The grizzly spectre, still more ghastly grown,
Surveyed with visage obdurate as stone,
Then smiled with grimace of derisive craft,
And in a most repugnant manner, laughed,
But all the knight discerned with eye and ear,
Was his own maudlin laugh and drunken leer. 
“Breathe thou thy message,” shrieked the frantic knight
“Discharge thy purpose, though it blast and blight,
I charge thee, speak, by all that is most fair. 
By all most foul, I charge thee to declare;
By my bright armor and my trusty sword;
I charge thee, speak, by Holy Rood and Word!”
He sank exhausted, in such pallid fright
The snowy sheets looked dark beside such white. 
The spectre paused in silence for awhile,
Then broke into a most repulsive smile,
And answered in a weird and hollow tone,
Enough to freeze the marrow in the bone: 
“I am thy blasted spirit’s counterpart,
A body fit for thy most evil heart,
I am thy life, its psychic image sent
To bear thee company, till thou repent.”

’Tis said, for forty days the spectre stayed. 
For forty days the knight incessant prayed;
With scourge, with vigil and ascetic rite,
With fast, with groan remorseful and contrite,
He cleansed his blackened spirit by degrees,
And purified it from its vanities;
And as he prayed, the spectre’s gruesome scowl
Grew day by day less hideous and foul,
As he waxed holy, it became more bright;
And after forty days, arrayed in white
It spread its spotless arms, devoid of taint
Above this erstwhile knight and henceforth saint
In benediction, as he knelt in prayer,—­
Then vanished instantly to empty air.

Such is the tale, embellished by the Muse,
’Tis true or false, believe it as you choose;
Some folks accept the story out and out,
While some prefer to entertain a doubt. 
But if it be fictitious and unreal,
’Tis not subscribed and sworn, and bears no seal;
It points a moral, as the legend old,
If it conveys it, ’twas not vainly told,
For should I such an apparition see—­
I think t’would almost make a monk of me.

As The Indian.

Lo, the poor Indian, whose untutored mind Sees God in the clouds and hears Him in the wind.  —­Pope.

Within the wind, my untaught ear
  The voice of Deity can hear,
And in the fleeting cloud discern
  His movements, vast and taciturn;
    For in the universe I trace
    The wondrous grandeur of His face.

I see him in each blade of grass,
  Each towering peak and mountain pass;
Each forest, river, lake and fen
  Reveals the God of worlds and men;
    His works of wisdom prove to me,
    A wise, creative Deity.

The Fragrant Perfume of the Flowers.

The fragrant perfume of the flowers,
Exuding in the summer hours,
E’en as the altar’s incense rare
Disseminated through the air,
May never reach the azure skies,
Yet can the earth aromatize.