The School-Boy's Dream on the Night before the Holidays

'Twas the half-year's last day, a festal one;
Light tasks and feast and sport, hoop, cricket, kite,
Employed us fully, till the summer-night
Stole o'er the roofs of happy Alderton.
Homer indoors, and field-games out of school,
Made medley of my dreams; for, when I slept,
The quaintest vision o'er my fancy swept,
That ever served the lordship of misrule:
Our hoops through gods and heroes ran a-muck;
Our kites o'erhung the fleet, a public gaze!
And one wild ball the great Achilles struck —
Oh! how he tower'd and lighten'd at the stroke!
But, tho' his formal pardon I bespoke,
I told him plainly 'twas our holidays.