THE TRAGEDY.

HE "Dame with the Camelias

THE

I think that was the play;

The house was packed from pit to dome,
With the gallant and the gay,
Who had come to see the tragedy,
And while the hours away.
There was the faint Exquisite,
With glove and glass sublime;
There was the grave Historian,
And there the man of Rhyme,
And the surly Critic front to front,
To see the play of Crime.
And there was heavy Ignorance,
And Vice in Honiton lace;
Sir Croesus and Sir Pandarus-
And the music played apace,
But of all that crowd, I only saw

A single, single face!

"Twas that of a girl whom I had known

In the summers long ago,

When her breath was like the new-mown hay, Or the sweetest flowers that grow;

When her heart was light and her soul was white,
As the winter's driven snow.

'Twas in our own New England,
She breathed the morning air;
'Twas the sunshine of New England
That blended with her hair,
And modesty and purity

Walked with her everywhere!

All day like a ray of light, she played
About old Harvey's mill;

And her grandsire held her on his knee
In the evenings long and still
And told her tales of Lexington,
And the trench at Bunker Hill-

And of the painted Wampanoags,
The Indians who of yore
Builded their wigwams out of bark
In the woods of Sagamore,
And how the godly Puritans
Burnt witches by the score!

Or touching on his sailor life
He told how long ago,

In the dark of a cruel winter night,
In the rain, and sleet, and snow,
The good bark "Martha Jane" went down
On the rock off Holmes's Hole!

The years flew by, and the maiden grew
Like a harebell in the glade;
The chestnut shadows crept in her eyes-
Sweet eyes that were not afraid

To look to heaven at morn or even,
Or any time she prayed!

She walked with him to the village church;
And his eyes would fill with pride

To see her walk with the man she loved-
To see them side by side-

Sweet Heaven! she were an angel now
If she had only died.

If she had only died! alas,

How keen must be the woe,

That makes it better one should be
Where the sunshine cannot go;
Than to live in this sunny world of ours
Where the happy blossoms blow.

Would she had wed some country clown

Before that luckless day,

When her cousin came to that lowly home-
Her cousin, Richard May,
With his city airs and handsome eyes,

To lead her soul astray.

One night they left the cottage,

One night in the mist and rain;

And the old man never saw his child
Nor Richard May again;

Never saw his pet in the clover path,
In the meadow, nor the lane.

Ah! never was a heart so torn
Since this wild world began ;
As day by day he looked for her,
This pitiful old man,
"Where's my pretty maid ?" he said,
This pitiful old man.

Many a dreary winter came,

And he had passed away;

And we never heard of her who fled
In the night with Richard May;
Never knew if she were alive or dead,
Till I met her at the play.

And there she sat with her great brown eyes—

They wore a troubled look;

And I read the history of her life
As it were an open book;
And saw her soul like a slimy thing
In the bottom of a brook.

There she sat in her rustling silk
With diamonds on her wrist,
And on her brow a gleaming thread
Of pearl and amethyst.

"A cheat, a gilded grief," I said,
And my eyes were filled with mist.

I could not see the players play,
I heard the music moan;

It moaned like the dismal autumn wind
That dies in the woods alone;

And when it stopped-I heard it still

The mournful monotone.

What if the Count were true or false?

I did not care, not I;

What if Camille for Armand died?

I did not see her die;

There sat a woman opposite

Who held me with her eye!

The great green curtain fell on all,
On laugh, on wine, on woe,
Just as death some day will fall
'Twixt us and life, I know!
The play was done, the bitter play,
And the people turned to go.

But did they see the tragedy?

They saw the painted scene-
They saw Armand, the jealous fool:
And the sick Parisian queen;
But they did not see the tragedy-
The one I saw-I mean.

They did not see that cold-cut face,
That furtive look of care:
Or, seeing her jewels, only said,
"The lady's rich and fair."

But I tell you 'twas the " Play of Life,"
And that woman played "Despair!"
THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH.

THE SKY.

NOT long ago I was slowly descending the carriage

road, after you leave Albano. It had been wild weather when I left Rome, and all across the Campagna the clouds were sweeping in sulphurous blue, with a clap of thunder or two, and breaking gleams of sunlight along the Claudian Aqueduct lighting up its arches like the bridge of chaos. But as I climbed the long slope of the Alban mount, the storm swept finally to the north, and the noble outlines of the domes of Albano and the graceful darkness of its ilex grove rose against pure streaks of alternate blue and amber, the upper sky gradually flushing through the last fragments of raincloud in deep, palpitating azure, half ether and half dew. The noonday sun came slanting down the rocky slopes of La Ricca and its masses of entangled and tall foliage, whose autumnal tints were mixed with the wet