Edward Everett.

ALARIC

THE

VISIGOTH.

(ALARIC stormed and spoiled the city of Rome, and was afterwards buried in the channel of the river Busentius, the water of which had been diverted from its course that the body might be interred.)

WHEN I am dead, no pageant train

WHEN

Shall waste their sorrows at my bier,
Nor worthless pomp of homage vain

Stain it with hypocritic tear;

For I will die as I did live,
Nor take the boon I cannot give.

Ye shall not raise a marble bust

Upon the spot where I repose;
Ye shall not fawn before my dust,

In hollow circumstance of woes;
Nor sculptured clay, with lying breath,
Insult the clay that moulds beneath.

Ye shall not pile, with servile toil,
Your monuments upon my breast,
Nor yet within the common soil

Lay down the wreck of power to rest,
Where man can boast that he has trod
On him that was "the Scourge of GOD!"

But ye the mountain-stream shall turn,
And lay its secret channel bare,
And hollow, for your sovereign's urn,
A resting-place forever there:

Then bid its everlasting springs
Flow back upon the king of kings;
And never be the secret said,
Until the Deep give up his dead.

My gold and silver ye shall fling

Back to the clods that gave them birth; The captured crowns of many a king, The ransom of a conquered earth: For, e'en though dead, will I control The trophies of the Capitol.

But when, beneath the mountain-tide,
Ye've laid your monarch down to rot,
Ye shall not rear upon its side

Pillar or mound to mark the spot;
For long enough the world has shook
Beneath the terrors of
my look ;

And, now that I have run my race,
The astonished realms shall rest a space.

My course was like a river deep,

And from the Northern hills I burst, Across the world in wrath to sweep,

And where I went the spot was cursed;
Nor blade of grass again was seen
Where Alaric and his hosts had been.

See how their haughty barriers fail
Beneath the terror of the Goth!
Their iron-breasted legions quail

Before my ruthless sabaoth;
And low the queen of empires kneels,
And grovels at my chariot-wheels.

Not for myself did I ascend

In judgment my triumphal car; 'Twas God alone on high did send

The avenging Scythian to the war-
To shake abroad, with iron hand,
The appointed scourge of His command.

With iron hand that scourge I reared
O'er guilty king and guilty realm;
Destruction was the ship I steered,

And Vengeance sat upon the helm,
When, launched in fury on the flood,
I ploughed my way through seas of blood,
And, in the stream their hearts had spilt,
Washed out the long arrears of guilt.

Across the everlasting Alp

I poured the torrent of my powers, And feeble Cæsars shrieked for help, In vain, within their seven-hilled towers; I quenched in blood the brightest gem That glittered in their diadem, And struck a darker, deeper die In the purple of their majesty,And bade my Northern banners shine Upon the conquered Palatine!

My course is run, my errand done;

I go to Him from whom I came;

But never yet shall set the sun

Of glory that adorns my name;

And Roman hearts shall long be sick,
When men shall think of Alaric.

My course is run, my errand done;
But darker ministers of Fate,
Impatient, round the Eternal Throne,
And in the caves of Vengeance, wait;
And soon mankind shall blench away
Before the name of Attila !

THE

ON

N its downy wing, the snow,
Hovering, flieth to and fro—
And the merry schoolboy's shout,
Rich with joy, is ringing out;
So we gather, in our glee,
To the snow-drifts-Chickadee !

Poets sing in measures bold
Of the glorious gods of old,
And the nectar that they quaffed,
When their jewelled goblets laughed;
But the snow-cups best love we,
Gemmed with sunbeams-Chickadee !

They who choose, abroad may go,
Where the Southern waters flow,

And the flowers are never sere
In the garland of the year;

But we love the breezes free
Of our North-land-Chickadee !

To the cottage yard we fly,

With its old trees waving high-
And the little ones peep out,
Just to know what we're about;
For they dearly love to see
Birds in winter-Chickadee !

Every little feathered form
Has a nest of mosses warm;
There our heavenly Father's eye
Looketh on us from the sky;
And He knoweth where we be-
And He heareth-Chickadee !

There we sit the whole night long,
Dreaming that a spirit-song
Whispereth in the silent snow;
For it has a voice we know,
And it weaves our drapery,
Soft as ermine-Chickadee !

All the strong winds, as they fly,
Rock us with their lullaby-
Rock us till the shadowy Night
Spreads her downy wings in flight:
Then we hasten, fresh and free,
To the snow-fields-Chickadee !

Where our harvest sparkles bright
In the pleasant morning light,
Every little feathery flake

Will a choice confection make

Each globule a nectary be,

And we'll drain it-Chickadee !