Nor organ's solemn peal, nor viol clear,
Nor warbling breath of man, that joins the hymning sphereCan speech of mortals tell
What tides of bliss shall swell,
If the first summons to thy wakened ear Should be the plaudits of thy Saviour's love,
The full, enraptured choir of the redeemed above?
THE LAST EVENING BEFORE ETERNITY.
By this, the sun his westering car drove low:
Round his broad wheel full many a lucid cloud
Floated, like happy isles, in seas of gold:
Along the horizon castled shapes were piled,
Turrets and towers, whose fronts, embattled, gleamed
With yellow light sinit by the slanting ray,
A ruddy beam the canopy reflected;
With deeper light the ruby blushed; and thick
Upon the seraphs' wings the glowing spots
Seemed drops of fire. Uncoiling from its staff,
With fainter wave, the gorgeous ensign hung,
Or, swelling with the swelling breeze, by fits
Cast off, upon the dewy air, huge flakes
Of golden lustre. Over all the hill,
The heavenly legions, the assembled world,
Evening her crimson tint for ever drew.
Where, in the purple west, no more to dawn,
Faded the glories of the dying day.
Mild twinkling through a crimson-skirted cloud
The solitary star of evening shone.
While gazing wistful on that peerless light,
Thereafter to be seen no more, (as, oft
In dreams, strange images will mix,) sad thoughts
Passed o'er my soul. Sorrowing, I cried, Farewell,
Pale, beauteous planet, that display'st so soft,
Amid yon glowing streak, thy transient beam,
A long, a last farewell! Seasons have changed,
Ages and empires rolled, like smoke, away;
But thou, unaltered, beam'st as silver fair
As on thy birthnight. Bright and watchful eyes,
From palaces and bowers, have hailed thy gem
With secret transport. Natal star of love,
And souls that love the shadowy hour of fancy,
How much I owe thee, how I bless thy ray!
How oft thy rising o'er the hamlet green,
Signal of rest, and social converse sweet,
Beneath some patriarchal tree, has cheered
The peasant's heart, and drawn his benison !
WELL do I love those various harmonies
That ring so gaily in Spring's budding woods,
And in the thickets, and green, quiet haunts,
And lonely copses of the Summer-time,
And in red Autumn's ancient solitudes.
If thou art pained with the world's noisy stir,
Or crazed with its mad tumults, and weighed down
With any of the ills of human life;
If thou art sick and weak, or mournest at the loss
Of brethren gone to that far distant land
To which we all do pass, gentle and poor,
The gayest and the gravest, all alike,-
Then turn into the peaceful woods, and hear
The thrilling music of the forest birds.
How rich the varied choir! The unquiet finch
Calls from the distant hollows, and the wren
Uttereth her sweet and mellow plaint at times,
And the thrush mourneth where the kalmia hangs
Its crimson-spotted cups, or chirps half hid
Amid the lowly dog-wood's snowy flowers,
And the blue jay flits by, from tree to tree,
And, spreading its rich pinions, fills the ear
With its shrill-sounding and unsteady cry.
With the sweet airs of Spring, the robin comes;
And in her simple song there seems to gush
A strain of sorrow when she visiteth
Her last year's withered nest. But when the gloom
Of the deep twilight falls, she takes her perch
Upon the red-stemmed hazel's slender twig,
That overhangs the brook, and suits her song
To the slow rivulet's inconstant chime.
In the last days of Autumn, when the corn
Lies sweet and yellow in the harvest field,
And the gay company of reapers bind
The bearded wheat in sheaves,-then peals abroad
The blackbird's merry chant. I love to hear,
Bold plunderer, thy mellow burst of song
Float from thy watch-place on the mossy tree,
Close at the corn-field edge.
There is much sweetness in thy fitful hymn,
Heard in the drowsy watches of the night.
Ofttimes, when all the village lights are out,
And the wide air is still, I hear thee chant
Thy hollow dirge, like some recluse who takes
His lodging in the wilderness of woods,
And lifts his anthem when the world is still :
And the dim, solemn night, that brings to man
And to the herds, deep slumbers, and sweet dews
To the red roses and the herbs, doth find
No eye, save thine, a watcher in her halls.
I hear thee oft at midnight, when the thrush
And the green, roving linnet are at rest,
And the blithe, twittering swallows have long ceased
Their noisy note, and folded up their wings.
Far up some brook's still course, whose current mines
The forest's blackened roots, and whose green marge
Is seldom visited by human foot,
The lonely heron sits, and harshy breaks
The sabbath silence of the wilderness:
And you may find her by some reedy pool,
Or brooding gloomily on the time-stained rock,
Beside some misty and far-reaching lake.
Most awful is thy deep and heavy boom,
Gray watcher of the waters! Thou art, king
Of the blue lake; and all the winged kind
Do fear the echo of thine angry cry.
How bright thy savage eye! Thou lookest down,
And seest the shining fishes as they glide;
And, poising thy gray wing, thy glossy beak
Swift as an arrow strikes its roving prey.
Ofttimes I see thee, through the curling mist,
Dart, like a spectre of the night, and hear
|