And still, perhaps, with faithless gleam,
Some other loiterers beguiling.
Such views the youthful bard allure;
But, heedless of the following gloom,
He deems their colours shall endure
Till peace go with him to the tomb.
And let him nurse his fond deceit,
And what if he must die in sorrow!
Who would not cherish dreams so sweet,
Though grief and pain may come to-morrow!
WRITTEN UPON THE THAMES, NEAR RICHMOND.
GLIDE gently, thus for ever glide,
O Thames! that other bards may see
As lovely visions by thy side
As now, fair river! come to me.
O glide, fair stream, for ever so !
Thy quiet soul on all bestowing,
Till all our minds for ever flow,
As thy deep waters now are flowing.
Vain thought! Yet be as now thou art,
That in thy waters may be seen
The image of a poet's heart,
How bright, how solemn, how serene!
Such as did once the poet bless,
Who, murm'ring here a later* ditty,
Could find no refuge from distress
But in the milder grief of pity.
Now let us, as we float along,
For him suspend the dashing oar,
And that never child of song
pray
May know that poet's sorrows more.
How calm-how still! the only sound,
The dripping of the oar suspended !
The evening darkness gathers round
By virtue's holiest powers attended.
Collins's Ode on the death of Thomson, the last written, I believe, of the poems which were published during his lifetime. This Ode is also alluded to in another stanza.
I AM not one who much or oft delight
To season my fireside with personal talk,—
Of friends who live within an easy walk,
Or neighbours daily, weekly, in my sight:
And, for my chance acquaintance, ladies bright,
Sons, mothers, maidens withering on the stalk
These all wear out of me, like forms with chalk
Painted on rich men's floors for one feast-night.
Better than such discourse doth silence long,
Long, barren silence, square with my desire;
To sit without emotion, hope, or aim,
In the loved presence of my cottage fire,
And listen to the flapping of the flame,
Or kettle, whispering its faint undersong.
"Yet life," you say, "is life; we have seen and see, And with a living pleasure we describe;
And fits of sprightly malice do but bribe
The languid mind into activity.
Sound sense, and love itself, and mirth and glee,
Are fostered by the comment and the gibe."
E'en be it so; yet still, among your tribe,
Our daily world's true worldlings, rank not me!
Children are blest, and powerful; their world lies
More justly balanced; partly at their feet
And part far from them: sweetest melodies
Are those that are by distance made more sweet.
Whose mind is but the mind of his own eyes,
He is a slave-the meanest we can meet !
Wings have we-and as far as we can go,
We may find pleasure: wilderness and wood,
Blank ocean and mere sky, support that mood
Which, with the lofty, sanctifies the low;
Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,
Are a substantial world, both pure and good:
Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood, Our pastime and our happiness will grow.
There do I find a never-failing store
Of personal themes, and such as I love best;
Matter wherein right voluble I am :
Two will I mention, dearer than the rest:
The gentle lady married to the Moor;
And heavenly Una, with her milk-white lamb.
Nor can I not believe but that hereby
Great gains are mine; for thus I live remote
From evil-speaking; rancour, never sought,
Comes to me not; malignant truth, or lie.
Hence have I genial seasons, hence have I
Smooth passions, smooth discourse, and joyous thought:
And thus, from day to day, my little boat
Rocks in its harbour, lodging peaceably.
Blessings be with them-and eternal praise,
Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares,
The poets-who on earth have made us heirs
Of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays!
Oh! might my name be numbered among theirs,
Then gladly would I end my mortal days.
CHARACTERISTIC OF A FAVOURITE DOG WHICH BELONGED TO A
FRIEND OF THE AUTHOR.
ON his morning rounds the master
Goes, to learn how all things fare;
Searches pasture after pasture,
Sheep and cattle eyes with care;
And, for silence or for talk,
He hath comrades in his walk;
Four dogs, each pair of different breed,
Distinguished, two for scent, and two for speed.
See, a hare before him started!
-Off they fly in earnest chase;
Every dog is eager-hearted,
All the four are in the race;
And the hare whom they pursue,
Hath an instinct what to do:
Her hope is near: no turn she makes,
But like an arrow, to the river takes.
Deep the river was, and crusted
Thinly by a one night's frost;
But the nimble hare hath trusted
To the ice, and safely crossed;
She hath crossed, and without heed
They are following at full speed,
When lo! the ice so thinly spread,
Breaks-and the greyhound Dart is over-head.
Better fate have Prince and Swallow
See them cleaving to the sport!
Music has no heart to follow-
Little Music she stops short.
She hath neither wish nor heart,
Hers is now another part:
A loving creature she and brave!
And fondly strives her struggling friend to save.
From the brink her paws she stretches,
Very hands as you would say !
And afflicting moans she fetches,
As he breaks the ice away.
For herself she hath no fears,—
Him alone she sees and hears,
Makes efforts and complainings; nor gives o'er
Until her fellow sinks, and re-appears no more.
TO THE MEMORY OF THE SAME DOG.
LIE here sequestered: be this little mound
For ever thine, and be it holy ground!
Lie here, without a record of thy worth,
Beneath the covering of the common earth!
It is not from unwillingness to praise,
Or want of love, that here no stone we raise :
More thou deservest; but this man gives to man,
Brother to brother, this is all we can,
Yet they to whom thy virtues made thee dear
Shall find thee through all changes of the year:
This oak points out thy grave; the silent tree
Will gladly stand a monument of thee.
I prayed for thee, and that thy end were past;
And willingly have laid thee here at last :
For thou hadst lived, till everything that cheers
In thee had yielded to the weight of years;
Extreme old age had wasted thee away;
And left thee but a glimmering of the day;
Thy ears were deaf, and feeble were thy knees,-
I saw thee stagger in the summer breeze,
Too weak to stand against its sportive breath,
And ready for the gentlest stroke of death.
It came, and we were glad; yet tears were shed:
Both man and woman wept when thou wert dead
Not only for a thousand thoughts that were
Old household thoughts, in which thou hadst thy share,
But for some precious boons vouchsafed to thee,
Found scarcely anywhere in like degree.
For love, that comes to all; the holy sense,
Best gift of God, in thee was most intense:
A chain of heart, a feeling of the mind,
A tender sympathy, which did thee bind
Not only to us men, but to thy kind :
Yea, for thy fellow-brutes in thee we saw
The soul of love, love's intellectual law :
Hence, if we wept, it was not done in shame;
Our tears from passion and from reason came,
And therefore shalt thou be an honoured name!
THE FORCE OF PRAYER; OR, THE FOUNDING OF BOLTON PRIORY.
"What is good for a bootless bene ?”
With these dark words begins my tale;
And their meaning is, "Whence can comfort spring,
When prayer is of no avail ?"
"What is good for a bootless bene ?”
The falconer to the lady said;
And she made answer,
"Endless sorrow!"
For she knew that her son was dead.
She knew it by the falconer's words,
And from the look of the falconer's eye;
And from the love which was in her soul
For her youthful Romilly.
-Young Romilly through Barden Woods
Is ranging high and low;
And holds a greyhound in a leash,
To let slip upon buck or doe.
And the pair have reached that fearful chasm,
How tempting to bestride!
For lordly Wharf is there pent in
With rocks on either side.
This striding-place is called "the Strid,"
A name which it took of yore:
A thousand years hath it borne that name,
And shall, a thousand more.
And hither is young Romilly come,
And what may now forbid
That he, perhaps for the hundredth time,
Shall bound across "the Strid?"
He sprang in glee,-for what cared he
That the river was strong, and the rocks were stcep!
-But the greyhound in the leash hung back,
And checked him in his leap.
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