The melodies and measures fraught With sunshine and the open air, Of vineyards and the singing sea Of his beloved Sicily;And much it pleased him to peruse The songs of the Sicilian muse,--Bucolic songs by Meli sung In the familiar peasant tongue, That made men say, "Behold! once more The pitying gods to earth restore Theocritus of Syracuse!"A Spanish Jew from Alicant With aspect grand and grave was there;Vender of silks and fabrics rare, And attar of rose from the Levant.
Like an old Patriarch he appeared, Abraham or Isaac, or at least Some later Prophet or High-Priest;With lustrous eyes, and olive skin, And, wildly tossed from cheeks and chin, The tumbling cataract of his beard.
His garments breathed a spicy scent Of cinnamon and sandal blent, Like the soft aromatic gales That meet the mariner, who sails Through the Moluccas, and the seas That wash the shores of Celebes.
All stories that recorded are By Pierre Alphonse he knew by heart, And it was rumored he could say The Parables of Sandabar, And all the Fables of Pilpay, Or if not all, the greater part!
Well versed was he in Hebrew books, Talmud and Targum, and the lore Of Kabala; and evermore There was a mystery in his looks;His eyes seemed gazing far away, As if in vision or in trance He heard the solemn sackbut play, And saw the Jewish maidens dance.
A Theologian, from the school Of Cambridge on the Charles, was there;Skilful alike with tongue and pen, He preached to all men everywhere The Gospel of the Golden Rule, The New Commandment given to men, Thinking the deed, and not the creed, Would help us in our utmost need.
With reverent feet the earth he trod, Nor banished nature from his plan, But studied still with deep research To build the Universal Church, Lofty as in the love of God, And ample as the wants of man.
A Poet, too, was there, whose verse Was tender, musical, and terse;The inspiration, the delight, The gleam, the glory, the swift flight, Of thoughts so sudden, that they seem The revelations of a dream, All these were his; but with them came No envy of another's fame;He did not find his sleep less sweet For music in some neighboring street, Nor rustling hear in every breeze The laurels of Miltiades.
Honor and blessings on his head While living, good report when dead, Who, not too eager for renown, Accepts, but does not clutch, the crown!
Last the Musician, as he stood Illumined by that fire of wood;Fair-haired, blue-eyed, his aspect blithe.
His figure tall and straight and lithe, And every feature of his face Revealing his Norwegian race;A radiance, streaming from within, Around his eyes and forehead beamed, The Angel with the violin, Painted by Raphael, he seemed.
He lived in that ideal world Whose language is not speech, but song;Around him evermore the throng Of elves and sprites their dances whirled;The Stromkarl sang, the cataract hurled Its headlong waters from the height;And mingled in the wild delight The scream of sea-birds in their flight, The rumor of the forest trees, The plunge of the implacable seas, The tumult of the wind at night, Voices of eld, like trumpets blowing, Old ballads, and wild melodies Through mist and darkness pouring forth, Like Elivagar's river flowing Out of the glaciers of the North.
The instrument on which he played Was in Cremona's workshops made, By a great master of the past, Ere yet was lost the art divine;Fashioned of maple and of pine, That in Tyrolian forests vast Had rocked and wrestled with the blast;Exquisite was it in design, Perfect in each minutest part.
A marvel of the lutist's art;
And in its hollow chamber, thus, The maker from whose hands it came Had written his unrivalled name,--"Antonius Stradivarius."
And when he played, the atmosphere Was filled with magic, and the ear Caught echoes of that Harp of Gold, Whose music had so weird a sound, The hunted stag forgot to bound, The leaping rivulet backward rolled, The birds came down from bush and tree, The dead came from beneath the sea, The maiden to the harper's knee!
The music ceased; the applause was loud, The pleased musician smiled and bowed;The wood-fire clapped its hands of flame, The shadows on the wainscot stirred, And from the harpsichord there came A ghostly murmur of acclaim, A sound like that sent down at night By birds of passage in their flight, From the remotest distance heard.
Then silence followed; then began A clamor for the Landlord's tale,--The story promised them of old, They said, but always left untold;And he, although a bashful man, And all his courage seemed to fail, Finding excuse of no avail, Yielded; and thus the story ran.
THE LANDLORD'S TALE.
PAUL REVERE'S RIDE.
Listen, my children, and you shall hear Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-five;Hardly a man is now alive Who remembers that famous day and year.
He said to his friend, "If the British march By land or sea from the town to-night, Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch Of the North Church tower as a signal light,--One, if by land, and two, if by sea;
And I on the opposite shore will be, Ready to ride and spread the alarm Through every Middlesex village and farm For the country folk to be up and to arm,"Then he said, "Good night!" and with muffled oar Silently rowed to the Charlestown shore, Just as the moon rose over the bay, Where swinging wide at her moorings lay The Somerset, British man-of-war;A phantom ship, with each mast and spar Across the moon like a prison bar, And a huge black hulk, that was magnified By its own reflection in the tide.
Meanwhile, his friend, through alley and street, Wanders and watches with eager ears, Till in the silence around him he hears The muster of men at the barrack door, The sound of arms, and the tramp of feet, And the measured tread of the grenadiers, Marching down to their boats on the shore.