'Tis men who say that through all hurt and pain
The woman's love, wife's, mother's, still will hold,
And breathes the sweeter and will more unfold
For winds that tear it, and the sorrowful rain.
So in a thousand voices has the strain
Of this dear patient madness been retold,
That men call woman's love. Ah! they are bold,
Naming for love that grief which does remain.

Love faints that looks on baseness face to face:

A little child she, half defiant came
Reasoning her case — 'twas not so long ago —
" I cannot mind your scolding, for I know
However bad I were you'd love the same."
And I, what countering answer could I frame?
'Twas true, and true, and God's self told her so.
One does but ask one's child to smile and grow,
And each rebuke has love for its right name.

And yet, methinks, sad mothers who for years,
Watching the child pass forth that was their boast,
Have counted all the footsteps by new fears

The poorest peasant of the meanest soil,
The child of poverty, and heir to toil,
Early, from radiant love's impartial light,
Steals one small spark to cheer his world of night:
Dear spark! which oft, through winter's chilling woes,
Is all the warmth his little cottage knows!

Laura was lightsome, gay, and free from guile;
Bright were her eyes, and beautiful her smile;
Women found fault, but men were heard to swear
That she was lovely, though she was not fair .
Her parents were not rich, nor very poor;

Loud sung the wind in the ruins above
Which murmured the warnings of time o'er our head,
While fearless we offered devotions to love,
The rude rock our pillow, the rushes our bed!

Damp was the chill of the wintery air,
But it made us cling closer, and warmly unite;
Dread was the lightning, and horrid its glare,
But it showed me my Julia in languid delight.

To my bosom she nestled and felt not a fear
Though the shower did beat and the tempest did frown;
Her sighs were as sweet and her murmurs as dear

O Love ! O beauteous Love!
— Thy home is made for all sweet things,
A dwelling for thine own soft dove
— And souls as spotless as her wings;
There summer ceases never:
The trees are rich with luscious fruits,
— The bowers are full of joyous throngs,
And gales that come from Heaven's own lutes
— And rivulets whose streams are songs
Go murmuring on for ever!

O Love! O wretched Love!
— Thy home is made for bitter care;
And sounds are in thy myrtle grove
— Of late repentance, long despair,
Of feigning and forsaking:

The gayest gallants of the Court
Oft fell in love, on mere report,
— With eyes they had not seen;
And knelt, and rhymed, and sighed, and frowned,
In talismanic fetters bound,
With flowers sunshine all around —
— And five-score leagues between. — MS. Poem .

VI. FLOWERS

Welcome , O pure and lovely forms! again
Unto the shadowy stillness of my room!
For not alone ye bring a joyous train
Of summer-thoughts attendant on your bloom —
Visions of freshness, of rich bowery gloom,
Of the low murmurs filling mossy dells,
Of stars that look down on your folded bells
Through dewy leaves, of many a wild perfume
Greeting the wanderer of the hill and grove
Like sudden music: more than this ye bring —
Far more; ye whisper of the all-fostering love

X.—A REMEMBRANCE OF GRASMERE

O VALE and lake, within your mountain-urn
Smiling so tranquilly, and set so deep!
Oft doth your dreamy loveliness return,
Coloring the tender shadows of my sleep
With light Elysian; for the hues that steep
Your shores in melting lustre, seem to float
On golden clouds from spirit-lands remote,
Isles of the blest; and in our memory keep
Their place with holiest harmonies: fair scene,
Most loved by evening and her dewy star!
Oh! ne'er may man, with touch unhallow'd, jar

Being in thought of love, I chanced to see
Two youthful damozels.
One sang: " Our life inhales
All love continually."

Their aspect was so utterly serene,
So courteous, of such quiet nobleness,
That I said to them: " Yours, I may well ween,
'Tis of all virtue to unlock the place.
Ah! damozels, do not account him base
Whom thus his wound subdues:
Since I was at Thoulouse,
My heart is dead in me."

They turned their eyes upon me in so much
As to perceive how wounded was my heart;

So glad a life was never, love,
— As that which childhood leads,
Before it learns to sever, love,
— The roses from the weeds;
When to be very duteous, love,
— Is all it has to do;
And every flower is beauteous, love,
— And every folly true.

And you can still remember, love,
— The buds that decked our play,
Though Destiny's December, love,
— Has whirled those buds away:
And you can smile through tears, love,
— And feel a joy in pain,
To think upon those years, love,
— You may not see again.