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Nor of a theme less solemn tells
That mighty surge that ebbs and swells,
And still between each awful pause
From the high vault an answer draws,
In varied tone, prolong'd and high,
That mocks the organ's melody;
Nor doth its entrance front in vain
To old Iona's holy fane,

That Nature's voice might seem to say,
"Well hast thou done, frail child of clay:
Thy humble powers that stately shrine
Task'd high and hard-but witness mine!"

Merrily, merrily goes the bark,
Before the gale she bounds;

So darts the dolphin from the shark,
Or the deer before the hounds;

They left Loch-Tua on their lee,

And they waken'd the men of wild Tiree,
And the chief of the sandy Coll;
They paused not at Columba's isle,
Though pealed the bells from the holy pile
With long and measured toll;

No time for matin or for mass,

And the sounds of the holy summons pass Away in the billows roll;

Lochbuie's fierce and warlike Lord

Their signal saw and grasp'd his sword,
And verdant Islay called her host,
And the scans of Jura's rugged coast

Lord Ronald's call obey;

And Scarba's isle, whose tortured shore
Still rings to Corrievreken's roar,

And lonely Colonsay;

Scenes sung by him who sings no more,
His bright and brief career is o'er,

And mute his tuneful strains;
Quench'd is his lamp of varied lore,
That loved the light of song to pour;
A distant and a deadly shore
Has Leyden's cold remains!

THE STARTLED STAG.

BY SCOTT.

THE stag at eve had drunk his fill,
Where danced the moon on Monan's rill,
And deep his midnight lair had made
In lone Glenartney's hazel shade;
But, when the sun his beacon red
Had kindled on Benvoirlich's head,
The deep-mouthed bloodhound's heavy bay
Resounded up the rocky way,

And faint, from farther distance borne,
Were heard the clanging hoof and horn.

As chief, who hears his warder call,
"To arms! the foemen storm the wall!
The antlered monarch of the waste
Sprang from his heathery couch in haste.
But, ere his fleet career he took,
The dewdrops from his flanks he shook;
Like crested leader, proud and high,
Tossed his beamed frontlet to the sky;
A moment gazed adown the dale,
A moment snuffed the tainted gale,
A moment listened to the cry

That thickened as the chase drew nigh;

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Then, as the headmost foes appeared,
With one brave bound the copse he cleared,
And, stretching forward free and far,
Sought the wild heaths of Uam-Var.

Yelled on the view the opening pack,
Rock, glen, and cavern, paid them back;
To many a mingled sound at once
The awakened mountain gave response.
A hundred dogs bayed deep and strong,
Clattered a hundred steeds along,
Their peel the merry horns rang out,
A hundred voices joined the shout;
With hark, and whoop, and wild halloo,
No rest Benvoirlich's echoes knew.
Far from the tumult fled the roe,
Close in her covert cowered the doe,
The falcon, from her cairn on high,
Cast on the rout a wondering eye,
Till far beyond her piercing ken
The hurricane had swept the glen.
Faint, and more faint, its failing din
Returned from cavern, cliff and linn,
And silence settled wide and still
On the lone wood and mighty hill.

S. T. COLERIDGE.-BORN 1772; DIED 1834.
HYMN BEFORE SUNRISE

IN THE VALE OF CHAMOUNI.

HAST thou a charm to stay the morning star
In his steep course? So long he seems to pause
On thy bald awful head, O sovran Blanc !
The Arve and Arveiron at thy base

Rave ceaselessly; but thou, most awful form!
Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines,
How silently! Around thee and above
Deep is the air and dark, substantial, black,
An ebon mass: methinks thou piercest it,
As with a wedge! But when I look again,
It is thine own calm home, thy crystal shrine,
Thy habitation from eternity!

O dread and silent mount! I gazed upon thee,
Till thou, still present to the bodily sense,

Didst vanish from my thought: entranced in prayer I worshipp'd the Invisible alone.

Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody

So sweet, we know not we are listening to it— Thou, the meanwhile, wast blending with my thought,

Yea, with my life and life's own secret joy:
Till the dilating soul, enrapt, transfused,
Into the mighty vision passing-there

As in her natural form, swelled vast to heaven!
Awake, my soul! not only passive praise
Thou owest! not alone these swelling tears,
Mute thanks, and secret ecstasy! Awake,
Voice of sweet song! Awake, my heart, awake!
Green vales and icy cliffs, all join my hymn.
Thou first and chief, sole sovran of the vale!
O struggling with the darkness all the night,
And visited all night by troops of stars,

Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink;.
Companion of the morning star at dawn,
Thyself earth's rosy star, and of the dawn
Co-herald! wake, O wake, and utter praise!
Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in earth?
Who filled thy countenance with rosy light?
Who made thee parent of perpetual streams?

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And you, ye five wild torrents, fiercely glad! Who called you forth from night and utter death, From dark and icy caverns called you forth, Down those precipitous, black, jagged rocks, For ever shattered and the same for ever? Who gave you your invulnerable life,

Your strength, your speed, your fury, and your joy, Unceasing thunder and eternal foam?

And who commanded-and the silence came"Here let the billows stiffen, and have rest?"

Ye ice-falls! ye that from the mountain's brow Adown enormous ravines slope amain

Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty voice,
And stopped at once amid their maddest plunge!
Motionless torrents! silent cataracts!

Who made you glorious as the gates of heaven
Beneath the keen full moon? Who bade the sun
Clothe you with rainbows? Who, with living flowers
Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at your feet?-
God! let the torrents, like a shout of nations,
Answer; and let the ice-plains echo, God!

God! sing, ye meadow-streams, with gladsome voice!
Ye pine groves, with your soft and soul-like sounds!
And they too have a voice, yon piles of snow,
And in their perilous fall shall thunder-GOD!
Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal frost!
Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle's nest!
Ye eagles, playmates of the mountain storm!
Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds!
Ye signs and wonders of the elements !

Utter forth God, and fill the hills with praise!
Thou too, hoar mount! with thy sky-pointing
peaks,

Oft from whose feet the avalanche, unheard,

Shoots downward, glittering through the pure serene

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