Or has it, in some distant clime,
With curious eye, unsated, stray'd,
And, down the winding stream of time,
On every changeful current play'd?
Or, lock'd in everlasting sleep,
Must we thy heart extinct deplore,
Thy fancy lost in darkness weep,
And sigh for her who feels no more?
Or, exiled to some humbler sphere,
In yonder wood-dove dost thou dwell,
And, murmuring in the stranger's ear,
Thy tender melancholy tell?
Whoe'er thou be, thy sad remains
Shall from the Muse a tear demand,
Who, wandering on these distant plains,
Looks fondly to a distant land.
WELL do I love those various harmonies
That ring so gayly 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 pain'd with the world's noisy stir,
Or crazed with its mad tumults, and weigh'd 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 dogwood'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 wither'd nest. But when the gloom Of the deep twilight falls, she takes her perch Upon the red stemm'd 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 watchplace on the mossy tree
Close at the cornfield edge.
Lone whipporwill,
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
The forest's blacken'd roots, and whose green marge Is seldom visited by human foot,
The lonely heron sits, and harshly breaks
The Sabbath silence of the wilderness :
And you may find her by some reedy pool,
Or brooding gloomily on the time-stain'd 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 wing'd 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
Thy strange, bewildering call, like the wild scream
Of one whose life is perishing in the sea.
And now, wouldst thou, oh man! delight the ear With earth's delicious sounds, or charm the eye With beautiful creations? Then pass forth, And find them mid those many-colour'd birds That fill the glowing woods. The richest hues Lie in their splendid plumage, and their tones Are sweeter than the music of the lute, Or the harp's melody, or the notes that gush So thrillingly from Beauty's ruby lip.
LINES ON PASSING THE GRAVE OF MY SISTER.
ON yonder shore, on yonder shore,
Now verdant with the depth of shade,
Beneath the white-arm'd sycamore,
There is a little infant laid.
Forgive this tear. A brother weeps.
"Tis there the faded floweret sleeps.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone,
And summer's forests o'er her wave;
And sighing winds at autumn moan
Around the little stranger's grave,
As though they murmur'd at the fate
Of one so lone and desolate.
In sounds that seem like Sorrow's own,
Their funeral dirges faintly creep;
Then, deep'ning to an organ tone,
In all their solemn cadence sweep,
And pour, unheard, along the wild,
Their desert anthem o'er a child.
She came and pass'd. Can I forget
How we, whose hearts had hail'd her birth, Ere three autumnal suns had set,
Consign'd her to her mother Earth! Joys and their memories pass away; But griefs are deeper traced than they.
We laid her in her narrow cell,
We heap'd the soft mould on her breast,
And parting tears, like raindrops, fell
Upon her lonely place of rest.
May angels guard it; may they bless
Her slumbers in the wilderness.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone;
For, all unheard, on yonder shore,
The sweeping flood, with torrent moan,
At evening lifts its solemn roar,
As, in one broad, eternal tide,
Its rolling waters onward glide.
There is no marble monument,
There is no stone, with graven lie,
To tell of love and virtue blent
In one almost too good to die.
We needed no such useless trace
To point us to her resting-place.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone;
But, mid the tears of April showers,
The genius of the wild hath strown
His germes of fruits, his fairest flowers,
And cast his robe of vernal bloom,
In guardian fondness, o'er her tomb.
She sleeps alone, she sleeps alone;
But yearly is her grave-turf dress'd,
And still the summer-vines are thrown,
In annual wreaths, across her breast.
And still the sighing autumn grieves,
And strews the hallow'd spot with leaves.
WASHINGTON. FROM ARNOLD AND ANDRE, A DRAMATIO FRAGMENT.
OLD OFFICER. My general, I know this people And all the virtues which Old England claims, [well; As the foundations of her happiness
And greatness-such as reverence of law
And custom, prudence, female chastity,
And with them, independence, fortitude,
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