X.

HIS LAST SONNET.

BRIGHT STAR! would I were steadfast as thou art!
Not in lone splendor hung aloft the night,
And watching, with eternal lids apart,

Like Nature's patient sleepless Eremite,
The moving waters at their priestlike task

Of pure ablution round earth's human shores, Or gazing on the new soft-fallen mask

Of snow upon the mountains and the moors : No! yet still steadfast, still unchangeable, Pillowed upon my fair love's ripening breast, To feel forever its soft fall and swell,

Awake forever in a sweet unrest,

Still, still to hear her tender-taken breath,
And so live ever, or else swoon to death.*

* Another reading :

*

Half passionless, and so swoon on to death.

JAMES HENRY LEIGH HUNT.

I.

QUIET EVENINGS.

(TO THOMAS BARNES, Esq.)

DEAR BARNES, whose native taste, solid and clear,
The throng of life has strengthened without harm,
You know the rural feeling, and the charm
That stillness has for a world-fretted ear:
'Tis now deep whispering all about me here,
With thousand tiny hushings, like a swarm
Of atom bees, or fairies in alarm,

Or noise of numerous bliss from distant sphere.
This charm our evening hours duly restore,

Naught heard through all our little, lulled abode,
Save the crisp fire, or leaf of book turned o'er,
Or watch-dog, or the ring of frosty road.

Wants there no other sound then? - Yes, one more,
The voice of friendly visiting, long owed.

II.

TO THE GRASSHOPPER AND THE CRICKET.*

GREEN little vaulter in the sunny grass,

Catching your heart up at the feel of June,
Sole voice that's heard amidst the lazy noon,
When even the bees lag at the summoning brass;
And you, warm little housekeeper, who class

With those who think the candles come too soon,
Loving the fire, and with your tricksome tune
Nick the glad silent moments as they pass;

O sweet and tiny cousins, that belong

One to the fields, the other to the hearth,

Both have your sunshine; both, though small, are strong At your clear hearts; and both seem given to earth To sing in thoughtful ears this natural song,

In doors and out, summer and winter, Mirth.

December, 1816.

* Written in the Vale of Health, Hampstead, and in companionship with that of Keats, on the same subject.

III.

TO MY WIFE.

(On Modelling my Bust.)

Ан, Marian mine, the face you look on now
Is not exactly like my wedding day's;
Sunk is its cheek, deeper-retired its gaze,
Less white and smooth its temple-flattened brow.
Sorrow has been there with his silent plough,
And strait, stern hand. No matter, if it raise
Aught that affection fancies, it may praise,

Or make me worthier of Apollo's bough.

Loss, after all, such loss especially, —

- -
-

Is transfer, change, but not extinction, -no;
Part in our children's apple cheeks I see;
And, for the rest, while you look at me so,
Take care you do not smile it back to me,
And miss the copied furrows as you go.

IV.

TO KOSCIUSKO.

(Who never fought either for Bonaparte or the Allies.)

'Tis like thy patient valor thus to keep, Great Kosciusko, to the rural shade,

While Freedom's ill-found amulet still is made
Pretence for old aggression, and a heap

Of selfish mockeries. There, as in the sweep
Of stormier fields, thou earnest with thy blade,
Transformed, not inly altered, to the spade,
Thy never yielding right to a calm sleep.
There came a wanderer, borne from land to land

Upon a couch, pale, many-wounded, mild, His brow with patient pain dulcetly sour. Men stooped with awful sweetness on his hand, And kissed it; and collected Virtue smiled, To think how sovereign her enduring hour.