race!

Unhappy Nuns, whose common breath's a sigh Which they would stifle, move at such a pace! The northern Wind, to call thee to the chase, Must blow to-night his bugle horn. Had I The power of Merlin, Goddess! this should be: And all the stars, fast as the clouds were riven, Should sally forth, to keep thee company, Hurrying and sparkling through the clear blue heaven;

But, Cynthia! should to thee the palm be given, Queen both for beauty and for majesty.

XXIV.

EVEN as a dragon's eye that feels the stress
Of a bedimming sleep, or as a lamp
Suddenly glaring through sepulchral damp,
So burns yon Taper 'mid a black recess
Of mountains, silent, dreary, motionless:
The lake below reflects it not; the sky,
Muffled in clouds, affords no company
To mitigate and cheer its loneliness.
Yet, round the body of that joyless Thing
Which sends so far its melancholy light,
Perhaps are seated in domestic ring
A gay society with faces bright,
Conversing, reading, laughing;—or they sing,
While hearts and voices in the song unite.

XXV.

THE stars are mansions built by Nature's hand
And, haply, there the spirits of the blest
Dwell, clothed in radiance, their immortal vest;
Huge Ocean shows, within his yellow strand,
A habitation marvellously planned,
For life to occupy in love and rest;
All that we see-is dome, or vault, or nest,
Or fortress, reared at Nature's sage command.
Glad thought for every season! but the Spring
Gave it while cares were weighing on my heart,
'Mid songs of birds, and insects murmuring;
And while the youthful year's prolific art-

Of bud, leaf, blade, and flower-was fashioning Abodes where self-disturbance hath no part.

XXVI.

DESPONDING Father! mark this altered bougn,
So beautiful of late, with sunshine warmed,
Or moist with dews; what more unsightly now,
Its blossoms shrivelled, and its fruit, if formed,
Knits not o'er that discolouring and decay
Invisible? yet Spring her genial brow
As false to expectation. Nor fret thou
At like unlovely process in the May
Fade and are shed, that from their timely fall
Of human life: a Stripling's graces blow,
(Misdeem it not a cankerous change) may grow
Rich mellow bearings, that for thanks shall call :
In all men, sinful is it to be slow

To hope-in Parents, sinful above all.

XXVII.

CAPTIVITY.-MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. "As the cold aspect of a sunless way Strikes through the Traveller's frame with deadlier chill,

Oft as appears a grove, or obvious hill,
Glistening with unparticipated ray,
Or shining slope where he must never stray;
So joys, remembered without wish or will,
Sharpen the keenest edge of present ill,-
On the crushed heart a heavier burthen lay.
Just Heaven, contract the compass of my mind
To fit proportion with my altered state!
Quench those felicities whose light I find
Reflected in my bosom all too late!-
O be my spirit, like my thraldom, strait
And, like mine eyes that stream with sorrow,
blind!"

XXVIII.

ST CATHERINE OF LEDBURY.

WHEN human touch (as monkish books attest)
Nor was applied nor could be, Ledbury bells
Broke forth in concert flung adown the dells,
And upward, high as Malvern's cloudy crest;
Sweet tones, and caught by a noble Lady blest
To rapture! Mabel listened at the side
Of her loved mistress; soon the music died,
And Catherine said, Here I set up my rest.
Warned in a dream, the Wanderer long had
sought

A home that by such miracle of sound
Must be revealed :-she heard it now, or felt
The deep, deep joy of a confiding thought;
And there, a saintly Anchoress, she dwelt
Till she exchanged for heaven that happy
round.

That animates the scenes of public life *
Inspired, may in their leisure claim a part;
And if these Transcripts of the private heart
Have gained a sanction from thy falling tears;
Then I repent not. But my soul hath fears
Breathed from eternity (for as a dart
Cleaves the blank air, Life flies; now every day
Is but a glimmering spoke in the swift wheel
Of the revolving week. Away, away,
All fitful cares, all transitory zeal!

So timely Grace the immortal wing may heal,
And honour rest upon the senseless clay.

PART III.

I.

THOUGH the bold wings of Poesy affect
The clouds, and wheel around the mountain

tops

Rejoicing, from her loftiest height she drops Well pleased to skim the plain with wild flowers deckt,

Or muse in solemn grove whose shades protect
The lingering dew-there steals along, or stops
Watching the least small bird that round her
hops,

Or creeping worm, with sensitive respect.
Her functions are they therefore less divine,
Her thoughts less deep, or void of grave intent
Her simplest fancies? Should that fear be thine,
Aspiring Votary, ere thy hand present
One offering, kneel before her modest shrine,
With brow in penitential sorrow bent !

SHAME on this faithless heart! that could allow Such transport, though but for a moment's space :

Not while-to aid the spirit of the place-
The crescent moon clove with its glittering prow
The clouds, or night-bird sang from shady
bough;

But in plain daylight :-She, too, at my side,
Who, with her heart's experience satisfied,
Maintains inviolate its slightest vow!
Sweet Fancy! other gifts must I receive;
Proofs of a higher sovereignty I claim;

And to that brow life's morning wreath restore;
Let her be comprehended in the frame
Of these illusions, or they please no more.

IV.

RECOLLECTION OF THE PORTRAIT OF KING HENRY EIGHTH, TRINITY LODGE, CAMbridge.

THE imperial Stature, the colossal stride,
Are yet before me; yet do I behold
The broad full visage, chest of amplest mould,
The vestments 'broidered with barbaric pride:
And lo! a poniard, at the Monarch's side,
Hangs ready to be grasped in sympathy
With the keen threatenings of that fulgent eye,
Below the white-rimmed bonnet, far-descried.
Who trembles now at thy capricious mood?
'Mid those surrounding Worthies, haughty
King,

We rather think, with grateful mind sedate,
Of lawless will, unlooked-for streams of good,
How Providence educeth, from the spring
Which neither force shall check nor time abate

JUNE, 1820.

FAME tells of groves-from England far away-
*Groves that inspire the Nightingale to trill
And modulate, with subtle reach of skill
Elsewhere unmatched, her ever-varying lay;
Such bold report I venture to gainsay:
For I have heard the quire of Richmond hill
Chanting, with indefatigable bill,

Strains that recalled to mind a distant day;
When, haply under shade of that same wood,
And scarcely conscious of the dashing oars
Plied steadily between those willowy shores,
The sweet-souled Poet of the Seasons stood-
Listening, and listening long, in rapturous mood,
Ye heavenly Birds! to your Progenitors.

VII.

eve,

This line alludes to Sonnets which will be found in another Class.

Their several features, mingled like the sound Of many waters, or as evening blends

* Wallael. is the country alluded to

With shady night. Soft airs, from shrub and flower,

Waft fragrant greetings to each silent grave; And while those lofty poplars gently wave Their tops, between them comes and goes a sky Bright as the glimpses of eternity,

To saints accorded in their mortal hour.

VIII.

COMPOSED AMONG THE RUINS OF A CASTLE
IN NORTH WALES.

THROUGH shattered galleries, 'mid roofless halls,
Wandering with timid footsteps oft betrayed,
The Stranger sighs, nor scruples to upbraid
Old Time, though he, gentlest among the Thralls
Of Destiny, upon these wounds hath laid
His lenient touches, soft as light that falls,
From the wan Moon, upon the towers and walls,
Light deepening the profoundest sleep of shade.
Relic of Kings! Wreck of forgotten wars,
To winds abandoned and the prying stars,
Time loves Thee! at his call the Seasons twine
Luxuriant wreaths around thy forehead hoar;
And, though past pomp no changes can restore,
A soothing recompence, his gift, is thine!

IX.

TO THE LADY E. B. AND THE HON. MISS P.

Composed in the Grounds of Plass Newidd, near Llangollen, 1824.

A STREAM, to mingle with your favourite Dee,
Along the VALE OF MEDITATION* flows;
So styled by those fierce Britons, pleased to see
In Nature's face the expression of repose;
Or haply there some pious hermit chose
To live and die, the peace of heaven his aim ;
To whom the wild sequestered region owes,
At this late day, its sanctifying name.
GLYN CAFAILLGAROCH, in the Cambrian tongue,
In ours, the VALE OF FRIENDSHIP, let this spot
Be named; where, faithful to a low-roofed Cot,
On Deva's banks, ye have abode so long;
Sisters in love, a love allowed to climb,
Even on this earth, above the reach of Time!

X.

TO THE TORRENT AT THE Devil's bridge, NORTH WALES, 1824

How art thou named? In search of what strange land

From what huge height, descending? Can such force

Of waters issue from a British source,

Or hath not Pindus fed thee, where the band Of Patriots scoop their freedom out, with hand Desperate as thine? Or come the incessant shocks

From that young Stream, that smites the throbbing rocks

Of Viamala? There I seem to stand,
As in life's morn; permitted to behold,
From the dread chasm, woods climbing above
woods,

In

that fades not; everlasting snows: pomp And skies that ne'er relinquish their repose; Such power possess the family of floods Over the minds of Poets, young or old!

* Glyn Myrvr.

XI.

IN THE WOODS OF RYDAL.

WILD Redbreast! hadst thou at Jemima's lip
Pecked, as at mine, thus boldly, Love might say,
A half-blown rose had tempted thee to sip
Its glistening dews; but hallowed is the clay
Which the Muse warms; and I, whose head is
grey,

Am not unworthy of thy fellowship:
Nor could I let one thought-one motion-slip
For are we not all His without whose care
That might thy sylvan confidence betray.
Vouchsafed no sparrow falleth to the ground?
And rolls the planets through the blue profound;
Who gives his Angels wings to speed through air,
Then peck or perch, fond Flutterer! nor forbear
To trust a Poet in still musings bound.

XII.

WHEN Philoctetes in the Lemnian isle
Lay couched on him or his dread bow unbent
Like a Form sculptured on a monument
Some wild Bird oft might settle and beguile
The rigid features of a transient smile,
Disperse the tear, or to the sigh give vent,
Slackening the pains of ruthless banishmen
From his loved home, and from heroic toil.
And trust that spiritual Creatures round us
move,

Griefs to allay which Reason cannot heal;
Yea, veriest reptiles have sufficed to prove
To fettered wretchedness, that no Bastile
Is deep enough to exclude the light of love,
Though man for brother man has ceased to feel.

shriek

GRAVE-STONE UPON THE FLOOR IN THE
CLOISTERS OF WORCESTER CATHEDRAL.

"MISERRIMUS!" and neither name nor date,

strain

ΤΟ

XVII.

IN HER SEVENTIETH YEAR.

SUCH age how beautful! O Lady bright,
Whose mortal lineaments seem all refined
By favouring Nature and a saintly Mind
To something purer and more exquisite
Than flesh and blood; whene'er thou meet'st
my sight,

When I behold thy blanched unwithered cheek, Thy temples fringed with locks of gleaming white,

And head that droops because the soul is meek,
Thee with the welcome Snowdrop I compare;
That child of winter, prompting thoughts that
climb

From desolation toward the genial prime;
Or with the Moon conquering earth's misty air,
And filling more and more with crystal light
As pensive Evening deepens into night.

Nought but that word assigned to the unknown,
That solitary word-to separate

From all, and cast a cloud around the fate
Of him who lies beneath. Most wretched one,
Who chose his epitaph?-Himself alone
Could thus have dared the grave to agitate,
And claim, among the dead, this awful crown;
Nor doubt that He marked also for his own
Close to these cloistral steps a burial-place,
That every foot might fall with heavier tread,
Trampling upon his vileness. Stranger, pass
Softly!-To save the contrite, Jesus bled.