What hidest thou in thy treasure-caves and cells,
Thou hollow-sounding and mysterious main?
Pale glistening pearls and rainbow-coloured shells,
Bright things which gleam unrecked of and in vain!
Keep, keep thy riches, melancholy sea!
We ask not such from thee.
Yet more, the depths have more!—what wealth untold,
Far down, and shining through their stillness, lies!
Thou hast the starry gems, the burning gold,
Torn from ten thousand royal Argosies!
Sweep o'er thy spoils, thou wild and wrathful main!
Earth claims not these again.
Yet more, the depths have more!—thy waves have rolled
Above the cities of a world gone by!
Sand hath filled up the palaces of old,
Sea-weed o'ergrown the halls of revelry—
Dash o'er them, ocean! in thy scornful play!
Man yields them to decay.
Yet more! the billows and the depths have more!
High hearts and brave are gathered to thy breast!
They hear not now the booming waters roar,
The battle-thunders will not break their rest.
Keep thy red gold and gems, thou stormy grave!
Give back the true and brave.
Give back the lost and, lovely!—those for whom
The place was kept at board and hearth so long!
The prayer went up through midnight's breathless gloom,
And the vain yearning woke midst festal song.
Hold fast thy buried isles, thy towers o'er-thrown,
But all is not thine own.
To thee the love of woman hath gone down;
Dark flow thy tides o'er manhood's noble head—
O'er youth's bright locks, and beauty's flowery crown;
Yet must thou hear a voice—Restore the dead!
Earth shall reclaim her precious things from thee!
Restore the dead, thou sea!
But if she loved in nature, pre-eminently, the beautiful and the serene—or what she could represent as such to her imagination—it was otherwise with human life. Here the stream of thought ran always in the shade, reflecting in a thousand shapes the sadness which had overshadowed her own existence. Yet her sadness was without bitterness or impatience—it was a resigned and Christian melancholy; and if the spirit of man is represented as tossed from disappointment to disappointment, there is always a brighter and serener world behind, to receive the wanderer at last. She writes Songs for Summer Hours, and the first is devoted to Death! and a beautiful chant it is. Death is also in Arcadia; and the first thing we meet with in the land of summer is the marble tomb with the "Et in Arcadia Ego." One might be excused for applying to herself her own charming song,—
A WANDERING FEMALE SINGER.
Thou hast loved and thou hast suffered!
Unto feeling deep and strong,
Thou hast trembled like a harp's frail string—
I know it by thy song!
Thou hast loved—it may be vainly—
But well—oh! but too well—
Thou hast suffered all that woman's heart
May bear—but must not tell.