Where the glare and the glitter and tinsel of Time Antony and Cleopatra. I AM dying, Egypt, dying, Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast, Thou, and thou alone, must hear. Though my scarred and veteran legions I must perish like a Roman, Die the great Triumvir still. Let not Cæsar's servile minions Mock the lion thus laid low; 'T was no foeman's arm that felled him 'T was his own that struck the blow,— Turned aside from glory's ray— Should the base plebeian rabble Weeps within her widowed home, As for thee, star-eyed Egyptian! I am dying, Egypt, dying; Hark! the insulting foeman's cry. Shall my heart exulting swell Isis and Osiris guard thee! Cleopatra, Rome, farewell! WILLIAM HAINES LYTLE. The Nautilus and the Ammonite. THE nautilus and the ammonite Were launched in friendly strife, Each sent to float in its tiny boat On the wide, wide sea of life. For each could swim on the ocean's brim, And sink to sleep in the great sea-deep, In its palace all of pearl. And theirs was a bliss more fair than this Which we taste in our colder clime; For they were rife in a tropic life— A brighter and better clime. They swam 'mid isles whose summer smiles Whose groves were palm, whose air was balm, They sailed all day through creek and bay, And at night they sank on a coral bank, And the monsters vast of ages past And hand in hand, from strand to strand, These fairy shells, with their crystal cells, And they came at last to a sea long past, The Almighty's breath spoke out in death, So the nautilus now in its shelly prow, Still seems to seek, in bay and creek, And alike do we, on life's stormy sea, As we roam from shore to shore, Yet the hope how sweet, again to meet, As we look to a distant strand, Where heart meets heart, and no more they part Who meet in that better land. ANONYMOUS. Carmen Bellicosum. In their ragged regimentals Yielding not, When the grenadiers were lunging, Cannon-shot; When the files Of the isles, [rampant From une smoky night encampment, bore the banner of the Unicorn, [drummer, And grummer, grummer, grummer rolled the roll of the Through the morn! Then with eyes to the front all, Stood our sires; And the balls whistled deadly, And in streams flashing redly As the roar On the shore, Swept the strong battle-breakers o'er the green-sodded acres Of the plain; And louder, louder, louder cracked the black gunpowder, Cracking amain! Now like smiths at their forges And the "villainous saltpetre" Rung a fierce, discordant metre As the swift Storm-drift, With hot sweeping anger, came the horse-guard's clangor On our flanks. Then higher, higher, higher burned the old-fashioned fire Through the ranks! Then the old-fashioned colonel And his broadsword was swinging, Trumpet loud. Then the blue Bullets flew, And the trooper-jackets redden at the touch of the leaden Rifle-breath; And rounder, rounder, rounder roared the iron six-pounder, Hurling death! GUY HUMPHREY MCMASTER. Doris. I SAT with Doris, the shepherd maiden; And she my Doris, whose lap incloses Wild summer roses of faint perfume, The while I sued her, kept hushed and hearkened |