Thirteen hundred and seventy-six :' And the better in memory to fix The place of the children's last retreat, They called it, the Pied Piper's streetWhere any one playing on pipe or tabor, Was sure for the future to lose his labour. Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern

To shock with mirth a street so solemn ; But opposite the place of the cavern

They wrote the story on a column,
And on the great church window painted
The same, to make the world acquainted
How their children were stolen away;
And there it stands to this very day.
And I must not omit to say

That in Transylvania there's a tribe
Of alien people that ascribe

The outlandish ways and dress,

On which their neighbours lay such stress,

To their fathers and mothers having risen
Out of some subterraneous prison,
Into which they were trepanned
Long time ago in a mighty band

Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land,
But how or why they don't understand.

XV.

So, Willy, let you and me be wipers

Of scores out with all men-especially pipers:

And, whether they pipe us free from rats or from mice,

If we've promised them aught, let us keep our promise.

A Parting Scene (1526 A.D.).

PARACELSUS and FESTUS.

Par. And you saw Luther?

Fest. 'Tis a wondrous soul!

Par. True: the so-heavy chain which galled mankind

Is shattered, and the noblest of us all

Must bow to the deliverer-nay the worker

Of our own project-we who long before

Had burst our trammels, but forgot the crowd,

We would have taught, still groaned beneath the load :

This he has done and nobly. Speed that may!
Whatever be my chance or my mischance,
What benefits mankind must glad me too:
And men seem made, though not as I believed,
For something better than the times display:
Witness these gangs of peasants your new lights
From Suabia have possessed, whom Münzer leads,
And whom the Duke, the Landgrave, and the Elector
Will calm in blood! Well, well-'tis not my world!
Fest. Hark!

Par. 'Tis the melancholy wind astir

Within the trees; the embers too are gray;

Morn must be near.

Fest. Best ope the casement. See,

The night, late strewn with clouds and flying stars,
Is blank and motionless : how peaceful sleep
The tree-tops all together! like an asp
The wind slips whispering from bough to bough.
Par. Ay; you would gaze on a wind-shaken tree
By the hour, nor count time lost.

Fest. So you shall gaze.

Those happy times will come again.

Par. Gone! gone!

Those pleasant times! Does not the moaning wind

Seem to bewail that we have gained such gains

And bartered sleep for them?

Fest. It is our trust

That there is yet another world, to mend

All error and mischance.

82

Par. Another world!

And why this world, this common world, to be
A make-shift, a mere foil, how fair soever,
To some fine life to come? Man must be fed
With angels' food, forsooth; and some few traces
Of a diviner nature which look out
Through his corporeal baseness, warrant him
In a supreme contempt for all provision
For his inferior tastes-some straggling marks
Which constitute his essence, just as truly
As here and there a gem would constitute
The rock, their barren bed, a diamond.
But were it so-were man all mind-he gains
A station little enviable. From God

Down to the lowest spirit ministrant,
Intelligence exists which casts our mind
Into immeasurable shade. No, no:

Love, hope, fear, faith-these make humanity,
These are its sign, and note, and character;

And these I have lost!-gone, shut from me for

ever,

Like a dead friend, safe from unkindness more !—
See morn at length. The heavy darkness seems
Diluted; gray and clear without the stars;

The shrubs bestir and rouse themselves, as if
Some snake, that weighed them down all night, let
go

His hold; and from the east, fuller and fuller,
Day, like a mighty river, is flowing in;

But clouded, wintry, desolate, and cold:
Yet see

how that broad, prickly, star-shaped plant,

Half down the crevice, spreads its woolly leaves
All thick and glistering with diamond dew.—
And you depart for Einsiedeln to-day,
And we have spent all night in talk like this!
If you would have me better for your love,
Revert no more to these sad themes.

From My Last Duchess.

That's my last Duchess painted on the wall,
Looking as if she were alive. I call

That piece a wonder, now: Frà Pandolf's hands
Worked busily a day, and there she stands.
Will 't please you sit and look at her? I said
'Frà Pandolf' by design, for never read
Strangers like you that pictured countenance,
The depth and passion of its earnest glance,
But to myself they turned (since none puts by
The curtain I have drawn for you but I),
And seemed as they would ask me, if they durst,
How such a glance came there; so, not the first
Are you to turn and ask thus. Sir, 'twas not
Her husband's presence only, called that spot
Of joy into the Duchess' cheek: perhaps
Frà Pandolf chanced to say, 'Her mantle laps
Over my lady's wrist too much,' or, 'Paint
Must never hope to reproduce the faint
Half flush that dies along her throat;' such stuff
Was courtesy, she thought, and cause enough
For calling up that spot of joy. She had
A heart-how shall I say?-too soon made glad,
Too easily impressed; she liked whate'er
She looked on, and her looks went everywhere.
Sir, 'twas all one! My favour at her breast,
The dropping of the daylight in the west,
The bough of cherries some officious fool
Broke in the orchard for her, the white mule
She rode with round the terrace-all and each
Would draw from her alike the approving speech,
Or blush, at least. She thanked men-good; but
thanked

Somehow I know not how-as if she ranked
My gift of a nine hundred years old name
With anybody's gift. Who'd stoop to blame
This sort of trifling?

465

COVENTRY PATMORE-EDWARD ROBERT, LORD LYTTON.

The delineation of married love and the domestic affections has been attempted by MR COVENTRY PATMORE, who has deservedly gained reputation from the sweetness and quiet beauty of his verse. His first work was a volume of Poems, 1844. This was republished with large additions in 1853, under the title of Tamerton Church Tower, and other Poems. He then produced his most important work, The Angel in the House, in four parts-The Betrothal, 1854; The Espousal, 1856; Faithful for Ever, 1860; and The Victories of Love, 1862. Mr Patmore has also edited a volume of poetical selections, The Children's Garland, from the Best Poets, 1862. The Angel in the House contains passages of great beauty, both in sentiment and description. Mr Ruskin has eulogised it as 'a most finished piece of writing.' Its occasional felicities of expression are seen in verses like these:

A girl of fullest heart she was;
Her spirit's lovely flame
Nor dazzled nor surprised, because
It always burned the same.
And in the maiden path she trod

Fair was the wife foreshewn-
A Mary in the house of God,
A Martha in her own.

And in this simile:

Her soft voice, singularly heard

Beside me, in the Psalms, withstood
The roar of voices, like a bird

Sole warbling in a windy wood.

The Joyful Wisdom.

Would Wisdom for herself be wooed,
And wake the foolish from his dream,
She must be glad as well as good,

And must not only be, but seem.
Beauty and joy are hers by right;

And, knowing this, I wonder less
That she's so scorned, when falsely dight
In misery and ugliness.

What's that which Heaven to man endears,
And that which eyes no sooner see
Than the heart says, with floods of tears,
Ah! that's the thing which I would be?'
Not childhood, full of fears and fret ;

Not youth, impatient to disown
Those visions high, which to forget

Were worse than never to have known. Not these; but souls found here and there, Oases in our waste of sin,

When everything is well and fair,
And God remits his discipline,
Whose sweet subdual of the world
The worldling scarce can recognise;
And ridicule, against it hurled,

Drops with a broken sting and dies.
They live by law, not like the fool,

But like the bard who freely sings In strictest bonds of rhyme and rule, And finds in them not bonds, but wings.

And one more minute's mine! You know
I've paid my girl a father's debt,
And this last charge is all I owe.

She's yours; but I love more than yet
You can; such fondness only wakes
When time has raised the heart above
The prejudice of youth, which makes
Beauty conditional to love.
Prepare to meet the weak alarms
Of novel nearness; recollect
The eye which magnifies her charms
Is microscopic for defect.

Fear comes at first ; but soon, rejoiced,

You'll find your strong and tender loves Like holy rocks by Druids poised,

The least force shakes, but none removes. . . . Her strength is your esteem; beware

of finding fault; her will 's unnerved
By blame; from you 'twould be despair;
But praise that is not quite deserved
Will all her noble nature move

To make your utmost wishes true:
Yet think, while mending thus your love,
Of matching her ideal too!
The death of nuptial joy is sloth:

To keep your mistress in your wife,
Keep to the very height your oath,

And honour her with arduous life.'

Mr Patmore was born at Woodford in Essex, July 2, 1823, son of Mr P. G. Patmore (1786– 1855), author of Personal Recollections of Deceased Celebrities, &c. In 1846 Mr Coventry Patmore was appointed one of the assistant-librarians of the British Museum, but retired from the office about 1868.

EDWARD ROBERT, LORD LYTTON, under the name of 'Owen Meredith,' has published two volumes of poetry-Clytemmestra, 1855, and The Wanderer, 1859. There are traces of sentimentalism and morbid feeling in the poems, but also fine fancy and graceful musical language. The poet is the only son of the first Lord Lytton, and was born November 8, 1831. The paternal taste in the selection of subjects from high life, with a certain voluptuous colouring, and a pseudo-melancholy, cynical air, has been reproduced in 'Owen Meredith,' though Tennyson was perhaps the favourite model. The young poet, however, had original merit enough to redeem such faults. He continued to write, and produced in succession Lucile, a novel in verse, 1860; Serbski Pesme, a translation of the national songs of Servia; The Ring of Amasis, a prose romance, 1863; Chronicles and Characters, two volumes of poems, chiefly historical, to which Mr Lytton prefixed his own name; Orval, or the Fool of Time, a dramatic poem, &c. For about twenty years Lord Lytton was engaged in the diplomatic service abroad, and in 1876 was appointed Governorgeneral or Viceroy of India. In 1874 the noble poet published two volumes of Fables in verse.

The Chess-board.

My little love, do you remember,

Ere we were grown so sadly wise, Those evenings in the bleak December, Curtained warm from the snowy weather, When you and I played chess together, Checkmated by each other's eyes? Ah! still I see your soft white hand Hovering warm o'er queen and knight;

Brave pawns in valiant battle stand; The double castles guard the wings; The bishop, bent on distant things,

Moves sidling through the fight.
Our fingers touch, our glances meet
And falter, falls your golden hair
Against my cheek; your bosom sweet
Is heaving; down the field, your queen
Rides slow her soldiery all between,

And checks me unaware.

Ah me! the little battle's done,
Dispersed is all its chivalry.

Full many a move, since then, have we
'Mid life's perplexing checkers made,
And many a game with fortune played―
What is it we have won?

This, this, at least-if this alone-
That never, never, never more,
As in those old still nights of yore-
Ere we were grown so sadly wise—
Can you and I shut out the skies,
Shut out the world and wintry weather,

And eyes exchanging warmth with eyes, Play chess as then we played together!

Changes.

Whom first we love, you know, we seldom wed.
Time rules us all. And life, indeed, is not
The thing we planned it out ere hope was dead.
And then, we women cannot choose our lot.
Much must be borne which it is hard to bear :
Much given away which it were sweet to keep.
God help us all! who need, indeed, His care,
And yet, I know, the Shepherd loves his sheep.

My little boy begins to babble now

Upon my knee his earliest infant prayer. He has his father's eager eyes, I know;

And, they say too, his mother's sunny hair.
But when he sleeps and smiles upon my knee,
And I can feel his light breath come and go,
I think of one-Heaven help and pity me!-
Who loved me, and whom I loved, long ago.

Who might have been-ah, what I dare not think!
We all are changed. God judges for us best.
God help us do our duty, and not shrink,
And trust in Heaven humbly for the rest.

He sleeps he sleeps, serene, and safe
From tempest and from billow,
Where storms that high above him chafe
Scarce rock his peaceful pillow.

The sea and him in death

They did not dare to sever;

It was his home when he had breath, 'Tis now his home for ever.

Sleep on-sleep on, thou mighty dead!

A glorious tomb they 've found thee; The broad blue sky above thee spread, The boundless ocean round thee.

No vulgar foot treads here,

No hand profane shall move thee, But gallant hearts shall proudly steer, And warriors shout above thee.

And though no stone may tell

Thy name, thy worth, thy glory, They rest in hearts that love thee well, And they grace Britannia's story.

Hymn-Abide with Me!'

Abide with me! fast falls the eventide ;
The darkness thickens: Lord, with me abide !
When other helpers fail, and comforts flee,
Help of the helpless, O abide with me!
Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day;
Earth's joys grow dim, its glories pass away;
Change and decay in all around I see;
O Thou who changest not, abide with me!
Not a brief glance I beg, a passing word,
But as Thou dwell'st with thy disciples, Lord-
Familiar, condescending, patient, free—
Come, not to sojourn, but abide with me!

Come, not in terrors, as the King of kings,
But kind and good, with healing on thy wings,
Tears for all woes, a heart for every plea :
Come, Friend of sinners, thus abide with me!

I need Thy presence every passing hour:
What but Thy grace can foil the tempter's power?
Who like Thyself my guide and stay can be?
Through clouds and sunshine, O abide with me!

I fear no foe, with Thee at hand to bless ;
Ills have no weight, and tears no bitterness:
Where is death's sting? where, grave, thy victory?

I triumph still, if Thou abide with me!
Reveal Thyself before my closing eyes,
Shine through the gloom, and point me to the skies:
Heaven's morning breaks, and earth's vain shadows
flee;

In life, in death, O Lord, abide with me!

CHARLES KENT (born in London in 1823) has published Dreamland, with other Poems, 1862; and a collective edition of his Poems was issued in 1870. Mr Kent has also written several prose tales and essays.

Love's Calendar.

Talk of love in vernal hours, When the landscape blushes With the dawning glow of flowers,

While the early thrushes

Warble in the apple-tree;

When the primrose springing

From the green bank, lulls the bee,
On its blossom swinging.

Talk of love in summer-tide
When through bosky shallows

Trills the streamlet-all its side

Pranked with freckled mallows; When in mossy lair of wrens Tiny eggs are warming; When above the reedy fens Dragon-gnats are swarming. Talk of love in autumn days, When the fruit, all mellow, Drops amid the ripening rays, While the leaflets yellow Circle in the sluggish breeze

With their portents bitter; When between the fading trees Broader sunbeams glitter. Talk of love in winter time,

When the hailstorm hurtles, While the robin sparks of rime Shakes from hardy myrtles, Never speak of love with scorn, Such were direst treason; Love was made for eve and morn, And for every season.

LYDIA HUNTLEY SIGOURNEY.

One of the best and most prolific of the American poetesses was MRS L. H. SIGOURNEY, born in Norwich, Connecticut, in 1791; died at Hartford in 1865. Maria Edgeworth and a host of critics have borne testimony to the poetic genius and moral influence of this accomplished woman.

The Early Blue-bird.

Blue-bird! on yon leafless tree,
Dost thou carol thus to me :
'Spring is coming! Spring is here!'
Say'st thou so, my birdie dear?
What is that, in misty shroud,
Stealing from the darkened cloud?
Lo! the snow-flakes' gathering mound
Settles o'er the whitened ground,
Yet thou singest, blithe and clear:
'Spring is coming! Spring is here!'
Strik'st thou not too bold a strain ?
Winds are piping o'er the plain;
Clouds are sweeping o'er the sky
With a black and threatening eye;
Urchins, by the frozen rill,
Wrap their mantles closer still;
Yon poor man, with doublet old,
Doth he shiver at the cold?
Hath he not a nose of blue?
Tell me, birdling, tell me true.

Spring's a maid of mirth and glee,
Rosy wreaths and revelry:
Hast thou wooed some winged love
To a nest in verdant grove?
Sung to her of greenwood bower,
Sunny skies that never lower?
Lured her with thy promise fair
Of a lot that knows no care?
Pr'ythee, bird, in coat of blue,
Though a lover, tell her true.

Ask her if, when storms are long,
She can sing a cheerful song?
When the rude winds rock the tree,
If she'll closer cling to thee?
Then the blasts that sweep the sky,
Unappalled shall pass thee by ;
Though thy curtained chamber shew
Siftings of untimely snow,

Warm and glad thy heart shall be; Love shall make it Spring for thee.

Midnight Thoughts at Sea.
Borne upon the ocean's foam,
Far from native land and home,
Midnight's curtain, dense with wrath,
Brooding o'er our venturous path,
While the mountain wave is rolling,
And the ship's bell faintly tolling:
Saviour! on the boisterous sea,
Bid us rest secure in Thee.

Blast and surge, conflicting hoarse,
Sweep us on with headlong force;
And the bark, which tempests surge,
Moans and trembles at their scourge:
Yet, should wildest tempests swell,
Be Thou near, and all is well.
Saviour! on the stormy sea,
Let us find repose in Thee.

Hearts there are with love that burn
When to us afar they turn ;
Eyes that shew the rushing tear
If our uttered names they hear :
Saviour! o'er the faithless main
Bring us to those homes again,
As the trembler, touched by Thee,
Safely trod the treacherous sea.

Wrecks are darkly spread below,
Where with lonely keel we go;
Gentle brows and bosoms brave
Those abysses richly pave:
If beneath the briny deep

We, with them, should coldly sleep,
Saviour! o'er the whelming sea,
Take our ransomed souls to Thee.

JOHN G. WHITTIER.

The Society of Friends, or Quakers, in America can boast of a poet who more than rivals their English representative, Bernard Barton. JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER, born near Haverhill, Massachusetts, in 1808, passed his early years on his father's farm; but after he came of age was chiefly engaged in literary pursuits. He edited several newspapers, and was an active opponent of negro slavery. He has published Legends of New England, in prose and verse, 1831 ; a volume of Ballads, 1838; The Stranger in Lowell (prose essays), 1845; Voices of Freedom, 1849; Songs of Labour, 1850; National Lyrics, 1865; Maud Müller, 1866; and various other poetical tales and sketches. There is a neat compact edition of his collected poetical works in two small volumes (the 'Merrimack Edition'), 1869. In 1873 he published The Pennsylvanian Pilgrim, and other Poems, which shewed that his fine vein of thought and melody was unimpaired.

The Robin.

My old Welsh neighbour over the way
Crept slowly out in the sun of spring,
Pushed from her ears the locks of gray,
And listened to hear the Robin sing.

Her grandson, playing at marbles, stopped,
And, cruel in sport as boys will be,
Tossed a stone at the bird, who hopped
From bough to bough in the apple-tree.

"Nay!' said the grandmother, 'have you not heard,

My poor, bad boy, of the fiery pit,

And how, drop by drop, this merciful bird

Carries the water that quenches it?

'He brings cool dew in his little bill,

And lets it fall on the souls of sin :

You can see the mark on his red breast still
Of fires that scorch as he drops it in.

'My poor Bron rhuddyn! my breast-burned bird,
Singing so sweetly from limb to limb,
Very dear to the heart of Our Lord

Is he who pities the lost like Him!'

'Amen!' I said to the beautiful myth;

Up from the meadows, rich with corn,
Clear from the cool September morn,
The clustered spires of Frederick stand,
Green-walled by the hills of Maryland.

Round about them orchards sweep,
Apple and peach tree fruited deep;
Fair as a garden of the Lord

To the eyes of the famished rebel horde.

On that pleasant morn of the early fall,
When Lee marched over the mountain wall,
Over the mountains winding down,
Horse and foot, into Frederick town,

Forty flags with their silver stars,
Forty flags with their silver bars,
Flapped in the morning wind: the sun
Of noon looked down and saw not one.

Up rose old Barbara Fritchie then,
Bowed with her fourscore years and ten,
Bravest of all in Frederick town,

She took up the flag the men hauled down;

In her attic window the staff she set,
To shew that one heart was loyal yet.
Up the street came the rebel tread,
Stonewall Jackson riding ahead;

Under his slouched hat, left and right,
He glanced; the old flag met his sight.
Halt!'-the dust-brown ranks stood fast;
'Fire!'-out blazed the rifle blast.

It shivered the window, pane and sash;
It rent the banner with seam and gash.
Quick, as it fell from the broken staff,
Dame Barbara snatched the silken scarf;

She leaned far out on the window sill,
And shook it forth with a royal will.
'Shoot, if you must, this old head,
gray
But spare your country's flag," she said."

A shade of sadness, a blush of shame,
Over the face of the leader came;
The noble nature within him stirred
To life, at that woman's deed and word.

'Who touches a hair of yon gray head,
Dies like a dog. March on!' he said.
All day long through Frederick street
Sounded the tread of marching feet;

All day long the free flag tossed
Over the heads of the rebel host;
Ever its torn folds rose and fell
On the loyal winds, that loved it well;

And through the hill-gaps sunset light
Shone over it with a warm good-night.
Barbara Fritchie's work is o'er,

And the rebel rides on his raid no more.

Honour to her and let a tear

Fall, for her sake, on Stonewall's bier!
Over Barbara Fritchie's grave,
Flag of Freedom and Union, wave!

Peace, and order, and beauty draw
Round thy symbol of light and law;
And ever the stars above look down
On thy stars below, in Frederick town!

ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH.

ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH (1819-1861) was the son of a merchant in Liverpool. He was one of the pupils of Dr Arnold of Rugby, to whom he was strongly attached; and having won the Balliol scholarship in 1836, he went to Oxford. The Tractarian movement was then agitating the university, and Clough was for a time under its influence. He ultimately abandoned the Romanising party; but his opinions were unsettled, and he never regained the full assurance of his early faith. In 1843 he was appointed tutor as well as Fellow of Oriel College, and laboured successfully for about five years, usually spending the long vacation among the Welsh mountains, the Cumberland lakes, or the Scotch Highlands. His most important poem, The Bothie of Tober-na-Vuolich (1848), which he terms a long-vacation pastoral, commemorates one of these holiday tours in the Highlands by the Oxford tutor and his pupils. It is written in hexameter verse, of which Southey had given a specimen in his Vision of Judgment, and contains a faithful picture of Highland scenes and character. Clough grafts a love-story on his descriptive sketch, and makes one of the reading-party marry a Highland maiden and migrate to New Zealand. In 1848, from conscientious motives, the poet resigned his tutorship, and also gave up his fellowship. Next year he accepted the appointment of Principal of University Hall, London, but held it only for two years, at the end of which he went to America, and settled (October 1852) at Cambridge, Massachusetts. He was drawn thence in less than a twelvemonth by the offer of an examinership in the Education Office, which he accepted; and to this was added, in 1856, the post of Secretary to a Commission for examining the scientific military schools on the continent. He took a warm interest in the philanthropic labours of Miss Nightingale; and thus his life, though uneventful, was, as his biographer remarks, 'full of work.' Ill health, however, compelled him to go abroad, and he died at Florence, November 13, 1861. Besides the Highland pastoral of The Bothie, Clough produced a second long poem, Amours de Voyage, the result of a holiday of travel in Italy, and of the impressions made upon him in Rome. His third long poem of Dipsychus was written in Venice in 1850, and is much superior to the Amours. Another work, Mari Magno, consists of a series of tales on love and marriage, supposed to be related to each other by a party of