Back to the camp behold us throng,
Flags stream and bugles play-
Woman and child with choral song,

And men, with dance and wine, prolong
The warrior's holiday.

And our old Count, and what doth he?
Before him lies his son !

Alone within his tent sits he,
And from his eyes falls silently

One tear-that mourns his son.

And therefore ever sworn to stand
By that great Count we are!
His might is in itself a band-
The thunder rests in his right hand;
He is the Suabian's star.

heed,

And therefore mark, and take ye
Ye braggarts South and North!
For men and warriors, good at need,

WITH this ballad conclude all in the First Period, or Early Poems, which Schiller himself thought worth preserving, and which are retained in the best editions of his collected works-except the "Sketch of Semele," which ought to be classed among his dramatic compositions.

FAREWELL TO THE READER.

(Transferred from the Third Period.)

I.

THE Muse is silent with a virgin cheek,

Bow'd with the blush of shame, she ventures near; She waits the judgment that thy lips may speak, And feels the deference, but disowns the fear— Such praise as Virtue gives 'tis hers to seek,

Bright Truth, not tinsel Folly to revere ; And he alone her crowning flowers should cull Whose heart with hers beats for the Beautiful.

II.

Not longer yet these lays of mine would live
Than to one genial breast not idly stealing,
There some sweet dreams and fancies fair to give,
And some still whispers of a loftier feeling.

Not for the far Posterity they strive,

Doom'd with the time whose shades they are revealing,

Born to record the moment's smile or sigh,

And with the light dance of the hours to fly.

III.

Spring wakes, and Life in all its youngest hues
Shoots through the mellowing meads delightedly :
Air the fresh herbage scents with nectar-dews,
Livelier the choral music fills the sky :
Youth grows more young, and Age itself renews,
In that Field-Banquet of the ear and eye :
Spring flies, and with it all the train it leads;
And flowers, in fading, leave us but their seeds.

THE END.

PRINTED BY WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, EDINBURGH.