And things we dream, but ne'er can speak,
Like clouds came floating o'er thy cheek-
Such summer-clouds as travel light,
When the soul's heaven lies calm and bright-
Till thou awokest; then to thine eye
Thy whole heart leapt in ecstasy!
And lovely is that heart of thine,
Or sure those eyes could never shine
With such a wild, yet bashful glee,
Gay, half-o'ercome timidity!

Nature has breathed into thy face
A spirit of unconscious grace—
A spirit that lies never still,

And makes thee joyous 'gainst thy will:
As, sometimes o'er a sleeping lake
Soft airs a gentle rippling make,
Till, ere we know, the strangers fly,
And water blends again with sky.

O happy sprite! didst thou but know
What pleasures through my being flow
From thy soft eyes! a holier feeling
From their blue light could ne'er be stealing;
But thou would'st be more loth to part,
And give me more of that glad heart.
Oh! gone thou art! and bearest hence
The glory of thy innocence.

But with deep joy I breathe the air
That kissed thy cheek, and fanned thy hair,
And feel, though fate our lives must sever,
Yet shall thy image live for ever!

TO A CHILD.

JOHN WILSON.

DEAR Child! whom sleep can hardly tame,
As live and beautiful as flame,
Thou glancest round my graver hours
As if thy crown of wild-wood flowers
Were not by mortal forehead worn,
But on the summer breeze were borne,
Or on a mountain streamlet's waves
Came glistening down from dreamy caves.

With bright round cheek, amid whose glow
Delight and wonder come and go;
And eyes whose inward meanings play,
Congenial with the light of day;

And brow so calm, a home for Thought
Before he knows his dwelling wrought;

Though wise indeed thou seemest not, Thou brightenest well the wise man's lot.

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That shout proclaims the undoubting mind;
That laughter leaves no ache behind;
And in thy look and dance of glee,
Unforced, unthought of, simply free,
How weak the schoolman's formal art
Thy soul and body's bliss to part!
I hail thee Childhood's very Lord,
In
gaze and glance, in voice and word.

In spite of all foreboding fear,
A thing thou art of present cheer;
And thus to be beloved and known,
As is a rushy fountain's tone,
As is the forest's leafy shade,
Or blackbird's hidden serenade.
Thou art a flash that lights the whole-
A gush from nature's vernal soul.

And yet, dear child! within thee lives
A power that deeper feeling gives,
That makes thee more than light or air,
Than all things sweet and all things fair;
And sweet and fair as aught may be,
Diviner life belongs to thee,
For 'mid thine aimless joys began
The perfect heart and will of Man.

Thus what thou art foreshows to me
How greater far thou soon shalt be;
And while amid thy garlands blow
The winds that warbling come and go,
Ever within, not loud but clear,
Prophetic murmur fills the ear,
And says that every human birth
Anew discloses God to earth.

JOHN STERLING.

TO GEORGE M—.

YES, I do love thee well, my child!
Albeit mine's a wandering mind;
But never, darling, hast thou smiled
Or breathed a wish that did not find
A ready echo in my heart.

What hours I've held thee on my knee,
Thy little rosy lips apart!

Or, when asleep, I've gazed on thee

Or by the couch of pain, a sitter meek, Watch the dim eye, and kiss the fevered cheek.

O boy! of such as thou are oftenest made Earth's fragile idols; like a tender flower, No strength in all thy freshness, prone to fade,

And bending weakly to the thundershower;

Still, round the loved, thy heart found force to bind,

And clung, like woodbine shaken in the

wind!

Then THOU, my merry love-bold in thy glee, Under the bough, or by the firelight dancing,

Mingling with every playful infant wile A mimic majesty that made us smile.

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And oh! most like a regal child wert thou! An eye of resolute and successful scheming! Fair shoulders-curling lips-and dauntless

brow

Fit for the world's strife, not for poet's dreaming;

And proud the lifting of thy stately head, And the firm bearing of thy conscious tread.

Different from both! yet each succeeding

claim

I, that all other love had been forswearing, Forthwith admitted, equal and the same;

Nor injured either by this love's comparing; Nor stole a fraction for the newer call

glancing,

Full of a wild and irrepressible mirth,
Like a young sunbeam to the gladdened earth!

Thine was the shout, the song, the burst of joy,

Which sweet from childhood's rosy lip resoundeth;

Thine was the eager spirit naught could cloy, And the glad heart from which all grief reboundeth;

And many a mirthful jest and mock reply Lurked in the laughter of thy dark-blue eye.

And thine was many an art to win and bless, The cold and stern to joy and fondness

warming;

The coaxing smile-the frequent soft caress— The earnest tearful prayer all wrath disarming!

Again my heart a new affection found, But thought that love with thee had reached its bound.

At length THOU camest-thou, the last and least,

Nick-named "The Emperor" by thy laugh

ing brothers

Because a haughty spirit swelled thy breast, And thou didst seek to rule and sway the others

CAROLINE NORTON.

MOTHER'S LOVE.

HE sang so wildly, did the boy,
That you could never tell

If 't was a madman's voice you heard,
Or if the spirit of a bird

Within his heart did dwell

A bird that dallies with his voice
Among the matted branches;
Or on the free blue air his note,
To pierce, and fall, and rise, and float,
With bolder utterance launches.
None ever was so sweet as he,
The boy that wildly sang to me;
Though toilsome was the way and long,
He led me, not to lose the song.

But when again we stood below
The unhidden sky, his feet

Grew slacker, and his note more slow,
But more than doubly sweet.
He led me then a little way
Athwart the barren moor,
And there he stayed, and bade me stay,
Beside a cottage door;

I could have stayed of mine own will,
In truth, my eye and heart to fill
With the sweet sight which I saw there,
At the dwelling of the cottager.