And many a man in his own breast then

delves,

But deep enough, alas! none ever mines. And we have been on many thousand lines, And we have shown, on each, spirit and

power;

But hardly have we, for one little hour, Been on our own line, have we been ourselves

Hardly had skill to utter one of all
The nameless feelings that course through
our breast,

But they course on for ever unexpress'd.
And long we try in vain to speak and act
Our hidden self, and what we say and do
Is eloquent, is well-but 't is not true!
And then we will no more be rack'd
With inward striving, and demand
Of all the thousand nothings of the hour
Their stupefying power;

Ah

yes, and they benumb us at our call! Yet still, from time to time, vague and forlorn,

From the soul's subterranean depth upborne
As from an infinitely distant land,
Come airs, and floating echoes, and convey
A melancholy into all our day.

Only but this is rare

When a beloved hand is laid in ours,
When, jaded with the rush and glare
Of the interminable hours,

Our eyes can in another's eyes read clear,
When our world-deafen'd ear

Is by the tones of a lov'd voice caress'd A bolt is shot back somewhere in our breast,

And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again. The eye sinks inward, and the heart lies plain,

And what we mean, we say, and what we would, we know.

A man becomes aware of his life's flow, And hears its winding murmur, and he sees The meadows where it glides, the sun, the breeze.

And there arrives a lull in the hot race
Wherein he doth for ever chase
The flying and elusive shadow, rest.
An air of coolness plays upon his face,

And an unwonted calm pervades his breast.
And then he thinks he knows

The hills where his life rose,

And the sea where it goes.

MEMORIAL VERSES

APRIL, 1850

GOETHE in Weimar sleeps, and Greece,
Long since, saw Byron's struggle cease.
But one such death remain'd to come;
The last poetic voice is dumb —
We stand to-day by Wordsworth's tomb.

When Byron's eyes were shut in death,
We bow'd our head and held our breath.
He taught us little ; but our soul
Had felt him like the thunder's roll.
With shivering heart the strife we saw
Of passion with eternal law;
And yet with reverential awe
We watch'd the fount of fiery life
Which serv'd for that Titanic strife.

When Goethe's death was told, we said:
Sunk, then, is Europe's sagest head.
Physician of the iron age,
Goethe has done his pilgrimage.
He took the suffering human race,

He read each wound, each weakness clear:
And struck his finger on the place,
And said: Thou ailest here, and here!
He look'd on Europe's dying hour
Of fitful dream and feverish power;
His eye plunged down the weltering strife,
The turmoil of expiring life

He said: The end is everywhere,
Art still has truth, take refuge there!
And he was happy, if to know
Causes of things, and far below
His feet to see the lurid flow
Of terror, and insane distress,
And headlong fate, be happiness.

For never has such soothing voice
Been to your shadowy world convey'd,
Since erst, at morn, some wandering shade
Heard the clear song of Orpheus come
Through Hades, and the mournful gloom.
Wordsworth has gone from us
and ye,
Ah, may ye feel his voice as we !
He too upon a wintery clime
Had fallen -on this iron time

Of doubts, disputes, distractions, fears.
He found us when the age had bound
Our souls in its benumbing round;
He spoke, and loos'd our hearts in tears.

He laid us as we lay at birth
On the cool flowery lap of earth,
Smiles broke from us, and we had ease;
The hills were round us, and the breeze
Went o'er the sun-lit fields again;
Our foreheads felt the wind and rain.
Our youth return'd; for there was shed
On spirits that had long been dead,
Spirits dried up and closely furl'd,
The freshness of the early world.

Ah! since dark days still bring to light
Man's prudence and man's fiery might,
Time may restore us in his course
Goethe's sage mind and Byron's force;
But where will Europe's latter hour
Again find Wordsworth's healing power?
Others will teach us how to dare,
And against fear our breast to steel;
Others will strengthen us to bear -
But who, ah! who, will make us feel?
The cloud of mortal destiny,
Others will front it fearlessly -
But who, like him, will put it by?
Keep fresh the grass upon his grave,
O Rotha, with thy living wave!
Sing him thy best! for few or none
Hears thy voice right, now he is gone.

Yes, only four! - and not the course
Of all the centuries yet to come,
And not the infinite resource

Of Nature, with her countless sum

Of figures, with her fulness vast
Of new creation evermore,
Can ever quite repeat the past,
Or just thy little self restore.

Stern law of every mortal lot!
Which man, proud man, finds hard to
bear,

And builds himself I know not what
Of second life I know not where.

But thou, when struck thine hour to go,
On us, who stood despondent by,
A meek last glance of love didst throw,
And humbly lay thee down to die.

Yet would we keep thee in our heart
Would fix our favorite on the scene,
Nor let thee utterly depart

And be as if thou ne'er hadst been.

And so there rise these lines of verse
On lips that rarely form them now;
While to each other we rehearse :
Such ways, such arts, such looks hadst thou!

We stroke thy broad brown paws again,
We bid thee to thy vacant chair,
We greet thee by the window-pane,
We hear thy scuffle on the stair.

We see the flaps of thy large ears
Quick rais'd to ask which way we go;
Crossing the frozen lake, appears
Thy small black figure on the snow!

Nor to us only art thou dear
Who mourn thee in thine English home;
Thou hast thine absent master's tear,
Dropp'd by the far Australian foam.

Thy memory lasts both here and there,
And thou shalt live as long as we.
And after that - thou dost not care!
In us was all the world to thee.

Yet, fondly zealous for thy fame,
Even to a date beyond our own
We strive to carry down thy name,

The day is fair, the hour is noon,
From neighboring thicket thrills the boon
The nuthatch yields in song:

All drench'd with recent rains, the leaves
Are dripping drip the sheltering eaves,
The dropping notes among.

And twinkling diamonds in the grass
Show where the flitting zephyrs pass,
That shake the green blades dry;
And golden radiance fills the air
And gilds the floating gossamer
That glints and trembles by.

Yet, blind to each familiar grace,
Strange anguish on his pallid face,
And eyes of dreamful hue,

That lonely man sits brooding there, Still huddled in his easy-chair,

With memories life will rue.

Where bay might crown that honor'd head,

A homely crumpled nightcap spread
Half veils the careworn brows;
In morning-gown of rare brocade
His puny shrunken shape array'd
His sorrowing soul avows:

Avows in every dropping line Dejection words not thus define

So eloquent of woe;

Yet never to those mournful eyes,
The heart's full-brimming fountains, rise
Sweet tears to overflow.

No token here of studied grief,
But plainest signs that win belief,
A simple scene and true.
Beside the mourner's chair display'd,
The matin meal's slight comforts laid
Trimly the board bestrew.

'Mid silvery sheen of burnish'd plate, The chill'd and tarnish'd chocolate

On snow-white damask stands ; Untouch'd the trivial lures remain In dainty pink-tinged porcelain, Still ranged by usual hands.

A drowsy bee above the cream
Hums loitering in the sunny gleam
That tips each rim with gold;
A checker'd maze of light and gloom
Floats in the quaintly-litter'd room
With varying charms untold.

Koscoe

And spoil the hopes of his expectant heart; Thus, with my mistress oft conversing, I Stir every lighter theme with careless voice, Gathering sweet music and celestial joys From the harmonious soul o'er which I fly; Yet o'er the one deep master-chord I hover, And dare not stoop, fearing to tell — I love her.

EARTH

SAD is my lot; among the shining spheres Wheeling, I weave incessant day and night, And ever, in my never-ending flight,

Add woes to woes, and count up tears on tears.

Young wives' and new-born infants' hapless biers

Lie on my breast, a melancholy sight;
Fresh griefs abhor my fresh returning light;
Pain and remorse and want fill up my years.
My happier children's farther-piercing eyes
Into the blessed solvent future climb,
And knit the threads of joy and hope and
warning;

But I, the ancient mother, am not wise,
And, shut within the blind obscure of time,
Roll on from morn to night, and on from
night to morning.

MIMNERMUS IN CHURCH You promise heavens free from strife, Pure truth, and perfect change of will; But sweet, sweet is this human life,

So sweet, I fain would breathe it

still;

Your chilly stars I can forego,
This warm kind world is all I know.

You say there is no substance here,
One great reality above:
Back from that void I shrink in fear,
And child-like hide myself in love.