L

CHARLES LAMB.

Due to reasonable creatures,

Call her Cockatrice and Siren, Liken'st us to fell chimeras,

Basilisk, and all that's evil, Monsters that, who see us, fear us;

Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, Devil, Worse than Cerberus or Geryon,

Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor, Or, who first lov'd a cloud, Ixion.

Monkey, Ape, and twenty more ;

Friendly Trait'ress, loving Foe, Bacchus we know, and we allow

Not that she is truly so, His tipsy rites. But what art thou,

But no other way they know That but by reflex can'st shew

A contentment to express, What his deity can do,

Borders so upon excess, As the false Egyptian spell

That they do not rightly wot
Aped the true Hebrew miracle?

Whether it be pain or not.
Some few vapours thou may’st raise,
The weak brain may serve to amaze,

Or, as men, constrain'd to part
But to the reins and nobler heart

With what's nearest to their heart, Can'st nor life nor heat impart.

While their sorrow's at the height,

Lose discrimination quite, Brother of Bacchus, later born,

And their hasty wrath let fall, The old world was sure forlorn,

To appease their frantic gall, Wanting thee, that aidest more

On the darling thing whatever, The god's victories than before

Whence they feel it death to sever, All his panthers, and the brawls

Though it be, as they, perforce,
Of his piping Bacchanals.

Guiltless of the sad divorce.
These, as stale, we disallow,
Or judge of thee meant: only thou

For I must (nor let it grieve thee,
His true Indian conquest art;

Friendliest of plants, that I must) leave thee. And, for ivy round his dart,

For thy sake, Tobacco, I The reformed god now weaves

Would do any thing but die, A finer thyrsus of thy leaves.

And but seek to extend my days

Long enough to sing thy praise. Scent to match thy rich perfume

But, as she, who once hath been Chemic art did ne'er presume

A king's consort, is a queen Through her quaint alembic strain,

Ever after, nor will bate None so sov'reign to the brain.

Any tittle of her state, Nature, that did in thee excel,

Though a widow, or divorced, Fram'd again no second smell.

So I, from thy converse forced, Roses, violets, but toys

The old name and style retain, For the smaller sort of boys,

A right Katherine of Spain; Or for greener damsels meant;

And a seat, too, 'mongst the joys Thou art the only manly scent.

Of the blest Tobacco Boys;

Where though I, by sour physician,
Stinking'st of the stinking kind,

Am debarr'd the full fruition
Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind,
Africa, that brags her foyson,

Of thy favours, I may catch

Some collateral sweets, and snatch
Breeds no such prodigious poison,
Henbane, nightshade, both together,

Sidelong odours, that give life

Like glances from a neighbour's wife;
Hemlock, aconite-

And still live in the by-places
Nay, rather,

And the suburbs of thy graces;
Plant divine, of rarest virtue;

And in thy borders take delight,
Blisters on the tongue would hurt you.

An unconquer'd Canaanite.
'Twas but in a sort I blam'd thee;
None e'er prosper'd who defam'd thee;
Irony all, and feign'd abuse,

TO T. L. H.
Such as perplext lovers use,

Model of thy parent dear, At a need, when, in despair

Serious infant worth a fear: To paint forth their fairest fair,

In thy unfaultering visage well Or in part but to express

Picturing forth the son of Tell, That exceeding comeliness

When on his forehead, firm and good, Which their fancies doth so strike,

Motionless mark, the apple stood; They borrow language of dislike;

Guileless traitor, rebel mild, And, instead of Dearest Miss,

Convict unconscious, culprit-child! Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss,

Gates that close with iron roar And those forms of old admiring,

Have been to thee thy nursery door;

ON THE SAME PICTURE BEING REMOVED TO MAKE

PLACE FOR A PORTRAIT OF A LADY BY TITIAN.

one,

who

a

Chains that chink in cheerless cells

This saintly lady Abbess hath made me justly fear, Have been thy rattles and thy bells;

It nothing will avail me that I were worshipp'd Walls contrived for giant sin

here."
Have hemmed thy faultless weakness in;
Near thy sinless bed black guilt

LINES
Her discordant house hath built,
And filled it with her monstrous brood-
Sights, by thee not understood

Who art thou, fair

usurp's

'st the place Sights of fear, and of distress,

Of Blanch, the lady of the matchless grace? That pass a harmless infant's guess!

Come fair and pretty, tell to me,

Who, in thy life-time, thou might'st be. But the clouds, that overcast

Thou pretty art and fair, Thy young morning, may not last.

But with the lady Blanch thou never must compare. Soon shall arrive the rescuing hour,

No need for Blanch her history to tell; That yields thee up to Nature's power.

Whoever saw her face, they there did read it well. Nature, that so late doth greet thee,

But when I look on thee, I only know Shall in o'er-flowing measure meet thee.

There lived a pretty maid some hundred years ago. She shall recompense with cost For every lesson thou hast lost. Then wandering up thy sire's lov'd hill,

LINES Thou shalt take thy airy fill

ON THE CELEBRATED PICTURE BY LIONARDO DA Of health and pastime. Birds shall sing

VINCI, CALLED THE VIRGIN OF THE ROCKS. For thy delight each May morning. 'Mid new-yean’d lambkins thou shalt play,

While young John runs to greet Hardly less a lamb than they.

The greater infant's feet, Then thy prison's lengthened bound

The mother standing by, with trembling passion Shall be the horizon skirting round.

Of devout admiration,

[ration; And, while thou fillest thy lap with flowers,

Beholds the engaging mystic play, and pretty adoTo make amends for wintery hours,

Nor knows as yet the full event The breeze, the sunshine, and the place,

Of those so low beginnings, Shall from thy tender brow efface

From whence we date our winnings, Each vestige of untimely care,

But wonders at the intent (worship meant. That sour restraint had graven there;

Of those new rites, and what that strange childAnd on thy every look impress

But at her side A more excelling childishness.

An angel doth abide,

With such a perfect joy So shall be thy days beguil'd,

As no dim doubts alloy,
Thornton Hunt, my favourite child.

An intuition,
A glory, an amenity,
Passing the dark condition

Of blind humanity,
LINES

As if he surely knew
SUGGESTED BY A PICTURE OF TWO FEMALES BY

All the blest wonders should ensue,

Or he had lately left the upper sphere, [dles there. The lady Blanch, regardless of all her lovers' fears,

And had read all the sovran schemes and divine ridTo the Urs’line convent hastens, and long the abbess hears.

[ye lead.”

SONNETS. “O Blanch, my child, repent ye of the courtly life Blanch looked on a rose-bud and little seem'd to heed.

[thought She looked on the rose-bud, she looked round, and You are not, Kelly, of the common strain, On all her heart had whisper'd, and all the Nun That stoop their pride and female honor down bad taught.

(my fame, To please that many-headed beast the town, “ I am worshipped by lovers, and brightly shines And vend their lavish smiles and tricks for gain; All Christendom resoundeth the noble Blanch's By fortune thrown amid the actors' train,

[the tree, You keep your native dignity of thought; Nor shall I quickly wither like the rose-bud from The plaudits that attend you come unsought, My queen-like graces shining when my beauty's As tributes due unto your natural vein. gone

[head, Your tears have passion in them, and a grace But when the sculptur’d marble is raised o'er my Of genuine freshness, which our hearts avow; And the matchless Blanch lies lifeless among the Your smiles are winds whose ways we cannot trace, noble dead,

That vanish and return we know not how

9

LIONARDO DA VINCI.

TO MISS KELLY.

name.

from me.

And please the better from a pensive face,

A timid grace sits trembling in her eye, A thoughtful eye, and a reflecting brow.

As loth to meet the rudeness of men's sight,

Yet shedding a delicious lunar light, ON THE SIGHT OF SWANS IN KENSINGTON GARDEN. That steeps in kind oblivious ecstasy Queen-bird that sittest on thy shining nest,

The care-crazed mind, like some still melody: And thy young cygnets without sorrow hatchest,

Speaking most plain the thoughts which do possess And thou, thou other royal bird, that watchest Her gentle sprite: peace, and meek quietnes, Lest the white mother wandering feet molest:

And innocent loves, and maiden purity: Shrined are your offspring in a chrystal cradle,

A look whereof might heal the cruel smart Brighter than Helen's ere she yet had burst Of changed friends, or fortune's wrongs unkind; Her shelly prison. They shall be born at first Might to sweet deeds of mercy move the heart Strong, active, graceful, perfect, swan-like, able

Of him who hates his brethren of mankind. To tread the land or waters with security.

Turned are those lights from me, who fondly yet Unlike poor human births, conceived in sin,

Past joys, vain loves, and buried hopes regret. In grief brought forth, both outwardly and in Confessing weakness, error, and impurity.

If from my lips some angry accents fell, Did heavenly creatures own succession's line,

Peevish complaint, or harsh reproof unkind, The births of heaven like to your's would shine.

'Twas but the error of a sickly mind

And troubled thoughts, clouding the purer well, Was it some sweet device of faery

And waters clear, of reason; and for me That mocked my steps with many a lonely glade, Let this my verse the poor atonement beAnd fancied wanderings with a fair-hair'd maid? My verse, which thou to praise wert ever inclined Have these things been? or what rare witchery, Too highly, and with a partial eye to see Impregning with delights the charmed air,

No blemish. Thou to me didst ever shew
Enlighted up the semblance of a smile

Kindest affection; and would oft-times lend
In those fine eyes? methought they spake the while An ear to the desponding love-sick lay,
Soft soothing things, which might enforce despair Weeping my sorrows with me, who repay
To drop the murdering knife, and let go by But ill the mighty debt of love I owe,
His foul resolve. And does the lonely glade Mary, to thee, my sister and my friend.
Still court the footsteps of the fair-hair'd maid?
Still in her locks the gales of summer sigh?
While I forlorn do wander reckless where,
And mid my wanderings meet no Anna there.

What reason first imposed thee, gentle name,

Name that my father bore, and his sire's sire, Methinks how dainty sweet it were, reclin'd Without reproach? we trace our stream no higher; Beneath the vast out-stretching branches high

And I, a childless man, may end the same. Of some old wood, in careless sort to lie,

Perchance some shepherd on Lincolnian plains, Nor of the busier scenes we left behind

In manners guileless as his own sweet flocks, Aught envying. And, O Anna! mild-eyed maid ! Received thee first amid the merry mocks Beloved! I were well content to play

And arch allusions of his fellow swains. With thy free tresses all a summer's day,

Perchance from Salem's holier fields returned, Losing the time beneath the greenwood shade. With glory gotten on the heads abhorr'd Or we might sit and tell some tender tale

Of faithless Saracens, some martial lord Of faithful vows repaid by cruel scorn,

Took his meek title, in whose zeal he burn'd. A tale of true love, or of friend forgot ;

Whate'er the fount whence thy beginnings came, And I would teach thee, lady, how to rail

No deed of mine shall shame thee, gentle name. In gentle sort, on those who practise not Or love or pity, though of woman born.

TO JOHN LAMB, ESQ. OF THE SOUTH-SEA-HOUSI When last I roved these winding wood-walks green, John, you were figuring in the gay career Green winding walks, and shady pathways sweet,

Of blooming manhood with a young man's joy, Oft times would Anna seek the silent scene,

When I was yet a little peevish boyShrouding her beauties in the lone retreat.

Though time has made the difference disappear No more I hear her footsteps in the shade:

Betwixt our ages, which then seemed so greatHer image only in these pleasant ways

And still by rightful custom you retain
Meets me self-wandering, where in happier days

Much of the old authoritative strain,
I held free converse with the fair-bair'd maid. And keep the elder brother up in state.
I passed the little cottage which she loved,

0! you do well in this. 'Tis man's worst deed The cottage which did once my all contain; To let the “ things that have been" run to waste, It spake of days which ne'er must come again, And in the unmeaning present sink the p:est: Spake to my heart, and much my heart was moved. In whose dim glass even now I faintly read “ Now fair befall thee, gentle maid!” said I,

Old buried forms, and faces long ago,
And from the cottage turned me with a sigh. Which you, and I, and one more, only know.

THE FAMILY NAME.