And wildwood echoes to the stream replying,
Mourn that the voices on the waters dying
Return no more!
But now the soft south-wind all gently wooeth
Our little barque, to leave the flower-gemmed shore; And the light breeze that perfume round us streweth, This fairy basin soon will waft us o'er;
Then while soft zephyrs, round us faintly blowing,
Bear wordless voices from the forest deep,
We'll listen to the waters' ceaseless flowing,
And watch the wavelets dancing on,
With rapid oar, the water-lilies parting,
Whose snowy petals form the Naiad's wreath,
Soon o'er the crystal fountain swiftly darting,
We cast our gaze a hundred feet beneath!
Between two heavens of purest blue suspended,
Above these fairy realms we float at will,
Where crystal grottos lift their columns splendid,
Formed of rare gems of pearl and emerald, blended
With magic skill.
Now in the west the gold and crimson blending,
Tell that soft twilight falleth o'er the world;
And on the breeze all noiselessly descending,
The dew-drops lie in lily-cups impearled.
All thought is lost in sweet bewildering fancies,
While from the forest dies the light of day;
And witching silence every spell enhances,
As o'er the wave the last glad sunbeam glances,
Then fades away!
Farewell, Wachulla! sadly must I sever
My spirit from thy sweet bewildering spell;
I leave thee, fairy fount, perhaps forever,
And mournfully I bid thee now — farewell!
Yet still thy loveliness my soul o'erpowers,
While dreamy shadows on the forest fall, –
And long shall memories of thy beauteous bowers
Fall on my heart like dew on summer flowers,
Refreshing all!
Washington, D. C.
A SECOND REVIEW OF THE GRAND ARMY.
READ last night of the Grand Review
In Washington's chiefest avenue,
Two Hundred Thousand men in blue,
I think they said was the number,
Till I seemed to hear their trampling feet,
The bugle blast and the drum's quick beat,
The clatter of hoofs in the stony street,
The cheers of people who came to greet,
And the thousand details that to repeat
Would only my verse encumber,
Till I fell in a revery, sad and sweet,
And then to a fitful slumber.
When, lo! in a vision I seemed to stand
In the lonely Capitol. On each hand
Far stretched the portico; dim and grand
Its columns ranged, like a martial band
Of sheeted spectres whom some command
Had called to a last reviewing.
And the streets of the city were white and bare, No footfall echoed across the square;
But out of the misty midnight air
I heard in the distance a trumpet blare,
And the wandering night-winds seemed to bear
The sound of a far tattooing.
Then I held my breath with fear and dread;
For into the square, with a brazen tread,
There rode a figure whose stately head
O'erlooked the review that morning,
That never bowed from its firm-set seat
When the living column passed its feet,
Yet now rode steadily up the street
To the phantom bugle's warning:
Till it reached the Capitol square, and wheeled,
And there in the moonlight stood revealed
A well-known form that in state and field
Had led our patriot sires;
Whose face was turned to the sleeping camp,
Afar through the river's fog and damp,
That showed no flicker, nor waning lamp,
Nor wasted bivouac fires.
And I saw a phantom army come,
With never a sound of fife or drum,
But keeping time to a throbbing hum
Of wailing and lamentation:
The martyred heroes of Malvern Hill,
Of Gettysburg and Chancellorsville,
The men whose wasted figures fill
The patriot graves of the nation.
And there came the nameless dead, — the men
Who perished in fever-swamp and fen,
The slowly starved of the prison-pen.
And, marching beside the others,
Came the dusky martyrs of Pillow's fight,
With limbs enfranchised and bearing bright:
I thought perhaps 't was the pale moonlight-
They looked as white as their brothers!
And so all night marched the Nation's dead,
With never a banner above them spread,
Nor a badge, nor a motto brandishèd;
No mark save the bare uncovered head
Of the silent bronze Reviewer;
With never an arch save the vaulted sky;
With never a flower save those that lie
On the distant graves- for love could buy
No gift that was purer or truer.
So all night long swept the strange array;
So all night long, till the morning gray,
I watched for one who had passed away,
With a reverent awe and wonder,
Till a blue cap waved in the lengthening line,
And I knew that one who was kin of mine
Had come; and I spake and lo! that sign
Awakened me from my slumber.
SPRING AT THE CAPITAL.
THE poplar drops beside the way
Its tasselled plumes of silver-gray;
The chestnut pouts its great brown buds, impatient for the laggard May.
The honeysuckles lace the wall;
The hyacinths grow fair and tall;
And mellow sun and pleasant wind and odorous bees are over all.
Down looking in this snow-white bud,
How distant seems the war's red flood!
How far remote the streaming wounds, the sickening scent of human blood!
For Nature does not recognize
This strife that rends the earth and skies; No war-dreams vex the winter sleep of clover-heads and daisy-eyes.
She holds her even way the same,
Though navies sink or cities flame;
A snowdrop is a snowdrop still, despite the nation's joy or shame.
When blood her grassy altar wets,
She sends the pitying violets
To heal the outrage with their bloom, and cover it
|