CAROLINE ANNE BOWLES, a sister of the Reverend WILLIAM LISLE BOWLES, was born near the close of the last century. On the fourth of June, 1839, she was married to the late ROBERT SOUTHEY, poet laureate. This is all I know of her personal history. She is one of the cleverest women of the time, and, besides her poems, has written several prose works which have been very popular
are distinguished for correctness, simplicity, and tenderness. She has little imagination, but she has a kindly disposition and an unusual depth of sentiment. Occasionally she is playful, but the genius of her poetry is religious. The range of her subjects is limited, but her writings evince a nice observation, a sympathy with the suffering, and a pious trustfulness. She has published two volumes
at home and in this country. Her productions | of poems, The Birth Day, and Autumn Flowers.
HARK! hark! they're come!-those merry bells
That peal their joyous welcome swells;
And many hearts are swelling high,
With more than joy-with ecstasy!
And many an eye is straining now
Toward that good ship, that sails so slow;
And many a look toward the land
They cast upon that deck who stand.
Flow, flow, ye tides!-ye languid gales,
Rise, rise, and fill their flagging sails!-
Ye tedious moments, fly, begone,
And speed the blissful meeting on.
Impatient watchers! happy ye,
Whose hope shall soon be certainty;
Happy, thrice happy! soon to strain
Fond hearts to kindred hearts again!
Brothers and sisters-children-mother-
All, all restored to one another!
All, all return'd;-And are there none
To me restored, return'd? -Not one.
Far other meeting mine must be
With friends long lost-far other sea
Than thou, O restless ocean! flows
Between us one that never knows
Ebb-tide or flood; -a stagnant sea;
Time's gulf; its shore eternity!
No voyager from that shadowy bourne
With chart or sounding may return.
There, there they stand the loved! the lost!
They beckon from that awful coast!-
They cannot thence return to me,
But I shall go to them. I see
E'en now, methinks, those forms so dear,
Bend smiling to invite me there.
O, best beloved! a little while,
And I obey that beckoning smile!
'T is all my comfort now to know
In God's good time it shall be so;
And yet, in that sweet hope's despite
Sad thoughts oppress my heart to-night.
And doth the sight of others' gladness
Oppress the selfish heart with sadness?
Now Heaven forbid! - but tears will rise-
Unbidden tears into mine eyes,
When busy thought contrasts with theirs
My fate, my feelings. Four brief years
Have wing'd their flight, since, where they stand,
I stood, and watch'd that parting band,
(Then parting hence)-and one, methought,
(O human foresight! set at nought
By God's unfathom'd will!) was borne
From England, never to return!-
With sadden'd heart, I turn'd to seek
Mine own beloved home to speak
With her who shared it, of the fears
She also shared in... It appears
But yesterday that thus we spoke;
And I can see the very look
With which she said, "I do believe
Mine eyes have ta'en their last long leave
Of her who has gone hence to-day!"
Five months succeeding slipp'd away;
And, on the sixth, a deep-toned bell
Swung slow, of recent death to tell;
It toll'd for her, with whom so late
I reason'd of impending fate;
To me those solemn words who spoke
So late, with that remember'd look!
And now, from that same steeple, swells A joyous peal of merry bells,
Her welcome, whose approaching doom We blindly thought a foreign tomb!
My father loved the patient angler's art;
And many a summer day, from early morn
To latest evening, by some streamlet's side
We two have tarried; strange companionship!
A sad and silent man; a joyous child.
Yet were those days, as I recall them now,
Supremely happy. Silent though he was,
My father's eyes were often on his child
Tenderly eloquent and his few words
Were kind and gentle. Never angry tone
Repulsed me, if I broke upon his thoughts
With childish question. But I learnt at last-
Learnt intuitively to hold my peace
When the dark hour was on him, and deep sighs
Spoke the perturbed spirit-only then
I crept a little closer to his side,
And stole my hand in his, or on his arm
Laid my cheek softly; till the simple wile
Won on his sad abstraction, and he turn'd
With a faint smile, and sigh'd, and shook his head,
Stooping toward me; so I reached at last
Mine arm about his neck, and clasp'd it close,
Printing his pale brow with a silent kiss.
That was a lovely brook, by whose green marge
We two, (the patient angler and his child)
Loiter'd away so many summer days!
A shallow sparkling stream, it hurried now
Leaping and glancing among large round stones,
With everlasting friction chafing still
Their polish'd smoothness; on a gravelly bed,
Then softly slipt away with rippling sound,
Or all inaudible, where the green moss
Sloped down to meet the clear reflected wave,
That lipp'd its emerald bank with seeming show
Of gentle dalliance. In a dark, deep pool
Collected now, the peaceful waters slept
Embay'd by rugged headlands; hollow roots
Of huge old pollard willows. Anchor'd there
Rode safe from every gale, a silvan fleet
Of milk-white water lilies; every bark
Worthy as those on his own sacred flood
To waft the Indian Cupid. Then the stream
Brawling again o'er pebbly shallows ran,
On-on, to where a rustic, rough-hewn bridge,
All bright with mosses and green ivy wreathes,
Spann'd the small channel with its single arch;
And underneath, the bank on either side
Shelved down into the water darkly green
With unsunn'd verd ze; or whereon the sun
Look'd only when his rays at eventide
Obliquely glanced between the blacken'd piers
With arrowy beams of orient emerald light
Touching the river and its velvet marge-
'Twas there, beneath the archway, just within
Its rough misshapen piles, I found a cave,
A little secret cell, one large flat stone
Its ample floor, embedded deep in moss,
And a rich tuft of dark blue violet,
And fretted o'er with curious groining dark,
Like vault of Gothic chapel was the roof
Of that small cunning cave..... Methought
The little Naiad of our brook might haunt
That cool retreat, and to her guardian care
My wont was ever, at the bridge arrived,
To trust our basket, with its ample store
Of home-made, wholesome cates; by one at home
Provided for our banquet-hour at noon.
A joyful hour! anticipated keen
With zest of youthful appetite I trow,
Full oft expelling unsubstantial thoughts
Of grots and naiads, sublimated fare-
The busy, bustling joy, with housewife airs
(Directress, handmaid, lady of the feast!)
To spread that "table in the wilderness!"
The spot selected with deliberate care,
Fastidious from variety of choice,
Where all was beautiful. Some pleasant nook
Among the fringing alders: or beneath
A single spreading oak: or higher up
Within the thicket, a more secret bower,
A little clearing carpeted all o'er
With creeping strawberry, and greenest moss
Thick vein'd with ivy. There unfolded smooth
The snowy napkin (carefully secured
At every corner with a pebbly bly weight,)
Was spread prelusive; fairly garnish'd soon
With the contents (most interesting then)
Of the well-plenish'd basket: simple viands,
And sweet brown bread, and biscuits for dessert,
And rich ripe cherries; and two slender flasks,
Of cider one, and one of sweet new milk,
Mine own allotted beverage, temper'd down
From the near streamlet. Two small silver cups
Set our grand buffet-and all was done;
But there I stood immovable, entranced,
Absorb'd in admiration-shifting oft
My ground contemplative, to reperuse
In every point of view the perfect whole
Of that arrangement, mine own handiwork.
Then glancing skyward, if my dazzled eyes
Shrank from the sunbeams, vertically bright,
Away, away, toward the river's brink
I ran to summon from his silent sport
My father to the banquet; tutor'd well,
As I approach'd his station, to restrain
All noisy outbreak of exuberant glee;
Lest from their quiet haunts the finny prey
Should dart far off to deeper solitudes.
The gentle summons met observance prompt,
Kindly considerate of the famish'd child:
And all in order left-the mimic fly
Examined and renew'd, if need required,
Or changed for other sort, as time of day,
Or clear or clouded sky, or various signs
Of atmosphere or water, so advised
Th' experienced angler; the long line afloat-
The rod securely fix'd; then into mine
The willing hand was yielded, and I led
With joyous exultation that dear guest
To our green banquet-room. Not Leicester's self,
When to the hall of princely Kenilworth
He led Elizabeth, exulted more
With inward gratulation at the show
Of his own proud magnificence, than I,
When full in view of mine arranged feast,
I held awhile my pleased companion back,
Exacting wonder-admiration, praise,
With pointing finger, and triumphant "There!"
THOSE few pale autumn flowers !
How beautiful they are!
Than all that went before,
Than all the summer store,
How lovelier far!
And why? they are the last
The last!- the last! - the last!-
Oh, by that little word,
How many thoughts are stirr'd!
That sister of the past!
Pale flowers!-pale, perishing flowers!
Ye're types of precious things;
Types of those bitter moments
That flit, like life's enjoyments,
On rapid, rapid wings.
Last hours with parting dear ones,
(That time the fastest spends,)
Last tears, in silence shed,
Last words, half-uttered,
Last looks of dying friends!
Who but would fain compress
A life into a day;
The last day spent with one
Who, ere the morrow's sun,
Must leave us, and for aye?
O precious, precious moments!
Pale flowers! ye're types of those-
The saddest! sweetest! dearest!
Because, like those, the nearest
Pale flowers! Pale, perishing flowers!
I woo your gentle breath;
I leave the summer rose
For younger, blither brows-
Tell me of change and death!
TREAD softly-bow the head-
In reverent silence bow-
No passing bell doth toll-
Yet an immortal soul
Is passing now.
Stranger! however great,
With lowly reverence bow; There's one in that poor shedOne by that paltry bedGreater than thou.
Beneath that beggar's roof,
Lo! death does keep his state; Enter no crowds attendEnter-no guards defend This palace gate.
That pavement, damp and cold, No smiling courtiers tread;
One silent woman stands,
Lifting with meager hands
A dying head.
No mingling voices sound-
An infant wail alone;
A sob suppress'd-agen
That short, deep gasp, and then
The parting groan.
O change!-0 wondrous change!-
Burst are the prison bars-
This moment there, so low,
So agonized, and now
Beyond the stars!
O change!-stupendous change!
There lies the soulless clod;
The Sun eternal breaks-
The new immortal wakes-
Wakes with his God.
LAUNCH thy bark, mariner!
Christian, God speed thee!
Let loose the rudder-bands-
Good angels lead thee!
Set thy sails warily,
Tempests will come;
Steer thy course steadily,
Christian, steer home!
Look to the weather-bow,
Breakers are round thee;
Let fall the plummet now,
Shallows may ground thee.
Reef in the foresail, there!
Hold the helm fast!
So let the vessel wear-
There swept the blast.
"What of the night, watchman?
What of the night?"
"Cloudy-all quiet-
No land yet-all's right!"
Be wakeful, be vigilant-
Danger may be
At an hour when all seemeth
Securest to thee.
How! gains the leak so fast?
Clear out the hold-
Hoist up thy merchandise,
Heave out thy gold;-
There-let the ingots go-
Now the ship rights;
Hurra! the harbour's near-
Lo, the red lights!
Slacken not sail yet
At inlet or island;
Straight for the beacon steer,
Straight for the high land;
Crowd all thy canvas on,
Cut through the foam-
Christian! cast anchor now-
Heaven is thy home!
HENRY HART MILMAN was born in London | subject is one of the noblest and most poetical
on the tenth of February, 1791, and was the youngest son of Sir FRANCIS MILMAN, physician to the king. In 1801 he was sent to Eton, and in 1810 he entered Brazen Nose College, Oxford, where he gained the first honours in examinations, and received many prizes for English and Latin poems and essays. In 1815 he became a fellow of his college, and two years afterward entered into holy orders. The living of St. Mary's, in Reading, was bestowed upon him in 1817, and he devoted much of his attention to the duties of his profession, until he was elected Professor of Poetry at Oxford, in 1821.
Mr. MILMAN commenced his course as a poet with the Judicium Regale, in which the people of the different nations of Europe pronounce their judgment against NAPOLEON. This was followed by the tragedy of Fazio, which was performed before crowded houses at Drury Lane, and is still occasionally played in the British and American theatres.
His next work, The Fall of Jerusalem, appeared in 1820. The basis of the story is a passage in JOSEPHUS, and the events, occupying a considerable time in the history, are in the play compressed into a period of thirty-six hours. The object of the author was to show the full completion of prophecy in the great event which he commemorates.
The Martyr of Antioch, published in 1822, is founded on a legend related in the twentythird chapter of GIBBON, of the daughter of a priest of APOLLO at Antioch, who was beloved by OLYBIUS, prefect of the East in the reign of PROBUS, converted to the Christian religion, and sacrificed to the unrelenting spirit of offended heathenism. It is an attempt to present in contrast the simple faith of JESUS and the most gorgeous yet most natural of pagan superstitions, the worship of the sun. The tale is similar to that of LOCKHART's fine romance of Valerius, by which it was probably suggested; and, except in its tragical termination and some minor characteristics, the plot of the drama is inferior to that of the novel. In the same year he finished Belshazzar. The
in the Scriptures, but Mr. MILMAN failed, as signally as some writers of less pretension, in its treatment. The characters are the Destroying Angel from Heaven, sent to complete the annihilation of Babylon; Belshazzar, his mother, Kalassan high-priest of Bel, the Captain of the Guard, and the eunuch Sabaris, Chaldeans; with Daniel, Imlah, his wife, his daughter Benina, and her betrothed lover, Hebrews. The story is that of the Handwriting on the Wall, with an underplot, in which Benina is seized as the virgin devoted to the pagan deity, but in fact destined for the chambers of Kalassan. The fall of the city intervenes to save her; the Chaldeans perish, and the Jews are restored to happiness. The time is one day, from the morning to the conflagration of the Assyrian capital. These actors and circumstances demand earnestness, force, tenderness, the grandest and most beautiful imagery, and a sustained enthusiasm, but the piece is tame and monotonous, inferior, even its lyrical portions, to the earlier works of the author. The latest of his dramas is Anne Boleyn, in which the characters of King Henry and the Jesuit Angelo Caraffa are well delineated and sustained, though the work has no great merit as a play or a poem.
Besides his dramatic works, Mr. MILMAN is the author of Samor, the Lord of the Bright City, an epic in twelve books; and a volume of minor poems, none of which are equal to passages in his tragedies. He has likewise written the best History of the Jews in our language, and a History of Christianity, both of which have been republished by Messrs. Harper of New York. He now resides in London, and is prebendary of St. Peter's, and minister of St. Margaret's, Westminster.
Mr. MILMAN'S poems contain some spirited lyrics, and much vigorous declamation and fine description; but, though he is not perhaps a plagiarist, they embrace nothing new, and nothing to entitle him to the appellation of a great poet. They are simply the verses of a well-educated gentleman, who has little sympathy with humanity.
CEASED the bold strain, then deep the Saxon
As eager 'twere to touch so fair a lip.
A moment, and the apparition bright
Had parted; as before, the sound of harps
Was wantoning about the festive hall.
The ruddy cup, and savage joy uncouth
Lit his blue gleaming eyes: nor sate unmoved
The Briton chiefs; fierce thoughts began to rise
Of ancient wars, and high ancestral fame.
Sudden came floating through the hall an air
So strangely sweet, the o'erwrought sense scarce
Its rich excess of pleasure; softer sounds
Melt never on the enchanted midnight cool,
By haunted spring, where elfin dancers trace
Green circlets on the moonlight dews; nor lull
Becalmed mariner from rocks, where basks
At summer noon the sea-maid; he his oar
Breathless suspends, and motionless his bark
Sleeps on the sleeping waters. Now the notes
So gently died away, the silence seem'd
Melodious; merry now, and light and blithe
They danced on air: anon came tripping forth
In frolic grace a maiden troop, their locks
Flower-wreathed, their snowy robes from clasped
Fell careless drooping, quick their glittering feet
Glanced o'er the pavement. Then the pomp of sound
Swell'd up, and mounted; as the stately swan,
Her milk-white neck embower'd in arching spray,
Queens it along the waters, entered in
The lofty hall a shape so fair, it lull'd
The music into silence, yet itself
Pour'd out, prolonging the soft ecstasy,
The trembling and the touching of sweet sound.
Her grace of motion and of look, the smooth
And swimming majesty of step and tread,
The symmetry of form and feature, set
The soul afloat, even like delicious airs
Of flute or harp: as though she trod from earth,
And round her wore an emanating cloud
Of harmony, the lady moved. Too proud
For less than absolute command, too soft
For aught but gentle, amorous thought: her hair
Cluster'd, as from an orb of gold cast out
A dazzling and o'erpowering radiance, save
Here and there on her snowy neck reposed
In a soothed brilliance, some thin, wandering tress.
The azure flashing of her eye was fringed
With virgin meekness, and her tread, that seem'd
Earth to disdain, as softly fell on it
As the light dew-shower on a tuft of flowers.
The soul within seem'd feasting on high thoughts,
That to the outward form and feature gave
A loveliness of scorn, scorn that to feel
Was bliss, was sweet indulgence. Fast sank back
Those her fair harbingers, their modest eyes,
Downcast, and drooping low their slender necks
In graceful reverence; she, by wondering gaze
Unmoved, and stifled murmurs of applause,
Nor yet unconscious, slowly won her way
To where the king, amid the festal pomp,
Sate loftiest; as she raised a fair-chased cup,
Something of sweet confusion overspread
Her features; something tremulous broke in
On her half-failing accents, as she said
[up,
"Health to the king!"-the sparkling wine laugh'd
LAMENTATION OVER JERUSALEM.
THERE have been tears from holier eyes than mine
Pour'd o'er thee, Zion! yea, the Son of Man
This thy devoted hour foresaw and wept.
And I can I refrain from weeping? Yes,
My country, in thy darker destiny
Will I awhile forget mine own distress.
I feel it now, the sad, the coming hour;
The signs are full, and never shall the sun
Shine on the cedar roofs of Salem more;
Her tale of splendour now is told and done:
Her wine-cup of festivity is spilt,
And all is o'er, her grandeur and her guilt.
O! fair and favour'd city, where of old
The balmy airs were rich with melody,
That led her pomp beneath the cloudless sky
In vestments flaming with the orient gold;
Her gold is dim, and mute her music's voice;
The heathen o'er her perish'd pomp rejoice.
How stately then was every palm-deck'd street,
Down which the maidens danced with tinkling feet!
How proud the elders in the lofty gate!
How crowded all her nation's solemn feasts
With white-robed Levites and high-mitred priests!
How gorgeous all her temple's sacred state, Her streets are razed, her maidens sold for slaves, Her gates thrown down, her elders in their graves; Her feasts are holden mid the gentile's scorn, By stealth her priesthood's holy garments worn; And where her temple crown'd the glittering rock, The wandering shepherd folds his evening flock. When shall the work, the work of death begin? When come the avengers of proud Judah's sin? Aceldama! accursed and guilty ground, Gird all the city in thy dismal bound;
Her price is paid, and she is sold like thou; Let every ancient monument and tomb Enlarge the border of its vaulted gloom,
Their spacious chambers all are wanted now. But never more shall yon lost city need Those secret places for her future dead; Of all her children, when this night is pass'd, Devoted Salem's darkest, and her last, Of all her children none is left to her, Save those whose house is in the sepulchre. Yet, guilty city, who shall mourn for thee? Shall Christian voices wail thy devastation? Look down! look down, avenged Calvary,
Upon thy late yet dreadful expiation. O! long foretold, though slow accomplish'd fate, "Her house is left unto her desolate;" Proud Cæsar's ploughshare, o'er her ruins driven, Fulfils at length the tardy doom of Heaven; The wrathful vial's drops at length are pour'd On the rebellious race that crucified their Lord!
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