Her moral thus the matron read,

Studious to teach her children dear,

And they by love, or duty led,

With pleasure heard, or seemed to hear.

Yet one less duteous, not less fair,

(In convents still the tale is known)

The fable heard with silent care,

But found a moral of her own.

The flower that smiled along the day,

And droop'd in tears at evening's fall;

Too well she found her life display,

Too well her fatal lot recall.

The treacherous Ivy's gloomy shade,
That murdered what it most embraced,
Too well that cruel scene conveyed
Which all her fairer hopes effaced.

THE EVENING PRIMROSE.

THERE are that love the shades of life,
And shun the splendid walks of Fame;
There are that hold it rueful strife
To risk AMBITION'S losing game:

That far from ENVY's lurid eye

The fairest fruits of GENIUS rear, Content to see them bloom and die In Friendship's small but kindly sphere.

Than vainer flowers though sweeter far,
The Evening Primrose shuns the day;
Blooms only to the western star,
And loves its solitary ray.

In EDEN's vale an aged hind,

At the dim twilight's closing hour, On his time-smoothed staff reclined, With wonder viewed the opening flower.

"Ill-fated flower, at eve to blow,"

In pity's simple thought he cries, "Thy bosom must not feel the glow "Of splendid suns, or smiling skies.

"Nor thee, the vagrants of the field,
"The hamlet's little train behold;
"Their eyes to sweet oppression yield,
"When thine the falling shades unfold.

"Nor thee the hasty shepherd heeds,

"When love has filled his heart with cares, "For flowers he rifles all the meads, "For waking flowers-but thine forbears.

"Ah! waste no more that beauteous bloom

"On night's chill shade, that fragrant breath,

"Let smiling suns those gems illume!
"Fair flower, to live unseen is death."

Soft as the voice of vernal gales

That o'er the bending meadow blow, Or streams that steal through even vales, And murmur that they move so slow: