And all the great traditions of the Past

They saw reflected in the coming time.

And thus for ever with reverted look

The mystic volume of the world they read, Spelling it backward, like a Hebrew book,

Till life became a Legend of the Dead.

But ah! what once has been shall be no more!

The groaning earth in travail and in pain Brings forth its races, but does not restore,

And the dead nations never rise again.

OLIVER BASSELIN.

In the Valley of the Vire

Still is seen an ancient mill, With its gables quaint and queer,

And beneath the window-sill,

On the stone,

These words alone:

« Oliver Basselin lived here."

Far above it, on the steep,

Ruined stands the old Château; Nothing but the donjon-keep

Left for shelter or for show.

Its vacant eyes

Stare at the skies, Stare at the valley green and deep.

Once a convent, old and brown,

Looked, but ah! it looks no more, From the neighboring hillside down On the rushing and the roar

Of the stream

Whose sunny gleam

Cheers the little Norman town.

In that darksome mill of stone,

To the water's dash and din,
Careless, humble, and unknown,
Sang the poet Basselin

Songs that fill
That ancient mill

With a splendor of its own.

Never feeling of unrest.

Broke the pleasant dream he dreamed ;
Only made to be his nest,
All the lovely valley seemed ;

No desire

Of soaring higher
Stirred or fluttered in his breast.

True, his songs were not divine;

Were not songs of that high art,
Which, as winds do in the pine,
Find an answer in each heart;

But the mirth

Of this green earth
Laughed and revelled in his line.

From the alehouse and the inn,

Opening on the narrow street,
Came the loud, convivial din,

Singing and applause of feet,

The laughing lays

That in those days Sang the poet Basselin.

In the castle, cased in steel,

Knights, who fought at Agincourt, Watched and waited, spur on heel; But the poet sang for sport

Songs that rang

Another clang, Songs that lowlier hearts could feel.

In the convent, clad in gray,

Sat the monks in lonely cells,
Paced the cloisters, knelt to pray,
And the poet heard their bells ;

But his rhymes
Found other chimes,

Nearer to the earth than they.