How oft, amid the heaped and bedded hay, Under the oak's broad shadow deep and strong, Have we sat listening to the noon-day song (If song it were), monotonously gay, Which crept along the field, the summer lay Of the gra**hopper. Summer is come in pride Of fruit and flower, garlanded as a bride, And crowned with corn, and graced with length of day:
But cold is come with her. We sit not now Listening that merry music of the earth, Like Arid beneath the blossomed bough; But all for chillness round the social hearth We cluster.--Hark! a sound of kindred mirth Echoes! O wintry cricket, welcome thou!