Meanwhile, without, the surly cannon waited,
The sun rose bright o'erhead;
Nothing in Nature's aspect intimated
That a great man was dead.

HAUNTED HOUSES.

ALL houses wherein men have lived and died
Are haunted houses. Through the open doors
The harmless phantoms on their errands glide,
With feet that make no sound upon the floors.
We meet them at the door-way, on the stair,
Along the passages they come and go,
Impalpable impressions on the air,

A sense of something moving to and fro.

There are more guests at table, than the hosts
Invited; the illuminated hall

Is thronged with quiet, inoffensive ghosts,
As silent as the pictures on the wall.

The stranger at my fireside cannot see

The forms I see, nor hear the sounds I hear; He but perceives what is; while unto me

All that has been is visible and clear.

We have no title-deeds to house or lands;
Owners and occupants of earlier dates
From graves forgotten stretch their dusty hands,
And hold in mortmain still their old estates.

The spirit-world around this world of sense
Floats like an atmosphere, and everywhere
Wafts through these earthly mists and vapours dense
A vital breath of more ethereal air.

Our little lives are kept in equipoise
By opposite attractions and desires;
The struggle of the instinct that enjoys,
And the more noble instinct that aspires.
These perturbations, this perpetual jar
Of earthly wants and aspirations high,
Come from the influence of an unseen star,
An undiscovered planet in our sky.

And as the moon from some dark gate of cloud
Throws o'er the sea a floating bridge of light,
Across whose trembling planks our fancies crowd
Into the realm of mystery and night,-

So from the world of spirits there descends
A bridge of light, connecting it with this,
O'er whose unsteady floor, that sways and bends,
Wander our thoughts above the dark abyss.

IN THE CHURCHYARD AT CAMBRIDGE.

IN the village churchyard she lies,

Dust is in her beautiful eyes,

No more she breathes, nor feels, nor stirs; At her feet and at her head

Lies a slave to attend the dead,

But their dust is white as hers.

Was she a lady of high degree,
So much in love with the vanity

And foolish pomp of this world of ours?
Or was it Christian charity,

And lowliness and humility,

The richest and rarest of all dowers?

Who shall tell us? No one speaks;
No colour shoots into those cheeks,
Either of anger or of pride,

At the rude question we have asked;
Nor will the mystery be unmasked

By those who are sleeping at her side
Hereafter?-And do you think to look
On the terrible pages of that Book

To find her failings, faults, and errors?
Ah, you will then have other cares,
In your own short-comings and despairs,
In your own secret sins and terrors!

THE EMPEROR'S BIRD'S NEST.

ONCE the Emperor Charles of Spain,
With his swarthy, grave commanders,
I forget in what campaign,

Long besieged, in mud and rain,

Some old frontier town of Flanders.

Up and down the dreary camp,

In great boots of Spanish leather,

Striding with a measured tramp,

These Hidalgos, dull and damp,

Cursed the Frenchmen, cursed the weather.

Thus as to and fro they went,

Over upland and through hollow,

Giving their impatience vent,
Perched upon the Emperor's tent,

In her nest, they spied a swallow.

Yes, it was a swallow's nest,

Built of clay and hair of horses, Mane, or tale, or dragoon's crest, Found on hedge-rows east and west, After skirmish of the forces.

Then an old Hidalgo said,

As he twirled his gray mustachio,
"Sure this swallow overhead

Thinks the Emperor's tent a shed,
And the Emperor but a Macho!"77

Hearing his imperial name

Coupled with those words of malice,
Half in anger, half in shame,
Forth the great campaigner came
Slowly from his canvass palace.
"Let no hand the bird molest,"
Said he solemnly, "nor hurt her!"
Adding then, by way of jest,
"Golondrina is my guest,

"Tis the wife of some deserter!"

Swift as bowstring speeds a shaft,

Through the camp was spread the rumour, And the soldiers, as they quaffed

Flemish beer at dinner, laughed

At the Emperor's pleasant humour.

So unharmed and unafraid

Sat the swallow still and brooded,
Till the constant cannonade

Through the wails a breach had made,
And the siege was thus concluded,

Then the army, elsewhere bent,
Struck its tents as if disbanding,

Only not the Emperor's tent,
For he ordered, ere he went,
Very curtly," Leave it standing!"

So it stood there all alone,

Loosely flapping, torn and tattered,
Till the brood was fledged and flown,

Singing o'er those walls of stone

Which the cannon-shot had shattered.

THE TWO ANGELS.

Two angels, one of Life and one of Death,
Passed o'er our village as the morning broke;

The dawn was on their faces and beneath,

The sombre houses hearsed with plumes of smoke.

Their attitude and aspect were the same,

Alike their featnres and their robes of white:

But one was crowned with amaranth, as with flame, And one with asphodels, like flakes of light.

I saw them pause on their celestial way;

Then said I, with deep fear and doubt oppressed, "Beat not so loud, my heart, lest thou betray The place where thy beloved are at rest!" And he who wore the crown of asphodels, Descending, at my door began to knock, And my soul sank within me, as in wells The waters sink before an earthquake's shock. I recognised the nameless agony,

The terror and the tremor and the pain, That oft before had filled or haunted me,

And now returned with threefold strength again.

The door I opened to my heavenly guest,

And listened, for I thought I heard God's voice;
And, knowing whatsoe'er He sent was best,
Dared neither to lament nor to rejoice.

Then with a smile, that filled the house with light,
"My errand is not Death, but Life," he said;
And ere I answered, passing out of sight,
On his celestial embassy he sped.

'Twas at thy door, O friend! and not at mine,
The angel with the amaranthine wreath,
Pausing, descended, and with voice divine,
Whispered a word that had a sound like Death.

Then fell upon the house a sudden gloom,
A shadow on those features fair and thin;
And softly, from that hushed and darkened room,
Two angels issued, where but one went in.
All is of God! If He but wave His hand,
The mists collect, the rain falls thick and loud,
Till, with a smile of light on sea and land,
Lo! He looks back from the departing cloud.

Angels of Life and Death alike are His;
Without His leave they pass no threshold o'er;
Who, then, would wish or dare, believing this,
Against His messengers to shut the door?

DAYLIGHT AND MOONLIGHT.

IN broad daylight, and at noon,
Yesterday I saw the moon
Sailing high, but faint and white,
As a school-boy's paper kite,

In broad daylight, yesterday,
I read a Poet's mystic lay;
And it seemed to me at most
As a phantom, or a ghost.

But at length the feverish day
Like a passion died away,
And the night, serene and still,
Fell on the village, vale, and hill.

Then the moon in all her pride,
Like a spirit glorified,

Filled and overflowed the night
With revelations of her light.

And the Poet's song again

Passed like music through my brain;
Night interpreted to me

All its grace and mystery,

THE JEWISH CEMETERY AT NEWPORT.

How strange it seems! These Hebrews in their graves, Close by the street of this fair seaport town,

Silent beside the never-silent waves,

At rest in all this moving up and down!

The trees are white with dust, that o'er their sleep
Wave their broad curtains in the south-wind's breath
While underneath such leafy tents they keep
The long, mysterious Exodus of Death.

And these sepulchral stones, so old and brown,
That pave with level flags their burial-place,
Seem like the tablets of the Law, thrown down
And broken by Moses at the mountain's base.
The very names recorded here are strange,
Of foreign accent, and of different climes;
Alvares and Rivera interchange

With Abraham and Jacob of old times.

"Blessed be God! for He created Death!"

The mourners said, "and Death is rest and peace;" Then added, in the certainty of faith,

"And giveth Life that never more shall cease."

Closed are the portals of their Synagogue,
No Psalms of David now the silence break,
No Rabbi reads the ancient Decalogue,
In the grand dialect the Prophets spake.

Gone are the living, but the dead remain,
And not neglected; for a hand unseen,
Scattering its bounty, like a summer rain,

Still keeps their graves and their remembrance green.

How came they here? What burst of Christian hate
What persecution, merciless and blind,

Drove o'er the sea-that desert desolate-
These Ishmaels and Hagars of mankind?