"He causeth His wind to blow, and the waters flow."—Psalm cxlvii. 18.

HE snow has left the cottage roof;

The thatch-moss grows in brighter green;

And eaves in quick succession drop,
Where grinning icicles have been,
Pit-patting with a pleasant noise

In tubs set by the cottage-door;
While ducks and geese with happy joys,
Plunge in the yard-pond brimming o'er.

The milkmaid singing leaves her bed,
As glad as happy thoughts can be,
While magpies chatter o'er her head

As jocund in the change as she:
Her cows around the closes stray,

Nor lingering wait the foddering-boy;

Tossing the mole-hills in their play

And staring round with frolic joy.

The shepherd now is often seen

Near warm banks o'er his hook to bend ;

Or o'er a gate or stile to lean,

Chattering to a passing friend:

Ploughmen go whistling to their toils,
And yoke again the rested plough;
And, mingling o'er the mellow soils,

Boys shout, and whips are noising now.

The barking dogs by lane and wood,

Drive sheep a-field from foddering ground,

And Echo in her Summer mood,

Briskly mocks the cheering sound. The flocks, as from a prison broke,

Shake their wet fleeces in the sun,

While, following fast, a misty smoke

Reeks from the moist grass as they run.

The small birds think their wants are o'er,
To see the snow-hills fret again,
And from the barn's chaff-littered door,
Betake them to the greening plain.
The woodman's robin startles coy,

No longer to his elbow comes

To peck, with hunger's eager joy,

'Mong mossy stumps the littered crumbs.

'Neath hedge and walls that screen the wind
The gnats for play will flock together;
And e'en poor flies some hope will find
To venture in the mocking weather;

From out their hiding-holes again,

With feeble pace, they often creep Along the sun-warmed window-pane,

Like dreaming things that walk in sleep.

FEBRUARY-FILL-DIKE.

31

FEBRUARY-FILL-DIKE.

"As yet the trembling year is unconfirmed
And Winter oft at eve resumes the breeze,

Chills the pale morn, and bids his driving sleets
Deform the day delightless."

Hark!

FEBRUARY-FILL-DIKE is an appropriate name for the damp month which comes in the end of Winter; but we know that "the time of the singing of birds" is at hand, and bear patiently the dearth and desolation which reigns around us, and look upon the lengthening of the days as sure heralds of coming sunshine and flowers. how the wind roars; and the leafless trees still sway their naked forms to and fro, and toss their skeleton arms in the air like maniacs; for there is a loud howling in the "savage woods," a roar of clashing branches and uprooted trees, as if Fingal led his warriors forth to battle, and commenced the "stormy strife," while Ossian twanged his wild harp to the gale. How wonderful are the winds! we feel their power, and shrink beneath it, yet see them not; the ocean is uplifted by their might, the angry waves lash the sky, navies are destroyed, and forests are blown down, yet we see not the arm that strikes.

"He plants His footsteps in the sea,

And rides upon the storm."

And beautiful are some of those sublime passages in Holy Writ :— "He did fly upon the wings of the wind;" "the heaven was black with clouds and wind;" "there came a great wind from the wilderness;" "the winds blew, and beat upon that house, and it fell;" "He gathereth the wind in His fists;" "and the wind was in their wings;" "like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.” All these and numberless other passages show what an eye the holy writers had for the poetry of the elements.

TO A WATERFOWL.

WHITHER, 'midst falling dew,

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day, Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue

Thy solitary way?

Vainly the fowler's eye

Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As darkly painted on the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.

Seek'st thou the plashy brink

Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean side?

There is a Power whose care

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,
The desert and illimitable air,

Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned,

At that far height, the cold thin atmosphere;
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.

And soon that toil shall end;

Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend

Soon o'er thy sheltered nest.