Their low, melodious din ;

I cross my arms on my breast,
And all is peace within.

MAIDEN AND WEATHERCÓCK.

MAIDEN.

O WEATHERCOCK on the village spire,
With your golden feathers all on fire,
Tell me, what can you see from your perch
Above there over the tower of the church?

WEATHERCOCK.

I can see the roofs and the streets below,
And the people moving to and fro,
And beyond, without either roof or street,
The great salt sea, and the fisherman's fleet.

I can see a ship come sailing in
Beyond the headlands and harbor of Lynn,
And a young man standing on the deck,
With a silken kerchief round his neck.

Now he is pressing it to his lips,

And now he is kissing his finger-tips,

And now he is lifting and waving his hand, And blowing the kisses toward the land.

MAIDEN.

Ah, that is the ship from over the sea,
That is bringing my lover back to me,
Bringing my lover so fond and true,

Who does not change with the wind like you.

DECORATION DAY.

WEATHERCOCK.

If I change with all the winds that blow,
It is only because they made me so,
And people would think it wondrous strange,
If I, a Weathercock, should not change.

O pretty Maiden, so fine and fair,

With your dreamy eyes and your golden hair,
When you and your lover meet to-day
You will thank me for looking some other way.

15

DECORATION DAY.

SLEEP, comrades, sleep and rest

On this Field of the Grounded Arms,
Where foes no more molest,

Nor sentry's shot alarms!

Ye have slept on the ground before,
And started to your feet

At the cannon's sudden roar,

Or the drum's redoubling beat.

But in this camp of Death

No sound your slumber breaks;
Here is no fevered breath,

No wound that bleeds and aches.

All is repose and peace,
Untrampled lies the sod;
The shouts of battle cease,

It is the Truce of God!1

1 Early in the eleventh century, when war had brought great misery, and bad harvests had added to the desolation, the church

Rest, comrades, rest and sleep!

The thoughts of men shall be
As sentinels to keep

Your rest from danger free.

Your silent tents of green

We deck with fragrant flowers; Yours has the suffering been, memory shall be ours.

The

HYMN OF THE MORAVIAN NUNS OF BETH

LEHEM.

AT THE CONSECRATION OF PULASKI'S BANNER.1

WHEN the dying flame of day
Through the chancel shot its ray,
Far the glimmering tapers shed
Faint light on the cowled head;
And the censer burning swung,
Where, before the altar, hung
The crimson banner, that with prayer

Had been consecrated there.

And the nuns' sweet hymn was heard the while,
Sung low, in the dim, mysterious aisle.

proclaimed the Truce of God, by which it was forbidden to wage war on any private account between Wednesday night and Monday morning of each week during the whole of Advent, and from the Monday before Ash-Wednesday till Whit-Sunday, as also on all holidays and festivals.

1 It is said that the Polish Count Pulaski, who served in our army in the Revolution, visited Lafayette when he lay sick at Bethlehem, in Pennsylvania, and ordered a silk banner of the Moravian sisterhood there, who helped to support their house by needlework.

HYMN OF THE MORAVIAN NUNS.

17

"Take thy banner! May it wave
Proudly o'er the good and brave;
When the battle's distant wail
Breaks the sabbath of our vale,
When the clarion's music thrills
To the hearts of these lone hills,
When the spear in conflict shakes,
And the strong lance shivering breaks.

"Take thy banner! and, beneath
The battle-cloud's encircling wreath,
Guard it, till our homes are free!
Guard it! God will prosper thee!
In the dark and trying hour,
In the breaking forth of power,
In the rush of steeds and men,
His right hand will shield thee then.

"Take thy banner! But when night
Closes round the ghastly fight,
If the vanquished warrior bow,
Spare him! By our holy vow,
By our prayers and many tears,
By the mercy that endears,

Spare him! he our love hath shared !
Spare him as thou wouldst be spared!

"Take thy banner! and if e'er

Thou shouldst press the soldier's bier,
And the muffled drum should beat
To the tread of mournful feet,
Then this crimson flag shall be
Martial cloak and shroud for thee."

The warrior took that banner proud,

And it was his martial cloak and shroud! 1

THE PHANTOM SHIP.

IN Mather's Magnalia Christi,2
Of the old colonial time,

May be found in prose the legend
That is here set down in rhyme.

A ship sailed from New Haven,
And the keen and frosty airs,
That filled her sails at parting,

Were heavy with good men's prayers.

"O Lord! if it be thy pleasure"
Thus prayed the old divine-
"To bury our friends in the ocean,
Take them, for they are thine!"

1 Pulaski was wounded at the siege of Savannah, and, dying on one of the vessels of the fleet on his way north, was buried at sea. As a matter of historic fact, the banner is preserved in the cabinet of the Maryland Historical Society, at Baltimore. Its size, twenty inches square, would have precluded its use as a shroud.

2 The whole title of the book is Magnalia Christi Americana [Christ's mighty works in America]; or, The Ecclesiastical History of New England, from its first Planting, in the year 1620, unto the year of our Lord 1698. It was first published in 1702. The story of the phantom ship is contained in it in the form of a letter from James Pierpont, a New Haven Minister. The letter occurs in Book I., chapter vi., and may also be found in The Bodleys Afoot, page 175.