VIGNETTES. 1853. AFTER A LECTURE ON WORDSWORTH. COME, spread your wings, as I spread mine, And leave the crowded hall For where the eyes of twilight shine O'er evening's western wall. These are the pleasant Berkshire hills, Hark! from their sides a thousand rills A thousand rills; they leap and shine, A hundred brooks, and still they run With ripple, shade, and gleam, Till, clustering all their braids in one, They flow a single stream. A bracelet spun from mountain mist, With ox-bow curve and sinuous twist Float we the grassy banks between ; Without an oar we glide; The meadows, drest in living green, Unroll on either side. Come, take the book we love so well, And let us read and dream We see whate'er its pages tell, And sail an English stream. Up to the clouds the lark has sprung, Still trilling as he flies; The linnet sings as there he sung; The unseen cuckoo cries, And daisies strew the banks along, With cowslips, and a primrose throng, And humble celandine. Ah foolish dream! when Nature nursed The fount was drained that opened first; On the young planet's orient shore Her morning hand she tried; Then turned the broad medallion o'er i And stamped the sunset side. Take what she gives, her pine's tall stem, Her elm with hanging spray; She wears her mountain diadem Still in her own proud way. Look on the forests' ancient kings, The hemlock's towering pride: Yon trunk had thrice a hundred rings Nor think that Nature saves her bloom For us she wears her court costume,- The lily with the sprinkled dots, The cardinal, and the blood-red spots, As if some wounded eagle's breast, And hark! and hark! the woodland rings; There thrilled the thrush's soul; And look! that flash of flamy wings, The fire-plumed oriole ! Above, the hen-hawk swims and swoops, Flung from the bright, blue sky; Below, the robin hops, and whoops Beauty runs virgin in the woods And oft a longing thought intrudes, Her every finger's every joint Had our wild home been thine. Yet think not so; Old England's blood But wafted o'er the icy flood Its better life remains : Our children know each wild-wood smell, The bayberry and the fern, The man who does not know them well Is all too old to learn. |