IF

A SACRED MELODY.

yon bright stars which gem the night Be each a blissful dwelling sphere, Where kindred spirits reunite,

Whom death has torn asunder here; How sweet it were at once to die,

And leave this blighted orb afarMixed soul with soul, to cleave the sky,

And soar away from star to star.

But, O! how dark, how drear, how lone

Would seem the brightest world of bliss, If, wandering through each radiant one,

We fail'd to find the loved of this! If there no more the ties should twine,

Which death's cold hand alone can sever, Ah! then these stars in mockery shine,

More hateful, as they shine forever.

It cannot be each hope and fear

That lights the eye or clouds the brow, Proclaims there is a happier sphere

Than this bleak world that holds us now! There is a voice which sorrow hears,

When heaviest weighs life's galling chain; "Tis heaven that whispers, "Dry thy tears: The pure in heart shall meet again!"

LOVE AND FRIENDSHIP.

THE birds, when winter shades the sky,
Fly o'er the seas away,
Where laughing isles in sunshine lie,
And summer breezes play;

And thus the friends that flutter near

While fortune's sun is warm,

Are startled if a cloud appear,
And fly before the storm.

But when from winter's howling plains

Each other warbler's past,

The little snow-bird still remains,

And chirrups midst the blast.

Love, like that bird, when friendship's throng
With fortune's sun depart,
Still lingers with its cheerful song,
And nestles on the heart.

SONG.

1 TRUST the frown thy features wear Ere long into a smile will turn;

I would not that a face so fair

As thine, beloved, should look so stern. The chain of ice that winter twines,

Holds not for aye the sparkling rill, It melts away when summer shines,

And leave the waters sparkling still. Thus let thy cheek resume the smile That shed such sunny light before; And though I left thee for a while,.

I'll swear to leave thee, love, no more.

As he who, doomed o'er waves to roam,
Or wander on a foreign strand,
Will sigh whene'er he thinks of home,
And better love his native land;
So I, though lured a time away,

Like bees by varied sweets, to rove, Return, like bees, by close of day,

And leave them all for thee, my love. Then let thy cheek resume the smile That shed such sunny light before, And though I left thee for a while, I swear to leave thee, love, no more.

LIFE'S GUIDING STAR.

THE youth whose bark is guided o'er A summer stream by zephyr's breath, With idle gaze delights to pore

On imaged skies that glow beneath. But should a fleeting storm arise

To shade a while the watery way, Quick lifts to heaven his anxious eyes,

And speeds to reach some sheltering bay, "Tis thus, down time's eventful tide,

While prosperous breezes gently blow, In life's frail bark we gayly glide,

Our hopes, our thoughts all fix'd below. But let one cloud the prospect dim,

The wind its quiet stillness mar,
At once we raise our prayer to Him
Whose light is life's best guiding star.

TO ELMIRA.

On this frail glass, to others' view, No written words appear; They see the prospect smiling through, Nor deem what secret's here. But shouldst thou on the tablet bright A single breath bestow, At once the record starts to sight Which only thou must know.

Thus, like this glass, to strangers' gaze My heart seemed unimpress'd; In vain did beauty round me blaze, It could not warm my breast. But as one breath of thine can make

These letters plain to see, So in my heart did love awake

When breathed upon by thee.

ed d'a m

EDWARD COATE PINKNEY was born in London, resin October, 1802, while his father, the Honourable

WILLIAM PINKNEY, was the American Minister at the court of St. James'. Soon after the return of bahis family to Baltimore, in 1811, he entered St. Mary's College, in that city, and remained there until he was fourteen years old, when he was appointed a midshipman in the navy. He conNtinued in the service nine years, and in that period visited the Mediterranean and several other foreign stations, and acquired much general knowledge and acquaintance with mankind.

The death of his father, and other circumstances, induced him, in 1824, to resign his place in the navy; and in the same year he was married, and admitted to the Maryland bar. His career as a lawyer was brief and unfortunate. He opened an office in Baltimore, and applied himself earnestly to his profession; but though his legal acquirements and forensic abilities were respectable, his rooms were seldom visited by a client; and after two years had passed, disheartened by neglect, and with a prospect of poverty before him, he suddenly determined to enter the naval service of Mexico, in which a number of our officers had already won distinction and fortune. When, however, he presented himself before Commodore PORTER, then commanding the sea-forces of that country, the situation he solicited was refused, and he was compelled reluctantly to return to the United States.

He reappeared in Baltimore, poor and dejected. He turned his attention again to the law, but in his vigorous days he had been unable to support himself by his profession; and now, when he was suffering from disease and a settled melancholy,

was not reasonable to anticipate success. The erroneous idea that a man of a poetical mind cannot transact business requiring patience and habits of careful investigation, was undoubtedly one of the principal causes of his failure as a lawyer; for that he was respected, and that his fellow-citizens were willing to confer upon him honours, is evident from the fact that, in 1826, he was appointed one of the professors in the University of Maryland. This office, however, was one of honour only: it yielded no profit.

PINKNEY now became sensible that his constitation was broken, and that he could not long

It has been said that Commodore PORTER refused to give PINKNEY a commission, because he was known to be a warm adherent of an administration to which he was himself opposed; but it is more reasonable to believe, as was alleged at the time, that the navy of Mexico was full, and that the citizens of that republic had begun to regard with jealousy the too frequent admission of foreigners into the service.

survive; but he had no wish to live. His feelings at this period are described in one of his poems:—

"A sense it was, that I could see
The angel leave my side-
That thenceforth my prosperity
Must be a falling tide;

A strange and ominous belief,
That in spring-time the yellow leaf
Had fallen on my hours;

And that all hope must be most vain,
of finding on my path again

Its former vanish'd flowers."

Near the close of the year 1827, a political gazette, entitled "The Marylander," was established in Baltimore, and, in compliance with the general wish of the proprietors, Mr. PINKNEY undertook to conduct it. He displayed much sagacity and candour, and in a few weeks won a high reputation in his new vocation; but his increasing illness compelled him to leave it, and he died on the eleventh of April, 1828, at the early age of twenty-five years and six months. was a man of genius, and had all the qualities of mind and heart that win regard and usually lead to greatness, except HOPE and ENERGY.

66

He

A small volume containing "Rodolph," and other poems, was published by PINKNEY in 1825. Rodolph" is his longest work. It was first published, anonymously, soon after he left the navy, and was probably written while he was in the Mediterranean. It is in two cantos. The first begins,―

"The summer's heir on land and sea
Had thrown his parting glance,
And winter taken angrily

His waste inheritance.
The winds in stormy revelry
Sported beneath a frowning sky;
The chafing waves, with hollow roar,
Tumbled upon the shaken shore,
And sent their spray in upward showers
To Rodolph's proud ancestral towers,
Whose bastion, from its mural crown,
A regal look cast sternly down."

There is no novelty in the story, and not much can be said for its morality. The hero, in the season described in the above lines, arrives at his own domain, after many years of wandering in foreign lands, during which he had "grown old in heart, and infirm of frame." In his youth he had loved-the wife of another-and his passion had been returned. "At an untimely tide," he had met the husband, and, in encounter, slain him. The wife goes into a convent, and her paramour seeks refuge from remorse in distant countries. In the beginning of the second canto, he is once more in his own castle; but, feeling some dark presentiment, he wanders to a cemetery, where, in the morning, he is found by his vassals, "senseless

"Italy,"

'—an imitation of GOETHE'S Kennst du das Land-has some noble lines. Where is there a finer passage than this:

"The winds are awed, nor dare to breathe aloud; The air seems never to have borne a cloud, Save where volcanoes send to heaven their curl'd And solemn smokes, like altars of the world!" PINKNEY'S is the first instance in this country in which we have to lament the prostitution ď true poetical genius to unworthy purposes. Pervading much that he wrote there is a selfish me lancholy and sullen pride; dissatisfaction with the present, and doubts in regard to the future life. The great distinguishing characteristic of Amer can poetry is its pure and high morality. May it ever be so!

ITALY.

KNOW'ST thou the land which lovers ought to choose?
Like blessings there descend the sparkling dews;
In gleaming streams the crystal rivers run,
The purple vintage clusters in the sun;
Odours of flowers haunt the balmy breeze,
Rich fruits hang high upon the verdant trees;
And vivid blossoms gem the shady groves,
Where bright-plumed birds discourse their careless
loves.

Beloved!-speed we from this sullen strand, Until thy light feet press that green shore's yellow sand.

[eye

Look seaward thence, and naught shall meet thine
But fairy isles, like paintings on the sky;
And, flying fast and free before the gale,
The gaudy vessel with its glancing sail;
And waters glittering in the glare of noon,
Or touch'd with silver by the stars and moon,
Or fleck'd with broken lines of crimson light,
When the far fisher's fire affronts the night.
Lovely as loved! toward that smiling shore
Bear we our household gods, to fix forever more.

It looks a dimple on the face of earth,
The seal of beauty, and the shrine of mirth;
Nature is delicate and graceful there,
The place's genius, feminine and fair;
The winds are awed, nor dare to breathe aloud;
The air seems never to have borne a cloud,
Save where volcanoes send to heaven their curl'd
And solemn smokes, like altars of the world.
Thrice beautiful!-to that delightful spot
Carry our married hearts, and be all pain forgot.
There Art, too, shows, when Nature's beauty palls,
Her sculptured marbles, and her pictured walls;
And there are forms in which they both conspire
To whisper themes that know not how to tire;
The speaking ruins in that gentle clime
Have but been hallow'd by the hand of Time,
And each can mutely prompt some thought of flame:
The meanest stone is not without a name.
Then come, beloved!-hasten o'er the sea,
To build our happy hearth in blooming Italy.

THE INDIAN'S BRIDE.

I.

Why is that graceful female here
With yon red hunter of the deer?
Of gentle mien and shape, she seems
For civil halls design'd,
Yet with the stately savage walks,
As she were of his kind.
Look on her leafy diadem,
Enrich'd with many a floral gem:
Those simple ornaments about

Her candid brow, disclose
The loitering spring's last violet,

And summer's earliest rose; But not a flower lies breathing there Sweet as herself, or half so fair. Exchanging lustre with the sun,

A part of day she straysA glancing, living, human smile

On Nature's face she plays. Can none instruct me what are these Companions of the lofty trees?

II.

Intent to blend her with his lot,
Fate form'd her all that he was not;
And, as by mere unlikeness, thoughts
Associate we see,

Their hearts, from very difference, caught
A perfect sympathy.
The household goddess here to be
Of that one dusky votary,
She left her pallid countrymen,
An earthling most divine,
And sought in this sequester'd wood

A solitary shrine.
Behold them roaming hand in hand,
Like night and sleep, along the land;
Observe their movements:-he for her
Restrains his active stride,
While she assumes a bolder gait

To ramble at his side;
Thus, even as the steps they frame,
Their souls fast alter to the same.

O, say not they must soon be old,

Their limbs prove faint, their breasts feel cold! Yet envy I that sylvan pair

More than my words express,― The singular beauty of their lot,

And seeming happiness.

They have not been reduced to share
The painful pleasures of despair;
Their sun declines not in the sky,
Nor are their wishes cast,
Like shadows of the afternoon,

Repining towards the past:
With nought to dread or to repent,
The present yields them full content.
In solitude there is no crime;

Their actions all are free,
And passion lends their way of life
The only dignity;

And how can they have any cares?-
Whose interest contends with theirs?

IV.

The world, for all they know of it,
Is theirs:-for them the stars are lit;
For them the earth beneath is green,

The heavens above are bright;

For them the moon doth wax and wane,
And decorate the night;

For them the branches of those trees
Wave music in the vernal breeze;
For them, upon that dancing spray,
The free bird sits and sings,
And glittering insects flit about

Upon delighted wings;

For them that brook, the brakes among,
Murmurs its small and drowsy song;
For them the many-colour'd clouds
Their shapes diversify,

And change at once, like smiles and frowns,

The expression of the sky.

For them, and by them, all is gay,
And fresh and beautiful as they:
The images their minds receive,

Their minds assimilate

To outward forms, imparting thus
The glory of their state.

SONG.

WE break the glass, whose sacred wine, To some beloved health we drain. Lest future pledges, less divine,

Should e'er the hallow'd toy profane;
And thus I broke a heart that pour'd
Its tide of feelings out for thee,
In draughts, by after-times deplored,
Yet dear to memory.

But still the old, impassion'd ways
And habits of my mind remain,
And still unhappy light displays

Thine image chamber'd in my brain, And still it looks as when the hours Went by like flights of singing birds, Or that soft chain of spoken flowers, And airy gems-thy words.

A HEALTH.

I FILL this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,

A woman, of her gentle sex
The seeming paragon;
To whom the better elements

And kindly stars have given A form so fair, that, like the air,

'Tis less of earth than heaven.

Her every tone is music's own,

Like those of morning birds,
And something more than melody
Dwells ever in her words;
The coinage of her heart are they,
And from her lips each flows
As one may see the burden'd bee
Forth issue from the rose.

Affections are as thoughts to her,
The measures of her hours;
Her feelings have the fragrancy,
The freshness of young flowers;
And lovely passions, changing oft,
So fill her, she appears

The image of themselves by turns,-
The idol of past years!

Of her bright face one glance will trace
A picture on the brain,

And of her voice in echoing hearts

A sound must long remain;
But memory, such as mine of her,
So very much endears,
When death is nigh my latest sigh
Will not be life's, but hers.

I fill'd this cup to one made up
Of loveliness alone,

A woman, of her gentle sex

The seeming paragon

Her health and would on earth there stood,

Some more of such a frame,

That life might be all poetry,

And weariness a name.