How long?
Never is a question ask'd,
While a throat can lift the song,
Or a flapping wing be task'd.
All the grandmothers about
Hear the orators of heaven;
Then put on their woollens stout,
And cower o'er the hearth at even;
And the children stare at the sky,
And laugh to see the long black line so high!
Thence once more I heard them say,""Tis a smooth, delightful road;
Difficult to lose the way,
And a trifle for a load."
'Twas our forte to pass, for this
Proper sack of sense to borrow
Wings and legs, and bills that clatter,
And the horizon of To-morrow.
TO MY COMPANIONS.
YE heavy-hearted mariners
Who sail this shore !
Ye patient, ye who labour
Sitting at the sweeping oar,
And see afar the flashing sea-gulls play
On the free waters, and the glad bright day
Twine with his hand the spray!
From out your dreariness,
From your heart weariness,
I speak, for I am yours
On these gray shores.
That high uplift their smooth dark fronts,
And sadly round us bar;
I do imagine that the free clouds play
Above those eminent heights, that somewhere Day
Rides his triumphant way,
And hath secure dominion
Over our stern oblivion,-
But see no path thereout
To free from doubt.
ARTHUR CLEVELAND COXE.
Born at Mendham, New Jersey, 1818
THE OLD ABBEYS.*
YE abbeys and ye arches!
How few and far between
The remnants of your glory
In all their pride are seen;
A thousand fanes are fallen,
And the bat and owl repose
Where once the people knelt them,
And the high TE DEUM rose.
But their dust and stones are precious
In the eyes of pious men,
And the baron hath his manor,
And the king his own again!
And again the bells are ringing
With a free and happy sound,
And again TE DEUM riseth
In all the churches round.
Now, pray ye for our mother,
That England long may be,
The holy, and the happy,
And the gloriously free!
Who blesseth her is blessed!
So peace be in her walls;
And joy in all her palaces,
And cottages and halls!
All ye, who pray in English,
Pray God for England, pray!
And chiefly, thou, my country,
In thy young glory's day!
Pray God those times return not,
'Tis England's hour of need!
Pray for thy mother, daughter!
Plead God for England, plead!
Born at New Brunswick, in New Jersey, 1818
BOBOLINK! that in the meadow,
Or beneath the orchard's shadow,
Keepest up a constant rattle,
Joyous as my children's prattle,
Welcome to the north again!
Welcome to mine ear thy strain,
Welcome to mine eye the sight
Of thy buff, thy black and white!
Brighter plumes may greet the sun
By the banks of Amazon;
Sweeter tones may weave the spell
Of enchanting Philomel;
But the tropic bird would fail,
And the English nightingale,
If we should compare their worth
With thy endless, gushing mirth.
When the ides of May are past,
June and summer nearing fast,
While from depths of blue above
Comes the mighty breath of love,
Calling out each bud and flower
With resistless, secret power,-
Waking hope and fond desire,
Kindling the erotic fire,—
Filling youths' and maidens' dreams
With mysterious, pleasing themes,-
Then, amid the sunlight clear
Floating in the fragrant air,
Thou dost fill each heart with pleasure
By thy glad ecstatic measure.
A single note, so sweet and low,
Like a full heart's overflow,
Forms the prelude; but the strain.
Gives us no such tone again,
For the wild and saucy song
Leaps and skips the notes among,
With such quick and sportive play,
Ne'er was madder, merrier lay.
Gayest songster of the Spring!
Thy melodies before me bring
Visions of some dream-built land,
Where, by constant zephyrs fann'd,
I might walk the livelong day,
Embosom'd in perpetual May.
Nor care nor fear thy bosom knows;
For thee a tempest never blows;
But when our northern Summer's o'er,
By Delaware's or Schuylkill's shore
The wild rice lifts its airy head,
And royal feasts for thee are spread.
And when the winter threatens there,
Thy tireless wings yet own no fear,
But bear thee to more Southern coasts,
Far beyond the reach of frosts.
Bobolink still may thy gladness
Take from me all taints of sadness;
Fill my
soul with trust unshaken
In that Being who has taken
Care for every living thing,
In Summer, Winter, Fall and Spring.
Born at Cambridge, Mass: 1819—
GOD sends His teachers unto every age,
To every clime, and every race of men,
With revelations fitted to their growth
And shape of mind, nor gives the realm of Truth
Into the selfish rule of one sole race.
Therefore each form of worship that hath sway'd
The life of man, and given it to grasp
The master-key of knowledge-reverence,
Enfolds some germs of goodness and of right;
Else never had the eager soul, which loathes
The slothful down of pamper'd ignorance,
Found in it even a moment's fitful rest.
There is an instinct in the human heart
Which makes that all the fables it hath coin'd,
To justify the reign of its belief
And strengthen it by beauty's right divine,
Veil in their inner cells a mystic gift,
Which, like the hazel-twig, in faithful hands,
Points surely to the hidden springs of truth.
For, as in nature naught is made in vain,
But all things have within their hull of use
A wisdom and a meaning, which may speak
Of spiritual secrets to the ear
Of spirit: so, in whatsoe'er the heart
Hath fashion'd for a solace to itself,
To make its inspirations suit its creed,
And from the niggard hands of Falsehood wring Its needful food of truth, there ever is
A sympathy with Nature, which reveals,
Not less than her own works, pure gleams of light And earnest parables of inward lore.
Hear now this fairy legend of old Greece,
As full of freedom, youth, and beauty still
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