In all his princely beauty, to defy

The heart that cherished him,-for him he poured,
In agony that would not be controlled,
Strong supplication, and forgave him there,
Before his God, for his deep sinfulness.

The pall was settled. He who slept beneath
Was straitened for the grave; and, as the folds
Sunk to the still proportions, they betrayed
The matchless symmetry of Absalom.
His hair was yet unshorn, and silken curls
Were floating round the tassels, as they swayed
To the admitted air, as glossy now

As when, in hours of gentle dalliance, bathing
The snowy fingers of Judea's girls.

His helm was at his feet: his banner, soiled
With trailing through Jerusalem, was laid,
Reversed, beside him: and the jeweled hilt,
Whose diamonds lit the passage of his blade,
Rested, like mockery, on his covered brow.
The soldiers of the king trod to and fro,
Clad in the garb of battle; and their chief,
The mighty Joab, stood beside the bier,
And gazed upon the dark pall steadfastly,
As if he feared the slumberer might stir.
A slow step startled him. He grasped his blade
As if a trumpet rang; but the bent form
Of David entered, and he gave command,
In a low tone, to his few followers,

And left him with his dead. The king stood still
Till the last echo died: then, throwing off
The sackcloth from his brow, and laying back
The pall from the still features of his child,
He bowed his head upon him, and broke forth
In the resistless eloquence of woe:→

"Alas! my noble boy! that thou shouldst die!
Thou, who wert made so beautifully fair!
That death should settle in thy glorious eye,
And leave his stillness in this clustering hair!
How could he mark thee for the silent tomb,
My proud boy Absalom!

"Cold is thy brow, my son! and I am chill,
As to my bosom I have tried to press thee.

How was I wont to feel my pulses thrill,

Like a rich harp-string, yearning to caress thee, And hear thy sweet 'my father!' from these dumb And cold lips, Absalom!

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The grave hath won thee. I shall hear the gush
Of music, and the voices of the young;

And life will pass me in the mantling blush,
And the dark tresses to the soft winds flung ;-
But thou no more, with thy sweet voice, shalt come
To meet me, Absalom!

"And, oh! when I am stricken, and my heart,
Like a bruised reed, is waiting to be broken,
How will its love for thee, as I depart,

Yearn for thine ear to drink its last deep token!
It were so sweet, amid death's gathering gloom,
To see thee, Absalom!

"And now, farewell! 'Tis hard to give thee up,
With death so like a gentle slumber on thee:-
And thy dark sin!-Oh! I could drink the cup,
If from this woe its bitterness had won thee.
May God have called thee, like a wanderer, home,
My erring Absalom!"

He covered up his face, and bowed himself
A moment on his child: then, giving him
A look of melting tenderness, he clasped
His hands convulsively, as if in prayer;
And, as a strength were given him of God,
He rose up calmly, and composed the pall
Firmly and decently, and left him there,
As if his rest had been a breathing sleep.

Ex. CII.-BATTLE OF BEAL' AN DUINE.

AT once there rose so wild a yell
Within that dark and narrow dell,
As all the fiends from heaven that fell,
Had pealed the banner cry of hell!

Forth from the pass in tumult driven,

WALTER SCOTT.

Like chaff before the wind of heaven,
The archery appear:

For life! for life! their flight they ply-
And shriek, and shout, and battle-cry,
And plaids and bonnets waving high,
And broad-swords flashing to the sky,
Are maddening in their rear.
Onward they drive in dreadful race,
Pursuers and pursued;

Before that tide of flight and chase,
How shall it keep its rooted place,

The spearmen's twilight wood?

"Down, down," cried Mar, "your lances down! Bear back both friend and foe!"

Like reeds before the tempest's frown,
That serried grove of lances brown
At once lay leveled low;

And closely shouldering side to side,
The bristling ranks the onset bide.
"We'll quell the savage mountaineer,
As their Tinchel cows the game!
They come as fleet as forest deer,
We'll drive them back as tame."

Bearing before them, in their course,
The relics of the archer force
Like wave with crest of sparkling foam,
Right onward did Clan-Alpine come.
Above the tide, each broad-sword bright
Was brandishing like beam of light,
Each targe was dark below;
And with the ocean's mighty swing,
When heaving to the tempest's wing,
They hurled them on the foe.

I heard the lance's shivering crash,
As when the whirlwind rends the ash;
I heard the broad sword's deadly clang,
As if an hundred anvils rang!

But Moray wheeled his rearward rank
Of horsemen on Clan-Alpine's flank-
"My banner-men, advance!

"I see," he cried, "their column shakeNow, gallants! for your ladies' sake, Upon them with the lance!"

The horsemen dashed among the rout,
As deer break through the broom;
Their steeds are stout, their swords are out,
They soon make lightsome room.
Clan-Alpine's best are backward borne-
Where, where was Roderick then!
One blast upon his bugle-horn
Were worth a thousand men.
And refluent through the pass of fear
The battle's tide was poured;
Vanished the Saxon's struggling spear,
Vanished the mountain's sword.
As Brocklinn's chasm, so black and steep,
Receives her roaring linn,

As the dark caverns of the deep
Suck the wild whirlpool in,
So did the deep and darksome pass
Devour the battle's mingled mass;
None linger now upon the plain,
Save those who ne'er shall fight again.

Ex. CIII.-THE DEVIL'S WALK ON EARTH.

ROBERT SOUTHEY.

FROM his brimstone bed at break of day,

A walking the devil is gone,

To look at his snug little farm of the world,
And see how his stock went on.

Over the hill and over the dale,
And he went over the plain;

And backward and forward he swished his tail,
As a gentleman swishes a cane.

How then was the devil dressed?

Oh, he was in his Sunday's best,

His coat was red, and his breeches were blue,
And there was a hole where his tail came through.

He met a lord of high degree,

No matter what was his name;

Whose face with his own when he came to compare The expression, the look, and the air,

And the character, too, as it seemed to a hair—
Such a twin-likeness there was in the pair,

That it made the devil start and stare,

For he thought there was surely a looking-glass there,
But he could not see the frame.

He saw a lawyer killing a viper,
On a dung-hill beside his stable;
Ha! quoth he, thou put'st me in mind
Of the story of Cain and Abel.

An apothecary on a white horse
Rode by on his vocation;

And the devil thought of his old friend
Death in the Revelation.

He passed a cottage with a double coach-house,
A cottage of gentility,

And he owned with a grin
That his favorite sin,

Is pride that apes humility.

He walked into London leisurely,
The streets were dirty and dim:
But there he saw Brothers the prophet,
And Brothers the prophet saw him.

He entered a thriving bookseller's shop;
Quoth he, we are both of one college,
For I myself sate like a cormorant once
Upon the tree of knowledge.

As he passed through Cold-Bath Fields he looked
At a solitary cell;

And he was well pleased, for it gave him a hint
For improving the prisons of hell.

He saw a turnkey tie a thief's hands
With a cordial tug and jerk;
Nimbly, quoth he, a man's fingers move
When his heart is in his work.

He saw the same turnkey unfettering a man
With little expedition;

And he chuckled to think of his dear slave-trade,
And the long debates and delays that were made,
Concerning its abolition.

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