Now turning faint with languishment of joy,

Having kept wakeful all the warm night through ;
And on th' expectant air there hangs a dream
As if from hidden beds of hyacinths,

Down in the dell below among the leaves.
There is a swooning sweetness in the hour,
All overcharged with its own deep perfume,
And dim with rapture of the sunbeams stolen
Into the haunted heart of the smooth shade,
Which calls perforce upon the place, the time
To answer to its yearning self-delight,

And to let loose the soul invisible.

For surely, as I pass, the conscious air

Can hold no more its secret, but must speak,
Already overladen with its sighs

Of fragrance, and the balm of the musk-rose;
And at the next turn of the golden day
The fate that trembles unrevealed around
Must step forth in some semblance palpable,
And must make one the heart of all things here,
Which now are throbbing to the unknown joy.
There cannot be but close, unutterable,
The coming of the crowning of the year.

And at my feet a flutter-and behold! I tread among a softly-stirring crowd

Of slow and half-awakened butterflies,

As if the moist and tender heat of earth

Had breathed them forth new-born to the new day.

All down the path is suddenly alive

With grey and glistering films that break to life, Their wet, furled wings unclosing momently, About to spread into a golden cloud.

Folded in dew and moss and speechless sleep

Waiting ;—and now th' enchanted hour has come That sets them free-a mist of starry shapes They rise, to wander down the noonward way.

*

A MOONLIGHT RIDE.

THROUGH the lands low-lying, fast and free
I ride alone and under the moon ;
An empty road that is strange to me,

Yet at every turn remembered soon:
A road like a racecourse, even and wide,
With grassy margins on either side;
In a rapture of blowing air I ride,
With a heart that is beating tune.

Light as on turf the hoof-beats fall,

As on spongy sod as fast and fleet,
For the road is smooth and moist withal,

And the water springs under the horse's feet; And to every stride sounds a soft plash yet, For all the length of the way is wet

With many a runnel and rivulet

That under the moonlight meet.

O surely the water lilies should be

Sunk away and safe folded to rest!
But, no; they are shining open and free,
White and awake on the water's breast:
On the long and shimmering waterway,
All silver-spread to the full moon's ray,
The shallow dykes that straggle and stray
With their floating fringes drest.

The road will flow winding and winding away Through the sleeping country to-night;

All one long level of dusky grey,

The border hedges slip past in flight;
Turning and twisting in many a lane,
Mile after mile of a labyrinth chain
I have seen before, I shall see again,
Yet remember not aright.

And somewhere all out of sight there stands A sleeping house that is white and low, Hid in the heart of the level lands,

The lands where the waters wander slow, Embowered all round by the thickset ways, Set in a silent and stately maze

Of high-grown ilex, arbutus, bays,—

If I ever saw it, I do not know.

Shall I ever reach it? or ere the day

Breaks, will it all have passed away?

If only the night might last!

While the mists of moonlight the warm air fill, Out of boskage and bower so deep and still There reaches afar the glimmer, the thrill,

O the night is flying too fast!