122 72 SUNRISE ABOVE THE CLOUDS. Scorned bramble of the brake! once more Thou bidd'st me be a boy, To gad with thee the woodlands o'er, In freedom and in joy. ELLIOTT. AN EVENING VISIT TO WINDERMERE BEHOLD the shades f afternoon have fallen To the lake's margin, where a boat lies moored WORDSWORTH. SUNRISE ABOVE THE CLOUDS. I STOOD upon the hills, when heaven's wide arch Was glorious with the sun's returning march, And woods were brightened, and soft gales Went forth to kiss the sun-clad vales. SUNRISE ABOVE THE CLOUDS. The clouds were far beneath me ;-bathed in light, They gathered mid-day round the wooded height, And, in their fading glory, shone Like hosts in battle overthrown, As many a pinnacle, with shifting glance, The dark pine, blasted, bare, and cleft. The veil of cloud was lifted, and below Glowed the rich valley, and the river's flow Where upward, in the mellow blush of day, I heard the distant waters dash, I saw the current whirl and flash,— And richly, by the blue lake's silver beach, The woods were bending with a silent reach. The music of the village bell Came sweetly to the echo-giving hills, And the wild horn, whose voice the woodland fills, Was ringing to the merry shout, That faint and far the glen sent out, 73 Where, answering to the sudden shot, thin smoke, Through thick-leaved branches, from the dingle broke. If thou art worn and hard beset With sorrows, that thou wouldst forget, If thou wouldst read a lesson, that will keep Go to the woods and hills!-No tears Dim the sweet look that Nature wears. LONGFELLOW THE FOREST STREAM. DELIGHTFUL is this loneliness; it calms My heart pleasant the cool beneath these elms While every other woodland lay is mute, Save when the wren flits from her down-coved nest, And from the root-sprigs trills her ditty clear,The grasshopper's oft-pausing chirp—the buzz, Angrily shrill, of moss-entangled bee, |