bought my little children bread,
And they were healthy with their food;
For me--it never did me good.
A woful time it was for me,
To see the end of all my gains,
The pretty flock which I had rear'd
With all my care and pains,
To see it melt like snow away--
For me it was a woful day.

7

Another still! and still another!
A little lamb, and then its mother!
It was a vein that never stopp'd--
Like blood-drops from my heart they dropp'd,
Till thirty were not left alive;
They dwindled, dwindled, one by one;
And I may say that many a time
I wish'd they all were gone;
Reckless of what might come at last,
Were but the bitter struggle past.

8

To wicked deeds I was inclined,
And wicked fancies cross'd my mind;
And every man I chanced to see,
I thought he knew some ill of me.
No peace, no comfort could I find,
No ease within doors or without;
And crazily and wearily
I went my work about;
And oft was moved to flee from home
And hide my head where wild beasts roam.

9

'Sir, 'twas a precious flock to me,
As dear as my own children be;
For daily with my growing store
I loved my children more and more.
Alas! it was an evil time;
God cursed me in my sore distress;
I pray'd, yet every day I thought
I loved my children less;
And every week, and every day,
My flock it seem'd to melt away;
They dwindled, sir, sad sight to see
From ten to five, from five to three,
A lamb, a wether, and a ewe;
And then at last from three to two;
And, of my fifty, yesterday
I had but only one:
And here it lies upon my arm,
Alas, and I have none;
To-day I fetch'd it from the rock--
It is the last of all my flock.'

_W. Wordsworth_

CLXI

_THE ROMANCE OF THE SWAN'S NEST_

Little Ellie sits alone
'Mid the beeches of a meadow,
By a stream-side on the grass;
And the trees are showering down
Doubles of their leaves in shadow
On her shining hair and face.

She has thrown her bonnet by;
And her feet she has been dipping
In the shallow waters' flow--
Now she holds them nakedly
In her hands, all sleek and dripping,
While she rocketh to and fro.

Little Ellie sits alone,
And the smile she softly