THE BELEAGUERED CITY. BY HENRY WADSWORTH LONG FELLOW. I HAVE read, in some old marvellous tale, Beside the Moldau's rushing stream, The army of the dead. White as a sea-fog, landward bound, The river flowed between. 96 THE BELEAGUERED CITY. No other voice nor sound was there, I have read, in the marvellous heart of man, That an army of phantoms vast and wan Encamped beside Life's rushing stream, Gigantic shapes and shadows gleam Portentous through the night. Upon its midnight battle-ground THE BELEAGUERED CITY. And, with a sorrowful, deep sound, No other voice, nor sound is there, No other challenge breaks the air, And, when the solemn and deep church-bell The midnight phantoms feel the spell, The shadows sweep away. Down the broad Vale of Tears afar The spectral camp is fled; Faith shineth as a morning star, Our ghastly fears are dead. K 97 FELICIA HEMANS. BY LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY. NATURE doth mourn for thee. There is no need For man to strike his plaintive lyre and fail, Save one sad requiem, when its blossoms fell, FELICIA HEMANS. Round the gray turrets of a buried race, And the tall palm that like a prince doth rear With their dim legends blend thy hallowed name. The cloistered chambers, where the sea-gods sleep, Lament for thee, through all the sounding deeps. From the scathed pine tree, near the red man's hut, To where the everlasting banian builds Its vast columnac temple, comes a moan For thee, whose ritual made each rocky height An altar, and each cottage-home, the haunt Of Poesy. Yea, thou didst find the link That joins mute nature to ethereal mind, And make that link a melody. The couch Of thy last sleep, was in the native clime K* 99 |