For her if Sorrow lay in wait, O, would that Titian's pencil had been mine! There is a smile which wit extorts And there are smiles, by shallow worldlings worn, And there are smiles with less alloy, Of some they love, would kindle joy But her's was of the kind which simply say And O, that gaiety of heart! There lives not he to whom Who, if he laugh, laughs less from mirth of mind The day went down; the last red ray It sank-and creeping up the bay True native of the clime was she, Nor could there have been found The woods, the fields, and genial nature, rife TO AN EARLY PRIMROSE. Mild offspring of a dark and sullen sire! Henry Taylor. Thee, when young Spring first questioned Winter's sway, To mark his victory. In this low vale, the promise of the year, Thy tender elegance. So virtue blooms, brought forth amid the storms Of life she rears her head, Obscure and unobserved; While every bleaching breeze that on her blows And hardens her to bear H. K. White. THE GRAVES OF A HOUSEHOLD. They grew in beauty, side by side The same fond mother bent at night One, midst the forests of the west, The Indian knows his place of rest, The sea, the blue lone sea, hath one, He lies where pearls lie deep; He was the loved of all, yet none O'er his low bed may weep. One sleeps where southern vines are dressed He wrapt his colours round his breast, On a blood-red field of Spain. And one, o'er her the myrtle showers The last of that bright band. And parted thus they rest, who played They that with smiles lit up the hall, Alas for love, if thou wert all, And naught beyond, on earth! THE VOICES OF HOME. The voices of my home,-I hear them still! My heart's clear depths with unalloy'd delight! Hemans. I hear them still, unchanged :-though some from earth Wild, silvery tones, that rang through days more bright— Singing of boyhood back-the voices of my home! They call me through this hush of woods, reposing On the parch'd traveller in his hour of thirst, E'en thus they haunt me with sweet sounds, till, worn O for the dove's swift wings, that I might flee away, And find mine ark!-Yet whither? I must bear I am of those o'er whom a breath of air Just darkening in its course the lake's bright wave, From the dim past, as from a wizard's cave. So must it be! These skies above me spread : Are they my own soft skies?-Ye rest not here, my dead! Hemans. MARINER'S HYMN. Launch thy bark, mariner! Look to the weather-bow, "What of the night, watchman? Cloudy-all quiet No land yet all's right." Be wakeful, be vigilant, Danger may be At an hour when all seemeth How! gains the leak so fast? Heave out thy gold; Now the ship rights; Hurra! the harbour's nearLo, the red lights! Slacken not sail yet At inlet or island; Straight for the beacon steer, Straight for the high land; Mrs. Southey. THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE. Not a drum was heard, not a funeral note, As his corse to the rampart we hurried; We buried him darkly at dead of night, No useless coffin enclosed his breast, Not in sheet nor in shroud we bound him Few and short were the prayers we said, ; But we stedfastly gazed on the face that was dead, We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed, That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head, ; Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone, But half of our heavy task was done When the clock struck the hour for retiring; Slowly and sadly we laid him down, From the field of his fame fresh and gory; We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, But we left him alone with his glory. THE CHAPEL BY THE SHORE. By the shore a plot of ground Where day and night and day go by, Wolfe. |