That pauses of deep silence mocked his skill, Then, sometimes, in that silence, while he hung Listening, a gentle shock of mild surprise

Has carried far into his heart the voice

Of mountain torrents; or the visible scene
Would enter unawares into his mind

With all its solemn imagery, its rocks,

Its woods, and that uncertain heaven, received
Into the bosom of the steady lake.

This Boy was taken from his Mates, and died

In childhood, ere he was ten years old.

Fair are the woods, and beauteous is the spot,

The Vale where he was born: the Church-yard

hangs

Upon a slope above the Village School,

And there, along that bank, when I have passed

At evening, I believe, that oftentimes

A full half-hour together I have stood

Mute-looking at the grave in which he lies.

THE

BROTHERS:

A PASTORAL POEM.

The BROTHERS*.

"These Tourists, Heaven preserve us! needs

must live

A profitable life: some glance along,
Rapid and gay, as if the earth were air,

And they were butterflies to wheel about

Long as their summer lasted: some, as wise,
Upon the forehead of a jutting crag

Sit perched, with book and pencil on their knee,
And look and scribble, scribble on and look,
Until a man might travel twelve stout miles,
Or reap an acre of his neighbour's corn.

This Poem was intended to be the concluding poem of a series of pastorals, the scene of which was laid among the mountains of Cumberland and Westmoreland. I mention this to apologize for the abruptness with which the poem begins.