Till death like sleep might steal on me,
And I might feel in the warm air
My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea
Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.
Some might lament that I were cold,
As I, when this sweet day is gone,

35

Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,
Insults with this untimely moan;

40

They might lament-for I am one

Whom men love not, and yet regret ;

Unlike this day, which, when the sun

Shall on its stainless glory set,

Will linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory yet. 45

Percy Bysshe Shelley.

CCXXIX

DESPONDENCY REBUKED.

Say not, the struggle nought availeth,
The labour and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke concealed,
Your comrades chase e'en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.

5

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
Seem here no painful inch to gain,

10

Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light;
In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly,
But westward, look, the land is bright.

Arthur Hugh Clough.

15

CCX.XX

THE LIGHT OF OTHER DAYS.

Oft in the stilly night

Ere slumber's chain has bound me, Fond Memory brings the light

Of other days around me:

The smiles, the tears

Of boyhood's years,

The words of love then spoken ;

The eyes that shone,

Now dimmed and gone,

The cheerful hearts now broken!

Thus in the stilly light

Ere slumber's chain has bound me,

Sad Memory brings the light

Of other days around me.

When I remember all

The friends so linked together

I've seen around me fall

Like leaves in wintry weather,

I feel like one

Who treads alone

Some banquet-hall deserted,

Whose lights are fled,

Whose garlands dead,

And all but he departed!

Thus in the stilly night

Ere slumber's chain has bound me,

Sad Memory brings the light

Of other days around me.

5

10

15

Thomas Moore.

20

25

CCXXXI

DIRGE.

If thou wilt ease thine heart

Of love, and all its smart-
Then sleep, dear, sleep!

And not a sorrow

Hang any tear on your eyelashes;

Lie still and deep,

Sad soul, until the sea-wave washes

The rim o' the sun to-morrow

In Eastern sky.

5

But wilt thou cure thine heart

IO

Of love, and all its smart

Then die, dear, die!

'Tis deeper, sweeter,

Than on a rose-bank to lie dreaming

Fresh clad from heaven in robes of white,
A young probationer of light,

Thou wert, my soul, an album bright,

A spotless leaf; but thought, and care,
And friend and foe, in foul and fair,
Have written strange defeatures' there;
And Time with heaviest hand of all,
Like that fierce writing on the wall,
Hath stamped sad dates-he can't recall.

5

And error, gilding worst designs

Like speckled snake that strays and shines—
Betrays his path by crooked lines;

And vice hath left his ugly blot;

And good resolves, a moment hot,
Fairly began-but finished not;

And fruitless, late remorse doth trace-
Like Hebrew lore a backward pace—
Her irrecoverable race.

Disjointed numbers; sense unknit ;
Huge reams of folly; shreds of wit;
Compose the mingled mass of it.

My scalded eyes no longer brook
Upon this ink-blurred thing to look-
Go, shut the leaves, and clasp the book.

Charles Lamb.

ΙΟ

15

20

CCXXXIII

SONNET.

October's gold is dim-the forests rot,
The weary rain falls ceaseless, while the day
Is wrapt in damp. In mire of village-way
The hedgerow leaves are stampt, and, all forgot,
The broodless nest sits visible in the thorn.
Autumn, among her drooping marigolds,
Weeps all her garnered fields and empty folds
And dripping orchards, plundered and forlorn.
The season is a dead one, and I die!

No more, no more for me the spring shall make
A resurrection in the earth, and take

The death from out her heart-O God, I die!
The cold throat-mist creeps nearer, till I breathe
Corruption. Drop, stark night, upon my death!

David Gray.

5

10

CCXXXIV

SONNET.

Die down, O dismal day, and let me live;
And come, blue deeps, magnificently strewn
With coloured clouds-large, light, and fugitive-
By upper winds through pompous motions blown.
Now it is death in life-a vapour dense
Creeps round my window, till I cannot see
The far snow-shining mountains, and the glens
Shagging the mountain tops. O God! make free
This barren shackled earth, so deadly cold-
Breathe gently forth thy spring, till winter flies
In rude amazement, fearful and yet bold,
While she performs her customed charities.
I weigh the loaded hours till life is bare_

O God, for one clear day, a snowdrop, and sweet air!

CCXXXV
SONNET.

David Gray.

O Winter, wilt thou never, never, go?
O Summer, but I weary for thy coming,
Longing once more to hear the Luggie flow,
And frugal bees, laboriously humming.
Now the east wind diseases the infirm,

And I must crouch in corners from rough weather
Sometimes a winter sunset is a charm—
When the fired clouds, compacted, blaze together,
And the large sun dips red behind the hills.
I, from my window, can behold this pleasure;
And the eternal moon, what time she fills
Her orb with argent, treading a soft measure,
With queenly motions of a bridal mood,
Through the white spaces of infinitude.

David Gray.

5

ΙΟ

5

;

IO