"St St," he'd whisper, "the Corregidor!" I had been used to think that personage

Was one with lacquered breeches, lustrous belt, And feathers like a forest in his hat,

Who blew a trumpet and proclaimed the news, Announced the bull-fights, gave each church its turn,

And memorised the miracle in vogue!

He had a great observance from us boys;
We were in error; that was not the man.

I'd like now, yet had haply been afraid, To have just looked when this man came to die, And seen who lined the clean gay garret sides, And stood about the neat low truckle bed, With the heavenly manner of relieving guard. Here had been, mark, the general-in-chief,

Through a whole campaign of the world's life and death,

Doing the King's work all the dim day long,

In his old coat and up to knees in mud,
Smoked like a herring, dining on a crust,-
And, now the day was won, relieved at once!
No further show or need of that old coat,

You are sure, for one thing! Bless us, all the while

How sprucely we are dressed out, you and I!
A second, and the Angels alter that.

Well, I could never write a verse,-could you?
Let's to the Prado, and make the most of time.
R. BROWNING

167. THE FIRE OF DRIFTWOOD

WE sat within the farmhouse old,

Whose windows, looking o'er the bay, Gave to the sea-breeze, damp and cold, An easy entrance, night and day.

Not far away we saw the port,

The strange, old-fashioned, silent town,— The lighthouse,—the dismantled fort,— The wooden houses, quaint and brown.

We sat and talked until the night,
Descending, filled the little room;
Our faces faded from the sight,

Our voices only broke the gloom.

We spake of many a vanished scene,

Of what we once had thought and said, Of what had been, and might have been, And who was changed, and who was dead;

And all that fills the hearts of friends,
When first they feel with secret pain,
Their lives thenceforth have separate ends,
And never can be one again;

The first slight swerving of the heart,
That words are powerless to express,

And leave it still unsaid in part,

Or say it in too great excess.

The very tones in which we spake

Had something strange, I could but mark; The leaves of memory seemed to make A mournful rustling in the dark.

Oft died the words upon our lips,
As suddenly, from out the fire
Built of the wreck of stranded ships,
The flames would leap and then expire.

And, as their splendour flashed and failed,
We thought of wrecks upon the main,—
Of ships dismasted, that were hailed

And sent no answer back again.

The windows, rattling in their frames,
The ocean, roaring up the beach,—
The gusty blast,—the bickering flames,-
All mingled vaguely in our speech;

Until they made themselves a part
Of fancies floating through the brain,-
The long-lost ventures of the heart,
That send no answer back again.

O flames that glowed! O hearts that yearned! They were indeed too much akin,

The driftwood fire without that burned,

The thoughts that burned and glowed within. H. W. LONGFELLOW

168.-GOOD COUNSEIL

FLE fro the pres, and dwelle with sothfastnesse;
Suffice thee thy good, though hit be smal;
For hord hath hate, and clymbyng tikelnesse,1
Pres hath envye, and wele blent overal.2
Savour no more then thee behovè shal;
Do wel thyself that other folk canst rede,
And trouthè shal delyver, hit is no drede.

Tempest thee not al crokèd to redresse,
In trust of hir that turneth as a bal:
Gret resté stant in lytil besynesse.
Bewar also to spurne agein an al;3
Stryve not as doth a crokkè 4 with a wal.
Dauntè thyself that dauntest otheres dede,
And trouthè shal delyver, hit is no drede.

That thee is sent receyve in buxumnesse : 5
The wrasteling for this world asketh a fal;
Heer nis non hoom, heer is but wyldernesse.
Forth pilgrime, forth! forth, best, out of thy stal!
Know thy contree, loke up, thank God of al;
Weyve thy lust, and let thy gost thee lede,
And trouthè shal delyver, hit is no drede.

169. THE SLEEPER

AT midnight, in the month of June,
I stand beneath the mystic moon.
An opiate vapour, dewy, dim,
Exhales from out her golden rim,
And, softly dripping, drop by drop,
Upon the quiet mountain top,
Steals drowsily and musically
Into the universal valley.

The rosemary nods upon the grave;
The lily lolls upon the wave;
Wrapping the fog about its breast,
The ruin moulders into rest;
Looking like Lethe, see! the lake
A conscious slumber seems to take,
And would not, for the world, awake.
All beauty sleeps:-and lo! where lies
(Her casement open to the skies)
Irene, with her destinies.

O lady bright! can it be right—
This window open to the night?
The wanton airs, from the tree-top,
Laughingly through the lattice drop-
The bodiless airs, a wizard rout,
Flit through thy chamber in and out,
And wave the curtain canopy

So fitfully-so fearfully—

Above the closed and fringèd lid

'Neath which thy slumbering soul lies hid, That, o'er the floor and down the wall Like ghosts the shadows rise and fall!