We over-rule and over-teach,
We curb and we confine,

And put the heart to school too soon,
To learn our narrow line.

No, only taught by love to love,
Seems childhood's natural task;
Affection, gentleness, and hope,
Are all its brief

years ask.

Enjoy thy happiness, sweet child,
With careless heart and eye;
Enjoy those few bright hours which now,
E'en now, are hurrying by:

And let the gazer on thy face
Grow glad with watching thee,
And better, kinder;-such at least
Its influence on me.

MISS LANDON.

LINES.

IMAGINATION; honourable aims;

Free commune with the choir that cannot die;
Science and song; delight in little things,
The buoyant child surviving in the man;
Fields, forests, ancient mountains, ocean, sky,
With all their voices-O dare I accuse
My earthly lot as guilty of my spleen,
Or call my destiny niggard? O no! no!
It is her largeness, and her overflow,
Which being incomplete, disquieteth me so?

For never touch of gladness stirs my heart,
But tim'rously beginning to rejoice
Like a blind Arab, that from sleep doth start
In lonesome tent, I listen for thy voice.

Beloved! 'tis not thine; thou art not there!
Then melts the bubble into idle air.

And wishing without hope I restlessly despair.

The mother, with anticipated glee

Smiles o'er the child, that, standing by her chair
And flatt'ning its round cheek upon her knee,
Looks up and doth its rosy lips prepare

To mock the coming sounds.

At that sweet sight She hears her own voice with a new delight;

And if the babe perchance should lisp the notes aright,

Then is she tenfold gladder than before!

But should disease or chance the darling take,

What then avail those songs, which sweet of yore
Were only sweet for their sweet echo's sake?
Dear maid! no prattler at a mother's knee
Was e'er so dearly prized as I prize thee:

Why was I made for Love, and Love denied to me?"

COLERIDGE.

RECORDS OF PASSING THOUGHT.

A REMEMBRANCE OF GRASMERE.

O VALE and lake, within your mountain-urn
Smiling so tranquilly, and set so deep,
Oft doth your dreamy loveliness return,
Colouring the tender shadows of my sleep
With light Elysian:-for the hues that steep
Your shores in melting lustre seem to float
On golden clouds from spirit-lands remote,

Isles of the blest; and in our memory keep
Their place with holiest harmonies. Fair scene,
Most loved by evening and the dewy star,
Oh! ne'er may man, with touch unhallow'd, jar
The perfect music of thy charm serene!

Still, still unchanged may one sweet region wear Smiles that subdue the soul to love, and tears, and prayer!

THOUGHTS CONNECTED WITH TREES.

Trees, gracious trees; how rich a gift ye are,
Crown of the earth! to human hearts and eyes!
How doth the thought of home, in lands afar,
Link'd with your forms and kindly whisperings,

rise?

How the whole picture of a childhood lies Oft 'midst your boughs forgotten, buried deep,

Till gazing through them up the summer skies, As hush'd we stand, a breeze perchance may creep, And old sweet leaf-sounds reach the inner world Where memory coils; and lo! at once unfurl'd The past, a glowing scroll, before our sight

Spreads clear! while gushing from their long-seal'd

urn

Young thoughts, pure dreams, undoubting prayers

return,

And a lost mother's eye gives back its holy light.

THE SAME.

And ye are strong to shelter! all meek things,
All that need home and covert, love your shades:
Birds of shy song, and low-voiced quiet springs,
And stealthy violets, by the winds betray'd.
Childhood beneath your fresh green tents hath
play'd

With his first primrose-wealth; there Love hath sought
A veiling gloom for his unutter'd thought,

And silent grief, of day's keen glance afraid, A refuge for his tears; and oft-times there Hath lone devotion found a place of prayer, A native temple, solemn, hush'd, and dim; For wheresoe'er your murmuring tremors thrill The woody twilight, there man's heart hath still Confess'd a spirit's breath, and heard a ceaseless hymn.

READING "PAUL AND VIRGINIA

O gentle story of the Indian Isle!

IN CHILDHOOD.

I loved thee in my lonely childhood well, On the sea-shore, when day's last purple smile Slept on the waters, and their hollow swell And dying cadence lent a deeper spell

Unto thine ocean-pictures. 'Midst thy palms,

And strange bright birds, my fancy joy'd to dwell, And watch the Southern Cross through midnight calms,

And track the spicy woods. Yet more I bless'd
Thy vision of sweet love, kind, trustful, true,
Lighting the citron groves-a heavenly guest-
With such pure smiles as Paradise once knew.
Even then my young heart wept o'er this world's

power

To reach and blight that holiest Eden flower.

THOUGHT AT SUNSET.

Still that last look is solemn-though thy rays,
O Sun! to morrow will give back, we know,
The joy to Nature's heart. Yet through the glow
Of clouds that mantle thy decline, our gaze
Tracks thee with love half fearful: and in days
When Earth too much adored thee, what a swell
Of mournful passion, deepening mighty lays,
Told how the dying bade thy light farewell;
O Sun of Greece! O glorious festal sun!
Lost, lost! for them thy golden hours were done,
And darkness lay before them. Happier far
Are we not thus to thy bright wheels enchain'd.
Not thus for thy last parting unsustain'd,

Heirs of a purer day, with its unsetting star.

IMAGES OF PATRIARCHAL LIFE.

Calm scenes of patriarch life! how long a power
Your unworn pastoral images retain

O'er the true heart, which, in its childhood's hour,
Drank their pure freshness deep! The camel's train!
Winding in patience o'er the desert plain,

The tent, the palm-tree, the reposing flock,
The gleaming fount, the shadow of the rock.
Oh! by how subtle, yet how strong a chain,
And in the influence of its touch how blest,

Are these things link'd, for many a thoughtful breast, With household memories, through all change endear'd!

The matin-bird, the ripple of a stream,

Beside our native porch, the hearth-light's gleam,
The voices earliest by the soul revered!

ATTRACTION OF THE EAST.

What secret current of man's nature turns
Unto the golden East, with ceaseless flow?
Still, where the sunbeam at its fountain burns,
The pilgrim-spirit would adore and glow.

Rapt in high thought, though weary, faint, and slow,

Still doth the traveller through the deserts wind,
Led by those old Chaldean stars, which know
Where pass'd the shepherd-fathers of mankind.
Is it some quenchless instinct, which from far
Still points to where our alienated home

Lay in bright peace? O thou, true Eastern Star! Saviour, atoning Lord! where'er we roam,

Draw still our hearts to thee; else, else how vain Their hope the fair lost birth-right to regain!

TO AN AGED FRIEND.

Not long thy voice amongst us may be heard,
Servant of God! thy day is almost done!
The charm now lingering in thy look and word
Is that which hangs about the setting sun,
That which the meekness of decay hath won
Still from revering love.-Yet doth the sense
Of Life immortal-progress but begun-
Pervade thy mien with such clear eloquence,
That hope, not sadness, breathes from thy decline,
And the loved flowers which round thee smile
farewell