In sadness there's a pleasure soft,
"Which mourners only know;"
My heart affords this treasure oft,
And there I love to go;
It is the chosen spot where I
Can live my life anew-

My Home!-my Castle!-my Serai!
Which none must dare break through.

In thee, my Heart! I am alone
Quite unrestrain❜d and free,
Thou'rt hung with pictures all my own,
And drawn for none but me;
All that in secret passes there,
Forever I can hide;
Ambition-love-or dark despair-
My jealousy-or pride.

Yes, when ambitious-ardent-young-
I thought the world my own,
My glowing portraits there were hung;
How have their colors flown!-
Some are by time defaced so far
I look on them with pain;
But time nor nothing else can mar
The portrait of my Jane.

I placed her there who won my soul;
No creature saw the maid;
I gazed in bliss, without control,
On every charm displayed:
It was a sweet impassioned hour,
When not an eye was near,
To steal into my lonely bower,
And kiss her image there.

Earth held not on its globe the man
Who breathed that holy air;
No mortal eye but mine did scan
My folly with my fair;

Sole monarch of that silent spot,
All things gave place to me;
I did but wish-no matter what-
Each obstacle would flee.

And did she love?-she loved me not,
But gave her hand away;
I hied me to my lonely spot-
In anguish, passed the day;
And such a desolation wide
Spread o'er that holy place,
The stream of life itself seemed dried,
Or ebbing out apace.

But what I did what madly said—
I cannot tell to any―

Her portrait in its place hath staid,
Though years have flown so many;
Nor can each lovely lineament
So deep impressed, depart,

Till Nature shall herself be spent,
And thou shalt break, my Heart.

[For the Southern Literary Messenger.]

MR. EDITOR,-I send you a Parody upon Bryant's Autumn, apparently written by some disconsolate citizen of Richmond, after the adjournment of the Legislature in time past. If the picture be faithfully drawn, it may perhaps amuse the members of the Assembly who are now in your city.

PARODY ON BRYANT'S AUTUMN.

The very dullest days are come, the dullest of the year, When all our great Assembly-men are gone away from here;

Heaped up in yonder capitol, how many bills lie dead, They just allowed to live awhile, to knock them on the head;

Tom, Dick and Harry all have gone and left the silent hall,

And on the now deserted square we meet no one at all— Where are the fellows? the fine young fellows that were so lately here,

And vexed the drowsy year of night with frolic and good cheer,

Alas! they all are at their homes-the glorious race of fellows,

And some perhaps are gone to forge, and some are at the bellows.

Old Time is passing where they are, but time will pass in vain ;

All never can, though some may be, transported here again.

Old "what d'ye call him," he's been off a week or may

be more,

And took a little negro up behind and one before.

But What's his name and you know who, they lingered to the last,

And neither had a dollar left and seemed to be downcast;

Bad luck had fallen on them as falls the plague on men, And their phizzies were as blank as if they'd never smile again;

And then when comes December next, as surely it will

come,

To call the future delegate from out his distant home, When the sound of cracking nuts is heard in lobby and in hall,

And glimmer in the smoky light old Shockhoe Hill and all.

An old friend searches for the fellows he knew the year

before,

And sighs to find them on the Hill Capitoline, no

more;

But then he thinks of one who her promise had belied,
The beautiful Virginia, who had fallen in her pride.
In that great house 'twas said she fell, where stands her
gallant chief,

Who well might weep in marble, that her race had been so brief,

Yet not unmeet it was, he thought-oh no, ye heavenly powers!

Since she trusted those good fellows, who kept such shocking hours.

[For the Southern Literary Messenger.]

MR. EDITOR.-The following sketch was given me by one of those mail stage story-tellers, who abound on our roads, and enliven the drowsy passengers by their narratives. It is founded on fact, and may not be unacceptable to such of your readers as are fond of delineation of human character in all its variety of phases.

SALLY SINGLETON.

Who thundering comes on blackest steed,
With slacken'd bit and hoof of speed?-Byron.

A horseman passed us at full speed, whose wild and haggard look arrested the attention of my friend. In the name of all that is singular, said he, who can that be, and whither is he posting with such rapidity? His garb seems of the last century, and his grizzled locks stream on the wind like those of some ancient bard.

That man, replied I, is a lover, and is hurrying away to pay his devoirs to his mistress, who married another, and has been dead for many years.

"Indeed, you surprise me," he rejoined. "He has, it is true, the 'lean look' of Shakespeare's lover; the 'blue eye and sunken ;' the 'unquestionable spirit,' and 'every thing about him demonstrates a careless desolation'-yet I should have imagined, that the snows of so many winters had extinguished all the fires of that frosty caucasus: but tell me who he is and what is his story."

"His name is Wilson; and that of the lady whom he loved was Sally Singleton. I would that I had the graphic power of Scott to sketch a tale of so much interest. If Sir Walter has immortalized an old man, mounted on his white pony, and going in quest of the tombstones, how much is it to be regretted that the same master hand cannot be employed to perpetuate the memory of yonder eccentric being, whose love lives on after the lapse of twenty years, in spite of the marriage and death of his mistress-in spite of the evidence of his own senses, and, notwithstanding every human effort to dispel his delusion. Regularly every

morning, for the last twenty years, no matter what the state of the weather, (alike to him the hail, the rain, and the sunshine,) has he mounted his horse, and travelled a distance of ten miles, to see his beloved Sally Singleton. His custom is, to ride directly up to the window of her former apartment, and in a courteous manner to bow to his mistress, in token of his continued attachment. Having performed this act of gallantry, he waves with his hand a fond adieu, and immediately gallops back with a triumphant air, as if perfectly satisfied with having set his enemies at defiance. "The course of true love never did run smooth," and in this case, whether "misgrafted in respect of years," or "different in blood," or "standing on the choice of friends," is not exactly known; but the lady was wedded to another, and died soon after. Her lover would never believe in her marriage or her death. His mind, unhinged by the severity of his disappointment, seems to have retained nothing but the single image of her he loved, shut up in that apartment; and he resolved to brave every difficulty, to testify his unchanging devotion. Obstacles were purposely built across his path-the bridges were broken down the idle boys would gather around him, and assail him in their cruel folly-guns, even, were fired at him,-all in vain! The elements could not quench the fervor of his love-obstacles were overleaped-he swam the rivers-the boys were disregarded-balls could not harm him. He held a charmed life; like young Lochinvar,

"He staid not for brake,

And he stopp'd not for stone;"

but dashed onward to his beloved window, and then, contented with this public attestation of his unalterable love, returned with a look of triumphant satisfaction to his joyless home. As a last effort to remove the veil from his eyes, a suit was instituted, in which he was made a party, and proof of the lady's marriage and death was purposely introduced to undeceive him. He listened with cold incredulity to the witnesses; smiled derisively at that part of their testimony which regarded