Kind Spirits! may we not believe
That they, so happy and șo fair
Through your sweet influence, and the care
Of pitying Heaven, at least were free
From touch of deadly injury?

Destined, whate'er their earthly doom,
For mercy and immortal bloom?

1817.

XX.

GYPSIES.

YET are they here, the same unbroken knot
Of human beings, in the selfsame spot!
Men, women, children, yea, the frame
Of the whole spectacle the same!

Only their fire seems bolder, yielding light,
Now deep and red, the coloring of night,
That on their Gypsy faces falls,

Their bed of straw and blanket-walls.

Twelve hours, twelve bounteous hours are gone,

while I

Have been a traveller under open sky,

Much witnessing of change and cheer,
Yet as I left I find them here!

The weary Sun betook himself to rest;
Then issued Vesper from the fulgent west,

Outshining like a visible God

The glorious path in which he trod. And now, ascending, after one dark hour And one night's diminution of her power, Behold the mighty Moon! this way She looks as if at them,

Regard not her.

but they

O better wrong and strife (By nature transient) than this torpid life,

Life which the very stars reprove,

As on their silent tasks they move!

Yet, witness all that stirs in heaven or earth!

In scorn I speak not;

they are what their birth

And breeding suffer them to be;

Wild outcasts of society!

XXI.

RUTH.

WHEN Ruth was left half desolate,
Her Father took another Mate;
And Ruth, not seven years old,
A slighted child, at her own will
Went wandering over dale and hill,
In thoughtless freedom, bold.

1807.

And she had made a pipe of straw,
And music from that pipe could draw
Like sounds of winds and floods;
Had built a bower upon the green,

As if she from her birth had been
An infant of the woods.

Beneath her father's roof, alone

She seemed to live; her thoughts her own;

Herself her own delight;

Pleased with herself, nor sad, nor gay;

And, passing thus the livelong day,

She grew to woman's height.

There came a Youth from Georgia's shore,

A military casque he wore,

With splendid feathers drest;

He brought them from the Cherokees;

The feathers nodded in the breeze,

And made a gallant crest.

From Indian blood you

deem him sprung:

But no! he spake the English tongue,

And bore a soldier's name;

And, when America was free

From battle and from jeopardy,

He 'cross the ocean came.

With hues of genius on his cheek,

In finest tones the Youth could speak:

The moon, the glory of the sun,

And streams that murmur as they run,
Had been his dearest joy.

He was a lovely Youth! I guess

The panther in the wilderness
Was not so fair as he;

And when he chose to sport and play,

No dolphin ever was so gay

Upon the tropic sea.

Among the Indians he had fought,

And with him many tales he brought
Of pleasure and of fear;

Such tales as told to any maid

By such a Youth, in the green shade,
Were perilous to hear.

He told of girls

a happy rout!

Who quit their fold with dance and shout,
Their pleasant Indian town,

To gather strawberries all day long;
Returning with a choral song

When daylight is gone down.

He spake of plants that hourly change Their blossoms, through a boundless range

Of intermingling hues;

With budding, fading, faded flowers,
They stand the wonder of the bowers

From morn to evening dews.

He told of the magnolia, spread
High as a cloud, high over head!
The cypress and her spire;

Of flowers that with one scarlet gleam
Cover a hundred leagues, and seem
To set the hills on fire.

The Youth of green savannas spake,
And many an endless, endless lake,
With all its fairy crowds

Of islands, that together lie
As quietly as spots of sky
Among the evening clouds.

"How pleasant," then he said, "it were,

A fisher or a hunter there,

In sunshine or in shade

To wander with an easy mind;

And build a household fire, and find

A home in every glade!

"What days and what bright years! Ah me!

Our life were life indeed, with thee

So passed in quiet bliss,

And all the while," said he, 66 to know

That we are in a world of woe,

On such an earth as this!"

And then he sometimes interwove

Fond thoughts about a father's love:

"For there," said he,

66

are spun