STANZAS.

YoN star of eve, so soft and clear,
Beams mildly from the realms of rest;
And, sure, some deathless angel there
Lives in its light supremely blest:
Yet if it be a spirit's shrine,
I think, my love, it must be thine.

Oh! if in happier worlds than this
The just rejoice-to thee is giv'n
To taste the calm, undying bliss

Eternally in that blue heav'n, Whither thine earnest soul would flow, While yet it linger'd here below.

If Beauty, Wit, and Virtue find

In heav'n a more exalted throne, To thee such glory is assign'd,

And thou art matchless and alone: Who lived on earth so pure-may grace In heav'n the brightest seraph's place.

For tho' on earth thy beauty's bloom
Blush'd in its spring, and faded then,
And, mourning o'er thine early tomb,

I weep thee still, but weep in vain;
Bright was the transitory gleam
That cheer'd thy life's short wav'ring dream.

Each youthful rival may confess

Thy look, thy smile, beyond compare, Nor ask the palm of loveliness,

When thou wert more than doubly fair: Yet ev'n the magic of that form Drew from thy mind its loveliest charm.

Be thou as the immortal are,

Who dwell beneath their God's own wing;

A spirit of light, a living star,

A holy and a searchless thing:

But oh! forget not those who mourn,
Because thou canst no more return.

"IN EARLY YOUTH I LOST MY SIRE."

"Hinc mihi prima mali labes."-VIRGIL.

IN early youth I lost my sire,
That fost'ring guide, which all require,
But chief in youth, when passion glows,
And, if uncheck'd, to frenzy grows,
The fountain of a thousand woes.
To flowers it is an burtful thing
To lose the sunshine in the spring;
Without the sun they cannot bloom,
And seldom to perfection come.

E'en so my soul, that might have borne
The fruits of virtue, left forlorn,
By every blast of vice was torn.

Why lowers my brow, dost thou enquire?
Why burns mine eye with feverish fire?
With hatred now, and now with ire?
In early youth I lost my sire.

From this I date whatever vice
Has numb'd my feelings into ice,
From this the frown upon my brow;
From this-the pangs that rack me now.
My wealth, I can with safety say,
Ne'er bought me one unruffled day,
But only wore my life away.

The pruning-knife ne'er lopp'd a bough;
My passions spread, and strengthen'd too.
The chief of these was vast ambition,

That long'd with eagle-wing to soar;
Nor ever soften'd in contrition,

Tho' that wild wing were drench'd in gore.
And other passions play'd their part
On stage most fit-a youthful heart;
Till far beyond all hope I fell,

A play-thing for the fiends of hell-
A vessel, tost upon a deep

Whose stormy waves would never sleep.
Alas! when virtue once has flown,

We need not ask why peace is gone:

If she at times a moment play'd

With bright beam on my mind's dark shade,

I knew the rainbow soon would fade!

Why thus it is, dost thou enquire?

Why bleeds my breast with tortures dire? Loathes the rank earth, yet soars not higher? In early youth I lost my sire.

MEMORY.

"The memory is perpetually looking back when we have nothing present to entertain us: it is like those repositories in anima's that are filled with stores of food on which they may ruminate when their present pasture fails."-ADDISON.

MEMORY dear enchanter !

Why bring back to view
Dreams of youth, which banter
All that e'er was true?

Why present before me Thoughts of years gone by, Which, like shadows o'er me, Dim in distance fly?

Days of youth, now shaded

By twilight of long years, Flowers of youth, now faded,

Though bathed in sorrow's tears:

Thoughts of youth, which waken Mournful feelings now,

Fruits which time hath shaken From off their parent bough:

Memory! why, oh why,

This fond heart consuming, Show me years gone by,

When those hopes were blooming?

Hopes which now are parted,

Hopes which then I prized, Which this world, cold-hearted, Ne'er has realized?

I knew not then its strife,

I knew not then its rancor; In every rose of life,

Alas! there lurks a canker.

Round every palm-tree, springing With bright fruit in the waste, A mournful asp is clinging, Which sours it to our taste.

O'er every fountain, pouring Its waters thro' the wild, Which man imbibes, adoring, And deems it undefiled,

The poison-shrubs are dropping Their dark dews day by day; And Care is hourly lopping

Our greenest boughs away!

Ah! these are thoughts that grieve me
Then, when others rest.
Memory! why deceive me
By thy visions blest?

Why lift the veil, dividing

The brilliant courts of springWhere gilded shapes are gliding

In fairy coloring

From age's frosty mansion,
So cheerless and so chill?
Why bid the bleak expansion
Of past life meet us still?

Where's now that peace of mind O'er youth's pure bosom stealing, So sweet and so refined,

So exquisite a feeling?

Where's now the heart exulting In pleasure's buoyant sense, And gaiety, resulting

From conscious innocence?

All, all have past and fled,

And left me lorn and lonely; All those dear hopes are dead, Remembrance wakes them only!

I stand like some lone tower
Of former days remaining,
Within whose place of power
The midnight owl is plaining;—

Like oak-tree old and gray,

Whose trunk with age is failing, Thro' whose dark boughs for aye The winter winds are wailing.

Thus, Memory, thus thy light
O'er this worn sonl is gleaming,
Like some far fire at night

Along the dun deep streaming.

"YES-THERE BE SOME GAY SOULS WHO NEVER WEEP."

"O Lachrymarum fons, tenero sacros
Ducentium ortus ex animo."

GRAY'S Poemata.

YES-there be some gay souls who never weep, And some who, weeping, hate the tear they shed; But sure in them the heart's fine feelings sleep, And all its loveliest attributes are dead.

HAVE ye not seen the buoyant orb, which oft
The tube and childhood's playful breath produce?
Fair, but impalpable-it mounts aloft,

While o'er its surface rove the restless hnes;
And sun-born tints their gliding bloom diffuse:
But 'twill not brook the touch-the vision bright,
Dissolved with instantaneous burst, we lose;

Breaks the thin globe with its array of light And shrinks at once to naught, at contact e'er so slight.

So the gay hopes we chase with ardent zeal-
Which view'd at distance to our gaze appear

Sweetly embodied, tangible, and real

Einde our grasp, and melt away to air:
The test of touch too delicate to bear,
In unsubstantial loveliness thy glow
Before our wistful eyes, too passing fair
For earth to realize or man to know,
Whose life is but a scene of fallacy and woe.

THE EXILE'S HARP.

I WILL hang thee, my harp, by the side of the fountain,

On the whispering branch of the lone-waving willow:

Above thee shall rush the hoarse gale of the mountain,

Below thee shall tumble the dark breaking billow.
The winds shall blow by thee, abandon'd, forsaken,
The wild gales alone shall arouse thy sad strain;
For where is the heart or the hand to awaken
The sounds of thy soul-soothing sweetness again?
Oh! harp of my fathers!

Thy chords shall decay,
One by one with the strings

Shall thy notes fade away;
Till the fiercest of tempests
Around thee may yell,
And not waken one sound
Of thy desolate shell!

Yet, oh! yet, ere I go, will I fling a wreath round

thee,

With the richest of flowers in the green valley

springing;

STANZAS.

YON star of eve, so soft and clear,
Beams mildly from the realms of rest;
And, sure, some deathless angel there
Lives in its light supremely blest:
Yet if it be a spirit's shrine,
I think, my love, it must be thine.

Oh! if in happier worlds than this
The just rejoice-to thee is giv'n
To taste the calm, undying bliss

Eternally in that blue heav'n, Whither thine earnest soul would flow, While yet it linger'd here below.

If Beauty, Wit, and Virtue find

In heav'n a more exalted throne, To thee such glory is assign'd,

And thou art matchless and alone: Who lived on earth so pure-may grace In heav'n the brightest seraph's place.

For tho' on earth thy beauty's bloom
Blush'd in its spring, and faded then,
And, mourning o'er thine early tomb,

I weep thee still, but weep in vain;
Bright was the transitory gleam
That cheer'd thy life's short wav'ring dream.

Each youthful rival may confess

Thy look, thy smile, beyond compare, Nor ask the palm of loveliness,

When thou wert more than doubly fair: Yet ev'n the magic of that form

Drew from thy mind its loveliest charm.

Be thou as the immortal are,

Who dwell beneath their God's own wing;

A spirit of light, a living star,

A holy and a searchless thing:

But oh! forget not those who mourn,
Because thou canst no more return.

"IN EARLY YOUTH I LOST MY SIRE."

"Hinc mihi prima mali labes."-VIRGIL.

In early youth I lost my sire,
That fost'ring guide, which all require,

But chief in youth, when passion glows,

And, if uncheck'd, to frenzy grows,

The fountain of a thousand woes.

To flowers it is an hurtful thing

To lose the sunshine in the spring;

Without the sun they cannot bloom,

And seldom to perfection come.

E'en so my soul, that might have borne The fruits of virtue, left forlorn,

By every blast of vice was torn.

Why lowers my brow, dost thou enquire?
Why burns mine eye with feverish fire?
With hatred now, and now with ire?
In early youth I lost my sire.

For oh! to feel it swelling to the eye,

When melancholy thoughts have sent it there, Is something so akin to ecstasy,

So true a balm to misery and care,

That those are cold, I ween, who cannot feel
The soft, the sweet, the exquisite control,
Which tears, as down the moisten'd cheek they
steal,

Hold o'er the yielding empire of the soul.

They soothe, they ease, and they refine the breast,
And blunt the agonizing stings of grief,

And lend the tortured mind a healing rest,
A welcome opiate, and a kind relief.

Then, if the pow'r of woe thou wouldst disarm, The tear thy burning wounds will gently close;

The rage of grief will sink into a calm,

And her wild frenzy find the wish'd repose.

"HAVE YE NOT SEEN THE BUOYANT

"A bubble......

ORB?"

That in the act of seizing shrinks to naught."

CLARE,

HAVE ye not seen the buoyant orb, which oft
The tube and childhood's playful breath produce!
Fair, but impalpable-it mounts aloft,

While o'er its surface rove the restless hues;
And sun-born tints their gliding bloom diffuse:
But 'twill not brook the touch-the vision bright,
Dissolved with instantaneous burst, we lose;
Breaks the thin globe with its array of light
And shrinks at once to naught, at contact e'er so
slight.

So the gay hopes we chase with ardent zeal-
Which view'd at distance to our gaze appear
Sweetly embodied, tangible, and real-

Elude our grasp, and melt away to air:
The test of touch too delicate to bear,
In unsubstantial loveliness thy glow
Before our wistful eyes, too passing fair
For earth to realize or man to know,
Whose life is but a scene of fallacy and woe.

THE EXILE'S HARP.

I WILL hang thee, my harp, by the side of the fount ain,

On the whispering branch of the lone-waving wil

low:

Above thee shall rush the hoarse gale of the mountain,

Below thee shall tumble the dark breaking billow.
The winds shall blow by thee, abandon'd, forsaken,
The wild gales alone shall arouse thy and strain;
For where is the heart or the hand to awaken
The sounds of thy soul-soothing sweetness again?
Oh! harp of my fathers!

Thy chords shall decay,
One by one with the strings
Shall thy notes fade away:
Till the fiercest of tempests
Around thee may yell,
And not waken one sound
Of thy desolate shell!

Yet, oh! yet, ere I go, will I fling a wreath round

thee,

With the richest of flowers in the green valley

springing;