THE INFLUENCE OF BEAUTY.

JOHN KEATS.

[John Keats was born in London 1796; he was intended for a surgeon, and published his mystical poem "Endymion" before he was twenty, a circumstance that ought to have procured for it a kindly consideration-but nothing was too young or too innocent for the savages of "The Quarterly."

In Keats' case the shot did not hit, for before the article appeared the young poet was taken to Italy; but he could not outstrip that galloping consumption that had seized him. He was buried in "the strangers' ground" in Rome, where he died Dec. 27, 1820.

Keats displayed in his writings an immense amount of imagination, and it may be safely asserted that much of our recent poetry has been influenced by them.]

A THING of beauty is a joy for ever:

Its loveliness increases; it will never

Pass into nothingness; but still will keep

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

Therefore, on every morrow are we wreathing

A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darken'd ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep; and such are daffodils
With the green world they live in; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
'Gainst the hot season: the mid-forest brake,
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms;
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
We have imagined for the mighty dead;
All lovely tales that we have heard or read:
An endless fountain of immortal drink,
Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink.

Nor do we merely feel these essences
For one short hour; no, even as the trees
That whisper round a temple become soon
Dear as the temple's self, so does the moon,
The passion poesy, glories infinite,
Haunt us till they become a cheering light
Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast,
That, whether there be shine, or gloom o'ercast,
They alway must be with us, or we die.

Therefore, 'tis with full happiness that I
Will trace the story of Endymion.
The very music of the name has gone
Into my being, and each pleasant scene
Is growing fresh before me as the green
Of our own valleys: so I will begin
Now, while I cannot hear the city's din;
Now, while the early budders are just new,
And run in mazes of the youngest hue
About old forests; while the willow trails
Its delicate amber; and the dairy-pails
Bring home increase of milk.
And, as the year
Grows lush in juicy stalks, I'll smoothly steer
My little boat, for many quiet hours,

With streams that deepen freshly into bowers.
Many and many a verse I hope to write,
Before the daisies, vermeil rimm'd and white,
Hide in deep herbage; and ere yet the bees
Hum about globes of clover and sweet peas,
I must be near the middle of my story.
Oh! may no wintry season, bare and hoary,
See it half finished; but let autumn bold,
With universal tinge of sober gold,
Be all about me when I make an end.
And now at once, adventuresome I send
My herald thought into a wilderness :
There let its trumpet blow, and quickly dress
My uncertain path with green, that I
may speed
Easily onward, through flowers and weed.

Upon the sides of Latmos was outspread
A mighty forest; for the moist earth fed
So plenteously all weed-hidden roots
Into o'erhanging boughs, and precious fruits.
And it had gloomy shades, sequester'd deep,
Where no man went; and if from shepherd's keep
A lamb stray'd far a-down those inmost glens,
Never again saw he the happy pens
Whither his brethren, bleating with content,
Over the hills at every nightfall went.

Among the shepherds 'twas believed ever,

That not one fleecy lamb which thus did sever
From the white flock, but pass'd unworried
By any wolf, or pard with prying head,

Until it came to some unfooted plains

Where fed the herds of Pan: ay, great his gains

Who thus one lamb did lose. Paths there were many Winding through palmy fern, and rushes fenny,

And ivy banks; all leading pleasantly

To a wide lawn, whence one could only see

Stems thronging all around between the swell
Of tuft and slanting branches: who could tell
The freshness of the space of heaven above,

Edged round with dark tree-tops? through which a dove
Would often beat its wings, and often too
A little cloud would move across the blue.

Full in the middle of this pleasantness
There stood a marble altar, with a tress
Of flowers budded newly; and the dew
Had taken fairy fantasies to strew
Daisies upon the sacred sward last eve,
And so the dawnèd light in pomp receive.
For 'twas the morn; Apollo's upward fire
Made every eastern cloud a silvery pyre
Of brightness so unsullied that therein
A melancholy spirit well might win
Oblivion, and melt out his essence fine
Into the winds: rain-scented eglantine
Gave temperate sweets to that well-wooing sun;
The lark was lost in him: cold springs had run
To warm their chilliest bubbles in the grass;
Man's voice was on the mountains: and the mass
Of nature's lives and wonders pulsed tenfold,
To feel this sun rise, and its glories old.

JANUARY WIND.

ROBERT BUCHANAN.

[Mr. Buchanan was educated at Glasgow University, and came to London in 1859. For the first four years of his London life he had a hard time of it, working as a nameless contributor to certain cheap periodicals, but he did find employment, and in the meantime was storing up those poetic treasures which culminated in the publication of his "Undertones" (1863), a volume which was acknowledged to be "the most remarkable first volume of poems, perhaps, ever written." He has published two volumes sirce-"The Idyls of Inverburn,' and recently, "London Poems." They have more than justified the high praise that was bestowed upon his maiden venture.]

THE wind, wife, the wind; how it blows, how it blows;

It grips the latch, it shakes the house, it whistles, it screams, it

crows:

It dashes on the window-pane, then rushes off with a cry,

Ye scarce can hear your own loud voice, it clatters so loud and

high;

And far away upon the sea it floats with thunder-call,

The wind, wife; the wind, wife: the wind that did it all.

The wind, wife, the wind; how it blew, how it blew ;

The very night our boy was born, it whistled, it screamed, it crew;

And while you moan'd upon your bed, and your heart was dark with fright,

I swear it mingled with the soul of the boy you bore that night; It scarcely seems a winter since, and the wind is with us still,The wind, wife; the wind, wife; the wind that blew us ill!

The wind, wife, the wind; how it blows, how it blows;
It changes, shifts, without a cause, it ceases, it comes and goés;
And David ever was the same, wayward, and wild, and bold—
For wilful lad will have his way, and the wind no hand can hold;
But ah! the wind, the changeful wind, was more in the blame
than he :

The wind, wife; the wind, wife; that blew him out to sea!

The wind, wife, the wind; now 'tis still, now 'tis still;
And as we sit I seem to feel the silence shiver and thrill;
'Twas thus the night he went away, and we sat in silence here,
We listen'd to our beating hearts, and all was weary and drear;
We longed to hear the wind again, and to hold our David's hand-
The wind, wife; the wind, wife; that blew him out from land.

The wind, wife, the wind: up again, up again!

It blew our David round the world, yet shrieked at our window

pane;

And ever since that time, old wife, in rain, and in sun, and in snow, Whether I work or weary here, I hear it whistle and blow,

It moans around, it groans around, it wanders with scream and

cry

The wind, wife; the wind, wife; may it blow him home to die. (From "Idyls and Legends of Inverburn." By permission of Mr. Strahan.)

MAUD MÜLLER.

J. G. WHITTIER.

[Mr. Whittier is an American poet of some standing, still living.]

MAUD MULLER, on a summer's day,
Raked the meadow sweet with hay.

Beneath her torn hat glowed the wealth
Of simple beauty and rustic health.

Singing, she wrought, and her merry glee
The mock-bird echoed from his tree.

But, when she glanced to the far-off town,
White from its hill-slope looking down,

The sweet song died, and a vague unrest
And a nameless longing filled her breast-

A wish, that she hardly dared to own,
For something better than she had known.

The Judge rode slowly down the lane,
Smoothing his horse's chestnut mane.
He drew his bridle in the shade

Of the apple-trees, to greet the maid,

And ask a draught from the spring that flowed
Through the meadows across the road.

She stooped where the cool spring bubbled up.
And filled for him her small tin cup,

And blushed as she gave it, looking down
On her feet so bare, and her tattered gown.
"Thanks!" said the Judge, "a sweeter draught
From a fairer hand was never quaffed."

He spoke of the grass, and flowers, and trees,
Of the singing birds and the humming bees;

Then talked of the haying, and wondered whether
The cloud in the west would bring foul weather.

And Maud forgot her briar-torn gown,
And her graceful ankles bare and brown;

And listened, while a pleased surprise
Looked from her long-lashed hazel eyes.

At last, like one who for delay
Seeks a vain excuse, he rode away.

66

Maud Müller looked and sighed :
That I the Judge's bride might be !

$6

Ah, me!

He would dress me up in silks so fine,

And praise and toast me at his wine.

66

My father should wear a broad-cloth coat;

My brother should sail a painted boat.

"I'd dress my mother so grand and gay,

And the baby should have a new toy each day.

"And I'd feed the hungry and clothe the poor, And all should bless me who left our door."

The Judge looked back as he climbed the hill,
And saw Maud Müller standing still.