ilky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of the bay.
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced, but they
Outdid the sparkling waves in glee,--
A poet could not but be gay
In such a [v]jocund company.
I gazed, and gazed, but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought.

For oft, when on my couch I lie,
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

DAWN

I had occasion, a few weeks since, to take the early train from
Providence to Boston; and for this purpose I rose at two o'clock in the
morning. Everything around was wrapped in darkness and hushed in
silence. It was a mild, serene, midsummer night,--the sky was without a
cloud,--the winds were [v]whist. The moon, then in the last quarter, had
just risen, and the stars shone with a luster but little affected by her
presence.

Jupiter, two hours high, was the herald of the day; the [v]Pleiades,
just above the horizon, shed their sweet influence in the east; Lyra
sparkled near the [v]zenith; Andromeda veiled her newly discovered
glories from the naked eye in the south; the steady Pointers, far
beneath the pole, looked meekly up from the depths of the north to their
sovereign.

Such was the glorious spectacle as I entered the train. As we proceeded,
the timid approach of twilight became more perceptible; the intense blue
of the sky began to soften; the smaller stars, like little children,
went first to rest; the sister-beams of the Pleiades soon melted
together; but the bright constellations of the west and north remained
unchanged. Steadily the wondrous transfiguration went on. Hands of
angels, hidden from mortal eyes, shifted the scenery of the heavens; the
glories of night dissolved into the glories of the dawn.

The blue sky now turned more softly gray; the great watch-stars shut up
their holy eyes; the east began to kindle. Faint streaks of purple soon
blushed along the sky; the whole celestial concave was filled with the
inflowing tides of the morning light, which came pouring down from above
in one great ocean of radiance; till at length, as we reached the Blue
Hills, a flash of purple fire blazed out from above the horizon, and
turned the