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Ex. LXXXVI.—MORNING MEDITATION S.

HOOD.

LET Taylor preach upon a morning breezy,
How well to rise while night and larks are flying,
For my part, getting up seems not so easy

By half, as lying.

What if the lark does carol in the sky,
Soaring beyond the sight to find him out-
Wherefore am I to rise at such a fly?

I'm not a trout.

Talk not to me of bees and such like hums,
They smell of sweet herbs at the morning prime;
Only lie long enough, and bed becomes

A bed of time.

To me Dan Phoebus and his cars are naught,
His steeds that paw impatiently about,
Let them enjoy, say I, as horses ought,

The first turn out.

Right beautiful the dewy meads appear,
Besprinkled by the rosy-fingered girl-
What then-if I prefer my pillow dear
To early pearl?

My stomach is not ruled by other men's,
And, grumbling for a season, quaintly begs-
Wherefore should miser rise before the hens
Have laid their eggs.

Why from a comfortable pillow start,
To see faint flushes in the east awaken ?

A fig, say I, for any streaky part,

Excepting bacon.

An early riser, Mr. Grey has drawn,
Who used to haste the dewy grass among

To meet the sun upon the upland lawn—

Well he died young.

With chairwomen such early hours agree,

And sweeps, that earn betimes their bite and sup;

But I'm no climbing boy, and will not be

All up-all up.

So here I'll lie, my morning calls deferring,
Till something to the stroke of noon;
A man that's fond precociously of stirring,
Must be a spoon.

Ex. LXXXVII.-HIAWATHA'S COMBAT WITH

MEGISSOG WON.

LONGFELLOW.

STRAIGHTWAY from the shining wigwam

Came the mighty Megissogwon,

Tall of stature, broad of shoulder,

Dark and terrible in aspect,

Clad from head to foot in wampum,
Armed with all his war-like weapons,
Painted like the sky of morning,
Streaked with crimson, blue and yellow,
Crested with great eagle-feathers,
Streaming upward, streaming outward.
"Well I know you, Hiawatha !"
Cried he in a voice of thunder,
In a tone of loud derision.
"Hasten back, O Shaugodaya!
Hasten back among the women,
Back to old Nokomis, Faint-heart!
I will slay you as you stand there,
As of old I slew her father!"

But my Hiawatha answered,
Nothing daunted, fearing nothing:
"Big words do not smite like war-clubs,
Boastful breath is not a bow-string,
Taunts are not so sharp as arrows,
Deeds are better things than words are,
Actions mightier than boastings!"
Then began the greatest battle
That the sun had ever looked on,
That the war-birds ever witnessed.
All a summer's day it lasted,
From the sunrise to the sunset;
For the shafts of Hiawatha

Harmless hit the shirt of

wampum,

Harmless fell the blows he dealt it

With his mittens, Minjekahwun,
Harmless fell the heavy war-club;
It could dash the rocks asunder,
But it could not break the meshes
Of that magic shirt of wampum.
Till at sunset Hiawatha,
Leaning on his bow of ash-tree,
Wounded, weary, and desponding,
With his mighty war-club broken,
With his mittens torn and tattered,
And three useless arrows only,
Paused to rest beneath a pine-tree,
From whose branches trailed the mosses,
And whose trunk was coated over
With the Dead-man's moccasin-leather,
With the fungus white and yellow.
Suddenly from the boughs above him
Sang the Mama, the woodpecker:
"Aim your arrows, Hiawatha,
At the head of Megissogwon,
Strike the tuft of hair upon it,

At their roots the long black tresses;
There alone can he be wounded!"

Winged with feathers, tipped with jasper, Swift flew Hiawatha's arrow,

Just as Megissogwon, stooping,

Raised a heavy stone to throw it.
Full upon the crown it struck him,
At the roots of his long tresses,
And he reeled and staggered forward,
Plunging like a wounded bison,
Yes, like Pezhekee, the bison,
When the snow is on the prairie.

Swifter flew the second arrow,
In the pathway of the other,
Piercing deeper than the other;
Wounding sorer than the other;
And the knees of Megissogwon
Shook like windy reeds beneath him,
Bent and trembled like the rushes.
But the third and latest arrow
Swiftest flew, and wounded sorest,
And the mighty Megissogwon
Saw the fiery eyes of Pauguk,

Saw the eyes of Death glare at him,
Heard his voice call in the darkness;
At the feet of Hiawatha

Lifeless lay the great Pearl-Feather,
Lay the mightiest of magicians.

Ex. LXXXVIII.—LAMENT OF A YOUNG LADY.

Ir's really very singular,

I can not make it out,

I've many beaux, yet none propose-
What are they all about?

There's Mr. Bailey comes here daily,
To dinner and to doze;

He smiles and sighs, looks very wise,
And yet he don't propose.

I'm sonnetized, I'm poetized,
I'm paragraphed on paper;
They vow, although I'm very stout,
My waist is very taper;
That I've a very Grecian face,
And rather a Grecian nose,
Yet seeing this, it's quite amiss
That none of them propose.

That Colonel Tancers, of the Lancers,
Sometimes looks speechless things;
He smiles and sighs, and coal black eyes,
And O, the songs he sings!
He does not want encouragement,
Enough of that, Heaven knows!
And then his air, so militaire-
O, if he would propose!

They steal my pocket-handkerchief-
They pray for locks of hair—
They ask me for my hand-to dance,
They praise my grace and air;
And he so often comes to tea-
I wonder he do n't close:
I make his tea, he smiles on me,
And yet he don't propose!

ANON.

At park or play, by night or day,
They follow me about;

Riding or walking, singing or talking,
At revel, mask, or rout!

My father thinks it very hard,

That out of all the beaux,

Who come to dine, and drink his wine,
None of them will propose.

Yes, it is very singular,

I've half a mind to pout;

Of all the beaux, none will propose-
What do they dream about?
However, now my mind's resolved:
In poetry or prose,
Whate'er ensue, or false or true,
One of them shall propose.

Ex. LXXXIX.-BERNARDO AND ALPHONSO.

LOCKHART.

ALL in the center of the choir Bernardo's knees are bent; Before him, for his murdered sire, yawns the old monument. His kinsmen of the Carpio blood are kneeling at his back, With knightly friends and vassals good, all garbed in weeds. of black.

He comes to make the obsequies of a basely-slaughtered man, And tears are running down from eyes whence ne'er before they ran.

His head is bowed upon the stone; his heart, albeit full sore, Is strong as when in days bygone he rode o'er Frank and

Moor;

And now between his teeth he mutters, that none his words

can hear;

And now the voice of wrath he utters in curses loud and clear.

He stoops him o'er his father's shroud, his lips salute the bier; He communes with the corse aloud, as if none else were near. His right hand doth his sword unsheathe, his left doth pluck his beard;

And while his liegemen held their breath, these were the words they heard:-

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