Burroughs was born April 3d, 1837, at Roxbury, N. Y. He has distinguished himself as a genial observer of natural phenomena, and his books about birds, flowers, and out-of-door life have a distinctive value, as coming from one at once a poet and a naturalist. He is the author of "Walt Whitman as Poet and Person" (1867); "Wake Robin" (1871); 66 Winter Sunshine" (1875); "Birds and Poets" (1877); "Locusts and Wild Honey" (1879). WAITING. Serene I fold my arms and wait, I stay my haste, I make delays, For what avails this eager pace? I stand amid the eternal ways, Asleep, awake, by night or day, The friends I seek are seeking me; No wind can drive my bark astray, Nor change the tide of destiny. What matter if I stand alone? I wait with joy the coming years; My heart shall reap where it has sown, Aud garner up its fruit of tears. The waters know their own, and draw The floweret nodding in the wind The stars come nightly to the sky; Algernon Charles Swinburne. Swinburne, son of an English admiral, was born at Holmwood, near Henley-on-Thames, in 1837. His early education, begun in France, was continued at Eton. In 1857 he entered a commoner of Baliol College, Oxford, but left without taking a degree. In his twenty-third year he published two plays, "The Queen Mother" and "Rosamund." In 1865 appeared his dramatic poem of "Atalanta in Calydon," thoroughly Grecian in form and spirit. The Edinburgh Review pronounced it "the produce of an affluent apprehensive genius which, with ordinary care and fair fortune, will take a foremost place in English literature." In 1866 appeared a volume of "Poems and Ballads," which was considered so objec tionable in its free and sensuous expressions, that, in obedience to the critical outcry against it, the edition was suppressed by the English publishers. Since then Swinburne has published "A Song of Italy" (1867); “Siena, a Poem " (1868); "Ode on the Proclamation of the French Republic" (1870); "Songs before Sunrise" (1871); "Bothwell, a Tragedy" (1874); "Songs of the Springtides" (1880). He is a genuine poet, both in temperament and original vivacity of thought and expression. At times there is a marvellous charm, peculiarly his own, in his diction, which is at once mellifluous and vigorous. It will be noticed that he has revived the old fashion of alliteration in many of his lines. Sometimes this is a defect, but not unfrequently it helps to sweeten the versification. AN INTERLUDE. In the greenest growth of the May-time, I rode where the woods were wet, Between the dawn and the daytime; The spring was glad that we met. There was something the season wanted, The breath at your lips that panted, The pulse of the grass at your feet. You came, and the sun came after, And the green grew golden above; And the flag-flowers lightened with laughter, And the meadow-sweet shook with love. Your feet in the full-grown grasses Moved soft as a weak wind blows; You passed me as April passes, With face made out of a rose. By the stream where the stems were slender, Your bright foot paused at the sedge; It might be to watch the tender Light leaves in the spring-time hedge, If you were April's lady, We'd throw with leaves for hours, If you were April's lady, And I were lord in May. If you were queen of pleasure, And I were king of pain, We'd hunt down love together, Pluck out his flying-feather, And teach his feet a measure, And find his mouth a rein; If you were queen of pleasure, And I were king of pain. Forceythe Willson. AMERICAN. Willson (1837-1867) was a native of Little Genesee, N. Y. "The Old Sergeant, and other Poems," was the title of a volume from his pen, published in Boston in 1867. "The Old Sergeant" has in it more of the narrative and dramatic element than of the poetic, but its pathos is genuine, and Willson fully believed in the possibility of the occurrence he describes. He was himself an intuitionalist, and the spirit-world seemed to him more real than this. In his poem of "The Voice" he describes himself as listening to the words of his deceased wife, and adds: "They fell and died upon my ear, And clasp thy living hand, or die!' The self-same words fell: I am here! "Here? Thou art here, Love!' 'I am here:' I looked around me-everywhere; Like Oberlin, he was firm in the belief here poetically expressed, and claimed to have had frequent interviews with the partner so dear to him in life. Waiting to be ferried over to the dark bluffs op- | I should not have even doubted, to this moment, I posite, When the river seemed perdition, and all hell seemed opposite! "And the same old palpitation came again with all its power, And I heard a bugle sounding as from heaven or a tower; And the same mysterious voice said: 'It is THE ELEVENTH HOUR! ORDERLY-SERGEANT - ROBERT-BURTON--IT IS THE ELEVENTH HOUR! "Dr. Austin!-what day is this?"-"It is Wednesday night, you know." was dead; For my footsteps were as silent as the snow upon the dead! "Death and silence! Death and silence! Starry silence overhead! And behold a mighty tower, as if builded to the dead, To the heaven of the heavens lifted up its mighty head! Till the Stars and Stripes of heaven all seemed waving from its head! "Round and mighty-based, it towered-up into the infinite! "Yes! To-morrow will be New-year's, and a right And I knew no mortal mason could have built a good time below! shaft so bright; What time is it, Dr. Austin?"—"Nearly twelve;" | For it shone like solid sunshine; and a winding "As he grasped my hand, I shuddered-thinking appeared in 1871. only of the grave But he smiled and pointed upward, with a bright and bloodless glave 'That's the way, sir, to head-quarters'—'What headquarters ?'-'Of the brave! 'But the great tower?'-"That was builded of the great deeds of the brave! "Then a sudden shame came o'er me at his uniform of light At my own so old and tattered, and at his so new and bright; "Ah!' said he, 'you have forgotten the new uniform to-night! Hurry back, for you must be here at just twelve o'clock to-night! "And the next thing I remember, you were sitting THERE, and I Doctor, it is hard to leave you-Hark! God bless you all! Good-bye! Doctor! please to give my musket and my knapsack, when I die, To my son-my son that's coming-he won't get here till I die! "Tell him his old father blessed him as he never did before And to carry that old musket-Hark! a knock is at the door! Till the Union-see! it opens!"-"Father! father! speak once more!" "Bless you!" gasped the old gray Sergeant, and he lay and said no more! When the Surgeon gave the heir-son the old Sergeant's last advice And his musket and his knapsack-how the fire flashed in his eyes! He is on the march this morning, and will march on till he dies[until he dies! He will save this bleeding country, or will fight 1866. ON AN OLD PORTRAIT. Eyes that outsmiled the morn, Behind your golden lashes, What are your fires now? Ashes! Cheeks that outblushed the rose, IN VAIN. Clasp closer, arms; press closer, lips, Will crimson 'neath your pressing. For these vain words and vainer tears She waited yester-even : She waits you now,-but in the far With patient eyes fixed on the door, Till death's dark wall rose cold between She heard your footsteps in the breeze, Now silenced lies the gentlest heart By you, a fickle lover! Now vain your false and tardy grief, Vain your remorseful weeping; |