HENRY B. HIRST. Which, even in dreams, adorns the Italian skies This, in some quiet, column'd chamber, where All day, all day, dear love, would I lie there, Poet's, like CHAUCER's, quaint, delicious pages, By murmurous streams, We'd pause, entranced by Dian's amber light, Her faultless feet in lucid ripples, white Then to some tall old wood, beneath old trees, Fairer than those which jewell'd Grecian leas And all that of earth, and watch the spheres, Treading the feather'd grasses, And as the gods who ruled all things we saw. Then giving way to mad imaginings The natural emotions of our race We'd vow that love should be the only law 535 THE LOST PLEIAD. Calmly the purple heavens reposed around her, Once on a day she lay in dreamy slumber; She dream'd; and in her dreams saw bending o'er A form her fervid fancy deified; What words, what passionate words he breathed, Have long been lost in the descending years; Nevertheless, she listen'd to his teaching, Smiling between her tears. And ever since that hour the happy maiden NO MORE. No MORE-no more! What vague, mysterious, What soul-disturbing secrecies abound In those sad syllables! and what delirious, Who questions, maddens! what is veil'd in shade, ASTARTE. THY lustre, heavenly star! shines ever on me. Floats thy fair form before me: the azure air Henceforth for earth; that even the rudest things (Twin planets swimming through Love's lustrous Should love and be beloved: while we, The ADAM and EVE, should sit enthroned, and see skies) Are mirror'd in my heart's serenest streams— AUGUSTINE J. H. DUGANNE. [Born about 1817.] THE largest work by Mr. DUGANNE which I hardly be stated, is Mr. LOWELL'S "Fable in have seen is a yellow-covered octavo called, "The Mysteries of Three Cities! Boston, New York, A. WORTH," «Truth, a New Year's Gift Critics." "American Bards," by Mr. GOBEY and Philadelphia! a True History of Men's Scribblers," by Mr. WILLIAM J. SNELLING, Hearts and Habits!" and on the title-page, which "The Quacks of Helicon," by Mr. L. A. WILMER is here faithfully copied, he is described as the author of "The Illegitimate," "Emily Harper," Mr. DUGANNE'S "Parnassus in Pillory," cana are superior to any others of the second class. The Pastor," "The Two Clerks," Guilt," "Fortunes of Pertinax," "etc. etc." He "Secret be regarded as equal to either of these, but it he is therefore undoubtedly a voluminous writer in occasional critical suggestions, neatly delivered. some epigrammatic turns of expression, with prose, for it may be inferred that all these pro- which render it very readable. If the works here ductions are in that form; and he has published referred to be compared with that amazing extr in verse «The Iron Harp," "Parnassus in Pil-bition of satiric rage, "The Dunciad," of whic lory," and "The Mission of Intellect," besides a great number of short pieces, in the newspapers, in a greater or less degree, according to the abd most of our attempts in this class are imitatiata, which are collected with the rest in a hand-ties of their respective authors, no surprise all te some octavo edition of his "Poetical Works." The argument of "Parnassus in Pillory" is thus announced: "As in some butcher's barricaded stall, A thousand prisoned rats guaw, squeak, and crawl, Several of them evince as much malice, but all felt that they have commanded so little attention. together, except Mr. LOWELL's ingenious perform ance, do not display as much poetry or wit the meanest page of POPE's ill-natured but in comparably polished and pointed attack on his contemporaries. From his "Iron Harp," Mr. DUGANNE seems to belong to "the party of progress," and his favorite poet, it may be guessed, is EBENEZER Elliott. The most creditable illustration of his abilities is Satires of American poets have been sufficient-probably the following ode on Mr. POWERS's status ly numerous. ODE TO THE GREEK SLAVE. O GREEK! by more than Moslem fetters thrall'd! Where life is half recall'd, And beauty dwells, created, not enwrought- O chastity of Art! Behold! this maiden shape makes solitude Beneath her soul's immeasurable woe, Of tears, is inward turned upon her heart; Her eloquent spirit swoons, She stands, the sweet embodiment of Truth; O Genius! thou canst chain If in the ancient days he dwelt Aright on her creations, haply pray and praise! signed Be thou Evangel of true Art, and preach GANNE E. SPENCER MILLER. [Born, 1817.] Mr. E. SPENCER MILLER is a son of the late eminent theologian, the Reverend SAMUEL MILLER, D.D., of Princeton, New Jersey, where he was born on the third day of September, 1817. When nineteen years of age he was graduated at Nassau Hall, in his native town, and having studied the law, and been admitted to the bar, in Philadelphia, chose that city for his residence, and has attained to a distinguished position there in his profession. Mr. MILLER has not hitherto been known to the public as a poet. The only book upon the titlepage of which he has placed his name, is a stout octavo called "A Treatise on the Law of Parti tion, by Writ, in Pennsylvania," published in 1847; but while engaged in researches concerning this most unpoetical subject, in leisure hours his mind was teeming with those beautiful productions which were given to the world in 1849, in a modest anonymous volume entitled "Caprices." Among these poems are some that evince an imagination of unusual sensibility and activity, and in all are displayed culture and wise reflection. No one of our poets has made a first appearance in a book of greater promise, and it will be justly regretted if devotion to the law or to any other pursuit prevents its accomplished author from keeping that promise to the lovers of literature. NIAGARA. Ho, SPIRIT! I am with thee now; By summer streams, by land and sea, And dreamed what thou wouldst say to me. In spells of vision I have stood, The hour is mine; the dream is gone; The hour is mine; I feel thy spray; I press along thy rainbow way; God help my throbbing heart to-day. The hour is mine; my feet are near; I falter not, but wrestle here; Eternal words are in mine ear. I falter not; I feel the whole; The mysteries of thy presence roll In waves of tumult o'er my soul. I merge myself, my race, my clime, And as I tread thy paths sublime, I seem to stand alone with Time; To stand, all lost, with Time alone; He makes thy sullen roar his own, An infinite sad monotone: Majestic dirge of strifes and sighs; The voices of the year that rise Between the two eternities: THE WIND. I STIR the pulses of the mind, It fans my face, it fans the tree, Upon my chilly brow it plays, Away,-again away, it roams, Then, sweeping where the shadows lie, Away, the old cathedral bell .... E. SPENCER MILLER. MOULD upon the ceiling, Mould upon the floor, Windows barred and double barred, Opening nevermore; Spiders in the corners, Spiders on the shelves, Weaving frail and endless webs Back upon themselves; Weaving, ever weaving, Nor the bat, that clings It will haunt your ear Where a breath has brushed away Dust from off a mark; Dust of weary winters, Dust of solemn years, Dust that deepens in the silence, On the shelf and wainscot, Hist! the spectres gather, Break, and group again, Wreathing, writhing, gibbering Round that fearful stain; Blood upon the panels, Blood upon the floor, Blood that baffles wear and washing, Red for evermore. See, they pause and listen, Where the bat that clings, Stirs within the crevices Of the pannelings. See, they pause and listen, How the eager life has struggled, See, they pause and listen, For a startled breath is sighing, Sighing on the floor, Sighing through the window-bars, That open nevermore. Waken not those whispers; They will pain your ears; Waken not the dust that deepens Through the solemn years,Deepens in the silence, Deepens in the dark; Covering closer, as it gathers, Many a fearful mark. Hist! the spectres gather, Break and group again, Wreathing, writhing, gibbering, Round that fearful stain: Blood upon the panels, Blood upon the floor, Blood that baffles wear and washing, Red for evermore. THE GLOW-WORM. DEEP within the night, Toiling on its way, With its feeble lamp Giving out a ray. Close about its path Sombre shadows meet, And the light is cast Only at its feet. Castle-top and grange Off within the dark; Groping by its ray; Light for all its way; Of the toilsome ground; E. SPENCER MILLER. EXTRACT FROM "ABEL." FROM these pure and happy places, Outcast, striding forth alone; Mournful eyes of all the ages Turning backward to his own. Striding forth alone, for ever, Burning brow, convulsive breath, And the mark of GoD upon him, Strange, mysterious mark of death. Death, relentless, stern intruder; Never, in the years before, Had its chill and pallid presence Passed within life's iron door. Death, from out the pregnant future Rise its tones of fear and pain, Voices from the grave of ABEL, Echoes of the curse of CAIN. REST. REST!-there is no such thing; A coward's baseless dream. Time is a rushing flood, And thou art in the stream. And turn upon thy side: Look out upon the night; sweep Where whirling eddies Evade thy destiny. Some fuel for its fire, Think what a helpless clog Their passive lethargy. .... Thy spirit to its day. And train them to command. Thou art not all a man, Till thou hast known them all, Till thou hast stood and faced Whatever may appal. Cui bono?-faithless words; Live one step further on, And know that thou art, here, A chrysalis, whose wings Grow for another sphere; That knowledge, being, power, Are onward, infinite, And every effort, now, A progress in thy flight; And see if thou, but one Of all this race of men, Can'st look around and ask That faithless question then. Time's earnest moments roll; Are way, reward, and end. 539 |