THE HOLLY TREE.

ROBERT SOUTHEY.

O READER! hast thou ever stood to see

The

The holly tree?

eye that contemplates it well perceives
Its glossy leaves,

Ordered by an intelligence so wise,

As might confound the atheist's sophistries.

Below, a circling fence, its leaves are seen,
Wrinkled and keen;

No grazing cattle, through their prickly round,
Can reach to wound;

But as they grow where nothing is to fear,
Smooth and unarmed the pointless leaves appear.

I love to view these things with curious eyes,

And moralize:

And in this wisdom of the holly tree

Can emblems see,

Wherewith, perchance, to make a pleasant rhyme, One which may profit in the after time.

Thus, though abroad perchance I might appear

Harsh and austere,

To those who on my leisure would intrude

Reserved and rude,

Gentle at home amid my friends I'd be,

Like the high leaves upon the holly tree.

And should my youth, as youth is apt, I know,

Some harshness show,

All vain asperities I day by day

Would wear away,

Till the smooth temper of my age should be
Like the high leaves upon the holly tree.

And as when all the summer trees are seen
So bright and green,

The holly leaves a sombre hue display,

Less bright than they;

But when the bare and wintry woods we see,
What then so cheerful as the holly tree?

So serious should my youth appear among
The thoughtless throng,

So would I seem amid the young and gay
More grave than they,

That in my age as cheerful I might be
As the green winter of the holly tree.

UNDER THE HOLLY BOUGH.

CHARLES MACKAY.

YE who have scorned each other,

Or injured friend or brother,
In this fast fading year;

Ye who, by word or deed,

Have made a kind heart bleed,

Come gather here.

Let sinned against, and sinning,
Forget their strife's beginning,

And join in friendship now:
Be links no longer broken,
Be sweet forgiveness spoken,

Under the Holly Bough.

THE HOLLY BERKY.

Ye who have loved cach other,
Sister and friend and brother,

In this fast fading year:
Mother and sire and child,

Young man and maiden mild, .
Come gather here;

And let your hearts grow fonder,
As memory shall ponder

Each past unbroken vow.
Old loves and younger wooing
Are sweet in the renewing,

Under the Holly Bough.

Ye who have nourished sadness,
Estranged from hope and gladness,
In this fast fading year;

Ye, with o'erburdened mind,
Made aliens from your kind,
Come gather here.

Let not the useless sorrow
Pursue you night and morrow.

If e'er you hoped, hope now-
Take heart;-uncloud your faces,
And join in our embraces,

Under the Holly Bough.

THE HOLLY BERRY.

THOMAS MILLER.

GONE are the summer hours,

The birds have left their bowers;

While the holly true retains his hue,

Nor changes like the flowers.

On his armèd leaf reposes

The berries tinged like roses; For he's ever seen in red and green,

While grim old Winter dozes.

hen drink to the holly berry,
With hey down, hey down derry;
The mistletoe we 'll pledge also,
And at Christmas all be merry.

Above all cold affections,

Like pleasant recollections,
The ivy grows, and a deep veil throws
O'er all Time's imperfections;
The mould'ring column screening,
The naked gateway greening,

While the falling shrine it doth entwine
Like a heart that 's homeward leaning.

Then drink, &c.

We read in ancient story,

How the Druids in their glory

Marched forth of old, with hooks of gold,

To forests dim and hoary;

The giant oak ascended,

Then from its branches rended

The mistletoe, long long ago,

By maidens fair attended.

Then drink, &c.

Each thorpe and grange surrounding,

The waits to music bounding,

Aroused the cook, that her fire might smoke

Ere the early cock was sounding.

THE CHRISTMAS HOLLY.

For all the land was merry,

And rang with "Hey down derry,"
While in castle hall, and cottage small,
There glittered the holly berry.
Then drink, &c.

THE CHRISTMAS HOLLY.

ELIZA COOK.

1

THE holly! the holly! oh, twine it with bay
Come give the holly a song;

For it helps to drive stern winter away,

With his garment so sombre and long;
It peeps through the trees with its berries of red,
And its leaves of burnished green,

When the flowers and fruits have long been dead,
And not even the daisy is seen.

Then sing to the holly, the Christmas holly,

That hangs over peasant and king;

While we laugh and carouse 'neath its glitt'ring boughs,
To the Christmas holly we'll sing.

The gale may whistle, the frost may come
To fetter the gurgling rill;

The woods may be bare, and warblers dumb,
But holly is beautiful still.

In the revel and light of princely halls

The bright holly branch is found;

And its shadow falls on the lowliest walls,

While the brimming horn goes round.

Then drink to the holly, &c.

A