Few, in the days of early youth,
Trusted like me in love and truth.
I ’ve learned sad lessons from the years;
But slowly, and with many tears;
For God made me to kindly view
The world that I was passing through.
How little did I once believe
That friendly tones could e’er deceive!
That kindness, and forbearance long,
...
Sweet bell of Stratford, tolling slow,
In summer gloaming’s golden glow,
I hear and feel thy voice divine,
And all my soul responds to thine.
As now I hear thee, even so,
My Shakespeare heard thee long ago,
When lone by Avon’s pensive stream
He wandered, in his haunted dream:
Heard thee—and far his fancy sped
Through...
Was it the chime of a tiny bell
That came so sweet to my dreaming ear,
Like the silvery tones of a fairy’s shell
That he winds, on the beach, so mellow and clear,
When the winds and the waves lie together asleep,
And the Moon and the Fairy are watching the deep,
She dispensing her silvery light,
And he his notes as silvery quite,...
