Poems (Larcom)/Notes
NOTES.
"Below, on each side of the door, are two beautiful groups. That to the right of the spectator represents Siegfried and Chriemhild. She is leaning on the shoulder of her warlike husband, with an air of the most inimitable and graceful abandonment in her whole figure: a falcon sits upon her hand, on which her eyes are turned with the most profound expression of tenderness and melancholy; she is thinking upon her dream, in which was foreshadowed the early and terrible doom of her husband."—Mrs. Jameson.—Description of the new palace at Munich.
From Mrs. Jameson's "Legends of the Monastic Orders."
"King Robert the Second of France was author of the touching hymn, in which all his gentle nature seems to speak:—'Veni Sancte Spiritus.' King Robert had certainly more of the monk than the king about him. Necessity drove him to the cares and the state of royalty; but his joys were in church-music, which he composed, in devotion, and in alms-giving."—Christian Life in Song.
Suggested by a bas-relief of the prophet Jeremiah, by Marguerite Foley, an American lady residing in Italy.
"But why I went hence, and went thither, Thou knewest, O God, yet shewedst it neither to me, nor to my mother, who grievously bewailed my journey, and followed me as far as the sea. But I deceived her; and I feigned that I had a friend whom I could not leave till he had a fair wind to sail. And yet refusing to return without me, I scarcely persuaded her to stay that night in a place hard by our ship, where was an Oratory in memory of the blessed Cyprian. And what was she asking with so many tears of Thee, but that thou wouldst not suffer me to sail? But Thou, in the depth of Thy counsels, and hearing the main point of her desire, regardedst not what she then asked, that Thou mightest make me what she ever asked. The wind blew and filled our sails, and withdrew the shore from sight; and she on the morrow was there, frantic with sorrow."—Confessions of St. Augustine.
"For whence was that dream whereby Thou comfortedst her?—She saw herself standing on a certain wooden rule, and a shining youth coming towards her, cheerful and smiling upon her, herself grieving. But he, having inquired the cause of her grief and daily tears, told her to look and observe 'That where she was, there was I also.' And when she looked, she saw me standing by her in the same rule. When I would fain bend the vision to mean, that she rather should not despair of being one day what I was; she replied "No;
for it was not told me, 'Where he, there thou also'; but, 'Where thou, there he also.'"—Ibid.
"She and I stood alone, leaning in a certain window which looked into the garden of the house where we now lay, at Ostia. We were discoursing then together, alone, very sweetly. . . . Such things was I speaking, when my mother said; 'Son, for mine own part I have no further any delight in this life. What I do here any longer, and why I am here, I know not, now that my hopes in this world are accomplished. One thing there was for which I desired to linger a little while in this life, that I might see thee a Catholic Christian before I died. My God hath done this for me more abundantly: what do I
here?' Scarce five days after she fell sick of a fever. On the ninth day of her sickness was that religious and holy soul freed from the body."—Ibid.
"The Pilgrim they laid in a large upper chamber, whose window opened towards the sun-rising: the name of the chamber was Peace."—Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress.
THE END.