And the fluttering scallop behind would float, But he bailed her out with his colen-bell, And he kept her trimmed with a wary tread, While on every side like lightning fell The heavy strokes of his bootle-blade. Onward still he held his way, Till he came where the column of moonshine lay The brown-backed sturgeon slowly swim: But he sculled with all his might and main, To catch the drop in its crimson cup. With sweeping tail and quivering fin, He plunged him in the deep again, The rainbow of the moony main. A moment, and its lustre fell; Joy to thee, Fay! thy task is done, And haste away to the elfin shore. BRONX. I SAT me down upon a green bank-side, Like parting friends who linger while they sever; Enforced to go, yet seeming still unready, Backward they wind their way in many a wistful eddy. Gray o'er my head the yellow-vested willow Or the fine frostwork which young winter freezes; When first his power in infant pastime trying, Congeals sad autumn's tears on the dead branches lying. From rocks around hung the loose ivy dangling, The humbird shook his sun-touch'd wings around, There were dark cedars with loose mossy tresses, White powdered dog-trees, and stiff hollies flauntGaudy as rustics in their May-day dresses, [ing Blue pelloret from purple leaves upslanting A modest gaze, like eyes of a young maiden Shining beneath dropp'd lids the evening of her wedding. The breeze fresh springing from the lips of morn, Kissing the leaves, and sighing so to lose 'em, The winding of the merry locust's horn, [som: The glad spring gushing from the rock's bare boSweet sights, sweet sounds, all sights, all sounds ex celling, [ing. Oh! 'twas a ravishing spot formed for a poet's dwell And did I leave thy loveliness, to stand Again in the dull world of earthly blindness? Pained with the pressure of unfriendly hands, Sick of smooth looks, agued with icy kindness? Left I for this thy shades, where none intrude, To prison wandering thought and mar sweet solitude? Yet I will look upon thy face again, My own romantic Bronx, and it will be A face more pleasant than the face of men. Thy waves are old companions, I shall see A well-remembered form in each old tree, And hear a voice long loved in thy wild minstrelsy. WILLIAM LEGGETT. A SACRED MELODY. IF yon bright stars which gem the night Where kindred spirits reunite, Whom death has torn asunder here; How sweet it were at once to die, And leave this blighted orb afar— But oh! how dark, how drear, how lone It cannot be! each hope and fear That lights the eye or clouds the brow, Than this bleak world that holds us now! When heaviest weighs life's galling chain; 'Tis heaven that whispers, “Dry thy tears: The pure in heart shall meet again!" JOHN G. C. BRAINARD. THE FALL OF NIAGARA. Labitur et labetur. THE thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain And spoke in that loud voice, which seem'd to him And notch His cent'ries in the eternal rocks. Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we, In his short life, to thy unceasing roar! 66 MR. MERRY'S LAMENT FOR LONG TOM." "Let us think of them that sleep, By thy wild and stormy steep, THY cruise is over now, Thou art anchor'd by the shore, And never more shalt thou Hear the storm around thee roar; Death has shaken out the sands of thy glass. The sea-grass round thy bier Shall bend beneath the tide, Where thy manly limbs abide; But the granite rock thy tombstone shall be. |