1841.

War to the last he waged with all
The tyrant canker-worms of earth;
Baron and duke, in hold and hall,
Cursed the dark hour that gave him birth;
He used Rome's harlot for his mirth;
Plucked bare hypocrisy and crime;
But valiant souls of knightly worth
Transmitted to the rolls of Time.

O Time! whose verdicts mock our own,
The only righteous judge art thou;

That poor old exile, sad and lone,
Is Latium's other Virgil now:
Before his name the nations bow;
His words are parcel of mankind,
Deep in whose hearts, as on his brow,
The marks have sunk of Dante's mind. 56
Thomas William Parsons.

48

A

ICHABOD

DANIEL WEBSTER, 1850

So fallen! so lost! the light withdrawn
Which once he wore!

The glory from his gray hairs gone
Forevermore!

Revile him not, the Tempter hath

A snare for all;

And pitying tears, not scorn and wrath,

Befit his fall!

Oh, dumb be passion's stormy rage,

When he who might

Have lighted up and led his age,
Falls back in night.

Scorn! would the angels laugh, to mark
A bright soul driven,

Fiend-goaded, down the endless dark,

From hope and heaven!

Let not the land once proud of him

Insult him now,

Nor brand with deeper shame his dim,

Dishonored brow.

But let its humbled sons, instead,

From sea to lake,

A long lament, as for the dead,

In sadness make.

Of all we loved and honored, naught

Save power remains;

A fallen angel's pride of thought,

Still strong in chains.

All else is gone; from those great eyes

The soul has fled:

When faith is lost, when honor dies,

The man is dead!

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12

16

20

24

28

32

1850.

Then, pay the reverence of old days
To his dead fame;

Walk backward, with averted gaze,

And hide the shame!

John Greenleaf Whittier.

THERE WAS A BOY

cliffs

THERE was a Boy; ye knew him well, ye
And islands of Winander!-many a time,
At evening, when the earliest stars began
To move along the edges of the hills,
Rising or setting, would he stand alone,
Beneath the trees, or by the glimmering lake;
And there, with fingers interwoven, both hands
Pressed closely palm to palm and to his mouth
Uplifted, he, as through an instrument,
Blew mimic hootings to the silent owls,
That they might answer him.-And they would
shout

Across the watery vale, and shout again,
Responsive to his call,-with quivering peals,
And long halloos, and screams, and echoes loud
Redoubled and redoubled; concourse wild
Of jocund din! And, when there came a pause
Of silence such as baffled his best skill:
Then, sometimes, in that silence, while he hung
Listening, a gentle shock of mild surprise
Has carried far into his heart the voice
Of mountain-torrents; or the visible scene
Would enter unawares into his mind

20

10

36

With all its solemn imagery, its rocks,

Its woods, and that uncertain heaven received Into the bosom of the steady lake.

This boy was taken from his mates, and died In childhood, ere he was full twelve years old. Preeminent in beauty is the vale

Where he was born and bred: the churchyard

hangs

Upon a slope above the village-school;

And through that church-yard when my way has led

On summer-evenings, I believe, that there
A long half-hour together I have stood
Mute-looking at the grave in which he lies!

1800.

William Wordsworth

30

RUTH

SHE stood breast high amid the corn
Clasp'd by the golden light of morn,
Like the sweetheart of the sun,

Who many a glowing kiss had won.

4

On her cheek an autumn flush,
Deeply ripen'd;—such a blush
In the midst of brown was born,
Like red poppies grown with corn.

8

Round her eyes her tresses fell,

Which were blackest none could tell,
But long lashes veil'd a light,
That had else been all too bright.

12

1827.

And her hat, with shady brim,
Made her tressy forehead dim;—
Thus she stood amid the stooks,
Praising God with sweetest looks:-.

Sure, I said, Heav'n did not mean,
Where I reap thou shouldst but glean,
Lay thy sheaf adown and come,
Share my harvest and my home.

Thomas Hood.

16

20

STEPPING WESTWARD

What, you are stepping westward?"
Yea."

-'T would be a wildish destiny,

If we, who thus together roam
In a strange Land, and far from home,
Were in this place the guests of Chance:
Yet who would stop, or fear to advance
Though home or shelter he had none,
With such a sky to lead him on?

The dewy ground was dark and cold;
Behind, all gloomy to behold;
And stepping westward seemed to be
A kind of heavenly destiny:

I liked the greeting; 't was a sound
Of something without place or bound;
And seemed to give me spiritual right
To travel through that region bright.

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