Yes, beautiful beyond belief,
Transfigured and transfused, he sees
The lady of the Pyrenees,
The daughter of the Indian chief.
Beneath the shadow of her hair
The gold-bronze colour of the skin
Seems lighted by a fire within,
As when a burst of sunlight shines
Beneath a sombre grove of pines,-
A dusky splendour in the air.
The two small hands, that now are pressed
In his, seem made to be caressed,
They lie so warm and soft and still,
Like birds half hidden in a nest,
Trustful and innocent of ill.
And ah! he cannot believe his ears
When her melodious voice he hears
Speaking his native Gascon tongue;
The words she utters seem to be
Part of some poem of Goudouli,
They are not spoken, they are sung!
And the Baron smiles, and says, “You see,
I told you but the simple truth;
Ah, you may trust the eyes of youth!”
Down in the village day by day
The people gossip in their way,
And stare to see the Baroness pass
On Sunday morning to early Mass;
And when she kneeleth down to pray,
They wonder, and whisper together, and say,
“ Surely this is no heathen lass!"
And in course of time they learn to bless
The Baron and the Baroness.
And in course of time the Curate learns
A secret so dreadful, that by turns
He is ice and fire, he freezes and burns.
The Baron at confession hath said,
That though this woman be his wife,
He hath wed her as the Indians wed,
He hath bought her for a gun and a knife!
And the Curate replies : " () profligate,
O Prodigal Son! return once more
To the open arms and the open door
Of the Church, or ever it be too late.
Thank God, thy father did not live
To see what he could not forgive;
On thee, so reckless and perverse,
He left his blessing, not his curse.

But the nearer the dawn the darker the night,
And by going wrong all things come right;
Things have been mended that were worse,
And the worse, the nearer they are to mend.
For the sake of the living and the dead,
Thou shalt be wed as Christians wed,
And all things come to a happy end."

O sun, that followest the night,
In yon blue sky, serene and pure,
And pourest thine impartial light
Alike on mountain and on moor,
Pause for a moment in thy course,
And bless the bridegroom and the bride!
O Gave, that from thy hidden source
In yon mysterious mountain-side
Pursuest thy wandering way alone,
And leaping down its steps of stone,
Along the meadow-lands demure
Stealest away to the Adour,
Pause for a moment in thy course
To bless the bridegroom and the bride!

The choir is singing the matin song,
The doors of the church are opened wide,
The people crowd, and press, and throng
To see the bridegroom and the bride.
They enter and pass along the nave;
They stand upon the father's grave;
The bells are ringing soft and slow;
The living above and the dead below
Give their blessing on one and twain;
The warm wind blows from the hills of Spain,
The birds are building, the leaves are green,
The Baron Castine of St. Castine
Hath come at last to his own again,

FINALE.

“ Nunc plaudite !" the Student cried,

When he had finished; “now applaud,
As Roman actors used to say
At the conclusion of a play;"
And rose, and spread his bands abroad,
And smiling bowed from side to side,
As one who bears the palm away.

And generous was the applause and loud,
But less for him than for the sun,
That even as the tale was done
Burst from its canopy of cloud,
And lit the landscape with the blaze
Of afternoon on autumn days,
And filled the room with light, and made
The fire of logs a painted shade.

A sudden wind from out the west
Blew all its trumpets loud and shrill;
The windows rattled with the blast,
The oak-trees shouted as it passed,
And straight, as if hy fear possessed,
The cloud encampment on the hill
Broke up, and fluttering flag and tent
Vanished into the firmament,
And down the valley fled amain
The rear of the retreating rain.

Only far up in the blue sky
A mass of clouds, like drifted snow
Suffused with a faint Alpine glow,
Was heaped together, vast and high,
On which a shattered rainbow hung,
Not rising like the ruined arch
Of some aerial aqueduct,
But like a roseate garland plucked
From an Olympian god, and flung
Aside in his triumphal march.

Like prisoners from their dungeon gloom,
Like birds escaping from a snare,
Like school-boys at the hour of play,
All left at once the pent-up room
And rushed into the open air;
And no more tales were told that day.

Translations.

TRANSLATIONS FROM THE SPANISH AND

PORTUGUESE.

COPLAS DE MANRIQUE.
() LET the soul her slumbers break, | Our lives are rivers, gliding free
Let thought be quickened, and awake; To that unfathomed, boundless sea,
Awake to see

The silent grave!
How soon this life is past and gone, Thither all earthly pomp and boast
And death comes softly stealing on, Roll, to be swallowed up and lost
How silently!

In one dark wave.
Swiftly our pleasures glide away,

Thither the mighty torrents stray, Our hearts recall the distant day

Thither the brook pursues its way, With many sighs;

And tinkling rill. The moments that are speeding fast

There all are equal. Side by side We heed not, but the past, – the past,

The poor man and the son of pride More highly prize

Lie calm and still.

I will not here invoke the throng Onward its course the present keeps,

Of orators and sons of song, Onward the constant current sweeps,

The deathless few; Till life is done;

Fiction entices and deceives, And, did we judge of time aright,

And, sprinkled o'er her fragrant leaves, The past and future in their flight Lies poisonous dew. Would be as one.

To One alone my thoughts arise, Let no one fondly dream again,

The Eternal Truth, the Good and That Hope and all her shadowy train

Wise,Will not decay;

To Him I cry, Pleeting as were the dreams of old, Who shared on earth our common lot, Remembered like a tale that's told, But the world comprehended not They pass away.

His deity.

This world is but the rugged road In life's first stage;
Which leads us to the bright abode These shall become a heavy weight,
Of peace above;

When Time swings wide his outward So let us choose that narrow way,

gate Which leads no traveller's foot astray To weary age. From realms of love.

The noble blood of Gothic name, Our cradle is the starting-place,

Heroes emblazoned high to fame, Life is the running of the race,

In long array; We reach the goal

How, in the onward course of time, When, in the mansions of the blest, The landmarks of that race sublime Death leaves to its eternal rest

Were swept away! The weary soul.

Some, the degraded slaves of lust, Did we but use it as we ought,

Prostrate and trampled in the dust, This world would school each wandering

Shall rise no more; thought

Others, by guilt and crime, maintain To its high state.

The scutcheon, that, without a stain, Faith wings the soul beyond the sky,

Their fathers bore. Up to that better world on high,

Wealth and the high estate of pride, For which we wait.

With what untimely speed they glide,

How soon depart! Yes,—the glad messenger of love,

Bid not the shadowy phantoms stay, To guide us to our home above,

The vassals of a mistress they,
The Saviour came;

Of fickle heart.
Born amid mortal cares and fears,
He suffered in this vale of tears

These gifts in Fortune's hands are found; A death of shame.

Her swift revolving wheel turns round, Behold of what delusive worth

And they are gone!

No rest the inconstant goddess knows, The bubbles we pursue on earth,

But changing, and without repose,
The shapes we chase;

Still hurries on.
Amid a world of treachery!
They vanish ere death shuts the eye,

Even could the hand of avarice save And leave no trace.

Its gilded baubles, till the grave Time steals them from us, --chances

Reclaimed its prey,

Let none on such poor hopes rely;
strange,

Life, like an empty dream, flits by,
Disastrous accidents, and change,
That come to all;

And where are they?
Even in the most exalted state,

Earthly desires and sensual lust Relentless sweeps the stroke of fate;

Are passions springing from the dust, The strongest fall.

They fade and die;

But, in the life beyond the tomb, Tell me, the charms that lovers seek

They seal the immortal spirit's doom In the clear eye and blushing cheek, Eternally! The hues that play O'er rosy lip and brow of snow,

The pleasures and delights, which mask When hoary age approaches slow, In treacherous smiles life's serious task, Ah, where are they?

What are they, all,

But the fileet coursers of the chase, The cunning skill, the cunning arts, And death an ambush in the race, The glorious strength that youth imparts Wherein we fall ?