For, through thy long dark lashes low depending,
The soul of melancholy Gentleness

Gleams like a seraph from the sky descending,
Above all pain, yet pitying all distress;
At once such majesty with sweetness blending,
I worship more, but cannot love thee less.

FROM THE PORTUGUESE.

IN moments to delight devoted,

་་

My life!» with tend'rest tone you cry; Dear words! on which my heart had doted, If youth could neither fade nor die. To death even hours like these must roll, Ah! then repeat those accents never Or change my life!» into « my soul!

་

Which, like my love, exists for ever.

he song from which this is taken is a great favourite with the young girls of Athens of all classes. Their manner of singing it is by verses in rotation, the whole number present joining in the chorus. I have heard it frequently at our χόροι, >> in the winter of 1810-11. The air is plaintive and pretty.

I

I.

ENTER thy garden of roses,
Beloved and fair Haidee,

Each morning where Flora reposes,
For surely I see her in thee.

Oh! Lovely! thus low I implore thee,
Receive this fond truth from my tongue,

Which utters its song to adore thee,

Yet trembles for what it has sung;
As the branch, at the bidding of Nature,
Adds fragrance and fruit to the tree,
Through her eyes, through her every feature
Shines the soul of the young Haidee.

2.

But the loveliest garden grows hateful
When Love has abandoned the bowers ;
Bring me hemlock-since mine is ungrateful,
That herb is more fragrant than flowers.

The poison, when poured from the chalice,
Will deeply embitter the bowl;

But when drunk to escape from thy malice,
soul.

The draught shall be sweet to my
Too cruel! in vain I implore thee
My heart from these horrors to save:
Will nought to my bosom restore thee?
Then open the gates of the grave.

3.

As the chief who to combat advances
Secure of his conquest before,

Thus thou, with those eyes for thy lances,
Hast pierced through my heart to its core.
Ah! tell me, my soul! must I perish

By pangs which a smile would dispel ?
Would the hope, which thou once bad'st me cheris

For torture repay me too well?

Now sad is the garden of roses,

Beloved, but false Haidee!

There Flora all withered reposes,

And mourns o'er thine absence with me.

SONG.

ATHENS, 1810.

Ζώη μου, σας ἀγαπῶ (1).

I.

MAID of Athens, ere we part,
Give, oh! give me back my heart!
Or, since that has left my breast,
Keep it now, and take the rest!
Hear my vow before I

Ζώη μοῦ, σάς ἀγαπῶ.

2.

go,

By those tresses unconfined,
Wooed by each Ægean wind;
By those lids whose jetty fringe
Kiss thy soft cheeks' blooming tinge;
By those wild eyes like the roe,

Ζώη μοῦ, σάς ἀγαπῶ.

(1) Zoë mou, sas agapo, or Zán poũ σás áɣáñâ, a Romaic expression of tenderness: if I translate it I shall affront the gentlemen, as it may seem that I supposed they could not; and if I do not I may affront the ladies. For fear of any misconstruction on the part of the latter I shall do so begging pardon of the learned. It means, « My life, I love you! » which sounds very prettily in all languages, and is as much in fashion in Greece at this day as, Juvenal tells us, the two first words were amongst the Roman ladies, whose erotie expressions were all Hellenized.

3.

By that lip I long to taste;
By that zone-encircled waist;

By all the token-flowers (1) that tell
What words can never speak so well;
By Love's alternate joy and woe,
Ζώη μου, σας αγαπώ.

4.

Maid of Athens I am gone :
Think of me, sweet! when alone.-
Though I fly to Istambol (2),
Athens holds my heart and soul:
Can I cease to love thee? No!

Ζώη μοῦ, σάς ἀγαπῶ.

(1) In the East (where ladies are not taught to write, lest they should scribble assignations), flowers, cinders, pebbles, etc., convey the sentiments of the parties by that universal deputy of Mercury-an old woman. A cinder says, « I burn for thee; » a bunch of flowers tied with hair, «< Take me and fly; but a pebble declares-«< what nothing else can. » (2) Constantinople.