THE LADDER OF ST. AUGUSTINE. SAINT AUGUSTINE! well hast thou said, Beneath our feet each deed of shame! All common things, each day's events, The low desire, the base design, That makes another's virtues less; The revel of the ruddy wine, And all occasions of excess; The longing for ignoble things; The strife for triumph more than truth; ~ The hardening of the heart, that brings Irreverence for the dreams of youth; All thoughts of ill; all evil deeds, That have their root in thoughts of ill; Whatever hinders or impedes The action of the nobler will;— All these must first be trampled down We have not wings, we cannot soar; That wedge-like cleave the desert airs, The distant mountains, that uprear The heights by great men reached and kept Standing on what too long we bore Nor deem the irrevocable Past, THE PHANTOM SHIP. IN Mather's Magnalia Christi, May be found in prose the legend A ship sailed from New Haven, Were heavy with good men's prayers. "O Lord! if it be thy pleasure And the ships that came from England, Nor of Master Lamberton. This put the people to praying That the Lord would let them hear What in his greater wisdom He had done with friends so dear. And at last their prayers were answered:It was in the month of June, An hour before the sunset Of a windy afternoon, When, steadily steering landward, . A ship was seen below, And they knew it was Lamberton, Master, On she came, with a cloud of canvas, Then fell her straining topmasts, And the masts, with all their rigging, And the hulk dilated and vanished, And the people who saw this marvel Each said unto his friend, That this was the mould of their vessel, And thus her tragic end. And the pastor of the village Gave thanks to God in prayer, That, to quiet their troubled spirits, He had sent this Ship of Air. G THE WARDEN OF THE CINQUE PORTS. A MIST was driving down the British Channel, And through the window-panes, on floor and panel, It glanced on flowing flag and rippling pennon, And, from the frowning rampart, the black cannon Sandwich and Romney, Hastings, Hithe, and Dover To see the French war-steamers speeding over, Sullen and silent, and like couchant lions, Holding their breath, had watched, in grim defiance, And now they roared at drum-beat from their stations Each answering each, with morning salutations, And down the coast, all taking up the burden, As if to summon from his sleep the Warden |