CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
arV1327 
 Art-life 
 
 Cornell university Library 
 
 3 1924 031 245 859 
 olin.anx 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924031245859 
 
ART-LIFE 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS 
 
 BY 
 
 BENJAMIN HATHAWAY. 
 
 ' Laurel crowns cleave to deserts, 
 And power to him who power exerts. 
 East not thy share I On wingedfeel, 
 Lo ! it rushes thee to meet; 
 And all that Nature made thy own, 
 Floating in air or pent in stone, 
 Will rive the hills and swim the sea, 
 And, like thy shadow, follow thee." 
 
 — Ralph Waldo Emerson. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 PUBLISHED BY H. H. CARTER & COMPANY, 
 
 3 BEACON STREET, 
 
 1877. 
 
All hearts the Poet fires are his : 
 The subtle link of mind to mind — 
 The link we do not forge and bind, 
 
 Most precious is ; — 
 We mine — not make — the golden ore, 
 And love, like fabled fairy store, 
 Divided, is not less but more, 
 
 And true love hath no jealousies. 
 
 Copyrighted, 1876. by 
 BENJAMIN HATHAWAY. 
 
TO MY MOTHER. 
 
 Thou type of noblest Womanhood! 
 Thou who in manhood's evil day, 
 As by the couch of infancy, 
 Still faithful stood; 
 Unfaltering, and with purpose strong, 
 Rebuking all the hosts of wrong, 
 With "Love is more than gift of song," 
 
 And " Virtue is the highest good." 
 
 Oh would these wildwood flowers for th 
 Were robed in Beauty's charm and bloom, 
 Made rich with every rare perfume 
 
 Of Poesy; 
 With every grace of heart and mind, 
 With Woman in all reverence shrined; 
 In part repaying so in kind 
 
 A debt as boundless as the sea. 
 
As to her best beloved the mother's heart 
 Still yearns when passed is childhood's tender age, — 
 When from her home and hearth she bids him go, 
 
 The stay and builder of the days to be; 
 As unto him, while loving tears do flow, 
 Her blessing with the parting kiss is given, 
 To him that is of her own life a part, 
 
 Asking upon his head the smiles of Heaven ; 
 So do I yearn to thee, O lettered Page ! 
 
 As tiers my love — as hers my prayer for thee. 
 
 Born in a world of books, O Book of mine ! 
 To-day, with noise-dulled ear, may pass thee by; 
 Born to thy destiny, albeit late, 
 
 All that to thee belong the Years shall give ; 
 If Prophet of the Better Time we wait, 
 If Truth's evangel, Beauty's messenger; 
 If the high Art, however rude, is thine, 
 That can the soul to nobler impulse stir, 
 Serving its deeper need, thou shalt not die : 
 
 Use is the deed of life to all that live. 
 
Contents. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 ART-LIFE 1 
 
 MISSISSIPPI . 13 
 
 VOICES FROM NATURE:— 
 
 Snow- Bird . .... 31 
 
 Pebbles . . ... 35 
 
 Fobbst Haunts . . . 38 
 
 Chickadee . . 41 
 
 Whippoorwill . . . 44 
 
 Sea - Shells . 46 
 
 Phebe ... 51 
 
 Katydid . . . . . 54 
 
 sunrise by the sea . ... 57 
 
 THE HAPPY VALLEY . 65 
 
 SONGS OF THE SEASONS:— 
 
 Spring Voices . . 89 
 
 Seed -Time . . .91 
 
 A Song op May . . . 92 
 
 June . . .94 
 
 Autumn Flowers . . 96 
 
 Parting Summer ^ . 99 
 
 Asphodel . . ... 104 
 
 October . 107 
 
 Autumn . ... 108 
 
 Indian Summer . . 113 
 
 Garnered Sheaves .. . . 117 
 
 Winter Lays . . . us 
 
 By the Fireside . . . . 128 
 
Vlli CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS :— 
 
 Songs of the Toiler 137 
 
 Tannhauser .... . . . 143 
 
 Revisited .151 
 
 Mine Own ... 157 
 
 Idle Hours . 162 
 
 Waited For 163 
 
 Under the Oaks 166 
 
 Unanswered Letters . . . 167 
 
 Compensations ... . . . 170 
 
 Home . . 172 
 
 The Beautiful . . .173 
 
 Motherhood ... . 178 
 
 The Image -Breaker . . 180 
 
 Too Late ... .182 
 
 Home from the War .... 185 
 
 Beloved . . . . 188 
 
 Work .... 190 
 
 Christine ... . 191 
 
 Little Linnie 194 
 
 The Time to Be . . . 197 
 
 Cousin Caroline 201 
 
 Parting Friends 204 
 
 A Complaint 206 
 
 Re -Emerged 208 
 
 Centennial 211 
 
 Aspiration 216 
 
 Wedded Love . 218 
 
 Forty Years ago . . ... 219 
 
ART-LIFE. 
 
 What prophet wide with, trumpet tongue is teaching 
 The chained world its thought of Liberty, 
 
 Till loving hearts go out in meek beseeching 
 And wild unbosomed longing to be free? 
 
 What stranger truth is new evangel preaching 
 Of Life to be? 
 
 Divinest Art! thou heaven of our aspiring, 
 
 Wherein our being is in doing blest, 
 And duty is at one with our desiring — 
 
 The radiant goal of all earth's empty quest; 
 The sternest toiling evermore untiring — 
 The sweetest rest! 
 
 joy supreme ! labor un vexed of wages ! 
 
 The equipoise of Good that all things wait; 
 Care that all care, pain that all pain assuages; 
 
 Bonds that are free — the brotherhood of Fate; 
 The Love unpledged that lives through all the ages 
 Inviolate. 
 
2 ART- LIFE. 
 
 Who shall the Life so beautiful unseal us — 
 The life whose labor is a work of bliss ? 
 
 When shall our doing of our doing heal us ? 
 Our toiling rest us of our weariness ? 
 
 Thou God within us, to ourselves reveal us 
 In perfectness! 
 
 A desert -way we wander unavailing; 
 
 Anear the babbling brook we fainting lie, 
 Or on and on — forevermore bewailing 
 
 Each fading bright oasis seeming nigh: 
 Lead us by living waters never failing, 
 Oh, else we die ! 
 
 With maniac hands, each nobler purpose foiling, 
 We strive to do, yet know not how or why; 
 
 We come not to our own in all our toiling, 
 We live a falsehood till we love the lie; 
 
 And, strangers to ourselves, our gifts despoiling, 
 We live and die. 
 
 Might bread alone appease this deathless yearnim 
 For bread alone to toil were meet and fit; 
 
 But oh, we feel, however dimly burning 
 Within the soul the fire celestial lit, 
 
 If Love is not the wages of our earning 
 What profits it? 
 
ART -LIFE. 
 
 Ungenial toil, our meaner wants supplying, 
 Our better life for this its birthright sells; 
 
 In all our doing we are only dying 
 
 With quenchless thirsting for Art's living wells: 
 
 Give us the labor and the self-denying, 
 Genius impels! 
 
 Genius, that is of Virtue the fair flowering — 
 
 All noble aspirations, true and brave; 
 The deathless love with life immortal dowering 
 
 Alike the pencilled dream, the poet's stave, 
 The sculptured bust, the chiselled column towering 
 To architrave. 
 
 All -conquering Genius! where is now thy dwelling? 
 
 In what fair clime is reared Minerva's home ? 
 Whose proudest fanes Time's rudest hand is felling: 
 
 Immortal Athens' beauty -sculptured dome; 
 Thy Coliseum, of Art's triumph telling, 
 Imperial Rome! 
 
 Where lives the soul — in what fair incarnation — 
 That woke of old the desert -city's smile? 
 
 Palmyra, peerless in thy devastation! 
 And hundred- gated Thebes — stupendous pile, 
 
 Girding the waste in awful desolation 
 By sacred Nile! 
 
4 ART- LIFE. 
 
 Oh, still meseems more vital breath distilling 
 From crumbling dome where alien footstep treads; 
 
 A haughty glance of nobler being dwelling 
 In stern repose of Amnion's stony lids — 
 
 Of morning Memnon, glory -smitten, thrilling 
 The Pyramids! 
 
 Beneath thy dust what hoary gods are sleeping — 
 Deathless heroes, drunken on lotus balm! 
 
 Around whose couch are nameless sphinxes keeping 
 Their hallowed watches, robed in sullen calm; 
 
 By many a long -forgotten shrine is weeping 
 The desert palm. 
 
 Oh, day by day, with an intenser yearning, 
 How do we turn with still expectant eyes 
 
 To greet thy rising day more fair returning, 
 Divinest Art! than lit thy morning rise 
 
 On Grecian hills, or sunset -halo burning 
 Italia's skies! 
 
 Perchance our life in light so sweetly tender 
 Has some reflected grandeur faintly caught; 
 
 To thee these weaker years still turn with wonder, 
 Sublimer age! with inspiration fraught, 
 
 When Pericles outrayed immortal splendor, 
 And Phidias wrought. 
 
AST- LIFE. 
 
 Alas ! how prone the weary years are fleeing 
 In lust of gold, or fame's unquiet quest; 
 
 With heart axed hand in endless disagreeing 
 O'er miscalled duties — while in every breast 
 
 Lives the monition of more beauteous being, 
 In vague unrest. 
 
 The youth glad hears his better genius calling, 
 Like far-off murmur of unquiet seas; 
 
 In vain he waits more happy hours befalling — 
 Time heartless speeds apace, life's morning flees; 
 
 Age seals his fiery lip — some world -enthralling 
 Demosthenes. 
 
 And maiden heart, in rarest dream elysian, 
 Would thrill all being with a love -refrain; 
 
 But Nature's need, and endless improvision 
 Of household care, or oft maternal pain, 
 
 Swift breaks the spell of each too ardent vision 
 And dreaming vain. 
 
 How many a soul by world of sorrow shaded, 
 Deep in whose wells the gems of Genius shine — 
 
 How many a hand with weary task o'erladed, 
 But digs the soil or delves the darkened mine — 
 
 That could have wrought, by kindlier fortune aided, 
 A work divine! 
 
6 ABT- LIFE. 
 
 And who may say, whom more of strength embolden 
 Or chance from meaner care some respite win, 
 
 The happier few — if throned in region golden 
 Of radiant Art, afar from strife and din, 
 
 What forms transcendent, by oblivion holden, 
 There might have been? 
 
 Oh, ever on untrodden walks ascending 
 To drink from Inspiration's storied well, 
 
 On heights of song in loftier glory bending, 
 Free of the boundless universe to dwell! 
 
 Like olden Bard, a life serenely lending 
 To Beauty's spell! 
 
 To tread with winged feet and heart imperial 
 The hills of morn, with sparry splendors rife; 
 
 A cloudless realm of loving light aerial, 
 Un wrecked of wrong, ungloomed of pain and strife: 
 
 High crowned and glorious in a world etherpal — 
 Life's dream of Life! 
 
 Alas! deep thirsting for the wave enchanted 
 No summer prime unseals those limpid springs; 
 
 Far gazing on the mountain way undaunted, 
 And glad to soar above all meaner things, 
 
 The longing spirit lags, though vision -haunted, 
 On wearied winsrs. 
 
ART- LIFE. 
 
 And prone are thousands by the wayside lying; 
 
 Crushed are their aspirations, but not dead; 
 For some high Art, diviner being, sighing — 
 
 For free, true life, unsoiled of want and dread; 
 Toiling and toiling — a vain self-denying 
 For daily bread. 
 
 With longings vain, and strivings all unaided, 
 No longer beaconed by Hope's lustrous light, 
 
 In vain they mourn life's fair ideal faded; 
 Their morning sun at noon is set in night; 
 
 In vain they seek the doing undegraded — 
 A life -delight. 
 
 Yet evermore new aspirations springing 
 
 Like summer flowers, our winter paths adorn; 
 
 And, wearing late, the glooming night is bringing 
 Anon the better prophecy of morn; 
 
 Though still we wait, through ages darkly winging 
 An iEon born — 
 
 When Life shall flow like some wide -rolling river, 
 A far, free, shining course serenely run; 
 
 To brighten, deepen, broaden on forever, 
 The days of its high destiny begun; 
 
 When Love and Labor nevermore shall sever — 
 Their being one. 
 
8 ABT-LIFE. 
 
 We are the lights on Life's mysterious dial, 
 The radiant stops on Love's celestial horn; 
 
 High Heaven's orchestra on untutored trial, 
 With harps discordant, dolorous, and forlorn; 
 
 Or waiting, hushed, like Egypt's stony viol, 
 The flush of morn. 
 
 Life of Art ! Thou life serene and holy — 
 Thou God - ordained balm for every woe ! 
 
 Up wing thy sovereign day that lightens slowly; 
 Unchain each suffering soul that would be true; 
 
 Whate'er our part, if proud it be or lowly, 
 Give us to do! 
 
 Oh, once again with medicine and healing 
 Into our hearts on rhythmic measures float; 
 
 A higher life in nobleness unsealing, 
 
 Unveiling near Love's ancient heaven remote; 
 
 For every evil of our flesh revealing 
 The antidote. 
 
 As mountain pine, in rugged grandeur growing, 
 Finds Nature's fullness in that bleak abode, 
 
 Or lowly blooms, its inner life outshowing. 
 
 The humblest flower that decks the meadow sod: 
 
 So finds the soul in Art's diviner doing 
 Its home in God. 
 
AUT-LIFH. 
 
 There limpid springs the Fount of Youth eternal, 
 That many a league our weary feet beguiles; 
 
 There lie Hesperian fields serene and vernal, 
 Whose magic shore from far receding smiles; 
 
 Anchored in thee, the evergreen, supernal 
 Enchanted Isles. 
 
 Therein alone we drink Life's blest oblation; 
 
 There lives the Real our Ideal brings; 
 Therein we roam — an endless recreation — 
 
 Untrodden paths that lie by living springs; 
 Therein is giving to our aspiration 
 Unfettered wings. 
 
 Thou final Good! the theme of wisest sages; 
 
 Beginning, end, and goal of Liberty; 
 The choral hymn that echoes down the ages, 
 
 The inspiration of all prophecy, 
 The golden clays all Poet's song presages — 
 The Time to be! 
 
 Our feeble hands in thee alone are mighty, 
 In thee our triumph in o'ermastering strife; 
 
 We turn to thee, as to yon heavens nightly, 
 Far seeming ever with new glories rife; 
 
 For Art -Love only is the Elixir -Vitse — 
 The Life of Life! 
 
MISSISSIPPI. 
 
If aught can lift the Soul to nobler mood — 
 From thought and feeling prone, 
 From passion's baser stvay, life disenthrall — 
 Full on the heights enthrone, — 
 It is to roam the rerdured solitude, 
 Alone, yet not alone; 
 To hark the voices from the silence call, 
 Dear as each household tone; 
 To feel, with Nature's ampler life imbued, 
 Free as the free winds blown, 
 The heart fall pulsing ivith the heart of all — 
 One with the Great Unknown. 
 
MISSISSIPPI. 
 
 Ail hail! thou mighty stretch of inland sea, 
 Now for the first unto my sight outlying ! 
 
 No faintly -canvassed imagery of thee, 
 
 But in thy glory and thy majesty 
 
 Murmuring immortal harmonies, outvying 
 
 The troubled ocean in its fitful sighing — 
 
 The tide -disturbing sea. 
 
 Oft have I wandered in a visioned dream 
 
 Through radiant summer lands of memories olden ; 
 Where rock and hill and vale and wood and stream 
 Far glanced and brightened to the kindling beam 
 Of fairer, sunnier climes, serene and golden; 
 While heart and thought in mystic band were holdeh 
 In one long radiant dream. 
 
14 MISSISSIPPI. 
 
 But peerless thy sublimity of scene: 
 
 Looming immense, in stern wild grandeur sleeping, 
 Thy hills, far glimmering in the noontide sheen, 
 The headlong rush of eddying floods between 
 Wave - warding cliffs, thy shores high overleaping, 
 With many a legend strange in their dim keeping, 
 Surpass each dream -born scene. 
 
 Far as the eye can trace I see thy might 
 
 Of hurrying waters in their seaward flashing; 
 While cleaving yonder deeps of crystal light 
 Ledge high on ledge uprears a dizzy height, 
 Majestic frowning on thy wayward dashing, 
 Chafing the echoing shores with ceaseless lashing 
 And still unwearied might. 
 
 Thy voiceful murmur hath a cadence deep, 
 
 That Echo answers from her craggy dwelling; 
 Waked are thy billows from their icy sleep, 
 And madly surging as they rush and leap 
 O'er all the embosomed valley wildly welling; 
 Or fearful and resistless onward -swelling 
 Unto the waiting deep. 
 
MISSISSIPPI. 15 
 
 Yet thine the music of the mountain springs — 
 The swelling song of myriad rillets blending; 
 
 Each tiny fount its rippling treasure brings, 
 
 That far amid the Alleghanies sings; 
 
 While in the sunset - land, their tribute lending, 
 Are serried, snow-capped, bleak Sierras, sending 
 Their glad eternal springs. 
 
 And it were joy their shining track to trace 
 
 Through thousand green savannas to their sources; 
 Pair fenceless fields in Nature's wildest grace 
 Thy countless streams meandering interlace; 
 
 Still hastening, murmuring, dallying in their courses, 
 Through many a wild where Art's despoiling forces 
 Have left no darkening trace. 
 
 Charmed with the music of thy lullaby 
 
 So softly crooning to the Hesper-even, 
 Forgot the anguish of each sundered tie, 
 The wrongs forgotten of the years gone by, 
 The harsher world forgotten and forgiven — 
 How might I hear the seraph - song of Heaven 
 In thy soft lullaby! 
 
16 MISSISSIPPI. 
 
 Blest with some friend of sympathizing breast, 
 
 Though prone to err, yet loving and forgiving, 
 And taught of sorrow that the sweetest rest, 
 The fullest blessing, is in making blest; 
 That truest balm for pain is pain -relieving; 
 Whose thought upreaehes to the ever -living 
 All - sympathizing breast, — 
 
 How sweet to dwell apart from care and strife, 
 By grove and stream with inspiration teeming; 
 
 To hail each day with some new rapture rife, 
 
 To taste the true sublimity of life 
 In some fair sylvan haunt of Eden - seeming, 
 More beauteous than charms the poet's dreaming, 
 Un vexed with care and strife; 
 
 Where no rude sound disturbs the tranquil dream, 
 
 The sacred calm on earth and azure lying; 
 Where mellowed murmurs of each laughing stream 
 That glances wanton in the glittering beam, 
 The wood -bowers wakened to a soft replying, 
 Or hushed as listening to thy farewell sighing — 
 All weave enchanted dream. 
 
MISSISSIPPI. 17 
 
 There, where the gardens of the desert shine, 
 The housewife bee her busy craft is plying, 
 
 Industrious hoarding till the day's decline 
 
 From blushing wood - rose and sweet eglantine 
 The luscious stores, her winter wants supplying; 
 
 ' Nor rests from toil till Autumn pale is sighing, 
 And dimmed each floweret's shine. 
 
 There through the quiet of the summer days 
 Rises the mound, the cunning gopher's mining; 
 
 There undisturbed the tameless bison strays, 
 
 The wary elk and moose securely graze — 
 Are lazily on mossy bank reclining; 
 While the long hours are bright with sun and shining 
 And breath of summer days. 
 
 Unmeasured leagues, where thy glad fountains rise, 
 The Red Man rears his rude bark -covered dwelling; 
 
 His simple wants the wonted chase supplies; 
 
 Nor taught to miss what partial Fate denies, 
 His heart elate with warrior pride is swelling, 
 Unmindful of the prophet - voices telling 
 Of darker days' uprise. 
 
18 MISSISSIPPI. 
 
 There the young hunter with a boldness rare 
 Roams the deep forest as the day is whiling, 
 
 To trail the panther to his lonely lair 
 
 Or thread the mazes of the wily bear — 
 
 Brave deeds alone his every thought beguiling, 
 Such as may win the bright eyes' kindliest smiling 
 Of forest - maiden rare. 
 
 There too, as deepens the departing day, 
 
 The dark - eyed daughter of the desert, stealing 
 Prom the home - wigwam silently away, 
 Unchidden wanders in the twilight ray 
 To list confiding unto Love's revealing; 
 While blissful promise, to her sight unsealing, 
 Floods many a coming day. 
 
 And who shall say if yet her lowly life, 
 
 So seeming shut in want and degradation, 
 
 Mid forest wilds, mid scenes of warrior -strife, 
 
 Through all its changeful years of maid and wife 
 
 Finds not alone in love the compensation 
 
 Of every loss; heavenly constellation, 
 
 Set in the lowliest life ! 
 
MISSISSIPPI. 19 
 
 And thou: what wondrous voices from the Past 
 Do babble to us in thy waves 1 deploring 
 
 Of mightiest secrets in oblivion cast! 
 
 Who shall unseal them from the slumbering vast ? 
 Re -tune thy lyre, some olden strain outpouring, 
 The lore of long -departed days restoring, 
 Thou Spirit of the Past! 
 
 Weave us some Idyl of the Ages flown ! 
 Help thou our reason in its weak divining, 
 
 To read the record of the years unknown! 
 
 The site of ancient empires overthrown, 
 The crumbled wall the forest dimly lining, 
 Where bows the cypress to the ivy's twining, 
 Tell of the ages flown. 
 
 These, the memorials of the days of yore, 
 Reveal the Present to the Past related; 
 A race, a people, that are now no more, 
 Here reared proud temples on thy lonely shore - 
 Of strange and unremembered art created, 
 To long -forgotten worship consecrated 
 In the far days of yore. 1 
 
20 MISSISSIPPI. 
 
 For thou hast looked on minaret and dome — 
 
 On thronging cities that the earth is hiding; 
 Whose days were numbered ere the infant Rome 
 Had wrought the grandeur of each palace home; 
 Some senior Carthage in her glory priding. 
 Some old imperial Thebes— though unabiding 
 Arch, column, wall, and dome. 
 
 Some elder Athens of the Astalan, 
 
 Rites, altars, fanes, all that the worship aided 
 Of Isis, Buddha, or an older than 
 These hoary gods, — old as the life of Man; 
 Some ancient Tyre, august and undegraded, 
 By the destroying hand of Time invaded, — 
 Pride of the Astalan. 2 
 
 Some rare Damascus of the elder world, 
 
 Prouder than her the Syrian gardens shading; 
 
 Nineveh, on thy fairer shores impearled; 
 
 Some Babylon from her foundations hurled, 
 Ere thine, Euphrates, saw her glory fading; 
 Silently teaching — history upbraiding — 
 Thine is tbe elder world. 
 
MISSISSIPPI. 21 
 
 What time the bison by the gleaming maize, 
 
 Or o'er the furrowed glebe the share constraining, 
 Through all the loitering sultry summer days, 
 Where now untamed his thousand fellows graze, 
 Bent his strong shagged shoulder uncomplaining, 
 The netted muzzle him alone restraining 
 From the fair -gleaming maize. 
 
 Where vale and hill and wide - expanding plain 
 And grassy field, unshorn, uncultured lying, 
 To beauty quickened by the sun and rain, 
 Waved golden billowed with the ripened grain; 
 While busy swains, the frugal sickle plying, 
 With cheerful song to cheerful song replying, 
 Enchanted all the plain. 
 
 When as the day wore tranquil to its close, 
 
 The hour of labor with the daylight ending, 
 From sylvan homes of undisturbed repose 
 The vesper hymn in thankfulness arose 
 From loving hearts in one communion blending; 
 A truthful life of true affection lending 
 Light to its final close. 
 
22 Mississippi. 
 
 Long peaceful years in peasant -labor led, 
 
 No bloody deeds its simple joys degrading; 
 
 A guileless race in rural freedom bred, 
 
 Unskilled in arts that fill the earth with dread, 
 
 Its pleasant places with a fearful shading; 
 
 No thirst for gain or selfish aim invading 
 
 The simple life they led. 
 
 All, all have vanished from the earth away, 
 
 And none are left their tragic end declaring: 
 If swiftly blotted from the face of day, 
 Of war, of famine, pestilence the prey, 
 
 If haply wrought to deeds of fearless daring 
 They nobly bled, unconquered, undespairing, 
 Till life had ebbed away. 
 
 The fierce and warlike Hunter -tribes arose — 
 
 The wandering lost of Israel's bewailing; 
 If thickly compassed with barbaric foes, 
 To warrior arm must warrior arm oppose; 
 The earth -built barriers were unavailing: 
 No free-born race survives, its freedom failing, 
 Where its free altars rose. 
 
Mississippi. 23 
 
 And long unnumbered centuries' have flown; 
 
 Arch, dome, and wall have yielded to their grading; 
 Where on the plain the smiling cities shone 
 A dense and rugged wilderness has grown; 
 
 The altar -mound the ancient oak is shading; 
 
 Each lingering trace is darkly dim and fading, 
 And soon shall all be flown. 
 
 But oh, what vision of the Golden Tear, 
 
 As from their trance thy slumbering billows started! 
 To see across the solitudes austere 
 Adventurous bark thy regal empire near — 
 
 A stalwart band, rude -girt yet fearless -hearted; 
 
 The kindling dawn the misty night -gloom parted — 
 Dawn of the Golden Year: 
 
 When he, the knight with snowy locks, but still 
 
 His fiery heart with youthful ardor burning, 
 Sought on thy Gulf's far shores the mystic rill, 
 The legend -promised Fount whose springs distil 
 Perpetual Youth, its vernal bloom returning: 
 He came — he went — with disappointment yearning, 
 His white locks whiter still. 3 
 
24 Mississippi. 
 
 And he, grim seeker, further on — his quest 
 The Fount of Youth, of Eldorado dreaming, 
 
 Glad hailed thee, sinking on thy banks to rest; 
 
 Though life was ebbing in his aged breast, 
 
 Full with exultant joy his great heart teeming — 
 
 " Behold, more rich than treasured Ophir gleaming, 
 The objects of our quest!" 4 
 
 As though transported to thy farthest shore, 
 In rarer light, his mortal vision failing, 
 
 He gazed in wonder on each hidden store ; 
 
 On wealth unmeasured of the glittering ore, 
 These later years to outer sight unveiling; 
 And heard the hosts of tramping miners trailing 
 To-day thy farthest shore. 
 
 But he too sought the hidden spot in vain; 
 
 His comrades left him to thy billows' caring; 
 Then mournful turning from that task of pain, 
 With thoughts that whispered of their native Spain, 
 Of dark eyes weeping, of Love's long despairing, 
 Went sorrowing on; but saddened memories bearing 
 Of that wild vision vain. 
 
Mississippi. 25 
 
 Wild vision vain? — that was prophetic dream; 
 
 The meaner type of man's prophetic yearning; 
 And here by thee, De Soto's mighty stream, 
 Shall yet the long -sought Eldorado gleam; 
 Where all shall find, the Golden Days returning, 
 The truest wealth; the deeper import learning 
 Of that wild fabled dream. 
 
 Through radiant vistas of the coming time 
 I see the glories of the Future's bringing, 
 
 Fair as the promise of Creation's prime p 
 
 The prophet voice of poet -seer sublime 
 
 Still cheers our aspirations lowly springing: 
 The fleeing years are through swift circles winging 
 Unto the Better Time; 
 
 When gentle deeds shall bless an ampler day; 
 Whose rising beam, a rayless night succeeding, 
 
 Flushes with rosy dawn the twilight gray; 
 
 When life shall kindle with serener ray, 
 
 And Art and Science, in their upward leading, 
 And Genius, on her starry pathway speeding. 
 Shall bless the risen day. 
 
 4 
 
26 Mississippi. 
 
 Though thrice a hundred leagues of Silent Land — 
 
 Or but thy voice the solitudes beguiling — 
 Stretch far away to where sublimely stand 
 The cloud -girt snow -capped mountains lone and grand, 
 Erelong in noontide beam of Freedom smiling 
 Shall cities of a free-born nation's , piling 
 Fill all the Silent Land. 
 
 On all is change — the mystic change of life, 
 
 The breath divine forever all things freeing; 
 The world is girded for its progress - strife: 
 The lonely desert with its voice is rife — 
 The solitary place afar is fleeing; 
 The Form is changeful, as the Soul of Being 
 Ascends to higher life. 
 
 Though changing, still unchanged forevermore 
 
 In thy vast cycles, boundless and unending, 
 Still onward do thy billows ceaseless pour, 
 While empires bloom and fade along thy shore, 
 Till nobler dust with meaner dust is blending; 
 From age to age thy anthem -song ascending 
 Rings out forevermore. 
 
Notes. 
 
 1. " This ancient race seems to have occupied nearly the whole basin oi 
 the Mississippi and its tributaries, with the fertile plains along the Gulf, and 
 their settlements were continued across the Rio Grande into Mexico." 
 
 Baldwin's Ancient America, p. 32. 
 
 2. " The people inhabiting the Vale of Mexico at the time the Spaniards 
 overrun that country, were called Astecks — having come from the North, 
 from a country they called Astalan; literally, a country of much water." 
 
 See Humboldt's Researches in South America. 
 
 3. Juan Ponce de Leon. In the 16th century, this enthusiastic adventurer 
 visited a portion of the continent lying on the Gulf, while in command of 
 an expedition fitted out by himself, for discovering the Fountain of Youth, 
 which was thought by the natives of Porto Rico to exist in one of the Lucayo 
 Isles. Its virtues were such that all who bathed in its waters would be 
 restored to the bloom of youth. 
 
 See Robertson's History of America. 
 
 4. Hernando De Soto. "Mournfully depositing the body of their beloved 
 commander, wrapped in his mantle, in the trunk of an evergreen Oak, hol- 
 lowed out for that purpose, they reverently lowered it at midnight beneath 
 the waters of that magnificent river he had been the first to discover." 
 
 Discovery of the Mississippi. 
 
VOICES FROM NATURE. 
 
As child bewildered in the thronging mart, 
 We look on Nature as a pageant grand, 
 But only as the pageant of an hour; 
 Nor see that all — tree, shrub, and forest flower, 
 June roses rare, by Summer breezes fanned, — 
 Bloom evermore in gardens of the heart. 
 
 The woodland bird that sings, surpassing art, 
 The insect life that thrills the twilight hour, 
 
 The mountains vast, the tide -led seas that roll 
 From Arctic Pole unto Antarctic Pole, 
 Are all a portion of the Spirit's dowei — 
 Are all of the Immortal Soul a part. 
 
SNOW-BIRD. 
 
 Arctic rover bold! 
 When forth in fierce array, 
 
 Resistless borne from farthest Labrador, 
 
 With tyrant sway 
 The icy squadrons pour — 
 
 Rage wide o'er wood and wold, 
 What never-dying love thy bosom warms! 
 What dauntless heart thy puny wings enfold, 
 To breast 'the wintry storms — 
 Thou scorner of the cold! 
 
 1 see thee come and go 
 
 In thy swift eager flight, 
 Piercing the keen cold air with sudden wing 
 
 Of quick delight — 
 A bright ethereal thing; 
 
 While, like the flitting show 
 Of poet thoughts that scarce embodied are, 
 A thousand storm -led kindred pinions glow, 
 Upswirled and blown afar — 
 A cloud of drifting snow. 
 
32 SNOW-BIRD. 
 
 Are all alike to thee 
 The storm and sunshine ? — are 
 The ever -changeful seasons as they go 
 
 Forever fair? 
 Is in thy breast the glow 
 
 Of suns we may not see — 
 Lighting thy way so airily, to wed 
 Joys of the past to joy and mystery 
 Of realms thy wings shall thread, 
 Journeying fleet and free ? 
 
 Nor toil is thine, nor care; 
 For thee the wayside weeds 
 And frosted hedge -row yield an ample store 
 
 Of ripened seeds; 
 And every land and shore 
 
 Where thy free pinions bear, 
 Is all thine own; in Nature's mother -heart 
 Is thine abode; in all the homeless air 
 Domesticate thou art: 
 Thy home is everywhere. 
 
 They tell us, far remote 
 In woodland mountain air, 
 Amid Katahdin's shadow -haunted glooms, 
 
 When June hours fair 
 Are gay with summer blooms, 
 
SNOW-BIRD. 33 
 
 Thine is a minstrel throat 
 That charms with song the love - delighted days, 
 Thrilling the silence of each cave and grot: 
 Wake, of remembered lays, 
 One joy -inspiring note! 
 
 Oh, but to enter in 
 
 Thy fairer world ! to see, 
 We know not what — though knowing all is fair, 
 
 Whatever be, 
 As the transcendent air 
 
 Of heaven to souls that win 
 Release from mortal ills: no tired brain 
 O'er unsolved mysteries, no battle - din, 
 No tears, no loved in vain, 
 No loss, no might - have - been. 
 
 What deeper sight is thine, 
 With what a soul possessed, 
 Thou pretty pinch of clay — thou sturdy, bold 
 
 Evangelist, 
 Preacher of gospel old! 
 Had I the subtle, fine 
 Ethereal blood that thrills thy radiant dust — 
 Had such unstudied art this harp of mine, 
 Thy simple love and trust 
 All human hearts should shrine. 
 
34 SNOW- BIRD. 
 
 Ah me ! if cognizant 
 Of all thy little needs 
 Is One, with tender breast to pity stirred, 
 
 Who loves and feeds 
 Even thee, my lowly bird, 
 
 That Winter cannot daunt; 
 An Eye that sees, a Hand that holds and guides 
 Thy devious flight across a continent, 
 And evermore provides, 
 Forecasting every want; — 
 
 Is it less provident 
 
 Of thee — the care divine ? 
 Less worthy thou of the benignant heed, 
 
 heart of mine, 
 In this thy human need? 
 
 Love's shining battlement 
 Leans evermore above Time's clouded strand: 
 See in all loss, all wrong, all accident, 
 A loving Father's hand, 
 And seeing, be content. 
 
PEBBLES. 
 
 Along the sea lies Summer's purple sheen; 
 
 The drowsy waves low lapse, with fond caress, 
 On amber sands; in fading light serene, 
 
 All purposeless 
 I wander where wide leagues of vernal green 
 And blue seas loving kiss. 
 
 Beneath my feet uncounted pebbles gride, 
 
 Strewn with unstinted hand on all the shore; 
 Some mighty Titan, rising from the tide, 
 
 Them hither bore 
 Up from earth's hidden workshop caverns wide — 
 Up from her granite floor. 
 
 Sandstone and flint from many a rocky trave, 
 
 Chips from the walls of dark Devonian keeps; 
 All glomerates from caves where Ocean's wave 
 
 Untroubled sleeps; 
 Schist, schale, and limestone, from the flags that pave 
 The old Silurian deeps. 
 
36 PEBBLES. 
 
 Hornblende and mica from the tidal locks 
 
 Down to whose depths no plummet line may go; 
 Porphyry and feldspar from earth's primal rocks 
 
 Here pale and glow; 
 Gneiss and basalt from the unquarried blocks 
 Of her foundations low. 
 
 Quartz, trap, and slate, from many a dyke and turn 
 
 Deep in the cosmic mines ; unsoiled of fame, 
 Agate and jasper from each billowy urn 
 
 With rocks that came 
 Up from the vaults where ever seethe and burn 
 Red seas of quenchless flame. 
 
 God's alphabet, could we interpret it 
 
 Aright, are ye; ye are — entraced as if 
 In monograph, in bits of mountain grit 
 
 And rocky cliff — 
 Creation's book, in mystic cypher writ, 
 In Nature's hieroglyph. 
 
 Could we but read its vast similitudes, 
 
 The wisdom of its ancient pages con, 
 Life's morning hymn through all its interludes 
 
 Still sounding on, 
 How might we hear — see, where but darkness broods, 
 Light of a higher sun ! 
 
PEBBLES. 37 
 
 To mighty secrets ye do hold the key; 
 
 Could ye but tell by what convulsions torn, 
 All ye have seen of change while ages flee 
 
 And worlds are born, 
 Here chafed and washed by the incessant sea, 
 To forms of beauty worn. 
 
 Oh for the gift, the lore to understand! 
 
 Yet what am I? — through elemental strife 
 Upborne as ye — up from what hidden land 
 
 With wonder rife ? 
 A pebble, thrown upon life's stormy strand, 
 Broke from the Prime of Life. 
 
 But ye are mute, howbeit, mute to me; 
 
 Though all too long I vain your silence mourn, 
 Hear but the homeless moaning of the sea 
 
 On shores forlorn, 
 Or vaguely dream of beauty yet to be 
 In some untravelled bourn: 
 
 Enough to know,' around me not in vain 
 
 The troubled tides of Being darkly press: 
 Grief, care, want, hope deferred, love's ache and strain, 
 
 The passions' stress: 
 So grows the soul immortal, wrought through pain 
 Into all comeliness. 
 
FOREST HAUNTS. 
 
 Ye oldeu oaks, deep clad in greenness Ternal, 
 With Summer's sunlight on your rugged brows, 
 
 Methinks I hear the voice of the Eternal 
 Go out amid the swaying of your boughs. 
 
 Oh, not the mythic fear- inspiring Monarch 
 
 That but with dread our doubting thoughts invest, 
 
 But He who bears above Wrong's throned Anarch 
 Earth's sorrowing children on his loving breast. 
 
 And oft unto your solemn shades retiring 
 Of temple, altar, shrine, my heart to him 
 
 Has poured the burden of its high aspiring 
 
 In measured cadence through your cloisters dim. 
 
 As wayward child, touched by some anguished arrow 
 From the full quiver of the coming years, 
 
 On mother's breast unbosoms wild its sorrow, 
 While loving kisses dry the brimming tears; 
 
FOREST HAUNTS. 39 
 
 So turn I, yearning for your dear caressing; 
 
 World - worn and weary do I come again 
 To win some measure of maternal blessing, 
 
 If but a brief forgetfulness of pain. 
 
 From Life's fierce conflict, from its toil unending, 
 Awhile to rest me where no care intrudes, 
 
 And feel my soul in quickened pulses blending 
 With kindred souls that dwell in solitudes; 
 
 To lowly listen to the mystic voices 
 
 That through your boundless sanctuaries ring, 
 
 And feel, while Nature in her heart rejoices, 
 Some thrill of rapture in my own upspring. 
 
 The mossy bank wears meek a smile of blessing; 
 
 There lives a gladness in each floral bell, 
 A spirit -healing in the mild caressing 
 
 Of balmy zephyrs in the woodland dell. 
 
 And hark ! a thousand tiny throats are winging 
 Joy's silvery songs amid the murmuring trees; 
 
 happy choir ! a choral anthem singing — 
 The blended music of the birds and bees. 
 
40 FOUUST HAUNTS. 
 
 These shall restore me to the pure and tender 
 Of feelings sullied in embittered strife; 
 
 Some faint ray kindle of Hope's morning splendor, 
 That shed a halo on each dream of life. 
 
 gentle Spirit that afar is hiding 
 
 In unfrequented wilds of wood and glen, 
 Couldst thou as in these tranquil haunts abiding 
 Dwell in the homes and in the hearts of men, 
 
 1 had not need to medicine this longing 
 With calm and quiet in your green retreat; 
 
 Life's stony paths, with weary pilgrims thronging, 
 Were fair and flowery to these bleeding feet. 
 
CHICKADEE. 
 
 What time the Oriole 
 Through verdurecl haunts by spicy breezes fanned 
 
 Pours his full soul, 
 Far off in tropic land, 
 
 In wildest minstrelsy, — 
 If not so glad and gay, 
 Here in December woods, as blithe and free, 
 I hear thy gleeful note the livelong day — 
 My Chickadee! 
 
 Is all this storm and gloam 
 Of Winter vain to chill thy heart of song? 
 
 Dost never roam 
 With the proud minstrel throng 
 
 To climes beyond the sea? 
 What secret dost thou hold? 
 Is in thy breast the wondrous alchemy, 
 
 Transmuting all these leaden skies to gold — 
 My Chickadee? 
 
42 CHICKADEE. 
 
 Oh, for the subtle art 
 To share thy life, unsoiled of strife and din: 
 
 A life apart 
 We may not enter in — 
 
 A realm of mystery! 
 Yet, though we may not cross 
 Its hidden bound, we feel it cannot be " 
 
 A weary world of ill and pain and loss — 
 My Chickadee! 
 
 Within thine eye so bright 
 No shadow lies of care or want or dread; 
 
 There shines a light 
 More than of summers dead 
 
 Or summers yet to be: 
 Like to the morning glow 
 On Eden hills serene ; — say, canst thou see 
 The fairer world behind this fading show- 
 My Chickadee? 
 
 Is thine the vision rare 
 To pierce the gloom that hides the heavenly bourn 
 
 Where all is fair? 
 The hidden land we mourn 
 
 Unsorrowed dost thou see? 
 
CHICKADEE. 43 
 
 Then at thy cheerful stave 
 I marvel not, indeed, nor how it be 
 
 Thy tiny breast can bear a heart so brave — 
 My Chickadee! 
 
 Oh, what a joyous song 
 Above this gloom and darkness would I pour — 
 
 How free and strong 
 This weary heart would soar, 
 
 That Morning Land to see ! 
 Where blight and storm and frost 
 And grief and pain and parting may not be; 
 Where glorified do wait our loved and lost — 
 My Chickadee! 
 
 Sole friend the Summer hides 
 That does not flee when summer hours are fled ; 
 
 That still abides 
 When vernal blooms are dead 
 
 O'er hill and vale and lea; 
 Oh, when the roundelays 
 Of rarer throats are hushed, still keep for me 
 
 Some breath of song to cheer life's darker days — 
 My Chickadee! 
 
WHIPPOORWILL. 
 
 lonely Night-bird from across the main, 
 That oft hath soothed me with a plaintive hymn ! 
 
 Once more the music of thy sad refrain 
 
 Wakes the deep cloisters of the greenwood dim; 
 
 From out the twilight's still repose I hear 
 Lorn Echo answering to thy sober song, — 
 
 A note, though mournful, to my heart more dear 
 Than gayer numbers of the minstrel throng. 
 
 Oft when the piping of thy ceaseless plaint 
 Rings out at even from the dusky wild, 
 
 Outsoaring all, time, tears, and sorrow -taint, 
 I roam, a happy simple-hearted child; 
 
 1 lightly wander on the hills away, 
 
 Or careless loiter by the meadow streams, 
 To pluck sweet garlands from the blushing May, — 
 The hours all golden with enchanted dreams. 
 
WMPPOORWILL. 45 
 
 I hear once more the voices of my youth, 
 
 The mystic voices that have long been hushed; 
 I dream again the dreams of love and truth, 
 
 Again am happy in all hope and trust; 
 Oh, still as glad as in the vanished Spring 
 
 My heart would tremble to some olden thrill, 
 If thou wouldst sing me as thou erst didst sing 
 
 Thy mournful vesper by my window-sill. 
 
 Why dost thou linger in the far-off land 
 
 When the gay songsters of the wood are here? 
 What leafy bowers by Spring's warm zephyrs fanned 
 
 Make but a long glad Summer of thy year? 
 Dost seek green haunts where shadows of the palm 
 
 Shut ever out the noontide's fiercer reign, 
 Mid spicy groves all prodigal of balm 
 
 That breathe a fragrance on the Indian Main? 
 
 Oh, could I journey with thy pinions fleet — 
 
 Swift wing with thee to far-off Southern Isles! 
 Prom saddened memories free, what joy to greet 
 
 Each scene of beauty that thy wing beguiles ; 
 There might I find hid in the wild afar , 
 
 Some spot untrodden by the feet of Care; 
 Where Love might linger with no ill to mar, 
 
 No grief to darken, and no wrong to bear. 
 
SEA-SHELLS. 
 
 dwellers in the deeps, 
 Up from the caves of Ocean hither borne! 
 
 Like to the soul that keeps 
 Porevermore, though in a realm forlorn, 
 
 All memories 
 Of fore -known love and joy — ye sigh and mourn 
 And wail for the unfathomable seas. 
 
 I low mine ear incline : 
 Within your convolutions sway and swash 
 
 All voices of the brine; 
 I hear on barren reefs the surges dasb, 
 
 The breakers roar; 
 
 The homeless billows fret and foam and wash, 
 
 And die far off upon an alien shore. 
 
SEA-SHELLS. 
 
 And ye do more complain, 
 When angry tides with Wintry tempests toss, 
 
 Of ill and wrong and pain; 
 Like heart new sorrowed at some olden loss, 
 
 Ye moan and sigh 
 As ye were sore a wounded albatross, 
 
 Or ye would feign the stormy petrel's cry. 
 
 From archipelagoes 
 That lave the sands of Indra, and the isles 
 
 Of palm, where nightly glows 
 The sea with a translucent splendor — smiles 
 
 In flash and foam 
 On shores Australian — over all the miles 
 To ye come visions of a long -lost home: 
 
 Telling of all things fair — 
 Of beauty blooming in the depths below; 
 
 Of coral gardens rare 
 Where sea -bells, sea- pinks, and sea -roses blow; 
 
 Where twinkle fine 
 The lamp- auricules; where sea - pens glow, 
 And sea -anemones and star -fish shine. 
 
48 SEA - SHELLS. 
 
 Where to the floor of rock 
 The limpet clings; where periwinkles hide 
 
 From the rude billows' shock; 
 Where pearly nautilus from prow of pride 
 
 Strikes his frail oars, 
 Or argonaut gay sails the tranquil tide, 
 
 Or far below his painted shallop moors. 
 
 Down where the diver bold 
 Takes his lone way, all gems of ocean are; 
 
 What marvels yet untold! — 
 Cones, wattles, volutes, helmets, nerites, — rare 
 
 Wonders of God's 
 Sea -world! — harps, tiaras, ear- shells fair, 
 
 With all your kindred of the eaverned floods. 
 
 There in your home with these 
 Again to be, ye grieve incessantly; 
 
 What deathless sympathies, 
 Outreaching mortal pain! — what subtle tie, 
 
 Unsundered, though 
 The springs that feed the briny wells go dry, 
 
 And mountains flee, and suns wax pale and go! 
 
SEA-SHELLS. 49 
 
 Though uninterpreted, 
 What tongue of prophecy, what mystic tone, 
 
 What voice as from the dead; 
 What intimation of a world unknown — 
 
 A rarer sphere 
 Transcending all — -the still uncharted zone 
 That vain we seek, so far and yet so near! 
 
 Though all things fade apace, 
 Do fade and fall, they pass not utterly; 
 
 Within your jasper vase 
 There lingers still a tone, a mystery, — 
 
 A something hides 
 Of glory fled, of love that cannot die: 
 
 All Life that ever was somewhere abides. 
 
 weary waiting soul! 
 Thou art not in thy loneliness alone; 
 
 Wherever billows roll, 
 Or sunlight falls, or pilgrim night -winds moan 
 
 On desert sand, 
 Some spirit wanders, yearning for its own, 
 And unforgotten far-off Fatherland. 
 
50 SEA- SHELLS. 
 
 exiled from the sea, 
 That homesick wander from your kin and clime! 
 
 What am I more than ye ? 
 Like ye, Life's foregone heritage sublime 
 
 I wait and weep: 
 A polyp, fainting on the shores of Time, 
 Vain longing for the illimitable deep. 
 
PHEBE. 
 
 Last horn, while wrapped in dreamy doze, 
 There came — or so it seemed to me — 
 The once familiar voice and free 
 Of one I may no longer see; 
 Yet ere I might, as glad I rose, 
 With greetings fit, my door unclose, 
 
 Came answer from the porch, " Phe-be." 
 
 As wakes some long - forgotten word 
 
 Par heard in childhood's Eden clime, 
 Or softly pealing Sabbath -chime 
 That makes the parted years sublime, 
 Though but by inmost spirit heard, 
 So came thy note, thou lowly bird, 
 Across the barren moors of Time. 
 
PHEBE. 
 
 Companion dear of Summers dead, 
 
 Spring's earliest herald, winged and fleet: 
 Though not the friend I yearned to greet, 
 No less I give thee welcome meet, 
 
 Nor mourn the fairer vision fled; 
 
 For of these lesser joys is fed 
 
 The hope that waits a joy complete. 
 
 Thanks that my weaker care is chid; 
 
 In blithesome scorn of sleet and snow 
 I had not thought to meet thee so, 
 Before the April violets blow; 
 
 But good and ill alike are hid: 
 
 Our happiness comes all unbid, 
 
 And takes unchartered wings to go. 
 
 What compass guides thy airy quest 
 
 Far over seas that storm and gloam ? 
 
 What longings prompt thy wing to roam ? 
 
 What yearnings to thy bosom come 
 To seek the dear remembered nest? 
 What heart is in that tiny breast, 
 
 So human in its love of home? 
 
PHEBE. 53 
 
 Oil sing, oh sing me once again 
 
 Thy homely "Phe-be" tenderly; 
 Nor let thy note, erst warbled free, 
 Less joyous wake, that unto me 
 It bears an undertone of pain — 
 A vanished Winter's sad refrain 
 
 Blent with the Summer's minstrelsy. 
 
 Soon shall thy lays, as oft of old, 
 
 Sweet lullabies in matron tongue 
 To dewy morns be softly sung; 
 With fragrance - laden roses hung, 
 Thy old-time nest, now hushed and cold, 
 Shall new love's priceless treasures hold — 
 Be clamorous with thy callow young. 
 
 Oh for thy free unsorrowed wing 
 
 To flee these wintry haunts of pain ! 
 Alas, it were but journeying vain: 
 No Summers from the spicy main 
 May to our fainting spirits bring 
 The breath of unforgotten Spring — 
 Our broken households build again. 
 
KATYDID. 
 
 Ere the sumachs crimson turning 
 Or the upland maples burning 
 
 Show a faintest tint of red; 
 While the primrose still is glowing, 
 And the faded pansies sowing 
 Seed for other seasons 1 blowing, 
 
 Wakes thy piping, Katydid. 
 
 Through the dusky twilight falling 
 Do I hear thee lonesome calling, 
 
 In thy grassy covert hid; 
 Of the minstrels of the Summer 
 Droning, dolorous, latest comer, 
 Autumn's earliest herald -drummer 
 
 Art thou, mournful Katydid. 
 
KATYDID. 55 
 
 Sadly falls thy ceaseless sighing 
 On the heart where hope is dying, 
 
 On the heart where love is dead; 
 Like an endless wail of sorrow, 
 Plaint of grief that may not borrow 
 Solace from the coming morrow — 
 
 Solemn -trilling Katydid. 
 
 Ever till our life be ended, 
 With the higher life inblended, 
 
 From all darkened memories hid, 
 But to hear thy harp at even, 
 As in days to sorrow given 
 Shall our hearts be newly riven; 
 Still to mind us, Katydid, 
 
 Of the watching, wan and weary, 
 Through the long hours sad and dreary, 
 
 Tearful eye and sleepless lid; 
 Watching orbs beloved, failing 
 Like the Star of Morning, paling, 
 Listening dear lips' fevered wailing, 
 
 And. thy moaning, Katydid. 
 
56 KATYDW. 
 
 Watching by the darkened river, 
 Slowly ebbing, ebbing ever, 
 
 Through the midnight dim and dread, 
 Feet of loved ones, fair as fleeting, 
 From the shores of Time retreating, 
 Harkening to our own heart -beating, 
 
 And thy joyless " Katydid." 
 
 Weary, woful, prayerful, tearful, 
 Waiting sad the moment fearful — 
 
 Knowing our beloved dead; 
 In Death's awful shadow lying, 
 Reft, despairing, anguished, dying, — 
 Oh, how cheerless comes thy sighing 
 To the love-lorn, Katydid! 
 
 Me — alas ! the song ye sing me 
 
 Doth such mournful memories bring me 
 
 Of the days to sorrow wed, 
 Olden loss doth new bereave me, 
 Olden griefs new deeply grieve me; 
 Hush thy requiem - chant, and leave me 
 
 Unto Silence, Katydid. 
 
SUNRISE BY THE SEA. 
 
 To gkeet the rising day 
 
 The waiting sea puts all her glory on; 
 The slow departing shadows, dim and gray, 
 
 More pale and wan, 
 Far to their gloomy caverns hurrying flee ; 
 As thousand tongues in voiceless melody 
 
 Sing "Hail thou morning sun! : ' 
 
 Porphyry, amethyst, 
 
 Jasper and ruby in one brightness blent, 
 Gay banners paint for Nature's royalest 
 
 Hierophant; 
 The weary winds a little space do rest, 
 While faint and far pulses the billows' breast - 
 
 Throbbing in deep content. 
 
58 SUNRISE BY THE SEA. 
 
 Out of the shining wave, 
 
 Slow mounting thence, robed in empurpled go!.l, 
 Comes forth the King of Day — lingers to lave 
 
 That brow so old 
 And yet so young, in the translucent tide; 
 Lingers like bridegroom by the willing bride, 
 
 When loving arms enfold. 
 
 Yet why so late to flee? 
 
 Some message for the loved ones far below? 
 Some parting kiss for one we may not see V 
 
 Bright rising, lo! 
 Up from the deep, robed in immortal charms, 
 A rarer orb, clasped in thy mighty arms, 
 
 As loth to let thee go. 
 
 Forgetting love's disguise 
 
 In love's entrance, lord of Potentates! 
 Low on the tide that peerless crescent lies; 
 
 Than on thee waits 
 A fairer queen and consort may not be, — 
 Fairer than Venus rising from the sea, 
 
 Parting the pearly gates. 
 
SUNB1SE BY THE SEA. 59 
 
 " One moment more !" — and still 
 
 "One moment more, oh yet my love delay!" 
 I hear, or so meseems ; — oh for the thrill, 
 
 The rapture — aye 
 The full impassioned madness of that bliss 
 That never, far - uprising, shalt thou miss, 
 
 Climbing the hills of Day! 
 
 " One moment more ! " — ah me ! 
 
 How vain to paint love's pure ecstatic glow 
 Supern, that only the immortals see — 
 
 That mortals know 
 As the lorn beggar riches; as lost soul 
 Knows heavenly peace, that hears despairing toll - 
 
 "Down to the depths below!" 
 
 " Oh, still one moment more!" 
 
 Yet while I list, loosed are the arms that twine; 
 The vision fades, as through some open doo. 
 
 A face divine 
 Looks on us and is gone; — the sun straightway 
 Climbs high the regal heavens, and leads the day 
 
 With a serener shine. 
 
60 SUNRISE BY THE SEA. 
 
 And higher still, and higher; 
 
 Still unto heights all meaner heights above, 
 Let evermore thy kindling feet aspire, 
 
 Thou mighty Jove! 
 A mightier than he of mythic fame, 
 Swift bearing wide the torch and oriflamme 
 
 Of an undying love. 
 
 Down in the purple deep 
 
 How unto one the long hours lightly wing, 
 Who there for thee love's tryst doth nightly keep; 
 
 Oh, who may bring 
 Up thence some hint of her transcendent bliss, 
 As brooding glad that last embrace and kiss 
 
 Of thee, her lord and king? 
 
 Thou that dost make the day, 
 
 If at love's threshold dear thou stoop'st to claim 
 One parting kiss, though long thy steps delay, 
 
 I may not blame; 
 Nor will I doubt thy fires eternal burn, 
 Now that my eyes have seen the hidden urn 
 
 Of all their quenchless flame. 
 
SUNRISE IIV THE SEA. 61 
 
 Still onward speed apace! 
 
 I may not marvel more, mighty sun, 
 Thou never tir'st — wading the deeps of space 
 
 Till day is done; 
 Remembering so the fairer orb that waits 
 To greet thee at the bright Hesperian Gates, 
 
 When thy far race is run. 
 
 Note.— The preceding poem was suggested by a phenomenon — as rare as 
 it is remarkable — witnessed by the writer in 1871, upon the shore of Lake 
 Michigan ; when by 6ome mirage or optical illusion, the 6un, as it rose from 
 the lake, appeared attended by a consort or duplicate orb. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
The World we behold is the Shadow of Life; 
 All things are of Being the outward impress; 
 
 Sits a Sphinx by each path that we tread; 
 If like a true Sibyl one riddle we guess, 
 Still ever within, with the Infinite rife, 
 Is there hidden a secret unread. 
 
 And meaning the inmost — the truest may be 
 
 To the mind and the heart — if outwardly wrought 
 
 Is of Truth hid a spectre and wraith; 
 The type can but symbol the' inflowing thought; 
 Each soul, as it needs, to its own finds the key— 
 And true Love is the key to true Faith. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 AN" ALLEGOBY. 
 
 Erewhile when these hills that slope gentle and fair 
 Were mountains so high they seemed lightly to bear 
 
 The sky in their rocky embrace; 
 When all the year long in its beauty unrolled 
 The meadow its green, wore the harvest its gold, 
 
 The Summer its glory and grace; 
 
 Then eyes they were clear, for the world it was new, 
 And ever the marvellous stories were true 
 
 That cannot be wholly forgot; 
 Then silver and gold, though they never were found, 
 In treasures uncounted were hid in the ground, 
 
 And dragons watched over the spot. 
 
 In river and wood dwelt sylphs, naiads, and fays, 
 Were everywhere seen in those wonderful days — 
 
 Though fled is the Faery race; 
 And who in this world is so spotless and good 
 To blame the sweet tenants of river and wood 
 
 For hiding each beautiful face? 
 
66 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 At eve, all the far -lapsing billows along 
 The niermaiden sang, and so charmed a song 
 
 That hushed was each murmuring wave; 
 And who harkened that dangerous minstrelsy 
 Went with her, alas! to her home in the sea — 
 
 To her home in a coral cave. 
 
 Then every maid was a shepherdess bold, 
 Yet gentle as was gentlest lamb in her fold; 
 
 So learned in Love's magical art 
 She could marry a prince whenever she would, 
 With a boundless estate, and noble and good, 
 
 And reign a proud queen of the heart. 
 
 In those marvellous days that all wonder enfold, 
 Bright days that illumine each legend of old 
 
 As sundown the westering main, 
 Far on the blue seas loomed with wave -warded strand 
 A mountain -girt, summer -clad, love -guarded land, 
 
 Undarkened of discord and pain. 
 
 Though where may be hidden the Beautiful Vale 
 Where care is unknown, where no sorrows assail, — 
 
 If isled on wide oceans afar, 
 I know not; — perchance it lies under the sea 
 Twice ten thousand fathoms; — though still it may be 
 
 Where gates of the Morning unbar. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 67 
 
 Howbeit — though shut from the wide world apart, 
 There prodigal Nature with kindliest art 
 
 Her gifts in such affluence poured, 
 That looking anear on each scene of delight 
 You had thought it an Eden unsorrowed of blight 
 
 Or to its lost beauty restored. 
 
 The hillside was gay with the citron and clove, 
 The olive tree grew with the fig in the grove, 
 
 The orange o'erburdened with scent; 
 The evening -born zephyr winged faint with perfume, 
 The orchard boughs reddened, adight with new bloom, 
 
 As low with ripe fruitage they bent. 
 
 By emerald sands, amid islands of calm, 
 
 Its shimmering track overshadowed with palm, 
 
 A river meandering went; 
 Went limpid and clear through the meadows along, 
 Went dallying, singing a lullaby song — 
 
 A murmur and song of content. 
 
 Free wandered the flocks, with their fleeces of snow 
 As white as the storm -girded Winter might show 
 
 Aloft in his silvery tent, 
 To new -springing pastures so luscious and green, 
 Or gaily anon might be frolicking seen 
 
 As on to the mountains they went. 
 
68 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 Thence sweetly their bleating like music would fall, 
 As homeward they came at each shepherdess' call, 
 
 When twilight its shadows'had cast; 
 Where yielding their milk- bearing udders, they lent 
 The joy -waiting cottager's home of content 
 
 The evening's delicious repast. 
 
 Where hearts all untainted of passion and strife 
 Grew guilelessly up in love's summering life, 
 
 That brightened from portal to roof 
 Each sylvan -wrought home, unadorned and plain, 
 From pleasures that leave in the bosom a stain 
 
 And vainer illusions aloof. 
 
 Whence forth at the morn, ever joyous and gay, 
 Went maidens and youths to the harvest away 
 
 Where golden it gleamed in the sun; 
 Or charmed the glad twilight with love -breathing lute, 
 Or lingered to dance to the tymbal and flute, 
 
 When the day with its labors was done. 
 
 May love so illumine the homeliest cot, 
 
 So charmed with content be the lowliest lot, 
 
 That sorrow may never assail ? 
 And was the true secret of happiness known — 
 Lost secret, alas!- — to that people alone 
 
 Who dwelt in the Beautiful Vale? 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 69 
 
 I know not : Lost Land, on far tropical sea 
 Haply shining serene, if only in thee, 
 
 Still lit with affections unchanged, 
 Are thresholds so bright that no shadows may cross, 
 Are hearthstones undarkened with anguish and loss — 
 
 Where lovers are never estranged. 
 
 And well you had doubted, one home to have seen, 
 Where joy ever wore its perennial green, 
 
 If Heaven has happier ones; 
 So rich without pride, without envy or blame, 
 So rich in the truest wealth woman may claim — 
 
 The treasure of beautiful sons. 
 
 Nor alone in the sunlight of motherly eyes: 
 For maidens, though hooded in maiden disguise, 
 
 Looked on them with partialest joy; 
 On Jehan the husbandman valiant and bold, 
 On Clarence the dreamer, that tended the fold, 
 
 And Reuben the studious boy. 
 
 So tranquil the skies were that over them bent, 
 They nigh unto manhood had journeyed content, 
 
 Nor tasted of pleasures unmeet; 
 Still slumbered desire in each peace - tented breast — 
 Desire that might waken the wish and unrest 
 
 To stray from that charmed retreat. 
 
70 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 That world all unknown — was it sombre and dread, 
 That wide from that rock - builded barrier spread, 
 
 Or sunny and mossy and green, 
 With mountains and valleys, and peopled with men ? 
 None ever had passed, thence returning again, 
 
 To tell of each wonderful scene. 
 
 A perilous way to him journeying there; 
 
 For lo! by the path that his footsteps must dare, 
 
 A cleft where a mountain had stood, 
 A fiery Dragon, by night and by day, 
 A fiery Dragon stood guarding the way — 
 
 Stood belching a fiery flood. 
 
 And he that would venture that Valley beyond 
 Must a talisman bear — a magical wand 
 
 The truly wise only may gain; 
 While he that would pass, said a prophet of old, 
 Unlearned in the secret, though fearless and bold, 
 
 Would sure by that Dragon be slain. 
 
 And why should there come to the dream-haunted heart 
 The wish from that beautiful home to depart, 
 
 Untroubled of sorrow or care? 
 And where in the wide world without and unknown 
 Were youths that to manlier stature had grown, 
 
 Or maidens more gentle and fair? 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 71 
 
 Yet had we the wings that could cleave the broad blue, 
 The pinions of Morning, and though it were true 
 
 We dwelt in an Eden of bliss, 
 How swift would we climb the bright ether afar, 
 If only to see if yon tiniest star 
 
 A world is, and fairer than this. 
 
 For deep in the soul the aspiring abides 
 
 To question each secret in Nature that hides — 
 
 Forever for knowledge athirst, 
 Not Heaven alone would it fearless explore, 
 But dauntless would tread the Plutonian Shore 
 
 And map the dark regions accursed. 
 
 Nor wonder the youth, on some star -guided trail 
 Far wandering alone in that Beautiful Vale, 
 
 Might dream of that magical wand; 
 And question if Cynthia, just hidden from sight 
 By high -beetling mountains, the peerless, might light 
 
 A fairer world lying beyond. 
 
 Nor alone in the light that so silvery shone, 
 
 That far world grew fairer — that far world unknown, 
 
 To Jehan, the longer he dreamed; 
 Till beauty anear had no beauty for him; 
 Noon's radiant sunshine with shadows was dim; 
 
 The horizon narrower seemed. 
 
72 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 No longer he led in the dance of delight, 
 
 No longer his lute charmed the listening night, 
 
 Nor songs cheered the lingering day; 
 Still brooded that shadow when toiling afield; 
 More darkly it deepened when midnight revealed 
 
 That Dragon dread guarding the way. 
 
 Still dreaming, and leaving his labor undone, 
 Chance guided, or led by the westering sun, 
 
 Or lured by that fatuous ray — 
 That vision of beauty — fatal unrest! — 
 With quickening footsteps he eagerly pressed 
 
 The path to the mountain away. 
 
 The loftiest peak that far dazzled and shone, 
 High lifted alluring its snow -mantled cone 
 
 O'er valley and river and wood; 
 Still toiling aloft on each intricate trail, 
 While dim and more dim shone the Beautiful Vale, 
 
 Upon the tall summit he stood. 
 
 When lo! from that airy empyrean height, 
 What realm of enchantment arose on his sight! 
 
 Elysian fields glimmer and gleam, 
 Enshrouding in gloom evermore to his eye 
 That Valley, close shut by the mountains so high; — 
 
 And this was the land of his dream! 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 73 
 
 There seeming to reach unto limitless day, 
 
 A new world, that broadened unbounded away, 
 
 Unto his rapt vision unrolled; 
 Where palaces shone, of all pleasures the shrine, 
 And gardens and fountains and statues divine 
 
 Gay glittered with crystal and gold. 
 
 Enrapt with the splendor and glory he saw, 
 He lingered, still gazing in wonder and awe 
 
 Till night -mists enshrouded the scene; 
 Then downward again through the darkness and gloam 
 Returning, he passed to his once happy home — 
 
 Alas, now how homely and mean ! 
 
 The mother who saw, with a motherly care, 
 Beneath the disguises that sorrow would wear, 
 
 Her joy-loving Jehan was sad, 
 Besought him, if ill had befallen to know — 
 If ill or misfortune had burdened with woe 
 
 The heart ever wont to be glad. 
 
 Said Jehan, "Our home is a prison; its ward 
 That Fiery Dragon, accursed and abhorred; 
 
 On cottage and meadow and lea 
 Forever the gloom and the shadows do lie, 
 Foreboding and dark, of the mountains so high; 
 
 And long have I yearned to be free. 
 
74 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 "I climbed to their cloud -mantled summit to-day: 
 More fair than I dreamed is that far world away; 
 
 There lie, with gold- glittering strand, 
 The Isles of Delight, with all splendors aglow; 
 The home of all pleasures; — to-morrow I go 
 
 To dwell in that beautiful land. 
 
 "A holiday life, a perpetual joy, 
 
 No toiling to trouble, no want to annoy; 
 
 Such plenty this poverty mocks; 
 Such pleasures and riches we never may guess 
 Who only the fruits of our orchards possess — 
 
 The fleeces and milk of our flocks." 
 
 fatalest vision of beauty ! his sight, 
 If only it were in a dream of the night, 
 
 Beyond the horizon had flown; 
 Already his footsteps were wandering free: 
 Ere long, and a palace of crystal should be 
 
 His home in that new world unknown. 
 
 The mother but sighed, "All illusive and vain;" 
 Yet felt in her heart the foreboding of pain 
 
 That ever some sorrow betides; 
 Nor hastily chiding his purpose unwise, 
 Bent tenderly on him love's pitying eyes, 
 
 Whose lid the tear tremblingly hides; 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 75 
 
 To soon overflow with its anguish and pain 
 For treasure the years may not render again — 
 
 For loss Time may never requite; 
 For oh! at the dawn, he, her Jehan, would tread 
 The perilous way past that barrier dread, 
 
 To dwell hi the Land of Delight. 
 
 So luring the vision that beckoned away, 
 Unheeded the tears that besought him to stay — 
 
 The mother's low -murmuring sigh; 
 "Oh, why should I live but this day to behold? 
 Ah me ! that the Siren of Pleasure or Gold 
 
 Should sever Love's beautiful tie! 
 
 "Yet harken and know, if my counsels are vain: 
 None ever may pass till that Dragon be slain; 
 
 Say, have you that talisman won? 
 None ever may venture the Valley beyond 
 But he whose hand beareth that magical wand — 
 
 Remember, my son, my son!" 
 
 No answer he gave ; but the earliest dawn 
 Looked down on that cottage, and Jehan was gone; 
 
 At sunrise, more fierce than before, 
 That -Dragon, mad -glaring and bloody the same, 
 Wide vomited torrents of sulphurous flame, — 
 
 And Jehan was heard of no more. 
 
76 THE NAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 When Time with soft healing a solace had lent, 
 The Mother glad smiled in her home of content, 
 
 As one that no sorrow had crossed; 
 Yet oft when the day on the mountain was dim, 
 Her eye thence turned tearful: her thought was of him 
 
 Her first-born — of Jehan, the lost. 
 
 Albeit the heart, every burden resigned, v 
 
 For pain and bereavement the sorest, shall find 
 
 A balm in the medicined years; 
 Yet oh, if for grief but this comfort accrue, 
 The swift -winging moments still open anew 
 
 Forever the fountain of tears. 
 
 And woe to the widowed! — one grief overpassed 
 Is only of sorrows one nearer the last; 
 
 New stricken with anguish untold, 
 Her Clarence she saw by the hearth's paling light 
 Sit brooding that vision, illusive as bright, 
 
 That lost her her Jehan of old. 
 
 A joy in his labor no longer he found, 
 
 But more, as the days wore monotonous round, 
 
 He pensive and silent became; 
 Like Jehan, he climbed to that cloud - mantled height 
 Like Jehan, he gazed on that Land of Delight, 
 
 With yearnings and longings the same. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 77 
 
 He saw the world broaden so boundless away, 
 Where moved the vast throng in their brilliant array, 
 
 The horizon looming immense, 
 With billowy seas to his wondering view, 
 With lands still beyond in the limitless blue, 
 
 Far shining more luminous thence. 
 
 The sunset had left all the mountain aflame, 
 As down to the night -glooming Valley he came; 
 
 How mean seemed the life he had led! 
 How rude and unsightly that cottage, his home — 
 His home now no longer, for he too would roam, 
 
 That land of enchantment would tread. 
 
 The Mother, whose heart bore the prescient pain 
 Of sorrow -foreboding, besought him in vain: 
 
 "What good" can my darling desire? 
 Oh, what has befallen my Clarence to-day — 
 So wont to be cheerful and tuneful and gay ? 
 Why slumber his songs and his lyre ? " 
 
 "Our Valley is small," said the youth in reply; 
 " The horizon narrow, the mountains so high 
 
 The shadows lie darkly below; 
 That far world away — oh how peerless and grand! 
 My feet will not rest from that beautiful land; — 
 
 To - morrow, to - morrow I go ! " 
 
78 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 Love answered him weeping: "What more do you know 
 Than he that was lost in the days long ago — 
 
 My first - born, my beautiful son ? 
 Oh, why will you venture the mountain to pass, 
 Again to o'erwhelm me with sorrow — alas! 
 
 Say, have you that talisman won?" 
 
 " Yea, Mother, for mine is a worthier quest," 
 Said Clarence; "this burning desire in my breast 
 
 No thought of mere pleasure has fanned; 
 I go for no purpose ignoble and vain: 
 I bear, in the wish and the longing to gain 
 
 All knowledge, that magical wand." 
 
 Low bent, as thrice widowed, the Mother again 
 Sat weeping till Midnight looked in at the pane, 
 
 Sad harkened her sorrowing wail; 
 For knew she how false, how deceitful the charm 
 Of knowledge — that knowledge might never disarm 
 
 That guardian fierce of the Vale. 
 
 The eyes of the Morning, all tearful and red, 
 Bent mournful on Reuben, as lonely he led 
 
 His flocks to their pastures so green; 
 More fierce and mad -glaring, and bloody the same, 
 That Dragon stood belching wide torrents of flame: 
 
 And Clarence — he never was seen. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 79 
 
 And in the glad Summers that beautiful wore, 
 His name in that Valley was spoken no more; 
 
 Or only, her loss to bemoan, 
 To Reuben, the Mother's now only delight, 
 Was whispered, and softly, as sadly at night 
 
 They mused by the fireside alone. 
 
 heart of the Mother! forever to bear 
 Its infinite sorrow of love and despair! 
 
 Howbeit, but darkly we know: 
 Yet ever some truth in Tradition is found, 
 And many, alas! by that Dragon lie bound — 
 
 Bound fast in a region of woe. 
 
 And oft when the Midnight shone angry and red, 
 
 Came sounds from afar, as of anguish and dread, 
 
 Lamenting and sorrowing vain; 
 
 While ever anon, fearful borne on the air, 
 
 Came tumult of battle, the wail of despair, 
 
 The moaning of spirits in pain. 
 * * * 
 
 The earth mantles green that the earthquake has rent; 
 The hills shine new-verdured when Winter is spent; 
 
 New bourgeons with sweetness the grove; — 
 So kindles anew in the desolate years 
 The day-star of Hope, quenched in anguish and tears, 
 
 Re -lit with the sunshine of Love. 
 
80 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 The Mother erelong, not to sorrow in vain, 
 Took up all her love -bearing burdens again — 
 
 Though widowed, not wholly bereft; 
 Though, telling of griefs for the loves she had lost, 
 Her brow wore a circlet of silver and frost, 
 
 More joyed she in one that was left. 
 
 And patient at evening, at morning, and noon, 
 Her spindle she plied, with its musical tune 
 
 Beguiling the care in her breast; 
 Yet oft, when the twilight fell sober and pale, 
 Would tears, with sad memories burdened, unveil 
 
 Unbidden, the sorrowful guest. 
 
 And is there an ever unmedicined woe? 
 Howbeit we know not; this only we know: 
 
 When breaks on the desolate years 
 Some loss that Time never may lighten again, 
 How dull seems the smart of a sorrow whose pain 
 
 May yield to the solace of tears! 
 
 And what unto her, the thrice -widowed, was left? 
 Alas! to that bosom so sorely bereft 
 
 The sorrow of sorrows had come; 
 The last of her treasures — her staff and her joy — 
 Her Reuben, her comfort, her studious boy, 
 
 Sat joyless and dreaming and dumb. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 81 
 
 eyes of the Mother! what pleading and prayer! 
 heart of the Mother, unbroken to bear 
 
 Of love the remembered caress ! 
 What bodings of ill all the future bethrong, 
 Well knowing, dream -haunted, his footsteps ere long 
 
 That path of enchantment would press. 
 
 What marvel to him would the morrow unveil? 
 At dawn he had passed on the mountain -led trail 
 
 With light -speeding footsteps and bold; 
 On him the bright world of immensity smiled, 
 Whose glories illusive so fatal beguiled — 
 
 Lost Jehan and Clarence of old. 
 
 Fair broadened the same to his wondering sight 
 The boundless horizon; the Land of Delight 
 
 In limitless splendor unrolled; 
 Where threshold and portal and pillar and dome 
 Of many a palace, of pleasure the home, 
 
 Gay glittered with crystal and gold. 
 
 Rapt in wonder and awe a moment he stood, 
 
 Nor questioned the pageant if evil or good, 
 
 Allured with its shimmer and sheen; 
 
 But gazing intent, with his sight clearer grown, 
 
 In a world that to others so beautiful shone 
 
 He saw but a sorrowful scene, 
 li 
 
82 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 He saw in that new world so seemingly fair 
 JNo brow but was dark with the shadow of care, 
 
 Though dwelling mid splendors untold; 
 Each phantom delight that evanishing rose 
 Was but the delirious frenzy of those 
 
 Whose gods are but pleasure and gold. 
 
 Palace, pillar, and dome, with their glitter and glow, 
 All things he beheld, were but treacherous show; 
 
 The gardens of beauty and bloom 
 Bore only the fruit that is bitter to taste; 
 The blossoms — if blossoms there brightened the waste, 
 
 Were poppies of deadly perfume. 
 
 An innermost life with true being is wed: 
 As this, so the outward is, living or dead, — 
 
 The living alone shall remain; 
 Whatever of Truth or of Beauty there hides 
 In the soul, in the world is in which it abides; 
 
 All else is illusive and vain. 
 
 His footsteps delayed on the rqck-builded height, 
 Till loftier purpose that sorrowing sight 
 
 Awoke in his pitying breast; 
 And he too would go — every danger would dare, 
 Might he the true secret of happiness bear 
 
 Afar to that people unblest. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 83 
 
 Grew stronger and deeper that worthier aim, 
 
 As downward he passed — to the cottage he came, 
 
 To dream of that magical wand; 
 If only by him might the Dragon be slain ! 
 Still deeply he pondered that vision of pain — 
 
 That charmed but illusory land. 
 
 The Mother, low bowed in new terror and dread, 
 Bent on him, as silent we look on the dead; 
 
 For well, without question, she guessed 
 That he too, her Reuben, that border would pass — 
 His footsteps the path to the mountain, alas ! 
 
 That path of enchantment had pressed. 
 
 Nor more did she weep, for the fountain of tears 
 Within her was dry with the sorrow of years; 
 
 Nor minded the pitying Dawn, 
 Though all the long night of her anguish was spent 
 Low moaning, as o'er the dead embers she bent, 
 "Oh he, my last treasure, is gone!" 
 
 Rain torrents of flame on his venturous head! 
 Make fiery the pathway he fearless must tread, 
 
 Who passes that Valley beyond! 
 Weave, evil -taught demons, your sorcerous thrall! 
 Yet him, midst all perils, no ill shall befall, 
 
 If bearing that magical wand. 
 
84 THE HAPPY VALLEY. 
 
 When tardy the Morning, and mournful, at last 
 Looked down on the Valley, thence Reuben had passed, 
 
 Had passed at the earliest sheen; 
 But lo! when the Day on the mountain was bright — 
 Had drowned all the sombering shadows with light, 
 
 That Dragon no longer was seen. 
 
 Dim rising afar on her tear -darkened view, 
 What wonder is there ? — could her vision be true ? 
 
 The Mother rejoices again; 
 That Dragon, that ever by night and by day 
 Stood barring the path to that far world away, 
 
 That Dragon her Reuben had slain! 
 
 And still as she gazed, lo! what marvels unfold? 
 What splendors break fair over woodland and wold ? 
 
 More bright, with a lovelier bloom, 
 Earth, thrilling ecstatic, quick mantles and glows; 
 Arrayed in new beauty, each flower that blows 
 
 Is sweet with a rarer perfume. 
 
 More golden the harvest that billows the plain, 
 With sound of the sickle blends happier strain 
 
 That joyous the reapers prolong; 
 The groves stand enrapt, with new blossoms adight, 
 More tremulous thrill with a sense of delight — 
 
 Are vocal with happier song. 
 
THE HAPPY VALLEY. 85 
 
 All Nature, endowed with a tenderer grace, 
 Like angel of mercy, that seeks to erase 
 
 All record of error and blame, 
 Glad kindles and quickens with beauty, until 
 Field, meadow, and woodland, and valley, and hill, 
 
 The triumph of Virtue proclaim. 
 
 Not he that would be of all Riches possessed, 
 Nor he that would pass of all Knowledge in quest, 
 
 Might venture that Valley beyond; 
 He only that spell of enchantment withstood 
 Who sought not his own, but of others the good: 
 
 Love — Love was that Magical Wand. 
 
SONGS OF THE SEASONS. 
 
Though all things with the changeful Seasons flee, 
 A garland glorious in its odorous shine 
 A few fleet sunny Summer hours may twine, 
 To fade, then spring again 
 
 In sun and shine — 
 The myriad lowly blooms on hill and plain ; 
 While evermore the changeful Seasons flee — 
 Forever onward flee. 
 
 The thoughts that light the temple of the Soul, 
 The fire that burns upon its inner shrine, 
 The lore and faith that from its depths outshine,- 
 That shall not all depart, 
 
 But bloom and twine 
 In Winters as in. Summers of the heart; 
 These mark the years unto the Iking Soul — 
 The ever -living Soul. 
 
SPRING VOICES. 
 
 Rose, whose tiny buds enfold 
 
 The promise of a perfect flower ; 
 Tulip, that a precious dower 
 
 Of beauty in thy heart dost hold; 
 
 Lily, that a robe of gold 
 
 Art weaving for thy bridal hour; 
 
 Ye Hyacinths, whose petals show 
 
 More than the blue of Summer skies;. 
 Ye Pansies that so fair arise 
 
 And smile on April's sleet and snow; 
 
 Ye Violets that bashful show 
 
 The heaven that is in loving eyes; 
 
 And all ye waiting blooms that sleep 
 The sleep by rarest dreams beguiled; 
 Ye children of the wood and wild 
 
 That watch, but do not watch and weep; — 
 
 Oh for the simple trust ye keep ! 
 Your saintly faith, undefiled! 
 
90 SPRING VOICES. 
 
 Though fierce the stormy tempest rage, 
 Ye only hear the murmuring 
 Of Summer, like the dreams that bring 
 
 The vision of Love's golden age; 
 
 And thrill to rapture's dim presage, 
 The pulse and prophecy of Spring. 
 
 Oh for your patient "All is well;" 
 
 Though shrouded deep in gloom and night, 
 Of radiant hours of dear delight 
 Your dimly -folded petals tell, 
 As wing, dark brooding in the shell, 
 Foreshows a free aerial flight. 
 
 heart of mine ! and art thou less 
 
 Than flower the kindly soil inurns? 
 The faithful sun to it returns — 
 
 Thy proper good thou shalt not miss; 
 
 More than a paradise of bliss 
 
 Lives in the soul that loves and yearns. 
 
SEED-TIME. 
 
 Oh, this the Toiler's happy fate: 
 
 He shall not toil in vain; 
 So, toiling early, toiling late, 
 
 Till well the gleby plain; 
 Cast in the fruitful seed and wait 
 
 The sunshine, dew, and rain; 
 Though many a morn shall come and go, 
 
 And night succeed the day, 
 Full -eared the ripened sheaf shall glow 
 
 In Autumn's halcyon ray. 
 
 Nor less, with labor made sublime 
 
 By purpose true and strong, 
 Sow all the fallow fields of Time 
 
 With Thought and Deed and Song; 
 And trust, from farthest land and clime, 
 
 The waiting heart erelong 
 Shall gather in its harvest hoard 
 
 Of precious corn and oil, 
 And wine of love, to brim the board — 
 
 Make glad the after -toil. 
 
A SONG OF MAY. 
 
 Theke's a harp in the boughs of the lindens again, 
 
 Like the voices my infancy knew; 
 There are tiny throats trilling a joyous refrain 
 
 To the morning bejewelled with dew; 
 And the dear baby -buds that all beauty enfold, 
 
 Softly peep from their covert to-day; 
 Lo! the Hyacinth's purple and Daffodil's gold 
 
 Are unveiling the glory of May. 
 
 There are Cowslips bestarring the moor -meadow green, 
 
 Budding Buttercups pale with surprise; 
 Sunny Dandelions couched in their velvety screen 
 
 Are outlooking with wondering eyes; 
 While the sweet -bringing bee in the orchard a-hum 
 
 "Vagrant loiters the noon -tide away, 
 Till the drone of his piping with sweetness is dumb 
 
 In the bountiful blossoms of May. 
 
A SOXO OF MAY. 93 
 
 There are Violets dear that have been with us long — 
 
 Spring's first darlings from under the snow; 
 And the frailer Anemones haply prolong 
 
 Vanished April's ephemeral show; • 
 
 Far the Dogwood is showering its snow in the dells, 
 
 And the Hazel with tassels is gay; 
 Softly rings the Azalia its silvery bells 
 
 To the rivulet's murmur of May. 
 
 And the Tulip I see, in the pride of her bloom, — 
 
 She has put on her gaudiest suit 
 For the Lilac, outbreathing a luscious perfume 
 
 To the Strawberry's promise of fruit; 
 High the Iris is bearing his helmet and spear — 
 
 Fair unfolding his azuring ray; 
 While the sigh of the slumbering Roses I hear, 
 
 All impatient of lingering May. 
 
 Yet how vain is the charm of each murmurous lute, 
 
 Vain the dower of all beauty, to him 
 Who must mourn the sweet music of lips that are mute 
 
 And the sunshine of eyes that are dim; 
 In each flowering bell, through each chorister's throat, 
 
 Sings the Summer a sorrowing lay 
 To the heart that still misses Love's rapturing note 
 
 From the merriest anthems of May. 
 
JUNE. 
 
 Month of Flora! month of roses! 
 
 Bring again the gifts divine; 
 Autumn's gold thy heart encloses; — 
 In the garlands thou dost twine 
 Hides the heaping Horn of Plenty — brims the vintage - 
 glowing wine. 
 
 When the dewy dawn is breaking 
 Unto morn serene and grand, 
 Hark! exultant anthem waking 
 
 Of the wildwood's warbling band, 
 Like a wind-swept harp Molism, joyful thrilling all the 
 land. 
 
 High the Thrush his song is swelling 
 Where no meaner voice intrudes; 
 
 Far the Wood -dove's note is telling 
 
 Love's soft matin through the woods, 
 While a home of beauty building mid the leafy solitudes. 
 
JUNE. 95 
 
 Mad with Joy's delirium panting, 
 
 Nearer sings the Oriole; 
 Loud the Bobolink is chanting 
 " Bob -o -link," with fiery soul, 
 Till through all the woodland arches wide the music 
 billows roll. 
 
 Lowly minstrels! long above ye 
 
 Gently wave the budding sprays; 
 Never will I cease to love ye; — 
 Let your choral roundelays 
 Waken still Love's wild aspirings, yearnings for harmo- 
 nious days. 
 
 Though the Seasons swiftly leave us, 
 
 Each some precious boon shall bring; 
 Nor shall ever Hope deceive us 
 
 Waiting for the coming Spring— 
 Waiting for the promised Summer, with its light and 
 blossoming. 
 
AUTUMN FLOWERS. 
 
 Though but a memory is the flowery reign 
 Of gentle Spring, out of the days before; 
 
 And Summer, journeying over hill and plain, 
 By sea and shore, 
 
 Jewelled and crowned, leading a joyous train, 
 And gorgeous, is no more ; — 
 
 Still unto Autumn suns is beauty born : 
 
 One Artist -hand paints every flower that blows; 
 The garlands that October's brow adorn 
 
 Are dear as those 
 By lovely June in all her glory worn, 
 
 Crowned with the royal Rose. 
 
 The garden boasts the Dahlia's regal show; 
 
 The many-hued Verbenas glint and shine; 
 Uplifts the Feverfew its brow of snow; 
 
 Still climb and twine 
 The Morning-glories; Portulacas glow — 
 . Flame like a ruby -mine. 
 
AUTUMN FLOWERS. 97 
 
 And all the common flowers — a lowly race — 
 
 Their bloom prolong: — the Zinnias bright unfold; 
 
 The Cockscomb proud flaunts high each gaudy grace; 
 The Marigold, 
 
 Though rude and homely, wears the cheerful face 
 It wore in days of old. 
 
 The Primrose frail, like her the Summer knew, 
 Hides from the ardor and the glare of noon; 
 
 Bears to the stars, as erst she poured unto 
 The Harvest -moon, 
 
 The fervor of a passionate heart and true 
 Though paling all too soon. 
 
 In borders wide the Asters radiant bloom — 
 For beauty's lofty guerdon vie and cope ; 
 
 The wind that murmurs by the Violet's tomb 
 Of vanished hope, 
 
 Comes laden with the Mignonette's perfume 
 And breath of Heliotrope. 
 
 Still keeps the Amaranth, nor overworn, 
 
 The loveliness that saw the Summer come; 
 
 And one shall glad the Christmas hour adorn — 
 Chrysanthemum, 
 
 Made dearer for the kisses latest -born 
 Of lips now cold and dumb. 
 
98 AUTUMN FLOWERS. 
 
 In shady nooks the gentle Pansies show 
 
 A smile as tender as the buds that blew — 
 
 Buds born too soon — amid the April snow; 
 I wander through 
 
 The tranquil woods with Golden Rod aglow, 
 And Speedwell's sapphire -hue. 
 
 Nor these alone illume the waning hour: 
 
 Along the moor with fierce intensity 
 Kindles and burns the scarlet Cardinal Flower; 
 
 And hosts there be — 
 The miscalled weeds, that, dowered with beauty's dower, 
 
 Gleam like a golden sea. 
 
 And oh, if chance the tempest's ruder kiss 
 
 Leave all the flowers of Spring untimely sere, 
 
 Or drouth lay waste the Summer's loveliness, 
 Thrice doubly dear 
 
 Are ye, Autumnal blooms ! that charm and bless 
 The slowly - passing year. 
 
 And best beloved, long -sought, late -found, — mine 
 More than this blossomed sweetness, Friend of Fate ! 
 
 Though on life's hills the hues of Autumn shine, 
 All seasons wait 
 
 Alike the Rose of Love — the flower divine, 
 That never blooms too late. 
 
PARTING SUMMER. 
 
 There is a moaning on the breath of morn, 
 
 A solemn cadence in the rillet's chime, 
 A voice foreboding on the night -winds borne — 
 
 The first low breathing of the wintry time. 
 The while meek Summer over all things broods 
 
 And pensive ponders on each lessening day, 
 There comes a glory on the ripened woods — 
 
 The sure precursor of a swift decay. 
 
 The corn is bending to the zephyrs free, 
 
 Its thick ears waving with a flush of gold; 
 The fruit is ripening on each orchard tree, 
 
 The nut is browning on the hazel -wold; 
 But she, the Beauteous, who had hardly known 
 
 One tearful trouble, in her sorrow lies; 
 Her song is saddened in its every tone, 
 
 And dimmed the shining of her lustrous eyes. 
 
100 PARTING SUMMER. 
 
 And when her sceptre from her swaying falls, 
 
 Oh, who would chide her for the brimming tear, 
 While to our hearts for sympathy she calls, 
 
 Through all the voices of the failing year? 
 As thrills our being with a sudden pain, 
 
 When fall the shadows of life's closing day, 
 To find its promise of fruition vain, 
 
 So freely trusted all the coming way; 
 
 As stirs the spirit with a dread unrest 
 
 And trails its pinion in the very dust, 
 As bowed with anguish is the aching breast 
 
 Ere Hope is anchored in a higher trust, — 
 So is she stricken with the sorest grief: 
 
 And oh, what wonder she should make such moan, 
 To leave the treasures of a life so brief, 
 
 And all things lovely that are still her own ? 
 
 Erewhile I marked her as she musing strayed 
 
 Through paths oft trodden in the vanished time 
 When gaily wandering as the vernal maid, 
 
 Or glad and joyous in her matron prime; 
 Soft charms still kindled in those features fair, 
 
 Quick feeling trembled in her troubled eye; 
 Her cheek still mantled through its lines of care, 
 
 Her lip low murmured through each stifled sigh: 
 
PARTING SUMMER. 101 
 
 "How have I nurtured ye with light and dew, 
 
 Ye woods, far waving with your glossy spray; 
 Each leaf now fading where it fluttering grew 
 
 Shall soon be wafted by the winds away, 
 And heaped and moulding in the lonely vale 
 
 With every semblance of its greenness gone, 
 Or trod by truant on the upland trail, 
 
 Or rustle fearful to the startled fawn. 
 
 " And you, ye songsters of the airy wing, 
 
 I well with plenty have your wants supplied; 
 And still contented could I hear ye sing, 
 
 Nor dream of aught of recompense beside ; 
 But now the voices of the grove are mute, 
 
 Save few more venturous that may still prolong 
 Joy's dying anthems with a lonely flute — 
 
 And these are singing too their parting song. 
 
 "And yon bright lakelets shall I see no more, 
 
 With white waves flashing in the Summer's pride ? 
 Will ye not sadden to the saddened shore, 
 
 With storm-clouds mirrored in your glassy tide? 
 And you, ye rillets of the silver chime, 
 
 That gleam and sparkle like a love -lit eye, 
 Will ye not miss me in the coming time, 
 
 And dim and darken to the darkened sky? 
 
102 PASTING SUMMEB. 
 
 ''And must I leave you in your beauty all, 
 
 Ye haunts so cherished, of field, wood, and glade, 
 And know ye shrouded in a gloom and pall, 
 
 A dearth all darkly on your brightness laid? 
 The earth was starry with my tiny flowers, 
 
 Now lost, or sweetly unto fruitage grown; 
 That soon, when ripened in the golden hours, 
 
 Shall Autumn garner as if all his own. 
 
 " Still would I tarry if I might with these, 
 
 If but in pleasures of the Past to dwell; 
 I may not rest me but beyond the seas, — 
 
 My reign is ended, and I go: Farewell." 
 But still she lingered, as if loth to part 
 
 From scene and vision with her being twined; 
 And how can woman, with a woman's heart, 
 
 Forget each idol that it once hath shrined? 
 
 And still she lingered; and I could but mourn 
 
 To see her grieving, and so soon to go; — 
 But hark! she listens to the sounding horn 
 
 Of Autumn, winding in the vale below; 
 Startled, she gazes on a stranger crest — 
 
 (She hardly knew him for her tear -dimmed sight); 
 Then swift reclining on his manly breast, 
 
 Re -gave his greeting with a heart -delight. 
 
PASTING SUMMER. 103 
 
 And many a day — a long bright sunny time — 
 
 These twain have tarried, and ye could not know 
 If this were Summer's in her sober prime, 
 
 Or that were Autumn's in his genial glow; 
 But late I marked him with a ruffled brow, 
 
 A look of sternness in his troubled eyes; 
 A frown is shrouding their effulgence now, 
 
 And clouds are flying through the startled skies. 
 
 Like sparks outpouring from some furnace fire, 
 The woods are showering off their crimson locks; 
 
 The winds blow boisterous in their fitful ire — 
 " The first up -gathering of the Equinox. 
 
 And she, the Beauteous, with a brow serene, 
 As if the calm of heavenly hope it wore, 
 
 Gave one look fondly at each olden scene, 
 One smile of parting, and was seen no more. 
 
ASPHODEL. 
 
 Sad September winds are swelling 
 
 Through the dreary Autumn wood; 
 As some haunting shade were telling 
 
 Through that regal solitude 
 Of the Past's untimely perished, 
 
 The beloved of gayer hours, 
 Early lost, too deeply cherished, — 
 
 Blighted hopes and faded flowers. 
 
 Once — what time the bee was drunken 
 
 On the orchard -bough's perfume, 
 In the Cowslip's calyx sunken, 
 
 Or the Lilac's purple bloom, — 
 By my path a flower was blowing, 
 
 With the Snow -drops, fair and frail; 
 A more living beauty growing 
 
 Than the pride of Sharon's Vale. 
 
ASPHODEL. 105 
 
 Ever from its morning natal 
 
 Did my heart all lovingly 
 Watch each tiny folded petal 
 
 Slow unveil its mystery; 
 Though, the hours with brightness winging, 
 
 Wheresoe'er the sunlight fell 
 Were a thousand blooms upspringing, 
 
 None so fair as Asphodel. 
 
 But the Mignonette is faded, 
 
 Dimmed the Tulip's gaudy dyes, 
 And the light of pity shaded 
 
 In the Violet's brimming eyes; 
 No ambrosia sweetly lingers 
 
 In the Rose's nectar -wells, 
 And no sound of fairy fingers 
 
 In the faded Lily -bells. 
 
 Lone the wood -haunts sleep ungladdened 
 With the Speedwell's sapphire blue, 
 
 Prone the Clematis lies saddened 
 With a love -forsaken hue; 
 
 Darkly quenched the frail aspiring 
 Of the Jasmine's slender stem; 
 
 Thick the clustered Vine is firing 
 
 With the Autumn's diadem; 
 11 
 
106 ASPHODEL. 
 
 Summer's troubled cheek is paling; 
 
 And my heart, bereft and sore, 
 With the widowed hours is wailing 
 
 For the Beautiful — no more; 
 All the garden walks are lonely, 
 
 Waking to no little tread; 
 All things wore a beauty only 
 
 In the love that now is dead. 
 
 Grief, alas! my grief to heighten, 
 
 In my loss is other known ; 
 All earth's fairest gifts do brighten 
 
 With a radiance not their own; 
 All things beauteous and tender — 
 
 Summer blooms and sunset skies - 
 Wear alone their Eden splendor 
 
 In the light of loving eyes. 
 
OCTOBER. 
 
 Oh how I love ye, pensive Autumn days, 
 
 With suns so meek, so beautiful and brief; 
 
 When grove and tree shed down the crimson leaf, 
 And Summer birds have sung their parting lays; 
 When lowly lies each haunt by vale and hill 
 
 In mellow brightness of the hazy skies; 
 When, as in thought, all Nature hushed and still 
 
 In sober, dreamy melancholy lies. 
 Why do ye win me so — oh, who may tell? 
 
 As yields the doting heart the deepest trust, 
 As bows the stubborn will to Beauty's spell, 
 So do I pour an homage full and free, 
 
 Because I would, but more because I must, 
 Unto the days the loveliest that be. 
 
AUTUMN. 
 
 With radiant brow, though deeply furrowed o'er 
 With lines of toil, old Autumn, hale appearing, 
 
 As if content with plenty, seeks no more; 
 
 Leans on his staff and eyes his treasured store, 
 The woe -worn wizard Want no longer fearing; 
 Broods o'er the Past — each tender thought endearing 
 His young loves, now no more. 
 
 And who the story of his days may tell, 
 Each deed and purpose of his heart divining? 
 
 These, like his sheaves, are ripe and garnered well- 
 All safely locked in Memory's deepest cell ; 
 Now, like a bough, no golden fruit inclining, 
 Or leafless tree where no brown nut is shining, 
 When all are hoarded well. 
 
AUTUMN. 109 
 
 And much of gladness, though in life's decline, 
 Yet warms his breast, in every feature glowing; 
 He quaffs a bumper of the choicest wine, 
 Still fresh from vintage where the clusters shine; 
 His full hand freely unto Want bestowing — 
 O'erjoyed to see the cup of all, high flowing 
 With oil and corn and wine. 
 
 Yet have I marked him when in pensive mood 
 Hard by my way on mossy bank reclining; 
 But on his rest I never dared intrude, — 
 His tearful eye forbade obtrusion rude; 
 Such snowy locks his kingly forehead twining, 
 With Such a presence all around him shining, 
 I never dared intrude. 
 
 Though oft when passing with a lingering tread 
 I could but think the old man's heart was breaking; 
 His lips were calling on the loved and dead, 
 And free the flowing of the tears he shed; 
 Now to his sight the Past new beauty taking, 
 While every thought, unconscious sigh awaking, 
 Was of the loved and dead. 
 
110 AUTUMN. 
 
 And thus he mused: " How long since low we laid 
 Your faded forms, loved ones buried lying! 
 
 How many well -endeared doth cypress shade! 
 
 And beauteous Flora — her, the gentlest maid" — 
 (My own eyes moistened at his tears and sighing) 
 "Her of the early wed and early dying — 
 Her too doth cypress shade. 
 
 "My toil -got gold — oh what a bootless gain! 
 And this the end of all my striving, praying: 
 My loves, my hopes, my aspirations vain, 
 Outliving all of life itself but pain — 
 The sense the deepest and the latest staying; 
 No pitying hand its keenest pang allaying — 
 Hopes, aspirations, vain." 
 
 While yet bis tear -wet eye and heaving breast 
 Betokened still his grief found no beguiling, 
 A lovely form, with grace celestial blest, 
 Came softly nigh, and sought his place of rest; 
 I knew sweet Summer by her kindly smiling, 
 That oft erewhile, a darkened moment whiling, 
 My own lone heart had blest. 
 
AUTUMN. Ill 
 
 She had come back — yes, had come back again, 
 To olden scenes, serene and calm outlying; 
 To linger yet awhile on hill and plain 
 Where erst she wandered with a joyous train, 
 Ere earth's soft music knew a tone of sighing, 
 Ere bright things saddened at the thought of dying, 
 O'er hill or vale or plain. 
 
 But not to mourn her youthful visions o'er — 
 One glorious faith from out their wreck retrieving: 
 
 Though grief at frost and blight were deep and sore, 
 
 That all of Love will live forevermore, 
 That fadeless wreath eternity is weaving; 
 But oh ! to find her friend so deeply grieving, 
 It pained her sad and sore. 
 
 That meeting who may paint? — my pen is weak; 
 The deep, deep pulsing of the heart's revealing 
 Is language truer than the tongue can speak, 
 Though on expression every power it wreak; 
 The long, long, warm embrace its fount unsealing — ■ 
 The ebb and flowing of the tide of feeling 
 Leave naught for lips to speak. 
 
112 AUTUMN. 
 
 And may not love have home — yea, love refined 
 In chastened breast with holiest passion swelling? 
 
 Such are the magnet sympathies that bind 
 
 In deeper, closer unity of mind, 
 The kin of thought — of life whose spirit dwelling 
 Is in the One Great Heart, whose love outwelling 
 For aye doth all things bind. 
 
 Nor strange that gladness should resume her reign, 
 As with all Hope -charmed words her lips were showing 
 
 The stern though dread necessity of pain — 
 
 How early loss may be our later gain; 
 While every soothing sympathy bestowing, 
 Such as alone from woman's heart outflowing 
 May loose the bond of pain. 
 
 And I have seen, through many a shining day, 
 O'er hill and plain these twain together straying, 
 While in their eyes gleams such a heavenly ray 
 I can but deem their bliss is full alwav ; 
 But still I fear me for their transient staying; 
 Yet would I long, the last farewell delaying, 
 Joy in that rapturing ray. 
 
INDIAN SUMMER. 
 
 Like bannered host, with helmet, plume and spear 
 Far borne elate, from thousand battles gory, 
 
 The flaming woodlands glow; — these, year by year, 
 Are Nature's palimpsest, whereon, austere 
 In Winter gloom, or gay in Summer glory, 
 Is writ with magic pen the wondrous story 
 Of all the circling year. 
 
 How thrills my bosom to thy tempered rays, 
 More fair than radiant smiles in beauty's keeping 
 Through all the quiet of thy golden days 
 Lie all things mantled in a dreamy haze — 
 Like wearied bosom in its tranquil sleeping, 
 Like gentle calm that cometh after weeping: 
 Thine are the loveliest days. 
 
 15 
 
114 INDIAN SUMMER. 
 
 They tell us of a far-off sunny clime 
 With noontide sheen on tropic splendors lying, 
 
 Where all the year is one long blooming - time - 
 Where song of Flora, in her joy and prime, 
 Wakes minstrel Echo with a joy replying 
 From morning's dawning until vesper's sighing, 
 Through all the charmed time. 
 
 Thy light, o'erlying all the azure wall, 
 So softly mellowed in its peerless shining; 
 Thy sober -kindling sunshine over all, 
 That lingers even where the shadows fall; 
 Thy frosted wreath, the vernal season's twining; 
 Thy faded scrolls, thine own fond first love's lining - 
 These do surpass them all. 
 
 See yonder up what goodly altitudes ! 
 Supremer heights, more tranquil airs, unveiling, 
 
 Along the hills a purple glory broods ; 
 
 In all the silence of the Autumn woods — 
 A royal robe of tinted splendor trailing 
 O'er shrub and tree, unto rare beauty paling — 
 A subtle spirit broods, 
 
INDIAN SUMMER. 115 
 
 Like smile that trembles in Love's sorrowing tear; 
 Like fond regret some tender thought suffusing; 
 
 Like heart high throbbing with a wealth of cheer, 
 Though known of grief, nor stranger unto fear, 
 Though lone and saddened, yet in hopeful musing, 
 When some high faith hath recompensed its losing 
 With well -enduring cheer. 
 
 Though stilled the chorus of the choral throng, 
 More red than mountain peaks that sunset umbers 
 
 Lies all the grove, late clamorous with song; 
 
 A sacred calm these forest aisles along, 
 A holy hush, a Sabbath quiet slumbers; 
 A silent music breathes in mystic numbers, 
 Sweeter than any song. 
 
 I lowly listen to each Dryad rune, 
 Through lonely woodland haunts ecstatic straying, 
 
 While all day long is one long afternoon; 
 
 Had Eden fairer sublunary boon 
 Than Nature ever at this height delaying? — 
 Such rainbow -tinted sundowns her arraying, 
 Gorgeous, at highest noon. 
 
116 INDIAN SUMMER. 
 
 Brief are thy halcyon days, and fleeting fast, 
 Though yet October's milder reign imposing, 
 
 As though thy hour most beauteous were last; 
 
 Like faithful spirit, when its strife is passed, 
 In bosom of a deathless hope reposing: 
 So may my days, when hastening to their closing, 
 Grow brighter till the last. 
 
GARNERED SHEAVES. 
 
 When passed life's Summer days of heat and toil, 
 As musing lone I sit with frosted locks, 
 When passed the Passions' stormy equinox 
 
 And vain Ambition's labor and turmoil, 
 
 May I, Autumn, bound with withered leaves 
 And faded flowers that failed of ripened seeds, 
 
 Like thee, like thee count o'er my wealth of sheaves 
 And harvest -hoard — the fruit of noble deeds. 
 
 Serene as falls thy light on amber slope, 
 
 And woodlands far aflame like set of sun, 
 
 My failing days be beautiful with Hope; 
 
 And bear, like thine, my heart's wild yearnings stilled, 
 The blest fruition of a labor done — 
 
 The glory of a destiny fulfilled. 
 
WINTER LAYS. 
 
 The bristling woods are tipped with gold, 
 As dusky twilight shadows fall; 
 I hear again the shepherd's call, 
 
 The sheep -bell tinkling to the fold; 
 
 The hearth -fire crackles to the cold, 
 And faintly flickers on the wall. 
 
 Re -pile the grate, and spread the board, 
 With little store, or plenty, blest; 
 Still from thy larder bring the best; 
 Unlock the orchard's harvest hoard — 
 Whatever good thy hand hath stored; 
 Then bid thy friend a welcome guest. 
 
 And while the slowly kindling blaze 
 
 Leaps sparkling from the crackling fire, 
 Bring forth the harp, attune the lyre, 
 
 And wake the songs of other days; 
 
 Love's olden long -forgotten lays, 
 That win the soul to new desire. 
 
WINTER LAYS. 119 
 
 And heart to heart, as eye to eye, 
 
 Charm the slow-winging hours away 
 With tales of many a vanished day 
 
 And severed link and sundered tie; 
 
 Of loved ones dead, that never die, 
 And other near ones, far away. 
 
 Or join awhile the joyous train, 
 
 And feel the pulses dance and leap 
 
 Where merry feet in mazes sweep 
 Unto the viol's mellow strain; 
 While moonlight silvers o'er the plain, 
 
 And starry eyes their watches keep. 
 
 Look where yon ice-bound river winds 
 Afar the cragged hills between; 
 See high above its snowy sheen 
 
 The glimmer of a thousand pines, 
 
 That all the dim horizon binds — 
 A massy belt of living green. 
 
 Deep rooted in the soilless earth 
 
 See heavenward rear their giant forms, 
 Though scarce the glow of Summer warms 
 
 Those serried steeps of frost and dearth; 
 
 Mid rocks and barrenness their birth, 
 High cradled by the eddying storms. 
 
120 WINTER LAYS. 
 
 And so the soul, in soil of care, 
 
 On glaring glacier peaks of woe, 
 Shall like yon pines amid the snow 
 
 A fadeless wreath of beauty wear — 
 
 Be brighter for the frosty air, 
 
 And stronger for the winds that blow. 
 
 The night -winds sigh along the sedge; 
 While on the orient's silver crest 
 The thickly sombering shadows rest; 
 High, pile on pile, a beetling ledge 
 Seems toppling on the horizon's edge, 
 Of clouds upgathering in the west. 
 
 Where Autumn shed his sober light 
 O'er shining fields of golden grain, 
 Whence blended in one glad refrain 
 Came harvest songs of home delight, 
 We see, alas! but dearth and blight, 
 
 And hear the storm shriek out amain. 
 
 The sable gloom the morning wears 
 Chill o'er the orient's misty bar, 
 The clouded noon, so dim and far, 
 
 But type the heart my bosom bears; 
 
 O'ershadowed by a thousand cares, 
 And rayless of each heavenly star. 
 
WINTER LAVS. 121 
 
 Yet soon the onward rolling year 
 
 Shall bring again each vanished day- 
 Spring shed a warm and joyous ray 
 
 Adown the vale now lone and drear; 
 
 New leaf in green the forest sere, 
 
 And robe the hills in bloom of May. 
 
 So may our souls, though all unblest, 
 And bowed in sorrow overlong, 
 With olden Summer glories throng; 
 And feeling's most divine unrest 
 Full flood again the empty breast, 
 
 And brim the crystal wells of song. 
 
 The cones that pierce yon purple light 
 Have seen a hundred winters flee, 
 And other hundred years shall see; 
 Ere, yielding to the tempest's might, 
 They topple from their dizzy height, 
 My simple harp will cease to be. 
 
 Yet will I tune my wintry lyre, 
 
 Though it may wake no note of fame, 
 To nobler purpose, higher aim, 
 
 To feel each winged thought aspire; 
 
 While brighter glows the kindling fire, 
 And still more bright the social flame. 
 
122 WINTER LAYS. 
 
 So will I cheer the hour with song; 
 
 Nor doubt along life's darkened ways 
 There swells some echo of my lays 
 
 In hearts where mystic murmurs throng; 
 
 More sweet, if love the strain prolong, 
 
 Than hollow trumpet -tongue of praise. 
 
 All day the forest oaks have swayed 
 
 Their branches with a restless sweep; 
 The winds their stormy revels keep 
 
 Through wooded wilds, in field and glade; 
 
 While round the cotter's hut delayed 
 Still higher piles the drifting heap. 
 
 All day upon my heart has lain 
 
 The shadow of a nameless fear; 
 I stay the overbrimming tear, 
 
 And still my bosom's throb of pain; 
 
 But its disquiet comes again, 
 
 And deepens as the glooms appear. 
 
 No vain regret for loved ones dead 
 
 Lives in this strangely - aching smart; 
 Nor careless hand with ruthless dart 
 
 Anew some olden wound hath bled; 
 
 Nor know I whence the sorrow dread 
 That casts its shadow on my heart. 
 
WINTER LAYS. 123 
 
 And is there by the soul possessed 
 
 A chord that feels prophetic thrill, 
 
 Presaging grief erewhile to fill 
 The coming time with sore unrest? 
 A horoscope within the breast, 
 
 And this its dark portent of ill? — 
 
 Some Stormy Petrel's warning cry 
 
 On Life's lone seas? — the haunting wraith 
 Of yet uncomned love and faith ? 
 
 The twanging of a sundered tie ? 
 
 The kiss. of lips that soon shall lie 
 Mute in the miracle of Death? 
 
 Ah well! — of Truth the rarest" seeds 
 
 Are sorrow -sown; from out the dust 
 Our tears have wet — the wreck and rust 
 
 Of perished hopes and buried creeds, 
 
 Spring harvests new of nobler deeds 
 Of purer love and higher trust. 
 
 Full many a day the biting snow 
 
 Has cumbered wide the saddened plain; 
 Still higher heaps the drifting lane, 
 
 Still bleak the storm -winged tempests blow; 
 
 We seek the sun's serener glow 
 
 From out the burdened skies in vain. 
 
124 WINTER LAYS. 
 
 The fleecy tenants of the fold 
 
 Still mourn the meadow's grassy boon; 
 
 The kine, the heathy copse to prune, 
 Lone wander on the dreary wold 
 And look, while shivering with the cold, 
 
 For pity to the clouded moon. 
 
 Like yeanlings reft of mother's breast, 
 That Summer's sunlight sadly miss, 
 Or, bowed in wintry loneliness, 
 
 Like yonder kine, with hunger pressed, 
 
 I wander on Life's weary waste, 
 
 Amid the blighted boughs of bliss. 
 
 O'er leagues of snow-emmantled earth 
 The Christmas bells are ringing clear; 
 Thrice -welcome hour, though bleak and drear, 
 
 And harbinger of storm and dearth; 
 
 In loving smiles and glowing hearth 
 
 Thou bringest more than Christmas cheer. 
 
 hallowed day! to thee allied 
 
 Is all that most this life endears 
 
 Of faith and hope — of doubt and tears. 
 
 And love of One for love that died, 
 
 Yet lives again, and glorified 
 
 In thee, through twice a thousand years! 
 
WINTER LAYS. 125 
 
 To-day shall Absence and Regret 
 
 Their iron sceptre yield to you; 
 
 For friends to old affection true 
 Across the stormy years have met, 
 And eyes with joy's suffusion wet 
 
 Drink light from kindred eyes anew. 
 
 * 
 To-day the sire that feebly bows 
 
 Shall flush with seeming youth the while; 
 
 And careless girlhood's happy smile 
 Re -light its glow on matron brows; 
 While blissful dreams and loving vows 
 
 Shall many a maiden care beguile. 
 
 To-day shall grief, in anguish prone, 
 
 Prom pain a respite gladly win ; 
 
 And he who owns no bosom -kin, 
 Who threads Time's wintry maze alone, 
 Shall start at oft -endearing tone — 
 
 Brief murmur from the life within; 
 
 And musing sad, his heart shall lean 
 
 To olden memories, hope -embossed; 
 The latest loved, the early lost, 
 
 Perchance are with him, all unseen, 
 
 From Paradise of summer -green, 
 
 To soothe his spirit, tempest -tossed; 
 
126 WINTER LAYS. 
 
 Or on his deeply visioned eye 
 
 Rise fairest forms we may not see — 
 Loom other landscapes, blooming free; 
 As, with a trust that may not die, 
 He ponders long each sundered tie, 
 Or bond more beautiful to be. 
 
 The mist lies heavy on the hills, 
 
 And shrouds in gloom each rocky steep; 
 
 The dusky clouds above them sleep, 
 "Whence slow the trickling rain distils. 
 Like some o'erburdened lid that fills 
 
 With gathering tears it can but weep. 
 
 The fleecy snow and glistening rime 
 Are melting from the earth away; 
 I look upon her mantle gray, 
 And think me of the blooming -time, 
 And mark the day -god slowly climb 
 Still higher up the walks of day. 
 
 And glad to know each vanished storm 
 Will go to grace the Summer hour, 
 And add new beauty to the bower 
 
 That drinks the sunshine glad and warm, 
 
 And give each fairy floral form 
 
 A greener leaf and gayer flower. 
 
WINTER LAYS. 127 
 
 So oft the troubled heart must know 
 
 The binding of an icy chain; 
 
 Yet dewy tears, like Summer rain, 
 Shall bid the frigid fountain flow — 
 Life wear anew its vernal glow, 
 
 And feeling's pulses leap again. 
 
 Some long -forgotten voice may wake 
 
 The murmur of an early song; 
 
 Or secret echo, silent long, 
 A well -remembered music make; 
 And oh! the aching heart must break, 
 
 Or tears dissolve each icy thong. 
 
 So shall we win from all things here 
 
 A trust for good in everything, 
 
 And hear Hope's bright -winged songsters sing 
 Behind the wintry clouds of fear; 
 And know, when watered by a tear, 
 
 Love wears anew the flush of Spring. 
 
BY THE FIRESIDE. 
 
 Deep in the forest brown and bare 
 I hear the Genius of the Storm; 
 I see the outline of his form 
 
 Dark pictured on the frosty air; 
 
 And mid the tall oaks waving there, 
 The swaying of his mighty arm. 
 
 Though bleak the bitter winds that blow, 
 And darkens on a dreary night, 
 The wide hearth beckons warm and bright; 
 
 In converse sweet, in genial glow 
 
 Of Summers buried long ago, 
 
 Is more than Summer's lost delight. 
 
 Awhile beside the cheerful blaze, 
 
 Some story of the vanished time, 
 And sweeter than the vesper -chime, 
 
 Come read me, dear; or lowly lays 
 
 From out the old heroic days, 
 
 Of love through sorrow made sublime. 
 * * * 
 
BY THE FIRESIDE. 129 
 
 Bring for our darling ones' delight 
 Arabia's fairy wonder -tome, 
 Or with the world-wide Pilgrim roam; 
 
 Tilt with the mad Castilian Knight; 
 
 Or look with Crusoe's yearning sight 
 On seas that gird his Island Home. 
 
 Turn to the Ploughman -Poet dear: 
 
 Let "Twa Dogs" wise their converse keep; 
 With "Halloween" our pulses leap; 
 
 Bend o'er the " Mountain Daisy's " bier; 
 
 Sing "Bonny Doon;" — one tender tear 
 With him for Highland Mary weep. 
 
 Read — of the Oak that lightly flung 
 
 Abroad such wealth of songful lore 
 To lovers dear; or, turning o'er, 
 Of Alice, and the Bard that sung — 
 Albeit his heart with sorrow wrung — 
 " That loss but made us love the more." 
 
 Of her whose breath passed in the sigh — 
 "Sweet is true love, though given in vain;" 
 
 Or her that, pierced with pity's pain, 
 Alone "clothed on with chastity," 
 Rode at high noon through Coventry— 
 
 Unrobed, yet without blame or stain. 
 
130 BY THE FIRESIDE. 
 
 Of him that with his Herniia strayed, 
 Slept a true lover and true knight; 
 On whom before the morning light 
 
 The Elfin's wizard charm was laid, 
 
 So, waking, he mistook the maid, 
 
 And broke, and lightly proffered, plight. 
 
 Is theirs alone the woe iu weal ? 
 
 Alas! such lovers all are we; 
 
 Where grows the herb whose potency 
 May, counter -charmed, our eyes unseal? 
 And each to each in truth reveal, 
 
 And this confusion cease to be? 
 
 Of her Wyoming darkly mourned — 
 The maiden beautiful, that fell 
 By the red hand of war; — ah, well! 
 Precious the bliss her heart inumed 
 That said: '"Tis Waldegrave's self," returned 
 Again — "of Waldegrave come to tell." 
 
 Of her that bore too long the smart 
 Of love delayed, yet keeping green 
 Love's lilies for the one unseen, 
 < Counselling but her woman's heart, 
 Chose in all ways life's better part; — 
 Arcadian Evangeline. 
 
BY Til A' FIXES WE. 131 
 
 Or, in the changeful Seasons, fly 
 
 With Damon to the sylvan shade; 
 
 Look on the foam -emman tied maid — 
 Behold love's sacred mystery ! 
 Oh, for the lover's chastened eye 
 
 To see all beauty, disarrayed! 
 
 Or roam Palemon's Harvest -land: 
 
 There with the lowly damsel glean, 
 And dream that Virtue's garments mean 
 
 Are Virtue's still; Love's sacred band 
 
 Is more than gold; that Beauty's wand 
 Still, chastened, holds its sway serene. 
 
 Weep — buried in Lavinia's grave — 
 For wedded loves in simple ways 
 Of Nature, crowned with length of days, 
 
 And fairest treasures Hymen gave; 
 
 When " numerous offspring," sturdy, brave, 
 And "lovely like themselves," was praise. 
 
 Or turning, read in lowly tales 
 
 And waifs of old idyllic song, 
 
 Of weary hearts that suffered long, 
 Yet firm in trust that never fails ; 
 For much their triumph us avails 
 
 To make our faith in Virtue strong. 
 
132 ST THE FIBESIDE. 
 
 Of him that, far years gazing through, 
 Looked on his Annie's face beside 
 An alien hearth; then, sorely tried, 
 With yearning heart so tender -true, 
 Back into sheltering darkness drew, 
 And held his purpose till he died. 
 
 Of him, the Chief of Table Round, 
 That bore the matchless cimeter — 
 The mystic brand Excalibur; 
 
 Great Arthur! he the Blameless crowned; 
 
 That in such pitying grief profound 
 Bent o'er his erring Guinevere. 
 
 And is there other sorrow — care 
 So infinite, supremely great 
 As theirs, alas ! who yearning wait 
 
 Prone by a darkened hearth, and bear 
 
 To Love an agonizing prayer 
 
 For love that, wandering, lingers late? 
 
 Of him, the pride of Ithaca: 
 
 The greatest his of names that throng 
 Heroic annals; brave and strong — 
 Mighty for noble deeds! — may we, 
 Like him, the Island Charmer flee, 
 Nor harken to the Sirens' Song. 
 
BY THE FIRESIDE. 133 
 
 Of him who, Lethe's waters passed, 
 In Hades journeyed far helow — 
 Dark mapped the nether realms of woe; 
 
 Thence rising to Elysian rest, 
 
 Saw all the legions of the blest 
 
 Whose garments are as drifting snow. 
 
 But turn the visioned tome with awe; 
 
 For who so pure to taste the bliss 
 
 Of Dante and of Beatrice? 
 Yet owning still the primal law, 
 All hearts do inspiration draw, 
 
 Woman, from thy loveliness! 
 
 * * * 
 
 Lo, Midnight lingers at the gate ! 
 
 Still wide the lettered page unrolls 
 
 Where Fame heroic deeds enscrolls; 
 And oft returning shall we wait 
 Around the hearthstone, conning late 
 
 These chronicles of noble souls. 
 
 And though the world do doubt their sooth, 
 And sceptic's scoff be on him cast 
 Who counts such legends of the Past 
 
 More than a fabled dream of youth, 
 
 Yet will we trust their very truth — 
 Or strive to make them true at last. 
 
MISCELLANEOUS. 
 
Erer the Moon the Sea draws on apace ; 
 Earth trembles, swaying unto orb afar; 
 No star but turning unto answering star, 
 Kindles and burns unto remotest space; 
 
 Orion's flaming car 
 Draws allthe Hosts of heaven — a shining train ; 
 
 So in thji wider realm, world of Mind! 
 A fine electric tie — lore's mystic chain 
 Doth kindred Spirits bind. 
 
SONGS OF THE TOILER. 
 
 The Seasons as they come and go — 
 
 Spring's gentle sunshine warm, 
 The Summer's heat, the Autumn's glow, 
 
 The Winter's cloud and storm; 
 The flowers that drink the dews of morn, 
 
 The earth -bescreening sod, 
 The myriad forms of beauty born 
 
 In the wide realms of God; 
 The rivers as they seaward wend, 
 
 The sea -waves' wild turmoil, 
 The winds the sturdy forest bend, — 
 
 Are the High Priests of Toil. 
 
 18 
 
138 SONGS OF THE TOILER. 
 
 They who in lettered lore untaught, 
 
 Yet deeper visioned be, 
 Who read, in Sibyl -cipher wrought, 
 
 In earth and air and sea 
 The good Beneficence intends, 
 
 In sun and dew and rain 
 See Nature working to vast ends 
 
 Through all her fair domain, — 
 Shall feel their life at one with these, 
 
 Nor from their task recoil, 
 But leave the languid paths of Ease 
 
 For the broad fields of Toil. 
 
 Joy to the Toiler! — him that tills 
 
 The fields with Plenty crowned; 
 Him with the woodman's axe that thrills 
 
 The wilderness profound; 
 Him that all day doth sweating bend 
 
 In the fierce furnace heat; 
 And her whose cunning fingers tend 
 
 On loom and spindle fleet ! 
 A prayer more than the prayer of saint, 
 
 A faith no fate can foil, 
 Lives in the heart that shall not faint 
 
 In time -long task of Toil. 
 
SONGS OF THE TOILER. 139 
 
 A bliss the sluggard never knows 
 
 Deep in his heart shall spring, 
 Whose life flows as the tide -wave flows - 
 
 Creation's antheming! 
 Whom ceaseless din of labor charms 
 
 Like new-world's primal song; 
 As grow his swart and sinewy arms, 
 
 His soul grows free and strong; 
 Till over all a glory springs 
 
 On mine and mill and soil, 
 And the stern destiny that brings 
 
 A heritage of Toil. 
 
 Peace to the troubled years agone ! 
 
 Their darkest day is set, 
 Though round the ages' rosy dawn 
 
 The shadows linger yet; 
 Full many a wondrous work is wrought, 
 
 More wondrous yet to be 
 Than flashing of undying Thought 
 
 Across the unfathomed sea: 
 And lo! the mystery that sleeps 
 
 In Magian Serpent's coil — ■ 
 The lightnings in the vasty deeps 
 
 Chained to the car of Toil! 
 
140 SONGS OF THE TOILER. 
 
 Still endless weave the subtle band 
 
 O'er ocean, vale, and hill, 
 Till far to one electric hand 
 
 Shall million pulses thrill! 
 God, this old world never knew 
 
 Such prophecy of Peace! 
 More faith and love our wrongs subdue, 
 
 With light our hopes increase; 
 Revealing near, like morning sun, 
 
 Above the Past's turmoil, 
 Our hearts' wild dream Utopian — 
 
 A Brotherhood of Toil! 
 
 What time the noble Worker -band — 
 
 The true, the free, the bold, 
 With swarthy brow and bony hand, 
 
 Like warrior host of old, 
 From where the Southern sunlight shines, 
 
 Or Mississippi glides, 
 Lone ceaseless sing our Northern pines, 
 
 Wild break Atlantic tides,- — 
 From many a land afar shall come, 
 
 And not to feud and broil; 
 But to the festive Harvest -home 
 
 And Carnival of Toil. 
 
SONGS OF THE TOILER. '141 
 
 Koll up the full -orbed Freedom -star 
 
 To light Earth's desert fields; 
 Affright the solitudes afar 
 
 With sound of rolling wheels, 
 Thou fiery ,steed whose fearful neigh 
 
 Wakes wide our sovereign Land! 
 Thou mighty triumph of To-day 
 
 From Labor's cunning hand! 
 Thy argosies no storms betide, 
 
 No tempest's wrath may spoil; 
 For all unheeding wind or tide, 
 
 Thou tread'st thy path of Toil. 
 
 The Giant Slave, that may not tire, 
 
 But work the long day through 
 With thews of steel and lungs of fire, 
 
 Has other task to do 
 Than delve the mine or rive the hill 
 
 Or wind the furnace -glow, 
 Or drive the plane, the forge, the mill,- 
 
 To plough and reap and sow! 
 Till none shall walk with aching feet, 
 
 With weary trudge and droil, 
 But kingly proud, as seemeth meet 
 
 The royal sons of Toil. 
 
142 SONGS OF THE TOILER. 
 
 The mighty sinew -powers that wait 
 
 In earth and sea and air, 
 Shall tireless early toil and late — 
 
 Our menial burdens bear; 
 Their iron feet still fleeter flee — 
 
 Our errands speed apace, 
 Till only Art and Science be 
 
 The Helots of the Race! 
 The Toiler's glorious destiny 
 
 No more to drudge and moil; 
 His labor loving labor be — • 
 
 Serene, untiring Toil. 
 
 Joy to the Toiler everywhere ! 
 
 Still let his hand be plied; 
 Wide plant the rose to blossom fair 
 
 In many a desert wide; 
 A richer blessing year by year 
 
 Win from old mother Earth; 
 A purer household altar rear 
 
 By the endearing hearth; 
 Let wiser Thought to Labor given 
 
 Redeem lost Eden's soil; 
 Then fair shall bloom the Flowers of Heaven 
 
 In the sweet Homes of Toil. 
 
TANNHAUSER. 
 
 All our modern skies are clouded with a sceptic gloom 
 and haze — 
 With the dust of vanished years; 
 Though the paling stars are shining, they have lost 
 their mystic chime, 
 Singing to our duller ears; — 
 So the ancient myths and legends, stories of the Olden 
 Time, 
 That the fading Past endears, 
 Only to the eye that reads them by the light of other 
 days, 
 Are instinct with Truth sublime. 
 
144 TANNHAUSER. 
 
 Yet to-day by cottage firesides still, by mountain, moor, 
 and fell, 
 As in far-off Aryan times, 
 Lives the Folk -Lore of the Ages; — are by wrinkled 
 grandames told"" 
 All the nursery tales and rhymes; 
 Faithful John and Cinderella, he the Master 'Thief and 
 bold- 
 Stories of all lands and climes; 
 Famous sleepers, wondrous pipers, matchless archers; — 
 and they tell 
 This among the legends old: 
 
 In a mountain of Thuringia, where the storms their 
 revels keep, 
 Hidden in its heart of rock, 
 Is the dwelling of Frau Holda, where her worshippers 
 resort, 
 Is the famous Horselloch; 
 Whence is heard the cry of anguish and the laugh of 
 demon sport — 
 Frenzied tongues that jeer and mock 
 Blent with sound of angry billows in some dread abys- 
 mal deep, — 
 Cave where Venus holds her court. 
 
TANNHAUSEE. 145 
 
 Only simple souls and lowly have the gift of clearer 
 sight — 
 Have that rarer vision won; 
 To the lone belated peasant, as he weary homeward 
 strode, 
 Plodding slow at set of sun, 
 Oft that terror-haunted Venusberg a sudden wonder 
 showed; 
 Brightening all the shadows dun, 
 Saw he shining forms of maidens dancing in the spec- 
 tral light — 
 Dwellers in that weird abode. 
 
 And the valiant knight, Tannhauser, he, the troubadour 
 renowned, 
 To all bold adventures led, 
 With his great heart sole companioned, journeying late 
 but unafraid 
 By that cavern yawning dread, 
 Saw uprising thence resplendent in the twilight's falling 
 shade 
 One of queenly form and tread; 
 And she beckoned to him smiling, with her cestus-zone 
 unbound, 
 In all loveliness arrayed. 
 
146 TANNHAUSEB. 
 
 As with kindling eye and eager feet he climbed that 
 perilled way, 
 Lo ! before him watching late 
 Rose an old man, Faithful Eckhardt — there with white 
 staff doomed to stand, 
 Warn and ward from evil fate ; 
 The fore -herald when at midnight ride the Wild Hosts 
 through the land; 
 And he looked with pity great 
 On that gallant minnesinger, lured by beauty's phantom 
 ray, 
 And he waved a warning hand. 
 
 But in vain: Tannhauser gazing on that unveiled glory 
 near, 
 In its wizard charm and thrall, 
 Saw not him, the faithful warden, nor the hand high 
 waved in air; — 
 Honor, fame, gold, comrades — all 
 Were but foregone things forgotten ; saw he but that 
 vision fair, 
 Heard he but that Siren -call; 
 Music more than harp of Orpheus to his enchanted 
 , ear, 
 
 Drowned that omen-tongued ''Beware!" 
 
TANNHAUSER. 147 
 
 On his good steed, on the onter world one longing look 
 he fed — 
 To that Goddess turned, and lo ! 
 Far she drew him to her palace, lit and garnished gor- 
 geously, 
 In the mountain far below; 
 And the hours went by unheeded, from all thought but 
 pleasure free, 
 And the wine -cups overflow; 
 Wild delights and bacchanalian, to all lustful pleasures 
 wed, 
 Rioting and revelry. 
 
 Nymphs with floating tresses shining like the gold in 
 sunset sky, 
 Waked the love -enchanted lyre; 
 And each hot erratic passion in his fiery soul 
 intense 
 Kindled into fierce desire; 
 All delights that beauty wanton, clasped in rapt delirious 
 dance, 
 And the foaming bowl inspire, 
 Freely quaffed he — until seven years had fled unheeded 
 by; 
 All the ravished joys of sense. 
 
148 TANNHAUSER. 
 
 But ere long the soul that slumbers with remorse shall 
 stricken be — 
 Must each sin its sorrow bear; 
 And Tannhauser. again longing for the sunshine's 
 clearer ray, 
 For a breath of purer air, 
 Cried unto the Virgin Mother, though with lips unused 
 to pray, 
 In his anguish and despair; 
 She, with tender heart of pity, set his erring footsteps 
 free 
 In the light of upper day. 
 
 More than jewelled halls and joy of wine and ribald jest 
 and song 
 In the caverns underground, 
 Was to him the sun new-risen, was the dew-besprinkled 
 sod, 
 Was the streamlet's leap and bound; 
 Was the path of mountain -chamois, that his foretime 
 footsteps trod, 
 Was the sheep -bell's tinkling sound; 
 And his soul, that wakened conscience sore reproved of 
 sin and wrong, 
 longed to be at peace with God. 
 
TANNHAUSEE. 149 
 
 But in vain his crimes confessing, he could no remission 
 find, 
 Though priest after priest he sought; 
 Still he wandered, sore benighted, in the unabated 
 gloom 
 Of his evil -darkened thought; 
 Humbly to the Pope he bowed him : he could not unseal 
 the doom 
 Of such condemnation wrought; 
 Sooner should the staff that bore him, like a garland 
 summer - twined, 
 Bud and quicken into bloom. 
 
 Then, a darkened soul unshriven through the endless 
 years to bear, 
 Bowed in sorrow, doubt, and pain, 
 Turned he from the world of sunlight — his great heart 
 with anguish torn, 
 
 To that Venusberg again 
 
 Three days, and behold! the Father's staff had — pass- 
 ing wonder! — borne 
 Buds and blossoms; but in vain; 
 For still he for whom no priestly hand might absolution 
 dare 
 Must his sin unpardoned mourn. 
 
150 TANNHAUSER. 
 
 Quick with awe arose Pope Urban — rode his messengers 
 amain; 
 And they sought the Horsel vale; 
 
 Late — alas! too late! How oft too late our hearts 
 
 forgiveness bear ! 
 
 Far along the mountain trail 
 A lone, wayworn, haggard man had passed, with weary 
 feet of care — 
 Passed with troubled brow and pale; 
 Since, Tannhauser has been seen no more; — nor home- 
 returning swain 
 Since has seen that Goddess fair. 
 
 And is this my homely legend but a story of the 
 Past? 
 Or the Present all unguessed? 
 Of some mighty Truth dishonored by its prophet over - 
 bold — 
 By its false evangelist? 
 And our souls the lost Tannhauser, seeking vain, with 
 grief untold, 
 The One Faith of peace and rest; 
 Till unto their painted idols they despairing turn 
 at last — 
 Gods of Pleasure, Fame, or Gold? 
 
REVISITED. 
 
 Chicago, 1871. 
 
 Downr- fallen, the Trojan's grand 
 Renowned ancestral halls 
 The far world mourned; and her, Persepolis, 
 With all her loveliness, 
 And Carthage — touched as by a wizard wand; 
 And still with grief recalls 
 Rome, Albion, aglow, 
 The Crescent's shrines laid low, 
 And her that stood where Moscow's temples stand. 
 
 But what are these to me? 
 
 They lighten, pale, and show 
 Like far-off flaring of a furnace - blast — 
 A pageant of the Past, 
 Fearful and grand, flaming in History! 
 With thee it is not so, 
 Beloved, thee I knew 
 While yet thy days were few, 
 And all thy greatness in the time to be. 
 
152 REVISITED. 
 
 As oft to ripened years 
 
 Some youth and maid unknown 
 Together grow from childhood's summers brief, 
 Till one in joy or grief 
 That evermore them each to each endears, 
 Have we together grown; 
 But oh ! as he that goes, 
 Whose fond heart thrills and glows, 
 Hiding the pain of love's delicious fears, — 
 
 Joyous, and bearing thence 
 
 Treasured affections old, 
 Lit with the brightness of one form and face,— 
 Returning, finds each grace 
 And beauty withered by the pestilence, 
 Sad weeping unconsoled, 
 Deplores and mourns in vain: 
 Such is my bosom -pain, 
 Finding in all my loss no recompense. 
 
 In anguish prone I wait 
 
 Where ruins strew the plains — 
 Where smoldering heaps the wealth -bethronging mart 
 By fallen shrines of Art, 
 Oblivioned tomes, and hearthstones desolate; 
 
HEVISITED. 153 
 
 Religion's fallen fanes, 
 And Learning's halls o'erthrown; 
 By trees stripped, blackened, lone, 
 Dead — monuments of a relentless Fate! 
 
 Oh, who can paint the gloom — 
 The woe that on thee fell, 
 When onward bore the fright -bewildered throng, 
 A hundred thousand strong! 
 Forlorn, and fleeing from a fiery doom, 
 As from the flames of Hell ! 
 Treasures that toil had wrought — 
 Treasures of gold unbought, 
 Buried in indistinguishable tomb ! 
 
 And how aghast and dumb 
 
 We stood, when from the Pit 
 Vile demons rose; bore high with maniac hand 
 The all -devouring brand! 
 With pillage, hate, — fell brood of lust and rum- 
 More wide thy horror lit; 
 As if foul fiends, accursed 
 Of God and man, had burst 
 The fiery gates of Pandemonium! 
 
154 REVISITED. 
 
 We hark the bell that tolls 
 
 Thy fallen fame — but tongue 
 Can never tell thy tale of miseries', 
 Of awful tragedies; 
 Of martyrdoms no poet's pen enrolls; 
 Of noble deeds unsung; 
 Of thy uncoffined dead; 
 Thy living hosts. that tread 
 Serene the heights, with all heroic souls! 
 
 As unto her that grieves 
 
 Less for her pain than his, 
 The lover's — he, alas! who can but miss 
 Her dower of loveliness — 
 Our pity yearns, and quick each want relieves 
 With thousand charities; 
 Brings for love's deeper needs 
 Kind words and gentle deeds, 
 And thus, in little part, her loss retrieves; — 
 
 So, with one heart amain, 
 
 In tender sympathies, 
 To thee the people of all tongues and lands 
 
 Have stretched full, pitying hands; 
 Anon have sought to soothe thy poignant pain 
 
REVISITED. 155 
 
 With all sweet ministries; 
 Until our souls go out 
 To ask, not all in doubt, 
 If in this fiery wrath be more of loss or gain. 
 
 Can aught again restore 
 
 The old-time beauty? No. 
 Ah, me! Howbeit, the s'bul that fair arrayed 
 In every grace the maid, 
 Still lives as when those outward charms it wore; 
 And Love, bewailing so, 
 Beholding how of pain 
 Is wrought the spirit's gain, 
 At length is comforted, and weeps no more. 
 
 And thou that wert so fair, 
 
 And now low in the dust, 
 Bearing thy weight of grief — thy grime and stain, 
 Without complaint of pain; 
 With hands still quick to do, as heart to dare — 
 Strong in all toil and trust; 
 I see thee, sorely tried, 
 Uprising purified, 
 And hope again is born of my despair. 
 
156 REVISITED. 
 
 Shall not the near years show 
 
 Thee crowned and lovely — nay, 
 Fairer than in thy maiden beauty brief ? 
 And we, erelong our grief 
 Outworn — what time the harvest sheaves of woe 
 We reap — shall we not say, 
 Recalling without pain 
 Our anguish, " then in vain 
 We wept and mourned — but it was better so " ? 
 
 Alas! we only see 
 
 Dimly — and darkly spell 
 In pain and loss, above all cant or creed 
 Sermons we can but heed; 
 Oh, for the faith that One, whatever be, 
 Doth order all things well! 
 We feel — we do not know — 
 It somehow must be so: 
 Our loss be still thy gain, Humanity! 
 
MINE OWN. 
 
 Thou who turnest, sore and fainting, 
 From life's discord, clang, and jar, 
 Weary longing for thine own, - 
 Like a bird its sorrow plainting, 
 Singing lone 
 •In the wilderness afar; — 
 Spirit that with mine is waiting 
 Spirit -mating, 
 Kindled at a kindred star; — 
 
 • 
 Beloved ! that didst lighten 
 
 To my childhood — that didst show 
 
 Like a beacon far away, 
 
 And that evermore didst brighten 
 
 Day by day 
 
 With my youth's intenser glow, 
 
 Still the dreams of an aspiring 
 
 Manhood firing, 
 
 Thou dost more a beauty grow. 
 
158 MINE OWN. 
 
 And a deeper joy divining: 
 
 Though we wander wide apart, 
 
 Seeking vain love's peace and rest, 
 Oft I feel thy arms entwining — 
 In my breast 
 Feel the throbbing of thy heart; 
 And I see in all transcendent 
 
 Forms resplendent — 
 See the loveliness thou art. 
 
 Nature, smiling, ever drew me, 
 As if hiding thee, my bride; 
 Garlanded with graces rare, 
 Thee the lilies show unto me, 
 Passing fair; 
 Thee the violets bashful hide; 
 And the rosej, all sweets inurning, 
 Crimson burning, 
 With thy blushes, love, is dyed. 
 
 Oft I see thee darkly, dwelling 
 
 In the Spring-time's greenery; 
 
 In the Summer's anthem -song 
 Love soft murmurs, of thee telling 
 
 All day long — 
 
MINE OWN. 159 
 
 Charms the night's serenity; 
 Wakes in orison and idyl, 
 
 Hymn and bridal 
 Of the woodland minstrelsy. 
 
 And thy heart is beauty -haunted: 
 Thou, thy fainting bosom fanned 
 
 With a breath from Eden -climes, 
 Too dost tread the realm enchanted; — 
 Hark the chimes 
 From that far celestial land! 
 Thrilling to the fervid grasping, 
 Hallowed clasping 
 Of a dear love -plighted hand. 
 
 Hope, unto the new day turning, 
 
 Plumes her joy -empurpled wings, 
 Far outsoaring ill and strife; 
 Or to charm the maiden, yearning 
 To the wife, 
 At Love's altar sits and sings 
 Of two lives to one inblending — 
 Still ascending, 
 Soaring unto higher things. 
 
160 MINE OWN. 
 
 And some gleam perchance just stealing 
 Faintly on life's widening skies, 
 That with mystic glory shine. 
 Kindles like the dawn, revealing — 
 Bliss divine! — 
 Baby lips and cherub eyes; 
 Half disclosing and yet hiding 
 Joys abiding 
 From a sinless paradise. 
 
 Dost thou startle at the vision? 
 
 And why not thou, darling, find 
 Love's high destiny and good? 
 Realize the dream elysian — 
 Motherhood — 
 In thy woman's breast enshrined; 
 The one marvel of all story, 
 The one glory, 
 The one crown of Womankind. 
 
 Yet through weary paths and lonely, 
 And with brambles overgrown, 
 
 Should we wander wide apart, 
 Finding each the other only 
 
 In a heart 
 
MINE OWN. 161 
 
 Beating loyal to its own; 
 Though we wait as we have waited — 
 All unmated 
 Tread the wide, wide world alone ;- 
 
 Beloved! undespairing, 
 
 Let our faith be strong to win ; — 
 Life is brief, but Love is long! 
 All the ills the trouble -bearing 
 Ages throng, 
 Error, anguish, wrong, and sin, 
 Shall not lovers leal dissever — 
 Part forever 
 Those who are the true - akin. 
 
 Let Time bar our souls asunder; 
 Let the years be sorrow -sown; 
 Let all meaner joys depart; — 
 In Love's bright imperial Yonder, 
 Heart to heart 
 I shall clasp thee, dear Unknown! 
 Every charm and grace arrayed in, 
 Peerless maiden, 
 I shall come unto Mike Own! 
 
IDLE HOURS. 
 
 Methought I had been idle all the day: 
 The plough was standing in the furrowed ground, 
 The sickle hanging where the sheaf was bound; 
 
 While listless basking in the Summer ray, 
 Soft -tempered by o'erarching boughs that hung 
 In fragrant tassels where the violets sprung, 
 
 The daylight's golden sands had run away. 
 
 Yet now with joy I see, in after time, 
 That much was won in that unnoted hour: 
 The treasures of the world of thought and power — 
 
 The chastened beauty of the true sublime — 
 The ceaseless plodding worldling never finds; 
 For only in a tranquil moment binds 
 
 The spell that wakes the Minstrel's mystic chime. 
 
WAITED FOR. 
 
 Spking's darling blossoms in their loamy prison 
 Sleeping in tiny buds beneath the snow, 
 Though darkly buried in the mould below, 
 Peeling the warmth of fervid suns unrisen, 
 
 They, yearning, throb and glow: 
 So, dearest, hidden from all outward seeing, 
 
 My heart fore -felt thy love, until it grew 
 A conscious presence to my inner being 
 Ere yet thy form I knew. 
 
 As oft, while yet the chilling glooms encumber, 
 We feel the breath of Summer days to be, 
 So was it, love, when first I looked on thee; 
 My soul leaped up — breaking its icy slumber — 
 
 fateful prophecy! 
 As when we hear the early partridge drumming, 
 
 Or the first cuckoo on the hills away, 
 Thrilling, it cried — " Surely the Spring is coming, 
 And cannot long delay." 
 
164 WAITED FOR. 
 
 And now are overpassed the wintry shadows; 
 Now all about us is the balmy air 
 Of orchards reddening in the May -day fair; 
 And like to fragrant groves and thymy meadows 
 
 The hearts our bosoms bear; 
 Dreaming sweet dreams, dear as the dreams of heaven, 
 
 Singing love's old immortal rapture -rune; 
 Like bees late drowsing in the flowers at even, 
 Droning a blissful tune. 
 
 peace and rest ! what after long delaying 
 Is to the thirsty earth the copious rain, 
 Love is to aching heart and tired brain; 
 Time's barren waste, to vernal impulse swaying, 
 
 Fresh -verdured, smiles again; 
 The quickened fields afar, soft -greening, brighten; 
 
 In the new day the mountains stand impearled: 
 A sun new -risen, a new world to lighten — 
 And ours that newer world. 
 
 Love divine ! in thy glad realm eternal 
 Can ever be or pain or want or fear? 
 Nay — we would hold this failing life too dear, 
 
 Flesh -habited, to taste the joy supernal 
 Of thy transcendent sphere. 
 
WAITED FOR. 165 
 
 Yet seems this purer air a rapt inhaling, 
 In little part, of the ethereal breath 
 Prom climes beyond— our outer senses failing - 
 What blindly we call Death. 
 
 Deep in the bud, its beauty -dream confessing, 
 There hides a glory and a mystery — 
 A promise of the fruitage yet to be: 
 So may love ripen into priceless blessing, 
 
 Beloved, for thee and me; 
 Of blossoms withered, with hope buried lying 
 In graves that vainly did my tears bedew, 
 May this new Summer of the heart, undying, 
 All the lost bloom renew. 
 
 And when, albeit bearing the heat and burden 
 
 Of the fierce noontide with its grime and moil. 
 Wide sowing, haply into fallow soil, 
 The seeds bf Truth — waiting the harvest -guerdon; 
 
 For all the long day's toil 
 May each the other strengthen and embolden, 
 
 In every high endeavor hand in hand; 
 Till in Life's field the ripened sheaves stand golden 
 O'er all the Autumn -land. 
 
, UNDER THE OAKS. 
 
 calm retreat! love -delighted bowers! 
 Where not alone the woodbine twines and blooms, 
 But all ideal beauty lights the glooms; 
 
 Where Poesy — that inspiration dowers 
 And genius nurtures in the mind and heart, 
 Till grown to forms of high creative Art — 
 
 Yields rare delight through all the tranquil hours, 
 
 The happy idle hours! moments blest! 
 
 solitudes instinct with higher life 
 
 To medicine the soul — its care and strife, 
 
 Its low desires, its prone world-weary quest, — 
 When in your sacred haunts of wood and glen 
 
 1 respite seek from toil, oh yield again 
 
 A joy beyond — those sweeter fruits of Rest! 
 
UNANSWERED LETTERS. 
 
 As lie that looks with longing eye 
 
 Across the blue seas, tempest- tossed, 
 Lone shipwrecked on a barren coast, 
 
 To see some hope -winged bark go by, 
 
 Or he the Stygian waters nigh — 
 A wandering ghost, 
 
 May longing wait, and waiting tire, — 
 
 So do we watch, in vain desire, 
 Day after day, an empty Post. 
 
 And sorely vexed with jealousy, 
 
 We feed the vagrant thoughts that bring 
 Love's unrequited smart and sting: 
 "My friend no longer cares for me; 
 An idle dream that we might see 
 
 In anything 
 The self- same beauty- — cease to mourn 
 A feeble friendship overworn, 
 
 Nor nurse the faded flowers of Spring." 
 
168 UNANSWERED LETTERS. 
 
 Or marvel if our last, missent, 
 
 Still keeps its ardent message sealed; 
 
 Or feeling's fervid page revealed 
 Some folly, though for wisdom meant; 
 Or sigh, " Alas, if love be spent 
 Or hearts congealed!" 
 Howbeit, only this is known: 
 Our friendship's fairy garden grown, 
 
 So all too soon, a barren field. 
 
 The while perchance our waiting friend, 
 Grown sick with joy delayed, nor gets 
 The long expected missive, frets: 
 "0 love — our being's sum and end! 
 Why still these precious moments lend 
 
 To vain regrets, 
 Or dream some other may be true ? 
 No more shall life its faith renew 
 In other men, if he forgets! 
 
 " doubt that deepens more my woe ! 
 
 Had I the trust, undimmed of fears, 
 That his the love Time but endears, 
 That burns with an unfailing glow, 
 How would I all this care forego — 
 
UNANSWERED LETTERS. 169 
 
 This grief and tears! 
 To know his heart still all my own, 
 I in this darkened world alone 
 
 Would wait content a thousand years." 
 
 So longing on we faint and tire: 
 
 And is this priceless good we wait — 
 Some friend with every mood to mate, 
 
 But offspring of a vain desire ? 
 
 Or love to which Our souls aspire, 
 Or soon or late 
 
 May yet our famished bosoms know? 
 
 Aye, nevermore to miss thee so, 
 
 •Companion of the heavenly state! 
 
 The gem the briny ocean urns 
 
 Still bears, though hid, its ruby ray; 
 Though storms enshroud the orb of day, 
 Behind the cloud the sunlight burns; — 
 Our friend, if true, still loves and yearns, 
 
 Though far away; 
 And if our waiting hearts but keep 
 Their faith, a fuller joy shall heap 
 The measure of love's long delay. 
 
COMPENSATIONS 
 
 The clime whose skies are ever clear 
 Through all the swiftly circling year, 
 Unknown to gloom of Winter drear, 
 
 The ever-shading palm may show; 
 
 And there the fig and olive grow, 
 
 And spicy breezes gently blow, 
 And downy blooms do softly lie 
 On all things, charming sense and eye 
 
 With Beauty's fadeless show. 
 
 But where through many a dreary day 
 The Frost King holds unyielding sway — 
 Where, far aslant, the beams of day 
 
 With shining on the glittering snow 
 
 Can wake no warm and kindling glow; 
 
 Where storm above and storm below 
 Do darken o'er the saddened plain 
 With frosty mist or sleety rain 
 
 Or cloud of drifting snow, — 
 
COMPENSATIONS. Ill 
 
 There strength is found with wisdom wed,. 
 The lightest foot, the firmest tread, 
 And there the truest hearts are bred; 
 And there the earth in bounty rears 
 The frugal corn's most golden ears, 
 And there the wheaten sheaf appears; 
 There Plenty cumbers all the ground 
 With luscious fruits, the sweetest found; 
 There Art her temple rears. 
 
 So hold thy way; in heart be strong, 
 Though evil hosts do round thee throng 
 Of sorrow, disappointment, wrong; 
 These are the Winters of thy life, 
 With hidden wealth of promise rife; — 
 So shrink not from the peril -strife, 
 And Autumn's store shall yet be thine, 
 And Peace serenely on thee shine 
 
 Through long bright Summer -life. 
 
HOME. 
 
 How many a charm within the precinct lies 
 Of one's own home — all hid to stranger eyes; 
 
 In every spot some beauty -shrine is reared — 
 In garden walk, though flower and bloom be flown, 
 In wild wood sacred haunt, though drear and lone; 
 Though sings chill Winter with a sorrow -tone 
 Among the leafless branches sad and seared: 
 Oh, whatso'er affection hath endeared, 
 Embalmed in beauty lies. 
 
 How full the joy when each familiar scene, 
 In frosty robe or vernal mantle green, 
 
 Takes form and semblance of our inner life; 
 When thrilling tones of melody and song 
 In gentle hearts for love and duty strong, 
 Swell high and free and gladsome all day long, 
 
 Till stilled are throbbings of each hidden strife; 
 
 While all the solemn night-time hours are rife 
 With radiant thought and scene. 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL. 
 
 All my life long have I harkened 
 To a voiceless melody — 
 To a subtle music fine; 
 Dimly, as in shadow darkened, 
 A divine 
 Peerless form afar I see, 
 That anon more nearly smiling, 
 Me beguiling, 
 Still forevermore doth flee. 
 
 Like the Summer charms adorning 
 Regal nature everywhere 
 In a fadeless tropic land, 
 Like the glory of the morning 
 Rising grand, 
 Oft it shineth passing fair; 
 When I reach a hand to grasp it, 
 Ere I clasp it 
 All again is empty air. 
 
174 THE BEAUTIFUL. 
 
 Yet in endless beauty -dreaming, 
 Do I bear a heart and mind 
 
 Haunted by that vision vain; 
 Turn I from each vanished seeming 
 Yet again 
 To that good I fail to find, 
 As a dying soul unshriven 
 To the heaven 
 Where all Perfectness is shrined. 
 
 I would bear of human sorrow 
 
 Every mortal pang and throe — 
 
 111 and loss and pain and wrong - 
 Could my heart the solace borrow 
 That ere long, 
 As the swift years come and go, 
 I shall clasp, no more to sever — 
 Mine forever — 
 Thee, the Beautiful I know! 
 
 I would dare, like pilgrim hoary, 
 
 Summer's sun and Winter's rain, 
 Homeless, weary, woeful, wan, 
 With unsandalled feet and gory, 
 On and on, — 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL. 175 
 
 Becking not of bruise and blain, 
 To this Mecca that I ponder 
 Would I wander 
 Over seas of trackless plain. 
 
 I would dive with heart undaunted 
 To old Ocean's roaring caves — 
 
 Storm - embillowed, terror - gloomed ; 
 Fearless tread, though darkness -haunted, 
 Dread - entombed, 
 Earth's Gethsemane of graves; — 
 Aye ! wherever I could find it, 
 Hold and bind it, 
 That my yearning spirit craves. 
 
 I would brave ensanguined battle 
 On the reddest field of strife; 
 
 For the conflict fierce arrayed, 
 Eager grasp the glittering metal, 
 Undismayed 
 In the hour with carnage rile; 
 Shrinking not from any daring, 
 To thee bearing — 
 More than lover, bride, or wife. 
 
176 THE BEAUTIFUL. 
 
 I would trace the fiery fountains 
 Of Sahara's desert sand — 
 All life's pulses fever -fed; 
 Climb the glaring glacier mountains, 
 Looming dread 
 O'er the Arctic's frozen land; 
 Track the homeless tides that moan on, 
 Breaking lone on 
 Chartless leagues of barren strand. 
 
 On from world to world a -winging, 
 Where more mellow moonlight lies 
 The more tranquil seas along; 
 Whither new-born stars are singing 
 A new song, 
 And more radiant suns uprise; 
 Unto constellations nightly 
 Burning brightly 
 In the depths of stranger skies; — 
 
 Roam the boundless ether meadows 
 That the starry hosts adorn — 
 Boundless as Eternity! 
 High above these twilight shadows 
 Would I flee, 
 
THE BEAUTIFUL. Ill 
 
 Out beyond this mortal bourne, - 
 Could I find the realm transcendent 
 Where resplendent 
 Hides the Beautiful I mourn. 
 
 Vision vain! — why should I wander, 
 
 Sore with penance, pain, and prayer, 
 Bearing an immortal dream ? 
 Well I know the Good I ponder — 
 Darkly deem, 
 Is not outward anywhere; 
 Only in the heavens supernal 
 Far, eternal 
 Dwells the One divinely fair. 
 
MOTHERHOOD. 
 
 In Life's wondrous gardens grow 
 
 Vestal lilies, snowy white; 
 Roses flushed with morning glow — 
 
 Flowers, the loving heart's delight; 
 Lowly pansies blooming fair — 
 
 Many a beauty's opening bud; 
 But the charms beyond compare, 
 
 Crown thee, beauteous Motherhood! 
 
 Let my fevered lip be fanned 
 
 By the breath of loveliness; 
 Let the tenderest maiden hand 
 
 Clasp my own in dear caress; 
 Light a heaven with starry eyes; 
 
 Still my heart, all unsubdued, 
 Bears its purest sacrifice 
 
 Unto queenly Motherhood. 
 
MOTHERHOOD. 179 
 
 Blushing bosom, budding warm, 
 
 Though it deepest rapture shed, 
 Ever wears its sweetest charm 
 
 Pillowing dainty baby head; — 
 See, while honeyed lips express 
 
 Softly their delicious food, 
 Tiny fingers fond caress 
 
 Bounteous breast of Motherhood. 
 
 Heavenly look of cherub eyes — 
 
 Fair, oh passing fair to see; 
 Angels, only in disguise, 
 
 Though they know it less than we; — 
 Who from these may coldly turn, 
 
 Nor with loftier love subdued, 
 Feel his quickened being yearn 
 
 To thee, saintly Motherhood? 
 
 Thou who bear'st in virgin breast 
 
 Happy heart unwed to care, 
 Joyous in its loving quest, 
 
 Whom thy mirror counteth fair, — 
 Maiden, matron -life is thine, 
 
 Thine for evil or for good; 
 Most in this thy virtues shine — 
 
 Miracle of Motherhood! 
 
THE IMAGE-BREAKER. 
 
 Though hushed since Delphi's tragic doom 
 Each mighty oracle's response, 
 Though every magic shape that haunts 
 
 The dusk of intervening gloom 
 
 Be silent — nor the shrouding tomb 
 
 Give answer to Love's yearning wants, — 
 
 Oh, spare those idols of the Past 
 
 Whose lips are dumb, whose eyes are dim; 
 
 Truth's diadem is not for him 
 That comes the fierce Iconoclast; 
 Who wakes the battle's stormy blast, 
 
 Hears not the angels' choral hymn. 
 
 In any creed, no heart -full prayer 
 
 To faithful devotee is lost; 
 
 Though dread -engloomed, and error -crossed, 
 Whate'er doth fruits of mere}- bear, 
 Is true; — for this each error spare, 
 
 Nor heap a common holocaust. 
 
THE IMAGE -BREAKER. 181 
 
 The faith that lights the pilgrim's way 
 
 To loving Heaven — though not for you 
 Its truth, to him must needs be true; 
 
 The rose that newly blooms to-day 
 
 Is pencilled by the primal ray: 
 
 The New is old — the Old is new. 
 
 And if thy path no longer lies 
 
 Through spirit -haunts of moor and fen, — 
 
 If, as of old to prophet ken, 
 To thee the hills of Canaan rise, 
 With broader fields and ampler skies, 
 
 And peopled wide with holy men, — 
 
 Remember still in charity, 
 
 Thy brother's need is not as thine; 
 
 Or, conning deep each darker line, 
 You too may find the mystic key 
 To every ward of mystery, 
 
 And see in all a Truth Divine. 
 
TOO LATE. 
 
 To every wrong 
 Not one — unnumbered penalties belong; 
 We expiate 
 Our deed with painful penitential tears, 
 To find, too late, 
 Thick in the breast the old avengers throng; 
 Part of that wages dread — the after years' 
 Remembrances of wrong. 
 
 There came a youth 
 To me long days agone; in form uncouth, 
 His brow sun -tanned, 
 Home -spun his coat, his garments all adust, 
 His bony hand 
 Just from the plough; hut with the sun of Truth 
 Pull on a manly face, lit with the trust 
 And the great heart of youth. 
 
TOO LATE. 183 
 
 And I recall 
 The words he spake; — if they have turned to gall, 
 Ah well -a- day! 
 We cannot always keep an equal mind ; 
 What we should say, 
 Alas, too oft we leave unsaid, and all 
 
 We should not say — the careless words unkind — 
 In vain we would recall. 
 
 "They tell me, Sir, 
 That you a Poet are, — your songs do stir 
 The hearts of men; 
 I too have rhymes : if they be good or ill 
 I cannot ken; 
 And you will tell me — if I do not err — 
 If there be aught in these of poet skill 
 Or promise, noble Sir." 
 
 I made reply 
 Unto that ardent youth of purpose high, 
 In cold disdain: 
 " Of songs," I said, " the world has all too much;" 
 As counting vain 
 His proffered rhymes, I pushed them idly by ; 
 Him grudged the little courtesy — if such — 
 Wherewith I made reply. 
 
184 TOO LATE. 
 
 More cruel, said: 
 "Do you not see that men have need of bread? 
 Seek not to win 
 A good whereto the strongest strive in vain; 
 The path wherein 
 Our feet have trodden long, we easy tread; 
 Late from the farm, I see: — return again 
 Unto the farm," I said. 
 
 And what is fame 
 To the dull eye, cold heart, ignoble aim? — 
 That youthful brow, 
 While yet I spake, lit with a purpose true, — 
 I see it now — 
 Flashed through the tan a beam of living flame; 
 A blush of shame — but oh, a blush that grew 
 Into immortal Fame. 
 
 So late — so late, 
 To learn what is ignoble, what is great; 
 So slow to see 
 Thought built the world, must build the world anew; 
 The Poet, he 
 The re -creator is whom all things wait: — 
 Recalling oft that youth, that poet true, 
 I sigh, "Alas, too late!" 
 
HOME FROM THE WAR. 
 
 July 4TH, 1865. 
 
 The round globe turns unto the sun; 
 
 The woods in waiting reverence lean ; 
 
 The far rejoicing hills between, 
 The rivers run; 
 The golden dawn and twilight dun 
 
 Weave wide their Summer robe of green 
 
 The earth is thick with beauty sown; 
 The Seasons, as they onward wing, 
 The promise still of plenty bring — 
 Of harvests grown; 
 
 Though priceless wealth in these we own, 
 To-day joy hath a deeper spring. 
 
 Through all the wide rejoicing land 
 
 We give with eager hearts unbound 
 Unto our heroes, laurel crowned, 
 A loving hand; 
 
 That come, a scarred and noble band, 
 
 From many a crimson field renowned. 
 
 24 
 
186 HOME FROM THE WAR. 
 
 And let the farthest minster- dome 
 
 Loud clang a mighty greeting forth; 
 Eing east and west, ring south and north 
 A welcome home 
 
 To all whose fearless feet have clomb 
 
 To radiant heights of truth and worth. 
 
 Yet not alone for wild alarms 
 
 Of deadly conflict heard no more, 
 The bugle's call, the cannon's roar, 
 The clash of arms, — 
 
 Nor yet to clasp the manly forms 
 
 That foremost in the battle bore ; — 
 
 Nor yet alone for victory bought 
 
 Where free the crimson current ran, 
 Our hearts rejoice; — for love of man 
 In deeds enwrought! 
 
 A fadeless iris, glory -fraught, 
 
 That far shall coming ages span. 
 
 For this, our Nation's starry goal, 
 
 Though reached through fieiy martyrdom, 
 For Freedom's lifeless form become 
 A living soul ! 
 
 That while the circling seasons roll, 
 
 No more shall outraged Truth be dumb. 
 
HOME FROM THE WAR. 187 
 
 And for a lowly race arrayed 
 In manhood's regal majesty, 
 Their native cane -fields tilling free 
 And unafraid; 
 
 For Peace with deep foundations laid 
 In righteousness, and Liberty. 
 
 Though mourning still our patriots gone, 
 This faith a nation's tears shall stay; 
 From fields still red with battle fray 
 Their feet withdrawn, 
 
 They climb the radiant hills of dawn, 
 That beacon on the coming day. 
 
BELOVED. 
 
 Thy love to me — like gentle Summer rain 
 
 Is the outpouring of thy love to me, 
 When full libations o'er the parched plain 
 Shower copious and free. 
 
 Thy love to me — like the deep hidden springs 
 
 That from the hills in cooling freshness buret, 
 More pure the wave its sparkling fountain brings 
 To quench my spirit - thirst. 
 
 Thy love to me — like the soft mystic chime 
 
 That murmurs to us in the twilight dim; 
 A voice glad singing of the coming time — 
 My heart's perpetual hymn. 
 
 Thy love to me — like the meek stars that shine 
 
 From the far -glowing galaxy of night: 
 Only the brightness of these orbs is mine — 
 Those have an alien light. 
 
BELOVED. 189 
 
 Thy love to me — no full, deep joy like this, 
 
 In the wild fervor that ray heart hath known ; 
 The large fulfilment of my dreams of bliss 
 Through weary years and lone. 
 
 Thy love for me — still present though unseen; 
 
 Though lengthening miles must long between us lie,, 
 Nor time can part, nor distance intervene: 
 I feel thee ever nigh, 
 
 And still more nigh, as still more wholly mine — 
 
 I still more thine, becoming day ; by 'day, 
 Until the sun shall undivided .shine ■ - . 
 
 That lights our severed way. 
 
WORK. 
 
 ' Tis much to know in life our proper task, 
 Yet more to do, when well we know our work; 
 Into Life's harvest none are sent to shirk — 
 
 Of others' toil the gifts of lahor ask; 
 Why should I beg? — couldst give me all the wealth 
 
 Of all the world, I might not hold it fast — 
 
 I could but die a mendicant at last. 
 It is not mine, the gold I get by stealth: 
 
 Only in doing may the arm grow strong, 
 The mind be strengthened in its own high thought; 
 And ours — ours only what our hands have wrought, 
 
 The sole sure wages that to Toil belong. 
 Do then thy task, and trust the gods' decree, 
 That as thy work thy recompense shall be. 
 
CHRISTINE. 
 
 Sore us, lady fair — 
 
 Not when afar 
 Upon the stifled air 
 The world's great anthem peal on peal resounds — 
 
 A lowly song; — not mid the din and jar 
 Of the deep organ -swells that blend and pour 
 In one grand symphony 
 All waves of sound 
 From full orchestra borne, like billows' roar 
 When tempests lash the sea. 
 
 Sing us the simple lays, 
 Home -ballads, born 
 In the dim mythic days, 
 Of mountain, sea, and river, wood and fell; 
 
 The Folk-songs old, that never are outworn! 
 So to our children when the years shall wanp, 
 At twilight -fall serene 
 Oft may we tell 
 Of the sweet Singer from across the main — 
 Of her, the fair Christine. 
 
192 CHBISTINE. 
 
 Sing us old waifs of song 
 
 From Runic -writ, 
 That to the scenes belong 
 Now far away — such as in years agone 
 
 Delighted homely labors — charmed and lit 
 The fagot -bearing woods of Wexio; 
 
 What time, with joyance rare, 
 At peep of dawn, 
 Arrayed in home -wrought kirtle thou didst go 
 Elate to Ljugby Pair. 
 
 Sing us of childhood's^ hour 
 
 That comes no more ; 
 Of all the wondrous dower 
 Of aspirations high — the longings wild 
 
 To know, to be, to do, to sing and soar, 
 To climb unto a far-off shining goal, 
 
 When thou didst wander free, 
 A happy child, 
 On Smoland hills, and feed thy hungry soul 
 On Nature's minstrelsy. 
 
 Sing us of all things fair: 
 
 Sing us of Home ! 
 Of bearts that nightly bear 
 Yearnings for one beloved beyond the sea, 
 
 Counting the days that weary wax and gloam ; 
 
CHRISTINE. 193 
 
 Sing us of her who with love's subtle art 
 
 Pore -kenned thy happier lot; 
 Who tearfully, 
 Stilling the throbbing of the mother's heart, 
 
 Said, " Go, but ask me not! " 
 
 Sing us of Fatherland — 
 
 theme sublime ! 
 Some tale from out the grand 
 Old Scandinavian Eddas that do bear 
 
 Lore from the ancient days — the first of Time! 
 Some Saga- song of mighty heroes dead! 
 Of Vikings bold — of all 
 To Norland dear, — 
 Of Thor, of Odin, Freya — all that tread 
 Walhalla's shining hall ! 
 
 Sing us of Love — but nay! 
 
 Not for our ears 
 Is that sweet minstrelsy, 
 So dear with all regret; — from lips like thine, 
 That song melodious of the coming years, 
 Whose prelude murmurs in the lowliest breast, 
 Would pierce us till we die; — 
 song divine ! 
 Sing us of Hope, of Trust, all sweet unrest, — 
 Saddest of all — good-bye. 
 
LITTLE LINNIE. 
 
 Oft in grief's dread shadow straying, 
 
 With a heart o'erbrimming full, 
 Have I mourned the swift decaying 
 
 Of the loved and beautiful ; 
 I have trod a pathway darkened, 
 
 Trod it wearily and lone, 
 While I hearkened, vainly hearkened 
 
 For a sweetly vanished tone; 
 But a calm came with the morrow 
 
 To my bosom's heaving tide, 
 For I only dreamed of sorrow 
 
 Till our Little Linnie died. 
 
LITTLE L1NNIB. I!i5 
 
 Though I vainly yearning, nightly 
 
 Woo thee from the realm of dreams, 
 Seek thy radiant footstep lightly 
 
 Wandering by the crystal streams, 
 See the lonely twilight darken, 
 
 All unlit of love's delight, 
 Though still evermore to hearken 
 
 For thy nevermore "good-night;" 
 By the deeper love I bore thee 
 
 Than all other love beside, 
 Though my grief may not restore thee, 
 
 Though our Little Linnie died; — 
 
 Though the ages may not claim thee 
 
 For this darkened earth again, 
 Though my waiting lip shall name thee 
 
 Long, and lovingly, in vain; 
 I shall clasp my little maiden 
 
 In all angel graces grown, 
 If the years, with sorrow laden, 
 
 Do but bear me to mine own; 
 Clasp again the early taken, 
 
 Latest loved, love's only pride, 
 To this lorn heart, hope forsaken 
 
 When our Little Linnie died. 
 
190 LITTLE LINNIE. 
 
 The dear azure heaven is shrouded 
 
 Of those orbs of tender blue, 
 Or my own, with mists beclouded, 
 
 They have darkened to my view; 
 Yet in vain my sore repining, 
 
 Howsoever that may be, 
 For if still undimmed their shining, 
 
 They are turned away from me; 
 And no solace can I borrow 
 
 From the days that darkly glide, 
 For my first, last, only sorrow, — 
 
 When our Little Linnie died. 
 
 ! how can I live without thee ? 
 
 If no more to feel the twine 
 Of thy gentle arms about me, 
 
 Or thy tiny hand in mine; 
 Still to miss thy soft caressing 
 
 Through the darkened days to be, 
 For thou wast the rarest blessing 
 
 From the angel-life to me. 
 Only in the heavens above me, 
 
 Where the Beautiful abide, 
 Were there any more to love me 
 
 When our Little Linnie died. 
 
THE TIME TO BE. 
 
 The shadows lengthen as the day 
 Declines along the Hesper-rim; 
 The night draws on- — more faint and dim 
 
 Fades the last purple light to gray; 
 
 Yet starry hosts come out alway, 
 To echo on Creation's hymn. 
 
 Creation's hymn — that first was sung 
 
 On boundless waste of shapeless gloom, 
 When out of Chaos' quickened womb 
 
 The earth to orbed being sprung; 
 
 While other orbs with music rung, 
 To see the new-born light illume. 
 
 And what though countless ages wane, 
 The while the Lichen race appears; 
 At length the mighty forest rears, 
 And wide outspreads the verdured plain 
 With luscious fruits and golden grain; — 
 Man crowns at last the ripened years. 
 
108 THE TIME TO BE. 
 
 Though chill and frail the Summer wears, 
 Till into stormy Autumn passed, 
 The sleety rain, the wintry blast, 
 
 Are Nature's need that loss repairs; 
 
 And Spring returns with balmy airs 
 
 And charms more mellow than the last. 
 
 And shall alone in beauty grow 
 
 These grosser outer things we see, 
 And not our lives more lovely be 
 
 Throughout the years that come and go? 
 
 Their brightness wear no deeper glow, 
 What time the circling seasons flee? 
 
 Though, seeming like old Night to mock 
 All order and all laws' control, 
 Looms on the dark the dawning soul, 
 
 Yet shall the storm and earthquake shock 
 
 And lava- fires subdue the rock, 
 
 And make its orb and circle whole. 
 
 And mantling over vale and hill, 
 
 The green and tender blade shall spring; 
 The fragrant bowers rich fruitage bring; 
 Each higher type of life infill, 
 Till from the thought and from the will 
 Dies out each vile and creeping thing. 
 
THE TIME TO BE. 199 
 
 And Mind throughout an endless day 
 
 Shall range a freer, ampler scope ; 
 
 With spectral fear and error cope — 
 Anon each ghostly phantom lay; 
 And roam in joyous noontide ray 
 
 Through paths wherein we darkly grope. 
 
 The Inner Life shall know its need, 
 
 And unto newer life be born; 
 
 From skies our lesser hopes adorn 
 Shall fade in light each darkening creed, 
 As swift the misty shades recede 
 
 Along the radiant path of morn. 
 
 With purer faith that upward leads 
 
 Forever toward the Great Unknown, 
 The infant Man, to manhood grown, 
 
 Shall write at length the Creed of Creeds — • 
 
 A liturgy of nobler deeds 
 
 Than yet this warrior -world has known. 
 
 And other prophet -stars shall rise 
 
 And shine along the Mythic Page 
 That lives anew in every age, 
 
 Yet with the dying ages dies; 
 
 Wherein a deeper meaning lies, 
 That ever waits the wiser Sage. 
 
20U THE TIME TO BE. 
 
 And thought shall find a fuller speech, 
 And still to loftier thought attain, — 
 And deeply -hidden truths made plain 
 
 More deeply hidden truths shall teach; 
 
 As gazing from some mountain reach 
 We see yet higher heights to gain. 
 
 And they whom selfish passions bind, 
 To gentler sympathy unknown, 
 As more of good enamored grown, 
 Shall more of good in all things find, 
 And he more kind unto their kind, 
 And each in each a brother own. 
 
 And Freedom, grown more free and bold, 
 
 The whole wide world shall fearless tread; 
 And Science far a glory shed — 
 
 Strange wonders in her light unfold; 
 
 While hearts now bound in lust of gold 
 Be unto holiest missions wed. 
 
 And progress -cycles still shall roll, 
 
 Still unto rarer ether speed: 
 
 Till Faith from cumbering Form be freed, 
 To see in all the living Soul; 
 Still pointing on the better goal, 
 
 Outgrown each grosser symbol's need. 
 
COUSIN CAROLINE. 
 
 Ere the spring-time's dewy splendor 
 
 Of thy sunny life had passed, 
 On thy young hopes, budding tender 
 
 Fell a breath of wintry blast; 
 And thy youth full early parted 
 
 From its blissful promise, thine; 
 Thou hast left us, gentle-hearted, 
 
 Fragile cousin Caroline. 
 
 With a heart untaught to murmur, 
 
 Thou didst suffer — not in vain ; 
 Patient growing still, and firmer, 
 
 With thy still increasing pain ; 
 Long and weary years of anguish 
 
 Thou didst number, nor repine, 
 Meekly droop, and drooping languish, 
 
 Lovely cousin Caroline. 
 
202 COUSIN CAROLINE. 
 
 Grief our troubled bosoms steeping, 
 
 Oh ! it was a wintry day, 
 When thy spirit left us weeping 
 
 O'er its tenement of clay ! 
 Yet we may not now deplore thee, 
 
 For life's better part is thine, 
 Where thy sister-angels bore thee, — 
 
 Our sweet cousin Caroline. 
 
 When the frosty baud shall lighten 
 
 Binding hill, aud vale and plain, 
 When the vernal hours shall brighten 
 
 O'er the gladdened earth again, 
 Who shall watch the flower bulb starting, 
 
 Who shall train the budding vine, 
 From its trellis wayward parting, 
 
 For our cousin Caroline ? 
 
 Soon each floral gem so cherished, 
 
 Sleeping in its snowy tomb, 
 That, like thee, in beauty perished, 
 
 Shall renew its pride of bloom ; 
 Though thy watchful care to lend them 
 
 Now can never more be thine, 
 ' We, with willing hand, will tend them 
 
 For our cousin Caroline. 
 
COUSIN CAROLINE. 203 
 
 Though we mourn that gloom hath shrouded 
 
 Friendship's jeweled diadem, 
 In celestial skies unclouded, 
 
 Shines another glory-gem, 
 With a radiance unborrowed, 
 
 With serene, untroubled shine ; 
 Thou hast found thy home unsorrowed, 
 
 Suffering cousin Caroline. 
 
 Oft in happy hours and lonely 
 
 We shall miss thy cheerful tone, 
 Lost one — lost ? — no, parted only, 
 
 Knowing thou art still our own ! 
 For thou wilt not cease to love us, 
 
 While each radiant orb shall shine 
 In the starry heavens above us, 
 
 Dearest cousin Caroline. 
 
 ' And our weary steps do hasten, 
 
 Journeying to that brighter shore, 
 Where no sorrow comes to chasten, 
 
 Chastened, thou hast gone before; 
 We shall there, our grief foregoing, 
 
 In love's recognition twine, 
 Never doubting of our knowing 
 
 Thee, our cousin Caroline. 
 
PARTING FRIENDS. 
 
 When the chosen Friend, and dear, 
 Leaves us for some far-off land, 
 
 When unbid the falling tear 
 Glistens on the clasping hand; 
 
 When the farewell murmur dies, 
 And the parting footsteps press, 
 
 On our path a shadow lies, 
 On our hearts a loneliness. 
 
 But the cherished may come back, 
 •And our vanished joy renew, 
 
 Far reti ace a devious track, 
 With a love unchanged and true; 
 
 Starry eyes that shed their light 
 On the dark of long ago, 
 
 Shine more tenderly and bright, 
 Kindle with serener glow. 
 
PARTING FRIENDS. 
 
 When the truest, that have been 
 With us in the walks of Time, 
 
 Turning from its strife and din 
 To the higher life sublime, 
 
 Leave us, — though we lonely grope 
 In this weary world behind, — 
 
 Still we trust the larger hope 
 With our better being twined. 
 
 But when friends — or counted such, 
 Linked with many a tender tie, 
 
 Souls we worshiped overmuch, 
 With an homage pure and high, — 
 
 Those we thought of kith and kin 
 In the realms of mind and heart, 
 
 Still to be, as they had been, 
 Of our very life a part ; — 
 
 Oh, to see them day by day 
 Lose that magic power to bless ! 
 
 Oh, to feel them wear away — 
 Feel that nearness growing less ! 
 
 Is there art to heal the pain, 
 Bring the aching heart relief, 
 
 When with anguish wild and vain 
 Deepens down this deepest grief? 
 
A COMPLAINT. 
 
 Sweet bird that chants so joyous strain, 
 Wake glad your early songs and late; 
 
 Pour free your jubilant heart amain, 
 The live long day — who needst but wait 
 
 The twilight hush, to seek again 
 
 Tour nest and mate. 
 
 And ye that grosser instincts bear, 
 That roam the homeless wilderness; 
 
 Whom nature haunts with hungry care, 
 Or fiercest brutal passions press ; 
 
 Ye too may turn to love-built lair, 
 
 And cubs' caress. 
 
 And ye that pipe, with droning shrill, 
 From shrub, and tree, your vesper sigh,- 
 
 Te lowly insect tribes that fill 
 
 The gloom with night-long minstrelsy, 
 
 Blow wide your homely reeds that trill 
 
 Love's lullaby. 
 
A COMPLAINT. 207 
 
 And ye that prone in darkness keep, 
 Whose life but earthy senses bind, — 
 
 Ye nameless reptile brood that creep 
 Low on the outer verge of mind, 
 
 Ye too may own companionship, 
 
 And love of kind. 
 
 Earth, wandering, bears a tranquil breast, 
 
 Content a kindred orb to own; 
 With stars that constellated rest, 
 
 The ether's purple deeps are sown; 
 All things the law of Love attest, 
 
 Save Man alone! 
 
 Life's riddles dark — ah me ! — are vain, 
 
 All vain, these beauty-dreams that haunt? 
 
 While from the worm we dare disdain, 
 Comes up Love's roundelay to taunt 
 
 Our empty breasts' wild, yearning pain, 
 
 And deathless want. 
 
 When shall our souls the joys confess, 
 That to the lowliest creatures come, 
 
 Their meaner lives to charm and bless? 
 When shall our weary hearts that roam 
 
 So lonely and companionless, 
 
 Find rest and home ? 
 
RE-EMERGED. 
 
 On tranquil tides afar lie isles of Summer, 
 
 Where shine serene, mantled in tropic calm, 
 
 Olive, magnolia, palm; 
 Along whose shores the billows lapsing murmur 
 
 Their glad immortal psalm. 
 
 Yet were these, fair, the radiant sunlight gilding, 
 Out of the deeps where slimy creatures stray, 
 
 Out of the briny spray, 
 Slowly through long uncounted years upbuilding 
 
 Into the light of day. 
 
 So erst my heart, in seas of foregone anguish, 
 Sunken too deep for plummet -line of hope, 
 
 Striving, did faint and grope, 
 Ages on ages, and despairing languish, 
 
 And with all monsters cope. 
 
RE- EMERGED. 209 
 
 Or rising thence, through oft alternate burning 
 And glacier -griding as the cycles run, 
 
 Or fiercer strife anon 
 Of earthquake shock, yearned with a deathless yearning 
 
 Toward love's transcendent sun; 
 
 And ever of some fateful force the urgence 
 
 Confessed, like all things fair that upward grow 
 
 Out of the dark below, 
 The admonition of a fair emergence, 
 
 And of the morning glow; 
 
 The vision of a bright supernal yonder, 
 
 Of verdured vales with harvest fields along, 
 
 Where happy gleaners throng; 
 Of flowery groves where spicy breezes wander, 
 
 And jubilant with song. 
 
 At length through thee, Friend — Spirit tender! 
 best beloved! — out of the years forlorn 
 
 My darkened soul is born — 
 Out of the deeps, into the sapphire splendor 
 
 Of a transcendent morn. 
 
 27 
 
210 RE - EMERGED. 
 
 Lit with the light divine, there lies a glory- 
 On all the land, enrobed in living green — 
 
 Love's radiant glow and sheen; 
 More marvellous the zephyr's whispered story 
 
 Of beauty yet unseen. 
 
 While all day long the billows' lips are pressing 
 
 The golden sands, with new- world splendors bright; 
 
 Kisses that may requite 
 Love infinite — repay the priceless blessing, 
 
 Precious, of life and light. 
 
 And oh! more fair than crowned the Summers olden, 
 Along the hills, late lifted from the brine, 
 
 Shall fragrant garlands twine; 
 In Autumn suns all luscious fruits hang golden, 
 
 And purple clusters shine. 
 
CENTENNIAL. 
 
 Turn backward — turn the horoscope of Time 
 Backward a hundred years, 
 year sublime ! 
 Lo! by the sea, 
 Anxious and bowed in tears, 
 Tearful but not forlorn, 
 Columbia sitting by the cradled form 
 
 Of one but newly born; 
 Sitting with mother-breast all full and warm, 
 Feeding thy infant life, Liberty! 
 
 Now in her matron pride she sees thee stand 
 Unto full stature grown; 
 From strand to strand, 
 Wide leagues away — 
 Still on — and all thine own, 
 Stretches thy fair estate; 
 From Isles of Palm to belts of Northern pine, ' 
 
 From where the Golden Gate 
 Looks on the sea, to the Atlantic brine; 
 Transfigured all in tbe new-risen day ! 
 
212 CENTENNIAL. 
 
 A hundred years! who so wise to know 
 
 The good thy years have brought, — 
 To rightly show 
 What work divine 
 Our hands through thee have wrought ? 
 By thee inspired to toil 
 We builded — building better than we planned; 
 
 Though shaped in grime and moil, 
 Before our thought embodied full and grand, 
 We stand abashed, — knowing the work is thine. 
 
 To-day thy Commerce spreads her snowy sail 
 On the remotest main; 
 And many a vale 
 
 Where wakes the sound 
 Of forge and loom and plane, 
 Where Learning builds her shrine, 
 Faith lights her altars, Art her temple rears, 
 
 Where homes fond hearts entwine, 
 Where harvests yield their wealth of golden ears; 
 Was at thy birth a wilderness profound. 
 
 Through mountain reach,by hill and moor and mead 
 We stretch the iron way, 
 On which the steed 
 That never tires, 
 Treads with exultant neigh; 
 
CENTENNIAL. 213 
 
 The plowman turning o'er 
 The farthest glebe, a joyful tremor feels; 
 
 The woodman from his door 
 
 Hears from afar the sound of rolling wheels; — 
 
 Hearing, his soul with nobler impulse fires. 
 
 And here to-day, where thou didst wake to birth — 
 Life from the Life Divine ! 
 Owning thy worth, 
 A mighty throng 
 Come — pilgrims to thy shrine, 
 Than armed host more grand ! 
 Never before such sound of hurrying feet 
 
 Was heard in all the land; 
 And still they come, — bearing an homage meet ; 
 And still, — and twice a hundred thousand strong! 
 
 And hither from across the stormy main 
 Have the far Nations brought, 
 And not in vain, 
 To honor thee, 
 Works that their hands have wrought; 
 Treasures of every zone: 
 Fur of all beasts that tread the Polar snow; 
 
 Sheaves from all harvests sown; 
 Gems, spices, gums — all plants, all fruits that grow 
 In gardens cradled on the Tropic sea. 
 
214 CENTENNIAL. 
 
 And dearer than all wealth, or proud device 
 From Labor's tireless hand, 
 Bought with the price 
 Of precious blood — 
 Freedom in all the land ! 
 Lighting the hills of Time, 
 Onward the morning glow of Freedom runs, — 
 Onward from clime to clime; 
 Lo! Afric's sons reaching to Afric's sons 
 A helping hand across the briny flood! 
 
 And though the evil Hosts that round thee stood 
 On that momentous day 
 Of Motherhood, 
 That gave thee life, 
 Dare still thy children slay; 
 Aye! — Though must be again, 
 And yet again, thy battle fought and won, — 
 
 Must be thy patriots slain, 
 Liberty! as they of Lexington, 
 And they that fell in Gettysburg's wild strife; — 
 
 Though too — shame! — thy sons against thee turn 
 Schooled in all low desires; 
 With hearts that burn 
 With greed of gold, 
 Or lusts that power inspires ; 
 
CENTENNIAL. 215 
 
 Yet will we not despair: 
 The God of Nations shall all gods dethrone, 
 
 All realms dissolve in air, 
 Save that wherein each soul shall have its own, — 
 The Key to its own destiny shall hold. 
 
 We hark the chimes that ring thy natal year: 
 A far-off minstrelsy 
 We seem to hear; 
 And sweeter than 
 The bells' "Sweet bye and bye," 
 Is the low-heard refrain ; 
 A music that our ears have waited long, 
 
 Erewhile to swell amain; 
 The prelude to the glad millennial song 
 Of — " Peace on earth, peace and good will to Man.'' 
 
ASPIRATION. 
 
 My heart's aspiring is, to me, 
 
 Of every good the prophecy — 
 
 The seed-corn of the time to be; 
 
 And though I mourn its planting vain 
 Till dewy tears, like summer rain, 
 Have freely watered all the plain, 
 
 Erewhile my gladdened eyes shall dwell 
 
 On sheaves of plenty, ripened well, 
 Nor be my toil in vain. 
 
 Though stubborn glebe be loth to yield, 
 Though only wrought to fallow field 
 By pointed share, oft newly-steeled; 
 Though late the tender blade appears, 
 Though slow the fruitful stalk uprears, 
 And long ere, glad, the well-filled ears 
 I crib; — the harvest's ample store 
 Shall safely garnered be before 
 The winter storm appears. 
 
ASPIRATION. 217 
 
 So will I trust; — in faith and prayer 
 Plant truth and friendship everywhere; 
 And love, seed of harvests rare ! 
 Deep in some gentle bosom warm 
 That thrills, as mine, in calm and storm, 
 To beauty's glance and glowing form; 
 Nor doubt the Autumn days shall shine, 
 Full-crowned and rich in corn and wine — 
 True hearts, fond, full and warm. 
 
 For this I hold: — however crossed 
 By drouth or flood, by storm or frost, 
 No stroke of honest toil is lost; 
 
 That still one purpose holds through all, 
 
 Whatever evil fate befall, 
 
 That unto each, or great or small, 
 Or soon or late is justice done 
 In every land beneath the sun; — 
 
 That God is over all. 
 
 28 
 
WEDDED LOVE. 
 
 In the blue that bends above us, 
 
 Shining far, 
 Never alien star that mated 
 
 Alien star; 
 Though with light the purple ether 
 
 Depths are sown, 
 Every orb there steadfast burneth — 
 Faithful turning to rrs own. 
 
 Like as they, are we, fate-chosen — 
 
 Mine and thine; 
 So thy heart, true heart ! wedded 
 
 Unto mine, 
 Like two flowers that grow together 
 
 In the grove, 
 With one root, one stem, one fragrance, 
 And one sun — the sun of Love. 
 
FORTY YEARS AGO. 
 
 To-dat the paths my infant footsteps pressed, 
 
 I tread, in stranger guise; 
 I climb the hills, whose woodland-mantled crest 
 
 First met my infant eyes; 
 On grassy mound, in Autumn's paling glow, 
 
 I sit and muse, where in the olden time 
 I sat and dreamed — dreams only Youth may know 
 Oh ! dreams sublime, 
 Dreamed forty years ago. 
 
 The pines above me sing as erst they sung: 
 
 The well-remembered lyre 
 I hear again, but not the Prophet-tongue — 
 
 " Aspire, Heart ! aspire ;" 
 As from some prisoned Ariel's lips of woe, 
 
 The voice wherein their murmurous boughs complain ; 
 Far off I hear, in accents faint and low, 
 The sad refrain 
 Of — " Forty years ago." 
 
220 FORTY YEARS AGO. 
 
 How much I miss that Memory's pictures hold: 
 
 Now but a tiny rill 
 The brook whereon at springtime-flood of old 
 
 I built the mimic mill; 
 Up to the spring, whence its pure waters flow, 
 I wend, aud from its shrunken tide partake; 
 Oh! but for once the keener thirst to know 
 Its wave did slake, 
 Slake — forty years ago. 
 
 Where stretched the moor that foretime seemed to mock 
 
 At Labor's hand benign, 
 In pastures green now roam the bleating flock, 
 
 Wide graze the lowing kine; 
 Where Autumn woods erewhile did flame and glow, 
 
 Outspreads a furrowed field, all bare and brown; 
 How oft I shook for eager hands below, 
 The ripe nuts down, 
 There — forty years ago!- 
 
 Once more I roam where oft with dog and gun 
 
 I scoured the wooded glen; 
 Oft set the snare upon the rabbit's run, 
 
 Or by the woodchuck's den ; 
 
FORTY YEARS AGO. 221 
 
 Let him who will, hunt elk and buffalo, 
 
 With fearless aim bring down the moose and bear; 
 No sport the hunter of the wild may know, 
 Than this more rare — 
 Of forty years ago. 
 
 Again beneath the orchard trees I stray, 
 
 The trees I used to climb; 
 But oh! somehow the apples lack to-day 
 
 The flavor of old time; 
 Though still their shining globes lie thick below — 
 
 In blushing heaps, green, red, and gold, I see ; 
 Is it, this change — alas! I hardly know — 
 In them or me, 
 Since forty years ago? 
 
 The spot where stood the home that gave me birth, 
 
 With grass is overgrown; 
 Alone is left of all that ample hearth 
 
 One solitary stone. 
 Ah! since that day, though I have wandered so, 
 
 Have seen remotest firesides blaze and shine, 
 None have I found to match that warmth and glow, 
 That beam divine 
 Of forty years ago. 
 
222 FOUTF TEARS AGO. 
 
 Still stands, as then, the school-house old; renewed, 
 
 And old again; to me 
 The same as when upon its benches rude 
 
 I conned my ABC; 
 Still carvings quaint the desk and lintels show, — 
 The work of hands beyond their task's employ; 
 If but by this, the boy to-day, I know 
 Is as the boy 
 OF forty years ago. 
 
 What nameless sins through ferule's sting and smart 
 
 Did I there expiate; 
 Some unrepented still — obdurate heart! 
 
 Now I recall — so late — • 
 The schoolmate maiden that did tempt me so; 
 
 Yet I forgave her all: — and it were bliss, 
 At thrice its price of stripes, thy sweets to know, 
 stolen kiss 
 Of forty years ago! 
 
 Last night I sat beside that saucy maid, 
 
 The same, yet not the same; 
 The frosts of Time had touched each auburn braid, 
 
 But left her heart, her name; 
 
FORTY YEARS AGO. 223 
 
 From childhood's years had it been ours to grow, 
 
 As we together grew — I questioned Fate, — 
 Would she, unwedded, still have waited so, 
 My gentle mate 
 Of forty years ago ? 
 
 To know what might have been, why should I seek?- 
 
 The good that may not be; 
 The Sibyl better silence keep than speak 
 
 Too late for Destiny; 
 Yet had it been my lot such joy to know, — 
 
 foolish Heart !' what wayward pulse is thine ; 
 For all our dreams, it may be better so, 
 schoolmate mine 
 Of forty years ago! 
 
 The Comrades of old days — oh! where are they? 
 
 Far from their native soil, 
 Unto what lands gone each his separate way,— 
 
 Into what fields of toil ? 
 Some cherished names the marble tablets show, 
 
 And some, alas! are fallen more than they; 
 Some toward a nobler manhood strive and grow 
 Still, day by day, 
 As forty years ago. 
 
224 FORTY TEAMS AGO. 
 
 And where, the forms more comely in my eyes, — 
 
 That more in beauty grew, 
 Their faces lit with Learning's morning-rise, 
 
 And with a purpose new ? 
 By Pleasure some, some lured by Fashion's show, 
 
 Some, crowned with Woman's fairest crown to-day, 
 Have sown the world with men; — as erst did sow 
 Our mothers, — they 
 Of forty years ago. 
 
 The vision fades, — the scenes of Childhood fiy,- 
 
 Recedes the Primal Age; 
 Upon my pen the sunset-shadows lie, 
 
 My tears despoil the page; 
 A.nd I full soon, the waiting fields to sow 
 
 For harvests new, afar again shall roam ; 
 Once more adieu — the last — I bid thee, 
 My Boyhood's Home 
 Of forty years ago! 
 
 Heart of Youth! Soul of Prophecy! 
 
 Go with me on my way ; 
 Fore-herald still more happy days to be, 
 
 That evermore delay; 
 
FOUTY TEAIiS AGO. 225 
 
 For oh ! not all in vain the dreams that so 
 
 Have led my weary feet by crystal streams; 
 Though some have fled, — thank God ! some wax and grow 
 To fairer dreams 
 Than forty years ago. 
 
 And may I, free from Time's decay and rust, 
 
 Still keep Youth's horoscope; 
 Keep all undimmed my childhood's love and trust, 
 
 My childhood's faith and hope; 
 That at the last, when fades Earth's fleeting show, — 
 Falls round my life the twilight's gathering haze, 
 A bright Beyond shall beckon, shine and glow, 
 As in the days 
 Of forty years ago. 
 
 29