'My child, in Durham do you dwell?"
She checked herself in her distress,
And said, "My name is Alice Fell;
I'm fatherless and motherless.

"And I to Durham, Sir, belong."

Again, as if the thought would choke
Her very heart, her grief grew strong;
And all was for her tattered cloak !

The chaise drove on; our journey's end
Was nigh; and sitting by my side,
As if she had lost her only friend
She wept, nor would be pacified.

Up to the tavern-door we post ;
Of Alice and her grief I told;
And I gave money to the host,
To buy a new cloak for the old.

"And let it be of duffil grey,

As warm a cloak as man can sell !"
Proud creature was she the next day,
The little orphan, Alice Fell!

THE PET LAMB.

A PASTORAL.

THE dew was falling fast, the stars began to blink;

I heard a voice; it said, "Drink, pretty Creature, drink!" And, looking o'er the hedge, before me I espied

A snow-white mountain Lamb with a Maiden at its side.

No other sheep were near, the Lamb was all alone,
And by a slender cord was tethered to a stone;
With one knee on the grass did the little Maiden kneel,
While to that mountain Lamb she gave its evening meal.

The Lamb, while from her hand he thus his supper took, Seemed to feast with head and ears; and his tail with pleasure shook.

"Drink, pretty Creature, drink," she said in such a tone That I almost received her heart into my own.

'Twas little Barbara Lewthwaite, a Child of beauty rare!
I watched them with delight, they were a lovely pair.
Now with her empty can the Maiden turned away :
But ere ten yards were gone her footsteps did she stay.
Towards the Lamb she looked; and from that shady place
I unobserved could see the workings of her face :
If Nature to her tongue could measured numbers bring,
Thus, thought I, to her Lamb that little Maid might sing :

"What ails thee, Young One? what? Why pull so at thy cord?

Is it not well with thee? well both for bed and board?
Thy plot of grass is soft, and green as grass can be ;
Rest, little Young One, rest; what is't that aileth thee?

"What is it thou wouldst seek? What is wanting to thy heart?

Thy limbs are they not strong? And beautiful thou art : This grass is tender grass; these flowers they have no peers; And that green corn all day is rustling in thy ears!

"If the Sun be shining hot, do but stretch thy woollen chain, This beech is standing by, its covert thou canst gain ; For rain and mountain storms! the like thou needest not

fear

The rain and storm are things that scarcely can come here.

"Rest, little Young One, rest; thou hast forgot the day When my Father found thee first in places far away; Many flocks were on the hills, but thou wert owned by

none,

And thy mother from thy side for evermore was gone.

"He took thee in his arms, and in pity brought thee home : A blessed day for thee! then whither wouldst thou roam? A faithful Nurse thou hast; the dam that did thee yean Upon the mountain tops no kinder could have been.

"Thou knowest that twice a day I have brought thee in this can

Fresh water from the brook, as clear as ever ran;
And twice in the day, when the ground is wet with dew,
I bring thee draughts of milk, warm milk it is and new.

"Thy limbs will shortly be twice as stout as they are now,
Then I'll yoke thee to my cart like a pony in the plough;
My playmate thou shalt be; and when the wind is cold
Our hearth shall be thy bed, our house shall be thy fold.

"It will not, will not rest !-Poor Creature, can it be
That 'tis thy mother's heart which is working so in thee?
Things that I know not of belike to thee are dear,
And dreams of things which thou canst neither see nor hear.

"Alas, the mountain tops that look so green and fair! I've heard of fearful winds and darkness that come there; The little brooks that seem all pastime and all play, When they are angry, roar like lions for their prey.

"Here thou needest not dread the raven in the sky; Night and day thou art safe,—our cottage is hard by. Why bleat so after me? Why pull so at thy chain? Sleep-and at break of day I will come to thee again!"

-As homeward through the lane I went with lazy feet, This song to myself did I oftentimes repeat;

And it seemed, as I retraced the ballad line by line,
That but half of it was hers, and one half of it was mine.

Again, and once again, did I repeat the song;

"Nay," said I, "more than half to the Damsel must belong,

For she looked with such a look, and she spake with such a tone,

That I almost received her heart into my own."

THE CHILDLESS FATHER.

"UP, Timothy, up with your staff and away!
Not a soul in the village this morning will stay;
The Hare has just started from Hamilton's grounds,
And Skiddaw is glad with the cry of the hounds."

-Of coats and of jackets grey, scarlet, and green,
On the slopes of the pastures all colours were seen;
With their comely blue aprons, and caps white as snow,
The girls on the hills made a holiday show.

Fresh springs of green box-wood, not six months before,
Filled the funeral basin1 at Timothy's door;

A coffin through Timothy's threshold had past;
One Child did it bear, and that Child was his last.

1 In several parts of the North of England when a funeral takes place, a basin full of Sprigs of Box-wood is placed at the door of the house from which the coffin is taken up, and each person who attends the funeral ordinarily takes a Sprig of this Box-wood, and throws it into the grave of the deceased.

Now fast up the dell came the noise and the fray,
The horse and the horn, and the hark! hark away!
Old Timothy took up his staff, and he shut
With a leisurely motion the door of his hut.

Perhaps to himself at that moment he said,
"The key I must take, for my Ellen is dead."
But of this in my ears not a word did he speak,
And he went to the chase with a tear on his cheek.

THE REVERIE OF POOR SUSAN.

AT the corner of Wood Street, when daylight appears,
Hangs a Thrush that sings loud, it has sung for three years:
Poor Susan has passed by the spot, and has heard
In the silence of morning the song of the Bird.

'Tis a note of enchantment; what ails her? She sees A mountain ascending, a vision of trees;

Bright volumes of vapour through Lothbury glide,
And a river flows on through the vale of Cheapside.

Green pastures she views in the midst of the dale,
Down which she so often has tripped with her pail ;
And a single small Cottage, a nest like a dove's,
The one only dwelling on earth that she loves.

She looks, and her heart is in heaven: but they fade,
The mist and the river, the hill and the shade :
The stream will not flow, and the hill will not rise,
And the colours have all passed away from her eyes.