There through the long, long summer hours,

The golden light should lie,

And thick young herbs and groups of flowers Stand in their beauty by.

The oriole should build and tell

His love-tale close beside my cell;

The idle butterfly

Should rest him there, and there be heard
The housewife bee and humming-bird.

And what if cheerful shouts at noon

Or

Come, from the village sent,

songs of maids, beneath the moon

With fairy laughter blent?

And what if, in the evening light,

Betrothed lovers walk in sight

I would the lovely scene around

Might know no sadder sight nor sound.

I know, I know I should not see

The season's glorious show,
Nor would its brightness shine for me,
Nor its wild music flow; '

But if, around my place of sleep,

The friends I love should come to weep,

They might not haste to go.

Soft airs, and song, and light, and bloom, Should keep them lingering by my tomb.

These to their softened hearts should bear
The thought of what has been,
And speak of one who cannot share
The gladness of the scene;

Whose part, in all the pomp that fills
The circuit of the summer hills,

Is that his grave is green;

And deeply would their hearts rejoice
To hear again his living voice.

A SONG OF PITCAIRN'S ISLAND.

COME take our boy, and we will go
Before our cabin door;

The winds shall bring us, as they blow,
The murmurs of the shore;
And we will kiss his young blue eyes,
And I will sing him, as he lies,

Songs that were made of yore:

I'll sing, in his delighted ear,

The island lays thou lov'st to hear.

And thou, while stammering I repeat,

Thy country's tongue shalt teach ;
'Tis not so soft, but far more sweet

Than my own native speech:
For thou no other tongue didst know,
When, scarcely twenty moons ago,
Upon Tahete's beach,

Thou cam'st to woo me to be thine,
With many a speaking look and sign.

I knew thy meaning-thou didst praise
My eyes, my locks of jet;

Ah! well for me they won thy gaze,—

But thine were fairer yet!

I'm glad to see my infant wear

Thy soft blue eyes and sunny hair,

And when my sight is met

By his white brow and blooming cheek, I feel a joy I cannot speak.

Come talk of Europe's maids with me, Whose necks and cheeks, they tell,

Outshine the beauty of the sea,

White foam and crimson shell.

I'll shape like theirs my simple dress,
And bind like them each jetty tress,

A sight to please thee well:
And for my dusky brow will braid
A bonnet like an English maid.

Come, for the low sunlight calls,

We lose the pleasant hours; 'Tis lovelier than these cottage walls,

That seat among the flowers.

And I will learn of thee a prayer,

To Him who gave a home so fair,

A lot so blest as ours

The God who made, for thee and me,

This sweet lone isle amid the sea.

THE SKIES.

Ay! gloriously thou standest there,
Beautiful, boundless firmament!

That, swelling wide o'er earth and air,
And round the horizon bent,

With thy bright vault, and sapphire wall,
Dost overhang and circle all.

Far, far below thee, tall old trees
Arise, and piles built up of old,
And hills, whose ancient summits freeze
In the fierce light and cold.

The eagle soars his utmost height,
Yet far thou stretchest o'er his flight.

Thou hast thy frowns-with thee on high The storm has made his airy seat, Beyond that soft blue curtain lie

His stores of hail and sleet.

Thence the consuming lightnings break,

There the strong hurricanes awake.