| Hunt and Lee, comps. The Book of the Sonnet. 1867. | | | | II. The Christmas Solitude Varied with the Christmas Streets | | By Alexander Smith (1830–1867) |
| | | SHEATHED is the river as it glideth by, | |
| Frost-pearled are all the boughs in forest old, | |
| The sheep are huddling close upon the wold, | |
| And over them the stars tremble on high. | |
| Pure joys these winter-nights around me lie; | 5 |
| ’T is fine to loiter through the lighted streets | |
| At Christmas time, and guess from brow and pace | |
| The doom and history of each one we meet, | |
| What kind of heart beats in each dusky case; | |
| Whiles startled by the beauty of a face | 10 |
| In a shop-light a moment. Or, instead, | |
| To dream of silent fields, where calm and deep | |
| The sunshine lieth like a golden sleep,— | |
| Recalling sweetest looks of summers dead. | | | | |
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