II "Anil sleeping pangs awake—and — but away" 1 (Confound me if I know what next to say). M Lo Hope reviving re-expands her wings," And Master G— recites what Doctor Busby sings! — i "If mighty things with small we may compare," (Translated from the grammar for the fair!) Dramatic " spirit drives a conquering car," And burn'd poor Moscow like a tub of " tar." "This spirit Wellington has shown in Spain," To furnish melodrames for Drury Lane. "Another Marlborough points to Blenheim's story," And George and I will dramatise it for ye.

1 "In arts and sciences our isle hath shone"

(This deep discovery is mine alone).

"Oh British poesy, whose powers inspire"

My verse—or I'm a fool—and Fame's a liar, I "Thee we invoke, your sister arts implore"

With " smiles," and " lyres," and " pencils," and much more.

These, if we win the Graces, too, we gain
Disgraca, too !" inseparable train!" [Cupid"

"Three who have stolen their witching airs from
(Tou all know what I mean, unless you're stupid);
"Harmonious throng" that I have kept In petto,
Now to produce in a " divine sestettn " I!
'• While Poesy," with these delightful doxies,
"Sustains her part" in all the " upper" boxes!
"Thus lifted gloriously, youH soar along,"
Borne In the vast balloon of Busby's song;

i "Shine in your farce, masque, scenery, and play"

■ (For this last line George had a holiday).

'"Old Drury never, never soar'd so high,"

! So says the manager, and so say I. "But hold, you say, this self-complacent boast;" Is this the poem which the public lost? [pride ;" "True—true—that lowers at once our mounting But lo ! — the papers print what you deride. "'Tis ours to look on you—you hold the prize," 'T Is twenty guinea*, as they advertise! "A double blessing your rewards impart"— I wish I had them, then, with all my heart. "Our twofold feeling owns Its twofold cause," Why son and I both beg for your applause. "When in your fostering beams you bid us live," My next subscription list shall say how much you give!

October, 1812.

VEBSES FOUND IN A SUMMER HOUSE AT HALES-OWEN.'

j When Dryden's fool, " unknowing what he sought,"

; His hours in whistling spent, " for want of thought," 2

u This guiltless oaf his vacancy of sense

j' Supplied, and amply too, by innocence;

!] Did modern swains, possess'd of Cymon's powers,

II In Cymon's manner waste their leisure hours,

Th' offended guests would not, with blushing, see |! These fair green walks disgraced by infamy. Severe the fate of modern fools, alas I When vice and folly mark them as they pass, lake noxious reptiles o'er the whiten'd wall, The filth they leave still points out where they crawl.

1 [In Warwickshire.] '[See Cymon and Iphigenla.]

3 [" The Gcquel of a temporary liaison, formed by Lord Byron during his gay but brief career in London, occasioned the composition of this Impromptu. On the cessation of the [ connection, the fair one, actuated by jealousy, called one

REMEMBER THEE I REMEMBER THEE I

Emihui thee I remember thee!

Till Lethe quench life's burning stream Remorse and shame shall cling to thee,

And haunt thee like a feverish dream!

Remember thee 1 Ay, doubt it not.

Thy husband too shall think of thee: By neither shalt thou be forgot,

Thou false to him, thou fiend tome!'

TO TIME.

Time I on whose arbitrary wing

The varying hours must flag or fly,

Wiose tardy winter, fleeting spring,
But drag or drive us on to die—

Hail thou 1 who on my birth bestow'd

Those boons to all that know thee known;

Vet better I sustain thy load.
For now I bear the weight alone.

I would not one fond heart should share
The bitter moments thou hast given;

And pardon thee, since thou couldst spare
All that I loved, to peace or heaven.

To them be joy or rest, on me

Thy future ills shall press in vain:

I nothing owe but years to thee.
A debt already paid in pain.

Yet even that pain was some relief;

It felt, but still forgot thy power: The active agony of grief

Retards, but never counts the hour.

In joy I've sigh'd to think thy flight
Would soon subside from swift to slow;

Thy cloud could overcast the light,
But could not add a night to woe;

For then, however drear and dark.

My soul was suited to thy sky; One star alone shot forth a spark

To prove thee — not Eternity.

That beam hath sunk, and now thou art
A blank; a thing to count and curse.

Through each dull tedious trifling part.
Which all regret, yet all rehearse.

One scene even thou canst not deform;

The limit of thy sloth or speed
When future wanderers bear the storm

Which we shall sleep too sound to heed:

And I can smile to think how weak
Thine efforts shortly shall be shown.

When all the vengeance thou can-: wreak
Must fall upon—a nameless stone.

morning at her quondam lover's apartments. His Lord-Siwas from home; but finding 'Yatktk' on the table, tlx bdt wrote in tho first page of the volume the words ' Keturaoer me 1' Byron immediately wrote under tbe ominous wanucf these two stanzas." — Meuwin.)

TRANSLATION OF A ROMAIC LOVE SONG.

Ah! Love was never yet without
The pang, the agony, the doubt,
Which rends my heart with ceaseless sigh,
While day and night roll darkling by.

Without one friend to hear my woe,
I faint, I die beneath the blow.
That Love had arrows, well I knew;
Alas I I find them poisou'd too.

'i

Birds, yet in freedom, shun the net
Which Love around your haunts hath set;
I Or, circled by his fatal fire,

Your hearts shall burn, your hopes expire.

A bird of free and careless wing
Was 1, through many a smiling spring;
But caught within the subtle snare
I bum, and feebly flutter there.

Who ne'er have loved, and loved in vain,
Can neither feci nor pity pain,
The cold repulse, the look askance,
The lightning of Love's angry glance.

In flattering dreams I deem'd thee mine;
Now hope, and he who hoped, decline;
Like melting wax, or withering flower,
I feel my passion, and thy power.

My light of life I ah, tell me why

That pouting lip, and alter'd eye?

My bird of love ! my beauteous mate!

And art thou changed, and canst thou hate?

Mine eyes like wintry streams o'erflow:
What wretch with me would barter woe?
My bird! relent: one note could give
A charm to bid thy lover live.

My curdling blood, my madd'ning brain,
In silent anguish I sustain;
And still thy heart, without partaking
One pang, exults—while mine is breaking.

Pour me the poison ; fear not thou!
I Thou canst not murder more than now:
I've lived to curse my natal day,
And Love, that thus can lingering slay.

My wounded soul, my bleeding breast,
Can patience preach thee into rest?
Alas! too late, I dearly know
That joy is harbinger of woe.

THOD ART NOT FALSE, BUT THOU ART FICKLE.

Thou art not false, but thou art fickle,

To those thyself so fondly sought;
The tears that thou hast forced to trickle

Are doubly bitter from that thought:
Tut this which breaks the heart thou grievest,
Too well thou lov'st—too soon thou leavest.

The wholly false the heart despises,

And spurns deceiver and deceit; But she who not a thought disguises,

Whose love is as sincere as sweet,— When she can change who loved so truly, It feels what mine has felt so newly.

To dream of joy and wake to sorrow
Is doom'd to all who love or live;

And if, when conscious on the morrow,
We scarce our fancy can forgive,

That cheated us in slumber only.

To leave the waking soul more lonely,

What must they feel whom no false vision,
But truest, tendercst passion warm'd?

Sincere, but swift in sad transition;
As if a dream alone had charm'd?

Ah ! sure such grief is fancy's scheming,

And all thy change can be but dreaming!

ON BEING ASKED WHAT WAS THE "ORIGIN OF LOVE."

The " Origin of Love !"—Ah, why

That cruel question ask of me,
When thou may'st read in many an eye

He starts to life on seeing thee?

And shouldst thou seek his end to know:
My heart forebodes, my fears foresee,

He '11 linger long in silent woe;
But live—until I cease to be.

REMEMBER HIM, WHOM PASSION'S POWER.

Remember him whom passion's power

Severely, deeply, vainly proved: Remember thou that dangerous hour

When neither fell, though both were loved.

That yielding breast, that melting eye,

Too much invited to be blcss'd: That gentle prayer, that pleading sigh,

The wilder wish reproved, repress'd.

Oh ! let me feel that all I lost

But saved thee all that conscience fears; And blush for every pang it cost

To spare the vain remorse of years.

Yet think of this when many a tongue,
Whose busy accents whisper blame.

Would do the heart that loved thee wrong,
And brand a nearly blighted name.

Think that, whate'er to others, thou
Hast seen each selfish thought subdued:

I bless thy purer soul even now,
Even now, in midnight solitude.

Oh, God! that we had met in time.

Our hearts as fond, thy hand more free;

When thou hadst loved without a crime,
And I been less unworthy thee!

Far may thy days, as heretofore,
From this our gaudy world be past!

And that too bitter moment o'er,
Oh! may such trial be thy last.

This heart, alas! perverted long.
Itself destroy'd might there destroy;

To meet thee in the glittering throng,
Would wake Presumption's hope of joy.

Then to the things whose bliss or woe,
Like mine, Is wild and worthless all,

That world resign—such scenes forego.
Where those who feel must surely fall.

Thy youth, thy charms, thy tenderness,
Thy soul from lone, seclusion pure;

From what even here hath pass'd, may guess
What there thy bosom must endure.

Oh I pardon that imploring tear,
Since not by Virtue shed in vain.

My frenzy drew from eyes so dear;
For me they shall not weep again.

Though long and mournful must it be.
The thought that we no more may meet;

Yet I deserve the stern decree,

And almost deem the sentence sweet.

Still, had I loved thee less, my heart
H'nl then less sacrificed to thine;

It felt not half so much to part,
As if its guilt had made thee mine.

'ON LORD THURLOW'S POEMS.'

When Thurlow this damn'd nonsense sent

(I hope I am not violent),

Nor men nor gods knew what he meant.

And since not ev'n our Rogers' praise

To common sense his thoughts could raise —

Why would they let him print his lays?

To me, divine Apollo, grant—O!
Hermilda's first and second canto,
I'm fitting up a new portmanteau;

And thus to furnish decent lining,

My own and others' bays I'm twining—

So, gentle Thurlow, throw me thine in.

TO LORD THURLOW.

"I lay my branch of laurel down,
Then thus to form Apollo's crown
Let every other brine his own."

Lord Thurlour's lines to Mr. Rogers.

** / lay my branch of laurel dotcn." Thou " lay thy branch of laurel down!" Why, what thou'st stole is not enow;

1 [" Among the many gay hours we passed together in the spring of 1813, 1 remember particularly the wild flow of his spirits one evening, when we had accompanied Mr. Rogers home from some early assembly. It happened that our host had just received a presentation copy or a volume of poems, written professedly In imitation of the old English writers, and containing, like many of these models, a good deal that was striking and beautiful, mixed up with much that was trifling, fantastic, and absurd. In vain did Mr. Rogers, in justice to the author, endeavour to direct our attention to some of the beauties of the work. In this sort of hunt through the volume, we at length lighted on the discovery that our host, in addition to his sincere approbation of some of its contents, had also the motive of gratitude for standing hy Us author, as one of the poems was a warm and. I need not add, welldeserved panegyric on himself. The opening line of the poem was, as well as I can recollect, 'When Rogers o'er this labour bent:1 and Lord Byron undertook to read it aloud ; — but ho found it impossible to get beyond the first two words

And, were it lawfully thine own,
Does Rogers want it most, or thou?

Keep to thyself thy witherM bough.
Or send It back to Doctor Donne:

Were justice done to both, I trow.

He'd have but little, and thou — none.

"Then thus to form Apollo's cram." A crown 1 why, twist it how you will, Thy chaplet must be foolscap sUlL When next you visit Delphi's town,

Inquire amongst your fellow-lodgers. They 'U tell you Phrebus gave his crown.

Some years before your birth, to Rogers.

"Lei every other bring his own.TM When coals to Newcastle are carried,

And owls sent to Athens, as wonders, From his spouse when the Regent's unmarried.

Or Liverpool weeps o'er his blunders; When Tories and Whigs cease to quarrel.

When Castlereagh's wife has an heir. Then Rogers shall ask us for laurel,

And thou shalt have plenty to spare.

TO THOMAS MOORE.

WEITTBN THE EVENING BEFORE HIS VISIT TO Ma. LEIGH I
IN HORSEMONOER-LAME GAOL, MAT 19, 1813.

Oh you, who in all names can tickle the town,
Anacreon, Tom Little, Tom Moore, or Tom I
For hang me if I know of which you may r
Your Quarto two-pounds, or your Two-penny Post
Bag;

• • • • •

But now to my letter— to yours't is an answer-
To-morrow be with me, as soon as you can, sir.
All ready and dress'd for proceeding to i
(According to compact) the wit in the i
Pray Phcebus at length our political malice
May not get us lodgings within the same palace!
I suppose that to-night you 're engaged with
codgers,

And for Sotheby's Blues have deserted Sam Rotters;
And I, though with cold I have nearly my death got.
Must put on my breeches, and wait on the Heathcote;
But to-morrow, at four, we will both play the Scutto,
And you'll be Catullus, the Regent Mamurra. *

[First published, 18X0 ]

Our laughter had now increased to such a pitch that could restrain ft Two or three times be began; bat t» sooner had the words 'When Rogers' passed his lips, ttuc our fit burst forth afresh, — till even Mr. Rogers himself, with all his feeling of our injustice, found it Impossible not to J us. A day or two alter. Lord Byron sent me the f<" * My dear Moore,4 When Rogers* must uot se which I send for your perusal' "— Moore.]

1 [The reader who wishes to understand the full twee of this scandalous Insinuation is referred to Muretus's I a celebrated poem of Catullus, entitled /a Cttsarr consisting, in fact, of savagely scornful abuse of the f Mamurra : —

"Quis hoc potest viderc ? quts potest pau.
Nisi tmpudicus et vorax et hetluo?
Mamurratn habere quod comata Gallia
Habebat unctum, et ultima Kritwinia''" *c

'i

IMPROMPTU, IN REPLY TO A FRIEND.

When, from the heart where Sorrow sits,

Her dusky shadow mounts too high,
And o'er the changing aspect flits,

And clouds the brow, or fills the eye;
Heed not that gloom, which soon shall sink:

My thoughts their dungeon know too well; Back to my breast the wanderers shrink,

And droop within their silent cell.1

September, 1813.

SONNET, TO GENEVRA.

| Thine eyes' blue tenderness, thy long fair hair, And the wan lustre of thy features—caught From contemplation — where serenely wrought.

Seems Sorrow's softness charm'd from its despair —

Have thrown such speaking sadness in thine air, That—but I know thy blessed bosom fraught With mines of unalloy'd and stainless thought —

I should have deem'd thee doom'd to earthly care.

With such an aspect, by his colours blent,
When from his beauty-breathing pencil born,

(Except that thou hast nothing to repent)
The Magdalen of Guido saw the morn —

Such seem'st thou — but how much more excellent!
With nought Remorse can claim—nor Virtue scorn.

December 17, 1813.'

SONNET, TO THE SAME.

Thy cheek is pale with thought, but not from woe,
And yet so lovely, that if Mirth could flush
Its rose of whiteness with the brightest blush,

My heart would wish away that ruder glow •.

And dazzle not thy deep-blue eyes — but, oh!
While gazing on them sterner eyes will gush,
And into mine my mother's weakness rush,

Soft as the last drops round heaven's airy bow.

For, through thy long dark lashes low depending,
The soul of melancholy Gentleness

Gleams like a seraph from the sky descending,
Above all pain, yet pitying all distress;

At once such majesty with sweetness blending,
I worship more, but cannot love thee less.

December 17, 1913.

1 [These verses are said to have dropped from the Poet's pen, to excuse a transient expression of melancholy which overclouded the general gaiety. It was impossible to observe his interesting countenance, expressive of a dejection belonging neither to his rank, his age, nor his success, without feeling an indefinable curiosity to ascertain whether It had a •ieeper cause than habit or constitutional temperament. It was obviously of a degree Incalculably more serious than that alluded to by Prince Arthur —

'I remember when I was in France

Young gentlemen would be as sad as night.
Only for wantonness.'

Bat. howsoever derived, this, joined to Lord Byron's air of minarling in amusements and sports as if he contemned them, and felt that his sphere was far above the frivolous crowd which surrounded him. gave a strong effect of colouring to a

FROM THE PORTUGUESE.

"TU Kl CI1AMAB."

Is moments to delight devoted,

"My life !" with tenderest tone, you cry; Dear words I on which my heart had doted,

If youth could neither fade nor die.

To death even hours like these must roll,
Ah! then repeat those accents never;

Or change " my life 1" into " my soul!"
Which, like my love, exists for ever.

ANOTHXa VEaSIOK.

You call me still your life.—Oh 1 change the word —
Life is as transient as the inconstant sigh:

Say rather I'm jour soul; more just that name,
For, like the soul, my love can never die.

THE DEVIL'S DRIVE;

AN UNFINISHED RHAPSODY.3

The Devil retum'd to hell by two,

And he stay'd at home till five; When he dined on some homicides done in rayout,

And a rebel or so in an Irish stew, And sausages made of a self-slain Jew — And bethought himself what next to do,

"And," quoth he, " IH take a drive. I walk'd in the morning, I '11 ride to-night; In darkness my children take most delight,

And I 'II see how my favourites thrive.

"And what shall I ride in ?" quoth Lucifer then—

"If I follow'd my taste, indeed,
I should mount in a waggon of wounded men.

And smile to see them bleed.
But these will be fiunish'd again and again.

And at present my purpose is speed;
To see my manor as much as I may,
And watch that no souls shall be poach'd away.

"I have a state-coach at Carlton House,

A chariot in Seymour Place; But they 're lent to two friends, who make me amends,

By driving my favourite pace: And they handle their reins with such a grace, I have something for both at the end of their race.

"So now for the earth to take my chance:"

Then up to the earth sprung he j
And making a jump from Moscow to France,

He stepp'd across the sea,
And rested his hoof on a turnpike road,
No very great way from a bishop's abode.

character whose tints were otherwise romantic—Sir WalTer Sl'OTT.]

3 [" Hedde some Italian, and wrote two sonnets. I never wrote but one sonnet before, and that was not in earnest, and many years ago, as an exercise — and I will never write another. They are the most puling, petrifying, stupidly pla* tonic compositions." — Byron Diary, 1813.J

3 [" 1 have lately written a wild, rambling, unfinished rhapsody, called ' The Devil's Drive,1 the notion of which I took from Porson's ' Devil's Walk.' "— Byron Diary, 1812. "Of this strange, wild poem," says Moore, " the only copy that Lord Byron, I believe, over wrote, he presented to Lord Holland. Though with a good deal of vigour and Imagination, It is, for the most part, rather clumsily executed, wanting the point and condensation of those clever verses of Mr. Coleridge, which Lord Byron, adopting a notion long prevalent, has attributed to Professor Forson.M]

But first as he flew, I forgot to say,
That he hover'd a moment upon his way,

To look upon Lelpsic plain;
And so sweet to bis eye was its sulphury glare,
And so soft to his ear was the cry of despair,

That he perch'd on a mountain of slain;
And he gazed with delight from its growing height.
Nor often on earth had he seen such a sight,

Nor his work done half as well: For the field ran so red with the blood of the dead,

That it blush'd like the waves of hell! Then loudly, and wildly, and long laugh'd he: "Methinks they have here little need of me.'" • • • * *

But the softest note that soothed his car

Was the sound of a widow sighing;
And the sweetest sight was the icy tear.
Which horror froze in the blue eye clear

Of a maid by her lover lying—
As round her fell her long fair hair;
And she look'd to heaven with that frenzied air,
Which seem'd to ask if a God were there!
And, stretch'd by the wall of a ruin'd hut,
With its hollow cheek, and eyes half shut,

A child of famine dying:
And the carnage begun, when resistance is done,

And the fall of the vainly flying!

• • • * •

But the Devil has reach'd our cliffs so white,

And what did he there, I pray?
If his eyes were good, he but saw by night

What we see every day:
But he made a tour, and kept a journal
Of all the wondrous sights nocturnal,
And he sold it in shares to the Men of the Raw,
Who bid pretty well—but they cheated him, though:

The Devil first saw, as he thought, the Mai!,

Its coachman and his coat;
So instead of a pistol he cock'd his tail,

And seized him by the throat:
"Aha:" quoth he, " what have we here?
'T is a new barouche, and an ancient peer!"

So he sat him on his box again,

And bade him have no fear,
But be true to his club, and stanch to his rein,

His brothel, and his beer;
"Next to seeing a lord at the council board,
I would rather see him here."

• • • • •

The Devil gat next to Westminster,

And he turn'd to " the room" of the Commons; But he heard, as he purposed to enter in there,

That " the Lords" had received a summons;
And he thought, as a " quondam aristocrat," [flat;
He might peep at the peers, though to hear them were
And he walk'd up the house so like one of our own,
That they say that he stood pretty near the throne.

He saw the Lord Liverpool seemingly wise,
The Lord Westmoreland certainly silly,

And Johnny of Norfolk—a man of some size —
And Chatham, so like his friend Billy;

i [" I cannot conceive how the Fault has got about; but so it is. It is too farouche; but truth to say, ray sallies are

to Sir. Moore, March 12.

And he saw the tears in Lord Eldon's eyes,
Because the Catholics would not rise,
In spite of his prayers and his prophecies;
And he heard—which set Satan himself a staring—
A certain Chief Justice say something like swearing.
And the Devil was shock'd — and quoth he, " I roust
For I find we have much better manners below: [go,
If thus be harangues when he passes my border,
I shall hint to friend Moloch to call him to order."

WINDSOR POETICS.

Lines composed on the occasion of his Royal
l'rince Resent being seen standing between the comn* <*
Henry VIII. and Charlee I., in the royal vault at Windsor.

Famed for contemptuous breach of sacred ties,
By headless Charles see heartless Henry lies;
Between them stands another sceptred thing—
It moves, it reigns—in all but name, a king:

Charles to his people, Henry to his wife.
—In him the double tyrant starts to life:
Justice and death have mix'd their dust in vain.
Each royal vampire wakes to life again.
Ah, what can tombs avail!—since these disgorge
The blood and dust of both—to mould a George. 1

STANZAS FOR MUSIC. 3

I Steak not, I trace not, I breathe not thy name.
There is grief in the sound, there is guilt In the
But the tear which now bums on
The deep thoughts that dwell in that silence of

Too brief for our passion, too long for our peace Were those hours—can their joy or their bitterness cease? [chain. —

We repent — we abjure—we will break from our
We will part, — we will fly to — unite it again I

Oh! thine be the gladness, and mine be the guilt!
Forgive me, adored one !—forsake, if thou wilt; —
But the heart which is thine shall expire I
And man shall not break it-

And stern to tbe haughty, but humble to thee.
This soul, in its bitterest blackness, shall be;
And our days seem as swift, and our i
sweet.

With thee by my side, than with worlds at our feet.

One sigh of thy sorrow, one look of thy love.
Shall turn me or fix, shall reward or reprove;
And the heartless may wonder at all I resign —
Thy lip shall reply, not to them, but to mine.

May, 181*.

ADDRESS INTENDED TO BE RECITED AT
THE CALEDONIAN MEETING.

Who hath not glow'd above the page where fame
Hath fix'd high Caledon's unconquer'd name;
The mountain-land which spurn'd the Roman chum.
And baffled back the fiery-crested Dane,

1 [" Thou hast asked me for a song, and I enclose yon m experiment, which has cost me something more than trouhl* and is. therefore, less likely to be worth your taking any Is your proposed setting. Now, if It be so, throw it into Cfew sww without pMrete." — Lord Byron to Mr. Moon, Kay 10, !*M-J

-