How cattle pine, and droop the shivering fowl,
Thy spirits will seem to feed on balmy air:
I speak with knowledge,- by that Voice beguiled,
Thou wilt salute old memories as they throng
Into thy heart; and fancies, running wild
Through fresh green fields, and budding groves

among,

Will make thee happy, happy as a child;

Of sunshine wilt thou think, and flowers, and song, And breathe as in a world where nothing can go wrong.

And know, that, even for him who shuns the day And nightly tosses on a bed of pain;

Whose joys, from all but memory swept away, Must come unhoped for, if they come again; Know, that, for him whose waking thoughts,

severe

As his distress is sharp, would scorn my theme,
The mimic notes, striking upon his ear

In sleep, and intermingling with his dream,
Could from sad regions send him to a dear
Delightful land of verdure, shower, and gleam,
To mock the wandering Voice beside some haunt-
ed stream.

O bounty without measure! while the grace
Of Heaven doth in such wise, from humblest

springs,

Pour pleasure forth, and solaces that trace

A mazy course along familiar things,

Well may our hearts have faith that blessings come, Streaming from founts above the starry sky,

With angels, when their own untroubled home

They leave, and speed on nightly embassy

To visit earthly chambers, and for whom?

Yea, both for souls who God's forbearance try, And those that seek his help, and for his mercy sigh.

XLVIII.

TO THE CLOUDS.

ARMY of Clouds! ye winged Host in troops
Ascending from behind the motionless brow
Of that tall rock, as from a hidden world,
O whither with such eagerness of speed?
What seek ye, or what shun ye? of the gale
Companions, fear ye to be left behind,
Or, racing o'er your blue, ethereal field,
Contend ye
with each other? of the sea
Children, thus post ye over vale and height

To sink upon your mother's lap, and rest?
Or were ye rightlier hailed, when first mine eyes
Beheld in your impetuous march the likeness
Of a wide army pressing on to meet
Or overtake some unknown enemy?

But your smooth motions suit a peaceful aim;
And Fancy, not less aptly pleased, compares
Your squadrons to an endless flight of birds
Aerial, upon due migration bound

To milder climes; or rather do ye urge
In caravan your hasty pilgrimage,

To pause at last on more aspiring heights
Than these, and utter your devotion there
With thundrous voice? Or are ye jubilant,
And would ye, tracking your proud lord, the Sun,
Be present at his setting; or the pomp
Of Persian mornings would ye fill, and stand
Poising your splendors high above the heads
Of worshippers kneeling to their up-risen God?
Whence, whence, ye Clouds! this eagerness of
speed?

Speak, silent creatures.

They are gone, are fled,

Buried together in yon gloomy mass

That loads the middle heaven; and clear and

bright

And vacant doth the region which they thronged
Appear; a calm descent of sky conducting
Down to the unapproachable abyss,

Down to that hidden gulf from which they rose
To vanish, fleet as days and months and years,
Fleet as the generations of mankind,

Power, glory, empire, as the world itself,

The lingering world, when time had ceased to be.
But the winds roar, shaking the rooted trees,
And see! a bright precursor to a train

Perchance as numerous, overpeers the rock
That sullenly refuses to partake

Of the wild impulse. From a fount of life
Invisible, the long procession moves
Luminous or gloomy, welcome to the vale
Which they are entering, welcome to mine eye
That sees them, to my soul that owns in them,

And in the bosom of the firmament

O'er which they move, wherein they are contained, A type of her capacious self and all

Her restless progeny.

A humble walk

Here is my body doomed to tread, this path,
A little hoary line and faintly traced,
Work, shall we call it, of the shepherd's foot
Or of his flock?-joint vestige of them both.
I pace it unrepining, for my thoughts

Admit no bondage and my words have wings.
Where is the Orphean lyre, or Druid harp,

To

accompany the verse? The mountain blast Shall be our hand of music; he shall sweep The rocks, and quivering trees, and billowy lake, And search the fibres of the caves, and they Shall answer, for our song is of the Clouds And the wind loves them; and the gentle gales Which by their aid reclothe the naked lawn With annual verdure, and revive the woods, And moisten the parched lips of thirsty flowersLove them; and every idle breeze of air

Bends to the favorite burden. Moon and stars

Keep their most solemn vigils when the Clouds
Watch also, shifting peaceably their place
Like bands of ministering Spirits, or when they lie,
As if some Protean art the change had wrought,
In listless quiet o'er the ethereal deep
Scattered, a Cyclades of various shapes
And all degrees of beauty. O ye Lightnings!
Ye are their perilous offspring; and the Sun—
Source inexhaustible of life and joy,

And type of man's far-darting reason, therefore
In old time worshipped as the god of verse,
A blazing intellectual deity

Loves his own glory in their looks, and showers
Upon that unsubstantial brotherhood

Visions with all but beatific light

Enriched,

too transient were they not renewed

From age to age, and did not, while we gaze
In silent rapture, credulous desire

Nourish the hope that memory lacks not power
To keep the treasure unimpaired. Vain thought!
Yet why repine, created as we are

For joy and rest, albeit to find them only
Lodged in the bosom of eternal things?