The happy child in dragon's way The lamb shall round the leopard play, The dove on Zion's hill shall light, That comes to set us free! HOGG. THE FOOLISH VIRGINS. LATE, late, so late! and dark the night, and chill ! No light had we-for that we do repent ; No light! so late! and dark and chill the night! Oh, let us in, that we may find the light !— Too late, too late! ye cannot enter now! Have we not heard the Bridegroom is so sweet? TENNYSON. THE NEGRO'S COMPLAINT. FORCED from home and all its pleasures, To increase a stranger's treasures, Men from England bought and sold me, But, though theirs they have enrolled me, Still in thought as free as ever, Dwells in white and black the same. Why did all-creating Nature Make the plant for which we toil? Sighs must fan it, tears must water, Sweat of ours must dress the soil. Think, ye masters, iron-hearted, Lolling at your jovial boards, Think how many backs have smarted For the sweets your cane affords. Is there, as ye sometimes tell us, Matches, blood-extorting screws, Hark! He answers !-wild tornadoes, Strewing yonder sea with wrecks, Wasting towns, plantations, meadows, Are the voice with which He speaks. He, foreseeing what vexations Afric's sons should undergo, Fix'd their tyrants' habitations Where His whirlwinds answer-No. By our blood in Afric wasted Ere our necks received the chain; By the miseries we've tasted Crossing in your barks the main; By our sufferings since ye brought us Deem our nation brutes no longer, COWPER. THE PAST. How wild and dim this life appears! Are faintly glittering by! And still forgotten while they go; We scarce believe it shone ! Heaven-airs amid the harp-strings dwell, Dream follows dream, through the long night hours, Each lovelier than the last: But, ere the breath of morning flowers, Whose smiles of love and fondness speak, While in a day we cannot tell Where shone the face we loved so well, In sadness, or in mirth! WILSON. THE CATARACT OF LODORE, HERE it comes sparkling, As if a war waging, Its caverns and rocks among. Rising and leaping, Sinking and creeping, Swelling and flinging, Showering and springing, Eddying and whisking, Spouting and frisking, Twining and twisting, In turmoil delighting; Confounding, astounding, Dizzying and deafening the ear with its sound. Receding and speeding, And shocking and rocking, And whizzing and hissing, And shining and twining, And rattling and battling, And heaving and cleaving, And thundering and floundering. And falling and brawling and sprawling, Grumbling and rumbling and tumbling, Clattering and battering and shattering. And gleaming and streaming and steaming and beaming, And rushing and flushing and brushing and gushing, And flapping and rapping and clapping and slapping, And curling and whirling and purling and twirling; Retreating and beating and meeting and sheeting, Delaying and straying and playing and spraying, Advancing and prancing and glancing and dancing, Recoiling, turmoiling, and toiling and boiling, |