Far, far below thee, tall gray trees
Arise, and piles built up of old,

And hills, whose ancient summits freeze
In the fierce light and cold.

The eagle soars his utmost height;
Yet far thou stretchest o'er his flight.

Thou hast thy frowns: with thee, on high,
The storm has made his airy seat:
Beyond thy soft blue curtain lie

His stores of hail and sleet.

Thence the consuming lightnings break;
There the strong hurricanes awake.

Yet art thou prodigal of smiles

Smiles sweeter than thy frowns are stern:
Earth sends, from all her thousand isles,

A song at their return;

The glory that comes down from thee
Bathes in deep joy the land sea.

The sun, the gorgeous sun is thine,

The pomp that brings and shuts the day,
The clouds that round him change and shine,
The airs that fan his way.

Thence look the thoughtful stars, and there
The meek moon walks the silent air.

A

The sunny Italy may boast

The beauteous tints that flush her skies, And lovely, round the Grecian coast,

May thy blue pillars rise :— I only know how fair they stand About my own beloved land.

And they are fair: a charm is theirs,

That earth-the proud, green earth—has not, With all the hues, and forms, and airs,

That haunt her sweetest spot.

We gaze upon thy calm, pure sphere,
And read of heaven's eternal year...

Oh! when, amid the throng of men,

The heart grows sick of hollow mirth, How willingly we turn us, then,

Away from this cold earth, And look into thy azure breast, For seats of innocence and rest!

THANATOPSIS.*

To him who, in the love of Nature, holds
Communion with her visible forms, she speaks
A various language. For his gayer hours
She has a voice of gladness, and a smile
And eloquence of beauty; and she glides
Into his darker musings with a mild
And gentle sympathy, that steals away
Their sharpness, ere he is aware.

When thoughts

Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images

Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,

And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,

This much admired poem was first published in 1817, in the North
American Review. The following verses were then prefixed to it :

"Not that from life, and all its woes,
The hand of death shall set me free;
Not that this head shall then repose,
In the low vale, most peacefully.

Ah, when I touch time's farthest brink,
A kinder solace must attend;

It chills my very soul to think

On that dread hour when life must end.

In vain the flattering verse may breathe
Of ease from pain, and rest from strife;
There is a sacred dread of death,
luwoven with the strings of life.

This bitter cup at first was given,

When angry Justice frowned severe;

And 'tis the eternal doom of Heaven,

That man must view the grave with fear."

Er.

Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart,——
Go forth unto the open sky, and list

To nature's teachings, while from all around-
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air-
Comes a still voice-Yet a few days, and thee
The all-beholding sun shall see no more
In all his course. Nor yet in the cold ground,
Where thy pale form was laid, with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist

Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again;
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go
To mix for ever with the elements,

To be a brother to the insensible rock

And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak
Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.
Yet not to thy eternal resting-place

Shalt thou retire alone; nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,
The powerful of the earth—the wise, the good,
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past,
All in one mighty sepulchre. The hills,
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun; the vales,
Stretching in pensive quietness between;
The venerable woods; rivers that move
In majesty; and the complaining brooks,

That make the meadow green; and, poured round all,
Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste,—

Are but the solemn decorations all

Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe, are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
`Of morning, and the Barcan desert pierce;
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound,
Save his own dashings; yet-the dead are there;
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep-the dead reign there alone.

So shalt thou rest; and what if thou shalt fall
Unnoticed by the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase
His favorite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come,
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men,

The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years-matron, and maid,
The bowed with age, the infant, in the smiles
And beauty of its innocent age cut off,—
Shall, one by one, be gathered to thy side,
By those, who, in their turn, shall follow them.

So live, that, when thy summons comes to join

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