Works

Three things make earth unquiet
And four she cannot brook
The godly Agur counted them
And put them in a book,
Those Four Tremendous Curses
With which mankind is cursed;...

Some of the Wonders Told at the Great in the East of the World by the Voice of Philip the Apostle, that Was Like the Laughter of an Army, and With that No Louder than the Talk of Friend in the Ear of Friend;

...

"Come to the window, mother!
Look out, and you will see
How fast these little clouds sail on,
Above our old elm tree!

"And tell me, dearest mother,
Are these the sheep of heaven,...

A shepherd, with a single dog,
Was ask'd the reason why
He kept a dog, whose least supply
Amounted to a loaf of bread
For every day. The people said
He'd better give the animal...

My dog and I are both grown old;
On these wild downs we watch all day;
He looks in my face when the wind blows cold,
And thus methinks I hear him say:

The gray stone circlet is below,...

ROVER, awake! the grey Cock crows!
Come, shake your coat and go with me!
High in the East the green Hill glows;
And glory crowns our shelt'ring Tree.
The Sheep expect us at the fold:...

[1]

'What! shall I lose them one by one,
This stupid coward throng?
And never shall the wolf have done?
They were at least a thousand strong,
But still they've let poor Robin[2] fall a prey!...

Abune the hill ae muckle star is burnin',
Sae saft an' still, my dear, sae far awa,
There's ne'er a wind, noo day to nicht is turnin',
To lift the brainches o' the whisperin' shaw;...

We now, held in captivity,
Spring to our bondage nor grieve,
See now, how it is blesseder,
Brothers, to give than receive!
Keep trust, wherefore we were made,
Paying the debt that we owe;...

I made search for you all my life, and when I found you
There came a trouble on me,
So that it seemed my blood escaped
And my life ran back from me
And my heart slipped into you....

The sigh that heaves the grasses
Whence thou wilt never rise
Is of the air that passes
And knows not if it sighs.

The diamond tears adorning
Thy low mound on the lea,...

I saw him in a picture, and I felt I'd like to cry -
He stood in line,
The man "for mine,"
A tall silk-hatted "guy" -
Right on the call,
Silk hat and all,
He'd hurried to the cry -...

1
Though no high-hung bells or din
Of braggart bugles cry it in -
What is sound? Nature's round
Makes the Silver Jubilee.

2
Five and twenty years have run...

We're more than partners, Ned 'n' me,
Two sections permanently righted.
Yiv seen us on the mooch, maybe,
Like remnants lovin'ly united.
Ned's only got one stump, the left;...

TO MR MURRAY.[135]

'Not to admire, is all the art I know,
To make men happy, and to keep them so.'
(Plain truth, dear Murray, needs no flowers of speech,
So take it in the very words of Creech.)[136]...

My untried muse shall no high tone assume,
Nor strut in arms; - farewell my cap and plume:
Brief be my verse, a task within my power,
I tell my feelings in one happy hour;...

(Written upon the return of General Scott from his brilliant Mexican campaign.)

Victorious the hero returns from the wars,
His brow bound with laurels that never will fade,...

It was when
Whirls of thick waters laved me
Again and again,
That something arose and saved me;
Yea, it was then.

In that day
Unseeing the azure went I
On my way,...

The sun is rising dimly red,
The wind is wailing low and dread;
From his cliff the eagle sallies,
Leaves the wolf his darksome valleys;
In the mist the ravens hover,
Peep the wild dogs from the cover,...

[Notes from HIAWATHA follow]

INTRODUCTION

Should you ask me, whence these stories?
Whence these legends and traditions,
With the odors of the forest
With the dew and damp of meadows,...