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Let my heart be still a moment, and this mystery explore.

'Tis the wind, and nothing more.'

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore.
Not the least obeisance made he; not a minute stopped or stayed he;
But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber-door-
Perched upon a bust of Pallas, just above my chamber door-
Perched and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling,
By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore,

"Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, ti ou,' I said, art sure no craven. Ghastly, grim, and ancient Raven, wandering from the nightly shoreTell me what thy lordly name is on the night's Plutonian shore!'

Quoth the Raven: Nevermore.'

Much I marvelled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly,
Though its answer little meaning-little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber-door-
Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber-door,

With such a name as Nevermore.'.

But the Raven, sitting lonely on that placid bust, spoke only
That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour,
Nothing further then he uttered; not a feather then he fluttered-
Till I scarcely more than muttered: Other friends have flown before-
On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before.'
Then the bird said: Never more.'

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
'Doubtless,' said I, what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master, whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster, till his songs one burden bore-
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore.

Of" Never-never more."

But the Raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling,

Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust and door;
Then upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking,
Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore-

What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt, and ominous bird of yore
Meant in croaking Never inore.'

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This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl whose flery eyes now burned into my bosom's core;
This and more I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamp-light gloated o'er,
But whose velvet violet lining, with the lamp-light gloating o'er,

She shall press, ah, never more!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an unseen censer
Swung by seraphim, whose footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor.
Wretch !' I cried, thy god hath lent thee-by these angels he hath sent thee
Respite-respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore!
Quaff, O quaff this kind nepenthe, and torget this lost Lenore!'

Quoth the Raven: 'Never more!'

'Prophet!' said I, 'thing of evil!-prophet still if bird or devil!
Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore,
Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted-
On this home by horror haunted-tell me truly. I implore-
Is there is there balm in Gilead ?-tell me-tell me. I implore!'
Quoth the Raven: Never more.

'Prophet!' said I, thing of evil!-prophet still, if bird or devil!
By that heaven that bends above us-by that God we bott: adore,
Tell this soul, with sorrow laden, if within the distant Aiden,
It shall clasp a sainted maiden. whom the angels name LeLore-
Clasp a rare and radiant maiden, whom the angels name Lenore?'
Quoth be Raven: Never more.'

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Be that word our sign of parting, bird or fiend!' I shrieked upstarting-
Get thee back into the tempest and the night's plutonian shore?
Leave no back plume as a token of that lie thy soul hath poen!
Leave my lone iness unbroken!-quit the bust above my door!
Take thy beak from out my heart, and take thy form from off my door!'
Quoth the Raven: 'Never more.'

And the Raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting,

On the pallid bust of Pallas, just above my chamber-door;

And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming,
And the laup-light o'er him streaming, throws his shadow on the floor
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor,
Shall be lifted-never more!

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

The father of the present generation of American poets, and one of the most original of the brotherhood, is WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT, born at Cummington, Hampshire County, Massachusetts, November 3, 1794. With a precocity rivalling that of Cowley or Chatterton, Bryant at the age of thirteen wrote a satirical poem on the Jeffersonian party, which was published in 1808 under the title of The Embargo.' A few lines from this piece will shew how well the boy-poet had mastered the art of versification:

E'en while I sing, see Faction urge her claim,
Mislead with falsehood and with zeal indame;
ift her black banner, spread her empire wide,
And stalk triumphant with a Fury's stride!
She blows her brazen trump and at the sound
An otley throng, obedient, flock around;
A mist of changing hue around she flings,
And Darkness perches on her dragon wings!
Ob, might some patriot rise, the gloom dispel,
Chase Error's mist, and break her magic spell!
But vain the wish-for, hark, the murmuring meed
Of hoarse applause from yonder shed proceed!
Enter and view the thronging concourse there,
Intent with gaping mouth and stupid stare;
While in their midst their supple leader stands,
Hargues aloud and flourishes his hands.
To adulation tones his servile throat.

And sues successful for each blockhead's vote.

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From this perilous course of political versifying, the young author was removed by being placed at Williams College. He was admitted to the bar, and practised for several years with fair success; but in 1825.. he removed to New York, and entered upon that literary life which he has ever since followed. In 1826 Mr. Bryant became editor of the New York Evening Post.' and his connection with that journal still subsists. His poetical works consist of Thanatopsis '— an exquisite solemn strain of blank verse, first published in 1816;

'The Ages, a survey of the experience of mankind, 1828; and various pieces scattered through periodical works. Mr. Washington Irving, struck with the beauty of Bryant's poetry, had it collected and published in London in 1832. The British public, he said, had expressed its delight at the graphic descriptions of American scenery and wild woodland characters contained in the works of Cooper. The same keen eye and just feeling for nature,' he added, 'the same indigenous style of thinking and local peculiarity of imagery, which give such novelty and interest to the pages of that gifted writer, will be found to characterise this volume, condensed into a narrower compass, and sublimated into poetry.'

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From this opinion Professor Wilson-who reviewed the volume in 'Blackwood's Magazine'-dissented, believing that Cooper's pictures are infinitely richer in local peculiarity of imagery and thought. The chief charm of Bryant's genius,' he considered, consists in a tender pensiveness, a moral melancholy, breathing over all his contemplations, dreams, and reveries, even such as in the main are glad, and giving assurance of a pure spirit, benevolent to all living creatures, and habitually pious in the felt omnipresence of the Creator. His poetry overflows with natural religion-with what Wordsworth calls the religion of the woods.' This is strictly applicable to the 'Thanatopsis and Forest Hymn;' but Washington Irving is so far right that Bryant's grand merit is his nationality and his power of painting the American landscape, especially in its wild, solitary, and magnificent forms. His diction is pure and lucid, with scarcely a flaw, and he is master of blank verse. Mr. Bryant has translated the 'Iliad' and 'Odyssey,' 4 vols. (Boston, 1870-1872.)

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From Thanatopsis.'

Not to thy eternal resting-place

Shalt thou retire alone, nor couldst thon wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings,
The powerful of the earth, the wise, the good
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past-
All in one mighty sepulchre! The hills,
Rock-ribbed and ancient as the sun-the vales,
Stretching in pensive quietness between-
The venerable woods, rivers that move

In majesty, and the complaining brooks

That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,
Old Ocean's gray and melancholy waste-

Are but the solemn decorations all

Of the great tomb of man! The golden sun,
The planets, all the infinite host of heaven,
Are shining on the sad abodes of death,
Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
Of morning, and the Barcan des rt pierce,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon, and hears no sound
Save his own dashings; yet, the dead are there,

And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep-the dead reign there alone.
So shalt thou rest. And what if thou shalt fall
Unheeded by the living, and no friend

Take note of thy departure! All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of Care
Plod on, and each one as before will chase
His favourite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men-

The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, natron, and maid,
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man-
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
By those who in their turn shall follow them.

So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves

To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,

Scourged to his dungeon; but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams.

The Wind-flower.

Lodged in sunny cleft
Where the cold breezes come not, blooms alone
The little wind-flower, whose just-opened eye
Is blue as the spring heaven it gazes at,
Startling the loiterer in the naked groves
With unexpected beauty, for the time
Of blossoms and green leaves is yet afar.
The Disinterred Warrior.

Gather him to his grave again,

And solemnly and softly lay, Beneath the verdure of the plain,

The warrior's scattered bones away. Pay the deep reverence, taught of old, The homage of man's heart to death; Nor dare to trifle with the mould

Once hallowed by the Almighty's breath.

The soul hath quickened every part-
That remnant of a martial brow,
Those ribs that held the mighty heart,
'That strong arm-strong no longer

NOW.

Spare them, each mouldering relic spare,

Of God's own image; let them rest, Till not a trace shall speak of where The awful likeness was impressed.

For he was fresher from the Hand

In nearer kindred than our race.
In many a flood to madness tossed,
In many a storm has been his path,
He hid him not from heat or frost.

But met them, and defied their wrath.

Then they were kind-the forests here,
Rivers, and stiller waters, paid
A tribute to the net and spear

Of the red ruler of the shade.
Fruits on the woodland branches lay,
Roots in the shaded soil below.
The stars looked forth to teach his way,
The still earth warned him of the foe.

A noble race! But they are gone,

With their old forests wide and deep, And we have built our homes upon Fields where their generations sleep. Their fountains slake our thirst at noon, Upon their fields our harvest waves,

That formed of earth the human face, Our lovers woo beneath their moonAnd to the elements did stand

Ah! let us spare at least their graves!

An Indian at the Burying-place of his Fathers.

It is the spot I came to seek

My fathers' ancient burial-place,
Ere from these vales, ashamed and weak,
Withdrew our wasted race.

It is the spot-I know it well-
Of which our old traditions tell.

For here the upland bank sends out
A ridge toward the river-side;
I know the shaggy hills about,

The meadows smooth and wide;
The plains that, toward the eastern sky,
Fenced east and west by mountains lie.

A white man, gazing on the scene,

Would say a lovely spot was here,
And praise the lawns, so fresh and green,
Between the hills so sheer.

I like it not-I would the plain
Lay in its tall old groves again.

The sheep are on the slopes around,
The cattle in the meadows feed.
And labourers turn the crumbling ground,
Or drop the yellow seed,

And prancing steeds, in trappings gay,
Whirl the bright chariot o'er the way.

Methinks it were a nobler sight

To see these vales in woods arrayed,
Their summits in the golden light,
Their trunks in grateful shade;
And herds of deer, that bounding go
O'er rills and prostrate trees below.

And then to mark the lord of all,

The forest hero, trained to wars,

And the gray chief and gifted seer
Worshipped the God of thunders here.
But now the wheat is green and high
On clods that hid the warrior's breast,
And scattered in the furrows lie

The weapons of his rest;
And there, in the loose sand. is thrown
Of his large arm the mouldering bone.

Ah, little thought the strong and brave,
Who bore their lifeless chieftain forth,
Or the young wife that weeping gave
Her first-born to the earth,

That the pale race, who waste us now,
Among their bones should guide the
plough!

They waste us-ay, like April snow

In the warm noon, we shrink away; And fast they follow, as we go

Toward the setting day

Till they shall fill the land, and we
Are driven into the western sea.

But I behold a fearful sign,

To which the white man's eyes are
blind;

Their race may vanish hence, like mine,
And leave no trace behind,

Save ruins o'er the region spread,
And the white stones above the dead.

Before these fields were shorn and tilled,
Full to the brim our rivers flowed;
The melody of waters filled

The fresh and boundless wood:

Quivered and plumed, and lithe and tall, And torrents dashed, and rivulets played,

And seamed with glorious scars,
Walk forth, amid his train, to dare
The wolf, and grapple with the bear.

This bank. in which the dead were laid,
Was sacred when its soil was ours;
Hither the artless Indian maid

Brought wreaths of beads and flowers,

And fountains spouted in the shade.

Those grateful sounds are heard no

. more:

The springs are silent in the sun;
The rivers, by the blackened shore,

With lessening current run;
The realm our tribes are crushed to get,
May be a barren desert yet!

R. H. DANA-N. P. WILLIS-O. W. HOLMES.

RICHARD HENRY DANA (born at Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1787) was author of a small volume, 'The Buccaneer, and other Poems' (1827), which was hailed as an original and powerful contribution to American literature. He had previously published The Dying Raven,' a poem (1825), and contributed essays to a periodical work. "The Buccaneer' is founded on a tradition of a murder committed on an island on the coast of New England by a

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