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THE BLACKBIRD.

Those who are apt to awake early on spring mornings in rural neighbourhoods, must often have been charmed with the solitary song of the Blackbird, when all beside is still, and the Lark himself is yet on the ground. At evening, too, his broad and homely strain, different from that of every other, and chiming in at intervals with the universal chorus of wild throats, is known from infancy by all who have been accustomed to walk abroad in the hour of twilight. The yellow bill and glossy plumage of the same conspicuous bird, when he flits from hedge to tree, or across a meadow, are equally familiar to the eye of such, nor less to their ear is the chuckling note with which he bolts out of a bush before the startled passenger, who has unconsciously disturbed him from his perch.

MORNING.

GOLDEN bill! Golden bill!
Lo, the peep of day ;

All the air is cool and still,

From the elm-tree on the hill,

Chant away:

While the moon drops down the west,

Like thy mate upon her nest,

And the stars before the sun,

Melt like snow-flakes, one by one;

Let thy loud and welcome lay
Pour along

Few notes but strong.

EVENING.

Jet-bright wing! jet-bright wing!
Flit across the sunset glade;
Lying there in wait to sing -
Listen with thy head awry,

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Keeping time with twinkling eye,

While from all the woodland shade, Birds of every plume and note

Strain the throat,

Till both hill and valley ring,
And the warbled minstrelsy,
Ebbing, flowing like the sea,
Claims brief interludes from thee:
Then, with simple swell and fall,
Breaking beautiful through all,
Let thy Pan-like pipe repeat,
Few notes but sweet.

Askern, near Doncaster, 1835.

THE MYRTLE.

DARK-GREEN and gemm'd with flowers of snow, With close uncrowded branches spread,

Not proudly high, nor meanly low,

A graceful myrtle rear'd its head.

Its mantle of unwithering leaf,

Seem'd, in my contemplative mood, Like silent joy, or patient grief,

The symbol of pure gratitude.

Still life, methought, is thine, fair tree! -Then pluck'd a sprig, and while I mused,

With idle hands, unconsciously,

The delicate, small foliage bruised.

Odours, at my rude touch set free,

Escaped from all their secret cells;
Quick life, I cried, is thine, fair tree!
In thee a soul of fragrance dwells:
:-

Which outrage, wrongs nor wounds destroy,
But wake its sweetness from repose;
Ah! could I thus heaven's gifts employ,
Worth seen, worth hidden, thus disclose.

In health, with unpretending grace,
In wealth, with meekness and with fear,
Through every season wear one face,
And be in truth what I appear.

Then should affliction's chastening rod Bruise my frail frame, or break my heart, Life, a sweet sacrifice to GOD,

Out-breathed like incense would depart.

The Captain of Salvation thus,

When like a Lamb to slaughter led, Was, by the Father's will, for us, Himself through suffering purified.

1837.

DALE ABBEY.

A solitary arch in the middle of an open meadow, and a small oratory more ancient than the monastery itself, now the chapel of ease for the hamlet, are alone conspicuous of all the magnificent structures which once occupied this ground. The site is about five miles south-east from Derby.

I.

THE glory hath departed from thee, Dale!
Thy gorgeous pageant of monastic pride,

A power, that once the power of kings defied,
Which truth and reason might in vain assail,
In mock humility usurp'd this vale,

And lorded o'er the region far and wide;
Darkness to light, evil to good allied,

Had wrought a charm, which made all hearts to quail.

What
gave that power dominion on this ground,
Age after age?-the Word of God was bound!-
At length the mighty captive burst from thrall,
O'erturn'd the spiritual bastile in its march,
And left of ancient grandeur this sole arch,
Whose stones cry out,-"Thus Babylon herself
shall fall."

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