66 High on the shore sate the great god Pan, While turbidly flowed the river, And hacked and hewed as a great god can, He cut it short, did the great god Pan, Then drew the pith, like the heart of a man, And notched the poor dry empty thing In holes, as he sate by the river. This is the way," laughed the great god Pan, (Laughed while he sate by the river,) "The only way, since gods began To make sweet music, they could succeed." Then, dropping his mouth to a hole in the reed, He blew in power by the river. Sweet, sweet, sweet, O Pan! Yet half a beast is the great god Pan, The true gods sigh for the cost and the pain,For the reed which grows never more again As a reed with the reeds in the river. ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING. WHAT is hope? A smiling rainbow What is life? A thawing iceboard We are sunk, and seen no more. What is man? A foolish baby, Vainly strives and fights and frets; THOMAS CARLYLE. CARCASSONNE. (Translated from the French of Gustave Naudaud, by John R. Thompson.) I'M growing old, I've sixty years; Bliss unalloyed there is for none. I never have seen Carcassonne ! You see the city from the hill, It lies beyond the mountains blue, Ah! had the vintage plenteous grown! grape withheld its yellow store: I shall not look on Carcassonne. "SO CROONED, ONE DAY, CLOSE BY LIMOUX, A PEASANT DOUBLE-BENT WITH AGE." They tell me every day is Not more or less than In shining robes and gar- The people walk upon One gazes there on castle walls I do not know fair Carcassonne. The vicar's right: he says that we Ambition ruins all mankind; Thy pardon, Father, I beseech, In this, my prayer, if I offend; Have travelled even to Narbonne ; So crooned, one day, close by Limoux, I'll go upon this pilgrimage." We left next morning his abode, with you But (Heaven forgive him!) half-way on He never gazed on Carcassonne. Each mortal has his Carcassonne ! THE LOST LEADER. JUST for a handful of silver he left us; |