"My father, my father, and seest thou not The Erl King's daughters in yon dim spot?" "My son, my son, I see and I know 'T is the old gray willow that shimmers * So." "I love thee; thy beauty has ravished my sense; And, willing or not, I will carry thee hence." "O father, the Erl King now puts forth his arm! O father, the Erl King has done me harm!" The father shudders; he hurries on ; LAMENT OF MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS. Burns. Now nature hangs her mantle green On every blooming tree, And spreads her sheets o' daisies white Now Phoebus cheers the crystal streams, But naught can glad the weary wight Now lav'rocks wake the merry morn, The merle, in his noontide bower, * Gleams with an uncertain light. The mavis wild, wi' many a note, Now blooms the lily by the bank, I was the queen o' bonnie France, As blithe lay down at e'en; But as for thee, thou false woman,* My sister and my foe! * Grim vengeance, yet, shall whet a sword That through thy soul shall go; The weeping blood in woman's breast Was never known to thee; Nor th' balm that drops on wounds of woe * Elizabeth, queen of England, who unjustly detained her in prison. My son! * my son! may Upon thy fortune shine; kinder stars And may those pleasures gild thy reign And where thou meet'st thy mother's friend, O, soon, to me, may summer suns And the next flowers that deck the spring AVARICE. George Herbert. MONEY, thou bane of bliss, and source of woe, Whence comest thou, that thou art so fresh and fine? I know thy parentage is base and low; Man found thee poor and dirty in a mine. Surely thou didst so little contribute To this great kingdom which thou now hast got, * James the First, king of England. Then forcing thee, by fire he made thee bright; Man calleth thee his wealth, who made thee rich, THE TRUMPET. - Mrs. Hemans. THE trumpet's voice hath roused the lan A hundred banners to the breeze And hark!was that the sound of seas? The chief is arming in his hall, The mourner hears the thrilling call, The mother on her first-born son They come not back, though all be won, The bard hath ceased his song, and boun E'en for the marriage-altar crowned, And all this haste, and change, and fear FAREWELL TO THE MUSE.- Sir W. Scott. ENCHANTRESS, farewell! who so oft has decoyed me, At the close of the evening, through woodlands to roam, Where the forester, lated, with wonder espied me Explore the wild scenes he was quitting for home. Farewell! and take with thee thy numbers wild speaking, The language alternate of rapture and woe; O, none but some lover, whose heart-strings are breaking, The pang that I feel at our parting can know! Each joy thou couldst double, and when there came sorrow Or pale disappointment to darken my way, What voice was like thine, that could sing of to-morrow, Till forgot in the strain was the grief of to-day! But when friends drop around us in life's weary waning, The grief, queen of numbers, thou canst not assuage; Nor the gradual estrangement of those yet remaining, The languor of pain, and the chillness of age. "T was thou that once taught me, in accents bewailing, To sing how a warrior lay stretched on the plain, And a maiden hung o'er him with aid unavailing, And held to his lips the cold goblet in vain; |