MARIANA IN THE SOUTH.*

BEHIND the barren hill upsprung

With pointed rocks against the light,

The crag sharpshadowed overhung

Each glaring creek and inlet bright. Far, far, one lightblue ridge was seen, Looming like baseless fairyland;

Eastward a slip of burning sand,

Dark-rimmed with sea, and bare of

Down in the dry salt-marshes stood

green.

That house darklatticed. Not a breath

Swayed the sick vineyard underneath,

Or moved the dusty southernwood.

* See Poems, chiefly Lyrical.

"Madonna," with melodious moan

Sang Mariana, night and morn,

"Madonna! lo! I am all alone,

Love-forgotten and love-forlorn."

She, as her carol sadder grew,

From her warm brow and bosom down

Through rosy taper fingers drew

Her streaming curls of deepest brown

On either side, and made appear,

Still-lighted in a secret shrine,

Her melancholy eyes divine, The home of woe without a tear.

"Madonna," with melodious moan

Sang Mariana, night and morn,

"Madonna! lo! I am all alone,

Love-forgotten and love-forlorn."

When the dawncrimson changed, and past

Into deep orange o'er the sea,

Low on her knees herself she cast,

Unto our lady prayed she.

She moved her lips, she prayed alone,

She praying disarrayed and warm From slumber, deep her wavy form In the darklustrous mirror shone.

"Madonna," in a low clear tone

Said Mariana, night and morn,
Low she mourned, "I am all alone,
Love-forgotten, and love-forlorn.”

At noon she slumbered.

All along

The silvery field, the large leaves talked

With one another, as among

The spiked maize in dreams she walked.

The lizard leapt the sunlight played :
She heard the callow nestling lisp,

And brimful meadow-runnels crisp,

In the full-leaved platan-shade.

In sleep she breathed in a lower tone,

Murmuring as at night and morn, "Madonna! lo! I am all alone,

Love-forgotten and love-forlorn."

Dreaming, she knew it was a dream

Most false: he was and was not there.

She woke the babble of the stream

Fell, and without the steady glare

Shrank the sick olive sere and small.
The riverbed was dusty-white;
From the bald rock the blinding light

Beat ever on the sunwhite wall.

She whispered, with a stifled moan More inward than at night or morn, "Madonna, leave me not all alone,

To die forgotten and live forlorn."

One dry cicala's summer song
At night filled all the gallery,

Backward the latticeblind she flung,

And leaned upon the balcony.

Ever the low wave seemed to roll

Up to the coast: far on, alone

In the East, large Hesper overshone

The mourning gulf, and on her soul

Poured divine solace, or the rise

Of moonlight from the margin gleamed,

Volcano-like, afar, and streamed

On her white arm, and heavenward eyes.

Not all alone she made her moan,

Yet ever sang she, night and morn, "Madonna, lo! I am all alone,

Love-forgotten and love-forlorn."