How high you lift your heads into the sky!
How huge you are! how mighty and how free!
Ye are the things that tower, that shine, whose smile
Makes glad, whose frown is terrible, whose forms,
Robed or unrobed, do all the impress wear
Of awe divine. Ye guards of liberty!
I'm with you once again!-I call to you
With all my voice! I hold my hands to you
To show they still are free.
I rush to you,
As though I could embrace you!

Scaling yonder peak,

I saw an eagle wheeling, near its brow,
O'er the abyss. His broad, expanded wings
Lay calm and motionless upon the air,
As if he had floated there, without their aid,
By the sole act of his unlorded will,

That buoyed him proudly up! Instinctively

I bent my bow; yet wheeled he, heeding not The death that threatened him! I could not shoot! 'Twas liberty! I turned my bow aside,

And let him soar away.

Once Switzerland was free! Oh, with what pride
I used to walk these hills, look up to heaven,
And bless God that it was so ! It was free!
From end to end, from cliff to lake, 'twas free!
Free as our torrents are, that leap our rocks
And plough our valleys without asking leave;
Or as our peaks, that wear their caps of snow
In very presence of the regal sun!

How happy was I in it then!

I loved

Its very storms! Ay, often have I sat

In my boat, at night, when down the mountain gorge

The wind came roaring-sat in it, and eyed

The thunder breaking from his cloud, and smiled
To see him shake his lightnings o'er my head,
And think I had no master, save his own!

You know the jutting cliff, round which a track
Up hither winds, whose base is but the brow
To such another one, with scanty room
For two to pass abreast? O'ertaken there

By the mountain-blast, I've laid me flat along;
And while gust followed gust more furiously,
As if 'twould sweep me o'er the horrid brink,
And I have thought of other lands, whose storms
Are summer-flaws to those of mine, and just

Have wished me there,—the thought that mine was free
Has checked that wish; and I have raised my head,
And cried, in thraldom, to that furious wind,

"Blow on !—This is the land of liberty!

SHERIDAN KNOWLES.

THE RAVEN.

Once, upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and

weary,

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore— While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tapping,

As of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door. "'Tis some visitor," I muttered, “ tapping at my chamber door

Only this, and nothing more."

Ah! distinctly. I remember! it was in the bleak December, And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.

Eagerly I wished the morrow; vainly I had tried to borrow From my books surcease of sorrow sorrow for the lost

Lenore

For the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore

Nameless here for evermore.

And the silken, sad, uncertain rustling of each purple curtain Thrilled me filled me with fantastic terrors never felt

before;

So that now, to still the beating of my heart, I stood re

peating,

"'Tis some visitor entreating entrance at my chamber

door;

This it is, and nothing more."

Presently my soul grew stronger; hesitating then no longer, "Sir," said I, "or madam, truly your forgiveness I implore; But the fact is I was napping, and so gently you came rapping,

And so faintly you came tapping, tapping at my chamber door,

That I scarce was sure I heard you"-here I opened wide +he door :

Darkness there, and nothing more!

Deep into that darkness peering, long I stood there wondering, fearing,

Doubting, dreaming dreams no mortal ever dared to dream before;

But the silence was unbroken, and the darkness gave no

token,

And the only word there spoken was the whispered word, "Lenore!"

This I whispered, and an echo murmured back the word, "Lenore!

Merely this, and nothing more.

Then into the chamber turning, all my soul within me burning,

Soon I heard again a tapping, somewhat louder than before; Surely," said I, "surely that is something at my window

lattice;

Let me see, then, what thereat is, and this mystery explore; Let my heart be still a moment, and this mystery explore; 'Tis the wind, and nothing more!

Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,

In there stepped a stately raven of the saintly days of yore; Not the least obeisance made he; not an instant stopped or stayed he;

But, with mien of lord or lady, perched above my chamber door

Perched upon a bust of Pallas, just above my chamber door

Perched, and sat, and nothing more.

Then this ebony bird beguiling my sad fancy into smiling, By the grave and stern decorum of the countenance it wore ; "Though thy crest be shorn and shaven, thou," I said, "art

sure no craven

Ghastly, grím and ancient raven, wandering from the nightly

shore

Tell me what thy lordly name is on the night's Plutonian shore!"

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore."

Much I marveled this ungainly fowl to hear discourse so plainly―

Though its answer little meaning, little relevancy bore;
For we cannot help agreeing that no living human being
Ever yet was blessed with seeing bird above his chamber
door-

Bird or beast upon the sculptured bust above his chamber
door,
With such name as "Nevermore."

But the raven, sitting lonely on the placid bust, spoke only That one word, as if his soul in that one word he did outpour. Nothing farther then he uttered—not a feather then he fluttered

Till I scarcely more than muttered, "Other friends have flown before

On the morrow he will leave me, as my hopes have flown before."

Then the bird said, "Nevermore."

Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken, 'Doubtless," said I, "what it utters is its only stock and

66

store

Caught from some unhappy master, whom unmerciful disaster Followed fast and followed faster,. till his songs one burden bore

Till the dirges of his hope the melancholy burden bore

But the raven still beguiling all my sad soul into smiling, Straight I wheeled a cushioned seat in front of bird and bust

and door;

Then upon the velvet sinking, I betook myself to linking Fancy unto fancy, thinking what this ominous bird of yore What this grim, ungainly, ghastly, gaunt and ominous bird of yore

Meant in croaking "Nevermore."

This I sat engaged in guessing, but no syllable expressing
To the fowl, whose fiery eyes now burned into my bosom's
core ;.

This, and more, I sat divining, with my head at ease reclining,
On the cushion's velvet lining that the lamplight gloated o'er;
But whose velvet violet lining, with the lamplight gloating o'er,
She shall press
ah, nevermore!

Then, methought, the air grew denser, perfumed from an

unseen censer

Swung by seraphim, whose faint footfalls tinkled on the tufted floor.

"Wretch!" I cried, "thy God hath lent thee, by these angels he hath sent thee,

Respite-respite and nepenthe from thy memories of Lenore! Quaff, oh quaff this kind nepenthe, and forget the lost Lenore!"

66

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore."

Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! — prophet still, if bird or devil!

Whether tempter sent, or whether tempest tossed thee here ashore

Desolate, yet all undaunted, on this desert land enchanted, On this home by horror haunted-tell me truly, I imploreIs there - is there balm in Gilead? tell me - tell me, I im

plore!"

Quoth the raven, "Nevermore."

"Prophet!" said I, "thing of evil! - prophet still if bird or devil!

By the heaven that bends above us by that God we both adore

Tell this soul with sorrow laden if, within the distant Aidenne, It shall clasp a sainted maiden whom the angels name LenoreClasp a rare and radiant maiden whom the angels name Lenore."

Quoth the raven,

"Nevermore."