The composer smiled as he only could smile, benevolently, indulgently, kingly. "Listen!" he said, and he played the opening bars of the symphony in F.

A cry of delight and recognition burst from them both, and exclaiming, "Then you are Beethoven!" they covered his hands with tears and kisses.

He rose to go, but we held him back with entreaties. "Play to us once more-only once more!"

He suffered himself to be led back to the instrument. The moon shone brightly in through the window and lit up his glorious rugged head and massive figure. "I will improvise a sonata to the moonlight!" looking up thoughtfully to the sky and stars-then his hands dropped on the keys, and he began playing a sad and infinitely lovely movement, which crept gently over the instrument like the calm flow of moonlight over the dark earth. This was followed by a wild, elfin passage in triple time-a sort of grotesque interlude, like the dance of sprites upon the sward. Then came a swift agitato finale—a breathless, hurrying, trembling movement, descriptive of flight, and uncertainty, and vague impulsive terror, which carried us away on its rustling wings, and left us all emotion and wonder.

66

Farewell to you," said Beethoven, pushing back his chair, and turning towards the door; "farewell to you."

"You will come again?" asked they in one breath.

He paused, and looked compassionately, almost tenderly, at the face of the blind girl. "Yes, yes," he said, hurriedly, “I will come again, and give the fraulien some lessons. Farewell! I will soon come again!"

They followed us in silence more eloquent than words, and stood at their door till we were out of sight and hearing.

"Let us make haste back," said Beethoven, "that I may write out that sonata while I can yet remember it!" We did so, and he sat over it till long past day-dawn. And this was the origin of that Moonlight Sonata with which we are all so fondly r quainted.

LXXVIII.

MAUD MULLER.

JOHN G. WHITTIER.

Maud Muller on a summer's day,
Raked the meadow sweet with hay.

Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth
Of simple beauty and rustic health.

Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee
The mock-bird echoed from his tree.

But, when she glanced to the far-off town,
White from its hill-slope looking down,

The sweet song died, and a vague unrest
And a nameless longing filled her breast-
A wish, that she hardly dared to own,
For something better than she had known.

The Judge rode slowly down the lane,
Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane.

He drew his bridle in the shade

Of the apple-trees, to greet the maid,

And ask a draught from the spring that flowed
Through the meadow, across the road.

She stooped where the cool spring bubbled up,
And filled for him her small tin cup,

And blushed as she gave it, looking down
On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown.

"Thanks!" said the Judge, "a sweeter draught
From a fairer hand was never quaffed."

He spoke of the grass and flowers and trees,
Of the singing birds and the humming bees;

Then talked of the haying, and wondered whether
The cloud in the west would bring foul weather.

And Maud forgot her brier-torn gown,
And her graceful ankles bare and brown,

And listened, while a pleased surprise
Looked from her long-lashed hazel eyes.

At last, like one who for delay

Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away.

Maud Muller looked and sighed: "Ah, me!
That I the Judge's bride might be !

'He would dress me up in silks so fine
And praise and toast me at his wine.

"My father should wear a broadcloth coat; My brother should sail a painted boat. "I'd dress my mother so grand and gay, And the baby should have a new toy each day;

"And I'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor. And all should bless me who left our door."

The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill And saw Maud Muller standing still.

"A form more fair, a face more sweet, Ne'er has it been my lot to meet.

"And her modest answer and graceful air. Show her wise and good as she is fair.

"Would she were mine, and I to-day, Like her, a harvester of hay.

"No doubtful balance of rights and wrongs, Nor weary lawyers with endless tongues,

"But low of cattle, and song of birds, And health, and quiet, and loving words."

But he thought of his sisters proud and cold,
And his mother vain of her rank and gold.

So, closing his heart, the Judge rode on,
And Maud was left in the field alone.

But the lawyers smiled that afternoon,
When he hummed in court an old love-tune;
And the young girl mused beside the well,
Till the rain on the unraked clover fell.

He wedded a wife of richest dower,
Who lived for fashion, as he for power.

Yet oft, in his marble hearth's bright glow,
He watched a picture come and go;

"Free as when I rode that day,

Where the barefoot maiden raked her hay."

She wedded a man unlearned and poor,
And many children played round her door.
But care and sorrow, and childbirth pain,
Left their traces on heart and brain.

And oft, when the summer sun shone hot
On the new-mown hay in the meadow lot,
And she heard the little spring brook fall
Over the roadside, through the wall,

In the shade of the apple-tree again
She saw a rider draw his rein.

And, gazing down with timid grace,
She felt his pleased eyes read her face.

Sometimes her narrow kitchen walls
Stretched away into stately halls,

The weary wheel to a spinnet turned,
The tallow candle an astral burned,

And for him who sat by the chimney lug,
Dozing and grumbling o'er pipe and mug,

A manly form at her side she saw,

And joy was duty and love was law.

Then she took up her burden of life again,
Saying only "It might have been."

Alas for maiden, alas for Judge,
For rich repiner and household drudge.

God pity them both! and pity us all,
Who vainly the dreams of youth recall,

For of all sad words of tongue or pen,

The saddest are these: "It might have been !"

Ah, well! for us all some sweet hope lies

Deeply buried from human eyes;

And, in the hereafter, angels may

Roll the stone from its grave away!

LXXIX.

ORATOR PUFF.

THOMAS MOORE.

1. Mr. Orator Puff had two tones in his voice,
The one speaking thus, and the other down so;
In each sentence he utter'd he gave you your choice;
For one half was B alt, and the rest G below.
Oh! Oh! Orator Puff,

One voice for an orator's surely enough.

2. But he still talk'ḍ away, spite of coughs and of frowns, So distracting all ears with his ups and his downs,

That a wag once, on hearing the orator say,

"My voice is for war," ask'd him,

Oh! Oh! Orator Puff,

"Which of them pray?"

One voice for an orator's surely enough.

3. Reeling homeward one evening, top-heavy with gin, And rehearsing his speech on the weight of the crown, He tripp'd near a saw-pit, and tumbled right in; "Sinking-fund" the last words, as his noddle came down. Oh! Oh! Orator Puff,

One voice for an orator's surely enough.

4. "Ho! help!" he exclaim'd, in his he and she tones;

Help me out! help me out! I have broken my bones!"

"Help you out!" said a Paddy, who pass'd; "what a bother! Why, there's two of you there; can't you help one another?" Oh! Oh! Orator Puff,

One voice for an orator's surely enough.