But the noble Mexic women still their holy task
pursued,
Through that long, dark night of sorrow, worn and
faint and lacking food.
Over weak and suffering brothers, with a tender
care they hung,
And the dying foeman blessed them in a strange
and Northern tongue.
Not wholly lost, O Father! is this evil world of
ours;
Upward, through its blood and ashes, spring afresh
the Eden flowers;
From its smoking hell of battle, Love and Pity
send their prayer,
And still thy white-winged angels hover dimly in
our air!
1847.
THE LEGEND OF ST. MARK.
"This legend [to which my attention was called by my friend Charles
Sumner], is the subject of a celebrated picture by Tintoretto, of which
Mr. Rogers possesses the original sketch. The slave lies on the ground,
amid a crowd of spectators, who look on, animated by all the various
emotions of sympathy, rage, terror; a woman, in front, with a child in
her arms, has always been admired for the lifelike vivacity of her
attitude and expression. The executioner holds up the broken implements;
St. Mark, with a headlong movement, seems to rush down from heaven in
haste to save his worshipper. The dramatic grouping in this picture is
wonderful; the coloring, in its gorgeous depth and harmony, is, in Mr.
Rogers's sketch, finer than in the picture."--MRS. JAMESON'S Sacred and
Legendary Art, I. 154.
THE day is closing dark and cold,
With roaring blast and sleety showers;
And through the dusk the lilacs wear
The bloom of snow, instead of flowers.
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