Beyond its proper bound, yet still confin'd,
Lost in a sort of Purgatory blind,
Cannot refer to any standard law

Of either earth or heaven? It is a flaw
In happiness, to see beyond our bourn,-
It forces us in summer skies to mourn,
It spoils the singing of the Nightingale.

Dear Reynolds! I have a mysterious tale, And cannot speak it: the first page I read Upon a Lampit rock of green sea-weed Among the breakers; 'twas a quiet eve,

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The rocks were silent, the wide sea did weave

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An untumultuous fringe of silver foam.

Along the flat brown sand; I was at home

And should have been most happy,-but I saw

Too far into the sea, where every maw

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The greater on the less feeds evermore.—
But I saw too distinct into the core

Of an eternal fierce destruction,

And so from happiness I far was gone..

Still am I sick of it, and tho', to-day,

I've gather'd young spring-leaves, and flowers gay

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Of periwinkle and wild strawberry,

Still do I that most fierce destruction see,

The Shark at savage prey,-the Hawk at pounce,-
The gentle Robin, like a Pard or Ounce,
Ravening a worm,-Away, ye horrid moods!

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Moods of one's mind! You know I hate them well.
You know I'd sooner be a clapping Bell

To some Kamtschatcan Missionary Church,
Than with these horrid moods be left i' the lurch.

DAWLISH FAIR.

OVER the Hill and over the Dale,

And over the Bourne to Dawlish,
Where ginger-bread wives have a scanty sale,
And ginger-bread nuts are smallish.

Fragment of an Ode to Maia, written on
May Day 1818.

MOTHER

OTHER of Hermes! and still youthful Maia!
May I sing to thee

As thou wast hymned on the shores of Baiæ ?
Or may I woo thee

In earlier Sicilian? or thy smiles

Seek as they once were sought, in Grecian isles,
By bards who died content on pleasant sward,
Leaving great verse unto a little clan?
O, give me their old vigour, and unheard
Save of the quiet Primrose, and the span
Of heaven and few ears,

Rounded by thee, my song should die away
Content as theirs,

Rich in the simple worship of a day.

SONG.

I.

HUSH, hush! tread softly! hush, hush my dear!
All the house is asleep, but we know very well
That the jealous, the jealous old bald-pate may hear,
Tho' you've padded his night-cap-O sweet Isabel!
Tho' your feet are more light than a Fairy's feet,
Who dances on bubbles where brooklets meet,-
Hush, hush! soft tiptoe! hush, hush my dear!
For less than a nothing the jealous can hear.

2.

No leaf doth tremble, no ripple is there

On the river, all's still, and the night's sleepy eye Closes up, and forgets all its Lethean care,

Charm'd to death by the drone of the humming Mayfly;

And the Moon, whether prudish or complaisant,

Has fled to her bower, well knowing I want

No light in the dusk, no torch in the gloom,

But my Isabel's eyes, and her lips pulp'd with bloom.

3.

Lift the latch! ah gently! ah tenderly-sweet!
We are dead if that latchet gives one little clink!
Well done-now those lips, and a flowery seat-
The old man may sleep, and the planets may wink;
The shut rose shall dream of our loves, and awake
Full blown, and such warmth for the morning's take,
The stock-dove shall hatch her soft brace and shall coo,
While I kiss to the melody, aching all through!

EXTRACTS FROM AN OPERA.

O!
! WERE I one of the Olympian twelve,
Their godships should pass this into a law,-
That when a man doth set himself in toil
After some beauty veiled far away,

Each step he took should make his lady's hand
More soft, more white, and her fair cheek more fair;
And for each briar-berry he might eat,

A kiss should bud upon the tree of love,
And pulp and ripen richer every hour,
To melt away upon the traveller's lips.

DAISY'S SONG.

I.

The sun, with his great eye,
Sees not so much as I ;

And the moon, all silver-proud,

Might as well be in a cloud.

2.

And O the spring-the spring!
I lead the life of a king!
Couch'd in the teeming grass,
I spy each pretty lass.

3.

I look where no one dares,

And I stare where no one stares,

And when the night is nigh,

Lambs bleat my lullaby.

FOLLY'S SONG.

When wedding fiddles are a-playing,

Huzza for folly O!

And when maidens go a-Maying,

Oh, I am frighten'd with most hateful thoughts!
Perhaps her voice is not a nightingale's,
Perhaps her teeth are not the fairest pearl;
Her eye-lashes may be, for aught I know,
Not longer than the May-fly's small fan-horns;
There may not be one dimple on her hand;
And freckles many; ah! a careless nurse,
In haste to teach the little thing to walk,
May have crumpt up a pair of Dian's legs,
And warpt the ivory of a Juno's neck.