ANGLING.

Go, take thine angle, and with practised line, Light as the gossamer, the current sweep; And if thou failest in the calm, still deep, In the rough eddy may a prize be thine. Say thou'rt unlucky where the sunbeams shine; Beneath the shadow where the waters creep Perchance the monarch of the brook shall leap— For Fate is ever better than Design. Still persevere; the giddiest breeze that blows For thee may blow with fame and fortune rife. Be prosperous; and what reck if it arose Out of some pebble with the stream at strife, Or that the light wind dallied with the boughs: Thou art successful—such is human life. Doubleday.

MARIANA.

Mariana in the moated grange.—Measure for Measure.

With blackest moss the flower-plots Were thickly crusted, one and all; The rusted nails fell from the knots That held the peach to the garden wall. The broken sheds look'd sad and strange— Uplifted was the clinking latch, Weeded and worn the ancient thatch, Upon the lonely moated grange. She only said, "My life is dreary— He cometh not," she said; She said, "I am aweary, weary, I would that I were dead!" Her tears fell with the dews at even— Her tears fell ere the dews were dried; She could not look on the sweet heaven, Either at morn or eventide. After the flitting of the bats, When thickest dark did trance the sky, She drew her casement-curtain by, And glanced athwart the glooming flats. She only said, "The night is dreary— He cometh not," she said; She said, "I am aweary, weary, I would that I were dead!" Upon the middle of the night, Waking, she heard the night-fowl crow: The cock sung out an hour ere light; From the dark fen the oxen's low Came to her. Without hope of change, In sleep she seem'd to walk forlorn, Till cold winds woke the gray-eyed morn About the lonely moated grange. She only said, "The day is dreary He cometh not," she said; She said, "I am aweary, weary, I would that I were dead!" About a stone-cast from the wall A sluice with blacken'd waters slept; And o'er it many, round and small, The cluster'd marish-mosses crept. Hard by, a poplar shook alway, All silver-green with gnarled bark; For leagues, no other tree did dark The level waste, the rounding gray. She only said, "My life is dreary— He cometh not," she said; She said, "I am aweary, weary, I would that I were dead!" And ever, when the moon was low, And the shrill winds were up and away In the white curtain, to and fro She saw the gusty shadow sway. But when the moon was very low, And wild winds bound within their cell, The shadow of the poplar fell Upon her bed, across her brow. She only said, "The night is dreary— He cometh not," she said; She said, "I am aweary, weary, I would that I were dead!" All day, within the dreary house, The doors upon their hinges creak'd; The blue-fly sang i' the pane; the mouse Behind the mould'ring wainscot shriek'd, Or from the crevice peer'd about. Old faces glimmer'd through the doors; Old footsteps trod the upper floors; Old voices called her from without: She only said, "My life is dreary— He cometh not," she said; She said, "I am aweary, weary, I would that I were dead!" The sparrow's chirrup on the roof, The slow clock ticking, and the sound Which to the wooing wind aloof The poplar made, did all confound Her sense; but most she loathed the hour When the thick-moated sunbeam lay Athwart the chambers, and the day Was sloping towards his western bower. Then said she, "I am very dreary— He will not come," she said; She wept, "I am aweary, weary, I would that I were dead!" Tennyson.