Grand'ther Baldwin's Thanksgiving, with Other Ballads and Poems

"Thy guilty stains shall be washed white again,
By noble service done thy fellow-men.

"His soul draws nearest unto God above,
Who to his brother ministers in love."

Meekly Anselmo rose, and, after prayer,
His soul was lightened of its past despair.

Henceforth he strove, obeying God's high will,
His heaven-appointed mission to fulfil.

And many a soul, oppressed with pain and grief,
Owed to the friar solace and relief.

MISCELLANEOUS POEMS

THE CHURCH AT STRATFORD-ON-AVON

One autumn day, when hedges yet were green,
And thick-branched trees diffused a leafy gloom,
Hard by where Avon rolls its silvery tide,
I stood in silent thought by Shakspeare's tomb.

O happy church, beneath whose marble floor
His ashes lie who so enriched mankind;
The many-sided Shakespeare, rare of soul,
And dowered with an all-embracing mind.

Through the stained windows rays of sunshine fall
In softened glory on the chancel floor;
While I, a pilgrim from across the sea,
stand with bare head in reverential awe.

Churches there are within whose gloomy vaults
Repose the bones of those that once were kings;
Their power has passed, and what remains but clay?
While in his grave our Shakspeare lives and sings.

Kings were his puppets, kingdoms but his stage,—
Faint shadows they without his plastic art,—
He waves his wand, and lo! they live again,
And in his world perform their mimic part.

Born in the purple, his imperial soul
Sits crowned and sceptred in the realms of mind.
Kingdoms may fall, and crumble to decay,
Time but confirms his empire o'er mankind.

MRS. BROWNING'S GRAVE AT FLORENCE

FLORENCE wears an added grace,
All her earlier honors crowning;
Dante's birthplace, Art's fair home,
Holds the dust of Barrett Browning.

Guardian of the noble dead
That beneath thy soil lie sleeping,
England, with full heart, commends
This new treasure to thy keeping.

Take her, she is half thine own;
In her verses' rich outpouring,
Breathes the warm Italian heart,
Yearning for the land's restoring.

From thy skies her poet-heart
Caught a fresher inspiration,
And her soul obtained new strength,
With her bodily translation.

Freely take what thou hast given,
Less her verses' rhythmic beauty,
Than the stirring notes that called
Trumpet-like thy sons to duty.

Rarest of exotic flowers
In thy native chaplet twining,
To the temple of thy great
Add her—she is worth enshrining.

MY CASTLE

I have a beautiful castle,
With towers and battlements fair;
And many a banner, with gay device,
Floats in the outer air.

The walls are of solid silver;
The towers are of massive gold;
And the lights that stream from the windows
A royal scene unfold.

Ah! could you but enter my castle
With its pomp of regal sheen,
You would say that it far surpasses
The palace of Aladeen.

Could you but enter as I do,