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 church-yard 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-
HEY come! the merry summer months of beauty, love, and flowers;
the gladsome months that bring thick leafiness to bowers.
Up, up, my heart! and walk abroad, fling work and
Seek silent hills, or rest thyself where peaceful waters glide;
Or underneath the shadow vast of patriarchal trees,
See through its leaves the cloudless sky in rapt tranquillity.
The grass is soft; its velvet touch is grateful to the hand,
And, like the kiss of maiden love, the breeze is sweet and bland;
The daisy and the butter-cup are nodding courteously;
It stirs their blood with kindest love to bless and welcome thee.
And mark how with thine own thin locks-they now are silvery gray— That blissful breeze is wantoning, and whispering "Be gay!"
There is no cloud that sails along the ocean of yon sky
But hath its own wing'd mariners to give it melody.
Thou see'st their glittering fans outspread, all gleaming like red gold,
And hark! with shrill pipe musical, their merry course they hold.
God bless them all, these little ones, who, far above this earth,
Can make a scoff of its mean joys, and vent a nobler mirth.
But soft! mine ear upcaught a sound-from yonder wood it came ;
The spirit of the dim green glade did breathe his own glad name.
Yes, it is he! the hermit bird, that apart from all his kind,
Slow spells his beads monotonous to the soft western winds.
Cuckoo ! cuckoo! he sings again-his notes are void of art :
But simplest strains do soonest sound the deep founts of the heart.
Good Lord! it is a gracious boon for thought-crazed wight like me, To smell again these summer flowers beneath this summer tree!
To suck once more in every breath, their little souls away,
And feed my fancy with fond dreams of youth's bright summer day ;
When rushing forth, like untamed colt, the reckless truant boy-
Wandered through green woods all day long, a mighty heart of joy!
I'm sadder now-I have had cause; but O, I'm proud to think
That each pure joy-fount loved of yore I yet delight to drink ;
Leaf, blossom, blade, hill, valley, stream, the calm unclouded sky,
Still mingle music with my dreams, as in the days gone by.
When summer's loveliness and light fall round me dark and cold,
I'll bear indeed life's heaviest curse, a heart that hath waxed old.
WILLIAM MOTHERWELL,
HRICE happy he who by some shady grove,
Far from the clamorous world, doth live his own;
Though solitary, who is not alone,
But doth converse with that Eternal Love.
O how more sweet is bird's harmonious moan,
Or the hoarse sobbings of the widow'd dove,
Than those smooth whisperings near a prince's throne,
Which good make doubtful, do the ill approve!
O how more sweet is zephyr's wholesome breath,
And sighs embalm'd, which new-born flowers unfold,
Than that applause vain honour doth bequeath!
How sweet are streams, to poisons drank in gold'
The world is full of horrors, troubles, slights;
Woods' harmless shades have only true delights.
HERE, in venerable rows,
Widely-waving oaks inclose
The moat of yonder antique hall,
Swarm the rooks with clamorous call;
And to the toils of nature true,
Wreath their capacious nests anew.
Musing through the lawny park,
The lonely poet loves to mark
How various greens in faint degrees
Tinge the tall groups of various trees;
While, careless of the changing year
The pine cerulean, never sere,
Towers distinguish'd from the rest,
And proudly vaunts her winter vest.
Within some whispering osier isle, Where Glym's low banks neglected smile, And each trim meadow still retains The wintry torrent's oozy stains, Beneath a willow, long forsook, The fisher seeks his 'custom'd nook; And bursting through the crackling sedge, That crowns the current's cavern'd edge, He startles from the bordering wood The bashful wild-duck's early brood.
O'er the broad downs, a novel race, Frisk the lambs with faltering pace, And with eager bleatings fill
The foss that skirts the beacon'd hill.
His free-born vigour, yet unbroke,
To lordly man's usurping yoke,
The bounding colt forgets to play,
Basking beneath the noontide ray,
And stretch'd among the daisies pied,
Of a green dingle's sloping side;
While far beneath, where Nature spreads
Her boundless length of level meads,
In loose luxuriance taught to stray,
A thousand tumbling rills inlay
With silver veins the vale, or pass
Redundant through the sparkling grass.
Yet, in these presages rude
'Midst her pensive solitude
Fancy, with prophetic glance,
Sees the teeming months advance;
The field, the forest, green and gay,
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