Alas! there’s far from russet frieze
  To silks and satin gowns,
But I doubt if God made like degrees
  In courtly hearts and clowns. 
My father wrong’d a maiden’s mirth,
  And brought her cheeks to blame,
And all that’s lordly of my birth
  Is my reproach and shame!

’Tis vain to weep,—­’tis vain to sigh,
  ’Tis vain, this idle speech,
For where her happy pearls do lie,
  My tears may never reach;
Yet when I’m gone, e’en lofty pride
  May say, of what has been,
His love was nobly born and died,
  Though all the rest was mean!

My speech is rude,—­but speech is weak
  Such love as mine to tell,
Yet had I words, I dare not speak,
  So, Lady, fare thee well;
I will not wish thy better state
  Was one of low degree,
But I must weep that partial fate
  Made such a churl of me.

THE EXILE.

The swallow with summer
  Will wing o’er the seas,
The wind that I sigh to
  Will visit thy trees. 
The ship that it hastens
  Thy ports will contain,
But me!—­I must never
  See England again!

There’s many that weep there,
  But one weeps alone,
For the tears that are falling
  So far from her own;
So far from thy own, love,
  We know not our pain;
If death is between us,
  Or only the main.

When the white cloud reclines
  On the verge of the sea,
I fancy the white cliffs,
  And dream upon thee;
But the cloud spreads its wings
  To the blue heav’n and flies. 
We never shall meet, love,
  Except in the skies!

TO ——­

Welcome, dear Heart, and a most kind good-morrow;
The day is gloomy, but our looks shall shine:—­
Flowers I have none to give thee, but I borrow
Their sweetness in a verse to speak for thine.

Here are red roses, gather’d at thy cheeks,—­
The white were all too happy to look white: 
For love the rose, for faith the lily speaks;
It withers in false hands, but here ’tis bright!

Dost love sweet Hyacinth?  Its scented leaf
Curls manifold,—­all love’s delights blow double: 
’Tis said this flow’ret is inscribed with grief,—­
But let that hint of a forgotten trouble.

I pluck’d the Primrose at night’s dewy noon;
Like Hope, it show’d its blossoms in the night;—­
’Twas, like Endymion, watching for the Moon! 
And here are Sun-flowers, amorous of light!

These golden Buttercups are April’s seal,—­
The Daisy-stars her constellations be: 
These grew so lowly, I was forced to kneel,
Therefore I pluck no Daisies but for thee!

Here’s Daisies for the morn, Primrose for gloom
Pansies and Roses for the noontide hours:—­
A wight once made a dial of their bloom,—­
So may thy life be measured out by flowers!