THE SUMMER'S CALL

COME away! The sunny hours
Woo thee far to founts and bowers!
O'er the very waters now,
In their play,

Flowers are shedding beauty's glow-
Come away!

Where the lily's tender gleam
Quivers on the glancing stream,
Come away!

All the air is filled with sound,
Soft, and sultry, and profound;
Murmurs through the shadowy grass
Lightly stray;

Faint winds whisper as they pass—
Come away!

Where the bee's deep music swells
From the trembling foxglove bells,
Come away!

In the skies the sapphire blue
Now hath won its richest hue;
In the woods the breath of song
Night and day

Floats with leafy scents along-
Come away!

Where the boughs with dewy gloom
Darken each thick bed of bloom,

Come away!

In the deep heart of the rose
Now the crimson love-hue glows;
Now the glow-worm's lamp by night
Sheds a ray,

Dreamy, starry, greenly bright-
Come away!

Where the fairy cup-moss lies,
With the wild-wood strawberries,
Come away!

Now each tree, by summer crowned, Sheds its own rich twilight round; Glancing there from sun to shade, Bright wings play;

There the deer its couch hath made-
Come away!

Where the smooth leaves of the lime
Glisten in their honey-time,
Come away-away!

THE STREAM SET FREE

FLOW on, rejoice, make music,

Bright living stream set free!

The troubled haunts of care and strife Were not for thee.

The woodland is thy country,

Thou art all its own again;

The wild birds are thy kindred race,

That fear no chain.

Flow on, rejoice, make music
Unto the glistening leaves,

Thou, the beloved of balmy winds
And golden eaves!

Once more the holy starlight

Sleeps calm upon thy breast,

Whose brightness bears no token more

Of man's unrest.

Flow, and let freeborn music

Flow with thy wavy line,

While the stock-dove's lingering loving voice Comes blent with thine;

And the green reeds quivering o'er thee,

Strings of the forest-lyre,

All filled with answering spirit-sounds,

In joy respire.

Yet, midst thy song's glad changes,
Oh! keep one pitying tone

For gentle hearts, that bear to thee
Their sadness lone.

One sound, of all the deepest,
To bring, like healing dew,
A sense that nature ne'er forsakes
The meek and true.

Then, then, rejoice, make music,
Thou stream, thou glad and free!
The shadows of all glorious flowers
Be set in thee!

LEAVE ME NOT YET

LEAVE me not yet! Through rosy skies from far,
But now the song-birds to their nests return;
The quivering image of the first pale star
On the dim lake scarce yet begins to burn:
Leave me not yet!

Not yet! O hark! low tones from hidden streams,
Piercing the shivery leaves, even now arise;
Their voices mingle not with daylight dreams,
They are of vesper's hymns and harmonies:
Leave me not yet!

My thoughts are like those gentle sounds, dear love!
By day shut up in their own still recess;
They wait for dews on earth, for stars above,
Then to breathe out their soul of tenderness:
Leave me not yet!

THE WANDERING WIND

THE Wind, the wandering Wind
Of the golden summer-eves—
Whence is the thrilling magic

Of its tones among the leaves?
Oh! is it from the waters,

Or from the long tall grass?
Or is it from the hollow rocks

Through which its breathings pass?

Or is it from the voices

Of all in one combined,

That it wins the tones of mastery? The Wind, the wandering Wind!

No, no! the strange sweet accents
That with it come and go,
They are not from the osiers,
Nor the fir-trees whispering low;
They are not of the waters,

Nor of the caverned hill:

"Tis the human love within us
That gives them power to thrill.
They touch the links of memory
Around our spirits twined,

And we start, and weep, and tremble,
To the Wind, the wandering Wind!

THE ORANGE BOUGH

OH! bring me one sweet orange-bough, To fan my cheek, to cool my brow; One bough, with pearly blossoms drest, And bind it, mother! on my breast.

Go, seek the grove along the shore, Whose odours I must breathe no more; The grove where every scented tree Thrills to the deep voice of the sea.