"Long looked she on the pictured face,

Which from my neck I took and gave;
Long looked she ere a word was spoke,
And then she slowly silence hroke,
The hatchet is not buried yet;
The tomahawk with blood is wet;

And the great chief is in his grave! "Yet for the father Onas' sake

For their sakes who no blood have shed; We will not by his sons be blamed For taking life which they have claimed ;The red man can avenge his dead!'

"So saying, with her broken heart

She went forth to the council-stone; And when the captive was brought out, 'Mid savage war-cry, taunt and shout, She stepp'd into the fierce array,

As the bereaved Indian may,

And claim'd the victim for her own.

"He was restored. What need of more
To tell the joy that thence ensued!
But sickness followed long and sore,
And he for a twelvemonth or more,

With our good, peaceful friends abode.

"But we, two plighted hearts, were wed;
A merry marriage ye may wis; —
And guess ye me a happy life-
In England here, an honoured wife,-
Sweet friends, ye have not guess'd amiss!

"But never more let it be said,

The red man is of nature base;
Nor let the crimes that have been taught,
Be by the crafty teachers brought

As blame against the Indian race!"

THE DOOMED KING.

THE voice of an archangel spake-
"A dark one draweth near,
Covered with guilt as with a robe; —
Wherefore doth he appear?"
And another answered solemnly -
"He comes for judgment here!"

Through myriad, myriad shapes of bliss,
On went the Spectre King,
And stood before the judgment-seat,
A guilty, trembling thing!

"I was an earthly king last night,"

With a hollow voice he spoke; "I drank the wine, I sank to sleepOh! how have I awoke!

"Back through the past my soul is urged;
Back through each guilty stain;
And every thought, and word, and deed,
Unperished lives again!

"For, as a leaf before the storm

Is bowed and borne away,
Some mighty power compelleth me,

And it must have its way;

Though every word condemn my soul,
I dare not disobey!

"I see a white, low village-home;
I see a woman there;

And a little child kneels at her knee,
And murmurs out its prayer.

"It is the first-born of her love-
Fairest, and most caressed;
Heaven only has a second place
Within that woman's breast.
"Mother, dear mother! by thy love,

Thy sorrowings, and thy truth,
Plead for me in my hour of need!

Think on my sinless youth!

Ah, no! thou canst not plead for me!
A dark and fearful time

Hath parted us, and death hath oped
The mystery of my crime!

"I made thy nights a weary watch;
I gloomed thy days with shame;

And a dark word by which men are cursed, I made my father's name!

"I was the eldest of our house;

Beside me there were three;
And pure and simple had they lived,
Had it not been for me!

But now their blood unto my soul
Doth cleave like leprosy!

"I stood as in a father's place,

As the sun before their sight, Beloved of all; and in their eyes Whate'er I did was right.

"Alas! my heart was a cursed thing! I lured them on to sin,

I lured them to a dark abyss,

And plunged them headlong in! "Bodies and souls I ruined them;

Yet in men's sight I kept

My name unstained -on their's alone
The infamy was heaped.

"They were my tools, and subtly
I wrought them to my will;
A tyrant to the wretched slaves
I bound to me for all!

"No, no! for me thou canst not plead!
I spoke not for the three;
And in thy broken-heartedness,
I kept them far from thee,
With cruel, specious lies' - no, no,
Thou canst not plead for me!

"And, in my after misery,

When evil days came down,
He saved me; and my coward life
He ransomed with his own!
"Brothers! why rise ye not, each one,
Upon this judgment-day;

The bitter wrongs I heaped on you,
Had power my soul to slay!

"The third, a spirit like to mine;
The nearest to my heart;
The only one I counselled with,-
Who in my power had part:

"He sate with me at the board last night,
He took from me the wine;
Traitor, there's blood upon thy hand,

And judgment will be thine!

"Ah, no! the guilt is mine- is mine!
I drew the three from Heaven;

I sold them to work wickedness,
And may not be forgiven!

"Talents and time

the noblest gifts

Ever on man bestowed,

Were mine; a soft and winning speech, And beauty like a god!

All, all were passion's vilest slaves; — All ministered to crime;

And now a dark eternity

Doth make account with time.

"I had a power, an awful power
Over men's minds; I wove,
Base as I was, around all hearts
A chain, half fear, half love.

"They were as clay; I moulded them

With the light words of my tongue; Old men and wise alike obeyed: And thence ambition sprung.

"The sin of angels was my sin;

And, bold as was my thought, Men, weak and willing instruments, They gave me what I sought:

On weak humanity.

"Rapine and outrage, and despair,

Over the land spread wide;
And what was wrung from poverty
My luxury supplied.

"The little that the poor man had,

In vain he guarded well; Mine eye was as the basilisk's, That withered where it fell. "My sceptre was an iron rod!

The suffering people's groan, Like sullen thunders heard afar, Was echoed to the throne:

"To me it was a mockery!

I scoffed at wise men's lore;
And to the madness of my power
I gave myself still more.

"Of seven dark and deadly sins,
Like plague-spots on the past
Of seven dark and deadly sins,
I must recount the last :-

"There was a maid -a fair young thingHigh-born, and undefiled

By thought of sin; so meek, so wise;
In heart so like a child!

"In the beauty of her innocence,
She had no earthly fear:
The blackness of my evil heart
I masked when she was near.

"With subtle mockery of good,
Her pure soul did I win ;
And fervent, lying vows I paid,
Ere she was lured to sin.

"I brought destruction on her house
The blameless and the brave!
And its grey-headed sire went down
Dishonoured to the grave.

"This was the triumph of my art;

This gave her to my power; Poor slave to passion's tyranny,The idol of an hour!

"Vain was her passionate despair,

My callous heart to wring;

I left her to her misery

And I and my companions saw,

Amid our shameless mirth,

A small train of poor men, who bore
Some child of clay to earth.
“A thought of mad impiety

Rushed through my drunken brain;
I seized the foremost by the arm,
And stopped the funeral train.
"Let's look upon the dead! I cried;
No answering word they said;
But gazed on me upbraidingly,
And then unveiled the dead!

"The dead! yes, on the dead I looked! Oh! sight of woe to me!

The one I drew as down from heaven,
And cast to infamy!

"Not in her beauty was she laid,
As for the high-born meet;
The coarsest garb of poverty
Was her poor winding-sheet!

"The drunken frenzy of my brain Was gone and through my soul A wild, remorseful agony,

Like a fierce weapon stole!

"From that night, life became a pang:
A dark, upbraiding sprite
Seemed ever nigh, for that one sin
Reproaching day and night.

"The gnawing sense of evil done,
Was as a desert beast
Above its prey - my living soul
Its unconsumed feast!

"I plunged into yet madder guilt,
To hush the ceaseless cry;

I matched my strength against remorse,
And sinned more recklessly!

"Vain, vain! through war, through civil strife;
Kept with me in each place,
The broken-hearted wretchedness
Of that dead woman's face!
"So, doomed to hopeless misery,
I loathed the light of day;

I loathed the sight of human eye,
And gave the passion way!

"It grew a cruel moodiness;
The tyrant's jealous sense,
To which the joy of other hearts
Becomes a black offence.

"Thus I was hated, feared, and shunned;

And hatred filled my mind

For all my race; and long I lived

Visions of beauty, green and cool -
The water-lily's shadowy pool;

The untrodden wood's sequestered shine,
Where hides the lustrous columbine,
And leaves astir for ever make
A breezy freshness through the brake.

I think of some old country hall,
With carved porch, and chimneys tall,
And pleasant windows many a one,
Set deep into the old, grey stone,
Hid among trees so large and green,
"T is only dimly to be seen.

I think of its dusk garden-bowers,
Its little plots of curious flowers,
Its casements wreathed with jessamine,
Flung wide to let all odours in,

And all sweet sounds of bird and bee,
And the cool fountain's melody.

I think of mountains still and grey,
Stretching in summer light away,
Where the blue, cloudless skies repose
Above the solitude of snows;

Of gleaming lakes, whose waters lie
In restless beauty sparklingly;
Of little island-nooks of rest

Where the grave heron makes her nest;
And wild cascades with hurrying roar,
Like the sweet tumult of Lodore-
Lodore! - that name recalls to me
Visions of stern sublimity,

And pastoral vales, and lonely rills,
And shepherd people on the hills,-
And more,-old names of men unknown
Save on their mouldering church-yard stone,
Or to some mountain-chronicler

Who talketh of the days that were ;-
For, in gone years, they of my race
Had, 'mong the hills, their dwelling-place,
In an old mansion that doth stand

As in the heart of fairy land.
Then mountains, lakes, and glorious skies
Lived in their children's memories,
There tended they, in evening hours,
Their garden's antiquated flowers,
And, on the Skiddaw mountain grey
They gambolled through the sunny day,-
Blest summer revellers! and did float
On Keswick Lake their little boat!-

Let Mammon's sons with visage lean,
Restless and vigilant, and keen,
Whose thought is but to buy and sell,
In the hot, toiling city dwell;
Give me to walk on mountains bare,
Give me to breathe the open air,
To hear the village-children's mirth,
To see the beauty of the earth-
In wood and wild, by lake and sea
To dwell with foot and spirit free

DU GUESCLIN'S RANSOM.

THE black Prince Edward sate at meat
Amid his chivalrie,

Two hundred knights at the board were set,
And the rosy wine ran free:

They were mailed men in merry cheer,

And the Prince sate on the dais,

And his laugh was loudest through the hall,
Upon that day of grace:

And some they told the jester's tale,
And some they gaily sang,

Till the hall of old Valenciennes

To the dusky rafters rang;
But 'mid the mirth and 'mid the wine
There sate an aged knight,
And heavy thoughts within his soul
Had dimmed his spirits light;
Quoth Edward, "By my faith, this man
Doth mar our heartsome cheer!

Sir knight, do battle with thy woe,

Or stay no longer here.'

"My liege." said he, "my soul is dark
With pondering on the wrong,
Done to the bravest man of France,

Within a dungeon strong,
Where night and day he pineth sore
To hear the small birds' song,
And all afar through Christendom
Thou'rt blamed for his thrall,
Even by the knights at thy right hand,
And the fair dames in the hall!"
"He shall be free!" Prince Edward said,
"No longer on a name,

So fair and far renowned as mine

Shall rest unknightly shame!
Go fetch him from his dungeon deep,
Myself will do him right."
Eftsoons into that banquet room

Was brought the prisoned knight.
Quoth Edward, "Thou'rt a noble knight,
Name now thy ransom fee,
How small soe'er, by my good sword,
Thy ransom it shall be!"
Du Guesclin in his prison garb

Stood proudly in the ring,

And named such ransom as would free
From thrall a captive king;
Prince Edward's brow grew darkly red;
"Sir Knight, I say thee nay;
Such ransom as thou nam'st, by Heaven,
No Christian knight could pay!
Three paces stepped Du Guesclin on,
And haughtier grew his brow,
Quoth he, "Is knighthood thus esteemed
By such a man as thou!
The kings of France and fair Castile

The sum would not gainsay,
And if I lacked elsewhere the gold,
My ransom they would pay;