ESSAYS IN VERSE.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 71, 23 March 1912, Page 19

ESSAYS IN VERSE.

THE FAIRIES' TREE. * Lat,t night beneath this aucient tree, Dim in tlio moonlight and the ferns, The elfin ioik held revelry, I know by what my noul discerns ■ Mysteriously. For, see you, where yon circle runs Of bluote, looking very wigo, The rapture of those tricksy ones Still puts contusion in their eyes, That blink the sun's. And, mark you, how that toadstool there Protrudes its bulk in Fatetaff state; It too hath seen, 1 well will svvoar, Some elf, and lesurned to imitate His pompom air. Aud where that lichen lays a streak Of foae, fair as a flowering stock, The place but recollects her cheek, The fay's, who danced upon this rock Above the creok. And, hark! between this rock and root, Where shrill the cricket pipes away, Some fairy dropped its magio flute, That never stops, but still must play For fairy foot. And yonder beetle, glittering by, Hath mailed himself, sis it hath seen Titania's guard, in many a dyo Of gold and green, when round their queen They caught its eye. Tho toad that equate, observing naught, Humped up where yonder mushrooms are, Hath donned the Puckliko look he caught From Oberon's chief councillor In judgment brought. The bees, that murmur drowsy here, And gnats and wood flies, but repeat The music that a sleepy ear Caught when all Elnand rose to greet Their queen with cheer. Oh, there is more than eye may see, That to the moon is visible! If it could speak, tluß ancient tree, , What would it B»y, what would it tell Oi 1 aerie? But it, it keeps its council close, As do the crickets and the flowers: Ah, could it speak and tell of those! What tales we'd hear, of elfin powers, That no one knows! —Madison Cawein. New York Sun. CONJURING. When I was a child at play in a yard A dust-heap then was a magio hill, And the wicked weed that the trim walks marred Were jungied ways by a dragon barred, And fancy Helped, till a barren place Grew a shining valley- where creepers lace. I wonder 1 Am I a baby still If When I was a child, where the willow tree Dipped into the billabong, I thought the creek was a boundlleas sea, And it toid of enchanted isles to me, Of trig galleons that sailed away A pirate's prau, and a coralled bay, And a white-edged breaker* song. . . „ I, once a child, am a child no more, Ab one'measures inches and tablets time, Yet I build my idols and I adore, ' Weave wizard carpets to deck my floor Till it ripples in perfumes rare and glows With the lily and tulip and damask rose Of some wonderful Eastern clime. So real do these oonjurings seem — < 'Tiff only when i search in your eyes Looking for love — that I grow quite wise, Knowing, alas! I dream 1 Australasian. " — M. Forrest. LASTNIGHT I SAW AN ARMED BAND. La»t night I saw an armed band whose feet Did take the martial step, although they w trod Soundless as waves of light upon the air,? 1 '" (Silent from silent lips the bugle fell.J'i ' The wind was wild; but the great flag they bore' tjJL Hung motionless, and glittered like a-giJS* Above their awful facet while they marched. And when I saw, I understood, and said; "If th&BO are they whom wo did love and Rive, What seek they?" But one sternly answered me: " . "We seek our comrades whom we left to thee ; The weak, who were thy strength] the poor, who had Thy pride ; the faint and-few who gav.e to theo One supreme hour from out the day of life — One deed majestic to their century. These wore thy trust; how fare they at thy hands? Thy saviours then— are , they thy heroes now? Our comrades still ; we keep the step with them. Behold ! as thou unto the leatit of them Shall do, so dost thou unto üb. Amen." —Elizabeth Stuart Phelps. Argonaut.