SONG.

WHICH is the finest feature

Of a lovely woman's face?
Which to the gentle creature
Adds the greatest grace?
Neck, or eye, or brow,
Cheek, or lip, or mou'?

I think that a red lip pouting
Is a very charming affair;
And 'tis past all sober doubting
That Harriet's head of hair,
Glossy as a heron's wing,

Is a very bright and lovely thing.

But, after all, the feature

Of a lovely woman's face What to the gentle creature

Adds the greatest grace — Is the word, and look, and tone, That proclaim her all your own.

STANZAS.

No bugle must sound:

Ye bright, waving banners, stoop low!

Let your lances with cypress be bound Let the drums be all silent in woe !

The bravest in fight

The pride of our glory-is slain!

On the war-cloud, to mansions of light,

His spirit has sped from the plain.

EAST FLORIDA, 1840.

THE FLATTERER.

A DIALOGUE BETWEEN A LADY AND

HER MAID.

Lady. NAY, Florence, do not flatter me. I hate flattery. Tell me the truth. What did Sir Charles say?

Maid. He said you had the finest form he

ever saw.

Lady. Pshaw! nonsense!

You said he

spoke of my eyes. What did he say of them? Maid. I am afraid I shall offend you.

Lady. Offend me? Why?

Maid. You said you did not like flattery. Lady. Nor do I. I hate it. I hate flattery. But what said Sir Charles about my eyes?

Maid. He said they united the softness of the opal with the brilliancy of the diamond. He said they became one whose dignity would have been forbidding, had it not been redeemed by so much grace.

Lady. Was that all he said?
Maid. Yes, lady.

Lady. Are you sure

?

Maid. Yes, I am sure, my lady.

Lady. Well, Flora, this is the same dress I wore when Sir Charles said those things of me; is it not?

Maid. The same.

Lady. Florence, you are a good girl, and I beg you to accept this brooch; but do not flatter me more. I wish you would not tell me those things of Sir Charles. I hate flattery above all things.

Maid. (Aside.) No doubt; witness this beautiful brooch!

ON ABSENCE.

FRIENDSHIP and love, divinely sung,
In many a poet's lay I hear;
But I, though sanguine still and young,
Too long have ceased to know them near.

And were there none who owe me these,
And none to whom the debt is owed,
It would not steal an hour of ease,

Nor give my heart a moment's load,

To know that through my best of youth
Its lot in loneliness is cast,

With nought to cheer, and nought to soothe,
Save idle memory of the past.

But when I think of those whose eyes
Have warm and tender looks for me,

United by those kindred ties,

Which time may wear but never free,—

Of those with whom my early years

In boyish innocence were spent,

I give perforce my soul to tears,

Which else could find no other vent.