To bear within an aching breast

Only a void at last

What sadder fate could any heart befall?

Alas! dear child, ne'er to have loved at all.

To trust an unknown good,

To hope, but all in vain,
Over a far-off bliss to brood,

Only to find it pain

What sadder fate could any soul befall?
Alas! dear child, never to hope at all.

ANONYMOUS.

THE SONG OF THE SAVOYARDS.

FAR poured past Broadway's lamps alight,
The tumult of her motley throng,
When high and clear upon the night
Rose an inspiring song,

And rang above the city's din
To sound of harp and violin;

A simple but a manly strain,

And ending with the brave refrain-
Courage! courage, mon camarade!

And now where rose that song of cheer,
Both old and young stood still for joy;
Or from the windows hung to hear

The children of Savoy:

And many an eye with rapture glowed,
And saddest hearts forgot their load,
And feeble souls grew strong again,
So stirring was the brave refrain-
Courage! courage, mon camarade!

Alone, with only silence there,
Awaiting his life's welcome close,
A sick man lay, when on the air
That clarion arose;

So sweet the thrilling cadence rang,
It seemed to him an angel sang,

And sang to him; and he would fain Have died upon that heavenly strainCourage courage, mon camarade!

A sorrow-stricken man and wife,
With nothing left them but to pray,
Heard streaming over their sad life
That grand, heroic lay:

And through the mist of happy tears
They saw the promise-laden years;
And in their joy they sang again,
And carolled high the fond refrain-
Courage! courage, mon camarade!

Two artists, in the cloud of gloom

Which hung upon their hopes deferred, Resounding through their garret-room That noble chanson heard;

And as the night before the day
Their weak misgivings fled away;

And with the burden of the strain
They made their studio ring again—
Courage! courage, mon camarade!

Two poets, who in patience wrought
The glory of an aftertime,—
Lords of an age which knew them not,
Heard rise that lofty rhyme;

And on their hearts it fell, as falls
The sunshine upon prison-walls;

And one caught up the magic strain
And to the other sang again—
Courage! courage, mon camarade!

And unto one, who, tired of breath,

And day and night and name and fame, Held to his lips a glass of death,

That song a savior came;
Beseeching him from his despair,
As with the passion of a prayer;
And kindling in his heart and brain
The valor of its blest refrain-
Courage! courage, mon camarade!

O thou, with earthly ills beset,
Call to thy lips those words of joy,
And never in thy life forget

The brave song of Savoy!

For those dear words may have the power To cheer thee in thy darkest hour;

The memory of that loved refrain Bring gladness to thy heart again!Courage! courage, mon camarade!

HENRY AMES BLOOD.

V.

DEATH AND BEREAVEMENT.

LIFE.

WE are born; we laugh; we weep;
We love; we droop; we die!
Ah! wherefore do we laugh or weep?
Why do we live or die?

Who knows that secret deep?
Alas not I!

Why doth the violet spring
Unseen by human eye?

Why do the radiant seasons bring
Sweet thoughts that quickly fly?

Why do our fond hearts cling

To things that die?

We toil-through pain and wrong;

We fight-and fly;

We love; we lose; and then, ere long,

Stone-dead we lie,

O life! is all thy song

"Endure and die?"

BRYAN WALLER PROCTER (Barry Cornwall).

251

SOLILOQUY ON DEATH.

66
FROM HAMLET," ACT III. SC. 1.

HAMLET. To be, or not to be,-that is the ques

Whether 't is nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And, by opposing, end them?-To die, to sleep ;-
No more; and, by a sleep, to say we end

The heart-ache, and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to,-'t is a consummation
Devoutly to be wished. To die,-to sleep ;—
To sleep! perchance to dream:-ay, there's the
rub;

For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there's the respect

That makes.calamity of so long life;

For who would bear the whips and scorns of time, The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's con

tumely,

The pains of despised love, the law's delay,
The insolence of office, and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,-
The undiscovered country, from whose bourn
No traveller returns,-puzzles the will,

And makes us rather bear those ills we have,