Or in a poisonous unknown land,
With fear and death on either hand,
And listless when the day was done
Have scarcely hoped to see the sun
Dawn on the morrow of the earth,
Nor in our hearts have thought of mirth.
And while the world lasts, scarce again
Shall any sons of men bear pain

Like we have borne, yet be alive.

So surely not in vain we strive Like other men for our reward; Sweet peace and deep, the chequered sward Beneath the ancient mulberry-trees, The smoothed-paved gilded palaces, Where the shy thin-clad damsels sweet Make music with their gold-ringed feet. The fountain court amidst of it,

Where the short-haired slave maidens sit, While on the veinèd pavement lie

The honied things and spicery

Their arms have borne from out the town.
The dancers on the thymy down

In summer twilight, when the earth
Is still of all things but their mirth,
And echoes borne upon the wind
Of others in like way entwined.

The merchant town's fair market-place,
Where over many a changing face
The pigeons of the temple flit,
And still the outland merchants sit
Like kings above their merchandise,
Lying to foolish men and wise.

Ah! if they heard that we were come Into the bay, and bringing home

That which all men have talked about,
Some men with rage, and some with doubt,
Some with desire, and some with praise,
Then would the people throng the ways,
Nor heed the outland merchandise,
Nor any talk, from fools or wise,
But tales of our accomplished quest.
What soul within the house shall rest
When we come home ? The wily king
Shall leave his throne to see the thing;
No man shall keep the landward gate,
The hurried traveller shall wait

Until our bulwarks graze the quay,
Unslain the milk-white bull shall be
Beside the quivering altar-flame;
Scarce shall the maiden clasp for shame
Over her breast the raiment thin

The morn that Argo cometh in.

Then cometh happy life again
That payeth well our toil and pain
In that sweet hour, when all our woe
But as a pensive tale we know,
Nor yet remember deadly fear;
For surely now if death be near,
Unthought-of is it, and unseen
When sweet is, that hath bitter been.

W. Morris.

DAVID PLAYING BEFORE SAUL.

(Saul.)

THEN I tuned my harp,-took off the lilies we twine round its chords

Lest they snap 'neath the stress of the noontide-those sunbeams like swords!

And I first played the tune all our sheep know, as, one after

one,

So docile they come to the pen-door till folding be done.

They are white and untorn by the bushes, for lo, they have fed

Where the long grasses stifle the water within the stream's

bed;

And now one after one seeks its lodging, as star follows star Into eve and the blue far above us, so blue and so far!

Then the tune, for which quails on the cornland will each leave his mate

To fly after the player; then, what makes the crickets elate Till for boldness they fight one another: and then, what has weight

To set the quick jerboa a-musing outside his sand houseThere are none such as he for a wonder, half bird and half mouse!

God made all the creatures and gave them our love and our fear,

To give sign, we and they are his children, one family here.

Then I played the help-tune of our reapers, their wine-song, when hand

Grasps at hand, eye lights eye in good friendship, and great hearts expand

And grow one in the sense of this world's life.-And then, the

last song

When the dead man is praised on his journey-Bear, bear him along

With his few thoughts shut up like dead flowerets! Are balm seeds not here

To console us? The land has none left such as he on the bier.

Oh, would we might keep thee, my brother!'-And then, the glad chaunt

Of the marriage,-first go the young maidens, next, she whom

we vaunt

As the beauty, the pride of our dwelling.-And then, the great march

Wherein man runs to man to assist him and buttress an arch Nought can break; who shall harm them, our friends? Then, the chorus intoned

As the levites go up to the altar in glory enthroned.

But I stopped here: for here in the darkness Saul groaned.

R. Browning.

ODE TO THE NORTH-EAST WIND.

WELCOME, wild North-easter!

Shame it is to see
Odes to every zephyr ;

Ne'er a verse to thee.

Welcome, black North-easter! O'er the German foam; O'er the Danish moorlands, From thy frozen home. Tired we are of summer, Tired of gaudy glare, Showers soft and steaming, Hot and breathless air. Tired of listless dreaming, Through the lazy day: Jovial wind of winter Turns us out to play! Sweep the golden reed-beds; Crisp the lazy dyke; Hunger into madness Every plunging pike. Fill the lake with wild-fowl; Fill the marsh with snipe; While on dreary moorlands Lonely curlew pipe. Through the black fir-forest Thunder harsh and dry, Shattering down the snow-flakes Off the curdled sky.

Hark! The brave North-easter!
Breast-high lies the scent,
On by holt and headland,
Over heath and bent.
Chime, ye dappled darlings,
Through the sleet and snow.

Who can over-ride you?
Let the horses go!
Chime, ye dappled darlings,

Down the roaring blast;

You shall see a fox die

Ere an hour be past.