II.

POEMS WRITTEN FOR A CHILD.

WINTER.

WONDERFUL white Winter !

I must clap my hands at you;

You are old and I am cold,

And there is nothing else to do. You and I are glad, are glad

When the snow comes creeping down, And ice drops fair leap out of the air To hang on the branches brown! Wonderful white Winter!

It is when you first begin

With berries fine the churches shine-
That is how we bring you in.
Don't you love the ding-dong bells?
Don't you love the hearty cheer?
The merry blaze, the good old plays,
When you fetch the little new year?
Wonderful white Winter!

Wave your lovely snow-white hand;
Signal make till river and lake

Form the ice that is so grand! Oh, the ice is dear, is dear;

Faithless friend, changed by a breath,
Smooth and sweet to gliding feet,
Gliding over grim death!
Wonderful white Winter!

I will make a league with you;
You must know of want and woe,
Tell me what I ought to do!
I must feed your little birds?

Shelter to the homeless lend?
Comfort and aid the poor and afraid?
That I will, my brave old friend!
Poems written for a Child. [A.] (Strahan.)

Mimics with passing life each summer boon;
Clothing the ground,-replenishing the tree;
Weaving arch, bower, and delicate festoon;
Still as a dream!-and like a dream to flee!
WILLIAM HOWITT.

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FAIRY WORKMEN.

WHEN the world is wrapped in slumber
Through the frosty winter night,
Fairy workmen without number

Labour till the morning light.

Cold they feel not, though 'tis biting,
Love keeps warm each tiny heart,

All in one bright work uniting

Each with gladness taking part:

Catching snowflakes earthward speeding,
Carving them with varied grace,
Every spray with pearl-drops beading,
Strewing gems o'er Nature's face.
Tracing forms of fairy bowers,

In which Oberon might reign,
Roofed with ferns, and paved with flowers,
Thickly o'er each lattice pane:

Dulling by their songs the river

To its dreamy Winter rest,
Till it sleeps, and not a quiver

Trembles on its placid breast.
Thus the fairies, slumber scorning,
Labour through the long-drawn night,
By their arts our world adorning,
Making all things fair and bright.

SOMERVILLE GIBNEY.

FROST.

THE frost looked forth one still clear night,
And he said, "I shall soon be out of sight,
So through the valley, and over the height,
In silence I'll take my way.

I will not go on like that blustering train,
The wind and the snow, the hail and the rain,
Who make so much bustle and noise in vain,
But I'll be as busy as they."

Then he went to the mountain, and powdered its crest,

He climbed up the trees, and their boughs he drest
With diamonds and pearls, and over the breast
Of the quivering lake he spread

A coat of mail, that it might not fear
The downward point of many a spear,
Which he hung on the margin far and near
Where a rock could rear its head.

He went to the windows of those who slept,
And over each pane, like a fairy, crept ;
Wherever he breathed, wherever he stept,

By the light of the moon were seen Most beautiful things; there were flowers and trees, There were bevies of birds, and swarms of bees, There were cities, thrones, temples, and towns and these

All pictured in silver sheen.

But he did one thing that was hardly fair-
He went to the cupboard, and, finding there
That all had forgotten for him to prepare ;
"Now, just to set them thinking,
I'll bite this basket of fruit," said he,
"This bloated pitcher I'll burst in three,
And the glass of water they've left for me

Shall crack to tell I've been drinking!"
UNKNOWN,

SNOW.

I WANDER forth this chill December dawn:
John Frost and all his elves are out, I see,
As busy as the elfin world can be,
Clothing a world asleep with fleecy lawn.
'Mid the blue silence of the evening hours
They glimmered duskly down in silent showers,
And featly have they laboured all night long
Cheering their labour with a half-heard rhyme-
Low as the burthen of a milkmaid's song
When Echo moans it over hills of thyme.

There is a hush of music on the air-
The white-winged fays are faltering everywhere;
And here and there,

Made by a sudden mingling as they fall,
There comes a softer lullaby than all,
Swept in upon the universal prayer.

Thine eyes and heart are troubled with a motion
Of music like the moving waves of ocean,
When, out of hearing, o'er the harbour bars
They sigh toward the moon and jasper stars.

The tiny squadrons waver down and thicken,
Gathering numbers as they fly,

And nearing earth their thick-set ranks they

quicken,

And swim in swarms to die!

away:

But now the clouds are winnowèd
The sky above is gray as glass; below
The feeble twilight of the dreamy day
Nets the long landskip hushed beneath the snow.
The arrowy frosts sting keenly as I stray
Along the rutted lane or broad highway,
Past wind-swept hedges sighing sharp and clear,
Where half the sweetly changeful year

The scented summer loves to gleam and glow.
The new-lain snowy carpet, ankle-deep,
Crumbles beneath my footsteps as I pass,
Revealing scanty blades of frozen grass;
On either side the chirping sparrows leap,
And here and there a robin, friendly now,
From naked bough to bough.

That snow-clad homestead in the river's arm
Is haunted with the noisy rooks that fly
Between its leafless beeches and the sky,
And hailing fast for yonder fallow farm,
A solitary crow is plunging by.

Light muffled winds arising high among
White mountains brooding in their winter rest,
Bear from the eastern winter to the West
The muttered diapason of a song
Made by the thunder on a mountain's breast.

The sun is hanging in a purple globe,
'Mid yellow mists that stir with silver breath;
The little landskip slumbers, white as death,
Amid its naked fields and woody wolds,
Wearing the winter as a stainless robe
Low-trailing in a fall of fleecy folds.
By pasture-gates the mottled cattle swarm,
Thick'ning the misty air, with piteous eyes
Fixed ever on the tempest-breeding skies,
And watch the lingering traces of the storm.
A feeble sunbeam kisses and illumes

Yon whitened spire that hints a hidden town, And flickering for a space it darkens down Above the silence of forgotten tombs.

I gain the shoulder of the woodland now,
A fledgling's flutter from a small hill's brow.
I see the hamlet, half a mile below,
With dripping gables and with crimson panes,
And watch the urchins in the narrow lanes
Below the school-house, shouting in the snow.
The whitened coach comes swiftly round the
road

With horns to which a dozen hills reply,
And rattling onward with its laughing load,
Halts steaming at the little hostelry.
Hard by the lonely woodman pants and glows,
And, wrapt in leather stockings to the thigh,
Toils with an icicle beneath his nose.
In yonder field an idle farm-boy blows
His frozen fingers into tingling flame;
The gaunt old farmer, as he canters by,
Reins in to greet the country clowns by name;
That chestnut pony in the yellow fly
Draws the plump parson and his leaner dame.

I loiter down the road, and feel the ground
Like iron 'neath my heel; the windless air
Seems lying in a swound.

Frost follows in its path without a sound,
And plies his nimble fingers everywhere,
Under my eyelids and beneath my hair.

Yon mountain dons once more its helm of cloud,
The air grows dark and dim as if in wonder;
Once more the heaven is winnow'd, and the crowd
Of silken fays flock murmurously under

A sky that flutters like a wind-swept shroud.

Through gloomy dimbles, clad with new-fall'n

snow,

Back to my little cottage home I go.

But once again I roam by field and flood,
Stung into heat where hoar-frosts melt and bite,
What time the fog wrapt sun drops red as blood,
And Eve's white star is tingling into sight.

ROBERT BUCHANAN. Poetical Works, Vol. II.

[By kind permission of the Author, and of Messrs. Chatto and Windus, the publishers of Mr. Buchanan's works.]

FROST IN THE HOLIDAYS.

THE time of Frost is the time for me!

When the gay blood spins through the heart with glee,

When the voice leaps out with a chiming sound,
And the footstep rings on the musical ground;
When the earth is white, and the air is bright,
And every breath is a new delight!

While Yesterday sank, full soon, to rest,
What a glorious sky!-through the level west
Pink clouds in a delicate greenish haze,
Which deepen'd up into purple grays,
With stars aloft as the light decreas'd,

Till the great moon rose in the rich blue east.

And Morning!—each pane a garden of frost,
Of delicate flow'ring, as quickly lost;
For the stalks are fed by the moon's cold beams,
And the leaves are woven like woof of dreams
By Night's keen breath, and a glance of the Sun
Like dreams will scatter them every one.
Hurra! the lake is a league of glass!
Buckle and strap on the stiff white grass.
Off we shoot, and poise and wheel,
And swiftly turn upon scoring heel;
And our flying sandals chirp and sing
Like a flock of swallows upon the wing.
Away from the crowd with the wind we drift,
No vessel's motion so smoothly swift;
Fainter and fainter the tumult grows,
And the gradual stillness and wide repose
Touch with a hue more soft and grave
The lapse of joy's declining wave.

Pure is the ice; a glance may sound
Deep through an awful, dim profound,

To the water dungeons where snake-weeds hide,
Over which, as self-upborne, we glide,
Like wizards on dark adventure bent,
The masters of every element.

Homeward! How the shimmering snow
Kisses our hot cheeks as we go!
Wavering down the feeble wind,
Like myriad thoughts in a Poet's mind,
Till the earth, and trees, and icy lakes,
Are slowly clothed with the countless flakes.

In the clasp of Home, by the ruddy fire,
Ranged in a ring to our heart's desire,—
Now who will tell some wondrous tale,
Almost to turn the warın cheeks pale,
Set chin on hands, make grave eyes stare,
Draw slowly nearer each stool and chair?

The one low voice goes wandering on
In a mystic world, whither all are gone;
The shadows dance; little Caroline
Has stolen her fingers up into mine.
But the night outside is very chill,
And the Frost hums loud at the window-sill.
WILLIAM ALLINGHAM.
Songs, Ballads, and Stories. (Bell.)

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THE COMING OF THE SNOW.
THE clouds were copper-dyed all day,
And struggled in each other's way,
Until the darkness drifted down
To the summer-forsaken town.
Said people passing in the lane,

"It will be snow," or "'twill be rain ;"
And school bairns, laughing in a row,
Looked through the panes, and wished for snow.

The swollen clouds let nothing fall,
But gath'ring gloom that covered all;
Then came a wind and shook his wings,
And curled the dead leaves into rings.
He made the shutters move and crack,
And hurtled round the chimney stack;
Then he swept on to shake the trees,
Until they moaned like winter seas.
Soon he went whistling o'er the hill,
And all the trees again stood still;
Then through the dark the snow came down,
And whitened all the sleeping town.

The keen stars looked out through the night,
And flecked the boughs with flakes of light,
Then moving clouds revealed the moon
That made on earth a fairy noon.
Then Winter went unto his throne,
That with a million diamonds shone;

A crown of stars was on his head,
And round him his great robes were spread.

At morn the bairns laughed with delight
To see the fields and hedges white,
And folk said as they hurried past,
"Good morning! Winter's come at last."

GUY ROSLYN. Lyrics and Landscapes.

[Reprinted from "Cassell's Family Magazine," by special permission of the publishers, Messrs. Cassell, Petter, Galpin, and Co.]

A WINTER PIECE.

FROST in the air, till every spray,
Stands diamond-set with rime,
That drops awhile at mid of day,
With tiny tinkling chime.
Beside the ice the ducks a-dose,
Dream of the pools to be;

The sheep for warmth lie huddled close,
Upon the naked lea.

The grey sky's flecked with wan white gleams,
And wan and white below,

On laden trees, and locked up streams,

And roof and road, the snow.
All silent shrinks the feathered throng

That cheered spring, wood, and wold;
Only the robin pipes his song,

The cheerier for the cold.

Dear household bird, whose gladsome strain, Beside the window-sill,

Sounds like reproof of hearts too fain

To freeze in winter's chill!

It stings, "This bare bough once was green, And green again will be ;

Where winter is, I've summer seen,

And summer yet shall see."

TOM TAYLOR.

Birket Foster's Pictures of English Landscape. (G. Routledge.)

[By kind permission of Messrs. G. Routledge and Sons.]

Down swept the chill wind from the mountain peak,

From the snow five thousand summers old; On open wold and hill-top bleak

It had gathered all the cold,

And whirled it like sleet on the wanderer's cheek;
It carried a shiver everywhere

From the unleafed boughs and pastures bare;
The little brook heard it and built a roof
'Neath which he could house him, winter proof.
All night by the white stars' frosty gleams

He groined his arches and matched his beams;
Slender and clear were his crystal spars

As the lashes of light that trim the stars;
He sculptured every summer delight
In his halls and chambers out of sight;
Sometimes his tingling waters slipt
Down through a frost-leaved forest-crypt,
Long, sparkling aisles of steel-stemmed trees
Bending to counterfeit a breeze;
Sometimes the roof no fretwork knew
But silvery mosses that downward grew;
Sometimes it was carved in sharp relief
With quaint arabesques of ice-fern leaf;
Sometimes it was simply smooth and clear

For the gladness of heaven to shine through, and here

He had caught the nodding bulrush-tops
And hung them thickly with diamond drops,
That crystalled the beams of moon and sun,
And made a star of every one;

No mortal builder's most rare device
Could match this winter-palace of ice;
'Twas as if every image that mirrored lay
In his depths serene through the summer day,
Each fleeting shadow of earth and sky,
Lest the happy model should be lost,
Had been mimicked in fairy masonry
By the elfin builders of the frost.

J. R. LOWELL.
Poetical Works. (Ward, Lock, and Co.)

WITHIN the hall are song and laughter,

The cheeks of Christmas glow red and jolly, And sprouting is every corbel and rafter

With lightsome green of ivy and holly;
Through the deep gulf of the chimney wide
Wallows the Yule-log's roaring tide;
The broad flame-pennons droop and flap

And belly and tug as a flag in the wind;