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Lo! seated on her opal throne

In robes, eye-spotted, Fancy smiles; Well might she smile, her fruitful zone With varied pleasures life beguiles. Before her bright eyes, as if in a glass, Fresh scenes in succession continually pass. Unshrouding now her awful form ; (Around her how the passions storm!) Though "ever young yet full of eld,” * Great Nature comes, as music swell'd Through Fancy's hall, a mingled strain,― all the train

Since pleasure, sorrow,

Of subject feelings on her wait,
Her darling's fame to consecrate.

Quickly through the golden gate
Glide the fairies, to relate

All their pranks of yesternight;
With their coronals of flowers,
Gather'd after April showers,
"Tis indeed a lovely sight.

"Hail! mortal, hail, near Avon's stream, As o'er thy slumbers Nature smiled,

We stole upon thee in a dream,

To fill thy soul with fancies wild.

* Spenser.

The moonlight slept upon the bank,

To charm thy guardian from our prank ;

But still her sweet influence watch'd o'er thy head,
To temper the thoughts which our cunning had bred.
Then Nature and Fancy their labours combined
To store with their wonderful treasures thy mind ;
-Now place we on thy head a crown,
Fit for thy brows, and thine alone.”

The poet bows, his looks express
An intellectual consciousness;
His features are so heavenly fair,

The mind, the eternal mind beams there.

A CHARACTER.

ALONZO was no common man, for few
Like him, the art of pleasing others knew.
Nature on him had kindly lavish'd all

Those gifts that please alike in bower or hall!
His soul was bounteous, in his eyes shone forth
A spirit that express'd his inward worth:
His honour as the sun itself was bright,
Though transient mists might intercept its light:
Ambition (his a virtue) often turn'd
His mind to deeds for which his spirit burn'd:
Then would he knit on vacancy his brow,
Till e'en with thought exprest it seem'd to glow :
Then dreams of greatness rush'd upon his brain-
In better times, those dreams had not been vain!
Long had Hispania been misruled by those
Who glut their little minds with others' woes;
Their sole delight to trample on their kind,
As serpents taint the fairest things they find;
Danger had scowl'd on all who dared to break
The bonds of silence for the people's sake.

To speak of freedom-'twas indeed to brave
The prison's durance, to forestal the grave!
Alonzo knew it; oft he wish'd to try
The chance of war-to conquer or to die.
The cause was hopeless, and to bleed alone
Had more of rashness than of virtue shown,
Since Chivalry, the nation's queen of yore,
Roused in her sons life's energies no more :-
But thus compell'd to bear within his soul
Feelings that often strove to break control-
To stifle in his breast the will to dare-
Nay, more, to find his talents buried there,
By public virtue ne'er call'd forth to shine
Of honest counsels an exhaustless mine!
Oh, that were misery! Besides, to wait
In seeming lowliness on slaves of state;
Or else, the game of spies, to fret away,
In restless fear, day lingering after day;
These evils all so smote upon his heart,
He could not bear them; no, he must depart;
Quit in disguise his land, his native Spain,
To seek some foster-country o'er the main!

THE

ABSENT POET TO HIS MISTRESS.

Stay! my charmer, can you leave me ?

Cruel, cruel to deceive me ;

Well you know how much you grieve me.

Cruel charmer, can you go?

Cruel charmer, can you go?-BURNS.

DOOM'D thus to worship thee in vain,
I useless mourn my rigid lot;
Yet happier in this secret pain
Than if thy beauty was forgot.

The sigh to memory gives a force,
That brings before me all thy charms;

Of grief and joy alike the source,
Of rapture, or of fond alarms.

The smile,—for often will the smile
Chase the sad shades of thought away,

That darken o'er the brows awhile,
As clouds o'er-cast an April day-

C C

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