Yew-trees. Upon whose grassless floor of red-brown hue, Of boughs, as if for festal purpose, decked May meet at noontide; Fear and trembling Hope, As in a natural temple scattered o'er 125 CHILDHOOD AND HIS VISITORS. NCE on a time, when sunny May And smiling,-who could choose but love him; Old Time, in most appalling wrath, With curling lip, and glancing eye, But Childhood's glance of purity Had such a holy spell within it, Childhood and his Visitors. That the dark demon to the air Spread forth again his baffled pinion, And hid his envy and despair, Self-tortured, in his own dominion. Then stepped a gloomy phantom up, 127 Pale, cypress-crowned, night's awful daughter, And proffered him a fearful cup, Full to the brim of bitter water: Poor Childhood bade her tell her name, And when the beldame muttered "Sorrow," He said, "Don't interrupt my game, I'll taste it, if I must, to-morrow." The Muse of Pindus thither came, And wooed him with the softest numbers That ever scattered wealth and fame Upon a youthful poet's slumbers; Though sweet the music of the lay, To Childhood it was all a riddle, And "Oh," he cried, "do send away That noisy woman with the fiddle." Then Wisdom stole his bat and ball, And taught him, with most sage endeavour, Why bubbles rise, and acorns fall, And why no toy may last for ever: She talked of all the wondrous laws Which Nature's open book discloses, And Childhood, ere she made a pause, Was fast asleep among the roses. Sleep on, sleep on!-Oh! Manhood's dreams PEARD. I MOURN NOT THE FOREST. I MOURN not the forest whose verdure is dying, I sigh for the worth that I slighted before, The spring may return with his garland of flowers, HEBER. |