Nor o'er thy cross the clouds of vengeance brake;
A little while the conscious earth did shake
At that foul deed by her fierce children done;
A few dim hours of day

The world in darkness lay;

Then bask'd in bright repose beneath the cloudless sun:
While thou didst sleep beneath the tomb,
Consenting to thy doom;

Ere yet the white-robed Angel shone
Upon the sealed stone.

And when thou didst arise, thou didst not stand
With devastation in thy red right hand,
Plaguing the guilty city's murtherous crew;
But thou didst haste to meet

Thy mother's coming feet,

And bear the words of peace unto the faithful few.
Then calmly, slowly didst thou rise
Into thy native skies,

Thy human form dissolved on high
In its own radiancy.

That yellow wretch, that looks as he were stain'd
With watching his own gold; every one knows him,
Enough to loathe him. Not a friend hath he,
Nor kindred, nor familiar; not a slave,

Not a lean serving wench: nothing e'er enter'd
But his spare self within his jealous doors,
Except a wand'ring rat; and that, they say,
Was famine-struck, and died there.-

FAZIO.

-What of him?

Yet he, Bianca, he is of our rich ones.
There's not a galliot on the sea, but bears
A venture of Bartolo's; not an acre,
Nay, not a villa of our proudest princes,

But he hath cramp'd it with a mortgage; he,
He only stocks our prisons with his debtors.
I saw him creeping home last night; he shudder'd
As he unlock'd his door, and look'd around,
As if he thought that every breath of wind
Were some keen thief; and when he lock'd him in,
I heard the grating key turn twenty times,
To try if all were safe. I look'd again
From our high window by mere chance, and saw
The motion of his scanty moping lantern;
And, where his wind-rent lattice was ill stuff'd
With tatter'd remnants of a money-bag,
Through cobwebs and thick dust I spied his face,
Like some dry wither-boned anatomy,

Through a huge chest-lid, jealously and scantily
Uplifted, peering upon coin and jewels,
Ingots and wedges, and broad bars of gold,
Upon whose lustre the wan light shone muddily,
As though the New World had outrun the Spaniard,
And emptied all its mines in that coarse hovel.
His ferret eyes gloated as wanton o'er them,
As a gross satyr on a sleeping nymph;
And then, as he heard something like a sound,
He clapp'd the lid to, and blew out the lantern;
But I, Bianca, hurried to thy arms,

And thank'd my God that I had braver riches.

From Fazio.

MERLIN'S CONGRATULATION AT THE MARRIAGE PROCESSION OF VORTIGERN AND ROWENA.

Came it from earth or air, yon savage shape

His garb, if garb it be, of shaggy hair

Close folding o'er his dusky limbs, his locks
And waving matted beard like cypress boughs
On bleak heath swaying to the midnight storm?
Came he from yon deep wood? On the light spray
No leaf is stirring. On the winged winds
Rode he? No breeze awakes the noontide air.
Mid that arm'd throng, dismaying, undismay'd,
With a strange eye dilated, as unused

To common sights of earth, and voice that seem'd
Rarely to hold discourse with human ears,
"Joy," and again, and thrice he utter'd "Joy."

Cower'd Horsa on his palsied steed; aghast,
As toiling to despise the thing he fear'd,
Sate Hengist. "Joy to Bridegroom and to Bride!
Why should not man rejoice, and earth be glad?
Beyond the sphere of man, the round of earth,
There's loud rejoicing; 'tis not in the heavens!
And many ministrant angels shake their wings
In gladness, wings that are not plumed with light.
The dead are jocund, not the dead in bliss.
Your couch is blest-by all whose blessings blast,
All things unlovely gratulate your love.

I see the nuptial pomp, the nuptial song

I hear, and full the pomp, for Hate, and Fear,
And excellent Dishonour, and bright Shame,
And rose-cheek'd Grief, and jovial Discontent,
And that majestic herald, Infamy,

And that high noble, Servitude, are there,
A blithesome troop, a gay and festive crew.
And the land's curses are the bridal hymn;
Sweetly and shrilly doth th' accordant isle
Imprecate the glad hymenean song.
So joy, again, I say, to Britain's King,
That taketh to his bosom Britain's fate,
Her beautiful destruction to his bed.

And joy to Britain's Queen, who bears her Lord
So bright a dowry and profuse, long years
Of war and havoc, and fair streams of blood,
And plenteous ruin, loss of crown and fame,
And full perdition of the immortal soul;
So thrice again I utter, Joy, joy, joy!'

Then upsprung spear to strike, and bicker'd bow: Ere spear could strike, or shaft could fly, the path Was bare and vacant; shape nor sound remain'd; Only the voice of Vortigern moan'd out, "Merlin," and on the long procession pass'd.

From Samor, Lord of the Bright City.

DEVOTEDNESS OF A JESUIT.

Man of this world, thou know'st not those who tread

The steps of great Ignatius, those that bear

The name of Jesus and his Cross. I've sunk

For ever title, rank, wealth—even my being;
And self-annihilated, boast myself

A limb, a nameless limb, of that vast body

That shall bespread the world, uncheck'd, untracedLike God's own presence, every where, yet no whereTh' invisible control, by which Rome rules

The universal mind of man.

On me

My Father's palace-gates no more shall open,
I own no more my proud ancestral name,

I have no property even in these weeds,

These coarse and simple weeds I wear; nor will,

Nor passion, nor affection, nor the love

Of kindred, touch this earth-estranged heart;
My personal being is absorb'd and dead.

Thou think'st it much with cilice, scourge, and fast,
To macerate thy all too pamper'd body;

That thy sere heart is seal'd to woman's love;

That child shall never climb thy knees, nor call thee His father:-on the altar of my God

I've laid a nobler sacrifice, a soul

Conscious it might have compass'd empire.―This
I've done; and in no brief and frantic fit
Of youthful lust ungratified-in the hour
Of disappointed pride. A noble, born

Of Rome's patrician blood, rich, letter'd, versed
In the affairs of men; no monkish dreamer,
Hearing Heaven's summons in ecstatic vision.
God spoke within this heart, but with the voice
Of stern deliberate duty, and I rose

Resolved to sail the flood, to tread the fire

That's nought-to quench all natural compunction,
To know nor right nor wrong, nor crime nor virtue,
But as subservient to Rome's cause and Heaven's.
I've school'd my haughty soul to subtlest craft,
I've strung my tender heart to bloodiest havoc,
And stand prepared to wear the martyr's flames
Like nuptial robes;-far worse, to drag to the stake
My friend, the brother of my soul-if thus

I sear the hydra's heads of heresy.

From Anne Boleyn.

MARGARITA'S ACCOUNT OF HER CONVERSION.

Dost thou not remember

When Deceus was the Emperor, how he came

To Antioch, and when holy Babylas

Withstood his entrance to the Christian church,

Frantic with wrath, he bade them drag him
To cruel death? Serene the old man walk'd
The crowded streets; at every pause the yell
Of the mad people made, his voice was heard
Blessing God's bounty, or imploring pardon
Upon the barbarous hosts that smote him on.
Then didst thou hold me up, a laughing child,
To gaze on that sad spectacle. He pass'd,
And look'd on me with such a gentle sorrow;
The pallid patience of his brow towards me
Seem'd softening to a smile of deepest love.
When all around me mock'd, and howl'd, and laugh'd,
God gave me grace to weep. In after time,
That face would on my noontide dreams return;
And in the silence of the night I heard

The murmur of that voice remote, and touch'd
To an aërial sweetness, like soft music
Over a tract of waters. My young soul
Lay rapt in wonder, how that meek old man
Could suffer with such unrepining calmness,
Till late I learn'd the faith for which he suffer'd,
And wonder'd then no more.

From The Martyr of Antioch,

THE GROVE OF DAPHNE.

My way is through the dim licentious Daphne, And evening darkens round my stealthful steps; Yet I must pause to rest my weary limbs.

Oh, thou polluted, yet most lovely grove! Hath the Almighty breathed o'er all thy bowers An everlasting spring, and paved thy walks With amaranthine flowers-are but the winds, Whose breath is gentle, suffer'd to entangle Their light wings, not unwilling prisoners, In thy thick branches, there to make sweet murmurs With the bees' hum, and melodies of birds, And all the voices of the hundred fountains, That drop translucent from the mountain's side, And lull themselves along their level course To slumber with their own soft-sliding sounds; And all for foul idolatry, or worse, To make itself a home and sanctuary?