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the levity seen in his face:

       There’s thought and no thought, and there’s paleness and bloom,

       And bustle and sluggishness, pleasure and gloom.

      There’s weakness, and strength both redundant and vain;

       Such strength, as if ever affliction and pain

       Could pierce through a temper that’s soft to disease,

       Would be rational peace — a philosopher’s ease.

      There’s indifference, alike when he fails and succeeds,

       And attention full ten times as much as there needs,

       Pride where there’s no envy, there’s so much of joy;

       And mildness, and spirit both forward and coy.

      There’s freedom, and sometimes a diffident stare

       Of shame scarcely seeming to know that she’s there.

       There’s virtue, the title it surely may claim,

       Yet wants, heaven knows what, to be worthy the name.

      What a picture! ‘tis drawn without nature or art,

       — Yet the Man would at once run away with your heart,

       And I for five centuries right gladly would be

       Such an odd, such a kind happy creature as he.

A FRAGMENT

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      Between two sister moorland rills

       There is a spot that seems to lie

       Sacred to flowrets of the hills,

       And sacred to the sky.

      And in this smooth and open dell

       There is a tempest-stricken tree;

       A corner stone by lightning cut,

       The last stone of a cottage hut;

       And in this dell you see

       A thing no storm can e’er destroy,

       The shadow of a Danish Boy.

      In clouds above, the lark is heard,

       He sings his blithest and his beet;

       But in this lonesome nook the bird

       Did never build his nest.

      No beast, no bird hath here his home;

       The bees borne on the breezy air

       Pass high above those fragrant bells

       To other flowers, to other dells.

       Nor ever linger there.

       The Danish Boy walks here alone:

       The lovely dell is all his own.

      A spirit of noon day is he,

       He seems a Form of flesh and blood;

       A piping Shepherd he might be,

       A Herd-boy of the wood.

      A regal vest of fur he wears,

       In colour like a raven’s wing;

       It fears nor rain, nor wind, nor dew,

       But in the storm ‘tis fresh and blue

       As budding pines in Spring;

       His helmet has a vernal grace,

       Fresh as the bloom upon his face.

      A harp is from his shoulder slung;

       He rests the harp upon his knee,

       And there in a forgotten tongue

       He warbles melody.

      Of flocks and herds both far and near

       He is the darling and the joy,

       And often, when no cause appears,

       The mountain ponies prick their ears,

       They hear the Danish Boy,

       While in the dell he sits alone

       Beside the tree and cornerstone.

      When near this blasted tree you pass,

       Two sods are plainly to be seen

       Close at its root, and each with grass

       Is cover’d fresh and green.

      Like turf upon a new-made grave

       These two green sods together lie,

       Nor heat, nor cold, nor rain, nor wind

       Can these two sods together bind,

       Nor sun, nor earth, nor sky,

       But side by side the two are laid,

       As if just sever’d by the spade.

      There sits he: in his face you spy

       No trace of a ferocious air,

       Nor ever was a cloudless sky

       So steady or so fair.

      The lovely Danish Boy is blest

       And happy in his flowery cove;

       From bloody deeds his thoughts are far;

       And yet he warbles songs of war;

       They seem like songs of love,

       For calm and gentle is his mien;

       Like a dead Boy he is serene.

POEMS ON THE NAMING OF PLACES.

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      I.

      It was an April Morning: fresh and clear

       The Rivulet, delighting in its strength,

       Ran with a young man’s speed, and yet the voice

       Of waters which the winter had supplied

       Was soften’d down into a vernal tone.

      The spirit of enjoyment and desire,

       And hopes and wishes, from all living things

       Went circling, like a multitude of sounds.

       The budding groves appear’d as if in haste

       To spur the steps of June; as if their shades

       Of various green were hindrances that stood

       Between them and their object: yet, meanwhile,

       There was such deep contentment in the air

       That every naked ash, and tardy tree

       Yet leafless, seem’d as though the countenance

       With which it look’d on this delightful day

       Were native to the summer. — Up the brook

       I roam’d in the confusion of my heart,

       Alive to all things and forgetting all.

      At length I to a sudden turning came

       In this continuous glen, where down a rock

       The stream, so ardent in its course before,

       Sent forth such sallies of glad sound, that all

       Which I till then had heard, appear’d the voice

       Of common pleasure: beast and bird, the lamb,

       The Shepherd’s dog, the linnet and the thrush

       Vied with this waterfall, and made a song

       Which, while I listen’d, seem’d like the wild growth

      

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