ROBERT TANNAHILL

[1774-1810] 362

JESSIE, THE FLOWER O DUNBLANE The sun has gane down o'er the lofty Benlomond,

And left the red clouds to preside o'er the scene, While lanely I stray in the calm simmer gloamin'

To muse on sweet Jessie, the flower o' Dunblane. How sweet is the brier, wi' its saft faulding blossom,

And sweet is the birk, wi' its mantle o' green; Yet sweeter and fairer, and dear to this bosom,

Is lovely young Jessie, the flower o' Dunblane.

She's modest as ony, and blythe as she's bonny;

For guileless simplicity marks her its ain; And far be the villain, divested o' feeling,

Wha'd blight, in its bloom, the sweet flower o’ Dunblane. Sing on, thou sweet mavis, thy hymn to the e'ening,

Thou’rt dear to the echoes of Calderwood glen; Sae dear to this bosom, sae artless and winning,

Is charming young Jessie, the flower o’ Dunblane

How lost were my days till I met wi' my Jessie,

The sports o' the city seemed foolish and vain; I ne'er saw a nymph I would ca’ my dear lassie,

Till charm'd wi' sweet Jessie, the flower o’ Dunblane
Though mine were the station o' loftiest grandeur,

Amidst its profusion I'd languish in pain;
And reckon as naething the height o' its splendour,

If wanting sweet Jessie, the flower o' Dunblane.

363

GLOOMY WINTER's Now Awa'

GLOOMY winter's now awa',

Saft the westlan' breezes blaw, 'Mang the birks o' Stanley-shaw

The mavis sings fu' cheerie, O!

Sweet the crawflower's early bell
Decks Gleniffer's dewy dell,
Blooming like thy bonnie sel',

My young, my artless dearie, O!

Come, my lassie, let us stray
O'er Glenkilloch's sunny brae,
Blithely spend the gowden day

'Midst joys that never weary, 0!
Towering o'er the Newton wuds,
Laverocks' fan the snaw-white cluds,
Siller saughs," wi' downy buds,

Adorn the banks sae briery, O!

Round the sylvan fairy nooks
Feath'ry breckans fringe the rocks,
'Neath the brae the burnie jouks,

And ilka thing is cheerie, O!
Trees may bud, and birds may sing,
Flowers may bloom, and verdure spring, ,
Joy to me they canna bring,

Unless wi' thee, my dearie, O!

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH

[1770-1850] 364 ODE ON INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLEC

TIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD

THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight

To me did seem

Apparell'd in celestial light,
The glory and the freshness of a dream.
It is not now as it has been of yore;-

Turn wheresoe'er I may,

By night or day, The things which I have seen I now can see no more! 1 Larks. 2 Silver willows.

3 Brakes. * Dodges. o Each.

The rainbow comes and goes,
And lovely is the rose;

The moon doth with delight
Look round her when the heavens are bare;

Waters on a starry night

Are beautiful and fair;
The sunshine is a glorious birth;

But yet I know, where'er I go,
That there hath pass'd away a glory from the earth.

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,
And while the young lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound,
To me alone there came a thought of grief:
A timely utterance gave that thought relief,

And I again am strong.
The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep,-
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong:
I hear the echoes through the mountains throng,
The winds come to me from the fields of sleep,

And all the earth is gay;

Land and sea
Give themselves up to jollity,

And with the heart of May
Doth every beast keep holiday ;-

Thou child of joy
Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy

Shepherd-boy!

Ye blesséd creatures, I have heard the call

Ye to each other make; I see
The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;

My heart is at your festival,

My head hath its coronal,
The fulness of your bliss, I feel—I feel it all

O evil day! if I were sullen
While Earth herself is adorning

This sweet May morning;
And the children are culling

On every side,

In a thousand valleys far and wide,

Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm, And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm:

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!

-But there's a tree, of many, one,
A single field which I have look'd upon,
Both of them speak of something that is gone:

The pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat: Whither is fled the visionary gleam? Where is it now, the glory and the dream? Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting; The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,

Hath had elsewhere its setting

And cometh from afar;
Not in entire forgetfulness,

And not in utter nakedness,
But trailing clouds of glory do we come

From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy!
Shades of the prison-house begin to close

Upon the growing boy,
But he beholds the light, and whence it flows,

He sees it in his joy;
The youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is Nature's priest,

And by the vision splendid

Is on his way attended;
At length the man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.
Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;
Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,
And, even with something of a mother's mind

And no unworthy aim,

The homely nurse doth all she can To make her foster-child, her inmate, Man,

Forget the glories he hath known And that imperial palace whence he came.

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,
A six years' darling of a pigmy size!
See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,
Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,
With light upon him from his father's eyes !
See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,
Some fragment from his dream of human life
Shaped by himself with newly-learnéd art;

A wedding or a festival,
A mourning or a funeral;

And this hath now his heart,
And unto this he frames his song:

Then will he fit his tongue
To dialogues of business, love, or strife;

But it will not be long
Ere this be thrown aside,

And with new joy and pride
The little actor cons another part;
Filling from time to time his ‘humorous stage
With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,
That life brings with her in her equipage;

As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie

Thy soul's immensity;
Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage, thou eye among the blind,
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,
Haunted for ever by the eternal Mind,-

Mighty Prophet! Seer blest!

On whom those truths do rest
Which we are toiling all our lives to find;
Thou, over whom thy immortality
Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave,
A presence which is not to be put by;
Thou little child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's height,
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke
The years to bring the inevitable yoke,