With song and dance and voice of flutes

That soothe the Regions Seven, We can call the blessed summer showers Down from the listening heaven! For ours is the lore of a dateless past, And we have power thereby, Power which our vanished fathers sought Through toil and watch and pain, Till the spirits of wood and wave and air To grant us help were fain; For we are the Ancient People, Born with the wind and rain.

HEAVEN, O LORD, I CANNOT LOSE

Now Summer finds her perfect prime; Sweet blows the wind from western calms; On every bower red roses climb;

The meadows sleep in mingled balms. Nor stream, nor bank the wayside by, But lilies float and daisies throng; Nor space of blue and sunny sky

That is not cleft with soaring song. O flowery morns, O tuneful eves,

Fly swift! my soul ye cannot fill! Bring the ripe fruit, the garnered sheaves, The drifting snows on plain and hill. Alike, to me, fall frosts and dews; But Heaven, O Lord, I cannot lose!

Warm hands to-day are clasped in mine; Fond hearts my mirth or mourning share; And, over hope's horizon line,

The future dawns, serenely fair. Yet still, though fervent vow denies, I know the rapture will not stay; Some wind of grief or doubt will rise And turn my rosy sky to gray.

In golden hours the angel Peace
Comes down and broods me with her
wings:

I gain from sorrow sweet release;
I mate me with divinest things;
When shapes of guilt and gloom arise
And far the radiant angel flees,
My song is lost in mournful sighs,
My wine of triumph left but lees;
In vain for me her pinions shine,

And pure, celestial days begin;
Earth's passion-flowers I still must twine,
Nor braid one beauteous lily in.
Ah! is it good or ill I choose?
But Heaven, O Lord, I cannot lose!

'A CHARACTER

His face is truly of the Roman mould,
He bears within the heart of Cato, too;
Although his look may seem severe and
cold,

He never would be false to truth or you.

And deepest feeling hides about the mouth;

His soul-wind blows not always from the north,

But sometimes also from the gentle south, And then, like flowers, the tender words steal forth.

The light and fickle still have love to spare,

If Death has taken from them even thrice;

And from the agonizing wreath ran many a crimson rill;

The cruel Roman thrust him on with unrelenting hand,

Till, staggering slowly mid the crowd, He fell upon the sand.

A little bird that warbled near, that memorable day,

Flitted around and strove to wrench one single thorn away;

The cruel spike impaled his breast, — and thus, 't is sweetly said,

The Robin has his silver vest incarnadined with red.

Ah, Jesu! Jesu! Son of man! My dolor and my sighs

Reveal the lesson taught by this winged Ishmael of the skies.

I, in the palace of delight or cavern of despair,

Have plucked no thorns from thy dear brow, but planted thousands there!