Yet, Lady, no!—for song so rude as mine,
Chase not the wonders of your dream divine;
Still, radiant eye! upon the tablet dwell;
Still, rosy finger! weave your pictured spell;
And, while I sing the animated smiles
Of fairy nature in these sun-born isles,
Oh! might the song awake some bright design,
Inspire a touch, or prompt one happy line,
Proud were my soul to see its humble thought
On painting's mirror so divinely caught,
And wondering Genius, as he leaned to trace
The faint conception kindling into grace,
Might love my numbers for the spark they threw,
And bless the lay that lent a charm to you!

Have you not oft, in nightly vision, strayed
To the pure isles of ever-blooming shade
Which bards of old, with kindly magic, placed
For happy spirits in th' Atlantic waste?
There as eternal gales, with fragrance warm,
Breathed from elysium through each shadowy form
In eloquence of eye, and dreams of song,
They charmed their lapse of nightless hours along!
Nor yet in song that mortal ear may suit,
For every spirit was itself a lute,

Where virtue wakened, with elysian breeze,
Pure tones of thought and mental harmonies!
Believe me, Lady, when the zephyrs bland
Floated our bark to this enchanted land,
These leafy isles upon the ocean thrown,
Like studs of emerald o'er a silver zone;
Not all the charm that ethnic fancy gave
To blessed arbours o'er the western wave
Could wake a dream more soothing or sublime
Of bowers ethereal and the spirit's clime!

The morn was lovely, every wave was still,
When the first perfume of a cedar-hill
Sweetly awaked us, and with smiling charms,
The fairy harbour wooed us to its arms.

*

Gently we stole, before the languid wind,

Through plantain shades that like an awning twined
And kissed on either side the wanton sails,

Breathing our welcome to these vernal vales;
While, far reflected o'er the wave serene,
Each wooded island shed so soft a green

*Nothing can be more romantic than the little harbour of St. George's. The number of beautiful islets, the singular clearness of the water, and the animated play of the graceful little boats, gliding for ever between the islands, and seeming to sail from one cedar-grove into another, form all together the sweetest miniature of nature that can be imagined.

That the enamoured keel, with whispering play,
Through liquid herbage seemed to steal its way!
Never did weary bark more sweetly glide,
Or rest its anchor in a lovelier tide!
Along the margin, many a brilliant dome,
White as the palace of a Lapland gnome,
Brightened the wave; in every myrtle grove,
Secluded bashful, like a shrine of love,
Some elfin mansion sparkled through the shade;
And, while the foliage interposing played,
Wreathing the structure into various grace,
Fancy would love, in many a form, to trace
The flowery capital, the shaft, the porch,*
And dream of temples, till her kindling torch
Lighted me back to all the glorious days
Of Attic genius; and I seemed to gaze
On marble, from the rich Pentelic mount,
Gracing the umbrage of some Naiad's fount.

Sweet airy being !+ who, in brighter hours,
Lived on the perfume of these honeyed bowers,
In velvet buds, at evening, loved to lie,
And win with music every rose's sigh!
Though weak the magic of my humble strain
To charm your spirit from its orb again,
Yet oh! for her beneath whose smile I sing,
For her (whose pencil, if your rainbow wing
Were dimmed or ruffled by a wintry sky,
Could smooth its feather and relume its dye,)
A moment wander from your starry sphere,
And if the lime-tree grove that once was dear,
The sunny wave, the bower, the breezy hill,
The sparkling grotto, can delight you still,
Oh! take their fairest tint, their softest light,
Weave all their beauty into dreams of night,
And, while the lovely artist slumbering lies,
Shed the warm picture o'er her mental eyes;
Borrow for sleep her own creative spells,

And brightly show what song but faintly tells!

*This is an allusion which, to the few who are fanciful enough to indulge in it, renders the scenery of Bermuda particularly interesting. In the short but beautiful twilight of their spring evenings, the white cottages scattered over the islands, and but partially seen through the trees that surround them, assume often the appearance of little Grecian temples, and fancy may embellish the poor fisherman's hut with columns which the pencil of Claude might imitate. I had one favourite object of this kind in my walks, which the hospitality of its owner robbed me of by asking me to visit him. He was a plain good man, and received me well and warmly; but I never could turn his house into a Grecian temple again.

"

Ariel. Among the many charms which Bermuda has for a poetic eye, we cannot for an instant forget that it is the scene of Shakspeare's "Tempest," and that here he conjured up the "delicate Ariel," who alone is worth the whole heaven of ancient mythology.

THE GENIUS OF HARMONY,

AN IRREGULAR ODE.

Ad harmoniam canere mundum.

Cicero. de Nat. Deor. lib. iii.

THERE lies a shell beneath the waves,

In many a hollow winding wreathed,
Such as of old

Echoed the breath that warbling sea-maids breathed.
This magic shell

From the white bosom of a Siren fell,

As once she wandered by the tide that laves
Sicilia's sands of gold.

It bears,

Upon its shining side, the mystic notes

Of those entrancing airs

The genii of the deep were wont to swell,
When heaven's eternal orbs their midnight music rolled!

Oh! seek it, wheresoe'er it floats;
And, if the power

Of thrilling numbers to thy soul be dear,
Go, bring the bright shell to my bower,
And I will fold thee in such downy dreams
As lap the spirit of the seventh sphere,
When Luna's distant tone falls faintly on his ear!
And thou shalt own

That, through the circle of creation's zone,
Where matter darkles or where spirit beams;
From the pellucid tides that whirl
The planets through their maze of song,
To the small rill that weeps along
Murmuring o'er beds of pearl;

From the rich sigh

Of the sun's arrow through an evening sky,
To the faint breath the tuneful osier yields
On Afric's burning fields;

Oh! thou shalt own this universe divine
Is mine!

That I respire in all and all in me,
One mighty mingled soul of boundless harmony!

Welcome, welcome, mystic shell!

Many a star has ceased to burn,

Many a tear has Saturn's urn

O'er the cold bosom of the ocean wept,
Since thy aërial spell

Hath in the waters slept !

I fly,

With the bright treasure, to my choral sky,
Where she who waked its early swell,

The Siren, with a foot of fire,

Walks o'er the great string of my Orphic Lyre,
Or guides around the burning pole

The winged chariot of some blissful soul!
While thou,

O son of earth! what dreams shall rise for thee!
Beneath Hispania's sun

Thou'lt see a streamlet run

Which I have warmed with dews of melody;
Listen!-when the night-wind dies

Down the still current, like a harp it sighs!
A liquid chord is every wave that flows,
An airy plectrum every breeze that blows!

There, by that wondrous stream,
Go, lay thy languid brow,

And I will send thee such a godlike dream,
Such-mortal! mortal! hast thou heard of him
Who, many a night, with his primordial lyre,
Sat on the chill Pangæan mount,

And, looking to the orient dim,

Watched the first flowing of that sacred fount
From which his soul had drunk its fire!
Oh! think what visions, in that lonely hour,
Stole o'er his musing breast!

What pious ecstacy

Wafted his prayer to that eternal Power

Whose seal upon this world impressed The various forms of bright divinity?

Or dost thou know what dreams I wove 'Mid the deep horror of that silent bower Where the rapt Samian slept his holy slumber? When, free

From every earthly chain,

From wreaths of pleasure and from bonds of pain, His spirit flew through fields above,

Drank at the source of Nature's fontal number, And saw, in mystic choir, around him move The stars of song, Heaven's burning minstrelsy! Such dreams, so heavenly bright,

I swear

By the great diadem that twines my hair,
And by the seven gems that sparkle there,
Mingling their beams

In a soft iris of harmonious light,

O mortal! such shall be thy radiant dreams!

Oh! for the boat the angel gave
To him who, in his heavenward flight,
Sailed, o'er the sun's ethereal wave,
To planet-isles of odorous light!
Sweet Venus, what a clime he found
Within thy orb's ambrosial round!
There spring the breezes, rich and warm,
That pant around thy twilight car;
There angels dwell, so pure of form
That each appears a living star!

These are the sprites, O radiant queen!
Thou send'st so often to the bed
Of her I love, with spell unseen,

Thy planet's brightening balm to shed:
To make the eye's enchantment clearer,
To give the cheek one rosebud more,
And bid that flushing lip be dearer

Which had been oh! too dear before!
But, whither means the muse to roam?
'Tis time to call the wanderer home.
Who could have ever thought to search her
Up in the clouds with Father Kircher?
So, health and love to all your mansion!
Long may the bowl that pleasures bloom in,
The flow of heart, the soul's expansion,
Mirth and song your board illumine!
Fare you well-remember too,

When cups are flowing to the brim,
That here is one who drinks to you,
And oh !-as warmly drink to him.

No-Lady! Lady! keep the ring ;
Oh! think, how many a future year.
Of placid smile and downy wing,
May sleep within its holy sphere !

Do not disturb their tranquil dream ;

Though love hath ne'er the mystery warmed,

Yet Heaven will shed a soothing beam,

To bliss the bond itself hath formed.

But then, that eye, that burning eye!
Oh! it doth ask, with magic power,

If Heaven can ever bless the tie

Where love inwreathes no genial flower! Away, away, bewildering look!

Or all the boast of virtue's o'er ; Go-hie thee to the sage's book,

And learn from him to feel no more!