VII.

F from a jutting ridge, around whose base
our deep vale, two heath-clad rocks ascend
Eship, the loftiest of the pair

y to no ambitious height; yet both,

fake and stream, mountain and flowery mead,
Tng prospects fair as human eyes
Er beheld. Up-led with mutual help,
1.one or other brow of those twin peaks
Wers two adventurous sisters wont to climb,

La took no note of the hour while thence they gazed, The booming heath their couch, gazed, side by side, eechless admiration. I, a witness

And frequent sharer of their calm delight
With thankful heart, to either eminence
Gave the baptismal name each sister bore.
Now are they parted, far as death's cold hand
Hath power to part the Spirits of those who love
As they did love. Ye kindred pinnacles—
That, while the generations of mankind
Follow each other to their hiding-place
In time's abyss, are privileged to endure
Beautiful in yourselves, and richly graced
With like command of beauty — grant your aid
For MARY's humble, SARAH's silent, claim,
That their pure joy in nature may survive
From age to age in blended memory.

A MORNING EXERCISE. FACT, who leads the pastimes of the glad, F... oft is pleased a wayward dart to throw ; Seng sad shadows after things not sad, Png the harmless fields with signs of woe; Bath her sway, a simple forest cry Becomes an echo of man's misery.

B the ravens croak of death; and when the owl Tras his two voices for a favourite strainTo-hit-Tu-whoo! the unsuspecting fowl Frebodes mishap, or seems but to complain: Fascy, intent to harass and annoy,

thus pervert the evidence of joy.

Through border wilds where naked Indians stray, Myrads of notes attest her subtle skill; 4 Sathered task-master cries, "WORK AWAY!" And, in thy iteration," WHIP POOR WILL," * beard the spirit of a toil-worn slave, Lasted out of life, not quiet in the grave!

What wonder? at her bidding ancient lays Seped in dire griefs the voice of Philomel; And that fleet messenger of summer days, The swallow, twittered subject to like spell; B: ne'er could Fancy bend the buoyant lark Tmelancholy service-hark! O hark!

The daisy sleeps upon the dewy lawn, Neng yet the head that evening bowed; E: He is risen, a later star of dawn,

ering and twinkling near yon rosy cloud; Bgt gem instinct with music, vocal spark; The happiest bird that sprang out of the ark!

Hail, blest above all kinds! - Supremely skilled Restess with fixed to balance, high with low, Tax leav'st the halcyon free her hopes to build Och forbearance as the deep may show; Perpetual flight, unchecked by earthly ties, Leavest to the wandering Bird of Paradise.

Faul, though swift as lightning, the meek dove; It more hath nature reconciled in thee;

nstant with thy downward eye of love, let, seral singleness, so free;

de humble, yet so ready to rejoice

la power of wing and never-wearied voice!

See Waterton's Wanderings in South America.

To the last point of vision, and beyond, Mount, daring warbler! that love-prompted strain, ("Twixt thee and thine a never-failing bond) Thrills not the less the bosom of the plain: Yet might'st thou seem, proud privilege! to sing All independent of the leafy spring.

How would it please old ocean to partake, With sailors longing for a breeze in vain, The harmony thy notes most gladly make Where earth resembles most his own domain ! Urania's self might welcome with pleased ear These matins mounting towards her native sphere.

Chanter by heaven attracted, whom no bars To day-light known deter from that pursuit, 'Tis well that some sage instinct, when the stars Come forth at evening, keeps thee still and mute; For not an eyelid could to sleep incline Wert thou among them, singing as they shine!

137

Whole summer fields are thine by right;
And Autumn, melancholy Wight!
Doth in thy crimson head delight

When rains are on thee.

In shoals and bands, a morrice train, Thou greetest the Traveller in the lane; If welcome thou countest it gain;

Thou art not daunted,

Nor carest if thou be set at naught:
And oft alone in nooks remote

We meet thee like a pleasant thought,
When such are wanted.

Be Violets in their secret mews

The flowers the wanton Zephyrs choose;
Proud be the Rose, with rains and dews
Her head impearling;

Thou livest with less ambitious aim,
Yet hast not gone without thy fame;
Thou art indeed by many a claim
The Poet's darling.

If to a rock from rains he fly,
Or, some bright day of April sky,
Imprisoned by hot sunshine lie

Near the green holly,

And wearily at length should fare;
He needs but look about, and there
Thou art!-a Friend at hand, to scare
His melancholy.

A hundred times, by rock or bower, Ere thus I have lain couched an hour, Have I derived from thy sweet power Some apprehension;

Come steady love; some brief delight; Some memory that had taken flight; Some chime of fancy wrong or right; Or stray invention.

If stately passions in me burn,

And one chance look to Thee should turn, I drink out of an humbler urn

A lowlier pleasure;

The homely sympathy that heeds
The common life our nature breeds;
A wisdom fitted to the needs
Of hearts at leisure.

When, smitten by the morning ray,
I see thee rise, alert and gay,
Then, cheerful Flower! my spirits play
With kindred gladness:

And when, at dusk, by dews opprest
Thou sink'st, the image of thy rest
Hath often eased my pensive breast
Of careful sadness.

And all day long I number yet,
All seasons through, another debt,
Which I, wherever thou art met,
To thee am owing;

An instinct call it, a blind sense;

A happy, genial influence,

Coming one knows not how, nor whence, Nor whither going.

Child of the year! that round dost run
Thy course bold lover of the sun,
And cheerful when the days begun
As morning Leveret,

Thy long-lost praise thou shalt regain;
Dear shalt thou be to future men
As in old time; - thou not in vain
Art Nature's favourite.

A WHIRL-BLAST from behind the hill
Rushed o'er the wood with startling sound:
Then all at once the air was still,
And showers of hail-stones pattered round
Where leafless Oaks towered high above.
I sat within an undergrove

Of tallest hollies, tall and green;
A fairer bower was never seen.
From year to year the spacious floor
With withered leaves is covered o'er,
And all the year the bower is green.
But see! where'er the hail-stones drop
The withered leaves all skip and hop;
There's not a breeze- no breath of air-
Yet here, and there, and everywhere
Along the floor, beneath the shade
By those embowering hollies made,
The leaves in myriads jump and spring,
As if with pipes and music rare
Some Robin Good-fellow were there,
And all those leaves, in festive glee,
Were dancing to the minstrelsy.

THE GREEN LINNET. BENEATH these fruit tree boughs that shed Their snow-white blossoms on my head, With brightest sunshine round me spread Of spring's unclouded weather, In this sequestered nook how sweet To sit upon my Orchard-seat! And birds and flowers once more to greet, My last year's Friends together.

One have I marked, the happiest Guest In all this covert of the blest:

Hail to Thee, far above the rest

*See, in Chaucer and the elder Poets, the honours former'y paid to this flower

In joy of voice and pinion,

Thou, Linnet! in thy green array,
Presiding Spirit here to-day,
Dost lead the revels of the May,

And this is thy dominion.

While Birds, and Butterflies, and Flowers,
Make all one Band of Paramours,
Thou, ranging up and down the bowers,

Art sole in thy employment;

A Life, a Presence like the Air,
Scattering thy gladness without care,
Too blest with any one to pair,

Thyself thy own enjoyment.

Upon yon tuft of hazel trees,
That twinkle to the gusty breeze,
Behold him perched in ecstasies,

Yet seeming still to hover;

There! where the flutter of his wings
Upon his back and body flings
Shadows and sunny glimmerings
That cover him all over.

My dazzled sight the Bird deceives,
A Brother of the dancing Leaves;
Then flits, and from the Cottage eaves

Pours forth his song in gushes;

As if by that exulting strain

He mocked and treated with disdain The voiceless Form he chose to feign, While fluttering in the bushes.

But, exiled from Australian Bowers,
And singleness her lot,

She trills her song with tutored powers,
Or mocks each casual note.

No more of pity for regrets

With which she may have striven!
Now but in wantonness she frets,
Or spite, if cause be given;

Arch, volatile, a sportive Bird
By social glee inspired;
Ambitious to be seen or heard,
And pleased to be admired!

II.

This moss-lined shed, green, soft, and dry,
Harbours a self-contented Wren,
Not shunning man's abode, though shy,
Almost as thought itself, of human ken.

Strange places, coverts unendeared
She never tried; the very nest

In which this Child of Spring was reared,
Is warmed, thro' winter, by her feathery breast.

To the bleak winds she sometimes gives

A slender unexpected strain;

That tells the Hermitess still lives,
Though she appear not, and be sought in vain.

Say, Dora! tell me by yon placid Moon,
If called to choose between the favoured pair,
Which would you be, the Bird of the Saloon,
By Lady fingers tended with nice care,
Caressed, applauded, upon dainties fed,
Or Nature's DARKLING of this mossy Shed?

THE CONTRAST.

THE PARROT AND THE WREN.

I.

Wris her gilded cage confined,

I saw a dazzling Belle,

A Parrot of that famous kind
Whose name is NON-PAREIL

Le beads of glossy jet her eyes;
And, smoothed by Nature's skill,
Wth pearl or gleaming agate vies
Her Goely-curved bill.

Her plumy Mantle's living hues
In mass opposed to mass,
shine the splendour that imbues
The robes of pictured glass.

inc, Booth to say, an apter Mate
Dnd never tempt the choice
Of feathered Thing most delicate
la figure and in voice.

TO THE SMALL CELANDINE.* PANSIES, Lilies, Kingcups, Daisies, Let them live upon their praises; Long as there's a sun that sets, Primroses will have their glory; Long as there are Violets,

They will have a place in story:
There's a flower that shall be mine.
'Tis the little Celandine.

Eyes of some men travel far
For the finding of a star;

Up and down the heavens they go,
Men that keep a mighty rout!
I'm as great as they, I trow,
Since the day I found thee out,
Little flower!-I'll make a stir,
Like a great Astronomer.

Common Pilewort