To me fair memories belong

Of scenes that used to bless,
For no regret, but present song
And lasting thankfulness,
And very soon to break away,
Like types, in purer things than they.

I will have hopes that cannot fade
For flowers the valley yields;
I will have humble thoughts instead
Of silent, dewy fields:

My spirit and my God shall be

My sea-ward hill, my boundless sea.

ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING.

TO A WATERFOWL.

WHITHER, 'midst falling dew,

While glow the heavens with the last steps

of day,

Far through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eye

Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly limned upon the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brink

Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,

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Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean side?

There is a Power whose care

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast-
The desert and illimitable air,—

Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned,
At that far height, the cold, thin atmosphere,
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end;

Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest, And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend Soon o'er thy sheltered nest.

Thou'rt gone, the abyss of heaven Hath swallowed up thy form; yet on my heart Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given, And shall not soon depart.

He who, from zone to zone,

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone

Will lead my steps aright.

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

THE REDBREAST IN SEPTEMBER.

THE morning mist is cleared away,
Yet still the face of heaven is grey,

Nor yet th' autumnal breeze has stirred the grove;
Faded, yet full, a paler green

Skirts soberly the tranquil scene;
The redbreast warbles round this leafy cove.

Sweet messenger of calm decay,

Saluting sorrow as you may,

As one still bent to find or make the best,
In thee, and in this quiet mead,

The lesson of sweet peace I read,
Rather, in all, to be resigned than blest.

'Tis a low chant, according well
With the soft solitary knell,

As homeward from some grave beloved we turn,
Or by some holy death-bed dear,

Most welcome to the chastened ear

Of her whom Heaven is teaching how to mourn.

O cheerful tender strain! the heart
That duly bears with you its part,
Singing, so thankful, to the dreary blast,

Though gone and spent its joyous prime,
And on the world's autumnal time,

'Mid withered hues and sere, its lot be cast :

That is the heart for thoughtful seer,
Watching, in trance nor dark nor clear,
Th' appalling Future as it nearer draws;
His spirit calmed the storm to meet,
Feeling the rock beneath his feet,

And tracing through the cloud th' eternal Cause.

That is the heart for watchman true
Waiting to see what God will do,

As o'er the church the gathering twilight falls:
No more he strains his wistful eye,

If chance the golden hours be nigh, By youthful Hope seen beaming round her walls.

Forced from his shadowy paradise,

His thoughts to Heaven the steadier rise: There seek his answer when the world reproves : Contented in his darkling round,

If only he be faithful found

When from the east th' eternal morning moves.

JOHN KEBLE.

THE NIGHTINGALE.

LESSONS sweet of Spring returning,

Welcome to the thoughtful heart!

May I call ye sense, or learning,

Instinct pure, or Heaven-taught art?

Soft as Memnon's harp at morning,
To the inward ear devout,
Touched by light, with heavenly warning
Your transporting chords ring out.
Every leaf in every nook,

Every wave in every brook,
Chanting with a solemn voice,
Minds us of our better choice.

Needs no show of mountain hoary,
Winding shore, or deepening glen,
Where the landscape in its glory

Teaches truth to wandering men:
Give true hearts but earth and sky,
And some flowers to bloom and die,—
Homely scenes and simple views,
Lowly thoughts may best infuse.

See the soft green willow springing
Where the waters gently pass,
Every way her free arms flinging

O'er the moist and reedy grass.
Long ere winter blasts are fled,
See her tipped with vernal red,