WE HAVE BEEN FRIENDS TOGETHER.
WE have been friends together,
In sunshine and in shade;
Since first beneath the chesnut trees
In infancy we play'd.
But coldness dwells within thy heart,
A cloud is on thy brow;
We have been friends together-
Shall a light word part us now?
We have been gay together;
We have laugh'd at little jests; For the fount of hope was gushing Warm and joyous in our breasts. But laughter now hath fled thy lip, And sullen glooms thy brow. We have been gay together
Shall a light word part us now?
We have been sad together,
We have wept with bitter tears,
O'er the grass-grown graves, where slumber'd The hopes of early years.
The voices which are silent there
Would bid thee clear thy brow;
We have been sad together-
Oh! what shall part us now?
How are they waned and faded from our hearts,
The old companions of our early days!
Of all the many loved, which name imparts
Regret when blamed, or rapture at its praise?
What are their several fates, by Heaven decreed,
They of the jocund heart, and careless brow?
Alas! we scarcely know and scarcely heed,
Where, in this world of signs, they wander now.
See, how with cold faint smile and courtly nod,
They pass, whom wealth and revelry divide-
Who walked together to the house of God,
Read from one book, and rested side by side;
No look of recognition lights the eye
Which laughingly hath met that fellow face;
With careless hands they greet and wander by,
Who parted once with tears and long embrace.
Oh, childhood! blessed time of hope and love,
When all we knew was Nature's simple law,
How may we yearn again that time to prove,
When we looked round, and loved what'er we saw
Non dark suspicion wakes, and love departs,
And cold distrust its well-feigned smile displays;
And they are waned and faded from our hearts,
The old companions of our early days!
MANY sounds were sweet,
Most ravishing and pleasant to the ear;
But sweeter none than voice of faithful friend,-
Sweet always, sweetest heard in loudest storm.
Some I remember, and will ne'er forget,
My early friends, friends of my evil day;
Friends in my mirth, friends in my misery too;
Friends given by God, in mercy and in love.
My counsellors, my comforters, and guides;
My joy in grief my second grief in joy;
Companions of my young desires; in doubt
My oracles; my wings in high pursuit.
Oh, I remember, and will ne'er forget
Our meeting-spots, our chosen sacred hours;
Our burning words, that uttered all the soul;
Our faces beaming with unearthly love;
Sorrow with sorrow sighing, hope with hope
Exulting, heart embracing heart entire.
As birds of social feather, helping each
His fellow's flight, we soared into the skies,
And cast the clouds beneath our feet, and earth
With all her tardy leaden-footed cares,
And talked the speech, and ate the food of heaven.
ON HIS PROPOSING TO DOMESTICATE WITH THE
A MOUNT, not wearisome, and bare, and steep, But a green mountain various.y up-piled, Where o'er the jutting rocks soft mosses creep, Or coloured lichens with slow oozing weep; Where cypress and the darker yew start wild; And, 'mid the summer torrent's gentle dash, Dance brightened the red clusters of the ash; Beneath whose boughs, by stillest sounds beguiled, Calm Pensiveness might muse herself to sleep; Till, haply started by some fleecy dam, That, rustling on the bushy cliff above, With melancholy bleat of anxious love, Made meek inquiry for her wandering lamb: Such a green mountain 'twere most sweet to climb, E'en while the bosom ached with lonelinessHow heavenly sweet, if some dear friend should bless
Th' advent'rous toil, and up the path sublime Now lead, now follow; the glad landscape round, Wide and more wide, increasing without bound! O, then 'twere loveliest sympathy, to mark The berries of the half up-rooted ash
Dripping and bright; and list the torrent's dash-
Beneath the cypress or the yew more dark,
Seated at ease, on some smooth mossy rock;
In social silence now, and now t' unlock
The treasured heart; arm linked in friendly arm,
Save if the one, his muse's witching charm
Muttering brow-bent, at unwatched distance lag;
Till, high o'er head, his beck'ning friend appears,
And from the forehead of the topmost crag
Shouts eagerly: for haply there uprears
That shadowing pine its old romantic limbs,
Which latest shall detain th' enamoured sight
Seen from below, when eve the valley dims,
Tinged yellow with the rich departing light;
And haply, basined in some unsunned cleft,
A beauteous spring, the rock's collected tears,
Sleeps sheltered there, scarce wrinkled by the gale!
Together thus, the world's vain turmoil left,
Stretched on the crag, and shadowed by the pine
And bending o'er the clear delicious fount,
Ah, dearest Charles! it were a lot divine
To cheat our noons in moralizing mood,
While west winds fanned our temples toil-bedewed:
Then downwards slope, oft pausing, from the mount,
To some low mansion in some woody dale, Where, smiling with blue eye, Domestic Bliss Gives this the husband's, that the brother's kiss!
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