And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my joy
Of youthful sports was on thy breast to be
Borne, like thy bubbles, onward: from a boy
I wantoned with thy breakers-they to me
Were a delight; and if the freshening sea
Made them a terror-'twas a pleasing fear;
For I was as it were a child of thee,
And trusted to thy billows far and near,
And laid my hand upon thy mane-as I do here.

The Letter H.

'Twas whispered in heaven, 'twas muttered in hell,
And echo caught softly the sound as it fell;
In the confines of earth 'twas permitted to rest,
And the depths of the ocean its presence confest;
'Twas seen in the lightning, 'twas heard in the thunder,
"Twill be found in the spheres when they're riven asunder.
'Twas given to man with his earliest breath,

It assists at his birth and attends him in death,
Presides o'er his happiness, honour, and health,
'Tis the prop of his house and the end of his wealth;
It begins every hope, every wish it must bound,

With the husbandman toils, and with monarchs is crowned;
In the heaps of the miser 'tis hoarded with care,
But is sure to be lost in the prodigal heir;
Without it the soldier and sailor may roam,
But woe to the wretch who expels it from home!
In the whispers of conscience it there will be found,
Nor e'er in the whirlwind of passion be drowned;
It softens the heart, and though deaf to the ear,
It will make it acutely and instantly hear;
But in shades let it rest, like an elegant flower,
Oh! breathe on it softly, it dies in an hour.

MRS. SIGOURNEY:

1791-1865.

Flowers in Childhood and Age.

THE flowers were beautiful to me,
When childhood lured the way
Along the green and sunny slope,
Or through the groves to stray.
They were to me as playmates dear,
And when upon my knee

I whispered to them in their beds,
Methought they answered me.

I bent to kiss them where they grew,
And smiling bore away

On lip and cheek the diamond dew
That glittering decked their spray.
The bud on which no eye hath glanced,
Save His who formed its pride,
Seemed as a sister to my heart,
For it had none beside.

Then countless gay and fairy forms
Gleamed by, on pinions rare,
And many a castle's turret bright
Was pictured on the air;
For Fancy held me so in thrall,
And peopled every scene,

That flowers might only fill the space
A thousand joys between,

But as life's river nears its goal,

And glittering bubbles break,

The love of flowers is like his grasp

Whom stronger props forsake,

Who, drifting towards some wintry clime,

Hangs o'er the vessel's side

To snatch one faded wreath of hope

From out the whelming tide.

Like his, who on the isthmus stands
Whose ever-crumbling verge
Divides the weary race of time
From death's advancing surge,
And sees, to cheer its dreary strand,
Pale memory's leaflets start,
And binds them, as a blessed balm,
To heal his lonely heart.

SHELLEY:

1792-1822.

To the Skylark.—An Ode.

HAIL to thee, blithe spirit!
Bird thou never wert,
That from heaven, or near it,
Pourest thy full heart

In profuse strains or unpremeditated art.

Higher still and higher,

From the earth thou springest

Like a cloud of fire;

The deep blue thou wingest,

And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.

In the golden lightning

Of the sunken sun,

Over which clouds are brightening,

Thou dost float and run;

Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.

The pale purple even

Melts around thy flight;

Like a star of heaven

In the broad day-light,

Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight.

Keen as are the arrows

Of that silver sphere,

Whose intense lamp narrows

In the white dawn clear,

Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there.

All the earth and air

With thy voice is loud;
As, when night is bare,
From one lonely cloud

The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflowed.

What thou art we know not;

What is most like thee?

From rainbow clouds there flow not

Drops so bright to see

As from thy presence showers a rain of melody.

Like a poet hidden

In the light of thought,
Singing hymns unbidden,
Till the world is wrought

To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not.

Like a high-born maiden
In a palace tower,
Soothing her love-laden

Soul in secret hour

With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower.

Like a glowworm golden

In a dell of dew,

Scattering, unbeholden,

Its aerial hue

Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the

view.

Like a rose embowered

In its own green leaves,
By warm winds deflowered

Till the scent it gives

Makes faint with too much sweet these heavy-wingèd thieves.

Sounds of vernal showers

On the twinkling grass,
Rain-awakened flowers,

All that ever was

Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass.

Teach us, sprite or bird,

What sweet thoughts are thine :
I have never heard

Praise of love or wine

That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.

Chorus hymeneal

Or triumphal chaunt,

Matched with thine would be all

But as empty vaunt

A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want.

What objects are the fountains

Of thy happy strain?

What fields, or waves, or mountains?

What shapes of sky or plain?

What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain?

With thy clear keen joyance

Languor cannot be:

Shadow of annoyance

Never came near thee:

Thou lovest; but never knew love's sad satiety.

Waking or asleep,

Thou of death must deem
Things more true and deep

Than we mortals dream;

Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream?

We look before and after,

And pine for what is not:

Our sincerest laughter

With some pain is fraught:

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.

Yet if we could scorn

Hate, and pride, and fear,

If we were things born

Not to shed a tear,

I know not how thy joys we ever should come

near.