III. THE OBOE.
Now come with me, beside this sedgy brook, Far in the fields, away from crowded street: Into the flowing water let us look, W'hile o’er our heads the whispering elm-trees meet. There will we listen to a simple tale Of fireside pleasures and of shepherds’ loves : A reedy voice sweet as the nightingale Shall sing of Corydon and Amaryllis ; The grasshopper shall chirp, the bee shall hum, The stream shall murmur to the water-lilies, And all the sounds of summer noon shall come,
And mingling in the oboé’s pastoral tone, Make them forget that man did ever sigh and moan.
IV, THE TRUMPETS AND TROMBONES. A band of martial riders next I hear,
Vhose sharp brass voices cut and rend the air. The shepherd’s tale is mute, and now the ear Is filled with a wilder clang than it can bear ; Whose arrowy trumpet notes so short and bright, The long-drawn wailing of that loud trombone, Tell of the bloody and tumultuous fight, The march of victory and the dying groan. ‘O’er the green fields the serried squadrons pour, Killing and burning like the bolts of heaven ; The sweetest flowers with cannon-smoke and gore Are all profaned, and Innocence is driven Forth from her cottages and wooded streams, While over all red Battle fiercely gleams.
V.
‘ THE HonNs. But who are these far in the leafy wood, Murmuring such mellow, hesitating notes, It seems the very breath of solitude, Loading with dewy balm each breeze that floats '4 They are a peasant-group, I know them well, The diflident, conscious horns, whose muffled speech
But half expresses what their souls would tell, Aiming at strains their strength can never reach ; An untaught rustic band; and yet how sweet And soothing comes their music o’er the soul! Dear poets of the forest, who would meet Your melodies save where wild waters roll,
Reminding us of Him who by his plough Walked with a laurel-wreath upon his brow! Boston, May, 1843. p
71
