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STANZAS.

By JOHN LOCKE.

LOWLY she droop'd upon the harp
With sad abstracted air,
Unbraided o'er the yellow wires
Was flung her long dark hair:
While from her eyes receding depths
Gleam'd coldly steadfast care.

First came murmurs, slow and fitful,
As spirit mutterings,

When storm, uprising from his lair,
Unfolds his shuddering wings,
And nature heaves a boding sigh,
Like a thrill of many strings.

Rapt, and controll'd, the minstrel woke
Dear strains of faded years,

Then changeful song-bursts, symbolling
Long buried hopes and fears-

Methought she smiled-'twas gloomy joy;
But I could not see for tears.

She ceased the founts of weeping fill'd
At the harp's familiar tone,

And long-imprison'd woe gush'd forth
With an energy love had known-
It was a breaking heart that spoke
Of a spirit overthrown.

THE RECLUSE.

Translated from the French of LAMARTINE.

THE rock is tipp'd with light: night's clouds depart,
The birds their songs begin-to God all praise !
His Name is earlier dearer to my heart

Than to mine eyes the morn's fresh kindled rays.

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'Twas erst,
"What chase to-day shall I pursue?
Glory and love and thoughts supremely vain,
For my mad hours my waking powers would strain :
Yet said my heart, to HIM all days are due.

All days I give to Him, the Only Wise,
From peep of dawn to midnight's drowsy reign:
In Him my heart at waking hour doth rise,
In Him my heart reposing rests again.

What is 't they mean ?—I have almost forgot!
Love, frail and fleeting! Glory, of a day!
Hope, mere delusion! Luxury, a blot!
Their trace upon my soul appeareth not,
More than do passing clouds on ocean spray!
As a strange language fall they on my ear,
The sense I gather not, the sound I hear;
Nay even the slight impression is effaced
That once upon my worldly heart they traced.

Oh! when a thought from Heaven's bright radiance glances,

It lessens distance! as the soul advances,

How beam the thoughts 'lumed by one ray of light!
Bright day less differs from the shades of night,

The west is nearer to the eastern skies,

Than is the soul that from Thee flies,

From his that on Thy Love relies.

Since I the busy haunts of men forsook,

Their heart's-food have I never ta'en I trow,

My hair is greyer than the aged oak;

My days are writ in wrinkles on my brow,

And years

but add fresh links unto my chain, Bowing my wasted limbs with weight and pain. How oft the earth hath breathed the breath of spring Lent her from Heaven-I've lost all reckoning.

How oft since I this rock have made my bed,
The kite its plumes, the oak its fruit hath shed!
My soul, oh God, possess'd but by Thy praise,
Heeds not time's records, nor distinctive days.

VOL. V.

G

73

8

To him whose ONE desire is bound in Thee
All time is but one day—that day, eternity!

By silence and long solitude,

My senses are grown dull and rude;
My ears unskill'd in human sounds remain;
To frame its tones my mouth essays in vain.
My body flex'd in prayer,

As senseless to the cold or heat
As e'en these flint stones are,
Here trodden by my naked feet.

And yet the soul of prayer is vaster grown,
That sense my life requires—that sense alone;
It smells, hears, sees, and feels, and doth descry
Things from afar, a present Deity.

More swift my flight as I ascend to Thee,
The more my spirit stoops in poverty,
Lost in Thy presence; the more void is time,
The deeper doth the sacred echo chime.

WINE OF CYPRUS.

A brilliant joyous poem, by ELIZABETH BARREtt Browning.

Ir old Bacchus were the speaker
He would tell you with a sigh,

Of the Cyprus in this beaker,
I am sipping like a fly,-

Like a fly or gnat on Ida

At the hour of goblet pledge,

By Queen Juno brush'd aside, a

Full white arm-sweep, from the edge!

Sooth, the drinking should be ampler,
When the drink is so divine!

And some deep-mouth'd Greek exampler
Would become your Cyprian wine!
Cyclops' mouth might plunge aright in,
While his one eye over-leer'd-
Nor too large were mouth of Titan,
Drinking rivers down his beard.

But for me, I am not worthy
After Gods and Greeks to drink;
And my lips are pale and earthy,
To go bathing from this brink!
Since you heard them speak the last time,
They have faded from their blooms;
And the laughter of my pastime

Has learnt silence at the tombs.

Ah! my friend! the antique drinkers Crown'd the cup, and crown'd the brow! Can I answer the old thinkers

In the forms they thought of, now?
Who will fetch from garden-closes
Some new garlands while I speak,
That the forehead, crown'd with roses,
May strike scarlet down the cheek?

Do not mock me! with my mortal,
Suits no wreath again, indeed!
I am sad-voiced as the turtle

Which Anacreon used to feed;
Yet as that same bird demurely
Wet her beak in cup of his,-
So without a garland, surely
I may touch the brim of this.

Go!-let others praise the Chian !—
This is soft as Muses' string-

This is tawny as Rhea's lion,

This is rapid as its spring,-
Bright as Paphia's eyes e'er met us,
Light as ever trod her feet!
And the brown bees of Hymettus
Make their honey, not so sweet.

Very copious are my praises,
Though I sip it like a fly !—
Ah!-but sipping,-times and places
Change before me suddenly-
As Ulysses' old libation

Drew the ghosts from every part,
So your Cyprian wine, dear Grecian,
Stirs the Hades of my heart.

And I think of those long mornings
Which my thought goes far to seek,
When, betwixt the folio's turnings,
Solemn flow'd the rhythmic Greek.
Past the pane, the mountain spreading,
Swept the sheep-bell's tinkling noise,
While a girlish voice was reading
Somewhat low for ais and os!

Then what golden hours were for us!
While we sat together there,
How the white vests of the chorus
Seem'd to wave up a live air!
How the Cothurns trod majestic
Down the deep Iambic lines!
And the rolling anapæstic

Curl'd, like vapour over shrines!

Oh! our Eschylus, the thundrous!
How he drove the bolted breath
Through the cloud, to wedge it ponderous
In the gnarled oak beneath.
Oh! our Sophocles, the royal!

Who was born to monarch's place-
And who made the whole world loyal,
Less by kingly power than grace.

Our Euripides, the human

With his droppings of warm tears,
And his touches of things common,
Till they rose to touch the spheres!
Our Theocritus, our Bion,

And our Pindar's shining goals!
These were cup-bearers undying
Of the wine that's meant for souls.

And my Plato, the divine one,-
If men know the gods aright
By their motions as they shine on
With a glorious trail of light!
And your noble Christian Bishops,
Who mouthed grandly the last Greek:
Though the sponges on their hyssops

Were distent with wine-too weak!

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