17 JULY 1886, Page 14

NOON.

Fula, summer, and at noon : from a waste bed Convolvulus, musk-mallow, poppies, spread The triumph of the sunshine overhead.

Blue on the shimmering ash-trees lies the heat ; It tingles on the hedgerows. The young wheat Sleeps, warm in golden verdure, at my feet.

The pale, sweet grasses of the hayfield blink; The heath-moors, as the bees of honey drink, Suck the deep bosom of the day. To think Of all that beauty, by the light defined, None shares my vision ! Sharply on my mind Presses the sorrow :—fern and flower are blind.