Pictures.

The full-orbed Paschal moon; dark shadows flung     On the brown Lenten earth; tall spectral trees     Stand in their huge and naked strength erect,     And stretch wild arms towards the gleaming sky.     A motionless girl-figure, face upraised     In the strong moonlight, cold and passionless.          *     *     *     *     *     A proud spring sunset; opal-tinted sky,     Save where the western purple, pale and faint     With longing for her fickle Love, - content     Had merged herself into his burning red.     A fair young maiden, clad in velvet robe     Of sombre green, stands in the golden glow,     One hand held up to shade her dazzled eyes,     A bunch of white Narcissus at her throat.          *     *     *     *     *     November's day, dark, leaden, lowering, -     Grey purple shadows fading on the hills;     Dreary and desolate the far expanse     And gloomy sameness of the open plain.     A peasant woman, in white wimpled hood,     White vest, and scarlet petticoat, surveys     The meadow, with rough hands crossed on her breast.          *     *     *     *     *     A shining, shimmering, gracious, golden day;     The sated summer's all-pervading hush;     Warm luscious tints, glowing in earth and sky.     On a low mossy bank, a little child,     His golden curls twined in the reedy grass,     Clutching within his tear-stained feverish hands     The yellow blossoms of the Celandine,     Sobs out his heart in passionate childish grief.