Follow eyes the steady keel-still anxious for her safe arrival in port. The first four lines of the second stanza present a splendid picture of national rejoicing. The closing lines of Longfellow's Building of the Ship should be read in this connection: Thou, too, sail on, O Ship of State! With all the hopes of future years, Fear not each sudden sound and shock. Our hearts, our hopes, are all with thee: Our hearts, our hopes, our prayers, our tears, Are all with thee,—are all with thee! ALADDIN The Arabian Nights, sometimes called The Thousand and One Nights, is one of the most widely read collections of tales ever written. The statement has been made that it has been read more widely than almost any other production of the human mind. They are wild and fanciful oriental stories, first collected and written down about the end of the fifteenth century, but nobody knows who was the author. They are supposed to have originated in Egypt. One of the characters in the Arabian Nights is Aladdin, a poor boy, who becomes possessed of a wonderful lamp. When he rubs this lamp, genii appear around him and offer to do his bidding, to get for him whatever he may like. One object to which he takes a fancy is the sultan's daughter, and even this prize is won for him by the slaves of his wonderful lamp. The sultan lets him know that if he will send the sultan forty baskets of diamonds carried by forty black slaves, and each black slave led by a white slave, he may have his daughter to be his wife. Aladdin rubs his lamp, the genii appear, he tells them his desire, and, behold, the thing is done. Aladdin builds a marvelous palace, and the lamp is hung up somewhere in a corner, nobody but Aladdin being aware of its value. By and by the old wizard, from whom Aladdin had obtained the lamp by accident, comes along, disguised as a peddler, and offers to trade some new silver lamps for the old lamp. The servants in the palace trade the old lamp for the new silver ones. This is but a small part of the story of Aladdin's lamp, but it may serve to explain this poem. ALADDIN 1 When I was a beggarly boy, 2 Since then I have toiled day and night, -James Russell Lowell. Aladdin's lamp-the imagination, by which we fancy we have the good and the beautiful things of the world, no matter how poor we may be. Castles in Spain-castles in the air, or existing only in our imaginations, but which may be very real to us and very wonderful and very beautiful. The youth who builds "castles in Spain" is dreaming his dreams and seeing his visions; and without them no great thing is accomplished. I had not a friend nor a toy-There are thousands of children, even today, who never have any toys. This is one of the saddest fates of childhood. I had fire enough in my brain-the fire of imagination and fancy. Good store-plenty. But I'd give all my lamps of silver bright-This has reference to the trading by the old wizard in the tale, of his new silver lamps for Aladdin's lamp. The second stanza means that youth has passed away and success has been attained, but the visions and pictures and dreams of boyhood are no more. He has lost Aladdin's lamp. Fortune, in the last stanza, is the old wizard from whom Aladdin got the lamp and who took it from him again. Read The Arabian Nights. THE OLD CLOCK ON THE STAIRS An introductory note to this poem in Houghton, Mifflin & Company's admirable eleven-volume edition of Longfellow's works states that the house referred to is now known as the Plunkett mansion, in Pittsfield, Massachusetts, the homestead of Mrs. Longfellow's maternal grandfather, whither Longfellow went after his marriage in the summer of 1843. The same authority explains the origin of the poem and the significance of the refrain: Forever-never! Never-forever! Under date of November 12, 1845, Longfellow wrote in his diary: "Began a poem on a clock, with the words 'Forever, never,' as the burden, suggested by the words of Bridaine, the old French missionary, who said of eternity: 'It is a clock whose pendulum says and repeats without ceasing only these two words in the silence of the tombs, Forever, never! Never, forever! And during these terrible revolutions a miserable soul cries out, What time is it? And another unhappy one answers him, Eternity."" The meaning is made clear in the last stanza of the poem, which says: Never here, forever there, Where all parting, pain, and care, THE OLD CLOCK ON THE STAIRS 1 Somewhat back from the village street Tall poplar trees their shadows throw; "Forever-never! Never-forever!" |