Изображения страниц
PDF
EPUB
[blocks in formation]

Man.

Helpless immortal! insect infinite!

A worm! a god!-I tremble at myself,
And in myself am lost. At home a stranger,
Thought wanders up and down, surprised, aghast,
And wondering at her own. How reason reels!
O, what a miracle to man is man!
Triumphantly distressed! What joy! what dread!
Alternately transported and alarmed!
What can preserve my life? or what destroy?
An angel's arm can't snatch me from the grave;
Legions of angels can't confine me there.
-Edward Young.

M

Man---Woman.

AN'S home is everywhere. On ocean's flood, Where the strong ship with storm-defying tether Doth link in stormy brotherhood

Earth's utmost zones together,

Where'er the red gold glows, the spice trees wave,
Where the rich diamond ripens, 'mid the flame
Of vertic suns that ope the stranger's grave,

He with bronzed cheek and daring step doth rove;
He, with short pang and slight,
Doth turn him from the checkered light

Of the fair moon through his own forests dancing,
Where music, joy and love

Were his young hours entrancing;
And where ambition's thunder claim

Points out his lot.

Or fitful wealth allures to roam,

There doth he make his home,
Repining not.

It is not thus with Woman. The far halls,
Though ruinous and lone,

Where first her pleased ear drank a nursing mother's

tone;

The home with humble walls,

Where breathed a parent's prayer around her bed;
The valley where, with playmates true,

She culled the strawberry, bright with dew;
The bower where Love her timid footsteps led:
The hearthstone where her children grew;

The damp soil where she cast

The flower seeds of her hope, and saw them bide the

blast,

Affection with unfading tint recalls,
Lingering round the ivied walls,

Where every rose hath in its cup a bee,

Making fresh honey of remembered things,

Each rose without a thorn, each bee bereft of stings. -Lydia H. Sigourney.

Man and Woman.

Never can the man divest her
Of that wondrous charm of sex,
Ever must she dreaming of him,
The same mystic charm annex.

S the man beholdst the woman,

AS

As the woman sees the man, Curiously they note each other, As each other only can.

[blocks in formation]

Her virgin bosom swell;

Such thoughts to Lucy I will give
While she and I together live

Here in this happy dell."

Thus Nature spake-the work was done― How soon my Lucy's race was run!

She died, and left to me

This heath, this calm, and quiet scene;
The memory of what has been,
And never more will be.

-William Wordsworth.

L'

IKE the violet, which alone
Prospers in some happy shade,

My Castara lives unknown,

To no ruder eye betrayed;
For she's to herself untrue
Who delights i' the public view.

Such is her beauty as no arts

Have enriched with borrowed grace; Her high birth no pride imparts, For she blushes in her place. Folly boasts a glorious blood,She is noblest being good.

Cautious, she knew never yet

What a wanton courtship meant;
Nor speaks loud to boast her wit,
In her silence eloquent.
Of herself survey she takes,

But 'tween men no difference makes.

She obeys with speedy will

Her grave parents' wise commands; And so innocent, that ill

Castara.

She nor acts nor understands.
Women's feet run still astray
If to ill they know the way.

She sails by that rock, the court,
Where oft virtue splits her mast;
And retiredness thinks the port,

Where her fame may anchor cast.
Virtue safely cannot sit
Where vice is enthroned for wit.
She holds that day's pleasure best
Where sin waits not on delight;
Without mask, or ball, or feast,

Sweetly spends a winter's night.
O'er that darkness whence is thrust
Prayer and sleep, oft governs lust.
She her throne makes reason climb,
While her wild passions captive lie;
And each article of time

Her pure thoughts to heaven fly; All her vows religious be, And she vows her love to me. -William Habington.

[blocks in formation]
[merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

BEA

Evangeline on the Prairie.

EAUTIFUL was the night. Behind the black wall of the forest,

Tipping its summit with silver, arose the moon. On the river

Fell here and there through the branches a tremulous

gleam of the moonlight,

Like the sweet thoughts of love on a darkened and devious spirit.

Nearer and round about her, the manifold flowers of the garden

Poured out their souls in odors, that were their prayers and confessions

Unto the night, as it went on its way, like a silent Carthusian.

Fuller of fragrance than they, and as heavy with shadows and night dews,

Hung the heart of the maiden. The calm and the magical moonlight

Seemed to inundate her soul with indefinable longings, As, through the garden gate, and beneath the shade of the oak trees,

Passed she along the path to the edge of the measureless prairie.

Silent it lay, with a silvery haze upon it, and fire-flies. Art thou so near unto me, and yet I cannot behold thee? Art thou so near unto me, and yet thy voice does not reach me?

Ah! how often thy feet have trod this path to the prairie!

Ah! how often thine eyes have looked on the woodlands around me!

Ah! how often beneath this oak, returning from labor, Thou hast lain down to rest, and to dream of me in thy slumbers.

Gleaming and floating away in mingled and infinite numbers,

[graphic][subsumed][merged small][merged small]
« ПредыдущаяПродолжить »