POSTHUMOUS FAME.

WRITTEN AFTER PERUSING A PARAGRAPH RESPECT

ING THE MONUMENT RECENTLY ERECTED TO THE

MEMORY OF BURNS.

Ir is a well-known fact, that bards have ever,
From Homer downwards, lived upon their wits;
And though, no doubt, they always have been clever
At brandishing their knives and forks, tid bits
Of calipash or venison have never

Or seldom been reserved for them; and spits With good roast joints not often have been turning For them, men deem the beacon-lights of learning.

Their's have been fame and flattery alone,
(But pudding is more nourishing than praise);
They've asked for bread, and oft received

stone!

a

Living, have passed unheeded through the maze Of a cold-hearted world:-their deaths once known, The titled fool hath forward pressed to raise Tombs o'er their ashes, that he thus might claim One leaf of laurel for his paltry name.

Shades of the mighty dead! arise and say

How much ye scorn such mockery!
forth,

Ye heirs of immortality! that they,
The proud, who deem nobility of birth
Surpasses rank of mind, no longer may
Cherish the weak delusion, but to worth
Yield, as becomes them, precedence—and learn

Stand

To honour those whom they were wont to spurn.

Match me among the Magnates of the world—

Those things of splendid nothingness - bright

names,

Who, when the roll of glory is unfurled,

Upon posterity can shew such claims

As Milton, Shakspeare, Spenser.

hurled

Those have

Some fellow despots from their thrones, their aims Still purchased but with blood; and they have made, Their worship of the shadow of a shade;

But these, the Muses' sons, have toiled to gain Renown which could not profit them;-through

years

Of unregarded poverty and pain,—

Slaves to their wild and passionate hopes and fears,-

Oh! how intensely did they strive to❜ attain

Fame that should be immortal; and the tears Of blood their hearts have wept, have been repaid With wreaths of laurel that can never fade!

CYTHNA.

The glassy splendour of her eye
Already sparkled of the sky;
The kindling of a world of bliss,

For it was not the light of this.

WIFFEN.

YES, in her eye there lived until the last,
A strange, unreal light,—a fearful glance,
Wild, yet most beautiful;-and o'er her cheek
Hues of such passing loveliness would stray,
As seemed not of this earth; but rather caught
Like the electric beams that dart across

The roseate clouds of Summer's softest eve-
From the high Heaven above! Upon her lip
Hung bland persuasion' eloquently mute;
And, in her very silentness there dwelt

Music's best half,-expression! She had borne,

With an untiring spirit, many a grief;
And sickness, that had wasted her fine form,
Had tainted not her soul, for that was pure

As the last tear which Pitv draws from Love.