Now plunging amain,

Now rising again,
Like a sea-bird on white bosom riding,

The wind louder grows,

And fiercer it blows,
Now shrill, and then hoarse as the thunder ;

The masts all are bent,

And the topsail is rent,
By the swift-rushing blast burst asunder.

Awe-struck, from the skies

The pilot descries.
The whirlwind in circles descending,

And marks over head,

Up-looking with dread,
The waves in white ridges impending.

The rudder is broke;

She reels from the stroke;
O’erwhelm’d, for a moment she's sinking:

In silence their fate

The seamen await;
On the sweetness of home they are thinking.

The twilight is gone,

Dark night is come on,
All dreary and wild is the ocean ;

And shoreward in haste

The billows are chased,
High-raging in boundless commotion.

The breakers are heard,

And all are prepar'd; To the rigging with cords they have bound them:

No star in the sky,

Nor light they espy,
But the foam of the waves all around them.

The landsman shall start,

As his slumbers depart,
On his soft couch so peacefully lying,

And hear with affright,

Through the darkness of night,
The groans and the shrieks of the dying.

“ Yes,” said the Bachelor, “ it is a very beautiful poem.”

“ And,” added Egeria, “ both original and striking in the conception and execution. It is what I would call a talismanic composition: it produces its effect not by what it describes, but by what it recalls to recollection, or by the associations which it awakens. This other is, however, still more beautiful. I have seldom met with any thing so simple and touching.”

THE OLD MAN'S REVERIE.

Sooth’d by the self-same ditty, see

The infant and the sire;
That smiling on the nurse's knee,

This weeping by the fire;
Where unobserved he finds a joy

To list its plaintive tone,
And silently his thoughts employ

On sorrows all his own.

At once it comes, by memory's power,

The loved habitual theme,

Reserved for twilight's darkling hour,

A voluntary dream;
And as with thoughts of former years

His weakly eyes o'erflow,
None wonders at an old man's tears,

Or seeks his grief to know.

Think not he dotes because he weeps ;

Conclusion, ah! how wrong!
Reason with grief joint empire keeps,

Indissolubly strong ;
And oft in age a helpless pride

With jealous weakness pines, (To second infancy allied)

And every woe refines.

How busy now his teeming brain,

Those murmuring lips declare ; Scenes never to return again

Are represented there.

He ponders on his infant years,

When first his race began,
And, oh! how wonderful appears

The destiny of man!
How swift those lovely hours were past,

In darkness closed how soon! As if a winter's night o'ercast

The brightest summer's noon.

And as he thinks o'er all his ills,

Disease, neglect, and scorn,
Strange pity of himself he feels,

Thus aged and forlorn.

“ This is not only pathetic,” continued the nymph, “ but it is poetical in the truest sense of the term; for it presents at once an image to the mind, an argument to the judgment, and a subject interesting to the universal feelings of our nature. Pray, do tell me by whom it was written.”

“ Some other time I may,” replied Benedict,“ when the proper occasion arises; meanwhile, have you found any thing else that pleases you ?"

“O they all please me,” said Egeria briskly; " and here is a humorous effusion, that seems to have been written as a companion to the affecting little piece which I have just read."

ELEGY BY A SCHOOL-BOY.

How blest was I at Dobson's ball!

The fiddlers come, my partner chosen !
My oranges were five in all,

Alas ! they were not half-a-dozen !

For soon a richer rival came,

And soon the bargain was concluded ;
My Peggy took him without shame,

And left me hopeless and deluded.

To leave me for an orange more !

Could not your pockets-full content ye?
What could you do with all that store?

He had but six, and five were plenty.

And mine were biggest, I protest,

For some of his were only penny ones, While mine were all the very best,

As juicy, large, and sweet as any one's.

Could I have thought, ye beaux and belles,

An orange would have so undone me! Or any thing the grocer sells,

Could move my fair one thus to shun me!

All night I sat in fixed disdain,

While hornpipes numberless were hobbled ; I watch'd my mistress and her swain,

And saw his paltry present gobbled.

But when the country-dance was call’d,

I could have cried with pure vexation; For by the arms I saw her haul'd,

And led triumphant to her station.

What other could I think to take?

Of all the school she was the tallest; What choice worth making could I make,

None left me, but the very smallest !

But now all thoughts of her adieu !

This is no time for such diversion ; Mair's Introduction lies in view,

And I must write my Latin version.

Yet all who that way are inclined,

This lesson learn from my undoing; Unless your pockets are well lined,

'Tis labour lost to go a wooing.