By all the graces with which Nature's hand
Had bounteously arrayed him. As old bards
Tell in their idle songs of wandering gods,
Pan or Apollo, veiled in human form:

Yet, like the sweet-breath'd violet of the shade
Discovered in their own despite to sense

Of mortals (if such fables without blame

May find chance-mentioned on this sacred ground)
So, through a simple rustic garb's disguise,
And through the impediment of rural cares,
In him revealed a scholar's genius shown;

And so, not wholly hidden from men's sight,

In him the spirit of a hero walked

Our unpretending valley-How the quoit

Whizzed from the stripling's arm! If touched by him,

The inglorious foot-ball mounted to the pitch

Of the lark's flight, or shaped a rainbow curve,

Aloft, in prospect of the shouting field!
The indefatigable fox had learned
To dread his perseverance in the chase.
With admiration he could lift his eyes
To the wide-ruling eagle, and his hand
Was loath to assault the majesty he loved,
Else had the strongest fastnesses proved weak
To guard the royal brood. The sailing glead,
The wheeling swallow, and the darting suipe,
The sportive sea-gull dancing with the waves,
And cautious waterfowl, from distant climes,
Fixed at their seat, the centre of the Mere,
Were subject to young Oswald's steady aim.

From "An Evening Walk."

AR from my dearest friend, 'tis mine to rove

core,

Through bare grey dell, high wood, and pastoral cove,

His wizard course where hoary Derwent takes,
Thro' crags and forest glooms and opening lakes,

Staying his silent waves, to hear the roar

That stuns the tremulous cliffs of high Lodore,
Where peace to Grasmere's lonely island leads
To willowy hedgerows, and to emerald meads;
Leads to her bridge, rude church, and cottaged grounds,
Her rocky sheepwalks, and her woodland bounds;
Where, bosom'd deep, the shy Winander peeps
'Mid clustering isles, and holy-sprinkled steeps;
Where twilight glens endear my Esthwaite's shore.
And memory of departed pleasures, more.

Fair scenes! erewhile I taught, a happy child,
The echoes of your rocks my carols wild;
Then did no ebb of cheerfulness demand
Sad tides of joy from Melancholy's hand;

In youth's wild eye the livelong day was bright,
The sun at morning, and the stars at night,
Alike, when first the valves the bittern fills
Or the first woodcocks roamed the moonlight hills.
In thoughtless gayety I coursed the plain,
And hope itself was all I knew of pain;
For then, even then, the little heart would beat

At times, while young Content forsook her seat,

And wild Impatience, pointing upward, showed,
Where, tipp'd with gold, the mountain summits glowed.
Alas! the idle tale of man is found

Depicted in the dial's moral round;

With hope Reflection blends her social rays

To gild the total tablet of his days;

Yet still the sport of some malignant power,
He knows but from its shade the present hour.

The Common Lot.

NCE, in the flight of ages past,

There lived a man;-and who was he?

Mortal, howe'er thy lot be cast,

That man resembled thee.

Unknown the region of his birth;

The land in which he died unknown:
His name has perished from the earth;
This truth survives alone:-

That joy and grief, and hope and fear,
Alternate, triumphed in his breast;
His bliss and woe,- -a smile, a tear,-
Oblivion hides the rest.

The bounding pulse, the languid limb,
The changing spirit's rise and fall,-
We know that these were felt by him
For these are felt by all.

He suffered—but his pangs are o er;

Enjoyed, but his delights are fled;
Had friends, his friends are now no more;
And foes, his foes are dead.

He loved, but whom he loved, the grave
Hath lost in its unconscious womb;
Oh, she was fair! but nought could save
Her beauty from the tomb.

He saw whatever thou hast seen,
Encountered all that troubles thee;

He was whatever thou hast been;

He is what thou shalt be.

The rolling seasons, day and night,

Sun, moon, and stars, the earth and main, Erewhile his portion, life and light,

To him exist in vain.

The clouds and sunbeams, o'er his eye

That once their shades and glory threw,

Have left in yonder silent sky

No vestige where they flew.

The annals of the human race,

Their ruin since the world began,

Of him afford no other trace

Than this,—THERE LIVED A MAN.

The Last Footfall.

HERE is often sadness in the tone,
And a moisture in the eye,

And a trembling sorrow in the voice,
When we bid a last good-bye.
But sadder far than this I ween,

O, sadder far than all,

Is the heart-throb with which we strain

To catch the last footfall.

The last press of a loving hand

Will cause a thrill of pain,

When we think, "Oh, should it prove that we

Shall never meet again."

And as lingeringly the hands unclasp,

The hot, quick drops will fall; But bitterer are the tears we shed,

When we hear the last footfall.

We never felt how dear to us

Was the sound we loved full well,

We never knew how musical,

'Till its last echo fell:

And till we heard it pass away

Far, far beyond recall,

We never thought what grief 'twould be

To hear the last footfall.