y,
There out upon the beaeten grass
Wer maidens at their play;
An' as the pretty souls did tweil
An' smile, I cried, "The flow'r
O' beauty, then, is still in bud
In Blackmwore by the Stour."

MAY

Come out o' door, 'tis Spring! 'tis May!
The trees be green, the yields be gay;
The weather's warm, the winter blast,
Wi' all his train o' clouds, is past;
The zun do rise while vo'k do sleep,
To teaeke a higher daily zweep,
Wi' cloudless feaece a-flingen down
His sparklen light upon the groun'.
The air's a-streamen soft,--come drow
The winder open; let it blow
In drough the house, where vire, an' door
A-shut, kept out the cwold avore.
Come, let the vew dull embers die,
An' come below the open sky;
An' wear your best, vor fear the groun'
In colors gaey mid sheaeme your gown:
An' goo an' rig wi' me a mile
Or two up over geaete an' stile,
Drough zunny parrocks that do lead,
Wi' crooked hedges, to the meaed,
Where elems high, in steaetely ranks,
Do rise vrom yollow cowslip-banks,
An' birds do twitter vrom the spraey
O' bushes deck'd wi' snow-white maey;
An' gil' cups, wi' the deaeisy bed,
Be under ev'ry step you tread.
We'll wind up roun' the hill, an' look
All down the thickly timber'd nook,
Out where the squier's house do show
His gray-walled peaks up drough the row
O' sheaedy elems, where the rock
Do build her nest; an' where the brook
Do creep along the meaeds, an' lie
To catch the brightness o' the sky;
An' cows, in water to their knees,
Do stan' a-whisken off the vlees.
Mother o' blossoms, and ov all
That's feaeir a-vield vrom Spring till Fall,
The gookoo over white-weaev'd seas
Do come to zing in thy green trees,
An' buttervlees, in giddy flight,
Do gleaem the mwost by thy gaey light.

[Illustration: _MILKING TIME_.
Photogravure from a Painting by A. Roll.]

Oh! when, at last, my fleshly eyes Shall shut upon the vields an'
skies, Mid zummer's zunny days be gone, An' winter's clouds be comen on:
Nor mid I draw upon the e'th, O' thy sweet air my leaetest breath;
Alassen I mid want to staey Behine' for thee, O flow'ry May!

MILKEN TIME

'Poems of Rural Life'

'Twer when the busy birds did vlee,
Wi' sheenen wings, vrom tree t