The national era. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1847-1860, 1859-03-17


continuous, yet connected dream it was. like :;
dramatic action; like composition in music
with prelude, and overture, and aria, crescendo
ana dimlnuendo, and march, and pomp, an,
wall, and intermezzo; beginning action, mid
acton, climax, and finale; lucrative fngue, AM
| sudden coda--or like 'an ode, with strophe an,
antistrophe, and epode, repeating. themselve
ever.
IL came upon him in faint conception O
| organ music, such as men sometimes wax,
| from their midnight slumbers to hear, afar off
and, with many breaks and pauses, gradual,
| grew nearer to him, and more around him. till
IN the notes that thronged around him in tn,
darkness, he could distinguish the sad wall O
Miserere. Now the sonorous bass pealet
against the air, and rumbled under his feet. a.
wave OF ocean sweeps up over the beacl
wherein the bather stands; now solemn, scarce
audible, now deep and stentorian it rises and
falls, it GIBBS and flows, like the heavy tapestr,
OF some grand Norman hall, when summer
winds pulse ftfully in at the higharched case
ments now 1t means with the panied shivel
and feeble trill of the new-made mother as
newly ohildlessi now it strangely ullulates
now, like the lark, it scars aloft, with quaver
and chirrup, and a CAROL oh, SO silver-sound
ing, so dulcet and inspiring:
tiimmering, pla ing
Like tie richest sunlight
All Nature array ing
Telling now OF dewy wine,
Press'd on green-rbbd Appenine"-
Now it drones lazily, now it thunders forth
alarums, telling of the Gathering hoofs the dust
and roar of the charge, the clashing stroke o.
sabres, and the quick mad shout of battle; now
it dies away in Q cadence, the tremulous tones
Of dirge, lower, lower, lower, till its silence is
deathflike and awful; and then, with a full
burst, 1t scars away, carrying his soul with il
onward and upward, up to the gates of Heaven
to the fields of empyrean, where
Hark bark the lark at heavens gate sings
And PhGbus gins arise,
hi steeds TO water those springs
Oh chalIc d towers that hesp
And while the swelling peal of the iubilant
chorus bursts on his raptured ears they begin,
to light up the cathedral, touching their waved
censers at the tall altar candles, aad difusing
around the fragrant breath Of holy incense, un-
til, family illumined, it meets his eyes, and
blends with the tranced rapture of his soul, all
sweet impregned with the music's rich melo-
dious essence-the form of tall cathedral,
shall we say, or rather Druid temple arched
aith branching oaks that slept above there in
grand and Gothic embrace; while gray and
old reclined the rock-hewn altar OH the earth,
like ancient Saturn,
Sill as the silence round about his lairn
when Thea found him and weird and solemn
swayed the sombre hangings from the arching
'tr Tr Trwy III yisla Tei srysaT,S ii ii stretcbnJ
he thought, the nations wofsnlpPse -s,d hassa.
and upon that altar-stone His Spirit smiles,
and there too rolls His Cloud, yelling His gifts
TO it, as Of old His Cloud did Tower and veil the
Jewish tabernacle in the days when Moses saw
Him, and thenceforth so glowed from the re-
Election of that holy Presence, that men feared
to look upon His face. II
Pictures were there, too; Abraham at his al
tar on Moriah, learning the lesson of faith and
Noah, pointing with his sacrifcial knife towards
Gods bowed promise in the starry heavens ;
and Orpheus, with his Tyre exaltng man from
brute into humanity by the spell of art; and
Plato, from his honeyed lips defining Psyche's
undying essence and eternal cyclic progress i;
and He, the Master, with His tender hand laid
pattInglY pp0n q little golden haired child,
teaching those bearded ones the lesson that He
lived and Boodha, horn Gpadma, ia Thibetan
hills, proclaiming moral life, and happy intro
yertive calm and there also were pictured
saints, who have not suffered vain martyrdom,
since art has won her perfect grace through the
inspiration of their lives. One little gem he
SaW lHcIt, anu ne lHUupbt LWdS DN EO,.Q
Angelica the Saviour, with His holy hand up
raising the woman in the temple, where she Law
hiding her face in her robes, and shuddering
but, though she hid her face. he could see that
the crimson shame which filed her, had made
the tip Of her ear blush red. None but Angel
ico gould fiji so full that holy face with pity,
with love, and with its expression of divine com
passion.
And now, as the peal of the Anthem died
away, the cathedral-iorest seemed to waver and
flicker in the waverng and Pickering light and
the sad-hued hangings pulsed slowly to and fro,
irresolute as it were, and the misty asles blend:
ed more and more with each other, and the
dreamy arching branches aloft receded farther
and farther; when, suddenly, clear soprano
voice commenced solo, softly followed by the
organs softest notes; broad light glared in
from above and clear shaft of celored GAYS
came down through painted windows, upon his
head, and upon all the scene, sepulchrally iu-
mining ihe whole place, and showing forth in
all their grinning horror the grotesquely aculp.
tured faces around him, that were stone, and
vet mouthed and mined towards him, till it
was horror to behold them. Above all i'm
pressions, however, the voice took precedence, a
wondrous clear soprano, pouring forth wall
that ceased not, a wall that was heard in
heaven, and made earth to tremhle--a wall that
transfxed him as with an arrow dipt in the
venom of eternal torment, transfxed him ever,
and would not be drawn out. And yet, in the
wondrous voice, and in the choral monotone
that dragged after it, and in the soft organ ut
terance that releysa is, hs thought there was
pictured to his sight, through the magic of as
ISOLATION, moved into operhtiveness by the ma
gician sound, purple passion-fower, that bud
III 4,cl.,o 40,
underline weight of its cross
j Sand this" he murmured to himself, inter-
preting the symbolism, "and this means life,
which we enter in pain, and Which eyer bears
upon Its bosom the cross; that heavy cross which
even Christ sank under. This is life, and its
type the passion-hower, purple-hued, and cross
laden and the voice murmurs of the yearning,
the longing, the fainting, the despair of the
Imprisoned SOUL I'
! Then the glarlng lighs assaned a softer, mel
lower tone, and the wailing voice merged its
nsaserere in the exultation of a happy song,
while it seemed as if q curtain had been drawn
up, revealing to the gaze, flooded in pleasant
light, the greenest and daintest mede ever seen,
where the daisy, and the primrose, and the violet,
blossomed beautifully, sprinkling the grassy
svard with charms es varYiEg ana delightful
as those that are reflected from the sun-kissed
ripples of summer brooklet there was a
fountain near by, also, from whose messy mouth
a stream ran gurgling and laughing, Knocked in
its melodious murmur by the clear joyous voice,
and the proud exhilarant chorus. The sombre
Cathedral hangings melted away before the ge-
NAL sunshine, aud The raek.hegn altar was con-
verted into pleasant grotto, where Pan piped
to dancing kid, and Satyr stretched his
lazy limbs, and Dryad bent down from her
tree to drop dowery coronals upon their brows.
From the forest walks, SO green and dappled