The sole brave hearts of Ghent! which five defunct,
The heartless town by brainless counsel led
Delivered up her keys, stript off her robes,
And so with all humility besought

Her haughty lord to scourge her lightly! No,
It shall not be-no, verily! for now,
Thus looking on you as ye gather round,
Mine eyes can single out full many a man
Who lacks but opportunity to shine

As great and glorious as the chiefs that fell.
But lo, the earl is mercifully moved!
And surely if we, rather than revenge

The slaughter of our bravest, cry them shame,
And fall upon our knees, and say we've sinned,
Then will the earl take pity on his thralls

And pardon us our letch for liberty!
What pardon it shall be, if we know not,

Yet Ypres, Courtray, Grammont, Bruges, they know;
For never can those towns forget the day

When by the hangman's hands five hundred men,
The bravest of each guild, were done to death

In those base butcheries that he called pardons.
And did it seal their pardons, all this blood?
Had they the earl's good love from that time forth?
O sirs! look round you lest ye be deceived:
Forgiveness may be written with the pen,
But think not that the parchment-and-mouth pardon
Will e'er eject old hatreds from the heart.
There's that betwixt you been, men ne'er forget
Till they forget themselves, till all 's forgot;
Till the deep sleep falls on them in that bed
From which no morrow's mischief knocks them up.
There's that betwixt you been, which you yourselves,
Should ye forget, would then not be yourselves;
For must it not be thought some base men's souls
Have ta'en the seats of yours and turned you out,
If in the coldness of a craven heart

Ye should forgive this bloody-minded man

For all his black and murderous monstrous crimes ?

Think of your mariners, three hundred men,
After long absence in the Indian seas,
Upon their peaceful homeward voyage bound,
And now, all dangers conquered, as they thought,
Warping the vessels up their native stream,
Their wives and children waiting them at home

In joy, with festal preparations made, —

Think of these mariners, their eyes torn out,

Their hands chopped off, turned staggering into Ghent
To meet the blasted eyesight of their friends!

And was not this the earl? 'T was none but he !

No Hauterive of them all had dared to do it

Save at the express instance of the earl.

And now what asks he? Pardon me, sir knights,

I had forgotten, looking back and back
From felony to felony foregoing,

[To Grutt and Bette.

This present civil message which ye bring:
Three hundred citizens to be surrendered

Up to that mercy which I tell you of,

-

That mercy which your mariners proved, which steeped
Courtray and Ypres, Grammont, Bruges, in blood!

Three hundred citizens -
-a secret list:

No man knows who; not one can say he's safe;
Not one of you so humble but that still

The malice of some secret enemy

May whisper him to death; - and hark look to it!
Have some of you seemed braver than their peers,
Their courage is their surest condemnation;
They are marked men - and not a man stands bere
But may be so. Your pardon, sirs, again!

[To Grutt and Bette.

You are the pickers and the choosers here,

And doubtless you're all safe, ye think-ha! ha!
But we have picked and chosen, too, sir knights.
What was the law for, I made yesterday?
What is it you that would deliver up

Three hundred citizens to certain death?

Ho! Van den Bosch! have at these traitors: there!

[Stabs Grutt, who falls.

[Stabs Bette.

VAN DEN BOSCH. Die, treasonable dog! is that enough?
Down, felon, and plot treacheries in hell.

JANE TAYLOR.

TAYLOR, JANE; born in London, September 23, 1783; died at Ongar, Essex, April 12, 1824, and her sister, ANN, born at Islington, London, January 30, 1782; died at Nottingham, December 20, 1866. English poets and juvenile writers, daughters of Isaac Taylor, of Ongar. The sisters were brought up at Lavenham in Suffolk, where their father, who was an accomplished engraver, had his residence. The daughters learned engraving, and early began to write poems designed for the young. Among their joint productions are: "Original Poems for Infant Minds" (1804); "Rhymes for the Nursery" (1806); "Hymns for Infant Minds" (1810);

"Rural Scenes and " City Scenes" (1810). Ann Taylor was

married to Josiah Gilbert, a dissenting clergyman, who died in 1852, of whom she wrote a "Memoir." Her own "Memoirs " were written by her son, Josiah Gilbert. Besides the works produced in conjunction with her sister, Jane Taylor wrote "Display," a novel (1815); "Essays in Rhyme" (1816); and "Contributions of Q. Q." (1824).

Slow was the world my worth to glean,

My visible secret long unseen.

Surly, apart the nations dwelt,

Nor yet the magical impulse felt;

Nor deemed that charity, science, art,
All that doth honor or wealth impart,
Spell-bound till mind should set them free,
Slumbered, and sung in their sleep-in me!
At length the day in its glory rose,
And off on its spell the Engine goes!
On whom first fell the amazing dream?
Watt woke to fetter the giant Steam,

His fury to crush to mortai rule,
And wield Leviathan as his tool.
The monster, breathing disaster wild,
Is tamed and checked by a tutored child;
Ponderous and blind, of rudest force,
A pin or a whisper guides its course.
Around its sinews of iron play

The viewless bonds of a mental sway,
And triumphs the soul in the mighty dower:
To Knowledge the plighted boon is Power!

Hark! 't is the din of a thousand wheels
At play with the fences of England's fields;
From its bed upraised, 't is the flood that pours
To fill little cisterns at cottage doors;

"T is the intricate, many-fingered bright Machine, With its flowery film of lace, I ween!

And see where it rushes, with silvery wreath,
The span of yon arched cove beneath;
Stupendous, vital, fiery, bright,

Trailing its length in a country's sight;
Riven are the rocks, the hills give way,
The dim valley rises to unfelt day,
And Man, fitly crowned with brow sublime,
Conqueror of Distance reigns, and Time.

Lone was the shore where the hero mused,
His soul through the unknown leagues transfused.
His perilous bark on the ocean strayed,

And moon after moon, since its anchor weighed,
On the solitude strange and drear did spin
The untracked ways of that restless brine,
Till at length his shattered sail was furled
'Mid the golden sands of a Western World.
Still centuries passed with their measured tread,
While, winged by the winds, the nations sped;
And still did the Moon, as she watched that deep,
Her triple task o'er the voyagers keep;
And sore farewells, as they hove from land,
Spake of absence long on a distant strand.
She starts: wild winds at her bosom rage;
She laughs in her speed at the war they wage;
In queenly pomp on the surf she treads,
Scarce waking the sea-things from their beds;
Fierce as the lightning tracks the cloud,
She glances on in her glory proud.
A few bright runs, and at rest she lies

Simpleton man! Why, who would have thought To this the song of a tea-kettle brought?