THE HEMLOCK-TREE. O HEMLOCK tree! O hemlock-tree! how faithful are thy branches! Green not alone in summer-time, But in the winter's frost and rime! O hemlock-tree! O hemlock-tree! how faithful are thy branches! O maiden fair! O maiden fair! how faithless is thy bosom! To love me in prosperity, And leave me in adversity! O maiden fair! O maiden fair! how faithless is thy bosom. The nightingale, the nightingale, thou takest for thine example: So long as summer laughs she sings, But in the autumn spreads her wings. The nightingale, the nightingale, thou takest for thine example. The meadow-brook, the meadow-brook, is mirror of thy falsehood! It flows so long as falls the rain, In drought its springs soon dry again. The meadow-brook, the meadow-brook, is mirror of thy falsehood! ANNIE OF THARAW. FROM SIMON DACH. ANNIE of Tharaw, my true love of old, Annie of Tharaw, her heart once again Annie of Tharaw, my riches, my good, Then come the wild weather, come sleet or come snow, We will stand by each other, however it blow. Oppression, and sickness, and sorrow, and pain, Shall be to our true love as links to the chain. As the palm-tree standeth so straight and so tall, The more the hail beats, and the more the rains fall So love in our hearts shall grow mighty and strong, Through crosses, through sorrows, through manifold wrong. Shouldst thou be torn from me, to wander alone Through forests I'll follow, and where the sea flows, Through ice, and through iron, through armies of foes. Annie of Tharaw, my light and my sun, The threads of our two lives are woven in one. Whate'er I have bidden thee, thou hast obeyed, How in the turmoil of life can love stand, Some seek for dissension, and trouble, and strife, Like a dog and a cat live such man and wife. Annie of Tharaw, such is not our love; Whate'er my desire is, in thine may be seen; It is this, O my Annie, my heart's sweetest rest, This turns to heaven the hut where we dwell, While wrangling soon changes a home to a hell. THE SEA HATH ITS PEARLS. FROM HEINRICH HEINE. THE sea hath its pearls, The heaven hath its stars; But my heart, my heart, My heart hath its love. Great are the sea and the heaven; Thou, little youthful maiden, My heart, and the sea, and the heaven, POETIC APHORISMS. FROM THE SINNGEDICHTE OF FRIEDRICH VON LOGAU. MONEY. WHEREUNTO is money good? Who has it not wants hardihood, THE BEST MEDICINES. Joy, and Temperance, and Repose, SIN. Man-like is it to fall into sin, POVERTY AND BLINDNESS. A blind man is a poor man, and blind a poor man is, For the former seeth no man, and the latter no man sees. LAW OF LIFE. Live I, so live I, To my Lord heartily, To my Prince faithfully, To my Neighbour honestly, CREEDS. Lutheran, Popish, Calvinistic, all these creeds and doctrines three Extant are; but still the doubt is, where Chris tianity may be. THE RESTLESS HEART. A millstone and the human heart are driven ever round; If they have nothing else to grind, they must themselves be ground. CHRISTIAN LOVE. Whilom Love was like a fire, and warmth and comfort it bespoke ; But, alas! it now is quenched, and only bites us, like the smoke. ART AND TACT. Intelligence and courtesy not always are combined; Often in a wooden house a golden room we find. RETRIBUTION. Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceeding small; Though with patience He stands waiting, with exactness grinds He all. TRUTH. When by night the frogs are croaking, kindle but a torch's fire, Ha! how soon they all are silent! Thus Truth silences the liar. RHYMES. If perhaps these rhymes of mine sound not well in strangers' ears, They have only to bethink them that it happens so with theirs; For so long as words, like mortals, call a fatherland their own, They will be most highly valued where they are best and longest known. |