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SONNET

ON MRS. KEMBLE'S READINGS FROM

SHAKSPEARE.

O PRECIOUS evenings! all too swiftly sped!

Leaving us heirs to amplest heritages Of all the best thoughts of the greatest sages,

And giving tongues unto the silent dead! How our hearts glowed and trembled as she read,

Interpreting by tones the wondrous pages

Of the great poet who foreruns the ages,
Anticipating all that shall be said!
O happy Reader! having for thy text
The magic book, whose Sibylline leaves
have caught

The rarest essence of all human thought!
O happy Poet! by no critic vext!
How must thy listening spirit now
rejoice

To be interpreted by such a voice!

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Or anchorites beneath Engaddi's palms
Pacing the Dead Sea beach,
And singing slow their old Armenian
psalms

In half-articulate speech;
Or caravans, that from Bassora's gate
With westward steps depart;
Or Mecca's pilgrims, confident of Fate,
And resolute in heart;

These have passed over it, or may have passed!

Now in this crystal tower Imprisoned by some curious hand at last,

It counts the passing hour.

And as I gaze, these narrow walls expand;

Before my dreamy eye Stretches the desert with its shifting sand,

Its unimpeded sky.

And borne aloft by the sustaining blast,
This little golden thread

Dilates into a column high and vast,
A form of fear and dread.
And onward, and across the setting sun,
Across the boundless plain,

The column and its broader shadow run,
Till thought pursues in vain.
The vision vanishes! These walls again
Shut out the lurid sun,

Shut out the hot, immeasurable plain;
The half-hour's sand is run!

BIRDS OF PASSAGE.

BLACK shadows fall

From the lindens tall,

That lift aloft their massive wall 'Against the southern sky;

And from the realms

Of the shadowy elms

A tide-like darkness overwhelms
The fields that round us lie.
But the night is fair,

And everywhere

A warm, soft vapour fills the air,
And distant sounds seem near;
And above, in the light

Of the star-lit night,

Swift birds of passage wing their flight Through the dewy atmosphere.

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THE OPEN WINDOW.
THE old house by the lindens
Stood silent in the shade,
And on the gravelled pathway
The light and shadow played.
I saw the nursery windows
Wide open to the air;
But the faces of the children,
They were no longer there.
The large Newfoundland housedog
Was standing by the door;
He looked for his little playmates,
Who would return no more.
They walked not under the lindens,
They played not in the hall;

But shadow, and silence, and sadness,
Were hanging over all.

The birds sang in the branches,

With sweet, familiar tone;
But the voices of the children

Will be heard in dreams alone!
And the boy that walked beside me,
He could not understand
Why closer in mine, ah! closer,

I pressed his warm, soft hand!

PEGASUS IN POUND.
ONCE into a quiet village,
Without haste and without heed,
In the golden prime of morning,
Strayed the poet's winged steed.
It was Autumn, and incessant

Piped the quails from shocks and
sheaves;

And, like living coals, the apples

Burned among the withering leaves.
Loud the clamorous bell was ringing
From its belfry gaunt and grim;
'Twas the daily call to labour,

Not a triumph meant for him.
Not the less he saw the landscape,
In its gleaming vapour veiled;
Not the less he breathed the odours
That the dying leaves exhaled.
Thus, upon the village common,

By the school-boys he was found,
And the wise men, in their wisdom,
Put him straightway into pound.
Then the sombre village crier,

Ringing loud his brazen bell, Wandered down the street proclaiming There was an estray to sell. And the curious country people,

Rich and poor, and young and old, Came in haste to see this wondrous Winged steed, with mane of gold. Thus the day passed, and the evening Fell, with vapours cold and dim; But it brought no food nor shelter, Brought no straw nor stall, for him. Patiently, and still expectant,

Looked he through the wooden bars, Saw the moon rise o'er the landscape, Saw the tranquil, patient stars;

Till at length the bell at midnight
Sounded from its dark abode,
And, from out a neighbouring farmyard,
Loud the cock Alectryon crowed.
Then, with nostrils wide distended,
Breaking from his iron chain,
And unfolding far his pinions,
To those stars he soared again.
On the morrow, when the village
Woke to all its toil and care,
Lo! the strange steed had departed,
And they knew not when nor where.

But they found, upon the greensward Where his struggling hoofs had trod, Pure and bright, a fountain flowing From the hoof-marks in the sod. From that hour, the fount unfailing Gladdens the whole region round, Strengthening all who drink its waters, While it soothes them with its sound.

GASPAR BECERRA. By his evening fire the artist

Pondered o'er his secret shame; Baffled, weary, and disheartened, Still he mused, and dreamed of fame. 'Twas an image of the Virgin

That had tasked his utmost skill; But, alas! his fair ideal

Vanished and escaped him still. From a distant Eastern island

Had the precious wood been brought; Day and night the anxious master At his toil untiring wrought; Till, discouraged and desponding, Sat he now in shadows deep, And the day's humiliation

Found oblivion in sleep.

Then a voice cried, "Rise, O master! From the burning brand of oak Shape the thought that stirs within thee!"

And the startled artist woke,-
Woke, and from the smoking embers
Seized and quenched the glowing
wood;

And therefrom he carved an image,
And he saw that it was good.
O thou sculptor, painter, poet!
Take this lesson to thy heart:
That is best which lieth nearest ;
Shape from that thy work of art.

KING WITLAF'S DRINKING-
HORN.

WITLAF, a king of the Saxons,
Ere yet his last he breathed,
To the merry monks of Croyland

His drinking-horn bequeathed,That, whenever they sat at their revels, And drank from the golden bowl, They might remember the donor,

And breathe a prayer for his soul.

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So sat they once at Christmas,
And bade the goblet pass;
In their beards the red wine glistened
Like dew-drops in the grass.
They drank to the soul of Witlaf,

They drank to Christ the Lord,
And to each of the Twelve Apostles,
Who had preached his holy word.
They drank to the Saints and Martyrs
Of the dismal days of yore,
And as soon as the horn was empty
They remembered one Saint more."
And the reader droned from the pulpit,
Like the murmur of many bees,
The legend of good Saint Guthlac,
And Saint Basil's homilies;

Till the great bells of the convent,
From their prison in the tower,
Guthlac and Bartholomæus,

Proclaimed the midnight hour.

And the Yule-log cracked in the chimney,

And the Abbot bowed his head,
And the flamelets flapped and flickered,
But the Abbot was stark and dead.
Yet still in his pallid fingers

He clutched the golden bowl,
In which, like a pearl dissolving,
Had sunk and dissolved his soul.
But not for this their revels

The jovial monks forbore,

For they cried, "Fill high the goblet! We must drink to one Saint more!"

TEGNER'S DRAPA.

I HEARD a voice that cried,
"Balder the Beautiful
Is dead, is dead!"

And through the misty air
Passed like the mournful cry
Of sunward-sailing cranes.
I saw the pallid corpse
Of the dead sun

Borne through the Northern sky.
Blasts from Niffelheim

Lifted the sheeted mists

Around him as he passed.

And the voice for ever cried, "Balder the Beautiful

Is dead, is dead!"

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And died away

Through the dreary night,
In accents of despair.
Balder the Beautiful
God of the summer sun,
Fairest of all the Gods!
Light from his forehead beamed,
Runes were upon his tongue,
As on the warrior's sword.
All things in earth and air
Bound were by magic spell
Never to do him harm;
Even the plants and stones;
All save the mistletoe,
The sacred mistletoe!
Hoeder, the blind old God,
Whose feet are shod with silence,
Pierced through that gentle breast
With his sharp spear, by fraud
Made of the mistletoe,
The accursed mistletoe!
They laid him in his ship,
With horse and harness,
As on a funeral pyre.
Odin placed

A ring upon his finger,
And whispered in his ear.

They launched the burning ship!
It floated far away
Over the misty sea,

Till like the sun it seemed,
Sinking beneath the waves.
Balder returned no more!
So perish the old Gods!
But out of the sea of Time
Rises a new land of song,
Fairer than the old.
Over its meadows green
Walk the young bards and sing.

Build it again,
O ye bards,

Fairer than before!

Ye fathers of the new race, Feed upon morning dew, Sing the new Song of Love! The law of force is dead! The law of love prevails! Thor, the thunderer,

Shall rule the earth no more, No more, with threats, Challenge the meek Christ.

Sing no more,

O ye bards of the North, Of Vikings and of Jarls! Of the days of Eld Preserve the freedom only, Not the deeds of blood!

THE SINGERS.

GOD sent his singers upon earth
With songs of sadness and of mirth,
That they might touch the hearts of men,
And bring them back to heaven again.
The first, a youth, with soul of fire,
Held in his hand a golden lyre;
Through groves he wandered, and by

streams,

Playing the music of our dreams.

The second, with a bearded face,
Stood singing in the market-place,
And stirred with accents deep and loud
The hearts of all the listening crowd.
A gray, old man, the third and last,
Sang in cathedrals dim and vast,
While the majestic organ rolled
Contrition from its mouths of gold.
And those who heard the Singers three
Disputed which the best might be;
For still their music seemed to start
Discordant echoes in each heart.
But the great Master said, "I see
No best in kind, but in degree;
I gave a various gift to each,

To charm, to strengthen, and to teach. "These are the three great chords of might,

And he whose ear is tuned aright
Will hear no discord in the three
But the most perfect harmony."

SUSPIRIA.

TAKE them, O Death! and bear away
Whatever thou canst call thine own!
Thine image, stamped upon this clay,
Doth give thee that, but that alone!
Take them, O Grave! and let them lie
Folded upon thy narrow shelves
As garments by the soul laid by,
And precious only to ourselves!

Take them, O great Eternity!

Our little life is but a gust,
That bends the branches of thy tree,
And trails its blossoms in the dust.

HYMN

FOR MY BROTHER'S ORDINATION.

CHRIST to the young man said: "Yet
one thing more:

If thou wouldst perfect be,
Sell all thou hast and give it to the poor,
And come and follow me!"
Within this temple Christ again, unseen,
Those sacred words hath said,

And his invisible hands to-day have been
Laid on a young man's head.

And evermore beside him on his way
The unseen Christ shall move,
That he may lean upon his arm and say,
"Dost thou, dear Lord, approve?'
Beside him at the marriage feast shall
be,

To make the scene more fair;
Beside him in the dark Gethsemane
Of pain and midnight prayer.

O holy trust! O endless sense of rest;
Like the beloved John

To lay his head upon the Saviour's
breast,
And thus to journey on!

THE GOLDEN LEGEND.

THE old Legenda Aurea, or Golden Legend, was originally written in Latin, in the thirteenth century, by Jacobus de Voragine, a Dominican friar, who afterwards became Archbishop of Genoa, and died in 1292.

He called his book simply "Legends of the Saints." The epithet of Golden was given it by his admirers; for, as Wynkin de Worde says, " Like as passeth gold in value all other metals, so this Legend exceedeth all other books." But Edward Leigh, in much distress of mind, calls it "a book written by a man of a leaden heart for the basenesse of the errours, that are without wit or reason, and of a brazen forehead, for his impudent boldnesse in reporting things so fabulous and incredible."

This work, the great text-book of the legendary lore of the Middle Ages, was translated into French in the fourteenth century by Jean de Vignay, and in the fifteenth into English by William Caxton. It has lately been made more accessible by a new French translation: La Légende Dorée, traduite du Latin, par M. G. B. Paris, 1850. There is a copy of the original, with the Gesta Longobardorum appended, in the Harvard College Library, Cambridge, printed at Strasburg, 1496. The title-page is wanting; and the volume begins with the Tabula Legendorum. I have called this poem the Golden Legend, because the story upon which it is founded seems to me to surpass all other legends in beauty and significance. It exhibits, amid the corruptions of the Middle Ages, the virtue of disinterestedness and self-sacrifice, and the power of Faith, Hope, and Charity, sufficient for all the exigencies of life and death. The story is told, and perhaps invented, by Hartmann von der Aue, a Minnesinger of the twelfth century. The original may be found in Mailáth's Altdeutsche Gedichte, with a modern German version. is another in Marbach's Volksbücher, No. 32.

There

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