IV.

MOONLIGHT.

THOU mystic moon that o'er the dim grey sound

Ray'st forth a yellow stream of thin cold light, If aught thou hast of knowledge more profound That told might profit bring to mortal wight, Tell me if not, why should I rack my wit

To shape me what thou art, or whither bound,

Or what strange souls, for fleshly coil unfit

Find a meet lodgment on thy spotted round? Dream dreams who will beneath the glimmering moons, And commune with dim ghosts that flit about,

I have no brains to waste on hazy runes,

That being read but stir more doubtful doubt; Shine on me, Sun! beneath thy clear strong ray

To live and work is all the bliss I pray.

THE BOULDER.

WHENCE Comest thou? The rest are black, but thou
Art rough and red as any Roy MacGregor,
And show'st as strangely on this spot, I vow,
As in white Washington a sooty nigger!

Say, wert thou roll'd o'er from the ruddy Ross
By Noah's flood, when God was wroth with men,
Or, when the giants played at pitch and toss

Wert thou the counter for their gambling then? I know not but what men who read the rocks

:

Propound, that Nature in her crude display

Of Titan strength with blocks high-heap'd on blocks
Made glorious sport, before Sire Adam's day,
May well be true; and, when the young sun shone,

Some travelling iceberg dropped this mighty stone.

VI.

THE DISAPPOINTED TOURIST.

AND is this all? And I have seen the whole,
Cathedral, chapel, nunnery, and graves!

"Tis scantly worth the tin, upon my soul,

Or the long travel through the tumbling waves! There's nothing now, but to sit down and smoke

A pipe on this grey channel's shelving brink. "There you are right," quoth I, to him who spoke, "Not much is here to see, but much to think; If you'll but sit and read the old monk's book,

Making the shifting shows of time your theme, And through the haze of centuries brooding look Till cunning Fancy shape the featured dream, Then learn what men served God in this lone nook

Nobly, without gas, newspapers, or steam."

MULL.

A PSALM OF BEN MORE.

How beautiful upon the mountains, Lord,

Is Earth, thy world, how beautiful and grand!
Ofttimes with firm unwearied foot I clomb

The old grey Ben, whose peak serene look'd down
In glory on the light careering clouds

That swept the nearer heights; but never fill'd
My wondering eye such pomp of various view
As now, from thy storm-shatter'd brow, Ben More.
How fearful from this high sharp-riven rim

To look down thy precipitous forehead seam'd

With scars from countless storms, whence to the plain

In long grim lines the livid ruin falls,

And think how with a touch the involving blast
From the rude North might seize such thing as I,
And whirl me into dust in that black glen,

Sown with destruction! But such danger now
Touches not me, when in her gentle mood
Nature, all robed in light, and shod with peace,
Upon the old foundations of her strength

Sits like a queen. How glorious in the West
The sheen of ocean lies, the boundless breadth
Of gleaming waves that girdle in the globe
With their untainted virtue, strangely cut
By rocky terraces projecting far

In measured tiers, and long-drawn sprawling arms
Of huge-slabbed granite huddled into knobs,
And studded, far as the rapt eye can reach,
With isle and islet sown in sportive strength,
Even as the sky with stars--the sandy Coll
Tiree-tway-parted, and the nearer group
Of Ulva, Gometra, and Lunga's isle,
And the flat Pladda, and the steep Cairnburg,
Where erst the Norseman, monarch of the main,
His sea-girt castle kept; and stout Maclean
Cromwell's harsh might defied, and planted proud
The flag of Charles, and on the ill-starred clans
Brought loss and harm, and crown'd authority's
Retributive mace. But chiefly, thy dark mass