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When he was gone, the house remained awhile
Silent and tenantless-then went to strangers.

Full fifty years were past, and all forgotten,
When on an idle day, a day of search
Mid the old lumber in the gallery,

That mouldering chest was noticed; and 't was said
By one as young, as thoughtless as Ginevra,

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"Why not remove it from its lurking place ?"

"T was done as soon as said; but on the way
It burst, it fell; and lo, a skeleton,

With here and there a pearl, an emerald-stone,
A golden clasp, clasping a shred of gold.
All else had perished-save a wedding-ring,
And a small seal, her mother's legacy,
Engraven with a name, the name of both,
"Ginevra."

There then had she found a grave! Within that chest had she concealed herself, Fluttering with joy, the happiest of the happy; When a spring-lock, that lay in ambush there, Fastened her down forever!

VENICE.

THERE is a glorious City in the Sea.
The sea is in the broad, the narrow streets,
Ebbing and flowing; and the salt sea-weed
Clings to the marble of her palaces.

No track of men, no footsteps to and fro,
Lead to her gates. The path lies o'er the sea,
Invisible; and from the land we went,
As to a floating city-steering in,

And gliding up her streets as in a dream,
So smoothly, silently-by many a dome
Mosque-like, and many a stately portico,
The statues ranged along an azure sky;
By many a pile in more than eastern splendour,
Of old the residence of merchant-kings;

The fronts of some, though time had shattered them,
Still glowing with the richest hues of art,

As though the wealth within them had run o'er.

268

STUDIES IN POETRY.

THOMAS CAMPBELL.

THE Gertrude of Wyoming, the Pleasures of Hope, the songs, and the odes of Campbell have given him a very high rank among the British Poets. In the first mentioned poem he has displayed great and varied powers; sublimity, pathetic tenderness, richness of natural description, nobleness and felicity in the conception of character, elevation and purity of moral sentiment, and a versification at once forcible, harmonious, and full of sweetness and melody. His odes exhibit a sublime fancy, vivid sternness of thought, striking imagery and intense energy of expression. Some of his songs are perhaps the finest in the language, and all his poetry is delightfully pure in its moral tendency.

THE VILLAGE OF WYOMING.

ON Susquehanna's side, fair Wyoming!
Although the wild-flower on thy ruin'd wall
And roofless homes a sad remembrance bring
Of what thy gentle people did befall,
Yet thou wert once the lovliest land of all
That see the Atlantic wave their morn restore.
Sweet land! may I thy lost delights recall,
And paint thy Gertrude in her bowers of yore,
Whose beauty was the love of Pennsylvania's shore.

Delightful Wyoming! beneath thy skies,
The happy shepherd swains had nought to do,
But feed their flocks on green declivities,
Or skim perchance thy lake with light canoe,
From morn, till evening's sweeter pastime grew,
With timbrel, when beneath the forests brown,
Thy lovely maidens would the dance renew:
And aye those sunny mountains half way down
Would echo flagelet from some romantic town.

Then, where of Indian hills the daylight takes
His leave, how might you the flamingo see
Disporting like a meteor on the lakes
And playful squirrel on his nut-grown tree:
And every sound of life was full of glee,
From merry mockbird's song, or hum of men,
While heark'ning, fearing nought their revelry,

And scarce had Wyoming of war or crime
Heard but in transatlantic story rung,
For here the exile met from every clime,
And spoke in friendship ev'ry distant tongue :
Men from the blood of warring Europe sprung,
Were but divided by the running brook;
And happy where no Rhenish trumpet sung,
On plains no sieging mine's volcano shook,

The blue-eyed German changed his sword to pruning hook.

Nor far some Andalusian saraband
Would sound to many a native roundelay-
But who is he that yet a dearer land
Remembers over hills and far away?

Green Albyn! what though he no more survey
Thy ships at anchor on the quiet shore,
The pellocks rolling from the mountain bay,

Thy lone sepulchral cairn upon the moor,

And distant isles that hear the loud Corbrechtan roar!

Alas poor Caledonia's mountaineer,

That want's stern edict e'er, and feudal grief,
Had forced him from a home he loved so dear!
Yet found he here a home, and glad relief,
And plied the beverage from his own fair sheaf,
That fired his Highland blood with mickle glee;
And England sent her men, of men the chief,
Who taught those sires of empire yet to be,
To plant the tree of life,-to plant fair freedom's tree!

Here was not mingled in the city's pomp
Of life's extremes the grandeur and the gloom;
Judgment awoke not here her dismal tromp,
Nor sealed in blood a fellow-creature's doom,
Nor mourned the captive in a living tomb.
One venerable man, beloved of all,
Sufficed where innocence was yet in bloom,
To sway the strife, that seldom might befall,
And Albert was their judge in patriarchal hall.

How reverend was the look, serenely aged,
He bore, this gentle Pennsylvanian sire,
Where all but kindly fervours were assuag'd,
Undimm'd by weakness' shade, or turbid ire:
And though amidst the calm of thought entire,
Some high and haughty features might betray
A soul impetuous once, 't was earthly fire
That fled composure's intellectual ray,

As Etna's fires grow dim before the rising day.

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270

STUDIES IN POETRY.

SCENE AT ALbert's home.

SCARCE had he utter'd-when heav'n's verge extreme
Reverberates the bomb's descending star,-

And sounds that mingled laugh,—and shout,—and scream,
To freeze the blood in one discordant jar,
Rung to the pealing thunderbolts of war.
Whoop after whoop with rack the ear assail'd;
As if unearthly fiends had burst their bar;
While rapidly the marksman's shot prevail'd :-
And aye, as if for death, some lonely trumpet wail'd.

Then look'd they to the hills, where fire o'erhung
The bandit groups, in one Vesuvian glare;

Or swept, far seen, the tow'r, whose clock unrung,
Told legible that midnight of despair.

She faints,-she falters not,-th' heroic fair,-
As he the sword and plume in haste array'd.

One short embrace-he clasp'd his dearest care-
But hark! what nearer war-drum shakes the glade?
Joy, joy! Columbia's friends are trampling through the shade!

Then came of every race the mingled swarm;
Far rang the groves, and gleam'd the midnight grass,
With flambeau, javelin, and naked arm;

As warriors wheel'd their culverins of brass,
Sprung from the woods, a bold athletic mass,
Whom virtue fires, and liberty combines :
And first the wild Moravian yargers pass,
His plumed host the dark Iberian joins-
And Scotia's sword beneath the Highland thistle shines.

And in, the buskin'd hunters of the deer,

To Albert's home, with shout and cymbal throng
Rous'd by their warlike pomp, and mirth, and cheer,
Old Outalissi woke his battle song,

And, beating with his war-club cadence strong,
Tells how his steep stung indignation smarts,
Of them that wrapt his house in flames, ere long,
To whet a dagger on their stony hearts,
And smile aveng'd ere yet his eagle spirit parts.

Calm, opposite the Christian father rose.
Pale on his venerable brow its rays
Of martyr light the conflagration throws;
One hand upon his lovely child he lays,
And one th' uncover'd crowd to silence sways;
While, though the battle flash is factor driv’n

DEATH OF GERTRUDE AND THE LAMENT OF OUTALISSI.

HUSH'D were his Gertrude's lips! but still their bland And beautiful expression seem'd to melt

With love that could not die! and still his hand
She presses to the heart no more that felt.
Ah heart! where once each fond affection dwelt,
And features yet that spoke a soul more fair.
Mute, gazing, agonizing as he knelt,—

Of them that stood encircling his despair,

He heard some friendly words;-but knew not what they were.

For now, to mourn their judge and child, arrives
A faithful band. With solemn rites between,
"T was sung, how they were lovely in their lives,
And in their deaths had not divided been.
Touch'd by the music, and the melting scene,
Was scarce one tearless eye amidst the crowd:-
Stern warriors, resting on their swords, were seen
To veil their eyes, as pass'd each much-lov'd shroud-
While woman's softer soul in woe dissolv'd aloud.

:

Then mournfully the parting bugle bid
Its farewell, o'er the grave of worth and truth;
Prone to the dust, afflicted Waldegrave hid
His face on earth;-him watch'd, in gloomy ruth,
His woodland guide: but words had none to soothe
The grief that knew not consolation's name:
Casting his Indian mantle o'er the youth,

He watch'd, beneath its folds, each burst that came
Convulsive, ague-like, across his shuddering frame!

“And I could weep;" th' Oneyda chief
His descant wildly thus begun;
“But that I ́may not stain with grief
The death-song of my father's son!
Or bow his head in woe;

For by my wrongs, and by my
To-morrow Areouski's breath,

wrath!

(That fires yon heav'n with storms of death),

Shall light us to the foe:

And we shall share, my Christian boy!

The foeman's blood, the avenger's joy!

"But thee, my flower, whose breath was given
By milder genii o'er the deep,

The spirits of the white man's heaven

Fórbid not thee to weep:

Nor will the Christian host,

Nor will thy father's spirit grieve

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