CHORIC SONG.

1. There is sweet music here that softer falls Than petals from blown roses on the grass, Or night-dews on still waters between walls Of shadowy granite, in a gleaming pass ; Music that gentlier on the spirit lies Than tired eyelids upon tired eyes ; Music that brings sweet sleep down from the bliss

ful skies. Here are cool mosses deep, And through the moss the ivies creep, And in the stream the long-leaved flowers weep, And from the craggy ledge the poppy hangs in sleep.

Sun-steeped at noon, and in the moon
Nightly dew-fed ; and turning yellow
Falls, and floats adown the air.
Lo! sweetened with the summer light,
The full-juiced apple, waxing over-mellow,
Drops in a silent autumn night.
All its allotted length of days,
The flower ripens in its place,
Ripens and fades, and falls, and hath no toil,
Fast-rooted in the fruitful soil.

4. Hateful is the dark-blue sky, Vaulted o'er the dark-blue sea. Death is the end of life; ah, why Should life all labor be ? Let us alone. Time driveth onward fast, And in a little while our lips are dumb. Let us alone. What is it that will last? All things are taken from us, and become Portions and parcels of the dreadful Past. Let us alone. What pleasure can we have To war with evil? Is there any peace In ever climbing up the climbing wave ? All things have rest, and ripen toward the grave In silence; ripen, fall and cease: Give us long rest or death, dark death or dreamful

ease !

5. How sweet it were, hearing the downward stream, With half-shut eyes ever to seem Falling asleep in a half-dream! To dream and dream, like yonder amber light, Which will not leave the myrrh-bush on the height; To hear cach other's whispered speech ; Eating the Lotos, day by day, To watch the crisping ripples on the beach, And tender-curving lines of creamy spray:

To lend our hearts and spirits wholly
To the influence of mild-minded melancholy;
To muse and brood and live again in memory,
With those old faces of our infancy
Heaped over with a mound of grass,
Two handfuls of white dust, shut in an urn of

brass !

6. Dear is the memory of our wedded lives, And dear the last embraces of our wives And their warm tears : but all hath suffered change; For surely now our household hearths are cold : Our sons inherit us : our looks are strange : And we should come like ghosts to trouble joy. Or else the island princes, over-bold Have eat our substance, and the minstrel sings Before them of the ten-years' war in Troy, And our great deeds, as half-forgotten things. Is there confusion in the little isle ? Let what is broken so remain. The Gods are hard to reconcile : 'Tis hard to settle order once again. There is confusion worse than death, Trouble on trouble, pain on pain, Long labor unto aged breath, Sore task to hearts worn out with many wars, And eyes grown dim with gazing on the pilot-stars.

7. But, propt on beds of amaranth and moly, How sweet (while warm airs lull us, blowing lowly,) With half-dropt eyelids still, Beneath a heaven dark and holy, To watch the long bright river drawing slowly His waters from the purple hillTo hear the dewy echoes calling, From cave to cave through the thick-twined vineTo watch the emerald-colored water falling

Through many a woven acanthus-wreath divine ! Only to hear and see the far-off sparkling brine, Only to hear were sweet, stretched out beneath the

pine.

8. The Lotos blooms below the barren peak: The Lotos blows by every winding creek: All day the wind breathes low with mellower tone; Through every hollow cave and alley lone Round

and round the spicy downs the yellow Lotos

dust is blown. We have had enough of action, and of motion we, Rolled to starboard, rolled to larboard, when the

surge was seething free, Where the wallowing monster spouted his foam

fountains in the sea. Let us swear an oath, and keep it with an equal

mind, In the hollow Lotos-land to live and lie reclined On the hills like Gods together, careless of man

kind. For they lie beside their nectar, and the bolts are

hurled Far below them in the valleys, and the clouds are

lightly curled Round their golden houses, girdled with the gleam

ing world ; Where they smile in secret, looking over wasted

lands, Blight and famine, plague and earthquake, roaring

deeps and fiery sands, Clanging fights, and flaming towns, and sinking

ships, and praying hands. But they smile, they find a music centred in a Steaming up, a lamentation and an ancient tale of

wrong, Like a tale of little meaning, though the words are

strong;

doleful song

Chanted from an ill-used race of men that cleave

the soil, Sow the seed, and reap the harvest with enduring

toil, Storing yearly little dues of wheat, and wine and

Coil ;

Till they perish and they suffer-some, 'tis whis

pered-down in hell Suffer endless anguish, others in Elysian valleys

dwell, Resting weary limbs at last on beds of asphodel. Surely, surely, slumber is more sweet thân toil, the

shore Than labor in the deep mid-ocean, wind and wave O rest ye, brother mariners, we will not wander

and oar;

more.

A DREAM OF FAIR WOMEN.

I.

I READ, before my eyelids dropt their shade,

“ The Legend of Good Women,” long ago Sung by the morning star of song, who made

His music heard below;

II.

Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose sweet breath

Preluded those melodious bursts, that fill The spacious times of great Elizabeth

With sounds that echo still.

III.

And, for a while, the knowledge of his art

Held me above the subject, as strong gales Hold swollen clouds from raining, though my heart,

Brimful of those wild tales,