"Three weeks we westward bore,
And when the storm was o'er,
Cloud-like we saw the shore
Stretching to lee-ward;
There for my lady's bower
Built I the lofty tower,
Which, to this very hour,
Stands looking sea-ward.

"There lived we many years; Time dried the maiden's tears; She had forgot her fears,

She was a mother;

Death closed her mild blue eyes,
Under that tower she lies;

Ne'er shall the sun arise

On such another!

'Still grew my bosom then,
Still as a stagnant fen!
Hateful to me were men,
The sun-light hateful!

In the vast forest here,
Clad in my warlike gear,
Fell I upon my spear,

O, death was grateful!

"Thus, seamed with many scars,
Bursting these prison bars,
Up to its native stars

My soul ascended!

There from the flowing bowl

Deep drinks the warrior's soul,

Skoal! to the Northland! skoal!"*
-Thus the tale ended.

DON QUIXOTE.

BY HENRY GILES.

N youth we revel in the mirth of this story; we

laugh at the exploits of the knight; we laugh at the misfortunes of the squire; we have no reverence for the chivalrous but bareboned imitation of Beltenebros; the famous recoverer of Mambrino's helmet; we extend no pity to the corpulent imbodiment of proverbs that rises beside him; we enjoy with all our hearts the capers which the merry lodgers of the inn compel him to perform in the air without aid of tight rope or slack rope; his flounderings are to us most

* In Scandinavia this is the customary salutation when drinking a health. I have slightly changed the orthography of the word, in order to preserve the correct pronunciation.

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exhilarating fun; and, in imagination, we ourselves take hold upon the blanket. But, when time has taught us more sober lessons, when we learn that we too have dreamed, that we too have had our buffetings and blanketings, we think differently. When we learn that we likewise have often put the shapings of fancy for the substance of truth, the coinage of the brain for the creation of reality, the vision in the wish for the fulfilment in the fact, laughter is changed into reflection, and musing takes the place of gaiety. There is hidden meaning in these wondrous imaginings of Cervantes; and experience, after many days, does not fail to show it. We have gleanings from them of life's purpose. We are here to do, and not to dream; we are here to endure as much as to enjoy; and, through doing and endurance, to grow-to grow in all that elevates the soul, in all that crowns it with genuine dignity, in all that clothes it at the same time with honour and humility, in all that renders it more gentle as it becomes more commanding. In the same manner we have gleamings of life's nature. Life is not all meditation; it is not all business; it is not all in the ideal; it is not all in the actual; and that life is best in which these several elements are best united. The ideal separate from the actual becomes mysticism or extravagance; the actual separate from the ideal degenerates into the sensual or into the sordid. It is in the proportioned combination of the ideal with the actual that life is highest; it is in this

proportioned combination that life presents the finest union of enthusiasm and reflection, the finest harmony of beauty and of power.

GODIVA.

BY LEIGH HUNT.

HIS is the lady who, under the title of Countess of Coventry, used to make such a figure in our childhood upon some old pocket-pieces of that city. We hope she is in request there still; otherwise the inhabitants deserve to be sent from Coventry. That city was famous in saintly legends for the visit of the eleven thousand virgins-an "incredible number," quoth Selden. But the eleven thousand virgins have vanished with their credibility, and a noble-hearted woman of flesh and blood is Coventry's true immortality.

The story of Godiva is not a fiction, as many suppose it. At least it is to be found in Matthew of Westminster,* and is not of a nature to have been a

* Flores Historiarum. A translation of this work was published by Bohn, in 2 vols., London, 1853, entitled: "The Flowers of History, especially such as relate to the affairs of Britain. From the beginning of the world to the year 1307. Collected by Matthew of Westminster. Translated from the original, by C. D. Yonge, B. A.”

mere invention. Her name, and that of her husband, Leofric, are mentioned in an old chapter recorded by another early historian. That the story is omitted by Ilume and others, argues little against it; for the latter are accustomed to confound the most interesting anecdotes of times and manners with something below the dignity of history (a very absurd mistake); and Hume, of whose philosophy better things might have been expected, is notoriously less philosophical in his history than in any other of his works. A certain coldness of temperament, not unmixed with aristocratical pride, or at least with a great aversion from everything like vulgar credulity, rendered his scepticism so extreme that it became a sort of superstition in turn, and blinded him to the claims of every species of enthusiasm, civil as well as religious. Milton, with his poetical eyesight, saw better, when he meditated the history of his native country. We do not remember whether he relates the present story, but we remember well, that at the beginning of his fragment on that subject, he says he shall relate doubtful stories as well as authentic ones, for the benefit of those, if no others, who will know how to make use of them, namely, the poets.*

We have faith, however, in the

* When Dr. Johnson, among his other impatient accusations of our great republican, charged him with telling unwarrantable stories in his history, he must have overlooked this announcement; and yet, if we recollect, it is but in the second page the fragment. So hasty, and blind, and liable to be put to shame, is prejudice.

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