Or was it some wild dream of love
That filled the summer noon,
And saw but one sweet face above,
What time the maiden moon
Looked on a fairy world beneath,
And waked the hawthorn's sweetest breath,
The fountain's softest tune?
For young love, living on a smile,
Makes its own Eden for a while.
The ancient hall, when winter came,
Gave fantasies to night,
Light by some old lamp's flickering flame,
Or the red embers' light.
The shadows, that have little power
Upon the sunshine's cheerful hour,
Then master mind and sight;
The visionary world appears
Girt with fantastic shapes and fears.
Such was his childhood, suited well
To fashion such a mind;
The feudal sword—the gothic cell,
Their influence combined.
The old oak-wood—the forest stream,
And love soon wakened from the dream
It never quite resigned.
His life contained no after hour
O'er which his boyhood had no power.
Be after scenes with after years—
Here only we recall
Whatever soothes, subdues, endears,
In his ancestral hall.
The deep enchantment we have felt,
When every thought and feeling dwelt
Beneath his spirit's thrall.
Sad, softened, are the hearts that come
To gaze around his boyish home.L. E. L.
14
