Thou'rt linked with all that is fresh and wild
In the prisoned thoughts of the city child-
And thy even wings
Are its brightest image of moving things.
It is no light chance. Thou art set apart
Wisely by Him who tamed thy heart-
To stir the love for the bright and fair,
That else were sealed in the crowded air-
I sometimes dream
Angelic rays from thy pinions stream.
Come, then, ever when daylight leaves
The page I read, to my humble eaves;
And wash thy breast in the hollow spout,
And murmur thy low, sweet music out-
I hear and see
Lessons of heaven, sweet bird, in thee!-WILLIS.
D'YE know the little wood mouse,
That pretty little thing,
That sits among the forest leaves,
Or by the forest spring?
Its fur is red, like the red chestnut,
And it is small and slim:
It leads a life most innocent,
Within the forest dim.
'Tis a timid gentle creature,
And seldom comes in sight;
It has a long and wiry tail,
And eyes both black and bright:
It makes its bed of soft dry moss,
In a hole that's deep and strong;
And there it sleeps, secure and warm,
The dreary winter long.
And though it keeps no calendar,
It knows when flowers are springing;
And it waketh to its summer life
When the nightingale is singing.
Upon the boughs the squirrel plays,
The wood mouse plays below;
And plenty of food she finds for herself
Where the beech and chestnut grow.
He sits in the hedge-sparrow's nest
When its summer brood is fled,
And picks the berries from the bough
Of the hawthorn overhead.
And I saw a little wood mouse once,
Like Oberon in his hall,
With the green green moss beneath his feet,
Sit under a mushroom tall.
I saw him sit and his dinner eat,
All under the forest tree-
His dinner of chestnut ripe and red;
And he ate it heartily.
I wish you could have seen him there:
It did my spirit good,
To see the small thing God had made
Thus eating in the wood!
I saw that God regardeth them,
Those creatures weak and small:
Their table in the wild is spread
By Him who cares for all!
OLD Oscar, how feebly thou crawl'st to the door, Thou who wert all beauty and vigour of yore;
How slow is thy stagger the sunshine to find, And thy straw-sprinkled pallet-how crippled and blind!
But thy heart is still living-thou hearest my voice-
And thy faint-wagging tail says thou yet canst rejoice;
Ah! how different art thou from the Oscar of old,
The sleek and the gamesome, the swift and the
bold!
At sunrise I wakened to hear thy proud bark,
With the coo of the house-dove, the lay of the lark;
And out to the green fields 'twas ours to repair,
When sunrise with glory empurpled the air;
And the streamlet flowed down in its gold to the
And the night-dew like diamond sparks gleamed from the tree;
And the sky o'er the earth in such purity glowed, As if angels, not men, on its surface abode!
How then thou wouldst gambol, and start from my feet,
To scare the wild birds from their sylvan retreat; Or plunge in the smooth stream, and bring to my
The twig or the wild-flower I threw from the land; On the moss-sprinkled stone, if I sat for a space, Thou wouldst crouch on the greensward, and gaze in my face,
Then in wantonness pluck up the blooms in thy teeth,
And toss them above thee, or tread them beneath,
Then I was a schoolboy all thoughtless and free,
And thou wert a whelp full of gambol and glee
Now dim is thine eyeball, and grizzled thy hair,
And I am a man, and of grief have my share!
Thou bring'st to my mind all the pleasures of youth,
When Hope was the mistress, not handmaid of
Truth;
When Earth looked an Eden, when Joy's sunny
Were cloudless, and every path glowing with flowers.
Now Summer is waning; soon tempest and rain
Shall harbinger desolate Winter again,
And thou, all unable its gripe to withstand,
Shalt die when the snow-mantle garments the land:
Then thy grave shall be dug 'neath the old cherry-
Which in Spring-time will shed down its blossoms on thee;
And, when a few fast-fleeting seasons are o'er,
Thy faith and thy form shall be thought of no more!
Then all who caressed thee and loved, shall be laid,
Life's pilgrimage o'er, in the tomb's dreary shade;
Other steps shall be heard on these floors, and the
Be like yesterday's clouds from the memory cast: Improvements will follow; old walls be thrown down,
Old landmarks removed, when old masters are gone; And the gardener, when delving, will marvel to see White bones where once blossomed the old cherry
Frail things! could we read but the objects around, In the meanest some deep-lurking truth might be
Some type of our frailty, some warning, to show
How shifting the sands are we build on below;
Our fathers have passed, and have mixed with the
mould;
Year presses on year, till the young become old;
Time, though a stern teacher, is partial to none;
And the friend and the foe pass away, one by one!
ON SCARING SOME WATER-FOWL IN LOCH TURIT
A WILD SCENE AMONG THE HILLS OF OCHTERTYRE
WHY, ye tenants of the lake,
For me your watery haunt forsake?
Tell me, fellow-creatures, why
At my presence thus you fly?
Why disturb your social joys,
Parent, filial, kindred ties?
Common friend to you and me,
Nature's gifts to all are free:
Peaceful keep your dimpling wave,
Busy feed, or wanton lave;
Or, beneath the sheltering rock,
Bide the surging billow's shock.
Conscious, blushing for our race,
Soon, too soon, your fears I trace.
Man, your proud usurping foe,
Would be lord of all below:
Plumes himself in freedom's pride,
Tyrant stern to all beside.
The eagle from the cliffy brow,
Marking you his prey below,
In his breast no pity dwells;
Strong necessity compels :
But man, to whom alone is given
A ray direct from pitying Heaven,
Glories in his heart humane-
And creatures for his pleasure slain.
In these savage, liquid plains,
Only known to wandering swains,
Where the mossy rivulet strays,
Far from human haunts and ways;
All on Nature you depend,
And life's poor season peaceful spend.
Or, if man's superior might
Dare invade your native right,
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