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TO

A FRIEND

ON HIS

MARRIAGE.

On thee, blest youth, a father's hand confers

The maid thy earliest, fondest wishes knew.
Each soft enchantment of the soul is hers;
Thine be the joys to firm attachment due.

As on she moves with hesitating grace,
She wins assurance from his soothing voice;
And, with a look the pencil could not trace,

Smiles thro' her blushes, and confirms the choice.

Spare the fine tremors of her feeling frame!
To thee she turns-forgive a virgin's fears!
To thee she turns with surest, tenderest claim;
Weakness that charms, reluctance that endears!

At each response the sacred rite requires,
From her full bosom bursts the unbidden sigh.
A strange mysterious awe the scene inspires;

And on her lips the trembling accents die.

O'er her fair face what wild emotions play!
What lights and shades in sweet confusion blend!
Soon shall they fly, glad harbingers of day,

And settled sunshine on her soul descend!

Ah soon, thine own confest, ecstatic thought!
That hand shall strew thy summer-path with flowers;

And those blue eyes, with mildest lustre fraught,

Gild the calm current of domestic hours!

THE ALPS

AT DAY-BREAK.

THE sun-beams streak the azure skies, And line with light the mountain's brow : With hounds and horns the hunters rise, And chase the roebuck thro' the snow.

From rock to rock, with giant-bound,
High on their iron poles they pass;

Mute, lest the air, convulsed by sound,
Rend from above a frozen mass.*

The goats wind slow their wonted way,
Up craggy steeps and ridges rude;
Marked by the wild wolf for his prey,
From desert cave or hanging wood.

And while the torrent thunders loud,
And as the echoing cliffs reply,
The huts peep o'er the morning-cloud,
Perched, like an eagle's nest, on high.

* There are passes in the Alps, where the guides tell you to move on with speed, and say nothing, lest the agitation of the air should loosen the snows above.

IMITATION OF AN ITALIAN SONNET.

Love, under Friendship's vesture white,

Laughs, his little limbs concealing;

And oft in sport, and oft in spite,

Like Pity meets the dazzled sight,

Smiles thro' his tears revealing.

But now as Rage the God appears!

He frowns, and tempests shake his frame !— Frowning, or smiling, or in tears,

'Tis Love; and Love is still the same.

A CHARACTER.

As thro' the hedge-row shade the violet steals, And the sweet air its modest leaf reveals;

Her softer charms, but by their influence known, Surprise all hearts, and mould them to her own.

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