The thunders of the Church were ended,
Back on his way the Templar wended;
But the name of him the Templar slew
Was more than the inquisition knew.
LINES ADDRESED TO MISS CRAVEN'S PICTURE.
By HORACE SMITH.
OH! what a likeness is the gazers' cry—
There is the faultless oval of the face,
The lofty brow, and the commanding eye,
The raven tress, the expression's thoughtful grace;
The noble figure, and the highborn mien,
Whose dignity might well become a queen.
Oh! what a likeness! even in the dress
The fair original we recognise,
Whose rare propriety shuns each excess
Of fashion's jewell'd or familiar guise.
At court, at home, in park, or in the dance,
Unrivall'd still in tasteful elegance.
Yet how unlike! the engraver's happiest art
Shows but the beauty of the form-not mind:
The social kindness prompted by the heart,
The frank good sense, the cheerfulness refined:
The winning, affable, and gracious ease
Which all adore-he cannot copy these.
E'en could this charm of polish'd manners meet
Our eyes, as Craven's portrait we behold;
The likeness would be faulty-incomplete:
Still should we miss the virtues manifold:
The principle, truth, duty that endear
The prototype to all within her sphere.
A characteristic poem, by EBENEZER ELLIOTT, glowing with genius -but diamonds roughly set.
Go, Mary, to the summer-house,
And sweep the wooden floor,
And light the little fire, and wash
The pretty varnish'd door;
For there the London gentleman,
Who lately lectured here,
Will smoke a pipe with Jonathan,
And taste our home-brew'd beer.
Go, bind the dahlias, that our guest
May praise their fading dyes;
But strip of every wither'd bloom
The flower that won the prize!
And take thy father's knife, and prune
The roses that remain ;
And let the fallen hollyhock
Peep through the broken pane,
And sponge his view of Blacklowscar,
Till bright on moor and town
The painted sun and stormy crest
O'er leagues of cloud look down.
He rose at three, to work till four-
The evenings still are long-
And still for every lingering flower
The redbreast hath a song.
I'll follow in an hour or two;
Be sure I will not fail
To bring his flute and spying-glass,
The pipes and bottled ale;
And that grand music which he made
About the child in bliss,
Our guest shall hear it sung and play'd,
And feel how grand it is!
This very graceful little poem is from the pen of JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL, a poet of America.
THY voice is like a fountain,
Leaping up in clear moonshine;
Silver, silver, ever mounting,
Ever sinking,
Without thinking,
To that brimful heart of thine.
Every sad and happy feeling,
Thou hast had in bygone years,
Through thy lips come stealing, stealing,
Clear and low;
All thy smiles and all thy tears
In thy voice awaken,
And sweetness, wove of joy and woe,
From their teaching it hath taken :
Feeling and music move together,
Like a swan and shadow ever
Heaving on a sky-blue river
In a day of cloudless weather.
It hath caught a touch of sadness,
Yet it is not sad;
It hath tones of clearest gladness,
Yet it is not glad;
A dim, sweet, twilight voice it is
Where to-day's accustom❜d blue
Is over-gray'd with memories,
With starry feelings quiver'd through.
Thy voice is like a fountain
Leaping up in sunshine bright,
And I never weary counting
Its clear droppings, lone and single,
Or, when in one full gush they mingle,
Shooting in melodious light.
Thine is music such as yields
Feelings of old brooks and fields,
And, around this pent-up room,
Sheds a woodland, free perfume;
O, thus for ever sing to me!
O, thus for ever!
The green, bright grass of childhood bring to me,
Flowing like an emerald river,
And the bright blue skies above!
O, sing them back, as fresh as ever,
Into the bosom of my love,-
The sunshine and the merriment,
The unsought, evergreen content,
Of that never cold time,
The joy, that, like a clear breeze, went
Through and through the old time!
Peace sits within thine eyes,
With white hands cross'd in joyful rest,
While, through thy lips and face, arise
The melodies from out thy breast;
She sits and sings
With folded wings
And white arms crost,
"Weep not for pass'd things,
They are not lost:
The beauty which the summer time
O'er thine opening spirit shed,
The forest oracles sublime
That fill'd thy soul with joyous dread,
The scent of every smallest flower
That made thy heart sweet for an hour,—
Yea, every holy influence,
Flowing to thee, thou knewest not whence,
In thine eyes to-day is seen,
Fresh as it hath ever been;
Promptings of Nature, beckonings sweet,
Whatever led thy childish feet,
Still will linger unawares
The guiders of thy silver hairs;
Every look and every word
Which thou givest forth to-day,
Tell of the singing of the bird
Whose music still'd thy boyish play."
Thy voice is like a fountain,
Twinkling up in sharp starlight,
When the moon behind the mountain
Dims the low East with faintest white,
Ever darkling,
Ever sparkling,
We know not if 'tis dark or bright;
But, when the great moon hath roll'd round,
And, sudden-slow, its solemn power
Grows from behind its black, clear-edged bound,
No spot of dark the fountain keepeth,
But, swift as opening eyelids, leapeth
Into a waving silver flower.
A fine passage in a Hymn to Intellectual Beauty, by SHELLEY.
SPIRIT of Beauty, that dost consecrate
With thine own hues all thou dost shine upon
Of human thought or form, where art thou gone?
Why dost thou pass away and leave our state,
This dim vast vale of tears, vacant and desolate?
Ask why the sunlight not for ever
Weaves rainbows o'er yon mountain river;
Why aught should fail and fade that once is shown;
Why fear and dream and death and birth
Cast on the daylight of this earth
Such gloom; why man has such a scope
For love and hate, despondency and hope?
No voice from some sublimer world hath ever
To sage or poet these responses given:
Therefore the names of Demon, Ghost, and Heaven, Remain the records of their vain endeavour;
Frail spells, whose utter'd charm might not avail to sever,
From all we hear and all we see,
Doubt, chance, and mutability.
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