VEN when the farmer, now secure of fear, Sends in the swains to spoil the finish'd year, Ev'n when the reaper fills his greedy hands, And binds the golden sheaves in brittle bands, Oft have I seen a sudden storm arise

From all the warring winds that sweep the skies.

74

A STORM IN HARVEST.

The heavy harvest from the root is torn,
And whirl'd aloft the lighter stubble borne;
With such a force the flying rack is driven;
And such a winter wears the face of heaven;
The lofty skies at once come pouring down ;
The promised crop and golden labours drown ;
The dikes are fill'd, and with a roaring sound
The rising rivers float the nether ground;

And rocks the bellowing voice of boiling seas rebound.
The father of the gods his glory shrouds,
Involved in tempests and a night of clouds;
And from the middle darkness flashing out,
By fits he deals his fiery bolts about.
Deep horror seizes ev'ry human breast,

Their pride is humbled, and their fear confest,
While he from high his rolling thunder throws,
And fires the mountains with repeated blows:
The rocks are from their old foundations rent;
The winds redouble, and the rains augment :
The waves in heaps are dash'd against the shore,
And now the woods and now the billows roar.

JOHN DRYDEN. [Translated from "Virgil."]

[TO JOHN DRYDEN, a great poet and most unfortunate courtier, is due the credit of having produced, in "Absalom and Achitophel," the best satirical poem in the English language. What a masterly description is that he gives of Shaftesbury-the wise judge!" Unbribed, unsought, the wretched to redress, Swift of despatch, and easy of access;" but the bad statesman, who

"Grown weary to possess

A lawful fame, and lazy happiness,
Disdained the golden fruit to gather free,
And lent the crowd his arm to shake the tree.
Now manifest of crimes contrived long since,
He stood at bold defiance with his prince;
Held up the buckler of the people's cause
Against the crown, and skulk'd behind the laws."

What more withering than his denunciation of the poet Shadwell, whom he accuses of disloyal practices, telling him at the same time, "Hadst thou the glories of thy king exprest, thy praises had been satire at the best!" The glorious "Alexander's Feast," written at the age of sixty-six, would alone have been sufficient to immortalise its author. And yet Dryden died poor, at the age of sixty-nine, and had not, like Milton, the consolation that his poverty had been caused by his independence. Unfortunately for his happiness and fame, this great master of the English tongue devoted himself to the service of a

court where licentiousness and frivolity reigned paramount, and where not even his mighty pen could remain uncontaminated by the miasma of vice that overhung everything. Unhappily, conforming to the spirit of the time, he defaced his writings without improving his fortunes. His subservience to James II., and his suspicious conversion to Popery, became unavailing on the accession of William III. Deprived of his laureateship, and reduced to poverty, his last days were devoted to literary drudgery, and he was compelled, in his old age, to write for bread!]

76

BELSHAZZAR'S FEAST.

Chaldea's seers are good,

But here they have no skill;
And the unknown letters stood
Untold and awful still.

And Babel's men of age

Are wise and deep in lore;

But now they were not sage,

w-but knew no more.

They saw

A captive in the land,

A stranger and a youth,
He heard the king's command,
He saw the writing's truth.
The lamps around were bright,
The prophecy in view ;
He read it on that night—
The morrow proved it true.
"Belshazzar's grave is made,
His kingdom passed away,
He in the balance weighed,
Is light and worthless clay.
The shroud, his robe of state,
His canopy the stone;

The Mede is at his gate!

The Persian on the throne!"

BYRON.

[LORD BYRON was born in Holles Street, London, in 1788, and succeeded to the title on the death of his granduncle, in 1798. His earliest publication, "Hours of Idleness," was harshly criticised in the Edinburgh Review; whereupon the youthful poet retaliated in the satire, "English Bards and Scotch Reviewers." The chief portion of his life was spent in foreign travel in the south of Europe, his poems being sent home at intervals for publication. A sad mystery hangs over the career of Byron. His separation from his wife, the charitable and amiable lady who so lately passed away from among us, excited great, and not undeserved, hostility against him; and he quitted England with a determination to return no more. Poems, sometimes soaring to the heights of poetic genius, at others trailing through the very slough of impurity and coarseness, gave evidence, from time to time, of the workings of the mighty but ill-regulated spirit, till, in 1824, England was startled by the intelligence of the premature death of a poet, whose powers, though frequently abused, were still marvellously great.]

To a Bee.

THOU wert out betimes, thou busy, busy bee!

As abroad I took my early way, Before the cow from her resting-place

Had risen up, and left her trace

On the meadow, with dew so grey,

Saw I thee, thou busy, busy bee.

Thou wert working late, thou busy, busy

bee!

After the fall of the cistus flower,

When the primrose of evening was ready to

burst,

I heard thee last, as I saw thee first;

In the silence of the evening hour, Heard I thee, thou busy, busy bee.

Thou art a miser, thou busy, busy bee!

Late and early at employ;

Still on thy golden stores intent,

Thy summer in keeping and hoarding is spent,
What thy winter will never enjoy;

Wise lesson this for me, thou busy, busy bee!

Little dost thou think, thou busy, busy bee!

What is the end of thy toil.

When the latest flowers of the ivy are gone,
And all thy work for the year is done,

Thy master comes for the spoil;

Woe, then, for thee, thou busy, busy bee!

SOUTHEY.