THE ESCAPED CONVICT.
She loved me she was sworn my bride;
I stabbed the striker, and he died!
For this the record lies,
Festering upon my brow;
For this-the rabble mocked my cries!
For this shame haunts me now;
For this-half withered must I be,
Ere my dead brow from stain is free.
My own, my beauteous land,
Land of the brave-the high;
I ask'd but this, of Fate's stern hand-
To see thee, and to die!
O yes, my country, let me be,
In my last hour-in death-with thee.
The Moon looked on the vale,
Wearing her starry wreath,
And soft displayed a form, that, pale,
Lay there alone-with death:
The Zephyrs drew a lengthened sigh,
And slow the Convict's corse passed by
'Twas said, that lovely night, A spirit youth was seen, Gliding among the flowerets bright,
The trees and meadows green;
And chiefly by a cot; and there
It wept, and melted into air.
I CALL upon thee in the night,
When none alive are near;
I dream about thee with delight,—
And then thou dost appear
Fair, as the day-star o'er the hill,
When skies are blue, and winds are still.
Thou stand'st before me silently,
The spectre of the past;
The trembling azure of thine eye,
Without a cloud o'ercast;
Calm as the pure and silent deep,
When winds are hushed and waves asleep.
Thou gazest on me!--but thy look
Of angel tenderness,
So pierces, that I less can brook
Than if it spoke distress,
Or came in anguish here to me
To tell of evil boding thee !
Around thee robes of snowy white,
With virgin taste are thrown;
And at thy breast, a lily bright,
In beauty scarcely blown :-
Calmly thou gazest-like the moon
Upon the leafy woods of June.
The auburn hair is braided soft
Above thy snowy brow :-
Why dost thou gaze on me so oft?
I cannot follow now !
It would be crime, a double death
To follow thy forbidden path.
But let me press that hand again,
I oft have pressed in love,
When sauntering through the grassy plain,
Or summer's evening grove;
Or, pausing, as we marked afar,
The twinkling of the evening star.
It is a dream, and thou art gone;
The midnight breezes sigh;
And downcast-sorrowful-alone-
With sinking heart, I lie
To muse on days, when thou to me
Wert more than all on earth can be!
Oh! lonely is the lot of him,
Whose path is on the earth,
And when his thoughts are dark and dim,
Hears only vacant mirth;
A swallow left, when all his kind
Have crossed the seas and winged the wind.
The age of pixies, like that of chivalry, is gone.-There is, perhaps, at present, scarcely a house, which they are reputed to visit. Even the fields and lanes which they formerly frequented seem to be nearly forsaken. Their music is rarely heard; and they appear to have forgotten to attend their ancient midnight dance. DREW'S CORNWALL.
Beautiful fictions of our fathers, wove
In Superstition's web when Time was young,
And fondly loved and cherished;-they are flown,
Before the wand of Science! Hills and vales,
Mountains and moors of Devon, ye have lost
The enchantments, the delights, the visions all,
The elfin visions that so blessed the sight
In the old days romantic. Nought is heard,
Now, in the leafy world, but earthly strains,-
Voices, yet sweet, of breeze, and bird, and brook,
And waterfall; the day is silent else,
And night is strangely mute! the hymnings high-
The immortal music, men of ancient times
Heard ravished oft, are flown! O ye have lost,
Mountains, and moors, and meads, the radiant throngs,
That dwelt in your green solitudes, and filled
The air, the fields, with beauty and with joy
Intense; with a rich mystery that awed
The mind, and flung around a thousand hearths
Divinest tales, that through the enchanted year
Found passionate listeners!
The very streams
Brightened with visitings of these so sweet
Ethereal creatures! They were seen to rise
From the charmed waters, which still brighter grew
As the pomp passed to land, until the eye
Scarce bore the unearthly glory. Where they trod
Young flowers, but not of this world's growth, arose,
And fragrance, as of amaranthine bowers,
Floated upon the breeze. And mortal eyes
Looked on their revels all the luscious night;
And, unreproved, upon their ravishing forms
Gazed wistfully, as in the dance they moved,
Voluptuous to the thrilling touch of harp
Elysian!
And by gifted eyes were seen
Wonders in the still air;-and beings bright
And beautiful, more beautiful than throng
Fancy's ecstatic regions, peopled now
The sunbeam, and now rode upon the gale
Of the sweet summer moon. Anon they touched
The earth's delighted bosom, and the glades
Seemed greener, fairer, and the enraptured woods
Gave a glad leafy murmur,-and the rills
Leaped in the ray for joy; and all the birds
Threw into the intoxicating air their songs,
All soul. The very archings of the grove,
Clad in cathedral gloom from age to age,
Lightened with living splendours; and the flowers,
Tinged with new hues, and lovelier upsprung
By millions in the grass, that rustled now
The seasons came In bloom or blight, in glory or in shade;
The shower or sunbeam fell or glanced as pleased These potent elves. They steered the giant cloud Through heaven at will, and with the meteor flash Came down in death or sport; ay, when the storm Shook the old woods, they rode, on rainbow wings,
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