"Alas! the joys that fortune brings
Are trifling, and decay;
And those who prize the paltry things,
More trifling still than they.
And what is friendship but a name,
A charm that lulls to sleep :
A shade that follows wealth or fame,
But leaves the wretch to weep?
'And love is still an emptier sound,
The modern fair one's jest ;
On earth unseen, or only found
To warm the turtle's nest.
"For shame, fond youth, thy sorrows hush, And " he said: the spurn sex, But while he spoke, a rising blush His love-lorn guest betrayed. Surprised he sees new beauties rise,
Swift mantling to the view; Like colours o'er the morning skies, As bright, as transient too.
The bashful look, the rising breast,
Alternate spread alarms;
The lovely stranger stands confest
A maid in all her charms!
And, "Ah, forgive a stranger rude,
A wretch forlorn," she cried; "W] ose feet unhallow'd thus intrude Where heaven and you reside.
"But let a maid thy pity share,
Whom love has taught to stray; Who seeks for rest, and finds despair Companion of her way.
"My father lived beside the Tyne,
A wealthy lord was he;
And all his wealth was mark'd as mine; He had but only me.
"To win me from his tender arms,
Unnumber'd suitors came;
Who praised me for imputed charms,
And felt, or feign'd, a flame.
"Each hour a mercenary crowd
With richest proffers strove ;
Among the rest young Edwin bow'd, But never talked of love.
"In humble, simplest habit clad,
No wealth nor power had he; Wisdom and worth were all he had, But these were all to me.
"The blossom opening to the day,
The dews of heaven refined,
Could nought of purity display,
To emulate his mind.
"The dew, the blossom on the tree,
With charms inconstant shine;
Their charms were his, but, woe is me,
Their constancy was mine!
"For still I tried each fickle art,
Importunate and vain :
And while his passion touch'd my heart,
I triumph'd in his pain.
"Till quite dejected with my scorn,
He left me to my pride;
And sought a solitude forlorn,
In secret, where he died.
{TOBIAS SMOLLETT. 1721-1771.]
THE TEARS OF SCOTLAND.
MOURN, hapless Caledonia, mourn
Thy banish'd peace, thy laurels torn !
Thy sons, for valour long renown'd,
Lie slaughter'd on their native ground;
Thy hospitable roofs no more
Invite the stranger to the door;
In smoky ruins sunk they lie,
The monuments of cruelty.
The wretched owner sees afar
His all become the prey of war;
Bethinks him of his babes and wife,
Then smites his breast, and curses life.
Thy swains are famish'd on the rocks,
Where once they fed their wanton flocks:
Thy ravish'd virgins shriek in vain ;
Thy infants perish on the plain.
What boots it, then, in every clime, Through the wide-spreading waste of time,
Thy martial glory, crown'd with praise,
Still shone with undiminish'd blaze!
Thy tow'ring spirit now is broke,
Thy neck is bended to the yoke.
What foreign arms could never quell,
By civil rage and rancour fell.
The rural pipe and merry lay
No more shall cheer the happy day:
No social scenes of gay delight
Beguile the dreary winter night:
No strains but those of sorrow flow,
And nought be heard but sounds of woe,
While the pale phantoms of the slain
Glide nightly o'er the silent plain.
O baneful cause! oh, fatal morn!
Accursed to ages yet unborn!
The sons against their father stood,
The parent shed his children's blood.
Yet, when the rage of battle ceased,
The victor's soul was not appeased:
The naked and forlorn must feel
Devouring flames and murd'ring steel!
The pious mother, doom'd to death,
Forsaken wanders o'er the heath;
The bleak wind whistles round her head,
Her helpless orphans cry for bread;
THY spirit, Independence, let me share,
Lord of the lion-heart and eagle-eye,
Thy steps I follow with my bosom bare,
Nor heed the storm that howls along the
sky.
Deep in the frozen regions of the north,
A goddess violated brought thee forth,
Immortal Liberty, whose look sublime
Hath bleach'd the tyrant's cheek in every
varying clime.
What time the iron-hearted Gaul,
With frantic superstition for his guide,
Arm'd with the dagger and the pall,
The sons of Woden to the field defied :
The ruthless hag, by Weser's flood,
In Heaven's name urged the infernal
blow,
And red the stream began to flow:
The vanquish'd were baptised with blood!
The Saxon prince in horror fled
From altars stain'd with human gore;
And Liberty his routed legions led
In safety to the bleak Norwegian shore.
There in a cave asleep she lay,
Lull'd by the hoarse-resounding main ;
When a bold savage past that way,
Impell'd by destiny, his name Disdain.
Of ample front the portly chief appear'd:
The hunted bear supplied a shaggy vest;
The drifted snow hung on his yellow
beard;
And his broad shoulders braved the furious blast.
The curlew scream'd, the tritons blew
Their shells to celebrate the ravish'd rite;
Old Time exulted as he flew ;
And Independence saw the light.
The light he saw in Albion's happy
plains,
Where under cover of a flowering thorn,
While Philomel renew'd her warbled
strains,
[born.
The auspicious fruit of stol'n embrace was
The mountain dryads seized with joy,
The smiling infant to their care con-
sign'd;
The Doric muse caress'd the favourite boy;
The hermit Wisdom stored his opening mind.
As rolling years matured his age,
He flourish'd bold and sinewy as his sire ;
While the mild passions in his breast assuage
The fiercer flames of his maternal fire.
And wing'd that arrow sure as fate,
Arabia's scorching sands he cross'd,
Where blasted nature pants supine,
Conductor of her tribes adust,
To freedom's adamantine shrine;
And many a Tartar horde forlorn, aghast!
He snatch'd from under fell oppression's
wing,
The all-cheering hymns of liberty to sing.
And taught amidst the dreary waste
He virtue finds, like precious ore,
Even now he stands on Calvi's rocky
Diffused through every baser mould;
shore,
And turns the dross or Corsica to gold:
He, guardian genius, taught my youth
Pomp's tinsel livery to despise :
My lips by him chastised to truth,
Ne'er paid that homage which my heart
denies.
Which ascertain'd the sacred rights of That bears the treasure which he cannot
While, lightly poised, the scaly brood
In myriads cleave thy crystal flood;
The springing trout in speckled pride,
The salmon, monarch of the tide;
The ruthless pike, intent on war,
The silver eel, and mottled par.
Devolving from thy parent lake,
A charming maze thy waters make,
By bowers of birch and groves of pins,
And hedges flower'd with eglantine.
Still on thy banks so gaily green,
May numerous herds and flocks be seen:
And lasses chanting o'er the pail,
And ancient faith that knows no guile,
And shepherds piping in the dale;
And industry embrown'd with toil;
And hearts resolved and hands prepared
The blessings they enjoy to guard!
ON RESIGNATION.
O GOD, whose thunder shakes the sky,
Whose eye this atom globe surveys,
To thee, my only rock, I fly,
Thy mercy in thy justice praise.
The mystic mazes of thy will,
The shadows of celestial light,
Are past the powers of human skill;
But what the Eternal acts is right.
O teach me in the trying hour,
When anguish swells the dewy tear,
To still my sorrows, own thy power,
Thy goodness love, thy justice fear.
If in this bosom aught but thee,
Encroaching sought a boundless sway,
Omniscience could the danger see,
And mercy look the cause away.
Then, why, my soul, dost thou complain
Why drooping seek the dark recess?
Shake off the melancholy chain,
For God created all to bless.
But, ah! my breast is human still;
The rising sigh, the falling tear,
My languid vitals' feeble rill,
The sickness of my soul declare.
But yet, with fortitude resign'd,
I'll thank the infliction of the blow,
Forbid the sigh, compose my mind
Nor let the gush of misery flow.
Which on my sinking spirit steals,
The gloomy mantle of the night,
Will vanish at the morning light,
Which God, my East, my Sun, reveals.
Their parent banish'd, hence her children THE LAMENT OF THE BORDER fly,
[train; Their fairy race that fill'd her festive Joy rears his wreath, and hope inverts her eye And folly wonders that her dream was vain.
My love he built me a bonnie bower,
And clad it all with lily flower;
A braver bower you ne'er did see,
Than my true love he built for me,
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