WILLIAM LISLE BOWLES

  EVENING

  Evening! as slow thy placid shades descend,
  Veiling with gentlest hush the landscape still,
  The lonely battlement, the farthest hill
  And wood, I think of those who have no friend;
  Who now, perhaps, by melancholy led,
  From the broad blaze of day, where pleasure flaunts,
  Retiring, wander to the ringdove’s haunts
  Unseen; and watch the tints that o’er thy bed
  Hang lovely; oft to musing Fancy’s eye
  Presenting fairy vales, where the tired mind
  Might rest beyond the murmurs of mankind,
  Nor hear the hourly moans of misery! 
  Alas for man! that Hope’s fair views the while
  Should smile like you, and perish as they smile!

  DOVER CLIFFS

  On these white cliffs, that calm above the flood
  Uprear their shadowing heads, and at their feet
  Hear not the surge that has for ages beat,
  How many a lonely wanderer has stood! 
  And, whilst the lifted murmur met his ear,
  And o’er the distant billows the still eve
  Sailed slow, has thought of all his heart must leave
  To-morrow; of the friends he loved most dear;
  Of social scenes, from which he wept to part! 
  Oh! if, like me, he knew how fruitless all
  The thoughts that would full fain the past recall,
  Soon would he quell the risings of his heart,
  And brave the wild winds and unhearing tide—­
  The world his country, and his God his guide.

  ROBERT BURNS

  MARY MORISON

  O Mary, at thy window be;
  It is the wished, the trysted hour! 
  Those smiles and glances let me see
  That make the miser’s treasure poor! 
  How blythely wad I bide the stoure,
  A weary slave frae sun to sun,
  Could I the rich reward secure,
  The lovely Mary Morison.

  Yestreen, when to the trembling string
  The dance gaed thro’ the lighted ha’,
  To thee my fancy took its wing;
  I sat, but neither heard nor saw: 
  Tho’ this was fair, and that was braw,
  And yon the toast of a’ the town,
  I sighed, and said amang them a’,
  ‘Ye are na Mary Morison.’

  O Mary, canst thou wreck his peace
  Wha for thy sake wad gladly die? 
  Or canst thou break that heart of his
  Whase only faut is loving thee? 
  If love for love thou wilt na gie,
  At least be pity to me shown! 
  A thought ungentle canna be
  The thought o’ Mary Morison.

  THE HOLY FAIR

  Upon a simmer Sunday morn,
  When Nature’s face is fair,
  I walked forth to view the corn,
  An’ snuff the caller air. 
  The rising sun, owre Galston muirs,
  Wi’ glorious light was glintin;
  The hares were hirplin down the furs,
  The lav’rocks they were chantin
  Fu’ sweet that day.

  As lightsomely I glowered abroad,
  To see a scene sae gay,
  Three hizzies, early at the road,
  Cam skelpin up the way. 
  Twa had manteeles o’ dolefu’ black,
  But ane wi’ lyart lining;
  The third, that gaed a wee a-back,
  Was in the fashion shining
  Fu’ gay that day.