Ask me no more: the moon may draw the sea;
The cloud may stoop from heaven and take the shape,
With fold to fold, of mountain and of cape;
But, O too fond, when have I answered thee?
Ask me no more.

Ask me no more: what answer could I give?
I love not hollow cheek or faded eye:

Yet, O my friend, I will not have thee die!
Ask me no more, lest I should bid thee live;
Ask me no more.

Ask me no more: thy fate and mine are sealed
I strove against the stream, and all in vain :
Let the great river take me to the main:
No more, dear love, for at a touch I yield;
Ask me no more.

ALFRED TENNYSON.

:

ANNABEL LEE.

It was many and many a year ago,

In a kingdom by the sea;

That a maiden lived, whom you may know

By the name of Annabel Lee;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought, Than to love, and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child

In this kingdom by the sea;

But we loved with a love that was more than love, I and my Annabel Lee

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven Coveted her and me.

And this was the reason that, long ago,
In this kingdom by the sea,

A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling,
My beautiful Annabel Lee;

So that her high-born kinsman came,
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulchre
In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,

Went envying her and me.

Yes! that was the reason (as all men know)

In this kingdom by the sea,

That the wind came out of the cloud by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love
Of those who were older than we,
Of many far wiser than we;

And neither the angels in heaven above,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever dissever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee,

And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.

And so, all the night-tide I lie down by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life, and my bride,
In her sepulchre there by the sea,

In her tomb by the sounding sea.

EDGAR A. POE.

BERTHA.

THE leaves have fallen from the trees; For under them grew the buds of May, And such is Nature's constant way;

Let us accept the work of her hand. Still, if the winds sweep bare the height, Something is left for hearts' delight,

Let us but know and understand.

Bertha looked down from the rocky cliff, Whose feet the tender foam-wreaths kist, Toward the outer circle of mist

That hedged the old and wonderful sea. Below her, as if with endless hope, Up the beach's marbled slope, The waters clomb eternally.

Many a long-bleached sail in sight Hovered awhile, then flitted away, Beyond the opening of the bay;

Fair Bertha entered her cottage late, 'He does not come,' she said, and smiled, 'But the shore is dark and the sea is wild,

And, dearest father, we still must wait.'

She hastened to her inner room,

And silently mused there alone;

'Three springs have come, three winters gone,

And still we wait from hour to hour; But earth waits long for her harvest-time, And the aloe, in the northern clime,

Waits an hundred years for its flower.

'Under the apple-boughs as I sit In May-time, when the robin's song Thrills the odorous winds along,

The innermost heaven seems to ope;
I think, though the old joys pass from sight,
Still something is left for hearts' delight,
For life is endless, and so is hope.

‹ If the aloe waits an hundred years, And God's times are so long indeed For simple things, as flower and weed,

That gather only the light and gloom, For what great treasures of joy and dole, Of life and death, perchance, must the soul, Ere it flower in heavenly peace, find room?

I see that all things wait in trust, As feeling afar God's distant ends, And unto every creature he sends

That measure of good that fills its scope; The marmot enters the stiffening mould, And the worm its dark sepulchral fold,

To hide there with its beautiful hope.'