All is so quiet; The Stare among it's graves! the troubled breast, wounded Spirit, the hearts oppressed, find the repose it draves. may Stanny W. Longfellow. M POEMS OF PLACES. THE CHIMES OF ENGLAND. THE chimes, the chimes of Motherland, Of England green and old, That out from fane and ivied tower A thousand years have toll'dHow glorious must their music be As breaks the hallow'd day, And calleth with a seraph's voice A nation up to pray! Those chimes that tell a thousand tales Sweet tales of olden time! And ring a thousand memories At vesper, and at prime: At bridal and at burial, For cottager and king From hill to hill, like sentinels, Responsively they cry, And sing the rising of the Lord, From vale to mountain high. I love ye, chimes of Motherland, That England's glory tells; For you, ye Christian bells! And heir of her ancestral fame, And happy in my birth, Those chimes-those glorious Christian Thee, too, I love, my forest-land, chimes, How blessedly they ring! Those chimes, those chimes of Motherland, Upon a Christmas morn, Outbreaking, as the angels did, For a Redeemer born, How merrily they call afar, To cot and baron's hall, With holly deck'd and misletoe, The chimes of England, how they peal And then, those Easter bells, in Spring, The joy of all the earth; For thine thy mother's voice shall be, With English chimes, from Christian spires, The wilderness shall ring. ARTHUR CLEVELAND COXE. SONNET. COMPOSED UPON WESTMINSTER Bridge. EARTH has not anything to show more fair; Dull would he be of soul who could pass by A sight so touching in its majesty: This city now doth like a garment wear The beauty of the morning; silent, bare, Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and tem ples lie Open unto the fields, and to the sky; All bright and glittering in the smokeless air. Never did sun more beautifully steep In his first splendor valley, rock, or hill; Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep! The river glideth at his own sweet will; Dear God! the very houses seem asleep, And all that mighty heart is lying still. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. To a sheepskin gave the story: And pledging with contented smack Happy field or mossy cavern Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern? JOHN KEATS. ON THE TOMBS IN WESTMINSTER ABBEY. MORTALITY, behold and fear What a change of flesh is here! Sleep within these heaps of stones! Where from their pulpits seal'd with dust Since the first man died for sin; died!" Here are sands, ignoble things, Dropt from the ruin'd sides of kings; Here's a world of pomp and state Buried in dust, once dead by fate. FRANCIS BEAUMONT. LINES ON THE MERMAID TAVERN. SOULS of poets dead and gone, I have heard that on a day SONNET. WRITTEN AFTER SEEING WINDSOR CASTLE. FROM beauteous Windsor's high and storied halls Where Edward's chiefs start from the glowing walls, To my low cot from ivory beds of state, Pleased I return unenvious of the great. So the bee ranges o'er the varied scenes Of corn, of heaths, of fallows, and of greens, Pervades the thicket, soars above the hill, Or murmurs to the meadow's murmuring rill: Now haunts old hollow'd oaks, deserted cells, Now seeks the low vale lily's silver bells; Sips the warm fragrance of the greenhouse bowers, And tastes the myrtle and the citron's flowers; At length returning to the wonted comb, Prefers to all his little straw-built home. THOMAS WARTON. ON A DISTANT PROSPECT OF ETON YE distant spires, ye antique towers, Ah, happy hills! ah, pleasing shade! Ah, fields beloved in vain !— I feel the gales that from ye blow As, waving fresh their gladsome wing, To breathe a second spring. Say, Father Thames-for thou hast seen To chase the rolling circle's speed, While some, on urgent business bent, Some bold adventurers disdain And unknown regions dare descry; And snatch a fearful joy. Gay hope is theirs by Fancy fed, Less pleasing when possest; The tear forgot as soon as shed, The sunshine of the breast: Theirs buxom health, of rosy hue, Wild wit, invention ever new, And lively cheer, of vigor born; The thoughtless day, the easy night, The spirits pure, the slumbers light, That fly th' approach of morn. Alas! regardless of their doom, The little victims play; No sense have they of ills to come, Nor care beyond to-day; Yet see, how all around them wait And black Misfortune's baleful train! Ah, show them where in ambush stand, To seize their prey, the murderous band! Ah, tell them, they are men! |