I have waited on the piers,
Gazing for them down the bay,
Days and nights for many years,
Till I turned heart-sick away.
But the pilots, when they land,
Stop and take me by the hand,
Saying, "You will live to see
Your proud vessels come from sea,
One and all, one and all."

So I never quite despair,

Nor let hope or courage fail;
And some day, when skies are fair,
Up the bay my ships will sail.
I shall buy then all I need,—
Prints to look at, books to read,
Horses, wines, and works of art,—
Everything except a heart.

That is lost, that is lost.

Once when I was pure and young,
Richer, too, than I am now,

Ere a cloud was o'er me flung,

Or a wrinkle creased my brow, There was one whose heart was mine; But she's something now divine, And though come my ships from sea,

They can bring no heart to me

Evermore, evermore.

Antony and Cleopatra

I am dying, Egypt, dying!
Ebbs the crimson life-tide fast,
And the dark Plutonian shadows
Gather on the evening blast;

Let thine arm, O Queen, enfold me,
Hush thy sobs and bow thine ear,
Listen to the great heart secrets

Thou, and thou alone, must hear.

Though my scarred and veteran legions
Bear their eagles high no more,
And my wrecked and scattered galleys
Strew dark Actium's fatal shore;
Though no glittering guards surround me,
Prompt to do their master's will,

I must perish like a Roman,

Die the great Triumvir still.

Let not Cæsar's servile minions
Mock the lion thus laid low;

'T was no foeman's arm that felled him, 'T was his own that struck the blow: His who, pillowed on thy bosom,

Turned aside from glory's ray— His who, drunk with thy caresses, Madly threw the world away.

Should the base plebeian rabble
Dare assail my name at Rome,
Where the noble spouse Octavia

Weeps within her widowed home, Seek her; say the gods bear witness,— Altars, augurs, circling wings,That her blood, with mine commingled, Yet shall mount the throne of kings.

And for thee, star-eyed Egyptian-
Glorious sorceress of the Nile!
Light the path to Stygian horrors,
With the splendor of thy smile;
Give the Cæsar crowns and arches,
Let his brow the laurel twine:
I can scorn the senate's triumphs,
Triumphing in love like thine.

I am dying, Egypt, dying!

Hark! the insulting foeman's cry; They are coming-quick, my falchion! Let me front them ere I die. Ah, no more amid the battle Shall my heart exulting swell; Isis and Osiris guard theeCleopatra-Rome-farewell!

All Quiet Along the Potomac

"All quiet along the Potomac," they say,
"Except now and then a stray picket
Is shot, as he walks on his beat to and fro,
By a rifleman hid in the thicket.

"T is nothing-a private or two now and then
Will not count in the news of the battle;
Not an officer lost-only one of the men,
Moaning out, all alone, the death-rattle."

All quiet along the Potomac to-night,

Where the soldiers lie peacefully dreaming; Their tents in the rays of the clear autumn moon, Or the light of the watch-fire, are gleaming. A tremulous sigh of the gentle night-wind

Through the forest leaves softly is creeping;
While stars up above, with their glittering eyes,
Keep guard, for the army is sleeping.

There's only the sound of the lone sentry's tread,
As he tramps from the rock to the fountain,
And thinks of the two in the low trundle-bed
Far away in the cot on the mountain.

His musket falls slack; his face, dark and grim,
Grows gentle with memories tender,

As he mutters a prayer for the children asleep,
For their mother; may Heaven defend her!

The moon seems to shine just as brightly as then,
That night, when the love yet unspoken
Leaped up to his lips-when low-murmured vows
Were pledged to be ever unbroken.

Then drawing his sleeve roughly over his eyes,
He dashes off tears that are welling,
And gathers his gun closer up to its place,
As if to keep down the heart-swelling.

He passes the fountain, the blasted pine-tree,
The footstep is lagging and weary;

Yet onward he goes, through the broad belt of light,
Toward the shade of the forest so dreary.

Hark! was it the night-wind that rustled the leaves? Was it moonlight so wondrously flashing?

It looked like a rifle. . . . "Ha! Mary, good-bye!" The red life-blood is ebbing and plashing.

All quiet along the Potomac to-night;

No sound save the rush of the river;

While soft falls the dew on the face of the dead-
The picket's off duty forever!