LIKE April morning clouds, that pass,
With varying shadow, o'er the grass,
And imitate, on field and furrow,
Life's chequer'd scene of joy and sorrow;
Like streamlet of the mountain north,
Now in a torrent racing forth,
Now winding slow its silver train,
And almost slumbering on the plain;
Like breezes of the Autumn day,
Whose voice inconstant dies away,
And ever swells again as fast,
When the ear deems its murmur past;
Thus various, my romantic theme
Flits, winds, or sinks, a morning dream.
Yet pleased, our eye pursues the trace
Of Light and Shade's inconstant race;
Pleased, views the rivulet afar,
Weaving its maze irregular;

And pleased, we listen as the breeze
Heaves its wild sigh through Autumn

trees:

Then, wild as cloud, or stream, or gale, Flow on, flow unconfined, my Tale!

Need I to thee, dear Erskine, tell I love the license all too well, In sounds now lowly, and now strong, To raise the desultory song?Oft, when 'mid such capricious chime, Some transient fit of lofty rhyme To thy kind judgment seem'd excuse For many an error of the muse, Oft hast thou said, "If, still mis-spent, Thine hours to poetry are lent,

Go, and to tame thy wandering course, Quaff from the fountain at the source; Approach those masters, o'er whose tomb Immortal laurels ever bloom: Instructive of the feebler bard,

Still from the grave their voice is heard ; From them, and from the paths they show'd,

Choose honour'd guide and practised road:

Nor ramble on through brake and maze, With harpers rude, of barbarous days.

Ashestiel, Ettrick Forest.

"Or deem'st thou not our later time Yields topic meet for classic rhyme? Hast thou no elegiac verse

For Brunswick's venerable hearse?
What! not a line, a tear, a sigh,
When valour bleeds for liberty?—
Oh, hero of that glorious time,
When, with unrivall'd light sublime,—
Though martial Austria, and though all
The might of Russia, and the Gaul,
Though banded Europe stood her foes—
The star of Brandenburgh arose !
Thou couldst not live to see her beam
For ever quenched in Jena's stream.
Lamented Chief!-it was not given
To thee to change the doom of Heaven,
And crush that dragon in its birth,
Predestined scourge of guilty earth.
Lamented Chief!-not thine the power
To save in that presumptuous hour,
When Prussia hurried to the field,
And snatched the spear, but left the shield!
Valour and skill 'twas thine to try,
And, tried in vain, 'twas thine to die.
Ill had it seem'd thy silver hair
The last, the bitterest pang to share,
For princedoms reft, and scutcheons
riven,

And birthrights to usurpers given;
Thy lands, thy children's wrongs to feel,
And witness woes thou couldst not heal!
On thee relenting Heaven bestows
For honour'd life an honour'd close;
And when revolves, in time's sure change,
The hour of Germany's revenge,
When, breathing fury for her sake,
Some new Arminius shall awake,
Her champion, ere he strike, shall come
To whet his sword on BRUNSWICK'S
tomb.

Alike to him the war that calls
Its votaries to the shatter'd walls,
Which the grim Turk, besmear'd with
blood,

Against the Invincible made good;
Or that, whose thundering voice could
wake

The silence of the polar lake,
When stubborn Russ, and metal'd Swede,
On the warp'd wave their death-game
play'd;

Or that, where Vengeance and Affright
Howl'd round the father of the fight,
Who snatched, on Alexandria's sand,
The conqueror's wreath with dying hand.*

"Or, if to touch such chord be thine, Restore the ancient tragic line, And emulate the notes that rung From the wild harp, which silent hung By silver Avon's holy shore,

Till twice an hundred years roll'd o'er ; When she, the bold enchantress, + came, With fearless hand and heart on flame! From the pale willow snatch'd the trea

sure,

And swept it with a kindred measure, Till Avon's swans, while rung the grove With Montfort's hate and Basil's love, Awakening at the inspired strain, Deem'd their own Shakspeare lived again.'

Thy friendship thus thy judgment
wronging,

With praises not to me belonging,
In task more meet for mightiest powers,
Wouldst thou engage my thriftless hours.
But say, my Erskine, hast thou weigh'd
That secret power by all obey'd,
Which warps not less the passive mind,
Its source conceal'd, or undefined;
Whether an impulse, that has birth
Soon as the infant wakes on earth,
One with our feelings and our powers,
And rather part of us than ours;
Or whether fitlier term'd the sway
Of habit form'd in early day?
Howe'er derived, its force confest
Rules with despotic sway the breast,
* Sir Ralph Abercromby.
Joanna Baillie.

And drags us on by viewless chain,
While taste and reason plead in vain.
Look east, and ask the Belgian why,
Beneath Batavia's sultry sky,
He seeks not eager to inhale
The freshness of the mountain gale,
Content to rear his whitened wall
Beside the dank and dull canal?
He'll say, from youth he loved to see
The white sail gliding by the tree.
Or see yon weather-beaten hind,
Whose sluggish herds before him wind,
Whose tatter'd plaid and rugged cheek
His northern clime and kindred speak;
Through England's laughing meads he

tower

Which charm'd my fancy's wakening hour.

Though no broad river swept along,
To claim, perchance, heroic song;
Though sigh'd no groves in summer gale,
To prompt of love a softer tale;
Though scarce a puny streamlet's speed
Claim'd homage from a shepherd's reed;
Yet was poetic impulse given,

By the green hill and clear blue heaven.
It was a barren scene, and wild,
Where naked cliffs were rudely piled;
But ever and anon between
Lay velvet tufts of loveliest green;
And well the lonely infant knew
Recesses where the wall-flower grew,

And honeysuckle loved to crawl
Up the low crag and ruin'd wall.
I deem'd such nooks the sweetest shade
The sun in all its round survey'd ;
And still I thought that shatter'd tower
The mightiest work of human power;
And marvell'd as the aged hind

With some strange tale bewitch'd my mind,

Of forayers, who, with headlong force, Down from that strength had spurr'd their horse,

Their southern rapine to renew,
Far in the distant Cheviots blue,
And, home returning, fill'd the hall
With revel, wassel-rout, and brawl.
Methought that still, with trump and
clang,

The gateway's broken arches rang;
Methought grim features, seam'd with

scars,

Glared through the window's rusty bars,
And ever, by the winter hearth,
Old tales I heard of woe or mirth,
Of lovers' slights, of ladies' charms,
Of witches' spells, of warriors' arms;
Of patriot battles, won of old
By Wallace wight and Bruce the bold;
Of later fields of feud and fight,
When, pouring from their Highland
height,

The Scottish clans, in headlong sway,
Had swept the scarlet ranks away.
While stretch'd at length upon the floor,
Again I fought each combat o'er,
Pebbles and shells, in order laid,
The mimic ranks of war display'd;
And onward still the Scottish Lion bore,
And still the scatter'd Southern fled
before.

Still, with vain fondness, could I trace, Anew, each kind familiar face, That brighten'd at our evening fire! From the thatch'd mansion's grey-hair'd Sire,

Wise without learning, plain and good, And sprung of Scotland's gentler blood; Whose eye, in age, quick, clear, and keen,

Show'd what in youth its glance had been;

Whose doom discording neighbours sought,

Content with equity unbought;
To him the venerable Priest,
Our frequent and familiar guest,
Whose life and manners well could paint
Alike the student and the saint;
Alas! whose speech too oft I broke
With gambol rude and timeless joke:
For I was wayward, bold, and wild,
A self-will'd imp, a grandame's child;
But half a plague, and half a jest,
Was still endured, beloved, caress'd.

For me, thus nurtured, dost thou ask The classic poet's well-conn'd task? Nay, Erskine, nay-On the wild hill Let the wild heath-bell flourish still; Cherish the tulip, prune the vine, But freely let the woodbine twine, And leave untrimm'd the eglantine: Nay, my friend, nay-Since oft thy praise Hath given fresh vigour to my lays; Since oft thy judgment could refine My flatten'd thought, or cumbrous line; Still kind, as is thy wont, attend, And in the minstrel spare the friend. Though wild as cloud, as stream, as gale, Flow forth, flow unrestrain'd, my Tale!

T.

THE livelong day Lord Marmion rode : The mountain path the Palmer show'd, By gien and streamlet winded still, Where stunted birches hid the rill.

They might not choose the lowland road,

For the Merse forayers were abroad, Who, fired with hate and thirst of prey, Had scarcely fail'd to bar their way.

Oft on the trampling band, from crown
Of some tall cliff, the deer look'd down;
On wing of jet, from his repose
In the deep heath, the black-cock rose ;
Sprung from the gorse the timid roe,
Nor waited for the bending bow;
And when the stony path began,
By which the naked peak they wan,
Up flew the snowy ptarmigan.

The noon had long been pass'd before
They gain'd the height of Lammermoor;
Thence winding down the northern way
Before them, at the close of day,
Old Gifford's towers and hamlet lay.

II.

No summons calls them to the tower,
To spend the hospitable hour.
To Scotland's camp the Lord was gone;
His cautious dame, in bower alone,
Dreaded her castle to unclose,
So late, to unknown friends or foes,
On through the hamlet as they paced,
Before a porch, whose front was graced
With bush and flagon trimly placed,

Lord Marmion drew his rein: The village inn seem'd large, though rude;

Its cheerful fire and hearty food

Might well relieve his train.

Down from their seats the horsemen

Were tools for housewifes' hand; Nor wanted, in that martial day, The implements of Scottish fray,

The buckler, lance, and brand. Beneath its shade, the place of state, On oaken settle Marmion sate, And view'd around the blazing hearth. His followers mix in noisy mirth; Whom with brown ale, in jolly tide, From ancient vessels ranged aside, Full actively their host supplied.

IV.

;

Theirs was the glee of martial breast,
And laughter theirs at little jest ;
And oft Lord Marmion deigned to aid,
And mingle in the mirth they made
For though, with men of high degree,
The proudest of the proud was he,
Yet, train'd in camps, he knew the art
To win the soldier's hardy heart.
They love a captain to obey,
Boisterous as March, yet fresh as May
With open hand, and brow as free,
Lover of wine and minstrelsy;
Ever the first to scale a tower,
As venturous in a lady's bower :—
Such buxom chief shall lead his host
From India's fires to Zembla's frost.

V.

Resting upon his pilgrim staff,

Right opposite the Palmer stood; His thin dark visage seen but half,

Half hidden by his hood.

Still fix'd on Marmion was his look, Which he, who ill such gaze could brook,

Strove by a frown to quell;

But not for that, though more than once Full met their stern encountering glance, The Palmer's visage fell.

VI.

By fits less frequent from the crowd Was heard the burst of laughter loud; For still, as squire and archer stared On that dark face and matted beard,

Their glee and game declined. All gazed at length in silence drear, Unbroke, save when in comrade's ear Some yeoman, wondering in his fear, Thus whisper'd forth his mind :

"So please you," thus the youth rejoin'd,
"Our choicest minstrel's left behind.
Ill may we hope to please your ear,
Accustom'd Constant's strains to hear.
The harp full deftly can he strike,
And wake the lover's lute alike;
To dear Saint Valentine, no thrush
Sings livelier from a spring-tide bush,
No nightingale her love-lorn tune
More sweetly warbles to the moon.
Woe to the cause, whate'er it be,
Detains from us his melody,
Lavish'd on rocks, and billows stern,
Or duller monks of Lindisfarne.
Now must I venture, as I may
To sing his favourite roundelay."

IX.

A mellow voice Fitz-Eustace had,
The air he chose was wild and sad ;
Such have I heard, in Scottish land,
Rise from the busy harvest band,
When falls before the mountaineer,
On Lowland plains, the ripen'd ear.
Now one shrill voice the notes prolong,
Now a wild chorus swells the song:
Oft have I listen'd, and stood still,
As it came soften'd up the hill,
And deem'd it the lament of men
Who languish'd for their native glen;
And thought how sad would be such

sound

On Susquehana's swampy ground,