THE FIRST SNOW. Fair Hope is dead, and light Is quenched in night. What sound can break the silence of despair? The sky is overcast, Yet stars shall rise at last, And angels' silver voices stir the air. 199 THE FIRST SNOW. HE first snow came. How beautiful it was, falling so silently all day long, all night long, on the mountains, on the meadows, on the roofs of the living, on the graves of the dead! All white save the river, that marked its course by a winding black line across the landscape; and the leafless trees at against the leaden sky now revealed more fully the wonderful beauty and intricacy of their branches. What silence, too, came with the snow, and what seclusion! Every sound was muffled, every noise changed to something soft and musical. No more trampling hoofs, no more rattling wheels! Only the chiming sleigh-bells, beating as swift and merrily as the hearts of children. The Winter did not pass without its peculiar delights and recreations-the singing of the great wood fires, the blowing of the wind over the chimney-tops, as if they were organ-pipes, the splendour of the spotless snow; the purple wall built round the horizon at sunset; the sea-suggesting pines, with the moan of the billows in their branches, on which the snows were furled like sails; the northern lights; the stars of steel; the transcendent moonlight, and the lovely shadows of the leafless trees upon the snow. 200 THE SHEPHERDS OF BETHLEHEM. BD there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night. And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them and they were sore afraid. "And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of Dabid a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you; We shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saping, Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.' THE HOLLY-TREE. 201 THE HOLLY-TREE. READER! hast thou ever stood to see The eye that contemplates it well, perceives Ordered by an Intelligence, so wise As might confound the atheist's sophistries. Below a circling fence its leaves are seen, No grazing cattle through their prickly round But as they grow where nothing is to fear, I love to view these things with curious eyes, And moralize : And in this wisdom of the holly-tree Can emblems see, Wherewith perchance to make a pleasant rhyme, Thus, though abroad perchance I might appear Harsh and austere, To those who on my leisure would intrude Reserved and rude; Gentle at home amid my friends I'd be, Like the high leaves upon the holly-tree. And as when all the Summer trees are seen So bright and green, The holly-leaves their fadeless hues display Less bright than they; But when the bare and wintry woods we see, What then so cheerful as the holly-tree? So serious should my youth appear among So would I seem among the young and gay That in my age as cheerful I may be CHRISTMAS BELLS. HE time draws near the birth of Christ : Answer each other in the mist. Four voices of four hamlets round, From far and near, on mead and moor, Were shut between me and the sound: Each voice four changes on the wind, That now dilate, and now decrease, Peace and goodwill to all mankind. STAR appeared, and peaceful threw It caught the faithful Magi's view, It led the wondrous way From far-famed Persia's smiling bowers, Each heart throughout the gazing throng While slowly moved that star along And softly fixed its mellow light On distant Bethlehem's joyful night. |