And woman, lovely woman! thou,
My hope, my comforter, my all!
How cold must be my bosom now,
When e'en thy smiles begin to pall!
Without a sigh would I resign

This busy scene of splendid woe,
To make that calm contentment mine,
Which virtue knows, or seems to know.
Fain would I fly the haunts of men-
I seek to shun, not hate mankind;
My breast requires the sullen glen,

Whose gloom may suit a darken'd mind. Oh! that to me the wings were given Which bear the turtle to her nest! Then would I cleave the vault of heaven, To flee away, and be at rest.

of snow,*

To gaze on the torrent that thunder'd beneath, Or the mist of the tempest that gather'd below, Untutor'd by science, a stranger to fear,

And rude as the rocks where my infancy grew, No feeling, save one, to my bosom was dear: Need I say, my sweet Mary, 'twas centred in you?

Yet it could not be love, for I knew not the name, What passion can dwell in the heart of a child? But still I perceive an emotion the same

As I felt, when a boy, on the crag-cover'd wild: One image alone on my bosom impress'd,

I loved my bleak regions, nor panted for new; And few were my wants, for my wishes were bless'd;

And pure were my thoughts, for my soul was with you.

I arose with the dawn; with my dog as my guide, From mountain to mountain I bounded along; I breasted the billows of Dee's rushing tide,

And heard at a distance the Highlander's song: At eve, on my heath-cover'd couch of repose, No dreams, save of Mary, were spread to iny view;

And warm to the skies my devotions arose,

For the first of my prayers was a blessing on you.

I left my bleak home, and my visions were gone; The mountains are vanish'd, my youth is no

You knew that my soul, that my heart, my

existence,

If danger demanded, were wholly your own; You knew me unalter'd by years or by distance, Devoted to love and to friendship alone.

You knew, but away with the vain retrospec

tion!

The bond of affection no longer endures: Too late you may droop o'er the fond recollection,

And sigh for the friend who was formerly yours.

For the present we part- I will hope not for ever; For time and regret will restore you at last : To forget our dissension we both should endea

vour,

I ask no atonement, but days like the past.

TO THE EARL OF CLARE.
"Tu semper amoris

Sis memor, et cari comitis ne abscedat imago."
VAL. FLAC.

FRIEND of my youth! when young we roved,
Like striplings, mutually beloved,

With friendship's purest glow,

The bliss which winged those rosy hours
Was such as pleasure seldom showers
On mortals here below.

The recollection seems alone
Dearer than all the joys I've known,
When distant far from you:

Though pain, 'tis still a pleasing pain,
To trace those days and hours again,
And sigh again, adieu!

My pensive memory lingers o'er
Those scenes to be enjoy'd no more,
Those scenes regretted ever:
The measure of our youth is full,
Life's evening dream is dark and dull,

And we may meet-ah! never!
As when one parent spring supplies
Two streams which from one fountain rise,
Together join'd in vain ;

How soon, diverging from their source,
Each, murmuring, seeks another course,
Till mingled in the main !

Our vital streams of weal or woe,
Though near, alas! distinctly flow,
Nor mingle as before:

Now swift or slow, now black or clear,
Till death's unfathom'd gulf appear,
And both shall quit the shore.

Our souls, my friend! which once supplied
One wish, nor breathed a thought beside,
Now flow in different channels:
Disdaining humbler rural sports,
'Tis yours to mix in polish'd courts,

And shine in fashion's annals:

"Tis mine to waste on love my time,
Or vent my reveries in rhyme,

Without the aid of reason:
For sense and reason (critics know it)
Have quitted every amorous poet,

Nor left a thought to seize on.

Poor Little! sweet, melodious bard! *
Of late esteem'd it monstrous hard,

That he, who sang before all-
He who the lore of love expanded-
By dire reviewers should be branded
As void of wit and moral.

And yet, while Beauty's praise is thine,
Harmonious favourite of the Nine!
Repine not at thy lot.

Thy soothing lays may still be read,
When Persecution's arm is dead,

And critics are forgot.

Still I must yield those worthies merit, Who chasten, with unsparing spirit,

Bad rhymes, and those who write them;
And though myself may be the next
By criticism to be vext,

I really will not fight them.*
Perhaps they would do quite as well
To break the rudely sounding shell
Of such a young beginner;
He who offends at pert nineteen,
Ere thirty may become, I ween,
A very harden'd sinner.

Now, Clare, I must return to you;
And, sure, apologies are due:

Accept, then, my concession.
In truth, dear Clare, in fancy's flight
I soar along from left to right;
My muse admires digression.

I think I said 'twould be your fate
To add one star to royal state ;- -

May regal smiles attend you!
And should a noble monarch reign,
You will not seek his smiles in vain,
If worth can recommend you.
Yet since in danger courts abound,
Where specious rivals glitter round,

From snares may saints preserve you; And grant your love or friendship ne'er From any claim a kindred care,

But those who best deserve you! Not for a moment may you stray From truth's secure, unerring way!

May no delights decoy!

O'er roses may your footsteps move,
Your smiles be ever smiles of love,

Your tears be tears of joy!

Oh if you wish that happiness
Your coming days and years may bless,
And virtues crown your brow;
Be still as you were wont to be,
Spotless as you've been known to me,-
Be still as you are now.

And though some trifling share of praise,
To cheer my last declining days,

To me were doubly dear:
Whilst blessing your beloved name,
I'd waive at once a poet's fame,
To prove a prophet here.

LINES WRITTEN BENEATH AN ELM IN

THE CHURCHYARD OF HARROW. SPOT of my youth whose hoary branches sigh, Swept by the breeze that fans thy cloudless sky; Where now alone I muse, who oft have trod, With those I loved, thy soft and verdant sod: With those who, scatter'd far, perchance deplore, Like me, the happy scenes they knew before: Oh! as I trace again thy winding hill, Mine eyes admire, my heart adores thee still, Thou drooping Elm! beneath whose boughs I lay.

And frequent mused the twilight hours away: Where, as they once were wont, my limbs recline, But ah! without the thoughts which then were

mine :

ODE TO NAPOLEON.

"Expende Annibalem :-quot libras in duce summo Invenies?" JUVENAL, Sat. X.

"The Emperor Nepos was acknowledged by the Senate, by the Italians, and by the Provincials of Gaul; his moral virtues and military talents were loudly celebrated; and those who derived any private benefit from his government announced in prophetic strains the restoration of public felicity. By this shameful abdication, he protracted his life a few years, in a very ambiguous state, between an Emperor and an Exile, till- ."-GIBBON'S Decline and Fall, vol. vi. p. 220.

'Tis done-but yesterday a King!
And arm'd with Kings to strive-
And now thou art a nameless thing:
So abject-yet alive!

Is this the man of thousand thrones,
Who strew'd our earth with hostile bones,
And can he thus survive?
Since he, miscall'd the Morning Star,
Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far.
Ill-minded man! why scourge thy kind
Who bow'd so low the knee?
By gazing on thyself grown blind,
Thou taught'st the rest to see.
With might unquestion'd,-power to save,-
Thine only gift hath been the grave,

To use that worshipp'd thee;
Nor till thy fall could mortals guess
Ambition's less than littleness!
Thanks for that lesson-it will teach
To after-warriors more
Than high Philosophy can preach,
And vainly preach'd before.
That spell upon the minds of men
Breaks never to unite again,

That led them to adore
Those Pagod things of sabre sway,
With fronts of brass, and feet of clay.
The triumph, and the vanity,

The rapture of the strife-
The earthquake voice of Victory,
To thee the breath of life;

The sword, the sceptre, and that sway
Which man seem'd made but to obey,
Wherewith renown was rife-

All quell'd!-Dark Spirit! what must be
The madness of thy memory!
The Desolator desolate !

The Victor overthrown!
The Arbiter of others' fate

A Suppliant for his own!
Is it some yet imperial hope
That with such change can calmly cope?
Or dread of death alone?

To die a prince-or live a slave-
Thy choice is most ignobly brave!
He who of old would rend the oak,*
Dream'd not of the rebound;
Chain'd by the trunk he vainly broke-
Alone-how look'd he round!
Thou, in the sternness of thy strength,
An equal deed hast done at length,

And darker fate hast found:
He fell, the forest prowlers' prey;
But thou must eat thy heart away!
The Roman, † when his burning heart
Was slaked with blood of Rome,
Threw down the dagger-dared depart,
In savage grandeur, home:
He dared depart, in utter scorn
Of men that such a yoke had borne,
Yet left him such a doom!
His only glory was that hour
Of self-upheld abandon'd power.
The Spaniard, when the lust of sway,
Had lost its quickening spell,
Cast crowns for rosaries away,
An empire for a cell;

A strict accountant of his beads,
A subtle disputant on creeds,
His dotage trifled well:

Yet better had he neither known

A bigot's shrine, nor despot's throne.
But thou-from thy reluctant hand
The thunderbolt is wrung-

Too late thou leav'st the high command
To which thy weakness clung;
All Evil Spirit as thou art,
It is enough to grieve the heart
To see thine own unstrung;

To think that God's fair world hath been
The footstool of a thing so mean!

And Earth hath spilt her blood for him,

Who thus can hoard his own!
And Monarchs bow'd the trembling limb,
And thank'd him for a throne!
Fair Freedom! we may hold thee dear,
When thus thy mightiest foes their fear
In humblest guise have shown.
Oh! ne'er may tyrant leave behind
A brighter name to lure mankind!
Thine evil deeds are writ in gore,

Nor written thus in vain-
Thy triumphs tell of fame no more,
Or deepen every stain:
If thou hadst died as honour dies,
Some new Napoleon might arise,

To shame the world again-
But who would soar the solar height,
To set in such a starless night?
Weigh'd in the balance, hero dust
Is vile as vulgar clay;
Thy scales, Mortality! are just
To all that pass away:

But yet methought the living great
Some higher sparks should animate.
To dazzle and dismay:

Nor deem'd Contempt could thus make
mirth

Of these, the Conquerors of the earth.
And she, proud Austria's mournful flower,
Thy still imperial bride,

How bears her breast the torturing hour?
Still clings she to thy side?

Must she, too, bend: must she, too, share,
Thy late repentance, long despair,

Thou throneless Homicide?

If still she loves thee, hold that gem,—
"Tis worth thy vanish'd diadem!
Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle,
And gaze upon the sea;
That element may meet thy smile-
It ne'er was ruled by thee!
Or trace with thine all idle hand,
In loitering mood upon the sand,

That Earth is now as free!
That Corinth's pedagogue hath now
Transferr'd his byword to thy brow.
Thou Timour! in his captive's cage, t
What thoughts will there be thine,
While brooding in thy prison'd rage,
But one "The world was mine!
Unless, like he of Babylon,
All sense is with thy sceptre gone,
Life will not long confine
That spirit pour'd so widely forth-
So long obey'd-so little worth!
Or, like the thief of fire from heaven,
Wilt thou withstand the shock?
And share with him, the unforgiven,
His vulture and his rock?
Foredoom'd by God-by man accurst,
And that last act, though not thy worst,
The very Fiend's arch mock;
He in his fall preserved his pride,
And, if a mortal, had as proudly died!
There was a day-there was an hour,
While earth was Gaul's-Gaul thine-

* Dionysius of Sicily.

The cage of Bajazet, by order of Tamerlane.

When that immeasurable power
Unsated to resign,

Had been an act of purer fame,
Than gathers round Marengo's name,
And gilded thy decline,

Through the long twilight of all time,
Despite some passing clouds of crime.
But thou, forsooth, must be a king,
And don the purple vest!

As if that foolish robe could wring
Remembrance from thy breast.
Where is that faded garment? where
The gewgaws thou wert fond to wear,
The star, the string, the crest?
Vain froward child of empire! say,
Are all thy playthings snatch'd away?
Where may the wearied eye repose,
When gazing on the Great;

Where neither guilty glory glows,
Nor despicable state?

Yes-one-the first-the last-the best-
The Cincinnatus of the West,

Whom envy dared not hate, Bequeath'd the name of Washington, To make man blush there was but one!

ODE FROM THE FRENCH.

I.

561

We do not curse thee, Waterloo! Though Freedom's blood thy plain bedew: There 'twas shed, but is not sunkRising from each gory trunk, Like the waterspout from ocean, With a strong and growing motion: It soars and mingles in the air, With that of lost LabedoyèreWith that of him whose honour'd grave Contains the "bravest of the brave.' A crimson cloud it spreads and glows, But shall return to whence it rose; When 'tis full 'twill burst asunderNever yet was heard such thunder As then shall shake the world with wonder- Never yet was seen such lightning As o'er heaven shall then be bright'ning! Like the Wormwood Star foretold By the sainted Seer of old, Showering down a fiery flood, Turning rivers into blood.