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THEODORE WATTS.

CCXLVII.

NATURA MALIGNA.

THE Lady of the Hills with crimes untold
Followed my feet, with azure eyes of prey ;
By glacier-brink she stood,-by cataract-spray,-
When mists were dire, or avalanche-echoes rolled.
At night she glimmered in the death-wind cold,

And if a foot-print shone at break of day,

My flesh would quail but straight my soul would say: 'Tis her's whose hand God's mightier hand doth hold.

I trod her snow-bridge, for the moon was bright,

Her icicle-arch across the sheer crevasse,

When lo, she stood! . . . God bade her let me pass;

Then fell the bridge; and, in the sallow light

Adown the chasm, I saw her cruel-white,

And all my wondrous days as in a glass.

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CCXLVIII.

THE DAMSEL OF THE PLAIN.

CHILDE ROWLAND found a Damsel on the Plain,

Her daffodil crown lit all her shining head;

He kissed her mouth and through the world they sped,

The beauteous smiling world in sun and rain.

But, when long joys made love a golden chain,
He slew her by the sea; then, as he fled,
Voices of earth and air and ocean said:
"The maid was Truth: God bids you meet again."

Between the devil and a deep dark sea

He met a foe more soul-compelling still;
A feathered snake the monster seemed to be,
And wore a wreath o' the yellow daffodil.
Then spake the devil: "Rowland, fly to me:
When murdered Truth returns she comes to kill.”

THEODORE WATTS.

CCXLIX.

A DREAM.

BENEATH the loveliest dream there coils a fear:

Last night came she whose eyes are memories now,

Her far-off gaze seemed all-forgetful how

Love dimmed them once; so calm they shone and clear. "Sorrow (I said) hath made me old, my dear;

'Tis I, indeed, but grief doth change the brow,A love like mine a seraph's neck might bow,Vigils like mine would blanch an angel's hair."

Ah, then I saw, I saw the sweet lips move!

I saw the love-mists thickening in her eyes,

I heard wild wordless melodies of love

Like murmur of dreaming brooks in Paradise ; And, when upon my neck she fell, my dove,

I knew her hair though heavy of amaranth-spice.

CCL.

THE BROOK RHINE,

SMALL current of the wilds afar from men,
Changing and sudden as a baby's mood;
Now a green babbling rivulet in the wood,
Now loitering broad and shallow through the glen,
Or threading 'mid the naked shoals, and then

Brattling against the stones, half mist, half flood,
Between the mountains where the storm-clouds brood;

And each change but to wake or sleep again.

Pass on, young stream, the world has need of thee;

Far hence a mighty river on its breast

Bears the deep-laden vessels to the sea;

Far hence wide waters feed the vines and corn.

Pass on, small stream, to so great purpose born,
On to the distant toil, the distant rest.

JOSEPH BLANCO WHITE.

CCLI.

TO NIGHT,

MYSTERIOUS Night! when our first parent knew
Thee from report divine, and heard thy name,

Did he not tremble for this lovely frame,
This glorious canopy of light and blue?

Yet 'neath a curtain of translucent dew,

Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame,

Hesperus with the host of heaven came,

And lo! Creation widened in man's view.

Who could have thought such darkness lay concealed

Within thy beams, O Sun! or who could find,

Whilst flow'r and leaf and insect stood revealed, That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind! Why do we then shun Death with anxious strife? If Light can thus deceive, wherefore not Life?

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