The Mask of the Red Death - Graham's Magazine, May 1842 — reading text

E’en when the dew of childhood’s hours ‘Ho, Julio!’”? What? No answer yet? Along her heart’s first blossoms clung, It rung from base to parapet ! And I amid my native bowers I mounted up the marble stair !— In sinless worship o’er them hung. I rushed into the olden room! It shone beneath the evening’s glare Oh! are not feelings such as these As silent as the tomb,— Like splendid rainbow-glories caught Save that a slave with wond’ring eye (To cheer our voyage o’er life’s seas) Looked from the dreary vacancy. From Heaven’s own holy Lanp oF THovcur? ‘Your Lady, Serf?’ pane esessment ‘¢ She’s in the bower.”’ And yet, oh, God! how soon may they ‘<In sooth I should have sought her there !"? waneT PS RSS SR aorspotet seiahcmta hia Siginctnie Like those bright glories flee away, For oft we passed the twilight hour And leave the heart an unlit sea, In its delicious air. Where piloted by dark despair The spirit-wreck rolls fearfully I rushed with lightning steps—Oh, God! Within the night of sullen air? Why flashed not then thy blasting flame— That it might wither from the sod . At last the eye of battle closed— The one who madly called Thy name? Its lurid fires no longer burned— The warrior on his wreath reposed, My poniard grasped, left not its sheath— And I unto my halls returned. I had nor hope—nor life—nor breath ; I only felt the ice of death Slowly congealing o’er my heart— Oh! who can tell the joys that start Like angel-wings within the heart, And on my eye a dizzy cloud When wearied with war’s toil, the chief Swam round and round, a sickening part In home’s dear light would seek relief? Of that which seemed a closing shroud The one might feel whom burial gave All prematurely to the grave. Not he who has no loved one there Left in his absence lonely— Whose heart he fondly hopes shall beat But soon that deadly trance was o’er ; For him and for him only. The foliage hid as yet; and I Retraced the path I trod before With such a heart-wild ecstasy. And such my Laura’s heart I deemed ; For me alone I thought she beamed Like some pure lamp on hermit’s shrine, For as I gazed upon their guilt, Which only glows for him, divine A thought flashed out of demon-hue ; And beauteous as the spirit-eyes And I resigned my dagger’s hilt That light the bow’rs of Paradise. As deadlier then my vengeance grew. It was a lovely eve, but known Small torture satisfies the weak— Unto the South’s voluptuous zone ; For they but slightly feel a wrong ; An eve whose shining vesture hung I would by hours my vengeance wreak ! Like Heaven’s own rosy flags unfurl’d, The deep revenge is for the strong. And by some star-eyed cherub flung In sport around our gloomy world; In Lorro’s castle is a cell An eve in which the coldest frame (Where Cruelty has sat in state, And heart must feel a warming flame, I ween that some have known it well,) When light and soul no longer single, Which is divided by a grate. But in a bridal glory mingle: Then think how I whose spirit bowed No sunbeam ever pierced its night ; Whene’er the dimmest light was sent Nor aught save lamp there shed its light : From twinkling star or rosy cloud No sound save sound of wild despair In God’s blue, glorious firmament— Hath ever vexed its heavy air.  PERDITI. 269 <= Rest: Upon its walls so grim and old But thus in agony I sought Have gathered centuries of mould. To strangle in their birth the brood It seems that with the birth of time Of serpents cradled in my thought. That cell was hollowed out by crime, Iv’e tried to pray: In vain! In vain! And there, her hateful labor o’er, The very words seem brands of fire She took her first sweet draught of gore. By demons hurled into my brain— The burning ministers of ire. Ha! Ha! Iseethem! See them now— The cold damp dripping from each brow, How Sprrir, mid such fearful strife With hands oustretched they mercy sue— I left the hated mortal life, (Ye know not how my vengeance grew, I need not say: it matters not While I stood by with suilen smile— How we may break that earthly spell ; The only answer to their grief— Enough! enough! I knew my lot For wearied in that dungeon aisle, And feel its agony too well. In smiles J even found relief. My frame beside its father rests— I watched them in that dreary gloom, The same old banner o’er their breasts (Tome a heaven—to them a tomb,) Which they with all their serfs, of yore, For hours—for days—and joyed to hear To battle and to triumph bore. Their pleadings fill that sepulchre. No chieftain sways the castle’s wall, At first they tried to lull their state No chieftain revels in its hall. By cheering each thro’ that dull grate, And on each bastion’s leaning stone (For this they lingered separate; Grim desolation sits alone, I could not bear e’en then to see While organ winds their masses roll Them closer in their agony.) Around each lonely turret’s head, And this they did for days! at last And seem to chant, ‘‘REsT TROUBLED sovuL ! A change upon them came— Mercy! On! MERCY FOR THE DEAD!”? For each to each reproaches cast, In which I heard my name. The spirit bent his brow—and tears The first which he had shed for years, I spake no word—their dread replies Fell burning from his eyes, for THovcuT Were only read within my eyes, Had oped their overflowing cells, Which as they glared upon the pair, Like wakened lightning which has sought Like scorpions writhing in their pain The cloud with all its liquid spells. When wounded in the loathsome lair, Seemed burning to my very brain. He wept—as he had wept of old— I shall not tell how hunger grew When sudden through the gloomy air In that dread time upon the two— A glorious gush of music roll’d When each would vainly try to break Around those wretched spirits there ;— The bars an earthquake scarce could shake, They started up with frantic eyes Nor how they gnawed, in their great pain, Wild-glancing to their sullen skies: Their dungeon’s rusted iron chain ; And still the angel-anthem went Nor how their curses, deep and oft, Rejoicing ’round that firmament ; From parching lips were rung aloft ; And shining harps were sparkling through Nor how like babbling fiends they would The cloud-rifts—held by seraph-forms Together vex the solitude; Oh! lovely as the loveliest hue Nor how the wasting crimson tide Of rainbows curled on buried storms. Of withered life their wants supplied; Nor how—enough! enough they died Faint and more faint the music grows— Aye! and I saw the red worm creep Yet how entrancing in its close— Upon their slumbers, dark and deep, Sweeter! oh sweeter than the hymn And felt with more ofjoy than dread Of an enthusiast who has given The grim eyes of the fleshless dead. His anthem forth, at twilight dim, And hopes with it to float to heaven. Long years have passed away, since then And see, where yonder tempests meet, And I have mixed with fellow men ; The rapid glance of silver feet— On land and wave my flag unfurl’d The last of that refulgent train Streamed like a storm above the world ; Who leave this desolated sphere; For Lorro was a soldier born ; Oh! not for them such realms of Parn His music was the battle-horn. Where Crime stands tremblingly by Fzar :~ E’en when a boy—his playthings were They’re gone, AND ALL IS DARK AGAIN, Such deadly toys as sword and spear, I did not pant for fame or blood, [End of Part First.] 23*  ee THE CHEVALIER GLUCK. BY W. W. STORY. Durine the latter part of the autumn in Berlin there eyebrows, under which the eyes glanced forth with are usually some fine days. The cloudless sun shines an almost wild, youthful fire, (the age of the man pleasantly out and evaporates the moisture from the might be about fifty;) the white and well-formed warm air which blows through the streets. Mingling chin presented a singular contrast to the compressed together in motley groups, you may see a long row mouth, and a satirical smile breaking out in the of fashionables, citizens with their wives, little chil- curious play of muscles in the hollow cheeks, dren in Sunday clothes, priests, Jewesses, young seemed