There will be a cry of wonder When the veil is rent asunder, And a shout among the reapers In the New Time rolling on. Shot and steel and iron rain To the steady tramp of time; And the green world, never waiting For the loving or the hating, Swings sublime, Until souls that look for morning Lo, the heavy night is gone, And the stone is rolled away. From the sepulcher at dawn,— To a risen Lord we pray, That the glory of Mount Tabor May transform the sons of labor With its ray, And the tender heart and lowly That made Palestine so holy, Aye shall beat within the bosom Of the New Time rolling on. PAINTING A POET. "KNOW thou, my recluse, the one ideal face He fancies his queen rose of roses unveiled In the blush of a cheek, and straightway is impaled On the thorns of a vixen-the thought makes me shiver Like a hand floating up from a dark flowing river: In his dreaming he climbs some Delectable hill, And the world is before him to choose where he will; There are forms for all orders the dealer may take, There are glances that dawn like a sunny daybreak, And eyes deep as stars in a still mountain lake. There are gifts for all winnings, the grave and the gay, There are faces that glow like the rose of Cathay, And tenement faces with souls moved away! ZADEL BARNES GUSTAFSON. RS. GUSTAFSON, in her girlhood, was a MR Successful contributor of prose and poetry to journals of the first class, like the Springfield Republican (for which she wrote, besides poems and short stories, critical musical and literary notes), the Home Journal and the Independent. She did, also, a great deal of unsigned writing, editorially and otherwise. But it was in 1871 that she first became widely known through "The Voice of Christmas Past,"'-a tribute to Dickens, the first written after his death,-published in Harper's Magazine. It was in every way characteristic of the young author-of a poetic strain so compelling that her prose seemed to sing; of intense dramatic power-grouping all the characters of Dickens' novels into a world where each took its place and part as in some great orchestra led by a master's hand; and of a most wonderful and intelligent sympathy. This piece and "Where is the Child?" published two years later in the same magazine, were a complete showing of the shadows of modern social life and of the waste in that life of its most precious and vital forces. The note here struck was the key to Mrs. Gustafson's best work in her subsequent pieces published in Harper's, such as "The Bard of Abbottsford," a centenary tribute to Scott, "The Children's Night," and "Little Martin Craghan," a poem copied nearly as widely as Bret Harte's 'Heathen Chinee." In 1878 a volume of Mrs. Gustafson's poems was published, taking its title from "Meg: a Pastoral," the leading poem. It was a book of poems calling forth especially the love and admiration of poets. Whittier warmly praised the whole volume, and said of "Meg," the opening poem: "It is as sweet and melodious as the songs of the thrushes and song-sparrows in spring. But the elegy on Bryant! I can only compare it with Milton's 'Lycidas;' it is worthy of any living poet at least." Bryant, who had seen the poem "Flower of May," before its publication in book form, said it was "the most exquisite dress that flower had ever worn in the English language." The late Edwin P. Whipple wrote to the author that he had read the whole volume at a sitting, and especially praised "On the Sands" and "The Prisoner," as ranking with the best English verse. He, like others, alluded to the broad, healthful inspiration of the volume, so unlike the morbid, complaining and self-absorbed tone of most American poetry. The poet Longfellow congratulated the author, saying that the book placed her beyond doubt in the foremost ranks of the younger poets. About the same time also appeared her novel "Can the Old Love?" a strikingly original book, both in subject and treatment, of a fine analytical quality, and marked by great dramatic and poetic power. "Maria del Occidente," in Harper's Magazine for January, 1879, was a tribute to a then almost forgotten American author, Maria Gowan Brooks, whose poem, “Zophiel, or the Bride of Seven," had made a profound impression upon Mrs. Gustafson's mind in childhood. She edited this poem, “Zophiel,” and caused it to be published in 1879. It was a labor of love, involving for its thorough completion a long and varied correspondence with Mrs. Brooks' American relatives, and with her English friends the Southeys and Coleridges. Those who have read Mrs. Gustafson's short stories find in them the same delicate quality of imagination and the same freshness of spirit that characterize her poetry. "Laquelle" has a quiet charm; it is a bright, sprite-like creation of the uncertain twilight, subtle, attractive, surprising. "Karin," a Swedish sketch, is so full of action and deep feeling that Longfellow advised the author to dramatize it. Mrs. Gustafson's residence in London, 1880-1889, brought her into delightful personal relations with the most remarkable men and women, not only of England, but of other countries-London being the great rendezvous of the world's choice spirits during some part of every year. Charles Reade, and the eccentric but brilliant R. H. Horne, were her special friends, as were also the late Philip Bourke Marston, the blind poet, and his poet friend, H. E. Clarke. Her breadth of mind and the liberality of her spirit are illustrated by the range of her varied personal associations, including eminent representatives in every field of social life, from the primate of England to the greatest exponent of Nihilism. What Mrs. Gustafson and her husband, Axel Gustafson, saw in London of the horrors of intemperance, stirred in their hearts the impulse to a crusade against drink. The result was “The Foundation of Death: a Study of the Drink Question," written by them both, and pronounced by the ablest thinkers in all countries to be the most complete and effective and the best considered work ever published on that subject. Its sales in England and in South Africa, India, the far East and Australia, have been unprecedented for a work of this character. She is now in the very prime of intellectual vigor, and her more practical life of recent years has enriched and ripened the genius shown in her earlier work. Mrs. Gustafson was born in Middletown, Conn., March 9, 1841, but resides mostly in London. L. H. D. ZLOBANE. AS SWAYETH in the summer wind The white shield of the husband, Who hath twice need of life, The black shield of the young chief, Who hath not yet a wife. Unrecking harm, the British lay, While close on front and either flank Then burst their wild and frightful cry Upon the British ears, With whir of bullets, glare of shields, And flash of Zulu spears. They gathered as a cloud, swift rolled, Uprose the British; in the shock Reeled but an instant; then, Shoulder to shoulder, faced the foe, And met their doom like men. But one was there whose heart was torn He had the soldier's steady nerve, Yet now, half turning from the fray, Not for himself. His little son, Scarce thirteen summers born, With hair that shone upon his brows Like tassels of the corn, And lips yet curled in that sweet pout Shaped by the mother's breast, Stood by his side, and silently To his brave father pressed. The horse stood nigh; the father kissed But she was not there: in her window That was but yesterday, and it seems- We were not shamed by the seeing sky,- And before the kiss, if I uttered words, We did not feel the sacred moments pass; MORNING. 'Tis early morning, and receding night In splendor glows the fragrant rose of June; Of her lord's coming; and to his grand brow And beaming eye she yields well pleased her charms Of dew and song, and breath of balmy blooms, DOLLS. On shelyes and in crevices of the wall,- Dolls that are paupers and dolls that are rich,— -A Ditly of Dolldom. |