One touch to her hand and one word in her ear, When they reach'd the hall door, and the charger

stood near ;

So light to the croupe the fair lady he swung, So light to the saddle before her he sprung! “ She is won! we are gone, over bank, bush, and

scaur, They 'll have fleet steeds that follow ! ” quoth young

Lochinvar.

There was mounting 'mong Græmes of the Neth

erby clan; Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they rode and

they ran; There was racing and chasing on Cannobie lea ; But the lost bride of Netherby ne'er did they

see:

So daring in love, and so dauntless in war, Have ye e'er heard of gallant like young Lochinvar?

Sir Walter Scott.

HOW SLEEP THE BRAVE

How sleep the Brave who sink to rest
By all their Country's wishes blest !
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallow'd mould,
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.

By fairy hands their knell is rung,
By forms unseen their dirge is sung:
There Honor comes, a pilgrim gray,
To bless the turf that wraps their clay,
And Freedom shall awhile repair
To dwell a weeping hermit there!

William Collins.

W

LUCY GRAY; OR, SOLITUDE

OFT I had heard of Lucy Gray:

And, when I crossed the wild, I chanced to see at break of day

The solitary child.

No mate, no comrade Lucy knew;

She dwelt on a wide moor,
The sweetest thing that ever grew

Beside a human door !

You yet may spy the fawn at play,
The hare

upon

the

green; But the sweet face of Lucy Gray

Will never more be seen.

“To-night will be a stormy night

You to the town must go;
And take a lantern, child, to light

Your mother through the snow.”

“ That, father, will I gladly do:

’T is scarcely afternoon

The minster-clock has just struck two,

And yonder is the moon!

At this the father raised his hook,

And snapped a fagot-band;
He plied his work; and Lucy took

The lantern in her hand.

Not blither is the mountain roe :

With many a wanton stroke
Her feet disperse the powdery snow,

That rises up like smoke.

The storm came on before its time:

She wandered up and down, And many a hill did Lucy climb,

But never reached the town.

The wretched parents all that night

Went shouting far and wide ;
But there was neither sound nor sight

To serve them for a guide.

At daybreak on a hill they stood

That overlooked the moor; And thence they saw the bridge of wood,

A furlong from their door.

They wept — and, turning homeward, cried,

“ In heaven we all shall meet!” When in the snow the mother spied

The print of Lucy's feet.

Then downwards from the steep hill's edge

They tracked the footmarks small;
And through the broken hawthorn hedge,

And by the long stone wall;

And then an open field they crossed :

The marks were still the same;
They tracked them on, nor ever lost,

And to the bridge they came.

They followed from the snowy bank

Those footmarks, one by one,
Into the middle of the plank;

And further there were none !

Yet some maintain that to this day

She is a living child ;
That you may see sweet Lucy Gray

Upon the lonesome wild.

O’er rough and smooth she trips along,

And never looks behind ;
And sings a solitary song
That whistles in the wind.

William Wordsworth.

THE WRECK OF THE HESPERUS

It was the schooner Hesperus,

That sailed the wintry sea ; And the skipper had taken his little daughter,

To bear him company.

Blue were her eyes as the fairy-flax,

Her cheeks like the dawn of day,
And her bosom white as the hawthorn buds,
That
ope

in the month of May.

The skipper he stood beside the helm,

His pipe was in his mouth,
And watched how the veering flaw did blow

The smoke now west, now south.

Then

up

and spake an old sailor, Had sailed the Spanish Main, “I pray thee put into yonder port,

For I fear a hurricane.

“ Last night the moon had a golden ring,

And to-night no moon we see !'
The skipper he blew a whiff from his pipe,

And a scornful laugh laughed he.

Colder and louder blew the wind,

A gale from the northeast;
The snow fell hissing in the brine,

And the billows frothed like yeast.

Down came the storm, and smote amain

The vessel in its strength; She shuddered and paused, like a frighted steed,

Then leaped her cable's length.

“Come hither! come hither! my little daughter,

And do not tremble so ;