ADAH ISAACS MENKEN.

[Born in New Orleans, 1839; died of consumption in Paris, August 1868. She was the daughter of a merchant, a Spanish Jew, and her maiden name was Dolores Adios Fuertos. Her father dying when she was only two years of age, she was taken by her mother to Cuba, and brought up in the family of a rich planter. This gentleman also died when she was but thirteen-her mother's death had occurred previously. He left her the bulk of his property: but the will was set aside,1 and the girl of fourteen came out on the stage as a dancer,-afterwards playing various parts in tragedy and drama. She next married a Mr. John Isaacs Menken; and, changing her proper name of Adios into Adah, made up the married name by which she thereafter continued to be known. Towards 1860 she married again-Mr. Robert H. Newell, author of the Orpheus C. Kerr Papers: this alliance was termi nated by a divorce. The impetuous actress made her southern sympathies, during the war of secession, rather perilously prominent; and in 1864 crossed over to England, where her performances-chiefly as "the female Mazeppa' '-are fresh in many memories. Of the numbers who admired her lavish graces of face and form, few indeed would have thought that she was predestined the victim of consumption within four years. “She expressed a wish to be buried in accordance with the rites of her religion [the Jewish], with nothing to mark her resting-place but a plain piece of wood bearing the words "Thou knowest : an inscription as sublime and profound as it is majestically simple.

Living a turbid and irregular life, with uncommon versatility of talent (though she showed no great gift for her professional calling as an actress), Adah Menken had a vein of intense melancholy in her character: it predominates throughout her verses with a wearisome iteration of emphasis, and was by no means vamped up for mere purposes of effect. The poems contained in her single published volume are mostly unformed rhapsodies-windy and nebulous; perhaps only half intelligible to herself, and certainly more than half unintelligible to the reader. Yet there are touches of genius which place them in a very different category from many so-called poems of more regular construction and more definable deservings. They really express a life of much passion, and not a little aspiration; a life deeply sensible of loss, self-baffled, and

In some of the incidents-not to speak of the general tenour— of Adah Menken's career, the reader may observe a curious parallelism to that of Edgar Poe: and indeed (allowing for a great difference in poetic merit) the tone of mind and inspiration of the two writers were not without some analogy. Poe was a man and an artist in a direction of faculty wherein Adah Menken was a woman and a votary.

mixing the wail of humiliation with that of indignation-like the remnants of a defeated army, hotly pursued. It is this life that cries out in the disordered verses, and these have a responsive cry of their own].

ONE YEAR AGO.

IN feeling I was but a child

When first we met-one year ago;
As free and guileless as the bird

That roams the dreary woodland through.

My heart was all a pleasant world

Of sunbeams dewed with April tears:
Life's brightest page was turned to me,
And nought I read of doubts or fears.

We met-we loved-one year ago,
Beneath the stars of summer skies:
Alas! I knew not then, as now,
The darkness of life's mysteries.

You took my hand-one year ago,
Beneath the azure dome above;
And, gazing on the stars, you told
The trembling story of your love.

I gave to you, one year ago,
The only jewel that was mine:
My heart took off her lovely crown,
And all her riches gave to thine.

You loved me too when first we met;
Your tender kisses told me so.

How changed you are from what you were
In life and love-one year ago!

With mocking words and cold neglect
My truth and passion are repaid;
And of a soul once fresh with love
A dreary desert you have made.

Why did you fill my youthful life

With such wild dreams of hope and bliss?

Why did you say you loved me then,
If it were all to end in this ?

You robbed me of my faith and trust
In all life's beauty-love and truth;
You left me nothing-nothing save
A hopeless, blighted, dreamless youth.
Strike if you will, and let the stroke
Be heavy as my weight of woe:
I shall not shrink-my heart is cold;
'Tis broken since one year ago.

ASPIRATION.

POOR impious Soul, that fixes its high hopes
In the dim distance, on a throne of clouds,
And from the morning's mist would make the ropes
To draw it up amid acclaim of crowds--

Beware! That soaring path is lined with shrouds ;
And he who braves it, though of sturdy breath,
May meet half-way the avalanche and death.

O poor young Soul, whose year-devouring glance
Fixes in ecstacy upon a star

(Whose feverish brilliance looks a part of earth,
Yet quivers where the feet of angels are,
And seems the future crown in realms afar)—
Beware! a spark thou art, and dost but see
Thine own reflection in eternity.

INFELIX.

WHERE is the promise of my years,
Once written on my brow-

Ere errors, agonies, and fears,

Brought with them all that speaks in tears,-
Ere I had sunk beneath my peers?

Where sleeps that promise now?

Nought lingers to redeem those hours,
Still, still to memory sweet!

The flowers that bloomed in sunny bowers
Are withered all; and Evil towers
Supreme above her sister powers
Of Sorrow and Deceit.

I look along the columned years,
And see Life's riven fane,

Just where it fell, amid the jeers
Of scornful lips, whose mocking sneers
For ever hiss within mine ears

To break the sleep of pain.

I can but own my life is vain,
A desert void of peace.

I missed the goal I sought to gain;
I missed the measure of the strain
That lulls Fame's fever in the brain,

And bids earth's tumult cease.

Myself! alas for theme so poor-
A theme but rich in fear!
I stand a wreck on Error's shore-
A spectre not within the door-
A houseless shadow evermore-
An exile lingering here!

IN from the night.—

ANSWER ME.

The storm is lifting his black arms up to the sky. Friend of my heart, who so gently mark'st out the lifetrack for me, draw near to-night.

Forget the wailing of the low-voiced wind:

Shut out the moanings of the freezing and the starving and the dying, and bend your head low to me.

Clasp my cold, cold hands in yours;

Think of me tenderly and lovingly.

Look down into my eyes the while I question you; and, if you love me, answer me—

Oh! answer me!

Is there not a gleam of peace on all this tiresome earth? Does not one oasis cheer all this desert-world?

When will all this toil and pain bring me the blessing? Must I ever plead for help to do the work before me set?

Must I ever stumble and faint by the dark wayside? Oh the dark lonely wayside, with its dim-sheeted ghosts peering up through their shallow graves!

Must I ever tremble and pale at the great Beyond?
Must I find rest only in your bosom, as now I do?
Answer me-

Oh! answer me!

Speak to me tenderly

Think of me lovingly.

Let your soft hands smooth back my hair;
Take my cold tear-stained face up to yours.

Let my lonely life creep into your warm bosom, knowing no other rest but this.

Let me question you, while sweet Faith and Trust are folding their white robes around me.

Thus am I purified, even to your love, that came like John the Baptist in the wilderness of Sin.

You read the starry heavens, and lead me forth. But tell me if, in this world's Judea, there comes never quiet when once the heart awakes.

Why must it ever hush Love back?

Must it only labour, strive, and ache?

Has it no reward but this?

Has it no inheritance but to bear—and break?
Answer me-

Oh! answer me !

The storm struggles with the darkness.

Folded away in your arms, how little do I heed their

battle!