That spurred him on to honest fame,
To other hearts give warmth and grace,
And keep on earth his honored place,
Become immortal in his race.

THE ARAB TO THE PALM.

EXT to thee, O fair gazelle,

O Beddowee girl, beloved so well;

Next to the fearless Nedjidee,

Whose fleetness shall bear me again to thee;

Next to ye both I love the Palm,

With his leaves of beauty, his fruit of balm;

Next to ye both I love the Tree

Whose fluttering shadow wraps us three

With love, and silence, and mystery!

Our tribe is many, our poets vie
With any under the Arab sky;

Yet none can sing of the Palm but I.

The marble minarets that begem
Cairo's citadel-diadem

Are not so light as his slender stem.

He lifts his leaves in the sunbeam's glance As the Almehs lift their arms in dance,

A slumberous motion, a passionate sign, That works in the cells of the blood like wine.

Full of passion and sorrow is he,
Dreaming where the beloved may be.

And when the warm south-winds arise,
He breathes his longing in fervid sighs, -

Quickening odors, kisses of balm,
-That drop in the lap of his chosen palm.

The sun may flame and the sands may stir,
But the breath of his passion reaches her.

O Tree of Love, by that love of thine,
Teach me how I shall soften mine!

Give me the secret of the sun,
Whereby the wooed is ever won!

If I were a King, O stately Tree,
A likeness, glorious as might be,

In the court of my palace I'd build for thee!

With a shaft of silver, burnished bright,
And leaves of beryl and malachite;

With spikes of golden bloom ablaze,
And fruits of topaz and chrysoprase:

And there the poets, in thy praise,
Should night and morning frame new lays, -

New measures sung to tunes divine ;
But none, O Palm, should equal mine!

AURUM POTABILE.

B

I.

ROTHER Bards of every region,
Brother Bards, (your name is Legion!)
Were you with me while the twilight
Darkens up my pine-tree skylight, –
Were you gathered, representing

Every land beneath the sun,

O, what songs would be indited,
Ere the earliest star is lighted,

To the praise of vino d'oro,

On the Hills of Lebanon!

II.

Yes; while all alone I quaff its
Lucid gold, and brightly laugh its
Topaz waves and amber bubbles,
Still the thought my pleasure troubles,
That I quaff it all alone.

-

O for Hafiz, — glorious Persian!
Keats, with buoyant, gay diversion
Mocking Schiller's grave immersion;
O for wreathed Anacreon!

Yet enough to have the living,

They, the few, the rapture-giving! (Blessèd more than in receiving,)

Fate, that frowns when laurels wreathe them, Once the solace might bequeath them,

Once to taste of vino d'oro,

On the Hills of Lebanon!

III.

Lebanon, thou mount of story,
Well we know thy sturdy glory,

Since the days of Solomon;
Well we know the Five old Cedars,
Scarred by ages,
silent pleaders,

Preaching, in their gray sedateness,
Of thy forest's fallen greatness,
Of the vessels of the Tyrian,
And the palaces Assyrian,
And the temple on Moriah

To the High and Holy One!
Know the wealth of thy appointment,
Myrrh and aloes, gum and ointment;
But we knew not, till we clomb thee,
Of the nectar dropping from thee,—
Of the pure, pellucid Ophir
In the cups of vino d'oro,

On the Hills of Lebanon!

IV.

We have drunk, and we have eaten,
Where Egyptian sheaves are beaten ;
Tasted Judah's milk and honey
On his mountains, bare and sunny;
Drained ambrosial bowls, that ask us
Never more to leave Damascus ;
And have sung a vintage paan
To the grapes of isles Ægean,
And the flasks of Orvieto,

Ripened in the Roman sun:
But the liquor here surpasses

All that beams in earthly glasses.
'Tis of this that Paracelsus
(His elixir vitæ) tells us,

That to happier shores can float us
Than Lethean stems of lotus,

And the vigor of the morning

Straight restores when day is done.

Then, before the sunset waneth,
While the rosy tide, that staineth
Earth, and sky, and sea, remaineth,
We will take the fortune proffered,
Ne'er again to be reoffered,
We will drink of vino d'oro,

On the Hills of Lebanon!

Vino d'oro! vino d'oro!

Golden blood of Lebanon!

ON THE SEA.

HE splendor of the sinking moon
Deserts the silent bay;

The mountain-isles loom large and faint,
Folded in shadows gray,

And the lights of land are setting stars
That soon will pass away.

O boatman, cease thy mellow song!
O minstrel, drop thy lyre!

Let us hear the voice of the midnight sea,
Let us speak as the waves inspire,
While the plashy dip of the languid oar
Is a furrow of silver fire.