Hemans, Felicia Dorothea Browne, "The Child and Flowers." in The Bijou; (London: William Pickering , 1828)
   
      
         
            
               The Bijou; 
               or Annual of Literature and the Arts
            
            compiled by William Fraser
            
            
               
                  William Pickering
               
               London
            
            1828
            
               
                  pp. 1-3
               
            
         
      
      
         
             1 
            
               The Child and Flowers
            
            
               By
                  Mrs. Hemans
            
            
               All good and guiltless thou art.
               Some transient griefs will touch thy heart,
               Griefs that along thy altered face
               Will breathe a more subduing grace,
               Than even those looks of joy that lie
               On the soft cheek of infancy.
               
                  WILSON, 
                  To a Sleeping Child
               
            
            
               HAST thou been in the woods with the honey-bee?
               Hast thou been with the lamb in the pastures free?
               With the hare through to copses and the dingles wild?
               With the butterfly over the heath, fair child?
               Yes: the light fall of thy bounding feet
               Hath not startled the wren from her mossy seat;
               Yet hast thou ranged the green forest-dells, 
               And brought back a treasure of buds and bells.
            
            
            
               Thou know'st not the sweetness, by antique song
               Breathed o'er the names of that flowery throng;
               The woodbine, the primrose, the violet dim,
               The lily that gleams by the fountain's brim:
                2 
               These are old words, that have made each grove
               A dreary haunt for romance and love;
               Each sunny bank, where faint odours lie
               A place for the gushings of Poesy.
            
            
            
               Thou know'st not the light wherewith fairy lore
               Sprinkles the turf and the daisies o'er;
               Enough for thee are the dews that sleep
               Like hidden gems in the flower-urns deep;
               Enough the rich crimson spots that dwell
               Midst the gold of the cowslip's perfumed cell;
               And the by the blossoming sweet-briars shed,
               And the beauty that bows the wood-hyacinth's head.
            
            
            
               Oh! Happy child in thy fawn-like glee!
               What is remembrance or thought to thee?
               Fill thy bright locks with those gifts of spring,
               O'er thy green pathway their colours fling;
               Bind them in chaplet and wild festoon—
               What if to droop and to perish soon?
               Nature hath mines of such wealth—and thou
               Never wilt prize its delights as now!
            
            
            
               For a day is coming to quell the tone
               That rings in thy laughter, thou joyous one!
               And to dim thy brow with a touch of care.
               Under the gloss of its clustering hair;
                3 
               And to tame the flash of thy cloudless eyes
               Into the stillness of autumn skies;
               And to teach thee that grief hath her needful part,
               Midst the hidden things of each human heart!
            
            
            
               Yet shall we mourn, gentle child! for this?
               Life hath enough of yet holier bliss!
               Such be thy portion!—the bliss to look
               With a reverent spirit, through nature's book;
               By fount, by forest, by river's line,
               To track the paths of a love divine;
               To read its deep meanings—to see and hear
               God in earth's garden—and not to fear.