Graham's Magazine Vol XXXIII No. 1 July 1848

Stifled and dying, at the city-gate,
Lies buried there – and now the long weeds, dank
With baneful dews, bend o'er her, and the rank
Entangled grass, the timid lizard's home,
Covers the sepulchre – the wild flower shrank
To plant its roots in that polluted loam —
Pity that such a tomb should look o'er ruined Rome.

Rome! lovely in her ruins! Can they claim
Common humanity who never feel
The pulse beat higher at the very name,
The brain grow wild, and the rapt senses reel,
Drunken with happiness? O'er us should steal
Feelings too big for utt'rance – I should prize
Such joy above all earthly wealth and weal,
Nor barter it for love – when Beauty dies
Love spreads his silken wings. The happy are the wise.

    HENRY S. HAGERT.

THE FANE-BUILDER

BY EMMA C. EMBURY

A poet's wreath shall be thine only crown,
A poet's memory thy most far renown. Lament of Tasso.

In the olden time of the world there stood on the ocean-border a large and flourishing city, whose winged ships brought daily the costly merchandise of all nations to its overflowing store-houses. It was a place of busy, bustling, turbulent life. Men were struggling fiercely for wealth, and rank, and lofty name. The dawn of day saw them striving each for his own separate and selfish schemes; the stars of midnight looked down in mild rebuke upon the protracted labor of men who gave themselves no time to gaze upon the quiet heavens. One only of all this busy crowd mingled not in their toil – one only idler sauntered carelessly along the thronged mart, or wandered listlessly by the seashore; Adonais alone scorned to bind himself by fetters which he could not fling aside at his own wild will. Those who loved the stripling grieved to see him waste the spring-time of life in thus aimlessly loitering by the way-side; while the old men and sages would fain have taken from him his ill-used freedom, and shut him up in the prison-house where they bestowed their madmen, lest his example should corrupt the youth of the city.

But for all this Adonais cared little. In vain they showed him the craggy path which traversed the hill of Fame; in vain they set him in the foul and miry roads which led to the temple of Mammon. He bowed before their solemn wisdom, but there was a lurking mischief in his glance as he pointed to his slender limbs, and feigned a shudder of disgust at the very sight of these rugged and distasteful ways. So at last he was suffered to wend his own idle course, and save that careful sires sometimes held him up as a warning to their children, his fellow-townsmen almost forgot his existence.

Years passed on, and then a beautiful and stately Fane began to rise in the very heart of the great city. Slowly it rose, and for a while they who toiled so intently at their daily business, marked not the white and polished stones which were so gradually and silently piled together in their midst. It grew, that noble temple, as if by magic. Every morning dawn shed its rose-tints upon another snowy marble which had been fixed in its appointed place beneath the light of the quiet stars. Men wondered somewhat, but they had scarce time to observe, and none to inquire. So the superb fabric had nearly reached its summit ere they heard, with unbelieving ears, that the builder of this noble fane, was none other than Adonais, the idler.

Few gave credence to the tale, for whence could he, the vagrant, and the dreamer, have drawn those precious marbles, encrusted as they were with sculpture still more precious, and written over with characters as inscrutable as they were immortal? Some set themselves to watch for the Fane-builder, but their eyes were heavy, and at the magic hour when the artist took up his labors, their senses were fast locked in slumber. Yet silently, even as the temple of the mighty Solomon, in which was never heard the sound of the workman's tool, so rose that mystic fane. Not until it stood in grand relief against the clear blue sky; not until its lofty dome pierced the clouds even a mountain-top; not until its polished walls were fashioned within and without, to surpassing beauty, did men learn the truth, and behold in the despised Adonais, the wonder-working Fane-builder. In his wanderings the dreamer had lighted on the entrance to that exhaustless mine, whence men of like soul have drawn their riches for all time. The hidden treasures of poesy had been given to his grasp, and he had built a temple which should long outlast the sand-heaps which the worshipers of Mammon had gathered around them.

But even then, when pilgrims came from afar to gaze upon the noble fane, the men of his own kindred and people stood aloof. They cared not for this adornment of their birth-place – they valued not the treasures that had there been gathered together. Only the few who entered the vestibule, and saw the sparkle of jewels which decked the inner shrine, or they to whom the pilgrims recounted the priceless value of these gems in other lands – only they began to look with something like pride upon the dreamer Adonais.

But not without purpose had the Fane-builder reared this magnificent structure. Within those costly walls was a veiled and jeweled sanctuary. There had he enshrined an idol – the image of a bright divinity which he alone might worship. Willingly and freely did he admit the pilgrim and the wayfarer to the outer courts of his temple; gladly did he offer them refreshing draughts from the fountain of living water which gushed up in its midst; but never did he suffer them to enter that "Holy of holies;" never did their eyes rest on that enshrined idol, in whose honor all these treasures were gathered together.

In progress of time, when Adonais had lavished all his wealth upon his temple, and when with the toil of gathering and shaping out her treasures, his strength had well-nigh failed him, there came a troop of revilers and slanderers – men of evil tongue, who swore that the Fane-builder was no better than a midnight robber, and had despoiled other temples of all that adorned his own. The tale was as false and foul as they who coined it; but when they pointed to many pigmy fanes which now began to be reared about the city, and when men saw that they were built of like marbles as those which glittered in the temple of Adonais, they paused not to mark that the fairest stones in these new structures were but the imperfect sculptures which the true artist had scorned to employ, or perhaps the chippings of some rare gem which in his affluence he could fling aside. So the tale was hearkened unto and believed. They whose dim perceptions had been bewildered by this new uncoined and uncoinable wealth, were glad to think that it had belonged to some far off time, or some distant region. The envious, the sordid, the cold, all listened well-pleased to the base slander; and they who had cared little for his glory made themselves strangely busy in spreading the story of his shame.

Patiently and unweariedly had the dreamer labored at his pleasant task, while the temple was gradually growing up toward the heavens; skillfully had he polished the rich marbles, and graven upon them the ineffaceable characters of truth. But the jeweled adornments of the inner shrine had cost him more than all his other toil, for with his very heart's blood had he purchased those costly gems that sparkled on his soul's idol. Now wearied and worn with by-gone suffering he had no strength to stand forth and defy his revilers. Proudly and silently he withdrew from the world, and entered into his own beautiful fane. Presently men beheld that a heavy stone had been piled against the door of the inner sanctuary, and upon its polished surface was inscribed these words: "To Time the Avenger!"

From that day no one ever again beheld the dreamer. Pilgrims came as before, and rested within the vestibule, and drank of the springing fountain, but they no longer saw the dim outline of the veiled goddess in the distant shrine, only the white and ghastly glitter of that threatening stone, which seemed like the portal of a tomb, met their eyes.

Thus years passed on, and men had almost forgotten the name of him who had wasted himself in such fruitless toil. At length there came one from a country far beyond the seas, who had set forth to explore the wonders of all lands. He lacked the pious reverence of the pilgrims, but he also lacked the cold indifference of those who dwelt within the shadow of the temple. He entered the mystic fane, he gazed with unsated eye upon the treasures it contained, and his soul sought for greater beauty. With daring hand he and his companions thrust aside the marble portal which guarded the sanctuary. At first they shrunk back, dazzled and awe-stricken as the blaze of rich light met their unhallowed gaze. Again they went forward, and then what saw they? Surrounded by the sheen of jewels – glowing in the gorgeous light of the diamond, the chrysolite, the beryl, the ruby, they found an image fashioned but of common clay, while extended at its feet lay the skeleton of the Fane-builder.

Worn with toil, and pain, and disappointment, he had perished at the feet of his idol. It may be that the scorn of the world had opened his eyes to behold of what mean materials was shapen the divinity he had so honored. It may be that the glitter of the gems he had heaped around it had perpetuated the delusion which had first charmed him, and he had thus been saved the last, worst pang of wasted idolatry. It matters not. He died – as all such men must die – in sorrow and in loneliness.

But the fane he has reared is as indestructible as the soul of him who lifted its lofty summit to the skies. "Time, the Avenger," has redeemed the builder's fame; and even the men of his own nation now believe that a prophet and a seer once dwelt among them.

When that great city shall have shared the fortunes of the Babylons and Ninevahs of olden time, that snow-white fane, written all over with characters of truth, and graven with images of beauty, will yet endure; and men of new times and new states shall learn lessons of holier and loftier existence from a pilgrimage to that glorious temple, built by spirit-toil, and consecrated by spirit-worship and spirit-suffering.

DREAM-MUSIC; OR, THE SPIRIT-FLUTE

A BALLAD

BY FRANCES S. OSGOOD

There – Pearl of Beauty! lightly press,
With yielding form, the yielding sand;
And while you lift the rosy shells,
Within your dear and dainty hand,

Or toss them to the heedless waves.
That reck not how your treasures shine,
As oft you waste on careless hearts
Your fancies, touched with light divine,

I'll sing a lay – more wild than gay —
The story of a magic flute;
And as I sing, the waves shall play
An ordered tune, the song to suit.

In silence flowed our grand old Rhine;
For on his breast a picture burned,
The loveliest of all scenes that shine
Where'er his glorious course has turned.

That radiant morn the peasants saw
A wondrous vision rise in light,
They gazed, with blended joy and awe —
A castle crowned the beetling height!

Far up amid the amber mist,
That softly wreathes each mountain-spire,
The sky its clustered columns kissed,
And touched their snow with golden fire;

The vapor parts – against the skies,
In delicate tracery on the blue,
Those graceful turrets lightly rise,
As if to music there they grew!

And issuing from its portal fair,
A youth descends the dizzy steps;
The sunrise gilds his waving hair,
From rock to rock he lightly leaps —

He comes – the radiant, angel-boy!