Hath been thine exiled youth ; but now take back,
From dying hands, thy freedom, and re-track
(After a few kind tears for her whose days
Went out in dreams of thee) the sunny ways
Of hope, and find thou happiness! Yet send,
Ev'n then, in silent hours a thought, dear friend !
Down to my voiceless chamber; for thy love
Hath been to me all gifts of earth above,
Tho' bought with burning tears! It is the sting
Of death to leave that vainly-precious thing
In this cold world! What were it then, if thou,
With thy fond eyes, wert gazing on me now?
Too keen a pang !--Farewell! and yet once more,
Farewell !—the passion of long years I pour
Into that word : thou hear'st not,-but the wo
And fervour of its tones may one day flow

To thy heart's holy place; there let them dwell We shall o'ersweep the grave to meet-Farewell!

THE BRIDE OF THE GREEK ISLE.*

Fear! I'm a Greek, and how should I fear death ?
A slave, and wherefore should I dread my freedom ?

*

**

I will not live degraded.

Sardanapalus.

COME from the woods with the citron-flowers,

Come with your lyres for the festal hours,
Maids of bright Scio! They came, and the breeze
Bore their sweet songs o'er the Grecian seas ;
They came, and Eudora stood robʼd and crown'd,
The bride of the morn, with her train around.

* Founded on a circumstance related in the Second Series of the Curiosities of Literature, and forming part of a picture in the " Painted Biography" there described.

Jewels flash'd out from her braided hair,
Like starry dews midst the roses there;
Pearls on her bosom quivering shone,
Heav'd by her heart thro’ its golden zone ;
But a brow, as those gems of the ocean pale,
Gleam'd from beneath her transparent veil ;
Changeful and faint was her fair cheek's hue,
Tho'clear as a flower which the light looks through;
And the glance of her dark resplendent eye,
For the aspect of woman at times too high,
Lay floating in mists, which the troubled stream
Of the soul sent up o'er its fervid beam.

She look'd on the vine at her father's door,
Like one that is leaving his native shore ;
She hung o'er the myrtle once call’d her own,
As it greenly wav'd by the threshold stone;
She turn'd--and her mother's gaze brought back
Each hue of her childhood's faded track.

Oh! hush the song, and let her tears
Flow to the dream of her early years !
Holy and pure are the drops that fall
When the

young
bride
goes

from her father's hall; She

goes unto love yet untried and new, She parts from love which hath still been true; Mute be the song and the choral strain, Till her heart's deep well-spring is clear again She wept on her mother's faithful breast, Like a babe that sobs itself to rest; She wept-yet laid her hand awhile In his that waited her dawning smile, Her soul's affianced, nor cherish'd less For the gush of nature's tenderness ! She lifted her graceful head at lastThe choking swell of her heart was past; And her lovely thoughts from their cells found way In the sudden flow of a plaintive lay. 3

THE BRIDE'S FAREWELL.

Why do I weep ?-to leave the vine

Whose clusters o'er me bend, The myrtle--yet, oh! call it mine!

The flowers I lov'd to tend.

A thousand thoughts of all things dear,

Like shadows o'er me sweep,

I leave my sunny childhood here,

Oh, therefore let me weep!

I leave thee, sister! we have play'd

Thro' many a joyous hour, Where the silvery green of the olive shade

Hung dim o'er fount and bower.

Yes, thou and I, by stream, by shore,

In song, in prayer, in sleep,
Have been as we may be no more-

Kind sister, let me weep!