Mother's Love.

He sang so wildly, did the boy,

That you could never tell

If 'twas a madman's voice you heard,

Or if the spirit of a bird

Within his heart did dwell—

A bird that dallies with his voice

Among the matted branches;

Or on the free blue air his note,

To pierce, and fall, and rise, and float,
With bolder utterance launches.
None ever was so sweet as he,
The boy that wildly sang to me;

Though toilsome was the way and long,
He led me, not to lose the song.

But when again we stood below
The unhidden sky, his feet

Grew slacker, and his note more slow,
But more than doubly sweet.
He led me then a little way
Athwart the barren moor,

And there he stayed, and bad me stay,
Beside a cottage door;

I could have stayed of my own will,
In truth, my eye and heart to fill
With the sweet sight which I saw there,
At the dwelling of the cottager.

A little in the doorway sitting,
The mother plied her busy knitting;
And her cheek so softly smiled,
You might be sure, although her gaze
Was on the meshes of the lace,

Yet her thoughts were with her child.

But when the boy had heard her voice,
As o'er her work she did rejoice,
His became silent altogether;
And slyly creeping by the wall,
He seized a single plume, let fall
By some wild bird of longest feather;
And all a-tremble with his freak,
He touched her lightly on the cheek.

Oh what a loveliness her eyes
Gather in that one moment's space,
While peeping round the post she spies
Her darling's laughing face!

Oh mother's love is glorifying,
On the cheek like sunset lying;
In the eyes a moistened light,
Softer than the moon at night!

THOMAS BURBIDGE.

The Pet Lamb.

THE dew was falling fast, the stars began to blink; I heard a voice; it said, "Drink, pretty creature, drink!"

And, looking o'er the hedge, before me I espied A snow-white mountain-lamb with a maiden at its side.

Nor sheep nor kine were near; the lamb was all alone,

And by a slender cord was tethered to a stone; With one knee on the grass did the little maiden

kneel,

While to that mountain-lamb she gave its evening mcal.

The lamb, while from her hand he thus his supper took,

Seemed to feast with head and ears; and his tail with pleasure shook.

"Drink, pretty creature, drink!" she said, in such

a tone

That I almost received her heart into my own.

'Twas little Barbara Lewthwaite, a child of beauty rare!

I watched them with delight: they were a lovely pair.

Now with her empty can the maiden turned away;

But ere ten yards were gone, her footsteps did she stay.

Right towards the lamb she looked; and from a shady place

I unobserved could see the workings of her face.

If nature to her tongue could measured numbers bring,

Thus, thought 1, to her lamb that little maid might sing:

are now;

Thy plot of grass is soft, and green as grass can be; Rest, little young one, rest; what is't that aileth thee?

"What is it thou wouldst seek? What is wanting to thy heart?

Thy limbs, are they not strong? And beautiful thou art.

This grass is tender grass; these flowers they have no peers;

And that green corn all day is rustling in thy ears!

"If the sun be shining hot, do but stretch thy woollen chain

This beech is standing by, its covert thou canst gain;

For rain and mountain-storms

need'st not fear;

plough.

My playmate thou shalt be; and when the wind is cold,

Our hearth shall be thy bed, our house shall be thy fold.

"It will not, will not rest!- Poor creature, can it be

That 'tis thy mother's heart which is working so in thee?

Things that I know not of belike to thee are dear,

And dreams of things which thou canst neither see nor hear.

66

yean

As homeward through the lane I went with lazy feet,

This song to myself did I oftentimes repeat; And it seemed, as I retraced the ballad line by line,

been.

mine.

The Shepherd Boy.

LIKE some vision olden

Of far other time,
When the age was golden,

In the young world's prime,

Is thy soft pipe ringing,

O lonely shepherd boy:

What song art thou singing,
In thy youth and joy?

Or art thou complaining
Of thy lowly lot,

And thine own disdaining,

Dost ask what thou hast not?
Of the future dreaming,
Weary of the past,

For the present scheming-
All but what thou hast.

No, thou art delighting
In thy summer home;
Where the flowers inviting

Tempt the bee to roam;
Where the cowslip, bending
With its golden bells,
Of each glad hour's ending
With a sweet chime tells.

All wild creatures love him
When he is alone;

Every bird above him

Sings its softest tone.
Thankful to high Heaven,
Humble in thy joy,

Much to thee is given,
Lowly shepherd boy.

LETITIA ELIZABETH LANDON.

To my Daughter.

DEAR Fanny! nine long years ago,
While yet the morning sun was low,
And rosy with the eastern glow

The landscape smiled;

Whilst lowed the newly-wakened herds
Sweet as the early song of birds,
I heard those first, delightful words,
"Thou hast a child!"

WHEN the corn-fields and meadows
Are pearled with the dew,
With the first sunny shadow
Walks little Boy Blue.

Oh the Nymphs and the Graces
Still gleam on his eyes,
And the kind fairy faces

Look down from the skies;
And a secret revealing
Of life within life,
When feeling meets feeling
In musical strife;

A winding and weaving
In flowers and in trees,
A floating and heaving
In sunlight and breeze;
A striving and soaring,

A gladness and grace,
Make him kneel half-adoring
The God in the place.

Then amid the live shadows
Of lambs at their play,
Where the kine scent the meadows
With breath like the May,

They fought the dogs, and killed the cats,

And bit the babies in the cradles,

And ate the cheeses out of the vats,

"Come in!"-the Mayor cried, looking bigger;

And in did come the strangest figure:

His queer long coat from heel to head

Split open the kegs of salted sprats,

Made nests inside men's Sunday hats,

And even spoiled the women's chats, By drowning their speaking With shrieking and squeaking In fifty different sharps and flats.

III.

At last the people in a body

To the Town Hall came flocking:
""Tis clear," cried they, "our Mayor's a noddy;
And as for our Corporation-shocking
To think we buy gowns lined with ermine
For dolts that can't or won't determine
What's best to rid us of our vermin!
You hope, because you're old and obese,
To find in the furry civic robe ease?
Rouse up, Sirs! Give your brains a racking
To find the remedy we're lacking,

Or, sure as fate, we'll send you packing!"
At this the Mayor and Corporation
Quaked with a mighty consternation.

IV.

An hour they sate in counsel —

At length the Mayor broke silence: "For a guilder I'd my ermine gown sell; I wish I were a mile hence!

It's easy to bid one rack one's brain-
I'm sure my poor head aches again,
I've scratched it so, and all in vain.

And he himself was tall and thin;
With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin;
And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin;
No tuft on cheek nor beard on chin,
But lips where smiles went out and in—
There was no guessing his kith and kin!
And nobody could enough admire
The tall man and his quaint attire.
Quoth one: "It's as my great-grandsire,
Starting up at the trump of doom's tone,
Had walked this way from his painted tomb-
stone!"

VI.

He advanced to the council-table:

And, "Please your honors," said he, "I'm able,
By means of a secret charm, to draw
All creatures living beneath the sun,
That creep, or swim, or fly, or run,
After me so as you never saw!

And I chiefly use my charm

On creatures that do people harm

The mole, and toad, and newt, and viper

And people call me the Pied Piper."

(And here they noticed round his neck

A scarf of red and yellow stripe,

To match with his coat of the self-same check;
And at the scarf's end hung a pipe;

And his fingers, they noticed, were ever stray

ing

As if impatient to be playing