And feed deep thought with many a dream, And lingering pause and lightly tread; Fond wretch! as if her step disturb'd the dead!

Away! we know that tears are vain,
That Death nor heeds nor hears distress:
Will this unteach us to complain?

Or make one mourner weep the less?
And thou, who tell'st me to forget,
Thy looks are wan, thine eyes are wet.

LORD BYRON.

233. HESTER.

When maidens such as Hester die
Their place ye may not well supply,
Though ye among a thousand try
With vain endeavour.

A month or more hath she been dead,
Yet cannot I by force be led
To think upon the wormy bed
And her together.

A springy motion in her gait,
A rising step, did indicate

Of pride and joy no common rate
That flush'd her spirit:

I know not by what name beside
I shall it call; if 'twas not pride,
It was a joy to that allied

She did inherit.

Her parents held the Quaker rule
Which doth the human feeling cool;
But she was train'd in Nature's school,
Nature had blest her.

A waking eye, a prying mind,
A heart that stirs, is hard to bind ;
A hawk's keen sight ye cannot blind,
Ye could not Hester.

My sprightly neighbour! gone before
To that unknown and silent shore,
Shall we not meet, as heretofore
Some summer morning—

When from thy cheerful eyes a ray
Hath struck a bliss upon the day,
A bliss that would not go away,
A sweet fore-warning?

C. LAMB

234. CORONACH.

He is gone on the mountain,
He is lost to the forest,

Like a summer-dried fountain,

When our need was the sorest.

The fount reappearing

From the raindrops shall borrow,

But to us comes no cheering,

To Duncan no morrow!

The hand of the reaper

Takes the ears that are hoary, But the voice of the weeper

Wails manhood in glory. The autumn winds rushing

Waft the leaves that are serest, But our flower was in flushing

When blighting was nearest.

Fleet foot on the correi,

Sage counsel in cumber,

Red hand in the foray,

How sound is thy slumber!
Like the dew on the mountain,
Like the foam on the river,
Like the bubble on the fountain,

Thou art gone, and for ever!

SIR W. SCOTT.

235. THE DEATH BED.

We watch'd her breathing thro' the night,

Her breathing soft and low,

As in her breast the wave of life

Kept heaving to and fro.

But when the morn came dim and sad
And chill with early showers,

Her quiet eyelids closed-she had

Another morn than ours.

T.. HOOD.

236. ROSABelle.

O listen, listen, ladies gay!

No haughty feat of arms I tell;

Soft is the note, and sad the lay

That mourns the lovely Rosabelle.

"Moor, moor the barge, ye gallant crew,
And, gentle lady, deign to stay!

Rest thee in Castle Ravensheuch,
Nor tempt the stormy firth to-day.

"The blackening wave is edged with white;
To inch and rock the sea-mews fly;
The fishers have heard the Water-Sprite,
Whose screams forbode that wreck is nigh.

"Last night the gifted Seer did view
A wet shroud swathed round lady gay;
Then stay thee, Fair, in Ravensheuch;
Why cross the gloomy firth to-day ?"

"'Tis not because Lord Lindesay's heir
To-night at Roslin leads the ball,
But that my lady-mother there
Sits lonely in her castle-hall.

"'Tis not because the ring they ride,
And Lindesay at the ring rides well,
But that my sire the wine will chide
If 'tis not fill'd by Rosabelle."

-O'er Roslin all that dreary night

A wondrous blaze was seen to gleam; 'Twas broader than the watch-fire's light, And redder than the bright moonbeam. It glared on Roslin's castled rock,

It ruddied all the copse-wood glen; 'Twas seen from Dryden's grove of oak, And seen from cavern'd Hawthornden.

Seem'd all on fire that chapel proud
Where Roslin's chiefs uncoffin'd lie,
Each Baron, for a sable shroud,
Sheath'd in his iron panoply.

Seem'd all on fire within, around,
Deep sacristy and altar's pale;
Shone every pillar foliage-bound,

And glimmer'd all the dead men's mail.

Blazed battlement and pinnet high,
Blazed every rose-carved buttress fair-
So still they blaze, when fate is nigh
The lordly line of high Saint Clair.

There are twenty of Roslin's barons bold
Lie buried within that proud chapelle;
Each one the holy vault doth hold,

But the sea holds lovely Rosabelle !

And each Saint Clair was buried there

With candle, with book, and with knell;

But the sea-caves rung, and the wild winds sung The dirge of lovely Rosabelle.

SIR W. SCOTT.

237. ON AN INFANT DYING AS SOON AS BORN.

S

I saw where in the shroud did lurk
A curious frame of Nature's work;

A flow'ret crushéd in the bud,
A nameless piece of Babyhood
Was in her cradle-coffin lying;

Extinct, with scarce the sense of dying:

So soon to exchange the imprisoning womb
For darker closets of the tomb!

She did but ope an eye, and put

A clear beam forth, then straight up shut

For the long dark: ne'er more to see

Through glasses of mortality.

Riddle of destiny, who can show

What thy short visit meant, or know

What thy errand here below?

Shall we say, that Nature blind

Check'd her hand, and changed her mind
Just when she had exactly wrought
A finish'd pattern without fault?
Could she flag, or could she tire,
Or lack'd she the Promethean fire