are eager for blood and plunder. I have risked my life to bring you this warning; but that is of little moment. Farewell!-Be happy!"

Cæsar stopped her. "Do you fly from my thanks, dear

Zoe?

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I wish not for your thanks, but for your safety;—I desire not to defraud Valeria or Servilia of one caress, extorted from gratitude or pity. Be my feelings what they may, I have learnt in a fearful school to endure and to suppress them. I have been taught to abase a proud spirit to the claps and hisses of the vulgar;-to smile on suitors who united the insults of a despicable pride to the endearments of a loathsome fondness ;-to affect sprightliness with an aching head, and eyes from which tears were ready to gush ;-to feign love with curses on my lips, and madness in my brain. Who feels for me any esteem-any tenderness? Who will shed a tear over the nameless grave which will soon shelter from cruelty and scorn the broken heart of the poor Athenian girl? but you, who alone have addressed her in her degradation with a voice of kindness and respect, farewell. Sometimes think of me,-not with sorrow ;-no: I could bear your ingratitude, but not your distress. Yet, if it will not pain you too much, in distant days, when your lofty hopes and destinies are accomplished,-on the evening of some mighty victory,-in the chariot of some magnificent triumph,think on one who loved you with that exceeding love which only the miserable can feel. Think that, wherever her exhausted frame may have sunk beneath the sensibilities of a tortured spirit,-in whatever hovel or whatever vault she may have closed her eyes,-whatever strange scenes of horror and pollution may have surrounded her dying bed, your shape was the last that swam before her sight-your voice the last sound that was ringing in her ears. Yet turn your face to me, Cæsar. Let me carry away one last look of those features, and then- He turned round. He looked at her. He hid his face on her bosom, and burst into tears. With sobs long and loud, and convulsive as those of a terrified child, he poured forth on her bosom the tribute of impetuous and uncontrollable emotion. He raised his head; but he in vain struggled to restore composure to the brow which had confronted the frown of Sylla, and the lips which had rivalled the eloquence of Cicero. He several times attempted to speak, but in vain; and his voice still faltered with tenderness, when, after a pause of several minutes, he thus addressed her:

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My own dear Zoe, your love has been bestowed on one who, if he cannot merit, can at least appreciate and adore you. Beings of similar loveliness, and similar devotedness of affection, mingled, in all my boyish dreams of greatness, with visions of

curule chairs and ivory cars, marshalled legions and laurelled fasces. Such I have endeavoured to find in the world; and, in their stead, I have met with selfishness, with vanity, with frivolity, with falsehood. The life which you have preserved is a boon less valuable than the affection

"Oh! Cæsar," interrrupted the blushing Zoe, "think only on your own security at present. If you feel as you speak, but you are only mocking me,-or perhaps your compassion

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By Heaven!-by every oath that is binding

"Alas! alas! Cæsar, were not all the same oaths sworn yesterday to Valeria? But I will trust you, at least so far as to partake your present dangers. Flight may be necessary:-form your plans. Be they what they may, there is one who, in exile, in poverty, in peril, asks only to wander, to beg, to die with you."

"My Zoe, I do not anticipate any such necessity. To renounce the conspiracy without renouncing the principles on which it was originally undertaken ;-to elude the vengeance of the Senate without losing the confidence of the people, is, indeed, an arduous, but not an impossible, task. I owe it to myself and to my country to make the attempt. There is still ample time for consideration. At present I am too happy in love to think of ambition or danger.'

They had reached the door of a stately palace. Cæsar struck it. It was instantly opened by a slave. Zoe found herself in a magnificent hall, surrounded by pillars of green marble, between which were ranged the statues of the long line of Julian nobles.

"Call Endymion," said Cæsar.

The confidential freed-man made his appearance, not without a slight smile, which his patron's good nature emboldened him to hazard, at perceiving the beautiful Athenian.

"Arm my slaves, Endymion; there are reasons for precaution. Let them relieve each other on guard during the night. Zoe, my love, my preserver, why are your cheeks so pale? Let me kiss some bloom into them. How you tremble! Endymion, a flask of Samian and some fruit. Bring them to my apartments. This way my sweet Zoe."

*

T. M.

THE SEVEN SLEEPERS.

A FRAGMENT.

I.

་

Is it the sun that opens these dim eyes?

The morning dew that wets this matted hair?—

'It is the sun that lights this stony lair

Awake, my brothers; brothers dear, arise!

Yet sleep ye on, for there is peace in sleep,
When spirits plunge in visions sweet and deep,

Earth-freed and pure, swimming the boundless ocean

Of sunless space, breathing its own clear light-
And such a vision I have dream'd to-night,

Thinking myself a disembodied motion—

'But now upon the earth again I creep.'

II.

He stretch'd his limbs, for they were stiff and chill;
He strain'd his eyes, and bent his slumbering will
To look upon the day-beam gently peering;
And now he spake with accents most endearing
To his six brothers; but no voice was there,
No low breath linger'd on his anxious ear:
They seem'd as dead; and then a quivering fear
Came over him; his eye look'd up in prayer:
Trembling he felt his younger brother's cheek,
And bow'd himself again, a suppliant meek,
And took the cold hand to his own warm heart,
And kiss'd the pale lips with a love unblenching;-
The pale lips move with a convulsive start,

The fingers cold his feverish flesh are clenching:
He bore him quickly from that cavern darkling
To the green vale where matin beams were sparkling,
The pure air play'd upon his pallid face,

And where the cool transparent brook was dancing,
In that fresh hour of sounds and sweets entrancing,
The youth wak'd up, to meet a brother's blest embrace.

III.

The earth was embroider'd with half-blown flowers,
The grass was wet with night's softest showers,
And the dripping leaves in the sun were glistening
Like the tearful eye of an innocent maid,

To some old fable of sorrow listening,

Where hope still sits on the trenchant blade,
And the crown of true-love is at last display'd.

There were voices of joy in the peaceful wind, As the small birds were twittering each to his kind, 'Midst the tremulous hum of the myriad flies,

And the buz of the golden bee's deep horn;
The sounds of the air, and the tint of the skies,
The mantle of gray over all which lies,

And the odorous breathings of that fresh morn,
Were life and delight to each gentle brother,
As they gazed in speechless love at each other.

IV.

These were delights of high and solemn tone;
But dim as dreams of long-forgotten things,
Or like the mystic veil by fancy thrown
O'er some abstracted soul, musing alone,
Till earth, and air, and the star-spangled zone,
Seem but the work of his imaginings.

Their eyes drank in the gentle sun-beam slanting
Down the thick covert with a light enchanting,
The music of the air their voices hushing,

With a persuasive and o'erpowering spell:
But, even as the playful brook was gushing
To the far river, did their spirits well

To their deep tendency; their earthly feeling
Was lost in what their sleep had been revealing.

V.

'Brother, the first beams of the day
Were wont to call us up to pray;
The birds are singing God's high praise,
The very flowers a breath do raise
Of incense to His holy power;
Brother, it is all nature's hour

'Of orison.' And so they knelt them down
In the green temple of that sunny vale,
And bade their Lord and glorious Maker hail,
And ask'd of their pure faith the blessed crown
Promis'd by Him that died upon the cross:
And, as they knelt upon the springing moss,
They look'd again upon that beauteous scene;

The mist had fled before their simple prayers:
The brook, the trees, the flowers, were then, I ween,
Clear written notes of what themselves had been,
Haunts of their early faith, memorials of their cares.

VI.

Yet, since those brothers knelt upon that soil,
Or heard that fountain's low, romantic coil,

Or saw the pine-wood sleeping in the sun,
There had been many a weary year outspun.
Since there the holy Seven had trod
To muse the praises of their God,
Two hundred garbs of greenery
The Spring had given to field and tree;
Two hundred icy shrouds and pale
Had Winter spread along that vale;
Crumbled was many a fane and sturdy tower,
Ramparts of war and shrines of kingly fame,
Ashes and dust was many a dome of power,
But yet the hills and vallies look'd the same.

VII.

O vital Spirit of nature, thou alone

Givest a perdurable garment to this earth,
And thou sitt'st momently smiling at the birth
Of myriad forms of life, that thou hast known
Before the first day broke! eternal forms,
That not the parching sun, nor scattering storms,
Nor winter's ice can change. Proud cities fall,
Time hides them with his black funereal pall,
Languages die, and many a scheme of pride
Leaves but the slime that marks the reptile's way;
But streams, that in the sedgy vallies play,-
Flowers of delight, in leafy nooks that hide,-
Trees, that in kissing clumps or forests bide,

And the soft gales in their green mantles fold,—
Mountains, below whose heads the winds are roll'd,—

And seas, that heave with an undying tide,—
These are for all time,' uttering words of truth,
Love, joy, and wisdom, in their ceaseless youth.

VIII.

And yet they gaz'd:-they look'd upon that place
As lovers, meeting after tedious years,
Scan the chang'd lineaments of each dear face,
And vainly seek the freshness and the grace
That mantled once in eyes, undimm'd by tears.
And yet they gaz'd: that hollow leafless trunk
Was unremember'd; the precipitous hill

Had lost its ancient pathways; and the rill
Into a deeper bed of earth had sunk:-

They wonder'd, yet they spake not. There's a voice, Not unfamiliar, on their silence breaking;

We come we join you-let our souls rejoice—

• Hark to the blest hymn of our brothers' waking:'