Yet not a heart to save my pain? Oh, Venus, take thy gifts again! Make not so fair to cause our moan, Or make a heart that's like our own. JOHN HARRINGTON. 'TIS THE LAST ROSE OF SUMMER. IS the last rose of summer, 'TIS Left blooming alone; All her lovely companions Are faded and gone; To reflect back her blushes I'll not leave thee, thou lone one, Thus kindly I scatter Thy leaves o'er the bed Where thy mates of the garden. Lie scentless and dead. The camp was all in tumult, And there was such a thunder Of cymbals and of drums. As if the earth would cleave in sunder. There you might see the Moors How they were forming fast, Ranged upon a line; Let not a man move from his rank Pero Bermuez heard the word, But he could not refrain: For there your banner goes! So eager was his will. He spurred his horse, and drove him on Amid the Moorish rout; They strove to win the banner, And compassed him about. He had lost either life or limb; Forth at once they gc, Their lances in the rest Levelled fair and low, Their heads all stooping down Toward the saddle-bow. The Cid was in the midst, His shout was heard afar: "I am Rui Diaz, The champion of Bivar- Amidst the foe they brake; You might see them raise their lances, BE EFORE his lord he came and mercy God grant that to punish my falsehood and sought, But to his fellows mercy would not show: pride Your ghost at the marriage may sit by my side, May tax me with perjury, claim me as bride, And bear me away to the grave!" His presence all bosoms appeared to dismay; The guests sat in silence and fear; To Palestine hastened the hero so bold; behold! A baron all covered with jewels and gold Arrived at Fair Imogine's door. His treasures, his presents, his spacious domain, Soon made her untrue to her vows; bled: "I pray, Sir knight, that your helmet aside you would lay And deign to partake of our cheer." The lady is silent; the stranger complies: His vizor he slowly unclosed; He dazzled her eyes, he bewildered her O God! what a sight met Fair Imogine's eyes! brain, He caught her affections, so light and so What words can express her dismay and vain, surprise When a skeleton's head was exposed? And now had the marriage been blest by the All present then uttered a terrified shout, priest, The revelry now was begun; The tables they groaned with the weight of the feast, Nor yet had the laughter and merriment ceased When the bell at the castle tolled one. Then first with amazement Fair Imogine found A stranger was placed by her side; His air was terrific, he uttered no sound; He spake not, he moved not, he looked not around, But earnestly gazed on the bride. His vizor was closed and gigantic his height, His armor was sable to view; All turned with disgust from the scene: The worms they crept in, and the worms they crept out, And sported his eyes and his temples about, While the spectre addressed Imogine. "Behold me, thou false one, behold me !" he cried; "Remember Alonzo the Brave! God grants that to punish thy falsehood and pride My ghost at thy marriage should sit by thy side Should tax thee with perjury, claim thee as bride, And bear thee away to the grave." Thus saying, his arms round the lady he wound, All pleasure and laughter were hushed at his While loudly she shrieked in dismay, sight; The dogs, as they eyed him, drew back in affright; The lights in the chamber burned blue. Then sunk with his prey through the wideyawning ground; Nor ever again was Fair Imogine found, Or the spectre that bore her away. Not long lived the baron, and none, since that time, To inhabit the castle presume; For chronicles tell that by order sublime There Imogine suffers the pain of her crime And mourns her deplorable doom. "And is mine one?" said Abou.-" Nay, not so," Replied the angel. Abou spoke more low, But cheerly still, and said, "I pray thee, then, Write me as one that loves his fellow-men." At midnight four times in each year does The angel wrote, and vanished. The next her sprite, night |