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He lifts his leaves in the sunbeam's glance, As the Almehs lift their arms in dance

A slumberous motion, a passionate sign,
That works in the cells of the blood like wine.

Full of passion and sorrow is he,
Dreaming where the beloved may be.
And when the warm south winds arise,
He breathes his longing in fervid sighs,
Quickening odors, kisses of balm,
That drop in the lap of his chosen palm.

The sun may flame, and the sands may stir,
But the breath of his passion reaches her.

O Tree of Love, by that love of thine,
Teach me how I shall soften mine!

Give me the secret of the sun,
Whereby the wooed is ever won!

If I were a king, O stately Tree,

A likeness, glorious as might be,

In the court of my palace I'd build for thee

With a shaft of silver, burnished bright,
And leaves of beryl and malachite;

With spikes of golden bloom a-blaze,
And fruits of topaz and chrysoprase.
And there the poets, in thy praise,
Should night and morning frame new lays -

New measures sung to tunes divine;
But none, O Palm, should equal mine!

The Tiger.

BAYARD TAYLOR.

TIGER, Tiger, burning bright,

In the forest of the night,
What immortal hand or eye
Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies Burned the ardor of thine eyes? On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand dare seize the fire?

Heedless at the ambushed brink
The tall giraffe stoops down to drink;
Upon him straight the savage springs
With cruel joy. The desert rings
With clanging sound of desperate strife;
The prey is strong, and strives for life.
Plunging off with frantic bound
To shake the tyrant to the ground,

He shrieks he rushes through the waste,
With glaring eye and headlong haste.
In vain!-the spoiler on his prize
Rides proudly, tearing as he flies.
For life, the victim's utmost speed
Is mustered in this hour of need.
For life, for life, his giant might

He strains, and pours his soul in flight;
And mad with terror, thirst, and pain,
Spurns with wild hoof the thundering plain.
"Tis vain; the thirsty sands are drinking
His streaming blood, his strength is sinking;
The victor's fangs are in his veins,
His flanks are streaked with sanguine stains;
His panting breast in foam and gore
Is bathed -he reels-his race is o'er.
He falls-and, with convulsive throe,
Resigns his throat to the ravening foe!
-And lo! ere quivering life is fled,
The vultures, wheeling overhead,
Swoop down, to watch in gaunt array,
Till the gorged tyrant quits his prey.

THOMAS PRINGLE.

Afar in the Desert.

AFAR in the desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side.
When the sorrows of life the soul o'ercast,
And, sick of the present, I cling to the past;
When the eye is suffused with regretful tears,
From the fond recollections of former years;
And shadows of things that have long since fled
Flit over the brain, like the ghosts of the dead:
Bright visions of glory that vanished too soon;
Day-dreams that departed ere manhood's noon;
Attachments by fate or falsehood reft;
Companions of early days lost or left —
And my native land-whose magical name
Thrills to the heart like electric flame;

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Afar in the desert I love to ride,

With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side.
O'er the brown karroo, where the bleating cry
Of the springbok's fawn sounds plaintively:
And the timorous quagga's shrill whistling neigh
Is heard by the fountain at twilight gray;
Where the zebra wantonly tosses his mane,
With wild hoof scouring the desolate plain;
And the fleet-footed ostrich over the waste
Speeds like a horseman who travels in haste,
Hieing away to the home of her rest,

Where she and her mate have scooped their nest,

Far hid from the pitiless plunderer's view
In the pathless depths of the parched karroo.

A far in the desert I love to ride,
With the silent Bush-boy alone by my side.
Away-away- in the wilderness vast

Where the white man's foot hath never passed,
And the quivered Coranna or Bechuan
Hath rarely crossed with his roving clan:
A region of emptiness, howling and drear,

Chiquita.

BEAUTIFUL! Sir, you may say so. Thar is n't her match in the county,

Is thar, old gal? Chiquita, my darling, my beauty! Whoa! Feel of that neck, sir,-thar's velvet!

Steady - ah, will you ? you vixen ! Whoa! I say. Jack, trot her out; let the gentleman look at her paces.

Morgan!-She ain't nothin' else, and I've got the papers to prove it.

Sired by Chippewa Chief, and twelve hundred dollars won't buy her.

Briggs of Tuolumne owned her. Did you know Briggs of Tuolumne ?

Busted hisself in White Pine, and blew out his brains down in 'Frisco ?

Hed n't no savey, -hed Briggs. Thar, Jack! that'll do, quit that foolin'!

Nothin' to what she kin do when she's got her work cut out before her.

fear;

Which the snake and the lizard inhabit alone,
With the twilight bat from the yawning stone;
Where grass, nor herb, nor shrub takes root,
Save poisonous thorns that pierce the foot;
And the bitter melon, for food and drink,
Is the pilgrim's fare by the salt-lake's brink;
A region of drought, where no river glides,
Nor rippling brook with osiered sides;
Where sedgy pool, nor bubbling fount,
Nor tree, nor cloud, nor misty mount,
Appears, to refresh the aching eye;
But the barren earth and the burning sky,
And the blank horizon, round and round,
Spread - void of living sight or sound.
And here, while the night-winds round
sigh,

And the stars burn bright in the midnight sky,
As I sit apart by the desert stone,
Like Elijah at Horeb's cave, alone,

"A still small voice" comes through the wild,
Like a father consoling his fretful child,
Which banishes bitterness, wrath, and fear,
Saying - Man is distant, but God is near !

me

THOMAS PRINGLE.

jockeys is jockeys;

And 'tain't every man as can ride as knows what a hoss has got in him.

Know the old ford on the Fork, that nearly got Flanigan's leaders?

Nasty in daylight, you bet, and a mighty rough ford in low water!

Well, it ain't six weeks ago that me and the Jedge, and his nevey,

Struck for that ford in the night, in the rain, and the water all round us;

Up to our flanks in the gulch, and Rattlesnake Creek just a bilin',

Not a plank left in the dam, and nary a bridge on the river.

I had the gray, and the Jedge had his roan, and his nevey, Chiquita :

And after us trundled the rocks jest loosed from the top of the cañon.

Lickity, lickity, switch, we came to the ford, and Chiquita

Buckled right down to her work, and afore I could yell to her rider,

Look-how 'round his straining throat
Grace and shifting beauty float;
Sinewy strength is in his reins,

But his famous fathers dead Were Arabs all, and Arab bred, And the last of that great line Trod like one of a race divine!

And yet, he was but friend to one,
Who fed him at the set of sun,

By some lone fountain fringed with green:
With him, a roving Bedouin,

He lived (none else would he obey
Through all the hot Arabian day),
And died untamed upon the sands
Where Balkh amidst the desert stands.
BARRY CORNWALL.

The Glory of Motion.

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THREE twangs of the horn, and they're all out of cover!

Must brave you, old bull-finch, that's right in the way!

A rush, and a bound, and a crash, and I'm over!

They're silent and racing and for'ard away; Fly, Charley, my darling! Away and we follow;

There's no earth or cover for mile upon mile; We're winged with the flight of the stork and the swallow;

The heart of the eagle is ours for a while.

The pasture-land knows not of rough plough or harrow!

The hoofs echo hollow and soft on the sward; The soul of the horses goes into our marrow; My saddle's a kingdom, and I am its lord: And rolling and flowing beneath us like ocean, Gray waves of the high ridge and furrow glide

on,

Richer, redder, never ran

Through the boasting heart of man.
He can trace his lineage higher
Than the Bourbon dare aspire, –
Douglas, Guzman, or the Guelph,
Or O'Brien's blood itself!

He, who hath no peer, was born, Here, upon a red March morn;

Before us, beneath us, behind us, are gone.

O puissant of bone and of sinew availing,

On thee how I've longed for the brooks and the showers!

O white-breasted camel, the meek and unfailing,

To speed through the glare of the long desert hours!