230 ALNWICK CASTLE. I wander'd through the lofty halls Each high, heroic name, From him who once his standard set Where now, o'er mosque and minaret, Glitter the Sultan's crescent moons; That last half stanza-it has dash'd And beasts and borderers throng the way; Men in the coal and cattle line; These are not the romantic times So dazzling to the dreaming boy : ALNWICK CASTLE, "Tis what "our President," Monroe, To modern laws, has felt their blow, The age of bargaining, said Burke, Has come to-day the turban'd Turk, (Sleep, Richard of the lion heart! Sleep on, nor from your cerements start,) For Greece and fame, for faith and Heaven, You'll ask if yet the Percy lives In the arm'd pomp of feudal state? Of Hotspur and his "gentle Kate," 231 232 DEATH OF AN INFANT. A chambermaid, whose lip and eye, And cheek, and brown hair, bright and curling, Spoke nature's aristocracy; And one, half groom, half seneschal, Who bow'd me through court, bower, and hall, For ten-and-sixpence sterling. DEATH OF AN INFANT. BY LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY. DEATH found strange beauty on that polish'd brow, And dash'd it out. On cheek and lip. And the rose faded. He touch'd the veins with ice, There spake a wisnful tenderness, a doubt Whether to grieve or sleep, which innocence For ever. There had been a murmuring sound With which the babe would claim its mother's ear, Charming her even to tears. The spoiler set The seal of silence. But there beam'd a smile, So fix'd, so holy, from that cherub brow, Death gazed, and left it there. He dared not steal The signet-ring of heaven, THE REAPER AND THE FLOWERS. BY HENRY W. LONGFELLOW. THERE is a Reaper, whose name is Death, He And, with his sickle keen, reaps the bearded grain at a breath, And the flowers that grow between. "Shall I have nought that is fair?" saith he; "Have nought but the bearded grain? Though the breath of these flowers is sweet to me, I will give them all back again." He gazed at the flowers with tearful eyes, He kiss'd their drooping leaves; It was for the Lord of Paradise He bound them in his sheaves. "My Lord has need of these flowerets gay," Where he was once a child. "They shall all bloom in fields of light, And saints, upon their garments white, And the mother gave, in tears and pain, She knew she should find them all again 20* (233) 234 DEMOCRACY. O, not in cruelty, not in wrath, DEMOCRACY. BY JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER. SPIRIT of Truth, and Love, and Light! Or wounds the generous ear of GOD! Beautiful yet thy temples rise, Though there profaning gifts are thrown; And fires unkindled of the skies Are glaring round thy altar-stone. Still sacred-though thy name be breathed Oh, ideal of my boyhood's time! The faith in which my father stood, Even when the sons of Lust and Crime Still to those courts my footsteps turn, I see the flame of Freedom burn The Kebla of the patriot's prayer! |