To close the eye, and close the ear, Wrapped in a trance of bliss, And gently dream in loving arms, To swoon to that,- from this. Scarce knowing if we wake or sleep, Sweet souls around us! watch us still, Let death between us be as naught, Our suffering life, the dream. ALFRED BILLINGS STREET. [From Frontenac.] QUEBEC AT SUNRISE. THE fresh May morning's earliest light, From where the richest hues were blended, Lit on Cape Diamond's towering height Whose spangled crystals glittered bright, Thence to the castle roof descended, And bathed in radiance pure and deep [steep. The spires and dwellings of the Still downward crept the strengthen ing rays; The lofty crowded roofs below And Cataraqui caught the glow, Till the whole scene was in a blaze. The scattered bastions, walls of stone With bristling lines of cannon crowned, Whose muzzles o'er the landscape frowned Blackly through their embrasures -shone. Point Levi's woods sent many a wreath Of mist, as though hearths smoked beneath, Whilst heavy folds of vapor gray The banks of Orleans' Isle displayed. [From Frontenac.] QUEBEC AT SUNSET. 'Twas in June's bright and glowing prime The loveliest of the summer time. The laurels were one splendid sheet Of crowded blossom everywhere: The locust's clustered pearl was sweet, [air And the tall whitewood made the Delicious with the fragrance shed From the gold flowers all o'er it spread. In the rich pomp of dying day Quebec, the rock-throned monarch, glowed, Castle and spire and dwelling gray The batteries rude that niched their way Along the cliff, beneath the play Against the burnished sky, appeared West of Quebec's embankments rose The forests in their wild repose. Between the trunks, the radiance slim Here came with slant and quivering blaze; Whilst there, in leaf-wreathed arbors The moose at morn the ripples drank. dim, Was gathering gray the twilight's The yacht, that stood with naked The butterfly new being found; Whilst round the pink may-apple's bloom, Gave myriad drinking bees their sound. Great fleeting clouds the pigeons made; When near her brood the hunter strayed With trailing limp the partridge stirred; Whilst a quick, feathered spangle shot Rapid as thought from spot to spot Showing the fairy humming-bird. [From Frontenac.] CAYUGA LAKE. SWEET sylvan lake! in memory's gold Is set the time, when first my eye From thy green shore beheld thee hold Thy mirror to the sunset sky! No ripple brushed its delicate air, Rich silken tints alone were there; The far opposing shore displayed, Mingling its hues, a tender shade; A sail scarce seeming to the sight To move, spread there its pinion white, Like some pure spirit stealing on Its gentle peace within him steal, Before His radiance, beauty still Each feeling of my soul refined, Then, contrast wild, I saw the cloud The next day rear its sable crest, And heard with awe the thunder loud Come crashing o'er thy blackening breast. Down swooped the eagle of the blast, One mass of foam was tossing high, Whilst the red lightnings, fierce and fast, Shot from the wild and scowling sky, And burst in dark and mighty train That the last eve so softly kissed, And birds so filled with melodies. Still swept the wind with keener shriek, The tossing waters higher rolled, Still fiercer flashed the lightning's streak, Still gloomier frowned the tempest's fold. Ah, such, ah, such is life, I sighed, Earth's future track an Eden seems Brighter than e'en our brightest dreams. Again, the tempest rushes o'er, Sweet sylvan lake! beside thee now, Villages point their spires to heaven, Rich meadows wave, broad grainfields bow, The axe resounds, the plough is driven: Down verdant points come herds to drink, Flocks strew, like spots of snow, thy brink; Sweet forest-odors have their birth From the clothed boughs and teeming earth; Where pine-cones dropped, leaves piled and dead Long tufts of grass, and stars of fern, With many a wild flower's fairy inn, A thick, elastic carpet spread: Here, with its mossy pall, the trunk, Resolving into soil, is sunk; There, wrenched but lately from its throne By some fierce whirlwind circling past, Its huge roots massed with earth and stone, One of the woodland kings is cast. Above, the forest-tips are bright With the broad blaze of sunny light; But now a fitful air-gust parts The screening branches, and a glow Of dazzling, startling radiance darts Down the dark stems, and breaks below: The mingled shadows off are rolled. The sylvan floor is bathed in gold; |