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232

SPRING.

[_]

FROM THE “PASTOR FIDO” OF GUARINI.

O Spring, thou youth of each fresh dawning year,
Mother of flowers, green leaves, and new desires,
I greet thy glories with full many a tear,
And weep the music of thy feathered choirs.
Thou dost return, but not with thee return
Delicious hours of happiness and joy.
Thou, thou returnest, but alas! I mourn
The treasures lost to me, a dreaming boy.
Sad the remembrance now of days no more,
While thou still art the blithe and jocund thing
That thou wert ever in the days of yore,
O always new and always happy Spring!
But I am not,—and hence these tears arise,—
What once I was,—dear to another's eyes.