STANZAS FOR MUSIC*.

"O Lachrymarum fons, tenero sacros
"Ducentium ortus ex animo: quater
"Felix! in imo qui scatentem

"Pectore te, pia Nympha, sensit."

Gray's Poemata.

1.

THERE's not a joy the world can give like that it takes away, When the glow of early thought declines in feeling's dull

decay;

'Tis not on youth's smooth cheek the blush alone, which fades so fast,

But the tender bloom of heart is gone, ere youth itself be past.

2.

Then the few whose spirits float above the wreck of

happiness,

Are driven o'er the shoals of guilt or ocean of excess :

The magnet of their course is gone, or only points in vain The shore to which their shiver'd sail shall never stretch

again.

* These Verses were given by Lord Byron to Mr. Power, Strand, who has published them, with very beautiful music by Sir John Stevenson.

3.

Then the mortal coldness of the soul like death itself comes

down;

It cannot feel for others' woes, it dare not dream its own; That heavy chill has frozen o'er the fountain of our tears, And though the eye may sparkle still, 'tis where the ice

appears.

4.

Though wit may flash from fluent lips, and mirth distract the breast,

Through midnight hours that yield no more their former hope of rest;

'Tis but as ivy-leaves around the ruin'd turret wreath, All green and wildly fresh without, but worn and gray beneath.

5.

Oh could I feel as I have felt,-or be what I have been, Or weep as I could once have wept, o'er

Scene:

many a vanish'd

As springs in deserts found seem sweet, all brackish though

they be,

So midst the wither'd waste of life, those tears would flow

to me.

1815.

STANZAS FOR MUSIC.

THERE be none of Beauty's daughters

With a magic like thee;

And like music on the waters

Is thy sweet voice to me:
When, as if its sound were causing
The charmed ocean's pausing,

The waves lie still and gleaming,
And the lull'd winds seem dreaming,

And the midnight moon is weaving
Her bright chain o'er the deep;
Whose breast is gently heaving,
As an infant's asleep:

So the spirit bows before thee,

To listen and adore thee;

With a full but soft emotion,

Like the swell of Summer's ocean.