Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

And in the dust be equal made

With the poor crooked scythe and spade.

2. Some men with swords may reap the field,
And plant with laurels where they kill;
But their strong nerves at last must yield,
They tame but one another still;
Early or late,

They stoop to fate,

And must give up their murmuring breath
When they, pale captives! creep to death.

3. The garlands wither on your brow;

Then boast no more your mighty deeds
Upon death's purple altar, now,

See where the victor victim bleeds!
All heads must come

To the cold tomb,

Only the actions of the just

Smell sweet and blossom in the dust.

;

SHIRLEY.

BUSY, CURIOUS, THIRSTY FLY.

1. Busy, curious, thirsty fly,

Drink with me, and drink as I;
Freely welcome to my cup,
Couldst thou sip, and sip it up.
Make the most of life you may;
Life is short, and wears away.

2. Both alike are mine and thine,
Hastening quick to their decline;
Thine's a summer, mine's no more,
Though repeated to threescore;

Threescore summers, when they 're gone,
Will appear as short as one.

ANONYMOUS, 1744.

ASPIRATIONS OF YOUTH.

[JAMES MONTGOMERY, poet and journalist, of Sheffield, born 4th November, 1771, published "Wanderer in Switzerland" in 1806, "The West Indies" in 1809, "Greenland" in 1810, "World before the Flood" in 1812, and "The Pelican Island" in 1827. He died 30th April, 1854.]

1. HIGHER, higher will we climb
Up the mount of glory,

That our names may live through time
In our country's story;
Happy, when her welfare calls,
He who conquers, he who falls.

2. Deeper, deeper let us toil

In the mines of knowledge;
Nature's wealth and Learning's spoil
Win from school and college;
Delve we there for richer gems
Than the stars of diadems.

3. Onward, onward may we press
Through the path of duty;
Virtue is true happiness,

Excellence true beauty :

Minds are of celestial birth,
Make we then a heaven of earth.

4. Closer, closer let us knit

Hearts and hands together,
Where our fireside comforts sit
In the wildest weather;-
Oh, they wander wide who roam
For the joys of life from home!

MONTGOMERY.

B

YARROW STREAM.

[JOHN LOGAN, born 1748, after completing his literary and theological course at the University of Edinburgh, became minister of South Leith. In 1781 he published a volume of poems, and in the same year "Elements of the Philosophy of History." He died 28th December, 1788.]

1. THY banks were bonnie, Yarrow stream,
When first on thee I met my lover;
Thy banks how dreary, Yarrow stream,
When now thy waves his body cover!
2. For ever now, O Yarrow stream,

Thou art to me a stream of sorrow;
For never on thy banks shall I

Behold my love-the flower of Yarrow !

3. He promised me a milk-white horse, To bear me to his father's bowers; He promised me a little page,

To squire me to his father's towers.

4. He promised me a wedding-ring,

The wedding-day was fixed to-morrow;
Now he is wedded to his grave,

Alas! a watery grave in Yarrow !

5. Sweet were his words when last we met, My passion as I freely told him ;

a;

Clasp'd in his arms, I little thought
That I should never more behold him.

6. Scarce was he gone, I saw his ghost-
It vanished with a shriek of sorrow;
Thrice did the Water Wraith ascend,
And give a doleful groan through Yarrow!

7. His mother from the window looked,
With all the longing of a mother;

His little sister, weeping, walked

The greenwood path to meet her brother.

8. They sought him east, they sought him west,
They sought him all the forest thorough;
They only saw the clouds of night—
They only heard the roar of Yarrow!

9. No longer from thy window look

Thou hast no son, thou tender mother!
No longer walk, thou lovely maid-
Alas! thou hast no more a brother!

10. No longer seek him east or west,

No longer search the forest thorough,
For, murdered in the night so dark,

He lies a lifeless corpse in Yarrow !

11. The tears shall never leave my cheek, No other youth shall be my marrow; I'll seek thy body in the stream,

And there with thee I'll sleep in Yarrow!

12. The tear did never leave her cheek,
No other youth became her marrow;
She found his body in the stream,

And with him now she sleeps in Yarrow.

JOHN LOGAN.

Rises

Yarrow.-The most classic stream in Scotland. in the south-west of Selkirkshire, and forms a small lake called the Loch of the Lowes, which communicates with the larger Lake of St. Mary's. The Yarrow joins the Ettrick a little above Selkirk, and the united streams fall into the Tweed. The stream is famous in Border story, and meets us in many of the old ballads, and in the writings of Scott and Hogg. Logan's ballad is a very good illustration of the kind of tales associated with the Yarrow. Wordsworth has two exquisite little poems on this stream entitled respectively, "Yarrow Unvisited," written in 1803, and "Yarrow Visited," written in 1814.

THE BLIND CHILD.

[ROBERT BLOOMFIELD, born 3rd December, 1766, author of "Farmer's Boy," published in 1800, and "Rural Tales,” published in 1802, died 19th August, 1823.]

WHERE's the blind child, so admirably fair,
With guileless dimples, and with flaxen hair
That waves in every breeze? He's often seen
Beside yon cottage wall, or on the green,
With others matched in spirit and in size,
Health on their cheeks and rapture in their eyes.
That full expanse of voice to childhood dear,
Soul of their sports, is duly cherished here:
And hark! that laugh is his, that jovial cry;
He hears the ball and trundling hoop brush by,
And runs the giddy course with all his might,
A very child in everything but sight;
With circumscribed, but not abated powers,
Play, the great object of his infant hours.
In many a game he takes a noisy part,
And shows the native gladness of his heart;
But soon he hears, on pleasure all intent,
The new suggestion and the quick assent;
The grove invites, delight fills every breast--
To leap the ditch, and seek the downy nest,
Away they start; leave balls and hoops behind,
And one companion leave-the boy is blind!
His fancy paints their distant paths so gay,
That childish fortitude awhile gives way :
He feels his dreadful loss; yet short the pain,
Soon he resumes his cheerfulness again,
Pondering how best his moments to employ
He sings his little songs of nameless joy;
Creeps on the warm green turf for many an hour,
And plucks by chance the white and yellow flower;
Smoothing their stems while, resting on his knees,
He binds a nosegay which he never sees;

« ZurückWeiter »