Part 6 (1/2)

”And I alone was cursed and loathed: 'T was in a garden bower I mused one eve, and scalding tears Fell fast on many a flower; And when I rose, I marked, with awe And agonizing grief, A frail mimosa at my feet Fold close each fragile leaf.”

”Alas! how dark my lot, if thus A plant could shrink from me!

But when I looked again, I saw That from the honey-bee, The falling leaf, the bird's gay wing.

It shrank with pain or fear: A kindred presence I had found,-- Life waxed sublimely clear.”

”I climbed the lofty mountain height, And communed with the skies, And felt within my grateful heart New aspirations rise.

Then, thirsting for a higher lore, I left my childhood's home, And stayed not till I gazed upon The hills of fallen Rome.”

”I stood amid the glorious forms Immortal and divine, The painter's wand had summoned from The dim Ideal's shrine; And felt within my fevered soul Ambition's wasting fire, And seized the pencil, with a vague And pa.s.sionate desire”

”To shadow forth, with lineaments Of earth, the phantom throng That swept before my sight in thought, And lived in storied song.

Vain, vain the dream;--as well might I Aspire to light a star, Or pile the gorgeous sunset-clouds That glitter from afar.”

”The threads of life have worn away; Discordantly they thrill; And soon the sounding chords will be For ever mute and still.

And in the spirit-land that lies Beyond, so calm and gray, I shall aspire with truer aim:-- Ave Maria! pray!”

THE CHILD'S APPEAL.

AN INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH REVOLUTION AND REIGN OF ROBESPIERRE.

Day dawned above a city's mart, Yet not 'mid peace and prayer: The shouts of frenzied mult.i.tudes Were on the thrilling air.

A guiltless man to death was led, Through crowded streets and wide, And a fairy child, with waving curls, Was clinging to his side.

The father's brow with pride was calm, But, trusting and serene, The child's was like the Holy One's In Raphael's paintings seen.

She shrank not from the heartless throng, Nor from the scaffold high; But now and then, with beaming smile, Addressed her parent's eye.

Athwart the golden flood of morn Was poised the wing of Death, As 'neath the fearful guillotine The doomed one drew his breath.

Then all of fiercest agony The human heart can bear, Was suffered in the brief caress, The wild, half-uttered prayer.

Then she, the child, beseechingly Upraised her eyes of blue, And whispered, while her cheek grew pale, ”I am to go with you!”

The murmur of impatient fiends Rang in her infant ear, And purpose strong woke in her heart, And spoke in accent clear:--

”They tore my mother from our side, In the dark prison's cell; Her eyes were filled with tears,--she had No time to say farewell.

”And you were all that loved me then, And you are pale with care, And every night a silver thread Has mingled with your hair.

”My mother used to tell me of A better land afar, I've seen it through the prison bars Where burns the evening star.

”O let us find a new home there, I will be brave and true; You cannot leave me here alone, O let me die with you!”