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AN EXCURSION TO THE MOUNTAINS.

[From The Village Patriarch.]

Come, Father of the Hamlet! grasp again

Thy stern ash plant, cut when the woods were young; Come, let us leave the plough-subjected plain,

And rise, with freshened hearts, and nerves restrung,

Into the azure dome, that, haply, hung

O'er thoughtful power, ere suffering had begun.

II.

Flowers peep, trees bud, boughs tremble, rivers run;
The redwing saith, it is a glorious morn.

Blue are thy Heavens, thou Highest! and thy sun
Shines without cloud, all fire. How sweetly, borne
On wings of morning o'er the leafless thorn,
The tiny wren's small twitter warbles near !
How swiftly flashes in the stream the trout!
Woodbine! our father's ever-watchful ear
Knows, by thy rustle, that thy leaves are out.
The trailing bramble hath not yet a sprout;
Yet harshly to the wind the wanton prates,
Not with thy smooth lisp, woodbine of the fields!
Thou future treasure of the bee, that waits
Gladly on thee, spring's harbinger! when yields
All bounteous earth her odorous flowers, and builds
The nightingale, in beauty's fairest land.

III.

Five rivers, like the fingers of a hand,

Flung from black mountains, mingle, and are onc
Where sweetest valleys quit the wild and grand,

And eldest forests, o'er the silvan Don,

Bid their immortal brother journey on,

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A stately pilgrim, watched by all the hills.
Say, shall we wander where, through warriors' graves,
The infant Yewden, mountain-cradled, trills
Her doric notes? Or, where the Locksley raves
Of broil and battle, and the rocks and caves
Dream yet of ancient days? Or, where the sky
Darkens o'er Rivilin, the clear and cold,

That throws his blue length, like a snake, from high?
Or, where deep azure brightens into gold

O'er Sheaf, that mourns in Eden? Or, where rolled
On tawny sands, through regions passion-wild,
And groves of love, in jealous beauty dark,
Complains the Porter, Nature's thwarted child,
Born in the waste, like headlong Wiming? Hark!
The poised hawk calls thee, Village Patriarch!
He calls thee to his mountains! Up, away!
Up, up, to Stanedge! higher still ascend,
Till kindred rivers, from the summit grey,
To distant seas their course in beauty bend,
And, like the lives of human millions, blend
Disparted waves in one immensity!

SONG.

Child, is thy father dead?

Father is gone!

Why did they tax his bread ?

God's will be done!
Mother has sold her bed:

Better to die than wed!

Where shall she lay her head?

Home we have none !

Father clammed' thrice a week-

God's will be done!

Long for work did he seek,

Work he found none.

Fasted; was hungry.

Tears on his hollow cheek

Told what no tongue could speak:
Why did his master break?

God's will be done!

Doctor said air was best-
Food we had none;
Father, with panting breast,
Groaned to be gone:
Now he is with the blest-
Mother says death is best!
We have no place of rest-
Yes, we have one!

BATTLE SONG.

Day, like our souls, is fiercely dark;

What then? 'Tis day!

We sleep no more; the cock crows-hark! To arms! away!

They come! they come ! the knell is rung Of us or them;

Wide o'er their march the pomp is flung

Of gold and gem.

What collared hound of lawless sway,

To famine dear

What pensioned slave of Attila,

Leads in the rear?

Come they from Scythian wilds afar,

Our blood to spill?

Wear they the livery of the Czar ?

They do his will.

Nor tasselled silk, nor epaulette,

Nor plume, nor torse—

No splendour gilds, all sternly met,

Our foot and horse.

But, dark and still, we inly glow,

Condensed in ire!

Strike, tawdry slaves, and ye shall know
Our gloom is fire.

In vain your pomp, ye evil powers,
Insults the land;

Wrongs, vengeance, and the cause are ours,
And God's right hand!
Madmen! they trample into snakes

The wormy clod

Like fire, beneath their feet awakes
The sword of God!
Behind, before, above, below,

They rouse the brave;

Where'er they go, they make a foe,
Or find a grave.

A POET'S EPITAPH.

Stop, Mortal! Here thy brother lies,

The Poet of the Poor.

His books were rivers, woods, and skies,
The meadow, and the moor;

His teachers were the torn hearts' wail,

The tyrant and the slave,

The street, the factory, the jail,

The palace-and the grave!

The meanest thing, earth's feeblest vorm, He feared to scorn or hate;

And honoured in a peasant's form

The equal of the great.

But if he loved the rich who make
The poor man's little more,

Ill could he praise the rich who take

From plundered labour's store.

A hand to do, a head to plan,

A heart to feel and dare

Tell man's worst foes, here lies the man
Who drew them as they are.

THE THREE MARYS AT CASTLE HOWARD, IN 1812 AND 1837.

The lifeless son--the mother's agony,
O'erstrained till agony refused to feel-

That sinner too I then dry-eyed could see;
For I was hardened in my selfish weal,

And strength and joy had strung my soul with steel
I knew not then what man may live to be,

A thing of life, that feels he lives in vain-
A taper, to be quenched in misery!
Forgive me, then, Caracci! if I seek

To look on this, thy tale of tears, again;
For now the swift is slow, the strong is weak.
Mother of Christ! how merciful is pain!
But if I longer view thy tear-stained cheek,
Heart-broken Magdalen! my heart will break.

PLAINT.

Dark, deep, and cold the current flows
Unto the sea where no wind blows,
Seeking the land which no one knows.

O'er its sad gloom still comes and goes
The mingled wail of friends and foes,
Borne to the land which no one knows.

Why shrieks for help yon wretch, who goes
With millions, from a world of woes,
Unto the land which no one knows?

Though myriads go with him who goes,
Alone he goes where no wind blows,
Unto the land which no one knows.

For all must go where no wind blows,
And none can go for him who goes;
None, none «eturn whence no one knows.

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