H TIRE SOME SPRING! [From the French.] BÉRANGER. HAVE watched her at her window Through long days of snow and wind, Till I learnt to love the shadow That would flit across her blind. 'Twixt the lime-tree's leafless branches In the dusk my eyes I'd strain : Now, behind that screen of verdure Is my angel lost to view; And no longer for the robins Will her white hands bread-crumbs strew. 364 TIRESOME SPRING! Never in the frosts of winter, Did those robins beg in vain : Now, alas! the snow has melted, Tiresome Spring! you've come again! 'Tis kind winter that I wish for ; How I long to hear the hail Dancing in the stormy gale! Watch my darling through each pane : Tiresome Spring! you've come again! "SHE IS SO PRETTY." [From the French.] BÉRANGER. HE is so pretty, the girl I love, Her eyes are tender and deep and blue As the summer night in the skies above, As violets seen through a mist of dew. How can I hope, then, her heart to gain? She is so pretty, and I am so plain ! She is so pretty, so fair to see! Scarcely she's counted her nineteenth spring, Fresh, and blooming, and young,-ah, me! Why do I thus her praises sing? Surely from me 'tis a senseless strain, She is so pretty, and I am so plain ! 366 SHE IS SO PRETTY. She is so pretty, so sweet and dear, There's many a lover who loves her well; I may not hope, I can only fear, Yet shall I venture my love to tell? .. Ah! I have pleaded, and not in vainThough she's so pretty, and I am so plain. THE CRICKET ON THE HEARTH. [Imitated from the French.] BÉRANGER. I' N the evening, I sit near my poker and tongs, And sometimes I quaver forgotten old songs That I listened to long ago. Then out of the cinders there cometh a chirp, Like an echoing, answering cry, Little we care for the outside world, For my cricket has learnt, I am sure of it quite, And perhaps he's been beaten and hurt in the fight, |