THERE WAS A CHILD WENT FORTH.

THERE was a child went forth every day;

And the first object he looked upon, that object he became ;

And that object became part of him for the day, or a certain part of the day, or for many years, or stretching cycles of years.

The early lilacs became part of this child,

And grass, and white and red morning-glories,1 and white and red clover, and the song of the phoebebird,2

And the Third-month lambs, and the sow's pink-faint litter, and the mare's foal, and the cow's calf, And the noisy brood of the barn-yard, or by the mire of the pond-side,

And the fish suspending themselves so curiously below there and the beautifu! curious liquid,

And the water-plants with their graceful flat heads—all became part of him.

The field-sprouts of Fourth-month and Fifth-month became part of him;

Winter-grain sprouts, and those of the light-yellow corn, and the esculent roots of the garden,

And the apple-trees covered with blossoms, and the fruit afterward, and wood-berries, and the commonest weeds by the road;

And the old drunkard staggering home from the outhouse of the tavern, whence he had lately risen, And the schoolmistress that passed on her way to the school,

And the friendly boys that passed-and the quarrelsome boys,

1 The name of "morning-glory" is given to the bindweed, or a sort of bindweed, in America.

2 A dim-coloured little bird, with a cheerful note, sounding like the word Phoebe.

And the tidy and fresh-cheeked girls-and the barefoot. negro boy and girl,

And all the changes of city and country, wherever he

went.

His own parents,

He that had fathered him, and she that had conceived him in her womb, and birthed him,

They gave this child more of themselves than that; They gave him afterward every day-they became part of him.

The mother at home, quietly placing the dishes on the supper-table;

The mother with mild words-clean her cap and gown, a wholesome odour falling off her person and clothes as she walks by;

The father, strong, self-sufficient, manly, mean, angered, unjust;

The blow, the quick loud word, the tight bargain, the crafty lure,

The family usages, the language, the company, the furniture-the yearning and swelling heart, Affection that will not be gainsaid-the sense of what is real-the thought if, after all, it should prove unreal,

The doubts of day-time and the doubts of night-timethe curious whether and how,

Whether that which appears so is so, or is it all flashes and specks?

Men and women crowding fast in the streets-if they are not flashes and specks, what are they? The streets themselves, and the façades of houses, and goods in the windows,

Vehicles, teams, the heavy-planked wharves-the huge crossing at the ferries,

The village on the highland, seen from afar at sunsetthe river between,

Shadows, aureola and mist, the light falling on roofs. and gables of white or brown, three miles off,

The schooner near by, sleepily dropping down the tide -the little boat slack towed astern,

The hurrying tumbling waves quick-broken crests slap

ping,

The strata of coloured clouds, the long bar of maroontint, away solitary by itself-the spread of purity it lies motionless in,

The horizon's edge, the flying sea-crow, the fragrance of salt marsh and shore-mud;

These became part of that child who went forth every day, and who now goes, and will always go forth every day.

TO A FOILED EUROPEAN REVOLUTIONNAIRE.

I.

COURAGE yet! my brother or my sister!

Keep on! Liberty is to be subserved, whatever occurs; That is nothing that is quelled by one or two failures, or any number of failures,

Or by the indifference or ingratitude of the people, or by any unfaithfulness,

Or the show of the tushes of power, soldiers, cannon, penal statutes.

Revolt! and still revolt! revolt!

What we believe in waits latent for ever through all the continents, and all the islands and archipelagoes

of the sea;

What we believe in invites no one, promises nothing, sits in calmness and light, is positive and composed, knows no discouragement,

Waiting patiently, waiting its time.

(Not songs of loyalty alone are these, But songs of insurrection also;

For I am the sworn poet of every dauntless rebel, the

world over,

And he going with me leaves peace and routine behind

him,

And stakes his life, to be lost at any moment.)

2.

Revolt! and the downfall of tyrants!—

The battle rages with many a loud alarm, and frequent advance and retreat,

The infidel triumphs-or supposes he triumphs, Then the prison, scaffold, garrote, handcuffs, iron necklace and anklet, lead-balls, do their work, The named and unnamed heroes pass to other spheres, The great speakers and writers are exiled-they lie sick in distant lands,

The cause is asleep the strongest throats are still, choked with their own blood,

The young men droop their eyelashes toward the ground. when they meet;

-But, for all this, liberty has not gone out of the place, nor the infidel entered into full possession.

When liberty goes out of a place, it is not the first to go, nor the second or third to go,

It waits for all the rest to go-it is the last.

When there are no more memories of heroes and

martyrs,

And when all life, and all the souls of men and women, are discharged from any part of the earth,

Then only shall liberty, or the idea of liberty, be discharged from that part of the earth,

And the infidel come into full possession.

3.

Then courage! European revolter! revoltress!
For, till all ceases, neither must you cease.

I do not know what you are for (I do not know what
I am for myself, nor what anything is for),
But I will search carefully for it even in being foiled,
In defeat, poverty, misconception, imprisonment-for
they too are great.

Revolt! and the bullet for tyrants!
Did we think victory great?

So it is-But now it seems to me, when it cannot be helped, that defeat is great,

And that death and dismay are great.

FRANCE,

THE 18TH YEAR OF THESE STATES.1

A great year and place;

I.

A harsh, discordant, natal scream out-sounding, to touch the Mother's heart closer than any yet.

I walked the shores of my Eastern Sea,

Heard over the waves the little voice,

Saw the divine infant, where she woke, mournfully wailing, amid the roar of cannon, curses, shouts, crash of falling buildings;

Was not so sick from the blood in the gutters running -nor from the single corpses, nor those in heaps, nor those borne away in the tumbrils;

Was not so desperate at the battues of death—was not so shocked at the repeated fusillades of the guns.

2.

Pale, silent, stern, what could I say to that long-accrued retribution?

Could I wish humanity different?

Could I wish the people made of wood and stone?
Or that there be no justice in destiny or time?

3.

O Liberty! O mate for me!

Here too the blaze, the grape-shot and the axe, in reserve, to fetch them out in case of need,

Here too, though long repressed, can never be destroyed; Here too could rise at last, murdering and ecstatic; Here too demanding full arrears of vengeance.