HAMPTON BEACH.

.

And all we shrink from now may seem

No new revealing,
The sunlight glitters keen and bright,

Familiar as our childhood's stream,
Where, miles away,

Or pleasant memory of a dream,
Lies stretching to my dazzled sight

The loved and cherished Past upon the new life
A luminous belt, a misty light,

stealing. Beyond the dark pine bluffs and wastes of sandy

Serene and mild, the untried light
gray.

May have its dawning ;
The tremulous shadow of the sea !

And, as in summer's northern night
Against its ground

The evening and the dawn unite,
Of silvery light, rock, hill, and tree,

The sunset hues of Time blend with the soul's
Still as a picture, clear and free,

new morning. With varying outline mark the coast for miles

I sit alone ; in foam and spray around.

Wave after wave

Breaks on the rocks which, stern and gray,
On-on
– we tread with loose-flung rein

Shoulder the broken tide away,
Our seaward way,

Or murmurs hoarse and strong through mossy
Through dark-green fields and blossoming

cleft and cave.
grain,
Where the wild brier-rose skirts the lane, What heed I of the dusty land
And bends above our heads the flowering locust

And noisy town?
spray.

I see the mighty deep expand

From its white line of glimmering sand
Ha! like a kind hand on my brow

To where the blue of heaven on bluer waves
Comes this fresh breeze,

shuts down!
Cooling its dull and feverish glow,
While through my being seems to flow

In listless quietude of mind,
The breath of a new life, the healing of the

I yield to all
seas!

The change of cloud and wave and wind;

And passive on the flood reclined,
Now rest we, where this

grassy
mound

I wander with the waves, and with them rise
His feet hath set

and fall.
In the great waters, which have bound
His granite ankles greenly round

But look, thou dreamer ! — wave and shore

In shadow lie;
With long and tangled moss, and weeds with
cool spray wet.

The night-wind warns me back once more

To where, my native hill-tops o'er,
Good by to pain and care ! I take

Bends like an arch of fire the glowing sunset
Mine ease to-day;

sky! Here, where the sunny waters break,

So then, beach, bluff, and wave, farewell !
And ripples this keen breeze, I shake

I bear with me
All burdens from the heart, all weary thoughts No token stone nor glittering shell,
away.

But long and oft shall Memory tell

Of this brief thoughtful hour of musing by the
I draw a freer breath - I seem
Like all I see

JOHN GREENLEAF WHITTIER.
Waves in the sun the white-winged gleam

Of sea-birds in the slanting beam
And far-off sails which flit before the south-wind
free.

SEA-WEED.
So when Time's veil shall fall asunder,

WHEN descends on the Atlantic
The soul may know

The gigantic
No fearful change, nor sudden wonder,

Storm-wind of the equinox,
Nor sink the weight of mystery under,

Landward in his wrath he scourges
But with the upward rise, and with the vastness

The toiling surges,

Laden with sea-weed from the rocks : grow.

sea,

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