Two sleeping Nymphs with wonder mute I spy!
And lo, she 's gone! In robe of dark-green hue,
"Twas Echo from her sister Silence flew ;

For quick the hunter's horn resounded to the sky!
In shade affrighted Silence melts away;

Not so her sister:-hark! for onward still
With far-heard step she takes her listening way,
Bounding from rock to rock, and hill to hill!

Ah, mark the merry maid in mockful play

With thousand mimic tones the laughing forest fill!

Mr. William Lisle Bowles has a beautiful one on
TIME.

O TIME! who know'st a lenient hand to lay
Softest on sorrow's wound, and slowly thence,
Lulling to sad repose the weary sense,
The faint pang stealest unperceived away;
On thee I rest my only hope at last,

And think, when thou hast dried the bitter tear
That flows in vain o'er all my soul held dear,
may look back on every sorrow past,
And meet life's peaceful evening with a smile ;
As some lone bird, at day's departing hour,
Sings in the sunbeam, of the transient shower
Forgetful, though its wings are wet the while;

Yet ah! how much must that poor heart endure
Which hopes from thee, and thee alone, a cure.

Mr. Housman gives a great number of Wordsworth's sonnets. We select the one on

TWILIGHT.

HAIL, Twilight, sovereign of one peaceful hour!
Not dull art thou as undiscerning Night;
But studious only to remove from sight
Day's mutable distinctions. Ancient Power!
Thus did the waters gleam, the mountains lower,
To the rude Briton, when, in wolf-skin vest
Here roving wild, he laid him down to rest
On the bare rock, or through a leafy bower
Looked ere his eyes were closed. By him was seen
The self-same Vision which we now behold,

At thy meek bidding, shadowy Power! brought forth;
These mighty barriers, and the gulf between-

The floods-the stars-a spectacle as old

As the beginning of the heavens and earth!

Several of Hartley Coleridge's sonnets are given. We have only for that addressed

space

TO A FRIEND.

When we were idlers with the loitering rills,
The need of human love we little noted;
Our love was Nature; and the peace that floated
On the white mist, and dwelt upon the hills,

To sweet accord subdued our wayward wills.
One soul was ours, one mind, one heart devoted,
That, wisely doting, asked not why it doted;

And ours the unknown joy, which knowing kills.
But now I find how dear thou wert to me;

That man is more than half of Nature's treasure,
Of that fair Beauty which no eye can see,

Of that sweet Music which no ear can measure :
And now the streams may sing for others' pleasure,
The hills sleep on in their eternity.

Passing over several other sonnets from contemporaries, we come to one which has much tender feeling in it. It is by Mr. Charles Strong, and is headed

DEATH.

They picture Death a tyrant, gaunt and grim,
And, for his random aim, temper a dart
Of bite so mortal that the fiery smart

Consumes, and turns to dust the stoutest limb.
Thus dire to meet, yet shrink not they from him,
Who walk, by faith, in singleness of heart;
The simply wise, who choose the watchful part,
Nor let their eyelids close, or lamps grow dim.
Nor always dark and terrible his mien ;

As those who by the couch the night-watch keep
Have known, spectators of the blessed scene,

When friends, who stand around, joy more than weep,
As, with hush'd step, and smile of love serene,

In the soft guise he comes of gentle Sleep.

The last sonnet given by Mr. Housman shall be our last one also. It is by Mr. Edmund Peel, and is addressed

TO WINTER.

THOU of the snowy vest and hoary hair,
With icicles down-hanging, Winter, hail!
Not mine at thy authority to rail;

To call thee stern, bleak, comfortless, and bare,
As though thou wert twin-brother of Despair;
Rather shall praises in my song prevail ;
Praises of Him who gives us to inhale
The freshness of the uninfected air.
So long as I behold the clear blue sky,
The carol of the robin-redbreast hear,
Along the frozen waters seem to fly,
Or, softly cushion'd while the fire burns clear
Bask in the light of a beloved eye;

So long shall Winter to my soul be dear.

We are unwilling to find fault with an author whose labours have afforded so much pleasure. But we cannot part with Mr. Housman without asking him why and wherefore he has devoted so much of his space to certain of our contemporary poets, while he has not even given a single sonnet from others? Mr. David Lester Richardson has written several beautiful sonnets-though others from his pen are doubtless poor enough-and yet his name is not even mentioned. This, however, is an oversight which we could willingly overlook as probably the result of accident; but we hold it to be an unpardonable sin in Mr. Housman to have omitted all reference to the sonnets of

Sir Egerton Brydges, beyond that of giving a single one. Sir Egerton has not only written more sonnets than all the other poets of the present day, but many of them are among the best pieces of verse which ever appeared in the fourteen-line form. Mr. Wordsworth himself points out some of Sir Egerton's sonnets as not only the best of the present day, but the best to be found in the English language. The omission therefore on the part of Mr. Housman of all mention of Sir Egerton as a writer of sonnets, beyond the slight one we have noticed, is to us altogether unaccountable. It is a sin, moreover, which we deem unpardonable.

THE RIVALS.

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DURING the last three years I spent at school two of my lows and I cherished a very warm attachment to each other. In almost all our hours of relaxation from study we contrived to associate together, and always, in short, regretted the existence of those circumstances which imposed on us the necessity of even the most temporary separation. It was so ordered, however, in the oft-times arbitrary appointments of Fate, that I was to be at last parted from my two young friends for a long period, if not for ever. By this time I had received all the education which the comparatively limited finances of my parents could afford to give me, and an excellent situation being offered me in a foreign clime, I signified my acceptance of it; and, after doing the utmost violence to all the feelings and susceptibilities of my heart, I tore myself from the clinging embraces of my friends-abandoned the endeared scenes of my earlier years and all my past happiness, and repaired to a distant land, where I knew no individual and was known to no one.

At this eventful and trying period of my life I was in my eighteenth year; and even so early as this I was not altogether unacquainted with the workings of what is emphatically designated the tender passion. There was one of the other sex-a young girl whose personal attractions were only rivalled by her intellectual accomplishments and virtuous dispositions-who had made a deep and abiding impression on my heart. She was the daughter of a respectable farmer in the neighbourhood of the village of Ardmore, in the west of Scotland-the place in which my parents and those of my two schoolfellows already referred to resided. The latter were as intimately acquainted with Matilda Gordon (such was her name) as myself; but I had not the remotest idea at that time-would that I had never been apprised of the fact!—that either of them had ever felt towards her any other emotion than that of esteem, an emotion with which all must have regarded her who had an opportunity of observing the amiable qualities she possessed.

Such was the sincerity and ardency of my affection for this interesting young girl that but for the dependent nature of the situation for which I was about to depart, I would, even at that early period of my life, have made proposals of marriage to her. As it would,

however, in all the circumstances of the case, have been a matter of imprudence in me to have proposed immediate marriage, or to have solicited her hand against any future period, when the distance of space and time by which we were to be separated from each other placed us both within the probable influence of so many and such important contingencies which neither of us could control, I deemed it the wisest course for me to pursue not to divulge even to herself or to any other individual under heaven that I regarded her with any other feelings than those of common friendship.

It was in the month of June, 18-, that I set out for Hadlow, a small town in one of the States of North America. In the course of my voyage nothing of a striking or extraordinary character occurred; and, in something less than seven weeks from the day on which I left my native village, I safely reached the place of my destination.

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As there were no incidents of a romantic nature associated with my residence on the other side of the Atlantic, it will not be necessary to detain the reader with an account of it. It may be sufficient to mention that during the eight years I was absent from my native country the image of Matilda was frequently before my mind's eye amid the ordinary occupations of the day, and was often present to my imagination, beaming in all its unrivalled loveliness, when fast locked in the embraces of Morpheus during the silence of midnight. Still, however, although I had frequent correspondence with the two young friends to whom I have already more than once referred, I carefully abstained from making any enquiries at them or at any one else respecting Matilda, simply because, as already mentioned, no second party in existence had any idea of the place she occupied in my fections. It so happened, therefore, that notwithstanding the deep interest I felt in Matilda I did not hear a single syllable in reference to her during the long period, more than seven years, I had been in a foreign country. About this time, however, I received a letter from my parents, in which, after mentioning several other matters of local intelligence, they stated, "Your old acquaintance, Miss Matilda Gordon, is well, and still unmarried." Those only who have felt the operation of a love at once ardent and honourable can form any conception of the supreme gratification this laconic sentence administered to my mind. It had to me a power, an eloquence, and a charm such as no other piece of human composition I had ever met with possessed. Frequent indeed were the perusals I gave it. I could not, in fact, withdraw my eyes from it; and every fresh perusal of it added a cubit to my happiness. Never before did I experience, never since have I experienced, and I feel an immovable conviction pressing on my mind that I never shall in future experience-I mean so long in this world-the felicity I then enjoyed. I had not, before I first gazed on the words which constitute the short sentence in question, any idea of how much bliss human nature, notwithstanding all the imperfections and infirmities which attach to it, is susceptible in this world.

A short time prior to the date at which I received the letter alluded to my employers had made proposals to me to enter into partnership with them, after the lapse of six months from the time at which

these proposals were made. From the extremely liberal terms on which it was proposed that I should be admitted to a share of my employers' business, I could not but accept of the offer, stipulating, however, which was readily agreed to, that before I entered into the concern I should be allowed to visit my native country, and spend a few weeks with my relatives and friends.

The receipt of the letter already referred to, from my parents, made me engage with additional activity in preparing for my intended journey; for I had fully resolved to marry Matilda, if no ob stacles should occur on her part to frustrate my wishes. In a fortnight afterwards I set out, not for Scotland in the first instance, but for Ireland, in one of the districts of which I had some business of importance to transact for the benefit of my employers. I arrived in Dublin in eight weeks from the date of my leaving the place of my residence in America.

After three days' stay in the Irish metropolis, I left it on one of the stage coaches for the county of Limerick, at one of the towns of which I arrived in due course, and remained in it, principally engaged in business, for twenty-four hours. One of my most intimate friends in America had forwarded by me a letter to his relations, who resided about six miles from this place, extorting from me a promise, when setting out on my journey, that, as I was to be in the town of Romney, I should do him the favour of delivering his letter in propria persona. With the view of fulfilling the promise I had made my friend, I left Romney at six o'clock in the evening for the residence of his parents and relations. As the weather was extremely fine-it was towards the end of August- and I had got directions which I thought would render it in the highest degree improbable I should mistake the way to the place to which I was going, I set out on foot by myself, being desirous of enjoying the pleasures of a walk in the open country after so long a sea voyage. Part of my way lay through a rather unfrequented path, and just at the very moment at which I was in the most lonesome portion of it the sky, which but a few minutes before was as bright and beautiful as ever mortal eye gazed on, all at once assumed a most lowering aspect, an aspect which proved too portentous of the dreadful storm which the heavens were about to discharge on that portion of our earth. I looked above and around me, and, when I beheld the frowning appearance which nature had so suddenly assumed, I felt an emotion of terror come over me, such as I had never before experienced. With that instinctive desire of self-preservation which is the last as well as the first law of our nature, and which man feels in every situation, however perilous, in which he can be placed, I paused for a moment to consider in my own mind how I might best escape from the impending storm. Adjacent to a little wood, and situated by it. self, I saw a small hut or cabin, about half a mile distant. As it was the only human habitation at this critical moment within the reach of my eye, I resolved on directing my steps to it. Just as I left the foot-path to cross a moor which intervened between me and the wretched-looking hovel, a vivid blaze of the electric fluid flashed across my eyes, and in a moment it was succeeded by a peal of thun