"Sweet day! so cool, so calm, so bright,
The bridal of the earth and sky,
Sweet dews shall weep thy fall to-night,
For thou must die.
"Sweet rose! whose hue, angry and brave,
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye,
Thy root is ever in its grave;
And thou must die.
"Sweet spring! full of sweet days and roses,
A box where sweets compacted lie,
My music shows you have your closes,
And all must die.
"Only a sweet and virtuous soul,
Like season'd timber, never gives;
But when the whole world turns to coal,
Then chiefly lives."
"That," said Colonel Lennox, "is one of the any exquisite little pieces of poetry which are to be found, like jewels in an Ethiop's ear, in my favourite Isaac Walton. The title of the book offers no encouragement to female readers, but I know few works from which I rise with such renovated feelings of benevolence and good-will. Indeed, I know no author who has given with so much _naïveté _so enchanting a picture of a pious and contented mind. Here—" taking the book from a shelf, and turning over the leaves—"is one of the passages which has so often charmed me:—'That very hour which you were absent from me, I sat down under a willow by the water-side, and considered what you had told me of the owner of that pleasant meadow in which you left me—that he has a plentiful estate, and not a heart to think so; that he has at this time many lawsuits depending, and that they both damped his mirth, and took up so much of his time and thoughts that he himself had not leisure to take that sweet comfort I, who pretended no title to them, took in his fields; for I could there sit quietly, and, looking in the water, see some fishes sport themselves in the silver streams, others leaping at flies of several shapes and colours. Looking on the hills, I could behold them spotted with woods and groves; looking down upon the meadows I could see, here a boy gathering lilies and lady-smocks, and there a girl cropping culverkeys and cowslips, all to make garlands suitable to this present month of May. These, and many other field flowers, so perfumed the air, that I thought that very meadow like that field in Sicily, of which Diodorus speaks, where the perfumes arising from the place make all dogs that hunt in it to fall off and lose their scent. I say, as I thus sat joying in my own happy condition, and pitying this poor rich man that owned this and many other pleasant groves and meadows about me, I did then thankfully remember what my Saviour said, that the meek possess the earth—or, rather, they enjoy what the others possess and enjoy not; for anglers and meek-spirited men are free from those high, those restless thoughts,—which corrode the sweets of life; and they, and they only, can say, as the poet has happily expressed it—
'Hail, blest estate of lowliness!
Happy enjoyments of such minds
As, rich in self-contentedness,
Can, like the reeds in roughest winds,
By yielding, make that blow but small,
By which proud oaks and cedars fall.'"
"There is both poetry and painting in such prose as this," said Mary; "but I should certainly as soon have thought of looking for a pearl necklace in a fishpond as of finding pretty poetry in a treatise upon the art of angling."
"That book was a favourite of your father's, Charles," said Mrs. Lennox, "and I remember, in our happiest days, he used to read parts of it to me. One passage in particular made a strong impression upon me, though I little thought then it would ever apply to me. It is upon the blessings of sight. Indulge me by reading it to me once again."
Colonel Lennox made an effort to conquer his feelings, while he read as follows:—
"What would a blind man give to see the pleasant rivers, and meadows, and flowers, and fountains, that we have met with! I have been told that if a man that was born blind could attain to have his sight for but only one hour during his whole life, and should, at the first opening of his eyes, fix his sight upon the sun when it was in its full glory, either at the rising or the setting, he would be transported and amazed, and so admire the glory of it that he would not willingly turn his eyes from that first ravishing object to behold all the other various beauties this world could present to them. And this, and many other like objects, we enjoy daily—-"