Edwin And

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"HE AND SHE."、

She is dead!" they said to him; "come away;
Kiss her and leave her, thy love is clay!"

They smoothed her tresses of dark-brown hair;
On her forehead of stone they laid it fair;

Over her eyes that gazed too much
They drew the lids with a gentle touch;

With a tender touch they closed up well
The sweet thin lips that had secrets to tell;

About her brows and beautiful face

They tied her veil and her marriage-lace,

And drew on her white feet her white-silk shoes,

Which were the whitest no eye could choose,

And over her bosom they crossed her hands.

Come away!" they said; "God understands."

And there was silence, and nothing there

But silence, and scents of eglantere,

And jasmine, and roses and rosemary;

And they said, "As a lady should lie, lies she."

And they held their breath till they left the room, With a shudder, to glance at its stillness and gloom.

But he who loved her too well to dread
The sweet, the stately, the beautiful dead,

He lit his lamp, and took the key
And turned it-alone again—he and she.

He and she; but she would not speak,

Though he kissed, in the old place, the quiet cheek.

He and she; yet she would not smile,

Though he called her the name she loved erewhile.

He and she; still she did not move

To any one passionate whisper of love.

Then he said: "Cold lips and breasts without breath,

Is there no voice, no language of death?

"Dumb to the ear and still to the sense,

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But to heart and to soul distinct, intense?

See, now; I will listen with soul, not ear;

What was the secret of dying, dear?

"Was it the infinite wonder of all

That you ever could let life's flower fall?

"Or was it a greater marvel to feel

The perfect calm o'er the agony steal?

"Was the miracle greater to find how deep Beyond all dreams sank downward that sleep?

"Did life roll back its records dear,

And show, as they say it does, past things clear?

"And was it the innermost heart of the bliss

To find out so, what a wisdom love is?

“O perfect dead! O dead most dear! I hold the breath of my soul to hear.

"I listen as deep as to horrible hell,

As high as to heaven, and you do not tell.

There must be pleasure in dying, sweet,
To make you so placid from head to feet!

"I would tell you, darling, if I were dead,

And 'twere your hot tears upon my brow shed,—

"I would say, though the Angel of Death had laid His sword on my lips to keep it unsaid.

“You should not ask vainly, with streaming eyes, Which of all deaths was the chiefest surprise,

“The very strangest and suddenest thing

Of all the surprises that dying must bring."

Ah foolish world! O most kind dead!

Though he told me, who will believe it was said?

Who will believe that he heard her say,
With the sweet soft voice, in the dear old way:

"The utmost wonder is this,-I hear

And see you, and love you, and kiss you, dear;

“And am your angel, who was your bride,

And know that, though dead, I have never died.”

A HOME SONG.

The swallow is come from his African home
To build on the English eaves;

The sycamore wears all his glistering spears,
And the aimond rains roseate leaves;

And-dear Love!-with thee, as with bird and with tree, 'Tis the time of blossom and nest,

Then, what good thing of the bountiful Spring

Shall I liken to thee-the best?

Over the streamlet the rose-bushes bend

Clouded with tender green,

And green the buds grow upon every bough,

Though as yet no rose-tint is seen;

Like those, thou art come to thy promise of bloom,
Like theirs, thine shunneth the light;

Break, rose-bud!—and let a longing heart know
If the blossom be red or white!

Up the broad river with swelling sails

A glorious vessel goes,

And not more clear in the soft blue air
Than in the still water she shows!
Dost thou not go with as brave a show,
And, sooth, with as swelling a state?
Oh, come into harbor with that thou bear'st,
Dear ship-for I eagerly wait.

Fair ship!-ah, Kate! none beareth a freight

As precious and rich as thine,

And where's the rose-bush that will burgeon and blush With a blossom like thine and mine?

-Well! well!-we do as the meadow-birds too,
Since meadows with gold were dyed,—
The hen sits at rest in the hidden nest,
And her mate sings glad at her side.

SWANSCOMBE, April, 1857.

THE RAJAH'S RIDE.

A PUNJAB SONG.

Now is the Devil-horse come to Sindh!
Wah! wah! Gooroo!-that is true!

His belly is stuffed with the fire and the wind,
But a fleeter steed had Runjeet Dehu!

It's forty koss from Lahore to the ford
Forty and more to far Jummoo;

Fast may go the Feringhee lord,

But never so fast as Runjeet Dehu!

Runjeet Dehu was King of the Hill,
Lord and eagle of every crest;

Now the swords and the spears are still,
God will have it-and God knows best!

Rajah Runjeet sate in the sky,
Watching the loaded Kafilas in;
Affghan, Kashmeree, passing by,
Paid him pushm to save their skin.

Once he caracoled into the plain,

Wah! the sparkle of steel on steel! And up the pass came singing again With a lakh of silver borne at his heel.