The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1839-07-23 00:00:00

S U M M E R.

Season of*.splendour, noon-tide of the year!
Smiling vicegerent of a bounteous God,
Whose golden sceptre rules the azure sky!!
O'er nature's kingdom fertile beauty reigns.
We hail thee with the heart's most vivid glow,
And call thee Summer•, centre of delight—
Summer ! as the clear blue sky o'erhangs
The river's mirror, and the verdure's glass,
Presenting glowing pictures, varied hues,
The lights and shadows of the concaved vault.
We hail thee on the wave-inviting beach.
Which bids us, charm'd, in its foot-tracks rove.
Sensation bathes in summer's genial glow,
And boasts refreshing privilege to touch
The great foundation of the mighty deep.
We hail thee in the grove, where leaf meets leaf„
And tendril twines with tendril as in play,
To give resistance to the ruling power
That smiles too brightly o'er the languid frame.
Nature's arcade! her leafy canopy!
Retreat refreshing, where the heart retires
With kindred spirits or an author lov'd.
Grateful to such the sombre, deep arch'd walk,
Which the too mirthful friend cannot invade.
Yes ! friend to Spring, to Winter, Autumn dear !
The rich man greets thee bearing on thy wing
Thy treasur'd store his coffers to refresh,
Thy golden vallies and thy verdant hills,
Thy ample tields, where stems are bending down,
And trembling with the ten-fold blessing rich
Of glorious harvest. Nature's lap o'erflows
With fragrant meadow and with fruitful corn,
Food meet for man, for every living thing,
That only He who made them can supply:
The husbandman walks forth amid the scene
Where he has laboned--now he's amply blest.
The wild flower's bloom his bosom may adorn,
Fortlowerslie planted richly bloom for him ;
And if a C'ht'istian husbandman, the prayer,
The ripening prayer falls from his grateful lips ;
His uplift eye wanders from earth to heaven,
Beams forth the motto of a fertile land—
Increase, increase belongs unto the Lord.
And to the poor man still a dearer friend,
The genial warmth of life's most glowing day,
It comes to him like garment from the fleece,
His ill-clad limbs to clothe, and make him feel
Thankful to heav'n for such a respite sweet.
To him all other seasons drear and cold,
For poverty bath shed its blighting there—
Poverty that frost which nips too close—
Too close—oh, yes 1 it reaches to the heart,
A wife, perchance a child, his much-loved woe—
Woe—as each feeling of his nature thrills,
To look on those he'd shelter with his life.
They are the shadows of his own poor form,
Shrinking like aspens from each passing breeze
-That scanty garments can't suffice to shield.
It is o'er such a scene that Summer glows
With radiance welcome and with warmth divine;
It is the syrnpathyzing beam of love—
The mercy that the shorn lamb preserves.

Summer!! we greet thee in that lovely hour
When, from each toil, all with tired Nature rest.
The sun declines beneath the Western hills,
And flow'rets close to picture forth repose.
It is the hour when Love may tell its tale,
And whisper the soft breathings of the heart.
Cynthia peers forth with a more radiant face,
Reflecting lustre from her central light,
A centre of attraction unto all.
But to the gentle Cynthia, oh ! how dear,
Her softer features tenderly disclose.
It is the Summer's sun illumes her heart.
Oh, lonely, lovely, silent, moon-lit hour,
In thy soft atmosphere how sweet is life !
The odour-perfumed air of fragrant plants,
The Sun,lziss'd flowers, essences so pure
From light and waamth of their source divine.
Lovely to watch the closing eye of Eve,
Glowing with beauty, sinking to repose
Beneath a drapery of cloud on cloud,
So light, so beauteous, mantling Evening's ray,
Gemm'd with the stars that watch her as she sleeps.
Then Fancy wakes to yield the midnight dream,
Short as Midsummer night and lively too,
Recalling visions of the past bright day.
Short—short such dream ! it quickly flees before
That sweet reality a Summer's morn,
Which, with a blushing face presents to man,
All that a bounteous Providence can give—
A grateful heart—a spirit to enjoy •
The gifts of Nature, wrapt in Summer love.
Cork Constitution.

THE CHARTISTS.
(From the Statesman and Dublin Record)
We have never heard or read of a body of sedition-
ists that have appeared to us so little entitled to com-
miseration as these same confederated disturbers called
Chartists. Is it distress that is goading them to act
in this un-English way? Now we believe not. Pro-
visions are dear, but trade is comparatively brisk. There
is no peculiar pressure at this time oppressing the ope-
rative, or the labouring classes. At least, if there be,
it seems inconsistent with the multitude of great public
works in progress in various parts of England, and the
ordinary character of the reports that have come to us
from the manufacturing districts. What then is this
flaming Chartism or Conventionism, that sets fire to
Birmingham, exhibits itself in such urnmaning tu-
mults, and causes itself to be heard in parliament
through the medium of a petition with twelve hundred
and fifty thousand signatures—that cart-load petition
rolled into the House of Commons under the orders of
Mr. Thomas Attwood, of Birmingham, and presented
about a month since ? Mr. Attwood on Friday called
attention to this petition, and enlarged upon the dis-
tress of the people, in which the middle classes, the
merchants, and manufacturers, he said, really shared—
on the right of the working classes to a fair remunera-
tion for their labours—the hopelessness of effectual
relief from the present monetary system—the utter
disappointment of the expectations of benefit from the
reform act, &c. &c., for all which these multitudinous
petitioners--these transcendantly enlightened Chartists,
offered their own peculiar nostrum, namely, universal
suffrage and- annual parliaments, as a remedy ! Now,
far be it from us to ridicule or despise the distress of
the working classes, or of any class of our fellow-crea-
tures. We do neither, but we do most gravely doubt
the existence of this alleged distress, and we do reject
and disbelieve it as the influencing cause of Chartism,
and its theatrical, multitudinous petition. If such dis-
tress really exist, why did not Mr. Atti,Vood, or some
other representative of Radicalism, call for a specific
inquiry jute, that particular subject.? Ah, no ; that
would not have answered the purpose. That might
have proved fatal to Chartism and all its cherished re-
volutionary quackery7—for we are satisfied that your
genuine Chartist would not have his distress removed
by any remedy but his own.
We look upon Chartism as a political thing—as a
disease with which society has been infected—rather
than as alt evil grown out• of physical distress. But it
is perhaps all the better that the disease should come
out—shoUld show itself externally—as the nurseten-
ders say—than that it should continue unobserved to
prey upon•tne vitals of the state. Chartism, in our
view of -it, may he fairly attributed to two causes—
first, want of church accommodation, and pastoral in-
struction by ministers of the Established Church, and
want of Christian education generally ; and 2dly, po-
litical irreligious preachers and spouters who have been
permitted without any check, hindrance, or restraint,
to go amongst the people and inflame their minds, hav-
ing first primed them with all the material of absurd
and revolutionary theory. These two we take as the
most prominent and influential causes of Chartism—
sufficient of themselves to account for it, if there were
no other. If we were to enter more at large into the
subject, it would he easy to show that the Whigs as a
party have had much to do in fostering and rearing it
up to its present rather inconvenient state of maturity.
Two " great charters" have been granted to popular
clamour within our memory, namely, Roman Catholic
Emancipation and Parliamentary Reform, and both
have most signally and egregiously failed of the mark
which we were assured they would reach.