MUSIC.

BY ALARIC A. WATTS.

What passion cannot music raise and quell?

MYSTERIOUS keeper of the key

That

opes the gates of memory:

Oft in thy wildest, simplest strain,
We live o'er years of bliss again!

DRYDEN.

The sun bright hopes of early youth; Love in its first deep hour of truth;

And dreams of life's delightful morn
Are on thy seraph pinions borne.

To the enthusiast's heart thy tone
Breathes of the lost and lovely one;
And calls back moments brief as dear,
When last 't was wafted on his ear.

Once heard his native bowers among; And straightway on his visions rise, Home's sunny slopes, and cloudless skies.

The warrior from the strife retired,
By Music's stirring strains inspired,
Turns him to deeds of glory done,
To dangers 'scaped—and laurels won.

Enchantress sweet of smiles and tears,
Spell of the dreams of vanished years!
Mysterious keeper of the key
That opes the gates of memory !

"T is thine to bid sad hearts be gay, Yet chase the smiles of mirth away; Joy's sparkling eye in tears to steep, Yet make the mourner cease to weep!

To gloom or sadness thou canst suit
The chords of thy delicious lute :
For every heart thou hast a tone
Can make its pulses all thine own!

TO AN OLD OAK.

BY SAMUEL ROGERS.

Immota manet; multosque nepotes,
Multa virûm volvens durando sæcula, vincit.

VIRGIL.

ROUND thee, alas, no shadows move!
From thee no sacred murmurs breathe!

Yet within thee, thyself a grove,
Once did the eagle scream above,

And the wolf howl beneath.

There once the steel-clad knight reclined,
His sable plumage tempest-tossed;
And, as the death-bell smote the wind,
From towers long-fled by human kind,
His brow the hero crossed!

Then culture came, and days serene;
And village sports, and garlands gay:
Full many a pathway crossed the green;
And maids and shepherd youths were seen
To celebrate the May.

Father of many a forest deep,

Whence many a navy thunder-fraught!
Erst in thy acorn-cells asleep,
Soon destined o'er the world to sweep,
Opening new spheres of thought!

Wont in the night of woods to dwell,
The holy Druid saw thee rise;
And, planting there the guardian-spell,
Sung forth, the dreadful pomp to swell
Of human sacrifice!

Thy singed top and branches bare
Now struggle in the evening sky;

And the wan moon wheels round to glare

On the long corse that shivers there

Of him who came to die!

R

VERSES TO THE MISSES L

BY THOMAS CAMPBELL, ESQ.

ADIEU, Romance's heroines!

Give me the nymphs, who this good hour May charm me, not in Fiction's scenes,

But teach me Beauty's living power; My harp, that has been mute too long, Shall sleep at Beauty's name no more, So but your smiles reward my song, JEMIMA, ROSE, and ELEANORE,

In whose benignant eyes are beaming
The rays of purity and truth,
Such as we fancy woman's seeming
In the creation's golden youth:
The more I look upon thy grace,

ROSINA, I could look the more,
But for JEMIMA's witching face,

And the sweet voice of ELEANORE!

-

Had I been LAWRENCE, kings had wanted
Their portraits, till I'd painted yours;
And these had future hearts enchanted,
When this poor verse no more endures :
I would have left the congress faces,
A dull-eyed diplomatic corps,
Till I had grouped you as the graces
JEMIMA, ROSE, and ELEANORE!

The Catholic bids fair saints befriend him;
Your poet's heart is catholic too
His rosary shall be flowers ye send him,
His saint-days when he visits you:
And my sere laurels for my duty,

Miraculous at your touch would rise,
Could I give verse one trait of beauty,
Like that which glads me from your eyes!

Unsealed by you, these lips have spoken,
Disused to song for many a day;

Ye've tuned a harp whose strings were broken,
And warmed a heart of callous clay !

So, when my fancy next refuses

To twine for you a garland more, Come back again and be my Muses, JEMIMA, ROSE, and ELEANORE!

THE SWALLOW.

BY THE REV. E. W. BARNARD.

THE visitress of man, on earth

She resteth not her flagging wing,

But seeks at once the blessed roof

To which in youth she loved to cling.