HELEN.

HIGH-BORN Helen, round your dwelling
These twenty years I've paced in vain :
Haughty beauty, thy lover's duty
Hath been to glory in his pain.

High-born Helen, proudly telling
Stories of thy cold disdain ;
I starve, I die, now you comply,
And I no longer can complain.

These twenty years I've lived on tears,
Dwelling for ever on a frown;

On sighs I've fed, your scorn my bread;
I perish now you kind are grown.

Can I, who loved my beloved

But for the scorn " was in her eye," Can I be moved for my beloved,

When she "returns me sigh for sigh?”

In stately pride, by my bed-side, High-born Helen's portrait's hung; Deaf to my praise, my mournful lays Are nightly to the portrait sung.

To that I weep, nor ever sleep, Complaining all night long to herHelen, grown old, no longer cold,

Said,

..

you to all men I prefer.”

A VISION OF REPENTANCE.

I SAW à famous fountain, in my dream,
Where shady path-ways to a valley led;
A weeping willow lay upon that stream,

And all around the fountain brink were spread Wide branching trees, with dark green leaf rich clad,

Forming a doubtful twilight-desolate and sad

The place was such, that whoso enter'd in,
Disrobed was of every earthly thought,
And straight became as one that knew not sin,
Or to the world's first innocence was brought;
Enseem'd it now, he stood on holy ground,
In sweet and tender melancholy wrapt around.

A most strange calm stole o'er my soothed sprite; Long time I stood, and longer had I staid, When, lo! I saw, saw by the sweet moon-light, Which came in silence o'er that silent shade,

Where, near the fountain, SOMETHING like

DESPAIR

Made, of that weeping willow, garlands for her hair.

And eke with painful fingers she inwove

Many an uncouth stem of savage thorn"The willow garland, that was for her love,

And these her bleeding temples would adorn." With sighs her heart nigh burst, salt tears fast fell, As mournfully she bended o'er that sacred well.

To whom when I addrest myself to speak,

She lifted up her eyes, and nothing said; The delicate red came mantling o'er her cheek, And, gath'ring up her loose attire, she fled To the dark covert of that woody shade, And in her goings seem'd a timid gentle maid.

Revolving in my mind what this should mean,
And why that lovely lady plained so;
Perplex'd in thought at that mysterious scene,
And doubting if 'twere best to stay or go,
I cast mine eyes in wistful gaze around,

When from the shades came slow a small and plaintive sound.

"PSYCHE am I, who love to dwell
In these brown shades, this woody dell,
Where never busy mortal came,

Till now, to pry upon my shame.

At thy feet what thou dost see
The waters of repentance be,
Which, night and day, I must augment
With tears, like a true penitent,

If haply so my day of grace

Be not yet past; and this lone place,
O'er-shadowy, dark, excludeth hence
All thoughts but grief and penitence."

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Why dost thou weep, thou gentle maid! And wherefore in this barren shade

Thy hidden thoughts with sorrow feed?
Can thing so fair repentance need?"

"O! I have done a deed of shame,
And tainted is my virgin fame,
And stain'd the beauteous maiden white,
In which my bridal robes were dight."

"And who the promised spouse, declare: And what those bridal garments were."