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SEPTEMBER.

BY C. WILCOX.

THE sultry summer past, September comes,
Soft twilight of the slow-declining year;—
All mildness, soothing loneliness and peace;
The fading season ere the falling come,
More sober than the buxom blooming May,
And therefore less the favourite of the world,
But dearest month of all to pensive minds.
'Tis now far spent; and the meridian sun,
Most sweetly smiling with attempered beams,
Sheds gently down a mild and grateful warmth
Beneath its yellow lustre, groves and woods,
Checkered by one night's frost with various hues,
While yet no wind has swept a leaf away,
Shine doubly rich. It were a sad delight

Down the smooth stream to glide, and see it tinged
Upon each brink, with all the gorgeous hues,
The yellow, red, or purple of the trees,
That, singly, or in tufts, or forests thick,
Adorn the shores; to see, perhaps, the side
Of some high mount reflected far below

SEPTEMBER.

With its bright colours, intermixed with spots
Of darker green. Yes, it were sweetly sad
To wander in the open fields, and hear,
E'en at this hour, the noonday hardly past,
'The lulling insects of the summer's night;
To hear, where lately buzzing swarms were heard,
A lonely bee long roving here and there

To find a single flower, but all in vain;
Then, rising quick, and with a louder hum,
In widening circles round and round his head,
Straight by the listener flying clear away,
As if to bid the fields a last adieu;

To hear, within the woodland's sunny side,
Late full of music, nothing, save, perhaps,
The sound of nutshells, by the squirrel dropped

From some tall beech, fast falling through the leaves.

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STANZAS.

BY R. H. WILDE.

"My life is like the summer rose
That opens to the morning sky,
But ere the shades of evening close,
Is scattered on the ground-to die!
Yet on the rose's humble bed
The sweetest dews of night are shed,
As if she wept the waste to see-
But none shall weep a tear for me!

My life is like the autumn leaf

That trembles in the moon's pale ray, Its hold is frail-its date is brief,

Restless-and soon to pass away! Yet, ere that leaf shall fall and fade, The parent-tree will mourn its shade, The winds bewail the leafless tree, But none shall breathe a sigh for me!

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