TRAVEL.

I should like to rise and go
Where the golden apples grow;
Where below another sky

Parrot islands anchored lie,

And, watched by cockatoos and goats,
Lonely Crusoes building boats;

Where in sunshine reaching out

Eastern cities, miles about,

Are with mosque and minaret
Among sandy gardens set,

And the rich goods from near and far

Hang for sale in the bazaar;

Where the Great Wall round China goes,

And on one side the desert blows,

And with bell and voice and drum,

Cities on the other hum;

Where are forests, hot as fire,
Wide as England, tall as a spire,
Full of apes and cocoanuts
And the negro hunters' huts;
Where the knotty crocodile
Lies and blinks in the Nile,
And the red flamingo flies
Hunting fish before his eyes;
Where in jungles, near and far,
Man-devouring tigers are,

Lying close and giving ear
Lest the hunt be drawing near,
Or a comer-by be seen

Swinging in a palanquin ;
Where among the desert sands
Some deserted city stands,

All its children, sweep and prince,
Grown to manhood ages since,
Not a foot in street or house,
Not a stir of child or mouse,
And when kindly falls the night,
In all the town no spark of light.
There I'll come when I'm a man
With a camel caravan;

Light a fire in the gloom
Of some dusty dining room;
See the pictures on the walls,
Heroes, fights, and festivals;
And in a corner find the toys
Of the old Egyptian boys.

ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON.

[From "Poems and Ballads." Copyright, 1896, by Charles Scribner's Sons.]

THE STAR-SPANGLED BANNER.

[This lyric, perhaps the noblest among American national songs, was written on the night of the bombardment of Fort Henry, near Baltimore, in the year 1814. The author was at the time a prisoner on board a British vessel.]

O say, can you see, by the dawn's early light,

What so proudly we hailed at the twilight's last gleaming

Whose broad stripes and bright stars through the clouds of the fight,

On the ramparts we watched were so gallantly

streaming!

And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air, Gave proof through the night that our flag was still

there;

O say, does the star-spangled banner yet wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave?

On that shore dimly seen, through the mists of the deep,

Where the foe's haughty host in dread silence

reposes,

What is that which the breeze, o'er the towering

steep,

As it fitfully blows, now conceals, now discloses ? Now it catches the gleam of the morning's first beam; In full glory reflected now shines on the stream;

'Tis the star-spangled banner; O long may it wave O'er the land of the free, and the home of the

brave!

And where is that band who so vauntingly swore

That the havoc of war and the battle's confusion A home and a country should leave us no more? Their blood has washed out their foul footsteps' pollution.

No refuge could save the hireling and slave

From the terror of flight or the gloom of the grave; And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall

wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the brave!

O! thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand

Between their loved homes and war's desolation; Blest with victory and peace, may the heaven-rescued land

Praise the Power that hath made and preserved us

a nation.

Then conquer we must, when our cause it is just;
And this be our motto-" In God is our trust";

And the star-spangled banner in triumph shall

wave

O'er the land of the free, and the home of the

brave.

FRANCIS SCOTT KEY.