Page:Biographical and critical studies by James Thomson ("B.V.").djvu/380

364 CRITICAL STUDIES Our next piece is " Saturday Night," p. 96, ending with a reminiscence of Goethe : — " Week's curtain, folded round Time with a solemn sound, Life sleeps within thy folds, The past like dreams it holds. Surely 'tis God's intent That life should well be blent With sleep, when every tread Has memory overhead. So may we pass each glance, That the whole's countenance, When met on shore of heaven, May be good, true, and even." I cite a Uttle of "The Fairies' Welcome," p. 99, because of the structure of its eight-lined stanza ; it was a wonderful tour de force to rush out sixteen such stanzas in " from thirty to forty-five minutes." " Pour forth the bells In odorous notes Of lovely light Upon the sky : Hark ! how it swells : Hark 1 how it floats. In colours bright Of minstrelsy. My South is Truth, Mine East is Love, My West is Joy, My North is Light : And thus my youth Doth stand above Mine aged cloy Of former night.