A REMEMBRANCE OF GRASMERE.
O vale and lake, within your mountain-urn
Smiling so tranquilly, and set so deep!
Oft doth your dreamy loveliness return,
Colouring the tender shadows of my sleep
With light Elysian:-for the hues that steep
Your shores in melting lustre, seem to float
On golden clouds from Spirit-lands remote,
Isles of the blest ;-and in our memory keep
Their place with holiest harmonies :-Fair scene,
Most lov'd by evening and her dewy star!
Oh! ne'er may man, with touch unhallow'd, jar
The perfect music of the charm serene !
Still, still unchanged, may one sweet region wear
Smiles that subdue the soul to love, and tears, and
ON READING PAUL AND VIRGINIA IN CHILDHOOD.
O gentle story of the Indian Isle!
I loved thee in my lonely childhood well
On the sea-shore, when day's last purple smile
Slept on the waters, and their hollow swell
And dying cadence lent a deeper spell
Unto thine ocean-pictures. 'Midst thy palms
And strange bright birds, my fancy joyed to dwell,
And watch the southern cross thro' midnight calms,
And track the spicy woods.-Yet more I blessed
Thy vision of sweet love; kind, trustful, true,
Lighting the citron groves—a heavenly guest,
With such pure smiles as Paradise once knew.
Even then my young heart wept o'er the world's
To reach and blight that holiest Eden-flower.
Still that last look is solemn ! though thy rays
• Sun! to-morrow will give back, we know,
Tais joy to nature's heart. Yet through the glow
Of clouds that mantle thy decline, our gaze
Tracks thee with love half fearful :—and in days
When earth too much adored thee, what a swell
Of mournful passion, deepening mighty lays,
Told how the dying bade thy light farewell,
O Sun of Greece! O glorious, festal Sun!
Lost, lost!-for them thy golden hours were done,
And darkness lay before them! Happier far
Are we, not thus to thy bright wheels enchained,
Not thus for thy last parting unsustained,
Heirs of a purer day, with its unsetting star.
IMAGES OF PATRIARCHAL LIFE.
Calm scenes of patriarch life!-how long a power
Your unworn pastoral images retain,
O'er the true heart, which in its childhood's hour
Drank their pure freshness deep! The camels' train,
Winding in patience o'er the desert plain,—
The tent-the palm-tree-the reposing flock-
The gleaming fount-the shadow of the rock-
Oh! by how subtle, yet how strong a chain,
And in the influence of its touch how blessed,
Are these things linked, in many a thoughtful breast,
To household memories, for all change endeared!
-The matin bird-the ripple of a stream
Beside our native porch-the hearth light's gleam
The voices, earliest by the soul revered!
What secret current of man's nature turns.
Unto the golden East with ceaseless flow?
Still, where the sunbeam at its fountain burns,
The pilgrim spirit would adore and glow;
Rapt in high thoughts, though weary, faint and slow,
Still doth the traveller through the deserts wind
Led by those old Chaldean stars, which know
Where passed the Shepherd Fathers of mankind.
Is it some quenchless instinct which from far
Still points to where our alienated home
Lay in bright peace? O thou true Eastern Star
Saviour! atoning Lord! where'er we roam,
Draw still our hearts to thee, else, else how vain
Their hope, the fair lost birthright to regain.
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