UNDER THE PORTRAIT OF MILTON. The British oak with rooted grasp Her slender handful holds together; In earth's broad temple where we stand, Bright with the lines our Mother taught us; The glistening links of gilded fetters, Enough! To speed a parting friend With rays of light from eyes that glisten. Good by! once more, - and kindly tell peace the young world's story,— In words of And say, besides, we love too well Our mothers' soil, our fathers' glory! 277 OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. Under the Portrait of Milton. HREE Poets, in three distant ages born, THRE Greece, Italy, and England did adorn. JOHN DRYDEN. The Atlantic. How in Heaven's name did Columbus get over, Is a pure wonder to me, I protest, Cabot and Raleigh too, that well-read rover, How he should ever think Of this wild waste, Terra Firma should be, How a man ever should hope to get thither, E'en if he knew there was another side! To stick to the notion That in some nook or bend Of a sea without end, He should find North and South America, Was a pure madness, indeed I must say. What if wise men had, as far back as Ptolemy, Judged that the earth, like an orange, was round; None of them ever said, Come along, follow me, Many a day before Ever they'd come ashore, Sadder and wiser men, They'd have turned back again; And that he did not, and did cross the sea, Is a pure wonder, I must say, to me. ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH. LOVERS, AND A REFLECTION. 279 IN Lovers, and a Reflection. N moss-pranked dells which the sunbeams flatter (And heaven it knoweth what that may mean; Meaning, however, is no great matter), Where woods are a-tremble, with rifts atween ; Through God's own heather we wonned together, I need hardly remark it was glorious weather, Boats were curtseying, rising, bowing Through the rare red heather we danced together, By rises that flushed with their purple favors, Through becks that brattled o'er grasses sheen, We walked or waded, we two young shavers, Thanking our stars we were both so green. We journeyed in parallels, I and Willie, Song-birds darted about, some inky As coal, some snowy (I ween) as curds; Or rosy as pinks, or as roses pinky – They reck of no eerie To-come, those birds! But they skim over bents which the mill-stream washes, Or hang in the lift 'neath the white cloud's hem; They need no parasols, no goloshes; And good Mrs. Trimmer she feedeth them. Then we thrid God's cowslips (as erst his heather) And Willie 'gan sing — (oh, his notes were fluty; Bowers of flowers encountered showers In William's carol (O love my Willie !) A nest in a hollow, "with buds to follow," I think occurred next in his nimble strain; Mists, bones, the singer himself, love-stories, Oh, if billows and pillows and hours and flowers, Nor ever again trotted out - ay me! How much fewer volumes of verse there'd be! CHARLES STUART CALVERLEY. SATURDAY AFTERNOON. 281 I Saturday Afternoon. LOVE to look on a scene like this, And persuade myself that I am not old, And my locks are not yet gray; For it stirs the blood in an old man's heart, To catch the thrill of a happy voice, I have walked the world for fourscore years, That my heart is ripe for the reaper Death, It is very true it is very true I am old, and I “bide my time”; But my heart will leap at a scene like this, Play on! play on! I am with you there, And I whoop the smothered call, I am willing to die when my time shall come, And I shall be glad to go For the world, at best, is a weary place, And my pulse is getting low; But the grave is dark, and the heart will fail And it wiles my heart from its dreariness To see the young so gay. NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS. |