Worn with speed is my good steed, And I march me hurried, worried; Onward, caballito mio, With the white star in thy forehead! Onward, for here comes the Ronda, And I hear their rifles crack! Ay, jaléo! Ay, ay, jaléo ! Ay, jaléo! They cross our track. (Song dies away. Enter PRECIOSA, on horseback, attended by VICTORIAN, HYPOLITO, DON CARLOS, and CHISPA, on foot and armed.) Vict. This is the highest point. Here let us rest. Chispa. I have a father, too, but he is a dead one. Alas and alack-a-day! Poor was I born, and poor do I remain. I neither win nor lose. Thus I wag through the world, half the time on foot, and the other half walking; and always as merry as a thunder-storm in the night. And so we plough along, as the fly said to the ox. Who knows what may happen? Patience, and shuffle the cards! I am not yet so bald that you can see my brains; and perhaps, after all, I shall some day go to Rome, and come back Saint Peter. Benedicite! [Exit. (A pause. Then enter BARTOLOMÉ wildly, as if in pursuit, with a carbine in his hand.) Bart. They passed this way! I hear their horses' hoofs ! Yonder I see them! Come, sweet caramillo, This serenade shall be the Gipsy's last! (Fires down the pass.) Ha ha! Well whistled, my sweet caramillo ! Well whistled!-I have missed her!Oh, my God! (The shot is returned. BARTOLOMÉ falls.) 97 SONGS. SEA-WEED. WHEN descends on the Atlantic Storm-wind of the equinox, The toiling surges, Laden with sea-weed from the rocks: In some far-off, bright Azore; Surges of San Salvador; From the tumbling surf, that buries On the desolate, rainy seas;- Currents of the restless main; Till in sheltered coves, and reaches All have found repose again. So when storms of wild emotion Strike the ocean Of the poet's soul, ere long In its vastness, Floats some fragment of a song: With the golden fruit of Truth; In the tropic clime of Youth; Wrestle with the tides of Fate; Floating waste and desolate ;- Currents of the restless heart; Household words, no more depart. THE DAY IS DONE. THE day is done, and the darkness I see the lights of the village Gleam through the rain and the mist, And a feeling of sadness comes o'er me, That my soul cannot resist: A feeling of sadness and longing, As the mist resembles the rain. Some simple and heartfelt lay, That shall soothe this restless feeling, And banish the thoughts of day. Not from the grand old masters, Not from the bards sublime, Whose distant footsteps echo Through the corridors of Time. For, like strains of martial music, Their mighty thoughts suggest Life's endless toil and endeavour; And to-night I long for rest. Read from some humbler poet, Whose songs gushed from his heart, As showers from the clouds of summer, Or tears from the eyelids start; Who, through long days of labour, And nights devoid of ease, Still heard in his soul the music Of wonderful melodies. Such songs have power to quiet And come like the benediction Then read from the treasured volume And lend to the rhyme of the poet And the night shall be filled with music, H AFTERNOON IN FEBRUARY. THE day is ending, The river dead. Through clouds like ashes, The snow recommences: The road o'er the plain, A funeral train. Like a funeral bell. TO AN OLD DANISH SONG BOOK. WELCOME, my old friend, Welcome to a foreign fireside, While the sullen gales of autumn The ungrateful world Has, it seems, dealt harshly with thee, Since, beneath the skies of Denmark, First I met thee. There are marks of age, There are thumb-marks on thy margin, Made by hands that clasped thee rudely At the alehouse. Soiled and dull thou art; Yellow are thy time-worn pages, Thou art stained with wine Yet dost thou recall Days departed, half-forgotten, When I paused to hear The old ballad of King Christian Thou recallest bards, Who, in solitary chambers, Thou recallest homes Where thy songs of love and friendship Made the gloomy Northern winter Bright as summer. Once some ancient Scald, In his bleak, ancestral Iceland, Once in Elsinore, At the court of old King Hamlet, Once Prince Frederick's Guard Sang them in their smoky barracks ;— Suddenly the English cannon Joined the chorus! Peasants in the field, Sailors on the roaring ocean, Students, tradesmen, pale mechanics, All have sung them. Thou hast been their friend; They, alas! have left thee friendless! And, as swallows build In these wide, old-fashioned chimneys, Quiet, close, and warm, WALTER VON DER VOGELWEID. [WALTER VON DER VOGELWEID, or BIRD-MEADOW, was one of the principal Minnesingers of the thirteenth century. He triumphed over Heinrich von Ofterdingen in that poetic contest at Wartburg Castle, known in literary history as the War of Wartburg.] VOGELWEID the Minnesinger, When he left this world of ours, Laid his body in the cloister, Under Würtzburg's minster towers. And he gave the monks his treasures, Gave them all with this behest: They should feed the birds at noontide Daily on his place of rest; Saying, "From these wandering minstrels I have learned the art of song; Let me now repay the lessons They have taught so well and long." Thus the bard of love departed; And, fulfilling his desire, On his tomb the birds were feasted By the children of the choir. Day by day, o'er tower and turret, In foul weather and in fair, Day by day, in vaster numbers, Flocked the poets of the air. On the tree whose heavy branches Overshadowed all the place, On the pavement, on the tombstone, On the poet's sculptured face, On the cross-bars of each window, On the lintel of each door, They renewed the War of Wartburg, Which the bard had fought before. There they sang their merry carols, Sang their lauds on every side; And the name their voices uttered Was the name of Vogelweid. Till at length the portly abbot Murmured, "Why this waste of food? Be it changed to loaves henceforward For our fasting brotherhood." Then in vain o'er tower and turret, From the walls and woodland nests, When the minster bell rang noontide, Gathered the unwelcome guests. 99 Then in vain, with cries discordant, Clamorous round the Gothic spire, Screamed the feathered Minnesingers For the children of the choir. Time has long effaced the inscriptions On the cloister's funeral stones, And tradition only tells us Where repose the poet's bones. But around the vast cathedral, By sweet echoes multiplied, Still the birds repeat the legend, And the name of Vogelweid. DRINKING SONG. INSCRIPTION FOR AN ANTIQUE COME, old friend! sit down and listen! Led by his inebriate Satyrs; And possessing youth eternal. Round about him, fair Bacchantes, Bearing cymbals, flutes, and thyrses, Wild from Naxian groves, or Zante's Vineyards sing delirious verses. Thus he won, through all the nations, Bloodless victories, and the farmer Bore, as trophies and oblations, Vines for banners, ploughs for armour. Judged by no o'erzealous rigour, Much this mystic throng expresses: Bacchus was the type of vigour, And Silenus of excesses. Point the rods of fortune-tellers; Youth perpetual dwells in fountains,Not in flasks, and casks and cellars. Claudius, though he sang of flagons And huge tankards filled with Rhenish, |