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Quick with the tale, and ready with the lie-
The genial confidante, and general spy—

Who could, ye gods! her next employment guess-
An only infant's earliest governess!

She taught the child to read, and taught so well,
That she herself, by teaching, learn'd to spell.
An adept next in penmanship she grows,
As many a nameless slander deftly shows:
What she had made the pupil of her art,
None know—but that high soul secured the heart,
And panted for the truth it could not hear,
With longing breast and undeluded ear.
Foil'd was perversion by that youthful mind,
Which flattery fool'd not-baseness could not blind,
Deceit infect not-near contagion soil-
Indulgence weaken-nor example spoil-
Nor master'd science tempt her to look down
On humbler talents with a pitying frown-
Nor genius swell-nor beauty render vain—
Nor envy ruffle to retaliate pain-

Nor fortune change-pride raise—nor passion bow,
Nor virtue teach austerity-till now.
Serenely purest of her sex that live,

But wanting one sweet weakness-to forgive;
Too shock'd at faults her soul can never know,
She deems that all could be like her below:
Foe to all vice, yet hardly virtue's friend,
For virtue pardons those she would amend.
But to the theme:-now laid aside too long
The baleful burthen of this honest song--
Though all her former functions are no more,
She rules the circle which she served before.
VOL. VII.

23

If mothers-none know why-before her quake;
If daughters, dread her for the mothers' sake;
If early habits-those false links, which bind
At times the loftiest to the meanest mind—
Have given her power too deeply to instil
The angry essence of her deadly will;
If like a snake she steal within your walls,
Till the black slime betray her as she crawls;
If like a viper to the heart she wind,
And leave the venom there she did not find;
What marvel that this hag of hatred works
Eternal evil latent as she lurks,

To make a pandemonium where she dwells,
And reign the Hecate of domestic hells?
Skill'd by a touch to deepen scandal's tints
With all the kind mendacity of hints,

While mingling truth with falsehood-sneers with smiles—
A thread of candour with a web of wiles;

A plain blunt show of briefly-spoken seeming,
To hide her bloodless heart's soul-harden'd scheming;
A lip of lies-a face form'd to conceal;
And, without feeling, mock at all who feel:
With a vile mask the Gorgon would disown;
A cheek of parchment-and an eye of stone.
Mark, how the channels of her yellow blood
Ooze to her skin, and stagnate there to mud,
Cased like the centipede in saffron mail,
Or darker greenness of the scorpion's scale-
(For drawn from reptiles only may we trace
Congenial colours in that soul or face)—
Look on her features! and behold her mind
As in a mirror of itself defined:

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Look on the picture! deem it not o'ercharged—
There is no trait which might not be enlarged:
Yet true to << nature's journeymen,» who made
This monster when their mistress left off trade,—
This female dog-star of her little sky,

"

Where all beneath her influence droop or die.

Oh! wretch without a tear-without a thought,
Save joy above the ruin thou hast wrought—
The time shall come, nor long remote, when thou
Shalt feel far more than thou inflictest now;
Feel for thy vile self-loving self in vain,
And turn thee howling in unpitied pain.
May the strong curse of crush'd affections light
Back on thy bosom with reflected blight!
And make thee in thy leprosy of mind
As loathsome to thyself as to mankind!
Till all thy self-thoughts curdle into hate,
Black—as thy will for others would create :
Till thy hard heart be calcined into dust,

And thy soul welter in its hideous crust.

Oh, may thy grave be sleepless as the bed,

The widow'd couch of fire, that thou hast spread!

Then, when thou fain would'st weary Heaven with prayer,

Look on thine earthly victims-and despair!

Down to the dust!-and, as thou rott'st away,
Even worms shall perish on thy poisonous clay.
But for the love I bore, and still must bear,
To her thy malice from all ties would tear—
Thy name thy human name-to every eye
The climax of all scorn should hang on high,
Exalted o'er thy less abhorr'd compeers—
And festering in the infamy of years.

--

FAREWELL TO ENGLAND.

OH! land of my fathers and mine,
The noblest, the best, and the bravest;
Heart-broken, and lorn, I resign

The joys and the hopes which thou gavest!

Dear mother of freedom! farewell!
Even freedom is irksome to me;
Be calm, throbbing heart, nor rebel,
For reason approves the decree.

Did I love?-Be my witness, high Heaven,
That mark'd all my frailties and fears;

I adored-but the magic is riven:

Be the memory expunged by my tears!

The moment of rapture how bright,
How dazzling, how transient its glare;
A comet in splendour and flight,

The herald of darkness and care.

Recollections of tenderness gone,

Of pleasure no more to return;

A wanderer, an outcast, alone,

Oh! leave me, untortured, to mourn.

Where where shall my heart find repose?
A refuge from memory and grief?
The gangrene, wherever it goes,
Disdains a fictitious relief.

Could I trace out that fabulous stream
Which washes remembrance away,
Again might the eye of hope gleam,'
The dawn of a happier day.

Hath wine an oblivious power?

Can it pluck out the sting from the brain? The draught might beguile for an hour, But still leaves behind it the pain.

Can distance or time heal the heart
That bleeds from the innermost pore?

Or intemperance lessen its smart?
Or a cerate apply to its sore?

If I rush to the ultimate pole,

The form I adore will be there,

A phantom to torture my soul,
And mock at my bootless despair.

The zephyr of eve, as it flies,

Will whisper her voice in mine ear, And, moist with her sorrows and sighs, Demand for love's altar a tear.

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