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Ye that in waters glide, and ye that walk
The earth, and stately tread, or lowly creep:
Witness if I be silent, morn or even,

To hill, or valley, fountain, or fresh shade,
Made vocal by my song, and taught his praise.
Hail, universal Lord, be bounteous still
To give us only good; and if the night
Have gather'd aught of evil, or conceal'd,
Disperse it, as now light dispels the dark!

Milton.

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I come, I come! ye have call'd me long,

I come o'er the mountains with light and song;
Ye may trace my step o'er the waking earth,
By the winds which tell of the violet's birth,
By the primrose stars in the shadowy grass,
By the green leaves opening as I pass.

I have breathed on the South, and the chestnut flowers,
By thousands, have burst from the forest-bowers;

And the ancient graves and the fallen fanes,

Are veil'd with wreaths on Italian plains.

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my

hour of bloom,

To speak of the ruin, or the tomb!

I have pass'd o'er the hill of the stormy North,
And the larch has hung all his tassels forth,
The fisher is out on the sunny sea,

And the rein-deer bounds through the pasture free,
And the pine has a fringe of softer green,

And the moss looks bright where my step has been.

I have sent through the wood-paths a gentle sigh,
And call'd out each voice of the deep-blue sky,
From the night-bird's lay through the starry time,
In the groves of the soft Hesperian clime,

To the swan's wild note by the Iceland lakes,
When the dark fir-bough into verdure breaks.

From the streams and founts I have loosed the chain ;
They are sweeping on to the silvery main,
They are flashing down from the mountain-brows,
They are flinging spray on the forest boughs,
They are bursting fresh from their sparry caves,
And the earth resounds with the joy of waves.
Come forth, O ye children of gladness, come!
Where the violets lie may now be your home.
Ye of the rose-cheek and dew-bright eye,
And the bounding footstep, to meet me fly,
With the lyre, and the wreath, and the joyous lay,
Come forth to the sunshine, I may not stay.

Away from the dwellings of care-worn men,
The waters are sparkling in wood and glen;
Away from the chamber and dusky hearth,
The young leaves are dancing in breezy mirth;
Their light stems thrill to the wild wood strains,
And youth is abroad in my green domains.

Mrs. Hemans.

LESSON II.

THE HOLLY TREE.

con-tem/-plates, regards contemplor. in-trude', to come in

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The common holly is found abundantly in the middle of Europe, and the southern side of the range of the Caucasus. It is valued chiefly as an ornamental tree, but its fine-grained, heavy, compact timber is used for a great number of useful purposes, especially by the turner and mathematical instrument maker. The berries are poisonous, producing violent emetic effects. The Nat. Cyclopædia.

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O reader! hast thou ever stood to see

The holly tree?

The eye that contemplates it well perceives
Its glossy leaves,

Ordered by an Intelligence so wise

As might confound the atheist's sophistries.

Below, a circling fence, its leaves are seen
Wrinkled and keen;

No grazing cattle, through their prickly round,
Can reach to wound;

But as they grow where nothing is to fear,
Smooth and unarm'd the pointless leaves appear.

I love to view these things with curious eyes,
And moralise:

And in this wisdom of the holly tree
Can emblems see

Wherewith, perchance, to make a pleasant rhyme, One which may profit in the after-time.

Thus, though abroad, perchance, I might appear
Harsh and austere ;

To those who on my leisure would intrude,
Reserved and rude;

Gentle at home amid my friends I'd be,
Like the high leaves upon the holly tree.

And should my youth, as youth is apt, I know,
Some harshness show,

All vain asperities, I, day by day,

Would wear away;

Till the smooth temper of my age should be
Like the high leaves upon the holly tree.

And as, when all the summer trees are seen
So bright and green,

The holly leaves their fadeless hues display
Less bright than they;

But when the bare and wintry woods we see,
What then so cheerful as the holly tree?

So serious should my youth appear among
The thoughtless throng;

So would I seem, amid the young and
More grave than they;

That in my age as cheerful I might be
As the green winter of the holly tree.

gay,

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I long to see the Northern Lights',
With their rushing splendours fly;
Like living things with flaming wings,
Wide o'er the wond'rous sky.

I long to see those icebergs 2 vast,

azur.

corvus
marīnus.

With heads all crown'd with snow;
Whose green roots sleep in the awful deep
Two hundred fathoms low!

I long to hear the thund'ring crash
Of their terrific fall,

And the echoes from a thousand cliffs,
Like lonely voices call.

1 The Aurora Borealis. In the northern skies, in clear frosty evenings, this electrical phenomenon is often seen. To the inhabitants of the arctic regions the Aurora Borealis proves a great solace during the long absence of the solar rays.

2 Icebergs, mountains of ice, sometimes immovably fixed upon some

projecting mass in the sea, but generally floating from place to place according to the action of the wind and currents. Many of them have an elevation of 200 feet above the level of the ocean; and vessels are often lost by coming in contact with these immense floating mountains.

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