Her neck of alabaster whité,
Surmounting far each other wight;

Why did'st thou not, that time, devise,

Why did'st thou not foresee before, The mischief that thereof doth rise,

And grief on grief doth heap with store, To make her heart of wax alone, And not of Aint and marble stone.

O lady! shew thy favour yet!

Let not thy servant die for thee; Where Rigour ruled, let Mercy sit:

Let Pity conquer Cruelty ! Let not Disdain, a fiend of hell, Possess the place where Grace should dwell.

TO A SNOW-DROP.

ANONYMOUS.
Poets may with tuneful power

Sing the glowing Rose's praise,
But the Snow-drop's simple flower

Better suits my humble lays.

Earliest bud; so sweetly rising,

Fairest of the fragrant race, ,
Spring's first-born, vain pomp despising,

Still thou seek'st thy lowly place.

No warm zephyr o'er thy bosom

Murmuring flies with balmy wing;
Yet we bail thee, spotless blossom,

Herald of the infant Spring..

Through the cheerless season's traces,

Soft thy tender form expands, Safe in unaspiring graces,

Foremost of the bloomy bands.

White flower, in lonely beauty smiling,

Rising from a wintry bed! Blasts ungenial, breezes chilling,

Rudely threatening round thy head.

Silvery bud, thy foliage bending

Seems the angry winds to fear,
Yet secure, through tempests rending,

Thou adorn’st the rising year.

No warm tints, or colours splendid,

Thy pale simple bells adorn, Still we seek thy sweets, defended

By no rude insidious thorn.

'Tis not thine with flaunting feature

To attract the roving sight; From her varied wardrobe, Nature

Chose thy vest of purest white.

The fleecy shower descends not whiter

Than thy form in sweetness grows; The valley's treasure is not brighter,

Not more sweet her lily grows.

Hail, gay Flora's drooping herald !

Simply are thy beauties drest; Thine artless blooms, with dew impearld,

Resemble mild Worth's blameless breast.

When to Virtue's spotless lustre

Friendship twines a votive wreath,

O'er the fair selected cluster

Thou thy perfume soft shalt breathe.

ON A DEAD LEAF FALLING INTO A

GENTLEMAN'S BOSOM.

ROBERTS.

PALE, wither'd wanderer, seek not here

A refuge from the ruthless sky; This breast affords no happier cheer

Than the rude blighting breeze you fly.

Cold is the atmosphere of grief,

When storms assail the barren breast: Go, then, poor exile, seek relief

In bosoms where the heart has rest.

Or fall upon the oblivious ground,

Where silent sorrows buried lie; There rest is surely to be found,

Or what, alas ! to hope have I ?

Where sepulchred in peace repose,

In yonder field, the village dead, Go, seek a shelter among those

Who all their mortal tears have shed.

But if thou com'st a Sibyl's leaf,

Such as did erst high truths declare, To tell me soon shall end my grief,

I bless the omen that you bear:

For sure you tell me that my woe

An end like thine at length shall have;

That wan like thee, and wasted so,

I sink to the forgetful grave.

Then come, thou messenger of peace!

Come, lodge within this barren breast, And lie there till we both shall cease

To seek in vain for nature's rest.

EXTRACT FROM SYMPATHY.

PRATT.

1

ONCE, and not far from where those seats are seen,
Just where yon white huts peep the copse between,
A damsel languish’d-all her kin were gone, ;
For God who lent, resum'd them one by one:
Disease and penury, in cruel strife,
Had ravish'd all the decent means of life;
E'en the mark'd crown, her lover's gift, she gave,
In filial duty, for a father's grave,
That so the honour'd clay which caus'd her birth
Might slumber peaceful in the sacred earth,
Chim’d to its grass-green home with pious peal,
While hallow'd dirges hymn the last farewell.-
At length these piercing woes her sense invade,
And lone and long the hapless wanderer stray'd,
O'er the black heath, around th' unmeasur'd wood,
Up the huge precipice, or near the flood :
She mounts the rock at midnight's awful hour,
Enjoys the gloom, and idly mocks the shower;
Now scorns her fate, then patient bends the knee,
And courts each pitying star to set her free;
Then starting wilder, thinks those stars her foes,
Smites her sad breast, and laughs amidst her woes;
Oft would she chase the bee, or braid the grass,
Or crop the hedge-flower, or disorder'd pass;

Else, restless loiter in the pathless mead, Sing to the birds at roost, the lambs at feed; Or if a nest she found the brakes among, No hand of hers destroy'd the promis'd young; And when kind nature brought the balmy sleep, Too soon she woke to wander and to weep; Across her breast the tangled tresses flew, And frenzied glances all around she threw; Th' unsettled soul those frenzied glances speak, And tears of terror hurry down her cheek; Yet still that eye was bright, that cheek was fair, Though pale the rose, the lily blossom'd there. A wandering swain the beauteous maniac found, Her woes wild-warbling to the rocks around; A river roll'd beside, aghast she ran, Her vain fears startling at the sight of man; And,“ Save me, God! my father's ghost !" she

cried, Then headlong plunged into the flashing tide. The youth pursues—but wild the waters rose, And o'er their heads in circling surges closeNot heaven-born Sympathy itself could save : Both, both, alas ! were whelm'd beneath the wave.

And lives the man who senseless could have stood To see the victim buffet with the flood ? Whose coward cheek no tinge of honour feels, Flush'd with no pride at what the Muse reveals ? If such a man, if such a wretch there be, Thanks to this aching heart, I am not he.

THE EVENING LANDSCAPE.

ANONYMOUS.

From the bright portals of the west
The sun in cloudless glory gazes,

B