The hunger of my soul were stilled, for Death hath told you more Than the melancholy world doth know; things deeper than all lore You could teach me, Barbara. In vain, in vain, in vain, You will never come again. There droops upon the dreary hills a mournful fringe of rain; The gloaming closes slowly round, loud winds are in the tree, Round selfish shores for ever moans the hurt and wounded sea, There is no rest upon the earth, peace is with death and thee, Barbara. ALEXANDER SMITH. XXV BERTRAM AND HELENA I AM undone there is no living, none, His arched brows, his hawking eye, his curls, In our heart's table; heart, too capable WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. XXVI TOO LATE EACH on his own strict line we move, From the twin soul which halves their own. And sometimes, by still harder fate, The lovers meet, but meet too late. -Thy heart is mine !-True, true! ah, true! -Then, love, thy hand!-Ah no! adieu! MATTHEW Arnold. XXVII HIGHLAND MARY YE banks and braes and streams around The castle o' Montgomery, Green be your woods, and fair your flowers, There simmer first unfaulds her robes, O' my sweet Highland Mary. How sweetly bloom'd the gay green birk, Wi' mony a vow, and lock'd embrace, We tore oursels asunder; That nipt my flower sae early! Now green's the sod and cauld's the clay O pale, pale now, those rosy lips, But still within my bosom's core ROBERT BURNS. XXVIII CLOISTERED LOVE (ELOISA TO ABELARD) How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! Tears that delight, and sighs that waft to Heaven. Far other dreams my erring soul employ, XXIX TO MARY IN HEAVEN THOU lingering star, with lessening ray, My Mary from my soul was torn. O Mary! dear departed shade! Where is thy place of blissful rest? Seest thou thy lover lowly laid? Hear'st thou the groans that rend his breast? That sacred hour can I forget? Can I forget the hallowed grove, Where by the winding Ayr we met, To live one day of parting love? Eternity will not efface Those records dear of transports past; Thy image at our last embrace; Ah! little thought we 't was our last! Ayr, gurgling, kissed his pebbled shore, O'erhung with wild woods, thickening green; The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar Twined amorous round the raptured scene. Still o'er these scenes my memory wakes, |