Those stars, content,-where last her song had gone,―
They, mute and cold in radiant life,—as soon
Their singer was to be, in darksome death? *
Bring your vain answers-cry, "We think of thee!"
How think ye of her? warm in long ago
Delights? or crowned with budding bays? Not so.
None smile and none are crowned where lieth she,—
With all her visions unfulfilled, save one—
Her childhood's-of the palm-trees in the sun—
And lo! their shadow on her sepulchre !
"Do ye think of me as I think of you ?”—
O friends, O kindred,-O dear brotherhood
Of all the world! what are we, that we should
For covenants of long affection sue?
Why press so near each other, when the touch
Is barred by graves? Not much, and yet too much,
Is this "Think of me as I think of you.”
But while on mortal lips I shape anew
A sigh to mortal issues,―verily
Above the unshaken stars that see us die,
A vocal pathos rolls! and HE who drew
All life from dust, and for all, tasted death,
By death and life and love, appealing, saith,
Do you think of me as I think of you?
WHEN last before her people's face her own fair face she bent,
Within the meek projection of that shade she was content
To erase the child-smile from her lips, which seemed as if it might
Be still kept holy from the world to childhood still in sight-
* Her lyric on the polar star came home with her latest papers.
To erase it with a solemn vow,-a princely vow—to rule—
A priestly vow-to rule by grace of God the pitiful,—
A very godlike vow-to rule in right and righteousness,
And with the law and for the land!-so God the vower bless!
The minster was alight that day, but not with fire, I ween,
And long-drawn glitterings swept adown that mighty aisled
The priests stood stoled in their pomp, the sworded chiefs in theirs,
And so, the collared knights,-and so, the civil ministers,-
And so, the waiting lords and dames--and little pages best
At holding trains—and legates so, from countries east and west-
So, alien princes, native peers, and high-born ladies bright,
Along whose brows the Queen's, new crowned, flashed coronets
to light.-
And so, the people at the gates, with priestly hands on high,
Which bring the first anointing to all legal majesty.
And so, the DEAD-who lie in rows beneath the minster floor,
There, verily an awful state maintaining evermore—
The statesman, whose clean palm will kiss no bribe whate'er
The courtier, who, for no fair queen, will rise up to his knee; The court-dame, who, for no court-tire, will leave her shroud
The laureate, who no courtlier rhyme than "dust to dust" can
The kings and queens, who, having made that vow and worn that crown,
Descended unto lower thrones and darker, deep adown!
Dieu et mon droit-what is't to them ?-what meaning can it have?
The King of kings, the rights of death-God's judgment and the grave!
And when betwixt the quick and dead the young fair Queen had vowed,
The living shouted "May she live! Victoria, live!" aloud—
And as the loyal shouts went up, true spirits prayed between,
"The blessings happy monarchs have, be thine, O crownèd
Queen!"
But now before her people's face she bendeth hers anew,
And calls them, while she vows, to be her witness thereunto.
She vowed to rule, and, in that oath, her childhood put away—
She doth maintain her womanhood, in vowing love to-day.
O lovely lady!-let her vow!—such lips become such vows,
And fairer goeth bridal wreath than crown with vernal brows.
O lovely lady!-let her vow !-yea, let her vow to love !—
And though she be no less a queen-with purples hung above,
The pageant of a court behind, the royal kin around,
And woven gold to catch her looks turned maidenly to ground,—
Yet may the bride-veil hide from her a little of that state,
While loving hopes, for retinues, about her sweetness wait.
SHE VOWS to love, who vowed to rule-the chosen at her side;
Let none say, God preserve the Queen !-but rather, Bless the
bride!
None blow the trump, none bend the knee, none violate the dream
Wherein no monarch, but a wife, she to herself may seem.
Or if ye say, Preserve the Queen !—oh, breathe it inward low-
She is a woman, and beloved!-and 'tis enough but so.
Count it enough, thou noble prince, who tak'st her by the hand,
And claimest for thy lady-love, our lady of the land!
And since, Prince Albert, men have called thy spirit high and
rare,
And true to truth and brave for truth, as some at Augsburg were,—
We charge thee by thy lofty thoughts, and by thy poet-mind,
Which not by glory and degree takes measure of mankind,
Esteem that wedded hand less dear for sceptre than for ring,
And hold her uncrowned womanhood to be the royal thing.
And now, upon our Queen's last vow, what blessings shall we pray?
None, straitened to a shallow crown, will suit our lips to-day.
Behold, they must be free as love-they must be broad as free,
Even to the borders of heaven's light and earth's humanity.
Long live she!-send up loyal shouts and true hearts pray
between,-
"The blessings happy PEASANTS have, be thine, Ọ crownèd Queen!"
NAPOLEON!-years ago, and that great word,
Compact of human breath in hate and dread
And exultation, skied us overhead—
An atmosphere whose lightning was the sword,
Scathing the cedars of the world,-drawn down
In burnings, by the metal of a crown.
Napoleon! Nations, while they cursed that name,
Shook at their own curse; and while others bore
Its sound, as of a trumpet, on before,
Brass-fronted legions justified its fame—
And dying men, on trampled battle-sods,
Near their lost silence, uttered it for God's.
Napoleon! Sages, with high foreheads drooped,
Did use it for a problem: children small
Leapt up to greet it, as at manhood's call:
Priests blessed it from their altars overstooped
By meek-eyed Christs,-and widows with a moan
Spake it, when questioned why they sate alone.
That name consumed the silence of the snows
In Alpine keeping, holy and cloud-hid,
The mimic eagles dared what Nature's did,
And over-rushed her mountainous repose
In search of eyries: and the Ægyptian river
Mingled the same word with its grand "For ever.”
That name was shouted near the pyramidal
Ægyptian tombs, whose mummied habitants,
Packed to humanity's significance,
Motioned it back with stillness. Shouts as idle
As hireling artists' work of myrrh and spice,
Which swathed last glories round the Ptolemies.
The world's face changed to hear it. Kingly men
Came down, in chidden babes' bewilderment,
From autocratic places-each content
With sprinkled ashes for anointing :-then
The people laughed or wondered for the nonce,
To see one throne a composite of thrones.
Napoleon and the torrid vastitude
Of India felt, in throbbings of the air,
That name which scattered by disastrous blare
All Europe's bound lines,-drawn afresh in blood.
Napoleon-from the Russias, west to Spain!
And Austria trembled―till ye heard her chain.
And Germany was 'ware-and Italy,
Oblivious of old flames-her laurel-locked,
High-ghosted Cæsars passing uninvoked,—
Did crumble her own ruins with her knee,
To serve a newer.-Ay! and Frenchmen cast
A future from them, nobler than her past.
For, verily, though France augustly rose
With that raised NAME, and did assume by such
The purple of the world,-none gave so much
As she, in purchase-to speak plain, in loss
Whose hands, to freedom stretched, dropped paralyzed To wield a sword, or fit an undersized
King's crown to a great man's head. And though along
Her Paris' streets did float on frequent streams
Of triumph, pictured or emmarbled dreams,
Dreamt right by genius in a world gone wrong,-
No dream, of all so won, was fair to see
As the lost vision of her liberty.
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