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Feels light and cheerful; o'er the crispy snow,
Which scarce beneath the passing footstep yields,
I love to tread,—and even here can find
Fresh beauty still, and charms for ever new.
Which scarce beneath the passing footstep yields,
I love to tread,—and even here can find
Fresh beauty still, and charms for ever new.
Yes; though all looks so drear, yet still to me
There is a something in this wintry scene,
A touching stillness in the echoing calm,
That wraps the earth in silence. Frost has flung
Her voiceless chain upon the murmuring breeze,
And hushed awhile the laughing streamlet's voice
In icy stillness: 'neath that vault of blue,
Which spreads unclouded o'er the slumbering world,
No sound is heard,—no murmur breaks the spell
Of noonday silence, save where one low note
The robin breathes in mournful melody,
Or icicle, that feels the sunbeam's power,
Drops tinkling 'mid the withered leaves below.
All heaven and earth are still! Oh, who but feels
The charm of such an hour—the witching spell
This hush of Nature casts o'er every heart,
Waking again the dreams of other days,
The voice of years long past! At least, to me,
Such silence seems to touch the inmost depths
Where Memory sleeps, and rouse to life once more
Scenes long departed—hours that passed away,
And cannot come again.
My earthly lot
I would not change for all this world can give.
Yet marvel not, if at an hour like this,
An hour so rife with all that stirs the thoughts
Of early days, my heart still yearns for home,
And all the well-known tones, familiar forms,
There is a something in this wintry scene,
A touching stillness in the echoing calm,
That wraps the earth in silence. Frost has flung
Her voiceless chain upon the murmuring breeze,
And hushed awhile the laughing streamlet's voice
In icy stillness: 'neath that vault of blue,
Which spreads unclouded o'er the slumbering world,
No sound is heard,—no murmur breaks the spell
Of noonday silence, save where one low note
The robin breathes in mournful melody,
Or icicle, that feels the sunbeam's power,
Drops tinkling 'mid the withered leaves below.
All heaven and earth are still! Oh, who but feels
The charm of such an hour—the witching spell
This hush of Nature casts o'er every heart,
Waking again the dreams of other days,
The voice of years long past! At least, to me,
Such silence seems to touch the inmost depths
Where Memory sleeps, and rouse to life once more
Scenes long departed—hours that passed away,
And cannot come again.
My earthly lot
I would not change for all this world can give.
Yet marvel not, if at an hour like this,
An hour so rife with all that stirs the thoughts
Of early days, my heart still yearns for home,
And all the well-known tones, familiar forms,
