169 JUNE. "There are a thousand pleasant sounds The torrent that before it bounds, The breeze upon the hill : The murmuring of the wood-dove's sigh, The swallow in the eaves, And the wind that sweeps a melody, M. A. BROWNE. Now that Spring, the jovial, playful infancy of a renovated world, the season of opening buds and flowers, of singing-birds, of beauty, and luxuriance, has passed by, June succeeds-that welcome month, when the fruits begin to ripen, and every thing looks full of life. Very pleasant is the early morning walk through "Our populous solitudes of birds and bees, And fairy-form'd, and many-coloured things," when the meadows are sparkling with dew, and light mists rolling from off the hills, discover the streamlets, that leap glittering into sight, and the bright flowers that open on their margins. Very pleasant, too, it is, in the fresh cool evening, to climb that old grey mount, which rises westward of the village, whose ample brow commands a mingling scene of streams and woodlands, village-spires, green hills, and vallies. This ancient mount was once a rampart of iron war. Ostorius is said to have occupied it, and the fierce Earl Godwin lay there with his army: there, too, Queen Margaret halted in her rapid march to the bloody field of Tewkesbury, and ill-fated Charles rested after the siege of Gloucester; but now a few sheep graze tranquilly along the ramparts, and wild flowers grow beside the trenches. This mount is situated at the verge of a wild common, rising in a gentle acclivity from the vale below. It is such as might have furnished Walter Scott with the first idea of his haunted circle, where Marmion encountered the spectre knight, and heard the clang of unearthly armour. But this fair spot is haunted by no ungentler sprites than fairies, if the legends of the village may be credited; nor is any sound heard there except the sighing of the wind through the tufts of withered grass, or the pealing of village-bells on a Sabbathday, coming up from the low country. Now and then, the heavy creaking of a waggon grates upon the ear, when returning from the stone quarries, of which there are several in view; the bleating of sheep is also heard across the common, and on high the cheerful song of the wakeful lark; but these are the only sounds that break upon the stillness of the place; and they, as Cowper beautifully observes, are such as silence delights to hear. I loved that spot from my early childhood. It was my greatest joy to watch the morning mists, as they hastened, chased by the sun-beams, across the vallies: or, in the stillness of a calm summer's evening, to observe the glorious sun shedding his parting beams across the broad expanse of the Severn, that rolls a pomp of waters along the richly wooded vale of Evesham, while in the distance, bold Malvern, and further still, the blue mountains of Merionethshire, were gilded with a softened light. But now, I love that spot, as I never loved it before. For there I sit, on one of the old trenches, and look down on the lovely scene--not exulting, as the traveller of Goldsmith, in a certain feeling of proud independence, but because I can see beneath me cottages and beechwoods, meadows covered with flocks, and fields, in which the life and business of husbandry is going on. During this joyous month, the scene is indescribably pleasing. He who is much abroad in the grey morning, may hear the mowers whet their scythes with the earliest clarion of the wakeful cock. In a few hours, when the sun is high and warm, the haymakers succeed them, and often in such troops, that it seems as if the whole population of the village had turned out to the pleasant labours of the hay-field. Grey-headed old men are there, the grandmother, and all her bairns. The youngest roll on the sweet grass, and those who have just strength to handle the long rake, mimic the sturdy labours of their parents, and draw the gathering load along the sward. Meanwhile, the hay is thrown abroad, then raked into lengthened lines; now the green grass appears, and wind-cocks rise in gay order along the meadow. The next day, and perhaps the third, they are thrown abroad again; and he who sits on one of the time-worn intrenchments of my favourite mount, may learn from the creaking of the waggon, as it winds up the steep, stony lane, from the old grey farm in the valley, that these pleasant labours are nearly over. The waggon is quickly filled, and then unloaded on a strong foundation of wattled boughs; as it rises by degrees, one labourer treads down the hay, others throw it up to him, till at length a loud rejoicing shout awakens the echo far and near, and announces that the work is done. June is also the shearing month. Beneath the southern declivity of the same old mount, a green meadow faces the morning sun; a deep belt of aged trees keeps off the sharp east wind, and near the centre a pond of clear running water is supplied by a little streamlet, that comes leaping and sparkling from a near cliff. This is a general shearing place, and thither the woolly people are driven in turn from the neighbouring farms. 'By men, and boys, and dogs, Compell'd, to where that mazy-running brook |