II
Sometimes, when in uphappy mood,
I on my limitations brood,
And think how narrow the confines,
In which the soul almost repines,
I turn again—just to behold
My finny friends of burnished gold.
How little is their rounded sphere,
Though rivers wide are rushing near!
How little chance themselves to be,
In freedom’s realm, the sunny sea!
I wonder not that mournful gape,
And rolling glance they seem to ape.
Yet, all the pity I bestow
Is tearless, since in heart I know,
It would be fatal for my fish
To leave the boun’dry of their dish,
For they would be an easy prey
To larger ones in stream or bay.
And then this moral comes to me,
While craving larger liberty;
It might be death the bounds to break,
Which fate and duty round me make,
So be content and get the best
Of what, perhaps, is but a jest.
THE FIDDLER’S CHRISTMAS MUSIC
(Founded on a Norwegian Folk-lore.)
There lived in the land of Ole Bull
A peasant-fiddler of old,
Whose soul with music was often more full
Than his violin ever told.
He knew not the art of clefs and notes,
Such seemed but some mystic runes,
But he heard the music that richly floats
In nature’s unwritten tunes.
He played for the dances at many a farm,
Led many a bridal train,
And everywhere did he naively charm
The mirth-loving maid and swain;
But sometimes he played in a lonely place,
When no one, perchance, was near,
And then there was sadness in his face,
In his eyes a furtive tear.
For the strains which he heard he could never play,
Though trying it o’er and o’er,
Forgotten they were from day to day,
And wandered his way no more;
Sometimes in anger he flung the thing,
Which would not obey his soul,
Then took it again with its broken string,
Like a mother her child from his fall.
On a Christmas eve he had listened long
To the tones in the snowy air—
The bells that sent forth their joyous song,
Re-echoing here and there
In mountain hollow or forest deep,
Or far o’er the frozen fjord,
A thousand voices woke from their sleep,
To join in the heavenly chord.