'Tis the early April lark,
Or the rooks, with busy caw,
Foraging for sticks and straw.
Thou shalt, at one glance, behold
The daisy and the marigold;
White-plumed lilies, and the first
Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst ;
Shaded hyacinth, alway
Sapphire queen of the mid-May;

And every leaf, and every flower
Pearled with the self-same shower.
Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep
Meagre from its cellèd sleep;
And the snake all winter-thin
Cast on sunny bank its skin;
Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see
Hatching in the hawthorn tree,
When the hen-bird's wing doth rest
Quiet on her mossy nest;
Then the hurry and alarm
When the bee-hive casts its swarm;
Acorns ripe down-pattering
While the autumn breezes sing.

O sweet Fancy! let her loose;
Everything is spoilt by use :
Where's the cheek that doth not fade,
Too much gazed at? Where's the maid
Whose lip mature is ever new?
Where's the eye, however blue,
Doth not weary? Where's the face
One would meet in every place?
Where's the voice, however soft,
One would hear so very oft?
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth.
Let then winged Fancy find
Thee a mistress to thy mind:
Dulcet-eyed as Ceres' daughter,
Ere the god of torment taught her
How to frown and how to chide;
With a waist and with a side
White as Hebe's, when her zone
Slipt its golden clasp, and down
Fell her kirtle to her feet

While she held the goblet sweet,
And Jove grew languid. · Break the mesh
Of the Fancy's silken leash;

Out o'er the tops of highest mountains skipping, Out o'er the hills, the trees and valleys tripping, Out o'er the ocean seas, without an oar or shipping. Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go?

Amidst the misty vapors, Fain would I know

What doth cause the tapers;
Why the clouds benight us,
And affright us

While we travel here below. Fain would I know what makes the roaring thunder,

And what these lightnings be that rend the clouds asunder,

And what these comets are on which we gaze and wonder.

Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go?

Fain would I know the reason
Why the little ant,
All the summer season,
Layeth up provision,
On condition

To know no winter's want:

And how these little fishes, that swim beneath salt water,

Do never blind their eye; methinks it is a matter An inch above the reach of old Erra Pater! Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go?

Fain would I be resolved

How things are done;

And where the bull was calved

Of bloody Phalaris,

And where the tailor is

That works to the man i' the moon!

Fain would I know how Cupid aims so rightly; And how these little fairies do dance and leap so lightly;

And where fair Cynthia makes her ambles

nightly.

Hallo, my fancy, whither wilt thou go!

beneath,

Its ardors of rest and of love,

And the crimson pall of eve may fall
From the depth of heaven above,

With wings folded I rest on mine airy nest,
As still as a brooding dove.

And I laugh to see them whirl and flee,
Like a swarm of golden bees,
When I widen the rent in my wind-built tent,
Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas,

Like strips of the sky fallen through me on high,
Are each paved with the moon and these.

That orbed maiden with white fire laden,
Whom mortals call the moon,
Glides glimmering o'er my fleece-like floor
By the midnight breezes strewn ;
And wherever the beat of her unseen feet,

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

To make the shifting clouds be what you please, Or let the easily persuaded eyes

Own each quaint likeness issuing from the mould
Of a friend's fancy; or, with head bent low,
And cheek aslant, see rivers flow of gold,
'Twixt crimson banks; and then a traveller go
From mount to mount, through Cloudland, gor-
geous land!

Or, listening to the tide with closèd sight,
Be that blind Bard, who on the Chian strand,
By those deep sounds possessed with inward light,
Beheld the Iliad and the Odyssey,