me with their notes another manner feigned."
CHAUCER: Pie Cuckoo and the Nightingale,
modernised by WORDSWORTH.--HORNE's Edition.

And once more, sweet Winandermere, we are on the banks of thy happy
lake! The softest ray of the soft clear sun of early autumn trembled
on the fresh waters, and glanced through the leaves of the limes and
willows that were reflected--distinct as a home for the Naiads--beneath
the limpid surface. You might hear in the bushes the young blackbirds
trilling their first untutored notes. And the graceful dragon-fly, his
wings glittering in the translucent sunshine, darted to and fro--the
reeds gathered here and there in the mimic bays that broke the shelving
marge of the grassy shore.

And by that grassy shore, and beneath those shadowy limes, sat the young
lovers. It was the very place where Spencer had first beheld Camilla.
And now they were met to say, "Farewell!"

"Oh, Camilla!" said he, with great emotion, and eyes that swam in tears,
"be firm--be true. You know how my whole life is wrapped up in your
love. You go amidst scenes where all will tempt you to forget me. I
linger behind in those which are consecrated by your remembrance, which
will speak to me every hour of you. Camilla, since you do love me--you
do--do you not?--since you have confessed it--since your parents have
consented to our marriage, provided only that your love last (for of
mine there can be no doubt) for one year--one terrible year--shall I not
trust you as truth itself? And yet how darkly I despair at times!"

Camilla innocently took the hands that, clasped together, were raised to
her, as if in supplication, and pressed them kindly between her own.

"Do not doubt me--never doubt my affection. Has not my father consented?
Reflect, it is but a year's delay!"

"A year!--can you speak thus of a year--a whole year? Not to see--not to
hear you for a whole year, except in my dreams! And, if at the end your
parents waver? Your father--I distrust him still. If this delay is
but meant to wean you from me,--if, at the end, there are new excuses
found,--if they then, for some cause or other not now foreseen, still
refuse their assent? You--may I not still look to you?"

Camilla sighed heavily; and turning her meek face on her lover, said,
timidly, "Never think that so short a time can make me unfaithful, and
do not suspect that my father will break his promise."

"But, if he does, you will still be mine."

"Ah