CHRISTMAS-TIME.

HEAP on more wood!-the wind is chill;
But let it whistle as it will,

We'll keep our Christmas merry still.
Each age has deemed the new-born year
The fittest time for festal cheer:
Even heathen yet, the savage Dane
At Iol more deep the mead did drain;
High on the beach his galleys drew,
And feasted all his pirate crew;
Then in his low and pine-built hall,
Where shields and axes decked the
wall,

They gorged upon the half-dressed steer;
Caroused in seas of sable beer;
While round, in brutal jest, were thrown
The half-gnawed rib and marrow-bone,
Or listened all, in grim delight,
While scalds yelled out the joys of fight.
Then forth in frenzy would they hie,
While wildly loose their red locks fly;
And, dancing round the blazing pile,
They make such barbarous mirth the
while,

As best might to the mind recall
The boisterous joys of Odin's hall.

And well our Christian sires of old
Loved when the year its course had rolled,
And brought blithe Christmas back again,
With all his hospitable train.
Domestic and religious rite
Gave honor to the holy night:

On Christmas eve the bells were rung;
On Christmas eve the mass was sung;
That only night, in all the year,
Saw the stoled priest the chalice rear.
The damsel donned her kirtle sheen;
The hall was dressed with holly green;
Forth to the wood did merry-men go,
To gather in the mistletoe.

Then opened wide the baron's hall
To vassal, tenant, serf, and all;
Power laid his rod of rule aside,
And Ceremony doffed his pride.
The heir, with roses in his shoes,
That night might village partner choose;
The lord, underogating, share
The vulgar game of "post and pair.'
All hailed, with uncontrolled delight
And general voice, the happy night
That to the cottage, as the crown,
Brought tidings of salvation down.

The fire, with well-dried logs supplied, Went roaring up the chimney wide;

The huge hall-table's oaken face,
Scrubbed till it shone the day to grace,
Bore then upon its massive board
No mark to part the squire and lord.
Then was brought in the lusty brawn,
By old blue-coated serving-man ;
Then the grim boar's head frowned on
high,

Crested with bays and rosemary.
Well can the green-garbed ranger tell
How, when, and where the monster fell;
What dogs before his death he tore,
And all the baiting of the boar.
The wassail round, in good brown bowls,
Garnished with ribbons, blithely trowls.
There the huge sirloin reeked; hard by
Plum-porridge stood, and Christmas pie;
Nor failed old Scotland to produce,
At such high-tide, her savory goose.
Then came the merry maskers in,
And carols roared with blithesome din;
If unmelodious was the song,
It was a hearty note, and strong.
Who lists may in their mumming see
Traces of ancient mystery;
White skirts supplied the masquerade,
And smutted cheeks the visors made:
But, O, what maskers richly dight
Can boast of bosoms half so light!
England was merry England, when
Old Christmas brought his sports again.
'T was Christmas broached the mightiest

ale;

'Twas Christmas told the merriest tale; A Christmas gambol oft could cheer The poor man's heart through half the year.

And she was there, my hope, my joy, My own dear Genevieve!

She leaned against the arméd man, The statue of the arméd knight; She stood and listened to my lay, Amid the lingering light.

Few sorrows hath she of her own, My hope! my joy! my Genevieve! She loves me best, whene'er I sing

The songs that make her grieve.

I played a soft and doleful air,
I sang an old and moving story,
An old rude song, that suited well
That ruin wild and hoary.

She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes and modest grace;
For well she knew, I could not choose
But gaze upon her face.

I told her of the Knight that wore
Upon his shield a burning brand;
And that for ten long years he wooed
The Lady of the Land.

I told her how he pined: and ah!
The deep, the low, the pleading tone
With which I sang another's love
Interpreted my own.

She listened with a flitting blush,
With downcast eyes, and modest grace;
And she forgave me, that I gazed
Too fondly on her face.

But when I told the cruel scorn
That crazed that bold and lovely Knight,

[1772-1834.]

GENEVIEVE.

ALL thoughts, all passions, all delights,
Whatever stirs this mortal frame,
All are but ministers of Love,

And feed his sacred flame.

Oft in my waking dreams do I
Live o'er again that happy hour,
When midway on the mount I lay

Beside the ruined tower.

The moonshine stealing o'er the scene Had blended with the lights of eve;

Nor rested day nor night;

That sometimes from the savage den, And sometimes from the darksome shade, And sometimes starting up at once

In green and sunny glade,

There came and looked him in the face
An angel beautiful and bright;
And that he knew it was a Fiend,

This miserable Knight!

And that unknowing what he did,
He leaped amid a murderous band,
And saved from outrage worse than death,
The Lady of the Land;

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The scorn that crazed his brain;

And that she nursed him in a cave,
And how his madness went away,
When on the yellow forest-leaves

A dying man he lay;

His dying words—but when I reached
That tenderest strain of all the ditty,
My faltering voice and pausing harp
Disturbed her soul with pity!

All impulses of soul and sense
Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve;
The music and the doleful tale,

The rich and balmy eve;

And hopes, and fears that kindle hope,
An undistinguishable throng,
And gentle wishes long subdued,

Subdued and cherished long.

She wept with pity and delight,
She blushed with love, and virgin shame;
And like the murmur of a dream,

I heard her breathe my name.

Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy,
Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused,
Into the mighty vision passing, there,
As in her natural form, swelled vast to
Heaven!

Awake, my soul! not only passive praise Thou owest! not alone these swelling

rocks,

Forever shattered and the same forever? Who gave you your invulnerable life, Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy,

Unceasing thunder and eternal foam? And who commanded (and the silence came),

Here let the billows stiffen and have rest? Ye ice-falls! ye that from the mountain's brow

Adown enormous ravines slope amain, Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice,

And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge!

Motionless torrents! silent cataracts! Who made you glorious as the gates of Heaven

Beneath the keen full moon? Who bade the sun

Clothe you with rainbows? Who, with living flowers

Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet?

God! let the torrents, like a shout of nations,

Answer! and let the ice-plains echo, God! God! sing, ye meadow - streams, with gladsome voice!

Ye pine-groves, with your soft and soullike sounds!

And they too have a voice, yon piles of snow,

And in their perilous fall shall thunder, God!

Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost!

Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle's nest!

Ye eagles, playmates of the mountainstorm!

Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds!

Ye signs and wonders of the elements, Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise!

Thou, too, hoar Mount! with thy skypointing peaks,

Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard,

Shoots downward, glittering through the pure serene, Into the depth of clouds that veil thy breast,

thou

That as I raise my head, awhile bowed low
In adoration, upward from thy base
Slow travelling with dim eyes suffused
with tears,

Solemnly seemest like a vapory cloud
To rise before me - Rise, O, ever rise,
Rise like a cloud of incense from the
Earth!

Thou kingly Spirit throned among the hills,

Thou dread ambassador from Earth to Heaven,

Great hierarch! tell thou the silent sky, And tell the stars, and tell yon rising sun, Earth, with her thousand voices, praises God.

CHRISTABEL.

PART I.

'T Is the middle of night by the castle clock,

And the owls have awakened the crowing
cock;
Tu-whit! tu-whoo!

And hark, again! the crowing cock,
How drowsily it crew.

Sir Leoline, the Baron rich,
Hath a toothless mastiff bitch;
From her kennel beneath the rock
She maketh answer to the clock,
Four for the quarters, and twelve for the
hour;

Ever and aye, by shine and shower,
Sixteen short howls, not over-loud;
Some say, she sees my lady's shroud.

Is the night chilly and dark?
The night is chilly, but not dark.
The thin gray cloud is spread on high,
It covers but not hides the sky.
The moon is behind, and at the full;
And yet she looks both small and dull.
The night is chill, the cloud is gray;
'T is a month before the month of May,
And the Spring comes slowly up this way.

The lovely lady, Christabel,
Whom her father loves so well,
What makes her in the wood so late,
A furlong from the castle gate?
She had dreams all yesternight
Of her own betrothed knight;

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She stole along, she nothing spoke, The sighs she heaved were soft and low, And naught was green upon the oak, But moss and rarest mistletoe : She kneels beneath the huge oak-tree, And in silence prayeth she.

The lady sprang up suddenly, The lovely lady, Christabel! It moaned as near as near can be, But what it is she cannot tell. On the other side it seems to be Of the huge, broad-breasted, old oak-tree. The night is chill; the forest bare; Is it the wind that moaneth bleak? There is not wind enough in the air To move away the ringlet curl From the lovely lady's cheek, There is not wind enough to twirl The one red leaf, the last of its clan, That dances as often as dance it can, Hanging so light, and hanging so high, On the topmost twig that looks up at the sky.

Hush, beating heart of Christabel ! Jesu Maria, shield her well!

She folded her arms beneath her cloak, And stole to the other side of the oak. What sees she there?

There she sees a damsel bright, Drest in a silken robe of white, That shadowy in the moonlight shone. The neck that made that white robe wan, Her stately neck, and arms were bare; Her blue-veined feet unsandalled were, And wildly glittered here and there The gems entangled in her hair. I guess, 't was frightful there to see A lady so richly clad as she, Beautiful exceedingly!

"Mary mother, save me now!" Said Christabel; "and who art thou?"

The lady strange made answer meet, And her voice was faint and sweet: "Have pity on my sore distress, I scarce can speak for weariness." "Stretch forth thy hand, and have no fear!"

Said Christabel; "how camest thou here?"

sweet,

Did thus pursue her answer meet:

"My sire is of a noble line, And my name is Geraldine: Five warriors seized me yestermorn, — Me, even me, a maid forlorn; They choked my cries with force and fright,

And tied me ona palfrey white.
The palfrey was as fleet as wind,
And they rode furiously behind.
They spurred amain, their steeds were
And once we crossed the shade of night.
white,
As sure as Heaven shall rescue me,
I have no thought what men they be;
Nor do I know how long it is
(For I have lain entranced, I wis)
Since one, the tallest of the five,
Took me from the palfrey's back,
A weary woman, scarce alive.
Some muttered words his comrades spoke :
He placed me underneath this oak;
He swore they would return with haste;
Whither they went I cannot tell-
I thought I heard, some minutes past,
Sounds as of a castle-bell.
Stretch forth thy hand" (thus ended she),
"And help a wretched maid to flee."

Then Christabel stretched forth her
hand

And comforted fair Geraldine:
"O well, bright dame! may you command
The service of Sir Leoline;
And gladly our stout chivalry
Will he send forth, and friends withal,
To guide and guard you safe and free
Home to your noble father's hall."

She rose and forth with steps they
passed

That strove to be, and were not, fast.
Her gracious stars the lady blest,
And thus spake on sweet Christabel:
"All our household are at rest,
The hall as silent as the cell;
Sir Leoline is weak in health,
And may not well awakened be,
But we will move as if in stealth,
And I beseech your courtesy,
This night, to share your couch with me.”

They crossed the moat, and Christabel Took the key that fitted well;