God prosper the cause!—Oh! it cannot but thrive,
While the pulse of one patriot heart is alive,

Its devotion to feel and its rights to maintain:
Then how sainted by sorrow its martyrs will die!
The finger of glory shall point where they lie;
While, far from the footstep of coward or slave,
The young Spirit of Freedom shall shelter their grave
Beneath Shamrocks of Erin and Olives of Spain !

FROM EURIPIDES.

Rogers.

THERE is a streamlet issuing from a rock,
The village-girls singing wild madrigals,

Dip their white vestments in its waters clear,
And hang them to the sun. There first I saw her,
Her dark and eloquent eyes, mild, full of fire,
"Twas heaven to look upon; and her sweet voice,
As tuneable as harp of many strings,

At once spoke joy and sadness to my soul!

Dear is that valley to the murmuring bees.
The small birds build there; and, at summer-noon,
Oft have I heard a child, gay among flowers,
As in the shining grass she sate concealed,
Sing to herself.

CAPTIVITY.

Rogers.

CAGED in old woods whose reverend echoes wake

When the hern screams along the distant lake,
Her little heart oft flutters to be free,

Oft sighs to turn the unrelenting key.

In vain! the nurse that rusted relic wears,
Nor moved by gold-nor to be moved by tears;
And terraced walls their black reflection throw
On the green-mantled moat that sleeps below.

LOVE.

Southey.

THEY sin who tell us Love can die.
With life all other passions fly,
All others are but vanity.

In heaven ambition cannot dwell,

Nor avarice in the vaults of hell.

Earthly these passions, as of earth,

They perish where they have their birth.

But Love is indestructible;

Its holy flame for ever burneth,

From heaven it came, to heaven returneth;

Too oft on earth a troubled guest,

At times deceived, at times opprest,

It here is tried and purified,
And hath in heaven its perfect rest;

It soweth here with toil and care,

But the karvest-time of Love is there.
Oh! when a mother meets on high
The babe she lost in infancy,

Hath she not then, for pains and fears,
The day of woe, the anxious night,
For all her sorrow, all her tears,

An over-payment of delight!

THE LILY.

Mrs. Tighe.

HOW withered, perished seems the form
Of yon obscure unsightly root!
Yet from the blight of wintry storm,
It hides secure the precious fruit.

The careless eye can find no grace,
No beauty in the scaly folds,
Nor see within the dark embrace
What latent loveliness it holds.

Yet in that bulb, those sapless scales,
The lily wraps her silver vest,

Till vernal suns and vernal gales

Shall kiss once more her fragrant breast.

Yes, hide beneath the mouldering heap,
The undelighting slighted thing;
There in the cold earth buried deep,

In silence let it wait the spring.

Oh! many a stormy night shall close
In gloom upon the barren earth,
While still, in undisturbed repose,
Uninjured lies the future birth;

And Ignorance, with sceptic eye,
Hope's patient smile shall wondering view ;
Or mock her fond credulity,

As her soft tears the spot bedew.

Sweet smile of hope, delicious tear!
The sun, the shower indeed shall come;
The promised verdant shoot appear,
And Nature bid her blossoms bloom.

And thou, O virgin Queen of Spring!
Shalt, from thy dark and lowly bed,
Bursting thy green sheath's silken string,
Unveil thy charms, and perfume shed;

Unfold thy robes of purest white,
Unsullied from their darksome grave,
And thy soft petals' silvery light
In the mild breeze unfettered wave.

So Faith shall seek the lowly dust
Where humble Sorrow loves to lie,
And bid her thus her hopes entrust,

And watch with patient, cheerful eye;

And bear the long, cold, wintry night,
And bear her own degraded doom,
And wait till Heaven's reviving light,
Eternal Spring! shall burst the gloom.

TO A LADY,

WITH FLOWERS FROM A ROMAN WALL.

Walter Scott.

TAKE these flowers which, purple waving,

On the ruined rampart grew,

Where, the sons of freedom braving,

Rome's imperial standards flew.

Warriors from the breach of danger
Pluck no longer laurels there :
They but yield the passing stranger
Wild-flower wreaths for Beauty's hair.

THE VIOLET.

Walter Scott.

THE violet, in her green-wood bower,

Where birchen boughs with hazles mingle,

May boast itself the fairest flower

In glen, or copse, or forest dingle.