Twins! female twins !-it was enough to stun
Their little wits and scare them from their skins
To hear their father stamp, and curse and swear,
Pulling his beard because he had no heir.

Then strove their stag-eyed mother to calm down
This his paternal rage, and thus addrest

"O! Most Serene! why dost thou stamp and frown,
And box the compass of the royal chest?
Ah! thou wilt mar that portly trunk, I own

I love to gaze on !-Pr'ythee, thou hadst best
Pocket thy fists. Nay, love, if you so thin
Your beard, you'll want a wig upon your chin!"

But not her words, nor e'en her tears, could slack
The quicklime of his rage, that hotter grew:
He called his slaves to bring an ample sack

Wherein a woman might be poked — a few
Dark grimly men felt pity and look'd black

At this sad order; but their slaveships knew
When any dared demur, his sword so bending
Cut off the "head and front of their offending."

H

For Ali had a sword, much like himself,

A crooked blade, guilty of human gore-
The trophies it had lopp'd from many an elf
Were stuck at his head-quarters by the score -

Nor yet in peace he laid it on the shelf,

But jested with it, and his wit cut sore;
So that (as they of Public Houses speak)
He often did his dozen butts a week.

Therefore his slaves, with most obedient fears,
Came with the sack the lady to enclose;
In vain from her stag-eyes "the big round tears
Coursed one another down her innocent nose

In vain her tongue wept sorrow in their ears;

Though there were some felt willing to oppose, Yet when their heads came in their heads, that minute, Though 'twas a piteous case, they put her in it.

And when the sack was tied, some two or three
Of these black undertakers slowly brought her
To a kind of Moorish Serpentine; for she

Was doom'd to have a winding sheet of water.
Then farewell, earth-farewell to the green tree-
Farewell, the sun-the moon-each little daughter!
She's shot from off the shoulders of a black,
Like a bag of Wall's-End from a coalman's back.

The waters oped, and the wide sack full-fill'd
All that the waters oped, as down it fell ;
Then closed the wave, and then the surface rill'd
A ring above her, like a water-knell ;

A moment more, and all its face was still'd,
And not a guilty heave was left to tell
That underneath its calm and blue transparence
A dame lay drowned in her sack, like Clarence.

But Heaven beheld, and awful witness bore,
The moon in black eclipse deceased that night,
Like Desdemona smother'd by the Moor-
The lady's natal star with pale affright
Fainted and fell-and what were stars before,
Turn'd comets as the tale was brought to light,
And all look'd downward on the fatal wave,
And made their own reflections on her grave.

Next night, a head—a little lady head,

Push'd through the waters a most glassy face, With weedy tresses, thrown apart and spread, Comb'd by 'live ivory, to show the space

Of a pale forehead, and two eyes that shed
A soft bine mist, breathing a bloomy grace
Over their sleepy lids-and so she rais'd
Her agustine nose above the stream, and gazed.

She oped her lips-lips of a gentle blush,

So pale it seem'd near drowned to a white,She oped her lips, and forth their sprang a gush Of music bubbling through the surface light; The leaves are motionless, the breezes hush

To listen to the air-and through the night There come these words of a most plaintive ditty, Sobbing as they would break all hearts with pity:

THE WATER PERI'S SONG.

Farewell, farewell, to my mother's own daughter,
The child that she wet-nursed is lapp'd in the wave ;

The Mussul-man coming to fish in this water,
Adds a tear to the flood that weeps over her grave.

This sack is her coffin, this water's her bier,
This greyish bath cloak is her funeral pall ;`
And, stranger, O stranger! this song that you hear
Is her epitaph, elegy, dirges, and all!

Farewell, farewell, to the child of Al Hassan,

My mother's own daughter-the last of her race She's a corpse, the poor body! and lies in this basin, And sleeps in the water that washes her face.

REMONSTRATORY ODE,

FROM THE Elephant at exeter change, to mr. mathews at the ENGLISH OPERA-HOUSE.

-See with what courteous action,

He beckons you to a more removed ground."— Hamlet.

(WRITTEN BY a friend.]

OH, Mr. Mathews! Sir !

(If a plain elephant may speak his mind,
And that I have a mind to speak I find
By my inward stir)

I long have thought, and wished to say, that we
Mar our well-merited prosperity

By being such near neighbours,

My keeper now hath lent me pen and ink,
Shov'd in my truss of lunch, and tub of drink,
And left me to my labours.

The whole menagerie is in repose,

The Coatamundi is in his Sunday clothes,
Watching the Lynx's most unnatural doze;
The Panther is asleep, and the Macaw;
The Lion is engaged on something raw;
The white Bear cools his chin

'Gainst the wet tin;

And the confined old Monkey's in the straw :
All the nine little Lionets are lying

Slumbering in milk, and sighing;

Miss Cross is sipping ox-tail soup,

In her front coop,

So here's the happy mid-day moment ;—yes,
I seize it, Mr. Mathews, to address

A word or two

To you

On the subject of the ruin which must come
By both being in the Strand, and both at home

On the same nights; two treats

So very near each other,

As, oh my brother!

To play old gooseberry with both receipts.

When you begin

Your summer fun, three times a week, at eight,
And carriages roll up, and cits roll in,

I feel a change in Exeter 'Change's change.
And, dash my trunk! I hate

To ring my bell, when you ring yours, and go,
With a diminish'd glory through my show!
It is most strange;

But crowds that meant to see me eat a stack,
And sip a water-butt or so, and crack

A root of mangel-wurzel with my foot,
Eat little children's fruit,

Pick from the floor small coins,

And then turn slowly round and show my India-rubber

loins :

'Tis strange-most strange, but true,

That these same crowds seek you!

Pass my abode and pay at your next door!

It makes me roar

With anguish when I think of this; I go
With sad severity my nightly rounds
Before one poor front row,

My fatal funny foe!

And when I stoop, as duty bids, I sigh

And feel that, while poor elephantine I,

Pick up a sixpence, you pick up the pounds!

Could you not go?

Could you not take the Cobourg or the Surrey?

Or Sadler's Wells,-(I am not in a hurry,

I never am!) for the next season ?—oh !

Woe! woe! woe!

To both of us, if we remain ; for not
In silence will I bear my altered lot,
To have you merry, sir, at my expense;
No man of any sense,

No true great person (and we both are great

In our own ways) would tempt another's fate-
I would myself depart

In Mr. Cross's cart;