SONNET

LADY! it cannot be but that thine eyes
Must be my sun, such radiance they display,
And strike me even as Phœbus him whose way
Through horrid Libya's sandy desert lies.
Meantime, on that side steamy vapours rise
Where most I suffer. Of what kind are they,
New as to me they are, I cannot say,

But deem them, in the lover's language-sighs.
Some, though with pain, my bosom close conceals,
Which, if in part escaping thence they tend
To soften thine, thy coldness soon congeals.
While others to my tearful eyes ascend,

Whence my sad nights in showers are ever drowned,
Till my Aurora comes,
her brow with roses bound.

SONNET

ENAMOURED, artless, young, on foreign ground,
Uncertain whither from myself to fly,

To thee, dear Lady, with an humble sigh
Let me devote my heart, which I have found

By certain proofs not few, intrepid, sound,
Good, and addicted to conceptions high :

When tempests shake the world, and fire the sky,
It rests in adamant self-wrapt around,

As safe from envy, and from outrage rude,
From hopes and fears that vulgar minds abuse,
As fond of genius and fixed fortitude,

Of the resounding lyre, and every muse.
Weak will find it in one only part,
Now pierced by Love's immedicable dart.

you

TRANSLATIONS FROM VINCENT BOURNE

ON THE PICTURE OF A SLEEPING CHILD

SWEET babe, whose image here expressed
Does thy peaceful slumbers show;
Guilt or fear, to break thy rest,
Never did thy spirit know.

Soothing slumbers, soft repose,
Such as mock the painter's skill,
Such as innocence bestows,

Harmless infant, lull thee still!

THE THRACIAN

THRACIAN parents, at his birth,

Mourn their babe with many a tear,

But with undissembled mirth

Place him breathless on his bier.

Greece and Rome with equal scorn
"O the savages!" exclaim;
"Whether they rejoice or mourn,
Well entitled to the name!"

But the cause of this concern

And this pleasure would they trace,
Even they might somewhat learn

From the savages of Thrace.

RECIPROCAL KINDNESS THE PRIMARY LAW OF NATURE

ANDROCLES from his injured lord, in dread
Of instant death, to Libya's desert fled.

Tired with his toilsome flight, and parched with heat,
He spied, at length, a cavern's cool retreat;

But scarce had given to rest his weary frame,
When, hugest of his kind, a lion came:
He roared approaching; but the savage din
To plaintive murmurs changed arrived within,
And, with expressive looks his lifted paw
Presenting, aid implored from whom he saw.
The fugitive, through terror at a stand,
Dared not awhile afford his trembling hand;
But, bolder grown, at length inherent found
A pointed thorn, and drew it from the wound.
The cure was wrought; he wiped the sanious blood,
And firm and free from pain the lion stood.
Again he seeks the wilds, and day by day
Regales his inmate with the parted prey;
Nor he disdains the dole, though unprepared,
Spread on the ground, and with a lion shared.
But thus to live, still lost, sequestered still!
Scarce seemed his lord's revenge a heavier ill.
Home! native home! oh might he but repair!
He must, he will, though death attends him there.
He goes, and, doomed to perish, on the sands,
Of the whole theatre unpitied, stands;
When lo! the self-same lion from his cage
Flies to devour him, famished into rage.
He flies, but viewing in his purposed prey
The man, his healer, pauses on his way,
And, softened by remembrance into sweet
And kind composure, crouches at his feet.

Mute with astonishment the assembly gaze :

But why, ye Romans? Whence your mute amaze?
All this is natural: nature bade him rend
An enemy; she bids him spare a friend.

A MANUAL

MORE ANCIENT THAN THE ART OF PRINTING, AND NOT TO BE
FOUND IN ANY CATALOGUE

THERE is a book, which we may call

(Its excellence is such)

Alone a library, though small;

The ladies thumb it much.

Words none, things numerous, it contains;
And, things with words compared,
Who needs be told, that has his brains,
Which merits most regard?