THINE EYES STILL SHONE. Was woven still by the snow-white choir. At last she came to his hermitage, THINE eyes still shone for me, though far Like the bird from the woodlands to the I lonely roved the land or sea: As I behold yon evening star, Which yet beholds not me. This morn I climbed the misty hill, When the red-bird spread his sable wing, Of thee from the hill-top looking down; Nor knowest thou what argument I thought the sparrow's note from heaven, cage ; The gay enchantment was undone, As I spoke, beneath my feet THE PROBLEM. I LIKE a church, I like a cowl, I love a prophet of the soul, And on my heart monastic aisles Fall like sweet strains or pensive smiles, Yet not for all his faith can see Would I that cowléd churchman be. Why should the vest on him allure, Which I could not on me endure? Not from a vain or shallow thought Himself from God he could not free; Of leaves, and feathers from her breast; RALPH WALDO EMERSON. To her old leaves new myriads? These temples grew as grows the grass; Bestrode the tribes that knelt within. Girds with one flame the countless host, Trances the heart through chanting choirs, And through the priest the mind inspires. The word unto the prophet spoken BOSTON HYMN. THE word of the Lord by night To the watching Pilgrims came, As they sat by the seaside, And filled their hearts with flame. God said, I am tired of kings, I suffer them no more; Up to my ear the morning brings The outrage of the poor. Think ye I made this ball 201 A field of havoc and war, My angel, his name is Freedom,- Lo! I uncover the land, Which I hid of old time in the West, As the sculptor uncovers the statue When he has wrought his best; I show Columbia, of the rocks I will divide my goods; Call in the wretch and the slave: None shall rule but the humble, And none but Toil shall have. I will have never a noble, No lineage counted great; Fishers and choppers and ploughmen Shall constitute a state. Go, cut down trees in the forest, And trim the straightest boughs; Cut down trees in the forest, And build me a wooden house. Call the people together, The young men and the sires, The digger in the harvest-field, Hireling, and him that hires; And here in a pine state-house They shall choose men to rule In every needful faculty, In church and state and school. Lo, now! if these poor men And ye shall succor men; Hear the loud alarum bells, Brazen bells! What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells! In the startled ear of night In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire, In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire. Leaping higher, higher, higher, By the side of the pale-faced moon. What a tale their terror tells How they clang, and clash, and roar! On the bosom of the palpitating air! And the clanging, How the danger ebbs and flows; Yet the ear distinctly tells, In the jangling, And the wrangling, How the danger sinks and swells, By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells Of the bells Of the bells, bells, bells, bells, Bells, bells, bells, In the clamor and the clangor of the bells! Hear the tolling of the bells, Iron bells! What a world of solemn thought their monody compels ! In the silence of the night, 203 At the melancholy menace of their tone! For every sound that floats From the rust within their throats Is a groan. And the people, -ah, the people, - And who, tolling, tolling, tolling, - On the human heart a stone, They are neither man nor woman, They are neither brute nor human,~ They are Ghouls: And their king it is who tolls; A pæan from the bells! With the pean of the bells! Keeping time, time, time, The shutters are shut, no light may pass | I loved you, Evelyn, all the while; Save two long rays through the hinge's My heart seemed full as it could hold,— There was place and to spare for the frank young smile And the red young mouth and the hair's young gold. So, hush, I will give you this leaf to keep, See, I shut it inside the sweet cold hand. There, that is our secret! go to sleep; You will wake, and remember, and understand. RABBI BEN EZRA. GROW old along with me! The last of life, for which the first was made: Our times are in His hand Who saith, "A whole I planned, Not that, amassing flowers, It yearned, "Nor Jove, nor Mars; Not for such hopes and fears, Poor vaunt of life indeed, I have lived, I shall say, so much since Irks care the crop-full bird? Frets doubt |