Didst vanish from my thought: entranced in prayer, I worshipped the Invisible alone,

Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody,

So sweet, we know not we are listening to it,

Thou, the meanwhile, wast blending with my thought,
Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy :
Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused,
Into the mighty vision passing-there

As in her natural form, swelled vast to Heaven!
Awake, my soul! not only passive praise
Thou owest! not alone these swelling tears,
Mute thanks and secret ecstasy! awake,
Voice of sweet song! awake, my heart, awake!
Green vales and icy cliffs all join my hymn.

Thou first and chief, sole sovran of the vale!
O struggling with the darkness all the night,
And visited all night by troops of stars,

Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink :
Companion of the morning-star at dawn,
Thyself earth's rosy star, and of the dawn
Co-herald wake, O wake, and utter praise.
Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in earth?
Who filled thy countenance with rosy light?
Who made thee parent of perpetual streams?

And you, ye five wild torrents, fiercely glad!
Who called you forth from night and utter death,
From dark and icy caverns called you forth,
Down those precipitous, black, jagged rocks,
For ever shattered, and the same for ever?
Who gave you your invulnerable life,

Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy,
Unceasing thunder, and eternal foam?

And who commanded (and the silence came),
"Here let the billows stiffen, and have rest?"

Ye ice-falls! ye that from the mountain's brow
Adown enormous ravines slope amain-
Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice,
And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge!
Motionless torrents! silent cataracts!

Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven
Beneath the keen full moon? Who bade the sun
Clothe you with rainbows? Who with living flowers
Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet?—
God! let the torrents, like a shout of nations,
Answer! and let the ice-plains echo, God!
God! sing, ye meadow-streams with gladsome voice!
Ye pine-groves, with your soft and soul-like sounds!
And they, too, have a voice, yon piles of snow,
And in their perilous fall shall thunder, God!

Ye living flowers, that skirt the eternal frost !
Ye wild goats, sporting round the eagle's nest!
Ye eagles, playmates of the mountain storm!
Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds !
Ye signs and wonders of the element !

Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise !

Thou too, hoar Mount! with thy sky-pointing peaks,
Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard,

Shoots downward, glittering through the pure serene
Into the depths of clouds that veil thy breast-
Thou, too, again, stupendous mountain! thou,
That as I raise my head, awhile bowed low
In adoration, upward from thy base
Slow-travelling with dim eyes suffused with tears,
Solemnly seemest, like a vapoury cloud,
To rise before me-rise, O ever rise,

Rise like a cloud of incense, from the earth!
Thou kingly spirit throned among the hills—-
Thou dread ambassador from earth to heaven-
Great Hierarch! tell thou the silent sky,
And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun,
Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God.

BRUCE'S ESCAPE IN LORN.-(Scott.)

WHAT spell was good King Robert's, say, to drive the weary night away? His was the patriot's burning thought, of Freedom's battle bravely fought, of castles stormed, of cities freed, of deep design and daring deed, of England's roses reft and torn, and Scotland's cross in triumph worn, of rout and rally, war and truce,— as heroes think, so thought the Bruce. No marvel, 'mid such musing high, sleep shunned the Monarch's thoughtful eye. Now over Coolin's eastern head the greyish light begins to spread, the otter to his cavern drew, and clamoured shrill the wakened mew; then watched the page-to needful rest the King resigned his anxious breast.

To Allan's eyes was harder task, the weary watch their safeties ask. He trimmed the fire, and gave to shine with bickering light the splintered pine; then gazed awhile, where silent laid their hosts were shroud

ed by the plaid. But little fear waked in his mind, for he was bred of martial kind, and, if to manhood he arrive, may match the boldest knight alive. Then thought he of his mother's tower, his little sisters' greenwood bower, how there the Easter-gambols pass, and of Dan Joseph's lengthened mass. But still, before his weary eye, in rays prolong'd, the blazes die ;— again he roused him-on the lake looked forth, where now the twilight flake of pale cold dawn began to wake. On Coolin's cliffs the mists lay'furled, the morning breeze the lake had curled, the short dark waves, heaved to the land, with ceaseless plash kissed cliff or sand ;—it was a slumbrous sound-he turned to tales at which his youth had burned, of pilgrim's path by demon crossed, of sprightly elf or yelling ghost, of the wild witch's baneful cot and mermaid's alabaster grot, who bathes her limbs in sunless well, deep in Strathaird's enchanted cell. Thither in fancy rapt he flies, and on his sight the vaults arise; that hut's dark walls he sees no more, his foot is on the marble floor, and o'er his head the dazzling spars gleam like a firmament of stars! Hark! hears he not the sea-nymph speak her anger in that thrilling shriek ?—No! all too late, with Allan's dream mingled the captive's warning scream. As from the ground he strives to start, a ruffian's dagger finds his heart! Upwards he casts his dizzy eyes, murmurs his master's name, and dies! Not so awoke the King! his hand snatched from the flame a knotted brand, the nearest weapon of his wrath; with this he crossed the murderer's path, and venged young Allan well! The spattered brain and bubbling blood hissed on the half-extinguished wood -the miscreant gasped and fell! Nor rose in peace the Island Lord; one caitiff died upon his sword, and one beneath his grasp lies prone, in mortal grapple overthrown. But while Lord Ronald's dagger drank

the life-blood from his panting flank, the Father-ruffian of the band behind him rears a coward hand!-O for a moment's aid, till Bruce, who deals no double blow, dash to the earth another foe, above his comrade laid! -And it is gained-the captive sprung on the raised arm and closely clung, and, ere he shook him loose, the mastered felon pressed the ground, and gasped beneath a mortal wound, while o'er him stands the Bruce. Then resting on his bloody blade, the valiant Bruce to Ronald said-" Now shame upon us both that boy lifts his mute face to heaven, and clasps his hands, to testify his gratitude to God on high, for strange deliverance given. His speechless gesture thanks hath paid, which our free tongues have left unsaid!" He raised the youth with kindly word, but marked him shudder at the sword: he cleansed it from its hue of death, and plunged the weapon in its sheath. Alas, poor child! unfitting part Fate doomed, when with so soft a heart, and form so slight as thine, she made thee first a pirate's slave, then, in his stead a patron gave of wayward lot like mine-A landless prince, whose wandering life is but one scene of blood and strife; yet scant of friends the Bruce shall be, but he'll find resting-place for thee.-Come, noble Ronald! o'er the dead enough thy generous grief is paid, and well has 'Allan's fate been wroke; come wend we hence, the day has broke.

HORATIUS. (Lord Macaulay.)

By kind permission of Messrs. Longmans, Green, & Co.
LARS PORSENA of Clusium by the Nine Gods he swore
That the great house of Tarquin should suffer wrong no more.
By the Nine Gods he swore it, and named a trysting day,
And bade his messengers ride forth,

East and west and south and north,

To summon his array.

Shame on the false Etruscan who lingers in his home,
When Porsena of Clusium is on the march for Rome.

The Fathers of the City, they sat all night and day,

For every hour some horsman came with tidings of dismay.
"Their van will be upon us before the bridge goes down:

And if they once may win the bridge, what hope to save the town?"
Then out spake brave Horatius, the Captain of the Gate:
"To every man upon this earth death cometh soon or late.
And how can man die better than facing fearful odds,

For the ashes of his fathers, and the temples of his Gods?
"Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul, with all the speed ye may;

I, with two more to help me, will hold the foe in play.

In yon straight path a thousand may well be stopped by three,
Now who will stand on either hand, and keep the bridge with me?"
Then out spake Spurius Lartius, a Ramnian proud was he

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Lo, I will stand at thy right hand, and keep the bridge with thee." And out spake strong Herminius: of Titian blood was he;

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"I will abide on thy left side, and keep the bridge with thee." "Horatius," quoth the Consul, as thou sayest, so let it be :" And straight against that great array forth went the dauntless Three. The Three stood calm and silent, and looked upon the foes, And a great shout of laughter from all the vanguard rose ; And forth three chiefs came spurring before that great array,

To earth they sprang, their swords they drew, and lifted high their shields,

And flew to win the narrow way.

But all Etruria's noblest felt their hearts sink to see

On the earth the bloody corpses, in the path the dauntless Three.
But meanwhile axe and lever have manfully been plied:

And now the bridge hangs tottering above the boiling tide.

"Come back, come back, Horatius!" loud cried the Fathers all,
"Back, Lartius! back, Herminius! back, ere the ruin fall!"
Back darted Spurius Lartius; Herminius darted back;

And, as they passed, beneath their feet, they felt the timbers crack :
But with a crash like thunder fell every loosened beam,
And, like a dam, the mighty wreck lay right athwart the stream:
And a long shout of triumph rose from the walls of Rome,
As to the highest turret-tops was splashed the yellow foam.
Alone stood brave Horatius-but constant still in mind-
Thrice thirty thousand foes before, and the broad flood behind.
"Down with him!" cried false Sextus, with a smile on his pale face.
"Now yield thee!" cried Lars Porsena, now yield thee to our

grace.

Round turned he-as not deigning those craven ranks to see;
Nought spake he to Lars Porsena, to Sextus nought spake he;
But he saw on Palatinus the white porch of his home;
And he spake to the noble river that rolls by the towers of Rome.
"Oh, Tiber! father Tiber! to whom the Romans pray,
A Roman's life, a Roman's arms, take thou in charge this day!"
So he spake, and speaking sheathed the good sword by his side,
And with his harness on his back, plunged headlong in the tide.