Looks out, effulgent, from amid the flush
Of broken clouds, gay shifting to his beam.
The rapid radiance instantaneous strikes
The illumined mountain, through the forest streams,
Shakes on the floods, and in a yellow mist,
Far smoking o'er the interminable plain,
In twinkling myriads lights the dewy gems.
Moist, bright, and green, the landscape laughs around.
Full swell the woods; their every music wakes,
Mix'd in wild concert with the warbling brooks
Increased, the distant bleatings of the hills,
And hollow lows responsive from the vales,
Whence, blending all, the sweeten'd zephyr springs.
Meantime, refracted from yon eastern cloud,
Bestriding earth, the grand ethereal bow
Shoots up immense and every hue unfolds,
In fair proportion running from the red
To where the violet fades into the sky.
Here, awful Newton, the dissolving clouds
Form, fronting on the sun, thy showery prism;
And to the sage-instructed eye unfold
The various twine of light, by thee disclosed
From the white mingling maze. Not so the boy;
He wondering views the bright enchantment bend,
Delightful, o'er the radiant fields, and runs
To catch the falling glory; but amazed
Beholds the amusive arch before him fly,
Then vanish quite away. Still night succeeds,
A soften'd shade, and saturated earth
Awaits the morning beam, to give to light,
Raised through ten thousand different plastic tubes,
The balmy treasures of the former day.
By JOHN HAMILTON REYNOLDS, who published, in 1820, a volume of poems under the assumed name of "Peter Corcoran, of Grays' Inn, Student at Law." These stanzas powerfully describe the emotions and sufferings of his strangely erratic life.
"and muttered lost, lost, lost."-SIR WALTER SCOTT.
'Tis vain to grieve for what is past,
The golden hours are gone;
My own mad hand the die hath cast,
And I am left alone:
'Tis vain to grieve-I now can leave
No other bliss-yet still I grieve!
The dreadful silence of this night
Seems breathing in my ear;
I scarce can bear the lonely light
That burns, oppress'd and near.
I stare at it, while half reclined,
And feel its thick light on my mind.
The sweetest fate have I laid waste,
With a remorseless heart;
All that was beautiful and chaste,
For me seem'd set apart;
But I was fashion'd to defy
Such treasure, so set richly by.
How could I give up her, whose eyes
Were fill'd with quiet tears,
For many a day-when thoughts would rise;
Though darken'd with just fears
Of all my vices!-Memory sees
Her eyes' divine remonstrances.
A wild and wretched choice was mine;
A life of low delight:
The midnight rounds of noise and wine,
That vex'd the wasted night;
The bitter jest, the wearied glee,
The strife of dark society.
To those who plunged me in the throng
Of such disastrous joys;
Who led me, by low craft, along,
And stunn'd my mind with noise-
I only wish they now could look
Upon my life's despoiled book.
When midnight finds me torn apart
From vulgar revelry,
The cold, still Madness of the heart,
Comes forth, and talks with me;
Talks with me, till the sky is grey
With the chill light of breaking day.
My love is lost-my studies marr'd,
My friends disgraced and changed;
My thoughts all scatter'd and impair'd,
My relatives estranged:
Yet can I not by day recall
My ruin'd spirit from its thrall.
FRANCESCA AND PAULO.
A passage from LEIGH HUNT's Story of Rimini.
READY she sat with one hand to turn o'er
The leaf, to which her thoughts ran on before,
The other on the table, half enwreathed
In the thick tresses over which she breathed.
So sat she fix'd, and so observed was she
Of one, who at the door stood tenderly,—
Paulo,-who from a window seeing her
Go straight across the lawn, and guessing where,
Had thought she was in tears, and found, that day,
His usual efforts vain to keep away.
Twice had he seen her since the Prince was gone,
On some small matter needing unison;
Twice linger'd, and conversed, and grown long friends;
But not till now where no one else attends.
May I come in ?" said he :-it made her start,
That smiling voice; she colour'd, press'd her heart
A moment, as for breath, and then with free
And usual tone, said,-"O yes,-certainly."
There's wont to be, at conscious times like these,
An affectation of a bright-eyed ease,
An air of something quite serene and sure,
As if to seem so, were to be, secure.
With this the lovers met, with thirst they spoke,
With this sat down to read the self-same book,
And Paulo, by degrees, gently embraced
With one permitted hand her lovely waist;
And both their cheeks, like peaches on a tree,
Came with a touch together thrillingly,
And o'er the book they hung, and nothing said,
And every lingering page grew longer as they read.
As thus they sat, and felt with leaps of heart
Their colour change, they came upon the part
Where fond Genevra, with the flame long nurst,
Smiled upon Lancelot, when he kiss'd her first :-
That touch, at last, through every fibre slid;
And Paulo turn'd, scarce knowing what he did,
Only he felt he could no more dissemble,
And kiss'd her, mouth to mouth, all in a tremble.
Oh then she wept,-the poor Francesca wept;
And pardon oft he pray'd; and then she swept
The tears away, and look'd him in the face,
And, well as words might serve the truth disgrace,
She told him all, up to that very hour,
The father's guile, th' undwelt-in bridal bower,
And wish'd for wings on which they two might soar
Far, far away, as doves to their own shore,
With claim from none.-That day they read no more.
Found in a novel entitled Oonagh Lynch, the authorship of which is not avowed. It is well entitled to a place here.
SHE will not drink the blood-red wine
That sparkles bright and high;
She sits her down to wail and pine,
The salt tear in her eye.
Will you not drink the wine of France,
Nor yet the wine of Spain ?—
"Oh better I love the wan water
I ne'er must drink again!"
The peach like fair maid's cheek is found;
Our southern fruit is fair;
And ye may seek all Scotland round,
Nor find such fruit grow there.
"I better love the bramble black;
The blackberry is good
For these are fruits of Scottish braes,
And they grow in our gay green wood."
Will ye not sleep in golden bed?
The curtains are of silk,
Of broidery is the coverlet,
The sheets are white as milk?— "Oh! the heather is a better bed, 'Neath the north winds blowing free; And I long to lay my weary head On the swaird of my own countree."
Another of BRYANT's beautiful poems.
I'VE watch'd too late; the morn is near;
One look at God's broad silent sky!
Oh, hopes and wishes vainly dear,
How in your very strength ye die!
Even while your glow is on your cheek,
And scarce the high pursuit begun,
The head grows faint, the hand grows weak,
The task of life is left undone.
See where upon the horizon's rim,
Lies the still cloud in gloomy bars;
The waning moon, all pale and dim,
Goes up amid the eternal stars.
Late in a flood of tender light
She floated through the ethereal blue:
A softer sun, that shone all night
Upon the gathering beads of dew.
And still thou wanest, pallid moon!
The encroaching shadow grows apace; Heaven's everlasting watchers soon
Shall see thee blotted from thy place.
Oh, night's dethroned and crownless queen!
Well may thy sad, expiring ray
Be shed on those whose eyes have seen
Hope's glorious visions fade away.
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