THOU HAST SWORN BY THY GOD, MY | Sprinkled with pearl, and pearling flowers atween,
THOU hast sworn by thy God, my Jeanie,
By that pretty white hand o' thine,
And by a' the lowing stars in heaven,
That thou wad aye be mine!
And I hae sworn by my God, my Jeanie,
And by that kind heart o' thine,
By a' the stars sown thick owre heaven,
That thou shalt aye be mine?
Then foul fa' the hands that wad loose sic bands,
And the heart that wad part sic luve !
But there's nae hand can loose my band,
But the finger o' Him abuve.
Though the wee, wee cot maun be my bield,
And my claithing ne'er sae mean,
I wad lap me up rich i' the faulds o' luve,
Heaven's armfu' o' my Jean.
Her white arm wad be a pillow for me,
Fu' safter than the down;
Do like a golden mantle her attire ;
And being crowned with a garland green,
Seem like some maiden queen.
Her modest eyes, abashéd to behold
So many gazers as on her do stare,
Upon the lowly ground affixéd are;
Ne dare lift up her countenance too bold,
But blush to hear her praises sung so loud,
So far from being proud.
Nathless do ye still loud her praises sing,
That all the woods may answer, and your echo ring.
Tell me, ye merchants' daughters, did ye see
So fair a creature in your town before?
So sweet, so lovely, and so mild as she,
Adorned with Beauty's grace and Virtue's store?
Her goodly eyes like sapphires, shining bright
Her forehead ivory white,
Her cheeks like apples which the sun hath rudded,
Her lips like cherries charming men to bite,
Her breast like to a bowl of cream uncrudded,
Her paps like lilies budded,
And Luve wad winnow owre us his kind, kind Her snowy neck like to a marble tower ;
And sweetly I'd sleep, and soun'.
Come here to me, thou lass o' my luve !
Come here and kneel wi' me!
The morn is fu' o' the presence o' God,
And I canna pray without thee.
The morn wind is sweet 'mang the beds o' new
flowers,
The wee birds sing kindlie and hie;
Our gudeman leans owre his kale-yard dike,
And a blythe auld bodie is he.
The Beuk maun be ta'en whan the carle comes
Wi' the holy psalmodie;
And thou maun speak o' me to thy God,
And I will speak o' thee.
Lo! where she comes along with portly pace,
Like Phoebe from her chamber of the east,
Arising forth to run her mighty race,
Clad all in white, that seems a virgin best.
So well it her beseems, that ye would ween
Some angel she had been.
Her long, loose yellow locks, like golden wire,
And all her body like a palace fair,
Ascending up with many a stately stair
To Honor's seat and Chastity's sweet bower.
Why stand ye still, ye virgins, in amaze,
Upon her so to gaze,
Whilst ye forget your former lay to sing,
To which the woods did answer, and your echo ring.
THERE are who say the lover's heart
Is in the loved one's merged;
O, never by love's own warm art
So cold a plea was urged !
No!-hearts that love hath crowned or crossed,
Love fondly knits together;
But not a thought or hue is lost
That made a part of either.
It is an ill-told tale that tells
Of "hearts by love made one";
He grows who near another's dwells
More conscious of his own;
In each spring up new thoughts and powers
That, mid love's warm, clear weather,
Together tend like climbing flowers,
And, turning, grow together.
MINE eyes he closed, but open left the cell
Of fancy, my internal sight, by which
Abstract, as in a trance, methought I saw,
Though sleeping, where I lay, and saw the shape
Still glorious before whom awake I stood;
Who, stooping, opened my left side, and took
From thence a rib, with cordial spirits warm,
And life-blood streaming fresh; wide was the
wound,
But suddenly with flesh filled up and healed:
The rib he formed and fashioned with his hands;
Under his forming hands a creature grew,
Manlike, but different sex, so lovely fair,
That what seemed fair in all the world seemed
Mean, or in her summed up, in her contained
And in her looks, which from that time infused
Sweetness into my heart, unfelt before,
And into all things from her air inspired
The spirit of love and amorous delight.
She disappeared, and left me dark; I waked
To find her, or forever to deplore
Her loss, and other pleasures all abjure:
When out of hope, behold her, not far off,
Such as I saw her in my dream, adorned
With what all earth or Heaven could bestow
To make her amiable. On she came,
Led by her heavenly Maker, though unseen,
And guided by his voice, nor uninformed
Of nuptial sanctity and marriage rites:
Grace was in all her steps, Heaven in her eye,
In every gesture dignity and love.
I, overjoyed, could not forbear aloud :
"This turn hath made amends; thou hast
Thy words, Creator bounteous and benign,
Not obvious, not obtrusive, but retired,
The more desirable; or, to say all,
Nature herself, though pure of sinful thought,
Wrought in her so, that, seeing me,
she turned:
I followed her; she what was honor knew,
And with obsequious majesty approved
My pleaded reason. To the nuptial bower
I led her blushing like the morn: all Heaven,
And happy constellations on that hour
Shed their selectest influence; the earth
Gave sign of gratulation, and each hill;
Joyous the birds; fresh gales and gentle airs
Whispered it to the woods, and from their
wings
Flung rose, flung odors from the spicy shrub,
Disporting, till the amorous bird of night
Sung spousal, and bid haste the evening star
On his hill-top, to light the bridal lamp.
Her loveliness, so absolute she seems,
And in herself complete, so well to know
Her own, that what she wills to do or say
Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best;
All higher knowledge in her presence falls
Degraded, wisdom in discourse with her
Loses discountenanced, and like folly shows:
Authority and reason on her wait,
As one intended first, not after made
Occasionally; and, to consummate all,
Greatness of mind and nobleness their seat
Build in her loveliest, and create an awe
About her, as a guard angelic placed."
Neither her outside formed so fair, nor aught In procreation common to all kinds,
So much delights me, as those graceful acts,
Those thousand decencies that daily flow
From all her words and actions, mixed with love
And sweet compliance, which declare unfeigned
Union of mind, or in us both one soul;
Harmony to behold in wedded pair
More grateful than harmonious sound to the ear.
She was gentler and shyer
Than the light fawn which stood by her,
And her eyes emit a fire
Soft and tender as her soul;
Love's dewy light doth drown her,
And the braided locks that crown her
Than autumn's trees are browner,
When the golden shadows roll
Along Glengariff's sea;
And crowds in many a galley
To the happy marriage rally
Of the maiden of the valley
And the youth of Céim-an-eich,
Old eyes with joy are weeping, as all ask on bended knee,
A blessing, gentle Alice, upon thee.
DENIS FLORENCE MACCARTHY.
TO A LADY BEFORE MARRIAGE.
O, FORMED by Nature, and refined by Art,
With charms to win, and sense to fix the heart!
By thousands sought, Clotilda, canst thou free
Thy crowd of captives and descend to me?
Content in shades obscure to waste thy life,
A hidden beauty and a country wife?
O, listen while thy summers are my theme!
Ah! soothe thy partner in his waking dream!
In some small hamlet on the lonely plain,
Where Thames through meadows rolls his mazy
Or where high Windsor, thick with greens arrayed, Through the forests in the evening, when cathe- Waves his old oaks, and spreads his ample shade,
And the purple sun advanceth to its goal.
Her cottage was a dwelling
All regal homes excelling,
But, ah! beyond the telling
Was the beauty round it spread,
The wave and sunshine playing,
Like sisters each arraying,
Far down the sea-plants swaying
Upon their coral bed,
And languid as the tresses on a sleeping maiden's head,
When the summer breeze is dead.
Need we say that Maurice loved her,
And that no blush reproved her,
When her throbbing bosom moved her
To give the heart she gave?
That by dawn-light and by twilight,
And, O blessed moon, by thy light,
When the twinkling stars on high light
The wanderer o'er the wave,
Fancy has figured out our calm retreat;
Already round the visionary seat
Our limes begin to shoot, our flowers to spring
The brooks to murmur, and the birds to sing.
Where dost thou lie, thou thinly peopled green,
Thou nameless lawn, and village yet unseen,
Where sons, contented with their native ground,
Ne'er travelled further than ten furlongs round,
And the tanned peasant and his ruddy bride
Were born together, and together died,
Where early larks best tell the morning light,
And only Philomel disturbs the night?
Midst gardens here my humble pile shall rise,
With sweets surrounded of ten thousand dyes;
All savage where th' embroidered gardens end,
The haunt of echoes, shall my woods ascend;
And oh! if Heaven th' ambitious thought approve,
A rill shall warble 'cross the gloomy grove,
A little rill, o'er pebbly beds conveyed,
Gush down the steep, and glitter through the glade.
What cheering scents these bordering banks exhale!
How loud that heifer lows from yonder vale!
That thrush how shrill! his note so clear, so high,
He drowns each feathered minstrel of the sky.
His steps unconscious led him where Glengariff's Here let me trace beneath the purpled morn
Each mossy bank and cave.
The sun his gold is flinging,
The happy birds are singing,
And bells are gayly ringing
The deep-mouthed beagle and the sprightly horn,
Or lure the trout with well-dissembled flies,
Or fetch the fluttering partridge from the skies.
Nor shall thy hand disdain to crop the vine,
The downy peach, or flavored nectarine;
Or rob the beehive of its golden hoard,
And bear th' unbought luxuriance to thy board
No
grape that's kindly ripe could be
So round, so plump, so soft as she,
Nor half so full of juice.
Her finger was so small, the ring
Would not stay on which they did bring,
It was too wide a peck;
And, to say truth, - for out it must,
It looked like the great collar — just -
About our young colt's neck.
Her feet beneath her petticoat,
Like little mice, stole in and out,
As if they feared the light;
But O, she dances such a way!
No sun upon an Easter-day
Is half so fine a sight.
Her cheeks so rare a white was on,
No daisy makes comparison;
Who sees them is undone ;
For streaks of red were mingled there,
Such as are on a Cath'rine pear,
The side that 's next the sun.
Her lips were red; and one was thin,
Compared to that was next her chin.
Some bee had stung it newly;
But, Dick, her eyes so guard her face,
I durst no more upon them gaze,
Than on the sun in July.
Her mouth so small, when she does speak,
Thou'dst swear her teeth her words did break,
That they might passage get;
But she so handled still the matter,
They came as good as ours, or better,
And are not spent a whit.
HEBREW WEDDING.
To the sound of timbrels sweet
Moving slow our solemn feet,
We have borne thee on the road
To the virgin's blest abode ;
With thy yellow torches gleaming,
And thy scarlet mantle streaming,
And the canopy above
Swaying as we slowly move.
Thou hast left the joyous feast,
And the mirth and wine have ceased;
And now we set thee down before
The jealously unclosing door,
That the favored youth admits
Where the veiléd virgin sits
In the bliss of maiden fear,
Waiting our soft tread to hear,
And the music's brisker din
At the bridegroom's entering in,
Entering in, a welcome guest,
To the chamber of his rest.
CHORUS OF MAIDENS.
Now the jocund song is thine,
Bride of David's kingly line;
How thy dove-like bosom trembleth,
And thy shrouded eye resembleth
Violets, when the dews of eve
A moist and tremulous glitter leave
On the bashful sealed lid !
Close within the bride-veil hid,
Motionless thou sitt'st and mute;
Save that at the soft salute
Of each entering maiden friend,
Thou dost rise and softly bend.
Hark! a brisker, merrier glee !
The door unfolds, 't is he! 't is he!
Thus we lift our lamps to meet him,
Thus we touch our lutes to greet him.
Thou shalt give a fonder meeting,
Thou shalt give a tenderer greeting.
HENRY HART MILMAN.
THEN before All they stand, the holy vow
And ring of gold, no fond illusions now,
Bind her as his. Across the threshold led,
And every tear kissed off as soon as shed,
His house she enters, there to be a light,
Shining within, when all without is night;
A guardian angel o'er his life presiding,
Doubling his pleasures and his cares dividing,
Winning him back when mingling in the throng,
Back from a world we love, alas! too long,
To fireside happiness, to hours of ease,
Blest with that charm, the certainty to please.
How oft her eyes read his; her gentle mind
To all his wishes, all his thoughts inclined;
Still subject, ever on the watch to borrow
Mirth of his mirth and sorrow of his sorrow!
The soul of music slumbers in the shell,
Till waked and kindled by the master's spell,
And feeling hearts-touch them but rightly-
A thousand melodies unheard before!
With boundless confidence: for naught but love
Can answer love, and render bliss secure.
Meantime a smiling offspring rises round,
And mingles both their graces. By degrees,
The human blossom blows; and every day,
Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm,
The father's lustre and the mother's bloom.
Then infant reason grows apace, and calls
For the kind hand of an assiduous care.
To teach the young idea how to shoot,
Delightful task! to rear the tender thought,
To pour the fresh instruction o'er the mind,
To breathe the enlivening spirit, and to fix
The generous purpose in the glowing breast.
O, speak the joy! ye whom the sudden tear
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