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And languishing to hear thy welcome sound, Lies the vast inland, stretched beyond the sight. Go forth into the gathering shade; go forth, God's blessing breathed upon the fainting earth! Go, rock the little wood-bird in his nest;

Curl the still waters, bright with stars; and rouse The wide old wood from his majestic rest,

Summoning, from the innumerable boughs, The strange deep harmonies that haunt his breast. Pleasant shall be thy way where meekly bows The shutting flower, and darkling waters pass, And where the o'ershadowing branches sweep the grass.

Stoop o'er the place of graves, and softly sway The sighing herbage by the gleaming stone That they who near the churchyard willows stray, And listen in the deepening gloom, alone, May think of gentle souls that passed away,

Like thy pure breath, into the vast unknown, Sent forth from heaven among the sons of men, And gone into the boundless heaven again.

The faint old man shall lean his silver head

To feel thee; thou shalt kiss the child asleep, And dry the moistened curls that overspread

His temples, while his breathing grows more deep;

And they who stand about the sick man's bed Shall joy to listen to thy distant sweep,

And softly part his curtains to allow

Thy visit, grateful to his burning brow.

Go, but the circle of eternal change,

Which is the life of nature, shall restore, With sounds and scents from all thy mighty range, Thee to thy birthplace of the deep once more. Sweet odors in the sea air, sweet and strange,

Shall tell the homesick mariner of the shore; And, listening to thy murmur, he shall deem He hears the rustling leaf and running stream.

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

THE EVENING STAR.

STAR that bringest home the bee,
And sett'st the weary laborer free!
If any star shed peace, 't is thou,

That send'st it from above,
Appearing when heaven's breath and brow

Are sweet as hers we love.

Come to the luxuriant skies,
Whilst the landscape's odors rise,
Whilst far-off lowing herds are heard,
And songs, when toil is done,
From cottages whose smoke unstirred
Curls yellow in the sun.

IF solitude hath ever led thy steps
To the wild ocean's echoing shore,
And thou hast lingered there
Until the sun's broad orb
Seemed resting on the burnished wave,
Thou must have marked the lines

Of purple gold, that motionless

Hung o'er the sinking sphere:
Thou must have marked the billowy clouds,
Edged with intolerable radiancy,
Towering like rocks of jet

Crowned with a diamond wreath.
And yet there is a moment,
When the sun's highest point

Peeps like a star o'er ocean's western edge,
When those far clouds of feathery gold,

Shaded with deepest purple, gleam Like islands on a dark-blue sea; Then has thy fancy soared above the earth, And furled its wearied wing Within the Fairy's fane.

Yet not the golden islands
Gleaming in yon flood of light,

Nor the feathery curtains
Stretching o'er the sun's bright couch,
Nor the burnished ocean's waves

Paving that gorgeous dome,
So fair, so wonderful a sight
As Mab's ethereal palace could afford.
Yet likest evening's vault, that fairy Hall!
Heaven, low resting on the wave, it spread
Its floors of flashing light,
Its vast and azure dome,
Its fertile golden islands
Floating on a silver sea;

Whilst suns their mingling beamings darted
Through clouds of circumambient darkness,
And pearly battlements around
Looked o'er the immense of heaven.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

EVENING.

FROM "DON JUAN."

AVE Maria! o'er the earth and sea,

That heavenliest hour of heaven is worthiest thee !

Ave Maria! blessed be the hour,

The time, the clime, the spot, where I so oft Have felt that moment in its fullest power

Sink o'er the earth so beautiful and soft, While swung the deep bell in the distant tower Or the faint dying day hymn stole aloft, And not a breath crept through the rosy air, And yet the forest leaves seemed stirred with

prayer.

Ave Maria! 't is the hour of prayer!

Ave Maria! 't is the hour of love! Ave Maria! may our spirits dare

Look up to thine and to thy Son's above! Ave Maria! O that face so fair!

Those downcast eyes beneath the Almighty dove,

What though 't is but a pictured image?strike,

That painting is no idol, -'t is too like.

Sweet hour of twilight! in the solitude

Of the pine forest, and the silent shore Which bounds Ravenna's immemorial wood, Rooted where once the Adrian wave flowed o'er To where the last Cæsarean fortress stood, Evergreen forest; which Boccaccio's lore And Dryden's lay made haunted ground to me, How have I loved the twilight hour and thee ! The shrill cicalas, people of the pine, Making their summer lives one ceaseless song, Were the sole echoes, save my steed's and mine,

And vesper bells that rose the boughs along; The spectre huntsman of Onesti's line,

His hell-dogs, and their chase, and the fair throng Which learned from this example not to fly From a true lover, shadowed my mind's eye.

O Hesperus! thou bringest all good things, -
Home to the weary, to the hungry cheer,
To the young bird the parent's brooding wings,
The welcome stall to the o'erlabored steer;
Whate'er of peace about our hearthstone clings,

Whate'er our household gods protect of dear, Are gathered round us by thy look of rest; Thou bring'st the child, too, to the mother's breast. Soft hour! which wakes the wish and melts the heart

Of those who sail the seas, on the first day When they from their sweet friends are torn apart; Or fills with love the pilgrim on his way, As the far bell of vesper makes him start, Seeming to weep the dying day's decay : Is this a fancy which our reason scorns? Ah! surely nothing dies but something mourns.

EVENING IN PARADISE.

BYRON.

Now came still evening on, and twilight gray
Had in her sober livery all things clad;
Silence accompanied; for beast and bird,
They to their grassy couch, these to their nests,
Were slunk, all but the wakeful nightingale;
She all night long her amorous descant sung.
Silence was pleased: now glowed the firmament
With living sapphires; Hesperus, that led
The starry host, rode brightest, till the moon,
Rising in clouded majesty, at length
Apparent queen, unveiled her peerless light,
And o'er the dark her silver mantle threw.
When Adam thus to Eve: "Fair consort, the
hour

Of night, and all things now retired to rest,
Mind us of like repose, since God hath set
Labor and rest, as day and night, to men
Successive; and the timely dew of sleep,
Now falling with soft slumberous weight, inclines
Our eyelids. Other creatures all day long
Rove idle, unemployed, and less need rest ;
Man hath his daily work of body or mind
Appointed, which declares his dignity,
And the regard of Heaven on all his ways;
While other animals unactive range,
And of their doings God takes no account.
To-morrow, ere fresh morning streak the east
With first approach of light, we must be risen,
And at our pleasant labor, to reform
Yon flowery arbors, yonder alleys green,

Our walk at noon, with branches overgrown,
That mock our scant manuring, and require
More hands than ours to lop their wanton growth.
Those blossoms also, and those dropping gums,
That lie bestrewn, unsightly and unsmooth,
Ask riddance, if we mean to tread with ease;
Meanwhile, as Nature wills, night bids us rest."
To whom thus Eve with perfect beauty adorned:
"My author and disposer, what thou bidd'st
Unargued I obey; so God ordains;

God is thy law, thou mine; to know no more
Is woman's happiest knowledge and her praise.
With thee conversing I forget all time;
All seasons and their change, all please alike.
Sweet is the breath of morn, her rising sweet,
With charm of earliest birds; pleasant the sun,
When first on this delightful land he spreads
His orient beams, on herb, tree, fruit, and flower,
Glistering with dew; fragrant the fertile earth
After soft showers; and sweet the coming on
Of grateful evening mild; then silent night,
With this her solemn bird, and this fair moon,
And these the gems of heaven, her starry train:
But neither breath of morn, when she ascends
With charm of earliest birds; nor rising sun
On this delightful land; nor herb, fruit, flower,
Glistering with dew; nor fragrance after showers,
Nor grateful evening mild; nor silent night
With this her solemn bird, nor walk by moon,
Or glittering starlight, without thee is sweet."
Thus talking, hand in hand alone they passed

On to their blissful bower.

MYSTERIOUS Night! when our first parent knew
Thee, from report divine, and heard thy name,
Did he not tremble for this lovely frame,
This glorious canopy of light and blue?
Yet, 'neath a curtain of translucent dew,
Bathed in the rays of the great setting flame,
Hesperus, with the host of heaven, came,

And lo! creation widened in man's view.
Who could have thought such darkness lay con-
cealed

Within thy beams, O Sun! or who could find, Whilst fly and leaf and insect stood revealed, That to such countless orbs thou mad'st us blind! Why do we then shun death with anxious strife? If light can thus deceive, wherefore not life?

NIGHT.

BLANCO WHITE.

How beautiful this night! the balmiest sigh Which vernal zephyrs breathe in evening's ear Were discord to the speaking quietude

That wraps this moveless scene. Heaven's ebon

vault,

Studded with stars unutterably bright,
Through which the moon's unclouded grandeur

rolls,

Seems like a canopy which love has spread
To curtain her sleeping world. Yon gentle hills,
Robed in a garment of untrodden snow;
Yon darksome rocks, whence icicles depend,
So stainless that their white and glittering spires
Tinge not the moon's pure beam; yon castle steep,
Whose banner hangeth o'er the timeworn tower
So idly that rapt fancy deemeth it
A metaphor of peace—all form a scene
Where musing solitude might love to lift

Her soul above this sphere of earthliness; Where silence undisturbed might watch alone, So cold, so bright, so still.

The orb of day In southern climes o'er ocean's waveless field Sinks sweetly smiling: not the faintest breath Steals o'er the unruffled deep; the clouds of eve Reflect unmoved the lingering beam of day; And vesper's image on the western main Is beautifully still. To-morrow comes : Cloud upon cloud, in dark and deepening mass, Rolls o'er the blackened waters; the deep roar Of distant thunder mutters awfully; Tempest unfolds its pinion o'er the gloom That shrouds the boiling surge; the pitiless fiend, With all his winds and lightnings, tracks his prey; The torn deep yawns, the vessel finds a grave Beneath its jagged gulf.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

NIGHT.

FROM CHILDE HAROLD."

'Tis night, when Meditation bids us feel We once have loved, though love is at an end: The heart, lone mourner of its baffled zeal, Though friendless now, will dream it had a friend.

Who with the weight of years would wish to bend, When Youth itself survives young Love and joy? Alas! when mingling souls forget to blend, Death hath but little left him to destroy ! Ah! happy years! once more who would not be a boy?

Thus bending o'er the vessel's laving side, To gaze on Dian's wave-reflected sphere, The soul forgets her schemes of Hope and Pride, And flies unconscious o'er each backward year. None are so desolate but something dear, Dearer than self, possesses or possessed A thought, and claims the homage of a tear; A flashing pang! of which the weary breast Would still, albeit in vain, the heavy heart divest.

To sit on rocks, to muse o'er flood and fell,
To slowly trace the forest's shady scene,
Where things that own not man's dominion
dwell,

And mortal foot hath ne'er or rarely been;
To climb the trackless mountain all unseen,
With the wild flock that never needs a fold;
Alone o'er steeps and foaming falls to lean,
This is not solitude; 't is but to hold
Converse with Nature's charms, and view her
stores unrolled.

Stretch the tired limbs, and lay the head Down on our own delightful bed!

Night is the time for dreams :

The gay romance of life,

When truth that is, and truth that seems,

Mix in fantastic strife;

Ah! visions, less beguiling far
Than waking dreams by daylight are!

Night is the time for toil :

To plough the classic field,
Intent to find the buried spoil

Its wealthy furrows yield;
Till all is ours that sages taught,
That poets sang, and heroes wrought.

Night is the time to weep:

To wet with unseen tears
Those graves of Memory, where sleep
The joys of other years;

Hopes, that were Angels at their birth,
But died when young, like things of earth.

Night is the time to watch:

O'er ocean's dark expanse, To hail the Pleiades, or catch

The full moon's earliest glance, That brings into the homesick mind All we have loved and left behind.

Night is the time for care:

Brooding on hours misspent, To see the spectre of Despair

Come to our lonely tent; Like Brutus, midst his slumbering host, Summoned to die by Cæsar's ghost.

Night is the time to think :

When, from the eye, the soul Takes flight; and on the utmost brink Of yonder starry pole

HYMN TO THE NIGHT.
Ασπασίη, τρίλλιστος.

I HEARD the trailing garments of the Night
Sweep through her marble halls!

I saw her sable skirts all fringed with light
From the celestial walls!

I felt her presence, by its spell of might,
Stoop o'er me from above;

The calm, majestic presence of the Night,
As of the one I love.

I heard the sounds of sorrow and delight,
The manifold, soft chimes,

That fill the haunted chambers of the Night,
Like some old poet's rhymes.

From the cool cisterns of the midnight air
My spirit drank repose;

The fountain of perpetual peace flows there,
From those deep cisterns flows.

O holy Night! from thee I learn to bear
What man has borne before!

Thou layest thy finger on the lips of Care,
And they complain no more.

Peace! Peace! Orestes-like I breathe this prayer!
Descend with broad-winged flight,

The welcome, the thrice-prayed for, the most fair,

The best-beloved Night!

DIE DOWN, O DISMAL DAY! And come, blue deeps, magnificently strewn DIE down, O dismal day, and let me live; With colored clouds,-large, light, and fugitive,

By upper winds through pompous motions blown.

Now it is death in life,

a vapor dense

Creeps round my window, till I cannot see
The far snow-shining mountains, and the glens
Shagging the mountain tops. O God! make free
This barren shackled earth, so deadly cold, -
Breathe gently forth thy spring, till winter flies
In rude amazement, fearful and yet bold,
While she performs her customed charities;
I weigh the loaded hours till life is bare,

O God, for one clear day, a snowdrop, and sweet air!

DAVID GRAY,