Henry Wadsw( Jong fellow /|-L0| a j- '*« \A Caaa^, Tf . acjx oV eilSLo^ IN THE HARBOR ULTIMA THULE.-PART II. BY HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW " Ultima Thule .' Utmost Isle ! Here in thy harbors for a while We lower our sails ; a while we rest From the unending, endless quest " BOSTON HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY New York: 11 East Seventeenth Street (£*je 0ifcer$&e $n#& Camfcri&oe 1882 «*>- AV *-s rV^°~ nV Copyright, 1882, Bt ERNEST LONGFELLOW, ADMINISTRATOR. All rights reserved. The Riverside Press, Cambridge : Electrotyped and Printed by H. 0. Houghton & Co. CONTENTS. POEMS. PAGE Becalmed 9 Hermes Trismegistus 11 The Poet's Calendar 16 Mad River, in the White Mountains 24 AUF WlEDERSEHEN 28 The Children's Crusade 31 The City and the Sea 39 Sundown 40 President Garfield 41 Decoration Day 42 Chimes 44 Four by the Clock 45 The Four Lakes of Madison 46 Moonlight 48 To the Avon 51 Elegiac Verse 53 A Fragment ..... 59 The Bells of San Blas 60 iv CONTENTS. TRANSLATIONS. PAGE Prelude 67 From the French 69 The Wine of Jurancon 71 At La Chaudeau 73 A Quiet Life 75 PERSONAL POEMS. Loss and Gain 79 Autumn Within 80 Victor and Vanquished 81 Memories 82 My Books 83 L'ENVOI. Possibilities 87 NOTE. — •— This volume contains all of Mr. Longfellow's unprinted poems which will be given to the public, with the exception of two sonnets re- served for his Biography, and " Michael An- gelo," a dramatic poem, which will be published later. "The Children's Crusade" was left unfin- ished. It is founded upon an event which oc- curred in the year 1212. An army of twenty thousand children, mostly boys, under the lead of a boy of ten years, named Nicolas, set out from Cologne for the Holy Land. When they reached Genoa only seven thousand remained. vi NOTE. There, as the sea did not divide to allow them to march dry-shod to the East, they broke up. Some got as far as Rome ; two ship-loads sailed from Pisa, and were not heard of again ; the rest straggled back to Germany. POEMS. BECALMED. Becalmed upon the sea of Thought, Still unattained the land it sought, My mind, with loosely-hanging sails, Lies waiting the auspicious gales. On either side, behind, before, The ocean stretches like a floor, — A level floor of amethyst, Crowned by a golden dome of mist. Blow, breath of inspiration, blow! Shake and uplift this golden glow! And fill the canyas of the mind With wafts of thy celestial wind. 10 IN TEE HARBOR. Blow, breath of song! until I feel The straining sail, the lifting keel, The life of the awakening sea, Its motion and its mystery ! HERMES TRISMEGISTUS. As Seleucus narrates, Hermes described the principles that rank as wholes in two myriads of books ; or, as we are informed by Manetho, he perfectly unfolded these principles in three myriads six thousand five hundred and twenty-five volumes. . . . . . . Our ancestors dedicated the inventions of their wisdom to this deity, inscribing all their own writings with the name of Her- mes. — Iamblicus. Still through Egypt's desert places Flows the lordly Nile, From its banks the great stone faoes Gaze with patient smile. Still the pyramids imperious Pierce the cloudless skies, And the Sphinx stares with mysterious, Solemn, stony eyes. But where are the old Egyptian Demi-gods and kings? 12 IN THE HARBOR. Nothing left but an inscription Graven on stones and rings. Where are Helius and Hephoestus, Gods of eldest eld? "Where is Hermes Trismegistus, Who their secrets held? Where are now the many hundred Thousand books he wrote? By the Thaumaturgists plundered, Lost in lands remote; In oblivion sunk forever, As when o'er the land Blows a storm-wind, in the river Sinks the scattered sand. Something unsubstantial, ghostly, Seems this Theurgist, In deep meditation mostly Wrapped, as in a mist. HERMES TR1SMEGISTUS. 13 Vague, phantasmal, and unreal To our thought he seems, Walking in a world ideal, In a land of dreams. Was he one, or many, merging Name and fame in one, Like a stream, to which, converging, Many streamlets run? Till, with gathered power proceeding, Ampler sweep it takes, Downward the sweet waters leading From unnumbered lakes. By the Nile I see him wandering, Pausing now and then, On the mystic union pondering Between gods and men ; Half believing, wholly feeling, With supreme delight, 14 IN THE HARBOR. How the gods, themselves concealing, Lift men to their height. Or in Thebes, the hundred-gated, In the thoroughfare Breathing, as if consecrated, A diviner air; And amid discordant noises, In the jostling throng, Hearing far, celestial voices Of Olympian song. Who shall call his dreams fallacious? Who has searched or sought All the unexplored and spacious Universe of thought? Who, in his own skill confiding, Shall with rule and line Mark the border-land dividing Human and divine? HERMES TRISMEGISTUS. 15 Trismegistus ! three times greatest! How thy name sublime Has descended to this latest Progeny of time! Happy they whose written pages Perish with their lives, If amid the crumbling ages Still their name survives ! Thine, O priest of Egypt, lately Found I in the vast, Weed-encumbered, sombre, stately, Grave-yard of the Past; And a presence moved before me On that gloomy shore, As a waft of wind, that o'er me Breathed, and was no more. THE POET'S CALENDAR. JANUARY. I. Janus am I ; oldest of potentates ; Forward I look, and backward, and below I count, as god of avenues and gates, The years that through my portals come and go. ii. I block the roads, and drift the fields with snow; I chase the wild-fowl from the frozen fen; My frosts congeal the rivers in their flow, My fires light up the hearths and hearts of men. THE POETS CALENDAR. 17 FEBRUARY. I am lustration ; and the sea is mine ! I wash the sands and headlands with my tide ; My brow is crowned with branches of the pine; Before my chariot-wheels the fishes glide. By me all things unclean are purified, By me the souls of men washed white again ; E'en the unlovely tombs of those who died Without a dirge, I cleanse from every stain. MARCH. I Martius am ! Once first, and now the third ! To lead the Year was my appointed place ; A mortal dispossessed me by a word, And set there Janus with the double face. 18 IN THE HARBOR. Hence I make war on all the human race ; I shake the cities with my hurricanes ; I flood the rivers and their banks efface, And drown the farms and hamlets with my rains. APRIL. I open wide the portals of the Spring To welcome the procession of the flowers, With their gay banners, and the birds that sing Their song of songs from their aerial tow- ers. I soften with my sunshine and my showers The heart of earth ; with thoughts of love I glide Into the hearts of men ; and with the hours Upon the Bull with wreathed horns I ride. THE POETS CALENDAR. 19 MAY. Hark ! The sea-faring wild-fowl loud proclaim My coming, and the swarming of the bees. These are my heralds, and behold ! my name Is written in blossoms on the hawthorn- trees. I tell the mariner when to sail the seas ; I waft o'er all the land from far away The breath and bloom of the Hesperides, My birthplace. I am Maia. I am May. JUNE. Mine is the Month of Roses ; yes, and mine The Month of Marriages ! All pleasant sights And scents, the fragrance of the blossoming vine, The foliage of the valleys and the heights. 20 IN THE HARBOR. Mine are the longest days, the loveliest nights ; The mower's scythe makes music to my ear ; I am the mother of all dear delights ; I am the fairest daughter of the year. JULY. My emblem is the Lion, and I breathe The breath of Libyan deserts o'er the land ; My sickle as a sabre I unsheathe, And bent before me the pale harvests stand. The lakes and rivers shrink at my command, And there is thirst and fever in the air ; The sky is changed to brass, the earth to sand ; I am the Emperor whose name I bear. THE POETS CALENDAR. 21 AUGUST. The Emperor Octavian, called the August, I being his favorite, bestowed his name Upon me, and I hold it still in trust, In memory of him and of his fame. I am the Virgin, and my vestal flame Burns less intensely than the Lion's rage ; Sheaves are my only garlands, and I claim The golden Harvests as my heritage. SEPTEMBER. I bear the Scales, where hang in equipoise The night and day ; and when unto my lips I put my trumpet, with its stress and noise Fly the white clouds like tattered sails of ships ; The tree-tops lash the air with sounding whips ; 2 22 IN THE HARBOR. Southward the clamorous sea-fowl wing their flight; The hedges are all red with haws and hips, The Hunter's Moon reigns empress of the night. OCTOBER. My ornaments are fruits ; my garments leaves, Woven like cloth of gold, and crimson dyed ; I do not boast the harvesting of sheaves, O'er orchards and o'er vineyards I preside. Though on the frigid Scorpion I ride, The dreamy air is full, and overflows With tender memories of the summer-tide, And mingled voices of the doves and crows NOVEMBER. The Centaur, Sagittarius, am I, Born of Ixion's and the clo'ud's embrace ; THE POET'S CALENDAR. 23 With sounding hoofs across the earth I fly, A steed Thessalian with a human face. Sharp winds the arrows are with which I chase The leaves, half dead already with affright ; I shroud myself in gloom ; and to the race Of mortals bring nor comfort nor delight. DECEMBER. Riding upon the Goat, with snow-white hair, I come, the last of all. This crown of mine Is of the holly ; in my hand I bear The thyrsus, tipped with fragrant cones of pine. I celebrate the birth of the Divine, And the return of the Saturnian reign ; — My songs are carols sung at every shrine, Proclaiming " Peace on earth, good will to MAD RIVER, IN THE WHITE MOUNTAINS. TRAVELLER. Why dost thou wildly rush and roar, Mad River, O Mad River? Wilt thou not pause and cease to pour Thy hurrying, headlong waters o'er This rocky shelf forever? What secret trouble stirs thy breast? Why all this fret and flurry? Dost thou not know that what is best In this too restless world is rest From over- work and worry? MAD RIVER. 25 THE RIVER. What wouldst thou in these mountains seek, O stranger from the city? Is it perhaps some foolish freak Of thine, to put the words I speak Into a plaintive ditty? TRAVELLER. Yes; I would learn of thee thy song, With all its flowing numbers, And in a voice as fresh and strong As thine is, sing it all day long, And hear it in my slumbers. THE RIVER. A brooklet nameless and unknown Was I at first, resembling A little child, that all alone Comes venturing down the stairs of stone, Irresolute and trembling. 26 IN THE HARBOR. Later, by wayward fancies led, For the wide world I panted; Out of the forest dark and dread Across the open fields I fled, Like one pursued and haunted. I tossed my arms, I sang aloud, My voice exultant blending With thunder from the passing cloud, The wind, the forest bent and bowed, The rush of rain descending. I heard the distant ocean call, Imploring and entreating; Drawn onward, o'er this rocky wall I plunged, and the loud Waterfall Made answer to the greeting. And now, beset with many ills, A toilsome life I follow; MAD RIVER. 27 Compelled to carry from the hills These logs to the impatient mills Below there in the hollow. Yet something ever cheers and charms The rudeness of my labors; Daily I water with these arms The cattle of a hundred farms, And have the birds for neighbors. Men call me Mad, and well they may, When, full of rage and trouble, I burst my banks of sand and clay, And sweep their wooden bridge away, Like withered reeds or stubble. Now go and write thy little rhyme, As of thine own creating. Thou seest the day is past its prime ; I can no longer waste my time ; The mills are tired of waiting. AUF WIEDERSEHEN. IN MEMORY OF J. T. F. Until we meet again ! That is the mean- ing Of the familiar words, that men repeat At parting in the street. Ah yes, till then ! but when death interven- ing Rends us asunder, with what ceaseless pain We frait for the Again ! The friends who leave us do not feel the sorrow Of parting, as we feel it, who must stay Lamenting day by day, AUF WIEDERSEHEN. 29 And knowing, when we wake upon the mor- row, We shall not find in its accustomed place The one beloved face. It were a double grief, if the departed, Being released from earth, should still retain A sense of earthly pain ; It were a double grief, if the true-hearted, Who loved us here, should on the farther shore Remember us no more. Believing, in the midst of our afflictions, That death is a beginning, not an end, We cry to them, and send Farewells, that better might be called pre- dictions, Being fore-shadowings of the future, thrown Into the vast "Unknown. 30 IN THE HARBOR. Faith overleaps the confines of our reason, And if by faith, as in old times was said, Women received their dead Raised up to life, then only for a season Our partings are, nor shall we wait in vain Until we meet again ! ■ i THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE. [a fragment.] I. What is this I read in history, Full of marvel, full of mystery, Difficult to understand ? Is it fiction, is it truth? Children in the flower of youth, Heart in heart, and hand in hand, Ignorant of what helps or harms, Without armor, without arms, Journeying to the Holy Land ! Who shall answer or divine ? Never since the world was made 32 IN THE HARBOR. Such a wonderful crusade Started forth for Palestine. Never while the world shall last Will it reproduce the past ; Never will it see again Such an army, such a band, Over mountain, over main, Journeying to the Holy Land. Like a shower of blossoms blown From the parent trees were they; Like a flock of birds that fly Through the unfrequented sky, Holding nothing as their own, Passed they into lands unknown, Passed to suffer and to die. O the simple, child-like trust ! O the faith that could believe What the harnessed, iron-mailed Knights of Christendom had failed, THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE. 33 By their prowess, to achieve, They, the children, could and must ! Little thought the Hermit, preaching Holy Wars to knight and baron, That the words dropped in his teaching, His entreaty, his beseeching, Would by children's hands be gleaned, And the staff on which he leaned Blossom like the rod of Aaron. As a summer wind upheaves The innumerable leaves In the bosom of a wood, — Not as separate leaves, but massed All together by the blast, — So for evil or for good His resistless breath upheaved All at once the many-leaved, Many-thoughted multitude. 3 34 IN THE HARBOR. In the tumult of the air Rock the boughs with all the nests Cradled on their tossing crests ; By the fervor of his prayer Troubled hearts were everywhere Rocked and tossed in human breasts. For a century, at least, His prophetic voice had ceased ; But the air was heated still By his lurid words and will, As from fires in far-off woods, In the autumn of the year, An unwonted fever broods In the sultry atmosphere. ii. In Cologne the bells were ringing, In Cologne the nuns were singing Hymns and canticles divine ; THE CHILDREN'S CRUSADE. 35 Loud the monks sang in their stalls, And the thronging streets were loud With the voices of the crowd ; — Underneath the city walls Silent flowed the river Rhine. From the gates, that summer day, Clad in robes of hodden gray, With the red cross on the breast, Azure-eyed and golden-haired, Forth the young Crusaders fared; While above the band devoted Consecrated banners floated, Fluttered many a flag and streamer, And the cross o'er all the rest ! Singing lowly, meekly, slowly, " Give us, give us back the holy Sepulchre of the Redeemer ! " On the vast procession pressed, Youths and maidens. . . . 36 IN THE HARBOR. III. Ah ! what master hand shall paint How they journeyed on their way, How the days grew long and dreary, How their little feet grew weary, How their little hearts grew faint ! Ever swifter day by day Flowed the homeward river ; ever More and more its whitening current Broke and scattered into spray, Till the calmly-flowing river Changed into a mountain torrent, Rushing from its glacier green Down through chasm and black ravine. Like a phoenix in its nest, Burned the red sun in the West, Sinking in an ashen cloud ; In the East, above the crest THE CHILDREN? S CRUSADE. 37 Of the sea-like mountain chain, Like a phoenix from its shroud, Came the red sun back again. Now around them, white with snow, Closed the mountain peaks. Below, Headlong from the precipice Down into the dark abyss, Plunged the cataract, white with foam ; And it said, or seemed to say : 44 Oh return, while yet you niay, Foolish children, to your home, There the Holy City is ! " But the dauntless leader said : 44 Faint not, though your bleeding feet O'er these slippery paths of sleet Move but painfully and slowly ; Ofcher feet than yours have bled; Other tears than yours been shed. 38 IN THE HARBOR. Courage ! lose not heart or hope ; On the mountains' southern slope Lies Jerusalem the Holy ! " As a white rose in its pride, By the wind in summer-tide Tossed and loosened from the branch, Showers its petals o'er the ground, From the distant mountain's side, Scattering all its snows around, With mysterious, muffled sound, Loosened, fell the avalanche. Voices, echoes far and near, Roar of winds and waters blending, Mists uprising, clouds impending, Filled them with a sense of fear, Formless, nameless, never ending. THE CITY AND THE SEA. The panting City cried to the Sea, "I am faint with heat, — breathe on me ! " And the Sea said, " Lo, I breathe ! but my breath To some will be life, to others death ! " As to Prometheus, bringing ease In pain, come the Oceanides, So to the City, hot with the flame Of the pitiless sun, the east wind came. It came from the heaving breast of the deep, Silent as dreams are, and sudden as sleep. Life-giving, death-giving, which will it be; O breath of the merciful, merciless Sea? SUNDOWN. The summer sun is sinking low ; Only the tree-tops redden and glow: Only the weathercock on the spire Of the neighboring church is a flame of fire ; All is in shadow below. O beautiful, awful summer day, What hast thou given, what taken away? Life and death, and love and hate, Homes made happy or desolate, Hearts made sad or gay! On the road of life one mile-stone more ! In the book of life one leaf turned o'er ! Like a red seal is the setting sun On the good arid the evil men have done, — Naught can to-day restore ! July 24, 1879. PRESIDENT GARFIELD. "E VENNI DAL MAKTIRIO A QUESTA PACE." These words the poet heard in Paradise, Uttered by one who, bravely dying here, In the true faith was living in that sphere Where the celestial cross of sacrifice Spread its protecting arms athwart the skies ; And set thereon, like jewels crystal clear, The souls magnanimous, that knew not fear, Flashed their effulgence on his dazzled eyes. Ah me ! how dark the discipline of pain, Were not the suffering followed by the sense Of infinite rest and infinite release ! This is our consolation ; and again A great soul cries to us in our suspense, " I came from martyrdom unto this peace ! " DECORATION DAY. Sleep, comrades, sleep and rest On this Field of the Grounded Arms, Where foes no more molest, Nor sentry's shot alarms! Ye have slept on the ground before, And started to your feet At the cannon's sudden roar, Or the drum's redoubling beat. But in this camp of Death No sound your slumber breaks ; Here is no fevered breath, No wound that bleeds and aches. DECORATION DAY. 43 All is repose and peace, Untrampled lies the sod ; The shouts of battle cease, It is the Truce of God ! Rest, comrades, rest and sleep ! The thoughts of men shall be As sentinels to keep Your rest from danger free. Your silent tents of green We deck with fragrant flowers; Yours has the suffering been, The memory shall be ours. February, 3, 1882. CHIMES. Sweet chimes ! that in the loneliness of night Salute the passing hour, and in the dark And silent chambers of the household mark The movements of the myriad orbs of light ! Through my closed eyelids, by the inner sight, I see the constellations in the arc Of their great circles moving on, and hark ! I almost hear them singing in their flight. Better than sleep it is to lie awake O'er-canopied by the vast starry dome Of the immeasurable sky ; to feel The slumbering world sink under us, and make Hardly an eddy, — a mere rush of foam On the great sea beneath a sinking keel. August 28, 1879. FOUR BY THE CLOCK. Foue by the clock! and yet not day; But the great world rolls and wheels away, With its cities on land, and its ships at sea,- Into the dawn that is to be ! Only the lamp in the anchored bark Sends its glimmer across the dark, And the heavy breathing of the sea Is the only sound that comes to me. Nahaxt, September 8, 1880, four o'clock in the morning. THE FOUR LAKES OF MADISON. Four limpid lakes, — four Naiades Or sylvan deities are these, In flowing robes of azure dressed; Four lovely handmaids, that uphold Their shining mirrors, rimmed with gold, To the fair city in the West. By day the coursers of the sun Drink of these waters as they run Their swift diurnal round on high; By night the constellations glow Far down the hollow deeps below, And glimmer in another sky. THE FOUR LAKES OF MADISON. 47 Fair lakes, serene and full of light, Fair town, arrayed in robes of white, How visionary ye appear ! All like a floating landscape seems In cloud-land or the land of dreams, Bathed in a golden atmosphere! MOONLIGHT. As a pale phantom with a lamp Ascends some ruin's haunted stair, So glides the moon along the damp Mysterious chambers of the air. Now hidden in cloud, and now revealed, As if this phantom, full of pain, Were by the crumbling walls concealed, And at the windows seen again. Until at last, serene and proud In all the splendor of her light, She walks the terraces of cloud, Supreme as Empress of the Night. MOONLIGHT. 49 I look, but recognize no more Objects familiar to my view ; The very pathway to my door Is an enchanted avenue. All things are changed. One mass of shade, The elm-trees drop their curtains down ; By palace, park, and colonnade I walk as in a foreign town. The very ground beneath my feet Is clothed with a diviner air ; White marble paves the silent street And glimmers in the empty square. Illusion ! Underneath there lies The common life of every day ; Only the spirit glorifies With its own tints the sober gray. 50 IN TEE HARBOR. In vain we look, in vain uplift Our eyes to heaven, if we are blind; We see but what we have the gift Of seeing; what we bring we find. December 20, 1878. TO THE AVON. Flow on, sweet river! like his verse Who lies beneath this sculptured hearse; Nor wait beside the churchyard wall For him who cannot hear thy call. Thy playmate once; I see him now A boy with sunshine on his brow, And hear in Stratford's quiet street The patter of his little feet. I see him by thy shallow edge Wading knee-deep amid the sedge; And lost in thought, as if thy stream Were the swift river of a dream. 52 IN THE HARBOR. He wonders whitherward it flows; And fain would follow where it goes, To the wide world, that shall erelong Be filled with his melodious song. Flow on, fair stream! That dream is o'er; He stands upon another shore ; A vaster river near him flows, And still he follows where it goes. ELEGIAC VERSE. i. Pekadvejstuhe of old, some bard in Ionian Islands, Walking alone by the sea, bearing the wash of the waves, Learned the secret from them of the beautiful verse elegiac, Breathing into his song motion and sound of the sea. For as a wave of the sea, upheaving in long undulations, Plunges loud on the sands, pauses, and turns, and retreats, 54 IN THE HARBOR. So the Hexameter, rising and sinking, with cadence sonorous, Falls ; and in refluent rhythm back the Pen- tameter flows. 1 ii. Not in his youth alone, but in age, may the heart of the poet Bloom into song, as the gorse blossoms in autumn and spring. m. Not in tenderness wanting, yet rough are the rhymes of our poet ; Though it be Jacob's voice, Esau's, alas! are the hands. l Compare Schiller. Im Hexameter steigt des Springquells fliissige Saule ; Im Pentameter drauf fallt sie melodiscb. herab. See also Coleridge's translation. ELEGIAC VERSE. 55 r IV. Let us be grateful to writers for what is left in the inkstand; When to leave off is an art only attained by the few. Y. I How can the Three be One ? you ask me ; I answer by asking, Hail and snow and rain, are they not three, and yet one ? VI. By the mirage uplifted the land floats vague in the ether, Ships and the shadows of ships hang in the motionless air ; So by the art of the poet our common life is uplifted, So, transfigured, the world floats in a lumi- nous haze. 56 IN THE HARBOR. VII. Like a French poem is Life ; being only per- fect in structure When with the masculine rhymes mingled the feminine are. VIII. Down from the mountain descends the brook- let, rejoicing in freedom ; Little it dreams of the mill hid in the val- ley below ; Glad with the joy of existence, the child goes singing and laughing, Little dreaming what toils lie in the future concealed. As the ink from our pen, so flow our thoughts and our feelings When we begin to write, however sluggish before. ELEGIAC VERSE. 57 X. Like the Kingdom of Heaven, the Fountain of Youth is within us ; If we seek it elsewhere, old shall we grow in the search. XI. If you would hit the mark, you must aim a little above it ; Every arrow that flies feels the attraction of earth. xn. Wisely the Hebrews admit no Present tense in their language : While we are speaking the word, it is al- ready the Past. C- 58 IN TEE HARBOR. xm. In the twilight of age all things seem strange and phantasmal, As between daylight and dark ghost-like the landscape appears. XIV. Great is the art of beginning, but greater the art is of ending; Many a poem is marred by a superfluous verse. 1881. '' A FRAGMENT. Awake ! arise ! the hour is late ! Angels are knocking at thy door ! They are in haste and cannot wait, And once departed come no more. Awake! arise! the athlete's arm Loses its strength by too much rest; The fallow land, the untilled farm Produces only weeds at best. THE BELLS OF SAN BLAS. 1 What say the Bells of San Bias To the ships that southward pass From the harbor of Mazatlan? To them it is nothing more Than the sound of surf on the shore, — Nothing more to master or man. But to me, a dreamer of dreams, To whom what is and what seems Are often one and the same, — The Bells of San Bias to me Have a strange, wild melody, And are something more than a name. 1 The last poem written by Mr. Longfellow. THE BELLS OF SAN BLAS. 61 For bells are the voice of the church ; They have tones that touch and search The hearts of young and old; One sound to all, yet each Lends a meaning -to their speech, And the meaning is manifold. They are a voice of the Past, Of an age that is fading fast, Of a power austere and grand; When the flag of Spain unfurled Its folds o'er this western world, And the Priest was lord of the land. The chapel that once looked down On the little seaport town Has crumbled into the dust; And on oaken beams below The bells swing to and fro, And are green with mould and rust. 62 IN THE HARBOR. "Is, then, the old faith dead," They say, "and in its stead Is some new faith proclaimed, M That we are forced to remain Naked to sun and rain, Unsheltered and ashamed? "Once in our tower aloof We rang over wall and roof Our warnings and our complaints; And round about us there The white doves filled the air, Like the white souls of the saints. " The saints ! Ah, have they grown Forgetful of their own ? Are they asleep, or dead, That open to the sky Their ruined Missions lie, No longer tenanted? THE BELLS OF SAN BLAS. , 63 " Oh, bring us back once more The vanished days of yore, When the world with faith was filled; Bring back the fervid zeal, The hearts of fire and steel, The hands that believe and build. " Then from our tower again We will send over land and main Our voices of command, Like exiled kings who return To their thrones, and the people learn That the Priest is lord of the land!" O Bells of San Bias, in vain Ye call back the Past again ! The Past is deaf to your prayer : Out of the shadows of night The world rolls into light ; It is daybreak everywhere. March 15, 1882. TBANSLATIONS. 1 V ; PRELUDE. As treasures that men seek, Deep-buried in sea-sands, Vanish if they but speak, And elude their eager hands. So ye escape and slip, O songs, and fade away, When the word is on my lip To interpret what ye say. Were it not better, then, To let the treasures rest Hid from the eyes of men, Locked in their iron chest ? 68 IN THE HARBOR. I have but marked the place, But half the secret told, That, following this slight trace, Others may find the gold. FROM THE FRENCH. Will ever the dear days come back again, Those days of June, when lilacs were in bloom, And bluebirds sang their sonnets in the gloom Of leaves that roofed them in from sun or rain? I know not ; but a presence will remain Forever and forever in this room, Formless, diffused in air, like a perfume, — A phantom of the heart, and not the brain. Delicious days ! when every spoken word Was like a foot-fall nearer ajid more near, And a mysterious knocking at the gate 70 IN TEE HARBOR. Of the heart's secret places, and we heard In the sweet tumult of delight and fear A voice that whispered, " Open, I cannot wait ! " THE WINE OF JURANCON. FROM THE FRENCH OF CHARLES CORAN. Little sweet wine of Jurangon, You are dear to my memory still ! With mine host and his merry song, Under the rose-tree I drank my fill. Twenty years after, passing that way, Under the trellis I found again Mine host, still sitting there an frais, And singing still the same refrain. The Jurancon, so fresh and bold, Treats me as one it used to know; Souvenirs of the days of old Already from the bottle flow. 72 IN THE HARBOR With glass in hand our glances met ; We pledge, we drink. How sour it is ! Never Argenteuil piquette Was to my palate sour as this ! And yet the vintage was good, in sooth ; The self -same juice, the self -same cask ! It was you, O gayety of my youth, That failed in the autumnal flask! AT LA CHAUDEAU. PROM THE FRENCH OF XAVIER MARMIER. At La Chaudeau, — ' t is long since then I was young, — my years twice ten ; All things smiled on the happy boy, Dreams of love and songs of joy, Azure of heaven and wave below, At La Chaudeau. To La Chaudeau I come back old : My head is gray, my blood is cold; Seeking along the meadow ooze, Seeking beside the river Seymouse, The days of my spring-time of long ago At La Chaudeau. 74 IN THE HARBOR. At La Chaudeau nor heart nor brain Ever grows old with grief and pain ; A sweet remembrance keeps off age; A tender friendship doth still assuage The burden of sorrow that one may know At La Chaudeau. At La Chaudeau, had fate decreed To limit the wandering life I lead, Peradventure I still, forsooth, Should have preserved my fresh green youth, Under the shadows the hill-tops throw At La Chaudeau. At La Chaudeau, live on, my friends, Happy to be where God intends ; And sometimes, by the evening fire, Think of him whose sole desire Is again to sit in the old chateau At La Chaudeau. A QUIET LIFE. FROM THE FRENCH. Let him who will, by force or fraud innate, Of courtly grandeurs gain the slippery height ; I, leaving not the home of my delight, Far from the world and noise will medi- tate. Then, without pomps or perils of the great, I shall behold the day succeed the night; Behold the alternate seasons take their flight, And in serene repose old age await. And so, whenever Death shall come to close The happy moments that my days compose, I, full of years, shall die, obscure, alone ! 76 IN THE HARBOR. How wretched is the man, with honors crowned, Who, having not the one thing needful found, Dies, known to all, but to himself un- known. September 11, 1879. PEBSONAL POEMS. LOSS AND GAIN. When I compare What I have lost with what I have gained, What I have missed with what attained, Little room do I find for pride. I am aware How many days have been idly spent ; How like an arrow the good intent Has fallen short or been turned aside. But who shall dare To measure loss and gain in this wise? * Defeat may be victory in disguise ; The lowest ebb is the turn of the tide. AUTUMN WITHIN. It is autumn ; not without, But within me is the cold. Youth and spring are all about ; It is I that have grown old. Birds are darting through the air, Singing, building without rest ; Life is stirring everywhere, Save within my lonely breast. There is silence : the dead leaves Fall and rustle and are still; Beats no flail upon the sheaves, Comes no murmur from the mill. April 9, 1874. VICTOR AND VANQUISHED. As one who long hath fled with panting breath Before his foe, bleeding and near to fall, I turn and set my back against the wall, And look thee in the face, triumphant Death. I call for aid, and no one answereth ; I am alone with thee, who conquerest all ; Yet me thy threatening form doth not ap- pall, For thou art but a phantom and a wraith. Wounded and weak, sword broken at the hilt, With armor shattered, and without a shield, I stand unmoved ; do with me what thou wilt ; I can resist no more, but will not yield. This is no tournament where cowards tilt ; The vanquished here is victor of the field. April 4, 1876. -7 MEMORIES. Oft I remember those whom I have known In other days, to whom my heart was led As by a magnet, and who are not dead, But absent, and their memories overgrown With other thoughts and troubles of my own, As graves with grasses are, and at their head The stone with moss and lichens so o'er- spread, Nothing is legible but the name alone. And is it so with them? After long years, Do they remember me in the same way, And is the memory pleasant as to me? I fear to ask ; yet wherefore are my fears ? Pleasures, like flowers, may wither and de- cay, And yet the root perennial may be. September 23, 1881. MY BOOKS. Sadly as some old mediaeval knight Gazed at the arms he could no longer wield, The sword two-handed and the shining shield Suspended in the hall, and full in sight, While secret longings for the lost delight Of tourney or adventure in the field Came over him, and tears but half concealed Trembled and fell upon his beard of white, So I behold these books upon their shelf, My ornaments and arms of other days ; Not wholly useless, though no longer used, For they remind me of my other self, Younger and stronger, and the pleasant ways In which I walked, now clouded and con- fused. December 27, 1881. L'EBTVOI. POSSIBILITIES. Wheee are the Poets, unto whom belong The Olympian heights ; whose singing shafts were sent Straight to the mark, and not from bows half bent, But with the utmost tension of the thong ? Where are the stately argosies of song, Whose rushing keels made music as they went Sailing in search of some new continent, With all sail set, and steady winds and strong ? Perhaps there lives some dreamy boy, un- taught In schools, some graduate of the field or street, 88 IN THE HARBOR Who shall become a master of the art, An admiral sailing the high seas of thought, Fearless and first, and steering with his fleet For lands not yet laid down in any chart. January 17, 1882. I Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide Treatment Date: Sept. 2009 PreservationTechnologies A WORLD LEADER IN COLLECTIONS PRESERVATION 1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive Cranberry Townsh p, PA 16056 (724)779-2111 BEQUEST OF LEONARD KEBLER TO 1HE LttRARY OF CONGRESS SEPTEMBER 1961