the mysteries of that haunted room explore —Hear once more that friend infernal – that grim visiter nocturnal!
Earnestly we long to learn all that befalls that bird of yore:
Oh, then, tell us something more!
Doth his shade thy floor still darken? dost thou still, despairing, hearken
To that deep sepulchral utterance like the oracles of yore?
In the same place is he sitting? Does he give no sign of quitting?
Is he conscious or unwitting when he answers "Nevermore?"
Tell me truly, I implore!
Knows he not the littlenesses of our nature – its distresses?
Knows he never need of slumber, fainting forces to restore?
Stoops he not to eating – drinking? Is he never caught in winking
When his demon eyes are sinking deep into thy bosom's core?
Tell me this, if nothing more!
Is he, after all, so evil? Is it fair to call him "devil?"
Did he not give friendly answer when thy speech friend's meaning bore?
When thy sad tones were revealing all the loneness o'er thee stealing,
Did he not, with fellow-feeling, vow to leave thee nevermore?
Keeps he not that oath he swore?
He, too, may be inly praying – vainly, earnestly essaying
To forget some matchless mate, beloved yet lost for evermore.
He hath donned a suit of mourning, and, all earthly comfort scorning,
Broods alone from night till morning. By thy memories Lenore,
Oh, renounce him nevermore.
Though he be a sable brother, treat him kindly as another!
Ah, perhaps the world has scorned him for that luckless hue he wore,
No such narrow prejudices can he know whom Love possesses —
Whom one spark of Freedom blesses. Do not spurn him from thy door
Lest Love enter nevermore!
Not a bird of evil presage, happily he brings some message
From that much-mourned matchless maiden – from that loved and lost Lenore.
In a pilgrim's garb disguiséd, angels are but seldom prizéd:
Of this fact at length adviséd, were it strange if he forswore
The false world for evermore?
Oh, thou ill-starred midnight ranger! dark, forlorn, mysterious stranger!
Wildered wanderer from the eternal lightning on Time's stormy shore!
Tell us of that world of wonder – of that famed unfading "Yonder!"
Rend – oh rend the veil asunder! Let our doubts and fears be o'er!
Doth he answer – "Nevermore?"
SONG OF THE ELVES.
BY ANNA BLACKWELL
When the moon is high o'er the ruined tower,
When the night-bird sings in her lonely bower,
When beetle and cricket and bat are awake,
And the will-o'-the-wisp is at play in the brake,
Oh then do we gather, all frolic and glee,
We gay little elfins, beneath the old tree!
And brightly we hover on silvery wing,
And dip our small cups in the whispering spring,
While the night-wind lifts lightly our shining hair,
And music and fragrance are on the air!
Oh who is so merry, so happy as we,
We gay little elfins, beneath the old tree?
THE FIRE OF DRIFT-WOOD.
BY HENRY W. LONGFELLOW
We sat within the farm-house old,
Whose windows looking o'er the bay,
Gave to the sea-breeze, damp and cold,
An easy entrance, night and day.
Not far away we saw the port, —
The strange, old-fashioned, silent town, —
The light-house, – the dismantled fort, —
The wooden houses, quaint and brown.
We sat and talked until the night
Descending filled the little room;
Our faces faded from the sight,
Our voices only broke the gloom.
We spake of many a vanished scene,
Of what we once had thought and said,
Of what had been, and might have been,
And who was changed, and who was dead.
And all that fills the hearts of friends,
When first they feel, with secret pain,
Their lives thenceforth have separate ends,
And never can be one again.
The first slight swerving of the heart,
That words are powerless to express,
And leave it still unsaid in part,
Or say it in too great excess.
The very tones in which we spake
Had something strange, I could but mark;
The leaves of memory seemed to make
A mournful rustling in the dark.
Oft died the words upon our lips,
As suddenly, from out the fire
Built of the wreck of stranded ships,
The flames would leap, and then expire.
And, as their splendor flashed and failed,
We thought of wrecks upon the main, —
Of ships dismasted, that were hailed,
And sent no answer back again.
The windows rattling in their frames,
The ocean, roaring up the beach —
The gusty blast – the bickering flames —
All mingled vaguely in our speech;
Until they made themselves a part
Of fancies floating through the brain —
The long lost ventures of the heart,
That send no answers back again.
O flames that glowed! O hearts that yearned!
They were indeed too much akin —
The drift-wood fire without that burned,
The thoughts that burned and glowed within.
SONG FOR A SABBATH MORNING.
BY THOMAS BUCHANAN READ
Arise ye nations, with rejoicing rise,
And tell your gladness to the listening skies;
Come out forgetful
