am the Gipsy Queen!

With my kingdom I'm well content,
Though my realm's but the hawthorn glade;
And my palace a tatter'd tent
Beneath the willow's shade:
Though my banquet I'm forc'd to make
On haws and berries store,
And the game that by chance we take
From some neighbouring hind's barn door!
Yet, 'tis I am the Gipsy Queen!

'Tis true I must ply my art,
And share in my subjects' toils;
But of all their gains I've part,
I've the choice of all their spoils;
And, by love and duty led,
Ere from my jet black eye
One sad tear should be shed,
A thousand hearts would die!
For, 'tis I am the Gipsy Queen!

* * * * *

A SONG OF PITCAIRN'S ISLAND.

Come, take our boy, and we will go
Before our cabin door;
The winds shall bring us, as they blow,
The murmurs of the shore;
And we will kiss his young blue eyes,
And I will sing him as he lies,
Songs that were made of yore:
I'll sing, in his delighted ear,
The island-lays thou lov'st to hear.

And thou, while stammering I repeat,
Thy country's tongue shalt teach;
'Tis not so soft, but far more sweet
Than my own native speech;
For thou no other tongue didst know,
When, scarcely twenty moons ago,
Upon Tahite's beach,
Thou cam'st to woo me to be thine,
With many a speaking look and sign.

I knew thy meaning--thou didst praise
My eyes, my locks of jet;
Ah! well for me they won thy gaze--
But thine were fairer yet!
I'm glad to see my infant wear
Thy soft blue eyes and sunny hair,
And when my sight is met
By his white brow and blooming cheek,
I feel a joy I cannot speak.

Come talk of Europe's maids with me,
Whose necks and cheeks, they tell,
Outshine the beauty of the sea,
White foam and crimson shell.
I'll shape like theirs my simple dress,
And bind like them each jetty tress,
A sight to please thee well;
And for my dusky brow will braid
A bonnet like an English maid.

Come, for the soft, low sunlight calls--
We lose the pleasant hours;
'Tis lovelier than these cottage walls--
That seat among the flowers.
And I will learn of thee a prayer
To Him who gave a home so fair,
A lot so blest as ours--
The God who made for thee and me
This sweet lone isle amid the sea.

_From a volume of American Poetry, William Cullen Bryant._

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