That fill the haunted chambers of the Night, Like some old poet's rhymes. From the cool cisterns of the midnight air My spirit drank repose; The fountain of perpetual peace flows there, From those deep cisterns flows. O holy Night! from thee I learn to bear What man has borne before ! Thou layest thy finger on the lips of Care, And they complain no more. Peace! Peace! Orestes-like I breathe this prayer! Descend with broad-winged flight, The welcome, the thrice-prayed for, the most fair, The best-beloved Night! A PSALM OF LIFE WHAT THE HEART OF THE YOUNG MAN TELL me not, in mournful numbers, Life is real! Life is earnest ! And the grave is not its goal; Not enjoyment, and not sorrow, Lives of great men all remind us Let us then, be up and doing, THE SKELETON IN ARMOR "SPEAK! speak! thou fearful guest! Who, with thy hollow breast Still in rude armor drest, Comest to daunt me! Wrapt not in Eastern balms, But with thy fleshless palms Stretched, as if asking alms, Why dost thou haunt me?" Then from those cavernous eyes Gleam in December; “I was a Viking old! No Saga taught thee! For this I sought thee. "Far in the Northern Land, By the wild Baltic's strand, I, with my childish hand, Tamed the gerfalcon; And, with my skates fast-bound, Skimmed the half-frozen Sound, That the poor whimpering hound Trembled to walk on. "Oft to his frozen lair Sang from the meadow. "But when I older grew, Joining a corsair's crew, O'er the dark sea I flew With the marauders. Wild was the life we led; Many the souls that sped, Many the hearts that bled, By our stern orders. "Many a wassail-bout "Once as I told in glee "I wooed the blue-eyed maid, Our vows were plighted. "Bright in her father's hall "Three weeks we westward bore, "There lived we many years; Time dried the maiden's tears; She had forgot her fears, She was a mother; Death closed her mild blue eyes; "Still grew my bosom then, Oh, death was grateful! "Thus, seamed with many scars, My soul ascended! There from the flowing bowl THE VILLAGE BLACKSMITH UNDER a spreading chestnut-tree The village smithy stands; His hair is crisp, and black, and long, His brow is wet with honest sweat, Week in, week out, from morn till night, You can hear him swing his heavy sledge And children coming home from school They love to see the flaming forge, He goes on Sunday to the church, And it makes his heart rejoice. It sounds to him like her mother's voice, Singing in Paradise! He needs must think of her once more, How in the grave she lies; And with his hard, rough hand he wipes A tear out of his eyes. CURFEW SOLEMNLY, mournfully, Cover the embers, And put out the light; Toil comes with the morning, And rest with the night. Dark grow the windows, And quenched is the fire; Sound fades into silence, All footsteps retire. No voice in the chambers, Sleep and oblivion The book is completed, And closed, like the day; And the hand that has written it Dim grow its fancies; Song sinks into silence, Darker and darker The black shadows fall; Sleep and oblivion FROM "EVANGELINE" EVANGELINE IN ACADIE SOMEWHAT apart from the village, and nearer the Basin of Minas, Benedict Bellefontaine, the wealthiest farmer of Grand-Pré, Dwelt on his goodly acres; and with him, directing his household, Gentle Evangeline lived, his child, and the pride of the village. Stalworth and stately in form was the man of seventy winters; Hearty and hale was he, an oak that is covered with snowflakes; White as the snow were his locks, and his cheeks as brown as the oak-leaves. Fair was she to behold, that maiden of seventeen summers. Black were her eyes as the berry that grows on the thorn by the wayside, Black, yet how softly they gleamed beneath the brown shade of her tresses ! Sweet was her breath as the breath of kine that feed in the meadows. When in the harvest heat she bore to the reapers at noontide Flagons of home-brewed ale, ah! fair in sooth was the maiden. Fairer was she when, on Sunday morn, while the bell from its turret Sprinkled with holy sounds the air, as the priest with his hyssop Sprinkles the congregation, and scatters blessings upon them, Down the long street she passed, with her chaplet of beads and her missal, Wearing her Norman cap, and her kirtle of blue, and the ear-rings, Brought in the olden time from France, and since, as an heirloom, Handed down from mother to child, through long generations. But a celestial brightness beauty a more ethereal |