Aroused by Gelert's dying yell,
Some slumberer wakened nigh:
What words the parent's joy can tell,
To hear his infant cry!

Concealed beneath a mangled heap,
His hurried search had missed,
All glowing from his rosy sleep,
His cherub-boy he kissed!

Nor scratch had he, nor harm, nor dread-
But, the same couch beneath,
Lay a great wolf, all torn and dead—
Tremendous still in death!

Ah! what was then Llewellyn's pain!
For now the truth was clear:
The gallant hound the wolf had slain,
To save Llewellyn's heir.

Vain, vain was all Llewellyn's woe;
"Best of thy kind, adieu !

The frantic deed which laid thee low,
This heart shall ever rue!"

And now a gallant tomb they raise,
With costly sculpture decked;
And marbles, storied with his praise,
Poor Gelert's bones protect.

Here never could the spearman pass,
Or forester, unmoved;

Here oft the tear-besprinkled grass
Llewellyn's sorrow proved.

And here he hung his horn and spear;
And, oft as evening fell,

In fancy's piercing sounds would hear
Poor Gelert's dying yell!

THE ALCHYMIST.

BY WILLIS.

THE night wind with a desolate moan swept by, And the old shutters of the turret swung Screaming upon their hinges: and the moon, As the torn edges of the clouds flew past, Struggled aslant the stained and broken panes So dimly, that the watchful eye of death Scarcely was conscious when it went and came.

The fire beneath his crucible was low; Yet still it burned; and ever as his thoughts Grew insupportable, he raised himself Upon his wasted arm, and stirred the coals With difficult energy, and when the rod Fell from his nerveless fingers, and his eye Felt faint within its sockets, he shrunk back Upon his pallet, and with unclosed lips Muttered a curse on death! The silent room, From its dim corners, mockingly gave back His rattling breath; the humming in the fire Had the distinctness of a knell; and when Duly the antique horologe beat one, He drew a phial from beneath his head, And drank. And instantly his lips compressed, And, with a shudder in his skeleton frame, He rose with supernatural strength, and sat Upright, and communed with himself:

"I did not think to die

Till I had finished what I had to do;

I thought to pierce the eternal secret through
With this my mortal eye;

I felt-oh God! it seemeth, even now,
This cannot be the death-dew on my brow!

M

"And yet it is- I feel,

Of this dull sickness at my heart, afraid!
And in my eyes the death-sparks flash and fade;
And something seems to steal
Over my bosom like a frozen hand-

Binding its pulse with an icy band.

"And this is death! But why
It cannot be

Feel I this wild recoil?

The immortal spirit shuddereth to be free!
Would it not leap to fly,

Like a chained eaglet at its parent's call?
I fear I fear-that this poor life is all!
"Yet thus to pass away!

To live but for a hope that mocks at last-
To agonize, to strive, to watch, to fast,
To waste the light of day,

Night's better beauty, feeling, fancy, thought,
All that we have and are- -for this-for nought!
"Grant me another year,

God of my spirit!—but a day-to win
Something to satisfy this thirst within!
I would KNOW something here!

Break for me but one seal that is unbroken!
Speak for me but one word that is unspoken!
"Vain-vain!-my brain is turning

With a swift dizziness, and my heart grows sick, And these hot temple-throbs come fast and thick, And I am freezing-burning

Dying! Oh God! If I might only live!

My phial

-Ha! it thrills me- -I revive!

"Ay-were not man to die,

He were too mighty for this narrow sphere! Had he but time to brood on knowledge hereCould he but train his eye

Might he but wait the mystic word and hour

Only his Maker would transcend his power!

"Earth has no mineral strangeThe illimitable air no hidden wingsWater no quality in covert springs,

And fire no power to change

Seasons no mystery, and stars no spell,
Which the unwasting soul might not compel.

"Oh, but for time to track

The upper stars into the pathless sky-
To see the invisible spirits eye to eye-

To hurl the lightning back—

To tread unhurt the sea's dim-lighted hallsTo chase Day's chariot to the horizon-walls-for now

"And more, much more

The life-sealed fountains of my nature move-
To nurse and purify this human love—
To clear the godlike brow

Of weakness and mistrust, and bow it down,
Worthy and beautiful, to the much-loved one-
"This were indeed to feel

The soul-thirst slaken at the living stream-
To live!-oh God! that life is but a dream!
And death. Aha! I reel-

Dim-dim-I faint-darkness comes o'er my eye-
Cover me! save me -God of heaven! I die!'

'T was morning, and the old man lay alone.
No friend had closed his eyelids, and his lips,
Open and ashy pale, the expression wore
Of his death-struggle. His long silvery hair
Lay on his hollow temples thin and wild,
His frame was wasted, and his features wan,
And haggard as with want, and in his palm
His nails were driven deep, as if the throe
Of the last agony had wrung him sore.

The storm was raging still. The shutters swung
Screaming as harshly in the fitful wind,

And all without went on—as aye it will,

Sunshine or tempest, reckless that a heart
Is breaking, or has broken, in its change.

The fire beneath the crucible was out;
The vessels of his mystic art lay round,
Useless and cold as the ambitious hand
That fashioned them; and the small rod,
Familiar to his touch for threescore years,
Lay on the alembic's rim, as if it still
Might vex the elements at its master's will.

And thus had passed from its unequal frame
A soul of fire—a sun-bent eagle stricken
From his high soaring down-an instrument
Broken with its own compass. Oh, how poor
Seems the rich gift of genius, when it lies,
Like the adventurous bird that hath out-flown

His strength upon the sea, ambition-wrecked-
A thing the thrush might pity, as she sits
Brooding in quiet on her lowly nest!

THE BITTER GOURD.

BY LEIGH HUNT.

LOKMAN the Wise, therefore the Good (for wise
Is but sage good, seeing with final eyes),

Was slave once to a lord, jealous though kind,
Who, piqued sometimes at the man's master mind,
Gave him, one day, to see how he would treat
So strange a grace, a bitter gourd to eat.