Some might lament that I were cold,
As I when this sweet day is gone,
Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,
Insults with this untimely moan;
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.
THERE was a little lawny islet
By anemone and violet,
Like mosaic, paven :
And its roof was flowers and leaves,
Which the summer's breath enweaves,
Where nor sun nor showers nor breeze
Pierce the pines and tallest trees,
Each a gem engraven.
Girt by many an azure wave
With which the clouds and mountains pave
WHEN some dear human friend to death doth bow,
Fair blooming flowers are strewn upon the bier,
And haply, in the silent house, we hear
The last wild kiss ring on the marble brow,
And lips that never missed reply till now;
And thou, poor dog, wert in thy measure dear—
And so I owe thee honour, and the tear
Of friendship, and would all thy worth allow.
In a false world, thy heart was brave and sound;
So, when my spade carved out thy latest lair,
A spot to rest thee on, I sought and found-
It was a tuft of primrose, fresh and fair,
And, as it was thy last hour above ground,
I laid thy sightless head full gently there.
"I cannot think thine all is buried here,"
I said and sighed-the wind awoke and blew
The morning beam along the gossamer
That floated o'er thy grave all wet with dew:
A hint of better things, however.slight,
Will feed a loving hope; it soothed my woe
To watch that little shaft of heavenly light
Pass o'er thee, moving softly to and fro:
Within our Father's heart the secret lies
Of this dim world; why should we only live,
And what was I that I should close mine eyes
On all those rich presumptions, that reprieve
The meanest life from dust and ashes?
How much on such dark ground a gleaming thread
can do!
OUR little bird in his full day of health
With his gold-coated beauty made us glad,
But when disease approached with cruel stealth,
A sadder interest our smiles forbad.
How oft we watched him, when the night hours
His poor head buried near his bursting heart,
Which beat within a puft and troubled frame ;
But he has gone at last, and played his part:
The seed-glass, slighted by his sickening taste,
The little moulted feathers, saffron-tipt,
The fountain, where his fever'd bill was dipt,
The perches, which his failing feet embraced,
All these remain-not even his bath removed—
But where's the spray and flutter that we loved?
He shall not be cast out like wild-wood things!
We will not spurn those delicate remains;
No heat shall blanch his plumes, nor soaking rains
Shall wash the saffron from his little wings;
Nor shall he be inearthed-but in his cage
Stand, with his innocent beauty unimpaired :
And all the skilled'st hand can do, to assuage
Poor Dora's grief, by more than Dora shared,
Shall here be done. What tho' those orbs of glass
Will feebly represent his merry look
Of recognition when he saw her pass,
Or from her palm the melting cherry took-
Yet the artist's kindly craft shall not retail
The filming eye, and beak that gasped with pain.
Charles Tennyson Turner.
Now, as the time wore by to our Lord's day,
Spring linger'd in the chambers of the South.
The nightingales were far in fairy lands.
Beyond the sunset: but the wet blue woods
Were half aware of violets in the wake
Of morning rains. The swallow still delay'd
To build and be about in noisy roofs,
And March was moaning in the windy elm.
With him from Carlyel to Camelot
To see the jousts. But she, because that yet
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