"THE NINETEENTH CENTURY."

45

Come back, come back; and whither and for what?

To finger idly some old Gordian knot,

Unskilled to sunder, and too weak to cleave,

And with much toil attain to half-believe.
Come back, come back.

Come back, come back!

Back flies the foam; the hoisted flag streams back; The long smoke wavers on the homeward track, Back fly with winds things which the winds obey, The strong ship follows its appointed way.

T

HOSE that of late had flitted far and fast

To touch all shores, now leaving to the skill
Of others their old craft seaworthy still,

Have chartered this; where, mindful of the past,
Our true co-mates regather round the mast;

Of diverse tongue, but with a common will
Here in this roaring moon of daffodil
And crocus, to put forth and brave the blast;
For some, descending from the sacred peak
Of hoar high-templed Faith, have leagued again
Their lot with ours to rove the world about ;
And some are wilder comrades, sworn to seek
If any golden harbour be for men

In seas of Death and sunless gulfs of Doubt.

Tennyson.

MOUNTAIN-TOP.

I

STAND on high,

Close to the sky,

Kissed by unsullied lips of light;

Fanned by soft airs

That seem like prayers

Floating to God through ether bright.

The emerald lands,

With love-clasped hands,

In smiling peace below outspread;

Around me rise

The amber skies,

A dome of glory o'er my head.

Wind-swept and bare

The fields of air

Give the weaned eagles room for play;

On mightier wing

My soul doth spring

To unseen summits far away.

C. G. Ames.

A DAY ON THE HILLS.

ADAY on the hills!-true king am

In my solitude public to earth and sky:

Fret inhales not this atmosphere;

Winged thoughts only can follow here :

47

SUNDAY ON THE HILL-TOP.

Folly and falsehood and babble stay
In the ground-smoke somewhere far away,
Let them greet and cheat

In the narrow street:

Who cares what all the newspapers say?

W. Allingham.

SUNDAY ON THE HILL-TOP.

NLY ten miles from the city,

ΟΝ

And how I am lifted away

To the peace that passeth knowing,
And the light that is not of day.

All alone on the hill-top,

Nothing but God and me!
And the springtime's resurrection,
Far shinings of the sea,

The river's laugh in the valley,
Hills dreaming of their past,
And all things silently opening,-
Opening into the Vast.

Eternities past and future

Seem clinging to all I see,
And things immortal cluster
Around my bended knee.

That pebble is older than Adam ;
Secrets it hath to tell :

These rocks—they cry out history,

Could I but listen well.

That pool knows the ocean-feeling
Of storm and moon-led tide;

The sun finds its east and west therein,
And the stars find room to glide.

That lichen's crinkled circle

Still creeps with the Life Divine, Where the Holy Spirit loitered

On its way to this face of mine,—

On its way to the shining faces
Where angel-lives are led,
Where I am the lichen's circle
That creeps with tiny tread.

I can hear these violets' chorus
To the sky's benediction above;
And we all are together lying

On the bosom of Infinite Love.

I, I am a part of the poem ;

Of its every sight and sound :
For my heart beats inward rhymings
To the Sabbath that lies around.

Oh the peace at the heart of Nature!
Oh the light that is not of day!
Why seek it afar forever,
When it cannot be lifted away?

W. C. Gannett.

A

NIRVANA.

LONG the scholar's glowing page

I read the Orient thinker's dream Of things that are not what they seem,Of mystic chant and Soma's rage.

The sunlight flooding all the room
To me again was Indra's smile,
And on the hearth the blazing pile
For Agni's sake did fret and fume.

Yet most I read of who aspire

To win Nirvana's deep repose, Of that long way the Spirit goes To reach the absence of desire.

But through the music of my book
Another music smote my ear-
A tinkle silver-sweet and clear-
The babble of the mountain-brook.

"Oh! leave," it said, “your ancient seers; Come out into the woods with me; Behold an older mystery

Than Buddhist's hope or Brahman's fears!”

The voice so sweet I could but hear;

I sallied forth, with staff in hand,
While, mile on mile, the mountain-land
Was radiant with the dying year.