But thou no more shalt haunt the beach,
Nor sit upon the tall cliff's crown,
Nor go the round of all that reach,
Nor feebly sit thee down,
Watching the swaying weeds:-another day,
And thou❜lt have gone far hence that dreadful way.
The third and last Appearance of the Spectre Horse and the
Burning Ship.-RICHARD H. DANA.
TO-NIGHT the charmed number's told.
"Twice have I come for thee," it said.
and none shall thee behold.
Come! live one, to the dead!"
So hears his soul, and fears the coming night;
Yet sick and weary of the soft, calm light.
Again he sits within that room;
All day he leans at that still board;
None to bring comfort to his gloom,
Or speak a friendly word.
Weakened with fear, lone, haunted by remorse,
Poor, shattered wretch, there waits he that pale horse.
Not long he'll wait.-Where now are gone
Peak, citadel, and tower, that stood
Beautiful, while the west sun shone
And bathed them in his flood
Of airy glory?-Sudden darkness fell;
And down they sank, peak, tower, and citadel.
The darkness, like a dome of stone,
Ceils up the heavens.-'Tis hush as death-
All but the ocean's dull, low moan.
How hard Lee draws his breath!
He shudders as he feels the working Power.
Arouse thee, Lee! up; man thee for thine hour!—
'Tis close at hand; for there, once more,
The burning ship. Wide sheets of flame
And shafted fire she showed before;
Twice thus she hither came ;-
But now she rolls a naked hulk, and throws
A wasting light; then, settling, down she goes.
And where she sank, up slowly came
The Spectre-Horse from out the sea.
And there he stands! His pale sides flame.
He'll meet thee shortly, Lee.
He treads the waters as a solid floor:
Lee waits him at the door.
They've met." I know thou com'st for me,"
Lee's spirit to the spectre said—
"I know that I must go with thee-
Take me not to the dead.
It was not I alone that did the deed!"
Dreadful the eye of that still, spectral steed!
Lee cannot turn. There is a force
In that fixed eye, which holds him fast.
How still they stand!-that man and horse.
"Thine hour is almost past."
"O, spare me,
," cries the wretch," thou fearful one!”—
66 My time is full-I must not go alone."
"I'm weak and faint. O, let me stay!"
—“ Nay, murderer, rest nor stay for thee!"
The horse and man are on their way;
He bears him to the sea.
Hark! how the spectre breathes through this still night! See! from his nostrils streams a deathly light!
He's on the beach; but stops not there.
He's on the sea!-Lee, quit the horse!
Lee struggles hard.-'Tis mad despair!-
'Tis vain! The spirit-corse
Holds him by fearful spell;-he cannot leap.
Within that horrid light he rides the deep.
It lights the sea around their track-
The curling comb, and dark steel wave:
There, yet, sits Lee the spectre's back-
Gone! gone! and none to save!
They're seen no more; the night has shut them in.
May Heaven have pity on thee, man of sin!
The earth has washed away its stain.
The sealed up sky is breaking forth,
Mustering its glorious hosts again
From the far south and north.
The climbing moon plays on the rippling sea.-
O, whither on its waters rideth Lee?
God's first Temples. A Hymn.—BRYANT.
THE groves were God's first temples. Ere man learned To hew the shaft, and lay the architrave,
And spread the roof above them,-ere he framed
The lofty vault, to gather and roll back
The sound of anthems,-in the darkling wood,
Amidst the cool and silence, he knelt down
And offered to the Mightiest, solemn thanks
And supplication. For his simple heart
Might not resist the sacred influences,
That, from the stilly twilight of the place,
And from the gray old trunks, that, high in heaven,
Mingled their mossy boughs, and from the sound
Of the invisible breath that swayed at once
All their green tops, stole over him, and bowed
His spirit with the thought of boundless Power
And inaccessible Majesty. Ah, why
Should we, in the world's riper years, neglect
God's ancient sanctuaries, and adore
Only among the crowd, and under roofs
That our frail hands have raised! Let me, at least,
Here, in the shadow of this aged wood,
Offer one hymn-thrice happy, if it find
Hath reared these venerable columns; thou
Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down
Upon the naked earth, and, forthwith, rose
All these fair ranks of trees. They, in thy sun,
Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze,
And shot towards heaven. The century-living crow,
Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died
Among their branches, till at last they stood,
As now they stand, massy, and tall, and dark,
Fit shrine for humble worshipper to hold
Communion with his Maker. Here are seen
No traces of man's pomp or pride ;—
Rustle, no jewels shine, nor envious eyes
Encounter; no fantastic carvings show
The boast of our vain race to change the form
Of thy fair works. But thou art here-thou fill'st
The solitude. Thou art in the soft winds
That run along the summits of these trees
In music ;-thou art in the cooler breath,
That, from the inmost darkness of the place,
Comes, scarcely felt ;-the barky trunks, the ground, The fresh, moist ground, are all instinct with thee. Here is continual worship;-nature, here,
In the tranquillity that thou dost love,
Enjoys thy presence. Noiselessly, around,
From perch to perch, the solitary bird
Passes; and yon clear spring, that, 'midst its herbs, Wells softly forth, and visits the strong roots
Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale
Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left
Thyself without a witness, in these shades,
Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace,
Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak-
By whose immovable stem I stand, and seein
Almost annihilated-not a prince,
In all the proud old world beyond the deep,
E'er wore his crown as loftily as he
Wears the green coronal, of leaves with which
Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root
Is beauty, such as blooms not in the glare
Of the broad sun. That delicate forest flower,
With scented breath, and look so like a smile,
Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mould,
An emanation of the indwelling Life,
A visible token of the upholding Love,
That are the soul of this wide universe.
My heart is awed within me, when I think
Of the great miracle that still goes on,
In silence, round me-the perpetual work
Of thy creation, finished, yet renewed
Forever. Written on thy works, I read
The lesson of thy own eternity.
Lo! all grow old and die: but see, again,
How, on the faltering footsteps of decay,
Youth presses-ever gay and beautiful youth
In all its beautiful forms. These lofty trees
Wave not less proudly that their ancestors
Moulder beneath them. O, there is not lost
One of earth's charms: upon her bosom yet,
After the flight of untold centuries,
The freshness of her far beginning lies,
And yet shall lie. Life mocks the idle hate
Of his arch enemy Death-yea, seats himself
Upon the sepulchre, and blooms and smiles,
And of the triumphs of his ghastly foe
Makes his own nourishment. For he came forth
From thine own bosom, and shall have no end.
There have been holy men, who hid themselves Deep in the woody wilderness, and gave
Their lives to thought and prayer, till they outlived
The generation born with them, nor seemed
Less aged than the hoary trees and rocks
Around them;-and there have been holy men,
Who deemed it were not well to pass life thus.
But let me often to these solitudes
Retire, and, in thy presence, reassure
My feeble virtue. Here its enemies,
The passions, at thy plainer footsteps shrink,
And tremble, and are still. O God! when thou
Dost scare the world with tempests, set on fire
The heavens with falling thunderbolts, or fill,
With all the waters of the firmament,
The swift, dark whirlwind, that uproots the woods,
And drowns the villages; when, at thy call,
Uprises the great Deep, and throws himself
Upon the continent, and overwhelms
Its cities;-who forgets not, at the sight
Of these tremendous tokens of thy power,
His pride, and lays his strifes and follies by?
Oh, from these sterner aspects of thy face,
Spare me and mine; nor let us need the wrath
Of the mad, unchained elements to teach
Who rules them. Be it ours to meditate,
In these calm shades, thy milder majesty,
And, to the beautiful order of thy works,
Learn to conform the order of our lives.
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