Is There Some Spirit Sighing?

Is there some Spirit sighing With sorrow in the air? Can weary hearts be dying, Vain love repining there? If not, then how can that wild wail, O sad Æeolian lyre! Be drawn forth by the wandering gale From thy deep thrilling wire?

No, no!--thou dost not borrow That sadness from the wind, Nor are those tones of sorrow In thee, O harp! enshrined; But in our own hearts deeply set Lies the true quivering lyre, Whence love, and memory, and regret Wake answers from thy wire.

THE NAME OF ENGLAND.

The trumpet of the battle Hath a high and thrilling tone; And the first, deep gun of an ocean-fight Dread music all its own.

But a mightier power, my England! Is in that name of thine, To strike the fire from every heart Along the banner’d line.

Proudly it woke the spirits Of yore, the brave and true, When the bow was bent on Cressy’s field, And the yeoman’s arrow flew.

And proudly hath it floated Through the battles of the sea, When the red-cross flag o’er smoke-wreaths play’d Like the lightning in its glee.

On rock, on wave, on bastion, Its echoes have been known; By a thousand streams the hearts lie low That have answer’d to its tone.

A thousand ancient mountains Its pealing note hath stirr’d,-- Sound on, and on, for evermore, O thou victorious word!

OLD NORWAY.

A MOUNTAIN WAR-SONG.

[“To a Norwegian, the words Gamlé Norgé (Old Norway) have a spell in them immediate and powerful; they cannot be resisted. Gamlé Norgé is heard, in an instant, repeated by every voice; the glasses are filled, raised, and drained--not a drop is left; and then bursts forth the simultaneous chorus ‘For Norgé!’ the national song of Norway. Here, (at Christiansand,) and in a hundred other instances in Norway, I have seen the character of a company entirely changed by the chance introduction of the expression Gamlé Norgé. The gravest discussion is instantly interrupted; and one might suppose for the moment that the party was a party of patriots, assembled to commemorate some national anniversary of freedom.”--Derwent Conway’s Personal Narrative of a Journey through Norway and Sweden.

The following words have been published, as arranged to the spirited national air of Norway, by Charles Graves, Esq.]

Arise! Old Norway sends the word Of battle on the blast; Her voice the forest pines hath stirr’d, As if a storm went past; Her thousand hills the call have heard, And forth their fire-flags cast.

Arm, arm, free hunters! for the chase, The kingly chase of foes! ’Tis not the bear or wild wolf’s race Whose trampling shakes the snows: Arm, arm! ’tis on a nobler trace The northern spearman goes.

Our hills have dark and strong defiles, With many an icy bed; Heap there the rocks for funeral piles Above the invader’s head! Or let the seas, that guard our isles, Give burial to his dead!