And shouted but once more, aloud, |

66

My father! must I stay?" 1

While o'er him fast, through sail and shroud,
The wreathing fires made way. I

They wrapt the ship in splendor wild,|
They caught the flag on high, |
And stream'd above the gallant child, |
Like banners in the sky.

There came a burst of thunder sound — |
The boy oh! where was he? |

Ask of the winds that far around |
With fragments strew'd the sea! |

With mast, and helm, and pennon fair, |
That well had borne their part -1
But the noblest thing that perish'd there, I
Was that young faithful heart. |

MEETING OF SATAN, SIN, AND DEATH.

(MILTON.)

Meanwhile the adversary of God and man, |
Satan, with thoughts inflam'd of highest design, |
Puts on swift wings, and towards the gates of Hell |
Explores his solitary flight: sometimes

He scours the right hand coast, sometimes the left; }
Now shaves with level wing the deep, then soars
Up to the fiery concave | towering high. |

As when far off at sea a fleet descried |
Hangs in the clouds, by equinoctial winds |
Close sailing from Bengala, or the isles

Of Ternate and Tidore, whence merchants bring
Their spicy drugs; they, on the trading flood, |
Through the wide Ethiopian to the Cape,

Ply, stemming nightly toward the pole: | so seem'd
Far off the flying fiend.

At last appear

Hell bounds, high, reaching to the horrid roof, | And thrice three fold the gates: three folds were brass,

Three iron, three of adamantine rock

Impenetrable, impaled with circling fire,

Yet unconsum'd. Before the gates there sat,
On either side, a formidable shape; 1

The one seem'd woman to the waist, and fair;|
But ended foul in many a scaly fold |
Voluminous and vast, a serpent, arm'd
With mortal sting; about her middle round |
A cry of hell-hounds, never ceasing, bark'd\
With wide Cerberean mouths full loud, and rung
A hideous peal! |

a

Far less abhorr'd than these
Vex'd Scylla, | bathing in the sea that parts
Calabria from the hoarse Trinacrian shore; |
Nor uglier follow the night hag, ❘ when, call'd
In secret, riding through the air, she comes,
Lured with the smell of infant blood, to dance
With Lapland witches, | while the laboring moon |
Eclipses at their charms. |

The other shape, |
If shape it might be call'd that shape had none |
Distinguishable in member, joint, or limb; |

Or substance might be call'd that shadow seem'd ;
For each seem'd either; black it stood as night, |
Fierce as ten furies, terrible as Hell, |

And shook a dreadful dart; what seem'd his head | The likeness of a kingly crown had on. [

SCYLLA, a fabled monster, of whom mention is made in the Odyssey. She is said to have twelve feet and six long necks, with a terrific head, and three rows of close-set teeth, on each.

↳ CALABRIA, the part of Italy occupied by the ancient Calabri.

TRINACRIA, one of the ancient names of Sicily.

Satan was now at hand; and from his seat |
The monster, moving, onward came as fast, |
With horrid strides; Hell trembled as he strode. I
The undaunted fiend what this might be admired, |
Admired, not fear'd: God and his Son except |
Created thing naught valued he, | nor shunn'd;\
And with disdainful look thus first began: |

"Whence and what art thou, execrable shape! |
That dar'st, though grim and terrible, advance
Thy miscreated front athwart my way

To yonder gates? | through them I mean to pass,
That be assured, without leave ask'd of thee.
Retire, or taste thy folly; and learn by proof, |
Hell-born! not to contend with spirits of Heaven!" |

To whom the goblin, full of wrath, replied, |
“Art thou that traitor angel, | art thou he

Who first broke peace in heaven, and faith, | till then Unbroken, and in proud rebellious arms |

Drew after him the third part of Heaven's sons,
Conjured against the Highest, | for which both thou
And they, outcast from God, are here condemn'd |
To waste eternal days in woe and pain? |

And reckonest thou thyself with spirits of Heaven, |
Hell-doom'd! and breath'st defiance here and scorn,|
Where I reign king, and, to enrage thee more,
Thy king, and lord? | Back to thy punishment, |
False fugitive! and to thy speed add wings, |
Lest with a whip of scorpions | I pursue

Thy lingering, or with one stroke of this dart |
Strange horror seize thee, and pangs unfelt before." |

So spake the grisly terror, and in shape, |

So speaking and so threat'ning, grew tenfold
More dreadful and deform. On the other side, |
Incens'd with indignation, Satan stood
Unterrified, and like a comet burn'd,

That fires the length of Ophiucus huge i
In the arctic sky, and from his horrid hair |
Shakes pestilence and war. |

Levell❜d his deadly aim;

No second stroke intend;

Each at the head | their fatal hands |

and such a frown

Each cast at the other, as when two black clouds |
With heaven's artillery fraught, come rattling on
Over the Caspian, then stand front to front
Hovering a space, | till winds the signal blow
To join their dark encounter in mid air:|

So frown'd the mighty combatants, that hell
Grew darker at their frown; so match'd they stood; !
For never but once more was either like

To meet so great a foe. | And now great deeds
Had been achiev'd, whereof all Hell had rung,
Had not the snaky sorceress that sat

Fast by Hell-gate, and kept the fatal key, I
Risen, and with hideous outcry rush'd between. |

WOMAN.

(CAMPBELL.)

In joyous youth, what soul hath never known |
Thought, feeling, taste, harmonious to its own? |
Who hath not paused while Beauty's pensive eye |
Ask'd from his heart the homage of a sigh? |
Who hath not own'd, with rapture-smitten frame,
The power of grace, the magic of a name? |

There be, perhaps, who barren hearts avow, |
Cold as the rocks on Torneo's hoary brow; |
There be, whose loveless wisdom never fail'd, |
In self-adoring pride securely mail'd ;-

OPHIUCUS, a constellation. b Whår-of.

But, triumph not, ye peace-enamour'd few! |
Fire, Nature, Genius, never dwelt with you! |
For you no fancy consecrates the scene
Where rapture utter'd vows,
and wept
between:
'Tis yours, unmoved, to sever and to meet ; |
No pledge is sacred, and no home is sweet! ¦

Who that would ask a heart to dullness wed, |
The waveless calm, the slumber of the dead?
No; the wild bliss of nature needs alloy,
And fear and sorrow fan the fire of joy! |
And say, without our hopes, without our fears,
Without the home that plighted love endears, |
Without the smile from partial beauty won,
O! what were man ? a world without a sun. ;

Till Hymen brought his love-delighted hour, |
There dwelt no joy in Eden's rosy bower! |
In vain the viewless seraph lingering there, |
At starry midnight charm'd the silent air; |
In vain the wild-bird carol'd on the steep,
To hail the sun, slow-wheeling from the deep; |
In vain, to soothe the solitary shade, |
Aërial notes in mingling measure play'd;
The summer wind that shook the spangled tree,
The whispering wave, the murmur of the bee;
Still slowly pass'd the melancholy day,
And still the stranger wist not where to stray: |
The world was sad! | the garden was a wild ! |
And man, the hermit, sigh'd — | till woman smil❜d ! |

i

SINCERITY.

(TILLOTSON.)

Truth and sincerity | have all the advantages of ap pearance, and many more. If the show of any thing be good, I am sure the reality is better; for why