RY VOF IIA GO , Through the Year with the Poets EDITED BY OSCAR FAY ADAMS. Now Ready. WINTER. DECEMBER. JANUARY. FEBRUARY. 3 Vols. in neat box, $2.25. SPRING. MARCH. MAY. 3 Vols. in neat box, $2.25. In Preparation. SUM MER. JUNE, AUTUMN. SEFFEMBER. OCTOBER. NOVEMBER. JULY. AUGUST. 3 Vols. in neat box, $2.25. 3 Vols. in neat box, $2.25. Separate Volumes, 75 cents each. D. LOTHROP AND COMPANY, PUBLISHERS, BOSTON. MAY EDITED BY OSCAR FAY ADAMS THOU pulse of joy, whose throb beats time For daisied field, for blossoming spray ! To dance of leaf and song bird's chime Set all the prose of life to rhyme. Ring in the May ! MARY ELIZABETH BLAKE. BOSTON D. LOTHROP AND COMPANY FRANKLIN AND HAWLEY STREETS COPYRIGHT, 1886, BY D. LOTHROP AND COMPANY. BOSTON: COMPOSITION AND ELECTROTYPING BY C. F. MATTUON AND COMPANY. CONTENTS. Vli PAGE SWEET LAGGARD, COME . . William Wilsey Martin . 47 WHEN MAY FOLLOWS . . Robert Browning ... 48 MAY William D. Gallagher . 48 MAY IN THE SWAN WOODS, Thomas Gold Appleton . 49 To THE DANDELION . . . James Russell Lowell . 51 SPRING Henry Howard .... 53 WHY SHOULD MAY REMEM- BER Algernon C. Swinburne . 54 MAY Paul Hamilton Hayne . 54 MAY MORNING Mrs. Celia Thaxter . . 55 MAY James Ritssell Lowell . 56 HEAT Ralph Waldo Emerson . 57 MAY Mrs. Helen F. Jackson . 58 FANTASIE DE PRINTEMPS . Edgar Fawcett .... 58 DARK SPRING Roden Noel 59 FLED ARE THE FROSTS . . Robert Herrick .... 60 *MAY Mrs. Jane G. Austin . . 61 MAY IN KINGSTON .... Henry Abbey 62 APPLE BLOSSOMS .... Horatio Nelson Powers . 63 IN MAY Alfred Perceval Graves . 64 IN BLOSSOM TIME .... Ina Donna Coolbrith . . 65 ON A COUNTRY ROAD . . Algernon C. Swinburne . 66 MAY Edmund Spenser ... 67 MAY GROWN A-COLD . . . William Morris ... 68 MAY GLADNESS Alexander Smith ... 68 IN MAY David Gray 69 MAY Edwin Arnold .... 69 APPLE BLOSSOMS .... William Wilsey Martin . 70 IN MAY Mrs. Celia Thaxter . . 72 * Written for this volume. Vlll CONTENTS. PACK As IT FELL UPON A DAY . Robert Bamfield ... 73 A LATE SPRING ..... Carlos Wilcox .... 74 THE RHODORA Ralph Waldo Emerson . 76 APPLE BLOSSOMS .... Lucy Larcom 77 A SNOWFLAKE IN MAY . . Clinton Scollard ... 78 APPLE BLOSSOMS Mrs. Louisa Hopkins . . 78 IN MAY Robert Kelley Weeks . . 79 *MAY Willis Boy d Allen . . . 79 SONG TO MAY Edward Hovell-Thurlow, 80 A QUIET EVE IN SPRING . J. McReath 81 MAY William Morris ... 82 PICTURES OF SPRING . . . Mrs. C. A. Mason ... 83 SPRING IN TUSCANY . . . Algernon C. Swinburne . 84 MAY MORN SONG .... William Mother-well . . 86 IN SPRING Percy Bysshe Shelley . . 88 SONG OF THE SPRING . . . James B. Kenyan ... 89 MAY George W. Thornbury . 90 'TWAS PRIME OF MAY . . Alexander Smith ... 90 WINDERMERE IN MiD-MAY . Alfred Perceval Craves . 91 WHEN NATURE TRIES HER FINEST TOUCH .... John Keble 91 VITA VITALIS ....;. Robert Kelley Weeks . . 92 SYLVAN MUSINGS .... Paul Hamilton Hayne . 95 IN A MAY DAY HUSH . . Jean Ingelow .... 95 AN ORCHARD FANCY . . . Richard K. Munkittrick . 96 DANDELIONS John Albee 96 To MAY Leigh Hunt 97 IN MIDDLE MAY .... Alfred Tennyson ... 98 APPLE BLOSSOMS .... Frank D. Sherman . . 99 * Written for this volume. CONTENTS. IX PAGE MAY James Gates Percival. . 99 A MAY SONG Mrs. Mary M. Singleton, 100 A SONG OF MAY .... Mrs. Mary M. Dodge . 101 THE WOODS IN MAY . . . Walter Scott 102 SPRING SONG Robert Kelley Weeks . . 103 MAY Sarah C. Woolsey . . . 103 A SPRINGTIME William Dean Howells . 105 BESIDE THE SEA Clinton Scollard . , . 106 IN THE PRIME OF SPRING . Mrs. Marian Evans Cross, 107 COMO IN MAY Mrs. M. Van Rensselaer, 108 A SONG OF SPRING . . . Mrs. Emily Davis Pfeijfer, 109 IN MAY Alfred Tennyson . . . no MAY Thomas Bailey Aldrich . 1 1 1 MAYTIDE James Russell Lowell . 1 1 1 IN MAY Edmund Spenser ... 112 THE CANADIAN SPRING . . Alfred Billings Street . 113 THE FLOWER OF LOVE LIES BLEEDING Richard Henry Stoddard, 114 ON THE DOWNS JohnAddingtoiiSymonds, 116 THE FIELDS IN MAY . . . William Allingham . . 117 IN MAYTIME Anne Whitney .... 117 THE FIRST ROSE .... Alfred Perceval Graves . 118 BALLADE OF THE MAYTIME, Clinton Scollard . . . 118 THE WOODWELE IN MAY . William Canton . . . 119 To THE MONTH OF MAY . Sir John Davies . . . 122 THE MAYTIME RAPTURE . Edgar Fawcett .... 122 THE MAY OF THE YEAR. . Alfred Perceval Graves . 123 MOONRISE IN MAY .... Mrs. Sarah Whitman . 124 PROPHETIC BIRDS .... Arthur O'Shaughnessy . 127 THE BIRDS IN MAY . . . William Morris . . . 128 X CONTENTS. PACK WAITING FOR JUNE . . . Elisha N. Gunnison . . 129 ON THE SPRING Thomas Gray .... 130 MAYTIME Mrs. Harriet Spofford . 132 A SPRING SONG William Cox Bennett. . 133 LATE SPRING EVENING . . Robert Bridges .... 134 AT THE CLOSE OF SPRING . Mrs. Charlotte Smith . 135 FAREWELL TO SPRING . . Alfred Austin .... 136 AT WHITSUNTIDE .... Helen Gray Cone . . . 138 A SPRING PICTURE. . . . Lewis Morris .... 138 IN MAY Dora Read Goodale . . 139 A SPRING LOVE SONG . . Mrs. Akers Allen ... 139 MAY AND DEATH .... Robert Browning ... 140 IN MAY Charlotte Fiske Bates . . 141 RONDEAU Melville M. Bigelow . . 142 IN WANING MAY .... Thomas Woolner ... 143 PREFACE. SIXCE Chaucer's time the month of May has never lacked its laureates to sing its praises in melodious verse. But the May poetry of an earlier day, like the most of Nature-inspired verse, was more general and didactic in its character than at present. The Vic- torian poets have something in view beyond the glorification of the month. They do not rest content with telling us that in May the grass is green and that the flowers are fresh and gay, but they let the very breath of blossom time blow through their lines. So, in this volume, the praise of May is not the only theme, since there is also here the odorous fragrance of apple blooms, the echo of bird songs, the May- time joy as well as the Maytime sadness. All these have their place in any attempt to adequately present the spirit of the month, for all these have found frequent utterance in English verse. The lines upon the title-page were written for that place by Mrs. Mary E. Blake ; the poems by Mr. Willis Boyd Allen, Mrs. Jane Goodwin Austin, Mrs. Meteyard, and Mr. William Hamilton Hayne have also iv PREFACE. been generously given to the editor as original con- tributions. The publishers gratefully acknowledge their obliga- tions to Messrs. Houghton, Mifflin & Co. ; Cupples, Up- ham & Co. ; Roberts Brothers ; Ticknor & Co. ; Lee & Shepard ; Chas. Scribner's Sons ; and the Century Company, as well as to Miss Emily C. Weeks and Mr. Parke Godwin for the use of certain poe'ms of which they control the copyright. CAMBRIDGE, MASS., April 18, 1886. CONTENTS. FAGB IN JOYOUS SPRING .... Alfred Tennyson .... I Is NOT THE MAYTIME NOW ON EARTH William Morris ... 2 MAY HAS COME IN ... Thomas Buchanan Read, 2 CUCKOO ! CUCKOO .... John Stuart Blackie . . 3 BELTANE Alfred Perceval Graves . 4 FIRST NIGHT OF MAY . . David Gray 5 CORINNA'S GOING A-MAY- ING Robert Herrick .... 5 *MAY DAY Airs. M. G. Meteyard . 8 MAY DAY SONG William Cox Bennett . . 8 THE ENTERING MAY . . . Ralph Waldo Emerson . 10 WHEN BEECHES BRIGHTEN EARLY MAY John Vance Cheney . . n ONE SWALLOW Mrs. Mary E. Blake . . 12 SONG ON MAY MORNING . John Milton 13 THE VOICE OF THE GRASS . Mrs. Sarah Roberts Boyle, 14 THE QUEEN OF THE MAY . George Darley .... 15 THE ARBUTUS John Albee 16 MAY Henry Gay Hewlett . . 17 ON THE THAMES .... JohnAddingtonSymonds, 18 A MAY MEMORY Edward Capern ... 18 * Written for this volume. vi CONTENTS. PACK MAYFLOWERS Mrs. Chandler Moulton . 19 SEEKING THE MAYFLOWER . Edmund C. Stedman . . 20 IN MAY Thomas William Parsons, 22 SPRING SONG Aubrey De Vere ... 23 MAY Mrs. C. A. Mason ... 24 EXPECTATION Emma Lazarus .... 24 THE GREEN THINGS GROW- ING Mrs. Mulock Craik . . 25 SPRING Alfred Tennyson ... 26 ON MAY James Thomson ... 27 THE DAISY Geoffrey Chaucer ... 28 PHILLIDA AND CORYDON . Nicholas Breton ... 29 THE RETURN OF THE NIGHT- INGALE Mrs. Charlotte Smith . 30 A MORN OF MAY .... Jean Ingelow .... 30 MAY Mrs. Mary E. Blake . . 32 MAY MEMORIES John Payne 33 A MAY SONG Genevieve Mary Irons . 35 MAY EVENING William Cullen Bryant . 37 RE-AWAKENING Frank D. Sherman . . 38 MAY Henry W. Longfellow . 38 MOONLIGHT IN MAY . . . Robert Kelley Weeks . . 39 MAY TIME Bayard Taylor .... 39 SONG OF THE PRINCESS MAY, Nora Perry 41 IN THE SPRING Mrs. Emily Davis Pfeiffer t 42 MAY Annie Leuthal Smith . . 44 LOOK HOW IN MAY . . . William Drummond . . 44 MAY William H. Hay tie . . 45 SPRING Thomas Nash .... 46 * Written for this volume. INDEX OF AUTHORS. PAGE ABBEY, HENRY. Born in Rondout, New York, July n, 1842. May in Kingston 62 ALBEE, JOHN. Born in Bellingham, Massachusetts, April 3, 1833. The Arbutus 16 Dandelions ........ 96 ALDRICH, THOMAS BAILEY. Born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, November n, 1837. May Ill ALLEN, MRS. ELIZABETH ANN [CHASE] [AKERS]. Born in Strong, Maine, October 9, 1832. A Spring Love Song 139 ALLEN, WILLIS BOYD. Boru in Kittery Point, Maine, July 9, 1855. May 79 ALLINGHAM, WILLIAM. Born in Ballyshannon, Ireland, circa 1828. The Fields in May 117 xii INDEX OF AUTHORS, PAGE APPLETON, THOMAS GOLD. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, March 31, 1812. Died in Boston, Massachusetts, April 18, 1884. May in the Swan Woods ..... 49 ARNOLD, EDWIN. Born in Rochester, England, June to, 1832. May .......... 69 AUSTIN, ALFRED. Born in Headingly, near Leeds, England, May 30, 1835. Farewell to Spring ....... 136 AUSTIN, MRS. JANE [GOODWIN]. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, February 25, 1831. May .......... 61 BARNFIELD, RICHARD. Born in England, circa 1574. Died in England, circa 1616. As it Fell upon a Day ...... 73 BATES, CHARLOTTE FISKE. Born in New York City, November 30, 1838. In May ......... 141 BENNETT, WILLIAM Cox. Born in Greenwich, England, 1820. A Spring Song . . ^ . . 133 My Day Song ........ 8 BIGELOW, MELVILLE MADISON. Born in Eaton Rapids, Michigan, August 2, 1^46. Rondeau .... ..... 142 INDEX OF AUTHORS. Xlll PACK BLACKIE, JOHN STUART. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, July, 1809. Cuckoo ! Cuckoo ....... 3 BLAKE, MRS. MARY ELIZABETH [McGRATH]. Born in Dungarven, County Waterford, Ireland, September i, 1840. May 32 One Swallow 12 The Pulse of May Title-page BOURDILLON, FRANCIS WILLIAM. Bora in Woolbedding, Sussex, England, 1852. Idle Days xxviii BOYLE, MRS. SARAH [ROBERTS]. Born in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 18 . Died in New York City, March 16, 1868. The Voice of the Grass 14 BRETON, NICHOLAS. Born in England, 1555. Died in England, 1624. Phillida and Corydon ...... 29 BRIDGES, ROBERT. Born in England, 1844. Late Spring Evening ...... 134 BROWNING, ROBERT. Born in Camberwell, Surrey, England, 181*. May and Death 140 When May Follows 48 XIV INDEX OF AUTHORS. PACK BRYANT, WILLIAM CULLEN. Born in Cummington, Massachusetts, November 3, 1794. Died in New York City, June 12, 1878. May Evening 37 CANTON, WILLIAM. Born in the Island of Chusan, near China, October 27, 1845. The Woodwele in May 119 CAPERN, EDWARD. Born in Tiverton, Devonshire, England, January 29, 1819. A May Memory 18 CHAUCER, GEOFFREY. Born in London, England, circa. 1328. Died in London, England, October 25, 1400. The Daisy 28 CHENEY, JOHN VANCE. Born in Groveland, Livingston Co., New York, December 29, 1848. When Beeches brighten Early May . . .11 CONE, HELEN GRAY. Born in New York City, March 8, 1839. At Whitsuntide 138 COOLBRITH, INA DONNA. Born in Springfield, Illinois, 18 . In Blossom Time 65 CROSS, MRS. MARIAN [EVANS] [LEWES]. Born in Griff, Warwickshire, England, November 22, 1819. Died in London, England, December 22, 1880. In the Prime of Spring 107 INDEX OF AUTHORS. XV PAGE CRAIK, MRS. DINAH MARIA [MULOCK]. Born in Stoke-upon-Trent, England, 1826. The Green Things Growing 2 5 BARLEY, GEORGE. Born in Dublin, Ireland, 1785. Died in London, England, 1849. The Queen of the May 15 DAVIES, SIR JOHN. Born in Tisbury, Wiltshire, England, 1570. Died in England, December 7, 1626. To the Month of May 122 DE VERE, AUBREY THOMAS. Born in Curra Chase, County Limerick, Ireland, January 10, 1814. Spring Song . . 23 DODGE, MRS. MARY [MAPES] Born in New York City, 1838. A Song of May 101 DRUMMOND, WILLIAM. Born in Hawthornden, Scotland, December 13, 1585. Died in Hawthornden, Scotland, December 4, 1649. Look how in May ....... 44 EMERSON, RALPH WALDO. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, May 25, 1803. Died in Concord, Massachusetts, April 27, 1882. Heat 57 The Entering May 10 The Rhodora 76 XVi INDEX OF AUTHORS. PACK FAWCETT, EDGAR. Born in New York City, May 26, 1847. Fantasia de Printemps 58 The Maytime Rapture uj GALLAGHER, WILLIAM D. Born in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, August, iSoS. May 48 GOODALE, DORA READ. Born in South Egremont, Massachusetts, October 29, 1866. In May * . . 139 GRAVES, ALFRED PERCEVAL. Born in Dublin, Ireland, July 22, 1846. Beltane 4 In May 64 The First Rose 1 18 The May of the Year 123 Windermere in Mid-May 91 GRAY, DAVID. Born in Duntiblae, near Glasgow, Scotland, January 29, 1838. Died in Merkland, near Glasgow, Scotland, December 3, 1861. First Night of May 5 In May . 69 GRAY, THOMAS. Born in London, England, December 26, 1716. Died in Cambridge, England, July 30, 1771. On the Spring 130 GUNNISON, ELISHA NORMAN. Born in Charlestown, Massachusetts, May 15, 1837. Died in York, Pennsylvania, February 18, 1880. Waiting for June 129 INDEX OF AUTHORS. XV11 PACK HAVNE, PAUL HAMILTON. Born in Charleston, South Carolina, January i, 1831. May 54 Sylvan Musings 95 HAYNE, WILLIAM HAMILTON. Born in Charleston, South Carolina, March n, 1856. May 45 HERRICK, ROBERT. Born in London, England, August 20, 1591. Died in Dean Priors, Devonshire, England, October 15, 1674. Corinna's Going A Maying 5 Fled are the Frosts 60 HEWLETT, HENRY GAY. Born in London, England, April 4, 1832. May 17 HOPKINS, MRS. LOUISA PARSONS [STONE]. Born in Newburyport, Massachusetts, April 19, 1834. Apple Blossoms 78 HOVELL-THURLOW, EDWARD. Born in England, 1781. Died in England, June 4, 1829. Song to May . . So HOWARD, HENRY. Born in England, circa 1516. Died in London, England, January 21, 1547. Spring 53 HOWELLS, WILLIAM DEAN. Born in Martinsville, Ohio, March i, 1837. A Springtime ........ 105 XV111 INDEX OF AUTHORS. PACK HUNT, JAMES HENRY LEIGH. Born in Southgate, England, October 19, 1784, Died in Putney, England, August 28, 1859. To May 97 INGELOW, JEAN. Born in Boston, England, 1830. A Morn of May 30 In a May Day Hush 95 IRONS, GENEVIEVE MARY. Born in Brompton, London, England, December 28, 1855. A May Song 35 JACKSON, MRS. HELEN MARIA [FISKE] [HUNT]. Born in Amherst, Massachusetts, October 18, 1831. Died in San Francisco, California, August 12, 1885. May 58 KEBLE, JOHN. Bom in Fairford, Gloucestershire, England, April 25, 1792. Died in Bournemouth, England, March 29, 1866. When Nature tries her Finest Touch ... 91 KENYON, JAMES BENJAMIN. Born in Frankfort, Herkimer County, New York, April 26, 1858. Song of the Spring 89 LARCOM, LUCY. Born in Beverly Farms, Massachusetts, 1826. Apple Blossoms 77 LAZARUS, EMMA. Born in New York City, July 22, 1849. Expectation 24 INDEX OF AUTHORS. XIX PAGE LONGFELLOW, HENRY WADSWORTH. Born in Portland, Maine, February 27, 1807. Died in Cambridge, Massachusetts, March 24, 1882. 38 LOWELL, JAMES RUSSELL. Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, February 22, 1819. May 5 6 Maytide i" To the Dandelion . . . ... . .51 MACREATH, J. Born in England, 18 . A Quiet Eve in Spring ...... Si MARTIN, WILLIAM WILSEY. Born in Reading, Berkshire, England, October n, 1833. Apple Blossoms 70 Sweet Laggard, Come 47 MASON, MRS. CAROLINE ATHERTON [BRIGGS]. Born in Marblehead, Massachusetts, July 27, 1823. May 24 Pictures of Spring 83 METEYARD, MRS. MARION GREENWOOD [LUNT]. Born in Newburyport, Massachusetts, July 18, 183-. May Day ......... 8 MILTON, JOHN. Born in London, England, December 9, 1608. Died in London, England, November 8, 1674. Song on May Morning 13 XX INDEX OF AUTHORS. PAGB MORRIS, LEWIS. Born in Caennarthen, Wales, January 23, 1833. A Spring Picture 138 MORRIS, WILLIAM. Born near London, England, March, 1834. May 82 May Grown A-Cold 68 Is not the Maytime now on Earth .... 2 The Birds in May 128 MOTHERVVEI.L, WlLLIAM. Born in Glasgow, Scotland, October 13, 1797. Died in Glasgow, Scotland, November i, 1835. May Morn Song 86 MOULTON, MRS. LOUISE [CHANDLER]. Born in Porafret, Connecticut, April 10, 1835. Mayflowers 19 MUNKITTRICK, RlCHARD KENDALL. Born in Manchester, England, March 5, 1853. An Orchard Fancy 96 NASH, THOMAS. Born in Lowestoft, Suffolk, England, 1567. Died in London, England, circa 1601. Spring 46 NOEL, RODEN BERKELEY WRIOTHESLEY. Born in England, 18 . Dark Spring 59 INDEX OF AUTHORS. XXI PACK O'SHAUGHNESSY, ARTHUR. Born in London, England, March 14, 1844. Died in London, England, January 30, 1881. Prophetic Birds 127 PARSONS, THOMAS WILLIAM. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, August 18, 1819. In May 22 PAYNE, JOHN." Born in London, England, August 23, 1842. May Memories PERCIVAL, JAMES GATES. Born in Berlin, Connecticut, September 15, 1795. Died in Hazel Green, Wisconsin, May 2, 1856. May 99 PERRY, NORA. Born in Providence, Rhode Island, 18 . Song of the Princess May 41 PFEIFFER, MRS. EMILY [DAVIS]. Born in England, 18 . In the Spring ........ 42 A Song of Spring 109 POWERS, HORATIO NELSON. Born in Araenia, New York, April 30, 1826. Apple Blossoms . 63 READ, THOMAS BUCHANAN. Born near Chester, Pennsylvania, March 12, 1822. Died in New York City, May n, 1872. May has Come In ....... 2 XX11 INDEX OS AUTHORS. PACK SCOLLARD, CLINTON. Born in Clinton, New York, September 18, 1860. A Snowflake in May 78 Ballade of the Maytime 118 Beside the Sea 106 SCOTT, SIR WALTER. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland, August 15, 1771. Died at Abbotsford, Scotland, September 21, 1832. The Woods in May 102 SHELLEY, PERCY BYSSHE. Born in Field Place, near Horsham, Surrey, August 4, 1792. Drowned in the Bay of Spczzia, Italy, July 8, 1822. In Spring 88 SHERMAN, FRANK DEMPSTER. Born iii Peekskill, New York, May 16, 1860. Apple Blossoms 99 Re-awakening 38 SINGLETON, MRS. MARY MONTGOMERIE [LAMB]. Born in England, 18 . A May Song too SMITH, ALEXANDER. Born in Kilmarnock, Scotland, December 31, 1830. Died in Wardie, Scotland, January 25, 1867. May Gladness 68 'Twas Prime of May 90 SMITH, ANNIE LEUTH.U.. Born in Stonington, Connecticut, 18 . May 44 INDEX OF AUTHORS. XX111 PACK SMITH, MRS. CHARLOTTE [TURNER]. Bom in Sussex, England, 1749. Died in Tetford, England, September 28, 1806. At the Close of Spring ...... 135 The Return of the Nightingale .... 30 SPENSER, EDMUND. Born in London, England, circa 1553. Died in London, England, January 15, 1599. In May 112 May 67 SPOFFORD, MRS. HARRIET ELIZABETH [PRESCOTT]. Born in Calais, Maine, April 3, 1835. Maytime 132 STEDMAN, EDMUND CLARENCE. Born in Hartford, Connecticut, October 8, 1833. Seeking the Mayflower 20 STODDARD, RICHARD HENRY. Born in Hingham, Massachusetts, July, 1825. The Flower of Love lies Bleeding . . . .114 STREET, ALFRED BILLINGS. Bom in Poughkeepsie, New York, December 18, 1811. Died in Albany, New York, June 2, 1881. The Canadian Spring 113 SWINP.URNE, ALGERNON CHARLES. Born in London, England, April 5, 1837. On a Country Road 66 Spring in Tuscany ....... 84 Why should May Remember I . . 54 XXIV INDEX OF AUTHORS. PAGE SYMONDS, JOHN ADDINGTON. Born in Bristol, England, October 5, 1840. On the Downs 116 On the Thames 18 TAYLOR, BAYARD. Bom in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, January n, 1825. Died in Berlin, Germany, December 19, 1878. Maytime 39 TENNYSON, ALFRED. Born in Somersby, Lincolnshire, England, August 5, 1809. In Joyous Spring I In May no In Middle May 98 Spring 26 THAXTER, MRS. CELIA [LAIGHTON]. Bom in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, 1835. In May 72 May Morning 55 THOMSON, JAMES. Bom in Ednam, Roxburghshire, Scotland, September n, 1700. Died in New Lane, near Richmond, England, August 27, 1748. On May 27 THORNBURY, GEORGE WALTER. Bora in London, England, 1828. Died in London, England, June n, 1876. May 90 VAN RENSSELAER, MRS. MARIANA [GRISWOLIJ]. Born in New York City, 1831. Como in May 108 INDEX OF AUTHORS. XXV PAGE WEEKS, ROBERT KELLEY. Born in New York City, September 21, 1840. Died in New York City, April 13, 1876. In May 79 Moonlight in May ....... 39 Spring Song 103 Vita Vitalis 92 WHITMAN, MRS. SARAH HELEN [POWER]. Born in Providence, Rhode Island, 1803. Died in Providence, Rhode Island, June 27, 1878. Moonrise in May . . . . t . .124 WHITNEY, ANNE. Born in Boston, Massachusetts, September 2, 1820. In Maytime 117 WILCOX, CARLOS. Born in Newport, New Hampshire, October 22, 1794. Died in Danbury, Connecticut, May 29, 1827. A Late Spring ....... 74 WOOLSEY, SARAH CHAUNCEY. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, 18 . May 103 MAY. IDLE DAYS. Sing me a song of idle days, When rosy and white are the new-blown mays. And rosy and white on the wanton breeze The petals fall from the apple trees. And under the hedge where the shade lies v/, Are children, picking the violet! Sing me a song of idle days, When Spring is queen over woods and ways / FRANCIS WILLIAM BOURDILLON. MAY. IN JOYOUS SPRING, LIKE souls that balance joy and pain, With tears and smiles from heaven again The maiden Spring upon the plain Came in a sunlit fall of rain. In crystal vapor everywhere Blue isles of heaven laughed between, And, far in forest-deeps unseen, The topmost elm-tree gathered green From draughts of balmy air. Sometimes the linnet piped his song : Sometimes the throstle whistled strong : Sometimes the sparhawk, wheeled along, Hushed all the groves from fear of wrong: By grassy capes with fuller sound In curves the yellowing river ran, And drooping chestnut-buds began To spread into the perfect fan, Above the teeming ground. ALFRED TENNYSON. Sir Lancelot and Queen Gtiinevere. MA Y If AS COME IN. IS NOT THE MAYTIME NOW ON EARTH. ORPHEUS. Is not the Maytime now on earth, When close against the city wall The folk are singing in their mirth, While on their heads the Mayflowers fall ? THE SIRENS. Yes, May is come, and its sweet breath Shall well-nigh make you weep to-day, And pensive with swift-coming death, Shall ye be satiate of the May. WILLIAM MORRIS. The Life and Death of Jason. MA Y HAS COME IN. MAY has come in, young May, the beautiful, Weaving the sweetest chaplet of the year. Along the eastern corridors she walks, What time the clover rocks the earliest bee, Her feet a flush with sunrise, and her veil Floating in breezy odors o'er her hair ; And ample garments, fluttering at the hem, With pleasing rustle round her sandal-shoon. THOMAS BUCHANAN READ. The New Pastoral. CUCKOO! CUCKOO! CUCKOO! CUCKOO! (SONG FOR THE FIRST OF MAY.) " CUCKOO ! cuckoo ! " it haunts my way ; I hear that sweet note all the day, From glen to glen, from brae to brae, While I pursue my grassy way Through Ettrick vale and Yarrow ! " Cuckoo ! cuckoo ! " it still doth say, The very spoken breath of May, But viewless still from brae to brae, As if a spirit led my way, Through all the length of Yarrow ! How many a city drudge this day, At large with me may sigh to stray, Drinking deep draughts of breezy May, With " Cuckoo ! cuckoo ! " all the way, To hymn their march through Yarrow ! Poor city scribes ! it makes me grieve To think how ye from inky sleeve And fretful quill find no reprieve, Nor faction's babbling mart may leave To taste sweet May in Yarrow. " Cuckoo ! cuckoo ! " it haunts my way, Now here, now there, from brae to brae ; It floats and wanders with light play From dark pine wood to castle grey, And shepherd's cot in Yarrow ! BELTANE. Ye lords and ladies gay, who ride Through London parks in dusty pride, I wish you all might here abide, With wimpling waters at your side, And cuckoo's note in Yarrow ! JOHN STUART BLACKIE. BELTANE* (FROM THE CELTIC OF FINN MACCUMHIALL.) OH, mild May day, in Fodla's clime Of fairy color, the laughing prime Of leafy summer from year to year, I would that Leagha were with me here To lie and listen down in a dell To Eauba's blackbirds warbling well, And her cuckoos crying with constant strain, Welcome, welcome the bright Beltane ; When the swallows are skimming the shore, And the swift steed stoops to the fountain, And the weak, fair bog-down grows on the moor, And the heath spreads her hair on the mountain, And the signs of heaven are in consternation, And the rushing planets such radiance pour, That the sea lies lulled, and the generation Of flowers awakes once more. ALFRED PERCEVAL GRAVES. * May Day. CORINNAS GOING A-MAYING. 5 FIRST NIGHT OF MA Y. FIRST night of May ! and the soft-silvered moon Brightens her semicircle in the blue ; And mid the tawny orange of the west Shines the full star that ushers in the even ! On the low meadows by the Luggie-side Gathers a semi-lucent mist, and creeps In busy silence, shrouding golden furze And leafy copsewood. Through the tortuous dell Like an eternal sound the Luggie flows In unreposing melody. DAVID GRAY. The Luggie, CO RINNANS GOING A-MAYING. GET up, get up for shame, the blooming morn Upon her wings presents the god unshorn. See how Aurora throws her fair Fresh-quilted colors through the air ; Get up, sweet slug-a-bed, and see The dew bespangling herb and tree. Each flower has wept, and bowed toward the East, Above an hour since, yet you not dressed, Nay ! not so much as out of bed ; When all the birds have matins said, And sung their thankful hymns ; 'tis sin, Nay, profanation to keep in, Whenas a thousand virgins on this day Spring, sooner than the lark to fetch in May. 6 CORINNA'S GOING A-MAYING. Rise, and put on your foliage, and be seen To come forth like the springtime, fresh and green, And sweet as Flora. Take no care For jewels for your gown or hair ; Fear not, the leaves will strew Gems in abundance upon you ; Besides, the childhood of the day has kept Against you come, some orient pearls unwept. Come, and receive them while the light Hangs on the dew locks of the night, And Titan on the eastern hill Retires himself, or else stands still Till you come forth. Wash, dress, be brief in pray- ino" lll s> > Few beads are best, when once we go a-Maying. Come, my Corinna, come ; and, coming, mark How each field turns a street, each street a park Made green, and trimmed with trees ; see how Devotion gives each house a bough Or branch ; each porch, each door, ere this, An ark or tabernacle is, Made up of whitethorn neatly interwove, As if here were those cooler shades of love. Can such delights be in the street And open fields, and we not see't ? Come, we'll abroad, and let's obey The proclamation made for May : And sin no more, as we have done, by staying ; But, my Corinna, come, let's go a-Maying. CORWA'A'S GOING A-MAYING. / There's not a budding boy or girl, this day, But is got up and gone to bring in May. A deal of youth, ere this, is come Back, and with whitethorn laden, home. Some have dispatched their cakes and cream Before that we have left to dream : And some have wept, and wooed, and plighted troth, And chose their priest, ere we can cast off sloth ; Many a green gown has been given, Many a kiss, both odd and even, Many a glance, too, has been sent From out the eye, love's firmament ; Many a jest told of the key's betraying This night, and locks picked, yet we are not a-May- ing. Come, let us go, while we are in our prime, And take the harmless folly of the time. We shall grow old apace and die Before we know our liberty. Our life is short, and our days run As fast away as does the sun, And as a vapor, or a drop of rain Once lost, can ne'er be found again ; So when or you or I are made A fable, song, or fleeting shade, All love, all liking, all delight Lies drowned with us in endless night. Then while time serves, and we are but decaying, Come, my Corinna, come, let's go a-Maying. ROBERT HERRICK. 8 MAY DA Y. MA Y DAY SONG. MA Y DA Y. I WALKED, in the " sweet season's " opening, Through budding groves, in downy wealth arrayed ; For bliss the unfettered streamlet danced and played, But dead leaves strewed the ground, no sign of spring ! O sweet south wind, I cried, the blossoms bring ! When May on these dull eyes her sceptre laid ; I turned, and lo ! fresh green in field and glade, And sweet young life in every growing thing. So through a barren world we listless move, Though fair the distant scene, yet close to us Dead leaves of disappointment and despair. Then suddenly appears the enchanter, Love, Touches us with his sceptre luminous, And joy's bright blossoms greet us everywhere. MRS. MARION GREENWOOD [LUNT] METEYARD. MA Y DAY SONG. OUT from cities haste away, This is earth's great holiday ; Who can labor while the hours In with songs are bringing May Through the gaze of buds and flowers, Through the golden pomp of day ? Haste, O haste ! 'Tis sin to waste MAY DAY SONG. 9 In dull work so sweet a time, Dance and song Of right belong To the hours of spring's sweet prime. Golden beams and shadows brown, Where the roofs of knotted trees Fling a pleasant coolness down, Footing it, the young May sees ; In their dance the breezes now Dimple every pond you pass ; Shades of leaves, from every bough Leaping, beat the dappled grass. Birds are noisy, bees are humming, All because the May's a coming ; All the tongues of Nature shout, Out from town, from cities out ! Out from every busy street ! Out from every darkened court ! Through the field-paths let your feet Lingering go in pleasant thought ! Out through dells the violet's haunting ! Out where golden rivers run ! Where the wallflower's gayly flaunting In the livery of the sun. Trip it through the shadows, hiding Down in hollow winding lanes ! Where through leaves the sunshine gliding Deep with gold the woodland stains ! Where, in all her pomp of weeds, Nature, asking but the thanks Of our pleasure, richly pranks IO 777^ ENTERING MAY. Painted heaths and wayside banks, Smooth-mown lawns and green deep meads ! Leave the noisy bustling town For still glade and breezy down ! Haste away To meet the May, This is earth's great holiday ! WILLIAM Cox BENNETT. THE ENTERING MAY. WHERE shall we keep the holiday, And duly greet the entering May ? Too strait and low our cottage doors, And all unmeet our carpet floors ; Nor spacious court, nor monarch's hall, Suffice to hold the festival. Up and away ! where haughty woods Front the liberated floods : We will climb the broad-backed hills, Hear the uproar of their joy ; We will mark the leaps and gleams Of the new-delivered streams, And the murmuring rivers of sap Mount in the pipes of the trees, Giddy with day, to the topmost spire, Which for a spike of tenderest green Bartered its powdery cap ; And the colors of joy in the bird, And the love in its carol heard, WHEN BEECHES BRIGHTEN EARL Y MA Y. 1 1 Frog and lizard in holiday coats, And turtle brave in his golden spots ; While cheerful cries of crag and plain Reply to the thunder of river and main. RALPH WALDO EMERSON. May-Day. WHEN BEECHES BRIGHTEN EARLY MAY. WHEN beeches brighten early May And young grass shines along her way ; When Joy first bares his sunny head, Leaned over brook and blossom-bed ; When smell of spring fills all the air, And wooing birds make music there ; When naught of sound or sight shall grieve From quiring morn to quiet eve, My restless thoughts are forward cast. This loveliness, it cannot last ; The merry field, the ringing bough, Shall silent be as tuneful, now ; Chill, warning winds shall hither roam, The Summer's children hasten home : That blue solicitude of sky Bent over beauty doomed to die, Ere long shall, pitying, witness here The yielded glory of the year. JOHN VANCE CHENEY. /// the Century Magazine* 12 ONE SWALLOW. ONE SWALLOW. THE day was grey and dark and chill ; Though May had come to meet us, So closely April lingered still, She had no heart to greet us ; When, with a swift and sudden flight, Wind-blown o'er hill and hollow, Two grey wings swept across my sight, And lo ! the first wild swallow. " Alas, fair bird ! thy little breast, That cuts the air so fleetly, Should still have pressed its southern nest Till June was piping sweetly. In spite of cheery song and voice, Thou brave and blithe newcomer, I cannot in thy joy rejoice : One swallow makes no summer." Thus, in my thought I fain would say ; Meantime, on swift wing speeding, Its wild and winning roundelay The bird sang on unheeding ; Of odorous fields and drowsy noons, Of slow tides landward creeping, Of woodlands thrilled with jocund tunes, Of soft airs hushed and sleeping : He sang of waving forest heights With strong green boughs upspringing ; SONG ON MAY MORNING, 13 Of faint stars paie with drowsy lights, In dusky heavens swinging ; Of nests high-hung in cottage eaves, Of yellow cornfields growing, And, through the long, slim, fluttering leaves, The sleepy winds a-blowing ; He sang until my soul took heed Of warm, soft-falling showers, Of dells high-piled with tangled leaves, And gay with tangled flowers ; Of life, and love, and hope's bright crew, This brave and blithe newcomer : And so and so at last I knew One swallow made the summer ! MRS. MARY ELIZABETH [MCGRATH] BLAKE. SONG ON MA Y MORNING. Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger, Comes dancing from the East, and leads with her The flowery May, who from her green lap throws The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose. Hail, bounteous May, that dost inspire Mirth and youth and warm desire ; Woods and groves are of thy dressing, Hill and vale doth boast thy blessing. Thus we salute thee with our early song, And welcome thee, and wish thee long. JOHN MILTON. 14 THE VOICE OF 7 HE GRASS. THE VOICE OF THE GRASS. HERE I come, creeping, creeping everywhere By the dusty roadside, On the sunny hillside, Close by the noisy brook, In every shady nook, I come creeping, creeping everywhere. Here I come, creeping, smiling everywhere : All around the open door, Where sit the aged poor, Here where the children play, In the bright and merry May, I come creeping, creeping everywhere. Here I come, creeping, creeping everywhere : In the noisy city street My pleasant face you'll meet, Cheering the sick at heart, Toiling his busy part, Silently creeping, creeping everywhere. Here I come, creeping, creeping everywhere : You cannot see me coming, Nor hear my low sweet humming; For in the starry night, And the glad morning light, I come quietly creeping everywhere. Here I come, creeping, creeping everywhere : More welcome than the flowers, THE QUEEN OF THE MAY. 1 5 In summer's pleasant hours ; The gentle cow is glad, And the merry bird not sad, To see me creeping, creeping everywhere. Here I come, creeping, creeping everywhere : When you're numbered with the dead In your still and narrow bed, In the happy spring I'll come And deck your silent home, Creeping, silently creeping everywhere. Here I come, creeping, creeping everywhere : My humble song of praise Most joyfully I raise To Him at whose command I beautify the land, Creeping, silently creeping everywhere. MRS. SARAH [ROBERTS] BOYLE. THE QUEEN OF THE MAY. HERE'S a bank with rich cowslips and cuckoo-buds strewn, To exalt your bright looks, gentle Queen of the May ! Here's a cushion of moss for your delicate shoon, And a woodbine to weave you a canopy gay. 1 6 THE ARBUTUS. Here's a garland of red maiden-roses for you ; Such a delicate wreath is for beauty alone ; Here's a golden kingcup, brimming over with dew, To be kissed by a lip just as sweet as its own. Here are bracelets of pearl from the fount in the dale, That the nymph of the wave on your wrists doth bestow ; Here's a lily-wrought scarf your sweet blushes to hide, Or to lie on that bosom, like snow upon snow. Here's a myrtle enwreathed with a jessamine band, To express the fond twining of beauty and youth ; Take the emblem of love in thy exquisite hand, And do thou sway the evergreen sceptre of truth. Then around you we'll dance, and around you we'll sing, To soft pipe and tabor we'll foot it away ; And the hills and the dales and the forest shall ring, While we hail you our lovely young Queen of the May. GEORGE BARLEY. THE ARBUTUS. THIS flower has lived and breathed and moved, And borne 'mong men a human name ; Nay, more, it loved and was beloved, And filled the first world with its fame. MAY. I/ It still might in our gardens thrive But that high love is out of date ; We rather choose to build and wive, And trade in souls at market's rate. She rather chose to be a flower, Hid in the deep and silent wood ; And only shows her perfumed power When lovers breathe its solitude. JOHN ALBEE, MAY. THE earth can, like the soul, but once be wed. The sun, howe'er his love may slacken or stray, In March woos hotly, wearies of delay Ere fitful April's budding-time be sped, And claims his bridal blossom-time in May. The sacred rites bird-voices overhead Acclaim in antiphon from dawn of day : And for the drapery of the spousal bed The beech brings leaflets fresh from downy sheaths ; There spreads the oak its cool green light, and here The elm its cool green shadow ; far and near The apple flushes and the whitethorn breathes. Such close embraces passion never wreathes As those that pledge the promise of the year. HENRY GAY HEWLETT. An English Year. 1 8 Off THE THAMES. A MAY MEMORY. ON THE THAMES. O SHOUT, for the morning Hath heard April's warning, And earth is adorning The bride-bed of May ! O shout, for the lover Of flowers shall discover Mid the haunts of the plover New snowflakes to-day ! Low down on the river Rathe aspen leaves shiver, And soaring larks quiver Aloft in the sun : The whole world is ringing With laughter and singing; Why need we be clinging To grief that is gone ? JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS. A MAY MEMORY. A COTTAGE in a winding lane, Reed-roofed and clasped with jessamine ; A face seen through a window-pane With charms that any lad would win. A pair of eyes as sapphire blue, A rivulet of golden hair, MAYFLOWERS. 19 Cheeks shaming e'en the rose's hue, Fresh vermeil lips of beauty rare. A morning in the month of May, A laddie standing at a gate ; A look, but not a word to say ; A sigh from one without a mate. A little chamber, hawthorn-sweet, A head low resting on a hand, Slow pacing of two dainty feet, A vacant stare out on the land. A tiny drop of liquid pearl, A joy gone nothing can restore ; The funeral of a village girl, A grave and peace forevermore. EDWARD CAPERN. MAYFLOWERS. IF you catch a breath of sweetness, And follow the odorous hint Through woods where the dead leaves rustle, And the golden mosses glint, Along the spicy sea coast, Over the desolate down, You will find the dainty Mayflowers When you come to Plymouth town. 2O SEEKING THE MAYFLOWER. Where the shy spring tends her darlings, And hides them away from sight, Pull off the covering leaf-sprays, And gather them pink and white, Tinted by mystical moonlight, Freshened by frosty dew, Till the fair, transparent blossoms To their pure perfection grew. Then carry them home to your lady, For flower of the spring is she, Pink and white, and dainty and slight, And lovely as lovely can be. Shall they die because she is fair, Or live because she is sweet ? They will know for which they were born, But you, must wait at her feet. MRS. LOUISE [CHANDLER] MOULTON. SEEKING THE MAYFLOWER. THE sweetest sound our whole year round : 'Tis the first robin of the spring ! The song of the full orchard choir Is not so fine a thing. SEEKING THE MAYFLOWER. 21 Glad sights are common ; Nature draws Her random pictures through the year, But oft her music bids us long Remember those most dear. To me, when in the sudden spring I hear the earliest robin's lay, With the first trill there comes again One picture of the May. The veil is parted wide, and lo, A moment, though my eyelids close, Once more I see that wooded hill Where the arbutus gro\vs. I see the village dryad kneel, Trailing her slender fingers through The knotted tendrils, as she lifts Their pink pale flowers to view. Once more I dare to stoop beside The dove-eyed beauty of my choice, And long to touch her careless hair, And think how dear her voice. My eager, wandering hands assist With fragrant blooms her lap to fill, And half by chance they meet her own, Half by our young hearts' will. Till at the last, those blossoms won, Like her, so pure, so sweet, so shy, 22 IN AT AY. Upon the grey and lichened rocks Close at her feet I lie. Fresh blows the breeze through hemlock trees, The fields are edged with green below ; And naught but youth and hope and love We know or care to know. Hark ! from the moss-clung apple bough, Beyond the tumbled wall, there broke That gurgling music of the May : 'Twas the first robin spoke. I heard it, ay, and heard it not, For little then my glad heart wist What toil and time should come to pass, And what delight be missed ; Nor thought thereafter, year by year Hearing that fresh yet olden song, To yearn for unreturning joys That with its joy belong. EDMUND CLARENCE STEDMAN. IN MA Y. OH, sing ! the swallows are in tune, Forget the rain of yesterday ; A few more suns will bring us June, And this, 'tis Chaucer's month, 'tis May. THOMAS WILLIAM PARSONS. May Day. SPRING SONG. 23 SPRING SONG. CREEP slowly up the willow wand, Young leaves ! and in your lightness, Teach us that spirits which despond May wear their own pure brightness. Into new sweetness slowly dip, O May ! advance ; yet linger ; Nor let the ring too swiftly slip Down that new-plighted finger. Thy bursting blooms, O Spring, retard ! While thus thy raptures press on, How many a joy is lost, or marred How many a lovely lesson. For each new sweet thou giv'st us, those Which first we loved are taken : In death their eyes must violets close Before the rose can waken. Ye woods, with ice-threads tingling late, Where late was heard the robin, Your chants that hour but antedate When autumn winds are sobbing ! Ye gummy buds, in silken sheath Hang back, content to glisten ! Hold in, O earth, thy charmed breath ! Thou air, be still and listen ! AUBREY THOMAS DE VERB, 24 MA K EXPECTA T/OM MAY. I SAW a child, once, that had lost its way In a great city : ah, dear Heaven, such eyes ! A far-off look in them, as if the skies Her birthplace were. So looks to me the May. April is winsome ; June is glad and gay ; May glides betwixt them in such wondering wise, Lovely as dropped from some far Paradise, And knowing, all the while, herself astray. Or, is the fault with us ? Nay, call it not A fault, but a sweet trouble. Is it we, (Catching some glimpse of our own destiny In May's renewing touch, some yearning thought Of Heaven, beneath her resurrecting hand) We who are aliens, lost in a strange land ? MRS. CAROLINE ATHERTON [BRIGGS] MASON. In TAf Century Magazine. EXPECTA TION. WHITE-FLOWERED orchards where young buds un- fold, Sweet-smelling, shining, shower-crumpled grass, Rainbows above where late the rain-cloud was, Now a bright harmless heap of vapory gold. The sharp rim of the slim new moon on high Is cut against the rosy western sky ; THE GREEN THINGS GROWING. 25 The fresh breeze curves the same crisp ripple soft On the green earth as on the smooth light stream, Wherein the double sky and landscape gleam With every cloud the sunshine smites aloft. Ah ! restless, fond, insatiate human heart, Filled full with all the pleasure of the spring, Yet holding it but as a little thing, And pressing forward, yearning to take part In something wider, larger, fairer still, Nor noting beauty of sky, field or hill. The clear horizon, the far-shining sea Invite and beckon : all the bloom and glow Seem but an earnest of what time will show, And the pulse leaps with wild expectancy. EMMA LAZARUS. THE GREEN THINGS GROWING. THE green things growing, the green things growing, The faint, sweet smell of the green things growing ! I should like to live, whether I smile or grieve, Just to watch the happy life of my green things growing. O the fluttering and the pattering of those green things growing ! How they talk each to each, when none of us are knowing ; 26 SPRING. In the wonderful white of the weird moonlight Or the dim dreamy dawn when the cocks are crow- ing. I love, I love them so, my green things growing ! And I think that they love me, without false show- ing; For by many a tender touch, they comfort me so much, With the soft mute comfort of green things growing. And in the rich store of their blossoms glowing Ten for one I take they're on me bestowing : Oh, I should like to see, if God's \\ ill it may be, Many, many a summer of my green things growing ! But if I must be gathered for the angels' sowing, Sleep out of sight awhile, like the green things grow- ing, Though dust to dust return, I think I'll scarcely mourn, If I may change into green things growing. /MRS. DINAH MARIA [MULOCK] CRAIK. SPRING. BIRDS' love and birds' song Flying here and there, Birds' song and birds' love, And you with gold for hair ! ON MA Y. 27 Birds' song and birds' love, Passing with the weather, Men's song and men's love, To love once and for ever. Men's love and birds' love, And women's love and men's ! And you my wren with a crown of gold, You my Queen of the wrens ! You the Queen of the wrens ! We'll be birds of a feather ; I'll be King of the Queen of the wrens, And all in a nest together. ALFRED TENNYSON. ON MA Y. AMONG the changing months, May stands confessed The sweetest, and in fairest colors dressed ! Soft as the breeze that fans the smiling field ; Sweet as the breath that opening roses yield ; Fair as the color lavish Nature paints On virgin flowers free from unodorous taints ! To rural scenes thou temp'st the busy crowd, Who, in each grove, thy praises sing aloud ! The blooming belles and shallow beaux, strange sight, Turn nymphs and swains, and in their sports delight. JAMES THOMSON. 28 THE DAISY. THE DAISY. ON bookes for to read I me delight, And to them give I faith and full credence, And in mine heart have them in reverence, So heartily that there is game none That fro my bookes maketh me to gone, But it be seldom on the holy-day : Save, certainly, that when the month of May Is comen, and that I hear the fowles sing, And that the flowers ginnen for to spring, Farewell my book and my devotion ! Now have I then eke this condition, As that, of all the flowers in the mead, Then love I most these flowers white and red, Such that men callen daisies in our town. To them I have so great affection, As I said erst, when comen is the May That in my bed there daweth me no day That I n'am up and walking in the mead, To seen this flower against the sunne sprede. When it upriseth early by the morrow, That blissful sight softeneth all my sorrow; So glad am I, when that I have presence Of it, to done it alle reverence, As she that is of all flowers the flower, Fulfilled of all virtue and honor, And ever alike fair and fresh of hue ; And ever I love it and ever alike new, And ever shall till that mine hearte die. GEOFFREY CHAUCER. The Legend of Good Women. (Prologue.) PHILLIDA AND CORYDON. 29 PHILLIDA AND CORYDON. IN the merry month of May, In a morn by break of day, Forth I walked by the woodside, Whenas May was in his pride. There I spied, all alone, Phillida and Corydon. Much ado there was, God wot ! He would love, and she would not ; She said, " Never man was true ; " He said, " None was false to you ; " He said, he had loved her long ; She said, Love should have no wrong. Corydon would kiss her then ; She said, " Maids must kiss no men Till they did for good and all : " Then she made the shepherd call All the heavens to witness truth, " Never loved a truer youth ! " Thus, with many a pretty oath, Yea and nay, and faith and troth, Such as silly shepherds use When they will not love abuse, Love, which had been long deluded, Was with kisses sweet concluded ; And Phillida, with garlands gay, Was made the lady of the May. NICHOLAS BRETON. 30 A MORN OF MAY. THE RETURN OF THE NIGHTINGALE. BORNE on the warm wing of the western gale, How tremulously low is heard to float, Through the green budding thorns that fringe the vale, The early nightingale's prelusive note. 'Tis Hope's instinctive power that, through the grove Tells how benignant heaven revives the earth ; 'Tis the soft voice of young and timid love That calls these melting sounds of sweetness forth. With transport, once, sweet bird, I hailed thy lay, And bade thee welcome to our shades again, To charm the wandering poet's pensive way, And soothe the solitary lover's pain ; But now ! such evils in my lot combine, As shut my languid sense to Hope's dear voice and thine. MRS. CHARLOTTE [TURNER] SMITH. A MORN OF MAY. ALL the clouds about the sun lay up in golden creases, (Merry rings the maiden's voice that sings at dawn of day;) Lambkins woke and skipped around to dry their dewy fleeces, So sweetly as she caroled, all on a morn of May. A MORN- OF MAY. 31 Quoth the Sergeant, " Here I'll halt ; here's wine of joy for drinking ; To my heart she sets her hand, and in the strings doth play ; All among the daffodils, and fairer to my thinking, And fresh as milk and roses, she sits this morn of May." Quoth the Sergeant, "Work is work, but any ye might make me, If I worked for you, dear lass, I'd count my holiday. I'm your slave for good and all, an' if ye will but take me, So sweetly as ye carol upon this morn of May." "Medals count for worth," quoth she, "and scars are worn for honor ; But a slave an' if ye be, kind wooer, go your way." All the nodding daffodils woke up and laughed upon her. O ! sweetly did she carol, all on that morn of May. Gladsome leaves upon the bough, they fluttered fast and faster, Fretting brook, till he would speak, did chide the dull delay ; " Beauty ! when I said a slave, I think I meant a master ; So sweetly as ye carol all on this morn of May. 32 MAY. " Lass, I love you ! Love is strong, and some men's hearts are tender." Far she sought o'er wood and wold, but found not aught to say ; Mounting lark nor mantling cloud would any counsel render, Though sweetly she had caroled upon that morn of May. Shy, she sought the wooer's face, and deemed the wooing mended ; Proper man he was, good sooth, and one would have his way : So the lass was made a wife, and so the song was ended. O ! sweetly did she carol all on that morn of May. JEAN INGELOW. MAY. NOT the word, but the soul of the thing ! Not the name, but the spirit of spring ! And so, at morning early, Through hedgerows fresh and pearly, Bedecked with hawthorn branches And apple blossoms gay, Her golden hair around her, As if some god had crowned her, Across the dewy woodland Comes dancing in the May. MAY MEMORIES. 33 O Spirit of hope and of truth ! O Spirit of beauty and youth ! Thine still the olden glory ; Thine still the song and story Of joyous lads and lasses, Of birds upon the spray, Of perfumed airs a-blowing, Of green things glad with growing, Of all the world grown young again To welcome in the May. MRS. MARY ELIZABETH^MCGRATH] BLAKE. MA Y MEMORIES. THE spring was very glad upon the hills ; The sweet pale wind-flowers waited in the grass ; And the white lilies, in the river's glass, Floated and fell, with the delight that fills The Maytime. So I stood upon the sills Of Faerie (for such to me the wood And all the glamours folded in its flood Of greenery were), thinking the joy, that kills March-sadness in the flowers, might make me whole. But, as I went, the crocus-flames did borrow White lights and sad, as sombre as my soul ; Ay me (the linnet sang) sweet love, sweet sorrow ! A golden evening and a sad to-morrow ! Spring could not hold from mocking at my dole. 34 MAY MEMORIES. Life unfulfilled ! The windy scents that shook The pink-blown glory of the apple trees, The surge of song that hung upon the breeze, The pale eyes of the primrose-stars, that took Faint heart to peer into the painted book Flower-writ by spring upon the wide-waved leas ; These all made moan of my dis-ease : And as I pulled the cresses in the brook, The thin slow water broke against my hand, With some faint cadence of blithe murmuring Broken to sadness. Over all the land, As I drew near, the linnets ceased their song, Saying (meseemed), " What wight goes thus in spring, Songless and sad, the dreamy day along ? " My feet turned back into the well-worn ways, Hollowed between the tree-marge and the rill ; And as I went, old memories did fill My soul with longing for the bygone days. The lush scents from the grey-pearled hawthorn maze, The birds' and breezes' babble and the stream's Brought back to me the songs I made in dreams, In the old days long dead ; the bright sweet lays, Hymning high valor in the world's despite ; The long untroubled lapses of swift song, Brimming with ecstacy the luminous night, As a thrush, piping, fills it ; sweet and strong And pure as ripples of the fresh sun's light, Filling the glad green glades and aisles along. A MAY SONG. 35 There walked for me along the flower-hung glades The shadowy figures of the world of song Of my pure youth, a white and rosy throng Of fair tall queens and lily-drooping maids, Shadowing pink cheeks with hyacinthine .braids And feathered gold of many-glancing locks. The mailed knights clashed together in the shocks Of clamorous war ; and through the spangled shades The mystic echoes of old questing went. There was no thing in all that dream untold For me, upon the woods with hawthorn sprent^ Of the old life ; and in the primrose-gold, The new came back to me with dreariment, In memories of the love that long lies cold. JOHN PAYNE. A MA Y SONG. THE CALL. COME away ! come away ! The sea is blue, and the sky is blue, The woods are green, and the fields are green, The golden sun and the silvery sheen, They call and call for you. The waves on the shore are playing, playing, The flowers in the breeze are swaying, swaying, The whole wide world is out a-Maying To-day, to-day. 36 A MA Y SONG. Come away ! come away ! The sea is song, and the sky is song, Music is here, and music is there, And life and love are everywhere, Singing the whole day long ! The tide on the beach is swaying, swaying, The sun with the clouds is playing, playing, And life and love are gone a-Maying To-day, to-day. THE ANSWER. I must stay, I must stay ; The song of the sea is not for me, Nor golden bowers of cowslip flowers Nor vision bright of sunbeam showers; No fresh green spring I see, No fragrant breeze is round me playing, No glorious ocean tide is swaying, Yet my world, too, is gone a-Maying To-day, to-day. Let me stay ! let me stay ! There is music here, as everywhere ; And sky pale blue, and sunshine too ; For eyes that love to read life true Love seeth all things fair. Like meadow flowers in breezes swaying, All radiant hopes are round me playing, My very heart is out a-Maying To-day, to-day ! GENEVIEVE MARY IRONS. MAY EVENING. 37 MAY EVENING. THE breath of springtime at this twilight hour Comes through the gathering glooms, And bears the stolen sweets of many a flower Into my silent rooms. Where hast thou wandered, gentle gale, to find The perfumes thou dost bring ? By brooks, that through the wakening meadows wind, Or brink of rushy spring ? Or woodside, where, in little companies, The early wild flowers rise, Or sheltered lawn, where, mid encircling trees, May's warmest sunshine lies ? Now sleeps the hummingbird, that, in the sun, Wandered from bloom to bloom ; Now, too, the weary bee, his day's work done, Rests in his waxen room. Now every hovering insect to his place Beneath the leaves hath flown ; And, through the long, night hours, the flowery race Are left to thee alone. O'er the pale blossoms of the sassafras And o'er the spice-bush spray, Among the opening buds, thy breathings pass, And come embalmed away. . . . WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT. 38 MAY, RE- A WAKENING. WITHIN a spot where slept the silent dead, I wandered once when spring had kissed the earth, And set around its breast an emerald girth Of grass, entangling roses white and red ; Among the leafy branches overhead The mating robins twittered in their mirth ; All Nature seemed rejoicing in new birth Beneath the canopy the blue skies spread : And as I sat beside one mossy stone Kissed by a hundred suns of summer skies, A sudden joy came to my heart, alone Among those graves, to think the dead shall rise In God's eternal spring when sounds are blown On angels' instruments in Paradise ! FRANK DEMPSTER SHERMAN. MAY. HARK ! The sea-faring wild-fowl loud proclaim My coming, and the swarming of the bees. These are my heralds, and behold ! my name Is written in blossoms on the hawthorn-trees. I tell the mariner when to sail the seas : I waft o'er all the land from far away The breath and bloom of the Hesperides, My birthplace. I am Maia. I am May. HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW. Calendar. MAY TIME. 39 MOONLIGHT IN MA Y. THANKS ! for I understand you, happy Night ! And smile with you at all that made me sad, Drawn unawares beyond all griefs I had Into the truthfulness of clear moonlight, Before whose frankness I can banish quite The old forlorn endeavor to be glad, And carelessly stand listening as I please To the low rustle on the sparkling shore Of conscious waves, that, rippling at their ease, Outrun the light and lead it on before ; Or to the murmur of the moonlit trees, Whose time of waiting and reserve is o'er, Whom spring has taught to captivate the breeze, And charm the nights made musical once more. ROBERT KELLEY WEEKS. MAY TIME. YES, it is May ! though not that the young leaf pushes its velvet Out of the sheath, that the stubbornest sprays are beginning to bourgeon, Larks responding aloft to the mellow flute of the bluebird, Nor that song and sunshine and odors of life im- mingled Even as wines in a cup ; but that May, with her delicate philtres 40 MAY TIME. Drenches the veins and the valves of the heart, a double possession, Touching the sleepy sense with sweet, irresistible languor, Piercing, in turn, the languor with flame : as the Spirit requickened Stirred in the womb of the world, foreboding a birth and a being ! Who can hide from her magic, break her insensible thraldom, Clothing the wings of eager delight as with plumage of trouble ? Sweeter, perchance, the embryo spring, forerunner of April, When on banks that slope to the south the saxifrage wakens, When, beside the dentils of frost that cornice the roadside, Weeds are a promise, and woods betray the trailing arbutus. Once is the sudden miracle seen, the truth and its rapture Felt, and the pulse of the possible May is throbbing already. Thus unto me, a boy, the clod that was warm in the sunshine, Murmurs of thaw, and imagined hurry of growth in the herbage, Airs from over the southern hills and something within me SONG OP THE PRINCESS MAY. 41 Catching a deeper sign from these than ever the senses Came as a call : I awoke, and heard, and endeav- ored to answer. Whence should fall in my lap the sweet, impossible marvel ? When would the silver fay appear from the willowy thicket ? When from the yielding rock the gnome with his basket of jewels ? "When, ah when ? " I cried on the steepest perch of the hillside Standing with arms outspread, and waiting a wind that should bear me Over the apple-tree tops and over the farms of the valley. BAYARD TAYLOR. SONG OF THE PRINCESS MAY. MARCH and April go your way ! You have had your fitful day ; Wind and shower, and snow and sleet, Make wet walking for my feet, For I come unsandaled down From the hillsides bare and brown ; But wherever I do tread There I leave a little thread 42 IN THE Of bright emerald, softly set Like a jewel in the wet ; And I make the peach-buds turn Pink and white, until they burn Rosy red within their cells ; Then I set the blooming bells Of the flowery alder ringing, And the apple blossoms swinging In a shower of rosy snow As I come and as I go On my gay and jocund way, 'I, the merry Princess May. NORA PERRY. IN THE SPRLVG. IT is good to be young in the spring, but to breathe, but to be, When the woods are tumultuous with song, the leaf freshly unfurled, To break into joy as the blossom breaks forth of the tree, In the on-coming tide which is lightening the heart of the world. Comes a time when the pulse of the season has risen still higher, When the crown of the year is of May, but not yet of the rose, IN THE SPRING. 43 When the trees through a mist of soft leaves seem to gladly respire The air that is balm, and to drink of the sun- shine that glows ; When the lilac still blushes, the lilies lie folded be- neath, When the broom and laburnum are tossing or shedding their gold, And the hand of the bountiful Giver o'er meadow and heath, In gorse and in kingcup is scattering riches un- told; When the moist living green of the nethermost boughs of the elm Rises up as a verdurous breath, and a robe seems to cling Round the boles of the birch, that show fair through the tremulous film, As the silvery limbs of a Dryad in vesture of spring. When the larch in its youth, and the king of the forest discrowned, The garlanded age of the thorn, and the succu- lent weed Born in yesterday's shower all things that have root in the ground Are alive and abloom in the sun, from the oak to the reed. EMILY [DAVIS] PFEIFFER. 44 LOOK IIO IV IN MAY. MAY. A RUSH last night of pinions sweeping by, And Winter passed with a grim retinue ! He holds his court where arctic skies imbue The flashing snows with tropic brilliancy, And orange morns with crimson sunsets vie. The wizard king has left his daughters three, And grants to each awhile the regency ; His daughters three, like those our Shakespeare drew. Fierce are the eyes of March, as Goneril's eyne ; April like Regan, falser is than fair ; True as Cordelia's smiles, May's glances shine ; Ermine he left with those, and jewels rare, But to his youngest, May, gives power to free The flowers they leave in drear captivity. ANNIE LEUTHAL SMITH. LOOK HOW IN MAY. LOOK how in May the rose At sulphur's azure fumes, In a short space her crimson blush doth lose, And, all amazed, a pallid white assumes. So time our best consumes, Makes youth and beauty pass, And what was pride turns Horror in our glass. WILLIAM DRUMMONO. MA Y. 45 MAY. How softly comes the breath of bloom From quiet garden closes ! And, blended in a rare perfume, The royal scent of roses ! How tender is the touch of May While gentle winds are blowing, And in a sweet yet silent way, All sylvan things are growing. How brilliant is the morning dew Amid the fields of clover ! Beneath a stainless arch of blue The mock-bird is a rover ; His songs are echoed o'er the hills, Their boon of music bringing, Till all the land with wonder fills To hear his rapturous singing. How gracious is the light that gleams Across the dancing billows, Or with a chastened splendor beams Above the drooping willows ! How fair are May's benignant feet O'er rugged vales and mountains, And how her magic pulses beat Beside the brooks and fountains ! What sudden fervor thrills her blood, Through grove or garden straying, 46 SPRING. To linger o'er some tardy bud, And chide its long delaying ! What pure contentment fills her breast, Through thick-leaved forests roaming, To find the peaceful birds at rest Beneath the dews of gloaming ! What month so musical and bright, So rife with vernal glory, All garmented in air and light, Like some Arcadian story ! Oh ! fragrant is the breath of May In tranquil garden closes, And soft yet regal is her sway Among the springtide roses. WILLIAM HAMILTON HAYNE. SPRING. SPRING, the sweet spring, is the year's pleasant king Then blooms each thing, then maids dance in ring, Cold doth not sting, the pretty birds do sing, Cuckoo, jug, jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo. The palm and may make country houses gay, Lambs frisk and play, the shepherds pipe all day, And, hear we aye, birds tune their pretty lay, Cuckoo, jug, jug, pu-wee, to-witta-woo. SWEET LAGGARD, COME. 47 The fields breathe sweet, the daisies kiss our feet, Young lovers meet, old wives a sunning sit ; In every street, these tunes our ears do greet, Cuckoo, jug, jug, pu-we, to-witta-woo. Spring, the sweet spring. THOMAS NASH. Summer's Last Will and Testament. SWEET LAGGARD, COME. SWEET laggard, come ! and list the drowsy chime Of happy bees, 'neath umbrage of the lime : The Spring is here, come thou and be my Spring ! The trees put on their leaves while west winds sing, Do thou put on the love my heart doth bring. Sweet laggard, come ! Waste not the vernal time, Enjoy the breath of Love's delicious prime. The Spring is here, come thou and be my Spring ! Sweet laggard, come ! The golden wren doth like a blossom swing, And hark ! the curlews clamor on the wing. Sweet laggard, come ! and list thy lover's rhyme, As up the starry ways of love we climb, Thou queen of all my song, and I thy king. Sweet laggard, come ! WILLIAM WILSEY MAI-TIN. 48 MA Y. WHEN MAY FOLLOWS. . . . AFTER April, when May follows, And the white-throat builds, and all the swallows, Hark ! where my blossomed pear tree in the hedge Leans to the field and scatters on the clover Blossoms and dewdrops, at the bent spray's edge, That's the wise thrush ; he sings each song twice over, Lest you should think he never could recapture The first fine careless rapture ! And though the fields look rough with hoary dew, All will be gay when noontide wakes anew The buttercups, the little children's dower. ROBERT BROWNING. MAY. WOULD that thou couldst last for aye, Merry, ever-merry May ! Made of sun-gleams, shade and showers, Bursting buds, and breathing flowers ! Dripping-locked, and rosy-vested, Violet slippered, rainbow-crested ; Girdled with the eglantine, Festooned with the dewy vine : Merry, ever-merry May, Would that thou couldst last for aye ! WILLIAM D. GALLAGHER. MA Y IX THE SWAN WOODS. 49 MA Y IN THE SWAN WOODS. NOT as where swoons the tranced lark Over our dewy mother isle, V\"hen May exiles the warming dark V\"ith one intoxicating smile ; Not as where hawthorn snows deride December's coverlet of rime, And the lush flowers conspire to hide The brand of earth's primeval crime ; "Where hangs along each lapsing stream, As myrrh o'er some cathedral floor, The golden crocus' heavy steam, Each minute richer than before ; \Yhere song and odor bribe the hours, Descendest thou, O May ! in this bleak clime of ours. Some pallid power instead of thee, Sings through morn's cage of golden wire A doleful ditty fitfully, Strains which depress and swift expire. I look into the dewless air, The sunshafts fall, bright-barbed, around ; In the dead sky the branches bare Stand, corpse-like, with the sunshine crowned. I thirst, and find not by the brook The savor of the sappy grass, Its sifting waters have not shook One flower-bell through the vaulted pass ; Swollen with snow, its languid sheet Tumbles in sullen curves beside the maple's feet. 50 Reclined in winter's magic trance, Yon rock o'erlooks the shaded hill, Musing with stony countenance Upon its last year's garlands still. In whistling shreds around its brow, They wail when cuffs the hardy wind, Stung with the torture of the snow, By Love untutored to be kind. Yet, where the uncertain rays repose All day upon the mellowing bank, Through the sere twigs there faintly shows Spring's vanguard, marching rank on rank. Like elfin sworders, on they press, Their green blades drawn in dauntless files, Gilding the dreary duskiness, Till, championed, May exults and pays them back in smiles ! Wandering in the crackling wood, The songless boughs repel my feet, Not loving mortal should intrude, To spy their winter-long defeat. The dwarf oak clutches at me oft, With skinny leaves which seem like hands ; And round me, trailed o'er mosses soft, The vines involve their twisted bands. The robin from the granite wall Clucks to the long delaying choir ; And the thawed snake uncoils to crawl, And bask his dappled coat of fire. TO THE DANDELION. 5 I The snake unlocks his slimy jaws, To hiss me forth from his retreat ; And gaffer robin maketh pause To bid me from the wood, till now his silent seat. THOMAS GOLD APPLETON. TO THE DANDELION. DEAR common flower, that grow'st beside the way, Fringing the dusty road with harmless gold, First pledge of blithesome May, Which children pluck, and, full of pride uphold, High-hearted buccaneers, o'erjoyed that they An Eldorado in the grass have found, \Yhich not the rich earth's ample round May match in wealth, thou art more dear to me Than all the prouder summer blooms may be. Gold such as thine ne'er drew the Spanish prow Through the primeval hush of Indian seas, Nor wrinkled the lean brow Of age, to rob the lover's heart of ease ; 'Tis the Spring's largess, which she scatters now To rich and poor alike, with lavish hand, Though most hearts never understand To take it at God's value, but pass by The offered wealth with unrewarded eye. 52 TO THE DANDELION. Thou art my tropics and mine Italy ; To look at thee unlocks a warmer clime ; The eyes thou givest me Are in the heart, and heed not space or time : Not in mid-June the golden-cuirassed bee Feels a more summer-like warm ravishment In the white lily's breezy tent, His fragrant Sybaris, than I, when first From the dark green :hy yellow circles burst. Then think I of deep shadows on the grass, Of meadows where in sun the cattle graze, Where, as the breezes pass, The gleaming rushes lean a thousand ways, Of leaves that slumber in a cloudy mass, Or whiten in the wind, of waters blue That from the distance sparkle through Some woodland gap, and of a sky above Where one white cloud like a stray lamb doth move. My childhood's earliest thoughts are linked with thee ; The sight of thee calls back the robin's song, Who, from the dark old tree Beside the door, sang clearly all day long, And I, secure in childish piety, Listened as if I heard an angel sing With news from heaven, which he could bring Fresh every day to my untainted ears When birds and flowers and I were happy peers. SPRING. 53 How like a prodigal doth Nature seem, When thou, for all thy gold, so common art ! Thou teachest me to deem More sacredly of every human heart, Since each reflects in joy its scanty gleam Of heaven, and could some wondrous secret show, Did we but pay the love we owe, And with a child's undoubting wisdom look On all these living pages of God's book. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. SPRING. THE soote ' season that bud and bloom forth brings With green hath clad the hill, and eke the vale ; The nightingale with feathers new she sings ; The turtle to her make 2 hath told her tale. Summer is come, for every spray now springs, The hart hath hung his old head on the pale ; The buck in brake his winter coat he flings ; The fishes flete with new repaired scale ; The adder all her slough away she slings ; The swift swallow pursueth the flies smale ; The busy bee her honey now she mings ; 3 Winter is worn that was the flowers' bale. And thus I see among these pleasant things Each care decays, and yet my sorrow springs ! HENRY HOWARD. Earl of Sumy. 1 Sweet. 2 Mate. 3 Mixes. 54 MA Y. IV HY SHOULD MA Y REMEMBER. WHY should May remember March, if March forget The days that began with December, The nights that a frost could fret ? All their griefs are done with Now the bright months bless Fit souls to rejoice in the sun with, Fit heads for the wind's caress ; Souls of children quickening \Yith the whole world's mirth, Heads closelier than field-flowers thickening That crowd and illuminate earth, Now that May's call musters Files of baby bands To marshal in joyfuller clusters Than the flowers that encumber their hands. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE. A Dark Month. MAY. ALL maiden lives that waned in their young prime, From the first throbbing of the heart of Time, Re-live, I dream, in May's mysterious grace, Sing through her birds, and blossom in her face. PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE. MAY MORNING. 55 MA Y MORNING. WARM, wild, rainy wind, blowing fitfully, Stirring dreamy breakers on the slumberous May sea, What shall fail to answer thee ? What thing shall withstand The spell of thine enchantment, flowing over sea and land ? All along the swamp-edge in the rain I go ; All about my head thou the loosened locks doth blow ; Like the German goose-girl in the fairy tale, I watch across the shining pool my flock of ducks that sail. Redly gleam the rose-haws, dripping with the wet, Fruit of sober autumn, glowing crimson yet ; Slender swords of iris leaves cut the water clear, And light green creeps the tender grass, thick spreading far and near. Every last year's stalk is set with brown or golden studs ; All the boughs of bayberry are thick with scented buds; Islanded in turfy velvet, where the ferns uncurl, Lo ! the large white duck's egg glimmers like a pearl ! Softly sing the billows, rushing, whispering low, Freshly, O deliciously, the warm, wild wind doth blow 3 56 MAY. Plaintive bleat of new-washed lambs comes faint from far away ; And clearly cry the little birds, alert and blithe and gay- O happy, happy morning ! O dear, familiar place ! O warm, sweet tears of heaven, fast falling on my face ! O well-remembered, rainy wind, blow all my care away, That I may be a child again this blissful morn of May. MRS. CELIA [LAIGHTON] THAXTER. MAY. MAY is a pious fraud of the almanac, A ghastly parody of real spring Shaped out of snow and breathed with eastern wind; Or if, o'er-confident, she trust the date, And, with her handful of anemones, Herself as shivery, steal into the sun, The season need but turn his hour-glass round, And Winter, suddenly, like crazy Lear, Reels back, and brings the dead May in his arms, Her budding breasts and wan dislustred front \Yith frosty streaks and drifts of his white beard All overblown. JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. Under t/u- Willows. HEAT. 57 HEAT. HITHER rolls the storm of heat; I feel its finer billows beat Like a sea which me infolds ; Heat with viewless fingers moulds, Swells, and mellows, and matures, Paints, and flavors, and allures, Bird and brier inly warms, Still enriches and transforms, Gives the reed and lily length, Adds to oak and oxen strength, Transforming what it doth infold, Life out of death, new out of old, Painting fawns' and leopards' fells, Seethes the gulf-encrimsoning shells, Fires gardens with a joyful blaze Of tulips, in the morning's rays. The dead log touched bursts into leaf, The wheat-blade whispers of the sheaf. What god is this imperial Heat, Earth's prime secret, sculpture's seat ? Doth it bear hidden in its heart Water-line patterns of all art ? Is it Daedalus ? is it Love ? Or walks in mask almighty Jove, And drops from Power's redundant horn All seeds of beauty to be born ? RALPH WALDO EMERSON. May-Day. 58 FANTASIE DE PRINTEMPS. MAY. THE voice of one who goes before to make The paths of June more beautiful, is thine, Sweet May ! Without an envy of her crown And bridal ; patient stringing emeralds And shining rubies for the brows of birch And maple ; flinging garlands of pure white And pink, which to their bloom add prophecy ; Gold cups o'erfilling on a thousand hills And calling honey-bees ; out of their sleep The tiny summer harpers with bright wings Awaking, teaching them their notes for noon ; O May, sweet- voiced one, going thus before, Forever June may pour her warm red wine Of life and passion, sweeter days are thine ! MRS. HELEN MARIA [FISKE] [HUNT] JACKSON. FANTASIE DE PRINTEMPS. IN the aisles of the orchard fair blossoms are drifting, The white petals drop one by one, And the tulip's pale stalk from the garden is lifting A goblet of gems to the sun ! Come ramble awhile through this exquisite weather Of days that are fleet to pass, When the stem of the willow shoots out a green feather, And buttercups burn in the grass ! DARK SPRING. 59 When, pushing the soil from her bonny pink shoul- ders, The clover glides forth to the world, And the fresh mosses gleam on the grey rugged boulders, With delicate May-dew impearled ! What vows to their sweethearts the gay robins utter! No marvel such wooers are heard ! Heigh-ho ! how the bosoms that scorn us would flutter, If man could make love like a bird ! EDGAR FAWCETT. DARK SPRING. Now the mavis and the merle Lavish their full hearts in song, Peach and almond boughs unfurl White and purple blooms along A blue burning air, And all is very fair. But ah ! the silence and the sorrow I may not borrow Any anodyne for grief From the joy of flower or leaf, No healing to allay my pain From the cool of air and rain ; Every sweet sound grew still, 60 FLED ARE THE FROSTS. Every fair color pale, When his life began to wane ; They may never live again ! A child's voice and visage will Evermore about me fail. Ah ! the silence and the sorrow ! Now my listless feet will go Laboring ever as in snow : Though the year with glowing wine Fill the living veins of vine ; Though the glossy fig may swell, And night hear her Philomel ; Though the sweet lemon blossom breathe, And fair Sun his falchion wreathe With crimson roses at his foot, All is desolate and mute ; Dark to-day, and dark to-morrow, Ah ! the silence and the sorrow ! RODEN BERKELEY WJUOTHESLEY NOEL. Love and Loss. FLED ARE THE FROSTS. FLED are the frosts and now the fields appear Re-clothed in fresh and verdant diaper ; Thawed are the snows and now the lusty spring Gives to each mead a neat enameling ; The palms put forth their gems, and every tree Now swaggers in her leafy gallantry. ROBERT HEKRICK. MAY, 6 1 MAY. SWEET month of Mary, month of May, What pale pure flowerets strew thy way ; Bellissima ! Low lilies press about thy feet With violets changing kisses sweet ; Dulcissima ! While through the snow that latest lingers The Mayflower thrusts her fairy fingers ; Rubentissima ! As through the Virgin's holy mood Struck tender joys of motherhood; Sanctissima ! Even thy moon, so cold and clear, Shines with a beauty half austere ; Splendissima ! While chill pure winds from eastern seas Enfold no dream of tropic breeze ; Purissima ! But, month of Mary, month of May, Still with our love we'll strew thy way ; Bellissima ! For O, sweet maiden of the year, We cannot choose but hold thee dear ; Carissima ! MRS. JANE [GOODWIN] AUSTIN. 62 MAY AV MA Y IX KfXGSTOX. OUR old colonial town is new with May : The loving trees that clasp across the streets, Grow greener sleeved with bursting buds each day. Still this year's May the last year's May repeats ; Even the old stone houses half renew Their youth and beauty, as the old trees do. High over all, like some divine desire Above our lower thoughts of daily care, The grey, religious, heaven-touching spire Adds to the quiet of the springtime air ; And over roofs the birds create a sea, That has no shore, of their May melody. Down through the lowlands now of lightest green, The undecided creek winds on its way. There the lithe willow bends with graceful mien, And sees its likeness in the depths all day ; While in the orchards, flushed with May's warm light, The bride-like fruit-trees dwell, attired in white. But yonder loom the mountains old and grand, That off, along dim distance, reach afar, And high and vast, against the sunset stand, A dreamy range, long and irregular, A caravan that never passes by, \Yhose camel-backs are laden with the sky. HIMRY ABBEY. APPLE BLOSSOMS. 63 APPLE BLOSSOMS. THE apple trees with bloom are all aglow : Soft drifts of perfumed light : A miracle of mingled fire and snow : A laugh of spring's delight. Their ranks of creamy splendor pillow deep The valleys pure repose ; On mossy walls, in meadow nooks, they heap Surges of frosted rose. Around old homesteads, clustering thick, they shed Their sweets to murmuring bees, And o'er hushed lanes and wayside fountains spread Their pictured canopies. Green-breasted knolls and forest edges wear Their beautiful array ; And lonesome graves are sheltered, here and there, With their memorial spray. The efflorescence on unnumbered boughs Pants with delicious breath ; O'er me seem laughing eyes and fair, smooth brows, And shapes too sweet for death. Clusters of dimpled faces float between The soft, caressing plumes, And lovely creatures 'mong the branches lean, Lulled by faint, flower-born tunes. 64 /iV MAY. A rude wind blows, and as the blossoms fall, My heart is borne away : Fainter and fainter tender voices call Of my enamored May. Fainter and fainter, oh, how strange it seems, With so much sweetness fled ! I go like one who dreams within his dreams, That, living, he is dead ! HORATIO NELSON POWERS. In The Century Magazine. IN MA Y. SEE ! the cautious oak at last, Owning angry winter past, Spreads his smiling leaves, in haste, Lest the roving woodsman dread, Haply holding him for dead, Plying horrid wound on wound, With gleaming axe should bear him to the ground. When with emulous blossoms gay, Snowy chestnut, snowy may, Laugh by every woodland way ; Then the blushing lilac kisses His laburnum's golden tresses. And, while sheepbells mingle sweet With the newborn-lambkin's bleat, Loud the pairing thrushes sing, " Wintertime has turned to Spring." ALFRED PERCEVAL GRAVES. IN BLOSSOM TIME. 6$ IN BLOSSOM TIME. IT'S O my heart, my heart, To be out in the sun and sing ! To sing and shout in the fields about, In the balm and the blossoming. Sing loud, O bird in the tree ; bird, sing loud in the sky, And honey-bees, blacken the clover seas: There are none of you glad as I. The leaves laugh low in the wind, Laugh low with the wind at play ; And the odorous call of the flowers all Entices my soul away ! For O but the world is fair, is fair : And O but the world is sweet ! I will out in the gold of the blossoming mold, And sit at the Master's feet. And the love my heart would speak, 1 will fold in the lily's rim, That the lips of the blossom, more pure and meek, May offer it up to Him. Then sing in the hedgerow green, O thrush, O skylark, sing in the blue : Sing loud, sing clear, that the King may hear, And my soul shall sing with you ! INA DONNA COOLLKITH. 66 ON A COUNTRY ROAD. ON A COUNTRY ROAD. (BALLADE.) ALONG these low pleached lanes, on such a day, So soft a day as this, through shade and sun, With glad grave eyes that scanned the glad wild way, And heart still hovering o'er a song begun, And smile that warmed the world with benison, Our father, lord long since of lordly rhyme, Long since hath haply ridden, when the lime Bloomed broad above him, flowering where he came. Because thy passage once made warm this clime, Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy name. Each year that England clothes herself with May, She takes thy likeness on her. Time hath spun Fresh raiment all in vain and strange array For earth and man's new spirit, fain to shun Things past for dreams of better to be won, Through many a century since thy funeral chime Rang, and men deemed it death's most direful crime To have spared not thee for very love or shame ; And yet, while mists round last year's memories climb, Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy name. Each turn of the old wild road whereon we stray, Meseems, might bring us face to face with one Whom seeing we could not but give thanks, and pray MA r. 67 . For England's love our father and her son To speak with us as once in days long done With all men, sage and churl and monk and mime, Who knew not as we know the soul sublime That sang for song's love more than lust of fame. Yet, though this be not, yet, in happy time, Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy name. ENVOY. Friend, even as bees about the flowering thyme, Years crowd on years, till hoar decay begrime Names once beloved ; but, seeing the sun the same, As birds of autumn fain to praise the prime, Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy name. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE. MAY. THEN came fair May, the fairest maid on ground, Decked all with dainties of her seasons pride, And throwing flowers out of her lap around : Upon two brethrens' shoulders she did ride, The twins of Leda, which on either side Supported her like to their sovereign Queen : Lord ! how all creatures laughed when her they spied And leaped and danced as they had ravished been ! And Cupid's self about her fluttered all in green. EDMUND SPENSER. The Faerie Queene. 68 MAY GLADA'ESS. At AY. GROWN A-COLD. O CERTAINLY, no month this is but May ! Sweet earth and sky, sweet birds of happy song, Do make thee happy now, and thou art strong, And many a tear thy love shall wipe away And make the dark night merrier than the day, Straighten the crooked paths and right the wrong, And tangle bliss so that it tarry long. Go cry aloud the hope the heavens do say ! Nay, what is this ? and wherefore lingerest thou ? Why sayest thou the sky is hard as stone ? Why sayest thou the thrushes sob and moan ? Why sayest thou the East tears bloom and bough ? Why seem the sons of man so hopeless now ? Thy love is gone, poor wretch, thou art alone ! WILLIAM MORRIS. MAY GLADNESS. THE lark is singing in the blinding sky, Hedges are white with May. The bridegroom sea Is toying with the shore, his wedded bride, And, in the fulness of his marriage joy, He decorates her tawny brow with shells, Retires a space, to see how fair she looks, Then proud, runs up to kiss her. All is fair : All glad, from grass to sun. ALEXANDER SMITH. A Life Drama. IN MAY. MAY, 69 IN MA Y. Now, while the long-delaying ash assumes The delicate April-green, and, loud and clear, Through the cool, yellow, mellow twilight glooms, The thrush's song enchants the captive ear ; Now, while a shower is pleasant in the falling, Stirring the still perfume that wakes around ; Now, that doves mourn, and from the distance call- ing, The cuckoo answers, with a sovereign sound, Come with thy native heart, O true and tried ! But leave all books ; for what with converse high, Flavored with Attic wit, the time shall glide On smoothly, as a river floweth by, Or as on stately pinion, through the grey Evening, the culver cuts his liquid way. DAVID GRAY. / the Shadows* MAY. WHO cares on the land to stay, Wooing the wilful May ; Leave the coquette To smile or pet And away to the sea, away ! My beauty, my bark at sea With the winds and the wild clouds and me; 7O APPLE BLOSSOMS. The low shore soon Will be down with the moon, And none on the waves but we. On ! on ! with a swoop and a swirl, High over the clear waves curl ; Tender they prow Like a fairy now, Make the blue water bubble with pearl. Lo ! yonder, my lady, the light ! Tis the last of the land in sight ! Look once, and away ! Bows down in the spray ; Lighted on by the lamps of the night ! EDWIN ARNOLD. APPLE BLOSSOMS. HAVE you seen an apple orchard in the spring ? In the spring? An English apple orchard in the spring ? When the spreading trees are hoary With their wealth of promise-glory, And the mavis pipes his story In the spring ! Have you plucked the apple blossoms in the spring ? In the spring ? APPLE BLOSSOMS. 7 1 And caught their subtle odors in the spring ? Pink buds pouting at the light, Crumpled petals baby-white, Just to touch them, a delight ! In the spring ! Have you walked beneath the blossoms in the spring ? In the spring? Beneath the apple blossoms in the spring ? When the pink cascades are falling, And the silver brooklets brawling, And the cuckoo bird is calling, In the spring! Have you seen a merry bridal in the spring ? In the spring? In an English apple county in the spring ? When the bride and maidens wear Apple blossoms in their hair, Apple blossoms everywhere In the spring? If you have not, then you know not, in the spring, In the spring ! Half the color, beauty, wonder of the spring. No sight can I remember Half so precious, half so tender, As the apple blossoms render In the spring ! WILLIAM WILSEY MARTIN. 72 IN MAY. IN MA Y. THAT was a curlew calling overhead, That fine, clear whistle shaken from the clouds : See ! hovering o'er the swamp with wings outspread, He sinks where at its edge in shining crowds The yellow violets dance as they unfold, In the blithe spring wind, all their green and gold. Blithe south wind, spreading bloom upon the sea, Drawing about the world this band of haze So softly delicate, and bringing me A touch of balm that like a blessing stays ; Though beauty like a dream bathes sea and land, For the first time Death holds me by the hand. Yet none the less the swallows weave above Through the bright air a web of light and song, And calling clear and sweet from cove to cove, The sandpiper, the lonely rocks among, Makes wistful music, and the singing sea Sends its strong chorus upward solemnly. Mother Nature, infinitely dear ! Vainly I search the beauty of thy face, Vainly thy myriad voices charm my ear, I cannot gather from thee any trace Of God's intent. Help me to understand Why, this sweet morn, Death hoids me by the hand. 1 watch the waves, shoulder to shoulder set, That strive and vanish and are seen no more. AS IT I- ELL UPON A DAY. 73 The earth is sown with graves that we forget, And races of mankind the wide world o'er Rise, strive, and vanish, leaving nought behind, Like changing waves swept by the changing wind. " Hard-hearted, cold, and blind," she answers me, " Vexing thy soul with riddles hard to guess ! No waste of any atom canst thou see, Nor make I any gesture purposeless. Lift thy dim eyes up to the conscious sky ! God meant that rapture in the curlew's cry. " He holds His whirling worlds in check ; not one May from its awful orbit swerve aside ; Yet breathes He in this south wind, bids the sun Wake the fair flowers He fashioned, far and wide, And this strong pain thou canst not understand Is but His grasp on thy reluctant hand." MRS. CELIA [LAIGHTON] THAXTER. AS IT FELL UPON A DAY. As it fell upon a day In the merry month of May, Sitting in a pleasant shade Which a grove of myrtles made, Beasts did leap and birds did sing, Trees did grow, and plants did spring, Everything did banish moan, Save the nightingale alone. 74 * LATE SPRING. She, poor bird, as all forlorn, Leaned her breast uptill a thorn, And there sung the dolefulest ditty, That to hear it was great pity : Fie, fie, fie, now would she cry ; Teru, Tern, by and by : That, to hear her so complain, Scarce I could from tears refrain ; For her griefs, so lively shown, Made me think upon my own. " Ah," thought I, "thou mourn'st in vain ; None takes pity on thy pain ! Senseless trees they cannot hear thee ; Ruthless beasts they will not cheer thee ; King Pandion he is dead ; All thy friends are lapped in lead ; All thy fellow birds do sing, Careless of thy sorrowing : Even so, poor bird, like thee, None alive will pity me." ROBERT BARNFIELD. A LATE SPRING. THE spring, made dreary by incessant rain, Was well-nigh gone, and not a glimpse appeared Of vernal loveliness, but light-green turf Round the deep bubbling fountain in the vale, Or by the rivulet on the hillside, near A LATE SPRING. 75 Its cultivated base, fronting the south, \Yhere in the first warm rays of March it sprung Amid dissolving snow : save these mere specks Of earliest verdure, with a few pale flowers, In other years blowing soon as earth Unveils her face, and a faint vermeil tinge On clumps of maple of the softer kind, Was nothing visible to give to May, Though far advanced, an aspect more like hers Than like November's universal gloom. All day beneath the sheltering hovel stood The drooping herd, or lingered near, to ask The food of winter. A few lonely birds, Of those that in this northern clime remain Throughout the year, and in the dawn of spring, At pleasant noon, from their unknown retreat Come suddenly to view with lively notes, Or those that soonest to this clime return From warmer regions, in thick groves were seen, But with their feathers ruffled, and despoiled Of all their glossy lustre, sitting mute, Or only skipping, with a single chirp, In quest of food. Long swollen in drenching rains, seeds, germs and buds Start at the touch of vivifying beams. Moved by their secret force, the vital lymph Diffusive runs, and spreads o'er wood and field A flood of verdure. Clothed in one short week, Is naked Nature in her full attire. 76 THE RHODORA. On the first morn, light as an open plain Is all the woodland, filled with sunbeams, poured Through the bare tips, on yellow leaves below, With strong reflection : on the last, 'tis dark With full-grown foliage, shading all within. In one short week the orchard buds and blooms. CARLOS WILCOX. The Age of Benevolence. THE RHODORA. IN May, when sea winds pierced our solitudes, I found the fresh rhodora in the woods, Spreading its leafless blooms in a damp nook, To please the desert and the sluggish brook. The purple petals, fallen in the pool, Made the black water with their beauty gay ; Here might the redbird come his plumes to cool, And court the flower that cheapens his array. Rhodora ! if the sages ask thee why This charm is wasted on the earth and sky, Tell them, dear, that if eyes were made for seeing, Then beauty is its own excuse for being : Why thou wert there, O rival of the rose ! I never thought to ask, I never knew : But, in my simple ignorance suppose The selfsame power that brought me there brought you. RALPH WALDO EMERSON. APPLE BLOSSOMS. 77 APPLE BLOSSOMS. APPLE blossoms, budding, blowing, In the soft May air : Cups with sunshine overflowing, Flakes of fragrance, drifting, snowing, Showering everywhere ! Fairy promises, outgushing From the happy trees ! White souls unto love-light blushing, Heavenly thoughts to utterance rushing, Are not ye like these ? Such an overflow of sweetness Needs the heart of spring ; In her wealth of bloom is meetness, Though to the ripe fruit's completeness All she may not bring. Words are more than idle seeming ; Blossoms of good will. What she would do, Love is dreaming ; What she can, ashamed of scheming, Cramped and stinted still. Apple blossoms, billowy brightness On the tide of May, Oh, to wear your rose-touched whiteness ! Flushing into bloom, with lightness To give life away ! LUCY LARCOM. 78 APPLE BLOSSOMS. A SNOWFLAKE IN MAY. (TRIOLET.) I SAW a snowflake in the air When smiling May had decked the year, And then 'twas gone, I knew not where ; I saw a snowflake in the air, And thought perchance an angel's prayer Had fallen from some starry sphere ; I saw a snowflake in the air When smiling May had decked the year. CLINTON SCOLLARD. APPLE BLOSSOMS. STORM-TWISTED, gnarled bough, Bloom forth in beauty now, Spring breezes woo thee 1 Hush the wind's blustering, Wear thy fresh clustering Blossoms, close mustering, Hastening to thee ! Leaf, bud, corolla fair, Spread in ambrosial air, Bossy branch cover ; In pink and white array, Decked for thy bridal day, Reaching forth graciously, Welcome thy lover ! MRS. LOUISA PARSONS [STONE] HOPKINS. IN MA K MA Y. 79 IN MA Y. Now that the green hillside has quite Forgot that it was ever white, \Yith quivering grasses clothed upon, And dandelions invite the sun ; And columbines have found a way To overcome the hard and grey Old rocks that also feel the spring ; And birds make love and swing and sing On boughs which were so bare of late ; And bees become importunate ; And butterflies are quite at ease Upon the well-contented breeze, Which only is enough to make A shadowy laughter on the lake ; And all the clouds that here and there Are floating, melting in the air, Are such as beautify the blue ; Now what is worthier, May, than you Of all my praise, of all my love, Except whom you remind me of ? ROBERT KELLEY WEEKS. MAY. OVER the hilltop and down in the meadow-grass Heaven like dew on the waking earth lies ; Part of it, dear, is the blue of these violets, Best of it all, I find in your eyes. WILLIS BOVD ALLEN. 80 SONG TO MAY. SONG TO MAY. MAY, queen of blossoms And fulfilling flowers, With what pretty music Shall we charm the hours ? Wilt thou have pipe and reed, Blown in the open mead ? Or to the lute give heed In the green bowers ? Thou hast no need of us, Or pipe or wire, Thou hast the golden bee Ripened with fire ; And many thousand more Songsters that thee adore, Filling earth's grassy floor With new desire. Thou hast thy mighty herds, Tame, and free livers ; Doubt not, thy music too, In the deep rivers ; And the whole plumy flight, Warbling the day and night; Up at the gates of light, See, the lark quivers ! When with the jacinth Coy fountains are tressed j A QUIET EVE JN SPRING. 8 1 And for the mournful bird Green woods are dressed, That did for Tereus pine ; Then shall our songs be thine, To whom our hearts incline : May, be thou blessed ! EDWARD HOVELL-THURLOW. A QUIET EVE IN SPRING. Tis the quiet eve of a northern spring : the village sleeps in the sun That flames in the west as fair as when the world was new begun. Tired Labor lays his tools aside and his cramped soul warms with mirth As he lingers out in the cool spring wind to look on the lovely earth : For the crocus gleams in the garden plots, primroses shine on the leas, And faintly, slowly, like gathering flame, the green tint gains on the trees. The swallow has come from the south once more to live in his last year's nest, For his heart, too, clings to the olden things and the places his youth knew best : The newborn bee is out in the fields, he is labor- ing, too, as we, To garner fruit through the sunshine hours for the days he shall never see ; 82 MA Y. And the heart of man, on this eve of spring, is glad, and he knows not why, But he feels that to live is a lovely thing, though at last he must die. J. A Village Idyll. MAY. O LOVE, this morn when the sweet nightingale Had so long finished all he had to say, That thou hadst slept, and sleep had told his tale ; And midst a peaceful dream had stolen away In fragrant dawning of the first of May, Didst thou see aught ? didst thou hear voices sing Ere to the risen sun the bells 'gan ring ? For then methought the Lord of Love went by To take possession of his flowery throne, Ringed round with maids, and youths, and min- strelsy ; A little while I sighed to find him gone, A little while the dawning was alone, And the light gathered ; then I held my breath, And shuddered at the sight of Eld and Death. Alas ! Love passed me in the twilight dun, His music hushed the wakening ouzel's song ; PICTURES OF SPRING. 83 But on these twain shone out the golden sun, And o'er their heads the brown birds' tune was strong, As shivering, twixt the trees they stole along ; None noted aught their noiseless passing by, The world had quite forgotten it must die. WILLIAM MORRIS. The Earthly Paradise. PICTURES OF SPRING. APPLE blossoms in the orchard, Singing birds on every tree ; Grass a-growing in the meadows Just as green as green can be ; Violets in shady places, Sweetest flowers were ever seen ! Hosts of starry dandelions, " Drops of gold among the green ! " Pale arbutus, fairy. wind-flowers, Innocents in smiling flocks ; Coolest ferns within the hollows, Columbines among the rocks ; Dripping streams, delicious mosses, Tassels on the maple trees ; Drowsy insects, humming, humming ; Golden butterflies and bees ; 84 SPRING IN TUSCANY. Daffodils in garden borders, Fiery tulips dashed with dew ; Crocus flowers ; and, through the greenness, Snowdrops looking out at you ! MRS. CAROLINE ATHERTON [BRIGGS] MASON. SPRING IN TUSCANY. ROSE-RED lilies that bloom on the banner; Rose-cheeked gardens that revel in spring; Rose-mouthed acacias that laugh as they climb, Like plumes for a queen's hand fashioned to fan her With wind more soft than a wild dove's wing, What do they sing in the spring of their time ? If this be the rose that the world hears singing, Soft in the soft night, loud in the day, Songs for the fireflies to dance as they hear; If that be the song of the nightingale, springing Forth in the form of a rose in May, What do they say of the way of the year ? What of the way of the world gone Maying, What of the work of the buds in the bowers, What of the will of the wind on the wall, Fluttering the wallflowers, sighing and playing, Shrinking again as a bird that cowers, Thinking of hours when the flowers have to fall ? SPRING IN TUSCANY. 8$ Out of the throats of the loud birds showering, Out of the folds where the flag-lilies leap, Out of the mouths of the roses stirred, Out of the herbs on the walls reflowering, Out of the heights where the sheer snows sleep, Out of the deep and the steep, one word, One from the lips of the lily-flames leaping, The glad red lilies that burn in our sight, The great live lilies for standard and crown ; One from the steeps where the pines are sleeping, One from the deep land, one from the height, One from the light and might of the town. The lowlands laugh with delight of the highlands, \Yhence May winds feed them with balm and breath From hills that beheld in the years behind A shape as of one from the blest souls' islands, Made fair by a soul too fair for death, With eyes on the light that should smite them blind. Vallombrosa remotely remembers, Perchance, what still to us seems so near, That time not darkens it, change not mars, The foot that she knew when her leaves were Sep- tember's, The face lift up to the star-blind seer, That saw from his prison arisen his stars. 86 MAY MORN SONG. And Pisa broods on her dead, not mourning, For love of her loveliness given them in fee ; And Prato gleams with the glad monk's gift Whose hand was there as the hand of morning ; And Siena, set in the sand's red sea, Lifts loftier her head than the red sand's drift. And far to the fair southwestward lightens, Girdled and sandaled and plumed with flowers, At sunset over the love-lit lands, The hillside's crown where the wild hill brightens, Saint Fina's town of the Beautiful Towers, Hailing the sun with a hundred hands. Land of us all that have loved thee dearliest, Mother of men that were lords of man, Whose name in the world's heart works as a spell, My last song's light, and the star of mine earliest, As we turn from thee, sweet, who wast ours for a span, Fare well we may not who say farewell. ALGERNON CHARLES SWINBURNE. MA Y MORN SONG. THE grass is wet with shining dews, Their silver bells hang on each tree, While opening flower and bursting bud Breathe incense forth unceasingly ; MA Y MORN SONG. 8/ The mavis pipes in greenwood shaw, The throstle glads the spreading thorn, And cheerily the blithesome lark Salutes the rosy face of morn. 'Tis early prime ; And hark ! hark ! hark ! His merry chime Chirrups the lark : Chirrup ! chirrup ! he heralds in The jolly sun with matin hymn. Come, come, my love ! and May-dews shake In pailfuls from each drooping bough ; They'll give fresh lustre to the bloom, That breaks upon thy young cheek now. O er hill and dale, o'er waste and wood, Aurora's smiles are streaming free ; With earth it seems brave holyday, In heaven it looks right jubilee. And it is right, For mark, love, mark ! How bathed in light Chirrups the lark : Chirrup ! chirrup ! he upward flies, Like holy thoughts to cloudless skies. They lack all heart who cannot feel The voice of heaven within them thrill, In summer morn when mounting high This merry minstrel sings his fill. 88 IN SPRING. Now let us seek yon bosky dell Where brightest wildflowers choose to be, And where its clear stream murmurs on, Meet type of our love's purity ; No witness there, And o'er us hark ! High in the air Chirrups the lark : Chirrup ! chirrup ! away soars he, Bearing to heaven my vows to thee ! WILLIAM MOTHERWKLL. IN SPRING. THE amorous birds now pair in every brake, And build their mossy homes in field and brere, And the green lizard and the golden snake, Like unimprisoned flames, out of their trance awake. Through wood and stream and field and hill and ocean A quickening life from the earth's heart has burst, As it has ever done, with change and motion, From the great morning of the world when first God dawned on chaos ; in its stream immersed, The lamps of heaven flash with a softer light ; All baser things pant with life's sacred thirst, Diffuse themselves, and spend in love's delight The beauty and the joy of their renewed might. PERCY BVSSHE SHELLEY. AJonais. SONG OF THE SPRING. 89 SONG OF THE SPRIA 7 G. BLUE lies the light upon the hills ; Keen scents of earth steal freshly up, Mixed with the winy air that fills The valley like a mighty cup. Warm winds, blown hither from yon wold, Come laden with the breath of flowers, And songs of brooks are blithely trolled Through all the slumberous, sunlit hours. From far afield, yet sweet and clear Above the mingled sounds of spring, Through all the mellow day I hear The swinging sower lightly sing. Like flakes of newly fallen snow, The blossoms flutter from the trees ; And like far music, faint and low, I hear the murmur of the bees. Ah, soul ! how good it is to be ! The pulses of the very sod Awake, and stir mysteriously Beneath the quickening breath of God. There is no death ; the years shall bring Thee nearer to some viewless goal, Where bloom perennial flowers of spring, And singing streams forever roll. JAMES BENJAMIN KEN YON. 90 'TWAS PRIME OF MAY. MAY. OF sunlight and green shade, and songs of birds, a happy blending, Of perfumes, and sweet sounds, and eyes' delight, Mild showers, and blooming boughs, a pleasure never-ending, A gentle coming on of calm, cool night, These, these are blessings scattered in our way, In happy May. In happy May, when winter, girt with hideous winds Seeks his ice caverns, his spies work summer grief ; The canker blasts the bud ; the ivy creeping binds The oak in galling chains ; the chill rain spots the leaf; They plot by night, they plot the livelong day In mournful May. GEORGE WALTER THORNBURY. PRIME OF MAY. 'TWAS prime of May ; and every square became A murmuring camp of summer. Now and then A dizzy and bewildered butterfly Fluttered through noisy streets. ALEXANDER SMITH. A Boy's J'MHI. NATURE'S FINEST TOUCH. $1 WINDERMERE IN MID-MA Y. COULD aught arrest the rushing wings of Time Or fix his shadow on the dial's face, This were the hour supreme, the perfect place, Winandermere, in May's eternal prime, So should you ask her emerald never yield Her fragrant snow this hawthorn, thrush and lark Carol all day, and not one storm-cloud dark Fright the soft fleeces from heaven's azure field ; The while we drank imperishable delight From the sun-smitten vale, the lustrous lake, The opposing purple of the lofty Fells, And breathed his verse who from the wood-nymph bright Stole every secret of the whispering brake, And spoiled the Mountain Spirit of all his spells. ALFRED PERCEVAL GRAVES. WHEN NATURE TRIES HER FINEST TOUCH. WHEN Nature tries her finest touch, Weaving her vernal wreath, Mark ye, how close she veils her round, Not to be traced by sight or sound, Nor soiled by ruder breath ? JOHN KEBLE. The Christian Year. 92 VITA VITA US. VITA VITALIS. WHEN first the spring grasses Take motion, and glisten In sun-litten masses, Wherethrough the brook passes And shimmers and sings ; When first the birds woo me To linger and listen, And watch them upspringing On wonderful wings ; When breezes are bringing Sweet scents to renew me, Sweet sounds thrilling through me, From apple blooms over The blossoming clover, Where bees murmur, clinging With passionate pleasure, And butterflies wander In silence, at leisure, Like spirits that ponder Inscrutable things ; Then always and ever, Despite my endeavor To 'scape its control, Some inflowing sadness Discolors the gladness That freshens my soul ; Some answerless question, Some subtile suggestion, VITA VITAL1S. 93 Some shyly returning Unsought recollection ; Some eager projection Of vague undiscerning, But passionate yearning ; A hoping, regretting, Remembering, forgetting ; A groping, a reaching, Demanding, beseeching; A strangeness, a dearness, A distance, a nearness ; Perplexes, excites me, Repels me, invites me, And fills me with fear : With fear of foregoing My life without knowing The life that without me, Above me, about me, Is ceaselessly flowing So near me, so near ! So near, and yet ever Beyond my endeavor To woo it and win it, To have it and be it, To lose myself in it. I only can see it, And feel it and hear it, And love it and fear it, So willing to bless me, So stern to repress me. 94 VITA VITALIS. What is it, what is it Which makes me to miss it, And only to miss it ? What charm to be spoken ? What spell to be broken, Before I regain it Once more, or attain it At last, and inherit And hold as securely As any of these, The life that my spirit Remembers obscurely, Obscurely foresees ? Winged spirits, that wander In silence and ponder Inscrutable things, Ah ! why do ye shun me ? Float over, light on me, O touch me and thrill me, With watchfulness fill me ! Nay ! fan me and still me, Ye wonderful wings, To slumber, if only, Me sleeping, my lonely Shy spirit, who knew you Once haply, can woo you To take her unto you Once more where ye wander In silence and ponder Inscrutable things ! ROBERT KELI.EY WEEKS. IN A MAY DAY HUSfT. 95 SYLVAN MUSINGS. (IN MAY.) COUCHED in cool shadow, girt by billowy swells Of foliage, rippling into buds and flowers, Here I repose o'erfanned by breezy bowers, Lulled by a delicate stream whose music wells Tender and low through those luxuriant dells, Wherefrom a single broad-leaved chestnut towers ; Still musing in the long, lush, languid hours, As in a dream I heard the tinkling bells Of far-off kine, glimpsed through the verdurous sheen, Blent with faint bleatings from the distant croft, The bee -throngs murmurous in the golden fern, The wood-doves veiled by depths of flickering green, And near me, where the wild " queen fairies " burn, The thrush's bridal passion warm and soft ! PAUL HAMILTON HAYNE, IN A MAY DAY HUSH. WHEN in a May day hush Chanteth the missel-thrush The harp o' the heart makes answer with murmurous stirs. JEAN INGELOW. The Nightingale Heard by tke Unsatisfied Heart. 96 DANDELIONS. AN ORCHARD FANCY. THERE stands a tree in the orchard, All leafless in its woe, Yet a little limb bears a handful Of blossoms white as snow. A picture of spring and winter Together, it seems to me, Or some old bent grandfather, With his grandchild on his knee. RICHARD KENDALL MUNKITTRICK. DANDELIONS. Now dandelions in the short, new grass, Through all their rapid stages daily pass ; No bee yet visits them ; each has its place, Still near enough to see the other's face ; Unkenned the bud, so like the grass and ground In our old country yards where thickest found, Some morn it opes a little golden sun, And sets in its own west when day is done. In a few days more 'tis old and silvery grey, And though so close to earth it made its stay, Lo ! now it findeth wings and lightly flies, A spirit form, till on the sight it dies. JOHN ALBFE. TO AfAT. 97 TO MAY. MAY, thou month of rosy beauty, Month, when pleasure is a duty ; Month of maids that milk the kine, Bosom rich, and breath divine ; Month of bees, and month of flowers, Month of blossom-laden bowers ; Month of little hands with daisies, Lovers' love, and poets' praises ; thou merry month complete, May, thy very name is sweet ! May was maid in olden times, And is still in Scottish rhymes ; May's the blooming hawthorn bough ; May's the month that's laughing now. 1 no sooner write the word, Than it seems as though it heard, And looks up and laughs at me, Like a sweet face, rosily, Like an actual color bright, Flushing from the paper's white ; Like a bride that knows her power, Started in a summer bower. If the rains that do us wrong Come to keep the winter long And deny us thy sweet looks, I can love thee, sweet, in books, Love thee in the poets' pages, Where they keep thee green for ages ; 98 IN MIDDLE MAY. Love and read thee, as a lover Reads his lady's letters over, Breathing blessings on the art, Which commingles those that part. There is May in books forever ; May will part from Spenser never ; May's in Milton, May's in Prior, May's in Chaucer, Thomson, Dyer; May's in all the Italian books ; .She has old and modern nooks, Where she sleeps with nymphs and elves In happy places they call shelves, And will rise, and dress your rooms With a drapery thick with blooms. Come, ye rains then, if ye will, May's at home, and with me still : But come rather, thou, good weather, And find us in the fields together. JAMES HENRY LEIGH HUNT. IN MIDDLE MA Y. THE nightingale, full-toned in middle May, Hath ever and anon a note so thin It seems another voice in other groves. ALFRED TENNYSON. Balin and Balait. MAY. 99 APPLE BLOSSOMS. THE soft wind whispered secrets to the apple tree, Caressed her in his arms and would not let her go Until the rosy blossoms came triumphantly To tell the one sweet message that he wished to know. A timid maiden with her lover lingered there In silence, clasping hands amid the leaves that fell, Till one bold blossom drifting down the perfumed air Just touched her rounded cheek, and bade the blushes tell. FRANK DEMPSTER SHERMAN. MAY. I FEEL a newer life in every gale ; The winds that fan the flowers, And with their welcome breathings fill the sail, Tell of serener hours : Of hours that glide unfelt away Beneath the sky of May. The spirit of the gentle south wind calls From his blue throne of air, And where his whispering voice in music falls, Beauty is budding there ; The bright ones of the valley break Their slumbers, and awake. 100 A MAY SONG. The waving verdure rolls along the plain, And the wide forest weaves, To welcome back its playful mates again, A canopy of leaves ; And from its darkening shadow floats A 1 gush of trembling notes. Fairer and brighter spreads the reign of May ; The tresses of the woods With the light dallying of the west wind play ; And the full-brimming floods, As gladly to their goal they run, Hail the returning sun. JAMES GATES PERCIVAL. A MA Y SONG. A LITTLE while my love and I, Before the mowing of the hay, Twined daisy-chains and cowslip-balls, And caroled glees and madrigals, Before the hay, beneath the may, My love (who loved me then) and I. For long years now my love and I Tread severed paths to varied ends ; We sometimes meet, and sometimes say The trivial things of every day, And meet as comrades, meet as friends. My love (who loved me once) and I. A SONG OF MAY. IOI But nevermore my love and I \Yill wander forth, as once, together, Or sing the songs we used to sing In springtime in the cloudless weather ; Some chord is mute that used to ring, Some word forgot we used to say Amongst the may, before the hay, . My love (who loves me not) and I. MRS. MARY MONTGOMERIE [LAME] SINGLETON. A SONG OF MAY. MY heart is light with May, with May, My heart is light with May ! The sky is soft ; the coming birds Are silent on their way. The miracle of flower and fruit Not yet the Lord hath wrought ; But never ripened summertime So bright a day hath brought. For there is promise in the air, And murmurous prophecy ; All breathless and with lifted arms, Stand waiting shrub and tree. To-morrow shall the blossoms glow ; At dawn the birds will sing; 102 THE WOODS IN MAY. All through the stillness .deep I hear The rushing tide of spring. My heart is light with May, with May, My heart is light with May ! And all the more that coming birds Are silent on their way. MRS. MARY [MAPES] DODGE. THE WOODS IN MA Y. 'Tis merry in greenwood, thus runs the old lay, In the gladsome month of lively May When the wild birds' song on stem and spray Invites to forest bower ; Then rears the ash his airy crest, Then shines the birch in silver vest, And the beech in glittering leaves is drest, And dark between shows the oak's proud breast, Like a chieftain's frowning tower ; Though a thousand branches join their screen, Yet the broken sunbeams glance between, And tip the leaves with lighter green, With brighter tints the flower : Dull is the heart that loves not then The deep recess of the wildwood glen, Where roe and red-deer find sheltering den \Yhen the sun is in his power. WALTER SCOTT. Harold the Dauntless, SPRING SONG. MAY. 1 03 SPRING SONG. WHILE I linger in her room, Singing idly at her feet, Si douce est la Marguerite, Are the clover blossoms sweet, Are the apple trees in bloom, While I linger in her room ? Is there murmuring of bees While I murmur at her feet, Si douce est la Marguerite ? Is there singing swift and sweet By the brookside, in the trees ? Is there murmuring of bees ? In the springtime of the year, Sitting singing at her feet, Si douce est la Marguerite, Is there then no other sweet Thing to see or have or hear In the springtime of the year ? ROBERT KELLEY WEEKS MAY. New flowery scents strewed everywhere, New sunshine poured in largess fair, " We shall be happy now," we say. A voice just trembles through the air, And whispers, " May." 104 Nay, but we must ! No tiny bud But thrills with rapture at the flood Of fresh young life which stirs to-day. The same wild thrill irradiates our blood ; Why hint of " May " ? For us are coming fast and soon The delicate witcheries of June ; July, with ankles deep in hay ; The bounteous Autumn. Like a mocking tune Again sounds, " May." Spring's last born darling, clear-eyed, sweet, Pauses a moment, with white twinkling feet, And golden locks in breezy play, Half teasing and half tender, to repeat Her song of " May." Ah, month of hope ! all promised glee, All merry meanings, lie in thee ; Surely no cloud can daunt thy day. The ripe lips part in shining mockery, And murmur, " May." Still from the smile a comfort may we glean ; Although our "must-be's," "shall-be's," idle seem, Close to our hearts one little word we lay. We may not be as happy as we dream, But then we, may. SARAH CHAUNCEY WOOLSEY. A SPRINGTIME. 1 05 A SPRINGTIME. ONE knows the spring is coming : There are birds ; the fields are green ; There is balm in the sunlight and moonlight, A dew in the twilights between. But ever there is a silence, A rapture great and dumb, That day when the doubt has ended, And at last the spring is come. Behold the wonder, O silence ! Strange as if wrought in a night: The waited and lingering glory, The world-old, fresh delight ! O blossoms that hang like winter, Drifted upon the trees, O birds that sing in the blossoms, O blossom-haunting bees, O green, green leaves on the branches, O shadowy dark below, O cool of the aisles of orchards, Woods that the wild flowers know : O air of gold and perfume, Wind, breathing sweet and sun, O sky of perfect azure, Day, Heaven and Earth in one ! 106 BESIDE THE SEA. Let me draw near thy secret, And in thy deep heart see How fared, in doubt and dreaming, The spring that is come in me. For my soul is held in silence, A rapture great and dumb, For the mystery that lingered, The glory that is come ! WILLIAM DEAN HOWELLS. BESIDE THE SEA. I STRAYED one golden noon in May 'Neath trembling trees where sunbeams lay Like bright mosaics on the grass. The roystering robins saw me pass, And quavered forth low greeting notes The while they preened their glossy coats. Down winding paths where tulips burned And jonquils bright their gold unurned, I wandered till I saw outreach A lawn that overlooked the beach. Athwart its emerald belt was set A deftly wrought and dainty net, Recalling mimic wars between The knights who trod the courts of green When Pompadour, long, long ago, With Louis roamed through Fontainebleau. IN THE PRIME OF SPRING. IO/ Beneath a patriarchal pine I sat and watched the sunlit brine. A single gull far out at sea Flew up the still air spirally ; The gleaming of its silvery wing Was like blown aspen leaves in spring, ^"hite-pinioned ships sailed slowly by And faded 'twixt the sea and sky, Each seeking weighty argosies. The hours sped on like silent bees That pass at noonday, amber clad ; The lapping of the waves grew sad As is the song of hermit thrush, Or rustling of the river rush ; Then calm night came, and soon, afar, A beacon light shone like a star ! CLINTON SCOLLARD. IN THE PRIME OF SPRING. IT was in the prime Of the sweet springtime. In the linnet's throat Trembled the love-note, And the love-stirred air Thrilled the blossoms there. Little shadows danced Each a tiny elf, Happy in large light And the thinnest self. 108 COMO Iff MAY. It was but a minute In a far-off spring, But each gentle thing, Sweetly-wooing linnet, Soft-thrilled hawthorn tree, Happy shadowy elf With the thinnest self, Live still on in me. O the sweet, sweet prime Of the past springtime ! MRS. MARIAN [EVANS] [LEWES] CROSS. The Spanish Gipsey. COMO IN MA Y. THE snow had not yet faded from the crest Where Alpine outskirts envy Italy, Yet, looking down the terraced walks, we see, On slopes beneath us, bud with snowy breast, And crimson-bosomed open roses, pressed With jasmine's slender arm and starry eye And nameless twining vines so thick and nigh Unto the parapet that, unconfessed, The stones lie hidden in luxuriance ; And where the bloom-girt pathway steepest slants, A ruined tower looks on the lake's blue trance, Known by its shape alone, so deep the wall Is buried in wistaria's purple fall And countless clustered roses, pink and small. MRS. MARIANNA [GRISWOLD] VAN KENSSKI.AER. A SOA'G OF SPRING. 1 09 A SOA r G OF SPRING. WITH the flying scud, with the birds on the wing, We wandered out at the close of day ; Our faint hearts swelled with the life of the spring, As the young buds bourgeon on branch and spray. As we heard the sheltering coppice ring With a burst of joy too full for words, Our hearts sung, too, but of what strange thing We knew no more than the singing birds. We stood mid the gorse on the golden hill As the sun went down in a sea of mist ; Though its glory was lingering around us still, We were sad at heart, for the end we wist. A homeless breath that was wandering chill Had found a voice in the evening breeze, And the silent birds that had sung their fill Were asleep in the shade of the feathery trees. " Soul of the younger springs gone by, Why haunt us with that breath forlorn, Avenging with a ghostly sigh, Too sad for words, the words we scorn ? " We said, when lo, the coppice nigh Gave forth a voice, and then had done : It seemed to touch the stars on high, It almost might recall the sun. Dear bird of love, fond nightingale, That firest all the grove with song, IIO IN MAY. Till we, who catch the tender tale, Forget the years that do us wrong, Glad birds that no lost springs bewail, Sweet hearts that are not sad and wise : Wake the spring night, young nightingale, And we will see it with thine eyes. MRS. EMILY [DAVIS] PFEIFFER. IN MA Y. . . . ALL the land in flowery squares Beneath a broad and equal-blowing wind, Smelt of the coming summer, as one large cloud Drew downward ; but all else of heaven was pure Up to the sun, and May from verge to verge, And May with me from head to heel The steer forgot to graze, And, where the hedgerow cuts the pathway, stood, Leaning his horns into the neighbor field, And lowing to his fellows. From the woods Came voices of the well-contented doves. The lark could scarce get out his notes for joy But shook his song together as he neared His happy home, the ground. To left and right, The cuckoo told his name to all the hills ; The mellow ouzel fluted in the elm ; The redcap whistled ; and the nightingale Sang loud, as though he were the bird of day. ALFRED TENNYSON. The Gardener's Daughter. MA y. MA YTIDE. 1 1 1 MAY. HEBE'S here, May is here ! The air is fresh and sunny ; And the miser-bees are busy Hoarding golden honey ! See the knots of buttercups, And the purple pansies ; Thick as these, within my brain, Grow the wildest fancies ! Let me write my songs to-day, Rhymes with dulcet closes ; Four-line epics one might hide In the hearts of roses. THOMAS BAILEY ALDRICH. MA YTIDE. TORE long the trees begin to show belief ; The maple crimsons to a coral reef, Then saffern swarms swing off from all the willers So plump they look like yaller caterpillars, Then grey hossches'nuts leetle hands unfold Softer'n a baby's be at three days old : Thet's robin-redbreast's almanick ; he knows Thet arter this ther's only blossom-snows ; So, choosin' out a handy crotch an' spouse, He goes to plast'rin' his adobe house. 112 IN MA Y. Then all comes crowdin' in ; afore you think, Young oak-leaves mist the side-hill woods with pink; The catbird in the laylock-bush is loud ; The orchards turn to heaps o' rosy cloud ; Red cedars blossom tu, though few folks know it, And all look dipt in sunshine like a poet ; The lime-trees pile their solid stacks o' shade An' drows'ly simmer with the bees' sweet trade ; In ellum-shrouds the flashin' hangbird clings An' for the summer vy'ge his hammock slings ; All down the loose-walled lanes in archin' bowers The barb'ry droops its strings o' golden flowers JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL. The Biglow Papers. IN MA K ALL is yclad With pleasance : the ground with grass, the woods With green leaves, the bushes with blooming buds. Young folk now flocken in everywhere, To gather May baskets and smelling brier : And home they hasten the posts to dight, And all the kirk pillars ere daylight, With hawthorn buds, and sweet eglantine, And garlands of roses and sops in wine. KDMUND SPENSER. The Shcpheards Calendar. THE CANADIAN SPRING. 113 THE CANADIAN SPRING. 'TWAS May ! the spring with magic bloom Leaped up from winter's frozen tomb. Day lit the river's icy mail ; The bland warm rain at evening sank ; Ice fragments dashed in midnight's gale ; The moose at morn the ripples drank. The yacht, that stood with naked mast In the locked shallows motionless When sunset fell, went curtseying past As breathed the morning's light caress. The woodsman in the forest deep, At sunrise heard with gladdening thrill, AY here yestereve was gloomy sleep, The brown rossignol's carol shrill ; YVhere yestereve the snowbank spread The hemlock's twisted roots between, He saw the coltsfoot's golden head Rising from mosses plump and green ; Whilst all around were budding trees, And mellow sweetness filled the breeze. A few days passed along, and brought More changes as by magic wrought. With plumes were tipped the beechen sprays ; The birch long dangling tassels showed ; The oak still bare, but in a blaze Of gorgeous red the maple glowed ; With clusters of the purest white Cherry and shadbush charmed the sight Like spots of snow the boughs among; 114 THE FLOWER OF LOVE LIES BLEEDING. And showers of strawberry blossoms made Rich carpets in each field and glade Where day its kindliest glances flung. And air too hailed spring's joyous sway ; The bluebird warbled clear and sweet ; Then came the wren with carols gay, The customed roof and porch to greet ; The mock-bird showed its varied skill ; At evening moaned the whippoonvill. Type of the spring from winter's gloom ! The butterfly new being found ; Whilst round the pink may-apple's bloom Gave myriad drinking bees their sound. Great fleeting clouds the pigeons made ; When near her brood the hunter strayed With trailing limp the partridge stirred ; Whilst a quick feathered spangle shot Rapid as thought from spot to spot Showing the fairy hummingbird. ALFRED BILLINGS STREET. Frontenac. THE FLOWER OF LOVE LIES BLEEDING. I MET a little maid one day, All in the bright May weather; She danced, and brushed the dew away As lightly as a feather. She had a ballad in her hand That she had just been reading, THE FLOWER OF LOVE LIES BLEEDING. 115 But she was too young to understand That ditty of a distant land, " The flower of love lies bleeding." She tripped across the meadow grass, To where a brook was flowing, Across the brook like wind did pass, Wherever flowers were growing. Like some bewildered child she flew, Whom fairies were misleading : " Whose butterfly," I said, " are you ? And what sweet thing do you pursue ? " " The flower of love lies bleeding. " I've found the wild rose in the hedge, And found the tiger-lily, The blue flag by the water's edge, The dancing daffodilly, Kingcups and pansies, every flower Except the one I'm needing ; Perhaps it grows in some dark bower, And opens at a later hour, This flower of love lies bleeding." " I wouldn't look for it," I said, " For you can do without it. There's no such flower." She shook her head. " But I have read about it ! " I talked to her of bee and bird, But she was all .unheeding : Her tender heart was strangely stirred ! Il6 ON THE DOWXS She harped on that unhappy word, " The flower of love lies bleeding ! " " My child," I sighed, and dropped a tear, " I would no longer mind it ; You'll find it some day, never fear, For all of us must find it. I found it many a year ago, With one of gentle breeding : You and the little lad you know, I see why you are weeping so ; Your flower of love lies bleeding ! " RICHARD HENRY STODDARD. ON THE DOWNS. UP, up ! for the earth is a-Maying, And heaven herself is arraying With woven rose Of cloudlets that float and shimmer, Pink mists where the sunbeams glimmer In warm repose. The boughs new-fledged are flinging Green silver and gold with singing Aloft to the blue. O heart of mine, be merry ! With the flower of the thorn and the cherry, Sing thy songs too ! JOHN ADDINGTON SYMONDS. IN MAYTIME. 1 1? THE FIELDS IN MA Y. WHAT can better please, When your mind is well at ease. Than a walk among the green fields in May ? To see the verdure new, And to hear the loud cuckoo, While sunshine makes the whole world gay ? When the grass is full of flowers, And the hedge is full of bowers, And the finch and the linnet piping clear, Where the branches throw their shadows On a footway through the meadows, With a brook among the cresses winding near. WILLIAM ALLINGHAM. IN MA YTIME. UNDER the apple boughs as I sit In Maytime, when the robin's song Thrills the odorous winds along, The innermost heaven seems to ope ; I think, though the old joys pass from sight, Still something is left for hearts' delight, For life is endless, and so is hope. ANNE WHITNEY. Bertha. Il8 BALLADE OF THE MAYTIME, THE FIRST ROSE. THE rose that in the springtide ventures forth To woo the zephyr, with her crimson smiles And odorous wiles, Too often chances on the cruel North ; For every kiss of his cold lips, With poisonous blight her beauty nips. Till one by one with downcast head She weeps away her petals red, And with the last, bereft of life and light Sighs forth her passionate soul on the dark lap of night. ALFRED PERCEVAL GRAVES BALLADE OF THE MAYTIME. O LADY mine with the sunlit hair, The birds are caroling blithe and gay In the bourgeoning boughs that sway in air O'er the grassy aisles of the orchard way. The mock-bird pipes to the busy jay : There's a gleam of white on the vines that twine Where your casement opes to the golden day, O lady mine ! O lady mine with the sunlit hair, The rills are glad that the month is May : The dawns are bright, and the eves are fair O'er the grassy aisles of the orchard way. THE WOODIVELE IN MAY. 1 19 The dales have doffed their gowns of grey, The bending buttercups spill their wine, There is joy in the heart of faun and fay, O lady mine ! O lady mine with the sunlit hair, The bees, like ruthless bandits, prey On the blooms that part their lips in prayer O'er the grassy aisles of the orchard way. From sunny shores where the nereids play The breezes blow o'er the foamy brine, And I dream I hear them softly say, " O lady mine ! " ENVOY. O lady mine, wilt thou not stray O'er the grassy aisles of the orchard way, And list to Love where the wind-flowers shine, O lady mine ? CLINTON SCOLLARD. THE WOODWELE IN MAY. I HEAR you in the orchard hid in clouds of apple flower, I hear you tapping, tapping, busy woodwele, in my tree ; My heart is glad to hear you in this golden morning hour, Your tapping is you cannot know how sweet a sound to me. 120 THE WOODWELE IN MAY. Oh, tap, tap ; tap, tap, tap ! The old man hears you, and he lifts his head as white as snow, And dreams he is the passionate heart of fifty years ago! The glad church bells were ringing then as they are ringing now ; The orchard was in bloom, and there was Sunday in the air ; My dear love's face was sweeter than the blossom on the bough, 'Twas bluest Maytime in her eyelids and her golden hair ! Oh, tap, tap ; tap, tap, tap ! We leaned together, lips to lips; we heard, but could not see, A woodwele 'twas not you, friend tapping in that apple tree ! Although 'twas Sunday, still, I thought, no Sabbath- breaker he ; And though to-day is Sunday too, no Sabbath- breaker you ; You cannot break, but you can make, a holy day for me : Your tapping crowds my trees with bloom, and fills my skies with blue. Oh, tap, tap ; tap, tap, tap ! THE WOODWELE IN MAY. 121 I hear you, and my cheek is flushed; my button-hole is gay ; I stride erect, what need have I of any staff to- day ? Oh, woodwele, with the laughing note, I feel my heart beat fast, My eyes are dim, my cheek is wet, my head grows white again ; For I remember, in the light of that long-vanished past, How kindly life has dealt with me, how hard with better men. Oh, tap, tap ; tap, tap, tap ! For those church bells, that orchard bloom, that woodwele in the tree, And all that plighted happiness have kept their pledge to me ! My dear love's eyes are faded and her face is wrinkled now, And all the golden color changed to silver in her hair; But when she smiles, ah, then you see the blossom on the bough; And when she speaks, you feel a sense of May- time in the air ! Oh, tap, tap ; tap, tap, tap ! Through all disguise, my dear old wife, be sure I see and know The pretty maid who loved a poet fifty years ago. WILLIAM CANTON. 122 THE MAYTIME RAPTURE. TO THE MONTH OF AT AY. EACH day of thine, sweet month of May, Love makes a solemn holy-day. I will perform like duty, Sith thou resemblest every way Astrasa, queen of beauty. Both your fresh beauties do partake, Either's aspect doth summer make, Thoughts of young love awaking ; Hearts you both do cause to ache, And yet be pleased with aching. Right dear art thou, and so is she, E'en like attracting sympathy, Gains unto both like dearness; I ween this made antiquity, Name thee, sweet May of majesty, As being both like in clearness. SIR JOHN DAVIES. Hymns to Astraa (Queen Elizabeth). THE MAYTIME RAPTURE. Now are the moments, brief and rare, When Nature warms with subtle bliss, Like some chaste maiden, shy of air, Who gives her lover the first kiss ! THE MAY OF THE YEAR. 123 The willows o'er the flashing brook Bow lissome, with fresh-mantled stem, Like graceful ladies when they look To find their mirrors praising them ! The orchard aisles, that blooms array In odorous mimicry of snow, Are thrilled through every happy spray With song's mellifluous overflow ! And all the world, with greens that shine, With breaking buds and wings that flit, Seems one expectancy divine Of something God has promised it. EDGAR FAWCETT. Four Days. THE MAY OF THE YEAR. O SHOW me a season as mild and as merry As the May of the year in the kingdom of Kerry. As the May of the year, as the May of the year, When the eyes of Atlantic, as crystal and clear As heaven's own blue, are beaming on you ; And the sun moves slowly for love of the flowers (Such flowers, with the wild bees all a-hum) And delights to linger above the bowers (Those very bowers, so dark and dumb, And sorrowful stripped for O, how long? But now how green ! how full of song !) 124 MOOA'RISE IN MAY. And the good sun gazes, with golden gaze, On the evergreens of our woodland ways : A gaze so glad, arbutus and holly Forget their wintry melancholy In diamond laughter, and he delays The happy heedless course of the hours, And looks with a lingering love-look down To do his duty To Irish beauty ; And looks again, with a royal frown, Steadfast and stern, our boys to burn, To burn our boys to a braver brown. So the good sun his course delays For he loves to lengthen our sweet spring days. ALFRED PERCEVAL GRAVES. MOONRISE IN MA Y. LONG lights gleam o'er the western wold Kindling the brown moss into gold ; The bright day fades into the blue Of the far hollows, dim with dew, The breeze comes laden with perfume From many an orchard white with bloom, And all the mellow air is fraught With beauty beyond fancy's thought. Outspread beneath me, breathing balm Into the evening's golden calm, MOONRISE IN MAY. 12$ Lie trellised gardens, thickly sown With nodding lilacs, newly blown, Borders with hyacinthus plumed, And beds with purple pansies gloomed ; Cold snowdrops, jonquils pale and prim, And flamy tulips, burning dim In the cool twilight, till they fold In sleep their oriflammes of gold. With many a glimmering interchange Of moss and flowers and terraced range The pleasant garden slopes away Into the gloom of shadows grey, Where, darkly green, the churchyard lies With all its silent memories. There the first violets love to blow About the headstones, leaning low; There, from the golden willows, swing The first green garlands of the spring, And the first bluebird builds her nest By the old belfry's umbered crest. Beyond, where groups of stately trees Waiting their vernal draperies, Stand outlined on the evening sky, The golden lakes of sunset lie ; With many-colored isles of light, Purple and pearl and chrysolite, And realms of cloudland, floating far Beyond the horizon's dusky bar, Now, fading from the lurid bloom Of twilight to a silver gloom, 126 MOONRISE IN MAY. As the fair moon's ascending beam Melts all things to a holy dream. So fade the cloud-wreaths from my soul Beneath thy solemn, soft control, Enchantress of the stormy seas, Priestess of night's high mysteries ! Thy ray can pale the north-light's plume, And, where the throbbing stars illume With their far-palpitating light The holy cloisters of the night, Thy presence can entrance their beams, And lull them to diviner dreams. To thee belong the silent spheres Of memory, the enchanted years Of the dead past, the shrouded woes That sleep in sculptural repose. Thy solemn light doth interfuse The magic world wherein I muse, With something too divinely fair For earthly hope to harbor there ; A faith that reconciles the will Life's mystic sorrow to fulfil ; A benison of love that falls From the serene and silent halls Of night, till through the lonely room A heavenly odor seems to bloom, And lilies of eternal peace Glow through the moonlight's golden fleece. MRS. SARAH HELEN [POWER] WHITMAN. PROPHETIC BIRDS. I2/ PROPHETIC BIRDS. ON May morn two lovers stood For the first time in the wood ; And lip wooed lip, and heart wooed heart, Till words must cease, and tears must start ; And overhead in the rustling green The birds talked over their fate unseen. "Sure," said the thrush, "we'll wed them soon;" " Yea," said the turtle-dove, " in June ; " "They'll make fine sport ere the year is out," Said the magpie between a laugh and a shout. And heedlessly the lovers heard The senseless babble of bird with bird. "Sure," croaked the jackdaw, "in July They'll quarrel, or no daw am I ; \Yhy, let them, since they are but men ; " " They can make it up though," quoth the wren. And heedlessly the lovers heard A senseless babble of bird with bird. " Love with them shall be sweet, ere sad," Said the goldfinch, " August shall make them glad." "Yea," said the oriole, "one rich noon They shall lengthen love in a golden swoon." And all this while the lovers heard But a senseless babble of bird with bird. " My news is from Prince Popinjay," Sighed the hoopoe. " Ah ! one August day 128 THE BIRDS IN MAY. They shall dream in the sunset, and fall asleep, And one shall awake from the dream to weep." And heedlessly the lovers heard This senseless babble of bird with bird. But a nightingale in a far-off shade That moment silenced the chattering glade, And sang like an angel from above Some mystic song of eternal love. And all this singing the lovers heard As the senseless babble of bird with bird. ARTHUR VV. E. O'SHAUGHNESSY. THE BIRDS IN MA Y. . . . OFT in the merry season and the morning of the May The birds break out a-singing for the world's face waxen gay, And they flutter there in the blossoms, and run through the dewy grass, As they sing the joy of the springtide, that bringeth the summer to pass ; And they deem that for them alone was the world wrought long ago, And no hate and no repentance, and no fear to come they know. WILLIAM MORRIS. The Story of Sigurd the Volsung. WAITING FOR JUNE. WAITING FOR JUNE. WITHIN the woods the sweet arbutus trails Its blossoming length. The happy robin sings. Nature the while a joyous face unveils, Bright with the sunshine of her countless springs. The days grow longer; and the strawberries blush, Ready to ripen in the year's hot noon, And in the shade, the amorous-voiced thrush Waits for thy coming, soft, delicious June. The angler casts within the swift cascade The ready line, whereon the gorgeous fly, To tempt the trout, by skilful hand is played, Or strong-mouthed salmon as he passes by. The playful bass leaps glistening from the stream, And shuns with veering fin the dangerous rocks, Along his sides the western sunrays gleam, And swift-winged swallows past me wheel their flocks. How sweet to rest, ere dawns the summer's heat, Where violets gaze upward to the sky ; To hear the brooklet murmuring at my feet, And see its waters as they sparkle by ; To lay my ear close to my mother earth, And listen to her myriad voices low ; To search the secret of the daisies' birth, And why, in spring, the wood flowers bud and blow. 130 ON THE SPRING. The sparrow chirps ; the lark upsoars and sings ; The brown-winged beetles slowly past me creep ; And through the shadows flit a thousand things That make the pulses of my being leap. O mother Nature ! Take me to your breast, While earth, and air, and sky, are all in tune ; Close to thy heart, a child, I fain would rest, And wait the coming of delicious June. ELISHA NORMAN GUNNISON. ON THE SPRING. Lo ! where the rosy-bosomed Hours, Fair Venus' train, appear, Disclose the long-expecting flowers, And wake the purple year ! The Attic warbler pours her throat, Responsive to the cuckoo's note, The untaught harmony of spring ; While, whispering pleasure as they fly, Cool zephyrs through the clear blue sky Their gathered fragrance fling. Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch A broader browner shade, Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech O'ercanopies the glade, Beside some water's rushy brink With me the Muse shall sit, and think OJV THE SPRING. (At ease reclined in rustic state) How vain the ardor of the crowd, How low, how little are the proud, How indigent the great ! Still is the toiling hand of care ; The panting herds repose : Yet hark, how through the peopled air The busy murmur glows ! The insect youth are on the wing, Eager to taste the honied spring, And float amid the liquid noon : Some lightly o'er the current skim, Some show their gayly-gilded trim Quick-glancing to the sun. To contemplation's sober eye Such is the race of man ; And they that creep, and they that fly, Shall end where they began. Alike the busy and the gay But flutter through life's little day, In fortune's varying colors drest : Brushed by the hand of rough mischance, Or chilled by age, their airy dance They leave, in dust to rest. Methinks I hear in accents low The sportive kind reply : Poor moralist ! and what art thou ? A solitary fly ! 132 MAYTIME. Thy joys no glittering female meets, No hive hast thou of hoarded sweets, No painted plumage to display : On hasty wings thy youth is flown ; Thy sun is set, thy spring is gone : We frolic while 'tis May. THOMAS GRAY. MA YTLME. A MIST of stars, a glimmering veil Before the ancient throne of night ; A planet like a sentinel Upon the outer height. Far dusky deeps, and wide still air, Where fainting fragrance rolls along ; A bird that warbles in his dream Some thrill of broken song. Thick fruit-flowers languishing for light Around us in the perfect gloom ; And, as we wait, far off and low, The distant breakers' boom. Ah, among all delicious nights, Give me this air's transcendent swoon; Enchanted song, enchanted hush, And May without a moon ! MRS. HARRIET ELIZABETH [PRESCOTT] SPOFFORD. I-'ancics. A SPRING SONG. 133 A SPRING SONG. LONG has been the winter, Long, long, in vain We've sought the bud upon the bough, The primrose in the lane. Long have skies been dull and grey, Nipping's been the blast ; But, sing ! Summer's coming ! The bee is out at last. Sing ! Winter's flying ; Summer's coming fast ; Humming joy and Springtime, The bee is out at last. Loud shouts the cuckoo ; The nested elm round, Wheels the rook, cawing ; There are shadows on the ground. Warm comes the breeze and soft, Freezing days are past. Sing ! Summer's coming ! The bee's out at last. Sing ! Winter's flying ; Summer's coming fast ; Humming hope and Springtime, The bee's out at last. WILLIAM Cox BENNETT. 134 LATE SPRING EVENING. LATE SPRING EVENING. I SAW the Virgin-mother clad in green, Walking the sprinkled meadows at sundown ; While yet the moon's cold flame was hung between The day and night, above the dusky town : I saw her brighter than the western gold, Whereto she faced in splendor to behold. Her dress was greener than the tenderest leaf That trembled in the sunset glare aglow : Herself more delicate than is the brief Pink apple blossom, that May showers laid low, And more delicious than's the earliest streak The blushing rose shows of her crimson cheek. As if to match the sight that did her please, A music entered, making passion fain ; Three nightingales sat singing in the trees, And praised the goddess for the fallen rain ; Which yet their unseen motions did arouse, Or parting zephyrs shook out from the boughs. And o'er the treetops, scattered in mid air, The exhausted clouds, laden with crimson light Floated, or seemed to sleep ; and highest there, One planet broke the lingering ranks of night ; Daring day's company, so he might spy The Virgin-queen once with his watchful eye. And when I saw her, then I worshipped her, And said, O bounteous Spring, O beauteous Spring, AT THE CLOSE OF SPRING. 135 Mother of all my years, thou who dost stir My heart to adore thee and my tongue to sing, Flower of my fruit, of my heart's blood the fire, Of all my satisfaction the desire ! How art thou every year more beautiful, Younger for all the winters thou hast cast : And I, for all my love grows, grow more dull, Decaying with each season overpast ! In vain to teach him love must man employ thee, The more he learns the less he can enjoy thee. ROBERT BRIDGES. AT THE CLOSE OF SPRING. THE garlands fade that spring so lately wove, Each simple flower, which she had nursed in dew, Anemones that spangled every grove, The primrose wan, and harebell mildly blue. No more shall violets linger in the dell, Or purple orchis variegate the plain, Till spring again shall call forth every bell, And dress with hurried hands her wreaths again. Ah, poor humanity ! so frail, so fair, Are the fond visions of thy early day, Till tyrant passion and corrosive care Bid all thy fairy colors fade away ! Another May new buds and flowers shall bring; Ah ! why has happiness no second spring ? MRS. CHARLOTTE [TURNER] SMITH. 136 FAREWELL TO SPKIXG. FAREWELL TO SPRING. I SAW this morning with a sudden smart, Spring preparing to depart. I know her well and so I told her all my heart. " Why did you, Spring, your coming so delay, If, now here, you cannot stay ? You win my love and then unloving pass away. " We waited, waited, O so long, so long, Just to hear the ouzel's song. To-morrow 'twill be hushed, to-day that is so strong. " Day after day, and dawn again on dawn, Winter's shroud was on the lawn, So still, so smooth, we thought 'twould never be with- drawn. " Now that at last your welcome mimic snow Doth upon the hawthorn blow, It bides not on the bough, but melts before we know. " Scarce hath the primrose o'er the sordid mould Lavished treasure, than behold ! Our wealth of simple joy is, robbed of all its gold. " When to the woods we hie with feet of mirth, Now the hyacinths have birth, Swiftly the blue of heaven fades from the face of earth. FAREWELL TO SPRIA'G. 137 " First drops the bloom, then darkens the green leaf ; Every thing in life is brief, Save autumn's deepening gloom and winter's change- less grief." Then with a smile thus answered me the Spring : " To my voice and flight you cling, For I, before I perch, again am on the wing. " With you were I the whole year round to stay, 'Twould be you that went away, Your love made fickle by monotony of May. " Love cannot live save upon love beyond. Leaving you, I keep you fond, Not letting you despair, but making you despond. " Farewell, and love me still, my lover dear, Love me till another year, And you, if you be true, will find me here." Then darker, deeper, waxed the woods ; the ground Flowerless turned, and then embrowned ; And less was of sweet scent, and less was of sweet sound. Mute was the mavis, moulted was the thorn, Meads were cut, and lambs were shorn, And I by Spring was left forsaken and forlorn. Forlorn, forsaken, shall I be until Primrose peep and throstle shrill, And in the orchard gleam the outriding daffodil. 138 A SPKSNG PICTURE. Then shall I know that Spring among the trees Hiding is, and that the breeze Anew will bear abroad odors and melodies. ALFRED AUSTIN. AT WHITSUNTIDE. . . . PENTECOST had kindled all the trees To tremulous thin whispering flames of green, And given to each a sacred word to say ; And wind-fine voices of the wind-borne birds Were ever woven in among their words. Soft-brooding o'er the hamlet where it lay, The circling hills stood stoled with holy white, For orchards break to blossom in the night ; And all the morning was one blown blue flower, And all the world was at its perfect hour. HELEN GRAY CONE. Oberon. A SPRING PICTURE. A HIGH cliff-meadow lush with spring ; Gay butterflies upon the wing ; Beneath, beyond, unbounded, free, The foam-flecked, blue, pervading sea. LEWIS MORRIS. Pictures. A SPRING LOVE SONG. 139 IN MA Y. FROM eastern summits, pine-possessed, The slow sun climbs the reddening skies, A shaft of color strikes the west, The phoebe shakes her wings, and flies ; A muffled murmuring in the hive Grows thicker with the crescent day ; All mummied creatures stir, alive, And bask beneath the warmth of May. From brink to base, the hills descend All steeped in dark and drenched in dew ; The orchards flush from end to end, The pink azalea flowers anew. Ere yet those amber cells are sealed Another moon shall lapse away, Yet mine the pledge of wood and field, The empty honeycomb of May. DORA READ GOODALE. A SPRING LOVE SONG. THE earth is waking at the voice of May, The new grass brightens by the trodden way, The woods wave welcome to the sweet spring day, And the sea is growing summer blue ; But fairer, sweeter than the smiling sky, Or bashful violet with tender eye, Is she whose love for me will never die ; I love you, darling, only you ! 1 40 MA Y AND DEA TIL O friendships falter when misfortunes frown, The blossoms vanish when the leaves turn brown, The shells lie stranded when the tide goes down, But you, dear heart, are ever true. The grass grows greenest when the raindrops fall, The vine clasps closest to the crumbling wall, So love blooms sweetest under sorrow's thrall ; I love you, darling, only you 1 The early robin may forget to sing, The loving mosses may refuse to cling, Or the brook to tinkle at the call of spring, But you, dear heart, are ever true. Let the silver mingle with your curls of gold, Let the years grow dreary and the world wax old, But the love I bear for you will ne'er grow cold ; I love you, darling, only you ! MRS. ELIZABETH ANN [CHASE] [AKERS] ALLEN MA Y AND DEA TH. I WISH that when you died last May, Charles, there had died along with you Three parts of spring's delightful things ; Ay, and, for me, the fourth part too. A foolish thought, and worse, perhaps ! There must be many a pair of friends Who, arm in arm, deserve the warm Moon-births and the long evening-ends. JN MAY. 141 So, for their sakes, be May still May ! Let the new time, as mine of old, Do all it did for me : I bid Sweet sights and sounds throng manifold. Only, one little sight, one little plant, Woods have in May, that starts up green Save a sole streak which, so to speak, Is spring's blood, spilt its leaves between, That, they might spare ; a certain wood Might miss the plant ; their loss were small : But I, whene'er the leaf grows there, Its drop comes from my heart, that's all. ROBERT BROWNING. IN MA Y. WHY, ye glories of to-day, Will ye bring a wet cheek here ? Light and odor, song and breeze, In delicious concord play ; What but care should fret the tear When we walk midst joys like these ? It is all too dark to see Sometimes, what our spirits hold ; All too damp for chords to sound, Or the rain falls noisily, 142 RONDEAU. Or the wind is fierce and cold, And our gentle thoughts are bound. But the tender looks of May Set them free and light the soul ; Overwhelmed at seeing there All we ever laid away, Rapturous sadness gains control : Tears must come, but not of care. CHARLOTTE FISKE BATES. RONDEAU. WHEN the May moon wanes how fresh is the day ! How sweet the smell of the new-mown hay ! And sweeter still the breath of morn. A long farewell to the weeks forlorn Of raw east winds ; to the fields away ! Now hail to the apple-blooms' display ! Hail, hail to the meadows' rich array ! And the dewdrop sparkles within the thorn When the May moon wanes. The bobolink returns with his roundelay, The timorous hare from his covert may stray, He may nibble the blades of the springing corn, For the hunter, the hunter winds not his horn. Sweet World ! can I ever upbraid thee ? Nay, When the May moon wanes. MELVJLLE MADISON BIGKLOW. IN WANING MAY. 143 IN WANING MAY. DOVES softly cooing murmurs musical Gladdened unseen the darksome cloud of pines : Below bright-hued innumerable wings Carried love messages from flower to flower. For Spring's outstretching fingers nearly touched The Summer's welcoming hands. THOMAS WOOLNER. Pygmalion. INDEX OF FIRST LINES. PACK A cottage in a winding lane 18 After April, when May follows 48 A high cliff-meadow lush with spring .... 138 A little while my love and I 100 All is yclad 112 All maiden lives that waned in their young prime . 54 All the clouds about the sun lay up in golden creases . 30 All the land in flowery squares no Along these low pleached lanes, on such a day . . 66 A mist of stars, a glimmering veil .... 132 Among the changing months, May stands confessed . 27 Apple blossoms, budding, blowing .... 77 Apple blossoms in the orchard 83 A rush last night of pinions sweeping by ... 44 As it fell upon a day . . 73 Birds' love and birds' song 26 Blue lies the light upon the hills 89 Borne on the warm wind of the western gale . . 30 Come away! come away 35 Couched in cool shadow, girt by billowy swells . . 95 Could aught arrest the rushing wings of Time . . 91 Creep slowly up the willow wand ..... 23 "Cuckoo! cuckoo!" it haunts my way .... 3 Dear common flower, that grow'st beside the way . 51 146 INDEX OF FIRST LINES. PAGE Doves softly cooing murmurs musical . . . . 143 Each day of thine, sweet month of May . . . \ 122 First night of May ! and the soft-silvered moon . . 5 Fled are the frosts and now the fields appear ... 60 'Fore long the trees begin to show belief . . . 1 1 1 From eastern summits, pine-possessed . ... . 1 39 Get up, get up for shame, the blooming morn . . 5 Hark I The sea-faring wild-fowl loud proclaim . . 38 Have you seen an apple orchard in the spring . . 70 Hebe's here, May is here in Here I come, creeping, creeping everywhere . . 14 Here's a bank with rich cowslips and cuckoo-buds strewn, 15 Hither rolls the storm of heat 57 How softly comes the breath of bloom .... 45 I feel a newer life in every gale 99 If you catch a breath of sweetness 19 I hear you in the orchard hid in clouds of apple flower, 1 19 I met a little maid one day 114 In May, when sea winds pierced our solitudes . . 76 In the aisles of the orchard fair blossoms are drifting . 58 I saw a child, once, that had lost its way ... 24 I saw a snowflake in the air 78 I saw the Virgin-mother clad in green . . . . 134 I saw this morning with a sudden smart . . . -136 In the merry month of May 29 Is not the Maytime now on earth 2 I strayed one golden noon in May . . . . iu6 It is good to be young in the spring, but to breathe, but to be 42 It's O my heart, my heart 65 It was in the prime 107 INDEX OF FIRST LINES. PAGE I walked, in the " sweet season's " opening ... 8 I wish that when you died last May .... 140 Like souls that balance joy and pain i Lo ! where the rosy-bosomed Hours .... 130 Long has been the winter . . . . . . . 133 Long lights gleam o'er the western wold . . . 124 Look how in May the rose 44 March and April go your way 41 May has come in, young May, the beautiful ... 2 May is a pious fraud of the almanac .... 56 May, queen of blossoms ....... So May, thou month of rosy beauty 97 My heart is light with May, with May .... 101 New flowery scents strewed everywhere . . . 103 Not as where swoons the tranced lark .... 49 Not the word, but the soul of the thing ... 32 Now are the moments, brief and rare . . . .122 Now dandelions in the short, new grass ... 96 Now that the green hillside has quite .... 79 Now the bright morning star, day's harbinger . . 13 Now the mavis and the merle 59 Now, while the long-delaying ash assumes ... 69 O certainly, no month this is but May .... 68 Of sunlight and green shade, and songs of birds, a happy blending 90 Oft in the merry season and the morning of the May . 1 28 Oh, mild May day, in Fodla's clime 4 Oh, sing ! the swallows are in tune .... 22 O lady mine with the sunlit hair nS O Love, this night when the sweet nightingale . . 82 On May morn two lovers stood . . . . .127 On bookes for to read I me delight .... 28 148 INDEX OP FIRST LINES. PACK One knows the spring is coming . . . . 105 O shout, for the morning 18 O show me a season as mild and as merry . . . 123 Our old colonial town is new with May .... 62 Out from cities haste away 8 Over the hilltop and down in the meadow-grass . . 79 Pentecost had kindled all the trees . . . . 138 Rose-red lilies that bloom on the banner .... 84 See ! the cautious oak at last 64 Sing me a song of idle days xxviii Spring, the sweet spring, is the year's pleasant king . 46 Storm-tossed, gnarled bough 78 Sweet laggard, come ! and list the drowsy chime . . 47 Sweet month of Mary, month of May 61 Thanks ! for I understand you, happy Night . . 39 That was a curlew calling overhead . . . . .72 The amorous birds now pair in every brake . . 88 The apple trees with bloom are all aglow ... 63 The breath of springtime at this twilight hour . . 37 The day was grey and dark and chill . . . .12 The earth can, like the soul, but once be wed . . 17 The earth is waking at the voice of May .... 139 The garlands fade that spring so lately wove . . . 135 The grass is wet with shining dews 86 The green things growing, the green things growing . 25 The lark is singing in the blinding sky .... 68 Then came fair May, the fairest maid on ground. . 67 The nightingale, full-toned in middle May ... 98 The rose that in the springtide ventures forth . . 118 There stands a tree in the orchard 96 The snow had not yet faded from the crest . . . 108 The soft wind whispered secrets to the apple tree . . 99 INDEX OF FIRST LINES. 149 PAGB The soote season that bud and bloom forth brings . 53 The spring, made dreary by incessant rain ... 74 The spring was very glad upon the hills ... 33 The sweetest sound our whole year round ... 20 The voice of one who goes before to make ... 58 This flower has lived and breathed and moved . . 16 Thou pulse of joy ! whose throb beats time . Title-page 'Tis merry in greenwood, thus runs the old lay . . 102 'Tis the quiet eve of a northern spring : the village sleeeps in the sun 8 1 'Twas May ! the spring with magic bloom . . . 113 'Twas prime of May ; and every square became . . 90 Under the apple boughs as I sit . . . . 117 Up, up ! for the earth is a-Maying 1 16 Warm, wild, rainy wind, blowing fitfully . . . 55 What can better please 117 When beeches brighten early May . . . . n When first the spring grasses 92 When in a May day hush 95 When Nature tries her faintest touch .... 91 When the May moon wanes how fresh is the day . 142 Where shall we keep the holiday 10 While I linger in her room 103 White-flowered orchards where young buds unfold . . 24 Who cares on the land to stay 69 Why should May remember 54 Why, ye glories of to-day ...... I4 1 Within a spot where slept the silent dead ... 38 Within the woods the sweet arbutus trails . . . 129 With the flying scud, with the birds on the wing . . 109 Would that thou couldst last for aye .... 48 Yes, it is May ! though not that the young leaf pushes its velvet 39 INDEX OF SUBJECTS. PAGE A Late Spring 74 A May Memory 18 A Morn of May 30 A May Song ......... 35, 100 An Orchard Fancy 96 Apple Blossoms 63, 70, 77, 78, 99 A Quiet Eve in Spring 81 As it Fell upon a Day 73 A Snowflake in May 78 A Song of May 101 A Song of Spring 109 A Spring Love Song 139 A Spring Picture 138 A Spring Song 133 A Springtime 105 At the Close of Spring 135 At Whitsuntide 138 Ballade of the Maytime 118 Beltane 4 Beside the Sea . . 106 Como in May 108 Corinna's Going A-Maying 5 Cuckoo ! Cuckoo 3 Dandelions 96 Dark Spring 59 152 INDEX OF SUBJECTS. PACK Expectation 24 First Night of May 5 Fled are the Frosts ........ 60 Fantasie de Printemps 58 Farewell to Spring . . . . . . . .136 Heat 57 Idle Days xxviii In a May Day Hush 95 In Blossom Time .... k ... 65 In Joyous Spring I In May ... 22, 64, 69, 72, 79, no. 112, 139, 141 In Middle May 98 In Maytime 117 In Spring 88 In the Spring 42 In the Prime of Spring 107 In Waning May 143 Is not the Maytime now on Earth .... 2 Late Spring Evening 134 Look how in May ...*.... 44 May . 17, 24, 32, 38, 44, 45, 48, 56, 58, 61, 67, 69, 79, 82, 90, 99. I0 3> Iir May and Death 140 May Day 8 May Day Song 8 May Evening 37 Mayflowers 19 May Gladness 68 May Grown A-Cold 68 May has Come In 2 May in Kingston 62 INDEX OF SUBJECTS. 153 PACK May in the Swan Woods 49 May Memories 33 May Morning .........55 May Morning, Song on ....... 13 May Morn Song 86 Maytide in Maytime 39, 1 32 Moonlight in May 39 Moonrise in May 124 On a Country Road ....... 66 One Swallow 12 On May 27 On the Spring 130 On the Downs 116 On the Thames 18 Phillida and Corydon 29 Pictures of Spring 83 Prophetic Birds . _. 127 Rondeau 142 Re-awakening ........ 38 Seeking the Mayflower ....... 20 Song of the Princess May 41 Song of the Spring . . 89 Song to May 80 Spring 26, 46, 53 Spring in Tuscany 84 Spring Song 23, 103 Sweet Laggard, Come 47 Sylvan Musings 95 The Arbutus 16 The Birds in May 128 154 INDEX OF SUBJECTS, PACK The Canadian Spring 113 The Daisy 28 The Entering May 10 The Fields in May 117 The First Rose 118 The Flower of Love lies Bleeding 114 The Green Things Growing 25 The May of the Year 123 The Maytime Rapture 122 The Pulse of May Title-page The Queen of the May 15 The Return of the Nightingale 30 The Rhodora 76 The Voice of the Grass 14 The Woodwele in May 119 The Woods in May 102 To May 97 To the Dandelion 51 To the Month of May 122 Twas Prime of May 90 Vita Vitalis 92 Waiting for June 129 When Beeches brighten Early May . . . . 1 1 When May Follows 48 When Nature tries her Finest Touch .... 91 Windermere in Mid-May 91 Why should May Remember 54