I have not here a kindred band
As in the Valteline.
When on my native hills I played,
I breathed not English air;
I did not love an English maid,
When love was all my care.
But I must die on England's strand,
A prisoner on the main!
And ne'er behold my native land,
Ah never, ne'er again!
PLEASURES of Memory!-oh! supremely blest,
And justly proud beyond a poet's praise,
If the pure confines of thy tranquil breast
Contain, indeed, the subject of thy lays!
By me how envied! for to me,
The herald still of misery,
Memory makes her influence known
By sighs and tears, and grief alone: I greet her as the fiend to whom belong The vulture's ravening beak, the raven's funeral song.
Alone, at midnight's haunted hour,
When nature woos repose in vain,
Remembrance wastes her penal power,
The tyrant of the burning brain:
She tells of time misspent, of comfort lost,
Of fair occasions gone for ever by ;
Of hope too fondly nursed, too rudely crossed,
Of many a cause to wish, yet fear to die;
For what, except the instinctive fear
Lest she survive, detains me here,
When "all the life of life" is fled?-
What, but the deep inherent dread,
Lest she beyond the grave resume her reign,
And realize the hell that priests and beldames feign.
ROSA! 't was one of those autumnal eves
When Heaven vouchsafes to Earth her loveliest looks ;The still wood's sun-touched wilderness of leaves, And cloud, and mountain-scalp, and castle took Their colour from the west-bright gold! the brook Rippled in gold;—the great oak, branching o'er, Was golden barked; -'t was gold the cygnet shook From her white wing;-and Strangford's blue lake wore A belt of quivering gold from shore to placid shore.
Yet-yet the broad sun loitered on the gaze
Dilated-slanting, ever as he went,
Intenser glory from his throne of rays,
Till, like some warrior-king, he won his tent,-
A purple cloud that wrapped the Occident.
Earth faded now, though heaven still was bright
With hues that blushed until the young moon bent
Her pointed crescent on the brow of night,
Which wore a dusky smile beneath that chrysolite.
Such was the scene, sweet girl! we gazed upon,
While thou recountedst o'er that tale of woe
Which oft, in other lands, a setting sun
Hath summoned like a talisman; - although
Gone hope, and griefs that bade the heart o'erflow,
Be since forgot, and tears that fell in vain ;-
And with it rose thine image, like the bow
That bathes its colours in the summer-rain,
Thou Iris of my heart, whose smiles wake hope again!
At length, one bright eve in a foreign bower,
I snatched my lute that on a laurel tree
Had idly hung-for, O! I knew the power
Of slighted song was hovering over me,
And felt its pulse in every artery!
I snatched my lute, and to its preluding
Unrolled the pictured scroll of Memory;
And found, 'mid many a far and favorite thing,
That unforgotten tale of love and sorrowing.
A spell was on me!-No! I could not choose
But weave that simple story into song!
And if its wild and plaintive beauty lose
Much of the grace it borrowed from thy tongue,—
And if sometimes a careless hand be flung
Where passion listened for her holiest tone-
Star of my path! forgive, forgive the wrong!
Whatever is of beauty is thine own:
Thy fair hand culled the flowers-I twined the wreath alone. Literary Souvenir.
THE LAUNCH OF THE NAUTILUS.
Up with thy thin transparent sail,
Thou tiny mariner !—The gale
Comes gently from the land, and brings
The odour of all lovely things
That Zephyr, in his wanton play,
Scatters in Spring's triumphant way;-
Of primrose pale, and violet,
And young anemone, beset
By thousand spikes of every hue,
Purple and scarlet, white and blue:
And every breeze that sweeps the earth
Brings the sweet sounds of love and mirth;
The shrilly pipe of things unseen
That pitter in the meadows green;
The linnet's love-sick melody,
The laverock's carol loud and high;
And mellowed, as from distance borne,
The music of the shepherd's horn.
Up, little Nautilus !-Thy day
Of life and joy is come:-away!
The ocean's flood, that gleams so bright
Beneath the morning's ruddy light,
With gentlest surge scarce ripples o'er
The lucid gems that pave the shore;
Each billow wears its little spray,
As maids wear wreaths on holiday;
And maid ne'er danced on velvet green
More blithely round the May's young queen,
Than thou shalt dance o'er yon bright sea
That wooes thy prow so lovingly.
Then lift thy sail!—'T is shame to rest,
Here on the sand, thy pearly breast.
Away! thou first of mariners :—
Give to the wind all idle fears;
Thy freight demands no jealous care,-
Yet navies might be proud to bear
The wonderous wealth, the unbought spell,
That load thy ruby-cinctured shell.
A heart is there to nature true,
Which wrath nor envy ever knew,—
A heart that calls no creature foe,
And ne'er designed another's woe;—
A heart whose joy o'erflows its home,
Simply because sweet spring is come.
Up, beauteous Nautilus!-Away!
The idle muse that chides thy stay
Shall watch thee long, with anxious eye,
O'er thy bright course delighted fly;
And, when black storms deform the main,
Cry welcome to the sands again!
Heaven grant, that she through life's wild sea
May sail as innocent as thee;
And, homeward turned, like thee may find
Sure refuge from the wave and wind.
SAY a kind farewell, my Mary!
Here's a kind farewell to thee!
'Tis the last time ever, Mary,
Thou 'lt say farewell to me.
I'll not depart in sorrow,
Nor mourn upon the shore;
But I'll smile upon to morrow,
And the sea-wave and its roar.
I dreamed a heart was mine,
With its passion and its joy;
And oh the heart was thine,
And I loved it as a boy.
But all is over now, Mary,
The dream and the delight;
And I'll bury all beside, Mary,
In forgetfulness to night.
I'll sing the song that others sing;
I'll pass the jest with all;
And I will not tame my spirit's wing
In banquet or in hall;
But I'll fill one cup alone, Mary,
To drown thy maiden spell;
And I'll drain that cup to thee, Mary,
For a health and a farewell!
When the snow-white sails are set,
And the seaward gale is blowing,
My eyes shall not be wet;
My tears shall not be flowing:
But when England fades away, Mary,
And I'm lone upon the sea;
Oh! I'll look towards England then, Mary,
And sigh farewell to thee.
|