THE WARDEN OF THE CINQUE PORTS.*

A MIST was driving down the British Channel,
The day was just begun,

And through the window-panes, on floor and panel,
Streamed the red autumn sun.

It glanced on flowing flag and rippling pennon,
And the white sails of ships;

And, from the frowning rampart, the black cannon
Hailed it with feverish lips.

Sandwich and Romney, Hastings, Hythe, and Dover
Were all alert that day,

To see the French war-steamers speeding over,
When the fog cleared away.

Sullen and silent, and like couchant lions,
Their cannon, through the night,

Holding their breath, had watched, in grim defiance,
The sea-coast opposite.

And now they roared at drum-beat from their stations
On every citadel;

Each answering each, with morning salutations,

That all was well.

And down the coast, all taking up the burden,
Replied the distant forts,

As if to summon from his sleep the Warden
And Lord of the Cinque Ports.

Him shall no sunshine from the fields of azure,

No drum-beat from the wall,

No morning gun from the black fort's embrasure,

Awaken with its call!

*The Duke of Wellington, who held the office of Warden of the Cinque Ports, died almost suddenly at Walmer Castle, September 14th, 1852, aged 82.

No more, surveying with an eye impartial

The long line of the coast,

Shall the gaunt figure of the old Field Marshal
Be seen upon his post!

For in the night, unseen, a single warrior,
In sombre harness mailed,

Dreaded of man, and surnamed the Destroyer,
The rampart wall has scaled.

He passed into the chamber of the sleeper,
The dark and silent room,

And as he entered, darker grew, and deeper,
The silence and the gloom.

He did not pause to parley or dissemble,

But smote the Warden hoar;

Ah! what a blow! that made all England tremble
And groan from shore to shore.

Meanwhile, without, the surly cannon waited,

The sun rose bright o'erhead;

Nothing in Nature's aspect intimated

That a great man was dead.

H. W. Longfellow.

JANUARY WIND.

THE wind, wife, the wind; how it blows, how it blows; It grips the latch, it shakes the house, it whistles, it screams, it crows;

It dashes on the window-pane, then rushes off with a cry, Ye scarce can hear your own loud voice, it clatters so loud

and high;

And far away upon the sea it floats with thunder-call, The wind, wife; the wind, wife; the wind that did it all.

The wind, wife, the wind; how it blew, how it blew; The very night our boy was born, it whistled, it screamed, it crew;

And while you moan'd upon your bed, and your heart was dark with fright,

I swear it mingled with the soul of the boy you bore that night;

It scarcely seems a winter since, and the wind is with us still,

The wind, wife; the wind, wife; the wind that blew us ill!

The wind, wife, the wind; how it blows, how it blows;
It changes, shifts, without a cause, it ceases, it comes and

goes;

And David ever was the same, wayward, and wild, and bold

For wilful lad will have his way, and the wind no hand can hold ;

But ah! the wind, the changeful wind, was more in the blame than he;

The wind, wife; the wind, wife; that blew him out to sea!

The wind, wife, the wind; now 'tis still, now 'tis still; And as we sit I seem to feel the silence shiver and thrill; 'Twas thus the night he went away, and we sat in silence here,

We listened to our beating hearts, and all was weary and

drear;

We longed to hear the wind again, and to hold our David's hand

The wind, wife; the wind, wife; that blew him out from land.

The wind, wife; the wind; up again, up again!

It blew our David round the world, yet shrieked at our

window-pane;

And ever since that time, old wife, in rain, and in sun,

and in snow,

Whether I work or weary here, I hear it whistle and blow: It moans around, it groans around, it wanders with scream

and cry

The wind, wife; the wind, wife; may it blow him home Robert Buchanan.

to die.

THE DESOLATION OF GREENLAND.

ONCE more to Greenland's long-forsaken beach,
Which foot of man again shall never reach,
Imagination wings her flight, explores
The march of Pestilence along the shores,
And sees how Famine in his steps hath paced,
While winter laid the soil for ever waste.
Dwellings are heaps of fallen or falling stones,
The charnel-houses of unburied bones,
On which obscene and prowling monsters fed,
But, with the rapine in their jaws, fell dead,
Thus while Destruction, blasting youth and age,
Raged till it wanted victims for its rage,—
Love, the last feeling that from life retires,
Blew the faint sparks of his unfuell'd fires.
In the cold sunshine of yon narrow dell
Affection lingers; there two lovers dwell,
Greenland's whole family: nor long forlorn;
There comes a visitant,—a babe is born.
O'er his meek helplessness the parents smiled;
'Twas hope;-for hope is every mother's child:
Then seemed they in that world of solitude
The Eve and Adam of a race renewed.
Brief happiness! too perilous to last;

The moon hath waxed and waned, and all is past:
Behold the end :-One morn, athwart the wall,
They marked the shadow of a reindeer fall,
Bounding in tameless freedom o'er the snow;
The father tracked him, and with fatal bow
Smote down the victim; but before his eyes,
A rabid she-bear pounced upon the prize;
A shaft into the spoiler's flank he sent,

She turned in wrath, and limb from limb had rent

1

The hunter, but his dagger's plunging steel
With riven bosom made the monster reel;
Unvanquished, both to closer combat flew,
Assailants each, till each the other slew:

Mingling their blood from mutual wounds, they lay
Stretched on the carcase of their antlered prey.
Meanwhile his partner waits, her heart at rest,
No burthen but her infant on her breast.
With him she slumbers, or with him she plays,
And tells him all her dreams of future days,
Asks him a thousand questions, feigns replies,
And reads whate'er she wishes in his eyes.

-Red evening comes; no husband's shadow falls
Where fell the reindeer's o'er the latticed walls:
'Tis night; no footstep sounds towards her door :
The day returns,—but he returns no more.
In frenzy, forth she sallies; and with cries,
To which no voice except her own replies

In frightful echoes startling all around,
Where human voice again shall never sound,
She seeks him, finds him not: some angel-guide
In mercy turns her from the
corpse
aside;

Perhaps his own freed spirit, lingering near,
Who waits to waft her to a happier sphere,
But leads her first, at evening, to their cot,
Where lies the little one all day forgot;
Imparadised in sleep she finds him there,
Kisses his cheek, and breathes a mother's prayer.
Three days she languishes, nor can she shed
One tear between the living and the dead;

When her lost spouse comes o'er the widow's thought,
The pangs of memory are to madness wrought;
But when her suckling's eager lips are felt,
Her heart would fain-but oh! it cannot-melt;
At length it breaks, while on her lap he lies,
With baby wonder gazing in her eyes.
Poor orphan! mine is not a hand to trace
Thy little story, last of all thy race!