ever. The future is lighted for us with the radiant colors of hope. Strife and sorrow shall disappear. Peace and love shall reign supreme. The dream of poets, the lesson of priest and prophet, the inspiration of the great musician, is confirmed in the light of modern knowledge; and as we gird ourselves up for the work of life, we may look forward to the time when in the truest sense the kingdoms of this world shall become the kingdom of Christ, and He shall reign for ever and ever, king of kings and lord of lords. G Sidney Lanier. BORN in Macon, Ga., 1842. DIED at Lynn, N. C., 1881. THE MARSHES OF GLYNN. [Poems of Sidney Lanier. Edited by his Wife. 1884.] LOOMS of the live-oaks, beautiful-braided and woven Emerald twilights,— Virginal shy lights, Wrought of the leaves to allure to the whisper of vows, Of the heavenly woods and glades, That run to the radiant marginal sand-beach within The wide sea-marshes of Glynn; Beautiful glooms, soft dusks in the noon-day fire,— Wildwood privacies, closets of lone desire, Chamber from chamber parted with wavering arras of leaves, Cells for the passionate pleasure of prayer to the soul that grieves, Cool for the dutiful weighing of ill with good ; O braided dusks of the oak and woven shades of the vine, While the riotous noon-day sun of the June-day long did shine Like a lane into heaven that leads from a dream, Ay, now, when my soul all day hath drunken the soul of the oak, And my heart is at ease from men, and the wearisome sound of the stroke Of the scythe of time and the trowel of trade is low, And belief overmasters doubt, and I know that I know, And my spirit is grown to a lordly great compass within, That the length and the breadth and the sweep of the marshes of Glynn VOL. X.-10 Will work me no fear like the fear they have wrought me of yore Oh, now, unafraid, I am fain to face The vast sweet visage of space. To the edge of the wood I am drawn, I am drawn, Where the gray beach glimmering runs, as a belt of the dawn, For a mete and a mark To the forest-dark: So: Affable live-oak, leaning low, Thus with your favor-soft, with a reverent hand, (Not lightly touching your person, Lord of the land!) Bending your beauty aside, with a step I stand, On the firm-packed sand, Free By a world of marsh that borders a world of sea. Sinuous southward and sinuous northward the shimmering band Of the sand-beach fastens the fringe of the marsh to the folds of the land. Inward and outward to northward and southward the beach-lines linger and curl As a silver-wrought garment that clings to and follows the firm sweet limbs of a girl. Vanishing, swerving, evermore curving again into sight, Softly the sand-beach wavers away to a dim gray looping of light. To the terminal blue of the main. Oh, what is abroad in the marsh and the terminal sea? From the weighing of fate and the sad discussion of sin, By the length and the breadth and the sweep of the marshes of Glynn. Ye marshes, how candid and simple and nothing-withholding and free As the marsh-hen secretly builds on the watery sod, I will fly in the greatness of God as the marsh-hen flies In the freedom that fills all the space 'twixt the marsh and the skies: And the sea lends large, as the marsh: lo, out of his plenty the sea Look how the grace of the sea doth go About and about through the intricate channels that flow Here and there, Everywhere, Till his waters have flooded the uttermost creeks and the low-lying lanes, And the marsh is meshed with a million veins, That like as with rosy and silvery essences flow In the rose-and-silver evening glow. Farewell, my lord Sun! The creeks overflow: a thousand rivulets run "Twixt the roots of the sod; the blades of the marsh-grass stir; Passeth a hurrying sound of wings that westward whir; Passeth, and all is still; and the currents cease to run; And the sea and the marsh are one. And now from the Vast of the Lord will the waters of sleep Roll in on the souls of men, But who will reveal to our waking ken The forms that swim and the shapes that creep Under the waters of sleep? And I would I could know what swimmeth below when the tide comes in On the length and the breadth of the marvellous marshes of Glynn. 1878. SONG OF THE CHATTAHOOCHEE. UT of the hills of Habersham, Far from the hills of Habersham, All down the hills of Habersham, Stay, The dewberry dipped for to work delay, And the little reeds sighed Abide, abide, High o'er the hills of Habersham, Wrought me her shadowy self to hold, Said, Pass not, so cold, these manifold Deep shades of the hills of Habersham, And oft in the hills of Habersham, brook-stone But oh, not the hills of Habersham, And oh, not the valleys of Hall Avail: I am fain for to water the plain. Did bar me of passage with friendly Downward the voices of Duty call UPERB and sole, upon a plumèd spray SU That o'er the general leafage boldly grew, Whate'er birds did or dreamed, this bird could say. THE REVENGE OF HAMISH. T was three slim does and a ten-tined buck in the bracken lay; IT And all of a sudden the sinister smell of a man, Awaft on a wind-shift, wavered and ran Down the hill-side and sifted along through the bracken and passed that way. Then Nan got a-tremble at nostril; she was the daintiest doe; In the print of her velvet flank on the velvet fern She reared, and rounded her ears in turn. Then the buck leapt up, and his head as a king's to a crown did go Full high in the breeze, and he stood as if Death had the form of a deer; And the two slim does long lazily stretching arose, For their day-dream slowlier came to a close, Till they woke and were still, breath-bound with waiting and wonder and fear. Then Alan the huntsman sprang over the hillock, the hounds shot by, But Alan loud winded his horn in sign that the quarry was nigh. mm For at dawn of that day proud Maclean of Lochbuy to the hunt had waxed wild, "I will kill a red deer," quoth Maclean, "in the sight of the wife and the child." So gayly he paced with the wife and the child to his chosen stand; Do thou turn them to me: nor fail, lest thy back be red as thy hand." mm Now hard-fortuned Hamish, half blown of his breath with the height of the hill, His shouts, and his nether lip twitched, and his legs were o'er-weak for his will. So the deer darted lightly by Hamish and bounded away to the burn. But Maclean never bating his watch tarried waiting below. Still Hamish hung heavy with fear for to go All the space of an hour; then he went, and his face was greenish and stern, And his eye sat back in the socket, and shrunken the eye-balls shone, As withdrawn from a vision of deeds it were shame to see. "Now, now, grim henchman, what is't with thee?" Brake Maclean, and his wrath rose red as a beacon the wind hath upblown. "Three does and a ten-tined buck made out," spoke Hamish, full mild, Cried Maclean: "Now a ten-tined buck in the sight of the wife and the child I had killed if the gluttonous kern had not wrought me a snail's own wrong!" Then he sounded, and down came kinsmen and clansmen all: "Ten blows, for ten tine, on his back let fall, And reckon no stroke if the blood follow not at the bite of thong!" So Hamish made bare, and took him his strokes; at the last he smiled. "Now I'll to the burn," quoth Maclean, "for it still may be, If a sliminer-paunched henchman will hurry with me, I shall kill me the ten-tined buck for a gift to the wife and the child!" Then the clansmen departed, by this path and that; and over the hill And the wife and the child stood sad; and bloody-backed Hamish sat still. But look! red Hamish has risen; quick about and about turns he. He snatches the child from the mother, and clambers the crag toward the sea. |