"Whence does she come?" they ask of me ; "Who is her master, and what her name?" And they smile upon me pityingly
When my answer is ever and ever the same.
O, mine was a vessel of strength and truth,
Her sails were white as a young lamb's fleece, She sailed long since from the port of Youth,
Bright visions of glory that vanished too soon ;
Day-dreams, that departed ere manhood's noon;
Attachments by fate or falsehood reft;
Companions of early days lost or left;
And my native land, whose magical name
Thrills to the heart like electric flame;
The home of my childhood; the haunts of my
prime;
Her master was Love, and her name was Peace. All the passions and scenes of that rapturous
O'er the brown karroo, where the bleating cry
Of the springbok's fawn sounds plaintively;
And the timorous quagga's shrill whistling neigh Courts are but only superficial schools
Yet whilst with sorrow here we live opprest,
What life is best?
Is heard by the fountain at twilight gray ;
Where the zebra wantonly tosses his mane,
With wild hoof scouring the desolate plain;
And the fleet-footed ostrich over the waste
Speeds like a horseman who travels in haste,
Hieing away to the home of her rest,
The rural parts are turned into a den
Of savage men :
And where's a city from foul vice so free,
But may be term'd the worst of all the three?
Where she and her mate have scooped their Domestic cares afflict the husband's bed,
Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's view
In the pathless depths of the parched karroo.
Afar in the desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side,
Away, away, in the wilderness vast
What is it, then, to have or have no wife,
But single thraldom, or a double strife?
Where the white man's foot hath never passed,
And the quivered Coranna or Bechuan
Hath rarely crossed with his roving clan,
A region of emptiness, howling and drear,
Which man hath abandoned from famine and To cross the seas to any foreign soil,
Which the snake and the lizard inhabit alone,
With the twilight bat from the yawning stone;
Where grass, nor herb, nor shrub takes root,
Save poisonous thorns that pierce the foot;
And the bitter-melon, for food and drink,
Is the pilgrim's fare by the salt lake's brink;
A region of drought, where no river glides,
Nor rippling brook with osiered sides ;
Where sedgy pool, nor bubbling fount,
Nor tree, nor cloud, nor misty mount,
Appears, to refresh the aching eye;
But the barren earth and the burning sky,
And the blank horizon, round and round,
Spread, void of living sight or sound.
And here, while the night-winds round me sigh,
And the stars burn bright in the midnight sky,
As I sit apart by the desert stone,
Like Elijah at Horeb's cave, alone,
"A still small voice" comes through the wild
(Like a father consoling his fretful child),
Which banishes bitterness, wrath, and fear,
Saying, Man is distant, but God is near!
THE World's a bubble, and the Life of Man
Less than a span:
In his conception wretched, from the womb,
So to the tomb;
Curst from his cradle, and brought up to years
With cares and fears.
Who then to frail mortality shall trust,
But limns on water, or but writes in dust.
Our own affection still at home to please
Is a disease:
Wars with their noise affright us; when they
We are worse in peace;
What then remains, but that we still should cry
For being born, or, being born, to die?
Love not, love not, ye hapless sons of clay!
Hope's gayest wreaths are made of earthly flow-
Things that are made to fade and fall away
Ere they have blossomed for a few short hours.
Love not!
Love not! the thing ye love may change;
The rosy lip may cease to smile on you,
The kindly-beaming eye grow cold and strange,
The heart still warmly beat, yet not be true.
Love not!
Love not! the thing you love may die,
May perish from the gay and gladsome earth;
The silent stars, the blue and smiling sky,
Beam o'er its grave, as once upon its birth.
Love not!
Love not! O warning vainly said
In present hours as in years gone by!
Love flings a halo round the dear ones' head,
Faultless, immortal, till they change or die.
Love not!
CAROLINE ELIZABETH SHERIDAN.
(HON. MRS. NORTON.)
O LOSS of sight, of thee I most complain !
Blind among enemies, O, worse than chains,
Dungeon, or beggary, or decrepit age!
Light, the prime work of God, to me is extinct,
And all her various objects of delight
Annulled, which might in part my grief have
eased.
Inferior to the vilest now become
Of man or worm; the vilest here excel me:
They creep, yet see; I, dark in light, exposed
To daily fraud, contempt, abuse, and wrong,
Within doors or without, still as a fool,
In power of others, never in my own;
Scarce half I seem to live, dead more than half.
O dark, dark, dark, amid the blaze of noon,
Irrecoverably dark, total eclipse,
Without all hope of day!
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O UNEXPECTED stroke, worse than of death!
Must I thus leave thee, Paradise? thus leave
Thee, native soil! these happy walks and shades,
Fit haunt of gods; where I had hope to spend,
Quiet, though sad, the respite of that day
That must be mortal to us both? O flowers,
That never will in other climate grow,
My early visitation, and my last
At even, which I bred up with tender hand
From the first opening bud, and gave ye names!
Who now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank
Your tribes, and water from the ambrosial fount?
Thee, lastly, nuptial bower! by me adorned
With what to sight or smell was sweet, from thee
How shall I part, and whither wander down
Into a lower world, to this obscure
And wild? how shall we breathe in other air
Less pure, accustomed to immortal fruits?
WITH sorrow and heart's distress Wearied, I fell asleep. But now lead on; In me is no delay; with thee to go, Is to stay here; without thee here to stay, Is to go hence unwilling; thou to me Art all things under heaven, all places thou, Who for my wilful crime art banished hence. This further consolation, yet secure, I carry hence; though all by me is lost, Such favor I unworthy am vouchsafed, By me the promised Seed shall all restore.
FROM "HENRY VIII.," ACT III. SC. 2.
FAREWELL, a long farewell, to all my greatness!
This is the state of man: to-day he puts forth
The tender leaves of hope; to-morrow blossoms,
And bears his blushing honors thick upon him:
The third day comes a frost, a killing frost ;
And-when he thinks, good easy man, full surely
His greatness is a ripening - nips his root,
And then he falls, as I do. I have ventured,
Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders,
This many summers in a sea of glory;
But far beyond my depth: my high-blown pride
At length broke under me; and now has left me,
Weary and old with service, to the mercy
Of a rude stream, that must forever hide me.
Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye:
I feel my heart new opened. O, how wretched
Is that poor man that hangs on princes' favors!
There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to,
That sweet aspéct of princes, and their ruin,
More pangs and fears than wars or women have:
And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer,
Never to hope again.
WOLSEY'S ADVICE TO CROMWELL.
FROM "HENRY VIII.,” ACT III. SC. 2.
CROMWELL, I did not think to shed a tear
In all my miseries; but thou hast forced me,
Out of thy honest truth, to play the woman.
Let's dry our eyes: and thus far hear me, Crom-
well;
And when I am forgotten, as I shall be,
And sleep in dull, cold marble, where no mention
Of me more must be heard of
Say, Wolsey - that once trod the ways of glory,
And sounded all the depths and shoals of honor-O WORLD! O Life! O Time!
Found thee a way, out of his wreck, to rise in ; On whose last steps I climb,
A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it.
Mark but my fall, and that that ruined me.
Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition :
By that sin fell the angels; how can man, then,
The image of his Maker, hope to win by 't?
Love thyself last : cherish those hearts that hate
Trembling at that where I had stood before;
When will return the glory of your prime ?
No more, — O nevermore !
Corruption wins not more than honesty.
Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace,
To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not :
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's,
Thy God's, and truth's; then if thou fall'st, O
Cromwell!
Thou fall'st a blessed martyr.
Serve the king; and pr'ythee, lead me in :
There take an inventory of all I have,
To the last penny; 't is the king's my robe,
And my integrity to heaven, is all
I dare now call mine own. O Cromwell, Crom-
well!
Had I but served my God with half the zeal
I served my king, he would not in mine age
Have left me naked to mine enemies!
Out of the day and night
A joy has taken flight :
Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar
Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight
No more,
O nevermore!
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.
"WHAT CAN AN OLD MAN DO BUT DIE?"
SPRING it is cheery,
Winter is dreary,
Green leaves hang, but the brown must fly;
When he's forsaken,
Withered and shaken,
What can an old man do but die?
Love will not clip him,
Maids will not lip him,
Maud and Marian pass him by;
Youth it is sunny,
Age has no honey,
What can an old man do but die ?
June it was jolly,
O for its folly!
A dancing leg and a laughing eye!
Youth may be silly,
Wisdom is chilly,
What can an old man do but die ?
Friends they are scanty,
Beggars are plenty,
If he has followers, I know why;
Gold's in his clutches
(Buying him crutches!)
What can an old man do but die?
WHEN SHALL WE ALL MEET AGAIN?
WHEN shall we all meet again?
When shall we all meet again?
Oft shall glowing hope expire,
Oft shall wearied love retire,
Oft shall death and sorrow reign,
Ere we all shall meet again.
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