"You're there, but yet I see ye not. Draw forth each trusty sword
And let me hear your faithful steel clash once around my board;
I hear it faintly: — Louder yet! What clogs my heavy breath?
Up all, and shout for Rudiger, Defiance unto Death!'"

That made the torches flare around, and shook the flags on high : "Ho! cravens, do ye fear him? - Slaves, traitors! have ye flown? Ho! cowards, have ye left me to meet him here alone!

"But I defy him :- let him come!" Down rang the massy cup, While from its sheath the ready blade came flashing halfway up; 10 And with the black and heavy plumes scarce trembling on his head, There in his dark, carved oaken chair Old Rudiger sat, dead.

--

NATHANIEL PARKER WILLIS

1806-1867

BORN in Portland, Maine, educated at Andover and Yale, Willis began his literary career in Boston, where his father had founded the Youth's Companion. Later he removed to New York, where he spent the remainder of his life, and became the most prominent man of letters of his day in America.

His literary reputation has slowly faded since his death. Much of his work-stories, verses, and letters of travel lies buried in the files of the Mirror and the Home Journal. It was distinguished by cleverness rather than by power or depth. But no man ever understood the taste of his own age better than did Willis. He fed this taste with sentimental stories, cleverly turned verses, and letters of travel full of personal gossip. His personal qualities, apart from his literary style, also served to increase his power over the men and women of his time. He was tall, handsome, elegant in dress, joyous in spirit, and both amiable in manner and honorable in conduct. He had, too, that deferential attitude towards women which has always been popu

lar in America. These qualities made him a social favorite, in Europe as well as in America. So dazzling, indeed, were his personal charms that one Englishman spoke of him as a young man likely to attain the presidency, and a Boston merchant said he guessed that Goethe was the N. P. Willis of Germany.

Much of Willis's contemporary fame must, therefore, be set down to the magic of his personality. Readers of to-day, untouched by this subtle wand, easily detect in his literary work much that is false in taste, shallow in feeling, and superficial in thought. A few of his best poems, however, seem likely to survive, and his heroic struggle in the waning days of his strength to support his family in comfort will always appeal to men of spirit and honor.

UNSEEN SPIRITS

THE shadows lay along Broadway,
'Twas near the twilight tide,
And slowly there a lady fair
Was walking in her pride.
Along walked she; but, viewlessly,

Walked spirits at her side.

Peace charmed the street beneath her feet

And Honor charmed the air ;

And all astir looked kind on her,
And called her good as fair,
For all God ever gave to her
She kept with chary care.

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'Twixt Want and Scorn she walked forlorn,

And nothing could avail.

No mercy now can clear her brow

For this world's peace to pray ;

For, as love's wild prayer dissolved in air,
Her woman's heart gave way!-

But the sin forgiven by Christ in heaven
By man is cursed alway!

SPRING

THE Spring is here - the delicate-footed May,
With its slight fingers full of leaves and flowers,
And with it comes a thirst to be away,

In lovelier scenes to pass these sweeter hours,
A feeling like the worm's awakening wings,
Wild for companionship with swifter things.

We pass out from the city's feverish hum,
To find refreshment in the silent woods;
And nature that is beautiful and dumb,
Like a cool sleep upon the pulses broods—
Yet, even there a restless thought will steal,
To teach the indolent heart it still must feel.

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Strange that the audible stillness of the noon,
The waters tripping with their silver feet,
The turning to the light of leaves in June,

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And the light whisper as their edges meet

Strange that they fill not, with their tranquil tone,
The spirit, walking in their midst alone.

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There's no contentment in a world like this,
Save in forgetting the immortal dream;
We may not gaze upon the stars of bliss,
That through the cloud rifts radiantly stream;
Birdlike, the prison'd soul will lift its eye
And pine till it is hooded from the sky.

CHARLES FENNO HOFFMAN

1806-1884

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HOFFMAN was born in New York city, studied at Columbia College, and practiced law in his native city. His tastes, however, were more literary than legal. He was the first editor of the Knickerbocker Magazine, founded in 1833, which was for thirty years the most conspicuous periodical of its kind in the country. It was the forerunner of Harper's and the Century. Among its contributors were Irving, Bryant, Halleck, Willis, Boker, Bayard Taylor, and George William Curtis. This group of writers formed what is often spoken of as the Knickerbocker School. The chief literary work of Hoffman consists of novels and books of travel, all now forgotten. His verse is also fading, but it had a lyrical quality above that of the verse of most of his contemporaries.

In 1849 Hoffman's mind was sadly darkened by an insanity which kept him in seclusion the last thirty-five years of his life.

And on still on our column kept
Through walls of flame its withering way;
Where fell the dead, the living stept,
Still charging on the guns which swept
The slippery streets of Monterey.

The foe himself recoiled aghast,

When, striking where he strongest lay,
We swooped his flanking batteries past,
And braving full their murderous blast,

Stormed home the towers of Monterey.

Our banners on those turrets wave,
And there our evening bugles play;
Where orange boughs above their grave
Keep green the memory of the brave

Who fought and fell at Monterey.

We are not many-we who pressed
Beside the brave who fell that day;
But who of us has not confessed
He'd rather share their warrior rest,

Than not have been at Monterey?

SAMUEL FRANCIS SMITH

1808-1895

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:10

THE author of the national hymn of America was born in Boston. He was graduated in 1829 from Harvard, where Oliver Wendell Holmes was his classmate. Three years after graduation he wrote this famous hymn. He was a Baptist clergyman, and wrote other hymns, as well as books for boys; but his name would soon be forgotten were it not for My Country, 'tis of Thee: