By-ways Among Books

Front Cover
W. Rae, 1900 - 193 pages
 

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Popular passages

Page 91 - Saturn, quiet as a stone, Still as the silence round about his lair; Forest on forest hung about his head Like cloud on cloud. No stir of air was there, Not so much life as on a summer's day Robs not one light seed from the feather'd grass, But where the dead leaf fell, there did it rest.
Page 75 - Then felt I like some watcher of the skies When a new planet swims into his ken; Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes He stared at the Pacific — and all his men Looked at each other with a wild surmise — Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
Page 89 - Eve — Ah, bitter chill it was! The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold; The hare limped trembling through the frozen grass, And silent was the flock in woolly fold; Numb were the Beadsman's fingers, while he told His rosary, and while his frosted breath, Like pious incense from a censer old, Seemed taking flight for heaven, without a death, Past the sweet Virgin's picture, while his prayer he saith.
Page 93 - In a drear-nighted December, Too happy, happy tree, Thy branches ne'er remember Their green felicity : The north cannot undo them With a sleety whistle through them, Nor frozen thawings glue them From budding at the prime. In a drear-nighted December, Too happy, happy brook. Thy bubblings ne'er remember Apollo's summer look ; But with a sweet forgetting They stay their crystal fretting, Never, never petting About the frozen time. Ah ! would 'twere so with many A gentle girl and boy ! But were there...
Page 88 - And she forgot the stars, the moon, and sun, And she forgot the blue above the trees, And she forgot the dells where waters run, And she forgot the chilly autumn breeze...
Page 76 - A THING of beauty is a joy for ever : Its loveliness increases ; it will never Pass into nothingness ; but still will keep A bower quiet for us, and a sleep Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Page 133 - Thy borders are in the midst of the seas, thy builders have perfected thy beauty. They have made all thy ship boards of fir trees of Senir: they have taken cedars from Lebanon to make masts for thee. Of the oaks of Bashan have they made thine oars; the company of the Ashurites have made thy benches of ivory, brought out of the isles of Chittim.
Page 87 - Then in a silken scarf, — sweet with the dews Of precious flowers pluck'd in Araby, And divine liquids come with odorous ooze Through the cold serpent-pipe refreshfully, She wrapp'd it up; and for its tomb did choose A garden-pot, wherein she laid it by, And cover'd it with mould, and o'er it set Sweet Basil, which her tears kept ever wet.
Page 125 - And they sat down to eat bread ; and they lifted up their eyes, and looked, and behold, a company of Ishmaelites came from Gilead with their camels, bearing spicery, and balm, and myrrh, going to carry it down to Egypt.

Bibliographic information