"LOOK, THE GENTLE DAY DAPPLES THE DROWSY EAST WITH SPOTS OF GRAY."-SHAKSPEARE.

"THE EYE OF DAY HATH OPENED ITS LIDS."-SHAKSPEARE.

"MORNING FAIR, CAME FORTH WITH PILGRIM STEPS IN AMICE GRAY."-MILTON.

MORNING.

|ULL many a glorious morning have I seen
Flatter the mountain-tops with sovereign eye,
Kissing with golden face the meadows green,
Gilding pale streams with heavenly alchemy;
Anon permit the basest clouds to ride
With ugly rack on his celestial face,

And from the forlorn world his image hide,
Stealing unseen to west with this disgrace.

[WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. These lines are extracted from Sonnet xxxiii.]

SUNRISE.

O! here the gentle lark, weary of rest,
From his moist cabinet mounts up on high,

And wakes the morning from whose silver breast
The sun ariseth in its majesty;

* Compare with John Lylye's "Songs of Birds," p. 16.

'FLAKY DARKNESS BREAKS WITHIN THE EAST."-SHAKSPEARE.

"NOW LIFE, WITH EVERY MOMENT, SEEMS TO START IN AIR, IN WAVE, ON EARTH; ABOVE, BELOW."-LYTTON.

28

'MORN, LIKE A MAIDEN GLANCING O'ER HER PEARLS."-BAILEY.

A FOOL IN THE FOREST.

Who doth the world so gloriously behold,
The cedar-tops and hills seem burnished gold.
[WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. From the poem of "Venus and Adonis."]

A FOOL IN THE FOREST.

FOOL, a fool! I met a fool i' the forest,
A motley fool; a miserable world!
As I do live by food, I met a fool;

Who laid him down and basked him in the sun,
And railed on Lady Fortune in good terms,
In good set terms-and yet a motley fool.

"Good morrow, fool," quoth I. "No, sir," quoth he,
"Call me not fool till heaven hath sent me fortune :"

66 MORN SOWED THE EARTH WITH ORIENT PEARL."-MILTON.

"THE POTENT SUN MELTS INTO LIMPID AIR THE HIGH-RAISED CLOUDS."-THOMSON.

"THE LAND WHERE, GIRT BY FRIEND OR FOE, A MAN MAY SPEAK THE THING HE WILL."-TENNYSON.

"ENGLAND, WITH ALL THY FAULTS I LOVE THEE STILL."-COWPER.

And then he drew a dial from his poke,

And, looking on it with lack-lustre eye,
Says, very wisely, "It is ten o'clock:

Thus may we see,” quoth he, “how the world wags:
'Tis but an hour ago since it was nine,

And after one hour more 'twill be eleven;
And so from hour to hour we ripe and ripe,
And then from hour to hour we rot and rot;
And thereby hangs a tale." When I did hear
The motley fool thus moral on the time,
My lungs began to crow like chanticleer,
That fools should be so deep-contemplative,
And I did laugh sans intermission
An hour by his dial. O noble fool!

A worthy fool! Motley's the only wear.

[WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. You Like It."]

This is spoken by Jaques in the play of "As

"GRAVE MOTHER OF MAJESTIC WORKS, FROM HER ISLE-ALTAR GAZING DOWN."-TENNYSON.

ENGLAND.

HIS royal throne of kings, this sceptered isle,

This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise;

This fortress, built by Nature for herself,
Against infection and the hand of war;
This happy breed of men, this little world;
This precious stone set in a silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as a moat defensive to a house,

Against the envy of less happier lands,—

This blessed spot, this earth, this realm, this England.

[WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE.

From the play of "Henry V."]

"LIKE LITTLE BODY WITH A MIGHTY HEART."-SHAKSPEARE.

"MAN SHUNS TO KNOW THAT LIFE PROTRACTED IS PROTRACTED WOE."-DR. JOHNSON.

330

"LIFE, LIKE A DOME OF MANY-COLOURED glass,

QUEEN MAB.

LIFE.

O-MORROW, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day

To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow; a poor player,
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

[WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. From the play of " Macbeth."]

"LET KNOWLEDGE GROW FROM MORE TO MORE, BUT MORE OF REVERENCE IN US DWELL."-TENNYSON.

QUEEN MAB.

JH, then, I see, Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife, and she comes

In shape no bigger than an agate-stone

On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep :
Her waggon-spokes made of long-spinners' legs;
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers;
The traces, of the smallest spider's web;
The collars, of the moonshine's watery beams;
Her whip, of cricket's bone; the lash, of film;
Her waggoner, a small gray-coated gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm
Pricked from the lazy finger of a maid;

STAINS THE WHITE RADIANCE OF ETERNITY."-SHELLEY.

"WITH MOST DELIGHTFUL WONDER I HAVE HEARD TALES OF THE ELFIN TRIBE."-SOUTHEY.

"ALL SUDDENLY I SAW THE FAERY QUEEN."—RALEIGH.

Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut,

Made by the joiner squirrel, or old grub,
Time out of mind the fairies' coach-maker.
And in this state she gallops night by night
Through lovers' brains, and then they dream of love!
O'er courtiers' knees, that dream on courtsies straight;
O'er lawyers' fingers, who straight dream on fees;
O'er ladies' lips, who straight on kisses dream;
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are.
Sometime she gallops o'er a courtier's nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;
And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig's tail,
Tickling a parson's nose as a' lies asleep,
Then dreams he of another benefice;
Sometime she driveth o'er a soldier's neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear; at which he starts and wakes,
And, being thus frighted, swears a prayer or two
And sleeps again.

[WILLIAM SHAKSPEARE. From "Romeo and Juliet.”|

ARIEL'S SONG.

JOME unto these yellow sands,

And then take hands:

Courtsied when you have and kissed,

(The wild waves whist,*)

Foot it featly here and there;
And, sweet sprites, the burden bear.

* Hushed, silent.

"THE REFLEX OF A LEGEND PAST."-ALFRED TENNYSON.

"ABOUT THIS SPRING, THE DAPPER ELVES THEIR MOONLIGHT SPORTS RENEW."-POPE.