Come, read to me some poem,

Some simple and heartfelt lay, That shall soothe this restless feeling, And banish the thoughts of day.

Not from the grand old masters,
Not from the bards sublime,
Whose distant footsteps echo
Through the corridors of Time.

For, like strains of martial music,
Their mighty thoughts suggest
Life's endless toil and endeavour;
And to-night I long for rest.

Read from some humbler poet,

Whose songs gushed from his heart, As showers from the clouds of summer, Or tears from the eyelids start;

Who, through long days of labour,
And nights devoid of ease,
Still heard in his soul the music
Of wonderful melodies.

Such songs have power to quiet

The restless pulse of care, And come like the benediction That follows after prayer.

Then read from the treasured volume

The poem of thy choice,

And lend to the rhyme of the poet

The beauty of thy voice.

And the night shall be filled with music,

And the cares that infest the day

Shall fold their tents, like the Arabs,
And as silently steal away.

"This morn is merry June, I trow,
The rose is budding fain;

But she shall bloom in winter snow,
Ere we two meet again.'

He turn'd his charger as he spake,

Upon the river shore,

He gave his bridle-reins a shake,
Said, Adieu for evermore,

My love!

And adieu for evermore.'

SCOTT.

THE TWO APKIL MORNINGS

WE walked along, while bright and red
Uprose the morning sun:

And Matthew stopped, he looked, and said,
'The will of God be done!'

A village schoolmaster was he,
With hair of glittering grey;
As blithe a man as you could see
On a spring holiday.

And on that morning, through the grass,

And by the steaming rills,

We travelled merrily, to pass
A day among the hills.

'Our work,' said I, 'was well begun; Then, from thy breast what thought, Beneath so beautiful a sun,

So sad a sigh has brought?'

A second time did Matthew stop;
And fixing still his eye

Upon the eastern mountain-top,
To me he made reply:

'Yon cloud with that long purple cleft Brings fresh into my mind

A day like this which I have left
Full thirty years behind.

'With rod and line I sued the sport

Which that sweet season gave,

And, to the church-yard come, stopped short
Beside my daughter's grave.

'Nine summers had she scarcely seen,

The pride of all the vale;

And then she sang;-she would have been
A very nightingale.

'Six feet in earth my Emma lay;

And yet I loved her more,

For so it seemed, than till that day
I e'er had loved before.

'And, turning from her grave, I met,
Beside the church-yard yew,

A blooming girl, whose hair was wet
With points of morning dew.

'A basket on her head she bare;
Her brow was smooth and white:
To see a child so very fair
It was a pure delight!

'No fountain from its rocky cave
E'er tripped with foot so free;
She seemed as happy as a wave
That dances on the sea.

'There came from me a sigh of pain
Which I could ill confine;

I looked at her, and looked again,
And did not wish her mine!'

Matthew is in his grave, yet now,
Methinks, I see him stand,
As at that moment, with a bough
Of wilding in his hand.

WORDSWORTH.