CCLXXXVIII

THE GREEN LINNET Beneath these fruit-tree boughs that shed Their snow-white blossoms on my head, With brightest sunshine round me spread Of Spring's unclouded weather, In this sequester'd nook how sweet To sit upon my orchard-seat ! And flowers and birds once more to greet, My last year's friends together. One have I mark'd, the happiest guest In all this covert of the blest : Hail to Thee, far above the rest In joy of voice and pinion ! Thou, Linnet ! in thy green array Presiding Spirit here to-day Dost lead the revels of the May; And this is thy dominion. While birds, and butterflies, and flowers, Make all one band of paramours, Thou, ranging up and down the bowers, Art sole in thy employment; A Life, a Presence like the air, Scattering thy gladness without care, Too blest with any one to pair ; Thyself thy own enjoyment. Amid yon tuft of hazel trees That twinkle to the gusty breeze, Behold him perch'd in ecstasies Yet seeming still to hover; There! where the flutter of his wings Upon his back and body flings Shadows and sunny glimmerings, That cover him all over. My dazzled sight he oft deceives A brother of the dancing leaves ; Then flits, and from the cottage-eaves Pours forth his song in gushes;

As if by that exulting strain
He mock'd and treated with disdain
The voiceless Form he chose to feign,
While fluttering in the bushes.

W. Wordsworth

CCLXXXIX

TO THE CUCKOO

O blithe new-comer! I have heard,
I hear thee and rejoice :
O Cuckoo ! shall I call thee Bird,
Or but a wandering Voice ?
While I am lying on the grass
Thy twofold shout I hear;
From hill to hill it seems to pass,
At once far off and near.
Though babbling only to the vale
Of sunshine and of flowers,
Thou bringest unto me a tale
Of visionary hours.
Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring !
Even yet thou art to me
No bird, but an invisible thing,
A voice, a mystery ;
The same whom in my school-boy days
I listen'd to; that Cry
Which made me look a thousand ways
In bush, and tree, and sky.
To seek thee did I often rove
Through woods and on the green ;
And thou wert still a hope, a love ;
Still long'd for, never seen !
And I can listen to thee yet;
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again.

O blessed Bird! the earth we pace
Again appears to be
An unsubstantial, faery place,
That is fit home for Thee !

IV. IVordstvorth

CCXC

ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE

My heart aches, and a drowsy numbness pains

My sense, as though of hemlock I had drunk,
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains

One minute past, and Lethe-wards had sunk:
'Tis not through envy of thy happy lot,
But being too happy in thine happiness,-
That thou, light-wingéd Dryad of the trees,

In some melodious plot
Of beechen green, and shadows numberless,

Singest of summer in full-throated ease.
O, for a draught of vintage ! that hath been

Cool'd a long age in the deep-delvéd earth, Tasting of Flora and the country green,

Dance, and Provençal song, and sunburnt mirth!
O for a beaker full of the warm South,
Full of the true, the blushful Ilippocrene,
With beaded bubbles winking at the brim,

And purple-stainéd mouth ;
That I might drink, and leave the world unseen,

And with thee fade away into the forest dim :
Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget

What thou among the leaves hast never known, The weariness, the fever, and the fret

Here, where men sit and hear cach other groan ; Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray hairs, Where youth grows pale, and spectre-thin, and dies Where but to think is to be full of sorrow

And leaden-eyed despairs ;
Where Beauty cannot keep her lustrous eyes,

Or new Love pine at them beyond to-morrow.

Away! away ! for I will fly to thee,

Not charioted by Bacchus and his pards,
But on the viewless wings of Poesy,

Though the dull brain perplexes and retards :
Already with thee! tender is the night,
And haply the Queen-Moon is on her throne,
Cluster'd around by all her starry Fays;

But here there is no light,
Save what from heaven is with the breezes blown
Through verdurous glooms and winding mossy

ways.

I cannot see what flowers are at my feet,

Nor what soft incense hangs upon the boughs, But, in embalméd darkness, guess each sweet

Wherewith the seasonable month endows
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree wild ;
White hawthorn, and the pastoral eglantine ;
Fast fading violets cover'd up in leaves;

And mid-May's eldest child,
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy wine,
The murmurous haunt of flies on summer eves.

Darkling I listen ; and for many a time

I have been half in love with easeful Death,
Call’d him soft names in many a muséd rhyme,

To take into the air my quiet breath;
Now more than ever seems it rich to die,
To cease upon the midnight with no pain,
While thou art pouring forth thy soul abroad

In such an ecstasy!
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have ears in vain--

To thy high requiem become a sod.

Thou wast not born for death, immortal Bird !

No hungry generations tread thee down; The voice I hear this passing night was heard

In ancient days by emperor and clown : Perhaps the self-same song that found a path Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, sick for

home,

She stood in tears amid the alien corn ;

The same that oft-times hath
Charm'd magic casements, opening on the foam

Of perilous seas, in faery lands forlorn.
Forlorn ! the very word is like a bell

To toll me back from thee to my sole self!
Adieu ! the fancy cannot cheat so well

As she is famed to do, deceiving elf.
Adieu ! adieu ! thy plaintive anthem fades
Past the near meadows, over the still stream,
Up the hill-side ; and now 'tis buried deep

In the next valley-glades :
Was it a vision, or a waking dream ?
Fled is that music :-Do I wake or sleep?

J. Kcats

9

Jornal

:

* Earth has not anything to show more fair :

Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty :
This City now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning : silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky,
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendour valley, rock, or hill ;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep !

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The river glideth at his own sweet will :
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still 7

IV. IVordsworth