Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream, And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, III. The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes, Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, When the morning star shines dead. As on the jag of a mountain crag, Which an earthquake rocks and swings, An eagle alit one moment may sit In the light of its golden wings. And when sunset may breathe, from the lit sea beneath Its ardors of rest and of love, And the crimson pall of eve may fall From the depth of heaven above, With wings folded I rest, on mine airy nest, As still as a brooding dove. IV. That orbed maiden, with white fire laden, Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor, May have broken the woof of my tent's thin roof, And I laugh to see them whirl and flee, Like a swarm of golden bees, When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent, Are each paved with the moon and these. V. I bind the sun's throne with the burning zone, Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof, The mountains its columns be. The triumphal arch through which I march, When the powers of the air are chained to my chair, The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove, While the moist earth was laughing below. VI. I am the daughter of earth and water, And the nursling of the sky : I pass through the pores of the ocean and shores; For after the rain, when with never a stain The pavilion of heaven is bare, And the winds and sunbeams, with their convex gleams, Build up the blue dome of air, I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, And out of the caverns of rain, Like a child from the womb, like a ghost from the tomb, I arise and unbuild it again. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.1 1 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY, born in 1792, was the son of Sir Timothy Shelley, and of ancient family. He was educated at Eton and went thence to University College, Oxford, whence he was expelled in 1811 for publishing a tract entitled A Defence Atheism. He then wrote his first important poem, Queen PRO PATRIA MORI. WHEN he who adores thee has left but the name O! say, Yes, weep, and however my foes may condemn, For, Heaven can witness, though guilty to them, With thee were the dreams of my earliest love; In my last humble prayer to the Spirit above O blest are the lovers and friends who shall live But the next dearest blessing that Heaven can give Is the pride of thus dying for thee. THOMAS Moore. Mab, and not long after married Miss Harriet Westbrooke. This marriage proved very unhappy, and Shelley and his wife soon separated. In 1816 Mrs. Shelley committed suicide, and Shelley then married Mary, the daughter of the celebrated William Godwin and his hardly less celebrated wife, Mary Wollstonecraft. This second marriage was a happy one. Shelley went to Italy, where he passed the rest of his life supported by an allowance from his father, and where he was constantly in the society of Lord Byron. In July, 1822, when he was out sailing, a squall came up, the boat capsized, and Shelley and his companions were drowned. His writings are almost wholly in verse, and many of his poems are of the most perfect and finished beauty. His mind, however, was morbid almost to the verge of disease and this gives a peculiar tone to all his poetry. I'HE LANDING OF THE PILGRIM FATHERS THE breaking waves dashed high On a stern and rock-bound coast, And the heavy night hung dark The hills and waters o'er, When a band of exiles moored their bark Not as the conqueror comes, They, the true-hearted, came, They shook the depths of the desert gloom With their hymns of lofty cheer. Amidst the storm they sang, And the stars heard, and the sea! And the sounding aisles of the dim woods rang To the anthem of the free! The ocean-eagle soared From his nest by the white wave's foam, Why had they come to wither there Away from their childhood's land? There was woman's fearless eye, Lit by her deep love's truth; There was manhood's brow, serenely high, And the fiery heart of youth. What sought they thus afar? The wealth of seas, the spoils of war? Ay, call it holy ground, The soil where first they trod ! They have left unstained what there they found Freedom to worship God! FELICIA HEMANS. TO THE MEMORY OF EDWARD THE BLACK PRINCE. O FOR the voice of that wild horn, The dying hero's call, That told imperial Charlemagne, Sad over earth and ocean sounding, |