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The Voice of the Waves.

-Then the sea's voice arose

Like an earthquake's under-tone: "Mortal! the strife of human woes Where hath not nature known?

"Here to the quivering mast
Despair hath wildly clung;

The shriek upon the wind hath passed,
The midnight sky hath rung;

"And the youthful and the brave,
With their beauty and renown,
To the hollow chambers of the wave
In darkness have gone down.

"They are vanished from their place—

Let their homes and hearths make moan! But the rolling waters keep no trace

Of pang or conflict gone."

-Alas! thou haughty deep!
The strong, the sounding far!
My heart before thee dies,-I weep

To think on what we are!

To think that so we pass

High hope, and thought, and mind—
Even as the breath-stain from the glass,
Leaving no sign behind!

Saw'st thou naught else, thou main?

Thou and the midnight sky?

Naught save the struggle, brief and vain,
The parting agony!

Oye Voices.

-And the sea's voice replied:

"Here nobler things have been ! Power, with the valiant when they died, To sanctify the scene:

"Courage, in fragile form,

Faith, trusting to the last,

Prayer, breathing heavenwards through the storm: But all alike have passed."

Sound on, thou haughty sea!

These have not passed in vain ;

My soul awakes, my hope springs free

On victor wings again.

Thou, from thine empire driven,

May'st vanish with thy powers;

But, by the hearts that here have striven,
A loftier doom is ours!

O

O YE VOICES.

YE voices round my own hearth singing,

As the winds of May to memory sweet!
Might I yet return, a worn heart bringing,
Would those vernal tones the wanderer greet,
Once again?

Never, never! Spring hath smiled and parted
Oft since then your fond farewell was said;
O'er the green turf of the gentle-hearted
Summer's hand the rose-leaves may have 'shed,
Oft again!

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56

Marguerite of France.

Or if still around my heart ye linger,

Yet, sweet voices! there must change have come:
Years have quelled the free soul of the singer,
Vernal tones shall greet the wanderer home
Ne'er again!

MARGUERITE OF FRANCE.

[Queen of St Louis. Whilst besieged by the Turks in Damietta, during the captivity of the king her husband, she there gave birth to a son, whom she named Tristan, in commemoration of her misfortunes. Information being conveyed to her that the knights intrusted with the defence of the city had resolved on capitulation, she had them summoned to her apartment; and, by her heroic words, so wrought upon their spirits, that they vowed to defend her and the Cross to the last extremity.]

"Thou falcon-hearted dove !”—Coleridge.

HE Moslem spears were gleaming
Round Damietta's towers,

Though a Christian banner from her wall
Waved free its lily-flowers.

Ay, proudly did the banner wave,

As queen of earth and air;

But faint hearts throbbed beneath its folds

In anguish and despair.

Deep, deep in Paynim dungeon

Their kingly chieftain lay,

And low on many an Eastern field

Their knighthood's best array.

Marguerite of France.

'Twas mournful, when at feasts they met,
The wine-cup round to send;
For each that touched it silently
Then missed a gallant friend!

And mournful was their vigil
On the beleaguered wall,

And dark their slumber, dark with dreams

Of slow defeat and fall. Yet a few hearts of chivalry

Rose high to breast the storm, And one-of all the loftiest thereThrilled in a woman's form.

A woman, meekly bending

O'er the slumber of her child,
With her soft, sad eyes of weeping love,
As the Virgin Mother's mild.
Oh! roughly cradled was thy babe,

Midst the clash of spear and lance,

And a strange, wild bower was thine, young queen!
Fair Marguerite of France!

A dark and vaulted chamber,
Like a scene for wizard spell,

Deep in the Saracenic gloom

Of the warrior citadel;

And there midst arms the couch was spread,

And with banners curtained o'er,

For the daughter of the minstrel-land,

The gay Provençal shore !

For the bright queen of St Louis,
The star of court and hall!

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58

Marguerite of France.

But the deep strength of the gentle heart
Wakes to the tempest's call!

Her lord was in the Paynim's hold,
His soul with grief oppressed,

Yet calmly lay the desolate,

With her young babe on her breast!

There were voices in the city,

Voices of wrath and fear

"The walls grow weak, the strife is vain-
We will not perish here!

Yield! yield! and let the Crescent gleam
O'er tower and bastion high!
Our distant homes are beautiful-
We stay not here to die!"

They bore those fearful tidings

To the sad queen where she lay—
They told a tale of wavering hearts,
Of treason and dismay :

The blood rushed through her pearly cheek,
The sparkle to her eye—

"Now call me hither those recreant knights
From the bands of Italy!"

Then through the vaulted chambers

Stern iron footsteps rang;

And heavily the sounding floor

Gave back the sabre's clang.

They stood around her-steel-clad men,
Moulded for storm and fight,

But they quailed before the loftier soul
In that pale aspect bright.