LA MER DU NORD

Page 30. Thèse fragments are from The Sea of the North, by Heine. In his picturesque description of the cold and icy Baltic, he has mingled the rêveries of philosophy and the souvenirs of affection. The Sea of the North is an analysis of the soûl of the poet with its varions contrasts and moods. The love and sentiment of the sea that Heine felt and so beautifully expressed, are to an equal degree possessed perhaps by Byron alone, who, in Childe Harold, says:

"And I hâve loved thee, Océan! and my joy Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be

Borne, like thy bubbles onward ; from a boy I wanton'd with thy breakers — they to me Were a delight; and if the freshening sea

Make them a terror — 'twas a pleasing fear,

For I was as it were, a child of thee, And trusted to thy billows far and near. And laid my hand upon thy mane — as I do hère.'*

II, terzine: from the Italian terza-rima, a form of verse in iambic rhythm used by the early Italian poèts. It is in this form that Dante's Divina Commedia is written. The most conspicuous example of its use in English literature is Byron's Prophecy of Dante.