A glimmering plain in drowsy trance
    The dim horizon bounds,
  Where all the air is resonant
    With sleepy summer sounds,—­
  The life that sings among the flowers,
    The lisping of the breeze,
  The hot cicada’s sultry cry,
    The murmurous dream of bees.

  The butterfly—­a flying flower—­
    Wheels swift in flashing rings,
  And flutters round his quiet kin
    With brave flame-mottled wings. 
  The wild Pinks burst in crimson fire,
    The Phlox’ bright clusters shine,
  And Prairie-cups are swinging free
    To spill their airy wine.

* * * * *

  Far in the East, like low-hung clouds
    The waving woodlands lie;
  Far in the West, the glowing plain
    Melts warmly in the sky;
  No accent wounds the reverent air,
    No foot-print dints the sod,—­
  Lone in the light the prairie lies,
    Rapt in a dream of God.

[Footnote 104:  Born in Indiana.  Gave up the practice of the law to become Secretary and Aide-de-camp to President Lincoln.  Served briefly in the Rebellion war with the rank of Colonel, and was afterward Secretary of Legation at Paris and Madrid, and for some months, Charge d’Affaires at Vienna.  Subsequently applied himself to literature and journalism.]

* * * * *

=_Joaquin Miller._=[105]

From “Songs of the Sierras.”

=_432._= THE FUTURE OF CALIFORNIA.

      Dared I but say a prophecy,
  As sang the holy men of old,
  Of rock-built cities yet to be
  Along those shining shores of gold,
  Crowding athirst into the sea,
  What wondrous marvels might be told! 
  Enough to know that empire here
  Shall burn her brightest, loftiest star;
  Here art and eloquence shall reign,
  As o’er the wolf-reared realm of old;
  Here learn’d and famous from afar,
  To pay their noble court, shall come,
  And shall not seek or see in vain,
  But look on all, with wonder dumb.

      Afar the bright Sierras lie,
  A swaying line of snowy white,
  A fringe of heaven hung in sight
  Against the blue base of the sky.

      I look along each gaping gorge,
  I near a thousand sounding strokes,
  Like giants rending giant oaks,
  Or brawny Vulcan at his forge;
  I see pick-axes flash and shine,
  And great wheels whirling in a mine. 
  Here winds a thick and yellow thread,
  A moss’d and silver stream instead;
  And trout that leap’d its rippled tide
  Have turn’d upon their sides and died.

      Lo! when the last pick in the mine
  Is rusting red with idleness,
  And rot yon cabins in the mould,
  And wheels no more croak in distress,
  And tall pines reassert command,
  Sweet bards along this sunset shore
  Their mellow melodies will pour;
  Will charm as charmers very wise,
  Will strike the harp with master-hand,
  Will sound unto the vaulted skies
  The valor of these men of old—­
  The mighty men of ’Forty-nine;
  Will sweetly sing and proudly say,
  Long, long agone, there was a day
  When there were giants in the land.