Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: THE VEIL. I WOULD not if I could the veil From off my future lift, Or catch a glimpse of coming days As thro' a cloudy rift. Why should I banish from my life The pleasure of surprise, Or baulk the rough vicissitudes Which warn and make us wise ? And why count up the toils and snares That round my path are set, As one who tired of watchfulness Hopes nothing—waiting yet ? Far better thro' my life to live With something yet to know, And up to whatsoe'er befalls, Firm fix'd in patience grow. Then looking back along my life, Across its boon and bale, I see reversed how Time and Will Have for me raised the veil. THE ALBATROSS. Now upon Australian seas, Wafted by the tropic breeze, We salute the Southern Cross, Seek the swift-winged albatross. Gulls and petrels scream and play On the ripple, in the spray ; At our prow the waters writhe, Swiftly sails our ship and blithe. But the albatross appears, Omen of a tale of fears, Holding us as with a spell While we watch him long and well : Circling round in orbits vast, Pausing now above the mast, Laving now his snowy breast Where the billows sleeping rest. Now he skims the surface o'er, Rising, falling evermore ; Floating high on stillest wing, Now he seems a guardian thing ; Now a messenger of wrath, Hurrying down his airy path ; Bearing o'er the liquid plain Warning of the hurricane. O ! thou wild and wondrous bird, Viewing thee, my thought is stirr'd : Round and round the world thou goest, And of solitudes thou trowest— Into trackless wastes hast flown Which no eye save thine hath known : Ever tireless—day or night; Calm or tempest—ceaseless flight. Albatross ! I envy thee Oft thy soaring pinions free ; For we deem the realms of air Too ethereal for care. Gladness as of end...