CASTLES IN SPAIN.

OUR castles in Spain are proud and high,
With lofty spires and glittering domes!
We may often see, in the western sky,

The burnished roofs of those stately homes, With their crimson banners flung out to cheer Our weary hearts in their exile here.

All that was lost, in days now gone,
Is treasured up in our castle fair;
Our faded crown and our fallen throne,
Our past renown and our valour rare,
Our ruined hopes and vanished dreams,
Take lasting shapes and unfading gleams!

Our gallant dead are restored to life,

By the balmy air of that Spanish land: Not ghastly pale from their glorious strife,

But laurel-crowned, in those halls they stand; While fretted ceiling and frescoed arch Resound with the notes of their triumph march.

The tender vows of the bridal day,

The light shut down 'neath the icy lid, The golden tint of the hair now gray,

Are all in our Spanish caskets hid;

With the generous hopes of our boyhood's time, And the nobler deeds of our manhood's prime !

SUMMER EVENING.

In our Spanish homes no oppression stalks,
To bow the head or to crush the heart;
No skeleton freedom in manacles walks,

Bleeding with wounds from a venomous dart;
But Liberty free, and unfettered, and proud,
Wears a heavenly robe, not a horrible shroud!

The future is dismal. Its clouds hang low,
Darkening the present with shadows of gloom;
But over our Spanish possessions we know
There's a golden glow and a tender bloom,
And a halo of beauty surpassingly bright,
In whose presence there enters no shadow of night.

If sorrow or shame, with want and dismay,

Ever darken the South in her valleys so fair, Her children all know they have lands far away,They all possess stately, proud "castles in air," Which they never can lose by tyrannical power, And where hope smiles serene through the gloomiest hour!

ΙΟΙ

MRS. SUSAN BLANCHARD ELDER.

SUMMER EVENING.

Go forth, the sky is blue above,
And cool the green sod lies below;
It is the hour that claims for love
Of Nature all we can bestow.

The glowworm lends her silver lamp,
The cricket sings his soothing strain,
And fainter sounds the weary tramp

Of footsteps in the grassy lane.

J. T. F.

PART III.

Ballads.

THE DUKE'S RETREAT.

FAREWELL the city's dust and din,
The laboured pomp, the splendid rattle,
The war without, the fret within,

The ceaseless tug of selfish battle!
I'll toss no more on seas of strife:
But, drifting to a lonely shore,
I'll slip into a peaceful life

Beneath the shade of dark Ben More.

Green is Ben Tealladh's sleepy side,

And soft the plash of waters sounding, Where fair Loch Baa outspreads her pride, With fringe of leafy trees surrounding: There would I lie in careless ease,

Stretched on the green and grassy shore, And nurse mild musings to the breeze That pipes around the dark Ben More.

What though the dress of State be far-
Vain show to shallow thought appealing-

The crown, the coronet, and star—

The bait that lures the vulgar feeling!

THE DUKE'S RETREAT.

Here, of all cumbrous trappings bare,
I wisely use my native store
Of happy thoughts and fancies fair
Beneath the shade of dark Ben More.

The brae, the billow, and the breeze,
Feed meditation's quiet rapture;
Or from the scriptured rock at ease,
I spell creation's natal chapter.
The white mist folds its gentle wings
Around the green hill's summit hoar,
And all the power of growing things
Breathes fragrance down from huge Ben More.

And when I wish to rouse the brain
From Contemplation's dreamy pillow,
I strive with artful fly to gain

The speckled swimmer from the billow.
And in my rocking boat I sit,

With busy wand and lazy oar,

While shadows o'er the dark waves flit
From the broad brow of huge Ben More.

Or, where the stag climbs there climb I,
And where the noonday cloud floats lightly,
Number the green isles as they lie

On the broad ocean glancing brightly;

And note Iona's sacred strand,

Where Erin's venturous saint of yore
With prayerful heart and sleepless hand,
Tamed the wild heathens of Ben More.

And when the black squall from the hills
Bristles the soft lake to a fury,

And down the steep the gathered rills,
Swelled to a torrent, madly hurry ;

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Then round the cheery blazing fire
Flies the quick jest and merry roar,
The louder for the tempest's ire

That frowns on us from dark Ben More.

And thus I woo my Autumn ease,

From intrigue far, and wordy squabble
Of men who vainly fret to please

The whim of the unreasoned rabble.
From courts and kings and camps aloof,
Upon a mountain-girdled shore,

I lurk beneath a lowly roof

At the green base of dark Ben More.

J. S. BLACKIE.

THE PRIVATE OF THE BUFFS.

["Some Sikhs, and a private of the Buffs, having remained behind with the grog-carts, fell into the hands of the Chinese. On the next morning, they were brought before the authorities, and commanded to perform the Kotow. The Sikhs obeyed; but Moyse, the English soldier, declaring that he would not prostrate himself before any Chinaman alive, was immediately knocked upon the head, and thrown upon a dunghill."—China Correspondent of the Times.]

Last night, among his fellows,
He jested, quaffed, and swore;
A drunken private of the Buffs
Who never looked before.
To-day, beneath the foeman's frown,
He stands in Elgin's place,*
Ambassador from Britain's crown,

And type of all her race.

* The late Earl of Elgin was at that time Ambassador to China.