Page images
PDF
EPUB

THE CUCKOO.

To the pleasures which Mirth can afford,― The revel, the laugh, and the jeer?

Ah! here is a plentiful board:

But the guests are all mute as their pitiful cheer,
And none but the worm is a reveller here.

Shall we build to Affection and Love?
Ah, no! they have withered and died,
Or fled with the spirit above,—

Friends, brothers, and sisters, are laid side by side,
Yet none have saluted and none have replied.

Unto Sorrow? The dead cannot grieve,Not a sob, not a sigh meets mine ear,

Which compassion itself could relieve;

Ah, sweetly they slumber, nor hope, love, or fear,Peace, Peace, is the watchword, the only one here.

Unto Death, to whom monarchs must bow? Ah, no! for his empire is known,

And here there are trophies enow:

Beneath, the cold dead, and around, the dark stone,
Are the signs of a sceptre that none may disown.

The first tabernacle to Hope we will build,
And look for the sleepers around us to rise:

The second to Faith, which insures it fulfill'd,— And the third to the Lamb of the great sacrifice,

7

Who bequeathed us them both when he rose to the skies.

Herbert Knowles.

THE CUCKOO.

HAIL, beauteous stranger of the wood,

Attendant on the spring!

Now Heaven repairs thy vernal seat,
And woods thy welcome sing.

8

WOLSEY'S ADVICE TO CROMWELL.

Soon as the daisy decks the green,
Thy certain voice we hear;
Hast thou a star to guide thy path,
Or mark the rolling year?

Delightful visitant! with thee
I hail the time of flowers,

When Heaven is fill'd with music sweet,
Of birds among the bowers.

The schoolboy, wandering in the wood
To pull the flowers so gay,
Starts-thy curious voice to hear,
And imitates thy lay.

Soon as the pea puts on the bloom,
Thou fliest the vocal vale,
An annual guest in other lands,
Another spring to hail.

Sweet bird, thy bower is ever green,
Thy sky is ever clear,
Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,
No winter in thy year!

O! could I fly, I'd fly with thee;
We'd make with social wing
Our annual visit o'er the globe,
Companions of the spring.

Logan.

WOLSEY'S ADVICE TO CROMWELL.

CROMWELL, I did not think to shed a tear
In all my miseries; but thou hast forced me
Out of thy honest truth to play the woman.

Let's dry our eyes: and thus far hear me, Cromwell;

EVE'S LAMENT.

And,—when I am forgotten, as I shall be,
And sleep in dull cold marble, where no mention
Of me more must be heard of,—say, I taught thee;
Say, Wolsey, that once trod the ways of glory,
And sounded all the depths and shoals of honour,-
Found thee a way, out of his wreck, to rise in;
A sure and safe one, though thy master missed it.
Mark but my fall, and that that ruin'd me.
Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition;
By that sin fell the angels; how can man then,
The image of his Maker, hope to win by't?
Love thyself last: cherish those hearts that hate thee;
Corruption wins not more than honesty.

Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace,

To silence envious tongues. Be just, and fear not:
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's,

9

Thy God's, and truth's; then if thou fall'st, O Cromwell, Thou fall'st a blessed martyr!

Shakspeare.

EVE'S LAMENT ON HER EXPULSION FROM
PARADISE.

O UNEXPECTED stroke, worse than of death!
Must I thus leave thee, Paradise?—thus leave
Thee, native soil! these happy walks and shades,
Fit haunt of gods? where I had hope to spend,
Quiet though sad, the respite of that day
That must be mortal to us both. O flowers,
That never will in other climate grow,
My early visitation, and my last

At eve, which I bred up with tender hand,
From the first op'ning bud, and gave ye names!
Who now shall rear ye to the sun, or rank

Your tribes, and water from the ambrosial fount?

[blocks in formation]

Thee lastly, nuptial bower! by me adorn'd
With what to sight or smell was sweet! from thee
How shall I part, and whither wander down
Into a lower world, to this obscure

And wild? how shall we breathe in other air
Less pure, accustom'd to immortal fruits?

Milton.

THE GARDEN.

A SENSITIVE plant in a garden grew,
And the young winds fed it with silver dew,
And it open'd its fan-like leaves to the light,
And closed them beneath the kisses of night.

And the Spring arose on the garden fair,
And the Spirit of Love fell everywhere;

And each flower and herb on Earth's dark breast
Rose from the dreams of its wintry rest.

The snowdrop, and then the violet,

Arose from the ground with warm rain wet,
And their breath was mix'd with fresh odour, sent
From the turf, like the voice and the instrument.

Then the pied wind-flowers and the tulip tall,
And Narcissi, the fairest among them all,
Who
in the stream's recess,
gaze on their eyes
Till they die of their own dear loveliness ;

And the Naiad-like lily of the vale,

Whom youth makes so fair and passion so pale,
That the light of its tremulous bell is seen
Through their pavilions of tender green;

And the hyacinth, purple, and white, and blue,
Which flung from its bells a sweet peal anew,
Of music so delicate, soft, and intense,
It was felt like an odour within the sense;

THE OCEAN.

And the jessamine faint, and the sweet tuberose,
The sweetest flower for scent that blows;
And all rare blossoms from every clime
Grew in that garden in perfect prime.

Shelley.

11

THE OCEAN.

ROLL on, thou deep and dark blue ocean—roll!
Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in vain;
Man marks the earth with ruin-his control
Stops with the shore; upon the watery plain
The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth remain
A shadow of man's ravage, save his own,
When, for a moment, like a drop of rain,
He sinks into thy depths with bubbling groan,
Without a grave, unknell'd, uncoffin'd, and unknown.

His steps are not upon thy paths, - thy fields
Are not a spoil for him,-thou dost arise

And shake him from thee; the vile strength he wields
For earth's destruction, thou dost all despise,
Spurning him from thy bosom to the skies,
And send'st him, shiv'ring, in thy playful spray,
And howling, to his gods, where haply lies
His petty hope in some near port or bay,
And dashest him again to earth: there let him lay.

The armaments which thunder-strike the walls
Of rock-built cities, bidding nations quake,
And monarchs tremble in their capitals;
The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs make
Their clay creator the vain title take
Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war;
These are thy toys, and as the snowy flake,
They melt into thy yeast of waves, which mar
Alike the Armada's pride, or spoils of Trafalgar.

« PreviousContinue »