Or, if chill, blustering winds, or driving rain,

Prevent my willing feet, be mine the hut That from the mountain's side Views wilds, and swelling floods,

And hamlets brown, and dim-discovered spires;

And hears their simple bell, and marks o'er all

Thy dewy fingers draw
The gradual, dusky veil.

While Spring shall pour his showers, as oft he wont,

And bathe thy breathing tresses, meekest
Eve!

While Summer loves to sport
Beneath thy lingering light;

While sallow Autumn fills thy lap with leaves;

Or Winter, yelling through the troublous air,

Affrights thy shrinking train,
And rudely rends thy robes, -

So long, regardful of thy quiet rule,
Shall Fancy, Friendship, Science, smiling
Peace,

Thy gentlest influence own,
And love thy favorite name!

JAMES MERRICK.

[1720-1769.]

THE CHAMELEON.

OFT has it been my lot to mark
A proud, conceited, talking spark,
With eyes that hardly served at most
To guard their master 'gainst a post;
Yet round the world the blade has been,
To see whatever could be seen.
Returning from his finished tour,
Grown ten times perter than before;
Whatever word you chance to drop,
The travelled fool your mouth will stop:
"Sir, if my judgment you 'll allow-
I've seen and sure I ought to know."
So begs you'd pay a due submission,
And acquiesce in his decision.

65

Two travellers of such a cast, As o'er Arabia's wilds they passed, And on their way, in friendly chat, Now talked of this, and then of that, Discoursed awhile, 'mongst other mat

ter,

Of the chameleon's form and nature.
"A stranger animal," cries one,
"Sure never lived beneath the sun:
A lizard's body, lean and long,
A fish's head, a serpent's tongue,
Its foot with triple claw disjoined;
And what a length of tail behind!
How slow its pace! and then its hue-
Who ever saw so fine a blue?"

"Hold there," the other quick replies; "'T is green, I saw it with these eyes, As late with open mouth it lay, And warmed it in the sunny ray; Stretched at its ease the beast I viewed, And saw it eat the air for food."

"I've seen it, sir, as well as you,
And must again affirm it blue;
At leisure I the beast surveyed
Extended in the cooling shade."

"T is green, 't is green, sir, I assure

ye.

"Green!" cries the other in a fury; "Why, sir, d'ye think I've lost my eyes?"

"'T were no great loss," the friend replies; "For if they always serve you thus, You'll find them but of little use."

So high at last the contest rose,
From words they almost came to blows:
When luckily came by a third;
To him the question they referred,
And begged he'd tell them, if he knew,
Whether the thing was green or blue.
"Sirs," cries the umpire, "cease your
pother;

The creature 's neither one nor t' other.
I caught the animal last night,
And viewed it o'er by candlelight;
I marked it well, 't was black as jet-
You stare-but, sirs, I've got it yet,
And can produce it."-"Pray, sir, do;
I'll lay my life the thing is blue."
"And I'll be sworn, that when you 've

seen

The reptile, you'll pronounce him green." "Well, then, at once to ease the doubt," Replies the man, "I'll turn him out; And when before your eyes I've set him, If you don't find him black, I'll eat him.'

He said; and full before their sight Produced the beast, and lo!-'t was white.

Both stared; the man looked wondrous

wise

"My children," the chameleon cries (Then first the creature found a tongue), "You all are right, and all are wrong: When next you talk of what you view, Think others see as well as you; Nor wonder if you find that none Prefers your eyesight to his own."

OLIVER GOLDSMITH.

[1728-1774.]

FROM "THE DESERTED VILLAGE."

SWEET was the sound, when oft, at

evening's close

Up yonder hill the village murmur rose; There, as I passsed with careless steps and

slow,

The mingling notes came softened from below;

The swain responsive as the milkmaid sung,

The sober herd that lowed to meet their young;

The noisy geese that gabbled o'er the pool, The playful children just let loose from school;

The watch-dog's voice that bayed the whispering wind,

And the loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind,

These all in sweet confusion sought the shade,

And filled each pause the nightingale had made.

But now the sounds of population fail, No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale,

No busy steps the grass-grown footway tread,

But all the bloomy flush of life is fled. All but yon widowed, solitary thing, That feebly bends beside the plashy spring;

She, wretched matron, forced in age, for bread,

To strip the brook with mantling cre

spread,

To pick her wintry fagot from th To seek her nightly shed, ap

morn;

She only left of all the harmless train, The sad historian of the pensive plain.

Near yonder copse, where once the garden smiled,

And still where many a garden flower grows wild,

There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose,

The village preacher's modest mansion

rose.

A man he was to all the country dear, And passing rich with forty pounds a year;

Remote from towns he ran his godly race, Nor e'er had changed, nor wished to change, his place;

Unpractised he to fawn, or seek for power, By doctrines fashioned to the varying hour;

Far other aims his heart had learned to prize,

More skilled to raise the wretched than to rise.

His house was known to all the vagrant train,

He chid their wanderings, but relieved their pain;

The long-remembered beggar was his guest,

Whose beard descending swept his aged breast;

The ruined spendthrift, now no longer proud,

Claimed kindred there, and had his claims allowed;

The broken soldier, kindly bade to stay, Sat by his fire, and talked the night away;

Wept o'er his wounds, or tales of sorrow done,

Shouldered his crutch, and showed how fields were won.

Pleased with his guests, the good man

learned to glow,

And quite forgot their vices in their woe; Careless their merits or their faults to

scan,

His pity gave ere charity began.

Thus to relieve the wretched was his pride,

And even his failings leaned to virtue's side:

But in his duty prompt at every call, He watched and wept, he prayed and felt for all;

Well had the boding tremblers learned

to trace

The day's disasters in his morning face; Full well they laughed, with counterfeited glee,

At all his jokes, for many a joke had he; Full well the busy whisper, circling round, Conveyed the dismal tidings when he frowned.

Yet he was kind, or if severe in aught, The love he bore to learning was in fault. The village all declared how much he knew;

"T was certain he could write, and cipher too;

Lands he could measure, times and tides presage,

And even the story ran that he could gauge; In arguing, too, the parson owned his skill, For, even though vanquished, he could argue still;

While words of learned length and thundering sound

Amazed the gazing rustics ranged around; And still they gazed, and still the wonder

67

Obscure it sinks, nor shall it more impart An hour's importance to the poor man's heart;

Thither no more the peasant shall repair
To sweet oblivion of his daily care;
No more the farmer's news, the barber's
tale,

No more the woodman's ballad shall prevail;

No more the smith his dusky brow shall clear,

Relax his ponderous strength, and-lean to hear.

The host himself no longer shall be found Careful to see the mantling bliss go round; Nor the coy maid, half willing to be prest, Shall kiss the cup to pass it to the rest.

THOMAS PERCY.

[1728-1811.]

THE FRIAR OF ORDERS GRAY.

IT was a friar of orders gray

Walked forth to tell his beads, And he met with a lady fair,

Clad in a pilgrim's weeds.

"Now Christ thee save, thou reverend friar!

I pray thee tell to me, If ever at yon holy shrine

My true-love thou didst see."

"And how should I know your true-love From many another one?" "Oh! by his cockle hat, and staff, And by his sandal shoon;

"But chiefly by his face and mien,
That were so fair to view,
His flaxen locks that sweetly curled,
And eyes of lovely blue."

"O lady, he is dead and gone!

Lady, he's dead and gone! And at his head a green grass turf, And at his heels a stone.

"Within these holy cloisters long He languished, and he died, Lamenting of a lady's love,

And 'plaining of her pride.

"Here bore him barefaced on his bier
Six proper youths and tall;
And many a tear bedewed his grave
Within yon kirkyard wall."

"And art thou dead, thou gentle youth?

And art thou dead and gone? And didst thou die for love of me? Break, cruel heart of stone!"

"O, weep not, lady, weep not so;
Some ghostly comfort seek:
Let not vain sorrow rive thy heart,
Nor tears bedew thy cheek."

"O do not, do not, holy friar,

My sorrow now reprove; For I have lost the sweetest youth That e'er won lady's love.

"And now, alas! for thy sad loss I'll evermore weep and sigh; For thee I only wished to live,

For thee I wish to die."

"Weep no more, lady, weep no more;
Thy sorrow is in vain :
For violets plucked, the sweetest shower
Will ne'er make grow again.

"Our joys as wingéd dreams do fly;
Why then should sorrow last?
Since grief but aggravates thy loss,
Grieve not for what is past."

"O, say not so, thou holy friar!

I pray thee say not so;

For since my true love died for me, 'Tis meet my tears should flow.

And will he never come again? Will he ne'er come again?

"And art thou dead, thou much-loved youth,

And didst thou die for me? Then farewell home; foreverinore A pilgrim I will be.

"But first upon my true-love's grave My weary limbs I'll lay,

And thrice I'll kiss the green grass turf That wraps his breathless clay."

"Yet stay, fair lady, rest awhile

Beneath this cloister wall;

The cold wind through the hawthorn blows,

And drizzly rain doth fall."

"O, stay me not, thou holy friar,
O stay me not, I pray;
No drizzly rain that falls on me
Can wash my fault away."

"Yet stay, fair lady, turn again,
And dry those pearly tears;
beneath this gown of gray
Thy own true-love appears.

For

see,

"Here, forced by grief and hopeless love, These holy weeds I sought;

And here, amid these lonely walls,
To end my days I thought.

"But haply, for my year of grace
Is not yet passed away,