Or, plunged in hollow-rolling brine, In emerald cradles rocked and swung, The sceptre of the sea is mine, And mine his endless song. For Earth with primal dew is wet, Her long-lost child to rebaptize: Her fresh, immortal Edens yet Their Adam recognize. Her ancient freedom is his fee; Her ancient beauty is his dower: She bares her ample breasts, that he May suck the milk of power. Press on, ye hounds of life, that lurk So close, to seize your harried prey! Ye fiends of Custom, Gold, and Work, I hear your distant bay! And like the Arab, when he bears To the insulted camel's path His garment, which the camel tears, And straight forgets his wrath; So, yonder badges of your sway, Life's paltry husks, to you I give: Fall on, and in your blindness say, We hold the fugitive! But leave to me this brief escape To simple manhood, pure and free,-- A child of God, in God's own shape, Between the land and sea! SACCHARISSA MELLASYS. I. THE HERO. When I state that my name is A. Bratley Chylde, I presume that I am already sufficiently introduced. My patronymic establishes my fashionable position. Chylde, the distinguished monosyllable, is a card of admission everywhere,-- everywhere that is anywhere. And my matronymic, Bratley, should have established my financial position for life. It should have--allow me a vulgar term--"indorsed" me with the tradesmen who have the honor to supply me with the glove, the boot, the general habiliment, and all the requisites of an elegant appearance upon the carpet or the _trottoir_. But, alas! I am not so indorsed--pardon the mercantile aroma of the word--by the name Bratley. The late Mr. A. Bratley, my grandfather, was indeed one of those rude, laborious, and serviceable persons whose office is to make money--or perhaps I should say to accumulate the means of enjoyment--for the upper classes of society. But my father, the late Mr. Harold Chylde, had gentlemanly tastes. How can I blame him? I have the same. He loved to guide the rapid steed along the avenue. I also love to guide the rapid steed. He could not persuade his delicate lungs--pardon my seeming knowledge of anatomy--to tolerate the confined air in offices, counting-houses, banks, or other haunts of persons whose want of refinement of taste impels them to the crude distractions of business-life. I have the same delicacy of constitution. Indeed, unless the atmosphere I breathe is rendered slightly narcotic by the smoke of Cabañas and slightly stimulating by the savor of heeltaps,--excuse the technical term,--I find myself debilitated to a degree. The open air is extremely offensive to me. I confine myself to clubs and billiard-rooms.