HORTON. THE other night I lay within my bed, Watching my dying fire: it mouldered out. I listened to the strange nocturnal cries: A ballad-singer 'neath my window stood, And sang hoarse songs; she went away, and then An oyster-man came crying through the streets; And straight, as if I stood on dusky shores, I saw the tremulous silver of the sea Set to some coast beneath the mighty moon. Just when my soul was sinking into dream, Alarm of "Fire!" ran through the startled street, And windows were thrown up as it went past. A hasty engine tore along, and trailed A lengthening crowd behind. "Ah, ha," I thought, "That maniac, Fire, is loose; who was so tame, When little children looked into his face, He laughed and blinked within his prison-grate. Has rushed into a hungry crimson fiend: Now he will seize a house, crush in the roof, The dead ones to us, took my hand in his, And led me down unto the under-world. We stood beside a drowsy-creeping stream Which ever through a land of twilight stole Unrippled, smooth as oil. It slipped 'tween cliffs ep.58 Gloomy with pines that neʼer were vexed with wind. See p. The cliffs stood deep in dream. The stream slid on, e; Nor murmured in its sleep. There was no noise But Sleep stood silent, and his eyes were closed. Give me this precious water, that I may Bear to my brothers in the upper-world, And they shall call me 'happy,' 'Sent of God,' And Earth shall rest." Sleep answered, "Every night When I am sitting 'neath the lonely stars, The world within my lap, I hear it mourn His orbs were blind with tears-he could not tell. I asked of Grief, as with red eyes he came From a sweet infant's bier; and at the sound He started, shook his head, with quick hand drew His mantle o'er his face, and turned away 'Mong the blue twilight-mists." Sleep did not raise His heavy lids, but in a drowsy voice, Like murmur of a leafy sycamore When bees are swarming in the glimmering leaves, Said, "I've a younger brother, very wise, Silent and still, who ever dwells alone— His name is Death: seek him, and he 66 I cried, "O angel, is there no one else?" But Sleep stood silent, and his eyes were closed. Methought, when I awoke, "We have two lives; The soul of man is like the rolling world, The one has music and the flying cloud, And as I hurried through the busy streets, Larks soaring up the ever-soaring sky, And mild kine couched in fields of uncrushed dew. |