And seeming to whisper-" All is well!"
A moment only he feels the spell

Of the place and the hour, the secret dread
Of the lonely belfry and the dead;
For suddenly all his thoughts are bent
On a shadowy something far away,
Where the river widens to meet the bay,-
A line of black, that bends and floats
On the rising tide, like a bridge of boats.

Meanwhile, impatient to mount and ride,
Booted and spurr'd, with a heavy stride,
On the opposite shore walk'd Paul Revere.
Now he patted his horse's side,

Now gazed on the landscape far and near,
Then impetuous stamp'd the earth,

And turn'd and tighten'd his saddle-girth;
But mostly he watch'd with eager search
The belfry-tower of the old North-Church,
As it rose above the graves on the hill,
Lonely and spectral and sombre and still.

And lo! as he looks, on the belfry's height
A glimmer, and then a gleam of light!
He springs to the saddle, the bridle he turns,
But lingers and gazes, till full on his sight
A second lamp in the belfry burns.

A hurry of hoofs in a village street,

A shape in the moonlight, a bulk in the dark,

And beneath from the pebbles, in passing, a spark,
Struck out by a steed that flies fearless and fleet:

That was all! and yet, through the gloom and the light,
The fate of a nation was riding that night:

And the spark struck out by that steed, in his flight,
Kindled the land into flame with its heat.

It was twelve by the village-clock,

When he cross'd the bridge into Medford town.

He heard the crowing of the cock,

And the barking of the farmer's dog,

And felt the damp of the river-fog,
That rises when the sun goes down.

It was one by the village-clock,
When he rode into Lexington.
He saw the gilded weathercock
Swim in the moonlight as he pass'd,

And the meeting-house windows, blank and bare,
Gaze at him with a spectral glare,

As if they already stood aghast

At the bloody work they would look upon.

It was two by the village-clock,

When he came to the bridge in Concord town.
He heard the bleating of the flock,

And the twitter of birds among the trees,
And felt the breath of the morning breeze
Blowing over the meadows brown.
And one was safe and asleep in his bed
Who at the bridge would be first to fall,
Who that day would be lying dead,
Pierced by a British musket-ball.

have read

You know the rest. In the books you
How the British regulars fired and fled,-
How the farmers gave them ball for ball,
From behind each fence and farmyard wall,
Chasing the red-coats down the lane,
Then crossing the fields to emerge again
Under the trees at the turn of the road,
And only pausing to fire and load.

So through the night rode Paul Revere;
And so through the night went his cry of alarm
To every Middlesex village and farm,-

A cry of defiance, and not of fear,

A voice in the darkness, a knock at the door,
And a word that shall echo for evermore!
For, borne on the night-wind of the past,
Through all our history, to the last,

In the hour of darkness, and peril, and need,
The people will waken and listen to hear
The hurrying hoof-beat of that steed,
And the midnight message of Paul Revere.

THE ARROW AND THE SONG.

I SHOT an arrow into the air;
It fell to earth, I knew not where :
For, so swiftly it flew, the sight
Could not follow it in its flight.

I breathed a song into the air,

It fell to earth I knew not where :
For who has sight so keen and strong,
That it can follow the flight of song?
Long, long afterward, in an oak
I found the arrow, still unbroke;
And the song, from beginning to end,
I found again in the heart of a friend.

Wind of the summer night!
Where yonder woodbine creeps
Fold, fold thy pinions light!
She sleeps!

My lady sleeps!
Sleeps!

Dreams of the summer night!
Tell her, her lover keeps
Watch! while in slumbers light
She sleeps!
My lady sleeps!
Sleeps!

CHILDREN.

COME to me, 0 ye Children!
For I hear you at your play,
And the questions that perplex'd me
Have vanished quite away.

Ye open the eastern windows,
That look towards the sun,

Where thoughts are singing swallows,
And the brooks of morning run.

In

your hearts are the birds and the sunshine, In your thoughts the brooklet's flow;

But in mine is the wind of Autumn,

And the first fall of the snow.

Ah! what would the world be to us,
If the children were no more?
We should dread the desert behind us
Worse than the dark before.

What the leaves are to the forest,
With light and air for food,
Ere their sweet and tender juices
Have been harden'd into wood,-

That to the world are children;
Through them it feels the glow
Of a brighter and sunnier climate
Than reaches the trunks below.

Come to me, 0 ye Children!
And whisper in my ear

What the birds and the winds are singing
In your sunny atmosphere.

For what are all our contrivings,
And the wisdom of our books,
When compared with your caresses,
And the gladness of your looks?

Ye are better than all the ballads
That ever were sung or said;

For ye are living poems,

And all of the rest are dead.

CATAWBA WINE.

THIS Song of mine
Is a Song of the Vine,

To be sung by the glowing embers
Of wayside inns,

When the rain begins

To darken the drear Novembers.

It is not a song
Of the Scuppernong,

From warm Carolinian valleys,
Nor the Isabel

And the Muscadel

That bask in our garden alleys.

Nor the red Mustang,

Whose clusters hang

O'er the waves of the Colorado,