POETRY.
THE EXILE.
FROM THE GREEK OF ALEXANDER HYPSHANTI.
"SAY, foreign bird of mournful mien, with sadness in thy singing, Where is the nest thou lovest best, say, whither art thou winging ?"— " I have no neat, in sad unrest unceasingly I roam, Yet ease of mind may never find nor gain a happy home.
Of old I had a fatherland, in youth's delightful days,
And led a life of golden hope amid the myrtle sprays ;
My roundelay the livelong day I chanted to my mate, And deemed a love so strongas ours might well o'ermaster fate.
When suddenly down swooped a hawk, and dead before my eyes, The light of all my life, struck dead in those fell talons lies.
Since then, bereft of hope and home, sad, partnerless, undone, A lonely exile have I strayed beneath an alien sun ; With drooping wings and weary frame, hither and thither cast From shore to shore, by random chance or by the driving blast Until, my toilsome wand'rings o'er, I reach the silent gate, Whereunto all created things must come, or soon or late,— The cruel hawk, the little bird, his unoffending prey ; For ev'n this wondrous universe must thither pass away."
C. L. Gn.AXES.
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