Piped the March-wind; pinch'd and slow
The deer were trooping in the snow;
He saw them out of the cottage-door,
The lame boy sitting upon the floor:
"Mother, mother, how long will it be
Till the prairie go like a waving sea?

Will the bare woods ever be green, and when?
O, will it ever be summer again?"-
She look'd in silence on her child:
That large eye, ever so dark and wild,
O me, how bright!-it may have been
That he was grown so pale and thin.
It came, the emerald month, and sweetly shed
Beauty for grief, and garlands for the dead.

TO A SWAN

FLYING AT MIDNIGHT, IN THE VALE OF THE HURON."

On, what a still, bright night! It is the sleep Of beauteous Nature in her bridal hall. See, while the groves shadow the shining lake, How the full-moon does bathe their melting green!I hear the dew-drop twang upon the pool. Hark, hark, what music! from the rampart hills, How like a far-off bugle, sweet and clear, It searches through the list'ning wilderness!A Swan-I know it by the trumpet-tone: Winging her pathless way in the cool heavens, Piping her midnight melody, she comes.

Beautiful bird! upon the dusk, still world Thou fallest like an angel-like a lone Sweet angel from some sphere of harmony. Where art thou, where ?-no speck upon the blue My vision marks from whence thy music ranges. And why this hour-this voiceless hour-is thine, And thine alone, I cannot tell. Perchance, While all is hush and silent but the heart, E'en thou hast human sympathies for heaven, And singest yonder in the holy deep Because thou hast a pinion. If it be Oh, for a wing, upon the aerial tide To sail with thee a minstrel mariner!

When to a rarer height thou wheelest up, Hast thou that awful thrill of an ascension

*The river Huron rises in the interior of Michigan, and flows into Lake Erie. Its clear waters gave it the name of its more mighty kinsman, Lake Huron.

The lone, lost feeling in the vasty vault?
Oh, for thine ear, to hear the ascending tones
Range the ethereal chambers!—then to feel
A harmony, while from the eternal depth
Steals nought but the pure star-light evermore!
And then to list the echoes, faint and mellow,
Far, far below, breathe from the hollow earth,
For thee, soft, sweet petition, to return.

And hither, haply, thou wilt shape thy neck;
And settle, like a silvery cloud, to rest,
If thy wild image, flaring in the abyss,
Startle thee not aloft. Lone aeronaut,
That catchest, on thine airy looking-out,
Glassing the hollow darkness, many a lake,
Lay, for the night, thy lily bosom here.
There is the deep unsounded for thy bath,
The shallow for the shaking of thy quills,
The dreamy cove, or cedar-wooded isle,
With galaxy of water-lilies, where,
Like mild Diana 'mong the quiet stars,
'Neath over-bending branches thou wilt move,
Till early warblers shake the crystal shower,
And whistling pinions warn thee to thy voyage.
But where art thou ?-lost,-spirited away
To bowers of light by thy own dying whispers ?
Or does some billow of the ocean-air,

In its still roll around from zone to zone,
All breathless to the empyrean heave thee?-
There is a panting in the zenith-hush!-
The Swan-how strong her great wing times the
She passes over high and quietly.

[silence!

Now peals the living clarion anew; One vocal shower falls in and fills the vale. What witchery in the wilderness it plays!— Shrill snort the affrighted deer; across the lake The loon, sole sentinel, screams loud alarm;-. The shy fox barks;-tingling in every vein I feel the wild enchantment;-hark! they come, The dulcet echoes from the distant hills, Like fainter horns responsive; all the while, From misty isles, soft-stealing symphonics.

Thou bright, swift river of the bark canoe, Threading the prairie-ponds of Washtenung, The day of romance wanes. Few summers more, And the long night will pass away unwaked, Save by the house-dog, or the village bell; And she, thy minstrel queen, her ermine dip In lonelier waters.

Ah! thou wilt not stoop: Old Huron, haply, glistens on thy sky. The chasing moon-beams, glancing on thy plumes, Reveal thee now, a little beating blot, Into the pale Aurora fading.

There!

Sinks gently back upon her flowery couch
The startled Night;-tinkle the damp wood-vaults
While slip the dew-pearls from her leafy curtains.
That last soft whispering note, how spirit-like!
While vainly yet mine car another waits,
A sad, sweet longing lingers in my heart.

THE TUCKERMAN family is of German origin, and the name is still common in the states of Germany, where, however, it is spelled with a double n. In a history of the country of Braunselweig and Luneberg, by WILLIAM HANEMANN, published in Luneberg in 1827, allusion is made to one of the kindred of the TUCKERMANS in America, PɛTER TUCKERMAN, who is mentioned as the last abbot of the monastery of Riddagshausen. He was chosen by the chapter in 1621, and at the same time held the appointment of superintendent or court preacher at Wolfenbuttill. By the mother's side, Mr. TUCKERMAN is of Irish descent. The name of his mother's family is KEATING. In MACAULAY's recent history he thus speaks of one of her ancestors, as opposing a military deputy of JAMES II., in his persecution of the Protestant English in Ireland, in 1686: "On all questions which arose in the privy council, TERCONNEL showed similar violence and partiality. JouN KEATING, chief-justice of the common pleas, a man distinguished for ability, integrity, and loyalty, represented with great mildness that perfect equality was all that the general could reasonably ask for his own church." Mr. TUCKERMAN is a nephew of the late Rev. Dr. JOSEPH TUCKERMAN, a memoir of whom has recently appeared in England, and who is generally known and honoured as the originator of the "Ministry at Large," an institution of Christian benevolence and eminent utility. His mother was also related to and partly educated with another distinguished Unitarian clergyman, JOSEPH STEVENS BUCKMINSTER, whose memory is yet cherished in Boston by all lovers of genius and character.

Mr. TECKERMAN was born in Boston, on the twentieth of April, 1813. After preparing for college, the state of his health rendered it necessary for him to relinquish his studies and seek a milder climate. In September, 1833, he sailed from New York for Havre, and after a brief sojourn in Paris, proceeded to Italy, where he remained until the ensuing summer. In the spring after his return he gave the results of his observation to the public, in a volume entitled "The Italian SketchBook," of which a third and considerably augmented edition appeared in New York in 1849. Mr. TUCKERMAN resumed and for a time prosecuted his academical studies, but again experiencing the injurious effects of a sedentary life and continued mental application, he embarked in October, 1837, for the Mediterranean; visited Gibraltar and Malta, made the tour of Sicily, and after a winter's residence in Palermo, crossed over to the continent. The winter of 1838 he passed chiefly in Florence,

55

and returned to the United States in the course of the ensuing summer. In 1839 he published “Isabel, or Sicily, a Pilgrimage," in which, under the guise of a romance, he gives many interesting descriptions and reflections incident to a tour in Sicily. This work was reprinted in London, in 1846. In 1845 he finished his "Thoughts on the Poets," in which he has discussed the characteristics of the chief masters of modern song. This work has passed through several editions. In 1848 he gave to the press his "Artist Life, or Sketches of Eminent American Painters:" and, in 1849, "Characteristics of Literature, illustrated by the Genius of Distinguished Men." In the latter production he has evinced the variety of his learning and the catholicity of his literary sympathies in genial criticisms of types of the most diversified intellectual and moral qualities, purposes, and cre

ations.

Mr. TUCKERMAN in these writings has evinced a taste delicately skilled in the niceties of language, and in pictorial and plastic art. There are few critics to whom we would submit with more confidence of a just opinion, any work composed with reference to the generally acknowledged canons of taste, in either construction, diction, or feeling. But his æsthetic conservatism is such that we would hesitate to consult him upon any new principle or upon any perfectly fresh creation, from a doubt whether his decision would be formed from a comparison with the models which are a law in experiment, or from an innate and perfectly independent sense of harmony in sublimity and beauty.

Mr. TUCKERMAN's poems are numerous and in a great variety of measures; they are for the most part expressions of graceful and romantic sentiment, but are often fruits of his reflection and illustrations of his taste. The longest of them, "The Spirit of Poetry," was written in 1813, and embodies in highly-polished verse some of the finest specimens of his criticism. The little piece called "Mary" is a delightful echo of emotions as common as culture of mind and refinement of feeling; and among his sonnets are some of the most perfect examples of that kind of writing that have been produced in this country.

There is no collection of Mr. TUCKERMAN'S poems, and besides the prose works which I have here noticed there are numerous essays by him scattered through the periodicals of the last ten or twelve years. Of his character as a critic and general essayist, some more particular observations may be found in my "Prose Writers of America."

Mr. TUCKERMAN has resided for several years in the city of New York.

20

433

THE HOLY LAND.

THROUGH the warm noontide, I have roam'd
Where CESAR's palace-ruins lie,
And in the Forum's lonely waste

Oft listen'd to the night-wind's sigh.
I've traced the moss-lines on the walls
That Venice conjured from the sea,
And seen the Colosseum's dust

Before the breeze of autumn flee.

Along Pompeii's lava-street,

With curious eye, I've wander'd lone, And mark'd Segesta's temple-floor

With the rank weeds of ages grown.

I've clamber'd Etna's hoary brow,

And sought the wild Campagna's gloom; I've hail'd Geneva's azure tide,

And snatch'd a weed from VIRGIL's tomb.

Why all unsated yearns my heart

To seek once more a pilgrim shrine?
One other land I would explore-
The sacred fields of Palestine.

Oh, for a glance at those wild hills
That round Jerusalem arise!
And one sweet evening by the lake

That gleams beneath Judea's skies!
How anthem-like the wind must sound
In meadows of the Holy Land-
How musical the ripples break

Upon the Jordan's moonlit strand! Behold the dew, like angels' tears,

Upon each thorn is gleaming now,
Blest emblems of the crown of love
There woven for the Sufferer's brow.

Who does not sigh to enter Nain,
Or in Capernaum to dwell;
Inhale the breeze from Galilee,

And rest beside Samaria's well?

Who would not stand beneath the spot
Where Bethlehem's star its vigil kept?
List to the plash of Siloa's pool,

And kiss the ground where JESUS wept?

Gethsemane who would not seek,

And pluck a lily by the way?
Through Bethany devoutly walk,
And on the mount of Olives pray?
How dear were one repentant night
Where MARY's tears of love were shed!
How blest, beside the Saviour's tomb,
One hour's communion with the dead!
What solemn joy to stand alone

On Calvary's celestial height!
Or kneel upon the mountain-slope
Once radiant with supernal light!
I cannot throw my staff aside,
Nor wholly quell the hope divine
That one delight awaits me yet-
A pilgrimage to Palestine.

TO AN ELM.

BRAVELY thy old arms fling

Their countless pennons to the fields of air,
And, like a sylvan king,

Their panoply of green still proudly wear.

As some rude tower of old, Thy massive trunk still rears its rugged form, With limbs of giant mould,

To battle sternly with the winter storm

In Nature's mighty fane,

Thou art the noblest arch beneath the sky;
How long the pilgrim train
That with a benison have pass'd thee by!

Lone patriarch of the wood!

Like a true spirit thou dost freely rise,
Of fresh and dauntless mood,
Spreading thy branches to the open skies.

The locust knows thee well,

And when the summer-days his notes prolong, Hid in some leafy cell,

Pours from thy world of green his drowsy song

Oft, on a morn in spring,

The yellow-bird will seek thy waving spray,
And there securely swing,

To whet his beak, and pour his blithesome lay.

How bursts thy monarch wail,

When sleeps the pulse of Nature's buoyant life And, bared to meet the gale,

Wave thy old branches, eager for the strife!

The sunset often weaves

Upon thy creat a wreath of splendour rare,
While the fresh-murmuring leaves
Fill with cool sound the evening's sultry air.

Sacred thy roof of green

To rustic dance, and childhood's gambols free: Gay youth and age serene

Turn with familiar gladness unto thee.

O, hither should we roam,

To hear Truth's herald in the lofty shade;
Beneath thy emerald dome

Might Freedom's champion fitly draw his blade.

With blessings at thy feet,

Falls the worn peasant to his noontide rest;
Thy verdant, calm retreat

Inspires the sad and soothes the troubled breast.

When, at the twilight hour,

Plays through thy tressil crown the sun's last gleam,
Under thy ancient bower

The schoolboy comes to sport, the bard to dream.
And when the moonbeams fall
Through thy broad canopy upon the grass,
Making a fairy hall,

As o'er the sward the flitting shadows pass

Then lovers haste to thee,

With hearts that tremble like that shifting light:
To them, O brave old tree,
Thou art Joy's shrine—a temple of delight!

MARY.

WHAT though the name is old and oft repeated,

What though a thousand beings bear it now, And true hearts oft the gentle word have greeted— What though 'tis hallow'd by a poet's vow? We ever love the rose, and yet its blooming Is a familiar rapture to the eye;

And yon bright star we hail, although its looming
Age after age has lit the northern sky.

As starry beams o'er troubled billows stealing,
As garden odours to the desert blown,
In bosoms faint a gladsome hope revealing,
Like patriot music or affection's tone—
Thus, thus, for aye, the name of MARY spoken
By lips or text, with magic-like control,
The course of present thought has quickly broken,
And stirr'd the fountains of my inmost soul.
The sweetest tales of human weal and sorrow,
The fairest trophies of the limner's fame,
To my fond fancy, MARY, seem to borrow

Celestial halos from thy gentle name:
The Grecian artist glean'd from many faces,
And in a perfect whole the parts combined,
So have I counted o'er dear woman's graces
To form the MARY of my ardent mind.
And marvel not I thus call my ideal—

We inly paint as we would have things beThe fanciful springs ever from the real,

AS APHRODITE rose from out the sea. Who smiled upon me kindly day by day,

In a far land where I was sad and lone? Whose presence now is my delight away? Both angels must the same bless'd title own. What spirits round my weary way are flying, What fortunes on my future life await, Like the mysterious hymns the winds are sighing, Are all unknown-in trust I bide my fate; But if one blessing I might crave from Heaven, "I would be that MARY should my being cheer, Hang o'er me when the chord of life is riven, Be my dear household word, and my last accent here.

"YOU CALL US INCONSTANT." You call us inconstant-you say that we cease Our homage to pay, at the voice of caprice; That we dally with hearts till their treasures are ours, As bees drink the sweets from a cluster of flowers; For a moment's refreshment at love's fountain stay, Then turn, with a thankless impatience, away. And think you, indeed, we so cheerfully part With hopes that give wings to the o'erwearied heart, And throw round the future a promise so bright That life seems a glory, and time a delight? From our pathway forlorn can we banish the dove, And yield without pain the enchantments of love? You know not how chill and relentless a wave Reflection will cast o'er the soul of the braveHow keenly the clear rays of duty will beam, And startle the heart from its passionate dream,

To tear the fresh rose from the garland of youth,
And lay it with tears on the altar of truth?
We pass from the presence of beauty, to think--
As the hunter will pause on the precipice brink—
"For ME shall the bloom of the gladsome and fair
Be wasted away by the fetters of care?
Shall the old, peaceful nest, for my sake be forgot,
And the gentle and free know a wearisome lot?
"By the tender appeal of that beauty, beware
How you woo her thy desolate fortunes to share!
O pluck not a lily so shelter'd and sweet,
And bear it not off from its genial retreat.
Enrich'd with the boon thy existence would be,
But hapless the fate that unites her to thee!"
Thus, dearest, the spell that thy graces entwined,
No fickle heart breaks, but a resolute mind;
The pilgrim may turn from the shrine with a smile,
Yet, believe me, his bosom is wrung all the while,
And one thought alone lends a charm to the past-
That his love conquer'd selfishness nobly at last.

GREENOUGH'S WASHINGTON.

THE quarry whence thy form majestic sprung
Has peopled earth with grace,

Heroes and gods that elder bards have sung,
A bright and peerless race;

But from its sleeping veins ne'er rose before
A shape of loftier name

Than his, who Glory's wreath with meekness wore,
The noblest son of Fame.

Sheathed is the sword that Passion never stain'd;

His gaze around is cast,

As if the joys of Freedom, newly-gain'd,

Before his vision pass'd;

As if a nation's shout of love and pride
With music fill'd the air,

And his calm soul was lifted on the tide
Of deep and grateful prayer;

As if the crystal mirror of his life
To fancy sweetly came,

With scenes of patient toil and noble strife,
Undimm'd by doubt or shame;

As if the lofty purpose of his soul
Expression would betray-

The high resolve Ambition to control,
And thrust her crown away!
Oh, it was well in marble firm and white
To carve our hero's form,

Whose angel guidance was our strength in fight,
Our star amid the storm!

Whose matchless truth has made his name divine, And human freedom sure,

His country great, his tomb earth's dearest shrine,
While man and time endure!

And it is well to place his image there,
Beneath the dome he blest;
Let meaner spirits who its councils share,
Revere that silent guest!

Let us go up with high and sacred love

To look on his pure brow,

And as, with solemn grace, he points above,
Renew the patriot's vow!

ALONE ONCE MORE. ALONE once more!-but with such deep emotion, Waking to life a thousand hopes and fears, Such wild distrust-such absolute devotion,

My bosom seems a dreary lake of tears: Tears that stern manhood long restrain'd from gushAs mountains keep a river from the sea, [ing, Until Spring's floods, impetuously rushing,

Channel a bed, and set its waters free! What mockery to all true and earnest feeling, This fatal union of the false and fair! Eyes, lips, and voice, unmeasured bliss revealing, With hearts whose lightness fills us with despair! O God! some sorrows of our wondrous being A patient mind can partly clear away; Ambition cools when fortune's gifts are fleeing, And men grow thoughtful round a brother's clay; But to what end this waste of noble passion?

This wearing of a truthful heart to dustAdoring slaves of humour, praise, or fashion, The vain recipients of a boundless trust? Come home, fond heart, cease all instinctive pleadAs the dread fever of insane desire, [ing, To some dark gulf thy warm affections leading, When love must long survive, though faith expire! Though wonted glory from the earth will vanish, And life seem desolate, and hope beguile, Love's cherish'd dream learn steadfastly to banish, Till death thy spirit's conflict reconcile !

II.

COURAGE AND PATIENCE.

COURAGE and patience! elements whereby
My soul shall yet her citadel maintain,
Baffled, perplex'd, and struggling oft to fly,

Far, far above this realm of wasting pain-
Come with your still and banded vigour now,
Fill my sad breast with energy divine,
Stamp a firm thought upon my aching brow,
Make my impulsive visions wholly thine!
Freeze my pent tears, chill all my tender dreams,
Brace my weak heart in panoply sublime,
Till dwelling only on thy martyr themes,

And turning from the richest lures of time,
Love, like an iceberg of the polar deep,
In adamantine rest is laid asleep!

III. ALL HEARTS ARE NOT DISLOYAL.

ALL hearts are not disloyal: let thy trust
Be deep, and clear, and all-confiding still,
For though Love's fruit turn on the lips to dust,
She ne'er betrays her child to lasting ill:
Through leagues of desert must the pilgrim go
Ere on his gaze the holy turrets rise;
Through the long, sultry day the stream must flow
Ere it can mirror twilight's purple skies.
Fall back unscathed from contact with the vain,
Keep thy robes white, thy spirit bold and free,
And calmly launch Affection's bark again,

Hopeful of golden spoils reserved for thee!
Though lone the way as that already trod,
Cling to thine own integrity and GoD!

IV. LIKE A FAIR SEA.

LIKE the fair sea that laves Italia's strand,
Affection's flood is tideless in my breast;
No ebb withdraws it from the chosen land,
Haven'd too richly for enamour'd quest:
Thus am I faithful to the vanish'd grace

Embodied once in thy sweet form and name,
And though love's charm no more illumes thy face,
In Memory's realm her olden pledge I claim.
It is not constancy to haunt a shrine

From which devotion's lingering spark has fled; Insensate homage only wreaths can twine

Around the pulseless temples of the dead: Thou from thy better self hast madly flown, While to that self allegiance still I own.

V. FREEDOM.

FREEDOM! beneath thy banner I was born-
Oh let me share thy full and perfect life!
Teach me opinion's slavery to scorn,

And to be free from passion's bitter strife;
Free of the world, a self-dependent soul

Nourish'd by lofty aims and genial truth, And made more free by Love's serene control, The spell of beauty and the hopes of youth. The liberty of Nature let me know,

Caught from her mountains, groves, and crystal streams,

Her starry host, and sunset's purple glow,
That woo the spirit with celestial dreams,
On Fancy's wing exultingly to soar,

Till life's harsh fetters clog the heart no more!

VI. DESOLATION.

THINK ye the desolate must live apart,

By solemn vows to convent-walls confined? Ah! no; with men may dwell the cloister'd heart, And in a crowd the isolated mind; Tearless behind the prison-bars of fate,

The world sees not how sorrowful they stand, Gazing so fondly through the iron grate,

Upon the promised, yet forbidden land; Patience, the shrine to which their bleeding feet, Day after day, in voiceless penance turn; Silence, the holy cell and calm retreat

In which unseen their meek devotions burn; Life is to them a vigil that none share, Their hopes a sacrifice, their love a prayer.