1826.

I remember, I remember,

The fir-trees dark and high;
I used to think their slender tops
Were close against the sky:
It was a childish ignorance,

But now 't is little joy

To know I'm farther off from Heav'n

Than when I was a boy.

32

Thomas Hood.

THOU LINGERING STAR

THOU ling'ring star with less'ning ray,
That lov'st to greet the early morn,

Again thou usher'st in the day

My Mary from my soul was torn.

O Mary, dear departed shade!

Where is thy place of blissful rest?

See'st thou thy lover lowly laid?

Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? 8

That sacred hour can I forget,

Can I forget the hallow'd grove,

Where, by the winding Ayr, we met
To live one day of parting love?

Eternity cannot efface

Those records dear of transports past,

Thy image at our last embrace

Ah! little thought we 't was our last!

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"Oft, in the Stilly Night"

Ayr, gurgling, kiss'd his pebbled shore,
O'erhung with wild woods thickening green;
The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar
'Twin'd amorous round the raptur'd scene;
The flowers sprang wanton to be prest,
The birds sang love on every spray,
Till too, too soon, the glowing west
Proclaim'd the speed of wingèd day.

Still o'er these scenes my mem'ry wakes,
And fondly broods with miser-care.
Time but th' impression stronger makes,
As streams their channels deeper wear.
O Mary, dear departed shade!

Where is thy place of blissful rest?
See'st thou thy lover lowly laid?

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Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? 32

1790.

Robert Burns.

66

'OFT, IN THE STILLY NIGHT'

OFT, in the stilly night,

Ere Slumber's chain has bound me,

Fond Memory brings the light

Of other days around me;

The smiles, the tears,

Of boyhood's years,

The words of love then spoken;

The eyes that shone,

Now dimmed and gone,

The cheerful hearts now broken!

1818.

Thus, in the stilly night,

Ere Slumber's chain has bound me,
Sad Memory brings the light

Of other days around me.

When I remember all

The friends, so linked together,
I've seen around me fall,

Like leaves in wintry weather;
I feel like one

Who treads alone

Some banquet-hall deserted,
Whose lights are fled,
Whose garlands dead,
And all but he departed!

Thus, in the stilly night,

Ere Slumber's chain has bound me,
Sad Memory brings the light

Of other days around me.

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28

Thomas Moore.

TEARS, IDLE TEARS

TEARS, idle tears, I know not what they mean, Tears from the depth of some divine despair Rise in the heart, and gather to the eyes, In looking on the happy Autumn-fields, And thinking of the days that are no more.

Fresh as the first beam glittering on a sail, That brings our friends up from the underworld,

5

Mother, I Cannot Mind my Wheel
Sad as the last which reddens over one
That sinks with all we love below the verge;
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no more.

Ah, sad and strange as in dark summer dawns The earliest pipe of half-awaken'd birds To dying ears, when unto dying eyes

ΙΟ

The casement slowly grows a glimmering square; So sad, so strange, the days that are no more.

Dear as remember'd kisses after death,
And sweet as those by hopeless fancy feign'd
On lips that are for others; deep as love,
Deep as first love, and wild with all regret;
O Death in Life, the days that are no more!
1847.

15

20

Lord Tennyson.

MOTHER, I CANNOT MIND MY WHEEL

1846.

MOTHER, I cannot mind my wheel;
My fingers ache, my lips are dry:
Oh! if you felt the pain I feel!
But oh, who ever felt as I!

No longer could I doubt him true—
All other men may use deceit ;

He always said my eyes were blue,
And often swore my lips were sweet.
Walter Savage Landor.

"WHEN THE LAMP IS SHAT

TERED"

WHEN the lamp is shattered
The light in the dust lies dead-
When the cloud is scattered
The rainbow's glory is shed.
When the lute is broken,

Sweet tones are remembered not;
When the lips have spoken,
Loved accents are soon forgot.

As music and splendour
Survive not the lamp and the lute,

The heart's echoes render

No song when the spirit is mute:

No song but sad dirges,

Like the wind through a ruined cell,

Or the mournful surges

That ring the dead seaman's knell.

When hearts have once mingled
Love first leaves the well-built nest,
The weak one is singled

To endure what is once possessed.

O Love! who bewailest

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