swift and dark;--
What horrid shapes they wear!
A winged giant sails the sky;
Oh father, father, let us fly!"

"Hush, child; it is a grateful sound,
That beating of the summer shower;
Here, where the boughs hang close around,
We'll pass a pleasant hour,
Till the fresh wind, that brings the rain,
Has swept the broad heaven clear again."

"Nay, father, let us haste--for see,
That horrid thing with horned brow--
His wings o'erhang this very tree,
He scowls upon us now;
His huge black arm is lifted high;
Oh father, father, let us fly!"

"Hush, child;" but, as the father spoke,
Downward the livid firebolt came,
Close to his ear the thunder broke,
And, blasted by the flame,
The child lay dead; while dark and still
Swept the grim cloud along the hill.

THE CHILD'S FUNERAL.

Fair is thy sight, Sorrento, green thy shore,
Black crags behind thee pierce the clear blue skies;
The sea, whose borderers ruled the world of yore,
As clear and bluer still before thee lies.

Vesuvius smokes in sight, whose fount of fire,
Outgushing, drowned the cities on his steeps;
And murmuring Naples, spire o'ertopping spire,
Sits on the slope beyond where Virgil sleeps.

Here doth the earth, with flowers of every hue,
Prank her green breast when April suns are bright;
Flowers of the morning-red, or ocean-blue,
Or like the mountain-frost of silvery white.

Currents of fragrance, from the orange-tree,
And sward of violets, breathing to and fro,
Mingle, and, wandering out upon the sea,
Refresh the idle boatsman where they blow.

Yet even here, as under harsher climes,
Tears for the loved and early lost are shed;
That soft air saddens with the funeral-chimes,
Those shining flowers are gathered for the dead.

Here once a child, a smiling playful one,
All the day long caressing and caressed,
Died when its little tongue had just begun
To lisp the names of those it loved the best.

The father strove his struggling grief to quell,
The mother wept as mothers use to weep,
Two little sisters wearied them to tell
When their dear Carlo would awake from sleep.

Within an inner room his couch they spread,
His funeral-couch; with mingled grief and love,
They laid a crown of roses on his head,
And murmured, "Brighter is his crown above."

They scattered round him, on the snowy