NOR cold, nor stern, my soul! yet I detest These scented Rooms, where, to a gaudy throng, Heaves the proud Harlot her distended breast, In intricacies of laborious song. These feel not Music's genuine power, nor deign Hark! the deep buzz of Vanity and Hate!' Scornful, yet envious, with self-torturing sneer My lady eyes some maid of humbler state, While the pert Captain, or the primmer Priest, 4 Prattles accordant scandal in her ear. O give me, from this heartless scene releas'd, His Scottish tunes and warlike marches play, By moonshine, on the balmy summer-night, Or lies the purple evening on the bay Around whose roots the fisher's boat is tied, On whose trim seat doth Edmund stretch at ease, And while the lazy boat sways to and fro, Breathes in his flute sad airs, so wild and slow, That his own cheek is wet with quiet tears. But O, dear Anne! when midnight wind careers, The Things of Nature utter; birds or trees Or where the stiff grass mid the heath-plant waves, Murmur and music thin of sudden breeze. THE KEEP-SAKE. THE tedded hay, the first-fruits of the soil, Stands, like some boasted beauty of past years, By rivulet, or spring, or wet road-side, That blue and bright-eyed flowret of the brook, With delicate fingers on the snow-white silk Has work'd, (the flowers which most she knew I lov'd,) And, more belov'd than they, her auburn hair. * One of the names (and meriting to be the only one) of the Myosotis Scorpioides Palustris; a flower from six to twelve inches high, with blue blossom and bright yellow eye. It has the same name over the whole Empire of Germany (Vergissmein nicht), and we believe, in Denmark and Sweden. In the cool morning twilight, early waked Leaving the soft bed to her sleeping sister, Down the slope coppice to the woodbine bower, Making a quiet image of disquiet In the smooth, scarcely moving river-pool. There, in that bower where first she own'd her love, From off her glowing cheek, she sate and stretch'd Nor yet th' entrancement of that maiden kiss With which she promis'd, that when spring return'd, She would resign one half of that dear name, And own thenceforth no other name but mine! TO A LADY. With Falkner's "Shipwreck." АH! not by Cam or Isis, famous streams, Nor yet while gazing in sublimer mood Nor in dim cave with bladdery sea-weed strew'd, Our sea-bard sang this song! which still he sings, |