I saw the forests, far inland
Stretched sullenly on either hand;
Whose wild inhabitants again

Had won their old domain from men.
The Elephants are browsing there

Beneath some archway's ebon shade,
And the fierce tigress has her lair
In the royal colonnade.

The few poor hinds, who sought to gain
A niggard living from the soil,
Oft leave the river-horse their grain

And curse their useless toil:

While gaunt hyænas nightly trooping down, With demon-laughter scare the sleeping town.

The sun was high as I sprang to land

And stood upon the burning sand:

"God knows," I cried, "His ways are still

Concealed from human ken;

How this alternate good and ill

Falls on the tribes of men.

This place so populous and great,

So blazed in ancient story,
How sunken now and desolate !
How fallen from her glory!"
"Peace to the stranger!"-
Calmly fell

The ancient greeting on mine ear—
"Needs not in words, my lord, to tell

The man I seek is here,

For on your youthful cheek there glows
The vermil of the western rose."

I looked upon the seemly dress,
The ample turban's fold,
The beard of silver fleeciness,
Upon his breast that rolled :
The eagle features of the face
The form of dignity and grace;
Alas! how sunk the haughty race
The Merchant-Princes of the place!

We toiled amid the brooding heats,
The stifling silence of the streets;
The very dogs had sought the shade,

While strength remained to crawl,
No living creature movement made
Save where the salamanders played
About the blinding wall.

No human frame could live, and bear
The furnace of that fiery air.

But help was nigh, not far before
Appeared the friendly merchant's door,-
A portico whose depth of gloom
Lay 'neath a high protecting dome.-
We hurried on, but when one pace

Had brought us to the resting-place,

My guide stopped short; and turning round,
Lifted, bending low his head,

A scrap of paper from the ground;

And, "See, my son," he said

As in the porch at length we stood,-
"Sinners are we, but ONE is good,

This fluttering shred, we know not whence it came,
How shall its future fate be clear,

Perhaps to-morrow, even here,

Some hand shall trace the great Elohim's name."

"Oh, if the meanest things appear

(My words broke forth without control)

"For His sake precious thus and dear, How shall the greatest, wisest here

Despise a human soul!

No hearts to our dim sight are shown, But THOU art wise and great alone,

THOU knowest, blessed LORD, thine own."

H. G. K.

C

GOD IN NATURE.

"THOU turnest away thy face, and they are troubled."

BEHOLD! an earthly Heaven, a realm of air,
Where, in their highest sweeps, the eagles show
Their backs below us, glancing in the sun.
Far off the plains lie, basking in the flood

Of distance, till their outlines fade; their fields,
Their streams, their trees, their wooded hills are lost
Little by little, till at length they melt,

And the horizon meets the sky, like Ocean's.

Whence are these tender hues, these lights and shades,
Upon the nearer mountains; what this haze,

This blue transparent film, in which I see
The farther dells dim-floating, glen to peak
Clad in the glory of the Centuries,

Half-hidden, half-revealed, like God's own truth
We cannot wholly see, and yet we feel?
Is it in us, not them, the splendour dwells?
Is it Imagination's self-wrought cheat

That robes them with a radiance not their own?
Ah see! the clouds draw up, and veil the plain,
The light forsakes the shadows of the woods,
The lightnings stream, the thunders roar, the rain
Bursts fiercely forth; the outer world departs;

I stand alone amid the general gloom.

Where now the splendour of the scene? where now
The pride, the pleasure of the sensuous eye
That called itself Creator? It is real,
The glory that we see on Nature's face,

And by celestial influence comes and goes.

H. G. K.

THE WORDS OF SCHAMYL, THE PROPHET.

[WE presume there are few if any of our readers to whom the name of the Circassian prophet-warrior, SCHAMYL, is not known. His character presents that remarkable combination of sacred and secular functions, to which our modern habits in Western Europe have rendered us strange, but which was not at all uncommon in ancient times, especially in the East. In a little book on Circassia, edited by Mr M'Kenzie (London, 1854), and selected principally from a German work by Wagner, there occurs a proclamation by this remarkable man to his fellow-countrymen, which for vigour, fire, and noble daring, both of thought and expression, is unsurpassed among the records of popular eloquence. Compared with this address, the best of Napoleon's speeches to the French soldiers are mere theatrical displays; there is an air of sincerity here, and of high stern conviction, which claims brotherhood, not with the rhetoric of modern French military adventurers, but with the passionate utterances of ancient Hebrew prophets. Those of our readers who have already read the passage which we here present in a rhythmical form, will perhaps think that, like the Psalms of David, it reads better in prose than in metre; but fine poetic gems of this sort are very apt to be overlooked in a book of statistics and historical detail; so we hope that the exhibition of this rare outburst of religious poetry (for such is its proper category), in a separate poetical form, will not only gratify the taste of some readers, but secure to the composition a more distinct attention and a wider circulation.]

SCHAMYL, the prophet, hath spent the night

In fasting and in prayer;

The Lord hath cased his soul with might,
And taught his heart to dare.

And now he comes to public light,
And calls the congregation
To speak the words of truth and right
To all the Tcherkess nation.

Stern and serene he stands, as one
Whose life is rooted surely

In God; a man who feareth none;
But as a fort, securely

Rock-based, recks not the rushing tide,
Nor all the warring storm,
So, mailed in faith and lofty pride,
He rears his kingly form ;*

And speaks-" Ye men of Kaf,† hear me
While I make proclamation;

Thus God to Schamyl spake; thus he

To all the Tcherkess nation.

"Deem not that God with numbers dwells

God dwelleth with the good;

And so

*This is no mere poetical figure. The modern Schamyl, like the ancient Saul, who was also at one period of his life amongst the prophets, is a tall man. was Agamemnon also among the Greeks.

The Turkish name for Elbruz, the highest peak in the Caucasus, 16,000 feet

high.

A Circassian fort taken by the Russians under General Grabbe in 1838. On this

Occasion Schamyl made an extraordinary escape.