What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,

From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

Hear the mellow wedding-bells,
Golden bells!

What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
Through the balmy air of night
How they ring out their delight
From the molten, golden notes!
And all in tune,

What a liquid ditty floats

To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats
On the moon!

Oh, from out the sounding cells,
What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!

How it swells!

How it dwells

296

THE BELLS.

On the Future! how it tells
Of the rapture that impels
To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells —

Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells

To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!

Hear the loud alarum bells

Brazen bells!

What a tale of terror now their turbulency tells!
In the startled ear of night

How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,

They can only shriek, shriek,
Out of tune,

In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire,
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,

And a resolute endeavor,

Now now to sit or never,

By the side of the pale-faced moon.

Oh, the bells, bells, bells!

What a tale their terror tells
Of despair!

How they clang, and clash, and roar
What a horror they outpour

On the bosom of the palpitating air!

Yet the ear, it fully knows,

By the twanging
And the clanging,

THE BELLS.

How the danger ebbs and flows;
Yet the ear distinctly tells,
In the jangling

And the wrangling,

How the danger sinks and swells,

297

y the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells

Of the bells

Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells

In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!

Hear the tolling of the bells
Iron bells!

What a world of solemn thought their monody compels !

In the silence of the night
How we shiver with affright

At the melancholy menace of their tone!

For every sound that floats

From the rust within their throats,
Is a groan:

And the people - ah, the people -
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,

And who, tolling, tolling, tolling,
In that muffled monotone,

Feel a glory in so rolling

On the human heart a stone
They are neither man nor woman
They are neither brute nor human
They are Ghouls!

298

THE BELLS.

And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls, rolls,

Rolls a pæan from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells
With the pean of the bells!
And he dances and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the pean of the bells—
Of the bells;

Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort Runic rhyme,

To the throbbing of the bells

Of the bells, bells, bells,

To the sobbing of the bells;
Keeping time, time, time,
As he knells, knells, knells,
In a happy Runic rhyme,
To the rolling of the bells
Of the bells, bells, bells, -

To the tolling of the bells,
Of the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells,

To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.

RAIN IN SUMMER.

299

RAIN IN SUMMER.

LONGFELLOW.

How beautiful is the rain!
After the dust and the heat,
In the broad and fiery street,
In the narrow lane,

How beautiful is the rain!

How it clatters along the roofs,

Like the tramp of hoofs !

How it gushes and struggles out

From the throat of the overflowing spout!

Across the window-pane

It pours and pours;

And swift and wide,

With a muddy tide,

Like a river down the gutter roars

The rain, the welcome rain!

The sick man from his chamber looks

At the twisted brooks;

He can feel the cool

Breath of each little pool;

His fevered brain

Grows calm again,

And he breathes a blessing on the rain.

From the neighboring school

Come the boys,