Scenes of bygone days returning,
Dimly float in memory's eye,
Scenes that cheer'd my youthful morning,
Scenes with which none else can vie,
In the cot I first sawlight in,
There a mother - tender, soft,-
In my welfare then delighting,
In the cot in. Collin Croft.
Spring appeared bedecked with flowers,
Charmingly the birdies sing,
Who can count the happy hours
These sweet harbingers did bring?
Summer, with its stores surround me,
With my tiny rake so oft,
There the Muses might have found me
Haymaking in Collin Croft.
Nature's treasures never-ending,
Clad in russet, autumn comes,
Heavily the boughs were bending,
Hung with apples and with plums.
When the wintry winds were blowing,
And the snow king rode aloft,
I with healthy vigour glowing,
Join'd the sports in Collin Croft.
Still the ills of life surmounting,
Though they throng in numbers vast,
Ossian-like, I sit recounting
O'er the memories of the past.
When the curtain closes o'er me,
All my toils and troubles "doff't,"
Let the friends who then deplore me,
Hail the spot as Collin Croft.
1873.
