And the whole universe from end to end,
Conscious of me, should tremble to its core !
Spirit heroical, imperious passion,

That sharply sets the pliant face of youth,
That blinds the shrinking eyes of pallid fear,
And plants the lion's heart in modest breasts-
I know that thou hast led, with regal port,
The potent spirits of humanity

Before the van of niggard Time, and borne,
With strides gigantic, man's advancing race
From power to power; till, like a host of gods,
They mock my elements, and drag the secrets
Of my mysterious forces up to light,
Giving them bounds determinate and strait,
And of their natures, multiform and huge,
Talking to children in familiar way.
The hero's sword, the poet's golden string,
The tome-illuming taper of the sage,
Flash 'neath thy influence; from thee alone,
Ambitious planet, comes the marvellous power
That in a cherub's glowing form can veil
A heart as cold as Iceland, and exalt
To deity the demon Selfishness.
O planet, mingle with thy chilling rays,
That stream inspiring to the hero's soul,
One beam of love for vast humanity,
And thou art godlike. Must it ever be,
That brightest flowers of action and idea
Spring from the same dark soil of selfish lust?
Must man receive the calculated gifts
Of shrewd Ambition's self-exalting hand,
And blindly glorify an act at which

The host of heaven grow red with thoughtful shame?
Shall Knowledge hasten with her sunny face,
And weeping Virtue lag upon the path?
Shall man exultant boast advance of power,
Nor see arise, at every onward stride,
New forms of sin to shadow every truth?
Roll on, roll on, in self-supported pride,
Prodigious influence of the hero's soul;
I feel thy strength, and tremble in thy glare!

O many-ringed Saturn, turn away
The chilling terrors of thy baleful glance!
Thy gloomy look is piercing to my heart-
I wither 'neath thy power! My springs dry up,
And shrink in horror to their rocky beds;
The brooks that whisper'd to the lily-bells
All day the glory of their mountain homes,
And kiss'd the dimples of the wanton rose,
At the deed blushing to their pebbly strands,
Cease their sweet merriment, and glide afraid
Beneath the shelter of the twisted sedge.
The opening bud shrinks back upon its shell,
As if the North had puff'd his frozen breath
Full in its face. The billowing grain and grass,
Rippling with windy furrows, stand becalm'd;
Nor 'mong their roots, nor in their tiny veins,
Bestirs the fruitful sap. The very trees,
Broad, hardy sons of crags and sterile plains,
That roar'd defiance to the Winter's shout,
And battled sternly through his cutting sleet,
Droop in their myriad leaves; while nightly birds,
That piped their shrilling treble to the moon,
Hang silent from the boughs, and peer around,

Awed by mysterious sympathy. From thee,
From thee, dull planet, comes this lethargy
That numbs in mid career meek Nature's power,
And stills the prattle of her pluméd train.
O icy Saturn, proud in ignorance,
Father of sloth, dark, deadening influence,
That dims the eye to all that's beautiful,
And twists the haughty lip with killing scorn
For love and holiness from thee alone
Springs the cold, crushing power that presses down
The infinite in man. From thee, dull star,
The cautious fear that checks the glowing heart,
With sympathetic love world-wide o'erfreighted,
And sends it panting back upon itself,
To murmur in its narrow hermitage.
The boldest hero staggers in thy frown,
And drops his half-form'd projects all aghast:
The poet shrinks before thy phantom glare,
Ere the first echo greets his timid song;
The startled sage amid the embers hurls
The gather'd wisdom of a fruitful life.-
Oh, who may know from what bright pinnacles
The mounting soul might look on coming time,
Had all the marvellous thoughts of genius-
Blasted to nothingness by thy cold sneer-
Burst through the bud and blossom'd into fruit?
Benumbing planet, on our system's skirt,
Whirl from thy sphere, and round some lonely sun,
Within whose light no souls their ordeals pass,
Circle and frown amid thy frozen belts;
For I am sick of thee, and stately man
Shrinks to a pigmy in thy fearful stare!

FINALE-CHORUS OF STARS.

Heir of Eternity, mother of souls, Let not thy knowledge betray thee to folly! Knowledge is proud, self-sufficient, and lone, Trusting, unguided, its steps in the darkness. Thine is the learning that mankind may win, Glean'd in the pathway between joy and sorrow; Ours is the wisdom that hallows the child, Fresh from the touch of his awful Creator, Dropp'd, like a star, on thy shadowy realm, Falling in splendour, but falling to darken. Ours is the simple religion of faith, The wisdom of trust in Gon who o'errules usThine is the complex misgivings of thought, Wrested to form by imperious Reason. We are forever pursuing the lightThou art forever astray in the darkness. Knowledge is restless, imperfect, and sad— Faith is serene, and completed, and joyful. Chide not the planets that rule o'er thy ways; They are Gon's creatures; nor, proud in thy reason, Vaunt that thou knowest his counsels and him: Boaster, though sitting in midst of the glory, Thou couldst not fathom the least of his thoughts. Bow in humility, how thy proud forehead, Circle thy form in a mantle of clouds, Hide from the glittering cohorts of evening Wheeling in purity, singing in chorus; Howl in the depths of thy lone, barren mountains, Restlessly moan on the deserts of ocean, Wail o'er thy fall in the desolate forests, Lost star of paradise, straying alone!

A BALLAD OF SIR JOHN FRANKLIN.

"The ice was here, the ice was there,
The ice was all around."-COLERIDGE.

O, WHITHER Sail you, Sir JOHN FRANKLIN?
Cried a whaler in Baffin's Bay.

To know if between the land and the pole
I may find a broad sea-way.

I charge you back, Sir JOHN FRANKLIN,
As you would live and thrive;

For between the land and the frozen pole
No man may sail alive.

But lightly laughed the stout Sir JOHN,
And spoke unto his men :

Half England is wrong, if he is right;

Bear off to westward then.

O, whither sail you, brave Englishman?
Cried the little Esquimaux.
Between your land and the polar star

My goodly vessels go.

Come down, if you would journey there,
The little Indian said;

And change your cloth for fur clothing,
Your vessel for a sled.

But lightly laughed the stout Sir JOHN,
And the crew laughed with him too:--
A sailor to change from ship to sled,
I ween, were something new!

All through the long, long polar day,
The vessels westward sped;

And wherever the sail of Sir JOHN was blown,
The ice gave way and fled.

Gave way with many a hollow groan,

And with many a surly roar,

But it murmured and threatened on every side; And closed where he sailed before.

Ho! see ye not, my merry men,

The broad and open sea?

Bethink ye what the whaler said,
Think of the little Indian's sled!

The crew laughed out in glee.
Sir JOHN, Sir JOHN, 't is bitter cold,
The scud drives on the breeze,
The ice comes looming from the north,
The very sunbeams freeze.

Bright summer goes, dark winter comes

We cannot rule the year;
But long e'er summer's sun goes down,
On yonder sea we'll steer.
The dripping icebergs dipped and rose,
And floundered down the gale;

The ships were staid, the yards were manned,
And furled the useless sail.

The summer's gone, the winter's come,
We sail not on yonder sea:
Why sail we not, Sir JOHN FRANKLIN ?
A silent man was he.

The summer goes, the winter comes-
We cannot rule the year:

I ween, we cannot rule the ways,
Sir JOHN, wherein we'd steer.

The cruel ice came floating on,

And closed beneath the lee,

Till the thickening waters dashed no more;
'T was ice around, behind, before--
My GOD! there is no sea!
What think you of the whaler now?
What of the Esquimaux ?

A sled were better than a ship,
To cruise through ice and snow.
Down sank the baleful crimson sun,
The northern light came out,
And glared upon the ice-bound ships,
And shook its spears about.

The snow came down, storm breeding storm,
And on the decks was laid:

Till the weary sailor, sick at heart,

Sank down beside his spade.

Sir JOHN, the night is black and long,
The hissing wind is bleak,

The hard, green ice is strong as death:-
I prithee, Captain, speak!

The night is neither bright nor short,
The singing breeze is cold,
The ice is not so strong as hope –

The heart of man is bold!

What hope can scale this icy wall,

High o'er the main flag-staff?
Above the ridges the wolf and bear
Look down with a patient, settled stare,
Look down on us and laugh.

The summer went, the winter came-
We could not rule the year;
But summer will melt the ice again,
And open a path to the sunny main,
Whereon our ships shall steer.

The winter went, the summer went,

The winter came around:

But the hard green ice was strong as death,
And the voice of hope sank to a breath,
Yet caught at every sound.

Hark! heard ye not the noise of guns?
And there, and there, again?
"T is some uneasy iceberg's roar,

As he turns in the frozen main.
Hurrah! burrah! the Esquimaux
Across the ice-fields steal :
GOD give them grace for their charity!
Ye pray for the silly seal.

Sir JOHN, where are the English fields,
And where are the English trees,
And where are the little English flowers
That open in the breeze?

Be still, be still, my brave sailors!

You shall see the fields again,

And smell the scent of the opening flowers. The grass and the waving grain.

Oh! when shall I see my orphan child?

My Mary waits for me.

Oh! when shall I see my old mother,

And pray at her trembling knee?

Be still, be still, my brave sailors!
Think not such thoughts again.
But a tear froze slowly on his cheek;
He thought of Lady JANE.

Ah! bitter, bitter grows the cold,

The ice grows more and more; More settled stare the wolf and bear, More patient than before.

Oh! think you, good Sir JOHN FRANKLIN, We'll ever see the land?

"I was cruel to send us here to starve,

Without a helping hand.

"T was cruel, Sir JOHN, to send us here,
So far from help or home,

To starve and freeze on this lonely sea:
I ween, the Lords of the Admiralty
Would rather send than come.

Oh! whether we starve to death alone,
Or sail to our own country,

We have done what man has never done-
The truth is founded, the secret won-
We passed the Northern Sea!

ODE TO ENGLAND.

Он, days of shame! oh, days of wo!
Of helpless shame, of helpless wo!
The times reveal thy nakedness,
Thy utter weakness, deep distress.
There is no help in all the land;

Thy eyes may wander to and fro,
Yet find no succour. Every hand

Has weighed the guinea, poised the gold,
Chaffered and bargained, bought and sold,
Until the sinews, framed for war,

Can grasp the sword and shield no more.
Their trembling palms are stretched to thee;
Purses are offered, heaping hoards-
The plunder of the land and sea—
Are proffered, all too eagerly,

But thou must look abroad for swords.

These are the gods ye trusted in;
For these ye crept from sin to sin;

Made honor cheap, made station dear,
Made wealth a lord, made truth a drudge,
Made venal interest the sole judge

Of principles as high and clear
As heaven itself.

With glittering pelf

Ye gilt the coward, knave, and fool,
Mcted the earth out with a rule

Of gold, weighed nations in your golden scales,

And surely this law never fails

What else may change, this law stands fast

To see Britannia's threatening form,

That loomed gigantic 'mid the splendid haze
Through which they saw her tower—

As, at the morning hour,

The spectral figure strides across her misty hillsShrink to a pigmy when the storm

Reds the delusive cloud,

And shows her weak and bowed,

A feeble crone that hides for shelter from her ills.

O mother of our race! can nothing break

This leaden apathy of thine?

Think of the long and glorious line Of heroes, who beside the Stygian lake Hearken for news from thee!

Apart their forms I see,

With muffled heads and tristful faces bowed-
Heads once so high, faces so calm and proud!
The Norman fire burns low

In WILLIAM'S haughty heart;
The mirth has passed away

From Cœur de Lion's ample brow;

In sorrowful dismay

The warlike EDWARDS and the HENRIES stand, Stung with a shameful smart;

While the eighth HARRY, with his close-clutched hand,

Smothers the passion in his ireful soul;
Or his fierce eye-balls roll

Where his bold daughter beats her sharp foot-tip,
And gnaws her quivering lip.
While the stern, crownless king who strode be-

tween

Father and son, and put them both aside, With straight terrific glare,

As a lion from his lair,

Asks with his eyes such questions keen
As his crowned brothers neither dare

To answer or abide.
How shall he make reply,
The shadow that draws nigh,
The latest comer, the great Duke,

Whose patient valour, blow by blow,
Wrought at a Titan's overthrow,
And gave his pride its first and last rebuke?
What shall he say when this heroic band
Catch at his welcome hand,

And trembling, half in fear,
Half in their eagerness to hear,
"What of our England?" ask

Ah! shameful, shameful task!
To tell to souls like these
Of her languid golden ease,
Of her tame dull history!
How she frowns upon the free,
How she ogles tyranny;
How with despots she coquets;
How she swears and then forgets:
How she plays at fast and loose
With right and gross abuse;
How she fawns upon her foes;
And lowers upon her friends;
Growing weaker, day by day,
In her mean and crooked way,
Piling woes upon her woes,
As tottering she goes

Down the path where falsehood ends. Methinks I see the awful brow

Of Cromwell wrinkle at the tale forlorn, See the hot flushes on his forehead glow,

Hear his low growl of scorn!

Is this the realm these souls bequeathed to you,
That with all its many faults,
Its hasty strides and tardy halts,

To the truth was ever true?

Oh! shame not the noble dead,

Who through storm and slaughter led,
With toil and care and pain,
Winning glory, grain by grain,
Till no land that history knows
With such unutterable splendor glows!

Awake! the spirit yet survives

To baffle fate and conquer foes!
If not among your lords it lives,
Your chartered governors, if they
Have not the power to lead, away,
Away with lords! and give the men
Whom nature gives the right to sway,
Who love their country with a fire
That, for her darkness burns the higher-
Give these the rule! Abase your ken,
Look downward to your heart for those
In whom your ancient life blood flows,
And let their souls aspire!
Somewhere, I trust in God, remain,
Untainted by the golden stain,

Men worthy of an English sire;
Bold men who dare, in wrong's despite,
Speak truth, and strike a blow for right;
Men who have ever but their trust,

Neither in rank nor gold,

Nor aught that's bought and sold,
But in high aims, and God the just!
Seek through the land,

On every hand,

Rear up the strong, the feeble lop;

Laugh at the star and civic fur,

1855.

The blazoned shield and gartered kneeThe gewgaws of man's infancy;

And if the search be vain,
Give it not o'er too suddenly-

I swear the soul still lives in thee!-
Down to the lowest atoms drop,
Down to the very dregs, and stir
The People to the top!

-

LIDA.

LIDA, lady of the land,

Called by men "the blue-eyed wonder," Hath a lily forehead fanned

By locks the sunlight glitters under. She hath all that's scattered round, Through a race of winning creatures, All-except the beauty found

By JOHNNY GORDON in my features. LIDA, lady of the land,

Hath full many goodly houses; Fields and parks, on every hand,

Where your foot the roebuck rouses;
She hath orchards, garden-plots,

Valleys deep and mountains swelling,
All except yon nest of cots,
JOHNNY GORDON'S humble dwelling.

LIDA, lady of the land,

Hath treasures, more than she remembers, Heaps of dusty gems that stand

Like living coals among the embers: She hath gold whose touch would bring A lordship to a lowly peasant;

All

except this little ring, JOHNNY GORDON'S humble present.

LIDA, lady of the land,

Hath a crowd of gallant suitors; Squires who fly at her command, Knights her slightest motion tutors: She hath barons kneeling mute,

To hear the fortune of their proffers; All-except the honest suit

JOHNNY GORDON humbly offers.

LIDA, lady of the land,

Keep your wondrous charms untroubled, May your wide domain expand,

May your gems and gold be doubled! Keep your lords on bended knec !

Take all earth, and leave us lonely, All-except you take from me Humble JOHNNY GORDON only!

rary Messenger" magazine, which he has since conducted, in a manner eminently creditable to his abilities, taste, and temper. Besides his large and various contributions to this periodical, he has made frequent public addresses at colleges, deliver ed several ingenious and highly finished lectures, and written occasional papers for the literary jour nals of the north and south. He is one of the most accomplished and most useful writers of the

It is not that the sculptor's patient toil Gives sweet expression to the poet's dream It is not that the cold and rigid stone Is taught to mock the human face divine. That silently we stand before her form And feel as in a holy presence there. But in those fair, calm lineaments of hers, All pure and passionless, we catch the glow The bright intelligence of soul infused, And tender memories of gentle things, And sorrowing innocence and hopeful trust. In some secluded vale of Arcady, In playful gambols o'er its sunny slopes, Had nature led her childish feet to stray; Or she had watched the blue Egean wave Dash on the sands of "sea-born Salamis;" Or, in her infant sports, had sank to sleep, Beneath the wasting shadow of that porch, Whose sculptured gods, upon its crumbling front, Reveal the glories of a bygone age. There, watered by affection's richest dews This lovely floweret, day by day grew up In beauty and in fragrance.

....

Now, a slave, Fettered and friendless in the market-place Of that imperial city of the cast, Whose thousand minarets at eve resound With the muezzin's sunset call to prayer, She stands exposed to the unhallowed gaze And the rude jests of every passer-by. There in her loveliness, disrobed, for sale, Girt with no vesture save her purity, A ray of placid resignation beams In every line of her sweet countenance, And on the lip a half-disdainful curl Proclaims the helpless victim in her chains Victorious in a maiden's modesty! There does the poor dejected slave display A mien the fabled goddess could not wear, A look and gesture that might well beseem Some seraph from that bright meridian shore, Where walk the angels of the Christian's creed..

Sweet visions cheer'd the sculptor's lonely hours,
And glorious images of heavenly mould
Came trooping at his call, as blow by blow,
The marble yielded to his constant toil,
And when he gave his last informing touch
And raised the chisel from that radiant hrow,
And gazed upon the work of his own hands,
So cunningly struck out from shapeless stone,
His eye dilated with a conscious joy,

That patient effort with enduring life
Had clothed his beauteous and majestic child.
Such are thy triumphs, genius! such rewards
As far outweigh all perishable gifts,
Ingots of silver and barbaric gold

And all the trophies of tiaraed pride.

TO MISS AMELIE LOUISE RIVES,

ON HER DEPARTURE FOR FRANCE

LADY! that bark will be more richly freighted, That bears thee proudly on to foreign shores, Than argosies of which old poets prated,

With Colchian fleece or with Peruvian ores; And should the prayers of friendship prove availing. That trusting hearts now offer up for thee. "T will ride the crested wave with braver sailing Than ever pinnace on the Pontic sea. The sunny land thou seekest o'er the billow May boast indeed the honors of thy barth, And they may keep a vigil round thy pillow

Whom thou dost love most dearly upon earth Yet, shall there not remain with thee a visionSome lingering thought of happy faces hereFonder and fairer than the dreams elysian

Wherein thy future's radiant hues appear? The high and great shall render thee obeisance, In halls bedecked with tapestries of gold, And mansions shall be brighter for thy presence, Where swept the stately MEDICIs of old; Still amid the pomp of all this courtly lustre I cannot think that thou wilt all forget The pleasing fantasies that thickly cluster Around the walls of the old homestead yet!