A SUMMER RAMBLE.

THE quiet August noon has come,

A slumberous silence fills the sky, The fields are still, the woods are dumb, In glassy sleep the waters lie.

And mark yon soft white clouds that rest Above our vale, a moveless throng; The cattle on the mountain's breast Enjoy the grateful shadow long.

Oh, how unlike those merry hours

In early June when Earth laughs out, When the fresh winds make love to flowers, And woodlands sing and waters shout.

When in the grass sweet voices talk,

And strains of tiny music swell
From every moss-cup of the rock,
From every nameless blossom's bell.

But now a joy too deep for sound,

A peace no other season knows, Hushes the heavens and wraps the ground, The blessing of supreme repose.

Away! I will not be, to-day,

The only slave of toil and care. Away from desk and dust! away! I'll be as idle as the air.

Beneath the open sky abroad,

Among the plants and breathing things, The sinless, peaceful works of God,

I'll share the calm the season brings.

Come, thou, in whose soft eyes I see

The gentle meanings of thy heart, One day amid the woods with me,

From men and all their cares apart.

And where, upon the meadow's breast,
The shadow of the thicket lies,
The blue wild flowers thou gatherest
Shall glow yet deeper near thine eyes.

Come, and when mid the calm profound,
I turn, those gentle eyes to seek,
They, like the lovely landscape round,
Of innocence and peace shall speak.

Rest here, beneath the unmoving shade,
And on the silent valleys gaze,
Winding and widening, till they fade
In yon soft ring of summer haze.

The village trees their summits rear
Still as its spire, and yonder flock
At rest in those calm fields appear

As chiselled from the lifeless rock.

One tranquil mount the scene o'erlooksThere the hushed winds their sabbath keep While a near hum from bees and brooks Comes faintly like the breath of sleep.

Well may the gazer deem that when,

Worn with the struggle and the strife, And heart-sick at the wrongs of men, The good forsakes the scene of life;

Like this deep quiet that, awhile,
Lingers the lovely landscape o'er,
Shall be the peace whose holy smile
Welcomes him to a happier shore.

A SCENE ON THE BANKS OF THE HUDSON.

COOL shades and dews are round my way,

And silence of the early day;

Mid the dark rocks that watch his bed,
Glitters the mighty Hudson spread,
Unrippled, save by drops that fall

From shrubs that fringe his mountain wall;
And o'er the clear still water swells

The music of the Sabbath bells.

All, save this little nook of land
Circled with trees, on which I stand;
All, save that line of hills which lie
Suspended in the mimic sky—
Seems a blue void, above, below,

Through which the white clouds come and go,
And from the green world's farthest steep
I gaze into the airy deep.

Loveliest of lovely things are they,
On earth, that soonest pass away.

The rose that lives its little hour
Is prized beyond the sculptured flower.
Even love, long tried and cherished long,
Becomes more tender and more strong,
At thought of that insatiate grave
From which its yearnings cannot save.

River! in this still hour thou hast
Too much of heaven on earth to last;
Nor long may thy still waters lie,
An image of the glorious sky.
Thy fate and mine are not repose,
And ere another evening close,
Thou to thy tides shalt turn again,
And I to seek the crowd of men.