Number 239 -. WiAWMI t^JMrti^WtiJ&tiffiSSnffi MMMJu^ka^g^ffMS. ^ 'umtfHur/fiitHrmiHmmvMMWifutanitmwirtvim \mtuutiHim Price, paper, 15 cents; linen, 25 cents. RIVERSIDE LITERATURE SERIES 1. Longfellow's Evangeline. 2. Longfellow's Courtship of Miles Standish. 3. Dramatization of Miles Standish. 4. Whittier's Snow-Bound, etc. 5. Whittier's Mabel Martin. 6. Holmes's Grandmother's Story. 7. 8, 9. Hawthorne's Grandfather's Chair. 10. Hawthorne's Biographical Series. 11. Longfellow's Children's Hour, etc. 12. Outlines — Longfellow, Whittier, Holmes, Lowell. 13. 14. Longfellow's Song of Hiawatha. 15. Lowell's Under the Old Elm, etc. 16. Bayard Taylor's Lars. 17. 18. Hawthorne's Wonder-Book. 19, 20. Franklin's Autobiography. 21. Franklin's Poor Richard's Almanac, etc 22, 23. Hawthorne's Tanglewood Tales. 24. Washington's Farewell Addresses, etc 25, 26. Longfellow's Golden Legend. 27. Thoreau's Forest Trees, etc. 28. Burroughs's Birds and Bees. 29. Hawthorne's Little Daffydowndilly, etc. 30. Lowell's Vision of Sir Launfal, etc. 31. Holmes's My Hunt after the Captain, etc. 32. Lincoln's Gettysburg Speech, etc. 33-35. Longfellow's Tales of a Wayside Inn. 36. Burroughs's Sharp Eyes, etc. 37. Warner's A-Hunting of the Deer, etc. 38. Longfellow's Building of the Ship, etc. 39. Lowell's Books and Libraries, etc. 40. Hawthorne's Tales of the White Hills. 41. Whittier's Tent on the Beach, etc. 42. Emerson's Fortune of the Republic, etc. 43. Bryant's Ulysses among the Phaeacians. 44. Edgeworth's Waste not, Want not, etc. 45. Macaulay's Lays of Ancient Rome. 46. Old Testament Stories. 47. 48. Scudder's Fables and Folk Stories. 49, 50. Andersen's Stories. 51. Irving's Rip "Van Winkle, etc. 52. Irving's The Voyage, etc. 53. Scott's Lady of the Lake. 54. Bryant's Thanatopsis, etc. 55. Shakespeare's Merchant of Venice. 56. Webster's First Bunker Hill Oration. 57. Dickens's Christmas Carol. 58. Dickens's Cricket on the Hearth. •>9. Verse and Prose for Beginners in Reading. 60, 61. The Sir Roger de Coverley Papers. 62. Fiske's War of Independence. 63. Longfellow's Paul Revere's Ride, etc. 64-66. Lambs' Tales from Shakespeare. 67. Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. 68. Goldsmith's Deserted Village, etc 69. Hawthorne's The Old Manse, etc. 70. 71. Selection from Whittier's Child Life. 72. Milton's Minor Poems. 73. Tennyson's Enoch Arden, etc. 74. Gray's Elegy ; Cowper's John Gilpin. 75. Scudder's George Washington. 76. Wordsworth's Intimations of Immortality. 77 Bum'i Cotter's Saturday Night, etc 78. Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield. 79. Lamb's Old China, etc. 80. Coleridge's Ancient Mariner ; Campbell's Lochiel's Warning, etc. Holmes' s Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table. Hawthorne's Twice- Told Tales. Eliot's Silas Marner. Dana's Two Years Before the Mast. Hughes's Tom Brown's School Daya. Scott's Ivanhoe. Defoe's Robinson Crusoe. Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin. 89, 90. Swift's Gulliver's Voyages. 91. Hawthorne's House of the Seven Gables. 92. Burroughs's A Bunch of Herbs, etc. 93. Shakespeare's As You Like It. 94. Milton's Paradise Lost. Books I-III. 95-98. Cooper's Last of the Mohicans. 99. Tennyson's Coming of Arthur, etc. 100. Burke's Conciliation with the Colonies. 101. Pope's Iliad. Books I, VI, XXII, XXIV. 102. Macaulay's Johnson and Goldsmith. 103. Macaulay's Milton. 104. Macaulay's Addison. 105. Carlyle's Essay on Burns. 106. Shakespeare's Macbeth. 107. 108. Grimms' Tales. 109. Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. 110. De Quincey's Flight of a Tartar Tribe. 111. Tennyson's Princess. 112. Cranch's ^Eneid. Books I-III. 113. Poems from Emerson. 114. Peabody's Old Greek Folk Stories. 115. Browning's Pied Piper of Hamelin, etc. 116. Shakespeare's Hamlet. 117. 118. Stories from the Arabian Nights. 119, 120. Poe's Poems and Tales. 121. Speech by Hayne on Foote's Resolution. 122. Speech by Webster in Reply to Hayne. 123. Lowell's Democracy, etc. 124. Aldrich's The Cruise of the Dolphin. 125. Dryden's Palamon and Arcite. 126. Ruskin's King of the Golden River, etc. 127. Keats's Ode on a Grecian Urn, etc. 128. Byron's Prisoner of Chillon, etc 129. Plato's Judgment of Socrates. 130. Emerson's The Superlative, etc 131. Emerson's Nature, etc. 132. Arnold's Sohrab and Rustum, etc 133. Schnrz's Abraham Lincoln. 134. Scott's Lay of the Last Minstrel. 135. Chaucer's Prologue. 136. Chaucer's The Knight's Tale, etc. 137. Bryant's Iliad. Bks. I, VI, XXII, XXIV. 138. Hawthorne's The Custom House, etc. 139. Howells's Doorstep Acquaintance, etc 140. Thackeray's Henry Esmond. 141. Higginson's Three Outdoor Papers. 142. Ruskin's Sesame and Lilies. 143. Plutarch's Alexander the Great. 144. Scudder's The Book of Legends. 145. Hawthorne's The Gentle Boy, etc 146. Longfellow's Giles Corey. (See also back covers,} (74) gtljt ISitursiDe JLitcrature Series SELECTIONS FROM AMERICAN POETRY WITH SPECIAL ATTENTION TO LONGFELLOW, WHITTIER POE and LOWELL EDITED WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES BY FREDERICK HOUK LAW, A.M. Ph.D. HEAD OF THE DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH IN THE STUVVESANT HIGH SCHOOL, NEW YOKE CITY BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY T5^ PREFACE .L ^ The purpose of this text is to present material for the present college entrance requirement for reading "Selec- tions from American Poets, with special attention to Long- fellow, Whittier, Poe, and Lowell." Its further purpose is to present poems so carefully chosen with regard to points of contact with adolescent life that they will give imme- diate pleasure and stimulate a desire for further reading along the best lines of interest. Furthermore, the poems have been chosen with regard to high literary values and far-reaching ethical importance. In accordance with the college entrance requirement em- phasis has been placed upon the work of Longfellow, Whit- tier, Poe, and Lowell. The poems of these writers have been placed first for the convenience of those who prefer to devote more intensive study to the writers of greatest importance. "The Vision of Sir Launfal," although much longer than any other poem in the book, has been included to meet the needs of those who wish to make a special study of that poem and at the same time to have at hand a help- ful body of collateral reading in American poetry. The book presents also explanatory notes, suggestions for study and for further reading, biographical notes, and valu- able critical estimates of the work of Longfellow, Whittier, Poe, and Lowell, — the last from Professor W. E. Simonds's A Student's History of American Literature. The poems by Bryant here reprinted are included with acknowledgments to D. Appleton & Co., the authorized publishers of Bryant's Poems. Permission to reprint those by Walt Whitman has been given by David McKay. Houghton Mifflin Company are the sole authorized publishers of the other poets repre-,, sented. COPYRIGHT I915 BY HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY ALL RIGHTS RESERVED ©CI.A398425 APR 19 1918 ■ CONTENTS Introduction v Selected Poems Henry Wadsworth Longfellow A Psalm of Life J The Wreck of the Hesperus 2 The Village Blacksmith 5 The Skeleton in Armor Serenade The Rainy Day l ] The Arsenal at Springfield Children The Bell of Atri . lo „ The Republic John Greenleaf Whittier 18 The Angels of Buena Vista MaudMuller ^ The Barefoot Boy The Pipes at Lucknow Marguerite In School-Days Edgar Allan Poe ^ TT , .... 36 To Helen Israfel gg The City in the Sea To One in Paradise ^ ... 40 The Raven 45 Ulalume 4,8 The Bells Annabel Lee Eldorado iv CONTENTS James Russell Lowell To the Dandelion 53 The Present Crisis 55 The Vision of Sir Launfal 60 The First Snow-Fail 70 The Courtin' 71 Abraham Lincoln 74 William Cullen Bryant Thanatopsis 76 Inscription for the Entrance to a Wood 78 To a Waterfowl 79 Ralph Waldo Emerson TheRhodora 81 Concord Hymn 81 Fable 82 Forbearance 82 Music 83 Oliver Wendell Holmes Old Ironsides 83 The Chambered Nautilus 84 The Deacon's Masterpiece 85 Walt Whitman Cavalry Crossing a Ford 89 O Captain! My Captain! 89 Hush'd be the Camps To-day 90 A Noiseless Patient Spider 91 The First Dandelion 91 Helps in Reading 92 Biographical Notes 110 An Estimate of the Poetry of Longfellow, Whittier, Poe, and Lowell 117 Reference Books 121 INTRODUCTION METHOD OF STUDY Our first duty in the study of a poem is to find the com- mon bond between ourselves and the poet. When we have found this point of contact we should realize it vividly through deeper thought or the stimulus of group discussion. We should go even further and realize the bond between the thought of the poet and the thought of the present-day world. It is the present, living significance of poetry that makes poetry worth while. A poem appeals to us in that proportion in which it expresses our own emotions. The second step in the study of poetry is to realize the meanings of the individual words as the poet has used them. We must find the connotative as well as the denotative values of the words employed. Then there are allusions to literature, to people, and to places, every allusion carrying with it a multitude of suggestions that may appeal to us through the association of ideas. Two dictionaries are therefore essential, the one a dictionary of words, the other a dictionary of proper names. We should trace the development of the author's thought as indicated in the various divisions of the poem, noting his method of approach to his subject, the points that he makes most emphatic, and his method of conclusion. When this has been done, we should consider the poem as an artistic whole, taking into account not only thought but also ex- pression. When we have mastered the thought-values of a poem we should consider its metrical and stanzaic forms, using as helps such books as Webster's Composition and Literature, chapter xi; Webster's English for Secondary Schools, chapter viii ; or Matthew's A Study of Versification. When we under- stand the mechanical means by which the poet produced the effects that please us, we gain proportionately in enjoyment. Knowledge of an author's life adds immensely to the pleasure that literature gives. When we read a poem whose thought, emotion, and artistic expression appeal to us deeply vi INTRODUCTION it is only natural to wish to know more concerning the writer. The study of biography should therefore accom- pany the study of poetry, not alone for the sake of illumi- nation, but also for the sake of the pleasure that may be derived from such study. A good encyclopaedia, or good biographies, — such as those of the American Men of Let- ters Series, — will be most helpful. In all study of poetry we should seek for such information as will lead us to think further or to read further in other books. We should make our study a center for life interests and for wide reading along the best lines. In the study of poetry the preparation of orderly note- books in which we may preserve and systematize the in- formation gained from day to day will be of the greatest help. Our study of the works of great poets should help to make us self-active. It should help us to think clearly and to feel deeply. It should lead us to express our own thoughts as clearly and as beautifully as possible. If we cannot express ourselves in verse, we should at least try to write prose that shall have somewhat of the charm, the high thought, and the noble spirit of the best poetry. SELECTED POEMS HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW A PSALM OF LIFE What the Heart of the Young Man said to the Psalmist Tell me not, in mournful numbers, Life is but an empty dream ! — For the soul is dead that slumbers, And things are not what they seem. Life is real ! Life is earnest ! 5 And the grave is not its goal ; Dust thou art, to dust returnest, Was not spoken of the soul. Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, Is our destined end or way; 10 But to act, that each to-morrow Find us farther than to-day. Art is long, and Time is fleeting, And our hearts, though stout and brave, Still, like muffled drums, are beating 15 Funeral marches to the grave. In the world's broad field of battle, In the bivouac of Life, Be not like dumb, driven cattle ! Be a hero in the strife ! 20 Trust no Future, howe'er pleasant! Let the dead Past bury its dead ! Act, — act in the living Present ! Heart within, and God o'erhead ! SELECTED POEMS Lives of great men all remind us 25 We can make our lives sublime, And, departing, leave behind us Footprints on the sands of time ; Footprints, that perhaps another, Sailing o'er life's solemn main, 30 A forlorn and shipwrecked brother, Seeing, shall take heart again. Let us, then, be up and doing, With a heart for any fate ; Still achieving, still pursuing, 35 Learn to labor and to wait. THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS It was the schooner Hesperus, That sailed the wintry sea; And the skipper had taken his little daughter, To bear him company. Blue were her eyes as the fairy-flax, 5 Her cheeks like the dawn of day, And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds, That ope in the month of May. The skipper he stood beside the helm, His pipe was in his mouth, 10 And he watched how the veering flaw did blow The smoke now West, now South. Then up and spake an old Sailor, Had sailed to the Spanish Main, " t pray thee, put into yonder port, 15 For I fear a hurricane. "Last night, the moon had a golden ring, And to-night no moon we see ! " The skipper, he blew a whiff from his pipe, And a scornful laugh laughed he. 20 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 3 Colder and louder blew the wind, A gale from the Northeast, The snow fell hissing in the brine, And the billows frothed like yeast. Down came the storm, and smote amain 25 The vessel in its strength ; She shuddered and paused, like a frighted steed, Then leaped her cable's length. " Come hither ! come hither ! my little daughter, And do not tremble so ; 30 For I can weather the roughest gale That ever wind did blow." He wrapped her warm in his seaman's coat Against the stinging blast ; He cut a rope from a broken spar, 35 And bound her to the mast. " O father! I hear the church-bells ring, Oh say, what may it be ? " " 'T is a fog-bell on a rock- bound coast ! " — And he steered for the open sea. 40 " O father ! I hear the sound of guns, Oh say, what may it be ? " " Some ship in distress, that cannot live In such an angry sea ! " " O father ! I see a gleaming light, 45 Oh say, what may it be ? " But the father answered never a word, A frozen corpse was he. Lashed to the helm, all stiff and stark, With his face turned to the skies, 50 The lantern gleamed through the gleaming snow On his fixed and glassy eyes. SELECTED POEMS Then the maiden clasped her hands and prayed That saved she might be ; And she thought of Christ, who stilled the wave, 55 On the Lake of Galilee. And fast through the midnight dark and drear, Through the whistling sleet and snow, Like a sheeted ghost, the vessel swept Tow'rds the reef of Norman's Woe. 60 And ever the fitful gusts between A sound came from the land ; It was the sound of the trampling surf On the rocks and the hard sea-sand. The breakers were right beneath her bows, 65 She drifted a dreary wreck, And a whooping billow swept the crew Like icicles from her deck. She struck where the white and fleecy waves Looked soft as carded wool, 70 But the cruel rocks, they gored her side Like the horns of an angry bull. Her rattling shrouds, all sheathed in ice, With the masts went by the board; Like a vessel of glass, she stove and sank, 75 Ho ! ho ! the breakers roared ! At daybreak, on the bleak sea-beach, A fisherman stood aghast, To see the form of a maiden fair, Lashed close to a drifting mast. 80 The salt sea was frozen on her breast, The salt tears in her eyes ; And he saw her hair, like the brown seaweed, On the billows fall and rise. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 5 Such was the wreck of the Hesperus, 85 In the midnight and the snow ! Christ save us all from a death like this, On the reef of Norman's Woe ! THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH Under a spreading chestnut-tree The village smithy stands ; The smith, a mighty man is he, With large and sinewy hands ; And the muscles of his brawny arms 5 Are strong as iron bands. His hair is crisp, and black, and long, His face is like the tan ; His brow is wet with honest sweat, He earns whate'er he can, 10 And looks the whole world in the face, For he owes not any man. Week in, week out, from morn till night, You can hear his bellows blow ; You can hear him swing his heavy sledge, 15 With measured beat and slow, Like a sexton ringing the village bell, When the evening sun is low. And children coming home from school Look in at the open door ; 20 They love to see the naming forge, And hear the bellows roar, And catch the burning sparks that fly Like chaff from a threshing-floor. He goes on Sunday to the church, 25 And sits among his boys ; He hears the parson pray and preach, He hears his daughter's voice, Singing in the village choir, And it makes his heart rejoice. 30 SELECTED POEMS It sounds to him like her mother's voice, Singing in Paradise ! He needs must think of her once more, How in the grave she lies ; And with his hard, rough hand he wipes 35 A tear out of his eyes. Toiling, — rejoicing, — sorrowing, Onward through life he goes ; Each morning sees some task begin, Each evening sees it close ; 40 Something attempted, something done, Has earned a night's repose. Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend, For the lesson thou hast taught ! Thus at the naming forge of life 45 Our fortunes must be wrought ; Thus on its sounding anvil shaped Each burning deed and thought. THE SKELETON IN ARMOR " Speak ! speak ! thou fearful guest ! Who, with thy hollow breast Still in rude armor drest, Comest to daunt me ! Wrapt not in Eastern balms, 5 But with thy fleshless palms Stretched, as if asking alms, Why dost thou haunt me ? " Then, from those cavernous eyes Pale flashes seemed to rise, 10 As when the Northern skies Gleam in December ; And, like the water's flow Under December's snow, Came a dull voice of woe 15 From the heart's chamber. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 7 " I was a Viking old ! My deeds, though manifold, $fo Skald in song has told, No Saga taught thee ! 20 Take heed, that in thy verse Thou dost the tale rehearse, Else dread a dead man's curse ; For this I sought thee. " Far in the Northern Land, 25 By the wild Baltic's strand, I, with my childish hand, Tamed the gerfalcon ; And, with my skates fast-bound, Skimmed the half -frozen Sound, 30 That the poor whimpering hound Trembled to walk on. " Oft to his frozen lair Tracked I the grisly bear, While from my path the hare 35 Fled like a shadow ; Oft through the forest dark Followed the were-wolf s bark, Until the soaring lark Sang from the meadow. 40 " But when I older grew, Joining a corsair's crew, O'er the dark sea I flew With the marauders. Wild was the life we led ; 45 Many the souls that sped, Many the hearts that bled, By our stern orders. " Many a wassail-bout Wore the long Winter out ; 50 Often our midnight shout Set the cocks crowing, SELECTED POEMS As we the Berserk's tale Measured in cups of ale, Draining the oaken pail, 55 Filled to o'erflowing. " Once as I told in glee Tales of the stormy sea, Soft eyes did gaze on me, Burning yet tender ; 60 And as the white stars shine On the dark Norwr^y pine, On that dark heart of mine Fell their soft splendor. " I wooed the blue-eyed maid, 65 Yielding, yet half afraid, And in the forest's shade Our vows were plighted. Under its loosened vest Fluttered her little breast, 70 Like birds within their nest By the hawk frighted. " Bright in her father's hall Shields gleamed upon the wall, Loud sang the minstrels all, 75 Chanting his glory ; When of old Hildebrand I asked his daughter's hand, Mute did the minstrels stand To hear my story. 80 " While the brown ale he quaffed, Loud then the champion laughed, And as the wind-gusts waft The sea-foam brightly, So the loud laugh of scorn, 85 Out of those lips unshorn, From the deep drinking-horn Blew the foam lightly. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 9 " She was a Prince's child, I but a Viking wild, 90 And though she blushed and smiled, I was discarded ! Should not the dove so white Follow the sea-mew's flight, — Why did they leave that night 95 Her nest unguarded ? " Scarce had I put to sea, Bearing the maid with me, — Fairest of all was she Among the Norsemen ! — 100 When on the white sea-strand, Waving his armed hand, Saw we old Hildebrancl, With twenty horsemen. " Then launched they to the blast, 105 Bent like a reed each mast, Yet we were gaining fast, When the wind failed us ; And with a sudden flaw Came round the gusty Skaw, 110 So that our foe we saw Laugh as he hailed us. " And as to catch the gale Round veered the flapping sail, 4 Death ! ' was the helmsman's hail, 115 4 Death without quarter ! ' Mid-ships with iron keel Struck we her ribs of steel ; Down her black hulk did reel Through the black water ! 120 " As with his wings aslant, Sails the fierce cormorant, Seeking some rocky haunt, With his prey laden, — 10 SELECTED POEMS So toward the open main, 125 Beating to sea again, Through the wild hurricane, Bore I the maiden. " Three weeks we westward bore, And when the storm was o'er, i30 Cloud-like we saw the shore Stretching to leeward ; There for my lady's bower Built I the lofty tower, Which, to this very hour, 135 Stands looking seaward. " There lived we many years ; Time dried the maiden's tears ; She had forgot her fears, She was a mother ; 140 Death closed her mild blue eyes, Under that tow^er she lies ; Ne'er shall the sun arise On such another ! " Still grew my bosom then, 145 Still as a stagnant fen ! Hateful to me were men, The sunlight hateful! In the vast forest here, Clad in my warlike gear, 150 Fell I upon my spear, Oh, death was grateful ! " Thus, seamed with many scars, Bursting these prison bars, Up to its native stars 155 My soul ascended ! There from the flowing bow/ Deep drinks the warrior's soul, . Skoal! to the Northland! skoal/" Thus the tale ended. lbO HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 11 SERENADE From The Spanish Student Stars of the summer night ! Far in yon azure cieeps, Hide, hide your golden light! She sleeps ! My lady sleeps ! 5 Sleeps ! Moon of the summer night ! Far down yon western steeps, Sink, sink in silver light ! She sleeps ! 10 My lady sleeps ! Sleeps ! Wind of the summer night ! Where yonder woodbine creeps, Fold, fold thy pinions light ! 15 She sleeps ! My lady sleeps ! Sleeps ! Dreams of the summer night ! Tell her, her lover keeps 20 Watch 1 while in slumbers light She sleeps ! My lady sleeps ! Sleeps ! THE RAINY DAY The day is cold, and dark, and dreary ; It rains, and the wind is never weary ; The vine still clings to the mouldering wall, But at every gust the dead leaves fall, And the day is dark and dreary. 5 \Z SELECTED POEMS My life is cold, and dark, and dreary ; It rains, and the wind is never weary ; My thoughts still cling to the mouldering Past, But the hopes of youth fall thick in the blast, And the days are dark and dreary. 10 Be still, sad heart ! and cease repining ; Behind the clouds is the sun still shining ; Thy fate is the common fate of all, Into each life some rain must fall, Some days must be dark and dreary. 15 THE ARSENAL AT SPRINGFIELD This is the Arsenal. From floor to ceiling, Like a huge organ, rise the burnished arms ; But from their silent pipes no anthem pealing Startles the villages with strange alarms. Ah! what a sound will rise, how wild and dreary, 5 When the death-angel touches those swift keys ! What loud lament and dismal Miserere Will mingle with their awful symphonies ! I hear even now the infinite fierce chorus, The cries of agony, the endless groan, 10 Which, through the ages that have gone before us, In long reverberations reach our own. On helm and harness rings the Saxon hammer, Through Cimbric forest roars the Norseman's song, And loud, amid the universal clamor, 15 O'er distant deserts sounds the Tartar gong. I hear the Florentine, who from his palace Wheels out his battle-bell with dreadful din, And Aztec priests upon their teocallis Beat the wild war-drums made of serpent's skin; 20 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 13 The tumult of each sacked and burning village ; The shout that every prayer for mercy drowns ; The soldiers' revels in the midst of pillage ; The wail of famine in beleaguered towns ; The bursting shell, the gateway wrenched asunder, 25 The rattling musketry, the clashing blade ; And ever and anon, in tones of thunder The diapason of the cannonade. Is it, O man, with such discordant noises, With such accursed instruments as these, 30 Thou clrownest Nature's sweet and kindly voices, And j arrest the celestial harmonies ? Were half the power that fills the world with terror, Were half the wealth bestowed on camps and courts, Given to redeem the human mind from error, 35 There were no need of arsenals or forts : The warrior's name would be a name abhorred ! And every nation, that should lift again Its hand against a brother, on its forehead Would wear for evermore the curse of Cain ! 40 Down the dark future, through long generations, The echoing sounds grow fainter and then cease ; And like a bell, with solemn, sweet vibrations, I hear once more the voice of Christ say, " Peace ! " Peace ! and no longer from its brazen portals 45 The blast of War's great organ shakes the skies ! But beautiful as songs of the immortals, The holy melodies of love arise. CHILDREN Come to me, O ye children ! For I hear you at your play, And the questions that perplexed me Have vanished quite away. 14 SELECTED POEMS Ye open the eastern windows, 5 That look towards the sun, Where thoughts are singing swallows And the brooks of morning run. In your hearts are the birds and the sunshine, In your thoughts the brooklet's flow, 10 But in mine is the wind of Autumn And the first fall of the snow. Ah ! what would the world be to us If the children were no more ? We should dread the desert behind us 15 Worse than the dark before. What the leaves are to the forest, With light and air for food, Ere their sweet and tender juices Have been hardened into wood, — 20 That to the world are children ; Through them it feels the glow Of a brighter and sunnier climate Than reaches the trunks below. Come to me, O ye children ! 25 And whisper in my ear What the birds and the winds are singing In your sunny atmosphere. For what are all our contrivings, And the wisdom of our books, 30 When compared with your caresses, And the gladness of your looks ? Ye are better than all the ballads That ever were sung or said ; For ye are living poems, 35 And all the rest are dead. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 15 THE BELL OF ATRI At Atri in Abruzzo, a small town Of ancient Roman date, bnt scant renown, One of those little places that have run Half up the hill, beneath a blazing sun, And then sat down to rest, as if to say, 5 " I climb no farther upward, come what may," The Re Giovanni, now unknown to fame, So many monarch s since have borne the name, Had a great bell hung in the market-place, Beneath a roof, projecting some small space 10 By way of shelter from the sun and rain. Then rode he through the streets with all his train, And with the blast of trumpets loud and long, Made proclamation, that whenever wrong Was done to any man, he should but ring is The great bell in the square, and he, the King, Would cause the Syndic to decide thereon. Such was the proclamation of King John. How swift the happy days in Atri sped, What wrongs were righted, need not here be said. 20 Suffice it that, as all things must decay. The hempen rope at length was worn away, Unravelled at the end, and, strand by strand, Loosened and wasted in the ringer's hand, Till one, who noted this in passing by, 25 Mended the rope with braids of briony, So that the leaves and tendrils of the vine Hung like a votive garland at a shrine. By chance it happened that in Atri dwelt A knight, with spur on heel and sword in belt, 30 Who loved to hunt the wild-boar in the w r oods, Who loved his falcons with their crimson hoods, Who loved his hounds and horses, and all sports And prodigalities of camps and courts ; — Loved, or had loved them ; for at last, grown old, 35 His only passion was the love of gold. 16 SELECTED POEMS He sold his horses, sold his hawks and hounds, Rented his vineyards and his garden-grounds, Kept but one steed, his favorite steed of all, To starve and shiver in a naked stall, 40 And day by day sat brooding in his chair, Devising plans how best to hoard and spare. At length he said : " What is the use or need To keep at my own cost this lazy steed, Eating his head off in my stables here, 45 When rents are low and provender is dear ? Let him go feed upon the public ways ; I want him only for the holidays." So the old steed was turned into the heat Of the long, lonely, silent, shadeless street ; 50 And wandered in suburban lanes forlorn, Barked at by dogs, and torn by brier and thorn. One afternoon, as in that sultry clime It is the custom in the summer time, With bolted doors and window-shutters closed, 55 The inhabitants of Atri slept or dozed ; When suddenly upon their senses fell The loud alarum of the accusing bell ! The Syndic started from his deep repose, Turned on his couch, and listened, and then rose 60 And donned his robes, and with reluctant pace Went panting forth into the market-place, Where the great bell upon its cross-beams swung, Reiterating with persistent tongue, In half- articulate jargon, the old song: 65 " Some one hath done a wrong, hath done a wrong ! " But ere he reached the belfry's light arcade He saw, or thought he saw, beneath its shade, No shape of human form of woman born, But a poor steed dejected and forlorn, 70 Who with uplifted head and eager eye Was tugging at the vines of briony. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW 17 " Domenecldio ! " cried the Syndic straight, " This is the Knight of Atri's steed of state ! He calls for justice, being sore distressed, 75 And pleads his cause as loudly as the best." Meanwhile from street and lane a noisy crowd Had rolled together like a summer cloud, And told the story of the wretched beast In five-and-twenty different ways at least, 80 With much gesticulation and appeal To heathen gods, in their excessive zeal. The Knight was called and questioned ; in reply Did not confess the fact, did not deny ; Treated the matter as a pleasant jest, 85 And set at naught the Syndic and the rest, Maintaining, in an angry undertone, That he should do what pleased him with his own. And thereupon the Syndic gravely read The proclamation of the King ; then said : 90 " Pride goeth forth on horseback grand and gay, But cometh back on foot, and begs its way ; Fame is the fragrance of heroic deeds, Of flowers of chivalry and not of weeds ! These are familiar proverbs ; but I fear 95 They never yet have reached your knightly ear. What fair renown, what honor, what repute Can come to you from starving this poor brute ? He who serves well and speaks not, merits more Than they who clamor loudest at the door. 100 Therefore the law decrees that as this steed Served you in youth, henceforth you shall take heed To comfort his old age, and to provide Shelter in stall, and food and field beside." The Knight withdrew abashed ; the people all 105 Led home the steed in triumph to his stall. The King heard and approved, and laughed in glee. And cried aloud: "Right well it pleaseth me! 18 SELECTED POEMS Church-bells at best but ring us to the door ; But go not in to mass ; my bell doth more : 110 It cometh into court and pleads the cause Of creatures dumb and unknown to the laws : And this shall make, in every Christian clime, The Bell of Atri famous for all time." THE REPUBLIC An excerpt from The Building of the Ship Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State ! Sail on, O Union, strong and great ! Humanity with all its fears, With all the hopes of future years, Is hanging breathless on thy fate ! 5 We know what Master laid thy keel, What Workmen wrought thy ribs of steel, Who made each mast, and sail, and rope, What anvils rang, what hammers beat, In what a forge and what a heat 10 Were shaped the anchors of thy hope ! Fear not each sudden sound and shock, 'T is of the wave and not the rock ; 'T is but the napping of the sail, And not a rent made by the gale ! 15 In spite of rock and tempest's roar, In spite of false lights on the shore, Sail on, nor fear to breast the sea ! Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee, Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, 20 Our faith triumphant o'er our fears, Are all with thee, — are all with thee ! JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER THE ANGELS OF BUENA VISTA Speak and tell us, our Ximena, looking northward far away, O'er the camp of the invaders, o'er the Mexican array, JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 19 Who is losing ? who is winning ? are they far or come they near ? Look abroad, and tell us, sister, whither rolls the storm we hear. " Down the hills of Angostura still the storm of battle rolls ; 5 Blood is flowing, men are dying ; God have mercy on their souls ! " Who is losing ? who is winning ? " Over hill and over plain, I see but smoke of cannon clouding through the mountain rain." Holy Mother ! keep our brothers ! Look, Ximena, look once more. M Still I see the fearful whirlwind rolling darkly as before, 10 Bearing on, in strange confusion, friend and foeman, foot and horse, Like some wild and troubled torrent sweeping down its mountain course." Look forth once more, Ximena ! M Ah ! the smoke has rolled away ; And I see the Northern rifles gleaming down the ranks of gray. Hark ! that sudden blast of bugles ! there the troop of Minon wheels ; 15 There the Northern horses thunder, with the cannon at their heels. " Jesu, pity ! how it thickens ! now retreat and now advance ! Right against the blazing cannon shivers Puebla's charging lance ! Down they go, the brave young riders; horse and foot together fall ; Like a ploughshare in the fallow, through them ploughs the Northern ball." 20 29 SELECTED POEMS Nearer came the storm and nearer, rolling fast and frightful on ! Speak, Ximena, speak and tell us, who has lost, and who has won ? " Alas ! alas ! I know not ; friend and foe together fall, O'er the dying rush the living : pray, my sisters, for them all ! " Lo ! the wind the smoke is lifting : Blessed Mother, save my brain ! 25 I can see the wounded crawling slowly out from heaps of slain. Now they stagger, blind and bleeding ; now they fall, and strive to rise ; Hasten, sisters, haste and save them, lest they die before our eyes ! "O my heart's love! O my dear one! lay thy poor head on my knee ; Dost thou know the lips that kiss thee ? Canst thou hear me ? canst thou see ? 30 O my husband, brave and gentle ! O my Bernal, look once more On the blessed cross before thee ! Mercy ! mercy ! all is o'er ! " Dry thy tears, my poor Ximena; lay thy dear one down to rest ; Let his hands be meekly folded, lay the cross upon his breast ; Let his dirge be sung hereafter, and his funeral masses said; 3" To-day, thou poor bereaved one, the living ask thy aid. Close beside her, faintly moaning, fair and young, a soldier lay, Torn with shot and pierced with lances, bleeding slew his life away; JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 21 But, as tenderly before him the lorn Ximena knelt, She saw the Northern eagle shining on his pistol- belt. 40 With a stifled cry of horror straight she turned away her head ; With a sad and bitter feeling looked she back upon her dead ; But she heard the youth's low moaning, and his strug- gling breath of pain, And she raised the cooling water to his parching lips again, Whispered low the dying soldier, pressed her hand and faintly smiled ; 45 Was that pitying face his mother's? did she watch beside her child ? All his stranger words with meaning her woman's heart supplied ; With her kiss upon his forehead, " Mother ! " mur- mured he, and died ! " A bitter curse upon them, poor boy, avIio led thee forth, From some gentle, sad -eyed mother, weeping, lonely, in the North ! " 50 Spake the mournful Mexic woman, as she laid him with her dead. And turned to soothe the living, and bind the wounds which bled. Look forth once more, Ximena ! " Like a cloud before the wind Rolls the battle down the mountains, leaving blood and death behind ; Ah ! they plead in vain for mercy ; in the dust the wounded strive ; 55 Hide your faces, holy angels ! O thou Christ of God, forgive ! " 22 SELECTED POEMS Sink, O Night, among thy mountains ! let the cool, gray shadows fall ; Dying brothers, righting demons, drop thy curtain over all ! Through the thickening winter twilight, wide apart the battle rolled, In the sheath the sabre "rested, and the cannon's lips grew cold. 60 But the noble Mexic women still their holy task pursued, Through that long, dark night of sorrow, worn and faint and lacking food. Over weak and suffering brothers, with a tender care they hung, And the dying foeman blessed them in a strange and Northern tongue. Not wholly lost, O Father! is this evil world of ours; 65 Upward, through its blood and ashes, spring afresh the Eden flowers ; From its smoking hell of battle, Love and Pity send their prayer, And still thy white- winged angels hover dimly in our air! MAUD MULLER Maud Muller, on a summer's day, Raked the meadow sweet with hay. Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth Of simple beauty and rustic health. Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee The mock-bird echoed from his tree. But when she glanced to the far-off town, White from its hill-slope looking down, JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 23 The sweet song died, and a vague unrest And a nameless longing filled her breast, — 10 A wish, that she hardly dared to own, For something better than she had known. The Judge rode slowly down the lane, Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane. He drew his bridle in the shade 15 Of the apple-trees to greet the maid, And asked a draught from the spring that flowed Through the meadow across the road. She stooped where the cool spring bubbled up, And filled for him her small tin cup, 20 And blushed as she gave it, looking down On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown. Thanks ! " said the Judge ; " a sweeter draught From a fairer hand was never quaffed." He spoke of the grass and flowers and trees, 25 Of the singing birds and the humming bees ; Then talked of the haying, and wondered whether The cloud in the west would bring foul weather. And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown, And her graceful ankles bare and brown ; 30 And listened, while a pleased surprise Looked from her long-lashed hazel eyes. At last, like one who for delay Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away. Maud Muller looked and sighed: " Ah me ! 35 That I the Judge's bride might be ! 24 SELECTED POEMS " He would dress me up in silks so fine, And praise and toast me at his wine. " My father should wear a broadcloth coat ; My brother should sail a painted boat. 40 " I 'd dress my mother so grand and gay, And the baby should have a new toy each day. " And I 'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor, And all should bless me who left our door." The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill, 45 And saw Maud Muller standing still. " A form more fair, a face more sweet, Ne'er hath it been my lot to meet. " And her modest answer and graceful air Show her wise and good as she is fair. 50 " Would she were mine, and I to-day, Like her, a harvester of hay : " No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs, Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues, " But low of cattle and song of birds, 55 And health and quiet and loving words." But he thought of his sisters, proud and cold, And his mother, vain of her rank and gold. So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on, And Maud was left in the field alone. 60 But the lawyers smiled that afternoon, When he hummed in court an old love-tune; And the young girl mused beside the well Till the rain on the unraked clover fell. JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 25 He wedded a wife of richest dower, 65 Who lived for fashion, as he for power. Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow, He watched a picture come and go ; And sweet Maud Mutter's hazel eyes Looked out in their innocent surprise. 70 Oft, when the wine in his glass was red, He longed for the wayside well instead ; And closed his eyes on his garnished rooms To dream of meadows and clover-blooms. And the proud man sighed, with a secret pain, 75 Ah, that I were free again ! Free as when I rode that day, Where the barefoot maiden raked her hay." She wedded a man unlearned and poor, And many children played round her door. 80 But care and sorrow, and childbirth pain, Left their traces on heart and brain. And oft, when the summer sun shone hot On the new- mown hay in the meadow lot, And she heard the little spring brook fall 85 Over the roadside, through the wall, In the shade of the apple-tree again She saw a rider draw his rein ; And, gazing down with timid grace, She felt his pleased eyes read her face. 90 Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls Stretched away into stately halls ; 26 SELECTED POEMS The weary wheel to a spinnet turned, The tallow candle an astral burned, And for him who sat by the chimney lug, 95 Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug, A manly form at her side she saw, And joy was duty and love was law. Then she took up her burden of life again, Saying only, " It might have been." 100 Alas for maiden, alas for Judge, For rich repiner and household drudge! God pity them both ! and pity us all, Who vainly the dreams of youth recall. For of all sad words of tongue or pen, 105 The saddest are these : " It might have been ! " Ah, well ! for us all some sweet hope lies Deeply buried from human eyes ; And, in the hereafter, angels may Roll the stone from its grave away ! 110 THE BAREFOOT BOY Blessings on thee, little man, Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan ! With thy turned-up pantaloons, And thy merry whistled tunes ; With thy red lip, redder still 5 Kissed by strawberries on the hill ; With the sunshine on thy face, Through thy torn brim's jaunty grace; From my heart I give thee joy,— I was once a barefoot boy ! 10 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 27 Prince thou art, — the grown-up man Only is republican. Let the million-dollared ride ! Barefoot, trudging at his side, Thou hast more than he can buy 15 In the reach of ear and eye, — Outward sunshine, inward joy: Blessings on thee, barefoot boy ! Oh for boyhood's painless play, Sleep that wakes in laughing day, 20 Health that mocks the doctor's rules, Knowledge never learned of schools, Of the wild bee's morning chase, Of the wild-flower's time and place, Flight of fowl and habitude 25 Of the tenants of the wood ; How the tortoise bears his shell, How the woodchuck digs his cell, And the ground-mole sinks his well ; How the robin feeds her young, 30 How the oriole's nest is hung ; Where the whitest lilies blow, Where the freshest berries grow, Where the ground-nut trails its vine, Where the wood-grape's clusters shine; 35 Of the black wasp's cunning way, Mason of his walls of clay, And the architectural plans Of gray hornet artisans ! For, eschewing books and tasks, 40 Nature answers all he asks ; Hand in hand with her he walks, Face to face with her he talks, Part and parcel of her joy, — Blessings on the barefoot boy ! 45 Oh for boyhood's time of June, Crowding years in one brief moon, When all things I heard or saw, 28 SELECTED POEMS Me, their master, waited for. I was rich in flowers and trees, 50 Humming-birds and honey-bees ; For my sport the squirrel played, Plied the snouted mole his spade ; For my taste the blackberry cone Purpled over hedge and stone ; 55 Laughed the brook for my delight Through the day and through the night, Whispering at the garden wall, Talked with me from fall to fall ; Mine the sand-rimmed pickerel pond, 60 Mine the walnut slopes beyond, Mine, on bending orchard trees, Apples of Hesperides ! Still as my horizon grew, Larger grew my riches too ; 65 All the world I saw or knew Seemed a complex Chinese toy, Fashioned for a barefoot boy ! Oh for festal dainties spread, Like my bowl of milk and bread, — 70 Pewter spoon and bowl of wood, On the door-stone, gray and rude ! O'er me, like a regal tent, Cloudy-ribbed, the sunset bent, Purple- curtained, fringed with gold, 75 Looped in many a wind-swung fold ; While for music came the play Of the pied frogs' orchestra ; And, to light the noisy choir, Lit the fly his lamp of fire. 80 I was monarch : pomp and joy Waited on the barefoot boy ! Cheerily, then, my little man, Live and laugh, as boyhood can ! Though the flinty slopes be hard, 85 Stubble-speared the new-mown sward, JOHN GREENLEAF WIIITTIER 29 Every morn shall lead thee through Fresh baptisms of the dew ; Every evening from thy feet Shall the cool wind kiss the heat: 90 All too soon these feet must hide In the prison cells of pride, Lose the freedom of the sod, Like a colt's for work be shod, Made to tread the mills of toil, 95 Up and down in ceaseless moil : Happy if their track be found Never on forbidden ground ; Happy if they sink not in Quick and treacherous sands of sin. 100 Ah! that thou couldst know thy joy, Ere it passes, barefoot boy ! THE PIPES AT LUCKNOW Pipes of the misty moorlands, Voice of the glens and hills ; The droning of the torrents, The treble of the rills ! Not the braes of bloom and heather, 5 Nor the mountains dark with rain, Nor maiden bower, nor border tower, Have heard your sweetest strain I Dear to the Lowland reaper, And plaided mountaineer, — 10 To the cottage and the castle The Scottish pipes are dear ; — Sweet sounds the ancient pibroch O'er mountain, loch, and glade ; But the sweetest of all music 15 The pipes at Lucknow played. Day by day the Indian tiger Louder yelled, and nearer crept ; 30 Selected poems Round and round the jungle-serpent Near and nearer circles swept. 20 " Pray for rescue, wives and mothers, — Pray to-day ! " the soldier said ; " To-morrow, death 's between us And the wrong and shame we dread." Oh, they listened, looked, and waited, 25 Till their hope became despair ; And the sobs of low bewailing Filled the pauses of their prayer. Then up spake a Scottish maiden, With her ear unto the ground : 30 " Dinna ye hear it ? — clinna ye hear it ? The pipes o' Havelock sound ! " Hushed the wounded man his groaning ; Hushed the wife her little ones ; Alone they heard the drum-roll 35 And the roar of Sepoy guns. But to sounds of home and childhood The Highland ear was true ; — As her mother's cradle-crooning The mountain pipes she knew. 40 Like the march of soundless music Through the vision of the seer, More of feeling than of hearing, Of the heart than of the ear, She knew the droning pibroch, 45 She knew the Campbell's call: " Hark ! hear ye no MacGregor's, The grandest o' them all ! " Oh, they listened, dumb and breathless, And they caught the sound at last ; 50 Faint and far beyond the Goomtee Rose and fell the piper's blast ! Then a burst of wild thanksgiving Mingled woman's voice and man's ; JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 31 1 God be praised ! — the march of Havelock ! 55 The piping of the clans ! " Louder, nearer, fierce as vengeance, Sharp and shrill as swords at strife, Came the wild MacGregor's clan-call, Stinging all the air to life. 60 But when the far-off dust-cloud To plaided legions grew, Full tenderly and blithesomely The pipes of rescue blew ! Round the silver domes of Lucknow, 65 Moslem mosque and Pagan shrine, Breathed the air to Britons dearest, The air of Auld Lang Syne. O'er the cruel roll of war-drums Rose that sweet and homelike strain; 70 And the tartan clove the turban, As the Goomtee cleaves the plain. Dear to the corn-land reaper And plaided mountaineer, — To the cottage and the castle 75 The piper's song is dear. Sweet sounds the Gaelic pibroch O'er mountain, glen, and glade; But the sweetest of all music The Pipes at Lucknow played ! 80 MARGUERITE Massachusetts Bay, 1760 The robins sang in the orchard, the buds into blos- soms grew ; Little of human sorrow the buds and the robins knew! Sick, in an alien household, the poor French neutral lay; 32 SELECTED POEMS Into her lonesome garret fell the light of the April day, Through the dusty window, curtained by the spider's warp and woof, 5 On the loose-laid floor of hemlock, on oaken ribs of roof, The bedquilt's faded patchwork, the tea-cups on the stand, The wheel with flaxen tangle, as it dropped from her sick hand ! What to her was the song of the robin, or warm morning light, As she lay in the trance of the dying, heedless of sound or sight ? 10 Done was the work of her hands, she had eaten her bitter bread ; The world of the alien people lay behind her dim and dead. But her soul went back to its child-time ; she saw the sun o'erflow With gold the Basin of Minas, and set over Gas- pereau ; The low, bare flats at ebb-tide, the rush of the sea at flood, 15 Through inlet and creek and river, from dike to up- land wood ; The gulls in the red of morning, the fish-hawk's rise and fall, The drift of the fog in moonshine, over the dark coast- wall. She saw the face of her mother, she heard the song she sang ; JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 33 And far off, faintly, slowly, the bell for vespers rang ! 20 By her bed the hard-faced mistress sat, smoothing the wrinkled sheet, Peering into the face, so helpless, and feeling the ice- cold feet. With a vague remorse atoning for her greed and long abuse, By care no longer heeded and pity too late for use. Up the stairs of the garret softly the son of the mis- tress stepped, 25 Leaned over the head-board, covering his face with his hands, and wept. Outspake the mother, who watched him sharply, with brow a-f rown : "What! love you the Papist, the beggar, the charge of the town ? " " Be she Papist or beggar who lies here, I know and God knows I love her, and fain would go with her wherever she goes ! 30 " O mother ! that sweet face came pleading, for love so athirst. You saw but the town-charge ; I knew her God's an- gel at first," Shaking her gray head, the mistress hushed down a bitter cry ; And awed by the silence and shadow of death draw- ing nigh, She murmured a psalm of the Bible ; but closer the young girl pressed, 35 With the last of her life in her fingers, the cross to her breast. 34 SELECTED POEMS " My son, come away," cried the mother, her voice cruel grown. "She is joined to her idols, like Ephraim; let her alone ! " But he knelt with his hand on her forehead, his lips to her ear, And he called back the soul that was passing: " Marguerite, do you hear ? " 40 She paused on the threshold of heaven ; love, pity, surprise, Wistful, tender, lit up for an instant the cloud of her eyes. With his heart on his lips he kissed her, but never her cheek grew red, And the words the living long for he spake in the ear of the dead. And the robins sang in the orchard, where buds to blossoms grew ; 45 Of the folded hands and the still face never the robins knew ! IN SCHOOL-DAYS Still sits the school-house by the road, A ragged beggar sleeping; Around it still the sumachs grow, And blackberry- vines are creeping. Within, the master's desk is seen, 5 Deep scarred by raps official ; The warping floor, the battered seats, The jack-knife's carved initial ; The charcoal frescoes on its wall ; Its door's worn sill, betraying io The feet that, creeping slow to school, Went storming out to playing ! JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER 35 Long years ago a winter sun Shone over it at setting ; Lit up its western window-panes, 15 And low eaves' icy fretting. It touched the tangled golden curls, And brown eyes full of grieving, Of one who still her steps delayed When all the school were leaving. 20 For near her stood the little boy Her childish favor singled : His cap pulled low upon a face Where pride and shame were mingled. Pushing with restless feet the snow 25 To right and left, he lingered ; — As restlessly her tiny hands The blue- checked apron fingered. He saw her lift her eyes ; he felt The soft hand's light caressing, 30 And heard the tremble of her voice, As if a fault confessing. " I 'm sorry that I spelt the word : I hate to go above you, Because," — the brown eyes lower fell, — 35 "Because, you see, I love you! " Still memory to a gray-haired man That sweet child-face is showing. Dear girl ! the grasses on her grave Have forty years been growing ! 40 Pie lives to learn, in life's hard school, How few who pass above him Lament their triumph and his loss, Like her, — because they love him. 36 SELECTED POEMS EDGAR ALLAN POE TO HELEN Helen, thy beauty is to me Like those Nicean barks of yore, That gently, o'er a perfumed sea, The weary, way-worn wanderer bore To his own native shore, 5 On desperate seas long wont to roam, Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face, Thy Naiad airs have brought me home To the glory that was Greece, And the grandeur that was Rome. 10 Lo ! in yon brilliant window-niche How statue-like I see thee stand, The agate lamp within thy hand ! Ah, Psyche, from the regions which Are Holy-Land ! 15 ISRAFEL In Heaven a spirit doth dwell " Whose heart-strings are a lute ; " None sing so wildly well As the angel Israfel, And the giddy stars (so legends tell) 5 Ceasing their hymns, attend the spell Of his voice, all mute. Tottering above In her highest noon, The enamored moon 10 Blushes with love, While, to listen, the red levin (With the rapid Pleiads, even, Which were seven) Pauses in Heaven. 15 EDGAR ALLAN POE 37 And they say (the starry choir And the other listening things) That Israfeli's fire Is owing to that lyre By which he sits and sings — 20 The trembling living wire Of those unusual strings. But the skies that angel trod; Where deep thoughts are a duty — Where Love 's a grown-up God — 25 Where the Houri glances are Imbued with all the beauty Which we worship in a star. Therefore, thou art not wrong, Israfeli, who despisest 30 An unimpassioned song ; To thee the laurels belong, Best bard, because the wisest ! Merrily live, and Ion ft The ecstasies above 35 With thy burning measures suit — Thy grief, thy joy, thy hate, thy love, With the fervor of thy lute — Well may the stars be mute ! Yes, Heaven is thine ; but this 40 Is a world of sweets and sours ; Our flowers are merely — flowers, And the shadow of thy perfect bliss Is the sunshine of ours. If I could dwell 45 Where Israfel Hath dwelt, and he where I, He might not sing so wildly well A mortal melody, While a bolder note than this might swell 50 From my lyre within the sky. 38 SELECTED POEMS THE CITY IN THE SEA Lo ! Death has reared himself a throne In a strange city lying alone Far down within the dim West, Where the good and the bad and the worst and the best Have gone to their eternal rest. 5 There shrines and palaces and towers (Time- eaten towers that tremble not !) Resemble nothing that is ours. Around, by lifting winds forgot, Resignedly beneath the sky 10 The melancholy waters lie. No rays from the holy heaven come down On the long night-time of that town ; But light from out the lurid sea Streams up the turrets silently — 15 Gleams up the pinnacles far and free — Up domes — up spires — up kingly halls — Up fanes — up Babylon- like walls — Up shadowy long-forgotten bowers Of sculptured ivy and stone flowers — 20 Up many and many a marvellous shrine Whose wreathed friezes intertwine The viol, the violet, and the vine. Resignedly beneath the sky The melancholy waters lie. 25 So blend the turrets and shadows there That all seem pendulous in air, While from a proud tower in the town Death looks gigantically down. There open fanes and gaping graves 30 Yawn level with the luminous waves ; But not the riches there that lie In each idol's diamond eye — Not the gay ly- jewelled dead — Tempt the waters from their bed ; 35 EDGAR ALLAN POE 39 For no ripples curl, alas ! Along that wilderness of glass — No swellings tell that winds may be Upon some far-off happier sea — No heavings hint that winds have been 40 On seas less hideously serene. But lo, a stir is in the air ! The wave — there is a movement there! As if the towers had thrust aside, In slightly sinking, the dull tide — 45 As if their tops had feebly given A void within the filmy Heaven ! The waves have now a redder glow The hours are breathing faint and low — And when, amid no earthly moans, 50 Down, down that town shall settle hence, Hell, rising from a thousand thrones, Shall do it reverence. TO ONE IN PARADISE Thou wast all that to me, love, For which my soul did pine — A green isle in the sea, love, A fountain and a shrine, All wreathed with fairy fruits and flowers, 5 And all the flowers were mine. Ah, dream too bright to last ! Ah, starry Hope ! that didst arise But to be overcast ! A voice from out the Future cries, 10 " 4 On ! on ! " — but o'er the Past (Dim gulf ! ) my spirit hovering lies Mute, motionless, aghast ! For, alas ! alas ! with me The light of Life is o'er ! 15 No more — no more — no more — " 40 SELECTED POEMS (Such language holds the solemn sea To the sands upon the shore) Shall bloom the thunder-blasted tree, Or the stricken eagle soar ! 20 And all my days are trances, And all my nightly dreams Are where thy gray eye glances, And where thy footstep gleams — In what ethereal dances, 25 By what eternal streams. THE RAVEN Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore — While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. " 'T is some visitor," I muttered, " tapping at my cham- ber door — 5 Only this and nothing more." Ah, distinctly, I remember, it was in the bleak Decem- ber, And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor. Eagerly I wished the morrow ; — vainly I had sought to borrow From my books surcease of sorrow — sorrow for the lost Lenore — 10 For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore — Nameless here for evermore. And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain EDGAR ALLEN POE 41 Thrilled me — filled me with, fantastic terrors never felt before ; So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating 15 " 'T is some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door — Some late visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door; This it is and nothing more." Presently my soul grew stronger ; hesitating then no longer, " Sir," said I, " or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore ; 20 But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping, And so faintly you came tapping,, tapping at my cham- ber door, That I scarce was sure I heard you " — here I opened wide the door : Darkness there and nothing more. Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, 25 Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before ; But the silence was unbroken, and the stillness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, " Lenore ! " This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word " Lenore ! " Merely this and nothing more. 30 Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning, Soon again I heard a tapping somewhat louder than before. " Surely," said I, " surely that is something at my win- dow lattice : 42 SELECTED POEMS Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore — Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore ; — 35 'T is the wind and nothing more ! " Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore. Not the least obeisance made he ; not a minute stopped or stayed he ; But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door — 40 Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door — Perched, and sat, and nothing more. Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, 4 Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, — thou," I said, " art sure no craven, 45 Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the Nightly shore — Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plu- tonian shore ! " Quoth the Raven, " Nevermore." Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly, Though its answer little meaning — little relevancy bore ; 50 For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his cham- ber door — Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door, With such name as " Nevermore." EDGAR ALLAN POE 43 But the Raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only 55 That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing further then he uttered — not a feather then he fluttered — Till I scarcely more than muttered, " Other friends have flown before — On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before." Then the bird said, " Nevermore." 60 Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, " Doubtless," said I, " what it utters is its only stock and store Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore — Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore 65 Of ' Never — nevermore.' " But the Raven still beguiling all my fancy into smil- ing, Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird, and bust and door ; Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore — 70 What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and omin- ous bird of yore Meant in croaking " Nevermore." This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable ex- pressing To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core : 44 SELECTED POEMS This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining 75 On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er, But whose velvet violet lining with the lamp-light gloating o'er, She shall press, ah, nevermore! Then methought the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer Swung by Seraphim whose foot-falls tinkled on the tufted floor. 80 " Wretch," I cried, " thy God hath lent thee — by these angels he hath sent thee Respite — respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore ; Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore ! " Quoth the Raven " Nevermore." * 4 Prophet ! " said I, " thing of evil ! prophet still, if bird or devil! — 85 Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate yet all undaunted, on this desert land en- chanted — On this home by Horror haunted — tell me truly, I implore — Is there — is there balm in Gilead? — tell me — tell me, I implore ! " Quoth the Raven " Nevermore." 90 "Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! — prophet still, if bird or devil ! By that Heaven that bends above us — by that God we both adore — Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenn, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore — EDGAR ALLAN POE 45 Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore." 95 Quoth the Raven " Nevermore." " Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend ! " I shrieked, upstarting — " Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plu- tonian shore ! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken ! Leave my loneliness unbroken ! — quit the bust above my door ! 100 Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door ! " Quoth the Raven " Nevermore." And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door ; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming, 105 And the lamp-light o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor ; And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted — nevermore ! ULALUME The skies they were ashen and sober ; The leaves they were crisped and sere — The leaves they were withering and sere ; It was night in the lonesome October Of my most immemorial year ; It was hard by the dim lake of Auber, In the misty mid region of Weir — It was down by the dank tarn of Auber, In the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir. 46 SELECTED POEMS Here once, through an alley Titanic, 10 Of cypress, I roamed with my Soul — Of cypress, with Psyche, my Soul. These were days when my heart was volcanic As the scoriae rivers that roll — As the lavas that restlessly roll 15 Their sulphurous currents down Yaanek In the ultimate climes of the pole — That groan as they roll down Mount Yaanek In the realms of the boreal pole. Our talk had been serious and sober, 20 But our thoughts they were palsied and sere — Our memories were treacherous and sere — For we knew not the month was October, And we marked not the night of the year — (Ah, night of all nights in the year !) 25 We noted not the dim lake of Auber — (Though once we had journeyed down here) — Remembered not the dank tarn of Auber, Nor the ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir. And now, as the night was senescent 30 And star-dials pointed to morn — As the star-dials hinted of morn — At the end of our path a liquescent And nebulous lustre was born, Out of which a miraculous crescent 35 Arose with a duplicate horn — Astarte's bediamonded crescent Distinct with its duplicate horn. And I said — " She is warmer than Dian : She rolls through an ether of sighs — 40 •She revels in a region of sighs : She has seen that the tears are not dry on These cheeks, where the worm never dies, And has come past the stars of the Lion To point us the path to the skies — 45 EDGAR ALLAN POE 47 To the Lethean peace of the skies — Come up, in despite of the Lion, To shine on us with her bright eyes — Come up through the lair of the Lion, With love in her luminous eyes." 50 But Psyche, uplifting her finger, Said — " Sadly this star I mistrust — Her pallor I strangely mistrust : — Oh, hasten ! — oh, let us not linger ! Oh, fly ! — let us fly ! — for we must." 55 In terror she spoke, letting sink her Wings until they trailed in the dust — In agony sobbed, letting sink her Plumes till they trailed in the dust — Till they sorrowfully trailed in the dust. 60 I replied — " This is nothing but dreaming : Let us on by this tremulous light ! Let us bathe in this crystalline light ! Its Sibyllic splendor is beaming With Hope and in Beauty to-night : — 65 See ! — it flickers up the sky through the night ! Ah, we safely may trust to its gleaming, And be sure it will lead us aright — We safely may trust to a gleaming That cannot but guide us aright, 70 Since it flickers up to Heaven through the night." Thus I pacified Psyche and kissed her, And tempted her out of her gloom — And conquered her scruples and gloom ; And we passed to the end of the vista, 75 But were stopped by the door of a tomb — ■ By the door of a legended tomb ; And I said — " What is written, sweet sister, On the door of this legended tomb ? " She replied — " Ulalume — Ulalume — 80 'T is the vault of thy lost Ulalume ! " 48 SELECTED POEMS Then my heart it grew ashen and sober As the leaves that were crisped and sere — As the ] eaves that were withering and sere, And I cried — " It was surely October 85 On this very night of last year That I journeyed — I journeyed down here — That I brought a dread burden clown here — On this night of all nights in the year, Ah, what demon has tempted me here ? 90 Well I know, now, this dim lake of Auber — This misty mid region of Weir — Well I know, now, this dank tarn of Auber, This ghoul-haunted woodland of Weir." THE BELLS I Hear the sledges with the bells — Silver bells ! What a world of merriment their melody foretells ! How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle, In the icy air of night ! 5 While the stars that oversprinkle AH the heavens, seem to twinkle With a crystalline delight ; Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, 10 To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells From the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells — From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells. II Hear the mellow wedding bells — 15 Golden bells ! What a world of happiness their harmony foretells ! Through the balmy air of night How they ring out their delight ! — From the molten-golden notes, 20 EDGAR ALLAN POE 49 And all in tune, What a liquid ditty floats To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats On the moon ! Oh, from out the sounding cells, 25 What a gush of euphony voluminously wells ! How it swells ! How it dwells On the future ! — how it tells Of the rapture that impels 30 To the swinging and the ringing Of the bells, bells, bells — Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells — To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells ! 35 III Hear the loud alarum bells — Brazen bells ! What a tale of terror now their turbulency tells ! In the startled ear of night How they scream out their affright! 40 Too much horrified to speak, They can only shriek, shriek, Out of tune, In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire, In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire, Leaping higher, higher, higher, 46 With a desperate desire, And a resolute endeavor Now — now to sit, or never, By the side of the pale-faced moon. 50 Oh, the bells, bells, bells ! What a tale their terror tells Of Despair ! How they clang, and clash, and roar ! What a horror they outpour 55 On the bosom of the palpitating air! Yet the ear it fully knows, 50 SELECTED POEMS By the twanging-, And the clanging, How the danger ebbs and flows ; fio Yet the ear distinctly tells, In the jangling, And the wrangling, How the danger sinks and swells, By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells — 65 Of the bells— Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells — In the clamor and the clanging of the bells ! IV Hear the tolling of the bells — 70 Iron bells ! WJiat a world of solemn thought their monody com- pels! In the silence of the night, How we shiver with affright At the melancholy menace of their tone! 75 For every sound that floats From the rust within their throats Is a groan. And the people — ah, the people — They that dwell up in the steeple, 80 All alone, And who, tolling, tolling, tolling, In that muffled monotone, Feel a glory in so rolling On the human heart a stone — 85 They are neither man nor woman — They are neither brute nor human — They are Ghouls : — And their king it is who tolls : — And he rolls, rolls, rolls, 90 Rolls A psean from the bells ! And his merry bosom swells EDGAR ALLAN POE 51 With the psean of the bells ! And he dances, and he yells : 95 Keeping time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the paean of the bells — Of the bells : Keeping time, time, time, 100 In a sort of Runic rhyme, To the throbbing of the bells — Of the bells, bells, bells — To the sobbing of the bells : — Keeping time, time, time, 105 As he knells, knells, knells, In a happy Runic rhyme, To the rolling of the bells — Of the bells, bells, bells : — To the tolling of the bells — 110 Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells — To the moaning and the groaning of the bells. ANNABEL LEE It was many and many a year ago, In a kingdom by the sea That a maiden there lived whom you may know By the name of Annabel Lee ; And this maiden she lived with no other thought 5 Than to love and be loved by me. She was a child and /was a child, In this kingdom by the sea, But we loved with a love that was more than love — I and my Annabel Lee — 10 With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven Coveted her and me. And this was the reason that, long ago, In this kingdom by the sea, 52 SELECTED FOEMS A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling 15 My beautiful Annabel Lee ; So that her high-born kinsmen came And bore her away from me, To shut her up in a sepulchre In this kingdom by the sea. 20 The angels, not half so happy in heaven, Went envying her and me — Yes ! — that was the reason (as all men know, In this kingdom by the sea) That the wind came out of the cloud by night, 25 Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee. But our love it was stronger by far than the love Of those who were older than we — Of many far wiser than we — And neither the angels in heaven above, 30 Nor the demons down under the sea, Can ever dissever my soul from the soul Of the beautiful Annabel Lee : — For the moon never beams, without bringing me dreams Of the beautiful Annabel Lee, 35 And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes Of the beautiful Annabel Lee ; And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride, In the sepulchre there by the sea — 40 In her tomb by the sounding sea. ELDORADO Gayly bedight, A gallant knight, In sunshine and in shadow, Had journeyed long, Singing a song, In search of Eldorado. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 53 But he grew old — This knight so bold — And o'er his heart a shadow Fell, as he found 10 No spot of ground That looked like Eldorado. And, as his strength Failed him at length, He met a pilgrim shadow — 15 " Shadow," said he, " Where can it be — This land of Eldorado? " " Over the Mountains Of the Moon, 20 Down the Valley of the Shadow, Ride, boldly ride," The shade replied, — " If you seek for Eldorado." JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL TO THE DANDELION Dear common flower, that grow'st beside the way, Fringing the dusty road with harmless gold, First pledge of blithesome May, Which children pluck, and full of pride uphold, High-hearted buccaneers, o'er joyed that they 5 An Eldorado in the grass have found, Which not the rich earth's ample round May match in ivealth, thou art more dear to me Than all the prouder summer- blooms may be. Gold such as thine ne'er drew the Spanish prow 10 Through the primeval hush of Indian seas, Nor wrinkled the lean brow Of age, to rob the lover's heart of ease ; 54 SELECTED POEMS 'T is the Spring's largess, which she scatters now To rich and poor alike, with lavish hand, 15 Though most hearts never understand To take it at God's value, but pass by The offered wealth with unrewarded eye. Thou art my tropics and mine Italy ; To look at thee unlocks a warmer clime ; 20 The eyes thou givest me Are in the heart, and heed not space or time : Not in mid June the golden-cuirassed bee Feels a more summer-like warm ravishment In the white-lily's breezy tent, 25 His fragrant Sybaris, than I, when first From the dark green thy yellow circles burst. Then think I of deep shadows on the grass, Of meadows where in sun the cattle graze, Where, as the breezes pass, 30 The gleaming rushes lean a thousand ways, Of leaves that slumber in a cloudy mass, Or whiten in the wind, of waters blue That from the distance sparkle through Some woodland gap, and of a sky above, 35 Where one white cloud like a stray lamb doth move. My childhood's earliest thoughts are linked with thee ; The sight of thee calls back the robin's song, Who, from the dark old tree Beside the door, sang clearly all day long, 40 And I, secure in childish piety, Listened as if I heard an angel sing With news from heaven, which he could bring Fresh every day to my untainted ears When birds and flowers and I were happy peers. 45 How like a prodigal doth nature seem, When thou, for all thy gold, so common art ! JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 55 Thou teachest me to deem More sacredly of every human heart, Since each reflects in joy its scanty gleam 50 Of heaven, and could some wondrous secret show, Did we but pay the love we owe, And with a child's undoubting wisdom look On all these living pages of God's book. THE PRESENT CRISIS When a deed is done for Freedom, through the broad earth's aching breast Runs a thrill of joy prophetic, trembling on from east to west, And the slave, where'er he cowers, feels the soul within him climb To the awful verge of manhood, as the energy sublime Of a century bursts full-blossomed on the thorny stem of Time. 5 Through the walls of hut and palace shoots the in- stantaneous throe, When the travail of the Ages wrings earth's systems to and fro ; At the birth of each new Era, with a recognizing start, Nation wildly looks at nation, standing with mute lips apart, And glad Truth's yet mightier man-child leaps be- neath the Future's heart. 10 So the Evil's triumph sendeth, with a terror and a chill, Under continent to continent, the sense of coming ill, And the slave, where'er he cowers, feels his sympa- thies with God In hot tear-drops ebbing earthward, to be drunk up by the sod, Till a corpse crawls round unburied, delving in the nobler clod. 15 56 SELECTED POEMS For mankind are one in spirit, and an instinct bears along, Round the earth's electric circle, the swift flash of right or wrong ; Whether conscious or unconscious, yet Humanity's vast frame Through its ocean-sundered fibres feels the gush of joy or shame; — In the gain or loss of one race all the rest have equal claim. 20 Once to every man and nation comes the moment to decide, In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good or evil side ; Some great cause, God's new Messiah, offering each the bloom or blight, Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep upon the right, And the choice goes by forever 'twixt that darkness and that light. 25 Hast thou chosen, O my people, on whose party thou shalt stand, Ere the Doom from its worn sandals shakes the dust against our land? Though the cause of Evil prosper, yet 't is Truth alone is strong, And, albeit she wander outcast now, I see around her throng Troops of beautiful, tall angels, to enshield her from all wrong. 30 Backward look across the ages and the beacon-mo- ments see, That, like peaks of some sunk continent, jut through Oblivion's sea ; Not an ear in court or market for the low foreboding cry JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 57 Of those Crises, God's stern winnowers, from whose feet earth's chaff must fly ; Never shows the choice momentous till the judgment hath passed by. 35 Careless seems the great Avenger; history's pages but record One death-grapple in the darkness 'twixt old systems and the Word ; Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the throne, — Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the • dim unknown, Standeth God within the shadow, keeping watch above his own. 40 We see dimly in the Present what is small and what is great, Slow of faith how weak an arm may turn the iron helm of fate, But the soul is still oracular ; amid the market's din, List the ominous stern whisper from the Delphic cave within, — "They enslave their children's children who make compromise with sin." 45 Slavery, the earth-born Cyclops, fellest of the giant brood, Sons of brutish Force and Darkness, who have drenched the earth with blood, Famished in his self-made desert, blinded by our purer day, Gropes in yet unblasted regions for his miserable prey;— Shall we guide his gory fingers where our helpless children play? 50 Then to side with Truth is noble when we share her wretched crust, 58 SELECTED POEMS Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and 't is pros- perous to be just ; Then it is the brave man chooses, while the coward stands aside, Doubting in his abject spirit, till his Lord is crucified, And the multitude make virtue of the faith they had denied. 55 Count me o'er earth's chosen heroes, — they were souls that stood alone, While the men they agonized for hurled the contu- melious stone, Stood serene, and down the future saw the golden beam incline To the side of perfect justice, mastered by their faith divine, By one man's plain truth to manhood and to God's supreme design. 60 By the light of burning heretics Christ's bleeding feet I track. Toiling up new Calvaries ever with the cross that turns not back, And these mounts of anguish number how each gen- eration learned One new word of that grand Credo which in prophet- hearts hath burned Since the first man stood God-conquered with his face to heaven upturned. 65 For Humanity sweeps onward : where to-day the mar- tyr stands, On the morrow crouches Judas with the silver in his hands ; Far in front the cross stands ready and the crackling fagots burn, While the hooting mob of yesterday in silent awe return To glean up the scattered ashes into History's golden urn. 70 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 59 'T is as easy to be heroes as to sit the idle slaves Of a legendary virtue carved upon our fathers' graves, Worshippers of light ancestral make the present light a crime ; — Was the Mayflower launched by cowards, steered by men behind their time ? Turn those tracks toward Past or Future, that make Plymouth Rock sublime ? 75 They were men of present valor, stalwart old icono- clasts, Unconvinced by axe or gibbet that all virtue was the Past's ; But we make their truth our falsehood, thinking that hath made us free, Hoarding it in mouldy parchments, while our tender spirits flee The rude grasp of that great Impulse which drove them across the sea. 80 They have rights who dare maintain them; we are traitors to our sires, Smothering in their holy ashes Freedom's new-lit altar-fires ; Shall we make their creed our jailer? Shall we, in our haste to slay, From the tombs of the old prophets steal the funeral lamps away To light up the martyr-fagots round the prophets of to-day? 85 New occasions teach new duties ; Time makes ancient good uncouth ; They must upward still, and onward, who would keep abreast of Truth ; Lo, before us gleam her camp-fires ! we ourselves must Pilgrims be, Launch our Mayflower, and steer boldly through the desperate winter sea, Nor attempt the Future's portal with the Past's blood- rusted key. 90 60 SELECTED POEMS THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL PRELUDE TO PART FIRST Over his keys the musing organist, Beginning doubtfully and far away, First lets his fingers wander as they list, And builds a bridge from Dreamland for his lay : Then, as the touch of his loved instrument 5 Gives hope and fervor, nearer draws his theme, First guessed by faint auroral flushes sent Along the wavering vista of his dream. Not only around our infancy Doth heaven with all its splendors lie ; 10 Daily, with souls that cringe and plot, We Sinais climb and know it not. Over our manhood bend the skies ; Against our fallen and traitor lives The great winds utter prophecies ; 15 With our faint hearts the mountain strives ; Its arms outstretched, the druid wood Waits with its benedicite ; And to our age's drowsy blood Still shouts the "inspiring sea. 20 Earth gets its price for what Earth gives us ; . The beggar is taxed for a corner to die in, The priest hath his fee who comes and shrives us, We bargain for the graves we lie in ; At the devil's booth are all things sold, 25 Each ounce of dross costs its ounce of gold ; For a cap and bells our lives we pay, Bubbles we 'buy with a whole soul's tasking : 'T is heaven alone that is given away, 'T is only God may be had for the' asking ; 30 No price is set on the lavish summer : June may be had by the poorest comer. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 61 And what is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days ; Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune, 35 And over it softly her warm ear lays ; Whether we look, or whether we listen, We hear life murmur, or see it glisten ; Every clod feels a stir of might, An instinct within it that reaches and towers, 40 And, groping blindly above it for light, Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers ; The flush of life may well be seen Thrilling back over hills and valleys ; The cowslip startles in meadows green, _ 45 The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice, And there 's never a leaf nor a blade too mean To be some happy creature's palace ; The little bird sits at his door in the sun, Atilt like a blossom among the leaves, 50 And lets his illumined being o'errun With the deluge of summer it receives ; His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings, And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings ; He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest,— 55 In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best? Now is the high-tide of the year, And whatever of life hath ebbed away Comes flooding back with a ripply cheer, Into every bare inlet and creek and bay ; ^ 60 Now the heart is so full that a drop overfills it, We are happy now because God wills it ; No matter how barren the past may have been, 'T is enough for us now that the leaves are green ; We sit in the warm shade and feel right well 65 How the sap creeps up and the blossoms swell; We may shut our eyes, but we cannot help knowing That skies are clear and grass is growing ; The breeze comes whispering in our ear, That dandelions are blossoming near, _ 70 That maize has sprouted, that streams are flowing, C2 SELECTED POEMS That the river is bluer than the sky, That the robin is plastering his house hard by ; And if the breeze kept the good news back, For other couriers we should not lack; 75 We could guess it all by yon heifer's lowing, — And hark ! how clear bold chanticleer, Warmed with the new wine of the year, Tells all in his lusty crowing ! Joy comes, grief goes, we know not how; 80 Everything is happy now, Everything is upward striving ; 'T is as easy now for the heart to be true As for grass to be green or skies to be blue, — 'T is the natural way of living : 85 Who knows whither the clouds have fled ? In the unscarred heaven they leave no wake ; And the eyes forget the tears they have shed, The heart forgets its sorrow and ache ; The soul partakes the season's youth, 90 And the sulphurous rifts of passion and woe Lie deep 'neath a silence pure and smooth, Like burnt-out craters healed with snow. What wonder if Sir Launfal now Remembered the keeping of his vow ? 95 PART FIRST My golden spurs now bring to me, And bring to me my richest mail, For to-morrow I go over land and sea In search of the Holy Grail ; Shall never a bed for me be spread, 100 Nor shall a pillow be under my head, Till I begin my vow to keep ; Here on the rushes will I sleep, And perchance there may come a vision true Ere day create the world anew." 105 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 63 Slowly Sir LaunfaFs eyes grew dim, Slumber fell like a cloud on him, And into his soul the vision flew. II The crows flapped over by twos and threes, In the pool drowsed the cattle up to their knees, 110 The little birds sang as if it were The one day of summer in all the year, And the very leaves seemed to sing on the trees ; The castle alone in the landscape lay Like an outpost of winter, dull and gray : 115 'T was the proudest hall in the North Countree, And never its gates might opened be, Save to lord or lady of high degree ; Summer besieged it on every side, But the churlish stone her assaults defied ; 120 She could not scale the chilly wall, Though around it for leagues her pavilions tall Stretched left and right, Over the hills and out of sight ; Green and broad was every tent, 125 And out of each a murmur went Till the breeze fell off at night. ill The drawbridge dropped with a surly clang, And through the dark arch a charger sprang, Bearing Sir Launfal, the maiden knight, 130 In his gilded mail, that flamed so bright It seemed the dark castle had gathered all Those shafts the fierce sun had shot over its wall In his siege of three hundred summers long, And, binding them all in one blazing sheaf, 135 Had cast them forth : so, young and strong, And lightsome as a locust-leaf, Sir Launfal flashed forth in his maiden mail, To seek in all climes for the Holy Grail. 64 SELECTED POEMS IV It was morning on hill and stream and tree, 140 And morning in the young knight's heart ; Only the castle moodily Rebuffed the gifts of the sunshine free, And gloomed by itself apart ; The season brimmed all other things up . 145 Full as the rain fills the pitcher-plant's cup. As Sir Launfal made morn through the darksome gate, He was 'ware of a leper, crouched by the same, Who begged with his hand and moaned as he sate ; And a loathing over Sir Launfal came ; 150 The sunshine went out of his soul with a thrill, The flesh 'neath his armor 'gan shrink and crawl, And midway its leap his heart stood still Like a frozen waterfall ; For this man, so foul and bent of stature, 155 Rasped harshly against his dainty nature, And seemed the one blot on the summer morn, — So he tossed him a piece of gold in scorn. VI The leper raised not the gold from the dust : " Better to me the poor man's crust, 160 Better the blessing of the poor, Though I turn me empty from his door ; That is no true alms which the hand can hold ; He gives nothing but worthless gold Who gives from a sense of duty ; 165 But he who gives but a slender mite, And gives to that which is out of sight, That thread of the all-sustaining Beauty Which runs through all and doth all unite, — ■ The hand cannot clasp the whole of his alms*, 170 The heart outstretches its eager palms, JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 65 For a god goes with it and makes it store To the soul that was starving in darkness before." PRELUDE TO PART SECOND Down swept the chill wind from the mountain peak, From the snow five thousand summers old ; 175 On open wold and hilltop bleak It had gathered all the cold, And whirled it like sleet on the wanderer's cheek ; It carried a shiver everywhere From the unleafed boughs and pastures bare ; 180 The little brook heard it and built a roof 'Neath which he could house him, winter-proof ; All night by the white stars' frosty gleams He groined his arches and matched his beams ; Slender and clear were his crystal spars 185 As the lashes of light that trim the stars : He sculptured every summer delight In his halls and chambers out of sight ; Sometimes his tinkling waters slipt Down through a frost-leaved forest-crypt, 190 Long, sparkling aisles of steel-stemmed trees Bending to counterfeit a breeze ; Sometimes the roof no fretwork knew But silvery mosses that downward grew ; Sometimes it was carved in sharp relief 195 With quaint arabesques of ice-fern leaf ; Sometimes it was simply smooth and clear. For the gladness of heaven to shine through, and here He had caught the nodding bulrush-tops And hung them thickly with diamond drops, 200 That crystalled the beams of moon and sun, And made a star of every one : No mortal builder's most rare device Could match this winter-palace of ice ; 'T was as if every image that mirrored lay 205 In his depths serene through the summer day, Each fleeting shadow of earth and sky, Lest the happy model should be lost, 66 SELECTED POEMS Had been mimicked in fairy masonry By the elfin builders of the frost. 210 Within the hall are song and laughter, The cheeks of Christmas glow red and jolly, And sprouting is every corbel and rafter With lightsome green of ivy and holly ; Through the deep gulf of the chimney wide 215 Wallows the Yule-log's roaring tide ; The broad flame-pennons droop and flap And belly and tug as a flag in the wind ; Like a locust shrills the imprisoned sap, Hunted to death in its galleries blind ; 220 And swift little troops of silent sparks, Now pausing, now scattering away as in fear, Go threading the soot-forest's tangled darks Like herds of startled deer. But the wind without was eager and sharp, 225 Of Sir Launfal's gray hair it makes a harp, And rattles and wrings The icy strings, Singing, in dreary monotone, A Christmas carol of its own, 230 Whose burden still, as he might guess, Was " Shelterless, shelterless, shelterless ! " The voice of the seneschal flared like a torch As he shouted the wanderer away from the porch, And he sat in the gateway and saw all night 235 The great hall-fire, so cheery and bold, Through the window-slits of the castle old, Build out its piers of ruddy light Against the drift of the cold. PART SECOND I There was never a leaf on bush or tree, 240 The bare boughs rattled shudderingly ; The river was dumb and could not speak, JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL G7 For the weaver Winter its shroud had spun ; A single crow on the tree-top bleak From his shining feathers shed off the cold sun ; 245 Again it was morning, but shrunk and cold, As if her veins were sapless and old, And she rose up decrepitly For a last dim look at earth and sea. II Sir Launfal turned from his own hard gate, 250 For another heir in his earldom sate ; An old, bent man, worn out and frail, He came back from seeking the Holy Grail; Little he recked of liis earldom's loss, No more on his surcoat was blazoned the cross, 255 But deep in his soul the sign he wore, The badge of the suffering and the poor. in Sir Launfal's raiment thin and spare Was idle mail 'gainst the barbed air, For it was just at the Christmas time ; 260 So he mused, as he sat, of a sunnier clime, And sought for a shelter from cold and snow In the light and warmth of long-ago ; He sees the snake-like caravan crawl O'er the edge of the desert, black and small, 265 Then nearer and nearer, till, one by one, He can count the camels in the sun, As over the red-hot sands they pass To where, in its slender necklace of grass, The little spring laughed and leapt in the shade, 270 And with its own self like an infant played, And waved its signal of palms. IV " For Christ's sweet sake, I beg an alms ; " — The happy camels may reach the spring, But Sir Launfal sees only the grewsome thing, 275 68 SELECTED POEMS The leper, lank as the rain-blanched bone, That cowers beside him, a thing as lone And white as the ice-isles of Northern seas In the desolate horror of his disease. And Sir Launf al said, " I behold in thee 280 An image of Him who died on the tree ; Thou also hast had thy crown of thorns, Thou also hast had the world's buffets and scorns, And to thy life were not denied The wounds in the hands and feet and side : 285 Mild Mary's Son, acknowledge me ; Behold, through him, I give to Thee ! " VI Then the soul of the leper stood up in his eyes And looked at Sir Launfal, and straightway he Remembered in what a haughtier guise 290 He had flung an alms to leprosie, When he girt his young life up in gilded mail And set forth in search of the Holy Grail. The heart within him was ashes and dust ; He i3arted in twain his single crust, 295 He broke the ice on the streamlet's brink, And gave the leper to eat and drink : 'T was a mouldy crust of coarse brown bread, 'T was water out of a wooden bowl, — Yet with fine wheaten bread was the leper fed, 300 And 't was red wine he drank with his thirsty soul. VII As Sir Launfal mused with a downcast face, A light shone round about the place ; The leper no longer crouched at his side, But stood before him glorified, 305 Shining and tall and fair and straight As the pillar that stood by the Beautiful Gate, — JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL GO Himself the Gate whereby men can Enter the temple of God in Man. VIII His words were shed softer than leaves from the pine, 310 And they fell on Sir Lannfal as snows on the brine, That mingle their softness and quiet in one With the shaggy unrest they float down upon ; And the voice that was softer than silence said, " Lo, it is I, be not afraid ! 315 In many climes, without avail, Thou hast spent thy life for the Holy Grail ; Behold, it is here, — this cup which thou Didst fill at the streamlet for Me but now ; This crust is My body broken for thee, 320 This water His blood that died on the tree ; The Holy Supper is kept, indeed, In whatso we share with another's need ; Not what we give, but what we share, For the gift without the giver is bare ; 325 Who gives himself with his alms feeds three, Himself, his hungering neighbor, and Me." IX Sir Launfal awoke as from a swound : " The Grail in my castle here is found ! Hang my idle armor up on the wall, 330 Let it be the spider's banquet-hall ; He must be fenced with stronger mail Who would seek and find the Holy Grail." x The castle gate stands open now, And the wanderer is welcome to the hall 335 As the hangbird is to the elm-tree bough ; No longer scowl the turrets tall, The Summer's long siege at last is o'er ; When the first poor outcast went in at the door, 70 SELECTED POEMS She entered with him in disguise, 340 And mastered the fortress by surprise; There is no spot she loves so well on ground, She lingers and smiles there the whole year round; The meanest serf on Sir Launfal's land Has hall and bower at his command ; 345 And there 's no poor man in the North Countree. But is lord of the earldom as much as he. THE FIRST SNOW-FALL The snow had begun in the gloaming, And busily all the night Had been heaping field and highway With a silence deep and white. Every pine and fir and hemlock 5 Wore ermine too dear for an earl, And the poorest twig on the elm-tree Was ridged inch deep with pearl. From sheds new-roofed with Carrara Came Chanticleer's muffled crow, 10 The stiff rails softened to swan's-down, And still fluttered down the snow. I stood and watched by the window The noiseless work of the sky, And the sudden flurries of snow-birds, 15 Like brown leaves whirling by. I thought of a mound in sweet Auburn Where a little headstone stood ; How the flakes were folding it gently, As did robins the babes in the wood. 20 Up spoke our own little Mabel, Saying, " Father, who makes it snow ? " And I told of the good All-father Who cares for us here below. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 71 Again I looked at the snow-fall, 25 And thought of the leaden sky That arched o'er our first great sorrow, When that mound was heaped so high. I remembered the gradual patience That fell from that cloud like snow, 30 Flake by flake, healing and hiding The scar that renewed our woe. And again to the child I whispered, " The snow that husheth all, Darling, the merciful Father 35 Alone can make it fall!*' Then, with eyes that saw not, I kissed her ; And she, kissing back, could not know That my kiss was given to her sister, Folded close under deepening snow. 40 THE COURTIN' God makes sech nights, all white an' still Fur 'z you can look or listen, Moonshine an' snow on field an' hill, All silence an' all glisten. Zekle crep' up quite unbeknown 5 An' peeked in thru' the winder, An' there sot Huldy all alone, 'ith no one nigh to hender. A fireplace filled the room's one side With half a cord o' wood in — 10 There war n't no stoves (tell comfort died) To bake ye to a pucldin'. The wa'nut logs shot sparkles out Towards the pootiest, bless her, An' leetle flames danced all about 15 The chiny on the dresser. 72 SELECTED POEMS Agin the chimbley crook-necks hung, An' in amongst 'em rusted The ole queen's-arm thet gran'ther Young Fetched back f'om Concord busted. 20 The very room, coz she was in, Seemed warm f'om floor to ceilin', An' she looked full ez rosy agin Ez the apples she was peelin'. 'T was kin' o' kingdom-come to look 25 On sech a blessed cretur, — A dogrose blushin' to a brook Ain't modester nor sweeter. He was six foot o' man, A 1, Clear grit an' human natur', — None could n't quicker pitch a ton Nor clror a furrer straighter. 30 He 'cl sparked it with full twenty gals, Hed squired 'em, danced 'em, clruv 'em, Fust this one, an' then thet, by spells — ' 35 All is, he could n't love 'em. But long o' her his veins 'ould run All crinkly like curled maple, — The side she breshed felt full o' sun Ez a south slope in Ap'il. 40 She thought no v'ice hed sech a swing Ez hisn in the choir ; My! when he made Ole Hunderd ring, She knowed the Lord was nigher. An' she 'd blush scarlit, right in prayer, 45 When her new meetin'-bunnet Felt somehow thru' its crown a pair O 1 blue eyes sot upun it. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 73 Thet night, I tell ye, she looked some ! She seemed to 've gut a new soul, 50 For she felt sartin-sure he 'd come, Down to her very shoe-sole. She heered a foot, an' knowed it tu, A-raspin' on the scraper, — All ways to once her feelins flew 55 Like sparks in burnt- up paper. He kin' o' l'itered on the mat, Some doubtfle o' the sekle, — His heart kep' goin' pity-pat, But hern went pity Zekle. 60 An' yit she gin her cheer a jerk Ez though she wished him furder, An' on her apples kep' to work, Parin' away like murder. ' You want to see my Pa, I s'pose ? " 65 " Wal ... no ... I come clasignin' " — ' To see my Ma ? She 's sprinklin' clo'es Agin to-morrer's i'nin'." To say why gals acts so or so, Or don't, 'ould be persumiu' ; 70 Mebby to mean yes an' say no Comes nateral to women. He stood a spell on one foot fust, Then stood a spell on t' other, An' on which one he felt the wust 75 He could n't ha' told ye nuther. Says he, " I 'd better call agin ; " Says she, " Think likely, Mister : " Thet last word pricked him like a pin, An' . . . Wal, he up an' kist her. 80 74 SELECTED POEMS When Ma bimeby upon 'em slips, Huldy sot pale ez ashes, All kin' o' smily roun' the lips An' teary roun' the lashes. For she was jes' the quiet kind 85 Whose naturs never vary, Like streams that keep a summer mind Snowhid in Jenooary. The blood clost roun' her heart felt glued Too tight for all expressin', 90 Tell mother see how metters stood, An' gin 'em both her blessin'. Then her red come back like the tide Down to the Bay o' Fundy, An' all I know is they was cried 95 In meetin' come nex' Sunday. ABRAHAM LINCOLN An excerpt from the Ode recited at the Harvard Commemoration, July 21, 1865 Life may be given in many ways, And loyalty to Truth be sealed As bravely in the closet as the field, So bountiful is Fate ; But then to stand beside her, 5 When craven churls deride her, To front a lie in arms and not to yield, This shows, me thinks, God's plan And measure of a stalwart man, Limbed like the old heroic breeds, 10 Who stands self-poised on manhood's solid earth, Not forced to frame excuses for his birth, Fed from within with all the strength he needs. Such was he, our Martyr- Chief, Whom late the Nation lie had led, 15 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL 75 With ashes on her head, Wept with the passion of an angry grief : Forgive me, if from present things I turn To speak what in my heart will beat and bnrn, And hang my wreath on his world-honored urn. 20 Nature, they say, doth dote, And cannot make a man Save on some worn-out plan, Repeating us by rote : For him her Old- World moulds aside she threw, 25 And choosing sweet clay from the breast Of the unexhausted West, With stuff untainted shaped a hero new, Wise, steadfast in the strength of God, and true. How beautiful to see 30 Once more a shepherd of mankind indeed, Who loved his charge, but never loved to lead ; One whose meek flock the people joyed to be, Not lured by any cheat of birth, But by his clear-grained human worth, 35 And brave old wisdom of sincerity ! They knew that outward grace is dust; They could not choose but trust In that sure-footed mind's unfaltering skill, And supple-tempered will 40 That bent like perfect steel to spring again and thrust. His was no lonely mountain-peak of mind, Thrusting to thin air o'er our cloudy bars, A sea-mark now, now lost in vapors blind ; Broad prairie rather, genial, level-lined, 45 Fruitful and friendly for all human kind, Yet also nigh to heaven and loved of loftiest stars. Nothing of Europe here, Or, then, of Europe fronting mormvard still, Ere any names of Serf and Peer 50 Could Nature's equal scheme deface And thwart her genial will ; Here was a type of the true elder race, And one of Plutarch's men talked with us face to face. 76 SELECTED POEMS I praise him not ; it were too late ; 55 And some innative weakness there must be in him who condescends to victory Such as the Present gives, and cannot wait, Safe in himself as in a fate. So always firmly he : 60 He knew to bide his time, And can his fame abide, Still patient in his simple faith sublime, Till the wise years decide. Great captains, with their guns and drums, 65 Disturb our judgment for the hour, But at last silence conies ; These all are gone, and, standing like a tower, Our children shall behold his fame. The kindly-earnest, brave, foreseeing man, 70 Sagacious, patient, dreading praise, not blame, New birth of our new soil, the first American. WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT THANATOPSIS To him who in the love of Nature holds Communion with her visible forms, she speaks A various language ; for his gayer hours She has a voice of gladness, and a smile And eloquence of beauty, and she glides 5 Into his darker musings, with a mild And healing sympathy, that steals away Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts Of the last bitter hour come like a blight Over thy spirit, and sad images 10 Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall, And breathless darkness, and the narrow house, Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart ; — Go forth, under the open sky, and list To Nature's teachings, while from all around — 15 Earth and her waters, and the depths of air — WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT 77 Comes a still voice — Yet a few clays, and thee The all-beholding sun shall see no more In all his course ; nor yet in the cold ground, Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears, 20 Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again, And, lost each human trace, surrendering up Thine individual being, shalt thou go 25 To mix forever with the elements, To be a brother to the insensible rock And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould. 30 Yet not to thine eternal resting-place Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thou wish Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down With patriarchs of the infant world — with kings, The powerful of the earth — the wise, the good, 35 Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past, All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun, — the vales Stretching in pensive quietness between ; The venerable woods — rivers that move 40 In majesty, and the complaining brooks That make the meadows green ; and, poured round all, Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste, — Are but the solemn decorations all Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun, v 45 The planets, all the infinite host of heaven, Are shining on the sad abodes of death, Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread The globe are but a handful to the tribes That slumber in its bosom. — Take the wings 50 Of morning, pierce the Barcan wilderness, Or lose thyself in the continuous ivoods Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound, Save his own dashings — yet the dead are there ; And millions in those solitudes, since first 55 78 SELECTED POEMS The flight of years began, have laid them down In their last sleep — the dead reign there alone. So shalt thou rest, and what if thou withdraw In silence from the living, and no friend Take note of thy departure ? All that breathe 60 Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care Plod on, and each one as before will chase His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave Their mirth and their employments, and shall come 65 And make their bed with thee. As the long train Of ages glides away, the sons of men, The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes In the full strength of years, matron and maid, The speechless babe, and the gray-headed man — 70 Shall one by one be gathered to thy side, By those, who in their turn shall follow them. So live, that when thy summons comes to join The innumerable caravan, which moves To that mysterious realm, where each shall take 75 His chamber in the silent halls of death, Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night, Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave, Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch 80 About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. INSCRIPTION FOR THE ENTRANCE TO A WOOD Stranger, if thou hast learned a truth which needs No school of long experience, that the world Is full of guilt and misery, and hast seen Enough of all its sorrows, crimes, and cares, To tire thee of it, enter this wild wood 5 And view the haunts of Nature. The calm shade Shall bring a kindred calm, and the sweet breeze That makes the green leaves dance, shall waft a balm To thy sick heart. Thou wilt find nothing here WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT 79 Of all that pained thee in the haunts of men, 10 And made thee loathe thy life. The primal curse Fell, it is true, upon the unsinning earth, But not in vengeance. God hath yoked to guilt Her pale tormentor, misery. Hence, these shades Are still the abodes of gladness ; the thick roof 15 Of green and stirring branches is alive And musical with birds, that sing and sport In wantonness of spirit ; while below The squirrel, with raised paws and form erect, Chirps merrily. Throngs of insects in the shade 20 Try their thin wings and dance in the warm beam That waked them into life. Even the green trees Partake the deep contentment ; as they bend To the soft winds, the sun from the blue sky Looks in and sheds a blessing on the scene. 25 Scarce less the cleft-born wild-flower seems to enjoy Existence, than the winged plunderer That sucks its sweets. The mossy rocks themselves, And the old and ponderous trunks of prostrate trees That lead from knoll to knoll a causey rude 30 Or bridge the sunken brook, and their dark roots, With all their earth upon them, twisting high, Breathe fixed tranquillity. The rivulet Sends forth glad sounds, and tripping o'er its bed Of pebbly sands, or leaping down the rocks, 35 Seems, with continuous laughter, to rejoice In its own being. Softly tread the marge, Lest from her midway perch thou scare the wren That dips her bill in water. The cool wind, That stirs the stream in play, shall come to thee, 40 Like one that loves thee nor will let thee pass Ungreeted, and shall give its light embrace. TO A WATERFOWL Whither, midst falling dew, While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue Thy solitary way ? 80 SELECTED POEMS Vainly the fowler's eye 5 Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong, As, darkly seen against the crimson sky, Thy figure floats along. Seek'st thou the plashy brink Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide, 10 Or where the rocking billows rise and sink On the chafed ocean-side? There is a Power whose care Teaches thy way along that pathless coast — The desert and illimitable air — 15 Lone wandering, but not lost. All day thy wings have fanned, At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere, Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land, Though the dark night is near. 20 And soon that toil shall end ; Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, And scream among thy fellows ; reeds shall bend, Soon, o'er thy sheltered nest. Thou 'rt gone, the abyss of heaven 25 Hath swallowed up thy form ; yet, on my heart Deeply has sunk the lesson thou hast given, And shall not soon depart. He who, from zone to zone, Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone, 31 Will lead my steps aright. RALPH WALDO EMERSON 81 RALPH WALDO EMERSON THE RHODORA: ON BEING ASKED, WHENCE IS THE FLOWER? Ix May, when sea-winds pierced our solitudes, I found the fresh Rhodora in the woods, Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook, To please the desert and the sluggish brook. The purple petals, fallen in the pool, 5 Made the black water with their beauty gay ; Here might the redbird come his plumes to cool, And court the flower that cheapens his array. Rhodora ! if the sages ask thee why This charm is wasted on the earth and sky, 10 Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing, Then Beauty is its own excuse for being : Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose ! I never thought to ask, I never knew : But, in my simple ignorance, suppose 15 The self-same Power that brought me there brought you. CONCORD HYMN SUNG AT THE COMPLETION OF THE BATTLE MONUMENT, JULY 4, 1837 By the rude bridge that arched the flood, Their flag to April's breeze unfurled, Here once the embattled farmers stood And fired the shot heard round the world. The foe long since in silence slept ; 5 Alike the conquerer silent sleeps : And Time the ruined bridge has swept Down the dark stream which seaward creeps. 82 SELECTED POEMS On this green bank, by this soft stream, We set to-day a votive stone ; 10 That memory may their deed redeem, When, like our sires, our sons are gone. Spirit, that made those heroes dare To die, and leave their children free, Bid Time and Nature gently spare 15 The shaft we raise to them and thee. FABLE The mountain and the squirrel Had a quarrel, And the former called the latter " Little Prig " ; Bun replied, " You are doubtless very big ; 5 But all sorts of things and weather Must be taken in together, To make up a year And a sphere. And I think it no disgrace 10 To occupy my place. If I 'm not so large as you, You are not so small as I, And not half so spry. I '11 not deny you make 15 A very pretty squirrel track ; Talents differ ; all is well and wisely put ; If I cannot carry forests on my back, Neither can you crack a nut." FORBEARANCE Hast thou named all the birds without a gun ? Loved the wood-rose, and left it on its stalk ? At rich men's tables eaten bread and pulse ? Unarmed, faced danger with a heart of trust ? And loved so well a high behavior, 5 In man or maid, that thou from speech refrained, OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES 83 Nobility more nobly to repay ? O, be my friend, and teach me to be thine ! MUSIC Let rae go where'er I will, I hear a sky-born music still : It sounds from all things old, It sounds from all things young, From all that 's fair, from all that 's foul, 5 Peals out a cheerful song. It is not only in the rose, It is not only in the bird, Not only where the rainbow glows, Nor in the song of woman heard, 10 But in the darkest, meanest things There alway, alway something sings. 'T is not in the high stars alone, Nor in the cup of budding flowers, Nor in the redbreast's mellow tone, 15 Nor in the bow that smiles in showers, But in the mud and scum of things There alway, alway something sings. OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES OLD IRONSIDES Ay, tear her tattered ensign down ! Long has it waved on high, And many an eye has danced to see That banner in the sky ; Beneath it rung the battle shout, And burst the cannon's roar ; — The meteor of the ocean air Shall sweep the clouds no more. 84 SELECTED POEMS Her deck, once red with heroes' blood, Where knelt the vanquished foe, 10 When winds were hurrying o'er the flood, And waves were white below, No more shall feel the victor's tread, Or know the conquered knee ; The harpies of the shore shall pluck 15 The eagle of the sea ! Oh, better that her shattered hulk Should sink beneath the wave ; Her thunders shook the mighty deep, And there should be her grave ; 20 Nail to the mast her holy flag, Set every threadbare sail, And give her to the god of storms, The lightning and the gale ! THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS This is the ship of pearl, which, poets feign, Sails the unshadowed main, — The venturous bark that flings On the sweet summer wind its purpled wings In gulfs enchanted, where the Siren sings, 5 And coral reefs lie bare, Where the cold sea-maids rise to sun their streaming hair. Its webs of living gauze no more unfurl ; Wrecked is the ship of pearl ! And every chambered cell, 10 Where its dim dreaming life was wont to dwell, As the frail tenant shaped his growing shell, Before thee lies revealed, — Its irised ceiling rent, its sunless crypt unsealed Year after year beheld the silent toil 15 That spread his lustrous coil ; OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES 85 Still, as the spiral grew, He left the past year's dwelling for the new, Stole with soft step its shining archway through, Built up its idle door, 20 Stretched in his last- found home, and knew the old no more. Thanks for the heavenly message brought by thee, Child of the wandering sea, Cast from her lap, forlorn ! From thy dead lips a clearer note is born 25 Than ever Triton blew from wreathed horn ! While on mine ear it rings, Through the deep caves of thought I hear a voice that sings : — Build thee more stately mansions, O my soul, As the swift seasons roll ! 30 Leave thy low- vaulted past ! Let each new temple, nobler than the last, Shut thee from heaven with a dome more vast, Till thou at length art free, 34 Leaving thine outgrown shell by life's unresting sea! THE DEACON'S MASTERPIECE OR, THE WONDERFUL " ONE-HOSS SHAY " A LOGICAL STORY Have you heard of the wonderful one-hoss shay, That was built in such a logical way It ran a hundred years to a day, And then, of a sudden, it — ah, but stay, I '11 tell you what happened without delay, .5 Scaring the parson into fits, Frightening people out of their wits, — Have you ever heard of that, I say ? Seventeen hundred and fifty-five. Georgius Secundus was then alive, — 10 86 SELECTED POEMS Snuffy old drone from the German hive ! That was the year when Lisbon-town Saw the earth open and gulp her down, And Braddock's army was done so brown, Left without a scalp to its crown. 15 It was on the terrible Earthquake-day That the Deacon finished the one-hoss shay. Now in building of chaises, I tell you what, There is always somewhere a weakest spot, — In hub, tire, felloe, in spring, or thill, 20 In panel, or crossbar, or floor, or sill, In screw, bolt, thoroughbrace, — lurking still, Find it somewhere you must and will, — Above or below, or within or without, — And that 's the reason, beyond a doubt, 25 That a chaise breaks down, but does n't wear out. But the Deacon swore (as deacons do, With an " I dew vum," or an " I tell yeou") He would build one shay to beat the taown 'n' the keounty 'n' all the kentry raoun' ; 30 It should be so built that it could ' rH break daown: " Fur," said the Deacon, " 't 's mighty plain Thut the weakes' place mus' stan' the strain; V the way t' fix it, uz I maintain, Is only jest 35 T' make that place uz strong uz the rest." So the Deacon inquired of the village folk Where he could find the strongest oak, That couldn't be split nor bent nor broke, — That was for spokes and floor and sills ; 40 He sent for lancewood to make the thills ; The crossbars were ash, from the straightest trees, The panels of white-wood, that cuts like cheese, But lasts like iron for things like these ; The hubs of logs from the " Settler's ellum,"— 45 Last of its timber, — they couldn't sell 'em, Never an axe had seen their chips, OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES 87 And the wedges flew from between their lips, Their blunt ends frizzled like celery-tips ; Step and prop-iron, bolt and screw, 50 Spring, tire, axle, and linchpin too, Steel of the finest, bright and blue ; Thoroughbrace bison-skin, thick and wide ; Boot, top, dasher, from tough old hide Found in the pit when the tanner died. 55 That was the way he " put her through." There ! " said the Deacon, " naow she '11 dew ! " Do ! I tell you, I rather guess She was a wonder, and nothing less ! Colts grew horses, beards turned gray, 60 Deacon and deaconess dropped away, Children and grandchildren — where were they ? But there stood the stout old one-hoss shay As fresh as on Lisbon-earthquake-day ! Eighteen hundred ; — it came and found 65 The Deacon's masterpiece strong and sound. Eighteen hundred increased by ten ; — ' Hahnsum kerridge " they called it then. Eighteen hundred and twenty came ; — Running as usual ; much the same. 70 Thirty and forty at last arrive, And then come fifty, and fifty-five. Little of all we value here Wakes on the morn of its hundredth year Without both feeling and looking queer. 75 In fact, there 's nothing that keeps its youth, So far as I know, but a tree and truth. (This is a moral that runs at large ; Take it. — You 're welcome. — No extra charge.) Fiest of November, — the earthquake-day, — 80 There are traces of age in the one-hoss shay, A general flavor of mild decay, 88 SELECTED POEMS But nothing local, as one may say. There could n't be, '■ — for the Deacon's art Had made it so like in every part 85 That there was n't a chance for one to start. For the wheels were just as strong as the thills, And the floor was just as strong as the sills, And the panels just as strong as the floor, And the whipple-tree neither less nor more, 90 And the back crossbar as strong as the fore, And spring and axle and hub encore. And yet, as a whole, it is past a doubt In another hour it will be worn out! First of November, 'Fifty-five ! 95 This morning the parson takes a drive. Now, small boys, get out of the way I Here comes the wonderful one-hoss shay, Drawn by a rat- tailed, ewe-necked bay. " Hudclup ! " said the parson. — Off went they. 100 The parson was working his Sunday's text, — Had got to fifthly, and stopped perplexed At what the — Moses — was coming next. All at once the horse stood still, Close by the meet'n'-house on the hill. 105 First a shiver, and then a thrill, Then something decidedly like a spill, — And the parson was sitting upon a rock, At half past nine by the meet'n'-house clock, — Just the hour of the Earthquake shock ! — 110 What do you think the parson found, When he got up and stared around? The poor old chaise in a heap or mound, As if it had been to the mill and ground ! You see, of course, if you 're not a dunce, 115 How it went to pieces all at once, — All at once, and nothing first, — Just as bubbles do when they burst. End of the wonderful one-hoss shay Logic is logic. That 's all I say. 120 WALT WHITMAN 89 WALT WHITMAN CAVALRY CROSSING A FORD A line in long array where they wind betwixt green islands, They take a serpentine course, their arms flash in the sun — hark to the musical clank, Behold the silvery river, in it the splashing horses loi- tering stop to drink, Behold the brown-faced men, each group, each person a picture, the negligent rest on the saddles, Some emerge on the opposite bank, others are just entering the ford — while, Scarlet and blue and snowy white, The guidon flags flutter gayly in the wind. O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN! O Captain ! my Captain ! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exult- ing, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring ; But O heart ! heart ! heart ! 5 O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. O Captain ! my Captain ! rise up and hear the bells ; Rise up — for you the flag is flung — for you the bugle trills, 10 For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths — for you the shores a-crowding, For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning; 90 SELECTED POEMS Here Captain ! clear father ! This arm beneath your head ! It is some dream that on the deck, 15 You Ve fallen cold and dead. My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still, My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will, The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done, From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won ; 20 Exult O shores, and ring O bells ! But I with mournful tread, Walk the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. HUSH'D BE THE CAMPS TO-DAY May 4, 1865 Hush'd be the camps to-day, And soldiers, let us drape our war-worn weapons, And each with musing soul retire to celebrate, Our dear commander's death. No more for him life's stormy conflicts, 5 Nor victory, nor defeat — no more time's dark events, Charging like ceaseless clouds across the sky. But sing, poet, in our name, Sing of the love we bore him — because you, dweller in camps, know it truly. As they invault the coffin there, 10 Sing — as they close the doors of earth upon him — one verse, For the heavy hearts of soldiers. WALT WHITMAN 91 A NOISELESS PATIENT SPIDER A noiseless patient spider, I mark'd where on a little promontory it stood iso- lated, Mark'd how to explore the vacant vast surrounding, It launch'd forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself, Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them. 5 And you my soul where you stand, Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space, Ceaselessly musing, venturing, throwing, seeking the spheres to connect them, Till the bridge you will need be form'd, till the ductile anchor hold, Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul. 10 THE FIRST DANDELION Simple and fresh and fair from winter's close emerg- ing, As if no artifice of fashion, business, politics, had ever been, Forth from its sunny nook of shelter'd grass — inno- cent, golden, calm as the dawn, The spring's first dandelion shows its trustful face. HELPS IN READING HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW A PSALM OF LIFE LINE Psalmist. Longfellow himself. He had been greatly de- pressed and had written A Psalm of Death. 7 Dust thou art. Genesis in, 19: " . . . For dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." 18 Bivouac. A temporary encampment without shelter. THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS The Wreck of the Hesperus was written on December 29, 1839, twelve days after Longfellow had read news of ter- rible shipwrecks along the New England coast, many of which took place on a reef called " Norman's Woe." The schooner Hesperus was among the wrecked vessels. One of the bodies washed ashore near Gloucester was lashed to a piece of wreckage. 11 Veering flaw. Shifting gusts of wind. 14 Spanish Main. The northern coast of South America. 55-6 Matthew vm, 23-26: " And when he was entered into a, ship, his disciples followed him, and behold, there arose a tempest in the sea. . . . and his disciples came to him and awoke him, saying, Lord, save us: we perish. . . . Then he arose, and rebuked the winds and the sea; and there was a great calm." 70 Carded wool. Wool that has been combed. THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH The " spreading chestnut tree " stood until 1876, when it was cut down in order to widen Brattle Street. The school-children of Cambridge gave Longfellow an arm- chair made from its wood. THE SKELETON IN ARMOR A skeleton in rude armor was dug up near Fall River, Massachusetts, some time before 1840 when this poem was written. Poe says of this poem that it shows "the beauty of bold courage and self-confidence, of love and maiden devotion, of reckless adventure, and finally of life-con- temning grief." 17 Viking. The Vikings, or Northmen, people of the Scandi- navian vicks, or bays, plundered the coasts of England, HELPS IN READING 93 LINE France, and neighboring lands in the eighth, ninth, and tenth centuries. 19 Skald. Minstrel. 20 Saga. A name applied to any ancient Norse legend. 28 Gerfalcon. A large falcon, or bird of prey used in hunting, found in the Far North. 38 Were-wolf. According to an old superstition certain evil persons were turned into wolves called "were-wolves." 42 Corsair. A pirate. 49 Wassail-bout. A drinking festival. 53 Berserk. Certain fierce Scandinavian warriors of ancient times were called "Berserks." 110 Skaw. A promontory. 122 Cormorant. A gluttonous sea-bird. 134 The lofty tower. Longfellow refers to the Round Tower at Newport, Rhode Island, the origin of which has never been explained satisfactorily. One theory names the Northmen as its builders. 159 Skoal. Hail! A Scandinavian salutation used when drink- ing a health. SERENADE This beautiful song occurs in Act I, Scene 3, of The Span- ish Student, a comedy written by Longfellow in 1840. THE RAINY DAY The Rainy Day was written in Longfellow's old home in Portland, Maine, on a dreary day in 1841. THE ARSENAL AT SPRINGFIELD The poet and his wife, on their wedding trip, visited the United States Arsenal at Springfield, Massachusetts. Mrs. Longfellow suggested the resemblance between the rows of gleaming gun-barrels and the pipes of an organ, and said that Death would produce sad music from them. 7 Miserere. Music appropriate for the 51st Psalm, or any lamentation. 13 Saxon hammer. The war-hammer in various forms has been used by many races. 14 Cimbric forest. The forests of northern and central Eu- rope, the home of the Cimbri, a people who fought against the Romans in the second century, b.c. 16 Tartar gong. The war gong of the Tartars. 17 Florentine. In the Middle Ages Florence was one of the leading Italian states. In the frequent contests of the time the "battle-bell " gave encouragement to those fighting. 19 Teocallis. The temples of the Aztecs, the Mexican In- dians whom Cortes fought in the first half of the six- teenth century. 94 HELPS IN READING LINE 28 Diapason. The figure is most appropriate because the open diapason of an organ has large metal pipes that give a loud, majestic tone. 40 Curse of Cain. Genesis iv, 11-15: "And now art thou cursed from the earth, which hath opened her mouth to receive thy brother's blood from thy hand. . . . And the Lord set a mark upon Cain, lest any finding him should kill him." CHILDREN Longfellow often expressed in poetry his deep love for children. That this was returned is well evidenced by the gift from the children of Cambridge. (See Note to The Village Blacksmith.) THE BELL OF ATRI The story is taken fron an old Italian tale in Gualte- ruzzi's Cento Novelle Antiche. 1 Atri in Abruzzo. Atri, a small town in the old division of Abruzzo, Italy, is about one hundred miles to the north- east of Rome. 7 Re Giovanni. King John. 17 Syndic. The chief magistrate of the town. 26 Briony. A tall climbing plant. 32 Hoods. Hunters who used the bird of prey called a falcon kept the bird's head covered with a hood until the prey was in sight. 66 Notice how the line imitates the sound of a great bell. 73 Domeneddio. Lord! THE REPUBLIC These are the closing lines of The Building of the Ship. They were written in 1849, a critical time in the history of the United States. Their patriotic fervor has always made deep appeal to every lover of the Union. HELPFUL QUESTIONS A PSALM OF LIFE 1. Outline the thought of the poem. 2. What do the figures of speech add to the poem? THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS 1. How strong is the character interest of the poem? 2. How strong is the descriptive interest? 3. What is the effect of the ballad style? 4. What is the effect of the figures of speech? 5. Why do we like the story? HELPS IN READING 95 THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH Which is most pleasing — the description in the first stanzas, the pathos in the sixth stanza, or the application in the final stanza? THE SKELETON IN ARMOR 1. What does the poem tell us of Viking life? 2. Poe thought the death of a beautiful woman the most appropriate subject for poetry. How does his opinion apply to this poem? To The Wreck of the Hesperus? To The Village Blacksmith f 3. What is the effect of the rhyme-scheme? SERENADE 1. What consonant sounds and what vowel sounds are most used in this poem? 2. What repetitions are employed? THE RAINY DAY Poe thought that poems must be both beautiful and sad. In what way is this poem like or unlike Poe's poems? THE ARSENAL AT SPRINGFIELD 1. On what comparison is the poem founded? 2. What is the effect of the allusions to history? 3. What are the most poetic elements of the poem ? CHILDREN What makes the poem pleasing? THE BELL OF ATRI To what common interests does the poem appeal? THE REPUBLIC 1. Explain the metaphors. 2. What spirit pervades the poem? ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING Hymn to the Night; Footsteps of Angels; The Beleaguered City; The Day is Done; Sea Weed; The Old Clock on the Stairs; Evangeline; Sir Humphrey Gilbert; Tales of a Way- side Inn; Hiawatha; My Lost Youth; The Discoverer of the North Cape; The Courtship of Miles Standish; The 96 HELPS IN READING Children's Hour; The Hanging of the Crane; The Revenge of Rain-in-the-Face; Keramos; The Children's Crusade; The Poets; The Descent of the Muses; Parker Cleaveland; Morituri Salutamus. 1 JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER THE ANGELS OF BUENA VISTA NE In the battle of Buena Vista, fought February 22-23, 1847, during the Mexican War, General Zachary Taylor, with 5000 United States soldiers, defeated Santa Anna with 15,000 Mexicans. After the battle a correspondent told of Mexican women who aided the wounded, and of one in particular who aided the soldiers of both armies. 5 Angostura. Santa Anna, in his report, speaks of the battle as the battle of Angostura 15 Minon. Don Jose V. Minon, a Mexican cavalry leader, commanded 1200 men in the battle. 18 Puebla. The companies of Puebla and Tampico were commanded by Don Santiago Blanco. 20 Fallow. Uncultivated land. MAUD MULLER The first suggestions for the poem came to Whittier dur- ing a journey in Maine with his sister. As they rested their horse under an apple tree beside a brook they talked with a young girl who had been at work in a near-by hayfield. 93 Spinnet. An old-time stringed musical instrument some- thing like a small grand piano. 94 Astral. A kind of oil lamp. 95 Lug. The pole on which a kettle could be hung in the fireplace. THE BAREFOOT BOY The poem is autobiographical. 12 Republican. Whittier means that a boy has so many ad- vantages that he is like a prince, while a grown man has no more advantages than other men have. 63 Apples of Hesperides. Gaea, the earth, according to a Greek legend, caused golden apples to grow on a tree guarded by the maidens called Hesperides. The apples were taken by Hercules with the aid of the giant Atlas. 78 Pied. Spotted. THE PIPES AT LUCKNOW The poem is founded on actual incidents in the siege of Lucknow, in the Indian Mutiny of 1857. Tennyson has 1 Most of these poems are contained in one or another of the following issues of the Riverside Literature Series: — Nos. 1, 2, 11, 38, 63, or N. HELPS IN READING 97 LINE told the same story in his poem, The Relief of Luckncw. Lucknow, on the Goomtee River, a tributary of the Ganges, is the capital of Oudh, a densely populated region of India. 5 Braes. Hills. 13 Pibroch. Music of the Scotch Highlanders usually played on the bagpipes before battle. 14 Loch. Lake. 32 Havelock. Sir Henry Havelock, 1795-1857, a distin- guished British general who won great praise for his con- duct in the Indian Mutiny. 36 Sepoy. Native soldiers employed in the service of the British. In 1857 these soldiers rebelled against the Brit- ish the immediate occasion of the rebellion being religious prejudice. 46 Campbell. The Campbells and MacGregors are two im- portant Scotch clans, famous in history. Colin Campbell, 1792-1863, was British Commander-in-Chief in Bengal in 1857. 71 Tartan. In old times every Scotch clan was denoted by a woolen cloth-, or tartan, of a particular pattern, worn as part of the costume. MARGUERITE Marguerite is based on the same historic event as Evan- geline — the expulsion of the Acadians. Before Long- fellow had received the inspiration for Evangeline, Whittier had made studies concerning the Acadians. 3 French neutral. An Acadian. 8 The wheel with flaxen tangle. The spinning-wheel. 14 Basin of Minas. An arm of the Bay of Fundy, Nova Scotia. Gaspereau is a small town not far from Grand Pre. 38 Ephraim. Hosea iv, 17: "Ephraim is joined to idols: let him alone." IN SCHOOL DAYS The poem is autobiographical. " You have written," said Holmes to Whittier, " the most beautiful school-boy poem in the English language." A tablet now marks the site of the old schoolhouse. HELPFUL QUESTIONS THE ANGELS OF BUENA VISTA 1. What points of view are taken in the poem? 2. What pictures are suggested? 3. What thoughts does the poem suggest? 4. How is the poem made artistic? 98 HELPS IN READING MAUD MULLER 1. What pictures are suggested? 2. What character interests does the poem have? 3. What are the poetic elements in this poem? THE BAREFOOT BOY 1. To what interests does the poem appeal? 2. How is the simple thought made beautiful? THE PIPES AT LUCKNOW 1. What is the plan of the poem? 2. What gives the poem narrative power? 3. To what senses does the poem appeal? 4. What metrical devices are employed? MARGUERITE 1. What pictures does the poem suggest? 2. What contrasts are given? 3. How does the poem fulfil some of Poe's ideas of poetic beauty? IN SCHOOL-DAYS What are the poetic elements in this poem? ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING The Farewell of a Virginia Slave Mother; Massachusetts to Virginia; The Frost Spirit; Barclay of Ury; Ichabod; Burns; Skipper Ireson's Ride; Telling the Bees; The Swan Song of Parson Avery; My Playmate; Brown of Ossa- watomie ; Amy Wentworth ; Snow- Bound ; The Wreck of Rivermouth; The Eternal Goodness; Our Autocrat (Holmes) ; The Poet and the Children (Longfellow); Bryant on his Birthday; O.W. Holmes on his Eightieth Birthday; James Russell Lowell; To William Lloyd Garrison. 1 EDGAR ALLAN POE TO HELEN Helen. In an undated letter to Mrs. Sarah Helen Whit- man, Poe says he wrote this poem to Helen Stannard, a woman for whom he had a high regard and who died when he was fifteen years old. 1 Most of these poems are contained in one or another of the follow- ing issues of the Riverside Literature Series: — Nos. 4, 5, 41, 175, or T. HELPS IN READING 99 LINE 2 Nicean barks. This allusion may refer to the Greek Empire of Nicaea. Pilgrims returning from the Holy Land may have been assisted by Nicsean boatmen. 8 Naiad. According to classical mythology the naiads were the beautiful and graceful guardians of springs and streams. 14 Psyche. The Greek and Roman personification of the soul, always represented as a beautiful girl with the wings of a butterfly. ISRAFEL Israfel. The angel of music, according to the Koran. 12 Levin. Lightning. 13 Pleiads. A group of six small stars. 26 Houri. The Koran speaks of the Houris as the beautiful nymphs of Paradise. THE CITY IN THE SEA 18 Babylon-like. The ancient city of Babylon was noted for its great walls. 30 Fanes. Temples. TO ONE IN PARADISE One. The poem was written in 1834 and may refer to Mrs. Stannard. See note to the poem To Helen. THE RAVEN 10 Surcease. End. 41 Pallas. The Greek goddess of wisdom, war, and the arts. 47 Plutonian. Pluto was the Roman god of the lower world. 80 Seraphim. Angels of the highest rank. 83 Nepenthe. An ancient drug used to give relief from pain and sorrow. 89 Balm in Gilead. A healing balsam found in Syria. See Jeremiah, viii, 22. 93 Aidenn* Eden. ULALUME Ulalume was written in 1847, some months after the death of Virginia Clemm, Poe's wife. 8 Tarn. A pool among the hills. 9 Ghoul-haunted. Ghouls, according to Eastern supersti- tion, are evil beings who eat human bodies. 10 Titanic. Gigantic. The Titans were gigantic deities against whom Zeus fought. 14 Scoriae. Lava. 16 Yaanek. A name invented by Poe. 19 Boreal Pole. The North Pole. 37 Astarte. A Syrian goddess of love whose emblem was the moon. 100 HELPS IN READING LINE 39 Dian. The Roman goddess of the moon. 44 Stars of the Lion. The group of stars called "Leo," the lion. 46 Lethean. Forgetful. Those who drank the waters of Lethe, a river in Hades, forgot all their past. 64 Sibyllic. Prophetic. The sibyls were women with prophetic powers. THE BELLS 10 Runic. Mysterious. The ancient Scandinavians used letters called "runes." The} r were early associated with mystery and magic. ANNABEL LEE The poem, written in 1849, commemorates the death of Poe's wife. ELDORADO Eldorado. Originally the "golden land" for which the early Spanish explorers in South America sought; hence, any land of exhaustless wealth; or an illusory quest. HELPFUL QUESTIONS TO HELEN 1 . Does the poet praise ' ' Helen ' ' for anything besides beauty? 2. What words add suggestive value to the poem? ISRAFEL 1. What is the secret of Israfel's power? 2. What is the thought of the poem? 3. What metrical effects add to the value of the poem? THE CITY IN THE SEA 1. What pictures does the poem suggest? 2. What is the general effect of the poem? 3. What expressions are especially poetic? TO ONE IN PARADISE 1. To what is the pleasing quality of the poem due? 2. What is the value of the last two lines? 3. What figures of speech add suggestive values? THE RAVEN 1. What is the mood of the poem? 2. What story does the poem tell? HELPS IN READING 101 3. What is the thought of the poem? 4. Which lines are most pleasing? 5. What word-effects are most noticeable? ULALUME 1. What pictures does the poem suggest? 2. Which lines are most pleasing? 3. To what effects is the charm of the poem due.' THE BELLS 1. What is the purpose of the poem? 2. What is the plan of the poem? . 3 What word-effects help to carry out the mam design f 4! Point out the lines in which thought-values and nnitative- sound- values most closely correspond. What metrical effects are most important? 5 ANNABEL LEE 1. What effects make the poem musical? 2. To what is the fascination of the poem due? ELDORADO 1. What is the meaning of the poem? 2. What metrical effects make the poem beautiful? ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING Bridal Ballad; The Sleeper; Lenore; To Zante; The Coliseum; The Haunted Palace; The Conqueror Worm; Eulalic; To F ; To Helen (II); For Annie; A Dream Within a Dream; Alone; The Valley of Unrest. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL TO THE DANDELION 5 Buccaneers. Seventeenth-century pirates and adventur- ers in the West Indies and along the coasts bordering the Caribbean Sea. 6 Eldorado. See note on Poe's poem "Eldorado above 10 Spanish prow. The Spaniards, seeking gold, were the first to explore the lands around the Caribbean Sea. 14 Largess. Gift. , . . . , 23. Golden-cuirassed. With the body covered with golden armor. . 26 Sybaris. An ancient city in southern Italy famous ior wealth and luxury. 102 HELPS IN READING THE PRESENT CRISIS LINE The immediate occasion of the poem was the proposed annexation of Texas. 44 Delphic cave. The cave of the oracle of Apollo at Delphi in ancient Greece. 46 Cyclops. Terrible one-eyed giants mentioned by Homer. 62 Calvaries. Luke xxm, 33 : " And when they were come to the place, which is called Calvary, there they crucified him." 64 Credo. Creed. "Credo" (I believe) is the opening word of the Apostle's Creed in Latin. 67 Judas. Matthew xxvn, 3: " Then Judas, which had be- trayed him, when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders." 74 Mayflower. The founders of Plymouth Colony sailed from Southampton on the Mayflower, a vessel of only 180 tons, landing at Plymouth Rock December 22, 1620. 76 Iconoclasts. Originally, those who opposed the use of images in church services. Literally image-breakers; hence, radicals; those who attack cherished beliefs as shams. THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL 4 A bridge from Dreamland. The sound of the first uncer- tain organ notes suggests coherent thought — builds a bridge from the world of dreams to the world of reality. 7 Auroral flushes. As a rose-colored eastern sky precedes sunrise, so the poet's first hesitating thought precedes his full theme. 12 Sinais. Exodus xix tells how God gave Moses the ten commandments on Mount Sinai. The poet means that we may see God, if we will, in our daily lives. 17 Druid. The Druids were priests of the ancient Celts. The forest, like a venerable priest, offers us its blessing. 18 Benedicite. Blessing. 23 Shrives. Hears confession and gives absolution. 46 Chalice. Cup. 77 Chanticleer. The cock. 99 Holy Grail. " According to the mythology of the Romancers, the San Greal, or Holy Grail, was the cup out of which Jesus partook of the Last Supper with his disciples. It was brought into England by Joseph of Arimathea, and remained there, an object of pilgrimage and adoration, for many years in • the keeping of his lineal descendants. It was incumbent upon those who had charge of it to be chaste in thought, word, and deed; but one of the keepers having broken this condition, the Holy Grail disappeared. From that time it was a favorite enterprise of the knights of Arthur's court to go in search of it. Sir Galahad was at last successful in HELPS IN READING 103 LINE finding it, as may be read in the seventeenth book of the Romance of King Arthur. Tennyson has made Sir Gala- had the subject of one of the most exquisite of his poems. " The plot (if I may give that name to anything so slight) of the following poem is my own, and, to serve its purposes, I have enlarged the circle of competition in search of the miraculous cup in such a manner as to in- clude, not only other persons than the heroes of the Round Table, but also a period of time subsequent to the sup- posed date of King Arthur's reign." (Lowell.) 103 Rushes. In old times the floors of castles were strewn with rushes. 176 Wold. An open, or treeless section of country. 184 Groined. One " groins " an arch by making a series of intersections with other arches, producing a ribbed vault. 190 Forest-crypt. A crypt is an underground vault. Here the poet supposes the brook to flow through a place like the crypt of a church. 196 Arabesques. An arabesque design is a fantastic design made up of flowers, vines, fruits and even figures of men and animals, a kind of design suggested by Arabic art. 213 Corbel. A bracket projecting from a wall as a support for a beam. 216 Yule-log. A great log used as the back-log at Christmas. 233 Seneschal. An officer in charge of domestic ceremonies. 255 Surcoat. A long garment worn over a knight's armor. 307 The Beautiful Gate. Acts m, 2: " At the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful." 308 Himself the Gate. John x, 9: " I am the door." 322 The Holy Supper. The communion service in commemor- ation of the last supper of Jesus and his disciples. THE FIRST SNOW-FALL This beautiful poem was written in 1849 in memory of Lowell's first child, Blanche, who died in March, 1847, at the age of fifteen months. 9 Carrara. Marble from Carrara, Italy. 17 Auburn. Mount Auburn Cemetery,' Cambridge, Massa- chusetts. 21 Mabel. Lowell's second daughter. THE COURTIN' 17 Crook-necks. Crook-neck squashes. 19 Queen' s-arm. An old musket used in the battle of Concord. 20 Concord. See the note on Emerson's Concord Hymn. 43 Ole Hunderd. A psalm tune formerly used with the one hundredth psalm and now generally used in the doxology, " Praise God from whom all blessings flow." 94 Bay o' Fundy. The Bay of Fundy, an inlet of the Atlantic 104 HELPS IN READING LINE Ocean between New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, is noted for its tides, which reach a height of sixty to seventy feet. 95 Cried. Their approaching marriage was officially an- nounced. HELPFUL QUESTIONS TO THE DANDELION 1. What comparisons does the poet make? 2. What suggestions does the dandelion bring to the poet? THE PRESENT CRISIS 1. What is the thought of the poem? 2. Explain: " For mankind are one in spirit," line 16. 3. Explain lines 38-40. 4. Name examples for lines 56-57. 5. Explain line 86. 6. What reasons lead you to think the meter of the poem well chosen? 7. What is the effect of the figurative language? THE VISION OF SIR LAUNFAL 1. What is the thought of the poem? 2. What is the plan of the poem? 3. What is the purpose of the preludes? 4. What parts of the poem are most poetic? 5. Which descriptions are most pleasing? 6. Explain lines 324-25. THE FIRST SNOW-FALL What is the effect of the poem? THE COURTIN' What effects produce the humor of the poem? ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING My Love; The Shepherd of King Admetus; An Incident in a Railroad, Car: Rhcecus: Columbus; An Indian-Summer Reverie; The Biglow Papers; A Fable for Critics; Beaver Brook: Ode Recited at the Harvard Commemoration; Alad- din; To Holmes: To H. W. L.; Wendell Phillips; To Whittier: At the Burns Centennial. 1 1 Most of these poems are contained in one or another of the follow- ing issues of the Riverside Literature Series : — Nos. 30, M, O, or Z. HELPS IN READING 105 WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT THANATOPSIS LINE Thanatopsis. A vision of death. A combination of two Greek words, ddvaros, death, and fyt.s, a vision. 11 Pall. A black cloth placed over a coffin. 12 Narrow house. The grave. 29 Share. Plowshare. 51 The Barcan wilderness. A desert region in the north of Africa. 53 The Oregon. The Columbia River. INSCRIPTION FOR THE ENTRANCE TO A WOOD 11 The primal curse. God's punishment of Adam. Genesis in, 17-19: " Cursed is the ground for thy sake." 30 Causey. A causeway or raised path. HELPFUL QUESTIONS THANATOPSIS 1. What is the main thought of Thanatopsis f 2. How can one hold communion with the visible forms of Nature? 3. What does Bryant mean when he says Nature " speaks a various language "? 4. What thoughts help Bryant to regard death without fear? 5. What is Bryant's "unfaltering trust" ? 6. How does the rhythm of the poem add to its thought? 7. What expressions are especially beautiful or suggestive? INSCRIPTION FOR THE ENTRANCE TO A WOOD 1. How is the thought in this poem related to passages in Thanatopsis ? 2. What pictures does the poem suggest? 3. To what senses does the poem appeal? TO A WATERFOWL 1. What picture is the foundation of the poem? 2. What is the thought of the poem? ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING The Yellow Violet; Green River; A Walk at Sunset; A Forest Hymn; Monument Mountain; The Death of the Flowers; Hymn to the City; The Song of Marion's Men; 106 HELPS IN READING To the Fringed Gentian; The Planting of the Apple-Tree; Robert of Lincoln; Sella; The Little People of the Snow; The Flood of Years. 1 RALPH WALDO EMERSON THE RHODORA lilNE 2 Rhodora. The rhodora is a low shrub found in cool, wet, wooded places in New England and elsewhere. Its pur- plish-rose colored flowers appear before the leaves. CONCORD HYMN The battle of Concord (Massachusetts) was fought April 19, 1775, between about 500 American Minute-Men and 800 British. The monument to which Emerson refers marks the place where the first British soldiers fell. FORBEARANCE 3 Pulse. Simple food, — peas, beans, and the like. HELPFUL QUESTIONS THE RHODORA 1. Describe the place in which the rhodora was found. 2. What is the meaning of the poem? CONCORD HYMN In what way was the shot "heard round the world "? FABLE 1. What thought does the poem express? 2. What is the advantage of using the form of a fable? FORBEARANCE 1. What is the poet's attitude toward nature? toward man? 2. What makes the poem artistic? MUSIC 1. What is the " sky-born music " ? 2. What can you say to prove the truth of the poem? » Most of these poems are contained in No. 54 of the Riverside Literature Series. HELPS IN READING 107 ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING Each and All; The Problem; To J. W.; Good-Bye ; The Humble-Bee; The Snow-Storm ; The Apology; Threnody; Brahma; The River; Thine Eyes Still Shincd; Written in Naples. 1 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES OLD IRONSIDES :ne The American frigate Constitution was launched at Boston in 1797, and was first used against the Mediterra- nean pirates. In the War of 1812 the vessel made a remark- able record, fighting the British Guerriere, August 19, the British frigate Java, December 29, and the Cyane and Levant, February 20, 1815. In 1830, the vessel being old and unseaworthy, the Secretary of the Navy proposed to dismantle it. Holmes, then a young man of twenty-one, having read of this in a newspaper, wrote Old Ironsides. The writing of the poem aroused public sentiment which saved the vessel. She was rebuilt and kept in commis- sion until 1881. After use as school ship and receiving ship, the Constitution was taken to Boston where it is still open to public inspection. 15 Harpies. Winged monsters with the faces and bodies of women and the wings and claws of birds of prey. THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS "The chambered nautilus " is a kind of mollusk said to sail by means of expanded tentacles. Its shell is pearly and iridescent. It makes a series of enlarging compart- ments built in a spiral. 5 Siren. The sirens, according to Homer, are sea nymphs who, by their singing, attract sailors in order to destroy them. 14 Crypt. An underground vault. 26 Triton. A sea god, usually represented as blowing a shell trumpet. THE DEACON'S MASTERPIECE 1 Shay. A chaise, or pleasure carriage, drawn by one horse and designed for two people. 10 Georgius Secundus. George II, King of England, born in Hanover, Germany, 1683, died in London, 1760. 12 Lisbon-town. Lisbon, the capital of Portugal, was nearly destroyed by an earthquake on November 1, 1755. 1 Most of these poems are contained in No. 113 of the Riverside Literature Series. 108 HELPS IN READING LINE 14 Braddock. Edward Braddock, 1695-1755, a British gen- eral, defeated July 9, 1755, by the French and Indians during an expedition against Fort Duquesne, now the city of Pittsburg. 20 Felloe — thill. Felly, the wooden rim of a wheel. Thill, one of the shafts between which a horse is hitched. 22 Thoroughbrace. A strong leather strap that aids in sup- porting the body of a carriage. 45 Ellum. Elm. 51 Linchpin. A pin that keeps a wagon wheel on the axletree. 90 Whipple-tree. The pivoted bar to which the tugs are fastened. 92 Encore. Once more. 99 Ewe-necked. A horse whose neck lacks the proper arch is said to be ewe-necked — to have a neck like a sheep. HELPFUL QUESTIONS OLD IRONSIDES 1. What is the spirit of the poem? 2. To what sentiments does it appeal? 3. What is the effect of the figurative language? THE CHAMBERED NAUTILUS 1. Comment on the use of adjectives in this poem. 2. What is the effect of the figures of speech? 3. What does the poem mean? i THE DEACON'S MASTERPIECE What are the humorous elements of the poem? ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING The Ballad of the Oysterman; The Height of the Ridiculous; My Aunt; The Last Leaf; On Lending a Punch Bowl; Par- son TurrelVs Legacy; The Boys; A Sun-Day Hymn; Bill and Joe; Dorothy Q.; Grandmother's Story of Bunker- Hill Battle; How the Old Horse won the Bet; For Whittier's Seventieth Birthday; To James Russell Lowell (three poems) ; The Broomstick Train; Bryant's Seventieth Birthday; To H. W. Longfellow; Farewell to J. R. Lowell; To John Greenleaf Whittier; In Memory of John Greenleaf Whiltier; At the Atlantic Dinner; For the Burns Centennial Celebra- tion. 1 1 Most of these poems are contained in No. 6 of the Riverside Literature Series. HELPS IN READING 109 WALT WHITMAN CAVALRY CROSSING A FORD LINE 7 Guidon flags. Small pointed flags carried by non-com- missioned cavalry officers to guide the march or formation. O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN! No other poem written in memory of Lincoln expresses deeper, more passionate feeling. 2 Rack. Storm. HELPFUL QUESTIONS CAVALRY CROSSING A FORD 1. What unusual power does the poem show? 2. What is the form of the poem? O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN! 1. Comment on the appropriateness of the figure on which the poem is based. 2. What contrast adds to the effect? 3. What metrical effects are most pleasing? HUSH'D BE THE CAMPS TO-DAY How does the poem differ from most poems by other authors? A NOISELESS PATIENT SPIDER 1. What does the poem mean? 2. Is the form of the poem pleasing? THE FIRST DANDELION Compare this poem with Lowell's To the Dandelion. ADDITIONAL POEMS FOR READING There was a Child Went Forth; Song of the Open Road; Assurances; Crossing Brooklyn Ferry; I Hear America Singing; Fidl of Life Now; Night on the Prairies; Mag- net Soidh; Mannahatta; Bivouac on a Mountain Side; The Wound Dresser; Give Me the Splendid Silent Sun; When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloomed; Darest Thou Now, Soul. BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES These notes are intended to be suggestive rather than definitive. In general their plan is (1) to give only the most important dates; (2) to present such facts with respect to the poet's ancestry, early surroundings, taste, and education as will, if studied with a little thought, illuminate the man's life and works; (3) to show how he came in contact with other literary men of his time and how he was molded by their influence; (4) to mention his attitude toward public questions of his day and to show what part he bore in public service. Full biographical notes are given for those poets to whom, according to the College Entrance Requirements, "special attention" is to be given. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW In Portland, Maine, — the " beautiful town that is seated by the sea," as he called it in his poem, My Lost Youth, — Longfellow was born on February 27, 1807. His father, a graduate of Harvard, was a prominent lawyer in Portland, a former Member of Congress, and a trustee of Bowdoin Col- lege. His mother, like the mother of Bryant, was a descend- ant of that romantic Puritan couple, John Alden and Pris- cilla Mullens, whose interesting story Longfellow told in The Courtship of Miles Standish. In his father's great collection of books Longfellow found much that gave him delight. He read Irving's Sketch-Book with unbounded interest, dreaming himself into the great author's indolent charm and kindly view of life, so that when in later years he wrote Outre-Mer he unconsciously repro- duced something of the spirit of Irving. In poetry he was drawn to the work of Bryant, feeling the power of its solemn music and reproducing something of its tone in the boyish poems he wrote before he entered college. At Bowdoin, which he entered as a sophomore, he was a classmate of Hawthorne, with whom, however, he never became really intimate. While in college his love for books increased so that he wrote home: " I most eagerly aspire after further eminence in literature." Upon his graduation he was offered the newly established professorship of Modern Lan- BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES ill guages at Bowdoin, with the privilege of spending three years in Europe in preparation for the work. After much travel and hard study in Europe he returned to his Alma Mater, where he taught for five years. In 1835 the brilliant young professor was called to Harvard to the professorship of Belles-Lettres. After eighteen months of further travel and study in Europe he took up his work at Harvard, where he remained until 1854, finally resigning in order to devote his entire time and strength to literary work. Longfellow, essentially a student, was never deeply moved by the public questions of the day. He did not become a Transcendentalist as did Emerson, nor did he take active part with Whittier and Lowell in fervent writing against the institution of slavery. In fact, the little that he wrote on that subject is in striking contrast with the impassioned verses of Whittier. In 1868, on another visit to Europe, he was received by Queen Victoria at Windsor Castle, and was given honorary degrees by the great English universities at Oxford and Cambridge. In his own land his poetry had made him loved by all, and by none more than by the children. On his seventy-second birthday the children of Cambridge, Massa- chusetts, the home of his later life, came to the Craigie House, where they presented him a chair made from the very wood of the "spreading chestnut tree" of The Village Blacksmith. His seventy-fifth birthday was celebrated in the schools throughout the United States. The charm of his literary work and the radiance of his kindly spirit gave him the admiration and the love of all who knew him. Thus, full of years and honors, he passed away on March 24, 1882. Two years later a marble bust of the great American poet was placed in the Poets' Corner of Westmin- ster Abbey, this being the first time an American writer was so honored. JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER In a pleasant old farmhouse not far from the thriving community of Haverhill, Massachusetts, John Greenleaf Whittier was born on December 17, 1807, the year that saw the birth of Longfellow. In that same farmhouse, erected in 1688, the Whittier family had lived generation after gen- 112 BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES eration for nearly a century and a quarter. The poet's father was a simple farmer whose ancestors had been sturdy, honest people. Through his mother the poet was related to Daniel Webster. Unlike Longfellow, Whittier was not born into a home filled with books. Nevertheless, he read the books that were at hand and made them a part of his life. There was the Bible, with its beautiful rhythms and its high spiritual values, — a book that he learned from cover to cover. His people for three generations had been Quakers, and so he had access to numerous sermons, journals, and biographies of famous members of the Society of Friends. To this reading he made definite reference in Snow-Bound. Then there was a volume of Burns, loaned to him by a school teacher, that thrilled him with its revelation of the poetry that lies hidden in things that are common and familiar. Because Whittier also re- vealed the beauty of the commonplace, he has been likened to Burns. Various borrowed books went into the making of Whittier's life — Pilgrim's Progress, Shakespeare's plays, Gray's Elegy, Cowper's Lament for the Royal George, and one at least of Scott's spirited novels. From such home reading and from a few terms in a district school Whittier gained his early education. Whittier was a mere boy when he first began to write verse. Once, unknown to him, his sister sent one of his poems to William Lloyd Garrison's Newburyport Free Press. This poem, printed in 1826, was Whittier's first poem to appear in print. Garrison, only twenty years of age at the time, be- came interested in the author and urged the father to give the young poet further school education. Although the father objected, saying, "Sir, poetry will not give him bread," he relented a little later and allowed his son to enter the new Haverhill Academy on condition that he pay his own way. By means of shoemaking by hand, at that time a common industry, and by teaching in a district school, Whit- tier supported himself for two terms. His family was too poor to afford him the advantage of college training. From 1829 to 1836 Whittier did editorial work in Boston, Haverhill, and Hartford, often leaving his literary labors to help in the farmwork for which his father's death had left him largely responsible. He had long sympathized with the work of the abolitionists, and in 1833 he definitely allied him- BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES 113 self with their cause, this being the great turning-point in his life. In this matter his guiding influence was the self- sacrificing work of William Lloyd Garrison. For the next twenty-seven years he wrote such vigorous prose and verse in favor of abolition that he was several times assaulted by angry mobs that opposed his views. In 1835 he was hon- ored by an election to the Legislature of Massachusetts. From 1836 to 1865 Whittier published various collections of his poetry, and some prose. His masterpiece, Snow-Bound, a New England idyll, appeared in 1866, its homely simplicity entitling it to a place beside Burns's The Cotter's Saturday Night and Goldsmith's The Deserted Village. The poem had such immediate popularity that he soon gained $10,000. During the remainder of his long life Whittier published many collections of poetry, the last appearing when he was eighty-five years old. His fame increased with his age, so that in his later years his birthday, like that of Long- fellow, was honored by public celebration. Having had the good fortune to see his most deeply cherished dreams real- ized, he died on the early morning of September 7, 1892. EDGAR ALLAN POE The glamor of romance hangs about the life of Poe, which harmonizes strangely with all that he wrote. His father, of Southern descent, had become an actor and had married an actress. On January 19, 1809, while their company was play- ing in Boston, Edgar Allan Poe was born. It was from his mother, we may believe, that Poe inherited his artistic abil- ity; while from his father came the prevailing weaknesses that so thoroughly wrecked his career. Both parents died when he was little more than a baby. Edgar was adopted by Mr. John Allan, a rich tobacco merchant of Richmond, Vir- ginia, who gave him every luxury, and for five years sent him to school in England. After further study in Richmond, Poe, at the age of seventeen, entered the University of Virginia. He was a good student, but he gambled and drank to excess. After a year he left the university and entered Mr. Allan's office. Soon tiring of that, he ran away from home and entered the United States Army under the name of Edgar A. Perry. At the end of two years Mr. Allan purchased his release from the ranks, and later procured for him an ap- 114 BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES pointment to West Point. After a time, however, Poe became purposely disobedient in order to gain his dismissal from the Academy. This led to a final breach with Mr. Allan. Poe then definitely took up literature as a profession, wrote a number of brilliant tales, became editor of one publication after another, and lived at various times in Baltimore, Rich- mond, Philadelphia, and New York. In 1835 he married his cousin, Virginia Clemm, then only fourteen years old. For a time Poe seems to have made a successful effort to recover his self-control, this being the period of his best work. But shortly his habits of intemperance were renewed, leading him into quarrels and neglect of work, so that he lost many posi- tions. The publication of The Raven in 1845 gave him wide- spread fame in this country and in Europe. The death of his wife in 1847 preceded his own death by two years, his last days being extremely sad. An estimate of Poe's work as a poet is given on page 119, but we may here mention his writing in other fields of thought. He was the first American literary critic. Not always cor- rect and not always fair, he still had remarkable critical in- sight. He was among the first to recognize the value of the poetry of Mrs. Browning, whose influence on his own work, by the way, is worthy of note. He recognized the charm in Tennyson's early work, admired Dickens from the beginning, and set Hawthorne before the world as a writer of a new type of fiction, the short story with a single effect. He gave accu- rate judgments of the poetry of Lowell, Longfellow, and Bryant as well as of the prose works of Irving and Cooper. His work as a writer of short stories is very important. He is practically the originator of the modern short story, for whose construction he gave definite principles. In his liter- ary work he has something of the fancy of Hawthorne, some- thing of the realism of Defoe. His scientific stories led the way to those of Jules Verne and of the writers of to-day. His stories of deductive reasoning have been models for Sherlock Holmes, and for all our modern detective stories. It is pos- sible that his William Wilson gave Stevenson the suggestion for Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES 115 JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL The ancestors of Lowell for three generations had been educated at Harvard College and had taken active and noble part in public life. His grandfather, in 1780, had led in the abolition of slavery in Massachusetts. The Lowell Institute in Boston, and the city of Lowell, Massachusetts, are pres- ent-day memorials of the work and influence of various branches of his family. Lowell was born in the university town of Cambridge, February 22, 1819, some three months before the birth of Whitman. His father was a Boston clergyman, whose library of 3000 to 4000 books gave the poet the best reading that could be obtained. His mother's love of poetry gave him an inherited taste for all that is best in literature. Few poets have been born to more favorable circumstances. The first great piece of literature to impress him was Spenser's Faerie Queen, while Scott's romantic novels made early appeal. Lowell has written that after he entered Har- vard in 1834 he "read almost everything except the text- books prescribed by the faculty"; for example, Dodsley's collection of Old Plays, Montaigne's Essays, Hakluyt's Voy- ages, Southey's Doctor, the works of Carlyle, and the poems of Dante, Milton, Cowper, Byron, Coleridge, and Keats. It is undoubtedly true that Lowell's wide reading gave him an education that he could never have gained from the some- what restricted curriculum of the college course of his time; but however that may be, his reading so seriously interfered with his studies that he was suspended for a short time just before his graduation in 1838 and "rusticated" in Concord with a tutor. There he became acquainted with Emerson, who, in 1837, had made a deep impression upon him and other Harvard students by his brilliant Phi Beta Kappa address on The American Scholar. Lowell had been editor of a college publication and had written a few poems, so that his election to the position of class poet is not surprising, al- though it displeased his father, who exclaimed: "Oh, dear ! James promised me that he would quit writing poetry and go to work! " Immediately after graduation Lowell took up the study of law and was admitted to the bar in 1840. With no natural 116 BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES liking for legal work, he devoted himself more to the writing of poems and sketches than to the sober work of the law. His literary work was so good that it had a ready sale, so critical an editor as Edgar Allan Poe being one of the editors who accepted his contributions. Lowell finally abandoned the law in order to give himself entirely to literature. He estab- lished a monthly magazine in which he printed excellent work from Poe, Hawthorne, and Miss Barrett (later Mrs. Browning). The magazine lived only three months, after which Lowell became a member of the editorial staff of the Pennsylvania Freeman, a paper at one time edited by Whit- tier. Little by little he gained interest in abolition until, in 1845, he held a foremost place with Whittier in supporting the cause of freedom for the slaves. In the next ten years he wrote a remarkable variety of work, including the satirical Biglow Papers, the humorous Fable for Critics, and the widely popular and beautiful Vision of Sir Launfal, his best work. His Lowell Institute lectures on the English poets, in 1854-55, brought him the appoint- ment as Longfellow's successor at Harvard as Professor of Modern Languages. When the Atlantic Monthly was founded in 1857, Lowell became its first editor, a position that brought him into contact with many literary men, including especially Oliver Wendell Holmes. Lowell acted as editor of the Atlantic Monthly four years; then, after an interval of three years, he took up work with the North American Re- view, the publication that had printed Bryant's noble Thanatopsis Lowell's work having brought him into national import- ance, President Hayes, in 1877, appointed him Minister to Spain, an office once held by Washington Irving. In 1880 he was sent as United States Minister to England, where his pleasing personality, his broad-minded patriotism, and his unusual ability as a public speaker won him a place in the hearts of all. While acting in his official capacity he took part in the unveiling of Longfellow's bust in Westminster Abbey. In 1885 he returned to America, where he remained lecturing and writing, with the exception of several summers in England, until his death on August 12, 1S91. AN ESTIMATE OF THE POETRY OF LONGFELLOW, WHITTIER, POE, AND LOWELL 1 HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW The qualities which especially mark the poetry of Long- fellow are simplicity of style, beautiful imagery, moral earn- estness, and narrative power. So simple is this poet that many critics pronounce him commonplace. Unquestionably he possessed what may be termed the common mind. He was not a profound thinker, not one of "the bards sublime" ; he spoke out of the common experience of life, and it was this in large degree which gave him the comprehension and affection of the common people. We must remember, also, that when we dwell upon the commonplaceness or the triteness of Longfellow's sentiment, we are often emphasizing the fact that the verse of our criti- cism has become worn by our own use. Longfellow shared generously in the gift bestowed on all poets, the sense of beauty and the power of figurative expres- sion. Not at all like the magical art of Poe, Longfellow's art, impassionate, quiet, restrained, often pensive, sometimes melancholy, — never morbid, — is equally distinctive and equally true. He too had a rare felicity of phrase which gave artistic setting to his figures. Like Bryant, Longfellow is usually impressed by the "les- son" in the thing he sees, and often tags his poem with a moral that is obvious enough to be left unformulated. Yet the happy expression of these wise observations is far from unattractive to the average American reader; and through them he won his way to the hearts of many. It is as a writer of narrative poems that Longfellow attains his chief distinction. No other American poet compares with him in this field. Not only the three long poems which deal with themes of national interest (Evangeline, The Court- ship of Miles Standish, and The Song of Hiawatha), but also i Excerpts from A Student's History of American Literature, by William Edward Simonds, Ph.D., Professor of English Literature in Knox College. Houghton Mifflin Company, Publishers. 118 AN ESTIMATE the twenty-two tales of The Wayside Inn series and his numer- ous ballads must be taken into account. As a lyric poet, Longfellow ranks with the best. Many of his poems are songs. With the sonnet, too, he was eminently successful. Longfellow's intimate acquaintance with the literatures of Europe and the influence of professional study are shown in the large number of facile translations from Scandinavian, German, French, Italian, and Spanish poets. They are marked by insight, sympathy, and felicity of interpretation; and form no unimportant portion of his work. The poetry of Poe found great favor among the Latin peoples of Europe; Longfellow's poems have enjoyed as wide if not wider popularity abroad. There is an anecdote which gives a remarkable illustration of this fact. It is said that on a French steamer sailing from Constantinople to Mar- seilles, a Russian, an Englishman, a Scotchman, a French- man, a Greek, and an American vied with one another in quotations from our poet. In America, certainly, Long- fellow is still the poet of the people. JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER In comparison with our other American poets, Whittier must be recognized as essentially provincial. Aside from the fact that a large body of his verse, the anti-slavery poems, was necessarily of temporary value, we must remember also that the best portion of his work belongs wholly to New England, It is nevertheless true that, while this circum- stance places a limitation upon its scope, it does not detract from the strength and value of his poetry. While the poet has never received, like Longfellow and Poe, the recognition of other peoples than our own, this restriction of his field, with the fidelity and vividness of his interpretation, is pre- cisely what gives to Whittier his chief distinction here at home. Nor was he in the larger sense a great poet. No one recognized the technical faults of his verse more frankly than Whittier himself. "I should be hung for my bad rhymes any- where south of Mason and Dixon's line," he wrote to his publisher. That he did not hold a place with the men of pro- found insight, the " seers," he knew equally well. His own modest estimate of his poetic gifts he has expressed in stanzas AN ESTIMATE 119 of unusual beauty, which to some extent are themselves a contradiction of the statement : — "The rigor of a frozen clime, The harshness of an untaught ear, The jarring words of one whose rhyme, Beat often Labor's hurried time, Or Duty's rugged march through storm and strife, are here. "Of mystic beauty, dreamy grace, No rounded art the lack supplies; Unskilled the subtle lines to trace, Or softer shades of Nature's face, I view her common form with unanointed eyes. "Nor mine the seer-like power to show The secrets of the heart and mind; To drop the plummet-line below Our common world of joy and woe, A more intense despair or brighter hope to find." The fine artistic taste of Longfellow, Whittier lacked, as he lacked the culture of broad reading and of travel ; but he possessed the genuine love of nature and humanity; he had the virility of a strong character, free from all artificiality, the ardor of the truest patriotism, and, at the outset of his career, the inestimable advantage of consecration to an up- lifting cause. EDGAR ALLAN POE The best of Poe's compositions are exquisite embodiments of his own theories regarding his art. Poetry and music were allied in his mind, the aim in both to produce an impression. The poetical effect, he said, could be prolonged only to a certain limit; and that he placed at about one hundred lines. He had no sympathy with the idea that poetry should incul- cate a moral; this idea he termed "the heresy of the Didac- tic," and soundly rated the New England poets for their inclination so to write. Poetry he defined as "the rhythmical creation of beauty." The poetic principle manifests itself "in an elevating excitement of the soul." In the service of beauty, Poe employed his art. Poe's melodies are haunting ones. Sonorous words play an important part in the mechanics of his composition. 120 AN ESTIMATE Repetition, sometimes in the form of assonance, as in the line, — "From a wild weird clime that lieth, sublime"; x sometimes in the refrain, so effectively employed in The Raven; sometimes in the recurrence of the identical word, as in Dream-Land and in Ulalume, is used with marked musical effect. Poe makes artful Use of melodious names, like Auber, Eldorado, Israfel, Ulalume, Lenore. There is wonderful charm in the rhythmic movement of Poe's verse, and there is also, for most readers, a charm in that omnipresent mel- ancholy which pervades his poems. So characteristic is this last quality that Poe has been described — "not as a single- poem poet, but the poet of a single mood." Weird, mystical, unearthly, — "Out of Space — out of Time," these compositions succeed in fulfilling the purpose of their author; they impress the mind with ideas of supernal beauty. They speak no message of hope or inspiration, they teach no lesson. In Poe's conception of his art, the poet as prophet had no place. If Poe had a literary master, it was the author of Christabel and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Coleridge, more than any other poet, taught the author of Israfel and The Raven the secret of melodious verse and the fascination of the weird. In the eye of Europe no other American poet ranks as high as Poe. Already, before his death, French writers had de- tected in Poe's works a quality that appealed strongly to their artistic sense; his poems and tales were translated into their language; later into Spanish and German also. To the present time, Germany, Spain, and France regard the author of The Raven as the supreme representative of the West in literary art. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL Lowell might, perhaps, have had a higher place among the poets had he been more careful in his art; his composition is often marred by haste; he gave little time to revision, and 1 Dream-Land. REFERENCE BOOKS 121 even the more important poems were put forth rapidly. But the poet was a master of language and of rhythm. In the literary training which helps to artistic expression, Lowell had the advantage over his contemporaries except Poe and Longfellow. The quality which in these two poets has ap- pealed so universally to readers abroad as well as at home is apparently lacking in Lowell; but we feel that there is a mas- culine strength in his verse which we do not find in Longfel- low, and a sincerity of utterance that does not appear in Poe. A survey of Lowell's work in literature reveals the ver- satility of his genius as well as the general excellence of his achievement. Not only is he the only American writer who has won high distinction in both prose and verse, — except Poe, — but in both verse and prose he has touched so many keys with such precision and such power, that he must be regarded as distinctly the most gifted among American men of letters. REFERENCE BOOKS Books marked with a * are published by Houghton Mifflin Company 1. COMPLETE WORKS, AND BIOGRAPHIES Longfellow. Complete Poems, Student's Cambridge Edition* Complete Works, Riverside Edition* Autobiographical Poems. With a sketch of Longfellow's Life by Charles Eliot Norton.* Life of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. Samuel Longfellow.* Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. G. R. Carpenter. (Beacon Biographies.) Whittier. Complete Poems, Student's Cambridge Edition* Complete Works, Riverside Edition* Autobiographical Poems. With a sketch of Whittier's Life by Bliss Perry.* Life and Letters of John Greenleaf Whittier. S. T. Pickard* John Greenleaf Whittier. G. R. Carpenter. (American Men of Letters*) Poe. Complete Poems, edited with Memoir by J. H. Whitty* Life and Letters of Edgar Allan Poe. J. A. Harrison. Edgar Allan Poe. G. E. Woodberry. (American Men of Let- ters.*) Edgar Allan Poe. W. P. Trent. (English Men of Letters.) Lowell. Complete Poems, Student's Cambridge Edition* Complete Works, Riverside Edition* James Russell Lowell. H. E. Scudder* James Russell Lowell, His Life and Work. Ferris Greenslet.* 122 REFERENCE BOOKS Bryant. The Life and Works of William Cullen Bryant, edited by Parke Godwin. Biography of William Cullen Bryant. Parke Godwin. William Cullen Bryant. John Bigelow. (American Men of Letters*) Bryant. W. A. Bradley. (English Men of Letters.) Emerson. Complete Works, Centenary Edition* Memoir of Ralph Waldo Emerson. J. E. Cabot.* Ralph Waldo Emerson. O. W. Holmes. (American Men of Letters*) Holmes. Complete Poems, Student's Cambridge Edition* Complete Works, Riverside Edition* Life and Letters of Oliver Wendell Holmes. J. T. Morse, Jr.* Oliver Wendell Holmes. S. M. Crothers. (American Men of Letters*) Whitman. Complete Writings, with bibliographical and critical matter by O. L. Triggs. Walt Whitman. Bliss Perry. (American Men of Letters*) Whitman: A Study. John Burroughs.* 2. SELECTED POEMS An American Anthology. Edited by E. C. Stedman.* The Chief American Poets. Edited by C. H. Page.* The Riverside Literature Series.* 3. HISTORY AND CRITICISM A Literary History of America. Barrett Wendell. A Reader's History of American Literature. T. W. Higginson and H. W. Boynton.* A Student's History of American Literature. W. E. Simonds.* A Short History of America's Literature. E. M. Tappan.* Poets of America. E. C. Stedman.* RIVERSIDE LITERATURE SERIES 147. 148. 149. 150. 151. 152. 153. 154. 155. 156. 157. 158. 159. 160. 161. 102. 103. 104. 105. 166. 107. 108. 100. 170. 171, 173. 174. 175. .170. 177. 178. 179. 180. 181. 182. 183. 184. 185. ISO. 187, 189. 190. 191. 192, 193. 194. 195. 190. 197. (Continued from Pope's Rape of the Lock, etc. Hawthorne's Marble Faun. Shakespeare's Twelfth Night. Ouida's Dog of Flanders, etc. Ewing's Jackanapes, etc. Martineau's The Peasant and the Prince. Shakespeare's MidsurnmerNight's Dream. Shakespeare's Tempest. Irving's Life of Goldsmith. Tennyson's Gareth and Lynette, etc. The Song of Roland. Malory's Merlin and Sir Balin. Beowulf. Spenser's Faerie Queene. Book I. Dickens's Tale of Two Cities. Prose and Poetry of Cardinal Newman. Shakespeare's Henry V. De Quiucey's Joan of Arc, etc. Scott's Quentin Durward. Carlyle's Heroes and Hero-Worship. Longfellow's Autobiographical Poems. Shelley's Poems. Lowell's My Garden Acquaintance, etc. Lamb's Essays of Elia. 172. Emerson's Essays. Kate Douglas Wiggin's Flag-Raising. Kate Douglas Wiggin's Finding a Home. Whittier's Autobiographical Poems. Burroughs's Afoot and Afloat. Bacon's Essays. Selections from John Ruskin. King Arthur Stories from Malory. Palmer's Odyssey. Goldsmith's The Good-Natured Man. Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer. Old English and Scottish Ballads. Shakespeare's King Lear. Moores's Life of Lincoln. Thoreau's Camping in the Maine Woods. 188. Huxley's Autobiography, and Essays Byron's Childe Harold, Canto IV, etc. Washington's Farewell Address, and Web- ster's Bunker Hill Oration. » The Second Shepherds' Play, etc. Mrs. Gaskell's Crauford. Williams's jEneid. Irving's Bracebridge Hall. Selections. Thoreau's Walden. Sheridan's The Rivals. Parton's Captains of Industry. Selected. 199. Macaulay's Lord Clive, and W. Hast- ings. Howelle's The Rise of Silas Lapham. Harris's Little Mr.Thimblefinger Stories. Jewett's The Night Before Thanksgiving. Shumway's Nibelungenlied. Sheffield's Old Testament Narrative. Powers's A Dickens Reader. Goethe's Faust. Part I. Cooper's The Spy. Aldrich's Story of a Bad Boy. Warner's Being a Boy. Kate Douglas Wiggin's Polly OHver'a Problem. inside front cover) 211. Milton's Areopagitica, etc. 212. Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. 213. Hemingway's Le Morte Arthur. 214. Moores's Life of Columbus. 215. Bret Harte's Tennessee's Partner, etc. 216. Ralph Roister Doister. 217. Gorboduc. (In preparation.) 218. Selected Lyrics from Wordsworth, Keats, and Shelley. 219. Selected Lyrics from Dryden, Collins, Gray, Cowper and Burns. 220. Southern Poems. 221. Macaulay's Speeches on Copyright; Lin- coln's Cooper Union Address. 222. Briggs's College Life. 223. Selections from the Prose Writings of Mat- thew Arnold. 224-227. See next page, Library Binding. 228. Selected English Letters. 229. Jewett's Playday Stories. 230. Grenfell's Adrift on an Ice-Pan. 231. Muir's Stickeen. 232. Harte's Waif of the Plains, etc. 233. Tennyson's The Coming of Arthur, The Holy Grail and the Passing of Arthur. 234. Selected Essays. (Other titles to be announced) (75) LIBRARY OF CONGRESS RIVERSIDE LITERAT (Continued) EXTRA NUMBERS 017 165 491 9 American Authors and their Birthdays. Biographical Sketches of American Au- thors. Warriner's Teaching of English Classics in the Grades. Scudder's Literature in School. Longfellow Leaflets. Whittier Leaflets. Holmes Leaflets. Thomas's How to Teach English Clas- sics. Holbrook's Northland Heroes. The Riverside Song Book. Lowell's Fable for Critics. Selections from American Authors. Lowell Leaflets. Holbrook's Hiawatha Primer. Selections from English Authors. R Hawthorne ' s Twice-Told Tales. Selected. a Irving' s Essays from Sketch Book. Se- lected. T Literature for the Study of Language. U A Dramatization of the Song of Hia- watha. V Holbrook ' s Book of Nature Myths . W Brown's In the Days of Giants. X Poems for the Study of Language. Y Warner ' s In the W ilderness . Z Nine Selected Poems. A A Coleridge's The Ancient Mariner and Lowell's The Vision of Sir La-unfal. Poe's The Raven, Whittier 's Snow- Bound, and Longfellow's The Court- ship of Miles Standish. Selections for Study and Memorizing. BB CO LIBRARY BINDING 135- 160. 166. 168. 177. 178. 181- 183. 187- 191. 211. 316. 222. 223. 224. 225. 226. 227. 335. 236. K. 136. Chaucer's Prologue, The Knight's Tale, and The Nun's Priest's Tale. Spenser's Faerie Queene, Book I. Carlyle's Heroes and Hero-Worship. Shelley's Poems. Selected. Bacon's Essays. Selections from the Works of John Ruskin. 182. Goldsmith's The Good-Natured Man, and She Stoops to Conquer. Old English and Scottish Ballads. 188 . Huxley ' s Autobiography and Selected Essays Second Shepherd's Play, Everyman, etc. Milton's Areopagitica, etc. Ralph Roister Doister. Briggs's College Life. Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold. Perry's The American Mind and American Idealism. Newman's University Subjects. Burroughs's Studies in Nature and Literature. Bryce's Promoting Good Citizenship. Briggs' To College Girls. Selected Literary Essays from James Russell Lowell. Minimum College Requirements in English for Study. Complete catalogue and price Itst of the Riverside Literature Series free upon application HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO <76)