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THE TALKING OAK

ONCE more the gate behind me falls;
Once more before my face
I see the moulder'd Abbey-walls,
That stand within the chace.

Beyond the lodge the city lies,
Beneath its drift of smoke;
And ah! with what delighted eyes
I turn to yonder oak.

For when my passion first began,
Ere that, which in me burn'd,
The love, that makes me thrice a man,
Could hope itself return'd;

To yonder oak within the field
I spoke without restraint,
And with a larger faith appeal'd
Than Papist unto Saint.

For oft I talk'd with him apart,
And told him of my choice,
Until he plagiarised a heart,

And answer'd with a voice.

Tho' what he whisper'd under Heaven
None else could understand;

I found him garrulously given,
A babbler in the land.

K

The Talking Oak

The

Talking
Oak

But since I heard him make reply

Is

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hour
many a weary
"Twere well to question him, and try
If yet he keeps the power.HT

Hail, hidden to the knees in fern,w0
Broad Oak of Sumner-chace,
Whose topmost branches can discern
The roofs of Sumner-place!

Say thou, whereon I carved her name,
If ever maid or spouse,

As fair as
is my Olivia, came

To rest beneath thy boughs.

A

'O Walter, I have shelter'd here to
Whatever maiden grace and
The good old Summers, year by year
Made ripe in Sumner-chace 500

• Old Summers, when the monk was f
And, issuing shorn and sleek,
Would twist his girdle tight, and pat-
The girls upon the cheek,

Ere yet, in scorn of Peter's-pence,
And number'd bead, and shrift,
Bluff Harry broke into the spence
And turn'd the cowls adrift:

fat,

And I have seen some score of those Fresh faces, that would thrive When his man-minded offset rose a 1 To chase the deer at five;

And all that from the town would stroll,

Till that wild wind made work

In which the gloomy brewer's sou
Went by me, like a stork:

The slight she-slips of loyal blood,
And others, passing praise,
Strait-laced, but all-too-full in bud
For puritanic stays:

مان ملل

• And I have shadow'd many a group Of beauties, that were born

In

tea-cup times of hood and hoop, Or while the patch was worn;

• And, leg and arm with love-knots gay,
About me leap'd and laugh'd

The modest Cupid of the day,
And shrill'd his tinsel shaft.

may

'I swear (and else Each leaf into a gall)

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This girl, for whom your heart is sick,
Is three times worth them all

For those and theirs, by Nature's law,
Have faded long ago;

But in these latter springs I saw
Your own Olivia blow, eit

From when she gamboll'd on the
A baby-germ, to when

The maiden blossoms of her teens
Could number five from ten.

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The Talking

Oak

I swear, by leaf, and wind, and rain, (And hear me with thine ears,) RE That, tho' I circle in the grain

Five hundred rings of years-off

Yet, since I first could cast a shade,
Did never creature pass
So slightly, musically made,
So light upon the grass:

For as to fairies, that will flit cesh
To make the greensward fresh,
I hold them exquisitely knit,

But far too spare of flesh.'s olub

Oh, hide thy knotted knees in fern,
Ánd overlook the chace; so
And from thy topmost branch discern
The roofs of Sumner-place.

But thou, whereon I carved her name,
That oft hast heard my vows,

Declare when last Olivia came big sldT
To sport beneath thy boughs.? 31

"O yesterday, you know, the faired no fa
Was holden at the town; bobstan
Her father left his good arm-chair, i sull
And rode his hunter down.wo mo

'And with him Albert came on his.now 4?
I look'd at him with joy :
As cowslip unto oxlip is,
So seems she to the boy.

'An hour had past-and, sitting straight

Within the low-wheel'd chaise,

Her mother trundled to the gate

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Behind the dappled grays.

'But, as for her, she staid at home,niw [*
And on the roof she went, med god
And down the way you use to come mad
She look'd with discontent.ium ork

She left the novel half-uncutivnees JoY
Upon the rosewood shelf;

She left the new piano shut :
She could not please herself.

QOW EA

Then ran she, gamesome as the colt,
And livelier than a lark

She sent her voice thro' all the holtprod
Before her, and the park.

'A light wind chased her on the wing,
And in the chase grew wild, yo
As close as might be would he cling
About the darling child :od faux O

But light as any wind that blows
So fleetly did she stir,

The flower, she touch'd on, dipt and rose,
And turn'd to look at her

'And here she came, and round me play'd,
And sang to me the whole wobbe
Of those three stanzas that you made
About my "giant bole; "Red I

The Talking Oak

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