"Tis said that Persia's baffled king,
In mad, tyrannic pride,
Cast fetters on the Hellespont,

To curb its swelling tide:

But freedom's own true spirit heaves
The bosom of the main;

It toss'd those fetters to the skies,
And bounded on again!

The scorn of each succeeding age
On Xerxes' head was hurl'd,
And o'er that foolish deed has peal'd
The long laugh of a world.

Thus, thus, defeat, and scorn, and shame,
Is his, who strives to bind

The restless, leaping waves of thought,
The free tide of the mind.

THE POET OF TO-DAY.

What siren joy from thy high trust hath won thee,
O Poet of to-day ?-thou still unheard,
Though struggling nations cast their eyes upon thee,
And the roused world is waiting for thy word!

Why lingerest thou amid the summer places,
The gardens of romance, the haunt of dreams,
'Mid verdurous shadows, lit by fairy faces,

And fitful playing of soft, golden gleams?

Arouse! look up, to where above thee tower
Regions of being grander, freer, higher,
Where God reveals his presence and his power,
E'en as of old, in thunders and in fire.

Ah, when the soul of ancient song was blending
With the rapt bard's in his immortal strains,
'Twas like the wine drunk on Olympus, sending
Divine intoxication through the veins.

It brought strange, charméd words, and magic singing,
And forms of beauty burning on the sight,-
Young loves their flight through airs ambrosial winging,
And dark-brow'd heroes arming for the fight,-

The trumpet's "golden cry," the shield's quick flashing,
The dance of banners and the rush of war,-
Death-showers of arrows and the spear's sharp clashing,—
The homeward rolling of the victor's car!

But, ah! in all that song's heroic story,

Had sad Humanity one briefest part?

Sounds through the clang of words, the storm, the glory, One sharp, strong cry from out her bleeding heart?

But unto thee the soul of song is given,
O Poet of to-day, a grander dower,-
Comes from a higher than the Olympian heaven,
In holier beauty and in larger power.

To thee Humanity, her woes revealing,

Would all her griefs and ancient wrongs rehearse;
Would make thy song the voice of her appealing,
And sob her mighty sorrows through thy verse.
Wherever Truth her holy warfare wages,

Or Freedom pines, there let thy voice be heard;
Sound like a prophet-warning down the ages
The human utterance of God's living word.

Oh, let thy lays prolong that angel-singing,
Girdling with music the Redeemer's star,

And breathe God's peace, to earth "glad tidings" bringing
From the near heavens, of old so dim and far!

EDITH MAY.

THIS is the assumed name of one of our sweetest female poets,-a name bestowed upon her by the poet Willis when she first began to write for the press. Her poems were written chiefly at a very early age, and yet have all the strength and finish of the productions of a more experienced hand. She is a native of Philadelphia, and now resides in Montrose, Pennsylvania.'

"Her dramatic power,"-observes Dr. Griswold,-"observation of life; imagination, fancy, and the easy and natural flow of her verse, which is nowhere marred by any blemish of imperfect taste, entitle this very youthful poet to a place in the common estimation inferior to none occupied by writers of ber years." We will add that, in our estimation, she is inferior to none of her own sex of any years.

SUMMER.

The early spring hath gone; I see her stand
Afar off on the hills, white clouds, like doves,
Yoked by the south wind to her opal car,

As she was a very dear pupil of mine, I could, of course, give her name; but in a most kind and grateful letter received from her, in answer to one of inquiry, she says, "Personally, I have never come before the public; and will you pardon me if I withhold some of the biographical facts you ask for? About Edith May,' Mr. Willis's creation, you may say what you please; but there is little to be said. She has published a trifling work in prose, and a volume of poems, and is a born and bred Philadelphian. I wonder if certain pleasant Shakspearian readings in our school, that I well remember, had any thing to do with my fancy for versemaking?"

A superb edition of her poems, elegantly illustrated, has been published by E. H. Butler & Co., Philadephia.

And at her feet a lion and a lamb

Couch'd, side by side. Irresolute spring hath gone! And summer comes like Psyche, zephyr-borne

To her sweet land of pleasures.

She is here!

Amid the distant vales she tarried long,

But she hath come, oh joy!-for I have heard
Her many-chorded harp the livelong day

Sounding from plains and meadows, where, of late,
Rattled the hail's sharp arrows, and where came
The wild north wind careering like a steed
Unconscious of the rein. She hath gone forth
Into the forest, and its poiséd leaves

Are platform'd for the zephyr's dancing feet.
Under its green pavilions she hath rear'd

Most beautiful things; the spring's pale orphans lie
Shelter'd upon her breast; the bird's loud song
At morn outsoars his pinion, and when waves
Put on night's silver harness, the still air

Is musical with soft tones. She hath baptized
Earth with her joyful weeping. She hath bless'd
All that do rest beneath the wing of Heaven,
And all that hail its smile. Her ministry
Is typical of love. She hath disdain'd
No gentle office, but doth bend to twine
The grape's light tendrils and to pluck apart
The heart-leaves of the rose. She doth not pass
Unmindful the bruised vine, nor scorn to lift
The trodden weed; and when her lowlier children
Faint by the wayside like worn passengers,
She is a gentle mother, all night long

Bathing their pale brows with her healing dews.
The hours are spendthrifts of her wealth; the days
Are dower'd with her beauty.

THE COLORING OF HAPPINESS.

My heart is full of prayer and praise to-day,
So beautiful the whole world seems to me!
I know the morn has dawn'd as is its wont,
I know the breeze comes on no lighter wing,
I know the brook chimed yesterday that same
Melodious call to my unanswering thought;
But I look forth with new-croated eyes,
And soul and sense seem link'd and thrill alike,
And things familiar have unusual grown,
Taking my spirit with a fair surprise!
But yesterday, and life seemed tented round
With idle sadness. Not a bird sang out
But with a mournful meaning; not a cloud-
And there were many-but in flitting past
Trail'd somewhat of its darkness o'er my heart,
And loitering, half becalm'd, unfreighted all,
Went by the Heaven-bound hours.

Lie all harmonious and lovely things

But, oh! to-day

Close to my spirit, and a while it seems

As if the blue sky were enough of Heaven!

My thoughts are like tense chords that give their music
At a chance breath; a thousand delicate hands
Are harping on my soul! no sight, no sound,
But stirs me to the keenest sense of pleasure,-
Be it no more than the wind's cautious tread,
The swaying of a shadow, or a bough,
Or a dove's flight across the silent sky.

Oh, in this sunbright sabbath of the heart,
How many a prayer puts on the guise of thought,
An angel unconfess'd! Its rapid feet,

That leave no print on memory's sands, tread not
Less surely their bright path than choral hymns
And litanies. I know the praise of worlds,
And the soul's unvoiced homage, both arise
Distinctly to His ear who holds all nature
Pavilion'd by His presence; who has fashion'd
With an impartial care, alike the star
That keeps unpiloted its airy circle,

And the sun-quicken'd germ, or the poor moss
The building swallow plucks to line her nest.

A POET'S LOVE.

The stag leaps free in the forest's heart,
But thy step is lighter, my love, my bride!
Light as the quick-footed breezes that part
The plumy ferns on the mountain's side;
Swift as the zephyrs that come and pass
O'er the waveless lake and the billowy grass.
I hear thy voice where the white wave gleams,
In the one-toned bells of the rippled streams,
In the silvery boughs of the aspen-tree,

In the wind that stirreth the shadowy pine,
In the shell that moans for the distant sea,
Never was voice so sweet as thine!

Never a sound through the even dim
Came half so soft as thy vesper hymn.

I have follow'd fast, from the lark's low nest,
Thy breezy step to the mountain crest.

The livelong day I have wander❜d on,

Till the stars were up, and the twilight gone,
Ever unwearied where thou hast roved,
Fairest, and purest, and best-beloved!
I have felt thy kiss in the leafy aisle,

And thy breath astir in my floating hair;
I have met the light of thy haunting smile

In the deep still woods, and the sunny air; For thou lookest down from the bending skies, And the earth is glad with thy laughing eyes.

When my heart is sad, and my pulse beats low,
Whose touch so light on my aching brow?
Who cometh in dreams to my midnight sleep?
Who bendeth over my noonday rest?
Who singeth me songs in the forest deep,
Laying my head to her gentle breast?
When life grows dim to my weary eye,
When joy departeth, and sorrow is nigh,
Who, 'neath the track of the stars, save thee,
Speaketh or singeth of hope to me?

There comes a time when the morn shall rise,
Yet charm no smile to thy filméd eyes.

There comes a time when thou liest low
With the roses dead on thy frozen brow,
With a pall hung over thy tranced rest,
And the pulse asleep in thy silent breast.

There shall come a dirge through the valleys drear,
And a white-robed priest to thine icy bier.
His lips are cold, but his dim eyes weep,

And he maketh thy grave where the snow falls deep
Woe is me, when I watch and pray

For the lightest sound of thy coming foot,

For the softest note of thy summer lay,

For the faintest chord of thy vine-strung lute!

Woe is me, when the storms sweep by

And the mocking winds are my sole reply!

GEORGE WILLIAM CURTIS.

THIS brilliant and fascinating writer, and graceful and eloquent orator, is the son of George Curtis, of Providence, Rhode Island, and was born in that city in 1824. At six years of age, he was placed at a school near Boston, and after being there five years, he returned to Providence, where he pursued his studies till he was fifteen, when his father removed to New York. Here he entered a large mercantile house; but, after remaining in it a year, he returned to his studies for two years, when, at eighteen, he joined the celebrated Association at Brook Farm, West Roxbury, Massachusetts. Here he remained a year and a half, and then, after spending the winter in New York, being still enamored of the country, he went to Concord, Massachusetts, and lived in a farmer's family, working hard a portion of every day upon the farm, enjoying the society of Emerson, Hawthorne, and others of kindred literary tastes, and perfecting himself in various literary accomplishments.

In 1846, Mr. Curtis sailed for Europe, and after visiting, with a scholar's eye, all the Southern countries, went to Berlin, to pursue his studies, and, in 1848, matriculated at the University. After this, he travelled through Italy again, visited Sicily, Malta, and the East, and returned home in the summer of 1850, In the autumn of that year, he published the Nile Notes of a Howadji, a great part of which was written on the Nile. In 1852, The Howadji in Syria appeared,