at a glimmer:
Peaceful towns were gone as fast,
Like to dreams that shimmer.

Midway in the Maytide trance
Tombs were shining whitely;
'Twas the churchyard met our glance--
None might view it lightly.

Close against the mountain braced
Ran the long white wall there,
And the cross, in sorrow placed,
Silent rose o'er all there.

Jehu straight, his humor spent,
Left his tuneful courses;
On the cross his gaze he bent
Then pulled up his horses.

"Here's where horse and coach must wait--
You may think it odd, sir:--
But up yonder, lies my mate
Underneath the sod, sir.

"Better lad was never born--
(Sir 'twas God's own pity!)
No one else could blow the horn
Half as shrill and pretty.

"So I stop beside the wall
Every time I pass here,
And I blow his favorite call
To him under grass here."

Toward the churchyard then he blew
One call after other,
That they might go ringing through
To his sleeping brother.

From the cliff each lively note
Echoing resounded,
As it were the dead man's throat
Answering strains had sounded.

On we went through field and hedge,
Loosened bridles jingling;
Long that echo from the ledge
In my ear kept tingling.

* * * * *

TO THE BELOVED FROM AFAR[19] (1838)

His sweet rose here oversea
I must gather sadly;
Which, beloved, unto thee
I would bring how gladly!

But alas! if o'er the foam
I this flower should carry,
It would fade ere I could come;
Roses may not tarry.

Farther let no mortal fare
Who would be a wooer,
Than unwithered he may bear
Blushing roses to her,

Or than nightingale may fly
For her nesting grasses,
Or than with the west wind's sigh
Her soft warbling passes.

* * * * *

THE THREE GIPSIES[20]

Three gipsy men I saw one day
Stretched out on the grass together,
As wearily o'er the sandy way
My wagon brushed the heather.

The first of the three was fiddling there
In the glow of evening pallid,
Playing a wild and passionate air,
The tune of some gipsy ballad.

From the second's pipe the smoke-wreaths curled,
He watched them melt at his leisure.
So full of content, it seemed the world
Had naught to add to his pleasure.

And what of the third?--He was fast asleep,
His harp