All the lands of the earth make contributions here ;) City of the sea! city of hurried and glittering tides! City whose gleeful tides continually rush or recede, whirling in and out, with eddies and foam!

City of wharves and stores! city of tall façades of marble and iron!

Proud and passionate city! mettlesome, mad, extrava

gant city!

Walt Whitman.

B

NEW YORK.

UT see! the broadening river deeper flows, Its tribute floods intent to reach the sea, While, from the west, the fading sunlight throws Its softening hues on stream, and field, and tree; All silent nature bathing, wondrously, In charms that soothe the heart with sweet desires, And thoughts of friends we ne'er again may see, Till lo! ahead, Manhatta's bristling spires,

Above her thousand roofs red with day's dying fires,

May greet the wanderer of Columbia's shore, Proud Venice of the west! no lovelier scene. Of thy vast throngs now faintly comes the roar, Though late like beating ocean surf I ween, And everywhere thy various barks are seen, Cleaving the limpid floods that round thee flow, Encircled by thy banks of sunny green, The panting steamer plying to and fro, Or the tall sea-bound ship abroad on wings of snow.

Theodore Sedgwick Fay.

TH

UNSEEN SPIRITS.

HE shadows lay along Broadway, -
'T was near the twilight tide, -

And slowly there a lady fair

Was walking in her pride.
Alone walked she; but, viewlessly,
Walked spirits at her side.

Peace charmed the street beneath her feet,
And Honor charmed the air,

And all astir looked kind on her,

And called her good as fair;

For all God ever gave to her

She kept with chary care.

She kept with care her beauties rare
From lovers warm and true;

For her heart was cold to all but gold,
And the rich came not to woo:

But honored well are charms to sell,
If priests the selling do.

Now walking there was one more fair, -
A slight girl, lily-pale;

And she had unseen company

To make the spirit quail:

'Twixt Want and Scorn she walked forlorn, And nothing could avail.

No mercy now can clear her brow

For this world's peace to pray;

For, as love's wild prayer dissolved in air,
Her woman's heart gave way!

But the sin forgiven by Christ in heaven,
By man is cursed alway.

Nathaniel Parker Willis.

BROADWAY.

N this day of brightest dawning,
Underneath each spreading awning,
Sheltered from the sun's fierce ray,

Come, and let us saunter gayly
With the crowd whose footsteps, daily,
Wear the sidewalks of Broadway.
Leave the proof-sheets and the printer
Till the duller days of winter,

Till some dark December day;
Better than your lucubrations
Are the vivid inspirations

You can gather in Broadway!

Tell me not, in half-derision,
Of your Boulevards Parisian,
With their brilliant broad pavés,
Still for us the best is nearest,
And the last love is the dearest,
And the Queen of Streets

Broadway!

Here, beneath bewitching bonnets,
Sparkle eyes to kindle sonnets,
Charms, each worth a lyric lay;

Ah! what bright, untold romances
Linger in the radiant glances
Of the beauties of Broadway!

All the fairer, that so fleeting
Is the momentary meeting,

That our footsteps may not stay;
While, each passing form replacing,
Swift the waves of life are chasing
Down the channels of Broadway!

Motley as the masqueraders
Are the jostling promenaders,

In their varied, strange display; Here an instant, only, blending, Whither are their footsteps tending As they hasten through Broadway?

Some to garrets and to cellars,
Crowded with unhappy dwellers;
Some to mansions, rich and gay,
Where the evening's mirth and pleasure
Shall be fuller, in their measure,
Than the turmoil of Broadway!

Yet were once our mortal vision
Blest with quicker intuition,

We should shudder with dismay
To behold what shapes are haunting
Some, who seem most gayly flaunting
On the sidewalks of Broadway!

For, beside the beggar cheerless,
And the maiden gay and fearless,
And the old man worn and gray,
Swift and viewless, waiting never,
Still the Fates are gliding ever,

Stern and silent, through Broadway!

William Allen Butler.

I

THE BOWLING GREEN.

S this the Bowling Green? I should not know it, So disarrayed, defaced, and gone to seed,

Like some un-Pegasused and prosy poet,

Whose Helicon is now the bowl and weed; Its Green, if grass, does not precisely show it,

So changed to worse from that once lovely mead.

Not Time has done it only, Desecration

Has with corrosive finger touched the place;

The iron fence, its once proud decoration,

The street, the mansions round, share the disgrace,

Now but the stepping-stone of every nation,
The point of fusion for the human race.

The houses once, long since, in evening's glory
Shone with a tranquil beauty; and on stoops
Maidens would listen while the old, old story
Beguiled the twilight; and broad-skirted groups
Displayed their sabres moderately gory,

Displacing with good Dutch the Indians' whoops.