Gorgeous, yet full of gloom!-In such an hour,,

The vesper-melody of dying bells

Wanders through Spain, from each gray convent's tower O'er shining rivers pour'd, and olive-dells,

By every peasant heard, and muleteer,

And hamlet, round my home :-and I am here,
Living again through all my life's farewells,

In these vast woods, where farewell ne'er was spoken, And sole I lift to Heaven a sad heart-yet unbroken!

In such an hour are told the hermit's beads;
With the white sail the seaman's hymn floats by:
Peace be with all! whate'er their varying creeds,
With all that send up holy thoughts on high!
Come to me, boy!-by Guadalquivir's vines,
By every stream of Spain, as day declines,
Man's prayers are mingled in the rosy sky.
-We, too, will pray; nor yet unheard, my child!
Of Him whose voice we hear at eve amidst the wild.

At eve ?—oh !—through all hours!—from dark dreams oft Awakening, I look forth, and learn the might Of solitude, while thou art breathing soft, And low, my loved one! on the breast of night: I look forth on the stars-the shadowy sleep Of forests-and the lake, whose gloomy deep Sends up red sparkles to the fire-flies' light. A lonely world!-ev'n fearful to man's thought, But for his presence felt, whom here my soul hath sought.

THE SONGS OF OUR FATHERS.

SING them upon the sunny hills,
When days are long and bright,
And the blue gleam of shining rills
Is loveliest to the sight.

Sing them along the misty moor,

Where ancient hunters roved,

And swell them through the torrent's roar

The songs our fathers loved!

The songs their souls rejoiced to hear

When harps were in the hall,

And each proud note made lance and spear
Thrill on the banner'd wall:

The songs that through our vallies

Sent on from age to age,

green,

Like his own river's voice, have been

The peasant's heritage.

The reaper sings them when the vale
Is fill'd with plumy sheaves;

The woodman, by the, starlight pale

Cheer'd homeward through the leaves:
And unto them the glancing oars

A joyous measure keep,

Where the dark rocks that crest our shores
Dash back the foaming deep.

So let it be a light they shed
O'er cach old fount and grove;
A memory of the gentle dead,
A spell of lingering love:
Murmuring the names of mighty men,
They bid our streains roll on,
And link high thoughts to every glen
Where valiant deeds were done.

Teach them your children round the hearth,
When evening-fires burn clear,
And in the fields of harvest mirth,
And on the hills of deer!

So shall each unforgotten word,
When far those loved ones roam,
Call back the hearts that once it stirr'd,
To childhood's holy home.

The green woods of their native land
Shall whisper in the strain,

The voices of their household band
Shall sweetly speak again;
The heathery heights in vision rise
Where like the stag they roved-
Sing to your sons those melodies,
The songs your fathers loved.

FAIR Wert thou, in the dreams Of elder time, thou land of glorious flowers, And summer-winds, and low-toned silvery streams' Dim with the shadows of thy laurel-bowers! Where, as they pass'd, bright hours Left no faint sense of parting, such as clings To earthly love, and joy in loveliest things!

Fair wert thou, with the light

On thy blue hills and sleepy waters cast,
From purple skies ne'er deepening into night,

Yet soft, as if each moment were their last
Of glory, fading fast

Along the mountains!-but thy golden day
Was not as those that warn us of decay.

And ever, through thy shades,
A swell of deep Eolian sound went by,
From fountain-voices in their secret glades,
And low reed-whispers, making sweet reply
To summer's breezy sigh!

And young leaves trembling to the wind's light breath,
Which ne'er had touch'd them with a hue of death!

And the transparent sky

Rung as a dome, all thrilling to the strain
Of harps that, 'midst the woods, made harmony
Solemn and sweet; yet troubling not the brain
With dreams and yearnings vain,

And dim remembrances, that still draw birth
From the bewildering music of the earth.

And who, with silent tread,

Moved o'er the plains of waving Asphodel?
Who, call'd and sever'd from the countless dead,
Amidst the shadowy Amaranth-bowers might dwell,
And listen to the swell

Of those majestic hymn-notes, and inhale
The spirit wandering in th' immortal gale ?

They of the sword, whose praise,
With the bright wine at nation's feasts, went round!
They of the lyre, whose unforgotten lays

On the morn's wing had sent their mighty sound,
And in all regions found

Their echoes 'midst the mountains!-and become
In man's deep heart, as voices of his home!

They of the daring thought!

Daring and powerful, yet to dust allied;

Whose flight through stars, and seas, and depths had sought
The soul's far birth-place-but without a guide!
Sages and seers, who died,

And left the world their high mysterious dreams,
Born 'midst the olive-woods, by Grecian streams.

But they, of whose abode

'Midst her green vallies earth retain'd no trace,
Save a flower springing from their burial-sod,
A shade of sadness on some kindred face,
A void and silent place

In some sweet home;-thou hadst no wreaths for these, Thou sunny land! with all thy deathless trees!

The peasant, at his door

Might sink to die, when vintage-feasts were spread,
And songs on every wind! From thy bright shore
No lovelier vision floated round his head,
Thou wert for nobler dead!

He heard the bounding steps which round him fell,
And sigh'd to bid the festal sun farewell!

The slave, whose very tears

Were a forbidden luxury, and whose breast
Shut up the woes and burning thoughts of years,
As in the ashes of an urn compress'd;
-He might not be thy guest!

No genile breathings from thy distant sky
Came o'er his path, and whisper'd "Liberty !"

Calm, on its leaf-strewn bier,

Unlike a gift of nature to decay,

Too rose-like still, too beautiful, too dear,
The child at rest before its mother lay;
E'en so to pass away,

With its bright smile!-Elysium! what wert thou,
To her, who wept o'er that young slumberer's brow?

Thou hadst no home, green land!
For the fair creature from her bosom gone,
With life's first flowers just opening in her hand,
And all the lovely thoughts and dreams unknown,
Which in its clear eye shone

Like the spring's wakening!—but that light was past-
-Where went the dew-drop, swept before the blast?

Not where thy soft winds play'd,
Not where thy waters lay in glassy sleep!-
Fade, with thy bowers, thou land of visions, fade!
From thee no voice came o'er the gloomy deep,
And bade man cease to weep!

Fade, with the amaranth-plain, the myrtle-grove,
Which could not yield one hope to sorrowing love!

For the most loved are they,

Of whom Fame speaks not with her clarion-voice
In regal halls!-the shades o'erhang their way,
The vale, with its deep fountains, is their choice,
And gentle hearts rejoice

Around their steps !—till silently they die,
As a stream shrinks from summer's burning eye.

And the world knows not then,

Not then, nor ever, what pure thoughts are fled !
Yet these are they, that on the souls of men
Come back, when night her folding veil hath spread,
The long-remember'd dead!

But not with thee might aught save glory dwell-
-Fade, fade away, thou shore of Asphodel!

THE TRAVELLER AT THE SOURCE OF THE NILE.

IN sunset's light o'er Afric thrown,
A wanderer proudly stood
Beside the well-spring, deep and lone,
Of Egypt's awful flood;

The cradle of that mighty birth,

So long a hidden thing to earth.

He heard its life's first murmuring sound,
A low mysterious tone;

A music sought, but never found

By kings and warriors gone;

He listen'd-and his heart beat high-
That was the song of victory!

The rapture of a conqueror's mood
Rush'd burning through his frame,
The depths of that green solitude
Its torrents could not tame,

Though stillness lay, with eve's last smile,
Round those calm fountains of the Nile.

Night came with stars :-across his soul
There swept a sudden change,
Even at the pilgrim's glorious goal,
A shadow dark and strange,
Breathed from the thought, so swift to fall
O'er triumph's hour-And is this all?

No more than this!-what seem'd it now
First by that spring to stand?

A thousand streams of lovelier flow
Bathed his own mountain land!
Whence, far o'er waste and ocean track,
Their wild sweet voices call'd him back.

They call'd him back to many a glade,
His childhood's haunt of play,

Where brightly through the beechen shade
Their waters glanced away;

They call'd him, with their sounding waves,

Back to his fathers' hills and graves.