Wayside Pictures, Hymns, and Poems ... With a portrait of the author

Front matter

WAYSIDE PICTURES, HYMNS, AND POEMS. BY JOHN HAREIS. WITH A PORTRAIT OF THE AUTHOR. LONDON : HAMILTON, ADAMS, AND CO. 1874. LONDON : MINTED BY WILLIAM NICHOLS, 4«, HOXTON SQUARE. SM^atiait- TO HIS LONG-TRIED FEIEND AND REVERED COUNTRYMAN, ROBERT ALEXANDER GRAY, ESQ., OF LONDON, THIS COLLECTION OL POEMS, THE LIFE-WORK OF THE AUTHOR, IS, BY PERMISSION, $t$ptMlu raft pteMIg mmM. |}^Ii(9t<n|a i Giving the feet of Time a tardy pace, Through heated hollows, and rude rifts to moil, AVhen boyhood blossoms opened on his face, And greenness clothed the tree which gave his being AVhere slender UarebeUs graced the garden hedge, And granite pillars rose beside the door, SpUt by the workman from the wondrous ledge AVith lichen covered on the mystic moor ; And torrents tumbled on, with foam and roar, By giant boulders sleeping in the moss ; And songful genii brushed the braken o'er ; A mountain minstrel, by the uplifted cross, Sang when the heights were grand in evening's golden gloss.

II. grace. IV. His study was tbe shadow of a rock, O'erhanging the meek moss and lowly thyme, Or flowery hawthorn, where the fleecy flock Cropped the green herbage in the day's fuU prime. And here he drank from rippling rills of rhyme, Which lulled his spirit into blissful rest, Till o'er tbe tree-tops rose the curfew's chime, And tbe last wood-dove sought her sheltered nest, And twilight Ungered long in dalliance with the West. His father was with honest hinds enrolled, UnskiUed in letters, save tbe Book Divine. Some mountain sheep he kept without a fold, A steady horse, and still some steadier kine. His mother's heart all gentle things enshrine, Which filled his opening hours with rosy Ught, As fancy-fraught he roved mid peak and pine, And read the lore of Nature's loneUest height, And ever taught himsetf by all things pure and bright.

V. And as he sang beside the lonely tree, In bUssful brightness, by the glowworm's bower, Where stone-crops nestled in the hedgerows free, And fays stole forth from many a closing flower, Enraptured with the mystery of the hour That o'er his senses Uke a vision crept, Filling his soul with the enchanter's power, From the cloud-isles of eve a being swept, With wondrous whisperings, as he watched and wept. III. Then came the darkness of the dangerous mine, His daily, nightly tasks of tedious toil, Where never star, or moon, or sunbeams shine, But sulphur-wreaths around the caverns coil ; AVhich health, and strength, and mental might despoil, 2 A DEDICATION. IV VI. IX. The friend of those whose earthlyfriendsarefew, He fills the widow's heart with richest joy ; To the Divine injunction ever true, The weak to shield, to feed the orphan boy ; The thorns along life's pathway to destroy, And smooth the steep by drooping genius trod, Who warmly thanks him in his loved employ, Mid craggy cliff and cascade, music-shod, And asks for Bobeet Gray the guidance of his God.