IN THE ALBUM OF A CLERGYMAN'S
LADY.
AN Album is a Garden, not for show
Planted, but use; where wholesome herbs should
A Cabinet of curious porcelain, where
No fancy enters, but what's rich or rare.
A Chapel, where mere ornamental things
Are pure as crowns of saints, or angels' wings.
A List of living friends; a holier Room
For names of some since mouldering in the tomb,
Whose blooming memories life's cold laws survive;
And, dead elsewhere, they here yet speak and live.
Such, and so tender, should an Album be;
And, Lady, such I wish this book to thee.
IN THE ALBUM OF EDITH S
IN Christian world MARY the garland wears!
REBECCA Sweetens on a Hebrew's ear;
Quakers for pure PRISCILLA are more clear;
And the light Gaul by amorous NINON Swears.
Among the lesser lights how LUCY shines!
What air of fragrance ROSAMOND throws round!
How like a hymn doth sweet CECILIA Sound!
Of MARTHAS, and of ABIGAILS, few lines
Have bragg'd in verse. Of coarsest household stuff
Should homely JOAN be fashion'd. But can
You BARBARA resist, or MARIAN?
And is not CLARE for love excuse enough?
Yet, by my faith in numbers, I profess,
These all, than Saxon EDITH, please me less.
IN THE ALBUM OF ROTHA Q—.
A PASSING glance was all I caught of thee,
In my own Enfield haunts at random roving.
Old friends of ours were with thee, faces loving;
Time short and salutations cursory,
Though deep, and hearty. The familiar Name
Of you, yet unfamiliar, raised in me
Thoughts--what the daughter of that Man should be,
Who call'd our Wordsworth friend. My thoughts did frame
A growing Maiden, who, from day to day
Advancing still in stature, and in grace,
Would all her lonely Father's griefs efface,
And his paternal cares with usury pay.
I still retain the phantom, as I can;
And call the gentle image-Quillinan.
IN THE ALBUM OF CATHERINE ORKNEY.
CANADIA! boast no more the toils
Of hunters for the furry spoils ;
Your whitest ermines are but foils
To brighter Catherine Orkney.
That such a flower should ever burst From climes with rigorous winter curst!We bless you, that so kindly nurst
This flower, this Catherine Orkney.
We envy not your proud display
Of lake-wood-vast Niagara;
Your greatest pride we've borne away.
How spared you Catherine Orkney?
That Wolfe on Heights of Abraham fell, To your reproach no more we tell: Canadia, you repaid us well
With rearing Catherine Orkney.
O Britain, guard with tenderest care The charge allotted to your share : You've scarce a native maid so fair, So good, as Catherine Orkney.
IN THE ALBUM OF LUCY BARTON.
LITTLE Book, surnamed of white,
Clean as yet, and fair to sight,
Keep thy attribution right.
Never disproportion'd scrawl;
Ugly blot, that's worse than all;
On thy maiden clearness fall!
In each letter, here design'd, Let the reader emblem'd find Neatness of the owner's mind.
Gilded margins count a sin, Let thy leaves attraction win By the golden rules within;
Sayings fetch'd from sages old; Laws which Holy Writ unfold, Worthy to be graved in gold:
Lighter fancies not excluding: Blameless wit, with nothing rude in, Sometimes mildly interluding
Amid strains of graver measure : Virtue's self hath oft her pleasure In sweet Muses' groves of leisure.
Riddles dark, perplexing sense;
Darker meanings of offence;
What but shades-be banish'd hence.
Whitest thoughts in whitest dress, Candid meanings, best express Mind of quiet Quakeress.
But stop, rash verse! and don't abuse
A bashful Maiden's ear with news
Of her own virtues. She'll refuse
Praise sung so loudly.
Of that same goodness you admire,
The best part is, she don't aspire
To praise-nor of herself desire
To think too proudly.
IN THE ALBUM OF MRS. JANE TOWERS.
LADY UNKNOWN, who crav'st from me Unknown
The trifle of a verse these leaves to grace,
How shall I find fit matter? with what face
Address a face that ne'er to me was shown?
Thy looks, tones, gesture, manners, and what
not,
Conjecturing, I wander in the dark.
I know thee only Sister to Charles Clarke !
But at that name my cold muse waxes hot,
And swears that thou art such a one as he,
Warm, laughter-loving, with a touch of madness,
Wild, glee-provoking, pouring oil of gladness
From frank heart without guile.
The pure reverse of this, and I mistake Demure one, I will like thee for his sake.
SUCH goodness in your face doth shine,
With modest look, without design,
That I despair, poor pen of mine
Can e'er express it.
To give it words I feebly try;
My spirits fail me to supply
Befitting language for't, and I
Can only bless it!
IN MY OWN ALBUM.
FRESH clad from heaven in robes of white,
A young probationer of light,
Thou wert, my soul, an album bright,
A spotless leaf; but thought, and care,
And friend and foe, in foul or fair,
Have "written strange defeatures" there;
And Time with heaviest hand of all,
Like that fierce writing on the wall,
Hath stamp'd sad dates he can't recall;
And error gilding worst designs-
Like speckled snake that strays and shines-
Betrays his path by crooked lines;
And vice hath left his ugly blot;
And good resolves, a moment hot,
Fairly began-but finish'd not;
And fruitless, late remorse doth trace-
Like Hebrew lore a backward pace-
Her irrecoverable race.
Disjointed numbers; sense unknit;
Huge reams of folly, shreds of wit;
Compose the mingled mass of it.
My scalded eyes no longer brook
Upon this ink-blurr'd thing to look-
Go, shut the leaves, and clasp the book.
ANGEL HELP.*
THIS rare tablet doth include Poverty with Sanctitude.
Past midnight this poor maid hath spun,
And yet the work is not half done,
Which must supply from earnings scant
A feeble bed-rid parent's want.
Her sleep-charged eyes exemption ask,
And Holy hands take up the task;
Unseen the rock and spindle ply,
And do her earthly drudgery.
Sleep, saintly poor one! sleep, sleep on;
And, waking, find thy labours done.
Perchance she knows it by her dreams;
Her eye hath caught the golden gleams,
Angelic presence testifying,
That round her everywhere are flying;
Ostents from which she may presume,
That much of heaven is in the room.
Skirting her own bright hair they run,
And to the sunny add more sun :
Now on that aged face they fix,
Streaming from the Crucifix;
The flesh-clogg'd spirit disabusing,
Death-disarming sleeps infusing,
Prelibations, foretastes high,
And equal thoughts to live or die.
Gardener bright from Eden's bower,
Tend with care that lily flower;
To its leaves and root infuse
Heaven's sunshine, Heaven's dews.
"Tis a type, and 'tis a pledge,
Of a crowning privilege.
Careful as that lily flower,
This Maid must keep her precious dower;
Live a sainted Maid, or die
Martyr to virginity.
ON AN INFANT DYING AS SOON AS BORN.
I SAW where in the shroud did lurk
A curious frame of Nature's work.
A flow'ret crushed in the bud,
A nameless piece of Babyhood,
Suggested by a drawing in the possession of Charles Aders, Esq., in which is represented the legend of a poor female Saint; who, having spun past midnight, to maintain a bed-rid mother, has fallen asleep from fatigue, and Angels are finishing her work. In another part of the chamber, an angel is tending a lily, the emblem of purity.
Was in her cradle-coffin lying;
Extinct, with scarce the sense of dying:
So soon to exchange the imprisoning womb
For darker closets of the tomb !
She did but ope an eye, and put
A clear beam forth, then straight up shut
For the long dark: ne'er more to see
Through glasses of mortality.
Riddle of destiny, who can show
What thy short visit meant, or know
What thy errand here below?
Shall we say, that Nature blind
Check'd her hand, and changed her mind,
Just when she had exactly wrought
A finish'd pattern without fault?
Could she flag, or could she tire,
Or lack'd she the Promethean fire
(With her nine moons' long workings sicken'd) That should thy little limbs have quicken'd? Limbs so firm, they seem'd to assure
Life of health and days mature:
Woman's self in miniature!
Limbs so fair, they might supply
(Themselves now but cold imagery)
The sculptor to make Beauty by.
Or did the stern-eyed Fate descry,
That babe, or mother, one must die;
So in mercy left the stock,
And cut the branch; to save the shock
Of young years widow'd; and the pain,
When Single State comes back again
To the lone man who, 'reft of wife,
Thenceforward drags a maimed life?
The economy of Heaven is dark;
And wisest clerks have miss'd the mark,
Why Human Buds, like this, should fall,
More brief than fly ephemeral,
That has his day; while shrivell'd crones
Stiffen with age to stocks and stones;
And crabbed use the conscience sears
In sinners of an hundred years.
Mother's prattle, mother's kiss,
Baby fond, thou ne'er wilt miss.
Rites, which custom does impose,
Silver bells and baby clothes;
Coral redder than those lips,
Which pale death did late eclipse;
Music framed for infants' glee,
Whistle never tuned for thee;
Though thou want'st not, thou shalt have them,
Loving hearts were they which gave them.
Let not one be missing; nurse,
See them laid upon the hearse
Of infant slain by doom perverse.
Why should kings and nobles have
Pictured trophies to their grave;
And we, churls, to thee deny
Thy pretty toys with thee to lie,
A more harmless vanity?
ARRAY'D-a half-angelic sight-
In vests of pure Baptismal white,
The Mother to the Font doth bring
The little helpless nameless thing,
With hushes soft and mild caressing,
At once to get-a name and blessing.
Close by the babe the Priest doth stand,
The Cleansing Water at his hand,
Which must assoil the soul within
From every stain of Adam's sin.
The Infant eyes the mystic scenes,
Nor knows what all this wonder means;
And now he smiles, as if to say
"I am a Christian made this day;"
Now frighted clings to Nurse's hold,
Shrinking from the water cold,
Whose virtues, rightly understood,
Strange words-The World, The Flesh, The Remain'd a child, and at thy sovereign will
Are, as Bethesda's waters, good.
Poor Babe, what can it know of Evil?
But we must silently adore
Mysterious truths, and not explore.
Enough for him, in after-times,
When he shall read these artless rhymes,
If, looking back upon this day
With quiet conscience, he can say—
"I have in part redeem'd the pledge
Of my Baptismal privilege;
And more and more will strive to flee
All which my Sponsors kind did then renounce for me."
THE YOUNG CATECHIST.* WHILE this tawny Ethiop prayeth, Painter, who is she that stayeth By, with skin of whitest lustre, Sunny locks, a shining cluster,
A picture by Henry Meyer, Esq.
HARMONY IN UNLIKENESS.
By Enfield lanes, and Winchmore's verdant hill,
Two lovely damsels cheer my lonely walk:
The fair Maria, as a vestal, still;
And Emma brown, exuberant in talk.
With soft and Lady speech the first applies
The mild correctives that to grace belong
To her redundant friend, who her defies
With jest, and mad discourse, and bursts of song.
O differing Pair, yet sweetly thus agreeing,
What music from your happy discord rises,
While your companion hearing each, and seeing,
Nor this, nor that, but both together, prizes;
This lesson teaching, which our souls may
strike,
That harmonies may be in things unlike!
TO A CELEBRATED FEMALE PERFORMER
IN THE "BLIND BOY."
RARE artist who with half thy tools, or none,
Canst execute with ease thy curious art,
And press thy powerful'st meanings on the
heart,
Unaided by the eye, expression's throne !
While each blind sense, intelligential grown
Beyond its sphere, performs the effect of sight:
Those orbs alone, wanting their proper might,
All motionless and silent seem to moan
The unseemly negligence of nature's hand,
That left them so forlorn. What praise is thine,
O mistress of the passions; artist fine!
Who dost our souls against our sense command,
Plucking the horror from a sightless face,
Lending to blank deformity a grace.
WRITTEN AT CAMBRIDGE.
I was not train'd in Academic bowers,
And to those learned streams I nothing owe
Which copious from those twin fair founts do flow;
Mine have been anything but studious hours.
Yet can I fancy, wandering mid thy towers,
Myself a nursling, Granta, of thy lap;
WHO first invented work, and bound the free
And holyday-rejoicing spirit down
To the ever-haunting importunity
Of business in the green fields, and the town—
To plough, loom, anvil, spade-and oh ! most sad
My brow scems tightening with the Doctor's cap, To that dry drudgery at the desk's dead wood?
And I walk gowned; feel unusual powers.
Strange forms of logic clothe my admiring speech,
Old Ramus' ghost is busy at my brain;
And my skull teems with notions infinite.
Be still, ye reeds of Camus, while I teach
Truths, which transcend the searching School-
men's vein,
And half had stagger'd that stout Stagirite!
Who but the Being unblest, alien from good,
Sabbathless Satan! he who his unglad
Task ever plies 'mid rotatory burnings,
That round and round incalculably recl—
For wrath divine hath made him like a wheel-
| In that red realm from which are no returnings:
Where toiling, and turmoiling, ever and aye
He, and his thoughts, keep pensive working-day.
|