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Behold the bier,

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the ebony bier, —
On sinewy shoulders borne,
Of many a dim, forgotten Year
From Primal Times forlorn.
All weary and all worn,

With their ancient garments torn
And their beards as white as Lear's,
Lo! how they tremble as they
tread,

Mourning above the marble dead,
In agonies of tears!

How very wan the old man looks!
As wasted and as pale

As some dim ghost of shadowy days
In legendary tale.

God give the sleeper hail !

And the world hath much to wail
That his ears no more may hear;
For, with his palms across his
breast,

He lieth in eternal rest
Along his stately bier.

1 See BIOGRAPHICAL NOTE, p. 799.

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Though winter howleth at the gate, In our hearts 't is summer still!

For we full many summer joys
And greenwood sports have shared,
When, free and ever-roving boys,

The rocks, the streams, we dared;
And, as I looked upon thy face,
Back, back o'er years of ill,
My heart flies to that happy place,
Where it is summer still.

Yes, though like sere leaves on the ground,

Our early hopes are strown,

And cherished flowers lie dead around,

And singing birds are flown, The verdure is not faded quite,

Not mute all tones that thrill;
And seeing, hearing thee to-night,
In my heart 't is summer still.

Fill up! The olden times come back
With light and life once more;
We scan the Future's sunny track
From Youth's enchanted shore;
The lost return: through fields of bloom
We wander at our will;

Gone is the winter's angry gloom,
In our hearts 't is summer still.

Hobert Traill Spence Lowell

THE BRAVE OLD SHIP, THE ORIENT

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The steadying sun heaved up as day drew

on,

And there grew a long swell of the sea. And, first in upper air, then under, everywhere,

From the topmost towering sail
Down, down to quarter-rail,

The wind began to breathe more free.
It was soon to breathe its last,

For a wild and bitter blast

Was the master of that stormy day to be.

"Ho! Hilloa! A sail!" was the topman's hail:

"A sail, hull-down upon our lee!"
Then with sea-glass to his eye,
And his gray locks blowing by,

The Admiral sought what she might be.
And from top, and from deck,

Was it ship? Was it wreck? A far-off, far-off speck,

Of a sudden we found upon our lee.

On the round waters wide, floated no thing beside,

But we and the stranger sail;

And a hazy sky, that threatened storm,
Came coating the heaven so blue and warm,
And ahead hung the portent of a gale:
A black bank hanging there

When the order came, to wear,

Was remembered, ever after, in the tale.

Across the long, slow swell That scarcely rose and fell,

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