Yet was I calm : I knew the time

My breast would thrill before thy look, But now to tremble were a crime-

We met, and not a nerve was shook. I saw thee gaze upon my face,

Yet meet with no confusion there : One only feeling couldst thou trace,

The sullen calmness of despair. Away! away! my early dream,

Remembrance never must awake: Oh! where is Lethe's fabled stream?

My foolish heart be still, or break.

ON THE DEATH OF SIR PETER PARKER, BART. THERE is a tear for all that die,

A mourner o'er the humblest grave; But nations swell the funeral cry,

And Triumph weeps above the brave. For them is Sorrow's purest sigh

O’er Ocean's heaving bosom sent: In vain their bones unburied lie,

All earth becomes their monument ! A tomb is theirs on every page,

An epitaph on every tongue; The present hours, the future age,

For them bewail, to them belong. For them the voice of festal mirth

Grows hush'd, their name the only sound; While deep remembrance pours to worth

The goblet's tributary round.
A theme to crowds that knew them not,

Lamented by admiring foes,
Who would not share their glorious lot?

Who would not die the death they chose ?

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And, gallant Parker! thus enshrined

Thy life, thy fall, thy fame shall be ;
And early valour, glowing, find

A model in thy memory.
But there are breasts that bleed with thee

In wo, that glory cannot quell;
And shuddering hear of victory

Where one so dear, so dauntless, fell. Where shall they turn to mourn thee less ?

When cease to hear thy cherish'd name? Time cannot teach forgetfulness,

While Grief's full heart is fed by Fame. Alas! for them, though not for thee,

They cannot choose but weep the more; Deep for the dead the grief must be,

Who ne'er gave cause to mourn before.

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SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY.

She walks in beauty, like the night

Of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that's best of dark and bright

Meet in her aspect and her eyes : Thus mellow'd to that tender light

Which heaven to gaudy day denies. One shade the more, one ray the less,

Had half impair'd the nameless grace Which waves in every raven tress,

Or softly lightens o'er her face; Where thoughts serenely sweet express

How pure, how dear their dwelling-place.
And on that cheek, and o'er that brow,

So soft, so calm, yet eloquent,
The smiles that win, the tints that glow,

But tell of days in goodness spent,
A mind at peace with all below,

A heart whose love is innocent!

Man. The stars are forth, the moon above the tops Of the snow-shining mountain. Beautiful! I linger yet with Nature, for the night Hath been to me a more familiar face Than that of man; and in her starry shade Of dim and solitary loveliness, I learn’d the language of another world. I do remember me, that in my youth, When I was wandering, upon such a night I stood within the Coliseum's wall, Mid the chief relics of almighty Rome ; The trees which grew along the broken arches Waved dark in the blue midnight, and the stars Shone through the rents of ruin; from afar The watchdog bay'd beyond the Tiber; and More near, from out the Cæsars' palace, came The owl's long cry, and, interruptedly, Of distant sentinels the fitful song Begun and died upon the gentle wind. Some cypresses beyond the time-worn breach Appear'd to skirt the horizon, yet they stood Within a bowshot. Where the Cæsars dwelt, And dwell the tuneless birds of night, amid A grove which springs through leveli'd battlements, And twines its roots with the imperial hearths, Ivy usurps the laurel's place of growth; But the gladiators' bloody circus stands, A noble wreck in ruinous perfection! While Cæsar's chambers and the Augustan halls, Grovel on earth in indistinct decay. And thou didst shine, thou rolling moon, upon All this, and cast a wide and tender light, Which soften'd down the hoar austerity Of rugged desolation, and fill’d up, As 'twere anew, the gaps of centuries ; Leaving that beautiful which still was so,

And making that which was not, till the place
Became religion, and the heart ran o'er
With silent worship of the great of old !
The dead, but sceptred sovereigns, who still rule
Our spirits from their urns.

SIR WALTER Scott. 1771-1832.

FROM "THE LAY OF THE LAST MINSTREL." The feast was over in Branksome tower, And the ladye had gone to her secret bower; Her bower that was guarded by word and by spell, Deadly to hear and deadly to tell : Jesu Maria, shield us well! No living weight, save the ladye alone, Had dared to cross the threshold stone. The tables were drawn, it was idlesse all;

Knight, and page, and household squire, Loiter'd through the lofty hall,

Or crowded round the ample fire : The staghounds, weary with the chase,

Lay stretch'd upon the rushy floor, And urged, in dreams, the forest race,

From Teviot Stone to Eskdale Moor. Nine-and-twenty knights of fame

Hung their shields in Branksome Hall;
Nine-and-twenty squires of nam
Brought them their steeds to bower from stall;

Nine-and-twenty yeomen tall
Waited, duteous, on them all :
They were all knights of mettle true,

Kinsmen to the bold Buccleugh.
Ten of them were sheathed in steel,
With belted sword, and spur on heel :

They quitted not their harness bright,
Neither by day, nor yet by night:

They lay down to rest

With corslet laced,
Pillow'd on buckler cold and hard ;

They carved at the meal
With gloves of steel,

[barr'd.
And they drank the red wine through the helmet
Ten squires, ten yeomen, mailclad men,
Waited the beck of the warders ten;
Thirty steeds, both fleet and wight,
Stood saddled in stable day and night,
Barded with frontlet of steel, I trow,
And with Jedwood-axe at saddle-bow;
A hundred more fed free in stall :
Such was the custom of Branksome Hall.

Why do these steeds stand ready dight?
Why watch these warriors, arm'd, by night?
They watch to hear the bloodhound baying;
They watch to hear the warhorn braying ;
To see Saint George's red cross streaming ;
To see the midnight beacon gleaming ;
They watch against Southron force and guile,

Lest Scrope, or Howard, or Percy's powers,

Threaten Branksome's lordly towers,
From Warkworth, or Naworth, or merry Carlisle.
Such is the custom of Branksome Hall.

Many a valiant knight is here ;
But he, the chieftain of them all,
His sword hangs rusting on the wall,

Beside his broken spear.
Bards long shall tell
How Lord Walter fell!
When startled burghers fled, afar,
The furies of the Border war;
When the streets of high Dunedin
Saw lances gleam and falchions redden,

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