Cauld blew the bitter, biting north
Upon thy early humble birth;
Yet cheerfully thou glinted' forth,
Amid the storm!
Scarce reared above the parent earth
Thy tender form.
The flaunting flowers our gardens yield,
High sheltering woods and wa's maun shield;
But thou, beneath the random bield2
O' clod or stane,
Adorns the histie3 stibble-field,
There, in thy scanty mantle clad,
Thy snawie bosom sunward spread,
Thou lifts thy unassuming head
But now the share uptears thy bed,
And low thou lies!
Such is the fate of simple bard,
On life's rough ocean luckless starred !
Unskilful he to note the card
Till billows rage, and gales blow hard,
And whelm him o'er.
Such fate to suffering worth is given,
Who long with wants and woes has striven;
By human pride or cunning driven
Till, wrenched of every stay but Heaven,
E'en thou who mourn'st the daisy's fate,
That fate is thine, no distant date;
Stern ruin's ploughshare drives, elate,
Till crushed beneath the furrow's weight
Shall be thy doom!
THE GRAVES OF A HOUSEHOLD. - Mrs. Hemans.
THEY grew in beauty, side by side,
They filled one home with glee,
Their graves are severed far and wide,
By mount, and stream, and sea.
The same fond mother bent at night
O'er each fair sleeping brow;
She had each folded flower in sight,
Where are those dreamers now?
One, 'midst the forests of the west,
By a dark stream, is laid,
The Indian knows his place of rest,
Far in the cedar shade.
The sea, the blue, lone sea, hath one,
He lies where pearls lie deep,-
He was the loved of all, yet none
O'er his low bed may weep.
One sleeps where southern vines are drest,
Above the noble slain;
He wrapped his colors round his breast,
On a blood-red field of Spain.
And one,
-o'er her the myrtle showers
Its leaves, by soft winds fanned;
She faded 'midst Italian flowers,
The last of that bright band.
And parted thus they rest, who played
Beneath the same green tree;
Whose voices mingled as they prayed
About one parent knee!
They that with smiles lit up the hall,
And cheered with song the hearth,-
Alas for love, if thou wert all,
And naught beyond, O Earth!
THE SOLITARY REAPER. Wordsworth.
BEHOLD her, single in the field,
Yon solitary Highland lass!
Reaping and singing by herself;
Stop here, or gently pass!
Alone she cuts and binds the grain,
And sings a melancholy strain;
O, listen! for the vale profound
Is overflowing with the sound.
No nightingale did ever chant
More welcome notes to weary bands
Of travellers, in some shady haunt
Among Arabian sands;
Such thrilling voice was never heard
In spring-time from the cuckoo bird,
Breaking the silence of the seas
Among the farthest Hebrides.
Will no one tell me what she sings?
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow
For old, unhappy, far-off things,
And battles long ago,
Or is it some more humble lay,
Familiar matter of to-day?
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain.
That has been, and may be again!
Whate'er the theme, the maiden sang
As if her song could have no ending;
I saw her singing at her work,
And o'er the sickle bending;
I listened, motionless and still;
And when I mounted up the hill,
The music in my heart I bore,
Long after it was heard no more.
THE ADOPTED CHILD. - Mrs. Hemans.
"WHY wouldst thou leave me, O gentle child?
Thy home on the mountains is bleak and wild,
A straw-roofed cabin with lowly wall;
Mine is a fair and a pillared hall,
Where many an image of marble gleams,
And the sunshine of picture forever streams."
O, green is the turf where my brothers play, Through the long, bright hours of the summer day; They find the red cup-moss where they climb, And they chase the bee o'er the scented thyme;
And the rocks where the heathflower blooms they
Lady, kind lady! O, let me go!"
"Content thee, boy! in my bower to dwell;
Here are sweet sounds which thou lovest well;
Flutes on the air in the stilly noon,
Harps which the wandering breezes tune;
And the silvery wood-note of many a bird,
Whose voice was ne'er in thy mountains heard.”
"My mother sings, at the twilight's fall,
Α song of the hills, far more sweet than all;
She sings it under our own green tree,
To the babe half slumbering on her knee;
I dreamt last night of that music low,-
Lady, kind lady! O, let me go!"
66 Thy mother is gone from her cares to rest,
She hath taken the babe on her quiet breast;
Thou wouldst meet her footstep, my boy, no more,
Nor hear her song at the cabin-door.
Come thou with me to the vineyards nigh,
And we 'll pluck the grapes of the richest dye."
"Is mother
my
from her home
gone
?
away
But I know that my brothers are there at play;
I know they are gathering the foxglove's bell,
Or the long fern leaves by the sparkling well,
Or they launch their boats where the bright streams flow,
Lady, kind lady! O, let me go!"
"Fair child! thy brothers are wanderers now,
They sport no more on the mountain's brow;
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