Where from this Gothic casement's beight, We view'd the lake, the park, the dell; And still, though tears obstruct our sight, We lingering look a last farewell.

O'er fields through which we used to run, And spend the hours in childish play; O'er shades where, when our race was dena Reposing on my breast you lay;

Whilst I, admiring, too remiss,

Forgot to scare the hovering flies, Yet envied every fly the kiss

It dared to give your slumbering eyes: See still the little painted bark,

In which I row'd you o'er the lake; See there, high waving o'er the park,

The elm I clamber'd for your sake. These times are past-our joys are gone, You leave me, leave this happy vale; These scenes I must rotrace alone :

Without thee, what will they avail ? Who can conceive, who has not proved, The anguish of a last embrace? When, torn from all you fondly loved, You bid a long adieu to peace.

This is the deepest of our woes,

For this these tears our cheeks bedew ; this is of love the final close,

Oh, God! the fondest, last adieu!

TO M. S. G.

WHENE'ER I view those lips of thine,
Their hue invites my fervent kiss;
Yet I forego that bliss divine,

Alas! it were unhallow'd bliss.

Whene'er I dream of that pure breast,
How could I dwell upon its snows!
Yet is the daring wish repress'd;

For that would banish its repose.

A glance from thy soul-searching eye
Čan raise with hope, depress with fear;
Yet I conceal my love,-and why?

I would not force a painful tear.

I ne'er have told my love, yet thou

Hast seen my ardent flame too well; And shall I plead my passion now,

To make thy bosom's heaven a hell!

No! for thou never canst be mine,
United by the priest's decree :
By any ties but those divine,

Mine, my beloved, thou ne'er shalt be.
Then let the secret fire consume,

Let it consume, thou shalt not know : With joy I court a certain doom,

Rather than spread its guilty glow. I will not ease my tortured heart,

By driving dove-eyed peace from thine; Rather than such a sting impart,

Each thought presumptuous I resign.

Yes! yield those lips for which I'd brave
More than I here shall dare to tell;
Thy innocence and mine to save,-

I bid thee now a last farewell.

Yes! yield that breast, to seek despair,
And hope no more thy soft embrace;
Which to obtain my soul would dare

All, all reproach-but thy disgrace.
At least from guilt shalt thou be free,

No matron shall thy shame reprove Though cureless pangs may prey on me, No martyr shalt thou be to love.

TO CAROLINE.

THINK'ST thou I saw thy beauteous eyes,
Suffused in tears, implore to stay;
And heard unmoved thy plenteous sighs,
Which said far more than words can say?

Though keen the grief thy tears express'd,

When love and hope lay both o'erthrown; Yet still, my girl, this bleeding breast

Throbb'd with deep sorrow as thine own.

But when our cheeks with anguish glow'd, When thy sweet lips were join'd to mine, The tears that from my eyelids flow'd

Were lost in those which fell from thine.

Thou couldst not feel my burning cheek,

Thy gushing tears had quench'd its fla And as thy tongue essay'd to speak,

In sighs alone it breathed iny name. And yet, my girl, we weep in vain,

In vain our fate in sighs deplore; Remembrance only can remain,

But that will make us weep the more.

Again, thou best beloved, adieu !
Ah! if thou canst, o'ercome regret ;
Nor let thy mind past joys review ;-
Our only hope is to forget!

TO CAROLINE.

WHEN I hear you express an affection so warm,

Ne'er think, my beloved, that I do not believe;
For your lip would the soul of suspicion disarm,
And your eye beams a ray which can never deceive.
Yet, still, this fond bosom regrets, while adoring,

That love, like the leaf, must fall into the sear;
That age will come on, when remembrance, deploring,
Contemplates the scenes of her youth with a tear.
That time must arrive, when, no longer retaining

Their auburn, those locks must wave thin to the breeze, When a few silver hairs of those tresses remaining,

Prove nature a prey to decay and disease.

"Tis this, my beloved, which spreads gloom o'er my features
Though I ne'er shall presume to arraign the decree
Which God has proclaim'd as the fate of His creatures,

In the death which one day will deprive you of me.
Mistake not, sweet sceptic, the cause of emotion,
No doubt can the mind of your lover invade;
He worships each look with such faithful devotion,
A smile can enchant, or a tear can dissuade.

But as death, my beloved, soon or late shall o'ertake us,

And our breasts, which alive with such sympathy glow, Will sleep in the grave till the blast shall awake us,

When calling the dead, in earth's bosom laid low.

Oh! then let us drain, while we may, draughts of pleasure.
Which from passion like ours may unceasingly flow:
Let us pass round the cup of love's bliss in full measure,
And quaff the contents as our nectar below.

TO CAROLINE.

OH! when shall the grave hide for ever my sorrows!
Oh! when shall my soul wing her flight from this clay ?
The present is hell, and the coming to-morrow

But brings, with new torture, the curse of to-day.

From my eye flows no tear, from my lips flow no curses,
I blast not the fiends who have hurl'd me from bliss:
For poor is the soul which bewailing rehearses

Its querulous grief, when in anguish like this.

180

Was my eye, 'stead of tears, with red fury-flakes bright'ning, Would my lips breathe a flame which no stream could assuage, On our foes should my glance launch in vengeance its lightning, With transport my tongue give a loose to its rage.

But now tears and curses, alike unavailing,

Would add to the souls of our tyrants delight; Could they view us our sad separation bewailing,

Their merciless hearts would rejoice at the sight.

Yet still, though we bend with a feign'd resignation,
Life beams not for us with one ray that can cheer,
Love and hope upon earth bring no more consolation!
In the grave is our hope, for in life is our fear.

Oh! when, my adored, in the tomb will they place me,
Since, in life, love and friendship for ever are fled?
If again in the mansion of death I embrace thee,
Perhaps they will leave unmolested the dead.

STANZAS TO A LADY.

WITH THE POEMS OF CAMOENS.

THIS Votive pledge of fond esteem,
Perhaps, dear girl! for me thou❜lt prize;
It sings of Love's enchanting dream,
A theme we never can despise.

Who blames it but the envious fool,
The old and disappointed maid;
Or pupil of the prudish school,

In single sorrow doom'd to fade?

Then read, dear girl! with feeling read,
For thou wilt ne'er be one of those;
To thee in vain I shall not plead
In pity for the poet's woes.

He was in sooth a genuine bard;

His was no faint, fictitious flame:
Like his, may love be thy reward,

But not thy hapless fate the same.

THE FIRST KISS OF LOVE

'Α Βάρβιτος δὲ χορδαῖς

Ερωτα μοῦνον ηχει.---ANACREON.

AWAY with your fictions of flimsy romance;

Those tissues of falsehood which folly has wove!
Give me the mild beam of the soul-breathing glance,

Or the rapture which dwells on the first kiss of love.

1805

Ye rhymers, whose bosoms with phantasy glow,

Whose pastoral passions are made for the grove; From what blest inspiration your sonnets would flow, Could you ever have tasted the first kiss of love!

If Apollo should e'er his assistance refuse,

Or the Nine be disposed from your service to rove,
Invoke them no more, bid adieu to the muse,
And try the effect of the first kiss of love!

I hate you, ye cold compositions of art!

Though prudes may condemn me, and bigots reprove, I court the effusions that spring from the heart

Which throbs with delight to the first kiss of love!

Your shepherds, your flocks, those fantastical themes,
Perhaps may amuse, yet they never can move.
Arcadia displays but a region of dreams:

What are visions like these to the first kiss of love?

Oh! cease to affirm that man, since his birth,

From Adam till now, has with wretchedness strove: Some portion of paradise still is on earth,

And Eden revives in the first kiss of love.

When age chills the blood, when our pleasures are past,
For years fleet away with the wings of the dove,
The dearest remembrance will still be the last,

Our sweetest memorial the first kiss of love.

ON A CHANGE OF MASTERS AT A GREAT PUBLIC

SCHOOL.

WHERE are those honours, Ida! once your own,
When Probus fill'd your magisterial throne?
As ancient Rome, fast falling to disgrace,
Hail'd a barbarian in her Cæsar's place;
So you, degenerate, share as hard a fate,
And seat Pomposus where your Probus sate.
Of narrow brain, yet of a narrower soul,
Pomposus holds you in his harsh control;
Pomposus, by no social virtue sway'd,
With florid jargon, and with vain parade;
With noisy nonsense, and new-fangled rules,
Such as were ne'er before enforced in schools.
Mistaking pedantry for learning's laws,
He governs, sanction'd but by self-applause ;
With him the same dire fate attending Rome,
Ill-fated Ida! soon must stamp your doom:
Like her o'erthrown, for ever lost to fame,
No trace of science left you, but the name.

July, 1805