Earth boasts one HOMER; we, one yet more high,
SHAKESPEARE. If Florence hush her soul in awe,
Naming her DANTE, hell, and heaven's sweet air
Were breathed by MILTON. Who to wisdom taught
How to be wisest? BACON. NEWTON lived,
And God's dread secrets straight man wondering read,
And all the worlds revolved in order'd law.

WATT made the might of Nature's primal powers
Our toiling bondslaves. DRAKE and wandering Cook,
PARRY and PARK and all their fellows trod

Billow and land, and made them paths to man.
Look, knowledge lightens thought from land to land;
That did our WHEATSTONE. Fame, to name our great,
Were weary ere the flaming roll were told,
And still she writes, what glories! on the scroll,
Courage and wisdom kin to greatness gone,
Those that the blasting path to Lucknow trod,
And smote curst Delhi and its brood of hell,
HAVELOCK and LAWRENCE-names fit mates to those
Who broke the dusky ranks at Plassy first,

And far Assaye, and crush'd Ameer and Sikh
At Meeanee and red Ferozeshah,

And crowned our brows with empire. Crecy's fame,
And mailed Poictiers' and Agincourt's had heirs
In Blenheim and Corunna, and the fields
Of WELLINGTON-Vittoria and its peers,
And the wild, earth-felt shock of Waterloo.

O ye old sea-kings, to whom your tossed decks
Were thrones to rule the lands from, from you sprung,
In us lives on your scorn of all that pales
Weakness-in us your hunger of renown.
Sea-roamers-grapplers with the might of storm-
Stern tramplers of the billows, fitting sons
To you were DRAKE and HAWKINS, and the hearts

That with fierce joy, for God and right, went forth
And wrapped the Armada—the Invincible-

In their red wrath, and whelm'd it in the deep.
Brother to you was he whom our proud lips
Name proudly-BLAKE, who, many a bloody day,
Grappled with Dutch VAN TROMP, and thundered down
The broadsides of DE RUYTER. Kin to you,

ye old Norse hearts, who dared look on death
And greet him loud if victory with him came,
Were later glories. From your fierce veins sprang
The fiery blood of ROOKE, who gave La Hogue
To glory-MONK and SHOVEL-Benbow-Hawke—
DUNCAN of Camperdown-HowE-RODNEY-he
Who at St. Vincent thunder-calmed the winds-
And of him, mightiest, whose fierce voice of war
Nile and the Dane heard, crouching-he who gave
To us the ocean's rule at Trafalgar.

So triumph grows to triumph. From the fire
Of by-gone fames we light the glories up
That sun the present. Oh, should danger threat,
New vauntings front us, and the shock of war,
In the red smoke of battle shall we feel
The awful presence of our living dead,
Steeling our hearts to conquer. Hellas heard,
At Marathon and Salamis heard clear
The roar of Ares, and the hero shout
Of Ajax pouring flight amid her foe.

The stern dead DOUGLAS won at Otterbourne;
SO WELLINGTON our charging ranks shall hurl
Through future triumphs; through all coming time
Shall foes' masts crash and struck flags flutter down,
We conquering in the thought we can but win
Whose blood is NELSON'S. Nor is fame alone
The bulwark of our greatness. Strong we stand

In surer strength than fates us not to fall;

For we have breathed the breath that knows not death,
Hers in whose might we dread not the decay
That palsies nations. At the mighty breast
Of Freedom were we nurtured. At her knee
Have we drunk in the mighty lore that gives
To nations immortality and youth

Eternal. To our hands she gave the spell

That masters monarchs. From her lips were caught
The charging cheer of Edgehill, and the shout
That at red Naseby scattered far her foes.
Strong in her strength, we strengthen-conquering
And still to conquer, while we do her will.
Us does she gift with wisdom. We are wise
In Courts and counsels-all that builds up States,
And from the clash of thought do we shock out
Fit light to walk by-truths, by which we walk
More and more wisely; but, O island home
Of freemen, thee a future beckons on,
Lit with a glory thou hast never known,
And great with greatness that for thee shall be.
Lo, thou hast walked in sunlight that is night
Seen by the radiance of that perfect day.
Then shall thy homes know wisdom. Not a hearth
But thou shalt ring with knowledge, as a right
Dealt to thy children-to thy sons reared up
Fitly, self-ruled, to share, ungrudged, thy rule,
And walk the ways of greatness, wide to all.
Theirs shall be all the victories of peace,
The piercing eyes to whose all-fearless gaze
Nature gives up her secrets-Art reveals
Unrobed her beauties; theirs the ears that hear
That voice divine that unto slavish ears

Speaks not that breathing of the airs of heaven

That the high Muse's lips give forth through man.
Then, mighty mother, then thy eagle brood,
All shalt thou train to front the cloudless sun
Of blasting glory with strong eyes that drink
Its glare unshrinking, scaling with strong wing
Height beyond giddy height of fame's bright air
To seats of gods and regions of the stars,
Where dwell the immortals wise in rule to man
And guidance godlike, there in light to dwell,
An awe and gladness to the eyes of earth.
O England, might that future now be thine!
Then shall the fulness of thy greatness be-
In war, in peace, the fulness of thy fame.
Then shall a race, how godlike! walk thy ways,
Eating of fruit forbidden now-the fruit
Of knowledge, making men like unto gods,
Knowing of good and evil-good, to embrace-
Ill, shun—that earth may liker grow to heaven,
That heaven's full blessedness on earth may be,
That the all-righteous reign of love may come,
Of right and peace, that wrong may be no morc.

So great thou art; so greater shalt thou grow, Doing the will of Him who bade thee be Foremost amongst the nations. Know thou right And do it. Be thy future, as thy past,

Built to His glory.

On His awful breath

Are rule and empire. At His word they rise,
They pass. So walk thou, that He be thy staff
In this thy journey onward-that thou be
The earthly shadow of His power and love,
His strength and mercy-that thou lead the earth
Unto His altar-steps in whom thou art,

Thy strength and succour-that the nations see

How great are they who surely trust in Him,
And know thee for the chosen of thy God.

W. C. BENNETT.

[By kind permission of the author.]

WHAT THE CHIMNEY SANG.

Over the chimney the night-wind sang

And chanted a melody no one knew;

And the Woman stopped, as her babe she tossed,
And thought of the one she had long since lost,
And said, as her tear-drops back she forced,
"I hate the wind in the chimney."

Over the chimney the night-wind sang

And chanted a melody no one knew;

And the Children said, as they closer drew,

""Tis some witch that is cleaving the black night through,

'Tis a fairy trumpet that just then blew,

And we fear the wind in the chimney."

Over the chimney the night-wind sang

And chanted a melody no one knew;
And the Man, as he sat on his hearth below,
Said to himself, "It will surely snow,

And fuel is dear, and wages low,

And I'll stop the leak in the chimney."

Over the chimney the night-wind sang
And chanted a melody no one knew;
But the Poet listened and smiled, for he

Was Man, and Woman, and Child, all three,
And he said, "It is God's own harmony,

This wind that sings in the chimney."

BRET HARTE.