And on the road, where once we might have met
Cæsar and Cato and men more than kings,
We meet, none else, the pilgrim and the beggar.
Samuel Rogers.

THE CAMPAGNA SEEN FROM ST. JOHN LATERAN.

AS it the trampling of triumphant hosts

WA

That levelled thus yon plain, sea-like and hoary;
Armies from Rome sent forth to distant coasts,
Or back returning clad with spoils of glory?
Around it loom cape, ridge, and promontory:
Above it sunset shadows fleet like ghosts,

Fast-borne o'er keep and tomb, whose ancient boasts,
By Time confuted, name have none in story.
Fit seat for Rome! for here is ample space,
Which greatness chiefly needs, severed aloue
By yonder aqueducts, with queenly grace
That sweep in curves concentric ever on
(Bridging a world subjected as a chart),
To that great city, head of earth, and heart.

Aubrey de Vere.

THE CAMPAGNA.

O, the Campagna! How those startling words
Sweep like swift fingers o'er enchanted cords,
Thrilling the heart with infinite delight!
Lo, the Campagna! The incredulous sight!
Sailing from this, the eagle's wild domain
Cleaves the far blue of the historic plain,
Fainting with pleasure. How, on this high bar,

till it grows

The soul dilates, and trembles like a star
New born! And, lo! as in a sea of rest
Rome lies, a palmy island of the blest,
Glowing with glory. Lo! the aspiring dome,
The smaller sky that overarches Rome,
Rome, and the minds of millions,
Greater than that it emulates, and shows
How Power still sways, with her titanic will,
The ancestral sceptre on her sevenfold hill!
Here, where I stand, the weary pilgrim line
Drops on its knees before the long-sought shrine.
The way-worn mother, with her rapture wild,
Holds towards the Dome the wide-eyed, wondering child.
Here youths and maidens kneel, with marvellous stare,
With pleasure taking precedence of prayer;
Drinking the sight, of which, in some far year,
The curious grandchild at their side shall hear..
Here manhood, from some foreign harvest-field,
Kneels, as beside his mother's feet he kneeled ;
And age, with white locks, bowing to the dust,
Salutes the goal, the temple of his trust,
His old arms crossed upon his tranquil breast,
Where all the passions lie in pious rest;
The lamb and lion,

The reign of peace.

and the child's control, Millennium of the soul! How beautiful! Old pilgrim, here by thee The heretic within me bows the knee.

Thomas Buchanan Read.

I

TWO IN THE CAMPAGNA.

WONDER do you feel to-day

As I have felt, since, hand in hand, We sat down on the grass to stray

In spirit better through the land, This morn of Rome and May?

For me, I touched a thought, I know,
Has tantalized me many times,
(Like turns of thread the spiders throw
Mocking across our path) for rhymes
To catch at and let go.

Help me to hold it: first it left

The yellowing fennel, run to seed

There, branching from the brickwork's cleft, Some old tomb's ruin; yonder weed

Took up the floating weft,

Where one small orange cup amassed
Five beetles, blind and green they grope
Among the honey-meal, and last

Everywhere on the grassy slope

I traced it. Hold it fast!

The champaign with its endless fleece
Of feathery grasses everywhere!
Silence and passion, joy and peace,
An everlasting wash of air,
Rome's ghost since her decease.

Such life there, through such lengths of hours, Such miracles performed in play,

Such primal naked forms of flowers,

Such letting Nature have her way While Heaven looks from its towers.

How say you? Let us, O my dove,
Let us be unashamed of soul,
As earth lies bare to heaven above.
How is it under our control

To love or not to love?

I would that you were all to me,

You that are just so much, no more
Nor yours nor mine, - nor slave nor free!
Where does the fault lie? what the core
Of the wound, since wound must be?

I would I could adopt your will,

See with your eyes, and set my heart Beating by yours, and drink my fill

At your soul's springs, — your part, my part In life, for good and ill.

No. I yearn upward-touch you close,
Then stand away. I kiss your cheek,
Catch your soul's warmth, I pluck the rose
And love it more than tongue can speak -
Then the good minute goes.

Already how am I so far

Out of that minute? Must I go

Still like the thistle-ball, no bar,

Onward, whenever light winds blow,
Fixed by no friendly star?

Just when I seemed about to learn!
Where is the thread now? Off again!
The old trick! Only I discern-

Infinite passion and the pain

of finite hearts that yearn.

Robert Browning.

A

ROMAN ROADS.

ND see from every gate those ancient roads,

With tombs high-verged, the solemn paths of fame; Deserve they not regard? O'er whose broad flints Such crowds have rolled, so many storms of war; Such trains of consuls, tribunes, sages, kings; So many pomps; so many wondering realms: Yet still through mountains pierced, o'er valleys raised, In even state, to distant seas around, They stretch their pavements.

John Dyer.

A

APPIAN WAY.

CROSS the broad Campagna fell
The softly dropping rain,

Obscured the hills I love so well,
And blotted out the plain.

As those gray mists came sweeping by,
I seemed to see the ghosts