THE FOUNTAIN.

FOUNTAIN, that springest on this grassy slope,
Thy quick cool murmur mingles pleasantly,
With the cool sound of breezes in the beach,
Above me in the noontide. Thou dost wear
No stain of thy dark birthplace; gushing up
From the red mould and slimy roots of earth,
Thou flashest in the sun. The mountain air,
In winter, is not clearer, nor the dew

That shines on mountain blossom. Thus doth God
Bring, from the dark and foul, the pure and bright.

This tangled thicket on the bank above

Thy basin, how thy waters keep it green!

For thou dost feed the roots of the wild vine

That trails all over it,

and to the twigs

Ties fast her clusters.

There the spice-bush lifts

Her leafy lances; the viburnum there,

Paler of foliage, to the sun holds up

Her circlet of green berries. In and out

THE FOUNTAIN.

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The chipping sparrow, in her coat of brown,
Steals silently, lest I should mark her nest.

Not such thou wert of yore, ere yet the axe
Had smitten the old woods. Then hoary trunks
Of oak, and plane, and hickory, o'er thee held
A mighty canopy. When April winds
Grew soft, the maple burst into a flush
Of scarlet flowers. The tulip-tree, high up,
Opened, in airs of June, her multitude
Of golden chalices to humming-birds

And silken-winged insects of the sky.

Frail wood-plants clustered round thy edge in Spring.

The liverleaf put forth her sister blooms

Of faintest blue. Here the quick-footed wolf,
Passing to lap thy waters, crushed the flower

Of sanguinaria, from whose brittle stem

The red drops fell like blood. The deer, too, left
Her delicate foot-print in the soft moist mould,
And on the fallen leaves. The slow-paced bear,

In such a sultry summer noon as this,

Stopped at thy stream, and drank, and leaped across.

But thou hast histories that stir the heart

With deeper feeling;

They rise before me.

while I look on thee

I behold the scene

With solemn rites of blessing and of prayer,
To lay the little corpse in earth below.

The door is opened; hark! that quick glad cry ; Carlo has waked, has waked, and is at play; The little sisters laugh and leap, and try

To climb the bed on which the infant lay.

And there he sits alone, and gayly shakes

In his full hands, the blossoms red and white, And smiles with winking eyes, like one who wakes

From long deep slumbers at the morning light.

THE WINDS.

When in the genial breeze, the breath of God,

Come spouting up the unsealed springs to light;
Flowers start from their dark prisons at his feet,
The woods, long dumb, awake to hymnings sweet,
And morn and eve, whose glimmerings almost meet,
Crowd back to narrow bounds the ancient night.

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THE OLD MAN'S COUNSEL.

AMONG Our hills and valleys, I have known Wise and grave men, who, while their diligent hands. Tended or gathered in the fruits of earth, Were reverent learners in the solemn school Of nature. Not in vain to them were sent Seed-time and harvest, or the vernal shower That darkened the brown tilth, or snow that beat On the white winter hills. Each brought, in turn, Some truth, some lesson on the life of man,

Or recognition of the Eternal mind

Who veils his glory with the elements.

One such I knew long since, a white-haired man,

Pithy of speech, and merry when he would;
A genial optimist, who daily drew

From what he saw his quaint moralities.
Kindly he held communion, though so old,
With me a dreaming boy, and taught me much
That books tell not, and I shall ne'er forget.