In its throne of light! Sorrow never paineth BALLAD. IT was not in the winter We plucked them as we passed! That churlish season never frowned O, no-the world was newly crowned "T was twilight, and I bade you go, We plucked them as we passed! THE ROMANCE OF COLOGNE. 'T IS even on the pleasant banks of Rhine The thrush is singing and the dove is cooing: Yet woos in vain, for to the voice of love Untouched by lovely Nature and her laws, Fair is she as the dreams young poets weave, But cold as nymph of Lurley. The more Love tries her pity to engross, The more she chills him with a strange behavior; Forth goes the lover with a farewell moan, The young warm heart of woman! 'Tis midnight and the moonbeam, cold and wan, On bower and river quietly is sleeping, And o'er the corse of a self-murdered man In vain she looks into his glassy eyes, No pressure answers to her hands so pressing; Despairing, stunned, by her eternal loss, She flies to succor that may best beseem her; With stern right hand it stretches forth a scroll, The cruel, fatal pact that placed her soul "Wretch! sinner! renegade to truth and God! And side by side the hapless lovers lie; THE KEY. A MOORISH ROMANCE. "On the east coast, towards Tunis, the Moors still preserve the keys of their ancestors' houses in Spain; to which country they still express the hopes of one day returning, and again planting the Crescent on the ancient walls of the Alhambra."- ScOTT'S TRAVELS IN MOROCCO AND ALGIERS. 66 'Is Spain cloven in such a manner as to want closing? "- SANCHO PANZA. THE Moor leans on his cushion, One hand is on his pistol, While his finger feels the trigger And is busy with the lock The other seeks his ataghan, His brows are knit, his eyes of jet And gleam with fatal flashes Like the fire-damp of the coal; His jaws are set, and through his teeth He draws a savage breath, As if about to raise the shout Of Victory or Death! For why the last Zebeck that came And moored within the mole Such tidings unto Tunis brought As stir his very soul The cruel jar of civil war, The sad and stormy reign, That blackens like a thunder-cloud The sunny land of Spain! No strife of glorious Chivalry, But Christians shedding Christian blood A war of horrid parricide, And brother killing brother; Yea, like to "dogs and sons of dogs," That worry one another. But let them bite and tear and fight; The sooner Hagar's swarming sons The sooner shall the Moor behold The Alhambra's pile again, And those who pined in Barbary The sooner shall the Crescent wave And proud Mohammed Ali sit "Alla-il-alla!" tiger-like Across the hall, till from the wall. A massive key of curious shape, The metal might incrust! For since the king Boabdil fell That ancient key, so quaint to see, Hath never been in lock. Brought over by the Saracens Who fled across the main, |