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64

HELVELLYN.

And still they rowed amidst the roar
Of waters fast prevailing :

Lord Ullin reached that fatal shore-
His wrath was changed to wailing.

For sore dismayed, through storm and shade
His child he did discover:

One lovely hand she stretched for aid,
And one was round her lover.

'Come back! come back!' he cried in grief,

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'Twas vain the loud waves lashed the shore,
Return or aid preventing-

The waters wild went o'er his child,

And he was left lamenting.

Campbell.

1 Ulva's Isle is a small island lying 3 Water-wraith, the spirit of the between Mull and Staffa.

waters.

Wight, a strong active man. A.S.

4 Scowl, frown.

wiht, a creature.

HEL VELLY N.

I climbed the dark brow of the mighty Helvellyn,1

Lakes and mountains beneath me gleamed misty and wide; All was still, save by fits, when the eagle was yelling,

And starting around me the echoes replied.

On the right, Striden-edge round the Red-tarn was bending, And Catchedicam its left verge was defending,

One huge nameless rock in the front was ascending,

When I marked the sad spot where the wanderer had died.

Dark green was that spot 'mid the brown mountain heather,
Where the Pilgrim of Nature 2 lay stretched in decay,
Like the corpse of an outcast abandoned to weather,
Till the mountain-winds wasted the tenantless clay.
Nor yet quite deserted, though lonely extended,
For, faithful in death, his mute favourite attended,
The much-loved remains of her master defended,
And chased the hill-fox and the raven away.

How long didst thou think that his silence was slumber? When the wind waved his garment, how oft didst thou start?

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 3 read o'er him—
No mother to weep, and no friend to deplore him,
And thou, little guardian, alone stretched before him-
Unhonoured 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,

4

And pages stand mute by the canopied pall:

Through the courts, as at 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 one faithful friend but to witness thy dying

In the arms of Helvellyn and Catchedicam.

E

Scott.

66

KILLED AT THE FORD.

1 Helvellyn, a high mountain on the borders of Cumberland and Westmoreland, 3117 feet above sealevel.

2 The Pilgrim of Nature was a young gentleman who, in the spring of 1805, lost his way among the mountains mentioned in the first

stanza. His remains were found three months after, faithfully guarded by his terrier.

3 Requiem, funeral service.

4 Scutcheons or escutcheons, shields on which the coat-of-arms of a family is represented.

KILLED AT THE FORD.

He is dead, the beautiful youth,
The heart of honour, the tongue of truth-
He, the life and light of us all,

Whose voice was as blithe as a bugle call,

Whom all eyes followed with one consent,

The cheer of whose laugh, and whose pleasant word,
Hushed all murmurs of discontent.

Only last night, as we rode along,
Down the dark of the mountain gap,
To visit the picket-guard1 at the ford,
Little dreaming of any mishap,

He was humming the words of some old song:

'Two red roses he had on his cap,

And another he bore at the point of his sword'—

Sudden and swift a whistling ball

Came out of a wood, and the voice was still;
Something I heard in the darkness fall,
And for a moment my blood grew chill ;
I spake in a whisper, as he who speaks
In a room when some one is lying dead;
But he made no answer to what I said.

We lifted him on his saddle again,

And through the mire, and the mist, and the rain
Carried him back to the silent camp,

And laid him as if asleep on his bed;

And I saw by the light of the surgeon's lamp,

Two white roses upon his cheeks,
And one just over his heart blood-red!

And I saw in a vision how far and fleet
That fatal bullet went speeding forth,
Till it reached a town in the distant North,
Till it reached a house in a sunny street,
Till it reached a heart that ceased to beat
Without a murmur, without a cry ;

And a bell was tolled in that far-off town,
For one who had passed from cross to crown-
And the neighbours wondered that she should die.

1 Picket-guard, a small company of men detached from the main body

Longfellow.

of an army to act as an outpost or guard.

TO DAFFODILS.

Fair Daffodils, we weep to see
You haste away so soon;
As yet the early-rising sun
Has not attained his noon.
Stay, stay,

Until the hasting day
Has run

But to the evensong;
And, having prayed together, we
Will go with you along.

We have short time to stay, as you;
We have as short a spring;
As quick a growth to meet decay,
As you, or any thing.

We die

As your hours do, and dry

Away,

Like to the summer's rain;

Or as the pearls of morning's dew,

Ne'er to be found again.

Herrick.

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When upward-springing, blithe, to greet The purpling east.3

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