1195 
 P3C8
 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 COUNTRY LIFE.
 
 1 EVEN WATER. 
 
 P. 18.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE 
 
 .-/ Country Life, without the strife 
 And noisy din of town, 
 Js all I need: 
 I (nkc i/o heed 
 Of splendour or renown. 
 
 %l 
 
 nbon ;i 
 
 lib 
 
 iMu 
 
 gtorl 
 
 i   
 
 
 GEORGE 
 
 ROl 
 
 TI 
 
 ,ED<. I 
 
 \ 
 
 SONS. 
 
 
 
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 3- 
 
 

 
 LONDON : R. CLAY, SONS, AND TAYLOk, 
 BREAD STREET HILL.
 
 
 
 A Country Life, without the strife 
 
 And noisy din of town, 
 Is all I need: I take no //■ 
 Of splendour or rem l 
 
 And when I die, oh let me lie 
 
 Where trees above me wa 
 Let wild flotvers bloom above my tomb. 
 
 My quiet country gra 
 
 Charles Dickexs 
 
 t Knar, i \ )
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Illustrated with Forty Engravings from Drawings by Birkct Foster, 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Country Life ..... Herrick 12 
 
 The Wayside Spring .... Read 16 
 
 Ode to Leven Water .... Smollett 18 
 
 Spring Mil/nan 19 
 
 The Nightingale Coleridge 20 
 
 The Voice of Spring Hemans 23 
 
 Spring Spenser 27 
 
 The Village Inn John Clare 28 
 
 Morning Walk Chamberlayne 30 
 
 Evening Close Goldsmith 31 
 
 Hark ! the Mavis Burns 31 
 
 Corinna's going a-Maying . . . Herrick 34 
 
 The Hay-field Thomson 36 
 
 Wild Flowers Keats 38 
 
 Field Flowers Campbell 40 
 
 A Summer Morning Thomson 42 
 
 Morning Otway 43 
 
 The Sun Barton 44 
 
 Invitation to Izaak Walton . . Charles Cotton 46 
 
 The Angler's Wish Izaak Walton 48 
 
 The Angler's Song IVilliam Barnes 50 
 
 Ode to Evening W. Collins 52 
 
 Sonnet Bryant 55 
 
 The Farmer's Boy Bloom field 56 
 
 Spring Wilson 58 
 
 Birds C. W. Thompson- 59 
 
 8
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 »N Cunningham . . .... 60 
 
 Spring Meleager 
 
 I.' k;an Braes Burns »>4 
 
 To the Trout Fisher Thomson 66 
 
 Country Lift. Holly 68 
 
 Aikii .V. /'. Willis 70 
 
 The Farmer's Boy Bloomfield 72 
 
 Ode to String Gray 74 
 
 Evening Hymn Sir Thomas Browne 7" 
 
 Little Streams Mary Howitt 78 
 
 My Ai\ Kind Dearie (J . . . . Burns 80 
 
 Rural Pleasures Gay 82 
 
 A Summer Sabbath Walk . . . James Grahame 
 
 The Evening Walk Hindis 84 
 
 The Rural Walk Cowper 86 
 
 June Stoddard 87 
 
 There was a Lass Burns V S 
 
 The Naturalist's Walk .... Gilbert While 91 
 
 The Sabbath Eve 4non 92 
 
 Village Hells Cowper 94 
 
 Ode on Solitude Pope 95 
 
 The Rigs o' Barley Burns 96 
 
 Autumn Longfellow 
 
 Now WESTLIN Winds Burns 100 
 
 The Autumn Day Thomson 103 
 
 Autumn „ . . . Keats 104 
 
 A Day in Autumn Southey 106 
 
 The Soger's Return . . . . Burns 107 
 
 Hock-Cart, or Harvest-Home . . Herrick no 
 
 Flocks and Herds Thomson 115 
 
 Evening Cunningham 114 
 
 Moonlight Night Shelley 116 
 
 Night Song Claudius 116 
 
 net Rev. W.L.Bowles 11S 
 
 A Winter Night Burns 119 
 
 To THE NlGHT P.B.Shelley 123 
 
 Night Pindemont 124 
 
 Devonshire Cristall 12 
 
 Highland Mary Burns i^ 
 
 9 ' ;
 
 CONTENTS^ 
 
 I'AGE 
 
 A Night Scene William Browne 130 
 
 With how Sad Steps, O Moon ! . Sir Philip Sidney 131 
 
 To the Moon ! P. B. Shelley 132 
 
 Winter Barton 133 
 
 Winter Song Holty '. . 133 
 
 A Wood in Winter Giovanni Delia Casa 134 
 
 November Scott 136 
 
 Woods in Winter Longfellow 138 
 
 Sonnet Burns 139 
 
 A Sabbath Walk in Winter . . Grahame 140 
 
 Winter Burns 141 
 
 The Wrathful Winter .... Thomas Sackville 143 
 
 The Moon is Up Byron 144
 
 cor \ 
 
 T k Y 
 
 L I F I
 
 THE COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Sweet country life, to such unknown, 
 Whose lives are others', not their own ! 
 But, serving courts and cities, be 
 Less happy, less enjoying thee. 
 Thou never plough'st the ocean's foam, 
 To seek and bring rough pepper home ; 
 Nor to the Eastern Ind dost rove, 
 To bring from thence the scorched clove ; 
 Nor, with the loss of thy loved rest, 
 Bring'st home the ingot from the West. 
 No ; thy ambition's master-piece 
 Flies no thought higher than a fleece ; 
 Or how to pay thy hinds, and clear 
 All scores, and so to end the year ; 
 But walk'st about thine own dear grounds, 
 Not envying others' larger bounds : 
 For well thou know'st 'tis not the extent 
 Of land makes life, but sweet content. 
 When now the cock, the ploughman's horn, 
 Calls for the lily-wristed morn, 
 Then to thy cornfields thou dost go, 
 Which, though well soiled, yet thou dost know 
 That the best compost for the lands 
 Is the wise master's feet and hands. 
 
 12
 
 ■• j\vi II COUNTRY L1FI
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 
 
 There, at the plough, thou find'st thy team, 
 With a hind whistling there to them ; 
 And cheer'st them up by singing how 
 The kingdom's portion is the plough. 
 This done, then to th' enamelled meads 
 Thou go'st, and as thy foot there treads, 
 Thou seest a present god like power 
 Imprinted in each herb and flower ; 
 And smell'st the breath of great eyed kine, 
 Sweet as the blossoms of the vine. 
 Here thou behold'st thy large sleek neat 
 Unto the dew laps up in meat : 
 And, as thou look'st, the wanton steer, 
 The heifer, cow, and ox draw near, 
 To make a pleasing pastime there. 
 These seen, thou go'st to view thy flocks 
 Of sheep, safe from the wolf and fox ; 
 And find'st their bellies there as full 
 Of short sweet grass, as backs with wool ; 
 And leav'st them, as they feed and fill, 
 A shepherd piping on the hill. 
 For sports, for pageantry, and plays, 
 Thou hast thy eves and holy-days, 
 On which the young men and maids meet 
 To exercise their dancing feet ; 
 Tripping the comely country-round. 
 With daffodils and daisies crowned. 
 Thy wakes, thy quintels, here thou hast, 
 Thy may-poles, too, with garlands graced ; 
 Thy morris-dance, thy Whitsun-ale, 
 Thy shearing-feast, which never fail ; 
 Thy harvest-home, thy wassail howl, 
 That's tost up after fox i' th' hole ; 
 
 •4
 
 7A I R Y I ;. 
 
 Thy mummeries, thy Twelfth night kii 
 
 And queens, thy Christmas revelling 
 
 Thy nut-brown mirth, thy russet wit, 
 
 And no man pays too de ir for it. 
 
 To these thou hast thy time to go, 
 
 And trace the hare in the treat herons snow : 
 
 Thy witty wiles to draw, and get 
 
 The lark into the trammel net ; 
 
 Thou hast thy cock-rood, and thy glade, 
 
 To take the precious pheasant made .' 
 
 Thy lime-twigs, snares, and pitfalls, then, 
 
 To catch the pilfering birds, not men. 
 
 O happy life, if that their good 
 
 The husbandmen but understood ! 
 
 Who all the day themselves do pleas 
 
 And younglings, with such sports as these; 
 
 And, lying down, have nought t' affright 
 
 Sweet sleep, that makes more short the night. 
 
 Robert /A. 
 
 
 "^P^- 
 
 '5
 
 THE WAYSIDE SPRING. 
 
 Fair dweller by the dusty way, 
 Bright saint within a mossy shrine, 
 
 The tribute of a heart to-day, 
 Weary and worn, is thine. 
 
 The earliest blossoms of the year, 
 The sweetbrier and the violet, 
 
 The pious hand of spring has here 
 Upon thy altar set. 
 
 And not alone to thee is given 
 
 The homage of the pilgrim's knee ; 
 
 But oft the sweetest birds of heaven 
 Glide down and sing to thee. 
 
 Here daily from his beechen cell, 
 The hermit squirrel steals to drink ; 
 
 And flocks which cluster to their bell, 
 Recline along thy brink. 
 
 And here the wagoner blocks his wheels, 
 To quaff the cool and generous boon ; 
 
 Here from the sultry harvest-fields 
 The reapers rest at noon. 
 16
 
 - 
 
 V- 
 
 &K4 
 
 i ' 
 
 K ^ 
 
 And oft the beggar mask'd with tan, 
 In rusty garments grey with dust. 
 
 Here >its and dips his little can, 
 And breaks his scanty i ruj 
 
 '7
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 And, lull'd beside thy whispering stream, 
 Oft drops to slumber unawares, 
 
 And sees the angel of his dream 
 Upon celestial stairs. 
 
 Dear dweller by the dusty way, 
 Thou saint within a mossy shrine, 
 
 The tribute of a heart to-day, 
 Weary and worn, is thine ! 
 
 Read. 
 
 ODE TO LEVEN WATER. 
 
 On Leven's banks while free to rove, 
 And tune the rural pipe to love, 
 I envied not the happiest swain 
 That ever trod the Arcadian plain. 
 Pure stream, in whose transparent wave 
 My youthful limbs I wont to lave ; 
 No torrents stain thy limpid source, 
 No rocks impede thy dimpling course, 
 That sweetly warbles o'er its bed, 
 With white, round, polished pebbles spread ; 
 While, lightly poised, the scaly brood 
 In myriads cleave thy crystal flood : 
 The springing trout in speckled pride ; 
 The salmon, monarch of the tide ; 
 The ruthless pike, intent on war; 
 The silver eel and mottled par. 
 Devolving from thy parent lake, 
 A charming maze thy waters make, 
 18 

 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 By bowers of birch and groves of pine, 
 
 And edges flowered with eglantine. 
 
 Still OIJ thy banks so gaily green 
 
 May numerous herds and flocks be seen . 
 
 And lasses chanting o'er the pail, 
 
 And shepherds piping in the dale; 
 
 And ancient faith that knows no guile. 
 
 And industry embrowned with toil ; 
 
 And hearts resolved, and hands prepared, 
 
 The blessings they enjoy to guard ! 
 
 Smollett. 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Alas, delicious Spring! God sends thee down 
 
 To breathe upon his cold and perish'd works 
 
 Beauteous revival; earth should welcome thee — 
 
 Thee and the west wind, thy smooth paramour, 
 
 With the soft laughter of her flowery meads. 
 
 Her joys, her melodies : the prancing stag 
 
 Flutters the shivering fern ; the steed shakes out 
 
 His main, the dewy herbage, silver-webb'd, 
 
 With frank step trampling; the wild goat looks down 
 
 From his empurpling bed of heath, where break 
 
 The waters deep and blue, with crystal gleams 
 
 Of their quick-leaping people; the fresh lark 
 
 Is in the morning sky ; the nightingale 
 
 Tunes evensong to the dropping waterfall. 
 
 Creation lives with loveliness — all melts 
 
 And trembles into one wild harmony. 
 
 Aft/man.
 
 THE NIGHTINGALE. 
 
 No cloud, no relic of the sunken day, 
 Distinguishes the west ; no long, thin slip 
 Of sullen light— no obscure, trembling hues. 
 Come ; we will rest on this old mossy bridge ! 
 You see the glimmer of the stream beneath, 
 But hear no murmuring ; it flows silently 
 O'er its soft bed of verdure. All is still — 
 A balmy night ! and though the stars be dim, 
 Yet let us think upon the vernal showers 
 That gladden the green earth, and we shall find 
 A pleasure in the dimness of the stars. 
 And hark ! the nightingale begins its song, 
 " Most musical, most melancholy " bird ! 
 A melancholy bird ! Oh, idle thought ! 
 In nature there is nothing melancholy. 
 
 'Tis the merry nightingale 
 That crowds, and hurries, and precipitates 
 With fast, thick warble his delicious notes, 
 As he were fearful that an April night 
 Would be too short for him to utter forth 
 His lone chant, and disburden his full soul 
 Of all its music ! 
 
 I know a grove 
 Of large extent, hard by a castle huge, 
 Which the great lord inhabits not ; and so 
 
 20
 
 
 This grove is wild with tangling underwood. 
 And the trim walks are broken up, and grass — 
 Thin grass — and king-cups grow within the paths. 
 But never elsewhere in one place I knew 
 So many nightingales ; and far and near.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 In wood and thicket, over the wide grove 
 
 They answer, and provoke each other's song 
 
 With skirmish and capricious passagings, 
 
 And murmurs musical, and swift jug- jug, 
 
 And one low, piping sound, more sweet than all, 
 
 Stirring the air with such a harmony, 
 
 That, should you close your eyes, you might almost 
 
 Forget it was not day ! On moonlit bushes, 
 
 Whose dewy leaflets are but half disclosed, 
 
 You may, perchance, behold them on the twigs, 
 
 Their bright, bright eyes — their eyes both bright and full, 
 
 Glistening, while many a glow-worm in the shade 
 
 Lights up her love-torch. 
 
 A most gentle maid, 
 Who dwelleth in her hospitable home, 
 Hard by the castle, and at latest eve 
 (Even like a lady, vow'd and dedicate 
 To something more than Nature in the grove), 
 Glides through the pathways; she knows all their notes, 
 That gentle maid ! and oft a moment's space, 
 What time the moon was lost behind a cloud, 
 Hath heard a pause of silence ; till the moon 
 Emerging, hath awaken'd earth and sky 
 With one sensation, and these wakeful birds 
 Have all burst forth in choral minstrelsy, 
 As if some sudden gale had swept at once 
 A hundred airy harps ! and she hath watch'd 
 Many a nightingale pitch'd giddily 
 On blossoming twig still swinging from the breeze, 
 And to that motion tune his wanton song, 
 Like tipsy joy that reels with tossing head. 
 
 Coleridge. 
 
 22
 
 THE VOICE OF SPRING 
 
 I come ! I conic ! yc have call'd me long — 
 I come o'er the mountains with light and song ! 
 Ye may trace my step o'er the wakening earth, 
 By the winds which tell of the violet's birth, 
 By the primrose-stars in the shadowy grass, 
 By the green leaves opening as I pass. 
 
 I have breathed on the south, and the chestnut-flowers 
 By thousands have burst from the forest bowers, 
 And the ancient graves and the fallen fanes 
 Are veil'd with wreaths on Italian plains ; 
 But it is not for me, in my hour of bloom, 
 To speak of the ruin or the tomb ! 
 
 I have look'd o'er the hills of the stormy north. 
 And the larch has hung all his tassels forth, 
 The fisher is out on the sunny sea, 
 And the reindeer bounds o'er die pastures free, 
 And the pine has a fringe of softer gre<- n, 
 Ami the moss looks bright where my foot hath keen. 
 
 23
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 I have sent through the wood-paths a glowing sigh, 
 And call'd out each voice of the deep blue sky ; 
 From the night-bird's lay through the starry time, 
 In the groves of the soft Hesperian clime, 
 To the swan's wild note by the Iceland lakes, 
 When the dark fir-branch into verdure breaks. 
 
 From the streams and founts I have loosed the chain ; 
 
 They are sweeping on to the silvery main, 
 
 They are flashing down from the mountain brows, 
 
 They are flinging spray o'er the forest boughs, 
 
 They are bursting fresh from their sparry caves, 
 
 And the earth resounds with the joy of waves. 
 
 Come forth, O ye children of gladness, come ! 
 Where the violets lie may be now your home. 
 Ye of the rose-lip and dew-bright eye, 
 And the bounding footstep, to meet me fly ! 
 With the lyre, and the wreath, and the joyous lay, 
 Come forth to the sunshine — I may not stay. 
 
 Away from the dwellings of careworn men — 
 The waters are sparkling in grove and glen ! 
 Away from the chamber and sullen hearth — 
 The young leaves are dancing in breezy mirth ! 
 Their light stems thrill to the wildwood strains, 
 And youth is abroad in my green domains. 
 
 But ye !— ye are changed since ye met me last ! 
 There is something bright from your features pass'd ! 
 There is that come over your brow and eye 
 Which speaks of a world where the flowers must die ! 
 — Ye smile ! but your smile hath a dimness yet : 
 Oh ! what have ye look'd on since last we met ? 
 
 24
 
 Ye are changed, ye are changed ! — and I sec not here 
 All whom I saw in the vanish'd year. 
 There were graceful heads, with their ringlets bright, 
 Which toss'd in the breeze with a play of light ; 
 There were eyes, in whose glistening laughter lay 
 No faint remembran< e of dull de< aj '
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 There were steps that Hew o'er the cowslip's head, 
 
 As if for a banquet all earth were spread ; 
 
 There were voices that rung through the sapphire sky, 
 
 And had not a sound of mortality. 
 
 Are they gone ? is their mirth from the mountain pass'd ? 
 
 — Ye have looked on Death since ye met me last. 
 
 
 The summer is coming, on soft winds borne — 
 
 Ye may press the grape, ye may bind the corn ! 
 
 For me, I depart to a brighter shore — 
 
 Ye are mark'd by care, ye are mine no more : 
 
 I go where the loved who have left you dwell, 
 
 And the flowers are not Death's — fare ye well, farewell." 
 
 lie mans. 
 
 26
 
 SPRING. 
 
 \ . folk now (lock in everywhere, 
 
 To gather May-bushes, and smelling brere. 
 
 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. 
 
 Even this morning — no longer ago — 
 I saw a shoal of shepherds oul 
 With singing, and shouting, and jolly clu 
 Before them went a lusty tabourer, 
 That unto man}- a hornpipe play'd, 
 Whereto they danced, each our with In. maid. 
 To see these folk making such joyan< 
 Made my heart after the pipe to dam 
 Then to the greenwood they speed them all 
 'I'o fetch home May. with their musical : 
 And home they bring him, in a royal throne, 
 Crown'd as king ; and his queen — fair one — 
 Was Lady Flora, on whom did attend 
 A fair flock of fairies, and a fresh bend 
 Of lovely nymphs. Oh that I were thei 
 To help the ladies their May-bush to bear !
 
 THE VILLAGE INN. 
 
 There with the scraps of songs, and laugh and tale, 
 He lightens annual toil, while merry ale 
 Goes round, and glads some old man's heart to praise 
 The threadbare customs of his early days ; 
 How the high bowl was in the middle set, 
 At breakfast-time when shearers yearly met, 
 Fill'd full of furmety, where dainty swum 
 The streaking sugar and the spotting plum : 
 The large stone-pitcher in its homely trim, 
 And clouded pint-horn with its copper rim, 
 Were there ; from which were drunk, with spirits high, 
 Healths of the best the cellar could supply ; 
 While sung the ancient swains, in uncouth rhymes, 
 Songs that were pictures of the good old times. 
 Thus will the old man ancient ways bewail, 
 Till toiling shears gain ground upon the tale. 
 Though fashion's haughty frown hath thrown aside 
 Half the old forms simplicity supplied, 
 Yet there are some pride's winter deigns to spare, 
 Left like green ivy when the trees are bare. 
 And now, when shearing oi die flocks is done, 
 Some ancient customs mix'd with harmless fun, 
 With ale, and song, and healths, and merry ways, 
 Keep ui) a shadow still of former days : 
 
 28
 
 
 I 111 VILLAG] INN.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 But the old beechen bowl, that once supplied 
 The feast of furmety, is thrown aside ; 
 And the old freedom that was living then, 
 When masters made them merry with their men — 
 When all their coats alike were russet brown, 
 And his rude speech was homely as their own; 
 All this is past, and soon will pass away, 
 The time-torn remnant of the holiday. 
 
 John Clare. 
 
 
 MORNING WALK. 
 
 The morning hath not lost her virgin blush, 
 
 Nor step, but mine, soil'd the earth's tinsell'd robe. 
 
 How full of Heaven this solitude appears — 
 
 This healthful comfort of the happy swain, 
 
 Who from his hard but peaceful bed roused up, 
 
 In morning's exercise saluted is 
 
 By a full choir of feather'd choristers, 
 
 Wedding their notes to the enamour' d air ! 
 
 There Nature, in her unaffected dress, 
 
 Plaited with valleys, and emboss'd with hills, 
 
 Enlaced with silver streams, and fringed with woods, 
 
 Sits lovely in her native russet. 
 
 ChambcrlavHC.
 
 EVENING CL( >SE. 
 
 '• When oft, at evening-close, 
 
 Up yonder hill the village murmur rose; 
 
 There as I pass'd with careless steps and slow. 
 
 The mingled notes came soften'd from below: 
 
 The swain responsive as the milk-maid sung . 
 
 The sober herd that low'd to meet their young ; 
 
 The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool, 
 
 The playful children just let loose from school ; 
 
 The watch-dog's voice that bay'd the whispering wind, 
 
 And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind ; — 
 
 These all in sweet confusion sought the shade, 
 
 And till'd each pause the nightingale had made. 
 
 How often have I paused on every charm! — 
 
 The sheltered cot, the cultivated farm, 
 
 I'll'' never failing brook, the busy mill. 
 
 The decent church that topt the neighbouring hill, — 
 
 The hawthorn bush, with seats beneath the shade. 
 
 For talking age and whispering lovers made ' 
 
 Goldsmith. 
 
 HARK! THE MAVIS. 
 
 Or' tlh yowes //' the inowes, 
 Cd' them where tin- heather gi 
 Or' them where the burnie ro7vs, 
 My bonie dearie.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Hark ! the mavis' evening sang 
 Sounding Clouden's woods amang, 
 Then a faulding let us gang, 
 My bonie dearie. 
 Ca! the, Qr>c. 
 
 We'll gae down by Clouden side, 
 Thro' the hazels spreading wide, 
 O'er the waves that sweetly glide 
 To the moon sae clearly. 
 Ca' the, &c. 
 
 Yonder Clouden's silent towers, 
 Where at moonshine midnight hours, 
 O'er the dewy-bending flowers, 
 Fairies dance sae cheery. 
 Ca' the, &*. 
 
 Cihaist nor bogle shalt thou fear ; 
 Thou'rt to love and Heaven sae dear, 
 Nocht of ill may come thee near, 
 My bonie dearie. 
 Ca the, &*c. 
 
 Fair and lovely as thou art, 
 Thou hast stown my very heart ; 
 I can die — but carina part. 
 My bonie dearie. 
 Ca' the, £-^r. 
 
 While waters wimple to the sea ; 
 While day blinks in the lift sae hie ; 
 Till clay-cauld death shall blin' my ee, 
 Ye shall be my dearie. 
 Ca' the, &>c. 
 
 Kobei-t I<it> i'\. 
 32
 
 10- 
 
 UPKN'S SILKN'l rOWFRS. 1
 
 CORINNA'S 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 colours through the air ! — 
 Get up, sweet slug-a-bed ! and see 
 The dew bespangling herb and tree. 
 Each flower has wept and bow'd toward the east 
 Above an hour since, yet you are not dress'd — 
 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, 
 Whereas a thousand virgins on this day 
 Spring sooner than the lark, to fetch in May. 
 
 Rise ! and put on your foliage, and be seen 
 
 To come forth, like the spring-time, fresh and green, 
 
 And sweet as Flora. Take no care 
 
 For jewels for your gown or hair ; 
 
 Fear not, for 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 praying 
 Few beads are best when once we go a-Maying. 
 
 34 

 
 7NTRY /./. 
 
 Come, my Corinna! come, and, coming, mark 
 How each field turns a street — each street a park. 
 Made green, and trimm'd with trees !— see how- 
 Devotion gives each house a bough 
 Or branch! — each porch, each door, ere this 
 An ark, a 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 M 
 And sin no more, as we have done by stayii 
 but, my Corinna! come, let's go 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 has come 
 back, and with whitethorn laden home: 
 Some have dispatch'd their cakes and cream 
 before that we have ceased to dream; 
 And some have wept, and woo'd, 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 -lance, too, has been sent 
 From out the eve, love's firmament; 
 Many a jest told of the key's betraying 
 This night, and locks pick'dj yet we're not a-Maying! 
 
 Come, let us go, while we are in our prime, 
 
 And take the harmless folly of the tune : 
 
 35
 
 NTRY LIFE. 
 
 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 vapour, or a drop of rain, 
 Once lost, can ne'er be found again, 
 
 So when or you or 1 are made 
 
 A fable, song, or fleeting shade, 
 
 All love, all liking, all delight 
 
 Lies drown'd with us in endless night. 
 Then while time serves, and we are but decaying, 
 Come, my Corinna ! come, let's go a-Maying." 
 
 Her rick. 
 
 THE HAY-FIELD. 
 
 The grateful sweetness of the new-mown hay, 
 Breathing refreshment, fans the toiling swain. 
 And soon the jocund dale and echoing hill 
 Resound with merriment : the simple jest, 
 The village tale of scandal, and the taunts 
 Of rude unpolish'd wit, raise sudden bursts 
 Of laughter from beneath the spreading oak, 
 Where, thrown at ease, and shelter'd from the sun, 
 The plain repast and wholesome beverage cheer 
 Their spirits : light as air they spring renew'd 
 To social labour ; soon the ponderous wain 
 Moves slowly onward with its fragrant load. 
 
 Thomson. 
 36
 
 I III HAY-FIEI.H
 
 WILD FLOWERS. 
 
 I stood tiptoe upon a little hill ; 
 The air was cooling, and so very still, 
 That the sweet buds which with a modest pride 
 Fell droopingly in slanting curve aside, 
 Their scanty-leaved and finely-tapering stems 
 Had not yet lost their starry diadems, 
 Caught from the early sobbings of the morn. 
 The clouds were pure and white as flocks new-shorn, 
 And fresh from the clear brook ; sweetly they slept 
 On the blue fields of heaven, and then there crept 
 A little noiseless noise among the leaves, 
 Born of the very sigh that silence heaves ; 
 For not the faintest motion could be seen 
 Of all the shades that slanted o'er the green. 
 There was wide wandering for the greediest eye, 
 To peer about upon variety ; 
 Far round the horizon's crystal air to skim, 
 And trace the dwindled edgings of its brim ; 
 To picture out the quaint and curious bending 
 Of a fresh woodland alley never-ending : 
 Or by the bowery clefts and leafy shelves, 
 Guess where the jaunty streams refresh themselves. 
 I gazed awhile, and felt as light and free 
 As though the fanning wings of Mercury 
 Had play'd upon my heels : I was light-hearted, 
 And many pleasures to my vision started ; 
 So I straightway began to pluck a posy 
 Of luxuries bright, milky, soft, and rosy. 
 A bush of May-flowers with the bees about them ; 
 Ah, sure no tasteful nook could be without them ; 
 And let a lush laburnum oversweep them, 
 And let long grass grow round the roots, to keep them 
 
 38
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Moist, cool, and green ; and shade the viol> 
 
 That they may bind the moss in leafy nets. 
 
 A filbert-edge with wild-brier overturned, 
 
 And clumps of woodbine taking the soft wind 
 
 Upon their summer thrones; there too should be 
 
 The frequent checker of a youngling tree, 
 
 That widi a score of bright-green brethren shoots 
 
 From the quaint mossiness of aged roots : 
 
 Round which is heard a spring head of clear wat< 
 
 Prattling so wildly of its lovely daughters. 
 
 The spreading blue-bells : it may haply mourn 
 
 That such fair clusters should be rudely torn 
 
 From their fresh beds, and scatter'd thoughtlessly 
 
 By infant hands left on the path to die. 
 
 < )pen afresh your round of starry folds, 
 
 Ye ardent marigolds ! 
 
 Dry up the moisture from your golden lids. 
 
 For great Apollo bids 
 
 That in these days your praises should be sung 
 
 On many harps, which he has lately stnu 
 
 And when again your dewiness he kisses, 
 
 Tell him, I have you in my world of bliss^ 
 
 So haply when I rove in some far vale, 
 
 His mighty voice may come upon the gale. 
 
 Here are sweet peas, on tiptoe for a flight, 
 
 With wings of gentle flush o'er delicate white, 
 
 And taper fingers catching at all thii 
 
 To bind them all about with tiny ri; 
 
 What next? A turf of evening primros 
 
 O'er which the mind maj hover till it do/< 
 
 O'er which it well might take a pleasant sleep, 
 
 But that 'tis ever startled by the leap 
 
 Of buds into ripe flowers. 
 
 Kit 
 
 59
 
 FIELD FLOWERS. 
 
 Ye field flowers ! the gardens eclipse you, 'tis true, 
 Yet, wildings of Nature, I doat upon you, 
 
 For ye waft me to summers of old, 
 When earth teem'd around me with fairy delight, 
 And when daisies and buttercups gladden'd my sight, 
 
 Like treasures of silver and gold. 
 
 I love you for lulling me back into dreams 
 
 Of the blue Highland mountains and echoing streams, 
 
 And of birchen glades breathing their balm ; 
 While the deer was seen glancing in sunshine remote, 
 And the deep mellow crush of the wood-pigeon's note 
 
 Made music that sweeten'd the calm. 
 
 Not a pastoral song has a pleasanter tune 
 
 Than ye speak to my heart, little wildings of June : 
 
 Of ruinous castles ye tell, 
 Where I thought it delightful your beauties to find, 
 When the magic of Nature first breathed on my mind, 
 
 And your blossoms were part of her spell. 
 
 Campbell 
 
 40
 
 
 
 III I D II i'\\ ERS.
 
 A SUMMER MORNING. 
 
 And soon, observant of approaching day, 
 The meek-eyed Morn appears, mother of dews, 
 At first faint gleaming in the dappled east ; 
 Till far o'er ether spreads the widening glow, 
 And from before the lustre of h r face 
 AYhite break the clouds away. With quicken'd step, 
 Drown Night retires : young Day pours in apace, 
 And opens all the lawny prospect wide. 
 The dripping rock, the mountain's misty top, 
 Swell on the sight, and brighten with the dawn, 
 blue, through the dusk, the smoking currents shine ; 
 And from the bladed field the fearful hare 
 Limps, awkward : while along the forest glade 
 The wild deer trip, aud, often turning, gaze 
 At early passenger. Music awakes 
 The native voice of undissembled joy; 
 And thick around the woodland hymns arise. 
 Roused by the cock, the soon -clad shepherd leaves 
 His mossy cottage, where with Peace he dwells ; 
 And from the crowded fold, in order, drives 
 His flock, to taste the verdure of the morn, 
 but yonder comes the powerful King of Day, 
 Rejoicing in the east! The lessening cloud, 
 The kindling azure, and the mountain's brow, 
 
 42
 
 \ TRY III! . 
 
 Illumed with fluid gold, his near approach 
 
 Betoken glad. Lo ! now, apparent all, 
 
 Aslant the dew-bright earth and colour'd 
 
 He looks in boundless majesty abroad ; 
 
 And sheds the shining day, that burnish'd pi 
 
 On rocks, and hills, and towers, and wandering I 
 
 High-gleaming from afar. 
 
 MORNING. 
 
 Wish'd morning's come ; and now upon the plains 
 And distant mountains, where they feed their flocks, 
 The happy shepherds leave their homely hi; 
 And with their pipes proclaim the new-born 
 The lusty swain comes with his well-fill'd stoup 
 Of healthy viands, which, when hunger 'alls, 
 With much content and appetite he eats, 
 To follow in the field his daily toil. 
 Ami dress the grateful glebe that yields him fruits. 
 The beasts, that under the warm hedges sl< 
 And weather'd out the cold, bleak night, are up, 
 And, looking toward the neighbouring pastures, raise 
 Their voice, and bid their fellow-brutes good-mon 
 The cheerful birds, too, on the tops of tfe< 
 Assemble all in choirs, and with their no! 
 Salute and welcome up the rising sun. 
 
 M
 
 THE SUN. 
 
 Most glorious art thou ! when from thy pavilion 
 Thou lookest forth at morning : flinging wide 
 Its curtain clouds of purple and vermilion, 
 Dispensing life and light on every side ; 
 Brightening the mountain cataract, dimly spied 
 Through glittering mist ; opening each dew-gemm'd flower, 
 Or touching, in some hamlet, far descried, 
 Its spiral wreaths of smoke that upward tower, 
 While birds their matin sing from many a leafy bower. 
 
 And more magnificent art thou, bright Sun ! 
 Uprising from the Ocean's billowy bed : 
 Who that has seen thee thus, as I have done, 
 Can e'er forget the effulgent splendours spread 
 From thy emerging radiance ? Upwards sped, 
 Even to the centre of the vaulted sky, 
 Thy beams pervade the heavens, and o'er them shed 
 Hues indescribable — of gorgeous dye, 
 Making among the clouds mute glorious pageantry. 
 
 Then, then how beautiful across the deep 
 The lustre of thy orient path of light ! 
 Onward, still onward, o'er the waves that leap 
 So lovelily, and show their crests of white, 
 The eye, unsated in its own despite, 
 Still up that vista gazes ; till thy way 
 Over the waters seems a pathway bright 
 For holiest thoughts to travel, there to pay 
 Man's homage unto Him who bade thee "rule the Day." 
 
 Barton. 
 44
 
 
 
 
 R.ISIN i l"K >\I THE i I JEAN'S BI1 ' >WY
 
 INVITATION TO IZAAK WALTON. 
 
 Whilst in this cold and blustering clime, 
 Where bleak winds howl and tempests roar, 
 
 We pass away the roughest time 
 Has been of many years before ; 
 
 Whilst from the most tempestuous nooks 
 The chillest blasts our peace invade, 
 
 And by great rains our smallest brooks 
 Are almost navigable made ; 
 
 Whilst all the ills are so improved 
 Of this dead quarter of the year, 
 
 That even you, so much beloved, 
 
 We would not now wish with us here : 
 
 In this estate, I say, it is 
 
 Some comfort to us to suppose 
 That in a better clime than this 
 
 You, our dear friend, have more repose ; 
 
 And some delight to me the while, 
 
 Though Nature now does weep in vain, 
 
 To think that I have seen her smile, 
 And haply may I do again. 
 46
 
 COUA TRY ///■/■. 
 
 If the all-ruling Power please 
 
 We live to sec another May, 
 We'll recompense an age of these 
 
 Foul days in one fine fishing-day. 
 
 We then shall have a day or two, 
 Perhaps a week, wherein to try 
 
 What the best master's hand can do 
 With the most deadly killing By. 
 
 A day with not too bright a beam ; 
 
 A warm, but not a scorching sun ; 
 A southern gale to curl the stream ; 
 
 And, master, half our work is done. 
 
 Then, whilst behind some bush we wait 
 
 The scaly people to betray. 
 We'll prove it just with treacherous bait 
 
 To make the preying trout our prey ; 
 
 And think ourselves in such an hour 
 
 Happier than those, though not so high, 
 
 Who, like leviathans, devour 
 
 Of meaner men the smaller try. 
 
 This, my best friend, at my poor home 
 Shall be our pastime anil our theme ; 
 but then— should you not deign to come, 
 
 You make all this a flattering dream. 
 
 ■17
 
 THE ANGLER'S WISH. 
 
 I in these flowery meads would be : 
 
 These crystal streams should solace me ; 
 
 To whose harmonious bubbling noise 
 
 I with my angle would rejoice, 
 
 Sit here and see the turtle-dove 
 Court his chaste mate to acts of love : 
 
 Or on that bank feel the west wind 
 Breathe health and plenty : please my mind 
 To see sweet dewdrops kiss these flowers, 
 And then washed off by April showers; 
 
 Here, hear my Kenna sing a song ; 
 
 There, see a blackbird feed her young, 
 
 Or a laverock build her nest : 
 
 Here, give my weary spirits rest, 
 
 And raise my low-pitched thoughts above 
 
 Earth, or what poor mortals love : 
 
 Thus, free from lawsuits and the noise 
 Of princes' courts, I would rejoice ; 
 
 Or with my Bryan and a book 
 
 Loiter long days near Shawford brook ; 
 
 There sit by him and eat my meat ; 
 
 There see the sun both rise and set ; 
 
 There bid good morning to next day ; 
 
 There meditate my time away; 
 
 And angle on, and beg to have 
 
 A quiet passage to a welcome grave. 
 
 Izaak Walton. 
 48
 
 I Ml ANGLER.
 
 THE ANGLER'S SONG. 
 
 As inward love breeds outward talk, 
 
 The hound some praise, and some the hawk ; 
 
 Some better pleas'd with private sport 
 
 Use tennis, some a mistress court : 
 
 But these delights I neither wish, 
 
 Nor envy, while I freely fish. 
 
 Who hunts, doth oft in danger ride 
 Who hawks, lures oft both far and wide ; 
 Who uses games, shall often prove 
 A loser ; but who falls in love 
 
 Is fettered in fond Cupid's snare ; 
 
 My Angle breeds me no such care. 
 
 Of recreation there is none 
 
 So free as fishing is alone ; 
 
 All other pastimes do no less 
 
 Than mind and body both possess : 
 My hand alone my work can do, 
 So I can fish and study too. • 
 
 I care not, I, to fish in seas, 
 
 Fresh rivers best my mind do please ; 
 
 Whose sweet calm course I contemplate, 
 
 And seek in life to imitate : 
 
 In civil bounds I fain would keep, 
 And for my past offences weep. 
 
 5°
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 And when the timorous Trout I wait 
 To take, and he devours my bait, 
 How poor a thing sometimes I find 
 Will captivate a greedy mind : 
 
 And when none bite, I praise the wise, 
 Whom vain allurements ne'er surprise. 
 
 But yet, though while I fish I fa 
 
 I make good fortune my repast, 
 
 And thereunto my friend invite, 
 
 In whom I more than that delight : 
 
 Who is more welcome to my dish, 
 Than to my Angle was my fish. 
 
 As well content no prize to take. 
 
 As use of taken prize to make : 
 
 For so our Lord was pleased when 
 
 He fishers made fishers of men : 
 
 Where, which is in no other game, 
 A man may fish and praise Ili-- name. 
 
 The fir>t men that our Saviour dear 
 Did choose to wait upon Him here, 
 lilest fishers were, and fish the last 
 Food was that He on earth did take : 
 I therefore strive to follow the 
 Whom He to foliow Him hath chose. 
 
 // .. 
 
 5i
 
 ODE TO EVENING. 
 
 If ought of oaten stop, or pastoral song, 
 
 May hope, chaste Eve, to soothe thy modest ear 
 
 Like thy own solemn springs, 
 
 Thy springs, and dying gales ; 
 
 O nymph reserved, while now the brightdiaired sun 
 Sits in yon western tent whose cloudy skirts, 
 
 With brede ethereal wove, 
 
 O'erhang his wavy bed : 
 
 Now air is huslied, save where the weak-eyed bat, 
 With soft shrill shriek flits by on leathern wing, 
 
 Or where the beetle winds 
 
 His small but sullen horn, 
 
 As oft he rises 'midst the twilight path, 
 Against the pilgrim borne in heedless hum : 
 
 Now teach me, maid composed, 
 
 To breathe some softened strain, 
 
 Whose numbers stealing through thy dark'ning vale, 
 May not unseemly with its stillness suit ; 
 
 As, musing slow, I hail 
 
 Thy genial loved return ! 
 
 '52
 
 EVENING.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 For when thy folding-star arising shows 
 His paly circlet, at his warning lamp 
 The fragrant hours, and elves 
 Who slept in buds the day, 
 
 And many a nymph who wreathes her brows with sedge, 
 And sheds the fresh'ning dew, and, lovelier still 
 
 The pensive pleasures sweet, 
 
 Prepare thy shadowy car ; 
 
 Then let me rove some wild and heathy scene; 
 Or find some ruin, 'midst its dreary dells, 
 
 Whose walls more awful nod 
 
 By thy religious gleams. 
 
 Or if chill blustering winds, or driving rain, 
 Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut 
 
 That from the mountain's side 
 
 Views wild and swelling floods, 
 
 And hamlets brown, and dim discovered spires, 
 And hears their simple bell, and marks o'er all 
 
 Thy dewy fingers draw 
 
 The gradual dusky veil. 
 
 While spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont, 
 And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest Eve ! 
 
 While summer loves to sport 
 
 Beneath thy lingering light ; 
 
 54
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 While sallow autumn fills thy lap with leaves ; 
 ( )r winter, yelling through the troublous air, 
 
 Affrights thy shrinking train, 
 
 And rudely rends thy robes; 
 
 So long regardful of thy quiet rule, 
 
 Shall fancy, friendship, science, smiling peace, 
 
 Thy gentlest influence own, 
 
 And love thy favourite name. 
 
 IV. Collins. 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 i 
 
 Yet one smile more, departing distant sun 
 
 One mellow smile through the soft vapoury air, 
 Ere o'er the frozen earth the loud winds run, 
 
 Or snows are sifted o'er the meadows bare. 
 One smile on the brown hills and naked trees, 
 
 And the dark rocks whose summer wreaths are cast, 
 And the blue Gentian-flower, that in the breeze 
 
 Nods lonely, of her beauteous race the last. 
 Yet a few sunny days, in which the bee 
 
 Shall murmur by the hedge that skirts the way, 
 The cricket chirps upon the russet lea, 
 
 And man delights to linger in thy ray. 
 Yet one rich smile, and we will try to bear 
 The piercing winter frosts and winds, and darkened air. 
 
 Bryant. 
 
 55
 
 THE FARMER'S BOY. 
 
 Small was his charge : no wilds had they to roam ; 
 But bright enclosures circling round their home. 
 No yellow-blossom'd furze, nor stubborn thorn, 
 The heath's rough produce, had their fleeces torn ; 
 Yet ever roving, ever seeking thee, 
 Enchanting spirit, dear Variety ! 
 O happy tenants, prisoners of a day ! 
 Released to ease, to pleasure, and to play; 
 Indulged through every field by turns to range, 
 And taste them all in one continual change. 
 For though luxuriant their grassy food, 
 Sheep long confined but loathe the present good: 
 Bleating around the homeward gate they meet, 
 And starve, and pine, with plenty at their feet, 
 Loosed from the winding lane, a joyful throng, 
 See, o'er yon pasture, how they pour along ! 
 Giles round their boundaries takes his usual stroll ; 
 Sees every pass secured, and fences whole ; 
 High fences, proud to charm the gazing eye, 
 Where many a nestling first essays to fly ; 
 Where blows the woodbine, faintly streak'd with red, 
 And rests on every bough its tender head ; 
 Round the young ash its twining branches meet, 
 Or crown the hawthorn with its odour sweet. 
 
 s6 

 
 Say, ye that know, ye who have felt and scon. 
 Spring's morning smiles, and soul-enliv'ning green, 
 Say, did you give the thrilling transport wa\ ? 
 Did your eye brighten, when young lambs at ; 
 Leaped o'er your path with animated pride, 
 < )r gazed in merry cluster by your side? 
 Ye who can smile, to wisdom no disg 
 At the arch meaning of a kitten's \\u e - 

 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 If spotless innocence, and infant mirth, 
 Excites to praise, or gives reflection birth ; 
 In shades like these pursue your fav'rite joy, 
 'Midst Nature's revels, sports that never cloy. 
 
 Robert Bloomfield. 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 The great Sun, 
 Scattering the clouds with a resistless smile, 
 Came forth to do thee homage ; a sweet hymn 
 Was by the low winds chaunted in the sky ; 
 And when thy feet descended on the earth, 
 Scarce could they move amid the clustering flowers 
 By nature strewn o'er valley, hill, and field, 
 To hail her bless'd deliverer '. — Ye fair trees, 
 How are ye changed, and changing while I gaze ! 
 It seems as if some gleam of verdant light 
 Fell on you from a rainbow ; but it lives 
 Amid your tendrils, brightening every hour 
 Into a deeper radiance. Ye sweet birds, 
 Were you asleep through all the wintry hours, 
 Beneath the waters, or in mossy caves ? — 
 Yet are ye not, 
 
 Sporting in tree and air, more beautiful 
 Than the young lambs, that, from the valley-side, 
 Send a soft bleating like an infant's voice, 
 Half happy, half afraid ? O blessed things ! 
 At sight of this your perfect innocence, 
 The sterner thoughts of manhood melt away 
 Into a mood as mild as woman's dreams. 
 
 // 'ilson. 
 
 5«
 
 BIRDS. 
 
 Yi Birds that fly through the fields of air, 
 
 What lessons of wisdom and truth ye bear ; 
 
 Ye would teach our souls from the earth to rise ; 
 
 Ye would bid us all grovelling scenes despise. 
 
 Ye would tell us that all its pursuits arc vain. 
 
 That pleasure is toil — ambition is pain, — 
 
 That its bliss is touched with a poisoning leaven. 
 
 Ye would teach us to fix our aim in heaven. 
 
 Beautiful Birds of lightsome wing, 
 
 Bright creatures that come with the voice of Sprit 
 We see you array'd in the hues of the morn. 
 Yet ye dream not of pride, ami ye wist not of scorn ! 
 Though rainbow-splendour around you glows, 
 
 \ unit Dot the beauty which ratine bestows: 
 Oh! what a lesson for glory are \c. 
 How ye preach the grace of humility. 
 
 Swift birds, that skim o'er the storm) deep, 
 Who steadily onward your journey keep. 
 Who neither for rest nor for slumber stay, 
 but press still forward, by night or day — 
 .\> in your unwearying course ye fly 
 beneath the clear and unclouded sky ; 
 Oh ! may we, without delay, like you, 
 The path of duty and right pursue.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Sweet Birds, that breathe the spirit of song, 
 And surround Heaven's gate in melodious throng, 
 Who rise with the earliest beams of day, 
 Your morning tribute of thanks to pay, 
 You remind us that we should likewise raise 
 The voice of devotion and song of praise ; 
 There's something about you that points on high 
 Ye beautiful tenants of earth and sky ! 
 
 C. IV. Thompson. 
 
 NOON. 
 
 Fervid on the glittering flood 
 
 Now the noontide radiance glow.-- ; 
 
 Drooping o'er its infant bud. 
 Not a dewdrop's left the rose. 
 
 By the brook the shepherd dines ; 
 
 From the fierce meridian heat 
 Sheltered by the branching pines, 
 
 Pendent o'er his grassy seat. 
 
 Now the ilock forsakes the glade. 
 
 Where, unchecked, the sunbeams fall ; 
 Sure to find a pleasing shade, 
 
 By the ivied abbey-wall. 
 
 Fcho, in her airy round, 
 
 O'er the ri\er, rock, and hill, 
 
 Cannot catch a single sound 
 Save the clack of yonder mill. 
 6 c 

 
 i 
 
 Cattle court the zephyrs bland, 
 Where the streamlet wander- i 
 
 Or with languid silence stand 
 Midway in the marshy \ 1. 
 
 But from mountain, dell, or stream. 
 
 Not .1 fluttering zephyr springs ; 
 Fearful lest the noontide beam 
 
 - on h it us silken wil 
 
 61
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Not a leaf lias leave to stir, 
 
 Nature's lulled, serene, and still ; 
 Quiet e'en the shepherd's cur, 
 
 Sleeping on the heath-clad hill. 
 
 Languid is the landscape round, 
 Till the fresh descending shower, 
 
 Grateful to the thirsty ground, 
 Raises every fainting flower. 
 
 Now the hill, the hedge is green, 
 Now the warbler's throat's in tune, 
 
 Blithesome is the verdant scene, 
 Brightened by the beams of noon ! 
 
 Cunningham . 
 
 SPRING. 
 
 Now Winter's storms, which chilled the sky, 
 Before the tepid breezes fly ; 
 Smiling advance the rosy hours, 
 Strewing around their purple flowers ; 
 Brown earth is crowned with herbage green, 
 And decked with bloom each twig is seen ; 
 The rose displays its lovely hues 
 In meads, which quaff the morning dews ; 
 His whistle shrill the shepherd blows ; 
 His kids the gladsome goatherd knows ; 
 E'en now I see the sai'or's boat, 
 Wafted by gentle breezes, float; 
 And Bacchus' girls, with ivy crowned, 
 Shout, Io ! through the echoing ground. 
 
 62 

 
 COUNTRY 11. 
 
 The bees in clusters round the hive, 
 
 Loaded with Liquid sweets, arrive ; 
 
 And, murmuring still in busy mood, 
 
 Elaborate their luscious food. 
 
 The race of warblers "pour their throats;" 
 
 The blue wave wafts the halcyon's notes; 
 
 The swallow twittering flits along ; 
 
 The white swan pours his piercing son,' ; 
 
 And Philomela mourns the woods among. 
 
 Does, then, the green earth teem with gladnes J 
 Has Nature dropt her robe of sadne 
 Do the swains pipe; the flocks rejoice; 
 The mountains echo Bacchus' voi< 
 The mariners their sails unloose ; 
 The bees distil their luscious juice? 
 Has Spring inspired the warbling throng? 
 
 And can't the poet make a song? 
 
 Meleagtr. 

 
 LOGAN BRAES. 
 
 O Logan, sweetly didst thou glide 
 That day I was my Willie's bride ; 
 And years sinsyne hae o'er us run, 
 Like Logan to the simmer sun. 
 But now thy flow'ry banks appear 
 Like drumlie winter, dark and drear, 
 While my dear lad maun face his faes, 
 Far, far frae me and Logan Braes. 
 
 Again the merry month o' May 
 
 Has made our hills and valleys gay ; 
 
 The birds rejoice in leafy bovvers, 
 
 The bees hum round the breathing flowers 
 
 Blithe morning lifts his rosy eye, 
 
 And evening's tears are tears of joy : 
 
 My soul, delightless, a' surveys, 
 
 While Willie's far frae Logan Braes. 
 
 Within yon milk-white hawthorn bush, 
 Amang her nestlings, sits the thrush ; 
 Her faithfu' mate will share her toil, 
 Or wi' his song her cares beguile : 
 But I wi' my sweet nurslings here, 
 Nae mate to help, nae mate to cheer, 
 Pass widow'd nights and joyless days, 
 While Willie's far frae Logan Braes. 
 *4 

 
 A.K 

 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 O wae upon you, men o' state, 
 That brethren rouse to deadly hate ! 
 As ye mak monie a fond heart mourn, 
 Sae may it on your heads return ! 
 How can your flinty hearts enjoy 
 The widow's tears, the orphan's cry? 
 But soon may peace bring happy days, 
 And Willie hame to Logan Braes ! 
 
 Robert Burns. 
 
 TO THE TROUT FISHER. 
 
 When with his lively ray the potent sun 
 Has pierced the streams, and roused the finny race, 
 Then, issuing cheerful, to thy sport repair ; 
 Chief should the western breezes curling play, 
 And light o'er ether bear the shadowy clouds. 
 High to their fount, this day, amid the hills, 
 And woodlands warbling round, trace up the brooks 
 The next pursue their rocky-channelled maze, 
 Down to the river, in whose ample wave 
 The little Naiads love to sport at large. 
 Just in the dubious point, where with the pool 
 Is mixed the trembling stream, or where it boils 
 Around the stone, or from the hollowed bank 
 Reverted plays in undulating flow — 
 There throw, nice-judging, the delusive fly ; 
 
 66
 
 ".V/'AT LIFE. 
 
 And, as you lead it round in artful cun . 
 With eye attentive mark the spring me. 
 
 Straight as above the surface of the tl 
 They wanton rise, or urged by hunger leap, 
 Then fix, with gentle twitch, the barbed hook ; 
 Some lightly tossing to the grassy bank, 
 And to the shelving shore slow-dragging some, 
 With various hand proportioned to their for 
 If yet too young, and easily deceived, 
 A worthless prey scarce bends your pliant rod, 
 Him, piteous of his youth and the short space 
 He has enjoyed the vital light of heaven. 
 Soft disengage, ami back into the stream 
 The speckled captive throw. 
 
 *T 
 
 "7
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Happy the man who has the town escaped ! 
 
 To him the whistling trees, the murmuring brooks, 
 
 The shining pebbles, preach 
 
 Virtue's and wisdom's lore. 
 
 The whispering grove a holy temple is 
 
 To him, where God draws nigher to his soul ; 
 
 Each verdant sod a shrine, 
 
 Whereby he kneels to Heaven. 
 
 The nightingale on him sings slumber down — 
 The nightingale rewakes him, fluting sweet, 
 
 When shines the lovely red 
 
 Of morning through the trees. 
 
 Then he admires thee in the plain, O God ! 
 
 In the ascending pomp of dawning day— 
 Thee in the glorious sun — 
 The worm — the budding branch. 
 
 ■& 
 
 Where coolness gushes in the waving grass, 
 Or o'er the flowers, streams, and fountains rests ; 
 Inhales the breath of prime, 
 
 The gentle airs of eve. 
 
 His straw-deck'd thatch, where doves bask in the sun, 
 And play and hop, incites to sweeter rest 
 
 Than golden halls of state 
 
 ( >r beds of down afford. 
 68
 
 "• i 111- MURM1 R1XCJ .
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 To him the plumy-people sporting chirp, 
 Chatter, and whistle, on his basket perch, 
 And from his quiet hand 
 Pick crumbs, or peas, or grains. 
 
 Oft wanders he alone, and thinks on death ; 
 And in the village churchyard by the graves 
 
 Sits, and beholds the cross — 
 
 Death's waving garland there. 
 
 The stone beneath the elders, where a text 
 Of Scripture teaches joyfully to die — 
 
 And with his scythe stands Death — 
 
 An angel, too, with palms. 
 
 Happy the man who thus hath 'scaped the town ! 
 Him did an angel bless when he was born — 
 
 The cradle of the boy 
 
 With flowers celestial strew'd. 
 
 Iloltv. 
 
 APRIL. 
 
 I have found violets. April hath come on, 
 And the cool winds feel softer, and the rain 
 Falls in the beaded drops of Summer time. 
 You may hear birds at morning, and at eve 
 The tame dove lingers till the twilight falls, 
 Cooing upon the eaves, and drawing in 
 His beautiful bright neck, and from the hills 
 
 7°
 
 COl'XTRY LIFE. 
 
 \ murmur, like the hoarseness of th< 
 Tells the release of waters, and the earth 
 
 Sends up a pleasant smell, and the dry leaves 
 Are lifted by the -rass — and so I know- 
 That Nature, from her delicate ear. hath heard 
 The dropping of the velvet foot of Sprit 
 
 Smell at my Violets ! — I found them where 
 The liquid south stole o'er them, on a bank 
 That lean'd to running water. There's to me 
 A daintiness about these early flower* 
 That touches one like poetry. They blow 
 With such a simple loveliness among 
 The common herbs of pasture, and breathe out 
 Their lives so unobtrusively, like hearts 
 Whose beatings are too gentle for the world. 
 I love to go in the capricious days 
 Of April and hunt Violets ; when the rain 
 Is in the blue cups trembling, and they nod 
 So gracefully to the kisses of the wind. 
 It may be deemed unmanly, but the wise 
 Read Nature like the manuscript of Heaven, 
 And call the flowers its poetry. Co out! 
 Ye spirits of habitual unrest, 
 And read it when the fever of the world 
 Hath made your hearts impatient, and, if life 
 
 Hath yet one spring unpoison'd, it will be 
 
 Like a beguiling music to its flow. 
 
 And you will no more wonder that I love 
 
 lo hunt for Violets in the April time. 
 
 .V. /'. " 
 
 7'
 
 THE FARMER'S BOY. 
 
 His simple errand done, he homeward hies ; 
 
 Another instantly its place supplies. 
 
 The clatt'ring Dairymaid immersed in steam, 
 
 Singing and scrubbing 'midst her milk and cream, 
 
 Bawls out, " Go fetch the cows ! " — he hears no more ; 
 
 For pigs, and ducks, and turkeys throng the door, 
 
 And sitting hens, for constant war prepared ; 
 
 A concert strange to that which late he heard. 
 
 Straight to the meadow then he whistling goes ; 
 
 With well-known hallo calls his lazy cows : 
 
 Down the rich pasture heedlessly they graze, 
 
 Or hear the summons with an idle gaze; 
 
 For well they know the cow-yard yields no more 
 
 Its tempting fragrance, nor its wintry store. 
 
 Reluctance marks their steps, sedate and slow ; 
 
 The right of conquest all the law they know ; 
 
 The strong press on, the weak by turns succeed, 
 
 And one superior always takes the lead ; 
 
 Is ever foremost, wheresoe'er they stray ; 
 
 Allow'd precedence, undisputed sway ; 
 
 With jealous pride her station is maintain'd, 
 
 For many a broil that post of honour gain'd. 
 
 At home, the yard affords a grateful s^ene ; 
 
 For Spring makes e'en a miry cow-yard clean. 
 
 Thence fiom its chalky bed behold convey'd 
 
 The rich manure that drenching Winter made, 
 
 Which piled near home, grows green with, many a weed, 
 
 A promised nutriment for Autumn's seed.
 
 Forth comes the Maid, and like the morning smiles 
 The Mistress too, and follow'd close by Giles. 
 
 A friendly tripod forms their humble seat, 
 With pails bright scour'd. and delicately sweet. 
 Where shadowing elms obstruct the morning ray, 
 Begins the work, begins the simple lay ; 
 The full-charged udder yields its willing streams, 
 While Mary sings some lover's amorous dream- . 
 And crouching Giles beneath a neighbouring tree 
 Tugs o'er his pail, and chants with equal gl< 
 Whose hat with tatter'd brim, of nap so bare. 
 From the cow's side purloins a coat of hair, 
 A mottled ensign of his harmless trad 
 An unambitious, peaceable cockade. 
 
 / j
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 As unambitious too that cheerful aid 
 
 The Mistress yields beside her rosy maid ; 
 
 With joy she views her plenteous reeking store, 
 
 And bears a brimmer to the dairy door ; 
 
 Her cows dismiss'd, the luscious mead to roam, 
 
 Till eve again recal them loaded home. 
 
 Robert BloomficU. 
 
 ODE TO SPRING. 
 
 Lo ! where the rosy-bosom 'd 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 gather'd fragrance fling. 
 
 Where'er the oak's thick branches stretch 
 
 A broader, browner shade ; 
 Where'er the rude and moss-grown beech 
 
 O'er-canopies the glade, 
 Beside some water's rushy brink 
 With me the Muse shall sit, and think 
 
 (At ease reclin'd in rustic state) 
 How vain the ardour of the crowd, 
 How low, how little are the proud, 
 
 How indigent the great ! 
 74
 
 COUNTRY Li 
 
 Still is the toiling hand of care , 
 
 The panting herds repo 
 Yet hark ! how through the peo| I :d air 
 
 The busy murmur glow 
 The insert youth are on the wing. 
 Eager to taste the honied Spring, 
 
 \n<l float aniiil the liquid noon 
 some lightly o'er the current skim, 
 Some show their gaily-gilded trim, 
 
 Qui< k glancing to the sun. 
 
 To contemplation's sober eye 
 
 Such is the rac e of man ; 
 And they that creep, and they that fly, 
 
 Shall cw(\. where they began. 
 Alike the busy and the gay 
 But flutter through life's little day 
 
 In fortune's varying colours dress'd 
 Brush' d by the hand of rough mischan* e 
 Or chill'd by age. their aire dance 
 
 They leave, in dust to rot. 
 
 Melhinks I hear in accents low 
 
 The sportive kind reply : 
 ••Poor Moralist! and what art thou? 
 
 A solitary fly ! 
 Thy joys no glittering female meet-. 
 V> hive hast thou of hoarded sweets, 
 
 No painted plumage to disp'ay : 
 On hasty wings thy youth is flown, 
 Thy sun is set, thy Spring is gone 
 
 We frolic, while 'tis M 
 
 75
 
 EVENING HYMN. 
 
 The night is come, like to the day ; 
 Depart not Thou, great God, away. 
 Let not my sins, black as the night, 
 Eclipse the lustre of Thy light. 
 Keep still in my horizon ; for to me 
 The sun makes not the day, but Thee. 
 Thou whose nature cannot sleep, 
 On my temples sentry keep ! 
 Guard me 'gainst those watchful foes, 
 Whose eyes are open while mine close ; 
 Let no dreams my head infest, 
 But such as Jacob's temples blest. 
 While I do rest, my soul advance ; 
 Make me to sleep a holy trance. 
 That I may, my rest being wrought, 
 Awake into some holy thought ; 
 And with as active vigour run 
 My course as doth the nimble sun. 
 Sleep is a death ; oh ! make me try, 
 By sleeping, what it is to die : 
 And as gently lay my head 
 On my grave, as now my bed. 
 Howe'er I rest, great God, let me 
 Awake again at last with Thee. 
 And thus assured, behold I lie 
 Securely, or to wake or die. 
 76

 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 These are my drowsy days ; in vain 
 1 do now wake to sleep again : 
 ( >h ! come that hour, when I shall never 
 Sleep again, but wake for ever. 
 
 Sir The nuts Bi'tnune. 
 
 LITTLE STREAMS. 
 
 Little streams are light and shadow, 
 Flowing through the pasture meadow- 
 Flowing by the green way- side, 
 Through the forest dim and wild, 
 Through the hamlet still and small, 
 By the cot' age, by the hall, 
 By the ruin'd abbey still, 
 Turning here and there a mill, 
 Bearing tribute to the river— 
 Little streams, I love you ever. 
 
 Summer music is there flowing — 
 Flowering plants in them are growing ; 
 Happy life is in them all, 
 Creatures innocent and small ; 
 Little birds come down to drink. 
 Fearless of their leafy brink ; 
 Noble trees beside them grow, 
 ('dooming them with branches low ; 
 And between the sunshine glancing 
 In their little waves is dancing. 
 
 Little streams have flowers a many, 
 Beautiful and fail as any ; 
 7§
 
 "WAT LIFE 
 
 T) pha strong, an 1 green bur re< 
 Willow-herb, with cotton-seed ; 
 Arrow-head, with eye of jet, 
 And the water-violet. 
 There the flowering rush you meet, 
 And the plumy meadow-sweet ; 
 And in places deep and stilly, 
 Marble-like, the water-lily. 
 
 Little streams, their voices cheery, 
 
 Sound forth welcomes to the wean . 
 
 Flowing on from day to day, 
 
 Without stint and without stay; 
 
 Here, upon their flowery bank. 
 
 In the old time pilgrims drank ; 
 
 Here have seen, as now, pass by, 
 
 King-fisher, and dragon-fly ; 
 
 Those bright things that have theii dwelling 
 
 Where the little streams are welling. 
 
 Down in valleys green ami lowly. 
 Mm muring not and gliding slowly, 
 Up in mountain hollows wild. 
 Fretting like a peevish child. ] 
 Through the hamlet, where all day 
 In their waves the children play ; 
 Running west, or running east, 
 Doing good to man and beast ; 
 Always giving, weary never — 
 Little streams, I love you ever. 
 
 79
 
 MY AIN KIND DEARIE O 
 
 When o'er the hill the eastern star 
 
 Tells bughtin-time is near, my jo 
 And owsen frae the furrow'd field 
 
 Return sae dowf and wearie O ; 
 Down by the burn, where scented birks 
 
 Wi' dew are hanging clear, my jo, 
 I'll meet thee on the iea-rig, 
 
 My ain kind dearie O. 
 
 In mirkest glen, at midnight hour, 
 
 I'd rove, and ne'er be eerie O, 
 If thro' that glen I gaed to thee, 
 
 My ain kind dearie O. 
 Altho' the night were ne'er sae wild, 
 
 And 1 were ne'er sae wearie O, 
 I'd meet thee on the lea-rig, 
 
 My ain kind dearie O. 
 
 The hunter lo'es the morning sun, 
 
 To rouse the mountain deer, my jo ; 
 At noon the fisher seeks the glen, 
 
 Along the burn to steer, my jo; 
 Gie me the hour o' gloamin grey. 
 
 It maks my heart sae cheery O, 
 To meet thee on the lea-rig, 
 
 My ain kind dearie O. 
 
 Robert Burns. 
 
 So
 
 " GIE ME THE HOUR O' GLOAMIN GREY.
 
 RURAL PLEASURES. 
 
 Tis not that rural sports alone invite, 
 Bat all the grateful country breathes delight ; 
 Here blooming health exerts her gentle reign, 
 And strings the sinews of the industrious swain. 
 Soon as the morning lark salutes the day, 
 Through dewy fields I take my frequent way, 
 Where I behold the farmer's early care 
 In the revolving labours of the year. 
 
 When the fresh spring in all her state is crown'd, 
 And high luxuriant grass o'erspreads the ground. 
 The labourer with the bending scythe is seen, 
 Shaving the surface of the waving green ; 
 Of all her native pride disrobes the land, 
 And meads lays waste before his sweeping hand ; 
 While with the mountain sun the meadow glows 
 The fading herbage round he loosely throws : 
 But, if some sign portend a lasting show'r, 
 The experienced swain foresees the coming hour 
 His sunburnt hands the scatt'ring fork forsake, 
 And ruddy damsels ply the saving rake ; 
 In rising hills the fragrant harvest grows, 
 And spreads along the field in equal rows. 
 
 Now when the height of heaven bright Phoebus gains, 
 And level rays cleave wide the thirsty plains ; 
 When heifers seek the shade and cooling lake, 
 And in the middle pathway basks the snake 
 Oh, lead me, guard me from the sultry hours, 
 Hide me, ye forests, in your closet bowers : 
 
 82
 
 UNTRY //. 
 
 Where the tail oak his spreading arms entwines, 
 And with the beech a mutual shade combines; 
 Where flows the raurm'ring brook inviting dreai 
 Where bordering hazel overhangs the stream 
 Whose rolling current winding round anil round, 
 With frequent falls makes all the wood resound ; 
 Upon the mossy couch my limbs I cast, 
 And e'en at noon the sweets of evening taste. 
 
 Gay. 
 
 A SUMMER SABBATH WALK. 
 
 Delightful is this loneliness! it calms 
 
 My heart : pleasant the cool beneath these elms. 
 
 That throw across the stream a moveless shade ! 
 
 Here Nature in her mid-noon whisper speaks; 
 
 How peaceful every sound ! — the ring-dove's plaint, 
 
 Moaned from the twilight centre of the grove, 
 
 While every other woodland lay is mute, 
 
 Save when the wren flits from her down-coved nest, 
 
 And from the root-sprig trills her ditty clear, — 
 
 The grasshopper's oft-pausing chirp, — the buzz, 
 
 Angrily shrill, of moss-entangled bee, 
 
 That, soon as loosed, booms with full twang away, — 
 
 The sudden rushing of the minnow-shoal, 
 
 Scared from the shallows by my passing tread. 
 
 Dimpling the water glides, with here and there 
 
 A glossy fly. skimming in circlets gay 
 
 The treacherous surface, while the quick-eyed trout
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Watches his time to spring ; or, from above, 
 
 Some feathered dam, purveying 'midst the boughs, 
 
 Darts from her perch and to her plumeless brood 
 
 Bears off the prize : — sad emblem of man's lot ! 
 
 He, giddy insect from his native leaf 
 
 (Where safe and happily he might have lurked), 
 
 Elate upon ambition's gaudy wings, 
 
 Forgetful of his origin, and, worse, 
 
 Unthinking of his end, flies to the stream ; 
 
 And if from hostile vigilance he 'scape, 
 
 Buoyant he flutters but a little while, 
 
 Mistakes the inverted image of the sky 
 
 For heaven itself, and, sinking, meets his fate. 
 
 James Grahame. 
 
 THE EVENING WALK. 
 
 But see, the setting sun 
 Puts on a milder countenance, and skirts 
 The undulated clouds, that cross his way 
 With glory visible. His axle cools, 
 And his broad disk, though fervent, not intense, 
 Foretells the near approach of matron Night. 
 Ye fair, retreat ! Your drooping flowers need 
 Wholesome refreshment. Down the hedgerow path 
 We hasten home, and only slack our speed 
 To gaze a moment at th' accustom'd gap, 
 That all so unexpectedly presents 
 The clear cerulean prospect down the vale, 
 
 84
 
 " Till NEAR APPROACH OF NIGH I.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Dispersed along the bottom flocks and herds, 
 Hay-ricks and cottages, beside a stream, 
 That silvery meanders here and there ; 
 And higher up corn-fields, and pastures, hops, 
 And waving woods, and tufts, and lonely oaks, 
 Thick interspersed as Nature best was pleased. 
 
 Happy the man who truly loves his home, 
 And never wanders farther from his door 
 Than we have gone to-day ; who feels his heart 
 Still drawing homeward, and delights, like us, 
 Once more to rest his foot on his own threshold. 
 
 Hindis- 
 
 THE RURAL WALK. 
 
 For I have loved the rural walk through lanes 
 Of grassy swarth, close cropped by nibbling sheep, 
 And skirted thick with intertexture firm 
 Of thorny boughs ; have loved the rural walk 
 O'er hills, through valleys, and by river's brink, 
 E'er since, a truant boy, I passed my bounds, 
 T enjoy a ramble on the banks of Thames; 
 And still remember, nor without regret, 
 Of hours, that sorrow has since much endeared, 
 How oft, my slice of pocket store consumed, 
 Still hungering, penniless, and far from home, 
 I fed on scarlet hips and stony haws, 
 Or blushing crabs, or berries, that emboss, 
 
 86
 
 UNTRY LIFE. 
 
 The bramble, black as jet, or sloes ausl 
 Hard flare! but such as boyish appel 
 Disdains not, nor the palate, undepraved 
 
 By culinary arts, unsavoury deems. 
 
 
 JUNE. 
 
 The summer-time has come again, 
 With all its light and mirth, 
 
 And June leads on the laughing hours 
 To bless the weary earth. 
 
 The sunshine lies along the street. 
 
 So dim and cold before, 
 And in the open window creeps. 
 
 And slumbers on the floor. 
 
 The country was so fresh and fine 
 
 And beautiful in May, 
 It must be more than beautiful — 
 
 A Paradise to-day ! 
 
 If I were only there again, 
 
 I'd seek the lanes apart, 
 And shout aloud in mighty words. 
 
 To ease my happy heart. 
 
 Stoddard. 
 
 :
 
 THERE WAS A LASS. 
 
 There was a lass, and she was fair, 
 At kirk and market to be seen. 
 
 When a' the fairest maids were met, 
 The fairest maid was bonie Jean. 
 
 And aye she wrought her mammie's wark 
 And aye she sang sae merrily : 
 
 The blithest bird upon the bush 
 Had ne'er a lighter heart than she. 
 
 But hawks will rob the tender joys 
 That bless the little lintwhite's nest ; 
 
 And frost will blight the fairest flowers, 
 And love will break the soundest rest. 
 
 Young Robie was the brawest lad, 
 The flower and pride of a' the glen ; 
 
 And he had owsen, sheep and kye, 
 And wanton naigies nine or ten. 
 
 He gaed wi' Jeanie to the tryste. 
 
 He danc'd wi' Jeanie on the down ; 
 And lang ere witless Jeanie wist, 
 
 Her heart was tint, her peace was stown. 
 
 As in the bosom o' the stream 
 
 The moon-beam dwells at dewy e'en ; 
 
 So trembling, pure, was tender love, 
 Within the breast o' bonie Jean. 
 88 

 
 '-' ^." 
 
 And now she works her mammie's wark, 
 And aye she sighs wi' care and pain ; 
 
 Yet wistna what her ail might be, 
 Or what wad mak her weel again. 
 
 But didna Jeanie's heart loup light, 
 
 And didna joy blink in her ee, 
 As Robie tauld a tale o' love, 
 Ae e'enin on the lily lea? 
 89 
 
 M
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 The sun was sinking in the west, 
 The birds sang sweet in ilka grove ; 
 
 His cheek to hers he fondly prest, 
 And whisper'd thus his tale o' love : 
 
 O Jeanie fair, I lo'e thee dear; 
 
 O canst thou think to fancy me ? 
 Or wilt thou leave thy mammie's cot, 
 
 And learn to tent the farms wi' me ? 
 
 At barn or byre thou shaltna drudge, 
 
 Or naething else to trouble thee ; 
 But stray amang the heather-bells, 
 
 And tent the waving corn wi' me. 
 
 Now what could artless Jeanie do ? 
 
 She had nae will to say him na : 
 At length she blush'd a sweet consent, 
 
 And love was aye between them twa. 
 
 Robert Barns. 
 
 ^^XW^K W 
 
 90
 
 THE NATURALIST'S gUMMER-EVENING WALK. 
 
 When day, declining, sheds a milder gleam, 
 
 What time the May-fly haunts the pool or stream ; 
 
 When the still ( >wl skims round the grassy mead, 
 
 What time the timorous Hare limps forth to feed : 
 
 Then be the time to steal adown the dale, 
 
 And listen to the vagrant Cuckoo's tale ; 
 
 To hear the clamorous Curlew call his mate, 
 
 Or the soft Quail his tender pain relate; 
 
 To see the Swallow sweep the darkening plain 
 
 Belated, to support her infant train ; 
 
 To mark the Swift in rapid giddy ring 
 
 Dash round the steeple, unsubdued of wing : 
 
 Amusive birds ! say where your hid retreat 
 
 When the frost rages and the tempests beat ; 
 
 Whence your return, by such nice instinct led, 
 
 When Spring, soft season, lifts her bloomy head? 
 
 Such baffled searches mock man's prying pride, 
 
 The God of Nature is your secret guide ! 
 
 While deepening shades obscure the face of day, 
 
 To yonder bench leaf-sheltered let us straw 
 
 Till blended objects fail the swimming sight, 
 
 And all the fading landscape sinks in night; 
 
 To hear the drowsy Dor come brushing by 
 
 With buzzing wing, or the shrill Cricket cry ; 
 
 To see the feeding Lat glance through the wood; 
 
 To catch the distant falling of the flood; 
 
 While o'er the cliff th' awakened Churn-owl hung 
 
 Through the still gloom protracts his chattering song ; 
 
 9 T
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 While high in air, and poised upon his wings, 
 Unseen the soft enamour'd Wood-lark sings : 
 These, Nature's works, the curious mind employ, 
 Inspire a soothing, melancholy joy : 
 As fancy warms, a pleasing kind of pain 
 Steals o'er the cheek, and thrills the creeping vein ! 
 Each rural sight, each sound, each smell, combine ; 
 The tinkling sheep-bell, or the breath of kine ; 
 The new-mown hay that scents the swelling breeze, 
 Or cottage-chimney smoking through the trees. 
 The chilling night-dews fall: — away, retire; — 
 For, see, the Glow-worm lights her amorous fire ! 
 Thus, ere night's veil had half obscur'd the sky, 
 Th' impatient damsel hung her lamp on high : 
 True to the signal, by love's meteor led, , 
 Leander hastened to his Hero's bed. 
 
 Gilbert White. 
 
 THE SABBATH EVE. 
 
 Is there a time when moments flow 
 
 More lovelily than all beside, 
 It is, of all the times below, 
 
 A Sabbath Eve in summer-tide. 
 
 Oh ! then the setting sun smiles fair, 
 And all below and all above, 
 
 The different forms of nature, wear 
 One universal garb of love. 
 92
 
 
 
 g 
 
 And then the peace that Jesus beams. 
 
 The life of grace, the death of sin. 
 With nature's placid woods and streams. 
 
 Is peace without, and peace within. 
 
 Delightful scene — a world .it rest, 
 A Cod all love— no grief, no tear, 
 93
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 A heavenly hope — a peaceful breast, 
 A smile unsullied by a tear. 
 
 If heaven be ever felt below, 
 A scene so heavenly sure as this 
 
 May cause a heart on earth to know 
 Some foretaste of celestial bliss. 
 
 Delightful hour — how soon will night 
 Spread her dark mantle o'er thy reign, 
 
 And morrow's quick returning light 
 Must call us to the world again. 
 
 Yet will there dawn at last a day, 
 A sun that never set shall rise ; 
 
 Night will not veil a ceaseless ray ! 
 The heavenly Sabbath never dies ! 
 
 A i/o 11. 
 
 VILLAGE BELLS. 
 
 How soft the music of those village bells, 
 Falling at intervals upon the ear 
 In cadence sweet, now dying all away, 
 Now pealing loud again, and louder still, 
 Clear and sonorous, as the gale comes on ! 
 With easy force it opens all the cells 
 Where memory slept. Wherever I have heard 
 A kindred melody, the scene recurs, 
 And with it all its pleasures and its pains. 
 
 94
 
 COUNTRY LIFE 
 
 Such comprehensive views the spirit takes, 
 That in a few short moments I retrace 
 (As in a map the voyager his course) 
 The windings of my way through many years. 
 
 i 
 
 ODE ON SOLITUDE. 
 
 II\i'i'\ the man, whose wish and care 
 
 A few paternal acres bound, 
 Content to breathe his native air 
 
 In his own ground". 
 
 Whose herds with milk, whose fields with bread, 
 
 Whose flocks supply him with attire, 
 Whose trees in summer yield him shade. 
 
 In winter fire. 
 
 Blest, who can unconcernedly find 
 
 Hours, days, and years, slide soft away 
 In health of body, peace of mind. 
 
 Quiet by day, 
 
 Sound sleep b) night: Study and ease 
 
 Together mixed : sweet recreation, 
 And innocence, which most does phase 
 
 With meditation. 
 
 Thus let me live, unseen, unknown; 
 
 Thus unlamented let me die ; 
 
 Steal from the world, and not a stone 
 
 Tell where I lie. 
 
 /' 
 95
 
 THE RIGS O' BARLEY. 
 
 It was upon a Lammas night, 
 
 When corn rigs are bonie, 
 Beneath the moon's unclouded light, 
 
 I held awa to Annie : 
 The time flew by, wi' tentless heed, 
 
 Till 'tween the late and early, 
 Wi' sma' persuasion she agreed, 
 
 To see me thro' the barley. 
 
 The sky was blue, the wind was still, 
 
 The moon was shining clearly ; 
 I set her down, wi' right good will, 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley ; 
 I ken't her heart was a' my ain ; 
 
 I lov'd her most sincerely ; 
 I kiss'd her owre and owre again 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley. 
 
 I lock'd her in my fond embrace ; 
 
 Her heart was beating rarely ; 
 My blessings on that happy place, 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley ! 
 But by the moon and stars so bright, 
 
 That shone that hour so clearly ! 
 She ay shall bless that happy night 
 
 Amang the rigs o' barley. 
 9 6
 
 , - ' 
 
 I hae been hi) the wi' comrades dear ; 
 
 I hae been merry drinking ; 
 I hae been joj t'u' gath'rin gear ; 
 
 I hae been happy thinking : 
 But a' the pleasures e'er I saw, 
 
 Tho' three times doubl'd fairly, 
 That happy night was worth them a', 
 
 Amang the rigs o' 1 arley. 
 
 97 
 
 Robert Burns. 
 
 N
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 With what a glory comes and goes the year ; 
 The buds of spring, those beautiful harbingers 
 Of sunny skies and cloudless times, enjoy 
 Life's newness, and earth's garniture spread out ] 
 And when the silver habit of the clouds 
 Comes down upon the autumn sun, and with 
 A sober gladness the old year takes up 
 His bright inheritance of golden fruits, 
 A pomp and pageant fill the splendid scene. 
 
 There is a beautiful spirit breathing now 
 Its mellow richness on the cluster'd trees, 
 And, from a beaker full of richest dyes, 
 Pouring new glory on the autumn woods, 
 And dipping in warm light the pillar'd clouds. 
 Morn on the mountain, like a summer bird, 
 Lifts up her purple wing ; and in the vales 
 The gentle Wind, a sweet and passionate wooer, 
 Kisses the blushing leaf, and stirs up life 
 Within the solemn woods of ash deep-crimson'd, 
 And silver beech, and maple yellow-leaved, 
 Where Autumn, like a faint old man, sits down 
 By the wayside a-weary. Through the trees 
 The golden robin moves. The purple finch, 
 That on wild cherry and red cedar feeds, * 
 A winter bird, comes with its plaintive whistle, 
 And pecks by the witch-hazel ; whilst aloud 
 From cottage roofs the warbling blue-bird sings; 
 
 98 

 
 
 And merrily, with oft-repeated stroke. 
 Sounds from the thrashing-floor the busy flail. 
 
 Oh, what a glory doth this world put on 
 For him who. with a fervent heart, goes forth 
 Under the bright and glorious sky, and looks 
 On duties well perform'd, and days well spent ! 
 For him the wind, ay, and the yellow leaves, 
 
 99
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Shall have a voice, and give him eloquent teachings 
 He shall so hear the solemn hymn, that Death 
 Has lifted up for all, that he shall go 
 To his long resting-place without a tear, 
 
 Longfellow. 
 
 NOW WESTLIN WINDS. 
 
 Now westlin winds and slaughtering guns 
 
 Bring autumn's pleasant weather ; 
 The moorcock springs, on whirring wings, 
 
 Amang the blooming heather : 
 Now waving grain, wide o'er the plain, 
 
 Delights the weary farmer ; 
 And the moon shines bright, when I rove at night 
 
 To muse upon my charmer. 
 
 The partridge loves the fruitful fells ; 
 
 The plover loves the mountains ; 
 The woodcock haunts the lonely dells ; 
 
 The soaring hern the fountains : 
 Thro' lofty groves the cushat roves, 
 
 The path of man to shun it ; 
 The hazel-bush o'erhangs the thrush, 
 
 The spreading thorn the linnet. 
 
 Thus ev'ry kind their pleasure find, 
 
 The savage and the tender ; 
 Some social join, and leagues combine 
 
 Some solitary wander ; 
 
 TOO
 
 fri ' 
 
 
 Avaunt, away ! the cruel sway, 
 
 Tyrannic man's dominion ; 
 The sportsman's joy, the murd'ring cry, 
 
 The flutt'ring, gory pinion ! 
 ioi
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 But, Peggy dear, the ev'ning's clear, 
 
 Thick flies the skimming swallow ; 
 The sky is blue, the fields in view, 
 
 All fading-green and yellow : 
 Come let us stray our gladsome way, 
 
 And view the charms of nature ; 
 The rustling corn, the fruited thorn, 
 
 And ev'ry happy creature. 
 
 We'll gently walk, and sweetly talk, 
 
 Till the silent moon shine clearly ; 
 I'll grasp thy waist, and, fondly prest, 
 
 Swear how I love thee dearly : 
 Not vernal show'rs to budding flow'rs, 
 
 Not autumn to the farmer, 
 So dear can be, as thou to me, 
 
 My fair, my lovely charmer. 
 
 Robert Burns. 
 
 
 102
 
 THE AUTUMN DAY. 
 
 Now the day. 
 O'er heaven and earth diffused, grows warm, and high 
 Infinite splendour! wide investing all. 
 How still the breeze ! save what the filmy threads 
 Of dew evaporate brushes from the plain. 
 How clear the cloudless sky ! how deeply tinged 
 With a peculiar blue ! the ethereal arch 
 How swelled immense ! amid whose azure throned. 
 The radiant sun how gay ! how calm below 
 The gilded earth ! the harvest-treasures all 
 Now gathered in, beyond the rage of storms, 
 Sure to the swain ; the circling fence shut up ; 
 Ami instant W inter's utmost rage defied ; 
 While, loose to festive joy, the country round 
 Laughs with the loud sincerity of mirth, 
 Shook to the wind their cares. The toil-strung youth. 
 By the quick sense of music taught alone. 
 Leaps wildly graceful in the lively dance. 
 Her every charm abroad, the village toast, 
 Young, buxom, warm, in native beauty rich, 
 Darts not unmeaning looks; and, where her eye 
 Points an approving smile, with, double ton e 
 The cudgel rattles, and the wrestler twines. 
 Age too shines out; and, garrulous, recounts 
 The feats of youth. Thus they rejoice ; nor think 
 That, with to-morrow's sun, their annual toil 
 begins again the never-ceasing round. 
 
 /'■'. mson.
 
 AUTUMN. 
 
 Season of mists and mellow fruitfiilness ! 
 
 Close bosom-friend of the maturing sun ; 
 Conspiring with him how to load and bless 
 
 With fruit the vines that round the thatch-eaves run 
 To bend with apples the moss'd cottage trees, 
 
 And fill all fruit with ripeness to the core ; 
 
 To swell the gourd and plump the hazel shells 
 
 With a sweet kernel ; to set budding more, 
 And still more, later flowers for the bees, 
 Until they think warm days will never cease, 
 
 For summer has o'er-brimm'd their clammy cells. 
 
 Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy store? 
 
 Sometimes, whoever seeks abroad may find 
 Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, 
 
 Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing wind ; 
 Or on a half-reap'd furrow sound asleep, 
 
 Drowsed with the fume of poppies, while thy hook 
 Spares the next swath and all its twined flowers ; 
 And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost keep 
 
 Steady thy laden head across a brook ; 
 
 Or by a cider-press, with patient look, 
 
 Thou watchest the last oqzings, hours by hours. 
 
 Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they? 
 
 Think not of them, thou hast thy music too, 
 While barred clouds bloom the soft dying day, 
 
 And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue ; 
 
 104
 
 Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn 
 Among the river sallows, borne aloft 
 < )r sinking as the light wind lives or di< - 
 
 IO: 

 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn ; 
 Hedge-crickets sing ; and now with treble soft 
 The redbreast whistles from a garden croft, 
 And gathering swallows twitter in the skies. 
 
 Keats. 
 
 A DAY IN AUTUMN. 
 
 There was not, on that day, a speck to stain 
 
 The azure heaven ; the blessed Sun, alone, 
 
 In unapproachable divinity, 
 
 Career'd, rejoicing in his fields of light. 
 
 How beautiful, beneath the bright blue sky, 
 
 The billows heave; one glowing green expanse, 
 
 Save where along the bending line of shore 
 
 Such hue is thrown, as when the peacock's neck 
 
 Assumes its proudest tint of amethyst, 
 
 Embath'd in emerald glory. All the flocks 
 
 Of Ocean are abroad : like floating foam, 
 
 The sea-gulls rise and fall upon the waves ; 
 
 With long protruded neck the cormorants 
 
 Wing their far flight aloft; and round and round 
 
 The plovers wheel, and give their note of joy. 
 
 It was a day that sent into the heart 
 
 A Summer feeling : even the insect swarms 
 
 From their dark nooks and coverts issued forth, 
 
 To sport through one day of existence more ; 
 
 The solitary primrose on the bank 
 
 Seem'd now as though it had no cause to mourn 
 
 Its bleak autumnal birth ; the Rocks and Shores, 
 
 The Forest, and the everlasting Hills, 
 
 Smiled in that joyful Sunshine, — they partook 
 
 The universal blessing. 
 
 Southey. 
 106
 
 THE SOGER'S RETURN. 
 
 When wild war's deadly blast was blawn, 
 
 And gentle peace returning, 
 Wi* mony a sweet babe fatherless, 
 
 And mony a widow mourning : 
 1 left the lines and tented field, 
 
 Where lang I'd been a lodger, 
 My humble knapsack a' my wealth, 
 
 A poor and honest soger. 
 
 A leal, light heart was in my breast, 
 
 My hand unstain'd wi' plunder ; 
 And for fair Scotia, hame again 
 
 I cheery on did wander. 
 I thought upon the banks o' Coil, 
 
 I thought upon my Nancy, 
 1 thought upon the witching smile 
 
 That taught my youthful fancy. 
 
 At length I reach'd the bonie glen, 
 
 Where early life I sported ; 
 I pass'd the mill, and trysting thorn. 
 
 Where Nancy aft I courted : 
 Wha spied 1 but my ain dear maid, 
 
 Down by her mother's dwelling ! 
 And turn'd me round to hide the fl   
 
 That in my een was swelling. 
 107
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Wi' alter'd voice, quoth I, Sweet lass, 
 Sweet as yon hawthorn blossom, 
 
 ! happy, happy may he be, 
 That's dearest to thy bosom ! 
 
 My purse is light, I've far to gang, 
 And fain wad be thy lodger ; 
 
 I've serv'd my King and Country lang — 
 Take pity on a soger ! 
 
 . Sae wistfully she gaz'd on me, 
 
 And lovelier was than ever : 
 Quo' she, a soger ance I lo'ed, 
 
 Forget him shall I never : 
 Our humble cot, and hamely fare, 
 
 Ye freely shall partake it, 
 That gallant badge, the dear cockade, 
 
 Ye're welcome for the sake o't. 
 
 She gaz'd — she redden'd like a rose — 
 
 Syne pale like onie lily ; 
 She sank within my arms, and cried, 
 
 Art thou my ain dear Willie ? 
 By Him who made yon sun and sky, 
 
 By whom true love's regarded, 
 
 1 am the man ; and thus may still 
 True lovers be rewarded ! 
 
 The wars are o'er, and I'm come hame, 
 And find thee still true-hearted ; 
 
 Tho' poor in gear, we're rich in love, 
 And mair we'se ne'er be parted. 
 
 Quo' she, My grandsire left me gowd, 
 A mailen plenish'd fairly ; 
 108
 
 %.$$% 
 A 
 
 And come, my faithful soger lad. 
 Thou'rt welcome to it dearly ! 
 
 For gold the merchant ploughs the main, 
 The farmer ploughs the manor ; 
 
 But glory is the soger's pri 
 The soger's wealth is honour: 
 109
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 The brave poor soger ne'er despise, 
 Nor count him as a stranger, 
 
 Remember he's his Country's stay 
 In the day and hour o' danger. 
 
 Robert Burns. 
 
 HOCK-CART, OR HARVEST-HOME. 
 
 Come, sons of summer, by whose toil 
 We are the lords of wine and oil ; 
 By whose tough labours, and tough hands, 
 We rip up first, then reap our lands ! 
 Crown'd with the ears of corn, now come, 
 And to the pipe sing " Harvest-home." 
 Come forth, my lord, and see the cart 
 Drest up with all the country art. 
 See, here a manikin, there's a sheet 
 As spotless pure as it is sweet ; 
 The horses, mares, and frisking fillies, 
 Clad all in linen white as lilies. 
 The harvest swains and wenches bound 
 For joy, to see the hock-cart crown'd. 
 About the cart hear how the rout 
 Of rural younglings raise the shout, 
 Pressing before, some coming after, — 
 Those with a shout, and these with laughter. 
 Some bless the cart, some kiss the sheaves, 
 Some prank them up with oaken leaves ; 
 Some cross the thill-horse, some with great 
 Devotion stroke the home-borne wheat ! 
 While other rustics, less attent 
 
 i 10
 
 To prayers than to merriment. 
 Run after, with their garments rent. 
 Well on, brave boys ! to your lord's hearth 
 Glittering with fire ; where, for your mirth, 
 Ye shall see first the large and chief 
 Foundation of your feast— fat beef, 
 
 i i i
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 With upper stories — mutton, veal, 
 
 And bacon — which makes full the meal ; 
 
 With several dishes standing by, — 
 
 As here a custard, there a pie, 
 
 And here all-tempting frumenty. 
 
 And for to make the merry cheer, 
 
 If smirking wine be wanting here, 
 
 There's that which drowns all care — stout beer ; 
 
 Which freely drink to your lord's health, 
 
 Then to the plough, the commonwealth • 
 
 Next to your flails, your fanes, your fats ; 
 
 Then to the maids with wheaten hats. 
 
 To the rough sickle, and crook'd scythe, 
 
 Drink, frolic boys, till all be blithe. 
 
 Feed and grow fat ; and as ye eat, 
 
 Be mindful that the labouring neat, 
 
 As you, may have their full of meat ; 
 
 And know besides, ye must revoke 
 
 The patient ox unto the yoke, 
 
 And all go back unto the plough 
 
 And harrow, though they're hang'd up now. 
 
 And you must know your lord's words true — 
 
 Feed him ye must whose food fills you ; 
 
 And that this pleasure is like rain, 
 
 Not sent ye for to drown your pain, 
 
 But for to make it spring again. 
 
 Herrick. 
 
 I I 2
 
 - 
 
 FLOCKS AND HERDS. 
 
 Around th' adjoining brook, that purl-; along 
 The vocal grove, now fretting o'er a rork. 
 Now scarcely moving through a reedy pool, 
 Now starting to a sudden stream, and now 
 
 i i
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Gently diffused into a limpid plain, 
 
 A various group the herds and flocks compose, 
 
 Rural confusion ! On the grassy bank 
 
 Some ruminating lie ; while others stand 
 
 Half in the flood, and often bending sip 
 
 The circling surface. In the middle droops 
 
 The strong laborious ox, of honest front, 
 
 Which incomposed he shakes ; and from his sides 
 
 The troublous insects lashes with his tail, 
 
 Returning still. Amid his subjects safe, 
 
 Slumbers the monarch-swain, his careless arm 
 
 Thrown round his head; on downy moss sustain'd : 
 
 Here laid his scrip, with wholesome viands fill'd ; 
 
 There, listening every noise, his watchful dog. 
 
 Thomson. 
 
 EVENING. 
 
 O'er the heath the heifer strays 
 Free ; — (the furrow'd task is done)- 
 
 Now the village windows blaze, 
 Burnish'd by the setting sun. 
 
 Now he sets behind the hill, 
 Sinking from a golden sky ; 
 
 Can the pencil's mimic skill 
 Copy the refulgent dye? 
 
 Trudging as the ploughmen go 
 (To the smoking hamlet bound), 
 
 Giant-like their shadows grow, 
 
 Lengthening o'er the level ground. 
 114 

 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Where the rising forest spreads 
 
 Shelter for the lordly dome, 
 To their high-built airy beds 
 See the rooks returning home. 
 
 \.s the lark with varied tune 
 
 ( irols to the evening loud. 
 Mirk the mild resplendent moon 
 
 Breaking through a parted < loud ! 
 
 Now the hermit owlet peeps 
 
 From the barn or twisted brake ; 
 
 And the blue mist slowly creeps, 
 Curling on the silver lake. 
 
 As the trout, in speckled pnde, 
 Playful from its bosom spring 
 
 To the banks a ruffled tide 
 Verges in successive rings. 
 
 Tripping through the silken grass, 
 
 O'er the path-divided dale. 
 Mark the rose-complexion'd lass 
 
 With her well-poised milking pail. 
 
 Linnets with unnurnber'd not 
 And the cuckoo bird with two, 
 
 Tuning sweet their mellow throats, 
 Bid the setting sun adieu. 
 
 ( 'nil in r 
 
 I I
 
 MOONLIGHT NIGHT. 
 
 How beautiful this Night! The balmiest sigh 
 
 Which vernal zephyrs breathe in Evening's ear, 
 
 Were discord to the speaking quietude 
 
 That wraps this moveless scene. Heaven's ebon vault, 
 
 Studded with stars unutterably bright, 
 
 Through which the Moon's unclouded grandeur rolls. 
 
 Seems like a canopy which Love had spread 
 
 To curtain her sleeping world. Yon gentle hills. 
 
 Robed in a garment of untrodden snow; 
 
 Yon darksome walls, whence icicles depend 
 
 So stainless, that their white and glittering spears 
 
 Tinge not the Moon's pure beam ; yon castled steep, 
 
 Whose banner hangeth o'er the time-worn tower 
 
 So idly, that wrapt Fancy deemeth it 
 
 A metaphor of Peace, — all form a scene 
 
 Where musing Solitude might love to lift 
 
 Her soul above this sphere of earthliness ; 
 
 Where Silence undisturb'd might watch alone, 
 
 So cold, so bright, so still. 
 
 ■Shelley. 
 
 NIGHT SONG. 
 
 The moon is up in splendour, 
 And golden stars attend her ; 
 
 The heavens are calm and bright ; 
 Trees cast a deepening shadow, 
 And slowly off the meadow 
 
 A mist isiising silver-white. 
 116
 
 M< lONLIUH'l NICHT,
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Night's curtains now are closing 
 Round half a world reposing 
 
 In calm and holy trust : 
 All seems one vast, still chamber, 
 Where weary hearts remember 
 
 No more the sorrows of the dust. 
 
 Claudius. 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 There is strange music in the stirring wind 
 When lowers the autumnal eve, and all alone 
 To the dark wood's cold covert thou art gone, 
 
 Whose ancient trees on the rough slope-reclined 
 
 Rock, and at times scatter their tresses sear. 
 If in such shades, beneath their murmuring, 
 Thou late hast pass'd the happier hours of spring, 
 
 With sadness thou wilt mark the fading year; 
 
 Chiefly if one, with whom such sweets at morn 
 Or eve thou'st shared, to distant scenes shall stray. 
 O Spring, return ! return, auspicious May ! 
 
 But sad will be thy coming, and forlorn, 
 If she return not With thy cheering ray, 
 Who from these shades is gone, gone far away ! 
 
 Rev. W. L. Bcnvles. 
 
 riS
 
 A WINTER NIGHT. 
 
 Poor naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are. 
 That bide the pelting of this pitiless Mr. mi ! 
 How shall your houseless heads, and unfed side^, 
 Vour loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you, 
 From seasons such as these '.' 
 
 Sll MCI SPEA RE. 
 
 When biting Boreas, tell and doure. 
 Sharp shivers thro' the leafless bowr : 
 When Phcebus gives a short-liv'd glow'r. 
 
 Far south the lift. 
 Dim-dark'ning thro' the flaky show'r, 
 
 < >r whirling drift ; 
 i [9
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Ae night the storm the steeples rocked, 
 Poor labour sweet in sleep was locked, 
 While burns, wi' snawy wreaths up-choked, 
 
 Wild-eddying swirl, 
 Or thro' the mining outlet bocked, 
 
 Down headlong hurl. 
 
 List'ning, the doors an' winnocks rattle, 
 I thought me on the ourie cattle, 
 Or silly sheep, wha bide this brattle 
 
 O' winter war, 
 And thro' the drift, deep-lairing, sprattle, 
 
 Beneath a scar. 
 
 Ilk happing bird, wee, helpless thing! 
 That, in the merry months o' spring, 
 Delighted me to hear thee sing, 
 
 What comes o' thee ? 
 Whare wilt thou cow'r thy chittering wing, 
 
 An' close thy e'e ? 
 
 Ev'n you on murd'ring errands toil'd, 
 Lone from your savage homes exil'd, 
 The blood-stain'd roost, and sheep cote spoil'd, 
 
 My heart forgets. 
 While pityless the tempest wild 
 
 Sore on you beats. 
 
 Now Phoebe, in her midnight reign, 
 Dark muffl'd, view'd the dreary plain ; 
 Still crowding thoughts, a pensive train, 
 
 Rose in my soul, 
 When on my ear this plaintive strain, 
 
 Slow, solemn, stole : — 
 120
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 " Blow, blow, ye winds, with heavier gust ! 
 
 And freeze, thou bitter-biting frost ! 
 Descend, ye chilly, smothering snows ! 
 Not all your rage, as now, united sho 
 
 More hard unkindness, unrelenting, 
 
 Vengeful malice unrepenting, 
 Than heav'n-illumin'd man on brother man best 
 See stern oppression's iron grip, 
 
 Or mad ambition's gory hand, 
 Sending, like blood-hounds from the slip, 
 
 Woe, want, and murder o'er a land ! 
 Ev'n in the peaceful rural vale, 
 Truth, weeping, tells the mournful tale, 
 How pamper'd luxury, flatt'ry by her side, 
 The parasite empoisoning her ear, 
 With all the servile wretches in the rear, 
 Looks o'er proud property, extended wide ; 
 And eyes the simple rustic hind, 
 
 Whose toil upholds the glitt'ring show, 
 A creature of another kind. 
 Some coarser substance, unrefin'd, 
 Plac'd for her lordly use thus far, thus vile, below '. 
 
 " Where, where is love's fond, tender throe, 
 With lordly honour's lofty brow, 
 
 The pow'rs you proudly own ? 
 Is there, beneath love's noble name, 
 Can harbour, dark, the selfish aim, 
 
 To bless himself alone ! 
 Mark maiden-innocence a prey 
 
 To love-pretending snai 
 This boasted honour turns away, 
 Shunning soft pity's rising sway, 
 
 1 2 1 Q
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Regardless of the tears, and unavailing pray'rs ! 
 Perhaps, this hour, in mis'ry's squalid nest, 
 She strains your infant to her joyless breast, 
 
 And with a mother's fear shrinks at the rocking blast. 
 
 " Oh ye ! who, sunk in beds of down, 
 Feel not a want but what yourselves create, 
 Think, for a moment, on his wretched fate, 
 
 Whom friends and fortune quite disown ! 
 Ill-satisfied keen nature's clam'rous call, 
 
 Stretch'd on his straw he lays himself to sleep, 
 While thro' the ragged roof and chinky wall, 
 
 Chill o'er his slumbers, piles the drifty heap ! 
 Think on the dungeon's grim confine, 
 Where gmlt and poor misfortune pine ! 
 Guilt, erring man, relenting view ! 
 But shall thy legal rage pursue 
 The wretch, already crushed low, 
 By cruel fortune's undeserved blow? 
 Affliction's sons are brothers in distress ; 
 A brother to relieve, how exquisite the bliss ! " 
 
 I heard nae mair, for Chanticleer 
 
 Shook off the pouthery snaw, 
 And hail'd the morning with a cheer, 
 
 A cottage-rousing craw. 
 
 But deep this truth impress'd my mind — 
 
 Thro' all His works abroad, 
 The heart, benevolent and kind, 
 
 The most resembles God. 
 
 Rebert Burns. 
 I 22 
 

 
 TO THE NIGHT. 
 
 Swiftly walk over the western wa 
 Spirit of Night ! 
 Out of the misty eastern cave, 
 Where all the long and lone daylight 
 Thou wovest dreams of joy and fear, 
 Which make thee terrible and dear. — 
 Swift be thy flight ! 
 
 Wrap thy form in a mantle grey 
 
 Star-wrought ! 
 Blind with thine hair the eyes of day, 
 Kiss her until she be wearied out, 
 Then wander o'er city, and sea, and land. 
 Touching all with thine opiate wand — 
 
 Come, long-sought ! 
 
 When I arose and saw the dawn, 
 
 I sigh'd for thee ; 
 When light was high, and the dew was gone, 
 And noon lay heavy on (lower and tree, 
 And the weary Day turn'd to his rest, 
 Lingering like an unloved guest, 
 
 I sigh'd for thee. 
 
 Thy brother Death came, and cried, 
 Wouldst thou me ? 
 
 Thy sweet child sleep the filmy-eyedj 
 
 Murrnur'dlike a noontide bee, 
 
 Shall I nestle near thy side? 
 
 Wouldst thou me?— and I replied. 
 No, not thee ! 
 123
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Death will come when thou art dead, 
 Soon, too soon — 
 
 Sleep will come when thou art fled ; 
 
 Of neither would I ask the boon 
 
 I ask of thee, beloved Night, — 
 
 Swift be thine approaching flight, 
 
 Come soon, soon ! 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
 NIGHT. 
 
 Night, dewdipp'd, comes, and every gleaming star 
 
 Its silent place assigns in yonder sky ; 
 The moon walks forth, and fields and groves afar, 
 
 Touched by her light, in silver beauty lie 
 In solemn peace, that no sound comes to mar ; 
 
 Hamlets and peopled cities slumber nigh ; 
 While on this rock, in meditation's mien, 
 Lord of the unconscious world, I sit unseen. 
 
 How deep the quiet of this pensive hour ! 
 
 Nature bids Labour cease — and all obey. 
 How sweet this stillness, in its magic power 
 
 O'er hearts that know her voice and own her sway ! 
 Stillness unbroken, save when from the flower 
 
 The whirling locust takes his upward way ; 
 And, murmuring o'er the verdant turf, is heard 
 The passing brook — or leaf by breezes stirr'd. 
 
 124
 
 ■"<.■: r 
 
 "■^-t*.: 
 
 \ , I \ I I [  
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Borne on the pinions of Night's freshening air, 
 Unfetter'd thoughts with calm reflection come ; 
 
 And fancy's train, that shuns the daylight glare, 
 
 To wake when midnight shrouds the heavens in gloom : 
 
 Now tranquil joys, and hopes untouch'd by care, 
 Within my bosom throng to seek a home ; 
 
 While far around the brooding darkness spreads, 
 
 And o'er the soul its pleasing sadness sheds. 
 
 Pindemonte. 
 
 DEVONSHIRE. 
 
 Where Dart romantic winds its mazy course, 
 And mossy rocks adhere to woody hills, 
 From whence each creeping rill its store distils, 
 
 And wandering waters join with rapid force ; 
 
 There Nature's hand has wildly strown her flowers, 
 
 And varying prospects strike the roving eyes; 
 
 Rough-hanging woods o'er cultured hills arise ; 
 Thick ivy spreads around huge antique towers ; 
 
 And fruitful groves 
 Scatter their blossoms fast as falling showers, 
 Perfuming every stream which o'er the landscape pours. 
 
 Along the grassy banks how sweet to stray, 
 
 When the mild eve smiles in the glowing west, 
 
 And lengthen'd shades proclaim departing day, 
 
 And fainting sunbeams in the waters play, 
 When every bird seeks its accustom'd rest! 
 
 How grand to see the burning orb desend, 
 
 And the grave sky wrapp'd in its nightly robes, 
 Whether resplendent with the starry globes. 
 
 126
 
 ?^-"" 
 
 ( >r silver'd by the mildly-solemn moon ; 
 When nightingales their lonely songs resume, 
 And folly's sons their babbling noise suspend ! 
 
 Or when the darkening clouds fly o'er the sea. 
 And early morning beams a cheerful ray,
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Waking melodious songsters from each tree ; 
 
 How sweet beneath each dewy hill 
 Amid the pleasing shades to stray, 
 
 Where nectar'd flowers their sweets distil, 
 Whose watery pearls reflect the day ! 
 
 To scent the jonquil's rich perfume, 
 To pluck the hawthorn's tender briers, 
 
 As wild beneath each flowery hedge 
 
 Fair strawberries with violets bloom, 
 And every joy of Spring conspires ! 
 
 Nature's wild songsters from each bush and tree 
 
 Invite the early walk, and breathe delight : 
 What bosom heaves not with warm sympathy, 
 
 When the gay lark salutes the new-born light ? 
 Hark ! where the shrill-toned thrush, 
 
 Sweet whistling, carols the wild harmony ! 
 The linnet warbles, and from yonder bush 
 
 The robin pours soft streams of melody ! 
 
 Crista 11. 
 
 HIGHLAND MARY. 
 
 Ye banks, and braes, and streams around 
 
 The castle o' Montgomery, 
 Green be your woods, and fair your flowers, 
 
 Your waters never drumlie ! 
 There simmer first unfauld her robes, 
 
 And there the langest tarry ; 
 For there I took the last fareweel 
 
 O' my sweet Highland Mary. 
 128
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 How sweetly bloom'd the gay green birk, 
 
 How rich the hawthorn's blossom, 
 As underneath their fragrant shade 
 
 I clasped her to my bosom ' 
 The golden hours, on angel win 
 
 blew o'er me and my dearie ; 
 For dear to me, as light and life, 
 
 Was my sweet Highland Mary. 
 
 VVi' monie a vow, and lock'd embrace. 
 
 Our parting was fu' tender : 
 And, pledging aft to meet again, 
 
 We tore oursels asunder; 
 But oh ! fell death's untimely frost, 
 
 That nipt my tlower sae early ! 
 Now green's the sod, and cauld's the cla) 
 
 That wraps my Highland Mary ! 
 
 pale, pale now, those rosy lips, 
 
 I aft hae kiss'd sae fondly ! 
 And closed for aye the sparkling glance, 
 
 That dwelt on me sae kindly ! 
 And mould'ring now in silent dust. 
 
 That heart that lo'ed me dearly ! 
 But still within my bosom's core 
 
 Shall live my Highland Mary. 
 
 Robert Burns. 

 
 A NIGHT SCENE. 
 
 Now great Hyperion left his golden throne 
 
 That on the dancing waves in glory shone, 
 
 For whose declining on the western shore 
 
 The oriental hills black mantles wore, 
 
 And thence apace the gentle twilight fled, 
 
 That had from hideous caverns ushered 
 
 All-drowsy Night ; who, in a car of jet, 
 
 By steeds of iron-grey (which mainly sweat 
 
 Moist drops on all the world) drawn through the sky, 
 
 The helps of darkness waited orderly. 
 
 First, thick clouds rose from all the liquid plains : 
 
 Then mists from marishes, and grounds whose veins 
 
 Were conduit pipes to many a crystal spring : 
 
 From standing pools and fens were following 
 
 Unhealthy fog : each river, every rill, 
 
 Sent up their vapours to attend her will. 
 
 These pitchy curtains drew 'twixt earth and heaven, 
 
 And as Night's chariot through the air was driven, 
 
 Clamour grew dumb, unheard was shepherd's song, 
 
 And silence girt the woods ; no warbling tongue 
 
 Talk'd to the echo ; satyrs broke their dance, 
 
 And all the upper world lay in a trance : 
 
 Only the curled streams soft chidings kept ; 
 
 And little gales, that from the green leaf swept 
 
 Dry Summer's dust, in fearful whisperings stirr'd, 
 
 As loath to waken any singing bird. 
 
 William Browne.
 
 
 WITH HOW SAD STEPS, MOON ! 
 
 With how sad steps, Moon ! thou climb'st the skies, 
 How silently, and with how wan a face! 
 What may it be, that even in heavenly pla< i 
 That busy Archer his sharp arrows tries?
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Sure, if that long with love acquainted eyes 
 
 Can judge of love, thou feel'st a lover's case; 
 
 I read it in thy looks, thy languish'd grace 
 
 To me that feel the like thy state descries. 
 
 Then, even of fellowship, O Moon, tell me, 
 
 Is constant love deem'd there but want of wit ? 
 
 Are beauties there as proud as here they be? 
 
 Do they above love to be lov'd, and yet 
 
 Those lovers scorn whom that love doth possess ? 
 
 Do they call virtue there ungratefulness ? 
 
 Sir Philip Sidney, 
 
 TO THE MOON! 
 
 Art thou pale for weariness 
 Of climbing heaven, and gazing on the earth, 
 
 Wandering companionless 
 Among the stars that have a different birth, 
 And ever changing, like a joyless eye, 
 That finds no object worth its constancy ? 
 
 P. B. Shelley. 
 
 
 I X2
 
 WINTER. 
 
 Thou hast thy beauties: sterner ones, I own, 
 Than those of thy precursors ; yet to thee 
 
 Belong the charms of solemn majesty 
 And naked grandeur. Awful is the tone 
 Of thy tempestuous nights, when clouds are blown 
 
 By hurrying winds across the troubled sky ; 
 
 Pensive, when softer breezes faintly sigh 
 Through leafless boughs, with ivy overgrown. 
 
 Thou hast thy decorations too, although 
 Thou art austere : thy studded mantle, gaj 
 
 With icy brilliants, which as proudly glow 
 As erst Golconda's ; and thy pure array 
 
 Of regal ermine, when the drifted snow 
 Knvelopes Nature ; till her features seem 
 Like pale, but lovely ones, seen when we dream. 
 
 Barton. 
 
 WINTER SONG. 
 
 Summer joys are o'er ; 
 
 Flow'rets bloom no more : 
 Wintry winds are sweeping ; 
 Through the snowdrifts peeping, 
 
 Cheerful evergreen 
 
 Rarely now is seen.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Now no plumed throng 
 Charms the wood with song ; 
 
 Ice-bound trees are glittering ; 
 
 Merry snow-birds, twittering, 
 Fondly strive to cheer 
 Scenes so cold and drear. 
 
 Winter, still I see 
 Many charms in thee ; 
 Love thy chilly greeting, 
 Snow-storms fiercely beating, 
 And the dear delights 
 Of the long, long nights. 
 
 Holty. 
 
 A WOOD IN WINTER. 
 
 Sweet, lonely wood, that like a friend art found 
 
 To soothe my weary thoughts that brood on woe, 
 
 While through dull days and short the north winds blow, 
 
 Numbing with winter's breath the air and ground, 
 
 Thy time-worn, leafy locks seem all around, 
 
 Like mine, to whiten with old age's snow, 
 
 Now that thy sunny banks, where late did grow 
 
 The painted flowers, in frost and ice are bound. 
 
 As I go musing on the dim, brief light 
 
 That still of light remain, then I, too, feel 
 
 The creeping cold my limbs and spirits thrill 
 
 But I with sharper frost than thine congeal ; 
 
 Since ruder winds my winter brings, and nights 
 
 Of greater length, ami days more scant and chill. 
 
 Giovanni Delia Casa. 
 
 LU
 
 • ?\m 
 
 A WINTER VT'.HI
 
 NOVEMBER. 
 
 November's sky is chill and drear, 
 November's leaf is red and sere. 
 Late, gazing down die steepy linn 
 That hems our little garden in, 
 Low in its dark and narrow glen, 
 You scarce the rivulet might ken, 
 So thick the tangled greenwood grew, 
 So feeble trill'd the streamlet through : 
 Now murmuring hoarse, and frequent seen 
 Through bush and brier, no longer green, 
 An angry brook, it sweeps the glade, 
 Brawls over rock and wild cascade, 
 And, foaming brown with doubled speed, 
 Hurries its waters to the Tweed. 
 
 No longer Autumn's glowing red 
 Upon our forest hills is shed ; 
 No more, beneath the evening's beam, 
 Fair Tweed reflects their purple gleam , 
 Away hath pass'd the heather-bell 
 That bloom'd so rich on Needpath fell; 
 Sallow his brow, and russet bare, 
 Are now the sister-heights of Yare. 
 The sheep, before the pinching heaven, 
 To shelter'd dale and down are driven, 
 Where yet some faded herbage pines, 
 And yet a watery sunbeam shines : 
 In meek despondency they eye 
 The wither'd sward and wintry sky, 
 '36
 
 l^T   - . < 
 
 And far beneath their summer hill, 
 Stray sadly by Glenkinnon's rill: 
 The shepherd shifts his mantle's fold, 
 \ 1 wraps him closer from the cold 
 137
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 His dogs no merry circles wheel, 
 But, shivering, follow at his heel ; 
 A cowering glance they often cast, 
 As deeper moans the gathering blast. 
 
 Scott. 
 
 WOODS IN WINTER. 
 
 When winter winds are piercing chill, 
 
 And through the hawthorn blows the gale, 
 
 With solemn feet I tread the hill 
 That overbrows the lonely vale. 
 
 O'er the bare upland, and away 
 
 Through the long reach of desert woods, 
 The embracing sunbeams chastely play, 
 
 And gladden those deep solitudes 
 
 Where, twisted round the barren oak, 
 The summer vine in beauty clung, 
 
 And summer winds the silence broke, 
 The crystal icicle is hung : 
 
 Where, from their frozen urns, mute springs 
 Pour out the river's gradual tide, 
 
 Shrilly the skater's iron rings, 
 
 And voices fill the woodland side. 
 
 Alas ! how changed from the fair scene, 
 When birds sang out their mellow lay, 
 
 And winds were soft, and woods were green, 
 And the song ceased not with the day. 
 T3§
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 But still wild music is abroad, 
 
 Pale, desert woods! within your crowd \ 
 And gathering winds in hoarse accord 
 Amid the vocal reeds pipe loud. 
 
 Chill airs, and wintry winds ! my ear 
 Has grown familiar with your song; 
 
 1 hear it in the opening year — 
 I listen, and it cheers me long. 
 
 Longfellow. 
 
 SONNKT. 
 
 Sing on, sweet Thrush, upon the leafless bough ; 
 Sing on, sweet bird, I listen to thy strain : 
 See aged Winter, 'mid his surly reign, 
 
 At thy blythe carol clears his furrow'd brow. 
 
 So in lone Poverty's dominion drear 
 
 Sits meek Content with light unanxious heart. 
 Welcomes the rapid moments, bids them part, 
 
 Nor asks if they bring aught to hope or fear. 
 
 I thank thee, Author of this opening day ! 
 
 Thou whose bright sun now gilds the orient skie> ! 
 
 Riches denied. Thy boon was purer joys, 
 What wealth could never give nor take away! 
 
 Yet come, thou child of poverty and care; 
 
 mite 
 share. 
 
 The mite high Heaven bestow'd. that mite with thee I'll 
 
 Robert Burns.
 
 A SABBATH WALK IN WINTER. 
 
 How dazzling white the snowy scene ! deep, deep, 
 The stillness of the winter Sabbath-day, — 
 Not even a footfall heard. Smooth are the fields, 
 Each hollow pathway level with the plain : 
 Hid are the bushes, save that here and there 
 Are seen the topmost shoots of brier or broom. 
 High-ridged, die whirled drift has almost reached 
 The powdered key-stone of the churchyard porch ; 
 Mute hangs the hooded bell ; the tombs He buried 
 No step approaches to the house of prayer. 
 The flickering fall is o'er ; the clouds disperse, 
 And show the sun hung o'er the welkin's verge, 
 Shooting a bright but ineffectual beam 
 On all the sparkling waste. Now is the time 
 To visit Nature in her grand attire ; 
 Though perilous the mountainous ascent, 
 A noble recompense the danger brings. 
 How beautiful the plain stretched far below ! 
 Unvaried though it be, save by yon stream 
 With azure windings, or the leafless wood. 
 But what the beauty of the plain, compared 
 To that sublimity which reigns enthroned, 
 Holding joint rule with solitude divine, 
 Among yon rocky fells that bid defiance 
 To steps the most adventurously bold ! 
 There silence dwells profound ; or if the cry 
 Of high-poised eagle break at times the calm, 
 The mantled echoes no response return. 
 
 G rah a inc. 
 140 

 
 W IN I E K. 
 
 A DIRGE. 
 
 The wintry west extends his blast, 
 And hail and rain does blaw ; 
 
 Or, the stormy north sends driving forth 
 The blinding sleet and snaw : 
 ' I'
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 While, tumbling brown, the burn comes down, 
 
 And roars frae bank to brae : 
 And bird and beast in covert rest, 
 
 And pass the heartless day. 
 
 " The sweeping blast, the sky o'ercast," 
 
 The joyless winter-day, 
 Let others fear, to me more dear 
 
 Than all the pride of May : 
 The tempest's howl, it soothes my soul, 
 
 My griefs it seems to join ; 
 The leafless trees my fancy please, 
 
 Their fate resembles mine ! 
 
 Thou Pow'r Supreme, whose mighty scheme 
 
 These woes of mine fulfil, 
 Here, firm, I rest, they must be best, 
 
 Because they are Thy will ! 
 Then all I want, (Oh ! do Thou grant 
 
 This one request of mine !) 
 Since to enjoy Thou dost deny, 
 
 Assist me to resign. 
 
 Robert Din ns. 
 
 
 142
 
 THE WRATHFUL WINTER. 
 
 The wrathful winter 'proaching on apace, 
 With blust'ring blasts had all ybared the treen, 
 And old Saturnus with his frosty face 
 With chilling cold had pierced the tender green ; 
 The mantles wrent, wherein enwrapped been 
 The gladsome groves that now lay overthrown. 
 The tapets torn, and every bloom down blown. 
 
 'I he soil that erst so seemly was to seen, 
 
 Was all despoiled of her beauty's hue : 
 
 And soote fresh flowers (wherewith the summer's queen 
 
 Had clad the earth) now Boreas' blasts down blew, 
 
 And small fowls flocking, in their song did rue 
 
 The winter's wrath, wherewith each thing defaced 
 
 In woful wise bewailed the summer past. 
 
 Hawthorn had lost his motley livery, 
 
 The naked twigs were shivering all for cold. 
 
 And dropping down the tears abundantly ; 
 
 Each thing (me thought) with weeping eye me told 
 
 The cruel season, bidding me withhold 
 
 Myself within, for I was gotten out 
 
 Into the fields whereas I walked about. 
 
 Thomas Sackville. 
 
 ' 13
 
 THE MOON IS UP, AND YET IT IS NOT 
 
 NIGHT. 
 
 "The moon is up, and yet it is not night — 
 Sunset divides the sky with her — a sea 
 Of glory streams along the Alpine height 
 Of blue Friuli's mountains ; Heaven is free 
 From clouds, but of all colours seems to be 
 Melted to one vast Iris of the West, 
 Where the Day joins the past Eternity; 
 While, on the other hand, meek Dian's crest 
 
 Floats through the azure air — an island of the blest ! 
 
 A single star is at her side, and reigns 
 With her o'er half the lovely heaven; but still 
 Yon sunny sea heaves brightly, and remains 
 Rolled o'er the peak of the far Rhretian hill, 
 As Day and Night contending were, until 
 Nature reclaim'd her order — gentle flows 
 The deep-dyed Brenta, where their hues instil 
 The odorous purple of a new-born rose, 
 Which streams upon her stream, and glass'd within it glows, 
 
 Filled with the face of heaven, which, from afar, 
 Comes down upon its waters ; all its hues 
 From the rich sunset to the rising star, 
 Their magical variety diffuse : 
 And now they change ; a paler shadow strews 
 
 '44 

 
 
 "THE HUSH OF NIGHT.
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 Its mantle o'er the mountains ; parting day- 
 Dies like the Dolphin, whom each pang imbues 
 With a new colour as it gasps away, 
 The last still loveliest, till — 'tis gone — and all is gray. 
 
 It is the hush of night, and all between 
 Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear, 
 Mellow'd and mingling, yet distinctly seen, 
 Save darken'd Jura, whose capt heights appear 
 Precipitously steep ; and, drawing near, 
 There breathes a living fragrance from the shore, 
 Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on the ear 
 Drops the light drip of the suspended oar, 
 Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more. 
 
 He is an evening reveller, who makes 
 His life an infancy, and sings his fill ; 
 At intervals, some bird from out the brakes 
 Starts into voice a moment, then is still. 
 There seems a floating whisper on the hill ; 
 But that is fancy, for the starlight dews 
 All silently their tears of love instil, 
 Weeping themselves away, till they infuse 
 Deep into Nature's breast the spirit of her hues. 
 
 Ye stars ! which are the poetry of heaven ! 
 If in your bright leaves we would read the fate 
 Of man and empires, 'tis to be forgiven, 
 That in our aspirations to be great, 
 Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state, 
 And claim a kindred with you ; for ye are 
 
 146
 
 COUNTRY LIFE. 
 
 A beauty and a mystery, and create 
 In us such love and reverence from afar. 
 That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themseh 
 a star ! 
 
 All heaven and earth are still — though not in 
 But breathless, as we grow when feeling most 
 And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep : 
 All heaven and earth are still ; from the high 
 Of stars, to the lull'd lake and mountain-coast, 
 All is concenter'd in a life intense, 
 Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost, 
 But hath a part of being, and a sense 
 Of that which is of all Creator and defence. 
 
 
 host 
 
 
 ' 17
 
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