NATURE IN LEASTS.

As sings the pine-tree in the wind,
So sings in the wind a sprig of the pine;
Her strength and soul has laughing France
Shed in each drop of wine.

AAAKPYN NEMONTAI AIONA,

'A NEW Commandment,' said the smiling Muse, 'I give my darling son, Thou shalt not preach '; · Luther, Fox, Behmen, Swedenborg, grew pale, And, on the instant, rosier clouds upbore Hafiz and Shakspeare with their shining choirs.

TRANSLATIONS.

SONNET OF MICHAEL ANGELO BUONAROTTI.

NEVER did sculptor's dream unfold

A form which marble doth not hold

In its white block; yet it therein shall find
Only the hand secure and bold

Which still obeys the mind.

So hide in thee, thou heavenly dame,

The ill I shun, the good I claim ;

I alas! not well alive,

Miss the aim whereto I strive.

Not love, nor beauty's pride,

Nor Fortune, nor thy coldness, can I chide,
If, whilst within thy heart abide

Both death and pity, my unequal skill

Fails of the life, but draws the death and ill.

THE EXILE.

FROM THE PERSIAN OF KERMANI.

IN Farsistan the violet spreads
Its leaves to the rival sky;
I ask how far is the Tigris flood,
And the vine that grows thereby?

Except the amber morning wind,
Not one salutes me here;
There is no lover in all Bagdat
To offer the exile cheer.

I know that thou, O morning wind!
O'er Kernan's meadow blowest,
And thou, heart-warming nightingale !
My father's orchard knowest.

The merchant hath stuffs of price,

And gems from the sea-washed strand,
And princes offer me grace
To stay in the Syrian land;

But what is gold for, but for gifts?

And dark, without love, is the day;

And all that I see in Bagdat

Is the Tigris to float me away.

FROM HAFIZ.

I SAID to heaven that glowed above,
O hide yon sun-filled zone,

Hide all the stars you boast;

For, in the world of love

And estimation true,

The heaped-up harvest of the moon
Is worth one barley-corn at most,
The Pleiads' sheaf but two.

IF my darling should depart,

And search the skies for prouder friends, God forbid my angry heart

In other love should seek amends.

When the blue horizon's hoop

Me a little pinches here,
Instant to my grave I stoop,

And go find thee in the sphere.

EPITAPH.

BETHINK, poor heart, what bitter kind of jest
Mad Destiny this tender stripling played;
For a warm breast of maiden to his breast,
She laid a slab of marble on his head.

THEY say, through patience, chalk
Becomes a ruby stone;

Ah, yes! but by the true heart's blood
The chalk is crimson grown.

FRIENDSHIP.

THOU foolish Hafiz! Say, do churls
Know the worth of Oman's pearls?
Give the gem which dims the moon
To the noblest, or to none.

DEAREST, where thy shadow falls,
Beauty sits and Music calls;
Where thy form and favor come,
All good creatures have their home.

ON prince or bride no diamond stone
Half so gracious ever shone,
As the light of enterprise

Beaming from a young man's eyes.

FROM OMAR KHAY YAM.

EACH spot where tulips prank their state Has drunk the life-blood of the great; The violets yon field which stain

Are moles of beauties Time hath slain.

HE who has a thousand friends has not a friend to

spare,

And he who has one enemy will meet him everywhere.

ON two days it steads not to run from thy grave,
The appointed, and the unappointed day;

On the first, neither balm nor physician can save,
Nor thee, on the second, the Universe slay.

FROM IBN JEMIN.

Two things thou shalt not long for, if thou love a mind

A woman to thy wife, though she were a crowned

queen;

And the second, borrowed money,

lender say

though the smiling

That he will not demand the debt until the Judgment

Day.

THE FLUTE.

FROM HILALI.

HARK what, now loud, now low, the pining flute complains,

Without tongue, yellow-cheeked, full of winds that wail

and sigh;

Saying, Sweetheart! the old mystery remains,
If I am I; thou, thou; or thou art I?