I

Far off he saw the outline of the city,

And watched its smoke rise upward to the sky,—
Like incense to the altar of God's pity-
And from his lips there stole a stifled sigh.

While on the trees o'erhead the birds chirped gaily,
And soothed his spirit with their simple notes: -
Sweet songs that come, unheeded by us, daily
From myriad throats.

Why should he stay and dream in dark seclusion?
Why should he ever cling to Nature's breast?
His past had been but as a fond delusion,
A life of shadows and of vague unrest.
Before him lay the city with its treasures,
Its noonday bustle and its midnight glare;
Around him were but Nature's sober pleasures,
Her sweet despair!

He sought the city, drained its transient pleasures
And fathomed all its misery and woe;

He gathered daily of its mighty treasures,
And felt within Desire's fierce furnace glow.
But struggling, panting in the race, the poet
While whirled around in fashion's giddy throng,
Had sacrificed, although he did not know it,
The gift of song.

Upon a bed of pain and sickness dying,
He scanned the pages of his past life o'er;
Those days when in the deep plantation lying,
Came back in fancy to his mind once more.

On the tall trees again birds hopped and twittered,
While through the foliage overhead, a gleam
Of flickering sunshine shyly stole and glittered
Upon the stream.

O! for those days of innocent ambition,
When, like a child, he lay on Nature's breast;

Felt her heart-throbbings through earth's thin partition,
And calmly, confidently sunk to rest.

Alas! no more, with spirit crushed and broken,
He lies, and knows the end will not be long :
Yet, for a moment came one last sweet token-
That gift of song.

Swan-like he sang his last song, in the gloaming,
And as night's shadows crept into the room,

Once more, in thought, he in the woods was roaming;
Once more the sunshine chased away the gloom.
Then quick returning to the fading present,

To those who stood around he faintly said :-
"That is not best that seems to us most pleasant?"
And he was dead!

HENRY BELLYSE BAILDON.

'HE Baildons are an old Yorkshire family, hailing originally from the village of the same name. The father of our poet, however, came to Edinburgh in 1827, and the subject of our sketch was born at Granton in 1849. He has no distinct recollection of his surroundings until the family removed to Duncliffe, where Mr Baildon still lives. He was educated at various schools in England and Scotland, and in 1865 matriculated at the University of Edinburgh. In his first literary efforts, which commenced at school, he was associated with Robert Louis Stevenson, who has since made his mark in literature. During his three years at Edinburgh University, Greek was his favourite study, and he was one of the prizemen in his second year. In 1868 Mr Baildon proceeded to Cambridge, where he read for the Mathematical Tripos, and graduated as a Senior Optime (second class honours) in 1872. For some little time after this he was uncertain what career to follow, but ultimately entered his father's business as a chemist in Edinburgh. Of this business, by the death of his father in 1881, he has become the proprietor.

Mr Baildon first became known in the walks of literature by the appearance of his tender and touching poem "Wreck of the Northfleet," which was published in the Scotsman in the spring of 1873. the autumn of the same year he published a volume of verse entitled "First Fruits and Shed Leaves," which was very favourably received by the press, especially in Scotland. In 1875 Messrs Longmans, London, published his "Rosamund : A Tragic Drama," and this, perhaps, as yet the least known of his books, contains some of his best writing. Again, in 1877, Mr Baildon published a third

volume bearing the title of "Morning Clouds," (David Douglas, Edinburgh) which naturally consists of maturer and more finished work than its predecessors. This book contains Alone in London,' a poem that appeared in Cornhill, and attracted wide attention. His next publication was in prose, viz., "The Spirit of Nature." This work met with a very gratifying reception, and has been the most successful of his efforts.

A fine example is given of Mr Baildon's powerful prose writing in his able preface to "First Fruits," which the Scotsman characterises as a “brief essay on poetry," in which the author points to the cultivation of the beautiful as the great work of poets, as of all other artists. The same authority adds "There is no metaphysical mystery-making in what he writes, no catering for base passions, no forgetfulness of the dignity of the art which he is illustrating. There is a strong individualism which might become a defect, but in its present development it serves to lend a high tone of earnestness to the poems. There is infinite tenderness and delicacy too, and there is a simplicity in most of the pieces, which adds greatly to their charm."

Mr Baildon has wide sympathies, and he has a keen appreciation of the sweet and the true. He is evidently a man of great ability, fine taste, and high culture, and in the midst of poetry, much of it really beautiful, that tends to mere refinement of expression, it is pleasing to meet with a writer who combines definite thought with a manly, clear, and practical utterance. Some of his descriptive poems are beautiful specimens of finished work, and display genuine sympathy with animate and inanimate nature. He can enter into the sorrows of the poor and erring, and depict them with the touch of a real artist, while in Rosamund" and other pieces the colouring and illustration are always to the point,

the positions are generally dramatically conceived, while his imagination is rich-sometimes even to the verge of sublimity-yet it is always finely tempered and subdued. In the words of one of his reviewers (referring to "Rosamund ")—"No one can turn over the pages of the book without coming upon evidences of a capacious imagination, great freshness of feeling, remarkable wealth of ideas, and an equally remarkable command of language."

ALONE IN LONDON.

By her fault or by ill-fate,
Left in great London, desolate
Of helpers and of comforters,

Without one heart to beat with hers,-
Without one hand in tenderness
And sympathy her hand to press,-
A lone soul, left dispassionate,
Without one link of love or hate.

From her lodging poor and bare,
And high up in the smoke-dim air
With cheerless heart, with aimless feet,
She descendeth to the street,

Where the people, coming, going,

Ceaseless as a river's flowing,

Seemed as imperturbable,

As though no heart-warm tear could well

Into those dry eyes.-no sob

Ever could those set lips rob

Of their sternness,-with blind stare
They passed a woman in despair.

With hopeless heart, with weary feet,
She wanders on from street to street,
Restless as a withered leaf
Fallen from its parent tree;
Goaded by a sleepless grief,
Dogged by dull perplexity,
Passing along in dumb despair,
Deserted street and silent square.

Into the shadow black and deep
Of a doorway she doth shrink,
Crouching there, she cannot weep,
Waiting there, she cannot think.

As a tide on river wall
Lappeth ever wearily,

Round her soul despair doth call
Constantly and drearily ;

As round ancient gable peaks

A ghostly night-wind wails and shrieks,
So again and yet again

Rise the bitter gusts of pain.

Steps are heard upon the stone:
One cometh down the street alone,
And upon the footsteps follow,
'Mid the dark roofs, echoes hollow.
On he comes, all unaware

Of the dark misery lurking there;
He pauses not, but passes on, ---
She speaketh not, and he is gone.
She thinks, "He would but reckon me

The vile thing that I would not be."

Silence again. A wild intent

The pang woke in her as it went;

She goes, nought with her, down the street, But haunting echoes of her feet.

She stands where, far below, is heard
The river's one unchanging word;
She stands and listens, and doth know,
Beneath the waters seaward go.
Like an incantation drear

She hears them wash by wharf and pier.

Will none come to save her yet?
Her foot is on the parapet;

Upward to a starless heaven

One last, hopeless look is given :

On each hand stretches black and far

The line of roofs irregular,

And beneath, a vast-night wall,

Based in gloom funereal.

The blackness floweth up to meet
The wanderer's world-weary feet,
And afar, below it all,

Still the river seems to call,

"Mortal, since thou wouldst not live,
Come, for I have rest to give ;
Over thee and thy dark woes
Silently my waves shall close,
Spreading changeless over all,
Like a mighty funeral pall."