THE CHIMES.

It was evening in New England, And the air was all in tune, As I sat at an open window, In the emerald month of June. From the maples by the roadway, The robins sang in pairs, Listening and then responding, Each to the other's airs. Sounds of calm that wrought the feeling Of the murmur of a shell, Of the drip of a lifted bucket In a wide and quiet well. And I thought of the airs of bargemen, Who tunefully recline, As they float by Ehrenbreitstein, In the twilight of the Rhine. And then of an eve in Venice, And the song of the gondolier, From the far lagunes replying To the wingéd lion pier. And then of the verse of Milton, And the music heard to rise, Through the solemn night from angels Stationed in Paradise. Thus I said it is with music, Wheresoe'er at random thrown, It will seek its own responses, It is loth to die alone. Thus I said the poet's music, Though a lovely native air, May appeal unto a rhythm That is native everywhere. For although in scope of feeling, Human hearts are far apart, In the depths of every bosom, Beats the universal heart; Beats with wide accordant motion, And the chimes among the towers Of the grandest of God's temples Seem as if they might be ours. And we grow in such a seeming, Till indeed we may control To an echo, our communion With the good and grand in soul. As an echo in a valley May revive a cadence there, Of a bell that may be swaying In a lofty Alpine air. As a screen of tremulous metal, From the rolling organ tone, Rings out to a note of the music That can never be its own. As an earnest artist ponders On a study nobly wrought, Till his fingers gild his canvas With a touch of the self-same thought. But the sun had now descended Far along his cloudy stairs, And the night had come like the angels To Abraham, unawares.