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Next day the scene was overcast ;
Such day till then I never passed.
For on that day, relentless fate!
Delia and I must separate.

Yet ere we looked our last farewell,
From her dear lips this comfort fell:
"Fear not that time, where'er we rove,
Or absence, shall abate my love."
And can I doubt, my charming maid,
As unsincere what you have said?
Banished from thee to what I hate,
Dull neighbours and insipid chat,
No joy to cheer me, none in view,
But the dear hope of meeting you;
And that through passion's optic seen,
With ages interposed between ;
Blessed with the kind support you give,
'Tis by your promised truth I live;
How deep my woes, how fierce my flame,
You best may tell, who feel the same.

R. S. S.

ALL-WORSHIPPED Gold! thou mighty

Say by what name shall I address thee, rather,
Our blessing or our bane? Without thy aid,
The generous pangs of pity but distress
The human heart, that fain would feel the bliss
Of blessing others; and, enslaved by thee,
Far from relieving woes which others feel,
Misers oppress themselves. Our blessing then
With virtue when possessed; without, our bane.

If in my bosom unperceived there lurk
The deep-sown seeds of avarice or ambition,
Blame me, ye great ones (for I scorn your censure),
But let the generous and the good commend ine;
That to my Delia I direct them all,

The worthiest object of a virtuous love.
Oh! to some distant scene, a willing exile
From the wild uproar of this busy world,
Were it my fate with Delia to retire ;
With her to wander through the sylvan shade,
Each morn, or o'er the moss-imbrownèd turf,
Where, bless'd as the prime parents of mankind
In their own Eden, we would envy none;
But, greatly pitying whom the world calls happy,
Gently spin out the silken thread of life;
While from her lips attentive I receive
The tenderest dictates of the purest flame,
And from her eyes (where soft complacence sits
Illumined with radiant beams of sense),
Tranquillity beyond a monarch's reach.
Forgive me, Heaven, this only avarice
My soul indulges; I confess the crime-
(If to esteem, to covet such perfection

Be criminal). Oh grant me Delia ! grant me wealth,
Wealth to alleviate, not increase my wants;
And grant me virtue, without which nor wealth
Nor Delia can avail to make me blessed.

WRITTEN IN A FIT OF ILLNESS.
R. S. S.

In ceaseless

While feverish pulses leap in every vein,

When each faint breath the last short effort seems

Of life just parting from my feeble limbs ;
How wild soe'er my wandering thoughts may be,
Still, gentle Delia, still they turn on thee!
At length if, slumbering to a short repose,
A sweet oblivion frees me from my woes,
Thy form appears, thy footsteps I pursue,
Through springy vales, and meadows washed in dew;
Thy arm supports me to the fountain's brink,
Where by some secret power forbid to drink,
Gasping with thirst, I view the tempting flood
That flies my touch, or thickens into mud;
Till thine own hands immerged the goblet dips,
And bears it streaming to my burning lips.
There borne aloft on fancy's wing we fly,
Like souls embodied to their native sky;
Now every rock, each mountain disappears:
And the round earth an even surface wears;
When lo! the force of some resistless weight
Bears me straight down from that pernicious height;
Parting, in vain our struggling arms we close;
Abhorred forms, dire phantoms interpose;
With trembling voice on thy loved name I call;
And gulfs yawn ready to receive my fall.
From these fallacious visions of distress
I wake; nor are my real sorrows less.

Thy absence, Delia, heightens every ill,

And gives e'en trivial pains the power to kill.
Oh wert thou near me; yet that wish forbear!

'Twere vain, my love, 'twere vain to wish thee near;
Thy tender heart would heave with anguish too,
And by partaking, but increase my woe.
Alone I'll grieve, till gloomy sorrow past,

Health, like the cheerful day-spring, comes at last-
Comes fraught with bliss to banish every pain,
Hope, joy, and peace, and Delia in her train !

DISAPPOINTMENT.

OOMED as I am, in solitude to waste

DMED as It moments, and regret the past;

Deprived of every joy I valued most,

My friend torn from me, and my mistress lost,
Call not this gloom I wear, this anxious mien,
The dull effect of humour or of spleen!
Still, still I mourn, with each returning day,
Him snatched by fate in early youth away;
And her through tedious years of doubt and pain,
Fixed in her choice and faithful-but in vain!
Whose eye ne'er yet refused the wretch a tear;
O prone to pity, generous, and sincere,
Whose heart the real claim of friendship knows,
Nor thinks a lover's are but fancied woes;
See me-ere yet my destined course half done,
Cast forth a wanderer on a world unknown!
See me neglected on the world's rude coast,
Each dear companion of my voyage lost!
Nor ask why clouds of sorrow shake my brow,
And ready tears wait only leave to flow !
Why all that soothes a heart from anguish free,
All that delights the happy-palls with me!

ODE.

SUPPOSED TO BE WRITTEN ON THE MARRIAGE OF A

FRIEND.

HOU magic lyre, whose fascinating sound

TH

Seduced the savage monsters from their cave, Drew rocks and trees, and forms uncouth around, And bade wild Hebrus hush his listening wave;

No more the undulating warblings flow
O'er Thracian wilds of everlasting snow!

Awake to sweeter sounds, thou magic lyre,
And paint a lover's bliss-a lover's pain!
Far nobler triumphs now thy notes inspire,
For see, Eurydice attends thy strain;
Her smile, a prize beyond the conjurer's aim,
Superior to the cancelled breath of fame.

From her sweet brow to chase the gloom of care,
To check the tear that dims the beaming eye,
To bid her heart the rising sigh forbear,

And flush her orient cheek with brighter joy,
In that dear breast soft sympathy to move,
And touch the springs of rapture and of love.
Ah me! how long bewildered and astray,

Lost and benighted, did my footsteps rove,
Till sent by heaven to cheer my pathless ray,
A star arose the radiant star of love.
The god propitious joined our willing hands,
And Hymen wreathed us in his rosy bands.

Yet not the beaming eye, or placid brow,
Or golden tresses, hid the subtle dart;
To charms superior far than those I bow,

And nobler worth enslaves my vanquished heart,
The beauty, elegance, and grace combined,
Which beam transcendent from that angel mind.

While vulgar passions, meteors of a day,
Expire before the chilling blasts of age,
Our holy flame with pure and steady ray,

Its glooms shall brighten, and its pangs assuage; By Virtue (sacred vestal) fed, shall shine,

And warm our fainting souls with energy divine.

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