Flashes the lovelight, increasing the glory, Beaming from bright eyes with warmth of the soul, Telling of trust and content the sweet story, King, king, crown me the king: Home is the kingdom, and Love is the king! Richer than miser with perishing treasure, Served with a service no conquest could bring; Happy with fortune that words cannot measure, Light-hearted I on the hearthstone can sing. King, king, crown me the king: Home is the kingdom, and Love is the king. REV. WILLIAM RANKIN DURYEA. Without disease, the healthful life; The household of continuance ; The mean diet, no delicate fare; The faithful wife, without debate; Such sleeps as may beguile the night; Contented with thine own estate, Ne wish for death, ne fear his might. LORD SURREY. A SHEPHERD'S LIFE. FROM THIRD PART OF HENRY VI." KING HENRY. O God! methinks, it were a happy life, To be no better than a homely swain ; To sit upon a hill, as I do now, To carve out dials quaintly, point by point, So many hours must I sport myself; So many days my ewes have been with young; THE FIRESIDE. DEAR Chloe, while the busy crowd, Be called our choice, we'll step aside. From the gay world we'll oft retire Where love our hours employs ; If solid happiness we prize, And they are fools who roam; And that dear hut, our home. Our portion is not large, indeed; But then how little do we need, For nature's calls are few; In this the art of living lies, To want no more than may suffice, And make that little do. We'll therefore relish with content To be resigned when ills betide, And pleased with favors given, – Dear Chloe, this is wisdom's part, This is that incense of the heart, Whose fragrance smells to heaven. NATHANIEL COTTON. A WINTER'S EVENING HYMN TO MY FIRE. O THOU of home the guardian Lar, Our brave old poets: at thy touch how stirs By the fast-throbbing hammers of the poet's thought! Thou murmurest, too, divinely stirred, The aspirations unattained, The rhythms so rathe and delicate, And broke, beneath the sombre weight As who would say, ""Tis those, I ween, While the gray snow-storm, held aloof, By him with fire, by her with dreams, Than all the grapes' bewildering juice, A flower of frailest revery, Now laughter-rippled, and now caught BUT where to find that happiest spot below, Who can direct, when all pretend to know? The shudd'ring tenant of the frigid zone Boldly proclaims that happiest spot his own; Extols the treasures of his stormy seas, And his long nights of revelry and ease: The naked negro, panting at the line, Boasts of his golden sands and palmy wine, Basks in the glare, or stems the tepid wave, And thanks his gods for all the good they gave. Such is the patriot's boast, where'er we roam, His first, best country, ever is at home. And yet, perhaps, if countries we compare, And estimate the blessings which they share, Though patriots flatter, still shall wisdom find An equal portion dealt to all mankind; As different good, by art or nature given, To different nations makes their blessing even. OLIVER GOLDSMITH. THE HOMES OF ENGLAND. The stately Homes of England, The deer across their greensward bound And the swan glides past them with the sound The merry Homes of England! What gladsome looks of household love There woman's voice flows forth in song, The blessed Homes of England! That breathes from Sabbath hours! Solemn, yet sweet, the church-bell's chime All other sounds, in that still time, FILIAL AND FRATERNAL LOVE. FILIAL LOVE. ་་ FROM CHILDE HAROLD.' www THERE is a dungeon in whose dim drear light What do I gaze on? Nothing: look again! Two forms are slowly shadowed on my sight, Two insulated phantoms of the brain : It is not so; I see them full and plain, An old man and a female young and fair, Fresh as a nursing mother, in whose vein The blood is nectar: but what doth she there, With her unmantled neck, and bosom white and bare? Full swells the deep pure fountain of young life, But here youth offers to old age the food, Than Egypt's river; - from that gentle side Drink, drink and live, old man! Heaven's realm holds no such tide. The starry fable of the milky-way No drop of that clear stream its way shall miss To thy sire's heart, replenishing its source With life, as our freed souls rejoin the universe. TO AUGUSTA. HIS SISTER, AUGUSTA LEIGH. BYRON. My sister! my sweet sister! if a name Dearer and purer were, it should be thine, Mountains and seas divide us, but I claim No tears, but tenderness to answer mine: Go where I will, to me thou art the same, And mine is not the wish to make them less. If my inheritance of storms hath been In other elements, and on the rocks Of perils, overlooked or unforeseen, I have sustained my share of worldly shocks, The fault was mine; nor do I seek to screen My errors with defensive paradox ; I have been cunning in mine overthrow, |