OH! THINK NOT MY SPIRITS, &c. Oh! think not my spirits are always as light, Which seldom the rose of enjoyment adorns ; Is always the first to be touched by the thorns! But send round the bowl, and be happy awhile; May we never meet worse in our pilgrimage here Than the tear that enjoyment can gild with a smile, And the smile that compassion can turn to a tear! The thread of our life would be dark, heaven knows, When these blessings shall cease to be dear to my mind But they who have loved the fondest; the purest, Too often have wept o'er the dream they believed; And the heart that has slumbered in friendship securest, Is happy indeed if 'twas never deceived. : But send round the bowl-while a relic of truth Is in man or in woman, this prayer shall be mine, That the sunshine of love may illumine our youth, And the moonlight of friendship console our decline ! Moore. GLENARA. O heard ye yon pibrach sound sad in the gale, Glenara came first with the mourners and shroud; In silence they reached, over mountain and moor; 6 Now here let us place the grey stone of her cairn: Why speak ye no word ?-said Glenara the stern! And tell me, I charge you! ye clan of my spouse, Why fold ye your mantles, why cloud ye your brows?` So spake the rude chieftain: No answer is made, I dreamt of my lady, I dreamt of her shroud,' Cried a voice from the kinsmen, all wrathful and loud; 'And empty that shroud and that coffin did seem: Glenara! Glenara! now read me my dream!' O! pale grew the cheek of that chieftain, I ween, When the shroud was unclosed, and no lady was seen ! When a voice from the kinsmen spoke louder in scorn, 'Twas the youth who had loved the fair Ellen of Lorn: 'I dreamt of my lady, I dreamt of her grief, In dust, low the traitor has knelt to the ground, Campbell. ODE. Oh, shame to thee, land of the Gaul! A mockery that never shall die; And, proud o'er thy ruin, for ever be hurled Oh, where is thy spirit of yore, The spirit that breathed in thy dead, When gallantry's star was the beacón before, And honour the passion that led ? Thy storms have awakened their sleep, They groan from the place of their rest, And wrathfully murmur, and sullenly weep, To see the foul stain on thy breast: For where is the glory they left thee in trust ?— 'Tis scattered in darkness, 'tis trampled in dust! Go, look through the kingdoms of earth, From Indus, all round to the pole, And something of goodness, of honour, and worth, Shall brighten the sins of the soul. But thou art alone in thy shame, The world cannot liken thee there; Abhorrence and vice have disfigured thy name Beyond the low reach of compare :— Stupendous in guilt, thou shalt lend us through time A proverb, a bye-word for treachery and crime. While conquest illumined his sword, While yet in his prowess he stood, Thy praises still followed the steps of thy Lord, Though tyranny sat on his crown, And withered the nations afar, Yet bright in thy view was the despot's renown, Till fortune deserted his car; Then, back from the chieftain thou slunkest awayThe foremost to insult, the first to betray! Forgot were the feats he had done, The toils he had borne in thy cause; Thou turned'st to worship a new rising sun, And waft other songs of applause. |