But he rides for the home he has pined to see
In the court, in the camp, in captivity.
He reached the castle-the gate was thrown
Open and wide, but he stood there alone.
He entered the door,-his own step was all
That echoed within the deserted hall;
He stood on the roof of the ancient tower,
And for banner there waved one pale wall-flower;
And for sound of the trumpet and sound of the horn,
Came the scream of the owl on the night-wind borne ;
And the turrets were falling, the vassals were flown,
And the bat ruled the halls he had thought his own.
His heart throbbed high, oh! never again
Might he soothe with sweet thoughts his spirit's pain!
He never might think on his boyish years,
Till his eyes grew dim with those sweet warm tears, Which hope and memory shed when they meet,— The grave of his kindred was at his feet.
He stood alone the last of his race,
With the cold, wide world for his dwelling-place;
The home of his fathers gone to decay,
All but their memory was passed away ;
No one to welcome, no one to share
The laurel he no more was proud to wear.
He came in the pride of his war-success,
But to weep o'er very
desolateness;
They pointed him to a barren plain
Where his father, his brothers, his kinsmen were slain.
They showed him the lowly grave, where slept
The maiden whose scarf he so truly had kept;
But they could not show him one living thing,
To which his withered heart could.cling.
Amid the warriors of Palestine,
Is one, the first in the battle line;
It is not for glory he seeks the field,
For a blasted tree is on his shield;
And, the motto he bears is, I fight for a grave!? He found it that warrior has died with the brave!
Miss L. E. Landon.
I love thee, Solitude! thou art possessed
Of all my secret heart; nor hath thine ear
Shrunk from the accents of thy lonely guest,
Told to the night when thou alone wert near.
I've sought thee 'neath the moonlight, where the stream
Through rock and sedge poured forth its voiced gush,
Where parted runnels leapt beneath its beam,
With sound such as thou lovest, like the hush
*
*
Of some sweet lullaby, by music tuned,
So soft, that silence scarcely feels the wound.
O there, beneath the moonbeam, have I stood:
There hast thou heard my voice, dear solitude!
I've sought thee, viewless spirit, 'mid the tombs,
Because I loved thee, loved thee even there,
'Mid black browed sepulchres and charnel glooms,
Content, dear solitude, thy home to share ;
And marked the cold moon through some crevice peep
Down o'er me, as I watched thy sullen sleep.
O! how my heart shrunk, when the green light shone Down on the gaunt and grinning skeleton ;
And I saw there the gorged and lazy worm
In rayless sockets coil its hideous form.
Yet, solitude, even then I left thee not:
My heart forgot its terror, thou wert near;
With love, strong-deep, that heart's warm cell was fraught, And, rich in thee, it had no room for fear.
暑
But best I love to roam with thee, when spring
Peeps from her arbours smilingly; and when
The travelled swallow plies her homeward wing,
Syren, 'tis sweet to saunter with thee then
Amid the wild woods, where the streams pass on
From sun to shadow, slowly, silently,
Like wayward thoughts, the present joys that shun,
To brood, like toads, in memory's midnight caves,
Where light, through fissures, glances but on graves;
And as we wander there, to list from high
The lone deep-throated cuckoo, whose sad song
Is lifted up at eve those woods among.
And then the moon, the mother of the earth,
Looking with sad eyes on her miscreant child,
As if she sorrowed o'er its fatal birth,
Wandering alone o'er ether's boundless wild,
Repentant, yet condemned to see her crime
In thee, base dust, through all the flights of time.
The moon comes on, wan pilgrim of the night!
Almost mine idol. With what deep delight
I lift mine eyes to thee! delight alone Shared with thy votaries profound and holy, Memory, and solitude, and melancholy,
Who all alike adore thee, lovely one. But yet thine hour must come, thine hour must pass Like summer clouds, or breath like beauty's glass. Alas! thou tarriest not at our behest,
Although, of all heaven's lights, we love thee best.
A. B. P.
• No longer weep-no more repine
For man's neglect, or woman's scorn,
But wed thee to an exile's lot;
For if the world have loved thee not
Its absence may be borne.'
I.
Yea, if the world have loved thee not,
No kindred soul thy thoughts to share,
Fly to the desert's dreariest spot
Thou canst not feel more lonely there.
II.
Though piercing be the wintry winds,
That o'er thy living grave hath rolled,
Man's bitter scorn is more unkind,
And woman's heart is far more cold.
III.
For soon will end the mortal strife,
Turn to the dust with death the blest;
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