We too have known such happy hours together,
That, were power granted to replace them (fetched
From out the pensive shadows where they lic)
In the first warmth of their original sunshine,
Loth should I be to use it: passing sweet
Are the domains of tender memory!

XXVII.

SEPTEMBER, 1819.

THE sylvan slopes with corn-clad fields
Are hung as if with golden shields
Bright trophies of the sun!

Like a fair sister of the sky,
Unruffled doth the blue lake lie,
The mountains looking on.

And, sooth to say, yon Vocal
Albeit uninspired by love,
By love untaught to ring,
May well afford to mortal ear

grove,

An impulse more profoundly dear

Than music of the Spring.

For that from turbulence and heat:
Proceeds, from some uneasy seat
In nature's struggling frame,

1817

Some region of impatient life:
And jealousy, and quivering strife,
Therein a portion claim.

This, this is holy;

while I hear

These vespers of another year,
This hymn of thanks and praise,
My spirit seems to mount above
The anxieties of human love,
And earth's precarious days.

But list! though winter storms be nigh, Unchecked is that soft harmony:

There lives Who can provide

For all his creatures; and in Him,

Even like the radiant Seraphim,

These choristers confide.

XXVIII.

UPON THE SAME OCCASION.

DEPARTING Summer hath assumed
An aspect tenderly illumed,
The gentlest look of Spring,

That calls from yonder leafy shade,
Unfaded, yet prepared to fade,
A timely carolling

No faint and hesitating trill,

Such tribute as to Winter chill
The lonely redbreast pays!
Clear, loud, and lively is the din,
From social warblers gathering in
Their harvest of sweet lays.

Nor doth the example fail to cheer
Me, conscious that my leaf is sere,
And yellow on the bough:-
Fall, rosy garlands, from my head!

Ye myrtle wreaths, your fragrance shed
Around a younger brow!

Yet will I temperately rejoice;

Wide is the range, and free the choice
Of undiscordant themes;

Which, haply, kindred souls may prize
Not less than vernal ecstasies,
And passion's feverish dreams.

For deathless powers to verse belong,
And they like Demigods are strong
On whom the Muses smile;

But some their function have disclaimed,
Best pleased with what is aptliest framed
To enervate and defile.

Not such the initiatory strains.
Committed to the silent plains

In Britain's earliest dawn:

Trembled the groves, the stars grew pale, While all too daringly the veil

Of nature was withdrawn!

Nor such the spirit-stirring note
When the live chords Alcæus smote,
Inflamed by sense of wrong;

Woe! woe to Tyrants! from the lyre
Broke threateningly, in sparkles dire
Of fierce, vindictive song.

And not unhallowed was the page
By winged Love inscribed, to assuage
The pangs of vain pursuit ;

Love listening while the Lesbian Maid
With finest touch of passion swayed
Her own Eolian lute.

O ye, who patiently explore
The wreck of Herculanean lore,
What rapture! could ye seize
Some Theban fragment, or unroll
One precious, tender-hearted scroll
Of pure Simonides.

That were, indeed, a genuine birth

Of poesy; a bursting forth

Of genius from the dust:

What Horace gloried to behold,

What Maro loved, shall we enfold?
Can haughty Time be just!

1819.

XXIX.

MEMORY.

A PEN- to register; a key
That winds through secret wards;
Are well assigned to Memory

By allegoric Bards.

As aptly, also, might be given
A Pencil to her hand;

That, softening objects, sometimes even

Outstrips the heart's demand;

That smooths foregone distress, the lines Of lingering care subdues,

Long-vanished happiness refines,

And clothes in brighter hues ;

Yet, like a tool of Fancy, works

Those Spectres to dilate

That startle Conscience, as she lurks

Within her lonely seat.

C that our lives, which flee so fast,

I purity were such,