Whilst far-off lowing herds are heard Star of love's soft interviews, By absence from the heart. T. Campbell CCLXIII DATUR HORA QUIETI 'HE sun upon the lake is low, ΤΗ The wild birds hush their song, The hills have evening's deepest glow, Yet Leonard tarries long. Now all whom varied toil and care From home and love divide, In the calm sunset may repair The noble dame on turret high, The village maid, with hand on brow Upon the footpath watches now For Colin's darkening plaid. Now to their mates the wild swans row, By day they swam apart, And to the thicket wanders slow The hind beside the hart. The woodlark at his partner's side All meet whom day and care divide, Sir W. Scott CCLXIV TO THE MOON RT thou pale for weariness A of climbing heaven, and gazing on the earth, Wandering companionless Among the stars that have a different birth, And ever-changing, like a joyless eye That finds no object worth its constancy? P. B. Shelley A CCLXV WIDOW bird sate mourning for her Love Upon a wintry bough; The frozen wind crept on above, The freezing stream below. There was no leaf upon the forest bare, No flower upon the ground, And little motion in the air Except the mill-wheel's sound. P. B. Shelley A CCLXVI TO SLEEP FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass by One after one; the sound of rain, and bees Murmuring; the fall of rivers, winds and seas, Smooth fields, white sheets of water, and pure sky; I've thought of all by turns, and still I lie Even thus last night, and two nights more I lay, Without Thee what is all the morning's wealth? O° CCLXVII THE SOLDIER'S DREAM UR bugles sang truce, for the night-cloud had lower'd, And the sentinel stars set their watch in the sky; And thousands had sunk on the ground overpower'd, The weary to sleep, and the wounded to die. When reposing that night on my pallet of straw And thrice ere the morning I dreamt it again. Methought from the battle-field's dreadful array To the home of my fathers, that welcomed me back. Ì flew to the pleasant fields traversed so oft In life's morning march, when my bosom was young; I heard my own mountain-goats bleating aloft, And knew the sweet strain that the corn-reapers sung. Then pledged we the wine-cup, and fondly I swore From my home and my weeping friends never to part; My little ones kiss'd me a thousand times o'er, And my wife sobb'd aloud in her fulness of heart. 'Stay stay with us!—rest!—thou art weary and worn!' And fain was their war-broken soldier to stay ;· But sorrow return'd with the dawning of morn, And the voice in my dreaming ear melted away. T. Campbell I CCLXVIII A DREAM OF THE UNKNOWN DREAM'D that as I wander'd by the way Bare Winter suddenly was changed to Spring, And gentle odours led my steps astray, Mix'd with a sound of waters murmuring Along a shelving bank of turf, which lay Under a copse, and hardly dared to fling Its green arms round the bosom of the stream, But kiss'd it and then fled, as Thou mightest in dream. There grew pied wind-flowers and violets, Faint ox-lips; tender blue-bells, at whose birth And in the warm hedge grew lush eglantine, Green cow-bind and the moonlight-colour'd May, And cherry-blossoms, and white cups, whose wine Was the bright dew yet drain'd not by the day; And wild roses, and ivy serpentine With its dark buds and leaves, wandering astray; And flowers azure, black, and streak'd with gold, Fairer than waken'd eyes behold. any And nearer to the river's trembling edge There grew broad flag-flowers, purple prankt with white, And starry river-buds among the sedge, And floating water-lilies, broad and bright, Which lit the oak that overhung the hedge With moonlight beams of their own watery light; And bulrushes, and reeds of such deep green As soothed the dazzled eye with sober sheen. Methought that of these visionary flowers I made a nosegay, bound in such a way |