Full often has my infant Muse,
Attun'd to love her languid lyre;
But, now, without a theme to choose,
The strains in stolen sighs expire.

My youthful nymphs, alas! are flown;

i.

E

is a wife, and C

a mother,

And Carolina sighs alone,

And Mary's given to another;
And Cora's eye, which roll'd on me,
Can now no more my love recall-
In truth, dear LONG, 'twas time to flee-ii.
For Cora's eye will shine on all.
And though the Sun, with genial rays,
His beams alike to all displays,

And every lady's eye's a sun,

These last should be confin'd to one.

i.

The soul's meridian don't become her,"

iii.

Whose Sun displays a general summer!
Thus faint is every former flame,
And Passion's self is now a name;

iv. v.

As, when the ebbing flames are low,

The aid which once improv'd their light,
And bade them burn with fiercer glow,

Now quenches all their sparks in night;

thank Heaven are flown.-[MS. Newstead.]

ii. In truth dear L- --[Hours of Idleness. Poems O. and T.] iii. The glances really don't become her.-[MS. Newstead.] iv. No more I linger on its name.-[MS. Newstead.] v. And passion's self is but a name.-[MS. Newstead.]

Thus has it been with Passion's fires,

As many a boy and girl remembers, While all the force of love expires, Extinguish'd with the dying embers.

But now, dear LONG, 'tis midnight's noon, And clouds obscure the watery moon, Whose beauties I shall not rehearse, Describ'd in every stripling's verse; For why should I the path go o'er Which every bard has trod before?i. Yet ere yon silver lamp of night

Has thrice perform'd her stated round, Has thrice retrac'd her path of light,

And chas'd away the gloom profound,

I trust, that we, my gentle Friend,
Shall see her rolling orbit wend,

Above the dear-lov'd peaceful seat,

Which once contain❜d our youth's retreat;
And, then, with those our childhood knew,

We'll mingle in the festive crew;
While many a tale of former day
Shall wing the laughing hours away;
And all the flow of souls shall pour
The sacred intellectual shower,
Nor cease, till Luna's waning horn,
Scarce glimmers through the mist of Morn.

i. And what's much worse than this I find
Have left their deepen'd tracks behind
-[MS. Newstead.]

Yet as yon

TO A LADY.

I.

OH! had my Fate been join'd with thine,'
As once this pledge appear'd a token,
These follies had not, then, been mine,
For, then, my peace had not been broken.

2.

To thee, these early faults I owe,

To thee, the wise and old reproving:

They know my sins, but do not know
'Twas thine to break the bonds of loving.

3.

For once my soul, like thine, was pure,

And all its rising fires could smother;
But, now, thy vows no more endure,
Bestow'd by thee upon another.'

i. To [Hours of Idleness. Poems O. and T.]

66

1. [These verses were addressed to Mrs. Chaworth Musters. Byron wrote in 1822, Our meetings were stolen ones. ... A gate leading from Mr. Chaworth's grounds to those of my mother was the place of our interviews. The ardour was all on my side. I was serious; she was volatile she liked me as a younger brother, and treated and laughed at me as a boy; she, however, gave me her picture, and that was something to make verses upon. Had I married her, perhaps, the whole tenour of my life would have been different."-Medwin's Conversations, 1824, p. 81.]

4.

Perhaps, his peace I could destroy,
And spoil the blisses that await him;
Yet let my Rival smile in joy,

For thy dear sake, I cannot hate him.

5.

Ah! since thy angel form is gone,

My heart no more can rest with any; But what it sought in thee alone,

Attempts, alas! to find in many.

6.

Then, fare thee well, deceitful Maid!
'Twere vain and fruitless to regret thee;

Nor Hope, nor Memory yield their aid,
But Pride may teach me to forget thee.

7.

Yet all this giddy waste of years,

This tiresome round of palling pleasures;

These varied loves, these matrons' fears,

These thoughtless strains to Passion's measures

8.

If thou wert mine, had all been hush'd:-
This cheek, now pale from early riot,
With Passion's hectic ne'er had flush'd,

But bloom'd in calm domestic quiet.

9.

Yes, once the rural Scene was sweet,

For Nature seem'd to smile before thee;
And once my Breast abhorr'd deceit,-

For then it beat but to adore thee.

IO.

But, now, I seek for other joys—

To think, would drive my soul to madness;
In thoughtless throngs, and empty noise,
I conquer half my Bosom's sadness.

II.

Yet, even in these, a thought will steal,
In spite of every vain endeavour;

And fiends might pity what I feel

To know that thou art lost for ever.

WHEN I ROVED A YOUNG HIGHLANDER."

I.

WHEN I rov'd a young Highlander o'er the dark heath, And climb'd thy steep summit, oh Morven of snow!1

i. Song.-[Poems O. and T.]

1. Morven, a lofty mountain in Aberdeenshire. "Gormal of snow is an expression frequently to be found in Ossian.