Though earth received them in her bed,
And o'er the spot the crowd may tread
In carelessness or mirth,

There is an eye which could not brook
A moment on that grave to look..

I will not ask where thou liest low,
Nor gaze upon the spot;

There flowers or weeds at will may grow,
So I behold them not:

It is enough for me to prove

That what I loved, and long must love,
Like common earth must rot;

To me there needs no stone to tell,
"Tis nothing that I loved so well.

Yet did I love thee to the last,
As fervently as thou,

Who didst not change through all the past,
And canst not alter now.

The love where death has set his seal,
Nor age can chill, nor rival steal,

Nor falsehood disavow:

And, what were worse, thou canst not see Or wrong, or change, or fault in me.

The better days of life were ours;

The worst can be but mine:

The sun that cheers, the storm that lowers, Shall never more be thine.

The silence of that dreamless sleep

I envy now too much to weep;

Nor need I to repine,

That all those charms have pass'd away,

I might have watch'd through long decay.

The flower, in ripen'd bloom unmatch'd,
Must fall the earliest prey;

Though by no hand untimely snatch'd,
The leaves must drop away:
And yet it were a greater grief
To watch it withering, leaf by leaf,
Than see it pluck'd to-day;
Since earthly eye but ill can bear
To trace the change to foul from fair.

I know not if I could have borne
To see thy beauties fade;

The night that follow'd such a morn
Had worn a deeper shade:
Thy day without a cloud hath past,
And thou wert lovely to the last;
Extinguish'd, not decay'd;

As stars that shoot along the sky
Shine brightest as they fall from high.

As once I wept, if I could weep,
My tears might well be shed,
To think I was not near to keep
One vigil o'er thy bed;

To gaze, how fondly! on thy face,
To fold thee in a faint embrace,
Uphold thy drooping head;
And show that love, however vain,
Nor thou nor I can feel again.

Yet how much less it were to gain,
Though thou hast left me free,
The loveliest things that still remain,
Than thus remember thee!

The all of thine that cannot die,
Through dark and drear eternity,
Returns again to me,

And more thy buried love endears
Than aught, except its living years.

BYRON.

TO A SPIRIT IN HEAVEN.

LIKE a young bird careering in the blast,
With shatter'd pinion, through a clouded sky,
Thy spirit in this ruder world was cast,

To live on tears, and breathe but in a sigh:
A wild weed on the ocean thrown, a leaf

Sear'd by the lightnings in its verdant prime, A transient light, an exhalation brief,

A sweet flower withering from its native clime. I weep that thou art gone, and yet mine eyes Hold joy's bright dew-drop, more than sorrow's

rain.

And why? Because I know that thou dost rise, With phenix wing, beyond the range of pain. I feel that the sear'd leaf, the wither'd flower,

Unto its "native clime" is now restored,

To bud and bloom where no dark clouds may low'r, Nor earth's cold blighting mists have ever soar'd Feel that the glory of thy spirit,—here

But for a moment flashing its soft rays,-Lives brighter in a higher, holier sphere,

And, in the smile of God, eternally shall blaze.

W. MARTIN,

LAMENT.

WHY should man strive to dream of bliss

That is not his?

Or cling to that all-gaudy show,

That is but woe?

All that is lovely, pure, and fair,

Death will not spare.

The speckless azure of the sky

Is mockery;

The sleep that smiles upon the deep,
Deceitful sleep.

The things for which we kneel and pray,
O! never stay;

The longings that our bosoms fill

But cheat us still;

The hopes, that from the heart arise,

Are wing'd by sighs.

The blossoms of our early years

Are gem'd by tears.

The thoughts that we to heaven would give, Alone survive

This world's deceit; and, while we grieve, Still whisper "Live."

W. MARTIN.

BIRDS.

AN INVOCATION TO BIRDS.

COME all ye feathery people of mid air,

Who sleep 'midst rocks, or on the mountain sum

mits

Lie down with the wild winds; and ye who build
Your homes amidst green leaves, by grottoes cool:
And ye who on the flat sands hoard your eggs
For suns to ripen, come! O! phenix, rare!
If death hath spared thee, or philosophic search
Permit thee still to own thy haunted nest,
Perfect Arabian; lonely nightingale!

Dusk creature, who art silent all day long,
But when pale eve unseals thy clear throat, loosest
Thy twilight music on the dreaming boughs,
Until they waken; and thou, cuckoo bird,
Who art the ghost of sound, having no shape
Material, but dost wander far and near,
Like untouch'd Echo, whom the woods deny
Sight of her love; come all to my slow charm!
Come thou, sky-climbing bird, wakener of morn,
Who springest, like a thought, unto the sun,
And from his golden floods dost gather wealth,
(Epithalamium and Pindaric song,)

And with it enrich our ears: come all to me,
Beneath the chamber where my lady lies,
And, in your several musics, whisper love!

BARRY CORNWALL.