Yet Geraldine nor speaks nor stirs ; Ah! what a stricken look was hers! Deep from within she seems half-way To lift some weight with sick assay, And eyes the maid and seeks delay; Then suddenly as one defied Collects herself in scorn and pride, And lay down by the maiden's side And in her arms the maid she took, Ah well-a-day! And with low voice and doleful look These words did say: In the touch of this bosom there worketh a spell, For this is alone in Thy power to declare, That in the dim forest Thou heard'st a low moaning, And found'st a bright lady, surpassingly fair : And didst bring her home with thee in love and in charity, To shield her and shelter her from the damp air. The Conclusion to Part I With open eyes (ah woe is me !) Asleep, and dreaming fearfully, Fearfully dreaming, yet I wis, Dreaming that alone, which is O sorrow and shame! Can this be she, The lady, who knelt at the old oak tree? A star hath set, a star hath risen, :0: S. T. COLEridge. Dr. Maginn's Introduction to Part III. LISTEN! ye know that I am mad, And ye will listen !-wizard dreams Were with me !-all is true that seems !From dreams alone can truth be had- In dreams divinest lore is taught, For the eye, no more distraught, Of sound unconscious, may apply Its attributes unknown, to hear The music of philosophy! Thus am I wisest in my sleep, For thoughts and things, which day-light brings, When the hushed frame is silent in repose ! Which bounds on earth with big drops warm, Christabel. Part III. NINE moons have waxed, and the tenth, in its wane, Sees Christabel struggle in unknown pain! -For many moons was her eye less bright, For many moons was her vest more tight, And her cheek was pale, save when, with a start, The life blood came from the panting heart, And fluttering, o'er that thin fair face Past with a rapid nameless pace, And at moments a big tear filled the eye, Oh! had her old father the secret known, Am I asleep or am I awake? In very truth I oft mistake, As the stories of old come over my brain, Sweet Christabel, it is not well That a lady, pure as the sunless snow That a maiden of sinless chastity In childbirth pangs should be doomed to die, Or live with a name of sorrow and shame, Of the things that be did we know but half, Or that deeper grief, (when its orb is dry, Pale Christabel, who could divine That its sire was the Ladie Geraldine. But in I rush, with too swift a gale, Into the ocean of my tale! Not yet young Christabel, 1 ween, Of her babe hath lighter been. 'Tis the month of the snow and the blast, And the days of Christmas mirth are past, When the oak-roots heaped on the hearth blazed bright, On the shadowy forms of the warriors old, On the holly boughs and the ivy leaves, They cheered our fathers' hours of mirth ! Twelve solar months complete and clear. (I saw her big breast swelling pant) What time, I dreamed, in ghostly wise Of Eleusinian mysteries, For I am the hierarch Of the mystical and dark And now, if rightly I do spell Of the Lady Christabel, She hates the three times ten so white, And woe is hers-alas! alack! She hates the three times ten so black- I hear her moaning in the dark !— 'Tis the month of January. Is withered all, and damp, and dark, While cold above the stars in doubt Look dull, and scarcely will stay out, And hides its name-sake, the snow-drop flower, Dear girl, I ask thee seriously. Thy cheek is pale, thy locks are wild- Tho' the baron's red cloak thro' the land hath no fellow, Dost thou wander to the field of graves And grinning skull, and transverse bone, And the names of warriors dead and gone Mark Sir Leoline's burial stone; Thither go not, or I deem almost That thou wilt frighten thy mother's ghost! 'Tis pleasant-'tis pleasant, in summer time, And the song of the birds thro' your heart is ringing, glisten 'Tis a thing of wonder, and fright, and fear, That aged cow, as each stroke sounds slow, She mews thro' all the hours of sleep Till morning comes with its pleasant beams, And the cat is at rest, and the baron dreams! Let it rain, however fast, Rest from rain will come at last, In my spirit I behold A lady-call her firm, not bold- -Strange feelings thro' her breast and brain Let me not call on thee in vain! That thy body will be found, What anguish will thy spirit feel, When it must to all reveal What the spell binds thee to conceal ! How the baron's heart will knock 'gainst his chest When the stake is driven into thy breast, When thy body to dust shall be carelessly flung, And over the dead no dirge be sung, No friend in mourning vesture dight, No lykewake sad-no tapered rite !— THE DREAM, A Psychological Curiosity. BY S. T. C. ADVERTISEMENT TO THE READER. THE following "wild and singularly original and beautiful poem " was written at the instigation of Mr. Robert Warren, who was desirous of enrolling me among the number of his panegyrists. The circumstances that lead to its original composition are as follows: I had been considering in what way I might best introduce the subject, when suddenly falling asleep over a provincial newspaper which detailed the battle between Cribb and Molineux, the thoughts of my waking hours assumed the aspect of the present poetical reverie. This to an unidead "reading public" may appear incredible, but minds of imaginative temperament are ever most active during the intervals of repose, as my late poem, entitled "The Pains of Sleep," will sufficiently attest. Dreams in fact are to be estimated solely in proportion to their wildness; and hence a friend of mine, who is a most magnificent dreamer, imagined but the other night that he invited a flock of sheep to a musical party. Such a flocci, nauci, nihili absurdity will, I am afraid, puzzle even our transcendental philosophers to explain, although Kant, in his treatise on the Phænomena of Dreams, is of opinion that the lens or focus of intestinal light ascending the esophagus at right angles, a juxtaposition of properties takes place, so that the nucleus of the diaphragm reflecting on the cerebellum the prismatic visions of the pilorus, is made to produce that marvellous operation of mind upon matter better known by the name of dreaming.-To such simple and satisfactory reasoning what answer can be made? TEN minutes to ten by Saint Dunstan's clock, Cock-a-doodle-doo. If he crows at this rate in so thrilling a note, Jesu Maria! he'll catch a sore throat. Warren the manufacturer rich To Saint Dunstan's clock, tho' silent enow, As wizard to wizard, or witch to witch, Buried in thought O'Warren lay, Like a village queen on the birth of May; He listed the tones of Saint Dunstan's clock, Of the mastiff bitch and the crowing cock; But louder, far louder, he listed a roar, Loud as the billow that booms on the shore; Bang, bang, with a pause between, Rung the weird sound at his door, I ween. Up from his couch he leaped in affright, Oped his grey lattice and looked on the night, Then put on his coat, and with harlequin hop Stood like a phantom in midst of the shop; In midst of his shop he stood like a sprite, Till peering to left and peering to right, Beside his counter, with tail in hand, He saw a spirit of darkness stand; Oh! read thee not, read thee not, lord of the Strand, Vain hope! the bogle hath marked her hour, Till the sullen toll of Saint Dunstan's bell, Like an oak that uplooketh to sun and sky; Satan is waiting; away, away; But the evil one muttered "too late, by my fay; And here mote I tell how they rode on the wind, The witch before and the Warren behind; How they passed in a twinkling the haunts of man, And the proud pagodas of Kubla Khan ; How they peeped at the planets like Allan-a-roon, And supped on green cheese with the man in the moon ; Or listed the dulcimer's tremulous notes, Or the voice of the wind through the azure that floats, Till pillar and palace and arching sky Rung to the mingled melody. Away, away, through the thunder-cloud, Where the night-wind howls to the falling star ; They gain the swart regions of darkness and woe. Then hymned to the Virgin for aid and for pity, "Miserere Maria," he cried in despair, While the bullet-nosed bogle drew back at the prayer, And the worricow dropt her eye-tooth at the strain, But spite of her teeth, she eschewed complaint, In the silence of thought on his ebon throne. Proudly he strode to his palace gate, Which the witch and the Warren approached in state, But paused at the threshold as onward they came, And thus, with words of fever and flame, The tradesman addressed, "Your name, Sir, is known But in hell with proviso this praise we must mix, A handsomer gloss o'er our shoes and our boots.". Answered the Warren, with choleric eye, I have dandies who laud me at Paine's and Almack's, The tradesman he laughed at this pitiful sneer, And drew from his pocket, unmoved by the jeer Of the gathering dæmons, blue, yellow, and pink, A bottle of blacking more sable than ink ;With the waves of the Styx in a jiffey they tried it, But the waves of the Styz looked foolish beside it; "You mote as well liken the summer sky," Quoth Warren the bold, "with an Irish stye; The nightingale's note with the cockatoo's whine, As your lily-white river with me or mine." Round the brow of Abaddon fierce anger played At the Strand manufacturer's gasconade; And lifting a fist that mote slaughter an ox, He wrathfully challenged his foeman to box; Then summoned each dæmon to form a ring, And witness his truculent triumphing.The ring was formed and the twain set to, Like little Puss with Belasco the Jew. Satan was seconded in a crack, By Molineux, the American black, While Warren was backed by the ghost of Dutch Sam.- Gentles, who fondly peruse these lays, Wild as a colt o'er the moorland that strays, Who thrill at each wondrous rede I tell, As fancy roams o'er the floor of hell, Now list ye with kindness, the whiles I rehearse In shapely pugilistic verse, (Albeit my fancy preferreth still The quiet of nature,) this desperate Mill. Then trumpet, and timbrel, and deafening shout, Or death-watch that beats in a sick man's ear. From the gulph where they howl to the lead colored night, The shadowless spectres leaped up with delight, But hark, 'tis the voice of the crowing cock! It is currently reported that Robert Warren, Esq., is a native of Birmingham. And hark, 'tis the toll of Saint Dunstan's clock! This is probably the most amusing parody of Christabel that has ever been written. It appeared originally in "Warreniana," a small anonymous volume of imitations published by Longmans & Co., in 1824. It is now known that the author was Mr. W. F. Deacon, who died about 1845. Between 60 and 70 years ago Robert Warren's Blacking was the best advertised article of the day, and even Lord Byron was accused of writing puffs for it. Hence this collection of squibs, in which all the leading poets of the day were represented as singing its praises. Some few redundant passages have been cut out, but nothing which is necessary to the plot of the poem has been omitted. Warreniana may still be met with occasionally as a second-hand book, and is well worth the few shillings it will cost. A PARODY OF CHRISTAbelle. 'Tis a quarter to ten by the castle clock, And the mastiff bitch' has awakened the cock, Say what can ail her, in her sleep, # The Baron awoke at the usual hour, And the bell toll'd loud in his moss-covered tow'r, Like a voice from the dead when the winds are at rest, And the crowing cock his shrill clarion blew, And hark again the crowing cock, As if it was loth from its pillow to creep, But determined at least to snore in its sleep. Again the cock crew, while the glance of his eye, Frightened the clouds as they sail'd thro' the sky, And the consequence was, that they shook with wonder, And tell me directly, or deeply you'll rue, |