My het leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky:

So was it when my life began;
So is it now I am a man;

So be it when I shall grow old,

Or let me die!

The Child is father of the Man;
And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety.

1804.

LUCY GRAY

OR, SOLITUDE.

OFT i had heard of Lucy Gray:
And, when I crossed the wild,
I chanced to see at break of day
The solitary child.

No mate, no comrade Lucy knew; She dwelt on a wide moor,

-The sweetest thing that cver grew Beside a human door!

You yet may spy the fawn at play,

The hare upon the green;

But the sweet face of Lucy Gray
Will never more be seen.

66 To-night will be a stormy night-
You to the town must go;
And take a lantern, c.ild, to light
Your mother through the snow."

"That, father! will I gladly do: 'Tis scarcely afternoon

The minster-clock has just struck two, And yonder is the moon!"

At this the father raised his hook,

And snapped a fagot-band;

He plied his work ;-and Lucy took
The lantern in her hand.

Not blither is the mountain roe:
With many a wanton stroke

Her feet disperse the powdery snow
That rises up like smoke.

The storm came on before its time:

She wandered up and down;

And many a hill did Lucy climb;
But never reached the town.

The wretched parents all that night
Went shouting far and wide;

But there was neither sound nor sight
To serve them for a guide.

At day-break on a hill they stood

That overlooked the moor;

And thence they saw the bridge of wood, A furlong from their door.

They wept and, turning homeward, cried,
"In heaven we all shall meet:"
-When in the snow the mother spied
The print of Lucy's feet.

Half breathless from the steep hill's edge
They tracked the footmarks small;
And through the broken hawthorn-hedge
And by the long stone wall:

And then an open field they crossed:
The marks were still the same:
They tracked them on, nor ever lost;
And to the bridge they came.

They followed from the snowy bank
Those footmarks, one by one,
Into the middle of the plank;

And further there were none !

-Yet some maintain that to this day
She is a living child;

That you may see sweet Lucy Gray

Upon the lonesome wild.

O'er rough and smooth she trips along,

And never looks behind:

And sings a solitary song

That whistles in the wind.

WE ARE SEVEN

-A SIMPLE child,

That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,
What should it know of death?

I met a little cottage girl:

She was eight years old, she said;
Her hair was thick with many a curl
That clustered round her head.

She had a rustic, woodland air,

And she was wildly clad;

Her eyes were fair, and very fair;

-Her beauty made me glad.

"Sisters and brothers, little maid, How many may you be?"

"How many? Seven in all," she said,

And wondering looked at me.