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IV. ST. IRVYNE'S TOWER

How swiftly through heaven's wide expanse

Bright day's resplendent colours fade! How sweetly does the moonbeam's glance

With silver tint St. Irvyne's glade!

II

No cloud along the spangled air,

Is borne upon the evening breeze; How solemn is the scene! how fair The moonbeams rest upon the trees!

III

Yon dark gray turret glimmers white,
Upon it sits the mournful owl;
Along the stillness of the night,
Her melancholy shriekings roll.

IV

But not alone on Irvyne's tower,

As enanguish'd he turns from the laugh of the scorner,

And drops, to perfection's remembrance, a tear;

When floods of despair down his pale cheek are streaming,

When no blissful hope on his bosom is beaming,

Or, if lull'd for awhile, soon he starts from his dreaming,

And finds torn the soft ties to affection so dear.

II

Ah! when shall day dawn on the night of the grave,

Or summer succeed to the winter of death?

Rest awhile, hapless victim, and Heaven will save

The spirit, that faded away with the breath.

Eternity points in its amaranth bower, Where no clouds of fate o'er the sweet prospect lower,

The silver moonbeam pours her ray; Unspeakable pleasure, of goodness the

It gleams upon the ivied bower,

It dances in the cascade's spray.

V

"Ah! why do dark'ning shades conceal
The hour, when man must cease to
be?

Why may not human minds unveil
The dim mists of futurity?

VI

"The keenness of the world hath torn The heart which opens to its blast ; Despis'd, neglected, and forlorn,

Sinks the wretch in death at last."

V.-BEREAVEMENT

I

dower,

When woe fades away like the mist of the heath.

VI. THE DROWNED LOVER

I

AH! faint are her limbs, and her foot

step is weary,

Yet far must the desolate wanderer

roam;

Though the tempest is stern, and the mountain is dreary,

She must quit at deep midnight her pitiless home.

I see her swift foot dash the dew from the whortle,

As she rapidly hastes to the green grove of myrtle;

How stern are the woes of the desolate And I hear, as she wraps round her

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truding them on the public notice.

The

High swell'd in her bosom the throb of first I found with no title, and have left it

affection,

As lightly her form bounded over the lea,

And arose in her mind every dear recol

lection;

"I come, dearest Henry, and wait but for thee."

How sad, when dear hope every sorrow is soothing,

When sympathy's swell the soft bosom is moving,

And the mind the mild joys of affection

is proving,

Is the stern voice of fate that bids happiness flee!

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that

And the moon dimly gleam'd through the tempested air;

Oh! how could fond visions such soft-
ness deceive?

Oh! how could false hope rend a
bosom so fair?

Thy love's pallid corse the wild surges
are laving,

O'er his form the fierce swell of the tempest is raving;

But, fear not, parting spirit; thy good-
ness is saving,

In eternity's bowers, a seat for thee
there.

POSTHUMOUS FRAGMENTS OF MARGARET NICHOLSON Being Poems found amongst the Papers of that noted Female who attempted the life of the King in 1786. Edited by John Fitzvictor.

ADVERTISEMENT

THE energy and native genius of these Fragments must be the only apology which the Editor can make for thus in

So. It is intimately connected with the dearest interests of universal happiness; and much as we may deplore the fatal and enthusiastic tendency which the ideas of this poor female had acquired, we cannot fail to pay the tribute of unequivocal regret to the departed memory of genius, which, had it been rightly organised, would have made that intellect, which has since become the victim of

frenzy and despair, a most brilliant ornament to society.

In case the sale of these Fragments evinces that the public have any curiosity to be presented with a more copious collection of my unfortunate Aunt's poems, I have other papers in my possession which shall, in that case, be subjected to their notice. It may be supposed they require much arrangement; but I send the following to the press in the same state in which they came into my posJ. F.

session.

POSTHUMOUS FRAGMENTS AMBITION, power, and avarice, now have hurl'd

Death, fate, and ruin, on a bleeding world.

See! on yon heath what countless victims lie,

Hark! what loud shrieks ascend thro' yonder sky;

Tell then the cause, 'tis sure the avenger's

rage

Has swept these myriads from life's
crowded stage:
Hark to that groan, an anguish'd hero
dies,

He shudders in death's latest agonies;
Yet does a fleeting hectic flush his
cheek,

Yet does his parting breath essay to speak

For

"Oh God! my wife, my children— Monarch thou

whose support this fainting frame

lies low;

For whose support in distant lands IAh! when will come the sacred f

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Let his friends' welfare be the warrior's When man unsullied by his kaz

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To thee, then, mighty God, I lift my Ah! when will come the time, wher o'er the plain

moan,

Thou wilt not scorn a suppliant's No more shall death and desolati

anguish'd groan.

reign?

Oh! now I die-but still is death's When will the sun smile on the bloodless field,

fierce pain

meet again.'

God hears my prayer-we meet, we And the stern warrior's arm the sickk wield?

He spake, reclin'd him on death's Not whilst some King, in cold ambition's

bloody bed,

And with a parting groan his spirit fled.
Oppressors of mankind to you we owe
The baleful streams from whence these
miseries flow;

dreams,

Plans for the field of death his plodding schemes;

Not whilst for private pique the pullic fall,

For you how many a mother weeps her And one frail mortal's mandate governs all.

son,

Snatch'd from life's course ere half his Swell'd with command and mad with

race was run!

For you how many a widow drops a tear,

In silent anguish, on her husband's

bier!

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Careless who lives or dies-so that he gains

“Is it then thine, Almighty Power," Some trivial point for which he took

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"Whence tears of endless sorrow dim What then are Kings?-I see the

these eyes?

Is this the system which thy powerful sway,

Which else in shapeless chaos sleeping lay,

Form'd and approv'd?-it cannot be but oh!

Forgive me Heaven, my brain is warp'd by woe."

'Tis not he never bade the war-note swell,

trembling crowd,

I hear their fulsome clamours echoed loud;

Their stern oppressor pleas'd appears awhile,

But April's sunshine is a Monarch's

smile

Kings are but dust-the last eventful day
Will level all and make them lose their

sway;

Will dash the sceptre from the Monarch's hand,

He never triumph'd in the work of hell-
Monarchs of earth! thine is the baleful And from the warrior's grasp wrest the

deed,

Thine are the crimes for which thy

subjects bleed.

ensanguin'd brand.

Oh! Peace, soft peace, art thou for

ever gone,

Is thy fair form indeed for ever flown? And love and concord hast thou swept

away,

As if incongruous with thy parted sway? Alas I fear thou hast, for none appear. Now o'er the palsied earth stalks giant Fear,

With War, and Woe, and Terror, in his train;

Dank lurid meteors shoot a livid

gleam;

From the dark storm-clouds flashes a fearful glare,

It shows the bending oak, the roaring

stream.

I ponder'd on the woes of lost mankind, I ponder'd on the ceaseless rage of Kings;

List'ning he pauses on the embattled My rapt soul dwelt upon the ties that

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See! gory Ruin yokes his blood-stain’d | I heard a yell—it was not the knell, When the blasts on the wild lake sleep,

car,

He scents the battle's carnage from afar ;

Hell and destruction mark his mad career, That floats on the pause of the summer

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Fainter and fainter, yet is borne around, Yet to enthusiast ears the murmurs tell That heaven, indignant at the work of hell,

Will soon the cause, the hated cause remove,

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That bade me recline on the shore;

I laid mine hot head on the surge-beaten mould,

And thought to breathe no more.

But a heavenly sleep
That did suddenly steep

In balm my bosom's pain,
Pervaded my soul,

And free from control,

Did mine intellect range again. Methought enthron'd upon a silvery cloud,

Which floated 'mid a strange and brilliant light;

Which tears from earth peace, innocence, My form upborne by viewless ether

and love.

FRAGMENT

SUPPOSED TO BE AN EPITHALAMIUM

OF FRANCIS RAVAILLAC AND

CHARLOTTE CORDÉ

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What beauteous spirits met my dazzled eye!

'Tis midnight now-athwart the murky Hark! louder swells the music of the

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Quas manibus premit illa duas insensa But it lulls in oblivion the fiends of

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