Love, like spring-tides full and high,
Swells in every youthful vein ;
But each tide does less supply,
Till they quite shrink in again :
If a flow in age appear,

'T is but rain, and runs not clear.

XXIII.

John Dryden.

LOVE'S SORROWS.

OH, how hard it is to find

The one just suited to our mind;
And if that one should be

False, unkind, or found too late,
What can we do but sigh at fate,

And sing Woe's me--woe's me!

Love's a boundless, burning waste,
Where bliss's stream we seldom taste,
And still more seldom flee

Suspense's thorns, suspicion's stings;

Yet somehow Love a something brings

That's sweet-e'en when we sigh, "Woe's me!"

XXIV.

Thomas Campbell.

LOVE'S ETERNITY.

THE great sun, benighted,
May faint in the sky;
But love, once uplighted,
Will never more die.

Form, with its brightness,
From eyes will depart;
It walketh, in whiteness,
The halls of the heart.

XXV.

George MacDonald.

LOVE'S GOOD-MORROW.

PACK, clouds, away, and welcome day,
With night we banish sorrow;
Sweet air blow soft, mount larks aloft
To give my Love good-morrow!
Wings from the wind to please her mind,
Notes from the lark I'll borrow;
Bird prune thy wing, nightingale sing,
To give my Love good-morrow;

To give my Love good-morrow,
Notes from them both I'll borrow.

Wake from thy nest, Robin-red-breast,
Sing birds in every furrow;
And from each hill, let music shrill

Give my fair Love good-morrow!
Blackbird and thrush in every bush,
Stare, linnet, and cock-sparrow !
You pretty elves, amongst yourselves,
Sing my fair Love good-morrow;

To give my Love good-morrow,
Sing birds in every furrow!

Thomas Heywood.

XXVI.

LOVE'S SERENADE.

MY LADY SWEET, ARISE!

HARK! hark! the lark at heaven's gate sings,

And Phoebus 'gins arise,

His steeds to water at those springs

On chaliced flowers that lies;

And winking Mary-buds begin
To ope their golden eyes;
With everything that pretty bin,

My Lady sweet, arise;

Arise, arise!

William Shakespeare.

XXVII.

LOVE'S SERENADE.

AWAKE, AWAKE!

THE lark now leaves his wat'ry nest,
And climbing, shakes his dewy wings;
He takes this window for the east,

And to implore your light he sings.
Awake, awake, the morn will never rise,
Till she can dress her beauty at your eyes.

The merchant bows unto the seaman's star;
The ploughman from the sun his season takes;
But still the lover wonders what they are,

Who look for day before his mistress wakes. Awake, awake, break through your veils of lawn! Then draw your curtains, and begin the dawn.

Sir William Davenant.

XXVIII.

THE CALL TO LOVE:

COME THEN, BELOVED.

O PENSIVE, tender maid, downcast and shy,

Who turnest pale e'en at the name of love,
And with flushed face must pass the elm-tree by
Ashamed to near the passionate grey dove
Moan to his mate, thee too the god shall move,
Thee too the maidens shall ungird one day,
And with thy girdle put thy shame away.

What then, and shall white winter ne'er be done,
Because the glittering frosty morn is fair?

Because against the early-setting sun

Bright show the gilded boughs though waste and bare?

Because the robin singeth free from care? Ah! these are the memories of a better day, When on earth's face the lips of summer lay.

Come then, beloved one, for such as thee

Love loveth, and their hearts he knoweth well,

Who hoard their moments of felicity,

As misers hoard the medals that they tell, Lest on the earth but paupers they should dwell; "We hide our love to bless another day; The world is hard, youth passes quick," they say.

Ah, little ones, but if ye could forget

Amidst your outpoured love that you must die, Then ye, my servants, were death's conquerors yet, And love to you should be eternity

How quick soever might the days go by:

Yes, ye are made immortal on the day

Ye cease the dusty grains of time to weigh.

Thou hearkenest, love? O make no semblance then
Thou art beloved, but as thy wont is

Turn thy grey eyes away from eyes of men,

With hands down-dropped, that tremble with thy bliss,

With hidden eyes, take thy first lover's kiss ;

Call this eternity which is to-day,

Nor dream that this our love can pass away.

William Morris.

XXIX.

CALL

THE CALL TO LOVE.

THE PASSIONATE SHEPHERD TO HIS LOVE.

COME live with me and be my Love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
Woods, or steepy mountain yields.

There will we sit upon the rocks,
Seeing the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, to whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

And I will make thee beds of roses
And a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroidered all with leaves of myrtle.

A gown made of the finest wool,
Which from our pretty lambs we pull;
Fair-lined slippers for the cold,
With buckles of the purest gold;

A belt of straw and ivy buds
With coral clasps and amber-studs :
And if these pleasures may thee move,
Come live with me and be my Love.