The king blew a blast on his bugle horn;
        (Silence!)
    No answer came, but faint and forlorn
    An echo returned on the cold gray morn,
      Like the breath of a spirit sighing. 
    The castle portal stood grimly wide;
    None welcomed the king from that weary ride;
    For, dead in the light of the dawning day,
    The pale sweet form of the welcomer lay,
    Who had yearned for his voice while dying.

    The panting steed with a drooping crest
        Stood weary. 
    The king returned from her chamber of rest,
    The thick sobs choking in his breast;
      And that dumb companion eying,
    The tears gushed forth, which he strove to check;
    He bowed his head on his charger’s neck: 
    “O steed, that every nerve didst strain,
    Dear steed, our ride hath been in vain,
      To the halls where my love lay dying!”

CAROLINE ELIZABETH NORTON.

* * * * *

    Go forth under the open sky and list
    To Nature’s teachings.

BRYANT.

* * * * *

DO YOU KNOW?

“Yesterday we buried my pretty brown mare under the wild-cherry tree.  End of poor Bess.”

    When a human being dies,
    Seeming scarce so good or wise,
    Scarce so high in scale of mind
    As the horse he leaves behind,
    “Lo,” we cry, “the fleeting spirit
    Doth a newer garb inherit;
    Through eternity doth soar,
    Growing, greatening, evermore.” 
    But our beautiful dumb creatures
    Yield their gentle, generous natures,
    With their mute, appealing eyes,
    Haunted by earth’s mysteries,
    Wistfully upon us cast,
    Loving, trusting, to the last;
    And we arrogantly say,
    “They have had their little day;
    Nothing of them but was clay.”

    Has all perished?  Was no mind
    In that graceful form enshrined? 
    Can the love that filled those eyes
    With most eloquent replies,
    When the glossy head close pressing,
    Grateful met your hand’s caressing;
    Can the mute intelligence,
    Baffling oft our human sense
    With strange wisdom, buried be
    “Under the wild-cherry tree?”
    Are these elements that spring
    In a daisy’s blossoming,
    Or in long dark grasses wave
    Plume-like o’er your favorite’s grave? 
    Can they live in us, and fade
    In all else that God has made! 
    Is there aught of harm believing
    That, some newer form receiving,
    They may find a wider sphere,
    Live a larger life than here? 
    That the meek, appealing eyes,
    Haunted by strange mysteries,
    Find a more extended field,
    To new destinies unsealed;
    Or that in the ripened prime
    Of some far-off summer time,
    Ranging that unknown domain,
    We may find our pets again?