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little do they suspect what is to befal them. Two hundred miles! and she never sleeps in a carriage! Well, patience be with them, and comfort and peace! A pleasant journey to them! And to her all happiness! She is a most kind and excellent person, one for whom I would do anything in my poor power-ah, even were it to listen to her another four days.

SHAKSPEARE.

BY LAMAN BLANCHARD.

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Deeply reverent as are now the countless worshippers of Shakspeare, there breathed not one, perhaps who worshipped the bard with a more ardent and feeling, than Laman Blanchard; in proof of which let these lines testify, which were written-On the first page of a volume intended for the reception of essays and drawings illustrative of Shakspeare:

LIKE one who stands

On the bright verge of some enchanted shore,
Where notes from airy harps, and hidden hands,
Are, from the green grass and golden sands,
Far echoed, o'er and o'er,

As if the tranced listener to invite

Into that world of light.

Thus stood I here,

Musing awhile on these unblotted leaves,
Till the blank pages brighten'd, and mine ear
Found music in their rustling, sweet and clear,
And wreathes that fancy weaves,

Entwined the volume-fill'd with grateful lays,
And songs of rapturous praise.

No sound I heard,

But echoed o'er and o'er our Shakspeare's name,
One lingering note of love, link'd word to word,
Till every leaf was as a fairy bird,

Whose song is still the same;

Or each was as a flower, with folded cells

For Plucks and Ariels!

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Visions not brief, though bright, which frosted age Hath failed to rob of one diviner hue,

Making them more familiar, yet more new

These flashed into the page;

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A group of crowned things-the radiant themes
Of Shakspeare's Avon dreams.

Of crowned things

(Rare crowns of living gems and lasting flowers), Some in the human likeness, some with wings Dyed in the beauty of ethereal springs

Some shedding piteous showers

Of natural tears, and some in smiles that fell
Like sunshine on a dell.

Here Art had caught

The perfect mould of Hamlet's princely form

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The frantic Thane, fiend-cheated, lived, methought; Here Timon howl'd; anon, sublimely wrought,

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Stood Lear amid the storm;

There Romeo droop'd, or soared, while Jacques, here, Still watched the weeping deer.

And then a throng

Of heavenly natures, clad in earthly vest,
Like angel-apparitions, pass'd along;

The rich lipp'd Rosaline, all light and song,
And Imogen's white breast;

Low-voed Cordelia, with her stifled sighs,
And Juliet's shrouded eyes.

The page, turned o'er,

Show'd Kate

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or Viola-my Lady Tongue,'

The lost Venetian, with her living Moor;
The Maiden-Wonder, on the haunted shore,
Happy, and fair, and young;

Till on a poor, love-martyr'd mind I look —
Ophelia at the brook.

With sweet Anne Page

The bright throng ended; for, untouched by time,
Came Falstaff, laughter-laurell'd, young in age,
With many a ripe and sack-devoted sage!
And deathless clowns sublime,

Crowded the leaf, to vanish at a swoop,
Like Oberon and his troop.

Here sate, entranced,

Malvolio, leg trapp'd; - he who served the Jew
Still with the fiend seem'd running; - then advanced
Messina's pretty piece of flesh, and danced

With Bottom and his crew;

Mercutio, Benedick, press'd points of wit,
And Osrick made his hit.

At these, ere long,

Awoke my laughter, and the spell was past;
Of the gay multitude, a marvellous throng,
No trace is here no tints, no word, no song,
On these bare leaves are cast

The altar has been rear'd, an offering fit-
The flame is still unlit.

O! who now bent

In humble reverence, hopes one wreath to bind
Worthy of him, whose genius, strangely blent,
Could kindle "wonder and astonishment"
In Milton's starry mind!

Who stood alone, but not as one apart,
And saw man's inmost heart.

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