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A STANZA FROM "THYRSIS."

Yet God deems not thine aeried sight
More worthy than our twilight dim,—
For meek Obedience, too, is Light,
And following that is finding Him.

STO

179

J. R. Lowell.

A MOUNTAIN STORM.

TORM in the night! for thrice I heard the rain Rushing; and once the flash of a thunderboltMethought I never saw so fierce a fork

Struck out the streaming mountain-side and show'd
A riotous confluence of watercourses
Blanching and billowing in a hollow of it
Where all but yester-eve was dusty-dry.

WH

Tennyson.

A STANZA FROM "THYRSIS."

HERE is the girl, who, by the boatman's door, Above the locks, above the boating throng, Unmoored our skiff, when through the Wytham flats,

Red loosestrife and blond meadow-sweet among, And darting swallows, and light water-gnats, We tracked the shy Thames shore?

Where are the mowers, who, as the tiny swell Of our boat passing heaved the river-grass, Stood with suspended scythe to see us pass?They all are gone, and thou art gone as well. Matthew Arnold.

A

ROWENA DARLING.

CHESTERFIELD HILL: WESTERN MASSACHUSETTS.

HEAP of mortar, brick, and stone,

O'ergrown with shrubs, o'errun with vines,

That here was once a house and home,

How ill the careless sense divines,

Rowena Darling.

Not careless his, my friend's, who loves
To wander in familiar ways,
To talk of olden times, and-yes-
To celebrate your simple praise,

Rowena Darling.

Here, once upon a time, he tells,
There lived a girl unknown to fame ;
The country side no sweeter knew;

It could not know a sweeter name,

Rowena Darling!

Here where the birches' silver gleam
Shines where the hearth-fire used to blaze,
The hearth-stone still you can descry,
As smooth as in your loveliest days,

Rowena Darling.

Here whisks about the squirrel brown;
Here thrush or robin comes and sings;

But standing here I can but think

Of other days and sweeter things,

Here baked the apples in a row;

Rowena Darling.

Here cracked the chestnuts, ripe and sweet;

THE BUSH ABOON TRAQUAIR.

181

Here-ah, I seem to see them now

You warmed your pretty buskined feet,
Rowena Darling.

And here, when burned the embers low,

And old folks long had been asleep, Your heart stood still to hear a voice

That whispered-Oh! how warm and deep

Rowena-Darling!

Alas, how many years have fled

Since hearth and heart were warm and bright, And all the room and all the world

Glowed with your love's supreme delight,

Rowena Darling.

This rose-bush growing by the door,

Perhaps you planted long ago;

I pluck and kiss, for your dear sake,

Its fairest, be it so or no,

Rowena Darling!

J. W. Chadwick.

THE BUSH ABOON TRAQUAIR.

ILL ye gang wi' me and fare

WILL

To the bush aboon Traquair?

Oure the high minchmuir we'll up and awa',

This bonny simmer noon,

While the sun shines fair aboon,

And the licht sklents saftly doun on holm and ha'.

And what wad ye do there,
At the bush aboon Traquair?

A lang dreich road, ye had better let it be ;
Save some ould scrants o' birk

I' the hillside lirk,

There's nocht i' the world for man to see.

But the blythe lilt o' that air,
"The Bush aboon Traquair,"

I need nae mair, it's eneuch for me;
Oure my cradle its sweet chime
Cam sughin' frae auld time,

Sae tide what may, I'll awa' and see.

And what saw ye there,

At the bush aboon Traquair?

Or what did ye hear that was worth your heed?
I heard the cushies croon

Thro' the gowden afternoon,

And the Quair burn singing down to the vale o' Tweed.

And birks saw I three or four,

Wi' gray moss bearded owre,

The last that are left o' the birken shaw,
Whar mony a simmer e'en

Fond luvers did convene,

Thae bonny, bonny gloamins that are lang awa'.

Frae mony a but and ben,

By muirland, holm, and glen,

They cam ane hour to spen' on the greenwood swaird; But lang ha'e lad an' lass

Been lying 'neth the grass

The green, green grass o' Traquair kirkyard.

TO MARGUERITE.

They were blest beyond compare,

When they held their trysting there,

Amang thae greenest hills shone on by the sun;
And then they wan a rest,

The lownest and the best,

I' Traquair kirkyard when a' was dune.

Now the birks to dust may rot,

Names o' luvers be forgot,

Nae lads and lasses there ony mair convene;
But the blythe lilt o' yon air

Keeps the bush aboon Traquair,

183

And the luve that ance was there, aye fresh and green.

J. C. Shairp.

Y

TO MARGUERITE.

ES in the sea of life enisl'd,

With echoing straits between us thrown,

Dotting the shoreless watery wild,

We mortal millions live alone.

The islands feel the enclasping flow,

And then their endless bounds they know.

But when the moon their hollows light
And they are swept by balms of spring,
And in their glens, on starry nights,
The nightingales divinely sing,

And lovely notes, from shore to shore,
Across the sounds and channels pour;

Oh then a longing like despair

Is to their farthest caverns sent;

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