Page:Songs from the Southern Seas and Other Poems (1873).djvu/58

With aim unerring and with deathful might,
And split the awful centre of their sight,—
The upraised Pearl! A moment there it shone
Before the spear-point,—then forever gone !

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The spell that long the ruined huts did shroud
Was rent and scattered, as a hanging cloud
In moveless air is torn and blown away
By sudden gust uprising; and one day
When evening's lengthened shadows came to hush
The children's voices, and the awful bush
Was lapt in sombre stillness, and on high
Above the arches stretched the frescoed sky,—
When all the scene such chilling aspect wore
As marked one other night long years before,
When through the reaching trees the moonlight shone
Upon a prostrate form, and o'er it one
With kingly gesture. Now the light is shed
No more on youthful brow and daring head,