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The leaves of wasted autumn woods shall float around thy head;

The blooms of dewy spring shall gleam beneath thy feet:

But thy soul or this world must fade in the frost that binds the dead,

Ere midnight's frown and morning's smile, ere thou and peace may meet.

The cloud-shadows of midnight possess their own repose,

For the weary winds are silent, or the moon is in

the deep:

Some respite to its turbulence unresting ocean knows;

Whatever moves, or toils, or grieves, hath its appointed sleep.

Thou in the grave shalt rest: yet till the phantoms flee

Which that house, and heath, and garden made dear to thee erewhile,

Thy remembrance, and repentance, and deep musings are not free

From the music of two voices, and the light of one sweet smile.

MUTABILITY.

We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon; How restlessly they speed, and gleam, and quiver, Streaking the darkness radiantly! yet soon

Night closes round, and they are lost for ever;

Or, like forgotten lyres, whose dissonant strings
Give various response to each varying blast,
To whose frail frame no second motion brings
One mood or modulation like the last.

We rest a dream has power to poison sleep;
We rise one wandering thought pollutes the day;
We feel, conceive or reason, laugh or weep;
Embrace fond wo, or cast our cares away:

It is the same! For, be it joy or sorrow,
The path of its departure still is free :
Man's yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow;
Naught may endure but Mutability.

LINES TO AN INDIAN AIR.

I ARISE from dreams of thee
In the first sweet sleep of night,
When the winds are breathing low,
And the stars are shining bright:
I arise from dreams of thee,
And a spirit in my feet

Has led me-who knows how ?-
To thy chamber window, sweet!

The wandering airs they faint
On the dark, the silent stream;
The champak odours fail

Like sweet thoughts in a dream;
The nightingale's complaint,
It dies upon her heart,

As I must on thine,
Beloved as thou art!

Oh lift me from the grass!
I die, I faint, I fail!
Let thy love in kisses rain
On my lips and eyelids pale.
My cheek is cold and white, alas
My heart beats loud and fast,
Oh! press it close to thine again,
Where it will break at last.

STANZAS.

THE sun is warm, the sky is clear,
The waves are dancing fast and bright,
Blue isles and snowy mountains wear
The purple moon's transparent light
Around its unexpanded buds;

Like many a voice of one delight,
The winds, the birds, the ocean-floods,
The city's voice itself is soft, like Solitude's.

I see the deep's untrampled floor

With green and purple seaweeds strown; I see the waves upon the shore,

Like light dissolved in star-showers, thrown: 1 sit upon the sands alone,

The lightning of the noontide ocean Is flashing round me, and a tone

Arises from its measured motion,

How sweet! did any heart now share in

Alas! I have nor hope nor health,

Nor peace within nor calm around, Nor that content, surpassing wealth, The sage in meditation found,

my

And walk'd with inward glory crown'd

emotion.

Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leisure. Others I see whom these surround

Smiling they live, and call life pleasure:

To me that cup has been dealt in another measure.

Yet now despair itself is mild,

Even as the winds and waters are;
I could lie down like a tired child,
And weep away the life of care
Which I have borne and yet must bear,

Till death, like sleep, might steal on me,

And I might feel in the warm air

My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea Breathe o'er my dying brain its last monotony.

Some might lament that I were cold,
As I, when this sweet day is gone,
Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,
Insults with this untimely moan;
They might lament-for I am one
Whom men love not-and yet regret,
Unlike this day, which, when the sun
Shall on its stainless glory set,

Will linger, though enjoy'd, like joy in memory yet

CHARLES WOLFE.

1791-1823.

THE BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE.

Not a drum was heard, nor a funeral note,
As his corse to the rampart we hurried;
Not a soldier discharged his farewell shot
O'er the grave where our hero we buried.
We buried him darkly at dead of night,
The sods with our bayonets turning-
By the struggling moonbeam's misty light,
And the lantern dimly burning.

No useless coffin enclosed his breast,

Not in sheet or in shroud we wound him;
But he lay like a warrior taking his rest,
With his martial cloak around him.

Few and short were the prayers we said,
And we spoke not a word of sorrow;
But we steadfastly gazed on the face of the dead,
And we bitterly thought of the morrow.

We thought, as we hollow'd his narrow bed,
And smooth'd down his lonely pillow,

That the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his
And we far away on the billow!

[head,

Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone,
And o'er his cold ashes upbraid him;
But little he'll reck, if they let him sleep on
In the grave where a Briton has laid him.

But half of our heavy task was done

When the clock struck the hour for retiring And we heard the distant and random gun That the foe was sullenly firing.

Slowly and sadly we laid him down,

From the field of his fame fresh and gory: We carved not a line, and we raised not a stone, But left him alone with his glory.

SONG.

IF I had thought thou couldst have died,
I might not weep for thee;

But I forgot, when by thy side,

That thou couldst mortal be!
It never through my mind had pass'd,
The time would e'er be o'er,

And I on thee should look my last,
And thou shouldst smile no more!

And still upon that face I look,
And think 'twill smile again;

And still the thought I will not brook,
That I must look in vain!

But when I speak, thou dost not say

What thou ne'er left'st unsaid;
And now I feel, as well I may,
Sweet Mary! thou art dead!

If thou wouldst stay, e'en as thou art,
All cold and all serene,

I still might press thy silent heart,
And where thy smiles have been!

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