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Yet their country long shall mourn
For her ranks so rashly shorn

In that fierce and fatal charge,
On the battle's bloody marge.

George Washington Cutter.

AMERICAN.

Cutter (1814-1865) was a native of Kentucky. He was a lawyer by profession, resident at Covington, Ky., and at one time a member of the Indiana Legislature. In the Mexican war he joined the army as a captain of volunteers, and served bravely. He wrote a poem of two hundred and fifty-six lines, entitled "Buena Vista," said to have been penned on the field after the battle, and interesting as giving the experiences of one who took part in the fight. He published in Philadelphia, in 1857, a volume of two hundred and seventy-nine pages, entitled "Poems, National and Patriotic." His "Song of Steam," though rude and unpolished, is the best of his productions. In an Indian poem, entitled "Tecumseh," he represents the old chief as somewhat better versed in classical mythology than savages usually are; for he refers to the time,

"When softly rose the Queen of Love,
All glowing from the sea."

SONG OF STEAM.

Harness me down with your iron bands,
Be sure of your curb and rein:

For I scorn the power of your puny hands,
As the tempest scorns a chain.

How I laughed as I lay concealed from sight
For many a countless hour,

At the childish boast of human might,
And the pride of human power.

When I saw an army upon the land,
A navy upon the seas,
Creeping along, a snail-like band,

Or waiting the wayward breeze ;--
When I marked the peasant faintly reel
With the toil which he daily bore,
As he feebly turned the tardy wheel,
Or tugged at the weary oar;—

When I measured the panting courser's speed,
The flight of the carrier-dove,

As they bore the law a King decreed,
Or the lines of impatient Love,-

I could not but think how the world would feel,
As these were outstripped afar,

When I should be bound to the rushing keel, Or chained to the flying car.

Ha ha ha! they found me at last;

They invited me forth at length;
And I rushed to my throne with a thunder-blast,
And laughed in my iron strength.

Oh, then ye saw a wondrous change
On the earth and the ocean wide,
Where now my fiery armies range,
Nor wait for wind or tide.

Hurrah! hurrah! the waters o'er

The mountain's steep decline; Time-space-have yielded to my power

The world-the world is mine! The rivers the sun hath earliest blessed,

Or those where his last beams shine; The giant streams of the queenly West, Or the Orient floods divine!

The ocean pales where'er I sweep,

To hear my strength rejoice;
And the monsters of the briny deep
Cower, trembling at my voice.

I carry the wealth and the lord of earth,
The thoughts of his godlike mind:
The wind lags after my going forth,
The lightning is left behind.

In the darksome depths of the fathomless mine My tireless arm doth play;

Where the rocks never saw the sun decline,
Or the dawn of the glorious day,

I bring earth's glittering jewels up
From the hidden caves below,
And I make the fountain's granite cup
With a crystal gush o'erflow.

I blow the bellows, I forge the steel,
In all the shops of trade;

I hammer the ore, and turn the wheel,
Where my arms of strength are made;

I manage the furnace, the mill, the mint;
I carry, I spin, I weave;

And all my doings I put into print,
On every Saturday eve.

I've no muscle to weary, no breast to decay,
No bones to be laid on the shelf;
And soon I intend you may go and play,
While I manage this world by myself.
But harness me down with your iron bands,
Be sure of your curb and rein;
For I scorn the power of your puny hands,
As the tempest scorns a chain.

John Lothrop Motley.

AMERICAN.

Motley (1814-1877), though far better known as an historian than a poet, was yet the author of verses of no ordinary promise. He was a native of Dorchester, now a part of Boston, Mass., and entered Harvard College at the early age of thirteen. He began to write, and to write well, both in prose and verse, before his fifteenth year. In 1832 he went to Germany, met Bismarck (afterward Prince Bismarck) at Göttingen, and in 1833 was his fellow-lodger, fellow-student, and boon companion at Berlin.

'We lived," writes Bismarck (1878), "in the closest intimacy, sharing meals and out-door exercise. *** The most striking feature of his handsome and delicate appearance was uncommonly large and beautiful eyes. He never entered a drawing-room without exciting the curiosity and sympathy of the ladies." Having returned to America and married (1837), Motley put forth a novel, "Morton's Hope," which was not a success. It was followed by "Merry-Mount," also a failure.

"It was a matter of course," he writes, "that I should he attacked by the poetic mania. I took the infection at the usual time, went through its various stages, and recovered as soon as could be expected." In 1841 Motley was Secretary of Legation to the Russian Mission. In 1850 he commenced those historical studies, the fruits of which gave him a wide and still flourishing reputation. His "History of the Rise of the Dutch Republic" at once established his literary fame both in Europe and America. It was translated into all the principal languages of Europe, and was followed by a "History of the United Netherlands." In 1861 he was appointed by President Lincoln Minister to Austria, and, soon after the election of Grant, became Minister to England, a post he resigned in 1870. In 1876 his health began to fail, and there were symptoms of paralysis, though his intellectual powers kept bright. He died the following year. From a tribute to his memory by William W. Story (Oct., 1877), we quote the following lines:

"Farewell, dear friend! For us the grief and pain,
Who shall not see thy living face again;

For us the sad yet noble memories

Of lofty thoughts, of upward-looking eyes,
Of warm affections, of a spirit bright
With glancing fancies and a radiant light,
That, flashing, threw around all common things
Heroic halos and imaginings:

Nothing of this can fade while life shall last,
But brighten, with death's shadow o'er it cast.
Ah, noble spirit, whither hast thou fled?
What doest thou amid the unnumbered dead?
Oh, say not 'mid the dead, for what hast thou
Among the dead to do? No! rather now,
If Faith and Hope are not a wild deceit,
The truly living thou hast gone to meet,
The noble spirits purged by death, whose eye
O'erpeers the brief bounds of mortality;
And they behold thee rising there afar,
Serenely clear above Time's cloudy bar,
And greet thee as we greet a rising star."

Motley's departure from this life took place near Dorehester, England; and, by his own wish, only the dates

of his birth and death appear upon his gravestone, with the text chosen by himself, "In God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all." An appreciative and interesting memoir of Motley by his early friend, Dr. O. W. Holmes, appeared in Boston in 1879.

LINES WRITTEN AT SYRACUSE.

Is this the stately Syracuse,
Proud Corinth's favorite child,
Hymued by immortal Pindar's muse,-
Thus grovelling, thus defiled?
Tamer of Agrigentum's might,

And Carthage's compeer,-
Humbler of Athens in the fight!

And art thou mouldering here?

Still Syracuse's cloudless sun

Shines brightly day by day, And, as 'twas Tully's boast, on none Seems to withhold his ray; Still blooms her myrtle in the vale,

Her olive on the hill,

And Flora's gifts perfume the gale

With countless odors stillThe myrtle decks no hero's sword, But ah! the olive waves, Type of inglorious peace, adored By hosts of supple slaves!

Round broken shaft and mouldering tombs, And desecrated shrine,

The wild goat bounds, the wild rose blooms,
And clings the clustering vine;

And mark that loitering shepherd-boy,
Reclined on yonder rock,

His listless summer hours employ

In piping to his flock!

Ah! Daphnis here, in earlier day,

By laughing nymphs was taught,
While Pan rehearsed the artless lay,
With tenderest music fraught;
Ay, and the pastoral muse inspired

Upon these flowery plains
Theocritus, the silver-lyred,

With sweeter, loftier strains.

I stood on Acradina's height,

Whose marble heart supplied

The bulwarks, hewn with matchless might, Of Syracuse's pride,

Where Dionysins built his cave,

And, crouching, crept to hear

The unconscious curses of his slave

Poured in the "Tyrant's Ear;" The prison where the Athenians wept, And hapless Nicias fell

With citrons now and flowers entwined

The friar's quiet cell!

The fragrant garden there is warm,

The lizard basking lies,
And, mocking desolation, swarm
The painted butterflies.

I stood on Acradina's height,

And, spread for miles around,

Vast sculptured fragments met my sight,
With weeds and ivy crowned;
Brightly those shattered marbles gleamed,
In wild profusion strown;

The city's whitening bones, they seemed,
To bleach and moulder thrown.

I gazed along the purple sea,

O'er Læstrygonia's plain,
Whence sprang of old, spontaneously,
The tall and bearded grain,

And nourished giants:-proudly sweep
Those plains, those cornfields wave!
Do Titans still the harvest reap?
Go ask yon toiling slave!

Brightly in yonder azure sky

Old Etna lifts his head,

Around whose glittering shoulders fly
Dark vapors, wildly spread.

Say, rises still that ceaseless smoke,
Old Vulcan's fires above,

Where Cyclops forged, with sturdy stroke,
The thunder-bolts of Jove?

Mark, where the gloomy King of Hell Descended with his bride;

By Cyané her girdle fell,

Yon reedy fountain's side;
Where Proserpine descended, still
The crystal water flows,
Though sullied now, that sister rill
Where Arethusa rose:-
Ay, while I gaze, eternal Greece!
Thy sunny fables throng
Around me, like the swarming bees
Green Hybla's mount along—
By Enna's plain, by Hybla's mount,
By yon Æolian isles,

By storied cliff, by fabled fount,
Still, still thy genins smiles!

Alas! how idle to recall

Bright myths forever fled,
When real urns lie shattered all,
Where slept the mighty dead-
Spurn Fancy's wing for History's pen,
Call up yon glorious host,
Not demigods, but godlike men;
Invoke Timoleon's ghost!

Or turn where starry Science weeps,
And tears the briers that hide
The tomb where Archimedes sleeps,
Her victim and her pride!

In vain, sweet Sicily! the fate
Of Proserpine is thine,
Chained to a despot's sceptred state,
A crownless queen to pine-
Thy beauty lured the Bourbon's lust,
And Ceres flings her horn,
Which scattered plenty, in the dust,
Again, her child to mourn.
All desolated lies thy shore,

Fallow thy fertile plains—
And shall thy sons aspire no more
To burst their iron chains?
No; when yon buried Titan rears
His vast and peerless form,
By Etna crushed, ten thousand years,

Through earthquake, fire, and storm,-
Shall man, arising in his strength,
Erect and proudly stand,
Spurning the tyrant's weight at length,
The Titan of the land!

Charles Mackay.

The son of an army-officer, Mackay was born in Perth, Scotland, in 1814. His first volume of poems appeared in 1834; since which he has put forth some twelve more. For several years he was editor of the Illustrated London News. In 1852 he travelled in America. His Autobiography appeared in 1877.

THE WATCHER ON THE TOWER. "What dost thou see, lone watcher on the tower? Is the day breaking? Comes the wished-for hour? Tell us the signs, and stretch abroad thy hand, If the bright morning dawns upon the land."

"The stars are clear above me; scarcely one
Has dimmed its rays, in reverence to the sun;
But yet I see, on the horizon's verge,
Some fair, faint streaks, as if the light would surge."

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