MORTE DI CLORINDA.

D'UN bel pallore è il bianco volto asperso,
Come a Gigli sarian miste viole:

E gli occhi al cielo affisa; e in lei converso
Sembra per la pietate il cielo e'l sole :

E la man nuda e fredda alzando verso
Il cavaliero, in vece di parole,

Gli dà pegno di pace.
Passa la bella donna, e

In questa forma

par che dorma.

GERUSALEMME LIBERATA.

QUEL languidetto Giglio
Che il vomere calcò,
Dal suolo alzar non può
L' oppresse foglie.

Ma se lo bagna il cielo
Col mattutino umor,
Solleva il curvo stelo,
E del natio candor

Tinge le spoglie.

METASTASIO. GALATEA.

CHORUS IN THE TRAGEDY OF MOINA.

THE Lily bows her head

Before the summer gale,

The green earth kissing;

But swift the summer gale is fled;

Again the flower uplifts her snowy crest,

And drinks the air serene.

Before the breath of woe

The soul of Moina bowed,

He bowed, and rose no more.

High o'er its banks the rapid river swells,
And flows impetuous on the plain—

The poplar meets the rushing wave,
And bends its tender stem-

The waters pass,

The plant uprears its pliant trunk,
And shoots aloft;

The plant uprears its dewy tufts,
And spreads its light-green leaves
To meet the warmth of heaven.
Before the tide of woe

The soul of Moina bowed,

It bowed, and rose no more.

Fair flower, no more the blast of woe
Shall shake thy tender form;

In Frea's gorgeous domes,

Thy bloom shall fade no more.

M

DR. SAYERS.

TO A LILY,

FLOWERING BY MOONLIGHT.

OH! why, thou Lily pale,

Lovest thou to blossom in the wan moonlight, And shed thy rich perfume upon the night? When all thy sisterhood,

In silken cowl and hood,

Screen their soft faces from the sickly gale? Fair horned Cynthia wooes thy modest flower, And with her beaming lips

Thy kisses cold she sips,

For thou art aye her only paramour;

What time she nightly quits her starry bower,
Tricked in celestial light

And silver crescent bright,
Oh! ask thy vestal queen
If she will thee advise,

Where in the blessed skies

That maiden may be seen,

Who hung like thee her pale head through

the day,

Love-sick, and pining for the evening ray;

And lived a virgin chaste amid the folly
Of this bad world, and died of melancholy?

Oh tell me where she dwells!
So on thy mournful bells,

Shall Dian nightly fling

Her tender sighs to give thee fresh perfume,
Her pale-night lustre to enhance thy bloom,
And find thee tears to feed thy sorrowing.

W. S. ROSCOE.

I SEND the Lilies given to me,
Though long before thy hand they touch,
I know that they must withered be,
But yet reject them not as such;
For I have cherished them as dear,
Because they yet may meet thine eye,
And guide thy soul to mine even here,
When thou behold'st them drooping nigh,
And know'st them gathered by the Rhine,
And offered from my heart to thine!
The river nobly foams and flows,
The charm of this enchanted ground,
And all its thousand turns disclose
Some fresher beauty varying round;
The haughtiest breast its wish might bound,
Through life to dwell delighted here;
Nor could on earth a spot be found,

To nature and to me so dear,

Could thy dear eyes, in following mine,
Still sweeten more these banks of Rhine!

LORD BYRON.

ONCE, Emir! thy unheeding child,
Mid all this havoc bloomed and smiled,—
Tranquil as on some battle plain

*

The Persian Lily shines and towers,

Before the combat's reddening stain
Hath fallen upon her golden flowers.

MOORE.

THE LILY,

AN EMBLEM OF CHRISTIAN HOPE.

How withered, faded, seems the form
Of yon obscure, unsightly root!
Yet from the blight of winter's storm,
It hides secure the precious fruit.
The careless eye can find no grace,
No beauty in the scaly folds;
Nor see within the dark embrace
What latent loveliness it holds.

*Amaryllis lutea.