The spaces of the universe;
Since everywhere the Spirit walks
The garden of the heart, and talks
With man, as under Eden's trees,
In all his varied languages.
Why mourn above some hopeless flaw
In the stone tables of the law,
When scripture every day afresh
Is traced on tablets of the flesh?
By inward sense, by outward signs,
God's presence still the heart divines;
Through deepest joy of Him we learn,
In sorest grief to Him we turn,
And reason stoops its pride to share
The child-like instinct of a prayer."

And then, as is my wont, I told
A story of the days of old,
Not found in printed books,
sooth,

A fancy, with slight hint of truth,
Showing how differing faiths agree
In one sweet law of charity.
Meanwhile the sky had golden grown,
Our faces in its glory shone;

But shadows down the valley swept,
And gray below the ocean slept,

And vales of vine, at Lisbon's harbormouth.

The date-palms rustled not; the peepul laid

Its topmost boughs against the balus. trade,

Then to the woman at his feet he said: "Tell me, O Miriam, something thou hast read

In childhood of the Master of thy faith, Whom Islam also owns. Our Prophet saith:

'He was a true apostle, yea, -a Word And Spirit sent before me from the Lord.'

Thus the Book witnesseth; and well I know

By what thou art, O dearest, it is so. As the lute's tone the maker's hand betrays,

The sweet disciple speaks her Master's praise."

Then Miriam, glad of heart, (for in

some sort

She cherished in the Moslem's liberal

And, through her life of sense, the undefiled

And chaste ideal of the sinless One Gazed on her with an eye she might not shun,

The sad, reproachful look of pity, born Of love that hath no part in wrath or scorn,)

Began, with low voice and moist eyes, to tell

Of the all-loving Christ, and what befell When the fierce zealots, thirsting for her blood,

Dragged to his feet a shame of womanhood.

How, when his searching answer pierced within

Each heart, and touched the secret of its sin,

And her accusers fled his face before,
He bade the poor one go and sin no

more.

And Akbar said, after a moment's thought,

"Wise is the lesson by thy prophet taught;

Woe unto him who judges and forgets
What hidden evil his own heart besets!
Something of this large charity I find
In all the sects that sever human kind;
I would to Allah that their lives agreed
More nearly with the lesson of their
creed!

Those yellow Lamas who at Meerut pray By wind and water power, and love to say:

'He who forgiveth not shall, unforgiven,

Fail of the rest of Buddha,' and who

court

The sweet traditions of a Christian child;

345

He knew thee not, he did but seek his own;

Who, in the very shadow of thy throne, Sharing thy bounty, knowing all thou art,

Greatest and best of men, and in her heart

Grateful to tears for favor undeserved, Turned ever homeward, nor one moment swerved

From her young love. He looked into my eyes,

He heard my voice, and could not otherwise

Than he hath done; yet, save one wild embrace

When first we stood together face to face,

And all that fate had done since last we met

Seemed but a dream that left us children yet,

He hath not wronged thee nor thy royal bed;

Spare him, O king! and slay me in his stead!"

Well spake thy prophet, Miriam, — he alone

Who hath not sinned is meet to cast a

forgives

"He who all things

Conquers himself and all things else, and lives

Above the reach of wrong or hate or fear,

Calm as the gods, to whom he is most dear."

Two leagues from Agra still the traveller sees

The tomb of Akbar through its cypresstrees;

And,

near at hand, the marble walls that hide

The Christian Begum sleeping at his side.

And o'er her vault of burial (who shall tell

If it be chance alone or miracle ?)
The Mission press with tireless hand

The

unrolls

words of Jesus on its lettered scrolls,

Tells, in all tongues, the tale of mercy o'er,

And bids the guilty, "Go and sin no

more !"

It now was dew-fall; very still The night lay on the lonely hill, Down which our homeward steps we bent,

And, silent, through great silence went,

Save that the tireless crickets played
Their long, monotonous serenade.
A young moon, at its narrowest,
Curved sharp against the darkening
west;

And, momently, the beacon's star,
Slow wheeling o'er its rock afar,
From out the level darkness shot
One instant and again was not.
And then my friend spake quietly
The thought of both: "Yon crescent

see !

Like Islam's symbol-moon it gives
Hints of the light whereby it lives:
Somewhat of goodness, something true
From sun and spirit shining through
All faiths, all worlds, as through the

dark

Of ocean shines the lighthouse spark,
Attests the presence everywhere
Of love and providential care.

[Norembega, or Norimbegue, is the name given by early French fishermen and explorers to a fabulous country south of Cape Breton, first discovered by Verrazzani in 1524. It was supposed to have a magnificent city of the same name on a great river, probably the Penobscot. The site of this barbaric city is laid down on a map published at Antwerp in 1570. In 1604 Champlain sailed in search of the Northern Eldorado, twenty-two leagues up the Penobscot from the Isle Haute. He supposed the river to be that of Norembega, but wisely came to the conclusion that those travellers who told of the great city had never seen it. He saw no evidences of anything like civilization, but mentions the finding of a cross, very old and mossy, in the woods.]

THE winding way the serpent takes
The mystic water took,

From where, to count its beaded lakes,
The forest sped its brook.

A narrow space 'twixt shore and shore,
For sun or stars to fall,
While evermore, behind, before,
Closed in the forest wall.

The dim wood hiding underneath

Wan flowers without a name; Life tangled with decay and death, League after league the same.

Unbroken over swamp and hill

The rounding shadow lay, Save where the river cut at will A pathway to the day.

Beside that track of air and light,

Weak as a child unweaned,
At shut of day a Christian knight
Upon his henchman leaned.

The embers of the sunset's fires

Along the clouds burned down; "I see," he said, "the domes and spires Of Norembega town."

"Alack! the domes, O master mine, Are golden clouds on high;

Yon spire is but the branchless pine
That cuts the evening sky."

"O hush and hark! What sounds are these

But chants and holy hymns?" "Thou hear'st the breeze that stirs the trees

Through all their leafy limbs."

"Is it a chapel bell that fills

The air with its low tone?" "Thou hear'st the tinkle of the rills, The insect's vesper drone."

"The Christ be praised!- He sets for me
A blessed cross in sight!
"Now, nay, 't is but yon blasted tree
With two gaunt arms outright!"

"Be it wind so sad or tree so stark,
It mattereth not, my knave;
Methinks to funeral hymns I hark,
The cross is for my grave!

"My life is sped; I shall not see
My home-set sails again;
The sweetest eyes of Normandie
Shall watch for me in vain.

"Yet onward still to ear and eye
The baffling marvel calls;

I fain would look before I die
On Norembega's walls.

"So, haply, it shall be thy part
At Christian feet to lay
The mystery of the desert's heart
My dead hand plucked away.
"Leave me an hour of rest; go
And look from yonder heights;
Perchance the valley even now
Is starred with city lights."

thou

The henchman climbed the nearest hill, He saw nor tower nor town,