With my hands I'll bind the briers, Gone to his death-bed, All under the willow tree. Come, with acorn-cup and thorn, Gone to his death-bed, All under the willow tree. Water-witches, crown'd with reytes,† SONG. On a Young Lady going out of town in Spring. DRYDEN. Ask not the cause, why sullen Spring Chloris is gone, the cruel fair, But left her lover in despair, To sigh, to languish, and to die : Great god of love, why hast thou made And change the laws of every land? Where thou had'st plac'd such power before, Thou should'st have made her mercy more. When Chloris to the temple comes, I only am by Love design'd A MORTAL'S WISH. ANN MARIA PORTER. YE Winds, whose sounding pinions sweep Thou starry heav'n, whose sleepless eyes O tell me of some solitude, Howe'er remote ; Some place, where sound of human woe O tell me, if such spot there be, These feet shall haste; And there, to shun the sight of grief, My days I'll waste! On sweep the blasts! Yet Fancy's ear Catches at times, through tempest drear, These accents stern: "Weak Child of ignorance! refrain; Cease thus to urge a question vain ; Listen and learn! "From pole to pole, where'er we fly, Sorrow and pain are virtue's soil; "His task fulfill'd, the fruit obtain❜d, Go-ask not then yon starry sky "Back to the world, and bravely dare Of grief and wrong thy destin'd share ; Resume life's load; Mourn not, but aid thy kindred dust, THE SHEPHERD. REV. W. GILLESPIE. FROM his cot on the plain hied the shepherd swain, The moon was his guide through the desert so wide; Deceitful the guide, and hopeless the lover; For the chill storms arose, and the rain-drops froze, And mantled the hills with a snowy cover. But love nerv'd his form as he baffled the storm, And his faithful dog still leapt on before him; Till the moon hid her light in the clouds of the night, And dark were the shades that now brooded o'er him. "O cease, cruel wind!" cried the wandering hind, "To beat on the breast that with love is swelling; And thou, Moon so pale, lift thy cloudy veil, And lighten the way to my maiden's dwelling." Yet, still urg'd by love, with the tempest he strove, And flounder'd along through each snowy billow, Till he sunk down to rest on the mountain's breast, The heath for his bed, and a wreath for his pillow. Ah! woe to the wight on the lone pathless height, By the wintry storm and the night o'ertaken; Who, weary and spent, on the cold snowy bent Lays him down to sleep, shall never awaken! Long marvell'd the maid why her lover delay'd, And look'd from the door of her lonely dwelling; She saw but the drift, as it fell so swift, And heard but the sprite of the tempest yelling. Pale, pale is the snow in the moonlight glow, And cold is the frost as it glazes the river; But paler that form which lies stretch'd in the storm, And colder those lips that are silent for ever. STANZAS WRITTEN AT SUNSET. ANONYMOUS. How sweet, my friend, it is to rove, Now when the gorgeous sun descending, Pours streams of gold on hill and grove, To nature richest beauty lending! Yon clouds against the west that lie, How bright their ample skirts are glowing! While Fancy views their magic dye, And still some mimic form bestowing, In mountains now beholds them tost, Where happiness is ever found; Where human woes, and tears, and sighing, Can never come-but joys abound, And soft the rosy hours are flying |