in his relations with his fellows. Christianity, for example-I do not say merely at the time of its first appearance, but in the earlier centuries of its existence-Christianity did not in any way influence the social state; it openly announced that it would not interfere with that; it ordered the slave to obey his master: it attacked none of the great evils, the great injustices of the society of that period. Notwithstanding this, who will deny that Christianity has been since then a great crisis of civilisation? Why? Because it has changed the internal man, his creeds and sentiments, because it has regenerated the moral and intellectual man.

The Pied Piper of Hamelin.

BROWNING.

[THE author of the following "Child's Story," as he calls it, is one of the most original poets of our time. He has a wonderful power of versification,— and qualities even higher. But his depth of thought often goes into the ob. scure; and as his poetry is mainly suggestive, and consequently makes large demands on the imagination of the reader, Mr Browning can scarcely be called popular, though he has, most deservedly, a large body of admirers. The story of the "Pied Piper of Hamelin" did not spring from the poet's invention, but, in the middle of the seventeenth century, was a legend firmly believed throughout Germany. It is thus told by James Howell, in one of his interesting letters bearing the date of 1643 :- "The town of Hamelin was annoyed with rats and mice; and it chanced that a pied-coated piper came thither, who cove nanted with the chief burghers for such a reward, if he could free them quite from the said vermin, nor would he demand it till a twelvemonth and a day after. The agreement being made, he began to play on his pipes, and all the rats and the mice followed him to a great sough hard by, where they all perished, so the town was infested no more. At the end of the year, the pied piper returned for his reward, the burghers put him off with slightings and neglect, offering him some small matter, which he, refusing, and staying some days in the town, on Sunday morning at high mass, when most people were at church, he fell to play on his pipes, and all the children up and down, followed him out of the town, to a great hill not far off, which rent in two and opened, and let him and the children in, and so closed up again. This happened a matter of two hundred and fifty years since, and in that town they date their bills and bonds and other instruments in law, to this day from the year of the going out of their children. Besides there is a great pillar of stone at the foot of the said hill, whereon this story is engraven."]

L

Hamelin Town's in Brunswick,

By famous Hanover city;
The river Weser, deep and wide,
Washes its wall on the southern side;
A pleasanter spot you never spied;
But, when begins my ditty,

Almost five hundred years ago,
To see the townsfolk suffer so

From vermin was a pity.
Rats!

1

II.

They fought the dogs and killed the cats,

And bit the babies in the cradles,

And ate the cheeses out of the vats,

And licked the soup from the cook's own ladles,

Split open the kegs of salted sprats,

Made nests inside men's Sunday hats,

And even spoiled the women's chats,
By drowning their speaking
With shrieking and squeaking
In fifty different sharps and flats.

III.

At last the people in a body

To the town hall came flocking:

""Tis clear," cried they, "our Mayor's a noddy;
And as for our Corporation-shocking

To think we buy gowns lined with ermine
For dolts that can't or won't determine
What's best to rid us of our vermin!
You hope, because you 're old and obese,
To find in the furry civic robe ease?
Rouse up, sirs! Give your brains a racking

To find the remedy we 're lacking,

Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing !" At this the Mayor and Corporation

Quaked with a mighty consternation.

IV.

An hour they sate in council,

At length the Mayor broke silence:
"For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell ;
I wish I were a mile hence !

It's easy to bid one rack one's brain-
I'm sure my poor head aches again,
I've scratched it so, and all in vain.
Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap!"
Just as he said this, what should hap
At the chamber door but a gentle tap?

"Bless us," cried the Mayor, "what's that?" (With the Corporation as he sat,

Looking little though wondrous fat;

Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister

Than a too-long-opened oyster,

Save when at noon his paunch grew mutinous

For a plate of turtle green and glutinous,)

"Come in!" the Mayor cried, looking bigger:

And in did come the strangest figure.

His queer long coat from heel to head
Was half of yellow and half of red;
And he himself was tall and thin,
With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin,
And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin,
No tuft on cheek, nor beard on chin,

But lips where smiles went out and in-
There was no guessing his kith and kin!
And nobody could enough admire

The tall man and his quaint attire:
Quoth one: "It's as my great-grandsire,
Starting up at the Trump of Doom's tone,
Had walked this way from his painted tombstone."

VI.

He advanced to the council-table :

And, "Please your honours," said he, "I'm able,
By means of a secret charm, to draw

All creatures living beneath the sun,
That creep, or swim, or fly, or run,
After me so as you never saw !
And I chiefly use my charm

On creatures that do people harm,

The mole, and toad, and newt, and viper; And people call me the Pied Piper." (And here they noticed round his neck.

A scarf of red and yellow stripe,

To match with his coat of the self same check;
And at the scarf's end hung a pipe ;

And his fingers, they noticed, were ever straying
As if impatient to be playing

Upon this pipe, as low it dangled

Over his vesture so old-fangled.)

"Yet," said he, "poor piper as I am,

In Tartary I freed the Cham,

Last June, from his huge swarms of gnats;
I eased in Asia the Nizam

Of a monstrous brood of vampire bats:
And, as for what your brain bewilders,
If I can rid your town of rats

Will you give me a thousand guilders ?"

"One? fifty thousand !"—was the exclamation Of the astonished Mayor and Corporation.

VII.

Into the street the Piper stept,
Smiling first a little smile,
As if he knew what magic slept
In his quiet pipe the while;
Then like a musical adept,

To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled,
And green and blue his sharp eyes twinkled
Like a candle flame where salt is sprinkled;
And ere three shrill notes the pipe uttered,
You heard as if an army muttered;

And the muttering grew to a grumbling;
And the grumbling grew to a mighty rumbling;
And out of the houses the rats came tumbling.
Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats,
Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats,
Grave old plodders, gay young friskers,

Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins,
Cocking tails and pricking whiskers,
Families by tens and dozens,
Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives-
Followed the Piper for their lives.
From street to street he piped advancing,
And step for step they followed dancing,
Until they came to the River Weser
Wherein all plunged and perished
-Save one, who, stout as Julius Cæsar,
Swam across and lived to carry
(As he the manuscript he cherished)
To Rat-land home his commentary,
Which was,
"At the first shrill notes of the pipe,
I heard a sound as of scraping tripe,