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BOOKS AND FLOWERS.

Here the crown'd spirits of departed ages
Have left the silent melodies of mind.

221

Their thoughts, that strove with time, and change, and anguish,

For some high place where faith her wing might rest,

Are burning here-a flame that may not languishStill pointing upward to that bright hill's crest!

Their grief, the veil'd infinity exploring

For treasures lost, is here;-their boundless love Its mighty streams of gentleness outpouring On all things round, and clasping all above.

And the bright beings, their own heart's creations, Bright, yet all human, here are breathing still; Conflicts, and agonies, and exultations

Are here, and victories of prevailing will!

Listen, oh, listen! let their high words cheer thee!
Their swan-like music ringing through all woes;
Let my voice bring their holy influence near thee—
The Elysian air of their divine repose!

Or would'st thou turn to earth? Not earth all furrow'd
By the old traces of man's toil and care,
But the green peaceful world that never sorrow'd,
The world of leaves, and dews, and summer air!

Look on these flowers! As o'er an altar shedding,

O'er Milton's page, soft light from colour'd urns! They are the links, man's heart to nature wedding, When to her breast the prodigal returns.

They are from lone wild places, forest dingles,

Fresh banks of many a low-voiced hidden stream, Where the sweet star of eve looks down and mingles Faint lustre with the water-lily's gleam.

They are from where the soft winds play in gladness, Covering the turf with flowery blossom-showers; -Too richly dower'd, O friend! are we for sadnessLook on an empire-mind and nature—ours!

FOR A PICTURE OF ST. CECILIA ATTENDED BY ANGELS.

"How rich that forehead's calm expanse!

How bright that heaven-directed glance!

Waft her to glory, winged powers,

Ere sorrow be renew'd,

And intercourse with mortal hours

Bring back a humbler mood!"

WORDSWORTH.

How can that eye, with inspiration beaming,
Wear yet so deep a calm?-Oh, child of song!
Is not the music-land a world of dreaming,
Where forms of sad, bewildering beauty throng?
Hath it not sounds from voices long departed?
Echoes of tones that rung in childhood's car?
Low haunting whispers, which the weary-hearted,
Stealing 'midst crowds away, have wept to hear?

No, not to thee!-thy spirit, meek, yet queenly,
On its own starry height, beyond all this,
Floating triumphantly and yet serenely,

Breathes no faint under-tone through songs of bliss.

FOR A PICTURE OF ST. CECILIA.

223

Say by what strain, through cloudless ether swelling, Thou hast drawn down those wanderers from the skies?

Bright guests! even such as left of yore their dwelling, For the deep cedar shades of Paradise!

What strain?-oh! not the nightingale's when showering

Her own heart's life drops on the burning lay, She stirs the young woods in the days of flowering, And pours her strength, but not her grief, away:

And not the exile's-when, 'midst lonely billows,
He wakes the alpine notes his mother sung,
Or blends them with the sigh of alien willows,
Where, murmuring to the wind, his harp is hung:

And not the pilgrim's-though his thoughts be holy, And sweet his ave song, when day grows dim; Yet, as he journeys, pensively and slowly, Something of sadness floats through that low hymn.

But thou!-the spirit which at eve is filling
All the hush'd air and reverential sky,

Founts, leaves, and flowers, with solemn rapture thrilling,

This is the soul of thy rich harmony.

This bears up high those breathings of devotion
Wherein the currents of thy heart gush free;
Therefore no world of sad and vain emotion
Is the dream-haunted music-land for thee.

THE BRIGAND LEADER AND HIS WIFE.

SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE OF EASTLAKE'S.

DARK chieftain of the heath and height!
Wild feaster on the hills by night!
Seest thou the stormy sunset's glow
Flung back by glancing spears below?
Now for one strife of stern despair!
The foe hath track'd thee to thy lair.

Thou, against whom the voice of blood
Hath risen from rock and lonely wood;
And in whose dreams a moan should be,
Not of the water, nor the tree;
Haply thine own last hour is nigh,—
Yet shalt thou not forsaken die.

There's one that pale beside thee stands, More true than all thy mountain bands! She will not shrink in doubt and dread, When the balls whistle round thy head: Nor leave thee, though thy closing eye No longer may to hers reply.

Oh! many a soft and quiet grace
Hath faded from her form and face;
And many a thought, the fitting guest
Of woman's meek religious breast,
Hath perish'd in her wanderings wide,
Through the deep forests by thy side.

THE CHILD'S RETURN.

Yet, mournfully surviving all,
A flower upon a ruin's wall,

A friendless thing, whose lot is cast
Of lovely ones to be the last;

Sad, but unchanged through good and ill,
Thine is her lone devotion still.

And oh! not wholly lost the heart
Where that undying love hath part;
Not worthless all, though far and long
From home estranged, and guided wrong;
Yet may its depths by Heaven be stirr'd,
Its prayer for thee be pour'd and heard!

225

THE CHILD'S RETURN FROM THE
WOODLANDS.

SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE OF SIR THOMAS LAWRENCE'S.

"All good and guiltless as thou art,

Some transient griefs will touch thy heart

Griefs that along thy alter'd face

Will breathe a more subduing grace,

Than even those looks of joy that lie
On the soft cheek of infancy."

WILSON.

HAST thou been in the woods with the honey-bee?
Hast thou been with the lamb in the pastures free?
With the hare through the copses and dingles wild?
With the butterfly over the heath, fair child?
Yes: the light fall of thy bounding feet

Hath not startled the wren from her mossy seat:

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