The Family Library of Poetry and Song

Fair City by the Sea! upraise

His veil with reverent hands; And mingle with thy own the praise And pride of other lands.

Let Greece his fiery lyric breathe
Above her hero-urns ;

And Scotland, with her holly, wreathe
The flower he culled for Burns.

O, stately stand thy palace walls, Thy tall ships ride the seas; To-day thy poet's name recalls

A prouder thought than these.

Not less thy pulse of trade shall beat,
Nor less thy tall fleets swim,
That shaded square and dusty street
Are classic ground through him.

Alive, he loved, like all who sing,
The echoes of his song;
Too late the tardy meed we bring,

The praise delayed so long.

Too late, alas! - Of all who knew

The living man, to-day Before his unveiled face, how few

Make bare their locks of gray!

Our lips of praise must soon be dumb,
Our grateful eyes be dim;

O, brothers of the days to come,
Take tender charge of him!

New hands the wires of song may sweep,
New voices challenge fame;

But let no moss of years o'ercreep
The lines of Halleck's name.

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.

THE DUKE OF GLOSTER.

I, that am rudely stamped and want love's majesty

To strut before a wanton ambling nymph;
I, that am curtailed of this fair proportion,
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,
Deformed, unfinished, sent before my time
Into this breathing world, scarce half made up,
And that so lamely and unfashionable
That dogs bark at me as I halt by them,
Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace,
Have no delight to pass away the time,
Unless to see my shadow in the sun.

King Richard III., Acti. Sc. 1.

---

SHAKESPEARE.

FRAGMENTS.

CHAUCER.

As that renowmèd poet them compyled With warlike numbers and heroicke sound, Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled, On Fame's eternall beadroll worthie to be fyled. Faerie Queene, Book iv. Cant. ¡¡.

SPENSER.

THE EARL OF WARWICK.

Peace, impudent and shameless Warwick! Proud setter-up and puller-down of kings.

King Henry VI., Part III. Act iii. Sc. 3.

SHAKESPEARE.

LORD BACON.

If parts allure thee, think how Bacon shined, The wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind! Essay on Man, Epistle IV.

POPF

What things have we seen

EARL OF MARLBOROUGH.

[Lord-President of the Council to King James I. Parliament was dissolved March 10, and he died March 14, 1628.]

Till the sad breaking of that Parliament
Broke him..

Done at the Mermaid! heard words that have Killed with report that old man eloquent.

been

So nimble, and so full of subtle flame,

As if that every one from whence they came
Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest,

And had resolved to live a fool the rest

To the Lady Margaret Ley.

MILTON.

JOHN WICKliffe.

As thou these ashes, little Brook! wilt bear

Of Severn, Severn to the narrow seas,
Into main ocean they, this deed accursed

Of his dull life: then when there hath been Into the Avon, Avon to the tide

thrown

Wit able enough to justify the town

For three days past; wit that might warrant be An emblem yields to friends and enemies,
For the whole city to talk foolishly
How the bold Teacher's doctrine, sanctified

Till that were cancelled; and when that was gone, By truth, shall spread, throughout the world
We left an air behind us, which alone

dispersed.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

Far from the sun and summer gale,
In thy green lap was Nature's darling laid,
What time, where lucid Avon strayed,

To him the mighty mother did unveil
Her awful face: the dauntless child
Stretched forth his little arms and smiled.

"This pencil take," she said, "whose colors clear
Richly paint the vernal year:

Thine too these golden keys, immortal boy!
This can unlock the gates of joy;

Of horror that, and thrilling fears,

Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears."

Renowned Spenser, lie a thought more nigh
To learned Chaucer, and rare Beaumont lie

A little nearer Spenser, to make room

'The Avon to the Severn runs,

The Severn to the sea;

And Wickliffe's dust shall spread abroad,
Wide as the waters be.'"

From Address before the "Sons of New Hampshire" (1849).
DANIEL Webster.

For Shakespeare in your threefold, fourfold tomb. How shall I then begin, or where conclude,

Ye men of wit and social eloquence !
He was your brother, bear his ashes hence !
While powers of mind almost of boundless range,
Complete in kind, as various in their change,
While eloquence, wit, poesy, and mirth,
That humbler harmonist of care on earth,
Survive within our souls, while lives our sense
Of pride in merit's proud pre-eminence,
Long shall we seek his likeness, - long in vain,
And turn to all of him which may remain,
Sighing that Nature formed but one such man,
And broke the die -- in moulding Sheridan!
Monody on the Death of Sheridan.

AMOS COTTLE.

BYRON.