That it was now his winding-sheet and grave, Where the citron and olive are fairest of fruit, Nor sung, 'twixt tears and smiles, our requiem for the And the voice of the nightingale never is mute; brave. I say, the muse shall quite forget to sound She do not strike it when Sam Patch is drowned. Because the wax did not continue stiff; He had not given a name unto his watery bed. And Helle's case was all an accident, As everybody knows. Why sing of these? Nor would I rank with Sam that man who went Down into Ætna's womb-Empedocles I think he called himself. Themselves to please, Or else unwillingly, they made their springs; For glory in the abstract, Sam made his, But ere he leaped, he begged of those who made As might be picked up from the "company" When all the streams have worn their barriers low, Therefore it is considered, that Sam Patch Shall never be forgot in prose or rhyme; His name shall be a portion in the batch Of the heroic dough, which baking time Kneads for consuming ages-and the chime Of fame's old bells, long as they truly ring, Shall tell of him: he dived for the sublime, And found it. Thou, who with the eagle's wing, Being a goose-wouldst fly-dream not of such a thing! Where the tints of the earth, and the hues of the sky, And the purple of ocean is deepest in die; 'T is the clime of the East; 't is the land of the SunCan he smile on such deeds as his children have done? , wild as the accents of lover's farewell Are the hearts which they bear and the tales which they tell! LORD BYRON. LIBERTY TO ATHENS. HE flag of freedom floats once more It waves, as waved the palm of yore As bright a glory, from the skies, Pours down its light around those towers, And once again the Greeks arise, As in their country's noblest hours; Their swords are girt in virtue's cause, Minerva's sacred hill is free Oh, may she keep her equal laws, While man shall live, and time shall be. The pride of all her shrines went down ; Her helm by many a sword was cleft: Where grew the palm, the cypress rose, And sounds redemption to the Greeks. JERUSALEM BEFORE THE SIEGE OF TITUS. ITUS.-It must be And yet it moves me, Romans! It confound And barren salt be sown on yon proud city. Where the flowers ever blossom, the beams ever Distils from stone to stone with gentle motion, shine; As through a valley sacred to sweet peace, Where the light wings of zephyr, oppressed with per- How boldly doth it front us! how majestically! fume, Wax faint o'er the gardens of Gúl in her bloom? Like a luxurious vineyard, the hill-side Terrace o'er terrace, nearer still, and nearer With cool and verdant gardens interspersed ; And, as our clouds of battle, dust and smoke, In the profound of heaven! It stands before us HENRY HART MILMAN. NOWEST thou the land which lovers ought to KON Like blessings there descend the sparkling dews; In gleaming streams the crystal rivers run, The purple vintage clusters in the sun; Odors of flowers haunt the balmy breeze, Rich fruits hang high upon the verdant trees; And vivid blossoms gem the shady groves, Where bright-plumed birds discourse their careless loves. Beloved!-speed we from this sullen strand, Until thy light feet press that green shore's yellow sand. Look seaward thence, and naught shall meet thine eye Or touched with silver by the stars and moon, It looks a dimple on the face of earth, There art, too, shows, when nature's beauty palls, THE MOUNTAINS OF SWITZERLAND. HE stranger wandering in the Switzer's land, Before its awful mountain-tops afraidWho yet, with patient toil, has gained his stand On the bare summit where all life is stayedSees far, far down beneath his blood-dimmed eyes, Another country, golden to the shore, Where a new passion and new hopes arise, Where southern blooms unfold forevermore. And I, lone sitting by the twilight blaze, Think of another wanderer in the snows, Yet courage, soul! nor hold thy strength in vain, B ROSE TERRY COOKE. PALESTINE. LEST land of Judea! thrice hallowed of song, Where the holiest of memories pilgrim-like throng; In the shade of thy palms, by the shores of thy sea, On the hills of thy beauty, my heart is with thee. Lo, Bethlehem's hill side before me is seen, Oh, here with His flock the sad wanderer came- And what if my feet may not tread where He stool, Nor my ears hear the dashing of Galilee's flood, Nor my eyes see the cross which He bowed him to bear, Nor my knees press Gethsemane's garden of prayer. Yet, Loved of the Father, Thy Spirit is near Oh, the outward hath gone?-but, in glory and power' GREECE. AND of the brave! where lie inurned Land of the Muse! within thy bowers And strike for freedom once again? Hath lost its splendor, ceased to play; With helmet shattered-spear in rustThy honor but a dream-and thou Despised-degraded in the dust! Where sleeps the spirit that of old Dashed down to earth the Persian plume, When the loud chant of triumph told How fatal was the despot's doom?— The bold three hundred-where are they, Who died on battle's gory breast? Tyrants have trampled on the clay Where death hath hushed them into rest. Yet, Ida, yet upon thy hill Which sheds a faint and feeble ray, In might-in majesty revealed. In vain, in vain the hero calls- In ruin, freedom's battle-shroud: Which gleams a moment, and expires. Lost land! where genius made his reign, And reared his golden arch on high; Where science raised her sacred fane, Its summits peering to the sky; Upon thy clime the midnight deep Of ignorance hath brooded long, And in the tomb, forgotten, sleep The sons of science and of song. Thy sun hath set-the evening storm And spread its pall upon the sky! And freedom never more shall cease To pour her mournful requiem O'er blighted, lost, degraded Greece ! JAMES G. BROoks. NAPLES. 'HIS region, surely, is not the earth. Sea-worn and mantled with the gadding vine, Till then invisible, a smoke ascends, SAMUEL ROGERS. MELROSE ABBEY. HE moon on the east oriel shone, Through slender shafts of shapely stone, By foliaged tracery combined; much music at a Russian festivity. Then swings were put up for the younger folk, and the Russian swing is different from ours: each swing hung by two ropes from a pole, which crossed a board transversely when the swingers either stood or sat between the two ropes opposite to, and swinging, one another. Dogs had come to the fête too, and some such hungrylooking ones that they were invited indoors before they went away again, to a good repast. There was a pretty view of the nearest church from the lawn. In the evening to prolong the fête, a good many of the same people assembled outside the largest izbá in the village, belonging also to one of her oldest inhabitants. He himself, dear old man, was a wonderful dancer, and his son sang very pretty songs to the Thou wouldst have thought some fairy's hand Russian lute. He danced the Tressaka very well in'Twixt poplars straight the ozier wand, In many a freakish knot, had twined; a The silver light, so pale and faint, And trampled the apostate's pride. FESTIVAL IN A RUSSIAN VILLAGE. TRAVELER gives the following interesting description of a fête he witnessed in Russia. The day before the fête an old Jew pedlar appeared in the village street selling very gaudy handkerchiefs, for which he found several purchasers. Little children were there too with their kopecks, or pennies, running along barefooted, or in lapti, their large shoes which many of them had made for themselves out of birch-bark, to buy a picture-book or some toy that the pedlar had for sale. An eager purchaser had bought some beads for the approaching fête, and was looking for something else to match. Another, a girl, had purchased an ornament for her forehead for to-morrow, and putting it on at once climbed on to a wall to see what other treasures the pedlar would disclose. One little would-be purchaser, who had no money wherewith to buy anything, resignedly looked on, just wishing that some day he too might have the good fortune to be a pedlar, to make all that money and have all those beautiful things besides. There was plenty of dancing on that fête-day, and the company enjoyed themselves immensely. The tambourine is the usual musical accompaniment to a village dance, also the balalaïka (a guitar of three strings), and "sepovka" and "sopel," pipes or flutes, were also used a good deal to-day. There is always | deed, to the admiration of all the bystanders, and in it he had to balance himself on each leg in turn. His son also performed another Russian dance still more cleverly, in which he had to stoop down to the ground as he changed the position of his legs. As they danced, the bystanders sang a song with a refrain, The old man's very heart and soul seemed to be in his dance, and everybody passed a very pleasant evening. a THEBES. ND Thebes, how fallen now! Her storied gates Relentless sands embattling, she awaits Man in his wrath turned her to waste again; And tossing mane and battle-breathing throat, And here, where ruin peers, the lover wooed And won his bride-brave men and beauteous maids Trod proudly through the vestibules-here stood In stern command, within the pillared shades, And conquering crime, made her the servitor Of baseness-she became the handmaid of the boor. And now she is a lone, deserted one The tears of Niobe are hers, for she And bows where Amphion left his bloody stains; No tides of life swell through her pulse less veins, Where she was turned to stone in gloom she still remains. She was a city of a thousand years Ere Homer harped his wars, yet on her plain, Crumbling, the riven monument appears, To mourn that glory ne'er returns again : Her front of graven epics vainly tells How long she conquered-lonely musings bound She dreams no dream of greatness now, doth mourn Yet who shall tread her grave without a sigh, The muniments by ripened vigor wrought! Why, when her towers with crowning years were hoary, And peerless forms and queenly graces shone, Should she be doomed to night and cerement gory, And dim remembrance linger at her tomb A voiceless phantom 'mid the cold and pulseless gloom? Not that her legions through her hundred gates And warning voices linger through her shades; Her vices were the parents of her woes The gods in justice turned her sweeping blades Forever and forever flows the river, Forever and forever looms the plain; What recks it that Sesostris dared to thrall Of night now hangs where distant glories blazed! THE ISLES OF GREECE. HE isles of Greece, the isles of Greece! The Scian and the Teian muse, The hero's harp, the lover's lute, I dreamed that Greece might still be free; For standing on the Persian's grave, I could not deem myself a slave. A king sat on the rocky brow Which looks o'er sea-born Salamis; |