Oh! many a pang the heart hath proved,
Hath deeply suffered, fondly loved,
Ere the sad strain could catch from thence
Such deep impassioned eloquence !—
Yes! gaze on him, that minstrel boy—
He is no child of hope and joy!
Though few his years, yet have they been
Such as leave traces on the mien,
And o'er the roses of our prime
Breathe other blights than those of time.
Yet seems his spirit wild and proud,
By grief unsoftened and unbowed.
Oh! there are sorrows which impart
A sternness foreign to the heart,

And, rushing with an earthquake's power,
That makes a desert in an hour,
Rouse the dread passions in their course,
As tempests wake the billows' force!-
'Tis sad, on youthful Guido's face,
The stamp of woes like these to trace.
Oh! where can ruins awe mankind,
Dark as the ruins of the mind?

His mien is lofty, but his gaze
Too well a wandering soul betrays :
His full dark eye at times is bright
With strange and momentary light,
Whose quick uncertain flashes throw
O'er his pale cheek a hectic glow:
And oft his features and his air
A shade of troubled mystery wear,
A glance of hurried wildness, fraught
With some unfathomable thought.
Whate'er that thought, still, unexpressed,
Dwells the sad secret in his breast;
The pride his haughty brow reveals,
All other passion well conceals—

He breathes each wounded feeling's tone
In music's eloquence alone;

His soul's deep voice is only poured
Through his full song and swelling chord.
He seeks no friend, but shuns the train
Of courtiers with a proud disdain ·
And, save when Otho bids his lay
Its half unearthly power essay
In hall or bower the heart to thril.,
His haunts are wild and lonely still.
Far distant from the heedless throng,
He roves old Tiber's banks along,
Where Empire's desolate remains
Lie scattered o'er the silent plains;
Or, lingering 'midst each ruined shrine

F

That strews the desert Palatine,
With mournful yet commanding mien,
Like the sad genius of the scene,
Entranced in awful thought appears
To commune with departed years.
Or, at the dead of night, when Rome
Seems of heroic shades the home;
When Tiber's murmuring voice recalls
The mighty to their ancient halls;
When hushed is every meaner sound,
And the deep moonlight-calm around
Leaves to the solemn scene alone
The majesty of ages flown,—
A pilgrim to each hero's tomb,

He wanders through the sacred gloom;
And, 'midst those dwellings of decay,
At times will breathe so sad a lay,
So wild a grandeur in each tone,
'Tis like a dirge for empires gone!

Awake thy pealing harp again,
But breathe a more exulting strain,
Young Guido! for awhile forgot
Be the dark secrets of thy lot,
And rouse the inspiring soul of song
To speed the banquet's hour along!--
The feast is spread, the music's call
Is echoing through the royal hall,
And banners wave and trophies shine
O'er stately guests in glittering line;
And Otho seeks awhile to chase
The thoughts he never can erase,

And bid the voice, whose murmurs deep
Rise like a spirit on his sleep-

The still small voice of conscience-die,
Lost in the din of revelry.

On his pale brow dejection lowers,

But that shall yield to festal hours:

A gloom is in his faded eye,

But that from music's power shall fly :

His wasted cheek is wan with care,

But mirth shall spread fresh crimson there.

Wake, Guido! wake thy numbers high,
Strike the bold chord exultingly!
And pour upon the enraptured ear
Such strains as warriors love to hear!
Let the rich mantling goblet flow,
And banish all resembling woe;
And, if a thought intrude, of power
To mar the bright convivial hour,
Still must its influence lurk unseen,
And cloud the heart-but not the mien !

Away, vain dream!-on Otho's brow,
Still darker lower the shadows now;
Changed are his features, now o'erspread
With the cold paleness of the dead;
Now crimsoned with a hectic dye,
The burning flush of agony!

His lip is quivering, and his breast
Heaves with convulsive pangs oppressed;
Now his dim eye seems fixed and glazed,
And now to heaven in anguish raised ;
And as, with unavailing aid,

Around him throng his guests dismayed,
He sinks-while scarce his struggling breath
Hath power to falter-"This is death!"

Then rushed that haughty child of song,
Dark Guido, through the awe-struck throng:
Filled with a strange delirious light,
His kindling eye shone wildly bright;
And on the sufferer's mien awhile
Gazing with stern vindictive smile,
A feverish glow of triumph dyed

His burning cheek, while thus he cried :-
"Yes! these are death-pangs-on thy brow
Is set the seal of vengeance now!
Oh! well was mixed the deadly draught,
And long and deeply hast thou quaffed;
And bitter as thy pangs may be,

They are but guerdons meet from me!
Yet, these are but a moment's throes,
Howe'er intense, they soon shall close.
Soon shalt thou yield thy fleeting breath-
My life hath been a lingering death;
Since one dark hour of woe and crime,
A blood-spot on the page of time !

"Deemest thou my mind of reason void?

It is not frenzied,--but destroyed!

Ay! view the wreck with shuddering thought,-That work of ruin thou hast wrought!

The secret of thy doom to tell,

My name alone suffices well!

Stephania!-once a hero's bride!

Otho! thou knowest the rest-he died.
Yes! trusting to a monarch's word,
The Roman fell, untried, unheard!
And thou, whose every pledge was vain,
How couldst thou trust in aught again?

"He died, and I was changed--my soul,
A lonely wanderer, spurned control.
From peace, and light, and glory hurled,
The outcast of a purer world,

I saw each brighter hope o'erthrown,
And lived for one dread task alone.
The task is closed, fulfilled the vow-
The hand of death is on thee now.
Betrayer! in thy turn betrayed,

The debt of blood shall soon be paid!
Thine hour is come-the time hath been
My heart had shrunk from such a scene;
That feeling long is past—my fate
Hath made me stern as desolate.

"Ye that around me shuddering stand,
Ye chiefs and princes of the land!
Mourn ye a guilty monarch's doom?
Ye wept not o'er the patriot's tomb!
He sleeps unhonoured-yet be mine
To share his low, neglected shrine.
His soul with freedom finds a home,
His grave is that of glory-Rome!
Are not the great of old with her,
That city of the sepulchre ?

Lead me to death! and let me share
The slumbers of the mighty there!"

The day departs-that fearful day
Fades in calm loveliness away :
From purple heavens its lingering beam
Seems melting into Tiber's stream,
And softly tints each Roman hill
With glowing light, as clear and still
As if, unstained by crime or woe,
Its hours had passed in silent flow.
The day sets calmly-it hath been
Marked with a strange and awful scene:
One guilty bosom throbs no more,
And Otho's pangs and life are o'er.
And thou, ere yet another sun
His burning race hath brightly run,
Released from anguish by thy foes,
Daughter of Rome! shalt find repose.
Yes! on thy country's lovely sky
Fix yet once more thy parting eye!
A few short hours-and all shall be
The silent and the past for thee.
Oh! thus with tempests of a day
We struggle, and we pass away,
Like the wild billows as they sweep,
Leaving no vestige on the deep!
And o'er thy dark and lowly bed
The sons of future days shall tread,
The pangs, the conflicts, of thy lot
By them unknown, by thee forgot.

["Antony, concluding that he could not die more honourably than in battle, determined to attack Cæsar at the same time both by sea and land. The night preceding the execution of this design, he ordered his servants a supper to render him their best services that evening, and fill the wine round plentifully, for the day following they might belong to another master, whilst he lay extended on the ground, no longer of consequence either to them or to himself. His friends were affected, and wept to hear him talk thus; which when he perceived, he encouraged them by assurances that his expectations of a glorious victory were at least equal to those of an honourable death. At the dead of night, when universal silence reigned through the city-a silence that was deepened by the awful thought of the ensuing day-on a sudden was heard the sound of musical instruments, and a noise which resembled the exclamations of Bacchanals. This tumultuous procession seemed to pass through the whole city, and to go out at the gate which led to the enemy's camp. Those who reflected on this prodigy concluded that Bacchus, the god whom Antony affected to imitate, had then forsaken him."-LANGHORNE'S Plutarch.]

THY foes had girt thee with their dead array,
O stately Alexandria !-yet the sound

Of mirth and music, at the close of day,

Swelled from thy splendid fabrics, far around
O'er camp and wave. Within the royal hall,
In gay magnificence the feast was spread;
And, brightly streaming from the pictured wall,
A thousand lamps their trembling lustre shed
O'er many a column, rich with precious dyes,

That tinge the marble's vein, 'neath Afric's burning skies.

And soft and clear that wavering radiance played
O'er sculptured forms, that round the pillared scene
Calm and majestic rose, by art arrayed

In goldlike beauty, awfully serene.

Oh! how unlike the troubled guests reclined
Round that luxurious board !-in every face

Some shadow from the tempest of the mind

Rising by fits, the searching eye might trace,

Though vainly masked in smiles which are not mirth,
But the proud spirit's veil thrown o'er the woes of earth.

Their brows are bound with wreaths, whose transient bloom
May still survive the wearers-and the rose