ORIGINAL POETRY.
THE DESOLATE VILLAGE.
A Reverie.
Sweet Village! on thy pastoral hill
Arrayed in sunlight sad and still,
As if beneath the harvest-moon,
Thy noiseless homes were sleeping!
It is the merry month of June,
And creatures all of air and earth
Should now their holiday of mirth
With dance and song be keeping.
But, loveliest Village! silent Thou,
As cloud wreathed o'er the Morning's brow,
When light is faintly breaking,
And Midnight's voice afar is lost,
Like the wailing of a wearied ghost,
The shades of earth forsaking.
'Tis not the Day to Scotia dear,
A summer Sabbath mild and clear!
Yet from her solemn burial-ground
The small Kirk-Steeple looks around,
Enshrouded in a calm
Profound as fills the house of prayer,
E'er from the band of virgins fair
Is breathed the choral psalm.
A sight so steeped in perfect rest
Is slumbering not on nature's breast
In the smiles of earthly day!
'Tis a picture floating down the sky,
By fancy framed in years gone by,
And mellowing in decay!
That thought is gone!—the Village still
With deepening quiet crowns the hill,
Its low green roofs are there!
In soft material beauty beaming,
As in the silent hour of dreaming
They hung embowered in air!
Is this the Day when to the mountains
The happy shepherds go,
And bathe in sparkling pools and fountains
Their flocks made white as snow?
Hath gentle girl and gamesome boy,
With meek-eyed mirth or shouting joy,
Gone tripping up the brae?
Till far behind their town doth stand,
Like an image in sweet Fairy Land,
When the Elves have flown away!
—O sure if aught of human breath
Within these walls remain,
Thus deepening in the hush of death,
'Tis but some melancholy crone,
Who sits with solemn eyes
Beside the cradle all alone,
And lulls the infant with a strain
Of Scotia's ancient melodies.
What if these homes be filled with life?
'Tis the sultry month of June,
And when the cloudless sun rides high
Above the glittering air of noon,
All nature sinks opprest,—
And labour shuts his weary eye
In the mid-day hour of rest.
Yet let the soul think what it will,
Most dirge-like mourns that moorland rill!
How different once its flow!
When with a dreamy motion gliding
Mid its green fields in love abiding,
Or leaping o'er the mossy linn,
And sporting with its own wild din,
Seemed water changed to snow.
Beauty lies spread before my sight,
But grief-like shadows dim its light,
And all the scene appears
Like a church-yard when a friend is dying,
In more than earthly stillness lying,
And glimmering through our tears!
Sweet Woodburn! like a cloud that name
Comes floating o'er my soul!
Although thy beauty still survive,
One look hath changed the whole.
The gayest village of the gay
Beside thy own sweet river,
Wert Thou on Week or Sabbath day!
So bathed in the blue light of joy,
As if no trouble could destroy
Peace doomed to last for ever.
Now in the shadow of thy trees,
On a green plat, sacred to thy breeze,
The fell Plague-Spirit grimly lies
And broods, as in despite
Of uncomplaining lifelessness,
On the troops of silent shades that press
Into the church-yard's cold recess,
From that region of delight.
Last summer, from the school-house door,
When the glad play-bell was ringing,
What shoals of bright-haired elves would pour,
Like small waves racing on the shore,
In dance of rapture singing!
Oft by yon little silver well,
Now sleeping hi neglected cell,
The village-maid would stand,
While resting on the mossy bank,
With freshened soul the traveller drank
The cold cup from her hand;
Haply some soldier from the war,
Who would remember long and far
That Lily of the Land.
And still the green is bright with flowers.
And dancing through the sunny hours,
Like blossoms from enchanted bowers
On a sudden wafted by,
Obedient to the changeful air,
And proudly feeling they are fair,
Glide bird and butterfly.
But where is the tiny hunter-rout
That revelled on with dance and shout
Against their airy prey?
