I'll mount to the clouds, and away they will sail,
On their white wings across the bright sky;
I bow to no mandate, save only to Him

Who reigneth in glory on high.

Selected.

I

THE CLOUD.

BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;

I bear light shade for the leaves when laid

In their noonday dreams.

From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,

When rocked to rest on their mother's breast,
As she dances about the sun.

I wield the flail of the lashing hail,
And whiten the green plains under;
And then again I dissolve it in rain,
And laugh as I pass in thunder.

I sift the snow on the mountain below,
And their great pines groan aghast ;
And all the night 'tis my pillow white,

While I sleep in the arms of the blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skyey bowers,
Lightning, my pilot, sits;

In a cavern under is fettered the thunder,
It struggles and howls by fits;

Over earth and ocean, with gentle motion,
This pilot is guiding me,

Lured by the love of the genii that move
In the depths of the purple sea;

Over the rills, and the crags, and the hills,
Over the lakes and the plains,

Wherever he dream, under mountain or stream,

The spirit he loves remains;

And I all the while bask in heaven's blue smile, Whilst he is dissolving in rains.

- Percy Bysshe Shelley.

HYMN OF PRAISE.

E mists and exhalations, that now rise

or

From hill or steaming lake, dusky or gray Till the sun paint your fleecy skirts with gold, In honor to the world's great Author rise; Whether to deck with clouds the uncolored sky, Or wet the thirsty earth with falling showers, Rising or falling, still advance his praise.

His praise, ye winds that from four quarters blow, Breathe soft or loud; and wave your tops, ye pines, With every plant, in sign of worship wave.

RAIN IN SEPTEMBER.

SWEET September rain!

I hear it fall upon the garden beds,

Freshening the blossoms which begin to wane;

Or 'tis a spirit who treads

The humid alleys through,

Whose light wings rustle in the avenue,
Whose breath is like the rose,

When to the dawn its petals first unclose.

Swift, swift, the dancing lines Flash on the water, brim the dusky pool, Brim the white cups of bindweed, where it twines Amid the hedgerows cool.

Eastward cloud-shadows drift

Where the wet autumn breeze is flying swift,
Bending the poplar tree,

Chasing white sails along the misty sea.

Drenching the dry brown turf,

Softening the naked cornland for the plow,
Fretting the bells of foam, the eddying surf,
Loading the heavy bough

With moisture, whose relief,

Slakes the hot thirst of every porous leaf,-
O sweet September rain!

We welcome thee across the western main.

This earth is very fair,

Whereon with careless, thankless hearts we stand:
A sphere of marvels in the coiling air,
Girdling the fertile land ·

There the cloud-islands lie;

There the great tempests do arise and die;

The rain is cradled there,

Falls on the round world, makes it green and fair.

THE EQUINOCTIAL.

HROUGH the long night the surges roared In hoarse, wild rage, against the rocks Whose flinty horns their white sides gored, Then came the Equinox!

No joy was in the face of day,
The air was full of wrath and strife;
The pall of cloud-rack torn away

Had more of death than life.

Swift from its stormy grasp is hurled
The mighty sheaf of thunderous spears;
While, hushed in dread, a silent world
Its shout of triumph hears.

Sullen, with deep and lowering brow,
Fierce foam of wrath upon its lips,
And strong breath smiting, keel and prow,
The quivering, doomèd ships,

The sunset meets its eyes' wild light
Unquenched beneath its tangled locks;
God! Help their need who meet to-night
The stormy Equinox.

- Mary Elizabeth Blake.

Upon the sun-dried fields and branches bare, Loosening with searching drops the rigid waste As if it would each root's lost strength repair; But not a blade grows green as in the spring; No swelling twig puts forth its thickening leaves; The robins only mid the harvests sing,

Pecking the grain that scatters from the sheaves; The rain falls still, the fruit all ripened drops,

It pierces chestnut-bur and walnut-shell;
The furrowed fields disclose the yellow crops;
Each bursting pod of talents used can tell;
And all that once received the early rain
Declare to man it was not sent in vain.

A STORM IN VENICE.

-Jones Very.

HE pent sea throbbed as if racked with pain;

THE

Some black clouds rose and suddenly rode

Right into the town. The thunder strode
As a giant striding from star to star,