The ivy of its ruins; unto which

There was a burst of tears around the bard:
All wept but one, and she serenely stood,
With her clear brow and dark religious eye,
Raised to the first faint star above the hills,
And cloudless; though it might be that her cheek
Was paler than before. So Morna heard
The minstrel's prophecy.
And spring returned,
Bringing the earth her lovely things again,
All, save the loveliest far! A voice, a smile,
A young sweet spirit gone.

THE MOURNER FOR THE BARMECIDES.

O good old man! how well in thee appears
The constant service of the antique world!
Thou art not for the fashion of these times.
As You Like It.

FALLEN was the House of Giafar; and its name,
The high romantic name of Barmecide,
A sound forbidden on its own bright shores,
By the swift Tygris' wave. Stern Haroun's
wrath,

Sweeping the mighty with their fame away,
Had so passed sentence: but man's chainless heart
Hides that within its depths, which never yet
Th' oppressor's thought could reach.

'Twas desolate

Where Giafar's halls, beneath the burning sun,
Spread out in ruin lay. The songs had ceased;
The lights, the perfumes, and the genii-tales,
Had ceased; the guests were gone. Yet still one
voice

Was there the fountain's; through those eastern courts,

Over the broken marble and the grass,
Its low clear music shedding mournfully.

And still another voice!--an aged man,
Yet with a dark and fervent eye beneath
His silvery hair, came, day by day, and sate
On a white column's fragment; and drew forth,
From the forsaken walls and dim arcades,
A tone that shook them with its answering thrill
To his deep accents. Many a glorious tale
He told that sad yet stately solitude,
Pouring his memory's fullness o'er its gloom,
Like waters in the waste; and calling up,
By song or high recital of their deeds,
Bright solemn shadows of its vanished race
To people their own halls: with these alone,
In all this rich and breathing world, his thoughts
Held still unbroken converse. He had been
Reared in this lordly dwelling, and was now

His fading life seemed bound. Day rolled on day,
And from that scene the loneliness was fled;
For crowds around the gray-haired chronicler
Met as men meet, within whose anxious hearts
Fear with deep feeling strives; till, as a breeze
Wanders through forest-branches, and is met
By one quick sound and shiver of the leaves,
The spirit of his passionate lament,

As through their stricken souls it passed, awoke
One echoing murmur.-But this might not be
Under a despot's rule, and summoned thence,
The dreamer stood before the Caliph's throne:
Sentenced to death he stood, and deeply pale,
And with his white lips rigidly compressed;
Till, in submissive tones, he asked to speak
Once more, ere thrust from earth's fair sunshine
forth.

Was it to sue for grace?-his burning heart
Sprang, with a sudden lightning, to his eye,
And he was changed!—and thus, in rapid words,
Th' o'ermastering thoughts, more strong than
death found way.

"And shall I not rejoice to go, when the noble and the brave,

With the glory on their brows, are gone before me to the grave?

What is there left to look on now, what brightness in the land?

I hold in scorn the faded world, that wants their princely band!

My chiefs! my chiefs! the old man comes, that in your halls was nursed,

That followed you to many a fight, where flashed your sabres first;

That bore your children in his arms, your name upon his heart

Oh! must the music of that name with him from earth depart?

"It shall not be!-a thousand tongues, though human voice were still,

With that high sound the living air triumphantly shall fill;

The wind's free flight shall bear it on, as wandering seeds are sown,

And the starry midnight whisper it, with a deep and thrilling tone.

"For it is not as a flower whose scent with the dropping leaves expires,

And it is not as a household lamp, that a breath should quench its fires;

It is written on our battle-fields with the writing of the sword,

It hath left upon our desert-sands a light in bless

ings poured.

a joyous wave;

And the groves, with whose deep lovely gloom ye hung the pilgrim's way,

Shall send from all their sighing leaves your praises on the day.

"The very walls your bounty reared, for the stranger's homeless head,

Shall find a murmur to record your tale, my glorious dead!

Though the grass be where ye feasted once, where lute and cittern rung,

And the serpent in your palaces lie coiled amidst its young.

"It is enough! mine eye no more of joy or splendour sees,

I leave your name in lofty faith, to the skies and to the breeze!

I go, since earth her flower hath lost, to join the bright and fair,

And call the grave a kingly house, for ye, my chiefs, are there!"

A dim and deeply-bosomed grove
Of many an aged tree,
Such as the shadowy violets love,
The fawn and forest-bee.

The darkness of the chestnut bough
There on the waters lay,
The bright stream reverently below,
Checked its exulting play;

And bore a music all subdued,

And led a silvery sheen,
On through the breathing solitude
Of that rich leafy scene.

For something viewlessly around
Of solemn influence dwelt,
In the soft gloom, and whispery sound,
Not to be told, but felt:

While sending forth a quiet gleam
Across the wood's repose,
And o'er the twilight of the stream,

A lowly chapel rose.

A pathway to that still retreat
Through many a myrtle wound,
And there a sight-how strangely sweet!
My steps in wonder bound.

For on a brilliant bed of flowers,

Even at the threshold made,
As if to sleep through sultry hours,
A young fair child was laid.

To sleep?-oh! ne'er on childhood's eye,
And silken lashes pressed,
Did the warm living slumber lie,

With such a weight of rest!

Yet still a tender crimson glow

Its cheek's pure marble dyed— "T was but the light's faint streaming flow Through roses heaped beside.

I stooped-the smooth round arm was chill,
The soft lip's breath was fled,
And the bright ringlets hung so still-
The lovely child was dead!

Alas!" I cried, "fair faded thing!
Thou hast wrung bitter tears,
And thou hast left a wo, to cling
Round yearning hearts for years!"

But then a voice came sweet and low-
I turned, and near me sate
A woman with a mourner's brow,
Pale, yet not desolate.

And in her still, clear, matron face,
All solemnly serene,

A shadowed image I could trace

Of that young slumberer's mien.

"Stranger! thou pitiest me," she said, With lips that faintly smiled, "As here I watch beside my dead, My fair and precious child.

"But know, the time-worn heart may be
By pangs in this world riven,
Keener than theirs who yield, like me,
An angel thus to Heaven!"

THE CAPTIVE KNIGHT.

The prisoned thrush may brook the cage,
The captive eagle dies for rage.
Lady of the Lake.

'Twas a trumpet's pealing sound!

And the knight looked down from the Paynim's

tower,

And a Christian host in its pride and power,
Through the pass beneath him wound.
Cease awhile, clarion! Clarion, wild and shrill,
Cease! let them hear the captive's voice-be still!

"I knew 'twas a trumpet's note! And I see my brethren's lances gleam, And their pennons wave by the mountain stream, And their plumes to the glad wind float! Cease awhile, clarion! Clarion, wild and shrill, Cease! let them hear the captive's voice-be still!

"I am here, with my heavy chain! And I look on a torrent sweeping by, And an eagle rushing to the sky,

And a host, to its battle-plain!

THE KAISER'S FEAST.

Louis, Emperor of Germany, having put his brother, the Palsgrave Rodolphus, under the ban of the empire, (in the 12th century,) that unfortunate Prince fled to England, where he died in neglect and poverty. "After his decease, his mother, Matilda, privately invited his children to return to Germany; and by her mediation, during a season of festivity, when Louis kept wassail in the Castle of Heidelberg, the family of his brother presented themselves before him in the garb of suppliants, imploring pity and forgiveness. To this appeal the victor softened."-Miss Benger's Memoirs of the Queen of Bohemia.

THE Kaiser feasted in his hall,

The red wine mantled high; Banners were trembling on the wall, To the peals of minstrelsy:

And many a gleam and sparkle came

From the armour hung around,

As it caught the glance of the torch's flame,

Or the hearth with pine boughs crowned.

Why fell there silence on the chord

Beneath the harper's hand?
And suddenly, from that rich board,
Why rose the wassail-band?

The strings were hushed-the knights made way
For the queenly mother's tread,
As up the hall, in dark array,

Two fair-haired boys she led.

She led them e'en to the Kaiser's place,
And still before him stood;
Till, with strange wonder, o'er his face

Flushed the proud warrior-blood:
And "Speak, my mother! speak!" he cried,
"Wherefore this mourning vest?
And the clinging children by thy side,
In weeds of sadness drest?"

"Must I pine in my fetters here?

With the wild wave's foam, and the free bird's flight,

And the tall spears glancing on my sight,

Well may a mourning vest be mine, And theirs, my son, my son! Look on the features of thy line In each fair little one! Though grief awhile within their eyes

Hath tamed the dancing glee, Yet there thine own quick spirit liesThy brother's children see?

"They are gone! they have all passed by! They in whose wars I had borne my part, They that I loved with a brother's heart,

They have left me here to die! Sound again, clarion! Clarion pour thy blast! Sound! for the captive's dream of hope is past."

And where is he, thy brother, where? He, in thy home that grew, And smiling, with his sunny hair, Ever to greet thee flew?

How would his arms thy neck entwine,

His fond lips press thy brow! My son! oh, call these orphans thineThou hast no brother now!

"What! from their gentle eyes doth nought

Speak of thy childhood's hours,

And smite thee with a tender thought

Of thy dead father's towers?

Kind was thy boyish heart and true,

When reared together there,

Through the old woods like fawns ye flew-
Where is thy brother-where?

"Well didst thou love him then, and he
Still at thy side was seen!
How is it that such things can be,

As though they ne'er had been?

Evil was this world's breath, which came
Between the good and brave!
Now must the tears of grief and shame

Be offered to the grave.

"And let them, let them there be poured! Though all unfelt below,

Thine own wrung heart, to love restored,
Shall soften as they flow.

Oh! death is mighty to make peace;
Now bid his work be done!

So many an inward strife shall cease

Take, take these babes, my son!"

His eye was dimmed-the strong man shook With feelings long suppressed;

Up in his arms the boys he took,

And strained them to his breast.

And a shout from all in the royal hall

Burst forth to hail the sight;

And eyes were wet, midst the brave that met At the Kaiser's feast that night.

ULLA, OR THE ADJURATION.

Yet speak to me! I have outwatched the stars, And gazed o'er heaven in vain, in search of thee. Speak to me! I have wandered o'er the earth, And never found thy likeness.-Speak to me! This once-once more!

Manfred.

"THOU 'RT gone!-thou 'rt slumbering low,
With the sounding seas above thee;
It is but a restless wo,

But a haunting dream to love thee!
Thrice the glad swan has sung,
To greet the spring-time hours,
Since thine oar at parting flung

The white spray up in showers.

There's a shadow of the grave on thy hearth, and round thy home;

Come to me from the ocean's dead!-thou 'rt surely of them-come!"

'T was Ulla's voice-alone she stood
In the Iceland summer night,

For gazing o'er a glassy flood,
From a dark rock's beetling height.

"I know thou hast thy bed

Where the sea-weed's coil hath bound thee: The storm sweeps o'er thy head,

But the depths are hushed around thee. What wind shall point the way

To the chambers where thou 'rt lying? Come to me thence, and say

If thou thought'st on me in dying?

I will not shrink to see thee with a bloodless lip and cheek

Come to me from the ocean's dead!-thou 'rt surely of them-speak!"

She listened-'t was the wind's low moan,

'T was the ripple of the wave,

'Twas the wakening ospray's cry alone,

As it started from its cave.

"I know each fearful spell

Of the ancient Runic lay,
Whose muttered words compel
The tempest to obey.
But I adjure not thee

By magic sign or song,
My voice shall stir the sea

By love, the deep, the strong!

By the might of woman's tears, by the passion of

her sighs,

Come to me from the ocean's dead by the vows we pledged-arise!"

Again she gazed with an eager glance,
Wandering and wildly bright;
She saw but the sparkling waters dance
To the arrowy northern light.

"By the slow and struggling death
Of hope that loathed to part,
By the fierce and withering breath

Of despair on youth's high heart;
By the weight of gloom which clings
To the mantle of the night,
By the heavy dawn which brings
Nought lovely to the sight,

By all that from my weary soul thou hast wrung of grief and fear,

Come to me from the ocean's dead-awake, arise, appear!"

Was it her yearning spirit's dream,

Or did a pale form rise,

And o'er the hushed wave glide and gleam,
With bright, still, mournful eyes?

A still, sad life was thine!-long years
With tasks unguerdoned fraught,
Deep, quiet love, submissive tears,

Vigils of anxious thought;
Prayer at the cross in fervor poured,
Alms to the pilgrim given-
Oh! happy, happier than thy lord,
In that lone path to heaven!

WARRIOR! whose image on thy tomb

With shield and crested head,

Sleeps proudly in the purple gloom

By the stained window shed;
The records of thy name and race

Have faded from the stone,
Yet, through a cloud of years I trace
What thou hast been and done.

A banner, from its flashing spear
Flung out o'er many a fight,
A war-cry ringing far and clear,

And strong to turn the flight;
An arm that bravely bore the lance

On for the holy shrine;

A haughty heart and a kingly glanceChief! were not these things thine:

A lofty place where leaders sate

Around the council-board; In festive halls a chair of state

When the blood-red wine was poured A name that drew a prouder tone

From herald, harp, and bard; Surely these things were all thine own, So hadst thou thy reward.

Woman! whose sculptured form at rest
By the armed knight is laid,
With meek hands folded o'er a breast
In matron robes arrayed;