How many long days and long weeks didst thou number, Ere he faded before thee, the friend of thy heart? And, oh! was it meet, that—no requiem read o'er him, No mother to weep, and no friend to deplore him, And thou, little guardian, alone stretched before him Unhonored the pilgrim from life should depart? When a prince to the fate of the peasant has yielded, The tapestry waves dark round the dim-lighted hall; With scutcheons of silver the coffin is shielded, And pages stand mute by the canopied pall; Through the courts, at deep midnight, the torches are gleaming; In the proudly arched chapel the banners are beaming; Far adown the long aisle sacred music is streaming, Lamenting a chief of the people should fall. But meeter for thee, gentle lover of nature, To lay down thy head like the meek mountain lamb, When, wildered, he drops from some cliff huge in stature, And draws his last sob by the side of his dam. And more stately thy couch by this desert lake lying, Thy obsequies sung by the gray plover flying, With but one faithful friend to witness thy dying In the arms of Helvellyn and Catchedicam. Sir Walter Scott. ON HER FIRST ASCENT TO THE SUMMIT OF HELVELLYN. [NMATE of a mountain dwelling, INMA Thou hast clomb aloft, and gazed Potent was the spell that bound thee, For blue Ether's arms, flung round thee, Lo the dwindled woods and meadows! Lo the clouds, the solemn shadows, And the glistenings, heavenly fair! And a record of commotion Now take flight; possess, inherit Or survey their bright dominions W Flung from off the purple pinions Thine are all the coral fountains Of the untrodden lunar mountains; or halt, To Niphates' top invited, For the power of hills is on thee, William Wordsworth. THE KNIGHT'S TOMB. HERE is the grave of Sir Arthur O'Kellyn? Where may the grave of that good man be? By the side of a spring, on the breast of Helvellyn, Under the twigs of a young birch-tree! The oak that in summer was sweet to hear, Is gone, His soul is with the saints, I trust. Samuel Taylor Coleridge. FAR-S Highgate. IN HIGHGATE CEMETERY. NAR-SPREAD below doth London wear Incessant troops from that vast throng Yet, 'neath the universal sky Bright children here too run and sing, William Allingham. Holmedon. HOLMEDON. MY liege, I did deny no prisoners. But, I remember, when the fight was done, When I was dry with rage and extreme toil, Breathless and faint, leaning upon my sword, Came there a certain lord, neat, trimly dressed, He was perfuméd like a milliner; And 'twixt his finger and his thumb he held He gave his nose and took 't away again; Who, therewith angry, when it next came there, With many holiday and lady terms He questioned me; among the rest demanded I then, all smarting with my wounds being cold, To be so pestered with a popinjay, Answered neglectingly, I know not what, He should or he should not; for he made me mad, To see him shine so brisk, and smell so sweet, And talk, so like a waiting-gentlewoman, And telling me the sovereign'st thing on earth |