2. EVENING IN PARIS.
In the drab air what sultry surfeit Lies!
Still through sparse leaves the sunset flares, and throws
Sparks in the river; a last lustre glows
In windows, as it were in dying eyes.
And lamp with lamp down yonder, ghost-like, vies
A hundred-fold; like distant thunder-blows
Carts rumble on; like crags in shattered rows
Pillars of Trocadero dusk-ward rise.
Twilight has faded; all is ashen-gray.
The spectral arches of the bridges wane.
Yet life still pulses there in seething husk.
Whither are bound these thousands on their way?
The soul in this strange eddy quails with pain,
And likewise shrouds it in the ashen dusk.
"What Life Gave" (1883).
3. A LEGEND CONCERNING MODERATION
When Brother Zeno after meat was sleeping,
A mountain-gnome stood in his cell's drab haze,
Where through the window, with its thousand lays
The forest peeped and fragrances were sweeping.
