FORGET ME NOT.

THE TOMB OF NAPOLEON.

BY MRS. L. H. SIGOURNEY.

"The moon of St. Helena shone out, and there we saw the face of Napoleon's sepulchre, characterless, uninscribed."

And who shall write thine epitaph ?-thou man
Of mystery and might!-Shall orphan hands
Inscribe it with their father's broken swords?
Or the warm trickling of the widow's tear
Channel it slowly in the sullen rock,

As the keen torture of the water-drop

Doth wear the sentenc'd brain? Shall countless ghosts Arise from Hades, and in lurid flame

With shadowy finger trace thine effigy,

Who sent them to their audit, unannealed,

And with but that brief space for shrift or prayer,

Given at the cannon's mouth?

Thou, who didst sit

Like eagle on the apex of the globe,

And hear the murmur of its conquer'd tribes,

As chirp the weak-voic'd nations of the grass,
Why art thou sepulchred in yon far isle,
Yon little speck, which scarce the mariner
Descries 'mid Ocean's foam?

Thou, who didst hew

Rough pathway for thy host, above the cloud,
Guiding their footsteps o'er the frost-work crown
Of the thron'd Alps-why sleep'st thou thus unmark'd
Even by such slight memento as the hind

Carves on his own coarse tombstone?

Bid the throng
Who pour'd thee incense, as Olympian Jove,
Breathing thy thunders on the battle-field,
Return, and deck thy monument. Those forms
O'er the wide valleys of red slaughter spread
From pole to tropic, and from zone to zone,
Heed not thy clarion-call. Yet, should they rise,
As in the vision that the prophet saw,

And each dry bone its sever'd fellow find,
Piling their pillar'd dust, as erst they gave

Their souls for thee, might not the pale stars deem
A second time the puny pride of man

Did creep by stealth upon its Babel-stairs,

To dwell with them? But, here unwept thou art, Like a dead lion in his thicket-lair,

With neither living man nor spectre lone

To trace thine epitaph.

Invoke the climes,

That served as playthings in thy desperate game
Of mad ambition, or their treasures strew'd

To pay thy reckoning, till gaunt Famine fed
Upon their vitals.

France! who gave so free

Thy life-stream to his cup of wine, and saw

That purple vintage shed o'er half the earth,
Write the first line, if thou hast blood to spare!
-Thou, too, whose pride adorn'd dead Cæsar's tomb,
And pour'd high requiem o'er the tyrant train
That ruled thee, to thy cost-lend us thine arts
Of sculpture and of classic eloquence,
To grace his obsequies at whose dark frown
Thine ancient spirit quail'd; and to the list
Of mutilated kings, who glean'd their meat
'Neath Agag's table, and the name of Rome.

-Turn, Austria! iron-brow'd and hard of heart
And on his monument, to whom thou gav'st
In anger, battle, and in craft, a bride,
Grave Austerlitz, and fiercely turn away.

-Rouse Prussia from her trance, with Jena's name, As the rein'd war-horse, at the trumpet blast, And take her witness to that fame which soars O'er him of Macedon, and shames the vaunt Of Scandinavia's madman.

From the shades

Of letter'd ease, oh Germany! come forth,
With pen of fire, and from thy troubled scroll,
Such as thou spread'st at Leipsic, gather tints
Of deeper character than bold romance
Hath ever imaged in her wildest dream,
Or history trusted to her sibyl-leaves.

-Hail, lotus-crown'd! in thy green childhood fed By stiff-necked Pharaoh and the shepherd-kings, Hast thou no trait of him who drenched thy sands At Jaffa and Aboukir? when the flight

Of rushing souls went up so strange and strong
To the accusing Spirit?

Glorious isle!

Whose thrice enwreathed chain, Promethean-like,
Did bind him to the fatal rock, we ask
Thy deep memento for this marble tomb.

-Ho! fur-clad Russia! with thy spear of frost,
Or with the winter-mocking Cossack's lance,
Stir the cold memories of thy vengeful brain,
And give the last line of our epitaph.

But there was silence. Not a sceptered hand
Moved at the challenge.

From the misty deep,

Rise, island-spirits! like those sisters three,
Who spin and cut the trembling thread of life-
Rise, on your coral pedestals, and write
That eulogy, which haughtier climes deny.
Come, for ye lulled him in your matron arms,
And cheered his exile with the name of king,
And spread that curtain'd couch, which none disturb :
So, twine some bud of household tenderness,

Some simple leaflet, damp with nature's dews,
Around his urn.

But Corsica, who rock'd

His cradle at Ajaccio, turned away,

And tiny Elba in the Tuscan wave

Plunged her slight annal, with the haste of fear, And lone Helena, sick at heart, and grey

'Neath Ocean's bitter smitings, bade the moon With silent finger point the traveller's gaze To an unhonoured tomb.

Then Earth arose,

That blind, old Empress, on her crumbling throne,
And to the echoed question, "Who shall write
Napoleon's epitaph ?" as one who broods
O'er unforgiven injuries, answered-" NONE !"

O gentle ones! come back, we need your smiles
To lighten our night wanderings.

Fairies on the seashore.

The angel hath not left her!

The Duchess de la Valliere.

I MUST not tell how many miles west of the pleasant town of Tewkesbury stands Tranby Hall; for the last surviving members of the family – a couple of aged persons who still retain the same retired habits and love of solitude as earned for their forefathers long ago the name of the Silent Tranbys-would hardly forgive me were I to lay their ancient mansion open to the stare of the hundreds of idle people who roam about Eng