When the painted birds laugh in the shade

Where our table with cherries and nuts is

spread,

Come live, and be merry, and join with me
To sing the sweet chorus of "Ha, ha, he!"

W. BLAKE.

* 8 *

A BOAT SONG.

THE morn shines bright,
And the bark bounds light

As the stag bounds o'er the lea:

We love the strife

Of the sailor's life,

And we love our dark-blue sea.

Now high, now low,

To the depths we go,

Now rise to the surge again:

We make a track

On the Ocean's back,

And play with his hoary mane.2

Fearless we face

The storm in its chase,

1

When the dark clouds fly before it,

And meet the shock

Of the fierce Siroc,3

Though death breathes hotly o'er it.

1 lea, grass-land.

2 hoary mane, white tops of the waves. 8 Siroc, the Sirocco, a hot wind from the Great Desert of Africa.

The landsman may quail

At the shout of the gale,

Which peril's1 the sailor's joy;
But wild as the waves

Which his vessel braves,

Is the lot of the sailor boy.

*9*

SIR E. B. LYTTON.

THE FAIRIES.

3

Up the airy 2 mountain,
Down the rushy 3 glen,
We daren't go a-hunting
For fear of little men;
Wee folk, good folk,
Trooping all together,

Green jacket, red cap,

And white owl's feather!

Down along the rocky shore
Some make their home;
They live on crispy pancakes
Of yellow tide-foam;

Some in the reeds

Of the black mountain lake,
With frogs for their watch-dogs,
All night awake.

1 peril's, peril is.

2 airy, high in air.

3 rushy, containing rushes, plants with round stems and no leaves.

4 wee, little.

High on the hill-top
The old King sits;

He is now so old and gray
He's nigh lost his wits.

With a bridge of white mist
Columbkill1 he crosses

On his stately journeys

From Slieveleague 1 to Rosses;

Or going up with music

On cold starry nights,

To sup with the Queen

Of the gay Northern Lights.2

They stole little Bridget,
For seven years long;
When she came down again,
Her friends were all gone.

They took her lightly back,

Between the night and morrow;

They thought that she was fast asleep;
But she was dead with sorrow.

They have kept her ever since
Deep within the lakes,
On a bed of flag-leaves,

Watching till she wakes.

1 Columbkill, a glen between Slieveleague, a mountain, and Rosses, islands

on the coast of Donegal, Ireland.

2 Northern Lights, the bright streamers sometimes seen in the northern sky, called, also, aurora borealis.

By the craggy hillside,

Through the mosses bare,
They have planted thorn-trees
For pleasure here and there.
Is any man so daring

As dig one up in spite,
He shall find the thornies 1 set
In his bed at night.

He's singing to me; he's singing to me! And what does he say, little girl, little boy? "Oh, the world's running over with joy! Don't you hear? Don't you see?

Hush! Look! In my tree

I'm as happy as happy can be!"

1 thornies, thorns, prickles.

And the brown thrush keeps singing, "A nest, do

you see,

And five eggs hid by me in the juniper-tree?1 Don't meddle, don't touch! little girl, little boy, Or the world will lose some of its joy:

Now I'm glad! now I'm free!

And I always shall be,

If you never bring sorrow to me.”

So the merry brown thrush sings away in the tree, To you and to me, to you and to me;

And he sings all the day, little girl, little boy: "Oh, the world's running over with joy! But long it won't be

Don't you know? don't you see? Unless we are as good as can be!"

LUCY LARCOM.

* 11 *

ROBERT OF LINCOLN.

MERRILY Swinging on brier and weed,
Near to the nest of his little dame,
Over the mountain-side or mead,

Robert of Lincoln is telling his name:

Bob-o'-link, bob-o'-link,

Spink, spank, spink;

Snug and safe is that nest of ours,
Hidden among the summer flowers.
Chee, chee, chee.

1 juniper-tree, a kind of evergreen tree.