Hath man's lone spirit here

With storms in battle striven? Where all is now so calmly clear, Hath anguish cried to heaven? -Then the sea's voice arose,

Like an earthquake's under-tone,
"Mortal, the strife of human woes
Where hath not nature known!
"Here to the quivering mast
Despair hath wildly clung,

The shriek upon the wind hath pass'd,
The midnight sky hath rung.

"And the youthful and the brave,
With their beauty and renown,
To the hollow chambers of the wave
In darkness have gone down.

"They are vanish'd from their place

Let their homes and hearths make moan! But the rolling waters keep no trace Of pang or conflict gone."

-Alas! thou haughty deep!

The strong, the sounding far!

My heart before thee dies,-I weep
To think on what we are!

To think that so we pass,

High hope, and thought, and mind,
Ev'n as the breath-stain from the glass,
Leaving no sign behind!

Saw'st thou naught else, thou main?
Thou and the midnight sky?

Naught save the struggle, brief and vain,
The parting agony?

-And the sea's voice replied,

"Here nobler things have been! Power with the valiant when they died,

To sanctify the scene:

"Courage, in fragile form,

Faith, trusting to the last,

Prayer, breathing heavenwards thro' the storm, But all alike have pass'd."

Sound on, thou haughty sea!

These have not pass'd in vain;

My soul awakes, my hope springs free
On victor wings again.

Thou, from thine empire driven,

May'st vanish with thy powers;

But by the hearts that here have striven,
A loftier doom is ours!

Thou art the victor, Love!

Thou art the fearless, the crown'd, the free,
The strength of the battle is given to thee,
The spirit from above!

Thou hast look'd on Death, and smiled! Thou hast borne up the reed-like and fragile form. Through the waves of the fight, through the rush of the storm,

On field, and flood, and wild!

No!-Thou art the victor, Death!

Thou comest-and where is that which spoke, From the depths of the eye, when the spirit woke! -Gone with the fleeting breath!

Thou comest-and what is left

Of all that loved us, to say if aught
Yet loves-yet answers the burning thought
Of the spirit lone and reft?

Silence is where thou art!
Silently there must kindred meet,
No smile to cheer, and no voice to greet,
No bounding of heart to heart?

Boast not thy victory, Death!

It is but as the cloud's o'er the sunbeam's power It is but as the winter's o'er leaf and flower, That slumber, the snow beneath.

It is but as a Tyrant's reign

O'er the voice and the lip which he bids be still
But the fiery thought, and the lofty will,
Are not for him to chain!

They shall soar his might above! And thus with the root whence affection springs Though buried, it is not of mortal thingsThou art the victor, Love!

O'CONNOR'S CHILD.

This piece was suggested by a picture in the possession of Mrs. Lawrence, of Wavertree Hall.-It represents the "Hero's Child" of Campbell's Poem, seated beside a solitary tomb of rock, marked with a cross, in a wild and desert place. A tempest seems gathering in the angry skies above her, but the attitude of the drooping figure expresses the utter carelessness of desolation, and the countenance speaks of entire abstraction from all external objects.-A bow and quiver lie beside her, amongst the weeds and wild flowers of the desert.

I fled the home of grief At Connocht Moran's tomb to fall, I found the helmet of my Chief, His bow still hanging on our wall; And took it down, and vow'd to rove This desert place, a huntress bold, Nor would I change my buried love For any heart of living mould.

THE VICTOR.

"De tout ce qui t'aimoit n'est-il plus rien qui t'aime?"

MIGHTY ones, Love and Death!

Ye are strong in this world of ours,

Lamartine.

Campbell.

flowers,

Which hath the conqueror's wreath?

And gird the form whose beauty grief hatt

bow'd,

And leave the tomb, as tombs are left-alone, To the star's vigil, and the wind's wild moan.

Tell her of revelries in bower and hall,

Where gems are glittering, and bright wine is pour'd;

Where to glad measures chiming footsteps fall, And soul seems gushing from the harp's full

chord;

And richer flowers amid fair tresses wave,
Than the sad "Love lies bleeding" of the grave.

Oh! little know'st thou of the o'ermastering spell,
Wherewith love binds the spirit strong in pain,
To the spot hallow'd by a wild farewell,

A parting agony,-intense yet vain;

A look-and darkness when its gleam hath flown A voice and silence when its words are gone!

She hears thee not; her full, deep, fervent heart Is set in her dark eyes;—and they are bound Unto that cross, that shrine, that world apart,

Where faithful love hath sanctified the ground: And love with death striven long by tear and prayer,

And anguish frozen into still despair.

Yet on her spirit hath arisen at last

A light, a joy, of its own wanderings born; Around her path a vision's glow is cast,

Back, back, her lost one comes, in hues of morn!*

For her the gulf is fill'd-the dark night fled; Whose mystery parts the living and the dead.

And she can pour forth in such converse high, All her soul's tide of love, the deep, the strong, Oh! lonelier far, perchance thy destiny,

And more forlorn, amidst the world's gay throng,

Than her's the queen of that majestic gloom, The tempest, and the desert, and the tomb!

THE HAUNTED HOUSE.

I seem like one

Who treads alone

Some banquet-hall deserted,

Whose lights are fled,

Wherefore, unto one alone,

Are those sounds and visions known?
Wherefore hath that spell of power,
Dark and dread,

On her soul, a baleful dower,
Thus been shed?
Oh! in those deep-seeing eyes,
No strange gift of mystery lies!
She is lone where once she moved,
Fair, and happy, and beloved!

Sunny smiles were glancing round her,
Tendrils of kind hearts had bound her;
Now those silver chords are broken,
Those bright looks have left no token;
Not one trace on all the earth,
Save her memory of their mirth.

She is lone and lingering now,
Dreams have gather'd o'er her brow,
'Midst gay songs and children's play,
She is dwelling far away;

Seeing what none else may see-
Haunted still her place must be!

THE

BRIGAND LEADER AND HIS WIFE.

SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE OF EASTLAKE'S.

DARK chieftain of the heath and height!
Wild feaster on the hills by night!
Seest thou the stormy sunset's glow
Flung back by glancing spears below?
Now for one strife of stern despair!
The foe hath track'd thee to thy lair

fhou, against whom the voice of blood
Hath risen from rock and lonely wood;
And in whose dreams a moan should be,
Not of the water, nor of the tree;
Haply, thine own last hour is nigh,—
Yet shalt thou not forsaken die.

There's one that pale beside thee stands,
More true than all thy mountain bands!
She will not shrink in doubt and dread,
When the balls whistle round thy head;
Nor leave thee, though thy closing eye
No longer may to her's reply.

Oh! many a soft and quiet grace
Hath faded from her form and face;
And many a thought, the fitting guest
Of woman's meek religious breast,
Hath perish'd in her wanderings wide,
Through the deep forests, by thy side.

Yet, mournfully surviving all,
A flower upon a ruin's wall,

A friendless thing whose lot is cast,
Of lovely ones to be the last;

Sad, but unchanged through good and ill,
Thine is her lone devotion still.

And oh! not wholly lost the heart
Where that undying love hath part;
Not worthless all, though far and long
From home estranged, and guided wrong;
Yet may its depths by heaven be stirr'd,
Its prayer for thee be pour'd and heard!

Enough for thee are the dews that sleep, Like hidden gems, in the flower-urns deep; Enough the rich crimson spots that dwell 'Midst the gold of the cowslip's perfumed cell; And the scent by the blossoming sweet-briers shed,

And the beauty that bows the wood-hyacinth's head.

Oh! happy child, in thy fawn-like glce!
What is remembrance or thought to thee?
Fill thy bright locks with those gifts of spring,
O'er thy green pathway their colours fling;
Bind them in chaplet and wild festoon-
What if to droop and to perish soon?
Nature hath mines of such wealth-and thou
Never wilt prize its delights as now!

For a day is coming to quell the tone
That rings in thy laughter, thou joyous one!
And to dim thy brow with a touch of care,
Under the gloss of its clustering hair;
And to tame the flash of thy cloudless eyes
Into the stillness of autumn skies;

And to teach thee that grief hath her needful part, 'Midst the hidden things of each human heart.

Yet shall we mourn, gentle child! for this?
Life hath enough of yet holier bliss!
Such be thy portion!-the bliss to look,
With a reverent spirit, through nature's book;
By fount, by forest, by river's line,
To track the paths of a love divine;
To read its deep meanings-to see and hear
God in earth's garden-and not to fear!

HAST thou been in the woods with the honey-bce?
Hast thou been with the lamb in the pastures free?
With the hare thro' the copses and dingles wild?
With the butterfly over the heath, fair child?
Yes! the light fall of thy bounding feet
Hath not startled the wren from her mossy seat;
Yet hast thou ranged the green forest-dells,
And brought back a treasure of buds and bells.
Thou know'st not the sweetness, by antique song
Breathed o'er the names of that flowery throng;
The woodbine, the primrose, the violet dim,
The lily that gleams by the fountain's brim;
These are old words, that have made each grove
A dreaming haunt for romance and love:
Each sunny bank, where faint odours lie,
A place for the gushings of poesy.

THE SISTER'S DREAM.

Suggested by a picture, in which a young girl is represented as sleeping, and visited during her slumbers by the spirits of her departed sisters.

SHE sleeps!-but not the free and sunny sleep That lightly on the brow of childhood lies: Though happy be her rest, and soft, and deep, Yet, ere it sunk upon her shadow'd eyes, Thoughts of past scenes and kindred graves o'erswept

Her soul's meek stillness:-she had pray'd and wept.

And now in visions to her couch they come,

The early lost-the beautiful-the dead-
That unto her bequeath'd a mournful home,
Whence with their voices all sweet laughter
fled;

They rise-the sisters of her youth arise,
As from the world where no frail blossom dies.

A solemn glory, robes them in that dream

Yet, if the glee of life's fresh budding years
In those pure aspects may no more be read,
Thence, too, hath sorrow melted, and the tears
Which o'er their mother's holy dust they shed,
Are all effaced; there earth hath left no sign
Save its deep love, still touching every line.

But oh! more soft, more tender, breathing more
A thought of pity, than in vanish'd days:
While hovering silently and brightly o'er
The lone one's head, they meet her spirit's gaze
With their immortal eyes, that seem to say,
Yet, sister, yet we love thee, come away!"

66

Thine, in its reckless and joyous way,
Like an embodied breeze at play!
Child of the sunlight!-thou winged and free!
One moment, one moment, I envied thee!

Thou art not lonely, though born to roam,
Thou hast no longings that pine for home,
Thou seek'st not the haunts of the bee and bird
To fly from the sickness of hope deferr'd:

No boundless passion is deeply shrined;
In thy brief being, no strife of mind,
While I-as I gazed on thy swift flight by,
One hour of my soul seem'd infinity!

And she, that voiceless below me slept,
Flow'd not her song from a heart that wept?
-O love and song, though of heaven you?

powers,

Dark is your fate in this world of ours!

Yet, ere I turn'd from that silent place,
Or ceased from watching thy sunny race,
Thou, even thou, on those glancing wings,
Didst, waft me visions of brighter things!

Thou, that dost image the freed soul's birth,
And its flight away o'er the mists of earth,
Oh! fitly thy path is through flowers that rise
Round the dark chamber where genius lies!

WRITTEN AFTER VISITING A TOMB,
Near Woodstock, in the County of Kilkenny.

Yes! hide beneath the mouldering heap,
The undelighting, slighted thing;
There, in the cold earth, buried deep,
In silence let it wait the spring.
Mrs. Tighe's Poem on the Lily.

1 STOOD where the lip of song laid low,
Where the dust had gather'd on beauty's brow;
Where stillness hung on the heart of love,
And a marble weeper kept watch above.

I stood in the silence of lonely thought,
Of deep affections that inly wrought,
Troubled, and dreamy, and dim with fear-
-They knew themselves exiled spirits here!

Then didst thou pass me in radiance by,
Child of the sunbeam, bright butterfly!
Thou that dost bear on thy fairy wings,
No burden of mortal sufferings!

Thou wert flitting past that solemn tomb,
Over a bright world of joy and bloom,
And strangely I felt, as I saw thee shine,
The all that sever'd thy life and mine.

Mine, with its inborn mysterious things,
Of love and grief its unfathom'd springs,
And quick thoughts wandering o'er earth
sky,

With voices to question eternity!