"And when I shall, as, soon or late, I must,
Become infirm: in age, if I grow old;
Or, sooner, if my strength should fail its trust;
When I relinquish haunts where I have stroll'd
At morn or eve, and can no more behold

Thy glorious works: forbid me to repine;
Let memory still their loveliness unfold

Before my mental eye, and let them shine With borrow'd light from thee, for they are thine!"

ERSES TO THE MEMORY OF A CHILD OF SUPERIOR EN

DOWMENTS AND EXTRAORDINARY

PIETY.

It is not length of years which lends
The brightest loveliness to those,
Whose memory with our being blends,
Whose worth within our bosoms glows.

The age we honor standeth not

In locks of snow, or length of days;
But in a life, which knows no spot,
A heart, which heavenly wisdom sways.

For wisdom, which is taught by truth,
Unlike mere worldly knowledge, finds
Its full maturity in youth,

Its image e'en in infant minds.

Thus was this child made early wise,
Wise as those sages, who, from far,
Beheld, in Bethlehem's cloudless skies,
The Christian church's gathering star.

What more could wisdom do for them,
Than guide them in the path they trod?
And the same star of Bethlehem

Hath led his spirit home to God!

Well may his memory be dear,
Whose loss is still its sole alloy,
Whose happy lot dries every tear
With holy hopes and humble joy.

"The brightest star of morning's host,"

Is that which shines in twilight skies;
"Scarce risen, in brighter beams 't is lost,"

Its loss inspires a brief regret;
Its loveliness is ne'er forgot;
We know full well 't is shining yet,
Although we may behold it not.

And thus the spirit which is gone,
Is but absorb'd in glory's blaze;
In beaming brightness burning on,
Though lost unto our finite gaze.

There are, who watch'd it to the last;
There are, who can forget it never;
May these when death's dark shade is past,
Partake with joy its light forever!

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

SPIRITS.

FIRST FAUN. Canst thou imagine where those spirits live, Which make such delicate music in the woods? We haunt within the least frequented caves And closest coverts, and we know these wilds, Yet never meet them, though we hear them oft; Where may they hide themselves?

SECOND FAUN.

"T is hard to tell:
I have heard those more skilled in spirits say,
The bubbles, which the enchantment of the sun
Sucks from the faint water-flowers that pave
The oozy bottom of clear lakes and pools,
Are the pavilions where such dwell and float
Under the green and golden atmosphere,
Which noon-tide kindles through the woven leaves;
And when these burst, and the thin fiery air,
The which they breathed within those lucent domes,
Ascends to flow like meteors through the night,
They ride on them, and rein their headlong speed,
And bow their burning crest, and glide in fire
Under the waters of the earth again.

FIRST FAUN. If such live thus, have others other lives,
Under pink blossoms or within the bells
Of meadow flowers, or folded violets deep,
Or on their dying odours, when they die,
Or on the sunlight of the sphered dew?

HAIL to thee blithe spirit!
Bird thou never wert,
That from heaven, or near it,
Pourest thy full heart

In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.

Higher still and higher

From the earth thou springest
Like a cloud of fire;

The blue deep thou wingest,

And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.

In the golden lightning

Of the sunken sun,

O'er which clouds are brightning,

Thou dost float and run;

Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.

The pale purple even

Melts around thy flight;

Like a star of heaven,

In the broad day-light

Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight,—

Keen as are the arrows

Of that silver sphere,

Whose intense lamp narrows

In the white dawn clear,

Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there.

All the earth and air

With thy voice is loud.

As, when night is bare,

From one lonely cloud

The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflowed.

What thou art we know not;

What is most like thee?

From rainbow clouds there flow not

Drops so bright to see,

As from thy presence showers a rain of melody.

Like a poet hidden

In the light of thought,
Singing hymns unbidden,
Till the world is wrought

Like a high-born maiden
In a palace tower,
Soothing her love-laden

Soul in secret hour,

With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower:

Like a glow-worm golden
In a dell of dew,

Scattering unbeholden

Its acrial hue,

Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the view;

Joyous, clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass:

What fields, or waves, or mountains?
What shapes of sky or plain?

What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain?

With some pain is fraught:

*

Our sweetest songs are those that tell the saddest thought.

Yet if we could scorn

Hate, and pride, and fear;

If we were things born

Not to shed a tear,

I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.

Better than all measures

Of delightful sound,

Better than all treasures

That in books are found,

Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground!

Teach me half the gladness
That thy brain must know,
Such harmonious madness
From my lips would flow,

The world should listen then, as I am listening now.

TO HIS SON, SIX YEARS OLD, DURING SICKNESS.

SLEEP breathes at last from out thee,

My little patient boy;
And balmy rest about thee
Smooths off the day's annoy.

I sit me down, and think
Of all thy winning ways;
Yet almost wish, with sudden shrink,
That I had less to praise,

Thy sidelong pillowed meekness,
Thy thanks to all that aid,
Thy heart, in pain and weakness,
Öf fancied faults afraid;

The little trembling hand
That wipes thy quiet tears,
These, these are things that may demand
Dread memories for years.

Sorrows I've had, severe ones,
I will not think of now;
And calmly, midst my dear ones,
Have wasted with dry brow;
But when thy fingers press
And pat my stooping head,
I cannot bear the gentleness,
The tears are in their bed.

Ah, first-born of thy mother,
When life and hope were new,
Kind playmate of thy brother,
Thy sister, father, too;
My light, where'er I go,
My bird, when prison-bound,
My hand in hand companion,-no,
My prayers shall hold thee round.