RAIN IN SUMMER.

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In the narrow lane,

How beautiful is the rain!

How it clatters along the roofs,
Like the tramp of hoofs!

How it gushes and struggles out

From the throat of the overflowing spout!
Across the window pane

It pours and pours;

And swift and wide,

With a muddy tide,

Like a river down the gutter roars

The rain, the welcome rain!

The sick man from his chamber looks

At the twisted brooks;

He can feel the cool

Breath of each little pool;

His fevered brain

Grows calm again,

And he breathes a blessing on the rain.

From the neighbouring school

Come the boys,

With more than their wonted noise

And commotion;

And down the wet streets

Sail their mimic fleets,

Till the treacherous pool

Engulfs them in its whirling

And turbulent ocean.

In the furrowed land

The toilsome and patient oxen stand;

Lifting the yoke-encumbered head,
With their dilated nostrils spread,
They silently inhale

The clover-scented gale,

And the vapours that arise

From the well-watered and smoking soil.

For this rest in the furrow after toil

Their large and lustrous eyes

Seem to thank the Lord,

More than man's spoken word.

EARLY MORNING IN SUMMER.

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EARLY MORNING IN SUMMER.

It was a lovely morning;-all was calm,
As if Creation, thankful for repose,
In renovated beauty, breathing balm
And blessedness around, from slumber rose;
Joyful once more to see the East unclose
Its gates of glory :-yet subdued and mild,
Like the soft smile of Patience, amid woes

By Hope and Resignation reconciled,

That morning's beauty shone, that landscape's charm beguiled.

The heavens were marked by many a filmy streak,
Even in the orient; and the sun shone through
Those lines, as Hope upon a mourner's cheek
Sheds, meekly chastened, her delightful hue.
From groves and meadows, all empearled with dew,
Rose silvery mists,-no eddying wind swept by,-
The cottage chimneys, half concealed from view
By their embowering foliage, sent on high
Their pallid wreaths of smoke, unruffled to the sky.

And every gentle sound which broke the hush
Of morning's still serenity, was sweet;
The skylark overhead; the speckled thrush,
Who now had taken with delight his seat
Upon the slender larch, the day to greet;
The starling, chattering to her callow young;
And that monotonous lay, which seems to fleet
Like echo through the air, the cuckoo's song,
Was heard at times the leafy woods among.

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Lifting they With their They silent

The clover

And the v

From th

For this

Their 1

Seem t

More i

A JULY EVENING.

elet now, no longer vexed with gusts, es on her breast the pictured moon

d round with stars.

How strangely fair

yon round still star, which looks half suffering from, And half rejoicing in its own strong fire,

Making itself a lonelihood of light,

Like Deity, where'er in Heaven it dwells.

How can the beauty of material things

So win the heart and work upon the mind,

Unless like-natured with them? Are great things
And thoughts of the same blood!

They have like effect, for mind

And matter speak, in causes, of one God.
The inward and the outward worlds are like;
The pure and gross but differ in degree.
Tears, feeling's bright embodied form, are not
More pure than dewdrops, Nature's tears, which she
Sheds in her own breast for the fair which die.
The sun insists on gladness; but at night,
When he is gone, poor Nature loves to weep.

The glory of the world

Is on all hands. In one encircling ken
I gaze on river, sea, isle, continent,

Mountain, and wood, and wild, and fire-tipped hill,
And lake, and golden plain, and sun, and Heaven,
Where the stars brightly die, whose death is day.

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