Puslapio vaizdai
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Her nose is straight and handsome, her | O lovely Mary Donnelly, your beauty's

eyebrows lifted up,

Her chin is very neat and pert, and smooth like a china cup, Her hair's the brag of Ireland, so weighty and so fine;

It's rolling down upon her neck, and gathered in a twine.

The dance o' last Whit-Monday night exceeded all before;

No pretty girl for miles about was missing from the floor;

But Mary kept the belt of love, and O, but she was gay!

She danced a jig, she sung a song, that took my heart away.

When she stood up for dancing, her steps were so complete The music nearly killed itself to listen to her feet;

The fiddler moaned his blindness, he heard her so much praised, But blessed himself he wasn't deaf when once her voice she raised.

And evermore I'm whistling or lilting what you sung,

Your smile is always in my heart, your name beside my tongue; But you've as many sweethearts as you'd count on both your hands, And for myself there's not a thumb or

little finger stands.

O, you're the flower o' womankind in country or in town;

The higher I exalt you, the lower I'm cast down.

If some great lord should come this way, and see your beauty bright, And you to be his lady, I'd own it was but right.

O, might we live together in a lofty palace hall,

Where joyful music rises, and where scarlet curtains fall!

O, might we live together in a cottage mean and small;

With sods of grass the only roof, and mud the only wall!

my distress;

It's far too beauteous to be mine, but I'll never wish it less.

The proudest place would fit your face, and I am poor and low; But blessings be about you, dear, whereever you may go!

THE FAIRIES.

Up the airy mountain,
Down the rushy glen,
We daren't go a hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together;
Green jacket, red cap,

And white owl's feather!

Down along the rocky shore
Some make their home,
They live on crispy pancakes
Of yellow tide-foam;
Some in the reeds

Of the black mountain-lake, With frogs for their watch-dogs, All night awake.

High on the hill-top
The old King sits;

He is now so old and gray
He's nigh lost his wits.
With a bridge of white mist
Columbkill he crosses,
On his stately journeys

From Slieveleague to Rosses;

Or going up with music
On cold starry nights,

To sup with the queen

Of the gay Northern Lights.

They stole little Bridget

For seven years long; When she came down again Her friends were all gone. They took her lightly back, Between the night and morrow; They thought that she was fast asleep, But she was dead with sorrow.

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[SON of Gabriel; born at London in 1828; educated at King's College. His love of art led him to found, in connection with Holman Hunt, Millais, and others, what is known as the "PreRaphaelite" school of painting; is widely known through his designs for illustrated works. His Early Italian Poets, a volume of translations, appeared in 1861. Dante and his Circle, in 1874, a revised edition of the preceding; and a volume of Poems in 1870. As a poet he is associated with that school of latter-day singers of which Morris and Swinburne are also notable members. Died April 9, 1882.]

THE SEA-LIMITS.

CONSIDER the sea's listless chime:
Time's self it is, made audible,
The murmur of the earth's own shell.
Secret continuance sublime

Is the sea's end: our sight may pass
No furlong further. Since time was,
This sound hath told the lapse of time.

No quiet, which is death's, - it hath
The mournfulness of ancient life,
Enduring always at dull strife.

As the world's heart of rest and wrath,
Its painful pulse is in the sands.
Last utterly, the whole sky stands,
Gray and not known, along its path.
Listen alone beside the sea,

Listen alone among the woods;
Those voices of twin solitudes
Shall have one sound alike to thee:

Hark where the murmurs of thronged

men

Surge and sink back and surge again, Still the one voice of wave and tree.

Gather a shell from the strown beach
And listen at its lips: they sigh
The same desire and mystery,
The echo of the whole sea's speech.
And all mankind is thus at heart
Not anything but what thou art:
And Earth, Sea, Man, are all in each.

MARY MAGDALENE

AT THE DOOR OF SIMON THE PHARISEE.

"WHY wilt thou cast the roses from

thine hair?

Nay, be thou all a rose, - wreath, lips, and cheek.

Nay, not this house, - that banquer-
house we seek;

See how they kiss and enter; come
thou there.
This delicate day of love we two will
share

Till at our ear love's whispering night
shall speak.

What, sweet one, - hold'st thou still | It lies in heaven, across the flood the foolish freak?

Nay, when I kiss thy feet they'll leave

the stair."

"Oh loose me! See'st thou not my Bridegroom's face

That draws me to Him? For His feet my kiss,

My hair, my tears He craves today: and oh!

What words can tell what other day and place

Shall see me clasp those blood-stained feet of His?

He needs me, calls me, loves me: let me go!"

THE BLESSED DAMOZEL.

THE blessed damozel leaned out
From the gold bar of heaven;
Her eyes were deeper than the depth.
Of waters stilled at even;
She had three lilies in her hand,

And the stars in her hair were seven.

Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem,
No wrought flowers did adorn,

But a white rose of Mary's gift,
For service neatly worn;
Her hair that lay along her back
Was yellow like ripe corn.

Herseemed she scarce had been a day.
One of God's choristers;
The wonder was not yet quite gone
From that still look of hers;
Albeit, to them she left, her day
Had counted as ten years.

It was the rampart of God's house
That she was standing on;

By God built over the sheer depth

The which is space begun;

So high, that looking downward thence She scarce could see the sun.

Of ether, as a bridge. Beneath, the tides of day and night With flame and darkness ridge The void, as low as where this earth Spins like a fretful midge.

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CHRISTINA GEORGİNA RÖSSETTİ.

591

CHRISTINA GEORGINA ROSSETTI.

1830-1894

[DAUGHTER of Gabriele Rossetti, and sister of D. G. Rossetti; born at London, Dec. 5, 1830. Author of Goblin Market and Other Poems, 1862; The Prince's Progress and Other Poems, 1866; Commonplace and Other Short Stories in Prose, 1870; Sing Song, A Nursery Rhyme Book, 1872; Speaking Likenesses, 1874; Annus Domini, a Prayer for every day in the year, 1874; A Pageant and Other Poems, 1881; Called to be Saints, 1881. Died 1894.]

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* Lo, I have brought my gift, my lord,
Have brought my gift," she said:
"To bless the hearth, to bless the board,
To bless the marriage-bed.

"Here's my half of the golden chain
You wore about your neck,
That day we waded ankle-deep
For lilies in the beck:

"Here's my half of the faded leaves
We plucked from budding bough,
With feet amongst the lily leaves,
The lilies are budding now."

He strove to match her scorn with scorn,
He faltered in his place:

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" Lady," he said, "Maude Clare," he said,

"Maude Clare:" - and hid his face.

Shall I meet other wayfarers at night?
Those who have gone before.

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[DAUGHTER of Mr. Wm. Ingelow, late of Ipswich, Suffolk; born about 1830. Her first vol. ume of poems came out in 1863, and five years afterwards A Story of Doom and Other Poems appeared. Miss Ingelow's other published works have been in prose, viz.: Studies for Stories, 1864; Stories told to a Child; Mopsa, the Fairy, 1869; Off the Skelligs, 1873; Fated to be Free, 1875; Sarah de Berenger, 1880; Don John, 1883. Her poems have obtained a remark. able degree of popularity, both in this country and in England.]

THE COMING IN OF THE "MERMAIDEN."

THE moon is bleached as white as wool, Some with their heart-hunger sighed,

And just dropping under; Every star is gone but three,

And they hang far asunder

There's a sea-ghost all in gray,
A tall shape of wonder!

I am not satisfied with sleep,
The night is not ended.
But look how the sea-ghost comes,
With wan skirts extended,
Stealing up in this weird hour,
When light and dark are blended.

A vessel! To the old pier end
Her happy course she's keeping;
I heard them name her yesterday:
Some were pale with weeping;

She's in-and they are sleeping.

O! now with fancied greetings blest,
They comfort their long aching:
The sea of sleep hath borne to them
What would not come with waking,
And the dreams shall most be true
In their blissful breaking.

The stars are gone, the rose-bloom

comes

No blush of maid is sweeter;
The red sun, half-way out of bed,
Shall be the first to greet her.
None tell the news, yet sleepers wake,
And rise, and run to meet her.

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