Concealed from friends who might disturb Rest, mother-bird! and when thy young Think how ye prospered, thou and thine, SONNETS. COMPOSED OR SUGGESTED DURING OF 1833. II. WHY should the Enthusiast, journeying Repine as if his hour were come too late? 'Mid fruitful felds that ring with jocund And pleasure-grounds where Taste, re- Of Truth and Beauty, strives to imitate, By social Order's watchful arms embraced, A With golden prospect for futurity, III. THEY called Thee merry England, in old A happy people won for thee that name [Having been prevented by the lateness of the season, in 1831, from visiting Staffa and Iona, the author made these the principal objects of a short tour in the summer of 1833, of which the following series of sonnets is a Memorial. The course pursued was down the Cumberland river Derwent, and to Whitehaven; thence (by the Isle of Man, where a few days were passed) up the Frith of Clyde to Greenock, then to Oban, Staffa, Iona; and back towards England, by Loch Awe, Inverary, Endearing title, a responsive chime Loch Goil-head, Greenock, and through parts. To the heart's fond belief, though some of Renfrewshire, Ayrshire, and Dumfriesshire to Carlisle, and thence up the river, Whose sterner judgments deem that word Eden, and homewards by Ullswater.] the same there are a snare For inattentive Fancy, like the lime This face of rural beauty be a mask Forbid it, Heaven!-that "merry Eng- May be thy rightful name, in prose and rhyme ! IV. TO THE RIVER GRETA, NEAR KESWICK. stones Rumble along thy bed, block after block : greans: But if thou (like Cocytus from the moans Heard on his rueful margin) thence wert | And You, my Offspring! that do still The Mourner, thy true nature was defamed, Yet may outstrip me in the appointed race, Deeks, on thy sinuous banks, her thousand thrones, Seats of glad instinct and love's carolling, The concert, for the happy, then may vie With liveliest peals of birth-day harmony: To a grieved heart, the notes are benisons. pain We breathed together for a moment's space, The wrong, by love provoked, let love arraign, And only love keep in your hearts a place. V. TO THE RIVER DERWENT. VII. ADDRESS FROM THE SPIRIT OF THOU look'st upon me, and dost fondly think, AMONG the mountains were we nursed, Poet! that, stricken as both are by years, We, differing once so much, are now Compeers, loved stream! Thou near the Eagle's nest-within brief sail, I, of his bold wing floating on the gale, Where thy deep voice could lull me! Faint the beam Of human life when first allowed to gleam On mortal notice.-Glory of the Vale, Such thy meek outset, with a crown, though frail, Kept in perpetual verdure by the steam Of thy soft breath!-Less vivid wreath entwined Nemaan victor's brow; less bright was Prepared, when each has stood his time, to sink Into the dust. Erewhile a sterner link United us; when thou, in boyish play, Entering my dungeon, didst become a prey To soul-appalling darkness. Not a blink Of light was there;-and thus did I, thy Tutor, Make thy young thoughts acquainted with the grave; While thou wert chasing the winged butterfly Through my green courts; or climbing, a bold suitor, Up to the flowers whose golden progeny Still round my shattered brow in beauty wave. VI. IN SIGHT OF THE TOWN OF (WHERE THE AUTHOR WAS BORN, AND HIS FATHER'S REMAINS ARE LAID. A POINT of life between my Parents' dust, VIII. NUN'S WELL, BRIGHAM. THE cattle crowding round this beverage clear To slake their thirst, with reckless hoofs have trod The encircling turf into a barren clod; Through which the waters creep, thea disappear, Born to be lost in Derwent flowing near; Yet, o'er the brink, and round the limestone-cell Of the pure spring (they call it the ' Name that first struck by chance my startled ear) A tender Spirit broods- the pensive Shade | The gloom that did its loveliness enshroud) She smiled; but Time, the old Saturnian Seer, Of ritual honours to this Fountain paid Looked down with pity upon eyes beguiled Sighed on the wing as her foot pressed the With step prelusive to a long array IX. TO A FRIEND. (ON THE BANKs of the Derwent.) XI. PASTOR and Patriot ! at whose bidding rise IN THE CHANNEL, BETWEEN THE COAST These modest Walls, amid a flock that OF CUMBERLAND AND THE ISLE OF RANGING the Heights of Scawfell or Black-coom, In his lone course the Shepherd oft will X. MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS, (LANDING AT the mouth of the derwENT, WORKINGTON.) DEAR to the Loves, and to the Graces vowed, The Queen drew back the wimple that she wore; And to the throng how touchingly she bowed That hailed her landing on the Cumbrian shore ; Bright as a Star (that, from a sombre cloud Of pine-tree foliage poised in air, forth darts, XII. AT SEA OFF THE ISLE OF MAN. BOLD words affirmed, in days when faith was strong, That no adventurer's bark had power to gain These shores if he approached them bent on wrong; For, suddenly up-conjured from the Main, And eager, might be still pursued in vain. When a soft summer gale at evening parts | But element and orb on acts did wait |