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WALTER VON DER VOGEL
WEID.1

VOGELWEID the Minnesinger,
When he left this world of ours,
Laid his body in the cloister,
Under Würtzburg's minster tow.

ers.

And he gave the monks his treasures, Gave them all with this behest : They should feed the birds at noontide

Daily on his place of rest;

Saying, "From these wandering minstrels

I have learned the art of song ;
Let me now repay the lessons
They have taught so well and
long." "1

Thus the bard of love departed;
And, fulfilling his desire,
On his tomb the birds were feasted
By the children of the choir.

Day by day, o'er tower and turret,
In foul weather and in fair,
Day by day, in vaster numbers,
Flocked the poets of the air.

On the tree whose heavy branches
Overshadowed all the place,
On the pavement, on the tombstone,
On the poet's sculptured face.

On the cross-bars of each window,
On the lintel of each door,

They renewed the War of Wartburg,

Which the bard had fought before.

There they sang their merry carols, Sang their lauds on every side; And the name their voices uttered Was the name of Vogelweid.

1 Walter von der Vogelweid. Walter von der Vogelweid, or Bird-Meadow, was one of the principal Minnesingers of the thirteenth century. He triumphed over Heinrich von Ofterdingen in that poetic contest at Wartburg Castle, Known in literary history as the War of Wartourg.

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The horologe of Eternity
Sayeth this incessantly,-
"Forever-never!
Never-forever!"

For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,
It fell to earth, I knew not where ;
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?

THE ARROW AND THE SONG. Long, long afterward, in an oak

I SHOT an arrow into the air,

It fell to earth, I knew not where ;

I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend,

SONNETS.

THE EVENING STAR.
Lo! in the painted oriel of the West,
Whose panes the sunken sun in-
carnadines,

Like a fair lady at her casement,
shines

The evening star, the star of love and rest!

And then anon she doth herself

divest

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Thou standest, like imperial Charlemagne,1

Upon thy bridge of gold; thy royal hand

Outstretched with

o'er the land,

benedictions

Of all her radiant garments, and Blessing the farms through all thy

reclines

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vast domain.

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hanging eaves;

Thy steps are by the farmer's prayers attended;

Like flames upon an altar shine the sheaves;

And, following thee, in thy ovation splendid,

Thine almoner, the wind, scatters

the golden leaves !

1 Like imperial Charlemagne. Charlemagne may be called by pre-eminence the monarch of farmers. According to the German tradition, in seasons of great abundance, his spirit crosses the Rhine on a golden bridge at Bingen, and blesses the cornfields and the vineyards. During his lifetime he did not disdain, says Moutesquieu, "to sell the eggs from the farmyards of his domains and the superfluous vegetables of his gardens; while he distributed among his people the wealth of the Lombards and the immense treasures of the Huns."

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