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SUNRISE ABOVE THE CLOUDS.

Scorned bramble of the brake! once more

Thou bidd'st me be a boy,

To gad with thee the woodlands o'er,

In freedom and in joy.

ELLIOTT.

AN EVENING VISIT TO WINDERMERE

BEHOLD the shades f afternoon have fallen
Upon this flowery slope; and see—beyond—
The silvery lake is streaked with placid blue;
As if preparing for the peace of evening.
How tempting the landscape shines! The air
Breathes invitation; easy is the walk

To the lake's margin, where a boat lies moored
Beneath her sheltering tree.

WORDSWORTH.

SUNRISE ABOVE THE CLOUDS.

I STOOD upon the hills, when heaven's wide arch Was glorious with the sun's returning march, And woods were brightened, and soft gales Went forth to kiss the sun-clad vales.

SUNRISE ABOVE THE CLOUDS.

The clouds were far beneath me ;-bathed in light, They gathered mid-day round the wooded height,

And, in their fading glory, shone

Like hosts in battle overthrown,

As many a pinnacle, with shifting glance,
Through the gray mist thrust up its shattered lance,
And rocking on the cliff was left

The dark pine, blasted, bare, and cleft.

The veil of cloud was lifted, and below

Glowed the rich valley, and the river's flow
Was darkened by the forest's shade,
Or glistened in the white cascade;

Where upward, in the mellow blush of day,
The noisy bittern wheeled his spiral way.

I heard the distant waters dash,

I saw the current whirl and flash,—

And richly, by the blue lake's silver beach,

The woods were bending with a silent reach.
Then o'er the vale, with gentle swell,

The music of the village bell

Came sweetly to the echo-giving hills,

And the wild horn, whose voice the woodland fills,

Was ringing to the merry shout,

That faint and far the glen sent out,

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Where, answering to the sudden shot, thin smoke,

Through thick-leaved branches, from the dingle

broke.

If thou art worn and hard beset

With sorrows, that thou wouldst forget,

If thou wouldst read a lesson, that will keep
Thy heart from fainting and thy soul from sleep,

Go to the woods and hills!-No tears

Dim the sweet look that Nature wears.

LONGFELLOW

THE FOREST STREAM.

DELIGHTFUL is this loneliness; it calms

My heart pleasant the cool beneath these elms
That throw across the stream a moveless shade.
Here Nature in her mid-noon whisper speaks;
How peaceful every sound!—the ring-dove's plaint,
Moaned from the forest's gloomiest retreat,

While every other woodland lay is mute,

Save when the wren flits from her down-coved nest, And from the root-sprigs trills her ditty clear,The grasshopper's oft-pausing chirp—the buzz, Angrily shrill, of moss-entangled bee,