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What lures thee thus to stay

With silence and decay,

Fix'd on the wreck of cold mortality?

The thoughts once chamber'd there,

Have gather'd up their treasures and are gone ;Will the dust tell thee where

That which hath burst the prison-house is flown? Rise, nursling of the day!

If thou would'st trace its way—

Earth has no voice to make the secret known.

Who seeks the vanish'd bird
Near the deserted nest and broken shell?
Far thence by us unheard,
He sings, rejoicing in the woods to dwell:
Thou of the sunshine born,

Take the bright wings of morn!
Thy hope springs heavenward from yon ruin'd cell.

THE BELL AT SEA.

The dangerous islet called the Bell Rock, on the coast of Fife, used formerly to be marked only by a bell, which was so placed as to be swung by the motion of the waves, when the tide rose above the rock. A lighthouse has since been erected there.

WHEN the tide's billowy swell

Had reach'd its height,

Then toll'd the rock's lone bell,
Sternly by night.

THE SUBTERRANEAN STREAM.

Far over cliff and surge

Swept the deep sound,

Making each wild wind's dirge
Still more profound.

Yet that funereal tone
The sailor bless'd,

Steering through darkness on

With fearless breast.

E'en so may we, that float
On life's wide sea,
Welcome each warning note,
Stern though it be!

THE SUBTERRANEAN STREAM.

"Thou stream,

Whose source is inaccessibly profound,

Whither do thy mysterious waters tend?
-Thou imagest my life."

DARKLY thou glidest onward,

Thou deep and hidden wave!

The laughing sunshine hath not look'd

Into thy secret cave.

Thy current makes no music.
A hollow sound we hear,

A muffled voice of mystery,
And know that thou art near.

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No brighter line of verdure
Follows thy lonely way;
No fairy moss, or lily's cup,
Is freshen'd by thy play.

The halcyon doth not seek thee,

Her glorious wings to lave;

Thou know'st no tint of the summer sky,

Thou dark and hidden wave!

Yet once will day behold thee,
When to the mighty sea,

Fresh bursting from their cavern'd veins,

Leap thy lone waters free.

There wilt thou greet the sunshine
For a moment, and be lost,
With all thy melancholy sounds,
In the ocean's billowy host.

Oh! art thou not, dark river,

Like the fearful thoughts untold,
Which haply in the hush of night
O'er many a soul have roll'd?

Those earth-born strange misgivings-
Who hath not felt their power?
Yet who hath breathed them to his friend,
E'en in his fondest hour?

They hold no heart communion,
They find no voice in song,
They dimly follow far from earth

The grave's departed throng.

THE SILENT MULTITUDE.

Wild is their course, and lonely,

And fruitless in man's breast;

They come and go, and leave no trace
Of their mysterious guest.

Yet surely must their wanderings,
At length, be like thy way;
Their shadows, as thy waters, lost
In one bright flood of day!

THE SILENT MULTITUDE.

"For we are many in our solitudes."

A MIGHTY and a mingled throng
Were gather'd in one spot;

Lament of Tasso

The dwellers of a thousand homes-
Yet 'midst them voice was not.

The soldier and his chief were there-
The mother and her child:

The friends, the sisters of one hearth-
None spoke-none moved-none smiled.

There lovers met, between whose lives
Years had swept darkly by;

After that heart-sick hope deferr'd-
They met but silently.

You might have heard the rustling leaf,
The breeze's faintest sound,

The shiver of an insect's wing,

On that thick-peopled ground.

183

Your voice to whispers would have died,
For the deep quiet's sake;

Your tread the softest moss have sought,
Such stillness not to break.

What held the countless multitude
Bound in that spell of peace?
How could the ever-sounding life
Amid so many cease?

Was it some pageant of the air—

Some glory high above,

That link'd and hush'd those human souls

In reverential love?

Or did some burdening passion's weight
Hang on their indrawn breath?
Awe-the pale awe that freezes words?
Fear the strong fear of death?

-

A mightier thing-Death, Death himself
Lay on each lonely heart!

Kindred were there-yet hermits all-
Thousands, but each apart.

THE ANTIQUE SEPULCHRE.'

O EVER joyous band

Of revellers amidst the southern vines !

"Les sarcophages même chez les anciens, ne rappellent que des idées guerrières ou riantes:-on voit des jeux, des danses, representés en bas-relief sur les tombeaux."

Corinne.

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