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"AND WHAT IS HOPE? THE PUFFING GALE OF MORN,-(CLARE)

ARTHUR HENRY CLOUGH.

W

THE THRUSH'S NEST.

ITHIN a thick and spreading hawthorn bush
That overhung a mole-hill, large and round,

I heard from morn to morn a merry thrush
Sing hymns of rapture, while I drank the sound
With joy; and oft an unintruding guest

I watched her secret toils from day to day;
How true she warped the moss to form her nest,
And modelled it within with wood and clay.
And by-and-by, like heath-bells gilt with dew,
There lay her shining eggs, as bright as flowers,
Ink-spotted over, shells of green and blue;
And there I witnessed, in the summer hours,
A brood of Nature's minstrels chirp and fly,
Glad as the sunshine and the laughing sky.

[From "Poems of Rural Life."]

"THEN WHAT IS LIFE?

WHEN STRIPT OF ITS DISGUISE, A THING TO BE DESIRED?

IT CANNOT BE!"-CLARE.

"SINCE EVERYTHING THAT MEETS OUR FOOLISH EYES GIVES PROOF SUFFICIENT OF ITS VANITY."--JOHN CLARE.

Arthur Henry Clough.

[ARTHUR HENRY CLOUGH was born at Liverpool, on the 1st of January
1819, and educated at Rugby, where he was regarded by Dr. Arnold as
one of the most promising of his pupils. From Rugby he went to Oxford,
carrying off the Balliol Scholarship—a high distinction-and obtaining in
1842 a fellowship at Oriel. His first published poem appeared in 1848—the
"Bothie of Tober-na-Vuolich;" which at once convinced the "judicious
few" of his extraordinary powers. "A sense of fresh, healthy manliness,"
66 a scorn of base and selfish motives; a frank
says Mr. F. T. Palgrave;
admiration for common life; a love of earth, not only for its earthly sake,'
but for the divine and the eternal interfused in it;—such, and other such,
are the impressions left. Viewed critically, Clough's work is wanting in
art; the language and the thought are often unequal and incomplete; the
poetical fusion into a harmonious whole imperfect."

In 1849 he published a series of poems under the title of “Ambarvalia,”
many of which, it has been said, will hold their place beside those of Ten-
nyson and Browning. For some few months he held the Wardenship of

THAT ROBS EACH FLOW'Ret of its gem, and dies."—clare.

"LOVE, DEPARTED ONCE, COMES BACK-(A. H. Clough)

GREEN Fields of ENGLAND.

115

University Hall, London. In 1852 he visited the United States, but an ap-
pointment in the educational department of the Privy Council Office recalled
him to England. He next received the secretaryship to the Commission of
Report on Military Education, which necessitated several journeys to the
Continent. In 1861 he visited Italy, but on one of the Italian lakes was
struck by the malaria, which a feeble constitution proved unable to throw
off; and in the very promise of his powers he passed away on the 13th of
November 1861. He was buried at Florence.

Besides the works already mentioned, he wrote the "Amours de Voyage,"
and "Mari Magno, or Tales on Board." In reading his works, we are pain-
fully struck with a sense of what he might have done, what he might have
been; so much greater, undoubtedly, than what he was-so much better,
undoubtedly, than what he did. Yet his life, brief and troubled and in-
complete, showed him possessed of an heroic, generous temper; and his
poems, imperfect, inartistic, irregular, of a deep love for, and abiding sym-
pathy with nature-a thoughtful soul-and a fine fancy.]

"EXCITEMENTS COME, AND ACT AND SPEECH FLOW FREELY FORTH; BUT NO,-(CLOUGH)

GREEN FIELDS OF ENGLAND.

|REEN fields of England! wheresoe'er
Across this watery waste we fare,
Your image at our hearts we bear,
Green fields of England, everywhere.

Sweet eyes in England, I must flee
Past where the waves' last confines be,
Ere your last smile I cease to see,
Sweet eyes in England, dear to me.

Dear home in England, safe and fast,
If but in thee my lot lie cast,
The past shall seem a nothing past
To thee, dear home, if won at last;
Dear home in England, won at last!

[From Clough's "Life, Letters, and Poems."]

NO MORE AGAIN,-NO MORE."-ARTHUR HENRY CLOUGH.

NOR THEY, NOR AUGHT BESIDE, CAN REACH THE BURIED WORLD BELOW."-A. H. CLOUGH.

"THE HEART IS PRONE TO FALL AWAY, HER HIGH AND CHERISHED VISIONS TO FORGET."-CLOUGH.

116

"THE SUMMUM PULCHRUM RESTS IN HEAVEN;

ARTHUR HENRY CLOUGH.

ENDURANCE AND PATIENCE.
UT forth thy leaf, thou lofty plane,

East wind and frost are safely gone;

With zephyr mild and balmy rain,
The summer comes serenely on;
Earth, air, and sun and skies combine
To promise all that's kind and fair;
But thou, O human heart of mine,
Be still, contain thyself, and bear.

December days were brief and chill,

The winds of March were wild and drear,
And, nearing and receding still,

Spring never would, we thought, be here.
The leaves that burst, the suns that shine,
Had, not the less, their certain date;
And thou, O human heart of mine,
Be still, refrain thyself, and wait.

[From Clough's "Life, Letters, and Poems."]

"YOUNG CHILDREN GATHER AS THEIR OWN THE HARVEST THAT THE DEAD HAD SOWN."-CLOUGH.

UNITED HEREAFTER.

Quà cursum ventus.

S ships, becalmed at eve, that lay
With canvas drooping, side by side,
Two towers of sail at dawn of day
Are scarce long leagues apart descried ;
When fell the night, up sprung the breeze,
And all the dark'ning hours they plied,

Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas
By each was cleaving, side by side;

SOME DAY THOU SHALT IT VIEW."-CLOugh,

BLESSED ARE THOSE WHO HAVE NOT SEEN,

A HIGHLAND BURN.

E'en so-but why the tale reveal

Of those, whom year by year unchanged,
Brief absence joined anew to feel,

Astounded, soul from soul estranged.

At dead of night their sails were filled,
And onward each rejoicing steered—
Ah, neither blamed, for neither willed,
Or wist, what first with dawn appeared!
To veer, how vain! on, onward strain,

Brave barks! in light, in darkness too,
Through winds and tides one compass guides-
To that, and your own selves, be true.
But, O blithe breeze! and, O great seas!
Though ne'er, that earliest parting past,
On your wide plain they join again,
Together lead them home at last.

One port, methought, alike they sought,
One purpose hold where'er they fare,-
O bounding breeze! O rushing seas!
At last, at last unite them there!

[From Clough's "Life, Letters, and Poems."]

"O ONLY SOURCE OF ALL OUR LIGHT AND LIFE, WHOM AS OUR STRENGTH WE SEE AND FEEL,

A HIGHLAND BURN.

HERE is a stream (I name not its name,
tourist

lest inquisitive

Hunt it, and make it a lion, and get it at last into
guide-books)

Springing far off from a loch unexplored in the folds of great

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BUT WHOM THE HOURS OF MORTAL MORAL STRIFE ALONE ARIGHT REVEAL!"-A. H.

CLOUGH.

"IT FORTIFIES MY SOUL TO KNOW THAT, THOUGH I PERISH, TRUTH IS SO."-A. H. CLOUGH.

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["Cliff over cliff for its sides, with rowan and pendent birch boughs."]

Falling two miles through rowan * and stunted alder, enveloped
Then for four more in a forest of pine, where broad and ample
Spreads, to convey it, the glen with heathery slopes on both sides:
Broad and fair the stream, with occasional falls and narrows;

*The Mountain Ash.

THE IMPLANTED WORD WITH FAITH."-A. H. CLOUGH.

"THAT HOWSOE'ER I STRAY AND RANGE, WHATE'ER I DO, THOU DOST NOT CHANGE."-CLOUGH.

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