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For how can I thy words believe, When even God thou didst deceive?

A sea of lies art thou, - our sin
Only a drop that sea within."

"Not so," said Satan, "I serve God,
His angel now, and now his rod.

In tempting I both bless and curse,
Make good men better, bad men worse. ⚫
Good coin is mixed with bad, my brother,
I but distinguish one from the other."
"Granted," the Caliph said, "but still
You never tempt to good, but ill.

Tell then the truth, for well I know
You come as my most deadly foe."

Loud laughed the fiend. "You know me well,
Therefore my purpose I will tell.

If you had missed your prayer, I knew
A swift repentance would ensue.

And such repentance would have been
A good, outweighing far the sin.

I chose this humbleness divine,

Borne out of fault, should not be thine,

Preferring prayers elate with pride
To sin with penitence allied."

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J. F. C.

OUR revels now are ended. These our actors,
As I foretold you, were all spirits, and
Are melted into air, into thin air;
And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,
The cloud-capped towers, the gorgeous palaces,
The solemn temples, the great globe itself,
Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve,
And, like this insubstantial pageant faded,
Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuff
As dreams are made of, and our little life
Is rounded with a sleep.

SHAKESPEARE

POEMS OF TRAGEDY.

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Hark! to the bolting bells
In echoes deefs and slow.
While on the breeze
our banner floats
Draped in the weeds of wee.
L. Huntley Siquuni.

POEMS OF TRAGEDY.

THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE.

EXECUTED 1650.

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"He is coming! he is coming!" Like a bridegroom from his room Came the hero from his prison

To the scaffold and the doom. There was glory on his forehead, There was lustre in his eye, And he never walked to battle More proudly than to die. There was color in his visage,

Though the cheeks of all were wan;

And they marvelled as they saw him pass, That great and goodly man!

He mounted up the scaffold,

And he turned him to the crowd; But they dared not trust the people,

So he might not speak aloud. But he looked upon the heavens, And they were clear and blue, And in the liquid ether

The eye of God shone through: Yet a black and murky battlement

Lay resting on the hill,

As though the thunder slept within, — All else was calm and still.

The grim Geneva ministers

With anxious scowl drew near, As you have seen the ravens flock Around the dying deer.

He would not deign them word nor sign, But alone he bent the knee;

And veiled his face for Christ's dear grace Beneath the gallows-tree.

Then, radiant and serene, he rose,

And cast his cloak away;

For he had ta'en his latest look
Of earth and sun and day.

A beam of light fell o'er him,
Like a glory round the shriven,
And he climbed the lofty ladder

As it were the path to heaven.
Then came a flash from out the cloud,
And a stunning thunder-roll;
And no man dared to look aloft,

For fear was on every soul.
There was another heavy sound,
A hush, and then a groan;
And darkness swept across the sky, -
The work of death was done!
WILLIAM EDMONDSTOUNE AYTOUN.

THE NUN.

FROM ITALY."

'Tis over; and her lovely cheek is now
On her hard pillow, there, alas! to be
Nightly, through many and many a dreary hour
Wan, often wet with tears, and (ere at length

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Naught save the crucifix and rosary,
And the gray habit lying by to shroud
Her beauty and grace.

When on her knees she fell,
Entering the solemn place of consecration,
And from the latticed gallery came a chant
Of psalms, most saint-like, most angelical,
Verse after verse sung out, how holily!
The strain returning, and still, still returning,
Methought it acted like a spell upon her,
And she was casting off her earthly dross;
Yet was it sad and sweet, and, ere it closed,
Came like a dirge. When her fair head was shorn,
And the long tresses in her hands were laid,
That she might fling them from her, saying, –
"Thus,

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Thus I renounce the world!" When all was changed,

And as a nun in homeliest guise she knelt,
Veiled in her veil, crowned with her silver crown,
Her crown of lilies as the spouse of Christ,
Well might her strength forsake her, and her knees
Fail in that hour! Well might the holy man,
He at whose foot she knelt, give as by stealth
('T was in her utmost need; nor, while she lives,
Will it go from her, fleeting as it was)

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IPHIGENEIA AND AGAMEMNON.

IPHIGENEIA, when she heard her doom
At Aulis, and when all beside the king
Had gone away, took his right hand, and said:
"O father! I am young and very happy.
I do not think the pious Calchas heard
Distinctly what the goddess spake; old age
Obscures the senses. If my nurse, who knew
My voice so well, sometimes misunderstood,
While I was resting on her knee both arms,
And hitting it to make her mind my words,
And looking in her face, and she in mine,
Might not he, also, hear one word amiss,
Spoken from so far off, even from Olympus?"
The father placed his cheek upon her head,
And tears dropt down it; but the king of men
Replied not. Then the maiden spake once more:
"O father! sayest thou nothing? Hearest thou

not

Me, whom thou ever hast, until this hour,
Listened to fondly, and awakened me

To hear my voice amid the voice of birds,
When it was inarticulate as theirs,
And the down deadened it within the nest?"
He moved her gently from him, silent still;
And this, and this alone, brought tears from her,
Although she saw fate nearer. Then with sighs:
"I thought to have laid down my hair before
| Benignant Artemis, and not dimmed
Her polished altar with my virgin blood;

I thought to have selected the white flowers
To please the nymphs, and to have asked of each
By name, and with no sorrowful regret,

That faint but fatherly smile, that smile of love Whether, since both my parents willed the change,

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I might at Hymen's feet bend my clipt brow;
And (after these who mind us girls the most)
Adore our own Athene, that she would
Regard me mildly with her azure eyes,
But, father, to see you no more, and see
Your love, O father! go ere I am gone!"
Gently he moved her off, and drew her back,
Bending his lofty head far over hers;
And the dark depths of nature heaved and burst.
He turned away,
not far, but silent still.
She now first shuddered; for in him, so nigh,

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