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C.N. Douglas, comp. Forty Thousand Quotations: Prose and Poetical. 1917.

Leland

  • And softly came the fair young queen
  • O’er mountain, dale, and dell;
  • And where her golden light was seen
  • An emerald shadow fell.
  • The good-wife oped the window wide,
  • The good-man spanned his plough;
  • ’Tis time to run, ’tis time to ride,
  • For Spring is with us now.
  • But, old Swedish legends say,
  • Of all the birds upon that day,
  • The swallow felt the deepest grief,
  • And longed to give her Lord relief,
  • And chirped when any near would come,
  • “Hugswala swala swal honom!”
  • Meaning, as they who tell it deem,
  • Oh, cool, oh, cool and comfort Him!
  • Dark eyes—eternal soul of pride!
  • Deep life in all that’s true!
  • *****
  • Away, away to other skies!
  • Away o’er seas and sands!
  • Such eyes as those were never made
  • To shine in other lands.
  • If all the world must see the world
  • As the world the world hath seen,
  • Then it were better for the world
  • That the world had never been.
  • The Lord of Learning who upraised mankind
  • From being silent brutes to singing men.
  • Time fleeth on,
  • Youth soon is gone,
  • Naught earthly may abide;
  • Life seemeth fast,
  • But may not last—
  • It runs as runs the tide.
  • Up rose the wild old winter-king,
  • And shook his beard of snow;
  • “I hear the first young hare-bell ring,
  • ’Tis time for me to go!
  • Northward o’er the icy rocks,
  • Northward o’er the sea,
  • My daughter comes with sunny locks:
  • This land’s too warm for me!”