Then by the flaring lights the Speaker read,

Albeit with husky voice and shaking hands,

An act to amend an act to regulate The shad and alewive fisheries. Whereupon

Wisely and well spake Abraham Da

venport,

Straight to the question, with no figures of speech

Save the ten Arab signs, yet not with

out

The shrewd dry humor natural to the

man:

His awe-struck colleagues listening all the while,

Between the pauses of his argument, To hear the thunder of the wrath of God Break from the hollow trumpet of the cloud.

And there he stands in memory to this day,

Erect, self-poised, a rugged face, half

seen

383

With bays of marsh, and capes of bush and tree,

The wood's black shore-line loomed
beyond the meadowy sea.
"One song,

The lady rose to leave.
Or hymn," they urged, "before
we part."

And she, with lips to which belong
Sweet intuitions of all art,

Gave to the winds of night a strain
Which they who heard would hear
again;

And to her voice the solemn ocean lent, Touching its harp of sand, a deep accompaniment.

The harp at Nature's advent strung
Has never ceased to play;
The song the stars of morning sung
Has never died away.

And prayer is made, and praise is given,
By all things near and far:
The ocean looketh up to heaven,
And mirrors every star.

Its waves are kneeling on the strand,
As kneels the human knee,
Their white locks bowing to the sand,
The priesthood of the sea!

They pour their glittering treasures forth,

Their gifts of pearl they bring, And all the listening hills of earth Take up the song they sing.

The green earth sends her incense up From many a mountain shrine; From folded leaf and dewy cup

She pours her sacred wine.

The mists above the morning rills
Rise white as wings of prayer;

The altar-curtains of the hills
Are sunset's purple air.

The winds with hymns of praise are loud,

Or low with sobs of pain, The thunder-organ of the cloud, The dropping tears of rain.