10 THE BOUQUET. 



Is to the Violet's blossoming, 

 Was her protecting power. 



Alas ! the Fay, 

 One tranquil night, was lured aAvay 

 From that sweet home. A merry band 

 Of sister Fairies, hand in hand, 

 Came dancing to her rosy bower 

 And tempted her, in evil hour, 

 To hie afar to a silvery stream 

 To revel and sport 'neath the moon's bright beam, 



'Twas such an eve as Fairies love — 

 All cloudless smiled the heaven above, 

 And gentle zephyrs wandered by 

 With the witching tone of a lover's sigh, 

 Or paused awhile, in their wayward flight. 

 To kiss some flower of brightest bloom 

 Which received the caress in mute delight 

 Then paid it back in a breath of perfume. 

 The minstrel night-bird's plaintive song 

 So sweetly broke o'er dewy plains 

 That echo kept the music long 

 Then sent it forth in softer strains ; 

 So calm the sleeping waters lay. 

 So true they mirror'd back the glow 

 Of sky and moon and starry ra}', 

 There seem'd another heaven beh.'>. 

 As pure, as fair, as full of love 

 As the blue boundless heaven above. 

 And Nature was as perfect, then, 

 In that hush'd, holy evening hour. 

 And stainless, as she e'er had been 

 When first the Great Creative Power 



