Three tedious moons with cheerless ray
Had vainly gilt the face of night,
Nor yet the hero took his way,

To bless his drooping Rena's sight. At length through Rena's favourite grove, When now the fourth her radiance shed, He came, and Victory's wreath was wove, But, ah! around a lifeless head. Distracted at the blasting sight,

To yon tall cliff's o'erarching brow
With heaving breast she urged her flight,
And would have sought the waves below.

But while with frantic gaze she view'd
The foaming billows, void of fear,
Faith strung each nerve, by grief subdued,
And whisper'd to her soul-forbear!

And now, though Passion's storm was o'er,
Yet Melancholy's weeping eye

Distill'd the slow and silent shower,
Till all the springs of life were dry.

For this, around yon hallow'd grave
The myrtle and the laurel bloom;
There sleep the lovely and the brave,
O, drop a tear upon their tomb!

HON. CHARLES F.

THE ELFIN KING.

- O SWIFT, and swifter far he speeds Than earthly steed can run;

But I hear not the feet of his courser fleet,

As he glides o'er the moorland dun.'

Lone was the strath where he cross'd their path,

And wide did the heath extend,

The Knight in Green on that moor is seen

At every seven year's end.

And swift is the speed of his coal-black steed

As the leaf before the gale,

But never yet have that courser's feet

Been heard on hill or dale.

But woe to the wight who meets the Green Knight,
Except on his falchion arm

Spell-proof he bear, like the brave St. Clair,
The holy Trefoil's charm;

For then shall fly his gifted eye

Delusions false and dim;

And each unbless'd shade shall stand portray'd In ghostly form and limb.

O, swift and swifter far he speeds

Than earthly steed can run

'He skims the blue air,' said the brave St. Clair, 'Instead of the heath so dun.

'His locks are bright as the streamer's light,
His cheeks like the rose's hue;
The Elfin King, like the merlin's wing
Are his pinions of glossy blue.'

No Elfin King, with azure wing,
On the dark brown moor I see;

But a courser keen, and a Knight in Green,
And full fair I ween is he.

• Nor Elfin King nor azure wing
Nor ringlets sparkling bright;'
Sir Geoffry cried, and forward hied
To join the stranger Knight.

VOL. III.

G G

He knew not the path of the lonely strath

Where the Elfin King went his round;

Or he never had gone with the Green Knight on,
Nor trod the charmed ground.

How swift they flew! no eye could view
Their track on heath or hill,

Yet swift across both moor and moss
St. Clair did follow still.

And soon was seen a circle green,
Where a shadowy wassail crew,
Amid the ring did dance and sing,
In weeds of watchet blue.

And the windlestrae *, so limber. and gray,
Did shiver beneath the tread

Of the coursers' feet as they rush'd to meet
The morrice of the dead.

Come here, come here, with thy green feere, Before the bread be stale;

To roundel dance with speed advance,
And taste our wassail ale.'

Then up to the Knight came a grizzly wight,
And sounded in his ear:

Sir Knight, eschew this goblin crew,
Nor taste their ghostly cheer.'-

The tabors rung, the lilts were sung,

And the Knight the dance did lead;

But the maidens fair seem'd round him to stare With eyes like the glassy bead.

* Rye-grass.

The glance of their eye, so cold and so dry,
Did almost his heart appal;

Their motion is swift, but their limbs they lift
Like stony statues all.

Again to the Knight came the grizzly wight,
When the roundel dance was o'er;
'Sir Knight, eschew this goblin crew,
Or rue for evermore.'-

But forward press'd the dauntless guest
To the tables of ezlar red,

And there was seen the Knight in Green,
To grace the fair board head.

And before that Knight was a goblet bright,
Of emerald smooth and green,

The fretted brim was studded full trim
With mountain rubies sheen.

Sir Geoffry the Bold of the cup laid hold,

With heath-ale mantling o'er;

And he saw as he drank that the ale never shrank, But mantled as before.

Then Sir Geoffry grew pale as he quaffed the ale,
And cold as the corpse of clay;

And with horny beak the ravens did shriek,
And flutter'd o'er their prey.

But soon throughout the revel rout

A strange commotion ran,

For beyond the round they heard the sound
Of the steps of an uncharm'd man.

And soon to St. Clair the grim wight did repair
From the midst of the wassail crew;—

'Sir Knight, beware of the revellers there, Nor do as they bid thee do.'

'What woful wight art thou,' said the Knight, 'To haunt this wassail fray?'

'I was once,' quoth he,

a mortal like thee, Though now I'm an Elfin gray.

'And the knight so bold as the corpse lies cold, Who trod the greensward ring;

He must wander along with that restless throng, For aye, with the Elfin King.

With the restless crew, in weeds so blue,

The hapless Knight must wend;

Nor ever be seen on haunted green
Till the weary seven years' end.

Fair is the mien of the Knight in Green,
And bright his sparkling hair;

"Tis hard to believe how malice can live
In the breast of aught so fair.

And light and fair are the fields of air,
Where he wanders to and fro;

Still doom'd to fleet from the regions of heat
To the realms of endless snow,

'When high over head fall the streamers * red, He views the blessed afar;

And in stern despair darts through the air
To earth like a falling star.

With his shadowy crew, in weeds so blue,
That Knight for aye must run,
Except thou succeed in a perilous deed,
Unseen by the holy sun.

*Northern lights.