Warm from the heart, her mother's tears
Bathe Jane's cold breast and icy cheek;
The sad appeal her bosom hears,
In fondness strong, in reason weak.
Gone is that guiding ray divine,
Unheard Religion's heavenly call,
Wit, virtue, sense, no more ye shine!
But filial love survives ye all!
Again the Tempter comes; nor vain
His offer'd love, his lavish'd gold;
"Give to my parents wealth, and Jane
"Shall Fitzroy find no longer cold.'
He came, but fled ere morning ray;
At noon again he sought the cot,-
There Jane a self-slain victim lay,
For ever closed her hapless Cot.
O God! in thine eternal day
May Mercy's tears the record blot!
Her virtues shine in bright array!
Her errors and her end forgot!
WHO ASKED THE AUTHOR IF HE COULD
you ask me, sweet maid, can I love?
And seek you a certain token?
Ah! Time will the doubt soon remove,
When my sad heart is broken!
Rosy red the hills appear
With the light of morning,
Beauteous clouds, in æther clear,
All the East adorning;
White thro' mist the meadows shine;
Wake, my Love, my Valentine!
For thy locks of raven hue,
Flowers with hoar frost pearly,
Crocus-cups of gold and blue,
Snow-drops drooping early,
With Mezereon-sprigs combine;
Rise, my Love, my Valentine!
O'er the margin of the flood,
Pluck the Daisy peeping;
Thro' the covert of the wood,
Hunt the sorrel creeping;
With the little Celandine,
Crown my Love, my Valentine.
Pansies, on their lowly stems,
Scatter'd o'er the fallows;
Hazel-buds with crimson gems,
Green and glossy sallows,
Tufted moss and ivy-twine,
Deck my Love, my Valentine.
Few and simple flow'rets these;
Yet to me less glorious
Garden-beds and orchard-trees!
Since this wreath victorious
Binds you now for ever mine,
O my Love, my Valentine.
Sheffield, February, 1811.
WHEN far beneath the western wave the orb of day's
[spreads, And Twilight o'er the tir'd earth her dewy mantle And all the birds, save Philomel, their warbled strains
[leafy beds; And, lull'd by whispering zephyr, sleep within their
I fly the sound of human voice, the sight of human dwelling,
A melancholy wanderer, to rove the woods along, And there, while tears my eyes o'erflow, while grief my heart is swelling, [ful song. I break the silence of the night by many a mourn
O! ask you, why alone I rove? why ceaselessly I languish ? [me wander so; 'Tis Love that saddens all my thoughts, that bids But who the maid, whose magic power has fill'd my
[know. No mortal ear has ever heard, no mortal ear must
To the Tragedy of Douglas, as performed by some young Gentlemen and Ladies at John Barker Church, Esq.'s in Sackville-street, in 1795. Spoken by Mr. Philip Church.
WHILE Christmas blithe defies the piercing gule,
With social banquet, and with jocund tale,
And, decking with a laugh his ruddy brow,
Lights his brisk fagot 'midst a waste of snow;
While Siddons mourns her perishing command,
As her sweet magic yields to Mago's wand,
And wondering Harlequin frisks round, and feels
Great Shakspeare's head outbalanced by his heels-
Bold is the task your bosoms to assail
With artless efforts, and a simple tale;
To wake the sigh for scenes of mimic woe,
To bid the tear for fancied sorrows flow;
No gesture known, but those which Nature taught;
No labour'd skill, to point the pregnant thought;
New to the smother'd tone of stifling grief,
The sudden burst of woe which brings relief,
The speaking pause, nice break, or frantic start,
And all the player's well envelop'd art.
Bold is the task! yet, should one tear from you Young Norval's solitary grave bedew,
Well shall we deem those labours crown'd, which strove
To blend instruction with the task we love;
For not in vain awakes the bosom's fire,
Which glows responsive to the poet's lyre;
This trifling scene some energy may wake,
Whose power, matur'd, the realms of Vice shall shake:
Some little spark perchance, emitted hence,
May thaw the stream of frozen eloquence,
Unbind the tongue, whose fetters have consign'd
To barren silence many a gifted mind;
The ponderous thought, to life and vigour warm,
Give to the strong conception vivid form;
Or bid that elemental ardour glow,
Which, playing round the patriot's awful brow,
Bursts in the thunder of the stern debate,
To crush the slave of faction or of state.-
Oh! let your censures bow to views like these ;
And all the crític-to our wish to please!
'Tis the custom, I'm told, at the end of the play,
With voice tun'd to mirth, and with aspect all gay,
Your woe-stricken hearts of their cares to beguile,
And relieve all your sorrows, at once by a smile.
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