When the golden day is done, Through the closing portal, Child and garden, flower and sun, Vanish all things mortal. As the building shadows fall As the rays diminish, Under evening’s cloak they all Roll away and vanish. Garden darkened, daisy shut, Child in bed, they slumber– Glow-worm in the hallway rut, Mice among the […]

Birds all the sunny day Flutter and quarrel Here in the arbour-like Tent of the laurel. Here in the fork The brown nest is seated; Four little blue eggs The mother keeps heated. While we stand watching her Staring like gabies, Safe in each egg are the Bird’s little babies. Soon the frail eggs they […]

All the names I know from nurse: Gardener’s garters, Shepherd’s purse, Bachelor’s buttons, Lady’s smock, And the Lady Hollyhock. Fairy places, fairy things, Fairy woods where the wild bee wings, Tiny trees for tiny dames– These must all be fairy names! Tiny woods below whose boughs Shady fairies weave a house; Tiny tree-tops, rose or […]

Great is the sun, and wide he goes Through empty heaven with repose; And in the blue and glowing days More thick than rain he showers his rays. Though closer still the blinds we pull To keep the shady parlour cool, Yet he will find a chink or two To slip his golden fingers through. […]

When the grass was closely mown, Walking on the lawn alone, In the turf a hole I found, And hid a soldier underground. Spring and daisies came apace; Grasses hide my hiding place; Grasses run like a green sea O’er the lawn up to my knee. Under grass alone he lies, Looking up with leaden […]

In the other gardens And all up the vale, From the autumn bonfires See the smoke trail! Pleasant summer over And all the summer flowers, The red fire blazes, The grey smoke towers. Sing a song of seasons! Something bright in all! Flowers in the summer, Fires in the fall!

Dear Uncle Jim, this garden ground That now you smoke your pipe around, Has seen immortal actions done And valiant battles lost and won. Here we had best on tip-toe tread, While I for safety march ahead, For this is that enchanted ground Where all who loiter slumber sound. Here is the sea, here is […]

If two may read aright These rhymes of old delight And house and garden play, You two, my cousins, and you only, may. You in a garden green With me were king and queen, Were hunter, soldier, tar, And all the thousand things that children are. Now in the elders’ seat We rest with quiet […]

To My Mother You too, my mother, read my rhymes For love of unforgotten times, And you may chance to hear once more The little feet along the floor. To Auntie “Chief of our aunts”–not only I, But all your dozen of nurselings cry– “What did the other children do? And what were childhood, wanting […]

The red room with the giant bed Where none but elders laid their head; The little room where you and I Did for awhile together lie And, simple suitor, I your hand In decent marriage did demand; The great day nursery, best of all, With pictures pasted on the wall And leaves upon the blind– […]

1 Some day soon this rhyming volume, if you learn with proper speed, Little Louis Sanchez, will be given you to read. Then you shall discover, that your name was printed down By the English printers, long before, in London town. In the great and busy city where the East and West are met, All […]

As from the house your mother sees You playing round the garden trees, So you may see, if you will look Through the windows of this book, Another child, far, far away, And in another garden, play. But do not think you can at all, By knocking on the window, call That child to hear […]

The gardener does not love to talk. He makes me keep the gravel walk; And when he puts his tools away, He locks the door and takes the key. Away behind the currant row, Where no one else but cook may go, Far in the plots, I see him dig, Old and serious, brown and […]

When the bright lamp is carried in, The sunless hours again begin; O’er all without, in field and lane, The haunted night returns again. Now we behold the embers flee About the firelit hearth; and see Our faces painted as we pass, Like pictures, on the window glass. Must we to bed indeed? Well then, […]

The friendly cow all red and white, I love with all my heart: She gives me cream with all her might, To eat with apple-tart. She wanders lowing here and there, And yet she cannot stray, All in the pleasant open air, The pleasant light of day; And blown by all the winds that pass […]

The rain is falling all around, It falls on field and tree, It rains on the umbrellas here, And on the ships at sea.

{1} There is nothing more disenchanting to man than to be shown the springs and mechanism of any art. All our arts and occupations lie wholly on the surface; it is on the surface that we perceive their beauty, fitness, and significance; and to pry below is to be appalled by their emptiness and shocked […]

{11} The profession of letters has been lately debated in the public prints; and it has been debated, to put the matter mildly, from a point of view that was calculated to surprise high-minded men, and bring a general contempt on books and reading. Some time ago, in particular, a lively, pleasant, popular writer {12} […]

{14} The Editor {15} has somewhat insidiously laid a trap for his correspondents, the question put appearing at first so innocent, truly cutting so deep. It is not, indeed, until after some reconnaissance and review that the writer awakes to find himself engaged upon something in the nature of autobiography, or, perhaps worse, upon a […]

{16} Style is the invariable mark of any master; and for the student who does not aspire so high as to be numbered with the giants, it is still the one quality in which he may improve himself at will. Passion, wisdom, creative force, the power of mystery or colour, are allotted in the hour […]