Page images
PDF
EPUB

EATON STANNARD BARRETT.

Abstracted answers, sudden feints of glee,
And steadfast looks unconscious that they see.
Much ease she summons up, when he retires;
Affects to mock him, to defend him, fires.
Her shunning eyes his glad return proclaim,
And her cheek kindles at his magic name.

Ah, cold are those who banter or reprove,
The enchanting trivialities of love!

The smile, the pout, capricious, fond delays;
The sudden turn of the detected gaze;

The captive finger, pressed as 'twere by chance,
And unwithdrawn, as 'twere from absent trance;
Lips saying "No!" while eyes imply "You may!"
Sweet admonitions after willing play;

Wiles, which can even before a mother woo,-
The mother made a witless agent too;
Arch Anger, that so prettily can take
Offence, for kissing reconcilement's sake;
Wild vows, mad menaces, demure replies,—
Then all the tender discontent of sighs;
Romantic treaties sworn, to gaze, when far,
Each spangled midnight, on a mutual star;
And the long look, at parting backward cast,
The hopeless look-perhaps for hours the last!
Thus meekly kind, thus amorously coy,
Play courted maids; such courtship youths employ,
To them these nothings are momentous things,
Fraught with more cares than diadems to kings.

[graphic][merged small][merged small]

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.

NOT a drum was heard, not a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.

We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning,
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin enclosed his breast,

Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him; But he lay like a warrior taking his rest, With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;

But we steadfastly gazed on the face that was dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

CHARLES WOLFE.

We thought, as we hollowed his narrow bed,

And smoothed down his lonely pillow,

That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head, And we far away on the billow!

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him,--
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done,

When the clock struck the hour for retiring; And we heard the distant and random gun That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down,

From the field of his fame fresh and gory;

We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone,
But we left him alone with his glory!

[graphic]
[graphic][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

SOME people say, that, when but three hours old, The first-born Love out of his cradle leapt, And clove dun Chaos with his wings of gold, And, like an horticultural adept,

Stole a strange seed, and wrapt it up in mould, And sowed it in his mother's star, and kept Watering it all the summer with sweet dew, And with his wings fanning it as it grew.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY.

The plant grew strong and green-the snowy flower
Fell, and the long and gourd-like fruit began
To turn the light and dew by inward power

To its own substance: woven tracery ran
Of light firm texture, ribbed and branching, o'er

The solid rind, like a leaf's veined fan,

Of which Love scooped this boat, and with soft motion Piloted it round the circumfluous ocean.

THE CLOUD.

I BRING fresh showers for the thirsting flowers,
From the seas and the streams;

I bear light shades for the leaves when laid
In their noon-day dreams.

From my wings are shaken the dews that waken
The sweet buds every one,

When rocked to rest on their mother's breast,
As she dances about the sun.

I wield the flail of the lashing hail,

And whiten the green plains under,
And then again I dissolve it in rain,
And laugh as I pass in thunder.

I sift the snow on the mountains below,
And their great pines groan aghast;
And all the night 'tis my pillow white,

While I sleep in the arms of the blast.
Sublime on the towers of my skiey bowers,
Lightning, my pilot, sits,

In a cavern under is fettered the thunder,
It struggles and howls at fits;

« PreviousContinue »