And there was pleasantness to me
In such belief-cold eyes
That slight dear Nature's loveliness
Profane her mysteries.
Long time I looked, and lingered there,
Absorbed in still delight,
My spirits drank deep quietness
In with that quiet sight.
SEE to the sun the Butterfly displays
Its glittering wings, and wantons in his rays;
In life exulting, o'er the meadow flies,
Sips from each flower, and breathes the vernal skies.
Its splendid plumes, in graceful order, show
The various glories of the painted bow ;
Where love directs, a libertine it roves,
And courts the fair ones through the verdant groves.
How glorious now! how chang'd since yesterday,
When on the ground a crawling worm it lay!
Where every foot might tread its life away!
Who raised it thence? and bid it range the skies?
Gave its rich plumage, and its brilliant dyes?
'Twas God.-Its God and thine, O man, and HE
In this thy fellow-creature lets thee see
The wondrous change which is ordained for thee:
Thou too shalt leave thy reptile form behind,
And mount the skies, a pure ethereal mind,
There range among the skies, all bright and unconfin’d.
TO A SPRIG OF MIGNONETTE.
THE lingering perfume of thy flower,
Its dying fragrance, sadly sweet,
Though faint to that of Summer's bower,
It still is soothing thus to greet.
The gusty winds, the darkening cloud,
The chilly mists, and rain, and dews,
And drifted leaves which half enshroud
Thy beauties, all delight my Muse,
And boast a charm that far outvies
The grace of Summer's proudest day,
When varied blooms of richer dyes
Unfolded to the sun's warm ray.
To me thy yet surviving bloom
And lingering sweetness can recall
Hearts which, unchill'd by gathering gloom,
Can meekly live, and love through all.
From such, in seasons dark and drear,
Immortal hopes of noblest worth,
Feelings and thoughts, to virtue dear,
Gush like the dying fragrance forth,
And fling a holier charm around
Than prosperous hours could ever know;
For Rapture's smile less fair is found
Than that which Patience lends to Woe!
The Mignonette, Reseda odorata, now naturalized to our climate, is a native of the South of France, where it is welcomed by the name of Mignonette, little darling. This favourite plant, introduced into England in 1742, is noticed by Cowper, in his Task :
COME ye, come ye, to the green, green wood;
Loudly the blackbird is singing,
The squirrel is feasting on blossom and bud,
And the curling fern is springing:
Here ye may sleep
While the noon is so warm and so weary,
And sweetly awake
As the sun through the brake
Bids the fauvette and white-throat sing cheery.
The quicken is tufted with blossom of snow,
And is throwing its perfume around it;
The wryneck replies to the cuckoo's halloo,
For joy that again she has found it;
The jay's red breast
In the midst of the crab-blossoms blushing;
And the call of the pheasant
Is frequent and pleasant
When all other calls are hushing.
THE FISH-HAWK, OR OSPREY.
Soon as the Sun, great ruler of the year,
Bends to our northern climes his bright career,
And from the caves of ocean calls from sleep
The finny shoals and myriads of the deep;
When freezing tempests back to Greenland ride,
And day and night the equal hours divide;
True to the season, o'er our sea-beat shore,
The sailing osprey high is seen to soar,
With broad unmoving wing; and circling slow,
Marks each loose straggler in the deep below;
Sweeps down like lightning! plunges with a roar !
And bears his struggling victim to the shore.
The long-housed fisherman beholds with joy,
The well-known signals of his rough employ,
And, as he bears his nets and oars along,
Thus hails the welcome season with a song:-
osprey sails above the sound,
The geese are gone, the gulls are flying;
The herring shoals swarm thick around,
The nets are launch'd, the boats are plying;
Yo ho, my hearts! let's seek the deep,
Raise high the song, and cheerly wish her,
Still as the bending net we sweep,
"God bless the Fish-hawk and the Fisher!"
She brings us fish,-she brings us Spring,
Good times, fair weather, warmth, and plenty,
Fine store of shad, trout, herring, ling,
Sheepshead, and drum, and old wives' dainty.
Yo ho, my hearts! let's seek the deep,
Ply every oar, and cheerly wish her,
Still as the bending net we sweep,
"God bless the Fish-hawk and the Fisher!"
She rears her young on yonder tree,
She leaves her faithful mate to mind 'em;
Like us, for fish, she sails to sea,
And plunging, shows us where to find 'em.
Yo ho, my hearts! let's seek the deep,
Ply every oar, and cheerly wish her,
While the slow-bending net we sweep,
"God bless the Fish-hawk and the Fisher!"
ALEXANDER WILSON.
The Fish-hawk, Falco Haliatus, arrives in the northern parts of the United States about the vernal equinox, and is welcomed by the fishermen as the happy signal of the approach of the vast shoals of fish which frequent those coasts at that season. For an animated description of its constant warfare with the Bald Eagle, Falco leucocephalus, see Wilson's American Ornithology.
By mountain-pass and long stone-sprinkled alley,
Through sweet vicissitudes of barrenness,
Our path-way lies,-with scarce a tree to bless
The worn wayfarer, to the noonday valley.
My mounds have many turns like these, and each
Seems to drop drown to lowlands broad and winning;
But the hills hold them upward: will they reach
Ere night the promise of their green beginning?
Thus my young life its own poor image takes
From bleak Caernarvon's small, unwooded lakes.
A inan with many homes hath none to spare;
Though he beget in calm, rock-shaded places,
Welcomes, farewells, joys, griefs, and soothing faces,
There is no echo to them in the air.
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