NATURE.

T may indeed be phantasy when I

Essay to draw from all created things

Deep, heartfelt, inward joy that closely clings;

And trace in leaves and flowers that round me lie

Lessons of love and earnest piety.

So let it be; and if the wide world rings

In mock of this belief, to me it brings

Nor fear, nor grief, nor vain perplexity.
So will I build my altar in the fields,

And the blue sky my fretted dome shall be,
And the sweet fragrance that the wild flower yields
Shall be the incense I will yield to Thee,

The only God! and Thou shalt not despise
Even me, the priest of this poor sacrifice.

FANCY IN NUBIBUS.

IT is pleasant, with a heart at ease,

Just after sunset, or by moonlight skies,

To make the shifting clouds be what you please,

Or let the easily-persuaded eyes

Own each quaint likeness issuing from the mould

Of a friend's fancy; or, with head bent low

And cheek aslant, see rivers flow of gold

'Twixt crimson banks; and then, a traveller, go

From mount to mount through Cloudland, gorgeous land! Or listening to the tide, with closëd sight,

Be that blind bard who, on the Chian strand

By those deep sounds possessed with inward light,

Beheld the Iliad and the Odyssee

Rise to the swelling of the voiceful sea.

THE AUTUMNAL MOON.

ILD splendour of the various-vested Night!
Mother of wildly-working-visions! hail!

I watch thy gliding, while with watery light
Thy weak eye glimmers through a fleecy veil;
And when thou lovest thy pale orb to shroud
Behind the gathered blackness lost on high;
And when thou dartest from the wind-rent cloud
Thy placid lightning o'er the awakened sky.
Ah such is Hope! as changeful and as fair!
Now dimly peering on the wistful sight;
Now hid behind the dragon-winged Despair;
But soon emerging in her radiant might
She o'er the sorrow-clouded breast of Care
Sails, like a meteor kindling in its flight.

FAREWELL TO LOVE.

AREWELL, sweet Love! yet blame you not

my truth:

More fondly ne'er did mother eye her child
Than I your form. Yours were my hopes of youth,
And as you shaped my thoughts, I sighed or smiled.
While most were wooing wealth, or gaily swerving
To pleasure's secret haunts, and some apart
Stood strong in pride, self-conscious of deserving,
To you I gave my whole, weak, wishing heart.
And when I met the maid that realized

Your fair creations, and had won her kindness,
Say but for her if aught on earth I prized!

Your dream alone I dreamt, and caught your blindness.
O grief!—but farewell, Love! I will go play me
With thoughts that please me less, and less betray me.

ASK not riches, and I ask not power,
Nor in her revel rout shall Pleasure view

Me ever,—a far sweeter nymph I woo.

Hail, sweet Retirement! lead me to thy bower, Where fair Content has spread her loveliest flower, Of more enduring, though less gaudy hue, Than Pleasure scatters to her giddy crew; Nor let aught break upon thy sacred hour, Save some true friend, of pure congenial soul; To such the latchet of my wicket-gate Let me lift freely, glad to share the dole Fortune allows me, whether small or great,

And a warm heart, that knows not the control

Of Fortune, and defies the frown of Fate.