Jean Ingelow

Grand is the leisure of the earth;
She gives her happy myriads birth,
And after harvest fears not dearth,
But goes to sleep in snow-wreaths dim.…

Ay, Oliver! I was but seven, and he was eleven;
He looked at me pouting and rosy. I blushed where I stood.
They had told us to play in the orchard (and I only seven!
A small guest at the farm): but he said, 'Oh, a girl was no good!'…

O My heart, my heart is sick awishing and awaiting:
The lad took up his knapsack, he went, he went his way;
And I looked on for his coming, as a prisoner through the grating
Looks and longs and longs and wishes for its opening day.On the wild purple mountains, all alone with no other,…

I.Laura, my Laura! 'Yes, mother!' 'I want you, Laura; come down.'
'What is it, mother—what, dearest? O your loved face how it pales!
You tremble, alas and alas—you heard bad news from the town?'
'Only one short half hour to tell it. My poor courage fails—II.Laura.' 'Where's Ronald?—O anything else but Ronald!' 'No, no,…