XII.

Fare thee well!-Fare thee well!—If these wild woven

numbers

May claim a fond place in a bosom so pure,

Till death from mortality's coil disencumbers

Thy soul,—and earth's dreams may no longer

endure,

Let the glass of thy mind give thee back, undefaced By time, absence, or sorrow, the thoughts of the past!

XIII.

Fare thee well!-Fare thee well!—Whilst a pilgrim I

wander,

Unsoothed and unloved on this cold-hearted earth, On the hour we first met, and last parted, I'll ponder, Till visions of gladness from grief shall have birth; Whatsoe'er may betide me, life's sands to their last Must have sped, ere I cease to REMEMBER THE PAST !

THE WAKING DREAM.

A SKETCH.

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.

BYRON.

[It is scarcely possible to describe the thrilling sensations of

Gray, in his

walk again' under the glorious canopy of heaven. Ode on the Pleasures arising from Vicissitude, observes of a person under such circumstances, with infinite beauty as well as

truth;

'The meanest floweret of the vale,

The simplest note that swells the gale,
The common sun, the air, the skies

To Him are opening Paradise !'

In the fulness of heart which the contemplation of a setting sun, diffusing its hues of golden light over a wide and singularly beautiful extent of landscape and this, too, after weeks of sultriness and suffering,-were the following lines poured forth. Every one has, doubtless, on such an occasion, invested the fantastic clouds which sport in a summer sky with such personifications as best consorted with the associations and temper of mind of the moment. The writer had just laid down Milton's Paradise Lost, and this will in some measure account for the fanciful vision he has attempted to depict.]

WHY, what a Paradise is earth to-day!
Some heavy torpor, sure, hath locked my soul
In dull, unvarying listlessness 'till now!
Some envious film hath, sure, obscured my sight,
And veiled this world of beauty from my view,
For long, long years!-Yon ever-glorious sun
Darts his life-giving beams upon my heart,
And stirs it to a deeper sense of bliss,
Than e'er it felt before. My pulses grow

Instinct with new existence,fresher life ;And all around me gathers, as I gaze,

Hues of a more pervading loveliness

Than it was wont to wear! The clouds above
Stream on like molten silver; now and then
Fretted with crimson tinges,—and anon
Streaked with the deep blue of the upper sky
That spreads and spreads behind them in a sea
Of living sapphire. Multitudes of forms,
Palpably bright and beautiful, are moving
Athwart the depths of the eternal heavens,
Making an unimaginable theme

For after-thought to dwell upon! I see
(So Fancy in her wayward mood would deem)
File upon file of rich and gorgeous shapes,
Advancing, and advancing without end,

Bearing the banners of the Lord of Hosts!

Throned in a car,

inwoven of the beams

Of the descending sun, whose flashing wheels

F

Leave a long trail of glory as they speed,
Towers the mighty and majestic form
Of the imperial Captain;-HIM who led
The forces of the' Omnipotent against
The dark and daring Lucifer, and hurled
The race rebellious' to 'combustion down'
And 'bottomless perdition!' On his brow-
His starry brow-a coronal is wreathed,
Worthy the temples of the King of Kings.

His shining sword is sheathless, and its blade—

Like a death-dooming meteor ere it falls

In ruin upon earth-flashes in light,

In terrible light, whichever way it turns!
Celestial scorn,-defiance without pride,
And all the wrath the son of God may own,
Hath curled his lip in 'beautiful disdain ;'

His deep eye streams in lightning ;-and he grasps
Ten thousand thousand thunders!

On the distance,

A huge and moving mass appears to rise