When the low crouched unto the high;
The times of other years!

Oh gay gos-hawk, your days were when
Came down at night the ruffian men,
To slay the sleeping children then
Lying in London Tower;
Yours were the days of civil feud ;
Of Rufus slain within the wood;
Of servile John; of Robin Hood;

Of Woodstock's bloody bower!

Oh gay goshawk, you but belong
To troubadour and minstrel song;
To shirt of mail and hauberk strong;
To moat and castle-wall;

To serf and baron, page and dame;
To abbot sleek as spaniel tame;

To kings who could not sign their name;
To times of wrong and thrall!

Times are not now as they were then ;

Ours is a race of different men,

Who loathe the sword and love the pen ; For right, not rapine, bold.

No more, as then, the ladies bright

Work tapestry-work from morn till night;

The very

children read and write,

Like learned clerks of old !

Oh, falcon proud, and goshawk gay,
Your pride of place has passed away;
The lone wood is your home by day,

Your resting-perch by night;

The craggy rock your castle-tower;
The gay, green wood your ladies' bower;
Your own wild will, the master-power
That can control your flight!

Yet, noble bird, old fame is thine;
Still livest thou in the minstrel's line;
Still in old pictures art the sign

Of high and pure degree;

And still, with kindling hearts we read
How barons came to Runymede,

Falcon on wrist to do the deed

That made all England free!

THE CHILD AND THE FLOWERS.

Put by thy work, dear mother,
Dear mother come with me,
For I've found within the garden,
The beautiful sweet pea!

And rows of stately hollyhocks
Down by the garden-wall,
All yellow, white, and crimson,
So many-hued and tall!

And bending on their stalks, mother,
Are roses white and red;
And pale-stemmed balsams, all a-blow,
On every garden-bed.

Put by thy work, I pray thee,

And come out, mother dear!

We used to buy these flowers,

But they are growing here!

Oh, mother! little Amy would

Have loved these flowers to see;

Dost remember how we tried to get

For her a pink sweet-pea?

Dost remember how she loved

Those rose-leaves pale and sere?

I wish she had but lived to see
The lovely roses here!

Put by thy work, dear mother,
And wipe those tears away;

And come into the garden
Before 't is set of day!

THE FLAX-FLOWER.

O the little flax-flower,

It groweth on the hill,
And be the breeze awake or sleep,
It never standeth still.

It groweth, and it groweth fast;
One day it is a seed,
And then a little grassy blade,

Scarce better than a weed.
But then out comes the flax-flower,
As blue as is the sky;
And "t is a dainty little thing!"
We say as we go by.

Ah, 't is a goodly little thing,
It groweth for the poor,
And many a peasant blesses it,

Beside his cottage door.

He thinketh how those slender stems
That shimmer in the sun,

Are rich for him in web and woof,
And shortly shall be spun.

He thinketh how those tender flowers,

Of seed will yield him store;

And sees in thought his next year's crop Blue shining round his door.