For such, 'tis sweet to think the while, When cares and griefs the breast invade, Is friendship's animating smile

In sorrow's dark'ning shade.

Thus it bursts forth, like thy pale cup,
Glist'ning amid its dewy tears,
And bears the sinking spirit up
Amid its chilling fears.

But still more animating far,

If meek Religion's eye may trace,

Even in thy glimmering earth-born star, The holier hope of Grace.

The hope, that as thy beauteous bloom
Expands to glad the close of day,
So through the shadows of the tomb
May break forth Mercy's ray.

Stanzas on the Sea.

Oh! I shall not forget, until memory depart,
When first I beheld it, the glow of my heart;
The wonder, the awe, the delight that stole o'er me,
When its billowy boundlessness opened before me.
As I stood on its margin, or roamed on its strand,
I felt new ideas within me expand,

Of glory and grandeur, unknown till that hour,
And my spirit was mute in the presence of power!
In the surf-beaten sands that encircled it round,
In the billow's retreat, and the breaker's rebound,
In its white-drifted foam, and its dark-heaving green,
Each moment I gazed, some fresh beauty was seen.
And thus, while I wandered on ocean's bleak shore,
And surveyed its vast surface, and heard its waves roar,
I seemed wrapt in a dream of romantic delight,
And haunted by majesty, glory, and might!

Power and Gentleness, or the Cataract and the Streamlet.

Noble the mountain-stream, Bursting in grandeur from its vantage-ground; Glory is in its gleam

Of brightness-thunder in its deafening sound!

Mark, how its foamy spray, Tinged by the sunbeams with reflected dyes, Mimics the bow of day Arching in majesty the vaulted skies;

Thence, in a summer-shower, Steeping the rocks around-0! tell me where Could majesty and power

Be clothed in forms more beautifully fair?

Yet lovelier, in my view,

The streamlet flowing silently serene;
Traced by the brighter hue,

And livelier growth it gives-itself unseen!

It flows through flowery meads,

Gladdening the herds which on its margin browse; Its quiet beauty feeds

The alders that o'ershade it with their boughs.

Gently it murmurs by

The village churchyard: its low, plaintive tone, A dirge-like melody,

For worth and beauty modest as its own.

More gaily now it sweeps

By the small school-house in the sunshine bright; And o'er the pebbles leaps,

Like happy hearts by holiday made light.

May not its course express,

In characters which they who run may read, The charms of gentleness,

Were but its still small voice allowed to plead?

What are the trophies gained

By power, alone, with all its noise and strife,
To that meek wreath, unstained,
Won by the charities that gladden life?

Niagara's streams might fail,

And human happiness be undisturbed :
But Egypt would turn pale,

Were her still Nile's o'erflowing bounty curbed!

BRYAN WALTER PROCTER.

BRYAN WALTER PROCTER, better known by his assumed name of Barry Cornwall, published, in 1815, a small volume of dramatic scenes of a domestic character, in order,' he says, 'to try the effect of a more natural style than that which had for a long time prevailed in our dramatic literature.' The experiment was successful; chiefly on account of the pathetic and tender scenes in Mr Procter's sketches. He has since published Marcian Colonna, The Flood of Thessaly, and other poems: also a tragedy, Mirandola, which was brought out with success at Covent Garden Theatre. Mr Procter's later productions have not realised the promise of his early efforts. His professional avocations-for the poet became a prosperous conveyancer-may have withdrawn him from poetry, or at least prevented his studying it with that earnestness and devotion which can alone insure success. Still, Mr Procter is a graceful and accomplished writer. His poetical style seems formed on that of the Elizabethan dramatists, and some of his lyrical pieces-which have been collected and published in one volume-are exquisite in sentiment and diction. Mr Procter is now a Commissioner of Lunacy.

Address to the Ocean.

O thou vast Ocean! ever-sounding sea!
Thou symbol of a drear immensity!
Thou thing that windest round the solid world
Like a huge animal, which, downward hurled
From the black clouds, lies weltering and alone,
Lashing and writhing till its strength be gone.
Thy voice is like the thunder, and thy sleep
Is as a giant's slumber, loud and deep.
Thou speakest in the east and in the west
At once, and on thy heavily laden breast

Fleets come and go, and shapes that have no life
Or motion, yet are moved and meet in strife.
The earth hath nought of this: no chance or change
Ruffles its surface, and no spirits dare
Give answer to the tempest-wakened air;
But o'er its wastes the weakly tenants range
At will, and wound its bosom as they go:
Ever the same, it hath no ebb, no flow:
But in their stated rounds the seasons come,
And pass like visions to their wonted home;
And come again, and vanish; the young Spring
Looks ever bright with leaves and blossoming;
And Winter always winds his sullen horn,
When the wild Autumn, with a look forlorn,
Dies in his stormy manhood; and the skies
Weep, and flowers sicken, when the summer flies.
Oh! wonderful thou art, great element:
And fearful in thy spleeny humours bent,
And lovely in repose; thy summer form
Is beautiful, and when thy silver waves
Make music in earth's dark and winding caves,

I love to wander on thy pebbled beach,
Marking the sunlight at the evening hour,
And hearken to the thoughts thy waters teach-
Eternity Eternity-and Power.

Marcelia.

It was a dreary place. The shallow brook
That ran throughout the wood, there took a turn
And widened: all its music died away,
And in the place a silent eddy told

That there the stream grew deeper. There dark trees
Funereal cypress, yew, and shadowy pine,
And spicy cedar-clustered, and at night
Shook from their melancholy branches sounds

And sighs like death: 'twas strange, for through the day

They stood quite motionless, and looked, methought,
Like monumental things, which the sad earth
From its green bosom had cast out in pity,

To mark a young girl's grave. The very leaves
Disowned their natural green, and took black
And mournful hue; and the rough brier, stretching
His straggling arms across the rivulet,
Lay like an armed sentinel there, catching
With his tenacious leaf straws, withered boughs,
Moss that the banks had lost, coarse grasses which
Swam with the current, and with these it hid
The poor Marcelia's death-bed. Never may net
Of venturous fisher be cast in with hope,
For not a fish abides there. The slim deer
Snorts as he ruffles with his shortened breath
The brook, and panting flies the unholy place,
And the white heifer lows, and passes on;
The foaming hound laps not, and winter birds
Go higher up the stream. And yet I love
To loiter there: and when the rising moon
Flames down the avenue of pines, and looks
Red and dilated through the evening mists,
And chequered as the heavy branches sway
To and fro with the wind, I stay to listen,
And fancy to myself that a sad voice,

Praying, comes moaning through the leaves, as 'twere
For some misdeed. The story goes-that some
Neglected girl-an orphan whom the world

Frowned upon-once strayed thither, and 'twas thought
Cast herself in the stream: you may have heard
Of one Marcelia, poor Nolina's daughter, who
Fell ill and came to want? No! Oh, she loved
A wealthy man, who marked her not.

He wed,

And then the girl grew sick, and pined away, And drowned herself for love.

Night.

Now to thy silent presence, Night!

Is this my first song offered: oh! to thee That lookest with thy thousand eyes of lightTo thee, and thy starry nobility

That float with a delicious murmuring

Though unheard here-about thy forehead blue;
And as they ride along in order due,
Circling the round globe in their wandering,
To thee their ancient queen and mother sing.
Mother of beauty! veiled queen!

Feared and sought, and never seen
Without a heart-imposing feeling,
Whither art thou gently stealing!
In thy smiling presence, I

Kneel in star-struck idolatry,

And turn me to thine eye (the moon),
Fretting that it must change so soon:
Toying with this idle rhyme,

I scorn that bearded villain Time,
Thy old remorseless enemy,
And build my linked verse to thee.

Not dull and cold and dark art thou:
Who that beholds thy clearer brow,
Endiademed with gentlest streaks

Of fleecy-silvered cloud, adorning
Thee, fair as when the young sun 'wakes,
And from his cloudy bondage breaks,

And lights upon the breast of morning,
But must feel thy powers;

Mightier than the storm that lours,
Fairer than the virgin hours

That smile when the young Aurora scatters
Her rose-leaves on the valleys low,
And bids her servant breezes blow.
Not Apollo, when he dies,

In the wild October skies,

Red and stormy; or when he
In his meridian beauty rides

Over the bosom of the waters,
And turns the blue and burning tides
To silver, is a peer for thee,
In thy full regality.

The Sleeping Figure of Modena. Upon a couch of silk and gold A pale enchanted lady lies, And o'er her many a frowning fold Of crimson shades her closed eyes; And shadowy creatures round her rise; And ghosts of women masked in woe; And many a phantom pleasure flies; And lovers slain—ah, long ago!

The lady, pale as now she sleeps,
An age upon that couch hath lain,
Yet in one spot a spirit keeps
His mansion, like a red-rose stain;
And, when lovers' ghosts complain,
Blushes like a new-born flower,
Or as some bright dream of pain
Dawneth through the darkest hour.

Once-but many a thought hath fled,
Since the time whereof I speak-
Once the sleeping lady bred
Beauty in her burning cheek,
And the lovely morn did break
Through the azure of her eyes,
And her heart was warm and meek,
And her hope was in the skies.

But the lady loved at last,

And the passion pained her soul,

And her hope away was cast,

Far beyond her own control;

And the clouded thoughts that roll
Through the midnight of the mind,
O'er her eyes of azure stole,
Till they grew deject and blind.

He to whom her heart was given,
When May music was in tune,
Dared forsake that amorous heaven,
Changed and careless soon!
O, what is all beneath the moon
When his heart will answer not!
What are all the dreams of noon
With our love forgot!

Heedless of the world she went,
Sorrow's daughter, meek and lone,
Till some spirit downwards bent
And struck her to this sleep of stone.

Look! Did old Pygmalion Sculpture thus, or more prevail, When he drew the living tone

From the marble pale?

An Invocation to Birds.

Come, all ye feathery people of mid air,
Who sleep 'midst rocks, or on the mountain summits
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 phoenix rare!
If death hath spared, 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 untouched 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 Pindarique 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!

Amel. I have spoke

Nothing but cheerful words, thou idle girl.
Look, look! above: the canopy of the sky,
Spotted with stars, shines like a bridal-dress:
A queen might envy that so regal blue

Which wraps the world o' nights. Alas, alas!
I do remember in my follying days
What wild and wanton wishes once were mine,
Slaves-radiant gems-and beauty with no peer,
And friends (a ready host)—but I forget.
I shall be dreaming soon, as once I dreamt,
When I had hope to light me. Have you no song,
My gentle girl, for a sick woman's ear?
There's one I've heard you sing: "They said his eye'—
No, that's not it: the words are hard to hit.
'His eye like the mid-day sun was bright’-

Mar. "Tis so.

You've a good memory. Well, listen to me. I must not trip, I see.

Amel. I hearken. Now.

Song.

His eye like the mid-day sun was bright, Hers had a proud but a milder light, Clear and sweet like the cloudless moon: Alas! and must it fade as soon?

His voice was like the breath of war,
But hers was fainter-softer far;
And yet, when he of his long love sighed,
She laughed in scorn :-he fled and died.

Mar. There is another verse, of a different air,
But indistinct-like the low moaning

Of summer winds in the evening: thus it runs

They said he died upon the wave,

And his bed was the wild and bounding billow:
Her bed shall be a dry earth grave:

Prepare it quick, for she wants her pillow.
Amel. How slowly and how silently doth time
Float on his starry journey. Still he goes,
And goes, and goes, and doth not pass away.
He rises with the golden morning, calmly,
And with the moon at night. Methinks I see
Him stretching wide abroad his mighty wings,
Floating for ever o'er the crowds of men,
Like a huge vulture with its prey beneath.
Lo! I am here, and time seems passing on:
To-morrow I shall be a breathless thing-
Yet he will still be here; and the blue hours
Will laugh as gaily on the busy world

As though I were alive to welcome them.
There's one will shed some tears. Poor Charles!

Ch. I am here.

Did you not call?

[CHARLES enters.]

Amel. You come in time. My thoughts

Were full of you, dear Charles. Your mother-now

I take that title-in her dying hour

Has privilege to speak unto your youth.

There's one thing pains me, and I would be calm.
My husband has been harsh unto me-yet
He is my husband; and you'll think of this
If any sterner feeling move your heart?
Seek no revenge for me. You will not?-Nay,
Is it so hard to grant my last request?
He is my husband: he was father, too,
Of the blue-eyed boy you were so fond of once.
Do you remember how his eyelids closed
When the first summer rose was opening?
'Tis now two years ago-more, more and I—
I now am hastening to him. Pretty boy!
He was my only child. How fair he looked
In the white garment that encircled him-
'Twas like a marble slumber; and when we
Laid him beneath the green earth in his bed,
I thought my heart was breaking-yet I lived:
But I am weary now.

Mar. You must not talk,
Indeed, dear lady; nay-

Ch. Indeed you must not.

Amel. Well, then, I will be silent; yet not so.
For ere we journey, ever should we take

A sweet leave of our friends, and wish them well,
And tell them to take heed, and bear in mind
Our blessings. So, in your breast, dear Charles,
Wear the remembrance of Amelia.
She ever loved you-ever; so as might
Become a mother's tender love-no more.
Charles, I have lived in this too bitter world
Now almost thirty seasons: you have been
A child to me for one-third of that time.

Ch. Is it then so? My soul is sick and faint. Oh! mother, mother. I-I cannot weep. Oh for some blinding tears to dim my eyes, So I might not gaze on her. And has death Indeed, indeed struck her-so beautiful? So wronged, and never erring; so beloved By one-who now has nothing left to love. Oh! thou bright heaven, if thou art calling now Thy brighter angels to thy bosom-rest, For lo! the brightest of thy host is goneDeparted-and the earth is dark below. And now-I'll wander far and far away, Like one that hath no country. I shall find A sullen pleasure in that life, and when I say 'I have no friend in all the world,' My heart will swell with pride, and make a show Unto itself of happiness; and in truth There is, in that same solitude, a taste Of pleasure which the social never know. From land to land I'll roam, in all a stranger, And, as the body gains a braver look, By staring in the face of all the winds, So from the sad aspects of different things My soul shall pluck a courage, and bear up Against the past. And now-for Hindostan.

HENRY HART MILMAN.

The REV. HENRY HART MILMAN is author of several poems and dramas, collected and published in three volumes. He first appeared as an author in 1817, when his tragedy of Fazio was published. It was afterwards acted with success at Drury Lane Theatre. In 1820 Mr Milman published a dramatic poem, The Fall of Jerusalem, and to this succeeded three other dramas, Belshazzar, The Martyr of Antioch,

Henry Hart Milman.

has contributed a History of the Jews, in three volumes, an edition of Gibbon's Rome, with notes and corrections, and an excellent edition of Horace. Mr Milman is a native of London, son of an eminent physician, Sir Francis Milman, and was born in the year 1791. He distinguished himself as a classical scholar, and in 1815 was made a fellow of Brazennose College, Oxford. He also held (1821) the office of professor of poetry in the university. In the church Mr Milman was sometime vicar of Reading; then rector of St Margaret's, Westminster; and finally (1849) dean of St Paul's. The taste and attainments of Mr Milman are seen in his poetical works; but he wants the dramatic spirit, and also that warmth of passion and imagination which is necessary to vivify his learning and his classical conceptions.

[Jerusalem before the Siege.]

Titus. It must be

And yet it moves me, Romans! It confounds
The counsel of my firm philosophy,

That Ruin's merciless ploughshare must pass o'er,
And barren salt be sown on yon proud city.
As on our olive-crowned hill we stand,
Where Kedron at our feet its scanty waters
Distils from stone to stone with gentle motion,
As through a valley sacred to sweet peace,
How boldly doth it front us! how majestically!
Like a luxurious vineyard, the hillside

Is hung with marble fabrics, line o'er line,
Terrace o'er terrace, nearer still, and nearer

To the blue heavens. There bright and sumptuous palaces,

With cool and verdant gardens interspersed ;
There towers of war that frown in massy strength;
While over all hangs the rich purple eve,

As conscious of its being her last farewell

POETS.

Of light and glory to that fated city.
And, as our clouds of battle, dust and smoke,
Are melted into air, behold the temple
In undisturbed and lone serenity,
Finding itself a solemn sanctuary

In the profound of heaven! It stands before us
A mount of snow, fretted with golden pinnacles!
The very sun, as though he worshipped there,
Lingers upon the gilded cedar roofs,

And down the long and branching porticoes,
On every flowery-sculptured capital,
Glitters the homage of his parting beams.
By Hercules! the sight might almost win
The offended majesty of Rome to mercy.

[Hymn of the Captive Jews.]
[From Belshazzar.]

God of the thunder! from whose cloudy seat
The fiery winds of desolation flow:
Father of vengeance! that with purple feet,

Like a full wine-press, tread'st the world below:
The embattled armies wait thy sign to slay,
Nor springs the beast of havoc on his prey,
Nor withering Famine walks his blasted way,
Till thou the guilty land hast sealed for woe.

God of the rainbow! at whose gracious sign

The billows of the proud their rage suppress; Father of mercies! at one word of thine

An Eden blooms in the waste wilderness! And fountains sparkle in the arid sands, And timbrels ring in maidens' glancing hands, And marble cities crown the laughing lands, And pillared temples rise thy name to bless.

O'er Judah's land thy thunders broke, O Lord! The chariots rattled o'er her sunken gate, Her sons were wasted by the Assyrian sword,

Even her foes wept to see her fallen state; And heaps her ivory palaces became, Her princes wore the captive's garb of shame, Her temple sank amid the smouldering flame, For thou didst ride the tempest-cloud of fate.

O'er Judah's land thy rainbow, Lord, shall beam,
And the sad city lift her crownless head;
And songs shall wake, and dancing footsteps gleam,
Where broods o'er fallen streets the silence of the
dead.

The sun shall shine on Salem's gilded towers,
On Carmel's side our maidens cull the flowers,
To deck, at blushing eve, their bridal bowers,
And angel-feet the glittering Sion tread.

Thy vengeance gave us to the stranger's hand,
And Abraham's children were led forth for slaves;
With fettered steps we left our pleasant land,

Envying our fathers in their peaceful graves.
The stranger's bread with bitter tears we steep,
And when our weary eyes should sink to sleep,
'Neath the mute midnight we steal forth to weep,
Where the pale willows shade Euphrates' waves.

[Summons of the Destroying Angel to the City of
Babylon.]

The hour is come! the hour is come! With voice
Heard in thy inmost soul, I summon thee,
Cyrus, the Lord's anointed! And thou river,
That flowest exulting in thy proud approach
To Babylon, beneath whose shadowy walls,
And brazen gates, and gilded palaces,
And groves, that gleam with marble obelisks,
Thy azure bosom shall repose, with lights
Fretted and chequered like the starry heavens:

I do arrest thee in thy stately course,

By Him that poured thee from thine ancient fountain,
And sent thee forth, even at the birth of time,
One of his holy streams, to lave the mounts
Of Paradise. Thou hear'st me: thou dost check
Abrupt thy waters as the Arab chief

His headlong squadrons. Where the unobserved,
Yet toiling Persian, breaks the ruining mound,
I see thee gather thy tumultuous strength;
And, through the deep and roaring Naharmalcha,
Roll on as proudly conscious of fulfilling
The omnipotent command! While, far away,
The lake, that slept but now so calm, nor moved,
Save by the rippling moonshine, heaves on high
Its foaming surface like a whirlpool-gulf,
And boils and whitens with the unwonted tide.
But silent as thy billows used to flow,
And terrible, the hosts of Elam move,
Winding their darksome way profound, where man
Ne'er trod, nor light e'er shone, nor air from heaven
Breathed. Oh! ye secret and unfathomed depths,
How are ye now a smooth and royal way
For the army of God's vengeance! Fellow-slaves
And ministers of the Eternal purpose,
Not guided by the treacherous, injured sons
Of Babylon, but by my mightier arm,
Ye come, and spread your banners, and display
Your glittering arms as ye advance, all white
Beneath the admiring moon. Come on! the gates
Are open-not for banqueters in blood
Like you! I see on either side o'erflow
The living deluge of armed men, and cry,
Begin, begin! with fire and sword begin
The work of wrath. Upon my shadowy wings
I pause, and float a little while, to see
Mine human instruments fulfil my task
of final ruin. Then I mount, I fly,

And sing my proud song, as I ride the clouds,
That stars may hear, and all the hosts of worlds,
That live along the interminable space,
Take up Jehovah's everlasting triumph!