But the herd may drink from thy gushing wave, Fount of the Virgin's ruin'd shrine! A voice that speaks of the past is thine! With the notes that ring through the laughing sky; Fount of the chapel with ages grey! In man's deep spirit of old hath wrought; If peace to the mourner hath here been given, Or prayer, from a chasten'd heart, to HeavenBe the spot still hallow'd while Time shall reign, Who hath made thee nature's own again! VOL. IV.- 14 THE PARTING OF SUMMER. THOU'RT bearing hence thy roses, But ere the golden sunset Of thy latest lingering day, Brightly, sweet Summer! brightly Thine hours have floated by, To the joyous birds of the woodland boughs, The rangers of the sky. And brightly in the forests; To the wild deer wandering free; And brightly, 'midst the garden flowers, Is the happy murmuring bee: But how to human bosoms, With all their hopes and fears, And thoughts that make them eagle-wings, Sweet Summer! to the captive Thou hast flown in burning dreams Of the woods, with all their whispering leaves, And the blue rejoicing streams ;— To the wasted and the weary On the bed of sickness bound, In swift delirious fantasies, That changed with every sound; To the sailor on the billows, For the gushing founts and breezy hills, And unto me, glad Summer! My chainless footstep nought hath kept Thou hast flown in wayward visions, In shadows from a troubled heart, In brief and sudden strivings But oh! thou gentle Summer! If I greet thy flowers once more, Give me to hail thy sunshine, May that next meeting be! THE SONGS OF OUR FATHERS. -"Sing aloud Old songs, the precious music of the heart." WORDSWORTH. SING them upon the sunny hills, Sing them along the misty moor, Where ancient hunters roved, And swell them through the torrent's roar, The songs our fathers loved! The songs their souls rejoiced to hear And each proud note made lance and spear The songs that through our valleys green, Sent on from age to age, Like his own river's voice, have been The peasant's heritage. The reaper sings them when the vale And unto them the glancing oars A joyous measure keep, Where the dark rocks that crest our shores Dash back the foaming deep. So let it be!-a light they shed Teach them your children round the hearth, When evening fires burn clear, And in the fields of harvest mirth, And on the hills of deer: So shall each unforgotten word, When far those loved ones roam, Call back the hearts which once it stirr'd, To childhood's holy home. The green woods of their native land 14* |