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The Waterfall and the Eglantine.

225

"Ah!" said the Briar, "blame me not:
Why should we dwell in strife?
We who in this sequestered spot
Once lived a happy life!

You stirred me on my rocky bed—
What pleasure through my veins you spread!
The summer long, from day to day,

My leaves you freshened and bedewed:
Nor was it common gratitude

That did your cares repay.

"When spring came on with bud and bell, Among the rocks did I,

Before you hang my wreaths to tell
That gentle days were nigh!
And in the sultry summer hours,

I sheltered you with leaves and flowers;
And in my leaves-now shed and gone—
The linnet lodged, and for us two
Chanted his pretty songs, when you

Had little voice or none.

"But now proud thoughts are in your breast,What grief is mine you see,

Ah! would you think, even yet how blest Together we might be !

Q

"Though of both leaf and flower bereft,

Some ornaments to me are left-
Rich store of scarlet hips is mine,
With which I, in my humble way,
Would deck you many a winter day;
A happy Eglantine !"

What more he said I cannot tell,
The stream came thundering down the dell,
With aggravated haste :

I listened, nor aught else could hear;
The Briar quaked-and much I fear
Those accents were his last.

Wordsworth.

THE SANDS OF DEE.

"O Mary, go and call the cattle home,

And call the cattle home,

And call the cattle home,

Across the sands o' Dee!"

The western wind was wild and dank with foam,

And all alone went she.

The creeping tide came up along the sand,
And o'er and o'er the sand,

And round and round the sand,

As far as eye could see;

The blinding mist came down and hid the land,

And never home came she.

Oh! is it weed, or fish, or floating hair?
A tress of golden hair,

Of drowned maiden's hair

Above the nets at sea:

Was never salmon got that shone so fair
Among the stakes at Dee!

They rowed her in across the rolling foam,

The cruel, crawling foam,

The cruel, hungry foam,

To her grave beside the sea :

But still the boatmen hear her call the cattle

home

Across the sands o' Dee.

Kingsley.

THE THREE FISHERS.

Three fishers went sailing out into the West, Out into the West as the sun went down ; Each thought of the woman who loved him the best,

And the children stood watching them out of the town;

For men must work, and women must weep, And there's little to earn, and many to keep, Though the harbour-bar be moaning.

Three wives sat up in the lighthouse tower,
And trimmed the lamps as the sun went

down,

And they looked at the squall, and they looked at the shower,

And the rack it came rolling up, ragged and

brown;

But men must work, and women must weep,
Though storms be sudden, and waters deep,
And the harbour-bar be moaning.

Three corpses lay out on the shining sands,

In the morning gleam, as the tide went down, And the women are watching and wringing their hands,

For those who will never come home to the

town.

But men must work, and women must weep, And the sooner it's over, the sooner to sleep, And good-bye to the bar and its moaning. Kingsley.

LAMENT OF THE IRISH EMIGRANT.

I'm sittin' on the stile, Mary,

Where we sat side by side

On a bright May mornin' long ago,
When first you were my bride:
The corn was springin' fresh and green,
And the lark sang loud and high-
And the red was on your lip, Mary,
And the love-light in your eye.

The place is little changed, Mary,
The day is bright as then,
The lark's loud song is in my ear,
And the corn is green again;

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