Narrative Poems, part 5, Among Hill etc | Page 6

of Islam reared a domed
tomb,
Saw some one kneeling in the shadow, whom
He greeted
kindly: "May the Holy One
Answer thy prayers, O stranger!"
Whereupon

The shape stood up with a loud cry, and then,
Clasped
in each other's arms, the two gray men
Wept, praising Him whose
gracious providence
Made their paths one. But straightway, as the
sense
Of his transgression smote him, Nathan tore
Himself away:

"O friend beloved, no more
Worthy am I to touch thee, for I came,

Foul from my sins, to tell thee all my shame.
Haply thy prayers, since
naught availeth mine,
May purge my soul, and make it white like
thine.
Pity me, O Ben Isaac, I have sinned!"
Awestruck Ben Isaac stood. The desert wind
Blew his long mantle
backward, laying bare
The mournful secret of his shirt of hair.
"I
too, O friend, if not in act," he said,
"In thought have verily sinned.
Hast thou not read,
'Better the eye should see than that desire

Should wander?' Burning with a hidden fire
That tears and prayers
quench not, I come to thee
For pity and for help, as thou to me.

Pray for me, O my friend!" But Nathan cried,
"Pray thou for me, Ben
Isaac!"
Side by side
In the low sunshine by the turban stone
They knelt;
each made his brother's woe his own,
Forgetting, in the agony and
stress
Of pitying love, his claim of selfishness;
Peace, for his friend
besought, his own became;
His prayers were answered in another's
name;
And, when at last they rose up to embrace,
Each saw God's
pardon in his brother's face!
Long after, when his headstone gathered moss,
Traced on the
targum-marge of Onkelos
In Rabbi Nathan's hand these words were
read:
"/Hope not the cure of sin till Self is dead;
Forget it in love's
service, and the debt
Thou, canst not pay the angels shall forget;

Heaven's gate is shut to him who comes alone;
Save thou a soul, and
it shall save thy own!/"
1868.
NOREMBEGA.
Norembega, or Norimbegue, is the name given by early French
fishermen and explorers to a fabulous country south of Cape Breton,
first discovered by Verrazzani in 1524. It was supposed to have a
magnificent city of the same name on a great river, probably the
Penobscot. The site of this barbaric city is laid down on a map

published at Antwerp in 1570. In 1604 Champlain sailed in search of
the Northern Eldorado, twenty-two leagues up the Penobscot from the
Isle Haute. He supposed the river to be that of Norembega, but wisely
came to the conclusion that those travellers who told of the great city
had never seen it. He saw no evidences of anything like civilization, but
mentions the finding of a cross, very old and mossy, in the woods.
THE winding way the serpent takes
The mystic water took,
From
where, to count its beaded lakes,
The forest sped its brook.
A narrow space 'twixt shore and shore,
For sun or stars to fall,

While evermore, behind, before,
Closed in the forest wall.
The dim wood hiding underneath
Wan flowers without a name;

Life tangled with decay and death,
League after league the same.
Unbroken over swamp and hill
The rounding shadow lay,
Save
where the river cut at will
A pathway to the day.
Beside that track of air and light,
Weak as a child unweaned,
At
shut of day a Christian knight
Upon his henchman leaned.
The embers of the sunset's fires
Along the clouds burned down;
"I
see," he said, "the domes and spires
Of Norembega town."
"Alack! the domes, O master mine,
Are golden clouds on high;
Yon
spire is but the branchless pine
That cuts the evening sky."
"Oh, hush and hark! What sounds are these
But chants and holy
hymns?"
"Thou hear'st the breeze that stirs the trees
Though all
their leafy limbs."
"Is it a chapel bell that fills
The air with its low tone?"
"Thou hear'st
the tinkle of the rills,
The insect's vesper drone."
"The Christ be praised!--He sets for me
A blessed cross in sight!"


"Now, nay, 't is but yon blasted tree
With two gaunt arms outright!"
"Be it wind so sad or tree so stark,
It mattereth not, my knave;

Methinks to funeral hymns I hark,
The cross is for my grave!
"My life is sped; I shall not see
My home-set sails again;
The
sweetest eyes of Normandie
Shall watch for me in vain.
"Yet onward still to ear and eye
The baffling marvel calls;
I fain
would look before I die
On Norembega's walls.
"So, haply, it shall be thy part
At Christian feet to lay
The mystery
of the desert's heart
My dead hand plucked away.
"Leave me an hour of rest; go thou
And look from yonder heights;

Perchance the valley even now
Is starred with city lights."
The henchman climbed the nearest hill,
He saw nor tower nor town,

But, through the drear woods, lone and still,
The river rolling
down.
He heard the stealthy feet of things
Whose shapes he could not see,

A flutter as of evil wings,
The fall of a dead tree.
The pines stood black against the moon,
A sword of fire beyond;

He heard the wolf howl, and the loon
Laugh from his reedy pond.
He turned him