and sings of the harmony there above, and here beneath, in
man's heart.

_That_ will not clearly show the symbol:

"THE SULTAN AND SCHEREZADE."

The sword of death hangs over her head whilst she relates--and the
Sultan-figure bids us expect that it will fall. Scherezade is the
victor: the poet is, like her, also a victor. He is rich,
victorious--even in his poor chamber, in his most solitary hours.
There, in that chamber, rose after rose shoots forth; bubble after
bubble sparkles on the magic stream. The heavens shine with shooting
stars, as if a new firmament were created, and the old rolled away.
The world does not know it, for it is the poet's own creation, richer
than the king's costly illuminations. He is happy, as Scherezade is;
he is victorious, he is mighty. _Imagination_ adorns his walls with
tapestry, such as no land's ruler owns; _feeling_ makes the beauteous
chords sound to him from the human breast; _understanding_ raises him,
through the magnificence of creation, up to God, without his
forgetting that he stands fast on the firm earth. He is mighty, he is
happy, as few are. We will not place him in the stocks of
misconstruction, for pity and lamentation; we merely paint his symbol,
dip into the colours on the world's least attractive side, and obtain
it most comprehensibly from

"THE SULTAN AND SCHEREZADE."

See--that is it! Do not behead Scherezade!

THE DAL-ELV.

* * * * *

Before Homer sang there were heroes; but they are not known; no poet
celebrated their fame. It is just so with the beauties of nature, they
must be brought into notice by words and delineations, be brought
before the eyes of the multitude; get a sort of world's patent for
what they are, and then they may be said first to exist. The elvs of
the north have rushed and whirled along for thousands of years in
unknown beauty. The world's great highroad does take this direction;
no steam-packet conveys the traveller comfortably along the streams of
the Dal-elvs; fall on fall makes sluices indispensable and invaluable.
Schubert is as yet the only stranger who has written about the wild
magnificence and southern beauty of Dalecarlia, and spoken of its
greatness.

Clear as the waves of the sea does the mighty elv stream in endless
windings through forest deserts and varying plains, sometimes
extending its deep bed, sometimes confining it, reflecting the bending
trees and the red painted