O (have I sigh'd) were mine the wizard's Smoothing through fertile fields thy rod, current meek! Dear native brook! where first young Poesy Stared wildly - eager in her noontide dream! Where blameless pleasures dimple Quiet's cheek, Or bloom a Myrtle, from whose odorous As water-lilies ripple thy slow stream! boughs Dear native haunts! where Virtue still is gay, My Love might weave gay garlands for her brows. When Twilight stole across the fading To fan my Love I'd be the Evening ramm Mourn in the soft folds of her swelling vest, And flutter my faint pinions on her breast! On Seraph wing I'd float a Dream by night, To soothe my Love with shadows of delight : Or soar aloft to be the Spangled Skies, And gaze upon her with a thousand eyes! 70 As when the Savage, who his drowsy frame Had basked beneath the Sun's unclouded flame, Where Friendship's fixed star sheds a mellowed ray, Where Love a crown of thornless Roses wears, Where soften'd Sorrow smiles within her tears; 90 And Memory, with a Vestal's chaste employ, | Unceasing feeds the lambent flame of joy! No more your sky-larks melting from the sight Shall thrill the attuned heart-string with delight No more shall deck your pensive Plea sures sweet With wreaths of sober hue my evening seat. Yet dear to Fancy's eye your varied scene Of wood, hill, dale, and sparkling brook between! Awakes amid the troubles of the air, TO FORTUNE TO THE EDITOR OF THE MORNING CHRONICLE SIR, The following poem you may perhaps deem admissible into your journal-if not, you will commit it els iepòv μένος Ηφαίστοιο. — I am, with more respect and gratitude than I ordinarily feel for Editors of Papers, your obliged, etc., CANTAB.-S. T. C. To FORTUNE On buying a Ticket in the Irish Lottery Composed during a walk to and from the Queen's Head, Gray's Inn Lane, Holborn, and Hornsby's and Co., Cornhill. PROMPTRESS of unnumber'd sighs, O snatch that circling bandage from thine eyes! O look, and smile! No common prayer Solicits, Fortune! thy propitious care! For, not a silken son of dress, I clink the gilded chains of politesses, Nor ask thy boon what time I scheme. Unholy Pleasure's frail and feverish dream; Nor yet my view life's dazzle blinds-Pomp!-Grandeur ! Power!-I give you to the winds! Let the little bosom cold Melt only at the sunbeam ray of goldMy pale cheeks glow-the big drops Trembling, I plac'd it in my secret breast: And thrice I've viewed the vernal gleam, Since oft mine eye, with joy's electric beam, Illum'd it and its sadder hue Oft moistened with the tear's ambrosial dew! Poor wither'd floweret! on its head May'st haply tinge its beauties pale, Morning Chronicle, Nov. 7, 1793. LEWTI OR THE CIRCASSIAN LOVE-CHAUNT AT midnight by the stream I roved, The Moon was high, the moonlight gleam But the rock shone brighter far, I saw a cloud of palest hue, Onward to the moon it passed; Still brighter and more bright it grew, With floating colours not a few, Till it reach'd the moon at last : Then the cloud was wholly bright, With a rich and amber light! And so with many a hope I seek And with such joy I find my Lewti; And even so my pale wan cheek IO 20 Drinks in as deep a flush of beauty! Nay, treacherous image! leave my mind, If Lewti never will be kind. rom The little cloud-it floats away, And now 'tis whiter than before! I saw a vapour in the sky, Thin, and white, and very high; I ne'er beheld so thin a cloud : Perhaps the breezes that can fly Now below and now above, Have snatched aloft the lawny shroud 30 4I I then might view her bosom white As these two swans together heave Oh! that she saw me in a dream, And dreamt that I had died for care; All pale and wasted I would seem Yet fair withal, as spirits are! I'd die indeed, if I might see Her bosom heave, and heave for me! Soothe, gentle image! soothe my mind! To-morrow Lewti may be kind. IMITATIONS AD LYRAM (CASIMIR, BOOK II. ODE 3) 1794. 80 To-morrow death shall freeze this hand, And on thy breast, my wedded trea sure, I never, never more shall live;Alas! I quit a life of pleasure. Morning Post, May 10, 1798. MORIENTI SUPERSTES YET art thou happier far than she The mighty parent's care hast found, Without whose tender guardian thought No sparrow falleth to the ground. THE SIGH WHEN Youth his faery reign began And when, along the waves of woe, But soon Reflection's power imprest And though in distant climes to roam, June 1794. THE KISS ONE kiss, dear Maid! I said and sighed- Yon viewless wanderer of the vale, At Morning's break, at Evening's close Too well those lovely lips disclose Clasp'd to her bosom with a mother's care; And, as she loved thy kindred form to trace, The slow smile wander'd o'er her pallid face. For never yet did mortal voice impart Tones more congenial to the sadden'd heart: Whether, to rouse the sympathetic glow, Thou pourest lone Monimia's tale of woe; Or haply clothest with funereal vest The bridal loves that wept in Juliet's breast. O'er our chill limbs the thrilling Terrors creep, Th' entranced Passions their still vigil keep; While the deep sighs, responsive to the song, Sound through the silence of the trembling throng. But purer raptures lighten'd from thy face, And spread o'er all thy form an holier grace, When from the daughter's breasts the father drew The life he gave, and mix'd the big tear's dew. Nor was it thine th' heroic strain to roll With mimic feelings foreign from the soul: Bright in thy parent's eye we mark'd the tear; Methought he said, 'Thou art no Actress here! A semblance of thyself the Grecian dame, And Brunton and Euphrasia still the same!' O soon to seek the city's busier scene, Pause thee a while, thou chaste-eyed maid serene, Till Granta's sons from all her sacred bowers With grateful hand shall weave Pierian flowers |