Year: 1868

THE CLOSING SCENE.


BY T. BUCHANAN READ.
The following is pronounced by the West
minister Reuieso to be unquestionably the finest
American poem ever written:
Within the sober realms of leaf1eSS trees,
The russet year inhaled the dreamy air,
Like some tanned reaper in his hour of ease,
When all the fields are lying brown and bare.
The gray barns looking from their hazy hills,
Ger the dun waters winding in the vale,
Sent down the air greeting of the mills,
On the dull thunder of alternate fails.
All sights were mellowed, and all sounds sub


dued,


The hills seemed further and the streams sang


low,
AS in a dream the distant woodman hewed
His wintry log, with many muffled blow.
Th' embattled forests, erewhile armed with


gold,


The banners bright with every martial hue,
Now stood like some sad, beaten host of old,
Withdrawn afar in Times remotest blue.
On sombre wings the vulture tried his fight;


complaint;
And, like star slow drowning in the light,
The village church vane seemed to pale and


faint.
The sentinel cock upon the hillside crew
Crew thrice-and all was stiller than before;
Silent, till some replying warder blew
His alien horn, and then was heard no more.
Where erst the jay, within the elm's tall crest,
Made garrulous trouble round her unhedged


young;
And where the oriole hung her swaying nest,
By every light wind like censer swung.
Where sang the noisy martins of the caves,
The busy swallows ever circling near
Foreboding, as the rustic mind believes,
An early harvest and plenteous year;
Where every bird that walked the vernal feast,
Shook the sweet slumber from its wings at


morn,
To warn the reaper of his rosy lust;
All now was sunless, empty ana forrorn,
Alone, from out the stubble, piped the quail;
And croaked the crow through all the dreary


gloom;
Alone, the pheasant drumming in the vale,
Made echo in the distant cottage loom.
There was no bud, no bloom upon the bowers;
The spiders wove their thin thread night by


night,
The thistle down, the only ghost of flowers,
Sailed slowly by-passed noiseless out of


sight.
Amid all this-in this most dreary air,
And where the woodbine shed upon the


porch
Its crimson leaves, as if the year stood there,
Firing the floor with its inverted touch
Amid all this, the centre of the scene,
The white-haired matron with monotonous


tread,
Piled the swift wheel and with her joyous mein
Sat like fate and watched the flying thread
She had known sorrow. He had walked with


her,


Oft supped, and broke with her the ashen


crust,
And in the dead leaves still she heard the stir
Of his thick mantle trailing in the dust.
While yet her cheek was bright with summer


bloom,


Her country summoned and she gave her all;
And twice war bowed to her in sable plume.
Re-gave the sword to rust upon the wall.
Re-gave the sword, but not the hand that drew
And struck for liberty the dying blows
Nor him who, to his sire and country true,
Fell mid the ranks of the invading foe.
Long, but not loud, the dropping wheel went


on,


Like the low murmur of a hive at noon;
Long, but not loud, the memory of the gone
Breathed through her lips a sad and tremu-


lous tone.
At last the thread was snapped-her head was


bowed,


Life dropped the distaff through her hand


serene;
And loving neighbors smoothed her careful


shroud,


Wb;lo doo+L 81 ~.