Yet did I never breathe its pure serene

Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez, when with eagle eyes
He stared at the Pacific, and all his men
Looked at each other with a wild surmise-
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.

HERE pause:

pause: these

ADONAIS.

PERCY BYSSHe Shelley.

graves are all too young as yet To have outgrown the sorrow which consigned Its charge to each; and if the seal is set,

Here, on one fountain of a mourning mind, Break it not thou! too surely shalt thou find Thine own well full, if thou returnest home,

Of tears and gall. From the world's bitter wind Seek shelter in the shadow of the tomb.

What Adonais is, why fear we to become?

The One remains, the many change and pass; Heaven's light forever shines, Earth's shadows fly; Life, like a dome of many-colored glass,

Stains the white radiance of Eternity,

Until Death tramples it to fragments. — Die, If thou wouldst be with that which thou dost seek! Follow where all is fled! - Rome's azure sky,

Flowers, ruins, statues, music, words are weak
The glory they transfuse with fitting truth to speak.

Why linger, why turn back, why shrink, my Heart ?
Thy hopes are gone before: from all things here
They have departed; thou shouldst now depart!
A light is past from the revolving year,
And man, and woman; and what still is dear
Attracts to crush, repels to make thee wither.
The soft sky smiles,

the low wind whispers near:

'Tis Adonais calls! oh, hasten thither,

No more let Life divide what Death can join together.

That light whose smile kindles the Universe,

That Beauty in which all things work and move, That Benediction which the eclipsing Curse

Of birth can quench not, that sustaining Love Which through the web of being blindly wove By man and beast and earth and air and sea,

Burns bright or dim, as each are mirrors of
The fire for which all thirst, now beams on me,
Consuming the last clouds of cold mortality.

The breath whose might I have invoked in song
Descends on me; my spirit's bark is driven
Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng
Whose sails were never to the tempest given;
The massy earth and spherèd skies are riven!
I am borne darkly, fearfully afar;

Whilst burning through the inmost veil of Heaven, The soul of Adonais, like a star,

Beacons from the abode where the Eternal are.

HESTER.

CHARLES LAMB.

WHEN maidens such as Hester die,
Their place ye may not well supply,
Though ye among a thousand try,
With vain endeavor.

A month or more hath she been dead,
Yet cannot I by force be led
To think upon the wormy bed
And her together.

A springy motion in her gait,
A rising step did indicate

Of pride and joy no common rate
That flushed her spirit;

I know not by what name beside
I shall it call,-if 'twas not pride,
It was a joy to that allied

She did inherit.

Her parents held the Quaker rule
Which doth the human feeling cool,

But she was trained in Nature's school-
Nature had blessed her.

A waking eye, a prying mind,

A heart that stirs is hard to bind,

A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blindYe could not Hester.

My sprightly neighbor gone before
To that unknown and silent shore!
Shall we not meet as heretofore
Some summer morning,

When from thy cheerful eyes, a ray
Hath struck a bliss upon the day -
A bliss that would not go away ·
A sweet forewarning?

THREE

LUCY.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

years she grew in sun and shower;
Then Nature said, "A lovelier flower
On earth was never sown ;
This child I to myself will take;

She shall be mine, and I will make
A lady of my own.

66

Myself will to my darling be

Both law and impulse; and with me

The girl, in rock and plain,

In earth and heaven, in glade and bower,

Shall feel an overseeing power

To kindle or restrain.

"The floating clouds their state shall lend

To her; for her the willow bend:

Nor shall she fail to see,

Even in the motions of the storm,

Grace that shall mould the maiden's form By silent sympathy.

"The stars of midnight shall be dear

To her; and she shall lean her ear

In many a secret place

Where rivulets dance their wayward round; And beauty, born of murmuring sound, Shall pass into her face.

"And vital feelings of delight

Shall rear her form to stately height,
Her virgin bosom swell:
Such thoughts to Lucy I will give,
While she and I together live
Here in this happy dell."

So Nature spoke; the work was done;
How soon my Lucy's race was run!
She died and left to me

This heath, this calm and quiet scene,
The memory of what has been

And nevermore shall be.

KILVANY.

JOHN HAY.

THE Song of Kilvany. Fairest she
In all the land of Savatthe.
She had one child, as sweet and gay,
As dear to her as the light of day.