Birds Nests.

I know not where-it matters not;
To-day their thoughts are bent,
To pitch, in some sequester'd spot,
Their secret summer tent;

Hid from the glance of urchins' eyes,
Peering already for the prize;
While daily, hourly intervene

The clustering leaves, a closer screen.

In bank, in bush, in hollow hole
High on the rocking tree,

On the gray cliffs that haughtily
The ocean waves control;
Far in the solitary fen,

On heath, and mountain hoar,
Beyond the foot or fear of men,
Or by the cottage door;

In grassy tuft, in ivy'd tower,
Where'er directs the instinctive power,
Or loves each jocund pair to dwell,
Is built the cone, or feathery cell.

Beautiful things! than I, no boy
Your traces may discern,
Sparkling beneath the forest fern,
With livelier sense of joy:

I would not bear them from the nest,
To leave fond hearts regretting;

But, like the soul screen'd in the breast,

Like gems in beauteous setting,

Amidst Spring's leafy, green array
I deem them; and, from day to day,
Passing, I pause, to turn aside,

With joy, the boughs where they abide.

87

The mysteries of life's early day
Lay thick as summer dew,

Like it, they glitter'd and they flew
With ardent youth away:

But not a charm of yours has faded,
Ye are full of marvel still.

Now jewels cold, and now pervaded
With heavenly fire, ye thrill
And kindle into life, and bear
Beauty and music through the air:
The embryos of a shell to-day ;
To-morrow, and—away! away!

Methinks, even as I gaze, there springs
Life from each tinted cone;

And wandering thought has onward flown
With speed-careering wings,

To lands, to summer lands afar,

To the mangrove, and the palm ;
To the region of each stranger star

Led by a blissful charm:

Like toys in beauty here they lay—

They are gone o'er the sounding ocean's spray ;

They are gone to bowers and skies more fair,

And have left us to our march of care.

The Partition of the Earth.

I thought that morning cloud was bless'd,

It moved so sweetly to the west.

I saw two summer currents

Flow smoothly to their meeting,

And join their course, with silent force,

In peace each other greeting:

Calm was their course through banks of green,
While dimpling eddies play'd between.

Such be your gentle motion,

Till life's last pulse shall beat;

Like summer's beam, and summer's stream,
Float on, in joy, to meet

A calmer sea, where storms shall cease-
A purer sky, where all is peace.

89

The Partition of the Earth.

FROM SCHILLER.

BY LORD FRANCIS LEVESON GOWER.

WHEN

HEN Jove had encircled our planet with light,
And had roll'd the proud orb on its way,

And had given the moon to illume it by night,

And the bright sun to rule it by day,

The reign of its surface he found to agree
With the wisdom which govern'd its plan;
He divided the earth and apportion'd the sea,
And he gave the dominion to man.

The hunter he sped to the forest and wood,
And the husbandman seized on the plain;
The fisherman launch'd his canoe on the flood,
And the merchant embark'd on the main.
The mighty partition was finish'd at last,
When a figure came listlessly on;

But fearful and wild were the looks that he cast
When he found that the labour was done.

The mien of disorder, the wreath which he wore,
And the frenzy that flash'd from his eye,
And the lyre of ivory and gold that he bore
Proclaim'd that the Poet was nigh;

And he rush'd all in tears at the fatal decree

To the foot of the Thunderer's throne,

And complain'd that no spot of the earth or the sea Had been given the bard as his own.

And the Thunderer smiled at his prayer and his mien,
Though he mourn'd the request was too late;
And he ask'd in what regions the Poet had been
When his lot was decided by fate?
"Oh, pardon my error!" he humbly replied,
"Which sprung from a vision too bright;
My soul at that moment was close at thy side,
Entranced in these regions of light.

"It hung on thy visage, it bask'd in thy smile,
And it rode on thy glances of fire;

And forgive, if bewilder'd and dazzled the while,
It forgot every earthly desire.”

“The earth,” says the Godhead, "is portion'd away, And I cannot reverse the decree;

But the heavens are mine, and the regions of day,
And their portal is open to thee."