Song! made in lieu of many ornaments,
With which my love should duly have been dect,
Which cutting off through hasty accidents,

Ye would not stay your dew time to expect,
But promist both to recompens;

Be unto her a goodly ornament,

And for short time an endlesse moniment.

Edmund Spenser

137

SEPHESTIA'S SONG TO HER CHILD

EEP not, my wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old there's grief enough for thee.
Mother's wag, pretty boy,

Father's sorrow, father's joy;

When thy father first did see
Such a boy by him and me,
He was glad, I was woe;
Fortune changed made him so,
When he left his pretty boy,

Last his sorrow, first his joy.

Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old there's grief enough for thee.
Streaming tears that never stint,

Like pearl drops from a flint,

Fell by course from his eyes,
That one another's place supplies;

Thus he grieved in every part,

Tears of blood fell from his heart,

When he left his pretty boy,

Father's sorrow, father's joy.

Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old there's grief enough for thee.
The wanton smiled, father wept,
Mother cried, baby leapt;

More he crowed, more he cried,
Nature could not sorrow hide:
He must go, he must kiss
Child and mother, baby bless,
For he left his pretty boy,

Father's sorrow, father's joy.

Weep not, my wanton, smile upon my knee,
When thou art old there's grief enough for thee.

Robert Greene

138

THE TWO APRIL MORNINGS

E walked along, while bright and red
Uprose the morning sun;

And Matthew stopped, he looked, and said,
"The will of God be done!"

A village schoolmaster was he,
With hair of glittering gray;

As blithe a man as you could see
On a spring holiday.

And on that morning, through the grass

And by the steaming rills,

We traveled merrily, to pass
A day among the hills.

"Our work," said I, "was well begun;

Then, from thy breast what thought,
Beneath so beautiful a sun,

So sad a sigh has brought?"

A second time did Matthew stop;
And fixing still his eye

Upon the eastern mountain top,
'To me he made reply:

"Yon cloud with that long purple cleft
Brings fresh into my mind.

A day like this, which I have left
Full thirty years behind.

"And just above yon slope of corn
Such colors, and no other,
Were in the sky, that April morn,
Of this the very brother.

"With rod and line I sued the sport

Which that sweet season gave,

And, to the churchyard come, stopped short Beside my daughter's grave.

"Nine summers had she scarcely seen,

The pride of all the vale;

And then she sang;-she would have been A very nightingale.

"Six feet in earth my Emma lay;
And yet I loved her more-
For so it seemed—than till that day
I e'er had loved before.

"And turning from her grave, I met
Beside the churchyard yew.

A blooming Girl, whose hair was wet
With points of morning dew.

"A basket on her head she bare;

Her brow was smooth and white:
To see a child so very fair,

It was a pure delight!

"No fountain from its rocky cave
E'er tripped with foot so free;
She seemed as happy as a wave
That dances on the sea.

"There came from me a sigh of pain
Which I could ill confine;

I looked at her, and looked again:
And did not wish her mine!"

-Matthew is in his grave, yet now
Methinks I see him stand,

As at that moment, with a bough
Of wilding in his hand.

William Wordsworth

139

URPRISED by joy-impatient as the Wind
I turned to share the transport-Oh! with whom

But Thee, deep buried in the silent tomb,
That spot which no vicissitude can find?

Love, faithful love, recalled thee to my mind-
But how could I forget thee? Through what power,

Even for the least division of an hour,

Have I been so beguiled as to be blind

To my most grievous loss?—That thought's return
Was the worst pang that sorrow ever bore,

Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn,
Knowing my heart's best treasure was no more;
That neither present time, nor years unborn
Could to my sight that heavenly face restore.

140

TO MARY1

William Wordsworth

'HE twentieth year is well-nigh past

THE

Since first our sky was overcast ;

Ah, would that this might be the last!
My Mary!

Thy spirits have a fainter flow,

I see thee daily weaker grow—

'Twas my distress that brought thee low,
My Mary!

Thy needles, once a shining store,

For my sake restless heretofore,

Now rust disused, and shine no more,
My Mary!

For though thou gladly wouldst fulfill

The same kind office for me still,

Thy sight now seconds not thy will,
My Mary!

But well thou playedst the housewife's part,

And all thy threads with magic art

Have wound themselves about this heart,

My Mary!

1 Mrs. Mary Unwin, in whose home the poet, who was of infirm health, pent a great part of his life.