Then mournfully the parting bugle bid

Its farewell, o'er the grave of worth and truth;
Prone to the dust, afflicted Waldegrave hid

His face on earth; -him watched in gloomy ruth
His woodland guide; but words had none to soothe
The grief that knew not consolation's name :
Casting his Indian mantle o'er the youth,

He watch'd, beneath its folds, each burst that came
Convulsive, ague-like across his shuddering frame!

'And I could weep ;'-th' Oneyda chief

His descant wildly thus begun ;

'But that I may not stain with grief

The death-song of my father's son,

Or bow this head in woe;

For by my wrongs and by my wrath
To-morrow Areouski's breath

(That fires you heav'n with storms of death)
Shall light us to the foe;

And we shall share, my Christian boy,

The foeman's blood, the avenger's joy!

'But thee, my flower, whose breath was giveɔ

By milder genii o'er the deep,

The spirits of the white man's heaven

Forbid not thee to weep;

Nor will the Christian host,

Nor will thy father's spirit grieve

To see thee, on the battle's eve,
Lamenting, take a mournful leave
Of her who loved thee most:

She was the rainbow to thy sight!
Thy sun-thy heaven-of lost delight!—

'To-morrow let us do or die!

But when the bolt of death is hurled,
Ah! whither then with thee to fly

Shall Outalissi roam the world?

Seek we thy once-loved home?—
The hand is gone that cropt its flowers,
Unheard their clock repeats its hours,
Cold is the hearth within their bowers,
And should we thither roam,

Its echoes and its empty tread

Would sound like voices from the dead.

'Or shall we cross yon mountains blue,
Whose streams my kindred nation quaff'd,
And by my side, in battle true,

A thousand warriors drew the shaft?
Ah! there in desolation cold

The desert serpent dwells alone,

Where grass o'ergrows each mouldering bone, And stones themselves to ruin grown,

Like me, are death-like old:

Then seek we not their camp-for there
The silence dwells of my despair.

'But hark, the trump!-to-morrow thou
In glory's fires shalt dry thy tears:
Ev'n from the land of shadows now
My father's awful ghost appears
Amidst the clouds that round us roll;
He bids my soul for battle thirst,
He bids me dry the last-the first-
The only tears that ever burst
From Outalissi's soul;

Because I may not stain with grief

The death-song of an Indian chic£'

JOHN HOOKHAM FRERE.

[JOHN HOOKHAM FRERE was born in London in 1769, and died at Malta in 1846. The first part of his Whistlecraft poem was published in 1817 as the Prospectus and Specimen of an intended National Work, by William and Robert Whistlecraft of Stow-Market in Suffolk, Harness and Collar Makers. In the following year a second part was issued with the first under the title of The Monks and the Giants; but the work was never completed. Frere contributed much to the Anti-Jacobin, 1797-8, and translated several of the plays of Aristophanes. His Works in Verse and Prose, with a prefatory Memoir, were published in 1872 by his nephews, W. E., and Sir Bartle Frere.]

Frere's versions of the Aristophanic Comedy have an established reputation for spirit of rendering and mastery of metre. His translations from the Poema del Cid, which were printed in Southey's Chronicle, have also a fine balladic lilt; but their literal fidelity to the Spanish has been lately challenged. Of his original work, the best examples are to be found in the Anti-Jacobin and the Whistlecraft fragment. He had a hand in all the great successes of the former,-notably the immortal Needy KnifeGrinder and the excellent imitations of Darwin and Schiller in the Loves of the Triangles and The Rovers. For The Monks and the Giants he adopted an eight-line stanza based upon that of the Italians. It had already been used by Harrington, Drayton, Fairfax, and (as we have seen) in later times by Gay; it had even been used by Frere's contemporary, William Tennant; but to Frere belongs the honour of giving it the special characteristics which Byron afterwards popularised in Beppo and Don Juan. Structurally the ottava rima of Frere singularly resembles that of Byron, who admitted that Whistlecraft was his 'immediate model.' But notwithstanding the cleverness and versatility of The Monks and the Giants, its interest was too remote and its plan too uncertain to command any but an eclectic audience. Moreover, it was almost immediately eclipsed by Beppo. Byron, taking up the stanza with equal skill and greater genius, filled it with the vigour of his personality, and made it a measure of his own, which it has ever since been hazardous for inferior poets to attempt.

AUSTIN DOBSON.

FROM THE MONKS AND THE GIANTS.'

And certainly they say, for fine behaving
King Arthur's Court has never had its match;
True point of honour, without pride or braving,
Strict etiquette for ever on the watch:

Their manners were refined and perfect-saving
Some modern graces, which they could not catch,
As spitting through the teeth, and driving stages,
Accomplishments reserved for distant ages.

They looked a manly, generous generation;

Beards, shoulders, eyebrows, broad, and square, and thick,
Their accents firm and loud in conversation,
Their eyes and gestures eager, sharp, and quick,
Showed them prepared, on proper provocation,
To give the lie, pull noses, stab and kick;
And for that very reason, it is said,
They were so very courteous and well-bred.

The ladies looked of an heroic race

At first a general likeness struck your eye,

Tall figures, open features, oval face,

Large eyes, with ample eyebrows arched and high ;
Their manners had an odd, peculiar grace,

Neither repulsive, affable, nor shy,

Majestical, reserved, and somewhat sullen;
Their dresses partly silk, and partly woollen.

*

Sir Gawain may be painted in a word-
He was a perfect loyal Cavalier;

His courteous manners stand upon record,

A stranger to the very thought of fear.

The proverb says, As brave as his own sword;
And like his weapon was that worthy Peer,
Of admirable temper, clear and bright,
Polished yet keen, though pliant yet upright.

On every point, in earnest or in jest,

His judgment, and his prudence, and his wit,
Were deemed the very touchstone and the test
Of what was proper, graceful, just, and fit;
A word from him set everything at rest,
His short decisions never failed to hit;
His silence, his reserve, his inattention,
Were felt as the severest reprehension;

His memory was the magazine and hoard,
Where claims and grievances, from year to year,
And confidences and complaints were stored
From dame and knight, from damsel, boor, and peer.
Loved by his friends, and trusted by his Lord,
A generous courtier, secret and sincere,
Adviser-general to the whole community,

He served his friend, but watched his opportunity.

Meanwhile the solemn mountains that surrounded
The silent valley where the convent lay,
With tintinnabular uproar were astounded,
When the first peal burst forth at break of day:
Feeling their granite ears severely wounded,
They scarce knew what to think, or what to say;
And (though large mountains commonly conceal
Their sentiments, dissembling what they feel,

Yet) Cader-Gibbrish from his cloudy throne
To huge Loblommon gave an intimation,
Of this strange rumour, with an awful tone,
Thundering his deep surprise and indignation;
The lesser hills, in language of their own,
Discussed the topic by reverberation ;
Discoursing with their echoes all day long,
Their only conversation was, 'ding dong.'

Those giant-mountains inwardly were moved,
But never made an outward change of place:
Not so the mountain-giants—(as behoved
A more alert and locomotive race).