The snow and the sky so bright-he used but to call

in the dark,

And he calls to me now from the church and not from

the gibbet-for hark!

Nay-you can hear it yourself—it is coming-shaking the walls

Willy-the moon's in a cloud- -Good night. I am going. He calls.

LORD HOUGHTON

THE BROOKSIDE

I wandered by the brook-side,
I wandered by the mill,-
I could not hear the brook flow
The noisy wheel was still;
There was no burr of grasshopper,
Nor chirp of any bird,

But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.

I sat beneath the elm-tree,

I watched the long, long, shade,
And as it grew still longer,

I did not feel afraid;
For I listened for a footfall,

I listened for a word,-
But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.

Born 1809

He came not, no, he came not,—
The night came on alone,-
The little stars sat one by one,
Each on his golden throne;
The evening air passed by my cheek,
The leaves above were stirr'd,-

But the beating of my own heart
Was all the sound I heard.

Fast silent tears were flowing,
When something stood behind,-
A hand was on my shoulder,
I knew its touch was kind:
It drew me nearer-nearer,—
We did not speak one word,
For the beating of our own hearts
Was all the sound we heard.

ROBERT BROWNING

Born 1812

HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM ABROAD

Oh, to be in England

Now that April's there,

And whoever wakes in England

Sees, some morning, unaware,

That the lowest boughs and the brush-wood sheaf

Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf,

While the chaffinch sings on the orchard bough.
In England-now!

And after April, when May follows,

And the whitethroat builds, and all the swallows!
Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in the hedge
Leans to the field and scatters on the clover
Blossoms and dew-drops-at the bent spray's edge-
That's the wise thrush; he sings each song twice over,
Lest you should think he never could recapture
The first fine careless rapture!

And though the fields look rough with hoary dew,
And will be gay when noontide wakes anew

The buttercups, the little children's dower
-Far brighter than this gaudy melon-flower!

FROM "A BLOT IN THE 'SCUTCHEON "

SONG

There's a woman like a dew-drop, she's so purer than the purest ;

And her noble heart's the noblest, yes, and her sure faith's the surest :

And her eyes are dark and humid, like the depth on depth of lustre

Hid i' the harebell, while her tresses, sunnier than the wild-grape cluster,

Gush in golden-tinted plenty down her neck's rosemisted marble:

Then her voice's music. . call it the well's bubbling, the bird's warble!

And this woman says, "My days were sunless and my nights were moonless,

Parched the pleasant April herbage, and the lark's heart's outbreak tuneless,