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But name th' offence, and you absolve the rest,
And point the dagger at a single breast.

Yet there are sinners of a class so low,
That you with safety may the lash bestow :
Poachers, and drunkards, idle rogues, who feed
At others' cost, a mark'd correction need:
And all the better sort, who see your zeal,
Will love and reverence for their pastor feel;
Reverence for one who can inflict the smart,
And love, because he deals them not a part.

CRABBE, The Tales, XV.

April 29.

DAFFODILS.

I WANDERED lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o'er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and waving in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay :
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee :-
A poet could not but be gay,

În such a jocund company.

I gazed, and gazed, but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought;

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude,
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

April 30.

WORDSWORTH.

THE NIGHTINGALE.

No cloud, no relique of the sunken day
Distinguishes the west, no long thin slip
Of sullen light, no obscure trembling hues.
Come, we will rest on this old mossy bridge!
You see the glimmer of the stream beneath,
But hear no murmuring: it flows silently
O'er its soft bed of verdure. All is still,
A balmy night! and though the stars be dim,
Yet let us think upon the vernal showers
That gladden the‍green earth, and we shall find
A pleasure in the dimness of the stars.
And hark! the nightingale begins its song,
"Most musical, most melancholy" bird!
A melancholy bird? O idle thought!
In nature there is nothing melancholy.

-But some night-wand'ring man, whose heart was pierced

With the remembrance of a grievous wrong,
Or slow distemper, or neglected love,

(And so, poor wretch! filled all things with himself,
And made all gentle sounds tell back the tale
Of his own sorrows) he and such as he
First named these notes a melancholy strain :
And many a poet echoes the conceit :
Poet, who hath been building up the rhyme
When he had better far have stretched his limbs

Beside a brook in mossy forest-dell,
By sun or moon light, to the influxes
Of shapes and sounds and shifting elements
Surrendering his whole spirit, of his song
And of his fame forgetful! so his fame
Should share in nature's immortality,
A venerable thing! and so his song
Should make all nature lovelier, and itself
Be loved, like nature. But 'twill not be so :
And youths and maidens most poetical,
Who lose the deep'ning twilights of the spring
In ball-rooms and hot theatres, they still
Full of meek sympathy must heave their sighs
O'er Philomela's pity-pleading strains.
We have learnt

A different lore, we may not thus profane
Nature's sweet voices always full of love
And joyous! 'Tis the merry nightingale
That crowds and hurries and precipitates
With fast thick warble his delicious notes,
As he were fearful that an April night
Would be too short for him to utter forth
His love chant, and disburthen his full soul
Of all its music! I know a grove

Is wild with tangling underwood,

And the trim walks are broken up, and grass,
Thin grass, and kingcups grow within the paths.
But never elsewhere in one place I knew
So many nightingales: and far and near
In wood and thicket over the wide grove
They answer and provoke each others' songs—
With skirmish and capricious passagings,
And murmurs musical, and swift jug, jug,
And one low piping sound more sweet than all-
Stirring the air with such a harmony,

That should you close your eyes, you might almost Forget it was not day.

S. T. COLERIDGE.

May 1.

MAY MORNING.

Now the bright morning-star, Day's harbinger,
Comes dancing from the east, and leads with her
The flow'ry May, who from her green lap throws
The yellow cowslip and the pale primrose.

Hail, beauteous May, that dost inspire
Mirth, and youth, and warm desire!
Woods and groves are of thy dressing;
Hill and dale doth boast thy blessing.
Thus we salute thee with our early song,
And welcome thee, and wish thee long.
MILTON.

May 2.

DREAM LAND.

WHERE sunless rivers weep
Their waves into the deep,
She sleeps a charmed sleep;
Awake her not.

Led by a single star

She came from very far,
To seek where shadows are,
Her pleasant lot.

She left the rosy morn,
She left the fields of corn,
For twilight cold and lorn
And water springs.

Through sleep, as thro' a veil,
She sees the sky look pale,
And hears the nightingale,
That sadly sings.

Rest, rest, a perfect rest,
Shed over brow and breast;
Her face is towards the west,
The purple land.

She cannot see the grain
Ripening on hill and plain ;
She cannot feel the rain
Upon her hand.

Rest, rest, for evermore
Upon a mossy shore ;
Rest, rest at the heart's core
Till time shall cease.

Sleep that no pain shall wake,
Night that no morn shall break,
Till joy shall overtake

Her perfect peace.

CHRISTINA ROSETTI.

May 3.

TO BLOSSOMS.

FAIRE pledges of a fruitfull tree,
Why doe ye fall so fast?

Your date is not so past,

But you may stay yet here awhile,
To blush and gently smile,

And go at last.

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