XII.

To one who has been long in city pent, 'Tis very sweet to look into the fair

And open face of heaven,-to breathe a prayer Full in the smile of the blue firmament.

Who is more happy, when, with heart's content,
Fatigued he sinks into some pleasant lair
Of wavy grass, and reads a debonair
And gentle tale of love and languishment?
Returning home at evening, with an ear

Catching the notes of Philomel,-an eye
Watching the sailing cloudlet's bright career,
He mourns that day so soon has glided by:
E'en like the passage of an angel's tear

That falls through the clear ether silently.

XIII.

ADDRESSED TO HAYDON.

HIGH-MINDEDNESS, a jealousy for good,

A loving-kindness for the great man's fame,
Dwells here and there with people of no name,
In noisome alley, and in pathless wood :
And where we think the truth least understood,
Oft may be found a "singleness of aim,"
That ought to frighten into hooded shame

A money-mongering, pitiable brood.
How glorious this affection for the cause

Of steadfast genius, toiling gallantly!
What when a stout unbending champion awes
Envy, and malice to their native sty?
Unnumber'd souls breathe out a still applause,
Proud to behold him in his country's eye.

XIV.

ADDRESSED TO THE SAME.

GREAT spirits now on earth are sojourning:
He of the cloud, the cataract, the lake,
Who on Helvellyn's summit, wide awake,
Catches his freshness from Archangel's wing:
He of the rose, the violet, the spring,

The social smile, the chain for Freedom's sake:
And lo! whose steadfastness would never take

A meaner sound than Raphael's whispering.
And other spirits there are standing apart
Upon the forehead of the age to come;
These, these will give the world another heart,
And other pulses. Hear ye not the hum
Of mighty workings?-

Listen awhile, ye nations, and be dumb.

XV.

ON THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET.

THE poetry of earth is never dead:

When all the birds are faint with the hot sun, And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead: That is the grasshopper's-he takes the lead In summer luxury, he has never done With his delights, for when tired out with fun, He rests at ease beneath some pleasant weed. The poetry of earth is ceasing never:

On a lone winter evening, when the frost Has wrought a silence, from the stove there shrills The Cricket's song, in warmth increasing ever,

And seems to one in drowsiness half lost,

The Grasshopper's among some grassy hills.

December 30, 1816.

XVI

TO KOSCIUSKO.

GOOD Kosciusko! thy great name alone

Is a full harvest whence to reap high feeling;
It comes upon us like the glorious pealing
Of the wide spheres-an everlasting tone.
And now it tells me, that in worlds unknown,

The names of heroes, burst from clouds concealing, Are changed to harmonies, for ever stealing Through cloudless blue, and round each silver throne, It tells me too, that on a happy day,

When some good spirit walks upon the earth,
Thy name with Alfred's, and the great of yore,
Gently commingling, gives tremendous birth
To a loud hymn, that sounds far, far away
To where the great God lives for evermore.