WHEN I'M BENEATH THE GOLD EARTH SLEEPING. 135

To learn, with saddest pain,

It loved one

Who scorned to own

Her heart could love again.

Fair France, farewell! my latest breath
Shall still be spent for thee,

While meeting strife, I court my death

In distant Galilee.

My soul is bound up with the glaive
That glitters at my thigh,

And fixed upon the banner brave
Now flashing to the sky.

A last adieu I well may waive
To her I loved so well;

She does not care what doom I bear,
Yet, heartless maid, farewell!
No bridal sheet

For me is meet,

I seek the soldier's bier,

Who, for his God,

Sleeps on the sod,
Unstained by woman's tear.

LVI.

WHEN I BENEATH THE COLD RED EARTH AM SLEEPING.

WHEN I beneath the cold red earth am sleeping,
Life's fever o'er,

Will there for me be any bright eye weeping
That I'm no more?

Will there be any heart still memory keeping
Of heretofore?

When the great winds through leafless forests rushing, Like full hearts break,

When the swollen streams, o'er crag and gully gushing,
Sad music make;

Will there be one whose heart despair is crushing
Mourn for my sake?

When the bright sun upon that spot is shining
With purest ray,

And the small flowers their buds and blossoms twining,
Burst through that clay ;

Will there be one still on that spot repining
Lost hopes all day?

When the night shadows, with the ample sweeping
Of her dark pall;

The world and all its manifold creation sleeping,
The great and small-

Will there be one, even at that dread hour, weeping
For me-for all?

When no star twinkles with its eye of glory,
On that low mound;

And wintry storms have with their ruins hoary
Its loneness crowned;

Will there be then one versed in misery's story
Pacing it round?

It may be so, but this is selfish sorrow
To ask such meed,-

A weakness and a wickedness to borrow

From hearts that bleed,

The wailings of to-day, for what to-morrow
Shall never need.

Lay me then gently in my narrow dwelling,
Thou gentle heart ;

And though thy bosom should with grief be swelling, Let no tear start;

It were in vain,—for Time hath long been knellingSad one, depart!

LVII.

SPIRITS OF LIGHT!-SPIRITS OF SHADE!

SPIRITS of Light! Spirits of Shade !

Hark to the voice of your love-craz'd maid,
Who singeth all night so merrily,

Under the cope of the huge elm tree.

The snow may fall, and the bitter wind blow,
But still with love must her heart overflow.

The great elm tree is leafy and high,

And its topmost branch wanders far up in the sky; It is clothed with leaves from top to toe;

For it loveth to hear the wild winds blow,—

The winds that travel so fast and free,

Over the land, and over the sea,

Singing of marvels continuously.

The moon of these leaves is shining ever,

And they dance like the waves of a gleaming river.

But, oft in the night,

When her smile shines bright,

With the cold, cold dew they shiver.

Oh, woe is me, for the suffering tree,

And the little green leaves that shiver and dream

In the icy moonbeam.

Oh, woe is me !

I would I were clad with leaves so green,

And grew like this elm, a fair forest queen;

S

Could shoot up ten fingers like branches tall,
Till the cold-cold dews would on me fall;
For to shiver is sweet when winds blow keen,
Or hoar frost powders the dreary scene.
And oh! I would like that my flesh could creep
With cold, as it was wont to do;

And that my heart, like a flower went to sleep,
When Winter his icy trumpet blew,

And shook o'er the wolds and moorland fells,

His crisping beard of bright icicles,

While his breath, as it swept adown the strath,

Smote with death the burn as it brawled on its path,

Stilled its tongue, and laid it forth

In a lily-white smock from the freezing north.
But woe, deep woe,

It is not so.

Spirits of Light! Spirits of Shade!

Hearken once more to your love-stricken maid,

For, oh, she is sad as sad may be,

Pining all night underneath this tree,

Yet lacking thy goodly company.

She is left self-alone,

While the old forests groan,

As they hear, down rushing from the skies,
The embattled squadrons of the air,
Pealing o'er ridgy hills their cries

Of battle, and of fierce despair.

Through sunless valleys, deep and drear,
Hark, to their trumpets' brassy blare,
The tramp of steed, and crash of spear!
Nearer yet the strife sweeps on,
And I am left thus self-alone,
With never a guardian spirit near,
To couch for me a generous lance,
When the storm fiends madly prance
On their steeds of cloud and flame,

To work a gentle maiden shame,

Oh, misery!

I die; and yet I scorn to blame
Inconstancy.

All in this old wood,

They may shed my blood,
But false to my true love
I never can be.

Peace, breaking heart! it is not so,
For sweetly I hear your voices flow-
All your sad soft voices flow
Like the murmurs of the ocean,
Kissed by Zephyrs into motion;
And when shells have found a tongue
To sing, as they were wont to sing,
When this noble world was young;
And the sea formed love's bright ring,
And hearts found hearts in every thing.
Now the trees find apt replying,

To your music, with a sighing

That doth witch the owl to sleep;

And, waving their great arms to and fro,

They feel ye walk, and their heads they bow

In adoration deep.

And I, with very joy could now,

Like weakest infant weep,

That hath its humour, and doth go

With joy-wrung tears to sleep.

And now all the leaves that are sere and dry,
Noiselessly fall, like stars from the sky;
They are showering down on either hand,
A brown, brown burden upon the land.
And thus it will be with the love-stricken maid,
That loveth the Spirits of Light and Shade,