A lovelier clime than birds can find,
While summers go and come,
Beyond this earth remains for those
Whom God doth summon home."

THE CUCKOO.

HAIL, beauteous1 stranger of the grove,
Attendant on the Spring!
Now Heaven repairs thy vernal seat,2
And woods thy welcome sing.
Soon as the daisy decks the green,
Thy certain voice we hear;
Hast thou a star to guide thy path,3
Or mark the rolling year?
Delightful visitant! with thee 4
I hail the time of flowers;
And hear the sound of music sweet
From birds among the bowers.
The schoolboy, wandering in the wood
To pull the primrose gay,

Starts-the new voice of Spring to hear,
And imitates thy lay.

The Cuckoo is not remarkable for beauty: it is addressed as beauteous here, because its coming back is connected with the appearance of the beauties of Spring.

2 Now Heaven, &c.-now Heaven, that is, God, makes thy Spring abode, the woods, beautiful again.

Hast thou a star, &c.—an allusion either to the pole star which guides the mariner, or to the star which led the wise men to the infant Saviour.

With thee-along with thee-when thou comest.

Soon as the pea puts on the bloom,
Thou fliest the vocal vale;1

An annual guest in other lands,2
Another Spring to hail.

Sweet bird! thy bower is ever green,

Thy sky is ever clear;

Thou hast no sorrow in thy song,

No winter in thy year!

Logan.

TO A BUTTERFLY.

I've watched you now a short half-hour,
Self-poised upon that yellow flower;
And, little Butterfly ! indeed

I know not if you sleep or feed.
How motionless !-not frozen seas
More motionless!-and then

What joy awaits you, when the breeze

Hath found

And calls

you out

among

the trees,

you forth again!

This plot of orchard ground is ours:
My trees they are, my sister's flowers;
Here rest your wings when they are weary:
Here lodge as in a sanctuary!

1 The old rhymes respecting the Cuckoo's arrival and departure are

"In April

Come he will.

In July

He prepares to fly."

? After leaving England, the Cuckoo goes to North Africa and Asia Minor.

Come often to us, fear no wrong;

Sit near us on the bough,

We'll talk of sunshine and of song,
And summer days, when we were young;
Sweet childish days, that were as long
As twenty days are now.

Wordsworth.

INVITATION TO A ROBIN.

LITTLE bird, with bosom red,
Welcome to my humble shed!
Daily near my table steal,
While I take my scanty meal;
Doubt not, little though there be,
But I'll cast a crumb to thee;

Well rewarded if I

spy

Pleasure in thy glancing eye,

1

And see thee when thou'st had thy fill,
Plume thy breast, and wipe thy bill.
Come, my feathered friend, again,
Well thou know'st the broken pane;
Ask of me thy daily store,

Ever welcome to my door.

THE BUTTERFLY'S BALL.

Langhorne.

Coмe, take up your hats, and away let us haste,
To the Butterfly's ball and the Grasshopper's feast;
The trumpeter Gad-fly has summoned the crew,
And the revels are now only waiting for you.

Plume-to pick and adjust the feathers.

On the smooth-shaven grass, by the side of a wood,
Beneath a broad oak, which for ages has stood,
See the children of earth, and the tenants of air,
For an evening's amusement together repair :

There first came the Beetle, so blind and so black,
Who carried the Emmet, his friend, on his back;
And there came the Gnat, and the Dragon-fly too,
And all their relations, green, orange, and blue.

And there came the Moth, in his plumage of down, And the Hornet, in jacket of yellow and brown, Who with him the Wasp his companion did bring; But they promised that evening to lay by their sting. And the sly little Dormouse crept out of his hole, And led to the feast his blind brother, the Mole; And the Snail, with his horns peeping out from his shell,

Came from a great distance the length of an ell.

A mushroom their table, and on it was laid
A water-dock leaf, which a tablecloth made;
The viands were various, to each of their taste,
And the Bee brought his honey to crown the repast.

There, close on his haunches, so solemn and wise,
The Frog from a corner looked up to the skies;
And the Squirrel, well pleased such diversion to see,
Sat cracking his nuts overhead in a tree.

Then out came a Spider, with fingers so fine,
To show his dexterity on the tight line;

From one branch to another his cobweb he slung,
Then as quick as an arrow he darted along.

But just in the middle, oh! shocking to tell!
From his rope in an instant poor Harlequin fell;
Yet he touched not the ground, but with talons1out-
spread,

Hung suspended in air at the end of a thread.

Then the Grasshopper came, with a jerk and a spring;

Very long was his leg, though but short was his wing;

He took but three leaps, and was soon out of sight,
Then chirped his own praises the rest of the night.
With steps quite majestic the Snail did advance,
And promised the gazers a minuet 2 to dance;
But they all laughed so loud, that he pulled in his
head,

And went in his own little chamber to bed.

Then as evening gave way to the shadows of night, Their watchman, the Glow-worm, came out with his light;

Then home let us hasten while yet we can see,
For no watchman is waiting for you and for me.

Roscoe.

THE BUTTERFLY'S FUNERAL.

Oн ye! who so lately were blithesome and gay,
At the Butterfly's banquet carousing away;
Your feasts and your revels of pleasure are fled,
For the chief of the banquet, the Butterfly's dead!

1 Talons-claws.

2 Minuet-an old-fashioned, slow, and stately dance.