE.
In high vengeance there is noble scorn.
—Ibid.
WORDS.
Our words have wings, but fly not where we would.
—Ibid
POETRY.
The poor poet
Worships without reward, nor hopes to find
A heaven save in his worship.
—Ibid,
GREATNESS.
No great deed is done
By falterers who ask for certainty.
—Ibid.
FRIENDSHIP.
The deepest hunger of a faithful heart
Is faithfulness.
—Ibid,
LOVE.
I think we had the chief of all love's joys
Only in knowing that we loved each other.
—Ibid,
REPENTANCE.
Repentance is the weight
Of indigested meals eat yesterday.
SPEECH.
—Ibid,
Speech is but broken light upon the depth
Of the unspoken; even your loved words
Float in the larger meaning of your voice
As something dimmer.
—Ibid,
PAIN.
A man deep- wounded may feel too much pain
To feel much anger.
—Ibid,
DUTY.
And rank for her meant dut>', various.
Yet equal in its worth, done worthily.
Command was service; humblest service done
By willing and discerning souls was glory.
— AgcUha.
BEAUTY.
Eyes that could see her on this summer-day
Might find it hard to turn another way.
She had a pensive beauty; yet not sad;
Rather, like minor cadences that glad
The hearts of little birds amid spring boughs.
—How Lisa Loved the King,
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CHARLES DICKENS,
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CHARLES DICKENS.
CHARLES DICKENS, novelist aud poet, was
born in Portsmouth, England, in 1812. His
father was a clerk in the Navy Pay Office, in
Portsmouth at that time, but while Charles was very
young, the family moved to London. His mother
was a woman of much energy, as well as many
accomplishments. She taught her son Latin, and
tried to establish a boarding school, to add, if pos-
sible, to a small income. But with their united
efforts, they could not keep out of distress, and
when Dickens was nine years of age the family was
living in abject poverty in Camden Town, then one
of the poorest London suburbs. Charles was sent
out, earning six shillings a week in a blacking
warehouse, tying blue covers on pots of paste. For
two years the child led a very hard, uncared-for life.
Precocious beyond his years, with acute sensibilities
and high aspirations, he had many books and
formed an ambition to be **a learned and dis-
tinguished man." He was self made, indebted
largely to circumstances for an education. The
streets were a painful study, but in after years they
proved to be the best of schools for him, as his
destined work was to describe the poorer homes
and streets of London, and the many varieties of
life, odd and sad, laughter-moving and pitiful, that
swarmed therein. Many a clever boy like him,
would have become a rogue and vagabond. He did
not. Instead of sinking into the depths of wretch-
edness which he saw, he rose above it, and became
one of England's greatest novelists. His first pub-
lished piece of original writing appeared in the
Old Monthly Magazine for January, 1834. From
that time on his career was a remarkable one. He
commenced the publication of the *' Pickwick
Papers'* in 1836. Eleven aditional papers were
published in 1837, and by November of that year
the sale reached 40,000. He continued to publish
articles, and between April, 1838, and October,
1839 he produced "The Life and Adventures of
Nicholas Nickleby." The list of Charles Dickens's
novels are too well known to need mention. Who
can forget the "Old Curiosity Shop ? " Who has
not wept over "Little Nell" or laughed over
** Daniel Quilp?" Those characters alone would
have made him fame.
In 1858 Dickens began a series of public readings
of his own works, appearing in nearly every town
of any size in the United Kingdom, and in 1867-68
renewing in this way his acquaintance with the
American people. To tell the wealth of his imagin-
ation is beyond words, while no one has excelled
him as a true painter of manners. His last novel,
"The Mystery of Edwin Drood," he did not live to
complete. He was suddenly overcome by a stupor,
caused by effusion on the brain, on the evening of
June the 8th, 1870, and died the following day. His
death took place at "Gadshill Place," a house near
the main road between Rochester and Gravesend.
As a poet, little has been said of him, yet he wrote
and published enough poems to fill a volume. The
most important is "The Hymn of the Wiltshire
Laborers. ' ' That song against oppression has found
a loyal response in thousands of hearts. The " Ivy
Green" and "A Word in Season" are also well
known. In his will he had desired " that he should
be buried in an inexpensive, unostentatious and
strictly private manner, without any public an-
nouncement of the time, or place of his burial."
These conditions were observed but his executors
did not consider them inconsistent with his receiving
the honor of interment in Westminster Abbey,
where he was buried on the 14th day of June, 1870.
I. R. W.
THE BRITISH LION.
A NEW SONG, BUT AN OLD STORY.
TUNE — The Great Sea- Snake,
Oh, p'raps you may have heard, and if not, Pll
sing
Of the British Lion free.
That was constantly a-going for to make a spring
Upon his en — e — me;
But who, being rather groggy at the knees,
Broke down, always, before;
And generally gave a feeble wheeze
Instead of a loud roar.
Right toor rol, loor rol, fee faw fum.
The British Lion bold!
That was always a-going for to do great
things.
And was always being "sold! "
He was carried about, in a carawan.
And was show'd in country parts.
And they said, "Walk up! Be in time! He can
Eat Corn-Law-Leagues like tarts! "
And his showmen, shouting there and then,
To puff him didn't fail;
And they said, as they peep'd into his den,
"Oh, don't he wag his tail! "
Now the principal keeper of this poor old beast,
WAN HUMBUG was his name,
Would once every day stir him up — at least —
And wasn't that a game!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
For he hadn't a tooth, and he hadn't a claw,
In that ''struggle" so "sublime;"
And, however sharp they touch 'd him on the raw,
He couldn't come up to time.
And this, you will observe, was the reason why
WAN HUMBUG, on weak grounds,
Was forced to make believe that he heard his cry
In all unlikely sounds.
So, there wasn't a bleat from an Essex Calf,
Or a Duke, or a Lordling slim;
But he said, with a wery triumphant laugh,
<' I'm blest if that ain't him."
At length, wery bald in his mane and tail.
This British Lion grow'd:
He pined and declined, and he satisfied
The last debt which he owed.
And when they came to examfne the skin
It was a wonder sore.
To find that the an— i — ^mal within
Was nothing but a BOAR!
Right toor rol, loor rol, fee faw fum,
The British Lion bold!
That was always a-going for to do great
things,
And was always being "sold! "
— Cainach,
THE HYMN OF WILTSHIRE LABORERS.
Oh god, who by Thy Prophet's hand
Didst smite the rocky brake,
Whence water came, at Thy command,
Thy people's thirst to slake;
Strike, now, upon this granite wall,
Stern, obdurate and high;
And let some drops of pity fall
For us who starve and die!
The GOD, who took a little child,
And set him in the midst,
And promised him His mercy mild,
As, by Thy Son, Thou didst:
Look down upon our children dear,
So gaunt, so cold, so spare,
And let their images appear,
Where Lords and Gentry are!
Oh GOD, teach them to feel how we,
When our poor infants droop,
Are weakened in our trust in Thee,
And how our spirits stoop;
For, in Thy rest, so bright and fair,
All tears and sorrows sleep:
And their young looks, so full of care,
Would make Thine Angels weep!
The GOD, who with His finger drew
The Judgment coming on,
Write, for these men, what must ensue,
Ere many years be gone!
Oh GOD, whose bow is in the sky.
Let them not brave and dare.
Until they look ( too late ) on high,
And see an Arrow there!
Oh GOD, remind them! In the bread
They break upon the knee.
Those sacred words may yet be read,
*' In memory of Me! "
Oh GOD, remind them of His sweet
Compassion for the poor.
And how He gave them Bread to eat.
And went from door to door!
SONG.
Love is not a feeling to pass away.
Like the balmy breath of a summer day;
It is not — it cannot be— laid aside;
It is not a thing to forget or hide.
It clings to the heart, ah, woe is me!
As the ivy clings to the old oak tree.
Love is not a passion of earthly mould.
As a thirst for honor, or fame, or gold:
For when all these wishes have died away.
The deep, strong love of a brighter day.
Though nourished in secret, consumes the more,
As the slow rust eats to the iron's core.
THE IVY GREEN.
Oh a dainty plant is the Iv>' green.
That creepeth o'er ruins old!
Of right choice food are his meals, I ween,
In his cell so lone and cold.
The wall must be crumbled, the stone decayed,
To pleasure his dainty whim;
And the mouldering dust that years have made
Is a merry meal for him.
Creeping where no life is seen,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Fast he stealeth on, though he wears no wings.
And a staunch old heart has he.
How closely he twineth, how tight he clings,
To his friend, the huge Oak Tree!
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FANNY PURD Y PALMER,
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And slyly he traileth along the ground,
And his leaves he gently waves,
As he joyously hugs and crawleth round
The rich mould of dead men's graves.
Creeping where grim death has been,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
Whole ages have fled and their works decayed.
And nations have scattered been;
But the stout old Ivy shall never fade,
From its hale and hearty green.
The brave old plant, and its lonely days.
Shall fatten upon the past;
For the stateliest building man can raise
Is the Ivy*s food at last.
Creeping on, where Time has been,
A rare old plant is the Ivy green.
SONG.
The child and the old man sat alone
In the quiet peaceful shade
Of the old green boughs, that had richly grown
In the deep, thick forest glade.
It was a soft and pleasant sound.
That rustling of the oak;
And the gentle breeze played lightly round.
As thus the fair boy spoke: —
** Dear father, what can honor be,
Of which I hear men rave ?
Field, cell, and cloister, land and sea.
The tempest and the grave; —
It lives in all, 'tis sought in each,
'Tis never heard or seen:
Now tell me, father, I beseech,
What can this honor mean ? "
** It is a name, — a name, my child, —
It lived in other days.
When men were rude, their passions wild.
Their sport, thick battle-frays.
When in armor bright, the warrior bold.
Knelt to his lady's eyes:
Beneath the abbey-pavement old
That warrior's dust now lies.
**The iron hearts of that old day
Have mouldered in the grave;
And chivalry has passed away.
With knights so true and brave.
The honor which to them was life
Throbs in no bosom now;
It only gilds the gambler's strife,
Or decks the worthless vow."
FANNY PURDY PALMER.
IN the company of authors and poets from time to
time chronicled in these columns belongs the
name of Fanny Purdy Palmer, a resident of Rhode
Island, now in the prime of her powers. Those
who have known Mrs. Palmer well, long ago
learned to regard her as possessed of exceptional
clearness of thought, acuteness and independence
of judgement, and comprehensiveness of outlook.
Her work upon the school committee of the city of
Providence, her connection with various philan-
thropic movements, and her presidency of the
Rhode Island Woman's Club, furnished abundant
opportunity for the exercise and strengthening of
these qualities. In them all, as in whatever of pub-
lic or private effort she has undertaken, she has
always shown that reserve force which is the sure
sign of strong character. It would be far from true,
however, to give the impression that Mrs. Palmer's
intellectual development has depended upon the
positions of trust which she has held. She has
been a good thinker, and a good student, and her
growth has been along those lines of thought which,
under-running all forms of organized movement are
the outcome, and expression of individual character
and life. A diligent reader of some of the best
scientific and metaphysical works she has mastered
the art of using language accurately, and of seeing
things in their universal relations. The tendency
to wild exaggeration of statement, and to nurse
one's pet ideas into fundamental panaceas for all
ills, has- found no friend in her. And yet by con-
viction and native instinct, the trend of her career
has been progressive and sympathetic.
For many years she has been a writer of stories
which have appeared in various weekly and
monthly publications; stories which have dealt more
or less, as would be expected from such an author,
with the problems of life; but I think she has done
no work which for literary quality, for moral pur-
pose, and deep spiritual insight will stand higher
than some of her poems. These are new evidence
of the spherical character of her outlook upon life
in all its deepest meanings. They fittingly supple-
ment, perhaps some of us who believe in the su-
periority of the poetic faculty would like to say
they fittingly crown an already worthy and increas-
ingly helpful use of the pen. F. A. H.
AT AN AFTERNOON TEA.
I DO not know why even yet
You meet me with a sigh,
It was your lips which said " Forget "
In those old days gone by.
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Bright days they were ? Yes. Now good-bye,
Tve talked to you so long!
Miss Thompson there will tell us both
We didn't hear her song.
But you must speak ? Well then be quick,
And give me my bouquet.
Have I no heart ? Oh, that I lost
At Tiffany's to-day.
" How changed!' ' you say. Of course I'm
changed!
What did you think to find ?
A girl who flirted with you once
And couldn't change her mind ?
I must not trifle thus ? Your hopes
Are staked upon my love ?
You have not changed? ha! ha! not you!
(Pray do not tear your glove.)
You thought that woman's love was true ?
I knew you went that day ?
Because? — oh, certainly, because
It bored you then to stay!
You did not know how deep your love,
Absence has proved how strong
The heart by rivets such as these ?
Metallic ? Am I wrong ?
I break your heart ? We're even then!
You broke mine long ago,
Ah, Charles Adair, I speak the truth!
But, really, I must go.
A few words more ? No, no, not one!
Our hostess I must seek.
And, oh, I'd most forgot! You'll get
My wedding cards next week.
AUGUSTS.
1861-62.
The summers change us. 'Tis a long way back
Into last August's vanished glories, Klare.
Dark Clotho has bright threads for memories,
Frail threads — False touch forbear!
On silver waters in a purple dusk,
The moonbeams splintered by the lifted oar
I learned of you, rose-crowned, bloom-flushed
First love's sweet lore.
We walked at sunset on surf-printed sands,
Through August mornings in green woods we
sate,
Nor knew the future entering even then
War's grim novitiate.
This year upon this stretch of Southern sand
I learn another lesson^stem and sad,
No loved-tuned whispers now but Moultrie's boom
For this — our Iliad.
Those were keen words, Klare. "You are free,'*
you said.
Well, shall you like your jewel-studded chain?
And are you happy ? Does no hope remote
Plead against my disdain ?
The freedom which you gave me back I hold,
I trust to no new love but liberty ♦ ♦ ♦
The long roll beats, vale, Klare. Now comrades
bold
Our lives for victory!
QUENCH NOT THE FIRES.
Quench not the fires which bum within the soul
E'en though the world smiles chill upon their
glow.
But feed those lonely fires which flicker low
With all that's best out of thy fortune's dole.
Thine ease consume, content, and proud control.
And love, dear love which pleads in whispers
low
That recognition comes too late, too slow,
To feed the fires which bum within thy soul
Thine utmost to inspire. The flames may blind,
To ashes tum the toys thou'd fain adore.
But trust the light that shines. Fear not to mind
The weaving gleam which tempts thee from the
shore
On stormy ventures. Quicken thy desires
For ports beyond thy sights. Quench not the fires^
ANTIGONE.
Young when the world was young, Antigone
Shared in the virtues of its primal power.
Beauty and strength and courage were her dower^
Body to soul allied in symmetry.
Clear eyed to view eternal verity.
Heroic still to bide the hapless hour
When fates implacable her hopes devour
She paid with lof\y calm the penalty
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GEORGE KLINGLE.
26l
Of other's crimes. Self-centered woman soul
Whom lover's love could swerve not nor divert,
Whom priestly threats could stay not from the goal
Of thy fixed purpose nor thy mind pervert,
Nor coward's paltry lust of life control.
The ages' homage is thy high desert!
OH, GREAT GREY WAVES.
Oh, great grey waves that bellow to the shore
And leap against the cliffs with loud assault
Of gathered thunders from that mystic vault
Whose limits ending still stretch on before!
Oh, lion waves with mad heroic roar
Deafning to meaner sounds 'gainst black basalt
Of frowning cliff! I count it as the fault
Of partial comprehension to deplore
That law which drives untempered to their bounds
Life's mighty forces love where love belongs,
Failures, successes, in the unerring rounds
Where Nemesis ofl^ets ancestral wrongs
With penalties, wherein no power to save
Between the iron cliff and breaking wave.
AT PORTSMOUTH, VA.
JULY 20, 1864.
The day has dawned! The lucent mist
Floats into realms of amethyst.
The river tide in ripples coy
Breaks on the beach with sounds of joy.
How fair the view! The morning scene
Bounded by sun gilt hilltops green
Is gay with southern fruits and flowers
Whose sweetness loads the odorous hours.
But different scene and drearier view
Where battle smoke obscures the blue
My heart divines, and waits to hear
News from the conflict raging near.
How can the morning shine so fair!
How can the roses scent the air.
When just at hand — upon the field —
Our heroes fall — but do not yield!
This throbbing reveille of life
The bugle mocks with call to strife.
O, morning hopes! oh, hearts elate,
Whom Willi to-day leave desolate!
GEORGE KLINGLE.
MRS. GEORGTANA KLINGLE HOLMES
was born in Philadelphia, Pa. Through
her mother, Mary Hunt Morris, who became the
wife of George Franklin Klingle, M. D., she is
a member of the historic Morris family of Morris-
ania, and wife of Benjamin Proctor Holmes of
New York City. She was educated in Philadel-
phia. Her father's ancestry is found in Upper
Saxony. Hans George Klingle, her great-grand-
father, came to this country in the ship ** Restor-
ation " with his son, 9th October, 1747, and settled
in Pennsylvania. At tlie breaking out of the
Revolutionary War her grandfather George resided
at Chestnut Hill. Dr. Klingle was a man of liter-
ary and scientific reputation. From early child-
hood Georgiana contributed to periodicals of the
different cities. Her taste run in a groove not
often entered by young authors, children's stories
with a moral to leave an impression. She is an
artist of merit, but writing is the passion of her life.
She has written no long list of books, but the
heartfelt poetry of "George Klingle " has touched
many hearts. Her collection of poems entitled
"Make Thy Way Mine" (New York, r876) was
made after repeated letters from interested strangers
in different parts of the country. That collection
was followed by ** In the Name of the King" (New
York, 1888) and another volume is ready for pub-
lication. Being interested in philanthropic work,
she founded Arthur's Home for Destitute Bo>'S, at
Summit, N. J., in memory of her son who died at
the age of nine years, this child's unselfish savings
being the germ of the institution. C. W. M.
FROM BETHLEHEM TO JERUSALEM.
Afar, sweet song
Echoed one night, along
The plains of Bethlehem, and rung
New, wondrous changes, tongue
Had never known
Through all the centuries flown.
And rapt, exultant time
Took up the chime
Of angel voices, swelling in amaze,
Redemption's natal song of praise.
All unaware
That such a royal gift her heart should bear,
Fair Bethlehem slept that night, nor dreamed such
fate
Could fall to one of low estate,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Nor knew within her manger-bed
The Christ was laid, till overhead
Light, flooding all the wondering skies,
Bore wings of angels, in surprise.
Bending from heaven's throne above
To herald Christ, the gift of love.
When Galilee's tempestuous sea
Trembled beneath the foot of Deity,
And breathlessly stood still
To do His will;
Or, when in pulsing beat
It heard the winds repeat
Love's message, grand and free,
Of immortality,
Redemption's song swept on from crest to crest
Of its fair waves, with promises of rest.
When on Mount Olivet's brow
Christ, the uncrowned, would bow
In nature's temple to repeat.
Beneath the stars, His intercession, love-replete.
And man beheld
The mystery of sin, felled
At its root by pardon won,
Redemption's song about the Holy One
Awoke anew and still.
With depths intensified, swept on from hill to hill.
When, scourged and crucified,
Our sacrificed One died
Outside Jerusalem's gate.
And wept the fate
Of her fair streets, her temple rent in twain,
Her crimson stain
Of sin, redemption's song of triumph dared pro-
claim.
A world redeemed in Jesus' name.
Jerusalem so fair!
Imperious in her beauty; chosen to bear
Upon her breast the mark of God;
To hold her hands to heaven; shod
With the sandals of sweet peace;
Consecrate; where man could turn to pray and
cease
From sin —
How diflerent all her future might have been
Had she but known
Messiah by His love alone!
To-day, across the waste of time,
Exultant voices chime
Sweet alleluias of the Christ who died, —
Yet death defied,—
One grand, tumultuous sea
Of voices, sweeping through immensity;
The song of souls redeemed, for Christ the
crowned,
Jerusalem's bleeding wounds has bound,
A new Jerusalem, to be
Ransomed to immortality.
TORRIGIANO TO HIS STATUE OF CHRIST.
It will be remembered that Tomgiano, the celebrated Floren-
tine sculptor, died, amid horrible tortures, at the hands of the
Inquisitors, for the breaking of his exquisite statue of the Infant
Christ.
Have I shattered thee, O Beautiful! thou Christ-
child pale and pure,
Not broken thee, O Little-one? I thought thou
wouldst endure
Down to the coming ages, and stand jn all thy
grace,
In all thy power of loveliness in fame's most hon-
ored place,
Breathing upon the distant air Torrigiano's name —
Breathing with thy pure lips — rekindling his fame —
But all is lost!
Lost! Lost— he stands before a broken shrine;
He bends above thee, Little-one! Thine
Is the favored part.
Thy frozen, frozen heart
Knows not the woe it is to throb, to beat so high —
To throb — and die!
Oh, I have shattered thee, thou Fair, but passion
nerved the blow;
They thought to win thee, Beautiful, but I have laid
thee low!
Did they think to buy thee with their bags — their
copper bags, in truth ?
Their thirty ducates ? — ^they have learned far other-
wise, forsooth.
I did not mean to desecrate the Name that thou
didst bear —
High Heaven, knowing all things, knows that I
am guiltless there —
I I have stricken thee, O Beautiful, and jealous rage
hath sworn
To drink the blood of vengeance for thy wondrous
beauty shorn:
A little while and muffled feet will bear me from
this cell —
The tortures of the after hours, who shall their be to
I tell?
They may part my flesh among them! I have
I wounded not the Christ!
It was only thee, thou Litde-one — thou the lost, th
I last!
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WALTER MALONE.
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GEORGE KLINGLE,
265
May the hand that makes the marble stand out
with life and nerve,
May the hand that wields the chisel over every
sleeping curve,
Not sway the severing hammer, where in lingering
love before
It hath bent with fiery ardor— love that kindles
never more!
PERFECTION IN DIVISION.
Some flowers bear violet on their bosom and some
blue;
Some love a hue
More tender, and you know,
Some are as white as snow,
If all the colors slept upon one breast
Our eyes would ask for rest.
Some birds have gifts of song;
Others of wings so strong
They rule as kings: some, going by,
Flush nature's heart with crimson dye.
Or blue, or gold; and some
With just a chirp of gladness come.
If all birds' wings were strong, or red.
Or all birds' songs said
Each to each the same on hills, through vales below
There would be tears I know.
Some human lips part singing; some with cries;
Some spirits weep or smile, from out their eyes;
Some eyes are blind.
Some hands are strong to loose or bind,
And some but cling:
Some spirits are so strong of wing.
With such a sweet control
Reaching from soul to soul;
And others never try
To rise and fly.
If all lips sung, or cried,
Or wings of spirits tried
The same broad flight,
Lips would fade white.
Gifls are divided. Some hands hold
A weight of gold;
Some just a child;
Some, acres where the sun hath smiled.
God never made
A hand without a gift — though gifts do fade —
And some, so many hold that they forget
The gift, God-set,
High toward the Throne, and so
Bend down too low.
MAKE THY WAY MINE.
Father, hold thou my hands; the way is steep,
I cannot see the path my feet must keep;
I cannot tell, so dark the tangled way.
Where next to step. Oh, stay;
Come close; take both my hands in thine;
Make thy way mine.
Lead me. I may not stay:
I must move on, but oh, the way!
I must be brave and go;
Step forward in the dark nor know
If I shall reach the goal at all —
If I shall fall
Take thou my hand:
Take it! thou knowest best
How I should go, and all the rest;
I cannot, cannot see;
Lead me; I hold my hands to thee;
I own no will but thine;
Make thy way mine.
THE SILVER CROSS.
She laid in his hand a tangled thorn
Crimsoned with berries, mountain-born;
She had nothing else, though his locks were white,
Nothing to give on the Christmas night:
But he smiled and laid on her braids of gold
The fingers, shriveled and spare and old.
And was gone; but a cross of silver light
Lay where he stood on the snow-drifts white.
A morsel of porridge; the hands were small
That divided the porridge, then gave it all
But he smiled, and bowed his locks of white —
Frosted with snow of the Christmas night —
Smiled and bent to the child-face cold.
Touched it with fingers shriveled and old,
And was gone; but a cross of silver light
Lay where he stood on the drifts of white.
Faces peered from cottage and hall —
Out on the midnight, great and small.
Out on the pilgrim, shriveled and old.
Pleading for alms; but who could have told
That the little Christ on the threshold stood —
In strange disguise, for evil or good.
That the angels bearing His gifts might know
The Blessed by the cross on the drifts of snow.
EVIL.
No life so high but it may stoop to take
The hand of evil — stoop to wake
Some sleeping thing debased which might have
slept. — Footprints.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
WALTER MALONE.
WALTER MALONE was born in De Soto
County, Miss., February lo, 1866. He at-
tended the University of Mississippi in Oxford,
Miss., from the year 1883 to 1887, graduating with
the degree of Bachelor of Philosophy. During his
collegiate career he won a medal for elocution and
was several times elected to deliver orations by the
literary societies. .He also edited the College Mag-
azine for three years. While a boy of sixteen years
of age, in 1882, he published in Louisville, a vol-
ume of poems of 300 pages entitled " Claribel and
Other Poems." In 1885, at the age of nineteen,
he published a second volume of poems through
the Riverside Press, containing 315 pages and en-
titled "The Outcast and Other Poems.** These
two books are the largest volumes of verse ever
composed by a minor, and it will be seen that Mr.
Malone has written more in that line than any
other boy with poetic aspirations. But since the
author has reached more mature years, he has
made no effort to perpetuate the works of his boy-
hood, because, on account of his inexperience, his
early verses have not that polish and finish which
would entitle them, in his opinion, to be classed
among his representative works. Mr. Malone has
just had published a new volume of poems, " Nar-
cissus and Other Poems (Philadelphia, 1893) which
has been generally praised by critics and by the
reading public, and in this volume are to be found
his ablest efforts.
Mr Malone belongs to the romantic school of
poets, has no tendency to the didactic or philo-
.sophic and is fond of brilliant coloring, and pas-
sionate, sensuous verbiage. He is best, probably,
in descriptions of natural scenery in vivid and
startling coloring.
Mr. Malone was admitted to the bar in 1887, and
since then has continued to practice law in Mem-
phis, Tenn.
H. H. McG.
THE FIRST TRANSGRESSION.
Eve, sweet tempter, lovely sinner, God hath cursed
the deed which thou hast done,
Paradise is lost forever, and the stricken world's
woes have begun.
Over Eden*s eastern mountains flame the purple
glories of the mom,
Welcomed by the waking warblers and the dewy
blossoms newly bom.
But I see the green leaves trembling, and I hear
the quivering breezes sigh,
Feeling that for thy transgression thou and I and all
the world must die.
Yet a spirit whispers to me that to save the world
*tis not too late.
If I tum my heart against thee, sin not, and desert
thee to thy fate.
Then the fleeting years would scatter pallid autumn
lilies on thy tomb,
I, thy consort, live forever, radiant with immortal
youthful bloom.
Then mayhap the great Creator would another
woman mould for me;
I would twine her locks with roses, give her kisses
that I once gave thee.
But I cannot, wondrous being! for thy smiles and
wistful, pleading tears
Still would follow, hunt and haunt me through the
maze of never-dying years.
Night's dim shades would find me ever lying by the
bride I could not save,
And the piping birds at morning still would find
me weeping at thy grave.
Each would be a barren kingdom when, without
my queen, to rest I stole.
Life etemal, bitter anguish, if I lost the idol of my
soul.
Thou hast conquered, sweet enchantress! I forsake
the fields of Paradise
For thy bosom's realm of rapture and the blissful
glory of thine eyes.
It is done! I see the tiger, maddened, eyes ablaze,
come creeping hither!
It is done! The birds cease singing, and our glori-
ous garden bowers wither!
So my sons shall min empires, cast away their
honor, treasures, fame.
Sink to Hell and tum from Heaven, when a woman
bids them share her shame.
CONFIRMATION.
The children, robed in spotless white, I see
Kneel for a blessing at the bishop's feet,
And, as I gaze upon their faces sweet.
As pure as doves, from stain of sin so free,
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Before the priest whose sins unnumbered be,
Whose heart for selfish, sordid aims doth beat,
I marvel why his blessing they entreat,
When he to them should rather bend the knee.
Dear little hearts, my soul adopts your creed;
Dear little feet, your pathway I shall share;
Dear little hands, my wandering^s ye shall lead!
Dear little brows, guide with your golden hair;
Dear little lips, my God's forgiveness plead;
Dear little eyes, shine on my soul's despair!
"HE WHO HATH LOVED."
He who hath loved hath borne a vassal's chain.
And worn the royal purple of a king;
Hath shuddered 'neath the icy Winter's sting,
Then revelled in the golden Summer's reign;
He hath within the dust and ashes lain,
Then soared o'er mountains on an eagle's wing;
A hut hath slept in, worn with wandering,
And hath been lord of castle-towers in Spain.
He who hath loved hath starved in beggar's cell.
Then in Aladdin's jewelled chariot driven;
He hath with passion roamed a demon fell,
And had an angel's raiment to him given;
His restless soul hath burned with flames of hell.
And winged through ever-blooming fields of
heaven.
MARY.'
Op all the sweet names that e^er were given
To mortals on earth or seraphs in heaven.
No matter if borne by milkmaid or fairy.
The sweetest of all must ever be ** Mary."
There's "Helen," the star of romance and story.
Men perished to wreathe her ringlets with glory;
There also is " Ruth," so true and so tender,
Whose meekness and faith make mankind sur-
render.
And ** Mable " 's a name that ever sounds sweetly,
And charms and enchants a mortal completely,
While ** Katie" suggests brown eyes and brown
tresses.
Created for love and lover's caresses.
There's *' Maud " with a mouth as red as a cherry.
With kisses so sweet, with laughter so merry;
There's "Edith," whose eyes are as blue as the
fountains,
With ringlets of gold like morn on the mountains.
There's " Blanche " and "Adele," that sound auto-
cratic,
Poor "Sarah" and "Jane" that dwell in an attic,
While "Emma" is dear, all dote upon "Jenny,"
And "Annie " is loved not least among many.
But never a name like " Mary " is spoken
To hearts that are glad or hearts that are broken;
Each other brings joy or brightness or sweetness,
But " Mary " alone has perfect completeness.
The lady high-born who reigns in a castle.
The widow forlorn, the spouse of the vassal,
The captive chained down in dungeon cell dreary,
The diademed queen, may bear the name " Mary. "
And " Mary " 's the soul who opes the heart's por-
tals,
A sweetheart, perchance, the dearest of mortals;
A sister, whose soul is dowered with beauty,
Or mother who lives for love and for duty.
»Twas "Mary" who first wept tears of contrition,
*Twas she who was blest with God's greatest mis-
sion;
She stood by His cross, she saw His tomb riven,
Her name shall be first on earth and in heaven.
SUCCESS.
Those who succeed will always have their crown,
While- thousands just as noble, and who strive
As eagerly to win the self-same boon,
Find at the end an ignominious grave.
They sink 'mid sneers and slander into death,
Or die forgotten in oblivion's night.
^The Outcast,
MARTYRADOM.
To be a martyr, one need not be hanged.
Or be beheaded by one sudden stroke;
Rather he must live out his weary life.
—Ibid,
FAITH.
Because my faith is like no written creed,
I am an infidel in most men's eyes.
—Ibid,
MUSIC.
In all things beautiful some music lives,
And earthly bliss 'tis only music gives;
It is an air that wafts to us from heaven,
And breathes of sweeter life than earth hath given.
— Music.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
EDWIN FRANCIS NASON.
THE gift of song» as we recognize it in the verses
of Edwin F. Nason, is both innate and culti-
vated. His more serious poems possess a certain
spiritual fineness while breathing an under-current
of poetic passion. His insight into life is keen and
his subtle analysis of human experience appears
most strikingly in his short poems.
Edwin Francis Nason comes of staunch New
England parentage, his ancestors being among the
earliest settlers of Maine and noted for their mental
and moral qualities through many generations.
He was born in Hallowell, October 22, 1851, and
has been from boyhood a lover of books and an in-
defatigable student. At the age of fourteen, he
entered the Nicholas Latin School, at Lewiston,
Me., and graduated from Bates College with well
deserved honors, in 1872. He at once adopted
teaching as a profession, and, by his scholarly ac-
quirements and his enthusiastic and conscientious
devotion to his work, he has won an enviable repu-
tation as an instructor, while wielding a strong and
helpful influence over a large circle of student-
friends. He was, for six years, teacher of Latin
and mathematics in the Lynden Literary Institute,
Lynden, Vt, whence, resigning his position on ac-
count of ill-health, he removed, in 1885, to Augusta,
Me., where he has since resided devoting his time
to study and literary work.
The poetic talent of Mr. Nason was recogized
during his college career. He delivered the com-
mencement poem before the alumni of his alma
mater in 1878, and was also chosen ** poet '* for the
*' Alumni Dinner" given in Boston, December,
1886. To the mention of his poetical productions,
should be added that of other excellent work in the
way of editorials, reviews and critical essays, all of
which bear the stamp of literary ability and thought-
ful scholarship. E. H. N.
POSSESSION.
Why is it true that all the golden fruit,
We deemed so fair when shining on the tree,
Turneth to ashes and to mockery
When we have plucked it from the parent shoot ?
Is it, indeed, that owning is not blest ?
That only seeking bears the golden meed ?
Is there no joy save in the eager greed.
The wildering doubt, the mad despair of quest ?
Are there no heights that, once attained, .fulfil
Their radiant promise and content the soul
That longs to see the dim horizon's roll .
To distance measureless, remote from ill ?
Are there no islands girt by sunlit seas,
No summer-lands of music and of song,
Where souls shall joy to dwell, nor tales of wrong
Shall enter there to mar their restful ease ?
Must the great gods forever jeer and mock ?
Are there no giants who of yore made war ?
Are Titans but a myth ? Is there no law
Save that which rules the wave and earthquake's
shock?
Is life, then, but a shuttle without rest,
Aweary darting through a ceaseless loom ?
Is it a light that breaks beyond the tomb ?
Will heaven be less than heaven because possessed?
YESTERDAY.
HAUNTING shade that flitted down the past,
Dim ghost that shuns the day-star's rising beam!
Art thou the type of every cherished dream ?
Dost ever hint of joys that may not last ?
1 see thee crouching 'neath Time's chilling blast;
Gone are thy vestments, and thy jewels' sheen,
Withered thy roses, O, once stately queen,
Fled the illusions life around thee cast
Alas! I can do naught save weep to see
Such piteous ruin of my heart's delight;
F^airest wert thou of all the fair to me,
Yet now I sadly give thee to the night;
Still ling' ring for a moment near to pray
That Morrow's shade be not like Yesterday.
TO-DAY.
RADIANT guest, who, decked in garmets fair,
Pausest upon the threshold of the mom!
Upon my waking eyes I see thee dawn.
With wine-red roses in thy shining hair.
Within their depths thine eyes hold secets rare;
Thy crimson lips, close-curved, yet not in scorn,
Will yield their treasures ere the night is bom
To seize us mid its shadows unaware.
1 would not give a single, dewy rose
From out the meshes of thy sunny locks.
E'en to be Paris when by Ida's snows.
With Oread fair, he tended alien flocks;
But fain would sing one rapt and tender lay
In praise of thee, O rare and sweet To-day!
TO-MORROW.
Where dost thou linger while we wait for thee
Mid the vague silences that hold the air,
The deep'ning hush that spreadeth everywhere
And wraps all nature in its mystery ?
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ED WIN FRANCIS NASON
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Let stars grow pale and waning swiftly flee,
Let darkness hide within her gloomy lair,
While thy rich banners, tinged with colors rare,
Fill all the sky with throbbing ecstasy.
Long have we looked for thee with anxious eyes
That bore no hopefulness in their unrest;
For night is irksome, none may hear our cries.
With thee and thee alone can we be blest;
Draw nigh to us while darkness hastes away.
That we may greet in thee the better day.
OMNIPRESENCE.
Yks, Thou art everywhere! and nature's heart
Beats close to thine through all her varied way;
Not solely when in springtime's fair, sweet day
With smiles she wooes us to forget her art,
Nor yet when autumn flings a golden dart
Athwart the fields where summer hies away;
But e*en when winter, wrapped in clouds of gray,
Comes halting o'er the plain to claim his part.
So may my heart, like nature's, cling to Thee,
Sweet Omnipresence! all my seasons through,
So may it rise unto thy mystery.
Like exhalations of the morning dew,
Till, thrilled and softened by thy influence rare,
I, too, shall seek and find Thee everywhere.
BARS.
Across the years I call to thee,
O love, my love! Canst thou not hear ?
Are earthly cries too faint ? the space
Too measureless for word of cheer ?
Across the void I reach to thee,
O love, my love! Dost thou not know ?
Are outstretched hands too weak ? the arms
Of flesh too frail ? Ah, bitter woe!
Along the ways I toil to thee,
O love, my love! Canst thou not see ?
Are heavenly eyes too dim ? their glance
Too highly set to shine for me ?
Nor years, nor space, nor ways can bind—
O love, my love! this heart of mine:
Perchance — I cannot hear^thy call
Drops through the vast where God's stars shine.
Perchance thou leanest down the ways —
O love, my love! I cannot see —
With arms outflung and eyes that glow
Amid thy calms with love for me.
The bars that hold our souls apart,
O love, my love! I cannot break:
I can but wait and onward fare
Until the higher life shall wake.
SONNET,
Why do I love thee ? Do you ask me this ?
Why does the bird sing to the rising day.
Flooding the air with sweet, melodious lay,
Thrilling the listener's heart with rapturous blisss?
Why does the flower bloom 'neath the tender kiss
Of the life-giving sun ? The green of May,
Quickened by falling showers, deftly array
The naked earth ? I cannot tell. We miss
These finer meanings. We may only say
That glad birds sing while listening hearts are
thrilled.
That warm suns shine where flowers blossom gay.
That grasses drift the naked earth above;
And while my soul with ecstasy is filled.
Rev' rent I bow my head and say, " I love! "
UNFULFILLED.
The springtime's promise in the air,
A flush of dawn upon the hills,
A sweep of wings, a bird-note rare;
And in the heart a hope that thrills.
A wintry breath that chills the day;
A fading light in sunset skies.
Nor flight of bird, nor warbled lay;
And in the heart a hope that dies.
SLEEP AND DEATH.
The waves of sleep roll up the strand of night.
We launch our dream skiffs on the lulling tide.
And drift to morning shores where, clad in light.
The new day waits with gifts the old denied.
The waves of death break on the beach of time.
Our storm-swept barks upon their crests may
glide
Through night and wailing winds to life's fair clime
Where morn eternal pours its golden tide.
ON A PICTURE.
H E looks at me from out the velvet frame,
The three-year-old with sober, steadfast eyes;
What seer so gifted as to rightly name
Their childish longing or their vague surmise ?
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
ELLA WHEELER WILCOX.
MRS. ELLA WHEELER WILCOX was bom
in Johnstown Center, Wis. Her parents
were poor, but from them she inherited a literary
bent. Her education was received in the public
schools of Windsor, that State, and in the Univer-
sity of Wisconsin. She began to write poetry and
sketches very early, and at the age of fourteen
years some of her articles were published in the
New York Mercury, Two years later she had se-
cured the appreciation of local editors and pub-
lishers, and from that time on she contributed
largely to newspapers and periodicals. Soon after,
she published "Drops of Water" (New York,
1872), a small volume on the subject of total absti-
nence. A miscellaneous collection of vevse en-
titled "Shells" (1883), was not successful, and is
now out of print. Her talents were used for the
unselfish purpose of providing a comfortable home
for her parents and caring for them during sick-
ness, and perhaps to that may be due the fact that,
although her poems were sometimes derided by the
hypercritical, she has had the satisfaction of being
a widely-read and much admired author, as also ot
receiving a good price and ready sale for all she
produces. In 1884 she became the wife of Robert
W. Wilcox, of Meridan, Conn., and since 1887 they
have resided in New York City. Her other works
are "Maurine" (Chicago, 1875); ** Poems of Pas-
sion " (Chicago. 1883); "Mai Moul^," a novel,
(New York, 1885), and "Poems of Pleasure"
(Ch icago, 1 888) . Of recent years she has published
several novels and has written much for the syndi-
cates. L. E. J.
SOLITUDE.
Laugh, and the world laughs with you;
Weep, and you weep alone;
For the sad old earth must borrow its mirth.
But has trouble enough of its own.
Sing, and the hills will answer;
Sigh, it is lost on the air.
The echos bound to a joyful sound,
But shrink from voicing care.
Rejoice and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go.
They want full measure of all your pleasure,
But they do not need your woe.
Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad and you lose them all.
There are none to decline your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life's gall.
Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by.
Succeed and give, and it helps you live.
But no man can help you die.
There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a large and lordly train.
But one by one we must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain.
THE FAULT OF THE AGE.
The fault of the age is a mad endeavor
To leap to heights that were made to climb;
By a burst of strength, of a thought most clever.
We plan to forestall and outwit Time.
We scorn to wait for the thing worth having;
We want high noon at the day's dim dawn;
We find no pleasure in toiling and saving.
As our forefathers did in the old times gone.
We force our roses, before their season.
To bloom and blossom for us to wear;
And then we wonder and ask the reason
Why perfect buds are so few and rare.
We crave the gain, but dispise the getting;
We want wealth— not as reward, but dower;
And the strength that is waisted in useless fretting
Would fell a forest or build a tower.
To covet the prize, yet to shrink from the winning;
To thirst for glory, yet fear to fight;
Why what can it lead to at last, but sinning,
To mental languor and moral blight?
Better the old slow way of striving.
And counting small gains when the year is done.
Than to use our force and our strength contriving.
And to grasp for pleasure we have not won.
OPTIMISM.
I'm no reformer; for I see more light
Than darkness in the world; mine eyes are quick
To catch the first dim radiance of the dawn.
And slow to note the cloud that threatens storm.
The fragrance and beauty of the rose
Delight me so, slight thought I give the thorn;
And the sweet music of the lark's clear song,
htays longer with me than the night-hawk's cry.
And even in this great throe of pain, called Life,
I find a rapture linked with each despair.
Well worth the price of Anguish. I detect
More good than evil in humanity.
Love lights more fires than hate extinguishes.
And men grow better as the world grows old.
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ELLA WHEELER WILCOX,
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WHAT LOVE IS.
Love is the center and circumference;
The cause and aim of all things — 'tis the key
To joy and sorrow, and the recompense
For all the ills that have been, or may be.
Love is as bitter as the dregs of sin.
As sweet as clover-honey in its cell;
Love is the password whereby souls get in
To Heaven — ^the gate that leads, sometimes, to
Hell.
Love is the crown that glorifies; the curse
That brands and burdens; it is life and death.
It is the great law of the universe;
And nothing can exist without its breath.
Love is the impulse which directs the world,
And all things know it and obey its power.
Man, in the maelstrom of his passions whirled;
The bee that takes the pollen to the flower;
The earth, uplifting her bare, pulsing breast
To fervent kisses of the amorous sun; —
Each but obeys creative Love's behest,
Which everywhere instinctively is done.
Love is the only thing that pays for birth,
Or makes death welcome. Oh, dear God above
This beautiful but sad, perplexing earth.
Pity the hearts that know— or know not — Love!
IMPATIENCE.
How can I wait until you come to me ?
The once fleet mornings linger by the way;
Their sunny smiles touched with malicious glee
At my unrest, they seem to pause and play
Like truant children, while I sigh and say.
How can I wait ?
How can I wait ? Of old, the rapid hours
Refuse to pai!ise or loiter with me long;
But now they idly fill my hands with flowers.
And make no haste, but slowly stroll among
The summer blooms, not heeding my one song.
How can I wait?
How can I wait ? The nights alone are kind;
They reach forth to a future day, and bring
Sweet dreams of you to people all my mind,
And time speeds by on light and airy wing.
I feast upon your face, I no more sing,
How can I wait ?
How can I wait ? The morning breaks the spell
A pitying night has flung upon my soul.
You are not near me, and I know full well
My heart has need of patience and control;
Before we meet, hours, days, and weeks must
roll.
How can I wait ?
How can I wait? Oh, love, how can I wait
Until the sunlight of your eyes shall shine
Upon my world that seems so desolate ?
Until your hand-clasp warms my blood like wine;
Until you come again, O Ipve of mine.
How can I wait ?
"TWO SINNERS."
Therb was a man, it was said one time;
Who went astray in his youthful prime.
Can the brain keep cool and the heart keep quiet
When the blood is a river that's running riot ?
And the boys will be boys, the old folks say,
And a man*s the better who's had his day:
The sinner reformed, and the preacher told
Of the prodigal son who came back to the fold
And the Christian people threw open the door.
With a warmer welcome than ever before.
Wealth and honor were his to command.
And a spotless woman gave him her hand.
And the world strewed their pathway with blossoms
a-bloom.
Crying, *'God bless lady and God bless groom! "
There was a maiden went astray
In the golden dawn of life's young day.
She had more passion and heart than head.
And she followed blindly where fond Love led.
And Love unchecked is a dangerous guide.
To wander at will by a fair girl's side.
The woman repented and turned from her sin.
But no door opened to let her in.
The preacher prayed that she might be forgiven.
But told her to look for mercy — in heaven.
For this is the law of the earth, we know.
That the woman is stoned, while the man may go-
A brave man wedded her, after all.
But the world said, frowning, "We shall not call."
WILL.
There is no chance, no destiny, no fate,
Can circumvent or hinder or control
The firm resolve of a determined soul.
Gifts count for nothing; will alone is great;
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
All things give way before it, soon or late.
What obstacle can stay the mighty force
Of the sea-seeking river in its course,
Or cause the ascending orb of day to wait ?
Each well-born soul must win what it deserves.
Let the fool prate of luck. The fortunate
Is he whose earnest purpose never swerves,
Whose slightest action or inaction serves
The one great aim.
Why, even Death stands still,
And waits an hour sometimes for such a will.
THE SADDEST HOUR.
The saddest hour of anguish and of loss
Is not that season of supreme despair
When we can find no lease light anywhere
To gild the dread black shadow of the Cross.
Not in that luxury of sorrow when
We sup on salt of tears, and drink the gall
Of memories of days beyond recall —
Of lost delight that cannot come ag^n.
But when with eyes that are no longer wet
We look out on the great, wide world of men,
And, smiling, lean toward a bright to-morrow,
Then backward shrink, with sudden keen regret*
To find that we are learning to forget:
Ah! then we face the saddest hour of sorrow.
VIRTUE.
With quiet feet.
In silence, Virtue sows her seeds;
While Sin goes shouting out his deeds,
And echoes listen and repeat.
— The World.
MUSIC.
I heard a strain of music in the street,
A wandering waif of s6und; and then straight-
way
A nameless desolation filled the day.
The great green earth, that had been fair and
sweet.
Seemed but a tomb; the life I thought replete
With joy grew lonely for a vanished May;
Forgotten sorrows resurrected lay
Like ghastly skeletons about my feet.
— A Minor Chord.
ART.
Awed and afraid, I cross the border-land.
Oh, who am I, that I dare enter here
Where the great artists of the world have trod.
The genius-crowned aristocrats of earth ?
Only the singer of a little song;
Yet loving Art with such a mighty love
I hold it greater to have won a place
Just on the fair land's edge, to make my grave,
Than in the outer world of greed and gain
To sit upon a royal throne and reign.
— Maurine and Other Poems.
CHARITY.
He who sits
And looks out on the palpitating world.
And feels his heart swell in him large enough
To hold all men within it, he is near
His great Creator's standard though he dwells
Outside the pale of churches, and knows not
A feast-day from a fast-day, or a line
Of Scripture even. What God wants of us
Is that outreaching bigness that tgnors
AH littleness of aims, or loves, or creeds,
And clasps all earth and heaven in its embrace.
— God^s Measure.
DISTRUST.
Distrust that man who tells you too distrust;
He takes the measure of his own small soul,
And thinks the world no larger.
— Distrust.
JULY.
*Twas a royal day:
Voluptuous July held her lover. Earth,
With her warm arms, upon her glowing breast,
And twined herself about him, as he lay
Smiling and panting in his dream-stirred rest.
She bound him with her limbs of perfect grace,
And hid him with her trailing robe of green.
And wound him in her long hair's shimmering
sheen.
And rained her ardent kisses on his face.
— Maurine.
WORK.
Work is the salve that heals the wounded heart
--Ilnd.
BEAUTY.
As long as men have eyes wherewith to gaze
As long as men have eyes,
The sight of beauty to their sense shall be
As mighty winds are to a sleeping sea *
When stormy billows rise.
— Inborn.
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L ULAH RAGSDALE.
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LUUH RAGSDALE.
JUST after the closing of the late war, a solemn
eyed baby in the ancient family mansion of
the Clover Hill plantation in Copiah county, Miss~
issippi, attracted much attention from a wide circle
of relatives and friends because of its peculiarly
sorrowful advent, and because it had seemed to
enter the world with a premonition of the bitterness
of life. That baby, who never smiled, but whose
coastant, unusual sighs awoke pity and strange
sympathy in all hearts, was Lulah Ragsdale, only
child of the gallant Confederate officer, James L.
Ragsdale, who had lately fallen in the battle field,
leaving a brilliant and beautiful young wife, wid-
owed and desolate, to whom the little one was
bom in the midst of bereavement. Lulah Rags-
dale's rearing, and later her training and education
thus became the mother's only solace, and no
doubt, that mother, whose own heart had been so
deeply lashed by sorrow, unconsciously did much
towards developing and accentuating the fine,
sensitive, imaginative characteristics of her daugh-
ter's mind.
At an early age, Lulah Ragsdale became an
unsatisfyable reader, always seeking the weird,
the unreal, the mystic; or else, the vivid, the
passionate, the glowing in prose and poetry. The
characters in her favorite books became her best
friends, and in the constant company of such
unreal creatures as she most fancied, her thoughts,
her manners and her conversation became very odd
and unchildlike.
At sixteen. Miss Ragsdale was graduated from
the Whitworth College, Brookhaven, Miss., and
though she had been for some years writing in
secret, it was not until about three years ago that
her first published poem, "My Love," appeared
in the New Orleans Times- Democrat, It at once
created a furore in the South, and was copied
widely. Her "Galatea," "Upton Rey " and many
other poems were stereotyped and reproduced
throughout the United States. She lives in her
magnolia-shadowed Southern home at Brookhaven,
Miss., where she devotes nearly all of her time to
her fancies and her writing.
D. H J.
GALATEA.
.1 FOUND a woman white and pure and cold;
So cold I said: " She has no human heart.
A statue this, which some deft hand of old
Cut from fair marble with a cunning art."
Yet shone this chill, pale being's yellow hair
As wintry sunshine o'er a world of snow.
Such crimson were this woman's lips — as rare
As some December's burning sunset glow.
Perfect each rounded limb and dimpled arm;
Each chisled feature with no fault to mar.
Great steel-blue eyes that did not melt or warm,
But glittered each like some far, brilliant star.
And yet I loved this statue-woman's face.
Her cold, white brow, her smiles like moonlight
gleams,
Her every chilling, scintillating grace.
Was more to me than other's sunny beams.
I went anear this woman, where, like stone,
She stood mute, moveless, frozen in her place;
"I love you, pure, cold marble " — wild my tone —
A sudden transformation warmed that face.
My hand to those loose-bended fingers strayed,
And felt their pulses quiveringly start.
My lips full on that sculptured mouth I laid; —
I heard — ah! wonder rare — a beating heart
And now that statue lives and breathes and loves!
And to pink flushes marble brow and cheeks,
When'er with stately grace she near me moves.
Or when with tender lips to me she speaks. .
UPTON REY.
" And when we meet, as meet we may;
'Twill be as strangers Upton Rey;"
With scornful lip I turned away.
He did not stretch a hand, nor chide:
He stood there silent in his pride:
As silently I left his side.
Across the stubble, brown and dry.
Beneath the purple twilight sky.
Alone, with wrathful thoughts walked L
" Henceforth as strangers let it be:
And when we meet be sure he'll see,
No sign of cankering grief on me. "
The frozen snow beneath our feet.
Trod icy hard as cruel sleet;
My heart foreknew that we would meet.
With scorn we met, with pride we passed:
A bitter sigh seemed in the blast;
No look my haughty eyes upcast.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
" To-day the soul of Upton Rey
Sped, gladsome, on its Heavenward way:
And will you come ? " I heard them say.
The grass was new beneath our feet,
Along our way the lanes were sweet.
** As strangers Upton Rey we meetP^
The candles twinkled through the gloom:
About the coffin bud and bloom
Of roses white made sweet the room.
In silent scorn of me he lay:
** You vex,'* his cold lips seemed to say,
*' No more the soul of Upton Rey.
"When you have breasted death's cold tide,
And stand in Heaven by my side,
We meet as strangers^ Gladdys Clyde!"
It is too late, too late to tell
How all the while I loved him well;
In secret how my hot tears fell.
Yet every golden summer day.
Above his grass-grown mound I pray,
" In that last Resurrection day
Oh, not as strangers Upton Rey!"
PROMISE.
Weepeth the rain, beloved one,
Silently over the churchyard grass,
Wetting the daisies above thy breast,
Lulling thy heart to a deeper rest.
Cooling the winds as they mourning pass
Through the slabs that bear records of sweet things
done.
Weepeth the rain in my heart, lost one;
Drippeth and droppeth it steadily down,
Silently washing all hope away,
Turning all life to a sodden gray.
Chilling the thoughts that are wandering, blown
Through the graves, in my breast, of the dear
things gone. '
Shineth the sun, beloved one;
Tipping with gold all the churchyard trees,
Crowning with jewels each daisy's brow.
Lighting thy mound with its glory-glow,
Warming and scenting each passing breeze
That whispers of light after clouds are gone.
Shineth the sun in my heart, lost one;
Gilding with hope all the coming time;
Crowning with rapture that last glad day,
When these earthly fetters shall fall away,
And the harps shall sound down the golden street.
As our hands shall clasp, and our lips shall meet;
And through years that stretch sweeter than psalm
or rhyme,
We will bring back the dear old things now gone.
OUTSIDE.
Oh, stars that guard the outer walls of heaven,
And nighdy catch the wafted echoing
Of songs the choir of raptured angels sing,
The melody from golden harp-strings driven: —
Ye are enchanted by the joy up there;
Ye are so deafened by the sounds within
Ye cannot hear the clamor and the din
That overfloweth all this fetid air.
Ye do not heed the wailings that ascend
From hearts that bleed and break, and break
again;
The outcries sharp when stabs the knife of pain,
The hopeless sobs /or griefs that know no end: —
Else would your light be drowned by tear on tear;
Else would you burst athrough the Jasper wall
And prone before the great white throne would
fall
Beseeching all the saints and seraphs round.
To join in one petition to their King
For pity on the poor, mad world of men,
Who, blinded by the earth-dust o'er their ken.
Writhe, tortured here by many a secret thing.
Oh stars if ye too happy are for this,
I plead you list but one wild prayer of mine.
Send down the ladder of your light, devine.
Whereon my soul may mount to gain the bliss —
Not singing through the gates of gold to pass
To seek her who, for earthly homes too fair.
Has found a fitter dwelling somewhere there
For I would mar her joy in heaven, alas! —
But only that among you, one more star,
I might keep guard about the jasper tx)unds,
Wherein she dwells, and catch some echoed
sound
When in her ecstacy she sings afar.
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CLARENCE A. BUSKIRK'
277
CLARENCE A. BUSKIRK.
CLARENCE A. BUSKIRK was bom in the
pleasant little village of Friendship, in Alle-
gany county, N. Y., on the 8th day of November,
1842. He enjoyed good educational opportunities,
studied law, and entered the practice at Princeton,
Gibson county, Ind., in 1866. He was a close
student and won ready recognition in his chosen
profession. He has made Princeton his home,
with the exception of the four years from
1874 to 1878, when, as Attorney-General for
the State, he resided in Indianapolis. He has been
somewhat active in politics, and, prior to his elec-
tion to the Attorney-Generalship was a member of
the State legislature, chosen in 1872. But notwith-
standing these preferments, he has not been in any
sense a place-seeker, being more at home in the
practice of his profession and in giving rein, as
leisure has permitted, to his love for poetry. In
addition to poetry he is deeply interested in the re-
lated pursuit of horticulture, and, in the practice o^
these favorite arts finds relaxation from the every-
day routine of legal practice.
Mr. Buskirk is endowed with a fine poetic tem.
perament. As a poet he is painstaking and cautious
and yet not to the extent of bridling in hb muse or
restraining her flights. He possesses a fine vein
of humor that finds easy and natural expressions in
his limpid verse. B. S. P.
THE MESSIAH.
The true Messiah came to earth.
Not as a kingly conquerer comes.
In jeweled pomp and noise of drums.
But a lone manger gave him birth.
Poor fishermen composed the band
With whom He moved in humblest guise,
Nor wealth nor greatness reached His eyes,
Nor sword nor sceptre stained his hand.
He saw the strutting Caesars pass,
He saw the parasites of power.
All as the insects of an hour,
Or flitting shadows on the grass.
Unlike all other princes born
He valued not what men most prized;
So Gentiles doubted and despised,
And Jews and Romans laughed in scorn.
The light of the Messiah's birth,
Still as the centuries go by,
A quiet daybreak in the sky.
Broadens its radiance round the earth.
No threatening swords of Moslem hosts,
No frightful gifts on Pagan shrines,
No awful menaces and signs.
The true Messiah's kingdom boasts.
A SUNSET.
A SINGLE sunset hath more loveliness
Than all the boasted paintings kings possess.
Take the rare moment ere the large sun sinks
Behind far hills and their mjrsterious brinks, —
Then Nature revels in most glorious mood.
And shows her powers as if to shame our brood: —
The sky uncloses like a radiant rose.
Blooming beside a zenith where repose
White flakes and threads of vapor, and cloud-
shapes
Of wondrous grace, and airy gulfs and capes;
Soon the whole sky becomes a molten sea
Of climbing fire and color; shadowy
Ravines receive the mantling streams of gold;
And marvelous scarlet hues, too manifold
And beautiful for human words to tell.
Or thought to treasure, in bright billows swell
Up to the very edges of the blue;
And every instant splendors ever new
With still unfolding charms enwrapt the view.
NATURE'S BALM.
A MAN among his fellow-men
Oft finds himself by wolves beset.
Whose hungry eyes devour his soul.
Whose teeth are with his life-blood wet:
At last he wearies of the strife,
And hates the vile, voracious herd;
He flees to Nature's outstretched arms.
And hears her voice in brook and bird.
THE FLOWERS OF THOUGHT.
The Flowers of Thought, with their divine perfume,
How shall we tell the gardens where they bloom ?
Their lusty roots what rich soil nourishes,
To clothe them in perrenial loveliness ?
What purer air and light their leaves unclose.
That they outvie the splendor of the rose ?
Not on the hillside where the golden grain
Couquets till comes the scythe by which 'tis slain;
Not where Anacreon-hearted bobolinks
Loiter in the meadows till the warm sun sinks;
Not in romantic woods where Dryads dream;
Not fed by kisses of Arcadian stream; —
Where nurtured, then, those fair immortal flowers,
Strewing our pathways like Idalian bowers ?
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Mayhap, those Flowers of Thought which for us
bloom,
Reach their deep roots to some forgotten tomb —
Where rolls the Nile 6r Tiber's turgid tide,
Or Grecian skies o'er fairest lands preside,
Or stares the Sphinx in awful mystery.
Or drift the sacred waves of Galilee.
Mayhap, they lie unknown for centuries
Before discovered to far-sailing eyes;
Yet henceforth to our galleons evermore
They send rare perfumes from their Sabian shore.
Wher'er they grow, in all our hearts they own
A Memon's statue, giving fdrth its tone
Of marvelous music under the dawn's kiss;
And on th' cloud-curtain hiding the abyss
Of matters infinite are seen their dyes,
Shining like starbeams from unfathomed skies.
POESY.
The mind that journeys into realms ideal,
May oft' forget the sorrows of the real;
The pen becomes the hand of Beatrice,
Guiding us on through lands of joy and peace,
Poesy like a fair enchantress waves
Her wand above the soul, and from its graves
New forms of beauty into being start,
With speech before unheard to move the heart;
A seraph uttering from a mortal's hood
The soul-thoughts of the living and the dead.
Like a shell that murmurs of the sirens' bed,
Or the weird sweet music in a haunted wood.
And then my fancy strays to those romantic days
When maidenhood built casdes in the air,
And saw in bright day-dreams Arcadian vales and
streams
. Where dwelt no sorbid souls and all was fair.
Ah, beautiful old face, that brow was once the place
Where Cupid, the Olympian, had his throne;
Those faded cheeks have known swift bridal
blushes blown,
Like fragrant flames across their fair domain.
But, dear old face, thou art most sacred to my
heart
For those far years of verdant pain and joy.
When life had not yet lost the bloom it once could
boast.
And when thou wert my friend, and I — ^a boy!
Alas! all now remains of years of joys and pains
Seems pictured in that face upon the wall!
Alas! that life should bloom so nigh the fatal tomb,
Which in its voiceless darkness buries all!
Constant and faithftil friend! within these words I
send
My greeting to thee, wheresoe'er thou art;
For like a thomless rose thy lovely memory grows
And blossoms at the gateway of my heart!
MOTHER'S PORTRAIT.
Within my humble hall there hangs against the
wall
A fairer flower than summer garlands know—
A beautiful old face, whijse gentleness and grace
Beam forth like winter flowers beside the snow.
How calm the light which lies within those dear old
eyes!
How noble the sad patience of that brow!
Those furrows which the years wore deep with
many tears —
Ah! how serene beneath life's sunset now!
As on that face I gaze my fancy seeks the days,
Long vanished, which her laughing girlhood
knew;
I see the well-sweep move she oft has told me of,
And fori si paths her bare feet rambled through.
YOUTH AND AGE.
Youth quickly tires of calm retreats,
And loves the tumult of the streets:
Age loves the noise of peaceful rills.
But not the noise of babbling men!
Age loves the stretch of quiet hills.
While mortared bricks fatigue its ken.
Youth fondly seeks the glittering strife
And gayeties of busy life:
Age seeks the balm of solitude
To heal the hurts the world bestows —
The balm that's found in lonely wood.
Or converse with a blushing rose.
PATIENCE.
Let the storms beat of Fate and Circumstance —
Her fiercest shafts let hostile Fortune fling —
I rise above them all. In suflerance
Patient and strong, I trample like a king
Under my heel all the vile things of chance.
The soul is its own master, and to bring
The soul to its own mastery is to gain
The sceptre of the world and break its chain.
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MRS. CYNTHIA M. R. GORTON,
281
MRS. CYNTHIA M. R. GORTON.
MRS. CYNTHIA M. R. GORTON was born
on the summit of one of the loftiest hills of
Berkshire, Mass., February 27, 1826. She is known
under the pen-name of* Ida Glen wood, " of Fenton,
Mich. In Berkshire, in a humble home, of poor
and religious parentage, her life began. As a
bright, rosy-cheeked little girl with a "foolish
habit of making rhymes,*' she often excited the
frowns of the elders and the laughter of her play-
mates. Unappreciated, she dwelt even at that
tender age in an atmosphere of unattainable hopes.
She was always a deep thinker, wondering at the
mysteries of life and death and adoring the sublim-
ities of nature, being from childhood left much to
her own ways and meditations. In after years, when
thick darkness fell over her, shutting out external
beauties, there were in the gallery of her soul,
pictures of what had been. When she was a year
old, her father died, leaving a family of five little
ones to the care of a most devoted, Christian
mother. When Cynthia was fourteen, that care
was taken away and she found herself an orphan.
At that time she was a pupil in the seminary of
Madame Willard, Troy, N. Y., where for three
years she had looked forward, with bright anticipa-
tions, to the acquirement of a liberal education.
She took great delight in school compositions and
she wrote in such a style as to attract the favorable
notice of her instructors. About that time her eyes,
always full of laughter, began to show the in-
cipient signs of that dark shadow which, later,
closed her physical vision. She was solicited, by
the preceptress, after her mother's death to con-
tinue her studies as a " teacher scholar," but the
state of her eyes would not permit. At the age of
twenty-one she married Mr. F. Gorton, a paper
manufacturer, and six years later, during a painful
illness, the dense curtains were drawn over the
windows of her soul and compelled her henceforth
to walk in darkness in spite of the efforts of science
and affection. When recovering from three long
years of physical agony, there arose in her heart,
from the mold and sadness of the grave, brighter
hopes and purer expectations which removed all
gloom and made of her a cheerful companion and
friend ever after. Her imprisoned spirit seemed to
bound forth to new exertions and the hidden talent
of poesy and wreathing of prose beauties shone out
as in childhood. During more than thirty years
her night has never been broken. For several
years after that sad event her work was exceedingly
limited in its progress, being dependent on others
to transcribe her thoughts to paper. But the am-
bition newly awakened after so long a slumber
would not down. Her first prose work, "The
Fatal Secret," was written wholly with a pencil,
but so rapidly did she do this that her hand, all
unconsciously to herself, formed an almost new al-
phabet, unreadable except by those who had followed
the transformation. That was a serious impediment. ,
Fortunately the typewriter appeared in that emer-
gency and was hailed by her with joy, and for
seventeen years, covering the greater part of her
literary life, she has used it with nearly as much
facility and precision as those with their full sight.
Her first published poem appeared in the Phila-
delphia Inquirer^ the editor, Mr. Harding, having ac-
cidentally seen it in her husband's office. He
encouraged her to work and in a short time many
journals both in city and country were pleased to
give publicity to her contributions. Since then from
the darkness have come many serials, short stories
and poems, among which are "The Fatal Secret, or
a Romance of Mackinac Island," "Kate Wynans
and the Forger's Daughter," "Ma Belle Queen,"
"The Mistress of Rosedale," "Tangled Threads,"
" Black France," and others. In the " Crusade "
movement she became an earnest and efficient
temperance worker, presiding at public meetings,
lecturing and reciting original poems which were
received by press and people with great enthusiasm.
Her short career as a platform speaker began with
the recitation of a poem entitled "Adolphus and
Olivia, or a tale of Kansas." Such labor wore
sadly upon her sensitive, shrinking nature, and after
a few years her health demanded a cessation from
so arduous a work. Her powers of thought have
not abated. She is a prolific and most acceptable
letter writer, and many a "shut-in," of which
society she is a member, will testify to their com-
forting influences. Her days are full of good works,
of a highly religious character, embodied in an un-
tiring and beautiful ambition, ever active, "doing
with all her might whatever hands, brain or heart
finds to do," she will leave the record of a full, well
rounded life, a memory to her loved ones that will
ever glow with precious deeds worthy of being
recorded in history for the abundance of undying
examples to be imitated. G. H. W.
HAVE 1 DONE WHAT I COULD ?
I WONDER, sometimes, in the darkness,
If I'm weaving the stitches aright;
Whether the threads that are put in my fingers,
Are dark-hued, or golden and bright.
Whether the pattern will show in the ending
That another dear hand did the blending!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
I wonder when the fingers grow weary
O'er the tasks so imperfectly done,
If he, who is watching the weaving,
Marks the stitches made, one by one,
Or, if when the darkness is ended,
I shall see how the pattern is blended.
I wonder so oft in my musings
If I'm pleasing the Master to-day,
By trying, yet perchance I am failing.
For the fingers work on as they may;
Or, if the pattern will show, in the ending,
That some other dear hand did the blending!
I wonder as the web keeps on moving,
The years rolling up each dark fold.
If th' Master is pleased with the weaving.
The black threads, with silver and gold!
O the pattern, my Father! the ending!
Have I done what I could in the blending ?
ALONE ALL NIGHT.
Hark! what's that? — a sound I hear!
Some one is at the door, I fear!
There! O, no,— 'twas not a step;
The wind perhaps! I must have slept!
O— it is dreary, one must own
To stay all night in the house alone!
This darkness wraps me like a pall!
Rearing around my bed a wall
So high, the air seems damp and chill!
And I, imprisoned, mind and will!
O — it is dreary, one must own.
To stay all night in the house alone!
Is all the world asleep or dead ?
It seems so still around my bed.
And yet if a slight noise I hear,
I start as if a ghost was near!
O — it is dreary one must own.
To stay all night in the house alone!
Ah— there's the clock! it's only one!
The midnight hour has but just gone!
When will the sluggard, laggard night
Draw back her curtains from the light?
O— it is dreary one must own.
To stay all night in the house alone!
"Tick,— tick,— *' the busy clock works on.
Time drags the heavy hours along!
And morning always with her light
Has followed close the darkest night.
Yet it is dreary one must own.
To stay all night in the house alone!
A LULLABY.
Hush — my little baby sweet.
Baby with the dimpled feet.
Baby with the rose-bud toes.
Pearly little ears and nose.
Little chubby hands so pink:
Ah— did ever baby think ?
Little baby sweet
Litde dimpled feet,
Soft and dewy eyes.
Like the summer skies,
Rosy fragrant lips.
Cunning finger tips,
All so sweet and fair and pink,
Ah! did ever baby think ?
"HE LEADETH ME."
When life is darkest, then oftdmes I feel
His hand clasps mine in tenderness and love,
And though I cannot see the way, I know full well
He will not let me fall, and so
I clasp more tightly the dear hand
That leads me onward, onward to my quiet rest.
Thanks dear ones for every kindly word,
Affection ever sends her cheerful rays
Down, deep down into the imprisoned soul.
And though all is dark around her silent chambers
Are full of light, with sympathy and love.
Our father leads us all, but most
He pities his poor sightless child!
SWISS SONG.
I am thinking of thee to-night love
While the bright little stars above — love
Are looking at me, and winking, —
I'm looking at them and thinking, —
Thinking of thee, to-night love,
Not of the stars above, love.
But thinking of thee!
The sweet little flowers are asleep love,
The cool evening zephyrs now weep love —
But the bright little star-eyes keep winking,
And I'm looking at them and thinking.
Thinking how lonely and drear love,
Are pleasures when thou art not near love, —
Yes— I am thinking of thee!
— From Don CharioL
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SARAH HELEN WHITMAN,
283
SARAH HELEN WHITMAN.
MRS. SARAH HELEN WHITMAN was bom
in Providence, R. I., in 1803, and died there,
June 27, 1878. She was the daughter of Nicholas
Power. She was married to John Whitman, a
lawyer, of Boston, Mass., in 1828. She lived in
Boston until her husband died, in 1833, when she
returned to Providence. There she devoted herself
to literature. In 1848 she became conditionally en-
gaged to Edgar A. Poe, but she broke the engage-
ment. They remained friends. She contributed
essays, critical sketches and poems to magazines
for many years. In 1853 she published a coUeciion
of her works entitled, "Hours of Life, and Other
Poems.*' In i86o she published a volume entitled
" Edger A. Poe and His Critics," in which she de-
fended him from harsh aspersions. She was the
joint author with her sister, Miss Anna Marsh
Power, of "Fairy Ballads," "The Golden Ball,"
"The Sleeping Beauty" and "Cinderella" (1867).
After her death a complete collection of her poems
was published. H. A. V.
A STILL DAY IN AUTUMN.
I LOVE to wander through the woodlands Hoary,
In the soft gloom of an autumnal day,
When Summer gathers up her robes of glory.
And, like a dream of beauty, glides away.
How through each loved, familiar path she lingers,
Serenely smiling through the golden mist,
Tinting the wild grape with her dewy fingers,
Till the cool emerald turns to amethyst;
Kindling the faint stars of the hazel, shining
To light the gloom of Autumn's mouldering
halls;
With hoary plumes the clematis entwining,
Where, o'er the rock, her withered garland falls.
Warm lights are on the sleepy uplands waning
Beneath dark clouds along the horizon rolled.
Till the slant sunbeams, through their fringes
raining,
Bathe all the hills in melancholy gold.
The moist winds breathe of crisped leaves and
flowers,
In the damp hollows of the woodland sown.
Mingling the freshness of autumnal showers
With spicy airs from cedam alleys blown.
Beside the brook and on the umbered meadow.
Where yellow fern-tufts fleck the faded ground,
With folded lids beneath their palmy shadow,
The gentian nods, in dewy slumbers bound.
Upon those soft, fringed lids the bee sits brooding.
Like a fond lover loath to say farewell;
Or, with shut wings, through silken folds intruding,
Creeps near her heart his drowsy tale to tell.
The little birds upon the hill-side lonely
Flit noiselessly along from spray to spray,
Silent as a sweet, wandering thought, that only
Shows its bright wings and softly glides away.
The scentless flowers, in the warm sunlight
dreaming.
Forget to breathe their fullness of delight;
And through the trancM woods soft airs are
streaming
Still as the dew-fall of the summer night.
So, in my heart, a sweet, unwonted feeling
Stirs, like the wind in ocean's hollow shell,
Through all its secret chambers sadly stealing.
Yet finds no words its mystic charm to tell.
THE LAST FLOWERS.
" The undying voice of that dead time,
With its interminable chime,
Rings on my spirit like a knell."
Dost thou remember that Autumnal day
When by the Seekonk's lonely wave we stood.
And marked the langor of repose that lay.
Softer than sleep, on valley, wave, and wood ?
A trance of holy sadness seemed to lull
The charmed earth and circumambient air,
And the low murmur of the leaves seemed full
Of a resigned and passionless despair.
Though the warm breath of summer lingered still
In the lone paths where late her footsteps passed,
The pallid star-flowers on the purple hill
Sighed dreamily, " We are the last! the last! "
I stood beside thee, and a dream of heaven
Around me like a golden halo fell!
Then the bright veil of fanta^ was riven.
And my lips murmured, "Fare thee well! — fare-
well!"
I dared not listen to thy words, nor turn
To meet the mystic language of thine eyes,
I only felt their power, and in the urn
Of memory, treasured their sweet rhapsodies.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
We parted, then, forever, — ^and the hours
Of that bright day were gathered to the past, —
But, through long wintry nights, I heard the flowers,
Sigh dreamily, ** We are the last! the last! "
SONNETS TO EDGAR ALLEN POE.
When first I looked into thy glorious eyes,
And saw, with their unearthly beauty pained,
Heaven deepening within heaven, like the skies
Of autumn nights without a shadow stained,
I stood as one whom some strange dream enthralls;
For, far away, in some lost life divine.
Some land which every glorious dream recalls,
A spirit looked on me with eyes like thine.
E*en now, though death has veiled their starry light.
And closed their lids in his relentless night—
As some strange dream, remembered in a dream.
Again I see, in sleep, their tender beam;
Unfading hopes their cloudless azure fill.
Heaven deepening within heaven, serene and still.
II.
If thy sad heart, pining for human love.
In its earth solitude grew dark with fear.
Lest the high Sun of Heaven itself should prove
Powerless to save from that phantasmal sphere
Wherein thy spirit wandered — ^if the flowers
That pressed around thy feet, seemed but to
bloom
In lone Gethsemanes, through starless hours,
When all, who loved, had left thee to thy doom: —
Oh, yet believe, that, in that hollow vale,
Where thy soul lingers, waiting to attain
So much of Heaven's sweet grace as shall avail
To lift its burden of remorseful pain, —
My soul shall meet thee and its Heaven forego
Till God's great love, on both, one hope, one
Heaven bestow.
SCIENCE.
While the dull Fates sit nodding at their loom,
Benumbed and drowsy with its ceaseless boom,
I hear, as in a dream, the monody
Of life's tumultuous, ever-ebbing sea;
The iron tramp of armies hurrying by
Forever and forever but to die.
The tradgedies of time, the dreary years.
The frantic carnival of hopes and fears,
The wild waltz-music wailing through the gloom.
The slow death-agonies, the yawning tomb.
The loved ones lost forever to our sight,
In the wide waste of chaos and old night;
Earth's long, long dream of martyrdom and pain;
No God in heaven to rend the welded chain
Of endless evolution!
Isthiso/^f
And mole-eyed " Science," gloating over bones
The skulls of monkeys and the age of stones.
Blinks at the golden lamps that light the hall
Of dusty death, and answers:
"It is all."
ARBUTUS.
There's a flower that grows by the greenwood tree.
In its desolate beauty more dear to me
Than all that bask in the noontide beam
Through the long, bright summer by fount and
stream.
Like a pure hope nursed beneath sorrow's wing.
Its timid buds from the cold moss spring;
Their delicate hues like the pink sea-shell.
Or the shaded blush of the hyacinth's bell;
Their breath more sweet than the faint perfume
That breathes from the bridal orange-bloom.
It is not found by the garden wall,
It wreathes no brow in the festal hall;
But it dwells in the depths of the shadowy wood,
And shines, like a star, in the solitude.
Never did numbers its name prolong.
Ne'er hath it floated on wings of song;
Bard and minstrel have passed it by,
And left it, in silence and shade, to die.
But with joy to its cradle the wild bees come.
And praise its beauty with drony hum;
And children love, in the season of spring.
To watch for its earliest blossoming.
— The Trailing Arbutus.
INFANCY.
Ere youth with its auroral blooms
Dispels the tender twilight glooms
O Infancy, while yet it lies
Close to the gate of Paradise,
No fears the guileless bosom thrill;
The little stranger slumbers still,
O'ershadowed by the silent wings
Of angels, till the morning brings
Music and perfume, and around him flings
Her rosy mist-wreaths, drooping warm and low,
And prints her fragrant kisses on his brow.
— Morning,
HOPE.
Not all in vain the vision of your youth,
The apocalypse of beauty and of love,
The stag-like heart of hope. Life's mystic dream
The soul shall yet interpret; to our prayer
The Isis veil be lifted. —A Hollow of the Hills.
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LEWIS MORRIS.
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LEWIS MORRIS.
BORN in Carmarthen in 1833. Mr. Lewis Morris
was educated first at Cowbridge and Sher-
borne schools, and subsequently at Jesus College,
Oxford. A learned scholar, a diligent student, he
early attained the coveted honor of being placed in
the first class in classics in the First Public Examina-
tion, in 1853. Two years later he was again placed
in the first class in classics at the Final Examination.
In 1858 he was awarded the Chancellor's Prize for
the best English Essay. In the same year he took
his degree of M. A., and in 1861 he was called to
the bar at Lincoln's Inn, obtaining at that period
a Certificate of Honor of the First Class. From
this time forward till the year 1880, we find him
practicing chiefly as a Conveyancing Counsel. In
this year he was appointed on the Departmental
Committee charged by the government to inquire
into intermediate and higher education in Wales —
a post for which, by his deep and detailed know-
ledge of the educational deficiencies and require-
ments of that picturesque country, he was eminenlty
qualified to lend very material and considerable
assistance. Mr. Morris is, further, an Honorary
Fellow of Jesus College, Honorary Secretary of the
University College of Wales, a Knight of the Order
of the Saviour of Greece, a Justice of the Peace for
theJCounty of Carmarthenshire, and Vice-Chairman
of the Political Committee of the Reform Club. It
was during the later years of his connection with
the bar that Mr. Morris found time to set about the
first of those classic contributions to poetic litera-
ture that have won him favor throughout the length
and breadth of the land. Between the years 1871
and 1874 appeared three volumes of '* Songs of
Two Worlds," now in their thirteenth edition.
**The Epic of Hades," stamps beyond all dispute
its author's genius, belongs to a somewhat later
period, and has already passed into its twenty-third
edition. This was followed, in 1879, ^Y **Gwen,
a Drama in Monologue,*' and **The Ode of Life,"
both in their seventh edition. In 1883 came "Songs
Unsung," in 1886, "Syria," a powerful drama of
the Byzantine period, written for Miss Anderson,
but, owing to the departure of that lady for America,
not yet acted; and in 1887, "Songs of Britain,"
comprising Welsh legands of great beauty, which
may one day become famous. All these, with the
exception of the two last-named, were published
anonymously as the productions of "A New
Writer," and have only, within a comparatively
recent period, made their appearance with the
signature of their author.
F. A. H. E.
DEAR LITTLE HAND.
Dear little hand that clasps my own.
Embrowned with toil and seamed with strife;
Pink little fingers not yet grown
To the poor strength of after-life —
Dear little hand!
Dear little eyes which smile on mine
With the first peep of morning light;
Now April-wet with tears, or fine
With dews of pity, or laughing bright.
Dear little eyes!
Dear little voice, whose broken speech
All eloquent utterance can transcend;
Sweet childish wisdom strong to reach
A holier deep than love or friend;
Dear little voice!
Dear little life! my care to keep
From every spot and stain of sin;
Sweet soul foredoomed, for joy or pain,
To struggle and— which ? to fail or win ?
Dread mystical life!
THE TREASURE OF HOPE.
O FAIR bird, singing in the woods.
To the rising and the setting sun.
Does ever any throb of pain
Thrill through thee ere thy song be done:
Because the summer fleets so fast;
Because the autumn fades so soon;.
Because the deadly winter treads
So closely on the steps of June ?
O sweet maid, opening like a rose
In love's mysterious, honeyed air,
Dost think sometimes the day will come
When thou shalt be no longer fair:
When love will leave thee and pass on
To younger and to brighter eyes;
And thou shalt live unloved, alone,
A dull life, only dowered with sighs ?
O brave youth, panting for the fight.
To conquer wrong and win thee fame.
Dost see thyself grown old and spent.
And thine a still unhonored name:
When all thy hopes have come to naught.
And all thy fair schemes droop and pine
And wrong still lifts her hydra heads
To fall to stonger arms than thine ?
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
Nay; song and love and lofty aims
May never be where faith is not;
Strong souls within the present live;
The future veiled— the past forgot:
Grasping what is, with hands of steel,
They bend what shall be, to their will;
And blind alike to doubt and dread,
The End, for which they are, fulfil.
IT SHALL BE WELL.
If thou shalt be in heart a child,
Forgiving, tender, meek, and mild,
Though with light stains of earth defiled.
Oh, soul, it shall be well.
It shall be well with thee indeed,
Whate'er thy grace, thy tongue, thy creed,
Thou shalt not lose thy fitting meed;
It shall be surely well.
Not, where, nor how, nor when we know.
Nor by what stages thou shalt grow;
We may but whisper faint and low,
** It shall be surely well."
It shall be well with thee, oh, soul,
Tho' the heavens wither like a scroll;
Tho' sun and moon forget to roll,—
Oh, soul, it shall be well.
C(ELUM NON ANIMUM.
Oh fair to be, oh sweet to be
In fancy's shallop fairing free,
With silken sail and fairy mast
To float till all the world be past!
Oh happy fortune, on and on
To wander far till care be gone,
Round beetling capes, to unknown seas.
Seeking the fair Hesperides!
But is there any land or sea
Where toil and trouble cease to be —
Some dim, unfound, diviner shore,
Where men may sin and mourn no more ?
Ah, not the feeling, but the sky
We change, however far we fly;
How swift soe'er our bark may speed.
Faster the blessed isles recede.
Nay, let us seek at home to find
Fit harvest for the brooding mind.
And find, since thus the world grows fair,
Duty and pleasure everywhere.
Oh well-worn road, oh homely way,
Where pace our footsteps, day by day,
The homestead and the church which bound
The tranquil seasons' circling round!
Ye hold experiences which reach
Depths which no change of skies can teach,
The saintly thought, the secret strife
Which guide, which do perturb our life.
ONE DAY.
One day, one day, our lives shall seem
Thin as a brief forgotten dream:
One day, our souls by life opprest,
Shall ask no other boon than rest.
And shall no hope nor longing come.
No memory of our former home,
No yearning for the loved, the dear
Dead lives that are no longer here ?
If this be age, and age no more
Recall the hopes, the fears of yore.
The dear dead mother's accent mild.
The lisping of the little child.
Come, Death, and slay us ere the blood
Run slow, and turn our lives from good
For only in such memories we
Consent to linger and to be.
SONG.
If ever, dear,
I might at last the barren victory gain.
After long struggle and laborious pain,
And many a secret tear,
To think, since think I must of thee,
Not otherwise' than thou of me.
Haply I might
Thy chilling coldness, thy disdain, thy pride,
Which draw me, half reluctant, to thy side,
With a like meed requite.
And I my too fond self despise,
Seeing with disenchanted eyes.
But now, alas,
So fast a prisoner am I to my love.
No power there is that can my chains remove.
So sweet the caged hours pass.
That, if it parted me from thee,
I would not willingly grow free.
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LEWIS MORRIS,
287
Nor would I dare
To ask for recompense of love again,
Who love thee for the height of thy disdain.
Thou wouldst not show so fair
If we should own an equal flame,
Unequal souls, in love the same.
Full well I know
That what I worship is not wholly thee,
But a fair dream, a pious fantasy.
Such as at times doth grow
On yearnings of the cloistered mind.
Or the rapt vision of the blind.
Scorn me then, sweet,
I would not thou shouldst leave thy lofty place.
Thy lover should not see thee face to face,
But prostrate at thy feet
No recompense, no equal part I seek,
Only that thou be strong and I be weak.
OTHER DAYS.
O THRUSH, your song is passing sweet.
But never a song that you have sung
Is half so sweet as thrushes sang
When my dear love and I were young.
O Roses, you are sweet and red.
Yet not so red nor sweet as were
The roses that my mistress loved
To bind within her flowing hair.
Time filches fragrance from the flower;
Time steals the sweetness from the song;
Love only scorns the tyrant's power,
And with the growing years grows strong.
"NO MORE, NO MORE."
**No more, no more,'* the autumnal shadows cry;
*• No more, no more,'* our failing hearts reply:
Oh! that our lives were come to that calm shore
Where change is done, and fading is no more.
But should some mightier hand completion send,
And smooth life's stream unrippled to its end.
Our sated souls, filled with an aching pain,
Would yearn for waning days and years again.
Thrice blessed be the salutary change
Which day by day brings thoughts and feelings
strange!
Our gain is loss, we keep but what we give.
And only daily dying may we live.
PICTURES.
Above tlie abysmal undivided deep
A train of glory streaming from afar;
And in the van, to wake the worlds from sleep,
One on whose forehead shines the Morning-Star.
Song-rolling surges of a falling sea.
Smiting the shear cliffs of an unknown shore;
And by a fanged rock, swaying helplessly
A mast with broken cordage — nothing more.
Three peaks, one loftier, all in virgin white.
Poised high in cloudland when the day is done.
And on mid-most, far above the night,
The rose-red of the long-departed sun.
A wild girl reeling, helpless, like to fall,
Down a hushed street at dawn in midsummer;
And one who had clean forgot their past and all.
From a lit palace casement looks at her.
A lurid sunset, red as blood.
Firing a sombre, haunted wood;
And from the shadows, dark and fell.
One hurrying with the face of Hell.
Two at a banquet board alone,
In dalliance, the feast being done.
And one behind the arras stands,
Grasping an axe with quivering hands.
A high cliff'-meadow lush with Spring;
Gay butterflies upon the wing;
Beneath, beyond, unbounded, free.
The foam-flecked, blue, pervading sea.
Hidden in a trackless and primaeval wood.
Long-buried temples of an unknown race,
And one colossal idol; on its face
A changeless sneer, blighting the solitude.
A home on a fair English hill; away
Stretch undulating plains, of gold and green,
With park and lake and glade, and homestead
grey;
And crowning all, the blue sea dimly seen.
A great ship forging from the shore.
And on the broad deck weeping figures bent;
And on the gliding pierhead, sorrow-spent.
Those whom the voyagers shall see no more.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
MARCELU A. FITZGERALD.
MISS MARCELLA A. FITZGERALD was
bom in the Dominion of Canada, February
23» 1845. Her family removed to California in 1851
and settled in Santa Clara Valley, near Gilroy,
where they have since resided. She was educated
in the College of Notre Dame, San Jos^, Cal. She
has been a regular contributor to the press since
1865. I. A. K.
MAUD'S HERO.
He never said he loved me; never told
That tale we women like so well to hold
A precious treasure folded evermore
In our hearts* keeping, something to dream o'er
When duty calls the dear one from our side,
Or in the holy calm of eventide.
And yet I knew it: plainly I could trace
The story in the brightening of his face,
The kindling glances of his azure eye,
And tenderer accents when I lingered nigh;
For we were much together in those days
Of summer's glow and autumn's golden haze-
He a young poet, skilled in leamM lore
And the quaint legends of the days of yore,
From wearying labor for a while set free.
And resting there beside the sounding sea.
The days sped by with pleasure's cheery zest,
Till one wild eve, when cloud-veils draped the west,
And the Atlantic, summoning its host.
Charged in mad fury on the rocky coast.
I feel its thunders thrill my spirit yet
With a strange terror I can ne'er forget.
Then, as the night closed down without a star,
Arose the cry: **A vessel on the bar! "
High o'er the storm we heard a cannon boom:
Its flash revealed the brave ship through the gloom.
With broad decks crowded with a mortal freight,
Waiting 'mid surging seas a dreadful fate,
Waiting and praying 'mid the tempest's roar
For aid and safety from the friendly shore.
And the help came, for swift the tidings flew,
And from their huts the hardy fishers drew;
In that dread moment not a hand delayed.
But all were prompt and earnest in their aid:
The dainty loiterer from the distant town
Wrought with the sturdy toiler bold and brown.
I watched them man the life- boat, saw it start,
And with it went the joy of my young heart;
For he was foremost of the brave men there—
The few brave men with strength the waves to dare.
Tossed on the breakers, 'whelmed by rushing spray.
Steadfast and true it kept upon its way,
And all were rescued, all, all reached the shore,
Save him— I looked upon his face no more.
He died as heroes die: his strong young life
Went out amid the water's angry strife.
He died for others; may the God above
Accept his sacrifice of human love.
And Amy, dear, though years may intervene
My faithful heart will keep his memory green.
THE ROBIN.
Among the quiet peasants in Brittany they tell
This legend of the robin, by children loved so
well —
This legend of the robin, whose merry accents ring
Through every glade and covert sweet welcome to
the Spring.
They say that when the Savior to Calvary's rugged
crest
Bearing his cross, moved forward, sore, wounded
and oppressed.
When foemen thronged around him, and friends
fled far in fear.
Above the angry multitude a robin hovered near,
And, reckless of the tumult and angry cries of
scorn.
From out Christ's bleeding forehead it snatched
one cruel thorn;
Then o'er the robin's bosom the sacred blood
flowed down,
And with its ruby tindng dyed the plumes of russel
brown.
And evermore the sweet bird bore upon its tender
breast
The warm hue of the Savior's blood, a shining seat
impressed.
Hence dearest to the peasants' heart, 'mid birds ol
grove and plain,
They hold the robin, which essayed to soothe the
Savior's pain.
SLANDER.
Only a whisper, but that whisper fell
With blighting power upon a gentle heart.
The Upas breathing forth the fumes of hell.
The deadly wound given by a poisoned dart,
Were merciful compared to Slander's hiss — .
Which robbed a spirit of all earthly bliss.
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JOHN AUGUSTINE WILSTACH.
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JOHN AUGUSTINE WILSTACH,
291
Life lost its beauty, Friendship hid her face;
Love changed his vows to words of bitter scorn,
And midnight darkness black as sin's disgrace
Fell o'er her ere her youth had passed its mom;
While envious Slander joyed to see her pain,
As vultures revel o'er a battle plain.
MORNING.
Beneath star-gemmed arches glowing
In the Orient's gorgeous land,
Rose-hued robes about her flowing,
Diamond dew-drops on her wand,
In with merry, joyous air
Entereth Morning, sweetly fair.
Bright her lustrous eyes are glancing.
Round her flits a fairy train.
Onward moves she 'mid their dancing
Over ocean, hill, and plain,
Kissing Night's dark frown away,
Softly ushering in the day.
CHEER UP.
Keep a stout heart, friend, though fortune may
frown;
Let not life's burdens thus weigh thee down.
What are earth's pleasures but glittering dross ?
Tread in His footsteps who carried the Cross.
Sink not aweary, faint not with fear;
Angels are with thee to comfort and cheer.
Life's path not always leads through joy's bower;
Griefs will assail thee and tempests will lower.
But as the morning follows :he night.
After the shadow cometh the light —
The light of that morning which ever endures.
Whose beauty no storm-cloud of sorrow obscures;
The light of His presence in whose love is found
An armor unfailing to compass the round.
Girt with that armor, what is there to fear ?
Then up, friend, and onward! Be of good cheer.
Not to the coward the battle is given,
Nor to the faltering the glories of Heaven.
JOHN AUGUSTINE WILSTACH.
JOHN AUGUSTINE WILSTACH, lawyer and
author, of Lafayette, Indiana, was bom in
Washington, D. C, July 14, 1824, and is a son of
Dr. Charies F. and Hannah Whittier (Ustick) Wil-
stach, the father a graduate of the University of
Pennsylvania. The mother, as her middle name
suggests, is a relative of the Quaker poet. The
name Wilstach is German, being originally Wilds-
dach (deer park). The Wilstach family trace their
genealogy back to the time of the conquest of Gaul
by Clovis, king of the warlike tribe of the Salians,
** renowned," says Gibbon, "for their love of lib-
erty," who in 486 defeated the Roman Governor
Syagrius, in the battle of Soissons. As a result of
this victory the Roman estates were confiscated and
divided as rewards of meritorious service among
the officers and soldiers of the Salian army. Bruno,
one of the Salian generals, thus acquired the estate
of Deer Park in Alsatia, and was thereafter known
as Bruno de Wildsdach. His descendants were
counted among the ancient nobility, and have filled
many important posts of honor in church and state.
Six of them at least, according to the genealogical
tables preserved in the Imperial library at Vienna,
have been bishops, and a still larger number at-
tained distinguished military positions. At the age
of eleven years Mr. Wilstach, the subject of this
sketch, entered the Military and Academical Insti-
tute at Cincinnati, Ohio. That institute was under
the management of Prof. Ormsby M. Mitchell, af-
terwards major general, the renowned astronomer
and author, and founder of the Adams Observatory
at Cincinnati. Two years afterwards the institute
was transferred to, and formed the nucleus of, the
Cincinnati College, and there Mr. Wilstach enjoyed
the instruction of teachers of rare ability.
During the remainder of Prof. Mitchel's life-time
he and Mr. Wilstach were intimate friends. The
latter acquired at college, before attaining the age
of fifteen years, a knowledge of the higher mathe-
matics, and of the Greek, Latin and French lan-
guages, and since then has also studied German
and Italian. History and general literature have
also been specialties to which he has devoted atten-
tion.
Mr. Wilstach 's law practice has been lucrative,
and his investments in real estate have brought him
large gains. In 1867 he was appointed one of the
commissioners to the World's Fair at Paris. In
1874-75 he again visited Europe, remaining seven
months. By appointment from Governor Baker he
was also Commissioner of Immigration. In 1855
he was united in marriage to Miss Elbta Cecilia
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Patti, her father of Italian origin, and her mother of
English.
Mr. Wilstach is the author of numerous public
addresses, some of them in foreign tongues in
Europe. He has elaborated the subject of biblical
literature, and has written, as the result of this
elaboration, a free, philological translation of the
entire bible. This work, up to the present, remains
in manuscript He has published, through Hough-
ton, Mifflin & Co., in 1884, a metrical translation of
the entire works of Virgil, the first one in the Eng-
lish language, for even Dryden's is not complete;
and in 1889 through the same publishers, a rhymed
translation of the "Divine Comedy'* of Dante.
The metrical system used in this translation was in-
vented by Mr. Wilstach for the better setting forth
the style of the original. A critical work nearly
ready for the press is entitled " Dante, The Dan-
leans, and Things Dantean." The work will be a
review of the entire field of Dantean literature.
J. L. S.
OCEAN CURRENTS.
When salutes the waves Pacific
The prolific
Hot stream of the southern seas,
Landward in its warmth it blisses
Sends with kisses
Shoreward borne upon the breeze.
From the islands equatorial
T' wards the boreal
Zones it has its jubilant sweep.
All the blooms of Polynesia
Bathing Asia
Through its forceful current deep.
And from distant myrtled moorlands,
0*er our ore-lands,
Dimpling soft our tinted lakes.
Breezes come to bathe our mountains.
While from fountains
Dim, remote, sweet influence breaks.
Ever inward, smiling, smiling,
Care- beguiling,
Fragrance each far valley yields
Plants here fruits and health abundant,
And redundant
Wealth distributes o'er our fields.
So, when breezes warm and fragrant
Strike the vagrant
Dreams the poet wrap, arise
From each zone of passion ancient,
Howe'er transient,
Glimpses of a paradise.
Gleams come in from Indian oceans,
And emotions
Seize his soul, which peoples gone
In their seats, firm fixed or shifting,
Found uplifting.
In the songs of many a swan.
Love and will are his, and glory
Gilds the story
Of the visits of the tides
Bringing boons from where old nations
Visitations
Have received, and wreck abides.
Ever inward, smiling, smiling.
Like the filing
Fays that fill the mimic stage.
Come and bless his lines the glorious
Though laborious
Tributes of each mind and age.
TEACH US CONTENT.
O Northern Pole
Whereon all summer glows the attendant sun.
Whereon all winter glooms continuous night.
How doth thy lesson teach us hardihood won
From fortune*s moods of favor or of slight.
In cheer or dole!
O Northern Star,
Whereon our latitude looks throughout the year,
Which, seen from sea or land, a Pharos shines.
How like the Light Supreme, unchanged and clear.
Is thine, which all of all the heavens combines.
Or near or far!
O rolling Earth,
Which, light or dark, in grooves appointed glides,
And gives, in changing measure, joy or pain.
Teach us content, in all the ebbs and tides
Of God's allotment, and the loss or gain
Death gives or birth!
LIFE AND DEATH.
To die is but to live again
Diviner life in nobler spheres;
To live is but a moment vain
Compared with never-ending years.
Hope steers a troubled voyage here,
It watches stars that change and set;
Hope in the heavens loses fear
And wears a starry coronet.
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JOHN AUGUSTINE l^ILSTACH, 293
How blest the memory of the just!
How sweet their rest on Eden's shore!
They know, where we can only trust;
They praise, where we can but implore.
"See whom," the father said, *'my child ? "
"The angel, like to those
Are pictured in our Bible, me
She beckons as she goes,
If music here of singing birds
And garnish sunshine thrill the heart,
What joy must heavenly seraphs' words,
Attuned to golden chords, impart!
"Her palm-branch waves she, and she means
I shall her follow, see.
See, how she nearer comes to earth,
And seems to call to me! '*
Why, when our pure and good in peace
Resign this' earth for happier skies,
Should sorrow still refuse to cease.
And griefs hot tear drops sadly rise?
The father looked, the mother, all
None could the angel see.
But in the blinding storm went forth
The little Rosalie.
But no! Our tear-drops are the soul
That bursts in pearls upon the cheek;
Good angels watch them as they roll;
The eyes of God were mild and meek.
And followed all, not doubting fear
Had crazed the beauteous child,
And caring nothing in such mood
For all the tempest wild.
Crash, crash, and blinding levin smote
Behind them ruin wide.
The child rushed on in ecstasy.
While all with terror cried.
And, in that moment, 'gan to fade
The gold from out the sky.
And left sweet Rosalie's raptured ken
THE BALLAD OF ROSALIE.
*TwAS *mongst the hop-vined glens of Kent
And poppied fields of grain,
The May-day sports were broken in
By mighty drops of rain.
Swiftly the May-queen sought the roof,
With all her blooming court,
And with the crown which on her brow
Had laid the merry sport.
The angel now so nigh.
And looked the terror-stricken crowd,
Behind them, and beheld
A burning ruin flat the house
Wild rolled the clamor of the skies.
The tempest fiercely howled,
Through dark clouds levin flashed, and then
The blackened heavens scowled.
The patriarch of the cottage up
The well-thumbed Bible took.
And sought to make the children hear
Words from the blessed Book,
When came such crashing bolts that voice
None in that hour was heard.
Sight e'en was blinded, only sobs
At times the silence stirred.
Expected all to hear the crash
Would set their spirits free,
First wind, then forked fire, had torn
To shreds the nearest tree.
When, all at once, fair Rosalie,
The little four-year-old.
Said, *' Father, look! I see her come
Enclosed in gleaming gold! '*
Whence they had been so spelled.
And all owned then the angel sent
By heaven's sweet charity,
To draw them from the danger forth.
Queen, court, and Rosalie.
WHAT IS A SONNET?
What is a sonnet ? 'Tis a little bell
Which rings, on paper, melodies of the heart;
Its silvery tones no terrors rude impart
In tinklings clear its quick-wrought numbers swell
And reign in realms where fairy echoes dwell.
'Tis heard in sweet philosophy's path where start
Tear-drops, full oft, when, free from guile or art,
The touched emotions own Sibylline spell.
Huge bells there be which storm or danger clang,
Or with the epic muse sing fame and arms:
Our little bell such numbers never rang;
Its carillons' peals brings only love's alarms,
Like that which from the altar sends its sound.
Or that which says your guest your door hath found.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
WHAT DID THEY SAY?
Fatigued by numerous calls of late,
"Say I'm not in," the lady said.
" What did they ? " the lady prayed,
As from the door returned the maid.
" Each in a breath the same thing said,"
Replied the maid, * How fortunate! ' "
IN WHAT MOOD?
"ALLZEIT LROHLICH 1ST CEPAHRLICH."
I.
He who is always gay is ofl in danger,
He who is always sad a burden bears,
He on whom Fortune smiles is not a stranger
To strifes, illusions, envyings, dreams and cares.
II.
What then ? Combine them all, be cheerful
When mirth the moment rules; and then, with grace
Receive each serious word, each thought that's
tearful;
And greet fair Fortune with her own sweet face.
NATURE.
There is a beauty in the early prime
Of nature seen not in the later time;
There is a freshness then, a choice perfume
That civilization hastens to its doom,
And, doomed, it ne'er can be replaced: the tint,
Mixed of the skies and earth's all-modest glint.
Fair nature wears, no art cosmetic yields;
And culture robs us of those perfumed fields.
Simplicity in character has more
Attractiveness than all a bookworm's lore.
— The Battle Forest.
WORSHIP.
The ancient worship ceased, and came the new.
New symbols, knowledge new and high and pure,
But much remained of beautiful and true
Left by the old that ever shall endure.
Nature remained the same, and ancient seats
Firm-fixed foundations furnished the new faith;
In some things one religion but repeats
That which, in other words, the older saith.
— Monte Cassino.
MARGHERITA ARLINA HAMM.
MISS MARGHERITA ARLINA HAMM was
bom in Montreal, Canada. She is a de-
scendant from a long line of scholarly ancestors.
Among her forefathers were literary men, theo-
logians and soldiers. She has in her veins the best
blood of southern France. Her maternal grand-
father was Rev. Harold Jean Spencer, a prominent
Episcopalian clergy-man, who was the author of
several widely-known pamphlets of the controver-
sial order. Her paternal grandfather was General
Pierre Hamm, a leader in the Liberal party in
Montreal, Canada. Miss Hamm was only thirteen
years of age when she began to write for the news-
papers. She found her first regular position on
the Boston Herald^ and for four years she did all
kinds of work on that journal. She then went to
New York and joined the staflf of the World.
Among her notable work was an interview with
Mr. Cleveland on the tariff question, in 1889, which
was cabled to the London, Eng., Times. Another
well-known achievement was her Bar Harbor in-
terview with Mr. Blaine. She has done much
** special " work for most of the New York dailies
and at the same time corresponded for a number of
western journals. She conducted the women's
department of the United Press Literary Budget.
Besides her prose work, covering everything in the
line of daily journalism, Miss Hamm is a writer of
much graceful verse, and her poems have appeared
in Current Literature, Youth's Companion^ New
England Magazine and other leading periodicals.
Wherever and whenever brought into direct rivalry
with male journalists, she had shown her ability to
do the work far better than most of the men, and
as well as the best of them. In political work she
has been very successful. H. A. T.
THE SILENT WITNESS.
Go where I may by night or day
I cannot hide or flee away.
However gay or fair the scene
This spectre makes all glory mean.
Smiles wreathe my lips, and I forget
The gruesome object there — and yet-
Perchance no eye but mine can see
This silent foe that tortures me.
Ah, who can guess the hidden grief
From which there never comes relief.
The sudden terror, guilty start
That inward bleeding of the heart.
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Joy like a butterfly takes wing —
The birds are gone, that gladdened spring;
The calm contentment, once I knew,
Seems vanished with the morning dew.
This silent witness I conceal,
Lest its dread presence chance reveal;
With stricken hope and studied care
I cover up my first grey hair.
I've mocked at others growing old.
Laughed at the silver mid the gold.
Alas I knew not nor could know
That pang until Youth turned to go.
To woman this means careless friends,
The loss of power, high aims and ends,
For even beauty learns the truth,
A woman's strength is in her youth.
That tender blush on lip and cheek.
The sparkling glance that seems to speak,
The roguish smile, the saucy tongue,
Ah! happiness is to be young.
Another takes your place to dance,
Another meets his ardent glance:
Your love will turn to one more fair,
Who has not found the first grey hair.
"TO HER LIPS."
No, ne'er did singing by its flattering art
To two Vermillion lips more charms impart;
Less sweet the flute's enchanting tones appear.
When softly stealing o'er the slumbering ear;
Your accents Love's own God himself must teach,
Por they the heart as well as ear can reach.
O Dolly, blest indeed the youth must be
To whom you deign to ope those lips of rose;.
But still a hundred times more blest is he
Who may presume those lovely lips to close.
THE COOKING SCRIBE.
Wise in her daily work was she
To fruits, pies, cakes immense,
And not to Faith or polity
She plied her common sense.
In her opinion it was cooking
Made the paper worth the looking,
So she put sweet herbs and thyme
In her prose and in her rhyme.
And the hungry readers grew more every night,
As the circulation went quite out of sight.
A TINT OF GOD.
There is a smile angelic in the sea,
There is a voice seraphic in the wind.
Each bit of nature is divinity to me,
A thought of that great infinite mind.
There is a trace of heaven in every voice.
There is a spark of eternity in every breast.
Each tint of God makes all my heart rejoice,
And to my soul brings harmony and rest.
A LENTERN STUDY.
She's so sweet and meek and lowly.
During Lent so pious, holy.
Thinking not of fashion's whirl,
That I dare not make a mention.
Or pay anywhere attention
To another pretty girl.
She's in Lent a Christain martyr.
Wrapped in chiffon, lace and pearl.
CHRISTMASTIDE.
Through the grey and frosty heavens.
Silver stars are shining bright;
Sparkling eyes in the throngs a-shopping,
Almost match their gleaming light.
While the winter snow is lying.
While the winter winds are sighing.
On this dazzling Christmas night.
Out from every church's steeple.
Heavenly bells sound sweet and clear,
Never with such melting gladness
Save when Christmastide is here.
All the people now make merry
Christmas comes but once a year.
Rich and poor feel love and blessing.
From the gracious heavens fall.
Joy and plenty in the poor house,
Peace and comfort in the Hall.
LOVE.
Time is long when thou art absent.
Time is short when thou art near;
When I truly feel your presence,
I forget all time, my dear.
— Love is Time,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
WILLIAM ALLINGHAM.
WILLIAM ALLINGHAM was born at Bally-
shannon in the northwest of Ireland in 1828,
and descended from an old Anglo-Irish family.
In his youth he was influenced strongly by the
* Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood,' and was for many
years editor of Eraser, In 1874 he married Miss
Helen Paterson, the artist He has published
** Poems,*' 1850; ''The Music Master, and Day and
Night Songs," 1854; "Lawrence Bloomfield in Ire-
land: a Modem Poem, in Twelve Chapters," 1864;
** Songs, Poems, and Ballads," 1877; ** Evil May-
Day," 1883; *• Ashley Manor" (Drama), 1883;
"Black-berries Picked Off Many Bushes," 1884.
H. F". R.
LOVELY MARY DONNELLY.
Oh, lovely Mary Donnelly, it's you I love the best!
If fifty girls were round you I'd hardly see the rest.
Be what it may the time of day, the place be where
it will,
Sweet looks of Mary Donnelly, they bloom before
me still.
Her eyes like mountain water that's flowing on a
rock.
How clear they are, how dark they are! and they
give me many a shock.
Red rowans warm in sunshine and wetted with a
shower,
Could ne'er express the charming lip that has me
in its power.
Her nose is straight and handsome, her eyebrows
lifted up.
Her chin is very neat and pert, and smooth like a
china cup.
Her hair's the brag of Ireland, so weighty and so
fine;
It's rolling down upon her neck, and gathered in a
twine.
The dance o' last Whit-Monday night exceeded aU
before.
No pretty girl for miles about was missing from the
floor;
But Mary kept the belt of love, and O but she was
gay!
She danced a jig, she sung a song, that took my
heart away.
When she stood up for dancing, her steps were so
complete.
The music nearly killed itself to listen to her feet;
The fiddler moaned his blindness, he heard her so
much praised,
But blessed his luck to not be deaf when once her
voice she raised.
And evermore I'm whistling or lilting what you sung.
Your smile is always in my heart, your name beside
my tongue;
But you've as many sweethearts as you'd count on
both your hands,
And for myself there's not a thumb or little finger
stands.
*Tis you're the flower o' womankind in country or
in town;
The higher I exhalt you, the lower I'm cast down.
If some great lord should come this way, and see
your beauty bright,
And you to be his lady, I'd own it was but right
O might we live together in a lofty palace hall,
Where joyful music rises, and where scarlet curtains
fall!
O might we live together in a cottage mean and
small.
With sods of grass the only roof, and mud the only
wall!
O lovely Mary Donnelly, your beauty's my distress.
Its far too beauteous to be mine, but I'll never wish
it less.
The proudest place would fit your face, and I am
poor and low;
But blessings be about you, dear, wherever you
may go!
THE DIRTY OLD MAN.
A LAY OF LEADEN HALL.
In a dirty old house lived a Dirty Old Man;
Soap, towels, or brushes were not in his plan.
For forty long years, as the neighbors declared.
His house never once had been cleaned or
repaired.
'Twas a scandal and shame to the business-like
street.
One terrible blot in a ledger so neat:
The shop full of hardware, but black as a hearse.
And the rest of the mansion a thousand times
worse.
Outside, the old plaster, all spatter and stain,
Looked spotty in sunshine and streaky in rain;
The window-sills sprouted with mildewy grass,
And the panes from being broken were known to
be glass.
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WILLIAM ALLINGHAM,
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On a rickety signboard no learning could spell
The merchant who sold, or the goods he'd to sell;
But for house and for man a new title took growth,
Like a fungus — ^the Dirt gave a name to them
both.
Within, there were carpets and cushions of dust,
The wood was half rot, and the metal half rust,
Old curtains, half cobwebs, hung grimly aloof;
*Twas a Spiders' Elysium from cellar to roof.
There, king of the spiders, the Dirty Old Man
Lives busy and dirty as ever he can;
With dirt on his fingers and dirt on his face.
For the Dirty Old Man thinks the dirt no disgrace.
From his wig to his shoes, from his coat to his
shirt.
His clothes are a proverb, a marvel of dirt;
The dirt is pervading, unfading, exceeding —
Yet the Dirty Old Man has both learning and
breeding.
Fine dames from their carnages, noble and fair.
Have entered his shop— less to buy than to stare;
And have afterwards said, though the dirt was so
frightful,
The Dirty Man's manners were tniely delightful.
Upstairs they don't venture, in dirt and in gloom —
Mayn't peep at the door of the wonderful room
Such stories are told of, not half of them true;
The keyhole itself has no mortal seen through.
That room — forty years since, folk settled and
decked it.
The luncheon's prepared, and the guests are ex-
pected.
The handsome young host he is gallant and gay.
For his love and his friends will be with him to-
day.
With solid and dainty the table is drest,
The wine beams its brightest, the flowers bloom
their best;
Yet the host need not smile, and no guests will ap-
pear.
For his sweetheart is dead, as he shortly shall hear.
Full forty years since, turned the key in that door.
'Tis a room deaf and dumb 'mid the city's uproar.
The guests, for whose joyance that table was
spread.
May now enter as ghosts, for they're every one
dead.
Through a chink in the shutter dim lights come
and go;
The seats are in order, the dishes a-row;
But the banquet was wealth to the rat and the
mouse
Whose descendants have long left the Dirty Old
House.
Cup and platter are masked in thick layers of dust;
The flowers fall'n to powder, the wine swathed in
crust;
A nosegay was laid before one special chair,
And the faded blue ribbon that bound it lies there.
The old man has plaid out his parts in the scene.
Wherever he now is, I hope he's more clean.
Yet give we a thought free of scoffing or ban
To that Dirty Old House and that Dirty Old Man.
NANNY'S SAILOR LAD.
Now fare-you-well! my bonny ship.
For I am for the shore.
The wave may flow, the breeze may blow.
They'll carry me no more.
And all as I came walking
And singing up the sand,
I met a pretty maiden,
I took her by the hand.
But still she would not raise her head,
A word she would not speak.
And tears were on her eyelids,
Dripping down her cheek.
Now grieve you for your father ?
Or husband might it be ?
Or is it for a sweetheart
That's roving on the sea ?
It is not for my father,
I have no husband dear.
But oh! I had a sailor lad
And he is lost, I fear.
Three long years
I am grieving for his sake.
And when the stormy wind blows loud,
I lie all night awake.
I caught her in my arms.
And she lifted up her eyes,
I kissed her ten times over
In the midst of her surprise.
Cheer up, cheer up, my Nanny,
And speak again to me;
O dry your tears, my darling.
For I'll go no more to sea.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
I have a love, a true true love,
And I have a golden store,
The wave may flow, the breeze may blow,
They'll carry me no more!
THE BRIGHT LITTLE GIRL.
Her blue eyes they beam and they twinkle,
Her lips have made smiling more fair;
On cheek and on brow there's no wrinkle,
But thousands of curls in her hair.
She's little, — you don't wish her taller;
Just half through the teens is her age;
And baby or lady to call her,
Were something to puzzle a sage.
Her walk is far better than dancing;
She speaks as another might sing;
And all by an innocent chancing.
Like lambkins and birds in the spring.
Unskilled in the airs of the city.
She's perfect in natural grace;
She's gentle, and truthful, and witty.
And ne'er spends a thought on her face.
Her face, with the fine glow that's in it,
As fresh as an apple-tree bloom —
And O! when she comes, in a minute,
Like sunbeams she brightens the room.
As taking in mind as in feature.
How many will sigh for her sake!
I wonder, the sweet little creature,
What sort of a wife she would make.
DANGER.
I STROVE for wicked peace, but might not win;
The bonds would bite afresh, one moment slack.
"Then burst them!" . . . instantly I felt
begin
Damnation. Falling through a chasm of black,
I swiftly sunk thousands of miles therein.
Soul grew incorporate with gross weight of sin,
Death clung about my feet: let none dare track
My journey. But a far Voice called me back.
I breathe this world's infatuating air,
And tremble as I walk. Most men are bold —
Perchance through madness. O that I could hold
One path, nor wander to the fen, nor dare
Between the precipice and the wild beast's lair!
For penalties are established from of old.
SOPHRONIA YOUNG KINNE.
SOPHRONIA YOUNG KINNE, was born
January ist, 1818 in a suburban village near
Syracuse, N. Y. Her grandfather, John Young,
Esq., was the first settler of that place, in 1788,
and her father. Rev. Seth Young, one of the early
pioneer preachers of the Methodist Episcopal
Church. He traveled extensively through central
and northern New York when the country was an
almost unbroken wilderness. The family were lin-
eal descendents of Rev. Christopher Youngs, vicar
of Reyden and Southwold, England. . He was
chaplain of Windsor in Queen Elizabeth's reign.
His son, Rev. John Youngs, was the first minister
of the gospel at Southhold, Long Island, where
he settled with his followers from England in
1638.
In early childhood there was developed in Miss
Young a religious element that has been the gov-
erning principle of her life. Taught by example
the sweet amenities of life in Christian parents,
and occupying the center of a circle of six loving
sisters and two brothers. Her inner being was
thus strengthened and matured into a consecrated
life. Her education was gained in the district
school of her native village, with the exception of
a term at Cazenovia Seminary. She then engaged
in teaching for some time until her marriage to
Elbridge Kinne. To the old ancestral homestead
of that family, she came in the early years of
womanhood and has given, what was her joy to
bestow, the loving service of a devoted Christian
mother. In the hearts of her children and friends
will always remain the cherished memory of a
home life made ideal by both father and mother
in the exercise of the highest Christian graces.
Not until the children had gone out of it in later
years did she find time to pen the thoughts that
have always made her inner life transcendent.
She is a lover of nature and always mindful of
her voice. At times she gives the reins to fancy
and indulges in charming creations that are much
admired. She writes for the love of it and although
solicited has rarely given her poems for publication.
Mr. and Mrs. Kinne celebrated their golden anni-
versary October 17th, 1887. C. Y. W.
SHADOWS.
Over the clover math,
Down in the dell,
Fol'wing the mountain path
Where sunbeams dwell,
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■ SOPHRONIA YOUNG KINNE.
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Nooning beneath the eaves,
Nature attired in spotless white
Climbing the vine,
With folded hands is taking rest,
Dancing among the leaves,
Those busy hands, in summers light
Crowning the pine.
Through summers heat, they work the best.
Formed in the cloudy realm,
Floating in light,
Her princess-robe which art defies,
Guided by unseen helm,
Woven in mystic loom, and dyed
Stranded at night,
By chemists rare of earth and skies.
Emblem of mortal day.
Like a worn wrap is cast aside.
Vanishing soon.
Coronet, robe, and cloak of cost.
Would they might longer stay-
Betoken her a bride arrayed,
Shadows of June.
The bridegroom Frost, young Jackson Frost
Has publis(}ed bans through glen and glade.
Into our homes they creep
Hushing our breath,
And pages sent in airy flight
Throughout the house they keep
This notice drop. Behold ! Behold ! !
Stillness of death.
Dame Nature decked in silvery white
Treasures we loved are hid
Wed to the Polar King so bold.
Shrouded in white.
The rain and hail with snow and sleet
Cold 'neath the coffin lid
Hasten his mandate to obey
Lying to-night;
As heralds fly on winged feet
Cover the dainty form
With clarion voice prepare the way.
With roses red;
Let the sun bright and warm.
In bristling mail Jack Frost is seen
Shine on her bed;
Bestud with gems of priceless worth
Finish the parting song
Sparkling in Luna's silver sheen
With joyful breath,
As if the stars were come to earth;
Linger they all too long;
A wreath of pearls his diadem,
Shadows of Death.
His locks with silver powdered o'er.
His eyes outshine Golcondas gem.
Etown in the vale so still
And dim the far-famed Kohinoor.
Whither we go.
Shadows of houses fill,
And all the guests seem in a blaze
Gloomy and low.
In wedding vestments from his store,
Yet sadder were the hours.
From which the myriad starry rays
Deeper the gloom,
Reflected are, by myriads more.
When lay in Death's dark powers
Assembled all ? delays the priest ?
Christ in the tomb.
List to the rolling of his car,—
But Lo! an angel bright
In cowl and sacerdotal vest
Swift from above.
The North wind hails from polar star.
Came e'er the morning light
On wings of love,
Rolled back the sealed stone.
His chariot groans; the charioteer
Direct from court of Arctic clime
Lifted the gloom;
Jesus the risen One
Unveils the tomb.
Rich armor brings, with helm and spear
Unto this scion of ancient Rime.
Up rose the North Wind, " Unto thee.
♦
King, we give this maiden fair
To have and hold thine own for aye.
THE FROST KING.
Till time dissolve these bonds of care."
The forests have a hoary look.
Then mazy whirl, the reel, the rout,
The darksome way is now more dreary.
Wildly began, and hand in hand
Chained is the babbling meadow brook.
To banquet hall they hasten out
And weary steps are yet more weary.
Where glittering snow-flakes waiting stand;
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
The side boards groan beneath the weight
Of frosted cakes and ices rare,
And viands served on crystal plate
Complete the bill of regal fare.
To make the festive scene replete
The elements have all combined,
And wood-nymphs clad in slippered feet
Dance to the piping of the wind.
The carnival runs wild and high
With flowing bowl, and clinking glass;
Sport on! ye revillers of the sky,
Till occasion asks it — But, Alas! —
»
The Southern breezes greet the king
And kissing, leave him bathed in tears,
Hb requiem shall the Zephyrs sing;
Hb death knell mark the passing years.
A subtle force behind the throne
Resistless as the tide of doom.
Marshalled by Spring, the conqueror comes,
To lay the Frost King in the tomb.
WHEN SINKS THE SUN.
When sinks the sun in Western sky,
And golden beams the mountains crown.
When darkling where the valleys lie
The shades of night are settling down.
His mountain horn the Herder takes
And Alpine twilight silence breaks
With summons loud, '' Praise the Lord God."
From crag to crag the song rebounds
And thro* the rockey dark defiles,
Where vocal anthem ne'er resounds.
Is heard the echo, and the whiles
Another catches the refrain
And urges on the joyous strain
Both loud and long, '* Praise the Lord God."
In chalet, hut, and duties round
Is heard the welcome call to praise,
Bend, every ear to catch the sound.
Bow, every head, each heart upraise,
That the Great Shepheard of the Sheep
May guard Hb people while they sleep.
Like towering angels bending low
The snow-capped mountains gather round.
Deeper the shadows fall below
And silent reverence profound
From loftiest peak to lesser height
The benediction comes, "Good Night!"
KATHARINE LEE BATES.
KATHARINE LEE BATES, the laureate ot
Wellesley, has a birthright of character and
intellect. Her grandfather, Rev. Joshua Bates,
was President of Middlebury College, and her
uncle, the late Joshua Bates of Boston, held an
honored place among the successful teachers of
that city. Her father, Rev. William Bates, was
settled in Falmouth, Mass., where she herself was
bom, on August 12th, 1859. He died three weeks
afterwards, leaving his children to the care of their
brave, bright and tenderly conscientious mother.
This lady fostered the literary tastes which began
early to appear in the little Katharine. After mak-
ing her mark in the public schools of two or three
Massachusetts towns, the girl entered Wellesley
College in 1876. Her reputation as a scholar had
preceded her; she soon held a unique place in the
college; and throughout her course she was Presi-
dent of the Class of '80, a dbtinction which can be
fully appreciated by those only who are familiar
with the annals of Wellesley. Her fellow-students
were attracted by her irrepressible wit and daring,
her profound mind, her unfailing practical insist-
ence on the brotherhood of mankind, her large
heart and nobility of soul. But college successes,
like those of later years, whether social or intellect-
ual, came to her by the way, and beckoned her in
vain from that secret and strenuous search for
truth which b the underlying effort of her life, and
from that love for poetry which b its master-pas-
sion. As a child she had begun the struggle to
express herself in verse, and out of the many
lyrical attempts of her undergraduate daN-s, one
found a ready place in the Atlantic Monthly^ while
another became the favorite song of her Alma
Mater, and is still sung there on occasions of high
festival. She was the Class Poet, and in 1886,
Commencement Poet.
After graduating from college, she taught for some
years in the Natick High School and the Dana Hall
Preparatory School. In 1885 she was called back
to Wellesley as instructor in the department ot
English literature. Steadily gaining in her excep-
tional power to teach and to uplift, always broad-
ening and deepening her already fine education,
she has risen step by step until she was appointed
Professor in her department.
Mbs Bates has been too faithful a teacher to
allow herself much time for authorship. Yet, in
the hurried intervals of her other duties, she has
edited Coleridge's "Ancient Mariner" and a col-
lection of "Ballads," with notes and suggestions
showing rare scholarship and insight; she ha^
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KATHERINE LEE BATES.
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written two story-books for young people, " Rose
and Thorn," and ** Hermit Island/* the former of
which took a first prize of seven hundred dollars
from the Congregational Publishing Society of
Boston, and she has contributed short stories,
sketches and lyrics to various periodicals, including
the Century^ Independent^ Christian Union^ Youth^s
Companion^ New England Magazine^ Chautau-
guan, Wide-Awake^ etc. But her power as a
writer should be estimated from her more serious
verse; such, for instance, as her poem on "The
Ideal," published in the Century ioi April, 1890.
Though her modesty and reverence forbid her
claiming for herself what she justly considers the
great name of poet, those who know her best are
conscious that a light is in their midst, and effectual
of its farther shining in years to come.
M. P. G.
" HE SHALL BE LIKE A TREE."
A BARREN tree against the sunset sky,
A brown, bleak tree, whose leaves of emerald
sheen,
Which singing birds were wont to peep between,
Long since have fallen. Through its summit high
The winter winds have swept with bitter cry.
And left it desolate, a crownless queen.
But beautiful, where golden clouds serene
The sharp, black outlines fill and glorify.
Ah Lord, dear Lord, my life is dry and bare:
How stript of summer grace is known to thee.
Shall nights of weariness and days of care
Be pleasing in thy sight ? Yea, passing fair.
If thus thy love stream through me, so I be
Within thy gracious light a naked tree.
THE ORGANIST.
Slowly I circle the dim, dizzy stair.
Wrapt in my cloak's gray fold.
Holding my heart lest it throb to the air
Its radient secret, for though I be old,
Though I totter and rock like a ship in the wind,
And the sunbeams come unto me broken and
blind,
Yet my spirit 'drinks youth from the treasure we
hold,
Richer than gold.
Princes below me, lips wet from the wine
Hush at my organ's swell;
Ladies applaud me with clappings as fine
As showers that splash in a musical well.
But their ears only hear mighty melodies ringing.
And their souls never know 'tis my angel there
singing,
That the grand organ-angel awakes in his cell
Under my spell.
There in the midst of the wandering pipes.
Far from the gleaming keys.
And the organ front with its gilded stripes,
My glorious angel lies sleeping at ease.
And the hand of a stranger may beat at his gate,
And the ear of a stranger may listen and wait,
But he only cries in his pain for these,
Witless to please.
Angel, my angel, the old man's hand
Knoweth thy silver way;
I loose thy lips from their silence-band
And over thy heart-strings my fingers play.
While the song peals forth from thy mellow-throat.
And my spirit climbs on the climbing note,
Till I mingle thy tone with the tones away.
Over the day.
So I look up as I follow the tone,
Up with my dim old eyes.
And I wonder if organs have angels alone,
Or if, as my fancy might almost surmise,
Each man in his heart folds an angel with wings.
An angel that slumbers, but wakens and sings,
When thrilled by the touch that is sympathy-wise,
Bidding it rise.
SLEEP, SORROW, SLEEP.
Slebp, Sorrow, sleep!
For I have watched thee weep
Till all the purpose of my days is riven.
Her quest forsaken, shall the soul be shriven ?
My vows are melted with unceasing woe,
As April rainfalls waste the winter snow.
Rest, Sorrow, rest!
For thee a curtained nest
Of faith and truth and lulling tendernesses
Is shaped within the spirit's dim recesses.
Where all the tumult of life's eddying stream
Sounds hollow as the rivers of a dream.
Rest, Sorrow, restl
Upon thy heaving breast
White poppy leaves I strew, so heavy-scented
I deem that pulsing heart will be contented
To droop on dull oblivion awhile,
As sinks the spent wave on a tropic isle.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Sleep, Sorrow, sleep!
Heaven send thee trances deep,
Too deep for dreams, till weary night hath ending
In rosy dawn, when Love, above thee bending,
As sunshine floods the long-enshrouded skies,
Shall kiss into a smile thy waking eyes.
ROBIN'S SECRET.
'Tis the blithest, bonniest weather for a bird to flirt
a feather,
For a bird to trill and warble, all his wee red
breast as well.
I've a secret. You may listen till your blue eyes
dance and glisten,
Little maiden, but Til never, never, never, never
tell.
You'll find no more wary piper, till the strawberries
wax riper
In December than in June— aha! all up and down
the dell,
Where my nest is set, for certain, with a pink and
snowy curtain,
East or west, but which I'll never, never, never,
never tell.
You may prick me with a thistle, if you ever hear
me whistle
How my brooding mate, whose weariness my
carols sweet dispel,
All. between the clouds and clover, apple-blossoms
drooping over.
Twitters low that I must never, never, never,
never tell.
Oh, I swear no closer fellow stains his bill in cherries
mellow.
Tra la la! and trilla lilla! I'm the jauntiest
sentinel,
Perched beside my jewel-casket, where be hidden
— don't you ask it.
For of those three eggs I'll never, never, never,
never tell.
Chirp! chirp! chirp! alack! for pity! who hath
marred my merry ditty ?
Who hath stirred the scented petals, peeping in
where robins dwell ?
Oh, my mate! May heaven defend her! Little
maidens' hearts are tender,
And I never, never, never, never, never meant to
tell.
COLLEGE SONG.
All hail to the College Beautiful!
All hail to the Wellesley blue!
All hail to the girls who are gathering pearls
From the shells that open to few!
From the shells upcast by the ebbing Past
On the shores where, faithful and true.
An earnest band, with the groping hand,
Are seeking the jewels from under the sand.
And spreading abroad through the breadth^of ^e
land
The name of the Wellesley blue.
CHORUS.
All hail to the College Beautiful!
All hail to the royal throne,
Whence, her heart within her burning,
Silver voiced, far-eyed Learning
Looks upon her own!
All hail to the College Beautiful!
All hail to the sacred walls,
Where, sinking away in the shadowy*gray,
Still the sun's last radience falls!
Where first on the lake the day-beams awake,
And the Spring's white menacles break.
But flushed in waking or pale in rest,
With leaves on her hair or with snows on her breast.
Forever the fairest and noblest and best,
All hail to her sacred walls!
CHORUS.
All hail to the College Beautiful! etc.
SLEEP.
the
I LAV me down before the rustic gate
That opens on the shadowed land of sleep*
I famish for its fruits and may not wait
To quafl'the drosy waters cool and deep.
I knock, O Sleep, the Comforter! Again
My weakness faints unto thy great caress.
The circling thought beats blindly through
brain
With dull persistency of barren pain, '
And draws uncertain doubting and distress
To prove that man unto himself is utter weariness.
Upon these withered grasses is no rest.
Thy crimson-dotted mosses are denied.
In dewy vines I see thy portal dressed.
But know that only on the further side
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MARY C. F. HALL-WOOD.
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MARY C R HALL- WOOD.
309
The purple grapes droop over. Take me in!
I do not fear to trust myself to thee.
Waking and danger are of closer kin,
But what hast thou to do with grief or sin ?
Imprisoned from myself, I wander free,
And no resplendent sun of moon grants such
security.
I would not lie to-night so near the bars,
If to thy realm fair entrance I may find,
That through them I might view our mortal stars
Or hear the passing of our pilgrim wind.
Not even would I wish some gentle friend
To lean against them with a loving face.
For rest and life were never willed to blend.
And as I watched the day unto its end,
So would I sleep the night without a trace
Not only of day's grievousness, but even of its
grace.
Nor spread my couch within thy garden-beds,
Where fairy forms from out the blossoms glance,
And catch the yellow moonlight on their heads
To shift it swiftly in the swaying dance.
Nor wrap my limbs in thine enchanted cloak
Beneath the trees whose hollow shadows teem
With changing faces of fantastic folk
And dim, disolving shapes, — ^thy wizard oak
Whose every leaf conceals a fabled dream.
Whose dipping boughs disturb thy hushed and
holy stream.
But take me to thy kingdom's very heart,
O solemn Sleep, with thee alone to dwell.
In deepest grotto hide me, far apart
From tone or touch, and guard mine eyelids well.
Yea, charm the weary senses deaf and blind,
And let me there lie face to face with thee.
So shall the morning cleave the clouds to find
Thy fragrance clinging to my waking mind.
But what thy lips did whisper unto me
I'll bear too fine for consciousness, too deep for
memory.
Then call my footsteps in, O silent warden.
For even as I plead, night waxes late.
Call thou my feet to rest Within the garden
And lift the latches of the rustic gate.
There grant me shelter till the blushing east
Proclaim another sun, whose golden gaze
Shall view me passing, from thy trance released.
With glad heart forth to share the generous feast
Of life, to run in God's appointed ways,
The songs of weariness all hushed in sweeter
psalms of praise.
MARY C. F. HALL-WOOD.
MARY CAMILLA FOSTER was born in New
York, and at an early age she was married
to Bradley Hall, a promising young lauyer. Mi-
grating with him to California, they settled in San
Rafael. He became a district attorney of Marin
county, and was rapidly rising -in his profession
when he died, leaving her in easy circumstances,
with an only son. Removing to Santa Barbara,
which has since been her home, she subsequently
was married to Dr. Edward Nelson Wood, a young
man of rare intellect and a brilliant writer, who ap-
preciated her poetic gifts and encouraged her to
write for the press. Her first poem was published
in a Santa Barbara journal in 1872. They estab-
lished the Santa Barbara Index in the fall of 1872,
but her husband's health was failing, and he died
in 1874. His long illness and unfortunate invest-
ments had dissipated her little fortune, and Mrs.
Wood found herself face to face with the necessity
of making a living for herself and son. Turning
naturally to literature as the only congenial or pos-
sible means, she entered a newspaper office and
made hersalf familiar with the practical details of
the business. In 1883 she helped to establish the
Daily Independent of Santa Barbara, which she
has since edited with ability and success, writing
poetry for her own amusement and the pleasure of
her readers as the inspiration came. Her first
volume, "Sea Leaves," was published from her
office in 1887. The book has received much atten-
tion from the press. Although never regularly
placed upon the market, it has been a financial
as well as a literary success. She has used the
pen-name "Camilla K. Von K.," but lately she
has used her full name, Mrs. C. F. Hall- Wood.
A. La G.
CORONADO BEACH IN 1870.
A STRONG wind sweeps the ancient town,
Her leveled walls, her quivering palms,
Her plaza, wide and bare and brown,
Across the land-locked harbor's calms.
From merry seas that whitely shine
Where Ocean's plunging ranks align.
And gaily beats against the breeze.
And veers, and turns, and tacks, and dips,
Our little bark, with pretty ease.
By walls and wharf and anchored ships;
Some mocking Ariel seems to hold
Her back from yonder bar of gold.
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But gaily still she turns and flies.
My love, the world is ours to-day:
Above us rest the luminous skies —
Beneath us bound the wavelets gay —
Beyond us in wide spaces free
To meet us springs the joyful sea!
At last we reach the strip of sand
Dividing bay from sea, and borne
Through tinted shelving shallows, land.
Our boat awaiting the return,
Swings idly on her anchor-chain.
While we, across the barren plain,
Walk ankle deep in sandy drifts,
Where with rare crystals jeweled o'er,
Her scarlet face the ice-plant lifts,
Sole blossom of this sterile shore:
An eerie flower she is, to be
The darling of this southern sea.
What treasures crowd the sands to-day,
By savage billows flung to us;
Red sea-leaves, sea-shells pearly grey,
And the pretty purple nautilus;
The big wave loves to play with him,
This little sailor quaint and trim.
Poor waif from unknown distances,
The storms that drove you rage no more;
Lie quietly, while roll the seas
In surging dactyls to the shore-
As wandering souls that have been driven
By earthly storms to coasts of heaven.
And lingering here, with doubt and dream
Of life that might be, life that is;
We, like these purple sailors, seem
Upon the golden breadth of peace
Left stranded — ah! but heart by heart,
No more to drift— no more to part
ATLAS.
Night! And the great sea seems to beat.
Moaning and thundering, under my feet;
And the stars hang low, like oranges.
Borne upon heaven's invisible trees.
Night! And an influence, rarely known
To my waking sense, is the undertone
Of sky and sea and the pallid rose.
That over my balcony sheds its snows.
I feel the pressure of crimes and cares;
'Tis the weight of the world my shoulder bears!
One may not be upright, but must be strong.
To carry the weight of the world along.
TOO LATE.
Has the trampled slave arisen,
Lit>eral, forbearing, free.
Out of hateful chains ai>d prison
Freshly bora to liberty ?
Can he, with sweet freedom gifted,
Rise at once to pure delight.
Into sudden sunshine lifted.
Out of night?
Cruel wounds that festered under
Iron links, can he forget ?
Though the chain be torn asunder,
Memory feels its thraldom yet
Years of black despair have taught him
Savage hates that cannot cease.
Sudden sunshine has not brought him
Sudden peace 1
SMOKE.
In the smoke of my dear cigarito
Cloud castles rise gorgeous and tall,
And Eros, divine muchachito.
With smiles hovers over it all.
But dreaming, forgetting to cherish
The fire at my lips, as it dies.
The dream and the rapture must perish.
And Eros descend from the skies.
O wicked and false muchachito.
Your rapture I yet may recall;
But like my re-lit cigarito
A bitterness ting^ it all!
DEATH.
Death sleeps and is quiet. Death lieth so still.
With the gray shadow veiling the face,
When the soul has flown out with a desperate thrill
And the body encumbeijs its place.
FRIENDSHIP.
Friends, like frightened sea-birds, fly
Fast before the weather;
Friendship and prosperity
Blow down the wind together.
— Fragments.
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CO VENTR Y PA TMORE.
311
COVENTRY PATMORE.
COVENT,RY KEARSEY DIGHTON PAT-
MORE (he has practically discarded the two
middle names) saw the light of Woodford, in Essex,
on July 2, 1*823. He is the son of the late P. G.
Patmore, a successful literary man, who is still
remembered as the author of "Literary Remin-
iscences," and also as the sometime editor of Col-
bum's New Monthly Magazine y to which he largely
contributed. Mr. Coventry Patmore was thus
reared in the congenial atmosphere of literary life
from the first. In 1844, that is, when he was only
twenty one, he published his first volume of
•* Poems,** a work which indicated the finest per-
ception, and, to the eyes of the discerning, held out
the promise which after years was so amply to fulfil.
The opening piece, "The River," is especially
finished and musical.
In 1846 he was appointed one of the assistant
librarians of the British Museum; and was associ-
ated with the leaders of the pre-Raphaelite move-
ment so far as to contribute several pieces to " The
Germ." In 1853, his volume titled "Tamerton
Church Tower, and other Poems," was published,
and, in the eyes of the more critical, advanced him
to a still higher position in the roll of our poets; but
during the next year his place was made secure by
the publication of the first portion of the "Angel in
the House" (The Betrothal). "The Espousals"
came next, in 1856; and a revised edition of the
two parts was issued in 1858; and a further revision
followed in i860. In the same year appeared
"Faithful for Ever;" and in 1863 "The Angel in
the House " was completed by the publication of
the " Victories of Love." An important recast of
the whole work was made in 1868 — the same year
in which Mr. Patmore retired from the British
Museum, after which he bought and occupied an
estate of some 400 acres in Sussex, which he farmed
and improved.
In 1S68 he settled in Hastings, occupying one of
the most delightful of old-fashioned mansions —
" not quite in the busy world, nor quite beyond it "
— completely protected from all winds save the
"sweet south," where ilexes and myrtles bloom
along the slope precisely as in Italy. Near by he
has built a large Catholic Church. His interests in
religious and philanthropic work go in harmony
'with his poetic labors. In 1877 appeared "The
Unknown Eros, and Other Odes," as remarkable
for elaborate finish as for fine conception; and in
1878 a collected edition of his works, elaborately
revised once more, was given to the public. The
list of Mr. Patmore'3 works would be incomplete
without reference to "The Childffen's Garland,"
one of the most select and tasteful of poetic anthol-
ogies, which he edited for "The Golden Treasury
Series," and the autobiography of Byran Walter
Procter (Barry Cornwall), which was published
under his editorship in 1877. Nor should we forget
the felicitous and scholarly translation of that re-
markable Cardiphonia of St. Bernard on "The
Love of God," which Mr. Patmore, along with a
member of his family, has accomplished, and which
was published in 1881. Mr. Patmore throughout
his literary career has also done good work in re-
views and journals, having contributed largely to
the Edinburgh Review^ North British Review^
National Review^ Saturday Review and to the
Pall Mall Gazette, and St. James's Gazette while
under his friend, Mr. Frederick Greenwood's edi-
torship. A. H. J.
THE ROSE OF THE WORLD.
Lo, when the Lord made north and south.
And sun and moon ordain^, he.
Forth bringing each by word of mouth
In order of its dignity,
Did man from the crude clay express
By sequence, and, all else decreed,
He formed the woman; nor might less
Than Sabbath such a work succeed.
And still with favor singled out,
Marred less than man by mortal fall.
Her disposition is devout.
Her countenance angelical.
No faithless thought her instinct shrouds,
But fancy checkers settled sense.
Like alteration of the clouds
On noonday's azure permanence.
Pure courtesy, composure, ease,
Declare affections nobly fixed,
And impulse sprung frOm due degrees
Of sense and spirit sweetly mixed.
Her modesty, her chiefest grace,
The cestus clasping Venus* side,
Is potent to defect the face
Of him who would affront its pride.
Wrong dares not in her presence speak,
Nor spotted thought its taint disclose
Under the protest of a cheek
Outbragging Nature's boast, the rose.
In mind and manners how discreet!
How artless in her very artl
How candid in discourse! how sweet
The concord of her lips and heart!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
How (not'to call true instinct's bent
And woman's very nature harm),
How amiable and innocent
Her pleasure in her power to charm!
How humbly careful to attract,
Though crowned with all the soul desires,
Connubial aptitude exact,
Diversity that never tires!
SWEET MEETING OF DESIRES.
I GREW assured before I asked,
That she'd be mine without reserve.
And in her unclaimed graces basked
At leisure, till the time should serve, —
With just enough of dread to thrill
The hope, and make it trebly dear;
Thus loaUi to speak the word, to kill
Either the hope or happy fear.
Till once, through lanes returning late,
Her laughing sisters lagged behind;
And ere we reached her father's gate,
We paused with one presentient mind;
And, in the dim and perfumed mist,
Their coming stayed; who blithe and free,
And very women, loved to assbt
A lover's opportunity.
Twice rose, twice died, my trembling word;
To faint and frail cathedral chimes
Spake time in music, and we heard
The chafers rustling in the limes.
Her dress, that touched me where I stood;
The warmth of her confided arm;
Her bosom's gentle neighborhood;
Her pleasure in her power to charm;
Her look, her love, her form, her touch!
The least seemed most by blissful turn, —
Blissful but that it pleased too much.
And taught the wayward soul to yearn.
It was as if a harp with wires
Was traversed by the breath I drew;
And oh, sweet meeting of desires!
She, answering, owned that she loved too.
SLY THOUGHTS.
** I SAW him kiss your cheek! " — *' 'Tis true.
'* O Modesty! "— '* 'Twas strictly kept:
He thought me asleep; at least, I knew
He thought I though he thought I slept."
PARTING.
If thou dost bid thy friend farewell,
But for one night though that farewell may be,
Press thou his hand in thine.
How canst thou tell how far from thee
Fate or caprice may lead his steps ere that to-mor-
row comes ?
Men have been known to lightly turn the comer of
a street.
And days have grown to months.
And months to lagging years, ere they have looked
in loving eyes again.
Parting, at best, is underlaid
With tears and pain.
Therefore, lest sudden death should come between.
Or time, or distance, clasp with pressure firm the
hand
Of him who goeth forth;
Unseen, Fate goeth too.
Yea, find thou always time to say some earnest
word
Between the idle talk, lest, with thee henceforth.
Night and day, regret should walk.
LOVES REALITY.
I WALK, I trust, with open eyes;
I've traveled half my worldly course.
And in the way behind me lies
Much vanity and some remorse.
I've lived to feel how pride may part
Spirits, tho' matched like hand and glove;
I've blushed for love's abode, the heart;
But have not disbelieved in love;
Nor unto love, sole mortal thing
Of worth immortal, done the wrong
To count it, with the rest that sing,
Unworthy of a serious song:
And love is my reward; for now.
When most of deadening time complain,
The myrtle blooms upon my brow.
Its odor quickens all my brain.
THE TRIBUTE.
No splendor 'neath the sky's proud dome
But serves for her familiar wear;
The far-fetched diamond finds its home
Flashing and smouldering in her hair;
For her the seas their pearls reveal;
Art and strange lands her pomp supply
With purple, chrome, and cochineal.
Ochre, and lapis lazuli;
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GRACE HIBBARD,
315
The worm its golden woof presents;
Whatever runs, flies, dives, or delves,
All doff for her their ornaments,
Which suit her better than themselves;
And all, by this their power to give
Proving her right to take, proclaim
Her beauty's clear prerogative
To profit so by Eden's blame.
HUSBAND.
Maid, choosing man, remember this:
You take his nature with his name;
Ask, too, what his religion is;
For you will soon be of the same.
— Tke Angel of the House,
WRONG.
The Wrong is made and measured by
The Right's inverted dignity;
Adulterous heart! as love is high
So low in hell thy bed shall be.
--Ibid.
MATERNITY.
The best things that the best believe
Are in her face so brightly writ,
The faithless, seeing her, conceive
Not only heaven, but hope of it.
With beauties so maturely fair,
Affecting, mild, and manifold.
Can girlish charms no more compare
Than nect'rines green with nect'rines gold.
—Ibid,
MODESTY
That nothing here may want its praise,
Know, she who by her dress reveals
A fine and modest taste, displays
More Loveliness than she conceals.
—Ibid.
GRACE.
Say Grace: it is not time mispent:
Worst food this betters, and the best,
Wanting this natural condiment,
Breeds crudeness, and will not digest
God loves no heart to others iced.
Nor erring flatteries, which bedim
Our glorious membership of Christ,
Wherein all loving His love Him.
All blessings ask a blessed mood:
The sauce is here much more than meat:
Happy who chooses gratitude!
That wanting, God will try regret.
—Ibid,
GRACE HIBBARD.
MRS. GRACE HIBBARD is the daughter of
the late L. Porter, D. D., a Massachusetts
clergyman, and a descendant of an old English
family. She was bom in a suburb of the city of
Boston, and there received her education. Her
early life was spent in New England, where, at her
father's knee when still a child, she learned the He-
brew and Greek alphabet long before she learned
the English. At an early age she was graduated
from a young ladies' college near Boston. Soon after
she was graduated her father removed to Chicago
where after a short time he died.
Mrs. Hibbard has spent the last few years in Col-
orado and California, and she has made a number
of trips to Mexico, where she studied the Mexican
character, which she has portrayed in her writings.
Her first literary work appeared in the Springfield,
Mass., Republican^ and since then she has been a
contributor to many of the leading magazines and
papers of America. In short stories and ballads she
excels. One short sketch, * * Bummer and Lazarus, ''
a story of San Francisco, was translated into the Ger-
man and printed in one of the leading papers pub-
lished in the German language. Not long ago she
received for the best short poem, from a leading
Eastern magazine a prize that was offered by the
publishers. A unique literary effort from her pen
was a complete novel of 100 words only, published
in Belford^s Magazine, Her short poems have
won her a reputation on the Pacific Coast. One of
the papers to recognize her ment as such a writer
was the Morning Call of San Francisco, which
did much to encourage her in developing her
talent. Many of her Pacific Coast poems have been
copied into the prominent papers of the United
States. She is a good conversationalist. In person
she is small, is fair, and has large blue eyes. About
three years ago she was married at Colorado
Springs, Col., to Dr. Hibbard, of Denver.
O. C. A.
WILD POPPIES.
THE STATE FLOWER OF CALIFORNIA.
Beautiful, golden wild poppies.
That nod in the soft, balmy air;
Well were you chosen the emblem
Of the land of the lands most fair.
Who planted you, golden poppies ?
Were you here when the world was new ?
Were you painted by the morning ?
Do you mirror the sunset's hue ?
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Do you grow from seeds of bright gold
That are hidden away from sight ?
Are you stars come down from the sky
That shine in the radiant light?
Are you golden cups o'erflowing
With jewels of rain-drop and dew ?
Why are you so constant-hearted ?
Tathe State that has chosen you ?
With gold you carpet the meadows,
Like the gold-paved '* Land of the Blest"
Wild poppies — the flower emblem
Of the State of " The Golden West"
SUSPENSE.
The sky and the sea like two nuns
Wear mantles of gray,
And like a black cross seem the masts
And the yards of a ship far away.
Is.it coming, coming to me
This heavy black cross ?
Shall the hopes and joys of my life
Suffer pitiful shipwreck and loss ?
The ship like a bird on the wing,
Seems only to stay.
Alas! it is coming, it tacks,
Oh! thank God it is sailing away.
A CIGERETTE.
The day is dying. In the western sky
The sun still lingers, brightness lies on waves,
The fallen shield of day. There comes to me
A vision fair, as curling mist-wreaths fly
Across the sun-like puff of smoke. There lies
Upon the window-sill a cigarette.
A tiny thing from Egypt far, and yet.
The lotus floating on the Nile, blue skies,
Tall palms, and faces dark, fade fast away;
And Venice rises up from waves of blue,
Its waters tinted with the sunset's hue;
And melody of bells at close of day.
A traveler— The sunset lingers yet
As does the vision, and— the cigarette.
BLUEBELLS.
The unseen fingers of the air
Set all the bluebells ringing.
My thoughts like birds that homeward fly,
Across the sea went winging.
To "banks and braes " where bluebells grow,
'Neath trees where birds are singing,
Their home and mine — did others hear
The bonnie bluebells ringing?
UP FROM THE SEA.
Wrapped in the cold, silver mist so white.
Up from the sea come the silent dead;
Through streets of the city with noiseless tread.
They wander together — 'tis All Souls' Night
One looks in the window, where long ago
Beloved at the hearthstone she had a place,
And she gazes long at a manly face.
** I love you, my husband," she murmurs low.
Men shuddering hurry along the street;
They shiver at touch of the cold white mist,
And they long for the morning's warm sunlight;
They know not 'tis spirit they love they meet,
They feel a horror they cannot resist,
Forgetting, alas! it is All Souls' Night
SAFE.
At the ebb of the tide, a stately ship,
Sailed away to a southern coast;
In the moonlight pale, with sails unfurled,
It seemed but a white, sheeted ghost
On the midnight tide, it drifted away;
Far away on the trackless main;
The stars shone bright, but the night-wind wailed,
*' It will never come back again."
The ship came back from the sunny south coast,
Like a bird, with its white wings spread;
The morning sun made the sea like gold.
And the wind with its warning had fled.
A WHITE CHRYSANTHEMUM.
Last night beside my hearthstone
She sat in snowy dress.
The firelight touched her golden hair
With many a fond caress.
She wore white autumn flowers.
Like frozen stars they seemed;
One flower she left, else I should think
Of angels I had dreamed.
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FRANCES FULLER VICTOR.
317
FRANCES FULLER VICTOR.
MRS. FRANCES FULLER VICTOR was
bom in Rome, N. Y. Her father was of an
old Colonial family, some of whom were among the
founders of Plymouth. She has on her mother's
side a long line of titled and distinguished ancestry,
ascending through thirty-nine generation to Egbert,
the first king of all England. When Frances was
nine years of age, she wrote verses on her slate in
school, and arranged plays from her imagination,
assigning the parts to her mates, to whom she ex-
plained the signification. At the agt of fcfurteen
she published verses which received favorable com-
ment, and at the age of eighteen some of her poems
were copied in English journals.
To her great delight her younger sister, Metta
Victoria, proved to possess a genius for poetry and
fiction which was of a high order, and the two sis-
ters were much bound together by their mutual
tastes and pursuits. At that time the family were
living in Ohio, to which State their parenrs had re-
moved, and it was a familiar boast of the Ohio press
that the State had two pairs of poet sisters, the
Carys and the Fullers. Frances and her sister
Metta married brothers. The younger sister re-
mained in the East, settling in the vicinity of New
York City, and Frances followed her husband, then
an officer in the naval service of the United States,
to California. At the close of the Civil War he re-
signed and went to settle in Oregon. In that new
world Mrs. Victor began to study with enthusiasm
the country and its history from every point of
view. She wrote stories, poems, and essays for
California publications, which, if collected, would
make several volumes. After the death of her hus-
band, in 1875, she returned to California and as-
sisted Mr. H. H. Bancroft on his series of Pacific
histories, writing in all six volumes of that work, on
which she was engaged for about eleven years.
Subsequently she resumed book-making on her
own account. Besides the great amount of literary
work done by Mrs. Victor which has never been
collected, the following works may be named:
** Poems of Sentiment and Imagination,'* published
in her girlhood; ** The River of the West; " "The
New Penelope, and Other Stories and Poems; "
"All Over Oregon and Washington," and "At-
lantis Arisen; " all of which, except the first volume
of poems, deal with the history and the romance of
the Northwest. Mrs. Victor is a woman of medium
height, with fair complexion, gray eyes and hair \
once auburn, changing to a softer tint. Her energy
and vitality are displayed in her vigorous prose.
Her home is in Portland, Oregon. H. A. K.
CHILDPOOD.
A CHILD of scarcely seven years,
Light haired, and fair as any lily;
With pure eyes ready in their tears
At chiding words, or glances chilly;
And sudden smiles, as inly bright
As lamps through alabaster shining.
With ready mirth, and fancies light.
Dashed with strange dreams of child-divining:
A child in all infantile grace,
Yet with the angel lingering in her face.
A curious, eager, questioning child,
Whose logic leads to naive conclusions;
Her little knowledge reconciled
To truth amid some odd confusions;
Yet credulous, and loving much
The problems hardest for her reason.
Placing her lovely faith on such,
And deeming disbelief a treason;
Doubting that which she can disprove,
And wisely trusting all the rest to love.
Such graces dwell beside your hearth,
And bless you in a priceless pleasure,
Leaving no sweeter spot on earth
Than that which holds your household treasure.
No entertainments ever yet
Had half the exquisite completeness —
The gladness without one regret.
You gather from your darling's sweetness:
An angel sits beside the hearth
Where e'er an innocent child is found on earth.
MOONLIGHT MEMORIES.
Do thy chamber windows open east.
Beloved, as did ours of old ?
And do you stand when day has cea.sed,
Withdrawn thro' evening's porch of gold,
And watch the pink flush fade above
The hills on which the wan moon leans,
Remembering the sweet girlish love
That blest this hour in other scenes !
I see your hand upon your heart —
I see you dash away the tears —
It is the same undying smart,
That touched us in the long-gone years;
And cannot pass away. You stand
Your forehead to the window presset.
And stifle sobs that no command
Can keep from rising in your breast.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
Dear, balm is not for griefs like ours;
Nor resurection for dead hope:
In vain we cover wounds with flowers,
That grow upon life's western slope.
Their leaves tho* bright, are hard and dry,
They have no soft and healing dew;
The pansies of past spring-times lie
Dead in the shadow of the yew.
You feel this in your heart, and turn
To pace the dimness of your room;
But lo, like fire within an urn,
The moonlight glows through all the gloom.
It sooths you like a living touch,
And spite of the slow-falling t^ars,
Sweet memories crowd with oh, so much.
Of all that girlhood's time endears.
On nights like this, with such a moon.
Full shining in a wintry sky,
Or on the softer nights of June,
When fleecy clouds fled thought-like by.
Within our chamber opening east,
With curtains from the window parted.
With hands and cheeks together prest,
We dreamed youth's glowing dreams, light-
hearted.
Or talked of that mysterious love
That comes like fate to every soul,
And vowed to hold our lives above,
Perchance its sorrowful control.
Alas, the very vow we made,
To keep our lives from passion free,
To wiser hearts well had betrayed
Some future love's intensity.
How well that youthful vow was kept.
Is written on a deathless page —
Vain all regrets, vain tears we've wept,
The record lives from age to age.
But one who '*doeth all things well,"
Who made us differ from the throng.
Has it within his heart to quell
This torturing pain of thirst, ere long.
And you, whose soul is all aglow
With fire Prometheus brought from heaven.
Shall in some future surely know
Joys for which high desires are given.
Not always in a restless pain
Shall beat your heart, or throb your brow;
Not always shall you sigh in vain
For hope's fruition, hidden now.
Beloved, are your tear-drop)s dried ?
The moon is riding high above: —
Though each from other 's parted wide.
We have not parted early love.
And tho' you never are forgot,
The moonrise in the east shall be
The token that my evening thought
Returns to home, and love and thee!
SOUVENIR.
You ask me, ** Do you think of me ? "
Dear, thoughts of thee are like this river,
Which pours itself into the sea,
Yet empties its own channel never.
All other thoughts are like this sail
Drifting the river's surface over;
They veer about with every gale —
The river keeps its course forever.
So deep and still, so strong and true.
The current of my soul sets thee-ward,
Thy river I, my ocean you,
And all myself am running seaward.
LOST AT SEA.
A FLEET set sail upon a summer sea:
'Tis now so long ago,
I look no more to see my ships come home;
But in that fleet sailed all 'twas dear to me.
Ships never bore such precious freight as these,
Please God, to any woe.
His world is wide, and they may ride the foam.
Secure from danger, in some unknown seas.
But they have left me bankrupt on life's change;
And daily I bestow
Regretful tears upon the blank account.
And with myself my losses re-arrange.
Oh, mystic wind of fate, dost hold my dower
Where I may never know ?
Of all my treasure ventured what amount
Will the sea send me in my parting hour!
RIVER.
Through deep ravine, through burning, barren
plain,
Through wild and rocky strait,
Through forest dark, and mountain rent in twain,
Toward the sunset gate.
— Sunset at Mouth of Columbia River,
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HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOVi^,
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HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.
QUOTATIONS.
TENNYSON.
Poet, I come to touch thy lance with mine;
Not as a knight who on the listed field
Of tourney touched his adversary's shield
In token of defiance, but in sign
Of homage to the mastery, which is thine,
In English song; nor will I keep concealed,
And voiceless as a rivulet frost congealed,
My admiration for thy verse divine,
Not of the howling dervishers of song,
Who craze the brain with their delirious dance
Art thou, O sweet historian of the heart!
Therefore to thee the laurel-leaves belong,
To thee our love and our allegiance.
For thy allegiance to the poet's art.
— ]^apentake.
AGB.
Whatever poet, orator, or sage
May say of it, old age is still old age.
Age is opportunity no less
Than youth itself, though in another dress,
And as the evening twilight fades away
The sky is filled with stars, invisible by day.
— Morituri Salutamus.
IMMORTALITY.
And in the wreck of noble lives.
Something immortal still survives.
— The Building of the Ship,
AMERICA.
Sail on, O Ship of State!
Sail on, O UNION, strong and great!
Humanity with all its fears.
With all the hopes of future years,
Is hanging breathless on thy fate!
—Ibid,
BAYARD TAYLOR.
Traveler! in what realms afar.
In what planet, in what star,
In what vast, aerial space.
Shines the light upon thy face ?
Poet, thou, whose latest verse
Was a garland on thy hearse;
Thou hast sung, with organ tone,
In Deukalion's life, thine own.
— Bayard Taylor,
RAPHAEL.
Raphael is not dead;
He doth but sleep; for how can he be dead
Who lives immortal in the hearts of men ?
He only drank the precious wine of youth,
The outbreak of the grapes, before the vintage
Was trodden to bitterness by the feet of men.
« » » » * «
I have but words of admiration
For his great genius.
And the world is fairer
That he lived in it. —Michael Angeh.
, INFLUENCE.
Each one performs his life-work, and then leaves it;
Those who come after him will estimate
His influence on the age in which he lived.
—Ibid,
SERVICE.
Bitter is servitude at best
TRUTH.
'Ibid.
The nimble lie
Is like the second-hand upon a clock;
We see it fly; while the hour-hand of truth
Seems to stand still, and yet it moves unseen,
And wins at last, for the clock will not strike
Till it has reached the goal.
—Ibid,
CHANGE.
When we are gone.
The generation that comes after us
Will have far other thoughts than ours. Our ruins
Will serve to build their palaces or tombs.
They will possess the world that we think ours,
And fashion it far otherwise.
—Ibid,
CLEMENCY.
I do not love thee less for what is done.
And cannot be undone. Thy very weakness
Hath brought thee nearer to me, and henceforth
My love will have a sense of pity in it,
Making it less a worship than before.
—Ibid.
MEN.
The men that women marry.
And why they marry them, will always be
A marvel and a mystery to the world.
3id,
CANDOR.
It is
The privilege of age to speak with frankness.
—Ibid,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
PRECOCITY.
Frost kills the flowers that bloom out of season;
And these precocious intellects protent
A life of sorrow or an early death.
--IMd.
RESERVE.
These silent men,
Who only look and listen, are like wells
That have no water in them, deep and empty.
—Ibid,
CHARITY.
Make not thyself the judge of any man.
— The Masque of Pandora,
DECISION.
Decide not rashly. The decision made
Can never be recalled. The gods implore not,
Plead not, solicit not; which once being passed
Return no more. — Ibid.
RESPECT.
He that respects himself is safe from others;
He wears a coat of mail that none can pierce.
—Ibid,
THOUGHT.
I need them not. I have within myself
All that my heart desires; the ideal beauty
Which the creative faculty of mind
Fashions and follows in a thousand shapes
More lovely than the real. My own thoughts
Are my companions; my designs and labors
And aspirations are my only friends.
—Ibid,
SLEEP.
Ye sentinels of sleep,
It is in vain ye keep
Your drowsy watch before the Ivory Gate:
Though closed the portal seems,
The airy feet of dreams
Ye cannot thus in walls incarcerate.
—Ibid,
TEMPTATION.
Satan desires us, great and small.
As wheat to sift us, and we all
Are tempted;
Not one, however rich or great,
Is by his station or estate
Exempted.
— The Sifting of Peter,
RENOWN.
Were a star quenched on high,
For ages would its light,
Still traveling downward from the sky,
Shine on our mortal sight
So when a great man dies.
For years beyond our ken,
The light he leaves behind him lies
Upon the paths of men.
— Charles Sumner,
DISENCHANTMENT.
*Twas but a dream, — let it pass, — let it vanish like
so
What I thought was a flower, is only a weed, and is
worthless!
— The Courtship of Miles Standish,
CiCSAR.
Truly a wonderful man was Caius Julius Oesar!
Better be first, he said, in a little Iberian village,
Than be second in Rome, and I think he was right
when he said it.
—Ibid.
SYMPATHY.
O little feet! that such long years
Must wander on through hopes and fears,
Must ache and bleed beneath your load;
I, nearer to the wayside Inn
Where toil shall cease and rest begin,
Am weary, thinking of your road!
— Weariness,
FORTUNE.
Fortune comes well to all that comes not late.
— The Spanish Student.
NECESSITY.
Something the heart must have to cherish,
Must love and joy and sorrow learn.
Something with passion clasp, or perish,
And in itself to ashes bum.
— Forsaken,
PERSEVERANCE.
The heights by great men reached and kept
Were not attained by sudden flight.
But they, while their companions slept.
Were toiling upward in the night
The Ladder of St Augustine,
HONOR.
Honor and blessings on his head
While living, good report when dead,
Who, not too eager for renown,
Accepts, but does not clutch, the crown!
— Ta/es of a Way side Inn,
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WORKERS.
All are architects of Fate,
Working in these walls of Time;
Some with massive deeds and great,
Some with ornaments of rhyme.
— The Builders,
STARS.
Silently one by one, in the infinite meadows of
heaven,
Blossomed the lovely stars, the forget-me-nots of
the Angels. — Evangeline,
PATIENCE.
Sorrow and silence are strong, and patient endur-
ance is godlike. — IHd.
BEAUTY.
When she had passed, it seemed like the ceasing of
exquisite music. — Ibid.
SOLITUDE.
Alas! to-day I would give everything
To see a friend's face, or to hear a voice
That had the slightest tone of comfort in it
—Judas Maccabeeus.
FORTITUDE.
O 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.
— The Light of Stars.
DESTINY.
Great men die and are forgotten,
Wise men speak; their words of widom
Perish in the ears that hear them.
— The Song of Haiwatha.
DEATH.
He is dead, the sweet musician!
» » # # »
He has moved a little nearer
To the Master of all music!
ANTICIPATION.
'Ibid.
It is a mystery of the unknown
That fascinates us; we are children still,
Wayward and wistful; with one hand we cling
To the familiar things we call our own,
And with the other, resolute of will,
Grope in the dark for what the day will bring.
— The Two Rivers.
AUTUMN.
Summer passed, and Shawondasse
Breathed his sighs o'er the landscape.
From the South-land sent his ardors,
Wafted kisses warm and tender;
And the maize-field grew and ripened,
Till it stood in all the splendor
Of its garments green and yellow.
Of its tassels and its plumage,
And the maize-ears full and shining
Gleamed from bursting sheaths of verdure.
— The Song of Hiawatha.
DISASTER.
Never stoops the soaring vulture
On his quarry in the desert.
On the sick or wounded bison.
But another vulture, watching
From his high aerial look-out.
Sees the downward plunge, and follows;
And a third pursues the second.
Coming from the invisible ether.
First a speck, and then a vulture,
Till the air is dark with pinions.
So disasters come not singly;
But as if they watched and waited,
Scanning one another's motions,
When the first descends, the others
Follow, follow, gathering flock- wise
Round their victim, sick and wounded.
First a shadow, then a sorrow,
Till the air is dark with anguish.
—Ibid,
ART.
Art is the child of Nature; yes.
Her darling child, in whom we trace
The features of the mother's face,
Her aspect and her attitude,
All her majestic loveliness
Chastened and softened and subdued
Into a more attractive grace.
And with a human sense imbued.
He is the greatest artist, then.
Whether a pencil or a pen.
Who follows Nature. Never man,
As artist or as artisan.
Pursuing his own fantasies.
Can touch the human heart, or please
Or satisfy our nobler needs,
As he who sets his willing feet
In Nature's footprints, light and fleet
And follows fearless where she leads.
— Keramos,
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
ENDURANCE.
There is something sublime in calm endurance.
— Hyperion,
BYRON.
So much to pardon — ^so much to pity — so much to
admire! Ibid,
SORROW.
Who ne*er his bread in sorrow ate,
Who ne'er the mournful midnight hours
Weeping upon his bed has sate,
He knows you not, ye Heavenly Powers.
— MoUOy Hyperion,
LOVE.
No one is so accursed by fate,
No one so utterly desolate.
But some heart, though unknown,
Responds unto his own.
— Endymion.
LOVE.
Like Dian's kiss, unasked, unsought,
Love gives itself, but is not bought;
Nor voice, nor sound betrays
Its deep, impassioned gaze.
^Ibid,
FAME.
Pride goeth forth on horseback grand and gay.
But cometh back on foot, and begs its way;
Fame is the fragrance of heroic deeds.
Of flowers of chivalry and not of weeds!
— Taies of a Wayside Inn,
JUNE.
Mine is the month of Roses; yes, and mine
The month of Marriages! All pleasant sights
And scents, the fragrance of the blossoming vine,
The foliage of the valleys and the heights;
Mine are the longest days, the loveliest nights;
The mower's scythe makes music to my ear;
I am the mother of all dear delights;
I am the fairest daughter of the year.
— The Poet's Calendar,
NIGHT.
The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.
— The Day is Done,
SADNESS.
A feeling of sadness and longing,
That is not akin to pain,
And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.
CARES.
-Ibid.
And the night shall be filled with music,
And the cares that infest the day
Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away. — Ibid,
DEATH.
There is no Death! What seems so is tran-
sition;
This life of mortal breath
Is but a suburb of the life elysian,
Whose portal we call Death.
— Pesignaiiin,
TEARS.
For there are moments in life, when the heart is so
full of emotion,
That if by chance it be shaken, or into its depths
like a pebble
Drops some careless word, it overflows, and its se-
cret,
Spilt on the ground like water, can never be
gathered together.
— The Courtship of Miles Standish,
SUN.
Forth from the curtain of clouds, from the tent of
purple and scarlet,
Issued the sun, the great High-Priest, in his gar-
ments resplendent,
Holiness unto the Lord, in letters of light, on his
forehead.
Round the hem of his robe the golden bells and
pomegranates:
Blessing the world he came, and the bars of vapor
beneath him
Gleamed like a grate of brass, and the sea at his
feet was a laver!
—Ibid,
MISERY.
O suffering, sad humanity!
O ye afflicted ones, who lie
Steeped to the lips in misery,
Longing, and yet afraid to die,
Patient, though sorely tried!
— The GobUtof Life.
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HEROINES OF THE POETS,
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HEROINES OF THE POETS.
TO LUCASTA,
ON GOING TO THE WARS.
Tell me not, sweet, I am unkinde,
That for the nuunerie
Of thy chaste breast and quiet minde,
To warre and armes I flee.
True, a new mistresse now I chase —
The first foe in the field;
And with a stronger faith imbrace
A sword, a horse, a shield.
Yet this inconstancy is such
As you, too, should adore;
I could not love thee, deare, so much,
Loved I not honor more.
Richard Lovelace.
HIGHLAND MARY.
Ye banks, and braes, and streams around
The castle o* Montgomery,
Green be your woods, and fair your flowers.
Your waters never drumlie!
There simmer first unfauld her robes,
And there the langest tarry;
For there I took the last farewell
O' my sweet Highland Mary.
How sweetly bloom 'd the gay green birk,
How rich the hawthorn's blossom.
As, underneath their fragrant shade,
I clasp' d her to my bosom!
The golden hours, on angel wings,
Flew o'er me and my dearie;
For dear to me as light and life
Was my sweet Highland Mary!
Wi* mony a vow, and lock'd embrace.
Our parting was fu* tender;
And, pledging aft to meet again.
We tore oursels asunder;
But, oh, fell death's untimely frost,
That nipp'd my flower sae early!
Now green's the sod and cauld's the clay.
That wraps my Highland Mary!
Oh, pale, pale now, those rosy lips
I aft ha'e kiss'd sae fondly!
And closed for aye the sparkling glance
That dwalt on me sae kindly!
And mouldering now in silent dust,
That heart that lo'ed me dearly;
But still within my bosom's core
Shall live my Highland Mary!
Robert Burns.
LINES ON ISABELLA MARKHAM.
Whence comes my love ? O heart, disclose;
It was from cheeks that shamed the rose,
From lips that spoil the ruby's praise,
From eyes that mock the diamond's blaze:
Whence comes my woe ? as freely own;
Ah me! 'twas from a heart like stone.
The blushing cheek speaks modest mind.
The lips befitting words most kind,
The eye does tempt to love's desire,
And seems to say 'tis Cupid's Are;
Yet all so fair but speak my moan,
Sith naught doth say the heart of stone.
Why thus, my love, so kind bespeak
Sweet eye, sweet lip, sweet blushing cheek —
Yet not a heart to save my pain ?
O Venus, take thy gifts again!
Make not so fair to cause our moan,
Or make a heart that's like our own.
John Harrington.
MAUD.
A VOICE by the cedar tree.
In the meadow under the Hall!
She is singing an air that is known to me,
A passionate ballad gallant and gay,
A martial song like a trumpet's call!
Singing alone in the morning of life.
In the happy morning of life and of May,
Singing of men that in battle array.
Ready in heart and ready in hand,
March with banner and bugle and flfe
To the death, for their native land.
II.
Maud with her exquisite face,
And wild voice pealing up to the sunny sky.
And feet like sunny gems on an English green,
Maud in the light of her youth and grace,
Singing of Death, and of Honor that cannot die.
Till I well could weep for a time so sordid and
mean,
And myself so languid and base.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
III.
Silence, beautiful voice
Be still, for you only trouble the mind
With a joy in which I cannot rejoice,
A glory I shall not find.
Still! I will hear you no more,
For your sweetness hardly leaves me a choice
But to move to the meadow and fall before
Her feet on the meadow grass, and adore,
Not her, who is neither courtly nor kind,
Not her, not her, but a voice.
Alfred Tennyson.
'MAin OF ATHENS.
Maid of Athens, ere we part.
Give, oh, give me back my hearti
Or, since that has left my breast.
Keep it now, and take the rest!
Hear my vow before I go.
My life, Hove you.
By those tresses unconfined,
Wooed by each ^Cgean wind;
By those lids whose jetty fringe
Kiss thy soft cheek's blooming tinge;
By those wild eyes like the roe,
My life, I love you.
By that lip I long to taste;
By that zone-encircled waist;
By all the token-flowers that tell
What words can never speak so well;
By love's alternate joy and woe,
My life, I love you.
Maid of Athens! I am gone:
Think of me, sweet! when alone.
Though I fly to Istambol,
Athens holds my heart and soul:
Can I cease to love thee ? No!
My life, Iloife you.
Lord Byron.
ROSALINE.
Like to the clear in highest sphere
Where all imperial glory shines:
Of selfsame color is her hair,
Whether unfolded, or in twines:
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline!
Her eyes are sapphiers set in snow.
Resembling Heaven by every wink;
The gods do fear when as they glow,
And I do tremble when I think
Heigh-ho, would she were mine!
Her cheeks are like the blushing cloud
That beautifies Aurora's face.
Or like the silver crimson shroud
That Phoebus' smiling looks doth grace:
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline!
Her lips are like two budded roses
Whom ranks of lillies neighbor nigh.
Within which bonds she balm encloses
Apt to entice a diety :
Heigh-ho, would she were mine!
Her neck is like a stately tower
Where Love himself imprisoned lies
To watch for glances every hour
From her divine and sacred eyes;
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline!
Her paps are centers of delight.
Her breasts are orbs of heavenly frame.
Where nature moulds the dew of light
To feed perfection with the same:
Heigh-ho, would she were mine!
With orient pearl, with ruby red.
With marble white, with sapphire blue,
Her body every way is fed.
Yet soft of touch and sweet in view:
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline!
Nature herself her shape admires;
The gods are wounded in her sight;
And Love forsakes his heavenly fires
And at he eyes his brand doth light:
Heigh-ho, would she were mine!
Then muse not, Nymphs, though I bemoan
The absence of fair Rosaliue,
Since for a fair there's fairer none,
Nor for her virtues so divine:
Heigh-ho, fair Rosaline!
Heigh-ho, my heart! would God that she
mine!
Thomas Lodge,
were
DORIS.
I SAT with Doris, the shepherd maiden:
Her crook was laden with wreathed flowers;
I sat and wooed her through sunlight wheeling,
And shadows steaUng, for hours and hours.
And she, my Doris, whose lap encloses
Wild summer roses of rare perfume.
The while I sued her, kept hushed and hearkened
Till shades had darkened from gloss to gloom.
She touched my shoulder with fearful finger:
She said, *' We linger; we must not stay;
My flock's in danger, my sheep will wander:
Behold them yonder — how far they stray! "
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I answered bolder, *' Nay, let me hear you,
And still be near you, and still adore;
No wolf nor stranger will touch one yearling;
Ah! stay, my darling, a moment more."
She whispered, sighing: "There will be sorrow
Beyond to-morrow, if I lose to-day;
My fold unguarded, my flock unfolded,
I shall be scolded, and sent away."
Said I, replying: ** If they do miss you.
They ought to kiss you when you get home;
And well rewarded by friends and neighbor
Should be the labor from which you come."
"They might remember," she answered meekly,
"That lambs are weakly and sheep are wild;
But if they love me 'tis none so fervent;
I am a servant, and not a child."
TTien each hot ember glowed quick within me,
And love did win me to swift reply:
"Ah! do but prove me, and none shall bind you
Nor fray nor find you, until I die."
She blushed and started, and stood awaiting,
As if debating in dreams divine;
But I did brave them — I told her plainly
She doubted vainly; she must be mine.
So we, twin-hearted, from all the valley
Did rouse and rally the nibbling ewes
And homeward drove them, we two together.
Through blooming heather and gleaming dews.
That simple duty fresh grace did lend her —
My Doris tender, my Doris true:
That I, her warder, did always bless her.
And often press her to take her due.
And now in beauty she fills my dwelling
With love excelling and undefiled;
And love doth guard her, both fast and fervent.
No more a servant, nor yet a child.
Arthur J. Munby.
JULIA.
Some ask'd me where the rubies grew,
And nothing I did say,
But with my finger pointed to
The lips of Julia.
Sopie ask*d how pearls did grow, and where;
Then spoke me to my girle,
To part her lips, and show'd them there
The quarelets of pearl.
One ask'd me where the roses grew;
I bade him not go seek;
But forthwith bade my Julia show
A bud in either cheek.
Robert Herrick.
CASTARA.
Like the violet, which alone
Prospers in some happy shade.
My Castara lives unknown.
To no ruder eye betray 'd;
For she's to herself untrue
Who delights i' the public view.
Such is her beauty as no arts
Have enriched with borrow'd grace.
Her high birth no pride imparts.
For she blushes in her place.
Folly boasts a glorious blood, —
She is noblest being good.
Cautious, she knew never yet
What a wanton courtship meant;
Nor speaks loud to boast her wit.
In her silence eloquent.
. Of herself survey she takes.
But 'tween men no difference makes.
She obejrs with speedy will
Her grave parents' wise commands;
And so innocent, that ill
She nor acts, nor understand
Women's feet run still astray
If to ill they know the way.
She sails by that rock, the court,
Where oft virtue splits her mast;
And retiredness thinks the port,
Where her frame may anchor cast
Virtue safely cannot sit
Where vice is enthroned for wit.
She holds that day's pleasure best
Where sin waits not on delight;
Without mask, or ball, or feast,
Sweetly spends a winter's night.
O'er that darkness whence is thrust
Prayer and sleep oft governs lust.
She her throne makes reason climb,
While wild passions captive lie;
And each article of time,
Her pure thoughts to heaven fly;
All her vows religious be.
And she vows her love to me.
William Habington.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
JESSIE, THE FLOWER 0* DUMBLANE.
The sun has gane down o'er the lofty Benlomond,
And left the red clouds to preside o'er the scene,
Wihile lanely I stray in the calm simmer gloamin',
To muse on sweet Jessie, the FlowV o' Dum-
blane.
How sweet is the brier, wi' its saft fauldin' blossom^
And sweet is the birk, wi* its mantle o' green;
Yet sweeter and fairer, and dear to this bosom,
Is lovely young Jessie, the Flow'r o* Dumblane.
She's modest as ony, and blithe as she's bonnie,
For guileless simplicity marks her its ain;
And far be the villain, divested to feeling,
Wha'd blight in its bloom the sweet Flower o'
Dumblane.
Sing on, thou sweet mavis, thy hymn to the
e'ening; —
Thou'rt dear to the echoes of Calderwood glen:
Sae dear to this bosom, sae artless and winning.
Is charming young Jessie, the Flow'r o' Dum-
blane.
How lost were my days till I met wi' my Jessie!
The sports o' the city seemed foolish and vain:
I ne'er saw a nymph I would ca' my dear lassie
Till charmed wi' sweet Jessie, the Flow'r o'
Dumblane.
Though mine were the station o' loftiest grandeur.
Amidst its profusion I'd languish in pain.
And reckon as naething the height o' its splendor.
If wanting sweet Jessie, the Flow'r o' Dumblane.
Robert Tannahill.
MAUD MULLER.
Maud Muller, on a summer's day.
Raked the meadow sweet A^ith hay.
Beneath the torn hat glow'd the wealth
Of simple beauty and rustic health*.
Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee
The mockbird echo'd from his tree.
But, when she glances to the far-off town.
White with its hillslope looking down,
The sweet song died, and a vague unrest
And a nameless longing fiU'd her breast, —
A wish, that she hardly dared to own,
ething better than she had known.
The judge rode slowly down the lane.
Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane.
He drew his bridle in the shade
Of the apple tree to greet the maid,
And ask a draught from the spring that flow'd
Through the meadow across the road.
She stoop'd where the cool spring bubbled up.
And flU'd for him her small tin cup.
And blush'd as she gave it, looking down
On her feet so bare, and her tatter' d gown.
"Thanks!" said the judge; '* a sweeterjdraught
From a fairer hand was never quaff d."
He spoke of the grass and flowers and trees,
Of the singing birds and the humming bees;
Then talk'd of the haying, and wonder'd whether
The cloud in the west would bring foul weather.
And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown,
And her graceful ankles bare and brown;
And listen' d, while a pleased surprise
Lxx>k'd from her long-lash'd hazel eyes.
At last, like one who for delay
Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away.
Maud Muller look'd and sigh'd: '* Ah me!
That I the judge's bride might be!
'' He would dress me up in silks so fine.
And praise and toast me at his wine.
" My father should wear a broadcloth coat.
My brother should sail a painted boat.
** I'd dress my mother so grand and gay.
And the baby should have a new toy each day.
"And I'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor,
And all should bless me who left our door."
The judge look'd back as he climb'd the hill.
And saw Maud Muller standing still.
"A form more fair, a face more sweet
Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet.
"And her modest answer and graceful air
Show her wide and good as she is fair.
" Would she were mine, and I to-day.
Like her a harvester of hay:
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" No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs,
Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues,
'' But low of cattle and song of birds,
And health and quiet and loving words."
But he thought of his sisters proud and cold,
And his mother vain of her rank and gold.
So, closing his heart, the judge rode on,
And Maud was left in the field alone.
But the lawyers smiled that afternoon,
When he hummed in court an old love-tune;
And the young girl mused beside the well,
Till the rain on the unraked clover fell.
He wedded a wife of richest dower,
Who lived for fashion, as he for power.
Yet oft in his marble hearth's bright glow,
He watch 'd a picture come and go;
And sweet Maud MuUer's hazel eyes
Look'd out in their innocent surprise.
Oft, when the wine in the glass was red.
He long'd for the wayside well instead;
And closed his eyes on his garnish 'd rooms,
To dream of meadows and clover-blooms.
And the proud man sigh'd, with a secret pain,
"Ah, that I were free again! —
** Free as when I rode that day.
Where the barefoot maiden raked her hay."
She wedded a man unlearned and poor.
And many children played round her door.
But care and sorrow, and childbirth pain,
Left their traces on heart and brain.
And oft when the summer sun shone hot
On the new-mown hay in the meadow lot.
And she heard the litde spring brook fall
Over the roadside, through the wall.
In the shade of the apple tree again
She saw a rider draw his rein.
And, gazing down with a timid grace.
She felt his pleased eyes read her face.
Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls
Stretch'd away into stately halls.
The weary wheel to a spinnet tum*d,
The tallow candle an astral burn'd.
And for him who sat by the chimney lug,
Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug,
A manly form at her side she saw.
And joy was duty and love was law.
Then she took up her burden of life again,
Saying only, " It might have been."
Alas for maiden, alas for judge.
For rich repiner and household drudge!
God pity them both! and pity us all,
Who vainly the dreams of youth recall.
For of all sad words of tongue or pen.
The saddest are these: " It might have been!"
Ah, well! for us all some sweet hope lies
Deeply buried from human eyes;
And in the hereafter, angels may
Roll the stone from its grave away!
JoHK Greenlbaf Whittier.
RUTH.
She stood breast-high amid theicom,
Clasp'd by the golden light of morn.
Like the sweetheart of the sun.
Who many a glowing kiss had won.
On her cheek an autumn flush
Deeply ripen'd; — such a blush
In the midst of brown was born.
Like red poppies grown with com.
Round her eyes her tresses fell,
Which were blackest none could tell,
But long lashes veil'd a light,
That had else been all too bright.
And her hat, with shady brim.
Made her tressy forehead dim;
Thus she stood amid the stooks,
Praising God with sweetest looks: —
Sure, I said, heav'n did not mean.
Where I reap thou shoulds't but glean.
Lay thy sheaf adown and come,
Share my harvest and my home.
Thomas Hood.
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328
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
SINGLE POEMS.
SONNETS OF THE SOUTHLAND.
Land of the pine and cypress, where the shades
Of tropic forests that no seasons know
Are wed to heralds from the realms of snow;
Where blooms the laurel while the jessamine braids
Its golden wreaths, and in dim everglades
Elegiac banners tremble to and fro;
Where dark palmettoes wave, and missletoe
Gives waxen verdure when the summer fades;
O land, wherein the mocker builds his nest
And chants his oracles, and loud adores,
Where silent marshes clasp the curving shores;
Thou gracious land, give us the largess blest
Of chosen souls who lean on Nature's breast
While in their ear her mysteries she pours.
In vernal hedgerows blooms the eglantine
And opening fleecy bolls and ripening maize
Give wealthy glories to the summer days.
O'er wayside bush the fervid passion vine
Its regal spray of mystic crowns doth twine.
Uf>on a sheltered bank while fancy strays
Through purpling distances we lie and gaze,
Such rare inheritance, O South, is thine.
Below, the river to the ocean runs.
And perfumed air and shimmering splendor lies
In feeless bounty *neath benignant skies.
Thus reverent Nature sings her orisons
And shows her secrets to the anointed ones
Who win to read them with anointed eyes.
III.
A land of old renown on History's page.
Where storied Huguenot and Cavalier
Their missions blended; where without a peer
Gay Chivalry doth boast his golden age;
Where beauteous women and brave men engage
Fond Memory's backward look and listening ear,
Though mingling sorrows start the ruthful tear
For all that marred the Southland heritage.
Yet sings its glory now with lute and lyre.
We bury but the dead. So let it be!
The Past is safe! With chastened gladness we
Will bid its virtues still the heart inspire.
Only the dross doth yield to furnace fire.
What ought to live hath immortality.
IV.
A land of nameless graves where heroes sleep
In blue and gray; the sacred dust of those
Above whose mouldering bed the rank weed
grows.
And never moistened eyes may come to weep.
The dumb, cold earth doth hide their secrets deep;
Its sealed, unpitying lips will ne'er disclose
This mortal pathos which no mortal knows.
Their God doth know, and he their souls will keep.
The loosened hand-clasp aching hearts still miss,
And thoughts of North and South do vainly turn
Unto these battle-graves and vaguely yearn
For the last loving word, the final kiss.
But Mother Nature's heart most tender is,
And wreaths each resting-place with moss and
fern.
V.
Land of the Future! Lift thy forehead high!
As from the chamber lit by taper rays.
With hidden comers where the shadow plays,
One goeth forth beneath the open sky
Of the vast firmament and sends his eye
Through starry spaces with a deep amaze,
So now a boundless vision meets thy gaze
In which the wings of faith unfettered fly.
The Future beckons. None shall say thee nay.
Go forth in large resolve with giant stride.
Nor in the foulds of doubt thy talents hide.
The dawn of Hope triumphant beams to-day,
No gate, no caste, no creed shall bar its way.
God's purposes forever shall abide.
VI.
O Morning Land! From dreaming slumbers wake!
High noon approacheth with occasion rare,
For nobler victories now thy strength prepare,
And every hindrance from thy shoulders shake.
The magic sword of truth now boldly take,
More than Excalibur in might, and dare
To wrestle with all wrong, and overbear
Each hindering foe, eachf chain of error break.
Thy moral manhood prove by noble fight;
Chivalric graces still the world doth need
For peaceful conquests over pride and greed.
Join then the tournament with armour bright,
And win thine honors as a gentle knight;
So shall thou boast a Chivalry indeed.
VII.
Peace be within thy borders! May the rude
Trumpet of War no more with blast malign
Disturb thy groves of laurel and of pine,
So verdant now in balmy quietude.
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May lofty motive lower aims preclude,
And Bethlehem's echoing song with cadence fine
Inspire thy steadfast soul with love devine
And keep thee safe through fate's vicissitude.
In benison my voice I gladly lend.
May peaceful homes and fireside pleasures be
Thy cherished tokens of felicity.
O kindly land, with trustfulness, as friend
Across thy hills and plains my prayers I send
And give thee here my benedicite.
VIII.
Thou larger land! Home of us all thou art!
Happy to-day that now the Cavalier
And Huguenot with Puritan draw near,
Hand clasped in hand and heart enlinked with
heart.
Forgotten now be every vengeful smart,
And while we hold our native country dear.
May- her wide bound proclaim in accents clear
That all mankind doth hold inherent part
In the All-Father's love, and so hath claim
To human brotherhood; that all who fill
God's family may share the birthright still.
May largest loves add lustre to her fame
The while we hush the noise of strife and blame
In grateful songs of glory and good will.
Truly the new is older than the old.
It hath but slept awhile, enwrapped in mist;
But waking earth the sunlight warm hath kissed
And all the hills are decked in robes of gold.
Lai^er horisons now our eyes behold;
Delusive fogs no more our way resist,
The far-off future doth our hopes enlist
And lengthening vistas to our view unfold.
In vain in narrow bounds is knowledge pent;
When God gives light in vain our ways we hide;
Our finite wills check not the ocean tide;
Unto our wanderings truth can ne'er be bent
But her straight bands of love and wisdom blent
Our rapt obedient souls will safely guide.
Mary H. Leonard.
— ^For Thi Magazine of Poetry,
FOR THEE.
TO MARIE B — .
For thee was always my awakening thought,
For thee the prayer that soothed me ere I slept,
For thee the smiles that Hope but seldom brought,
For thee the many bitter tears I wept.
For thee my life I gladly would cast down.
And for thy love would pay Death's fatal price,
Thou my sweet consolation and my crown.
Thou my despair, my hope, my Paradise.
For thee, oh my unsullied, stainless goal,
I live to-day! and for one perfect kiss
From thy warm lips I would give forth my soul
And life in worlds hereafter and in this.
For thee, from sin I would not even shrink.
For thee, I would not tremble before death,
For thee I'd perish, if I once could sink
And die upon the perfume of thy breath.
Thou art my hope, my future, and my past,
Thou art my sweetest torture and delight,
Thou art my only love, the first, the last,
Thou art my radiant dawn, my starry night.
Spurn not my passion that will e'er abide.
Boundless and vast and constant as the sea,
But rather pity in thy conscious pride
A love more strong than Death itself, for thee.
Francis Saltus Saltus.
THE WANDERER.
(Lines written on re-crossing: the Rocky Mountains in winter
after many years.
Long years ago I wandered here,
In the midsummer of the year —
Life's summer too.
A score of horsemen here we rode.
The mountain world its glories showed,
All fair to view.
These scenes, in glowing colors drest,
Mirrored the life within my breast,—
Its world of hope.
The whispering woods and fragrant breeze
That stirred the grass in verdant seas
On billowy slope.
And glistening crag in sunlit sky,
'Mid snowy clouds piled mountains high,
Were joys to me;
My path was o'er the prairie wide.
Or here on grander mountain side.
To choose, all free.
The rose that waved in morning air,
That spread its dewy fragrance there
In careless bloom.
Gave to my heart its ruddiest hue,
O'er my glad life its color threw.
And sweet perfume.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Now changed the scene and changed the eyes
That here once looked on glowing skies
Where summer smiled;
These riven trees and wind-swept plain
Now show the winter's dread domain —
Its fury wild.
The rocks rise black from storm-packed
snow,
All checked the river's pleasant flow,
Vanished the bloom;
These dreary wastes of frozen plain
Reflect my bosom's life again,
Now lonesome gloom.
The buoyant hopes and busy life
Have ended all in hateful strife
And thwarted aim.
The world's rude contact kills the rose,
No more its radiant color shows
False roads to fame.
Backward amid the twilight glow
Some lingering spots yet brightly show
On hard roads won
Where still some grand peaks mark the way,
Touched by the light of parting day
And memory's sun.
But here thick clouds the mountains hide,
The dim horizon, bleak and wide,
No pathway shows.
And rising gusts and darkening sky
Tell of " the night that cometh " nigh
The brief day's close.
John C. Fremont.
CONFESSIONS.
O Lady mine! O Lady of my Life!
Mine and not mine, a being of the sky
Turn'd into Woman, and I know not why —
Is't well, bethink thee, to maintain a strife
With thy poor servant ? War unto the knife,
Because I greet thee with a lover's eye 1
II.
Is't well to visit me with thy disdain,
And rack my soul, because, for love of thee,
I was too prone to sink upon my knee.
And too intent to make my meaning plain,
And too resolved to make my loss a gain
To do thee good, by Love's immortal plea ?
III.
O friend! foi^give me for my dream of bliss.
Forgive: forget; be just! Wilt not forgive?
Not though my tears should fall, as through a
sieve
The salt sea-sand ? What joy hast thou in this:
To be a maid, and marvel at a kiss ?
Say! Must I die, to prove that I can live ?
IV.
Shall this be so ? E'en this ? And all my love
Wreck'd in an instant ? No, a gentle heart
Beats in thy bosom; and the shades depart
From all fair gardens, and from skies above,
When thou art near! For thou art like a dove.
And dainty thoughts are with thee where thou
art
V.
Oh! it is like the death of dearest kin,
To wake and And the fancies of the brain .
Sear'd and confused! We languish in the strain
Of some lost music, and we find within,
Deep in the heart, the record of sin.
The thrill thereof, and all the blissful pain.
VI.
For it is deadly sin to love too well.
And unappeased, unhonor'd, unbesought.
To feed on dreams; and yet 'tis aptly thought
That all must love. E'en those who most rebeL
In Eros' camp have known his master-spell;
And more shall learn that Eros yet has taught.
VII.
But I am mad to love. I am not wise.
I am the worst of men to love the best
Of all sweet women! An untimely jest,
A thing made up of rhapsodies and sighs,
And unordained on earth, and in the skies,
And undesired in tumult and in rest.
VIII.
All this is true. I know it. I am he.
I am that man. I am the hated friend
Who once received a smile, and sought to mend
His soul witli hope. O tyrant! by the plea
Of all thy grace, do thou accept from me
At least the notes that know not to oflend.
See! I will strike again the major chord
Of that great song, which, in his eariy days,
Beethoven wrote; and thine shall be the praise,
And thine the frenzy like a soldier's sword
Flashing therein; and thine, O thou adored
And bright true Lady! all the poet's lays.
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To thee, to thee, the songs of all my joy,
To thee the songs that wildly seem to bless,
And those that mind thee of a past caress
Lo! with a whisper to the WingM Boy
Who rules my fate, I will my strength employ
To make a maten-song of my distress.
XI.
But playing thus, and toying with the notes,
I half forget the cause I have to weep;
And, like a reaper in the realms of sleep,
I hear the bird of morning where he floats
High in the welkin, and in fairy boats
I see the minstrels sail upon the deep.
XII.
In mid-suspension of my leaping bow
I almost hear the silence of the night;
And, in my soul, I know the stars are bright
Because they love, and that they nightly glow
To make it clear that there is nought below,
And nought above, so fkir as Love*s delight.
XIII.
But shall I touch thy heart by speech alone,
Without Amiti ? Shall I prove by words,
That hope is meant for men as well as birds;
That I would take a scorpion, or a stone,
In lieu of gold, and sacrifice a throne
To be the keeper of thy flocks and herds ?
XIV.
Ah no, my Lady! though I sang to thee
With fuller voice than sings the nightingale —
Fuller and softer in the moonlight pale
Than lays of Keats, or Shelley, or the free
And fire-lipp*d Byron — there would come to me
No word of thine to thank me for the tale.
XV.
Thou would'st not heed. Thou would'st not any-
when.
In bower or grove — or in the holy nook
Which shields thy bed — thou would'st not care
to look
For thoughts of mine, though faithful in their ken
As are the minds of England's fighting men
When they inscribe their names in Honor's book.
XVI.
Thou would'st not care to scan my face, and
through
This face of mine, the soul, for scraps of thought.
Yet 'tis a face that somewhere has been taught
To smile in tears. Mine eyes are somewhat blue
And quick to flash (if what I hear be true)
And dark, at times, as velvet newly wrought.
XVII.
But wilt thou own it ? Wilt thou in the scroll
Of my sad life, perceive, as in a hive,
A thousand happy fancies that contrive
To seek thee out ? Thy bosom is the goal
Of all my thoughts, and quick to thy control
They wend their way, elate to be alive.
XVIII.
But there is something I could never bring
My soul to compass. No! could I compel
Thy plighted troth, I would not have thee tell
A lie to God. I'll have no wedding-ring
With loveless hands around my neck to cling;
For this were worse than all the fires of hell.
I would not take thee from a lover's lips,
Or from the rostrum of a roaring crowd.
Or from the memory of a husband's shroud,
Or from a goblet where a Csesar sips.
I would not touch thee with my finger tips.
But I would die to serve thee — and be proud.
XX.
And could I enter Heaven, and find therein.
In all the wide dominions of the air,
No trace of thee among the natives ther^,
I would not bide with them— No! not to win
A seraph's lyre — but I would sin a sin,
And free my soul, and seek thee otherwhere.
Eric Mackav.
FRANCIS S. SALTUS.
O, masters! your sweet singer lieth here —
The lovely and unloved, the lone and lost;
His life's frail barque, on seas tumultous tossed.
Hath reached the heaven where the skies are clear.
All's well! Take ye thought, and shed no tear —
Ye that were blinded when his spirit crossed
Your songless world, and, counting not the cost.
Sang in the dark, to die when dawn was near!
When his heart hungered for your love, ye gave
Nothing. Now that his famished lips are dumb-
Lips that Love kissed not, though their kiss was
sweet —
Lay not a flower upon his voiceless grave:
Of their own will the flowers to him will come—
God will plant daisies at his head and feet.
Thou canst rest in peace, O poet strong and vernal,
Aud rapacious death for thee has lost his sting;
For thy melodies return to us eternal,
With the birds, and bees, and blossomings of
spring. Frank L. Stanton.
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334 THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
NOW AND EVER.
A lawn unrolled beneath my feet
Bespangled o'er with flowers as sweet
Ask what you will, my own and only love;
For to love's service true,
To look upon as those that nod
Within the garden fields of God;
Your least wish sways me as from worlds above,
And I yield all to you
Who art the only she,
And in one girl all womanhood to me.
But odorless as those that blow
In ashes in the shades below.
And on my hearing fell a strain
Of gusty music, sadder yet
Than every whimper of regret
That sobbing utterance could form.
Yet some things e*en to thee I cannot yield, —
And patched with scraps of sound that seemed
As that one gift by which
Tom out of tunes that devils dreamed,
On the still morning on the woodside field
Thou mad*st existence rich,—
And pitched to such a piercing key
It stabbed the ear with agony.
Who wast the only she,
And when at last it lulled and died,
And in one girl all womanhood to me.
I stood aghast and terrified,
And staring with a dazed surprise,
We had talked long, and then a silence came;
I saw a creature so divine
And in the topmost firs
That never subde thought of mine
To his nest a white dove floated like a flame,
May reproduce to inner sight
And my lips closed on hers
So fair a vision of delight
Who was the only she,
And in one girl all womanhood to me.
A syllable of dew that drips
From out a lily's latching lips
Since when, my heart lies by her heart— nor now
Could not be sweeter than the word
Could I, *twixt hers and mine,
I listened to yet never heard.
Nor the most love-skilled angel choose; so thou
For oh! the woman standing there
In vain wouldst ask for thine.
Within the shadow of her hair.
Who art the only she,
Spoke to me in an undertone
And in one girl all womanhood to me.
So delicate my soul alone
Elizabeth Hbnrv Miller.
But understood it as a moan
Of some weak melody of wind
A heavenly breeze had left behind.
POEM.
A tracery of trees grotesque
Printed in the Fort Wayne GaitstU, in 1878, after Uie death
Against the sky behind her seen
of the author by suicide.
Like shapeless shapes of arabesque
Wro't in an oriental screen;
GENTLE death, bow down and sip
And, tall austere and statuesque
The soul that lingers on my lip;
She loomed before it— e'en as tho*
gentle death, bow down an keep
The spirit hand of Angelo
Eternal vigil o'er my sleep;
Had chiseled her to life complete,
For I am weary and would nest
With chips of moonshine round her feet
Forever on your loving breast
And I grew jealous of the dusk
To see it softly touch her face.
I stood beneath a summer moon
As lover-like in fond embrace.
All swollen to uncanny girth,
It folded round her like a husk;
And hanging like the sun at noon
But when the glitter of her hand,
Above the center of the earth:
Like wasted glory, beckoned me.
But with a sick and sallow light
My eyes grew blurred and dull and dim.
As it had sickened of the night.
My vision failed— I could but see,
And fallen in a palid swoon.
I could not stir — I could but stand,
Around me I could hear the rush
Till, quivering in every limb,
Of sullen winds an feel the whirr
I flung me prone as if to swim
Of unseen wings against me brush.
The tide of grass whose waves of green
Like phantoms in a sepulcher.
Went rolling ocean-wide between
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My helpless ship-wrecked heart and her
Who claimed me for a worshiper.
And, waiting thus in my despair,
I heard a wierd unearthly sound,
That seemed to lift me from the ground,
And hold me floating in the air.
I looked, and lo! I saw her brow
Above a harp within her hands —
A crown of blossoms on her brow,
And in her harp were twisted strands
Of silken starlight, rippling o'er
With music never heard before
By mortal ears; and at the strain
I felt my spirit snap its chain
And break away, and I could see
It as it turned and fled from me
To greet its mistress, where she smiled
To see the phantom dancing wild
And wizard-like before the spell
Her mystic fingers knew so well.
What is it? Who will rightly guess
If it brought but nothingness,
That dribbles from a wayward pen
To spatter in the eyes of men ?
What matter? I will call it mine,
And I will take the changeling home
And bathe its face with morning shine
And comb it with a golden comb
Till every tangled tress of rhyme
Will fairer be than summer-time,
And I will nurse it on my knee
And dandle it beyond the clasp
Of hands that grip and hands that grasp
Through life and all eternity.
Jambs O'Reilley.
SOLACE OF THE WOODS.
Woods, waters, have a charm to soothe the ear.
When common sounds have vexed it: when the
day
Grows sultry, and the crowd is in thy way.
And working* in thy soul much toil and care.
Betake thee to the forest: in the shade
Of pines, and by the side of purling streams
That prattle all their secrets in their dreams,
Unconscious of a listener — unafraid —
Thy soul shall feel their freshening and the truth,
Of nature then, reviving in thy heart,
Shall bring thee the best feelings of thy youth,
When in all natural joys thy joy had part.
Ere lucre and the narrowing toils of trade
Had turned thee to the thing thou wast not made.
William Gilmore Simms.
CURRENT POEMS.
THE BANNER THAT WELCOMES THE
WORLD.
The dawn of new ages is breaking.
The cycle of Concord has come;
There is peace in the echoing bugle,
And a festival march in the drum.
To-day the old Sandy Hook wakens
An echo that never will cease;
O'er the spot where the grand hero perished
The winds lift the banner of peace!
flag of the Navesink Highlands
That patriot bands gave the air.
The joy that our bosom is thrilling.
The hearts of the ages shall share!
The war ships, the peace ships, shall hail thee,
The prows from the nations oppressed.
As thy iris gleams forth from the heaven
At the sentinelled gates of the West!
The eye of the immigrant mother
Shall long through the melting mist gaze.
And turn into tears to behold thee,
And close in the silence of praise.
The sky-piercing eye of the sailor
From afar shall thy sun ripples view;
The tempest-tossed traveler returning
Shall pledge his allegiance anew.
The skies of good-will bend above us.
The ocean beneath us rolls fair;
The chords of new harmonies move us,
What sayest thou, Seer of the air ?
The west winds breathe low for thy message,
And wait it the waters impearled.
Speak, Flag of the ocean auroras,
Speak, banner that welcomes the world!
" O Liberty, thou who hast lifted
My eye to the walls of the sun,
1 float for the new years of heaven,
The brotherhood conflict has won.
No longer for races contending.
But for man move the cycles sublime;
The summons for peace is ascending
From the jubilee trumpets of time!
'* I salute ye, O feet that have followed
Fair Hesper to destinies new.
I salute ye, O pioneers coming,
I bid ye, O voyagers, adieu!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
In the mist of the surge, in the tempest,
With the sunlight or cloud on my brow,
I float for the best of all ages,
And the best of all ages is now!
" That man may be given his birthright.
And knowledge, the future that waits;
Equality, freedom to labor.
And labor, the wealth it creates.
That the temples of truth, for their Master,
By charity's feet may be trod;
That hearts that are humble and human,
May do the swift service of God."
Fraternity, rise to thy mission,
The noblest since order began,
Till the nations are brothers united
In one federation of man!
The future stands waiting to greet thee,
And Battle her standards has furled.
And thou art a signal of heaven,
O flag, to humanity given.
For which all the heroes have striven!
Hail, banner that welcomes the world!
Hbzekiah Butterworth.
A CIRCUS REFLECTION.
The circus of to-day I deem a wondrous sort of
thing.
Folks seem no longer satisfied with one plain saw-
dust ring.
But three and four it takes to sate the modem appe-
tite;
And *stead of one good acrobat they've ten at once
in sight
The day has gone when boys were glad to see one
elephant
That coddn't do a thing but stand around and
sway and pant;
To-day the mammoths have to waltz upon their
nether i^;8,
And show the public wondrous feats of balancing
on kegs;
And monkeys, too, that once were full of lovely
monkey shines,
No longer play their natural tricks, but work in
other lines,
And do not rouse the plaudits of the modem multi-
tudes
Unless they're gayly dressed and taught to fool
around like dudes.
I can't imagine what we'll have in 1993
If things go on developing as now they seem to be.
The camels of that coming age will have no doubt
a score
Of humps upon their poor old backs, and every
lion's roar
They'll set to music in that time that's coming on
apace,
And hippopotami will dance the York with agile
grace.
The monkey of the future they'll provide with
schooner yachts.
And not a leopard will there be that cannot change
his spots.
I would that I could live till^ that great time shall
come around,
When drcus tents will stretch at least o*er ten
square miles of ground;
Not that I like the new style show as much as'other
folks.
But I'm in hopes that by that time the clowns will
have new jokes.
John Kendrick Bangs.
— Harper's Weekly, April s^ iSgj.
HUMILITY.
'Tis not in self-abasement —
That is but an object pride, —
But on the honoring of those
We chance to walk beside.
Frank H. Sweet.
— New England Magazine, April, iSgj.
THE TEST.
The test of labor is what staysl
Be it brain or hand, —
And on industrious yesterdays
The tallest cities stand.
James Riley.
—For The Magaxine of POelry.
A LEAP FROM THE DEVIL'S JEST BOOK.
Beside the sewing*table chained and bent
They stitch for the lady, tynumous and proud—
For her wedding gown, for them a shrood;
They stitch and stitch, but never mend the rent
Tom in life's golden curtains. Glad Youth went,
And left them alone with Time; and now if bowed
With burdens they should sob and cry aloud.
Wondering, the rich would look from their content
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And so this glimmering life at last recedes
In unknown, endless depths beyond recall;
And what's the worth of all our ancient creeds,
If here, at the end of ages, this is all —
A white face floating in the whirling ball,
A dead face plashing in the river reeds ?
Charles Edwin Markham.
— CcUi/omian Magazine, June, iSgj,
THE LAST BATTLE.
The noisy day was over; like a red rose tossed to
the sky
Its petals floated out to the West, and a pale
moon hung on high.
We lay in the sweet, white clover, half sorry, may-
hap, half glad,
John and I together, and there was Stephen the
lad.
We said not a word of the battle which drew anear
with day,
Our thunder the musket's rattie, our rain was
the bullet's play;
Face to face with Death forgot were a thousand
ills.
For it was the last, long night of all, and home
lay over the hills!
Home, which yearned and watched in more than
one dear face.
To whom that bitterest absence had brought the
tenderest grace.
And lying at rest in the clover, facing the waning
light,
To-morrow held happiness only, and War was a
dream of the night.
Then sudden I spoke my thought, "What eyes are
of all most true? "
And Stephen, his young face turned to the stars,
smilingly answered " Blue;"
"Ay " said John ** you are right, boy, my all under
heaven lies
In a pair that are waiting for me alone, the bluest
and truest of eyesl
"I have her picture here safely hidden over my
heart;
rn show it to you to-morrow, boys, to-morrow
before we part!**
And Stephen, he made no sign, but his hand lay
over his breast,
And I knew he thought of the last sweet look of
the blue eyes he loved best
It was only a chance, light word, and seems still
less to tell,
. Yet I thought of it on that next, dread day in a
shudder of shot and shell,
Strange, like the flash of a sword, when John fell
down at my side;
Straight, as a mountain pine tree smitten by
storm, he died.
We drew him out of the tumult, Stephen the lad
and I,
Back in the sweet, white clover, his face to the
quiet sky,
And the boy all flushed with fervor, kneeling beside
him said,
. ''Give me his musket; mine is gone; I'll fight
for the bravest dead!"
His hand was on John's heart when sudden he
leaned and gazed,
Then sprung to his feet with a cry as of anguish
sore amazed;
Had a bullet pierced him too? Nay, then 'tis the
body dies! —
He saw but the face on the dead man's breast,—
John's *' bluest and truest of eyes."
Was it Stephen who looked through the smoke
with a face like the face of the dead ?
Who laid his lips to the picture once, then back
through the tumult sped ?
In the din it seemed but a dream, and I left John
lying apart
With the smiling, blue forget-me-not eyes of the
pictured face on his heert.
Surely it was a dream, yet through all that horrible
day
The stricken face of Stephen the lad was before
my sight alway;
In the densest rout, in the broken ranks, in the
smoking, blood-red air,
In danger's front, in the direst need, I found that
young face there!
And found it again, as I knew I should, at the close
of that daytime, when
The sunset flamed o'er a smoking pyre strewn with
the hearts of men;
Upward turned, with a smile that it never in life-
time had.
With a light as of triumph upon its brow, was the
face of Stephen the lad.
And I came on a mystery there, kneeling by him
apart,
For the same fair face looked up from his breast
That lay on John's brave heart;
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The same soft, rose-red mouth; the eyes of forget-
me-not blue,
TWO HEARTS.
And I learned of a battle fought that day whose
TO H. H.
bitterness no man knew!
About the shrine of Cupid lay,
At^dawn, in the sweet, white clover, I laid them
Two hearts, poor little things,
together there;
They both were nestling by the way,
The same sun ray that shone on John, lay over
Beneath his drooping wings,
the lad's bright hair;
And as they lay in close commune,
The same smile sealed the lips of both,— which has
*Tis strange a golden sun.
grown so strangely wise!
Came riding o'er so opportune
And there lay on each heart the same fair face
They melted into one.
with blue forget-me-not eyes.
N. J. Clodfbltbr.
I know not if she be North; I know not if she be
South*
THE BISHOP OP GRETNA GREEN.
She with the bluest of eyes, and that smiling rose-
The bishop was genial and buriy.
red mouth;
Unsurpliced and guiltless of sleeves;
Or to which brave heart she was true, or whose
His red locks were matted and curly.
would have been the woe
Eyes twinkled from bushiest eaves.
Had that battle never been fought, or had one
A spy-glass well battered lay handy,
been left to know;
With hammer and nails littered up,
All flanked by a bottle of brandy,
But watching beside those two, in the glory of Sun
With never a sign of a cup.
and Stars,—
The boyish form and its stilled young grace, the
No matter what task was in order.
man with his well won scars,—
At herald of love's refugees
I was filled with a great content Yes, I who loved
When dust-douds arose on the border.
them was glad
The bishop would tear from his knees
That they solved it together, just that way,— John
The apron, and forth from the smithy
and Stephen the lad!
In tattered canonicals strode.
Virginia Woodward Cloud.
Beginning a marriage-rite pithy
—For The Magazine of Poetry,
With bride and groom still on the road.
And yet, if the time was not pressing.
GEORGE MacDONALD.
The bishop more leisurely wrought,
And gave, with episcopal blessing.
O Nightingale! that fills the air with song,
A last benediction that brought
The thrush and blackbird perched on bush or
A grin to each by-standing varlet,
thorn
Unchecked by the bishop's smug leer.
Spell-bound would listen to thy strains heav'n
The bride's face would mantle with scarlet.
bom;
The bridegroom not seeming to hear.
So one who lisps in rhyme would hear thy voice
Now softly sweet, now rich and full in tone
And when the pursuers with clamor
Discourse in music that is all thine own;
Drew up at the vestry's front door,
Till all the soul within me should rejoice.
The bishop stood grasping his hammer
With muscles to weild it like Thor,
Thy songs that tell of God, and God's deep love
And a look that it mattered but little
Inspire the doubting, so that oft, through tears,
If the anvil he smote or a skull.
Is seen, beyond the starry sky above
Since the latter was always more brittle.
With joy the everlasting glorious spheres
And oftentimes fully as dull.
Where better things than fame or gold await—
The Crown and Palm and Well Done— soon or late
The lovers for ftirther flight buckled,
The Child at heart within the Pearly Gate.
Or else perchance fell on their knees.
John Fullkrton.
The bishop said nothing, but chuckled.
—For The Magazine of Poetry.
And fondled his bottle and fees.
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All possible troubles that try men
He drowned in a midnight debanch, —
The high-priest of virtue and Hymen,
Whose bellows-flame kindled the torch.
Wilbur Larremore.
- The Green Bag, June, i8gs-
AT HIS GATE.
Without I stand, timid and trembling still
Before the portals of the King's domain,
Bewildered at its beanty, I remain
Silent and blinded by the light— until
Sweet music sending throngh my soul a thrill
Sweeps down its avenues in joyous strain
Like waves of Peace upon the shores of Pain
While breaks the Star of Hope through douds
of 111!
The darkness falb and crouching low I cry
From depths of penitence and misery
" Dear Lord! and may I come within Thy gate
The wind is bitter. and the hour is late!*'
I wait and weep beneath my weight of sin —
When answer comes: *' Knock, I will let you in!\
Alice S. Deletombb.
-For The Magazine of Poetry.
TRAVELERS.
Wb shall lodge at the Sign o' the Grave, you say!
Yet the road is a long one we trudge, my friend,
So why should we greive at the break of the day ?
Let us drink, let us love, let us sing, let us play,
We can keep our sighs for the journey's end.
We shall lodge at the Sign o* the Grave, you say!
Well, since we are nearing the journey's end,
Our hearts may be merry while yet they may;
Let us drink, let us love, let us sing, let us play,
For perchance it's a comfortless Inn, my friend.
Percy Addleshaw.
London Academy,
ON SOME FORGOTTEN POEMS.
Dead rhymes are here that no man comes to read;
Dead as the flowers that robed the maiden spring
To wed with summer, when the streams were freed,
And all the birds began to nest and sing.
If some one plucked the flowers and laid them by
Between the prim white pages that I hold.
The crushed and faded leaves would dim the eye.
And leave the yearning heart uncheered and cold.
But sweeter flowers of rhyme, amid the gloom
And silent dust of all the silent shelves.
You keep your glory and your primal bloom,
And live, if not for others, for yourselves.
And when I chance to open wide the page,
Behold, your beauty breaks upon the earth;
And all the splendor of a buried age
Is born again with glad immortal birth.
And, happy, I may hear the master-hand
Sweep down the lyre and wake each vibrant
chord,
That swells with glory of a sweeter land,
Where life was hope, and love alone was lord.
So let the cover close, and page grow gray
Amid the dust where no eye comes to see;
My heart alone the song shall hold and sway —
The poet's dream shall wake a world for me.
W. J. Henderson.
—Harper's Weekly.
ON A PORTRAIT.
At seventeen she grew between
His gaze and some Old World romance:
A face — seductive and serene
As all that old romance may mean —
With dark eyes waking from a trance.
At seventeen.
At twenty-one no song might run
More sweetly than his longing leapt
To her — whose loveliness begun
For him all song beneath the sun —
With eyes of brown whose laughter slept
At twenty-one.
At thirty-two no dreams would do! —
He loved this daughter of the South,
Whose eyes of blue his fancy drew.
What time the battles bugles blew
To dask him on the cannon's mouth.
At thirty-two.
Madison Cawein.
'Fetter's Southern Magazine, July, iSgj.
A VISION OF BRAVE MEN.
I.
A VISION of brave men. From eldest time,
Of alien speech, of every race and clime!
Their deeds of valor flow and shine,
Like wind-blown torches in long line.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
A vision of brave men. These were, who marbhed,
At great Cambysses' hest, through deserts parched,
The driving sands make dark the air,
The drifting sands their couch prepare.
A vision of brave men. These were, whose
swords
By gulf and pass repelled the Persian hordes;
Nor can the hero sleep for thought
Of deeds Miltiades has wrought.
A vision of brave men. Toward Palestine
These strive, pale faces lit*as from the shrine;
The cross goes down before their eyes,
They sleep, — ^to wake in Paradise.
A vision of brave men. The Six who came
(Round their strong necks the hempen cord of
shame).
And of the conqueror lowly craved
That their loved city might be saved.
A vision of brave men. Closed in by craft,
These drink from Mexique waters death's dark
draught.
In the still Lake they clash and fall —
Trist Night receives them one and all!
A vision of brave men. These follow him
Whose star has led through lands the snow makes
dim;
With richer drops the snow has blushed
Than ever from the grape were crushed!
A vision of brave men. These were, whose hands
Were lifted up to smite off servile bands —
My country! these, the latest birth
Of godlike, warring men on earth!
A vision of brave men. The shadowy plain
Resounds to many a mingled martial strain;
And deeds of valor flow and shine,
Like wind-blown torches in a line!
These were, whose cause the God of fiatUes
crowned;
These were on whom incensed Heaven frowned;
But all is now by them forgot,
Save that in fight they faltered not.
"There is one language of the brave,'* they cry,
"We fought! Valor lives on, tho' causes die!
There is one kindred of the brave, —
Howe'er we fought, 'twas Life we gave! "
II.
A vision of brave men. They also, — they
Who fought, yet fought in no ensanguined fray,
But drew the spirit's sword and stood
Right forth, invincible for good.
A vision of brave*men. Of seer and sage, —
Of such as lashed the follies of their age,
Who dared, what others think;;to say.
And, praised, or praised not, went their way.
One softly speaks among his weeping friends.
Drinks the quick hemlock, as the sun descends,
And darkening Athens sleeps, nor knows
Her fairest day draws to its close.
One, Hesper-like, looked from his lonely height,
And all forgetful of the bigot's might,
Saw, and proclaimed, the centered sun.
And earth that in her orbit run.
A vision of brave men. Whose ventures fleet
An unknown path through chartless ocean beat.
Whose name resounds, — whose glorious name
OuUives the passing day's acclaim.
They, also, — ^they who dared not less than he
That sailed afar upon the Western sea;
Brave framers of the State, they stand
With either pen or sword in hand!
A vision of brave men. My country's sires,
Preserve in us, undimmed, yonr patriot fires.
That we from detriment may save.
The gift of freedom that ye gave.
A vision of brave men. Or near, or far —
In council brave — or brave in armed war —
Your deeds of valor flow and shine.
Like wind-blown torches in long line!
"There is one language of the brave," ye cry,
" We fought! Valor lives on, tho' causes die!
There is one kindred of the brave, —
Howe'er we fought, 'twas Life we gave!"
Edith M. Thouas.
DREAMING AND DOING.
Dreaming is pleasant, I know, my boy;
Dreaming is. pleasant, I know.
To dream of that wonderful, far-off day
When you'll be a man and have only to say
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To this one and that one, Do that and do this^
While your wishes fulfillment never ghall miss,
May fill you with pleasure ;|but deeper the joy
Of doing a thing yourself, my boy —
Of doing a thing yourself.
Dreaming is pleasant, I know, my girl;
Dreaming is pleasant, I know.
To dream of that far-off, wonderful day
When you'll be a queen and hold full sway
Over hearts that are loyal and kind and just,
While your sweet ** If you please ** will mean " You
must!"
May fill you with joy; but you'll find pleasure's pearl
In doing for others yourself, my girl —
In doing for others yourself.
William S. Lx)rd.
— The Independent, May 2^^ iSgj,
-)(-
NOTES.
Dickens. The heroine of Dicken's novel of
"The Old Curiosity Shop " is a beautiful and deli-
cate creation, whose devotion to her grandfather,
and childlike wisdom, sharpened to an unnatural
extent, are beautiful, says a critic, in the extreme.
The poetry of her death is still finer, and the very
prose, if but divided into lines, will, as Mr. Home
pointed out in "The New Spirit of Age, " form that
kind of gracefully irregular blank verse which
Southey and Shelley have used. The following is
from the description of Little Nell's funeral, with-
out the alteration of a word:
" When death strikes down the innocent and young,
From every fragile form, from which he lets
The parting spirit free,
A hundred virtues rise,
In shape of mercy, Charity, and Love,
To walk the world and bless it,
Of every tear
That sorrowing Nature sheds on such green graves.
Some good is bom, some gentle nature comes."
WiLSTACH. "Ocean Currents." As Longfellow
in his "Seaweed" treats of the Atlantic agitated
by equinoctial storm, so in the poem ** Ocean Cur-
rents" an endeavor has been made to treat, in a
similar metre of the Pacific warmed by the Southern
current
Ibid. The Ballad of Rosalie, The incident
whereon these verses are based may be found re-
lated in one of the earliest numbers of BlackwoocTs
Magazine,
Fremont. " The Wanderer ' ' republished from
LitieVs Living Age, and ascribed by the New York
Evening Post to General John C. Fremont
Miller. Elizabeth Henry Miller was bom in
Lexington, Va., December 2nd, 1859. Miss Miller
can count among her ancestry some historic names:
on her father's side, that of Jonathan Dickinson,
founder and first President of Princeton College;
while her mother, a daughter of Governor McDow-
ell of Virginia, and niece of William C. Preston,
the eloquent South Carolina Senator, had for
grandfather the gallant Gen. William Campbell,
who won the battle of King's Mountain in 1783;
and for grandmother, Elizabeth Henry, a sister of
Patrick Henry, of whom every schoolboy knows.
Miss Henry was quite as remarkable in intellectual
respects as her illustrious brother, whom she
resembled in many of her traits. Thus Miss
Miller, who was named after her, may be said to be
entitled to her intellectual endowments by the law
of heredity. The specimen of her poems pub-
lished in this issue of the magazine was written by
her before she had attained her twelfth year.
BuTTERWORTH. "The Banner that Welcomes
the World," one of the most interesting features of
the great naval and patriotic celebration at New
York was the raising of the National flag at the
Navesink Highlands. A flagstaff, 135 feet high,
had been erected by the Lyceum League of Amer-
ica, which numbers 30,000 members; and on this
was first hoisted the Paul Jones flag, "the original
Stars and Strips made by the hands of patriotic
women of Philadelphia during the days of the
American Revolution." This was raised by Mrs.
H. R. P. Stafford, a descendant of Paul Jones. It
was then lowered and a beautiful flag, presented by
the League, was raised by Mrs. Schuyler Hamilton,
Honorary Regent of the New York State Daughters
of the Revolution. Salutes were fired by the Mian-
tonomoh, an oration was delivered by Mr. Amos P.
Wilder, and "The Banner that Welcomes the
World," written for the occasion by Mr. Hezekiab
Butterworth, was read by Madame Alberti.
Greenwich, Connecticut, June 30, 1893.
To Editor of Magazine of Poetry: I send you with my
regards, but oh, such sad regrets, a photograph of the plot and
grave of my late gifted son, Francis Saltus Saltus, now resting
in Sleepy Hollow Cemetery. This entire plot of some eight
hundred square feet, is entirely covered with flowers, the
border in white, the body of plot in purple, and the grave
(raised) in white. No adequate idea can be formed of its per-
fect beauty, without a personal view, but I assure you that the
result is magnificent, regal and royal. It is but just that the
grave of the poet should be covered with earthly flowers, who,
when in life, gave utterance to so many "Flowers of Thought,"
that blossomed into perfect song.
Very sincerely yours, Francis H. Saltus.
Thomas. " A Vision of Brave Men " was read
at the Fourth of July exercises at the Columbian
Exposition.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
WORKS CONSULTED IN THE PREPARATION OP THIS
NUMBER OF "THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY."
Eliot, George. The Spanish Gypsy. New
York: White, Stokes, & Allen, 1885. i6mo, pp.
271.
Eliot, George. Poems. New York: White,
Stokes & Allen, 1885. i6n]o, pp. 4 and 202.
Dickens, Charles. Complete Poems. New
York: White, Stokes & Allen, 1885. i6mo, pp. 6
and 142.
Palmer, Fanny Purdy. Miscellaneous poems.
Klingle, George. In the Name of the King.
New York: Frederick A. Stokes & Bro, 1888.
i6mo, pp. 199.
Klingle, George. Make Thy Way Mine.
New York: White, Stokes, & Allen, 1886. i6mo,
pp. 5 and 103.
Malone, Walter. The Outcast and Other
Poems. Cambridge, Mass.: The Riverside Press.
i2mo, pp. 8 and 103.
Malone, \y alter. Narcissus and Other Poems.
Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott Co, 1893. i2mo, pp.
6 and 118.
Nason, Edwin Francis. Miscellaneous poems.
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler. Poems of Pleasure.
Chicago: Belford, Clark & Co., 1888. i2mo, pp.
158.
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler. Poems of Passion.
X:hicago: Belford, Clark & Co.
Wilcox, Ella Wheeler. Maurine and Other
Poems. Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Co., 1886.
j2mo, pp. 5 and 254.
Ragsdale, Lulah. Miscellaneous poems.
BusKiRK, Clarence A. A Cavern for a Her-
mitage. New York: John B. Alden, 1889. i8mo,
pp. 93.
Gorton, Cynthia M. R. Miscellaneous poems.
Whitman, Sarah Helen. Poems. Boston:
Houghton, Osgood & Co., 1879. i2mo, pp. 12 and
261.
Morris, Lewis. Songs of Britain. London:
Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1887. F. cap, 8vo,
pp. 8 and 180.
Morris, Lewis. Songs Unsung. London:
Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1886. F. cap, 8vo,
pp. 8 and 180.
Morris, Lewis. Songs of Two Worlds. Lon-
don: Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1885. F. cap,
8vo, pp. 12 and 424.
Fitzgerald, Marcblla Agnbs. New York:
The Catholic Publication Society Co., 1886. i2mo,
pp. 10 and 504.
Wilstach, John Augustine. The Angel and
the King, and Other Poems. Buffalo: Charles
Wells Moulton, 1893. i2mo, pp. 12 and 441.
Hamm, Margherita Arlina. Miscellaneous
poems.
Allingham, William. Songs, Ballads, and
Stories. London: George Bell & Sons, 1877.
i2mo, pp. 9 and 341.
KiNNB, SopHRONiA YouNG. Miscellaneous
poems.
Bates, Kathsrine Lee. The College Beauti-
ful. Cambridge, Mass.: H. O. Houghton & Co.,
1877. i6mo, pp. 4 and 71.
Wood, Mary C. F. Sea Leaves, by Camilla K.
Von K., Santa Barbara, 1887. i2mo, pp. 3 and 178.
Patmorb, Coventry. The Angel in the House.
New York: E. P. Button & Co., 1876. i2mo, 2
vols, in one, pp. 10 and 201, and 10 and 204.
HiBBARD, Gracb. Wild Poppies. Buffalo:
Charles Wells Moulton* 1893. i6mo, pp. 8 and 106.
Victor, Frances Fuller. The New Pene-
lope. San Francisco: A. L. Bancroft & Co., 1877.
i2mo, pp. 6 and 349.
-)(-
THE EDITOR'S TABLE.
For engravings in this number of The Maga-
zine OF Poetry, the editor acknowledes the
courtesy of the Buffalo Electrotyping and Engrav-
ing Co., Buffalo. N. Y.; W. J. F. Dailey, editor of
Figaro^ Chicago, 111.
For copyright poems and pother selections, the
editor returns thanks to F. A. Stokes Company,
New York; J. B. Lippincott Co., Philadelphia, Pa.;
Morrill, Higgins & Co., Chicago, 111.; John B.
Alden, New York; Houghton, Mifflin & Co., Bos-
ton, Mass.; Kegan, Paul, French & Co., London;
The Catholic Publication Society Co., New York;
Charles Wells Moulton, Buffalo, N. Y.; George
Bell & Sons, London; E. P. Dutton & Co., New
York; A. L. Bancroft & Co., San Francisco, CaL
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l88o« Six years after, only one thousand machines had been sold. The
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1892 Finds our standing orders to our factory of one-hundred machines
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VOL V NO 4
^=z=zTHE —
MAGAZINE OF POETRY
A QUARTERLY REVIEW
II^I,rUSXRAXED
OCTOBER 1893
CHARLBS WBLLS MOXJLTON
BUFFAIX> N Y
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C0NTBNT8 FOR OCTOBBR, 1893*
CAROLINE ELIZABETH NORTON Alfred H. MiUs 345
With portrait drawn by Edwin Landseer, R. A.
SAM WALTER FOSS Ina RusseUe Warren 351
With portrait.
''BIRCH ARNOLD/* H, A, Van Fredenberg 354
With portait by Holcombe & MeUen, Detroit, Mich.
HELEN HINSDALE RICH - . CharUs G, WhUing 359
With portrait by Scott, Chicago, III.
CLARA DOTY BATES Charles IVells MauUon 364
With portrait by Morse, Chicago, 111.
ELLEN PALMER ALLERTON D. W. Wilder 366
With portrait by Evans, Hiawatha, Kan.
JOHN RUSKIN G, Washington Moon 370
With portrait.
MARY ELIZABETH BLAKE Oscar Fay Adams 373
EMMA LAZARUS Henry A, Van Fredenberg ... 375
With portrait.
ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS WARD /. Arthur King 380
With portrait.
DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI H. Buxton Forman 382
EVA KATHRINE CLAPP Inez R, Wood 389
With portrait by Atelier Scheurich, Berlin.
MARY R. P. HATCH Henry A, Thurman 391
With portrait by P. Haseltine, Lancaster, N. H.
WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT Richard ie GaUienne 395
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HATTIE LEONARD WRIGHT Horace A. KimbaU 401
With portrait.
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MARION DALANA DANIEL Rev, /. B. Hawthorne, D, Z>. . 407
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JULIA WARD HOWE Dudley Irving 410
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SINGLE POEMS 414
CURRENT POEMS 419
INDEXES 432
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: ,CAl?OllJ;g ^B^/IZABETH NORTON.
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The Magazine of Poetry.
Vol. V.
No. 4.
CAROLINE ELIZABETH NORTON.
CAROLINE ELIZABETH SARAH SHERI-
DAN, afterwards the Hon. Mrs. Norton, was
the second daughter of Thomas Sheridan, and the
granddaughter of Richard Brinsley Sheridan. Her
mother, who was the daughter of Colonel Callen-
dar, possessed great personal charms, and natural
literary ability which found exercise in the writing
of novels. Caroline inherited many of her mother's
gifts and graces, together with the more brilliant
qualities belonging to her father's family, and was
thus well equipped for both a fashionable and a lit-
erary career. Bom in 1808, she spent some years
after her father's death with her mother and sisters
at Hampton Court Palace, and later at a small
mansion in Great George Street, near Storey's
Gate. When scarcely more than a child she was
sought in marriage by Mr. George Norton, a
younger brother of Lord Grantley, and in 1827 he
married her. The marriage was a most unhappy
one, and Mrs. Norton doubtless found some relief
from her sorrows in the employment of her pen.
She is said to have earned large sums by her writ-
ings, and for a long time to have provided the
means for the family subsistence, as well as for her
husband's extravagances. These were the days of
the "Annuals" with their covers of red silk and
embellishments of steel engravings, and Mrs. Nor-
ton became both a contributor and an editor in this
connection. Like her mother, she wrote several
novels: "Old Sir Douglas," "Lost and Found,"
and others, novels which, in some instances, ran to
several editions, and to these she added four
volumes of verse: "The Sorrox^-s of Rosalie"
(1829) ; " The Undying One " (1831) ; "The Child
of the Islands" (1845); "The Lady of la Garaye"
(1861-2). Mrs. Norton's work was not conceived
in any dilettante spirit. It shows from first to last
that steady progress which only comes to consci-
entious application and continuoXis study. Her
longer works lack the sustained interest which can
alone make such poems permanently popular, but
they contain stanzas which give felicitous expres-
sion to genuine feeling and ennobling thought.
Lockhart, in the Quarterly ^ called her "the Byron
of poetesses," but, except for the connubial infelic-
I ity which withered both their lives, and the occas-
ional expression of the emotions stirred by their
common experience, the analogy cannot be said to
hold good. Each, like Wordsworth's nightingale,
was "a creature of fiery heart;" but Mrs. Norton
was chastened and refined by the sufferings that
irritated and degraded Byron. Mrs. Norton's ten-
der, womanly feeling was everywhere evident in
her life and work. Her sympathy with the poor
and suffering was keen and constant.
A. H. M.
BINGEN ON THE RHINE.
A SOLDIER of the Legion lay dying in Algiers —
There was lack of woman's nursing, there was
dearth of woman's tears ;
But a comrade stood beside him, while his life-
blood ebbed away,
And he bent, with pitying glances, to hear what he
might say.
The dying soldier faltered, as he took that com-
rade's hand.
And he said : "I never more shall see my own,
my native land ;
Take a message and a token to some distant friends
of mine.
For I was bom at Bingen— at Bingen on the Rhine 1
"Tell my brothers and companions, when they
crowd around
To hear my mournful story,. in the pleasant vine-
yard ground,
That we fought the battle bravely — and, when the
day was done,
Full many a corse lay ghastly pale, beneath the set-
ting sun.
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346
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
And 'midst the dead and dying were some grown
old in wars, —
The death-wound on their gallant breasts, the last
of many scars ;
But some were young, — ^and suddenly beheld life's
mom decline, —
And one had come from Bingen — fair Bingen on
the Rhine !
'*Tell my mother that her other sons shall comfort
her old age.
And I was aye a truant bird, that thought his home
a cage ;
For my father was a soldier, and, even as a child.
My heart leaped forth to hear him tell of struggles
fierce and wild ;
And when he died, and left us to divide his scanty
hoard,
I let them take whatever they would — but kept my
father's sword ;
And with boyish love I hung it where the bright
light used to shine,
On the cottage wall at Bingen — calm Bingen on
the Rhine !
"Tell my sister not to weep for me, and sob with
drooping head,
When the troops are marching home again, with
glad and gallant tread ;
But to look upon them proudly, with a calm and
steadfast eye.
For her brother was a soldier, too— and not afraid
to die.
And, if a comrade seek her love, I ask her, in my
name,
To listen to him kindly, without regret or shame ;
And to hang the old sword in its place (my father's
sword and mine),
For the honor of old Bingen — dear Bingen on the
Rhine !
"There's another — not a sister, — in the happy
days gone by.
You'd have known her by the merriment that
sparkled in her eye :
Too innocent for coquetry! too fond for idle
scorning ; —
Oh friend ! I fear the lightest heart makes some-
times heaviest mourning !
Tell her, the last night of my life (for, ere this moon
be risen.
My body will be out of pain — my soul be out of
prison),
I dreamed I stood with her^ and saw the yellow
sunlight shine
On the vine-clad hills of Bingen— fair Bingen on I But ride as they would, the king rode first,
the Rhine ! I For his Rose of the Isles lay dying!
" I saw the blue Rhine sweep along — I heard, or
seemed to hear,
The German songs we used to sing, in chorus sweet
and clear ;
And down the pleasant river, and up the slanting
hill.
That echoing chorus sounded, through the evening
calm and still ;
And her glad blue eyes were on me, as we passed
with friendly talk,
Down many a path beloved of yore, and well-
remembered walk ;
And her little hand lay lighdy, confidingly in
mine
But we '11 meet no more at Bingen — loved Bingen
on the Rhine!"
His voice grew faint and hoarser, — his grasp was
childish weak, —
His eyes put on a dying look, — he sighed and
ceased to speak;
His comrade bent to lift him, .... but the spark
of life had fled !
The soldier of the Legion in a foreign land was
dead!
And the soft moon rose up slowly, and calmly .she
looked down
On the red sand of the battie-field, with bloody
corpses strown ;
Yea, calmly on that dreadful scene her pale light
seemed to shine.
As it shone on distant Bingen — fair Bingen on the
Rhine !
THE KING OP DENMARK'S RIDE.
Word was brought to the Danish king,
(Hurry!)
That the love of his heart lay sufferii^,
And pined for the comfort his voice would bring;
(Oh! ride as though you were flying!)
Better he loves each golden curl
On the brow of that Scandinavian girl
Than his rich crown jewels of ruby and peart:
And his Rose of the Isles is dying!
Thirty nobles saddled with speed;
(Hurry!)
Each one mounting a gallant steed
Which he kept for batde and days of need;
(Oh! ride as though you were flying!)
Spurs were struck in the foaming flank;
Worn-out chargers staggered and sank;
Bridles were slackened and girths were burst;.
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CAROLINE ELIZABETH NORTON.
347
His nobles are beaten, one by one;
(Hurry!)
They have fainted and faltered and homeward gone;
His little fair page now follows alone,
For strength and for courage trying.
The king looked back at that faithful child;
Wan was the face that answering smiled;
They passed the drawbridge with clattering din,
Then he dropped; and only the king rode in
Where his Rose of the Isles lay dying!
The king blew a blast on his bugle horn;
(Silence!)
No answer came; but faint and forlorn
An echo returned on the cold grey mom,
Like the breath of a spirit sighing.
The castle portal stood grimly wide;
None welcomed the king from that weary ride;
For dead in the light of the dawning day,
The pale sweet form of the welcomer lay
Who had yearned for his voice while dying!
The panting steed, with a drooping crest,
Stood weary.
The king returned from her chamber of rest,
The thick sobs choking in his breast,
And that dumb companion eyeing.
The tears gushed forth which he strove to check.
He bowed his head on his charger's neck;
" O steed, that every nerve didst strain.
Dear steed, our ride hath been in vain
To the halls where my love lay dying! "
LOVE NOT.
Love not, love not, ye hapless sons of clay!
Hope's gayest wreaths are made of earthly
flow'rs —
Things that are made to fade and fall away,
When they have blossomed but a few short
hours.
Love not, love not!
Love not, love notl The thing you love may die —
May perish from the gay and gladsome earth;
The silent stars, the blue and smiling sky.
Beam on its grave as once upon its birth.
Love not, love notl
Love not, love not! The thing you love may
change.
The rosy lip may cease to smile on you;
The kindly beaming eye grow cold and strange;
The heart still warmly beat, yet not be true.
Love not, love not!
Love not, love not! — Oh, warning vainly said
In present years, as in the years gone by:
Love flings a halo round the dear one's head,
Faultless, immortal, — till they change or die. *
Love not, love not!
1 DO NOT LOVE THEE!
1 DO not love thee!— no! I do not love thee!
And yet when thou art absent I am sad;
And envy even the bright blue sky above thee.
Whose quiet stars may see thee and be glad.
I do not love thee! — ^yet, I know not why.
Whatever thou dost seems still well done, to me —
And often in my solitude I sigh —
That those I do love are not more like thee!
I do not love thee! — ^yet, when thou art gone
I hate the sound (though those who speak be dear)
Which breaks the lingering echo of the tone
Thy voice of music leaves upon my ear.
I do not love thee! — ^yet thy speaking eyes,
With their deep, bright, and most expressive blue —
Between me and the midnight heaven arise,
Oftener than any eyes I ever knew.
I know I do not love thee! — ^yet, alas!
Others will scarcely trust my candid heart;
And oft I catch them smiling as they pass.
Because they see me gazing where thou art.
IPS.
Oh! if the winds could whisper what they hear,
When murmuring round the sunset through the
grove;
If words were written on the streamlet clear,
So often spoken fearlessly above;
If tell-tale stars, descending from on high.
Could image forth the thoughts of all that gaze,
Entranced, upon that deep cerulean sky,
And count how few think only of their rays!
If the luird heaving ocean could disclose
All that has pa.ss'd upon her golden sand.
When the moon-lighted waves triumphant rose.
And dash'd their spray upon the echoing strand;
If dews could tell how many tears have mix'd
With the bright gem-like drops that Nature
weeps;
If night could say how many eyes are fix'd
On her dark shadows^ while creation sleeps!
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348
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
If echo, rising from her magic throne,
Repeated with her melody of voice
Each timid sigh— each whisper'd word and tone,
Which made the hearer's listening heart rejoice;
If Nature could, unchecked, repeat aloud
All she hath heard and seen — must hear and
Where would the whispering, vowing, sighing
crowd
Of lovers and their blushing partners be ?
A MOTHER'S LOVE.
The mother looketh from her latticed pane —
Her children's voices echoing sweet and clear:
With merry leap and bound her side they gain,
Offering their wild field-flow' rets : all are dear,
Yet still she listens with an absent ear :
For, while the strong and lovely round her press,
A halt, uneven step sounds drawing near :
And all she leaves, that crippled child to bless.
Folding him to her heart, with cherishing caress.
Yea, where the soul denies illumined grace,
(The last, the worst, fatallest defect);
She, gazing earnest in that idiot face.
Thinks she perceives a dawn of intellect :
And, year by year, continues to expect
What time shall never bring ere life be flown :
Still loving, hoping, — patient, though dejected, —
Watching those eyes that answer not her own, —
Near him, and yet how far! with him, but still alone.
Want of attraction this love cannot mar :
Years of rebellion cannot blot it out :
The prodigal, returning from afar,
Still finds a welcome, giv'n with song and shout!
The father's hand without reproach or doubt,
Clasps his, — who caused them all such bitter fears :
The mother's arms encircle him about :
That long, dark course of alienated years.
Marked only by a burst of reconciling tears !
WE HAVE BEEN FRIENDS TOGETHER.
We have been friends together.
In sunshine and in shade ;
Since first beneath the chestnut trees
In infancy we play'd.
But coldness dwells within thy heart,
A cloud is on thy brow ;
We have been friends together—
Shall a light word part us now ?
VV^e have been sad together.
We have wept with bitter tears,
O'er the grass-grown graves, where slumber'd
The hopes of early years.
The voices which are silent there
Would bid thee clear thy brow ;
We have been sad together —
Oh 1 what shall part us now ?
TO MY BOOKS.
Silent companions of the lonely hour,
Friends, who can never alter or forsake.
Who for inconstant roving have no power
And all neglect, perforce, must calmly take, —
Let me return to you; this turmoil ending
Which worldly cares have in ray spirit wrought.
And, o'er your old familiar pages bending.
Refresh my mind with many a tranquil thought,
Till, haply meeting there, from time to time,
Fancies, the audible echo of my own,
'Twill be like hearing in a foreign dime
My native language spoke in friendly tone.
And with a sort of welcome I shall dwell
On these, my unripe musings, told so well.
BE FRANK WITH ME.
Be frank with me, and I accept my lot ;
But deal not with me as a grieving child.
Who for the loss of that which he hath not
Is by a show of kindness thus beguiled.
Raise not for me, from its enshrouded tomb.
The ghostly likeness of a hope deceased ;
Nor think to cheat the darkness of my doom
By wavering doubts how far thou art released ,
This dressing Pity in the garb of Love,-—
This efibrt of the heart to seem the same,-—
These sighs and lingerings, (which nothing prove
But that thou leav'st me with a kind of shame,) —
Remind me more, by their most vain deceit.
Of the dear loss of all which thou dost counterfeit-
HBMORY.
Beneath the influence of this fond spell,
Happy, contented, bless'd, we seem to dwell ;
Sweet faces shine with love's own tender ray,
Which frown, or coldly turn from us, by day ;
The lonely orphan hears a parent's voice ;
Sad, childless mothers once again rejoice ;
The poor deserted seems a happy bride ;
And the long parted wander side by side.
— The Dream,
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SAM WALTER FOSS.
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SAM WALTER FOSS.
351
SAM WALTER FOSS.
MR. SAM WALTER FOSS, journalist, was
born in the little town of Candia, N. H.,
fune 19th, 1858. Through his ancestor, Stephen
Bacheller, he claims kinship with Daniel Webster,
the poet Whittier and William Pitt Fessenden. He
worked on his father's farm till he was fourteen
years of age, when the family moved to Ports-
mouth, N. H. In that place he remained until he
was nineteen, attending the high school, from
which he was graduated in 1877. A year later he
was graduated fromTilton Seminary, Tilton, N.H.,
and shortly afterwards entered Brown University,
taking his degree four years later. In the latter
institution he was obliged to work his way, and did
it nobly by writing for the press and doing janitor's
work. Young Foss had a hard time of it, but
showed pluck, and by perseverance his efforts were
crowned with marked success. Soon after leaving
the university he embarked in journalism. With
another young fellow he bought out the Lynn
Union. That paper did not prove a financial suc-
cess, and his partner withdrew, leaving him to run
it alone. It was in Lynn he first took to writing
humorous poetry, and here began his reputation as a
poet In 1886 he sold out the Union. The follow-
ing year he assumed editorial charge of the Yankee
Blade of Boston, a position he adequately filled for
nearly six years. Since 1886 he became known as
a poet by profession, writing for all the humorous
papers, Puck, Judge, Life, Tid-Bits, the Detroit
Free Press, and many of the more important
papers and syndicates. His poems are as well
known in Canada, England and Australia as in this
country. Mr. Foss published a collection of his
poems in 1893, entitled "Back Country Poems.*'
His style is peculiar, and entirely his own. It
shows strong individuality combined with genius.
Generous in thought, charitable in word, he has
won for himself the deserved praise of the public.
L R. W.
THE VOLUNTEER ORGANIST.
The great big church wuz crowded full uv broad-
cloth an' uv silk,
An' satins rich as cream thet grows on our ol'
brindle's milk ;
Shined boots, biled shirts, stiff dickeys, an* stove-
pipe hats were there.
An* doods 'ith trouserloons so tight they couldn'
kneel in prayer.
The elder, in his poolpit high^ said, as he slowly
riz:
*' Our organist is^^kep' to hum. laid up 'ith rooma-
tiz,
An* as we hev no substitoot, as brother Moore ain't
here,
Will some *un in the congregation be so kind *s to
volunteer?**
An' then a red-nosed, drunken tramp, of low-
toned, rowdy style,
Give an interduct'ry hiccup, *an then staggered up
the aisle ;
Then thro* thet holy atmosphere there crep' a sense
er sin,
An' thro* thet'air er sanctity the odor uv ol* gin.
Then Deacon Purin*ton he yelled, his teeth all sot
on edge :
** This man purfanes the house er God ! W*y, this
is sakerlege !**
The tramp didn* hear a word he said, but slouched
'ith stumblin* feet.
An* sprawled an* staggered up the steps, an* gained
the organ seat.
He then went pawrin* thro* the keys, an' soon there
riz a strain
Thet seemed to jest bulge.out the heart, an* 'lectrify
the brain ;
An* then he slapped down on the thing *ith hands
*an head *an knees, —
He slam-dashed his hull body down kerflop upon
the keys.
The organ roared, the music flood went sweepin*
high an* dry.
It swelled into the rafters, *an bulged out into the
sky.
The ol' church shook an* staggered, an* seemed to
reel an* sway.
An* the elder shouted "Glory!** an* I yelled out
"Hooray!**
An* then he tried a tender strain thet melted in our
ears,
Thet brought up blessed memories an* drenched
'em down *ith tears ;
An' we dreamed uv ol' time kitchens, *ith Tabby
on the mat,
Uv home an* luv an' baby days, an' mother, an' all
that!
An' then he struck a streak uv hope — a song from
souls forgiven —
Thet burst from prison-bars uv sin, an* stormed the
gates uv heaven ;
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
The momin* stars they sung together, — no soul
wuz left alone, —
We felt the universe wuz safe, an' God wuz on his
throne !
'An then a wail uv deep despair an' darkness come
again,
An' long black crape hung on the doors uv all the
homes uv men ;
No luv, no light, no joy, no hope, no songs uv glad
delight, —
An' then the tramp, he staggered down an' reeled
into the night !
But we knew he 'd tol' his story, though he never
spoke a word,
An' it was the saddest story thet our ears hed ever
heard ;
He hed tol' his own life hist'ry, an' no eye wuz dry
thet day.
Wen the elder rose an' simply said : "My breth-
ren let us pray."
THE RAILROAD THROUGH THE FARM.
There's thet black abomemation, thet big loco-
motive there,
Its smoke-tail like a pirut-flag a-wavin' through the
air;
An' I mus' set, twelve times a day, an* never raise
my arm.
An' see thet gret black monster go a-snordn thro'
my farm.
My father's farm, my grandsir's farm — I come of
Pilgrim stock —
My great-great-great-great grandsir's farm — 'way
back to Plymouth Rock ;
*Way back in the sixteen hundreds it was in our
family name,
An' no man dared to trespass till that tootin' rail-
road came.
Isez, ** You can't go through this farm, you hear
it flat an' plain !"
An' then they blabbed about the right of ** eminent
domain."
*• Who's Eminent Domain?" sez I. ** I want you
folks to see
Thet on this farm there ain't no man as eminent as
me."
An' w'en their gangs begun to dig I went out with
a gun.
An* they rushed me off to prison till their wretched
work wuz done.
" If I can't purtect my farm," sez I, ** w'y, then, it's
my idee
You 'd better shet off callin' this * the country of
the free.' "
There, there ! ye hear it toot again an' break the
peaceful calm.
I tell ye, you black monster, you've no business on
my farm !
An' men ride by in stovepipe hats, an' women loll
in silk.
An', lookin' in my barnyard, say, *'See thet ol'
codger milk !"
Git off my farm, you stuck-up doods, who set in
there an' grin,
I own this farm, railroad an' all, an' I will fence it
in!
Ding-dong, toot-toot, you black ol' fiend, you'll
find w'en you come back
An' or rail fence, without no bars, built straight
across the track.
An' then you stuck-up doods inside, you Pullman
upper crust.
Will know this codger '11 hold his farm an' let the
railroad bust.
You '11 find this railroad all fenced in — 'twon'tdo
no good to talk —
If you want to git to Boston, w'y jest take yer laigs
an* walk.
THE AUCTIONEER'S GIFT.
The auctioneer leaped on a chair, and bold and
loud and clear
He poured his cataract of words— just like an auc-
tioneer.
An auction sale of furniture, where some hard
mortgagee
Was bound to get his money back, and pay his
lawyer's fee.
A humorist of wide renown, this doughty auction-
eer.
His horse-play raised the loud guffaw, and brought
the answering jeer ;
He scattered round his jokes, like rain, on the un-
just and the just:
Sam Sleeman said he ** laffed so much he thought
that he would bust."
He knocked down bureaus, beds, and stoves, and
chandeliers.
And a grand piano, which he swore would '* last a
thousand years;"
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SAM WALTER FOSS,
353
He rattled out the crockery, and sold tht? silver-
wate, —
At last they passed him up, to sell, a little baby's
chair.
** How much ? How much ? Come, make a bid ; is
all your money spent ?"
And then a cheap, facetious wag came up and bid,
.** One cent!"
Just then a sad-faced woman, who stood in silence
there,
Broke down, and cried, "My baby's chair! My
poor dead baby's chair !"
" Here, madame, take your baby's chair," said the
softened auctioneer,
'* I know its value all too well — my baby died last
year—
And if the owner of the chair, our friend the mort-
gagee,
Objects to this proceeding, let him send the bill to
me!"
Gone was the tone of raillery ; the humorist auc-
tioneer
Turned shamefaced from his audience to brush I
away a tear ; '
The laughing crowd was awed and still, no tear- i
less eye was there |
When the weeping woman reached and took her
little baby's chair. |
Then was I lonely, and the way grew dreary ;
I grimly fought with fate,
And cherished, with my loneliness aweary,
Dead love and living hate.
I sought his grave to whom my heart was mated —
My friend, the good and brave ;
And there I saw the form of him I hated,
Bent, weeping, o'er his grave.
And then he told me that, in all the city,
But me and him below, [pity,
From all the throngs that needed God's sweet
He had no friend or foe.
And now we live within the self-same city,
No other friends we crave ;
.Our love is strong that sprang from human pity.
Above the dead man's grave.
TWO FRIENDS. I
I LIVED alone within a mighty city.
The crowds that come and go ; '
'Mid all its throngs, the foolish and the witty, I
I had no friend or foe. |
There were two men, within that mighty city, I
Come to me from the throng ; |
One loved me with a love akin to pity, ,
The other's hate was strong.
The lover and the hater dwelt beside me,
Passed through the selfsame gate ;
And neither, in their passing-by, denied me
The look of love and hate.
So, many months within that mighty city |
I loved my friend full well ;
But him, my foe, for him I felt no pity-
But the deep hate of hell. '
One morning, in the twilight, o'er the city
There came an icy breath :
My friend had passed beyond my love and pity.
The border-land of death.
INGIN SUMMER.
Natur', the good old school marm who pities our
distress,
She gives her children each year a glad recess ;
An' ol' gray-headed boys an' girls, they feel their
hearts thaw out,
An' life flows on as music'ly as water from a spout.
An' now the Ingin Summer time, 'ith all its rest, is
here,
A piece of sweet meat stuck between the slices of
the year ;
A sorter reign er jubilee 'twixt snow an' thunder
showers ;
A chunk of sweetness sandwiched in between the
frost and flowers.
The Prince of the Power of the Air goes oflT on his
vacation,
The Devil jest holds up a spell an' stops his agger-
v^tion ;
An* Natur' an' the heart er man, unriled by heatgr .
flood,
They jest lay back an' hoi' their breath, an' feel
that God is good.
Now w'en we breathe we jest take in great gulps er
happines,
We drink the air, like apple juice from Natur' 's
cider-press ;
It jest comes tricklin' down thro' space from
Heaven's great vats above.
An' fills our lungs 'ith oxygin. an' slops our .souls
'ith love !
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
I love my neighbor like myself, this Ingin Summer
day,
I feel it's glorious to live, for life is all O. K.
Natur', the good ol* schoolmarm who pities our
distress,
She gives her children every year this little glad
recess.
SWEETS FOR THE SWEET.
Oh, these rondeaus and triolets are pretty as vio-
lets,
They 're dainty, artistic and neat ;
They 're Gallic, Parisian, and pinks of precision,'
And veritable sweets for the sweet.
They give a soft pleasure to young men of leisure —
Those beautiful feminine men—
Who on literature's border crochet and embroider,
And do ** fancy-work ** with the pen.
Their sapless aridities, their dry insipidities,
In statuesque beauty are wrought.
But 't would be unconventional to express an inten-
tional
Wilful, original thought.
LIFE.
And all lives are a poem; some wild and cyclonic,
With verses of cynical bluster Byronic;
And some still flow on in perpetual benison,
As perfect and smooth as a stanza of Tennyson;
And some find huge boulders their currents to
hinder.
And are broken and bent like the poems of Pindar;
And some a deep base of proud music are built on,
The calm ocean smell of the epic of Milton;
And some rollick on with a freedom completer
In Whitman's chaotic, tumultuous meter.
But most lives are mixed, like Shakespearian
dramas,
Where the king speaks heroics, the idiot stam-
mers,
Where the old man gives counsel, the young man
loves hotly,
Where the king wears his crown and the fool wears
his motley.
Where the lord treads his hall and the peasant his
heather —
And in the fifth act they all exit together, —
And the drama goes out with its pomp, and its
thunder,
And we weep, and we laugh, and we listen, and
wonder !
— The Cosmic Poem,
'' BIRCH ARNOLD." ^
MRS. ALICE ELQISE BARTLETT, author,
was bom in Delavan, Wis., September 4th,
1848. Her maiden name was Bowen, and she is
widely known by her pen-name, "Birch Arnold."
Her first poem, **The Meeting of the Waters,"
was published in the Madison Democrat, With all
its crudities it was unique and* poetic, and the en-
couragement received determined her to enter into
the field of literature as a profession. In 1877 she
published her first novel, ** Until the Daybreak,"
which at once gave her a rank among story writers.
In 1872 she commenced to write for the Toledo
Blade and Lockers National Monthly, Her articles
attracted a great deal of attention, and D. R. Locke
(•'Petroleum V. Nasby") told a friend that he in-
tended to " adopt that promising young man." His
( Nasby 's) chagrin on learning that the young man
was a girl can be imagined. It has often afforded
her amusement to find her utterances commented
on as the " vigorous ideas of thinking men." To
the world-at-large she still remains, and is often
addressed as, " Birch Arnold, Esq." Ill health for
several years prevented the continuous effort neces-
sary to pronounced success, but lyrics, essays and
miscellaneous writings have from time to time ap-
peared over her signature. In 1876 she was mar-
ried to J. M. D. Bartlett, of Quincy, III., and has
two children. As a conversationalist she is inter-
esting, and is an elocutionist of no ordinary ability.
She is extremely sincere and earnest in her life, as
well as her writings, and her heart is in the eleva-
tion of her sex and of humanity. Her latest work
is a novel entitled '* A New Aristocracy," (Detroit,
1 891), dealing with women and the labor question.
Her home is in Detroit, Mich. H. A. V.
THE WATER LILY'S SPIRIT.
Moonbeam and night.
Mystical light.
Mingle and merge on the edge of the stream,
Where in a breath
As silent as death
The lily gives birth to the soul of a dream.
Gossamer wings,
Vanishing things.
That flutter and dazzle, now fade and now shine,
Lift from its heart
When the pale sepals part,
A spirit o'er human, though less than divine.
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'BIRCH ARNOLDr
357
Deeps of her eyes I She bids me bend and soothe them, she bids me
Where witchery lies, wipe their tears,
Hold the subtlest of sweets to charm away care, And gather up the stitches of the raveled web of
Yet lighter than down,
By fairy winds blown,
No mortal hath gazed on this sprite of the air.
Around us and over
She lightly doth hover,
With the charm of Titania she sealeth our eyes,
Till lulled on her breast
In a vision of rest
We dream but of love and a near Paradise.
L*ENVOI.
The incense that steals
When summer reveals
The river's fair bosom with lillies aglow.
Is this spirit of dreams,
By bloom-bordered streams,
That from elflands of fancy enchantingly flow.
THE ANGEL OF MY HEART.
When the twilight gathers lonely, and I sit within
the gloom,
As the flickering firelight chases the shadows round
the room.
There often comes to meet me, from the land where
fancies start,
A sweet and blessed presence — the Angel of my
Heart.
She comes and sits beside me, and I take her hand
in mine,
And my pulses thrill and gladden, with a love that
seems divine,
As I clasp her close, and hold her, till the world
slips out of sight,
And hand in hand together we walk the realms of
light
Then whatever is the fairest, in this poor heart of
mine —
As bees extract the honey from the rose*s garnered
wine,
She draws with gentle glances, that lead me like a
prayer.
To follow in her footsteps through the pathway of
the air.
Wherever crime is rampant, wherever pain and woe
Lift up the heads of suffering with the look that
all men know.
years,
To weave them in a garment, that is wholesome,
fair and pure.
With the strength there is in hoping and the
patience to endure.
And oft when most I need her, when my path seems
overgrown
With the follies and temptations that my wayward
life has known.
And I long with ceaseless longing for the joys that
once were mine.
Oh, then in gentle pity I can feel her glances shine
Upon my bended spirit, and I rise refreshed to say,
I will be strong and faithful, howe'er so dark the
way.
rare and radiant Angel, I know thou*rt but a
dream.
And yet .so real and potent do thy ministrations
seem.
That when across the river with old Charon I shall
go,
1 shall look to see thee standing against the morn-
ing's glow !
And there the first to greet me, the first to take my
hand.
And lead me through the pastures of that sweet
and peaceful land.
With a blissful sense of rapture, that we never
more need part,
I shall clasp thee close forever, O thou Angel of my
Heart.
FORGETFULNESS.
If in the viewless haunts of time.
Some gift of fortune treasured there.
In garnered fullness, might be mine
In answer to entreating prayer,
I scarce could claim a boon to bless
To equal thee, Forgetfulness ?
A haunting shadow sups with me,
To greet the morning's old surprise,
With only sense of misery
And bitter meaning in its eyes ;
Alas ! I cannot seek redress
Except in thee, Forgetfulness !
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
The summer's suns may rise and set,
And June-day fragrance fill the air ;
I see thro* tears, nor can forget
That ever-hovering wraith of care ;
Though sorrow makes the sunshine less.
They're one with thee, Forgetfulness !
Each heart must know its day of grief;
All earthly things must fade and die ;
Remembrance brings perchance relief,
Or bitterness of tear and sigh ;
For me no other boon can bless
Alike to thee, Forgetfulness !
TO A BUTTERFLY IN NOVEMBER.
Oh, pallid phantom of a joyous summer day.
That vaguely trembles on my window pane,
Dost lift thy heavy-lidded eyes in vain
To catch the westering sun*s endearing ray ?
Dost sigh for odorous breaths that idly play
Their sweet enchantments o'er the damask
rose.
Upon whose glowing breast thou might'st re-
pose
And lull thy fears in dreams of blooming May ?
Alas ! thou art the idle sport of fate,
And winter's blast shall rudely smite thee down
Yet not alone shalt thou find all too late —
Thou might'st have worn thy summer's golden
crown;
Like thee, I lingering watch the waning light
As swift the shadows rise of destined night.
REPROOF.
Love does not always^heal with balm ;
The surgeon's knife some anguished wounds
must bare,
For oft their poison balks the tenderest care
That lies within the touch of pity's palm.
Who keeps for love a sweet, unbroken calm,
Like breath of some novitiate's cloistered prayer,
Nor brooks the storm that frets the tranquil air,
And sends a discord quavering through its psalm,
Belittles love. That love is truest, best.
Which bravely learns to face all bitter things.
And yet in answering wisdom's high behest
Forgets no word of its sweet utterings ;
And even as perforce it wields the knife
Recalls with its fond kiss to stronger life.
YOUTH AND I.
Youth was led by hope,
I leaned low to sorrow;
Youth saw golden dreams
In every bright to-morrow;
I looked often back
Upon our flower-strewn track,
And when we reached the crest
Of the hilltop, looking west,
Youth and I, we parted.
Youth would follow love ;
I knew love's devotion,
All its bitter sweet,
All its restless ocean;
Youth was eager, bold.
And I, a trembling hold
Upon his glowing hand.
Could only feebly stand ;
So Youth and I parted.
Youth was glad to go,
And I am well content ;
Life is so much calmer
Since away he went;
All the eager yearnings.
All the old time burnings
Of feverish desires.
Have quenched their fitful fires,
Since Youth and I have parted.
Youth is far away.
But on the westward slope.
Where glints the evening sun,
I once more welcome Hope ;
And Faith is close beside me.
Her hand outstretched to guide me.
Where shadows darkly close,
Above earth's last repose.
When Life and I have parted.
UNSATISFIED.
E'en thro' her radiant beauty, hour by hour,
I drink with draughts of darkly liquid eyes,
And listen oft her sweet and low replies,
And pluck again the fragrant crimson flower
Upon her cheeks and dewy lips that lies.
Insatiate still, with love's most sovereign power
As empty always as the Danaid's sieve —
My miser's heart will cry forever— Give.
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HELEN HINSDALE RICH
359
HELEN HINSDALE RICH.
WHEN Helen Hinsdale was born into this
world, it was as the daughter of a first
settler of a new and wild region of northern New
York. The primeval forests were on every side of
the log cabin where she saw the light, and not very
far away in any direction, for it was something over
sixty years ago, her father having migrated thither
from Berkshire county in Massachusetts, where the
family name still remains in the town of Hinsdale
and in the possession of many citizens. There she
grew up with little schooling, but read as many
books as came her way; she married early, and
afterward continued her self-culture by every means
at her command, so that the great masterpieces of
English literature became familiar to her, and her
love of beauty was fostered by her husband, Moses
Rich of Brasher Falls. She made everything serve
an inextinguishable desire to benefit her kind, in
the cause of temperance, patriotism and the rights
of woman, and has been useful in many moral
causes as writer and speaker. From early years
Mrs. Rich wrote her verses for newspapers and
later for magazines, and when her volume, ''A
Dream of the Adirondacks, and Other Poems,"
was published, it gained instant recognition from
the press of the whole country as a worthy part of
the poetry of America. Indeed a first book of
verse very seldom reaches any such common
judgment of approval, and it was justified by the
merits of the contents. This volume was published
in 1884, and now there is ready for the press and
will shordy be issued a new volume, which will
sustain the standard of the other.
Mrs. Rich's verse is always fluent and graceful,
and she expresses emotion with that impress of
genuineness and honesty which carries a personal
force into the verse. She is deeply engaged in
moral motives, and these fill many of her best
poems with an inspiring fervor. But she also has
the feeling of pure beauty; no poet could so cele-
brate the clearness of Nature, the roses, the lilies,
the autumn glory, without an ecstatic sense of their
loveliness. Her heart throbs in unison with the
beauty of earth as well as with the heart of human-
ity, and she deserves her place with Lucy Lar-
com, Mrs. Dorr, Mrs. Rollins and others, as a
fortunate interpreter of Nature and humanity.
Mrs. Rich is now a resident of Chicago; she re-
tains her connection with many important social
movements, her religious afliliations are liberal,
and she enjoys the warm friendship of men and
women known in reforms and in literature.
C. G. W.
JUSTICE IN LEADVILLE.
Yes, law is a great thing,|but justice comes in
ahead
When a lie makes a fiend.not guilty, and the neigh"
bor he shot is dead.
Leadville would follow the fashion, — have regular
courts of law, —
I take no stock in lawyers, don't gamble upon their
jaw;
But the judge he said Gueldo undoubtedly did for
Blake,
And we ought to give him a trial, just for appear-
ance sake;
That Texas chap can't clear him, the lead's too
rich to hide.
And the black neck of the Spaniard on the air-
line's bound to ride.
So I tried to believe in the woman with the bandage
upon her eyes,
Though one side's as likely as t'other to drop
from the beam or rise
If a nugget should tip the balance or a false tongue
cry the weight;
But I thought I'd see if a trial was **the regular
thing" for Kate.
So I went to her pretty cottage; the widow's a tidy
thing, —
Great mournful eyes, and a head of hair as brown
as a heron's wing.
Her husband's murder was cruel; Antonio, fierce
and sly,
Had sworn revenge for a trifle when some of the
boys were nigh.
She had tripped to her bed of pansies, for Blake
was going away;
While he bent to embrace their baby she gathered
a love bokay.
She heard a voice, — Gueldo's, — ^a shot, — and she
ran to Jim;
But the baby's white dress was scarlet, and his
father's eyes were dim.
You've heard the cry of a bittern ?— it was just that
sort of a noise;
It brought us there in a hurry, — the women and
half the boys.
She tried to tell us the story, — her white lips only
stirred;
She seemed to slip quite out of life, and couldn't
utter a word.
She told us at last in writing, only a name,— and
then
Six derringers found his level, his guard was a
dozen men.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
She didn't take on, seemed frozen, — but Lord! i Would be urged for the wolf defendant; the judge,
what a ghastly face!
With slow, sad steps, like the shade of joy, she
crept round the woful place.
And when we lifted the coffin she knelt with her
little child.
Just whispered to Jim and kissed him; we said she
was going wild.
Ah! deep things yield no token, and she wa'n't sur-
face gold;
'T was a gloomy job prospecting round the claim
Jim couldn't hold.
But I found her rocking the baby, her chin in the
dainty palm,
White as the shaver's pillow, tearless, and dreadful
calm.
I told her about the trial; she shuddered, her
great black eyes
Flashed out such a danger signal, — or may be it
was surprise.
"They never can clear Gueldo, — he cannot escape,
fori
Can swear to his hissing Spanish,— that I saw him
turn and fly!"
"No, never," I said; "his ticket is good for the
underground;
He's due' this time to-morrow where he won't find
Blake around."
The judge held court in his wood-house, and Bag-
get had stripped his store
Of barrel and box; I never set eyes on a crowd
before.
I dropped on a keg of ciscos, the judge on a box
of soap;
Gueldo and his attorney found seats on a coil of
rope.
Then Kate came, with her baby like a rosebud in
the snow.
Its pink cheek against the mother's pallid and
pinched with woe.
Jim's blue eyes, as I live, sir! there were his very
curls;
They set us miners to sobbing like a corral of silly
girls.
She looked so thankful on us, colored, and when
she met
The snake eyes of Gueldo, the braids on her brow
were wet.
And if the hell of the preachers had yawned on our
gentle Kate,
She couldn't have glared such horror or woman's
deadly hate.
Well, they went on with the trial; an alibi, it was
claimed.
I — well, he looked ashamed,
When ten of the hardest rascals, the cruellest,
meanest lot.
Swore, black and blue, Gueldo was four miles from
the spot
With them, a-hunting the grizzly; then the Texan
pled his case.
Till the judge turned pale as ashes,— couldn't look
in an honest face.
" Your verdict, my men of the jury, must be
grounded, I suppose,
On the weight of the testimony; if you have any
faith in those
Reliable fellows from Gouger, the prisoner was not
Mar."
And his honor growled upon him like a vexed and
hungry b'ar.
I've noticed the newest convert prays loudest of all
the camp;
And that mutton-headed jury declared for the
cuss^ scamp.
For spite of Kate's truthful story, the evidence
went, you see.
To disprove the facts; Gueldo by the law was
acquitted, free.
"You can go," said the judge; "but likely the
climate won't suit you here."
Antonio rose defiant.
Then Kate spoke, low and clear,
(Clasping her babe, and rising,) "Are you done
with the prisoner, sir? "
As a marble statue might ask it. His honor
bowed to her, —
"Heaven knows I'm sorry I am, child." "Be-
cause," she replied, "I am not."
A flash from her eyes and pistol, — ^the Mexican
devil was shot
The smoke made a little halo round the laughing
baby's head.
Then I knew the terrible promise she whispered
her husband dead.
Gueldo staggered, falling, his swart face scared
and gH^m, —
" Dead, gentlemen of the jury! Decision reversed
for him!
And justice! " we heard her mutter, though she
wasn't the talking kind,
And she hadn't the least allusion to that female
pictured blind.
Trembling she turned upon us the eyes of a
wounded doe;
"Amen!" from the weeping neighbors; "God
help you! " the judge said, "Go! "
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HELEN HINSDALE RICH
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DEATH AND ROSES.
When I am dead, strew roses o'er me, Sweet-
Great bleeding hearts, roses from head to feet;
Buds without stint, and leaves as bright and cool
As ferns that nod by lily-haunted pool;
And let me hold them in these arms, my Own,
So shall I never be again— alone.
How have I loved them ? All the happy days
I walked with life the old and pleasant ways;
Loved them so well I gave the best to thee.
These, my true loves, broke never faith with me;
Nay, in their folds I often found the tear
I shed by night, a morning dew-drop clear.
I want them all — my roses of Lorraine,
The wild sweetbrier that blossomed in the lane,
My Bengal beauties, moss-rose, pink and white —
With all their glory it will not be night
Let lily-bells alone for me be tolled,
And drape the sod with trailing Cloth of Gold.
O peerless darlings of the sun and rain!
When did I seek your velvet lips in vain ?
Your thorns have left no scar upon my heart,
My first, last breath still yours, a very part
Of all my being; go with me where blows
On Death's white bosom Life's immortal Rose!
MAY SONG.
Let me see! It was May, for an oriole came,
With its crest of vermillion and jet,
Darting down like an arrow of radiant flame,
In a song I shall never forget;
And flooding the air with a melody wild,
Half sorrow, half passion, and pain.
The years faded slowly; I stood there a child,
With a child's holy rapture again.
Ah, yes, it was May; for the violets blue
That I crushed in my palms in my glee,
With gentle reproach, shedding tear-drops of dew.
Found pity and refuge with thee;
It was May in the valley, on meadow and hill.
And you kissed me, you know, by thd birch
That stands by the little, wild, frolicsome rill,
Where the robins come always to perch.
It was May in my heart, every folding and cell
In imperial purple (all sovereigns may wear);
May danced in my eyes that reflected so well
Thy face lighting up all the beautiful there;
It was May! It was May! for you said with a sigh
" I love you; remember it ages to come;
It will never be May to me more, if you fly,
Then hasten to tell me you pine for your home."
DIE, SWEET JUNE.
Ring all thy lily bells, thy royal colors fly.
Sweet June, and die!
The burden of her flowery state she bore.
Till heart could bear no more
The revelry of golden throats, perfumes
Of all the dear, dead Junes.
The phantom rose-leaves drifting faint and wan.
Slow fading in the sun,
Remembered kisses by the pansy bed,
Vows that were said.
Soft dreaming eyes of loved ones passed away
Haunt the still day.
The vanished sighs, the thrilling touch of hands.
In death's far lands.
All the impassioned loveliness that smiled
On thee, fair child.
Oh! rose-crowned daughter of a deathless sire,
Too fierce the fire
That poured its amber tide along thy veins;
Too strong the chains
That bound thy spirit to the unburied past:
■ Peace, June, at last!
EMERSON.
Never alone again, since I have found
The treasure of the jewels of thy mind-
Richer than Ormus, or the fairest bound
Of Persian beauty poets joy to find!
Do I behold the starry realms above.
Or walk the fields, or in the forest lie,
Thy matchless thoughts all loveliness approve;
The winds repeat them in each passing sigh,
Birds sing thy messages of truth and praise.
The ferns repeat thy wisdom to the flowers.
The river murmurs of thy soul's calm ways
Beyond the mists that cloud our feeble powers!
And life, love, duty, by thy royal side, —
All things, O sage, through thee are glorified!
RED ROSES.
Let not the drifted snow of lilies white
Press my dead heart, but roses red as flame;
It will be morning then; the stormy night
Gone like the discords of some martial strain
Heard all too near— in the dim distance sweet
O rose of life! that struggled to the light,
At last unfolding, beautiful, complete.
To bud and bloom forever in His sight!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
MRS. CLARA DOTY BATES.
MRS. CLARA DOTY BATES was born in
Ann Arbor, Mich., in 185—. She is the
second daughter of Samuel Rosecrans Doty and
Hannah Lawrence, who were among the pioneers
of Michigan. Mrs. Bates comes of stalwart stock;
mingled Dutch and English blood. Her great-
grandfather, a Rosecrans, was ninety years old
when he died, and the legend goes, that at the time
of his death " his hair was as black as a raven's
wing." Another ancestor was with Washington at
Valley Forge. On the mother's side are the Law-
rences, and Hannah Lawrence, the great-grand-
mother, was famous for her gift of story telling.
Clara had a faculty for rhyme from her earliest days.
She wrote verses when she could only print in big
letters. Her first poem was published when she
was nine yean old. The most of her published
work has been fugitive, although there have been
several books, chiefly for children. Among these
are "iEsop's Fables Versified," "Child Lore,^
"Classics of Babyland," " Heart's Content," and
several minor books, all published in Boston. Her
life up to her marriage was passed in Ann Arbor.
The homestead, "Heart's Content," was well
known for its treasures of books and pictures. The
location of the State University at Ann Arbor gave
better facilities for education than was offered in
the usual western village. It was before the ad-
mission of women to equal opportunities with men,
but it was possible to secure private instruction in
advanced studies. This the little flock of Doty
girls had in addition to private schools, while the
son had the university. Clara Doty was married in
1869 to Morgan Bates, a newspaper man and the
author of several plays. Her home is in Chicago,
III. She is a member of The Fortnightly, a dub
foremost among the literary societies of America.
She is upon the literary committee of the
woman's branch of the World's Congress Auxili-
ary. All her manuscript and notes were destroyed
by the burning of her father's house several years
ago. Among them were a finished story, a half-
completed novel and some other work. Mrs. Bates
is fond of outdoor life, and is a woman of marked
individuality. C. W. M.
THE SLEEP-JOURNEY.
The breath of a soft wing.
A flutter as of dark bat hurrying
Across a twilight garden, and I knew
' Twas Sleep that hither flew
Out of night's spaces to my bed, to bear
Me whithersoe'er her vagrant flight might dare.
For never did wild swan
With all its strength of silvery whiteness on.
Though quilled as with fine steel its pinions are,
Fly ever half so far
As Sleep will carry one, enfolded warm
And safe within her close protecting arm.
" Now, Sleep, sweet Sleep," I sighed,
"To you is time as naught ; tiie world is wide;
Yet is there but one spot where I would be,
One face I care to see."
"Whither ?" she whispered. I, with bated breath:
"Through the dark Valley of the Shadow of Death. ' '
A lariat tethered fast
To zone or pole, I saw her hand uncast,
Of cobweb ; and its loop on loop she whirled
And leashed with it a world —
A star ; and on this slack and silken stair
She bore me up into the midmost air.
A lull held every sense.
As lullaby to child the influence.
Not Heaven's soft wind, blowing across my face.
Nor the far look through space,
Gave tremor to my heart. I said, "This^ay
She went before me on that dreadful day."
The uttennost blue was past ;
Our land was gained, the height attained at^asL
Ah, height of green! Ah, sun^flecked, breezy slope.
No fairer goal has Hope !
Nor jasper wall nor gold-paved street could be
So cool with peace, so comforting to me.
A summit, — ^upland glade
It was, where earthly light had seemed a shade ;
Where happy throngs on some glad plan intent
Hither and thither went.
Singing and flutes, and many a tender word.
With silences as musical, I heard.
Nor did my weary eyes,
Stained with their tears, seem new to Paradise,
For she I longed to see was there to greet
The coming of my feet.
Rest was where pain had been in her dear face.
But mother-love still held its sovereign place.
Just as of old, she came.
Smiled on me, called me "daughter," spoke my
name,
Held in her hand my hand — ^no hint of change,
And Heaven was not strange !
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CLARA DOTY BATES.
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** You will be glad when all the children come ?**
I said. And she, *.* Yes, child, for this is home,"
And now, through stress and strife.
Through all the burden and the blare of life,
I say, ** Wait, heart, the day will soon be done,
When Sleep, the blessed one.
Will bear you to your lost, or her to you.
With flight as soft as silence or as dew."
AH, HEART, I KNOW.
Out from the mossy earth, with drip and trickle,
The brook begins its ways ;
Lies on the meadow grass, like a wet sickle,
Through all the summer days ;
Through all the summer nights lies on the meadow,
As if from the blue air
The new moon had cast down her crescent shadow.
And left it gleaming there.
Such colors as it wears, too, in its bosom —
The pink of moms and eves,
The red of clover, blue of violet blossoms,
The green of the green leaves.
It holds the flitting figure of the swallow.
The babbling bobolink ;
And the field lark comes, with its breast of yellow,
Down to its edge to drink.
And to its merriment and blithesome babble
Is never any end —
It gossips to the smallest, dullest pebble,
As if it were a friend.
Ah, Heart ! I know a stream whose finst essaying
Was free and fair as this.
Dallying with brightness, dancing and delaying 1
And now, how changed it is !
Almost before we knew of it, or heeded,
The meadow lands were past ;
Rocks thwarted, and the work of man impeded,
And cliffs their shadows cast.
Oh, Heart ! the way was sweet as first we found it.
Changed now so utterly !
There is but bare, bleak sand, — and— just beyond it.
The salt and turbulent sea I
THE SINGING SAND.
Along the beach,
Where each to each
The wavelets talked in whispered speech.
With idly loitering steps I strayed.
Hearkening the murmur that they made.
Like far-off words and laughter, blent
With many a wind-blown instrument.
On either hand,
The sunny strand
Was one wide reach of glaring sand ;
A silent waste, without a stir—
A bit of desert, as it were —
Desolate, voiceless, in the heat.
But for the water at its feet.
"Ah, why," I sighed,
"Is one denied
Color and life and voice beside ?
Why one have waves with foamy crest.
And white sails on its buoyant breast,
While yet the other can but show
One idler's footsteps, to and fro ?"
Just then, anear.
My well-schooled ear
A musical, new sound could hear —
A resonant, grinding sound, yet sweet—
That seemed to come from 'neath my feet ;
And I was quick to understand
I walked the fabled singing sand.
Ah, then, no more
That lifeless shore
Its look of blank desertion wore 1
My fancy on its margin drew
The prow of many a bark canoe ;
Rude wigwams rose, and here and there
Upcurled blue smoke on the clear air.
I seemed to see
How blithe and free
Ran dusky children in their glee ;
How grizzled women, old and bent,
Toiled at the fire or in the tent,
While warriors, sprawling at their ease,
Looked on and smoked their pipes in peace.
A vanished race.
With scarce a trace
But legend now in all the place!
Yet what a busy-peopled shore.
If spirit-eye but scanned it o'er !
What print of keel and foot and hand,
Here on the Indian's singing sand!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
GRAxXDMOTHER'S BIRTHDAY.
Just seventy years ago,
A little baby smiled,
And they gave the sweet old Bible name
Of Hannah to the child.
She slept, no doubt, such sleep
As only falls on eyes
That still have shut within their lids
The light of Paradise.
No doubt the little hands
Lay passive on her breast,
As with the cradle's lullaby
They hushed her to her rest.
Ah, me ! who could foretell
What work those hands should do ?
How many they should help to lead
Life's troubled mazes Uirough ?
What never-faltering part
Their tender strength should take —
What burdens for the tired ones bear,
What barriers help to break ?
Scarcely a day or hour
In all these long, long years
But they have helped some weaker one,
Or wiped some sufferer's tears.
And, ah, who could foresee
Upon that baby brow,
Where lay the dark and silky locks,
Its crown of silver now ?
Peace, as at first, is there ;
The world has never set
One single line of its hard seal
Upon that forehead yet !
The constant shadow of pain
Has dimmed, perhaps, the eyes.
Yet still they hold within their lids
The light of Paradise.
Just seventy years ago
Since the little baby came,
And now her children's children bless
That sweet old Bible name.
MRS. ELLEN P. ALLERTON.
MRS. ELLEN PALMER ALLERTON was
bom in Centerville, N. Y., October 17,
1835, of genuine Knickerbocker blood. One of her
pleasantest prose sketches describes a family heir-
loom that has come down to her from her Dutch
ancestry. Most of her life has been passed in Wis-
consin, and th^e she was married to a gentleman
who fully appreciates her. Mr. Alpheus B, AUer-
ton, her husband, is a native of Ohio, and a de-
scendant of the AUerton who came over in the
"Mayflower."
Mrs. Allerton composed and recited verses before
she could write, but offered little to the press until
she was past thirty years of age. It is not difficult
for her to write, but easy and natural, in prose or
verse. She writes plainly, clearly, and sends the
printer a faultless manuscript. As a woman and as
a writer she is quiet, modest, sensible. She has
high, lofty thoughts, and she has the gift of expres-
sion.
Mr. and Mrs. Allerton were invalids in Wiscon-
sin, and they traveled to Kansas in a wagon, through
Illinois, Iowa and Missouri, cooking their own meals
and getting health and happiness out of the jour-
ney. On very high land in Brown County, in sight
of Padonia, Hamlin, Falls City and Hiawatha, Mr.
Allerton, in 1879, bought a quarter section of un-
improved land. The brave man and his wife went
to work, and now they have a handsome home,
crowded granaries, catde and horses on all the hills,
apple and peach trees that bear luscious fruit, groves
of trees, planted by hand, for shade and for beauty,
and every comfort that prosperity brings in her
train.
Mrs. Allerton has attended to every household
duty, and has written poetry just as the birds sing,
out of a joyous heart, and when there was nothing
else to do. Her first poems were published in Mil-
waukee and Chio^o papers. Col. Elias A. Calkins,
a brilliant writer, was early an appreciative friend
of the poet. A volume of Mrs. AUerton's poems,
entitled "Poems of the Prairies," published in New
York in x886, met with general favor and a large
sale. Her poetry is natural, sweet, tender and true.
It does not defy the laws of morals, of rhetoric or
of good taste. D. W. W.
BEAUTIFUL THINGS.
Beautiful faces are those that wear-
It matters little if dark or fair—
Whole-souled honesty printed there.
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ELLEN p. ALLERTON.
369
Beautiful eyes are those that show,
Like crystal panes^vhere hearth-fires glow.
Beautiful thoughts that bum below.
Beautiful lips are those whose words
Leap from the heart like songs of birds,
Yet whose utterance prudence girds.
Beautiful hands are those that do
Work that is earnest and brave and true,
Moment by moment the long day through.
Beautiful feet are those that go
On kindly ministries to and fro —
Down lowliest way, if God wills it so.
Beautiful shoulders are those that bear
Ceaseless burdens of homely care
With patient grace and with daily prayer.
Beautiful lives are those that bless —
Silent rivers and happiness.
Whose hidden fountains but few may guess.
Beautiful twilight, at set of sun,
Beautiful goal, with race well won,
Beautiful rest, with work well done.
Beautiful graves, where grasses creep,
Where brown leaves fall, where drifts lie deep
Over worn-out hands— Oh beautiful sleep !
There are some idle hands that reach afar
For wider mission, some great work of fame;
Would they but grapple in life's daily war.
Reward awaits them nobler than a name.
O thirsty souls ! O hungry hearts, and hands,
W^eary with idleness ! take what you may
Of proffered good; accept life as it stands.
And make the most of its swift-fleeting day.
ACCEPTANCE.
That man is wisest who accepts his lot.
Yet mends it where he can — Glad if there grows
Some lowly flower beside his lonely cot.
E'en while he plants and tends his Alpine rose.
Some good comes to us all. No poverty
But has some precious gift laid at its door.
We scorn it, call it small; what fools are we,
To spurn the less because it is not more !
There are some thirsty souls, all sick and faint
VV^ith longing for the cup that is denied; .
Would they but stoop and drink, without com-
plaint,
From the near stream, and so be satisfied.
There are some hungry hearts that well nigh break
With the dull soreness of mere emptiness.
To fill the void and soothe the weary ache,
Let them but strive some other hearts to bless.
MY AMBITION.
I HAVE my own ambition. It is not
To mount on eagle wings and soar away
Beyond the palings of the common lot,
Scorning the griefs and joys of every day;
I would be human — toiling, like the rest.
With tender human heart-beats in my breast.
Not on cold, lonely heights above the ken
Of common mortals would I build my fame,
But in the kindly hearts of living men.
There, if permitted, would I write my name;
Who builds above the clouds must dwell alone;
I count good fellowship above a throne.
And so, beside my door I sit and sing
My simple strains — now sad, now light and gay;
Happy, if this or that but wake one string.
Whose low, sweet echoes give me back the lay.
And happier still, if girded by my song.
Some strained and tempted soul stands firm and
strong.
Humanity is much the same; if I
Can give my neighbor's pent-up thought a tongue.
And can give voice to his unspoken cry
Of bitter pain, when my own heart is wrung, —
Then we two meet upon a common land.
And henceforth stand together, hand in hand.
I send my thought its kindred thought to greet,
Out to the far frontier, through crowded town.
Friendship is precious, sympathy is sweet;
So these be mine, I ask no laurel crown.
Such my ambition, which I here unfold;
So it be granted — mine is wealth untold.
OCTOBER DAYS.
Push back the curtains and fling wide the door;
Shut not away the light nor the sweet air,
Let the checked sunbeams play upon the floor.
And on my head low bowed, and on my hair.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Would I could sing, in words of melody,
The hazy sweetness of this wondrous time !
Low would I pitch my voice; the song should be
A soft, low chant, set to a dreamy rhyme.
No loud, high notes for tender days like these !
No trumpet tones,, no swelling words of pride,
Beneath these skies, so like dim summer seas,
Where hazy ships of cloud at anchor ride
At peace are earth and sky, while softly fall
The brown leaves at my feet. A holy palm
Rests in a benediction over all.
O silent peace ! O days of silent calm !
And passion, like the winds, lies hushed and still;
A throng of gentle thoughts, sweet, calm and
pure,
Knock at my door and lightly cross the sill.
Would that their feet might stay, their reign
endure !
But storms will come. The haze upon the hills
Will yield to blinding gusts of sleet and snow;
And, for this peace that all my being fills,
The tides of battle shall surge to and fro.
Life is a struggle: and 'tis better so.
Who treads its stormy steeps, its stony ways,
And breasts its wintry blasts, must battling go.
And yet — it hath its Indian summer days.
PITY.
A woman's pity is a dangerous thing; —
Most when its softness is all mixed and blent
With woman's admiration. Such content
It hath of passion and of tenderness.
Which from its tearful dew luxuriant spring,
That she who feels needs double guardedness
O'er her heart's citadel; and all the more,
When in that heart lie mines of untold wealth
Unwrought by human hand. Its golden ore,
Unlocked, unguarded, yields to subtle stealth.
— Annabel.
PATIENCE.
We call him strong who stands unmoved-
Calm as some tempest-beaten rock —
When some great trouble hurls its shock;
We say of him, His strength is proved:
But, when the spent storm folds its wings,
How bears he then Life's little things ?
—Little Things.
JOHN RUSKIN.
JOHN RUSKIN, M.A., LL.D.. son of a London
merchant, was bom in Hunter Street, Bruns-
wick Square, London, in February, 1819, and was
educated privately, and at Christ Church. Oxford,
where he gained the Newdigate Prize in 1839. He
then devoted himself to painting, and worked under
Copley Fielding and J. D. Harding. A pamphlet
in defense of Turner and the modem English school
of landscape painting was his first effort in the
cause of modem art, and it was enlarged into a
standard work, entitled "Modem Painters," the
first volume of which appeared in 1843. The au-
thor's success as a writer on art was decided by the
warm reception accorded to this volume, of which
several editions have since been published. Mr.
Ruskin's views, however, were combatted with bit-
ter asperity by some of the art critics of the day,
who resented with an affectation of contempt his
free expression of dissent from the trammels of
their school. In his second volume of ** Modem
Painters," written after a residence in Italy, and pub-
lished in 1846, he took a much wider survey of the
subject originally entered upon, including the works
of the great Italian painters, and discussed at length
the merits of their respective schools. This, his
chief work, has been completed by the publication
of three additional volumes, the last of which, pub-
lished in i860, contains illustrations by himself.
Mr. Ruskin temporarily diverted his attention from
the study of painting to that of architecture, and
wrote "The Seven Lamps of Architecture," pub-
lished in 1849, as a first result, followed by the first
volume of "The Stones of Venice," in 1851, the
second and third volumes of which appeared in
1853. The illustrations in the last-named produc-
tions, which excited some of the same professional
hostility that his first publication evoked, displayed
to much advantge his artistic powers. Mr. Ruskin
has expounded his views both in lectures and in
newspapers and reviews, having, as early as 1847.
contributed articles to the Quarterly on Lord Lind-
say's "Christian Art." In 1851 he advocated Pre-
Raphaelitism in letters to the Times, and in 1853
he lectured in Edinburgh on Gothic architecture.
In addition to the above-mentioned works, Mr.
Ruskin has written " Notes on the Constmction of
Sheepfolds," the "King of the Golden River," a
story for children, illustrated by Doyle, in 1851;
' "The Two Paths: Lectures on Architecture and
Painting," in 1854; " Notes to Pictures in the Royal
I Academy, Nos. i to 5," in 1854-9; "Giotto and His
Works in Padua," written in 1855 for the Amndel
I Society, of which he is a member; " Notes on the
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JOHN RUSKIN,
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Turner Collection," in 1857; ** Cambridge School
of Art," and *' Lectures on Art: Political Economy
of Art," in 1858; " Elements of Perspective," and
** Lectures on Art: Decoration and Manufacture,"
in 1859; "Unto this Last: Four Essays," repub-
lished from the Comhill Magazine, in 1862; * 'Ethics
of the Dust: Ten Lectures;" ** Sesame and Lilies:
Two Lectures;" and "Study of Architecture in Our
Schools," in 1865; "Crown of Wild Olive: Three,
Lectures," in 1866; and "The Queen of the Air:
Being a Study of the Greek Myths of Cloud and
Storm." To the Art Journal he contributed the
" Cestus of Aglaia," and he has written for various
periodicals. Mr. Ruskin was appointed Rede Lec-
turer, at Cambridge, in April, 1867, and the Senate
conferred the degree of LL. D. upon him, May 15.
He was also elected Slade Professor of Fine Art at
Oxford, and in 1872 published "Aratra Pentelici:
Six Lectures on the Elements of Sculpture, given
before the University of Oxford in Michaelmas
Term, 1870." In 187 1 he proposed to devote |i 5,000
for the purpose of an endowment to pay a master
of drawing in the Taylor Galleries, Oxford, and
this handsome offer was, with some modifications,
accepted by the University in January, 1872. He
was re-elected to the Slade Professorship of Fine
Art, March i, 1876. A collection of his letters, with
a preface by himself, was published in 1880, under
the title of "Arrows of the Chase." In 1883 he
was again elected Slade Professor, and at his inau-
gural lecture was received with unprecedented en-
thusiasm. So great was the crowd that thronged
to hear his lectures that it was impossible to accom-
modate the audience, and Prof. Ruskin undertook
to deliver each lecture twice. He was obliged to
resign the post in 1884 on account of failing health.
Of late he has been issuing, in parts, his autobiog-
raphy, under the title of " Praeterita." In 1887 he
published "Hortus Inclusus: Letters from Mr.
Ruskin to the Ladies of the Thwaite." For several
years he has lived in tranquil retirement at Brant-
wood, Coniston. G. W. M.
AGONIA.
When our delight is desolate.
And hope is overthrown;
And when the heart must bear the weight
Of its own love alone;
And when the soul, whose thoughts are deep,
Must guard them unrevealed,
And feel that it is full, but keep
That fullness calm and sealed;
When love's long glance is dark with pain-
With none to meet or cheer;
And words of woe are wild in vain
For those who cannot hear;
When earth is dark and memory
Pale in the heaven above, —
The heart can bear to lose its joy.
But not to cease to love.
But what shall guide the choice within.
Of guilt or agony, —
When to remember is to sin,
And to forget— to die!
THE GLACIER.
The mountains have a peace which none dis-
turb—
The stars and clouds a course which none re-
strain —
The wild sea-waves rejoice without a curb.
And rest without a passion; but the chain
Of Death, upon this ghastly cliff and chasm
Is broken evermore, to bind again,
Nor lulls nor looses. Hark! a voice of pain.
Suddenly silenced; — a quick passing spasm,
That startles rest, but grants not liberty, —
A shudder, or a struggle, or a cry —
And then sepulchral stillness. Look on us,
God! who hast given these hills their place of
pride.
If Death's captivity be sleepless thus.
For those who sink to it unsanctified.
CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD.
NIGHT.
Fatnt from the bell the ghastly echoes fall,
That grates within the gray cathedral tower;
Let me not enter through the portal tall.
Lest the strange spirit of the moonless hour
Should give a life to those pale people, who
Lie in their fretted niches, two and two.
Each with his head on pillowy stone reposed.
And his hands lifted, and his eyelids closed.
From many a moldering oriel, as to flout.
Its pale, grave brow of ivy-tressed stone.
Comes the incongruous laugh, and revel shout-
Above, some solitary casement, thrown
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Wide open to the wavering night wind,
Admits its chill, so deathful, yet so kind,
Unto the fevered brow and fiery eye
Of one, whose night hour passeth sleeplessly.
Ye melancholy chambers! I could shun
The darkness of your silence, with such fear,
As places where slow murder had been done.
How many noble spirits have died here,
Withering away in yearnings, to aspire.
Gnawed by mocked hope — devoured by their own
fire!
Methinks the grave must feel a colder bed
To spirits such as these, than unto common dead.
REMEMBRANCE.
I OUGHT to be joyful, the jest and the song
And the light tones of music resound through the
throng,
But its cadence falls dully and dead on my ear.
And the laughter I mimic is quenched in a tear.
For here is no longer, to bid me rejoice,
The light of thy smile, or the tone of thy voice,
And, gay though the crowd that's around me may
be,
I am alone, when I'm parted from thee.
Alone, said I, dearest ? O, never we part, —
For ever, for ever, thou'rt here in my heart:
Sleeping or waking, where'er I may be,
I have but one thought, and that thought is of
thee.
When the planets roll red through the darkness of
night.
When the morning bedews all the landscape with
light.
When the high sun of noon-day is warm on the
hill,
And the breezes are quiet, the green leafage still;
I love to look out o'er the earth and the sky.
For nature is kind, and seems lonely as I;
Whatever in nature most lovely I see,
Has a voice that recalls the remembrance of thee.
Remember— remember. Those only can know
How dear is remembrance, whose hope is laid
low;
'Tis like clouds in the west, that are gorgeous still,
When the dank dews of evening fall deadly and
chill.
Like the bow in the cloud that is painted so bright.
Like the voice of the nightingale, heard through
the night,
Oh, sweet is remembrance, most sad though it be,.
For remembrance is all that remaineth for me.
SONG.
From " Leoni: A Romance of Italy.''
Full, broad, and bright is the silver light
Of moon and stars on flood and fell;
But in my breast is starless night.
For I am come to say farewell.
How glad, how swift, was wont to be
The step that bore me back to thee;
Now coldly comes upon my heart
The meeting that is but to part.
I do not ask a tear, but while
I linger where I must not stay.
Oh, give me but a parting smile,
To light me on my lonely way.
To shine a brilliant beacon star.
To my reverted glance, afar.
Through midnight, which can have no morrow.
O'er the deep, silent surge of sorrow.
BELL.
And in its hollow height there hung
From a black bar, a brazen bell:
Its hugeness was traced clear and well
The slanting rays among.
Ever and anon it swung
Halfway round its whirling wheel;
Back again, with rocking reel.
Lazily its length was flung.
Till brazen lip and beating tongue
Met once, with unrepeated peal.
Then paused; — until the winds could feel
The weight of the wide sound that clung
To their inmost spirit, like the appeal
Of startling memories, strangely strung,
That point to pain, and yet conceal.
• Again with single sway it rung.
And the black tower beneath could feel
The undulating tremor steal
Through its old stones, with long shiver.
The wild woods felt it creep and quiver
Through their thick leaves and hushed air,
As fear creeps through a murderer's hair.
And the gray reeds beside the river,
In the moonlight meek and mild.
Moved like spears when war is wild.
--The Broken Chain,
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MAR Y ELIZABETH BLAKE.
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MARY ELIZABETH BLAKE.
MRS. MARY ELIZABETH BLAKE was bom
in Dungarven, County Waterford, Ireland,
September i. 1849. Her father's name was Mc-
Grath, a man of wide reading and much originality
of thought When Mary was six years old the fam-
ily came to America, settling at Quincy, Mass. Her
education was acquired in the public and private
schools of Boston, and at the Convent of the Sacred
Heart, Manhattanville, N. Y. In June, 1885, she
married Dr. John G. Blake, who has long held a
prominent position among Massachusetts medical
men. Up to the present time Mrs. Blake has pub-
lished the following works: '* Poems," (Boston,
1881), which has passed to a second edition; "On
the Wing," (Boston, 1883), a volume of letters of
western travel, in its fifth edition; "Mexico," (Bos-
ton, 1888), a volume of travel, written in colabora-
tion with Mrs. Margaret Sullivan; "A Summer
Holiday," (Boston, 1890), an account of her Euro-
pean impressions; and "Verses Along the Way,"
(Boston and Dublin, 1890). Mrs. Blake has for
many years contributed at frequent intervals to the
Boston y<7«fWfl/, the "Rambling Talks," over the
initials "M. E. B.," being one of its most valued
features. Much of her work in essays and poems
has appeared in the Catholic IVorld^ LippincoWs
Magazine^ the Independent, St. Nicholas, and Wide
Awake. At the invitation of the Boston city
government she \frrote the poem read on the oc-
casion of the Wendell Phillips Memorial Service in
that city, and also the poem read on the occasion
of similar honors paid to the memory of Admiral
Porter. Mrs. Blake's verse is lyrical rather than
epic or dramatic, and its quality deepens and
strengthens as time goes on. A comparison care-
fully made of her two books of verse, published ten
years apart, shows a marked advance both in sub-
stance and technique, and leads one to look for still
stronger work from her in the future.
O. F. A.
A DEAD SUMMER.
What lacks the summer ?
Not roses blowing.
Nor tall white lilies with fragrance rife.
Nor green things gay with the bliss of growing,
Nor glad things drunk with the wine of life.
Nor flushing clouds in blue skies shining.
Nor soft wind-murmurs to rise and fall,
Nor birds for singing, nor vines for twining —
Three little buds I miss, no more.
That blossomed last year at my garden door.-
And that is all.
What lacks the summer ?
Not leaves a-quiver
With arrows of light from the land of dawn,
Nor drooping of boughs by the dimpling river,
Nor nodding of grass on the windy lawn.
Nor tides upswept upon silver beaches.
Nor rustle of leaves on tree-tops tall.
Nor dapple of shade in woodland reaches, —
Life pulses gladly on vale and hill,
But three little hearts that I love are still,—
And that is all.
What lacks the summers
O light and savior,
And message of healing the world above !
Gone is the old-time strength and flavor,
Gone is the old-time peace and love !
Gone is the bloom of the shimmering meadow,
Music of birds, as they sweep and fall, —
All the great world is dim with shadow.
Because no longer mine eyes can see
The eyes that made summer and life for me,-
And that is all.
REGRET.
Now, that you come no more to me,
love, how dreary life has grown !
There is no song of bird or bee
That for your silence can atone;
And since I go my ways alone.
There is no light on land or sea.
The fragrant messengers of June —
White jessamine and brier-rose —
Breathe through the golden afternoon
On every wind that comes and goes:
1 care for no sweet breath that blows,
The whole world being out of tune.
What is an idle word to make
Such shadow where was sun before ?
When others sleep, I watch and wake,
And restless pace my chamber-floor:
Now that you come to me no more,
O love, it seems my heart must break.
And these are days ? How shall it be
If years must drag the lengthening chain
Of sad and bitter memory ?
How shall we live our lives again,
With all its sweetness spent in vain ?
O love, come back once more to me I
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
A GREETING.
Ireland ! Mother unknown,
Sitting alone by the water,
Lift up your eyes to your own,
Stretch out your arms to your daughter !
Many and many a day have I longed for your green
robe's splendor,
Your eyes of the deep sea gray, your strong love,
patient and tender;
For the croon of the welcoming voice, and the
smile half joy and half sadness.
Soul of my soul rejoice, for this is the hour of thy
gladness !
Sure if I never had heard
What land had given me birth,
And cradled the spirit's bird
On its first weak flight to earth;
If I never had heard the name of thy sorrow and
strength divine,
Or felt in my pulses the flame of the fire they had
caught from thine,
I would know by this rapture alone that sweeps
through me now like a flood,
That the Irish skies were my own, and my blood
was the Irish blood !
Proud did I hold my race,
Yet knew not what pride might dare;
Fair did I deem thy face,
But never one-half so fair;
Like a dream with deep happiness fraught that
some happier dawn makes true,
Nothing was glad in my thought but gladdens still
more in you —
From ivied tower and wall, and primrose pale on
the lea.
To vales where the bright streams call to the lilting
bird in the tree.
How can I frame the thought
That sets all my soul aglow !
How can I speak as I ought
The longing that moves me so !
My comrades laugh like a boy whose heart to
pleasure is stirred,
But my heart is weeping with joy while my lips
speak never a word;
Here where the green hills start from the breast of
the deep blue water,
Ireland ! land of my heart, stretch out your arms to
your daughter !
WITH A SILKEN PURSE.
If this were a fairy gift, dear.
And I were a fairy, too,
The purse should never be empty
The whole of the long year through.
The longest summer day, dear,
And the longest winter night.
The purse should be always heavy
And your heart be always light.
But the fairies have flown away, dear,
Alas 1 that the words are true,
And there's nothing to fill the silken mesh
But the gold of my love for you.
THIS AND THAT.
Once, in the dark. I knew a rose was near,
Because her lips had kissed the summer air
And left their haunting perfume floating there;
But when I fain would pluck it for my dear,
Lo ! naught of all its sweet could I attain.
But in its stead sharp thorns that sore did fret
My eager hands, and force them to forget
Their loving quest for smart and bitter pain.
Shall I then cheat my fancy with the thought
No flower was there within the prickly space,
To add its lustre to my lady's grace,
Or give me the fair prize my longing sought ?
Nay ! far behind its thorns the rose must be,
If we who search so blindly could but see I
SEQUENCE.
There *s not a breath of Summer's joy and glory
But whispers of the Autumn twilight near;
There *s not a page of Winter's saddest story
But turns to meet the dawning of the year.
Thus fear doth wait on hope and hope on fear.
HOSTAGES.
All men must pay some ransom imto Fate
For this strange boon of living. Blest is he
Who with some loss of gold or land goes free;
Nor yet unhappy is his fair estate
On whom kind death most tenderly doth wait
To take his treasure. Larger swells the fee
He pays to Fortune, from whom love doth flee,
Or change unto the scowling face of hate.
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EMMA LAZARUS.
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More sad than these, his darkly mournful lot
Whose hand the clasp of friendship hath forgot;
But deadliest price of all the soul must pay,
Which for some lure of earthly power or pride
Hath cast its heritage of heaven aside,
And for such gaud hath given itself away.
A BEETHOVEN SYMPHONY.
The glorious movement heaven-aspiring flies,
Through the rapt silence of the listening hall;
Fades from our sight the stem encircling wall
And dreamland opens to our dreaming eyes.
Forgotten hopes and lost ambitions rise
To shake the soul with happy longing. All
Triumphant fancies hold the heart in thrall;
The future brightens under smiling skies.
And thon, O Master! On whose mighty brow
The waves of thine own harmonies do break,
High rising through the golden orb^ spheres
Like billows round some stately vessel's prow, —
Do they no echo to thine ears awake,
That reaches where thy listening spirit hears ?
MEMORY.
When, in the first wild throes of grief,
The sick heart turns from all relief.
And backward counting, sad and slow,
An hour, a week, a month ago,
To-day ere yet the light had flown
From those dear eyes we called our own,-
We ask of God the seal to set:
•* How long, O Lord, ere we forget ?"
But when above life's troubled springs
We feel the stir of angels' wings,
And His dear blessing, sweet and slow,
Drops on the wounded hearts below;
When Faith ascends the golden stair
Of love and hope and trust and prayer, —
Though grief and pain may linger yet,
We would not, if we could, forget !
TOMB.
Some tombs are altars ! On them flame
The beacon-lights of sacrifice.
Like stars fair set in skies of fame
To light the way for seeking eyes;
Beside them lie the conqueror's bays,
The patriot's sword, the poet's pen—
Like kindling stars to set ablaze
The fire divine in hearts of men.
EMMA LAZARUS.
MISS EMMA LAZARUS was bom in New
York, N. Y., July 22, 1849, and died there
November 19, 1887. She was a member of a Jew-
ish family of prominence. She was noted in child-
hood for her quickness and intelligence. She
received a liberal education under private tutors,
and her attainments included Hebrew, Greek,
Latin and modem languages. She read widely on
religious, philosophical and scientific subjects, and
was a profound thinker. Her literary bent dis-
played itself in poetry at an early age. In 1867 she
published her volume, ** Poems and Translations,'^
and at once attracted attention by the remarkable
character of her work. In 187 1 she published
"Admetus, and Other Poems," and the volume
drew friendly notice from critics on both sides of
the Atlantic. In 1874 she published her first im-
portant prose work, "Alide, an Episode of
Goethe's Life** She contributed original poems
and translations from Heinrich Heine's works to
Scribnet*s Magazine. In 188 1 she published her
translations, "Poems and Ballads of Heine," and
in 1882 her ** Songs of a Semite." She wrote for
the Century a number of striking essays on Jewish
topics, among them '* Was the Earl of Beaconsfield
a Representative Jew ? " and " Russian Christianity
versus Modem Judaism." Her work includes
critical articles on Salvini, Emerson and others. In
the winter of 1882, when many Russian Jews were
flocking to New York City to escape Russian per-
secution. Miss Lazarus published in the American
Hebrew a series of articles solving the question of
occupation for the incomers. Her plan involved
industrial and technical education, and the project
was carried out on her plan. In 1882 she wrote her
*• In Exile," "The Crowing of the Red Cock " and
'* The Banner of the Jew." In 1887 she published
her last original work, a series of prose poems of
remarkable beauty. Among her many translations
are poems from the mediaeval Jewish authors,
|udah Halivy, Ibu Gabriel and Moses Ben Esra.
Some of these translations have been incorporated
in the rituals of many American Hebrew syna-
gogues. She was a woman of marked poetic
talent, and many of her verses are aflame with.
genius and sublime fervor. H. A. V.
THE CROWING OF THE RED COCK.
Across the Eastern sky has glowed
The flicker of a blood-red dawn,
Once more the clarion cock has crowed.
Once more the sword of Christ is drawn.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
A million burning rooftrees light
The world-wide path of Israel's flight.
Where is the Hebrew's fatherland ?
The folk of Christ is sore bestead;
The Son of Man is bruised and banned,
Nor finds whereon to lay his head.
His cup is gall, his meat is tears,
His passion lasts a thousand years.
Each crime that wakes in man the beast,
Is visited upon his kind.
The lust of mobs, the greed of priest,
The tyranny of kings, combined
To root his seed from earth again,
His record is one cry of pain.
When the long roll of Christian guilt
Against his sires and kin is known,
The flood of tears, the life-blood spilt.
The agony of ages shown,
What oceans can the stain remove,
From Christian law and Christian love ?
Nay, close the book; not now, not here,
The hideous tale of sin narrate.
Reechoing in the martyr's ear.
Even he might nurse revengeful hate.
Even he might turn in wrath sublime,
With blood for blood and crime for crime.
Coward ? Not he, who faces death.
Who singly against worlds has fought.
For what ? A name he may not breathe,
For liberty of prayer and thought.
The amgry sword he will not whet.
His nobler task is — to forget.
THE WORLD'S JUSTICE.
If the sudden tidings came
That on some far, foreign coast,
Buried ages long from fame.
Had been found a remnant lost
Of that hoary race who dwelt
By the golden Nile divine,
Spake the Pharaoh's tongue and knelt
At the moon-crowned Isis* shrine —
How at reverend Egypt's feet.
Pilgrims from all lands would meet!
If the sudden news were known,
That anigh the desert-place
Where once blossomed Babylon,
Scions of a mighty race
Still survived, of giant build,
Huntsmen, warriors, priest and sage,
Whose ancestral fame had filled,
Trumpet-tongued, the earlier age,
How at old Assyria's feet
Pilgrims from all lands would meet!
Yet when Egypt's self was young.
And Assyria's bloom unworn,
Ere the mythic Homer sung,
Ere the gods of Greece were bom.
Lived the nation of one God,
Priests of freedom, sons of Shem,
Never quelled by yoke or rod.
Founders of Jerusalem —
Is there one abides to-day.
Seeker of dead cities, say ?
Answer, now as then, ^/ley are;
Scattered broadcast o'er the lands,
Knit in spirit nigh and far,
With indissoluble bands.
Half the world adores their God,
They the living law proclaim.
And their guerdon is— the rod,
Stripes and scourgings, death and shame.
Still on Israel's head forlorn,
Every nation heaps its scorn.
OFF ROUGH POINT.
W^B sat at twilight nigh the sea,
The fog hung gray and weird.
Through the thick film uncannily
The broken moon ap^^eared.
We heard the billows crack and plunge.
We saw nor waves nor ships.
Earth sucked the vapors like a sponge.
The salt spray wet our lips.
Closer the woof of white mist drew,
Before, behind, beside.
How could that phantom moon break through,
Above that shrouded tide ?
The roaring waters filled the ear,
A white blank foiled the sight
Close-gathering shadows near, more near,
Brought the blind, awful night.
O friends who passed unseen, unknown !
O dashing, troubled sea !
Still stftnd we on a rock alone.
Walled round by mystery.
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EMMA LAZARUS.
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THE ELIXIR.
" Oh brew me a potion strong and good !
One golden drop in his wine
Shall charm his sense and fire his blood.
And bend his will to mine.*'
Poor child of passion ! ask of me
Elixir of death or sleep,
Or Lethe's stream; but love is free,
And woman must wait and weep.
YOUTH AND DEATH.
What hast thou done to this dear friend of mine,
Thou cold, white, silent Strange? From my hand
Her clasped hand slips to meet the grasp of thine;
Her eyes that flamed with love, at thy command
Stare stone-blank on blank air; her frozen heart
Forgets my presence. Teach me who thou art,
Vague shadow sliding 'twixt my friend and me.
I never saw thee till this sudden hour.
What secret door gave entrance unto thee ?
What power is thine, o'ermastering Love's own
power?
SUCCESS.
Opt have I brooded on defeat and pain,
The pathos of the stupid, stumbling throng.
These I ignore to-day, and only long
To pour my soul forth in one trumpet strain,
One clear, grief-shattering, triumphant song.
For all the victories of man's high endeavor,
Palm-bearing, laureled deeds that live forever,
The splendor clothing him whose will is strong.
Hast thou beheld the deep, glad eyes of one
Who has persisted and achieved ? Rejoice !
On naught diviner shines the all-seeing sun.
Salute him with free heart and choral voice,
'Midst flippant, feeble crowds of spectres wan,
The bold, significant, successful man.
LIFE AND ART.
Nor while the fever of the blood is strong,
The heart throbs loud, the eyes are veiled, no less
With passion than with tears, the Muse shall bless
The poet-soul to help and soothe with song.
Not then she bids his trembling lips express
The aching gladness, the voluptuous pain.
Life is his poem then; flesh, sense and brain
One full-stringed lyre attuned to happiness.
But when the dream is done, the pulses fail,
The day's illusion, with the day's sun set,
He, lonely in the twilight, sees the pale
Divine Consoler, featured like Regret,
Enter and clasp his hand and kiss his brow.
Then his lips ope to sing — as mine do now.
THE NEW COLLOSSUS.
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame.
With conquering limbs astride from land to land;
Here at our sea-washed sunset gates shall stand
A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame
Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name
Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand
Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes com-
mand
The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame.
** Keep, ancient lands, your storied pomp !" cries
she
With silent lips. " Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe fr^e,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door !"
left
THE UNDINES' DANCE.
Upon the silver beach the undines dance
With interlinking arms and flying hair;
Like polished marble gleam their limbs
bare;
Upon their virgin rites pale moonbeams glance.
Softer the music! for their foam-bright feet
Print not the moist floor where they trip their
round:
Affrighted, they will scatter at a sound,
Leap in their cool sea-chambers, nimbly fleet,
And we shall doubt that we have ever seen,
While our same eyes behold stray wreaths of
mist,
Shot with faint colors by the moon rays kissed,
Floating snow-soft, snow-white, where these had
been —
Already, look! the wave-washed sands are bare.
And mocking laughter ripples through the air.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS WARD.
ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS WARD
was bom in Boston, Mass., August 31,
1844. Her father \wis Rev. Austin Phelps, profes-
sor of sacred rhetoric in Andover Theological Sem-
inary. The family removed from Boston to An-
dover in 1848, and lived there until the death of
Professor Phelps, in 1890. Professor Phelps was
elected president of the seminary in 1869, and in
1879 he became professor emeritus. Elizabeth
was a precocious, imaginative child, and her educa-
tion was liberal and thorough. Her mother, Mrs.
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps, was an author of note.
After the death of her mother, in 1852, Miss Phelps,
who had been christened with another name, took
her mother's name in full. She began to publish
sketches and stories in her thirteenth year and her
literary work was mingled with charitable, temper-
ance and general reform work. In 1876 she deliv-
ered a course of lectures in the Boston University.
Her published works are "Ellen's Idol," (1864);
"Up Hill," (1865); "The Tiny Series," (4 vols.,
1866 to 1869); "The Gipsy Series," (4 vols., 1866
to 1869); "I Don't Know How," (1867); "The
Gates Ajar," (20 editions in the first year, 1868);
" Men Women and Ghosts." (1868); "Hedged In,"
(1870); "The Silent Partner," (1870); "The Frotty
Book." (1870); "Frotty's Wedding Tour," (1873);
" What to Wear," (1873); "Poetic Studies," (1875);
" The Story of Avis," (1877); " My Cousin and I,"
(1879); "Old Maids' Paradise," (1879); "Sealed
Orders," (1879); "Friends: A Duet," (1881);
"Beyond the Gates," (1883); "Dr. Zay," (1884);
"The Gates Between," (1887); and "Jack the
Fisherman," (1887). Besides her books, she has
written many sketches, stories and poems for
Harper's Magazine y The Atlantic Monthly ^ Youih^s
Companion^ and other periodicals. Her most fa-
mous work is "The Gates Ajar." which has passed
through many large editions in the United States
and Great Britain, and was translated into several
European languages. In October, 1888, she
became the wife of Rev. Herbert D. Ward. Since
then she has published "The Master of the
Magicians," "Come Forth," and "Fourteen to
One," a volume of stories. She is a slight, delicate
woman, and her health is not strong. In the sum-
mer she and her husband live in East Gloucester,
Mass., and in the winter their home is in Newton
Highlands. Her productions throughout are
marked by elevated spirit and thoughtfulness.
She is interested in all philanthropic work. Her
circle of readers is constantly growing.
L A. K.
APPLE BLOSSOMS;
I SIT beneath the apple-tree,
I see nor sky nor sun;
I only know the apple-buds
Are opening one by one.
You asked me once a little thing—
A lecture or a song
To hear with you; and yet I thought
To find my whole life long
Too short to bear the happiness
That bounded through the day.
That made the look of apple-blooms,
And you and me and May!
For long between us there had hung
The mist of love's young doubt;
Sweet, shy, uncertain, all the world
Of trust and May burst out.
I wore the flowers in my hair.
Their color on my dress;
Dear love ! whenever apples bloom
In heaven, do they bless
Your heart with memories so small.
So. strong, so cruel, glad ?
If ever apples bloom in heaven.
I wonder are you sad ?
Heart ! yield up thy fruitless quest.
Beneath the apple tree;
Youth comes but once, love only once,
And May but once to thee !
GALATEA.
A moment's grace, Pygmalion ! Let me be
A breath's space longer on this hither hand
Of fate too sweet, too sad, too mad to meet.
Whether to be thy statue or thy bride —
An instant spare me ! Terrible the choice,
As no man knoweth, being only man;
Nor any, saving her who hath been stone
And loved her sculptor. Shall I dare exchange
Veins of the quarry for the throbbing pulse ?
Insensate calm for a sure-aching heart ?
Repose eternal for a woman's lot?
Forego God's quiet for the love of man ?
To float on his uncertain tenderness,
A wave tossed up the shore of his desire,
To ebb and flow whene'er it pleaseth him;
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ELIZABETH STUART PHELPS WARD, 381
Remembered at hLs leisure, and forgot,
Let her pass; it is her place.
Worshipped and worried, clasped and dropped at
Death hath given her this grace.
mood,
Or soothed or gashed at mercy of his will,
Let her pass; she resteth well.
Now Paradise my portion, and now Hell;
What her dreams are, who can tell ?
And every single, several nerve that beats
In soul or body, like some rare vase, thrust
In fire at first, and then in frost, until
Mute the steersman; why, if he
The fine, protesting fibre snaps ?
Speaketh not a work, should we ?
Oh, who,
II.
Foreknowing, ever chose a fate like this ?
What woman out of all the breathing world
Would be a woman, could her heart select,
Dead, she drifteth to his feet.
Close, her eyes keep secrets sweet.
Or love her lover, could her life prevent ?
Then let me be that only, only one;
Living, he had loved her well.
Thus let me make that sacrifice supreme,
High as Heaven and deep as'Hell.
No other ever made, or can, or shall.
Behold, the future shall stand still to ask,
Yet that voyage she stayeth not.
What man was worth a price so isolate ?
Wait you for her, Launcelot ?
And rate thee at its value for all time.
For I am driven by an awful law.
See ! while I hesitate, it mouldeth me,
Oh! the river floweth fast.
And carves me like a chisel at my heart.
Who is justified at last ?
*Tis stronger than the woman or the man;
*T is greater than all torment or delight;
Locked her lips are. Hush ! If she
'T is mightier than the marble or the flesh.
Sayeth nothing, how should we ?
Obedient be the sculptor and the stone 1
Thine am I, thme at all the cost of all
The pangs that woman ever bore for man;
Thine I elect to be, denying them;
AN ACKNOWLEDGMENT.
Thine I elect to be, defying them;
Thine, thine I dare to be, in scorn of them;
For the faith that is not broken
And being thine forever, bless I them !
By the burden of the day;
For the word that is not spoken
Pygmalion ! Take me from my pedestal,
(Dearest words are slow to say);
And set me lower— lower. Love !— that I
For the golden draught unproffered
May be a woman, and look up to thee;
To the thirst that thirsteth on;
And looking, longing, loving, give and take
For the hand that is not oflered
The human kisses worth the worst that thou
When the struggling strength is gone;
By thine own nature shalt inflict on me.
For the sturdy heart that will not
Make a pauper of my need;
Friend, I mean sometime to thank you,
From my soul, in truth and deed.
ELAINE AND ELAINE.
Wait! Some day, when I am braver.
I will do so— say so. Now
Dead, she drifted to his feet
(Oh! be tender!) I am tired;
Tell us, Love, is Death so sweet ?
I have forgotten how.
Oh ! the river floweth deep.
Fathoms deeper is her sleep.
THE ROOM'S WIDTH.
Oh ! the current driveth strong.
Wilder tides drive souls along.
I THINK if I should cross the room,
Far as fear;
Drifting, though he loved her not,
Should stand beside you like a thought-
To the heart of Launcelot,
Touch you, Dear!
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY
Like a fancy. To your sad heart
It would seem
That my vision passed and prayed you,
Or my dream.
Then you would look with lonely eyes-
Lift your head —
And you would stir, and sigh, and say-
"Sheisdead."
Baffled by death and love, I lean
Through the gloom.
O Lord of life! am I forbid
To cross the room ?
LOVE.
Though all the wine of life be lost,
Try well the red grape's hue.
Holy the soul that cannot taste
The false love for the true.
--ParUd.
ALL THE RIVERS.
"All the rivers run into the sea."
Like the pulsing of a river,
The motion of a song,
Wind the olden words along
The tortuous turnings of my thoughts whenever
I sit beside the sea.
**A11 the rivers run into the sea."
O you little leaping river,
Laugh on beneath your breath!
With a heart as deep as death.
Strong stream, go patient, grave, and hasting
never,—
I sit beside the sea.
"All the rivers run into the sea."
Why the passion of a river ?
The striving of a soul ?
Calm the eternal waters roll
Upon the eternal shore. At last, whatever
Seeks it — finds the sea.
"All the rivers run into the sea."
O thou bounding, burning river.
Hurrying heart! I seem
To know (so one knows in a dream)
That in the waiting heart of God forever.
Thou too shalt find the sea.
: DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.
GABRIEL CHARLES DANTE ROSSETTI,
poet and painter, and usually known as
I Dante Gabriel Rossetti, was the second child of
Gabriele and Frances Rossetti, and was bom in
, London on the 12th of May, 1828. When only five
years old he distinguished himself from the childish
crowd by actually writing down an attempt at
dramatic composition. He cannot have been more
than seven years of age when he was sent to the
private school of the Rev. Mr. Paul, in Foley
Street, London, for already, in 1835, his education
appears to have been transferred to King's College
School. Here he remained until 1843, having in
the meantime written some verse, and shown a
strong bent towards painting. A literary compo-
sition of his thirteenth or fourteenth year owes its
preservation to the same cause as that which gave
us his sister's early poems. " Sir Hugh the Heron:
a Legendary Tale, in Four Parts," was privately
printed by his grandfather in 1843. From the
time of attaining his fourteenth year he was in-
structed in art at Gary's Art Academy (Bloomsbury)
until 1846, when he entered the Antique School of
the Royal Academy. The notable poems "My
Sister's Sleep" and "The Blessed Damozel "
were composed before he was nineteen years old,
though not published till 1850. After quitting the
schools of the Royal Academy, he became the
pupil of Mr. Ford Madox Brown; but it was not
till he left that artist's studio and- took one jointly
with Mr. Holman Hunt that he commenced his
early picture, "The Girlhood of the Virgin,"
exhibited in 1849 at the Pordand Gallery. He
visited Antwerp, Bruges and Ghent in this early
period of his career, and was greatly influenced by
what he then saw of the work of Memling and Van
Eyck; and about the same time he wrote " Hand
and Soul," the most considerable piece in prose
which he has left us. Shortly afterwards the cel-
ebrated Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, of which he
was the leading spirit, was founded; and in 1850
Rossetti co-operated with his brother and sister and
a small band of earnest young men in the issue of
that extraordinary publication the Germ, the
first organ of Pre-Raphaelitism. From that time
until 1870 he worked on, practically unknown to
the public either as artist or as poet, though famil-
iar to a few as a genius in the foremost rank among
contemporaries. The work of his pencil, eagerly
acquired by private clients, came but rarely where
the general public could see it, and while deeply
influencing the tone and tendency of English art,
he seems to have been content to remain, so to
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DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTL
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speak, a living tradition, except to his clients and
intimates. In 1856 he contributed a few poems to
the Germ's successor, the more lasting but yet
short-lived Oxford and Cambridge Magazine,
and in 1861 he published one of the most remark-
able collections of poetic translations ever given to
the world, **The Early Italian Poets, from CiuUo
d* Alcamo to Dante Alighirri," a volume which
includes a version of the "Vita Nuova." At that
time he had by him a considerable collection of
original poetry, on which he had bestowed that
earnest thought and ceaseless revision character-
istic of all his work; and of this poetry he now
designed to offer the reading public a selection. In
i860 he had married Elizabeth Eleanor Siddal,
who died in February, 1862, suddenly, and in
somewhat tragic circumstances. The greater part
of the poems intended for the public, but then still
in manuscript, he impulsively brought together and
laid as a last offering in his wife's coffin, in which
they were accordingly buried. In time, however,
he let himself be persuaded to recall this seemingly
irrevocable sacrifice, and eventually the precious
manuscripts were exhumed and revised for publi-
cation. In 1870 appeared the volume entitled
** Poems," which contains "Dante at Verona,"
"Sister Helen," "The Burdens of Ninevah,"
"Jenny," "A Last Confession." and many of the
wonderful sonnets of "The House of Life," a
volume which at once met with an acceptance as
wide and warm as it was unprecedented in its
suddenness. Of this volume he made more than
one revision; in 1874 he republished his transla-
tions, "revised and re-arranged" under the new
title of "Dante and His Circle," and in 1881 he
issued a second collection of original poetry, en-
titled " Ballads and Sonnets," at the same time re-
edidng the "Poems," and redistributing the
contents of the two volumes. Shortly after the
issue of this definitive edition of his. poems, Ros-
setti's health, which had once before completely
broken down, gave way, and after a few months
all hope of its restoration was at an end. He
died on Easter Sunday, 1882, at Westgate-on-Sea,
and was buried in the neighboring churchyard of
Birchington. H. B. F.
THE BLESSED DAMOZEL.
Thb blessed damozel leaned out
From the gold bar of Heaven;
Her eyes were deeper than the depth
Of waters stilled at even;
She had three lilies in her hand.
And the stars in her hair were seven.
Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem,
No wrought flowers did adorn,
But a white rose of Mary's gift,
For service meetiy worn;
Her hair that lay along her back
Was yellow like ripe com.
Herseemed she scarce has been a day
One of God's choristers;
The wonder was not yet quite gone
From that still look of hers;
Albeit, to them she left, her day
Had counted as ten years.
(To one, it is ten years of years.
. . . Yet now, and in this place.
Surely she leaned o'er me — her hair
Fell all about my face. . . .
Nothing: the autumn fall of leaves.
The whole year sets apace.)
It was the rampart of God's house
That she was standing on;
By God built over the sheer depth
The which is Space begun;
So high, that looking downward thence
She scarce could see the sun.
It lies in Heaven, across the flood
Of ether, as a bridge.
Beneath, the tides of day and night
With flame and darkness ridge
The void, as low as where this earth
Spins like a fretful midge.
Around her, lovers, newly met
'Mid deathless love's acclaims.
Spoke evermore among themselves
Their rapturous new names;
And the souls mounting up to God
Went by her like thin flames.
And still she bowed herself and stooped
Out of the circling charm;
Until her bosom must have made
The bar she leaned on warm.
And the lilies lay as if asleep
Along her bended arm.
From the fixed place of Heaven she saw
Time like a pulse shake fierce
Through all the worlds. Her gaze still strove
Within the gulf to pierce
Its path; and now she spoke as when
The stars sang in their spheres.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
The sun has gone now; the curled moon
Was like a little feather
Fluttering far down the gulf; and now
She spoke through the still weather.
Her voice was like the voice the stars
Had when they sang together.
(Ah sweet! even now, in that bird's song,
Strove not her accents there,
Fain to be hearkened ? When those bells
Possessed the mid-day air,
Strove not her steps to reach my side
Down all the echoing stair ?)
** I wish that he were come to me.
For he will come," she said.
*' Have I not prayed in Heaven ?— on earth,
Lord, Lord, has he not prayed ?
Are not two prayers a perfect strength ?
And shall I feel afraid ?
" When round his head the aureole clings.
And he is clothed in white,
ril take his hand and go with him
To the deep wells of light;
We will step down as to a stream.
And bathe there in God*s sight.
** We two will stand beside that shrine.
Occult, withheld, untrod.
Whose lamps are stirred continually
With prayer sent up to God;
And see our old prayers, granted, melt
Each like a little cloud.
" We two will lie i* the shadow of
That living mystic tree
Within whose secret growth the dove
Is sometimes felt to be,
While every leaf that His plumes touch
Saith His Name audibly.
**And I myself will teach to him,
I myself, lying so,
The songs I sing here; which his voice
Shall pause in, hushed and slow,
And find some knowledge at each pause.
Or some new thing to know."
(Alasl We two, we two, thou say'st?
Yea, one wast thou with me
That once of old. But shall God lift
To endless unity
The soul whose likeness with thy soul
Was but its love for thee ?)
"We two," she said, " will]seek the groves
Where the lady Mary is,
With her five handmaidens, whose names
Are five sweet symphonies,
Cecily, Gertrude, Magdalen,
Margaret and Rosalys.
** Circlewise sit they, with bound locks
And foreheads garlanded;
Into the fine cloth white like'flame
Weaving the golden thread.
To fashion the birth-robes- for them
Who are just bom, being dead.
" He shall fear, haply, and be dumb:
Then will I lay my cheek
To his, and tell about our love,
Not once abashed or weak:
And the dear Mother will approve
My pride, and let me speak. ,
" Herself shall bring us, hand in hand,
To Him round whom all souls
Kneel, the clear-ranged unnumbered|heads
Bowed with their aureoles:
And angels meeting us shall sing
To their citherns and citoles.
"There will I ask of ChristJthelLord
Thus much for him and me:—
Only to live as once on earth
With Love, — only to be.
As then awhile, for ever now
Together, I and he."
She gazed and listened and then said,
Less sad of speech than mild, —
* *A11 this is when he comes.' ' She ceased.
The light thrilled towards her, filled
With angels in strong level flight,
Her eyes prayed, and she smiled.
(I saw her smile.) But soon their path
Was vague in distant spheres:
And then she cast her arms along
The golden barriers.
And laid her face between her hands,
And wept. (I heard her tears.)
A LITTLE WHILE.
A LiTTLB while a little love
The hour yet bears for thee and me
Who have not drawn the veil to see
If still our heaven be lit above.
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DANTE GABRIEL ROSSETTI.
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Thou merely, at the day's last sigh,
Hast felt thy soul prolong the tone;
And I have heard the night-wind cry
And deemed its speech mine own.
A little while a little love
The scattering autumn hoards for us
Whose bower is not yet ruinous
Nor quite unleaved our songless grove.
Only across the shaken boughs
We hear the flood-tides seek the sea,
Ana deep in both our hearts they rouse
One wail for thee and me.
A little while a little love
May yet be ours who have not said
The word it makes our eyes afraid
To know that each is thinking of.
Not yet the end: be our lips dumb
In smiles a little season yet:
ril tell thee, when the end is come,
How we may best forget
EVEN SO.
So it is, my dear.
All such things touch secret strings
For heavy hearts to hear.
So it is, my dear.
Very like indeed:
Sea and sky, afar, on high,
Sand and strewn seaweed, —
Very like indeed.
But the sea stands spread
As one wall with the flat skies,
Where the lean black craft like flies
Seem well-nigh stagnated.
Soon to drop off dead.
Seemed it so to us
When I was thine and thou wast mine,
And all these things were thus,
But all our world in us ?
Could we be so now ?
Not if ail beneath heaven's pall
Lay dead but I and thou,
Could we be so now!
A SONNET.
A SONNBT is a moment's monument,
Memorial from the Soul's eternity
To one dead deathless hour. Look that it be.
Whether for lustral rite or dire portent,
Of its own arduous fullness reverent:
Carve it in ivory or in ebony.
As Day or Night may rule; and let Time see
Its flowering crest impearled and orient
A sonnet is a coin: its face reveals
The soul, — its converse, to what Power 'tis due: —
Whether for tribute to the august appeals
Of Life, or dower in Love's high retinue.
It serve; or, 'mid the dark wharf's cavernous
breath.
In Charon's palm it pay the toll to Death.
"RETRO ME, SATHANA!''
Get thee behind me. Even as, heavy-curled.
Stooping against the wind, a charioteer
Is snatched from out his chariot by the hair,
So shall Time be; and as the void car, hurled
Abroad by reinless steeds, even so the world:
Yea, even as chariot-dust upon the air,
It shall be sought and not found anywhere.
Get thee behind me, Satan. Oft unfurled,
Thy perilous wings can beat and break like lath
Much mightiness of men to win thee praise.
Leave these weak feet to tread in narrow ways.
Thou still, upon the broad vine-sheltered path,
Mayst wait the turning of the phials of wrath
For certain years, for certain months and days.
TRUE WOMAN.
To be^ sweetness more desired than Spring;
A bodily beauty more acceptable
Than the wild rose-tr^'s arch that crowns the
fell;
To be an essence more environing
Than wine's drained juice; a music ravishing
More than the passionate pulse of Philomel; —
To be all this 'neath one soft bosom's swell
That is the flower of life: — ^how strange a thing!
How strange a thing to be what Man can know
But as a sacred secret! Heaven's own screen
Hides her soul's purest depth and loveliest glow;
Closely withheld, as all things most unseen, —
The wave-bowered pearl,-^he heart-shaped seal
of green
That flecks the snowdrop underneath the snow.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
THE HEART OF THE NIGHT.
From child to youth; from youth to arduous man;
From lethargy to fever of the heart;
From faithful life to dream-dowered days apart;
From trust to doubt; from doubt to brink of ban; —
Thus much of change in one swift cycle ran
Till now. Alas, the soul!— how soon must she
Accept her primal immortality,—
The flesh resume its dust whence it began ?
O Lord of work and peace! O Lord of life!
O Lord, the awful Lord of will! though late,
Even yet renew this soul with duteous breath:
That when the peace is garnered from strife,
The work retrieved, the will regenerate.
This soul may see thy face, O Lord of death!
GENIUS IN BEAUTY.
Bbauty like hers is genius. Not the call
Of Homer*s or of Dante's heart sublime, —
Not Michael's hand furrowing the zones of time,—
Is more with compassed mysteries musical;
Nay, not in Spring's or Summer's sweet footfall
More gathered gifts exuberant Life bequeathes
Than doth this sovereign face, whose love-spell
breathes
Even from its shadowed contour on the wall.
As many men are poets in their youth,
But for one sweet-strung soul the wires prolong
Even through all change the indomitable song;
So in likewise the envenomed years, whose tooth
Rends shallower grace with ruin void of ruth,
Upon this beauty's power shall wreak no wrong.
HER GIFTS.
High grace, the dower of queens; and therewithal
Some wood-bom wonder's sweet simplicity;
A glance like water brimming with the sky
Or hyadnth-light where forest-shadows fall;
Such thrilling pallor of cheeks doth enthral
The heart; a mouth whose passionate forms imply
All music and all silence held thereby;
Deep golden locks, her sovereign coronal;
A round reared neck, meet column of Love's shrine
To cling to when the heart takes sanctuary;
Hands which for ever at Love's bidding be,
And soft-stirred feet still answering to his sign: —
These are her gifts, as tongue may tell them o'er.
Breathe low her name, my soul; for that means
more.
LOVE.
A holy thought
Which is a prayer before one knows of it.
— A Last Confession.
INCONSTANCY.
Alas for hourly change! Alas for all
The loves that from his hand proud Youth lets fall.
Even as the beads of a told rosary!
^ Pride of Youth,
RB6RBT.
Look in my face; my name is Might-have-been;
I am also called No-more, Too-late, Farewell;
Unto thine ear I hold the dead-sea shell
Cast up thy Life's foam-fretted feet between;
Unto thine eyes the glass where that is seen
Which had Life's form and Love's, but by my
spell
Is now a shaken shadow intolerable,
Of ultimate things unuttered the frail screen.
-tA Superscription.
HOPE.
Crave thou no dower of earthly things
Unworthy Hope's imaginings.
To have brought true birth of Song to be
And to have won hearts to Poesy,
Or anywhere in the sun or rain
To have loved and been loved again.
Is loftiest reach of Hope's bright wings.
— Soothsay.
SBA.
Consider the sea's lisdess chime:
Time's self it is, made audible,—
The murmur of the earth's own shell.
Secret continuance sublime
Is the sea's end: our sight may pass
No furlong further. Since time was,
This sound hath told the lapse of time.
— The Sea-Limits.
MARY.
Being a daughter borne to God,
Mother of Christ from stall to rood,
And wife unto the Holy Ghost: —
Oh when our need is uttermost.
Think that to such as death may strike
Thou once wert sister sisterlike!
Thou headstone of humanity,
Groundstone of the great Mystery,
Fashioned like us, yet more than we!
—Ave.
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EVA KATHERINE CLAPP,
389
EVA KATHERINE CLAPP.
EVA KATHERINE CLAPP wUs bom in Brad-
ford, 111., August 10, 1857. Her father re-
moved from Western Massachusetts and preempted
a section of the best farming land in the State.
There he built a log house of the frontier type, and
in this his children were bom. Miss Clapp's pater-
nal grandmother was Lucy Lee, who was a direct
descendant, on her father's side, from the famous
Indian princess, Pocahontas. Her mother was
Ann Ely, from Litchfield, Conn., a direct descen-
dant from Lady Alice Fenwick, a romantic
figure in collonial times, of Old Lyme, Conn. Miss
Clapp passed the first eleven years of her life under
her mother's watchful care, on her father's farm.
After her mother's death she lived with a married
sister. She attended school at Amboy, at the
Dover Academy, and subsequently at the Milwau-
kee Female College. While her studies were pur-
sued in a desultory manner and at irregular inter-
vals, she learned very rapidly and easily. When
about sixteen years old she visited for a time in the
large eastem cities, and subsequently taught school
in Western Massachusetts. She commenced to
write at an early age. Her first story, written when
she was twenty years old, was a novel entitled **Her
Bright Future," drawn largely from life. Some
thirty thousand copies were sold. This was fol-
lowed by a "A Lucky Mishap " and *' Mismated,"
which reached a sale of about ten thousand copies;
"A Woman's Triumph," and a serial first pub-
lished in one of the Chicago dailies as "Tragedies
of Prairie Life," and subsequently published in
book form as a " A Dark Secret." She has written
many short stories and sketches, and has done con-
siderable editorial work. Her poems have had a
wide circulation. Miss Clapp's writings are char-
acterized by a high moral tone. '* Her Bright
Future" is in itself an eloquent sermon on the evil
of intemperance, while '* Mismated" presents for-
cibly the errors in our social system which its title
indicates.
Miss Clapp's poems have appeared in the Chi-
cago Current, the Interior^ the Chicago Times, the
Chicago Tribune, the fnier Ocean, the Boston
Budget, and she writes regularly for the Boston
Transcript^ and the /Register, of Berlin, Germany.
Her poems are to be published in book form, under
the title, "Songs of Red Rose Land."
Miss Clapp became the wife of Dr. C. B. Gib-
son of Chicago, in 1892, and spent a year in
Europe, where Mrs. Gibson made a special
study of the literature of Germany and France.
I. R. W.
GOLDEN-'-ROD.
When the swift field spider weaves
'Mong the dry late garnered sheaves,
And the cricket's ceaseless song
Echoes shrill the whole night long,
From the hill,
Shom and still,
Plaintive pipes the whip-poor-will.
By the brooklet's reedy edge,
By the dusty wajrside hedge.
From the fragrant, fertile sod
Steps my Princess Goldenrod.
All in state
Doth she wait,
When the summer groweth late.
Motley is her retinue:
Dragon-flies of steely hue, «
Mail-clad beetles — ^warriors bold —
Bronze-brown bees with belts of gold,
Courtiers tme.
Come to sue
E'er the sunshines dries the dew.
Butterflies with wings out spread,
Purple, richly broider^d
With heraldic quaint device;
Timid hares and shy field mice —
Here they meet,
At her feet,
In the sultry August heat.
From no well-kept garden bed
Doth she lift her yellow head.
Gorgeous-hued is she and wild —
Summer's wayward gypsy child.
Her rich sprays
Softly blaze
By the homely weed-grown ways.
In her tawny, tangled hair
Spanish colors doth she wear —
Royal, fervid tints that hold
All the summer's buming gold;
And each line.
Clean and fine,
Glows with exquisite design.
Through my idly dreaming brain.
Princess of the blooming train.
Ah! how many fancies chase.
Musing on thy ardent grace —
Come and go,
To and fro,
Like the ocean's rhythmic flow.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Who can tell in what far place
Grew the founders of thy race ?
Who can tell ? — ^perchance they sprang
Where the shepherds piped and sang,
By the sea,
On those free
Flower-clad plains of Arcady.
If indeed a spirit dwells
In each flower-cup* s scented cells,
As in classic days of old
Famous pagan poets told,
Strong and fine
Sure is thine,
Fiery, sweet as Cyprus wine.
LAST WORDS.
Adieu, happy dream, for Life's day-star has van-
ished,
Burned out into darkness and left me alone
In a night more intense, for a bliss so soon ban-
ished,
One brief gleam of love that so fitfully shone.
Yet locked in this heart let me fondly brood over
That passion so deathless, too faintly concealed;
Though no more, never more to your gaze, my
proud lover,
This soul to its depths be expressed or revealed.
Yet what more can be said ? earth is full of such
grieving;
We loved, drinking deep of the gladness of life;
And your kiss on my lips held a charm full retriev-
ing
AH griefs of the past, wasted years of my life.
So be brave fainting heart, though thy life's light is
failing
And thy wealth is all pledged on the cast of this
die.
If against Fate's decree proves thy strife naught
availing,
Then break, foolish heart, thou shalt utter no cry.
Could one deep draught of death but call back or
recover
The rash, fatal step that so vainly we mourn,
I would drain its dark cup to the dregs, aye my
lover!
Count anguish but light thus for thee to be borne.
All for thy sake, not mine, since my brightest ideal,
Enshrined in thy being, brought rapture supreme;
And the boundless content of Love's long delayed
real
Outshone — yes, by far, all my dim, girlish dream.
Now that Spring comes apace, bringing fragrance
of flowers
To her chill northern love, like a fair, sunny bride.
What memories will sadden these long, listless
hours,
What hope make amends for Life's best hope de-
nied?
This only, this only, the surge of Time's river
Sweeps on evermore to Etemitie's breast,
The keen nerves of pain must at last cease to
quiver.
The weariest brain And oblivion and rest.
Or if not, if this spirit, unchanging, immortal.
Lives on through the ages supernal and free.
We shall meet, yes and love, far beyond the grave's
portal.
As clouds meet and mingle above the wild sea.
"WHEN RILEY SINGS.
The immortal beauty of God's simple things
We understand and bless
When Riley sings.
Once more we smell the sweetness far and wide
Of locust blossoms, in the warm June-tide.
Rustle of leaves and lovers' talk we hear
And childhood's laughter, innocent and clear;
And everywhere gleams humor bright and true.
Clean as the sunshine in a drop of dew.
Thrilling with sympathy the heart's still springs
Leap upward to the light
When Riley sings.
Joyous we read, how purity and worth
Make glad the quiet comers of the earth.
Till we are fain, with yearning hearts and warm,
To wander back again to that old farm
Where gray-haired parents wait and watch and pray
For the loved one who bides so long away.
Bright hopes and dreams and days long dead he
brings
Again to life, as tenderly he sings;
Heaven's love and goodness seem more close at
hand,
And all the world as but one household band.
Sing on, true poet, for the age is cold.
And hearts grow hard striving for place and gold.
We need the sweet evangel of thy song,
For we are weary and have wandered long.
And so for this we give thee thanks and praise
That in the magic mirror of thy lays,
Through smiles and tears and pathos keen as pain
Childhood's lost Paradise we And again.
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MARY R, P, HATCH.
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A DREAM OF SAPPHO.
In summer nights, when Philomers despair
Fills woodland aisles, and thrills with yearning
pain
The breasts of all the listening dryad train,
My heart throbs swifter, sudden made aware
Of her sad eyes, shadowed by dusky hair.
Soft-crumpled where the drowsy Loves have lain.
She comes while faint, sweet odors everywhere —
The white day-lilies* souls— float thro' the air.
Hover and drift above the garden's space.
Ah ! stately singer, hushed are lute and lyre;
What dost thou hear, with pale, impassioned face,
In this cold age ? No more thy deathless fire
Thrills in a kiss or hallows with its grace
The sweet yet bitter pain of love's desire.
THE SOLDIER'S WIDOW.
At the dim close of the November day
She stands alone, amidst the falling snow.
By her lost hero's grave; while backward flow
The currents of her musings. Once again life's
May;
Youth, love and hope in rosy colors play
Around her head; when, hush! the bugles blow!
And o'er her dreams a lifelong loss and woe.
Like yon dull cloud, sinks cheerless, cold and
«Tay.
Columbia's children, of your birthright proud,
Oh! in this peaceful year's calm autumn-tide,
Let to new deeds of love your hearts be vowed
For those whose dearest ones have fought and
died
For us. By generous act with fervid phrase allied.
Thy pride, America, prove justified.
TO VICTOR HUGO.
Majestic mother of a hero-race!
Old France in arts and honors still the first.
The twain republics, thy proud breasts have nursed
Clasp hands across the billowy ocean's space
O'er the great dead, whose words with us abide.
Once more we own our father's debt to thee.
Whose fervid breath fanned Liberty's faint spark
Until its beacon fires flamed through the dark.
And still shall flame, till all mankind is free.
With seer's gaze he saw the rushing tide
Of years that banish errors gray and old;
In that free France his prophet-song foretold,
High aspiration crowned and satisfied.
He turns from strife to sleep, his message told.
— Sunset
MARY R. P. HATCH.
MRS. MARY R. P. HATCH, poet and story
writer, was born in the town of Stratford,
N. H., June 19th, 1848. She is the daughter of
Charles G. 'and Mary Blake Piatt. Her ancestors
were English. The Blakes settled in Dorchester,
Mass., in 1620, and the Platts in Stratford, Conn.,
the families presenting a long line of illustrious
names, from Admiral Blake, the naval hero, to
Senator Piatt, who managed the Copyright Bill in
Congress. The list includes the Blakes, Judsons
and McLellans of literary fame. Mrs. Hatch's life
has been spent in the Connecticut valley. In
childhood she possessed a quiet manner, a
sensitive disposition, was a close observer and a
student of nature. She early developed scholarly
and literary tastes. At the age of fifteen she left
the common schools and attended the academy at
I.,ancaster, eighteen miles from her home. There
she studied the higher mathematics, rhetoric, Latin
and French, and there her ability as a writer was
discovered and recognized. From that time she
contributed sketches on various subjects for the
county papers, and articles under her pen-name
'* Mabel Percy," from time to time appeared in the
Portland Transcript, Peterson^ s Magazine, Satur-
day Evening Post and other papers and periodicals.
Since then, under her true name, she has written
for Zian^s Herald, Springfield Republican, Chicago
Inter' Ocean, the Writer, the Epoch, Frank Leslie* s
Illustrated Newspaper and oliiers. After leaving
school she became the wife of Antipas M. Hatch.
Their family consists of two sons, and as the wife
of an extensive farmer she has been a busy woman.
Her management of her home has left her some
time to devote to literature, and her versatility has
enabled her to do creditable work in the wide
realm of short stories, dialect sketches, essa3rs and
poems, grave and gay, vers de societe and verses in
dialect. "The Bank Trs^edy," published serially
in the Portland Transcript, was issued in book
form and was a great success. Other stories from
her pen are "Quicksands," "The Missing Man"
and "Polimpsa: A Psychical Study." Mrs. Hatch
is painstaking and careful in all her work, following
out lines of thought suggested by little things, and
making everything count for its greatest value.
Personally she is petite in figure, a blonde, with
regular features and an aspect of frailness.
She is a pleasing conversationalist, keeps thor-
oughly posted on the current events of the day,
maintains a lively interest in political and religious
matters and possesses a generous fund of common
sense. H. A. T.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
AN INDIAN LEGEND.
In Dixville woods a lone grave lies,
Untouched by hands, unseen by eyes.
The bright stars look caressing down,
The blue sky draws her curtains round.
In years agone Metalluc wooed
An Indian maid in language rude.
They lived and loved as others do,
Of red or white, or whate'er hue.
He caught with curious line and hook
The luscious trout from mountain brook;
With rarer skill he tracked the deer.
And filled their lowly hut with cheer.
The hues of sky and flowers she caught,
In beads their lovely colors wrought.
At eve Metalluc hasted home,
Mahala waited in the gloam.
Moons came and went, a babe was there —
A dusky babe, round-faced and fair.
Metalluc saw his child with pride,
Mahala, no less happy, cried.
'Tis break of day, the lone crags frown,
On wreck and ruin they look down.
The lonely echo, wondering, lists,
The valley weeps in tears of mist.
No graceful wigwams dot the vale,
But flickering fires light up the dale.
For fancied wrongs the pale-face fought,
At dead of night this ruin wrought.
Of all that happy Indian band,
Metalluc only lifts his hand.
Toward cr^ and cliff he lifts it high,
And utters his despairing cry:
*' Father of spirits whose home is in the rocks,
Who lists from every hill, and never mocks
The poor Indian's cry to Thee for help!
O let the sad winds tell Thee of our tears,
And let the rushing torrents speak to Thee of fears
That fell upon Mahala's heart at night-time.
Let the happy hearts and peaceful homes that were
Be weighed against our sinful souls that err.
And let our wrongs meet vengeance, God, if right!"
No trodden path points out to curious eyes
The lonely grave where his Mahala lies.
For Indian hate concealed with cunning art
Where Indian love had buried one fond heart
Their happy life is told by birds and flowers,
By babbling brooks and glistening summer showers.
Their fate, by loudly echoing thunder borne
To western borders, told by hearts that mourn.
PATRICK'S LETTER.
Iv'e a mother in ould Ireland,
Though I fear me she is dead;
For the dreadful tale of famine
Makes my heart sink down like lead.
They tell me Ireland's starving,
That the crops have failed to pay.
And but few have any praties —
Let alone the mate and tay.
It's a year now since I left her •
Fpr to cross the stormy say;
And she blissed her boy at parting,
Saying " don't forgit to pray!"
So I've prayed to Virgin Mary
And to many a blissid saint
For luck to come to Ireland;
But now my heart is faint.
O, I see my poor ould mother
As she looked, upon that day
With her dim old eyes a-weeping,
And her face so worn and gray.
'*Shure, we'll live like quanes*and princes,"
Said she, when my grief she see;
*'And I'll sell the pig and shanty
When you send the word for me."
I'd niver left my mother
But I heard such fine big pay
Might be had for jist the asking,
In the land beyond the say.
I've sint my earnings to her,
But I've niver heard a word;
And I'm feared she's not a-living
Since the dreadful news I've heard;
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WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT.
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WILFRID SCA WEN BL UNT.
395
Please write to Ireland, mister,
Jist a Uttle, little bit,
And ask if Mis' Maloney
Is alive, and if she's writ.
Say, since the dreadful famine
That my heart has been like lead,
Say ** write to your son Patrick,
If it*s thrue that you are dead.*'
HOW NICE!
How nice it is when men must rave
That in his home each has a slave
(A sa/efy valve, or so to speak).
On whom he can his vengeance wreak.
How nice it is!
A man can't always feel the same;
To think he must is quite a shame.
Then what's to do, I'd like to know,
But go right to his wife and blow!
How nice it is!
It wouldn't do to use men so;
A man might up and fight, you know.
The plan is perfect, seems to me,
In this I'm sure you'll all agree.
How nice it is!
Yes, beautiful is nature's plan.
That woman must submit to man;
The unit he, the cipher she.
Makes ten, not one, of him, you see.
How nice it is!
Of course we didn't court 'em so;
It wouldn't do to let 'em know
That all we men want of a wife
Is thus to smooth the path of life.
How nice it is!
THE PATHOS OF THE PAST.
Wb stand and look the ages in the face.
The gaunt, worn ages that will ever be.
'Mid proud, majestic lines we yet can trace
The pathos of the past; as plainly see
The sacrificial waste of blood and race
For us. They for us. For unborn races we.
While we have lights set all along the way,
Their past in thick tradition folds was hid,
Though in each soul there gleamed one forceful ray.
They knew not why it gleamed, nor why it chid
Their evil deeds. But we know and see to-day
That when He said, they knew not what they did.
Forgiven were the people of the past.
While time was set to bring the Good at last.
WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT.
WILFRID SCAWEN BLUNT was bom at
Crabbet Park, Crawley, Sussex, in the year
1840. Educated at Stoneyhurst and St. Mary's
College, Oscot, he entered the diplomatic service,
and acted as attach^ to British embassies at various
European courts from 1858 to 1869, in which latter
year he married Lady Anne Isabella Noel, daugh-
ter of the Earl of Lovelace and grand-daughter of
Lord Byron. Leaving the diplomatic service, Mr.
Blunt now devoted himself to travel in Spain, Al-
giers, Egypt, the Holy Land, Mesopotamia, and
the Syrian Desert. A result of these travels was
Lady Anne Blunt's "Bedouins of the Euphrates."
Mr. Blunt then visited Arabia, and published "The
Future of Islam," after which he returned to Egypt
and championed the cause Arabi Pasha. It was at
this time that his name came prominently before
the public, and in this connection that he published
"The Wind and the Whirlwind." During the
Egyptian war he was much abused for want of pat-
riotism, and for love of disorder and vanity. Lord
Houghton used to say, "The fellow knows he has
a handsome head, and wants it to be seen on Tem-
ple Bar." His reputation as the writer of love-
.sonnets scarcely helped him in this connection.
People would not believe that a love poet could be
a serious politician. After the war, when Arabi
was in prison, and apparently on the eve of execu-
tion, Mr. Blunt sent counsel from England to de-
fend him, taking upon himself the whole expense
of the defence. Mr. Blunt's early education in a
strict Catholic school, and the subsequent reaction,
are described in one of his prose works, " Proteus
and Amadeus," (1878). His mind regained its faith
and reverence while living amongst tlie Arab tribes
of the East, and a feeling of gratitude to them was
mixed with his natural sympathy for oppressed
nationalities.
This same* sympathy for a national cause sent
him to Ireland, where he took part in a prohibited
meeting at Woodford, and did not shrink from the
consequences for his defiance of what he believed
to be unjust laws. He claims the honor of having
been the first Englishman put in prison for the sake
of Ireland. He spent two months in Gal way and
Kilmainham gaols, where most of the "In Vinculis"
sonnets were written. Galway was made tolerable
by the friendliness of the warders and of the visit-
ing justices, who were won by his personal charm
and his cheerful acquiescence in the prison rules.
He daily went through his task of picking oakum,
and was far from shrinking from the prison dress.
Mr. Blunt's contributions to poetic literature are
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
"Sonnets and Songs," (1875); *The Love-Sonnets
of Proteus," (1881); "The Wind and the Whirl-
wind," (1883); "In Vinculis," (1889); "The New
Pilgrimage," (1889.) The "Love-Sonnets of Pro-
teus" are dedicated to Lord Lytton, who was the
first to tell Mr. Blunt, when they were in the diplo-
matic service together, that he was a poet. An
article by Lord Lytton in the Nineteenth Century,
November, 188 1, on "A New Love Poet," drew a
good deal of attention to Mr. Blunt's work. With
reference to the ballad of "Sancho Sanches " in the
" New Pilgrimage," it will be interesting to record
that a visitor, many years ago, on going to a bull-
fight at Madrid, was struck by the extraordinary
good looks of the matadore awaiting the rush of
the bull in the arena, and. on inquiry, was told that
he was an amateur bull-fighter, a young man from
the English Embassy, Mr. Wilfrid Blunt..
Mr. Blunt has twice contested metropolitan con-
stituencies for Parliament, but without success. In
1885 he stood for North Camberwell as a Conserv-
ative Home Ruler, and in 1888, while confined in
Kilmainham gaol, he contested Deptford as a Rad-
ical candidate.
Mr. Blunt makes it his boast that his work be-
longs rather to the literature of energy that of form.
R. L. G.
IN THE NIGHT.
Whbrb art thou, thou lost face,
Which, yet a little while, wert making mirth
At these new years which seemed too sad to be ?
Where art thou fled, which, for a minute's space,
Shut out the world, and wert my world to me ?
And now a comer of this little Earth,
A broken shadow by the day forgot.
Is wide enough to be thy hiding-place;
And thou art shrunk away, and needest not
The darkness of this night to cover thee.
Where art thou hidden ? In the boundless air
My hands go forth to thee, and search and feel
As through the universe. I hold the night
Caught in my arms; and yet thou art not there.
Where art thou ? What if I should strike a light
So suddenly that thou could 'st never steal
Back to thy shadows ? What if I should find
Thee stading close to me, with all thy hair
Trailing about me, and with eyes grown blind
With looking at me vainly through the night ?
There are three rings upon thy hand to-night.
One with a sapphire stone; and one there is
Coiled like a snake; and one on which my name
Is written with strange gems. By this dim light
I cannot read if it be writ the same.
See, I have worn no other ring but this I
— Why dost thou look at me with eyes estranged?
Is it not thine? — Ah, God ! thou readest right !
And it is changed, and thou and I are changed,
And I have written there another name.
Oh happiness, how has it slipped away !
We who once lived and held it in our hand !
What is the rest that these new years can bring ?
Did we not love it in our loves to-day.
And pleasure, which was so divine a thing,
The sweetest and most strange to understand ?
And that is why it left regret behind.
As though a wild bird suddenly should stay
A moment at our side, and we should find,
When we look up, that it had taken wing.
And thou, hast thou forgotten how to love ?
Hast thou no kissing in thy lips ? — thy tongue,
Has it no secret whisper for my ear?
I have been watching thee to see thee move
A little closer to my side, in fear
Of the cold night — Oh there is room among
The pillows for thy head, if thou would'st sleep:
And thou art cold, and I would wrap my love
To my breast, and so my vigil keep
And be alone with darkness and with her.
Thou standest with thy hand upon my heart.
As once thou used to stand, to feel it beat
Doth it beat calmer now than in those days?
Thy foolish finger-tips will leave a smart,
If they so press upon my side. Thy gaze
Is burning me. Oh speak a word and cheat
This darkness into pain, if pain must be.
And wake me back to sorrow with a start;
For I am weary of the night and thee,
And thy strange silence and thy stranger face.
Can*st thou not speak ? Thy tale* was but begun.
How can I answer thee a tale untold ?
Whisper it quick before the morning break.
How loud thou weepest ! Listen, there is one
Dreaming beside me who must not awake.
Close in my ear !— Ah, child, thy lips are cold,
Because thou art forsaken. — Misery !
Is there not room enough beneath the sun
For her, and thee, and me ? . . .
AT A FUNERAL.
I LovBD her too, this woman who is dead.
Look in my face. I haVe a right to go
And see the place where you have made her bed
Among the snow.
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WILFRID SCA WEN BL UNT,
397
I loved her too, whom you are burying.
I have a right to stand beside her bier,
And too, my handful of the dust I fling,
That she may hear.
I loved her; and it was not for the eyes
Which you have shut, nor for her yellow hair.
Nor for the face which in your bosom lies, —
Let it lie there, —
Nor for the wild-bird's music of her voice,
Which we shall hear in dreams till we too sleep;
Nor for the rest, which made the world rejoice,
The angels weep.
It was not for the payment of sweet love,
Though love is often straightened for a kiss;
Nor for the hope of other joys above,
But only this.
That she had laid her hand upon my heart
Once, in the summer time when we were young
And that her Anger-tips had left a smart,
And that my tongue
Had spoken words which might not be unspoken,
Lest they should make a by-word of love's truth,
And I had sworn that love should be the token
Of my youth.
And so I gave her all, and long ago
The treasure of my youth was put in pawn;
And she was a little richer that I know
When that was gone.
But I have lived a beggar since that day,
And hide my face if may be from men's eyes;
For often I have seen them shrink away,
As in surprise,
That such a loathsome cripple should be found
To walk abroad in daylight with the rest.
With scarce a rag to cover up the wound
Upon his breast
Yet no man stopped to ask how this might be.
Or I had scared them, and let loose my tongue, —
How I had bought myself this misery
When I was young.
Yet I have loved her. This must be my pay;
The pension I have earned me with these tears;
The right to kneel beside her grave to-day,
Despite these years,
With all her kisses burning on my cheek,
As when I left her and our love was dead,
And our lips trembled, though they did not speak,
The night I fled;
The right to bid you stand aside, nor be
A witness of our meeting. Did you love
In joy as I have loved in misery?
You did not prove
Your love was stronger than the strength of death.
Or she had never died upon your hand.
I would have fed her breathing with my breath;
I would have fanned
A living wind of Heaven to her lips;
I would have stolen life from Paradise.
And she is dead, and you have seen eclipse
Within those eyes.
If I could know that you had loved her well;
If I could hold it for a certainty
That you had sold your life as I did sell;
If I could see
The blackness of your soul, and with my tongue
Taste the full bitterness of tears unshed;
If I should find your very heart was wrung,
And maimed and dead;
I If I should feel your hand's grasp crumble mine«
And hug the pain when I should grasp in turn;
If I could dip my fingers in the brine
Of eyes that bum;
If I could hear your voice call back the dead
With such a mighty cry of agony
That she should turn and listen in the bed
Where she doth lie,
And all the heavens should together roll.
Thinking they heard the angel's trumpet tone,
I I could forget it that you bought a soul
Which was my own;
I could forget that she forgot her vows,
That aught was bartered for the wealth of love;
I could untell the story of my woes,
Till God above
Should hold her guiltless and condone the wrong
' Done to His justice; I could take your hand
And call you brother, as we went along
To take our stand
Before His judgment-seat with her again,
Where we are hurrying, — for we could not keep
Our place unchallenged in the ranks of men
Who do not weep.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
I
LAUGHTER AND DEATH.
There is no laughter in the natural world
Of beast, or fish or bird, though no sad doubt
Of their futurity to them unfurled
Has dared to check the mirth-compelling shout
The lion roars his solemn thunder out
To the sleeping woods. The eagle screams her cry.
Even the lark must strain a serious throat
To hurl his blest defiance at the sky.
Fear, anger, jealousy have found a voice.
Love's pain or rapture the brute bosoms swell.
Nature has symbols for her nobler joys.
Her nobler sorrows. Who had dared foretell
That only man, by some sad mockery,
Should learn to laugh who learns that he must die.
FAREWELL, DARK GAOL.
Farewell, dark gaol. You hold some better hearts
Than in this savage world I thought to find.
I do not love you nor the fraudulent arts
By which men tutor men to ways unkind.
Your law is not my law, and yet my mind
Remains your debtor. It has learned to see
How dark a thing the earth would be and blind
But for the light of human charity.
I am your debtor thus and for the pang
Which touched and chastened, and the nights of
thought
Which were my years of learning. See, I hang
Your image here, a glory all unsought.
About my neck. Thus saints in symbol hold
Their tools of death and darings manifold.
THERE ARE WRONGS DONE IN THE FAIR
FACE OF HEAVEN.
There are wrongs done in the fair face of Heaven
Which cry aloud for vengeance, and shall cr>';
Loves beautiful in strength whose wit has striven
Vainly with loss and man's inconstancy;
Dead children's faces watched by souls that die;
Pure streams defiled; fair forests idly riven;
A nation, suppliant in its agony,
Calling on justice, and no help is given.
All these are pitiful. Yet, after tears,
Come rest and sleep and calm forgetfulness,
And God's good providence consoles the years.
Only the coward heart which did not guess,
The dreamer of brave deeds that might have been.
Shall cureless ache with wounds forever green.
ON THE SHORTNESS OF TIME.
If I could live without the thought of death,
Forgetful of time's waste, thy soul's decay,
I would not ask for other joy than breath;
With light and sound of birds and the sun's ray,
I could sit on, untroubled day by day.
Watching the grass grow and the wild flowers
range
From blue to yellow and from red to gray.
In natural sequence as the season's change;
I could afford to wait but for the hurt
Of this dull tick of time which chides my ear.
But now I dare not sit with loins ungirt
And staff uplifted, for death stands too near.
I must be up and doing, ay, each minute;
The grave gives time for rest when we are in it
TO JULIET, EXHORTING HER TO PATIENCE.
Why do we fret at the inconstancy
Of our frail hearts, which cannot always love ?
Time rushes onward, and we mortals move
Like waifs upon a river, neither free
To halt nor hurry. Sweet, if destiny
Throws us together for an hour, a day.
In the back-water of this quiet bay.
Let us rejoice. Before us lies the sea,
Where we must all be lost in spite of love.
We dare not stop to question. Happiness
Lies in our hand unsought, a treasure trove.
Time has short patience of man's vain distress;
And fate grows angr>' at too long delay;
And floods rise fast, and we are swept away.
TO ONE WHO WOULD MAKE A CONFESSION.
Oh! leave the Past to bury its own dead.
The Past is naught to us, the Present all.
What need of last year's leaves to strew Love's
bed?
What need of ghosts to grace a festival ?
I would not, if I could, those days recall,
Those days not ours. For us the feast is spread,
The lamps are lit, and music plays withal.
Then let us love and leave the rest unsaid.
This island is our home. Around it roar
Great gulfs and oceans, channels, straits and seas.
What matter in what wreck we reached the shore,
So we both reached it ? We can mock at these.
Oh! leave the Past, if Past indeed there be.
I would not know it. I would know but thee.
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HATTIE LEONARD WRIGHT.
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HATTIE LEONARD WRIGHT.
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THE TWO HIGHWAYMEN.
I LONG have had a quarrel set with Time,
Because he robbed me. Every day of life
Was wrested from me after bitter strife,
I never yet could see the sun go down
But I was angry in my heart, nor hear
The leaves fall in the wind without a tear
Over the dying summer. I have known
No truce with Time nor, Time's accomplice, Death.
The fair world is the witness of a crime
Repeated every hour. For life and breath
Are sweet to all who live; and bitterly
The voices of these robbers of the heath
Sound in each ear and chill the passerby.
— What have we done to thee, thou monstrous
Time?
What have we done to Death that we must die ?
A DAY IN SUSSEX.
Thb dove did lend me wings. I fled away
From the loud world which long had troubled me.
Oh, lightly did I flee when hoyden May
Threw her wild mantle on the hawthorn tree.
I left the dusty highrpad, and my way
Was through deep meadows, shut with copses fair.
A choir of thrushes poured its roundelay
From every hedge and every thicket there.
Mild, moon-faced kine looked on, where in the
grass,
All heaped with flowers I lay, from noon till eve;
And hares unwitting close to me did pass,
And still the birds sang, and I could not grieve.
Oh, what a blessed thing that evening was!
Peace, music, twilight, all that could deceive
A soul to joy, or lull a heart to peace.
It glimmers yet across whole years like these.
JUSTICE.
I hold the justice of Heaven
Larger than all the science, and welled from a
purer fount.
— The Canon of Aughrim.
RICHES. j
Riches make selflsh souls, and gain has an evil eye. '
—Ibid.
IRELAND.
All you have made it to-day is a hell to conquer
and keep,
Yours by the right of the strongest hand, the right
of the rod.
—Ibid.
HATTIE LEONARD WRIGHT.
HATTIE LEONARD WRIGHT was bom in
Fort Wayne, Ind., December 9, 1858. When
little more than three years old, her mother died
and the following two years were spent at the home
of her grandfather, Rev. J. Ivers Whitman, of Fair-
field, Ohio. About that time her father remarried
and she was taken to Fort Wayne to reside with
him. When she was twelve years old her step-
mother died, and in less than three years after-
wards she became the feminine head of her father's
house. When nine years old she began to attend
school, but could read and write well at that time.
She was graduated from the Fort Wayne High
School when she had attained her sixteenth year.
The following June she was graduated from the
Training School, notwithstanding a ten weeks' ill-
ness endured that spring. The next two winters
she taught in the public schools of Fort Wayne, but
her health began to fall, and for that reason she
was obliged to give up teaching. She did not, how-
ever, remain idle, but assumed charge of the house-
work, also giving lessons in vocal and instrumental
music. Five years passed thus, when she again
taught school, in the country near Fort Wayne, and
later she also taught in Ohio schools. She was so
ambitious that even in her busy life of teaching she
found time to learn painting, giving all her leisure
to that accomplishment. On her return from Ohio
she was engaged as society editor on the Fort
Wayne Morning Journal^ which position she filled
for more than a year. A few years later she ac-
cepted a position as teacher of vocal music in the
schools of Fort Wayne, resigning that position
to marry Mr. R. M. Wright. Mrs. Wright's first
literary work was done when she was littie more
than fourteen years of age — a poem written in mem-
ory of a classmate who had died. In later years she
wrote many letters of travel, reports of various meet-
ings, a few humorous sketches and a large number
of poems that have been published from time to
time. In addition to these accomplishments Mrs.
Wright read medicine with her father for a number of
years, but disliked the practice too much to make it
her profession in life, although she had rare gifts in
that direction, and would probably have been very
successful. She is passionately fond of animals and is
an expert horsewoman. The Leonard family is a
very old one, dating back eight generations in this
country and have been distinguished for fine memor-
ies and rare musical and literary talent. Mrs. Wright
has a pleasant home in Fort Dodge, Iowa, where she
resides, happy in the cares of her household and de.
voted to her little son. H. A. K.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
MY VIEW AN' HIS'N.
I TELL ye jest what, them teachers
Has a awful sight fer to bear,
An' I couldn't be hired to be one
Ef I hadn't a rag to wear
Except this old suit uv blue jeans
An' not nary cent fer to spare.
Fust they's a passel uv young ones
Jest full uv the very old Nick —
The biggest ones puttin* the littlest
Up to ev'ry mis-chee-vious trick
An' a keepin' theirselves out uv trouble
In a way that seems purty slick.
Then, they's the intrusted payrents
Ferever a meddlin' aroun'
An' a faultin' the teacher fer somethin'
He knows better'n they, I'll be boun'.
It hain't possible fer ye to suit 'em,
Anyways to suit *em all roun*.
This one — ^he thinks thet his children
The teacher hain't learned 'em enough,
Thet he's ben by far too easy;
The next one allows he's too rough;
An' Jones, he says thet he's partial,
An' he took his'n out in a huff.
An' then, jest look at his quarters.
He boards with the Widder Van Bloom,
Two mile an' a half he must foot it
'Cause the neighbors here hedn't room.
Takin' summer an* winter together
His comfort it hain't on the boom.
Fer 'n fall the roads is so muddy,
In winter ther drifted with snow;
An' *n spring the mud is repeated;
By June in the dust he must go;
'F it hain't one thing it's another
To make him feel mizzerble low.
Then ther's that dirty old school-house,
'Tain't fit fer to stable a cow;
The ceil in' all frescoed with spit-balls
Thet's stuck frum the fust year tell now;
The windows without any curtains —
A comfortless place, you'll allow.
Ther hain't a tree that Stan's nigh it
To keep off the blisterin* sun
Thet strikes straight through ihem old winders
In the children's eyes — ev'ry one
Scorchin* an' parchin' an' blindin'
Tell the long afternoon is done.
It's jest as bad in the winter,
Fer the glare uv the dazzlin' snow
Shines through them unshaded winders
All day with its pitiless glow
An' cracks in the weather-boardin'
Lets in all the winds thet blow.
My son, he don't see it thet way;
He believes thet teachin's a trade
Much better' n farmin' or physic
Or than sellin' dress-goods an' braid;
Thet next to preachin' come teachin'
An' thet teachers is bom 'n not made.
He says thet thet narrer school-room
Is the big world copied out small
Where students uv human nacher
Can find little samples uv all
The bodies, brains, dispositions
Thet crowd this terrestrial ball.
He says thet the work uv teachin'
Is somethin' noble an' grand;
Thet the unknown hard worked teacher
To-day holds fast in his hand
Shapin' fer good or fer ^vil
The Destiny uv our land.
He says thet it learns him patience,
At the same time thoroughness.
As he tries to foller the pattern
Uv One who will surely bless
The work uv the 'umblest teacher
Thet strives in His footsteps to press.
THE OLD GRAY HORSE.
A SORRY old nag was the old gray horse.
With his roughened coat and his shaggy mane
And his undipped locks 'bove his well- worn shoes
And his knotted tail fringed with frozen rain
And as he soberly went on his way
Through the mud and sleet in the morning gray
Very few, very few would have- dared to say
There was once a time when this old horse gray
Was a brisk young nag — ^in the days that are
past —
And had even been dubbed in those early days
**fast"
But there had been a time when men shook their
heads
And had even declared that the young gray colt.
With his swinging trot at a lightning-like pace
Would never do aught excepting to race.
"For an honest day's work " said they, one and all
'' He'll be likely to balk and be sure to stall."
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GEORGE CARLETON RHODERICK. Jr.
403
But a patient head and a loving hand
Were guiding the gray colt's bridle rein
And, although with many a fret and pain,
He learned to know when to stop and to stand.
And little by little he learned the fact
That, to always be able the right to act,
For horses as well as for men it is true
A moderate course is the best to pursue.
So, jogging along through the mist and the rain
Over the hill and over the plain,
When it is wet and when it is dry
The old gray horse goes patiently by;
Carefully plodding where it is rough.
Cheerfully trotting where smooth enough.
Doing his best and doing his all
Never known to balk, never known to stall.
People may talk with a jeer and a frown
Of his long-haired coat with its mud-stains brown.
May laugh at the quaintiy bundled up knot
That nods behind to his regular trot
But the old gray horse with an unmoved face
Goes quietly by at the same old pace,
TO A NOVEMBER VIOLET.
Oh Flower of Spring, that lingered here to cheer
The briefer daylight of a ling'ring fall,
Speak to my darling of another year —
Of vines that drape an humble cottage wall.
Of birds that build beneath its slanting eaves
And swing upon the rose-bush at the door;
Of Hope that bourgeons with the budding leaves
And Love that waxes more and more.
Smile in her face, my flower, and see thyself
Reflected in the dark depths of her dusky eyes;
Smile, for the answer of her bending lips
Will stir thy beauty with a new, a sweet surprise.
Nestie against her cheek my wee blue flower
And dream of summer winds and sunny days;
Breathe in her ear a murmur of that hour
When last I saw her lovely flower- like face;
And tell her, oh my bonny blossom blue.
Tell her, oh, tell her, violets are true.
Tell her I work and wait for her alone
And tell her winter will e'er long have flown.
TIME.
The years glide by, dear friend,
The years glide by.
Like ripples on a shoreless sea.
Where all beyond is mystery
And all behind is memory,
The years glide by.
— The Years Glide By,
GEORGE CARLETON RHODERICK, Jr.
GEORGE CARLETON RHODERICK, Jr.
was bom in Middletown, Frederick County*
Md., February 19, 1861. He had no more educa-
tional advantages than those of his companions in
the public and private schools of the village. At
the age of fourteen he left school to enter the
printing oflice of his father where he began to
weave his fancies into rhyme, often composing at
the case, and writing his verses out afterward.
In 1881 he projected and published ihe Jolly Joker,
a humorous monthly which enjoyed an enviable
reputation, circulating all over the country; but a
pressure of oflice duties forced him to abandon the
enterprise, when at the height of its popularity.
Mr. Rhoderick is now, and has long been,
assistant editor of the Valley Register, published
in Middletown, besides being correspondent for a
number of metropolitan dailies. Nearly all of his
poems originally appeared in the columns of the
Register. Mr. Rhoderick is fond of athletic exer-
cises, and is a genial, whole-souled gentleman
whom it is a pleasure to meet. In physique he is
tall and well proportioned, has a good carriage,
and a frank, open countenance. He is a favorite
wherever known. T. C. H.
THANKSGIVING.
For the bounteous gifts of Heaven
That upon us have been poured,
For the rich and plenteous har\'est
In the barns and gran'ries stored,
For the peace with which our land
Has been so gloriously blest,
We would lift the voice in praises
And our thankfulness attest.
For the sunshine and the rain
That descended from above,
For the increase of the harvest
And the Father's gracious love.
For the year of peace and plenty
And for blessings without end,
Let the voices of the people
In Thanksgiving praises blend.
For the health that God has given
To the Nation, bought with blood;
For the absence of contagion.
And of famine, and of flood;
For the blessings of kind Heaven,
That throughout the land extend,
We bow in holy reverence
While Thanksgiving prayers ascend.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
DRIFTING WITH THE TIDE.
With retrospective thought I sit
Beside Time's flowing river,
Beside the ebbing, surging tide
That floweth on forever;
And as I gaze upon this stream,
I see the ceaseless glide
Of countless crafts of human freight
All drifting with the tide.
I see the waves beat to and fro,
I hear their sullen roar,
As ever and anon they dash
With force from shore to shore.
I see the ever constant stream
Bear on its bosom wide,
The rapid flow of precious souls,
All drifting with the tide.
Ah 1 mem'ry crowds my vision dim
With those who 've passed before —
With those who 've long since anchored safe
Upon the other shore.
I count the friends most dear to me
Who once were by my side;
But now, alas, they are no more—
They've drifted with the tide.
Ah! soon my frail bark, too, will launch
Upon Time's boundless sea,
And drift upon its bosom wide
Into eternity.
And on will flow the mighty deep.
And on the years will glide,
While countless more will swiftly sweep
Down with the rushing tide.
CHRISTMAS BELLS.
Again we hear the Christmas bells
Ring out their joyful story;
*'A Savior unto us is bom-
Christ, the King of glory."
Loud and clear the music floats
From steeple and from tower,
Across the hills and distant vales,
Throughout the happy bower.
Once more the merry Christmas bells
Ring out in every clime;
** Peace on earth, good will to men,"
In sweet and silvery rhyme,
Everywhere the bells are ringing,
Out a glad and sweet refrain, —
In the village, in the city.
On the wide and distant plain.
They are ringing on the waters
On the deep and boundless sea;
They are ringing in the prisons
On this gladsome jubilee.
They are ringing, ringing, ringing.
Loud and clear — now soft and sweet —
In the cottage, in the palace.
Through the city's crowded street.
They are ringing at the homestead.
As they've rung year after year
For the gay and happy loved ones,
Who are home from far and near,
Home to spend the merry Christmas
With the old folks kind and true-
Where the Christmas joys of childhood
Were first brought before their view.
DECORATION DAY.
To the fallen heroes, who are now sleeping the last sleep in
Antietam National Cemetery.
CovBR them over with beautiful flowers —
Cover them over— those dear friends of ours,
Sleeping so quietly 'neath the green sod.
Over which hero and martjrr have trod.
Speak of the honors they won in the fray,
E'en though they hear it not, spoken to-day;
Cover them over with beautiful flowers.
Scatter the rosebuds in plenteous showers.
Cover them o'er, friends, cover them o'er —
As the years onward roll, let us honor them more;
They, who fought, bled and died
On South Mountain's steep side;
They, who fought, bled and fell
Where they now fore'er dwell;
Let the drum's muflled tone be heard once again.
On the spot where so many brave souls were slain.
Sleep, heroes, sleep! Thy work is all done—
Thy battles are o'er, thy cause nobly won;
Sleep, 'till the archangd's trumpet shall sound.
Throughout thy silent camping-ground.
Then shall thy slumbers forevermore cease,
And the dark tomb^thy spirits release;
Then udlt thou march in serried array,
Into the dawn of Eternal day.
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MARION DALANA DANIEL
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MARION DALANA DANIEL.
407
MARION DALANA DANIEL.
MISS MARION DANIEL was born in New-
nan, Georgia, a little inland city, noted for
its picturesque scenery, its beautifid homes, its
cultured social life and its gifted men and women.
Her father. Rev. Francis Marion Daniel, devoted
his life to the work of the Christian ministry.
Strong in intellect, well informed upon every theme
that he discussed, in all his walk and conversation
consistent with his high calling, sensitive and
responsive to every form of human suffering, wise
in his methods and untiring in his efforts to do
good, he was admired, honored and loved by all
who knew him. He was fortunate in having a wife
who appreciated his worth, adopted his ideas, and
supported his undertakings. Much that was best
and nobles t in him is reproduced in his gifted and ac-
complished daughter. Miss Daniel spent five years
in Atlanta, Ga., in the select school of Mrs. Bal-
lard, a successful Southern educator. Her favorite
studies were the modem languages and literature,
and for these she displayed not only an exceptional
fondness but a remarkable aptitude. It was then,
and is yet, her ambition to be a writer of verse, a
singer of the beauties of earth and sky, of the sighs
and sorrows, hopes and fears of human hearts, of
the greatness and goodness of God, and of that
''blest abode," invisible to mortal ken, where the
rainbow never fades and the flowers never wither,
and music, love and gladness are eternal. Among
the earliest of her published productions are "A
Dream of Life," and "Treading the Wine Press,"
two little poems of merit. In God's school of afflic-
tion she has been disciplined into an exquisite sensi-
bility to spiritual truth and beauty. She sings of
the great world lying about us, to which the average
mortal is utterly blind. J. B. H.
OUR QUESTION.
What is this world, the great wide world.
Of people and their fancies —
The rushing crowd, the careless whirl,
The banners Fame and Wealth unfurl,
The maze that round me dances ?
What is this throng of pleasures gay.
Entrancing and delusive —
The giddy throng that floats away.
As some smooth strain of music may,
With no discord intrusive ?
What is this life, the gliding life
Of ease and pretty pleasures —
Where men may meet their sober strife
With hearts as light, with jestings rife.
As dancers trip their measures ?
A mimic sure, a shining fraud.
Where souls are quenched or hidden —
Where men will stoop and smirk, or laud
The vapid farce, and tread the broad
And worldly way forbidden.
Apart from such a life as this —
Apart from mimic living —
Life's earnest hope and simple bliss
Our truer souls more deeply miss
Than all Earth's gaudy giving.
Of all the ways and forms of life.
So varied and beguiling,
O, let me live — not free from strife.
Where skies are clear, with no clouds rife.
And lucid pleasure smiling —
Ah, no! In truth, I pray to live,
Though small the circuit given,
In earnest zeal, to bless and give
My best to other lives — ^to live
Approved by truth and Heaven!
LILIES.
We read of thee in sacred story.
Reflections of God's face.
Not Solomon arrayed in glory
Could match thy peerless grace.
White robed and fair in purity,
With half hid golden heart.
Enshrined in virgin sanctity.
Sweet emblems of God's art
SOUL
She wove her life of myths and dreams.
Of fabrics made of rainbow gleams,
A woof of crimson, warp of gold
Whose colors gay her stories told.
But no lips smiled, and no hearts wept.
Within her life her soul still slept.
Her heart untouched, untaught its speech.
No other heart could touch or teach.
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
She sang of shells and ocean sprays,
Of purple nights and golden days,
The twinkling heart-beats of the stars,
But through her music blankness jars.
A motion moves her idle heart,
"My toils are dreams, my soul is art
For one warm heart-beat, Ah!" she sighs,
"I'd give my gems of seas and skies. "
And Life comes close and hears her prayer,
Aud Death her heart embalms with care,
And to her lips their cups of pain
Is pressed for her young soul to drain.
Dark wine of life, it gurgles up.
The blood of hearts— red in her cup;
The dregs of death, the sighs of souls
A mingled tide of sorrow rolls.
From out the furnace of their pain.
Her chastened lips would sing again,
Her harp is heart, her song is soul.
Her art is life, and heaven its goal!
Her prism shines with tender light
Of human lives— their day and night—
And burning through her peerless art,
The after-glow of a radiant heart
TO MISS KATE T. GOODE.
Mv tribute lay, a sweet bouquet
Of Nature's poesy,
First intertwine clematis vine,
A fleecy canopy.
And therein place with guileless grace,
A lily blossom white
Whose golden heart and peerless art
Sweet poesy would write.
Then pansies pure thoughts to allure
And roses with pink stem.
Close kissed with dew, in reverent blue,
A modest violet gem.
Sweet emblems meek, my still heart speak
In chastened flower-lore;
Thy beauty bend, thy fragrance lend,
With tear-drops dew it o'er.
EDWARD SHERWOOD CREAMER.
EDWARD SHERWOOD CREAMER was bora
in Oldcastle, County Meath, Ireland, about
fifty years ago. He came to this country with his
parents when he was eleven years old, and lived in
New York City many years. At present he resides
in Brooklyn, N. Y. During the War of the Rebel-
lion he did honorable service in the cavalry of the
Union army for over three years, fighting bravely
as a volunteer in the First New York Mounted
Rifles. He has for a long time contributed to
newspapers and periodicals, notably to the Sunday
edition of the New York Sun^ a number of them
going the rounds of the press. He has recently
published a volume of poems entitled, ''Adirondack
Readings." E. W. K.
SONG OF THE UPLANDS.
O BBTTBR a glimpse of a star
That may never be reached but be hoped for;
O better a grand life afar,
That at least in the mind can be groped for.
Than to have all the senses desire,
And all that the passions require,
But no more, but no more.
O better a faith that can cope
With the doubts of the world and can quicken;
O better a life that has hope
To illume it, though poverty stricken,
Than to have all that riches can hire
Or buy, so to feast and not tire,
But no more, but no more.
O better a love that is blind,
That can see in the loved one no badness;
O better a trust in one*s kind,
Spite of all of its folly and madness,
Than to stand all alone mid earth's mire,
Having food and raiment and fire.
But no more, but no more.
A WAIL FOR WALT WHITMAN.
Gone over the border land to the haven of rest,
tired voyager I
Old mother earth is gracious, and she received thee
with open arms.
She knows her children at sight, and loves and
glorifies them.
And in her embrace she took thee to keep at her
heart forever.
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EDWARD SHERWOOD CREAMER.
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Who would not be such a poet, to be loved by such
a mother?
Who would not be such a son, to feel such a
mother's attractions?
Thou wert narrow as sin, yet broad as the uni-
verse's pulse beats,
To sing that grime and shine, even as flower and
gem were perfection.
A passionate heart hadst thou, with love for thyself
and thy kindred,
Who were of the high and low, no special exclu-
sion for any;
And if there were few tears shed on thy grave, in
the Jersey clearing.
It may not be because worthier ones are lying un-
wept and forgotten.
Another's not left with us now to show the full
glory of freedom;
The flight from the classic and prim to the fresh-
ness and grasses of nature;
The might of the ocean, the factories exalting and
vengeful.
The great spirit of cities, and the audacity even of
prairies!
MOUNTAINS AND FOOTHILLS.
Developed human nature is greater than nation-
ality;
Nor can aught creed be large enough to take in
inflnite wisdom.
Men of high thought the world over are harmon-
iously minded;
Worship the self-same God, or ideas of it material;
Honor Virtue and Truth, and their many attend-
ants beautiful.
'Tis only the somewhat warped who harp on their
creed or their nation;
As if the Beneflcent showed prejudice toward
temples and places!
ABOVE CAUSALITY.
Where ride the inner guides to-night ?
A snowflake fell upon my hand.
Soft as a spirit's touch, and white,
Brought back from the interior land
Unto a mother's sight.
I heard some strains of music when
The moon sank o'er the wood,
And if they never come again
Their meaning well I understood :
The singers once were men.
Wouldst follow up the stair of beams —
Good stars have dropped it for our kind-
To mount above the land of dreams.
Where reason permeates the mind.
Where all exists and nothing seems ?
Ah ! pity for the soul of him
Who never hears the saintly song.
Nor sees the beings on the rim
Of the great zone, where all belong
When life has reached the cherubim.
HELICON.
A poet bound for distant Helicon,
To quafl" the nectar of its many springs,
A draft of which lays bare the soul of things,
O'ertook another deviously wandering on.
Approving not such waywardness, he said :
" Straight have I come through jungle, city, mire,
Seldom my progress matching my desire ;
The road seems long; how has thy journey
sped?"
The other answered, **I have sought 'the field
Where birds made melody, where flowers were
fair ;
While rock, and tree, and leaflet, sun and air,
Gave me new dreams not hitherto revealed."
And thus each one thought his own road the
best,
While far away loomed Helicon in the west.
BELLS OF THE MORNING.
Each morning, as I lie in bed,
I hear a far-ofl* bell's sweet tone •
Welcome the day gleams, rosy red.
And telling me that night has flown.
So one, upon his dying bed,
Hears bells of a celestial tone
Welcome the soul far overhead
And telling me that death has flown.
MUSIC.
All things had reached creation, but stood still.
Awaiting the divine creative sign
To move with life eternal ; and His will
Chose music for the signal, gift divine !
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
JULIA WARD HOWE.
MRS. JULIA WARD HOWE was bom May
27, 1819, in New York City. Her parents
were Samuel Ward and Julia Cutler Ward. Her
ancestors included the illustrious Huguenot fam-
ily of Marions of South Carolina, Governor
Samuel Ward, of Rhode Island, and Roger Wil-
liams, the apostle of religious tolerance. Her
mother died in 1824. Her father, a successful
banker, gave her every advantage of education.
She was instructed at home by able teachers. Her
education included music and languages. She
learned German, Greek and French. She became
the wife of Dr. Samuel G. Howe in 1843. They
went abroad and remained a year, and her first
child was bom in Rome, Italy. Her father died in
1829, and Mrs. Howe became a Universalist in re-
ligion after rallying from the sorrow caused by his
death. In youth she had shown her literary trend.
At seventeen she published a review of Lamartine's
" Jocelyn, '' an essay on the minor poems of Goethe
and Schiller, and a number of original poems. Her
marriage interrupted her literary work for a time.
In 1850 she went to Europe and passed the winter
in Rome with her two youngest children. In the
fall of 1857 she returned to Boston. In 1852 and
1853 she published her first volume of poems,
"Passion Flowers," which attracted much atten-
tion. In 1853 she published her "Words for the
Hour," and a blank-verse drama, which was pro-
duced in Wallack's Theater in New York City, and
later in Boston. Her interest in the anti-slavery
question dated from 185 1. Her third volume,
"Later Lyrics," included her "Battle Hymn of
the Republic," which was written in Washington,
D. C, in the fall of 1861. Her book, "A Trip to
Cuba," written after her visit to Cuba in 1857, is a
prohibited volume on that island. Her prominence
during the Civil War was due to her celebrated pat-
riotic songs. Her "John Brown" song was written
in 1862. It at once became known throughout the
country and was sung ever>'where. In 1867, with
her husband, Mrs. Howe visited Greece, where
they won the gratitude of the Greeks for their aid
in their stmggle for National independence. Her
book, "From the Oak to the Olive," was written
after her visit to Greece. She has been a profound
student of philosophy, and has written numerous es-
says on philosophical themes. In 1868 she joined
the woman suffrage movement. In 1869, before a
legislative conunittee in Boston, she made her first
suffrage speech. She has been officially connected
from the beginning with the New England, Ameri-
can and other woman suffrage organizations. Her
husband died in 1876, and since that year she has
preached, lectured, written and traveled much in
all parts of the United States. Her lectures included
"Is Polite Society Polite?" "Greece Revisited,"
and "Reminiscences of Longfellow and Emerson."
In 1872 she went to England to lecture on arbitra-
tion as a means for settling national and interna-
tional disputes. In London she held a series of
Sunday evening services, devoted to " The Mission
of Christianity in Relation to the Pacification of the
Worfd." In 1872 she attended, as a delegate, the
Congress for Prison Reform held in London. Re-
turning to the United States, she instituted the Wo-
men's Peace Festival, which meets on June 22nd
each year. Several years ago she went to Europe
and spent over two years in travel in England,
France, Italy and Palestine. In Paris she was one
of the presiding officers of the Woman's Rights
Congress in 1878. She lectured in Paris snd Athens
on the work of the women's associations in the
United States. In Boston she organized the Wo-
man's Club and the Ladies' Saturday Moming
Club. In Newport she aided to forai the Town
and Country Club. She has served as president of
the Association for the Advancement of Women for
several years. She maintains her connection with
these organizations and is an active promoter of
their interests. She is still a vigorous, active wo-
man. In the clubs which she has formed the mem-
bers study Latin, French, German, literature, polit-
ical economy, botany and many other branches.
Her life has been and still is one round of cease-
less activity. Her home is in Boston, Mass.
D. I.
THE CITY OF MY LOVE.
Shb sits among the eternal hills,
Their crown, thrice glorious and dear.
Her voice is as a thousand tongues
Of silver fountains, gurgling clear.
Her breath is prayer, her life is love.
And worship of all lovely things;
Her children have a gracious port.
Her beggars show the blood of kings.
By old Tradition guarded close.
None doubt the grandeur she has seen;
Upon her venerable front
Is written: " I was bora a Queen !"
She rules the age by Beauty's power;
As once she mled by arm6d might;
The Southern sun doth treasure her
Deep in its golden heart of light.
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JULIA WARD HOWE.
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JULIA WARD HOWE,
413
Awe strikes the traveler when he sees
The vision of her distant dome,
And a strange spasm wrings his heart,
As the guide whispers, "There is Rome !"
Rome of the Romans ! where the gods
Of Greek Olympus long held sway;
Rome of the Christians, Peter's tomb,
The Zion of our later day.
Rome, the mailed Virgin of the world,
Defiance on her brows and breast;
Rome, to voluptuous pleasure won,
Debauched, and locked in drunken rest.
Rome, in her intellectual day,
Europe's intriguing step-dame grown;
Rome, bowed to weakness and decay,
A canting, mass-frequenting crone.
Then th* unlettered man plods on.
Half chiding at the spell he feels,
The artist pauses at the gate,
And on the wondrous threshold kneels.
The sick man lifts his languid head
For those soft skies and balmy airs;
The pilgrim tries a quicker pace.
And hugs remorse, and patters prayers.
For ev'n the grass that feeds the herds
Methinks some unknown virtue yields,
The very hinds in reverence tread
The precincts of the ancient fields.
But wrapt in gloom of night and death,
I crept to thee, dear mother Rome;
And in thy hospitable heart,
Found rest and comfort, health and home.
And friendships, warm and living still,
Although their dearest joys are fled;
True sympathies that bring to life
The better self, so often dead.
F'or all the wonder that thou wert.
For all the dear delight thou art,
Accept an homage from my lips,
That warms agaid a wasted heart.
JVnd, though it seem a childish prayer,
I've breathed it oft, that when I die,
As thy remembrance dear in it,
That heart in thee might buried lie.
SPEAK, FOR THY SERVANT HEARETH.
Speak, for thy servant heareth;
Alone in my lowly bed,
Before I laid me down to rest,
My nightly prayer was said;
And naught my spirit feareth,
In darkness or by day:
Speak, for thy servant heareth.
And heareth to obey.
I've stood before thine altar,
A child before thy might;
No breath within thy temple stirred
The dim and cloudy light;
And still I knew that thou wast there.
Teaching my heart to say —
" Speak, for thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey."
O God, my flesh may tremble
When thou speakest to my soul;
But it cannot shun thy presence blessed.
Nor shrink from thy control.
A joy my spirit cheereth
That cannot pass away:
Speak, for thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey.
Thou biddest me to utter
Words that I scarce may speak,
And mighty things are laid on me,
A helpless one, and weak:
Darkly thy truth declareth
Its purpose and its way:
Speak, for thy servant heareth.
And heareth to obey. ,
And shouldst thou be a stranger
To that which thou hast made ?
Oh I ever be about my path.
And hover near my bed.
Lead me in every step I take.
Teach me each word I say:
Speak, for thy servant heareth.
And heareth to obey.
How hath thy glory lighted
My lonely place of rest;
How sacred now shall be to me
The spot which thou hast blessed I
If aught of evil should draw nigh
To bring me shame and fear,
My steadfast soul shall make reply,
" Depart, for God is near !"
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I bless thee that thou speakest
Thus to an humble child;
The God of Jacob calls to me
In gentle tones and mild;
Thine enemies before thy face
Are scattered in dismay:
Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth.
And heareth to obey.
Tve stood before thee all my days-
Have ministered to thee;
But in the hour of darkness first
Thou speakest unto me.
And now the night appeareth
More beautiful than day:
Speak, Lord, thy servant heareth,
And heareth to obey.
POETRY.
The critic is allowed to rule
The common law of art^
The poet takes his judgment from
The pleading of the heart.
—A Vision of Montgomery Place.
TRUTH.
And what that need, both old and new,
The eternal need of human-kind ?
Not that we keep a fable blind:
It is that thou, dear God, be true!
— First Catises.
JUSTICE.
Such a heart Td bear in my bosom, that, threading
the crowded streets,
My face should shed joy unlooked for on every
poor soul one meets.
And such wisdom should crown my forehead, that,
coming where counsels stand,
I should carry the thoughts of justice, and stablish
the weal of the land.
— A Vision of Palm Sunday.
SPRING.
In this glad time of Spring
Nature doth garlands bring,
Crowning her joys.
All that was seared with frost,
Buried, and mourned for lost,
With a new Pentecost,
Flame-touched, doth rise.
— Hymn for a Spring Festival.
SINGLE POEMS.
THE DANCE OF DEATH.
CHANT ROYAL, AFTER HOLBEIN.
" Contra vim Mortis
Non est medicamen in bortis."
He is the despots' Despot. All must bide,
Later or soon, the message of his might;
Princes and potentates their heads must hide,
Touched by the awful sigil of his right;
Beside the Kaiser he at eve doth wait
And pours a potion in his cup of state;
The stately Queen his bidding must obey;
No keen-eyed Cardinal shall him affray;
And to the Dame that wantoneth he saith —
** Let be. Sweetheart, to junket and to play . . "
There is no king more terrible than Death.
The lusty Lord, rejoicing in his pride,
He draweth down; before the arm^d Knight
With jingling bridle-rein he still doth ride;
He crosseth the strong Captain in the fight;
He beckons the grave Elder from debate,
He hales the Abbot by his shaven pate,
Nor for the Abbess' wailing will delay;
No bawling Mendicant shall say him nay;
E'en to the pyx the Priest he followeth.
Nor can the Leech his chilling finger stay . .
There is no king more terrible than Death.
All things must bow to him. And woe betide
The Wine-bibber, — ^the Roisterer by night;
Him the feast-master, many bouts defied.
Him 'twixt the; pledging and the cup shall smite;
Woe to the Lender at usurious rate,
The hard Rich Man, the hireling Advocate;
Woe to the Judge that selleth right for pay;
Woe to the Thief that like a beast of prey
With creeping tread the traveler hurryeth: —
These, in their sin, the sudden sword shall slay.
There is no king more terrible than Death.
He hath no pity, —nor will be denied.
When the low hearth is garnish^ and bright,
Grimly he flingeth the dim portal wide,
And steals the Infant in the Mother's sight;
He hath no pity for the scorned of fate: —
He spares not Lazarus lying at the gate.
Nay, nor the Blind that stumbleth as he may;
Nay, the tired Ploughman, — at the sinking ray, —
In the last furrow, — ^feels an icy breath.
And knows a hand hath turned the team astray.
There is no king more terrible than Death.
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He hath no pity. For the new-made Bride,
Blithe with the promise of her life's delight.
That wanders gladly by her Husband's side,
He with the clatter of his drum doth fright;
He scares the Virgin at the convent gate.
The Maid half-won, the Lover passionate;
He hath no grace for weakness or decay;
The tender Wife, the Widow bent and gray,—
The feeble Sire whose footsteps faltereth, —
All these he leadeth by the lonely way . . .
There is no king more terrible than Death.
ENVOY.
Youth, for whose ear and monishing, of late
I sang of Prcxligals and lost estate,
Have thou thy joy of living and be gay;
But know not less that there must come a day, —
Aye, and perchance e*en now it hasteneth, —
When thine own heart shall speak to thee and
say.
There is no king more terrible than Death.
Austin Dobson.
THE PRAISE OF DEATH.
CHANT ROYAL.
He is the Friend of friends. In his chill hand
Is cooling for the fever and the pain
That fall on humans, who on earth are banned
To strive against all occult powers in vain.
In his gaunt arms is rest from toil and ache,
Is sleep so sweet the sleeper ne'er would wake.
Is peace for warring kings and weeping queens.
Is dreamland's glory after earth's drear scenes,
Is freedom from the fluttering, pain-filled breath.
Is love, is joy, instead of hate's gangrenes:
There is no friend more generous than Death.
Sweet gifts hath he for all who make demand:
The weary wealthy, they with mark of Cain
Upon the forehead, they of famine's band.
All they who glare and rant in glee insane.
They who in flames faint at the torturing stake.
Through hatred or for holy conscience* sake.
They who deplore the deed that life demeans.
They who have tired of earth's illusive sheens.
Come suppliant to this wraith who wavereth,
And he, assenting, to their pleading leans:
There is no friend more generous than Death.
When pestilence is lowering o'er the land.
When horror pallid, grisly, sole doth reign,
When foes invade with sword and ruthless brand.
When grief doth every aching heart o'erstrain.
When fear's abroad on sea, on plain, on lake,
When o'er the sun is drawn a pall opaque,
When wounded patriots fall, with spent canteens
And shattered swords, upon the wrecked fascines,
When everything that is but injureth.
Then he applies his balm, that soothes and
cleans:
There is no friend more generous than Death.
Yea, in despite of vessel weakly manned.
Amid the lightning, wind, or hail, or rain.
We may with confidence awaiting stand,
Yea, mock at all disaster we may deign,
And our contempt for things may bravely slake,
While all things evil o'er our heads do break:
We have a friend, o'er seers, or kings, or deans.
Who, though the world to chaos drear careens.
Yet with us lingereth and comforteth.
And with his touch our souls anew impregns:
There is no friend more generous than Death.
All wants and woes by him are known and
spanned;
His mercy knoweth never halt or wane.
He hath no choice; the lowly and the grand
Alike win answer praying at his fane.
His touch is light as 'twere the snow's soft flake,
But O! no other touch such change can make.
Such change from wintry wastes to summer
greens,
From wails of woe to pleasure's highest paeans,
As that light touch he giveth when he saith:
" Go where nor gloom nor sorrow intervenes! "
There is no friend more generous than Death.
ENVOY.
Friend, Death is our friend! The weary .he doth
take
Where nevermore hearts toil, or long, or quake.
Where peace the soul from earth and sorrow
weans,
Where being ever greater glory gleans,
Where, free from dross, the immortal reveleth
O'er flowerful meads in heaven's wide demesnes:
There is no friend more generous than Death.
Henry A. Van Fredbnbbrg.
A NATIONAL HYMN.
Hail, Freedom ! Thy bright crest
And gleaming shield, thrice blest,
Mirror the glories of a world thine own I
Hail, heaven-bom Peace I Our sight,
Led by thy gentle light,
Shows us thy paths with deathless flowers strown;
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Peace, daughter of a strife sublime,
Abide with us till strife be lost in endiess time !
chorus:
Thy sun is risen, and shall not set
Upon thy day divine !
Ages of unborn ages yet,
America, are thine !
^ Her one hand seals with gold
Her portals of night's fold,
Her other the broad gates of dawn unbars;
O'er silent wastes of snows,
Crowning her lofty brows.
Gleams high her diadem of northern stars;
While, clothed in garlands of warm flowers,
Round Freedom's feet the South her beauty
showers.
Sweet is the toil of peace,
Sweet the year's rich increase
To loyal men who live by Freedom's laws;
And in war's fierce alarms
God gives stout hearts and arms
To freemen sworn to save a rightful cause.
Fear none, trust God, maintain the right,
And triumph in unbroken union's peerless might !
Welded in war's fierce flame.
Forged on the hearth of fame.
The sacred Constitution was ordained;
Tried in the fire of time.
Tempered by woes sublime.
An age has passed and left it yet unstained,
God grant its glories still may shine
While ages fade forgotten in time's slow decline !
Honor the few who shared
Freedom's first fight, and dared
To face war's desperate tide at the full flood;
Who fell on hard-won ground,
And into Freedom's wound
Poured the sweet balsam of their brave hearts'
blood.
They fell, but o'er their glorious grave
Floats free the banner of the cause they died to
save.
In radiance heavenly fair
Floats on the peaceful air
That flag, that never stooped from victory's
pride.
Those stars that softly gleam.
Those stripes that o'er us stream,
In war's grand agony were sanctified
A holy standard, pure and free.
To light the home of peace or blaze in victory.
Father, whose mighty power
Shields us through life's short hour,
To Thee we pray. Bless us and keep us free.
All that is past forgive.
Teach us henceforth to live
That through our country we may honor Thee;
And, when this mortal life shall cease,
Take Thou at last our souls to Thine eternal peace.
F. Marion Crawford.
JENNY KISSED ME.
Jenny kissed me when we met,
Jumping from the chair she sat in;
Time, you thief! who love to get
Sweets into your list, put that in.
Say I'm weary, say I'm sad;
Say that health ^nd wealth have miss'd me;
Say I 'm growing old, but add —
Jenny kiss'd me !
Lbigh Hunt.
WHAT MY LOVER SAID.
By the merest chance, in the twilight gloom
In the orchard path he met me;
In the tall, wet grass, with its faint perfume,
And I tried to pass, but he mad^ no room,
Oh I tried, but he would not let me.
So I stood and blushed till the grass grew red,
With my face bent down above it,
While he took my hand as he whispering said—
(How the clover lifted each pink, sweet head.
To listen to all that my lover said;
Oh, the clover in bloom, I love it !)
In the high, wet grass went the path to hide,
And the low, wet leaves hung over;
But I could not pass upon either side,
For I found myself when I vainly tried.
In the arms of my steadfast lover.
And he held me there and he raised my head.
While he closed the path before me,
And he looked down into my eyes and said —
(How the leaves bent down from the boughs over-
head.
To listen to all that my lover said,
Oh, the leaves hanging lowly o'er me !)
Had he moved aside but a little way,
I could surely then have passed him;
And he knew I never could wish to stay,
And would not have heard what he had to say,
I Could I only aside have cast him.
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It was almost dark, and the moments sped,
And the searching night wind found us,
But he drew me nearer and softly said —
(How the pure, sweet wind grew still, instead.
To listen to all that my lover said;
Oh, the whispering wind around us !)
I am sure he knew when he held me fast,
That I must be all unwilling;
For I tried to go, and I would have passed,
As the night was come with its dew, at last,
And the sky with its stars was filling.
But he clasped me close when I would have fled.
And he made me hear his story,
And his soul came out from his lips and said —
(How the stars crept out where the white moon led,
To listen to all that my lover said;
Oh, the moon and the stars in glory !)
I know that the grass and the leaves will not tell,
And Pm sure that the wind, precious rover,
Will carry my secret so safely and well
That no being shall ever discbver
One word of the many that rapidly fell
From the soul-speaking lips of my lover;
And the moon and the stars that looked over
Shall never reveal what a fairy-like spell
They wove round about us that night in the dell.
In the path through the dew-laden clover,
Nor echo the whispers that made my heart swell
As they fell from the lips of my lover.
Homer GIreene.
ALAS! HOW EASILY THINGS GO WRONG.
Alas ! how easily things go wrong;
A sigh too much or a kiss too long,
And there follows a mist and a weeping rain,
And life is never the same again.
Alas ! how hardly things go right I
*Tis hard to watch on a summer's night,
For the sigh will come and the kiss will stay
And the summer's night is a winter's day.
And yet how easily things go right.
If the sigh and the kiss of a winter's night
Come deep from the soul in the stronger ray
That is bom in the light of the winter's day.
And things can never go badly wrong
If the heart be true and the love be strong;
For the mist, if it comes and the weeping rain
Will be changed by the love into sunshine again.
George MacDonald.
CURRENT POEMS.
FREEDOM.
My work is done; the eventide is here;
My wages now I ask of Thee.
Not gold nor jewels do I crave, my Lord,
But, Master, set my spirit free !
The shadows lengthen on my glacier path.
Heavier the chains that fret me here;
I ask for freedom from their crushing weight.
'Tis life, not death, I hold in fear !
My work is done; the hour of rest draws near;
The vesper-bells toll clear and sweet.
Unto the ag^ should be spared, my Lord,
The pains that torture tired feet.
According to my need, I ask of Thee
That Thou bestow the promised wage.
If faithful I have been in small and great.
Wilt Thou not now my pangs assuage ?
My work is done; take me within the gate
Where enter only those Thou wilt;
A city lighted by Thy glory great.
The city not by mortals built.
Come quickly, I beseech, and freely give
The guerdon in its full degree,
Which Thou hast promised unto every man
According as his work shall be.
Yet, Master, not my will, but thine, be done.
On Thee I wait; forgive my prayer !
Thou knowest best if here I'm needed still.
Thou knowest if I'm needed there.
The wages are not due till work is done:
Submissive to the end I'll be.
Knowing Thy precious prdmise never fails,
That my reward still rests with Thee !
Clara Jessup Moore.
-Lippincott* s Magazine, August, 1893.
ENCHANTMENT.
There is enchantment in the thought
Of lands which we will never see —
Life's undetermined mystery.
And strength which strives and wearies not
There is enchantment, in regret —
Regret— the one bewildering strain
Which no soul ever can forget
While memory breathes across life's plain.
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Wherefore it is the soul must find
Her happiest dreams in realms untried;
Yet will all triumphs of the mind
Leave, still, the heart unsatisfied.
The troubled heart, whose pulse must bring
To thought her music and repose,
And guard Life's wayward tide which flows
And ebbs with Passion's whispering.
Robert Burns Wilson.
-Fetter's Southern Magazine^ August, /Spj.
WHOM THE GODS LOVE.
You say that being so old
'Tis time for him to die ?
Rings not your comment cold
And even inhuman ? Why
Should tenderer tears be shed
When death lays young lives low,
Spared years of sorrow and fret,
Spared age's overthrow ?
When young we are called away,
We shirk untold regret;
For austere time will slay
Not merely ourselves, but yet
Brand with authentic sign
His despotisms elsewhere —
Drape wisps of silvering hair
0*er eyes beloved — plough line
And furrow on treasured cheeks.
" Whom the gods love die young."
Ah me ! there Wisdom's tongue
With sovereign accent speaks I
Pity the old who die;
The young behind them leave
Such bounteous grief whereby
Fate bids they should not grieve.
Heart-racked with many a sigh.
Wounded with many a scar.
Pity the old who die;
The young are happier far !
Edgar Fawcett.
-Lippincotfs Magaeine, September, iSgj.
To meet the clouds Aurora's lips have kissed.
A flutter of glad wings is heard below;
From beetling crag and sheltered covert dim
The eagle soars ethereal heights to skim.
The earth awakes, the heavens are aglow,
As from the darkness of his slumber-prison,
Grand and majestic, lo ! the King is risen.
Cornelia J. M. Jordan.
—For The Magazine of Poetry.
SUNRISE FROM THE PEAKS OF OTTER.
Dawn lights the gray horizon, — Night is gone;
A roseate flame kindles the glowing East;
The stars have faded, — for a morning feast
Elfin and fay are ready. Hail, all hail thee. Mom !
From fairy-woven shrouds of dewy mist
That slowly falls, melting unseen away,
The mountains lift their lofty summits gray
REVEALMENT.
" All men are evil more than good," he said;
'* I trust no man; some evil thing I see
In each. Speak I not truth ?" Said I, " You shed
One ray, no more; I never can trust thee."
Charles P. Nettlbton.
— For The Magazine of Poetry,
TO MY MOTHER'S PICTURE.
O WHAT a flood of memory fills my soul
As on this smiling, pictured face I gaze!
It seems as though some fairy fingers raise
The curtain of the past, and slow unroll
Before me on a panoramic scroll
The several scenes of early boyhood days,
Days that were blest by her whose picture sways
Me now with thoughts that grieve, and yet console.
Ah mother. Death was robbed of half his sting
By him who thus depicted that sweet smile
That plays about those lips and seems to bring
Thee back to me to soothe my soul awhile!
How noble is the art that thus could trace
And make endure this sweet maternal face!
John M. Farrbll.
— For The Magazine of Poetry,
CATULLUS TO LESBIA.
Come, my Lesbia, no repining;
Let us love while yet we may!
Suns go on forever shining;
But when we have had our day,
Sleep perpetual shall o'ertake us.
And no morrow's dawn awake us.
Come, in yonder nook reclining,
Where the honeysuckle climbs,
Let us mock at Fate's designing.
Let us kiss a thousand times!
And if they shall prove too few, dear,
When they're kissed we'll start anew, dear!
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And should any chance to see us,
Goodness! how they'll agonize!
How they'll wish that they could be us,
Kissing in such liberal wise!
Never mind their envious whining; »
Come, my Lesbia, no repining!
Eugene Field.
-Second Book of Verse,
-)(-
NOTES.
Blunt. The portrait of Wilfrid Scawen Blunt
used in this number of The Magazine of Poetry
was taken in the prison dress he wore at Galway.
Howe. "The Battle Hymn of the Republic, ' ' by
Julia Ward Howe, will be found in The Magazine
OP Poetry, April, 1891, Vol. 3, page 245.
Van Fredenberg. "The Praise of Death,"
now first published, was written in reply to Mr.
Dobson's poem, "The Dance of Death."
Greene. The following letter, written by Mr.
Greene several years ago, will explain itself :
HoNESDALE, Pa., Nov. 26, 1888.
p. p. SmUh, Esq.
My Dear Sir:— Your favor of the 22d inst., concerning the
poem " What My Lover Said," is at hand. I will say to you in
reply that the poem was certainly written by me. I made the
first draft of it while at home on my vacation in the summer of
1875, completed and perfected it on my return to college in the
fall, and in November sent it to the New York Evening Post
for publication. Mr. Francis E. Leupp, who was at that time
on the editorial staff of the Post, has described, in an article
published some years ago in the Syracuse Herald, the way in
which he received the poem from me through the mails,
changed the title slightly, and cut down my name, which I had
signed in full, to the simple initials " H. G." The poem then
appeared for the first time in the issue of the daily Post of No-
vember 19, 1875, and of the semi-weekly Post of November 23d,
1875. The test of any other claim of authorship should rest
upon the ability to show a prior publication. To any one who
will produce a copy of the poem printed in any publication of
an earlier date than November 19, 1875, 1 will cheerfully make
a deed of my "Highland Cottage" property at Honesdale,
which I value at |i5,ooo. The controversy has afforded me
more entertainment than annoyance, and I have not taken the
trouble before to reply in so explicit a manner as this to any of
the numerous letters of inquiry I have received concerning the
poem. You will understand that I do this for you on account
of " Auld acquaintance " sake.
Sincerely yours, Homrr Greene.
Hunt. "Jennie Kissed Me." Marian Lee in
the Ot/iV writes: "This little stanza, the author-
ship of which is attributed to Leigh Hunt, is an old
acquaintance of the American public, and the im-
pression is widespread that the lady who thus hon-
ored the poet was Mrs. Jane Welsh Carlyle. I had
seen it stated so often and so positively that I ac-
cepted it as one does the catechism— upon trust ;
but a question that appeared, a short time since, in
American Notes and Queries^ set me to thinking.
Taking it for granted that Mrs. Carlyle was the
•Jenny,' I found myself asking, *What wrought
her up to this osculatory fervor ?*' Nothing in her
life or her letters indicates this lady to have been
given to * gush.* Where, then, are we to look for
the mainspring of the 'jumping' immortalized by
the bard?
"In a publication called, I think, Queries^ I found
it asserted that Mrs. Carlyle kissed Leigh Hunt on
his bringing the news that her husband had been
awarded a pension of 300/ per annum by the British
Government. Here was a reason with a vengeancet
A pension I Had the great apostle of literary inde-
pendence felt an itching in his palm, and )rielded
his finger to toy with the Government purse-strings?
My attention once fixed upon this point, I found
this reason for Jenny's kiss to be the generally re-
ceived one ; but I knew it to be a direct contradic-
tion of Mr. Froude's published statements on the
pension subject, so to Froude I determined to ap-
peal. But I wanted an authority to quote. The
articles I had met were anonymous, and I sought
for a name— a name of note.
'• All comes, sooner or later, to the patient ; so,
on a certain day, I set jubilant eyes on the thirty-
ninth volume of Harper's Magazine^ and ex-
claimed, * Eureka ! ' For here Mr. Moncure D.
Conway, in the fourth of his * South Coast Saunter-
ings in England,' asserted most roundly the verse^
the Jenny, the kiss and the pension. Mr. Conway
speaks of the pension awarded by England to her
literary children as a 'graceful custom; ' says that,
instead of being a bribe to sycophancy it is usually
bestowed upon those ' who have been most faithful
to their ideals ;' and that Carlyle, * who consented
through long, dreary years to be painfully poor,
rather than turn his pen to the kind of work that
promised gain, was pensioned by the nation he had
so remorselessly criticised.' To this he adds : * His
friends can remember the happy scene when Leigh
Hunt came with the happy news, for telling which
Mrs. Carlyle kissed him. To this kiss, so charac-
teristic of one of the noblest of women, we are in-
debted for one of Leigh Hunt's charming improvi-
sations.' Here was a foeman worthy of Froude's
steel. I immediately presented the matter to his
notice, and, by return mail, received the following
reply, in which the illustrious English author stands
stanchly by his colors :
" ' December, 20, x888.
'"Madam:— I have read your letter with much surprise. I never
heard that Mrs. Carlyle had kissed Leigh Hunt. I think it ex-
ceedingly unlikely that she ever did, and equally unlikely that if
she ever had Leigh Hunt would have written a poem about it.
* * * I never heard that a pension had been offered to Carlyle
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THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
until near the end of his life, when he refused it. I am certain no
pension was ever offered to him while Leigh Hunt was alive,
and I am certain, also, that at no time of his life, even when he
was in extreme poverty, would Carlyle have accepted any pen-
sion. Moncure Conway may possess information which is un-
known to me, but in the absence of any authority which would
lead me to believe it, I do not hesiute to regard the story as
without foundation. You may make any use you please with
this letter. Your faithful servant, „,, ^ „
'"J. A. Froude.'
** Nothing can be more explicit, and I think Mr.
Fronde's denial of the pension should be published
as widely as Mr. Conway's assertion. Doubtless a
record is kept of all pensions granted by the Eng-
lish Government, so that the truth can be estab-
lished beyond controversy. If * Conway possesses
information not known ' to Froude, let him make
good his statement ; but if Carlyle refused all Gov-
ernment emolument to the very last, let him not, in
this lucre-loving age, be debarred the credit due
such self-denial."
-)(-
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
WORKS CONSULTED IN THE PREPARATION OF THIS
NUMBER OP "THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY."
Norton, Caroline Elizabeth. Poems: two
volumes in one. New York: C. S. Francis & Co.,
1857. i2mo, pp. 239 and 388.
Foss, Sam Walter. Back-Country Poems.
Illustrated. Boston: The Potter Publishing Co.,
1892. i2mo, pp. 258.
**Arnold, Birch." Miscellaneous poems.
Rich, Helen Hindsdale. A Dream of the
Adirondacks and Other Poems. New York: G. P.
Putnam's Sons, 1884. i2mo, pp. 11 and 171.
Bates, Clara Doty. Miscellaneous poems.
Allbrton, Ellen P. Annabel and Other
Poems. New York: John B. Alden, 1885. i2mo,
pp. 153.
RusKiN, John. Poems. New York: John Wiley
& Sons, 1884. i2mo, pp. 6 and 239.
Blake, Mary Elizabeth. Verses Along the
Way. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1890
pp. 166.
Lazarus, Emma. The Poems of Emma Lazarus,
in two volumes. Boston: Houghton, Mifflin & Co.,
1889. i6mo, pp. 342 and 257.
Ward, Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. Songs of
the Silent World and Other Poems. Boston:
Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1885. i6mo.
Ibid. Poetic Studies. Boston: Houghton,
Mifflin & Co. i6mo.
RossETTi, Dante Gabriel. Ballads and Son-
nets. New York: White, Stokes & Allen. i6mo,
pp. 287.
Ibid. Poems. New York: White, Stokes &
Allen. i6qio, pp. 26 and 282.
Clapp, Eva Katharine. Soi^ of Red Rose
Land. Advance sheets.
Hatch, Mary R. P. Miscellaneous poems.
Blunt, Wilfred Scawen. In Vinculis. Lon-
don: Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1889. i8mo, pp.
8 and 64.
Ibid. The Love Sonnets of Proteus. London:
Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1885. i8mo, pp. 12
and 120.
Ibid. The Wind and the Whirlwind. London:
Kegan Paul, Trench & Co., 1883. i2mo, pp. 41.
Wright, Hattie Leonard. Miscellaneous
poems.
Rhoderick, George Carleton, Jr. Miscel-
laneous poems.
Daniel, Marion Dalana. Miscellaneous
poems.
Creamer, Edward Sherwood. Adirondack
Readings. Buffalo: Charles Wells Moulton, 1893.
i6mo, pp. 116.
Howe, Julia Ward. Passion-Flowers. Boston:
Ticknor & Fields, 1856. i6mo.
Ibid. Words for the Hour. Boston: Ticknor &
Fields, 1857. i6mo, cl., pp. 165,
Ibid. Later Lyrics. Boston: Lee & Shepard.
i2mo.
Ibid. Birthday Book. Arranged and edited by
her daughter, Laura E. Richards. Boston: Lee &
Shepard, 1889. i8mo, pp. 292.
-)(-
THE EDITOR'S TABLE.
For engravings in this number of The Maga-
zine OF . Poetry, the editor acknowledes the
courtesy of the Buffalo Electrotyping and Engrav-
ing Co., Buffalo, N. Y.; The Potter Publishing Co.,
Boston, Mass. ; Bryant Lecture Bureau, New York;
Garrelson, Cox & Co., Buffalo, N. Y.
For copyright poems and other selections the
editor returns thanks to Potter Publishing Co.,
Boston, Mass.; G. P. Putnam's Sons, New York;
John B. Alden, New York; Houghton, Mifflin &
Co., Boston, Mass.; Frederick A. Stokes Co.,
New York; Paul, Trench & Co., London, Eng.;
Charles Wells Moulton, Buffalo, N. Y.; Lee &
Shepard, Boston, Mass.
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INDEX OF COMPLETE POEMS.
Above Causality.
Creamer
409
Absence.
Jackson
Allerton
10
Acceptance.
369
Acknowledgment, An
381
Acquiescence.
Bigelow
170
After-Glow.
Brittingham
66
Again to the Work.
Barrows
181
Agonia.
Ah ! Heart, I Know.
Ruskin
371
C. D. Bates
365
Alas ! How Easily Things Go Wrong.
MacDonald
418
Alone.
Conklin
80
Almost Homfe.
Hager
205
All the Rivers.
Ward
382
Alone All Night.
Gorton
282
America.
S. F. Smith
108
America.
Bryant
226
American Flag, The
Angel of My Heart, The
Drake
226
B. Arnold
357
Annabel Lee.
Poe
137
Annie O'Neil.
Wintermute
213
Antigone.
F. P. Palmer
260
Apart.
Pennell
24
Apple-Blossoms.
Larcom
150
Apple- Blossoms.
Ward
380
Apple-Blossoms.
McConihe
182
April
Benton
241
April 's Afield.
Wister
237
Arbutus.
Hager
206
At a Funeral.
Blunt
396
At an Afternoon Tea.
F. P. Palmer
259
At His Gate.
Deletombe
339
Atlas.
Wood
310
At Portsmouth, Va.
F. P. Palmer
261
At the Church Social.
Walsworth
72 1
Auctioneer's Gift, The
Foss
352
Augusts.
F. P. Palmer
260
Avich Machree.
McCabe
183
Awajcening, An
Baby in Church.
Brittingham
66 1
Walsworth
72
Ballad of Rosalie, The
Wilstach
293 1
Banner that Welcomes the World, The
Butterworth
335 i
Barbara Frietchie.
Whittier
225 '
Bark, The Frailest on the Sea.
Clarke
217
Bars.
Nason
27i
Bats.
Burnett
241
Beautiful Rest.
Ware
16
Beethoven Symphoay, A
Blake
375
Beautiful Thmgs.
Allerton
366
Before the Bal Masqae,
Cleary
145
Be Frank with Me.
Norton
348
Belief.
Damon
166
Bells ot the Morning.
Creamer
409
Bells, The
Poe
132
Berry-Pickers, The
Damon
169
Best.
Jackson
12
Bethlehem Song, The
Phelps
23
Beware.
Dieudonn^
160
Bingen on the Rhine.
Norton
345
Bird that Sang to Columbus, The Butterworth
97
Birth of the Lyre. Clarke
Bishop of Gretna Green, The Larremore
Bit of Lace, A Jackson
Blessed Damozel, The Kossetti
Blossoms. Tabb
Bluebells. Hibbard
Brave at Home, The Read
Bright Idea, A Bohan
Brigfht Little Girl. The Allingham
British Lion, The Dickens
Brooks Wedding, The Ware
Brother and Sister. Eliot
Bruised Reed, The Upham
Candid Proposal, A Bocock
Castara. Habington
Cast thy Burden on the Lord. Dieudonn^
Catoctin. Markell
Catullus to Lesbia. Field
Cause of the Sooth, The Ryan
Cavalry Song. Stedman
Changes. Shaler
Charge of the Light Brigade, The Tennyson
Cheer Up. Fitzgerald
Cherish the Flowers. Hager
Childhood. Victor
Children, The Buck
Christmastide. Hamm
Christ Church, Oxford. Ruskin
Christmas Bells. Rhoderick
Christ's Tears. F. M. O. Smith
Cigarette, A Hibbard
Cities of the Eyes, The Valentine
City of My Love, The Howe
Claribel. Tennyson
Cleopatra. Dieudonn^
Closmg Scene, The Read
Cloud-Land. Charles
Coelum Non Animum. Morris
Cooking Scribe, The Hamm
College Song. K. L. Bates
Columbia. D wight
Columbia. Monroe
Columbia, 1492-1892. Washington
Columbia's Poet Laureate. W. S. Bigelow
Columbia to the Front Crane
Columbus. Merrill
Columbus. Butterworrh
Columbus at the Spanish Court. H. Smith
Comparisons. Vasser
Complaint of Ninathoma, The Coleridge
Confessions. Mackay
Confirmation. Malone
Content. Simpson
Content. Beardsley
Contrast. Farmer
Com, The Cleary
Coronado Beach in 1870. Wood
Consolation. Browning
Circus Reflection, A Bangs
Crossing the Bar. Tennyson
Crowing of the Red Cock, The Lazarus
217
338
12
fd
316
6
175
300
255
15
249
77
236
325
160
138
420
227
299
188
31
291
205
317
53
297
371
404
195
316
106
410
32
160
4
154
286
297
306
227
97
234
108
96
96
219
330
266
38
238
177
144
309
163
336
32
37S
Digitized by
Google
424
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Dance of Death, The
Danger.
Dead Summer, A
Day in Sussex, A
Dear Little Hand.
Death.
Death and Roses.
Decoration Day.
Dedication.
Deserted House, The
Dew-Drop, The
Dickens.
Dies Dierum.
Dies Irae.
Die, Sweet June.
Dirge.
Dirty Old Man, The
Dream, A
Dreaming and Doing.
Dream of June, A
Dream of Sappho, A
Drifting Down.
Drifting with the Tide.
Doris.
Dost Recollect it Tennie Dear?
Down from the Alountain.
Easter Morning.
Eden God Hato Made.
Elaine and Elaine.
Elegy for Whittier.
Elixir, The
Emerson.
Enchantment.
Endeavor.
Epochs.
Eternity.
Etude.
Evening.
Even So.
Faith.
Faith's Appeal to Ireland.
Fallen Idol, A
Farewell, Dark Goal.
Fate.
Fate
Fault of the Age, The
Kinite and Infinite.
First Transgression, The
Five Year-Old Perplexities.
For^etfulness.
Florida — A Fragment
Flowers of Thought, The
For Annie.
For Other's Sake.
For Thee.
Francis S. Saltus.
Freedom.
From Bethlehem to Jerusalem.
From the Class Poem.
Frost King, The
Funeral Hymn.
Galatea.
Galatea.
Galatea.
Gaudeamus Igitur.
Genius In Beauty.
Geoi]g:e MacDonald.
Glacier, The
Gleaner, The
W.
Dobson
Allingham
Blake
Blunt
Morris
Wood
Rich
Rhoderick
Swinburne
Tennyson
Charles
Blanchard
Walsworth
Crane
Rich
Harris
Allingham
Buck
Lord
Pennell
Clapp
Cleanr
Rhoderick
Munby
Ware
Conklin
McConihe
Clarke
Ward
S. Bigelow
Lazarus
Rich
Wilson
Simpson
L. S. Bigelow
Kaye
Beery
Rice
Rossetti
Wintermute
F. M. O. Smith
Vasser
Blunt
Dieudonn^
Coyle
Wilcox
Browning
Malone
Simpson
Arnold
Ware
Buskirk
Poe
Bigelow
Saltus
Stanton
Moore
Klingle
Blanchard
Kinne
Heber
RajTsdale
Ward
Poole
Brittingham
Rossetti
Fullerton
Ruskin
Crane
L. S.
414
300
373
401
285
363
404
109
32
156
78
71
47
363
21
298
54
340
24
391
145
404
324
16
79
182
217
381
109
379
363
419
38
170
241
28
39
385
214
194
59
398
'59
240
272
163
266
39
357
240
277
134
171
329
333
419
261
78
303
236
275
380
202
67
386
338
371
48
God's Promises to Abraham.
Golden-Rod.
Grandmother's Birthday.
Grant.
Greeting, A
Grey Bayard.
Grief.
Grief of Hercules.
Grieving.
Hail, Columbia.
Hannah Binding Shoes.
Happy Woman, A
Harp and the Winds, The
Harvesters, The
Have I Done What I Could ?
Heart of the Night, The
Heart of the Rose.
Heart of the War, The
Heart's Confession, The
He Leadeth Me.
Helicon.
Here and There.
Her Gifts.
" He Shall Be Like a Tree."
Hcstpr
*• He Who Hath Loved."
Highland Mary.
Hilda's Dream.
Hill-Country, The
Hoarded.
Hostages.
Hour with Whittier, An
Household Voices.
How It Fell Calm on Sununer
How Life's Dark is Lighted.
How Much ?
How Nice !
Humility.
Hymn of Wilkshire Laborers,
Ich Liebie Ungeliebt.
Ich Ruhe Nun.
Ideal, An
I Do Not Love Thee.
If.
If I Could Know.
If I Could Only Know.
If I Might Choose.
If I Were Only Young.
Ifs.
Impatience.
Indian Legend, An
Ingin Summer.
In Heavenly Places.
In March.
Inner Mbsic.
In the Night.
In the Cemetery at Frankfort
In the Cotton Fields.
In that Day.
In the Delphic Chamber.
In the Dismal Swamp.
Insanity.
Intimations of Genius.
Invitation, The
In What Mood?
Iphigenia.
I Still Live.
Italian Sunset, An
It Shall Be Well.
Phelps 22
Clapp 389
C. D. Bates 366
Wolverton 208
Blake 374
Hope 189
Browning 163
Wintermute 214
Pennell 24
Hopkinson 95
Larcom 150
Parham 49
Wolverton 207
Damon 166
Gorton 281
Rossetti 386
Poole 202
Holland 228
Rice 40
Garton 282
• Creamer 409
Hager 206
Rossetti 386
K. L. Bates 305
Markell 139
Malone 267
Bums 323
Martin 233
Upham 74
L. S. Bigelow 169
Blake 374
Holder 199
Barrows 178
Night. Hope 190
C. F. Bates 143
L. S. Bigelow 170
Hatch 395
Sweet 336
The Dickens 256
Johnson 211
ohnson 211
Wilson 42
Norton 347
Farmer 176
Buck 54
Baskett 196
Morgan 107
Mountcastle 235
Norton 347
Wilcox 273
Hatch 392
Foss 353
Barrows 178
C. F. Bates 144
Upham 74
Blunt 396
Poole 202
Hurd 67
Conklin 79
Beery 28
Hurd 71
Charles 154
C. F. Bates 144
Harris 18
Wilstach 294
Baskett 199
Harris 18
Phelps 22
Morris 286
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INDEX OF COMPLETE POEMS.
425
It Seems So Strange.
Ivy Green, The
\ apanese Vase, A
' ennie Kissed Me.
^ essie, the Flower o' Dtimblane.
^ ulia.
' une Song for the Old.
ustice In Leadville.
ECey-Note, The
King of Denmark's Ride, The
Kisses.
Lady Clara Vere De Vere.
I..amb that Was Slain, The
Last Battle, The
Last Flowers, The
Last Words.
Last Words.
Laughter and Death.
Laureate Dead, The
Lawrence Barrett.
Leaf from the Devil's Jest Book,
Lenore.
Lentem Study, A
Lesson in Love, A
Life.
Life and Art.
Life and Death.
Life's Treasures.
Lilies.
Lines on Isabella Markham.
Lines to .
Little Brown Fist, The
Little Song, A
Little While.
Lord Tennyson's Last Poetry.
Lost at Sea.
Love.
Lovely Mary Donnelly.
Love Not.
Love's Reality.
Love's Season.
Lullaby. A
Maid of Athens.
Make Thy Way Mine.
Man from the North, The
Man's Power.
March Sunset, A
Marching Along.
March to the Grave, The
Mart and Mountain.
"Mary."
Maud.
Maud Mullen
Maud's Hero.
May Song.
Meditation.
Messiah, The
Midsummer-Mom.
MidsummeV-Night.
Mission, The
Moonlight Memories.
Morning.
Morning Glory, The
Mother's Love, A
Mother's Portrait
Mountains and Foothills.
Mowing.
Music.
Music of the Waves, The
Currier 107
Dickens 256
Cleary 149
Hunt 416
Tannahill 326
Herrick 325
C. F. Bates 143
Rich 359
Farrand 44
Norton 346
Coleridge 219
Tennyson 30
Larcom 151
Cloud 337
Whitman 283
Clapp 390
Jackson 10
Blunt 397
Rawnsley 104
Rexdale 235
A Markham 336
Poe 132
Hamm 297
Farmer 177
Rice 40
Lazarus 379
Wilstach 292
Johnson 212
Daniel 407
Harrington 323
Wolverton 208
Wilson 41
Johnson 208
Kossetti 384
Tennyson 109
Victory 318
Dieudonn^ 160
Allingham 298
Norton 347
Patmore 312
Wilcox 238
Gorton 282
B^on 324
Khngle 265
McNamara 55
Dieudonn^ 160
McGaffey 241
Bradbury 231
See 86
O'Beime 84
Malone 267
Tennyson 324
Whittier 326
Fitzgerald 288
Rich 363
Poole 201
Buskirk 277
Hurd 68
Harris 18
Markell 139
Victor 317
Fitzgerald 291
Upham 77
Norton 348
Buskirk 278
Creamer 409
Buck 53
Creamer 409
Shaler 188
My Ambition.
My Books.
My Brother.
My Lady June.
My Legacy.
BIy IJUIe Giri.
Mv Morning Prayer.
Myself.
Wy SoTT^.
My ^Juten.
My Religion.
Mv Robm and Blue-Jay.
My Two Gifts.
My \ iew an' His'n.
Nanny's Sailor Lad.
National Hymn, A
Nature's Balm.
Nelly.
New Collossus, The
Nocturne, A
"No More, No More."
Nook, A
Not Always Thus.
Not as I Will.
Now and Ever.
Oblivion.
Ocean Currents.
October.
October.
October Days.
October Snow.
O'Donoghue's Return.
Off Rough Point
Oh, Great Gray Waves.
Old Gray Horse, The
Old School-House, The
Old-Time Pictures.
Old Year, The
Olney Hymns.
O May I Join the Choir Invisible,
Omnipresence.
On a Picture.
On a Portrait.
Once Again.
One Day.
Allerton
Holder
Ware
F. M. O. Smith
Jackson
Markell
Upham
Simpson
Wilson
Cushman
Farrand
McConihe
Hope
H. L. Wright
Allingham
Crawford
Buskirk
O'Beime
Lazarus
Bohan
Morris
McNamara
Johnson
Jackson
Miller
Dieudonn^
Wilstach
Brittingham
Rice
Allerton
Beery
F. M. O. Smith
Lazarus
P. Palmer
L. Wright
Larcom
Simpson
Parnam
Cowper
Eliot
Nason
Nason
Cawein
Markell
Morris
F.
H.
On Finding a Robin's Egg on the Ground in
Early April.
On Some Forgotten Poems.
On the Beach.
On the Shortness of Time.
Optimism.
Organist, The
Other Days.
Our Harvest Years.
Our Hopes.
Our Question.
Our whittier.
Outcast.
Outside.
Overruled.
Pardon of Psyche, The
Pathos of the Past, The
"Parzelia."
Passing of Whittier, The
Past, The
Patience.
Parting.
Parting, A
Patrick's Letter.
McCabe
Henderson
Beery
Blunt
Wilcox
K. L. Bates
Morris
Bohan
O'Beirne
Daniel
D. H. Wright
Farrand
Ragsdale
Parham
Wintermute
Hatch
Dieudonn^
Cross
Parham
Buskirk
Patmore
Farrand
Hatch
369
200
16
193
9
138
74
38
42
238
44
181
193
402
299
415
277
84
379
175
287
55
212
II
334
161
292
66
40
369
28
194
376
261
402
151
38
50
236
249
271
271
339
138
286
184
338
28
398
272
305
287
172
83
407
106
43
276
49
212
395
161
104
50
278
312
43
392
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Google
426
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Paul Revere's Ride. Longfellow 230
Penalty of Fame, The Farmer 176
Perfect Day, A Beery 27
Perfection m Division. Klingle 265
Phillips Brooks. MacKelTar 237
Pictures. Morris 287
Pictures in the Sky. McCabe 183
Pilgrim to the Land of Song, The Read 3
Pines, The Holder 200
Pleasant Days in Winter. Blanchard 78
Poem. O'Reilley 334
Poet's Honeymoon, The Yasser 59
Poet's Song, The Farmer 177
Poesy. Wintermute 213
Poesy. Buskirk 278
Portrait. A Tapley 242
Possession. Nason 268
Praise of Death, The Van Fredenberg 415
Promise. Ragsdale 276
Pulchrorum Hutnueuns Pulcher. Yasser 60
Purport Poole 201
Quatrains — Music. Blanchard 78
Quatrains. Jones 240
Quench Not the Fires. F. P. Palmer 260
Railroad Through the Farm, The Foss 352
Raven, The Poe 128
Reason Why, The L. S. Bigelow 171
Recollection, A Hope i^l
Red Roses. Rich 363
Reflections. Coleridee 218
Regret Blake 373
Remembrance. Ruskin 372
Reproof. Arnold 358
Resting. Markell 139
'* Retro Me, Sathana." Rossetti 385
Revealment Nettleton 420
Reveille, The Hartc 233
Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Coleridge 219
Ripples and the Pool, The Ditchett 238
Risk. C. F. Bates 140
Robin, The FiUgerald 288
Robin's Secret K. L. Bates 306
Rock and Rill. Larcom 150
Room's Width, The Ward 381
Rosaline. Lodge 324
Rose, A Poole 202
Rose of the World, The Patmore 311
Rose, The Coleridge 219
Rustic Lover's Soliloquy, The Hope 190
Ruth. Hood 327
Saddest Hour, The Wilcox 274
Safe. Hibbard 316
Saint and the Sinner, The Bridges 237
Science. Whitman 284
Science of Life, The Farmer 176
Sea of Silence, The Farrand 44
September. Bohan 172
Sequence. Blake 374
Serenade. Yasser 59
Shadows. . Kinne 300
Sheridan's Ride. Read 5
Sherman. Bohan 171
Silent Witness, The Hamm 294
Silver Cross, The Klingle 265
Singing Sand, The C. D. Bates 365
Singing in the Rain. McConihe 182
Sing for the Garish Eye. Gilbert 65
Sisters, The Tennyson 31
Skeptic, The O'Beime 83
Slander.
Sleep.
Sleep and Death.
Sleep-Journey, The
Sleep. Sorrow, Sleep.
Sly Thoughts.
Smile, A
Smoke.
Snow.
Soldier's Widow, The
Something for Thee.
Solace of the Woods.
Solitude.
Song.
Song.
Song.
Song.
Song.
Song from "Agatha."
Song from the ** Spanish Gypsy-'
Song of the Darning-Needle, Thi
Song of the Rill. The
Song of the Uplands.
Sonnet.
Sonnet
Sonnet.
Sonnet.
Sonnet, A
Sonnets of the Southland.
Sonnets to Ed^ Allen Poe.
Soul's Expression, The
Soul.
Souvenir.
Sowing and Reaping.
Speak, for Thy Servant Heareth
Spinning.
Stanzas.
Star of Dawn, The
Star-Spangled Banner, The
Still Day in Autumn, A
Striving.
'* Stonewall " Jackson's Way. J. W. Palmer 229
Substitution. Browning 163
Success. Lazarus 379
Sunrise from the Peaks of Otter. Jordan 420
Sunset, A Buskirk 277
Sunset Thought, A Poole 201
Suspense. Hibbard 316
Sweet are the Uses of the Adversity. Crane 47
Sweet Forget-Me-Not Clarke 217
Sweetheart. Markell 139
Sweetheart, to You ! Hayne 108
Sweets for the Sweet. Foss 354
Sweet Meeting of Desires. Patmore 312
Teach Us Content WilsUch 292
Tears. Browning 163
Tears. Shaler 187
Tell Me. L. S. Bigelow 170
Tennyson. Dewart 102
Tennvson. Coates 237
Tennyson. E. S. Smith 98
Tennyson. Fullerton 102
Tennyson. Austin 102
Tennyson. Arnold 103
Tennyson. Moulton 104
Test, The Riley 336
Thanks^ving. Rhoderick 403
That Things are no Worse, Sire. Jackson 11
There and Here. F. M. O. Smith 194
Fitzgerald 288
K. L. Bates 306
Nason 271
C. D. Bates 364
K. L. Bates 305
Patmore 312
Bohan 172
Wood 312
Lockhart 106
Clapp 391
Phelps 22
Simms 335
Wilcox 272
Read 6
Ruskin 372
Morris 286
Dickens 259
Dickens 256
Eliot 248
Eliot 247
e Wilson 41
Hempstead 239
Creamer 408
Ireland 2.
Simpson
Baskett 196
Nason 271
Rossetti 385
Leonard 328
Whitman 284
Browning 163
Danid 407
Victor 318
Hager 205
Howe 413
Jackson 11
Harris 17
Fahnestock 107
Key 225
Whitman 283
Bohan 175
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INDEX OF COMPLETE POEMS.
427
There are Wrongs Done in
the Fair Face of
Two Messengers.
Pennell
24
Heaven.
Blunt
398
"Two Sinners."
Wilcox
273
'* There Shall be no Night There." Buck
54
Under the Apple Blossoms.
Pennell
23
This and That
Blake
374
Undines* Dance, The
Lazarus
379
Three Score.
McNamara
56
Unfulfilled.
Nason
271
Thought.
Charies
155
Unhindered.
C. F. Bates
143
Thought, A
Hager
206
Unsaid.
C. F. Bates
3^i
Through Dreamy Days in Autumn Woods.
Unsatisfied.
Arnold
Pennell
27
Up from the Sea.
Hibbard
316
Through Life.
Time for Rest, The
Charies
155
Upton Rey.
Ragsdale
275
Bohan
172
Vae Victus.
Brittingham
67
Tint of God, A
Hamm
297
Vanished.
Parham
49
Tired.
Cleary
146
Vision of Brave Men, A
Volunteer Organist, The
Thomas
339
To a Butterfly in November.
Arnold
358
Foss
351
To a Meadow Lark.
McConihe
182
Wail for Walt Whitman, A
Creamer
408
To a November Violet
H. L. Wright
403
Waking Song, A
Wanderer, The
L. S. Bigelow
170
To-Day.
Nason
268
Fremont
329
To Her I Sing.
Johnson
21X
Washington.
See
85
"To Her Lips:"
Hamm
297
Water Lily's Spirit, The
Way of Wooing, The
B. Arnold
354
To John Burroughs.
To J. G. Whittier on His Eig
Blanchard
77
Gilbert
62
fhtieth Birthday.
We.
Bohan
^
Holmes
105
We Have Been Friends Together. Norton
To Juliet, Exhorting Her to Patience. Blunt
398
"We Two are One."
O'Beime
84
ToLucasta.
Lovelace
323
What Did They Say?
Wilstach
294
To Marie Bashkirtseff,
Shaler
187
What Is a Sonnet?
Wilstach
293
To Memory.
Baskett
196
What Love Is.
Wilcox
273
To Miss Kate T. Goode.
Daniel
468
What My Lover Said.
Greene
416
To-Morrow.
Coates
241
What Shall be my Prayer?
Barrows
181
To-Morrow.
Nason
268
When Comes the Crown ?
Beery
29
To My Books.
Norton
348
"When Riley Sings."
Clapp
390
To My Mother's Picture.
Farrell
420
When Sinks the Sun.
Kinne
304
To My Wee Bit Lad.
Wilson
42
White Chrysanthemum, A
Whittier's Mantle.
Hibbard
316
Too Late.
Wood
319
Farmer
177
To One Who Would Make a
I Confession.
When Nature Wreathed Her Rosy Bowers.
Blunt
398
Ware
15
To Phoebe.
Gilbert
62
Whom the Gods Love.
Fawcett
419
Torrigiano to his Statue of Christ Klinrfe
262
Widowed in July.
Wild Bee, The
Wintermute
214
To the Poet Laureate.
Belrose
98
O'Beime
83
To the Poet Whittier.
Hayne
106
Wild Rose of September, A
Jackson
Hibbard
10
To Victor Hugo.
Clapp
J. O. Smith
391
Wild Poppies.
315
To Whittier.
105
Will.
Wilcox
273
Transfi^red.
Tranquillity.
Travelers.
L. S. Bigelow
170
William Blake.
D. H. Wright
240
Damon
166
William CuUen Bryant
Poole
202
Addleshaw
339
Winter.
Parham
50
Treasure of Hope, The
Morris
285
With a Silken Purse.
Blake
374
Tribute.
Patmore
312
Women Who Went to the Field, The Barton
231
Tribute, A
Blanchard
78
Work and Contemplation.
World's Justice, The
Browning
%
Tribute, A
Wolverton
207
Lazarus
True Woman.
Rossetti
385
Would.
Patterson
106
Two Friends.
Foss
Yam of the Nancy Bell, The
Gilbert
61
Two Hearts.
Clodfelter
338
Yesterday.
Nason
268
Two Highwaymen, The
Blunt
401
Youth and Age.
Buskirk
278
Two Lives.
Parham
248
Youth and Death.
Lazarus
358
Two Lovers.
Eliot
Youth and I.
B. Arnold
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INDEX OF QUOTATIONS.
Age. Lonefellow 319
Agnostidstn. Coleridge 223
Ambition. Tennyson 33
do Browning 165
America. Longfellow 319
do Read 6
do Phelps 23
Anticipation. Lonc;feIlow 321
Arbutus. Whitman 284
Art. Longfellow 321
do Wilcox 274
Aspiration. Larcom 152
Autumn. Longfellow 321
Avarice. Tennyson 34
Babyhood. Simpson 39
Bayard Taylor. Whittier 89
do do Longfellow 319
Beauty. Oircom 152
do Eliot 254
do Wilcox 274
do Longfellow 321
do whittier 95
Bell. Ruskin 372
Bestiality. Whittier 92
Birds. Tennyson 34
Bittersweet Larcom 152
Books. Browning 164
Brook. Coleridge 220
Bums. Charles 159
Bjrron. Longfellow 322
Csesar. Longfellow 320
Candor. Longfellow 319
Cares. Longfellow 322
Change. Lonnellow 319
Charity. Wilcox 274
do Longfellow 320
Chatterton. Coleridge 220
Clemency. Longfellow 319
Cleopatra. Charles 156
Clouds. Browning 165
Commerce. Tennjpon 34
Conscience. Eliot 254
Contentment. Larcom 153
Coquetry. Coleridjg:e 223
Courage. Eliot 253
Courtship. Tennyson 34
Cowardice. Whittier 90
Death. Tennyson 33
do Browning 165
do Longfellow 322
do Longfellow 320
Decision. Longfellow 320
Despair. Eliot 254
Destiny. Longfellow 321
Disaster. Longfellow 321
Disenchantment
Lonefellow 320
Distrust Wilcox 274
Doubt. Tennyson 33
do Whittier 90
Duty. Eliot 254
Earth.
Ecce Deus.
Economy.
Eeotism.
Eleanore
Browning 164
Farmer 177
Read 6
Browning 164
*^.^»..x,.^. Tennyson 34
Emulation. Browning 164
Endurance. Longfellow 322
England. Browning 164
Eumanasia. Whittier 90
Evil. Klingle 265
Experience. Tetinyson 32
Faith. Whittier 92
do Tennyson 33
do Eliot 253
do Malone 267
Fame. Eliot 254
do Longfellow 322
Fancy. Coleridge 223
Fear. Coleridge 223
Flowers. Tennyson 34
For^veness. Whittier 92
Fortitude. Longfellow 320
Fortune. Longfellow 320
Freedom. Coleridge 223
Friend. O'Beime 85
Friendship. Wood 310
do Eliot 254
Garrison. Whittier 91
Generosity. Larcom 153
Grace. Patmore 315
Grant Charles 156
Gratitude. Whittier 92
Greatness. Eliot 254
Grief. Browning 165
Habitude. Browning 164
Hatred. Whittier 90
Heredity. Jackson 12
Home. ' Whittier 95
do Whittier 91
Honor. Longfellow 320
Hope. Rossetti 386
do Whittier 95
do Larcom 125
do Whitman 284
Husband. Patmore 315
Hypocrisy. Tennyson 34
Immortality. Longfellow 319
do Tennyson 37
Inconstancy. Rossetti 386
Indians. Whittier 91
Indian Summer. Charles 156
Infancy. Whitman 284
Influence. Longfellow 319
Instinct. Whittier 91
Introspection. Whittier 95
Ireland. Blunt 401
July. Wilcox 274
lune. Ware 17
do Longfellow 322
Justice. Blunt 401
Kismet. Coleridge 224
Kiss. Tennyson 33
Labor. Larcom 153
Life. Foss 354
do Wadsworth 73
do Browning 165
do Browning 164
do Tennyson 33
Love. Longfellow 322
do Whittier 91
do O'Beime 85
do Tennyson 37
do Larcom 152
do Tennyson 33
do Coleridge 223
do Hamm 297
do Eliot 254
do Rossetti 386
do Ward 382
Lucifer. Browning 164
Mammon. Whittier 91
Man. Tennyson 37
Marriage. Tennyson 34
Martyrdom. Malone 267
Martyrs. Whittier 89
Mary. Rossetti 386
Maternity. Patmore 315
Melancholy. Browning 164
Memory. Blake 375
do Norton 348
Men. Longfellow 319
Midnight Coleridge 223
Misery. Longfellow 322
Modesty. Patmore 315
Moon. Coleridge 220
Mother. Tennyson 34
Mothers. Browning 164
Motheriiood. Coleridge 223
Mother-Love. Browning 164
Mountains. Larcom 153
Mrs. Siddons. Colridge 224
Music. Wilcox 274
do Malone 267
Mystery. Browning 165
do Browning 164
Nature. Whittier 90
do Charles 159
do Tennyson 33
do Wilstach 294
Necessity. Longfellow 320
Night Longfellow 322
do Parham 50
do Tennyson 34
Ocean. Charles 156
O. W. Hohnes. Whittier 89
Pain. Eliot 254
Passion. Tennyson 33
Patience. Allerton 370
do Whittier 89
do Longfellow 321
Peace. Tennyson 34
Perplexity. Hurd 71
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INDEX OF Q UO TA TIONS.
429
Perseverance. Longfellow 320
Philanthropy. ^ Larcom 153
Philosophy.
Pity,
do
Poetry.
Poets.
Praise.
Prayer.
Prayers.
Precocity.
Present.
Pride.
Progress.
Randolph.
Raphael.
Realization.
Regret.
Renown.
Repentance,
Reserve.
Retrospect.
Tennyson 33
Allerton 370
Browning 165
Eliot 254
Charles 156
Eliot 253
Tennyson 37
Larcom 152
Longfellow 320
Whittier 90
Tennyson 37
Tennyson 33
Whittier 92
Longfellow 319
Larcom 152
Larcom 152
Rossetti 386
Longfellow 320
Eliot 254
Lon&fellow 320
Coleridge 223
K.eirospeci. i^oiena^e 223
Retrospection. Whittier 91
Respect. Longfellow 320
Riches. Blunt 401
Victor 318
River.
River Otter.
Sadness.
Satire.
Scriptures.
Sea.
Coleridge 224
Longfellow 322
Tennyson 34
Whittier 90
Rossetti 386
Sea. RossetU 386
Self-Complacent. Browning 164
Self-Critidsm Eliot 254
Service. Longfellow 319
Shadows. whittier 92
Sheridan. Coleridge 224
Shipley. Whittier 92
Shoemakers. Whittier 95
Simplicity. Coleridge 224
Skies. Browning 164
Slander. Tennyson 37
do Colendge 223
Sleep. Coleridge 223
do Longfellow 320
Solitude. Longfellow 321
Song of the Universe, The
Fanner 177'
Coleridge 224
Longfellow 322
Tennyson 33
Sonnet
Sorrow.
do
do
Speech.
Spirituality.
Spring.
do
do
do
do
Stars.
Striving.
Strife.
Success.
Summer.
Sununertime,
Sun.
Eliot 253
Eliot 254
Whittier 92
Clarke 217
Whittier
Harris
Tennyson
Wilson
Longfellow 321
Whittier 95
Larcom 153
Malone 267
Charles 156
Larcom 153
Longfellow 322
90
21
33
42
Superstition,
Swiss Song.
Sympathy.
Tears.
do
Temptation.
Tennyson.
Thought
Time.
Tomb.
Coleridge 223
Gorton 282
Longfellow 320
Longfellow 322
Coleridge 220
Longfellow 320
Longfellow 319
Longfellow 320
H.L. Wright 403
Blake 375
1 omo. lisia
To the Autumnal Moon.
Coleridge 224
Longfellow 319
Hager 206
Truth.
Twilight.
Twins.
Uncertainty.
Unity.
Vengeance.
Virtue.
War.
Wife.
Winter.
do
do
Woman.
Words.
Wordsworth,
Work.
Workers.
Worship.
Wrong.
do
Read 6
Walsworth 73
Whittier 90
Eliot 254
Wilcox 274
Whittier 91
Tennyson 33
Coleridge 223
McConihe 182
Whittier 90
Eliot 253
Eliot 254
Whittier 91
Wilcox 274
Longfellow 320
Wilstach 294
Hibbard 315
Patmore 315
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INDEX OF POETS.
Those marked * are accompanied with biographical notice ; those marked t by illustration.
Addleshaw, Percy
*tAllerton, Ellen P.
*Allingham, William
*t*'Amold, Birch'*
Arnold, Sir Edwin
Austin, Alfred
Bangs, John Kendrick
♦Barrows, John Otis
♦tBardett, Alice Eloise
BJarton, Clara
*Baskett, N. M., M. D.
*tBates, Charlotte Fiske
♦fBates, Clara Dotv
*Bates, Katharine Lee
Beardsley, Anna Poole
♦tBeery, Adaline Hohf
Belrose, Louis, Jr.
Benton, Joel
♦fBieelow. Lettie S.
BieeTow, Walter Storrs
^Blake, Mary Elizabeth
♦fBlanchard, Ferdinand, M. D.
♦tBlunt, Wilfred Scawen
Bocock, John Paul
*tBohan, Elizabeth Baker
Bradbury, William B.
Bridges, Madeline
*tBnttingham, Florence V.
♦tBrownme. Elizabeth Barrett
Bryant, WtlJiam CuUen
*tBuck, Mary K.
Burnett, Jean La Rue
Bums, Robert
*Buskirk, Clarence A.
Butterworth, Hezekiah
Byron, Lord
Cawein, Madison
*tCharles, Emily Thornton
•fClapp, Eva Katharine
♦tClarke, Mary H. Gray
♦tCleary, Kate McPhehm
Clodfelter, N.J.
Cloud, Virginia Woodward
Coates, Florence Earle
*Coleridee, Samuel Taylor
♦tConklm, Jane E. D.
Cowper, William
Coyle, Henry
♦tCrane, Rev. Oliver, D. D.
Crawford, F. Marion
*Creamri^, Edward Sherwood
Cross, Allen Eastman
Currier, Maty M.
Cushman, Lilla N.
*Damon, Frances Lewis Brackett
^tOaniel, Marion Dalana
Deletombe, Alice S.
Dewart, Rev. E. H., D. D.
*t Dickens, Charles
339
366
293
354
104
336
173
354
231
195
140
364
238
27
98
241
169
108, 109
373
77
395
236
171
231*
237
65
161
226
53
241
323
271
76, 96, 336
324
339
153
389
214
144
338
337
237, 241
218
79
236
240
47,96
415
408
104
107
165
407
339
102
255
♦fDieudonne, Florence Carpenter
Ditchett, Herbert
Dobson, Austin
Drake, Joseph Rodman
Dwight, Timothy
*tEhot, Georce
Fahnestock, Rev. Alfred H.
♦fFanner, Lydia Hoyt
*Farrand, May Spencer
F^urell. John M.
Fawcett, Edgar
Field, Eugene
*Fitzgera^, Marcella A.
•tFoas, Sam Walter
Fremont, John C.
Fullerton, John
♦fGibson, Eva Katharine Clapp
♦Gilbert, William Schwenck
*tGorton, Cynthia M. R.
*tGow, Minnie
Greene, Homer
Habington, William
*tHager, Lucie C.
*tHamm, Mareherita Ariioa
Harrington, John
^Harris, Edmund K.
Harte, Bret
♦tHatch, Maiy R. P.
Hayne, Paul Hamilton
Hayne, William H.
Heber, Reginald
Hempstead, Junius L.
Henderson, W. J.
Herrick, Robert
♦tHibbard, Grace
♦tHolder, Phebe A.
Holland, J. G.
*tHolmes, Georgiana Klingle
Holmes, Oliver Wendell
Hood, Thomas
*Hope, James Barron
Hopkinson, Joseph
*t Howe, Julia Ward
♦tHunt, Helen
Hunt, Leigh
*Hurd. Helen Marr
Ireland, Mary E.
♦Hackson, Helen Hunt
♦fjohnson, Gertrude Tracy
Toties, Florence A.
Jordan, Cornelia J. M.
Kaye^John W.
Key, Frands Scott
*tKinne, Sophronia Young
*tKHngle, George
*tLaroom, Lucy
Lairemore, Wilbur
*fLazanis, Emma
Leonard, Mary H.
102,
414
226
227
247
107
176
43
420
420
420
288
351
330
60
2SI
71
416
325
205
294
323
17
233
391
106
108
236
239
339
325
315
199
228
261
105
327
188
95
410
?
416
67
235
J
240
420
241
225
300
261
149
338
375
329
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INDEX OF POETS.
431
Lockhart, Arthur Johnson
io6
♦Rossetti, Dante Gabriel
382
Lodge, Thomas
324
♦Runnells, Fannie Huntington
201
Lonefellow, Henry Wadsworth
Lord. William S.
130. 319
♦tRuskin, John
370
340
Ryan, Abram J.
227
Lovelace, Richard
323
Saltus, Francis Saltus
329
*McCabe, Andrew
183
♦fSee, Benjamin F.
♦tShaler, Clarence A.
Simms, William Gilmore
85
nMcConihe, Isabella Wilson
ist
187
MacDonald, George
419
335
McGaffey, Ernest
241
♦tSimpson, Corelli C. W.
37
Mackay, Eric
MacKellar, Thomas
333
Smith, Emeline Sherman
98
237
♦fSmith, Frances M. O.
193
*McNamara, William F.
55
Smith, Huntington
Smith, Jeanie Oliver
Smith. Rev. Dr. Samuel F.
97
nMalone, Walter
266
105
*tMarkell, Charles F.
137
108
Markham, Charles Edwin
336
Stanton, Frank L.
333
Martin, W. Wilsey
Merrill, Geoiige E.
233
Stedman, Edmund Clarence
229
97
Sweet, Frank H.
336
Miller, Elizabeth Henry
334
Swinburne, Algernon Charles
;s
Monroe, Harriet
96
Tabb. John B.
Tannahill, Robert
Moore, Clara Jessup
Morgan, Came Blake
419
326
107
Tapley, Kimball Chase
♦ttennyson. Alfred (Lord)
242
*Morris, Lewis
285
29, 324
Moulton, Louise Chandler
104
Thomas, Edith M.
340
Mountcastle, Clara H.
235
*tThornton, Emily
153
Munby, Arthur).
325
♦tUpham, Rev. James. D. D.
x^
*Nason, Edwin Francis
268
Valentine, Edward A. Uffington
Nettleton, Charles P.
420
Van Fredenberg, Henry A.
415
*tNorton, Caroline Elizabeth
345
♦tVasser, William Edward
56
*tO*Beime. Harry F.
80
♦fVictor, Frances Fuller
317
O'Reilley, James
*tPalmer, Fanny Purdy
334
♦tVon K., Camilla K.
304
259
*tWalsworth, Minnie Gow
71
Palmer, J. W.
229
*tWare. Mary
15. 240
*tParham, Eugenia
49
♦tWard. Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
380
*Patmore, Coventry
311
Washington, Lucy H.
♦tWheeler, Ella
234
Patterson, John
♦Pennell, Harriette G.
106
238, 272
23
*tWhitman, Sarah Helen
283
♦fPhelps, Elizabeth Stewart
385
♦tWhittier, John Greenleaf
nWilcox. Ella Wheeler
89, 225, 327
♦tPhelps, Rev. S. Dryden
21
238, 272
*tPoe, Edgar Allan
125
♦Wilson, Olivia Lovell
41
*Poole, Fanny H. R.
201
Wilson, Robert Bums
419
♦tRagsdale, Lulah
275
•fWilstach, John Augustine
291
Rawnsley, H. D.
*Read, Thomas Buchanan
104
♦tWintermute, Martha
212
4
Wister, Owen
237
Rexdale, Robert
235
♦Wolverton, Sarah
207
*tRhoderick, George C, Jr.
403
♦tWood. Mary C. F. Hall
Wright, David Henry
♦tWright, Hattie Leonard
309
♦Rice, Walter Allen
39
240, 106
♦tRich, Helen Hindsdale
359
401
Riley, James
336
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INDEX OF AUTHORS OF PROSE SKETCHES.
Abraham, Lewis 41
Adams, Oscar Fay 373
Anderson, Mrs. E. F. S. 178
Armstrong, Mrs. J. A. 159
Ashbury, O. C. 315
Bates, Mrs. E. L. 53
Berteline, J. B., M. D. 183
Bullen, Mrs. G. A. 67
Carrington, Gen. H. B., U. S. A. 47
Cobb, Cyrus 214
Everett, Mrs. Naomi 65
Eyles, F. A. H. 285
Forman, H. Buxton 382
Gallienne, Richard le 395
Gault, William R. 188
Gilmore, Charles Marsh, M. D. 187
Gow, James M. 71
Green, F. H. 27
Guild, Marion P. 304
Guiney, Louise Imoeen 140
Harbaugh, Thomas C. 403
Hawthorne, Rev. J. B., D. D. 407
Hinckley, Frederic A. 259
Hyde, Rev. Henry, D. D. 199
In^am, John H. 124
Irving, Dudley 410
Tames, Dallas H. 275
Jamison, Lela E. 272
Japp, Alexander H. 312
Kennedy, Eva Marie 29, 161
Kerr, Miss Belle F. 17
Kieman, Edward W. 408
Kimball, Horace A. 317, 401
King, L Arthur 288, 380
Knowles, Fred. Lawrence 201
LaGrange, Annette 309
Lockhart, Rev. Arthur T., D. D. 165
Lovejoy, George Newell 23
Lowber J. W. 49
Mace, Frances L. 37
McCahon, J. C.
212
McCallestcr, Rev. Lee S., D. D.
207
McGee, Howard Hawthorne
266
Manning, Helen
Michel, Nettie Leila
89,169
3i 218
Miles, Alfred H.
345
Moon, G. Washington
Moulton, Charles Wells
370
144, 261, 364
Nason, Emma Huntington
268
Nias, James
60
O'Hagan, Thomas
193
Parker, Benjamin S.
277
Perry, Wilder W.
55
Pettit, Elusa S.
268
Princeton, John
80
Randolph, Henry F.
298
Read, Jane Maria
21, 73t 205
Renfrew, Carrie
247
Rexdale, Robert
39
Robinson, Harriet H.
149
Rodes, J. H.
195
Sanders, W. F.
56
Sawyer, Col. Benjamin F.
15
Smith, J. L.
291
Stevens, Alice F.
77
Thomas, C. S.
137
Thompson, M. M.
181
Thurman, Henry A.
294. 391
Ticknor, Cornelia E.
79
Van Fredenbeiig, Henry A.
153, 283, 354, 375
Ward, Jeanette
9. 176
Warner, Samuel
43
Warren, Ina Russelle
255. 351
Watrous. C0I.T. A.
Whiting, Charles G.
Willardi Cordelia Young
171
359
300
Wilder, D. W.
366
Williams, W. G.. D. D., LL. D.
85
Wilson, G. Herrick
28?
Wood, Inez R.
389
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INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
A barren tree against the sunset sky 305
About the shrine of Cupid lay, 338
Above the abysmal undivided deep 287
Above the drowsy hum of bees, 56
A bright little brook went dancing by. 15
A child is crying in the street, 104
A child of scarcely seven years 317
Across a continent and sea, 183
Across the Eastern sky has glowed 375
Across the years I call to thee, 271
Adieu, happy dream, for Life's day-star has
vamshed, 390
Afar, sweet song 261
A fleet set sail upon a summer sea, 318
A full camellia at her heart, 106
Again the Christmas bells have rung. 50
Again we hear the Christmas bells. 404
A German maiden springs the warp, 211
A hawthorn bough in full and snowy bloom 144
Ah broken is the golden bowl, 132
Ah! changes! changes! within thy spell 188
Ah! that sunny southern clime, 240
Alas! how easily things go wrong. 419
A lewd, low fellow of the baser sort, 97
Alexander has drunk too deep; 166
A little weeping over glad hopes perished, 206
A little while a little 16ve 384
All are not taken; there are left behind 163
All hail the College Beautiful! 306
All men must pay some ransom unto Fate 374
"All the riven? run into the sea *' 382
All things had reached creation, but stood still 409
A]on£[ the beach 365
A maiden sat at her window 62
A man amon^ his fellow-men, 277
Amid these hills is felt the winter's rigor; 74
A moment's grace, Pygmalion! Let me be 380
Among the quiet peasants in Brittany they tell 288
An angel strayed from Heaven's gate, 139
And so you have found an old programme ? 145
^*And when we meet, as meet we may, 275
An oval form of greenish blue, 184
A Poet bound for distant Helicon 409.
Apple-blossoms, budding, blowing, 150
Apollo plays on his lyre of gold, 212
April's afield, April's in Uie air! 237
Art thou a dream ? 202
A shrouded fear came to my gate, 67
A single sunset hath more loveliness 277
As late each flower that sweetest blows 219
A soft September twilight, 28
Ask what you will, my own and only love; 334
A soldier of the Legion lay dying in Algiers — 345
As some ^nd sun slow rolling 171
A sonnet is a moment's monument, 385
A sorry old nag was the old grey horse 402
A soul in unison with God, 106
A strong wind sweeps the ancient town, 309
A summer's day ana summer's ripe perfection, 7 1
As water lilies from the depths 240
As when the buds of oak and maple swell, 28
Athwart the grain-clad fields, 138
A timid little lover, 146
At play, a boy, just turning eleven, 38
At seventeen she grew between 339
At sunset oft along tiie lower sky. 178
At the dim close of the November day. 391
At the ebb of the tide, a statel^^ ship, 316
Aunt Nellie has fashioned a dainty thing, 72
A vision of brave men from eldest time, 339
A voice by the cedar tree, 323
Away my dear from slumber land, 170
Bark, the frailest on the sea, 217
Beautiful faces are those that wear — 366
Beautiful, golden wild poppies, 315
Beautiful hands, folded to rest, 16
Beautiful land, where my home has been, 194
Beauty like hers is genius. 386
Be frank with me, and I accept my lot; 348
Beneath star-gemmed arches glowing 291
Beside the sewing-table chained and bent, 336
Between the sea-cliffs, 108
Blindfolded and alone I stand. 1 1
Budding, blooming, dying, 40
By radiant beams the western hill 66
By the merest chance in the twilight gloom 416
Capricious daughter of the sprinp; 241
Columbia, Columbia, to elory arise, 227
Columbia ! Men beheld thee rise, 96 '
Come, my Lesbia, no repining, 420
Come, stack arms, men ! 329
Cover them over with beautiful flowers — 404
Cupid, if storying legends tell aright, 219
Day of judgment, awe-investing, 47
Dazzling through the glamour 160
Dead, she drifted to his feet 381
Dead rhymes are here that no man comes to read;339
Dear friend, in leafy, balmy days, 38
Dear hearts, whose love has been 10
Dear litde hand that clasps my own; 285
Death sleeps and is quiet, 310
Debarred from fragrant wood and field, 183
Developed human nature is greater 409
Dost thou remember that autumnal day 283
Do thy chamber windows open east, 317
Down, down through by-gone ages 217
Down from the cloud-capped mountain, 79
Dreaming^ is pleasant, I know, my boy; 340
Dusk-devils ! Messengers of woe 241
Each morning, as I lie in bed 409
E'en thro' her radiant beauty, hour by hour 358
Eighty-five ! how strange to see 16
Entenng life, we come fearfully 155
Eve, sweet tempter, lovely sinner 266
Eyes shaded gray, wistful, tender, 43
Faint clouds that form a snowy ledge 241
Faint from the bell the ghastly echoes fall, 371
Fair hand that gleaneth treasures bright, 78
Farewell, dark gaol. You hold some better
hearts 398
Far westward is a snow-bound train; 143
Fate, 'tis the tide eternal of 159
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434
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY.
Father, hold thou my hands; 265
Fatigued by numerous calls of late, 294
Fear not, Abraham, saith the Lord, 22
Flaunting the tinsel of shame 43
For days and weeks upon the lips has hung, 143
Forests that once were so dear, 21
For the bounteous gifts of Heaven 403
For thee was always my awakening thought, 329
For the faith that is not broken 38 £
For this the fruit, for Uiis the seed, 108
" Forward !" cried the brave Pulaski, 96
Four rounded centuries have rolled, 234
Freemen extol your Washington, 85
Friend, thou and I had known each other long 105
Friend, whom thy fourscore winters, 105
From child to youth; from youth to arduous
man; 386
From that far land, beloved. 24
From the time of our old Revolution 11
From this far realm of pines 106
Full, broad and bright is the silver light 372
" Gentle, modest little flower, . 62
Get thee behind me. Even as heavy-curled 385
Give me the rest of faith, 214
Glad sunshine clothes the world to-day, 206
Gone over the border land 408
Gone the ripple and the rushes 145
Go where I may by night or day 294
Great ruler in the realm of thought, 98
Hail Columbia ! happy land ! 95
Hail, Freedom ! Thy bright crest 415
Half a league, half a league, 31
Hark! I hear the tramp of thousands, 233
Hark, my soul! it is the Lord; 236
Hark! what's that? — a sound I hear! 282
• Has the trampled slave arisen, 310
Have I shattered thee O Beautiful! Thou
Christ-child pale and pure 262
Hear the sledges with the bells, 132
Heart-worn and weary the woman sat 237
He is the despots' Despot. All must bide. 414
He is the friend of friends. In his chill hand. 415
He looks at me from out the velvet frame, 271
Help to a soul in need, 44
He never said he loved me; 288
Her blue eyes they beam and they twinkle, 300
Here 'mid these paradises,. 96
Her summer days are gone, 60
He who hath loved ham borne a vassal's chain, 267
He who is always gay is oft in danger, 294
High grace, the dower of queens 386
High-niched within the temple, 59
How beautiful the night! 18
How beautiful this earth my love, 212
How beautiful to live as thou didst live 237
How can I wait until you come to me ? 273
How like an Alexander now he stands 190
How long will ye round me be swelling, 219
How much do I love you ? 170
How nice it is when men must rave 395
How tenderly about earth's russet breast, 172
Hush — my little baby sweet, 282
Hylas, Hylas, where art thou! 214
I am Merlin, and I am dying, 102
I am sitting alone in the twilight, 80
I am so happy, dear, when I am near you; 238
I am thinkmg of thee to-night love 282
I ask thee not, O Lord, for rest — 181
I cannot choose but think upon the time 249
I come at mom when dew-drops bright, 83
I do not know why even yet 259
I do not love thee — ^no! I do not love thee! 347
I dreamed last night that I had died, 54
If by a wish I could withdraw, 54
I fear thee, ancient Mariner 1 219
If ever dear, 286
I found a woman white and pure and cold; 275
If I could live without the thought of death 398
If I could only count, my love 196
If I might choose my meeting-time, 107
If in the viewless haunts of time 357
If is a word bom of sad human doubt, 176
If I were only young. 235
If the sudden tidings came 376
If this were a fairy gift dear, 374
If thou dost bid thy friend farewell, 312
If thou, O friend, canst say 105
If thou shalt be in heart a child, 286
I gave that eamest love of mine 193
I grew assured before I asked, 312
I had a haunting thought at Easter-tide, 151
I have a bright idea, lassie, 175
I have honestly tried to love her 66
I have my own ambition. 369
I hold before me, in weak trembling hands, 242
I know a nook, a sunny nook, 55
** I know what your poem will be," 59
I lay dreaming, mv soul filled with music 188
I lay me down before the mstic gate 306
I lived alone within a mighty city 353.
I long have had a ciuarrel set with time, 401
I loved her too, this woman who is dead. 396
I love to wander through the woodlands hoary, 283.
I love you, love you! love you! — 236
I'm a sprite from the depth of a spring, 239
I'm mad, mad, mad, I know but this — 154
I'm no reformer, for I see more light 272
In a dirty old house lived a dirty old man; 298
In and out, out and in, 41
In a sunny nook of a sunny room, 213
In Dixville woods a lone grave lies, 392^
In sad sweet days when hectic flushes, 238
In spring we plough the field 205
In summer nights, when Philomel's despair 391
In the early dawn of the moming 194
Into the gloom of the summer night, 72
In the quiet of the evening 140
In the smoke of my dear cigarito 3'o
Into the silence of the silent night 104
" In to the sunshine out of shade!" 150
in vain for him the buds shall burst, 109
I ought to be joyful, the jest and the song 372
I passed it yesterday again, 151
Ireland! Mother unknown, 374
I remember, I remember, 190
I sat with Doris, the shepherd maiden: 324
Is aught so sweet as is this faded rose ? 202
I saw a diamond glistening. 156
" I saw him kiss your cheek!" 312
" I shall be happy,!" she said, 49^
I sit beneath the apple-tree 380
Is it best to be one of a garden of flowers, 60
I sought to leam the cause of things, 176
I stocxi upon the ocean's brink 172
I strove for wicked peace but might not win; 300
It belongs to other years, 169
I tell ye jest what, them teachers 402
I tell you hopeless grief is passionless, 163
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INDEX OF FIRST LINES.
435
I thank thee Father, for thy care, 74
I think if I should cross the room, 381
I think if I were dsring, 208
It seems so strange, 107
It was many and many a year ago, 137
Pve a mother in ould Ireland, 392
I walk, I trust, with open eyes; 312
I wander in a city, tranquil, fair, 202
I wonder, sometimes, in the darkness, 281
** I would be great, O Lord!** 176
Jenny kissed me when we met, 416
I oy took up the harp of life, 177
] ust seventy vears ago, 366
Just when all dusky and dreary, 146
■Ceep a stout heart friend, though fortune may
frown; 291
Lady Clare Vere de Vere. 30
Land of the pine and cypress, where the shades
328
Last night beside mv hearthstone, 316
Laugh, and the world laughs with you; 272
Let me see! It was May, for an oriole came 363
Let not the drifted snow of lilies white 363
Let the storms beat of Fate and Circumstance — 278
** Let us hush this cry of forward till, 98
Life and thought have gone away. 32
Life is too short, its days too few 170
Like a blind spinner in the sun 1 1
Like skyward sparks our souls aspire, 38
Like the violet, which alone 325
Like to a stately palm 199
Like to the clear in highest sphere 324
Listen, my children, and you shall hear 230
Long years ago I wandered here, 329
Love does not always heal with balm 358
Love is not a feeling to pass away, 256
Love is the center and circumference; 273
Love not, love not, ye hapless sons of clay! 347
Loving little brownie, darling, 182
Lo, when the Lord made North and South, 311
Low was our pretty cot! 218
Maid of Athens, ere we part, 324
Majestic mother of a hero- race! 391
Man were too mighty for this sphere, 160
Maud Muller on a summer's day, 326
Midnight by the chapel bell! 248
Month of the season's garnered gold, 214
Moonbeam and night 354
Mother I see you, with your nursery light, 12
My books beloved, ve take me backward, 200
My country, — 'tis of thee, 108
My lady's rest was calm and deep; 190
My little ^rl with fluttering^ heart, 138
My love smgs like the mavis, 2%
My own dear lad, my wee bit lad, 42
My tribute lay, a sweet bouguet 408
My work is done; the eventide is here 419
Natur* the good old schoolmarm who pities our
distress 353
Ne'er did singing by its flattering art 297
Ne'er subject bowed before the royal throne, 40
Never alone again since I have found 363
Night! And the great sea seems to beat, 310
No moaning on the bar; sail forth, 103
" No more, no more," the autumnal shadows
cry; 287
No song was ever heard, 23
No splendor 'neath the sky's proud dome 312
Not always thus! Not always thus, 212
Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, 379
Not rich are we in hoarded eold. 171
Not while the fever of the blood is strong 379
Now fare-you-well! My bonny ship, 299
Now mark the contrast in a woman's heart 177
Now, that you come no more to me, 373
O better the glimpse of a star 408
October! Why do I this month adore ? 40
O Dartmouth's Melpomene, gracefully green! 78
O'er mountains and meadows, 24
O fair bird, singing in the woods, 285
Of all the sweet names that ever were given 267
Oft as we turn we catch the gleam 78
Oft have I brooded on defeat and pain, 379
O genial John! beneath the shade, 77
O gentle death, bow down and sip 334
O gleaner, who homeward, as if in retreat, 48
Oh a dainty plant is the ivy green, 256
O happy bee, so heavy-laden, fly! 172
O haunting shade that flitted down the past 268
'* Oh brew me a potion strong and gooa! 379
O, he lightly swings his gleaming scythe 53
Oh fair to be, oh sweet to be 286
Oh flower of spring that lingered here to cheer 403
Oh God who by thy Prophet's hand, 256
Oh great grey waves that bellow to the shore 261
Oh! if the winds could whisper what they hear, 347
Oh! leave the past to bury its own dead, 398
Oh! let it never more be said, 84
Oh, lovely Mary Donnelly, it's you I love the
best! 298
Oh, pallid phantom of a joyous summer day 358
Oh! pity me dolly. 39
Oh p'raps you may have heard, 255
Oh radiance mine when day is o'er! 201
Oh, say, can you see by the dawn's early light 225
Oh, stars that guard the outer walls of heaven, 276
Oh the dear, dead days that sleep, 50
Oh, these rondeaus and triolets are pretty as
violets 354
Oh, thought that is deeper and vaster 155
O lady mme! O lady ot my life! 330
Older my realm than other known 161
O life! so dark, so bright, so evanescent, 17
O, little clouds how swift 201
O, masters! your sweet singer lieth here — 333
O may I join the choir invisible 249
O mother of a mighty race, 226
On a brown and sheltered hillside, 206
Once again the leaves are falling, 138
Once, in the dark, I knew a rose was near 374
Once upon a midnight dreary, 128
One day, one day, our lives shall seem 286
One night, like a jockey contesting a race 55
O Nightingale! that fills the air with song, 338
Only a- bit of lace, 12
Only a whisper, but that whisper fell 288
Only the hum of the distant bees 42
O Northern pole 292
Onward, still on! the grave is yawning, 86
O poet, crowned with songs, 202
O, radiant guest, who, decked in garments fair, 268
O restful, suent tomb! 161
O Tennvson! Of poets loved the best; 102
O thrusn, your song is passing sweet, 287
Our good steeds snuff the evening air, 229
Out from the mossy earth, with drip and trickle 365
Out of the South, where dainty heaps of cloud 27
O! vast unmeasured bound — 241
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436
THE MAGAZINE OF POETRY,
Over the clover math 300
O wild red rose what mind has stayed. 10
O World in tears, thy Christ lies in the tomb! 182
' ' Padre. As on we go, ' ' 97
Peace in the clover-scented air, 228
Peeping round the world so novel, 77
Poet believed, again I come, 199
Poor lone Hannah 150
Push back the curtains and fling wide the door;
369
Quench not the fires which bum within the soul
260
Quoth Nelly " the will of the Lord be done,*' 84
Ring all thy lily bells, thy royal colors fly, 363
Savior, thy dying love, 22
Shakespeare, thou hast nodded too, 47
Sharp are the thrusts, 106
She comes no more, 24
She is here in all her glory, 193
She is my Queen — though not of royal line; 238
She laid in his hand a taneled thorn 265
She sits among the eternal hills, 410
She's so sweet and meek and lowly, 297
She stood breast-high amid the corn, 327
She wove her life of myths and dreams. 407
Silent and mute the harp of love 44
Silent companions of the lonely hour, 348
Sing for the garish eye, 65
Six years ago, O autumn rain, 208
Sleep, Sorrow sleep! 305
Slow from the west the sunbeams 196
Slowly I circle the dim, dizzy stair, 305
Slumberous depths of tired eves, 238
Soft languor lies upon the hill, 68
So it is, my dear. 385
Solemn and still on the outward wind 208
Some ask'd me where the rubies grew, 325
Some days there are. 66
Some flowers bear violets on their bosom 265
Some men are reason-proof, 83
So plump dimple-dented, 41
Sparrows are piping, the bold robins sing, 169
Speak, for thy servant heareth; 413
Spring to thy wings bright lark of the meadow 182
Star of the eastern sky, 107
Statesman, yes! tho' cold and lowly. 18
Stranger than aught on earth, 177
Sunset and evening star, 32
Sweet "Forget-me-not " 217
Sweet guardian of the storehouse of the mind 196
Sweetheart, to you all things are clear, 108
Tears! Tears! Tears! 187
Tell me not, sweet, I am unkinde, 323
Thank God, bless God. 163
Thank Heaven! the crisis— 134
That man is wisest who accepts his lot, 369
The apple trees are laden' d with blossoms to-
day 182
The army is gathering from near and far; 231
The artist culls from wood and glade, 217
The auctioneer leaped on a chair, and bold
and loud ana clear 352
The bishop was genial and burly, 338
The blessed damozel leaned out 383
The breath of a soft wing 364
The brightest star in Britain's sky, 102
The brook is frozen from bridge 166
The camp is astir and the men muster fast, 189
The child and the old man sat alone 259
The children robed in spotless white 266
The circus of to-day I deem a wondrous sort
of thing. 336
The clouds, the beautiful clouds! 154
The dawn of new ages is breaking, 335
The day had dawn^ ! The lucent mist 261
The day is dying. In the western sky, 316
The day was black with clouds, 143
; The dews are dry upon my sandal-shoon 3
' The east glowed like a blush rose fair, 28
The fallen cause still waits, — 227
The fault of the age is a mad endeavor 272
The flowers of thought, with their divine per-
fume, 277
The forests have a hoary look, 303
The Frost-King lays his icy hand 205
The glorious movement heaven-aspiring flies, 375
The great big church waz crowded 351
The heart of woman! Who shall read 160
The house was packed from pit to dome, 240
The immortal beauty of God's simple things 390
The jewel'd water stretched, 166
The June is sweet with rose and song, 143
The lark that thrills us with its song, 74
The laurels fall from ofl* as high a brow, 104
The long and weary hours, 67
The mind that joumejrs into realms ideal 278
The mom breaks gloriously. 29
The morning May-beams, 233
The mother looketh from her latticed pane — 348
The mountains have a peace which none dis-
turb. 371
The musk-rose, love, is sweetest now, 59
The noisy day was over, 337
The prettiest picture that I 181
There are boundless chasms in time 170
There are days that come and go, 170
There are those who grow prosaic. 67
There are wrongs done in the fidr face of
Heaven 398
There be two messengers that come to me, 24
There is a smile angeuc in the sea, 297
There is enchantment in the thought 419
There is no chance, no destiny, no fate. 273
There is no laughter in the natural world 398
There on top of the down, 109
There's a song in my heart, 42
There's not a oreath of summer's joy and
glory 374
There's thet black abomemation, thet big
locomotive there, 352
There was a man, it was said one time, 273
The robin chants when the thrush is dumb, 241
The saddest hour of anguish and of loss 274
The school is dosed! the books are laid away. 211
The shortest absence brings 10
The skv and the sea like two nuns 316
The solemn sea of silence is unbroken, 44
The spirit of the summer night 78
The springtime's promise in the air, 271
The star-necked robe that wraps, 175
The summer hath kissed the winter 78
The summers change us, 260
The sun has gone down o'er the lofty Benlo-
mond, 326
The test of labor is what stays! 336
The time drew near that our ling'ring feet, 43
The true Messiah came to earth, 277
The unseen fingers of the air 316
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INDEX OF FIRST LINES,
437
The wars are ended, and soft brooding peace 97
The waves of sleep roll up the strand of night, 271
The wind sounds only in opposing straits, 163
The woman singeth at her spinning-wheel 163
The women who went to the field, 231
The woods are bare, 50
The world is great! the birds all fiy from me, 247
They told me I was heir. 9
Tho* bent to earth and almost broke, 77
Thou art gone to the grave, 236
Though palace grand or humble cot, 38
Thou limpid stream, that laughing flows, 139
Thou who walked in those old days 240
Through dreamy days in autumn woods 27
Through the day, when the children, 53
Through the grey and frosty heavens, 297
Thus childlike. '* I am going home,'* 237
*Tis not in self-abasement. 336
'Tis sweet to hear, in pensive hours, 178
'Tis the blithest, bonniest weather for a bird to
flirt . 306
To be a sweetness more desired than spring; 385
To die is but to live a^in 292
To her, who caught mme earliest sigh, 211
** Too commonplace! ** the critic hath averred, 235
Too frail, too false, too faithless, 139
To the belov^ sound I listen 200
'Twas a beautiful harp! 207
*Twas 'mongst the hop-vined glens of Kent 293
Twas night! I wondered how Td breast 207
'Twas on the shores that round our coast, 61
Two cities dwell within thy shadowy eyes, 106
Two lovers by a moss-grown spring! 248
Two sons from out two distant homes, 49
Under the trees in the apple orchard, 23
Up from the meadows ncn with com, 225
Up from the South at break of day, 5
Upon a mossy bank I lie, 201
Upon the branches serpents lie; 71
Upon the silver beach the undines dance 379
Use Uiy power unto the uttermost, 175
Weepeth the rain, beloved one, 276
We have been friends together, 348
We lavish our lives in getting, 84
We look into to-morrow, 49
We loved, indeed we did. 175
We nurse our hopes as mothers do 83
We read of thee m sacred story, 407
We sat at twilight nigh the sea, 376
We shall lodge at the Sign o' the Grave, you
say! 339
We stand and look the ages in the face, 395
We were two daughters of one race, 31
We would stay on this high mount i8t
What, — Barret dead ? How soon life's play
is o'er 235
What hast thou done to this dear friend of
mine, 379
What is a sonnet? 'Tis a little bell 293
What is this world, the great wide world, 407
What lacks the summer ? 373
Whence comes my love ? O heart, disclose; 323
When Dante following the elder poet, 194
When first I looked into thy glorious eyes, 284
When Freedom from her mountain height 226
When hope is lost, 160
When I am dead, strew roses o'er me, sweet 363
When I walk out beneath the starry skies, 54
When life is darkest, then ofttimes I feel 282
When Nature wreathed her rosy bowers, 15
When our delight is desolate, 371
When russet apples turn 172'
When the merry April morn, 144
When salutes the waves Pacific 292
When sleep shall close each weary lid. 139
When sinks the sun in western sky, 304
When some beloved voice, 162
When suddenly there passes, 49
When summer, like an elfin queen, * 16
When the swift spider weaves 389
When the twilight gathers lonely and I sit
within the gloom, 357
When Titan reins his fiery steed, 39
When you and I shall stand, 79
Where art thou, thou lost face, 396
Where Claribel low-lieth, 32
Where did you find little maiden fair, 170-
Where dost thou linger while we wait for thee 268
While icy winds do pierce me 144
While I stand on one of her seven hills, 22
While the dull Fates sit nodding at their loom, 284
While waiting for the lily. 38
Who knows uie inmost heart of the rose, 202-
Who shall catch his falling mantle, 177
Why did He weep, 195
Why do I love thee ? Do you ask me this ? 271
Why do we fret at the inconstancy 39^
Why I love you ? Tell me first 171
Why is it true that all the golden fruit, 26&
Will you come with me, my own love ? 18
Wise in her daily work was she 297
Within his sober realm of leafless trees, 4
Within its border land I long did wait 213
Within my humble hall there hangs 278
Witl^out I stand, timid and trembling still 339
With retrospective thought I sit 404
With stammering lips, 163
Woman, this dream, thy love, is dead. i6a
Woods, waters, have a charm to soothe the
ear, 335
Word was brought to the Danish King 346
Wrapped in the cold, silver mist so white, 316
Years to a century had grown, 108
Ye banks, and braes, and streams around 323
Yes, law is a great thing, but justice comes in
ahead 359
Yes Marie! all child, all woman, 187
Yes. Thou art everywhere! 271
Yonder from a vine-clad dwelling 205
You ask me, ** Do you think of me ? " 318
Young when the world was young, Antigone 260
Youth quickly tires of calm retreats, 278
Youth was led by hope, 358
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informed concerning important events in all parts of the
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of human interest.
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number and an elaborate index at the end of each year.
The bound volumes make an ideal annual.
of eminent people appear in each issue and form a val-
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trated journal of contemporary biography.
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