He hears a noise-he's all awake-
Again!-on tip-toe down the hill
He softly creeps-'t is Goody Blake;
She's at the hedge of Harry Gill.

Right glad was he when he beheld her;
Stick after stick did Goody pull :

He stood behind a bush of elder,

Till she had filled her apron full.

When with her load she turned about,
The by-road back again to take,
He started forward with a shout,
And sprang upon poor Goody Blake.

And fiercely by the arm he took her,
And by the arm he held her fast,
And fiercely by the arm he shook her,
And cried, "I've caught you, then, at last!"

Then Goody, who had nothing said,

Her bundle from her lap let fall;

And, kneeling on the sticks, she prayed
To God, that is the Judge of all.

She prayed, her withered hand uprearing,
While Harry held her by the arm—
"God! who art never out of hearing,
O may he never more be warın !"
The cold, cold moon above her head,
Thus on her knees did Goody pray.
Young Harry heard what she had said:
And icy cold he turned away.

He went complaining all the morrow

That he was cold and very chill:

His face was gloom, his heart was sorrow;Alas, that day for Harry Gill!

That day he wore a riding-coat,
But not a whit the warmer he :
Another was on Thursday brought,
And ere the Sabbath he had three.

'T was all in vain, a useless matter-
And blankets were about him pinn'd ;
Yet still his jaws and teeth they clatter,
Like a loose casement in the wind.
And Harry's flesh it fell away;
And all who see him say, 'tis plain,
That, live as long as live he may,
He never will be warm again.

No word to any man he utters,
Abed or up, to young or old;
But ever to himself he mutters,
"Poor Harry Gill is very cold."
Abed or up, by night or day,
His teeth they chatter, chatter still.
Now think, ye farmers all, I pray,
Of Goody Blake and Harry Gill.

'Twas summer, and the sun had mounted high:
Southward the landscape indistinctly glared
Through a pale steam; but all the northern downs,
In clearest air ascending, showed far off

A surface dappled o'er with shadows flung
From many a brooding cloud; far as the sight
Could reach, those many shadows lay in spots
Determined and unmoved, with steady beams

Of bright and pleasant sunshine interposed;
Pleasant to him who on the soft cool moss
Extends his careless limbs along the front
Of some huge cave, whose rocky ceiling casts
A twilight of its own, an ample shade,

Where the wren warbles; while the dreaming man,
Half conscious of the soothing melody,

With side-long eye looks out upon the scene,

By that impending covert made more soft,
More low and distant! Other lot was mine;
Yet with good hope that soon I should obtain
As grateful resting-place, and livelier joy.
Across a bare wide Common I was toiling

With languid feet, which by the slippery ground
Were baffled; nor could my weak arm disperse
The host of insects gathering round my face,
And ever with me as I paced along.

The wished-for port to which my steps were bound.
Thither I came, and there, amid the gloom

Spread by a brotherhood of lofty elms,
Appeared a roofless Hut; four naked walls.
That stared upon each other!--I looked round,
And to my wish and to my hope espied
Him whom I sought; a Man of reverend age,
But stout and hale, for travel unimpaired.

There was he seen upon the cottage-bench,
Recumbent in the shade, as if asleep;

An iron-pointed staff lay at his side.

Him had I marked the day before-alone

And in the middle of the public way

Stationed, as if to rest himself, with face

Turned toward the sun then setting, while that staff

Afforded to his figure, as he stood

Detained for contemplation or repose,

Graceful support; the countenance of the Man
Was hidden from my view, and he himself
Unrecognised; but, stricken by the sight,
With slackened footsteps I advanced, and soon
A glad congratulation we exchanged

At such unthought-of meeting.-For the night
We parted, nothing willingly; and now
He by appointment waited for me here,
Beneath the shelter of these clustering elms.

Had known him -In a little Town obscure,

A market village, seated in a tract

Of mountains, where my school-day time was passed,
One room he owned, the fifth part of a house,

A place to which he drew, from time to time,
And found a kind of home or harbour there.