Ye waves of Lismore, by the tempest tost,
Waft all that's left of R-tt to your coast.
Bless with one sight, a father's streaming eyes,
Yield one cold comfort to a mother's sighs.
Resign your victim to a narrower bed,
While o'er his bones affection's tears are shed,
And rites religious consecrate the dead.
But if your genius has confirm'd his doom,
Let Fancy shroud the dead and raise the tomb.
She there shall deck the grave in sweetest form,
Calm the rude waves, and soothe the angry storm.
With shells of varying hues, and sea-weeds, spread
His decent limbs upon their coral bed ;
And, as the morn beams o'er the rocky steep,
Pierce the dark confines of th' unfathom'd deep,
The sea-nymph there, (for there she loves to dwell)
Low, in her cavern'd vaults, shall toll the knell ;
And weeping Naiads, in chants by angels given,
With mournful requiem speed his soul to heav'n! H. B.

We may not quit the scene of the Hebrides without adverting to the obligation we have to Mrs. Grant for the pleasing delineations she gives in her works of the pastoral life in the Hebrides.

Life passed in cities weakens all tender associations; the affections become deadened, and the heart corrupt it is among rocks, and glens, and flowers, and beautiful scenery, that nature re-asserts her in. fluence. In the entangled forest, and in the daisied meadow; in the serenity of the heavens, the lover finds similes of his mistress's perfection.

We will select an instance of this primitive and

pure felicity of two lovers in happy pastoral life, in the Hebrides. We owe these happy delineations to the pen of this Lady, who has renewed our love and admiration for the descendants of Ossian and Fingal. Never has the Plaid boasted an.abler advocate. We love her amiable Quixotism in the cause of her favourite people; but her reasoning is paradoxical. “How lovely, how sweet is evening on the braes of Glen-gillian, exclaimed Flora, while tears of rapture swelled her eye; and her lover smiled in sympathy with her young enthusiasm.†

Every object in the bosom of the glen was now nearly involved in soft obscurity; but a bright flush of parting day still glowed on the shrubby cliffs, and tinged the light mists, which in slow and graceful convolution played around. Groups of cattle were reposing under the rocks; some goats were still browsing on the summits; the cotter's children, who had ventured to wade across the shallow summer stream, were gathering blackberries and wild rasps in their recesses, and all their echoes were alive and joyous, with bleating of kids, the imitative cries of children, and shouts of shepherd-boys, the notes of the crochallin lilted by the milk-maids, as they wound

* Save and excepting always Sir Walter Scott: but his merits we shall notice elsewhere, in the Sketch of our Domestic Library.

Refer to her descriptions in M'Albin, and in Letters from the Mountain, and Superstitions of the Highlands; also, Sketches of the Highlanders, &c. by Col. D. Stewart, vol. i. page 212.

down the glen from the evening fold. As we walk up the glen, we listen to the Gaelic songs, which are strong proofs of national taste for music and poetry."

The songs of a nation are generally thought to be most characteristic of their manners and sentiments. This touching harmony from mountainous scenes* of Scotch, Welch, and Irish Melody, revive in the bosom some delusive charm of youth: we revert to early impressions; we recall the period when every object was clothed in vivid hues; when earth seemed paradise, and its inhabitants deserving but of esteem and love.

In our progress through life, the enchanted palace of illusion disappears; experience reveals many unlooked-for, and unwelcome truths; but yet we love to cherish the fond remembrance :-and although the gay blossoms of hope have been nipped in the bud, still do we welcome the poetic strain which sways those associations. Some scenery also tends to awaken thoughts not to be defined: shadowy recollections of a former, or anticipations of future felicity; some mysterious notions of a period of existence of happier date than memory can record.

May it not be that Sensibility, cherished in retire

* Who but laments that one of our most splendid poets of the present day should degrade his talents to the worst of purposes, so as to preclude the mention of his name, in the sacred recesses of domestic life? His mountain scenery is enchanting.

ment, reveals to us an undefined consciousness of the soul's divine essence? Again, when the slumbers of night steal on a train of pleasing reflection, not unfrequently we seem to exist in some enchanted scene: some beauteous visions arise, and we dream of a purer felicity than the world has yet bestowed.

Is there not an incommunicable intercourse with the world of spirits at these moments? and in dreams, oft times, an influence which may never be explained? Even in advanced life, the soul of the aged restores images of former times. They come as the dreams in the still hour of darkness; and they flit away as shadowy ghosts; or as lovely clouds floating before a gale over the unruffled brow of a wide spreading and sheltered lake. A friend of our's, conversant in German literature, pointed out the lines of Goëthe, which precede his play of Faustus, as an instance in point of this feeling. I know not how they may be appreciated in my humble attempt of putting them into a poetical dress, in English.

YE shadowy forms! your charms again I find,
Which once so fetter'd my bewilder'd mind:
Now may I hope to hold you as my own,
And let lost Fancy re-assume her throne?
Yes! ye shall rule! ye lawless, shapeless crowds,
Who sport in vapours, and who beam thro' clouds.
The youthful tremblings of my breast betray,
The magic breathings which announce your sway;

With you the scenes of happy moments rise,
And past illusions float before my eyes,

Like some sweet strain, which faulter'd on the tongue,
When love enthrall'd us, and when Friendship sung.

Fresh springs the wound, as with unceasing pain,
Life's labyrinthine course I trace again:

For they, to whom the unpitying Sisters gave,
Alas! too short a term, are in the grave.

The song that charm'd, shall charm those ears no more,

To whom I sang so blythly gay before;

Lock'd in the marble slumbers of the tomb,

No joyous sounds shall pierce that dreary gloom.
Though thousands dwell with rapture on my lays,
My frigid bosom thrills not to their praise.
The voice of fame no more is sweet to me,
That once could wake my soul to extacy;
And yet those musings time can ne'er controul,
Which bring the realm of visions to the soul,
And sad, uncertain melodies inspire,

Like the wild murmurs of th' Æolian lyre.
Convuls'd, I tremble; and relieving tears

Tame the strong heart, and make it what it fears.
All that is real mocks my eager view:

All that is vanish'd, I possess in You.

On the enthusiasm to be derived from Poetry, I shall observe, that it has ever been a passion of the human mind to estimate poetical talents far higher than any other; antiquity abounds in instances of this preference. When Virgil came into the theatre at Rome, the whole audience rose and saluted him, with the same respect as they would have paid Augustus himself. The life of Petrarch will also furnish