And if thou bearest it he will hear it. Our child who was dead again is living! Forester. I did not tell you she was dead;

If you thought so 'twas no fault of mine; At this very moment, while I speak, They are sailing homeward down the Rhine,

In a splendid barge with golden prow, And decked with banners white and red As the colours on your daughter's cheek. They call her Lady Alicia now;

For the Prince in Salerno made a vow That Elsie only would he wed.

Ursula. Jesu Maria! what a change! All seems to me so weird and strange! Forester. I saw her standing on the deck,

Beneath an awning cool and shady.
Her cap of velvet could not hold
The tresses of her hair of gold,

That flowed and floated like the stream,
And fell in masses down her neck.
As fair and lovely did she seem
As in a story or a dream

Some beautiful and foreign lady.

And the Prince looked so grand and proud,

And waved his hand thus to the crowd That gazed and shouted from the shore, All down the river, long and loud.

Ursula. We shall behold our child

once more;

She is not dead! She is not dead!
God, listening, must have overheard
The prayers, that, without sound or
word,

Our hearts in secrecy have said!
Oh, bring me to her; for mine eyes
Are hungry to behold her face :
My very soul within me cries:
My very hands seem to caress her,
To see her, gaze at her, and bless her;
Dear Elsie, child of God and grace!

(Goes out toward the garden.) Forester. There goes the good woman out of her head;

And Gottlieb's supper is waiting here; A very capacious flagon of beer,

And the descending dark invests
The Niederwald, and all the nests
Among its hoar and haunted oaks.
Elsie. What bells are those, that ring
so slow,

So mellow, musical, and low?

Prince Henry. They are the bells of
Geisenheim,

That with their melancholy chime
Ring out the curfew of the sun.

Elsie. Listen, beloved.
Prince Henry.

They are done!
Dear Elsie! many years ago
Those same soft bells at eventide
Rang in the ears of Charlemagne,
As, seated by Fastrada's side
At Ingelheim, in all his pride,
He heard their sound with secret pain.
Elsie. Their voices only speak to me
Of peace and deep tranquillity,
And endless confidence in thee!
Prince Henry. Thou knowest the
story of her ring;

How, when the Court went back to Aix,
Fastrada died; and how the King
Sat watching by her night and day,
Till into one of the blue lakes,
Which water that delicious land,
They cast the ring, drawn from her
hand;

And the great monarch sat serene,
And sat beside the fated shore,
Nor left the land for evermore.

Elsie. That was true love.
Prince Henry.
For him the queen
Ne'er did what thou hast done for me.
Elsie. Wilt thou as fond and faithful
be?

Wilt thou so love me after death? Prince Henry. In life's delight, in death's dismay,

Beneath

In storm and sunshine, night and day,
In health, in sickness, in decay,
Here and hereafter, I am thine!
Thou hast Fastrada's ring.
The calm blue waters of thine eyes,
Deep in thy steadfast soul it lies,
And, undisturbed by this world's breath,
With magic light its jewels shine!
This golden ring, which thou hast worn
Upon thy finger since the morn,
Is but a symbol and a semblance,
An outward fashion, a remembrance
Of what thou wearest within unseen,
O my Fastrada! O my queen!
Behold! the hill-tops all aglow
With purple and with amethyst;
While the old valley deep below
Is filled, and seems to overflow,
With a fast-rising tide of mist.
The evening air grows damp and chill
Let us go in.

Elsie.

Ah, not so soon.
See yonder fire! It is the moon
Slow rising o'er the eastern hill.
It glimmers on the forest tips,
And through the dewy foliage drips
In little rivulets of light,

And makes the heart in love with night. Prince Henry. Oft on this terrace, when the day

Was closing, have 1 stood and gazed, And seen the landscape fade away,

And the white vapours rise and drown
Hamlet and vineyard, tower and town,
While far above the hill-tops blazed.
But then another hand than thine
Was gently held and clasped in mine;
Another head upon my breast

Was laid, as thine is now, at rest.
Why dost thou lift those tender eyes
With so much sorrow and surprise?
A minstrel's, not a maiden's hand,
Was that which in my own was pressed.
A manly form usurped thy place,
A beautiful, but bearded face
That now is in the Holy Land,
Yet in my memory from afar
Is shining on us like a star.
But linger not. For while I speak,
A sheeted spectre, white and tall,
The cold mist climbs the castle wall,
And lays his hand upon thy cheek!
(They go in.)

EPILOGUE.

THE TWO RECORDING ANGELS ASCENDING.

The Angel of Good Deeds (with closed book).

God sent his messenger the rain,
And said unto the mountain brook,
"Rise up, and from thy caverns look,
And leap, with naked, snow-white feet,
From the cool hills into the heat,
Of the broad, arid plain."

God sent his messenger of faith,
And whispered in the maiden's heart,
"Rise up, and look from where thou art,
And scatter with unselfish hands
Thy freshness on the barren sands
And solitudes of Death."

O beauty of holiness,

Of self-forgetfulness, of lowliness!
O power of meekness,

Whose very gentleness and weakness
Are like the yielding, but irresistible air!
Upon the pages

Of the sealed volume that I bear,
The deed divine

Is written in characters of gold

Not yet, not yet

Is the red sun wholly set,
But evermore recedes,
While open still I bear

The Book of Evil Deeds,

To let the breathings of the upper air
Visit its pages and erase
The records from its face!

Fainter and fainter as I gaze
In the broad blaze

The glimmering landscape shines,
And below me the black river
Is hidden by wreaths of vapour!
Fainter and fainter the black lines
Begin to quiver

Along the whitening surface of the paper;
Shade after shade

The terrible words grow faint and fade, And in their place

Runs a white space!

Down goes the sun!
But the soul of one,
Who by repentance

Has escaped the dreadful sentence,
Shines bright below me as I look.
It is the end!

With closed Book

To God do I ascend.

Lo! over the mountain steeps
A dark, gigantic shadow sweeps
Beneath my feet;

A blackness inwardly brightening
With sullen heat,

As a storm-cloud lurid with lightning,
And a cry of lamentation,
Repeated and again repeated,
Deep and loud

As the reverberation

Of cloud answering unto cloud,

Swells and rolls away in the distance, As if the sheeted

Lightning retreated,

Baffled and thwarted by the wind's resistance.

It is Lucifer,

The son of mystery;

And since God suffers him to be,

He, too, is God's minister,

And labours for some good

By us not understood!

"And the pleasant water-courses, You could trace them through the valley, By the rushing in the Spring-time, By the alders in the Summer, By the white fog in the Autumn, By the black line in the Winter; And beside them dwelt the singer, In the Vale of Tawasentha,* In the green and silent valley.

"There he sang of Hiawatha, Sang the Song of Hiawatha, Sang his wondrous birth and being, How he prayed and how he fasted, How he lived, and toiled, and suffered, That the tribes of men might prosper, That he might advance his people!"

Ye who love the haunts of Nature,
Love the sunshine of the meadow,
Love the shadow of the forest,
Love the wind among the branches,
And the rain-shower and the snow-storm,
And the rushing of great rivers
Through their palisades of pine-trees,
And the thunder in the mountains,
Whose innumerable echoes
Flap like eagles in their eyries ;-
Listen to these wild traditions,
To this Song of Hiawatha !

Ye who love a nation's legends,
Love the ballads of a people,
That like voices from afar off
Call to us to pause and listen,
Speak in tones so plain and childlike,
Scarcely can the ear distinguish
Whether they are sung or spoken ;-
Listen to this Indian Legend,
To this Song of Hiawatha!

Ye whose hearts are fresh and simple
Who have faith in God and Nature,
Who believe, that in all ages
Every human heart is human,
That in even savage bosoms
There are longings, yearnings, strivings,
For the good they comprehend not,
That the feeble hands and helpless,
Groping blindly in the darkness,
Touch God's right hand in that darkness

*This valley, now called Norman's Kill, is in Albany County, New York.

And are lifted up and strengthened ;— Listen to this simple story,

To this Song of Hiawatha !

Ye, who sometimes in your rambles Through the green lanes of the country, Where the tangled barberry-bushes Hang their tufts of crimson berries Over stone walls gray with mosses, Pause by some neglected graveyard, For a while to muse, and ponder On a half-effaced inscription, Written with little skill of song-craft, Homely phrases, but each letter Full of hope, and yet of heart-break, Full of all the tender pathos Of the Here and the Hereafter;Stay and read this rude inscription, Read this Song of Hiawatha!

I.

THE PEACE-PIPE.

ON the Mountains of the Prairie, (14)
On the great Red Pipe-stone Quarry,
Gitche Manito, the mighty,
He the Master of Life, descending,
On the red crags of the quarry
Stood erect, and called the nations,
Called the tribes of men together.

From his footprints flowed a river,
Leaped into the light of morning,
O'er the precipice plunging downward
Gleamed like Ishkoodah, the comet.
And the spirit, stooping earthward,
With his finger on the meadow
Traced a winding pathway for it,
Saying to it," Run in this way!"

From the red stone of the quarry With his hand he broke a fragment, Moulded it into a pipe-head, Shaped and fashioned it with figures; From the margin of the river Took a long reed for a pipe-stem, With its dark green leaves upon it; Filled the pipe with bark of willow, With the bark of the red willow: Breathed upon the neighbouring forest, Made its great boughs chafe together, Till in flame they burst and kindled ; And erect upon the mountains,