CHARACTER OF THE ITALIANS. FAR to the right, where Appenine ascends,

Bright as the summer, Italy extends: Its uplands sloping deck the mountain's side,

Woods over woods in gay theatric pride : While oft some temple's mouldering tops between

With venerable grandeur mark the scene,

Could Nature's bounty satisfy the breast,

The sons of Italy were surely bless'd. Whatever fruits in different climes are found,

That proudly rise, or humbly court the ground;

Whatever blooms in torrid tracts appear, Whose bright succession decks the varied year;

Whatever sweets salute the northern

sky

With vernal lives, that blossom but to die;

These here disporting, own the kindred soil,

Nor ask luxuriance from the planter's

toil;

While sea-born gales their gelid wings expand

To winnow fragrance round the smiling land.

But small the bliss that sense alone bestows,

And sensual bliss is all the nation knows. In florid beauty groves and fields appear, Man seems the only growth that dwindles here.

Contrasted faults through all his manners reign;

Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain;

Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue;

And even in penance planning sins

anew.

All evils here contaminate the mind, That opulence departed leaves behind; For wealth was theirs, not far removed the date,

CHARACTER OF THE SWISS. My soul turn from them; - turn we to

survey

Where rougher climes a nobler race display,

Where the bleak Swiss their stormy man.. sion tread,

And force a churlish soil for scanty bread;

No product here the barren hills afford But man and steel, the soldier and his sword:

No vernal blooms their torpid rocks

array,

But winter lingering chills the lap of May;

No zephyr fondly sues the mountain's breast,

But meteors glare, and stormy glooms

invest.

Yet still, even here, content can spread a charm,

Redress the clime, and all its rage dis

arm.

Though poor the peasant's hut, his feasts though small,

He sees his little lot the lot of all;
Sees no contiguous palace rear its head,
To shame the meanness of his humble
shed;

No costly lord the sumptuous banquet deal,

To make him loathe his vegetable meal; But calm, and bred in ignorance and toil,

Each wish contracting, fits him to the soil.

Cheerful at morn, he wakes from short repose,

Breathes the keen air, and carols as he goes;

With patient angle trolls the finny deep, Or drives his venturous ploughshare to

the steep;

But while this softer art their bliss supplies,

It gives their follies also room to rise: For praise too dearly loved, or warmly sought,

Enfeebles all internal strength of thought, And the weak soul, within itself unblest, Leans for all pleasure on another's breast. Hence ostentation here, with tawdry art, Pants for the vulgar praise which fools impart;

Here vanity assumes her pert grimace, And trims her robe of frieze with copper lace;

Here beggar pride defrauds her daily cheer,

To boast one splendid banque. once a

year;

The mind still turns where shifting fashion draws,

Nor weighs the solid worth of selfapplause.

CONCLUSION OF THE TRAVELLER.

HAVE we not seen, round Britain's peopled shore,

Her useful sons exchanged for useless ore?

Seen all her triumphs but destruction haste,

Like flaring tapers bright'ning as they waste;

Seen opulence, her grandeur to maintain,

Lead stern depopulation in her train, And over fields where scatter'd hamlets rose,

In barren solitary pomp repose?

Have we not seen at pleasure's lordly call,

The smiling long-frequented village fall?

Beheld the duteous son, the sire decay'd, The modest matron, and the blushing maid,

Forced from their homes, a melancholy train,

To traverse climes beyond the western main;

Where wild Oswego spreads her swamps

around,

And Niagara stuns with thun'dring sound?

Even now, perhaps, as there some

pilgrim strays

Through tangled forests, and through dangerous ways;

Where beasts with man divided empire claim,

And the brown Indian marks with murd'rous aim;

There, while above the giddy tempest flies,

And all around distressful yells arise, The pensive exile, bending with his woe, To stop too fearful, and too faint to go,

Casts a long look where England's glories shine,

And bids his bosom sympathize with mine.

Vain, very vain, my weary search to find

That bliss which only centres in the mind;

Why have I stray'd, from pleasure and repose,

To seek a good each government bestows?

In every government, though terrors reign,

Though tyrant kings, or tyrant laws restrain,

How small of all that human hearts endure,

That part which laws or kings can cause or cure!

Still to ourselves in every place consign'd, Our own felicity we make or find.

With secret course, which no loud storms annoy,

Glides the smooth current of domestic joy. The lifted axe, the agonizing wheel, Luke's iron crown, and Damien's bed of

steel,

To men remote from power but rarely known,

Leave reason, faith, and conscience, all

our own.

EDWIN AND ANGELINA. "TURN, gentle hermit of the dale, And guide my lonely way To where yon taper cheers the vale With hospitable ray.

"For here forlorn and lost I tread,

With fainting steps and slow; Where wilds, unmeasurably spread, Seem lengthening as I go."

"Forbear, my son," the hermit cries,

"To tempt the dangerous gloom; For yonder faithless phantom flies To lure thee to thy doom.