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THE REVERIE.

COME, dusky shadows of the night,
Companions of the midnight hour;
Sleep binds his fillet o'er my brow,
And Silence guards the lonely bower;
Ah, come! this restless mind engage,
Soothe it with retrospective bliss,
Recall the joys of early life,

And all the present gloom dismiss.
Give me one golden minute back

Of those when prosperous fortune smiled, When friendship smooth'd each passing care, And pleasure's witching voice beguiled: Call back those dreams of fond romance, That lull'd me with their specious name, With faith's firm pledge, with honour's vow, Love's soft deceit and transient flame.

Dreary and toilsome is the path

When life's aerial schemes are flown,
When kind illusions cheat no more,
And sober Reason claims her own:
Burns then the ardent patriot's fire?
Avails the stoic's boasted aid?
Alas! hear godlike Brutus mourn
How Virtue's self was but a shade?

The world's wide desert I survey

With fainting step and cheerless breast;
No soul congenial blends with mine,
I taste no bliss, I feel no rest;
Fled the bright forms which Fancy drew,
Nor Hope's gay visions cheer my eye,
Oh, drown the sense of present woe!
Oh, save me from reality!

MARIA RIDDELL,

ELEGIAC STANZAS*.

WHY, Damon, with the forward day,
Dost thou thy little spot survey,

From tree to tree, with doubtful cheer,
Pursue the progress of the year;

What winds arise, what rains descend;
When thou before that year shalt end?

What do thy noontide walks avail,
To clear the leaf, and pick the snail;
Then wantonly to death decree
An insect of more use than thee?

Thou and the worm are brother kind,
As low, as earthly, and as blind!

Vain wretch! canst thou expect to see
The downy peach make court to thee?
Or that thy sense shall ever meet
The bean flower's deep-embosom'd sweet,
Exhaling with the evening blast?
Thy evenings then will all be pass'd.

Thy narrow pride, thy fancied green,
O Vanity, in little seen!

All must be left when Death appears,
In spite of wishes, groans, and tears:
Nor one-of all thy plants that grow,
Save Rosemary, with thee will go!

DR. SEWELL.

*Written at Hampstead, by Dr. Sewell, a few weeks before his death.

THE DREAM.

WHAT piercing shriek, what cry of wild affright Chides the dull silence of unbroken night?

Cold are the drops which these moist limbs bedew;
I wake to weep, I slept to dream of you.
Methought the well known stream before me
flow'd,

While languid breezes o'er its current rode;
Slow-wheeling sank the sun's autumnal ray,
And twilight meekly stole on parting day;
No sound was heard save when the river side
Beat back the minute ripplings of its tide *;
No light, save Hesper glancing on the stream,
Pour'd the mild lustre of his dewy beam.
Thus oft before-ah! no, how changed the view,
How varied now from that which once I knew!
I did not pause upon the pausing eye,
Meet look with look, or mingle sigh with sigh;
I did not gaze on Fancy's glass to see
That all was Love, as Love was all to me.
Silent and slow by that wide-water'd green
I wander'd forth to weep, alone, unseen:—
Alone? ah! no, my own sad thoughts were there;
Unseen? thine eye is never closed, Despair!

I saw in Fancy's vivid colours warm,
Even now again I see the much loved form:
I heard once more the warblings of that tongue,
Ah! who could fly them while the siren sung!
Her cheek's warm glow, her sigh but half re-
press'd,

Her eyes' soft lustre seeming love confess'd:

* With minute drops from off the eaves.

Il Penseroso.

False fleeting slumber! why my tears renew?
So lovely once she smiled, and not more true.

Is there no dream which ceases to beguile?
No sleep which wears not a delusive smile?
No lasting slumber of unfeign'd repose?
No couch on which the tear-drop never flows?
Cease, cease, perturbed spirit, to repine;
There is that couch, that sleep will soon be thine.
E. SMEDLEY, JUN.

STANZAS TO A CANDLE.

THOU glimmering taper! by whose feeble ray
In thoughtful solitude the night I waste!
How dost thou warn me by thy swift decay,
That equal to oblivion both we haste!
The vital oil that should our strength supply,
Consuming, wastes, and bids us learn to die.

Touch'd by my hand, thy swift reviving light With new gain'd force again is taught to glow! So, rising from surrounding troubles bright,

My conscious soul begins herself to know: And, from the ills of life emerging forth, Learns the just standard of her native worth.

But see in mists thy fading lustre veil'd,
Around thy head the dusky vapours play;
So, by opposing fortune's clouds conceal'd,
In vain to force a passage I essay:

While round me,gathering thick, they daily spread,
And, living, I am number'd with the dead!

But now thy flame diminish'd quick subsides,
Too sure a presage that thy date is run;
Alike I feel my life's decreasing tides;

Soon will like thine my transient blaze be gone! Instructive emblem! how our fates agree!

I haste to darkness, and resemble thee.

BOYSE.

ELEGIAC STANZAS,

WRITTEN AT BATH DURING SICKNESS.

WHEN I lie musing on my bed alone,
And listen to the wintry waterfall*;
And many moments that are pass'd and gone
(Moments of sunshine and of joy) recall;

Though the long night is dark and damp around,
And no still star hangs out its friendly flame;
And the winds sweep the sash with sullen sound,
And freezing palsy creeps o'er all my frame;

I catch consoling phantasies that spring

From the thick gloom, and as the night airs beat They touch my heart, like the wild wires + that ring

In mournful modulations, strange and sweet.

Was it the voice of thee, my buried friend?

Was it the whisper'd vow of faithful love? Do I in ****** green shades thy steps attend, And hear the high pines murmur thus above?

*The fall of the river, heard from the Parade. The Eolian harp.

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