And bosom beating with a heart renew'd. Lo ever thus thou growest beautiful Why wilt thou ever scare me with thy tears, Ay me! ay me! with what another heart In days far-off, and with what other eyes I used to watch-if I be he that watch'dThe lucid outline forming round thee; saw The dim curls kindle into sunny rings; Changed with thy mystic change, and felt my blood Glow with the glow that slowly crimson'd all Thy presence and thy portals, while I lay, Mouth, forehead, eyelids, growing dewy-warm With kisses balmier than half-opening buds Of April, and could hear the lips that kiss'd Whispering I knew not what of wild and sweet, Like that strange song I heard Apollo sing, While Ilion like a mist rose into towers. Yet hold me not forever in thine East: How can my nature longer mix with thine? Coldly thy rosy shadows bathe me, cold Are all thy lights, and cold my wrinkled feet Upon thy glimmering thresholds, when the steam Floats up from those dim fields about the homes Of happy men that have the power to die, And grassy barrows of the happier dead. Release me, and restore me to the ground: Thou seest all things, thou wilt see my grave; Thou wilt renew thy beauty morn by morn; I earth in earth forget these empty courts, And thee returning on thy silver wheels. THE VOYAGE. I. WE left behind the painted buoy II. Warm broke the breeze against the brow, Caught the shrill salt, and sheer'd the gale. III. How oft we saw the Sun retire, And sleep beneath his pillar'd light! How oft the purple-skirted robe Of twilight slowly downward drawn, As thro' the slumber of the globe Again we dash'd into the dawn! IV. New stars all night above the brim V. The peaky islet shifted shapes, High towns on hills were dimly seen, We past long lines of Northern capes And dewy Northern meadows green. We came to warmer waves, and deep Across the boundless east we drove, Where those long swells of breaker sweep The nutmeg rocks and isles of clove. VI. By peaks that flamed, or, all in shade, By sands and steaming flats, and floods VII. O hundred shores of happy climes, For one fair Vision ever fled Down the waste waters day and night, And still we follow'd where she led, In hope to gain upon her flight. Her face was evermore unseen, And fixt upon the far sea-line; But each man murmur'd, "O my Queen, I follow till I make thee mine." IX. And now we lost her, now she gleam'd X. And only one among us-him We pleased not-he was seldom pleased: He saw not far: his eyes were dim: But ours he swore were all diseased. "A ship of fools," he shriek'd in spite, "A ship of fools," he sneer'd and wept. And overboard one stormy night He cast his body, and on we swept. XI. And never sail of ours was furl'd, Nor anchor dropt at eve or morn; We loved the glories of the world; But laws of nature were our scorn; For blasts would rise and rave and cease, But whence were those that drove the sail Across the whirlwind's heart of peace, And to and thro' the counter-gale ? IN THE VALLEY OF CAUTERETZ.—THE RINGLET. XII. Again to colder climes we came, For still we follow'd where she led: Now mate is blind and captain lame, And half the crew are sick or dead. But blind or lame or sick or sound, We follow that which flies before: We know the merry world is round, And we may sail forevermore. IN THE VALLEY OF CAUTERETZ. ALL along the valley, stream that flashest white, Deepening thy voice with the deepening of the night, All along the valley, where thy waters flow, I walk'd with one I loved two and thirty years ago. Cataract brooks to the ocean run, "Thither, O thither, love, let us go." "No, no, no! For in all that exquisite isle, my dear, 203 "Mock me not! mock me not! love, let us go." "No, love, no. For the bud ever breaks into bloom on the tree, THE FLOWER. ONCE in a golden hour Up there came a flower, To and fro they went Thro' my garden-bower, And muttering discontent Cursed me and my flower. Then it grew so tall It wore a crown of light, But thieves from o'er the wall Stole the seed by night. Sow'd it far and wide By every town and tower, Till all the people cried, "Splendid is the flower." Read my little fable: He that runs may read. Most can raise the flowers now, For all have got the seed. And some are pretty enough, And some are poor indeed; And now again the people Call it but a weed. THE ISLET. "WHITHER, O whither, love, shall we go, On the day that follow'd the day she was wed: With a satin sail of a ruby glow, To a sweet little Eden on earth that I know, REQUIESCAT. FAIR is her cottage in its place, Where yon broad water sweetly slowly glides. It sees itself from thatch to base Dream in the sliding tides. And fairer she, but ah, how soon to die! THE SAILOR-BOY. He rose at dawn and, fired with hope, And while he whistled long and loud "The sands and yeasty surges mix "Fool," he answer'd, "death is sure To sit with empty hands at home. "My mother clings about my neck, My sisters crying, 'Stay, for shame;' My father raves of death and wreck, They are all to blame, they are all to blame. "God help me! save I take my part Of danger on the roaring sea, A devil rises in my heart, Far worse than any death to me." THE RINGLET. "YOUR ringlets, your ringlets, That look so golden-gay, If you will give me one, but one, To kiss it night and day, 204 A WELCOME TO ALEXANDRA.-A DEDICATION. Then never chilling touch of Time Will turn it silver-gray; And then shall I know it is all true gold To flame and sparkle and stream as of old, Till all the comets in heaven are cold, And all her stars decay." "Then take it, love, and put it by; This cannot change, nor yet can I." 2. "My ringlet, my ringlet, That art so golden-gay, Now never chilling touch of Time Can turn thee silver-gray; And a lad may wink, and a girl may hint, For my doubts and fears were all amiss, Warble, O bugle, and trumpet, blare! Roll as a ground-swell dash'd on the strand, Bride of the heir of the kings of the sea- We are each all Dane in our welcome of thee, ODE SUNG AT THE OPENING OF THE INTERNATIONAL EXHIBITION. UPLIFT a thousand voices full and sweet, In this wide hall with earth's invention stored, Who lets once more in peace the nations meet, O silent father of our Kings to be For this, for all, we weep our thanks to thee! The world-compelling plan was thine, Steel and gold, and corn and wine, Polar marvels, and a feast Of wonder out of West and East, O ye, the wise who think, the wise who reign, A DEDICATION. DEAR, near and true-no truer Time himself THE CAPTAIN. THREE SONNETS TO A COQUETTE.-ON A MOURNER. 205 Who wrote it, honoring your sweet faith in him, Till himself was deadly wounded THE CAPTAIN. A LEGEND OF THE NAVY. HE that only rules by terror Doeth grievous wrong. Deep as Hell I count his error, Brave the Captain was: the seamen Gallant sons of English freemen, But they hated his oppression, Wheresoe'er he came. So they past by capes and islands, Many a harbor-mouth, Sailing under palmy highlands Far within the South. On a day when they were going In the North, her canvas flowing, Then the Captain's color heighten'd But a cloudy gladness lighten'd In the eyes of each. "Chase," Then they look'd at him they hated, Mute with folded arms they waited- But they heard the foeman's thunder All the air was torn in sunder, Crashing went the boom, Spars were splinter'd, decks were shatter'd, Over mast and deck were scatter'd Spars were splinter'd: decks were broken: Down they dropt-no word was spokenEach beside his gun. On the decks as they were lying, Were their faces grim. In their blood, as they lay dying, Did they smile on him. Those, in whom he had reliance For his noble name, With one smile of still defiance Sold him unto shame. Shame and wrath his heart confounded, *The fruit of the Spindle-tree (Euonymus Europaus). THREE SONNETS TO A COQUETTE. CARESS'D or chidden by the dainty hand, And singing airy trifles this or that, Light Hope at Beauty's call would perch and stand, And run thro' every change of sharp and flat: And Fancy came and at her pillow sat, When Sleep had bound her in his rosy band, And chased away the still-recurring gnat, And woke her with a lay from fairy land. But now they live with Beauty less and less, For Hope is other Hope and wanders far, Nor cares to lisp in love's delicious creeds; And Fancy watches in the wilderness, Poor Fancy sadder than a single star, That sets at twilight in a land of reeds. 2. The form, the form alone is eloquent! My fancy made me for a moment blest To find my heart so near the beauteous breast That once had power to rob it of content. A moment came the tenderness of tears, The phantom of a wish that once could move, A ghost of passion that no smiles restoreFor ah! the slight coquette, she cannot love, And if you kiss'd her feet a thousand years, She still would take the praise, and care no 3. more. Wan Sculptor, weepest thou to take the cast But breathe it into earth and close it up ON A MOURNER. NATURE, So far as in her lies, Imitates God, and turns her face To every land beneath the skies, Counts nothing that she meets with base, But lives and loves in every place; 2. Fills out the homely quick-set screens, And makes the purple lilac ripe, Steps from her airy hill, and greens The swamp, where hums the dropping snipe, With moss and braided marish-pipe; EXPERIMENTS. WHILE about the shore of Mona those Neronian legionaries Mad and maddening all that heard her in her fierce volubility, "They that scorn the tribes and call us Britain's barbarous populaces, Bark an answer, Britain's raven! bark and blacken innumerable, "Hear it, Gods! the Gods have heard it, O Icenian, O Coritanian ! Bloodily flow'd the Tamesa rolling phantom bodies of horses and men; Lastly yonder yester-even, suddenly giddily tottering There was one who watch'd and told me-down their statue of Victory tell. Shall we teach it a Roman lesson? shall we care to be pitiful? "Hear Icenian, Catieuchlanian, hear Coritanian, Trinobant! While I roved about the forest, long and bitterly meditating, |