WHERE is thy home, soft Breeze ?

Is it among the trecs,
Or in the silent dell ?

Tell

Where dost thou dwell?
Still break the golden beam
That shines upon the stream
There let thy murmurs play
The livelong summer's day,
But tell

Where dost thou dwell?

66

My home is in ladies' bowers, I sigh among the flowers

When dew'd with evening showersThere,

There do I dwell;

On Ocean's breast I play,

And wanton with his spray;
But chief o'er stream and dell

My murmurs love to swell,

And there,

There do I dwell.

Over the fount I take

My airy flight, and break
The crystal liquid curls,
It hurls

Into a thousand pearls,—
I kiss the placid lake

And its glassy smoothness shake—
Where from their watery lairs
Bright trout the angler snares,

Yon chimes

My breath unto him bears."

Then hail, thou heaven-sent Breeze!

Still sigh among the trees!

And in the silent dell,

Swell

The evening's knell !

Thy odorous breathings, now
Salute my burning brow,
And with my glowing palm
I clutch thy cooling balm-
O swell!

Here dost thou dwell.

T. Stuart.

ON AN ANCIENT STONE-QUARRY.

KNOW, visitor, that from this spot obscure,
So hid from human gaze,

Whither scarce once a year, across the moor,
A lonely shepherd strays,-

In olden time, far off beyond the seas,
A vast cathedral rose,

Whose fame extends to earth's extremities,

And still with ages grows.

The stones, that here in darkness would have lain, There piled in glorious state,

Up to the skies, the fretted roof sustain,

Majestically great;

Or carved in many a mystical device,

And forms of Saints on high,

In glory ever new, bring Paradise
Before th' astonish'd eye.

Such power hath God for His eternal ends
To human genius given ;-

Genius sublime! by which the mind ascends
In Him from earth to heaven!

So, at His will and bountiful decree,
From low obscurest things,

In everlasting truth and harmony,

Celestial beauty springs.

E'en as at first, from the rude formless mass

Of earth's chaotic frame,

This fair creation, at His word of grace,

In perfect order came.

Cuswall.

THE WINGED WORSHIPPERS.

[Two swallows, having flown into church during divine service, are supposed to be apostrophised in the following stanzas.]

GAY, guiltless pair,

What seek ye from the fields of heaven?
Ye have no need of prayer,

Ye have no sins to be forgiven.

Why perch ye here,

Where mortals to their Maker bend?

Can your pure spirits fear

The God ye never could offend?

Ye never knew

The crimes for which we come to weep:
Penance is not for you,

Blest wanderers of this upper deep.

To you 'tis given

To make sweet Nature's untaught lays,
Beneath the arch of heaven

To chirp away a life of praise.

Then spread each wing

Far, far above, o'er lakes and lands;

And join the choirs that sing

In yon blue dome not rear'd with bands.

Sprague.

CARE OF BIRDS FOR THEIR YOUNG.

EXALTING love,

By the great Father of the Spring inspired,
Gives instant courage to the fearful race,
And to the simple, art. With stealthy wing,
Should some rude foot their woody haunts molest,
Amid a neighbouring bush they silent drop;
And whirring thence, as if alarmed, deceive
The unfeeling school-boy, Hence, around the head
Of wandering swain the white-wing'd plover wheels
Her sounding flight; and then directly on,
In long excursion, skims the level lawn,

To tempt him from her nest. The wild-duck hence,
O'er the rough moss; and o'er the trackless waste
The heath-hen flutters: pious fraud! to lead
The hot-pursuing spaniel far astray.

Thompson.

THE COMMONWEALTH OF BEES.
So work the honey-bees:

Creatures that, by a rule in nature, teach
The art of order to a peopled kingdom.
They have a king, and officers of sorts,-
Where some, like magistrates, correct at home;
Others, like merchants, venture trade abroad;
Others, like soldiers, armèd in their stings,
Make boot upon the summer's velvet buds ;
Which pillage they with merry march bring home
To the tent royal of their emperor;
Who, busied in his majesty, surveys
The singing masons building roofs of gold;
The civil citizens kneading up the honey;
The poor mechanic porters crowding in
Their heavy burdens at his narrow gate;
The sad-eyed justice, with his surly hum,
Delivering o'er to executors pale
The lazy yawning drone.

TO A BEE.

Shakspeare.

THOU wert out betimes, thou busy, busy bee
As abroad I took my early way,

Before the cow from her resting-place

Had risen up and left her trace

On the meadow with dew so grey,

Saw I thee, thou busy, busy bee!

Thou wert working late, thou busy, busy bee!
After the fall of the cistus flower,

When the primrose of evening was ready to burst,
I heard thee last, as I saw thee first;
In the silence of the evening hour,
Heard I thee, thou busy, busy bee!

Thou art a miser, thou busy, busy bee!
Late and early at employ ;

Still on thy golden stores intent,

Thy summer in heaping and hoarding is spent, What thy winter will never enjoy :

Wise lesson this for me, thou busy, busy bee!

Little dost thou think, thou busy, busy bee!
What is the end of thy toil;

When the latest flowers of the ivy are gone,
And all thy work for the year is done,

Thy master comes for the spoil;

Woe then for thee, thou busy, busy bee!

Southey.

THE BUTTERFLY.

I'VE watch'd you now a full half-hour,
Sitting upon that yellow flower,
And, little butterfly, indeed,
I know not if you sleep or feed ;
How motionless, how still you seem,
And do you muse, or do you dream?
Till, softly shaking you, the breeze
Has found you out among the trees,
And calls you forth again.-

This plot of orchard-ground is ours;
My trees these are, my sister's flowers;
Stay here, and in that harebell rest,
Or perch upon that rose's breast;
Or in that lily slyly creep,

While soft winds rock you to your sleep;
Its white leaves closing round your head
Shall make a soft and fragrant bed.
And in the morning form a bower
Safe from the hailstorm and the shower;
From yonder woodbine's perfumed lip,
The choicest honey you shall sip,
And cowslip-cups each morn for you
Shall still be filled with sparkling dew.

Wordsworth.