Of tender joy wilt thou remember me,
And these my exhortations! nor, perchance,
If I should be where I no more can hear

Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams
Of past existence, wilt thou then forget
That on the banks of this delightful stream
We stood together; and that I, so long
A worshipper of Nature, hither came,
Unwearied in that service; rather say
With warmer love, oh! with far deeper zeal
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget,
That after many wanderings, many years
Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs,
And this green pastoral landscape, were to me
More dear, both for themselves and for thy sake.

1798.

THE sun has long been set:

The stars are out by twos and threes;
The little birds are piping yet

Among the bushes and trees;

There's a cuckoo, and one or two thrushes;

And a noise of wind that rushes,

With a noise of water that gushes;

And the cuckoo's sovereign cry

Fills all the hollow of the sky!

Who would go "parading"
In London, and " masquerading,"
On such a night of June,

With that beautiful soft half-moon,
And all these innocent blisses,

On such a night as this is?

POEMS OF SENTIMENT AND

REFLECTION.

EXPOSTULATION AND REPLY.

"WHY, William, on that old gray stone,

Thus for the length of half a day,

Why, William, sit you thus alone,

And dream your time away?

"Where are your books?-that light bequeathed

To beings else forlorn and blind!

Up! up! and drink the spirit breathed
From dead men to their kind.

"You look round on your mother earth,
As if she for no purpose bore you;
As if you were her first-born birth,
And none had lived before you!"

One morning thus, by Esthwaite lake,
When life was sweet, I knew not why,
To me my good friend Matthew spake,
And thus I made reply:

"The eye-it cannot choose but see;
We cannot bid the ear be still;
Our bodies feel, whate'er they be,
Against, or with, our will.

"Nor less I deem that there are powers

Which of themselves our minds impress;

That we can feed this mind of ours
In a wise passiveness.

"Think you, 'mid all this mighty sum

Of things for ever speaking,

That nothing of itself will come,

But we must still be seeking?

"Then ask not wherefore, here, alone,
Conversing as I may,

I sit upon this old gray stone,
And dream my time away."

THE TABLES TURNED;

AN EVENING SCENE, ON THE SAME SUBJECT.
UP! up! my friend, and clear your looks;
Why all this toil and trouble?

Up! up! my friend, and quit your books,
Or surely you'll grow double.

The sun, above the mountain's head,
A freshening lustre mellow

Through all the long green fields has spread,
His first sweet evening yellow.

Books! 'tis a dull and endless strife:

Come, hear the woodland linnet,

How sweet his music! on my life

There's more of wisdom in it.

And hark! how blithe the throstle sings!

He, too, is no mean preacher:

Come forth into the light of things,

Let Nature be your teacher.

She has a world of ready wealth,
Our minds and hearts to bless-
Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health,
Truth breathed by cheerfulness.

One impulse from a vernal wood
May teach you more of man,
Of moral evil and of good,
Than all the sages can.

Sweet is the lore which Nature brings;

Our meddling intellect

Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things

-We murder to dissect.

Enough of science and of art;

Close up

these barren leaves;

Come forth, and bring with you a heart
That watches and receives.

TO THE SPADE OF A FRIEND.

(AN AGRICULTURIST.)

COMPOSED WHILE WE WERE LABOURING TOGETHER IN HIS

PLEASURE-GROUND.

SPADE! with which Wilkinson hath tilled his lands,
And shaped these pleasant walks by Emont's side,
Thou art a tool of honour in my hands;

I press thee, through the yielding soil, with pride.

Rare master has it been thy lot to know;
Long hast thou served a man to reason true;
Whose life combines the best of high and low,
The toiling many and the resting few;

Health, quiet, meekness, ardour, hope secure,
And industry of body and of mind;
And elegant enjoyments, that are pure
As Nature is;-too pure to be refined.

Here often hast thou heard the Poet sing
In concord with his river murmuring by;
Or in some silent field, while timid Spring
Is yet uncheered by other minstrelsy.

Who shall inherit thee when death has laid
Low in the darksome cell thine own dear lord?
That man will have a trophy, humble spade!
A trophy nobler than a conqueror's sword.

If he be one that feels, with skill to part
False praise from true, or greater from the less,
Thee will he welcome to his hand and heart,
Thou monument of peace and happiness!

With thee he will not dread a toilsome day,
His powerful servant, his inspiring mate!
And, when thou art past service, worn away,
Thee a surviving soul shall consecrate.

His thrift thy uselessness will never scorn;
An heir-loom in his cottage wilt thou be:-
High will he hang thee up, and will adorn
His rustic chimney with the last of thee!

WRITTEN IN GERMANY,

ON ONE OF THE COLDEST DAYS OF THE CENTURY.

I must apprise the Reader that the Stoves in North Germany generally have the impression of a galloping Horse upon them, this being part of the Brunswick Arms.

A FIG for your languages, German and Norse!
Let me have the song of the kettle;

And the tongs and the poker, instead of that horse
That gallops away with such fury and force
On this dreary dull plate of black metal.

Here's a fly, a disconsolate creature! perhaps
A child of the field or the grove;

And, sorrow for him! this dull treacherous heat
Has seduced the poor fool from his Winter retreat,
And he creeps to the edge of my stove.

Alas! how he fumbles about the domains
Which this comfortless oven environ!

He cannot find out in what track he must crawl,
Now back to the tiles, and now back to the wall,
And now on the brink of the iron.

Stock-still there he stands like a traveller bemazed;
The best of his skill he has tried;

His feelers methinks I can see him put forth

To the east and the west, and the south and the north;
But he finds neither guide-post nor guide.

See his spindles sink under him, foot, leg, and thigh;
His eye-sight and hearing are lost;

Between life and death his blood freezes and thaws;
And his two pretty pinions of blue dusky gauze
Are glued to his sides by the frost.

No brother, no friend has he near him-while I
Can draw warmth from the cheek of my Love;
As blest and as glad in this desolate gloom,
As if summer grass were the floor of my room,
And woodbines were hanging above.

Yet, God is my witness, thou small helpless thing!
Thy life I would gladly sustain

Till Summer comes up from the south, and with crowds Ofthy brethren a march thou shouldst sound through the clouds And back to the forests again!

CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR.

WHO is the happy Warrior? Who is he
Whom every man in arms should wish to be?

-It is the generous spirit, who, when brought
Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought
Upon the plan that pleased his childish thought:
Whose high endeavours are an inward light
That make the path before him always bright:
Who, with a natural instinct to discern

What knowledge can perform, is diligent to learn;
Abides by this resolve, and stops not there,
But makes his moral being his prime care;
Who, doomed to go in company with pain,
And fear, and bloodshed, miserable train!
Turns his necessity to glorious gain;