"But they are dead: those two are dead! Their spirits are in heaven!"

'Twas throwing words away: for still

The little Maid would have her will,

And said, "Nay, we are seven!"

"That, Father, will I gladly do!

'Tis scarcely afternoon

The minster-clock has just struck two,
And yonder is the moon."

Not blither is the mountain roe:
With many a wanton stroke

Her feet disperse the powdery snow,
That rises up like smoke.

The storm came on before its time:

She wandered up and down;

And many a hill did Lucy climb;

But never reached the town.

The wretched parents all that night

Went shouting far and wide;

But there was neither sound nor sight

To serve them for a guide.

At day-break on a hill they stood

That overlooked the moor;

And thence they saw the bridge of wood,

A furlong from their door.

And, turning homeward, now they cried,

"In heaven we all shall meet !"

-When in the snow the mother spied

The print of Lucy's feet.

Then downward from the steep hill's edge

They tracked the footmarks small;

And through the broken hawthorn hedge,

And by the long stone wall:

And then an open field they crossed;

The marks were still the same;

They tracked them on, nor ever lost;

And to the bridge they came.

They followed from the snowy bank

The footmarks, one by one,

Into the middle of the plank ;

And further there were none !

-Yet some maintain that to this day

She is a living child;

That you may see sweet Lucy Gray
Upon the lonesome wild.

O'er rough and smooth she trips along, And never looks behind;

And sings a solitary song

That whistles in the wind.

THE PET LAMB.

A PASTORAL.

THE dew was falling fast, the stars began to blink;
I heard a voice: it said, "Drink, pretty creature, drink!"
And, looking o'er the hedge, before me I espied

A snow-white mountain lamb, with a Maiden at its side.

No other sheep were near, the lamb was all alone,
And by a slender cord was tethered to a stone;
With one knee on the grass did the little Maiden kneel,
While to that mountain-lamb she gave its evening meal.

The lamb, while from her hand he thus his supper took, Seemed to feast with head and ears; and his tail with pleasure shook.

"Drink, pretty creature, drink," she said in such a tone, That I almost received her heart into my own.

'Twas little Barbara Lewthwaite, a child of beauty rare!
I watched them with delight; they were a lovely pair.
Now with her empty can the Maiden turned away;
But ere ten yards were gone her footsteps did she stay.

Towards the lamb she looked; and from that shady place
I unobserved could see the workings of her face;

If Nature to her tongue could measured numbers bring,
Thus, thought I, to her lamb that little Maid might sing:

"What ails thee, young One? What? Why pull so at thy cord?

Is it not well with thee? Well both for bed and board?

Thy plot of grass is soft, and green as grass can be ;
Rest, little young Que, rest; what is't that aileth thee