The Poetical Works of Hemans, Heber, and Pollok

and power,

CER,

NORTH WALES.

Say, (for thine Isis yet recalls with pride

AN EVENING WALK IN BENGAL. Thy youthful triumphs by her leafy side,) Say, hast thou scorned, mid pomp, and wealth,

Our task is done! on Gunga's breast(6)

The sun is sinking down to rest; The sober transports of a studious hour?

And moored beneath the tamarind bough, No, statesman, no!-thy patriot fire was fed

Our bark has found its harbour now. From the warm embers of the mighty dead;

With furled sail and painted side, And thy strong spirit's patient grasp combined

Behold the tiny frigate ride. The souls of ages in a single mind.

Upon her deck, ʼmid charcoal gleams, -By arts like these, amidst a world of foes,

The Moslems' savoury supper steams, Eye of the earth, th' Athenian glory rose ;

While all apart, beneath the wood, Thus, last and best of Romans, Brutus shone;

The Hindoo cooks his simpler food.
Our Somers thus, and thus our Clarendon ;

Come walk with me the jungle through;
Such Cobham was; such, Grenville, long be thou, If yonder hunter told us true,
Our boast before our chief and champion now!

Far off, in desert dank and rude,

The tiger holds his solitude;
Nor (taught by secret charm to shun

The thunders of the English gun,)
EPITAPH ON A YOUNG NAVAL OFFI.

A dreadful guest but rarely seen,

Returns to scare the village green. DESIGNED FOR A TOMB IN A SEAPORT TOWN IN Come boldly on! no venomed snake

Can shelter in so cool a brake:

Child of the sun! he loves to lie SAILOR! if vigour nerve thy frame,

'Mid nature's embers parched and dry, If to high deeds thy soul is strung,

Where o'er some tower in ruin laid,
Revere this stone that gives to fame
The brave, the virtuous, and the young !-(5)

The peepul spreads its haunted shade,

Or round a tomb his scales to wreathe, For manly beauty decked his form,

Fit warder in the gate of death! His bright eye beamed with mental power;

Come on! yet pause! behold us now Resistless as the winter storm,

Beneath the bamboo's arched bough, Yet mild as summer's mildest shower.

Where gemming of that sacred gloom,

Glows the geranium's scarlet bloom, In war's hoarse rage, in ocean's strife,

And winds our path through many a bower For skill, for force, for mercy known;

Of fragrant tree and giant flower; Still prompt to shield a comrade's life,

The ceiba's crimson pomp displayed And greatly careless of his own.

O'er the broad plaintain's humbler shade,

And dusk anana's prickly blade;
Yet youthful seaman, mourn not thou
The fate these artless lines recall;

While o'er the brake, so wild and fair,

The betel waves his crest in air. No, Cambrian, no, be thine the vow,

With pendent train and rushing wings, Like him to live, like him to fall!

Aloft the gorgeous peacock springs; But hast thou known a father's care,

And he, the bird of hundred dyes,(7) Who sorrowing sent thee forth to sea; Whose plumes the dames of Ava prize. Poured for thy weal th' unceasing prayer,

So rich a shade, so green a sod, And thought the sleepless night on thee? Our English fairies never trod;

Yet who in Indian bower has stood, Has e'er thy tender fancy flown,

But thought on England's "good green wood ?' When winds were strong and waves were high, And blessed beneath the palmy shade, Where, listening to the tempest's moan,

Her hazel and her hawthorn glade, Thy sisters heaved the anxious sigh?

And breathed a prayer, (how oft in vain!) Or, in the darkest hour of dread,

To gaze upon her oaks again? Mid war's wild din, and ocean's swell,

A truce to thought! the jackal's cry

Resounds like sylvan revelry; Hast mourned a hero brother dead,

And through the trees, yon failing ray And did that brother love thee well ?

Will scantly serve to guide our way. Then pity those whose sorrows flow

Yet, mark! as fade the upper skies, In vain o'er Shipley's empty grave! Each thicket opes ten thousand eyes, -Sailor, thou weep'st :-Indulge thy wo; Before, beside us, and above,

Such tears will not disgrace the brave ! - The fire-fly lights his lamp of love,

Then on! Then on! where duty leads,

My course be onward still,
On broad Hindostan's sultry meads,

O'er black Almorah's hill.

Retreating, chasing, sinking, soaring, The darkness of the copse exploring; While to this cooler air confest, The broad Dhatura bares her breast, Of fragrant scent, and virgin white, A pearl around the locks of night! Still as we pass in softened hum, Along the breezy valleys come The village song, the horn, the drum. Still as we pass, from bush and briar, The shrill cigala strikes his lyre; And, what is she whose liquid strain Thrills through yon copse of sugar-cane ? I know that soul-entrancing swell ! It is, -it must be,

-Philomel! Enough, enough, the rustling trees Announce a shower upon the breeze, The flashes of the summer sky Assume a deeper, ruddier dye; Yon lamp that trembles on the stream, From forth our cabin sheds its beam; And we must early sleep to find Betimes the morning's healthy wind. But O! with thankful hearts confess, Ev'n here there may be happiness; And He, the bounteous Sire, has given His peace on earth, his hope of heaven!

That course, nor Delhi's kingly gates,

Nor mild Malwah detain,
For sweet the bliss us both awaits,

By yonder Western main.
Thy towers, Bombay, gleam bright, they say,

Across the dark blue sea,
But never were hearts so light and gay,

As then shall meet in thee!

LINES WRITTEN TO HIS WIFE,

WHILE ON A VISIT TO UPPER INDIA. If thou wert by my side, my love!

How fast would evening fail
In green Bengala's palmy grove,

Listening the nightingale!
If thou, my love! wert by my side,

My babies at my knee,
How gaily would our pinnace glide

O'er Gunga's mimie sea !
I miss thee at the dawning gray,

When, on our deck reclined,
In careless ease my limbs I lay,

And woo the cooler wind.
I miss thee when by Gunga's stream

My twilight steps I guide,
But most beneath the lamp's pale beam,

I miss thee from my side.
I spread my books, my pencil try,

The lingering noon to cheer,
But miss thy kind approving eye

Thy meek attentive ear.
But when of morn and eve the star

Beholds me on my knee,
I feel, though thou art distant far,

Thy prayers ascend for me.

HAPPINESS.
One morning in the month of May,

I wandered o'er the hill;
Though nature all around was gay,

My heart was heavy still.
Can God, I thought, the just, the great,

These meaner creatures bless,
And yet deny to man's estate

The boon of happiness ?
Tell me, ye woods, ye smiling plains,

Ye blessed birds around,
In which of nature's wide domains

Can bliss for man be found.
The birds wild carolled over head,

The breeze around me blew,
And nature's awful chorus said

No bliss for man she knew.
I questioned love, whose early ray,

So rosy bright appears,
And heard the timid genius say

His light was dimmed by tears.
I questioned friendship: Friendship sighed,

And thus her answer gave
The few whom fortune never tried

Were withered in the grave !
I asked if vice could bliss bestow?

Vice boasted loud and well,
But fading from her withered brow,

The borrowed roses fell.
I sought of feeling, if her skill

Could sooth the wounded breast ;
And found her mourning, faint and still,

For others' woes distressed !
I questioned virtue: virtue sighed,

No boon could she dispense-
Nor virtue was her name, she cried

But humble penitence.

I questioned death-the grisly shade

Relaxed his brow severeAnd "I am happiness,” he said,

" If Virtue guides thee here."

When fettered by a viewless chain, We turn and gaze, and turn again, Oh! death were mercy to the pain

Of them that bid farewell!

VESPERS.

God that madest Earth and Heaven,

Darkness and light!
Who the day for toil hast given,

For rest the night!
May thine angel guards defend us,
Slumber sweet thy mercy send us,
Holy dreams and hopes attend us,

This livelong night!

THE MOONLIGHT MARCH. I SEE them on their winding way, About their ranks the moonbeams play; Their lofty deeds and daring high Blend with the notes of victory. And waving arms, and banners bright, Are glancing in the mellow light: They 're lost—and gone, the moon is past, The wood's dark shade is o'er them cast; And fainter, fainter, fainter still The march is rising o'er the hill. Again, again, the pealing drum, The clashing horn—they come, they come; Through rocky pass, o'er wooded steep In long and glittering files they sweep. And nearer, nearer, yet more near, Their softened chorus meets the ear; Forth, forth, and meet them on their way; The trampling hoofs brook no delay; With thrilling fife and pealing drum, And clashing horn, they come, they come.

TO LIEUTENANT-GENERAL, SIR

ROWLAND HILL, K. B. Hill! whose high daring with renewed success Hath cheered our tardy war, what time the cloud Of expectation, dark and comfortless, Hung on the mountains; and yon factious crowd Blasphemed their country's valour, babbling loud! Then was thine arm revealed, to whose young

might, By Toulon's leaguered wall, the fiercest bowed Whom Egypt honoured, and the dubious fight Of sad Corunna's winter, and more bright Douro, and Talavera's gory bays; Wise, modest, brave, in danger foremost found.O still, young warrior, may thy toil-earned praise, With England's love, and England's honour

crowned, Gild with delight thy Father's latter days!

LINES.

REFLECTED on the lake I love

To see the stars of evening glow; So tranquil in the heavens above,

So restless in the wave below.

Thus heavenly hope is all serene,

But earthly hope, how bright so e'er, Still fluctuates o'er this changing scene,

As false and fleeting as 'tis fair.

FAREWELL.

When eyes are beaming

What never tongue might tell, When tears are streaming

From their crystal cell; When hands are linked that dread to part, And heart is met by throbbing heart, Oh! bitter, bitter is the smar

Of them that bid farewell ! When hope is chidden

That fain of bliss would tell, And love forbidden

In the breast to dwell;

IMITATION OF AN ODE BY KOOD

RUT, IN HINDOOSTANEE. AMBITION's voice was in mine ear, she whispered

yesterday, “How goodly is the land of Room (9) how wide

the Russian sway! How blest to conquer either realm, and dwell

through life to come, Lulled by the harp's melodious string, cheered by

the northern drum!" But Wisdom heard; “O youth,” she said, " in

passion's fetter tied, O come and see a sight with me shall cure thee of

thy pride!" She led me to a lonely dell, a sad and shady

ground, Where many an ancient sepulchre gleamed in the

moonshine round.

And “Here Secunder(10) sleeps," she cried ;-him to content himself with the composition of an" this is his rival's stone;

other. Of this diffidence his friends have reason And here the mighty chief reclines who reared the to complain, as it suppressed some elegant lines Median throne.(11)

of his own on the same occasion, Inquire of these, doth aught of all their ancient pomp remain,

Note 6, page 40, col. 1. Save late regret, and bitter tears for ever, and in The brave, the virtuous, and the young. vain?

Captain Conway Shipley, third son to the dean Return, return, and in thy heart engraven keep of St. Asaph, perished in an attempt to cut out an my lore;

enemy's vessel from the Tagus with the boats of The lesser wealth, the lighter load, -small blame his majesty's frigate La Nymphe, April 22, 1808, betides the poor."

in the 26th year of his age, and after nearly six

teen years of actual service; distinguished by every NOTES.

quality both of heart and head which could adorn

a man or an officer. Admiral Sir Charles Cotton, Note 1, page 38, col. 2.

and the captains of his fleet, have since erected a

monument to his memory in the neighbourhood Siwah.

of Fort St. Julian. Oasis. Sennaar.-Meroe.

Note 7, page 40, col. 2.
Note 2, page 38, col. 2.

On Gunga's breast.
Shangalla.

These lines were written at a small village on The black tribes whom Bruce considers as the

the banks of the Ganges, which he was ascending aboriginal Nubians, are so called. For their gi- in a pinnace, on his first visitation of his diocese, gantic stature, and their custom of ornamenting in August, 1824. themselves and their houses with the spoils of the elephant, see the account he gives of the person

Note 8, page 40, col. 2. and residence of one of their chiefs whom he visit

The bird of hundred dyes. ed on his departure from Ras el Feel.

"The Mucharunga-many coloured. I learned Note 3, page 38, col. 2.

at Dacca, that while we were at peace with the Emeralds.

Burmans, many traders used to go over all the The emerald, or whatever the ancients dignified tiful birds for the Golden Zennanah; at Ummera

eastern provinces of Bengal, buying up these beauby the name of smaragdus, is said to have been found in great quantities in the mountain now poora it was said that they were sometimes worth called Gebul Zumrud (the mount of emeralds.)

a gold mohur each." Note 4, page 39, col. 1.

Note 9, page 42, col. 2.

The land of Room.
Elim's well.
It is interesting to observe with what pleasure

The oriental name of the Turkish Empire. and minuteness Moses , amid the Arabian wilder

Note 10, page 43, col. 1.
ness, enumerates the "twelve wells of water, and
the "threescore and ten palm-trees," of Elim.

Alexander the Great.
Note 5, page 39, col. 2.
Ye viewless guardians of these sacred shades.

Note 11, page 43, col. 1.
These lines were spoken (as is the custom of the

The mighty Chief who reared the Median throne. university on the installation of a new chancellor) The founder of the Median throne was Kyby a young nobleman, whose diffidence induced Kaoos, or Deiioces.

Secunder.

THE END OF HEBER'S POEMS.

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