In lordly hall, in rustic bower,
In every clime, in every tongue,
Howe'er its sweet vibration rung.
In whispers low, in poets' lays,
There lives not one who has not hung
Enraptured on the voice of praise.
The timid child, at that soft voice,
Lifts, for a moment's space, the eye;
It bids the fluttering heart rejoice,
And stays the step prepared to fly :
'Tis pleasure breathes that short, quick sigh,
And flushes o'er that rosy face;
Whilst shame and infant modesty
Shrink back with hesitating grace.
The hero, when a people's voice
Proclaims their darling victor near,
Feels he not then his soul rejoice,
Their shouts of love, of praise to hear?
Yes! fame to generous minds is dear ;—
It pierces to their inmost core;
He weeps, who never shed a tear,
He trembles, who ne'er shook before.
The sun is careering in glory and might,
'Mid the deep blue sky and the cloudlets white;
The bright wave is tossing its foam on high,
And the summer breezes go lightly by;
The air and the water dance, glitter, and play,
And why should not I be as merry as they?
The linnet is singing the wild wood through:
The fawn's bounding footstep skims over the dew:
The butterfly flits round the flowering tree,
And the cowslip and blue-bell are bent by the bee;
All the creatures that dwell in the forest are gay,
And why should not I be as merry as they?
CCCXV. WILLIAM KNOX, 1789-1825.
The sun of the morning looked forth from his throne,
And beamed on the face of the dead and the dying:
For the yell of the strife like the thunder had flown,
And red on Gilboa the carnage was lying.
And there lay the husband that lately was pressed
To the beautiful cheek that was tearless and ruddy— Now the claws of the vulture were fixed in his breast, And the beak of the vulture was busy and bloody. And there lay the son of the widowed and sad,
Who yesterday went from her dwelling for ever—
Now the wolf of the hills a sweet carnival had
On the delicate limb that had ceased not to quiver.
And there came the daughter, the desolate child,
To hold up the head that was breathless and hoary;
And there came the maiden, all frantic and wild,
To kiss the loved lips that were gasping and gory.
And there came the consort, that struggled in vain
To stem the red tide of a spouse that bereft her;
And there came the mother, that sunk 'mid the slain,
To weep o'er the last human stay that was left her.
O bloody Gilboa! a curse ever lie
[together!
Where the king and his people were slaughtered
May the dew and the rain leave thy herbage to die,
Thy flocks to decay, and thy forests to wither!
CCCXVI. THOMAS PRINGLE, 1789-1834.
'Twas noontide; and breathless beneath the hot ray
The far winding vales of the wilderness lay;
By the Koonap's lone brink, with the cool shadow o'er me,
I slept and a dream spread its visions before me.
Methought, among scenes which I loved when a boy,
I was walking again with fresh feelings of joy;
For my soul, like the landscape, seemed softened and
changed
From what it was once-when, in childhood, I ranged
Through Cheviot's valleys, to pluck the bright flowers,
Or chase, with young rapture, the birds through the
bowers.
On my dreaming ear waters were murmuring still,
But the wild foreign river had shrunk to a rill;
And Kaha's dark mountains had melted away;
And the brown thorny desert, where antelopes stray:
Had become a sweet glen, where the young lambs were
racing
And yellow-haired children the butterflies chasing;
And the meadows were gemmed with the primrose and
And the ferny braes fringed with the hazel and rowan;
The foxglove looked out from the osiers dank,
And the wild-thyme and violet breathed from the bank.
With the lowing of herds from the broom-blossomed lea;
The cuckoo's soft note from the old beechen-tree;
The waving of woods in the health-breathing gale;
The dash of the mill-wheel afar down the dale;-
All these were around me: and with them there came
Sweet voices that called me aloud by my name,-
And looks of affection with innocent eyes,—
And light-hearted laughter, and shrill joyous cries:
And I saw the mild features of all that were there,
Unaltered by years, and unclouded by care!
CCCXVII. JOHN PRINGLE,
THE LITTLE BIRD.
Come, tell me now, sweet little bird,
Who decked thy wings with gold?
Who fashioned so thy tiny form,
And bade thy wings unfold?
Who taught thee such enchanting power,
To soothe this aching heart;
And, with thy note of harmony,
To mock the reach of art ?
Thou fly'st away! who bade thee soar?
Who bade thee seek the sky,
And wander through yon silver cloud,
A speck to mortal eye?
Oh, had I but thy wings, sweet bird!
I'd mount where angels be,
And leave behind this world of sin,
A little thing like thee;
I'd mount where golden harps proclaim
Emmanuel's dying love,
And gladly hail th' eternal rest
Of that pure realm above.
CCCXVIII. WOLFE, 1791-1823.
THE BURIAL OF SIR J. MOORE.
Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning;
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.
No useless coffin enclosed his breast,
Not in sheet nor in shroud we bound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,
With his martial cloak around him.
Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.
We thought as we hollowed his narrow bed,
And smoothed down his lonely pillow,
That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head,
And we far away on the billow!
Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,—
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.
But half our heavy task was done,
When the clock struck the hour for retiring; And we heard the distant and random gun That the foe was sullenly firing.
Slowly and sadly we laid him down,
From the field of his fame fresh and gory;
We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone-
But we left him alone with his glory.
CCCXIX. H. HART MILMAN, 1791
1 PASSAGE OF THE RED SEA.
On the margin of the flood
With lifted rod the prophet stood;
And the summoned east wind blew,
And aside it sternly threw
The gathered waves that took their stand,
Like crystal rocks, on either hand,
Or walls of sea-green marble piled
Round some irregular city wild.
Then the light of morning lay
On the wonder-paved way,
Where the treasures of the deep
In their caves of coral sleep.
The profound abysses, where
Was never sound from upper air,
Rang with Israel's chanted words,
King of kings and Lord of lords!
Then with bow and banner glancing,
On exulting Egypt came,
With her chosen horsemen prancing,
And her cars on wheels of flame,
In a rich and boastful ring
All around her furious king.
With a quick and sudden swell
Prone the liquid ramparts fell;
Over horse, and over car,
Over every man of war,
Over Pharoah's crown of gold,
The loud thundering billows rolled.
As the level waters spread,
Down they sank, they sank like lead,
Down without a cry or groan,
And the morning sun that shone
On myriads of bright-armed men,
Its meridian radiance then
Cast on a wide sea, heaving as of yore,
Against a silent, solitary shore.
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