Spirits moving musically, To a lute's well-tuned law, Round about a throne where, sitting (Porphyrogene!) In state his glory well befitting, The ruler of the realm was seen. And all with pearl and ruby glowing Was the fair palace door, Through which came flowing, flowing, flowing, And sparkling evermore, A troop of Echoes, whose sweet duty In voices of surpassing beauty, The wit and wisdom of their king. But evil things, in robes of sorrow, Assailed the monarch's high estate. And travellers, now, within that valley, A hideous throng rush out for ever LENORE. Ah! broken is the golden bowl! the spirit flown forever! Let the bell toll!gian river; And, Guy De Vere, hast thou no tear?-weep now or never more! —a saintly soul floats on the Sty See! on yon drear and rigid bier low lies thy love, Lenore! Come! let the burial rite be read-the funeral song be sung! An anthem for the queenliest dead that ever died so young A dirge for her the doubly dead in that she died so young. "Wretches! ye loved her for her wealth and hated her for her pride, And when she fell in feeble health, ye blessed herthat she died! How shall the ritual, then, be read?-the requiem how be sung By you-by yours, the evil eye,-by yours the slanderous tongue That did to death the innocence that died, and died so young?" Peccavimus; but rave not thus! and let a Sabbath song Go up to God so solemnly the dead may feel no wrong! The sweet Lenore hath "gone before," with Hope, that flew beside, Leaving thee wild for the dear child that should have been thy bride For her, the fair and debonair, that now so lowly lies, The life upon her yellow hair but not within her eyes The life still there, upon her hair-the death upon her eyes. "Avaunt! to-night my heart is light. No dirge will I upraise, But waft the angel on her flight with a Pean of old days! Let no bell toll;-lest her sweet soul, amid its hallowed mirth, Should catch the note, as it doth float-up from the damnéd Earth. To friends above, from fiends below, the indignant ghost is riven From Hell unto a high estate far up within the Heaven From grief and groan, to a golden throne, beside the King of Heaven." THE RAVEN. Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary, Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore, While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping, As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. ""Tis some visiter," I muttered, tapping at my chamber door Only this, and nothing more." Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December, And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor. Eagerly I wished the morrow;-vainly I had sought to borrow From my books surcease of sorrow-sorrow for the lost Lenore For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore Nameless here for evermore. And the silken sad uncertain rustling of each purple curtain Thrilled me-filled me with fantastic terrors never felt before; So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood repeating ""Tis some visiter entreating entrance at my chamber door Some late visiter entreating entrance at my chamber door; This it is, and nothing more." Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer, "Sir," said I," or Madam, truly your forgiveness I implore; But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping, And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door, That I scarce was sure I heard you"-here I opened wide the door ; Darkness there, and nothing more. Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing, Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before; But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no token, And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore!" This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore!" Merely this, and nothing more. Back into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning, Soon I heard again a tapping somewhat louder than before. "Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window lattice; Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore Let my heart be still a moment and this mystery explore;"Tis the wind and nothing more!" Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter, In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore; Not the least obeisance made he; not an instant stopped or stayed he; But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door Perched upon a bust of Pallas just above my chamber door Perched, and sat, and nothing more. Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore, "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art sure no craven, Ghastly grim and ancient raven wandering from the Nightly shore Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night's Plutonian shore!" Quoth the raven, "Nevermore." Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly, Though its answer little meaning-little relevancy bore; For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber door Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber door, With such a name as "Nevermore." But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour Nothing farther then he uttered-not a feather then he fluttered Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other friends have flown before On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before." Then the bird said "Nevermore." Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, "Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore Meant in croaking "Nevermore." This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing To the fowl whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's core; This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er, But whose velvet violet lining with the lamplight gloating o'er, She shall press, ah, nevermore! Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed Quaff, oh, quaff, this kind nepenthe and forget this lost Lenore!" Quoth the raven, "Nevermore." "Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil!-prophet still, if bird or devil! Whether Tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore, Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted On this home by Horror haunted-tell me truly, I implore Is there is there balm in Gilead?-tell mc-tell me, I implore!" 66 Quoth the raven, "Nevermore." Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil-prophet still, if bird or devil! By that Heaven that bends above us-by that God we both adore Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the dis Quoth the raven, "Nevermore." 'Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!" I shrieked, upstarting "Get thee back into the tempest and the Night's Plutonian shore! Leave no black plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath spoken! Leave my loneliness unbroken!-quit the bust above my door! Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!" Quoth the raven, "Nevermore." And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door; And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming, And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor; And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor Shall be lifted-nevermore! A DESCENT INTO THE MAELSTROM. The ways of God in Nature, as in Providence, are not as our ways; nor are the models that we frame any way commensu rate to the vastness, profundity, and unsearchableness of His works, which have a depth in them greater than the well of Democritus.-Joseph Glanville. We had now reached the summit of the loftiest crag. For some minutes the old man seemed too much exhausted to speak. Not long ago," said he at length, "and I could have guided you on this route as well as the young. est of my sons; but, about three years past, there happened to me an event such as never happened before to mortal man-or at least such as no man ever survived to tell of-and the six hours of deadly terror which I then endured have broken me up body and soul. You suppose me a very old man— but I am not. It took less than a single day to change these hairs from a jetty black to white, to weaken my limbs, and to unstring my nerves, so that I tremble at the least exertion, and am frightened at a shadow. Do you know I can scarcely look over this little cliff without getting giddy?" The little cliff," upon whose edge he had so carelessly thrown himself down to rest that the weightier portion of his body hung over it, while he was only kept from falling by the tenure of his elbow on its extreme and slippery edge-this "little cliff" arose, a sheer unobstructed precipice of black shining rock, some fifteen or sixteen hundred feet from the world of crags beneath us. Nothing would have tempted me to within half a dozen yards of its brink. In truth so deeply was I excited by the perilous position of my companion, that I fell at full length upon the ground, clung to the shrubs around me, and dared not even glance upward at the sky-while I struggled in vain to divest myself of the idea that the very foundations of the mountain were in danger from the fury of the winds. It was long before I could reason myself into sufficient courage to sit up and look out into the distance. "You must get over these fancies," said the guide, "for I have brought you here that you might have the best possible view of the scene of that event I mentioned-and to tell you the whole story with the spot just under your eye." Myself and my two brothers once owned a schooner-rigged smack of about seventy tons burthen, with which we were in the habit of fishing among the islands beyond Moskoe, nearly to Vurrgh. In all violent eddies at sea there is good fishing, at proper opportunities, if one has only the courage to attempt it; but among the whole of the Lofoden coastmen, we three were the only ones who made a regular business of going out to the islands, as I tell you. The usual grounds are a great way lower down to the southward. There fish can be got at all hours, without much risk, and therefore these places are preferred. The choice spots over here among the rocks, however, not only yield the finest variety, but in far greater abundance; so that we often got in a single day, what the more timid of the craft could not scrape together in a week. In fact, we made it a matter of desperate speculation-the risk of life standing instead of labor, and courage answering for capital. "We kept the smack in a cove about five miles higher up the const than this; and it was our prac tice, in fine weather, to take advantage of the fifteen minutes' slack to push across the main channel of the Moskoe-ström, far above the pool, and then drop down upon anchorage somewhere near Otterholm, or Sandflesen, where the eddies are not so violent as elsewhere. Here we used to remain until nearly time for slack-water again, when we weighed and made for home. We never set out upon this expedition without a steady side-wind for going and coming -one that we felt sure would not fail us before our return-and we seldom made a miscalculation upon this point. Twice, during six years, we were forced to stay all night at anchor on account of a dead calm, which is a rare thing indeed just about here ; and once we had to remain on the grounds nearly a week, starving to death, owing to a gale which blew up shortly after our arrival, and made the channel too boisterous to be thought of. Upon this occasion we should have been driven out to sea in spite of everything (for the whirlpools threw us round and round so violently, that, at length, we fouled our anchor and dragged it), if it had not been that we drifted into one of the innumerable cross currentshere to-day and gone to-morrow-which drove us under the lee of Flimen, where, by good luck, we brought up. The "I could not tell you the twentieth part of the difficulties we encountered on the grounds'-it is a bad spot to be in, even in good weather--but we made shift always to run the gauntlet of the Moskoestrom itself without accident; although at times my heart has been in my mouth when we happened to be a minute or so behind or before the slack. wind sometimes was not as strong as we thought it at starting, and then we made rather less way than we could wish, while the current rendered the smack unmanageable. My eldest brother had a son eighteen years old, and I had two stout boys of my own. These would have been of great assistance at such times, in using the sweeps, as well as afterward in fishing-but, somehow, although we ran the risk ourselves, we had not the heart to let the young ones get into the danger-for, after all is said and done, it was a horrible danger, and that is the truth. It is now within a few days of three years since what I am going to tell you occurred. It was on the tenth day of July, 18-, a day which the people of this part of the world will never forget-for it was one in which blew the most terrible hurricane that ever came out of the heavens. And yet all the morning, and indeed until late in the afternoon, there was a gentle and steady breeze from the south-west, while the sun shone brightly, so that the oldest seaman amongst us could not have foreseen what was to follow. 66 We set out with a fresh wind on our starboard quarter, and for some time spanked along at a great rate, never dreaming of danger, for indeed we saw not the slightest reason to apprehend it. All at once we were taken aback by a breeze from over Helseggen. This was most unusual-something that had never happened to us before-and I began to feel a little uneasy, without exactly knowing why. We put the boat on the wind, but could make no headway at all for the eddies, and I was upon the point of proposing to return to the anchorage, when. looking astern, I saw the whole horizon covered with a singular copper-colored cloud that rose with the most amazing velocity. "In the meantime the breeze that had headed us off fell away, and we were dead becalmed, drifting about in every direction. This state of things, however, did not last long enough to give us time to think about it. In less than a minute the storm was upon us-in less than two the sky was entirely overcast and what with this and the driving spray, it became suddenly so dark that we could not see each other in the smack. "Such a hurricane as then blew it is folly to attempt describing. The oldest seaman in Norway never experienced any thing like it. We had let our sails go by the run before it cleverly took us; but, at the first puff, both our masts went by the board as if they had been sawed off-the mainmast taking with it my youngest brother, who had lashed himself to it for safety. "Our boat was the lightest feather of a thing that ever sat upon water. It had a complete flush deck, with only a small hatch near the bow, and this hatch it had always been our custom to batten down when about to cross the Ström, by way of precaution against the chopping seas. But for this circumstance we should have foundered at once-for we lay entirely buried for some moments. How my elder brother escaped destruction I cannot say, for I never had an opportunity of ascertaining. For my part, as soon as I had let the foresail run, I threw myself flat on deck, with my feet against the narrow gunwale of the bow, and with my hands grasping a ring-bolt near the foot of the foremast. It was mere instinct that prompted me to do this--which was undoubtedly the very best thing I could have done -for I was too much flurried to think. 'For some moments we were completely deluged, as I say, and all this time I held my breath, and clung to the bolt. When I could stand it no longer I raised myself upon my knees, still keeping hold with my hands, and thus got my head clear. Presently our little boat gave herself a shake, just as a dog does in coming out of the water, and thus rid herself, in some measure, of the seas. I was now trying to get the better of the stupor that had come over me, and to collect my senses so as to see what was to be done, when I felt somebody grasp my arm. was my elder brother, and my heart leaped for joy, for I had made sure that he was overboard-but the next moment all this joy was turned into horrorfor he put his mouth close to my ear, and screamed out the word Moskoe-ström !' It "No one ever will know what my feelings were at that moment. I shook from head to foot as if I had had the most violent fit of the ague. I knew what he meant by that one word well enough-I knew what he wished to make me understand. With the wind that now drove us on, we were bound for the whirl of the Ström, and nothing could save us! "You perceive that in crossing the Ström channel, we always went a long way up above the whirl, even in the calmest weather, and then had to wait and watch carefully for the slack-but now we were driving right upon the pool itself, and in such a hurricane as this! To be sure,' I thought, we shall get there just about the slack-there is some little hope in that--but in the next moment I cursed myself for being so great a fool as to dream of hope at all. I knew very well that we were doomed, had we been ten times a ninety-gun ship. "By this time the first fury of the tempest had spent itself, or perhaps we did not feel it so much, as we scudded before it, but at all events the seas, which at first had been kept down by the wind, and lay flat and frothing, now got up into absolute mountains. A singular change, too, had come over the heavens. Around in every direction it was still as black as pitch, but nearly overhead there burst out, all at once, a circular rift of clear sky-as clear as I ever saw-and of a deep bright blue-and through it there blazed forth the full moon with a lustre that I never before knew her to wear. She lit up everything about us with the greatest distinctness-but, O God, what a scene it was to light up! "I now made one or two attempts to speak to my brother-but, in some manner which I could not understand, the din had so increased that I could not make him hear a single word, although I screamed at the top of my voice in his ear. Presently he shook his head, looking as pale as death, and held up one of his fingers, as if to say 'listen l' At first I could not make out what he meantbut soon a hideous thought flashed upon me. I dragged my watch from its fob. It was not going. I glanced at its face by the moonlight, and then burst into tears as I flung it far away into the ocean. It had run down at seven o'clock! We were behind the time of the slack, and the whirl of the Strom was in full fury! "When a boat is well built, properly trimmed, and not deep laden, the waves in a strong gale, when she is going large, seem always to slip from beneath her-which appears very strange to a landsmanand this is what is called riding in sea phrase. Well, so far we had ridden the swells very cleverly; but presently a gigantic sea happened to take us right under the counter, and bore us with it as it rose-up -up-as if into the sky. I would not have believed that any wave could rise so high. And then down we came with a sweep, a slide, and a plunge, that made me feel sick and dizzy, as if I was falling from some ofty mountain-top in a dream. But while we were up I had thrown a quick glance around-and that one glance was all-sufficient. I saw our exact position in an instant. The Moskoe-strom whirlpool was about a quarter of a mile dead ahead-but no more like the every-day Moskoe-ström, than the whirl as you now see it is like a mill-race. If I had not known where we were, and what we had to expect, I should not have recognised the place at all. As it was, I involuntarily closed my eyes in horror. The lids clenched themselves together as if in a spasm. "It could not have been more than two minutes afterward until we suddenly felt the waves subside, and were enveloped in foam. The boat made a sharp half turn to larboard, and then shot off in its new direction like a thunderbolt. At the same moment the roaring noise of the water was completely drowned in a kind of shrill shriek--such a sound as you might imagine given out by the waste pipes of many thousand steam-vessels, letting off their steam all together. We were now in the belt of surf that always surrounds the whirl; and I thought, of course, that another moment would plunge us into the abyss-down which we could only see indistinctly on account of the amazing velocity with which we were borne along. The boat did not seem to sink into the water at all, but to skim like an airbubble upon the surface of the surge. Her starboard side was next the whirl, and on the larboard arose the world of ocean we had left. It stood like a huge writhing wall between us and the horizon. It may appear strange, but now, when we were in the very jaws of the gulf, I felt more composed than when we were only approaching it. Having made up my mind to hope no more, I got rid of great deal of that terror which unmanned me at first. I suppose it was despair that strung my nerves. "It may look like boasting-but what I tell you is truth-I began to reflect how magnificent a thing it was to die in such a manner, and how foolish it was in me to think of so paltry a consideration as my own individual life, in view of so wonderful a manifestation of God's power. I do believe that I blushed with shame when this idea crossed my mind. After a little while I became possessed with the keenest curiosity about the whirl itself. I positively felt a wish to explore its depths, even at the sacrifice I was going to make; and my principal grief was that I should never be able to tell my old companions on shore about the mysteries I should see. These, no doubt, were singular fancies to occupy a man's mind in such extremity-and I have often thought since, that the revolutions of the boat around the pool might have rendered me a little light-headed. "There was another circumstance which tended to restore my self-possession; and this was the cessation of the wind, which could not reach us in our present situation-for, as you saw yourself, the belt of surf is considerably lower than the general bed of the ocean, and this latter now towered above us, a high, black, mountainous ridge. If you have never been at sea in a heavy gale, you can form no idea of the confusion of mind occasioned by the wind and spray together. They blind, deafen, and strangle you, and take away all power of action or reflection. But we were now, in a great measure, rid of these annoyances just as death-condemned felons in prison are allowed petty indulgences, forbidden them while their doom is yet uncertain. 66 'How often we made the circuit of the belt it is impossible to say. We careered round and round for perhaps an hour, flying rather than floating, getting gradually more and more into the middle of the surge, and then nearer and nearer to its horrible inner edge. All this time I had never let go of the ring-bolt. My brother was at the stern, holding on to a small empty water-cask which had been securely lashed under the coop of the counter, and was the only thing on deck that had not been swept overboard when the gale first took us. As we approached the brink of the pit he let go his hold upon this, and made for the ring, from which, in the agony of his terror, he endeavored to force my hands, as it was not large enough to afford us both a secure grasp. I never felt deeper grief than when I saw him attempt this act-although I knew he was a madman when he did it—a raving maniac through sheer fright. I did not care, however, to contest the point with him. I knew it could make no difference whether either of us held on at all; so I let him have the bolt, and went astern to the cask. This there was no great difficulty in doing; for the smack flew round steadily enough, and upon an even keel-only swaying to and fro, with the immense sweeps and swelters of the whirl. Scarcely had I secured myself in my new position, when we gave a wild lurch to starboard, and rushed headlong into the abyss. I muttered a hurried prayer to God, and thought all was over. "As I felt the sickening sweep of the descent, I had instinctively tightened my hold upon the barrel, and closed my eyes. For some seconds I dared not open them-while I expected instant destruction, and wondered that I was not already in my deathstruggles with the water. But moment after moment elapsed. I still lived. The sense of falling had ceased; and the motion of the vessel seemed much as it had been before while in the belt of foam, with the exception that she now lay more along. I took courage, and looked once again upon the scene. 1 down, upon the interior surface of a funnel vast in circumference, prodigious in depth, and whose perfectly smooth sides might have been mistaken for ebony, but for the bewildering rapidity with which they spun around, and for the gleaming and ghastly radiance they shot forth, as the rays of the full moon, from that circular rift amid the clouds which I have already described, streamed in a flood of golden glory along the black walls, and far away down into the inmost recesses of the abyss. 46 At first I was too much confused to observe anything accurately. The general burst of terrifie grandeur was all that I beheld. When I recovered myself a little, however, my gaze fell instinctively downward. In this direction I was able to obtain an unobstructed view, from the manner in which the smack hung on the inclined surface of the pool. She was quite upon an even keel-that is to say, her deck lay in a plane parallel with that of the water -but this latter sloped at an angle of more than forty-five degrees, so that we seemed to be lying upon our beam-ends. I could not help observing, nevertheless, that I had scarcely more difficulty in maintaining my hold and footing in this situation, than if we had been upon a dead level; and this, I suppose, was owing to the speed at which we revolved. The rays of the moon seemed to search the very bottom of the profound gulf; but still I could make out nothing distinctly, on account of a thick mist in which everything there was enveloped, and over which there hung a magnificent rainbow, like that narrow and tottering bridge which Mussulmen say is the only pathway between Time and Eternity. This mist, or spray, was no doubt occasioned by the clashing of the great walls of the funnel, as they all met together at the bottom-but the yell that went up to the Heavens from out of that mist, I dare not attempt to describe. “Our first slide into the abyss itself, from the belt of foam above, had carried us a great distance down the slope; but our farther descent was by no means proportionate. Round and round we swept-not with any uniform movement-but in dizzying swings and jerks, that sent us sometimes only a few hundred yards-sometimes nearly the complete circuit of the whirl. Our progress downward, at each revolution, was slow, but very perceptible. Looking about me upon the wide waste of liquid ebony on which we were thus borne, I perceived that our boat was not the only object in the embrace of the whirl. Both above and below us were visible fragments of vessels, large masses of building timber and trunks of trees, with many smaller articles, such as pieces of house furniture, broken boxes, barrels and staves. I have already described the unnatural curiosity which had taken the place of my original ter rors. It appeared to grow upon me as I drew nearer and nearer to my dreadful doom. I now began to watch, with a strange interest, the numerous things that floated in our company. I must have been delirious-for I even sought amusement in speculating upon the relative velocities of their several descents toward the foam below. This fir tree,' I found myself at one time saying, will certainly be the next thing that takes the awful plunge and disappears.'-and then I was disappointed to find that the wreck of a Dutch merchant ship overtook it and went down before. At length, after making several guesses of this nature, and being deceived in all-this fact-the fact of my invariable miscalculation-set me upon a train of reflection that made my limbs again tremble, and my heart beat heavily once more. "It was not a new terror that thus affected me, but the dawn of a more exciting hope. This hope |