But mighty hopes that learn'd to tower and soar
From my own peaks of snow;
Whose prophecies in wave and woodland roar,
When the free tempests blow!

"Like spectral lamps, that burn before a tomb, The ancient lights expire;

I wave a torch, that floods the lessening gloom

With everlasting fire!

Crown'd with my constellated stars, I stand

Beside the foaming sea,

And from the future, with a victor's hand, Claim empire for the free!"

THE FIGHT OF PASO DEL MAR.

GUSTY and raw was the morning,

A fog hung over the seas,
And its gray skirts, rolling inland,

Were torn by the mountain trees;
No sound was heard, but the dashing
Of waves on the sandy bar,
When PABLO of San Diego

Rode down to the Paso del Mar.

The pescador, out in his shallop,

Gathering his harvest so wide,
Sees the dim bulk of the headland

Loom over the waste of the tide;
He sees, like a white thread, the pathway
Wind round on the terrible wall,

Where the faint, moving speck of the rider

Seems hovering close to its fall!

Stout PABLO of San Diego

Rode down from the hills behind;
With the bells on his gray mule tinkling,
He sang through the fog and wind.
Under his thick, misted eyebrows,
'Twinkled his eye like a star,
And fiercer he sang, as the sea-winds
Drove cold on the Paso del Mar.

Now BERNAL, the herdsman of Corral,
Had travell'd the shore since dawn,
Leaving the ranches behind him—
Good reason had he to be gone!
The blood was still red on his dagger,

The fury was hot in his brain,
And the chill, driving scud of the breakers
Beat thick on his forehead in vain.
With his blanket wrapp'd gloomily round him,
He mounted the dizzying road,
And the chasms and steeps of the headland
Were slippery and wet as he trode;
Wild swept the wind of the ocean
Rolling the fog from afar,
When near him a mule-bell came tinkling,
Midway on the Paso del Mar!
"Back!" shouted BERNAL, full fiereely,
And "Back!" shouted PABLO, in wrath;
As his mule halted, startled and shrinking,
On the perilous line of the path.
The roar of devouring surges

Came up from the breakers' hoarse war;

And "Back, or you perish!" cried BERNAL, "I turn not on Paso del Mar!"

The gray mule stood firm as the headland:
He clutch'd at the jingling rein,
When PABLO rose up in his saddle
And smote till he dropp'd it again.
A wild oath of passion swore BERNAL,
And brandish'd his dagger, still red,
While fiercely stout PABLO lean'd forward
And fought o'er his trusty mule's head.
They fought, till the black wall below them
Shone red through the misty blast;
Stout PABLO then struck, leaning farther,
The broad breast of BERNAL at last.
And, frenzied with pain, the swart herdsman
Closed round him with terrible clasp,
And jerk'd him, despite of his struggles,
Down from the mule, in his grasp.
They grappled with desperate madness
On the slippery edge of the wall;
They sway'd on the brink, and together
Reel'd out to the rush of the fall!
A cry of the wildest death-anguish
Rang faint through the mist afar,
And the riderless mule went homeward
From the fight of the Paso del Mar!

KUBLEH:

A STORY OF THE ASSYRIAN DESERT.

THE black-eyed Children of the Desert drove Their flocks together at the set of sun. The tents were pitch'd; the weary camels bent Their suppliant necks, and knelt upon the sand; The hunters quarter'd by the kindled fires The wild boars of the Tigris they had slain, And all the stir and sound of evening ran Throughout the Shammar camp. The dewy air Bore its full burden of confused delight Across the flowery plain, and while, afar, The snows of Koordish mountains in the ray Flash'd roseate amber, Nimroud's ancient mound Rose broad and black against the burning west. The shadows deepen'd and the stars came out, Sparkling through violet ether; one by one Glimmer'd the ruddy camp-fires on the plain, And shapes of steed and horseman moved among The dusky tents, with shout and jostling cry, And neigh and restless prancing. Children ran To hold the thongs, while every rider drove His quivering spear in the earth, and by his door Tether'd the horse he loved. In midst of all Stood Shammeriyah, whom they dared not touch— The foal of wondrous Kubleh-to the Sheik A dearer wealth than all his Georgian girls.

But when their meal was o'er-when the red fires Blazed brighter, and the dogs no longer bay'dWhen Shammar hunters with the boys sat down To cleanse their bloody knives, came ALIMAR, The poet of the tribe, whose songs of love Are sweeter than Balsora's nightingales— Whose songs of war can fire the Arab blood

Like war itself: who knows not ALIMAR? "hen ask'd the men: "O poet, sing of Kubleh!" And boys laid down the knives half burnish'd, saying:

Tell us of Kubleh, whom we never sawOf wondrous Kubleh!" Closer flock'd the group Vith eager eyes about the flickering fire, Vhile ALIMAR, beneath the Assyrian stars, Sang to the listening Arabs:

"GOD is great! 9 Arabs, never yet since MAHMOUD rode The sands of Yemen, and by Mecca's gate The winged steed bestrode, whose mane of fire Blazed up the zenith, when, by ALLAH call'd, He bore the prophet to the walls of heaven, Was like to Kubleh, SOFUK's wondrous mare: Not all the milk-white barbs, whose hoofs dash'd flame

In Bagdad's stables, from the marble floor—
Who, swath'd in purple housings, pranced in state
The gay bazaars, by great AL-RASCHID back'd:
Not the wild charger of Mongolian breed
That went o'er half the world with TAMERLANE:
Nor yet those flying coursers, long ago
From Ormuz brought by swarthy Indian grooms
To Persia's kings-the foals of sacred mares,
Sired by the fiery stallions of the sea!

"Who ever told, in all the Desert Land, The many deeds of Kubleh? Who can tell Whence came she, whence her like shall come again?

O Arabs, like a tale of ScHEREZADE
Heard in the camp, when javelin shafts are tried
On the hot eve of battle, is her story.

"Far in the Southern sands, the hunters say,
Did SOFUK find her, by a lonely palm.
The well had dried; her fierce, impatient eye
Glared red and sunken, and her slight young limbs
Were lean with thirst. He check'd his camel's pace,
And while it knelt, untied the water-skin,
And when the wild mare drank, she follow'd him.
Thence none but SoгUK might the saddle gird
Upon her back, or clasp the brazen gear
About her shining head, that brook'd no curb
From even him; for she, alike, was royal.

"Her form was lighter, in its shifting grace, Than some impassion'd Almée's, when the dance Unbinds her scarf, and golden anklets gleam Through floating drapery, on the buoyant air. Her light, free head was ever held aloft; Between her slender and transparent ears The silken forelock toss'd; her nostril's arch, Thin-drawn, in proud and pliant beauty spread, Snuffing the desert winds. Her glossy neck Curved to the shoulder like an eagle's wing, And all her matchless lines of flank and limb Seem'd fashion'd from the flying shapes of air By hands of lightning. When the war-shouts rang From tent to tent, her keen and restless eye Shone like a blood-red ruby, and her neigh Rang wild and sharp above the clash of spears. "The tribes of Tigris and the Desert knew her: SOFUK before the Shammar bands she bore To meet the dread Jebours, who waited not To bid her welcome; and the savage Koord,

Chased from his bold irruption on the plain,
Has seen her hoofprints in his mountain snow.
Lithe as the dark-eyed Syrian gazelle,
O'er ledge and chasm and barren steep, amid
The Sindjar hills, she ran the wild ass down.
Through many a battle's thickest brunt she storm'd,
Reeking with sweat and dust, and fetlock-deep
In curdling gore. When hot and lurid haze
Stifled the crimson sun, she swept before
The whirling sand-spout, till her gusty mane
Flared in its vortex, while the camels lay
Groaning and helpless on the fiery waste.

"The tribes of Taurus and the Caspian knew her:
The Georgian chiefs have heard her trumpet-neigh
Before the walls of Teflis. Pines that grow
On ancient Caucasus, have harbour'd her,
Sleeping by SOFUK in their spicy gloom.
The surf of Trebizond has bathed her flanks,
When from the shore she saw the white-sail'd bark
That brought him home from Stamboul. Never yet,
O Arabs, never yet was like to Kubleh!

"And SOFUK loved her. She was more to him Than all his snowy-bosom'd odalisques. For many years, beside his tent she stood, The glory of the tribe.

"At last she died:
Died, while the fire was yet in all her limbs-
Died for the life of SOFUK, whom she loved.
The base Jebours-on whom be ALLAH's curse!-
Came on his path, when far from any camp,
And would have slain him, but that Kubleh sprang
Against the javelin-points and bore them down,
And gain'd the open desert. Wounded sore,
She urged her light limbs into maddening speed
And made the wind a laggard. On and on
The red sand slid beneath her, and behind
Whirl'd in a swift and cloudy turbulence,
As when some star of Eblis, downward hurl'd
By ALLAH'S bolt, sweeps with its burning hair
The waste of darkness. On and on, the bleak,
Bare ridges rose before her, came and pass'd;
And every flying leap with fresher blood
Her nostril stain'd, till SOFUK's brow and breast
Were fleck'd with crimson foam. He would have
turn'd

To save his treasure, though himself were lost,
But Kubleh fiercely snapp'd the brazen rein.
At last, when through her spent and quivering frame
The sharp throes ran, our distant tents arose,
And with a neigh, whose shrill excess of joy
O'ercame its agony, she stopp'd and fell.
The Shammar men came round her as she lay,
And SOFUK raised her head and held it close
Against his breast. Her dull and glazing eye
Met his, and with a shuddering gasp she died.
Then like a child his bursting grief made way
In passionate tears, and with him all the tribe
Wept for the faithful mare.

"They dug her grave
Amid Al-Hather's marbles, where she lies
Buried with ancient kings; and since that time
Was never seen, and will not be again,
O Arabs, though the world be doom'd to live
As many moons as count the desert sands,
The like of wondrous Kubleh. GoD is great!"

[Born,

MR. EASTMAN was educated at the University of Vermont, and has been for several years engaged as a journalist, at Burlington, Woodstock, and Montpelier. He now resides in the latter town, where he is editor of "The Vermont Patriot," the leading gazette of the democratic party in the state. In 1848 he published a collection of "Poems," nearly all of which had previously appeared in various literary miscellanies. They are chiefly lyrical, and the author displays in them

THE FARMER SAT IN HIS EASY CHAIR.
THE farmer sat in his easy chair,
Smoking his pipe of clay,
While his hale old wife with busy care
Was clearing the dinner away;

A sweet little girl with fine blue eyes
On her grandfather's knee was catching flies.
The old man laid his hand on her head,
With a tear on his wrinkled face;
He thought how often her mother, dead,
Had sat in the self-same place:

As the tear stole down from his half-shut eyeDon't smoke," said the child; "how it makes you cry!"

64

The house-dog lay stretch'd out on the floor Where the shade after noon used to steal; The busy old wife by the open door

Was turning the spinning-wheel; And the old brass clock on the manteltree Had plodded along to almost three :

Still the farmer sat in his easy chair, While close to his heaving breast The moisten'd brow and the cheek so fair Of his sweet grandchild were press'd; His head, bent down, on her soft hair layFast asleep were they both, that summer day.

MILL MAY.

THE strawberries grow in the mowing, MILL MAX,
And the bob-o'-link sings on the tree;

On the knolls the red clover is growing, MILL MAY,
Then come to the meadow with me!
We'll pick the ripe clusters among the deep grass,
On the knolls in the mowing, MILL MAY,
And the long afternoon together we'll pass,

Where the clover is growing, MILL MAY, Come! come, ere the season is over, MILL MAY, To the fields where the strawberries grow, While the thick-growing stems and the clover, MILL Shall meet us wherever we go; [MAY,

We'll pick the ripe clusters among the deep grass,
On the knolls in the mowing, MILL MAY,
And the long afternoon together we'll pass,
Where the clover is growing MILL MAY.
The sun, stealing under your bonnet, MILL MAY,
Shall kiss a soft glow to your face,

And your lip the strawberry leave on it, MILL MAT,
A tint that the sea-shell would grace;
Then come the ripe clusters among the deep grass
We'll pick in the mowing, MILL MAY,
And the long afternoon together we'll pass,
Where the clover is growing, MILL MAY.

HER GRAVE IS BY HER MOTHER'S.

HER grave is by her mother's,

Where the strawberries grow wild, And there they've slept for many a year, The mother and the child.

She was the frailest of us all,

And, from her mother's breast,
We hoped, and pray'd, and trembled, more
For her, than all the rest.

So frail, alas! she could not bear
The gentle breath of Spring,
That scarce the yellow butterfly
Felt underneath its wing.

How hard we strove to save her, love
Like ours alone can tell;

And only those know what we lost,
Who've loved the lost as well.

Some thirteen summers from her birth,
When th' reaper cuts the grain,
We laid her in the silent earth,
A flower without a stain.

We laid her by her mother,

Where the strawberries grow wild, And there they sleep together well, The mother and the child!

MR. STODDARD is a young man, who has within a year or two appeared before the public as a poet. The first poem to which his name was attached attracted notice by a purity and quiet grace of language, which, though echoing at times the masters of song whom he studied, would have suggested a greater range of opportunity and experience than he actually possessed. In the autumn of 1848 he collected a number of his effusions, most of which had previously been published in the Knickerbocker and Union Magazine, into a small volume, with the title of "Foot-Prints." This essay was well received; notwithstanding some traces of unconscious imitation, natural to a young writer, it gave evidence of a clear and vigorous fancy and a correct appreciation of the harmonies of sound and rhythm. Perhaps the most individual trait displayed in its pages is a capacity for finished and picturesque description. His landscapes have a sharp and distinct outline, in which none of the minor features are omitted-a keen

perception of form, in striking contrast to the more glowing coloring and careless outline of young writers in general.

Mr. STODDARD's best poems, from which the following selections are taken, have been written since the appearance of his volume. They give evidence of growing power and a capacity of attaining high excellence in a school of poetry of which we have few modern specimens. The poem of "Leonatus," in its daintiness of metre and language, reminds one of the old English songwriters, whose purity of diction Mr. STODDARD evidently endeavours to emulate. Fortunately for him, he has the industry and untiring enthusiasm without which lasting success is impossible, his literary studies being prosecuted entirely in the scanty intervals of severe physical labour.

Mr. STODDARD is a native of Hingham, Massachusetts, but has resided several years in the city of New York. He was about twenty-one years of age when he published his "Foot-Prints."

LEONATUS.

A LEAF FROM "CYMBELINE."

I.

THE orphan LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN--

His father died when he was small:

A general in the wars with Rome,
Wounded to death, he totter'd home,
And hung his sword upon the wall;
He had borne it through the fight,
Summer, winter, day and night-
He died at last with it in sight,
And they laid it on his pall,
A legacy unto his son;

Other fortune he had none

What need of more, what could he claim As precious as a soldier's fame?

II.

The fair boy LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-

He was now a dainty youth,

His brow was smooth, and fair, and high,
And in the blueness of his eye
Glow'd sincerity and truth.

He was soft and low of speech;
His cheeks were rounded-upon each
Was down, like that upon a peach;
And his golden hair, in sooth

A shower of tresses rich and bright,
Shone down upon his shoulders white,

Like the sunny locks of Spring Falling o'er its snowy wing.

III.

The sweet boy LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-
It was his duty evermore
To tend on Ladye IMOGEN.

By peep of day he might be seen,
Light-finger'd, tapping at her door,
Rousing the sleepy waiting-maid:
When she had risen, and array'd
The princess, and their prayers were said
(On pearled rosaries counted o'er),
They call'd him, pacing to and fro;
And cap in hand, and bowing low,
He enter'd, and began to feed
The singing-birds with fruit and seed.

JV.

The brave boy LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-

He tripp'd along the kingly hall,
From room to room, with messages;
He stopp'd the butler, clutch'd his keys,
And dragg'd him with his hand so small
Into the dusty vaults, where wine
In bins lay beaded and divine;
He pick'd a flask of vintage fine,
Came out, and clomb the garden wall,
And pluck'd from out the sunny spots
Peaches and luscious apricots,

And fill'd his golden salver there, And hurried to his ladye fair.

V.

The gallant LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-

He had a steed from Arab ground,
And when the lords and ladies gay
Went hawking on a festal day,
And hunting in the country round,
And IMOGEN did join the band,
He rode him like a hunter grand,
A hooded hawk upon his hand,
And by his side a slender hound:

When they saw the deer go by,
He slipp'd the leash and let him fly,
And spurr'd his steed, and slack'd the rein,
And scour'd beside her o'er the plain.

VI.

The strange boy LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-

Sometimes he used to stand for hours
Within her room, behind her chair;
The soft wind blew his golden hair
Across his eyes, and bees from flowers
Flew at him, but he did not stir:
He fix'd his earnest eyes on her,
A pure and reverent worshipper,

A dreamer building airy towers.

But when she spoke, he gave a start
That sent the warm blood from his heart
Into his cheeks; and, blushing sweet,
He listen'd, kneeling at her feet.

VII.

The sad boy LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-

He lost all relish and delight

For all things that did please before; By day, he wish'd the day was o'erAnd night, he wish'd the same of night.

He could not mingle in the crowd, He loved to be alone, and shroud His tender thoughts, and sigh aloud, And cherish in his heart its blight.

At last his health began to fail,
His fresh and glowing cheeks to pale;
His eyes grew lustreless and dead,
Like violets ere their dews are shed.

VIII.

The timid LEONATUS,

The page of IMOGEN

"What ails the boy?" said IMOGEN.
Hestammer'd, sigh'd, and answer'd "Naught."
She shook her head, and then she thought
What all his malady could mean;

It might be love: her maid was fair,
And LEON' had a loving air.

She watch'd them with a jealous care,
And play'd the spy, but naught was seen;
And then she was aware at first
That she unwittingly had nursed
Passion, till it had grown a part-
A heart within her very heart!

IX.

The dear boy LEONATUS,

The page of IMOGEN-
She loved, but own'd it not as yet;
When he was absent, she was lone,
She felt a void before unknown,
And LEON' fill'd it when they met.

She call'd him twenty times a day,
She knew not why, she could not say;
She fretted when he went away,
And lived in sorrow and regret;
Sometimes she frown'd with stately mien,
And chid him like a little queen—
And then she soothed him, meek and mild,
As pettish as a wayward child.

X.

The neat scribe LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-
She wonder'd that he did not speak

And tell his love, if love indeed

It was that made his spirit bleed; And she bethought her of a freak

To test the lad: she bade him write A letter that a maiden mightA billet to her heart's delight. He took the pen with fingers weak, Unknowing what he did, and wrote, And folded up and seal'd the note. She wrote the superscription sage"For LEONATUS, ladye's page!"

XI.

The happy LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-

The die was cast, and all was o'er;

She loved him so, she could not stir
But she took LEON' after her,

And they were lovers evermore.
He used to sit beside her feet,

And read the classic poets sweet; And touch her lute, and then repeat Brave legends of the days of yore.

One day he tried to spin: in vain-
He tangled up the silken skein;
His thoughts were busy in his head,
Spinning away a golden thread.

XII.

The daring LEONATUS,
The page of IMOGEN-
They wedded secretly one day,
And grew secure and light of wing;
And tidings came unto the king,
Who frown'd the messenger away.
His child, the glory of his age,
In love, and married to a page!—
"S'death!" he shouted in a rage,
And pluck'd his beard so thin and gray.
He would have burn'd him at the stake,
But for his honour'd father's sake
(JESU, mercy for the dead!)-
And so he banish'd him instead,
And he went out with curse and ban
From Brittany, a ruin'd man-

The wretched LEONATUS,
The lord of IMOGEN!