POEMS OF NATURE.

Feurs, idle tears, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depth of some donne despair Rise in the heart & gather to the

on the happy autumn fields,

on the days that are no more.

eyes

In looking And thinking

Shrnyron

POEMS OF NATURE.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

WORLDLINESS.

INVOCATION TO LIGHT.
The World is too much with us ; late and soon, Hail, holy Light, offspring of Heaven first-born !

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers; Or of the Eternal coeternal beam
Little we see in nature that is ours ;

May I express thee unblamed ? since God is light,
We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! And never but in unapproached light
This sea that bares her bosom to the moon,

Dwelt from eternity, dwelt then in thee,

Bright effluence of bright essence increate. The winds that will be howling at all hours And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers, whose fountain who shall tell ? before the sun,

Or hear'st thou rather pure ethereal stream, For this, for everything, we are out of tune ;

Before the heavens, thou wert, and at the voice It moves us not. -Great God! I'd rather be Of God, as with a mantle, didst invest A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn,

The rising world of waters dark and deep), So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

Won from the void and formless infinite.
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn; Thee I revisit now with bolder wing,
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea ; Escaped the Stygian pool, though long detained
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathéd horn. In that obscure sojourn, while in my flight

Through utterand through middle darkuess borne,
With other notes than to the Orpplean lyre,
I sung of Chaos and eternal Night,

Taught by the heavenly Muse to venture down
DAYBREAK.

The dark descent, and up to reascend, A WIND came up out of the sea,

Though hard and rare : thee I revisit safe, And said, “O mists, make room for me!”

And feel thy sovereign vital lamp; but thou

Revisitest not these eyes, that roll in vaia It hailed the ships, and cried, “Sail on,

To find thy piercing ray, and find no dawn; Ye mariners, the night is gone."

So thick a drop serene hath quenched their orbs, And hurried landward far away,

Or dim suffusion veiled. Yet not the more Crying, “Awake! it is the day."

Cease I to wander where the Muses haunt

Clear spring, or shady grove, or sunny hill, It said unto the forest, “Shout !

Smit with the love of sacred song ; but chief Hang all your leafy banners out !”

Thee, Sion, and the flowery brooks beneath, It touched the wood-bird's folded wing,

That wash thy hallowed feet, and warbling flow, And said, “O bird, awake and sing!”

Nightly I visit : nor sometimes forget

Those other two equalled with me in fate,
And o'er the farms, “() chanticleer, So were I equalled with them in renown,
Your clarion blow; the day is near !" Blind Thamyris and blind Mæonides,
It whispered to the fields of corn,

And Tiresias and Phineus, prophets old :
Bow down, and hail the coming morn!".

Then feed on thoughts that voluntary move

Harmonious numbers ; as the wakeful bird
It shouted through the belfry-tower, Sings darkling, and in shadiest covert hid
“Awake, O bell ! proclaim the hour." Tunes her nocturnal note. Thus with the year
It crossed the churchyard with a sigh,

Seasons return, but not to me returns
“Not yet ! in quiet lie.'

Day, or the sweet approach of even or morn,
Or sight of vernal bloom, or summer's rose,

And said,

HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW.

Or flocks, or herds, or human face divine ; The whistling ploughman stalks afield ; and, But cloud, instead, and ever-during dark,

hark ! Surrounds me, from the cheerful ways of men Down the rough slope the ponderous wagon Cut off, and for the book of knowledge fair

rings; Presented with a universal blank

Through rustling corn the hare astonished Of nature's works, to me expunged and rased,

springs ; And wisdom at one entrance quite shut out. Slow tolls the village-clock the drowsy hour; So much the rather thou, celestial Light,

The partridge bursts away on whirring wings ; Shine inward, and the mind through all her powers Deep mourns the turtle in sequestered bower, Irradiate ; there plant eyes, all mist from thence And shrill lark carols clear from her aerial tower. Purge and disperse, that I may see and tell

JAMES BEATTIE, Of things invisible to mortal sight.

MILTON.

THE SABBATH MORNING.

PACK CLOUDS AWAY.

Pack clouds away, and welcome day,

With night we banish sorrow ;
Sweet air, blow soft ; mount, lark, aloft,

To give my love good morrow.
Wings from the winıl to please her mind,

Notes from the lark I 'll borrow :
Bird, prune thy wing; nightingale, sing,

To give my love good morrow.
To give my love good morrow,
Notes from them all I 'll borrow.

With silent awe I hail the sacred morn,
That slowly wakes while all the fields are still !
A soothing calm on every breeze is borne ;
A graver murmur gurgles from the rill ;
And echo answers softer from the hill;
And softer sings the linnet from the thorn :
The skylark warbles in a tone less shrill.
Hail, light serene ! hail, sacred Sabbath morn!
The rooks float silent by in airy drove;
The sun a placid yellow lustre throws ;
The gales that lately sighed along the grove
Have hushed their downy wings in dead repose ;
The hovering rack of clouds forgets to move,
So smiled the day when the first morn arose !

DK. JOHN LEYDEN.

Wake from thy nest, robin redbreast,

Sing, birds, in every furrow; And from each hill let music shrill

Give my fair love good morrow. Blackbird and thrush in every bush,

Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow,
You pretty elves, amongst yourselves,

Sing my fair love good morrow.
To give my love good morrow,
Sing, birds, in every furrow.

REVE DU MIDI.

THOMAS HEYWOOD.

WHEN o'er the mountain steeps
The hazy noontide creeps,
And the shrill cricket sleeps
Under the grass ;
When soft the shadows lie,
And clouds sail o'er the sky,

And the idle winds go by,
With the heavy scent of blossoms as they pass, –

Then, when the silent stream
Lapses as in a dream,
And the water-lilies gleam
Up to the sun;
When the hot and burdened day
Rests on its downward way,

When the moth forgets to play,
And the plodding ant may dream her work is

done,

The cottage curs at early pilgrim bark ;
Crownell with her pail the tripping milkmaid

sings ;

Then, from the noise of war
And the din of earth afar,
Like some forgotten star
Dropt from the sky,
The sounds of love and fear,

Beneath the golden gloamin' sky
NOONTIDE.

The mavis mends her lay;

The redbreast pours his sweetest strains BENEATH a shivering canopy reclined,

To charm the gering day; Of aspen-leaves that wave without a wind,

While weary yeldrins seem to wail I love to lie, when lulling breezes stir

Their little nestlings torn, The spiry cones that tremble on the fir;

The merry wren, frae den to den,
Or wander mid the dark-green fields of broom,

Gaes jinking through the thorn.
When peers in scattered tufts the yellow bloom ;
Or trace the path with tangling furze o’errun,

The roses fauld their silken leaves,
When bursting seed-bells crackle in the sun,

The foxglove shuts its bell ; And pittering grasshoppers, confus'dly shrill,

The honeysuckle and the birk Pipe giddily along the glowing hill :

Spread fragrance through the dell. Sweet grasshopper, who lov'st at noon to lie

Let others crowd the giddy court Serenely in the green-ribbed clover's eye,

Of mirth and revelry, To sun thy filmy wings and emerald vest,

The simple joys that nature yields Unseen thy form, and undisturbed thy rest,

Are dearer far to me.

ROBERT TANNAHILL.
Oft have I listening mused the sultry day,
And wondered what thy chirping song might say,
When naught was heard along the blossomed lea,
To join thy music, save the listless bee.

THE EVENING WIND.
DR. JOHN LEYDEN.

Spirit that breathest through my lattice : thou

That cool'st the twilight of the sultry day! ON A BEAUTIFUL DAY,

Gratefully flows thy freshness round my brow ;

Thou hast been out upon the deep at play, O UNSEEN Spirit ! now a calm divine

Riding all day the wild blue waves till now, Comes forth from thee, rejoicing earth and air ! Roughening their crests, and scattering ligh Trees, hills, and houses, all distinctly shine, And thy great ocean slumbers everywhere. And swelling the white sail. I welcome thee

To the scorched land, thou wanderer of the sea ! The mountain ridge against the purple sky Stands clear and strong, with darkened rocks Nor I alone, - a thousand bosoms round and dells,

Inhale thee in the fulness of delight; And cloudless brightness opens wide and high And languid forms rise up, and pulses hound

A home aerial, where thy presence dwells. Livelier, at coming of the wind of night;

their spray,