WHAT time the earth takes on the garb of Spring,

And new-born joy runs riot in the blood, When the year's tide turns refluent to its flood,

And blissful birds their songs are carolling,

When life once more is fair, and everything

In nature smiles, when tender flowrets bud, And deck the mead as stars the heavens stud,

What wonder that my heart leaps up to sing!

What wonder that to thee my song of praise I bring, and burn sweet incense at thy

shrine,

And offer all the worship of my lays
To thee, whose loveliness hath lent my

Calm vision of the world; our feet to urge
On to ideal far-set goals; to merge
Our being with the heart of things; brought

near

The springs of life, to make us see and hear

And feel its swelling and pulsating surge:
Such, Thespian art divine, thy nobler aim;
For this the tale of Edipus was told,
Of frenzied Lear, Harpagon's greed of
gold;-

And, knowing this, how must we view with shame

Thy low estate, and hear the plaudits loud

That mark thee now but pander to the crowd!

TANNHÄUSER

SIN-SATIATE, and haggard with despair, Freed from the unholy mountain's baleful spell,

Forth coming from the very pit of Hell, The fallen knight repentant kneels in prayer.

But hark! what solemn strains fill all the air?

What pilgrim chants now on the morning swell,

And pour hope's balm upon his soul, and

tell

Of pardon, if he to Christ's seat repair?

With fervent heart he treads the weary

way,

Kneels at the throne of God's anointed,

hears

The fearful doom repentance may not stay: And yet, in death's last gasp if he but heed

An angel voice soft whispers in his ears That for him too the Saviour once did bleed.

LOHENGRIN

STRAIN, strain thine eyes, this parting is for aye!

Grief have her will of thee! Thy faith confessed

To his unequal, he must go, the quest

66

Fulfilled that brought him hither on thy day

Of imminent, direst peril. Now away
To other shores bids him the Grail's behest.
Thou knewest him too late to spare thy
breast

This keen remorse, thy soul this dark dismay.

Yet canst thou face not all disconsolate The coming years. The horn remains, the sword,

The ring he left thee, and the child whom late

Thou mournedst; while beyond the power of fate

To dim the memory of that love outpoured Upon thee by thy stainless knight and lord.

SONG AND SCIENCE

Well was it for thee where the glad gods dwelt

In happy Hellas, clasped by silver nights, When on the clear blue of Olympian heights

Apollo's lyre, and by the reedy stream Pan's shrill, sweet pipe made life a sunny dream.

Well was it for thee in the English wood, When red, new leaves were bursting out of bud,

And hearts were fresh as young leaves on the elm.

And well, through all the centuries since, thy realm

Has loyally been kept for thee, and thou, Departing oft, hast still returned; but

now

New powers devour thy kingdom day by day.

How shouldst thou come amidst such waste to stay?

For even now, across that western glow,
A keen light whitens coldly in the east,
And glittering on the slopes of morning,
lo,

One comes in silver arms; and aye increased
The sharp light shines, and men beholding

turn

YOSEMITE

FROM THE WASHINGTON SEQUOIA "

SOUL of a tree ungrown, new life out of God's life proceeding,

Folded close in the seed, waking-O wonder of wonders

Waking with power as a spirit to clothe thee in leaves and in branches, What, in thine age-long future, is the word thou art set here to say?

Far in the great Sierra dwell the mighty groups of thy kindred;

Aisles of the sounding pines; and colonnades dusky and fragrant, Pillared with ridgy shafts of tall and wonderful cedar,

Lead to their presence; and round them forever the mountains stand.

Deep in that inner temple listens the fortunate pilgrim,

Low where the red lilies tremble he lies while the still hours pass by him, Baring his brows to the silence, the dear and intimate greatness,

The touch of the friendly air, like a quiet and infinite hand.

Far, far up from the earth, in the lower spaces of heaven,

Shadowy green on the blue, rests the moving lace of the branches,

Holding the faint winds captive, dropping but lightest of murmurs,

Spirits of far-away sound, to the windless reaches below.