The Classic and the Beautiful from the Literature of Three Thousand Years

No more I'll guard my sisters now-how | Hark! how the surges o'erleap the deck ! dear to me they are!Hark! how the pitiless tempest raves!

But let them trust that Brother's arm "that Ah! daylight will look upon many a wreck sticketh closer" far:

He'll guard them safe through every snare,

in danger still defend;

It would be dreadful, oh, father, to miss them. at the end!

And my loved mother, she shall miss her own, her darling, boy;

I know I've been her pride through life, her true and heartfelt joy;

But she must come with her loved one eter

nal years to spend ;

Drifting over the desert waves.

Yet courage, brothers: we trust the wave,
With God above us our guiding-chart;
So, whether to harbor or ocean-grave,
Be it still with a cheery heart.

BAYARD TAYLOR.

BUILD ON HIGH GROUND.

BESIDES, the sportive brook for ever

shakes

It would be dreadful, oh, father, to miss her The trembling air; that floats from hill to

at the end!

MARGARET L. CARSON.

STORM SONG.

hill,

From vale to mountain, with incessant change
Of purest element, refreshing still

Your airy seat and uninfected gods.

THE clouds are scudding across the moon, Chiefly for this I praise the man who builds

A misty light is on the sea,

The wind in the shrouds has a wintry tune,
And the foam is flying free.

Brothers, a night of terror and gloom

Speaks in the cloud and gathering roar; Thank God, he has given us broad sea-room, A thousand miles from shore!

High on the breezy ridge whose lofty sides
Th' ethereal deep with endless billows chafes:
His
purer mansion nor contagious years
Shall reach, nor deadly putrid airs annoy.

JOHN ARMSTRONG.

FANCY'S PICTURE OF WAR.

Down with the hatches on those who sleep: FEEL, I feel, with sudden heat,

The wind and whistling deck have we; Good watch, my brothers, to-night we'll keep,

While the tempest is on the sea.

Though the rigging shriek in his terrible grip
And the naked spars be snapped away,
Lashed to the helm, we'll drive our ship

In the teeth of the whelming spray.

My big tumultuous bosom beat;
The trumpet's clangors pierce mine ear,
A thousand widows' shrieks I hear;
"Give me another horse," I cry :
Lo! the base Gallic squadrons fly.
Whence is this rage? What spirit, say,
To battle hurries me away?
'Tis Fancy in her fiery car
Transports me to the thickest war,

There whirls me o'er the hills of slain,
Where Tumult and Destruction reign-
Where, mad with pain, the wounded steed
Tramples the dying and the dead;
Where giant Terror stalks around,
With sullen joy surveys the ground,
And, pointing to the ensanguined field,
Shakes his dreadful Gorgon shield.

JOSEPH WARTON.

THE LEARNED LOVERS.

ATE heard her prayer: a lover came Who felt, like her, th' innoxious flameOne who had trod, as well as she,

The flowery paths of poesy;

Had warmed himself with Milton's heat,
Could every line of Pope repeat,
Or chant in Shenstone's tender strains
"The lover's hopes," "the lover's pains."
Attentive to the charmer's tongue,
With him she thought no evening long;
With him she sauntered half the day,
And sometimes, in a laughing way,

They gave me first ane thing they call citan- | To thy protecting shade she runs,
dum;

Within aucht days I gat but libellandum;
Within ane month I gat ad opponendum;
In ane half year I gat inter loquendum;
An syne I gat-how call ye it?-ad repli-
candum;

But I could never ane word yet understand

him.

An then they gart me cast out mony placks,
An gart me pay for four and twenty acts;
But or they came half gate to concludendum,
The fient a plack was left for to defend him.
Thus they postponed me twa year with their
train,

Syne, hodie ad octo, bade me come again.
An then thir rooks they roupit wonder fast,
For sentence silver they cryit at the last.
Of pronunciandum they made me wonder fain,
But I gat ne'er my gude grey meir again.

SIR DAVID LYNDSAY.

Thy tender buds supply her food;
Her young forsake her downy plumes
To rest upon thy opening blooms.

Flower of the desert though thou art,
The deer that range the mountain free,
The graceful doe, the stately hart,

Their food and shelter seek from thee;
The bee thy earliest blossom greets,
And draws from thee her choicest sweets.

Gem of the heath, whose modest bloom

Sheds beauty o'er the lonely moor,
Though thou dispense no rich perfume,

Nor yet with splendid tints allure,
Both valor's crest and beauty's bower
Oft hast thou decked, a favorite flower.

MRS. ANNE GRANT (Miss Anne MacVicar).

Unmerited contempt I hate to bear,
Yet on my faults, like others, am severe;
Dishonest flames my bosom never fire,
The bad I pity and the good admire ;
Fond of the Muse, to her devote my days,
And scribble-not for pudding, but for praise.
These careless lines if any virgin hears,
Perhaps, in pity to my joyless years,
She may consent a generous flame to own,
And I no longer sigh the nights alone.
But should the fair, affected, vain or nice
Scream with the fears inspired by frogs or
inice,

Cry, "Save us, Heaven! A spectre, not a world. Everybody shall choose thee as the

man!"

Her hartshorn snatch or interpose her fan,
If I my tender overture repeat,
Oh, may my vows her kind reception meet!
May she new graces on my form bestow
And with tall honors dignify my brow!

THOMAS BLACKLOCK.

AUTUMN.

source of light-thee, thee, holiest spirit Mazda! Thou createst all good things by means of the power of thy good mind at any time, and promisest us who believe in thee a long life. I believe thee to be the powerful holy god Mazda, for thou givest with thy hand, filled with helps, good to the pious man, as well as to the impious, by means of the warmth of the fire strengthening the good things. From the reason, the

HE days grow chill and drear; now vigor of the good mind has fallen to my comes the time

THE

When Nature, fully tired, prepares to sleep.
The heavy sky hangs dark o'er all the

deep;

The birds fly southward to a warmer clime,
And, borne upon the chilly breeze, the chime
Of pealing bells proclaims how sure the

hours creep:

They bid the sinning soul for sin to weep And turn his thoughts to things sublime.

Now, like a bride upon her wedding-night, All Nature blushes crimson ere she sleeps Beneath her spotless counterpane of snow. The fallen leaves fly wildly round in dread affright;

lot. Who was in the beginning the
father and the creator of truth? Who
showed to the sun and the stars their
way? Who causes the moon to increase
and wane if not thou? Who is hold-
ing the earth and the skies above it? Who
made the waters and the trees of the field?
Who is in the winds and in the storms that
they so quickly run? Who is the creator of
the good-minded beings, thou wise? Who
made the lights of good effect and the dark-
ness? Who made the sleep of good effect
and the activity?
and the activity? Who made morning,
noon and night?

From the French translation of the GATHA,

THE JURY-ROOM.

AN EXCITING TOPIC.

URING the assize-week of an important city in the South of Ireland, a gravelooking gentleman dressed in a sober suit of brown and Petersham top-coat was observed riding with a somewhat inquisitive air through the dense crowds who thronged the open space before the city and county court-house. Everything in his appearance announced a person of good sense and prudence. His dress was neither too good for the road nor too mean for the wearer's rank as indicated by his demeanor; his hat was decent, but evidently not his best; a small spotted shawl folded cravat-wise protected his throat and ears from the rather moist and chilly air of an early Irish spring. A pair of doeskin caps, or overalls, buttoned on the knees, defended those essential hinges of the lower man from the danger of contracting any rheumatic rust in the open air; while gloves of the same material and top-boots neatly foxed evinced in the extremities of the wearer's person the same union of economy and just sufficient attention to appearances which was observable in all the rest of his attire. The countenance, likewise, was one which at the first glance attracted the respect and confidence of the beholder. It was marked by a certain air of good-will and probity of character, with a due consciousness of the owner's posi

tion in life and an expression which seemed to intimate that he would not be willingly deficient in what was due to others, nor readily forfeit any portion of what was fairly owing to himself.

As is usually the case when a stranger makes his appearance amid an idle crowd, all eyes were fixed upon him as he leisurely walked his horse toward a small hotel which stood at a little distance from the courthouse. Giving the bridle to the hostler with the easy air of one who seldom hurries about anything, and of the two feels less satisfaction in motion than in rest, he alighted, and after desiring, in what seemed an English accent, that the horse should not be fed until he had leisure himself to visit the animal in the stall, he drew off his gloves, looked up and down the street, then up at the sky, where the clouds seemed just deliberating whether they would rain or no, took off his hat, inspected it all over, thrust his gloves into the pocket of his great-coat, and finally entered the coffee-room. It may seem trifling to mention all these motions of the traveller with so much precision, but not one of them was lost upon the intelligent observers in the street, who doubtless would not have employed a thing so valuable as time in watching the movements of an entire stranger if there were not something very important, though still a mystery, to them in every turn he took.

The coffee-room was at this instant the scene of a very animated discussion. It needed only a few minutes' standing at the

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The Classic and the Beautiful from the Literature of Three ..., 6. kötet