The Youths Coronal | Page 3

fancy permission to range.
He dreamed that he saw, what he could but despise,?The swarm from a neighboring hive;?Which, having come out for their winter supplies,?Had made the whole garden alive.
He looked with disgust, as the proud often do,?On the diligent movements of those,?Who, keeping both present and future in view,?Improve every hour as it goes.
As the brisk little alchymists passed to and fro,?With anger the butterfly swelled;?And called them mechanics--a rabble too low?To come near the station he held.
"Away from my presence!" said he, in his sleep,?"Ye humble plebeians! nor dare?Come here with your colorless winglets to sweep?The king of this brilliant parterre!"
He thought, at these words, that together they flew,?And, facing about, made a stand;?And then, to a terrible army they grew,?And fenced him on every hand.
Like hosts of huge giants, his numberless foes?Seemed spreading to measureless size:?Their wings with a mighty expansion arose,?And stretched like a veil o'er the skies.
Their eyes seemed like little volcanoes, for fire,--?Their hum, to a cannon-peal grown,--?Farina to bullets was rolled in their ire,?And, he thought, hurled at him and his throne.
He tried to cry quarter! his voice would not sound,?His head ached--his throne reeled and fell;?His enemy cheered, as he came to the ground,?And cried, "King Papilio, farewell!"
His fall chased the vision--the sleeper awoke,?The wonderful dream to expound;?The lightning's bright flash from the thunder-cloud broke,?And hail-stones were rattling around.
He'd slumbered so long, that now, over his head,?The tempest's artillery rolled;?The tulip was shattered--the whirl-blast had fled,?And borne off its crimson and gold.
'Tis said, for the fall and the pelting, combined?With suppressed ebullitions of pride.?This vain son of summer no balsam could find,?But he crept under covert and died!
=The Boy and the Cricket=
At length I have thee! my brisk new-comer,?Sounding thy lay to departing summer;?And I'll take thee up from thy bed of grass,?And carry thee home to a house of glass;?Where thy slender limbs, and the faded green?Of thy close-made coat, can all be seen.?For I long to know if the cricket sings,?Or plays the tune with his gauzy wings;--?To bring that shrill-toned pipe to light?Which kept me awake so long last night,?That I told the hours by the lazy clock,?Till I heard the crow of the noisy cock;?When, tossing and turning, at length I fell?In a sleep so strange, that the dream I'll tell.
Methought, on a flowery bank I lay,?By a beautiful stream; and watched the play?Of the sparkling wavelets, that fled so fast,?I could not number them as they passed.?But I marked the things which they carried by;?And a neat little skiff first caught my eye.?'Twas woven of reeds, and its sides were bound?By a tender vine, that had clasped it round;?And spreading within, had made it seem?A basket of leaves, borne down the stream.?And the skiff had neither a sail nor oar;?But a bright little boy stood up, and bore,?On his outstretched hands, a wreath so gay,?It looked like a crown for the Queen of May.?And while he was going, I heard him sing,?"O seize the garland of passing Spring!"?But I dared not reach, for the bank was steep;?And he bore it away, to the far off deep!
There came, then, a lady;--her eye was bright--?She was young and fair, and her bark was light;?Its mast was a living tree, that spread?Its boughs for a sail, o'er the lady's head.?And some of its fruits had just begun?To flush, on the side that was next the sun;?And some with the crimson streak were stained;?While others their size had not yet gained.?In passing she cried, "Oh! who can insure?The fruits of Summer to get mature??For, fast as the waters beneath me flowing,?Beyond recall, I'm going! I'm going!"
I turned my eye, and beheld another,?That seemed as she might be Summer's mother.?She looked more grave; while her cheek was tinged?With a deeper brown; and her bark was fringed?With the tasselled heads of the wheaten sheaves?Along its sides; and the yellow leaves,?That had covered the deck concealed a throng?Of Crickets!--I knew by their choral song.?And at Autumn's feet lay the golden corn,?While her hands were raised, to invert a horn?That was filled with a sweet and mellow store,?And the purple clusters were hanging o'er.?She bade me seize on the fruit that should last?When the harvest was gone, and Autumn had past.?But, when I had paused to make the choice,?I saw no bark! and I heard no voice!
Then I looked on a sight that chilled my blood!?'Twas a mass of ice, where an old man stood?On his frozen float; while his shrivelled hand?Had clenched, as a staff by which to stand,?A whitened branch that the blast had broke?From the lifeless trunk of an aged oak.?The icicles hung from the naked limb,?And the old man's eye was sunken and dim.?But his scattering locks were silver bright,?His beard with gathering frost was white;?The tears congealed on his furrowed