Of storm deep-grasping scarcely spent 'Twixt continent and continent.

Such quiet souls have never known

Thy truer inspiration, thou

Who lov'st to feel upon thy brow Spray from the plunging vessel thrown Grazing the tusked lee shore, the cliff

That o'er the abrupt gorge holds its breath, Where the frail hair-breadth of an if

Is all that sunders life and death:

These, too, are cared-for, and round these
Bends her mild crook thy sister Peace;
These in unvexed dependence lie,

Each 'neath his strip of household sky; O'er these clouds wander, and the blue Hangs motionless the whole day through; Stars rise for them, and moons grow large

And lessen in such tranquil wise

As joys and sorrows do that rise

Within their nature's sheltered marge;

Their hours into each other flit

Like the leaf-shadows of the vine

And fig-tree under which they sit,

And their still lives to heaven incline

With an unconscious habitude,

Unhistoried as smokes that rise

From happy hearths and sight elude
In kindred blue of morning skies.

Wayward when once we feel thy lack,
"T is worse than vain to woo thee back!
Yet there is one who seems to be
Thine elder sister, in whose eyes
A faint far northern light will rise

Sometimes, and bring a dream of thee;
She is not that for which youth hoped,
But she hath blessings all her own,
Thoughts pure as lilies newly oped,
And faith to sorrow given alone;
Almost I deem that it is thou

Come back with graver matron brow,

With deepened eyes and bated breath,

Like one that somewhere hath met Death.

But "No," she answers, "I am she

Whom the gods love, Tranquillity;
That other whom you seek forlorn
Half earthly was; but I am born
Of the immortals, and our race

Wear still some sadness on our face:

He wins me late, but keeps me long, Who, dowered with every gift of passion, In that fierce flame can forge and fashion Of sin and self the anchor strong; Can thence compel the driving force Of daily life's mechanic course,

Nor less the nobler energies

Of needful toil and culture wise;

Whose soul is worth the tempter's lure
Who can renounce, and yet endure,
To him I come, not lightly wooed,
But won by silent fortitude."

W

VILLA FRANCA.

1859.

AIT a little: do we not wait?

Louis Napoleon is not Fate,

Francis Joseph is not Time;

There's One hath swifter feet than Crime; Cannon-parliaments settle naught;

Venice is Austria's, whose is Thought?

-

Minié is good, but, spite of change,
Gutenberg's gun has the longest range.
Spin, spin, Clotho, spin!

Lachesis, twist! and Atropos, sever!
In the shadow, year out, year in,

The silent headsman waits forever.

Wait, we say our years are long;
Men are weak, but Man is strong;
Since the stars first curved their rings,
We have looked on many things;

Great wars come and great wars go,
Wolf-tracks light on polar snow;
We shall see him come and gone,

This second-hand Napoleon.

Spin, spin, Clotho, spin!

Lachesis, twist! and Atropos, sever!
In the shadow, year out, year in,
The silent headsman waits forever.

We saw the elder Corsican,

And Clotho muttered as she span,

While crowned lackeys bore the train,

Of the pinchbeck Charlemagne :

་

Sister, stint not length of thread!

Sister, stay the scissors dread!

On Saint Helen's granite bleak,

Hark, the vulture whets his beak!"
Spin, spin, Clotho, spin!

Lachesis, twist! and Atropos, sever!
In the shadow, year out, year in,
The silent headsman waits forever.