Disputants often after hot debates
Leave the contention as they found it-bone, And take to dueling or thumping têtes;
Thinking by strength of artery to atone
For strength of argument; and he who winces
From force of words, with force of arms convinces !
With pistols, powder, bullets, surgeons, lint,
Seconds, and smelling-bottles, and foreboding,
Our friends advanced; and now portentous loading
(Their hearts already loaded) served to show
It might be better they shook hands—but no;
When each opines himself, though frightened, right,
Each is, in courtesy, obliged to fight!
And they did fight; from six full measured paces
The unbeliever pulled his trigger first;
And fearing, from the braggart's ugly faces,
The whizzing lead had whizzed its very worst,
Ran up, and with a duelistic fear
(His ire evanishing like morning vapors),
Found him possessed of one remaining ear,
Who, in a manner sudden and uncouth,
Had given, not lent, the other ear to truth ;
For while the surgeon was applying lint,
He, wriggling, cried "The deuce is in 't-
"Sir! I meant-CAPERS !"
It was many, full many a year ago,
In a kingdom by the sea,
That a maiden there lived, whom you may know
By the name of Annabel Lee;
And this maiden lived with no other thought,
Than to love and be loved by me.
I was a child, and she was a child,
In this kingdom by the sea:
But we loved with a love that was more than love,
I and my Annabel Lee:
With a love the winged seraphs of heaven,
Coveted her and me.
And this was the reason that long ago
In this kingdom by the sea,
A wind blew out of a cloud, chilling
My beautiful Annabel Lee;
So that her high-born kinsman came
And bore her away from me,
To shut her up in a sepulcher,
In this kingdom by the sea.
The angels not half so happy in heaven,
Went envying her and me-
Yes! that was the reason as all men know,
In this kingdom by the sea-
That the wind came out of the cloud, by night,
Chilling and killing my Annabel Lee.
But our love was stronger by far, than the love
Of those who were older than we-
Of many far wiser than we;
And neither the angels above in heaven,
Nor the demons down under the sea,
Can ever disever my soul from the soul
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee.
For the moon never beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:
And the stars never rise but I feel the bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee:
And so all the night tide, I lie down by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life and my bride,
In the sepulcher there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
Ex. XXVII.-"PASSING AWAY."
WAS it the chime of a tiny bell,
That came so sweet to my dreaming ear,-
Like the silvery tones of a fairy's shell,
That he winds on the beach so mellow and clear,
When the winds and the waves lie together asleep,
And the moon and the fairy are watching the deep,
She dispensing her silvery light,
And he, his notes as silvery quite,
While the boatman listens and ships his oar,
To catch the music that comes from the shore ?--
Hark! the notes on my ear that play
Are set to words;-as they float they say,
Passing away! passing away!"
But no! it was not a fairy's shell,
Blown on the beach so merry and clear;
Nor was it the tongue of a silver bell,
Striking the hour, that filled my ear,
As I lay in my dream; yet was it a chime
That told of the flow of the stream of time.
For a beautiful clock from the ceiling hung,
And a plump little girl for a pendulum swung;
(As you've sometimes seen, in a little ring
That hangs in his cage, a canary-bird swing ;)
And she held to her bosom a budding bouquet,
And as she enjoyed it, she seemed to say,
Passing away! passing away!"
O, how bright were the wheels, that told
Of the lapse of time, as they moved round slow!
And the hands, as they swept o'er the dial of gold,
Seemed to point to the girl below.
And lo! she had changed;-in a few short hours
Her bouquet had become a garland of flowers,
That she held in her outstretched hands, and flung
This way and that, as she dancing swung
In the fullness and grace of womanly pride,
That told me she soon was to be a bride :-
Yet then, when expecting her happiest day,
In the same sweet voice I heard her say,
"Passing away! passing away!"
While I gazed at that fair one's cheek, a shade
Of thought, or care, stole softly over,
Like that by a cloud in a summer day made,
Looking down on a field of blossoming clover.
The rose yet lay on her cheek, but its flush
Had something lost of its brilliant blush;
And the light in her eye, and the light on the wheels,
That marched so calmly round above her,
Was a little dimmed,—as when evening steals
Upon noon's hot face :-yet one could n't but love her, For she looked like a mother, whose first babe lay,
Rocked on her breast, as she swung all day;
And she seemed, in the same silver tone, to say,
"Passing away! passing away!"
While yet I looked, what a change there came!
Her eye was quenched, and her cheek was wan:
Stooping and staffed was her withered frame,
Yet just as busily swung she on;
The garland beneath her had fallen to dust;
The wheels above were eaten with rust;
The hands, that over the dial swept,
Grew crooked and tarnished, but on they kept,
And still there came that silver tone
From the shriveled lips of the toothless crone,—
(Let me never forget till my dying day
The tone or the burden of her lay!)
"Passing away! passing away!"
THE Comet! He is on his way,
And singing as he flies;
The whizzing planets shrink before
The specter of the skies;
Ah! well may regal orbs burn blue,
And satellites turn pale,
Ten million cubic miles of head,
Ten billion leagues of tail!
On, on, by whistling spheres of light,
He flashes and he flames;
He turns not to the left or right,
He asks them not their names;
One spurn from his demoniac heel,—
Away, away they fly,
Where darkness might be bottled up,
And sold for "Tyrian dye."
And what would happen to the land,
And how would look the sca,
If in the bearded demon's path
Our earth should chance to be!
Full hot and high the sea would boil,
Full red the forests gleam;
Methought I saw and heard it all
In a dyspeptic dream!
I saw a tutor take his tube
The comet's course to spy;
I heard a scream,-the gathered rays
Had struck the tutor's eye;
I saw a fort, the soldiers all
Were armed with goggles green; Pop cracked the guns! whiz flew the balls! Bang went the magazine!
I saw a poet dip his scroll
Each moment in a tub,
I read upon the warping back,
"The Dream of Beelzebub ;"
He could not see his verses burn,
Although his brain was fried,
And ever and anon he bent
And wet them as they dried.
I saw the scalding pitch roll down
The crackling, sweating pines;
And streams of smoke, like water-spouts,
Burst through the rumbling mines;
I asked the firemen why they made
Such noise about the town;
They answered not,-but all the while
The brakes went up and down.
I saw a roasting pullet sit
Upon a baking egg;
I saw a cripple scorch his hand
Extinguishing his leg;
I saw nine geese upon the wing
Towards the frozen pole,
And every mother's gosling fell,
Crisped to a crackling coal.
I saw the ox that browsed the grass,
Writhe in the blistering rays,
The herbage in his shrinking jaws
Was all a fiery blaze;
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