To-night will guide thee, Traveller, and the war A dismal night-and on my wakeful bed Thoughts, Traveller, of thee will fill my head, And him who rides where winds and waves contend, And strives, rude cradled on the seas, to guide SONNET VI. BY CAPEL LOFFT, ESQ. This Sonnet was addressed to the Author of this Volume, and was occasioned by several little Quatorzains, misnomered Sonnets, which he published in the Monthly Mirror. He begs leave to return his thanks to the much respected writer, for the permission so politely granted to insert it here, and for the good opinion he has been pleased to express of his productions. Ye, whose aspirings court the muse of lays, throng The muse selects, their ear the charm obeys Of its full harmony:-they fear to wrong The Sonnet, by adorning with a name Of that so varied and peculiar frame. SONNET VII. Recantatory, in reply to the foregoing elegant Admonition. LET the sublimer muse, who, wrapt in night, Who wake the wood-nymphs from the forest shade [aid With wildest song;-Me, much behoves thy Of mingled melody, to grace my strain, And give it power to please, as soft it flows. Through the smooth murmurs of thy frequent close. SONNET VIII. On hearing the Sounds of an Eolian Harp. So ravishingly soft upon the tide Of the infuriate gust, it did career, It might have sooth'd its rugged charioteer, And sunk him to a zephyr ;-then it died, Melting in melody ;—and I descried, Borne to some wizard stream, the form appear Pour'd his lone song, to which the surge replied: SONNET IX. WHAT art thou, MIGHTY ONE! and where thy seat? Thou broodest on the calm that cheers the lands, And thou dost bear within thine awful hands The rolling thunders and the lightnings fleet, Stern on thy dark-wrought car of cloud and wind, 'Thou guid'st the northern storm at night's dead noon, Or on the red wing of the fierce Monsoon, Disturb'st the sleeping giant of the Ind. In the drear silence of the polar span Hears nightly howl the tiger's hungry brood? Vain thought! the confines of his throne to trace, Who glows through all the fields of boundless space. A BALLAD. BE hush'd, be hush'd, ye bitter winds, Lie still, lie still, ye busy thoughts, That wring with grief my aching breast. Oh! cruel was my faithless love, When exiled from my native home, My child moans sadly in my arms, Ah, little knows the hapless babe What makes its wretched mother weep! Now lie thee still, my infant dear, And never will he shelter thee. Oh, that I were but in my grave. THE LULLABY. OF A FEMALE CONVICT TO HER CHILD, THE NIGHT PREVIOUS TO EXECUTION. SLEEP, baby mine,* enkerchieft on my bosom, Thy cries they pierce again my bleeding breast Sleep, baby mine, not long thou'lt have a mother To lull thee fondly in her arms to rest. Baby, why dost thou keep this sad complaining, Long from mine eyes have kindly slumbers fled, Hush, hush, my babe, the night is quickly waning, And I would fain compose my aching head. Poor wayward wretch! and who will heed thy weeping, When soon an outcast on the world thou'lt be: *Sir Phillip Sidney has a poem beginning, "Sleep, Baby mine." |