THE NOBLY BORN.

ANONYMOUS.

WHO Counts himself as nobly born
Is noble in despite of place.

And honors are but brands, to one

Who wears them not with nature's grace.

Then, be thou peasant, be thou peer,

Count it still more thou art thine own; Stand on a larger heraldry

Than that of nation or of zone.

What though not bid to knightly halls? Those halls have missed a courtly guest; That mansion is not privileged,

Which is not open to the best.

Give honor due when custom asks,
Nor wrangle for this lesser claim:
It is not to be destitute,

To have the thing without the name.

Then dost thou come of gentle blood,
Disgrace not thy good company:

If lowly born, so bear thyself

That gentle blood may come of thee.

Strive not with pain to scale the height
Of some fair garden's petty wall,
But climb the open mountain's side,
Whose summit rises over all.

ARISTOCRACY.

THOMAS CARLYLE.

A HIGH CLASS without duties to do, is like a tree planted on precipices: from the roots of which all the earth has crumbled. Nature owns no man who is not a martyr withal. Is there a man who pretends to live luxuriously housed up, screened from all work, from want, danger, hardship, the victory over which is what we name work, — he himself to sit serene, amid downbolsters and appliances, and have all his work and battling done by other men? And such man calls himself a noble-man? His fathers worked for him, he says, or successfully gambled for him: here he sits, professes not in sorrow but in pride that he and his have done no work time out of mind.

What is the meaning of nobleness, if this be noble? In a valiant suffering for others, not in a slothful making others suffer for us, did nobleness ever lie. The chief of men is he who stands in the van of men; fronting the peril which frightens back all the others; which, if it be not vanquished, will devour the others. Every noble crown is, and on earth will forever be, a crown of thorns. The Pagan Hercules, why was he accounted a hero? Because he had slain Nemean Lions, cleansed Augean Stables, undergone Twelve Labors, only not too heavy for a god.

In modern, as in ancient and all societies, the Aristocracy, they that assume the functions of an Aristocracy, doing them or not, have taken the post of honor,

which is the post of difficulty, the post of danger, of death, if the difficulty be not overcome. Il faut payer de sa vie? Why was our life given us if not that we should manfully give it? Descend, O Do-nothing Pomp; quit thy down-cushions; expose thyself to learn what wretches feel and how to cure it!

HYMN.

EMILY BRONTÉ.

No coward soul is mine,

No trembler in the world's storm-troubled sphere.
I see Heaven's glories shine
And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

O God within my breast,

Almighty, ever-present Deity!

Life that in me has rest

As I undying life- have power in thee.

Vain are the thousand creeds

That move men's hearts: unutterably vain;
Worthless as withered weeds

Or idlest froth amid the boundless main

To waken doubt in one

Holding so fast by thine infinity:
So surely anchored on

The steadfast rock of immortality.

With wide embracing love

Thy spirit animates eternal years,

Pervades and broods above,

Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates, and rears.

Though earth and man were gone,

And suns and universes ceased to be,
And thou wert left alone,

Every existence would exist in thee.

There is not room for Death,

Nor atom that his might could render void:
Thou thou art Being and Breath,

And what thou art may never be destroyed.

CARCASSONNE.

FROM THE FRENCH OF JEAN GUSTAVE NADaud. TRANSLATION OF J. R. THOMPSON.

I'm growing old; I've sixty years;

I've labored all my life in vain ;
In all that time of hopes and fears
I've failed my dearest wish to gain:
I see full well that, here below,

Bliss unalloyed there is for none.
My prayer will ne'er fulfilment know.
I shall not look on Carcassonne,-
I shall not look on Carcassonne.

You see the city from the hill;
It lies beyond the mountains blue,
And yet to reach it, one must still

Five long and weary leagues pursue,

And to return as many more,

Ah, had the vintage plenteous grown!
The grape withheld its yellow store,-
I shall not look on Carcassonne,-

I shall not look on Carcassonne !

Our vicar's right; he says that we
Are ever wayward, dull, and blind:
He tells us in his homily,

Ambition ruins all mankind.

Yet could I there three days have spent
While still the Autumn sweetly shone,
Ah me, I could have died content

When I had looked on Carcassonne,-
When I had looked on Carcassonne.

Forgive me, Father, I implore
In this, my prayer, if I offend!
One something sees that's just before
From childhood to his journey's end.
My wife, -our little boy, Aignan,
Have travelled even to Narbonne,
My grandchild has seen Perpignan,
And I have not seen Carcassonne !

And I have not seen Carcassonne !

So crooned one day, close by Limoux
A peasant, double bent with age.
"Rise up, my friend," said I, "with you
I'll go upon this pilgrimage."