Misgivings.

(1860.) When ocean-clouds over inland hills 2Sweep storming in late autumn brown, And horror the sodden valley fills, 2And the spire falls crashing in the town, I muse upon my country's ills— The tempest bursting from the waste of Time On the world's fairest hope linked with man's foulest crime. Nature's dark side is heeded now— 2(Ah! optimist-cheer disheartened flown)— A child may read the moody brow 2Of yon black mountain lone. With shouts the torrents down the gorges go, And storms are formed behind the storm we feel: The hemlock shakes in the rafter, the oak in the driving keel.