Chapter 6 ABRAM J. RYAN

The poems of Abram J. Ryan, better known as Father Ryan, are unambitious. The poet modestly wished to call them only verses; and, as he tells us, they "were written at random,-off and on, here, there, anywhere,-just as the mood came, with little of study and less of art, and always in a hurry." His poems do not exhibit a painstaking, polished art. They are largely emotional outpourings of a heart that readily found expression in fluent, melodious lays.

The poet-priest understood their character too well to assign them a very high place in the realm of song; yet the wish he expressed, that they might echo from heart to heart, has been fulfilled in no small degree. In Sentinel Songs he says:-

"I sing with a voice too low

To be heard beyond to-day,

In minor keys of my people's woe,

But my songs pass away.

"To-morrow hears them not-

To-morrow belongs to fame-

My songs, like the birds', will be forgot,

And forgotten shall be my name.

"And yet who knows? Betimes

The grandest songs depart,

While the gentle, humble, and low-toned rhymes

Will echo from heart to heart."

But few facts are recorded of Father Ryan's life. The memoir and the critique prefixed to the latest edition of his poems but poorly fulfill their design. Besides the absence of detail, there is an evident lack of taste and breadth of view. The poet's ecclesiastical relation is unduly magnified; and the invidious comparisons made and the immoderate laudation expressed are far from agreeable. But we are not left wholly at a loss. With the few recorded facts of his life as guide, the poems of Father Ryan become an interesting and instructive autobiography. He was a spontaneous singer whose inspiration came, not from distant fields of legend, history, science, but from his own experience; and it is not difficult to read there a romance, or rather a tragedy, which imparts a deep pathos to his life. His interior life, as reflected in his poems, is all of good report, in no point clashing with the moral excellence befitting the priestly office.

Abram J. Ryan was born in Norfolk, Virginia, August 15, 1839, whither his parents, natives of Ireland, had immigrated not long before. He possessed the quick sensibilities characteristic of the Celtic race; and his love for Ireland is reflected in a stout martial lyric entitled Erin's Flag:-

"Lift it up! lift it up! the old Banner of Green!

The blood of its sons has but brightened its sheen;

What though the tyrant has trampled it down,

Are its folds not emblazoned with deeds of renown?"

When he was seven or eight years old, his parents removed to St. Louis. He is said to have shown great aptitude in acquiring knowledge; and his superior intellectual gifts, associated with an unusual reverence for sacred things, early indicated the priesthood as his future vocation. In the autobiographic poem, Their Story Runneth Thus, we have a picture of his youthful character. With a warm heart, he had more than the changefulness of the Celtic temperament. In his boyhood, as throughout his maturity, he was strangely restless. As he says himself:-

"The boy was full of moods.

Upon his soul and face the dark and bright

Were strangely intermingled. Hours would pass

Rippling with his bright prattle-and then, hours

Would come and go, and never hear a word

Fall from his lips, and never see a smile

Upon his face. He was so like a cloud

With ever-changeful hues."

When his preliminary training was ended, he entered the Roman Catholic seminary at Niagara, New York. He was moved to the priesthood by a spirit of deep consecration. The writer of his memoir dwells on the regret with which he severed the ties binding him to home. No doubt he loved and honored his parents. But there was a still stronger attachment, which, broken by his call to the priesthood, filled all his subsequent life with a consecrated sorrow. It was his love for Ethel:-

"A fair, sweet girl, with great, brown, wond'ring eyes

That seemed to listen just as if they held

The gift of hearing with the power of sight."

The two lovers, forgetting the sacredness of true human affection, had, with equal self-abnegation, resolved to give themselves to the church, she as a nun and he as a priest. He has given a touching picture of their last meeting:-

"One night in mid of May their faces met

As pure as all the stars that gazed on them.

They met to part from themselves and the world.

Their hearts just touched to separate and bleed;

Their eyes were linked in look, while saddest tears

Fell down, like rain, upon the cheeks of each:

They were to meet no more. Their hands were clasped

To tear the clasp in twain; and all the stars

Looked proudly down on them, while shadows knelt,

Or seemed to kneel, around them with the awe

Evoked from any heart by sacrifice.

And in the heart of that last parting hour

Eternity was beating. And he said:

'We part to go to Calvary and to God-

This is our garden of Gethsemane;

And here we bow our heads and breathe His prayer

Whose heart was bleeding, while the angels heard:

Not my will, Father! but Thine be done!'"

The Roman Catholic training and faith of Father Ryan exerted a deep influence upon his poetry. His ardent studies in the ancient languages and in scholastic theology naturally withdrew his mind, to a greater or less degree, from intimate communion with Nature. His poetry is principally subjective. Nature enters it only in a subordinate way; its forms and sounds and colors do not inspire in him the rapture found in Hayne and Lanier. He not only treats of Scripture themes, as in St. Stephen, The Masters Voice, and A Christmas Chant, but he also finds subjects, not always happily, in distinctive Roman Catholic dogma. The Feast of the Assumption and The Last of May, both in honor of the Virgin Mary, are sufficiently poetic; but The Feast of the Sacred Heart is, in parts, too prosaically literal in its treatment of transubstantiation for any but the most believing and devout of Roman Catholics.

On the breaking out of the Civil War, Father Ryan entered the Confederate army as a chaplain, though he sometimes served in the ranks. In 1863 he ministered to the inmates of a prison in New Orleans during an epidemic of smallpox. His martial songs, The Sword of Robert Lee, The Conquered Banner, and March of the Deathless Dead, have been dear to many Southern hearts. He reverenced Lee as a peerless leader.

"Forth from its scabbard! How we prayed

That sword might victor be;

And when our triumph was delayed,

And many a heart grew sore afraid,

We still hoped on while gleamed the blade

Of noble Robert Lee.

"Forth from its scabbard all in vain

Bright flashed the sword of Lee;

'Tis shrouded now in its sheath again,

It sleeps the sleep of our noble slain,

Defeated, yet without a stain,

Proudly and peacefully."

After four years of brave, bitter sacrifice beneath the Confederate flag, words like the following appealed strongly to the men and women who loved The Conquered Banner:-

"Take that Banner down! 'tis tattered;

Broken is its staff and shattered;

And the valiant hosts are scattered

Over whom it floated high.

Oh! 'tis hard for us to fold it;

Hard to think there's none to hold it;

Hard that those who once unrolled it

Now must furl it with a sigh.

"Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory,

Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory.

And 'twill live in song and story,

Though its folds are in the dust:

For its fame on brightest pages,

Penned by poets and by sages,

Shall go sounding down the ages-

Furl its folds though now we must."

Father Ryan's devotion to the South was intense. He long refused to accept the results of the war. The wrongs of the so-called Reconstruction period aroused his ardent indignation, and found expression in his song. In The Land We Love he says, with evident reference to those days:-

"Land where the victor's flag waves,

Where only the dead are the free!

Each link of the chain that enslaves,

But binds us to them and to thee."

But during the epidemic of yellow fever in 1878, his heart was touched by the splendid generosity of the North; and, surrendering his sectional prejudice and animosity, he wrote Reunited:-

"Purer than thy own white snow,

Nobler than thy mountains' height;

Deeper than the ocean's flow,

Stronger than thy own proud might;

O Northland! to thy sister land,

Was late thy mercy's generous deed and grand."

After the close of the Civil War, the restless temperament of the poet- priest asserted itself in numerous changes of residence. He was successively in Biloxi, Mississippi, Knoxville, Tennessee, and Augusta, Georgia. In the latter place he published for some three years the Banner of the South, a periodical that exerted no small influence on the thought of the state. In 1870 he became pastor of St. Mary's church in Mobile. Two years later he made a trip to Europe, of which we find interesting reminiscences in his poems. His visit to Rome was the realization of a long-cherished desire. He was honored with an audience by Pope Pius IX, of whom he has given a graphic sketch:-

"I saw his face to-day; he looks a chief

Who fears nor human rage, nor human guile;

Upon his cheeks the twilight of a grief,

But in that grief the starlight of a smile.

Deep, gentle eyes, with drooping lids that tell

They are the homes where tears of sorrow dwell;

A low voice-strangely sweet-whose very tone

Tells how these lips speak oft with God alone."

In Milan he was seriously ill. In his poem, After Sickness, we find an expression of his world-weariness and his longing for death:-

"I nearly died, I almost touched the door

That swings between forever and no more;

I think I heard the awful hinges grate,

Hour after hour, while I did weary wait

Death's coming; but alas! 'twas all in vain:

The door half opened and then closed again."

As a priest Father Ryan was faithful to his duties. But whether ministering at the altar or making the rounds of his parish, his spirit frequently found utterance in song. In 1880 he published a volume of poems, to which only a few additions were subsequently made. The keynote of his poetry is struck in the opening piece, Song of the Mystic. He dwelt much in the "Valley of Silence."

"Do you ask me the place of the Valley,

Ye hearts that are harrowed by care?

It lieth afar between mountains,

And God and His angels are there:

And one is the dark mount of Sorrow,

And one the bright mountain of Prayer."

The prevailing tone of Father Ryan's poems is one of sadness. His harp rarely vibrated to cheerful strains. What was the cause of this sadness? It may have been his keen sense of the tragic side of human life; it may have been the enduring anguish that came from the crucified love of his youth. The poet himself refused to tell. In Lines-1875, he says:-

"Go list to the voices of air, earth, and sea,

And the voices that sound in the sky;

Their songs may be joyful to some, but to me

There's a sigh in each chord and a sigh in each key,

And thousands of sighs swell their grand melody.

Ask them what ails them: they will not reply.

They sigh-sigh forever-but never tell why.

Why does your poetry sound like a sigh?

Their lips will not answer you; neither shall I."

Yet, in spite of the prevailing tone of sorrow and weariness, Father Ryan was no pessimist. He held that life has "more of sweet than gall"-

"For every one: no matter who-

Or what their lot-or high or low;

All hearts have clouds-but heaven's blue

Wraps robes of bright around each woe;

And this is truest of the true:

"That joy is stronger here than grief,

Fills more of life, far more of years,

And makes the reign of sorrow brief;

Gives more of smiles for less of tears.

Joy is life's tree-grief but its leaves."

Father Ryan conceived of the poet's office as something seerlike or prophetic. With him, as with all great poets, the message counted for more than do rhythm and rhyme. Divorced from truth, art seemed to him but a skeleton masque. He preferred those melodies that rise on the wings of thought, and come to human hearts with an inspiration of faith and hope. He regarded genuine poets as the high priests of Nature. Their sensitive spirits, holding themselves aloof from common things, habitually dwell upon the deeper mysteries of life in something of a morbid loneliness. In Poets he says:-

"They are all dreamers; in the day and night

Ever across their souls

The wondrous mystery of the dark or bright

In mystic rhythm rolls.

"They live within themselves-they may not tell

What lieth deepest there;

Within their breast a heaven or a hell,

Joy or tormenting care.

"They are the loneliest men that walk men's ways,

No matter what they seem;

The stars and sunlight of their nights and days

Move over them in dream."

With Wordsworth, or rather with the great Apostle to the Gentiles, he held that Nature is but the vesture of God, beneath which may be discerned the divine glory and love. The visible seemed to him but an expression of the invisible.

"For God is everywhere-and he doth find

In every atom which His hand hath made

A shrine to hide His presence, and reveal

His name, love, power, to those who kneel

In holy faith upon this bright below,

And lift their eyes, thro' all this mystery,

To catch the vision of the great beyond."

With this view of Nature, it was but natural that its sounds and forms- its birds and flowers-should inspire devotion. In St. Mary's, speaking of the songs and silences of Nature, he says:-

"God comes close to me here-

Back of ev'ry roseleaf there

He is hiding-and the air

Thrills with calls to holy prayer;

Earth grows far, and heaven near.

"Every single flower is fraught

With the very sweetest dreams,

Under clouds or under gleams

Changeful ever-yet meseems

On each leaf I read God's thought."

It can hardly be said that Father Ryan ever reaches far poetic heights. Neither in thought nor expression does he often rise above cultured commonplace. Fine artistic quality is supplanted by a sort of melodious fluency. Yet the form and tone of his poetry, nearly always in one pensive key, make a distinct impression, unlike that of any other American singer. "Religious feeling," it has been well said, "is dominant. The reader seems to be moving about in cathedral glooms, by dimly lighted altars, with sad procession of ghostly penitents and mourners fading into the darkness to the sad music of lamenting choirs. But the light which falls upon the gloom is the light of heaven, and amid tears and sighs, over farewells and crushed happiness, hope sings a vigorous though subdued strain." Having once caught his distinctive note of weary melancholy, we can recognize it among a chorus of a thousand singers. It is to his honor that he has achieved a distinctive place in American poetry.

His poetic craftsmanship is far from perfect. His artistic sense did not aspire to exquisite achievements. He delighted unduly in alliteration, assonance, and rhyming effects, all which he sometimes carried to excess. In the first stanza, for example, of The Conquered Banner, popular as it is, the rhyme effect seems somewhat overdone:-

"Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary;

Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary;

Furl it, fold it, it is best;

For there's not a man to wave it,

And there's not a sword to save it,

And there's not one left to lave it

In the blood which heroes gave it;

And its foes now scorn and brave it;

Furl it, hide it-let it rest."

Here and there, too, are unmistakable echoes of Poe, as in the following stanza from At Last:-

"Into a temple vast and dim,

Solemn and vast and dim,

Just when the last sweet Vesper Hymn

Was floating far away,

With eyes that tabernacled tears-

Her heart the home of tears-

And cheeks wan with the woes of years,

A woman went one day."

But in spite of these obvious defects, Father Ryan has been for years the most popular of Southern poets. His poems have passed through many editions, and there is still a large demand for them. They have something that outweighs their faults, and appeals strongly to the popular mind and heart. What is it? Perhaps it is impossible to answer this question fully. But in addition to the merits already pointed out, the work of Father Ryan is for the most part simple, spontaneous, and clear. It generally consists of brief lyrics devoted to the expression of a single mood or reflection. There is nothing in thought or style beyond the ready comprehension of the average reader. It does not require, as does the poetry of Browning, repeated and careful reading to render its meaning clear. It does not offend sensible people with its empty, overdone refinement. From beginning to end Father Ryan's poetry is a transparent casket, into which he has poured the richest treasures of a deeply sorrowing but noble Christian spirit.

Again, the pensive, moral tone of his poetry renders it attractive to many persons. He gives expression to the sad, reflective moods that are apt, especially in time of suffering or disappointment, to come to most of us. The moral sense of the American people is strong; and sometimes a comforting though commonplace truth from Nature is more pleasing than the most exquisite but superficial description of her beauties. How many have found solace in poems like A Thought:-

"The waving rose, with every breath

Scents carelessly the summer air;

The wounded rose bleeds forth in death

A sweetness far more rich and rare.

"It is a truth beyond our ken-

And yet a truth that all may read-

It is with roses as with men,

The sweetest hearts are those that bleed.

"The flower which Bethlehem saw bloom

Out of a heart all full of grace,

Gave never forth its full perfume

Until the cross became its vase."

Then again, the poet-priest, as was becoming his character, deals with the mysteries of life. Much of our recent poetry is as trifling in theme as it is polished in workmanship. But Father Ryan habitually brings before us the profounder and sadder aspects of life. The truths of religion, the vicissitudes of human destiny, the tragedy of death-these are the themes in which he finds his inspiration, and to which we all turn in our most serious moments. And though the strain in which he sings is attuned to tears, it is still illumined by a strength-giving faith and hope. When we feel weighed down with a sense of pitiless law, when fate seems to cross our holiest aspirations with a ruthless hand, he bids us be of good cheer.

"There is no fate-God's love

Is law beneath each law,

And law all laws above

Fore'er, without a flaw."

In 1883 Father Ryan, whose reputation had been established by his volume of poems, undertook a lecturing tour through the North in the interest of some charitable enterprise. At his best he was an eloquent speaker. But during the later years of his life impaired health interfered with prolonged mental effort. His mission had only a moderate degree of success. His sense of weariness deepened, and his eyes turned longingly to the life to come. In one of his later productions he said:-

"My feet are wearied, and my hands are tired,

My soul oppressed-

And I desire, what I have long desired-

Rest-only rest.

* * * * *

"And so I cry a weak and human cry,

So heart oppressed;

And so I sigh a weak and human sigh

For rest-for rest."

At length, April 22, 1886, in a Franciscan monastery at Louisville, came the rest for which he had prayed. And in that higher life to which he passed, we may believe that he was welcomed by her to whom in youth he had given the tender name of Ullainee, and for whom, through all the years of a great sacrifice, his faithful heart had yearned with an inextinguishable human longing.

ILLUSTRATIVE SELECTIONS WITH NOTES

SELECTION FROM FRANCIS SCOTT KEY

THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER [1]

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming,

Whose broad stripes and bright stars, through the perilous fight,

O'er the ramparts [2] we watched, were so gallantly streaming?

And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,

Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.

O say, does that star-spangled banner yet wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave?

On the shore dimly seen thro' the mists of the deep,

Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence reposes, [3]

What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering steep,

As it fitfully blows, half conceals, half discloses?

Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam,

In full glory reflected now shines on the stream;

'Tis the star-spangled banner; O long may it wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore

That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion

A home and a country should leave us no more? [4]

Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.

No refuge could save the hireling and slave

From the terror of flight, or the gloom of the grave;

And the star-spangled banner in triumph doth wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand

Between their loved homes and the war's desolation!

Blest with victory and peace, may the heav'n-rescued land

Praise the power that hath made and preserv'd us a nation!

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just,

And this be our motto-"In God is our trust:"

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall wave

O'er the land of the free and the home of the brave.

[Footnote 1: For a brief statement of the circumstances that gave rise to the poem, see sketch of Key, page 12.]

[Footnote 2: Fort McHenry, on the north bank of the Patapsco, below

Baltimore, was attacked by the British fleet, September 13, 1814.]

[Footnote 3: The attack being unsuccessful, the British became disheartened and withdrew.]

[Footnote 4: Before the attack upon Baltimore, the British had taken

Washington and burned the capitol and other public buildings.

With this poem may be compared other martial lyrics, such as Hopkinson's

Hail Columbia, Mrs. Howe's Battle Hymn of the Republic,

Campbell's Ye Mariners of England and Battle of the Baltic,

Tennyson's Charge of the Light Brigade, etc.]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM RICHARD HENRY WILDE

STANZAS [1]

My life is like the summer rose,

That opens to the morning sky,

But, ere the shades of evening close,

Is scattered on the ground-to die![2]

Yet on the rose's humble bed

The sweetest dews of night are shed,

As if she wept the waste to see-

But none shall weep a tear for me!

My life is like the autumn leaf

That trembles in the moon's pale ray:

Its hold is frail-its date is brief,

Restless-and soon to pass away!

Yet, ere that leaf shall fall and fade,

The parent tree will mourn its shade,

The winds bewail the leafless tree-

But none shall breathe a sigh for me!

My life is like the prints, which feet

Have left on Tampa's [3] desert strand;

Soon as the rising tide shall beat,

All trace will vanish from the sand;

Yet, as if grieving to efface

All vestige of the human race,

On that lone shore loud moans the sea-

But none, alas! shall mourn for me!

A FAREWELL TO AMERICA [4]

Farewell, my more than fatherland![5]

Home of my heart and friends, adieu!

Lingering beside some foreign strand,

How oft shall I remember you!

How often, o'er the waters blue,

Send back a sigh to those I leave,

The loving and beloved few,

Who grieve for me,-for whom I grieve!

We part!-no matter how we part,

There are some thoughts we utter not,

Deep treasured in our inmost heart,

Never revealed, and ne'er forgot!

Why murmur at the common lot?

We part!-I speak not of the pain,-

But when shall I each lovely spot,

And each loved face behold again?

It must be months,-it may be years,-[6]

It may-but no!-I will not fill

Fond hearts with gloom,-fond eyes with tears,

"Curious to shape uncertain ill."

Though humble,-few and far,-yet, still

Those hearts and eyes are ever dear;

Theirs is the love no time can chill,

The truth no chance or change can sear!

All I have seen, and all I see,

Only endears them more and more;

Friends cool, hopes fade, and hours flee,

Affection lives when all is o'er!

Farewell, my more than native shore!

I do not seek or hope to find,

Roam where I will, what I deplore

To leave with them and thee behind!

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Wilde, page 13. This song was translated into

Greek by Anthony Barclay and announced as a newly discovered ode by

Alcaeus. The trick, however, was soon detected by scholars, and the

author of the poem received a due meed of praise.]

[Footnote 2: The brevity of life has been a favorite theme of poets ever since Job (vii. 6) declared, "Our days are swifter than a weaver's shuttle."]

[Footnote 3: The reference seems to be to the shore about the Bay of

Tampa on the west coast of Florida.]

[Footnote 4: See page 13.]

[Footnote 5: It will be remembered that the poet was a native of

Ireland.]

[Footnote 6: The years 1834-1840 were spent in Europe, chiefly in Italy.

Compare with this Byron's farewell to England, in Canto I of Childe

Harold.]

* * * * *

SELECTION FROM GEORGE D. PRENTICE

THE CLOSING YEAR [1]

'Tis midnight's holy hour, and silence now

Is brooding like a gentle spirit o'er

The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds

The bell's deep tones are swelling,-'tis the knell

Of the departed year.

No funeral train

Is sweeping past; yet on the stream and wood,

With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest

Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred,

As by a mourner's sigh; and on yon cloud

That floats so still and placidly through heaven,

The spirits of the seasons seem to stand-

Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form,

And Winter with his aged locks-and breathe,

In mournful cadences that come abroad

Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail,

A melancholy dirge o'er the dead year,

Gone from the earth forever.

'Tis a time

For memory and for tears. Within the deep,

Still chambers of the heart a specter dim,

Whose tones are like the wizard voice of Time,

Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold

And solemn finger to the beautiful

And holy visions that have passed away,

And left no shadow of their loveliness

On the dead waste of life. That specter lifts

The coffin lid of Hope, and Joy, and Love,

And, bending mournfully above the pale,

Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead flowers

O'er what has passed to nothingness.

The year

Has gone, and with it many a glorious throng

Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,

Its shadow in each heart. In its swift course

It waved its scepter o'er the beautiful,-

And they are not. It laid its pallid hand

Upon the strong man,-and the haughty form

Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.

It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged

The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail

Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song

And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er

The battle plain, where sword, and spear, and shield

Flashed in the light of midday-and the strength

Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass,

Green from the soil of carnage, waves above

The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came

And faded like a wreath of mist at eve;

Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,

It heralded its millions to their home

In the dim land of dreams.

Remorseless Time!

Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe!-what power

Can stay him in his silent course, or melt

His iron heart to pity? On, still on

He presses, and forever. The proud bird,

The condor of the Andes, that can soar

Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave

The fury of the northern hurricane,

And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,

Furls his broad wings at nightfall and sinks down

To rest upon his mountain crag-but Time

Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,

And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind

His rushing pinions. Revolutions sweep

O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast

Of dreaming sorrow,-cities rise and sink

Like bubbles on the water,-fiery isles

Spring blazing from the ocean, and go back

To their mysterious caverns,-mountains rear

To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow

Their tall heads to the plain,-new empires rise,

Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,

And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,

Startling the nations,-and the very stars,

Yon bright and burning blazonry of God,

Glitter a while in their eternal depths,

And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,

Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away [2]

To darkle in the trackless void,-yet Time,

Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career,

Dark, stern, all-pitiless, and pauses not

Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path

To sit and muse, like other conquerors,

Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Prentice, page 14. The flight of time is another favorite theme with poets. The Closing Year should be compared with Bryant's The Flood of Years; similar in theme, the two poems have much in common. The closing lines of Bryant's poem express a sweet faith that relieves the somber tone of the preceding reflections:-

"In the room

Of this grief-shadowed present, there shall be

A Present in whose reign no grief shall gnaw

The heart, and never shall a tender tie

Be broken; in whose reign the eternal Change

That waits on growth and action shall proceed

With everlasting Concord hand in hand."]

[Footnote 2. This is a reference to the belief that one of the seven stars originally supposed to form the Pleiades has disappeared. Such a phenomenon is not unknown; modern astronomers record several such disappearances. See Simms's The Lost Pleiad, following.]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS

THE LOST PLEIAD [1]

Not in the sky,

Where it was seen

So long in eminence of light serene,-

Nor on the white tops of the glistering wave,

Nor down in mansions of the hidden deep,

Though beautiful in green

And crystal, its great caves of mystery,-

Shall the bright watcher have

Her place, and, as of old, high station keep!

Gone! gone!

Oh! nevermore, to cheer

The mariner, who holds his course alone

On the Atlantic, through the weary night,

When the stars turn to watchers, and do sleep,

Shall it again appear,

With the sweet-loving certainty of light,

Down shining on the shut eyes of the deep!

The upward-looking shepherd on the hills

Of Chaldea, night-returning with his flocks,

He wonders why her beauty doth not blaze,

Gladding his gaze,-

And, from his dreary watch along the rocks,

Guiding him homeward o'er the perilous ways!

How stands he waiting still, in a sad maze,

Much wondering, while the drowsy silence fills

The sorrowful vault!-how lingers, in the hope that night

May yet renew the expected and sweet light,

So natural to his sight! [2]

And lone,

Where, at the first, in smiling love she shone,

Brood the once happy circle of bright stars:

How should they dream, until her fate was known,

That they were ever confiscate to death? [3]

That dark oblivion the pure beauty mars,

And, like the earth, its common bloom and breath,

That they should fall from high;

Their lights grow blasted by a touch, and die,

All their concerted springs of harmony

Snapt rudely, and the generous music gone![4]

Ah! still the strain

Of wailing sweetness fills the saddening sky;

The sister stars, lamenting in their pain

That one of the selected ones must die,-

Must vanish, when most lovely, from the rest!

Alas! 'tis ever thus the destiny.

Even Rapture's song hath evermore a tone

Of wailing, as for bliss too quickly gone.

The hope most precious is the soonest lost,

The flower most sweet is first to feel the frost.

Are not all short-lived things the loveliest?

And, like the pale star, shooting down the sky,

Look they not ever brightest, as they fly

From the lone sphere they blest!

THE SWAMP FOX [5]

We follow where the Swamp Fox guides,

His friends and merry men are we;

And when the troop of Tarleton [6] rides,

We burrow in the cypress tree.

The turfy hammock is our bed,

Our home is in the red deer's den,

Our roof, the tree-top overhead,

For we are wild and hunted men.

We fly by day and shun its light,

But, prompt to strike the sudden blow,

We mount and start with early night,

And through the forest track our foe.[7]

And soon he hears our chargers leap,

The flashing saber blinds his eyes,

And ere he drives away his sleep,

And rushes from his camp, he dies.

Free bridle bit, good gallant steed,

That will not ask a kind caress

To swim the Santee [8] at our need,

When on his heels the foemen press,-

The true heart and the ready hand,

The spirit stubborn to be free,

The twisted bore, the smiting brand,-

And we are Marion's men, you see.

Now light the fire and cook the meal,

The last, perhaps, that we shall taste;

I hear the Swamp Fox round us steal,

And that's a sign we move in haste.

He whistles to the scouts, and hark!

You hear his order calm and low.

Come, wave your torch across the dark,

And let us see the boys that go.

We may not see their forms again,

God help 'em, should they find the strife!

For they are strong and fearless men,

And make no coward terms for life;

They'll fight as long as Marion bids,

And when he speaks the word to shy,

Then, not till then, they turn their steeds,

Through thickening shade and swamp to fly.

Now stir the fire and lie at ease,-

The scouts are gone, and on the brush

I see the Colonel [9] bend his knees,

To take his slumbers too. But hush!

He's praying, comrades; 'tis not strange;

The man that's fighting day by day

May well, when night comes, take a change,

And down upon his knees to pray.

Break up that hoecake, boys, and hand

The sly and silent jug that's there;

I love not it should idly stand

When Marion's men have need of cheer.

'Tis seldom that our luck affords

A stuff like this we just have quaffed,

And dry potatoes on our boards

May always call for such a draught.

Now pile the brush and roll the log;

Hard pillow, but a soldier's head

That's half the time in brake and bog

Must never think of softer bed.

The owl is hooting to the night,

The cooter [10] crawling o'er the bank,

And in that pond the flashing light

Tells where the alligator sank.

What! 'tis the signal! start so soon,

And through the Santee swamp so deep,

Without the aid of friendly moon,

And we, Heaven help us! half asleep!

But courage, comrades! Marion leads,

The Swamp Fox takes us out to-night;

So clear your swords and spur your steeds,

There's goodly chance, I think, of fight.

We follow where the Swamp Fox guides,

We leave the swamp and cypress tree,

Our spurs are in our coursers' sides,

And ready for the strife are we.

The Tory camp is now in sight,

And there he cowers within his den;

He hears our shouts, he dreads the fight,

He fears, and flies from Marion's men.

[Footnote 1: See note above. There is a peculiar fitness in the reference to the sea in this poem; for the constellation of the Pleiades was named by the Greeks from their word plein, to sail, because the Mediterranean was navigable with safety during the months these stars were visible.]

[Footnote 2: The poet seems to associate the Chaldean shepherd with the Magi, who, as astrologers, observed the stars with profound interest. The hope expressed for the return of the star cannot be regarded, in the light of modern astronomy, as entirely fanciful. Only recently a new star has flamed forth in the constellation Perseus.]

[Footnote 3: The fixed stars, continually giving forth immeasurable quantities of heat, are in a process of cooling. Sooner or later they will become dark bodies. Astronomers tell us that there is reason to believe that the dark bodies or burned-out suns of the universe are more numerous than the bright ones, though the number of the latter exceeds 125 millions. The existence of such dark bodies has been established beyond a reasonable doubt.]

[Footnote 4: A reference to the old belief that the stars make music in their courses. In Job (xxxviii. 7) we read: "When the morning stars sang together." According to the Platonic philosophy, this music of the spheres, too faint for mortal ears, was heard only by the gods. Shakespeare has given beautiful expression to this belief:-

"There's not the smallest orb which thou behold'st

But in his motion like an angel sings,

Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins;

Such harmony is in immortal souls;

But whilst this muddy vesture of decay

Doth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it."

-Merchant of Venice, Act V., Sc. 1.]

[Footnote 5: See sketch of Simms, page 16. This poem is found in The

Partisan, the first of three novels descriptive of the Revolution.

Read a biographical sketch of General Francis Marion (1732-1795), whose

shrewdness in attack and escape earned for him the sobriquet

"Swamp Fox."]

[Footnote 6: Sir Banastre Tarleton (1754-1833) was a lieutenant colonel in the army of Cornwallis. He was a brilliant and successful officer, but was defeated by General Morgan in the battle of Cowpens in 1781.]

[Footnote 7: "Sumter, Marion, and other South Carolina leaders found places of refuge in the great swamps which are found in parts of the state; and from these they kept up an active warfare with the British. Their desperate battles, night marches, surprises, and hairbreadth escapes make this the most exciting and interesting period of the Revolution."-Johnston's History of the United States.]

[Footnote 8: Marion's principal field of operations lay between the

Santee and Pedee rivers.]

[Footnote 9: Marion held the rank of captain at the outbreak of the Revolution, and was made lieutenant colonel for gallant conduct in the defence of Fort Moultrie, June 28, 1776. Later he was made general.]

[Footnote 10: A water tortoise or snapping turtle.]

Compare Bryant's Song of Marion's Men.

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM EDWARD COATE PINKNEY

A HEALTH [1]

I fill this cup to one made up

Of loveliness alone,

A woman, of her gentle sex

The seeming paragon;

To whom the better elements

And kindly stars have given

A form so fair, that, like the air,

'Tis less of earth than heaven.

Her every tone is music's own,

Like those of morning birds,

And something more than melody

Dwells ever in her words;

The coinage of her heart are they,

And from her lips each flows

As one may see the burdened bee

Forth issue from the rose.

Affections are as thoughts to her,[2]

The measures of her hours;

Her feelings have the fragrancy,

The freshness of young flowers;

And lovely passions, changing oft,

So fill her, she appears

The image of themselves by turns,-

The idol of past years!

Of her bright face one glance will trace

A picture on the brain,

And of her voice in echoing hearts

A sound must long remain;

But memory, such as mine of her,

So very much endears,

When death is nigh my latest sigh

Will not be life's, but hers.

I fill this cup to one made up

Of loveliness alone,

A woman, of her gentle sex

The seeming paragon-

Her health! and would on earth there stood

Some more of such a frame,

That life might be all poetry,

And weariness a name. [3]

SONG

We break the glass, whose sacred wine

To some beloved health we drain,

Lest future pledges, less divine,

Should e'er the hallowed toy profane;

And thus I broke a heart that poured

Its tide of feelings out for thee,

In draught, by after-times deplored,

Yet dear to memory.

But still the old, impassioned ways

And habits of my mind remain,

And still unhappy light displays

Thine image chambered in my brain;

And still it looks as when the hours

Went by like flights of singing birds,[4]

Or that soft chain of spoken flowers

and airy gems,-thy words.

VOTIVE SONG

I burn no incense, hang no wreath,

On this thine early tomb:

Such can not cheer the place of death,

But only mock its gloom.

Here odorous smoke and breathing flower

No grateful influence shed;

They lose their perfume and their power,

When offered to the dead.

And if, as is the Afghaun's creed,

The spirit may return,

A disembodied sense to feed

On fragrance, near its urn,-

It is enough that she, whom thou

Didst love in living years,

Sits desolate beside it now,

And fall these heavy tears.

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Pinkney, page 18. The flowing or lilting melody of this and the following songs is quite remarkable. It is traceable to the skillful use of liquid consonants and short vowels, and the avoidance of harsh consonant combinations.]

[Footnote 2: The irregularities of this stanza are remarkable. The middle rhyme used in the first and seventh lines of the other stanzas is here lacking. It seems to have been an oversight on the part of the poet.]

[Footnote 3: With this drinking song we may compare the well-known one of

Ben Jonson:-

"Drink to me only with thine eyes,

And I will pledge with mine;

Or leave a kiss but in the cup,

And I'll not look for wine.

The thirst that from the soul doth rise

Doth ask a drink divine;

But might I of Jove's nectar sup,

I would not change for thine.

"I sent thee late a rosy wreath,

Not so much honoring thee

As giving it a hope that there

It could not withered be;

But thou thereon didst only breathe

And sent'st it back to me;

Since when it grows, and smells, I swear,

Not of itself, but thee."]

[Footnote 4: This same simile occurs in a beautiful poem by Amelia C. Welby (1819-1852), a Southern poet of no mean gifts, entitled Twilight at Sea:-

"The twilight hours like birds flew by,

As lightly and as free;

Ten thousand stars were in the sky,

Ten thousand on the sea;

For every wave with dimpled face,

That leaped upon the air,

Had caught a star in its embrace,

And held it trembling there."]

* * * * *

SELECTION FROM PHILIP PENDLETON COOKE

FLORENCE VANE [1]

I loved thee long and dearly,

Florence Vane;

My life's bright dream, and early,

Hath come again;

I renew, in my fond vision,

My heart's dear pain;

My hope, and thy derision,

Florence Vane.

The ruin lone and hoary,

The ruin old,

Where thou didst hark my story,

At even told,-

That spot-the hues Elysian

Of sky and plain-

I treasure in my vision,

Florence Vane.

Thou wast lovelier than the roses

In their prime;

Thy voice excelled the closes

Of sweetest rhyme;

Thy heart was as a river

Without a main. [2]

Would I had loved thee never,

Florence Vane.

But fairest, coldest wonder!

Thy glorious clay

Lieth the green sod under-

Alas the day!

And it boots not to remember

Thy disdain-

To quicken love's pale ember,

Florence Vane.

The lilies of the valley

By young graves weep,

The pansies love to dally

Where maidens sleep;

May their bloom, in beauty vying,

Never wane,

Where thine earthly part is lying,

Florence Vane!

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Cooke, page 19. In the preface to the volume from which this poem is taken, the author tells us that Florence Vane and Rosalie Lee, another brief lyric, had "met with more favor than I could ever perceive their just claim to." Hence he was kept from "venturing upon the correction of some faults." Rosalie Lee is more than usually defective in meter and rhyme, but Florence Vane cannot easily be improved.]

[Footnote 2: "My meaning, I suppose," the poet wrote an inquiring friend, "was that Florence did not want the capacity to love, but directed her love to no object. Her passions went flowing like a lost river. Byron has a kindred idea expressed by the same figure. Perhaps his verses were in my mind when I wrote my own:-

'She was the ocean to the river of his thoughts,

Which terminated all.'-The Dream.

But no verse ought to require to be interpreted, and if I were composing

Florence Vane now, I would avoid the over concentrated expression in the

two lines, and make the idea clearer."-Southern Literary

Messenger, 1850, p. 370.]

* * * * *

SELECTION FROM THEODORE O'HARA

THE BIVOUAC OF THE DEAD [1]

The muffled drum's sad roll has beat

The soldier's last tattoo:

No more op Life's parade shall meet

That brave and fallen few.

On Fame's eternal camping-ground

Their silent tents are spread,

And Glory guards, with solemn round,

The bivouac of the dead.

No rumor of the foe's advance

Now swells upon the wind;

No troubled thought at midnight haunts

Of loved ones left behind;

No vision of the morrow's strife

The warrior's dream alarms;

No braying horn nor screaming fife

At dawn shall call to arms.

Their shivered swords are red with rust,

Their plumed heads are bowed;

Their haughty banner, trailed in dust,

Is now their martial shroud.

And plenteous funeral tears have washed

The red stains from each brow,

And the proud forms, by battle gashed,

Are free from anguish now.

The neighboring troop, the flashing blade,

The bugle's stirring blast,

The charge, the dreadful cannonade,

The din and shout, are past;

Nor war's wild note nor glory's peal

Shall thrill with fierce delight

Those breasts that nevermore may feel

The rapture of the fight.

Like the fierce northern hurricane

That sweeps his great plateau,

Flushed with the triumph yet to gain,

Came down the serried foe. [2]

Who heard the thunder of the fray

Break o'er the field beneath,

Knew well the watchword of that day

Was "Victory or Death."

Long had the doubtful conflict raged

O'er all that stricken plain,

For never fiercer fight had waged

The vengeful blood of Spain; [3]

And still the storm of battle blew,

Still swelled the gory tide;

Not long, our stout old chieftain knew,

Such odds his strength could bide.

'Twas in that hour his stern command

Called to a martyr's grave

The flower of his beloved land,

The nation's flag to save.

By rivers of their fathers' gore

His first-born laurels grew, [4]

And well he deemed the sons would pour

Their lives for glory too.

Full many a norther's breath has swept

O'er Angostura's plain, [5]

And long the pitying sky has wept

Above its moldered slain.

The raven's scream, or eagle's flight,

Or shepherd's pensive lay,

Alone awakes each sullen height

That frowned o'er that dread fray.

Sons of the Dark and Bloody Ground,

Ye must not slumber there,

Where stranger steps and tongues resound

Along the heedless air.

Your own proud land's heroic soil

Shall be your fitter grave:

She claims from war his richest spoil-

The ashes of her brave.

Thus 'neath their parent turf they rest,

Far from the gory field,

Borne to a Spartan mother's breast

On many a bloody shield; [6]

The sunshine of their native sky

Smiles sadly on them here,

And kindred eyes and hearts watch by

The heroes' sepulcher.

Rest on, embalmed and sainted dead!

Dear as the blood ye gave;

No impious footstep here shall tread

The herbage of your grave;

Nor shall your glory be forgot

While Fame her record keeps,

Or Honor points the hallowed spot

Where valor proudly sleeps.

Yon marble minstrel's voiceless stone

In deathless song shall tell,

When many a vanished age hath flown,

The story how ye fell;

Nor wreck, nor change, nor winter's blight,

Nor Time's remorseless doom,

Shall dim one ray of glory's light

That gilds your deathless tomb.

[Footnote 1: See sketch of O'Hara, page 21, for the occasion of this poem.]

[Footnote 2: The American force numbered 4769 men; the Mexican force under Santa Anna, 21,000. The latter was confident of victory, and sent a flag of truce to demand surrender. "You are surrounded by 20,000 men," wrote the Mexican general, "and cannot, in any human probability, avoid suffering a rout, and being cut to pieces with your troops." Gen. Taylor replied, "I beg leave to say that I decline acceding to your request."]

[Footnote 3: The battle raged for ten hours with varying success. There was great determination on both sides, as is shown by the heavy losses. The Americans lost 267 killed and 456 wounded; Santa Anna stated his loss at 1500, which was probably an underestimate. He left 500 dead on the field. The battle was a decisive one, and left northeastern Mexico in the hands of the Americans.]

[Footnote 4: The reference is to Zachary Taylor, who was in command of the American forces. Though born in Virginia, he was brought up in Kentucky, and won his first laurels in command of Kentuckians in the War of 1812, during which he was engaged in fighting the Indian allies of Great Britain. His victory at Buena Vista aroused great enthusiasm in the United States, and more than any other event led to his election as President.]

[Footnote 5: The plateau on which the battle was fought, so called from the mountain pass of Angostura (the narrows) leading to it from the South.]

[Footnote 6: Kentucky is here beautifully likened to a Spartan mother who was accustomed to say, as she handed a shield to her son departing for war, "Come back with this or upon this."]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM FRANCIS ORRERY TICKNOR

THE VIRGINIANS OF THE VALLEY [1]

The knightliest of the knightly race

That, since the days of old,

Have kept the lamp of chivalry

Alight in hearts of gold;

The kindliest of the kindly band

That, rarely hating ease,

Yet rode with Spotswood [2] round the land,

With Raleigh round the seas;

Who climbed the blue Virginian hills

Against embattled foes,

And planted there, in valleys fair,

The lily and the rose;

Whose fragrance lives in many lands,

Whose beauty stars the earth,

And lights the hearths of happy homes

With loveliness and worth.

We thought they slept!-the sons who kept

The names of noble sires,

And slumbered while the darkness crept

Around their vigil fires;

But aye the "Golden Horseshoe" knights

Their Old Dominion [3] keep,

Whose foes have found enchanted ground.

But not a knight asleep.

LITTLE GIFFEN [4]

Out of the focal and foremost fire,

Out of the hospital walls as dire;

Smitten of grape-shot and gangrene,

(Eighteenth battle [5] and he sixteen!)

Specter! such as you seldom see,

Little Giffen, of Tennessee!

"Take him and welcome!" the surgeons said;

Little the doctor can help the dead!

So we took him; and brought him where

The balm was sweet in the summer air;

And we laid him down on a wholesome bed,-

Utter Lazarus, heel to head!

And we watched the war with abated breath,-

Skeleton Boy against skeleton Death.

Months of torture, how many such?

Weary weeks of the stick and crutch;

And still a glint of the steel-blue eye

Told of a spirit that wouldn't die,

And didn't. Nay, more! in death's despite

The crippled skeleton "learned to write."

"Dear Mother," at first, of course; and then

"Dear captain," inquiring about the men.

Captain's answer: "Of eighty-and-five,

Giffen and I are left alive."

Word of gloom from the war, one day;

Johnston pressed at the front, they say.

Little Giffen was up and away;

A tear-his first-as he bade good-by,

Dimmed the glint of his steel-blue eye.

"I'll write, if spared!" There was news of the fight;

But none of Giffen.-He did not write. [6]

I sometimes fancy that, were I king

Of the princely Knights of the Golden Ring, [7]

With the song of the minstrel in mine ear,

And the tender legend that trembles here,

I'd give the best on his bended knee,

The whitest soul of my chivalry,

For "Little Giffen," of Tennessee.

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Ticknor, page 22, for the occasion of this poem. In this poem the exact meaning and sequence of thought do not appear till after repeated readings.]

[Footnote 2: Alexander Spotswood (1676-1740) was governor of Virginia 1710-1723. He led an exploring expedition across the Blue Ridge and took possession of the Valley of Virginia "in the name of his Majesty King George of England." On his return to Williamsburg he presented to each of his companions a miniature golden horseshoe to be worn upon the breast. Those who took part in the expedition, which was then regarded as a formidable undertaking, were subsequently known as the "Knights of the Golden Horseshoe."]

[Footnote 3: "The Old Dominion" is a popular name for Virginia. Its origin may be traced to acts of Parliament, in which it is designated as "the colony and dominion of Virginia." In his History of Virginia (1629) Captain John Smith calls this colony and dominion Old Virginia in contradistinction to New England.]

[Footnote 4: See page 23. Of this poem Maurice Thompson said: "If there is a finer lyric than this in the whole realm of poetry, I should be glad to read it."]

[Footnote 5: Probably the battle of Murfreesboro, which opened December 31, 1862, and lasted three days. Union loss 14,000; Confederate, 11,000.]

[Footnote 6: He was killed in some battle near Atlanta early in 1864.]

[Footnote 7: A reference to King Arthur and the Knights of the Round

Table.]

With this poem should be compared Browning's Incident of the French Camp.

* * * * *

SELECTION FROM JOHN R. THOMPSON

MUSIC IN CAMP [1]

Two armies covered hill and plain,

Where Rappahannock's waters [2]

Ran deeply crimsoned with the stain

Of battle's recent slaughters.

The summer clouds lay pitched like tents

In meads of heavenly azure;

And each dread gun of the elements

Slept in its hid embrasure.

The breeze so softly blew, it made

No forest leaf to quiver,

And the smoke of the random cannonade

Rolled slowly from the river.

And now, where circling hills looked down

With cannon grimly planted,

O'er listless camp and silent town

The golden sunset slanted.

When on the fervid air there came

A strain-now rich, now tender;

The music seemed itself aflame

With day's departing splendor.

A Federal band, which, eve and morn,

Played measures brave and nimble,

Had just struck up, with flute and horn

And lively clash of cymbal.

Down flocked the soldiers to the banks,

Till, margined by its pebbles,

One wooded shore was blue with "Yanks,"

And one was gray with "Rebels."

Then all was still, and then the band,

With movement light and tricksy,

Made stream and forest, hill and strand,

Reverberate with "Dixie."

The conscious stream with burnished glow

Went proudly o'er its pebbles,

But thrilled throughout its deepest flow

With yelling of the Rebels.

Again a pause, and then again

The trumpets pealed sonorous,

And "Yankee Doodle" was the strain

To which the shore gave chorus.

The laughing ripple shoreward flew,

To kiss the shining pebbles;

Loud shrieked the swarming Boys in Blue

Defiance to the Rebels.

And yet once more the bugles sang

Above the stormy riot;

No shout upon the evening rang-

There reigned a holy quiet.

The sad, slow stream its noiseless flood

Poured o'er the glistening pebbles;

All silent now the Yankees stood,

And silent stood the Rebels.

No unresponsive soul had heard

That plaintive note's appealing,

So deeply "Home, Sweet Home" had stirred

The hidden founts of feeling.

Or Blue or Gray the soldier sees,

As by the wand of fairy,

The cottage 'neath the live-oak trees,

The cabin by the prairie.

Or cold or warm, his native skies

Bend in their beauty o'er him;

Seen through the tear-mist in his eyes,

His loved ones stand before him.

As fades the iris after rain

In April's tearful weather,

The vision vanished, as the strain

And daylight died together.

And memory, waked by music's art,

Expressed in simplest numbers,

Subdued the sternest Yankee's heart,

Made light the Rebel's slumbers.

And fair the form of music shines,

That bright celestial creature,

Who still, 'mid war's embattled lines,

Gave this one touch of Nature.

[Footnote 1: See sketch of John R. Thompson, page 23.]

[Footnote 2: The incident on which the poem is based may have occurred in 1862 or 1863. In both years the Union and Confederate forces occupied opposite banks of the Rappahannock.]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM MRS. MARGARET J. PRESTON

Grateful acknowledgment is here made to Dr. George J. Preston of

Baltimore, for permission to use the two following poems.

A NOVEMBER NOCTURNE [1]

The autumn air sweeps faint and chill

Across the maple-crested hill;

And on my ear

Falls, tingling clear,

A strange, mysterious, woodland thrill.

From utmost twig, from scarlet crown

Untouched with yet a tinct of brown,

Reluctant, slow,

As loath to go,

The loosened leaves come wavering down;

And not a hectic trembler there,

In its decadence, doomed to share

The fate of all,-

But in its fall

Flings something sob-like on the air.

No drift or dream of passing bell,

Dying afar in twilight dell,

Hath any heard,

Whose chimes have stirred

More yearning pathos of farewell.

A silent shiver as of pain,

Goes quivering through each sapless vein;

And there are moans,

Whose undertones

Are sad as midnight autumn rain.

Ah, if without its dirge-like sigh,

No lightest, clinging leaf can die,-

Let him who saith

Decay and death

Should bring no heart-break, tell me why.

Each graveyard gives the answer: there

I read Resurgam[2] everywhere,

So easy said

Above the dead-

So weak to anodyne despair.

CALLING THE ANGELS IN

We mean to do it. Some day, some day,

We mean to slacken this feverish rush

That is wearing our very souls away,

And grant to our hearts a hush

That is only enough to let them hear

The footsteps of angels drawing near.

We mean to do it. Oh, never doubt,

When the burden of daytime broil is o'er,

We'll sit and muse while the stars come out,

As the patriarchs sat in the door [3]

Of their tents with a heavenward-gazing eye,

To watch for angels passing by.

We've seen them afar at high noontide,

When fiercely the world's hot flashings beat;

Yet never have bidden them turn aside,

To tarry in converse sweet;

Nor prayed them to hallow the cheer we spread,

To drink of our wine and break our bread.

We promise our hearts that when the stress

Of the life work reaches the longed-for close,

When the weight that we groan with hinders less,

We'll welcome such calm repose

As banishes care's disturbing din,

And then-we'll call the angels in.

The day that we dreamed of comes at length,

When tired of every mocking guest,

And broken in spirit and shorn of strength,

We drop at the door of rest,

And wait and watch as the day wanes on-

But the angels we meant to call are gone!

[Footnote 1: See sketch of Mrs. Preston, page 25. This and the following poem are good examples of her poetic art, and exhibit, at the same time, her reflective religious temperament.]

[Footnote 2: Resurgam (Latin), I shall rise again.]

[Footnote 3: "And Abraham sat in the tent door in the heat of the day; and he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground, and said, My Lord, if now I have found favour in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant."-Genesis xviii. 1-3.]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM EDGAR ALLAN POE

TO HELEN [1]

Helen, thy beauty is to me

Like those Nicaean [2] barks of yore,

That gently, o'er a perfumed sea,

The weary, wayworn wanderer bore

To his own native shore.

On desperate seas long wont to roam,

Thy hyacinth hair, thy classic face,

Thy Naiad airs, have brought me home

To the glory that was Greece,

And the grandeur that was Rome.[3]

Lo! in yon brilliant window-niche

How statue-like I see thee stand,

The agate lamp within thy hand!

Ah, Psyche, [4] from the regions which

Are Holy Land! [5]

ANNABEL LEE [6]

It was many and many a year ago,

In a kingdom by the sea, [7]

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

By the name of Annabel Lee;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,

In this kingdom by the sea:

But we loved with a love that was more than love,

I and my Annabel Lee;

With a love that the winged seraphs of heaven

Coveted her and me.[8]

And this was the reason that, long ago,

In this kingdom by the sea,

A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling

My beautiful Annabel Lee;

So that her highborn kinsmen [9] came

And bore her away from me,

To shut her up in a sepulcher

In this kingdom by the sea.

The angels, not half so happy in heaven,

Went envying her and me;

Yes!-that was the reason (as all men know,

In this kingdom by the sea)

That the wind came out of the cloud by night,

Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.

But our love it was stronger by far than the love

Of those who were older than we,

Of many far wiser than we;

And neither the angels in heaven above,

Nor the demons down under the sea,

Can ever dissever my soul from the soul

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:

For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And the stars never rise, but I feel the bright eyes

Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;

And so, all the night-tide, I lie down by the side [10]

Of my darling-my darling-my life and my bride,

In her sepulcher there by the sea,

In her tomb by the sounding sea.

THE HAUNTED PALACE [11]

In the greenest of our valleys

By good angels tenanted,

Once a fair and stately palace-

Radiant palace-reared its head.

In the monarch Thought's dominion,

It stood there;

Never seraph spread a pinion

Over fabric half so fair.

Banners yellow, glorious, golden,

On its roof did float and flow

(This-all this-was in the olden

Time long ago),

And every gentle air that dallied,

In that sweet day,

Along the ramparts plumed and pallid,

A winged odor went away.

Wanderers in that happy valley

Through two luminous windows saw

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

Was but to sing,

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;

(Ah, let us mourn, for never morrow

Shall dawn upon him desolate!)

And round about his home the glory

That blushed and bloomed,

Is but a dim-remembered story

Of the old time entombed.

And travelers now within that valley

Through the red-litten windows see

Vast forms that move fantastically

To a discordant melody;

While like a ghastly rapid river,

Through the pale door

A hideous throng rush out forever,

And laugh-but smile no more.

THE CONQUEROR WORM [12]

Lo! 'tis a gala night

Within the lonesome latter years.

An angel throng, bewinged, bedight

In veils, and drowned in tears,

Sit in a theater to see

A play of hopes and fears,

While the orchestra breathes fitfully

The music of the spheres.

Mimes, in the form of God on high,

Mutter and mumble low,

And hither and thither fly;

Mere puppets they, who come and go

At bidding of vast formless things

That shift the scenery to and fro,

Flapping from out their condor wings

Invisible woe.

That motley drama-oh, be sure

It shall not be forgot!

With its Phantom chased for evermore

By a crowd that seize it not,

Through a circle that ever returneth in

To the self-same spot;

And much of Madness, and more of Sin,

And Horror the soul of the plot.

But see amid the mimic rout

A crawling shape intrude:

A blood-red thing that writhes from out

The scenic solitude!

It writhes-it writhes!-with mortal pangs

The mimes become its food,

And seraphs sob at vermin fangs

In human gore imbued.

Out-out are the lights-out all!

And over each quivering form

The curtain, a funeral pall,

Comes down with the rush of a storm,

While the angels, all pallid and wan,

Uprising, unveiling, affirm

That the play is the tragedy "Man,"

And its hero the Conqueror Worm.

THE RAVEN [13]

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 visitor," 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 visitor entreating entrance at my chamber door-

Some late visitor 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 the 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 stillness 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 again I heard 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 a minute 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 marveled 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 name as "Nevermore."

But the Raven, sitting lonely on that 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 and store,

Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful Disaster

Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore:

Till the dirges of his Hope that melancholy burden bore

Of 'Never-nevermore.'"

But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,

Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;

Then, upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking

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 from an unseen censer

Swung by seraphim whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor.

"Wretch," I cried, "thy God hath lent thee-by these angels he hath

sent thee

Respite-respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!

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 me-tell me, I

implore!"

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 distant Aidenn,

It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name Lenore:

Clasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore!"

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; [14]

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;[15]

And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor

Shall be lifted-nevermore!

For a general introduction to the selections from Poe, the biographical and critical sketch in Chap. II should be read.

[Footnote 1: This was Mrs. Helen Stannard, the mother of one of Poe's schoolmates in Richmond. Her kind and gracious manner made a deep impression on his boyish heart, and soothed his passionate, turbulent nature. In after years this poem was inspired, as the poet tells us, by the memory of "the one idolatrous and purely ideal love" of his restless youth.]

[Footnote 2: The reference seems to be to the ancient Ligurian town of Nicaea, now Nice, in France. The "perfumed sea" would then be the Ligurian sea. But one half suspects that it was the scholarly and musical sound of the word, rather than any aptness of classical reference, that led to the use of the word "Nicaean."]

[Footnote 3: This appears to be Poe's indefinite and poetic way of saying that the lady's beauty and grace brought him an uplifting sense of happiness. After seeing her the first time, "He returned home in a dream, with but one thought, one hope in life-to hear again the sweet and gracious words that had made the desolate world so beautiful to him, and filled his lonely heart with the oppression of a new joy."-Ingram's Edgar Allan Poe, Vol. I, p. 32.]

[Footnote 4: Psyche was represented as so exquisitely beautiful that mortals did not dare to love, but only to worship her. The poet could pay no higher tribute to "Helen."]

[Footnote 5: This little poem-very beautiful in itself-illustrates

Poe's characteristics as a poet: it is indefinite, musical, and intense.]

[Footnote 6: This poem is a tribute to his wife, to whom his beautiful devotion has already been spoken of. "I believe," says Mrs. Osgood, "she was the only woman whom he ever truly loved; and this is evidenced by the exquisite pathos of the little poem lately written, called 'Annabel Lee,' of which she was the subject, and which is by far the most natural, simple, tender, and touchingly beautiful of all his songs."]

[Footnote 7: This is Poe's poetic designation of America.]

[Footnote 8: "Virginia Clemm, born on the 13th of August, 1822, was still a child when her handsome cousin Edgar revisited Baltimore after his escapade at West Point. A more than cousinly affection, which gradually grew in intensity, resulted from their frequent communion, and ultimately, whilst one, at least, of the two cousins was but a child, they were married."-Ingram's Edgar Allan Poe, Vol. I, p. 136.]

[Footnote 9: These were the angels, to whom "Annabel Lee" was akin in sweet, gentle character. "A lady angelically beautiful in person, and not less beautiful in spirit."-Captain Mayne Reid.]

[Footnote 10: This may be literally true. At all events, it is related that he visited the tomb of "Helen"; and "when the autumnal rains fell, and the winds wailed mournfully over the graves, he lingered longest, and came away most regretfully."]

[Footnote 11: This admirable poem is an allegory. The "stately palace" is a man who after a time loses his reason. With this fact in mind, the poem becomes quite clear. The "banners yellow, glorious, golden" is the hair; the "luminous windows" are the eyes; the "ruler of the realm" is reason; "the fair palace door" is the mouth; and the "evil things" are the madman's fantasies. The poem is found in The Fall of the House of Usher.

Poe claimed that Longfellow's Beleaguered City was an imitation of The Haunted Palace. The former should be read in connection with the latter. Though some resemblance may be discerned, Longfellow must be acquitted of Poe's charge of plagiarism.]

[Footnote 12: This terrible lyric is also an allegory. The "theater" is the world, and the "play" human life. The "mimes" are men, created in the image of God, and are represented as the "mere puppets" of circumstance. The "Phantom chased for evermore" is happiness; but for all, the end is death and the grave.]

[Footnote 13: This poem was first published in the New York Evening Mirror, January 29, 1845. "In our opinion," wrote the editor, N. P. Willis, "it is the most effective single example of 'fugitive poetry' ever published in this country; and unsurpassed in English poetry for subtle conception, masterly ingenuity of versification, and consistent sustaining of imaginative lift."

The story of The Raven is given in prose by Poe in his Philosophy of Composition, which contains the best analysis of its structure: "A raven, having learned by rote the single word, 'Nevermore,' and having escaped from the custody of its owner, is driven at midnight, through the violence of a storm, to seek admission at a window from which a light still gleams,-the chamber window of a student, occupied half in poring over a volume, half in dreaming of a beloved mistress deceased. The casement being thrown open at the fluttering of the bird's wings, the bird itself perches on the most convenient seat out of the immediate reach of the student, who, amused by the incident and the oddity of the visitor's demeanor, demands of it, in jest and without looking for a reply, its name. The raven addressed answers with its customary word, 'Nevermore'-a word which finds immediate echo in the melancholy heart of the student, who, giving utterance aloud to certain thoughts suggested by the occasion, is again startled by the fowl's repetition of 'Nevermore.' The student now guesses the state of the case, but is impelled, by the human thirst for self-torture, and in part by superstition, to propound such queries to the bird as will bring him, the lover, the most of the luxury of sorrow, through the anticipated answer, 'Nevermore.'"]

[Footnote 14: As Poe explains, the raven is "emblematical of mournful and never-ending remembrance."]

[Footnote 15: From the position of the bird it has been held that the shadow could not possibly fall upon the floor. But the author says: "My conception was that of the bracket candelabrum affixed against the wall, high up above the door and bust, as is often seen in the English palaces, and even in some of the better houses in New York."]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE

For their generous permission to use A?thra, Under the Pines, Cloud Pictures, and Lyric of Action, the grateful acknowledgments of the editor are due to The Lothrop Publishing Company, Boston, who hold the copyright.

THE WILL AND THE WING [1]

To have the will to soar, but not the wings,

Eyes fixed forever on a starry height,

Whence stately shapes of grand imaginings

Flash down the splendors of imperial light;

And yet to lack the charm [2] that makes them ours,

The obedient vassals of that conquering spell,

Whose omnipresent and ethereal powers

Encircle Heaven, nor fear to enter Hell;

This is the doom of Tantalus [3]-the thirst

For beauty's balmy fount to quench the fires

Of the wild passion that our souls have nurst

In hopeless promptings-unfulfilled desires.

Yet would I rather in the outward state

Of Song's immortal temple lay me down,

A beggar basking by that radiant gate, [4]

Than bend beneath the haughtiest empire's crown!

For sometimes, through the bars, my ravished eyes

Have caught brief glimpses of a life divine,

And seen a far, mysterious rapture rise

Beyond the veil [5] that guards the inmost shrine.

MY STUDY [6]

This is my world! within these narrow walls,

I own a princely service;[7] the hot care

And tumult of our frenzied life are here

But as a ghost and echo; what befalls

In the far mart to me is less than naught;

I walk the fields of quiet Arcadies,[8]

And wander by the brink of hoary seas,

Calmed to the tendance of untroubled thought;

Or if a livelier humor should enhance

The slow-time pulse, 'tis not for present strife,

The sordid zeal with which our age is rife,

Its mammon conflicts crowned by fraud or chance,

But gleamings of the lost, heroic life,

Flashed through the gorgeous vistas of romance.

A?THRA [9]

It is a sweet tradition, with a soul

Of tenderest pathos! Hearken, love!-for all

The sacred undercurrents of the heart

Thrill to its cordial music:

Once a chief,

Philantus, king of Sparta, left the stern

And bleak defiles of his unfruitful land-

Girt by a band of eager colonists-

To seek new homes on fair Italian plains.[10]

Apollo's [11] oracle had darkly spoken:

"Where'er from cloudless skies a plenteous shower

Outpours, the Fates decree that ye should pause

And rear your household deities!"

Racked by doubt

Philantus traversed-with his faithful band

Full many a bounteous realm; but still defeat

Darkened his banners, and the strong-walled towns

His desperate sieges grimly laughed to scorn!

Weighed down by anxious thoughts, one sultry eve

The warrior-his rude helmet cast aside-

Rested his weary head upon the lap

Of his fair wife, who loved him tenderly;

And there he drank a generous draught of sleep.

She, gazing on his brow, all worn with toil,

And his dark locks, which pain had silvered over

With glistening touches of a frosty rime,

Wept on the sudden bitterly; her tears

Fell on his face, and, wondering, he woke.

"O blest art thou, my A?thra, my clear sky."

He cried exultant, "from whose pitying blue

A heart-rain falls to fertilize my fate:

Lo! the deep riddle's solved-the gods spake truth!"

So the next night he stormed Tarentum,[12] took

The enemy's host at vantage, and o'erthrew

His mightiest captains. Thence with kindly sway

He ruled those pleasant regions he had won,-

But dearer even than his rich demesnes

The love of her whose gentle tears unlocked

The close-shut mystery of the Oracle!

UNDER THE PINE [13]

To the memory of Henry Timrod

The same majestic pine is lifted high

Against the twilight sky,

The same low, melancholy music grieves

Amid the topmost leaves,[14]

As when I watched, and mused, and dreamed with him,

Beneath these shadows dim.

O Tree! hast thou no memory at thy core

Of one who comes no more?

No yearning memory of those scenes that were

So richly calm and fair,

When the last rays of sunset, shimmering down,

Flashed like a royal crown?

And he, with hand outstretched and eyes ablaze,

Looked forth with burning [15] gaze,

And seemed to drink the sunset like strong wine,

Or, hushed in trance divine,

Hailed the first shy and timorous glance from far

Of evening's virgin star?

O Tree! against thy mighty trunk he laid

His weary head; thy shade

Stole o'er him like the first cool spell of sleep:

It brought a peace so deep

The unquiet passion died from out his eyes,

As lightning from stilled skies.

And in that calm he loved to rest, and hear

The soft wind-angels, clear

And sweet, among the uppermost branches sighing:

Voices he heard replying

(Or so he dreamed) far up the mystic height,

And pinions rustling light.

O Tree! have not his poet-touch, his dreams

So full of heavenly gleams,

Wrought through the folded dullness of thy bark,

And all thy nature dark

Stirred to slow throbbings, and the fluttering fire

Of faint, unknown desire?

At least to me there sweeps no rugged ring

That girds the forest king,

No immemorial stain, or awful rent

(The mark of tempest spent),

No delicate leaf, no lithe bough, vine-o'ergrown,

No distant, flickering cone,

But speaks of him, and seems to bring once more

The joy, the love of yore;

But most when breathed from out the sunset-land

The sunset airs are bland,

That blow between the twilight and the night,

Ere yet the stars are bright;

For then that quiet eve comes back to me,

When deeply, thrillingly,

He spake of lofty hopes which vanquish Death;

And on his mortal breath

A language of immortal meanings hung,

That fired his heart and tongue.

For then unearthly breezes stir and sigh,

Murmuring, "Look up! 'tis I:

Thy friend is near thee! Ah, thou canst not see!"

And through the sacred tree

Passes what seems a wild and sentient thrill-

Passes, and all is still!-

Still as the grave which holds his tranquil form,

Hushed after many a storm,-

Still as the calm that crowns his marble brow,

No pain can wrinkle now,-

Still as the peace-pathetic peace of God-

That wraps the holy sod,

Where every flower from our dead minstrel's dust

Should bloom, a type of trust,-

That faith which waxed to wings of heavenward might

To bear his soul from night,-

That faith, dear Christ! whereby we pray to meet

His spirit at God's feet!

CLOUD PICTURES [16]

Here in these mellow grasses, the whole morn,

I love to rest; yonder, the ripening corn

Rustles its greenery; and his blithesome horn

Windeth the frolic breeze o'er field and dell,

Now pealing a bold stave with lusty swell,

Now falling to low breaths ineffable

Of whispered joyance. At calm length I lie,

Fronting the broad blue spaces of the sky,

Covered with cloud-groups, softly journeying by:

An hundred shapes, fantastic, beauteous, strange,

Are theirs, as o'er yon airy waves they range

At the wind's will, from marvelous change to change;

Castles, with guarded roof, and turret tall,

Great sloping archway, and majestic wall,

Sapped by the breezes to their noiseless fall!

Pagodas vague! above whose towers outstream

Banners that wave with motions of a dream-

Rising, or drooping in the noontide gleam;

Gray lines of Orient pilgrims: a gaunt band

On famished camels, o'er the desert sand

Plodding towards their prophet's Holy Land;

Mid-ocean,-and a shoal of whales at play,

Lifting their monstrous frontlets to the day,

Thro' rainbow arches of sun-smitten spray;

Followed by splintered icebergs, vast and lone,

Set in swift currents of some arctic zone,

Like fragments of a Titan's world o'erthrown;

Next, measureless breadths of barren, treeless moor,

Whose vaporous verge fades down a glimmering shore,

Round which the foam-capped billows toss and roar!

Calms of bright water-like a fairy's wiles,

Wooing with ripply cadence and soft smiles,

The golden shore-slopes of Hesperian Isles;

Their inland plains rife with a rare increase

Of plum?d grain! and many a snowy fleece

Shining athwart the dew-lit hills of peace;

Wrecks of gigantic cities-to the tune

Of some wise air-god built!-o'er which the noon

Seems shuddering; caverns, such as the wan Moon

Shows in her desolate bosom; then, a crowd

Of awed and reverent faces, palely bowed

O'er a dead queen, laid in her ashy shroud-

A queen of eld-her pallid brow impearled

By gems barbaric! her strange beauty furled

In mystic cerements of the antique world.

Weird pictures, fancy-gendered!-one by one,

'Twixt blended beams and shadows, gold and dun,

These transient visions vanish in the sun.

LYRIC OF ACTION [17]

'Tis the part of a coward to brood

O'er the past that is withered and dead:

What though the heart's roses are ashes and dust?

What though the heart's music be fled?

Still shine the grand heavens o'erhead,

Whence the voice of an angel thrills clear on the soul,

"Gird about thee thine armor, press on to the goal!"

If the faults or the crimes of thy youth

Are a burden too heavy to bear,

What hope can re-bloom on the desolate waste

Of a jealous and craven despair?

Down, down with the fetters of fear!

In the strength of thy valor and manhood arise,

With the faith that illumes and the will that defies.

"Too late!" through God's infinite world,

From his throne to life's nethermost fires,

"Too late!" is a phantom that flies at the dawn

Of the soul that repents and aspires.

If pure thou hast made thy desires,

There's no height the strong wings of immortals may gain

Which in striving to reach thou shalt strive for in vain.

Then, up to the contest with fate,

Unbound by the past, which is dead!

What though the heart's roses are ashes and dust?

What though the heart's music be fled?

Still shine the fair heavens o'erhead;

And sublime as the seraph [18] who rules in the sun

Beams the promise of joy when the conflict is won!

For a general introduction to the following poems, see Chapter III. The selections are intended to exhibit the poet's various moods and themes.

[Footnote 1: This poem, which appeared in the volume of 1855 under the title Aspirations, gives expression to a strong literary impulse. It was genuine in sentiment, and its aspiring spirit and forceful utterance gave promise of no ordinary achievement.]

[Footnote 2: An act or formula supposed to exert a magical influence or power.

"Then, in one moment, she put forth the charm

Of woven paces and of waving hands."

-Tennyson's Merlin and Vivien.

Compare the first scene in Faust where the Earth-spirit comes in obedience to a "conquering spell."]

[Footnote 3: Tantalus was a character of Greek mythology, who, for divulging the secret counsels of Zeus, was afflicted in the lower world with an insatiable thirst. He stood up to the chin in a lake, the waters of which receded whenever he tried to drink of them.]

[Footnote 4: The poet evidently had in mind the lame man who was "laid daily at the gate of the temple which is called Beautiful."-Acts iii. 2.]

[Footnote 5: A reference to the veil that hung before the Most Holy

Place, or "inmost shrine," of the temple. Compare Exodus xxvi. 33.]

[Footnote 6: This sonnet, which appeared in the volume of 1859, reveals the retiring, meditative temper of the poet. To him quiet reflection was more than action. He loved to dwell in spirit with the good and great of the past. The rude struggles of the market-place for wealth and power were repugnant to his refined and sensitive nature.]

[Footnote 7: Something served for the refreshment of a person; here an intellectual feast fit for a prince.]

[Footnote 8: Arcady, or Arcadia, is a place of ideal simplicity and contentment; so called from a picturesque district in Greece, which was noted for the simplicity and happiness of its people.]

[Footnote 9: This poem will serve to illustrate Hayne's skill in the use of blank verse. It is a piece of rare excellence and beauty. The name of the heroine is pronounced Ee-thra.]

[Footnote 10: This migration occurred about 708 B.C.]

[Footnote 11: Apollo was one of the major deities of Grecian mythology. He was regarded, among other things, as the god of song or minstrelsy, and also as the god of prophetic inspiration. The most celebrated oracle of Apollo was at Delphi.]

[Footnote 12: A town in southern Italy, now Taranto. It was in ancient times a place of great commercial importance.]

[Footnote 13: For the occasion of this poem, see page 61. The poet had a peculiar fondness for the pine, which in one of his poems he calls-

"My sylvan darling! set 'twixt shade and sheen,

Soft as a maid, yet stately as a queen!"

It is the subject of a half-dozen poems,-The Voice of the Pines,

Aspect of the Pines, In the Pine Barrens, The Dryad of the Pine, The

Pine's Mystery, and The Axe and the Pine,-all of them in his

happiest vein.]

[Footnote 14: In The Pine's Mystery we read:-

"Passion and mystery murmur through the leaves,

Passion and mystery, touched by deathless pain,

Whose monotone of long, low anguish grieves

For something lost that shall not live again."]

[Footnote 15: Hayne's very careful workmanship is rarely at fault; but here there seems to be an infelicitous epithet that amounts to a sort of tautology. "Eyes ablaze" would necessarily "look forth with burning gaze."]

[Footnote 16: This poem illustrates the poet's method of dealing with Nature. He depicts its beauty as discerned by the artistic imagination. He is less concerned with the messages of Nature than with its lovely forms. This poem, in its felicitous word-painting, reminds us of Tennyson, though it would be difficult to find in the English poet so brilliant a succession of masterly descriptions.

With this poem may be compared Hayne's Cloud Fantasies, a sonnet that brings before us, with great vividness, the somber appearance of the clouds in autumn. See also A Phantom in the Clouds. No other of our poets has dwelt so frequently and so delightfully on the changing aspects of the sky.

Compare Shelley's The Cloud.]

[Footnote 17: It is not often that Hayne assumed the hortatory tone found in this poem. In artistic temperament he was akin to Keats rather than to Longfellow. Even in his didactic poems, he is meditative and descriptive rather than hortatory. The artist in him hardly ever gave place to the preacher.]

[Footnote 18: The seraph's name was Uriel, that is, God's Light. In Revelation (xix. 17) we read, "And I saw an angel standing in the sun." Milton calls him-

"The Archangel Uriel-one of the seven

Who in God's presence, nearest to his throne,

Stand ready at command."

-Paradise Lost, Book III, 648-650.]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM HARRY TIMROD

TOO LONG, O SPIRIT OF STORM [1]

Too long, O Spirit of storm,

Thy lightning sleeps in its sheath!

I am sick to the soul of yon pallid sky,

And the moveless sea beneath.

Come down in thy strength on the deep!

Worse dangers there are in life,

When the waves are still, and the skies look fair,

Than in their wildest strife.

A friend I knew, whose days

Were as calm as this sky overhead;

But one blue morn that was fairest of all,

The heart in his bosom fell dead.

And they thought him alive while he walked

The streets that he walked in youth-

Ah! little they guessed the seeming man

Was a soulless corpse in sooth.

Come down in thy strength, O Storm!

And lash the deep till it raves!

I am sick to the soul of that quiet sea,

Which hides ten thousand graves.

A CRY TO ARMS [2]

Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side!

Ho! dwellers in the vales!

Ho! ye who by the chafing tide

Have roughened in the gales!

Leave barn and byre,[3] leave kin and cot,

Lay by the bloodless spade;

Let desk, and case, and counter rot,

And burn your books of trade.

The despot roves your fairest lands;

And till he flies or fears,

Your fields must grow but arm?d bands,

Your sheaves be sheaves of spears!

Give up to mildew and to rust

The useless tools of gain;

And feed your country's sacred dust

With floods of crimson rain!

Come, with the weapons at your call-

With musket, pike, or knife;

He wields the deadliest blade of all

Who lightest holds his life.

The arm that drives its unbought blows

With all a patriot's scorn,

Might brain a tyrant with a rose,

Or stab him with a thorn.

Does any falter? let him turn

To some brave maiden's eyes,

And catch the holy fires that burn

In those sublunar skies.

Oh! could you like your women feel,

And in their spirit march,

A day might see your lines of steel

Beneath the victor's arch.

What hope, O God! would not grow warm

When thoughts like these give cheer?

The Lily calmly braves the storm,

And shall the Palm Tree fear?

No! rather let its branches court

The rack [4] that sweeps the plain;

And from the Lily's regal port

Learn how to breast the strain!

Ho! woodsmen of the mountain side!

Ho! dwellers in the vales!

Ho! ye who by the roaring tide

Have roughened in the gales!

Come! flocking gayly to the fight,

From forest, hill, and lake;

We battle for our Country's right,

And for the Lily's sake!

ODE [5]

I

Sleep sweetly in your humble graves,

Sleep, martyrs of a fallen cause;

Though yet no marble column craves

The pilgrim here to pause.

II

In seeds of laurel in the earth

The blossom of your fame is blown,

And somewhere, waiting for its birth,

The shaft is in the stone![6]

III

Meanwhile, behalf [7] the tardy years

Which keep in trust your storied tombs,

Behold! your sisters bring their tears,

And these memorial blooms.

IV

Small tributes! but your shades will smile

More proudly on these wreaths to-day,

Than when some cannon-molded pile [8]

Shall overlook this bay.

V

Stoop, angels, hither from the skies!

There is no holier spot of ground

Than where defeated valor lies,

By mourning beauty crowned.

FLOWER-LIFE [9]

I think that, next to your sweet eyes,

And pleasant books, and starry skies,

I love the world of flowers;

Less for their beauty of a day,

Than for the tender things they say,

And for a creed I've held alway,

That they are sentient powers.[10]

It may be matter for a smile-

And I laugh secretly the while

I speak the fancy out-

But that they love, and that they woo,

And that they often marry too,

And do as noisier creatures do,

I've not the faintest doubt.

And so, I cannot deem it right

To take them from the glad sunlight,

As I have sometimes dared;

Though not without an anxious sigh

Lest this should break some gentle tie,

Some covenant of friendship, I

Had better far have spared.

And when, in wild or thoughtless hours,

My hand hath crushed the tiniest flowers,

I ne'er could shut from sight

The corpses of the tender things,

With other drear imaginings,

And little angel-flowers with wings

Would haunt me through the night.

Oh! say you, friend, the creed is fraught

With sad, and even with painful thought,

Nor could you bear to know

That such capacities belong

To creatures helpless against wrong,

At once too weak to fly the strong

Or front the feeblest foe?

So be it always, then, with you;

So be it-whether false or true-

I press my faith on none;

If other fancies please you more,

The flowers shall blossom as before,

Dear as the Sibyl-leaves [11] of yore,

But senseless every one.

Yet, though I give you no reply,

It were not hard to justify

My creed to partial ears;

But, conscious of the cruel part,

My rhymes would flow with faltering art,

I could not plead against your heart,

Nor reason with your tears.

SONNET [12]

Poet! if on a lasting fame be bent

Thy unperturbing hopes, thou wilt not roam

Too far from thine own happy heart and home;

Cling to the lowly earth and be content!

So shall thy name be dear to many a heart;

So shall the noblest truths by thee be taught;

The flower and fruit of wholesome human thought

Bless the sweet labors of thy gentle art.

The brightest stars are nearest to the earth,

And we may track the mighty sun above,

Even by the shadow of a slender flower.

Always, O bard, humility is power!

And thou mayest draw from matters of the hearth

Truths wide as nations, and as deep as love.

SONNET [13]

Most men know love but as a part of life;[14]

They hide it in some corner of the breast,

Even from themselves; and only when they rest

In the brief pauses of that daily strife,

Wherewith the world might else be not so rife,

They draw it forth (as one draws forth a toy

To soothe some ardent, kiss-exacting boy)

And hold it up to sister, child, or wife.

Ah me! why may not love and life be one?[15]

Why walk we thus alone, when by our side,

Love, like a visible God, might be our guide?

How would the marts grow noble! and the street,

Worn like a dungeon floor by weary feet,

Seem then a golden court-way of the Sun!

THE SUMMER BOWER [16]

It is a place whither I have often gone

For peace, and found it, secret, hushed, and cool,

A beautiful recess in neighboring woods.

Trees of the soberest hues, thick-leaved and tall.

Arch it o'erhead and column it around,

Framing a covert, natural and wild,

Domelike and dim; though nowhere so enclosed

But that the gentlest breezes reach the spot

Unwearied and unweakened. Sound is here

A transient and unfrequent visitor;

Yet, if the day be calm, not often then,

Whilst the high pines in one another's arms

Sleep, you may sometimes with unstartled ear

Catch the far fall of voices, how remote

You know not, and you do not care to know.

The turf is soft and green, but not a flower

Lights the recess, save one, star-shaped and bright-

I do not know its name-which here and there

Gleams like a sapphire set in emerald.

A narrow opening in the branch?d roof,

A single one, is large enough to show,

With that half glimpse a dreamer loves so much,

The blue air and the blessing of the sky.

Thither I always bent my idle steps,

When griefs depressed, or joys disturbed my heart,

And found the calm I looked for, or returned

Strong with the quiet rapture in my soul.[17]

But one day,

One of those July days when winds have fled

One knows not whither, I, most sick in mind

With thoughts that shall be nameless, yet, no doubt,

Wrong, or at least unhealthful, since though dark

With gloom, and touched with discontent, they had

No adequate excuse, nor cause, nor end,

I, with these thoughts, and on this summer day,

Entered the accustomed haunt, and found for once

No medicinal virtue.

Not a leaf

Stirred with the whispering welcome which I sought,

But in a close and humid atmosphere,

Every fair plant and implicated bough

Hung lax and lifeless. Something in the place,

Its utter stillness, the unusual heat,

And some more secret influence, I thought,

Weighed on the sense like sin. Above I saw,

Though not a cloud was visible in heaven,

The pallid sky look through a glaz?d mist

Like a blue eye in death.

The change, perhaps,

Was natural enough; my jaundiced sight,

The weather, and the time explain it all:

Yet have I drawn a lesson from the spot,

And shrined it in these verses for my heart.

Thenceforth those tranquil precincts I have sought

Not less, and in all shades of various moods;

But always shun to desecrate the spot

By vain repinings, sickly sentiments,

Or inconclusive sorrows. Nature, though

Pure as she was in Eden when her breath

Kissed the white brow of Eve, doth not refuse,

In her own way and with a just reserve,

To sympathize with human suffering;[18]

But for the pains, the fever, and the fret

Engendered of a weak, unquiet heart,

She hath no solace; and who seeks her when

These be the troubles over which he moans,

Reads in her unreplying lineaments

Rebukes, that, to the guilty consciousness,

Strike like contempt.

For a general introduction to the following selections, see Chapter IV.

The poet's verse is perfectly clear. He prefers to

"Cling to the lowly and be content."

[Footnote 1: This poem, which first appeared in Russell's Magazine, exhibits one of Timrod's characteristics: he does not describe Nature for its own sake, as Hayne often does, but for the sake of some truth or lesson in relation to man. The lesson of this poem is that a life of uninterrupted ease and comfort is not favorable to the development of noble character.]

[Footnote 2: This selection illustrates the fierce energy of the poet's martial lyrics. Compare Bannockburn by Burns, which Carlyle said "should be sung with the throat of the whirlwind."]

[Footnote 3: Byre is a cow-stable.]

[Footnote 4: Rack, usually wrack, signifies ruin or destruction.]

[Footnote 5: This lyric, which was sung on the occasion of decorating the graves of the Confederate dead in Magnolia Cemetery, Charleston, South Carolina, in 1867, has been much admired, especially the last stanza.]

[Footnote 6: It is interesting to know that this prediction has been fulfilled. A monument of granite now stands above the dead.]

[Footnote 7: Behalf, instead of in behalf of, is a rather hazardous construction.]

[Footnote 8: A noble bronze figure of a color bearer on a granite pedestal now commemorates the fallen heroes.]

[Footnote 9: This poem first appeared in the Southern Literary Messenger in 1851. The first stanza of this half-playful, half-serious piece, mentions the objects in which the poet most delighted.]

[Footnote 10: This belief has been frequently held, and has some support from recent scientific experiments. But that this sentiency goes as far as the poet describes, is of course pure fancy.]

[Footnote 11: The sibyls (Sybil is an incorrect form) were, according to ancient mythology, prophetic women. The sibylline leaves or books contained their teachings, and were preserved with the utmost care in Rome. The sibyl of Cumae conducted Aeneas through the under world, as narrated in the sixth book of Virgil's Aeneid.]

[Footnote 12: This sonnet expresses the poet's creed, to which his practice was confirmed. This fact imparts unusual simplicity to his verse-a simplicity that strikes us all the more at the present time, when an over-refinement of thought and expression is in vogue.]

[Footnote 13: This sonnet, on the commonest of all poetic themes, treats of love in a deep, serious way. It is removed as far as possible from the sentimental.]

[Footnote 14: This line reminds us of a well-known passage in Byron:-

"Man's love is of man's life a thing apart;

'Tis woman's whole existence. Man may range

The court, camp, church, the vessel and the mart;

Sword, gown, gain, glory, offer in exchange

Pride, fame, ambition, to fill up his heart,

And few there are whom these cannot estrange."]

[Footnote 15: This is the divine ideal, the realization of which will bring the true "Golden Age." "God is love; and he that dwelleth in love dwelleth in God, and God in him."-I John iv. 16.]

[Footnote 16: This poem first appeared in the Southern Literary Messenger in 1852. It will serve to show Timrod's manner of using blank verse. It will be observed that "a lesson" is again the principal thing.]

[Footnote 17: This recalls the closing lines of Longfellow's Sunrise on the Hills:-

"If thou art worn and hard beset

With sorrows that thou wouldst forget,

If thou wouldst read a lesson that will keep

Thy heart from fainting and thy soul from sleep,

Go to the woods and hills! No tears

Dim the sweet look that Nature wears."]

[Footnote 18: Compare the following lines from Bryant's Thanatopsis:-

"To him who in the love of Nature holds

Communion with her visible forms, she speaks

A various language; for his gayer hours

She has a voice of gladness, and a smile

And eloquence of beauty, and she glides

Into his darker musings, with a mild

And healing sympathy, that steals away

Their sharpness, ere he is aware."]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM SIDNEY LANIER

SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE [1]

Out of the hills of Habersham,

Down the valleys of Hall,[2]

The hurrying rain,[3] to reach the plain,

Has run the rapid and leapt the fall,

Split at the rock and together again,

Accepted his bed, or narrow or wide,

And fled from folly on every side,

With a lover's pain to attain the plain,

Far from the hills of Habersham,

Far from the valleys of Hall.

All down the hills of Habersham,

All through the valleys of Hall,

The rushes cried, Abide, abide;

The wilful water weeds held me thrall,

The laurel, slow-laving,[4] turned my tide,

The ferns and the fondling grass said stay,

The dewberry dipped for to win delay,[5]

And the little reeds sighed Abide, abide,

Here in the hills of Habersham,

Here in the valleys of Hall.

High over the hills of Habersham,

Veiling the valleys of Hall,

The hickory told me manifold

Fair tales of shade, the poplar tall

Wrought me her shadowy self to hold,

The chestnut, the oak, the walnut, the pine,

Overleaning, with flickering meaning and sign,

Said, Pass not so cold these manifold

Deep shades of the hills of Habersham,

These glades in the valleys of Hall.

And oft in the hills of Habersham,

And oft in the valleys of Hall,

The white quartz shone, and the smooth brook-stone

Barred[6] me of passage with friendly brawl,

And many a metal lay sad, alone,

And the diamond, the garnet, the amethyst,

And the crystal that prisons a purple mist,

Showed lights like my own from each cordial stone[7]

In the clefts of the hills of Habersham,

In the beds of the valleys of Hall.

But oh, not the hills of Habersham,

And oh, not the valleys of Hall,

Shall hinder the rain from attaining the plain,[8]

For downward the voices of duty call-

Downward to toil and be mixed with the main.

The dry fields burn and the mills are to turn,

And a thousand meadows [9] mortally yearn,

And the final [10] main from beyond the plain

Calls o'er the hills of Habersham,

And calls through the valleys of Hall.

THE CRYSTAL [11]

At midnight, death's and truth's unlocking time,

When far within the spirit's hearing rolls

The great soft rumble of the course of things-

A bulk of silence in a mask of sound-

When darkness clears our vision that by day

Is sun-blind, and the soul's a ravening owl

For truth, and flitteth here and there about

Low-lying woody tracts of time and oft

Is minded for to sit upon a bough,

Dry-dead and sharp, of some long-stricken tree

And muse in that gaunt place,-'twas then my heart,

Deep in the meditative dark, cried out:

Ye companies of governor-spirits grave,

Bards, and old bringers-down of flaming news

From steep-walled heavens, holy malcontents,

Sweet seers, and stellar visionaries, all

That brood about the skies of poesy,

Full bright ye shine, insuperable stars;

Yet, if a man look hard upon you, none

With total luster blazeth, no, not one

But hath some heinous freckle of the flesh

Upon his shining cheek, not one but winks

His ray, opaqued with intermittent mist

Of defect; yea, you masters all must ask

Some sweet forgiveness, which we leap to give,

We lovers of you, heavenly-glad to meet

Your largess so with love, and interplight

Your geniuses with our mortalities.

Thus unto thee, O sweetest Shakspere sole,[12]

A hundred hurts a day I do forgive

('Tis little, but, enchantment! 'tis for thee):

Small curious quibble; ... Henry's fustian roar

Which frights away that sleep he invocates;[13]

Wronged Valentine's [14] unnatural haste to yield;

Too-silly shifts of maids that mask as men

In faint disguises that could ne'er disguise-

Viola, Julia, Portia, Rosalind;[15]

Fatigues most drear, and needless overtax

Of speech obscure that had as lief be plain.

... Father Homer, thee,

Thee also I forgive thy sandy wastes

Of prose and catalogue,[16] thy drear harangues

That tease the patience of the centuries,

Thy sleazy scrap of story,-but a rogue's

Rape of a light-o'-love,[17]-too soiled a patch

To broider with the gods.

Thee, Socrates,[18]

Thou dear and very strong one, I forgive

Thy year-worn cloak, thine iron stringencies

That were but dandy upside-down,[19] thy words

Of truth that, mildlier spoke, had manlier wrought.

So, Buddha,[20] beautiful! I pardon thee

That all the All thou hadst for needy man

Was Nothing, and thy Best of being was

But not to be.

Worn Dante,[21] I forgive

The implacable hates that in thy horrid hells

Or burn or freeze thy fellows, never loosed

By death, nor time, nor love.

And I forgive

Thee, Milton, those thy comic-dreadful wars [22]

Where, armed with gross and inconclusive steel,

Immortals smite immortals mortalwise,

And fill all heaven with folly.

Also thee,

Brave Aeschylus,[23] thee I forgive, for that

Thine eye, by bare bright justice basilisked,

Turned not, nor ever learned to look where Love

Stands shining.

So, unto thee, Lucretius [24] mine,

(For oh, what heart hath loved thee like to this

That's now complaining?) freely I forgive

Thy logic poor, thine error rich, thine earth

Whose graves eat souls and all.

Yea, all you hearts

Of beauty, and sweet righteous lovers large:

Aurelius [25] fine, oft superfine; mild Saint

A Kempis,[26] overmild; Epictetus,[27]

Whiles low in thought, still with old slavery tinct;

Rapt Behmen,[28] rapt too far; high Swedenborg,[29]

O'ertoppling; Langley,[30] that with but a touch

Of art hadst sung Piers Plowman to the top

Of English songs, whereof 'tis dearest, now,

And most adorable; Caedmon,[31] in the morn

A-calling angels with the cowherd's call

That late brought up the cattle; Emerson,

Most wise, that yet, in finding Wisdom, lost

Thy Self, sometimes; tense Keats, with angels' nerves

Where men's were better; Tennyson, largest voice

Since Milton, yet some register of wit

Wanting,-all, all, I pardon, ere 'tis asked,

Your more or less, your little mole that marks

Your brother and your kinship seals to man.

But Thee, but Thee, O sovereign Seer of time,

But Thee, O poets' Poet, Wisdom's Tongue,

But Thee, O man's best Man, O love's best Love,

O perfect life in perfect labor writ,

O all men's Comrade, Servant, King, or Priest,-

What if or yet, what mole, what flaw, what lapse,

What least defect or shadow of defect,

What rumor, tattled by an enemy,

Of inference loose, what lack of grace

Even in torture's grasp, or sleep's, or death's,-

Oh, what amiss may I forgive in Thee,

Jesus, good Paragon, thou Crystal Christ?[32]

SUNRISE [33]

In my sleep I was fain of their fellowship, fain

Of the live-oak, the marsh, and the main.

The little green leaves would not let me alone in my sleep;

Up breathed from the marshes, a message of range and of sweep,

Interwoven with waftures of wild sea-liberties, drifting,

Came through the lapped leaves sifting, sifting,

Came to the gates of sleep.

Then my thoughts, in the dark of the dungeon-keep

Of the Castle of Captives hid in the City of Sleep,

Upstarted, by twos and by threes assembling:

The gates of sleep fell a-trembling

Like as the lips of a lady that forth falter yes,

Shaken with happiness:

The gates of sleep stood wide.

I have waked, I have come, my beloved! I might not abide:

I have come ere the dawn, O beloved, my live-oaks, to hide

In your gospeling glooms,[34]-to be

As a lover in heaven, the marsh my marsh and the sea my sea.

Tell me, sweet burly-barked, man-bodied Tree

That mine arms in the dark are embracing, dost know

From what fount are these tears at thy feet which flow?

They rise not from reason, but deeper inconsequent deeps.

Reason's not one that weeps.

What logic of greeting lies

Betwixt dear over-beautiful trees and the rain of the eyes?

O cunning green leaves, little masters! like as ye gloss

All the dull-tissued dark with your luminous darks that emboss.

The vague blackness of night into pattern and plan,

So,

(But would I could know, but would I could know,)

With your question embroid'ring the dark of the

question of man,-

So, with your silences purfling this silence of man

While his cry to the dead for some knowledge is

under the ban,

Under the ban,-

So, ye have wrought me

Designs on the night of our knowledge,-yea, ye

have taught me,

So,

That haply we know somewhat more than we know.

Ye lispers, whisperers, singers in storms,

Ye consciences murmuring faiths under forms,

Ye ministers meet for each passion that grieves,

Friendly, sisterly, sweetheart leaves,[35]

Oh, rain me down from your darks that contain me

Wisdoms ye winnow from winds that pain me,-

Sift down tremors of sweet-within-sweet

That advise me of more than they bring,-repeat

Me the woods-smell that swiftly but now brought breath

From the heaven-side bank of the river of death,-

Teach me the terms of silence,-preach me

The passion of patience,-sift me,-impeach me,-

And there, oh there

As ye hang with your myriad palms upturned in the air,

Pray me a myriad prayer.[36]

My gossip, the owl,-is it thou

That out of the leaves of the low-hanging bough,

As I pass to the beach, art stirred?

Dumb woods, have ye uttered a bird?

Reverend Marsh, low-couched along the sea,

Old chemist, rapt in alchemy,

Distilling silence,-lo,

That which our father-age had died to know-

The menstruum that dissolves all matter-thou

Hast found it: for this silence, filling now

The globed clarity of receiving space,

This solves us all: man, matter, doubt, disgrace,

Death, love, sin, sanity,

Must in yon silence' clear solution lie.

Too clear! That crystal nothing who'll peruse?

The blackest night could bring us brighter news.

Yet precious qualities of silence haunt

Round these vast margins, ministrant.

Oh, if thy soul's at latter gasp for space,

With trying to breathe no bigger than thy race

Just to be fellowed, when that thou hast found

No man with room, or grace enough of bound

To entertain that New thou tell'st, thou art,-

'Tis here, 'tis here, thou canst unhand thy heart

And breathe it free, and breathe it free,

By rangy marsh, in lone sea-liberty.

The tide's at full: the marsh with flooded streams

Glimmers, a limpid labyrinth of dreams.

Each winding creek in grave entrancement lies

A rhapsody of morning-stars. The skies

Shine scant with one forked galaxy,-

The marsh brags ten: looped on his breast they lie.

Oh, what if a sound should be made!

Oh, what if a bound should be laid

To this bow-and-string tension of beauty and silence a-spring,-

To the bend of beauty the bow, or the hold of silence the string!

I fear me, I fear me yon dome of diaphanous gleam

Will break as a bubble o'erblown in a dream,-

Yon dome of too-tenuous tissues of space and of night,

Overweighted with stars, overfreighted with light,

Oversated with beauty and silence, will seem

But a bubble that broke in a dream,

If a bound of degree to this grace be laid,

Or a sound or a motion made.

But no: it is made: list! somewhere,-mystery,

where?

In the leaves? in the air?

In my heart? is a motion made:

'Tis a motion of dawn, like a nicker of shade on shade.

In the leaves 'tis palpable: low multitudinous stirring

Upwinds through the woods; the little ones, softly conferring,

Have settled my lord's to be looked for; so; they are still;

But the air and my heart and the earth are a-thrill,-

And look where the wild duck sails round the bend of the river,-

And look where a passionate shiver

Expectant is bending the blades

Of the marsh-grass in serial shimmers and shades,-

And invisible wings, fast fleeting, fast fleeting,

Are beating

The dark overhead as my heart beats,-and steady and free

Is the ebb-tide flowing from marsh to sea-

(Run home, little streams,

With your lapfuls of stars and dreams),-

And a sailor unseen is hoisting a-peak,

For list, down the inshore curve of the creek

How merrily flutters the sail,-

And lo, in the East! Will the East unveil?

The East is unveiled, the East hath confessed

A flush: 'tis dead; 'tis alive; 'tis dead, ere the West

Was aware of it: nay, 'tis abiding, 'tis withdrawn:

Have a care, sweet Heaven! 'Tis Dawn.

Now a dream of a flame through that dream of a flush is uprolled:

To the zenith ascending, a dome of undazzling gold

Is builded, in shape as a beehive, from out of the sea:

The hive is of gold undazzling, but oh, the Bee,

The star-fed Bee, the build-fire Bee,

Of dazzling gold is the great Sun-Bee

That shall flash from the hive-hole over the sea.[37]

Yet now the dewdrop, now the morning gray,

Shall live their little lucid sober day

Ere with the sun their souls exhale away.

Now in each pettiest personal sphere of dew

The summ'd morn shines complete as in the blue

Big dewdrop of all heaven: with these lit shrines

O'er-silvered to the farthest sea-confines,

The sacramental marsh one pious plain

Of worship lies. Peace to the ante-reign

Of Mary Morning, blissful mother mild,

Minded of nought but peace, and of a child.

Not slower than Majesty moves, for a mean and a measure

Of motion,-not faster than dateless Olympian leisure [38]

Might pace with unblown ample garments from pleasure to pleasure,-

The wave-serrate sea-rim sinks unjarring, unreeling,

Forever revealing, revealing, revealing,

Edgewise, bladewise, halfwise, wholewise,-'tis done!

Good-morrow, lord Sun!

With several voice, with ascription one,

The woods and the marsh and the sea and my soul

Unto thee, whence the glittering stream of all morrows doth roll,

Cry good and past-good and most heavenly morrow, lord Sun.

O Artisan born in the purple,-Workman Heat,-

Parter of passionate atoms that travail to meet

And be mixed in the death-cold oneness,-innermost Guest

At the marriage of elements,-fellow of publicans,-blest

King in the blouse of flame, that loiterest o'er

The idle skies, yet laborest fast evermore,-

Thou in the fine forge-thunder, thou, in the beat

Of the heart of a man, thou Motive,-Laborer Heat:

Yea, Artist, thou, of whose art yon sea's all news,

With his inshore greens and manifold mid-sea blues,

Pearl-glint, shell-tint, ancientest perfectest hues,

Ever shaming the maidens,-lily and rose

Confess thee, and each mild flame that glows

In the clarified virginal bosoms of stones that shine,

It is thine, it is thine:

Thou chemist of storms, whether driving the winds a-swirl

Or a-flicker the subtiler essences polar that whirl

In the magnet earth,-yea, thou with a storm for a heart,

Rent with debate, many-spotted with question, part

From part oft sundered, yet ever a globed light,

Yet ever the artist, ever more large and bright

Than the eye of a man may avail of:-manifold One,

I must pass from thy face, I must pass from the face of the Sun:

Old Want is awake and agog, every wrinkle a-frown;

The worker must pass to his work in the terrible town:

But I fear not, nay, and I fear not the thing to be done;

I am strong with the strength of my lord the Sun:

How dark, how dark soever the race that must needs be run,

I am lit with the Sun.

Oh, never the mast-high run of the seas

Of traffic shall hide thee,

Never the hell-colored smoke of the factories

Hide thee,

Never the reek of the time's fen-politics

Hide thee,

And ever my heart through the night shall with knowledge abide thee,

And ever by day shall my spirit, as one that hath tried thee,

Labor, at leisure, in art,-till yonder beside thee

My soul shall float, friend Sun,

The day being done.

For a general introduction to Lanier's poetry, see Chapter V.

[Footnote 1: This poem was first published in Scott's Magazine, Atlanta, Georgia, from which it is here taken. It at once became popular, and was copied in many newspapers throughout the South. It was subsequently revised, and the changes, which are pointed out below, are interesting as showing the development of the poet's artistic sense.

The singularly rapid and musical lilt of this poem may be readily traced to its sources. It is due to the skillful use of short vowels, liquid consonants, internal rhyme, and constant alliteration. These are matters of technique which Lanier studiously employed throughout his poetry.

This poem abounds in seeming irregularities of meter. The fundamental measure is iambic tetrameter, as in the line-

"The rushes cried, Abide, abide";

but trochees, dactyls, or anapests are introduced in almost every line, yet without interfering with the time element of the verse. These irregularities were no doubt introduced in order to increase the musical effects.]

[Footnote 2: As may be seen by reference to a map, the Chattahoochee rises in Habersham County, in northeastern Georgia, and in its south- westerly course passes through the adjoining county of Hall. Its entire length is about five hundred miles.]

[Footnote 3: Changed in the revision to "I hurry amain," with the present tense of the following verbs. The pronoun "his" in line 6 becomes "my."]

[Footnote 4: This line was changed to-

"The laving laurel turned my tide."]

[Footnote 5: In this line the use of a needless antiquated form may be fairly questioned. In the revised form "win" is changed to "work."]

[Footnote 6: "Barred" is changed to "did bar" in the revision-a doubtful gain.]

[Footnote 7: The preceding four lines show a decided poetic gain in the revised form:-

"And many a luminous jewel lone-

Crystals clear or a-cloud with mist,

Ruby, garnet, and amethyst-

Made lures with the lightnings of streaming stone."]

[Footnote 8: The revised form, with an awkward pause after the first foot, and also a useless antiquated phrase, reads-

"Avail! I am fain for to water the plain."]

[Footnote 9: Changed to "myriad of flowers."]

[Footnote 10: "Final" was changed to "lordly" with fine effect. This poem challenges comparison with other pieces of similar theme. It lacks the exquisite workmanship of Tennyson's The Brook, with its incomparable onomatopoeic effects:-

"I chatter over stony ways,

In little sharps and trebles;

I bubble into eddying bays,

I babble on the pebbles."

It should be compared with Hayne's The River and also with his The

Meadow Brook:-

"Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,

Hark! the tiny swell;

Of wavelets softly, silverly

Toned like a fairy bell,

Whose every note, dropped sweetly

In mellow glamour round,

Echo hath caught and harvested

In airy sheaves of sound!"

But The Song of the Chattahoochee has what the other poems lack, -a lofty moral purpose. The noble stream consciously resists the allurements of pleasure to heed "the voices of duty," and this spirit imparts to it a greater dignity and weight.]

[Footnote 11: This poem appeared in The Independent, July 15, 1880, from which it is taken. It illustrates the intellectual rather than the musical side of Lanier's genius. It is purely didactic, and thought rather than melody guides the poet's pen. The meter is quite regular,-an unusual thing in our author's most characteristic work.

It shows Lanier's use of pentameter blank verse,-a use that is somewhat lacking in ease and clearness. The first sentence is longer than that of Paradise Lost, without Milton's unity and force. Such ponderous sentences are all too frequent in Lanier, and as a result he is sometimes obscure. Repeated readings are necessary to take in the full meaning of his best work.

This poem, though not bearing the distinctive marks of his genius, is peculiarly interesting for two reasons,-it gives us an insight into his wide range of reading and study, and it exhibits his penetration and sanity as a critic. In the long list of great names he never fails to put his finger on the vulnerable spot. Frequently he is exceedingly felicitous, as when he speaks of "rapt Behmen, rapt too far," or of "Emerson, Most wise, that yet, in finding Wisdom, lost Thy Self sometimes."]

[Footnote 12: It will be remembered that Lanier was a careful student of

Shakespeare, on whom he lectured to private classes in Baltimore.]

[Footnote 13: See second part of King Henry IV, iii. I. The passage which the poet had in mind begins:-

"How many thousand of my poorest subjects

Are at this hour asleep!"]

[Footnote 14: See The Two Gentlemen of Verona.]

[Footnote 15: These characters are found as follows: Viola in Twelfth

Night; Julia in The Two Gentlemen of Verona; Portia in The

Merchant of Venice; and Rosalind in As You Like It.]

[Footnote 16: Referring to the well-known catalogue of ships in the

Second Book of the Illiad:-

"My song to fame shall give

The chieftains, and enumerate their ships."

It is in this passage in particular that Homer is supposed to nod.]

[Footnote 17: It will be recalled that Paris, son of Priam, king of Troy,

persuaded Helen, the fairest of women and wife of King Menelaus of

Greece, to elope with him to Troy. This incident gave rise to the famous

Trojan War.]

[Footnote 18: Socrates (469-399 B.C.) was an Athenian philosopher, of whom Cicero said that he "brought down philosophy from the heavens to the earth." His teachings are preserved in Xenophon's Memorabilia and Plato's Dialogues.]

[Footnote 19: That is to say, his needless austerity was as much affected as the dandy's excessive and ostentatious refinement.]

[Footnote 20: Buddha, meaning the enlightened one, was Prince Siddhartha of Hindustan, who died about 477 B.C. He was the founder of the Buddhist religion, which teaches that the supreme attainment of mankind is Nirvana or extinction. This doctrine naturally follows from the Buddhist assumption that life is hopelessly evil. Many of the moral precepts of Buddhism are closely akin to those of Christianity.]

[Footnote 21: Dante Alighieri (1265-1321), a native of Florence, is the greatest poet of Italy and one of the greatest poets of the world. His immortal poem, The Divine Comedy, is divided into three parts -"Hell," "Purgatory," and "Paradise."]

[Footnote 22: This is a reference to the wars among the angels, which ended with the expulsion of Satan and his hosts from heaven, as related in the sixth book of Paradise Lost. This criticism of Milton is as just as it is felicitous.]

[Footnote 23: Aeschylus (525-456 B.C.) was the father of Greek tragedy. He presents destiny in its sternest aspects. His Prometheus Bound has been translated by Mrs. Browning, and his Agamemnon by Robert Browning-two dramas that exhibit his grandeur and power at their best.]

[Footnote 24: Lucretius (about 95-51 B.C.) was the author of a didactic poem in six books entitled De Rerum Natura. It is Epicurean in morals and atheistic in philosophy. At the same time, as a work of art, it is one of the most perfect poems that have descended to us from antiquity.]

[Footnote 25: Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180 A.D.), one of the best emperors of Rome, was a noble Stoic philosopher. His Meditations is regarded by John Stuart Mill as almost equal to the Sermon on the Mount in moral elevation.]

[Footnote 26: Thomas a Kempis (1379-1471) was the author of the famous Imitation of Christ in which, as Dean Milman says, "is gathered and concentered all that is elevating, passionate, profoundly pious in all the older mystics." No other book, except the Bible, has been so often translated and printed.]

[Footnote 27: Epictetus (born about 50 A.D.) was a Stoic philosopher, many of whose moral teachings resemble those of Christianity. But he unduly emphasized renunciation, and wished to restrict human aspiration to the narrow limits of the attainable.]

[Footnote 28: Jacob Behmen, or B?hme (1575-1624), was a devout mystic philosopher, whose speculations, containing much that was beautiful and profound, sometimes passed the bounds of intelligibility.]

[Footnote 29: Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772) was a Swedish philosopher and theologian. His principal work, Arcana Caelestia, is made up of profound speculations and spiritualistic extravagance. He often oversteps the bounds of sanity.]

[Footnote 30: William Langland, or Langley (about 1332-1400), a disciple of Wycliffe, was a poet, whose Vision of Piers Plowman, written in strong, alliterative verse, describes, in a series of nine visions, the manifold corruptions of society, church, and state in England.]

[Footnote 31: Caedmon (lived about 670) was a cowherd attached to the monastery of Whitby in England. Later he became a poet, and wrote on Scripture themes in his native Anglo-Saxon. His Paraphrase, is, next to Beowulf, the oldest Anglo-Saxon poem in existence.]

[Footnote 32: Lanier was deeply religious, but his beliefs were broader than any creed. In Remonstrance he exclaims,-

"Opinion, let me alone: I am not thine.

Prim Creed, with categoric point, forbear

To feature me my Lord by rule and line."

Yet, as shown in the conclusion of The Crystal he had an exalted sense of the unapproachable beauty of the life and teachings of Christ. His tenderest poem is A Ballad of Trees and the Master:-

"Into the woods my Master went,

Clean forspent, forspent.

Into the woods my Master came,

Forspent with love and shame.

But the olives they were not blind to Him,

The little gray leaves were kind to Him;

The thorn-tree had a mind to Him,

When into the woods He came.

"Out of the woods my Master went,

And He was well content.

Out of the woods my Master came,

Content with death and shame.

When Death and Shame would woo Him last,

From under the trees they drew Him last:

'Twas on a tree they slew Him-last

When out of the woods He came."]

[Footnote 33: This poem was first published in The Independent, December 14, 1882, from which it is here taken. The editor said, "This poem, we do not hesitate to say, is one of the few great poems that have been written on this side of the ocean." With this judgment there will be general agreement on the part of appreciative readers. On the emotional side, it may be said to reach the high-water mark of poetic achievement in this country. Its emotion at times reaches the summits of poetic rapture; a little more, and it would have passed into the boundary of hysterical ecstasy.

The circumstances of its composition possess a melancholy interest. It was Lanier's last and greatest poem. He penciled it a few months before his death when he was too feeble to raise his food to his mouth and when a burning fever was consuming him. Had he not made this supreme effort, American literature would be the poorer. This poem exhibits, in a high degree, the poet's love for Nature. Indeed, most of his great pieces- The Marshes of Glynn, Clover, Corn, and others-are inspired by the sights and sounds of Nature. Sunrise, in general tone and style, closely resembles The Marshes of Glynn.

The musical theories of Lanier in relation to poetry find their highest exemplification in Sunrise. It is made up of all the poetic feet -iambics, trochees, dactyls, anapests-so that it almost defies any attempt at scansion. But the melody of the verse never fails; equality of time is observed, along with a rich use of alliteration and assonance.

The poem may be easily analyzed; and a distinct notation of its successive themes may be helpful to the young reader. Its divisions are marked by its irregular stanzas. It consists of fifteen parts as follows: 1. The call of the marshes to the poet in his slumbers, and his awaking. 2. He comes as a lover to the live-oaks and marshes. 3. His address to the "man-bodied tree," and the "cunning green leaves." 4. His petition for wisdom and for a prayer of intercession. 5. The stirring of the owl. 6. Address to the "reverend marsh, distilling silence." 7. Description of the full tide. 8. "The bow-and-string tension of beauty and silence." 9. The motion of dawn. 10. The golden flush of the eastern sky. 11. The sacramental marsh at worship. 12. The slow rising of the sun above the sea horizon. 13. Apostrophe to heat. 14. The worker must pass from the contemplation of this splendor to his toil. 15. The poet's inextinguishable adoration of the sun.]

[Footnote 34: "Gospeling glooms" means glooms that convey to the sensitive spirit sweet messages of good news.]

[Footnote 35: Lanier continually attributes personality to the objects of Nature, and places them in tender relations to man. Here the little leaves become-

"Friendly, sisterly, sweetheart leaves,"

as a few lines before they were "little masters." In Individuality we read,-

"Sail on, sail on, fair cousin Cloud."

And in Corn there is a passage of great tenderness:-

"The leaves that wave against my cheek caress

Like women's hands; the embracing boughs express

A subtlety of mighty tenderness;

The copse-depths into little noises start,

That sound anon like beatings of a heart,

Anon like talk 'twixt lips not far apart."]

[Footnote 36: This passage is Wordsworthian in spirit. Nature is regarded as a teacher who suggests or reveals ineffable things. Lanier might have said, as did Wordsworth,-

"To me the meanest flower that blows can give

Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears."]

[Footnote 37: Lanier had a lively and vigorous imagination, which is seen in his use of personification and metaphor. In this poem almost every object-trees, leaves, marsh, streams, sun, heat-is personified. This same fondness for personification may be observed in his other characteristic poems.

In the use of metaphor it may be doubted whether the poet is always so happy. There is sometimes inaptness or remoteness in his resemblances. To liken the naming heavens to a beehive, and the rising sun to a bee issuing from the "hive-hole," can hardly be said to add dignity to the description.

In Clover men are clover heads, which the Course-of-things, as an ox, browses upon:-

"This cool, unasking Ox

Comes browsing o'er my hills and vales of Time,

And thrusts me out his tongue, and curls it, sharp,

And sicklewise, about my poets' heads,

And twists them in....

and champs and chews,

With slantly-churning jaws and swallows down."]

[Footnote 38: The deities of Olympus, being immortal, have no need of strenuous haste. They may well move from pleasure to pleasure with stately leisure.]

* * * * *

SELECTIONS FROM FATHER RYAN

SONG OF THE MYSTIC [1]

I walk down the Valley of Silence-[2]

Down the dim, voiceless valley-alone!

And I hear not the fall of a footstep

Around me, save God's and my own;

And the hush of my heart is as holy

As hovers where angels have flown!

Long ago was I weary of voices

Whose music my heart could not win;

Long ago was I weary of noises

That fretted my soul with their din;

Long ago was I weary of places

Where I met but the human-and sin.[3]

I walked in the world with the worldly;

I craved what the world never gave;

And I said: "In the world each Ideal,

That shines like a star on life's wave,

Is wrecked on the shores of the Real,

And sleeps like a dream in a grave."

And still did I pine for the Perfect,

And still found the False with the True;

I sought 'mid the Human for Heaven,

But caught a mere glimpse of its Blue;

And I wept when the clouds of the Mortal

Veiled even that glimpse from my view.

And I toiled on, heart-tired of the Human,

And I moaned 'mid the mazes of men,

Till I knelt, long ago, at an altar,

And I heard a voice call me. Since then

I walked down the Valley of Silence

That lies far beyond mortal ken.

Do you ask what I found in the Valley?

'Tis my Trysting Place with the Divine.

And I fell at the feet of the Holy,

And above me a voice said: "Be Mine."

And there arose from the depths of my spirit

An echo-"My heart shall be thine."

Do you ask how I live in the Valley?

I weep-and I dream-and I pray.

But my tears are as sweet as the dewdrops

That fall on the roses in May;

And my prayer like a perfume from censers,

Ascendeth to God night and day.

In the hush of the Valley of Silence

I dream all the songs that I sing;[4]

And the music floats down the dim Valley,

Till each finds a word for a wing,

That to hearts, like the dove of the deluge

A message of peace they may bring.

But far on the deep there are billows

That never shall break on the beach;

And I have heard songs in the Silence

That never shall float into speech;

And I have had dreams in the Valley

Too lofty for language to reach.

And I have seen thoughts in the Valley-

Ah me! how my spirit was stirred!

And they wear holy veils on their faces,

Their footsteps can scarcely be heard:

They pass through the Valley like virgins,

Too pure for the touch of a word![5]

Do you ask me the place of the Valley,

Ye hearts that are harrowed by care?

It lieth afar between mountains,

And God and His angels are there:

And one is the dark mount of Sorrow,

And one the bright mountain of Prayer.

THE CONQUERED BANNER [6]

Furl that Banner, for 'tis weary;

Round its staff 'tis drooping dreary;

Furl it, fold it, it is best;

For there's not a man to wave it,

And there's not a sword to save it,

And there's not one left to lave it

In the blood which heroes gave it;

And its foes now scorn and brave it;

Furl it, hide it-let it rest![7]

Take that Banner down! 'tis tattered;

Broken is its staff and shattered;

And the valiant hosts are scattered

Over whom it floated high.

Oh! 'tis hard for us to fold it;

Hard to think there's none to hold it;

Hard that those who once unrolled it

Now must furl it with a sigh.

Furl that Banner! furl it sadly!

Once ten thousands hailed it gladly,

And ten thousands wildly, madly,

Swore it should forever wave;

Swore that foeman's sword should never

Hearts like theirs entwined dissever,

Till that flag should float forever

O'er their freedom or their grave!

Furl it! for the hands that grasped it,

And the hearts that fondly clasped it,

Cold and dead are lying low;

And that Banner-it is trailing!

While around it sounds the wailing

Of its people in their woe.

For, though conquered, they adore it!

Love the cold, dead hands that bore it!

Weep for those who fell before it!

Pardon those who trailed and tore it![8]

But, oh! wildly they deplore it,

Now who furl and fold it so.

Furl that Banner! True, 'tis gory,

Yet 'tis wreathed around with glory,

And 'twill live in song and story,

Though its folds are in the dust:

For its fame on brightest pages,

Penned by poets and by sages,

Shall go sounding down the ages-

Furl its folds though now we must.

Furl that Banner, softly, slowly!

Treat it gently-it is holy-

For it droops above the dead.

Touch it not-unfold it never,

Let it droop there, furled forever,

For its people's hopes are dead![9]

THE SWORD OF ROBERT LEE [10]

Forth from its scabbard, pure and bright,

Flashed the sword of Lee!

Far in the front of the deadly fight,

High o'er the brave in the cause of Right,

Its stainless sheen, like a beacon light,

Led us to victory.

Out of its scabbard, where full long

It slumbered peacefully,

Roused from its rest by the battle's song,

Shielding the feeble, smiting the strong,

Guarding the right, avenging the wrong,

Gleamed the sword of Lee.

Forth from its scabbard, high in air

Beneath Virginia's sky-

And they who saw it gleaming there,

And knew who bore it, knelt to swear

That where that sword led they would dare

To follow-and to die.

Out of its scabbard! Never hand

Waved sword from stain as free;

Nor purer sword led braver band,

Nor braver bled for a brighter land,

Nor brighter land had a cause so grand,

Nor cause a chief like Lee![11]

Forth from its scabbard! How we prayed

That sword might victor be;

And when our triumph was delayed,

And many a heart grew sore afraid,

We still hoped on while gleamed the blade

Of noble Robert Lee.

Forth from its scabbard all in vain

Bright flashed the sword of Lee;

'Tis shrouded now in its sheath again,

It sleeps the sleep of our noble slain,

Defeated, yet without a stain,

Proudly and peacefully.

DEATH [12]

Out of the shadows of sadness,

Into the sunshine of gladness,

Into the light of the blest;

Out of a land very dreary,

Out of the world very weary,

Into the rapture of rest.

Out of to-day's sin and sorrow,

Into a blissful to-morrow,

Into a day without gloom;

Out of a land filled with sighing,

Land of the dead and the dying,

Into a land without tomb.

Out of a life of commotion,

Tempest-swept oft as the ocean,

Dark with the wrecks drifting o'er,

Into a land calm and quiet;

Never a storm cometh nigh it,

Never a wreck on its shore.

Out of a land in whose bowers

Perish and fade all the flowers;

Out of the land of decay,

Into the Eden where fairest

Of flowerets, and sweetest and rarest,

Never shall wither away.

Out of the world of the wailing

Thronged with the anguished and ailing;

Out of the world of the sad,

Into the world that rejoices-

World of bright visions and voices-

Into the world of the glad.

Out of a life ever mournful,

Out of a land very lornful,

Where in bleak exile we roam,[13]

Into a joy-land above us,

Where there's a Father to love us-

Into our home-"Sweet Home."

PRESENTIMENT [14]

Cometh a voice from a far-land,

Beautiful, sad, and low;

Shineth a light from the star-land

Down on the night of my woe;

And a white hand, with a garland,

Biddeth my spirit to go.

Away and afar from the night-land,

Where sorrow o'ershadows my way,

To the splendors and skies of the light-land,

Where reigneth eternity's day,-

To the cloudless and shadowless bright-land,

Whose sun never passeth away.

And I knew the voice; not a sweeter

On earth or in Heaven can be;

And never did shadow pass fleeter

Than it, and its strange melody;

And I know I must hasten to meet her,

"Yea, Sister! Thou callest to me!"

And I saw the light; 'twas not seeming,

It flashed from the crown that she wore,

And the brow, that with jewels was gleaming,

My lips had kissed often of yore!

And the eyes, that with rapture were beaming,

Had smiled on me sweetly before.

And I saw the hand with the garland,

Ethel's hand-holy and fair;

Who went long ago to the far-land

To weave me the wreath I shall wear;

And to-night I look up to the star-land

And pray that I soon may be there.[15]

NIGHT THOUGHTS [16]

Some reckon their age by years,

Some measure their life by art,-

But some tell their days by the flow of their tears,

And their life, by the moans of their heart.

The dials of earth may show

The length-not the depth of years;

Few or many they come, few or many they go,

But our time is best measured by tears.

Ah! not by the silver gray

That creeps through the sunny hair,

And not by the scenes that we pass on our way,

And not by the furrows the fingers of care,

On forehead and face, have made:

Not so do we count our years;

Not by the sun of the earth, but the shade

Of our souls, and the fall of our tears.

For the young are oft-times old,

Though their brow be bright and fair;

While their blood beats warm, their heart lies cold-

O'er them the springtime, but winter is there.

And the old are oft-times young,

When their hair is thin and white;

And they sing in age, as in youth they sung,

And they laugh, for their cross was light.

But bead by bead I tell

The rosary of my years;

From a cross to a cross they lead,-'tis well!

And they're blest with a blessing of tears.

Better a day of strife

Than a century of sleep;

Give me instead of a long stream of life,

The tempests and tears of the deep.

A thousand joys may foam

On the billows of all the years;

But never the foam brings the brave [17] heart home-

It reaches the haven through tears.

For a general introduction to Father Ryan's poetry, see Chapter VI.

[Footnote 1: As stated in the sketch of Father Ryan, this poem strikes the keynote to his verse. It therefore properly opens his volume of poems. It became popular on its first publication, and was copied in various papers. It is here taken from the Religious Herald, Richmond, Virginia.]

[Footnote 2: The location of The Valley of Silence is given in the last stanza.]

[Footnote 3: This poem may be taken, in a measure, as autobiographic. In this stanza, and the two following ones, the poet refers to that period of his life before he resolved to consecrate himself to the priesthood.]

[Footnote 4: This indicates the general character of his poetry. Inspired in The Valley of Silence, it is sad, meditative, mystical, religious.]

[Footnote 5: Perhaps every poet has this experience. There come to him elusive glimpses of truth and beauty which are beyond the grasp of speech. As some one has sung:-

"Sometimes there rise, from deeps unknown,

Before my inmost gaze,

Far brighter scenes than earth has shown

In morning's orient blaze;

I try to paint the visions bright,

But, oh, their glories turn to night!"]

[Footnote 6: This poem was first published in Father Ryan's paper, the Banner of the South, March 21, 1868, from which it is here taken. Coming so soon after the close of the Civil War, it touched the Southern heart.]

[Footnote 7: For a criticism of the versification of this stanza, see the chapter on Father Ryan.]

[Footnote 8: This note of pardon, in keeping with the poet's priestly character, is found in several of his lyrics referring to the war. In spite of his strong Southern feeling, there is no unrelenting bitterness. Thus, in The Prayer of the South, which appeared a week later, we read:-

"Father, I kneel 'mid ruin, wreck, and grave,-

A desert waste, where all was erst so fair,-

And for my children and my foes I crave

Pity and pardon. Father, hear my prayer!"]

[Footnote 9: This was the poet's feeling in 1868. In a similar strain we read in The Prayer of the South:-

"My heart is filled with anguish deep and vast!

My hopes are buried with my children's dust!

My joys have fled, my tears are flowing fast!

In whom, save Thee, our Father, shall I trust?"

Happily the poet lived to see a new order of things-an era in which vain regrets gave place to energetic courage, hope, and endeavor.]

[Footnote 10: This poem first appeared in the Banner of the South,

April 4, 1868, and, like the preceding one, has been very popular in the

South.]

[Footnote 11: Father Ryan felt great admiration for General Lee, who has remained in the South the popular hero of the war. In the last of his Sentinel Songs, the poet-priest pays a beautiful tribute to the stainless character of the Confederate leader:-

"Go, Glory, and forever guard

Our chieftain's hallowed dust;

And Honor, keep eternal ward,

And Fame, be this thy trust!

Go, with your bright emblazoned scroll

And tell the years to be,

The first of names to flash your roll

Is ours-great Robert Lee."]

[Footnote 12: This poem was first published in the Banner of the South, April 25, 1868. It illustrates the profounder themes on which the poet loved to dwell, and likewise the Christian faith by which they were illumined.]

[Footnote 13: This mournful view of life appears frequently in Father

Ryan's poems. In De Profundis, for example, we read:-

"All the hours are full of tears-

O my God! woe are we!

Grief keeps watch in brightest eyes-

Every heart is strung with fears,

Woe are we! woe are we!

All the light hath left the skies,

And the living, awe-struck crowds

See above them only clouds,

And around them only shrouds."]

[Footnote 14: This poem, as the two preceding ones, is taken from the Banner of the South, where it appeared June 13, 1868. It affords a glimpse of the tragical romance of the poet's life. The voice that he hears is that of "Ethel," the lost love of his youth. Her memory never left him. In the poem entitled What? it is again her spirit voice that conveys to his soul an ineffable word.]

[Footnote 15: This desire for death occurs in several poems, as When? and Rest. In the latter poem it is said:-

"'Twas always so; when but a child I laid

On mother's breast

My wearied little head-e'en then I prayed

As now-for rest."]

[Footnote 16: This poem is taken from the Banner of the South, where it appeared June 29, 1870. In the volume of collected poems the title is changed to The Rosary of my Tears.]

[Footnote 17: "Brave" is changed to "lone" in the poet's revision.]