Thou and the earth, twin-sisters as they say, The summer hours away, Curling thy loving ripples up her quiet shore. She is a married matron long ago, With nations at her side; her milk doth flow Thy sole and virgin throne Thy mood is ever changing-thy resolve the same. Sunlight and moonlight minister to thee;- Heaven's two great lights for ever set and rise; In vast and silent love, Is gazing down upon thee with his hundred eyes. All night thou utterest forth thy solemn moan, His day-work hath begun, Under the opening windows of the golden sky. The Spirit of the mountain looks on thee With a sight-baffling shroud Mantling the grey-blue islands in the western sky. Sometimes thou liftest up thine hands on high Pierces with deadly chill The wet crew feebly clinging to the shattered mast. Foam-white along the border of the shore Watchers for some struck vessel in the boiling tide. Daughter and darling of remotest eld Time's childhood and Time's age thou hast beheld; His arm is feeble, and his eye is dim : He tells old tales again— He wearies of long pain: Thou art as at the first: thou journeyedst not with him. Alford. THE CORAL INSECT. TOIL on toil on! ye ephemeral train, Who build in the tossing and treacherous main, With your sand-based structures and domes of rock; And your arches spring up to the crested wave; A fabric so vast in a realm so drear. Ye bind the deep with your secret zone, But why do you plant, 'neath the billows dark, Ye build,-ye build,—but ye enter not in, Like the tribes whom the desert devour'd in their sin; Ye slumber unmark'd 'mid the desolate main, LET US LOVE ONE ANOTHER. "LET us love one another, not long may we stay; In this bleak world of mourning some droop while 'tis day, Others fade in their noon, and few linger till eve ;— And the fondest, the purest, the truest that met, Then, oh! though the hopes that we nourished decay, There are hearts, like the ivy, though all be decayed, Thus, let's love one another 'midst sorrows the worst, Though the false wing of pleasure may change and forsake, And the bright urn of wealth into particles break, There are some sweet affections that wealth cannot buy,- C. Swain. DANISH MARGARET. [This story is taken from Miss Strickland's "Queens of England." Through the custom of one of the ladies of the queen watching in the royal chamber every night, "Danish Margaret" conceived and executed her daring scheme for the rescue of her betrothed.] WRAPT in midnight slumbers deep, But sleep to Danish Margaret Never a moment came : By the pale lamp's steady flame. Silently she rose and went With a quick uneven tread, Until her tearful eyes she bent Even their breathing, soft and low, Then back turned Danish Margaret, And lightly stept through chamber and hall, Boldly she came where the warders stood, A strong barred door before; Though to her cheek came the bright warm blood, Never the more, but fair and free, "Guards, bring ye the prisoner on with me, To speak with the king alone.” They opened the door, and they brought him there Oh! Wemyss of Logie, that guardian fair They followed her on through corridor damp, Through hall and through chamber too; While she passed before with the guiding lamp, The room of the king unto. "Now keep ye your watch here bold and true, Till I bring him again in charge to you Then took she the Chief of Logie's hand, And left them to watch there, the warder band, Firmly stood they, the warder band, And a lagging hour hath gone; The door is still closed, and there they stand, Another hour-and another still; More slowly they pass away; A few more hours and then there will the bonnie day! The bonnie day!—the bonnie day! Higher it rises;-and once again And over the hill and over the plain Comes the break of an August morn. Much then marvell'd the guards, that yet "May not the bird have escaped our net?" |