THE COLOSSUS OF RHODES,

HYMN OF APOLLO.

"The sleepless Hours who watch me as I lie, Curtain'd with star-enwoven tapestries,

From the broad moonlight of the sky,

Fanning the busy dreams from my dim eyes,Waken me when their mother, the gray dawn, Tells them that dreams and that the moon is gone.

"Then I arise, and climbing Heaven's blue dome, I walk over the mountains and the waves, Leaving my robe upon the ocean foam;

My footsteps pave the clouds with fire; the caves Are fill'd with my bright presence, and the air Leaves the green earth to my embraces bare.

"The sunbeams are my shafts, with which I kill Deceit, that loves the night and fears the day;

All men who do or even imagine ill

Fly me, and from the glory of my ray

Good minds and open actions take new might,
Until diminish'd by the reign of night.

"I feed the clouds, the rainbows, and the flowers, With their ethereal colours; the moon's globe And the pure stars in their eternal bowers

Are cinctured with my power as with a robe; Whatever lamps on earth or heaven may shine Are portions of one power, which is mine.

"I stand at noon upon the peak of heaven,
Then with unwilling steps I wander down
Into the clouds of the Atlantic even;

For grief that I depart they weep and frown:
What look is more delightful than the smile
With which I soothe them from the western isle ?

"I am the eye with which the universe

Beholds itself and knows itself divine;
All harmony of instrument or verse,
All prophecy, all medicine are mine,
All light of art or nature;-to my song
Victory and praise in their own right belong."

THIS Colossus, which was deemed worthy of a place among our seven wonders," was a brazen image of Apollo, of the enormous height of 105 Grecian feet, placed at the entrance of one of the harbours of the city of Rhodes. Rhodes, or rather Rhodus, is an island in the Mediterranean Sea, lying nearly opposite the coast of Lycia and Caria, from which it is about twenty miles distant.

The island is about 120 miles in circumference-it possesses a fertile soil, produces fine fruits and wines, and enjoys an atmosphere of great serenity, no day passing without sunshine. From Homer we learn that the island was occupied by a colony of Greeks from Crete and Thessaly at an early period, and also that the wealth and power of its inhabitants were considerable. During the Peloponnesian war the Rhodians were flourishing in commerce, arts, and arms, and succeeded in extending their dominion over a part of the contiguous continent.

The capital was situate on the east coast, at the foot of a gently rising hill, in the midst of a plain abound