Till at length the bell at midnight

Sounded from its dark abode,

And, from out a neighbouring farm-yard, Loud the cock Alectryon crowed.

Then, with nostrils wide distended,
Breaking from his iron chain,

And unfolding far his pinions,

To those stars he soared again.

On the morrow, when the village
Woke to all its toil and care,

Lo! the strange steed had departed,
And they knew not when nor where.

But they found, upon the greensward

Where his struggling hoofs had trod, Pure and bright, a fountain flowing

From the hoof-marks in the sod.

From that hour, the fount unfailing

Gladdens the whole region round, Strengthening all who drink its waters,

While it soothes them with its sound.

TEGNERS DRAPA.

I HEARD a voice that cried, "Balder the Beautiful

Is dead, is dead!"

And through the misty air
Passed like the mournful cry

Of sunward sailing cranes.

I saw the pallid corpse

Of the dead sun

Borne through the Northern sky.

Blasts from Niffelheim

Lifted the sheeted mists

Around him as he passed.

And the voice for ever cried,

"Balder the Beautiful

Is dead, is dead!"

And died away

Through the dreary night,

In accents of despair.

Balder the Beautiful,

God of the summer sun,

Fairest of all the gods!

Light from his forehead beamed,

Hoeder, the blind old god,
Whose feet are shod with silence,
Pierced through that gentle breast
With his sharp spear, by fraud
Made of the mistletoe,

The accursed mistletoe!

They laid him in his ship,

With horse and harness,

As on a funeral pyre.

Odin placed

A ring upon his finger,

And whispered in his ear.

They launched the burning ship!

It floated far away

Over the misty sea,

Till like the sun it seemed,

Sinking beneath the waves.

Balder returned no more!

SONNET

ON MRS. KEMBLE'S READINGS FROM SHAKSPEARE.

O PRECIOUS evenings! all too swiftly sped!
Leaving us heirs to amplest heritages

Of all the best thoughts of the greatest sages,
And giving tongues unto the silent dead!

How our hearts glowed and trembled as she read,
Interpreting by tones the wondrous pages

Of the great poet who foreruns the ages,
Anticipating all that shall be said!

O happy Reader! having for thy text

The magic book, whose Sibylline leaves have caught

The rarest essence of all human thought!

O happy Poet! by no critic vext!

How must thy listening spirit now rejoice

To be interpreted by such a voice!

THE SINGERS.

GOD sent his Singers upon earth
With songs of sadness and of mirth,

That they might touch the hearts of men,
And bring them back to heaven again.

The first a youth, with soul of fire,
Held in his hand a golden lyre ;