Shall keep our hearts-like meads, that lie
To be bathed by those eternal rills-
Ever green, if thou wilt be mine, love!
All this and more the Spirit of Love
Can breathe o'er them who feel his spells;
That heaven, which forms his home above,
He can make on earth, wherever he dwells,
And he will-if thou wilt be mine, love!
To ladies' eyes a round, boy,
We can't refuse, we can't refuse; Though bright eyes so abound, boy,
'Tis hard to choose, 'tis hard to choose.
For thick as stars that lighten
Yon airy bowers, yon airy bowers,
The countless eyes that brighten
This earth of ours, this earth of ours.
But fill the cup-where'er, boy,
Our choice may fall, our choice may fall,
We're sure to find Love there, boy,
So drink them all! so drink them all!
Some looks there are so holy,
They seem but given, they seem but given,
As splendid beacons solely,
To light to heaven, to light to heaven.
While some-oh! ne'er believe them-
With tempting ray, with tempting ray,
Would lead us (God forgive them!)
The other way, the other way.
But fill the cup-where'er, boy,
Our choice may fall, our choice may fall,
We're sure to find Love there, boy,
So drink them all! so drink them all!
FORGET not the field where they perished,
The truest, the last of the brave,
All gone-and the bright hope they cherished
Gone with them, and quenched in their grave.
Oh! could we from death but recover
Those hearts, as they bounded before,
In the face of high Heaven to fight over
That combat for freedom once more ;-
Could the chain for an instant be riven
Which Tyranny flung round us then,
Oh! 'tis not in Man nor in Heaven
To let Tyranny bind it again!
But 'tis past-and though blazoned in story
The name of our Victor may be,
Accursed is the march of that glory
Which treads o'er the hearts of the free.
Far dearer the grave or the prison,
Illumed by one patriot name,
Than the trophies of all who have risen
On liberty's ruius to fame!
THEY MAY RAIL AT THIS LIFE.
THEY may rail at this life-from the hour I began it,
I've found it a life full of kindness and bliss;
And until they can show me some happier planet,
More social and bright, I'll content me with this.
As long as the world has such eloquent eyes,
As before me this moment enraptured I see,
They may say what they will of their orbs in the skies,
But this earth is the planet for you, love, and me.
In Mercury's star, where each minute can bring them
New sunshine and wit from the fountain on high,
Though the nymphs may have livelier poets to sing them,
They've none, even there, more enamoured than I.
And as long as this harp can be wakened to love,
And that eye its divine inspiration shall be,
They may talk as they will of their Edens above,
But this earth is the planet for you, love, and me.
In that star of the west, by whose shadowy splendour
At twilight so often we've roamed through the dew,
There are maidens, perhaps, who have bosoms as tender,
And look, in their twilights, as lovely as you.
But though they were even more bright than the queen
Of that isle they inhabit in heaven's blue sea,
As I never those fair young celestials have seen,
Why, this earth is the planet for you, love, and me.
As for those chilly orbs on the verge of creation,
Where sunshine and smiles must be equally rare,
Did they want a supply of cold hearts for that station,
Heaven knows we have plenty on earth we could spare.
Oh! think what a world we should have of it here,
If the haters of peace, of affection, and glee,
Were to fly up to Saturn's comfortless sphere,
And leave earth to such spirits as you, love, and me.
Young Joy ne'er thought of count-
ing hours,
Till Care, one summer's morning,
Set up among his smiling flowers
A dial, by way of warning.
But Joy loved better to gaze on the sun,
As long as its light was glowing,
Than to watch with old Care how the
shadow stole on,
And how fast that light was going
So fill the cup-what is it to us
How Time his circle measures?
The fairy hours we call up thus
Obey no wand but Pleasure's.
SAIL ON, SAIL ON.
SAIL on, sail on, thou fearless bark--
Wherever blows the welcome wind,
It cannot lead to scenes more dark,
More sad, than those we leave behind.
Each wave that passes seems to say,
Though death beneath our smile may be,
Less cold we are, less false than they
Whose smiling wrecked thy hopes and thee.'
Sail on, sail on-through endless space
Through calm-through tempest-stop no more ;
The stormiest sea's a resting-place
To him who leaves such hearts on shore.
Or-if some desert land we meet,
Where never yet false-hearted men
Profaned a world that else were sweet-
Then rest thee, bark, but not till then.
YES, sad one of Sion,-if closely resembling,
In shame and in sorrow, thy withered-up heart-
If drinking, deep, deep, of the same 'cup of trembling'
Could make us thy children, our parent thou art.
Like thee doth ou. nation lie conquered and broken,
And fallen from her head is the once royal crown;
In her streets, in her halls, Desolation hath spoken,
And while it is day yet, her sun hath gone down.'
Like thine doth her exile, 'mid dreams of returning,
Die far from the home it were life to behold;
Like thine do her sons, in the day of their mourning,
Remember the bright things that bless'd them of old!
1 These verses were written after the perusal of a treatise by Mr. Hamilton, professing to prove that the Irish were originally Jews.
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