O'er her rich robe, through every satin fold,
Wanders an arabesque in threads of gold.
From its green urn the rose, unfolding grand,
Weighs down the exquisite smallness of her hand.
And when the child bends to the red leaf's tip
Her laughing nostril, and her carmine lip,
The royal flower purpureal kissing there

Hides more than half that young face, bright and fair,
So that the eye, deceived, can scarcely speak
Where shows the rose, or where the rose-red cheek.
Her eyes look bluer from their dark brown frame;
Sweet eyes, sweet form, and Mary's sweeter name.
All joy, enchantment, perfume, waits she there,
Heaven in her glance, her very name a prayer.

Yet 'neath thy sky, and before life and fate,
Poor child, she feels herself so vaguely great.
With stately grace she gives her presence high
To dawn, to spring, to shadows flitting by,
To the dark sunset glories of the heaven,
And all the wild magnificence of even:
On nature waits, eternal and serene,
With all the graveness of a little queen.
She never sees a man but on her knee;
She Duchess of Brabant one day will be,
And rule Sardinia, or the Flemish crowd-
She is the Infanta, five years old, and proud.

Thus it is with king's children, for they wear
A shadowy circlet on their foreheads fair;
Their tottering steps are toward a kingly chair.
Calmly she waits, and breathes her gather'd flower
Till one shall cull for her imperial power.
Already her eye saith, "It is my right;"
Even love flows from her mingled with affright.

If some one, seeing her so fragile stand,
Were it to save her should put forth his hand,
Ere he had made a step, or breath'd a vow,

The scaffold's shadow were upon his brow.

While the child laughs, beyond the bastion thick Of that vast palace, Roman Catholic,

Whose every turret like a mitre shows,
Behind the lattice something fearful goes.
Men shake to see a shadow from beneath,

Passing from pane to pane, like vapoury wreath,
Pale, black, and still, it glides from room to room,
Or stands a whole day, motionless in its gloom,
In the same spot, like ghost upon a tomb,
Or glues its dark brow to the casement wan,
Dim shade that lengthens as the night draws on.
Its step funereal lingers like the swing
Of passing bell-'tis death, or else the king.

'Tis he, the man by whom men live or die; But could one look beyond that phantom eye, As by the wall he leans a little space,

And see what shadows fill his soul's dark place,
Not the fair child, the waters clear, the flowers
Golden with sunset-not the birds, the bowers—
No; 'neath that eye, those fatal brows that keep
The fathomless brain, like ocean dark and deep,
There, as in moving mirage, should one find
A fleet of ships that go before the wind :
On the foam'd wave, and 'neath the starlight pale,
The strain and rattle of a fleet in sail,

And through the fog an isle on her white rock,
Hearkening from far the thunder's coming shock.

Still by the water's edge doth silent stand The Infanta, with the rosebud in her hand, Caresses it with eyes as blue as heaven. Sudden a breeze-such breeze as panting even, From her full heart, flings out to field and brake— Ruffles the waters, bids the rushes shake, And makes through all their green recesses swell The massive myrtle and the asphodel.

To the fair child it comes, and tears away

On its strong wind the rose-flower from the spray,
On the wild waters casts it, bruised and torn,
And the Infanta only holds a thorn.

Frighten'd, perplex'd, she follows with her eyes
Into the basin where her ruin lies,

Looks up to heaven, and questions of the breeze
That had not fear'd her Highness to displease.
But all the pond is changed--anon so clear,
Now black it swells as though with rage and fear;
A mimic sea, its small waves rise and fall,
And the poor rose is broken by them all;
Its hundred leaves, toss'd wildly round and round,
Beneath a thousand waves are whelm'd and drown'd.
It was a foundering fleet, you might have said.
Quoth the duenna, with her face of shade:
"Madam"-for she had mark'd her ruffled mind—
"All things belong to princes-but the wind."

THE REGIMENT OF BARON

MADRUCE.

WHEN the regiment of the halberdiers is proudly marching by,

The eagle of the mountain screams from out his stormy sky; Who speaketh to the precipice, and to the chasm sheer, Who hovers o'er the thrones of kings, and bids the caitiffs fear.

King of the peak and glaciers, king of the cold white scalps, He lifts his head, at that close tread, the eagle of the Alps. Oh, shame! those men that march below! oh, ignominy dire!

Are the sons of my free mountains, sold for Imperial hire? Ah! the vilest of the dungeon, ah! the slave upon the seas Is great, is pure, is glorious, is grand compared with these, Who, born amid my holy rocks in solemn places high, Where the tall pines bend like rushes when the storm goes sweeping by,

Yet give the strength of foot they learn'd by perilous path and flood,

And from their blue-eyed mothers won the old mysterious

blood,

T

The daring that the good south wind into their nostrils blew, And the proud swelling of the heart with each pure breath they drew ;

The graces of the mountain glens with flowers in summer

gay,

And all the glory of the hills-to earn a lackey's pay."

Their country free and joyous-she of the rugged sides-
She of the rough peaks arrogant, whereon the tempest rides ;
Mother of the unconquer'd thought, and of the savage form;
Who brings out of her sturdy heart the hero and the storm;
Who giveth freedom unto man, and life unto the beast;
Who hears her silver torrents ring, like joy-bells at a feast;
Who hath her caves for palaces, and, where her chalets stand,
The proud old archer of Altorf, his good bow in his hand ;—
Is she to suckle jailers? Shall shame and glory rest
Amid her lakes and mountains, like twins upon her breast?
Shall the two-headed eagle, mark'd with her double blow,
Drink of her milk through all these hearts whose blood he
bids to flow?

Say, was it pomp ye needed, and all the proud array
Of courtliness and high parade upon a gala day?
Look up; have not my valleys their torrents white with
foam,

Their lines of silver bullion on the green hills of home? Doth not sweet May embroider my rocks with pearls and flow'rs,

Her fingers trace a richer lace than yours in all my bow'rs?
Are not my old peaks gilded when the sun rises proud,
And each one shakes a white mist plume out of the thunder-
cloud?

O neighbours of the golden sky, sons of the mountain sod,
Why wear a base king's colours for the livery of God?