But thou the while shalt bear To after-times an old and honored name, Thy founder's virtuous fame. Fair structure, worthy the triumphant age And happiness thy dower! Robert Southey. Lyme Regis. AT LYME REGIS. ALM, azure, marble sea, CALM, As a fair palace pavement largely spread, Where the gray bastions of the eternal hills Lean over languidly, Bosomed with leafy trees, and garlanded! Peace is on all I view; Sunshine and peace; earth clear as heaven one hour; Save where the sailing cloud its dusky line Ruffles along the blue, Brushed by the soft wing of the silent shower. In no profounder calm Did the great Spirit over ocean brood, Doubled her maiden beauty in the flood. * * * * Francis Turner Palgrave, "T Lynn. THE DREAM OF EUGENE ARAM. WAS in the prime of summer time, An evening calm and cool, And four-and-twenty happy boys Came bounding out of school; There were some that ran and some that leapt Like troutlets in a pool. Away they sped with gamesome minds To a level mead they came, and there Like sportive deer they coursed about, And shouted as they ran, Turning to mirth all things of earth, As only boyhood can; But the usher sat remote from all, A melancholy man! His hat was off, his vest apart, To catch heaven's blessed breeze; For a burning thought was in his brow, So he leaned his head on his hands, and read The book between his knees! Leaf after leaf he turned it o'er, Nor ever glanced aside; For the peace of his soul he read that book In the golden eventide; Much study had made him very lean At last he shut the ponderous tome; Then leaping on his feet upright, Now up the mead, then down the mead, And past a shady nook, And, lo! he saw a little boy That pored upon a book! "My gentle lad, what is 't you read, Romance or fairy fable? Or is it some historic page, Of kings and crowns unstable?" Six hasty strides beyond the place, And down he sat beside the lad, And, long since then, of bloody men, And how the sprites of injured men He told how murderers walk the earth With crimson clouds before their eyes, And flames about their brain; For blood has left upon their souls Its everlasting stain! "And well," quoth he, "I know, for truth, Their pangs must be extreme, Woe, woe, unutterable woe, Who spill life's sacred stream! For why? Methought, last night I wrought A murder, in a dream! "One that had never done me wrong, A feeble man and old; I led him to a lonely field, The moon shone clear and cold: Now here, said I, this man shall die, "Two sudden blows with a ragged stick, "Nothing but lifeless flesh and bone, There was a manhood in his look And, lo! the universal air "O God! it made me quake to see Such sense within the slain! But when I touched the lifeless clay, |