Steal on her ear, distinct and clear As if her lover was in che room.

And read me this riddle, how Ruth should know,

As she bounds to throw open the heavy door,

That her lover was lost in the drifting snow,
Dying or dead, on the great wild moor.

"Help! help!" "Lost! lost!"
Rings through the night as she rushes away,
Stumbling, blinded and tempest-tossed,
Straight to the drift where her lover lay.

And swift they leap after her into the night,
Into the drifts by Blueberg hill,
Ridsdale and Robinson, each with a light,
To find her there holding him white and
still.

The braces are taut, the lithe boom quivers, And the waves with the coming squallcloud blacken.

Open one point on the weather-bow,

Is the light-house tall on Fire Island Head.

There's a shade of doubt on the captain's brow,

And the pilot watches the heaving lead.

I stand at the wheel, and with eager eye To sea and to sky and to shore I gaze, Till the muttered order of " Full and by !" Is suddenly changed for "Full for stays!'

The ship bends lower before the breeze,

As her broadside fair to the blast she lays; And she swifter springs to the rising seas, As the pilot calls, "Stand by for stays!"

It is silence all, as each in his place, With the gathered coil in his hardened hands,

"

By tack and bowline, by sheet and brace, Waiting the watchword impatient stands.

And the light on Fire Island Head draws near,

As, trumpet-winged, the pilot's shout From his post on the bowsprit's heel I hear, With the welcome call of "Ready!

About!"

No time to spare! It is touch and go; And the captain growls, "Down helm! hard down!'

As my weight on the whirling spokes I throw,

While heaven grows black with the storm-cloud's frown.

High o'er the knight-heads flies the spray, As we meet the shock of the plunging

sea;

And my shoulder stiff to the wheel I lay, As I answer, "Ay, ay, sir! Ha-a-rd

a-lee!"

With the swerving leap of a startled steed The ship flies fast in the eye of the wind, The dangerous shoals on the lee recede, And the headland white we have left behind.

The topsails flutter, the jibs collapse,

And belly and tug at the groaning cleats; The spanker slats, and the mainsail flaps; And thunders the order, "Tacks and sheets!"

Mid the rattle of blocks and the tramp of the crew,

Hisses the rain of the rushing squall: The sails are aback from clew to clew, And now is the moment for "Mainsail, haul!"

And the heavy yards, like a baby's toy,

By fifty strong arms are swiftly swung: She holds her way, and I look with joy For the first white spray o'er the bulwarks flung.

"Let go, and haul!" "Tis the last command,

And the head-sails fill to the blast once

more:

Astern and to leeward lies the land,

With its breakers white on the shingly shore.

What matters the reef, or the rain, or the squall?

I steady the helm for the open sea; The first mate clamors, " Belay, there, all!" And the captain's breath once more comes free.

And so off shore let the good ship fly;
Little care I how the gusts may blow,
In my fo'castle bunk, in a jacket dry.
Eight bells have struck, and my watch is
below.

WALTER MITCHELL

ANTONY TO CLEOPATRA

I AM dying, Egypt, dying!
Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast,
And the dark Plutonian shadows

Gather on the evening blast;
Let thine arm, O Queen, enfold me,
Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear,
Listen to the great heart secrets

Thou, and thou alone, must hear. Though my scarred and veteran legions Bear their eagles high no more,

And my wrecked and scattered galleys
Strew dark Actium's fatal shore;
Though no glittering guards surround me,
Prompt to do their master's will,
I must perish like a Roman,
Die the great Triumvir still.

Let not Cæsar's servile minions

Mock the lion thus laid low;

'T was no foeman's arm that felled him, 'T was his own that struck the blow: His who, pillowed on thy bosom, Turned aside from glory's ray His who, drunk with thy caresses, Madly threw a world away.

Should the base plebeian rabble

Dare assail my name at Rome, Where the noble spouse Octavia

Weeps within her widowed home,
Seek her; say the gods bear witness,
Altars, augurs, circling wings,
That her blood, with mine commingled,
Yet shall mount the thrones of kings.

And for thee, star-eyed Egyptian —
Glorious sorceress of the Nile!
Light the path to Stygian horrors,

With the splendor of thy smile;
Give the Cæsar crowns and arches,
Let his brow the laurel twine:
can scorn the senate's triumphs,
Triumphing in love like thine.

I

TO AN AUTUMN LEAF

THE Scarlet tide of summer's life

Is ebbing toward a shoreless sea; Late fell before the reaper's knife

The ripened grain - a type of thee.

How fresh and young the earth looked, when

The sun first kissed thy silken head!
Now blazing grass and smouldering fen
Burn incense for an empress dead.

With gorgeous robes she lies in state,
Her trailing banners cloud the sky:
When Atropos no more will wait,

'Tis joy so gloriously to die.

Whose loss is it, if thou and I

Are dropped into the fecund earth? A privilege it is to die

When life is of no further worth.

Some newer lives will fill the place

Of which we feel ourselves bereft; Mayhap, though shadows for a space, Our vital essence will be left.

The spirit of each form that grows

Survives the mould in which 't is cast: The universe will not repose,

Though death and life each follow fast.

Whence comes, where goes the spark we see ?

Till time's last ensign is unfurled, This miracle of life will be,

For aye, the problem of the world.

Who reads a page of Nature's book,
How clear soe'er the text may be,
Needs something of a wizard's look,
If he would probe her mystery.

Oh, for an art like palmistry,

That I might scan thy mazy veins ! I long to know thy history,

Why blood thy transient record stains.

The symmetry of thy outline,

The curious function of each part, Betray the work of love divine:

Does it conceal a throbbing heart?

Dost know the mortal life of man,

Its wants and wrongs and pangs and fears?

Does sorrow trouble thy brief span,
Although denied relief of tears?

Hast thou a soul as well as I,

To breathe and blush and live the same What matters if I make outcry,

And call myself a prouder name

One made us both by His high will,
He gave alike and takes away:
We grind as small in His great mill,
"Ďust unto dust," our roundelay.

What griefs from passion's overflow, What shame that follows after sin !

Yet calm as heaven's serenest deeps
Are those pure eyes, those glances pure;
And queenly is the state she keeps,
In beauty's lofty trust secure.

And who has strayed, by happy chance,
Through all those grand and pictured
halls,
Nor felt the magic of her glance,

As when a voice of music calls?

Not soon shall I forget the day,
Sweet day, in spring's unclouded time,
While on the glowing canvas lay
The light of that delicious clime, -

I marked the matchless colors wreathed
On the fair brow, the peerless cheek;
The lips, I fancied, almost breathed

The blessings that they could not speak.

Fair were the eyes with mine that bent
Upon the picture their mild gaze,
And dear the voice that gave consent
To all the utterance of my praise.

O fit companionship of thought;

O happy memories, shrined apart; The rapture that the painter wrought, The kindred rapture of the heart! WILLIAM ALLEN BUTLER

ON ONE WHO DIED IN MAY

WHY, Death, what dost thou here,
This time o' year?

Peach-blow and apple-blossom;
Clouds, white as my love's bosom;
Warm wind o' the west
Cradling the robin's nest;

Young meadows hasting their green laps to fill

With golden dandelion and daffodil:
These are fit sights for spring;
But, oh, thou hateful thing,

What dost thou here?

Why, Death, what dost thou here,
This time o' year?

Fair, at the old oak's knee,
The young anemone;