Had braved the death-wing'd tempest's blast,
And 'scaped a tyrant's fiercer wrath?
Lady! when I shall view the walls
Where free Byzantium once arose,
And Stamboul's Oriental halls

The Turkish tyrants now enclose;

Though mightiest in the lists of fame,
That glorious city still shall be;
On me 'twill hold a dearer claim,
As spot of thy nativity:

And though I bid thee now farewell,

When I behold that wondrous scene, Since where thou art I may not dwell,

"Twill soothe to be where thou hast been.

LINES WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM, AT MALTA.

As o'er the cold sepulchral stone

Some name arrests the passer-by; Thus, when thou view'st this page alone, May mine attract thy pensive eye! And when by thee that name is read, Perchance in some succeeding year, Reflect on me as on the dead,

And think my heart is buried here.

STANZAS

COMPOSED DURING A THUNDER-STORM, AND WHILE BEWILDERED NEAR MOUNT PINDUS IN ALBANIA.

CHILL and mirk is the nightly blast,

Where Pindus' mountains rise,

And angry clouds are pouring fast

The vengeance of the skies.

Our guides are gone, our hope is lost,
And lightnings, as they play,

But show where rocks our path have crost,
Or gild the torrent's spray.

Is yon a cot I saw, though low?

When lightning broke the gloomHow welcome were its shade!-ah, no! 'Tis but a Turkish tomb.

Through sounds of foaming waterfalls,
I hear a voice exclaim-

My way-worn countryman, who calls
On distant England's name.

A shot is fired-by foe or friend?
Another 'tis to tell

The mountain-peasants to descend,
And lead us where they dwell.

Oh! who in such a night will dare

To tempt the wilderness?

And who 'mid thunder-peals can hear
Our signal of distress?

And who that heard our shouts would rise
To try the dubious road?

Nor rather deem from nightly cries That outlaws were abroad?

Clouds burst, skies flash, oh, dreadful hour!
More fiercely pours the storm!

Yet here one thought has still the power
To keep my bosom warm.

While wandering through each broken path,
O'er brake and craggy brow;

While elements exhaust their wrath,
Sweet Florence, where art thou?
Not on the sea, not on the sea,

Thy bark hath long been gone :
Oh, may the storm that pours on me,
Bow down my head alone!

Full swiftly blew the swift Siroc,
When last I press'd thy lip;
And long ere now, with foaming shock,
Impell'd thy gallant ship.

Now thou art safe; nay, long ere now
Hast trod the shore of Spain;
'Twere hard if aught so fair as thou
Should linger on the main.

And since I now remember thee

In darkness and in dread,
As in those hours of revelry
Which mirth and music sped;
Do thou, amid the fair white walls,
If Cadiz yet be free,

At times, from out her latticed halls,
Look o'er the dark blue sea;
Then think upon Calypso's isles,
Endear'd by days gone by;
To others give a thousand smiles,
To me a single sigh.

And when the admiring circle mark
The paleness of thy face,

A half-form'd tear, a transient spark
Of melancholy grace,

Again thou'lt smile, and blushing shun
Some coxcomb's raillery;

Nor own for once thou thought'st on one
Who ever thinks on thee.

Though smile and sigh alike are vain,
When sever'd hearts repine,

My spirit flies o'er mount and main,
And mourns in search of thine.

STANZAS

WRITTEN IN PASSING THE AMBRACIAN GULF.

THROUGH cloudless skies, in silvery sheen, Full beams the moon on Actium's coast: And on these waves, for Egypt's queen, The ancient world was won and lost.

And now upon the scene I look,

The azure grave of many a Roman; Where stern Ambition once forsook

His wavering crown to follow woman.

All, all in vain; my wayward lyre
Wakes silver notes of soft desire.
Adieu, ye chiefs renown'd in arms!
Adieu the clang of war's alarms!
To other deeds my soul is strung,
And sweeter notes shall now be sung;
My harp shall all its powers reveal,
To tell the tale my heart must feel:
Love, Love alone, my lyre shall claim,
In songs of bliss and sighs of flame.

FROM ANACREON. [Μεσονυκτίαις ποθ' ώραις, κ. τ. λ.] "TWAS now the hour when Night had driven Her car half round yon sable heaven"; Bootes, only, seem'd to roll

His arctic charge around the pole :
While mortals, lost in gentle sleep,
Forgot to smile, or ceased to weep:
At this lone hour, the Paphian boy,
Descending from the realms of joy,
Quick to my gate directs his course,
And knocks with all his little force.
My visions fled, alarm'd I rose-
'What stranger breaks my blest repose?'
'Alas!' replies the wily child,
In faltering accents sweetly mild,
'A hapless infant here I roam,
Far from my dear maternal home.
Oh! shield me from the wintry blast!
The nightly storm is pouring fast.
No prowling robber lingers here.
A wandering baby who can fear?'
I heard his seeming artless tale,
I heard his sighs upon the gale:
My breast was never pity's foe,
But felt for all the baby's woe.
I drew the bar, and by the light,
Young Love, the infant, met my sight;
His bow across his shoulders flung,
And thence his fatal quiver hung
(Ah! little did I think the dart
Would rankle soon within my heart).
With care I tend my weary guest,
His little fingers chill my breast;
His glossy curls, his azure wing,
Which droop with nightly showers, I wring;
His shivering limbs the embers warm ;
And now reviving from the storm,
Scarce had he felt his wonted glow,
Than swift he seized his slender bow:
'I fain would know, my gentle host,'
He cried, if this its strength has lost;
I fear, relax'd with midnight dews,
The strings their former aid refuse.'
With poison tipt, his arrow flies,
Deep in my tortured heart it lies;
Then loud the joyous urchin laugh'd:
'My bow can still impel the shaft:
'Tis firmly fix'd, thy sighs reveal it ;

Say, courteous host, canst thou not feel it?'

TO EMMA.

SINCE now the hour is come at last,

When you must quit your anxious lover; Since now car dream of bliss is past, One pang, my girl, and all is over. Alas! that pang will be severe,

Which bids us part to meet no more;
Which tears me far from one so dear,
Departing for a distant shore.

Well! we have pass'd some happy hours,
And joy will mingle with our tears;
When thinking on these ancient towers,
The shelter of our infant years;

Where from this Gothic casement's height,
We view'd the lake, the park, the dell;
And still, though tears obstruct our sight,
We lingering look a last farewell,
O'er fields through which we used to run,
And spend the hours in childish play;
O'er shades where, when our race was done,
Reposing on my breast you lay;

Whilst I, admiring, too remiss,

Forgot to scare the hovering flies, Yet envied every fly the kiss

It dared to give your slumbering eyes:
See still the little painted bark,

In which I row'd you o'er the lake;
See there, high waving o'er the park,
The elm I clamber'd for your sake.
These times are past-our joys are gone,
You leave me, leave this happy vale;
These scenes I must retrace alone:
Without thee, what will they avail?
Who can conceive, who has not proved,
The anguish of a last embrace,
When, torn from all you fondly loved,
You bid a long adieu to peace?

As the chief who to combat advances

Secure of his conquest before,
Thus thou, with those eyes for thy lances,
Hast pierced through my heart to its core.
Ah, tell me, my soul, must I perish

By pangs which a smile would dispel? Would the hope, which thou once bad'st me cherish,

For torture repay me too well? Now sad is the garden of roses, Beloved but false Haidée ! There Flora all wither'd reposes,

And mourns o'er thine absence with me.

ON PARTING.

THE kiss, dear maid! thy lip has left
Shall never part from mine,
Till happier hours restore the gift

Untainted back to thine.

Thy parting glance, which fondly beams, An equal love may see :

The tear that from thine eyelid streams
Can weep no change in me.

I ask no pledge to make me blest
In gazing when alone;
Nor one memorial for a breast,
Whose thoughts are all thine own.
Nor need I write-to tell the tale
My pen were doubly weak:
Oh! what can idle words avail,
Unless the heart could speak?
By day or night, in weal or woe,
That heart, no longer free,
Must bear the love it cannot show,
And silent ache for thee.

ON A CORNELIAN HEART WHICH WAS BROKEN.

ILL-FATED Heart! and can it be,

That thou shouldst thus be rent in twain ? Have years of care for thine and thee Alike been all employ'd in vain? Yet precious seems each shatter'd part, And every fragment dearer grown, Since he who wears thee feels thou art A fitter emblem of his own.

LINES TO A LADY WEEPING.* WEEP, daughter of a royal line,

A Sire's disgrace, a realm's decay;
Ah! happy if each tear of thine

Could wash a father's fault away!
Weep-for thy tears are Virtue's tears-
Auspicious to these suffering isles;
And be each drop in future years
Repaid thee by thy people's smiles!

• The Princess Charlotte. (EDIT.)

THE CHAIN I GAVE.
FROM THE TURKISH.

THE chain I gave was fair to view,
The lute I added sweet in sound;
The heart that offer'd both was true,

And ill deserved the fate it found.
These gifts were charm'd by secret spell,
Thy truth in absence to divine;
And they have done their duty well,-
Alas! they could not teach thee thine.
That chain was firm in every link,

But not to bear a stranger's touch;
That lute was sweet-till thou couldst think
In other hands its notes were such.
Let him who from thy neck unbound
The chain which shiver'd in his grasp,
Who saw that lute refuse to sound,

Restring the chords, renew the clasp. When thou wert changed, they alter'd too The chain is broke, the music mute. 'Tis past-to them and thee adieu

False heart, frail chain, and silent lute.

EPITAPH FOR JOSEPH BLACKETT,
LATE POET AND SHOEMAKER.
STRANGER! behold, interr'd together,
The souls of learning and of leather.
Poor Joe is gone, but left his all:
You'll find his relics in a stall.

His works were neat, and often found
Well stitch'd, and with morocco bound.
Tread lightly-where the bard is laid
He cannot mend the shoe he made;
Yet is he happy in his hole,
With verse immortal as his sole.
But still to business he held fast,
And stuck to Phoebus to the last.
Then who shall say so good a fellow
Was only 'leather and pruneila?'
For character-he did not lack it;
And if he did, 'twere shame to Black it.