Desponding Father! mark this altered bough,[49] So beautiful of late, with sunshine warmed, Or moist with dews; what more unsightly now, Its blossoms shrivelled, and its fruit, if formed, Invisible? yet Spring her genial brow 5 Knits not o’er that discolouring and decay As false to expectation. Nor fret thou At like unlovely process in the May Of human life: a Stripling’s graces blow, Fade and are shed, that from their timely fall 10 (Misdeem it not a cankerous change) may grow Rich mellow bearings, that for thanks shall call: In all men, sinful is it to be slow To hope----in Parents, sinful above all. [49] Compare _The Excursion_ (book iii. l. 649), and the sonnet (vol. vi. p. 72) beginning---- Surprised by joy----impatient as the Wind. ED. “FOUR FIERY STEEDS IMPATIENT OF THE REIN” Composed 1835.--Published 1835 [Suggested on the road between Preston and Lancaster where it first gives a view of the Lake country, and composed on the same day, on the roof of the coach.--I.F.] One of the “Miscellaneous Sonnets.”--ED. Four fiery steeds impatient of the rein Whirled us o’er sunless ground beneath a sky As void of sunshine, when, from that wide plain, Clear tops of far-off mountains we descry, Like a Sierra of cerulean Spain, 5 All light and lustre. Did no heart reply? Yes, there was One;--for One, asunder fly The thousand links of that ethereal chain; And green vales open out, with grove and field, And the fair front of many a happy Home; 10 Such tempting spots as into vision come While Soldiers, weary of the arms they wield And sick at heart[50] of strifeful Christendom, Gaze on the moon by parting clouds revealed. [50] 1837. While Soldiers, of the weapons that they wield Weary, and sick of strifeful … 1835. TO ---- Composed 1835.--Published 1835 [The fate of this poor Dove, as described, was told to me at Brinsop Court, by the young lady to whom I have given the name of Lesbia.--I.F.] [Miss not the occasion: by the forelock take That subtle Power, the never-halting Time, Lest a mere moment’s putting-off should make Mischance almost as heavy as a crime.] One of the “Miscellaneous Sonnets.”--ED.