Though winter howleth at the gate, In our hearts 't is summer still! For we full many summer joys And greenwood sports have shared, When, free and ever-roving boys, The rocks, the streams, we dared; And, as I looked upon thy face, Back, back o'er years of ill, My heart flies to that happy place, Where it is summer still. Yes, though like sere leaves on the ground, Our early hopes are strown, And cherished flowers lie dead around, And singing birds are flown, The verdure is not faded quite, Not mute all tones that thrill; Fill up ! The olden times come back The lost return: through fieids of bloom Gone is the winter's angry gloom, we. She grew to the eye, against the clouded sky, And eagerly her points and gear we guessed. As we made her out, at last, She was maimed in spar and mast And she hugged the easy breeze for rest. We could see the old wind fail We could see them lay their course with the wind: Still we neared and neared her fast, With the seas tumbling headlong behind. She had come out of some storm, and, in many a busy swarm, Her crew were refitting, as they might, That had left their ugly scars, As if the ship had come out of a fight. A strange old ship, with her poop built high, And with quarter-galleries wide, And a huge beaked prow, as no ships are builded now, And carvings all strange, beside. A Byzantine bark, and a ship of name and mark Long years and generations ago; Ere any mast or yard of ours was growing hard With the seasoning of long Norwegian snow. She was the brave old Orient, The old imperial Orient, Brought down from times afar, Down her old black side poured the water in a tide, As they toiled to get the better of a leak. We had got a signal set in the shrouds, And our men through the storm looked on in crowds: But for wind, we were near enough to speak. It seemed her sea and sky were in times long, long gone by, That we read in winter-evens about; She had reared her old-world spars, And her hull had kept an old-time ocean All that stormy night through, our ship was lying-to Whenever we could keep her to the wind; But late in the next day we gained a quiet bay, For the tempest had left us far behind. Went our anchors splashing down; With our canvas, hour by hour, in their fun. We leaned on boom or rail with many a lazy tale Of the work of the storm that had died; But we heard a sadder tale, ere the night came on, And a truer tale, of the ship that was gone. A ship driving heavily to land; A strange great ship (so she seemed to be While she tumbled and rolled on the far off sea, New were red lip, true eyes, fresh dew; Feelings sprang fresh, to them, and thought; Fresh things were hope, trust, faith, endeavor; All things were new, wherein men wrought, And so they had the lead, forever. Not even where to set their lever. And strange when she toiled, near at hand), To move the world their frank hearts sought Then utterance, like thought, was young, Must then the world to us be stale? mers? To those free lords of song and tale Oh, no! was ever life-blood cold? Yes! Life and strength forever can; In your unnumbered vales, where God thought best. Your vines and flowers learned long since to forgive, And o'er their graves a broidered mantle weave: Be you as kind as they are, and the word Shall reach the Northland with each sum mer bird, And thoughts as sweet as summer shall awake Responsive to your kindness, and shall make And ye, O Northmen! be ye not outdone And they that give shall find it in their Spare of your flowers to deck the stranger's grave, Who died for a lost cause: A soul more daring, resolute, and brave, A brave man's hatred pauses at the tomb. For him some Southern home was robed in gloom, Some wife or mother looked with longing James Thomas Fields WITH WORDSWORTH AT RYDAL THE grass hung wet on Rydal banks, The golden day with pearls adorning, When side by side with him we walked To meet midway the summer morning. The west wind took a softer breath, The sun himself seemed brighter shining, As through the porch the minstrel stepped, His eye sweet Nature's look enshrin ing. |