Hark! the hours are softly calling
Bidding Spring arise,

To listen to the rain-drops falling
From the cloudy skies,

To listen to Earth's weary voices,
Louder every day,

Bidding her no longer linger
On her charm d way;

But hasten to her task of beauty
Scarcely yet begun.

a. ADELAIDE A. PROCTER-Spring.

I wonder if the sap is stirring yet,

If wintry birds are dreaming of a mate,
If frozen snowdrops feel as yet the sun
And crocus fires are kindling one by one.
b. CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI-The First
Spring Day. St. 1.
There is no time like Spring that passes by,
Now newly born, and now
Hastening to die.

C. CHRISTINA G. ROSSETTI-Spring. St. 4.

There is no time like Spring,
When life's alive in everything,
Before new nestlings sing,

Before cleft swallows speed their journey

back

Sc. I.

Sony.

p.

THOMSON-The Seasons. Spring.
Line 529.

To-day the Spring is in the air

And in the blood: sweet sun-gleams come and go

Upon the hills, in lanes the wild-flowers flow,

And tender leaves are bursting everywhere. About the hedge the small birds peer and

i.

O, Soft Spring Airs.

The spring is here-the delicate footed May, With its slight fingers full of leaves and

flowers,

And with it comes a thirst to be away, Wasting in wood-paths its voluptuous hours. S. WILLIS-Ode to Spring.

SUMMER.

In lang, lang days o' simmer,
When the clear and cloudless sky
Rufuses ae wee drap o' rain

To Nature, parched and dry,
The genial night, wi' balmy breath,
Gars verdure spring anew,
An' ilka blade o' grass

Keps its ain drap o' dew.

a. BALLANTINE-Its Ain Drap o' Dew.

Now simmer blinks on flowery braes,
And o'er the crystal streamlet plays.

ს. BURNS-The Birks of Aberfeldy.

The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece!
Where burning Sappho loved and sung,
Where grew the arts of war and peace,-
Where Delos rose, and Phoebus sprung!
Eternal summer gilds them yet,
But all, except their sun, is set.

C.

BYRON-Don Juan. Canto III. St. 86.

The richest of perfumes and jewels are mine, While the dog-roses blow and the dewspangles shine.

d.

ELIZA COOK- Summer is Nigh.

All green and fair the Summer lies,

Just budded from the bud of Spring,

With tender blue of wistful skies,
And winds which softly sing.

Anemonies, that spangled every grove,
The primrose wan, and harebell mildly blue.
No more shall violets linger in the dell,
Or purple orchis variegate the plain,
Till Spring again shall call forth every bell,
And dress with hurried hands her wreaths
again.

p.

CHARLOTTE SMITH-Elegiac Sonnets and Other Poems. Heat, ma'am! it was so dreadful here that I found there was nothing left for it but to take off my flesh and sit in my bones. SYDNEY SMITH-Lady Holland's Memoir. Vol. I. P. 267.

Then came the jolly sommer, being dight
In a thin silken cassock, coloured greene,
That was unlyned all, to be more light,
r. SPENSER-Farie Queene. Bk. VII.
Canto VII. St. 29.

All-conquering Heat, O, intermit thy wrath! And on my throbbing temples potent thus Beam not so fierce! incessant still you flow, And still another fervent flood succeeds, Poured on the head profuse. In vain I sigh, And restless turn, and look around for night;

Night is far off; and hotter hours approach. .. THOMSON The Seasons. Summer, Line 451.

From brightening fields of ether, fair disclosed,

Child of the Sun, refulgent Summer comes; In pride of youth, and felt through nature's depth,

He comes, attended by the sultry Hours,
And ever-fanning breezes, on his way.

b. THOMSON The Seasons. Summer.

g. BURNS-Brigs of Ayr. Line 217. The mellow autumn came, and with it came The promised party, to enjoy its sweets. The corn is cut, the manor full of game; The pointer ranges, and the sportsman beats

In russet jacket;--lynx-like is his aim;

Full grows his bag, and wonderful his feats. Ah, nutbrown partridges! Ah, brilliant pheasants!

And ah, ye poachers!--'Tis no sport for peasants.

h. BYRON-Don Juan. Canto XIII.

St. 75.

k.

1.

DAVID GRAY-The Luggie and Other
Poems. In the Shadows.
Sonnet XIX.

The trees in the autumn wind rustle,
The night is humid and cold.
HEINE-Book of Songs. Lyrical
Interlude. No. 63.
'Tis autumn, the night's dark and gloomy,
With rain and tempest above.
m. HEINE-Book of Songs. Lyrical
Interlude. No. 62.

The summer's throbbing chant is done
And mute the choral antiphon;
The birds have left the shivering pines
To flit among the trellised vines,
Or fan the air with scented plumes
Amid the love-sick orange-blooms,
And thou art here alone, -alone,

n.

Sing, little bird! the rest have flown.
HOLMES-Songs of Many Seasons. An
Old-Year Song.

I saw old Autumn in the misty morn
Stand shadowless like Silence, listening
To silence, for no lonely bird would sing
Into his hollow ear from woods forlorn,
Nor lowly hedge nor solitary thorn;
Shaking his languid locks all dewy bright
With tangled gossamer that fell by night,
Pearling his coronet of golden corn.
0. HOOD Ode. Autumn.

The Autumn is old;
The sere leaves are flying;
He hath gathered up gold,
And now he is dying:
Old Age, begin sighing!
p. HOOD-Autumn.

When the silver habit of the clouds Comes down upon the autumn sun, and with A sober gladness the old year takes up His bright inheritance of golden fruits, A pomp and pageant fill the splendid scene. g. LONGFELLOW-Autumn.

What visionary tints the year puts on, When falling leaves falter through motionless air

Or numbly cling and shiver to be gone! How shimmer the low flats and pastures bare,

As with her nectar Hebe Autumn fills The bowl between me and those distant hills,

And smiles and shakes abroad her misty, tremulous hair!

When Fridthjof comes again over the sea;
Bear them my love for his weeping,
I shall be sleeping.

D. ESAIAS TEGNER-Fridthjof's Saga.
Ingeborg's Lament.

Crown'd with the sickle and the wheaten

sheaf,

While Autumn, nodding o'er the yellow plain, Comes jovial on.

q. THOMSON-The Seasons. Autumn.

Line 1.

I love to wander through the woodlands hoary

In the soft light of an autumnal day, When Summer gathers up her robes of glory, And like a dream of beauty glides away. SARAH HELEN WHITMAN-Still Day in Autumn.

r.