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ANSWER TO A CHILD'S QUESTION.

Do you ask what the birds say? The sparrow, the dove,
The liner and thrush say, "I love and I love!"
In the winter they re silent-the wind is so strong;
What it says, I don't know, but it sings a loud song.
Fat green leaves, and blossoms, and sunny warm weather,
And singing, and loving-all come back together.
E the lark is so brimful of gladness and love,
The green Selds below him, the blue sky above,
That be sings and he sings; and for ever sings he-
"I love my Love, and my Love loves me !"

1799.

TO A YOUNG LADY.

ON HER RECOVERY FROM A FEVER

WHY need I say, Louisa dear!
How glad I am to see you here,
A lovely convalescent;

Risen from the bed of pain and fear,
And feverish heat incessant.

The sunny showers, the dappled sky,
The little birds that warble high,
Their vernal loves commencing,
Will better welcome you than I
With their sweet influencing.
Believe me, while in bed you lay,
Your danger taught us all to pray :
You made us grow devouter!
Each eye looked up and seemed to say,
How can we do without her?

Besides, what vexed us worse, we knew,
They have no need of such as you
In the place where you were going:
This world has angels all too few,
And Heaven is overflowing!

INTRODUCTION TO THE TALE OF THE DARK LADIE.

O LEAVE the lily on its stem;

O leave the rose upon the spray;
O leave the elder bloom, fair maids!
And listen to my lay.

A cypress and a myrtle bough

This morn around my harp you twined,
Because it fashioned mournfully

Its murmurs in the wind.

And now a tale of love and woe,
A woeful tale of love I sing;
Hark, gentle maidens ! hark, it sighs
And trembles on the string.

But most, my own dear Genevieve,
It sighs and trembles most for thee!
O come and hear the cruel wrongs,
Befell the Dark Ladie!*

And now, once more a tale of woe,
A woeful tale of love I sing;
For thee, my Genevieve, it sighs,
And trembles on the string.

When last I sang the cruel scorn,
That crazed this bold and lovely knight,
And how he roamed the mountain woods,
Nor rested day nor night;

I promised thee a sister tale,

Of man's perfidious cruelty;

Come then, and hear what cruel wrong
Befell the Dark Ladie.

THE BALLAD OF THE DARK LADIE.
A FRAGMENT.

BENEATH yon birch with silver bark,
And boughs so pendulous and fair,
The brook falls scatter'd down the rock:
And all is mossy there!

And there upon the moss she sits,
The Dark Ladie in silent pain;
The heavy tear is in her eye,

And drops and swells again.

Three times she sends her little page
Up the castled mountain's breast,
If he might find the Knight that wears
The Griffin for his crest.

The sun was sloping down the sky,
And she had lingered there all day,
Counting moments, dreaming fears-
O wherefore can he stay?

*Here followed the Stanzas, afterwards published separately under the title "Love," and after them came the other three stanzas printed above; the whole forming the introduction to the intended Dark Ladie, of which all that exists is subjoined.

She hears a rustling o'er the brook,
She sees far off a swinging bough!
"'Tis He! 'Tis my betrothed Knight!
Lord Falkland, is it Thou !"

She springs, she clasps him round the neck,
She sobs a thousand hopes and fears,
Her kisses glowing on his cheeks
She quenches with her tears.

"My friends with rude ungentle words
They scoff and bid me fly to thee!
O give me shelter in thy breast!
O shield and shelter me!

"My Henry, I have given thee much,
I gave what I can ne'er recall,
I gave my heart, I gave my peace,
O Heaven! I gave thee all."

The Knight made answer to the Maid,
While to his heart he held her hand,
"Nine castles hath my noble sire,
None statelier in the land.

"The fairest one shall be my love's,
The fairest castle of the nine!
Wait only till the stars peep out,
The fairest shall be thine :

"Wait only till the hand of eve
Hath wholly closed yon western bars,
And through the dark we two will steal
Beneath the twinkling stars!"

"The dark? the dark? No! not the dark?
The twinkling stars? How, Henry? How?
O God! 'twas in the eye of noon

He pledged his sacred vow!

"And in the eye of noon, my love,
Shall lead me from my mother's door,
Sweet boys and girls all clothed in white
Strewing flow'rs before:

"But first the nodding minstrels go
With music meet for lordly bow'rs,
The children next in snow-white vests,
Strewing buds and flow'rs!

"And then my love and I shall pace,
My jet black hair in pearly braids,
Between our comely bachelors

And blushing bridal maids."

SOMETHING CHILDISH, BUT VERY NATURAL.

1799-9.

WRITTEN IN GERMANY.

IF I had but two little wings,
And were a little feathery bird,
To you I'd fly, my dear!

But thoughts like these are idle things,
And I stay here.

But in my sleep to you I fly:

I'm always with you in my sleep!
The world is all one's own.

But then one wakes, and where am I?
All, all alone.

Sleep stays not, though a monarch bids :
So I love to wake ere break of day:
For though my sleep be gone,

Yet while 'tis dark, one shuts one's lids,
And still dreams on.

THE VISIONARY HOPE.

SAD lot, to have no hope! Though lowly kneeling
He fain would frame a prayer within his breast,
Would fain entreat for some sweet breath of healing,
That his sick body might have ease and rest;
He strove in vain! the dull sighs from his chest
Against his will the stifling load revealing,

Though Nature forced; though like some captive guest,
Some royal prisoner at his conqueror's feast,
An alien's restless mood but half concealing,
The sternness on his gentle brow confessed,
Sickness within and miserable feeling :

Though obscure pangs made curses of his dreams,
And dreaded sleep, each night repelled in vain,
Each night was scattered by its own loud screams:
Yet never could his heart command, though fain,
One deep full wish to be no more in pain.

That Hope, which was his inward bliss and boast,
Which waned and died, yet ever near him stood,
Though changed in nature, wander where he would-
For Love's despair is but Hope's pining ghost!
For this one hope he makes his hourly moan,
He wishes and can wish for this alone!

Pierced, as with light from Heaven, before its gleams
(So the love-stricken visionary deems)

Disease would vanish, like a summer shower,

Whose dews fling sunshine from the noon-tide bower!
Or let it stay! yet this one Hope should give

Such strength that he would bless his pains and live.

1806

THE HAPPY HUSBAND.

OFT, oft methinks, the while with Thee
I breathe, as from the heart, thy dear
And dedicated name, I hear

A promise and a mystery,

A pledge of more than passing life,
Yea, in that very name of Wife!

A pulse of love, that ne'er can sleep!
A feeling that upbraids the heart
With happiness beyond desert,
That gladness half requests to weep!
Nor bless I not the keener sense
And unalarming turbulence

Of transient joys, that ask no sting
From jealous fears, or coy denying;
But born beneath Love's brooding wing,
And into tenderness soon dying,

Wheel out their giddy moment, then
Resign the soul to love again;—

A more precipitated vein

Of notes, that eddy in the flow

Of smoothest song, they come, they go,
And leave their sweeter understrain
Its own sweet self-a love of Thee
That seems, yet cannot greater be!

THE PANG MORE SHARP THAN ALL
AN ALLEGORY.

I.

HE too has flitted from his secret nest,

Hope's last and dearest Child without a name !—
Has flitted from me, like the warmthless flame,
That makes false promise of a place of rest
To the tir'd Pilgrim's still believing mind ;-
Or like some Elfin Knight in kingly court,
Who having won all guerdons in his sport,
Glides out of view, and whither none can find!

II.

Yes! He hath flitted from me-with what aim,
Or why, I know not! 'Twas a home of bliss,
And He was innocent, as the pretty shame
Of babe, that tempts and shuns the menaced kiss,
From its twy-cluster'd hiding place of snow!
Pure as the babe, I ween, and all aglow

As the dear hopes, that swell the mother's breast-
Her eyes down-gazing o'er her clasped charge ;-

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